#someday i’ll be able to express how comforting this show is

[ha1cyon-daze]

i’m so glad that i managed to catch up with horizons-

i cried when dot caught tinktatink ;u;

[archiveikemen]

『 Secret In Your Heart 』 Collection Event

Liam Evans

This is a fan-made translation solely for entertainment purposes with no guaranteed perfection. I do not own any of the original content. Please support CYBIRD by buying their stories and playing their games. Reblogs appreciated.

❥･• Warnings and FAQ

The gentle sunlight fell on my eyelids, that was how I knew that morning had come.

(Mm…)

Liam: You’re up? Good morning, Kate.

Kate: Good morning, Liam.

Liam: I’m so happy that I’m the first person whose image is reflected in your eyes today too.

Liam cuddled me and nuzzled his nose against me like a cat seeking affection.

It made me happy that he grew more comfortable with showing these gestures that showed the amount of trust in me, ever since we became lovers.

Kate: Fufufu, it tickles.

(... Ahh, I’m so happy.)

Liam would always stay by my side, even though he wasn't a good sleeper.

I hoped that he’d be able to sleep better someday, but right now, simply being close to each other felt precious.

(Hm?)

Kate: Liam. Did you go somewhere while I was asleep?

Liam: Uh, why do you ask?

Kate: There’s a leaf in your hair. Here.

Liam: Um… perhaps I got it there from last night?

Kate: Last night?

Liam: Thanks for getting it out of my hair! Alright, let’s go have our breakfast. I’ll make it.

…

(He was definitely evading the question just now, wasn't he?)

Throughout the day, I couldn't forget the unnatural facial expression Liam had in the morning.

While I wondered if I should go see him, I accidentally missed a step while going down the stairs—

Liam: Kate! Phew, just in time.

Kate: … Liam.

Kate: Sorry, my mind was preoccupied by something.

Liam: …

Liam: I shouldn't have kept secrets from you if it’d make you look like this.

Liam: I’ll tell you everything I did while you were asleep.

…

Liam carried me in his arms and sprinted as fast as the wind across the roofs of buildings.

Liam: Okaay, we’re here. I’ll put you down now, Kate.

He gently put me down onto the ground, and I turned around to see—

(Wow…!)

Liam: I heard this street is the only one that's lit up at night.

Liam: And that’s not all. There’s also a new sweets shop opening soon across the street.

Liam: And there's something you'll like over there near the river—

Something similar to the leaf I found in Liam’s hair earlier that day fell at my feet.

(Could these be…)

When I looked at him in surprise, Liam chuckled awkwardly.

Liam: Whenever I watch your sleeping face on nights I can’t fall asleep, I’m always thinking about how I can make you smile even more the next day because I love you.

Kate: Is that why you’ve been heading out to look for various things?

Liam: … Mm. I intended to keep them a secret from you, so I snuck out.

Liam: Ahh, I wanted to find you a present and surprise you, but I failed miserably…

Liam: I really can’t do anything right…

Kate: I don't think so. You’ve made me very, very happy. Thank you so much, Liam.

Liam: Kate…

Kate: And besides, what makes me the happiest I can ever be is already right here before my eyes.

Liam: Before your eyes?

Kate: That’s you, Liam.

Kate: It makes me smile knowing that you’re here by my side.

Liam: …

Liam: … Ahh, goodness.

Liam: … I’m seriously no match for you.

Liam hugged me so tightly that it almost felt painful, and rested his chin on my head.

His gesture was a mixture of joy and embarrassment, I couldn't help but smile lovingly at it.

Kate: Please don’t leave my side next time, okay? We can go looking for nice things together when I wake up.

Liam: Am I allowed to interpret that as an ‘OK’ from you to remain next to you while you’re asleep?

Kate: … OK.

Liam: … You’re so cute.

Liam: Mm, got it. I’ll do my best to fulfil that request.

Liam: I might have to break that promise just for tonight, though.

Kate: Huh?

Liam: Because I don't intend to let you get any sleep tonight.

[kiyosamu]

how the hq boys sleep:

———✨———

rintarou suna

———✨———

more often than not, you and suna find yourselves dozing off together on the couch.

it’s not that you don’t want to go to bed, but you just have so much fun together. even as you get older, the two of you cherish the time you have with each other. like you were teenagers all over again. the movie you wanted to watch is over? he’ll put on another one. uncomfortable on the couch? good thing he’s huge and you can use him as your personal pillow.

he tends to fall asleep first. you’ll ask him if he wants to go to bed. you can tell from his heavy lidded eyes and soft spoken tone that he’s exhausted. he always insists he wants to stay up. “just one more episode” of the show neither of you were really paying attention to.

you always agree, because really, who are you to say no to him? it’s not like you don’t want to be there. laying in his arms is your favourite place in the world.

you’ll ask him a question about the show you’d mindlessly started to pay a shred of attention to, noticing his grip on you had loosened just a little bit. you look up at him when he doesn’t respond, realizing he’d fallen into a deep sleep only a few minutes after he swore he “wasn’t even tired.”

you lean up, cupping the soft skin of his cheek in your palm. he leans into your hand and sighs as he rests peacefully.

you slowly get off of him, the sudden lack of warmth of your bodies causing you both a bit of discomfort. suna wakes up and his eyes search for you immediately, but his expression turns into the sweet smile you love so much once he sees you folding the blanket that was draped over the two of you.

“come on, rin” you said as you turned off the tv. “let’s go to bed.”

“i’m not even tired” he half-heartedly protested as he sat up, running his fingers through his hair. you couldn’t help but let out a small laugh as you took his hand and led him to your shared bedroom.

“sorry, i must have imagined you being fast asleep on the couch out there.” you teased.

“definitely. we both know your imagination is something else. should pay better attention, babe. i was ready for another movie.” he joked, pulling the blankets up and holding his arms out for you so you could both get comfortable.

suna hadn’t ever told you this, but the real reason he didn’t like sleeping in the bedroom much was because he just... couldn’t.

he loved the feeling of your body against his. he loved seeing your beautiful, peaceful face that showed him how much you trusted him. how safe you felt with him.

it was easy for him to fall asleep in the living room. the noise from the tv made it effortless for him to mindlessly drift away into a decent restful state.

the bedroom was different. it’s not that he didn’t like it - he did, he loved being in bed with you. it’s just that the quiet, dark room left him feeling... alone. the deafening silence and only his thoughts to keep himself occupied was way too much for him to be able to sleep.

sometimes he’d let you fall asleep, lay there for hours, even, until he knew you were in your deepest sleep. he’d get up, turn the tv on in the living room, and fall back asleep out there.

that was only when it got really bad, though.

most of the time he would put in his airpods and listen to a podcast or some music and scroll on his phone until he felt himself get tired again. he would always fall asleep eventually, but it was a struggle that he had to deal with almost every single night. the one thing you were blissfully unaware of, and he was okay with that.

you woke up to the feeling of suna’s nails softly scratching your scalp. you let out a soft sigh, nuzzling your face closer into his chest.

to your surprise, his fingers continued moving back and forth in your hair. something you loved, but it was also something he’d do when he was anxious and trying to ground himself. his hands were a dead giveaway when he wasn’t feeling quite right, he’d be rubbing his palms against his thighs, playing with his own hair, or, if you were close enough, touching you or rubbing you without even noticing it.

you looked up at him, noticing his face was dimly illuminated by the screen of his phone.

“rin? are you okay?”

“mm?” he looked down, locking his phone and running his hand down your back to rub soft, slow circles into your skin. “go back to sleep, baby. i’m sorry if i woke you up.” he said with a light kiss to your forehead.

you shook your head, putting your hand over his and bringing it to your lips. you kissed his palm and pressed it against your face.

“no, no, i woke up on my own. what’s wrong?”

he softly ran his thumb over your cheek. his eyes met yours, full of complete adoration for you. he’d noticed how attentive you were to him. how easily you could read him. he couldn’t ever hide anything from you, and he’d never want to.

“just feelin’ a bit anxious, can’t sleep...” he mumbled. suna tucked a piece of hair behind your ear, leaning down to kiss you on the lips.

you kissed him back happily, running your hand up his chest and through his hair.

suna pulled you closer to him, continuing his thoughts from before.

“not even anxious about anything in particular... just can’t shut my mind off, you know? and it’s so quiet in here i can’t distract myself.” he stopped himself there, feeling like he’d said too much already. you knew he struggled with anxiety, but he didn’t elaborate much because he never wanted you to worry about him.

you nodded, taking your time giving him a soothing back rub.

“want to put a movie on in here?” you suggested, still quite sleepy. he smiled at how sweet you sounded when you were so tired.

“i don’t wanna disturb you, baby. i’ll be okay. go back to sleep.”

you sat up, leaning over him to get the remote and turned on the tv. you handed it to him and settled back into your spot in his arms, but facing away from him this time.

“it’s fine, rin, i told you.” you mumbled, “i can sleep through anything.” you yawned, scooting back into him. “just want you to be comfy and have a good sleep...”

suna smiled, scooping you up in his arms and pulling you against him. he got comfortable behind you, completely wrapping you up in himself.

“love you so much” he whispered, pressing a kiss to the top of your head. “so sweet to me, so perfect for me...” he continued, smiling to himself when he noticed his voice had already put you back to sleep.

the tv stayed on the lowest volume, just enough to occupy his mind enough for him to finally drift into the sleep that he’d been longing for.

sleeping in the bedroom was never an issue after that night. leaving the television on was just another part of your nightly routine. suna had no problem falling asleep after that.

he became the one to start suggesting to go to bed together. knowing his sleeping problems were resolving, he realized how much more comfortable it really was in bed with you. he craved it. the closeness of your bodies, the way he could whisper sweet things to you and feel you relax in his arms just from his voice and his touch. there was nothing he loved more.

he hoped that someday he’d be able to sleep in silence, but the two of you were happy with this alternative. after all, all the two of you you really wanted was just to spend as much time as you could together.

[seokjins-luigi]

just say goodnight n go | prologue

pairing ↠ jin x reader, fuckboy!jungkook x reader

genre ↠ college au | love triangle | strangers to lovers | slow burn | fluff, angst, smut | multi-chapter

word count ↠ 4.7k

18+ | warnings ↠ mentions of death, a little bit of jealousy, swearing, no sex in this part, but I'll keep the 18+, because there will be soon.

summary ↠ when your mother passes away, you go back to your college student life, only to find out the guy you liked (and were friends with benefits with) had a girlfriend now. trying to get over him and your mother’s passing, seokjin, the friend of a friend wants you to give him a chance. will you find your way back to yourself?

A/N  ↠ hi, y’all. this is the first time I’m writing, English isn’t my first language, my boyfriend hates fanfiction (so I had to write when he wasn’t around)... anyway, I had 1000 reasons not to right this. but I just needed to let it flow. this is it. it may be shitty, but I like it lol so I hope you enjoy it too.

so here’s a playlist for you to listen while you read :) feedback is always appreciated, my inbox is always open

You've been through the hardest week of your life. It was the type of week we all know it’s gonna come, eventually, but in your case, it came just too soon. You look at your reflection in the mirror close to the door and what you see is the sight of a broken person. Dark circles under your tired eyes show a worn out expression, the reflexes of the events happening in your life for the past eight months.

Yesterday, you buried your mother. Alone, except for the presence of your best friend, Jimin. You understood the absence of your other friends, after all, you used to live in a city that wasn’t exactly close to where you study. But your brother Namjoon’s absence, though, was a little harder to understand. You were the one who dealt with all the difficult things regarding your mother’s health, since you got that goddamn call from the hospital. And now you had to deal with the post mortem paperwork, burial, relative phone calls and everything else, again, all alone. 

He and your mom didn’t have the best of relationships, that’s true. He never wanted to come back home, and you understood that. After your parents’ divorce, she became a darker version of herself. She used to lash out on Joonie when things didn't go her way. And you understood his bitter feelings towards her. It has been like that since your father left. But not with you, though, she always treated you differently. She was kind to you, in her own manner. You never really knew why. Loving her was hard at times, but she was your mother. The one who stayed, unlike your father. The one who cried and laughed with you. The one who cooked you dinner. The one who drove you to the train station when you moved. Looking back, she has always been there. 

She always took care of everything and, honestly, looking at yourself now reminds you of her. Since Jimin got your text with the heartbreaking news, he has been by your side. He didn't even ask if you wanted him to come, he just came to be there with you. That’s the thing about Jimin, he’s always so tender and attentive. He’s always there. You hope someday you'll be able to repay everything he does for you.

Right now, standing in your mother’s empty apartment, you feel as empty as the room. This is the place you lived since you were little. You can not describe the feeling in words, it's overwhelming. You feel empty. You don't know what to do and how to react to things, what to say to people or how to respond to the hundreds of texts you gotten since yesterday. You feel the touch of a warm hand on your right shoulder and turn around to face Jimin.

“Sweetums… Shall we?”, he asks with a soft voice, a comforting expression in his eyes.

“Sure, let's go”, you say as you take one last look in the empty room where you grew up. 

“Go ahead and wait for me in the car, I’ll handle the last details with the realtor, don't worry”, he says as you two turn to leave the apartment and hands you his car keys.

“Don't worry, Chim, I got-”, not really allowing you to finish the sentence, he grabs your hand and places the car keys on its palm. Defeated, you smile weakly at your friend and head to his car.

Sitting on the passenger’s seat, you start thinking about your life from now on. Nothing would ever be the same again. You had an absent father, who never cared if you and your brother were sick, well, dead or alive. Your only family now was Namjoon. Namjoon and Namjoon alone meant home to you, now. 

At some point, Jimin opened the car door and gave you a reassuring smile. You were too lost in your own thoughts to notice he was ready to leave. He got in the car and turned the car keys. Now you were going back to the life you left behind to take care of your mom, eight months ago. College, your friends, Jungkook.

But how? Your mind wandered as the car ride made you fall asleep. Something you haven't been able to do properly for a couple of days.

You feel your shoulders being softly shaken. Squeezing your eyes open, you find Jimin alongside Namjoon babbling something to you. You still don’t really understand what they say, but you flash their way a delicate smile as you take your back off the passenger’s seat. You didn’t really notice, but you must have slept through the whole journey back.

Before you could say anything, you feel your brother’s arms around you, holding you tightly. You didn’t do much, just allowed him to hold you. 

“Y/n, I’m so sorry. I couldn’t…”, he whispers that in your ears, his voice is so low, you can barely listen.

You don’t really know how to respond to that. Yes, you were hurt, you were aching, but the pain in his voice showed a vulnerability he didn’t show to anyone else, except you. You know how he felt about your mom, how he resented her. How their relationship was complicated. It was his weight to carry now, you had your own, but the two of you could help each other every now and then. You had to. 

You managed to wrap your arms around him, in a way to show him you were listening and that you were there for him, as always. You would always be there for him. The two of you had much to talk about, but today you just wanted to comfort him and to be comforted by him.

“Joonie, I’d love to stay here, but my butt is numb. I’ve been sitting in the same position for two hours”.

He chuckles as he lets you go of his hug. You get out of Jimin’s car and stretch, still feeling the numbness in your butt. You look at your surroundings and recognize Eunjoo’s condo. You didn’t realize how much you missed being back until this point. Being back at your best friend’s place, with your other best friend and your brother, it was almost like things were normal after the eight months you went away and after every shit you have been through.

You had decided to stay at Eunjoo’s until classes returned, which she was more than happy to hear from you. She had moved in with her boyfriend Yoongi after you went away. He was a very nice dude, a little reclusive, but nice. You’d be crashing on their couch for some days, but it was ok, because 1- you missed your bf and 2- the two of you had been 8 months apart, you had sooo much to catch up with (and no phone calls could replace being physically together, let’s be honest).

In the meantime, while waiting for the beginning of the term in college, you and Namjoon were probably going to start looking for a place to rent for the two of you. Back in your hometown, you were able to arrange things and the paperwork (with Jimin’s help, thank God) and rented your mother’s apartment. It was a good apartment, so you wouldn’t be in financial trouble. And luckily, in order to keep you and Joonie away, your father had agreed to keep on paying your child’s support. Yeah, he’s an asshole, fuck him. What’s really important here is that you and Namjoon would be able to get by until your graduation.

The boys helped you with your luggage up to Eunjoo’s place. Both of them wanted to stay with you there, but you were more than quick to send them back to their frat house, promising you all would get together later on. You not only wanted, but needed some girl time with her.

As soon as you got to her door, you felt excited. Something you didn’t feel for a long, long time. You knock at her door and, a few moments later, she opens the door with a wide smile on her face. 

“Oh, it’s so good to see you, lovey!”, she pulls you into a tight hug. “How are you? I know it’s a stupid question given the circunstances, but…”

“Yeah, I’m…”, you look at her and her expression shows that you don’t need to worry about finishing that sentence. She understands, as she always has. 

“You know what? Come on in, I’ll make you a cup of hot chocolate and we’ll watch 10 Things I Hate About You or whatever else you’d like to. I told Yoongi to go to Hoseok’s house so we could be alone today”.

And that’s exactly what the two of you do. You and your best friend spend the rest of the morning and afternoon on her couch, betweens sips of her famous hot chocolate, sobs and chuckles. 

As you got out of the shower, you hear your phone buzzing against Eunjoo’s sink. You dry your hands in the towel that wrapped your body and look at its screen.

[5:43 pm]  joonie: y/n

[5:43 pm]  joonie: what do you think of a little gathering here at the house?

[5:43 pm]  joonie: the guys want to see you

[5:43 pm] You: hmmm

[5:43 pm] You: ok, i guess 

[5:43 pm] joonie: it’s ok if you dont feel like it 

[5:44 pm] You: no, its ok

[5:44 pm] You: i think it will make me feel better being with friends 

[5:44 pm] joonie: i think so too

[5:44 pm] joonie: ok, then, see you in a few 

[5:44 pm] You: 💛

A part of you wanted to feel guilty for not staying home, feeling the sadness and the numbness your mom’s absence left behind. But the other part of you wanted to see friendly faces and be comforted by them. You decide to ignore the shitty part of yourself and start getting dressed to go to the boys’ frat house. You go through your luggage to find something other than the sweatshirt and the yoga pants you spent the day with. You decide to go for something simple, a shirt, a pair of jeans and your signature black converse.  

You open the door of Eunjoo’s room (where you kept your luggage, at first, but when Yoongi returned, you’d have to keep your stuff at the living room, alongside the couch where you’d be sleeping on), bumping into her in the corridor. Your shoulder hurts, but she seems not to worry about that. You find her with an already worried expression, looking at her phone as she fidgeted her fingers. She gives you a smile, probably trying to convince herself (more than to convince you) that she looked just fine. 

“Joo, Joonie just texted me-”

“Yeah, I know, I was talking to him too. What do you think?”, she stops for a second after looking at you. “Well, I think you’re even ready, right? I’ll hit the shower and we can go, then.” 

But she’s still standing in front of you, still fidgeting her fingers, looking at you with the same weird expression. Something’s off.

“What, woman?”, you ask her with an unsure voice.

“I didn’t want to do this now, but I’ll have to…”

“What is it, Joo? Something happened?”, you start to worry about her. “OH MY GOD! ARE YOU PREGNANT?”

“What? No… I-I need to tell you something”.

“You’re making me nervous, Eunjoo… What happened?”

“Ok, let’s do this... You’ve been away for eight months, right?”

“Yes?”, you look at her still trying to understand where she's coming from.

“While you were away, things… Well, they changed a little around here”, she says that as she makes exaggerated hand gestures. “There’s no easy way to say it, lovey, so I’m just gonna cut to the chase, ok?”.

“Ok...”, you respond, realizing she expects your feedback.

“JUNGKOOK HAS A GIRLFRIEND”, she screams, while looking at the ceiling.

Her words hit you like a bullet. You just stand there dumbfounded, as Eunjoo looks at you with an anxious expression.

“Oh”, and that is all you manage to say.

“Just ‘oh’?”

Your heart was pounding out of your chest. You were still trying to make sense out of Eunjoo’s words. 

“What do you want me to say? We were never boyfriend and girlfriend, he can do whatever he wants” you say it and chuckle nervously, letting her words sink in. “Since when?”

“I think they’ve been together for 2 months, I’m not sure”.

“Why the fuck didn't you tell me this before? We text each other every day! Didn’t it occur to you that this is something I’d like to know beforehand?” 

“Y/n, you had enough on your plate already, I didn't want to make things worse for you”.

“There’s nothing on his Instagram, I checked it yesterday! What the fuck?!”

“I know, lovey… It fucking sucks. He sucks”.

“My life fucking sucks!”

“Don’t say that, lovey, things will get better. Fuck Jungkook!”

“Well, fuck me”.

Of fucking course you felt like shit. It was sucker punch kind of news. You and Jungkook had been friends with benefits in secret since your first year in college. He was a freshman at the same time as you were and you two instantly connected, both of you were into arts, especially cinema. You two spent a lot of time together, you took the same classes, studied together, hated the same professors and classmates. He loved photography and wanted to be a director. You also wanted to be a director, but he made you see the magic in being assistant director and you loved working on his projects. One thing leading to another, you two started hooking up, but no strings attached. 

Honestly, he was way out of your league, you were lucky he even looked at you. He was actually a dream. Super sweet, funny and to make matters worse, he was hot as hell. To make matters worse big time, he was a gym rat, so his body was chef’s kiss. And also he’s such a fucking talented singer. Like, he can really sing. It’s hard not to fall for him… Wait, did you say fall? Sorry, you mean, it’s hard not to be amazed by him. 

He was also a member of the fraternity Namjoon and Jimin belonged. Hence, he was friends with your friends and with your brother. That seemed to be the reason he was “scared of taking your relationship to the next level”, so you settled for just being secret friends with benefits. Of course, Eunjoo knew everything about it. She liked Jungkook, but she often said she didn't think settling for this “friends with benefits” shit was such a good idea. 

You two were “together” for a little more than a year, funny thing that in eight months he managed to find someone else and got himself into a relationship. Even funnier, it all happened behind your back, while you were out of town taking care of your sick mother. While you were away, he didn’t even text you. Occasionally, he sent you a funny meme or some shit. But he never texted you for real, like, to check how you were doing  and it was all you needed, really. You just wanted to know he cared. Now you know he didn’t and it hurted like hell. Losing your mother and then losing whatever the shit you had with Jungkook, to whom you were clearly attached to, was a nightmare.

Eunjoo is still looking at you, waiting for you to say something. You unintentionally frown and she notices, softly pulling you into a hug. In your best friends’ arms, you allow yourself to cry for, maybe, the hundredth time today. For a new reason, though. You try to say something, but you just babble unintelligible stuff.

“Don’t worry, lovey, I’m here for you”, she says as she caresses your hair softly. “Do you want to cancel the plans with the boys? I can call them and say I got period cramps or something”.

“N-No”, you manage to say as you sob. “I don’t even want to think about him today.”

“He’ll probably be there, y’know?”

“I’ll ignore him, whatever. If we stay home, the night will end up in tears and that’s not what I want”.

“Hey, sweetums!”, a smiling Jimin welcomes you and Eunjoo in the boys’ frat house with his usual amazing manners, even though the three of you were intimate friends.

And well, this was your brother’s house too, so you were used to being there all the time. 

Taehyung, another member of the fraternity was also home and seeing him was a breath of fresh air. He was always a nice person to be around, he’s always sweet and spirited. He was also an art hoe and you used to talk about it a lot whenever you got together (not very often, he was always on a date with someone, somewhere, the guy was cute af). 

Namjoon was also home and he was super worried about you, asking how you were feeling every 2 minutes. At first, you thought the “older brother mode” was cute, but now it started annoying the shit out of you. Maybe you were just taking your frustration out on your brother, because you know that any moment Jeon Jungkook is gonna come through the door and you’d have to see his stupid face. His beautiful stupid face. He’d probably bring his girlfriend along. And you weren't officially allowed to be mad or hurt, not in front of Namjoon and your friends, at least.

At least an hour had gone by and you hadn’t really noticed, too involved in this moment with your friends. Sharing laughs, jokes and rolling your eyes at your brother from time to time. At some point, the door swings open and through it walks in Yoongi, with his usual resting bitch face; a smiling Hoseok, aka Hobi, you were not really sure why the guys call him like that, but you do too. Hobi was also a member, but he moved out of the frat house, you were also not sure why.

Right after him, there was Jungkook (looking divine, as fucking always) and some other guy you didn't know. Your heart skips a beat and as soon as your gaze locks with Jungkook’s, a bittersweet feeling bursts into your stomach. 

His eyes were different. He knew he screwed up big time. Was he looking at you with… pity in his eyes? Or was it guilt? Is he fucking serious right now? Either way, screw that, you didn’t need that shit. You might be devastated right now, but you’d rather get hit by a fucking truck than letting him know that. You’ve spent too many years of your life working on your strong self for a guy to mess with you like this.

“Hello, sunshine!” Hobi greets you with open arms, inviting you into a hug, taking your attention away from Jungkook.

“Heeeey! I’ve missed you, Hobi”, you say as you wrap your arms around him. He gives a tight hug and it feels nice being in the arms of the people you love, the family you kinda chose for yourself.

“And how are you feeling?”, he asks, as he looks you in the eye. “Forget it, it’s a stupid question”, he states and laughs at himself.

“Yeah, honestly, I feel like shit”, you say that as you look unwittingly at your feet.

“We’re here for you”, he lifts your chin up with a delicate touch of his index finger and he says looking you in the eyes. “You have your brother. You have Eunjoo. You have us. You’re not alone, ok?”

You know that if you try to answer him, you’re gonna end up crying in front of everyone, so you just flash him your right thumb, smiling softly and he pats your head affectionately, smiling back at you. That’s the thing about Hobi, he called you “sunshine”, but actually, that’s exactly what he was. Whenever he walks into a room, he’s able to lighten up anyone’s mood. 

Right behind him, you see a very awkward Yoongi getting closer to you and then giving you a very uncomfortable hug, as you hear him say: “I’m sorry for what happened”. After that, he looks at Eunjoo and she smiles at him, like this was some type of rehearsed scenario (and you don't think it's unlikely to be just the case). 

After Yoongi, you know you can’t escape facing Jungkook. He comes over to you and you freeze. You couldn't believe how hot he looked with a fucking white oversized shirt and a pair of ripped jeans. Unfortunately, seeing him just made pretty clear to you how deep you were into your complicated past. The butterflies flying all over your stomach were there for a reason, that's for sure. Honestly, you could throw yourself at him then and there and you’d let him manhandle you as much as he wanted. 

But instead of that, you just stood in their living room and allowed him to wrap his arms around you in a friendly hug. My, my how you've missed his perfume. And his touch.

“Hey, beautiful. I’m sorry for your loss”, he whispers only for you to hear, lips close to your ear. You shiver faintly. He pulls away from the hug and holds both of your hands in his, looking you in the eyes. “How are you?”

“Well… as I told Hobi, I feel like shit” you let out a nervous chuckle, more related to you and him than to what happened to your mom. That's the effect this bastard had on you.

“I can only imagine… Again, I’m really sorry” he squeezes your hands in a reassuring way.

“Thanks, Jungkook. And how are you? Why didn't you bring your girlfriend? I’d love to meet her sometime”, you say that before you can give two thoughts about this sentence. 

You regret saying this the moment the words leave your mouth. Cool, now he knows you’re jealous. Eunjoo, who was sitting on the sofa right behind Jungkook, just widened her eyes and looked at you with a desperate expression, almost begging you to shut up. You just needed to throw a jab at him to get it out of your system. Jungkook looks at you with an awkward smile, barely looking at your eyes now.

“Oh, yeah… I-I’m good. Sure, yeah, I’m sure Seulki would love to meet you as well”, he pulls one of his hands away from yours and rubs his neck.

Seulki. You hated how he pronounced her name. 

“Why didn't you bring her today, man?” Namjoon asks his friend, completely unaware of the tension between the two of you.

“She was busy today, hyung. With her friends. Girl's night out and stuff”. 

“Maybe next time, right?”, you smile at Jungkook with the most plastic way you could. You know he knows you’re pissed (and hurt). And you’re... Still holding his hand. Honestly, why the fuck were you holding his hand? 

You pull your hand away from his hold in a soft movement as you turn to grab your wine glass on the coffee table, if there was anyone looking at you, they wouldn’t notice the tension. 

That’s when you notice there's a guy sitting right next to Yoongi, focusing on something he was showing him on his phone. Yes, the guy that walked in with the boys, you’d forgotten about him. You didn't notice it before, but his hair was fully bleached. Which is ironic, since bleached haired people are hard to ignore. Against all odds, he looked really good with this hairstyle. He was actually quite handsome, even more than Jungkook, whom you just left there standing, as you turned around focusing on your glass of wine and now, on this guy.

“Y/n, Yoongi has absolutely zero manners and didn't introduce you two”, Eunjoo says, as she stands up and gets closer to you. “This is Kim Seokjin, Yoongi’s former roommate”.

“Hi, Y/n, sorry to be an intruder here today, but Yoongi didn't want to leave me alone… been through some shit as well. Anyway, it’s nice to finally meet you, Eunjoo talks so much about you I feel like I know you already”, he also gets on his feet and puts a hand on one of your shoulders, tapping it lightly. “I’m sorry for your loss”.

He’s nice. His touch feels nice.

“Thanks”, it must be the tenth time you’ve had to say this to someone tonight, you wish people would just stop bringing it up all the time. You just flash him a faint smile. “I hope you’ve heard good things… I’ve heard a lot about you as well, Yoongi’s best friend, right? Also, bold hairstyle, I like it”.

You just needed to change the subject. About Seokjin’s hair, well… You really meant it.

“Oh”, he looks surprised to hear that and he lets out a loud chuckle, sounding more like a windshield wiper than a human being. You end up smiling as well. “Really? Do you like it? You are the only person, so far... When my mom saw it, she almost fainted”.

Cute, did he show his hairstyle to his mom?

“I liked it too”, said Yoongi as he shrugged.

“Yeah? But she told me first and she just met me, which makes you an ass”.

Yoongi just raises his eyebrows and looks at Seokjin with his resting bitch face as his friend laughs again with his kinda cute, kinda obnoxious loud laugh.

And that's pretty much how your evening goes, actually, with your friends helping you carry the weight of the loss of your mother, by simply being there with and for you. You haven't felt this relaxed in months. With them, right then and there, you could be and have fun again. Be the old Y/n. It was refreshing, even in the situation you found yourself in. 

As always, Hobi lightens up the mood of the room, but you couldn't help but notice how fun Seokjin is as well. Which is funny, because he was the complete opposite of Yoongi. They say opposites attract, don’t they? It must be true. You and Eunjoo weren’t really opposites, though, neither were you and Jimin… Maybe this rule doesn't apply to you.

Your normal self would kill Eunjoo for introducing you and Seokjin only at this point of your friendship. He was amusing and really good looking. But you do remember her mentioning he had a girlfriend back then. Was he single now? It's none of your business, anyway. You weren't ready for that right now.

And there’s Jungkook. 

You can't help but notice he seems a little off today. He’s way too quiet and you are sure you can feel his gaze burning the back of your neck every time you’re not looking. And even when you two locked your eyes, he’d stare. Well, fuck him and his puppet eyes. He had no right to look at you like this. 

“Earth to Y/n!” Namjoon shouts at you and waves his hand in front of your eyes. “Since I know you zoned out, I won't even ask if you heard me… Can you please go get the last wine bottle in the fridge? Your turn now”.

“Last one already? Ugh!”, you say rolling your eyes.

“Do you want to drink some more? We can go out and buy more wine, right, hyung? There’s always a convenience store somewhere”, Jimin asks as he grabs your hand, to direct your attention to him. Bless his heart, this man is always so sweet.

“No, honey, I’m ok”, you take a look at the bottles piled up by the coffee table and laugh, squeezing his hand affectionately. “Also… It’s been eight bottles already, I’m good. I’ll go get the last one”.

As soon as you get on your feet, you realize the amount of alcohol present in your veins was a little higher than you thought. You feel woozy and your feet feel heavy, so you make your way to the boys’ kitchen stumbling a bit. As much as you know this house like you lived here, you took your while to cross the kitchen door. You grab the fridge door handle and suddenly a hand is placed on top of yours. A tattooed hand you know very well.

Ch 01 ⋙

[bts-trans]

210302 J-Hope’s Blog Post

3월 2일입니다. Hope World라는 믹스테잎이 나온 지 3년이 되는 날이기두 하구요.

그때 그 시절은 마냥 제 음악들을 들려드리고 싶은 급한 마음에 몸이 이끌리고, 제 창작이 이끌리는 대로 막무가내로 써 내려갔던 그런 기억이 있는데요.

그래서 그런지 다시 들어보면 민망하기도 하고 부끄럽기도 한 거 같아요. ㅎㅎ 그러면서 저 시절만의 용기와 마음가짐이 이 Hope World라는 믹스테잎을 만들어 낸 거 같기도 하구요.

근데 가끔 그 시절이 그립기도 합니다. 철없이 이끌리는 대로 써 내려갔던 순수했던 한 소년의 음악 일지.

Blue Side를 완성시켜야겠다는 생각의 시작은 저 감정이 시초인 거 같아요. 사람은 누구나 옛날의 것에 한 번쯤은 감정이입이 되고 이어서 향수병이 나타기 마련이라고 생각하는데 요즘 딱 그 시점인 거 같더라구요.

작업을 하면서 순수했던 그 시절, 백지상태의 나를 이끌리는 대로 그려서 채워보는 어린 시절의 나.

돌아갈 수는 없지만 한 번쯤은 그 품에 안겨 지금의 나를 위로하고 뜨겁게 달아오른 나를 차분하고 냉정하게 식혀주는 다방면의 파란 안식처가 필요했던 거죠.

시간이 지나면서 '왜 곡을 다 쓰지 못했을까?'라는 물음의 답도 점점 정리가 되더라구요. 음악적으로 제가 담아낼 수 있었던 부분에 과분한 주제였던 거 같고 그렇지만 '언젠가는 내 스스로가 느끼고 알겠지?'라는 운명적인 의식을 가졌던 거 같아요.

비록 아직은 한 곡에 불과하지만 음악적으로 조금은 성숙해지고 있다는 모습을 보여드리고 싶었고 나아가 앞으로도 계속 도전하고 발전하며 성장한 모습으로 찾아뵙겠다는 당찬 마음도 담아 발표한 곡입니다.

예쁘게 들어주시고 편안하게 즐겨주세요.

It’s March 2nd. It’s also been three years since the mixtape Hope World came out. 

Back then, my hurried heart that wanted to just let people hear my music was what guided my body, and I remember writing my creations stubbornly, however they led me to. 

I wonder if that’s why when I listen back, I feel a little ashamed and embarrassed. Haha  Still, I think it was because of a courage and heart unique to that time that this mixtape Hope World was created. 

But sometimes I miss those times too.  Maybe because it was the music of an innocent young boy, written childishly and simply the way he felt led to. 

I think the root of those feelings was what started me thinking that I needed to finish Blue Side.  Everyone always ends up with a rush of feelings for the past once in a while and feeling a sense of nostalgia is only natural; I think that’s exactly how I’ve been viewing things these days.

Those times where I would innocently work on music, that young me who tried filling up his blank canvas simply however he felt led to. 

Even though I can’t go back, I thought I needed to rest in that embrace and comfort the me of today,  to take this me that feels a heat rising, and cool him down calmly and coldly with a place of refuge that’s multi-faceted and blue.  

As time passes, I think I’ve also slowly sorted out the answer to the question of why I wasn’t able to finish this song. I think it was a subject that was greater than I could express musically and  I was holding on to this sense of destiny that thought ‘Someday I’ll be able to feel it and figure it out on my own, won’t I?’

Even though it’s still just one song, I wanted to show how I’ve matured a little musically and  with a strong heart that is determined to return in the future having taken on even more challenges and grown even more, I present to you this song. 

I hope you’ll enjoy listening to it  and find it soothing. 

Trans cr; Faith @ bts-trans © TAKE OUT WITH FULL CREDITS

[koushou]

hi!! could u do a oneshot for fem!mechanic!reader x childe, zhongli & albedo separately? if u only do one character per request, then i'd prefer childe - also i get the term 'mechanic' is kinda vague so i guess a reader who invents and repairs things could be another way to word it

pairings : childe, zhongli, albedo x f!mechanic!reader (separate)

{fluff, lots of crack}

warnings : none ! 

wc : 1.3k

a/n : i'm so so sorry this took so long TT it’s been a bit busy recently, anw thank you for requesting!! (the reader here is less of a mechanic, she just invents stuff; i hope u like them!)

 “Ouch!” 

Childe yelps as he steps on the hundredth nail that day in your shared home in Liyue, hopping on one foot in pain as you sheepishly send him an apologetic smile.

“Oops! Looks like I missed one.”

“Baby, you’re killing me - literally.”

You hum, happily returning back to whatever strange invention you had come up with that day, as Childe heaves a sigh and retreats away from the danger zone, aka anywhere within a 5-feet radius around you.

He grimaces, inspecting the minor outline the nail had made on the bottom of his right foot, before your voice rings through the air.

“Childe, come here!”

A few crashes and bangs sound from the other room you occupied, followed by a string of curses.

Yup, you really were going to kill him someday.

He makes his way cautiously to where you were, and he was surprised to see you holding a metal bow-shaped gadget with little parts attached on the sides.

“You mentioned wanting to improve on your archery skills, so this, my newest invention - you should be honored, by the way - is made just for you!”

You smile triumphantly at him, beginning to explain the functions of the gadget, the little parts that can assist him in working on his aim, how you could adjust the grip on the bow to make it more comfortable, and -

Childe couldn’t help the grin spreading across his face, he thought you looked the most beautiful when you talked about your passions and interests. Plus, you took your time and made it just for him?

He engulfs you in a hug, breaking you out of your rant, leaving you confused.

“I love you so much. Thank you for this, honey,” Childe suddenly proclaims.

You giggle, about to say it back when one of the small parts on the metal gadget in your hand falls off, landing right on your boyfriend’s foot.

“Ow--!” He limps with his unwounded foot before tripping again on the same nail he had stepped on earlier.

“Childe!” You rush over to him, bending down to offer him a hand before stepping on the nail yourself and falling right on top of him - also accidentally stepping on his wounded foot along the way.

Ignoring your half-dead boyfriend now on the verge of tears on the ground, you gasp at the sight of the nail.

“Oh, that must be the nail I was missing - that’s why the part fell off!”

Childe sighs again.

In Mondstadt, you two were known as the smartest couple. 

With Albedo as the Chief Alchemist of the Knights of Favonius, it was only natural he had a deep understanding in alchemy already. Paired with your unique skill in being able to repair and invent almost anything, experiments with you two were a daily routine.

“Darling, do you mind passing me the warming gadget you made earlier? I’m heading out to gather some ingredients for my next experiment.”

“Of course! Here.”

Being with the most dedicated alchemist of Mondstadt meant traveling quite a lot, especially to Dragonspine.

Of course, Albedo insists you stay home as it could be dangerous, but you argue that you would miss him too much. Plus, you could - quoted from you - “use your inventing abilities to assist him in his experiments.”

It would be a lie if Albedo said your skills haven’t come in handy, especially in situations like these.

“I designed it so that the colder the temperature gets, the more heat this gadget produces! Super helpful, right?”

Albedo chuckles, taking your latest invention from your hands, before smiling at your excited expression.

“Yes, dear. I’m not sure what I’d do without you.”

You giggle, leaning into him, planting a small kiss on his cheek before he sets out on his exploration.

“Ah - just remember to adjust the sensitivity when-“

You gasp suddenly in the middle of your sentence, eyes widening like it always did when you had some brilliant idea for your next creation.

“Wait, dear, what do you mea-“ Albedo starts, but stops as he watches you already busying yourself around the workspace, gathering materials with a wild grin on your face.

He sighs, smiling gently to himself as he decides it was probably nothing important.

-

He regrets not asking.

Albedo shivers, breathing out in relief as he spots the entrance to the camp.

The gadget had suddenly started producing an excessive amount of heat as he was starting to head back, too hot even in Dragonspine.

After the small gadget had become too hot for the touch, it let out a small explosion before letting out a trail of smoke indicating it was no longer usable.

The small explosion had shocked the blonde alchemist, resulting in him falling in a pile of snow.

Albedo steps into the safe confines of the camp, alerting you of his presence.

“Oh - you’re back Alb-” You pause, examining his appearance.

“Why are you covered in snow, dear?” 

He only sighs, as you narrow your eyes at the broken gadget in his hand. 

“Oh no - did you forget to adjust the sensitivity??” You furrow your eyebrows at the now useless tool, taking it from him and examining it carefully. 

“You didn’t tell me-” He starts to explain, before you interrupt him.

“I just made this, Albedo!” You pout at him, setting the broken object on the table, before huffing and walking towards the alchemist.

Grabbing a nearby towel, you start to clean him of the snow he had fallen in earlier, scolding him to be more careful.

“Go sit down, I’ll make you some hot chocolate. You’re gonna get sick.” You huff again, turning around leaving a very confused Albedo still standing.

He then breaks into a laugh, amused by your very unique way of caring for him. 

“I love you a lot, darling, you know?” He suddenly confesses while making his way to a seat.

“W-wha-” You almost dropped the cup in your hand, flustered. 

“Be quiet and drink your hot chocolate--!”

Your giggling could be heard as a confused Zhongli held a small controller in his hands, trying to navigate the robot dog on the floor.

“Zhongli - other way--!” 

“Like this?”

The dog crashed into the wall of your home, leaving Zhongli huffing and putting the controller down.

You couldn’t resist a laugh at your pouting boyfriend. “Aww, Zhongli, here I’ll show you!”

You take the controller and explain the buttons and how to move the dog properly, while he watches with a serious expression.

“Here, you try.”

Zhongli furrows his eyebrows, carefully moving the buttons as you instructed. When the dog finally moves in a direction that isn’t crashing into something, you could’ve sworn you saw Zhongli’s eyes light up.

You stifled a giggle at his excited expression, almost resisting the urge to ruffle his hair with how adorable he looked for such a seemingly mature man.

Without thinking, you leaned forward to press a kiss against his unknowing lips, to which Zhongli froze almost dropped the controller at the action.

“Ah-uhm,” The geo archon clears his throat, facing you with a raise of his eyebrows. “What was that for, love?”

You shake your head, leaning your head on his shoulder. “Nothing. You’re just too cute with that thing.” 

Zhongli chuckles, pressing a kiss to the top of your head. “Thank you for making this, darling. It is quite amusing to play with.”

A smile breaks across your face, sitting up to face him. “There’s a cool trick this dog can do, want to see?” 

He nods, curious as you take the controller from his hands.

Hiding a mischievous smile on your lips, you press a button on the bottom of the controller that sends the robotic dog jumping into Zhongli’s lap, startling the tall man.

The dog starts to lick Zhongli’s face - with its mechanical tongue - as he sputters and finally gets the dog to stay in place in his arms.

“Love - this is...the trick?” 

You burst out laughing at the still squirming dog in your shocked boyfriend’s arms, raising the controller again.

“There’s another trick too! Wanna s-”

“No.”

[spideyhexx]

take a chance on me - b.b.

here's something I wrote for @buckyblues 4k writing challenge! I've been wanting to get back into writing, so here's my first go at it :)

using the song prompt "take a chance on me by abba." @edenslibrary

be sure to let me know what you think :) reblogs, likes and comments are appreciated 😊

bucky barnes x reader

summary: bucky has a crush on you. he's doubtful of himself, messes up, but turns it around.

WARNINGS: sfw. fluffy. some tiny tiny angst. bucky being self deprecating. huge hate of chekhov. bookstore owner!reader.

word count: 2.3k

Bucky replays his conversation with you a billion times within the couple of minutes it takes for him to walk from the quaint little book shop to his apartment.

After his favorite bookstore closed, Bucky took to finding a new one and stumbled upon the Murky Lime. He thought the name was strange, a little off putting, but as soon as he walked in, Bucky knew he was going to enjoy spending his afternoons there. It always smelled like hazelnut or vanilla, a scent he found so incredibly comforting that he bought a hazelnut scented candle for his home. Although it was a small shop, the shelves were loaded with books and he was able to find a hidden corner to sit down and read for a couple of hours, unbothered.

Not to mention the pretty girl that worked at the main desk and seemed to be the owner. You were there every afternoon that Bucky stopped by. He noticed how you would paint your nails when there weren’t as many customers. How kind your words were to anyone who asked for help. It took him a couple of weeks to work up the courage to ask you to help him find a book, even though he knew exactly where it was.

Bucky remembers when he complimented your bracelet and you smiled, stuttering out a thank you. The first time he saw you nervous. It gave him hope that maybe you were into him, but Bucky pushed away those thoughts as quickly as they came.

He couldn’t fathom how someone would truly want to be with him. Besides, he had enough on his plate, what with helping Sam on whatever mission he called him on and dealing with the occasional nightmare that haunted his mind.

That’s why he keeps on replaying the conversation. And cursing at himself for being so stupid.

…

“Hey Bucky!” Your words were cheerful, causing heat to rise up on his cheeks. You loved how a simple greeting seemed to get him all flustered. He’s still not used to even hearing his name come from your lips.

“How’re you doing, doll?” He lets the endearment slip, hoping he’d get to see you smile, and you do, before turning away and pointing at a box.

“I’m alright! And if you don’t mind, and you can totally say no, but I got a whole new set of Chekhov plays and I need to bring them to the play section, which is the furthest point from here and the box is a bit too heavy and I was going to make multiple trips but now you’re here and-”

“Of course I’ll help,” Bucky responded, chuckling at your babbling. You sighed, secretly hating your rambling habit, but it was hard not to when a handsome man was standing in front of you.

“I thought you hated Chekhov?” Bucky asked, picking up the box and following you to the play section.

“Oh I do, but a customer has been calling in for the last three weeks, asking if we have Chekhov and I thought I should finally put my Chekhov hating ass aside to appease the people who adore him,” you told him.

You couldn’t remember when you told Bucky you hated Chekhov, but you did not necessarily need to say it for someone to understand your distaste for the author.

“Or they could’ve just gone to a different bookstore,” Bucky mumbled, but you heard and let out a laugh. He put the box down and leaned against the opposite book shelf, hoping you would continue talking to him as you put the books away.

“So, I had another question for you,” you said, sneaking one glance at him before looking away.

“Go for it.”

“I was wondering if you wanted to go out sometime? Not sure where but we could just go get some coffee? Or go out to dinner?”

This was it, the penultimate moment Bucky had been dreaming about ever since he laid eyes on you. Yet his mouth began speaking before he could really take it in.

“Um, no,” he said, immediately widening his eyes at your expression. Your mouth dropped to say something, but you weren’t sure what to even say.

“I mean, I don’t know. I don’t think I can, right now, maybe?” You raised an eyebrow at him and smiled softly.

“It’s okay to say no, Bucky.”

“I know that, I know. I think I’m just not ready right now,” he said, his voice quieter as he said the last part. His brain was screaming at him to retract everything he had just said to you and to tell you he would go on a date, but Bucky could not do it. He already felt like he had failed and saw no point in trying.

“That’s okay. But...if you ever change your mind, let me know, I’d still be down,” you said.

You were slightly disappointed, but understood his reasoning even if he didn't give you an exact one.

Ever since he first came to your shop, you knew exactly who the tall, blue eyed man was. It was hard trying to comprehend everything James Bucky Barnes had gone through. You knew asking him out might’ve been a big step from having occasional small talk. A small part of you hoped he would take a chance on you someday.

...

Bucky throws his jacket haphazardly onto the couch as soon as he gets home, not caring that it ends up falling to the floor. He lights the candle on the kitchen counter and collapses onto the couch face first, letting out the sigh that was building up in him ever since he left the Murky Lime.

How could he do that? Was he actually not ready to date? He told himself he wasn’t, that’s why he felt like he had to say no to your date. But god, does Bucky want to go out with you and hold your hand and kiss your cheek. He hasn’t felt this feeling in a long while.

All the therapy sessions with Dr. Raynor flood his mind. The ones where she encouraged him to try dating and finding new friends but he brushed it off, feeling like he was unworthy of it. How could a sweet girl like you see something in him, he simply did not understand it. But you liked him enough to ask him on a date and he fucking said no.

Bucky sends Sam a quick text that’s more like an entire paragraph explaining the situation and what he should do. He throws his phone to the other side of the couch and drops his head into his hands. His phone pings a few seconds later and Bucky scrambles to grab it.

I think you’re just afraid of dating buck. You’re definitely ready, you’ve done so much work to be yourself again and I’ve seen that in you. If you like her AND she mentioned still going out if you changed your mind??? Go get her, man. Take the chance. If it doesn’t work out and you really aren’t ready, then that’s okay too. But it’s clearly eating you up that you said no, so just go to her.

...

You button up your coat and stuff your phone into your pocket, straining your head to the side to double check the time. Closing the store required a particular routine that you perfected, but you did not expect to see Bucky’s face at the front door. He did not notice you looking at him and you see the hesitation in his hands before he opens the door.

“Hey,” he says, shoving his hands into his jacket pockets.

“Hello again.” Bucky gives you a stiff grin and rocks on his feet for a few moments. The silence is deafening and it’s just about too awkward for you to handle.

“Is there uh..something you want?” He glances up and your eyes lock with his pretty blue eyes. You feel like you could gaze into them all day.

“Yeah, if you’re still up for it, I would like to go on that date with you. I’ve been afraid to put myself out there, but you’re so kind and beautiful..” his words trail off and he’s distracted for a moment at how you’re biting your lip nervously.

“I wanted to take a chance, so yes, let’s go on a date.”

“Do you wanna go now?” Bucky raises his brow and nods. You run to the back door to make sure it’s locked. When you come back, you see that Bucky took it upon himself to turn a few of the lights off and he hands you your purse.

“What a gentleman, huh?” He blushes and moves to open the door for you. You lock it up and turn to him.

“Does a walk in the park sound like a good idea?”

“Perfect.”

Since it was almost evening time, the park was not as busy. Bucky prefers it that way, and you do too. He’s so close to you, you can smell the little bit of cologne he must’ve put on. You want to tease him for it but decide not to. Instead, you purposely brush your hand against his own and Bucky immediately takes your hand in his.

“Maybe after this we could get dinner,” Bucky suggests.

“That would be nice. You can pick where.” Bucky thinks for a moment before responding.

“There’s this diner..a couple of blocks from your shop actually. It was there back in….you know.” Now that he’s thinking about it, he wasn’t sure you knew. He doesn’t wear gloves to hide his vibranium arm anymore and it’s an easy google search but you never showed any indication you knew about his past.

“I know about your past, Bucky. I won’t ask anything about it if-”

“No, it’s okay. I can talk about it.”

You nod. You're not planning to scour his brain about the haunting details of his life as the Winter Soldier, but you were curious about his life before that.

“Does it look the same as it did back then? The diner, I mean.”

“For the most part. There’s some newer technology in there and updated furniture but the style is all the same. It’s kind of nice to go somewhere familiar.”

The two of you walk over to an empty bench and take a seat. Your hands are still intertwined, resting on Bucky’s thigh.

“One more question about the 30s and 40s and then we can head on over to the diner,” you say, making Bucky laugh and nod his head at you to continue.

“How were dates back then? Like would you do the same thing we’re doing now or was there anything different?”

“It’s mostly the same,” he tells you. Bucky looks down at your hand, admiring how you rub your thumb against his hand.

“But there were these dances. I haven’t seen anything like them nowadays.”

“I think the closest thing we have to that is nightclubs. I’m gonna assume that is not your scene,” you say, giggling at his disgusted expression.

“It isn’t. I like forties music. I tried to listen to newer stuff and it’s not all terrible, but still not my favorite. I don’t think anyone in a nightclub will play Tommy Dorsey or Dinah Shore.” You ponder that for a moment as he turns to observe what else is going on in the park.

Quickly, you take out your phone.

“What are you doing?” All you do is smile at him, setting your phone down on the bench and standing up in front of him. He raises an eyebrow suspiciously as you hold your hand out.

“Mr. Barnes, can I have this dance?” Bucky takes a look around. There were a few people around who seemed to not take notice of the music coming from your phone.

“Gladly,” he accepted, taking your hand. Bucky placed one hand on your hip and pulled you in closer to him.

“I must admit, I know this was my idea, but I don’t know how to dance,” you whisper to him. Bucky shakes his head, smiling so wide he thought his mouth would start hurting. He slowly moves his feet side to side.

“Just this is fine,” he mutters. He tries not to take his eyes off yours, but you’re so close and Bucky can’t help but look at your lips, slightly parted and letting out deep breaths. He moves your hand rest on his shoulder, both of his own now holding your hips.

You trail your fingers from his shoulder to behind his neck, clasping your hands there.

“Thank you for this,” Bucky says and he hums along to the song playing, ‘Be Careful, It’s My Heart’ by Frank Sinatra. You smile at it, so he keeps humming. Bucky leans his forehead against yours.

“I know it’s not perfect-”

“Doesn’t matter. It’s with you. And this is...it’s nice.” You feel like your heart is going to burst. His eyes keep flitting down to your lips and Bucky leans in.

As his lips ghost against yours, you move your head, so he ends up kissing your cheek. He pulls back, a confused look on his face.

“Save that for the end of the date, honey,” you tease, leaning up to kiss his cheek. You linger your lips against his skin before moving away from him and his scoff turns into a laugh.

“I’m holding you to that,” he says, biting the inside of his cheek.

“I hope you do” you mumble and Bucky pulls you in close to him, making you squeal. He twirls you and brings you back into his arms, his lips touching the top of your ear.

“Let’s go get some dinner now.” You nod and grab your phone, opting to let the music keep playing. Bucky doesn’t hesitate from telling you random music facts about the artists as you make your way to the diner.

And as you ramble on about your own favorite singer, Bucky thanks the heavens that he took a chance on you and that it was going better than he ever imagined.

[eirikaanemo]

Venti falls in love with an Inazuman rebel. The rebel has no vision, but what they do have is a belief that everyone has an inherent right to live freely. How does Venti know about this rebel in the first place? I honestly have no idea...

Visionless Visionary

Venti x GN!Reader

1.8k Words

Warning: Minor character death mentioned, prayer (if that bothers you)

Disclaimer: I knew next to nothing about Baal when I wrote this, so it may not be an accurate representation of her character.

Inazuma is a mess. That is just a fact now. Baal has suddenly become violent and a danger to her people. So many had done nothing but hold a vision she had bestowed upon them in the first place. And because of that, she struck your cousin down. You can still remember the thump of his lifeless body hitting the ground and the steady tap, tap, tap of Baal’s shoes as she walked away.

She seemed completely unaffected by her actions. You were anything but. The scene played over and over in your nightmares for weeks, and continues to haunt you. So when the rebellion reached out to you for support you were happy to assist. You found out he had just joined their ranks and that’s why he had been targeted.

However, you don’t have a vision so there’s only so much you can do. Of course they always welcome financial support and you gave it to the best of your ability. But you knew there had to be more you could do. So you spoke to some people and it was agreed that you would go to Mondstadt and position Barbatos for his support for your cause.

He hadn’t been seen in centuries, but he was the god of freedom, right? If anyone could help them, it would be him. So with the rebellion’s blessing you took your savings and made the long journey to Mondstadt.

Finding lodging was fairly easy. The people of Mondstadt were more than willing to help you. Especially once they found out what you were there to do. ‘Such a great and admirable cause,’ they said. ‘May Barbatos bless you!’ And all you could do was hope he did.

You prayed every morning and every night for help for your people. The heavens seemed quiet, but you didn’t let that dissuade you. Surely your sheer persistence would make a difference, you reasoned. And so you kept on.

One night, rather early on, you ran into a bard not long after your evening prayer. He had been not too far from the statue and you were captivated by the beauty of the song he played. It was ancient Inazuman and for just a moment you were able to forget and be caught up in the memories of better days.

When the song ended you were disappointed and tried not to pout. Judging from the laugh the bard let out when he saw you, it must have still shown on your face. “Did you like the song?” He asks. “I know I didn’t play for long. Would you like to hear another?”

“I would love to,” you admit. He smiles and simply starts on another song, this one also of Inazuma origin. From there he transitions into a more Mondstadtian style, singing The Ballad of Freedom. You know it well, as it’s a favorite of many of the rebels. As the last note fades he turns back to you.

“What brings you here, I wonder. Has it to do with your country being torn asunder?” He inquires.

“Yes,” you reply. “I’ve come to ask Lord Barbatos for his assistance in our cause. We fight for freedom from Baal, who has become nothing but a tyrant. As for me personally, well, she killed my cousin right in front of me. Her only reasons being the vision she bestowed upon him herself not many years ago and his belief that what she was doing was wrong. No one should have to suffer that.”

“Indeed, it seems you have a need. Your cause is just and swords you thrust. But the archons don’t just help everyone, so prove to him you’re worthy of some.”

“But how do I do that?” You question the cryptic bard.

“You’ll see in time, dear friend of mine!” He winks and you find your face warming. “Though I have a question if you don’t mind. Is the assistance you’re seeking a vision like mine?” He taps the glowing turquoise vision sitting on his belt by his hip.

“No,” you shake your head. “After what happened to my cousin, I’m not sure I’d be comfortable with a vision. For me they’ve been nothing but trouble.” He nods in understanding.

“I see how that would be. I must take my leave for now, we’ll see each other later anyhow.” And he’s off into the night.

He’s right that this is far from the last time you see him. And he’s right that you start noticing the tests that Barbatos has set before you. More and more people seek your help in one thing or another, especially since the one they call “honorary knight” left to Liyue. There’s much to do, but you’re happy to help them.

Eventually you stop helping them because it’s a test and start helping them because you want to; because it’s the right thing to do. You help Lisa organize the library. You help Barbara clean the cathedral. You help Amber keep watch. You help Venti with his performances from time to time. You stand in for Diluc’s barkeep while he recovers from an illness.

Days and days have passed and your relationship with Venti grows and grows. You notice more and more things about him that you rather like. His laugh. His eyes. His hands. His music. His sense of humor. His optimism.

Really, everything about him is amazing. You try to deny it at first. But you know deep down that you’re falling in love. And you’re seeing some hints that he might be too. Lots of them, because he’s started flirting with you almost constantly.

However, as your relationship grows, your hope dwindles. It’s been weeks! You’ve helped so many people and have prayed so many times. And yet you have not received an answer. Not even an acknowledgement that he has heard.

When you express your concern and discouragement to Venti, he is very concerned. “I’m just not sure how much longer I can stay,” you explain. “While I would hate to return empty handed, I can’t stay here forever.”

“Try just one more time, for me?” he asked you, looking a little guilty despite not having reason to be. It’s not like he was keeping Barbatos from speaking with you. As if he could sense your hesitance he sweetened the deal. “If you do, I’ll give you a kiss!” He wiggled his eyebrows at you and flashed you a mischievous smile and you felt a warm blush bloom on your face.

“Alright,” you grumble good-naturedly. “I’ll try one more time.” His resulting cheer and more cheery smile were nearly enough to have made you do it by themselves.

That night you approached his statue, feeling unreasonably nervous compared to the nights before. “Lord Barbatos,” you prayed. “I seek thy assistance for my people’s cause. We seek the freedom thou dost represent. Someday may we all be free to live our lives reasonably, but as we please. This is my vision, my hope. Please, if it be thy will, let thy winds be not still. Guide us to better days, for this is what I pray.”

You stay there for a long moment, waiting. Then, the wind picks up and you hear a voice from it. It seems vaguely familiar but you can’t quite figure out why.

“Your diligence and passion for your cause has secured my blessing,” the winds whispered. “My winds will be at your back and support your cause. However, if you accept a vision despite your fears, you will be able to do far more. The wind will whisper secrets to your ears. All plans spoken will be carried to your ears.

“You need not fight with it. Trust in me, that I will not strike you down for accepting this gift. In your time here in my home I have found you to be a friend to us so I will be a friend to you.”

You feel tears come to your eyes. “I accept,” you whisper. This will be incredibly valuable.There’s no way you could turn it down. And this is the kind of god you can trust and accept a vision from. He is as kind, generous, and benevolent as his people.

After a moment of silence, the winds calm and a gleaming turquoise vision lies before you, dangling from a necklace like a pendant. It’s smaller than some others you’ve seen and is hidden easily when you slide it over your head and under your shirt. That will be invaluable when you return to Inazuma. It would be most suspicious for you to return with one after everything that’s happened.

You take another moment to catch your breath and wipe the tears from your eyes. Then you take a particularly deep breath to steady yourself and make your way back to Venti. “How did it go?” He asks, and you smile in response.

“It went very well,” you said, pulling the pendant out to show him your new vision. “Now we match! Now… I believe I was promised a kiss?”

The smile on his face at your teasing words could have lit up a room, if you were in one. He took your hands in his and tugged you closer gently before leaning in and pressing his lips to yours. It was a pleasant kiss, chaste but lingering and sweet.

He giggled at the face you made when he pulled away. You joined it, adding your laughter to his. Between the blessing and his kiss you felt like you were on top of the world. Then you remembered something that brought you down from your high.

“Venti, you know this means I have to leave now, right?” You inquire.

His face fell to a serious and thoughtful expression before it softened and he sent you a small smile. “Yeah, I know. You know I love you, right?”

“I know,” you respond softly. “I love you too.”

He nods. “Then I’ll wait for you. So don’t take too long, okay?”

“Of course, I’ll do what I can,” you reply.

Your parting is sad, but hopeful as he waves you goodbye until you’re so far away that he can’t see you. He sings nearly nothing but sappy love songs for the next week. He misses you, but knows you’ll be back. His winds won’t let anything happen to you after all.

When you return to Inazuma you find that all the rebels with anemo visions had their power boosted, the ships sailed swifter with the wind behind them, and the information the wind brought you gave you many victories. The struggle was still difficult, but the help you had obtained made a serious difference and soon enough you were headed back to Mondstadt.

You are headed home. After all, home is where the heart is.

tag list: @clouds-rambles

[shadyteacup]

Hello! If you’re free, I was wondering if I could have a request where 15y/o Dazai meets his future s/o which he feels comfortable around them and has good impression abt them. Like he’s wandering somewhere and suddenly run into them. They have a chitchat abt their thoughts on something and have fun talking to each other. Then leave and meet again when he joins ADA. (s/o is a weird kind of person, like out of this world)

I’m not an English speaker so sorry for my terrible English y-y. Btw, i love your writings!!💟

This is such an amazing idea! I had fun writing this! And dw, your English is spectacular ♡ Enjoy, dove!

Dazai Osamu x gn! Reader||Reader has a time traveling ability

Timeless

You were a time traveler. Your ability allowed you to visit places from different timelines. The only drawback was that you aged no matter where you were, even if you were using your ability. This meant that if you wanted to enjoy the present, you had to ensure that you didn't spend much time in the past. You couldn't visit the future.

But that was okay. You loved finding out the root of all problems. That's why you joined the ada. Your ability helped them to identify who the perpetrator was. You would travel in the past and be there at the crime scene at the right time. Then you'd come back and reveal important information like the hiding place of the murder weapon, or if they had been looking at the wrong suspect all along.

You were currently investigating the death of a businessman. His body had turned up near the docks. It was highly decomposed, and probably atleast 2 years dead. You decided to travel 2 years into the past, and made your way to the docks. While searching for the potential crime scene, you bumped into someone. A mop of brown hair stood a few steps ahead of you. The boy wore bandages all over his arms and neck, and had an eye covered. Judging by the absence of any outline of his eye on the bandage that covered it, and the lack of moisture, his eye probably wasn't injured at all. He was probably only wearing bandages to appear weak. But this was just an assumption on your part.

"Ah, I'm so sorry, boy. I didn't see you there!"

He looked at you with a dead look in his eye, then gave you the fakest smile to ever exist.

"It's alright. May I ask what you are doing at a place like this?"

You were taken aback by his cold demeanor. It reminded you a lot of your own self.

"I'm here to investigate a death."

You said. His eyes darkened at your words.

"You see, the body will be discovered two years later. No tangible evidence will be recovered, then. So I must find something useful here, now."

The boy smirked.

"Time traveling ability?"

You smiled.

"Yup."

His smirk dropped and he glared at you.

"I see. This is a dangerous adventure, dear. You might get caught in a string of trouble, one that might lead you to harm."

The boy's aura and dark look had made you suspicious about his employers, but now you were certain that he worked for the mafia.

"Don't worry. I'm pretty positive that the murder wasn't committed by someone from the mafia."

His surprise was momentary, but obvious. It caught your eye.

"Before you ask, no, I don't know your future self. Also, the method of the crime doesn't match the mafia's M.O."

He nodded, thinking.

"Well in that case, I don't think you and I should be enemies."

He chirped, a happy look on his face.

You were taken aback by the sudden change in his mood.

"Sure, kid."

You said, patting his shoulder and walking away, trying to find the crime scene. The area was littered with compartments and shipment goods. It all looked so similar, almost like a maze.

"Hey, kiddo, can you lend me a hand?"

He blinked in confusion.

"Um. Sure."

He was confused as to why you weren't afraid of him. You clearly knew he was from the mafia, but you still acted so casually around him. It made him think that you either represented somebody powerful, or worked for an influential employer.

You rummaged through your pocket, trying to find the picture. Handing him the the snap of the crime scene, you observed him as he peered into the paper.

"This way."

He said, walking between two cargo containers, and leading the way.

"I never got your name, boy."

He shrugged, peering at you over his shoulder.

"Does it really matter?"

You mimicked him, raising your shoulders in a lazy shrug.

"Maybe, maybe not. But I'd like to call you something other than 'boy'."

He hummed in thought.

"How about 'knight in shining armour'?"

You scoffed.

"I get the whole 'I'm helping you, so I'm a knight' thing, but I'm no damsel in distress."

He smirked.

"Oh? And what if I were to abandon you here? What would you do?"

You smirked.

"I'd find my way on my own. I don't need you, eye-patch."

He grinned at you smugly, stopping in his tracks and moving towards you. He leaned in, his face almost touching yours.

"And what if I were to overpower you, hmm? What would you do then?"

You shuffled closer to him, much to his surprise. You whispered near his ear.

"I'll ensure that you'll never be able to have kids."

Pushing him back, you snatched the picture from his palm, and continued searching for the location. He was astonished at your bravery. He always comes across as intimidating, and that was putting it mildly. You were very courageous.

Following you like a lost puppy, he watched you hide behind a bunch of wooden crates.

You patted the space next to you, beckoning him to sit there.

"The show's about to start, eye-patch."

You took out your camera and were ready to click.

That's when two men, clad in expensive suits walked over. One of them was explaining something to the other.

You began clicking a few snaps.

The guy who was observing, turned his back on the other for a second. That's when he brandished his knife and plunged it into the other's back. You were furiously tapping away on the camera's button, determined to get every detail of proof.

The victim suffered atleast 50 stabwounds, 53 to be exact, when the killer decided to stop and hide the body. You snapped every single second of the ordeal.

When the killer left the crime scene, the two of you got up, and dusted your clothes.

"Do you have any plans after this?"

He asked you.

"Well, not really. I was planning to grab a drink, maybe something to eat, before heading back."

You said.

"Or heading 'ahead', since I'm going to the future. I don't even know."

Dazai nodded his head.

"How about I treat you to a drink?"

You eye him suspiciously.

"I have no reason to harm you. You literally don't belong here, so I've got no reason to hurt you."

You hum in acknowledgement.

"Okay then. Lead the way."

....

"How old are you?"

He asked, swirling his drink in his glass.

"A few years older than you."

"Cryptic."

"Intrusive."

"Touche."

"You have so many questions, don't you, eye-patch. "

Dazai hummed, taking a sip.

"Consider me intruiged by your... ability."

He turned in his bar stool to face you.

"Why didn't you prevent it from happening?"

"Because if I break the flow of time, or even mess with it, everything will go haywire."

"And if you were able to prevent it, without disrupting the flow of time, would you have intervened?"

You gaze at your own glass.

"I would do some heavy research before I make my decision."

Dazai was curious. Did you not want to save people?

"Everybody has a reason for murder. Nobody wakes up one day and decides to kill someone. I'll dig into their lives and find out why the killer did it. And I'll decide whether or not preventing the murder would save an innocent life, or harm many others in the future."

"So, in short, you intend to play God."

You chuckled.

"If given the power, who in their right mind would turn down the offer? Everybody wants to play God. Our entire society is built that way. The one who has more money, more power, more influence, has the right to play God to those beneath them."

Dazai found you very interesting. The way you viewed the world was so unique. You were a textbook 'good person' but could easily become the 'bad guy' if given the resources. Good or bad doesn't really matter to him, he finds the difference between the two very confusing.

"Doesn't that make you, and everybody who has power, a "bad" person?"

You chuckled.

"Funny coming from a mafioso."

Downing the rest of your drink, you answer his question.

"The distinction between good and bad is so distorted. The same set of actions can be termed as good for certain circumstances, and bad for others. The villain is always the hero when you try to see the world through his shoes, and the hero is always the villain for those supporting the so called 'bad guy' ."

"I agree. I don't care about what's 'good' or 'bad' ,either."

"Then what do you follow?"

"What do you mean?"

"There must be some set of rules that you abide by. What are they?"

"I.. Don't have any. I'm a free bird!"

You tap your chin in thought.

"One must have something to fall back on when they don't know what to do. Something to blindly follow. For example, I follow a set of rules created by my morals and values. When I don't  know how to proceed, I remember them and act accordingly. "

Dazai observed you as you spoke, absorbing every single syllable that floated out if your luscious lips. He was attracted towards opinionated, strong and focused people. He adores the look on people's faces when they speek about their passions, and express their opinions on matters. Even if he disagreed with them, the fact that they have a strong reasoning behind their actions, and the way they calmly portray their points so skillfully, makes him like them more.

The way you were effortlessly articulating your inner thoughts was something that he was fascinated by. He had so much going on inside, so much turmoil, that it was impossible for him to express it out in words. But you seem to be so sorted and disciplined. He loved that about you.

"You'll get there someday, eye-patch. Don't worry. "

You comforted, smiling at the young man.

He smiled back at you. For the first time that day, he had given you a genuine smile.

"You should smile more. It suits you."

He blushed at your words. It was a weird feeling for him. He didn't understand why his face was heating up, or why his ears felt like they were on fire.

Flicking your wrist to check the time, you sighed.

"Well, time to leave."

Dazai held your wrist as you were about to get up.

"Wait!"

You looked at him quizzically.

"Will we meet again?"

You tilted your head and smiled at him.

" I can't say for sure, but I do hope that we do."

With that, he watched you walk out of the bar. He only respected Odasaku. But now, he respected you, too.

....

Time skip to a few weeks later.

....

"L/N san, please get yourself together, we're expecting a new member to join us, soon."

You laid on the couch of the ada as Kunikida rambled on about how everyone must be in their best behavior to greet their newest member. Yosano was handling most of it, so Ranpo and you had no work to do.

"Yes, yes, Doppo. Also, it's Y/N."

You said, stretching your arms above your head.

"Y/N kun, you need to try this new type of cookie. It has two different flavors!"

Ranpo said, offering you a cookie from his bag.

You smile at him, accepting it.

"Yum!"

"I know, right!"

"Ranpo san, Y/N san! Please come here! Our newest member has arrived!"

Both of you lazily got up and strolled over to the front of the office.

"What is the big deal, Doppo-"

You stopped mid sentence when you saw the person standing at the doorway.

"Eye-patch!"

Dazai's eyes widened when he saw you, the one person who had managed to intruige him other than his deceased friend, standing in the office. The office where he was to work at, today onwards.

"Damsel!"

He said, pointing at you.

You scoffed at his choice of nickname.

"Ha! I knew your eye was fine!"

"Do you both know each other?"

Kunikida asked.

"Ofcourse they do. They met a long time ago, right, Dazai?"

Ranpk said, muching on his sweets. Ofcourse, he figured it out.

"Well, not that long ago for me."

You smiled.

Dazai had finally met you. He was elated.

"I'm glad we met again."

"Don't worry, eye-patch, we have a lot of time to catch up. ;)"

[sugarmaplewings-fics]

Bath Bomb

Pairing: Bakugou x reader

Warnings: Bakugou

⋘ ──────── ∗ ⋅◈⋅ ∗ ──────── ⋙

"Come on, girls! Let's go here next!"

You giggled with your friends as you hurried to keep close with one another in the crowded street. Today was one of your bi-annual girls' day out with all your gal pals from the former class A.

It so happened that this outing was planned and organized by Yaomomo, and she had decided to take you all on a shopping trip to Harajuku. Everyone was already laden with bags, some even assisted by Ochaco in lightening the heavier ones.

The store Momo had pointed to was a quaint LUSH store, where pink neon lights glowed in the windows.

All seven of you eagerly crowded into the store, breaking off into smaller groups to wander around. You ended up with Toru and Mina, wandering over to one of the walls packed nearly floor to ceiling with colorful bath bombs.

"Look at them all," Toru breathed, carefully bringing one up to her invisible nose for a sniff.

You walked around with them, occasionally pointing out a particularly cutely shaped or colorful one.

Suddenly, you felt a hand alight on your arm. "(Y/N)!" Mina said, barely stifling a giggle. "Look at that one!"

Your eyes followed the direction her finger pointed, finally landing on an egg-shaped turquoise bath bomb. Except, it wasn't meant to be an egg. This was unmistakably a grenade.

"Oh, I get it," you said. "Bath bomb, and it's a grenade. That is pretty funny."

"Well, yeah, but what I meant was—" Mina paused to grin and wiggle her eyebrows at you. "I think you might be able to enjoy that with a certain explosive someone, perhaps?"

Heat flooded into your cheeks as you realized she was talking about your fiancé, Bakugou Katsuki. Now that she mentioned it, it did remind you of him. The mold it had come from was similar to the very real explosives he kept on his hero belt.

"You should totally get it!" she went on, practically bouncing on her toes.

You picked one up, feeling its shape and weight. It was easily the size of your palm, and you finally let your hand take it up to your nose for a quick sniff. Lavender and rosemary greeted your senses. It was a very pleasant mix and you held it up so Mina could get a whiff of her own.

"Mmm," she said, briefly fluttering her eyelids closed. "Yep. You're getting that."

She pulled you with her so you could grab a tray together, gently placing it in the little holder. Everyone browsed for another twenty minutes or so before finally checking out. You had decided on an additional bath bomb for yourself along with something called a bubble bar, but you were truly the most excited about the distinct blue-green grenade that innocently rested at the bottom of your bag. As your group left the store, you couldn't wait for a chance to try out what you'd bought. It would be a nice way to surprise Katsuki when he got home. Additionally, it provided an excuse to relax together and spend time in each other's presence.

You had to snap yourself out of a quick daydream you'd begun to sink into in order to answer Jirou, silently grinning to yourself in anticipation for what was to come.

. . . . . . . .

Not three days later, you finally found your chance.

You got home earlier than he did, which was normal. As you began your routine of amusing yourself while you waited for Katsuki to come home, you felt a buzz emanating from your pocket. It turned out to be a call from none other than your fiancé himself, Bakugou.

"Hey, babe, what's up?" you said into the phone, uncertain as to why he was calling.

"Just wanted to let you know I'm coming home early," his gruff voice came through. "Do you want anything for dinner? I know it's been awhile since we've had that takeout you like."

Your eyes lit up. "You'd do that?"

Katsuki grumbled on his end of the phone, however you could hear that there was no malice behind it. "Yes. I don't understand why you like it so much, especially because of how bad for you it is and when my cooking is so much better, but I'll get it. For you."

"Thank you so much!"

"Whatever."

Thus went most of your conversations with the blond. You were used to it by now, so you merely smiled. "I love you."

Katsuki's voice abruptly changed to tender. "I love you too."

Your smile only brightened as the end-call tone sounded in your ear. You loved everything about Katsuki, even his overly boorish nature. It only made the moments he let it slip all the sweeter. You knew you were the only one who got to witness that softer side to him, and it made your heart swell every time.

You flopped back into position on your couch, mind beginning to wander through possibilities of what you could do during your evening with Bakugou. You quickly remembered the little bath bomb you had shoved into the back of the bathroom cabinet. That would be perfect! You decided to wait until after dinner and then surprise him with the little plan that was already beginning to take form within your mind.

The lock on your door clicked a few minutes later, alerting you that Bakugou had come home. You rose to greet him, strolling into the kitchen to see him setting a bag down on the counter.

You walked up to his side and pecked him on the cheek. "Welcome home, babe."

Katsuki's vermilion eyes met yours as you leaned into him, draping an arm around his waist. "Hey."

"How was work?"

"Not bad," he answered, reaching up into a cabinet and pulling out two glasses, handing one to you.

You grabbed the bag and went to your little table, going back into the kitchen to fill your cup with ice and water once Katsuki was done. The two of you settled at the table, taking out the boxes of food he'd bought for you.

"So why did they let you off early?" you inquired, plunging your chopsticks into a personal container of noodles.

"Dumbass advisor told me to go home," he answered. "Villain hit me with their quirk or something and I got a little dinged up."

"Are you alright?" you asked, suddenly concerned.

"Of course. They just told me to stay in and rest. Pathetic, thinking I'm weak or some shit."

"'Tsuki, you know he just cares about you."

Bakugou made his classic tch noise, scowling back down into his mixed vegetables. "The only reason I agreed to leave was so that I could spend more time with you."

You looked back to him, hoping to catch those ruby eyes of his. He refused to offer them, however, and you eventually gave up, going back to your food.

"I know you don't see me as often as you'd like to," he continued, his voice little more than a mutter. "It's been a while since we've been able to spend a day together, let alone plan our—our wedding."

It was true. Even today, for Katsuki, he'd gotten home early, but you weren't blind to the fact that it was already half past seven. Some nights you'd be up until nearly two AM, waiting for his footsteps to come in through your door. You never ceased to stay awake for him, however, filling some of your free time with planning for your wedding ceremony. Bakugou was letting you handle most of it, although it wasn't as though he had much choice. That didn't stop you from trying to include him any way you could; occasionally talking over what you'd thought of and decided on that day while the two of you lay in bed together. Sometimes lying alone with one another in cool darkness were the only moments you could share, quietly conversing until one of you fell victim to the sleep that had been pressing at the backs of both of your eyes for the last few hours.

You had to hope that one day it would get better. Someday, he may be able to catch more breaks. Maybe someday, society would be fixed so that crime would dwindle to nearly nothing. But that someday was far, far away, if it even would ever come at all. All you could do was be thankful that Katsuki loved his job and rarely got injured. It brought in good money too, with his position so high at the top. The only thing that mattered was that he somehow walked in through that door at the end of each day, no matter what time it was or how long the two of you had gone without sleep. No matter what, you'd always be there, waiting for him.

Your hand snaked its way across the table to settle on top of Katsuki's, finally getting him to look up at you. "It's okay," you assured him. "You're here now. I couldn't be happier."

You both sat, looking at each other in a silent moment, his palm having turned to take yours, thumb gently stroking the outside of your hand.

Flicking your eyes down, you let a small smile creep onto your lips. "I actually have a little surprise for you," you said. "It's for after dinner."

Bakugou breathed out a little laugh in a singular huff, going back to consuming your "shitty takeout" food. "Do you, now?"

"Uh huh."

You could tell he was curious. Bakugou wasn't really one who was much for surprises, but he trusted you.

It wasn't too much longer before you finished your meal, taking the cardboard containers and stuffing them back into the bag they had come from. Bakugou put the glasses on the counter next to the sink while you tied up the trash bag and tossed it out, double checking that the table was clear and clean.

"Ready?" you asked, running your hand down his forearm until it met his own, intertwining your fingers.

"Sure."

"Let's get started, then."

You led him to the bathroom, letting go of his hand so you could turn on the tap for your bathtub. It was just the right size for the two of you to comfortably sit together in, and this was hardly your first time doing so.

"You wanted me to take a bath?" Katsuki asked, watching you adjust the temperature.

"Well, yes, but—" you turned and strode over to the cabinet, rummaging around for the object of interest. You pulled out the bag, reaching in to show off the little grenade. "Ta-da!"

Bakugou looked at it, slightly unimpressed. "What is it?"

"It's a bath bomb," you explained. "I saw it the other day when I was out shopping with the girls and it reminded me of you." You watched his expression, but it hadn't really changed. "So are you interested?"

Katsuki finally let the smallest of smiles grace his lips. "Sure. I was planning on showering here anyway. A bath will do."

"Am I invited?" you asked, just to make sure.

"Of course you are, dumbass," he said, looking nearly offended that you might have thought otherwise.

"Well, then. Let's get to it."

The two of you started stripping off your clothes, discarding them on the floor. When you glanced up at Bakugou, you noticed a little red mark on his shoulder, disappearing over the peak and presumably continuing on his back. You stepped closer, walking around behind him, ignoring a half-hearted protest from the man who was sporting it. A large, red blotchy welt bloomed on the skin of his back, and when you touched it as gently as possible with your fingertips, you found that it was nearly burning.

"Katsuki, baby," you crooned concernedly, unable to take your eyes off it.

"That was the best the healing guy could do," he explained, his voice quieter than usual. "It was worse before, but that's why I got sent home."

"Does it hurt?"

"Not really."

You clicked your tongue, still figuring it probably did hurt more than he would ever let on. You gently kissed a patch of unmarked skin next to it, just to be safe.

Knowing how much Bakugou hated it when you fussed over any injuries he got, you finally left to grab the bath bomb. You traded it for your engagement ring, sliding off the gold band and picking up the green grenade from where you had set it on the counter. The faucet handle of the tub was cool in your hand as you turned the water off, having moved back over to its edge. You shifted your appendage to flick your fingers in the water to check the temperature. It was just right; not too hot, not too cold.

"Come here," you beckoned Katsuki to your side. "Watch this."

You dropped the bath grenade into the water, both of you watching as it began to fizz at the bottom. The water began to take on a cartoonish lagoon-blue tint, and the smell of rosemary and lavender began to sweetly float into the air.

"Now come on," you said, stepping into the tub. Katsuki followed in after you, and you let him sit down and adjust before sliding into his lap. You leaned against his shoulder as his arms wrapped around you. You scanned his face, searching for any signs of discomfort. You found that sometimes it was the best way to tell what he was feeling, rather than asking.

Nevertheless, his eyes were gently shut, jaw relaxed. An eyelid slid open to peer at you, a tiny sliver of red just scarcely able to be seen.

"Whatcha lookin' at?" he asked, tone conversational.

"You."

"Feh."

"'Feh'," you mocked. "The great Bakugou Katsuki, 20—"

"Stop," he interrupted, sending a splash of scented unnaturally blue water over your shoulder. You giggled, nuzzling closer into his chest in your giddiness. A deep inhale and exhale went through your man's lungs, and you followed the idea soon after. The lavender really did do something to your brain, almost magically quieting your thoughts as you felt calm steal over your body.

You'd missed this, just being able to spend time with the love of your life, relaxing together. The water you both were encased in was so soothingly warm, reaching you where Katsuki's hold could not.

"So how did your day go?" you asked, keeping your eyes shut as you snuggled into him. "Tell me all about the villains you vanquished."

You could practically hear Katsuki grin above you, and without hesitation he launched into an anecdote about a man he'd apprehended early that morning. You knew how much he loved talking about his great feats of heroism. It seemed to be a bit of an ego booster for him, watching your face as you reacted to his account of his day.

You felt him shift slightly, not ceasing in his talk. The sound of a shampoo bottle popping open met your ears, and soon after, Bakugou's fingers were lacing through your damp hair, spreading the cleansing scent throughout your scalp.

You hummed and leaned into his touch, enjoying the added sensation while he finished up his speech.

"—shoulda seen the look on the little shit's face when he realized there was nothing he could do. I had him, just like that. Damn extra, didn't even have that much paperwork to file on him."

"Mmm," you hummed in acknowledgement. "Oh, baby, that feels so good."

Bakugou continued rubbing circles into your scalp, lather and foam coating his hands. You loved his hands. They were so large and strong; the source of his power, the source of his pride.

Finally he swirled your hair up and out of the way into a makeshift twist-bun, held together sheerly by the sticky shampoo lather. He took a bar of your favorite soap and began to run it over the skin of your back and shoulders, applying a delicious amount of pressure to muscles you hadn't even known were tensed. Satisfied with the slippery coating, Katsuki went back to using those hands of his, rolling the heels perfectly into you, alternating between palms and knuckles.

"'Tsuki," you said, voice hazy from how good it felt, "this was supposed to be for you."

"Yes, and?"

You pouted, eyes still lidded. "You're supposed to be relaxing."

"This is how I relax."

"Yeah, but—"

"Did I fucking stutter?"

You snorted, letting him continue his business in massaging your back. "Okay, but you're next."

"You wish."

"Did I fucking stutter?" you countered, using his own words against him. "You can't escape me. You're going to feel good by the time we get out of here, and that's a rock fact."

Even Katsuki had to have known his grumbles sounded fake. It was rare for him to show it, but you knew that every now and then he reveled in having you take care of him. Whether it be working out knots in his muscles or rubbing cream into his burns, there was a secret side to him that would allow you to tend to him. His brash persona had to be let down sometime, and every day you felt honored that you were among the few people who he trusted enough to see him without it.

Katsuki finally began to pour water over your back, the warmth trickling down and bringing the soap right with it. He leaned you back so your hair was submerged and your head was in his lap. His fingers began to wind through your tresses again, shaking the shampoo bubbles into the water around you. Without fail, Bakugou always insisted that you were completely taken care of before he ever allowed anything to be done to himself. There was nothing you could do to protest, that's just the way it was. Firm but gentle fingertip pads were pressed into your shoulders, signaling for you to sit up.

He began the process over again with your conditioner, squirting some on his hand before running it through the strands of hair that fell from your head.

"Have the energy to talk about our wedding?" you asked, eyes flicking up to the counter where your sparkling ring sat waiting.

"Sure."

You ran over a few thoughts you'd gotten to recently. You already had a pretty solid guest list, a venue in mind, arrangements for flowers, the cake, dresses, and even the suit Bakugou had picked out. Now was the more practical stuff; scheduling and seating, sketching out designs for the invitations.

You relayed over the conversation you'd had with Momo earlier yesterday. You were so thankful to have her as a friend, helping you plan. It was almost as if she knew what she was doing, at least, more than you did. She was good with decision making and had your best interests at heart.

Bakugou listened while he continued to thread his fingers through your hair, occasionally commenting or making little noises of acknowledgment while you spoke. It wasn't long before he tapped your shoulder, ready to dip you again.

The water that flooded your ears distorted your voice as you continued talking. You wished you had your laptop in front of you so you could show him your detailed spreadsheet.

You finally sat up, him having finished rinsing once again. You paused in your conversation to say, "Now it's your turn."

He turned, trying to find a moderately comfortable means to lean back so you could reach the top of his head. You cupped water in your hands and used it to wet his ash blond hair. Satisfied at its newly damp state, you pulled down his shampoo. Which also happened to be his conditioner.

You'd always grumbled at him for being tacky and using it, but his argument was that he didn't need anything more. It was cheap and quick and he refused to budge from his stance on it. At least you'd gotten him to start picking up scents you liked. This one was coconut. You glanced at the upside down bottle in your hand as you squeezed some out, silently cringing at the 3-in-1 proudly printed on the sticker. What bothered you was probably the sheer difference in male vs female advertised products. You wouldn't be surprised if they came out with something that he could brush his teeth with too.

You spread it over his spikes, each point becoming droopy under the weight of the water that had soaked into them. You couldn't help but notice how Bakugou leaned into your touch. Your voice began to trail off as you focused on his hair. It didn't take long to spread the shampoo through his short blond hair, working it into his roots. Next you moved down to his neck, trying to keep your fingers away from any reddened areas. Your hands skillfully moved over his back, much like his had done to yours a few moments prior. His skin was soon covered in a fine layer of suds, deliciously scented as you finally began to rinse both it and his hair with the now scarcely lukewarm water.

"You feel any better, Katsuki?" you asked, leaning forward to rest your chin on his shoulder.

"From what?" he shot back, annoyed that you'd suggest he was ever anything less than 'fine'.

"I don't know," you said, keeping your tone soft. "You still haven't told me how you got this today." You gingerly tapped a patch of skin on his back, still flushed but now glistening with moisture.

He abruptly stood, water running in rivulets down his legs as he stepped out of your bath. Bakugou wordlessly grabbed a towel and wrapped it around his waist, exiting the bathroom with nothing more than it and heavy footsteps.

You sighed and chewed on your lip, collecting yourself before pulling the plug from the drain. Your fingers slid through the receding water, eventually locating the fizzing remains of your grenade and setting it on the ledge. You lifted yourself out and grabbed a towel, sliding your ring back onto your finger before finally leaving the warm, steamy bathroom to find Katsuki.

It wasn't difficult to locate the blond, finding him in the first place you checked; your bedroom. He laid on his back, palms supporting his head while his elbows stretched out on either side. He wore only a pair of loose-fitting orange and black gym shorts, slung low on his hips as he gazed up at the ceiling.

You decided it would be best to not force him to talk, opting to begin work on patting your hair dry with your towel before slipping on one of Katsuki's large, old t-shirts and some cotton panties. The bed dipped under your weight as you sat at the edge, silently beginning to finger comb your damp hair. You listened to nothing but your own heartbeat steadily thumping in your chest, concern for your fiancé clouding your thoughts.

Before you could turn around to ask him what was wrong, Bakugou finally spoke. "Why did you agree to marry me?"

The question caught you so completely off guard, a scoff escaped your throat. "Because I love you and I want to spend the rest of my life with you. Why are you asking me that?"

Katsuki's frown deepened. "It's just that . . . sometimes I wonder if you don't deserve this. I never see you. When I do, I'm not the . . . nicest person. You could—you would probably be better off with someone different."

You rubbed your hand soothingly over his toned belly. "Was today not a good day?"

Bakugou chewed on the inside of his cheek. You recognized the blank look in his eyes, signaling that he was trying to distance himself from his emotions. "He got away."

"Who?" you asked quietly, shifting so you could comfortably run your hands over him. The action was meant to try to calm him and ease him from behind his figurative walls.

"The villain who—who hurt me. I didn't catch him and it's all my fault. I lost. I'm a failure."

You frowned at his words. This must have really affected him if he was willing to break down so much in front of you. Bakugou had always had the mindset that he always had to win. That was how he decided he would be the greatest hero. A blow like this had to hurt.

You laid down and pulled yourself against his side, ducking under his arm so he had no choice but to hold you to his warm chest. You placed a kiss over one of his pecs, your gentle fingers never ceasing in their soothing up and down motions over his abs.

"You're far from a failure, Katsuki," you said softly in his ear. "Things like this happen."

"Not to me," he grumbled, turning his head away from you.

"You'll catch him next time, I'm sure of it."

Bakugou huffed beside you. "I should be out there, hunting him down," he finally said.

"Not in this condition," you stated firmly, tapping a finger against his skin.

You could see Bakugou's lip curl over his teeth. "It's not like I can't fight. I barely even hurt anymore. I can—"

"I wasn't talking about your wound."

He turned his head, finally looking at you. Confusion and suspicion swam in his vermilion eyes, but you used the opportunity to place your hand on his cheek.

"You're down on yourself," you said. "You need some time off. You're working so much and so hard, which is a good thing, but I think you need some time away."

Bakugou rested his hand over yours, gazing into your eyes. "I can't just let him go," he stated simply. "I can't afford to take time off."

"I know," you sighed. "But just for tonight? For me? You deserve it."

Your fiancé sighed. There wasn't anything he wanted more then than to hold you in his arms and forget for a few moments. Forget about his demanding job and getting a whole new hero agency kicked off the ground. Forget about his sworn responsibilities to the world. Forget about that damned bastard who got away.

A grumble sounded deep within Bakugou's chest, signaling to you that he had caved. You let him tug you forward and pull you into a kiss, attacking your lips in that perfectly rough but sweet way that you craved and loved.

Once he was temporarily satisfied, he cradled you against his bare chest for several minutes, refusing to move until all the stress had slowly trickled out of his muscles. You nuzzled into his bare skin, which still smelled so deliciously fresh after having gotten out of your bath.

"I love you," Bakugou finally said. "You know that, right?"

"Of course." Your voice came out a bit muffled, but you had little interest in adjusting from your position.

"I do want to get married," he went on. "To you. Maybe start a family . . . . It wouldn't be so bad, having a little fuckin' monster running around."

Your heart leapt at the idea of having a baby with the pro hero. It was something you'd thought about quite a bit, actually. "And is this child's 'fuckin' monster' qualities from you or from me?"

"You, obviously."

You laughed at Katsuki's joke, glad that he was beginning to feel better. When you looked back into his face, you were pleased to find that even he was smiling just a little bit.

You kissed his skin again as a way to segway to another topic. "So what do you want to do for the rest of your evening off?"

"Maybe we could watch something." He shrugged. "I don't care as long as I'm holding you."

His wish was an easy one to have come true. Within minutes you were relocated to the couch, snuggled up under a blanket together with a bowl of popcorn, watching something you both had been able to agree upon.

Your relationship with Katsuki wasn't an easy one, but there was no one else in the whole world you'd rather spend a lifetime with.

⋘ ──────── ∗ ⋅◈⋅ ∗ ──────── ⋙

Taglist: @basicaegyo​ @iiminibattlehero​ @pyrofanatic​​ @xoxopam4​

[21burritoseavey]

wonder (j.a.)

a/n: uhh, yeah so I would like to formally apologise for what you are about to read. I don’t know if I’ll make a pt.2 but if you want one let me know. thanks to the wonderful person who requested this and thank you for your patience. I changed a few things and it’s a little unedited but I really hope you like it!  

Summary: Jack tells Y/n he likes her on her birthday.

Song: Wonder by Shawn Mendes

I wonder if I'm being real Do I speak my truth or do I filter how I feel?

“We’re already late! Hurry up!” Corbyn yelled out from the entrance hall of the Seavey residence, ending his third reminder with an irritated slam of the front door. 

“I’ll be out in a minute!” Jack shot back quieter. His gaze lingered on Daniel’s wardrobe mirror, clean and reflective of his handsomely dressed figure. Jack sighed as he glanced down at himself, ruffling a hand through his hair. 

The day dawned crisp and clear, warm with the light of the sun glaring through fewer clouds than usual. Corbyn strolled across the driveway to meet the rest of the boys - ready and waiting - in the car. No other boy was seen following behind them, indicating another few minutes of waiting to be had. 

“It’s a birthday party, we’re not meeting the Queen.” Daniel rolled his eyes. 

“It’s not just a birthday party,” Jack declared a moment after, tugging at the narrow collar of his blazer in his hurry to make it to the car. He finally decided this outfit would be the one - all white clothes on, black dress shoes and dark brunette curls left unbound to tumble messily along the breeze as he jogged to Jonah’s open window. 

I wonder, wouldn't it be nice To live inside a world that isn't black and white?

“It’s Y/n’s 21st birthday.” He breathed, leaning his elbows on the edge of the window. 

“You’re wearing the first outfit you put on,” Zach drawled, slumping back into the passenger’s seat. 

“Yeah, yeah, whatever.” Jack shrugged, walking across the road to the empty seats in the back. Corbyn and Jack slipped into the back beside Daniel. The air was sticky and humid, only to perish when the air conditioning blasted from the front before they made it out of Daniel’s neighbourhood, wafting cool air with the low hum of constant blowing accompanying it. 

I wonder what it's like to be my friends Hope that they don't think I'll forget about them I wonder

While the rest of the boys filled the air with conversation about gifts and birthday festivities, Jack was silent, making his quiet presence known with simple nods and agreements. His mind reeled with thoughts and thoughts of Y/n, unable to still to a peacefulness for the whole car ride. Y/n was always one to make everyone feel comfortable, especially at a party she’d planned herself. But there was something about Y/n’s special day that made Jack’s cheeks flush and heart flutter with even more intensity every moment he thought about it. Maybe this would be the perfect day to tell her?

Y/n never enjoyed all the parties she’d been dragged to by friends at university. The chaos of college students finally letting loose was overwhelming, to say the least. The strobe lights dancing onto the floor and pounding baselines reverberating through intoxicated bodies and infused scents of perfume and cologne laced in the foggy dark air only made Y/n’s loathing for them grow stronger every time she went to one. And when it was time for her own party, Y/n made sure it was everything she envisioned it to be. 

Right before I close my eyes The only thing that's on my mind

Including the guys, an invite had been sent to some friends from her classes, one of whom was named James, a friend from her visual arts class. Nothing more. Or at least that’s how Jack liked to think of it. He had no right to be angry, but every time that name rolled off his tongue, it sent a sickening chill down his spine. It all started when Y/n went over to Jack’s place. With her backpack across her back, she let herself into his room casually. Her smile caught Jack’s gaze as he sat behind his keyboard...along with another smile, from a guy he’d never seen before. Y/n had invited him over herself in order for the two boys to ‘get to know each other’. Jack could barely stomach the thought of wiping the grin off her face with any sort of disagreement, so he let them both stay. That night was packed with great conversation and giddy dimpled laughter between them, but not Jack. His mind was so deep in wonder and confusion that he could hardly hear what they were even saying. 

“Jack, could you pass that box over there?” Corbyn asked, gesturing towards the wrapped rectangular gift. Jack raised his gaze to Corbyn. Just a friend Jack thought at last, dismissing the rest of his thoughts as he leaned over to grab the present. 

Been dreamin' that you feel it too I wonder what it's like to be loved by you

“You got her something?” He gaped, “I thought we all agreed to not get her anything?” His eyes shot back towards the rest of the guys as they stepped out of the car. He noticed their gifts as his eyes roamed down towards the neatly...and some quite messily wrapped gifts in their hands. “So, it’s just me then?” He asked with an annoyed glare. “Great.” He sighed, “no that’s just wonderful.” He corrected, hopping out of the car to show the sarcasm etched in his expression. “I just won’t have anything to give Y/n. This was my one chance to tell her-” 

“That’s okay,” Y/n spoke gently behind him. Her sudden words had Jack twirling around slowly to greet her, as if doing so would ease the embarrassment that washed over him. Though, a quick hug from Y/n had him easing back into himself in seconds. Y/n pulled away and glanced at him, “What’d you need to tell me?” 

“Uh...um,” Jack’s eyes flickered to the boys, “Happy birthday!” He assured her, leaning back in for a hug, ignoring the boys’ teasing laughter that found its way along the breeze and into his ears. 

“Thank you,” Y/n said sweetly. 

“And Sydnie wanted me to tell you that she’s sorry she couldn’t make it and happy birthday.” 

“Oh,” Y/n grinned, “Well tell her that I’m sad she’s missing out, but she’s still my favourite Avery.” Y/n bit back a smile and watched Jack’s expression morph into an opened mouthed glare. 

She broke out into a fit of laughter, cheerful giggles falling between them as Jack stuttered out a “Wow, how could you?” He shook his head disapprovingly. 

I wonder why I'm so afraid Of saying something wrong, I never said I was a saint

Y/n’s party was at the park - nothing unexpected for Jack since he knew she loved it so much - and with the help of some friends, the set up was the perfect mix of classy and casual. A long table cut through the grassy field, standing under a silky white sheet, and it was almost like a canopy of flowers were draped across it. The bandmates noticed a few of Y/n’s friends at their spots on the cushions, helping themselves to the platters of fruit and snacks. And even a small tepee stood a small distance away, upholstered with light blue canvas that sheltered Y/n’s sleepy puppy inside. The sun kissed shades of champagne pink and soft beige with its bright rays and the gentle wind allowed the tableware to stay in place without worry of anything toppling over.

The boys wished Y/n a happy birthday while they took their seats, but Jack lingered in front of the narrow table. The way in which he was standing was almost perfect for a photo and Y/n took their fleeting moment of stillness to snap a quick one beside them. Her beaming smile greeted Jack’s gaze from the side. “I can’t believe you did this,” He chuckled breathily. 

“Are you doubting my hard work, Jack Avery?” She teased, pocketing her phone. 

“No, no, It’s great.” He rushed out. 

“Yeah, this is amazing Y/n.” Jonah started, crouched down to pat the lazy puppy. “It's so aesthetic.” He said honestly, sending a wave of light laughter to flourish over the group. 

“Well, come on, then. Sit down.” She ushered Jack to sit on one of carefully placed cushions. A familiar boy came breezing towards the low table from behind the low-lying bushes. Y/n looked up at him with a smile, and she gazed back at the boys to introduce him formally. “Oh, and, um” She wobbled onto her feet and stood beside him. “This is James,” she said gently, looking towards the boys with hesitance in her eyes, a smile still on her face. 

I wonder, when I cry into my hands I'm conditioned to feel like it makes me less of a man

Jack’s neutral expression faltered into a frown, and he bowed his head towards his dress shoes, blaming it on the fake notification he’d gotten on his phone when Y/n asked him if he was okay.  “You two already know each other.” She smiled, settling back into her seat beside James. “Why don’t you tell him about the band?” she proposed. Her jolly gaze towards the other boy practically gave Jack no other choice but to start the conversation. 

“Yeah, sure.” He answered calmly. 

--------

And I wonder if someday you'll be by my side And tell me that the world will end up alright I wonder

Jack had counted sixteen people at the park in his head while he talked to James. It was more of a one-sided thing actually - the other boy held forth almost all hour about his own musical experiences - and Jack finally decided to end the conversation with a random excuse, no longer able to hide his hurt with a smile. “Hey, you know what, I actually have to get Y/n’s gift from the car. So, we’ll talk later?” He spoke gently, standing up to make his escape quick and easy. 

“Oh, sure. Nice talking to you.” James nodded, letting Jack leave with a smile on his lips. In all honesty, the conversation wasn’t bad enough for him to leave abruptly, but there was just something about the way Y/n lingered close to him as they chatted...the way her eyes roamed over James’ lips as he spoke... the slight twinkle in her eyes kindled with an almost childish nervousness at their close proximity. To the other boys, Jack was always reading too much into things, but this time was quite the opposite, and he swore there were a bunch of signs that something was going on between them. 

Right before I close my eyes The only thing that's on my mind

“Six instruments,” Jack started plainly, trudging over to Daniel and Corbyn. Y/n’s 4-month-old golden retriever had made himself comfortable on Daniel’s lap as the pair sat on the grass with a plate of snacks next to them. The mutual laughter falling between them broke with Jack’s voice again, “He plays six instruments.” He sat tiredly on the grass, palms propped up behind him and legs stretched out. “How can I compete with that?” He threw his hands up in exasperation and dropped them to plop a piece of cantaloupe in his mouth. 

“Damn, almost as many as me.” Daniel let out an impressed chuckle, glancing over at the tall brunette boy standing next to Y/n. “Maybe he could be our sixth member.” He joked.

Corbyn caught on and continued their teasing, “yeah, his hair is goals.” He laughed. 

“So, what, you guys think he’s great too?” Jack looked furiously towards them as he plucked out stands of grass. 

Been dreamin' that you feel it too I wonder what it's like to be loved by you

“You don’t?” Corbyn asked between a bite of his watermelon. Daniel eyed him with an envious stare silently. Jack stayed quiet; fingers focused on ripping out small roots from the ground. “Why are we just hearing of this now?”

“I didn’t think it would get to this!” Jack admitted breathily. “I mean, studying together, that’s okay, but coming to her birthday party?”

“...More of a... get-together...” Daniel trailed off quietly. 

Jack continued on as if the others were invisible. “I’ve had my heart set on telling her today for weeks now.” He slumped back against the tepee, sharing a swift look with the small blonde puppy that wobbled back into his bed. “I can’t tell her now. Not when he’s here.” 

“We come to birthday parties and we’re friends...I don’t get what the problem is. He’s probably just a friend like Y/n said.”

I wonder what it's like I wonder what it's like to be loved by you

“No, look at the way they’re standing. He linked his arm with hers.” Jack didn’t bother acting sly and just pointed towards the almost coupley pair of university students sitting at the picnic table again. Y/n’s arm was indeed linked with James’ as they shared a plate of snacks. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter. Jack repeated, keeping his gaze on the one individual he thought liked him back. But Jack could see how it mattered to Y/n, she wasn’t pulling away after all. He tried to shake it off and focus back on his group that had now increased with Zach hearing Jack’s gloomy thoughts from a few paces away. 

“Why don’t you just go talk to her?” Zach said. 

“I can’t,” Jack pouted. “Or else I’d be interrupting whatever that is…” Jack’s quiet last word couldn’t be heard over Jonah’s heavy footsteps pounding across the levelled grass. His panicked expression immediately set Jack into high alert, and he looked towards his friend with the same concerned stricken face. 

Right before I close my eyes The only thing that's on my mind

“Okay-I-...” Jonah hunched over with his hands on his thighs as he caught his breath, “I don’t- I-” He stopped trying to speak and let a silence fall over the small group. He cleared his throat. “I wouldn’t usually be this panicked about something like this but, they are like going to. Kiss.” Jonah’s words came out as faint breaths, but Jack understood every word and he shifted his gaze over towards Y/n again. The gap between the two was basically non-existent in Jack’s eyes. James’ hand was on her thigh as they faced each other before it reached up to tuck a strand of Y/n’s sun kissed hair that cascaded down her back. And with Y/n leaning in closer with a smile, their lips were mere seconds away from meeting and stomach’s almost swarming with premature first kiss butterflies. That sight of them together, that moment suspended in time ignited this spark in Jack. It was more than the spark of fondness and adoration for Y/n, it was this weird, stinging mix of hurt and panic that just led him towards the picnic table. The loud stomps coming from the corner had Y/n and James flinching back in fear. 

“Hey, okay look Y/n. I know I’m not like this James guy,” Jack rushed out, barely paying a glance towards the other boy as he stepped closer to the frazzled girl sitting cross-legged on the floor. “And I can’t play six instruments and do homework as good as him and I don’t have cool hair,” His voice was fragile as if it could break any second with the chance of his confession being a total disaster, but he went for it. “But I like you… so much Y/n. I always have.” 

Been dreamin' that you feel it too I wonder what it's like to be loved by you

 a/n: AHHH SORRY gjreigihtrh

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[jangmi-latte]

(Twst Anni!) Oneshot form please! I know I can choose up tot wi characters, but in this case, I’m just gonna choose one for Vil (i cant think of any other lines that appealed to me): “Beautiful flowers are poisonous. But isn’t that just another one of their charms?”

╰──➢    “Beautiful flowers are poisonous. But isn’t that just another one of their charms?”

❥ ara ara you geared something in my brain. may our waiter, vil schoenheit, treat you with this anniversary special dessert!

Another hit bashed his sides as he fell to the ground. No pain did adhere to his figure yet the disappointment of failing yet another training session made him scowl to himself. His foil was thrown across the room in a sign of defeat. His father sighed while you kept yourself sitting on the chair in worry. “Vil,” his father began, helping his son up and continuing, “It’s time for you to rest. You’ve done enough for today.”

“I want to continue, papa,” came his struggling grunts while he stood up. Patting down the dust on his pants, he walked to pick up his foil. However, his papa prevented him from going any further with a tight grip on his wrist. “I said, that’s enough.”

“But I’m not tired--”

You wanted to run and comfort the boy -- your best friend. His father had already removed his fencing mask off of him. “Vil. You need to rest. You’re already frustrated enough to continue.”

Mr. Schoenheit’s eyes glanced at you, nodding his head over at his son while his hand laid at the small of his back. Vil’s face was cast down, hands balled into fists with teeth gritted in frustration. You looked at the older man and quickly set your feet down on the floor and ran over to your friend. 

“Let’s go outside, Vil. The sun can calm you down."

Vil looked at you in the eyes, his expression not even fading — gazing down at your hands holding his. He doesn't know what he’s feeling but immense frustration. Towards who? Himself. He brought you to his home to show you how much progress he did with fencing and yet he just wiped the floor with his failure. The shame of failing his own ability. How did he word his statement again?

“Come to my house! I’ll show you how much stronger I got with fencing!”

Stronger, huh.

“I’ll make you something to drink.” Mr. Schoenheit placed a hand on his son’s head, “You go outside with y/n. It will help you greatly.”

Now both of you sat at the porch of his home, listening to the white noises his little village made whilst drinking some nutritious smoothie. It was quiet between the two of you. No awkwardness, no uncomfortability, just feeling the presence of one another. You gazed at Vil, his blonde locks covering his face yet you could see how he stared at the pavement below him. His lips remain locked around the straw as you watch him subconsciously swallow down his smoothie.

“Vil?” you called.

“Hm?” he responded yet his eyes never left where they desire to look.

Your mouth ran dry; what did you want to say to him? Think, y/n. How can you emotionally support your friend who was disappointed? “You did great back there.”

Really, y/n?

“You’re only saying that to make me feel better,” he exhaled, taking his time to finally glance at you. His glass is now empty and yours still half full. You tripped on your words, scratching the back of your nape. “I didn’t do well. I know that. I just need to try harder.”

“But you really did better. It’s okay to fail, you know. You’re still ten years old.”

“You speak as if you’re any older than me. I’m fine, y/n.”

“You don’t look like it.” You placed your glass on the steps beside you and scooted closer to Vil. “You’re stubborn, you know that. I saw how you wanted to cry back inside and yet you didn’t let yourself. If you want to cry now, then I have a shoulder for you to cry on!”

Vil shook his head in denial, twirling his straw as he looked away. “I don’t like showing signs of weakness. You’re being ridiculous.”

“Sheesh.” You gave up, huffing in defeat while you slurped on your smoothie. You know it’s useless to get into Vil’s head. When he’s determined to do something, you know he wants it to happen. Despite seeming weak already, he wants to stay strong. How poisonous. Even you wanted to keep on going through his head.

You already saw his success by being a child influencer. You were there -- or at least try to be present -- during his stage plays. His movies? Oh, Vil would use his dad’s phone just to contact you and how everything is going. What else does he want? Surely, he would tell you about this and that and how the world of media is different from his little village in his homeland. He failed just ONE round of fencing and now he’s sulking.

Why won’t he tell you his objective this time?

He could beat you in fencing himself. Even his dad would wince every time Vil would attempt to playfully punch his arm. He’s that strong already. What else, Vil. What else do you want?

You wish to know the answer eight years later.

You sat in Pomefiore’s lounge, the leg over your other, swinging in boredom as you scanned through endless magicam content. Epel was so close to looking like a pile of hay with his hands tugging on his hair countless times. Looking at your junior, you sighed and placed your phone down. “Magical pharmaceuticals? That’s Iodine. It can be used to revive dead plants. Wait, why are you studying this? This is for second-years.”

“I wanna prove something to Vil-- I mean, my senior…” he admitted laying his head on his arms in distress. “He said the first step into being stronger is to be smart. So I...well..borrowed some books from other second-years.”

“Be smart? I don’t think Vil would say something like that…” you said.

“I ‘on’t know! I didn’t understand a single w’rd he said s-so I assumed that!” he burst out as he sat back with a scowl on his face. You sighed, scooting closer to the boy and wrapping an arm around his shoulder. Just across the room where the both of you sat were Vil and Rook. You can’t hear what they’re talking about yet you could see how focused they both were as they communicated with another third-year. 

“Epel, you know…” you began, rubbing his arm in a comforting way, “Whatever Vil told you, he just wants you to do well.”

“But ‘e’s too harsh!”

“Not everything is going to be easy and Vil just wants to see you work hard. You wouldn’t be able to carry that interviewer’s luggage if it wasn’t for him working out your arms right? He just finds a way to gear you up.”

“He succeeded alright…” he mumbled, following your gaze over to his senior. As he looked at Vil, he remembered how he turned down his magic wheel design in order to bring out his full potential in creativeness. Admittedly, he often misunderstands Vil’s words into something much cruel but people learn from mistakes, right?

With a deep inhale, Epel stood up and collected the books. “Alright! I’ll prove to Vil that I’m gonna be the best. Someday, I’ll… I’ll…”

“Think about it Epel. You still have a long way to go.” 

“Ahhh…” he moaned and nodded. “I’ll be back! I still have some flowers to pick for the experiment! See you, y/n!”

You waved at the departing boy. Adorable. No small body can hold such a big ambition. And just what was still the answer to your question about Vil? What does he want?

“That boy,” you heard the dorm leader sigh as he and Rook walked closer. The latter chuckling to himself as he sat beside you. “He complained again, didn’t he?” he questioned. Nodding as a response, you laid your head on the arm of the couch as Vil eyed you.

“He misunderstood me again, no?”

“He understood afterward. No biggie,” you grinned.

“Either way, you conveyed my message--” He moved his hand, swatting the air in a sign of disregard, “But that won’t be the last time I’ll persuade him to do better.”

“We know,” You and Rook simultaneously spoke. You mentioned how Vil could even tolerate Epel’s attitude and how immune he is to his personality. You remembered how both yourself and Mr. Schoneheit are immune to Vil’s determination and non stop hard work. Is there a difference? Maybe there is, maybe none. That’s a Pomefiore student after all.

No harsh or rude words can knock them down. Determined? Hah! That’s a battle with oneself against the world. How poisonous would a flower be if its beauty and ability are showcased to everyone. Nothing can destroy something so elegant yet powerful when they are their own poison. Being poisonous is something to brag about.

“He’s cute but he’s the first student in Pomefiore that can fight you Vil.”

The young man laughed to himself, smirking your way in delight. “That’s a challenge I am looking forward to. After all, beautiful flowers are poisonous. But isn’t that just another one of their charms?”

© jangmi-latte, all rights reserved. Happy to Serve!

[blu-joons]

When You’re Angry When You’re Scary ~ EXO Reaction

Xiumin:

As soon as he spotted you getting worked up, you watched on as Minseok went behind one of the units in your home, pulling the door as he tried to hide from you.

“Why are you doing that?” You frowned, only feeling yourself get more frustrated by him messing around with you. “Do you not see how annoying this is? You’re supposed to help me.”

His head slowly peered around the door, “you’re always so scary when you’re angry, I thought I’d just hide behind here until it’s safe to come out. I am listening to your problems though; I’ll just help when you’re calm.”

“I’m not scary when I’m angry.”

“Do I need to remind you of when you broke the cutlery draw in a fit of rage?”

“That was just an accident,” you protested, but Minseok’s head shook. “You can’t really hold that against me every time I get angry, that’s unfair.”

“There’s plenty more things you’ve done I could bring up,” he smiled.

“Alright, I get it, I’m scary, but you don’t need to hide, really."

Suho:

From the moment he heard the front door slam shut as you walked into your home, Junmyeon ran through the house to greet you, quickly grabbing a hold of your hands.

“What are you doing that for?” You asked, trying to shake your jacket off without the use of your hands. “Are you planning on letting go of me or is this how we’re going to be for the rest of the night?”

His shoulders shrugged, “usually when you slam the door it’s because you’re angry, and you always grab things. So, I thought I’d stop you from breaking anything,” he teased, pressing a kiss against the tip of your nose.

“I don’t know whether this is nice or mean of you.”

“You know if you break anything, you’ll only make yourself angrier,” he reminded you.

“I guess you’re right,” you hummed, feeling let go of your hands momentarily so that you could take your jacket off. “I promise I’m calm though, it’s alright.”

“I would let go, but this is actually quite comfortable for me, having you so close.”

“I won’t complain if you don’t want to let go for a while.”

Lay:

He couldn’t help but sit back and chuckle as your voice got louder as your frustrations got bigger. It was only annoying you more seeing the huge smile on his face.

“I know you’re annoyed, but it’s no big deal,” Yixing grinned as you threw yourself back down onto the sofa, “you need to stop letting loads of little things get to you, it’s no good for you.”

Your brows knitted together, “are you forgetting what just happened? Chanyeol’s eaten the food I left in the fridge, that was my food and now I’m probably going to starve. How is any of this funny to you Yixing?”

“Because you’re cute when you’re angry, that’s why.”

“I’m not angry, I’m furious. I’d been looking forward to eating that all day.”

“I’ll buy you some more food,” he tried to reason, “but please just take a breath. It’s scary when you’re angry, somehow you just never stop talking.”

“Maybe if your friends didn’t make me angry, I wouldn’t be angry,” you snapped back.

“I’ll talk to him and sort it, just calm down a little bit.”

Baekhyun:

As your voice became louder and louder, Baekhyun struggled to know what to do to control your anger. As yet another yell came, he was left with no choice but to let go of a screech that matched yours.

“What are you doing?” You sighed, as finally you fell silent for a few moments whilst Baekhyun caught his breath. “I never even realised that your voice could go that high.”

He chuckled gently, coughing a few times, “neither did I, but it was the only way I was going to get you to be quiet. You’re getting yourself far too angry, you’re going to wake the whole street at this rate.”

“You didn’t have to shout; you can’t blame that on me.”

“I’d been saying your name for ten minutes, but you were far too angry to listen to me.”

“Why don’t you just admit you were getting scared,” you teased, finally beginning to calm yourself down. “You had no idea how else to get my attention.”

“You’re super scary when you’re angry, I didn’t know what else to do,” he blushed.

“Well, apparently shouting at me appears to do the trick.”

Chen:

He was running out of options to try and calm you down as your anger spoiled over, moving around the room, he wasn’t quite sure what came over him as his hand covered your mouth.

“That’s better,” he laughed as only muffled sounds came from you for a few moments. “Can you please just remember to breathe before you pass out. All of this isn’t going to help anyone.”

Once he was sure you were calm, Jongdae finally removed his hand from your mouth. “You don’t understand how annoying this is, everything was supposed to go perfectly but instead it’s all gone wrong, I’m allowed to be angry.”

“You’re not angry anymore, you’re just scary.”

“Covering my mouth isn’t going to stop me from complaining though,” you pointed out.

“Perhaps not, but at least it gave you a few moments to breath,” he argued back at you, “just talk for a moment and try not to get stressed about it.”

“That’s so easy for you to say, you’re always so calm,” you frowned.

“Try it, before you end up passed out on the ground.”

Chanyeol:

He didn’t know what else to do as you only wound yourself up more, his options were limited, with the exception of walking over to you and wrapping his arms tightly around you.

“Calm down,” he pleaded, whispering closely into your ear. “I know it’s frustrating but you’re going to make things so much worse for yourself if you don’t take a moment to relax.”

Your hands rested over his arms that were squeezing you closely into his chest. “You only ever do this when you have no idea how to comfort me. Is this your way of telling me that you were getting scared of my anger?”

“Well, I’ve not seen you this frustrated for a while now.”

“That’s because this whole situation is annoying, I swear the whole world is against me.”

“You say that every time,” he giggled, resting his head against yours, “and every time I have to remind you that everything will work itself out eventually, and I’m always right, aren’t I?”

“Sometimes,” you huffed, “I hate how much you can solve a situation.”

“I guess that’s just what a good boyfriend does.”

D.O.:

He knew better than to interrupt you when you were angry, even if it did scare him to see you so worked up. He sat and he waited for you to finally go quiet before he comforted you.

“Finished,” he chuckled, trying to quickly brighten up your mood. “I didn’t think you were ever going to stop talking, is work really that stressful at the moment?”

You knew Kyungsoo meant well, but stressful didn’t even begin to cover how you were feeling. “I nearly handed in my notice today, that’s how bad it got. I’m sorry for getting so angry, this has just been eating me up for days now.”

“There’s nothing wrong with getting angry, just maybe not so scary.”

“Sorry, I guess all these things just came to me and I didn’t really know what to do.”

“I feel better now that you’re a little less angry,” he laughed, pulling you into his side, “I thought for a moment you were going to end up talking all the way into the night.”

“I would have stopped eventually, but probably because you would have had to stop me,” you laughed.

“Eventually I would have found a way to stop you.”

Kai:

As you watched him place his headphones into his ears, you finally stopped complaining to him. He knew you’d spotted him, glancing across at you with a wide smirk.

“Finally,” he blushed, taking them back out again, “I thought I was going to end up having to drown you out with some music. How can one person be so scary?”

You scoffed, pushing lightly against his shoulder. “Alright, I admit that maybe I’m a little more agitated that usual, but you’re Jongin, there’s no way that you can be scared of me, you’re supposed to be all big and strong.”

“You really underestimate how scary you get when you’re on one.”

“I’m not even scary, there’s not a single scary bone in my body,” you protested.

“One day I’m going to record you so that you can see for yourself,” he teased, “it would be a miracle if we found one person who wouldn’t be scared of you.”

“Stop making me feel so bad,” you scolded, “you’ve got to be exaggerating right now.”

“I wish I was; you’ll see what I mean someday.”

Sehun:

Your expression furrowed as you watched Sehun pull out his phone in the middle of your rant, throwing your arms helplessly into the air out of frustration.

“Are you just not listening to me?” You yelled, only feeling yourself get angrier. “I thought I’d be able to come to you for help, but whatever is on your phone must be far more interesting.”

His head shook, showing you the screen of his phone. “I am listening, but when you’re this angry, the only way to calm you down is food. So, I thought I’d order something in before you end up giving me a right fright.”

“Do you really think food is the answer to all of this?”

“Are you going to try and tell me that food wouldn’t at least cheer you up a little bit right now?”

“Alright,” you sighed, admitting defeat, “maybe you win this time, but ordering food still won’t change the fact that I’m annoyed by all of this.”

“No, but it will stop you scaring the life out of me,” he teased, offering you a smile.

“I can’t believe you’re actually scared of me.”

---

Masterlist

[milk--loaf]

original script of a needlessly long review of buffy the vampire slayer - part one. check out the video

Hi there, just a question, but how do you start a YouTube channel? Like, I’m talking, how is a person meant to begin their very first YouTube video without sounding or looking like an uncomfortable mess with bad lighting? Every time some of my favorite YouTubers mention the words “first YouTube video,” it’s usually with a cringy expression, recalling their adolescent selves uploading a poorly-filmed tutorial immediately after the advent of Web 2.0

I know that most people aren’t actively looking up a person’s list of videos from oldest to newest, but it still begs the question, how do I avoid that? Can I avoid that at all? Like, with what I’m doing right now in this very moment, I’m completely unpracticed with naturally reading from a script, but I’m trying my best. I’m trying my best because I hope that someday, I might be able to use this platform as genuine creative outlet for my thoughts, and in the practice of creating these videos I’ll hopefully become more comfortable and polished and actually proud of the end product I come up with.

Genuinely, I doubt this first video will be anything good, or anything of special substance in the long-run. But if I want to get started, I have to start somewhere, and I’m guessing that’s with this introduction

So, that is to say—My name is Andrew, I’m twenty-six years old, and I recently graduated with my masters in English and Poetry. I pursued a subject like this because I am inspired by creatives and artists and critical thinkers. I love to write, and I love to read. But after I graduated, I found myself in this rut where I disengaged from those passions of mine. I moved away from my college town, away from most of my friends and family.

A large part of the reason I’m starting this YouTube channel is because I want to use this online space as a force that motivates me to return to form, that keeps me accountable as a critical thinker, to help re-join the conversation around books and other medias that I find important. In a way, maybe these first few videos will be like a journal, in which case, they’re just for me. But maybe, best case scenario, someone sees it and finds this to be interesting.

So, the question becomes, how do I start? Where do I start? On YouTube, the older I get, the more I find myself drawn to the kind of long-form content that analyzes and breaks down popular TV, and movies, and literature. I feel like that side of YouTube deliberately has to change itself to accommodate my demographic because I’m constantly hearing about this shift of what draws click and views according to the algorithm. So I think to myself: what do I click on?

I’d say I have a fairly limited scope in terms of how I choose a video. If I’m choosing a video essay that I know will be centered around some kind of scripted media, I want to choose something that aligns with my genre tastes, but that I know I’ll never watch.

If I’m clicking on a Jenny Nicholson video about The Vampire Diaries, I do it because I love supernatural content, but I know I’m never going to watch eight seasons of vampire trash. If I’m watching a Mike’s Mic video, it’s because I love a good mystery, but I genuinely can’t see myself investing in Pretty Little Liars for more than a few hours total. It’s why, when I click on a Bad Movies and a Beat review by Kennie J.D., I’m okay with listening to her rant about The Kissing Booth because I like shitty movies, but I don’t want to invest an hour and a half to suffer through it.

For me, a video essay has to balance on that precarious beam where the movie or TV show exists in my periphery, exists in my general realm of cultural knowledge without catching my full interest. I choose what can easily condense that material down. Maybe it’s just because I have ADHD or because I can’t commit to anything, but a 2-hour video hits that sweet spot of consumption without significant investment.

So what do I choose? What content am I most familiar with that I can revisit, that doesn’t seem like the priority in our cultural gaze right now? Well, you already know because it’s Buffy. It’s official: starting now, I’m out of the intro, you can’t make me go back there. I can’t wait when, a week from now, I can say I’ve grown so much since then, and how embarrassing that is.

To really dive into the meat of this video now, what I wanted to do from the outset was take a close look at the show season-to-season and track the ups and downs of every major player in and out of the main cast, the group that will soon be known as the “Scooby Gang.”

If you’ve taken even a cursory gander at the academic angle, Buffy has been ripped to shreds and sewn back together over and over since its inception, whether from a feminist lens, a horror lens, or even a queer lens, and from what I can tell it’s only recently that the conversation has calmed, but honestly it’s also very possible that I just don’t have my ear to the ground anymore, and maybe that’s a good thing. I’d rather be “no thoughts heady empty” and recount the basic plot because that’s fun, that’s what I’m here for—any critical thinking I might apply to this will likely be very old news. But what can I say, I want to start with low pressure.

So, Buffy as a TV show first aired March 10th, 1997 on “the WB” channel and ran for just over six years, or seven seasons total, making one network switch during its run to UPN after its fifth season. Buffy had 144 episodes total, and if my math is mathing correctly, every season after the first had twenty-two episodes, while the first only had twelve because, as it turns out, Buffy was a mid-season replacement for a different show. Buffy the Vampire Slayer as a TV show is actually technically a spin-off from a movie of the same name that premiered in theaters five years earlier, in 1992. 

Fun personal fact on that, I actually have never seen this original film, and you would think for my research I’d spend an hour and a half watching the film to maybe build my ethos, but no. No hate to the film at all, but you know when you’ve gone so long without doing something that it becomes some microscopic part of your personality that no one except yourself is aware of, well, yeah, that’s what happened to me.

Maybe that’s just one my neuroses, I don’t know. Anyway, from what I’ve read, the director of the film version, Kaz Kuzui, and Buffy’s original creator, Joss Whedon, had creative differences in terms of certain story beats and the overall tone, so when the show starting rolling around and Whedon took overall control,  the show’s production shifted dramatically from the first iteration of Buffy to the second. And yes, I will talk about Joss Whedon eventually.

So, in the five years between the film and the show, the entire cast and a large chunk of the production team changed and, plot-wise, the only relevant narrative to continue forth into the new series is how Buffy, at her old school, burned down an entire gymnasium to kill a bunch of vampires. Apparently it was very dramatic, and the show’s pilot itself begins with Buffy moving to a new town with her mother and beginning anew in Sunnydale, California, with a brand new reputation and a horrible school transcript.

For the sake of this video and to honor Buffy with as much depth as I can give it, I’m going to break this analysis into two halves, so that this half, part one. focuses on Buffy’s high school years, or seasons one to three. If you’re talking to Buffy purists, many may tell you that these first three seasons mark some of the most intense and well-crafted overarching plots in the show’s history, and they’re not entirely wrong. The ups, the downs, the character beats and developments and turns, all of these for me feel perfectly compact and condensed in this three-season structure.

I actually really enjoy season four to seven just as much as these seasons, and I actually appreciate the break from form when Buffy later enters college, but I’m getting ahead of myself talking about that.

If we’re to start right at the beginning, the central cast begins with Buffy Summers played by the beautiful and talented Sarah Michelle Gellar, as she attends her first day of her sophomore year. She’s the vampire slayer, the slayer of vampires, and being marked as a Chosen One to protect all mankind against the darkness is a big bummer when, understandably, all you want to do is date a few boys, enjoy your birthday party and, I don’t know… not flunk a science test, I guess.

But no, she’s been imbued with the sacred ability to kick ass and dust baddies, and any time Buffy gets the opportunity to monologue in the first few seasons—which is a lot—there will inevitably be some iteration of this complaint whereupon a vamp impedes on her normal life.

If we’re to follow the pilot, a lot of things get set up as Buffy attends her first day of class at Sunnydale High, so I’ll be going into this episode with a bit more depth and a detail than many of the following entries in this season. Those other episodes may have a few expansive plot elements sprinkled in, but largely focus on the monster of the week—whether that’s a sexy praying mantis who’s also their science teacher, an Inca mummy girl disguised as a transfer student, or a… pack of student bullies possessed by hyenas? Yeah.

All great and maybe questionable episodes, but ultimately less relevant when considering the bigger picture. To explain, each season of Buffy has what the characters and writers refer to as the Big Bad, who is an especially powerful or persistent evil power that is hellbent on destroying Buffy and/or taking over wil world, or perhaps destroying. If the plot isn’t moving in that direction, chances are I might gloss over it.

So Buffy’s going about her day, she’s looking cute, she has a stake in her bag. The first person she actually meets is Xander, but the first thing I really want to point out is this random shot of Xander, another central cast member, riding a skateboard? I bring this up because Xander never skateboards again.

According to Joss Whedon the setup for this shot and coordination of the camera along with the extras in the background really made this difficult to accomplish, and afterward the entire team was like sike, let’s get rid of that character trait. Anyway, later Buffy runs into Xander in the hallway, helping her pick up a few things she’s dropped. 

It’s a good a time as any to really introduce him. Xander is a pivotal member of what will soon be known as the “Scooby Gang,” which is the tightly-knit main cast who are all in on the big vampire secret and who we’ll soon see work together as a team to protect Sunnydale, combining their strength, their wits, and their smarts to combat a greater evil.

Xander is… well, if we’re thinking of what Xander contributes to a group dynamic… I’m guessing it’s “heart”? The answer is heart. But that always felt like a gimme answer when dividing up character tropes, a sort-of leftovers trait handed out when all the other more pivotal roles are taken, be it the Hufflepuff house or… Shaggy in Scooby doo. 

A character like Xander is meant to be the goofy, a fun-loving guy who tells jokes and eases tensions, but the problem is, with Buffy, you have an entire cast of witty characters spouting one-liners and speaking Whedonese—also known as Buffy Speak [SCREENSHOT OF BUFFY SPEAK FROM TV TROPES]—so it begs the question: what does Xander have that’s unique to him? And that, very pointedly in the series, is usually nothing. A big fat pile of nothing.

Xander often struggles with justifying his own position in the group, mostly because he is neither the strongest nor the smartest, and if you ever look closely at both his shorter and longer character arcs, you’ll see he either reaches an epiphany that he is, in fact, important to the group, or all that angst and resentment of inferiority weaves itself frustratingly into his next self-deprecating joke. 

If you can’t tell already, Xander isn’t exactly my favorite character. His sense of inferiority often makes him whiny and possessive, largely of Buffy because he has this open secret of a crush on her. I know all of this is intentional on the writer’s part, and I think the team does a great job of making every character both interesting and imperfect for the most part, but Xander’s darker personality traits really rack up episode after episode.

I have to remember that Buffy came out long before streaming services were a thing, so the concept of “binging” entire seasons of a TV show, at least by that name, wasn’t as common. Arguably, in small doses, Xander is a lot more interesting. Also, this is just a reminder to myself to talk about the episode titled The Zeppo later on in more depth. I’m giving myself that reminder now.

Anyway, it turns out the next character Buffy meets is Cordelia, but she’s an interesting feature of the main cast who I want to put a pin in for now. All you really need to know at this moment is that Cordelia’s hot, she loves fashion, she comes from a rich family, and she’s a bitch. It’s great. She and Buffy hit it off in class, but spoiler alert, this friendship isn’t going to last for long.

Buffy meets the next main cast member when she visits the library to pick up a few books for her classes, and what would usually be a really quick trip in and out for a textbook turns out to be an encounter with someone who, at the beginning of the series, is really just Buffy’s cranky, British babysitter.

It’s Giles, Rupert Giles, the very new librarian and a person Buffy’s never seen or heard about. He knows who she is, but she doesn’t know who he is, and when she says her name—boom. Drops this big book you’ll see in every credits sequence for at least half the show. He seems excited at the prospect of meeting her, but she absolutely hates that. Books it out of the library in record time, honestly.

Also, a dead guy is found in the girl’s locker. But anyway. Dead bodies aren’t really remarkable in this show, he’s just a means to an end at this point. We saw him still alive in the show’s very first scene. That’s Darla, she’s a cheeky little vampire in season one with a whole lot of backstory and I don’t have time for her right now.  She killed him, it’s very dramatic, very exciting stuff. Moving on!

Who cares about a dead guy when Buffy finally meets one of my favorite characters in the series, and honestly that’s not at all an uncommon opinion. Or at least, from what I can tell. It’s Willow, nerdy, wallflower Willow. Buffy briefly saw her earlier when she was talking to Cordelia, but now they’ve finally met.

On the theme of trying to be a normal school girl and doing normal teenager things, Buffy’s asks Willow for help catching up on school work, which Willow says yes to. Xander shows up and so does their friend Jesse, but I’m not focusing on them right now! I’m focusing on Willow!

I’d actually say it’s really hard to talk about Willow in retrospect, because when you take into account just how much character growth she experiences over seven seasons, just how much she comes out of her shell and learns about herself and her passions, looking back at season one really makes you realize just how sheltered and un-blossomed she is. Is that a word? I’m not sure, but I’m saying it.

She’s the stereotypical nerd, she’s not good at talking to boys at all, she gets picked on by popular girls and has a crush on her best friend, Xander. They’re very endearing traits, and on the surface they might feel stereotypical. 

But I don’t know, there’s both a certain weight to Willow’s character in season one—of timidity, and repressed feelings—that makes her feel more fleshed out than a stereotype. To add to that, there’s a levity to her and those underlying themes. She’s not a fighter, but she intensely cares for her friends, and in times of crisis, she doesn’t cower away from the face of pure evil. 

She’s brave despite her fears and inability to fight, she’s infinitely resourceful, and she has this continuous positivity, or maybe I should call it hopefulness, when talking with her friends and tackling tough situations.   Willow especially favors the kind of cheeky writing that’s so integral to the show because it elevates her from the basic image of a dork to someone who, despite her initially shy demeanor, can really come out of her shell when she wants to.

I think you can really find these traits popping out more once we enter season two and beyond, because the bonds she builds with the Scooby Gang, with Buffy and also Giles, they allow her to carve out this space for herself, to be more confident in everyday situations, even if she stumbles over her words or isn’t sure what she’s said is right. I think I’m going on a bit long about her, but the point is here, Buffy and Willow have found a friend each other.

The first episode actually poses them as foils, I think, particularly when we consider their confidence and their sexualities; Buffy is obviously confident and forthright and stands up for herself, meanwhile Willow literally can’t speak to guys. She talks about it later in the club, actually. Anyway, there’s some banter between the girls and the guys before Cordelia comes up and tells them about the body that was found.

This next scene, I actually find to be a bit bizarre, because Buffy, despite wanting to be this normal girl, cannot help herself from investigating the scene and finding the body. It’s not that she wants to find it that’s weird to me, but do you see this scene she comes upon? There’s literally nobody there. Where are the police, where’s the CSI team? I guess in retrospect this really sets up the fact that Sunnydale’s police force is virtually nonexistent. In fact, I really can’t remember a single time where police tried to stop a crime or a mugging?

Okay, I’m looking it up and apparently, out of 144 episodes, Sunnydale PD shows up or is mentioned in exactly four episodes. Yeah, okay. A character at one point says the police department is, quote, “deeply stupid.” Hell yeah, ACAB. Anyway.

Anyway, Buffy is super ticked off about this, and rightfully so. The only person she can consult about this and, more importantly, complain to, is Giles. Here’s the part where we learn who Giles is, which is her Watcher, AKA some guy elected by this historical British council with heavy Tory vibes to watch over the Slayer, train her, whip her into shape, etc.  More importantly, we get probably the first distinct monologue from Buffy about being a normal teenage girl.

[ENTER SCENE]

Love that. Good for her. Giles is very timid at this point, or, actually, I’d say he’s just very thrown off by Buffy’s attitude as the Slayer. He doesn’t understand how teenagers speak or think or act the way they do, and he doesn’t get why Buffy isn’t ready to kick ass and give up her entire personal life. The thing about Giles, if we’re really going to get into him now, is he’s at a crossroads. He’s very posh and by the books, he’s very traditional in that way and expects his relationship with the Slayer to be professional and distant. So part of him is really stern.

But then you have Buffy waltzing in and challenging the entire status quo by being a sassy sixteen-year old, so early-seasons Giles is really just trying to figure out how to be an authority figure to the Slayer figure while also trying to  detangle the often chaotic and unpredictable mind of a girl who just wants to go to a house party, or go on a date with a boy.

So, spoiler alert, as Buffy and Giles get closer to one another, Giles eventually becomes her father figure. I debated saying like a father figure, because Buffy does have a father who shows up like two episodes, but for all intents and purpose, Giles is the one who she has to look up to for guidance, and Giles is the one who must be both a strict authority and emotional rock. He’s very bad at that second thing at first, and doesn’t set out to inhabit that role, but it happens with time. 

Anyway, two important points of this scene: one, Giles postulates that Sunnydale must be the center of mystical energy, which is very correct, and two: Xander of all people is hidden in the back of the scene, I guess looking for a book of some kind, and he hears everything Buffy and Giles say regarding vampires and slaying, etc., etc. Scene end.

I’m gonna go a bit faster here, because this is when we get a scene of a random vampire dude praying in a cave talking about how the “sleep will wake and the world will end,” oooh, spooky, very big stuff. The next scene with this dude is great because it turns out we meet the Big Bad in the very first episode; his name’s the Master. I guess it’s because this is a half season, I don’t know.

This might be an unpopular opinion, but I actually really like the Master? Like, I don’t like the Master himself, but if you take into account every Big Bad that the Scooby Gang encounters in later seasons, the Master, by virtue of being the first, is really just this transparently-written catalyst of a bad guy whose sole purpose is to unite the Scooby Gang against a common enemy, and that’s it.  

The role and plot are played really straight, for what it’s worth, but just look at him—look at his dead eyes and his weird Kool-Aid mouth, and try to tell me that this man has a deep, complex personality. You can’t. He’s the Buffy equivalent of Nosferatu, except the Spongebob version where he just flicks the lights on and off, and it’s great. He says his lines in a funny accent, he gives Buffy the opportunity for a few cool one-liners, and boom, he’s gone by the end of episode twelve.

Anyway, Buffy has been invited out to The Bronze that evening by Cordelia, and I love The Bronze, but like… what club lets underage kids in? Don’t get me wrong, I’d love a place like the Bronze, but I don’t know who’s checking those IDs, man.

Anyway, Buffy actually meets up with Willow and not Cordelia, and this is where they have that interesting foil I was talking about—Willow tells Buffy about her inability to talk to boys, and Buffy encourages her to make her move.  This is what I’m talking about with Willow when I say she’s actually very brave despite the archetype she falls into, because as soon Buffy steps away, girl is on the prowl.

Turns out she left because old Giles is watching her from afar, and they have this very intense little chat on the club’s mezzanine. Giles tells her she should be able to identify a vampire through the dine of noise and people, and then we get this little gem of a scene:

[INSERT OUTDATED SHIRT SCENE]

It turns out that unfashionable vampire is talking to Willow, and then the vampire leads her out of the building. Fearing for Willow’s safety, Buffy leaves Giles and attempts to pursue them. A funny thing about the following scnee, so you’ve seen this guy Jesse in a few shots, but I’m not going to dive into him for a pretty good reason. He’s talking with Darla, that girl from the beginning who at that other dude? Yeah, turns out these two vamps are bringing sacrifices to the Master for something called the Harvest. Yeah, the Master’s too weak to escape the cave he’s been magically revived in, so he needs a bunch of sacrifices, the usual evil stuff.

So, everyone I’ve talked about in depth so far—Buffy, Xander, Willow and Giles—these are the integral members of the Scooby Gang, you can’t have the Scooby Gang without them, but there are some very important tangential members thus far. The first is Cordelia, you saw her at school being bitchy but fashionable and it’s around this time that Buffy finally reveals how weird she is. While she’s tracking Willow and that vampire, she mistakes Cordelia for a bad guy, and we get this amazing line:

“What is your childhood trauma?” (S1 E1, Welcome to the Hellmouth)

I also really like this character. Cordelia really is a bitch, and the great thing about her character in this first season is that she really doesn’t reveal much of a soft side. She does have a soft side, and as she grows up and moves through the Buffyverse, she gets a lot more complex, but these first few seasons have her navigating around the Scoobies in a really interesting  (AKA very mean) way, because despite her harsh personality she often has to coordinate with the Scooby Gang despite her best efforts. I think you could liken her to Regina George in Mean Girls with that popular girl stereotype, and let’s be honest, she doesn’t stray too far from that role at the beginning, like Willow strays from the nerd role. But like, who wouldn’t want to see Regina George stake a few vamps? It’s camp, I’m calling it camp.

The other role is someone who’s scene I actually recently ignored, and that’s right before Buffy arrives at the Bronze. Downtown Sunnydale, you’ll realize when you watch this series, has like, one grimy, dark alley that they use as a setpiece. Characters walk dramatically down its center, engage in fantastically-choreographed fight scenes, and they’re all thrown against nearby trash bags, dumpsters. It’s great. Buffy’s walking down this alley when she realizes someone’s tailing her, and bam! [HANDSTAND/KICK SCENE – enter here] she ambushes him. 

Turns out this is Angel; we don’t get a lot from him in this first episode. But he’s hot, he’s wearing this weird velvet black blazer, and he warns Buffy about the Harvest, conveniently leaving the Master’s name out of the conversation. We get way more of him later, but all I’ll say here is that he was the blueprint! I love Twilight, but Edward did not invent the vampire boyfriend up-do! Anyway, end scene.

God, somehow I’m still talking about the pilot. Let’s make this fast: Darla and the male vampire have each brought a victim back to this creepy mausoleum, but Darla, that harlot, already bit her victim, Jesse. He’s not dead, he’s still wandering around lightheaded, but he’s been compromised. Buffy has left the Bronze and Giles behind and confidently strolls into the mausoleum to save her newfound friends.

This is really the first scene where Buffy is able to reveal her quippy banter prowess. [ENTER A FEW LINES OF DIALOGUE] She kills the male vampire, Darla manages to escape, but then there’s this third vampire who comes upon the scene! Wham, bam! Nearly kills Buffy! I love this last show, look—[last show]—a freeze frame? Like, oh my god? I don’t think they ever did that again in the series. I love it.

Anyway, that’s the first episode. 

Okay, so where do we go from here? I already mentioned how the Master himself is basically just a conduit for all of Buffy’s friends to meet and get used to their crime-fighting dynamic together, so as I was watching all these other episodes from season one in my free time, I ultimately came to the realization that it’s not necessary to cover his rise and fall of power with excess detail.

I’ll give you the basics, he loses his fight against Buffy and gets irreparably vanquished in the process, but it’s really how the writers provoke the world around the Master into action, both good and bad, that really matters. 

When he’s later taunting Buffy in a one-on-one fight, it doesn’t necessarily matter that he’s this evil, ugly demon hellbent on killing her. But rather, his importance is that he represents something bigger than himself for Buffy, he’s the embodied reminder that this teenage girl has a terrifying mystical obligation she must face, that she must accept herself as the Slayer, and all the burdens of prophecy that come with it. Season one forces Buffy in the most straightforward of ways to understand her life will never be normal, but instead of giving that up that normal part of herself, 

Buffy carves out a corner where she is able to exist on both sides—as the Slayer, yes, but also as a friend, a daughter, a student, a cheerleader, and a young adult, moving through the world at her own pace. Buffy the Vampire Slayer as a TV show isn’t about the struggle of having to choose between two very different sides of life, but rather the active decision to live in both of these worlds simultaneously. 

You can see the various powers who sway her life most obviously through Buffy’s mother, Joyce Summers, who only wants her to be a happy and normal teenage girl, and then Giles, who at first struggles to understand Buffy’s compromise of lifestyle and often devalues those social and personal needs. This whole part of the topic really makes me want to talk about Faith, who is a character we meet in Season 2, but I’m gonna hold off on that for the sake of keeping all this organized.

So, to jump back into where we are in the plot, you already saw in the freeze frame that Buffy’s pilot episode was actually the first half of a two parter, but I’m not going into nearly as much depth as last time. To keep this brief, Buffy manages to save herself and rescue all of her friends from that mausoleum and the Master’s posse—except, notably, Jesse.  

The Master, in his little cave, decides that Jesse will no longer serve as a sacrifice, but rather, has been upgraded to the role of “bait” so the vamps can lure in the Slayer. The Scooby Gang figures out how the vampires are getting around, which is through Sunnydale’s sewer system, and she goes back to save Jesse. Oh, and Xander follows because he cares for Jesse but the way it’s written it really just feels like he can’t trust Buffy to do it by herself, because, I don’t know, sexism.

Unfortunately, they find Jesse in the tunnels and he starts leading them back out, but it turns out all that biting Darla did turned Jesse into a vampire. He tries to kill him in this weird boiler room, but Xander and Buffy manage to escape through some air vents. Meanwhile, Giles and Willow have gained intel on why the hell everything is happening.

Turns out, and this is important, that the entirety of Sunnydale sits on top of what’s called the Hellmouth, which Giles describes to be a portal between this reality and the next, and the Master is seeking to open the Hellmouth so he can roam the world and do bad guy things. 

The Hellmouth is ultimately very pivotal to the series because it’s always under constant threat of being opened by a bad guy or two. But more importantly than that, lore-wise, the Hellmouth isn’t simply this mystical portal, it’s also, in large part, the sole reason why so many supernatural creatures converge upon (or arise in) Sunnydale episode after episode, like it’s a Twilight Zone magnet of a town.

Most of the weekly creatures don’t even mention the Hellmouth, but it gives reason to how, for example, a Sunnydale student who has no friends in one episode can magically becomes invisible, or why a kid in a coma can turn the entire town into a literal nightmare hellscape because of his repressed traumas. It can also be the vague explanation for how Buffy landed in Sunnydale rather than somewhere a bit more normal.

Moving forward, Giles is able to deduce that the Master’s harvest can only happen one night in a century, and that happens to be tonight. I mention this specifically because episode two gives us the very important distinction between Giles’ type of smarts and Willow’s—Giles, of course, has a massive index of supernatural texts, untranslated prophecies, and is, himself, an encyclopedia on vampires and other evil life forms. Meanwhile Willow—earlier in the episode we saw her gain access to Sunnydale’s city plans so they can learn about the sewer tunnels, to which she explains this:

[STUMBLED ONTO THEM CLIP]

I think that explains their differences pretty well. The Scooby Gang determines the only place the Harvest can happen that night is at the Bronze, and they go to put an end to it. There’s this vampire again, the freeze frame guy—Buffy only escaped him the first time and didn’t kill him, and turns out, the way the Master plans to escape the Hellmouth is by making this other dude his vessel, who he can feed through.

Which—sounds kinda gay. But I’m not gonna get into that for now. Contrary to like, every other vampire media in the nineties and earlier two thousands, Buffy’s vampires are nearly absent of homoeroticism—with a few notable exceptions. Anyway, Buffy ends up fighting these dudes, saves Cordelia from getting fed on, and kills the Vessel, ruining the Master’s harvest. Darla escapes alive, but barely, and then—oops! Yeah, Xander kills vampire Jesse.

I wanted to have a whole section on Jesse as a sike-out, honestly, but I ultimately cut it. Which I find funny, because apparently behind the scenes, Joss Whedon also wanted Jesse to be a sike-out character. Apparently there were plans mad to have Jesse’s actor, Eric Balfour, briefly featured in the show’s opening theme, but apparently they just didn’t have the budget yet. The shows redeems itself on this front way later in the series, which I can commend, but not for the actual character killed. If you’ve seen the show you know what I’m talking about here.

That’s the end of that episode. Also, when I was watching this episode, they actually talk about the police when Willow asks if the Scoobies should call about this whole debacle, but Buffy immediately turns that idea down. I think that’s all I really wanted to talk about that episode, so if we’re keeping track, Darla’s still alive, the Master’s stuck in his little cave still, and Angel is still around, but I didn’t mention him because he’s being very mysterious and therefore useless.

So, not to brag or anything, but I have all seven season of Buffy on DVD, and each season has a little pamphlet on the inside that synopsizes each episode. I just wanted to read a few of the lesser-important episodes out to you, because I love them. They’re structured like poems and honestly, I feel like the writers had a field day putting them together

So, starting with episode 3, titled Witch: “In an effort to inject some normalcy / into her life Buffy tries out / for the cheerleading squad – / only to discover the competition / wants her dead.”

Yeah, so this episode follows Buffy as she tries out (and fails) to make the cheerleading team. Through a series of unpredictable events, popular girls are forced off the team thanks to magical meddling and witchcraft. One talented girl is set on fire during the tryouts, another girl literally has her mouth disappear off her face, and Cordelia goes blind during a driving test. Big yikes. 

It turns out a girl who made second alternate, possessed by her evil mom, is cursing all these girls so more spots open on the team, just so she can relive her glory days as cheer captain. Yeah, weird.

The only actual relevant thing to come out of this episode is Amy, that second alternate. Usually, tertiary characters never show up after their episode, but Amy will randomly pop up once a season or every other season, which is a nice break from the rules.

Notably, this is the first time Giles gets knocked out in the series. You’ll realize this is a running them throughout the show’s seven seasons.

Moving onto episode 4, titled Teacher’s Pet: “Xander falls for a beautiful substitute / teacher who is actually a She-Mantis / intent on mating with, then decapitating, virginal boys.”

Yeah, I don’t think there’s any better way to describe that episode. While I was watching this episode I didn’t actually take any notes because, big surprise, Buffy kills the She-Mantis. The big joke in this is that the She-Mantis only mates with virgins, and isn’t it funny that Xander is a virgin, etc., etc.

Skipping through the rest somewhat quickly. Episode 6, The Pack: “A field trip to the zoo turns deadly after / Xander and a clique of mean-spirited kids / become possessed by the spirit / of a demonic breed of hyenas.”

The only thing of note in this episode is that Principal Flutie dies. It’s kinda sad – Flutie at least tried to understand Buffy and look past her bad track record. But I get it, he didn’t add any conflict, unlike his replacement.

Also, Giles gets knocked out in this episode when the Scooby Gang faces the evil zookeeper.

Episode 8, I Robot… You Jane: “Willow unwittingly unleashes / a powerful demon named Moloch / onto the Internet where he turns Sunnydale’s / computer crowd into his helpless pawns.”

This is the episode where Jenny Calendar is introduced. She’s actually a great secondary character and I really love her personality. She’s the computer science teacher and Giles’ foil in a lot of ways, but I’ll go into her with more depth later. 

This episode’s great because it’s Buffy’s version of an afterschool special about internet stranger danger, except there’s an all-powerful demon possessing the internet. It’s a fun time capsule in retrospect and I recommend watching it even if you don’t know anything else about the show.

Episode 9, The Puppet Show: “Buffy suspects that a ventriloquist’s / dummy may be harvesting organs / from classmates performing in a school talent show.”

I really don’t like talking about this episode, which sucks, because when you remove the puppet, the rest of the script and the conceit itself is great. A mysterious demon is killing students in a talent show and Buffy has to figure out which performer is the bad guy. We love a mystery.

What sucks is that this puppet is a massive red herring of a suspect who takes up an absurd amount of the episode’s focus. He has way too much meaningless, pervy dialogue, the justification for him being a puppet is convoluted, and there are entire story beats dedicated to the puppet that ultimately serve as time filler. As the viewer, you’re led to believe he’s the bad guy harvesting organs, which would make all of this focus justified, but he isn’t! 

And when you learn he isn’t, you realize he’s this entirely useless, superfluous part of the plot whose only purpose was to distract you in a gimmicky way.

His connection to the demon at large is loose at best and it’s blandly described through dialogue, so as a viewer I feel like my time’s been wasted. It doesn’t help that his perverted dialogue is aimed towards underage girls. If this was funny back in 1990-whatever, then I’m glad we, as a society, have moved on.

I’m entirely thankful that the puppet never comes around again.

Episode 10 is Nightmares: “The nightmare world of a comatose / child sends Buffy and her friends / into a realm where their worst / nightmares become a reality.”

While I was watching this episode, I was trying to decide if I wanted to discuss this one with the other plot-heavy episodes, but decided against it, mostly because the Master’s part is a brief cameo. He clacks his fingers together at the start of the episode, foretelling chaotic energies afoot in Sunnydale, but that’s about it.

What is fun about this episode is it portrays some of the most innate fears of the main cast. 

With Xander, Willow, and Cordy, we’re mainly privy to very superficial fears like stage fright and clowns, which is fun. But most of the heavyweight fears that the explores, naturally, come from Buffy and Giles.

This episode gets a lot of praise for its character work, and I agree with that, I think this episode is really exciting. But I also get the sense that an episode like this would look entirely different if the writers pushed it off to a later season, even season two. 

There are legitimate existential fears that Willow and Xander, for example, could’ve explored, but I understand when it comes to a subject like our innermost nightmares, there needs to be a balance of heft and levity.

I think the strongest concepts explored here, of course, come from Buffy. This is one of the few episodes in the entire series that we get to see her dad, and I think they use him really well within the plot. 

Buffy is fearful that she was the cause of her parent’s divorce, and in the process of confronting that fear, Buffy talks with a fictional, dream-version of her dad who scathingly places all of the blame of the divorce on her.

It’s not merely that Buffy believes she is the cause of the divorce, it’s bigger than that—Buffy believes that she is this chaotic figure who is a burden to the people she cares for, that she only brings discord because of who she is as the slayer. Whenever there are real-life scenes with Joyce, Buffy’s mother, there is the underlying theme that Buffy must do well so she doesn’t cause stress, or worry, or resentment. She wants to be that teenage girl.

I’m already going on too long about this episode, so I’ll leave it there.

Episode 11, Out of Mind, Out of Sight: “As Cordelia prepares for Sunnydale / High’s May Queen competition, / an invisible force starts attacking / her closest friends.”

This is the last monster-of-the-week episode of season one, but it’s also a really pivotal one because it’s Cordelia-centric. As the last member of the main cast and the only one, besides Angel, to be circling outside the central Scooby Gang, Cordelia really needed some focus to complicate her character beyond basic mean girl. 

I won’t really dive into the monster itself in this episode, but a large theme is popularity, but also the inverse: loneliness. At one point in the episode, Buffy is alone with Cordelia, and they gravitate in conversation towards these themes. In all honestly, I think the entire conceit of this episode was a vehicle for this very pivotal piece of dialogue. Cordelia admits this to Buffy:

“You think I’m never lonely because I’m so cute and popular? I can be surrounded by people and be completely alone. It’s not like any of them really know me. I don’t even know if they like me half the time. People just want to be in the popular zone. Sometimes when I talk, everyone’s so busy agreeing with me, they don’t hear a word I say.”

Buffy says, “Well if you feel so alone, why do you work so hard at being popular?” Cordelia responds,

“Well, it beats being alone all by yourself.”

I think I can leave the episode there. It’s a really strong one. Also, this episode confirms that the government is aware of supernatural phenomena, which is funny, and eventually comes back around for season four.

Those are all the fun, non-plot heavy episodes from season one. I did leave out a lot of information while going over this stuff, which I admit, but at this point I’m trying to challenge myself with how well I can condense material down without losing a season’s narrative. So as we move into the rest of the season, you’re probably going to see me try different ideas out with mixed success. It’s all trial and error, and this is my first video, so I hope you can cut me some slack.

You also may have noticed after I finished talking about episode one, my outfit and the lighting’s changed again, and that’s because I’ve spent a lot of time between this recording and the last, taking notes and watching more of season one, and I’ve found myself faced with the interesting challenge of practicing liberal, wholesale trimming of story content. 

It’s funny, because if you know where I’ve been in the past two years or so, you know I’ve been teaching introductory English to college freshmen. 

A large part of the lectures I put together involve the ongoing practice of summarization, and learning how to summarize without sounding dismissive or reductive is more challenging when the focus of your writing becomes heftier, or bloated, really, in the sense that minutiae is constant, and mapping out the important story beats without the excess is a continuous process.

So if it seems like I’m being dismissive, then I welcome commentary and feedback, because I’m still very green to the process of internet content and don’t mind the help right now.

I did want to talk about the more story-driven episodes with more depth, and that means I’m going back to episode 5, which I skipped over. This episode’s titled Never Kill a Boy on the First Date, and this is the first pivotal episode where Buffy must navigate her two worlds in real time—being a regular teenager and vampire slayer. To briefly touch on overall story beats, there are a few pieces of the puzzle that I’ll identify now: 

The Master gains an ally through “the Anointed One,” who is allegedly the Master’s greatest warrior, quote “the slayer will not know him, will not stop him, and he will lead her into hell.” The large conceit of this plot is that Buffy and the Scooby Gang must stop the Anointed One from rising, but Buffy is in conflict because she has a date with a cute boy on the same night a few ritual sacrifices are meant to take place.

The great dramatic irony of this episode is that the vampire they believe is the Anointed One (or initially, a cadaver they expect will turn into the Anointed One) is actually a complete red herring, so the Master ends up gaining a new ally while the Scooby think they’ve beaten him at his game again.

It really sucks, because the guy she’s supposed to go on a date with is admittedly someone I probably would’ve found dreamy in high school. His name is Owen, and he’s just a throwaway tertiary character in the long run, because he never shows up again. I don’t know, he likes poetry and is always super quiet and brooding, yeah, very fun stuff.

It turns out, in the hijinks of trying to break off a date with him to defeat the fake Anointed One, he ends up following her to the confrontation and gets caught in the middle. At one point, Buffy wrongly believes a vampire has killed him, hence the title. Oh, and Giles gets knocked out during the big fight scene.

The devastation of this episode isn’t that he realizes she’s some kickass girl who fights bad guys, it’s the fact that he’s enthralled by that side of Buffy and wants to become like, an adrenaline junkie through being around her. This turn of events is revealed after the episode’s conflict has resolved itself, and it’s here that Buffy realizes that having a normal love life isn’t an easy or responsible task as the vampire slayer.

She ends up turning Owen down despite her growing like for him, and when talking about it with Giles, she describes her reasoning to be that she’s protecting him. Which makes sense, because right now he’s still a completely optional part of her life that she can protect by staying away from him, unlike her friends, who have inextricably woven themselves into the complicated world of vampire slayage. 

This is the turning point where Buffy truly realizes she must sacrifice living life the way she wants to for the safety of the world around her. It’s the first time I think the audience gets a fully realized understanding of what it’s like to require solitude as a prophetic, super powerful girl. There were conversations about it beforehand, but only now can we see those ramifications played out through Owen’s false death scene.

On the other hand, it also forces the audience to understand just how different Buffy truly is to every other slayer in history. A lifetime of solitude isn’t merely a suggestion, but a spoken rule of the job when we receive backstory on the lineage of the slayer. If you’ve seen the series, I’m talking about the various trippy dream sequences where Buffy encounters the First Slayer, and other historical slayers are explored or described.

More on that, there comes a time where we learn of, and meet other slayers alive and kicking in the Buffyverse, and it’s here that the contrast of Buffy’s lifestyle actualizes her as an anomaly in history. Funnily enough, this diverse lifestyle is also what keeps her both alive and sane. Having a support system, much like being a human being, is what keeps Buffy grounded.

So, you see what I mean when I say that the Master really is only a catalyst? Ultimately, the Anointed One is a mere motivator for Buffy to grow and understand herself, as a person, as an individual separated from the enviable ignorant. This “catalyst” theme continues when we near the end of season one, and the Master’s storyline wraps up completely.

Skipping ahead a bit, Episode 7 is titled Angel, so naturally the entire episode is focused exclusively on unwrapping the mystery that is this brooding, pre-Edwardian vampire bad boy. Skipping right to a big reveal in this episode, Angel is revealed to be a vampire. Through a series of hilarious hijinks set up by Darla and company, Angel and Buffy are forced to confront each other as opposites on the spectrum of good and evil.

Vampires, as Buffy and the Scooby Gang understand them, are universally, uniformly evil, mere facsimiles of humans by appearance and nothing more. Buffy actually learns of Angel’s vampirism after sharing their first kiss, So, naturally, when the idea is posed that she must kill him, as so deigned by her description, she is hesitant. He has always been kind to her, if a little aloof. Mysterious, more than anything else, but occasionally helpful and, very importantly, super hunky.

Meanwhile, Angel is confronted by Darla, but it’s not really a fight. It’s more like she’s taunting him for living above the surface, interacting with humanity, and drinking out blood bags stolen from a hospital. It turns out that Darla and Angel have a long and storied past. Darla, it’s revealed, was the vampire that actually turned him.

She taunts Angel and says that he should tell Buffy about the curse. As we learn through Giles, Angel is actually the current version of Angelus, a 240-year old vampire who was especially vicious and deadly throughout Europe before moving to America. After which, he basically disappeared off the face of the planet with no recorded hunting patterns or victims. 

Because Darla is a conniving little vampire, she gets into the Summers household and very lightly feeds on Buffy’s mom’s blood. Through perfect timing, she throws Joyce’s body into Angel’s awaiting arms and disappears. 

Thereafter, Buffy shows up on the scene and when she sees him, she understandably thinks he’s been feeding and that he’s evil. More dramatic irony ensues. Buffy prepares for maximum slayage.

When they have their confrontation, we learn the important details of Angel’s past. It turns out that Angel, while he was all evil and vicious, once fed on and killed a, uh… beloved Romani girl. What follows is that the Romani people then curse Angel with a soul so he may suffer in remembering his horrific, ungodly crimes that he committed for all eternity.

Just to pause, I think it’s obvious when I say that this feature of Angel’s backstory is really irresponsible and reprehensible. I agree with that criticism wholeheartedly, but to sit here and unfeelingly run through the dialogue which explains why this depiction is harmful would be, frankly, very old news. 

What I will say is, typically when a group of critically-minded, modern people return their gaze to an older media, their writing or logic is often riddled with the asterisk which states “this TV show or book was a product of its time, and can we really criticize it to its fullest extent.” It’s a practice, I think, that a lot of people embrace, including myself, when they encounter really bad social or political perspectives, interpretations, and depictions in aged content. And prior to really applying that to reality, I embrace this as good practice.

But when you look at any singular example of poor or unfair depiction in media, such as Buffy with the Romani people, you realize that the asterisk can’t feasibly apply. Especially in knowing that Buffy the Vampire Slayer exists as this flagship piece of syndicated media, it becomes obvious that no harmful portrayal exists in a vacuum, and it can’t be excused from judgment. 

There are obvious ramifications through the understanding that Buffy set a precedent, or at least perpetuated the precedent, that the Romani people are a one-dimensional, thieving, dishonest minority, and it’s only recently that this shitty trope is seeing less use. And it’s not that this criticism has only just come out of the woodwork, but rather that this magical thing called the internet conveniently disseminates critical thought to a wider platform of people. Buffy was never absolved of criticism, even when it was originally airing. 

From a superficial search, a fair few pieces of criticism I found were published around 2008 or 2009—Nikolina Dobreva, in their 2009 dissertation, describes Buffy to be deserving of criticism for portraying the Roma as primitive and, quote, “irrevocably foreign.” Meanwhile, Katie McClain in their 2008 article “Representation of the Roma in Buffy and Angel” observes the Buffyverse to depict the Roma as a vengeful, punishing people tied to magic and the occult. 

I did find this one brief news piece from 1998 about pushback from Romani critics, but the language seems a bit insensitive, so I’ll just put it on the screen.

I will say, that despite the criticism against Buffy’s depiction of the Roma, a lot of people actually find the minority’s primary representative, Jenny Calendar to be a pretty rad character. And I have to agree, I really love Jenny. She’s Sunnydale’s computer science teacher, and immediately upon entering the show, she and Giles spark up this interesting rivalry between them. Giles, being Giles, is really stuffy and technology averse, preferring to stick to ancient texts and old scriptures. In that way he’s very traditional, and stuck in his old ways.

Meanwhile Jenny, who describes herself to be a technopagan, is this confident, self-possessed woman who embraces the new age of technology, and even goes so far as to challenge the gatekeeping of knowledge by pompous white men. Very prevalent commentary there, Jenny. Reading from “Exploring the Contemporary Relevance of “Gypsy” Stereotypes in the Buffyverse,” Julianna Beaudoin (I’m sorry if I’m pronouncing that wrong) writes:

“Yet Whedon and his writers ended up creating a dynamic and multifaceted Romani character, Jenny Calendar, who, despite reinforcing certain Gypsy myths, overall defied stereotype and contributed to a positive Romani portrayal.”

Similarly, going back to Dobreva, they write that 

“Jenny’s character, despite the reversion to a few stereotypes, is arguably one of the most multi-faceted and positive representations of a female Gypsy in the past 20 years. In sharp contrast to all other Gypsy portrayals, she is technologically savvy… [etc. etc.]”

[Pause.]

I love how I was like, “I’m not going to talk about this subject,” and then I did exactly that.

To get back on track, this whole episode was about Angel, right? So yeah, the Roma cursed him to have a soul, and now he walks the earth as a suffering man grieving his many sins, up until he starts romantically stalking Buffy Summers. Returning to this episode, they have their conflict where Buffy nearly kills him, but luckily Angel is able to explain the many nuances of his brooding existence.

Oh, but that’s not all because Darla shows up with TWO FUCKING GUNS holy shit I fucking love Darla. Like, way to raise the stakes, girl.

Unfortunately, to further solidify Angel’s departure from his old evil ways, he symbolically kills Darla, the woman who originally turned him. Yada yada, the Master’s pissed and the Scooby Gang wins out for this episode. I think I spent more time on Jenny Calendar than I did Angel, but who cares. He’s the prototypical vampire boyfriend, so you already know his entire personality.

Moving on to Episode 12 and the finale of season one, Buffy and the rest of the Scooby Gang must face the everlasting trouble of prophecy, fate, destiny, whatever you want to call it. This is a big episode for Buffy, yes, but I’ll also say this is a big episode for Xander, too. 

The trouble I’ve noticed with older shows, AKA shows that aired before the era of online streaming, is it’s difficult to sprinkle pivotal story beats from episode to episode. Not every viewer can watch every episode as it first airs, so naturally, it makes sense for the writers to pack a lot of important character beats into a flagship episode like the finale, or a season premier.

I think after Buffy solidifies its place in pop culture and popularity, it’s definitely able to avoid those writing pitfalls, but I’d argue that season one Xander suffers from that type of writing. He’s pining after Buffy from the first moment he’s seen her, and it’s only in episode 12 that we see him finally make a move.

It’s really refreshing, I’ll admit, because for characters like Xander (and not only Xander), this type of unreciprocated, geeky pining often lasts for an entire series, and then the character is just uselessly piddling around until the finale. Nobody likes that. But Xander actually shoots his shot by asking Buffy to the school dance in this episode. Unfortunately, it’s a total bust and Buffy plainly explains to him that she doesn’t like him or view him like that, but at least he tried, right?

Xander struggles with the denial and mopes around for a while listening to sad country music, and for a brief second he’s giving, like, incel vibes, but it mostly reads as reactionary and temporary. Of course, the episode largely focuses around Buffy’s relationship with fate and duty, but Xander’s arc feels like an underrated aspect of this plot. 

In the climax of the episode when Buffy really needs him, he saves her life despite the negative feelings he previously felt. He makes the active decision to no longer wallow uselessly in the “friend zone,” instead actually picking up the mantle as a close friend. It’s the appropriate, normal thing to do, of course, to want to save your friend, but it’s still a transformative moment that I like.

Buffy’s arc, I think, can best be summed up by the visual presented at the climax of the episode—she is facing off against the Master, yes, but she’s doing it in her prom dress. When a fatal prophecy falls on the same night as the school dance, Buffy of course struggles throughout the episode thinking about her oncoming death, and responsibility, and her mystical fate, only wanting to deny that supernatural world and return to her normal life. 

But instead of simply running away, Buffy comes to understand that there’s no one else but her who can face off against the vampires and the other forces of evil, that it must be her. In the end, she doesn’t compromise her personal life or goals in the process, either, which is what the slayer is traditionally forced to decide—instead, she actively chooses to represent herself as both the slayer and as the normal girl, finding power in humanity and friendship, and a sense of normalcy. These worlds are symbolically, visually combined.

In fact, if it weren’t for her friends or her innate desire to stay true to herself, she would be dead. The Master, near the end of the episode, actually kills her and disposes of her, and it’s only through Xander’s help and care for her, that she survives. He gives her CPR, and after recovering, she’s able to fight the Master a second time and kick his ass. 

Other notes about this episode: it’s learned that the center of the Hellmouth’s is situated directly under the school’s library, which causes some fun hijinks near the climax with the Master. And I would put an asterisk on Buffy’s death, because that has an interesting domino effect down the line.

And that’s season one! That took a lot longer to go through than I thought, but I had a fun time. Moving onto season two, I’m not going to review every episode, so things are going to move much faster. The characters and stakes are set up, I’ve done my job, so now I’m just gonna focus on the fun stuff. I’m probably gonna make another cut here, so the next time you’ll see me, I’ll look different yet again.

[Pause in script; notes and outline for season two:]

Separate note: make a concession edit about the police: thus far in season two, they’ve shown up in S2E3 (“School Hard – police officers”), S2E8 (“Dark Age” – detective shows up), S2E9+10 (career fair – law enforcement), S2E11 (“Ted” – detectives, police, police station, arrests), S2E17 (“Passion,” blinking police lights after JC’s death), S2E19 (police officers, ambulances, police department). In Becoming pt. 1, Buffy is literally arrested for a crime didn’t commit. S3E6 (“Band Candy” – cops regressed into teenagers), S3E8 (“Lovers Walk” - cops are briefly mentioned having to “cover up” one of Spike’s murders in a magic shop). S3E14 (“Bad Girls” – cops try to arrest Faith/Buffy as they rob a weapons store). S3E15 (“Consequences” – the police interrogate Buffy at her house about the murder of Allan Finch). S3E19 (“Choices” – Snyder and the police ambush a trade-off of Willow and the Box of Gavrok).

Things to mention: new tech, and how the video is already an hour long, wow. I’d suggest watching the entirety of season 2 before starting this script—make a comment that you’re been around the block now, and mention how many episodes out of 22 you’ll be going over.

Maybe this is the right time to set up a numbered list of things to discuss in season 2?

1. New characters, the big bad, and character arcs

The romances (this season is about love):

1. Introducing Spike and Drusilla (Ep. 3 – plot setup, details) 2. Spike and Drusilla as the “ostensible” Big Bad of the season

Xander hooks up/dates Cordelia (Ep. 10 + Ep. 16)

Introducing Seth Green/Oz with Willow (Meet Ep. 10, date Ep. 13, + 15)

Angel + Buffy (Start dating Ep. 5, profess love Ep. 7, Making out by Ep. 12. Then, Ep. 13+14 for Angel losing soul,  Ep. 17)

Jenny + Giles romance and Jenny’s death (Ep. 8 + discuss after Passion/A+B)

Side note: mention the various monster-of-the-week episodes that have a partial “love” component/plot element.

1. Inca Mummy Girl 2. Reptile Boy (more about dating, but still fits) 3. Ted 4. Bad Eggs (literally begins from a school lesson about sex drive/hormones/sexual activity) 5. I Only Have Eyes For You.

2. Kendra’s brief stint as slayer (Ep. 9/10+Ep. 21)

3. Superfluous things I love:

Bazooka

Joyce learning about the slayer/metaphor for homosexuality.

Jonathan lmao

The finale. Ep. 21 + 22, Becoming

4. Random stuff

The DVD menu cutscenes??? Lmao

Cibo Matto!!

Buffy catching the sword

Fan cams (look up Jenny and Giles [and other relationships] on YouTube)

[bask in the revelry of new tech]

Honestly, I’m pretty pleased with the new setup. Since you last saw me, I’ve got a new desk to sit at, a new webcam, and a new microphone to make my recordings a lot nicer. I considered keeping the old background for continuity’s sake, but decided against it because I wanted to start fresh. I almost re-filmed the entire first hour of the video, too, but the idea of recording everything again nearly took all the energy out of me, so I didn’t.

You would think, with the amount of changes I made since the last recording, that it’s been like a month, but no, it’s actually only been a week and a half. For season one it took me like three weeks to watch twelve episodes and write a script and record it, but I decided to be a bit more serious and gung-ho with this next chapter in my review. On my own time, I’ve been watching the twenty-two episode of Buffy season two over the course of a week, four episodes a day, and two episode on the last day.

Honestly, I don’t know how people binge TV shows. Like, I enjoy taking my time. When I get into a TV show I usually deliberately space out the episodes to watch like, one or two a day so I don’t run out too soon. But with Buffy, I already know the plot, plus there’s a butt-ton of content to consume overall, so I was okay with watching it one episode after another. I don’t know, it just confounds me that people half-watch things. If I know I’ll be distracted by my phone or something else, then I just put off TV for another time.

Anyway, that’s all to say, I’ve taken a lot of notes, reviewed the various plots and relationships going on, and I wanted to take a slightly different approach than what I did with season one. Which is to say, instead of just summarizing the content, I wanted to order my biggest observations through a convenient numbered list.

And the first thing I really have to say, is: this season is about love! You literally can’t avoid it. In every plot, every subplot, and nearly every monster of the week, there’s some element of romance that plays into it, whether passion and lust is the reason a monster exists, or there is an undercurrent of love when it comes to the main Scooby Gang itself. 

And believe me when I say, legitimately every character in the main cast has linked up with someone else in the main cast. And if not with each other, then they’ve outsourced their romance to a secondary character. There are a couple of those, and I’ll introduce them when we get their way. So the first part of this list is reviewing the main couples of the season, and naturally I’ll try and divulge plot developments where relevant.

So, number one: Spike and Drusilla. These two are ostensibly the Big Bads of the season. When they’re introduced in episode 3, School Hard, they are treated with the same type of gravitas and plot relevance that the Master received, except this time it’s elevated because they aren’t as simple in concept or as transparently designed to unify the Scooby Gang. 

On the matter of Spike and Drusilla, I wanna skip the first two episodes of this season because they’re not too relevant in the grand scheme of things. I want to move right into talking about School Hard, because the very first shot you see of these two entering Sunnydale is as their barreling through the welcome sign, and it’s a great visual. They make callbacks to it later in the series, it’s a good bit.

As a funny note, the Anointed One, that kid vampire from last season, is still alive and trying to create an army to fight the Slayer, but Spike runs amok over their entire scheme and seizes control of their operation very cavalierly, very easily. As they’re introducing themselves to these low-life vampires, the audience is made to understand they have a solid motivation for arriving in Sunnydale, but I will say, the backstory is left fairly ambiguous.

Drusilla has apparently been wounded or made ill recently; the most concise explanation we get for this is that they were run out of Prague by a mob and she got injured along the way. The fun thing about these two vampires is that they are in love! Drusilla is, quite literally, this crazed, deranged, and very importantly, psychic vampire. And Spike—

[pause for dramatic effect]

Spike is just so handsome. I mean, that’s not his personality. Spike is very devil-may-care and violent. He has this bleach blonde hair and black nails and like, a scar running through his eyebrow. I don’t care how tacky that might look to some of you but I am happy to admit I immediately found him very attractive from the moment I saw him to the last time he was ever seen in the Buffyverse. I don’t know what it is, maybe I’m a little brainwashed. Maybe I’m a little bit Spike-pilled. What can I say, I drool for the guy.

If at any point you’re not happy with me describing my attraction to all of these men from the turn of the century, I don’t think this is the right video for you.

Anyway, I guess with Sunnydale being the Hellmouth, sitting on or living within its energies can have a restorative effect for injured baddies. It’s not exactly going to heal Drusilla, but at the very least the Hellmouth can sustain her. As a side note, her being “injured” has nothing to do with her being absolutely out of her mind. She’s just like that, and “healing” doesn’t involve that side of her. I’ll get into why she’s the way she is later.

My guess is that in this episode, the writing team wasn’t exactly sure what Spike and Drusilla were planning, but it somehow had to do with killing the slayer so Drusilla can heal. Later, in episode 6, Spike says to Dru that once he kills her, she can have her run of Sunnydale and get strong again. So it’s not exactly a ritual as far as the plot is concerned, more-so a desire to create a power vacuum.

Also funny, in episode 3, School Hard, Spike goes out of his way to introduce himself to Buffy in that alleyway outside the Bronze. Yeah, I know.

So, I actually want to talk about this episode in depth because I do really enjoy its premise and the way it plays out on the screen. On the Scooby Gang side of things, Buffy has been forcefully enlisted by the new principal, Principal Snyder, to set up the decorations and snacks for Parent-Teacher Night.

Principal Snyder, as a side note, is a really awful man who unfairly loathes Buffy, and any time he shows up he’ll drone on about how he hates high school and high schoolers. His goal, from the moment he replaces Flutie, is to screw over Buffy, get her expelled, delete her from existence, whatever. At this juncture, Snyder actually threatens Buffy with expulsion if she doesn’t help out.

So, of course, she’s forced to. And because Buffy is a show about the normal world and the supernatural world colliding, Spike’s ambush and conflict with the Slayer happens exactly on Parent-Teacher Night. I say I really enjoy this episode because when his gang of vampires attacks the school, they bar all the doors and windows so the building is on lock-down. This makes the episode feel very insular, very present rather than stretched out over a couple days.

Anyway, all the lights turn off, and because the vampires are incompetent, all of the main cast members escape into the school and hide in various rooms. The setup becomes very much like a game of chess, because the vampires have this brutish strength and kill any student they find, and Buffy must travel through the rafters of the school, gaining insight, weaponry, spreading messages.

Oh! And Buffy’s mom, Joyce, is there. A large focus of this episode is that Joyce talks with Principal Snyder and she’s vey disappointed with what she hears. Which is to say, through Snyder’s eyes, Buffy has returned to her old, violent, ways—you know, like when she burnt down her last school’s gymnasium. 

But what Joyce sees in this episode isn’t that Buffy is just some violent nuisance of a girl. But rather, she realizes she’s raised someone who’s very emotionally strong. There’s this quote from Joyce at the end of the episode: 

“I have a daughter who can take care of herself. Who’s brave and resourceful, and thinks of others in a crisis. No matter who you hang out with or what dumb stuff you think you need to do… I’m gonna sleep better knowing all that.” (S2 E3, School Hard)

This is also really handy, because there’s only so much suspension of disbelief one can handle in a show like Buffy. Sunnydale as a city-wide concept just doesn’t make sense: they have this insanely high body count month to month, mystical creatures are converging upon the town at a constant rate, and yet nobody is the wiser except for Buffy’s crew. 

Buffy regularly encounters intel about monsters before they become a problem, and circumstances often line up unrealistically to set up a convenient final battle. 

Examples in season 2 are Inca Mummy Girl, when the titular mummy pretends she is a transfer student who is meant to temporarily live at the Summers house. Orr the episode Ted, when an evil robot falls in love with Joyce Summers and conveniently no other woman her age. 

That’s all to say, for Joyce to know that Buffy isn’t a bad person and that she can handle herself, it lends a lot of flexibility to the plot that previously felt unearned. 

But I realize I’m getting distracted from Spike and Drusilla. Big surprise, the end of School Hard ends with a win for the Scooby Gang. Xander manages to escape the property alive and enlists Angel to fend off Spike, allowing for Buffy to escort her mother and other civilians from the school while he’s distracted.

Important developments do arise in how Angel distracts Spike. He walks into the front of the school and acts evil, and turns out, these two vampires are old buds. More importantly, Angel is called Angelus by Spike, and it’s revealed in this conversation that Angel was, in fact, Spike’s sire. This is a pretty big development. We’ll also learn later that Angel was the one to convert Drusilla as well, but that process was much more sinister.

Anyway, Spike ultimately doesn’t fall for the Angelus act. Before they can really fight, however Buffy shows up, having rescued all of the parents and teachers, and kicks Spike’s ass, sending him home. The episode ends with Drusilla an Spike needlessly killing the Anointed One by putting him in sunlight. 

Which, good. He was a vestige of the old plot and didn’t have a personality at all. The next really important plot point with Spike and Drusilla arrives in the two-parter episode, What’s My Line. This episode is really pivotal for a lot of relationship and plot developments, so I’m going to back and refer to this episode a number of times. There are various threads that weave their way in and out of this couplet, and I don’t want to miss the good stuff.

For now, I do want to talk about the main premise of this episode. Spike and Drusilla are trying to transcribe this old manuscript which may contain a cure for Drusilla’s illness. They send one of their lackeys to obtain an item called the du Lac cross, which somehow functions to decode the text containing the curative ritual.

The excavation of that cross from a mausoleum tips off the Scooby Gang, but Spike and Drusilla occupy those guys by siccing some bounty hunters called the Order of Taraka on them. This allows Spike to set up the ritual, which also involves capturing and sacrificing Angel to restore Drusilla’s health. Thanks to some earlier hijinks in the episode, this particular task isn’t too hard, so the ritual is set up without issue.

However, because it’s the Scooby Gang, they’re able to intervene before Angel is truly sacrificed. There’s this big fight scene between the good guys and Spike, along with the Order of Taraka, and Spike realizes they’re facing a losing battle. In a last-ditch effort to save himself and his girlfriend, he picks up Drusilla and attempts to flee the church. But buffy makes an entire organ fall on them, presumably killing them. Happy day for the good guys.

However, at the end of the episode, after everything’s been wrapped up, we see a shot of Drusilla rising out of the ashes carrying Spike. The power dynamic has completely inverted, and Drusilla has become the powerful one, with Spike ultimately confined to a wheelchair because of his injuries. 

This shift in power away from Spike is actually pivotal in the main plot, so I’m going to pause the Drusilla and Spike romance for now and come back to it at a later time. 

So, point number two: Xander and Cordelia. I wanted to move onto a lighter subject for now, and in terms of all the romances that go on in season two, theirs is treated with the least amount of heft, which is nice, actually; they’re the “funny” couple of this season. 

Now, Cordelia, being Cordelia, has historically trash-talked anybody who isn’t herself in the series, often hurling insults and low blows based off appearance or intelligence, even in sensitive situations. Xander, on the other hand, has always been snarky or hostile in return when Cordelia throws these insults, but in season two, the dynamic becomes very… one-to-one transactional, I’d say.

In contrast, Cordelia opts for less targeted harassment towards the likes of Buffy and the Scooby Gang, usually only spouting harsh judgment when she wrongly believes the statement she’s saying is neutral. For example, in one episode, Cordelia comments on the flatness of Willow’s hair, thinking she’s being constructive and not mean, when that isn’t the case.

But for Xander, because he’s trying to stand up for himself, Cordelia takes that as a challenge and they start throwing childish insults at each other in rapid succession. This happens consistently throughout the season, with the notable exception of episode 2. In this episode, Cordelia was nearly the victim of a Frankenstein monster, and Xander saved her. 

After that conflict, as Xander is complaining to Willow that everyone in the cast is linking up romantically, Cordelia tries to be vulnerable and sweet to Xander about how he was her hero, and he completely, obliviously blows her off.  So it’s obvious this couple won’t be falling for each other in the traditional romantic way.

More on that, returning to the two-parter episode What’s My Line, we see their relationship dramatically shift. Xander and Cordelia have been paired together to find Buffy, and they go to the Summers household, but get ambushed by a bounty hunter from the Order of Taraka. They get trapped in the Summers basement, and…

[insert I hate you/kiss scene]

So they start making out. They’re not actually dating, they’re just kissing a lot on the regular in broom closets and places where people won’t find them. After What’s My Line, Xander does try to speed things along by asking Cordelia to be his date to Buffy’s birthday party, but keeping in mind that Cordelia is very popular and Xander is a verified weirdo, she turns the idea down.

That said, they’re both at the party and will continue to make out in the future, but their budding relationship is very much kept a secret for now. Well, for the rest of the episode, at least. In episode 14, Innocence, Willow of all people finds them kissing and understandably gets really upset. We’re going to talk about Willow in just a minute and that whole debacle for just a minute, but for the sake of continuity, we’ll just say that the Scooby Gang is “in the know.”

What I will say is that Willow gets a romantic interest during this season that’s not Xander, and while Xander isn’t obviously upset or jealous, but he does regularly interrupt his make out sessions with Cordelia to babble on about how he isn’t sure what Willow sees in him, etc. etc. At one point, even Willow is talking with Cordelia on a friendly level, and Willow makes this really astute observation:

“He’s so busy looking around at everything he doesn’t have, he doesn’t even realize what he does have.” (S2 E15, Phases) 

There isn’t an immediate resolution to this observation because the episode is largely focused on Willow and other characters, but it’s an interesting character flaw that the show doesn’t actually waste or let fester. Episode 16, ed, Bothered, and Bewildered—say that three times fast—takes a dramatic turn when Cordelia’s popular friends criticize Cordy for dating Xander. As far as I know, they’re official as a couple by this point, but Cordelia bows to the social pressure and breaks up with him, which she actually really doesn’t want to do. 

But Xander takes it to heart and enlists Amy—remember Amy, the witch’s daughter from season one? Yeah, she’s come around for just this episode in season two—anyway, he enlists Amy to cast a love spell on Cordelia so that he can break up with her, but the spell backfires and causes the entire adult female population of Sunnydale except for Cordelia to become romantically obsessed with Xander, to the point that after a while, a mob of women, full of obsessive rage, try and kill both him and Cordelia.

I won’t spend too long on this episode, but something really important happens between Xander and Buffy. Buffy is the first girl to be affected by the spell, and naturally she escalates through lust and then passion before everyone else. At the start of season two, Xander actually (very annoyingly) resumes his crush for Buffy, and it’s very annoying.

But this episode, after Xander realizes that Buffy’s flirtation is false and that she’s not in her right mind, he makes the active and conscious effort to turn her down, which just goes to show that Xander isn’t all that bad of a guy. This sort of behavior just means he’s hit the minimum requirement of “not being an asshole,” but with Xander, you gotta take character growth wherever you can get it. Especially because, later in this season, he regresses in some very frustrating ways.

This episode is also really big for Cordelia as an individual, and not just as one part in the Xander-Cordelia couple. Once the conflict of the love spell has been resolved, she goes back to her popular friends, who continue to bully and berate Xander whenever they see him. But Cordelia isn’t the basic Regina George-style mean girl she used to be. I just want to put this clip in because I love it so much:

[You’re a sheep” speech]

I think the way Cordelia conveys her feelings and her resentments is very her—no other main cast member could or would go about saying this same sentiment in the same, still-superficial way she does. Cordelia isn’t some 100% different character now, she’s still very much her scathing, superficial self, but once you get beneath the surface, there are layers of compassion and confidence that make her so much more interesting. 

It’s why I say I like her, and paired with Out of Mind, Out of Sight from season one, the Buffyverse makes a strong case for Cordelia as a nuanced, pivotal member of the Scooby Gang.

After this point Cordelia fully immerses herself in the Scooby Gang dynamic, and in the next episode, you even see her patrolling for vampires with Willow and Xander when Buffy is out sick. She’s there because she cares for them and wants to contribute, even if she doesn’t always have the tact or the manners to play nicely. 

It’s also probably obvious when I say that Xander and Cordelia got back together and are more confident than ever with their dynamic. They still fight, of course, but it’s less scathing.

That’s all I have for Xander and Cordelia, so moving onto point number three: Willow and Oz. I deliberately arranged them after the last couple because this relationship is introduced and explored with a bit more weight to it, I think. Good weight! I mean. 

Like, I feel these two were taken a bit more seriously, so the honeymoon moments feel a bit more genuine and less for comic relief. That’s not to disparage the Cordy and Xander thing, either, because I think they added a good balance for the show’s overall tone.

Anyway, we all know who Willow is by this point, so the question becomes: Who is Oz? The writers actually do a really nice job of introducing Oz, because he doesn’t just pop up in a random plot and stick around. Instead, in the earliest episodes of season two, there’ll often be these short scenes of Oz on his own driving his van or talking with someone in his band, and then he’ll spot Willow.

[enter clips of Oz spotting Willow in Inca Mummy Girl]

Sometimes he’ll try and talk to her and miss her, other times he’ll just see her and be enamored with how she looks or stands around or behaves. And here we are, returning to the two-part episode, What’s My Line again (see what I mean when I say this episode was really pivotal?). 

A running plot in this episode is that a career fair is going on at Sunnydale High, and the Scooby Gang must learn what careers they may be destined to have in their adult life. Willow, for the fact that she’s incredibly intelligent, is one of two students selected by some big-name software agency who wants to hire them. And guess what, that other student is Oz.

They presumably introduce themselves to each other, but I don’t think much happens there because it doesn’t happen on screen. As a side note, I watched this two-parter twice, once for the plot and once for the commentary. 

I don’t think I’m going to make a habit of watching or talking about the commentary, because a lot of the time all the directors and writers do is drone on about is set design or other small things. Plus, if it’s a very plot heavy episode, it’s usually Joss Whedon who speaks over the footage, and I’m just not going to subject myself to that man if I don’t have to.

But this one was interesting! This was commentated on by Marti Noxon, who at the time was a co-executive producer for Buffy the Vampire Slayer and a writer for What’s My Line. Concerning Oz and Willow, this scene was interesting to hear from her perspective because—beyond doing the service of making them acquainted—it largely served to pose these two characters as equals, as having something in common.

Later, Willow believes that Oz is just a friend, and the only reason he looks at her longingly from afar is because they are expressing, quote, “computer-nerd solidarity,” as Willow explains to Buffy. But Oz immediately challenges that and approaches Willow, and they both talk about how they turned down those software dudes. Things are growing slowly between these two, but they haven’t expressed any feelings quite yet.

Side note, Oz does ­take a bullet for Willow in this episode. If you remember, Spike and Drusilla hired the Order of Taraka to k-word Buffy, and in this scene a woman disguised as a police officer shoots up the school in an attempt to take the bounty. Yikes. No one’s hurt, but it’s very romantic. At the end of the episode, when the couple are mostly just chatting, Oz tells Willow that she has the sweetest smile he’s ever seen.

Like, y’all, I just get giddy re-watching the Oz and Willow stuff. I smile every time, and it doesn’t help that Seth Green is just, like the cutest guy from the turn of the century. I admit it, I’m Oz-pilled. It feels a lot more relatable than the Buffy and Angel stuff, and a lot less hokey than the Cordelia and Xander stuff. I will say, I really liked the Giles and Jenny relationship as well, which I’ll get into later. I’d say those are my favorites in the season.

In episode 13, Surprise, their casual chatting gets upgraded to dating when Willow asks Oz to be her date to Buffy’s birthday party, which he says yes to. This is also the episode where Oz gets clued in on the whole Hellmouth debacle, because Buffy stakes and dusts a vampire at the party. 

Honestly, Oz is a great character with a great personality. He’s comically very unaffected by everything that happens around him. When he’s shot, he’s mostly just like—ow, that hurt. I feel pain. When he learns vampires are real, he’s mostly just like “huh. That explains a lot.”

Episode 14, Innocence, is the episode that Willow learns about Xander and Cordelia’s relationship. Willow subconsciously tries to retaliate and make Xander jealous, using Oz to do so. At one point she asks Oz if he wants to make out, but he turns her down.

[how he imagines kissing her scene]

And if that’s not the cutest shit I’ve ever seen. I’d fucking love to have someone think of me the same way Oz thinks of Willow. Another funny thing about Oz, which the show just rolls with, is the fact that at this point, Seth Green is becoming an A-list star with movies like Idle Hands and Austin Powers coming out, so his hair color is constantly changing. At one point someone else points out the change and he’s just like “yeah, that happens occasionally.”

So, Cordy and Xander had Bewitched, Bothered, and Bewildered dedicated to their romantic exploit, meanwhile Oz and Willow have Phases, which is all about werewolves. Which, hell yeah, I’m surprised it took them this long to cover werewolves.

I’ll spare you the details and give away the fun part: Oz is a werewolf. He doesn’t know he is at the start of the episode, and he doesn’t tell the Scooby Gang the news at first, because they think the werewolf’s slaughtered a few people, which he hasn’t, so they’re going to kill it.

This episode is cute because an important subplot is that Willow thinks Oz is pulling away. Not that he’s not interested, but that he’s waiting for the perfect moment. This line of thinking is based off that last clip I showed where Oz is like, I want everything to be perfect! But Willow is frankly tired of waiting. She complains near the start of the episode that she wants kiss him already, and Buffy encourages her to make the first move.

Which she does! After the misunderstanding is sorted out and the Scooby Gang learns of Oz’s lycanthropy, the couple resumes their romantic feelings and Willow kisses him first. This is a really transformative moment for her character because she’s officially moved on from Xander. She’s become her own person, and she no longer pines for Xander, like ever again. It’s very refreshing.

Make a note here that you were completely wrong and that a large plot point between Xander and Willow is that they cheat on their partners with each other.

Sparing the details, this pairing remains steadfast throughout the rest of the season. At this point, Oz isn’t a main character, so he doesn’t show up for evey scene or every episode, but he really makes it count when he does.

To tie off the last two couples, in the finale of the season, there’s this point where Willow has been knocked unconscious, and the doctors believe she may enter a coma if she doesn’t wake up soon. Xander, having a moment alone with Willow, expresses his love and friendship for her in a really endearing, honest way. 

I personally interpreted this confession of love for very platonic, but it’s interesting—this speech does rouse Willow from her sleep, but the first word to co me out of her mouth is Oz’s name. This is another strong piece of development for Xander: you can see when she says “Oz” that he has the faintest expression of disappointment, but he doesn’t let it last. Immediately he steps aside and has Oz take his place to comfort her, then going off to find a doctor.

I think I really just have to commend Nicholas Brendan, who plays Xander, for how he expresses his emotions and conveys the complex imperfections of Xander’s character. He’s very honorable in certain lights, and then in others, he just becomes very quietly despicable. 

Because, as it turns out, his pining for Buffy never fully leaves his system after season one, and it still affects some of the decisions he makes, even if he doesn’t outwardly try to pursue her. I’m mostly talking about how he is very envious and resentful that Angel is dating Buffy, sometimes speaking against Angel with legitimate reason, and other times doing so without justification. The show writers like to blend those two categories in a way that makes Xander’s character motivations very gray, and I really commend it.

Which does lead me to my fourth point: Angel and Buffy. We were bound to get here eventually, and it’s a pretty hefty one to go over. And reminder that I’m literally giving spoilers for the entire season of a very good show, so if you find yourself interested from season one, you still have time to stop now.

[pause]

All good? Okay, so since the end of season one, Buffy’s actually been living with her dad in Los Angeles, so she’s had absolutely no time to spark things up again with Angel. In fact, when she returns to Sunnydale for school, it’s obvious she’s not interested in being a friend or lover to anyone. She’s still experiencing post-traumatic stress from getting actually killed by the Master, and it’s made her very distant upon returning to Sunnydale.

The whole of episode one goes over her processing her trauma, so I’ll leave it there, but the point is that the Angel/Buffy romance is a slow start for season two. At the end of episode 2, Buffy and Angel admit their romantic feelings for another again, and by episode 5, Buffy is dreaming about Angel. 

At that point she even asks if he’ll go on like, a coffee date with her, and he’s just like, no, we have a 225 year age difference. As if that that stopped you before! Kissing her in her bedroom and shit. 

Because it’s Buffy the Vampire Slayer, she ends up going on a pseudo-date with some other guy at a frat party, but it turns out that that guy wants to sacrifice her to a snake demon—just another day in Sunnydale—and Angel has to save her. Actually, before he agrees to do so, Willow steps up and reprimands Angel because he’s uselessly beating around the bush with Buffy despite harboring genuine feelings for her.

Once that episode’s conflict is as all resolved, boom, Angel agrees to go on the coffee date. So things are on the up-and-up. By episode 6, they’re macking on each other,  so things are getting serious, and by episode 7, once they’re finally in a good place, some conflict is inserted into the plot.

So we already talked about how Angel is a good guy because the Roma cursed him to have a soul and remember all of his crimes, right? Well, before then, when he was known as Angelus, Angel actually committed a few atrocities to Drusilla before turning her into a vampire. In fact, if it weren’t for Angel, Drusilla wouldn’t ever have gone mad.

In episode 7, titled “Lie to Me,” one person from Buffy and Angel’s past each come into play. Buffy is made aware of Drusilla, and Ford, a crush Buffy had in her old school, enrolls in Sunnydale High. Ford’s entrance as an old figure in Buffy’s life, as a side note, is really interesting because it’s one of the very times, if not the only time, that a relic from Buffy’s past swings back around. 

Unfortunately he’s just a tertiary character and, in fact, evil, so we don’t hear more from him after Lie to Me. Drusilla, on the other hand, Buffy and the audience learns Angelus deliberately and aggressively pursued human Drusilla after he learned of her psychic affliction. He saw her as this pure entity, and Drusilla, because she thought she had a devilish affliction, wanted to be pure and godly, so it was the perfect setup.

Angel systematically killed everyone that was important to Drusilla, much in the same way he later killed everyone connected to that Romani girl. He actively drove Drusilla insane, convincing her that she was a devil child, and pretty much corrupted every part of her mind until she was very mentally fragile.

After fleeing from the tragedy of her murdered family, she joined a convent and was going to give herself to the Lord as a nun I guess, but Angelus turned her on the day she was meant to take her vows, basically putting the nail in the coffin.

It’s actually a really tragic story, because in the finale, we do get a flashback of a very coherent and sane Drusilla confessing her sins to a priest. It’s the only time in the series where we really see her as this normal human person, and the very next scene we see deranged vampire Drusilla in modern day. 

It’s a very stark contrast, and it reminds me of how vampires—in the Buffyverse, at least—are likened to being demons inhabiting the bodies of the dead, who remember the person you used to be and basically bastardize it. We actually get that description in Lie to Me from Buffy, just to get myself back on track.

The thing that’s important here, is that it doesn’t drive Buffy away. I mean, yeah, it upsets her, and it’s something that she has to work through before staying with Angel, but she doesn’t turn away. For all intents and purposes, Angel is a completely different entity than his soulless self, and she takes that to heart. 

The episode ends on the note that Buffy tells Angel she loves him, but that she doesn’t trust him, so there’s that. By episode nine, Buffy tells Angel, quote, “You’re the one freaky thing in my freaky world that still makes sense to me.” so it’s obvious Angel’s history isn’t a hindrance anymore.

That quote was actually What’s My Line, but the only plot point I’ll mention here is that Buffy and Angel go on a date to a skating rink, and they’re ambushed by a hunter from the Order of Taraka. It’s fine—they kill him, but what’s really sweet is that after the fight, Buffy sees Angel with his vampire face on, and instead of recoiling, she embraces him like that, tending to a wound on his face 

This was the episode I listened to the commentary and Marti Noxon says here, quote, 

“Buffy for the first time, I think maybe the only time, kisses Angel... when he’s a vampire... And it was a real important scene because we wanted to show she was really beginning to accept him and really acknowledge who he was and not be afraid of him anymore.” (Marti Noxon, What’s My Line)

Episode 13 and 14 are vital in terms of the Buffy and Angel romance, but more importantly, it shifts the entire power dynamic through the season. If you remember, I previously said that Spike and Drusilla were the “ostensible” Big Bads of the season, and this is where that statement falls apart.

So Buffy and Angel are becoming very intimate. In fact, things get so intimate that, when Buffy is at school, she tells Willow that she thinks she and Angel are going to… you know, “make love.” And she predicted correctly—later, Buffy and Angel have a fight with Drusilla and Spike, and  the two good guys lose and barely escape with their life. It starts raining, and they determine they have to take hide and take shelter at Angel’s place… yeah.

So they have sex. But there are other important plot developments which arise earlier in the episode that give context to what happens next.

To return to Jenny Calendar, I already revealed that she, in fact, is of Romani heritage. But what’s important is that the other characters, and the audience upon the episode’s premier, didn’t have this information. It turns out, Jenny Calender is actually a spy for the Romani people, placed in Sunnydale to watch over Angel and make sure he continues suffering with a soul.

Now, the question becomes, why does she need to watch him? Well, it turns out, the way Angel loses his soul and breaks the Romani curse is by experiencing a singular moment of true happiness. I’ll get back to Jenny Calendar and her plot in a few minutes, but it turns out, by having sex, Angel, at least momentarily, feels truly happy.

The drama of this episode is he loses his soul at the very end. Buffy is oblivious and sleeping in his bed, and Angel runs out in to the street, clutching his chest and calling out Buffy’s name. But it’s already too late, he’s no longer Angel, but Angelus.

Episode 13 and Episode 14 really go hand in hand, and I’d call it a two-parter in many ways because the monster plaguing Sunnydale is the same in both. But that guy, the Judge, he’s not really important in the long run. What really pairs these two episode together is the setup of Angel’s true happiness, and the immediate fall-out as Angelus joins the dark side.

The first thing Angelus does isn’t, you know, kill the slayer, but to fuck with her, just like he twisted Drusilla’s mind  back in the day. It’s actually a really tragic scene for Buffy, because obviously she’s very sensitive right now, emotionally, after losing her virginity, and Angelus waltzes in pretending he’s still Angel, and basically acts like a big fuckboy.

[fuckboy scene]

This is obviously really devastating and I think even talking about it would diminish the really hard feelings the show explores.

What I will say is that, later in the episode, there are flashbacks to the sex scene, and my god, it is the worst thing I’ve ever seen. It’s like the stereotypical PG-looking sex scene where all you see are various, ambiguous shots of skin moving around on sheets, and soft music, and the camera fades in and out a lot. I feel like Buffy must’ve had a hand in creating that trope. It’s the only part of the episode I can make fun of.

The next episode I want to talk about in relation to these two is Episode 17, Passion, and this is probably the most dramatic episode in the season besides the finale. I legitimately was in my feelings when I re-watched this episode and I knew exactly what happened. 

I’ve tried to re-watch Buffy multiple times in the past, to some success, but sometimes you just know what tragedies are awaiting the characters, so I don’t know, it always de-incentivized me from continuing. It’s why I haven’t really returned to a show like Game of Thrones, either, because so many of my favorite characters just die off and I don’t want to endure that twice.

But I’m going to talk about this episode with a lot of depth, because everything is important and very, very good, so buckle up.

The first thing is, it didn’t take much research to learn that this episode aired just ten days after Valentine’s Day in 1998, and the episode itself takes place just prior to Valentine’s day. So if it wasn’t obvious the entirety of the season is based around romance, whether genuine or merely lust, Passion steps in as a kind of exclamation point to ward off all doubt. 

In many ways, for a few of the key romances in this season, it’s the breakup episode, whether that means finally realizing your lover is no longer the person he used to be, or that your budding romance is violently and tragically dashed for you. 

An important plot point is that earlier, in episode 14, Innocence, Jenny Calendar’s arc in the main plot unfolds. Put shortly, Jenny’s very traditional Romani uncle arrives in Sunnydale and admonishes her for slacking on her duties to protect Angel’s soul. 

A really weird detail about this that’s mentioned in Passion is how Jenny didn’t even know what the ramifications would be if Angel experienced true happiness. She was never told by her Romani ancestors about the details of the curse:

“I was sent here to watch you. They told me to keep you and Angel apart, they never told me what would happen... Angel was supposed to pay for what he did to my people” (S2 E13, Innocence).

She knew she had this vague job to keep, but honestly, “happiness” seems like an impossible thing to safeguard. She could’ve sabotaged Buffy and Angel’s relationship, and to her credit, she tried to distance them from one another at least once, but it’s laughably unsuccessful. 

To explain, in episode 13, Surprise, she urges Angel to leave the country alone while in possession of a detached demon arm, because if said demon were to fully reassemble its corporeal form, it could destroy all of human life. 

This suggestion she makes is to keep Buffy and Angel from falling in love, which admittedly does stem from an ulterior motive, but it probably would’ve been the plan even if Jenny wasn’t the one to suggest it. This whole plot detail ends up being moot anyway because Angel and Buffy are ambushed as they say their goodbyes and the demon arm is stolen from them. And that’s the one time Jenny ever acts from a less-than-ideal position.

When Giles and the rest of the Scooby Gang learn of Jenny’s past, which she kept secret, they act as if she has betrayed them. This reveal happens right around the time that Angel loses his soul, so I get that everyone’s pretty sensitive, but I always felt this emotional fallout and reactive distancing from Jenny was really convoluted and poorly justified.

Like I get they’re hurt Jenny had an ulterior motive, but she only acted out of the will of her people. And even if you wanted to protest that aspect of her character motivation, Jenny honestly and vulnerably explains after the fact that she never showed up to deceive or hurt anybody. 

And realistically, when you recognize her primary goal in the series—that is, to make Angel keep his soul—it lines up perfectly with what the Scooby Gang wants. Everyone thinks the good guy should stay good; it’s a bipartisan issue… disregarding the connotation of generational vengeance.

All of these character beats are an important setup for Passion, because by the time this episode premiers, Jenny has resolutely decided she wants to make amends not only with Buffy, but also with Giles. I haven’t talked about their romance yet, but I’m going to talk about it after I finish up with the Buffy-Angel stuff.

Jenny, being a technopagan girl-boss, has been privately working on translating a spell lost to time—the “Ritual of Restoration” which her Romani ancestors previously used on Angel to ensoul him. Allegedly she’s been working on constructing a computer program which can translate the old Romanian to English, and the ritual itself also involves obtaining what’s called an “Orb of Thesulah,” a conduit for souls, essentially

At this point, by the way, Drusilla receives a convenient portent foretelling of Jenny’s plans. We’ll get back to the evil just in just a second. The most important aspect of this plot thread right now is that Jenny keeps the whole spell thing secret. 

When she successfully translates the old ritual on her school computer, she notably stores the translated text both on her desktop and on a floppy disk. You should always back up your files, people.

But what Jenny doesn’t account for when she translates the ritual, is that she is a secondary character, alone in a scene at night, having just pushed the plot forward in a vital way, and she hasn’t told anyone about what she’s accomplished. 

So when the camera pans over from her desk and you see Angelus watching her in the shadows, you get this unique and terrible sense of dread. You may not realize it at the time, but when you factor in every main character moving around in the episode, you realize none of them are physical present to provide plot armor over her, to intervene on her behalf.

There was a similar sequence in an earlier episode; after Angel has become Angelus, he approaches Willow in the school at night, pretending he’s Angel but ultimately preparing to kill her. What stops that from happening, one, is that nearly every main character is on school property, providing an abundance of opportunities and characters who can save Willow. 

In that sequence, funnily enough, it’s Jenny Calendar who is able to stall Angelus before Buffy arrives on the scene to hold her off. And for whatever reason, Xander is also able to intuit that Angel is bad and converges upon the scene.

These plot circumstances all line up to make that version of events very typical: a character is put in danger, but ultimately, you know nothing crazy is going to happen in terms of life and death.

But with this Jenny scene in Passion, every possible encouraging factor is absent. Nobody knows what Jenny is doing, what she’s accomplished, nor that Angel even has an immediate motivation to thwart her plans. Yes, everyone’s in danger all the time, but there’s no special reason to target Jenny right this moment, according to everyone else. Buffy isn’t there with a stake and one-liner.

In the scene, Angelus completely destroys Jenny’s computer and the printed-out spell, assuming that these were the only copies available and thus protecting his soulless, evil form. 

Jenny manages to escape out of her classroom, and what follows is a chase sequence for the ages. Strangely enough, this reminds me in some ways of Scream’s chase sequences between Ghostface and the victim, because the victim will often throw down some large object to trip the bad guy. 

There’s a sense of ingenuity when someone who is being preyed upon provides some defense in that way, or is able to close a door on the bad guy in time. But this is Angelus – and Angelus , more than any other vampire we know, plays with his food. 

While Jenny is running from hallway to hallway, I think there’s a genuine moment where you think—yes, she can do this, she can make this. There’s something so strong about the way Jenny is able to carry herself even through fear. She runs up a flight of stairs in heels flawlessly! I know I couldn’t to do that. 

And I think it’s definitely such a praiseworthy moment for the writers and showrunners, because for just an inkling of a second, against all odds, as the viewer you’re able to play momentarily with hope, and denial. But—

[death scene]

That’s what makes it so devastating when Angelus finally catches up with her. If he killed her in a flash, yes, I think an audience would be genuinely affected, but not nearly as strongly. Buffy, because it’s a show about supernatural creatures, is predisposed with the ability to make horror-themed plots. 

For the most part, I’d say it doesn’t go into the true horror category. Its style of production and plot development doesn’t really lend itself to being so hopeless from the jump, which is what a lot of popular horror movies embrace. If you’re going to be killed by a demon in seven days or callously hunted in backwoods with no sign of rescue, you’re faced with your own mortality in ways that inspire very human, existential dread, even beyond mortality.

For Buffy, I think there are genuinely scary things that happen. Sometimes monsters are legitimately terrifying, such as the Gentlemen from Hush in season four, but that episode also has some of the funniest moments as well. 

In another sense, Buffy plays skillfully with concepts like dread, existential fear, and death, but the show writers don’t typically manipulate that story into a traditional horror—they don’t present those heavy moments with the intention to scare you.

But this particular scene in season two really hits the nail on the head in terms of being a legitimate horror. Like, despite knowing the outcome, my heart still beats pretty fast when I give this a re-watch. 

It was a very fortunate setup – if Jenny was any more pivotal to the plot or any more beloved by fans, it’s possible the writers would’ve stepped from making this a thrilling, terrible moment. If Jenny were any less important, the audience wouldn’t feel anything at all. She’d just be another dead body found in a locker, spurring the plot forward and quickly leaving our conscious.

Seasons two and three really get this balance perfect in a wide swath of episodes, and I think it’s why season four, for example, suffers from a l ack of very human tension and stakes. Again, I love season four, but it does get receive some justifiable criticism in the end.

Anyway, we’re going to a point in the plot where a lot of character relationships are converging and changing rapidly. To keep things brief on the Buffy-Angel relationship, it’s obvious things are long dead. But the pivotal change is that, in learning of Jenny’s death, Buffy no longer feels conflicted. Angel ultimately has played with his food a bit too aggressively, and for a bit too long. 

In a previous episode Buffy even had the opportunity to dust Angel, but ultimately had to walk away, letting him escape. But there’s no confusion or conflict in her mind at the end of this episode – Angel is gone, and Angelus is merely a monster in desperate need of being slain. 

Switching gears a bit, I’ll return to the Spike-Drusilla relationship for a moment. In retrospect, having talked about all the heavy things regarding Angelus, Spike and Drusilla seem a bit pushed to the side. Though, to be fair, I have been saying stuff like “Angelus and the other bad guys,” so it’s not the show’s fault.

In fact, the show very happily jumps on exploring the shifting dynamics between Spike, Drusilla, and Angelus. As you might remember, all of the power switched to Drusilla once she was restored in Spike’s ritual, and Spike has been confined to a wheelchair.

When Angel becomes Angelus, he very quickly joins the lovely couple. Drusilla is happy to let him rejoin their gang, but Spike, in so few words, is apprehensive about his return. Apprehensive very quickly devolves into resentment and then loathing as Angelus assumes the role of head honcho, kicking Spike into third place.

Not only does Angelus immediately call the shots, but he quickly starts openly flirting with Drusilla as well, which she doesn’t turn down. In fact, she leans heavily into it, which I guess is, in part, because she’s evil and chaotic, but also verifiably deranged. 

And because Spike is confined to a wheelchair, plus the understated fact that Angelus is Spike and Drusilla’s sire, he doesn’t fight back so much as fruitlessly complain about their flagrant sexual energies. If Angelus is Lestat from Interview With The Vampire, Drusilla is his Louis (Loo-ey) and Spike is very much his Claudia, sans the pampering.

Not to mention the fact that Spike very much tried to kill the Slayer on multiple occasions and failed miserably, and Angelus isn’t one to mince words:

“Spike... my boy! You really don’t get it, do you? You tried to kill her, but you couldn’t. Look at you, you’re a wreck!” (S2 E13, Innocence)

Drusilla is being a little condescending/belittling to Spike, trying to “feed him like a child” with a cute little puppy. Angel eggs on the discord by saying she bathes and carries him around like a child, etc. (ep. 17 Passion)

That’s all I’ll say about them until the finale, but it’s just funny to see how dramatically Spike has fallen from the role of Big Bad in a mere seventeen episodes, and as the series progresses things only get more interesting.

So now I’m going to move onto point number five: Giles and Jenny. When I was arranging all of my talking points, I was having a tough time figuring out where to place them. Because ultimately, their romance is its own thing in season two and, functionally speaking, doesn’t contribute much to the larger plot – but is, itself, very beautiful and well-written. 

But I didn’t want to give away that it was tragically cut short at the same time I was talking about, you know, Cordelia and Xander. The tone just didn’t seem right.

There may have been inklings of this romance in season one. But Jenny only showed up in two episodes, one of them being the finale, so what little time she had was dedicated to being Giles’ intellectual foil and providing a witchy perspective for the Scooby Gang. The very first scene Giles and Jenny share together in season two, however, is rife with sexual energy—

[show clip of scene]

Giles is always stumbling over his words, it’s a very deliberate character decision, but around Jenny it’s less to do with the fact that he’s a fuddy duddy, as Jenny calls him, but that he’s enamored with her, and frankly has no idea how to deal with those feelings.

There’s a scene in episode two that encapsulates their dynamic, and this is when Giles is trying to ask her out on a date, but legitimately can’t figure out how to act normal or casual about it. Ultimately, he fails at saying the words, but Jenny, being confident and friendly and very forward with her feelings, asks him out instead.

Once they start dating, Jenny challenges Giles in just about every respect of the word. She doesn’t go on quaint library dates with him and maintain the status quo: she takes him to football games and monster truck rallies. On her own, Jenny is known to go to Burning Man, and we already know she’s cool because she’s a technopagan, and she’s very self-assured and self-possessed (and I realize I’ve already described her like that, I know).

But a good character decision they gave Jenny is that she likes seeing Giles all flustered around her; a large part of the reason she’s attracted to him, I think, is because he’s different from her, very formal and straightlaced, and she likes to see how she can unlace him, essentially making him reconsider the old, stuffy ways of the Watchers Council.

In a very important Giles episode titled The Dark Age, the entire Scooby Gang besides Jenny overtly observe and validate to themselves that Giles is simply a very bland and responsible person, that he’s always been this by-the-books adult who can’t help but follow the rules. 

But Jenny, who’s so consistently prodded at that protective exterior, is starting to see the very interesting man underneath. Or, even if she’s not necessarily privy to his backstory quite yet, she’s still happy to ruffle his edges and break down those walls. 

It turns out that Giles hasn’t always been the responsible librarian the kids know him to be. In fact, Giles was kind of a bad boy in his youth. I don’t want to dive deep into this episode, but to keep it brief: when Giles first went to University at a young age, he was resentful of his Watcher destiny and retaliated by shirking off his duties. 

Calling himself Ripper, he and a small group of friends formed an amateur-ish warlock cult, where they would collectively summon a demon called Eyghon and willingly let it possess them one-by-one, essentially giving them a major high. 

It wasn’t exactly safe or responsible, and the dark magics greatly affected Giles’ demeanor, his personality, his outlook on life. Having that sense of power made him and the other warlocks feel drunk and reckless, just until Eyghon’s possession of a friend ended up killing him. After that, as far as I know, the cult went their separate ways and forgot about Eyghon, and Giles accepted his responsibilities as Watcher

The point of mentioning that is, of course, to give Giles sense of depth, which frankly, he really needed. In The Dark Age, Eyghon rturns by slowly killing off Giles’ cult of warlock friends across the globe, just until Giles is left.

Actually, no—it’s Giles and an old friend-turned enemy named Ethan Rayne, who was also a warlock but never truly turned away from chaos and destruction. But he’s not super important. What is important is that, while Eyghon tries to reach Giles, it ends up possessing Jenny. 

In short, the Scooby Gang is able to rescue her while also destroying Eyghon in the process, but the possession has seriously disturbed her, so she puts her relationship with Giles on pause, much to his dismay. To be fair, however, it was largely his fault. 

This pause lasts about three episodes before Jenny forgives him and they kiss, very passionately. In fact, by the end of episode 11, they’re much closer than before. Oh! And Jenny accidentally shoots Giles with a crossbow this episode. It’s not super relevant, I just thought it was funny.

Naturally, just a few episodes later the Romani reveal happens and Giles has to distance himself from Jenny. It’s obvious he’s apprehensive about the distance, but he’s more supportive of Buffy (and her feeling of betrayal) at this point than he is in love with Jenny. Or rather, I’d actually say this was a tough conflict within Giles, but he’s first a man of principle when danger is afoot, so he aligns with Buffy.

Jenny is obviously very upset about this distance, but she understands why everybody feels the way they do. She tries to talk with Giles on occasion, but he respects Buffy’s wishes, so he respectfully, tentatively turns her down. 

By episode 17, Passion, Buffy is still enforcing a feeling of betrayal, but she’s cognizant enough of the fact that Giles sincerely misses Jenny, and in fact may love her. She approaches Jenny in this episode and, in so few words, tell Jenny she should continue her groveling, but she should reconcile with Giles in the meantime.

This is where the heartbreak really happens. I already talked about how Jenny is murdered in this episode, but Angelus takes this really horrifying and tragic death and twists the knife as hard as he can. 

Before Giles leaves the school the day Jenny dies, she tells him she might have a breakthrough with the Angel situation, and that they should get together that night. I don’t know how Angel knew they were going to meet that night, but I guess the details aren’t super important.

When Giles gets home, he’s surprised to find romantic music is playing. Rose petals are strewn across the floor, and lead up the stairs to his bedroom.  A bottle of champagne, even, is sitting with an ice bucket, and a letter sits on the table, saying “upstairs” in cursive.

There’s this terrible moment right as he approaches his front door where Giles finds the first rose and, tentatively, lovingly smells it. He’s genuinely happy, hopeful, and you can see in his smile that he’s finally ready to let down those intense barriers he puts up for the world. 

It’s possible that, perhaps in this moment, he may have realized she was his match, his equal, a person who can challenge him, knowing all of him and still saying “yes, I want you.” I think there’s a certain expression that Anthony Stewart Head, Giles’ actor, gets perfect here – almost like Giles is able to see a future, and it makes that moment of irony all the more horrific.

When Giles finally starts ascending the staircase, he can spot the lower half of Jenny’s body on his bed, and the scene instantly, dramatically turns south when you see Jenny’s blank, dead eyes open and staring at the ceiling.

It’s a scene that I love for what it accomplishes, but I hate for what it leaves behind. I’m not sure if Giles every truly meets his match in the same way, and certainly not romantically. Angelus irreparably destroyed something integral to Giles as a person and as a character. Giles continues to grow in interesting ways and be a pivotal member of the Scooby Gang, but nobody ever looks at him in quite the same way that Jenny did. 

While Angelus expects retaliation from Giles, he doesn’t anticipate Giles’ intensity and immediate action as the Watcher regresses to his dark, violent Ripper persona, ambushing Angelus at his home base. Admittedly, Giles gets a few really satisfying hits in on Angel, but Giles also recklessly ambushed the warehouse alone, without the slayer, a decision that nearly gets him killed. 

Luckily, Buffy is able to save Giles at the last minute, kicking Angel’s ass in the process. Two fun things about this scene: first, Spike casually holds off Drusilla from intervening when Giles and Buffy converge upon Angel, and second, Giles gets knocked out when Angelus nearly chokes him. The circumstances aren’t funny anymore, but it’s a good callback. 

Which means, thank goodness, I’ve finally finished all the romances. But I’m not done with my numbered list! Moving onto number six: Kendra.

I thoroughly avoid Kendra up to this point, but I actually think she’s a really interesting character. We're introduced to her in the two-part episode What’s My Line, where she arrives in Sunnydale by hiding in a plane’s fuselage.

If you remember from season one’s finale, Buffy actually briefly died when the Master bit her and dropped her in a puddle – you know, that moment when Xander has to provide CPR. Well apparently, that death, despite only a few minutes max, was enough to enact the Slayer prophecy and call upon the next girl in line for the position.

Which, if you haven’t already put together, is Kendra. Kendra, contrary to Buffy, actually trained for years in her home country of Jamaica with her Watcher prior to being called upon. This detail is interesting if only for the fact that we now know potential Slayer can be anticipated and trained in advance. By this detail alone, I know for a fact that there are probably hundreds of girls out there, who were like Kendra but not picked, but that’s just a random aside.

Kendra ultimately represents Buffy’s opposite in a Slayer capacity. Everyone around Buffy, audience included, likely understood Buffy to be a rational, level-headed, and well-balanced Slayer, but Kendra’s arrival on the scene sort of squashes that. Kendra is incredibly well-informed on the subjects of demonology, history, fighting strategies, and Slayer ethics – in terms of keeping one’s distance from human society.

Kendra is also really unsocialized, however. While she’s incredible well-prepped to fill the Slayer role, she doesn’t understand why Buffy collaborates with a team of civilians, she unilaterally disagrees with the fact that Buffy is dating a vampire, and she dissents to how Buffy can make important decisions on-the-fly, without express permission from her Watcher.

In many ways, Kendra’s contrast to Buffy confirms a lot of the strict and unnatural rules that a Slayer usually must live by, forgoing the normal human realm for an isolated, unfeeling life. Rather than doubting herself, Buffy loosely considers what a presence like Kendra could offer her: would she still need to be the slayer, or could she give the job a rest for a while, go to Disneyland?

In contrast, Buffy offers some substantial advice for Kendra as well. There’s this one scene they share in Giles’ office, alone, and the audience is made privy to the secret inner world of the slayer:

“Kendra, my emotions give me power. They’re total assets... You feel it, right? How the anger gives you fire? A slayer needs that.” (S2E10, What's My Line, Part One)

It’s one of the few times Buffy really opens up about this supernatural power she possesses, and the psychology of it. In that same scene, she offers Kendra the lesson of drive, of emotion and strength from emotion, which Kendra doesn’t understand at first. She even claims that emotions are a weakness before Buffy offers that rebuttal. 

So Kendra isn’t necessarily a two-dimensional figure meant to make Buffy look bad. She has a horrible fake accent, bless Bianca Lawson, but she has a lot of layers to her.  She’s a big nerd, and she doesn’t know how to talk to boys, and she’s presumably poor, based on the fact that she owns, like, one shirt. She’s also a person of color, which is something that has been pointedly absent on the series thus far and will remain a valid criticism throughout the show’s run.

She doesn’t just make simple amends with Buffy- they’re constantly fighting about the rules and ideals of being the Slayer, but they’re still working together and looking badass all the while. 

I didn’t actually talk about why she showed up, but we sort-of already addressed it: Spike is doing a ritual to restore Drusilla’s body. Kendra’s Watcher sent her to Sunnydale because he sensed those dangerous mystical energies converging, or something, and didn’t realize the last slayer was still kicking around. 

After the episode’s plot is resolved, disappointingly, Kendra returns to Jamaica instead of bopping around for a while and. The next time we see her, it’s the finale, and—

[Drusilla kills Kendra moment]

Yeah, she dies. I think if this were any other season besides the “love” season, she might’ve had a bigger role, maybe something Jenny Calendar-sized, but we don’t get the chance. And just to jump ahead a bit, a different slayer does replace Kendra, so it’s not like the writers didn’t want to enjoy a slayer-versus-slayer plot. They just didn’t want Kendra to be that part. I took pages and pages of notes just on Kendra and—somehow I’m already done with her. Anyway!

I’ve already talked about the majority of the season, so for the finale, I think I’ll just wrap up by saying that Buffy kills Angelus. She saves the world, and it’s big happy day. Or so you might think!

A few important things do happen in the last two episodes, titled Becoming part one and part two. The first is that the Scooby Gang finds Jenny Calendar’s floppy disk with the Restoration spell, and Willow elects to perform the spell. She’d been substituting for Ms. Calendar’s computer class and was going through all her old teaching files, including witchy stuff. The Gang thinks Willow shouldn’t do it, but she insists.

Second thing: Buffy is going to confront Angelus and save the world. I’ll spare you the apocalypse part of the plot, because it’s just your standard end-of-the-world fare. But she essentially has to sacrifice Angelus and send him through a portal directly to hell, saving the world. 

In part one of Becoming, Willow actually tried the Restoration and failed, on account of Angelus’ minions ambushing the scene and sending her into a temporary coma. So at this point, Buffy has ultimately concluded that Angel is no longer able to be saved. On her way to this final battle, she comes across Xander, who just came from the hospital after seeing Willow wake up.

Willow told Xander to tell Buffy they were retrying to the Restoration spell, and that Buffy could potentially stall Angel instead of killing him.  But you know what Xander doesn’t do? Exactly fucking that. He just tells her good luck. Like, literally the worst character on earth. I hate Xander.

At the very height of the Buffy-Angel battle, a hell portal has opened up and is set to consume the world. Buffy has perfectly positioned Angelus to stab him and send him through the portal, but right as she does so, Willow succeeds in performing the Restoration spell from her hospital bed, with the help of some Romani spirit that possesses her.

Cue terrible sad moment. Right as she’s about to slay Angelus and save the day, his vampire expression completely disappears, and Angel is suddenly back. But the portal’s already open, and Buffy has to save the world; there’s no other option in front of her but to sacrifice him or see the apocalypse succeeds. 

Even worse, Angel doesn’t remember anything that happened since the night they made love, so he’s very confused and genuinely, heartbreakingly scared. All Buffy can do is comfort him, kiss him longingly, say that everything’s okay, and stab him, sending him into actual hell.

[Pause]

Xander is not seeing heaven.

Side note, Spike betrays Angelus. He regains mobility in his legs, knocks Drusilla out because she probably would follow Angelus into death if Spike didn’t intervene, and drives out of Sunnydale in a poorly blacked-out vehicle while she’s unconscious in the passenger seat. Buffy actually lets him escape because they forged an unsteady alliance against Angelus earlier in the episode. The enemy of my enemy is my friend, and all that.

I did forget to say, Joyce, Buffy’s mom, does learn that Buffy is the slayer in the finale, and there’s this really poorly-constructed metaphor where Joyce likens being the slayer to being gay, and can’t Buffy just decide to not be the slayer, etc. etc. 

Their conversation ends on a really sour note, and they have this massive falling out. Joyce says in no unclear terms that Buffy can’t return home if she leaves, which of course she has to, to save the world. Big bummer.

Anyway, I do have one last point on my season two list: number six! Superfluous things that I love!

The first is that this season, just a small thing, Buffy has an episode where the band “Cibo Matto” is playing a set at the Bronze, and I just have to thank whoever brought them onto the show because I am now a big fan of them. Shout out to Cibo Matto.

The second point on the list of very superfluous things is oh my god? I watched this season on DVD and they had the most bizarrely choreographed transitions between episodes??? I hope I’m able to put them on the screen now. I scoured the internet and I couldn’t find any other recording of these as reference, so you’ll have to deal with what I can cobble together. Each episode you click on, you travel to a different part of a graveyard, and fly around statues and through mausoleums to get to your episode, which reveals itself out of a spooky mist.

I remember hearing in the commentary by Marti Noxon that even dusting vampires can be a huge ordeal in terms of cost, so I can’t imagine what kind of price tag these transition sequences cost the production. But I love them! It’s like I’m playing one of those really bad DVD games that movies in like, 2005 had. It feels like this big secret that I’m letting out.

My third detail is something completely unrelated to the actual production, but occasionally while I was doing research I would type in the various couples’ names into Google and YouTube, and I just have to call out this Giles and Jenny fancam. This person knew what they were doing and it slays. I don’t know what their ship name is, but I support it. Jennels? Giley?

[no solitary clips, just make last script bit a voiceover]

And lastly, the thing I liked most about this season was this:

[Buffy catching the sword]

And that’s season two! Any question? No? I didn’t think so. I’m moving onto season three, you can’t stop me.

[Pause in script; notes and outline for season three:]

Interjection edits to make:

Still need to make an interjection about how cops are actually very prevalent, at least in season two.

Make an interjection at the moment where you point out Willow moves on from Xander. That isn’t the case and in fact is a fairly contentious part of season 3

Important episodes:

Discuss in brief:

Ep. 2 – Dead Man’s Party (discuss in brief – resentment, specifically Xander’s)

Ep. 6 – Band Candy (discuss in brief – superfluous love) 

Ep. 8 – Lovers Walk (discuss in brief – Spike returns + superfluous love: Spike and Joyce friendship, Spike taunts Angel by pretending to eat her)

Ep. 10 – Amends (discuss in brief – Bad Bangs Buffy. Though, this style is sort of coming back around. The First.)

Ep. 12 – The Zeppo (discuss in brief – Xander-centric episode; funny.)

The Wish, Doppelgangland, and Anya deserve their own small section. No time!

Discuss in part:

Ep. 3 – Faith, Hope, & Trick (discuss in part - introduction of Faith)

Ep. 12 – Helpless (discuss in part – Watcher’s Council influence, Giles fired / to be replaced.)

Ep. 17+19 – Enemies and Choices (discuss together in part – the reveal of Faith as an ally of the Mayor. The familial relationship they share. Buffy’s college acceptances, Willow fending off Faith and choosing UC Sunnydale)

Ep. 20 – The Prom (discuss in part – Angel and Buffy break up; Buffy is given The Protector award.)

Discuss in full:

Ep. 7 – Revelations (discuss in full – fake watcher; initial falling out of Faith and Buffy; Xander resentment and rant; everyone learns Angel is alive)

Ep. 14/15 – Bad Girls and Consequences (discuss 14 in part – mention Faith’s murder of Allan for context. Discuss 15 in full)

Ep. 21/22 Graduation Day (finale. Combine together)

So, main points to discuss:

The Faith and Mayor narrative. Introduce them both separately; intertwine them with Bad Girls and Consequences.

a. Faith, Hope & Trick (introduction of Faith) b. Bad Girls and Consequences (discuss in full) c. Enemies (reveal of Faith as evil; graduation day reveal) and Choices (familial bonds) d.Graduation Day, part one (Faith confrontation and defeat)

Reintegration of Angel and Buffy; eventual break up (mention Spike and the Mayor’s rants? and The Prom. TBE)

Willow developing as a witch, and The Wish/Doppelgangland/Anya

I hate Xander (Dead Man’s Party and The Zeppo)

Random stuff I love (Spike pretending to bite Joyce in Lovers Walk; Band Candy;  Buffy’s bad bangs in Amends; 

So when I approach the big themes being addressed in season three, I have like—no clue? Season three seems more like a smorgasbord of the teams’s best and most off-beat ideas cobbled together in a way that’s somehow very cohesive yet each episode can stand on its own. Like, thus far, I think season three has the best random watchability. 

Like, if you were to turn on cable television and land on an episode of Buffy in the year 2022 somehow, season three would give you the best of the best. There are an abundance of monster-of-the-week episodes, but the best part is, none of them feel like filler.

I mean sure, for example there’s a random episode where Hansel and Gretel have fused into a demon that manipulates Sunnydale to near psychological self-destruction, but you still get a lot of great character moments through, such as seeing Willow’s magical abilities develop, and you see Amy get turned into a rat. 

Which, yes, I will get to that later. The point is that the writers don’t allocate episodes to be exclusively plot-driven or exclusively side-show distraction. They’re usually some mix of both, which is to the show’s overall benefit. I have very few critiques for season two, because honestly its plot and themes are some of the strongest in the shows entire run, but occasionally I’d feel burnout from the constant underpinning of romance.

Season three sidesteps that and allows for a flexibility of theme that feels unburdened from the necessity of romantic tragedy, lust, or euphoria. Willow and Xander, because of some shenanigans they get up to this season, involve themselves and their respective partners in the fallout of heartbreak, but they’re not pointlessly attached to this narrative for the entire season.

Love is still around, and in many ways Buffy and Angel’s story is a continuation of who they were together in season two, but Angel’s vacation to hell and back again seriously turns their dynamic on its head—

Buffy is more rationally cautious of Angel and aware of her vulnerability when she’s with him, and Angel is especially cognizant of his and Buffy’s mortal differences, which becomes less of a hurdle he can overcome and more a wall he’ll be forced to confront as Buffy gets older. Something that can’t be remedied or avoided.

I can’t say the “overarching theme” I fell on for season three was my own making, because I have regularly perused the Buffy Boards of buffy-boards.com for various pieces of insight, but where season one is a lot about accepting one’s destiny, or for the layman, accepting one’s self, and season two is about love and lust, I feel that season three is about facing one’s future. 

I’m going to bring this back up as we explore various character beats moving forward, because we see it for Angel, for Buffy, for Willow and Giles moving forward. Everyone is affected by the thought or the reality of their future in some way or another, and have to accept or compromise with that reality.

The easiest place to start with this season is Buffy and Angel. The end of season two, we saw Buffy effectively vanquish Angel by stabbing him and sending to a hell dimension, and that was really wickedly cool and sad. 

But then when you dive into season three, immediately David Boreanaz is featured in the opening credits sequence for the first time ever. So it was sort of a big giveaway that his passing wasn’t permanent. 

The writers attempt to undermine your assumptions in the early episodes because at least three or four times, you’ll see Buffy having a dream where Angel is there talking to her, but I don’t know—I was never convinced. No one can just be a dream image for an entire season, that would get repetitive and boring.

In episode 4, Angel is brought back very unceremoniously at the end of the episode, I guess as a cliffhanger, and if you’re wondering what mystical forces brought him back, we don’t know. If you think they’re going to be investigated in season three of Buffy, you’re incorrect. They take that plot with them into Buffy’s spinoff show, Angel, which I fully do not have the time to talk about now.

But what you get of Angel here is that he’s essentially gone feral from his time in hell. He’s naked, he’s postverbal, and when he first sees Buffy he’s so far gone mentally that he tries to attack her, not recognizing who she is.

Angel’s suddenly re-entry into Buffy’s life is very strange. She’s still incredibly torn up about having lost him in the first place, or more accurately having killed him, and I think anyone in her position would’ve reacted similarly, if not way, way worse. 

There’s a lot of vitriol still hanging in the air regarding the person that is Angel—specifically from Xander, who I hate for the first half of season three. I have a whole section dedicated to the fuckery that is Xander Harris a bit down the line. But you also have the likes of Giles, who understandably is recovering from the trauma of Angelus torturing him and killing his girlfriend.

Everyone in the Buffy gang has seriously justified reasoning for hating or fearing Angel, which is why it makes sense for Buffy to keep his return secret. She doesn’t tell anyone at first; she keeps him in this big, open mausoleum that becomes a regular set for season three. Slowly Buffy is able to help him recover.

In the meantime, I want to make note that Buffy was trying to move on from Angel, going so far as to date other, more normal boys in high school. So the passion you saw from season two, the very Romeo and Juliet-style romance that ultimately became fatal, has effectively disappeared. They’re not so blindly driven by love.

The romance that eventually does come back is a lot more rational, given they understand the rules and limits of how they can act, they’re moderately more mature, and they better understand their differences as vampire and slayer.

For now, their relationship focuses on the relatively celibate act of Angel’s recovery, though for a couple episodes there, the two of them practice some very relaxed, suggested tai chi positions. But other than that, Buffy is deliberately distant, and Angel doesn’t immediately jump back into the pretense of a relationship.

I had a hard time determining what their relationship was in these private meetings, and honestly, I think it’s better to just focus on Buffy here. She of course never stopped loving Angel, but there’s a serious hesitancy at seeing him in the flesh again. 

Hesitant that he’s even the same person, that he may not feel the same way, hesitant about what this means for leading a more normal life, or what could happen if the rest of her friends and family found out. Not to mention the fact that for at least three episodes on Angel’s return, she’s dating a boy named Scott.

All these factors push off the inevitable. In episode 7, Revelations, despite her better judgment, Buffy and Angel kiss for the first time since his return. Immediately they consider this a mistake and pull back, but because the writers just love crafting misunderstandings, they have Xander spot the kiss and only the kiss. 

Not only is Xander the worst character to spot them because of his anti-Angel biases, but he completely misses everything surrounding that kiss, both before and after. All the self-awareness and rationality that suggests Angel and Buffy are being cautious and platonic up to this point is never seen.

Not only is this a reveal that Angel and Buffy are romantic again, but more importantly, it’s the mere fact that Angel’s returned in the first place.

I’m looking at my notes and I’m wondering when, really is the most appropriate place to talk about how much I hate Xander in this arc of the series. To put it most tamely, Xander completely lacks control of his emotions and critical thinking skills when Angel is in the mix. 

I’m not saying what he feels isn’t justified on some level, because he has experienced the same traumas and losses everyone else has in the Scooby Gang. Recoiling at the sight of Angel’s return makes sense and I honor that feeling.

But what Xander does so distinctly, gratingly wrong is that his motivations aren’t so simple as hating Angel for the greater welfare of humankind. But he poses himself that way, and what lies underneath is the residual, yet strong resentment he holds for Angel effectively “winning” Buffy rather than him. 

Every vindictive and antagonistic response that he throws at Buffy after the kiss reveal feels purely born out of those immature feelings, but he masks it as justified anger for what Angelus has destroyed, pretending justice means he can get revenge for losing a girl he never had. This is envy in one of the ugliest forms I’ve seen on scripted TV.

You can’t tell me Xander spotting Buffy and Angel kissing wasn’t a deliberate move on the writer’s part to twist the knife of a plotline that otherwise should’ve disappeared in the last season. And the worse part of Xander’s behavior is that he feel righteous in his negative response. He lacks the cognizance that Willow and Giles have to step outside of their feelings and understand Buffy’s circumstances. 

Maybe it’s a tribute to Giles’ age, but he’s able to understand what Buffy’s going through while still expressing how thoroughly pissed off he is and admonishing her. Similarly, it may be because Willow is still an emotional wallflower, but she first holds onto the fact that Buffy is an important person to her instead of unfeelingly condemning her behavior

This is call empathy, not forgiveness, and Xander’s lack of empathy, multiplied by his vindictive, incel behavior masked as “justice” is frankly really gross, and makes him really irredeemable. The way he treats Buffy in the aftermath of the reveal is completely unforgivable; he treats her like the dirt under his shoe for nursing Angel back to health.

The thing is, Xander’s immediate reaction upon spotting the kiss is leaving without being noticed, and immediately tattling to the Scooby Gang. When Buffy later returns to the library alone, they hold an intervention for her. Xander’s convinced the Buffy’s fallen into the same toxic love pattern she had with Angel in season two, and naturally has skewed what he saw to fit that narrative.

The worst part is that Buffy doesn’t have the vocabulary here to really defend herself; she can’t describe the complex nuances of how she feels at Angel’s return because everyone thinks she’s head over heels for him and fibbing to save face. 

Not to mention she hardly can hold the floor during the intervention because Xander’s horrid, envious behavior has turned to a wrathful call to action, to find and kill Angel. This is a big plot point in the episode and I’m going to return to it later, but god. Do you ever get so pent up about a girl you didn’t date that you want to kill her boyfriend?  

What I can say is Buffy does pull herself together to call out Xander for his actual behavior:

“You would just love an excuse to hurt him, wouldn’t you?”

“I don’t need an excuse. I think lots of dead people actually constitutes a reason.”

“Right. This is all nobility. This has nothing to do with jealousy.” (S3 E7, Revelations)

I’m telling you guys! Xander is a bad friend! And that’s not even mentioning the really shitty way he treats Buffy in episode two of season three, but I really don’t have  enough time to talk about that. He does call Buffy an idiot though in that episode, with that same flavor of false bravado he has in the intervention. It’s disgusting.

For all those reasons, I think Buffy’s writers spent a lot of time making Xander’s character more complex than your average pining best friend, when really, they could’ve kept with the status quo and maintained a show of the same quality. 

I don’t really see a lot of critical writing around Xander, and I guess it’s because he is the normal one out of the bunch, and by today’s standards he’s just a prototypical “nice guy,” with all of the connotations that carries, so he’s not really a revolutionary archetype in today’s influx of scripted media.

I’d also say he suffers from the same pitfalls a lot of annoying male characters fall into, where he doesn’t get proper comeuppance for just how much of an asshole he is. Yes, Xander faces consequences for being a hypocrite in entirely separate circumstances, but concerning Buffy, he never has to apologize.

At the end of this same episode, after the fighting has wrapped up, Buffy plainly asks if the two of them are “cool,” to which he says yes and tells her he trusts her. But we don’t see any of that growth or that understanding play out on screen between the two of them, because they were busy fighting a homicidal British lady. More on her later.

But the point is that regarding Buffy, Xander gets off scot-free. It feels like an easy out for otherwise dangerous and non-friend-like behavior.

Moving back to Buffy and Angel, the next episode we briefly see Spike, so yay! He doesn’t make any other appearances in this season, but I mention him because, unlike everyone else who eventually believes Buffy at her word that she and Angel aren’t romantically inclined, Spike calls out their sappy pining.

Spike is still as chaotic and evil as ever, but he’s notably very forlorn and pathetic at the start of this episode because Drusilla broke up with him for his betrayal at the end of season two. Remember how he sabotaged the apocalypse? Yeah. Anyway, the plot isn’t super relevant, but he calls out Buffy and Angel’s denial of their attraction for what it is,

Saying, “I may be love’s bitch, but at least I’m man enough to admit it.” At the end of the episode, Spike stops being pathetic and resolutely decides to win Drusilla back, leaving town again with that familiar bravado he used to possess. Meanwhile Angel and Buffy have to face the feelings they’ve otherwise buried.

I’m skipping over a lot of the plot here mainly to talk about the Buffy and Angel romance, but without much fanfare the two of them become closer on a romantic level, falling less in that weird category of Buffy helping Angel recuperate from an emotional distance. 

They basically admit their feelings in the episode title Amends, which I won’t go over, but it’s that episode where Buffy has really iconically bad bangs. Which I object to! In the year 2022, I can confidently say that, statistically, there must be at least one fashionable gen-z TikTok girl with this haircut, and I’m sure she sports it well. I simply can’t imagine otherwise. 

By episode 14, they’re casually kissing and consider themselves romantically involved, and they’re pretty stable for like, six episodes, minly because Angel isn’t really part of the plot. Buffy might go to him and they’ll coordinate on a strategy to take down the bad guy or have a normal conversation one-on-one, but nothing happens that affects their relationship beyond quietly making it stronger.

That is, until episode 19, Choices. I think what they do with Angel from this point forward is a really smart move, because in terms of the plot, Angel doesn’t offer much that’s significant anymore. For the gang, he’s of course an invaluable tool to help get the edge on bad guys, but in terms of propelling drama and angst amongst the Scoobies, Angel’s role was relatively front-loaded in season three with his dramatic revival from hell. After the dust settles, he’s just there.

So when you’re not accidentally being turned into an evil vampire and you’re not recovering from your time in hell and you’re not standing around as a catalyst for Buffy’s fallout with her friends, there’s really nothing left to do beyond be a good boyfriend. And that’s just boring. Angel has to be there to cause some strife from a writer’s perspective or he’s dead weight.

So understandably, when eventually facing off against the big bad of the season, a man whom we’ll come to know as “the Mayor,” we start to see what Angel’s next big wrench will be for Buffy. And unfortunately, it’s his last for this particular series. 

For context, the Mayor is relatively lucid at his best and maniacally, manically perky at his worst, and I can’t really portray what he says any better than he can:

“You kids, you know...  you don’t like to think about the future, you don’t like to make plans... You’re immortal, she’s not... What kind of a life can you offer her?... She’s a blossoming young girl, and you want to keep her from the life she should have till it’s passed her by. And by God...  I think that’s a little selfish. Is that what you came back from hell for? Is that your greater purpose?” (S3 E18, Choices)

I mean, this type of relationship difference was one of the big points of contention in another vampire-human romance later down the line, that being Stephenie Meyer’s Twilight. But the mythologies for vampirism between these series are entirely different, so Bella can somewhat reasonably propose that she turn into a vampire to solve the problem, whereas for Buffy, being turned means death, plain and simple. There’s no possibility for solving the problem of contradicting mortalities with her and Angel. 

Buffy is relatively unaffected by the Mayor’s rhetoric, but Angel, having apparently thought about this for a long time, takes this to heart, despite the Mayor being evil. The fun thing about these big bads, is yes they want to bring on an apocalypse, but they often make damn good points every now and then. They’re not absent of logic.

To make matters worse, Buffy’s mom, Joyce Summers, approaches Angel alone in the next episode, and mentions her concern of their relationship. Joyce isn’t even angry or confrontational, but she’s   on the understanding that her daughter is very young. 

Joyce could be worried about the logistics of Angel’s curse, which would be entirely reasonable to bring up, but she doesn’t even mention that – more poignantly, she only talks about how she worries about the stark differences between Angel and Buffy, of the possible repercussions that a real relationship between them could cause down the line.

Very correctly, Joyce talks honestly about how Buffy is a young girl just starting out in the world. Without having to say so, there is an understanding between Angel and Joyce of what Buffy’s life would look like if she were chained down to an immortal demon boyfriend, that she wouldn’t be able to experience true joy or happiness in the daylight, wouldn’t be able to start a family if she wanted to or die happy and old with her partner.

The reality of their relationship and what would be in store for them in the future is a far more real and present danger than Angel losing his soul, because one is a preventable danger while the other is the inevitable passage of time.

Not long after this scene, and rather randomly, Angel breaks up with Buffy while they’re patrolling in Sunnydale’s sewers. In the same breath that Buffy is heartbroken, Angel tries to be strong and cut ties, and tells her he’s leaving town once the Mayor business is wrapped up. Which he later does, keeping true to his word.

Of course it’s a surprise and devastating for Buffy, but later when Willow is consoling her about the breakup, Buffy does admit that Angel is right, despite how much she resents it and cries over him. 

Because the writers can’t stand to have Angel and Buffy on bad terms before the finale, the two of them do come to a quiet resolution. Angel shows up to Buffy’s prom and they have a last dance together to The Sundays’ cover of Wild Horses, which is the most beautiful cover and song to ever exist. End relationship.

I’d actually say it was a pretty anticlimactic ending, all things considered. I can’t imagine if this breakup occurred in season two, I’m pretty sure Buffy would’ve done something stupid to keep him. But their relationship has naturally reached its end.

Moving backward to the beginning, that was just on major plot arc I wanted to cover. Most of their relationship didn’t address the plot, (mostly because I ignored it), but now we’re going to dive into the most important catalyst of season three:

Not the Mayor.

No, okay, so I’m talking about Faith. In short, if you remember us talking about Kendra, the second slayer, I mentioned the fact that, unfortunately, she died. That meant she had to replace, and in walks Faith, who I had so many notes for, I’m not sure if I’m going to get to them all.

In short, Faith is rebellious –  she’s a little punk, a little white trash, forever flippant, and under the surface, very emotionally bruised. The best way I can describe her is this: if Kendra’s dutiful and straightlaced image were meant to serve as a foil to Buffy, and makes Buffy look a little rough around the edges, Faith swings way to the other side of the Slayer spectrum.

Next to Faith, Buffy is positively a girl’s girl, a stickler for the rules, practically boring by comparison. My favorite and the most obvious evidence of this comes from the costuming department, because any time Faith is especially rugged or out of line, Buffy is there looking feminine, wearing a cute skirt, heels, holding a purse, the works. Basically non-slayer appropriate attire.

Faith is introduced in the third episode of season three title Faith, Hope, and Trick, and the short explanation we get for her arrival is that her original watcher was brutally murdered by some powerful vampire gang, and Faith shows up in Sunnydale to escape her emotional demons while also not telling the others about her literal demons. 

The monster that’s chasing her isn’t important; he dies in the same episode he’s introduced. But what is important is that you immediately understand Faith hides all of her trauma under an evergreen false bravado, which gets old fast. But the good news is that Faith, by virtue of being the second slayer, is also an immediate satellite member of the Scooby Gang. They’re on good terms.

Notably, however, she’s not a true friend of anyone in the group, only a strong ally, which is why I say satellite rather than full-fledged member. It’s similar to Angel’s role, but Angel benefits from being in love with the protagonist, so at least he has a support system. Faith, notably, doesn’t.

For a while she’ll pop in and out of episodes whenever the plot calls for it, but the next really pivotal episode for Faith is episode seven, Revelations. As mentioned, Faith’s Watcher died before the events of Faith’s arrival, so she’s due a new one any day now. While it would probably be very convenient for Giles to assume the role, the Watcher’s Council doesn’t agree, thinking watchers and slayers should be one-to-one.

Enter Gwendolyn Post, Faith’s new Watcher, who isn’t super relevant to the overarching plot beyond this episode, but she throws enough of the cast off-balance that it leaves some echoes of mistrust in Faith, I think.

Gwendolyn Post is this especially high-strung, very pompous, and frustratingly intelligent British woman who is just... the absolute worst kind of academic you could ever possibly meet. With Giles, you understood he was very tight-laced at the beginning of the series, but he was never condescending or quietly cruel in the way that Gwendolyn Post effortlessly is.

She looks down upon everything on first arrival, even Giles, who you come to realize has actually loosened up a lot since the very first episode . More than ever because of his contrast to Gwen, you can see just how much he and the rest of the gang have gelled, how they compliment each other’s strengths and trust each other to fight evil.

If Gwendolyn became Buffy’s watcher, they probably would’ve butt heads and settled to some agreement, but with Faith, they obviously don’t see eye to eye at all. Faith has this very obvious mistrust and dislike of authority, but at this point in the series, Faith isn’t detrimentally rebellious. They’re still able to communicate without destroying each other, which feels miraculous.

To give away the plot twist in this episode, Gwendolyn Post isn’t actually part of the Watcher’s Council anymore. She was fired on account of being evil, but the message to Giles got lost in the mail or something. The point is, she causes more chaos and sews seeds of doubt between Faith and the others.

Even more importantly, this is the same episode where Xander catches Buffy and Angel kissing, so if you recall, there’s this entire intervention sequence where Xander spews hate at her, Giles admonishes her, and Willow is being timid and concerned, as per usual. Faith was not invited to this intervention. 

So it’s important to remember that Xander right now is feeling envy and hate towards Buffy, towards Angel, and rather than stewing on his feelings or venting to a friend, he takes his rage and uses it to manipulate Faith and potentially hurt Angel. Let me explain.

Just previous to the intervention. Buffy and Faith are patrolling downtown. Faith lightly asks some questions about Buffy’s relationship with Angel, but Buffy kind of roughly brushes her off, and while Faith’s not one to show feeling, I think this cold shoulder hurts her a bit. At first it feels like a very inconsequential scene, but I think it was one of those moments where Buffy really could’ve opened up to Faith and gotten closer to her. But she doesn’t.

This sense of separation or seclusion from the group is later emphasized when Gwendolyn tells Faith, very inaccurately, that everyone else is having a “secret meeting,” whereupon Faith remarks that “I guess that doesn’t include me.” Faith already feels distant, but these small moments are really pivotal in making her feel more alone. 

This is the part where Xander really puts his shitty behavior on full, violent display, which I couldn’t really explain in depth before. The next person Faith sees after her meeting with Gwendolyn is Xander, and in his rage and envious contempt for Angel’s mere existence, he tells her that Angel is holding onto an ancient, evil artifact.

Which is true! He’s holding onto this glove that could potentially bring about the end of the world if someone wore it, but what Xander doesn’t say is Angel is holding it for Buffy and the Scooby Gang. Xander is so caught up in his own envy that he deliberately manipulates Faith to think Angel is evil because he wants Faith to slay him. 

And I get it, Angelus terrorized you and your friends and murdered some people. But Xander knows this is Angel, not Angelus, and understands the nuances of separation between each identity. It’s like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. 

What this does for Faith, on the other end, is push her further into this territory of not being a friend, but a weapon to be used, to be manipulated. She likes to kill vampires, sure, but it goes without saying that spurring her on in this direction will only cause her to be alienated from the cast after the fact, whether she succeeds in killing Angel or not. Xander is leading her astray for his own cause.

The writers try to subtly save face for Xander a bit later in the episode, because he and Faith get separated. In doing so, Xander faces a brief moment of lucidity from his wrath, and admits how he cruelly twisted Faith to cause a conflict. 

Do you remember how Gwendolyn Post is evil? So, when Giles tells Gwen that Angel has the glove, she knocks him out. Because it turns out, the only reason Gwendolyn arrived in the first place was to gain intel on this glove and come to possess it, to wear for herself. So she knocks Giles out and arrives at the mausoleum where Angel lives, where she encounters Faith.

I can’t remember where Buffy has been while this is happening, but by this point, she has also arrived at Angel’s mausoleum, and here ensues the first of many “Buffy versus Faith” girl fights, and oh my god, these are some of the best in the series. We saw a hint of this in season two when Buffy and Kendra had a cat fight, but nothing to this level.

Importantly Buffy tries to talk it out with Faith first, but Faith has already been set on the path of slaying the vampire and saving the day. Faith throws the first punch, and what follows is a violent roller coaster of one girl getting an edge over the other, back and forth, and there’s lots of sound effects and stumbling around, there are a few set changes, lots of fun props. The set designers and choreographers really went to town for this one.

At one point, you do see an expression on Faith’s face where she may be unsure about fighting, but the thing about Faith is: she doesn’t let go of her convictions. Very much to her detriment, she has way too much personal pride to admit when she’s wrong. Regardless of whether her behavior is correct, she’s going to follow through with something until it’s finished.

So even when she may realize that this fight means nothing or she’s been led astray by Xander and Gwendolyn, she doesn’t stop, because she doesn’t want to look weak. Her pride doesn’t rely on her winning every fight, necessarily, because she knows she can always get vengeance another day, and it doesn’t rely on her being morally correct in the aftermath of a confrontation, either. Faith fully embraces the chaos that surrounds her, physically speaking, and makes that her identity.

But she doesn’t want to look mentally and emotionally weak to those around her. It’s why when Buffy and the others try to bond with her or appeal to her humanity later on, she shuts them down. For Faith, living in solitude and having no friends isn’t necessarily what she wants in life. But having to own up to her personal failings is a hurdle she can’t possibly face. It would mean becoming vulnerable, and vulnerability only leads to betrayal or loss.

And I do think it’s that point earlier in the episode, where Buffy rebuffs Faiths’ questions about Angel, that Faith’s mentality begins her downward descent. It’s not really Buffy’s fault because it was a very mundane social transaction, but it’s one of those instances a person could look back and question, “what if I said something else?”

In the end, neither of them win the fight, because Gwendolyn is able to locate and don the glove, after which she can throw around lightning and destroy things. But Buffy manages to cut off Gwen’s arm in retaliation, and then a lightning bolt strikes Gwen, destroying her and sending her into a nether realm.

So ultimately, this is just a “monster of the week” style episode. But what remains after the fight are strong echoes of mixed feelings and discontent, as well as stark differences in views. The day after the conflict, Buffy tries to smooth things over with Faith at her apartment, but it becomes obvious that Faith wasn’t simply led astray by Gwen’s word.

I think Faith does want there to be a resolution, but she is so stuck in the decisions she made, that she deliberately avoids seeing eye to eye with Buffy. She stays true to her conviction that all vampires should be slain and about her actions taken the night before, and in that failure to meet in the middle, their relationship is significantly tarnished.

Maybe she’s right on some level, that Angel shouldn’t be an exception to the rule. And if so, that just means there’s this plain, unavoidable conflict of interest between slayers. Angel can neither be alive or dead for these girls to reasonably move forward.

I want to briefly pause between episodes and say, yes, I haven’t really discussed the Mayor in full. We’re about to get to him. I will say, however, that the Mayor’s interactions with the Scooby Gang really only pick up near the end of the season. The earlier episodes, the Mayor is likely doing something adjacent to a monster of the week, is endorsing that monster somehow, or is benefiting from the predicament some way.

A good example of this is episode 6, Band Candy, where Giles’ old buddy, Ethan Rayne, comes back to town and gives chocolate bars to all the adults in Sunnydale, whereupon eating them makes them act like teenagers and causing chaos. 

That in itself is a good one-episode plot, but in the grand scheme of things, this chaos is meant to serve as a distraction so the Mayor and his minions can collect babies and sacrifice them to a sewer demon. Yeah, heavy stuff.

In fact, many of these other episodes conveniently leave the Mayor, to the point that the Scooby Gang doesn’t realize the Mayor is evil until episode 15, Consequences, which we’re about to get to. Episode 14 and 15 go hand-in-hand regarding Faith’s downfall, and this all leads to her eventual alliance with the Mayor. Yeah, Faith goes bad.

Funnily, episode 14 is called “Bad Girls.” We start this episode with Faith’s actual new Watcher showing up to town, Wesley Wyndham-Price. And oh my god, on the spectrum of dorky-to-pompous Watchers, Wesley is the possibly the dorkiest person alive. He’s similar to Giles season one, but at least Giles season one had some authority about him, meanwhile Wesley is walked all over.

Nobody in the entire cast appreciates Wesley’s existence: Buffy doesn’t care for him, Giles can’t even humor the guy’s authority, and Faith all but ignores him. The important traits to list for Wesley are that he’s very dorky, he’s a stickler for the rules, and his genuine lack of experiences makes him fully unequipped to handle his position. He says he’s killed two vampires, I believe, but within in very controlled environments, to the point that calling it “slaying” feels like a lie.

His presence, conveniently, also gives Giles plenty of opportunities to look cool and down with the kids. At one point the two watchers are fencing and while Wesley tries his best to keep up, Giles effortlessly beats him while talking to someone else.

Seemingly in contradiction to the new walking rulebook, while slaying, Faith convinces Buffy to indulge in the slayer’s carnal desire to kill, and they sweep an entire vampire lair, which is very out of the norm for Buffy. Usually she plays the defensive rather than pursue the negligent offensive.

Also, obviously, Buffy and Faith are back on talking terms. I don’t think they ever stopped talking or coordinating patrols, in fact they’re relatively friendly, but there’s a new air to Faith that feels a bit disingenuous, and she’s a bit more rough around the edges.

What follows after successfully slaying an entire vampire nest is that Faith convinces Buffy it’s cool to listen to those instincts and live above the law. It’s an adrenaline high, something that Faith on multiple occasions describes as a kind of aphrodisiac for the slayer. Way back in the episode where she first pops into town, even, she plainly explains to the Scooby Gang that she gets really horny after some slayage, to which Buffy only responds that she craves a low-fat yogurt.

Buffy, in Bad Girls, gets so drunk off of Faith’s own sense of fun and power, that she skips school to hang out with her, to start fights and dance sexually at the Bronze. At seemingly their worst, Buffy and Faith break into a weapon store at night and steal some fancy crossbows and knives.

This doesn’t end so well and the two of them are arrested, but to make matters worse, when they’re in the cop car, they intentionally cause a wreck to escape out the backseat, after which Buffy finally starts to realize this behavior isn’t okay.

So the two of them are still mucking about in Sunnydale’s alleyways at night, but Buffy is actively trying to make Faith cool off, and Faith isn’t really having it. Before they can really settle down, they’re ambushed by a few random vampires who are loyal to a monster of the week named Balthazar. Balthazar is not relevant. They slay those vampires with ease.

But here’s the dramatic bit: so the Mayor has this assistant named Allan Finch, and Allan Finch is fully human. He’s riding along with all of the Mayor’s evil plans up to this point in the season, but I think it’s mostly out of fear, because Allan Finch seems like a nice enough man. 

In Bad Girls, the Mayor audibly plans and alludes to bringing on the apocalypse, and Allan thinks its high-time to get out of there. From what we know, Allan Finch was actually trying to find the Scooby Gang and warn them about the oncoming doom, but I’m not sure if that was really confirmed in the script.

But what happens is, when he finds Faith and Buffy, it’s in the alleyway at night. The slayers have just killed off Balthazar’s vamps one by one, and unfortunately, getting highly caught up in the moment, Faith mistakes Allan Finch for a vampire and stabs him with a stake. Almost immediately he collapses against a dumpster and dies.

This is a massive mistake on Faith’s part. Slayers are not supposed to kill humans for any reason. It isn’t considered slaying, it’s just plain murder.

Now, you remember how Faith, to her detriment, sticks to her convictions and actions? Yeah, unfortunately this is one of those instances, and it’s the worst of its kind. In the moment, it seems like Faith is scared and regretful of what she’s done, but she almost immediately 180s.

Horrified, for the rest of the episode Buffy tries to convince Faith that this isn’t okay, that she has to turn herself into the police and face her crimes, rightfully noting that being the slayer isn’t the same as being a killer. But Faith has immediately regressed into this aggressive, solitary, self-protective mode. 

Instead of being reflective, she doubles down on this carnal power of being a vampire slayer, going so far as to claim that she is above the law, that she can do what she wants. At her worst, and at the end of Bad Girls when Buffy pleads to her about Allan’s death, Faith blithely, hauntingly tells Buffy that she doesn’t care. 

How authentic she feels about that at the time is really hard to gauge, because she sticks to her guns for quite a while, into the season’s finale. After the fact, I feel it becomes obvious that Faith’s derision and self-propelled chaos is parallel to her shame and her guilt and her fear, because the longer she goes on, and the more evil she presents herself as, the more you get the sense that Faith is deliberately masking her shame.

I am getting ahead of myself here, but sort of like how Faith fought Buffy in the Gwendolyn episode, Faith is simply pushing forward with violence and hate because to rewind and acknowledge her own shortcomings and mistakes would be to show weakness. Posing one’s self as evil, to go so far as to join an apocalypse-seeking mayor, it’s just very dramatic denial.

Claiming yourself as evil and effectively absolving yourself as human is to theoretically absolve yourself of the guilt of your actions. In a very real sense, I think Faith is trying to pursue her own Angelus, to create her own Mr. Hyde persona, but she can’t escape it, at least not in the end.

In episode 15, Consequences, Buffy is still keeping Faith’s murder as secret, and is still trying to plead with her to see reason. At one point, she goes to Faith’s apartment and describes how she knows how Faith feels. To quote Buffy, it’s

“Dirty. Like something sick creeped inside you and you can’t get it out. And you keep hoping it was just some nightmare, but it wasn’t.”

But Faith isn’t listening, and flippantly disregards the way Buffy tries to connect with her. She’s using her power and separation from society as a kind of armor, and not long after this scene, Faith attempts to use Allan’s murder as a weapon against Buffy.

Later on, while Buffy isn’t around, Faith twists the scene to Giles and claims Buffy was the one to kill Allan. Faith leaves so Giles can reprimand Buffy, immediately after which Giles admits he knew Faith was lying, that Faith is, in fact, a very bad liar. The two of them agree that Faith is unstable and, quote,

“utterly unable to accept responsibility...  She’s in denial. There is no help for her until she admits what happens.”

Now, remember the fact that Wesley exists? Yeah, he eavesdrops on their conversation and hears about Faith’s actions. This is bad news for everyone involved, because he tattle tales to the actual Watcher’s Council.

In another scene, Angel, who is already suspicious that Buffy and Faith are involved in the Allan murder, ambushes Faith and drags her back to his museum, chaining her up. He lets Buffy know of his actions and she’s like, yeah, sure, do your thing.

My earlier comparison between Angel and Faith is actually something the show explores with a lot of depth, because Angel has a talk with Faith. Up to this point, nobody has been able to penetrate Faith’s exterior, but Angel gets substantially close by comparison. He says to her, 

“I mean, to kill without remorse is to feel like a god. But you’re not a god. You’re not much more than a child. Going down this path will ruin you. You can’t imagine the price for true evil.”

And sure, Buffy and Giles can try to understand what she’s going through, but only Angel really understands, and he understands better than her, because he’s had to live with that guilt a hundred fold, if not more. 

But just as you think Angel is getting through to her, Wesley intervenes with the Watcher’s Council and detains Faith, sending her back to square one, if not square negative one, because ew, Wesley. Naturally, because he is incompetent, Wesley doesn’t detain Faith for long and she escapes. 

I’ll spare you the details of the rest of this episode, but Faith is now an official baddie. All ties have been severed between herself and the Scooby Gang, who never properly showed her compassion to start with.

Moving on, I’m not going to talk in-depth episode 17, Enemies, but it does feature Faith heavily, so I want to touch on a few character beats. She’s fully evil by this point, but the gang doesn’t know she’s bad, so under the Mayor’s instruction, she tries to enlist the help of Angelus. Yes, Angelus, not Angel.

To explain, Faith laughably tries to hook up with Angel so that by having sex he will lose his soul again, and Angel turns her down straight up. This whole episode’s plot is about how Angel briefly turns Angelus, by the way, but it’s a all a big temporary ruse, so I don’t feel the need to explain any further.

What I will say is, on the subject of Faith, in the climax of the episode when Buffy and Angel face off against Faith, she aggressively laments how everything in their world is always about Buffy, that Buffy gets all the credit as the slayer and Faith is sidelined. Which is true, because it’s her show. The world revolves around her.

I want to popcorn over to episode 18, Earshot, very briefly. This episode is super irrelevant in the grand scheme of things, but Buffy contracts telepathy in this episode, and I wanted to highlight an interesting thought from Oz, of all people. We haven’t talked about Oz much yet.

But to himself, he thinks, "I am my thoughts. If they exist in her, Buffy contains everything that is me. She becomes me. I cease to exist.” Obviously this is first and foremost a joke from the writers to show how Oz, while he’s very quiet and unaffected on the outside, is casually a philosopher on the inside. But I really found it to be a powerful idea, and I wanted to see if anyone on the internet thought similarly.

So I cannot take credit at all for this theory, but I really wanted to highlight this post from the Tumblr user herinsectreflection, who writes:

Faith presents herself as the dark side of Buffy, as someone who does all the things that Buffy wants to do, but represses. You can debate how true this exactly is, but let’s assume it is. If what Faith claims is true, everything that Faith thinks and feels exists within Buffy - then as Oz says, Faith ceases to exist. Buffy contains everything that is her, and becomes her. Faith is subsumed inside another. And of course she is - she is Buffy’s shadow, she cannot exist without Buffy, she’s not designed to. (herinsectreflection.tumblr.com)

They then incorporate a quote from this same episode, from Othello, referencing Iago:

“It’s like he’s not really a person. He’s the dark half of Othello himself.” (S3 E18, Earshot)

The fact that these two sentiments are woven into the same episode really solidifies for me that these ideas were intentional, despite the fact that Faith isn’t present at all in episode 18. To continue with their theory, 

Faith cannot achieve personhood while she continues to define herself entirely in relation to Buffy. Which is a pattern she is trapped in because the narrative itself demands that she does. She is the dark half of Buffy. Everything that she is exists within Buffy, and she ceases to exist. (herinsectreflection.tumblr.com)

And I really don’t know if I can expand significantly on their theory, but after I read this, I felt really moved and reconsidered Faith’s behavior Enemies, where she is essentially lashing out in the worst way possible, trying to etch out her own corner in the world where Buffy cannot reach.

Something I haven’t mentioned up to this point is the Mayor and Faith, once they became allies, are not merely allies. They have this very strange father-daughter bond which grows as the season persists. This becomes important.

The Mayor, by virtue of being this very false shell of a human, experiences nearly zero real human emotion outside the occasional hiccup of evil which betrays his genial exterior. But with Faith, what starts as the standard evil person alliance very subtley softens and changes. 

At one point in a previous episode, the Mayor buys Faith a fancy apartment, lifting her out of the hovel of her old place. He gives her a PlayStation, I think, and showers her with other gifts including weapons.

The false positivity and charisma the Mayor exudes, somehow along the way, is superceded by genuine human care for Faith. Where, in every other way both physical and mental, the Mayor has transformed himself into the nonhuman, this relationship they’ve nurtured sticks itself firm within the Mayor’s psyche. He doesn’t even try to fight or undo it. I’d go so far to say that he loves her unconditionally.

I will say, by this point we start to learn that the Mayor’s big evil goal for season three isn’t simply to cause chaos and destruction. No, the Mayor seeks to become a pure demon, and engages in various transformative rituals throughout the season to prepare his body as a vessel, such as making himself invincible. But I’m getting ahead of myself.

Then we get to the finale. Yes, I’m skipping The Prom. And yes, I’m skipping really fun landmark episode like Doppelgangland and The Wish. However, I do think I’ll mention the latter two if I eventually do a second Buffy video because we’d have to talk about Anya. 

Rest assured, I still have a section in this review dedicated to Willow and Xander and what they’ve been doing this whole season besides being mean to Buffy. I’ll get to it after the finale.

Graduation Day part one and part two is the finale of season three, and Part one is markedly the conclusion of the Faith plot for season three. I’ll talk about these with some depth. 

So, in previous episodes, the Scooby Gang has caught word that the Mayor’s big transformation into the demon Olvikan, known as the ascension, is set to occur on graduation day itself, and to give a little insight from the Mayor’s perspective as to why,

it’s because he needs a nice big meal when the transformation takes place. So he’s conniving to munch on the graduating class to confirm his strength and bring about chaos, etc. To jump back into a point I glossed over a minute or so ago, the Mayor wishes to become a pure demon. 

We learn in part one that the run-of-the-mill demons we see from episode to episode are merely partial demons, to quote, “tainted, human hybrids, like vampires. The ascension means that a human becomes pure demon. They’re different.” In fact, the last ascension to occur 800 years prior completely destroyed the town with which it occurred, and the demon itself was only destroyed by a volcano’s eruption, somehow. 

But the Scooby Gang isn’t able to fully focus on preparing for the ascension yet, because one night, when Buffy and Angel are standing around in public, Faith from afar shoots Angel with a poison arrow, which could prove deadly if left untreated. I mention this because as they are plotting to find a cure and heal Angel, Wesley, who’s still around, forbids them to follow through with that plan.

But they’re not having it. When they dissent, Wesley calls their actions mutiny, and the others simply accept it. Wesley, by and large, has been the sole voice of the Watcher’s Council, and nobody trusts him, and his influence is very weak, so this was bound to happen.

In effect, by turning their backs on Wesley, they are turning their backs on the council and ultimately severing ties. Which, good. The Watcher’s Council sucks. Even Giles stays with the Scooby Gang. As a side note, Willow is working on a spell to hopefully cure Angel.

Meanwhile, Buffy takes action and ambushes Faith’s apartment. Which, great, but also, I have no idea when the good guys attained that information. Anyway, the quality of this scene is—ugh, chef’s kiss. The quality of the choreography and each character’s fighting style is pitch perfect, very similar to their last fight in Revelations.

They forcibly move their fight from Faith’s apartment to Faith’s balcony, and ultimately Buffy wins out over Faith by stabbing her in the stomach with her own knife. Buffy specifically does this because Willow’s spell cure calls for the blood of the person who inflicted the poison.

But instead of allowing Buffy to take her blood, Faith very dramatically throws herself on the balcony and lands in the bed of a truck, traveling off to who-knows-where in a near-death state. So no cure yet.

When Buffy returns fruitless to Angel’s bedside, he’s become delusional, he’s having hallucinations. Instead of letting him die like that, Buffy shoos away her friends and essentially coerces Angel to suck on her blood, which can cure him. Don’t ask me how, it just does. Anyway, in his psychosis he relents and feeds on her. 

I think this is one of those transactions that everyone expected to happen eventually. Granted, we all thought it would be Angelus feeding on Buffy and not Angel, but the worst of the worst has come true, and everyone involved has to face the repercussions of their actions.

I wouldn’t necessarily describe their relationship as abusive, by any means, but what Buffy and Angel are, is volatile. They aren’t good for one another for practical reasons, for emotional reasons, for the risks inherent to their being together, both short term and long term. And finally, we see in the flesh how their connection could potentially prove fatal.

Luckily, when Angel eventually becomes lucid again, he pulls off of Buffy successfully, but she becomes very ill and he rushes her to a hospital.

This is an interesting scene, because Faith is revealed to be in the hospital as well, and the Mayor is watching over her, meanwhile Buffy and Angel are like, just a room over. What occurs after that point is a confrontation of words, and for the first time the Mayor’s false exterior falters, and he shows himself as a genuine, violent, evil threat to Angel. He calls Buffy Angels’ whore.

It’s weird, there was a scene earlier in the same episode where the Mayor sees Giles and very sinisterly, plainly says he’s going to eat Buffy. It’s played off in the same way, and it’s really quite terrifying.

Besides that, Buffy has a very serene dream sequence, and Faith is also there. There’s no fighting, no ill will or hostility. All their wounds have disappeared and they’re standing in a light, airy bedroom.

The thing is, this is definitely Faith’s actress, but I’m not certain it’s 100% Faith herself, because she holds a lot of information about the future that otherwise is impossible to know. It’s probable that some higher power just shoved certain ideas into her head, which ultimately is fine because Faith will be staying in a semi-permanent coma. By the time she comes out of it those little prophecies aren’t even her concern.

She says the phrase, “Little Miss Muffet, counting down from 7-3-0,” which his a very silly nothing burger of a statement, but actually foretells some events later on in season five, which feels very much like the writers pompously patting themselves on the back. The scene doesn’t last much longer than that.

We have now entered the last phase of the finale, which is when all the characters prepare for their final battle with the Mayor during his ascension. I just want to come out and say it—the best seasons of Buffy have incredible finales, and season three is squarely one of those stellar examples.

At the start, it’s posed as the fact that Buffy has this crazy plan they’re following through with, but the viewer isn’t allowed to know it until the final conflict occurs. And dear lord, is it actually kinda nuts. On their own, every main character is seen or heard talking with various students in the graduating class who have been featured in previous episodes. 

This means the ditzy popular girl Harmony, the dorky short kid Jonathan, gay Larry, and Willow’s jock friend, Percy, all of whom I’ve glossed over significantly. Truly, they’re not that important regarding the previous plots, but they are students.

On the day of the ascension, the Mayor is set to perform the commencement speech, and the most evil thing he does this entire episode is subject those graduating students to a long, boring speech rather than getting straight to the transformation and murder.

Luckily, finally, he does the dang thing. And my god, the graphics for this snake-looking monster are horrible. In almost every other circumstance, I can excuse the graphics or it seems pretty passable for its time, but my god, they really didn’t have the budget for a monster to be on screen for more than a second.

But the big twist that makes this season so fucking cool is the entire graduating class has unified in support of slaying the Mayor. Underneath their graduating garb are crossbows, knives, maces, the works. Do you remember how Xander remembers had all that military intel ever since the Halloween in season two?

Well, that still comes in handy here because Xander is commanding all of these students by squadron. Because there’s not enough chaos going on, a full eclipse is happening during the graduation event, so on top of a massive snake demon, tons of the Mayor’s vampire lackeys are crowding the students from behind.

Rest assured, there is chaos everywhere. But the students have been exceptionally equipped and divided into teams to handle every side, so it’s not just a big student buffet. If that wasn’t enough fire power for the good guys, Angel and Wesley have assembled a team of… random men? To aid in the battle? I actually have no idea who these people are. I couldn’t identify who any of them were in the background. But they’re helping out, too.

There are a few notable things which happen to the side characters: so gay Larry, who I mention maybe a minute ago, he gets thwacked by the Mayor’s tail and breaks his neck. Principal Snyder dies, Harmony gets bitten by a vampire, and for all intents and purposes, dies. Jonathan somehow survives, and Cordelia is there, staking her first vampire.

If you’re wondering where Cordelia’s been this whole time, by the way, she’s been around, faffing about and kissing Wesley. I’ll get to that. It’s just not that interesting.

But here’s the actually interesting bit: the Scooby Gang has previously concluded that in order to win out against the Mayor, they have to taunt what remains of his humanity after the transformation. And do you know how they accomplish that?

Buffy—waves around a knife that the Mayor bought for Faith, the same knife that Buffy stabbed Faith with, near-killing her. It holds a lot of weight.

So instead of feasting on the students like he’s supposed to, he aggros on Buffy alone. She runs into the school and he basically plows right into it behind her, so she’s running through the halls while he completely demolishes the cafeteria and every other familiar set. Buffy runs through the library, and the Mayor files in, destroying that too.

But here’s the best part—Buffy runs to the back of the library and throws herself out of a window that’s behind the stacks, I guess. The Mayor loses sight of her, and Giles, hiding out in the grass where Buffy lands, flicks a switch and sets off a massive pile of explosives in the library, not only destroying the library, but the majority of the school in the process.

Oh yeah, and the Mayor’s dead. If you’re concerned, we saw earlier in the finale all of the main characters clearing out Giles’ books from the school, but it’s really sneakily done because they’re talking about other stuff as they’re doing it, not commenting on their actions at all.

Anyway, the students on the school’s lawn manage to fend off the vampires with minimal losses, and the good guys win out. Ambulances and police arrive on the scene and various injured people are escorted away. All of the loose threads have, for better or for worse, been tied up or exploded, so there’s not much scene left to chew up.

However, near the very end of the episode, we are following Buffy walking through the crowd, the media, the ambulances. She’s looking for Angel, but remember that Angel and Buffy have already broken up by this point. They had their slow dance at prom, they met their resolution. And remember also that Angel said he was leaving after the conflict ended.

But instead of leaving so simply, Buffy does eventually spot him in the distance, standing just barely on her side of a rising fog. They don’t approach each other and cry, they don’t argue. For better or for worse, they understand this is for the best, even if it’s not what they want in the current moment. 

Their expressions are solemn, and it’s obvious they’re sad, but there are no tears. This is for the best. Very simply, Angel turns away and leaves the series for good.

And that’s the end of season three. I kind of want to scream, because oh my god, that took so long. I didn’t anticipate taking so long. You may have noticed, I was trying to speak less and less about things but I was also trying to still give all of the context and characters beats. This is a challenging gig. It’s not easy.

I did have one last point throughout the series I wanted to bring up, and that’s the plot surrounding Willow, Xander, Oz, and Cordelia. I didn’t really touch on this because it’s its own schmaltzy drama and resolution, and feels fairly insular in and of itself.

I made a comment earlier about how Willow completely and permanently gets over Xander, but that’s absolutely not the case. Forgive me for the mix-up, in the long run I think I just repressed this plot because it largely feels pointless.

Basically, Xander and Willow start becoming mutually attracted to one another in season three. Willow of course has always pined after Xander, but there’s a specific scene in episode 5, Homecoming, where everyone is preparing for the dance. Not the Prom, which is episode 20, but homecoming, which is apparently different.

Xander and Willow are both trying on formal outfits and after a few failed dresses on Willow’s part, they both step out from behind separate room dividers in really nice clothing, all gussied up. Willow’s old feelings bubble to the surface, and Xander’s finally able to see Willow come out of her shell as a beautiful blossoming girl. 

They didn’t plan it ahead of time, but getting caught up in the moment, they share an unexpected kiss. Immediately after, they freak out a little bit because both of them are very taken by other partners, but by the next episode… they’re playing footsy in science class because they can’t help themselves. Yeah, it’s that kind of plot.

Xander’s two-timing actions make his behavior in episode seven, Revelations, even worse than before. This is the intervention episode we keep going back to. Because not only is he literally cheating on Cordelia with Willow, he’s also letting his ancient feelings for a different girl who blatantly isn’t interested in him, affect his judgment and his decision-making skills. 

Inversely, it feels especially hypocritical for a man who keeps his legitimately shameful romantic exploits hidden to then turn around and harshly criticize a girl who is keeping her romantic exploits secret. And Angel’s not even her lover or boyfriend by that point, to make it worse. 

The more factors play into this scene, the more and more Xander’s legitimate motives for not trusting Angel chip away from gross self-interest, envy, and hypocrisy. But I’ve talked about this too long.

Oh, and Xander make out in the library in this episode, to make the betrayal even more substantial within the moment. Willow, on the other hand, was fairly tame and the most forgiving of Buffy because she, in fact, saw the parallels between her situation and Buffy’s. At one point when they’re alone, Willow tries to come clean about the affair, but chickens out.

Episode 9 is when this plot all comes crashing down. It’s the episode where Spike comes to town. Not only is Spike good at calling out the problems in the Buffy-Angel relationship, he also perfectly gives Willow and Xander a location to have their affair, because Spike has kidnapped them and stored them in his old warehouse.

On their own, Oz and Cordelia are actually driving around town trying to find their partners while Buffy and Angel distract Spike, and because Oz is a werewolf, he eventually smells Willow’s fearful scent from like, a county road. So they pull over to the side and make their way to the warehouse.

Willow and Xander are basically on top of each other at this point, and they kiss. Understandably Oz and Cordelia are upset. In fact, Cordelia is so upset, she flees the basement by climbing the stairs they just descended down. But because this is an abandoned warehouse and everything is very faulty down there, one of the steps collapses beneath her.

What follows is Cordelia falls on the ground on her back and is impaled through the stomach with a rogue pipe or something. There’s a scene right after the graveyard where the camera leads you to believe we are watching Cordelia’s funeral, and oh my god, I remember screaming the first time I saw this scene.

But no, it’s a cheeky red herring. Cordelia’s in the hospital and, needless to say, she’s broken up with Xander. Oz and Willow are separated as well, but Oz, given that he’s mostly unaffected by the world around him, is lucid and tries to understand Willow.

He needs distance and is very angry, but things aren’t completely broken.

Fast forward to episode 11, and this isn’t about the romance plot anymore, because that’s basically completed. It’s done, its rotation is finished. This is actually just a monster of the week episode, but I wanted to highlight that we are finally privy to Willow’s connection with magic. 

All the episodes up to this point have her helping out with spells and incantations very gradually, much to Giles’ worry, but for the most part her investment has been pretty tame and helpful. This episode, Amy’s back in the picture! But only this once in season three. She’s part of Willow’s little coven along with some other random goth boy, and they perform a protection spell on Buffy, it’s very cute.

I won’t spend too long on this one, but this is the episode where an evil version of Hansel and Gretel convince Sunnydale’s entire population of moms to form a mob and try to kill all the witches in town, including Amy and Willow. They’re unsuccessful spoiler, but in order to save herself from being burnt at the stake, she turns herself into a mouse.

After the conflict has settled, Willow tries to turn Amy back in to ah uman, but she doesn’t know how. So instead, she keeps rat Amy as a pet and passively tries to find a cure throughout the rest of the season. In short, she has no luck. But Amy doesn’t stay a rat forever! More on her way in the next video.

I’d talk about episode twelve, Helpless, which centers on the relationship between Buffy and Giles, as well as the Watcher’s Council, but really to save time, all I’ll say is this is the start of Gile’s defection from the Watcher’s Council because of their barbaric traditions. Buffy reasonably begins to loathe them as well.

I don’t know, for the most part, Giles is just a growing character in this season with few significant plot points. Giles feels betrayed when he learns Angel is still alive, and in the episode Helpless Buffy’s trust of Giles is briefly tarnished, but it’s all very simple beyond that.

Like I alluded to previously, after Jenny’s death I’m not sure the writers played with Giles as much as they could’ve. He has a lot of fun character beats in season three, like in the episode Band Candy where he acts like the Ripper again. But they’re all very individual moments that don’t weave their way into the main plot. He very much maintains the status quo.

I’m skipping the episode The Zeppo despite wanting to talk about it because I’ve already spent so much time talking about Xander, but I don’t know, maybe I’ll make a shorter video down the line on the subject.

As for Cordelia, the writers really started to phase her out. After her breakup with Xander, she’s not around as much, and then for whatever she’s back without cause. The first half of season three was really her bread and butter, especially when it came to episodes like SlayerFest and The Wish. But again, these are like monster-of-the-week episodes and she doesn’t have a longstanding arc within the story.

Near the end, she does have two characters beats, neither of which I’m a big fan of. The first is relatively tame: she and her family lost all her fortune, and she’s not able to go to any of the colleges she wants to. Again, this season focuses a lot on what the future may hold, especially when it comes to secondary education and relationships.

I think this wealth subplot functioned to shoehorn Cordelia into Angel’s own show, because instead of going to an Ivy League school, Cordelia eventually settles in Los Angeles to become an actor, which is where Angel also goes to live. I think she does great on that series, but her end on Buffy is truly abysmal.

The cast never says goodbye to Cordelia, and when episode one of season four rolls around, she’s just gone without pomp and circumstance. With the wealth issue, Xander learns that Cordelia is trying to save up for a prom dress but can’t afford it, so Xander quietly pays it off for her.

I do like this plot because it wraps up their relationship on a fairly neutral to positive note, and removes all of the ill will between them. But other than that, there’s no significant character conclusion.

The other Cordelia subplot is with Wesley Wyndham-Price, and I plain hate this plot. Wesley must be in his mid-twenties when he shows up in Sunnydale, and the show portrays their immediate attraction to one another as corny and weird.

But portraying it as corny and weird doesn’t really mitigate the blow that this fully-grown adult man is essentially drooling over and eighteen year old girl. I know our values around age differences in relationships has changed since the turn of the century, but even Giles remarks on their age the prom, and with contempt.

It’s just gross overall. It doesn’t go anywhere, because when they finally admit their feelings for one another by making out in the stacks of the library, they realize the other one is a horrible kisser, and that’s all over.

Cordelia does stake a vampire in the season finale, which is nice because I know Charisma Carpenter hadn’t had the opportunity to do that on screen yet, so that’s cool. But yeah, Cordelia’s out. She’s irrelevant.

Returning to Willow and Xander for the last leg of this season’s discussion, after the romantic affair and all the breakups, Xander… loses his virginity to Faith. Yeah, it’s super random, but it occurred in the Zeppo, which was an episode all about Xander’s weird hijinks.

Despite not making out anymore and in fact mending things with Oz, Willow is really dismayed and in fact heartbroken after learning this news. I mention this because later, in episode 19, Choices, Willow has a pretty intense face-off against evil Faith.

Faith,, thinking that Willow has come around to try and sway Faith back to the side of good, mocks about this. But Willow is like, nah, I don’t give a fuck about what you do or who you are. I’d also like to note that in this episode, Willow has really upped her combat game. 

At one point when she’s nearly preyed upon by a vampire, she telekinetically floats a stake behind the guy and stabs him, vanquishing him and saving herself. So she’s built up a bit of bravado and they throw insults back and forth at one another as bitter equals. The rest of the episode doesn’t really amount to that supercool moment.

And because episode 19 is titled Choices in a season all about choices, we also learn that Willow has gotten into pretty much every school she’s applied to across the globe—Oxford, M.I.T., Yale and Harvard. But in the end, for Buffy, she decides she’s going to UC Sunnydale.

[side eye]

I really want to criticize her for her choices, because you should never, ever choose a college based off of where your friend is going, especially if you have exceptional, and paid-for opportunities at state or Ivy League schools. 

But this part really redeems itself because Willow explains to Buffy that facing off against Faith, made her realize she wanted to fight evil and help people, and staying in Sunnydale with her friends is the perfect place to do that. So ultimately, if she’s following her dreams, I can’t fault her.

And that’s it. God, am I missing anything? I don’t think I’m missing anything. If I’ve overlooked any part of the plot that I haven’t already stated I’ll discuss later, please let me know. I’m curious to see what I missed.

I will wrap this up with a few random tidbits that I loved from across the season. The first is when Spike is in Buffy’s home and taunts Angel by pretending to eat Joyce Summers. I actually really like his and Joyce’s relationship. I’m pretty sure there’s a Spike-Joyce friendship fancam somewhere on YouTube, I recommend looking for that.

Two, the fact that in Band Candy, when all the adults act like teens, Giles and Joyce have sex on top of a cop car. Even better, a dozen episodes pass before that information gets out, and it’s only because Buffy reads her mom’s mind in the episode Earshot.

Three, at prom, when they’re handing out superlative awards to all the students, Buffy unexpectedly gets her moment to shine and receives a new award called Class Protector, and she receives a cutely decorated umbrella with her prize. I really enjoyed this because it represented the perfect combination of a teenage girl’s ideals at prom and Buffy’s obligations as a slayer.

And that’s it!

[pause; nods]

I’m wracking my brain on whether I should say anything else, or cut things off right on the spot.

But you know what, I think is the conclusion. So what I will say is, oh my god? Reviewing three season of a dense series as my first video was probably a crazy idea? This last leg for season three took way longer than I’d like to admit to put together, but we finally did it.

I know moving forward that I’m going to cover a lot less material in these video essays, but this is the kind of content I really like to see out in the world, so I’m going to stick with it more or less. I really want to keep this as a fun hobby to keep in touch with all of my friends and family.

Other than that, please make sure to subscribe to me, friends, because I’ll try to put out new videos once in a blue moon, and I would appreciate all your support. Give it a like, too, if you can.

Now, please excuse me as I lay down and scream.

[softpadawan]

in the au where they're both mers, imagine ezra still flopping on land a lot to fetch kanan all sorts of land stuff since he's less able to leave the water

This is honestly really cute. Ezra being eager to show off his land navigating capabilities so he can steal acquire all sorts of neat, useful human items for Kanan—metal stuff like knives and tools and chains and harpoons, things forged by fire, alien to mers—but Kanan is incredibly cautious, almost to the point of paranoia (because humans are the biggest enemies of sharks in every universe).

“No, it’s too dangerous,” he says, one hand firmly clamped around the smallest part of Ezra’s tail, holding him in place. “If you get caught, there’s no way I can help you.” 

(Even though Kanan would never be the type to just sit back while Ezra gets attacked by a mob of humans. He’d launch out of the water teeth-first and start shredding and beating and tearing apart as many humans he could reach, even if it meant he would never touch seawater again. He would give his life for Ezra, though he hasn’t told him that—yet.)

Ezra just laughs and shakes himself free. “C’mon, Kanan, don’t be such a guppy. I’ll be fine! I’ve done this lots of times. I always come back.”

“But someday you might not.” Kanan scowls and crosses his arms. “We should stick to shipwrecks. Leave the land for the crabs and the crazies.”

“Aw, Kanan”—Ezra flicks his tail and swims a close circle around his Carcarin friend—“you’re scared for me, aren’t you?”

“Of course I’m scared for you,” Kanan grumps. “You’re young and reckless and dangerous. You do stupid things every single day because you think you’re immortal. I don’t know how you survived this long, to be honest. Every gray hair on my head you’ve put there.”

“But they look so nice,” Ezra quips, running his fingers through Kanan’s flowing brown mane. “Maybe someday you’ll be a great white.”

“That’s inevitable if I stick with you.”

“Oh, so now it’s you sticking to me?” Ezra hangs upside-down in front of Kanan’s face, grinning. “I thought I was the annoying brat hanging onto your fins like a bloodsucking barnacle?”

“Oh, you still are,” Kanan insists, a smile forming on his mouth. With a quick slash of his tail, he surges forward and nabs the laughing, squealing merboy around the waist. “But sometimes I can be clingy, too!”

They play-wrestle for a few raucous minutes, tails beating and churning, filling the water around them with clouds of bubbles and sending nearby reef fish diving for cover. As always, Kanan gets the better of Ezra—although lately he’s been having to work hard to maintain his undefeated champion status. The little merboy is getting stronger, which is a good thing. Soon he’ll be able to properly defend himself and follow Kanan across the great blue desert to locate his missing pod. With luck, Ezra will be reunited with his parents, find a mate, and settle into a comfortable life of family and home.

No room for a grizzled old Carcarin in that pretty picture of domestic bliss. 

Taking advantage of Kanan’s momentary distraction, Ezra manages to break free from his hold. He whirls with a triumphant smirk, opening his mouth to declare his victory, but then catches the cheerless expression on Kanan’s face. “Hey.” He swims closer and touches his arm. “What’s wrong?”

Kanan shakes himself out of his daydream—not the inevitable lonely future that awaits him, but a dream in the truest sense, an unspoken fantasy: he and Ezra sticking together season after season, a pod of two, traveling across every ocean, every sea. A mated pair. It’s ludicrous, unheard of, a Carcarin and a Delfin sharing their lives together. There would be no offspring between them, but pups were never a priority for Kanan. If Ezra wanted them, he wouldn’t object to taking in an orphan or two. The oceans are teeming with them. They’d be pariahs, they and their mismatched pod of outcasts, but that wouldn’t matter. As long as they had each other, had love, what more did they need? 

“Nothing,” Kanan says. “Just a little worn out by all your wiggling.” He smiles and bumps Ezra’s jaw with his fist. “Come on, let’s go to the Black Reef and see if there’s any new wrecks. Thought I smelled fresh timber when we passed by the other day. Might be worth checking out.”

Without waiting for a response, he turns and begins heading in that direction.

Ezra stares after him for a moment, wondering. Then he sighs and follows him with a swish of his short blue tail.

[inkandpen22]

Otherworldly Kings and Queens (10/10) Caspian Version

Pairing: Prince Caspian x Female!Reader/ Peter Pevensie x Female!Reader

Warnings: emotional ending but happy!

Word Count: 2.6k

Part Summary: As the Pevensies time in Narnia comes to an end, Y/N must decide. There isn’t just one question that needs to be answered... who will Y/N pick? Will Y/N really consider staying in Narnia? 

A/N: And with that one of my first series comes to an end... it’s both exciting yet sad at the same time as I’ve had so much fun writing it. Thank you to everyone who’s followed the series! I appreciate you so much! Be warned, you bet I cried a little writing this! It’s so bitter-sweet! 

Masterlist 

The whole Talmarine kingdom, as well as Narnians, have gathered in the courtyard for the ceremony. Aslan has made the decision to allow some Talmarines to leave Narnia if they choose. Apparently, Talmarines are like the Pevensies and myself I suppose, they're from our world. They traveled to Narnia centuries ago by accident and made a home here. Caspian speaks to his people with such ease as he encourages them to consider the offer. He's a natural-born leader. He's meant to be Narnia's future king. As I come to this conclusion, I take Peter's hand beside me. He glances down at me, having not expected the action. Nonetheless, he gives my hand a comforting squeeze and offers me a gentle smile of reassurance.

General Glozelle and Miraz's wife, Prunaprismia, volunteer first with her baby. In honor of their bravery, Aslan blesses them with a good future. The pair walk toward the tree that Aslan has made part in half. Everyone watches in awe the General and former Queen disappear in a blink. My lips part in astonishment. I don't think I'll ever get used to magic. Gasps fall across the crowd and people begin to question Aslan's intentions. They fear this is all a trick.

Peter slips his hand from mine and steps forward. "We'll go," he volunteers us.

"We Edmund frowns, sharing my expression.

"Wait, what?" I express rather rashly.

In my defense, it's justified. Peter never asked for my opinion. He's deciding for me. Aslan... Aslan made it out to seem as though I had a choice, as though we all would have at least some more time here.

"Come on. Our time's up," Peter tells me solemnly, but an ounce of hope lingers in his tone. "After all... we're not really needed here anymore," he determines while approaching Caspian to offer him his sword.

"I will look after it until you return," Caspian assures Peter confidently.

"I'm afraid that's just it," Susan interjects beside me. "We're not coming back."

"We're not?" Lucy pouts with concern.

"You two are," Peter predicts, glancing between Aslan and his youngest sister. "At least, I think he means you two."

"But why?" Lucy struggles to comprehend the purpose behind this news, as do I. "Did they do something wrong?"

"Quite the opposite, Dear One," Aslan voices. "Your brother and sister have learned what they can from this world. Now it's time for them to live on their own." Aslan comforts each of us with his wisdom.

Though, frankly, I'm finding it hard to swallow this harsh pill. But all things have their time.

"It's all right, Lu," Peter tries to ease Lucy's mind as he takes her hand gently. "It's not how I thought it would be...but it's all right."

Peter directs his attention to me and holds out his free hand for me to take. "One day you'll see, too. Come on."

He offers me a weak smile, not one that shows genuine happiness, but contentment. I ease my hand out to glide it into his, but something stops me. A feeling in my chest telling me not to settle as Peter as with his decision. I shift my head toward Aslan to ask the lion directly. "And what about me?"

My patience is growing thin. All this back-and-forth yet I haven't heard a concrete answer about where I belong. Aslan is constantly confusing me with his tricky wording. One minute he makes me believe that finding him wasn't my purpose for coming here and the next he's telling Peter that his time here is over. I belong where Peter is, I always have. If his purpose is in our world... then so is mine. Then, does that mean I'm like Edmund and Lucy? Am I destined to return in the future? How far in the future? Narnian time is different from ours, who knows how many years will pass before we're here again. It could be another thousand years in Narnian time.

"Your course is not as clear-cut as theirs," Aslan states with uncertainty. "You still have much to learn from here, as do Edmund and Lucy. Going back means one day, you will return, as will they."

"So I am to go back," I hope to clarify.

All I want is an answer, to know my path.

"Returning to your world will bring you back here someday, yes, that is a course you may take," Aslan nods calmly.

So, after all this time, after all the back-and-forth, Aslan is guiding me toward Peter. He made it sound as though I had to make this life-altering decision. The first few days we were here, I would've given anything to go back home. I never wanted to be in Narnia. Now that I have my chance to get out and everyone is rushing me out the door, I'm digging my heels into the dirt begging for a moment's pause. All this time Aslan has been pressing me to make a decision, why do I feel as though he's making it for me? It's suffocating.

I glance between Aslan and Peter nervously. Aslan wears his usual gentle and patient smile while Peter is confused with furrowed brows. His hand remains out to me, lingering for mine to join it. I whip my head around and my eyes land on Caspian. His features fall as he comes to terms with my departure. I approach the future King solemnly. All I can keep thinking is 'more time! More time! If only we had more time!' I can't visualize who the 'we' is exactly. When I say it, all I can think of is the riverbank in the forest. I see myself lying beside the river in the plush green, flower-covered, grass. The warmth of the golden sun scatters over my skin. I spent time with both Peter and Caspian there. What I would give to return to those moments. Whether I'm hoping it's with Peter or Caspian, I can't see. Each of them matters to me, on what level I can't decide.

"I'm glad I came," I tell Caspian whole-heartedly.

"I wish we had more time together," the prince sighs, taking my hands in his.

His hands are warm. Mine are always cold. I never noticed that before now. I'll miss that.

"I'm not entirely sure I belong here," I confess timidly, still unsure of my thoughts and Aslan's advice.

"Why not?" Caspian frowns as if my words are nonsense.

"I’m not of this world and if the Pevensies are 1,300 years older than you so am I," I shrug with a hint of a smile as I comprehend how old I am.

I'm not a Narnian or a monarch of Narnia. Aslan said I was meant to come here with the Pevensies, but our time is up and I've yet to find this purpose he speaks so much about.

Caspian expresses a faint smile, amused by my humor, but too solemn to fully be happy. Both of us pull the other into an embrace. The words continue to repeat in my mind. 'More time! More time! If only we had more time!' I feel as though I'm standing on the edge of the cliff overlooking a deep trench and I'm stuck wondering whether I should jump. Caspian and I part from one another. It's painful. I feel safe with him, more secure and understood than I ever have before. I don't want to let go, but at the same time, I'm yearning to cling to Peter.

Peter meets me halfway and wraps an arm around my waist, leading me toward the tree trunk. The Pevenesies begin toward the tree as well, ready to go on.

"It’ll be okay," Peter whispers in my ear as he brings me into his side.

I feel safe here with him. Peter is home for me. For years, he's been my rock, my strength. Through the war, losing my dad, through all the bad, Peter has been my guiding light.

He continues to comfort me. "Everything will be as if we-"

"Peter, no wait... " I shake my head as my steps come to a halt.

It takes a second for Peter to react. He comes to a halt a few steps ahead of me. Turning over his shoulder, he gives me a confused look.

"I can’t go back," I voice, but my volume is weak.

"What do you mean?" He frowns.

"I... I think I’m still needed here..." I stammer with uncertainty. "At least... At least that’s what I think Aslan means. He speaks like a fortune teller and it’s confusing!"

Peter switches his now crossed expression from me to the lion. "Aslan, is that true?"

"Y/N’s future is not set in stone as your four’s is in history. She has known that she has to decide her course of action for some time. The clock is dwindling," Aslan explains steadily.

Lucy steps forward from behind Peter. "You mean you have to stay here?"

"It means I have a choice, staying here or coming again later. I’m assuming the next time will be with you and Edmund. Either way, I’m needed here. I just know it." I try to explain, but how do I explain a feeling?

"Neither choice is wrong," Aslan injects as he moves to stand beside Peter and me. "Going back to your world would mean you would return with Edmund and Lucy. After that, your life will be as you've always envisioned with who you envisioned. Staying here would be as you've envisioned as well," Aslan explains, giving me a knowing look. "You will prosper in both worlds, in whichever you decide."  

Does Aslan know that I haven't been able to stop thinking about the riverbank? Is that what he's referring to? Does he mean that if I stay in Narnia I'll be with Caspian? If I return to England Peter and I will be together? Choosing a world also means choosing between Peter and Caspian.

"But why?" Lucy pouts.

"I don’t know," I struggle to say as my eyes begin to well up.  

"I do," Peter voices.

"What?" I mutter.

"I didn’t understand it at first, but Aslan told me something earlier today. He said, ‘as much as we wish we could, sometimes we can’t choose who we love, the world chooses for us.’ You’re needed here. This is why you were brought here with us. When Caspian called for us with the horn, he unknowingly was calling to you as well."

I press my lips together as my throat becomes strained from holding back tears. "Peter I- "

"It’s okay," he assures me as his hand glides up to cup my cheek. "Everything is as it should be."

"If this is how it should be, why does it hurt so much?" I mutter, my tone shaky with emotion.

Peter shakes his head as his eyes become glossy. "It won’t forever. We’ll both grow and find that which we were destined to. I always thought we would find that together," he chuckles softly, it's bitter-sweet. "But this is right," he speaks with certainty.

"But I’ll never see you again," I comprehend the harsh reality of it all. "I... I don't want that! I can't imagine my life without you in it! You've always been there and I... haven't I lost enough people already? How many more goodbyes must I say?"

"We mustn’t think like that. One day we'll be together again!" Peter thinks optimistically.

This isn't fair. None of this is fair! In choosing Narnia, in choosing a different life for myself, I'm losing my best friend. I'm losing the one person who kept me going, who gave me a reason to survive.

"I love you," I cry.

Peter grins at my words, a faint and joyful chuckle escapes between his teeth. "And I’ve always loved you, perhaps I always will. We’ll never lose that, even across worlds."

I nod repeatedly, holding onto every syllable. I pray and hope, that he's right. Peter pulls me into his chest and I wrap my arms around him for dear life. I grip the fabric of his loose shirt in my fists. His hand cradles my head as he plants a kiss on my forehead.

Do the ones we love ever truly leave us? Is the memory of them strong enough to keep us going in their absence? I doubt a day will pass by where Peter doesn't cross my mind or any of the Pevensies for that matter.

Now that our time has officially run out, I say my goodbyes to each of the Pevensies. I'm not just saying goodbye to Peter's siblings, each of them has become family to me. Lucy and Susan cry with me as the three of us hug each other. Edmund does his best not to show emotion, but I can see behind his stone hard expression that he's holding back. His tight embrace is enough evidence as well.

When the moment comes for the Pevensies to return to London, I hold onto Peter's hand as I approach the tree with them. His siblings walk a step ahead as Peter walks backward to face me. Until the last second, we hold on.

"Someday," I nod, as though I'm making a promise that one day we'll see each other again.

He nods, agreeing to the vow. "Someday."

Our hands begin to slip as Peter backs away toward the cliff between the tree halves and my breath hitches in my throat. I stare into his sea-glass eyes and the seconds travel rapidly by. In a blink, he's gone, disappeared from my world.

A gasp escapes my lips at the sight. My arm falls to my side as tears glide down my cheeks. My heart sinks as reality hits me that I'll never see Peter ever again as long as we're alive. An arm wraps around my waist, supporting me. Caspian appears in my peripheral vision as my eyes remain locked on the open space beneath the tree.

"I've got you," he assures. "It’ll be okay."

I know..." I swallow hard, my face becomes blank other than the tears falling down my cheeks. "But for right now it's agony."

"This too shall pass. You did right by your heart today, be proud," Aslan encourages.

I glance toward the lion, "so I was right?"

"You were never wrong," he smiles.

"I can’t believe you stayed," Caspian confesses beside me.

I look at the boy with a sigh of relief. "I can't either, but it feels right," I smile softly.

Despite everything, the painful goodbye, the uncertainty, I know I'm where I'm meant to be now. I couldn't leave. I wasn't sure until Peter was guiding me to the tree. I would've done anything to stay.  

"Now we have all the time in the world!" Caspian gleams, over the moon.

Seeing him so happy eases my emotions. He's right, now we have all we could ever need, more time.

"That’s all I ever wanted," I grin.

His lips part as his eyes scan my face. Gently, his hand brushes across my cheek, and I lean into his touch as my eyes fall shut. Now, when I close my eyes and envision the riverbank, he's there beside me. It was him all this time.

"Y/N? My Love," he mutters.

"Hm?" I hum contently as my eyes flicker open to meet his jet-black ones.

"Marry me," he states with certainty and determination.

Bewildered, my eyes widen. Marry him?! Be...Become Queen of Narnia?! 

A sea of gasps and murmuring travel across the crowd. I shift my eyes to them, analyzing various faces. Then, I glance at Aslan. The lion narrows his eyes at me as he wears a soft smile. He wants me to make this decision for myself. He's certain I make it on my own. His words repeat in my mind, 'you were never wrong.' Is this the purpose he speaks of? Is this why I was called here? 

Destiny is a funny thing. 

Blinking rapidly, I inhale sharply and turn my attention back to Caspian who awaits my answer eagerly. He smiles brightly with raised brows. Our eyes meet and I decide instantly, perhaps I already knew my decision.

"Yes,” I answer without a moment’s hesitation. 

Caspian releases a sigh of relief, his grin never fading. In a moment of impulse, I extend my neck and bring my lips to his. My fingers glide to the back of his neck, bringing him in closer. He deepens the kiss as he cups my face urgently. I smile into the kiss and he does the same, both of us over the moon. 

Finally, we have time, something we thought we’d never have. Now, we have forever. 

_________________________________

Masterlist

Tags:  @blackbirddaredevil23​ @rangergranger11 @hyperactiveravenclaw @whiskeywinter89​ @i-hav-no-life​