#someone explain to me how layer styles work I have no idea what I’m doing here

[sunnytheopossum]

JESSICA DONE!

My teefs (or hole where teefs used to be?) are beginning to heal, so I’m slowly starting to finish these last couple half bodies for my MAP part! Now that Jess’s is complete, all I have left now to do is Tim and Alex, and I’ll be done! Homestretch baybeee!!

For a while, I was kind of stuck on what I wanted to do for Jessica’s background. At first I was thinking I could make all the trees have distorted faces like how she sometimes sees people in the comics, and then a little after that I thought it might be a better idea to surround her with Ship Out boxes, but ultimately I decided on this shattered mirror effect, and I think it turned out great! I’m not super familiar with drawing Jessica just yet, so she looks a bit generic in my style compared to the boys, but hey, it just has to be done for now. This frame will only be on screen for half a second anywho lol.

[retourne-toi-eurydice]

Ghost Death Theory Time!

I have basically no proof for any of this, it’s just for fun and I’m sure there’s going to be a line or detail I’ve missed as most of my Ghosts knowledge comes from Tumblr because I’m English and episodes are hard to find here.

Note: Trying to work out the cause of death for any of the ghosts (in either series) is difficult because by nature of being family-friendly(ish) shows they can’t go overboard on the body horror and also whatever makeup they do has to be cheap and efficient enough to do every day exactly the same, particularly for our main cast. So it’s not surprising that most of these theories centre on the idea of internal injuries. All that being said, I believe Hetty and Sass are the only true mysteries left so let’s get into it!

~Hetty~

Pushed: Much like her BBC counterpart I think it’s possible Hetty was murdered by someone she knew. However, if she were pushed out of a window like Lady Button I don’t see why they wouldn’t also carry over the joke about noisily reenacting her death every day. For some reason, my brain latched onto the idea that she was pushed out of a moving carriage. There was just something about everyone’s reactions when she got exorcised out of the car, I don’t know. For many reasons (clothes and hair in perfect order, no broken bones, it wouldn’t really make sense) I don’t think this is it. But I like it so it’s on the list.

Hoity toitied to death: Maybe something stressed her out so much, something was so contemptuous, someone so impertinent, that she had an aneurysm. Obviously, if she had had a stroke or something they couldn’t keep giving half her face muscle relaxant for shooting (yeah I don’t like that image either), so it would make sense if they were choosing to exercise creative license and have all the damage be out of sight. All that cocaine she took in life probably wouldn’t have helped, either. Speaking of…

Drug overdose: I think this is a popular theory but not one I particularly like because that would bring our count of drug-induced deaths up to three, and given that a house full of dead people is the perfect opportunity to get creative why wouldn’t the writers take it? However, I do think that their mutual love of drugs has probably been the topic of a pillow talk or two between her and Trevor- and who knows, maybe dying from the same thing is one of the reasons they bonded in the first place?

There isn’t really any one cause of death I’d bet on with Hetty, although the fact that we got the beheading, lightning strike, and mass disease deaths carried over from the original show makes me think a Grey Lady-style end is a very real possibility.

~Sass~

It is possible that Sass has a fatal injury somewhere under all his layers, though I’m not sure what the most prominent offensive weapons were in his lifetime so I can’t say how likely that is. I’m not sure whether that would be something he’d have disclosed by now either, albeit everyone else who died by another’s hand doesn’t half go on about it. Two things we do know about him are that he is very defensive and hates being embarrassed, so this leads me to think that perhaps his life was cut short by something comparatively pedestrian (and dare I say Isaac-like?). How about these:

Foodie misadventure: This tracks, right? He saw an unfamiliar berry or type of plant during his travels, it looked/smelt good, he ate it without due diligence and died either immediately or a short while after. Explains no physical indications for his death, his love of food, and why he might not want to advertise that he got taken out by a berry he should have known better not to eat. My money’s on this one.

Illness: Boring, but effective. He got sick with something only antibiotics could cure and he died young and unfulfilled *sad face*.

The elements: To be honest if one of the ghosts had frozen to death I like to think they'd be our Mary equivalent but with icicles clinging to them instead of smoke. That would be cool. I don’t have a lot to say about this one but it’s a possibility so it’s on the list.

I think that’s pretty much it for Sass theories- unless he’s got a stab wound hidden somewhere I do think that given his lifestyle and times he died of literal natural causes.

So what do you think, anything you agree with/disagree with? I honestly loved considering all these theories and I’m dying to hear everyone else’s ideas!

[draconicdeityarts]

Hey there! I love you’re semi realistic, semi cartoonish art style bro! I hope you don’t mind me asking but what software/mediums do you use? I am trying to work on my lighting and shadows and textures but I have no clue how artists like you achieve such detail

First off- thank you so much! I truly appreciate it. And second- oh my goodness I am so sorry for how long this ask has sat in my inbox! I hope some of this can still help you :’D

As far as software goes, I’m almost exclusively working in procreate as of late. There’s plenty of great programs- if you need something free and desktop based, I highly recommend Krita. I have a few brushes from different packs that I often default to. You can see them all and links to said packs through this answer I gave to someone asking about my brushes earlier:

As far as detail in my work goes, that’s just through a loooot of practice and doodles and drawings. I’ve been drawing since I could pick up a pencil, so I’ve had a lot of time to figure out the way I like to do things- but even then I have so much to learn!

I do, however, work in many traditional forms of media as well! I haven’t done so as much lately since digital doesn’t require cleanup, but I honestly believe that working in traditional for my entire life up until 5 or so years ago has a hand in how I approach things digitally as well. I’ve done pen and marker illustration, pencil and colored pencil, acrylic painting, as well as 3D work. I’ve worked in a lot of media and I want to get around to trying as much as I can when I have the energy to! If you have questions specifically about what traditional media I use or work with let me know!

When it comes to improving on rendering, doing small studies of images you really like the lighting in helps a lot for me. Learning how to break light in a photo down to simple, blocky shapes helps to figure out getting an initial layer down to refine later when doing full pieces! When rendering a character, especially if drawing something that isn’t in a scene, I always recommend marking out the direction the light is coming from as well as color of the light before even starting, so that you can determine where highlights and shadows would be placed in an initial blockout. Keep in mind there’s different kinds of light in a piece- I would recommend looking into tutorials about direct light, indirect light, reflected light, etc to get a better feel for how it works- while I do my best, I don’t think I am quite skilled enough to explain those nuances.

When approaching most textures, especially unfamiliar ones, references are my best friend always. It might be a good idea to just do test sheets/practice making the textures that would be useful to you on occasion! And in the end, textures also tie into lighting as well, since a lot of what makes textures super distinct is how light hits them, especially when it comes to things like metal. It may be a bit of a hot take, but in a lot of cases I tend to avoid a lot of digital texture/object brushes, especially those meant to simulate natural textures like leaves, and I do those textures manually instead. I just personally like having more control over those shapes and feel it looks better when each texture is made intentionally by hand! Sometimes I do use texture brushes especially for backgrounds, abstract work or subtle layers, especially if I’m working on something very fast, but it’s not my first choice. However I do know there’s plenty of artists who use texture brushes in ways that look great, so that’s just personal preference. :)

I do apologize it took me so long to respond! But if you have any specific questions, my dms are open and I want to start replying to y’all more!

[the-mother-of-lions]

hi, your overlay tutorial is sooooo beautiful! I wonder if you could make tutorial for overlaying image and gif as seen in this Natasha edit /post/693119366952288256/pscentral-event-06-favorite it's sooo beautiful!

Hi there! I just want to make sure you know that I am not the same creator of that gifset, but I can definitely explain how this person made that gifset.

This is the Natasha gifset, as you can see it’s gorgeous.

Before I begin I want to start by saying it’s totally fine to take inspiration from other gifs, to see something that someone has done and replicate it in your own way. With giffing, at the end of the day, we’re all using the same source material, the same amount of scenes and minutes of screen time to create something so there are going to be similarities in gifs across the same fandom. However, it is never okay to steal someone’s gifs and repost them as your own, nor is it okay to directly and blatantly copy someone’s gifset frame for frame to post even if you make the gifs yourself. Copying to learn a technique is fine so long as that gifset stays in your drafts or stays in your groupchat.

It is always a good idea to give credit where credit is due when giffing, in that if you use a text post/tweet/a specific set of graphics or theme, to credit the person you got the idea from by linking back to where you got it.

I’m assuming you’re asking specifically about the third gif. The process is going to be similar to the one I detailed here, however the gif on the left has either a grayscale or black and white filter on it, or you can even open a Hue/Sat layer and take out as much saturation as you want. It all depends on the look you’re going for!

The gif on the right has cyan added to it, whether they did that with a brush or layers idk and I’m not going to try to recreate it exactly, so if you want to know for sure I recommend asking them. But I can show you a similar process with Photopea, which is what I’m assuming you’re wanting (although to be completely honest I primarily use Photoshop now😂😭)/

Lately in my own gifs I’ve been doing blend types other than Lighten (like Screen for example), and this kind of looks like that but I could be wrong! Again, it all just depends on what kind of look you want, the vibe or aesthetic you’re going for.

The tutorial I make for you will use Lucas from Stranger Things S4 because that is the only live action on my hard drive at the moment😂😭 I mainly gif anime now (anime sideblog: @icythot-bakubitch) and I could absolutely do a tutorial with it but it won’t come out the same as what you’re wanting to see.

This tutorial is made on the basis that you already know 1) how to make a gif 2) how to make overlays and 3) have a good sense of familiarity with photopea/photoshop.

If you don’t have those things, you’re welcome to look at my other tutorials:

Make A Gif | Anti-White Washing (BBC Merlin) (OFMD) | Overlays

Please remember that this gif is made with Photopea and not Photoshop, so there is going to be a deficit in quality compared to the set you’ve shown me. Your quality will come out much better if you’re able to use Photoshop.

Basically all I really did was add a Black and White layer to the bottom gif, making adjustments to keep as much quality as possible and adjusting the brightness to my taste. The original gif is already pretty dark, I probably should have picked something else but for a tutorial I’m not that pressed.

On the top gif, I used Selective Color and Hue/Sat to change the cyan of his background to purple.

Using a soft round brush I cleaned up their faces and got rid of any parts of the background that I felt was too distracting.

Attached below is a side by side of the original and recolor respectively, and then a screenshot of my layers.

Again, this is my way of doing things. It’s going to look different from someone else’s. Focus on finding a style that you like and that works for you. Just because a style of giffing is popular or something a lot of people are doing doesn’t mean that you have to do that.

I’m sure there are better or more efficient ways of doing things as well! And there isn’t one set way of doing things, this is not a be all end all of doing overlays or giffing.

If you have questions regarding the Natasha set more specifically, I highly recommend asking the creator personally. All I’m doing is explaining the recoloring process when it comes to overlay gifs as it applies to Photopea.

[fluffallamaful]

Personally I don’t think immortality was actually the goal: it’s such a random, non-emotionally-charged answer that from a Doylist perspective it would be a hugely unsatisfying payoff to a mystery that the cc!s have kept going for over two years at this point, and from a Watsonian perspective why would Dream be honest about his intentions? I don’t know what he was trying to do, but I’d bet money that it wasn’t that — or at least, not COMPLETELY that.

Anyway, yeah Dream and Punz are probably getting interrogated because some members of the server are convinced that Tommy’s sudden turnaround is the result of some sort of brainwashing or w/e. Those that have gone after him have a surprising variety of perspectives on this. Quackity, for example, is actually completely on Tommy’s side — and Sapnap is absolutely not. So Quackity basically went along to secretly try and mend the bridge he burned down a little bit, and Sapnap is there to force a confession. Unintentional Good Cop / Bad Cop style. (Also that idea about Punz expecting gentle tickles and then getting absolutely destroyed is hysterical. Canon.)

But then Sapnap switches his target.

Quackity was shockingly nice, but Sapnap wants answers. He kneads into his sides, drills into his armpits, scratches a pen into the soles of his feet — it’s horrible. Dream can’t stand this for long. And then Sapnap calls over the others to help, and suddenly Dream is having all of his worst spots targeted at once until he’s sobbing into the floor. (Quackity forces them off after a bit, saying that they’re not gonna get anything out of him if they kill him first.)

Later, when it devolved from an interrogation to a competition of “how can we make Dream lose his shit the fastest”, Punz ends up being even worse than Sapnap. This is probably because the turning point of this whole situation had something to do with everyone realizing at once just how self-destructive Dream actually is and deciding that he needs some punishment tickles for all the bullshit he pulled in the past few years.

there you go @wishitweresummer your addition as been canonised :D

i’m gonna discuss lore stuff first and then continue with AU stuff underneath. soup your brain is epic 🤌🏼 it deserves a warm bath, a boop on the snoot, and a cookie. you attention to detail with lore stuff will never fail to amaze me 👌🏼

(discussion belowwww)

🦙🦙🦙…

lore stuff

yes what you’ve pointed out is interesting. i think that the realisation that the server could potentially have immortal beings on it now was definitely something that sparked punz and dream to work together so much. i’m pretty sure it’s canon that part of the reason that cdream built the prison was just in case someone immortal ‘got in his way’ and he needed to contain them (interestingly he never explicitly explained what they could be getting in the way of 👀)

i think that you’re right about immortality not being the end goal,, but certainly understanding everything there is to know about it would have been close. i think that what could have happened is that they started off by wanting to understand it,, but then realised that there were so many other layers beyond immortality itself (they mentioned that they had seen different realms).

i’m actually rather unfamiliar with what cpunz’ motives were? did he ever explain them deeper than ‘wanting to be powerful’? i got the impression that he wanted to learn about the revival stuff for more selfish reasons,, whereas dream had a more fluffy fantasy of having him and his friends live together kind of thing. it’s why i felt he was so silent when punz pointed out to tommy that him and dream were friends — coz i think he knew deep down that punz and him wanted the same thing, but for different reasons. (i could be completely wrong about all of this lmao,, my cpunz obsession isn’t quite as strong as my cdream obsession)

🦙🦙🦙…

AU stuff (Drunz Interrogation AU?? what do i call it lmao. maybe just Interrogation AU?)

ohhhh this is so much fun with quackity and sapnap playitn good cop bad cop holy moly 😍 so quackity hears what tommy is saying and actually believes him? i suppose it makes sense. he had seen dream at his most vulnerable moments in the past year afterall. and he did always seem to have some sort of soft spot for tommy

would quackity and sap have spoken before this moment? i feel like sap would take on the bad cop role for such sweet reasons. like he’s heard all this stuff from tommy and he’s not only scared that his country and his fiancé’s are going to be caught in the crossfire. but he’s also angry at dream suddenly trying to be open and friendly again,, and ever more angry that he confessed it to tommy of all people. why couldn’t he have told him while he visited him in prison?!

i always love having sap be the one to interrogate dream and punz coz i can just imagine that he’d know them so well. like early days sap and punz were playful and brotherly, and it’s fun to imagine tickles coming into play during sap and dream sparring sessions. basically he’d just know all the spots and techniques to get them howling. and they’re both still tied up to a tree with nowhere to go

i’m still stuck thinking about quackity giving dresm soft neck nibbles 🥺 and i kinda love the idea that after being absolutely wrecked by sapnap,, the comparatively softer techniques from quackity are what begin to fluster him. though not entirely coz i imagine he’d still be inconsolably pissed at quackity for what he did to dream in prison

also AHHH!!! so it turns into the “the tickles didn’t make him speak but he looked like he could use them anyway” kinda of situation :(( where punz actually starts to help give dream tickles. i adore the idea of punz cradling dreams head in his lap and sternly promising that he’s not going to let them hurt him. that’s so cute ☹️

🦙🦙🦙…

[layered-worlds]

02/02/24

Personal Statement.

Layered Worlds is a project I feel I may take forward into my personal work. It took me a long time to get the necessary motivation, but now that I have had to choose a point to finish it I feel that I am almost dissatisfied with how many new directions I could take this if I could keep going without time limitations. I was very intimidated initially by the idea of creating a pure ‘utopia’ but have now realised that what someone may deem as perfection will always be challenged by another who sees it as the opposite- Utopia will always be subjective. My concept of technology advancing to a point where humans become one with it originated from Jeanette Winterson’s essays, where she explains the intricacies of its evolution, and how we have/ will entirely ignore it as it happens, as it is handled by the companies that are already aiming and gaining control over our lives. The concept I have created is only the extremes of this being shown: how we could one day be entirely unaware of how our bodies and the flesh inside us are extorted to create a ‘perfect world’. I began my final pieces with my star character, as I feel they are representative of what is ‘half-human’. This progressed to setting the scene of the interior in a bedroom overwhelmed with flesh pink and furniture made of muscle. The exterior shows the environment of natural spaces being made from human flesh and muscles as well as actual ‘half- humans’ growing from the ground.

I had never had the space to explore digital art properly until this project, as it was almost impossible to avoid with the topic at hand. This has caused me to be honestly unhappy with the outcomes I’ve created. I have never used photoshop before this project, and am still learning to draw using IbisPaintX, so my technique is entirely experimental and all over the place; I am yet to find my style. I’ve had huge amounts of technical difficulties just from learning how to use the softwares but have tried by best to implement the style I have with traditional painting/ drawing. The exterior was completed first and has much harsher lines, as I was focused on achieving a cleaner look. The interior was created to put emphasis on texture through softer use of brushes. I’m hoping to come back to these pieces once my digital skills have improved, but for now this is the best I could do. 

[eleanor-bradstreet]

Eleanor the Destroyer. The Author of Despair 🤣🫶 I will bear these titles with so much pride, you have no idea 🤣 Thank you for bestowing them upon me. Please rattle them off Daenerys-style every time I enter a room. (You may sit there grouchy faced as I gleefully laugh at your pain 😘) I’m so sorry Tumblr cut off your rant! I do think the secret is more spaces between bullets to break up the text block. I’d delight in 5k words of your vitriol, but this feedback is priceless as it is 💙

Again Anthony and Sophie - I’m so pleased that you’ve already found them intriguing enough to contemplate an *dare I utter the name of a rare pair?* Antophie love story. Is that a WIP of mine? Of course it is 🤪 Is it about them recognizing the mirrored strengths in each other despite their wildly different upbringings? Yes. Is it also about the love that Benedict cultivated with and between each of them? Yes. “I really do think this experience is going to do a lot to strengthen their relationship.” Well, you were right.

“Benedict is the glue that keeps unlikely people connected.” Precisely 🥹 And that’s why this hurts so much.

“But you're going to force me, aren't you? You're going to make me look at this impending disaster. YOU'RE GOING TO HOLD ME DOWN AND MAKE ME ENDURE HIM ASKING HIS BIG BROTHER IF THEIR MOTHER IS COMING!!!!” 🫣 whispers timidly: Yes.

“His ass better invent that telephone in the next 10 minutes and get their mom there pronto. I ain't playin' games baby boi.” Omg, this made me laugh so hard! 🤣 Quick, Anthony - you went to Eton with a Graham-Bell, didn’t you??? I’m so, so sorry to be using the Violet card against you. I wrote this conversation ages ago before I knew how much she meant to you. I’m sure this feels like a personal attack. 💙 But I had to convey how dire this is. There are certain things Ben has to say to actually break through Anthony’s 10 foot steel walls of denial. 

“It makes me wonder, has Benedict ever told him about the feelings he experienced before their father died? Is that why it scares him so much and he tries to dismiss Benedict's words as more theatrics?” Oooo, what a fantastic question!! I definitely worked this moment in to allude to Ben’s canon spiritual sensitivity. But I never contemplated whether Anthony would know about it. I suppose in my HC, Ben keeps this part of himself private, between him and Sophie only. He probably assumes that Anthony would think he was a nutter if he tried explaining it AND I don’t think he would tell him about his Edmund premonition because it would only upset Anthony further. But if you want to believe Anthony does know about Ben’s ‘senses’, that makes this all the juicier because YES, it would add another layer of terror to everything Anthony is feeling. 😢 What wonderful insight!

“You know what, Benedict, fuck you too. You and Eleanor can ride off into the sunset together.” 🤣🤣🤣 Oh, if only 😍 I’d happily ride off and fuck off with him. 

“He's lost his mind. He's clearly sicker than any of them could have feared. One does not recover from being married to Benedict Bridgerton and then losing him.” Preach. Amen. As we’ve discussed before, Benny boy doesn’t understand the impact he has on people - particularly the women who love him. But in this case I believe he does know, in his heart of hearts, that Sophie would never love another in the same way. They are too fated for one another - their love is too miraculous. But nonetheless, he wants to make sure she is materially comfortable for the rest of her life and has companionship - intimacy even, because he knows how important that is. He loves her enough to let her go, as much as it may burn him, because he knows it’s her best chance at second-best happiness. Now, would Sophie actually be able to remarry someone?? I have my thoughts on this but won’t say anything now. This story isn’t over yet…

“MaKe sUrE ShE dOEsn'T FInD soMEonE BetTer lOOkiNg.” 🤣🤣

Oh the joint message from Ben and Edmund. Listen, if there’s one thing I have to do in my fics where Anthony appears, it’s sing his praises to high heaven because lord knows his family sure as hell hasn’t in the show thus far, and it leaves me steamed. This is me righting the wrongs of the Bridgerton family; of having a blood relative FINALLY look at Anthony and tell him what an amazing fucking job he has done managing his ridiculously large and dramatic family on top of running a massive estate, on top of raising his own immediate family - jeeezus. When Benedict takes a moment to be genuine and reflect on his brother without judgment, ridicule or jokes, he out of anyone KNOWS how much pressure Anthony has always been under and how well he has done bearing it up. But he needs to be vulnerable to be able to say it honestly. And he’s spurred on by their father, right there with them both but just out of sight. Edmund is using the opportunity to speak clearly to Ben while he is between worlds, and deliver the message to his eldest son: he is proud, he has seen Anthony being the father that was robbed from everyone, and he will continue to be strong even if Benedict has to leave. Anthony needs to hear this from his living relative, and it’s extra potent that he suspects he may be hearing it from his father as well, but it’s what he will need to carry on if the worst should happen. I did indeed call up my smithy friend in hell to craft this special torment for you. 🫶

Then Ben and El - he’s still her big brother, no matter what state he’s in. He’s still the only one she feels will listen to her without judgment and may be able to help her out of her own mess, however guilty she feels asking him for help right now. But he obliges. Because he wants to. Because he’s Ben. He will indeed spend his last words feverishly asking her to meet him out at the swings so that they can talk through her problems, because that’s the kind of brother and man he is. 💙 I humbly accept your somewhat-affectionate ‘bitch’ title for this 😂

Idk where the inspiration for Anthony wearing Ben’s shirt came from, but I’m so glad it popped into my head. It seemed too poignant to skip. 

Anthony did indeed send the first letter, but you know I didn’t let you off that easy. I’m delivering a metric ton of gratitude to you for your thoughtful and passionate feedback 🥹 I was feeling a bit wobbly about this story at the start, and you have cured me of that. 🫶 Now, will I cure someone in turn….???? Time will tell…

Willow Bark - Day 2: A Message

Rated: T, whump and angst Word count: 3.4k

Day 1 Masterpost

Summary: Benedict has messages for each of his siblings.

The night passed in silent watches. Benedict’s siblings sat with him until Eloise was drooping so dramatically that Anthony ordered her to bed. He stayed, keeping a determined vigil, wracking his thoughts for the right course forward. Benedict’s footman had agreed to collect the doctor at dawn and Anthony’s coachman would make a round trip to Aubrey Hall to bring back necessities for Eloise and himself to remain at the cottage. If Benedict and Sophie had kept any additional staff beyond a skeleton crew of one maid and one footman, plus the pokey elderly couple who accounted for their cook and groundskeeper, he would have ordered a man to ride through the night for the best doctor in the county. But keeping a full array of staff was something Sophie would never entertain.

Benedict slept soundly. Though his face looked pained, he wasn’t restless. At some point shortly before dawn Sophie returned and insisted Anthony get some sleep. He refused and they sat in silence together. Sophie was the newest addition to the family having married Benedict only a few months prior, and there was no one with whom Anthony could find less in common. The bastard daughter of a late earl, her courtship with his brother had been one full of drama and unexpected turns, but eventually he had granted them his blessing, seeing how evidently happy they were together. But there was still a chasm of difference between them. She had been raised as a maid, he as the heir to a noble house. She was an orphaned only child and he had always been surrounded by an impractically large family. They had each navigated facets of life that the other couldn’t imagine, widely separated at opposite ends of the social spectrum. But they were family now and were united in their love for Benedict, which was all that mattered in this moment.

Anthony didn’t know he had drifted off until he found himself stumbling into another bedroom, gently guided by his sister-in-law. The last thing he recalled before he sank into exhaustion was the sound of heavy rain against the windows.

---

He woke to a hand on his shoulder shaking him lightly. Snapping to attention, he turned to see Sophie, a smile bringing some color back to her face.

“Is the doctor here?” The words tumbled out, the most pressing thought on his mind.

“Not yet,” Sophie sighed. “I’m sure the rain will delay them.”

Anthony turned to see the grey skies through the windowpanes, sheets of rain so dense that the entire landscape was a blur.

“He is awake,” Sophie’s voice was choked with emotion as she gave him an encouraging grin, tears brimming in her tired eyes. “He’d like to see you.”

Anthony felt his heart leap. Surely this was a good sign. Once he had straightened himself, Sophie walked him back to the main bedroom and left them in privacy. Benedict was sitting up in the bed, decidedly more animated than he had been the night before, but the color of his skin in the daylight made him look ghastly. Anthony had to convince his feet to keep moving as he walked to the chair at the bedside. This sunken, sallow man before him bore almost no resemblance to the brother he knew. But he would not betray how shaken he felt.

“Benedict! You’re awake. How do you feel?” He forced a smile and took his brother’s hand.

The pale figure turned to face him, his eyes glassy and hair matted with sweat. “Hello, brother,” he croaked. A deep, joyless voice that was unfamiliar. “Not good. It’s…” He shook his head then stared off across the room. “I’ve never felt like this.”

A stone seemed to lodge itself in Anthony’s throat. Benedict always had a flair for the dramatic. They just had to wait for the doctor to arrive and then everything would be set right. “You’ll be alright,” he declared, squeezing the limp fingers in his grasp. “This is likely just a passing influenza. Our doctor will be here soon. Just rest.”

Benedict took a rattling inhale and stared eagerly at the door. “Is Mother here?” There was something like panic in his voice, something reminiscent of the child Anthony had grown alongside so many years ago.

Tightness closed around the Viscount’s heart. He clenched his jaw to fight against the sickening tide he felt rising within. He wouldn’t entertain anything dire, but he didn’t want to upset his brother any further. He decided to lie. 

“She’s on the way. Everyone is. Eloise and I are here.” He gripped his brother’s hand more tightly, trying to reassure him.

After a few rasping breaths Benedict turned to face him, something burning in his red eyes. His voice was just above a whisper. “Ant, I’ve been seeing things.” His haunting gaze seemed to penetrate right through Anthony’s flesh. More dramatics. 

“What?” The Viscount scoffed dismissively. “You’re just exhausted.”

Benedict never blinked, his eyes just continued to bore with an intensity Anthony had never seen. “Brother,” he heaved a deep breath, “if this is to be the end…”

The stone in Anthony’s throat turned to ice and dropped into his stomach. “No.” He said firmly, shaking his head. “No.” Tears began to brim in his eyes. This was preposterous. Ridiculous. 

“Anthony, I know something is happening.” Benedict’s voice turned gravelly as his hand began to grip back weakly. “If this is the end, I must ask something of you.”

Anthony’s face was growing hot. He could hear the thudding of his heart in his ears. This conversation could not be happening. “Benedict…” he pleaded.

“Look after Sophie.” Suddenly there was strength in Benedict’s tone, and a clear urgency in his eyes. “Provide for her. Keep her safe.” He let out a shaking exhale. “She should marry again.”

Anthony was losing his internal battle as tears began to stream down his face. A terror was growing in his mind, hot and buzzing. This was not happening. “God damn it…” he whispered through gritted teeth.

Swallowing hard, Benedict continued. “I want her to be happy.” His voice cracked, sounding as if he would weep but was clearly too weak to do so. “But if she does, make sure the fucker isn’t better looking than me.” Somehow, that cheeky crooked grin smiled out from the strangely ashen face and Anthony was reminded of precisely who he was speaking to.

Anthony could barely breathe much less respond. He sat silently, trying to quell his tears and the roaring in his head.

Benedict’s face fell, grey and urgent once more. “Promise me, Ant.” He gripped his hand tightly. “You must…”

“Yes.” Anthony spluttered, ready to say anything to stop this horrific conversation. “Of course I will take care of Sophie. But Benedict, there will be no need. You have the strength to overcome this. You must find it.” He placed his other hand on his brother’s shoulder. Even there he felt frail. “You must recover from this. You will.”

At this Benedict sighed deeply, sinking further into the pillows. He closed his eyes, the hint of a smile tugging at his lips. “Father would be so proud of you, Anthony.”

Anthony fell numb. “What?”

His brother’s eyes reopened, suddenly seeming at ease, his blue-grey stare calm. “We take you for granted, the family. We don’t tell you enough how well you have done.”

All Anthony could feel was his heart pounding and tearing apart simultaneously, and the clammy grasp of his brother’s hand in his. “Ben…” he whispered, at a loss.

Benedict continued, his voice growing warm. “You deserve all our gratitude. You have been the most wonderful father to your children…and to the rest of us. You are an excellent Viscount, and the most aggravating,” he grinned, “and exceptional brother I could ask for. I need you to hear it.” He gave Anthony’s hand a final squeeze. “I need you to know.”

As Anthony sat stunned, tears pouring helplessly down his face, Benedict’s eyes closed again and he turned away, tilting his head almost as if listening to something at a distance. Then another smile spread across his lips and he almost seemed to nod to himself.

“He is proud.”

Struck with a raw terror he had never known, Anthony withdrew his hand from his brother’s and stumbled out the door, gasping for air.

---

While Anthony spoke with Benedict, Sophie joined Eloise in the sitting room. The younger paced in front of the fire while Sophie perched on a sofa.

“It’s good that he is awake.” Eloise gave an encouraging half-smile to her sister-in-law.

“Yes,” Sophie sighed. “Thank you again for making the journey. I know the timing is terrible with your wedding and…”

“Surely, if we could control the timing of illnesses, we would all delay them forever.” 

Sophie smiled weakly, grateful for Eloise’s practical point of view. Before he had struggled to stay conscious, Benedict had been so concerned about appearing at his sister’s wedding. Sophie suspected that he had hidden the severity of his symptoms in some bullheaded attempt to fight them and not cause alarm. But they both knew that Eloise was the one sibling who would be the least perturbed about an interruption to her nuptial plans. Particularly as they weren’t her plans at all, but rather Anthony’s. 

Eloise joined her on the sofa and placed a light hand on her arm. “It’s alright, Sophie. I want to be with my brother. Thank you for writing to us.”

Sophie nodded. With Benedict awake and the doctor on his way, perhaps he would indeed recover in time. “Are you excited?” she asked, eager to not let this passing cloud overshadow someone else’s joyous occasion.

Eloise faltered, her lips forming a grimace more than a smile. Sophie’s heart sank. “Oh no, what is it?”

Eloise shook her head, scrunching her face in that agitated way that Sophie knew meant her mind was whirring faster than she could string words together. “It’s just…I want what you and Benedict have. I want what Penelope found with Colin, though for the life of me I can’t understand how.” She sighed, gripping her hands together in her lap. “I all but swore I would never marry, but I suppose the truth is that I never wanted to marry unless it was for love. Genuine, true love.” 

Sophie’s heart broke seeing the consternation in her sister-in-law’s eyes. “And you do not love Sir Phillip?”

“How can one tell they are in love?”

Her tone was so matter-of-fact, Sophie nearly spluttered. Leave it to Eloise to approach something so emotional and intangible with scrutiny and pragmatism. “It’s not an exact science, Eloise.” 

She let her mind drift back, remembering the instant magnetism she had felt upon first seeing Benedict at the masquerade. That was perhaps not the most helpful example, as she knew the lightning bolt which initiated their love story was rare. So she remembered the longing she felt afterward. How the memory of Benedict was all that had comforted her through her years of servitude. How she wanted nothing more than to hear his voice and return to his arms. Then the fluttering, warm joy of being reunited with him again, and the deep comfort that now filled their married life, permeating each moment and day. Everything that they had worked so hard to protect and precisely the thing that she was now terrified to lose.

“It’s an inability to forget them when you are apart.” She explained, her eyes growing misty. “A desire to be with them even in the most mundane moments. That they are foremost in your thoughts, especially when you are in need. It’s knowing that they would do anything for your well being and you would do the same in return.”

Eloise took in each word, grateful for the insight despite the distress it seemed to cause Sophie. Before she could reply, they heard the bedroom door open upstairs and Anthony’s unmistakable footsteps pound down the hall. 

“You should go see him,” Sophie sniffed, wiping the corner of her eye.

Eloise nodded, squeezed Sophie’s hand in gratitude and made her way to Benedict’s room.

The scene within was strange, giving her a feeling of unreality, as if she were stepping into a painting. Benedict, always the energy in a room, now reduced to a withered invalid, sweating and nearly swallowed by the pillows. She felt an overwhelming sense that she shouldn’t witness this, or rather, that he would not want her to witness it. He was her elder, her confidante, her advocate. He had always cared for her and doubtless never wanted her to care for him.

“Benedict?” She called quietly, moving slowly toward the bed.

His eyes opened upon hearing her and a small grin lit his features. He beckoned her to his side and she knelt, resting both of her hands on his arm.

“I’m sorry, El,” he croaked.

“For what?”

“Wedding,” he rasped, clearly struggling to speak and trying to convey his remorse through his bloodshot eyes.

“Stop it.” Eloise nudged him lightly. “You’re either going to recover in plenty of time to be there, or in truth, it may not happen at all. It doesn’t matter.” She tried to sound nonchalant, her intent to dissuade his concern, but as soon as his brow knit together, she knew that she had misspoken. If there was anyone she could be truthful with, it was her second brother, but she should have known that he would worry and try to resolve her problems regardless of the state he was in.

“Tell me.” 

Eloise sighed, chastising herself for her brutal honesty. Given everything that had occurred since, her disagreement with Phillip now seemed a small matter. It was still one she had to reconcile in her heart, one that would determine what kind of future, if any, she planned with her intended. But it did not take precedence over Benedict’s wellbeing and she wished that everyone, including Benedict, would stop acting as if it did. Why did they all insist on speaking to her about the wedding? Why couldn’t they all just wait until Benedict was well again? Then she would have the energy to untangle her feelings toward Sir Phillip.

“We had an argument. It’s nothing. We’ll sort it out. Do not worry yourself about this.”

Benedict stared at her, exacting even with his weakened features. She knew what he was doing, reading her like a book. She could never hide her true feelings from Benedict. No one could. It was her brother’s remarkable and troublesome talent.

After a long moment, he grasped her hand and pulled it to his chest with a reassuring squeeze. Then he sank back into the pillows as if that small action had drained him of all energy. 

“He cares for you.” He declared, his voice small.

There it was again, that knowledge of love, that secret language which everyone around her seemed to understand but which she was still trying to decipher. If Benedict had been well, she knew he would have explained it to her or at least attempted to. She didn’t want to tax him with this but she knew he was inviting her to, however little he could offer now. 

“How do you know?” she asked, her voice a broken whisper.

Benedict’s gaze was unwavering even though he was clearly fighting to keep it that way. “Deeds, not words.” His voice was clear but as soon as he spoke, his eyes closed and he exhaled deeply, his fingers loosening around hers.

Eloise froze, knowing she would remember his words even if she wasn’t entirely sure of their meaning. Watching her brother drifting back into unconsciousness caused panic to rise within her. She didn’t know what to do. All she wanted was for him to stay, not for her sake but for Sophie’s, to stay awake and speak to them and tell them what he needed. If he could speak to the doctor, surely it would help.

She gripped his arms and shook him gently. “Ben? Can you stay awake?” Something dreadful turned in her stomach when he just lay there limply. For the first time since they arrived, she felt the hot sting of tears in her eyes and her voice faltered. “Please,” she pleaded. “I need you. We all need you.”

Then his lips moved, murmuring something so faintly she had to lean close, but the only word she could make out was “swings”.

— 

Benedict didn’t wake again and within the hour he lapsed into a fever. Dr. Crowe, the Bridgerton’s family physician, finally arrived with the footman, the two of them soaked through from the rain. While he examined Benedict, Sophie offered her in-laws changes of clothes until their belongings arrived from Aubrey Hall.

Still shaken from his earlier conversation, Anthony thanked her and hid away in a bedroom. He slipped on Benedict’s shirt and looked in the mirror. It was a bit too long and entirely too flamboyant with its ruffled collar and cuffs, but something about it was undeniably soothing. It felt like Benedict. It smelled like Benedict. In that moment he felt that he was in the presence of his true brother, not the unrecognizable ghost who was lying in the bed nearby. Then a sudden pang of longing for his family. He wanted his wife, his children, the rest of his siblings. If they were nearby he would feel more certain in how to navigate this storm. He thought of the distress in Benedict’s voice asking after their mother. He must write to her, to the entire family. Whatever was going on, it was clearly time to send word to everyone. But he would wait for the doctor’s report to know what to tell them.

Rolling the sleeves to his elbows to hide the cuffs, Anthony straightened himself as best he could  then rejoined everyone outside Benedict’s room. Eloise wore one of Sophie’s day dresses, looking uncharacteristically pale and quiet. Looking, Anthony noted, like Sophie herself. They waited in silence for the doctor to emerge and when he did, he looked somber. It was influenza or an infection of the lungs. When he could not sufficiently respond to Anthony’s demand to determine precisely which, the Viscount launched into a tirade about the man’s credentials and education, inserting barely veiled threats against his reputation and receipt of payment.

Thoroughly castigated, Dr. Crowe offered to administer a medicine that promised to treat both conditions. Sophie agreed and they all watched as the doctor fed a mystery tonic down Benedict’s throat and instructed Sophie to keep him cool. He declared that if the fever broke by the next day, it was a promising sign of recovery. Confirming he would stay at the village nearby, he then begged his way out of the house, clearly eager to escape Anthony’s perpetual glare.

Making use of Sophie’s study, Anthony penned a letter to his family. He wanted to be truthful but not alarming. He paid Dr. Crowe a good deal, good enough that the man should have access to all of the best treatments. He was confident - adamant - that Benedict’s fever would break before any of the family could reach them anyway. So he kept the tone balanced.

To my dear Viscountess and my beloved mother,

I write to inform you that our brother Benedict has taken ill suddenly. Sophie sent word and now Eloise and I are with them at the cottage. I spoke with Benedict this morning and Dr. Crowe is here to tend to him. I am confident that he will recover to full health in time for the wedding. If plans can be hastened so that you might arrive a few days earlier, I’m sure Benedict would be heartened by your presence as he recovers. 

Love to my children.

-Anthony

As he folded the letter into an envelope and sealed it, he tried not to see the desperate look in Benedict’s eyes. As he handed the letter to the footman with instructions to find the fastest messenger to London, he tried to forget about the vow he had been forced to make. As he made his way back upstairs, he tried to ignore how glum Dr. Crowe had looked with his diagnosis, even after providing the attempted cure. 

Benedict would recover. That was the only conceivable outcome. They simply had to wait through the night.

Tagging: @angels17324 @bridgertontess @broooookiecrisp @secretagentbucky @musicismyoxygen84

[nevermindirah]

Do you have any thoughts on the use of AAVE for Nile (or lack thereof) in TOG fanfiction? I've been reading some Book of Nile fic and some writers seem to write her as a Millennial™ (using words like "fave" and "woke") but never acknowledge her Blackness in her patterns of speech. I know we don't see her use as much AAVE in the films, but I would argue she's in situations where code-switching would be valued (first in a "professional" environment in the army, then around a group of non-Black strangers).

Hi anon! I have many thoughts on this and I'm honored you asked me! But I should start by saying I'm white and any thoughts Black fans and especially Black American fans have on this that they want to share would be beyond lovely. (I'm not gonna tag anybody bc that feels rude but please add onto this post if any of y'all see this and want to!)

The main reason I personally avoid AAVE for Nile in my own fics is because I'm not Black. But Nile-centric fics by Black writers tend to avoid using much of it too, at least from what I've noticed/understood, and my guess is it's largely for the reason you mention, that she's in situations that encourage code-switching.

In movie canon Nile is highly competent at tailoring her language to each situation she finds herself in. This fantastic linguistics analysis meta shows how skillfully Nile chooses her vocabulary and grammar to meet her goals with different conversation partners in different contexts. In comics canon Nile had a bunch of different civilian jobs before joining the Marines, so she would've had experience code-switching in the ways that made sense for all those different contexts as well as the Marines and her family and high school and wherever else she spent her time before we met her. And now she's spending her time with a handful of immortals none of whom are native English speakers and a fellow Black American but one with a Queen's English UK accent whose professional experience is in the CIA where high-status code-switching is often an absolute must for success or even survival.

Fics featuring Nile are charged with extrapolating from that to how it might show up in her use of language that she's coping with a traumatic separation from her family and her career and pretty much everything she's ever known and now she needs to be able to make herself understood to people who seem to care about her and each other but are super duper in crisis, three (soon to be four) of whom predate Modern English entirely and the only one who's anywhere near her contemporary she's not supposed to talk to for a century. All of these people are telling her that pretty much any contact with any mortals poses an existential threat to her and the rest of the group. How the FUCK is she supposed to cope with that, like, generally? And would it be a more effective way for her to cope if she talked to Andy Joe and Nicky using the speech patterns that she used to use with her mom and brother, to at least retain that part of her identity even if it means having to do a lot of explaining, or would it meet her needs better to prioritize Andy Joe and Nicky understanding what she means with her words over using the particular words and grammar forms she used with her family?

I've seen several fics, both Nile-centric / BoN and otherwise, explore this a little bit in how/whether Nile uses Millennial™ speak. It's often a theme in Nile texting Booker despite the exile because of the popular headcanon that he as The Tech Guy is the only other immortal who understands memes. But Nile's much-younger-than-Booker mom probably uses Boomer and/or Gen X memes and Andy has been adapting to new communication styles for forever as evidenced by her canon high level of fluency with standard-American-accented English.

Which brings us back to people avoiding AAVE because they're not Black and they don't want to make mistakes (or they're not Black and they don't want to get yelled at for making mistakes, though I think many people overestimate how much they'll get yelled at while underestimating how much these mistakes can hurt). I can imagine some Black fans hold back from using much AAVE in fic because they don't want to share in-group stuff with white people who are likely to then adopt and ruin it, as white people so often do with Black cultural stuff. Some links about this including a great Khadija Mbowe video. I'm saying this gently, anon, because you might not know: woke, an example you cited as Millennial™ speak, is AAVE, and that's gotten erased by so many white people appropriating it and using it incorrectly online.

And also there's the part where fandom is a hobby and you never know when you're reading a fic that's the very first thing someone's ever written outside of a school assignment. This cultural considerations of language shit takes a level of effort and skill that not everybody puts into every fic, or even could if they wanted to because they haven't had time to build their skills yet. It's definitely easier for non-Black fans to project our millennial feels onto Nile than to do the layers of research and self-reflection it requires to depict what Blackness might mean to Nile, and it's not surprising that often people sharing their hobby creations on the internet have gone the easier route. There's not even necessarily shame in doing what's easier. It's just frustrating and often hurtful when structural white supremacy means that 3-dimensional Black characters are rare in media and thoughtful explorations of them in fandom are seen by the majority of fans as not-easy to make and therefore Nile Freeman, the main character in The Old Guard (2020) dir. Gina Prince-Bythewood, has the least fic and meta and art made about her of our 5 main immortals.

I've been active in different fandoms off and on for twenty years and I barely managed to write 5,000 words about Sam Wilson across multiple different fics in the 7 years since I fell in love with him. There's an alchemy to which characters we connect with, and on top of that which characters we connect with in a way that causes us to create stuff about them. Something about Nile Freeman finally tipped me over the edge from a voracious reader to a voracious writer. It's not for me to judge which characters speak to other individuals to the level of creating content about them, but I do think it's important for us to notice, and then work to fight, the pattern where across this fandom as a whole Nile gets way less content, and way less depth in so much of the content that's in theory about her, than any of these other characters.

Anyway, back to language. My two long fics feature Nile with several Black friends — Copley and OCs and cameos from other media — but all of those characters except Alec Hardison from Leverage aren't American. It's very possible I'm guilty of stereotyping Black British speech patterns in I See Your Eyes Seek a Distant Shore. I watched hours and hours of Black haircare YouTube videos in the research for that fic and I modeled my OCs' speech patterns on what I heard from some of those YouTubers as well as what I've heard people like John Boyega and Idris Elba saying in interviews, but the thing about doing your best is you still might fuck up.

I'm slowly making progress on my WIP where Nile and Sam Wilson are cousins, and what ways of talking with a family member might be authentic for Nile is a major question I need to figure out. For that, I'm largely modeling my writing choices on how I hear my Black friends and colleagues talking to each other. I haven't overheard colleagues talking in an office in a long-ass time, but back when that was a thing, I remember seeing a ton of nuance in the different ways many of my Black colleagues would talk to each other. Different people have different personalities! And backgrounds! And priorities! A few jobs ago my department was about 1/3 Black and we worked closely with Obama administration staff many of whom were Black and there was SO MUCH VARIETY in how Black people talked to each other, about work and workplace-appropriate personal stuff, where I and other white coworkers could hear. There are a few work friends in particular who I have in my head when I'm trying to imagine how Sam and Nile might talk to each other. From the outside looking in, God DAMN is shit complicated, intellectually and interpersonally and spiritually, for Black people who are devoting their professional lives to public service in the United States.

One more aspect of this that I have big thoughts on but I need to take extra care in talking about is the idea of acknowledging Nile's Blackness in her patterns of speech. There's no one right way to be Black, and Nile's a fictional character created by a white dude but there are plenty of real-life Black Americans who don't use much or even any AAVE, for reasons that are complicated because of white supremacy. (Highly highly recommend this video by Shanspeare on the harms of the Oreo stereotype.)

Something that's not the same but has enough similarity that I think it's worth talking about is my personal experience with authenticity and American Jewish speech patterns. My Jewish family members don't talk like they're in The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, and I've known lots of people who do talk that way (or the millennial version of it), some of whom have questioned my Jewishness because I don't talk that way. That hurts me. Sometimes when another Jew tells me some shit like "I've never heard a Jew say y'all'd've," I can respond with "well now you have asshole, bless your Yankee-ass heart," because the myth of Dixie is a racist lie but I will totally call white Northerners Yankees when they're being shitty to me for being Southern, and this particular Jew fucking revels in using "bless your heart" with maximum polite aggression, especially with said Yankees. But sometimes I don't have it in me to say anything and it just quietly hurts having an important part of me disbelieved by someone who shares that important part of me. The sting isn't quite the same when non-Jews disbelieve or discount my Jewishness, but that hurts too.

Who counts as authentically Jewish is a messy in-group conversation and it doesn't really make sense to explain it all here. Who counts as authentically Jewish is a matter of legal status for immigration, citizenship, and civil rights in Israel, and it's my number 2 reason after horrific treatment of Palestinians that I'm antizionist. But outside that extremely high-stakes legal situation, it can just feel really shitty to not be recognized as One Of Us, especially by your own people.

It can also feel really shitty to be The Only One of Your Kind in a group, even if that group is an immortal chosen family who all loves each other dearly. Sometimes especially in a situation like that where you know those people love you but there are certain things they don't get about you and will never quite be able to. I'm definitely projecting at least a little bit of my "lonely Jew who will be alone again for yet another Jewish holiday" stuff onto Nile when at the end of I See Your Eyes Seek a Distant Shore she's thinking about being the only Black immortal and moving away from the community she'd built with a mostly-Black group of mortals in that fic. Maybe that tracks, or maybe that's fucked up of me.

Basically, this got very long but it's complicated, writing about experiences that aren't your own takes skill which in turn takes time and practice to build, writing about experiences not your own that our society maligns can cause a lot of harm if done badly, it can also cause a lot of harm when a large enough portion of a fandom just decides to nope out of something that's difficult and risky because then there's just not much content about a character who deserves just a shit ton of loving and nuanced content, people are individuals and two people who come from the exact same cultural context might show that influence in all kinds of different ways, identity is complicated, language is complicated, writing is hard, and empathy and humility and doing our best aren't a guarantee of avoiding harm but they do go a long way in helping people create thoughtful content about a character as awesome and powerful and kind and messy and scared and curious and WORTHY as Nile Freeman.

[ariesjupiter]

Mitski Birth Chart Reading

This is just my interpretation based on Mitski’s birth chart and what I know of her music. Let me know if you have any suggestions of someone I should make a post on next! If you’re interested, I offer natal chart readings, just check my pinned post!

Libra sun: In terms of basic personality and ego, Mitski is focused on creating balanced, harmonic relationships. Intimate, one-on-one relationships are a major part of her identity. Libra is ruled by venus which represents love and beauty. After all, she is known for her lyrics relating to her romantic relationships. The lyric “I love everybody because I love you” is so profoundly Libra to me. She is friendly and charming. She sees herself reflected and other people and people see themselves reflected in her (for better or worse). Venus also rules the arts and Mitski is a natural artist in every sense of the word. Her music sonically is very unique, inventive, and creative as she experiments with mixing different genres. This is influenced by her sun in the 11th house. Sun in the 11th house also indicates an emphasis on friendships and memberships of certain groups and communities. It also indicates an importance of her hopes and dreams. Her sun in 3° explains why she is such a talented writer, communicator, and lyricist. Peak libra sun culture: “Young adult romance is the shit” (a real quote from the queen herself). And let’s not forget her iconic quote from 2016: “I’m a libra so my sexuality is essentially “you can really be any gender as long as you treat me like a princes.” Truer words have never been spoken.

Capricorn moon: Despite how personal her music is, Mitski is a rather private and reserved person, particularly when it comes to expressing her emotions. Also, Capricorn is associated with the father and she has been known to be especially private regarding her dad’s career. She is serious and intense with emotions but can sometimes get detached. The emphasis is on having control over her feelings. She is ambitious and a practical person. Her emotions are connected to her career. Those who do not know her well may see her as cold. In temperament she tends to be melancholic. Emotionally mature and wise beyond her years. Straightforward and honest with her expression. She is dependable, loyal, hard working, & realistic. Emotional fulfillment is often tied to achievement and success. Her moon in the 2nd house and 2° suggests material comforts make her feel safe. With the 2nd house being associated with venus, she is able to express her emotions in an artistic way. Could be protective over material objects. Sentimental. Music has a big impact on her emotions and mood. Peak capricorn moon culture: “I didn’t really feel anything. I’ve stopped feeling things for a long time” - Mitski, The Fader Interview, 2017. In all seriousness, I hope my capricorn moons are doing good.

Virgo mercury: Mitski is practical and detail oriented when it comes to communication and matters of learning. She takes the time to choose the right words to convey her thoughts. She is clear and concise. Mercury is in its sign of rulership here. Her mercury in the 10th house suggests that she will be known for her communication style. Has a lot of thoughts but is also organized. Analytical. Mitski likes making lists. Loves to give advice. Mercury is in 16° (cancer degree) and she has a soft spoken voice. Talks about the past and her roots (cancerian themes).

Virgo venus: In love, Mitski will assume a caretaking role and will gladly help her partner finish mundane tasks and chores. A devoted and faithful lover. Love is about the mundane and routine details of life. Love is about service. Acts of service tend to be virgo venus’ main love language. She wants to help improve her partner’s life. She is patient and observant. Values love that is simple and authentic. Appreciates a partner with whom she can have intellectual conversations. May have a tendency to be too critical on herself when it comes to love. Venus rules aesthetics & style and she tends to have a modest fashion sense. Mitski has voiced her interest in astrology and how she has asked people she’s interested for their birth times lmao. Her venus is in the 11th house, she treats a lover like she would treat a friend. In fact, romantic love probably equates to platonic love in her book. She has her venus in 24° which is a pisces degree, which explains this natural interest in astrology.

Gemini mars: Could be impatient because she moves quickly. Efficient. Has a lot of goals and likes to keep busy. She thrives when she talks to others and exchanged ideas. Likes to multitask. Very versatile. Probably has a flirty, bubbly energy when she’s attracted to someone. Attracted to intellect. Desire to see things from multiple perspectives. Gemini rules the hands so she’s skilled with playing instruments and writing. Likes to try new things. Witty and humorous. Could have nervous energy or fidget often.

Leo jupiter: The planet of luck and expansion in Leo is a big indicator of fame. Her jupiter is also in the 9th house and in 7°. Jupiter in the 9th indicates being born in a different country from where you reside now. Mitski is biracial and has lived in multiple countries growing up. She loves to learn, particularly about other cultures and ways of life. She is open minded, philosophical and values freedom and being independent. She attracts good fortune when she travels (touring!) and also when she focuses on partnerships/intimate relationships (7°). Combining this energy, Mitski attracts luck when she acts dramatically, demonstrates/teaches her knowledge, expresses herself artistically, shows her warm hearted and sometimes stubborn side, & takes chances, shows her bravery, and takes the lead. Be the Cowboy is big leo energy 🤠

Capricorn saturn: Mitski is responsible, practical, goal-oriented, and cautious. With saturn in the 3rd house, she probably had to grow up quickly and become mature at a young age. Capricorn saturn people tend to be very successful people. Strong willed. Tendency to be quiet and is a good listener. Could also be outspoken. With saturn in 18° (virgo degree), she’s very hard working but she may need to learn how to take a break and let herself rest and recharge.

Capricorn uranus: This placement also indicates that she goes after her goals and is efficient and practical in achieving them. Uranus being in the 2nd house shows that she could make money from being unique and groundbreaking. 2nd house also rules the voice! Her values are unique and she could be resistant to change them. Her self esteem could be in a constant state of flux and be tied to money. Her income could rapidly change, like maybe she did not get paid much but then suddenly she starts making a lot of money. Uranus is in 5° which is a fame degree. She’s famous for being authentically herself and very much an individual in the industry that can’t be compared.

Capricorn neptune: Capricorn neptunes are most likely realists. She is skilled at going after her dreams. Her dreams are practical and connected to themes of wealth, power, and control. Neptune in 3rd house shows a dreamy, poetic way of communicating. A very creative placement. Dreamy vibes. Could be elusive in communication, open for interpretation. Neptune is in 11° so this gives aquarian energy. Idealistic with friends and always searching for ways to achieve her dreams.

Scorpio pluto: Her power lies in her ability to analayze human interactions and be introspective with herself since it’s in the 1st house. She is very self aware. Mitski understands that life is about going through changes and she welcomes the ability to grow and rebuild. She has intense, deep emotions but has control over them and how she expresses them. Pluto in 16° adds a cancerian energy. Her strength lies in her ability to nurture and be empathetic.

Scorpio rising: First impressions of Mitski can be that she’s mysterious and secretive. A powerful and intimidating presence. This explains to me why she loves dressing in black. She probably has a strong dislike for anything superficial. She likes to get to know people on a deeper level and connect with them. She likes honesty and is probably very perceptive and intuitive. Privacy is so important to her! She has a lot of layers and wants people to unpack them, but it may take her a while to open up. She is powerful and has endurance. Her presence leaves an impact on people. Loyalty and intimacy is important. She’s not afraid to talk about taboo topics or scary, heavier emotions. Passionate and even a tendency to get fixed on or obsessed with something or someone. Her rising is in 15° (gemini degree) so she’s clever, curious, and thinks quickly. a little more flexible than a regular Scorpio rising would be.

Leo midheaven: People might see her as dramatic or arrogant. In the public eye, she was meant to be a performer. At her concerts she’s known for putting on a good show & includes interpretive dance and choreography. She becomes herself more when she’s on stage. The stage is where she shines. Has a lot of pride connected to her career. Reputation for creatively expressing herself and being brave and taking risks. Wants to be admired, especially regarding her career. Her purpose is to become a leader. Mc in 22° (capricorn degree) shows that she is a very hard worker when it comes to her career. She won’t let anyone stop her when it comes to achievement and success in her field. Another indicator of being at the top of her career and being publicly recognized for it!

TLDR: Mitski is a natural born singer, performer and artist. She is unique, talented, and an introspective writer. Being earth and water dominant, she balances practicality & stability with sentimentality & raw emotion. With all of her Capricorn placements, she is grounded and doesn’t let fame get to her head. Her chart ruler is Scorpio pluto in the 1st which means that major transformations will be a big theme in her life, especially regarding herself & her identity. She is always reflecting and looking at herself on a deep level.

[echo-of-sounds]

your birthday

Drabbles of Aizawa, Toshi, and Hound Dog celebrating your birthday. 

These came out a little longer than initially planned. But that’s okay since these are birthday drabbles for @smutav​ @mrsvash​ and @rurounivash​! I hope you guys have/had/will have a great, relaxing day, and thank you for all your support! (I also tried to tailor them a bit towards what you like and how you’d want to spend your day. I hope I did okay!)💙💙

Warnings: there is some smut in these

Aizawa Shouta

Wind and water washed; one brought a fine layer of salt across your skin; the other, a cold tidal flow over your feet. You walked into Shouta’s shoulder. He didn’t react until you did it again, trying to get away from the freezing water.

“Too cold?”

You hummed and nudged closer to his eternally high body heat. That same heat enveloped your hand, guiding you away from the tide. Gratefully, he didn’t chide your request for an evening stroll on the beach. Well, he sighed but hid any reluctance.

It wasn’t till most people cleared the area and you were nearing the exit that he halted, keeping you in the open, onshore winds. The tiny tilt of his eyebrows stopped you from questioning him. The simple, long bracelet box he pulled from his pocket turned your chills into a fluttering. Wrapping paper nor bows covered it. The only design was the imprint of the designer’s name.

Shouta mumbled over the mounting breeze, the smallest blush noticeable in the lowering light, “It’s not much. You didn’t give me any helpful ideas.”

“Because you didn’t need to get me anything.”

“Yes, I did. Here.”

Careful to not drop or let the wind take it, you accepted and opened the box. Inside, waiting on a velvet cushion, laid a rose gold bracelet. White gemstones, glittering from the waves and sun, decorated the braiding chains. It felt frosty yet loving under your fingertips. You exhaled, “Shouta… how much was this?”

“Don’t worry about that,” he scolded and returned the box to its pocket. Deft fingers aligned it around your wrist, easily linking the tiny clasps together. His hands stayed around yours, holding firm, displaying the bracelet between you. “Do you like it?”

Dark eyes waited, calm, almost concerned as you stared. It didn’t matter how tired they were, they always gave you so much love. And it didn’t matter how much he typically sucked at buying presents. This one was good, excellent, raising a laugh from your throat. You threw your arms around his neck. “It’s beautiful. Thank you.”

“I love you,” heated breath puffed along your jacket’s collar. Lips replaced it, gracefully skimming the hidden skin. His warmth perfectly offset the cold.

“I love you, too.” You withdrew to meet his eyes and whisper, “Let’s go home.”

He agreed with a kiss.

Once home, you sat with Sho on the couch, hunkering down for the rest of the evening for some wine, cuddling, and kissing. His question paused that: “Glasses?”

“Fuck.”

Before you could get up, he plucked the bottle of wine from your hands, popped the cork, and took a swig. He handed it back to you and watched as you mirrored his actions. Fewer dishes, you guessed.

He lounged back, leaving his chest wide open for you to rest against. The cracked window provided an excellent chilly breeze for snuggling up under a blanket. You curled up, legs on his lap, ready for relaxation.

The beginning of the movie was the only part you paid attention to. The hand drifting from your shoulder to your waist, slowly touching every part of you as it moved towards your thigh, pinching the bottom of your shorts, kept tugging at your thoughts. It would fondle its way back up, carelessly pulling up your shirt until it snapped back in place.

Forty minutes into the movie, he presented you with another box: same color, same style as before, just smaller. With lips flushed to your temple, in a deep, doting tone, he whispered, “Open it.”

As you did, his kisses traveled to your cheek then neck. Propped inside were earrings, mimicking the angelic rose gold and white of the necklace. You sighed at his lips and gift, “Shouta, they’re beautiful… thank you.”

“Put them on,” he hummed just before biting your collar bone.

Stuck between laughing and moaning, you did. And he immediately removed your shirt after, kissing behind your ears, kneading your sides. You gripped the back of his shirt, wanting it gone, but as per usual, he didn’t listen, choosing to unclasp your bra next. Teeth returned to your neck. Something thin and cold accompanied them.

Sho sat back exposing your front to the nippy air. He stared at your chest. You looked down. A necklace hung, gleaming and gorgeous, pink and white. You smiled at his lunky gift giving. “You could've just given them to me all at once, you know?”

He shrugged and slid off his shirt. You leaned back as he came forward. Lips landed on yours hard, firm, just like his body did, weighing you into the cushions. He propped up on his elbows, staring at the necklace.

“I can take it o-”

“No. It stays on,” he droned, coming back down for a kiss. Your palms flattened along his sides. Your legs spread for him to settle much closer, properly close, wonderful for grinding, and exactly where you wanted him the rest of the evening.

Yagi Toshinori

It was already noon. You didn’t expect a call at six a.m. sharp, but you imagined he’d call before noon, at least, or send a text, a picture, an emoji, something to show you he remembered. No, you knew he remembered. He always did. He was probably just busy teaching the next generation of Heroes and all.

Something closed. You froze, listening, wondering if you imagined it. The faint shuffling told you, you didn’t. You hurried out of the bedroom to see Toshinori waiting, holding a bouquet of flowers. He sang, “Happy birthday, sweetheart.”

“What are you doing home? I thought you had to stay on campus till tomorrow.”

“I finished early.” He set the stuff down and collected his welcome-home hug. “Well, I convinced Nezu I could finish my work from home, and since tomorrow is a training day, I have an extra day to finish.”

“Thank you.” You latched tight, nuzzling against his jacket. The thought of spending your birthday alone wasn’t the worst thing, but it wasn’t the best. You mumbled, “I thought you forgot.”

“I would never.” He pulled away and rubbed the back of his neck. “However, I, uh, I wasn’t prepared to celebrate today. I couldn’t find a reservation for tonight. I tried a bunch of different places, but they were all booked. I’m sorry, I tried.”

“That’s alright, Toshi. I’m fine staying in.” You hugged him again, adding, “I hate when they sing to me. Home is perfectly fine.”

He kissed the top of your head with a laugh. He stroked your back, slow and firm, keeping his lips pressed to you, occasionally whispering sweet sappiness. Yeah, this was much more preferable than spring the day alone.

“I’ll cook you something, anything. What do you feel like?”

“Dunno. Doesn’t really matter.”

“You have no ideas?”

“No. Let’s just order something.” You really didn’t want to let him go. Feeling him in your arms was much more pleasurable than anything else.

“Alright. What do you want?”

“Dunno.”

“You’re not helping me.”

“Surprise me.”

In thirty minutes’ time, someone knocked on the door. Toshi paid, thanked them, and returned to the couch, bearing a brown paper bag. Inside was your very early dinner of chocolate chip pancakes and fresh fruit. The last thing he withdrew was a milkshake. “It’s cake batter. I figured if you lacked a cake, this was the next best thing.”

“Thank you,” you chuckled.

The meal was enjoyed in a simple, snuggling silence, watching Tv with a kiss here or there. The syrup added a tasty sweetness to his lips, something you kept going back for during commercial breaks.

You didn’t want to break the cuddle. It was Toshi who eventually did. He retrieved your jacket and held it out for you.

“What’s this for?”

“This day may not have been the most exciting, and I feel like I was underprepared, but I do have an idea for your present.”

“Toshi, you don’t need to get me anything. You’ve done more than enough for me.”

“I know, but I want to treat you to something. Come on.” Toshi led you outside and down the street.

The late afternoon air provided a blissful breeze and contentment. People were sparse, allowing you the comfort to hold his hand. Though the occasional glance made you tuck into his side until they passed. He never mentioned it; he simply squeezed your hand and continued the walk.

Just when you began to question if there was an actual destination, he steered you towards the computer store you frequented. Inside was just as barren as out. You guessed he picked a good time for shopping, if that was what this was about. And since you were still left in the dark, you questioned him, “What’s this about, Toshi? I don’t need anything from here.”

He scratched his jaw. “When you were talking about the parts you wanted for your, uh… hard drive… motherboard, processor… thing, I was more than a little confused. Instead of buying the wrong thing, I’ll let you pick it out. I know it isn’t much of a surprise this way, but I wanted it to be useful to you. So, go pick!” he chimed, throwing his hands out in front of him.

“Toshi, this stuff is expensive. You don’t-”

“I want to. Go pick some things, and don’t you dare look at the price.”

Encouraged by his smile, your hesitations vanished, and you all but skipped to your desired isle. A hard drive adapter and mounting bracket caught your eye. Plus, they were cheap: thirty dollars at most.

You tried to move on from the next thing that piqued your interest. Yet, the box kept calling your name. You picked it up to read the back.

Toshi came up beside you. “What’s that?”

“It’s a motherboard.” You showed him the label, Gigabyte Z590 AORUS Elite Intel LGA 1200 ATX Motherboard, and explained, “It could run with my Corsair ram with the Intel 10700k. It’s supposed to be easy to overclock and stable on air.”

“Oh, that sounds very nice, sweetie,” confusion faltered his voice. Bewildered or not, he still kissed your temple, murmured his love, and took the items.

“Toshi, I wasn’t planning on getting it.”

“Well, I am.” He smiled and, despite your very vocal doubts, bought them.

You hugged his arm the entire way home, eager for your presents and craving some more cuddles.

Hound Dog

Through the tiniest crack in the shades, light beamed directly into your eyes. You rolled over and snuggled into the blankets. The day could wait…

Apparently, Ryo didn’t think so. The door squeaked open. The bed creaked as he crawled behind you, funneling heat across your body and fur nuzzling your neck. His ridiculously gigantic hands thwarted your attempt to wiggle away. You fussed his name, just wanting to sleep more.

“It’s almost noon.”

“Hng.”

“Time to get up.”

“Why?”

“I made breakfast. Come on.”

“No,” you whined into the pillow. You should be allowed to sleep in on your-

“Fine.” With a chest-filled growl, arms circled and heaved you out of bed, comforter included. You gripped his bicep amid the whiplash. The swirling ceased once he plopped you on the couch, bundled in your blanket, surrounded by pillows. None of which you could lie on since all were fur-coated and staticky.

“Breakfast,” he introduced, placing two plates down with a mix of breakfast quesadillas, muffins, patatas bravas, yogurt, and avocado and eggs. It appeared like he just made whatever he could think of. Not that you were complaining. It all smelled and looked amazing.

“Eat quickly.”

“Why? Do we have plans?”

“No,” he grumbled and sat beside you, his right leg bouncing. He gave you no more information and dug in. You did as well, thanking him for and appreciating the big birthday breakfast.

And all the way through the meal, his leg never stopped. Sometimes, he’d shift in place, or twitch, but his leg just kept going.

“Are you-”

“Time for your gifts.” He jumped up and disappeared into the hall. You wiped your hands and mouth clean in time for a giant gift bag and a present to fall into your lap. He was certainly rushing his way through this.

You blinked at the present. There was no way in hell he wrapped it. The huge, purple bow was tied neat and even, enclosing pink and blue wrapping paper, perfectly folded and taped down. It looked like a picture, not his actual doing.

And your face must have said it all because he gruffed, “I kept ripping the damn paper. Vlad wrapped it for me. Now open it.”

You’d have to thank Vlad next time you saw him. The ribbon released easily and the paper slid off quickly. You stared, smiling at the box of fine-tipped inking pens. It included nine of different sizes and one brush pen. Every time you thought about buying them, you talked yourself out of it. He must have remembered you mulling it over one of the few dozen times.

Wet heat licked your cheek. His nose pressed to you after, cooling the spot down. “Is it the right one?”

“The exact one. Thank you.” You kissed his muzzle, running your nails along the length of it and between his eyes. An odd grumble came from his throat. Judging from his calm, closed eyes, it was a happy grumble. You pressed a few kisses to his cheek, wanting to listen to the husky rumbles.

Ryo’s eyes opened, surprisingly remaining content, and he tapped the gift bag. “This next.”

This one was most definitely done by him; ripped tissue paper was shoved into the top, littered with holes from pointy claws. You laughed as you pulled it out. Strays pieces of tape somehow made their way inside, sticking paper to your skin.

Eventually, you found the presents: two t-shirts, a wearable blanket, and a deshedding brush. You held the last item up in a silent question.

“You always complain about my hair everywhere. This will fix that.”

You rolled your eyes and thanked him. He lapped at your cheek again, choosing to frisk down to your neck. His heavy hands tugged you onto his lap, sending tissue and wrapping paper falling to the floor. Fingers felt around your shirt. You gasped when they clamped on your side’s sensitive skin.

“Ryo-” You shuddered at their increasing strength. He didn’t really know how to fondle passionately. It was more like prodding and pricking to him. You panted, “I haven’t showered today or anything.”

“You do that once I’m done with you.” Teeth clamped on your shoulder, not enough to draw blood or pain, yet solid enough to lock you in place. His tongue, solid and way too hot, aimlessly dragged along thin skin.

His embrace kept you from wiggling away. Not that you really intended to. A day home with Ryo was such a scarce thing you valued so highly. You’d take anything at this point…

Especially since that anything was his fingers shoving into your shorts. Like the rest of him, they wasted no time and slipped inside you, steadily and sturdily caressing your front wall. Your body was hardly awake, making it considerably more responsive to his intense touch.

“Ryo, fuck-” Your breath caught at digging teeth. His palm pressured your clit, grinding, near jerking, giving you no preparation for your speedy orgasm. You gripped his wrist, closing your thighs on his hand, holding him in place.

His arm muscled its way out so he could lick his fingers, smirking and rumbling, clearly delighted.

Once again, he heaved you up, comforter included, and carried you back to bed. But this time, he threw you down and crawled atop, not letting you catch your breath because his tongue replaced where his fingers were.

Your shower was a long ways away.

[jimines]

Whats actually happened between you and taemaknae? I read about it on the tea blog and still confused

This is an insanely long story so I'm going to put it below the cut so for anyone interested in this absolute shit show, continue on.

Essentially, I posted these headers about a month ago:

It was a set of like 8 colours and it was the first time I had ever posted any headers or anything. The issue nic had with these, was the ripped paper bottom. Because apparently you can trademark that. I had asked a (now ex) “friend” of mine if she knew where I could find the ripped paper effect because I had seen the effect on the header of her network blog and I had been trying to find a similar thing for months and google images never gave me anything good. She ended up referring me to google images anyways and after like an hour of dedicated searching, I found this ripped paper effect and used it. This ex “friend” went on to tell another friend of mine that I had "asked where nicole gets her resources for her headers" and then screenshotted my dm as "proof", which still confuses me because I never mentioned nicole there lmao. I've seen the screenshot.

Tell me where I said nicole. It was literally just a question born from seeing the header they had on their network lmao. I feel it’s important to mention I didn’t know this person ran said network at that time, which is why i said “these people”.

This other friend then came to me and just said my headers "may be seen as similar to nic's” and said she noticed it on her own and never mentioned my other “friend” approaching her. I was confused because other than that ripped paper effect that I know many people on tumblr use, I saw no similarities. Nic's headers are usually more complex and more than just a coloured background with a little effect in it. I just wanted to make some simple headers for fun because I was bored. But, regardless, I messaged nic about it to make sure she didn't feel the same way. I told her a friend of mine was worried nic might think my headers are similar to her's and I assured her that if she found them similar I would take them down, no questions asked. Nic told me she was surprised this friend brought it up and told me that it was entirely up to me if I found the headers similar. She never once told me she felt they were the same, never mentioned anything about them, she insisted it was up to me to do as I pleased. So, since I genuinely found no similarities, I left them up.

About a week went by and things between nic and I were fine, or so I thought, based off the fact that she was interacting with my posts, sending me cute asks and replying to a lot of my comments and stuff being kind and whatnot. Then, I decided to post a small list of my creations and the series I had running at the time. 

After that, all of a sudden I got an influx of rude hate anons:

To anyone I mentioned the anons to, they agreed with me, you cannot trademark circular icons. This anon also accused me saying “just the fact that you had an anxiety attack about it proves you copied them” Like no sweetie, it’s called three strangers walked into my house and I got anxious.

Despite me not seeing the issue, I messaged nic, assuming she wouldn't care about the icons (it wasn't like I was taking her exact work and copying and pasting them as my own) and that made her very upset. When she responded to me, she was incredibly heated and gave off the vibe she was waiting for me to message her about it. 

She said things like "this has actually been bothering me for a while", "i expected you to be able to read between the lines and delete the headers", "i don't know who that anon was but clearly they recognize my style". For starters, she never told me that she was annoyed with me, she was being very kind to me publicly. And I have no idea how I was meant to “read between the lines” of what she said especially considering how kind she was to me the following days. I also never accused her of knowing this anon, she just insisted it wasn't her and she didn't know them right off the bat. She also insinuated that I copied my gifs from others as well, which ticked me off because I made my 100+ layer psd myself thank you very much. But I kept my cool, and I told her I had no idea she felt the way she did, and I told her I would delete the headers (which i did as the conversation was going on), and that I would stop posting my icons and bringing attention to them because no one ever paid it any mind before that point. And I asked her “please tell me straight up the next time you have an issue with me because I am generally pretty dumb with social cues”, I have my adhd to thank for that. And instead of replying, she just blocked me. And conveniently, the hate anons stopped dead right after we blocked each other and I haven't received any since.

Also, these are the kinds of icons I posted:

Looks pretty generic and idk, universal, right?

Then, as I've recently found out today, she was in an "anti-loverjimin" groupchat with at least 2 other bloggers. 

Which explains why this all went and fell into place. I know who the two other bloggers are because of what happened two days later but I won't name them just yet, but these two people had been "friends" with me for several months. So, a day or two after nic blocked me, all of a sudden some good friends of mine were blocking me and not talking to me when I asked what was going on. I found out soon after it was because nicole and those two now ex “friends” of mine had taken old dms I sent them and were showing them to people. And I will go into detail about them but I won't name the people they are about for privacy reasons.

Before I move on, to clarify some lies nic has been spreading about me, I never once shit talked nicole to my friends. One of these ex friends also said I was trying to get people on my side. I would have reacted to this all very very differently if that were the case. I would be dragging everyone through the fucking dirt but I don't get off on drama or micromanaging what my mutuals do. My issues are with these people, if you're still friends with them that's your decision i could not care less. So, back to it, the only thing I said about nic was that she and I had a stupid small fight over icons and that she was spreading lies about me, based off of what nic said to jordan.

That exact message, or slight variations of it, was sent to anyone I interacted with because I didn't know if nic was going to stop at jordan or try and get to everyone I fucking knew lmao. Some of the people I messaged this to told ME nic had done this kind of thing before, that she has sent hate anons, launched hate campaigns, cancelled people, etc. Over stupid shit like icons lmao.

Here are some responses I received after I mentioned nicole:

And nic or one of her friends also took it upon themselves to send anons to that tea blog to blow shit up and named everyone and made it an even bigger mess when they saw no one was actively trying to fight me after the dms got out. 

I also love that in this following ask, they named my two “friends” that were behind the whole dm drama and backstabbed me, as well as two other people I never badmouthed, that story was twisted. But we’ll get into those details shortly.

And she also told people I clout chased big blogs and only cared about notes. At one point, yes, I did care a lot about my statistics. However, never once did I think clout chasing was worth my fucking time or energy, Nic is the biggest clout chaser on this damn site and there are receipts of that, ask jordan lmao. And I couldn’t give two shits about my statistics anymore lmao, much less anxiety that way. Do I still crave validation sometimes? Sure. But it's not a driving force of my tumblr experience like it used to be.

But, moving on to the dms, the first one was sent when I first came back to tumblr full-time and didn't understand why people self reblogged things, I found the pretence of self reblogging annoying and greedy and I complained about it and it was a comment fuelled by two bloggers that i would see sr a lot on my dash. But I never thought THEY were annoying, as these people are saying I did, it was self reblogging I found annoying and as you can see I have come to understand why people sr and I do it myself too. I didn't even know these two bloggers at this time either. That dm was cropped to hide the fact that this "friend" agreed with me and hid the date as well so it seemed recent, and was sent to one of the bloggers I mentioned as an example, someone I had since become good friends with. 

I didn’t befriend one of the people I mentioned there until mid to late June. That friendship is now over thanks to this drama and all the lies. The second friend of mine they went after was never spoken about in dms, they went and turned her against me through lies and manipulation so that friendship has ended too. And while those two were doing that, nic went off to try and turn jordan against me.

There was a particular user on here that I did say some nasty things about but we weren't friends, as many people have been made to believe. I was particularly mad at this person in those dms and was hurtful, I admit, and I have since apologized and owned up to all of it to these people. I did call them fake and/or two-faced. 

And what in the gassing me up bullshit was their response though lmao. I also sent this following dm before I even talked about the issue with this person. They urged me to continue and to name drop the person, and I stupidly thought they were trustworthy.

My reasoning for what I said wasn't unwarranted though, I don't make a habit of going around shit-talking people, unless they do something to me first. I vent when I am upset and this person had sent me a passive aggressive ask and then denied sending it when I asked and I thought that was just very fake, especially since she was so kind to me in dms before the ask came in. But all of these dms were cropped too to hide timestamps and responses, and in most cases, like those screenshots prove, these "friends" either gassed me up or egged me on to continue ranting or to name the people i was mad at and they had agreed with me on several, several occasions. Turns out they were trying to get dirt on me to use in their cancel campaign. But the point is, nic has made me out to be this horrible person that befriends "big blogs" (an overrated statement) and then shit talks them behind their back without remorse. Yet it was one person I said rude things about and I, again, owned up to it all and apologized to them the first day. I would've done it sooner had I a) remembered feeling the way I did all those months ago or remembered the dms themselves or b) felt that way still after meeting them. But neither is the case.

I find it really amusing though that these people wanted things to be kept quiet and didn’t want anyone they spoke to to talk to me about it because I was going to “out them on my blog” and “make a big scene”, then they three went and made it a big fucking scene and ruined my friendships. I’m familiar with this pattern of manipulation as it has happened to me in real life before and it’s the most childish bullshit to witness.

Before this callout day for nic, I had never once been directly rude to or about her, same goes for those ex “friends” that betrayed my trust and friendship. The fact that they plotted against me in a group chat while still actively talking to me and being all buddy buddy is just disgusting. Both of them were talking to me that day at the same time they were sharing the dms and shit-talking me to my friends. But yeah, that's my side, the untwisted side, of the whole story. I tried to be mature and talk to nic and when I didn't do what she wanted me to do, she blocked me and launched the hate campaign with dms and the power of photoshop. I’ve been hesitant to make any of this public because it was meant to be a silent ordeal but I’ve grown tired of her constantly publicizing everything without consequence while I remain silent like I promised.

[kurisus]

Chapter 96 thoughts

This chapter made me want to not be alive so uh let’s talk about it, group therapy style. Spoilers under the cut, obviously.

This was easily the worst chapter in a long time, but it was a different type of pain than the last bad chapter I flipped out over (Hagusa’s first appearance in 88-2). This was more like a slow, burning feeling of dread. I’m not quite sure how to describe it but this chapter definitely made me feel no less than 7 new emotions.

Things started off poorly with Yuka seeing Hiyori as being similar to her mom. Which, as we learned a few chapters ago, means the type of person to keep pushing away her pain and inconvenience with a smile. At least I’m glad Yuka decided to make her breakfast anyway.

The comparison isn’t entirely one-for-one though. Yuka and Haru’s mother was also the type of person to completely close herself off from her surroundings, not really doing anything to prevent her kids from being hurt. We know our Hiyori would never let that slide--I’m fondly remembering the multiple times she’s gone after trash dad despite how he keeps finding new ways to hurt her.

On that note, I still don’t think Yukine’s father is alive, but if he was I would love for Hiyori to kick his ass too.

Anyway, the anecdote about Haru forgetting their dad’s birthday was already rough for me. I’d forget too, if I had someone like that holding it against me every time. And of course it shouldn’t surprise me he was cruel enough to force his children to sleep outside at night, but somehow it’s just another horrible, horrible thing we were forced to learn.

Adachitoka’s really pulling no punches with Yukine’s backstory, man. Every time I think we’ve heard the worst of it, they come back with something new and equally horrible.

I’m really not sure what to make of Yuka’s “This isn’t something to talk about just after waking up” statement. What was she implying was happening to Haru? My first thought was that she realized he’s in danger somehow, and is afraid he’s going to die, but if that were true she’d be urging the girls out the door to go look for him. Feel free to tell me if it was obvious, but I was confused.

I still have no idea how Nora and Hiyori are gonna explain what happened to Haru, but I feel like Yuka will just catch a glimpse of him and realize, somehow.

I also feel like when they meet, Yukine will turn his anger on his sister at first, but hopefully Hiyori will be there to mediate things. I can’t wait for her to get some action, provided things don’t go belly-up again (they will).

Okay so I was completely NOT expecting to get the letter revealed this month so I felt blindsided.

I remember speculating the letter would be something normal, like what Yato saw in those fragments when naming Yukine. But boy, was I wrong.

He never got any of her letters, and didn’t Yuka also say she never got any of his?

Anyway, my first thought when I saw that final letter was that their dad forced him to write it, but looking at it again now I’m not so sure. I think the paneling is meant to imply their dad read out all his letters, and that was the one he was holding when the POV switched to a flashback. I also misread “I can’t take it anymore” as a sort of suicide note, but I think it was just frustration.

Either way, there’s a conspiracy going on that their dad was behind. Somehow, he got hold of all Haru’s letters, and likewise prevented Yuka’s from ever reaching him. So the two siblings wrote to each other and never got a response, each believing they had been abandoned.

It’s also horrifying that Yuka wrote about mundane things out of concern for her brother’s life and safety, yet Haru was openly writing about how much he wanted to run away. Perfect fuel for their dad’s story once he went missing, huh?

This also shows he wasn’t, like, handing the letters to his dad to mail off. He was sending them by himself, in secret, yet they all got returned one day. So like, was their mom hoarding his letters to prevent Yuka from getting them? What exactly happened here? I’m wondering if their mom was so committed to putting everything behind them that she kept all of Haru’s arriving letters and hid them away, hoping the siblings would forget about each other. But then, did she send them back? Why would she do such a thing?

I mentioned this a while ago, but nothing about this whole letter business adds up, and now there’s a whole new layer to it.

Anyway, on to what was, for me, the crux of this chapter--the page with just the “thud” and “smack” sfx, followed by an unnerving silence. This was, as is shown later, the final abuse that Haru suffered. His father got hold of the letters, ripped them up in front of his son, then beat him up and dragged him to the mountains where he dumped him in the fridge, already concocting his story about how Haru ran away. Now we know why Haru was barefoot and in his pajamas when it showed the fridge door shutting. Good lord.

This page had a deep impact on me, because though Adachitoka is not one to shy away from direct depictions of abuse (think Father smacking Yuuki against a pole or setting wolves on a crying Yato), everything about this was deeply unpleasant in a new way. I think it’s because we already knew that everyone ignored what was happening at the Tajima house, as well as the consequences of that specific instance of abuse.

I think it was @eerna who said this page goes straight to the compilation of pages that make me feel like I’ll never be happy again? bc yeah.

I gotta stop talking about this before I cry so I’m instead pivoting to taking another break from being mad at Kazuma because he was actually doing good stuff this chapter. Seems like he’s finally come around and agrees they need to get Yukine back, and is offering his help to Yato.

Poor Yato, though, remembering how their last exchange before Father named Yukine was Yukine renouncing that name in a fit of anger. I don’t think calling Sekki would work at the moment, but certainly when Yuka, Hiyori, and Nora help Yukine see reason, I can picture Yato summoning him back and away from Amaterasu.

So, they better all get their butts moving, because Father’s about to do a test run of Hagusa’s fury against those gods unfortunate enough to be in his way. Pleaaaaase let them be in time. I don’t have it in me to go through a box incident again.

If memory serves, Arahabaki is also in the area, meaning Shiigun may face off against Yuuki. But their time is running out, so Yukine’s fractured mental state will likely interfere with that plan.

One last thing before I close out this very long post. Father drew a clear parallel between himself and Yukine with their shared feelings of despair, yet the visual puts him in the same place as Yukine’s father, and Freckles as Yukine. Makes me wonder if she received similar treatment from Father as Yato and Nora did. Was their relationship not quite so “star-crossed lovers” as Father would have us believe? Was he perhaps partially to blame for her death?

In any case, seeing Yukine’s father carrying him to what will be his grave made me feel violent. I really hope that bastard is long dead, because I don’t want Yukine to become a murderer even though it would be completely justified after seeing incident after incident of the environment he grew up in.

Always questions, questions, and more questions. Feel free to send your own thoughts! See yall in October~

[path-of-my-childhood]

CABIN FEVER - Aaron Dessner: Producing folklore and evermore

Sound On Sound Magazine // March 2021 issue // By Tom Doyle

The pandemic gave Taylor Swift a chance to explore new musical paths, with two lockdown albums co-written and produced by the National's Aaron Dessner.

Few artists during the pandemic have been as prolific as Taylor Swift. In July 2020, she surprise-released folklore, a double-length album recorded entirely remotely and in isolation. It went on to become the biggest global seller of the year, with four million sales and counting. Then, in December, she repeated the trick with the 15-song evermore, which quickly became Swift's eighth consecutive US number one.

In contrast to her country-music roots and the shiny synth-pop that made her a superstar, both folklore and evermore showcased a very different Taylor Swift sound: one veering more towards atmospheric indie and folk. The former album was part-produced by Swift and her regular co-producer Jack Antonoff (St Vincent, Lana Del Rey), while the other half of the tracks were overseen by a new studio collaborator, Aaron Dessner of the National. For evermore, aside from one Antonoff-assisted song, Dessner took full control of production.

Good Timing

Although his band are hugely popular and even won a Grammy for their 2017 album Sleep Well Beast, Aaron Dessner admits that it initially felt strange for an indie-rock guitarist and keyboard player to be pulled into such a mainstream project. Swift had already declared herself a fan of the National, and first met the band back in 2014. Nonetheless, Dessner was still surprised when the singer sent him a text "out of the blue" last spring. "I mean, I didn't think it was a hoax," he laughs. "But it was very exciting and a moment where you think it's like serendipity or something, especially in the middle of the pandemic. When she asked if I would ever consider writing with her, I just happened to have a lot of music that I had worked really hard on. So, the timing was sort of lucky. It opened up this crazy period of collaboration. It was a pretty wild ride."

Since 2016, Aaron Dessner has been based at his self-built rural facility, Long Pond Studio, in the Hudson Valley, upstate New York. The only major change to the studio since SOS last spoke to Dessner in October 2017 has been the addition of a vintage WSW Siemens console built in 1965. "It had been refurbished by someone," he says, "and I think there's only three of them in the United States. I heard it was for sale from our friend [and the National producer/mixer] Peter Katis. That's a huge improvement here."

Although the National made Sleep Well Beast and its 2019 successor I Am Easy To Find at Long Pond, the band members are scattered around the US and Europe, meaning Dessner is no stranger to remote working and file sharing. This proved to be invaluable for his work with Swift. Dessner spent the first six weeks of lockdown writing music that he believed to be for Big Red Machine, his project with Bon Iver's Justin Vernon. Instead, many of these work-in-progress tracks would end up on folklore. Their first collaboration (and the album's first single), 'cardigan', for instance, emerged from an idea Dessner had been working on backstage during the National's European arena tour of Winter 2019.

"I sent her a folder and in the middle of the night she sent me that song," Dessner explains. "So, the next morning I was just listening to it, like, `Woah, OK, this is crazy."

On The Move

As work progressed, it quickly became apparent that Swift and Dessner were very much in tune as a songwriting and producing unit. There was very little Dessner had to do, he says, in terms of chopping vocals around to shape the top lines. "I think it's because I'm so used to structuring things like a song, with verses and choruses and bridges," he reckons. "In most cases, she sort of kept the form. If she had a different idea, she would tell me when she was writing and I would chop it up for her and send it to her. But, mostly, things kind of stayed in the form that we had."

Dessner and Swift were working intensively and at high speed throughout 2020, so much so that on one occasion the producer sent the singer a track and went out for a run in the countryside around Long Pond. By the time he got back, Swift had already written 'the last great american dynasty' and it was waiting for him in his inbox. "That was a crazy moment," he laughs. "One of the astonishing things about Taylor is what a brilliant songwriter she is and the clarity of her ideas and, when she has a story to tell, the way she can tell it. I think she's just been doing it for so long, she has a facility that makes you feel like you could never do what she's capable of. But we were a good pair because I think the music was inspiring to her in such a way that the stories were coming."

Swift's contributions to folklore were recorded in a makeshift studio in her Los Angeles home. Laura Sisk engineered the sessions as the singer recorded her vocals, using a Neumann U47, in a neighbouring bedroom. Live contact between Swift, Sisk, Dessner and Long Pond engineer Jonathan Low was done through real-time online collaboration platform Audiomovers.

"We would listen in remotely and kind of go back and forth," says Dessner. "We used Audiomovers and then we would have Zoom as a backup. But mainly we were just using Audiomovers, so we could actually be in her headphones. It's powerful, it's great. I've used it a lot with people during this time. Then, later on, when we recorded evermore, a lot of the vocals were done here at the studio actually when Taylor was visiting when we did the [Disney+ documentary] Long Pond Sessions. But Taylor's vocals for folklore were all done remotely."

Keeping Secrets

Given the huge international interest in Swift, the team had to work with an elaborate file-sharing arrangement to ensure that the tracks didn't leak online. Understandably, Dessner won't be drawn on the specifics. "Yeah, I mean we had to be very careful, so everything was very secretive," he says. "There were passwords on both ends and we communicated in a specific way when sharing mixes and everything. There was a high level of confidentiality and data encryption. It was sort of a learning curve.

"I'm not used to that," he adds, "'cause usually we're just letting files kind of fly all over the Internet [laughs]. But I think with someone like her, there's just so many people that are paying attention to every move that she makes, which can be a little, I think, oppressive for her. We tried to make it as comfortable as possible and we got used to how to get things to her and back to us. It worked pretty well."

Drums & Guitars

For the generally minimalist beat programming on the records, Dessner would sometimes turn to his more expensive new analogue drum generators - Vermona's DRM1 and Dave Smith's Tempest - but more often used the Synthetic Bits iOS app FunkBox. "There's just a lot of great vintage drum machine sounds in there, and they sound pretty cool, especially if you overdrive it," he says. "Often I send that through an amplifier, or through effects into an amplifier. Then I have a [Roland) TR-8 and a TR-8S that I use a lot. I also use the drum machine in the [Teenage Engineering] OP-1. So, a song like 'willow', that's just me tapping the OP-1."

Elsewhere, Dessner's guitar work appears on the tracks, with the intricate melodic layering on 'the last great american dynasty' from folklore having been inspired by Radiohead's In Rainbows. "Almost all of the electric guitar on Taylor's records is played direct through a REDDI DI into the Siemens board," he says. "It's usually just my 1971 Telecaster played direct and it just sounds great. Oftentimes I just put a little spring reverb on it and sometimes I'll overdrive the board like it's an amplifier, 'cause it breaks up really beautifully.

"I have a 1965 [Gibson] Firebird that I play usually through this 1965 Fender Deluxe Reverb. So, if I am playing into an amp, that's what it is. But on 'the last great american dynasty', those little pointillistic guitars, that's just played direct with the Telecaster through the board."

Elsewhere, Aaron Dessner took Taylor Swift even further out of her sonic comfort zone. A key track on folklore, the Cocteau Twins-styled 'epiphany', features her voice amid a wash of ambient textures, created by Dessner slowing down and reversing various instrumental parts in Pro Tools. "I created a drone using the Mellotron [MD4000D] and the Prophet and the OP-1 and all kinds of synth pads," he says. "Then I duplicated all the tracks, and some of them I reversed and some of them I dropped an octave. All manner of using varispeed and Polyphonic Elastic Audio and changing where they were sitting. Just to create like this Icelandic glacier of sounds was my idea. Then I wrote the chord progression against that.

"The [Pro Tools] session was not happy," he adds with a chuckle. "It kept crashing. Eventually I had to print the drone but I printed it by myself and there was some crackle in it. It was distorting. And then I couldn't recreate it so Jon Low, who was helping me, was kind of mad at me 'cause he was like, 'You can't do that.' And I was like, 'Well, I was working quickly. I didn't know it'd become a song."

Orchestra Of Nowhere

Meanwhile, the orchestrations that appear on several of the tracks were scored by Aaron's twin brother and National bandmate, Bryce Dessner, who is located in France. "I would just make him chord charts of the songs and send them to him in France," Aaron says. "Then he would orchestrate things in Sibelius and send the parts to me. I would send the parts and the instrumental tracks to different players remotely and they would record them literally in their bedrooms or in their attics. None of it was done as a group, it was all done separately. But that's how we've always worked in the National so it's quite natural."

On folklore standout track 'exile', Justin Vernon of Bon Iver delivered his stirring vocal for the duet remotely from his home in Eaux Claires, Wisconsin. "He's renovating his studio, so he has a little home studio in his garage," says Dessner. "It was Taylor's idea to approach him. I sent him Taylor's voice memo of her singing both parts, and he got really excited and loved the song and then he wrote the extra part in the bridge.

"I do a lot of work remotely with Justin also, so it was easy to send him tracks and he would track to it and send back his vocals. I was sending him stems, so usually it's just a vocal stem of Taylor and an instrumental stem and then if he wants something deeper, I'll give him more stems. But generally, he's just working with the vocal layers and an instrumental."

Vernon also provided the grainy beat that kicks off 'closure', one of two tracks on evermore that started life as a sketch for the second Big Red Machine album. "It was this little loop that Justin had given me in this folder of 'Starters', he calls them. I had heard that and been playing the piano to it. But I was hearing it in 5/4, although it's not in 5/4. 'Closure' really opened everything up further. There were no real limits to where we were gonna try to write songs."

Given the number of remote players, Dessner says there were surprisingly few problems with the file swapping and that it was a fairly painless technical process. "It was pretty smooth, but there were issues," he admits. "Sometimes sample-rate issues, or if I happened to give someone an instrumental that was an MP3, that sometimes lines up differently than if you send them an actual WAV that's bounced on the grid. So, sometimes I'd have to kinda eyeball things.

"If there was trouble it started to be because of track counts. I probably only used 20 percent of what was actually recorded, 'cause we would try a lot of things, y'know. So, eventually the sessions got kinda crazy and you'd have to deactivate a lot of things and print things. But we got used to that."

Soft Piano

Aaron Dessner's characteristic dampened upright piano sound, familiar from the National's albums, is much in evidence throughout both folklore and evermore. "The upright is a Yamaha U1 that I've had for more than a decade. Usually, I play it with the soft pedal down and that's the sound of 'hoax' or 'seven' or 'cardigan', y'know, that felted sound. It kind of almost sounds like an electric piano.

"I always mic it the same way, just with two [AKG] 414s, and they're always the same distance off the wall. I had a studio in Brooklyn for 10 years and then when I moved here, I copied the same [wooden] pattern on the wall. And the reason I did that is 'cause of how much I love how this piano sounds bouncing off that wall. It just does something really special for the harmonics."

When on other folklore songs, such as 'exile' or 'the 1', where the piano was the main sonic feature of the track, Dessner played his Steinway grand. "A lot of times we use a pair of Coles [4038s] on the Steinway, just cause it's darker. But sometimes we'll have the 414s there as well and choose."

Keeping Warm

On both folklore and evermore, Taylor Swift's voice is very much front and center and high in the mix, and generally sounds fairly dry. "I think the main thing was I wanted her vocals to have a more full range than maybe you typically hear," Dessner explains. "'Cause I think a lot of the more pop-oriented records are mixed a certain way and they take some of the warmth out of the vocal, so that it's very bright and it kinda cuts really well on the radio. But she has this wonderful lower warmth frequency in her voice which is particularly important on a song like `seven'. If you carved out that mud, y'know, it wouldn't hit you the same way. Or, like, `cardigan', I think it needs that warmth, the kind of fuller feeling to it. It makes it darker, but to me that's where a lot of emotion is."

Effects-wise, almost all of the treatments were done in the box. "There's no outboard reverbs printed," says Dessner. "The only things that we did print would be like an [Eventide] H3000 or sometimes the [WEM] CopiCat tape delay for just a really subtle slap. But generally, it's just different reverbs in the box that Jon was using. He uses the Valhalla stuff quite a bit and some other UAD reverbs, like the [Capitol] Chambers. I often just use Valhalla VintageVerb and the [Avid] Black Spring and simple things."

In some instances, the final mix ended up being the never-bettered rough mix, while other songs took far more work. "'cardigan' is basically the rough, as is `seven'. So, like the early, early mixes, when we didn't even know we were mixing, we never were able to make it better. Like if you make it sound 'good', it might not be as good 'cause it loses some of its weird magic, y'know. But songs like `the last great american dynasty' or 'mad woman', those songs were a little harder to create the dynamics the way you want them, and the pay-off without going too far, and with also just keeping in the kind of aesthetic that we were in. Those were harder, I would say.

"On evermore, I would say 'willow' was probably the hardest one to finish just because there were so many ways it could've gone. Eventually we settled back almost to the point where it began. So, there's a lot of stuff that was left out of 'willow', just because the simplicity of the idea I think was in a way the strongest."

The subject of this month's Inside Track article, 'willow' was the first song written for evermore, immediately following the release of folklore. "It almost felt like a dare or something," Dessner laughs. "We were writing, recording and mixing all in one kind of work stream and we went from one record to the other almost immediately. We were just sort off to the races. We didn't really ever stop since April."

Rubber & Vinyl

Sometimes, Dessner and Swift drew inspiration from unlikely sources; `no body, no crime', for instance, started when he gave her a 'rubber bridge' guitar made by Reuben Cox of the Old Style Guitar Shop in LA. "He's my very old friend," says Dessner of Cox. "He buys undervalued vintage guitars. Stuff that was made in the '50s and '60s as sort of learner guitars, like old Silvertones and Kays and Harmonys. These kinds of guitars which now are quite special, but they're still not valued the same way that vintage Fenders or Gibsons are valued. Then, he customizes them.

"Recently he started retrofitting these guitars with a rubber bridge and flatwound strings. He'll take, like, an acoustic Silvertone from 1958 and put a bridge on it that's covered in this kind of rubber that deadens the strings, so it really has this kind of dead thrum to it. And he puts two pickups in there, one that's more distorted and one that's cleaner. They're just incredible guitars. I thought Taylor would enjoy having one 'cause she loves the sound. So, I had Reuben make one for her and she used it to write `no body, no crime'."

Another friend of Dessner's, Ryan Olsen, has developed a piece of software called the Allovers Hi-Hat Generator which helped create the unusual harmonic loops that feature on `marjorie'. "It's not available on the market," Dessner says of the software. "It's just something that he uses personally, but I think hopefully eventually it'll come out. I wouldn't say it's artificial intelligence software but there's something very intelligent about it [laughs]. It basically analyses audio information and is able to separate audio into identifiable samples and then put them into a database. You then can design parameters for it to spit out sequences that are incredibly musical.

"When Ryan comes here, he'll just take all kinds of things that I give him and run it through there and then it'll spit out, like, three hours of stuff. Then I go through it and find the layers that I love, then I loop them. You can hear it also on the song 'happiness', the drumming in the background. It's not actually played. That's drums that have been sampled and then re-analyzed and re-sequenced out of this Allovers Hi-Hat Generator."

The song `marjorie' is named after Swift's opera-singer grandmother and so, fittingly, her voice can be heard flitting in and out of the mix at the end of the track. "Taylor's family gave us a bunch of recordings of her grandmother," Dessner explains. "But they were from old, very scratchy, noisy vinyl. So, we had to denoise it all using [iZotope's] RX and then I went in and I found some parts that I thought might work. I pitch-shifted them into the key and then placed them. It took a while to find the right ones, but it's really beautiful to be able to hear her. It's just an incredibly special thing, I think."

Meet At The Pond

Taylor Swift finally managed to get together with Aaron Dessner and Jack Antonoff in September 2020 for the filming of folklore: the long pond studio sessions, featuring the trio live-performing the album. It also provided an opportunity for Swift to add her vocals to some of the evermore tracks.

"It did allow us to have more fun, I think," says Dessner. "Y'know, drink more wine and just kinda be in the same place and have the feeling of blasting the music here and dancing around and just enjoying ourselves. She's really a lovely person to hang out with, so in that sense I'm glad that we had that chance to work together in person.

"We were using a [Telefunken] U47 to record Taylor here," he adds. "Either we were using one of the Siemens preamps on the board, which are amazing. Or I have Neve 1064s [preamps/EQs] and we use a Lisson Grove [AR-i] tube compressor generally."

One entirely new song, `tis the damn season', came out of this face-to-face approach, which Swift wrote in the middle of the night after the team had stayed up late drinking. "We had a bunch of wine actually," Dessner laughs, "and then everybody went to sleep, I thought. But I think she must have had this idea swimming around in her head, 'cause the next morning when she arrived, she sang 'Us the damn season' for me in my kitchen. It's maybe my favourite song we've written together. Then she sang it at dinner for me and my wife Stine and we were all crying. It’s just that kind of a song, so it was quite special.”

National Unity

One key track on evermore, 'coney island', features all of the members of the National and sees Swift duetting with their singer Matt Berninger. "My brother [Bryce] actually originated that song," says Aaron Dessner. "I sent him a reference at one point - I can't remember what it was - and then he was sort of inspired to write that chord progression. Then we worked together to sort of develop it and I wrote a bunch of parts and we structured it.

"Taylor and William Bowery [the songwriting pseudonym of Swift's boyfriend, actor Joe Alwyn] wrote 'coney island' and she sang a beautiful version. It felt kind of done, actually. But then I think we all collectively thought, Taylor and myself and Bryce, like this was the closest to a National song."

Dessner then asked the brothers who make up the National's rhythm section, drummer Bryan and bassist Scott Devendorf, to play on 'coney island'. Matt Berninger, as he often does with the band's own tracks, recorded his vocal at home in Los Angeles. "It was never in the same place, it was done remotely," says Dessner, "except Bryan was here at Long Pond when he played. It was great to collaborate as a band with Taylor."

No Compromise

folklore and evermore have been both enormous critical and commercial successes for Taylor Swift. Aaron Dessner reckons that making these anti-pop records has freed the singer up for the future. "I think it was very liberating for her," he says. "I think that's the thing that's been probably the biggest change for her has just been being able to make songs without compromise and then release them without the promotional requirements that she's used to from the past. Obviously, it comes at this time when we're all in lockdown and nobody can tour or go on talk shows or anything. But I think for her probably it will impact what she does in the future.

"But I also think she can shapeshift again," he concludes. "Who knows where she'll go? She's had many celebrated albums from the past, but to release two albums of this quality in such a short time, it really did shine a light on her songwriting talent and her storytelling ability and also just her willingness to experiment and collaborate. Somehow, I ended up in the middle of all that and I'm very grateful."

INSIDE TRACK - Jonathan Low: Secrets of the Mix Engineers

Sound On Sound Magazine // March 2021 issue // By Paul Tingen

From sketches to final mixes, engineer Jonathan Low spent 2020 overseeing Taylor Swift’s hit lockdown albums folklore and evermore.

“I think the theme of a lot of my work nowadays, and especially with these two records, is that everything is getting mixed all the time. I always try to get the songs to sound as finalised as they can be. Obviously that’s hard when you’re not sure yet what all the elements will be. Tracks morph all the time, and yet everything is always moving forwards towards completion in some way. Everything should sound fun and inspiring to listen to all the time.”

Speaking is Jonathan Low, and the two records he refers to are, of course, Taylor Swift’s 2020 albums folklore and evermore, both of which reached number one in the UK and the US. Swift’s main producer and co‑writer on the two albums was the National’s Aaron Dessner, also interviewed in this issue. Low is the engineer, mixer and general right‑hand man at Long Pond Studios in upstate New York, where he and Dessner spent most of 2020 working on folklore and evermore, with Swift in Los Angeles for much of the time.

“In the beginning it did not feel real,” recalls Low. “There was this brand‑new collaboration, and it was amazing how quickly Aaron made these instrumental sketches and Taylor wrote lyrics and melodies to them, which she initially sent to us as iPhone voice memos. During our nightly family dinners in lockdown, Aaron would regularly pull up his phone and say, ‘Listen to this!’ and there would be another voice memo from Taylor with this beautiful song that she had written over a sketch of Aaron’s in a matter of hours. The rate at which it was happening was mind‑blowing. There was constant elevation, inspiration and just wanting to continue the momentum.

“We put her voice memos straight into Pro Tools. They had tons of character, because of the weird phone compression and cutting midrange quality you just would not get when you put someone in front of a pristine recording chain. Plus there was all this bleed. It’s interesting how that dictates the attitude of the vocal and of the song. Even though none of the original voice memos ended up on the albums, they often gave us unexpected hints. These voice memos were such on‑a‑whim things, they were really telling. Taylor had certain phrasings and inflections that we often returned to later on. They became our reference points.”

Pond Life

The making of the National’s 2017 album Sleep Well Beast and the setup at Long Pond were covered in SOS October 2017; today the studio remains pretty much the same, with the exception of a new desk. “The main space is really big, and the console sits in the middle,” says Low. “In 2019, I installed a 1965 WSW/Siemens, which has 24 line‑in and microphone channels and another 24 line channels. WSW is the Austrian branch of Siemens usually built for broadcast. It’s loaded with 811510B channels. The build quality is insane, the switches and pots feel like they were made yesterday. To me it hints at the warm haze of a Class‑A Neve channel but sits further forward in the speakers. The midrange band on the passive EQ is a huge part of its charm, it really does feel like you’re changing the tone of the actual source rather than the recording. Most microphones go through the desk on their way into Pro Tools, though we sometimes use outboard Neve 1064 mic pres. Occasionally I use the Siemens to sum a mix.

“We have a pair of ATC SCM45 monitors, which sound very clear in the large room. The ceiling is very high, and the front wall is about 25 feet behind the monitors. There are diffusers on the sidewalls and the back walls are absorbing, so there are very few reflections. Aaron and I will be listening in tons of different ways. I’ll listen in my home studio with similar ATC SCM20 monitors or on my ‘70s Marantz hi‑fi setup. Aaron is always checking things in his car, and if there’s something that is bugging him, I’ll join him in his car to find out what he hears.”

Low works at Long Pond and with Dessner most of the time, though he does find time to do other projects, among hem this last year the War On Drugs, Waxahatchee and Nap Eyes. When lockdown started in Spring 2020, Low tacked up on supplies and "had a bunch f mixes lined up". Meanwhile, on the Eest Coast, Swift had seen her Lover Fest our cancelled. With help from engineer aura Sisk, she set up a makeshift studio which she dubbed Kitty Committee in bedroom in her Los Angeles home, and began working with long-term producer nd co-writer Jack Antonoff. At the end of April, however, Swift also started working with Dessner, which took the project in different direction. The impressionistic, atmospheric, electro-folk instrumentals Dessner sent her were mostly composed nd recorded by him at Long Pond, assisted by Low.

Sketching Sessions

The instrumental sketches Aaron makes come into being in different ways," elaborates Low. "Sometimes they are more fleshed-out ideas, sometimes they are less formed. But normally Aaron will set himself up in the studio, surrounded by instruments and synths, and he'll construct a track. Once he feels it makes some kind of sense I'll come in and take a listen and then we together develop what's there.

"I don't call his sketches demos, because while many instruments are added and replaced later on, most of the original parts end up in the final version of the song. We end up in the final version of the song. We try to get the sketches to a place where they are already very engaging as instrumental are already very engaging as instrumental tracks. Aaron and I are always obsessively listening, because we constantly want to hear things that feel inspiring and musical, not just a bed of music in the background. It takes longer to create, but in this case also gave Taylor more to latch onto, both emotionally and in terms of musical inspiration. Hearing melodies woven in the music triggered new melodies."

Not long after Dessner and Low sent each sketch to Swift, they would receive her voice memos in return, and they'd load them into the Pro Tools session of the sketch in question. Dessner and Low then continued to develop the songs, in close collaboration with Swift. "Taylor's voice memos often came with suggestions for how to edit the sketches: maybe throw in a bridge somewhere, shorten a section, change the chords or arrangement somewhere, and so on. Aaron would have similar ideas, and he then developed the arrangements, often with his brother Bryce, adding or replacing instruments. This happened fast, and became very interactive between us and Taylor, even though we were working remotely. When we added instruments, we were reacting to the way my rough mixes felt at the very beginning. Of course, it was also dictated by how Taylor wrote and sang to the tracks."

Dessner supplied sketches for nine and produced 10 of folklore's 16 songs, playing many different types of guitars, keyboards and synths as well as percussion and programmed drums. Instruments that were added later include live strings, drums, trombone, accordion, clarinet, harpsichord and more, with his brother Bryce doing many of the orchestrations. Most overdubs by other musicians were done remotely as well. Throughout, Low was keeping an overview of everything that was going on and mixing the material, so it was as presentable and inspiring as possible.

Mixing folklore

Although Dessner has called folklore an "anti-pop album", the world's number-one pop mixer Serban Ghenea was drafted in to mix seven tracks, while Low did the remainder.

"It was exciting to have Serban involved," explains Low, "because he did things I'd never do or be able to do. The way the vocal sits always at the forefront, along with the clarity he gets in his mixes, is remarkable. A great example of this is on the song 'epiphany'. There is so much beautiful space and the vocal feels effortlessly placed. It was really interesting to hear where he took things, because we were so close to the entire process in every way. Hearing a totally new perspective was eye-opening and refreshing.

"Throughout the entire process we were trying to maintain the original feel. Sometimes this was hard, because that initial rawness would get lost in large arrangements and additional layering. With revisions of folklore in particular we sometimes were losing the emotional weight from earlier more casual mixes. Because I was always mixing, there was also always the danger of over-mixing.

"We were trying to get the best of each mix version, and sometimes that meant stepping backwards, and grabbing a piano chain from an earlier mix, or going three versions back to before we added orchestration. There were definitely moments of thinking, 'Is this going to compete sonically? Is this loud enough?' We knew we loved the way the songs sounded as we were building them, so we stuck with what we knew. There were times where I tried to keep pushing a mix forward but it didn't improve the song — 'cardigan' is an example of a song where we ended up choosing a very early mix."

The Low Down

"I'm originally from Philadelphia," says Jonathan Low, "and played piano, alto saxophone and guitar when growing up. My dad is an electrical engineer and audiophile hobbyist, and I learned a lot about circuit design and how to repair things. I then started building guitar pedals and guitar amps, and recorded bands at my high school using a minidisc player and some binaural microphones. After that I did a music industry programme at Drexel University, and spent a lot of time working at the recording facilities there.

"This led to me meeting Brian McTear, a producer and owner of Miner Street Studios, which became my home base from 2009 to 2014. I learned a lot from him, from developing an interest in creating sounds in untraditional ways, to how to see a record through to completion. The studio has a two-inch 16-track Ampex MM1200 tape machine and a beautiful MCI 400 console which very quickly shaped the way I think about routing and signal flow. I'm lucky to have learned this way, because a computer environment is like the Wild West: there are no rules in terms of how to get from point A to point B. This flexibility is incredible, but sometimes there are simply too many options.

"l met Aaron [Dessned] because singer-songwriter Sharon van Etten recorded her second album, Epic [2010] at Miner Street, with Brian producing. Her third album, Tramp [2012] was produced by Aaron. They came to Philly to record drums and I ended up mixing a bunch of that record. After that I would occasionally go to work in Aaron's garage studio in Brooklyn, and this became more and more a regular collaboration. I then moved from Philly up to the Hudson Valley to help Aaron build Long Pond. We first used the studio in the spring of 2016, when beginning to record the National's album Sleep Well Beast."

Onward & Upward

folklore was finished and released in July 2020. In a normal world everyone might have gone on to do other things, but without the option of touring, they simply continued writing songs, with Low holding the fort. In September, many of the musicians who played on the album gathered at Long Pond for the shooting of a making-of documentary, folklore: the long pond studio sessions, which is streamed on Disney+.

The temporary presence of Swift at Long Pond changed the working methods somewhat, as she could work with Dessner in the room, and Low was able record her vocals. After Swift left again, sessions continued until December, when evermore was released, with Dessner producing or co-producing all tracks, apart from 'gold rush' which was co-written and co-produced by Swift and Antonoff. Low recorded many of Swift's vocals for evermore, and mixed the entire album. The lead single 'willow' became the biggest hit from the album, reaching number one in the US and number three in the UK.

"Before Taylor came to Long Pond," remembers Low, "she had always recorded her vocals for folklore remotely in Los Angeles or Nashville. When I recorded, I used a modern Telefunken U47, which is our go-to vocal mic — we record all the National stuff with that — going straight into the Siemens desk, and then into a Lisson Grove AR-1 tube compressor, and via a Burl A-D converter into Pro Tools. Taylor creates and lays down her vocal arrangements very quickly, and it sounds like a finished record in very few takes."

Devils In The Detail

In his mixes, Low wanted listeners to share his own initial response to these vocal performances. "The element that draws me in is always Taylor's vocals. The first time I received files with her properly recorded but premixed vocals I was just floored. They sounded great, even with minimal EQ and compression. They were not the way I'm used to hearing her voice in her pop songs, with the vocal soaring and sitting at the very front edge of the soundscape. In these raw performances, I heard so much more intimacy and interaction with the music. It was wonderful to hear her voice with tons of detail and nuances in place: her phrasing, her tonality, her pitch, all very deliberate. We wanted to maintain that. It's more emotional, and it sounds so much more personal to me. Then there was the music..."

The arrangements on evermore are even more 'chamber pop' than on folklore, with instruments like glockenspiel, crotales, flute, French horn, celeste and harmonium in evidence. "As listeners of the National may know, Aaron's and Bryce's arrangements can be quite dense. They love lush orchestration, all sorts of percussion, synths and other electronic sounds. The challenge was trying to get them to speak, without getting in the way of the vocals. I want a casual listener to be drawn in by the vocal, but sense that something special is happening in the music as well. At the same time, someone who really is digging in can fully immerse themselves and take in all the beauty deeper in the details of the sound and arrangement. Finding the balance between presenting all the musical elements that were happening in the arrangement and this really beautiful, upfront, real-sounding vocal was the ticket."

A particular challenge is that a lot of the detail that Aaron gravitates towards happens in the low mids, which is a very warm part of our hearing spectrum that can quickly become too muddy or too woolly. A lot of the tonal and musical information lives in the low mids, and then the vocal sits more in the midrange and high mids. There's not too much in the higher frequency range, except the top of the guitars, and some elements like a shaker and the higher buzzy parts of the synths. Maintaining clarity and separation in those often complex arrangements was a major challenge."

In & Out The Box

According to Low, the final mix stage for evermore was "very short. There was a moment in the final week or so leading up to the release where the songs were developed far enough for me to sit down and try to make something very cohesive and final, finalising vocal volume, overall volume, and the vibe. There's a point in every mix where the moves get really small. When a volume ride of 0.1dB makes a difference, you're really close to being done. Earlier on, those little adjustments don't really matter.

"I often try to mix at the console, with some outboard on the two-bus, but folklore was mixed all in the box, because we were working so fast, plus initially the plan was for the mixes to be done elsewhere. I ran a couple of mixes for evermore through the console, and `closure' was the only one that stuck. It was summed through the Siemens, with an API 2500 compressor and a Thermionic Culture Phoenix and then back into Pro Tools via the Burl A-D. I will use hardware when mixing in the box, though mainly just two units: the Eventide H3000, because I have not found any plug-ins that do the same thing, and the [Thermionic] Culture Vulture, for its very broad tone shaping and distortion properties.

"The writing and the production happened closely in conjunction with the engineering and mixing, and the arrangements were dense, making many of the sessions super hefty and actually quite messy. Sounds would constantly change roles in the arrangement and sometimes plug-ins would just stack up. So final mixing involved cleaning up the sessions and stemming large groups down."

Across The Rubber Bridge

The Pro Tools mix session of 'willow' has close to 100 tracks, though there's none of the elaborate bussing that's the hallmark of some modern sessions. At the top are six drum machine tracks in green from the Teenage Engineering OP-1, an instrument that was used extensively on the album. Below that are five live percussion tracks (blue), three bass tracks (pink), and an `AUX Drums' programming track. There's a 'rubber bridge' guitar folder and aux, OP-1 synth tracks, piano tracks, 'Dream Machine' (Josh Kaufman's guitar) and E-bow tracks, Yamaha, Sequential Prophet X, Moog and Roland Juno synth tracks, and Strings and Horns aux stem tracks.

"Most of the drum tracks were performed on the OP-1 by Aaron. These are not programmed tracks. Bryan Devendorf, drummer of the National, programmed some beats on a Roland TR-8S. I ran those though the Fender Rumble bass amp, which adds some woofiness, like an acoustic kit room mic. There's an acoustic shaker, and there's an OP-1 backbeat that's subtle in the beginning, and then gets stronger towards the end of the song. I grouped all the drum elements and the bass, and sent those out to a hardware insert with the Culture Vulture, for saturation, so it got louder and more and more harmonically rich. There is this subtle growing and crescendo of intensity of the rhythm section by the end.

"The 'rubber bridge' guitars were the main anchor in the instruments. These guitars have a wooden bridge wrapped in rubber, and sound a bit like a nylon-string guitar, or a light palm mute. They're very percussive and sound best when recorded on our Neumann U47 and a DI. On many of those DI tracks I have a [SPL] Transient Designer to lower the sustain and keep them punchy, especially in the low end. There's a folder with five takes of 'rubber bridge' guitar in this session, creating this wall of unique guitar sound.

"I treated the 'rubber bridge' guitars quite extensively. There's a FabFilter Pro-Q3 cutting some midrange frequencies and some air around 10kHz. These guitars can splash out in the high end and have a boominess that's in the same range as the low end of Taylor's vocal, so I had to keep these things under control. Then I used a SoundToys Tremolator, with a quarter-note tremolo that makes the accents in the playing a bit more apparent. I like to get the acoustic guitars a little bit out of the way for the less important beats, so I have the Massey CT5 compressor side-chained to the kick drum. I also used the UAD Precision K-Stereo to make the guitars a bit wider. The iZotope Ozone Exciter adds some high mids and high-end harmonic saturation sparkly stuff, and the SoundToys EchoBoy delay is automated, with it only coming on in the bridge, where I wanted more ambience."

Growing Pains

"Once we had figured out how to sit the 'rubber bridge' guitars in the mix, the next challenge was to work out the end of the song, after the bridge. Taylor actually goes down an octave with her voice in the last chorus, and at the same time the music continues to push and grow. That meant using a lot of automation and Clip Gain adjustment to make sure the vocal always stayed on top. There also are ambient pianos playing counter-melodies, and balancing the vocals, guitars and pianos was the main focus on this song. We spent a lot of time balancing this, particularly as the track grows towards the end.

"The vocal tracks share many of the same plug-ins and settings. On the main lead vocal track I added the UAD Pultec EQP-1A, with a little bit of a cut in the low end at 30Hz, and a boost at 8kHz, which adds some modern air. The second plug-in is the Oeksound Soothe, which is just touching the vocal, and it helps with any harsh resonance stuff in the high mids, and a little in the lower mids. Next is the UAD 1176AE, and then the FabFilter Pro-Q3, doing some notches at 200Hz, 1kHz, 4kHz and close to 10kHz. I tend to do subtractive EQ on the Q3, and use more analogue-sounding plug-ins, like the Pultec or the Maag, to boost. After that is the FabFilter Pro-DS [de-esser], taking off a couple of decibels, followed by the FabFilter Saturn 2 [saturation processor], on a warm tape setting.

"Below the vocal tracks are three aux effects tracks, for the vocals. 'Long Delay' has a stereo EchoBoy going into an Altiverb with a spring reverb, for effect throws in the choruses. 'Chamber' is the UAD Capitol Chamber, which gives the vocal a nice density and size, without it being a long reverb. The 'Plate' aux is the UAD EMT140, for the longer tail. These two reverbs work in conjunction, with the chamber for the upfront space, determining where the vocal sits in the mix, and the plate more for the depth behind that.

"At the bottom of the session is a two-bus aux, which mimics the way I do the two-bus on the desk. The plug-ins are the UAD Massive Passive EQ, UAD API 2500 compressor, and the UAD Ampex ATR102. Depending on the song, I will choose 15ips or 30ips. In this case it was set to 15ips, half-inch GP9. That has a nice, aggressive, midrange push, and the GP9 bottom end goes that little bit lower. There's also a PSP Vintage Warmer, a Sonnox Oxford Inflator, plus a FabFilter Pro-L2 [limiter]. None of these things are doing very much on their own, but in conjunction give me the interaction I expect from an analogue mix chain."

[planecrashdreams]

Take My Breath Away

Peter Parker x Stark!daughter

Summary: The Avengers are close to unveiling The Vulture’s plan to destroy the city. They uncover that his son is throwing a ball with all of the most notorious villains within the city. It is decided that you, along with Peter, must attend to gather intel.

Warnings: *violence* *swearing* *fight scenes* *mentions of blood/wounds*

Peter & Y/N are 18

“F.R.I.D.A.Y., call everyone into the lab in 5 minutes, I need to have a meeting.” Tony announces while peering at the screen in front of him.

F.R.I.D.A.Y.’s voice floods the entire compound inviting everyone to meet with your dad. You however, were busy doing your homework with the boy you’ve had a crush on for what feels like a century.

“Ughh, not again. What does dad want this time?” You whine getting up from your chair.

“Come on, Y/N, it sounds important, he said he wanted us in the lab.”

“I’m not even an Avenger, why do I have to be involved?” You say slightly annoyed.

You and Peter were the last ones to join the meeting and your dad started talking almost immediately.

“I found a new lead on Vulture, his son Dimitri Toomes is having a party for all of the mafia bosses and criminals and that roam the city. This party is taking place tonight at 8pm. I’m going to get you Nat, and you Steve, to attend this party as a couple to uncover more intel as you can—“

“Wait, but, how old is this Dimitri Toomes anyway? Isn’t he just a kid?” Bucky interrupts.

“Yeah, isn’t he like 18 or 19?” Nat also jumps in.

“I don’t think sending Nat and Steve in for this mission is such a good idea, Tony. He would know not to trust them once he saw them. We need someone younger.” Bruce suggests.

“No, I’m not sending Peter in to do this mission. Peter hasn’t done many missions, and this one involves the mafia and every criminal in New York!” Tony says sternly.

“Well, we weren’t thinking Peter exactly...” Bruce says very quietly.

“NO! I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU WOULD EVEN THINK TO OFFER MY DAUGHTER TO GO ON A MISSION!” Tony yells loud enough for the whole city to hear.

“Yeah, uh, Bruce, I don’t know how much you’ve had to drink but sending me for this? What!??” You say very frightened and shocked.

“Tony, I know you would never want to do this in a million years, but hear us out. Dimitri is a young man, he’ll be easily persuaded if something strikes his interest. If we send Y/N, she’ll intrigue him and make him lower his guard and he could reveal his father’s plans. If we do this, we won’t send her alone. Someone will be there to watch out for her.” Bruce explains.

“I can’t believe I’m actually having to consider this plan.” Tony confesses.

“I’ll do it if you guys keep a close watch of me. I just want to get it done and over with.” You agree to Bruce’s plan but almost regret it.

“Y/N wants to go through with it, Tony? Are you okay going through with this?”

“Ok. But she goes in and she’s coming back out as quick as possible.” Tony finally agrees.

“We need to get ready now, the party starts in a couple of hours.” Tony leads the way out of the lab.

“Y/N, you’re going to need a dress to wear to this party. Steve, you’re going to be her chaperone and you’ll need a suit. Nat, Bucky, Thor—“

“Mr. Stark? Can I come and help keep watch of Y/N?” Peter interjects.

“Peter I’d feel more comfortable with you staying here in the compound.”

“Please, Mr. Stark, my spidey-sense can be helpful for this and I want to help keep Y/N safe an I kno—“

“Okay! Peter, fine, you can help Steve keep watch. Just be careful, and if I feel you’re not safe I will pull you out from the mission. Got it?”

“Yes! Thank you, Mr. Stark.” Peter beams, now he can keep watch on you to make sure you stayed safe.

Everyone headed off to help prepare for the mission and you headed up to your bedroom to get ready for what you thought was possibly the worst party ever.

Nat hung a few dresses on your closet door for you to wear tonight. But one caught your eye. It was gorgeous, it was a shade of dark blue. The fabric was silky and vibrant. The colour made your mind wander to a certain boy whose favourite colour is blue. Peter. “Well, I guess the night won’t be as terrible.” You thought to yourself happy that you got to feel pretty at least. The dress was a ball gown and sparkled in certain lighting.

You put your dress on and had Nat help you style your hair into a princess braid updo. You did your makeup, a few layers of mascara and a layer of pink peach tinted lip gloss. A simple look, but still radiated beauty. Your wore a pair of little black heels under your dress and went on your way downstairs.

Peter dressed himself in a simple black suit that he wore to the last school dance. He even shaved and gelled his hair a bit. Steve also dawned a suit, but dark grey. They went over a plan of how they would surveillance the party while keeping an eye on you. In the middle of their conversation, you start coming down the stairs. Step by step, Peter comes into your view and you smile taking in how handsome he was, especially in a suit.

Peter gasped looking at you, he couldn’t believe how gorgeous you were and wished he could’ve been the one spending the night with you. Just thinking about Dimitri being with you sent him into an internal rage. But looking at your smile takes him away from that thought. He realizes you’ve been standing there for almost a minute and he hasn’t said a word to you.

“Wow, you look... pretty.” Peter says rubbing his arms.

“Yeah, you really are beautiful, Y/N.” Steve adds.

“Aw, thanks guys. And you both look very handsome.” You say shyly.

Peter looks up at Steve with an annoyed look, jealous that he made a comment about your appearance. Steve just laughs messing with Peter.

You, Steve, and Peter all drive to Dimitri Toomes’ party and discuss what the game plan will be.

“Ok, here’s what I’m thinking, Y/N goes in and scopes for Dimitri, she talks with him and get him comfortable with her. She’ll lead him on with questions about his family business. Once we get enough intel, she calls it a night and we get her out of there. Y/N, you’re going to go by a fake name and say you’re the daughter of the mafia boss, Lorenzo Bianchi. Just make up answers the best you can to his questions. We’ll be in your ear the whole night and we’ll help you talk to him. Peter and I will walk around the party to look for any suspicious behaviour and to keep a closer eye on you. If at any time you don’t feel safe anymore, say “my head hurts” got it?”

“Yeah, I think so. I’m still really nervous about this.” You say scared about the whole situation you were about to enter.

“Don’t worry, Peter and I are with you the entire night. Just act natural and you’ll be okay. We are here.”

The three of you enter and immediately disperse. You enter the ballroom and turn heads as you move towards the bar. As you get to the bar, your eyes meet with a seducing glare. It almost made you uncomfortable but it was oddly alluring. You notice this man is young and clean cut. He was wearing a lighter suit with a dark black shirt. He was very tidy for a criminal.

“That’s him, Y/N. Across the bar from you. Make your move.” Steve says in your earpiece.

You instead have a better idea. You made sure his eyes were still fixed on you and flutter your eyes slightly and order yourself a drink. Just as you predicted, he got up from his seat and made his way over to you.

“Excuse me, miss, I don’t think I know you.” He says with a dark masculine voice.

“You’re right, you don’t know me.” You say slightly shocked at how unintentionally confident you were coming across.

“Beautiful and funny, now I’m sure I haven’t met you before.” He chuckles.

“Dimitri Toomes.” He says now leaning on the bar bench beside you.

“Francesca Bianchi.” You say now making eye contact with the man.

“You’re Lorenzo Bianchi’s daughter? Wow, he never said he had a daughter. A sexy one too.” He says looking over you with a venomous sound in his voice.

Peter was listening to this entire conversation and he was starting to get annoyed by Dimitri’s tone with you. His fist was squeezed tight and his knuckles turned white.

“Y/N, flirt back with him. You’ve got him attention and he’ll be easier to pry if he’s getting your attention back.” Steve suggests.

Peter is now dying inside, having to hear the conversation that’s about to happen. He wants to pull you away and not have you be flirted with by someone who only looks at you as a piece of meat.

“Well, I’m his little girl after all, he wants to protect me as much as he can. He wouldn’t want me to go out and find myself a new kind of daddy.” You say looking deep into his eyes and slightly biting your lip.

Both Peter and Steve stood still, mouth agape at what they just overheard you say. Peter was slightly turned on by your confident tone and how on the nose you were. He was still of course bothered that you were talking to Dimitri. Peter tried to keep his cool for the sake of the mission and your safety.

“Careful what you say, sweetheart. Wouldn’t want to say something you don’t mean.” Toomes says towering over you now with a very condescending tone.

“Who said I didn’t mean it? And any way, how do you know my father?” You ask, trying to push for information.

“Lorenzo is a friend of my father’s. My father is working on a plan to run the city better for the mafia. And how do you not know this? Does your father know you’re here?” Dimitri asks slightly suspicious of you.

“My father doesn’t like women being involved with his business. I just want to look out for my father, I don’t want him getting into trouble is all.” You say hoping this puts him off your scent.

“Ah, the delicate princess, of course, I mean, if you were mine, I wouldn’t let anyone touch you, except me of course.” He says now trailing his fingertips along your forearm to your hand.

Unsure of how to react you just play along with him hoping Steve or Peter will help direct your next move.

“You’ve got him wrapped around your finger, Y/N. Try getting more info out of him. He’s buying it.” Steve guides you. Peter at this point is speechless, he was stuck in an internal rage. He wanted to kill this guy just because he touched you.

“Dimitri?” You say with a higher pitch now hoping to sound too cute to decline.

“Hmm?” He hums in response.

“Could you tell me what my dad is planning on doing to make the mafia run better?” You ask fluttering your lashes, not breaking eye contact with him.

“I don’t know, Princess. I think it’s best to keep you out of it. Your father thinks so.” He says looking at you, now taking your hand and pulling you up from your seat.

“We can talk over by the balcony, it’s more private there, and I like my privacy.” He says very ominous. You were now feeling pale, unsure of what he meant by that. As you both move towards the balcony, your eyes meet with Peter’s and he looked concerned. He followed close behind the both of you, not daring to let you out of his sight.

“Now, Princess, I’ll tell you just a little bit to give you piece of mind about your your father. Your father works by conducting drug runs across the borders and selling drugs to smaller criminal groups within the city. Lately, the drugs have been resurfacing and the police have been finding out what groups are in possession of these drugs. Your father made a business deal with my father to make these weak groups disappear. My father in turn, had your father invest in most lethal warfare for taking over the city. As of now, our fathers have almost successfully taking over a stronghold, and they’re not stopping there.” He says, taking pride in his father’s work.

“Wow, I never knew my father would actually be helping take over the whole city.” You say in fake awe.

“But enough about that, I haven’t been able to take my eyes off of you tonight, darling. In the moonlight you are just mouthwatering.” He says, moving closer to you taking a handful of your hair to move away from your neck. He leans in to start kissing your neck. You jitter from the sudden touch of his hand. As he kisses your neck you step away from him. You could sense Peter was near.

“What’s wrong, princess? I was just kissing you.” He says deep in lust.

“Oh, I.. know it’s just, I’m really thirsty, would it be possible if you could get me a drink?” You ask hoping he would so you could catch your breath and talk to Peter.

“Okay, I’ll be back, don’t move.” He says as he makes his way back to the bar.

You exhale deeply and Peter appears almost out of nowhere.

“Y/N! I can’t believe that guy! I want to kill him, if we weren’t on a mission right now I would do it right now—“ Peter whispers loudly.

“Pete, I’m okay, he’s creepy, but harmless. I got so much intel for him. This plan is working well so far, I’m going to try for a little more, and then we’ll get out of here.” You say trying to reassure Peter, but also starting to blush at how much he really cared about you. Does he maybe like you back?

“You gotta go before he comes back.” You tell him almost shooing him away.

A few seconds pass and Dimitri appears with your drink just in time that Peter wasn’t stood beside you.

“Thanks.” You say taking a sip from the glass.

A few minutes pass and your head starts to spin. Your vision is blurry and and your eyelids feel heavy. You tried to remember what Steve said to alert him.

“My head hurts.” You say mumbling, losing control of your voice.

“You know, you really shouldn’t trust people you don’t know, Princess.” He says darkly. Why did he do this? Did he hear you and Peter?

You lose control of your body and start to tumble forward, but a pair of strong arms catches you before hitting the hard ground.

..........

You wake, arms and ankles tied in a dark concrete room. Where was this place? Am I still at the party? You ask yourself.

Moments later you hear footsteps approaching the door to your concrete room. You close your eyes hoping that whoever it was would think you’re still unconscious.

The footsteps approach closer and closer until they stop directly in front of you.

A hand hits you across the face, you shudder from it and find that it is none other than Dimitri.

“Hello, sweetheart.” He says with no recognizable tone in his voice. You almost revaluated if the man even was Dimitri.

“So, you think you would just stumble into my party hoping to steal all of our information? And by the way I know your fucking name isn’t Francesca Bianchi! Bianchi has no children!” He says now very angry at your attempt to deceive him earlier.

“I saw you arrive at the party with those two men, as soon as I saw that, I knew to pay attention to you. Women who show up with bodyguards aren’t good news around here.” He scolds you.

“Now, do you want to tell me who you and those men are? Or do you want me to beat it out of you?” He says bringing his face down to meet yours, taking your chin in his hand.

“Go fuck yourself!” You shout, heart racing at your courage.

Dimitri laughs and suddenly slaps you across the the face. You can feel blood starting to drip from your nose now.

“Talk like a bitch, get slapped around like a bitch!” He yells at you even angrier.

“Do something stupid like that again, I’ll have kill one of your boyfriends.” He says with a sharp tongue.

Did he actually have Peter and Steve captive? You couldn’t help thinking it was your fault, he must have heard you talking to Peter before he drugged you.

“No! Do whatever you want to me but don’t hurt them!” You yell back at him.

“Aw, does someone have a little soft spot for them? I’m thinking you like the little one. He was so bothersome, following us all night. I just couldn’t get you alone could I?” He says with an irritated tone.

“It’s too bad too, I was really starting to like you, you’re quite the flirt.” He says as he shifts closer to you. You try to move away from him but fail, he picks you up and takes you out of the concrete room.

You now find yourself in tied in a chair in a room with mob men. All of them look intimidating, these men were decorated in scars and appeared quite muscular.

“Now princess, I’m leaving you here to think about what you might want to tell me. I’m going to visit your little boyfriends, if you try anything stupid I’ll fucking kill you instantly.” He says sharply and disappears.

You were beyond scared, you didn’t think much of Dimitri when you met him. You just thought he was a rich kid who thought he was a top dog. But now being at his mercy you were so terrified. You were even more scared thinking about what awful things he could be doing to Steve and Peter.

“Steve!.... Steve, are you awake?” Peter asks quietly hoping that the cap was okay.

“Yeah... I’m fine, my head is spinning a bit.” Steve reassures Peter.

“We gotta get out of here, Y/N needs us, I hope she’s okay, I don’t know what I’d do if she was hurt.” Peter cries out.

“It’s okay Peter, relax, we’ll figure something out and we’ll get Y/N. Just let me think of something.” Steve says now thinking of an escape plan.

Peter struggles in his ropes and realizes his knots were not as tight as they should have been. “Hey, Cap? I think I can get out of my ties.”

“That’s great, looks like someone underestimated you.” Steve says struggling in his ties hoping his were loose also.

Peter got his wrists free and is now working on his ankle ties. As he finishes freeing himself, the door starts opening and Peter resumes to his position when tied.

“Boys, you’re awake now?” A dark voice emerges from the black doorway.

“Why are we here?” Steve boldly replies.

“To answer my questions, that little girl certainly had a lot for me tonight. Now, you have the option to answer and be good boys, or, you can dodge my questions and have her get beaten again. Your choice.” Dimitri says coldly.

“You won’t put your damn hands on her you piece of shit!!!” Peter says, now having a nerve struck after hearing that you have been beaten.

Dimitri laughs at Peter’s reaction, “And what? You think you’re going to do something about it? You’re just a kid, and you’re tied!”

“Am I?” Peter says pouncing onto Dimitri, punching him in the jaw.

“Poor choice little boy.” Dimitri says pulling out a knife.

Dimitri lunges towards Peter with his knife and tries slicing Peter’s arm. Peter dodges Dimitri and elbows Dimitri in the face. Dimitri stumbles behind Peter and takes the opportunity to stab Peter in the shoulder. Peter gasps and lands on a knee in front of Steve. He slowly pulls the knife out of his shoulder and drops it on the floor. This only sets more of a fight in Peter, Peter grapples Dimitri and pulls him to the ground. They both wrestle and each try to knock each other out.

As Peter and Dimitri fight, Steve is in arm’s reach of Dimitri’s knife and uses it to cut the ropes from his wrists. A few moments later Steve has now freed himself and helps Peter knock Dimitri out. Peter exhausted, can still only wonder if you were alright. He didn’t want to take a breath, he needed to save you.

“We have to find Y/N!” Peter tells Steve, now running out of the room.

“Peter hold on, we need to be careful, we don’t know what are doing with her. And what are we going to do with Dimitri? We can’t just leave him like this.” Steve warns Peter of his reckless behavior.

“Do you want me to finish him? Cause I’ll do it!” Peter says very dominantly.

“No! We can’t kill him! We need him for more information. We should tie him up and come back for him once we find Y/N.” Steve explains.

Steve and Peter tie Dimitri to a pipe, making it harder for him to remove himself if he were to wake up.

“We should split up, listen you can climb quietly along the walls and the ceilings and not be seen. I’ll go search areas around here.” Steve leads.

Before Steve could even finish his thought, Peter was already on the ceiling making his way to a room.

“And Peter, be careful!!” Steve’s voice echoes.

You were sitting in a chair with five mutants surrounding you in a circle. Your wrists were bruising from the restraints and they wouldn’t budge no matter how hard you tried.

“Stop struggling, sweetheart.” You hear one of them say. “We don’t want to hurt your beautiful face.”

“Why am I tied up when there’s five of you? Is Dimitri afraid I’ll overpower you.” You question.

The same man turns around and slaps you hard across the face. You cheek stung and became numb in a matter of seconds. What the hell? Why did he hit me?! You think to yourself.

“You don’t talk about Dimitri Toomes like that. Show some respect.” He says enraged.

You decided to push him some more. You didn’t know if it was out of pure courage or pure stupidity.

“Why the fuck would I respect him? He beat me!” You scream.

“That man is the son of Adrian Toomes, he’s among the strongest men in the city!” He defends.

“He’s a child, he’s not strong, I know plenty of stronger men and women than him!” You argue.

The man grows more annoyed and tired of your stubbornness. He pulled his arm back and whipped his hand hard across your face. Your cheek burned and you could taste blood on your tongue. You barely let out a whimper.

“You keep talking, and I’ll fucking end you right here.” He says very seriously.

As Peter is crawling along the walls and ceilings of the concrete hideout, he feels the hairs on his arms stand. His spider senses were going haywire. He sensed you nearby. He could hear muffled voices coming from a room ahead of him, he rushed to the doorway and listened for your voice but instead he only heard cries of pain from you. He crawled into the room and met eyes with you. You smile now knowing you were going to be okay. You wanted to help Peter have a better chance at freeing you. You needed to come up with a distraction and fast.

“Hey, do you hear that?” You say curiously.

“Hear what?”

“There! Did you hear it now? It was a loud slam! It sounds like it’s coming from outside of this room!” You say trying to sound as convincing as possible.

“You better not be lying, Dimitri will torture you and your friends even worse than you imagined.”

“Fine. Don’t believe me. Dimitri might be fighting off both of my friends right now.” You say coy.

The man scoffs and slowly leaves the room not breaking eye contact until he fully leaves. Another man follows for reassurance. Only three men remained in the room. Peter could handle them, these men were much scrawnier compared to the other two men.

Peter slowly crawls down the wall behind you and plans his attack. He looks over to you and makes a web shooting motion with his hand. You nodded, knowing exactly what his idea was.

Peter stuck his wrist out and shot webs at man leaving him stuck on the ground. The other two men were now aware of Peter’s presence and began attacking him.

Peter shoots his webs at one of the remaining men’s wrists, removing his knife. Peter then punches the man’s jaw and swings him down. The other man was more difficult to fight. He was much stronger than Peter anticipated.

Peter swung his fist to make contact with man, the man dodges and makes a quick hit to Peter’s ribs. You could see the pain oozing from his face. You cried for Peter, wanting him to be okay.

“It’s okay, Y/N.” Peter says staggering in his place trying to get his momentum back. Peter tried to take another swing and hits the man in the cheek. The man is slightly fazed, but kicks Peter off his feet. The man puts Peter in a chokehold. You yell at the man to stop.

“You want me to stop? I don’t know, I think loverboy could take some more.” The man taunts.

As the man taunts you, Peter loosens the man’s grip from his neck. “It’s going to take a lot more for you to take me down that easily.” Peter huskily replies to the man.

Peter then elbows the man in the ribs, knocking the wind right out of him. Peter removes himself from him and reverses the positions between them. He then grabs the man’s collar and punches the man hard, knocking him out.

Peter steps back still looking at the man. He is breathing hard. You look Peter over, glancing at all of his wounds. His neck was already bruising, his fists were bloody, his clothes were ripped and bloodied, his jaw was bruised. You also notice a large stab wound in his shoulder. When did he get that?! Peter was a mess and you blamed it on yourself.

“Peter... you’re hurt.” You say with tears in your eyes.

“Y/N, I’m okay, please don’t cry.” He says as he quickly makes his way to you.

You could see him breathing deep and hunch in pain when he makes certain movements.

“No, you’re not Peter. Every time you move I can see it hurts you. You were also stabbed, how long ago did that happen? This is all my fault, if I had been better at lying and not trusting Dimitri none of this would have happened.”

“Y/N this is not your fault at all! Please don’t blame yourself for this. Dimitri tried to fight me and he ended up stabbing me. You don’t have to worry about him, he’s not going to hurt you again. We’re okay, and we’re gonna get out of here.” He says now untying you from your chair.

“I put you into a situation where you got hurt, I couldn’t bare to watch that asshole choke you. I don’t know what I would’ve done if he actually killed you.” You say now sobbing thinking of what the outcome could’ve been.

“He didn’t, you’ve still got me. I would’ve chosen for him to take me down over you getting hurt.” He says comforting.

“I really don’t know what I would’ve done if one of those assholes had you like that. I could hear you crying. That’s how I found you. They’re lucky I didn’t kill them.” He says now getting very tense. You could feel it, being the only one with him.

“Peter?” You say interrupting him.

“Yeah Y/N?

You lean in wrapping your arms around his neck gently to kiss him. He takes control fast and kisses you deeply and sweetly.

“I’ve been wanting to do that since I walked down the stairs back at the compound.” You admit aloud.

“I’ve been wanting to do that since I met you, I just never knew how to tell you and I thought you only liked me as a friend.” Peter says now very shyly.

“And, you kinda took my breath away when you came down the stairs in that dress. You know blue is my favourite colour.” Peter admits.

You cut him off and kiss him again, reassuringly.

“I know! I picked that dress out of Nat’s options for you. I’ve had a crush on you for a long time, Pete.” You confess.

Just as you were leaning in again. Your dad busts the door in finding the both of you in an embrace.

“Y/N! ARE YOU OKAY! THANK GOD I FOUND YOU TWO!” Tony says very relieved.

Steve, Nat, Bruce, and Bucky enter behind and relax finding the both of you safe. Once Steve and Bruce see that you’re both okay, they breakaway from the group to find Dimitri to bring back for questioning.

“Dad! We’re okay! How did you find us?” You say beaming.

“I put a tracker on your bracelet so we could locate you in case of an emergency.” Tony says.

“Wait, I’ve had this bracelet for over a year now. You did just put a tracker on it now right?” You say suspicious.

“...”

“DAD! There’s a thing called privacy! You can’t stalk my every move!!..” As you get mad you slowly realize if it weren’t for your irratic father, you may never have escaped.

“Thanks, dad.” You say running up to him hugging him tightly.

He squeezes back, then realizes who you were hugging moments before when he broke the door down.

“Hey Peter, do you want to explain to me why you were hugging my daughter?” He says protectively.

“Dad! Stop! He saved me, if it weren’t for Pete I wouldn’t have made it.” You say defending Peter.

“And, I love him.”

“Ok.... And we will have a discussion about this later young lady. I don’t like the idea of you using the L word.” He says now leading the way out of the room.

The Avengers follow Tony, you and Peter are left alone for a moment in the room again.

“Thanks for defending me, Y/N. Did you mean that also?” He says softly.

“Yeah I did.” You say placing your hand in his.

You both follow along still hand in hand. “Also, my dad will get over us liking each other. He tells me how great of a guy you are all the time.” You chirp.

“What if he doesn’t? I don’t think he’d think I’m a great guy if I’m dating his daughter.” Peter says slightly concerned.

“Then it’ll be our little secret.” You say whispering to him.

“That’s a secret I could keep.” Peter says now smiling looking back at you.

[sweatersstyles]

This is my contribution to @meetmeinfleetwood​‘s “to lovers” fic challenge! I chose the trope roommates to lovers and the prompt “I think I’m in love with you and I don’t know what to do.” This was fun to write thank you for allowing me to participate!

Thank you to my beta readers @tbslenthusiast​, @witch-harry​, and @sunflowers-styles​! Y’all are the best!!

no warnings that I can think of other than alcohol tw // bc of the wine they share!

word count: 2.3k

writing tag | masterlist

It’s 5:45 p.m. when you finally leave work for the day. You should’ve just said to hell with it and went home at 5:30 like you were supposed to, but you were nice enough not to. Too nice you’d been told in the past, but it’s a flaw you’re willing to accept if it gets you a promotion to the position you ultimately dreamed of working when you started there 3 years ago.

After a quick stop to grab a bottle of wine (or two), your car can’t get you home fast enough. It’s Friday and you’re looking forward to spending time doing absolutely nothing for the next two days but curling up in a blanket and watching Christmas movies in the apartment you will essentially be alone in. Your roommate Harry shared the space with you, but kept to himself for the most part. Aside from dinners and movie nights on rare occasions when your schedule lined up, allowing you to spend the evening together.

As if your thoughts summoned him, your phone dinged, indicating a new message. Your eyes dart down to where it sits in the passenger seat, careful to keep your eyes on the car in front of you, waiting patiently for the light to turn red so you can grab your phone to respond.

It’s one simple word, “Home?” so you know he’s either still working or on his own drive home. 

Your reply is just as direct, “Not yet. On my way! Movie night?” 

The light’s green again so you tuck your phone back into your purse, ignoring the next ding until you arrive home. You’re through the door of your apartment and down the hall before you read his message, “Sure. Chinese or pizza?” 

“Chinese! I’ll pick the movie and you pay for dinner?”

“That doesn’t sound fair :(”

“Alright fine, you get home before I’m out of the shower and in my pajamas you can pick the movie..deal?”

“Deal!”

The race is on then, both of you competitive and determined to win. You have a movie in mind that you’ve been dying to watch all day and you don’t want to have to rock-paper-scissors to break the tie like you usually do when the two of you don’t agree on who wins  these little games. 

You’d already shed most of your layers of clothing easily as you moved through the apartment; your boots kicked off by the door, jacket gone and thrown over the back of one of the kitchen chairs, cardigan pulled from your body and tossed on the bed by the time you made it to your bedroom. It doesn’t take long to strip the rest away and to gather a set of pajamas from your well organized drawer before darting across the hall to the shared bathroom.

You know you have at minimum 45 minutes to be done, an hour if he goes to the better Chinese place a little further across town, which he most likely would. You’d been dreaming of ending your week with a bubble bath, but you don’t take the chance now, just hop under the hot spray of the shower, hoping it will have the same relaxing effect. Your eyes are closed as you tilt your head back to wet your hair while one hand fumbles over the bottles to find your shampoo. 

Eyes still closed, you tip the bottle to add a bit to your hand, but you freeze when you open your eyes temporarily to close the bottle and put it back on the shelf. It’s Harry’s shampoo you’ve grabbed instead and for a moment you don’t know what to do. You don’t know how many times you’ve teased him about how expensive his products are. But he would never let you hear the end of it if he came home and you smelled like him. Ultimately you would’ve felt too guilty to waste it, so you work it through and hope he never finds out. Pray that the act washes away just like the suds do when you rinse them from your hair. 

By your hopeful calculations, you still have about 10 minutes left before he arrives by the time you're done in the shower. You decide to give him a fair advantage, venturing into the kitchen to decide which bottle of wine would pair best with dinner. When you make your selection, you pour yourself a glass, settling into a comfy spot on the couch. The black remote taunts you from the small wooden coffee, and you grab it. No harm in getting the movie ready while you wait, right?

You’re 2 glasses deep and 20 minutes into the movie when he arrives, a smirk on his face at the sight of you. Your eyes go wide when you see him. You’re not sure why, there had been many nights he’d found you in the same position, but tonight feels different. You gulp down the sip of wine, too tipsy and unaware that you’re staring. Had his dimples always been that prominent when he smiled? Even without your glasses you could spot that grin that stretched a mile wide across his face.

“Haroldddd..you’re home!”

He hated that nickname, had always despised when other people called him that, but falling from your lips it sounds like a prayer and he would gladly change his name to that if he thought it would make you the least bit happy.

“S’pose I lost, huh? Got the food pretty quickly but stopped to get this,” He holds up a bottle of wine, ironically the very same kind that you’re drinking now, “Shoulda known y’would already have some!”

“Oh good, you got some for yourself..this one’s almost empty..”

“M’not that late, am I?” He chuckles as he makes his way to the counter, looking between you and the bottle.

“Hey..it’s a small bottle! This is only my third glass and I’ve barely even touched it.”

“Rough day?” He’s pulling plates down now and retrieving a glass for himself from the cabinet.

“Rough week. Rough few weeks, really.” You take a few more sips as you watch him prepare a plate of food. You figure he’s just making his own, and you wait patiently for him to finish so you won’t be in the way. But when he makes his way around the counter, he’s holding two plates in his hand and wow you want to jump from your spot and kiss him. You restrain yourself, as hard as it may be, and try to focus on the question he’s asking you.

He holds the plates towards the table and then towards where you sit on the couch, silently wanting to know where you’d prefer to enjoy your meal. You pat the spot next to you, inviting him to move closer, knowing how much effort it would take to lift yourself from your warm, comfy spot to go eat at the table.

“Emily still on vacation?” 

“Yes! And she expects us to do double the work while she’s gone! It’s her 3rd vacation this year. I know she’s the boss but..”

“Doesn’t mean she has to be a bitch to you.” He finishes your sentence for you, brow furrowed, upset at even the idea of someone mistreating you in the slightest. 

“Right! Thank you!” 

You hold your hand out to accept the plate he’s made for you, “Got our usual, hope that’s alright.”

“Yeah, that’s fine. I was just joking earlier about you paying for all of it. I’ll pay you back for my half.”

He’s already shaking his head no, stuffing a bite of food in his mouth, “It was my turn anyway, r‘member? You paid for those tacos we had last week.”

“Right, I did. Forgot about that.”

You watch him devour a few more bites, your eyes darting from your plate to his, “Yours looks better.”

“Huh?”

Maybe it’s the wine making you more bold, you’d normally never complain, “Your plate it just..looks better than mine. Switch with me.”

“It’s literally the same thing..and I’ve already eaten half the noodles off mine.” He looks mildly annoyed at even the suggestion.

“Don’t care..it looks better. Switch.” You realized just how bratty you sound, so you add a quick, “Please?”

He huffs dramatically, switching the plates and giving you a sarcastic smile, “Happy?”

You return his smile, blissfully unaware of his annoyance in your tipsy state, “Very, thank you.”

You both turn your attention to the tv you realize now you had forgotten to pause, so the movie had progressed further, about 30 minutes in now.

His irritation has already faded when he asks, “What are y’making me watch?”

You start to explain the plot but stop mid-bite of your food, “Wait..have you never seen this movie?”

He shrugs, “Doesn’t look familiar.”

“Oh we’re definitely starting it over then!” 

“No, ya don’t hafta..”

It’s too late, you’ve already discarded your now mostly empty plate of food, nearly knocking your glass of wine over in your excitement of making him watch one of your favorite movies.

Almost an hour in, you don’t notice that Harry’s eyes have drifted to you. In fact, they’d mostly stayed on you since you’d restarted the movie. Your facial expressions were better to him than any movie; the way your eyes softened at the more heartwarming parts, or when your mouth formed a soft ‘o’ and gasped at parts he was certain you had probably seen at least a dozen times before.

You clasp your hand over your heart dramatically and he doesn’t even flinch, just listens intently when you say, “I love this part..this is the moment.”

His eyes temporarily flash back to the tv then, “The moment?”

“Yeah, you know, the moment. Where the guy looks at the girl and realizes he’s in love.” You sigh deeply, “I always wanted someone to look at me like that.”

Oh, you mean like what’s happening now between us? God he hopes for just a glance from you, a chance to show you that you’re living your own moment now if you’d just look at him. 

It’s tumbling out of his mouth quicker than he can stop it, his mouth working faster than his brain, but it’s a low enough whisper he thinks maybe you won’t hear.

“I think I’m in love with you and I don’t know what to do.”

You do hear him, though you don’t believe it at first. Your hand is still resting over your heart, searching his face for any sign of teasing or dishonesty.

“H..did you just..?”

He’s looking down at his hands, fingers fiddling with one of the rings adorning his fingers, nodding before replying, “I did.” 

“How long?”

“Um..since the first week we’ve lived together? That first night we made dinner together and it was a disaster. Thought you were gonna catch the place on fire.” A giggle escapes him at the memory of you, rushing around the kitchen that night, face flushed red and hair a mess.

“That’s my moment? Almost burning our apartment down?”

“That and now, yeah. Just been strugglin’ with the best way to tell you. S’pose the wine’s making me a lil’ more fearless,'' He takes a deep breath, still not able to look at you in case he finds even a hint of rejection on your face, “But I understand if you don’t feel the same..”

“I do.”

His head snaps to look at you then, eyes widening for a second before he composes himself, “Really?”

You can’t stop the smile that blooms across your face at the sight of the thrill in his eyes. There’s a new buzz of elation in the air, but neither of you make a move at first. A pleasant tension fills the space between the two of you.

You break the silence, “So..what do we do now?”

“S’all up to you how fast and how far we take this. M’all in though, ready when you are, love. A cuddle might be nice while we finish the movie, if you’re up f’that.”

“I think I could handle that. I want something else first though.”

He’s trying to read your mind, thinks he knows exactly what it is, but he wants to hear you say it. Wants to hear the words he’s been waiting to hear for what feels like a lifetime now.

“Kiss me, Harry.”

You’ve already turned your body towards him; the movie, the food and the wine all long forgotten. He clears the space between the two of you easily, a hand on the side of your neck to add just enough pressure to pull you towards him.

Your lips crash against his, noses bumping at first but it doesn’t stop you, it only makes you crave him deeper and closer. You press your knees into his thighs, pushing yourself up so that you hover over him, your hair falling around his face. It’s still slightly damp from the shower, and his hand comes to rest on the back of your head now. 

There’s a smug look on his face when he pulls away, a hand still placed on your hip to hold you steady. He’s still breathless when he asks, “Did you use my shampoo?”

When you wake up in his bed the next morning, you question if last night was a mistake. You don’t regret it, not for a second, just wonder if maybe things will be different in the morning light. 

So when you barely touch the plate of eggs and toast he’s made for you for breakfast, he worries you’re having second thoughts about him, that he’s ruined any friendship you’ve already built by rushing into a relationship. 

So when you say, “Did you really mean what you said last night..about loving me?” He visibly relaxes, dropping his shoulders and beaming at you from across his own breakfast plate.

“Oh, darlin’,” He plucks a piece of uneaten toast from your plate, winking at you as he does, “You don’t know the half of it.” 

[bucksblr]

#showyourprocess

From planning to posting, share your process for making creative content!

To continue supporting content makers, this tag game is meant to show the entire process of making creative content: this can be for any creation.

RULES — When your work is tagged, show the process of its creation from planning to posting, then tag 5 people with a specific link to one of their creative works you’d like to see the process of. Use the tag #showyourprocess so we can find yours!

Thank you so much for tagging me @lan-xichens​, I’ll try my best to explain how I made this set from start to finish hehe ♡ and also a big thank you to @suibianjie​ @highwarlockkareena​ @nyx4​ @aheartfullofjolllly​ and you as well Kris for putting this all together! Content creators get a lot less recognition than they deserve for all the time they put into their content, so getting everyone to see the (sometimes excessive) process we all go through to put our content in our blog, I hope it creates a positive change!! 💖

1. Planning

The set in question was actually requested by someone so they could celebrate their friend’s birthday! At first I wasn’t entirely sure if I was going to be able to finish it on time (college is very hectic right now) but I was able to finish it three days before the deadline which was may 1st! ^-^

The first thing I did was decide what characters I wanted to use in the set, I first reached out to the person who requested the set if there were certain characters they wanted me to use but they said they didn’t know enough to really give me any directives outside of the quote. I decided, since the quote is applicable to the entirety of the show, that I would try to put in as many characters as possible.

Thus, of course, came the hunting for scenes. Those of you in the net discord surely know I came into the content help channel a few times to ask for certain scenes here and there, and eventually I had to download an additional 10 episodes to the back then 20 or so episodes I had in my CQL episodes folder.

As you can see I have 30 random episodes of CQL downloaded (slowly but surely getting to the point where I have all 50 episodes downloaded) and I think I ended up using scenes out of at least 20 of those episodes.

I planned out beforehand what characters I would use per gif. I knew obviously I would start out with Wangxian, them being the main characters of the show, and then would work my way down the list. The second gif consists of Nie Huaisang, Nie Mingjue, Jin Zixuan, Jiang Yanli, Wen Qing, and Wen Ning. They’re all family pairings, two being siblings and one being a married couple. The next gifset consists of the Yi City characters, then the fourth gif consists of the juniors, and the final gif has Jin Guangyao, Mianmian, Jiang Cheng, and Lan Xichen in it.

I have to admit though that when I had made the first four gifs I’d forgotten who I would put in the last gif and the when I thought about it the first time around I could only think of Lan Qiren and the very cursed Yaoyang ship 😭 it was only at dinner time that same day that I remembered I hadn’t put Jiang Cheng in my gifset yet and that’s when I thought of the other characters as well.

I had already made my first two gifs when I went to check Hanyi’s blog for layout inspo and eventually I decided I wanted to try a triangle-ish layout, which I doodled below. I eventually ended up changing the layout of the last gif in the final design. It was also the first time I would work with a triangle-ish layout so I was a bit nervous as I was scared it wasn’t going to work out...

2. Creating

I use Avisynth 2.5 and Adobe Photoshop 2021 (the paid version, unfortunately, I need it for school except I didn’t need it this year but I wanted it so I paid for it with my own money ouch) to make my gifsets! I always start out with trimming down all the scenes I’m going to use into three to five second videos and putting them through Avisynth. This time around I did it separately for each gif I made, simply because I needed so many scenes. I would include a screenshot of my “gif vids” and “temp” folders but I’ve already deleted all the videos, which is what I usually do immediately after a set is posted.

I’ll try my best explaining this gif by gif since each one had a different layout!

2.1 Wangxian

I think I had up to five different designs of this gif 😭 it started out with the gif on the left originally being more centered and the quote right smack in the center but somehow it felt a bit too... empty? I changed up the design and pulled the gif over to the right and put the two closeups on the left, the exact opposite of the gif I eventually ended up with. I switched things around one more time and saved the gif as you can see it right now, except I didn’t include the lines yet. It was only as I finished up my fourth gif that I decided this gif needed lines as well so I added them ^-^

2.2 Nie Huaisang, Nie Mingjue, Jin Zixuan, Jiang Yanli, Wen Qing, and Wen Ning

I got the inspiration for the font layout on this gif from this Wenzhou post! I hadn’t tried it before and when I did for this gif I was very happy with the way it turned out :D I wanted to portray that life is a pile of good and bad things, as the quote says, in CQL by mirroring these happy scenes side by side with the sad scenes

2.3 Yi CIty

My first time working with the triangle layout!! Putting in the lines and making sure they would line up with the second gif took me the longest of all actually  😭 I think once I got the line on the left in I just copy pasted it and flipped it horizontally so I didn’t have to fiddle around with angling it anymore :’) my original idea was to get a happy Song Lan scene and a sad A-Qing scene, but when I stumbled upon this A-Qing scene in ep38 I just had to put it in there because her smile is so precious 🥺 Xue Yang and Xiao Xingchen in the center are also supposed to be mirrored, with Xue Yang embodying the “bad things” and Xiao Xingchen the “good things” ! I also think the Yi City characters fit this part of the quote very well!!

2.4 The Juniors

Ah yes, the junior quartet!! :D I had this planned out from the very beginning, that I would include happy versus sad juniors in the “vice versa” part of the quote, and I think it worked out quite well! My first idea was to put the “vice versa” completely in the special font and have it typed out over the gifs like I did with the “vice” but as I typed out the “versa” I realized it had one letter too much to be able to do that 😭😭 it took me a while to come up with how I would position the “but” and “versa” and after some moving around I decided to just place them the way I did in the final gif! For the font, I duplicated the “vice” and added a stroke to the duplicate, then I changed the fill setting to 0% so I could slightly drag the duplicate away from the original layer to create the effect that’s in the gif — also, finding a scene in which Jin Ling smiles is really difficult.... he barely even smiles in the scene I ended up using :(

2.5 Jin Guangyao, Mianmian, Jiang Cheng, and Lan Xichen

The final gif!! I feel like this might come a little across as “I promise I didn’t forget these characters” because they’re a very odd quadruplet to put together, but they were the most important characters left to put in the set! I was thinking of putting Nie Mingjue in here together with Jin Guangyao and Lan Xichen, but I did feel he fit more with his brother up in the second gif. Mei @mylastbraincql​ cheered me on making this gif for which I was very grateful :D <3 the layout came to be after I googled “how to evenly split a rectangle in four” because I didn’t want a repeat layout in the set  (*/∇＼*)

2.6 Coloring

For the coloring I pretty much did all of the tweaking on the first gif and then copy pasted all of it onto the second, third, fourth, and fifth gif. This is usually the way I go about my coloring, I will always edit certain gifs if necessary but I don’t think I had to change the coloring much on any of these gifs? Maybe I added in a curve layer here and there, but nothing major! This is really one of my preferred coloring styles, even though I try to step outside of my comfort zones with other sets ^-^

3. Posting

I will always upload sets into my drafts and edit the caption in there as well, clicking on “preview post” a couple times to check everything looks good on my blog as well, before I post a set. However, this time, since there was a deadline and I finished before the deadline, I put this set in the queue so it would automatically post on the 1st of may! Knowing myself, I would’ve forgotten to do so </3

Whew that was... a lot 😭 did it make any sense? Probably not, but it was fun to ramble （ ´∀｀）

I’ll tag

@blinkplnk​ with this set !

@wuxien​ with this set !

@wendashanren​ with this set !

@wanyinxichen​ with this set !

@yibobibo​ with this set !

@mylastbraincql​ with this set !

@sugarbabywenkexing​ with this set !

@yiling-recesses​ with this set !

@jiancheng​ with this set !

Please feel totally free to ignore this if you’ve already been tagged and don’t want to do it again!! <3