#somehow i've never written the replacements before so this was interesting!

[jessequinnfirstofhername]

The Rules:

Every twenty-four hours there will be another round. After every round, the ship in last place will be eliminated.

If there are multiple ships tying for last place, there will be a special elimination round. In these rounds, every ship in last place will be eliminated, even if all the ships have tied equally.

When there are only two ships remaining, they will face off against one another in a week-long poll to determine the victor.

If the ship that you consider the best isn't listed here, hit the 'the best polarizing ship is ___' option and reply to this post with the overlooked ship. The ship with the highest 'write-in' votes will be added to the next round. Unless the 'the best polarizing ship is ___' option is the least voted for, in which case it will be eliminated. Welcome to the party, VaderLuke/AniLuke!

Addendum to Rule 4: Only polarizing ships are allowed. Yes, I'm sure your OTP is awesome, but if there's no proof of it being polarizing then it unfortunately cannot be added to the poll.

This is all for fun. Don't take it too seriously ;)

...so. I'm going to cheat.

The least voted for option in Round One was the 'the best polarizing ship is ___' option. However, because I love chaos, I'm going to replace it with the most 'written-in' polarizing ship instead of eliminating it altogether.

...and that ship is...

VaderLuke! (Sometimes also referred to as 'AniLuke').

Please direct all death threats to my inbox, thank-you! :)

A special shout-out to the other 'write-in' options: Rexsoka, Kryzecest, and Kyluxma

Round Two!

[okaylikeschaewon]

What part of writing that make you think "yep this person never have sex before" when you read other smut? For example,for me its when they use "sound effects" in sex like "plok!"

And how do you translate the sex scenes you have on mind to your writing to make it compelling? THANKS A LOT

Two questions so the answer is going to be a bit longer, I'm going to try being thorough with this one since it's a very interesting question.

Honestly I generally try to ignore that part as best as I can because I don't think it matters, people should write what they want to write even if they are virgins! That being said, there's a big difference with the plot being ridiculous and the actual physical act being ridiculous, and the latter is much more difficult to read for me personally - it's just very immersion-ruining.

For example, my Aespa fic has an absolutely absurd plot that leads to sex with Winter, but I'm totally fine with that because it's clearly fiction. What ruins it for me a bit is when people write stuff like a girl trying anal for the first time who takes it in the ass for an hour in the most brutal, intense, relentless session, and begs for you to go harder because it feels so good. Or like when a girl is written as a virgin, but somehow she's amazing in bed and knows every trick, has no issue deepthroating, etc etc. I generally try to avoid doing this (although, I have no issue writing over-the-top sex scenes from time to time), and I put a good chunk of effort from time to time to write fics that depict the struggles of sex. Maybe the girl can't deepthroat her first time, maybe anal is too painful, maybe she doesn't love the taste of your cum, these are all possibilities and I like to explore them sometimes to make my writing feel more 'real' and have some variety. There are only so many ways to write 'he put penis in vagina' in a compelling and interesting way.

To answer your second question, and this applies to more than just sex scenes, I just try to use real life experience whenever applicable. Let's take relationships in general, assuming you are a writer who is a virgin. You can still write a lovely relationship by using your own experience with relationships, you could write out a date you went on with a girl (while replacing names ofc). Maybe you've never gone on a date, you could write about a date your friend has told you about instead. Maybe you've seen a cute couple while you were out for a hike, you can use that as inspiration. It's obviously more difficult with sex when you are a virgin because people don't generally talk about their personal lives and the amount of details is a bit less than the info about dates and stuff, but you get the pont. I really think using porn is not a good idea because it's incredibly unrealistic for how sex really is, but if you are going to then at least try using amateur content. You can always browse online forums where people are more comfortable sharing their experiences, like Reddit, but just be aware that people can lie on the internet!

I personally wouldn't write out one of my real life expereinces one to one in a fic for numerous reasons, but I absolutely mix and match aspects and alter them in both positive and negative ways. Like I've written stuff that I, in real life, would never do. I've also written stuff that I, in real life, wished I did. It really comes down to the little details, the subtle awkwardness, the comfort and fun being with someone you really love, that feeling you get inside. Trying to put it into words is what really makes writing enjoyable despite the difficulty at times - for me at least.

I hope I adequately answered the question, and I hope my answer can potentially be of some help/insight for other writers in the community! Thank you again for the lovely ask!

[justanotherfanwriter]

And they were ROOMmates, cht 2

cht list: (1) (2) (3) (4)

a/n: thank you to everyone who left such encouraging messages on the first part of this. Ah ha, so like I said, I lost the rest of the outline for this story, and can’t remember where I was supposed to be going with it, but people said they would be interested in more, so here’s more! I’ve got a general idea of where I want to take this, but im writing without much of a plan! sort of how soul eater was fking written anyway Hopefully, it’s still enjoyable!

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Above Soul, there was a fluorescent light that needed replacing. The light flickered off-beat with the high-pitched buzz of the dying bulb, and at odd intervals, the room would dim before filling with an irritatingly bright, white light. He stared absently ahead, slouching in his seat. For the most part, the white walls, white light, and now, what he accepted as a white noise stood in the peripheral of his attention.

His eyes flickered to the clock nailed to the wall above the door before leaning over the hospital bed to rest a hand right below Maka's chest. He had been conscious of her breathing since the fight, checking it on the hour almost every hour. He sat completely still, holding his breath, afraid he'd somehow steal the oxygen away from her, as he felt her diaphragm rise and fall. He counted three slow inhales and three slow exhales before he allowed himself to suck in a greedy breath of his own.

He had no reason to be doing so. Logically, Maka was quite alive and hooked up to a monitor here, at one of DWMA's clinics, but there was this little needling voice in the back of his mind that would whisper differently, the tone of which was almost as high-pitched as the buzzing lights above him.

"You're touching my boob."

"Can't touch something that isn't there." He shot back without startling, "How are you feeling?"

Maka groaned, her eyes fluttering open, "Just kill me."

He didn't bother hiding how he smiled as he shook his head, "Drama much?"

"You'd think with everything we've been through, they'd, you know," She waved a bandaged hand in the air, "go easy on the bed rest stuff. I'm fine."

"You'd think after everything we've been through, you'd go easy on the almost dying stuff."

"Okay," She let her head fall back onto the pillow, "noted. I'll admit this hasn't been my…best moment, but death do me in, I was dealing with Oxford!"

He also didn't bother to hide the way he rolled his eyes, "Yeah, he's a brat, Maka, but he's not worth two ribs, a leg, and, well, I guess there was never any helping that face of yours, was there?"

"Har. Har." She sighed, then said, "Noise isn't so bad anymore, but I could do without all the light."

"They won't let me turn this shit off," He grunted, glaring at the door where the nurses popped their heads in from time to time, "but I'll bring your eye mask with me tomorrow. On your nightstand, right?"

"Hanging on one of my bed posts," She corrected, covering her eyes with the crook of her arm. "Sorry, I can't remember which one."

"Don't worry about it." He stood up, placing their duffle bag on the bed, "I've got your book still. Do you want that, or…?"

She shook her head, "It'll just give me a headache."

"Right," He nodded, toeing the ground. "Do you want me to go to the café, get you something not-disgusting to eat?"

"If you did, I'd probably love you forever."

"Pfft, is that all it takes?"

She smirked, lifting her arm off her face, "What can I say? I'm a woman of simple tastes."

After a three-beat pause, he fixed her with a look and asked, "Can I get that in writing?"

"Hey!" She huffed, chucking a pillow at him.

He dodged it easily, "Good luck picking that up by yourself."

"Soul!" Maka called out after him as he walked out of the room, snickering. He was halfway out the door when she spoke again, "Uh, hey, wait, Soul?"

He poked his head back into the room, and his smile faded when he saw the way she had crowded in on herself, "Yeah? What's up?"

She fiddled with the blankets in her lap, "Well, are you alright?"

"I'm not the one in a hospital."

She snorted and looked up. She had that look on her face, still kind but closed-off, staring at him like he was a puzzle she couldn't quite figure out, "I know that, but I mean, in general? You've been a little in your head lately." She pressed her lips together as her eyebrows furrowed, "Wanna…wanna talk about it?"

His heart dropped.

"I'm good, Maka. I'm okay."

"It's just with Harvar—"

"—he just pissed me off, that's all. He's an ass, and 'sides," he shrugged, "I was worried and stuff about you." Her face softened, and he glanced away, feeling embarrassed all of a sudden, "Sheesh, don't give me that look. Are you seriously surprised?"

He didn't stick around for her response. Instead, he shoved his fists into his pockets and stalked down the hallway. Guilt did a number on his gut. Lying to Maka, even the innocent 'no-we're-not-throwing-a-surprise-party-for-you' kinda shit always messed him up, but he didn't know what else to say or do.  

A short elevator ride later, he stepped into the clinic's café line, gnawing on the inside of his cheeks in thought. This was all Harvar's fault, or not so much Harvar, but the shit he had said was all Soul could think about. And usually, he did such a good job of not thinking about it that all the thinking about it was—

"Hey, aren't you that kid?" The guy behind the counter asked, snapping him out of his thoughts. Soul blinked. The line had moved quicker than he had expected.

"Hm?" He looked at the large guy looming before him, "Sorry, what?"

"That kid! You're that kid, right? The new Death Scythe? I've seen you on the news with the Death Lord and the pigtails girl, you know, the one who was involved in all that moon stuff. Nasty business, that moon stuff. I was committed for a few years after all that, got some of the moon crazy." The man's eye twitched as his smile spread just a little further than humanly possible up his face, "I'm good now, of course."

Soul eyed the guy carefully, "And you're working at a clinic?"  

"Applied for that program, you know, the Death Lord initiative helpin' with all the moon—" the man circled a finger next to his head, "—got this job with it!"

"Well, I can't see how that'll backfire on us," He drawled, mostly to himself, before uttering a small "congrats."

The man preened, "Real nice seein' a Death Scythe, never got to thank anyone, you know, none of my letters ever made it past censor for some reason. Say what you doin' here?"

"The ambiance, I guess," He pointed to the menu, noticing how he was holding up the line, "listen, can I just get a—"

If possible, the man's smile grew wider, "I like it too. Good energy. Death and sickness. That girl, she's here, right now, isn't she, pigtails? That's—" He laughed, "—that's probably why you're actually here. I heard the gossip this morning! Nasty business dealing with that monster! If it wasn't for pigtails, I'd just be another version of that guy! I'll have to stop by her room, huh? This morning when I heard what all the buzz was about, I asked, I said, hey! What room's she in, and they all said, that's inappropriate, but I just want to say thanks, you know, for what she's done! That's not so bad, is it?"

Soul narrowed his eyes but chose not to respond. He knew this guy's type. Madness was hard to recover from, and most people couldn't do it. Many people were like this guy, half there, half not, living a convincingly everyday life until something pushed them over the edge. Anything could do it, but from Soul's observations (and experience), it was always some sort of invocation of fear.

Thanks, of course, to Asura for that. A real cool guy, that one.

A lot of times, these people didn't know they were still under the heavy effects of madness until they were standing smack dab in the middle of their living room, surrounded by the bodies of their dead loved ones. To say the least, it wasn't a good time for anyone involved, and for the past few years, it had been his and Maka's line of work, given that she thought Crona, and therefore the Moon, was her doing and responsibility.

"I mean, she fixed everything! Can't say anything was ever broken," The guy behind the counter laughed harder, pounding his fist onto the prep counter off-beat with his belly laugh, "but hey, you know, I ain't no shrink! But seriously, it's got me all frazzled," The man leaned completely over the plastic display window so his face was close enough to Soul's that he could no longer politely ignore his breath, "cause she's here, but no one's fucking telling me where she's at. Guy can't live like that, you know, me and her, we've got something special, and I can't even see her!? What the fuck is that all about?"

Soul pushed the man's nose away with the tip of his finger, "Back up—" He peered at the nametag on his left breast pocket, "—Marc, you're starting to really piss me off."  

Marc slid back to the other side of the counter, and the faux-jovial expression fell off his face. Soul studied his eyes closely, watching his pupils dilate at odd intervals. A violent twitch shook his whole body, and then, the face-splitting smile reappeared as if nothing had happened.

"Oof," Marc shook his head, "ha! That got a little intense, didn't it? My bad. We're all good here, aren't we?"

"Are we?"

"Course we are! Say, you know pigtails, and I, obviously, would like to know pigtails. Maybe put in a good word for me, yeah? I mean, she was your meister, right, and no need to lie, you know, 'cause I already know. Maybe she could make me a Death Scythe, too? I'd like that a bunch! You're through with her, right?"

"You got a manager or something I could talk to?"

"It's not like you need her anymore," Marc kept going, "you're already a Death Scythe, and I think it's only fair I get a shot, right? I mean, that little bitch ruined my fucking life. I think she owes me one." He said this like he was making a casual remark about the weather, "So, just tell me her room number."

"Yeah, I want to talk to that manager now." He reiterated, "And your counselor. They're not gonna like this."

Marc threw back his head with a short laugh, which ended rather abruptly, and he continued looking at the ceiling as he talked, "I just don't get it. Why won't you just give me her room number? I mean, just give it to me, you know? What—" His head snapped down, and he gave Soul a look that would have made him flinch if he weren't so used to it, "—you fuckin' her or something?"

He picked some lint off his shirt and, watching it float to the ground, asked, "Why are you freaks always asking shit like that?"

"Give me her room number."

He mulled over an answer before returning to Marc, "No."

An ear-piercing scream seemed to erupt right from Marc's gut as he lunged over the counter. Soul stepped back, transforming his arm into a scythe as the man jabbed his own spear-like arm in his direction. It was always interesting, in Soul's opinion, at least, when a demon weapon was under the control of madness. Soul knew what it felt like firsthand to be under the effects of madness and how fucking hard it was to shake the feeling, so seeing another weapon's reaction to its' influence made him feel less othered in some twisted way like he wasn't the only one.   

On the other hand, it was harder for him to sympathize with these people. If he could overcome it, why couldn't they?

He blocked Marc's attack, pushing the older man back against the counter he had just hopped over. Then, with a spin kick, he moved the scythe of his arm to his leg, slashing at Marc's center. He made contact, could literally feel the way Marc's skin split in two for him, but he didn't dare go any deeper than a surface-level cut.

He pulled away quickly, putting some distance between them as he prepared for the counterattack, but was surprised to see Marc slump to the ground with a grunt, falling to his knees.

The fact that someone his size—and a weapon at that—was already on his knees because of a little graze was odd. Sure, most weapons didn't choose to work as a weapon as he had, so Marc's lack of stamina wasn't totally unexpected, but regardless, it was surprising.

Unless of course—

Soul tilted Marc's head up, so he could see his eyes. They continued to dilate at impossible speeds, like his sanity and insanity were playing tug-o-war with his consciousness.   

—he was internally fighting himself. People who made it this far in the Program didn't make it this far without trying.  

"Bad idea, coming for a Death Scythe. I guess I freaked you out, huh?" Soul spoke to the groaning, mumbling man, "Don't worry. I won't take you out. The people in this room have enough problems as it is."

Soul looked around at the frantic individuals and families cowering over each other, still likely scarred from all those years ago when this sort of happenstance played out on a near-daily basis. People from Death City weren't usually the "cowering" type as in some way, shape, or form they had walked the halls of DWMA, but visitors, like the family wearing the matching sports jerseys from some team in Georgia, weren't probably as used to this, especially in a hospital setting.

He gave them a weak smile and muttered, "Fuck, what a drag."

"Hey! What's going on out here!" A man in the same uniform as Marc scrambled around the corner, coming from the direction of a supply closet.

Soul flashed his badge, and the other man—Clay, he assumed from the nametag, at least—came to a halt.

"Shit, you're a Death Scythe!"

"Is that what that badge says?" He sniffed and then jerked his head at Marc, "You got his counselor's name and number?"

"Uh, I'm—did he attack you? They said—my supervisor said this one wouldn't do that!"

'This one,' Soul felt offended on Marc's behalf. How demeaning was that shit, 'this one.' It wasn't like any of this was Marc's fault.

"Well, he pulled it, sorry. That number, though? Kind of time-sensitive. I think he's trying to—" Soul paused. Explaining exactly what this guy was going through would just take up more time, "—stop himself, let's go with that."

"Can't you do something!" Clay exclaimed, "Aren't you, like, supposed to be doing more? Is he gonna go ballistic? I thought this guy was messed up! I told them!"

"Did my badge say Program Counselor, or did it say Death Scythe?" He snapped, "Get the number!"

Clay's eyes widened a fraction as he scrambled around in the front pocket of his apron, "My supervisor told me I had to keep it on me at all times. He said it was just some dumb rule and that we had to follow it or the cafeteria company—it's not the hospital, it's like some third party—they wouldn't get some grant or something, but he said it was just a precaution, nothing bad was supposed to happen. Is his arm a knife! Is he a weapon! They never said anything about him being a—"

Shock did a lot of things to people. Evidently, it turned Clay into a talker. Fan—fucking—tastic.

"—Looks more like a spear to me. Now, Clay, dude, the number," He demanded, making a grabby hand at him.

"Right!" Clay squeaked, passing it over with a shaky hand, making Soul lousy.

He took the number and pulled out his phone. As he dialed, he looked back at Clay, "Hey, you're not from around here, are you?"

Clay's large eyes bounced away from Marc. If Soul could guess, he'd say Clay was maybe five-ish years older than him. He had the Death City aesthetic down, but anyone could wear a pair of gauges and combat boots and have the Death City aesthetic down, and his reaction to a weapon was telling. Obviously, weapons lived worldwide, but unless they turned into a weapon, non-weapons tended to forget they existed, which had its perks from time to time. Other times, it did not.

"Uh, well, I'm from Las Vegas, but they pay better down here."

"Heard that." Soul nodded as a woman on the other end of the phone picked up, "It's gonna be okay, though, alright? We'll get this—"

He didn't have time to finish his sentence. Dropping his phone, he pulled Clay into his chest and turned, shielding him with his body as Marc sprang up from his spot, his spear arms stabbing into the tile floor where Clay had just been standing.

Soul cursed, ignoring Clay's cry of surprise as he pushed him toward the family from Georgia. He hoped they'd all get the fucking picture and book it out of here, but fear made people do stupid things. He was a living testament to that.

He didn't have much time to react as Marc freed his arms from the ground and made another lunge at him. He'd be able to dodge one of those spears, but no matter what, thanks to his own stupidity and timing, the other was going to land its target. He braced himself for the inevitable. It wasn't like he hadn't been stabbed before, but this was really the cherry on top of an already shitty week.

At the same time he dodged one of Marc's arms, a gunshot echoed throughout the cafeteria. Marc's eyes went wide, staring into his own as a bullet hit the shoulder of the arm Soul wouldn't have been able to dodge.

Marc fell with a cry, the blast of the shot sending pulse waves through his body until he collapsed. The convulsions were semi-unsettling to watch. Kid's wavelength manipulation reminded Soul of a cartoon character getting hit with a taser, but Marc didn't immediately bounce back like a cartoon. Instead, a moment of clarity flickered through his eyes, and Soul wished he could look away. Genuine, non-madness-induced fear was there, and it was like Soul could read his every thought.

I've been shot. 

Then, I'll be recommitted.

It turned Soul's stomach. That could have been him. He could have been Marc.

"I said!" Black*Star screamed, and Soul jumped in surprise, looking up at the ceiling where Black*Star hung from a light fixture, "I had it!"

"You were taking too long," Kid rolled his eyes, brushing invisible dust off his jacket while Liz transformed back into her human form.

"Too long! Too long!" Star continued to scream, dropping from the ceiling with a thud right in front of Clay and the terrified family from Georgia. He regarded them as he pointed at Kid, "This guy says I took too long. Can you believe it!? He took my—" He turned back to Kid, "—it isn't just about the shot! It's about the suspense! Dammit. Where was the flair?"

"Upsey-daisy!" Patty appeared in front of Soul with a giggle, forcing him to look away from the argument brewing between Star and Kid.

"Oh!" He blinked in surprise, staring at her outstretched hands, "I fell?'

"Like a sack, man," Liz appeared, "what's up with that?"

He took Patty's hands and was yanked up at such an incredible speed Tsubaki had to reach out to steady him.

"Are you okay, Soul?" She hummed, tilting her head in concern, "You—" she frowned, "—well—"

"—You froze!" Patty finished with a laugh, mocking what he assumed his face must have looked like, "Like a deer!"

He rubbed his head, "I—it's…this week has been absolute shit."

Liz looked around the room, first at Marc, then the cowering bystanders, and nodded, "Nothing ever good happens in a hospital for us, that's for sure." Then, she spoke up, yelling in the direction of her—their—meister, "If only there had been someway to prevent this!"

Kid got the hint, loud and clear, and froze mid-argument with Black*Star.

"B-but…they weren't...even…," He whimpered, ducking his head.

"Even…did he just say—" Soul muttered to himself, Kid's words relighting the fire under his feet as he put two and two together, "—you piece of shit! I was right!" He took off after Kid, "I'll show you even!"

[duskwoodgirl4life]

It's been 2 years since Jake and I broke up. We tried to make it work but having a relationship with a hacker that's wanted by the government at some point it's going to fall apart. I've never really gotten over him. No amount of dating can ever replace the hole in my heart. I've never stopped loving him even if he does move on or maybe he already is and he's with someone that makes him happy. More than I ever could. Lilly has set me up on yet another date tonight this time it's someone that she works with. He's been single for a while and wants to get back out on the dating scene again. My heart is not even in this date all I want is to be with Jake but yet that can not happen. We did break up on sort of good terms. He told me I could contact him anytime and he will always reply.

I pull my phone out and start to type a message to Jake. I think about it before I hit the send button. I hold back and delete what I've written. I don't want to bother him. I find myself standing in front of my bedroom mirror trying to find something to wear for this date. I picked out a dress that I haven't worn in a long time. I hold it up to my body and close my eyes. Thinking back to when Jake would wrap his arms around me when I wore this dress. It always drove him insane. We never did get anywhere when I wore this dress. It was a simple tight black pencil dress with sparkles all over the dress. I hang up the dress and go to shower.

I head into the bathroom and switch the shower on getting undressed while I wait for the water to get hotter. Once it's at the temperature I like I get in and let the water wash over me. I stood under the water that long I didn't notice it had started to get cold. I quickly wash my hair and use some shower gel so I can wash. Once I've finished I get out and wrap a towel around me and head into the kitchen to make a coffee. While I'm waiting I grab some fresh sweatpants and an oversized hoodie and put them on. I make a coffee and take it into the bedroom and start drying my hair. While I'm getting ready my thoughts drift back to Jake. I can still smell his scent on the hoodie even though it's been washed. It's like his scent has been imprinted onto the hoodie. A warm smile spreads across my face as I think about him.

I notice the time and realize I need to get a move on otherwise I'll end up being late not that I was all that bothered. I didn't even want to go on this stupid date. Yet I find myself rushing around my bedroom looking for my favorite pair of heels. Once I finally find them it's time for me to leave and head out to the restaurant. I fix my hair one last time in the mirror and grab my purse and car keys. Thankfully the restaurant isn't too far away. When I look up I notice it's the black swan, the place where me and Jake had our second anniversary of being together. I take a deep breath in and out to recenter myself and head inside the restaurant.

The waiter shows me to the table where my date is already waiting, "hi I'm Mike it's really nice to meet you" I fake smile and sit down in front of him. "I'm MC I'm sure lilly has told you loads about me already. As Mike's talking I start to zone out not taking any notice of what he's droning on about. I happen to look up and my mouth drops open. The next table I see Jake sitting with some blonde haired women laughing and joking. My heart feels like it's breaking into a million pieces all over again. I can't let him see me. I don't think I could face seeing him. He always knew when I wasn't okay. I don't know how he did it; he always got it out of me. I try distracting myself with whatever Mike is talking about pretending to fane interest in whatever topic he's talking about.

Mercifully our food arrives and I can focus on something else other than Jake, I've missed him so much he looks so cute all dressed up he always did look good in a shirt and trousers outfit. Somehow I managed to make it through dinner and part ways with Mike. He asked if he could see me again like an idiot. I told him to phone me in the week to set up another date. I took my keys out of my purse and unlocked the car before I could get in. I felt a hand on my shoulder. I knew that touch before I even saw his face. I turn around and I'm met by his beautiful ocean blue eyes. For a second I forgot how to speak. I got so lost in his eyes. "Hi MC, it's been a long time, how are you?" I try to regain control so I can answer him back. "Hi Jake, I'm okay, how are you?" I see that beautiful smile appear on his face. How I have missed that smile.

"You don't have to pretend with me MC I couldn't keep my eyes off you either I've missed you alot" my mouth drops open how does he always know he always knows what I'm thinking and what I want to do. "I've missed you Jake but you were the one that decided to end things between us" Jake's smile starts to fade away. "It's something I have regretted every single day. I should never have ended things with you. I love you MC" my whole body feels like it's frozen in time the words Jake's run through my head does he really want me back? Should I let myself be with him again? "I want nothing more than to wrap my arms around you and tell you how much I still love you but you hurt me Jake" I feel Jake's hand running up and down my arm goosebumps running all over my body. I can feel the electric building up inside me fighting to hold myself back but I can't.

My arms wrap around his neck and I kiss him deep on the lips, it's like electric cursing through our bodies. We both break apart not because we wanted to but because we need to catch our breath. "I've missed you so much Jake, I never stopped loving you. Do you really want to give us another go?" I could feel Jake's thumb running softly over my cheek and smiling. "I'd love to give us another go. I never want us to be apart ever again, I've got something for you I was going to come and see you tonight but I want to give it to you now" I look in confusion as Jake puts his hand into his pocket. "Jake what are you doing?" Jake gets down on one knee and opens up a box. "MC will you do me the honor of becoming my wife?" I'm taken back by what Jake has just asked I never thought in a million years this would ever happen this is the reason why we broke up in the first place.

"But.. I thought you didn't want to get married, that's why we broke up" I look into Jake's eyes and I can see he means every word. "MC, when we broke up it was the worst decision I've ever made but at the same time I wanted you to be happy and find someone you love and get married. The more I thought about you I realized I made a big mistake. I love you and I want to be with you" I don't know what to say it's like I've lost the ability to talk. I managed to get out the words I've been wanting to say for so long. "Yes, Jake I will marry you" Jake stands up and puts the rock onto my finger. We embrace each other in a heated kiss. It's like we have never been apart from each other. We pull apart again trying to catch our breath.

"Jake, did you know I would be here tonight?" Jake smiles and looks into my eyes "I didn't know you would be here, Lily set me up on another date" I looked in shock at Jake when I realized what Lily had done. "Jake, I think we have been set up, lily set me up on a blind date as well" we both look at each other and start to laugh. "Should we go spend the rest of our lives together and be bus and wife?" I can't help but smile. I've not smiled like this in so long. "Take me home Jake let's go spend the rest of our lives together" we both get into my car and drive back to my apartment.

The next morning I wake up with the biggest smile on my face, I turn over in bed and see that Jake is still sleeping. He looks so beautiful laying there with his eyes closed I can't help myself. I lean forwards and kiss his soft lips. I can't stop at just one kiss. I can feel him starting to wake up and a smile spreading across his face. "Good morning my beautiful wife to be" I warm feeling spreads across my body. "Good morning my handsome husband to be" we cuddle up next to each other holding each other as close as possible ready to take on what life has to throw at us.

[tetrakys]

Hi. How are you? It's been a while since I have written a message here, but I've always had an eye on your profile and I wanted to thank both of you and Chino from the bottom of my heart for giving us the ANE story of Eldarya we all deserved to have, our little hearts are less heartbroken :))

Now I am wondering just as much as the others in the community how new gen candy is gonna be like. 😂😂😂

Truth be told, I am a little worried that no matter if they're gonna try their best or not, there will be a though crowd to impress due to recent events and I don't blame anyone for being skeptic, it will be hard to beat the original MCL that we all love and grew up with. I never tried Moonlight lovers or Uncoven, so IDK why they've never been an interesting subject of interest. Henri's Secret sincerely should have been left like that, only with the first season, the second one was a waste of time and money.

Getting back to New Gen, unfortunately, because of the comparison that will be between this and the previous series, the risk of not being successful is pretty high and I really hope it won't happen. It will be hard for them to have another failed project like Eldarya ended up for example. I never understood why I loved Eldarya TO so much (do you know how to answer that question for yourself?). I discovered it very late, despite MCL, but it still means so much to me and I'm sad that it's probably gonna end this way, with these 20 failed chapters. 💔

To answer my question, maybe because everything just made sense and worked together perfectly: the plot, the characters, the references, the harsher topics which made it real and somehow relatable.

Anyways, keep up with the good work girl and I will be back with a feedback that you will be asking for or not after finishing the story (I love writing, so who cares as long as I'm enjoying myself 😅). Sending love and hugs to you and the community. 🫶

Hello! Lovely to see you 💕 thank you for following me and the kind message, let me answer everything (long post, I'm putting it under the cut).

About New Gen:

You're very right, it's gonna be hard to impress people, I'm fully expecting part of the fandom to claim that the new LIs aren't as good as the old ones for the simple fact that there's no replacing your first love. I'm also expecting some people to hate on the game just because it's Beemoov and they would hate the company even if they found the cure for HIV. But I also thing that the game has the potential to bring a breath of fresh air to the fandom. Lots of people have left and haven't come back even to play Alternate Life, maybe a similar game but with a new story and new characters will make tired people and new people interested. Personally I just love Chino's characters, the way she brings life to them, in her 3 games I've managed to fall in love every single time so I'm fully prepared to do it again. I've never been able to get so attached to other games' characters even if I enjoyed them. I guess at the end of the day it's just a matter of personal preferences, her writing just click with me. Which brings me to Eldarya...

About Eldarya TO/ANE:

Why I loved Eldarya TO? ��� Firstly, as I mentioned before, I enjoyed the characters even the secondary ones, even the ones I hated (*cough*Miiko*cough*), I just got attached to them. I also started playing Eldarya late, it was 2018 or 2019, when the game first came out it was in French only and then I never kept up with it. Then I joined Tumblr, saw people playing and decided to play as well. I started with Nevra because he was the one dressed in all black and looked a little like a bad boy, turns out he was the ladies' man route instead, not exactly my type but I am still attached to him as he was my first. While I was playing his route I got super invested in wanting to tame Ezarel, he was such a bish, so I had to make him fall for me. In the end I got over him the moment I won the challenge and I got him lol, I spent the rest of his route trying to get with Lance with no success, obviously. After that I tried Leiftan because he was clearly in my eyes the "main guy" but I'm a shallow person when I play these games and I've never been able to move past his clothes, hair and general fakeness. I love him though, when he's his real daemonic self, just not my perfect type. Then I played Valkyon because he was the last one left and oh boy... I fell for him hard. I still bonk myself for having left him for last. However, I think we all know here that my one true love is his brother and I've spent years trying to have him to end up with... whatever his ANE version is. As I said I love Chino's characters, and since Eldarya was given to another creator you can SEE that the characters aren't the same. I've seen a couple of people upset when I say that Eldarya's characters aren't the same, they claim that the way they are now is a natural consequence of what they lived through those 7 years time lapse and NO I'm sorry I will never be able to agree with this. Game characters' aren't real people, they exist only in the way their creator makes them exist, if the creator changes they are very literally the definition of different people. ANE LIs are what ANE writer and creator see them as, which is not what TO writer and creator saw them as. It's really, quite literally, a different game. Including the way dialogues and events are written. I LOVED TO's darker themes and I loved the potion plot. TO wasn't a perfect game by any means but it made me feel things, now I just feel nothing when I play Eldarya. It makes me really sad. (And I haven't managed to keep playing since episode 14 :( )

About The Dragon's Call:

Thank you for liking our story 💕💕 writing it is cathartic for me, not only because of the game, but also because life has been a bit tough this past year and I'm fully aware Chino is indulging me only because she cares (and also cares about all the players who love Eldarya of course). I want to get to the point where I have Lance's (and Valkyon's) route complete and I can read it whenever I feel like I miss him. Honestly I wish someone else would've written it so I could've just enjoy it as a reader 😂 but at least I hope I'm doing the characters justice. And yes please come back to give me feedback whenever you want I really appreciate it! 💕

Sorry for the loooong rambling, hope to see you around here again 😊

[moth-yknowtheartist]

dear moth,

hey! it's been a while since we've seen each other! sorry about that, I've just been sooooo busy recently but that's what letters are for, eh? it's nice to talk to you, even if it's just like this.

how have things been? I thought I heard someone say you'd died or something? your friends are so funny! the other day I ran across gale and we tried to have a conversation, but they just kept finishing my sentences for me as if they somehow knew what I was going to say right before I said it! haha, what a jokester!

me? I'm doing alright. I really hope we get to talk about moths again sometime! plus I got a cool new sword that I'm super excited to show you- maybe you can show me your cool knives?

alright, I've got to go. I'm baking gingersnaps tonight, and I completely forgot to buy any molasses! ha, silly me!

talk soon! love you!

nat ⁠♡

[LETTER ONE: ADDRESSED TO NAT, FROM MOTH.

THE HANDWRITING IS A CLEAN RECREATION OF MOTH'S HANDWRITING. ALMOST TOO CLEAN, LIKE IF THEIR HANDWRITING WERE TURNED INTO A FONT AND TYPED IN INSTEAD OF WRITTEN.

THIS LETTER IS IN ITS OWN NEW ENVELOPE AND STAMPED, BUT ITLL NEVER BE SENT OUT. NOT SINCE THE WRITER CHANGED THEIR MIND.]

DEAR NAT:

GRREAT TO HEAR FROM YOU!! NO WORRIES ON BEING BUSY, I HAVE ALSO BEEN. BUSY. WORKING ON SOME VERY IMPORTANT PRO.JECTS.

I HAVE BEEN. FFINE. DEFINITELY NOT DEAD HAHA! WHAT A STRANGE JOKE. WONDER IF GALE MADE IT. GALE IS AN INTERESTING CHARACTER, ARENT TH.EY.

ANYWAY, I DO REMEMBER OUR CHAT ABOUT MOTHS!! ACHERONTIA PARTICULARLY. G.REAT CREATURES, ARENT THEY? FANTASTIC CONVERSATION. I WOULD BE VERY EXCITED TO SEE YOUR SWORD THOUGH, I ABSOLUTELY LOVE ALL THINGS SSHARP!!! (:

ID LOVE TO SHOW YOU MY KNIVES! YOU JUST MIGHT HAVE TO REMIND ME WHERE I. KEEP THEM. IM JUST SO FORGETFUL SOMETIMES!

ENJOY YOUR BAKING. IF YOU HAVE ANY MOLASSES LEFT OVER, YOU SHOULD. SEND IT MY WAY!!! SUCH A USEFUL INGREDIENT.

HOPE TO MEET WITH YOU SOON:

MOTH

.

[LETTER TWO: ADDRESSED TO NAT, FROM MOTH.

THE HANDWRITING IS SHAKY AND SCRIBBLY, WITH IT SOMETIMES POKING THROUGH AND RIPPING THE PAPER- LIKE WRITING ON AN UNEVEN SURFACE OR WHILE MOVING. ITS STICKY, AND SMELLS SUGARY SWEET.

IT'S REPACKAGED IN THE ENVELOPE NAT'S LETTER WAS SENT IN, WITH MOTH'S ADDRESS SCRIBBLED OUT AND REPLACED WITH NAT'S. SEEMS LIKE THEY WERE IN A RUSH TO GET THIS WRITTEN- AND NOT IN THE BEST ENVIRONMENT TO REALLY WRITE A LETTER. ITS NOT STAMPED YET- THEY'LL HAVE TO GET ONE BEFORE THEY FIND SOMEWHERE TO SEND IT OUT.]

dear nat,

hey!!!! you're right, it has been a while and I've missed you so so much, I'm really glad you wrote me. guess you could say I've been busy too.

things are interesting!! been out and about recently!! currently in Nebraska? bit of a weird trip hahaha it's been interesting. definitely not dead though!!!!! definitely not dead haahahahahha that is a very funny joke my friends are really funny!!! but no I'm here don't worry I'm here I'm here

as for gale haha you know how they are!! definitely just being silly. they should be a comedian!!! they've had a lot on their plate though, lately. you know how it is.

I'm glad you're okay though. I really hope I can see you sometime soon. I've missed you a lot while I've been. out and about.

you'll have to remind me about our moth conversation my head's been all over the place!!! I would LOVE to see your new sword though!!!! I have this really cool rainbow knife I'll have to show you when we next see each other!!

ha!! molasses. If I have any laying around maybe you can have it, it's. not my favorite ingredient lately. so sticky and persistent and it really just does not want to go away hahahahahah you know what I mean!! Good luck with the gingersnaps.

love you. I hope I see you soon.

- moth

[ursaspecter]

Before I get into it I just want to give a disclaimer: this is not a personal attack on anyone or me trying to gatekeep Danny Phantom. I am simply just airing some frustrations. This is all my opinion based on what I've seen from the current state of the fandom.

Also I'm writing this at 1am.

Now that that's out of the way, I'm really frustrated with the way this fandom acts at times. I've been a fan of this show for around 10 years now and only relatively recently came back to the fandom after being away for a while. It's nothing like what it was when I first got into the show, and I think that comes from the fact that a lot of people in the fandom haven't actually seen the show and have only read fanfics. And that is where I think the problems start to come up.

Now, ok, the show isn't for everyone. It's loud, has flashing colors, and certain parts haven't aged particularly well since its run from 2004-2007, and that's perfectly understandable as to why someone wouldn't be able to watch the show. I'm not faulting anyone for that. I only take issue when someone has a popular headcanon and a majority of the fandom acts like everyone agrees that it's canon and then get all up in arms when someone says they don't like that particular piece of fanon. I know in the grand scheme of things it's not that big of a deal, but it really bothers me whenever I see something like "I love how we all agree that [fanon]" or "so we all know how [fanon]"

Little things like ghost cores, haunts, obsessions are whatever I don't care that much, but when it gets into the territory of replacing fundamental aspects of the source material is where I have a big problem. See, I got back into Danny Phantom because I wanted to explore a darker take on the story that's a little more grounded in reality, but when every other thing is angst or torture or just treating Danny like a punching bag (most of the time written out of character), the idea really started to lose its luster ans made me hesitant to share my ideas.

The biggest issue I have though is with Wes Weston. Gonna be honest: I never liked him. I thought he was unnecessary from the moment I saw him. Then someone (I'm so sorry I forgot who it was) pointed out that Valerie was the perfect character to fill the role of the skeptic that tries to expose Danny, but the fact that the fandom wanted to focus more on an unnamed background character who happens to look like Danny was very telling.

Obviously I'm not saying that if you like using Wes that it automatically means you're racist. There's more nuance than that. I think what Wes does reflect though is just how much of the fandom just rejects the show? How so many people probably didn't even know about Valerie because perhaps she just wasn't in the fanfics they've been reading? Hell, I see more focus put on Dash than Valerie sometimes. Another one-dimensional white boy minor antagonist instead of a complex black girl anti-hero who is probably the best antagonist Danny has in the show AND the best love interest.

Also the overabundance of DC crossovers where Danny gets adopted by Batman are really annoying. I blocked every possible tag that could've gone with the crossover, but still somehow whenever I go through the main tag one sneaks through. Seriously between Frostbite, Clockwork, and now Batman why are y'all so obsessed with giving him a new father figure when you can just give Jack a better personality. Oh right because then you won't be able to write him vivisecting his son if he actually cared about him. Silly me I almost forgot!

Anyway thats why I only follow like 5 dp blogs and like 2 of them dont even post about dp most of the time. And schnuffel-danny my partner in chaos and shitposting. Gonna start a petition for a Danny Phantom reboot on the CW and make it the most edgy cringy shit ever and it'll have blackjack and hookers and Wes Weston is not invited.

[dreadreverendryan]

I can't believe Akira Toriyama is gone. I know everyone's going to be more upset about Dragon Ball, and I'm sad that Daima will be his last work, but Chrono Trigger means so, SO much more to me. I didn't get it at first: I'd never played a turn based RPG before and didn't understand the menus. I could have read the manual, but I only looked at the character section because the designs were fucking awesome. Hell, the only good memory I have of my great grandfather was him flipping thru the manual and saying Lucca's name. I have no context as to why he was reading it, I was fully capable of reading it myself and he had no interest in video games, but it's something. My best friend, Justin, saw my copy of the game and asked if he could borrow it. I was so annoyed with the menus that I told him he could HAVE the game, but he gave it back after he was done and he'd shown me how the game works. Once I got it back I was HOOKED, but stuck on the first boss, Yakra. We didn't have dial up internet yet, so I just threw myself against that wall so much that when my sister decided to literally sit on her controller and bounce on it to randomly select commands I was all for it (no clue why I didn't just ask Justin). It worked, somehow, but her controller... Well, let's just say that I have *my* original controller and had to replace hers many, many years ago. Luckily we got dial up not too long after that, so if I needed help I could go to GameFAQs, and I found Icybrian's RPG page, which had fanart and fanfics for Final Fantasy and Chrono Trigger. The message boards there became my first online community and the older members of the forums mocked my typing so hard that to this day it pains me if I don't type properly. It was still fun, and I was pretty annoying so I don't blame them for it. My other early internet community included a Star Wars RPG forum, the Star Wars Council (SWC for short). Everyone made their own OCs and I really liked Frieza (but just him, I wasn't into the show enough to care about anyone else yet because I had no consistent way to watch it), so Frieza Omega (shut up, I was like 11 or 12 and it was cool back then), leader of the Bounty Hunter's Guild was born. A bit after that I also joined an actual DBZ RPG group with my cousin and his friends as Trunks. That group was less fun because the fights were judged by other people, not co-written like the SWC. All those little interlinking pieces of my life (and other bits I left out) started with Chrono Trigger and I can honestly say I wouldn't be the person I am today without it. And while the music, mechanics, and story were all amazing, the art Toriyama did gave the game so much charm. I honestly don't know if I'd have gotten into DBZ without Chrono Trigger. Even when I saw Super Sayin God for the first time my brain immediately went "that's literally just Crono!" It's kind of funny to imagine the silent protagonist Crono screaming before doing his techs, or Goku losing his voice from all the screaming and becoming a time traveling mute stuck in Super Sayin God. I'm also really surprised that I've got more to say about Akira Toriyama than I did about Kentaro Miura, the author of Berserk. I mean, I have a Berserk tattoo because of how much the story resonated with me, but then again I also have a clock tattoo because of my time obsession that started with Chrono Trigger. It's like... Berserk changed me and has an extremely warm place in my heart, but Chrono Trigger is in my bones, my veins, my DNA, and my soul. Also, I do have one piece of DBZ merch: the Devil card from the Dragonball tarot deck, which has first form Frieza on it. Now I'm thinking about buying a copy of the full deck when I can afford it, but anyway...

Rest easy, Toriyama-san; you will be missed dearly and remembered fondly.

[springtrappd]

the books are genuinely batshit, yeah, but mostly not in a fun way (barring a few exceptions). like, even beyond the myriad technical problems or the L O R E, they're just the written equivalent of junk food -- empty calories you gorge on not for their contents, but the joy of it. and the joy of it is almost entirely derived from Special Interest Dopamine over anything actually in them. truly, seriously, they're some of the most soulless garbage i've ever read, while still managing to be so, so fucking cruel in some of the worst ways possible.

eleanor, for example, is originally from a story about a tweenage girl with body dysmorphia caused by, y'know, The Horrors, and the story -- rather than examining what external factors would have made her feel this way, or why she feels such an intense need to be a palatable objection of consumption, or any of that shit -- instead ends with this being Her Fault; when eleanor tricks her into secretly replacing her body parts with scrap, it's framed as a kind of karmic retribution for her own failings, which is just an utterly unhinged thing to write at all, let alone about a 13 year old girl. (she realises her mistake, has her face stolen by eleanor, and then collapses into a pile of trash to be discarded without anyone realising what happened.) particularly when the story prior was about the time travelling ball pit, and the following is fearmongering about goths being obsessed with death?? and that is the frights experience. (minus the writer's thinly disguised fetish.png, ofc, which only really come into play after book 1)

people focus on the actual interesting shit that comes out of The Ghostwritten Hellpit because trying to actually explain literally any of it makes me sound crazy. like. frights was originally supposed to end after #7, right, which is when frights!afton has his big final boss battle and dies! and it's a pretty cool sequence except eleanor is also there just kind of hanging out in lines very obviously added in later, setting her up as secretly behind afton somehow and also the true big bad, definitely. except they now no longer have a plot, because their fucking main antagonist is dead and none of the protagonists have ever spoken with each other before, so instead -- and i'm going to sound like i'm shitting you here, but i promise you i am not -- jake the stitchwraith (our main ghost kid who stuck around to end the hauntings) finds evil drug dealers threatening a homeless girl and murders them because he remembers that drugs are bad. and he burns 'SAY NO TO DRUGS' into one of their foreheads. and that homeless girl is eleanor, who pretends to be the real homeless girl because uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. and they then spend several entire epilogues just sitting around a warehouse doing nothing. concurrently to this happening, our main adult character, detective larson, has been having visions of the time travelling ball pit calling to him to come find it, so he's off investigating the HALLUCINATIONS OF THE SUPERNATURAL BALL PIT. at one point he is aided by a fellow cop who dresses and speaks like a cowboy. he appears twice and is never mentioned again.

eleanor's master plan was to pretend to be the daughter of this scientist researching remnant so he'd try to inject her with remnant which would do uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh because uhhhhhhhhhhhh anyway so larson falls into the ball pit and starts time travelling across the various previous stories, revealing that he had secretly been there the whole time as he chased eleanor away from the shit she was doing because uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh and while they're doing that jake seals her inside one of her memories and she dies. and it turns out she exists in the first place because scientist guy's actual druggie daughter, renelle, was ill and he -- terrified of losing her -- made her a locket out of remnant, which just made eleanor, because uhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. and then jake goes off to exorcise the ball pit, which was actually the source of eleanor's power and also everything that happened because uhhhhhhhhhh. and -- again, i'm not joking -- all of the balls in the time travelling ball pit are actually the souls of its victims, and jake goes in and frees every single one from the bad memories they're stuck in because uhhhhhhhhhhhh. yippee!

"oh but eleanor is afton--" no she isn't. she is afton's creation (in the vaguest sense), the same way that elizabot and charliebot are; they are the remnants of a legacy, the shadow cast by the looming spectre of tragedy. It Is A Fucking Metaphor

[himbowelsh]

Hello ^^ For the intimacy prompts: 32.take care of the other when sick. With Bull and anyone of his replacement ducklings if that inspires you? (Platonic) Thank you ❤

intimacy prompts  ( no longer accepting )

32.   taking care of each other while sick

this is a companion piece to this other fic i wrote a while back, because the circumstances fit really well!!   somehow, holland lends itself to sickfics, idk.

Hoobler’s mother is a nurse, so he has somehow become the de-facto leader of this... mission. Not that anyone really thinks he knows what to do better than they do; it just helps to have someone to defer to, when the chain-of-command structure of the army has suddenly crumbled beneath their feet.

No one knows what to do. That’s the problem... and for the moment, there’s really nothing to do, except sit around and wait.

“Sarge isn’t the only one,” Garcia remarks in an undertone, low enough that his voice doesn’t carry across the drafty old barn. “Sergeant Martin’s got it too, and a few other guys in the next barn. Started in Dog company, but of course they passed it off to us.”

“Christ.” Hashey rubs a hand over his brow, as though it’s possible to massage out the exhaustion carving premature lines there. It figures — as though conditions in Holland weren’t already miserable enough, with surprise Kraut nests and inedible rations, now they’ve got a damned plague on their hands. Join the paratroopers, they said. An elite unit, they said. Thrills. Experience. Patriotism. Extra money.

None of the brochures ever mentioned being holed up in some barn in the middle of Dutch nowhere, while their Sergeant shivers on a pile of hay.

There’s something real disconcerting about seeing a fella like Sergeant Randleman down for the count. He’s always so... steady. No matter what knocks him down, he’s always able to get back up again. Getting stabbed didn’t faze him; being left behind in enemy territory only turned out to be an interesting weekend for him; a grenade went off five feet from the man last week, and Bull Randleman barely even flinched.

Now, whatever illness is sweeping through the company has completely decimated him. The worst part about it is how small he seems. That’s not a word that should ever apply to Sergeant Randleman... but, curled up beneath the thin blanket Hoobler managed to find for him, shivering profusely, he looks half his size. Every so often, he gives a soft whimper through his fit of delirium, and Hashey can’t help remembering the time his little sister caught the flu. She ailed for over a week; it got so bad that Mom brought their priest in, though his ministrations weren’t necessary in the end. The way she trembled, though, and cried out in her sleep for comfort they couldn’t give... the way her chest rattled with every labored breath, even while she choked on the air that made it to her lungs...

Randleman’s massive frame lurches forward as he breaks into a fit of sudden, heaving coughs. Hashey can’t help flinching. Each violent tremor wracks Randleman’s huge frame, like he’s trying to force his lungs up his own windpipe. For a moment, the two replacements hover, not sure what to do; then Garcia jerks forward as though pushed. His tentative hand settles on Randleman’s back, massaging him through the worst of the attack. Spurred into action, Hashey scrambles for the nearest water canteen. He can’t find any nearby, save his own. It’s halfway full, so he hovers at Randleman’s side, and waits until the coughs die down before raising it to his lips.

Bull tries to shake his head, but Hashey’s insistent. “You have to drink, Sarge,” he insists, pressing the skein to Randleman’s mouth. After a moment, the sick man’s lips part, and water dribbles over them. He gets a few mouthfuls down — not much, but enough to relieve his thirst for now.

“I can’t stand this,” Garcia declares, once Randleman is settled and they’ve slumped back against the barn wall once more. “We can’t do anything for him like this. He should be in a hospital.”

Hashey doesn’t state the obvious — that the only men being transported out now are the severely wounded ones, and even then, they don’t have much of a hospital to go to. Instead, he just levels Garcia with a skeptical, tired look. Neither of them really think Randleman would leave, if given the choice.

A sudden rustle of hay is the only warning they get before Hoobler descends, flopping down in front of them like he’s just parachuted from the sky. He’s been out scavenging, and the fruits of his labor are obvious: a few moth-eaten blankets, some extra rations, and a towel that almost looks clean. “Got Doc’s attention again, but the poor guy’s running ragged. Unless Bull takes a turn, there’s not much he can do.”

“So what?” Garcia demands, eyes wide and earnest. “He’s better off like this?”

“Better off here than at an aid station. Better he stays with the people he knows.” Hoobler shrugs, tucking one of the blankets around Bull’s shoulders. His ministrations are gentle, like he’s scared of breaking him; that, more than anything else, sets Hashey’s nerves on edge. Hoobler’s a Toccoa man, just like Randleman. If he’s worried, they all should be.

“Hey, buddy,” says Hoobler, laying a hand on Randleman’s broad back. “How you doing?”

Randleman turns just enough to face his friend. Beneath the cover of shadow, his face is wan, brow slick with sweat. “Like somebody… mowed me over with a reaper and left me out there in the fields.”

“You’re gonna be fine. This is the worst of it.” Hoobler massages tiny circles into Bull’s shoulder blades, which seems to relax him a bit. “Doc’s trying to get something for the fever, but for now you’ll have to ride it out.”

“Gonna be fine,” Randleman mutters, shaking his head. The reassurance is obviously meant for his friends’ sake, more than his own. When the man’s fever-bright eyes dart over to him, Hashey summons an uneasy smile. Their sergeant, god bless him, tries to return it.

Garcia’s folded the towel, and used up a bit of their water just to soak it. It’s not cool, but it’s better than nothing. Hoobler moves aside to allow Garcia in. He places the compress over Bull’s brow gently, like settling a baby down to sleep. A long sigh drags from Bull’s congested chest, and he settled back into the hay once again. One hand comes up to cup Garcia’s in silent thanks; as his eyes flutter shut, he doesn’t see the way Garcia’s gaze lingers on it, like even this tiny bit of affection is a precious gift.

Hashey shuffles nervously, catching Hoobler’s attention. “He’s, uhh — he’s gonna be alright, right? It’s just some kind of flu, and he’ll… be fine in a few days?”

Hoobler’s one of the nicest of all the Toccoa men. Instead of scoffing at Hashey’s unease, he offers him a nod, laying a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t worry. Nothing’s gonna take Bull Randleman down for long. He’s just got to take it easy for a little while. Good thing you guys are here to help him, huh?”

Hashey seizes on this with enthusiasm, while Garcia perks up at Bull’s side. “Absolutely,” he affirms, casting another glance at their ailing CO. “We’ll take good care of him — Sarge’ll be back on his feet in no time.”

[mismaeve]

After Hours

↳ Armitage Summer Splash, Nr.9 Trope: Coffee Shop Prompt: "You've never cared about me. Only yourself" RA Character: Thorin Oakenshield x Fem!Reader, Modern AU Warnings: None Word Count: 2.1k A/N: Well, I don't know what this is, all I know is that I was rushing and I was excited. I've not written for him before at all, so go easy on me. I'm very insecure about this piece, but here it is. Hope it will be somewhat enjoyable. And also, thank you so much @i-did-not-mean-to for encouraging me and believing in me. Love you tons!

Why you had agreed to this disaster in the making, you couldn’t tell, but when the dark-haired bundle of muscle and unruly gruff finally arrived – an hour late as per usual – you realised it no longer mattered.

It wasn’t surprising either when you caught yourself sporting a self-indulgent look of smugness while watching the star quarterback stroll past the group of cheerleaders and otherwise swooning girls that stalked his every move with dreamy eyes and wishful sighs – made even better by the fact that Thorin appeared to be completely oblivious to it all – as he made his way towards the counter where you were waiting for him. You had to admit, it felt good being the sole reason for his being there. Not to mention, it would give them all something to talk about, even if they didn’t know the full story as to why Thorin kept meeting you at the café where you worked at precisely – a good hour later – 5pm every day.

Having long decided that you weren’t going to be one of those girls, you quickly replaced your smug grin with a slightly annoyed expression, after all – he was late.

“Hey,” Thorin greeted you with his usual half-smile, half-smirk, otherwise known as the lady charmer, that was fool-proof and bound to work on any female in the near vicinity. Except for you, that is.

“You’re late again, Thorin,” you offered him an unimpressed look while reaching for a clean mug to fill it with freshly pressed coffee. No milk and two sugars; you could thank your lucky stars that he wasn’t one of those coffee-snobs who somehow always managed to make complete fools out of themselves by using words they barely knew or understood and subjecting themselves to trendy drinks they’d otherwise find repulsive. No, Thorin was into the classics.

“Yeah, sorry about that. Coach wanted to talk after practice,” he sighed, a formless shadow descending upon his sun-kissed features, making him appear somewhat thoughtful, regretful even.

“Bad news?” you asked as you placed the steaming hot cup of coffee in front of his now sulking frame.

Although football wasn’t necessarily the one thing Thorin was most passionate about, he still enjoyed it, and judging by the looks of him now, something must have gone wrong. It couldn’t have been that bad though, he was too good to be taken off the team or even benched for the season for whatever reasons, so it had to be something else. A healthy rivalry among teammates gone too far? Early practice drills when normally half the town would still be snoozing?

“I’ve been offered varsity captain,” Thorin mumbled while avoiding meeting your questioning gaze.

Varsity captain was a huge deal, the kind that often came with scholarships and Ivy League Schools. While Thorin wasn’t interested in becoming the new poster boy for Princeton, he was in sore need of those scholarships. His foster parents had been good to him, but they lacked the funds to lend Thorin a helping hand in terms of college tuition.

“And that’s bad?” you raised an eyebrow, not understanding why he was acting as if someone had just told him his entire life was over when in fact it was getting brighter by the minute.

Slowly, almost begrudgingly, Thorin met your gaze. He looked very serious and almost mournful, the complete opposite of how a guy should look like after being offered varsity captain.

“Means I’ll have no time for music,” he said at last, his dark eyes watching and waiting for your reaction. Music had been the reason behind you starting to meet at your workplace after school to begin with, naturally Thorin thought you wouldn’t be too thrilled about his latest accomplishment on the football field when he had spent the better half of the first semester trying to talk you into mentoring him, after which you had warned him that he wouldn’t be able to do both things at once. Or do them well, for that matter.

Your heart sank against your will once you realized where he was going with this. You had known better than to ever dream that he’d pick music – you – over football if it ever came down to it. As passionate as Thorin was about music, he found himself pressured to lead the kind of life that was expected of him, and no one expected or even suspected him of being interested in music, let alone humbly dreaming of making a life out of it.

But what broke your heart even more was the devastating realization that he wasn’t even going to try and make it work, hence the guilty gleam in his brown eyes. He was going to sacrifice one for the other, just like any other sane and rational – impulsive and stupid – teenage boy would do, never mind the consequences or whose feelings might get hurt in the process.

“You’re unbelievable,” you breathed out while slowly shaking your head, a part of you still refusing to believe the madness he was knowingly subjecting himself to. His best years wasted and spent on doing something that would leave a bleeding hole in his heart.

“You don’t get it,” Thorin insisted, hoping that he’d be able to make you see things his way, or at least try and make you respect his decision however moronic you might think it to be.

“I’m pretty sure I do. You’re about to throw everything that you worked so hard for away at the slightest inconvenience. Instead of trying and putting effort into both things, you choose the easy way out by ditching one for the other,” you felt you couldn’t control yourself, the hurt had taken you by surprise and just like any smart girl, you knew the best defense was a very good offense.

“And what pisses me off the most is you don’t even love football!”

You hadn’t realized you were shouting until it was already too late. Half the café had heard you and would soon be tweeting about how Thorin Oakenshield, the best quarterback Erebor High had seen in decades, turned out to be blasphemous about the very thing that would secure his golden ticket out of their sorry excuse of a town.

Not only had you embarrassed Thorin – who looked positively taken aback by your sudden surge of fiery temper – in front of half the Pep Squad and other patrons, but you had also humiliated yourself at the place you worked and would probably continue to work long after Thorin had gone away for college. Provided your superiors would see fit to forgive you this little – horrific – incident.

“Look, I’m sorry, really I am,” Thorin tried to take your hand in his, but you moved yours away before he could reach it.

“Sorry? For wasting my time? For having me foolishly believe in you?” you demanded as you felt yourself surrender to another eruption of blind rage, caused by the bitter and foul betrayal of your so-called friend. Thankfully, you could restrain yourself enough to keep your voice down.

“You’ve never really cared about music or making it work. You’ve never cared about me. Only yourself,” your uttered words embodied the heartbreaking realization that made your stomach hurt, a heavy fist gripping your insides and pulling them whichever way was possible. What a little fool you had been after all, falling for his charm and empty platitudes, thinking he had been sincere when you should have known better.

You were worse than a walking and singing cliché.

You had expected there to be ‘I’m sorry’ texts and a couple of missed calls, maybe even a groveling voicemail or two. But there had been none of that. Nothing.

As days went by, you were suddenly faced with the harsh reality of how your life would look like without Thorin Oakenshield. The morning shift no longer rushed by, fueled by your excitement to see your friend – crush – and your afternoons were spent in deafening solitude, no longer filled with the hearty laughs of the dark-haired boy who dreamed of becoming a musician.

His sheet music laid untouched on your desk, devoid of his nearly undecipherable scribbles and remarks. The sweet and thoughtful notes remained a dark ink on white paper, unable to be heard and loved.

Had it really been your right to be this harsh with him, or had it been your wounded pride and heart that had lashed out irrationally without a single regard for the consequences of your petulant outburst. Who were you to tell him how he should or shouldn’t live his life when all you had ever done was mess up your own? How despicable you were for calling him selfish, how rich it must have sounded – the kettle calling the pot black.

With a sigh that spoke volumes of your inner disgust towards yourself, you closed the book and let it slip from your hands and onto your lap. Your eyes drifted to your cellphone, right there on your nightstand where you had left it after your previous debate of whether you should bite the bullet and call Thorin first.

What would you say anyway? I’m sorry for being a bitch? For being such a girl about it – that alone was enough to make you shiver in subtle loathing – when we both know it makes sense for you to see it through as varsity captain. I’m sorry for having thought there could be more between us? None of them sounded right, yet all of them were the truth.

 Were you scared? Ashamed? Worried that you might have lost the best thing to ever dare venture into the dumpster fire that was your life? Devastated because maybe you had already fallen for him and now there was no hope left?

All of the above.

Just as you had decided to take a break from your own personal pity-party and see if the next chapter of your book would manage to restore your will to live, the screen of your cell lit up with a picture of Thorin.

Reassuring yourself that a heart skipping a beat or two was not life threatening, you threw aside your book and reached for the cellphone.

The café was deserted, all the blinds had been lowered and drawn, and the majority of the lights were off save for the one directly above where Thorin was sitting on one of the barstools with his hand-me-down guitar on his lap. His expression was stone hard and unreadable when he motioned with his hand for you to take a seat at the table closest to him.

Confused as you were, but not about to disobey and ruin any luck of moving past your argument, you stiffly led yourself to your ordained seat while your eyes remained peeled on Thorin who held your gaze until he was certain you weren’t going to get up and storm out. Again.

A few nervous heartbeats later, he began to play his guitar, filling the dark and desolate café with a beautiful melody. It wasn’t one you had heard before and you had listened to them all which made you suspect that this one must be new and composed entirely without your help and expert guidance. It sounded lovely even as it bore faint hints of sadness and regret - that could have easily just been wishful thinking on your part.

And then Thorin Oakenshield began to sing. The usual gruff and edginess were replaced by a deep soft velvety voice that got the hairs on your arms rising in awe and a swarm of spring butterflies burst free from their timeless cocoons. His voice was filled with love and longing as he told the story of the girl with the beautiful gift, one she had tried to share with a silly boy who hadn’t been ready for her yet.

Fighting the tears that were beginning to sting your eyes was pointless, how could you resist when Thorin sang about the girl with the gentle soul and burning heart, whose love was a great vast ocean, so deep and wild; whose courage was an endless blue sky for as far as the eye could see; whose temper was a hot and bright blaze, wicked in its untamed ways. And how all the silly boy could do was try his best to keep up and not drown and pray that one day the girl might take pity on him and forgive him his ignorant ways, for despite his less than admirable actions, his heart too was longing and burning for hers.

 Hot tears of gratitude and relief trickled down your cheeks, your heart undeniably touched by his creative apology and thoughtful gesture, one that had ultimately left you speechless and fluttery, and wanting for more.

More songs, more love, more nights like this one and more of Thorin Oakenshield and that angelic voice he possessed.

Liked it? Likes/reblogs/comments are hugely appreciated and encouraged!

Thank you @lathalea and @fizzyxcustard for organising the event!

Divider by @firefly-graphics, moodboard created by me

[izzielizzie]

okay, so i just finished rereading oouin and omg i need to rant about the ending. like the book is really good and everything but the ending is ??????

like first of all: the bomb?? why is there a bomb it seriously came out of nowhere? and that jared jackson guy was rly random character imo, like he came out of nowhere basically, set off a bomb, then we never hear anything about him again?

then second of all nate, i dont even really know why nate was the one to get hurt by the bomb bc he wasn't really a major character? like it would have made sm more sense if it was maeve or knox??

then somehow, after getting hit by a bomb, nate is well enough to go to a wedding the NEXT DAY even though maeve literally says that the arboretum closes at 6 - so presumably the explosion took place much later than 6, so nate had surgery that night and then is just fine and let out of the hospital at what can only be a few hours later??

and then BRONWYN IN THE WEDDING SCENE. why was she so pissy when nate didn't want to dance?? like babes, your boyfriend literally got severely injured last night (protecting her as well) maybe he wants to rest?? seriously the whole book bronwyn was completely out of character and she really annoyed me.

oh my god hi i love this so much.

the bomb was so out of the blue?? like i completely forgot about all the threats bc they weren't touched on? like it was treated as something that just happens to eli and therefore not something to knox to worry about (as sad as it sounds). and jared is so random?? i just feel like this entire plot point came out of left field ngl.

nate did not need to be injured. knox getting his hero arc would have been better. maeve nearly dying after literally telling her sister a couple hours earlier that she was convinced that she wouldn't live past high school so she didn't get close to anyone would be so interesting.

again: when you get literal pieces of bomb shrapnel taken out of you, you are not well enough to go to a wedding the next morning. i wasn't even allowed out of the er when i dislocated my knee for at least twelve hours and that was not a surgery.

bronwyn was the worst at the wedding. if the guy doesn't want to dance then don't dance. go dance with your sister, or your friends, or heck go dance with your parents. i've danced with my dad at tens of weddings when i didn't have anyone else to dance with. and bron has great relationships with her parents that's totally plausible for her to do.

i've said this before and i'll keep saying it bc i'm mad: bronwyn did not need to be in the book at all. cooper was literally just in a different city and he didn't have major scenes. bronwyn was on a different coast. this book was maeve's book. the main couple was maeve and luis. not bronwyn and nate. it made sense for nate to have scenes, he's like maeve's brother. and he works for knox's dad. it made sense for addy to have scenes, her sister was getting married and she lives across the hall from phoebe. it made sense for kris to have a scene because he was watching his boyfriend's baseball game.

also bronwyn was kind of the worst to everyone. she kept telling maeve to apply to college even though maeve clearly has not had a normal high school experience and it might be hard for her to think about that right now. she judged addy for not being organized when the literal wedding planner was stuck in the hospital with her daughter (who had alcohol poisoning). she got mad at nate when he was kissed by jules even though he didn't willingly do that (he was assaulted!!) and bronwyn did willingly hang out with her ex boyfriend. and then she made maeve's cancer scare all about her. there was no reason for her to be upset with maeve for not telling her because maeve was scared out of her mind and she didn't want to hurt bronwyn.

i'm just so upset with the way bronwyn was written in oouin i wish her scenes were replaced with cooper.

[decepti-thots]

Thoughts on Bumblebee?

You know, I feel like fandom has got some real Bumblebee fatigue sometimes. And like. I get it. In a post-Bayverse world, we get a lot of Bumblebee. So much yellow plastic on store shelves to sell kid appeal character toys of. So many series where he just has to be there, starting when TFA got told they had to replace Hot Shot with Bumblebee and going on from there. (Leading, too, to some pretty variable characterisation over the years, with Bee clearly being written according to this or that other character archetype but company mandates mean it has to be Bumblebee instead.)

But I love Bee. He makes me happy. He's shaped like a friend, he's a cutie, I have a soft spot for him. I loved what IDW did with him, trying to take him in a different direction since they were freed from the obligation to make him The Kid Appeal Character TM given their target demographic. Ghost!Bee with Starscream was so much fun as an idea IMO, that was such an off the wall way to go and it somehow clicks anyway. Plus they managed to make the 'Bee tries to be a successor as a leader to OP' idea actually work in a way it never really did for me when they tried it elsewhere (...RiD15, basically), because they had the option to go more interesting places with it without having to adhere to the kid appeal schtick. And I know I've mentioned before that his weird, tense quasi-friendship thing with Prowl in exRiD fascinates me even as I struggle to make it all hang together. He's a character who just bounces off people in that comic in a way very few other characters do by design, as a genuine people person in a continuity full of characters who are more guarded and damaged, and I found what they did with him compelling!

And he's great in Cyberverse as the modern incarnation of G1 Bee as the kid appeal character, too. I know the aggressive rebranding of TFC to be big on pushing him was kinda grating, but I can forgive it because TFC Bee is so genuinely charming and fun, tbh. We love Bee in this house, haha.

[innuendostudios]

Thoughts on: Criterion's Neo-Noir Collection

I have written up all 26 films* in the Criterion Channel's Neo-Noir Collection.

Legend: rw - rewatch; a movie I had seen before going through the collection dnrw - did not rewatch; if a movie met two criteria (a. I had seen it within the last 18 months, b. I actively dislike it) I wrote it up from memory.

* in September, Brick leaves the Criterion Channel and is replaced in the collection with Michael Mann's Thief. May add it to the list when that happens.

Note: These are very "what was on my mind after watching." No effort has been made to avoid spoilers, nor to make the plot clear for anyone who hasn't seen the movies in question. Decide for yourself if that's interesting to you.

Cotton Comes to Harlem I feel utterly unequipped to asses this movie. This and Sweet Sweetback's Baadasssss Song the following year are regularly cited as the progenitors of the blaxploitation genre. (This is arguably unfair, since both were made by Black men and dealt much more substantively with race than the white-directed films that followed them.) Its heroes are a couple of Black cops who are treated with suspicion both by their white colleagues and by the Black community they're meant to police. I'm not 100% clear on whether they're the good guys? I mean, I think they are. But the community's suspicion of them seems, I dunno... well-founded? They are working for The Man. And there's interesting discussion to the had there - is the the problem that the law is carried out by racists, or is the law itself racist? Can Black cops make anything better? But it feels like the film stacks the deck in Gravedigger and Coffin Ed's favor; the local Black church is run by a conman, the Back-to-Africa movement is, itself, a con, and the local Black Power movement is treated as an obstacle. Black cops really are the only force for justice here. Movie portrays Harlem itself as a warm, thriving, cultured community, but the people that make up that community are disloyal and easily fooled. Felt, to me, like the message was "just because they're cops doesn't mean they don't have Black soul," which, nowadays, we would call copaganda. But, then, do I know what I'm talking about? Do I know how much this played into or off of or against stereotypes from 1970? Was this a radical departure I don't have the context to appreciate? Is there substance I'm too white and too many decades removed to pick up on? Am I wildly overthinking this? I dunno. Seems like everyone involved was having a lot of fun, at least. That bit is contagious.

Across 110th Street And here's the other side of the "race film" equation. Another movie set in Harlem with a Black cop pulled between the police, the criminals, and the public, but this time the film is made by white people. I like it both more and less. Pro: this time the difficult position of Black cop who's treated with suspicion by both white cops and Black Harlemites is interrogated. Con: the Black cop has basically no personality other than "honest cop." Pro: the racism of the police force is explicit and systemic, as opposed to comically ineffectual. Con: the movie is shaped around a racist white cop who beats the shit out of Black people but slowly forms a bond with his Black partner. Pro: the Black criminal at the heart of the movie talks openly about how the white world has stacked the deck against him, and he's soulful and relateable. Con: so of course he dies in the end, because the only way privileged people know to sympathetize with minorities is to make them tragic (see also: The Boys in the Band, Philadelphia, and Brokeback Mountain for gay men). Additional con: this time Harlem is portrayed as a hellhole. Barely any of the community is even seen. At least the shot at the end, where the criminal realizes he's going to die and throws the bag of money off a roof and into a playground so the Black kids can pick it up before the cops reclaim it was powerful. But overall... yech. Cotton Comes to Harlem felt like it wasn't for me; this feels like it was 100% for me and I respect it less for that.

The Long Goodbye (rw) The shaggiest dog. Like much Altman, more compelling than good, but very compelling. Raymond Chandler's story is now set in the 1970's, but Philip Marlowe is the same Philip Marlowe of the 1930's. I get the sense there was always something inherently sad about Marlowe. Classic noir always portrayed its detectives as strong-willed men living on the border between the straightlaced world and its seedy underbelly, crossing back and forth freely but belonging to neither. But Chandler stresses the loneliness of it - or, at least, the people who've adapted Chandler do. Marlowe is a decent man in an indecent world, sorting things out, refusing to profit from misery, but unable to set anything truly right. Being a man out of step is here literalized by putting him forty years from the era where he belongs. His hardboiled internal monologue is now the incessant mutterings of the weird guy across the street who never stops smoking. Like I said: compelling! Kael's observation was spot on: everyone in the movie knows more about the mystery than he does, but he's the only one who cares. The mystery is pretty threadbare - Marlowe doesn't detect so much as end up in places and have people explain things to him. But I've seen it two or three times now, and it does linger.

Chinatown (rw) I confess I've always been impressed by Chinatown more than I've liked it. Its story structure is impeccable, its atmosphere is gorgeous, its noirish fatalism is raw and real, its deconstruction of the noir hero is well-observed, and it's full of clever detective tricks (the pocket watches, the tail light, the ruler). I've just never connected with it. Maybe it's a little too perfectly crafted. (I feel similar about Miller's Crossing.) And I've always been ambivalent about the ending. In Towne's original ending, Evelyn shoots Noah Cross dead and get arrested, and neither she nor Jake can tell the truth of why she did it, so she goes to jail for murder and her daughter is in the wind. Polansky proposed the ending that exists now, where Evelyn just dies, Cross wins, and Jake walks away devastated. It communicates the same thing: Jake's attempt to get smart and play all the sides off each other instead of just helping Evelyn escape blows up in his face at the expense of the woman he cares about and any sense of real justice. And it does this more dramatically and efficiently than Towne's original ending. But it also treats Evelyn as narratively disposable, and hands the daughter over to the man who raped Evelyn and murdered her husband. It makes the women suffer more to punch up the ending. But can I honestly say that Towne's ending is the better one? It is thematically equal, dramatically inferior, but would distract me less. Not sure what the calculus comes out to there. Maybe there should be a third option. Anyway! A perfect little contraption. Belongs under a glass dome.

Night Moves (rw) Ah yeah, the good shit. This is my quintessential 70's noir. This is three movies in a row about detectives. Thing is, the classic era wasn't as chockablock with hardboiled detectives as we think; most of those movies starred criminals, cops, and boring dudes seduced to the darkness by a pair of legs. Gumshoes just left the strongest impressions. (The genre is said to begin with Maltese Falcon and end with Touch of Evil, after all.) So when the post-Code 70's decided to pick the genre back up while picking it apart, it makes sense that they went for the 'tecs first. The Long Goodbye dragged the 30's detective into the 70's, and Chinatown went back to the 30's with a 70's sensibility. But Night Moves was about detecting in the Watergate era, and how that changed the archetype. Harry Moseby is the detective so obsessed with finding the truth that he might just ruin his life looking for it, like the straight story will somehow fix everything that's broken, like it'll bring back a murdered teenager and repair his marriage and give him a reason to forgive the woman who fucked him just to distract him from some smuggling. When he's got time to kill, he takes out a little, magnetic chess set and recreates a famous old game, where three knight moves (get it?) would have led to a beautiful checkmate had the player just seen it. He keeps going, self-destructing, because he can't stand the idea that the perfect move is there if he can just find it. And, no matter how much we see it destroy him, we, the audience, want him to keep going; we expect a satisfying resolution to the mystery. That's what we need from a detective picture; one character flat-out compares Harry to Sam Spade. But what if the truth is just... Watergate? Just some prick ruining things for selfish reasons? Nothing grand, nothing satisfying. Nothing could be more noir, or more neo-, than that.

Farewell, My Lovely Sometimes the only thing that makes a noir neo- is that it's in color and all the blood, tits, and racism from the books they're based on get put back in. This second stab at Chandler is competant but not much more than that. Mitchum works as Philip Marlowe, but Chandler's dialogue feels off here, like lines that worked on the page don't work aloud, even though they did when Bogie said them. I'll chalk it up to workmanlike but uninspired direction. (Dang this looks bland so soon after Chinatown.) Moose Malloy is a great character, and perfectly cast. (Wasn't sure at first, but it's true.) Some other interesting cats show up and vanish - the tough brothel madam based on Brenda Allen comes to mind, though she's treated with oddly more disdain than most of the other hoods and is dispatched quicker. In general, the more overt racism and misogyny doesn't seem to do anything except make the movie "edgier" than earlier attempts at the same material, and it reads kinda try-hard. But it mostly holds together. *shrug*

The Killing of a Chinese Bookie (dnrw) Didn't care for this at all. Can't tell if the script was treated as a jumping-off point or if the dialogue is 100% improvised, but it just drags on forever and is never that interesting. Keeps treating us to scenes from the strip club like they're the opera scenes in Amadeus, and, whatever, I don't expect burlesque to be Mozart, but Cosmo keeps saying they're an artful, classy joint, and I keep waiting for the show to be more than cheap, lazy camp. How do you make gratuitious nudity boring? Mind you, none of this is bad as a rule - I love digressions and can enjoy good sleaze, and it's clear the filmmakers care about what they're making. They just did not sell it in a way I wanted to buy. Can't remember what edit I watched; I hope it was the 135 minute one, because I cannot imagine there being a longer edit out there.

The American Friend (dnrw) It's weird that this is Patricia Highsmith, right? That Dennis Hopper is playing Tom Ripley? In a cowboy hat? I gather that Minghella's version wasn't true to the source, but I do love that movie, and this is a long, long way from that. This Mr. Ripley isn't even particularly talented! Anyway, this has one really great sequence, where a regular guy has been coerced by crooks into murdering someone on a train platform, and, when the moment comes to shoot, he doesn't. And what follows is a prolonged sequence of an amateur trying to surreptitiously tail a guy across a train station and onto another train, and all the while you're not sure... is he going to do it? is he going to chicken out? is he going to do it so badly he gets caught? It's hard not to put yourself in the protagonist's shoes, wondering how you would handle the situation, whether you could do it, whether you could act on impulse before your conscience could catch up with you. It drags on a long while and this time it's a good thing. Didn't much like the rest of the movie, it's shapeless and often kind of corny, and the central plot hook is contrived. (It's also very weird that this is the only Wim Wenders I've seen.) But, hey, I got one excellent sequence, not gonna complain.

The Big Sleep Unlike the 1946 film, I can follow the plot of this Big Sleep. But, also unlike the 1946 version, this one isn't any damn fun. Mitchum is back as Marlowe (this is three Marlowes in five years, btw), and this time it's set in the 70's and in England, for some reason. I don't find this offensive, but neither do I see what it accomplishes? Most of the cast is still American. (Hi Jimmy!) Still holds together, but even less well than Farewell, My Lovely. But I do find it interesting that the neo-noir era keeps returning to Chandler while it's pretty much left Hammet behind (inasmuch as someone whose genes are spread wide through the whole genre can be left behind). Spade and the Continental Op, straightshooting tough guys who come out on top in the end, seem antiquated in the (post-)modern era. But Marlowe's goodness being out of sync with the world around him only seems more poignant the further you take him from his own time. Nowadays you can really only do Hammett as pastiche, but I sense that you could still play Chandler straight.

Eyes of Laura Mars The most De Palma movie I've seen not made by De Palma, complete with POV shots, paranormal hoodoo, and fixation with sex, death, and whether images of such are art or exploitation (or both). Laura Mars takes photographs of naked women in violent tableux, and has gotten quite famous doing so, but is it damaging to women? The movie has more than a superficial engagement with this topic, but only slightly more than superficial. Kept imagining a movie that is about 30% less serial killer story and 30% more art conversations. (But, then, I have an art degree and have never murdered anyone, so.) Like, museums are full of Biblical paintings full of nude women and slaughter, sometimes both at once, and they're called masterpieces. Most all of them were painted by men on commission from other men. Now Laura Mars makes similar images in modern trappings, and has models made of flesh and blood rather than paint, and it's scandalous? Why is it only controversial once women are getting paid for it? On the other hand, is this just the master's tools? Is she subverting or challenging the male gaze, or just profiting off of it? Or is a woman profiting off of it, itself, a subversion? Is it subversive enough to account for how it commodifies female bodies? These questions are pretty clearly relevant to the movie itself, and the movies in general, especially after the fall of the Hays Code when people were really unrestrained with the blood and boobies. And, heck, the lead is played by the star of Bonnie and Clyde! All this is to say: I wish the movie were as interested in these questions as I am. What's there is a mildly diverting B-picture. There's one great bit where Laura's seeing through the killer's eyes (that's the hook, she gets visions from the murderer's POV; no, this is never explained) and he's RIGHT BEHIND HER, so there's a chase where she charges across an empty room only able to see her own fleeing self from ten feet behind. That was pretty great! And her first kiss with the detective (because you could see a mile away that the detective and the woman he's supposed to protect are gonna fall in love) is immediately followed by the two freaking out about how nonsensical it is for them to fall in love with each other, because she's literally mourning multiple deaths and he's being wildly unprofessional, and then they go back to making out. That bit was great, too. The rest... enh.

The Onion Field What starts off as a seemingly not-that-noirish cops-vs-crooks procedural turns into an agonizingly protracted look at the legal system, with the ultimate argument that the very idea of the law ever resulting in justice is a lie. Hoo! I have to say, I'm impressed. There's a scene where a lawyer - whom I'm not sure is even named, he's like the seventh of thirteen we've met - literally quits the law over how long this court case about two guys shooting a cop has taken. He says the cop who was murdered has been forgotten, his partner has never gotten to move on because the case has lasted eight years, nothing has been accomplished, and they should let the two criminals walk and jail all the judges and lawyers instead. It's awesome! The script is loaded with digressions and unnecessary details, just the way I like it. Can't say I'm impressed with the execution. Nothing is wrong, exactly, but the performances all seem a tad melodramatic or a tad uninspired. Camerawork is, again, purely functional. It's no masterpiece. But that second half worked for me. (And it's Ted Danson's first movie! He did great.)

Body Heat (rw) Let's say up front that this is a handsomely-made movie. Probably the best looking thing on the list since Night Moves. Nothing I've seen better captures the swelter of an East Coast heatwave, or the lusty feeling of being too hot to bang and going at it regardless. Kathleen Turner sells the hell out of a femme fatale. There are a lot of good lines and good performances (Ted Danson is back and having the time of his life). I want to get all that out of the way, because this is a movie heavily modeled after Double Indemnity, and I wanted to discuss its merits before I get into why inviting that comparison doesn't help the movie out. In a lot of ways, it's the same rules as the Robert Mitchum Marlowe movies - do Double Indemnity but amp up the sex and violence. And, to a degree it works. (At least, the sex does, dunno that Double Indemnity was crying out for explosions.) But the plot is amped as well, and gets downright silly. Yeah, Mrs. Dietrichson seduces Walter Neff so he'll off her husband, but Neff clocks that pretty early and goes along with it anyway. Everything beyond that is two people keeping too big a secret and slowly turning on each other. But here? For the twists to work Matty has to be, from frame one, playing four-dimensional chess on the order of Senator Palpatine, and its about as plausible. (Exactly how did she know, after she rebuffed Ned, he would figure out her local bar and go looking for her at the exact hour she was there?) It's already kind of weird to be using the spider woman trope in 1981, but to make her MORE sexually conniving and mercenary than she was in the 40's is... not great. As lurid trash, it's pretty fun for a while, but some noir stuff can't just be updated, it needs to be subverted or it doesn't justify its existence.

Blow Out Brian De Palma has two categories of movie: he's got his mainstream, director-for-hire fare, where his voice is either reigned in or indulged in isolated sequences that don't always jive with the rest fo the film, and then there's his Brian De Palma movies. My mistake, it seems, is having seen several for-hires from throughout his career - The Untouchables (fine enough), Carlito's Way (ditto, but less), Mission: Impossible (enh) - but had only seen De Palma-ass movies from his late period (Femme Fatale and The Black Dahlia, both of which I think are garbage). All this to say: Blow Out was my first classic-era De Palma, and holy fucking shit dudes. This was (with caveats) my absolute and entire jam. I said I could enjoy good sleaze, and this is good friggin' sleaze. (Though far short of De Palma at his sleaziest, mercifully.) The splitscreens, the diopter shots, the canted angles, how does he make so many shlocky things work?! John Travolta's sound tech goes out to get fresh wind fx for the movie he's working on, and we get this wonderful sequence of visuals following sounds as he turns his attention and his microphone to various noises - a couple on a walk, a frog, an owl, a buzzing street lamp. Later, as he listens back to the footage, the same sequence plays again, but this time from his POV; we're seeing his memory as guided by the same sequence of sounds, now recreated with different shots, as he moves his pencil in the air mimicking the microphone. When he mixes and edits sounds, we hear the literal soundtrack of the movie we are watching get mixed and edited by the person on screen. And as he tries to unravel a murder mystery, he uses what's at hand: magnetic tape, flatbed editors, an animation camera to turn still photos from the crime scene into a film and sync it with the audio he recorded; it's forensics using only the tools of the editing room. As someone who's spent some time in college editing rooms, this is a hoot and a half. Loses a bit of steam as it goes on and the film nerd stuff gives way to a more traditional thriller, but rallies for a sound-tech-centered final setpiece, which steadily builds to such madcap heights you can feel the air thinning, before oddly cutting its own tension and then trying to build it back up again. It doesn't work as well the second time. But then, that shot right after the climax? Damn. Conflicted on how the movie treats the female lead. I get why feminist film theorists are so divided on De Palma. His stuff is full of things feminists (rightly) criticize, full of women getting naked when they're not getting stabbed, but he also clearly finds women fascinating and has them do empowered and unexpected things, and there are many feminist reads of his movies. Call it a mixed bag. But even when he's doing tropey shit, he explores the tropes in unexpected ways. Definitely the best movie so far that I hadn't already seen.

Cutter's Way (rw) Alex Cutter is pitched to us as an obnoxious-but-sympathetic son of a bitch, and, you know, two out of three ain't bad. Watched this during my 2020 neo-noir kick and considered skipping it this time because I really didn't enjoy it. Found it a little more compelling this go around, while being reminded of why my feelings were room temp before. Thematically, I'm onboard: it's about a guy, Cutter, getting it in his head that he's found a murderer and needs to bring him to justice, and his friend, Bone, who intermittently helps him because he feels bad that Cutter lost his arm, leg, and eye in Nam and he also feels guilty for being in love with Cutter's wife. The question of whether the guy they're trying to bring down actually did it is intentionally undefined, and arguably unimportant; they've got personal reasons to see this through. Postmodern and noirish, fixated with the inability to ever fully know the truth of anything, but starring people so broken by society that they're desperate for certainty. (Pretty obvious parallels to Vietnam.) Cutter's a drunk and kind of an asshole, but understandably so. Bone's shiftlessness is the other response to a lack of meaning in the world, to the point where making a decision, any decision, feels like character growth, even if it's maybe killing a guy whose guilt is entirely theoretical. So, yeah, I'm down with all of this! A- in outline form. It's just that Cutter is so uninterestingly unpleasant and no one else on screen is compelling enough to make up for it. His drunken windups are tedious and his sanctimonious speeches about what the war was like are, well, true and accurate but also obviously manipulative. It's two hours with two miserable people, and I think Cutter's constant chatter is supposed to be the comic relief but it's a little too accurate to drunken rambling, which isn't funny if you're not also drunk. He's just tedious, irritating, and periodically racist. Pass.

Blood Simple (rw) I'm pretty cool on the Coens - there are things I've liked, even loved, in every Coen film I've seen, but I always come away dissatisfied. For a while, I kept going to their movies because I was sure eventually I'd love one without qualification. No Country for Old Men came close, the first two acts being master classes in sustained tension. But then the third act is all about denying closure: the protagonist is murdered offscreen, the villain's motives are never explained, and it ends with an existentialist speech about the unfathomable cruelty of the world. And it just doesn't land for me. The archness of the Coen's dialogue, the fussiness of their set design, the kinda-intimate, kinda-awkward, kinda-funny closeness of the camera's singles, it cannot sell me on a devastating meditation about meaninglessness. It's only ever sold me on the Coens' own cleverness. And that archness, that distancing, has typified every one of their movies I've come close to loving. Which is a long-ass preamble to saying, holy heck, I was not prepared for their very first movie to be the one I'd been looking for! I watched it last year and it remains true on rewatch: Blood Simple works like gangbusters. It's kind of Double Indemnity (again) but played as a comedy of errors, minus the comedy: two people romantically involved feeling their trust unravel after a murder. And I think the first thing that works for me is that utter lack of comedy. It's loaded with the Coens' trademark ironies - mostly dramatic in this case - but it's all played straight. Unlike the usual lead/femme fatale relationship, where distrust brews as the movie goes on, the audience knows the two main characters can trust each other. There are no secret duplicitous motives waiting to be revealed. The audience also know why they don't trust each other. (And it's all communicated wordlessly, btw: a character enters a scene and we know, based on the information that character has, how it looks to them and what suspicions it would arouse, even as we know the truth of it). The second thing that works is, weirdly, that the characters aren't very interesting?! Ray and Abby have almost no characterization. Outside of a general likability, they are blank slates. This is a weakness in most films, but, given the agonizingly long, wordless sequences where they dispose of bodies or hide from gunfire, you're left thinking not "what will Ray/Abby do in this scenario," because Ray and Abby are relatively elemental and undefined, but "what would I do in this scenario?" Which creates an exquisite tension but also, weirdly, creates more empathy than I feel for the Coens' usual cast of personalities. It's supposed to work the other way around! Truly enjoyable throughout but absolutely wonderful in the suspenseful-as-hell climax. Good shit right here.

Body Double The thing about erotic thrillers is everything that matters is in the name. Is it thrilling? Is it erotic? Good; all else is secondary. De Palma set out to make the most lurid, voyeuristic, horny, violent, shocking, steamy movie he could come up with, and its success was not strictly dependent on the lead's acting ability or the verisimilitude of the plot. But what are we, the modern audience, to make of it once 37 years have passed and, by today's standards, the eroticism is quite tame and the twists are no longer shocking? Then we're left with a nonsensical riff on Vertigo, a specularization of women that is very hard to justify, and lead actor made of pulped wood. De Palma's obsessions don't cohere into anything more this time; the bits stolen from Hitchcock aren't repurposed to new ends, it really is just Hitch with more tits and less brains. (I mean, I still haven't seen Vertigo, but I feel 100% confident in that statement.) The diopter shots and rear-projections this time look cheap (literally so, apparently; this had 1/3 the budget of Blow Out). There are some mildly interesting setpieces, but nothing compared to Travolta's auditory reconstructions or car chase where he tries to tail a subway train from street level even if it means driving through a frickin parade like an inverted French Connection, goddamn Blow Out was a good movie! Anyway. Melanie Griffith seems to be having fun, at least. I guess I had a little as well, but it was, at best, diverting, and a real letdown.

The Hit Surprised by how much I enjoyed this one. Terrance Stamp flips on the mob and spends ten years living a life of ease in Spain, waiting for the day they find and kill him. Movie kicks off when they do find him, and what follows is a ramshackle road movie as John Hurt and a young Tim Roth attempt to drive him to Paris so they can shoot him in front of his old boss. Stamp is magnetic. He's spent a decade reading philosophy and seems utterly prepared for death, so he spends the trip humming, philosophizing, and being friendly with his captors when he's not winding them up. It remains unclear to the end whether the discord he sews between Roth and Hurt is part of some larger plan of escape or just for shits and giggles. There's also a decent amount of plot for a movie that's not terribly plot-driven - just about every part of the kidnapping has tiny hitches the kidnappers aren't prepared for, and each has film-long repercussions, drawing the cops closer and somehow sticking Laura del Sol in their backseat. The ongoing questions are when Stamp will die, whether del Sol will die, and whether Roth will be able to pull the trigger. In the end, it's actually a meditation on ethics and mortality, but in a quiet and often funny way. It's not going to go down as one of my new favs, but it was a nice way to spend a couple hours.

Trouble in Mind (dnrw) I fucking hated this movie. It's been many months since I watched it, do I remember what I hated most? Was it the bit where a couple of country bumpkins who've come to the city walk into a diner and Mr. Bumpkin clocks that the one Black guy in the back as obviously a criminal despite never having seen him before? Was it the part where Kris Kristofferson won't stop hounding Mrs. Bumpkin no matter how many times she demands to be left alone, and it's played as romantic because obviously he knows what she needs better than she does? Or is it the part where Mr. Bumpkin reluctantly takes a job from the Obvious Criminal (who is, in fact, a criminal, and the only named Black character in the movie if I remember correctly, draw your own conclusions) and, within a week, has become a full-blown hood, which is exemplified by a lot, like, a lot of queer-coding? The answer to all three questions is yes. It's also fucking boring. Even out-of-drag Divine's performance as the villain can't save it.

Manhunter 'sfine? I've still never seen Silence of the Lambs, nor any of the Hopkins Lecter movies, nor, indeed, any full episode of the show. So the unheimlich others get seeing Brian Cox play Hannibal didn't come into play. Cox does a good job with him, but he's barely there. Shame, cuz he's the most interesting part of the movie. Honestly, there's a lot of interesting stuff that's barely there. Will Graham being a guy who gets into the heads of serial killers is explored well enough, and Mann knows how to direct a police procedural such that it's both contemplative and propulsive. But all the other themes it points at? Will's fear that he understands murderers a little too well? Hannibal trying to nudge him towards becoming one? Whatever dance Hannibal and Tooth Fairy are doing? What Tooth Fairy's deal is, anyway? (Why does he wear fake teeth and bite things? Why is he fixated on the red dragon? Does the bit where he says "Francis is gone forever" mean he has DID?) None of it goes anywhere or amounts to anything. I mean, it's certainly more interesting with this stuff than without, but it has that feel of a book that's been pared of its interesting bits to fit the runtime (or, alternately, pulp that's been sloppily elevated). I still haven't made my mind up on Mann's cold, precise camera work, but at least it gives me something to look at. It's fine! This is fine.

Mona Lisa (rw) Gave this one another shot. Bob Hoskins is wonderful as a hood out of his depth in classy places, quick to anger but just as quick to let anger go (the opening sequence where he's screaming on his ex-wife's doorstep, hurling trash cans at her house, and one minute later thrilled to see his old car, is pretty nice). And Cathy Tyson's working girl is a subtler kind of fascinating, exuding a mixture of coldness and kindness. It's just... this is ultimately a story about how heartbreaking it is when the girl you like is gay, right? It's Weezer's Pink Triangle: The Movie. It's not homophobic, exactly - Simone isn't demonized for being a lesbian - but it's still, like, "man, this straight white guy's pain is so much more interesting than the Black queer sex worker's." And when he's yelling "you woulda done it!" at the end, I can't tell if we're supposed to agree with him. Seems pretty clear that she wouldn'ta done it, at least not without there being some reveal about her character that doesn't happen, but I don't think the ending works if we don't agree with him, so... I'm like 70% sure the movie does Simone dirty there. For the first half, their growing relationship feels genuine and natural, and, honestly, the story being about a real bond that unfortunately means different things to each party could work if it didn't end with a gun and a sock in the jaw. Shape feels jagged as well; what feels like the end of the second act or so turns out to be the climax. And some of the symbolism is... well, ok, Simone gives George money to buy more appropriate clothes for hanging out in high end hotels, and he gets a tan leather jacket and a Hawaiian shirt, and their first proper bonding moment is when she takes him out for actual clothes. For the rest of the movie he is rocking double-breasted suits (not sure I agree with the striped tie, but it was the eighties, whaddya gonna do?). Then, in the second half, she sends him off looking for her old streetwalker friend, and now he looks completely out of place in the strip clubs and bordellos. So far so good. But then they have this run-in where her old pimp pulls a knife and cuts George's arm, so, with his nice shirt torn and it not safe going home (I guess?) he starts wearing the Hawaiian shirt again. So around the time he's starting to realize he doesn't really belong in Simone's world or the lowlife world he came from anymore, he's running around with the classy double-breasted suit jacket over the garish Hawaiian shirt, and, yeah, bit on the nose guys. Anyway, it has good bits, I just feel like a movie that asks me to feel for the guy punching a gay, Black woman in the face needs to work harder to earn it. Bit of wasted talent.

The Bedroom Window Starts well. Man starts an affair with his boss' wife, their first night together she witnesses an attempted murder from his window, she worries going to the police will reveal the affair to her husband, so the man reports her testimony to the cops claiming he's the one who saw it. Young Isabelle Huppert is the perfect woman for a guy to risk his career on a crush over, and Young Steve Guttenberg is the perfect balance of affability and amorality. And it flows great - picks just the right media to res. So then he's talking to the cops, telling them what she told him, and they ask questions he forgot to ask her - was the perp's jacket a blazer or a windbreaker? - and he has to guess. Then he gets called into the police lineup, and one guy matches her description really well, but is it just because he's wearing his red hair the way she described it? He can't be sure, doesn't finger any of them. He finds out the cops were pretty certain about one of the guys, so he follows the one he thinks it was around, looking for more evidence, and another girl is attacked right outside a bar he knows the redhead was at. Now he's certain! But he shows the boss' wife the guy and she's not certain, and she reminds him they don't even know if the guy he followed is the same guy the police suspected! And as he feeds more evidence to the cops, he has to lie more, because he can't exactly say he was tailing the guy around the city. So, I'm all in now. Maybe it's because I'd so recently rewatched Night Moves and Cutter's Way, but this seems like another story about uncertainty. He's really certain about the guy because it fits narratively, and we, the audience, feel the same. But he's not actually a witness, he doesn't have actual evidence, he's fitting bits and pieces together like a conspiracy theorist. He's fixating on what he wants to be true. Sign me up! But then it turns out he's 100% correct about who the killer is but his lies are found out and now the cops think he's the killer and I realize, oh, no, this movie isn't nearly as smart as I thought it was. Egg on my face! What transpires for the remaining half of the runtime is goofy as hell, and someone with shlockier sensibilities could have made a meal of it, but Hanson, despite being a Corman protege, takes this silliness seriously in the all wrong ways. Next!

Homicide (rw? I think I saw most of this on TV one time) Homicide centers around the conflicted loyalties of a Jewish cop. It opens with the Jewish cop and his white gentile partner taking over a case with a Black perp from some Black FBI agents. The media is making a big thing about the racial implications of the mostly white cops chasing down a Black man in a Black neighborhood. And inside of 15 minutes the FBI agent is calling the lead a k*ke and the gentile cop is calling the FBI agent a f****t and there's all kinds of invective for Black people. The film is announcing its intentions out the gate: this movie is about race. But the issue here is David Mamet doesn't care about race as anything other than a dramatic device. He's the Ubisoft of filmmakers, having no coherent perspective on social issues but expecting accolades for even bringing them up. Mamet is Jewish (though lead actor Joe Mantegna definitely is not) but what is his position on the Jewish diaspora? The whole deal is Mantegna gets stuck with a petty homicide case instead of the big one they just pinched from the Feds, where a Jewish candy shop owner gets shot in what looks like a stickup. Her family tries to appeal to his Jewishness to get him to take the case seriously, and, after giving them the brush-off for a long time, finally starts following through out of guilt, finding bits and pieces of what may or may not be a conspiracy, with Zionist gun runners and underground neo-Nazis. But, again: all of these are just dramatic devices. Mantegna's Jewishness (those words will never not sound ridiculous together) has always been a liability for him as a cop (we are told, not shown), and taking the case seriously is a reclamation of identity. The Jews he finds community with sold tommyguns to revolutionaries during the founding of Israel. These Jews end up blackmailing him to get a document from the evidence room. So: what is the film's position on placing stock in one's Jewish identity? What is its position on Israel? What is its opinion on Palestine? Because all three come up! And the answer is: Mamet doesn't care. You can read it a lot of different ways. Someone with more context and more patience than me could probably deduce what the de facto message is, the way Chris Franklin deduced the de facto message of Far Cry V despite the game's efforts not to have one, but I'm not going to. Mantegna's attempt to reconnect with his Jewishness gets his partner killed, gets the guy he was supposed to bring in alive shot dead, gets him possibly permanent injuries, gets him on camera blowing up a store that's a front for white nationalists, and all for nothing because the "clues" he found (pretty much exclusively by coincidence) were unconnected nothings. The problem is either his Jewishness, or his lifelong failure to connect with his Jewishness until late in life. Mamet doesn't give a shit. (Like, Mamet canonically doesn't give a shit: he is on record saying social context is meaningless, characters only exist to serve the plot, and there are no deeper meanings in fiction.) Mamet's ping-pong dialogue is fun, as always, and there are some neat ideas and characters, but it's all in service of a big nothing that needed to be a something to work.

Swoon So much I could talk about, let's keep it to the most interesting bits. Hommes Fatales: a thing about classic noir that it was fascinated by the marginal but had to keep it in the margins. Liberated women, queer-coded killers, Black jazz players, broke thieves; they were the main event, they were what audiences wanted to see, they were what made the movies fun. But the ending always had to reassert straightlaced straight, white, middle-class male society as unshakeable. White supremacist capitalist patriarchy demanded, both ideologically and via the Hays Code, that anyone outside these norms be punished, reformed, or dead by the movie's end. The only way to make them the heroes was to play their deaths for tragedy. It is unsurprising that neo-noir would take the queer-coded villains and make them the protagonists. Implicature: This is the story of Leopold and Loeb, murderers famous for being queer, and what's interesting is how the queerness in the first half exists entirely outside of language. Like, it's kind of amazing for a movie from 1992 to be this gay - we watch Nathan and Dickie kiss, undress, masturbate, fuck; hell, they wear wedding rings when they're alone together. But it's never verbalized. Sex is referred to as "your reward" or "what you wanted" or "best time." Dickie says he's going to have "the girls over," and it turns out "the girls" are a bunch of drag queens, but this is never acknowledged. Nathan at one point lists off a bunch of famous men - Oscar Wild, E.M. Forster, Frederick the Great - but, though the commonality between them is obvious (they were all gay), it's left the the audience to recognize it. When their queerness is finally verbalized in the second half, it's first in the language of pathology - a psychiatrist describing their "perversions" and "misuse" of their "organs" before the court, which has to be cleared of women because it's so inappropriate - and then with slurs from the man who murders Dickie in jail (a murder which is written off with no investigation because the victim is a gay prisoner instead of a L&L's victim, a child of a wealthy family). I don't know if I'd have noticed this if I hadn't read Chip Delany describing his experience as a gay man in the 50's existing almost entirely outside of language, the only language at the time being that of heteronormativity. Murder as Love Story: L&L exchange sex as payment for the other commiting crimes; it's foreplay. Their statements to the police where they disagree over who's to blame is a lover's quarrel. Their sentencing is a marriage. Nathan performs his own funeral rites over Dickie's body after he dies on the operating table. They are, in their way, together til death did they part. This is the relationship they can have. That it does all this without romanticizing the murder itself or valorizing L&L as humans is frankly incredible.

Suture (rw) The pitch: at the funeral for his father, wealthy Vincent Towers meets his long lost half brother Clay Arlington. It is implied Clay is a child from out of wedlock, possibly an affair; no one knows Vincent has a half-brother but him and Clay. Vincent invites Clay out to his fancy-ass home in Arizona. Thing is, Vincent is suspected (correctly) by the police of having murdered his father, and, due to a striking family resemblence, he's brought Clay to his home to fake his own death. He finagles Clay into wearing his clothes and driving his car, and then blows the car up and flees the state, leaving the cops to think him dead. Thing is, Clay survives, but with amnesia. The doctors tell him he's Vincent, and he has no reason to disagree. Any discrepancy in the way he looks is dismissed as the result of reconstructive surgery after the explosion. So Clay Arlington resumes Vincent Towers' life, without knowing Clay Arlington even exists. The twist: Clay and Vincent are both white, but Vincent is played by Michael Harris, a white actor, and Clay is played by Dennis Haysbert, a Black actor. "Ian, if there's just the two of them, how do you know it's not Harris playing a Black character?" Glad you asked! It is most explicitly obvious during a scene where Vincent/Clay's surgeon-cum-girlfriend essentially bringing up phrenology to explain how Vincent/Clay couldn't possibly have murdered his father, describing straight hair, thin lips, and a Greco-Roman nose Haysbert very clearly doesn't have. But, let's be honest: we knew well beforehand that the rich-as-fuck asshole living in a huge, modern house and living it up in Arizona high society was white. Though Clay is, canonically, white, he lives an poor and underprivileged life common to Black men in America. Though the film's title officially refers to the many stitches holding Vincent/Clay's face together after the accident, "suture" is a film theory term, referring to the way a film audience gets wrapped up - sutured - in the world of the movie, choosing to forget the outside world and pretend the story is real. The usage is ironic, because the audience cannot be sutured in; we cannot, and are not expected to, suspend our disbelief that Clay is white. We are deliberately distanced. Consequently this is a movie to be thought about, not to to be felt. It has the shape of a Hitchcockian thriller but it can't evoke the emotions of one. You can see the scaffolding - "ah, yes, this is the part of a thriller where one man hides while another stalks him with a gun, clever." I feel ill-suited to comment on what the filmmakers are saying about race. I could venture a guess about the ending, where the psychiatrist, the only one who knows the truth about Clay, says he can never truly be happy living the lie of being Vincent Towers, while we see photographs of Clay/Vincent seemingly living an extremely happy life: society says white men simply belong at the top more than Black men do, but, if the roles could be reversed, the latter would slot in seamlessly. Maybe??? Of all the movies in this collection, this is the one I'd most want to read an essay on (followed by Swoon).

The Last Seduction (dnrw) No, no, no, I am not rewataching this piece of shit movie.

Brick (rw) Here's my weird contention: Brick is in color and in widescreen, but, besides that? There's nothing neo- about this noir. There's no swearing except "hell." (I always thought Tug said "goddamn" at one point but, no, he's calling The Pin "gothed-up.") There's a lot of discussion of sex, but always through implication, and the only deleted scene is the one that removed ambiguity about what Brendan and Laura get up to after kissing. There's nothing postmodern or subversive - yes, the hook is it's set in high school, but the big twist is that it takes this very seriously. It mines it for jokes, yes, but the drama is authentic. In fact, making the gumshoe a high school student, his jadedness an obvious front, still too young to be as hard as he tries to be, just makes the drama hit harder. Sam Spade if Sam Spade were allowed to cry. I've always found it an interesting counterpoint to The Good German, a movie that fastidiously mimics the aesthetics of classic noir - down to even using period-appropriate sound recording - but is wholly neo- in construction. Brick could get approved by the Hays Code. Its vibe, its plot about a detective playing a bunch of criminals against each other, even its slang ("bulls," "yegg," "flopped") are all taken directly from Hammett. It's not even stealing from noir, it's stealing from what noir stole from! It's a perfect curtain call for the collection: the final film is both the most contemporary and the most classic. It's also - but for the strong case you could make for Night Moves - the best movie on the list. It's even more appropriate for me, personally: this was where it all started for me and noir. I saw this in theaters when it came out and loved it. It was probably my favorite movie for some time. It gave me a taste for pulpy crime movies which I only, years later, realized were neo-noir. This is why I looked into Kiss Kiss, Bang Bang and In Bruges. I've seen it more times than any film on this list, by a factor of at least 3. It's why I will always adore Rian Johnson and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. It's the best-looking half-million-dollar movie I've ever seen. (Indie filmmakers, take fucking notes.) I even did a script analysis of this, and, yes, it follows the formula, but so tightly and with so much style. Did you notice that he says several of the sequence tensions out loud? ("I just want to find her." "Show of hands.") I notice new things each time I see it - this time it was how "brushing Brendan's hair out of his face" is Em's move, making him look more like he does in the flashback, and how Laura does the same to him as she's seducing him, in the moment when he misses Em the hardest. It isn't perfect. It's recreated noir so faithfully that the Innocent Girl dies, the Femme Fatale uses intimacy as a weapon, and none of the women ever appear in a scene together. 1940's gender politics maybe don't need to be revisited. They say be critical of the media you love, and it applies here most of all: it is a real criticism of something I love immensely.

[getmemymicroscope]

I don't think I've seen a Pierce Brosnan movie since his Bond days.

Wait, no. Just did an IMDb check. I've seen: The Long Way Down, The World's End, The Ghost Writer, Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief. And I think Mamma Mia (both of them) is on my 'to watch' list (as will be Black Adam, once it releases). And I did once consider watching The Foreigner, and even actually tried to watch The Thomas Crown Affair (I got bored), so maybe it hasn't been that long. Of course, I hadn't seen any of him before Bond either - and in fact, I didn't watch his Bond movies until just a couple years back (after I'd seen all the other movies with him, aside from The World's End). Okay, so that was a lot of words to say one simple thing: most of his movies haven't really been memorable to me.

Even Bond: GoldenEye is more memorable for the awesome N64 game, Die Another Day for an invisible car & stupid on-ice chase, The World is Not Enough for Denise RIchards' Dr. Christmas character, and Tomorrow Never Dies because Michelle Yeoh is fucking awesome in it.

And this one... I mean, it is undoubtedly a movie, with actors playing characters, and a plot of sorts, and good guys and bad guys, and action, and what I assume is supposed to be signs of failed romance, and what was written as comedy moments, and ... well, it just sort of happens in front of you without ever really coming together.

There's nothing new here - it's all predictable, because we've seen it all before. Criminals teaming up. Criminals that only steal from the evil. Pickpockets who constantly pick pockets and never get caught. Money-happy bad guy. Bad guy who runs his own prison. The very early twist of it being her daughter, and the almost immediately sequential twist of her being the one that had brought this idea together. Old guy hitting on younger girl. A heist of gold. Gold turned into something else to sneak it out, while something else is going on as a diversion (and the plan isn't told to us, so that we're also unaware of the impending "twist"). A chase scene designed as a diversion. The family member being like "I should've known he would do this" (aka, cheat them and run with the loot), right before *surprise* the person shows up having not cheated them at all. ... None of it, absolutely none of it, is anything new, and our characters aren't interesting enough (there just isn't enough time to get to know them that well) to make this any better than any of the many similar-such movies.

The twists they should've considered: Brosnan does actually cheat them and disappear; Tim Roth is somehow in on it and is a good guy (also not a novel idea, but would've been an interesting twist here, maybe).

I don't know. The entire thing just felt oddly meh, which is unfortunate because to some end I really did want to root for these characters. They just - there isn't much to it. They're also never really in any danger of anything bad happening, from the word go, so that lowers the stakes a bit as well.

It's a bit like Leverage, kinda, but thankfully Leverage is a multi-season show that let us get to know the characters and their quirks, whereas here they're forced to cram everything in together and it's clear the quirks they're using are not to help us learn about the characters but instead are just complete replacements for 'character development.'

Also, Pierce Brosnan's character is a creep and kinda a douche. On the plus side, I was afraid this would be kinda like Killer Anonymous in that they'd say 'hey we have Pierce Brosnan' and then just give him a 10-second cameo, like KA did with Gary Oldman & Jessica Alba, but they didn't do that - so at least that's a win, I guess. But that's about it, really.

[welllpthisishappening]

Hello there, I see you're back on blue-line drabbles! I love them, I am obsessed with this universe. I don't know if I ever came back to say hi after I read all your big fics, but somehow I liked each even better than the last! I don't know how that's possible! But anyway, I think one of the best signs of a good writer/good story is when you're not ready to leave the world once you've finished, and Blue Line is one of the few fanfics I've read where even well after I've finished it, (cont)

(cont) I want to keep living in it and I end up writing my own fic of it in my head (strange, I know). Anyway, for whatever reason, I got really invested in Roland and Lizzie's relationship. Like, how did they end up dating after knowing each other for literally Lizzie's entire life? How did the adults react? Do you have any Lizzie/Roland stories up your sleeve? They would not go unread :)

————

Hello, yes, listen, this ask has lived rent free™ in my head since I first got it and I cannot properly convey how absolutely, goddamn wonderful it is. I am a broken record of outdated references , but it continues and will always amaze me that people are not only interested in Blue Line (more than three years!!! after I originally started posting) but are also interested in other characters in the story who are, for all intents and purposes, original characters at this point. Like the overall size my heart becomes when reading something like that could potentially cause a serious medical condition.

But, like, in a nice way.

So thank you, thank you, thank you. It genuinely warms the cockles of my entire soul. And, like, if you wanna share those fic ideas of the fic, you’ll never hear me say no. Just like I will never turn down the opportunity to write more stuff. Which is what’s under the cut. This stuff includes:

Roland and Lizzie’s first kiss, what I hope is some legitimate banter, more kissing, obvious flirting, and Roland being something of a sap.

Also, uh, it’s entirely possible that I have also already written: Roland and Lizzie’s first “I love you,” their wedding and some other stuff where their kid is involved. Seriously, guys, I am always down to write other relationships in this ‘verse.

————

It was, she figured, something almost passably close to, sort of resembling, definitely inching somewhere nearer to—

Assured. 

Unavoidable. 

Inexorable

Inevitable. 

That was a bad word. That last word. The third one was pretty impressive, honestly. Vocabulary, wise. She’d have to remember that one later. The last one, though. Made teeth Lizzie wasn’t even aware she possessed ache as she ground them together, a pronounced tension in her jaw that was likely affecting her shoulders as well. That word. An awful word. Boasted less-than-positive connotations, letters practically dripping with lack of self-control and overtly aggressive infatuation, but if the world expected her not to be a little in love with Roland Locksley by the time she turned fourteen and noticed that slight indentation in his right cheek every time he smiled, well, then the world had another thing coming. 

Dimple, that was the appropriate description. Another word. More words. Too many words. All of them bouncing off the slope of her skull and scratching at the back of her brain, nearly distracting her from what should have been the very pleasant buzz lingering beneath whatever biological thing made up her top and bottom lips. 

Which were parted in an emotion very similar to overwhelming surprise. 

That was stupid. 

The whole thing was stupid. God, maybe she was stupid. No, that wasn’t true. She’d made Dean’s List last semester. Stupid was—

A stupid word, really. Despite the blush rising in her cheeks and the wide eyes practically boring into her soul, bated breath that didn’t make any noise because that was what bated entailed, and no one else glanced in their direction. Not once. No one else noticed. 

That the whole world had flipped upside down.

Or right-side-up, maybe. Depending on how the next five minutes or so went. 

Because the last two minutes and twelve seconds, give or take, had seen Roland Locksley tilt his head and let his eyes flutter closed before his mouth found hers for the very first time — at midnight for God’s sake. On New Year’s Eve. Or New Year’s Day, she supposed. His parents were standing on the other side of the room.

Suggesting that Lizzie had ever been just a little in love with Roland was a rather monumental lie. 

As far as those things went. 

“So, uh—” she started, only to find blood in her mouth. From her teeth. Wayward and unpredictable, as they were. Biting down on the side of her tongue and Lizzie hated going to the dentist. Doing irreparable damage to her teeth on what was now legitimately New Year’s Day, in the middle of an annual party, was not on her schedule. 

Metaphorical as it might have been. 

She liked schedules. Had plans. Focus, even. People always said that about her — how focused she was, liked to throw around the word drive with startling regularity, as if they were amazed she wasn’t simply willing to rest on her laurels or the pair of last names she proudly toted around with her. As if Lizzie expected doors to swing open on a glance. 

Rather than consistently preparing herself to knock them down. 

She liked the challenge of it all. Appreciated the way disbelief always spiked something in her blood, and that was likely equal parts genetic predisposition and a product of her childhood, but right now, Lizzie was simply prepared to fight for the schedule she’d never allowed herself to mention to anyone else before and it wasn’t like they weren’t friends. 

Talked outside the group chat, even. 

That meant something. Definitely meant something. Had to mean something. Her lips felt like they’d been doused in liquid nitrogen. 

She didn’t know all the scientific properties of liquid nitrogen, but it always made that rather impressive cloud of steam-type stuff on cooking shows. So, it seemed very likely that it did something similar to cause whatever was happening in the region directly surrounding her mouth. Buzzing and tingling, and whatnot. 

When had Roland last blinked? Lizzie couldn’t remember. That would have been impressive in any other situation. Right now, it was sort, kind of, totally— Pissing her off. 

Color dotted his cheeks, no sign of the goddamn dimple because he wasn’t smiling, presumably couldn’t do that when it was clear he was so intent on pulling his lips into his mouth, and that felt a little insulting. Her tongue had just been in that mouth. 

Lizzie was fairly confident in the abilities of her tongue, so she wasn’t all that pleased to be replaced by a pair of lips that could have been doing much better work against the side of her neck. 

“If you sit here right now and tell me that you are,” Lizzie lifted a finger, “one, sorry,” another finger, “two, anything even remotely resembling regretful,” another finger, wiggling close enough to Roland’s nose to make him just a bit cross-eyed, “or, three, too old for me, I will throw my heel at that bruise I know exists on the back of your left calf.”

His lips twitched. 

He really had impossible eyelashes. Seemingly made so he could glance up from underneath them, to meet Lizzie’s steely expression with what she refused to believe could be cautious hope. Passable optimism, maybe. She’d have to look up what liquid nitrogen did, later. 

“I’m standing.” “I hate you.”

“You wanna go in order, or how do you want to work this?” “Where else are you bruised?” Roland laughed softly, a shift of his shoulders and tiny burst of air between barely parted lips. Feeling that tiny burst meant they were standing very close to each other. How they were standing remained another mystery. 

One of those great ones, Lizzie figured. The kind referenced when people talked about the sweeping potential of life and love and— Ah, fuck. 

“Please don’t threaten to attack me anywhere else,” he muttered, before quickly adding, “you gotta know this was not my end game, Liza.” Narrowing her eyes did nothing to temper the…tempest. Swirling in her gut. Threatening the back of her throat. Eating away at vocal cords and vocal boxes and the structural integrity of her entire goddamn larynx. Possibly her tongue, too, just to be especially efficient. 

“Really? Might’a been mine, actually.”

She’d always liked his eyes. 

How they could widen, and it wasn’t like...a normal brown. Nothing about the way he looked was ever dull. Drifted toward regularly excited, and the sparkles were probably a figment of her over-active teenage imagination, but Lizzie liked to think sometimes the sparkle came from her. Because of her, even. When she’d call because he always wanted to hear about her latest lecture and he’d call because sometimes Western swings were exhausting and loneliness-inducing and—

She knew. 

He knew. 

They knew each other.   

Grand scheme, the sparkle-prone eyes still weren’t particularly close to the dimple. On the list of things Lizzie liked. What left butterflies fluttering in her stomach and her heart hammering against her chest. Sparkle was probably a solid fourth. Behind the precise way his curls fell toward his eyebrows when he didn’t have time to get his hair cut. Which rarely happened during the season. Right now, it was happening right now. Well-defined strands that Lizzie knew felt even smoother than she’d ever theorized between her fingers, and she wasn’t sure what she was going to do with that information. 

Obsess over it, probably. 

For at least the next week, or so. 

Still. Eyes. Eyelashes. Too long and too bright, and that was the wrong description order and she was starting to teeter. On the edge of a rather dramatic free-fall. Into feelings and possibility, and this was way too dramatic. For both of them. 

“Don’t do that,” she mumbled, a scrunch of her nose that apparently demanded his thumb. Brushing against the bridge, and there wasn’t any caution there. No obvious fear or concern. For the way it left Lizzie’s lungs pinched, and there must have been a limit. 

To everything her internal organs could cope with in a limited span of time. 

“What was the last one on the list?” She swallowed. “Too old.” “Yuh-huh.” “Pretty flimsy as far as excuses go. You realize I’m not asking you to marry me right now, right?” He choked. On what, she wasn’t entirely sure. Only that it made her stomach heave and her teeth dig into her lower lip, and that was— “Because I know I said, end game,” Lizzie continued, giving in to the need to fill empty space with the sound of her own voice, “but that sounds like several pop culture references all at once, and you know how much I—”

“Hate to come across as disingenuous.” “Mattie’s the pop culture reference machine, anyway.” “Please don’t talk about Matt when I keep thinking about how much I want to kiss you again.” Her eyes, that time. Widened. Bugged. Did something unnatural. “Yeah?” “You’re kidding me, right?” “You’re not an old man.” Rolling his eyes, Roland’s tongue dragged across the front of his teeth. To torture her, apparently. “I was in college when you were a freshman in high school.” “Yuh-huh.” “Liza.” “Nah, nah,” Lizzie shook her head. Crossed her arms. Tried to stand up to her full height, but even the heels didn’t do much to add to the overall intimidation factor. Roland was doing an awful job of fighting off his smile. “Pulling out ancient nicknames is not—” “—It’s not a nickname; it’s literally letters in your name.” “Nick,” she leaned forward, “name. All personal-like.”

Making mistakes was not something she enjoyed very much. It was that Jones competitive streak. Plus, the Vankald stubborn streak. Created a monster of determination, who knew what she wanted, and feeling Roland’s fingers graze her cheek as a strand of hair hung limply in the minimal space between them was the result of Lizzie’s mistaken movement. 

Even as much as she might have wanted it. 

Goosebumps prickled her arms. Stole whatever oxygen she’d managed to get in the last forty-six seconds, or so. Her eyes fluttered. Head tilted. Towards the touch and the warmth, and for someone who spent so much time on the ice, he really was impossibly warm. 

“This is your fault.”

He didn’t move his fingers. Cupped her cheek, instead. “You were doing that eyebrow thing.” “Expand on that for me.” “Lifting ‘em. Happens sometimes. When you’re listening intently. Like you’re a little amazed by new information. They’re these stupid little arches on your face. Drives me nuts.” “The compliment was in there somewhere, I’m sure of it.” “I am so much older than you, Liza.” “Shouldn’t’a played out a bunch of teenage daydreams at once, then.” She was legitimately worried about the state of his tongue. Barely biting back her laugh, Lizzie let her eyes lift. To find Roland gaping at her, drooped shoulders and puppy-dog eyes. And that goddamn dimple. “C’mon, this isn’t...do you think I haven’t made out with people before?” “Wouldn’t classify what we just did as a makeout.” “No?” His eyes darkened. Shivering was probably not a good move, right? Right. Definitely. She wasn’t shivering. It was just...January. And inside. With dozens of people around them. “I would not, no,” Roland said, and the drop in overall volume was some sort of trick. Or, something. 

“How many people do you think you’ve made out with? Ballpark it for me.” “No.” “Is the issue a lack of appropriate numbers to tally that mark, or—” She bit her tongue, again. At the flash of amused frustration sweeping his face and polluting the molecules of whatever air was hovering between them. Permeating was a better word. Lizzie really needed to work on all of that. Words. Being slightly less jealous of potential make outs that didn’t have anything to do with her and definitely happened because there had to be other people out there in the world who simply could not cope with the existence of that dimple. 

“How many people have you made out with, then?” “Scores,” Lizzie snarled, only to get immediately scoffed at. “I’m really, incredibly popular.” “Oh, I’ve got no doubt.” “Boatloads of guys. Lining up to,” she pointed an imperious finger at her mouth, “make out with this.” “Your well-defined chin?” “I’m going to take my shoe off.” “Draw attention with a move like that.” Whatever fight she had didn’t immediately die. It just, sort of, fell. At her feet, threatening all the bones there and there were too many. All of them far too fragile. For whatever metaphor she was running with at the moment. “And we’re not trying to do that, huh? Draw attention.” “Shouldn’t you be out sowing wild oats?” “Really know how to charm a girl,” she grumbled, and that got her a smile. No scoff. Not even the hint of a smile. The whiplash was hurting her neck. “Trust me, the oats have appropriately sowed. If I was ever particularly inclined to farm work.” “I’m starting to be vaguely embarrassed by all of this.” “Good.” Wasn’t quite a scoff. Was more like a half-hearted laugh, and a tinge of desire and that was better than the other emotions, but the decreasing level of Roland’s eyebrows gave her pause. “What about the status of your oats?”

“Well sowed, rookie season,” Roland said. 

“You’re going to change the name on your jersey.” “Not sure that particular fact has a lot to do with anything else. Seven years, Liza.” “I’m perfectly capable of doing math, you know I took that stats class once.” “Because I double checked everything you turned in.” “Makes you slightly less of an idiot than the vibe you're giving off right now.” “A freeway or compliments.” Pulling in a deep inhale through her nose, Lizzie didn’t miss the way Roland’s gaze fell. To the neckline of her dress, lingering on the jut of her collarbones for a few seconds longer than a strictly platonic friendship should allow, and they were friends. Still. She knew that as well as she knew that he believed she thought he was simply being clever with nicknames. 

And not making vaguely incorrect My Fair Lady references. 

Because he’d always been a little annoyed that Eliza had gone back to Henry Higgins. Instead of Freddie.

It was really impossible not to be a little in love with him at all times. 

“You’re really going to hyphenate?” Roland nodded. “Think of all the new jerseys they’ll sell.” “By the box-load, and Gina’s gonna buy the entire stock. She’s—that’s really nice, you know.” “Just a fact. Little late, but—” He shrugged. Lizzie’s smile threatened to split her face. In that same nice way, she’d been talking about. Her lips were still buzzing. She might have been buzzing. With adrenaline. Happiness. The near-desperate desire to find some type of closet and get her fingers back in Roland’s questionably long hair. 

“Of naming conventions.” She couldn’t begin to guess what the record was for shoulder shifts in an emotionally charged conversation between two people who were simultaneously ignoring the point of the conversation, but Lizzie also knew her eyebrows had been halfway up her face as he’d detailed the reasons for making his jersey say Mills-Locksley. From here on out. 

Maybe that was the top of the list, actually. 

He was a good guy. 

Had always been a good guy. The best guy, really. 

Falling into that chasm wasn’t nearly as terrifying as Lizzie expected it to be. 

“Why’d you do it?” Roland’s lips disappeared. His tongue moved, again. She was staring at the area around his tongue. So, like, his mouth. Directly at his mouth. “Because, I uh—have wanted to?” “Oh, don’t phrase that like a question.” “Wanted to,” he repeated, a statement of fact with a certain amount of conviction. Enough to make Lizzie’s pulse sputter. “Which is kind of freaking me out.” “Come back with more compliments.” “Your dress nearly made me fall over.” “Better, actually,” she laughed. 

He ran his fingers through his hair. “Made sense at the time.” “Be more specific.” “Kissing you,” Roland said, enough emphasis that he leaned forward half an inch as well. It was a miracle their noses didn’t collide. Not the most impressive miracle, but—counted. “If I tell you that you might be my best friend does that make the lamest professional hockey player alive?” “Yes, absolutely.” “Matt might challenge you to a duel if he hears me talking like this, you know.” “God, Locksley, didn’t we just talk about the Mattie rules? Also, that made it sound like Mattie wants to kiss you too, so...”

He chuckled. Fingers still tugging on the back of his hair, like he was trying to ground himself in the pull and the self-inflicted tension, Roland looked up. Back at her. And Lizzie didn’t flinch. Didn’t blink. Held her position and prepared herself to defend the schedule she’d only ever allowed herself to hope for in the silence of that one corner in her brain. 

Filled, as it was, with memories. Of conversations that didn’t have anything to do with hockey. Others that did. Arguing over blue line placement in the brownstone and college rankings. Of movies watched on two different laptops in different corners of the country, bad jokes, and consistent updates, that deep-rooted understanding that came from a life full of expectations and the exact opposite. No overt pressure, but the need to prove yourself anyway, if only because of the name on the back of the jersey, and Lizzie was going to have to buy a new jersey. 

“You like me? Yes, or no?” Roland smiled. Wide and honest, the kind that ensured the dimple was on prominent display. “Yes.” “I am a grown adult? Yes, or no?” Crinkles appeared around his eyes. From the smile. 

“Yes.” “Meaning I get to make my own choices. Romantically, or otherwise. Yes, or no?” “Obviously.” “Wasn’t one of the options.” “Yes,” Roland corrected, fingers trailing over the bend of her elbow. Lizzie hadn’t uncrossed her arms. Or remembered when she’d crossed them in the first place. 

“Ok, good. Same page, then.” “Liza.” “Locksley.” Lifting her eyebrows wasn’t a challenge, per se. Was closer to instinct, really. Specifics didn’t matter, honestly. She did that thing with her eyebrows, and he did that thing with his mouth, the same one she was staring at and hoping would move closer to her, and then—

Well, it did. 

Hands found Lizzie’s hips, pulling her forward sharply enough that she let out a soft grunt. From the feel of hips bumping against hers, and she honestly wasn’t sure who hissed in their next inhale, only that it did something to the flutter-like state of her pulse and the erratic nature of her heart, and it was slow and fast and good and great and not a single person noticed. 

Miracles were arriving en masse, apparently. 

Pushing her fingers into Roland’s hair got Lizzie another hum of approval, the first brush of his tongue making her lips part and her head fall to the side, but then his hand was wrapped around the back of her neck, and she could not be expected to pay attention to anything except the semi-consistent swipe of his thumb against her skin. It left more goosebumps. Caused another chuckle, the kind that rumbled through her and resonated around her, a tiny bubble of that same cautious optimism from before. 

Like a spark. 

Fanning flames and threatening to burn everything because if this didn’t work, then Lizzie wasn’t sure what would, and that was scary and overwhelming and terrifying was a synonym, but she really was working with very limited word-based resources when Roland’s thumb kept moving. Tracing her. Committing the feel to memory, and she wasn’t sure when they’d established the rocking pattern they were moving in, but something deep in the center of her trusted it. 

Someone who regularly strapped knives to his feet and raced around at top speed knew how to stay balanced. And she was a stubborn idiot. Who got what she wanted. 

“Is part of liking me because I told you I didn’t think it was embarrassing that you still got a little emotional about Miracle on 34th Street?” Laughter pushed past her lips. Took root in the pit of her stomach and the spaces between her ribs. Laced through her heart. In the kind of way that cemented itself. Right in the middle of Lizzie. Right in the middle of this. Them. 

There was a them, now. 

“Was definitely a factor, yeah,” Roland said, not bothering to pull away. “You, uh—you snuck up on me a little, Liza.” “Peak romance.” “Want me to talk about your dress some more?” She shook her head. “Unnecessary. And you didn’t.” “That might be part of the problem.” “Nursing old crushes, you mean?” Her hair hit her cheek. And his hand. He couldn’t seem to let go of her. “Nah, this wasn’t like...there was no torch, not really. I—I wasn’t hanging posters of you on my wall if that’s the picture you’ve painted for yourself.” “Kinda disappointing, admittedly.” “Pick a lane, babe.” No sparkle, that time. Just flash and want and the very thin line Lizzie’s lips had become. “Be more specific,” Roland repeated softly. “You’re not standing on a pedestal. Just you, Rol, as is.” He waited. That was fair. There should have been more. Should have been a detailed list of all the reasons the grown-up version of her liked so many parts of the grown-up version of him, but that all felt a little extraneous when she was still thinking about closet-type possibilities and that stubborn streak was a mile wide, anyway. 

Roland nodded once. “Good.”

Both of them jumped. At the pop of another champagne bottle and Lizzie never understood how Regina managed to order so much champagne every year, but she felt a bit like she was floating on the bubbles, and they didn’t decide. Explicitly. To keep the whole thing—

Secret. 

Another bad word. With bad connotations and shadows that clung to the definition, but this was them and only them and, for right now, that was enough. And if no one noticed the way Roland’s hand drifted over the small of Lizzie’s back during David’s speech, then that was a miracle she was willing to accept.