#that doesn’t mean the others forgive her by any means and those who cut her off still maintain that

[watchfuldeer]

last night i went to a really fun and informal fundraiser evening with jesse and lucy at westminster school, where they were interviewing each other. i got to ask a question which i’ve mused upon for some time about tom, shiv and greg. enjoy! full transcript under cut

Transcript

me: so i’m gonna have to look at what i wrote down.

jesse: that’s alright, you’re highly in credit since you know more about the show than us. more about john berryman.

(laughter)

lucy: tell us what we’ve done wrong so far!

me: god, no. i wouldn’t! so my question, this is a character based question, and one thing that probably got a bit subsumed in the fourth season just because everything was happening. but i’d like to know more about tom and shiv, and also greg. because my read on the situation between the three of them is that greg is a source of marital strife (laughter) that shiv never noticed, and what would it have taken for shiv to notice the depth of greg’s presence in their marriage.

jesse: uh huh.

me: and tom’s attachment to him.

jesse: uh huh. sometimes you get little bits in life or you see something and you’re like, i wish we were making the show, because i suddenly do want to hear shiv say ‘greg you’re a source of marital strife’.

(laughter)

jesse: that’s like, when you’re like, that’s gonna be in, we’re not gonna cut that.

lucy: absolutely.

jesse: (doing greg voice) wh-wh-what?!

(laughter)

lucy: yeah. well we enjoyed that, didn’t we. we had a scene in america decides, which was the only scene between shiv and greg.

jesse: oh yeah.

lucy: the election episode in the final season where she takes him into a little room and threatens him.

me: ah, but it’s jealousy over lukas, over the greg and lukas thing, and it’s like, have you forgotten your husband, who is also very attached to this limpet?

lucy: yeah. i would also say that there are marriages in which a third party is not an unuseful thing, as well. not in a forgiving way about infidelity, but i would say that there are things that tom can express with and at and on greg (laughter) as it were, to greg, that are useful because he’s both a - you know the great, the interesting thing about tom is that he’s both a courtier and a bully. he’s that rare combination of someone who you totally believe as being almost like (mimes bowing and doffing cap) ‘oh yes sorry thank you yes ma’am’ and also like, ‘i’m gonna kill you’ and that juxtaposition is what makes him so interesting.

but in his marriage to shiv he has no real way, until quite late i guess in the final season, where we explore it, to hold power over her and to use that part of himself. so he’s accepted the acquiescing, he’s accepted the role of courtier in that marriage, and greg is quite a useful place where he gets to express all of that, the bully in him so that maybe it doesn’t have to come out in the marriage. which might be bad, because perhaps it should do and then the marriage would’ve ended much earlier, yknow, when shiv would just be like ‘i’m not dealing with you challenging me in any way’. so it’s not until that balcony scene i think where he really challengers her much at all. possibly the beach scene, where he sort of says that he’s considered leaving her, and how that would feel. but with aggressive challenge? it’s all directed at greg, and greg is allowed to be the place where all those feelings go.

me: but the affection - there’s also affection between them.

jesse: YEAH. and i think that’s the other thing maybe you’re alluding to is like, she… i think, some things you know you’re putting in the show because you talk about them and other things just naturally occur, and audiences and people tell you what the show is and what you put in there and you didn’t even realise, but i think we were aware of this - she’s oblivious. her obliviousness is a big part of her wealth and her upbringing and… so there’s something homoerotic going on between greg and tom.

me: i mean it’s not for me to say.

(laughter)

jesse: and does she… i think there’s two ways of reading that, either she’s oblivious, and that’s intriguing and possible. the other is that she sort of - there’s a scene in, you know that one, in the sun valley media conference in argestes, where we wrote a bit where shiv shows up unexpected and tom’s sort of flirting with someone, and it never really landed that much. i think we were like, oh this really gonna, shiv’s gonna spark up when she sees him flirting with someone. and it’s one of those things where you were like, you know what? i don’t think she gives a hoot, really, does she.

(laughter)

jesse: it’s like, she hasn’t got that, that’s not in her belly, that fear of loss.

lucy: no.

jesse: so i think that goes, that probably goes for a same-sex relationship or flirtation as much as it does for with a woman.

lucy: i think that’s true.

jesse: like she really… even if he was like - and this is not the way that tom would be like - ‘i think i’d like to sleep with greg’, i think she’d be like (mimes looking at watch) ‘when?’.

(laughter)

jesse: (as shiv) ‘not when i’m in the city, that’s weird, tom’.

(laughter)

jesse: i don’t think she’d have any fundamental objection to that.

lucy: that’s true. i think jealousy is quite a low status emotion.

jesse: yes.

lucy: and i think that she would struggle to feel it.

(jesse laughs)

lucy: even if it was present in some way, she would never be able to access it because it would put her too much at a disadvantage. so i think yeah exactly that, it would be like, ‘oh i guess you’re going to fuck that boring woman now are you, tom’ or do that, like… she has to be here (mimes one hand above another hand) so jealousy can’t really be accessed by her. so she might be irritated by greg, but in the way you would be by a mosquito.

me: to her detriment.

lucy: to her detriment, sure, ultimately yeah.

[hibiscusol]

IVY - rafe cameron .⋆·˚ ༘ *

navigation ! masterlist

warnings: language and mentions of alcohol

summary: rafe came back after swearing he never would.

author's note: we are sooo back guys :]

The moment Rafe’s hand snaked up your waist after three years of no contact, your mind went full-blank.

You never thought that Rafe, of all people - who are you kidding, you always did - would come back one day after swearing on his dad that he never would.

It’s not like he ever really liked his dad anyway.

So as you turned around in shock to connect your drunk glossy eyes to his, it felt wrong. So wrong. Sarah had told you he’d found someone new. That he’d found a pretty blonde who looked better next to him. She’d never say it to your face, but the pictures you’d see on his account screamed it at you.

It took you a second to remember that he probably mistook you for her, and you take a step back, shaking your head quickly.

“Wait, Y/N,” He whispers, and even in the bustling crowd, it reaches you just fine. You wait and turn, feeling dizzy. “Excuse me?” You say, too stunned to make up any other words. You want to shove him away and scream at him, yet his fucking beautiful blue eyes hold you in place. 

“Can we talk? By my bike?” He says, inching a little closer so that his voice would reach you. His body towers over yours and the blue and purple lights dim a little.

“No?!” You say defensively, making it sound more like a question. “Who even are you?” You say jokingly, your freshly manicured hand landing on his shoulder and pushing him slightly away. He doesn’t resist. He takes a step back and puts his hands up in understanding. “Y/N. Please. I need to tell you some things I needed to tell you all those years ago.” 

You feel your eyes sting, and a tear rolls away. You instantly turn away from him to the backyard, looking at all the half-naked people in the pool, even though your eyes are getting blurry.

He doesn’t say anything. He knows you. He waits for you to turn around.

“Your drinking problem never went away, did it?” You finally manage, barely saying it without crying. Your voice breaks, but he doesn’t notice it with the loud sound of bass-boosted Travis Scott playing in the background.

“No, Y/N, I know I’m drunk. Which is probably why I’m not rethinking this. Just 5 minutes. Please.” He says, frowning. He sounds like he’s going to cry too.

“Isn’t she here?” You spit out, rolling your eyes. Your heart has never beaten so fast before. You believe him. It must’ve been a big deal if it’s still breaking him after three years. “I tried to make me and her work. She’s not you.” He says and your heart stops.

It fucking stops.

“Rafe, stop it. You’re being mean,” You say, raising your voice. You don’t want to believe him. You don’t want to believe all the tears you shed were for nothing. You don’t want to believe when Sarah told you herself that his brother sucked, you felt like the only person who understood yourself. You hated him, yet you loved him too. And you didn’t want to believe he was sorry. You wanted to get the closure and move on. But every day, you found yourself refusing to take the picture of you and him off your bedstand. Just in case this happened.

“Mean? Y/N, what are you saying? I…” He says and you interrupt. “No, Rafe, I’m not fucking falling for this again.” You say and shake your head. Your hands are feeling so empty. You want to grab his flesh, hug him, and tell him you forgive him. For ignoring your calls when things would be rough at home all those years ago. For getting wasted and coming home, yelling at you because his dad had cut his only source of income for his rich shit. You wanna tell him it’s okay, that he was 17 and you know he didn’t know life isn’t just about that. But you can’t. Because what if he doesn’t think that like you do? What if that girl is waiting for him to come back with her drink?

“For what? Baby, I…” His voice breaks again when he calls you baby, and your body stiffens. He sounds broken and you can’t help but put your hand on his shoulder. “Don’t call me that,” You say, making it sound like advice and not a threat. “You should leave, you’re not feeling okay. You’re out of your…” You say and he shakes his head. “No, Y/N, I’m not okay because you won’t let me talk to you. I didn’t want to ruin your night, I just… I have to tell you how I feel. I’ve bottled it up for too long.”

A tear rolls down your face, and he notices it. “Don’t cry, I’m… I’m sorry.” There you go. He’s said it. He’s sorry.

The magic word. It goes through your brain and every single cell, making you shiver. You nod involuntarily, wiping your tears away with the palm of your hand. “You’re crying too.” You say, looking down at the space between the two of you. He’s wearing the shoes you bought him for his 17th birthday.

“I am.” He says and sniffs, looking away. He chuckles to lighten the mood and lets out a sigh. “I’m sorry for everything. I was a kid and I didn’t realize what I was doing wrong. I know better now.” He says and nods repeatedly. 

“And I’m not with her. I… we didn’t even like each other like that. She once asked me if I was gay because of how uninterested I was.” He says and you laugh. The fact that something not even funny could sound funny coming out of his mouth makes you blush. He smiles from ear to ear when he hears your laugh. “I missed that laugh.” He whispers.

“So… do you forgive me?” He says and your smile disappears. “Wait, Y/N, don’t be like that. I’ve changed. I’ll change more. I’ll change however you want if it means I’ll have you again…”

“Okay, Rafe, I understand.” You say and nod. “I just… why three years? Where were you?” You say and rub your forehead.

He takes a deep breath and puts his drink down. He hesitates to cup your face, but then you give him the nod of permission, and he does. “Because I wasn’t in a good enough place to be with you. I wanted you to be with someone you truly deserved, even if it wasn’t me.”

The next few seconds happen before you can digest his words. His lips part and gently crash onto yours, making your breath get stuck in your throat. His head leans forward and his thumb caresses your jawline as you melt into him. You smile through the kiss and your arms snake around his neck, pulling him closer. 

He pulls away abruptly and you frown. “Wha…” You try to protest but he stops you. “As much as I would love to keep on kissing you and more, I’m not here for this tonight. I’m not too drunk to drive so let’s go under that one tree we always hung out under. Come on.” His words make you chuckle as he pulls on your hand through the crowd, leading you to his bike. No matter how intoxicated you both are, you feel safe with him for the first time, because you know he’s not the same person he was all those years ago.

[livwritesstuff]

Question- do Steve and Eddie (mostly Eddie) only do the fun, lighthearted pranks? Does Eddie ever try a “meaner” prank (i.e., “I hit your car with mine,” *waking from a dead sleep* “get up my boyfriend is coming,” ‘not saying I love you before leaving,’ etc.)? How does Steve (yes, he’s a therapist, but there’s still a trauma response because of what he went through) react to it?

I 100% think Eddie pulled some shit earlier in their relationship (like, pre-kids era) that he learned real quick not to repeat for the sake of his relationship with Steve (which he really does value, no matter how many of his behaviors might contradict that).

Like, maybe he once answered a phone call, and when Steve asked who it was (it was Robin), he said, “Oh, no one. Just my other boyfriend.”

(Robin just said, “Jesus fucking Christ, Eddie,” and hung up).

Steve did not appreciate that one at all, obviously.

I also feel like Eddie might have gotten somewhat lax about Hazel’s adoption (because it was their third go of it at that point and they already had her older sisters and they had the same judge as the last two, which made it basically a shoe-in in Eddie’s eyes, so he didn’t really feel like he needed to be all that checked-in), and maybe Will is learning how to use Photoshop for editing at the time, so Eddie sends him a picture of Hazel being tossed up into the air by Eddie and asks him to edit it to look like she’s way higher up than she actually is because, to him, that’s funny, and he thought Steve might find it funny too.

He turned out to be very incorrect. Steve was incredibly upset, and they ended up having a very long argument about it (because, in Steve’s opinion, that photo in the wrong hands meant game over for their adoption case, and he would never forgive Eddie if he did something to screw up the adoption).

As Eddie gets older, he finds the mean pranks less and less funny.

I feel like the only people who really find those meaner pranks funny are young people – kids and very young adults, so Hazel sees that leave without saying I love you trend on TikTok and doesn’t see any issue with it at all, but when she tries to convince Eddie to try it on Steve, he outright refuses.

“Oh c’mon,” Hazel goads, “I bet it’d be funny.”

“Nope,” Eddie replies, because he knows for a fact how that kind of thing cuts deeper for Steve than their kids realize, “Not doing it, Haze. Give it up already.”

[musaaaaalo]

Mean!Sevika Headcanons

Minors DNI + requests are open <3

Mean!Sevika who is Intimidating Presence, she has a naturally intimidating presence, often using it to her advantage to get what she wants. People tend to steer clear of her, knowing she’s not someone to be messed with.

Mean!Sevika who is Sarcastic and Cutting,She frequently uses sarcasm and biting remarks, not holding back when it comes to making others feel small. Her sharp tongue is one of her most formidable weapons.

Mean!Sevika who’s Uncompromising, Sevika is known for being extremely stubborn and set in her ways. Once she’s made up her mind, there’s no changing it, and she expects others to fall in line with her decisions.

Mean!Sevika who is Ruthless in Business ,In the undercity, Sevika is known for her ruthless business practices. She doesn’t hesitate to exploit weaknesses and manipulate others to secure her position and resources.

Mean!Sevika who is Cold and Distant, She maintains a cold and distant demeanor, rarely showing any vulnerability. Even those who work closely with her find it hard to get past her tough exterior.

Mean!Sevika who is Merciless Fighter In combat, Sevika is brutal and merciless. She fights with a ferocity that leaves her opponents battered and demoralized, ensuring no one dares challenge her authority.

Mean!Sevika who is Unforgiving ,Sevika holds grudges and doesn’t forgive easily. If someone crosses her, they’re likely to find themselves facing severe consequences, as she never forgets a slight.

Mean!Sevika who is Manipulative, She’s a master manipulator, often playing people against each other to maintain her power. She’s adept at reading others and exploiting their weaknesses for her gain.

Mean!Sevika who has High Standards ,Sevika expects a lot from those around her and isn’t afraid to call out incompetence or failure. She demands excellence and doesn’t tolerate mistakes lightly.

Mean!Sevika who is Self-Reliant (periodt), She’s fiercely independent and rarely asks for help. Sevika prefers to rely on her own skills and resources, often seeing dependency on others as a sign of weakness.

Requests are open!!! Please feel free to request aracane stuff <3

[cameronspecial]

Assisting In Deception (Part 10)

Pairing: Rafe Cameron x Reader

Warnings: Sexual Jokes

Pronouns: She/Her

Word Count: 4.1K 

Summary: Can Rafe do whatever he can to get his happily ever after with Y/N?

A/N: This is the final part and I hope you enjoy it! I am going to miss writing for these two because I love their dynamic.

Masterlist

The news had gotten out, not only about Y/N and Rafe’s break up but also about their relationship being only for the media and wedding. A lower-level lawyer at Cameron Development had found their contract and after the breakup was made public by someone at the company, she thought it was a good time for a payday. In true media fashion, Y/N was crucified for being a whore and materialistic, while Rafe was praised for being such a great boyfriend to her even when the relationship was fake. The double standard bothers Rafe way more than it did Y/N. She has finally learned not to take anything to heart. Rafe on the other hand knows how much those labels sunk into her skin, especially since he called her those exact same things. He has done every single possible interview he could to clear her name, but no outlet would really listen to his words. 

Not to mention, his father’s anger just adds to his feeling of guilt. Ward screamed about how Rafe could treat her that way and he should’ve made the relationship real as soon as he knew he was falling for her. Ward wasn’t upset at the lie; instead, his feelings were more focused on the fact that his son had let love go.

Rafe is going to get her back though and this is the only thing he has ever been a hundred percent sure about in his entire life. The long days without the refreshing smell of strawberry shampoo and the long nights without the soft whispers from her sleeping lips are driving him insane. Every morning and night he reaches out to pull her into his warmth, always being left empty-handed. 

He thinks of a thousand ways to make it up to her, but he doesn’t know what to do. He decides to go to the one person who he knows could help him with her. “Juni, please talk to me. I need your help,” he begs, wedging his foot between the door and its frame to stop it from shutting in his face. The shorter girl shakes her head, “She is very angry at you. I don’t know what I can do for you. We both know she doesn’t mess around and that’s exactly what you did, Big C” His eyes flicker to the carpeted floors of the hallway, dragging his left foot back and forth across it. “You don’t need to think about anything. I just need you to send her food every week. I’ll give you my card number so you can charge it to me because I know she won’t take it if I put my name on it,” he states. His hand reaches into his pocket to pull out his card. Her head tilts and her eyebrows frow together to become one.

“If this is about getting her back, then what’s the point of sending her the food without your name?” 

“It’s not about her forgiving me or taking me back. I just want to make sure that she can still eat out. I know she’ll get frugal about her money while she is figuring out a new budget with her new income and she won’t factor in getting take-out into her budget until everything else is taken care of. Her accountant degree will definitely kick in.” 

“That’s really sweet. And I know what you mean, she’s already started cutting her own expenses on groceries. I’ve never seen her go more than a day without having coffee from the shop downstairs. It’s weird.” 

“Exactly, so do it for me, please. I just want her to be happy and cared for.”

“Fine, you are lucky that I was rooting for you guys.” 

“Thank you! Thank you so much! Let me know if you guys need anything else, okay? Nothing is too big.” 

“I know Y/N needs a trip to Cabo, but under my name.” 

He gives her a playful smile with the tilt of his head. She shrugs, “I tried. Let me know if you need any help with your plan.” Rafe nods at her offer. “I will. Thank you again,” he says, walking away from the apartment after their goodbyes. 

——

Y/N sits at her desk looking at the number on her screen. They start to merge together and she wants to bang her head against the wall. She got a job as an accountant’s assistant and she is not exactly thrilled with it, but it made the most sense because of her degree. She needed a job and she didn’t have the time to try to figure out what is the right career for her. Her boss has gone to lunch but needed her to stay behind to finish up this budget. 

The noise from the door draws her focus to Lydia, the secretary for the office. Nutmeg and parsley fill the room with its aroma. Her mouth salivates as it smells exactly like her favourite creamy mushroom gnocchi. The brown bag with a familiar logo sits in Lydia’s hand. “A delivery guy brought this over. Said it was from Juni,” she explains, placing it on her desk before exiting. Y/N grins at the bag and her hands draw together near her chest. Her shoulders sway from side to side in a little dance. She opens the bag, letting the food overwhelm her senses. With her phone in hand, she takes a selfie of herself hovering over the food and sends it to Juni with a thank you. The food hits her taste buds and she wants to melt as the creamy goodness settles in. 

——

“Sir, all of your meetings, appointments and business dinners are on your calendar. I took the liberty of decolour-coding the calendar and rearranged it in a manner that each happens in the same time frame every day. It makes more sense like that. All your meetings are arranged in the afternoon. Appointments in the mornings. And obviously the business dinners in the evening,” Ricardo debriefs, showing Rafe with his tablet what he meant. Rafe isn’t too pleased that Ricardo changed Y/N’s system, but he knows it’s because he is holding on to any piece of her he can. It isn’t Ricardo’s fault that she left. Rafe acknowledges he heard his assistant, “Okay, sounds good. Thank you. You may go back to your desk now.” 

Ricardo does as he is told and heads to his desk. The ding from Rafe’s phone immediately attracts his attention. He scrambles to pull it out of his pocket and opens the text from Juni. The screenshot she sent makes the clock stop spinning for just a second. The smile on Y/N’s face is enchanting and he wishes he saw the little dance he knew she did after taking the food out. He sends a thank you back and practically begs her to send him the actual photo so that he can save it to his camera roll. Once she does, he lets out a sigh of happiness. This is who he is trying to fight to get back. 

——

How do you make up for pushing your not-real girlfriend, but the girl you are totally in love with, away is not a Google search that has a lot of results. Something big and grand would scare her away. Something small and intimate doesn’t feel like enough. And there really isn’t a middle ground when it comes to gestures. He always defaults to food, so he wants to do something different from his norm. The sounds of his socked feet dragging against the hardwood floor bounce off of the walls as he paces the room. His head darts to the space over his bed and he stops. He takes in the painting he bought from Nancy. Each stroke comes together to show the emotions he felt at that moment and he knows the perfect way to prove to Y/N what he feels for her. 

——

When she opens the door, Nancy isn’t expecting to see her sister’s fake ex-boyfriend standing behind it. “What do you want?” she growls, crossing her arms. It is clear that her crush on him is gone with the way he upset Y/N. He looks at her with pleading eyes, “Hey Little Artist, I need your help. Please.” Her cheeks start to redden, but he can tell that it isn’t because of embarrassment or her small crush. 

“Why should I help you? You called my sister a gold digger. Do you know how much she is hurting right now? If anything I should be trying to figure out how to hide your body.”

“I know. I’m sorry that I hurt her and I want to tell her this too. I just need your help with how I execute this apology.”

“Well, I don’t want to.”

“Little Artist, please. I love your sister so much and I can’t handle knowing that I’ve made her feel bad about herself. I just want to apologize and show her her worth again. If she tells me to get lost after I do, then I promise she will never hear or see me again. I just want her to be happy.”

Nancy looks him in the eyes and her anger lessens at what she sees. Rafe is practically in tears at the thought of what he has done. His words have really hit home for her. “Fine, I’ll help you. But you are buying me food.” 

“Wow, you really do take after your sister.” 

��—

Nancy watches over his shoulder as he sketches onto the canvas. The look she makes at the outline causes him to turn towards him. “What did I do wrong?” he asks, immediately erasing the mark he just made. Her hand stops his movement, “No, it’s not that. It’s just that this is great and all, but you aren’t capturing anything deep. I don’t feel the emotion you are trying to convey right now. Just make sure when you are painting to try to bring what you are trying to say to life. But don’t worry about it for now.” He takes in her advice and keeps doing what he is told. 

The next day he starts painting. He is a lot more nervous about making the first mark than he thought he would be. “Would you stop being a big baby and just start?” Nancy complains, trying to push the paintbrush in his hand onto the canvas. His strength halts her attempt, “No, I can’t. I have to make this perfect, Little Artist. I need to show your sister how sorry I am.” “Trying to make it perfect isn’t going to work. The raw emotion you put into it is what is going to make it perfect. So turn your brain off and start,” she commands. She goes over to her own canvas to do some work. He takes a deep breath and takes a leap of fate in himself by completing the first stroke. 

——

For weeks, Juni has been sending Y/N food every single day at the office. Y/N has tried to tell her that leftovers are okay to eat for lunch, but she doesn’t appear to listen. Y/N questioned how Juni could’ve gotten the money and was met with the promise that her work has added a lunch plan for two in her contract. This doesn’t sound any bit true to Y/N, but she goes along with the lie. The headphones over her ears make her oblivious to the world around her. She opens the door to the dark apartment, grooving to the music. The routine she moves through when she gets home goes smoothly until she gets to her bedroom. 

The thin large square package leaning against her bed is not a part of that routine. She approaches the gift, looking for any indication of who sent it or how it got into her room. Her first thought is to ask Juni if she knows anything and is met with the answer to her question. You got a package this morning when you left. I brought it into your room, Sweetie. This eases her worry that someone has broken into her room. She puts her purse away and starts tearing into the wrapping paper. The painting she finds brings tears to her eyes. Years of living with Nancy means Y/N knows a little bit about painting, so she knows the technique is nowhere near perfect. Yet, the meaning it is trying to convey is clear to the woman. She can feel the emotion he felt while he painted it. There could only be one person who made this for her. 

The subject of the painting: her, specifically from a picture of her when they went to Greece. They had found a little cafe near the beach and she was completely in love with the saragli and baklava he bought her. She was too occupied enjoying the nutty and sticky pastry to notice him taking her picture. The painting isn’t a good likeness to her. Her nose is a little too close to her lips and her eyes are wider apart than in actuality, but the lighting tells her everything she needs to know. She remembers the picture vividly and knows that it isn’t accurate to the day. Instead, the light paints her in a golden light that makes her look ethereal. The love he feels for her comes across with every golden stroke on the canvas. Her anger starts to vanish. 

She doesn’t know how she knows, but she heads to the front door. Y/N opens the door to find Rafe waiting with bubble tea in his hand. “The painting was amazing. It doesn’t make up for what you said though,” she comments, moving out of the way for him to come in. He does and sets the drinks on the kitchen island, “I know. I was hoping the bubble tea would make up for the rest of it.” 

“You and I both know that’s not what I am waiting for, Boss.”

“I know… I’m sorry, Butterfly. I have never thought that you were a gold digger. I was hurting because I didn’t like seeing you with another guy.”

“Just because you are hurting, it doesn’t mean you get to hurt me.” 

“That’s true. And I want to prove to you that I don’t truly think those things. But I’m going to have to be around you for that to happen. So if you feel the same way about me as I think you do, then please let me back into your life. I missed your excited squeals about food or watching you play with Dax. He misses you too you know.” 

“I miss him too. I just don’t know if I’m ready to forgive you.” 

He steps toward her, reaching for her hand. His fingertips graze hers before she lets his large hand envelop hers. His lips brush the shell of her ear, “I am prepared to wait for eternity to get you back.” Her eyebrows form a caterpillar as she gives him a trying look. “What if it takes an eternity and one day?” she pushes. His other arm pulls her flush against his chest by the waist, “I’d beg on my knees an eternity and a hundred days if you want.” “On your knees, huh? How about on your knees between my thighs?” Y/N whispers, lips ghosting his. She can basically feel his lips on hers. “I thought I was apologizing to you? But I’ll be on my knees between wherever you want. So, are we going to give me another chance?” 

“I think I have to think about it.” 

He chuckles at her playful tone, “Well, I hope you don’t mind me doing this.” She takes the lead and brings his lips to hers. Their lips move in tandem like a well-oiled machine. Her hands twist in his hair and he plays with the bottom of hers. This is where they are meant to be. She is who he is meant to be with. 

——

A year. A year of bliss as her official boyfriend. Although Rafe likes to count the time they spent faking dating as the start of their relationship, he knows Y/N likes the beginning of their relationship to be the day she found his painting in her room. She believes it’s more romantic that way. Now, she’s spent the last six months living in his apartment with him. He gets to wake up every day with her and go to sleep beside her every night. 

After they got together, Y/N didn’t go back to work for him and he completely understood why. She wanted to find someplace for herself in the world, which she did. Her love of food turned into an Instagram account reviewing different places around the city. It’s grown quite the following, but nothing so great that she would quit her job as an assistant accountant. Rafe insisted that he would take care of her while she pursued this passion, but ever the planner she is, she said that she wants a steady income to make some savings for herself first. Plus, accounting is a little more bearable when she can devour delicious food for money after work. 

Y/N is away at a work conference for the week and the empty house makes Rafe feel a little lonely. Dax keeps him company, but waking up the first day she is away is normally the hardest for him. Over the last six months of living together, they have grown into a well-synced routine with each other that is currently broken. Rafe would normally wake up earlier than needed so they could get ready for work together and he could drive her to her office before he gets to work himself. He tried offering to buy her a car, but she is very keen on saving up for one herself and he is not about to take away her independence. He sadly walks to the bathroom, getting ready to brush his teeth by himself. His hand reaches for the toothbrush and is met with the sound of paper rustling against his finger. He looks down to see a Post-it note on his toothbrush: I’m sorry I had to go away for work, but I love you, always, Boss. He smiles at the little note and feels his mood start to lift immediately. 

The next note he finds is in his car. The sun was in his eyes while he was getting ready to pull out of the parking spot, so he put down the sun visor, only for a small paper square to float down onto his lap. Did you know that 90% of drivers sing behind the wheel? So sing your heart out to Call Me Maybe, Boss. He loves it when she gives him random facts. He opens his phone case so he can keep it safe to put it with all the others. He’s kept every single Post-it note she has ever written for him, even the ones she wrote when she started as his assistant. 

By the third note, he guesses that the rest of the time that Y/N is away he is just going to be finding them everywhere. Ricardo walks in like he normally does every morning to give him a detailed rundown of his day. “The last thing of note is that Ms. Y/L/N has ordered me to give you this today,” Ricardo finishes, handing Rafe a blue piece of paper. He waits for Ricardo to leave before reading it. What do you call a butterfly that can fly faster than any other butterfly? A betterfly. He laughs at the horrible joke and texts her the laughing emoji. He knows she’ll know why without any context. He waits for a response and receives the kissy face emoji. 

He gets home from work and is getting ready to feed Dax when he finds the next one. He doesn’t know how he didn’t notice the note sticking to the jar when he fed Dax this morning but he shrugs it off. Confusion crosses his face when he reads it though. Hi Daddy, Mommy wanted to let you know that I’m not going to be an only child soon. Love, Dax. Why in the world would Dax not be an only child soon? Is this her way of telling him she is adopting another dog? Dax whines for the food and snaps him out of his thoughts. He’ll just have to call her later to ask. 

The phone call he plans to make gets quickly forgotten and he is watching TV at the moment. However, Dax’s scratching at one of the guest bedroom doors removes Rafe from the couch. He goes upstairs to see what is going on, opening the door to see what Dax wants. The dog immediately enters the room and hops on the bed to his favourite chew toy that has somehow got in there. He heads over to take the toy into the living room so he can keep an eye on Dax. He stops at the contrast of the bright pink sticky notes against the light gray sheets. “Huh, why would mommy leave a note here? We never go in here,” he asks the occupied dog. Rafe takes a second and remembers the last time this room was used. It was the first-night Y/N had ever stayed over at his house. His hand hesitantly picks up the note and this time he isn’t met with words but a drawing.

The drawing is of a woman without a clear view of her face because her hair is blocking it. She is looking down at her round belly with her hands placed lovingly on it. Rafe’s first thought is that there is no way Y/N drew this because she can barely draw stick figures this well. Then the dots start to connect. The note before this one. The complaints that her favourite foods are repulsing her. The crying at every animal commercial. The little belly weight she gained that he just chalked up to being because he read in one article that the extra weight gained at the beginning of a new relationship means they are happy and he isn’t displeased by that fact. His happiness quickly turns to upset that she isn’t here to celebrate the news with her.

His hands clumsily fish for his phone in his pocket and he goes to dial her number. When the ringing comes from behind, he freezes all movement. He slowly turns around to see her standing with a massive grin on her face. His phone drops to the floor and he doesn’t care that a massive crack noise sounds throughout the room. He runs to her, taking her into his arms. He lifts her up from the ground and spins her in excitement. Her giggles send pure joy through him. “We are having a baby!” he exclaims, finally letting her two feet find the ground again. She takes his chin into her hand so she can look into his eyes, “We are.” 

“I can’t believe it. We have so much to do. I have to go to the store so we can repaint this room. Actually, we should hire someone to paint a mural. And we have to pick out the crib, a new dresser, a diaper gen-”

“Woah, woah, woah, Boss. Slow down a little. The baby isn’t coming for another nine months. And I thought I was supposed to be the planner.”

“You are right. I’m just really excited. I literally just found out about them and they are just the size of like a pea, but I already love them as much as I love their mommy. I can’t help it.” 

“I love you too and I can’t wait to meet them too.” 

The couple takes a moment to just look at each other in their eyes, conveying all their emotions and thoughts. The baby was not planned, but it is clear to both of them that the baby is still very much wanted. They smile at this communication and kiss each other for the first time since she got home. For once in her life, Y/N Y/L/N took a chance on love and look where she is now. She never looked back on that decision to let go of her fear of commitment because it led her to not only her first love of her life but to her second one as well. 

Taglist: @loves0phelia @thelomlisrafecameron @wickedlovely121 @aprilrudgate @loving-and-dreaming @thepatriarchykeychain @maybankslover @abbybarnesstuff @wh0reforbucknasty @spencereidbasis @drewsmusee @starkowswife @mskezza @h34rtsformilli @ijustwanttoreadlols @forstarkey @f4ll-for-you @bellbottombaby @jaydaaasworld

[badfictropes]

Danny/Dani and Clark/Conner

(Warning: This is just my opinions and while I would love to hear other thoughts please be polite in your comments.)

Now I want to start by saying I don’t think Clark is wrong in feeling the way he does about Conner and about not wanting to be a father to him. But the way he dealt with and expressed those feelings is my problem. The way Clark treats Conner as if he isn't a real person with emotions and feelings and refuses to acknowledge Conner's personhood is fucked up.

Clark doesn’t want to be Conner’s father and while this is deeply unfair for Conner and will no doubt leave a scar it would be far worse to try and force Conner on Clark, I don’t doubt Clark will not be able to be the parent Conner needs.(Side note:does Lois or Clark’s parents ever find out about Conner in canon?) In DpxDc fics and prompts the JL trying to force Clark to play daddy is not going to do any good for Connor or for Clark. Clark does not see Conner as his own person/a person at all; all Clark sees is evidence of his violation and while this sucks for Conner forcing the two together isn’t going to help.

I read one DpxDc fic where Clark got therapy about this(Side note: this fic also pointed out how unethical it is to have a therapist that not only works under you but is also your personal friend ie Dinah. A lot of fics have her as not only the JL’s counselor but individual teammates personal therapist which just can’t be ethical.) and his therapist pointed out that Clark talks about Conner worse than he does Lex who actually violated his consent. I thought this was a very good point and definitely something Clark needs to think about. How is his opinion of Conner(who is the innocent and also a victim in this) worse than his one of Lex?.

Now for the Dp side. I personally am a fan of Danny being a mom(gender-neutral) to Dani(and Dan) and it’s my top 3 favorite Dp tropes but I know not everyone prefers it. While I imagine that after everything was over the full force of his violation at Vlad’s hands hit him I don’t think Danny ever wished Dani didn’t exist at all, I don’t think it ever even occurred to him to think that way. I could see him wishing the circumstances around her existence was different(after all Neverborne are a thing and it would be just like Danny to make one by accident) but he could never regret Her no matter how she got here. I’ve seen people mention that Dani manipulated and betrayed Danny and I’m just like while Dani has Danny’s memories she was literally created a few months ago cut her some slack, Dani was also being manipulated and used and Danny knows that he understands that; it why he not only helped her but forgave her. And I know people are going to be like forgiving someone is not that easy or quick but sometimes it is especially when your not even 18 and full set in your stubborn mindset and when your an empath like most people hc ghost to be(a little hard to stay mad for long when you can literally feel someone’s regret and remorse, it doesn’t hurt Danny no doubt saw Dani as someone smaller and weaker that needed his help and protection.)

Onto DpxDc. Now I think Danny would be sympathetic to Clark’s feelings and circumstances but I think his sympathy would end when he hears/witnesses how Clark treats Conner. Clark’s feelings are valid but how he deal with/expresses those feelings are not. Clark is a grown ass man and should know better than to take out his anger and pain on a child(Side note: Do you think Clark wouldn’t be as cruel to Conner or that the JL would be more intolerant of Clark’s behavior towards Conner if Conner was younger/a baby?). Danny would find Clark’s treatment/opinion of Conner deplorable after all Neverborn/Mirror born are precious no matter how they came to be and while it understandable Clark can’t be a parent to Conner that doesn’t mean someone shouldn’t be. Conner deserves to have a parent, a family that loves and cares about him; he deserves to be treated his own person and choose how he wants to live his life(not just be a hero) and since he won’t get that from Clark, the JL should find him a good foster parent he can get that from.

So in conclusion I think Danny would be sympathetic and understand of Clark’s circumstances until he sees Clark’s treatment of Conner/hears his opinin of Conner and then the sympathy is over; Danny will then focus on Conner and helping him/helping to figure out what’s best for him.

[demigod-shenanigans]

"I can go into why i dislike ToA (especially Tyrant's Tomb is. a book that exists) but box of pandora. Once open good luck shutting me up" (source: your tags)

Now that you said that, i'm geniunely curious. Open the box. I dare you

This should be obvious but @ the people who really enjoyed ToA, this post is not for you. I’m not sure I’ll even tag it because this is mostly me venting into the void because two people asked and not me wanting to ruin other people’s fun. These are just my personal opinions.

I also apologize if I get any details wrong, I did recheck a lot of the things mentioned but it’s been a minute since I read ToA and might not remember everything 100% correctly. Also, obvious spoiler warning.

*claps hands together* Okay, you asked for this but heads up, it’s going to be long. Maybe grab a snack and a glass of water beforehand.

My beef with ToA can be summarized into a few key points that I’ll elaborate on below but basically:

-It tries to wrap up character arcs for some of the seven (and Reyna) but does this through the eyes of someone with zero context and also treats these characters arcs as unimportant footnotes in the larger story

-Jason’s death and everything surrounding it was handled extremely poorly.

-I cannot remember any demigods staying mad at Apollo. Redemption arcs should not mean everyone has to forgive this character for all the shit they’ve done in the past.

-The death toll. This is not helped by the fact that a lot of the deaths feel like they exist solely for the purpose of making Apollo learn death sucks over and over again (Jason is the worst example of this, but there are others)

More grievances I have but don’t have enough to say about to justify a longer explanation:

-There are a whole bunch of new minor characters on top of the old ones already struggling for screen time. I don’t remember much about any of them, which is a shame because the idea behind some of them is really compelling.

-The story is centered around the Triumvirate as antagonists, with Python as a final boss, but book four just dumps an additional antagonist on you out of nowhere? Why?

-Reyna rejecting Apollo is nice and all but I still had to put up with him crushing on her and was very uncomfortable the whole time.

-Chiron sends a bunch of new demigods into what’s potentially a death battle and tells them it’s a fun field trip (what the fuck)

-This is a personal grievance more than anything but it took me ages (book five) until I really got attached to Meg. I feel like that could have been fixed if she at least got a few POV chapters.

-Dishonorable mention to the punch line joke. Two whole camps of people lining up to hit the canonically abused kid that saved them is not funny.

Details under the cut (Pandora’s box, I did warn you)

Character arcs:

The books really do try to tell meaningful stories for people whose arcs weren’t finished in Heroes of Olympus. With some of them, you can even tell the ideas behind wrapping up those arcs were solid. But the books also tells those stories through the eyes of a character who doesn’t know these people’s pasts and quite frankly doesn’t care a lot of the time. People will voice/do something that is huge for their character and instead of going into that it’s followed up with some random Apollo anecdote that’s only tangentially related at best.

Taking Leo as an example: Apollo has no idea why Leo settling down and finding a home somewhere after everything he’s been through is meaningful. That’s a story that could have been the focus of an entire book of its own, but instead it’s just a side plot to a completely different story. And that story really should have been told through Leo’s eyes, or at least through the eyes of someone like Jason or Piper who realize why this is huge for him.

Apollo also does not care why Leo and Calypso are fighting, so it’s not something that’s properly explored. Leo’s fights with Calypso are mainly mentioned/witnessed. You get some guesses as to how they started but they never mention the exact reasons. They both say they care about each other, but only to Apollo, when the other person isn’t present. When they sort things out it happens largely off-screen. I was also not a fan of the way many of their issues ended up being pinned on Leo being sexist when it was actually way more than that.

ToA does this a lot. It gives arcs to characters who honestly deserved to be explored more, but those arcs are barely footnotes in a larger story where these characters just cameo for a hundred or so pages.

The cameo stuff works okay for Percy and Solangelo because the books are very aware they’re cameos and they get to have fun but this is not their story. But the characters the series tries to give proper plots to are all over the place.

It’s said that Jason and Thalia are really close but they never interact in the books. Jason had a bit of a chance at a normal life finally but that’s barely gone into. (More on Jason later because my god did how the books handled him piss me off massively)

Piper’s struggles with her queerness get the random Apollo anecdote treatment. There’s some stuff about her reconnecting with her dad and her heritage but that’s not explored a ton either.

Frank’s firewood burns up and he’s fine, which is just sort of hand-waved and doesn’t feel meaningful, especially because I think the fireproof pouch was already a fine solution? Congrats on being free of this, now you can get stabbed to death like all the other characters, I guess.

Reyna gets a sort of arc but it feels really weird because it happens almost entirely off-screen. She spends a large fraction of the book chiding Lavinia for leaving her post, then gets her leg broken, is off-screen for a while and then just DIPS with the Hunters after her home suffered huge casualties.

I also think her joining the Hunters is a super lame way to resolve her arc in general (she just lays down one responsibility to sign up for the next, and a character not wanting romance/not wanting romance right now should be allowed to exist without having to join the eternal maiden’s club, but that problem isn’t isolated to Reyna and could honestly be a whole post of its own)

This also comes down to the fact that I’m here mainly for the demigods. I care about these kids having good arcs and good lives. I care significantly less about Apollo having to learn really obvious shit like “murdering my pregnant girlfriend was perhaps a little messed up”

Jason’s death and everything surrounding it

Killing off a major character (especially one whose arc isn’t finished) can be a plot twist that works at times. But it has to be handled well. Doing it to a character that’s suffered horrifically and is starting to heal is also a hugely shitty move, but I understand you want meaningful deaths for the plot sometimes.

But you cannot do it the way Rick did it with Jason’s death. If he was going to kill off one of the seven, he should have done it in Heroes of Olympus, with that character narrating and their friends getting to deal with the aftermath and grieve.

Instead, Jason dies in a book that he appears in for like. A hundred pages iirc? Two-hundred at most? You get Apollo narration on it, and sure, he’s big sad about it, but he also knew this guy for two days.

Piper gets a few pages to deal with his death, then disappears from the book and comes back for a heroic rescue later. Leo gets like two pages to deal with the fact that his best friend is dead. They then proceed to fuck off to Oklahoma instead of going to the funeral. For what reason? No idea. The book doesn’t bother to explain it.

Jason gets a Camp Jupiter funeral, with none of his Camp Half-Blood friends present, because fuck the fact that him belonging to both camps was a huge part of his arc, right?

Piper and Leo know Jason is dead but they cannot be there because they’d already used up their time as ToA side characters, I guess. Percy and Annabeth can’t come, they don’t find out due to demigod communication issues until the end of the series. Thalia also doesn’t get to go to her brother’s funeral. She doesn’t find out until the funeral is already over. We don’t even really get to see her grieving, her finding out Jason died happens off-screen too.

Because this is the Apollo show, Apollo is the guy who leads the funeral procession instead of, like, Reyna, who knew Jason for years.

Also, for some reason, the person avenging Jason is Frank? Absolutely no offense to Frank, he’s a great guy and I’m sure he cared about Jason, but that choice still feels deeply comedic considering I can remember exactly one meaningful interaction him and Jason had in HoO (Jason giving Frank praetor position at the end of HoH) and not a single conversation they had beyond that. If Rick had to write Leo and Piper out of the plot, why not at least have Reyna avenge him?

Jason dies specifically because Apollo broke a stupid oath he made on the River Styx. We’re told that people around him will keep dying because of this. He dies as a chess piece in a stupid game between gods, for the sake of Apollo’s character development. He dies so he can be brought up every hundred pages for Apollo to waffle about how sad his death was but how he’d also definitely not want to be brought back (I get it, we cannot revive people constantly, but having Apollo make this point when, again, he knew the guy for two days, is still really stupid. Nico also gets to make the same point at the end just in case the reader didn’t understand before that we’re not bringing Jason back)

Apollo is forgiven by everyone

Related to the above point. Like I said, we’re outright told that Jason dying is a direct consequence of Apollo’s oath. Apollo also knew taking them along on the mission would get Jason or Piper killed and he did it anyway.

Piper gets to be mad at him very briefly, but when he tries to apologize at the end of the book, she interrupts him and tells him “it’s fine” (her voice is described as “no anger, just natural heat”)

Thalia doesn’t get to be mad at him at all. Her baby brother died and she just pats Apollo on the back and tells him “it’s fine, Jason made his own choices. That’s what heroes do.” And then it’s made about how Artemis lost Apollo when he got transformed into a human instead of. Like. The fact that Thalia just lost her baby brother for the second time in her life.

IT’S FINE?? THAT’S ALL ANYONE HAS TO SAY ABOUT THIS??

Hell, Apollo even has a sort of dream hallucination of Jason’s ghost so that ghost can forgive him too.

Was that really necessary? Why do people think that a character learning to be better means absolutely everyone has to forgive them? Wouldn’t it have been a better sticking point for a god to learn people are allowed to stay mad at you?

The death toll

A lot of people die in these books. People dying in pjo books has always been a thing, but it’s never felt this pointless or this much like it was solely happening for a single person’s character development.

Jason is the most pointed example of this, but there are more. Starting with the fact that two of Apollo’s kids almost get torched in front of his face in the first book (Austin and Kayla) and somehow that is not a sticking point. I don’t think it’s ever brought up again afterwards.

Other characters that die so Apollo can learn death sucks:

-Several Dryads die saving the grove of Dodonna

-Heloise the Griffin

-One random unnamed demigod in Dark Prophecy (mentioning them because that’s where it occurs to Apollo demigod deaths also suck)

-Money Maker (Dryad)

-Crest

-Harpocrates and the Sybil of Cumae

The death toll in Tyrant’s Tomb is completely ridiculous. Like, “feels worse than Last Olympian despite not even being the final battle”-ridiculous. And unlike how Percy at least gets to use that tragic battle to change things in a fundamental way, the Camp Jupiter demigods don’t win anything significant. Their home is only almost completely destroyed. Some of them aren’t dead. That’s it.

If you remember the name of any side character Camp Jupiter demigod from HoO, there’s a very high chance they die in this book.

We don’t get exact numbers for how many people die. The book actually explicitly refuses to give numbers, stating “We didn’t count the dead. They weren’t numbers. They were people we had know, friends we had fought with.” (Which gets even more ironic due to the fact that, again, we barely have any named CJ demigods to begin with)

The closest thing we get to numbers are that 25 demigod members of the legion died in the battle before the book started, and towards the end there are fourteen total demigods still standing of the first to third cohort combined. Even if half the missing demigods are “just” so severely wounded that they can’t fight anymore, that’s still 60 dead kids! The pre-book battle was mentioned to have been hardest on the civilians. We don’t know how many of them died, and losses among the fourth and fifth cohort are also unknown, but that is a ridiculous amount of losses. Why are there so many dead kids in this book and why are we all just supposed to be okay with this?

Jupiter explicitly forbids the other gods to intervene. The only one who does is Diana, after an offering, and she takes her sweet time to get there. That camp is named after the guy! That’s people’s kids down there! I know the gods not helping their kids isn’t exactly new, but this is on a whole other level.

There are funerals but those are largely skipped over, and Frank announces that they’ll resolve this by asking Lupa to bring in more demigods so they’ll come back stronger, which. Baffling statement. Let’s just fix the dead people by replacing them.

TL;DR: Good on Apollo for learning to be better, but I really didn’t like how it was done. There were a handful of things I liked in almost all the books, not including Tyrant’s Tomb which wins the award for rrverse book I most wanted to chuck out of a window. Some of the ideas were good. I think the first and last books are mostly solid (largely due to the fact that those don’t try to shove in entire side character arcs). But the things I did enjoy just get very heavily outweighed by everything that annoyed and upset me.

I really wish ToA had been mostly new characters with maybe some minor cameos, and other people’s arcs had been saved for different books. I also think splitting the perspective between Apollo, Meg and maybe the character who was trying to have an arc in that specific book would have helped.

[procrastinatingsoicanreadfanfics]

Vikings + gen z slang

Summary: How Vikings Characters would react to Gen Z slang

Notes: back on working on requests, so i hope i can get some more oneshots out soon. happy lunar new year to everyone who celebrates!!

Tagged: @majesticwren @obsessiveformiyatwins @leithdragon @demon-of-the-ancient-world @alicedopey @ivarlover @levithestripper @batmandallyboy @akayxo09 @vrtualfairy (hmu to be added to any taglist!)

Masterlist | based on this request | requests are OPEN!

Ragnar

With the program

He knows that he’s a slay-queen-girlboss-cunt-serving-camp

He understands gen z slang like no other

Rizz? He’s got it. Mister Worldwide? Been there, done that.

Turns into a ninth century (?) twitter queen

Lagertha

She doesn’t really care all that much about gen z slang

“You’re slaying? Me too, but on the battlefield. Catch up.”

Pretends not to understand

Fully understands and sometimes busts down on her gen z meme culture knowledge

Aslaug

Aslaug is above gen z slang

But she also knows that she’s camp

She just knows

She’s a volva, magic is in her blood. You know what else is? An immaculate sense in fashion

That’s the only thing that might make her willing to try to understand our culture

Perfected the lightskin stare the moment she was born (it’s permanently on her face istg)

Athelstan

PLEASE NO

You know that ancient man video? Athelstan is the ancient man. Would he understand the video? No.

This would be his response: God, that girl looks terribly drunk.

As a linguist, he tries

Approaches it as a foreign language. It works to some degree.

I never want to hear the words “You’re serving girlboss today, Ragnar.” Out of his mouth

(this happened to me in a dream. Literally traumatizing)

Bjorn

Thinks it’s girlish (it is not)

Would say “You’re one of them queers?”

I mean yeah, but so is your mom.

Gen z talk isn’t cool enough for him (he’s suffering from Rollo’s internalized generational homophobia/gayness, give him some space)

Ubbe

Like a supportive mom

‘That’s wonderful sweetie. Now back to my casserole.’

Absolutely understands gen z slang after you teach him

Prides himself on having the most rizz

Boy you rizzed up a slave girl and your aunt calm down

Protects gen z slang against ivar like it’s cultural heritage

Hvitserk

Worst mistake you could make is teach him slang

He uses it

Just incorrectly

At all times

And does not care to be corrected.

Slang is a product of pop culture? Hvitserk is now making it HIS product

Deal with it (don’t. make him stfu pls.)

Sigurd

He’s one of those abcdefu people

The ones that are like ‘let me sing my new song for you, and if you don’t like it, I’ll pay for your gas’

So annoying

But also in an indie artist generational trauma daddy issues kind of way, so I can forgive him

Not really

Ivar

HATES gen z slang more than anything

He thinks it’s stupid

Dumb

Dull

Incredibly unintellectual

Secretly uses it to express his feelings in a diary he burns every week

Ecbert

ECBERT MY SILLY LITTLE GASLIGHT GATEKEEP GIRLBOSS

Manwhore and proud!

Get this man a gag asap or you’ll live to regret the day you met him

With him and Ragnar, you’re gonna be stuck in a little hellcircle (probably to be joined by Athelstan)

Gets acrylics despite not knowing what they are and clicks with them

STOP HIM! STOP THIS SILLY LITTLE MAN!

Aethelwulf

Literally the opposite of Ecbert

If he has to spend one more second around his father speaking slang

He’ll cut off his ear to match Judith

And then the other to outdo her (he’s such a loser smh)

So done with Ecbert

He’ll literally hate everything Ecbert likes

[mexicangela]

okay. so. about tedbecca.

this is long and i apologize i just have thoughts. first, the fakeout in the beginning was cruel. BUT i was willing to forgive because tbh it was kinda funny and i’m not convinced that the “morning after” tension between ted and rebecca didn’t make everyone, everyone, think for just a second that they had slept together. y’know, like, if there was never any chemistry there, why the fakeout to get tedbeccas excited/cut them down and antis worried? did the reason for ted, beard, and jane being there really make a ton of sense? no. therefore, it really does feel like it was just something they wrote in to be mean and, like. come on, guys. why be mean? second, their talk in the stands??? you gotta be fucking kidding me. rebecca welton poured her fucking soul out to ted and he didn’t have a thing to say about it other than that “i’ve already made my decision” bullshit? didn’t even offer her a hand or hug of comfort? how out of character was that? he seemed so stoic through the whole episode, like he was stunted. which, maybe has to do with his being sad about leaving but still it threw me off. jesus, talk about “subverting expectations” or whatever. also, the things rebecca was saying? “you go, i go”? the ultimatum of “either we both stay or we both leave” and then her saying they’d both go only to take it back in the end? be so fucking for real right now. the offer to pay him insane amounts of money then telling him there was really no kind of monetary compensation that could represent how much he meant to the club (and her), the proposed solution to bring his child and his child’s mother over to london for him to stay (it is one thing to offer to get henry over, but to extend the offer to michelle is something else)? those aren’t things regular old friends say/do for each other, i’m sorry. listen, i love my friends but that’s a lot to offer anyone. you really have to love someone to be willing to do all that and cry real tears while begging them to stay, to choose you, to choose the home you’ve made for yourself. third, the airport scene gutted me but AGAIN i was kind of at peace with it. it would have at least left it super open ended and allowed the fanbase to imagine what could have happened afterward, y’know. like the whole “rom-com leave-cute” thing was another mean thing to do because where was the rom or the com about that?? why do that? but like i said, i would have been at peace with it because, dear god, the way rebecca was looking at him (again, ted gave us almost nothing but whatever. not even a tear? ugh.). i mean, she was looking at him like she wanted to say “stay. choose me. choose your own happiness.” also i know she’s loaded but WHO BUYS A FIRST CLASS TICKET JUST TO GET PAST SECURITY ONLY TO SAY GOODBYE TO A GOOD PAL? doesn’t make sense to my little pea brain!!! sudeikis, make it make sense (unfortunately for me and everyone around me i still love him)! there really should have been an “i love you” and not even necessarily in a romantic way. these two are supposed to be soulmates, cosmically connected, there’s not supposed to be one without the other and all we got was…”thank you” and a head nod? like, yes, thank you. thank you for showing me warmth and kindness and grace. thank you for reminding me what my strength looks like. thank you for being there for me. yes, yes, yes, thank you! but an “i love you” really would have been wonderful and i’m actually sad they didn’t get to hear it from each other. fourth, the way nameless boat dude came back in like a fucking generic ass early disney prince was just lame. i thought it was lazy. here we have a rebecca who is devastated that this weird, funny, kindhearted american football coach who shoved himself into her life and her heart has just left to go back to kansas and this little dutch girl trips and suddenly rebecca’s found happiness? it’s frustrating. really, it is. like i’m happy rebecca has a shot at happiness and a family, but she just as well could have had it with ted, who is admittedly very similar to this dutch man. i don’t get it. this is where it well and truly lost me. fifth (this one’s a three parter, sorry), where’s ted’s happy ending? because i don’t think it’s a life of volunteering to coach children’s soccer. i know people have been implying/worrying that ted and michelle reconcile but i don’t see that happening. ted, at his core, is still the man michelle left. he’s still overly optimistic (although we didn’t see that in the finale, like what?), he’s still punny, and let’s be real, he’s still a mess. i didn’t see the resolution to his arc. in fact, returning to kansas feels like a regression. he literally ran from kansas. that’s the whole reason he went to richmond in the first place. what changed? why is he going back now? for henry, yes, of course, that’s understandable. and at the same time, within the show we’ve been shown that the bond of a father and child is not always enough to get dad to stay/be a good and decent father (i.e. ted’s father, i.e. james tartt sr., i.e. rebecca’s father). this isn’t, of course, true for ted and henry, but i think it’s a point to make concerning everyone saying things about the child-parent bond being end-all, be-all. for some people, that’s true. for others, it isn’t. it isn’t a jab at anyone or the parent-child relationship in general, it’s just the truth. this is a coin that has two sides, y’know. got off course there but anyway, henry also could have gone to london, which i think might have been the best thing for him anyway, he seemed to have a good time there and he would have had a whole band of new brothers with all the himbos. michelle isn’t a bad mother by any means, but she’s got her own shit to work through if the whole doctor jacob thing was anything to go by. i also don’t think the show did all that great of a job showing us that henry had this super deep connection with his dad, but maybe that was just me lol. regardless, i still understood the bond and its importance and of course ted wanted to be there for his child. that part does make sense. the way it was gone about felt like a disservice though. ted’s expression at the end there doesn’t scream happy. he looked rather sad to me, like something was weighing on him still. and i’m sure there was. i don’t think he’s at peace with himself yet, or happy. maybe he’ll get happy in kansas. i hope he does. but getting to see rebecca’s “happily ever after” and not ted’s hurt my heart. guess i was hoping they would actually subvert the expectations and have him stay in the home he’d made for himself instead of going back to the place where he lost so much. why did he have to give up his found family and the job he loved (and was still actively learning about!! offsides!!) and the best friend he made and the support system he found (which, no matter your age or your progress, you always need a support system) and the community that had come to love him andandand- all ted did was sacrifice to make other people happy and better and this feels like another sacrifice because his mom guilt tripped him by saying something he already fucking knew (sorry i’m not a fan of dottie). i just don’t get it. how is his happy ending going back to the root of all his problems and staying there? just sucks, really, even if it was always the obvious outcome. sixth, i’m just mad all the signs lead to nowhere. the matchboxes, the army man, the bantr fakeout (will never, ever be over this one), the hotel room fakeout where they cut from rebecca to ted in the room and then he opens the door and it’s sassy, the romcommunism, the soulmatism. it wasn’t all for nothing, of course. their friendship is so important and i love it, but this ending felt like a big fuck you to it too because ted was so…distant. it almost felt like he didn’t care that much that he was leaving rebecca and it makes me super upset. all of this is based on the one-time watch from last night but tbh i don’t know if i can handle watching the episode again right now. it really did hurt, especially the way rebecca looked at him at the airport. tbh nothing can convince me she wasn’t at least a little bit in love with him. and, yes, i know. henry is ted’s everything and that’s so admirable and it’s not all about romance, and it’s not. but just let me believe what i want to believe. let me find the joys in the media i consume and if it’s the hope that two attractive, single, middle aged leads could have gotten with each other in the end and figured out how to be happy together, then so be it. i just hate seeing the hate from all sides, honestly, and a lot of people are legitimately really mean about it when this show is all about being kind. ted lasso is a beautiful series and, at the end of the day, it’s just another piece of media that the audience is free to interpret and pick apart however they want to. me, personally? i will continue to live in my delusional little world where ted and rebecca figure out that they belong together/i will pretend the last 10 minutes of the finale didn’t happen. thanks for coming to my tedtalk.

[bellesans-merci]

not my inspiration flying over to a Deadpool/Sakura crossover 😭

Deadpool ending up in the Naruto verse, obviously knowing where he is because he’s canonically a fan.

Except, he somehow lands in Sakura’s apartment and she is ✨unamused✨. He starts fanboying, because of course he is President of Sakura Haruno Deserved Better™️, and he’s her biggest fan.

He gets excited because he’s in a village full of assassins, fanboys over Naruto and Kakashi. Ironically, he hates Sasuke - thinks he’s a douchebag, but he acknowledges that he’s very hot and he can forgive him only if he’d allow him the courtesy of a reach around.

Surprisingly, in this AU, Sakura isn’t married to Sasuke…who turns out to be married to Naruto. Deadpool squeals, “🤩 omg it’s a fanfiction universe. Oh, the possibilities are endless!”

Sakura doesn’t know what to do with him, he follows her everywhere like a lovesick puppy. Kakashi wants to lock him up somewhere, but Deadpool’s like, “Well, you could, but I’d be a very, very, very, very, very, very long term commitment and we all know you have issues with that.”

Sai cuts off his head.

Deadpool’s head on the ground: “I see why no one likes you.”

Sakura’s intrigued, agrees to keep an eye on him just so she can study him. They get closer because she’s lonely with a bleeding heart, isn’t too disgusted by his face, and they have some bonding moments even though he’s so fucking annoying.

Kakashi needs Sakura for a mission, Deadpool begs to go just once since it’s his dream, and Kakashi inexplicably agrees.

Deadpool nearly moans: “You’re letting me go? Oh, this such a fucking plot hole - I love it.”

Kakashi: “what does that even mean?”

Sakura: “I don’t know, I stopped processing what he says a few days ago,”

The night before the mission, Deadpool locks himself up in the guest room and the next morning he comes out dressed as Naruto. Complete with wig and orange jacket he probably stole from him.

Sakura, absolutely dumbfounded: “wuh-what are you doing?”

Deadpool, striking a thumbs up: “If I’m gonna be Hokage, I have to look the part.”

Sakura, exasperated: “Hokage? Seriously?”

Deadpool, nods: “Yeah, I’ve even got my campaign slogan: SASUKEEEEHH!”

Sakura: “Oh god, please no, we already have one of those.”

Narutopool: “I can’t wait to use Talk no Jutsu.”

Sakura, sighing: “You already do. Let’s just go.”

They go on this mission, Deadpool calls his attacks Rasengan and Raikiri and all these other things that don’t even make sense — Sakura wants to kill him herself but admits this lunatic is wildly entertaining.

Deadpool, on the other hand, is having an absolute blast. They complete the mission, they end up drinking to celebrate, he dresses her up in his suit. She thinks it’s restrictive, he thinks it’s hot.

Sakura: “Do you ever shut up?”

Deadpool, shaking his head: “No, not that I can recall. They do call me the Merc with the mouth.”

Sakura: “You’re actually so annoying.”

Deadpool, gleefully aghast: “That’s so ironic, coming from you. Say it again.”

They’re in another battle, both assassins just decimating everyone, and Sakura has an internal crisis over why she thinks this masked lunatic is so fucking hot when he cuts someone in half.

Sakura, despairing: “Whyyyy is he so hot when he’s killing people??? Is it because he’s focused and not talking for once?”

Deadpool, with his blade in a howling shinobi’s asshole: “Shh, shh, it goes in easier when you relaxxx.”

Sakura screams in frustration. He’s making a mess of things, as usual, and she just can’t take his jabbering any longer. She punches him through the chest, immediately feels better, and he regenerates.

Deadpool: “God that was so fucking hot, you were literally inside me.”

They end up at another bar. He’s growing on her, unfortunately, even with the bloody Naruto wig he stapled onto his head.

He’s asking her how to use chakra, he obviously doesn’t have any. She asks him when he’s going home, he shrugs and tells her he fucked everything up and he kind of likes it there. Sakura panics a bit, knowing that if he stays, he’ll cause an international disaster.

Sakura: “You need to go home. You don’t belong here.”

Deadpool, for the first time since she’s known him, is silent and she gets the feeling he’s a little hurt: “I don’t belong anywhere.”

Of course, Sakura feels bad now: “I didn’t mean it like that, you probably have a whole life waiting for you even if you think you messed up. Everyone’s redeemable.”

Deadpool, nods sagely: “Yeah! Like Sasuke.”

Sakura: “…You fucked up like that?”

Deadpool goes on to tell her that he may have accidentally stolen a hero from another timeline to save his world, but he didn’t account for how his love interest would get the hots for him.

Deadpool: “It’s probably because he has a working dick.”

Sakura, shocked: “Your dick doesn’t work?”

Deadpool, gestures to his face: “My face isn’t the only thing that looks battered and air fried.”

Sakura, wide eyed, glances down at his crotch then at his masked face: “….can I see?”

Deadpool: 😳

Sakura: 😳

Deadpool, grabs her by the hand and drags her to the room: “Fuck yeah, you can see!”

He drops his pants as soon as they’re alone and Sakura gasps. She doesn’t even feel titillated considering she’s staring at a mottled sausage, substantial as it is.

Deadpool, hands on his hips, squinting down at it: “Yeah, I guess it does kinda look like a sausage.”

Sakura, mortified: “Oh my gosh, I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to say that out loud.”

Deadpool: “You’re good, it’s nothing I haven’t thought of myself.”

Sakura, continues to stare: ….

Deadpool: “I’ve never had a chick stare at my dick for so long.”

Sakura: “I could probably get it to work. Actually, I think I might be able to fix you at the molecular level. Probably not permanently though, given your regenerative abilities are due to this…mutated cancer.”

Deadpool, overcome by emotion, drops to his knees in front of her, dick still swangin: “What? You can?”

Sakura, ignoring the genitals near her pinky, nods: “Yes, probably. I’m not sure until I get in there, though.”

Deadpool slaps his hands against his cheeks, absolutely excited: “Holy fuck, I forgot you’re Medical Jesus in this world!”

Sakura: “Please, what does that even mean?????”

Sakura, obviously fixes him up, taps into her inner mad scientist and works with his cells and experiments. She only fixes him temporarily, every time he gets hurt the cells come back, but it’s light work for her. When she fixes his face, she’s genuinely taken aback by how handsome he is, if saddened by how much he has struggled.

Deadpool, now going by Wade without the suit, is definitely obsessed with her. Calls her his Messiah and plastic surgeon.

Out of Scientific Curiosity™️, she asks if the mouth on the merc is only good for talking shit, and Deadpool’s not the cherry stem champion for no reason. When they fuck she tells herself it’s because she wants to know if her work is that good, not because he’s so damn hot in that suit and she’s 🎀 just a girl 🎀.

They fuck a lot.

When they get back to the village, it’s in chaos. There’s a yellow clad man running around with steel claws wreaking havoc and Sasuke’s about to Tsukuyomi his ass to white padded walls. Deadpool runs in between them.

Deadpool, arms out in appeasement: “Woah, woah! Down, boys! This is my pet!”

Naruto, Rasengan in hand: “Your pet?!”

Deadpool, slapping a hand on a growling Wolverine’s bloody head: “Oh my—is that the Rasengan?! Wait! Hold on! This is Wolvie! Isn’t he cute?!”

Random shinobi, clutching his bloody stump of an arm and holding his cut off hand: “He cut off my arm!”

Sakura, rushing forward to reattach it: “Oh shit, give me that!”

Deadpool winces and sucks in air through his teeth: “Sorry, haven’t had the time to house break him yet!”

Wolverine, twisting out of his grip: “You fucking piece of shit, where have you been? I’ve been going to all these fucking crazy dimensions looking for your dumb ass!”

Deadpool tells him how he’d ended up in the Naruto verse, how he’s had a great time, and met a very pretty lady who’s been his handler. He tells Wolverine how it’s a world ran by assassins with mutant powers, and it’s fucking great and there’s unlimited Japanese takeout everywhere.

Deadpool, smiling and proud: “And they love me here!”

The villagers and shinobi blanch, having been around for the mayhem and chaos and meddling, and someone calls out: “Take him home!”

Kakashi finally steps forward and addresses the two: “While we appreciate your services to the village, Mr. Wilson, I think it’s time you return to your dimension with your friend.”

Deadpool deflates, thinking of how he was happy there and even though no one else accepted him, Sakura did…after putting a fist through his chest and experimenting on him, of course. And the sex was hot, hot as fuck.

He takes off his mask, showing his healed face and head full of hair.

Anko whistles low, pressing a hand to her chest: “Oh yeah, I’m definitely having a wet dream tonight.”

Deadpool turns to her, touched: “Thank you, crazy snake lady, that means so much to me.”

Wolverine grabs him by the shoulder, exasperated: “Let’s fucking go, idiot. The Time Slider’s battery is almost dead.”

Deadpool turns to him, disappointed: “You forgot to charge it?!”

Wolverine: “I didn’t know it was rechargeable!”

Sakura steps forward, sad smile on her lips. He was an absolute menace and lunatic, probably shared a brain cell with Naruto on a good day, and defied all logic; but he was fun, the most fun she’s ever had, and she’ll miss him.

“Well, I guess this is it, Wade,” she says, looking up into his quite vulnerable face. He reminds her of Kakashi, with the way he uses the mask to hide from the world. “It’s been fun and I really enjoyed your company.”

Wolverine turns to Wade, incredulous and suspicious: “Did you drug her?”

Wade’s offended: “Must you always think the worst of me?”

Wolverine, Kakashi, Naruto, Sasuke: “Yes.”

Wade and Sakura share a moment where he thanks her for reminding him what it was like to be happy. Sakura sadly explains that once he leaves, her work will come undone every time he’s injured and he’ll go back to what he once was.

He’s disappointed, of course, wanting so badly to look normal but who’s he but a tragic anti-hero in a world of violence and puns. If only a benevolent god would pity him and send him back sometimes, just to have one good thing every once in a while now that Vanessa and Wolvie are bumping uglies.

“I’ll miss you, Sakura,” he says, a little choked up and sounding like a pussy. “You were the best foster home I could have ever hoped for, and I am truly sorry for humping your leg.”

Sakura laughs and gives him a hug and a chaste kiss, surprising everyone. Most especially Wolverine, who thinks Sakura’s probably been knocked in the head a few too many times. “I’ll miss you too, Wade. Remember that you’re worth it.”

Deadpool, pulling his mask back on: “Fuck yeah, I love L’Oreal.”

Sakura, tightening her arms around him and cracking a rib: “I don’t know what that means.”

After their heartfelt goodbye, Wolverine sets the Time Slider and drags Deadpool along with him, who’s throwing kisses and waving to the crowd of villagers, to the other side.

The portal disappears and Sakura deflates, already missing his mouth and surprisingly, the endless vocalization of intrusive thoughts. Ino saddles up next to her, “So, did ya fuck him?”

Sakura simply looks at her. Ino nods pleasantly, “Yeah, I would have too. That costume and mask combo was somehow so fucking hot, and his thighs!”

Sakura giggles conspiratorially, “I know!”

And if a benevolent god takes mercy on Wade and breaks the Time Slider so that it’s permanently set to the Naruto Verse, making it so he can return to Sakura for healings and good dicking downs, well…it’s an alternate universe with plot holes, who are they to complain?

[applesontheground]

could you write a nsfw piece with patrick bateman and a timid fem reader who’s started working at the office with him, which he doesn’t like because yk, misogyny. so, he invites her over and he’s degrading her and just being cruel under the guise of just hooking up but she surprisingly likes it. thank you!

i could absolutely do this, anon! (forgive me for the misogyny, though, lol!)

lion's den 💼

NSFW | Word Count: 1,931 | Patrick Bateman x Female Reader contains DUBCON/unwanted touching, very casual workplace misogyny/sexual harrassment, mentions of drug use, degradation 🎼: x

Even after tenure had weathered you well into your position in the workplace, there was still a subtle hostility every time you sat in the line of mostly single, mostly lawless men. It honestly fascinated you to see such clean-cut faces never progress past what you might have seen on a college campus, to do the things they did outside of work – but you kept that to yourself.

Like you didn’t do a line in those club bathrooms every so often.

Any threat posed by you wouldn’t be taken kindly to. It was as though an elephant had stampeded through the room as you sat yourself at the conference table, a small portfolio splayed in front of you. The presence was loud enough, the mere appearance that you were the only woman there, and that there was no need for a throat clear or even an adjustment in your chair that would break such fragile silence.

This only became worse when you were directed to lead the conference, your branch at Pierce and Pierce being the one under question, and so early in the morning on top of it. Just one good thing for you after another. Your voice began to take control. Rather, set on top of the surface of the room as all your male coworkers acted like it was holding any actual water. Everything was so fabricated you were close to tearing your own hair out should you be left alone.

“Any questions?” You asked towards the end of the display you had put on, oblivious to what was about to happen as you closed the portfolio. “[Y/N], I’m sure you get this question a lot,” You glanced up, interested at first until you heard a snicker from the other side of the conference table. You held your breath, gaze frozen to your coworker Turner as he went on, “But you know, you could leave us to do this sort of planning.”

Your throat tightened, a confused smile crawling over your expression as you lied, “I’m sorry, but I don’t-“

“Boys. He means us as in men, sweetheart.” The snickering voice finally broke into his abrasive tone, and the table couldn’t help but laugh along. You smirked, the fake chuckle in your mouth drier than you had meant it as you clasped your hands together, a quiet murmur above the voices, “Yes, I am aware. Not now, though, but maybe one day.”

“One of us could pick you off the vine,” Your teeth pressed together in their interlock, pressure building badly in your face as the smile became jagged. “Settle down, have some kids...”

“Turner, cut the shit. Not at the conference,” Another piped up, but he was leaning back in his chair; a posture he had worn the moment you had opened your mouth.

He watched this from afar, a few catches of the eye all he got from you as he took it in. Something was starting to cave underneath that smile, he figured, but the utter disdain he caught as you closed your mouth to run your tongue over your teeth. A sign of disgust, she’s hiding it well.

I wouldn’t tolerate blatant undermining from these men, he then concurred, more for a stroke at his own ego than any kudos to you. It was simply a power play, and he’d be lying to himself if he didn’t flat out admit it was delicious to watch. A dark tress of his own psyche asked the question, looking to the man who was leading the berating in harmless breaths. Why does Turner think that he has any sort of control over [Y/N]? Besides being a man, his performance at best runs alongside hers – let alone struggles to maintain even her average pace.

When he looked back over to you, pulling from the cyclone behind his glassy brown eyes, he then caught the stare that was quickly moving on, throwing itself to the window in a surprised flash of [y/e/c].

Was she staring at me? His mouth twitched from behind a curled hand, still doing his best to appear disinterested.

Why?

Maybe you could understand why there was such heavy drug use outside these walls now. Standing in a secluded break area, away from the council of airheads and with your cup of coffee, you recalled you had a flask in your office. Would anyone notice the spiked coffee? You thought with a smirk, but then seeing a glance of yourself in the crystal clear pot you were setting back in its place on the maker, you stomped the moment’s happiness back down with a following thought.

They’d notice if it was you.

“Oh, Miss [L/N]? Are you busy?” You almost didn’t recognize the voice of Jean, one of the secretaries for the VPs. You didn’t know if she was Constance or Bateman’s girl, but she cleared that up rather quickly with an introduction, stepping into the room with a downturned smile that did nothing to hide the intimidation she was feeling. “Jean, Mr. Bateman’s secretary. Have we spoken before?” You outstretched your hand and replied quietly, “Don’t believe so. Knew you helped one of the Vices here, though.”

She nodded hurriedly and mentioned, “Mr. Bateman told me that you were great at the meeting today. He…” She faltered, and you turned away from the counter fully, mug in hand and eyebrows furrowing. It was something you once again saw coming from a mile away, but still left the poor secretary to spit it out. “He wanted me to find you so that he could ask if you’d stop in his office at around two today. Go over your plans for the upcoming…uh-“

“Transfer?” You finished for her and smiled along when she beamed and nodded to you, “Yes, that. The transfer.”

You nodded, only thinking for a moment before answering, “Tell him I’ll be there, but I have another quick meeting at four. It’s a tight fit but I’m sure he’ll understand.”

Seeing that smile on her face again as she nodded for the third time in five minutes, you then admitted to her, “I’ll be honest, it felt like he was the only one taking me serious during the stand-up this morning.” Jean hummed in agreement, and mentioned, “He takes the girls here very…coldly, I think. I-It’s better than being laughed at, I suppose.” She paused, and then pleaded, “Oh, don’t tell him I said that.”

You winked at her, “Of course not. It’s between us.”

At two, you went down the hall with your portfolio (just as infamous as you were at this point). Jean gave you a meek smile to see you enter the small office that came before Bateman’s quarters, and before she had even got on the phone to tell him the door opened.

“[L/N],” He greeted, and you caught that he was overtly warm as he gestured inside. You wondered if this was going to be anything of substance, but still walked in with the same level of mock joy. “Bateman, glad to meet with you.”

The door closed behind you, and there was an almost serene silence as he walked over to his desk. A careful finger dragged on the page of his open planner, checking something while you merely stood there.

“You know, I think Turner had a point.” Your eyes grew cold, staring at him as he stood from his desk, eyes still on his planner as he closed it. He then stated in a plain voice, “You’re far too incompetent to be leading this transfer.” You scoffed and were about to mention something about tenure when he suddenly froze up and looked at you. It wasn’t a friendly workplace stare or the stifled contempt you had seen from coworkers before. It was irritating, downright callous as he seemed to already be looking past you. You couldn’t help but stand a little straighter as he then approached, still in a leisurely stroll.

He got uncomfortably close, and you almost pressed into his office door as he murmured, “I think that you take disrespect far too often to ever be taken seriously, [Y/N]. It’s embarrassing.”

For once, you received this sort of comment from a sharp voice that was a little more than a complicated strain of hot air. He meant that, something he wasn’t just regurgitating from his peers. It was honest, and it was making your face catch fire as you muttered, “I’ve earned my place here just as well as half the trust-fund children who bought their way here, Bateman.”

Part of you was downright terrified of losing your pristine mask, frowning as you gave his well-fit suit a glance up and down. He was doing the same, and the two of you met eyes at the same time. He then sighed, “Well, I don’t think it’s going to get you anywhere. Especially not here."

You dug your tongue into your cheek, and snapped back, “I don’t need to be anywhere else besides here.” A pause, and you quickly clarified, “In this office, doing these busywork transfers and inventory checks so you men can go on, do coke and fuck whoever you want in your free time.”

He took in a breath, facing you and not shy to start backing you into the door. It should’ve made you leave, but that same hollow reminder that HR wouldn’t do anything kept you glued to the door, trying to stand your ground even while downright petrified. You wondered if Jean had heard the door shift from your shoulders sliding up against it.

It shouldn’t have made you wet, either, but knowing he was speaking his mind – his cruel, lucid mind – was going straight to the part of you that desired that. You desired drugs, you desired distraction, but you desired something real more than any of it.

Suddenly, his hand slid up your thigh, and your mouth fell open to yelp but he silenced you with nearly boxing you against the door, feeling the heat kept between your legs even through the layers of fabric, the guise of professionalism. The shock melted into pleasure as he watched you crumble bit by bit, pressing harder against your sex just for good measure.

“Do you bring this on yourself because you like it?” He then asked, scrunching his nose, “That’s deplorable.”

“Please,” You huffed, “It's only because you've been the only man who means it.” His neck straightened, no longer ogling your body to see you smile at him in a wicked prick of the lips, “I hear it all the time from these goddamn parrots we work with. Turner heard it from Allen, Allen heard it from Constance…But that’s the first time a man has had the brain power to call me deplorable.”

His hand left your crotch, and he almost seemed taken back by the way you smiled. You then asked, “Are you telling human resources about this, or are you going to make a woman do it?”

He scoffed now, and reminded you, “They wouldn’t do anything.”

Grinning, you agreed, “I know.”

He was stunned again, watching you adjust your clothes from where he had haphazardly pushed them aside. “Let me know if you have any more concerns about the transfer, Mr. Bateman.” You plainly stated, turning the knob to his office door before excusing yourself.

You closed the door, and Jean and you both jumped when his fist pounded against the door. You stood with your back to the wood, and when you met the secretary's eyes, you merely smiled.

"That wasn't cold at all."

[feather314]

I was thinking about how in the first game, GLaDOS says ‘we’ a lot up until the endgame, and she really doesn’t do that in the second. We can assume that this wording is referring to Aperture as a whole and their ‘public image’. In the first game, GLaDOS still has a professional attitude and is focused on running things how they’re ‘supposed’ to be run and keeping up with what Cave Johnson started. In short, using ’we’ could symbolize her loyalty to the business and to Cave. If this is the case, it reveals some interesting truths about how she is built in the second game:

Firstly, it shows that she is thinking much less of the company aspect of Aperture, which I think does show through in her actions and words. She has none of the previously mentioned ‘professionalism’ and doesn’t seem to care at all about keeping up the legacy left behind by Old Aperture. She becomes childish, throws insults around, doesn’t even pretend that she’s not being especially mean to Chell or otherwise not treating her like she would any other normal subject. This is very significant because it shows just how much her motives and values have shifted between the two games. Even after she forgives Chell, even in the co-op campaign, she still seems to have no respect left for Aperture as an organization. She gets a lot more selfish and lax with the rules and just kind of does whatever she wants (including testing robots instead of people as the original scientific mission entailed). It is up to us to wonder whether that was all just the morality and/or anger and/or curiosity cores, or whether some other event triggered this change.

Additionally, it draws an interesting parallel between her and Chell and how they each change between games. I believe it was in the developer commentary that someone talked about a certain, seemingly small detail: the fact that Chell has tied the sleeves of her jumpsuit around her waist instead of wearing it properly. Basically, it said that it symbolizes her ‘shedding’ the logo in an act of defiance and indifference to her prison, and also that she’s ‘rolling up her sleeves’ and preparing to fight dirty this time if that’s what it takes. That seems quite similar to what happened with GLaDOS. They both are cutting themselves off from the company of Aperture, and they’re both acting in what could be interpreted as defiance toward the establishment that’s keeping them both there. Even in the beginning of the game when they are clearly painted as enemies, they are in quite similar positions. Whether they realize it or not, it’s the company’s fault that they even ended up pitted against each other in the first place, and they’re only against each other to start because they’re both so stubborn that they refuse to cooperate until it’s absolutely necessary.

This could also have something to do with GLaDOS slowly realizing (or remembering, I guess) what happened with Caroline and the non-consensual computerization that happened to her all those years ago. Now that the numbing, stupefying, pacifying presence of the morality core is gone, she can see herself and her situation for what they are and can feel something wrong. Once that starts to dawn on her, perhaps she doesn’t really want to be the head of such a company anymore. She may also be doing it to defy Cave since she now knows that he’s the one who did this to her. (It’s unclear how she feels about Cave once she remembers what happened. She seems to still like him, since she hypes him up when he talks, but we can’t know for sure since she doesn’t give us much. Perhaps she’s more focused on her old self, and maybe she only starts defying Aperture to do what she thinks her old self would have wanted. But that creates an interesting contrast between her deleting Caroline and her doing what we can assume Caroline would have wanted. Maybe she realizes this, maybe not, maybe she realizes that she’s trying to heal her old wounds by deviating from the set system and she doesn’t like this and deletes Caroline to try and stop it, there’s sooo much I could talk about here. Anyway!) Similarly, Chell realizes that this place managed to drag her back down into its jaws, and is willing to do whatever it takes, to break as many rules as she needs to (again, and it will be even harder this time, and she probably knows this), in order to get out. For Chell, it’s not nearly as much of a change since she obviously never liked what was going on, but she’s now in an outright war instead of quietly trying to slip out the back door. (This brings up a possible argument as to whether or not Chell was planning to kill GLaDOS in the first game all along or whether she just went through whatever door was open and ended up in her chamber, but that’s a different post.) Maybe they’re both distancing themselves from the company facade that Aperture’s made and trying to do whatever they can to defy and escape the prison that they certainly now know that it is, whether they realize, like, or admit it or not.

Or I could be looking too far into it and it could simply be because GLaDOS finally accepted the fact that there is no more public on the surface to maintain an image for and just plain enjoys tormenting Chell with no restrictions , but that’s no fun.

[yourpenpaldee]

·˚ ༘₊· ͟͟͞͞꒰➳ WHEN ART TALKS: THE INTRO

When a girl meets a boy who sees the world as his playground, and she has to learn how to let others in her space.

if you would like to be tagged, please let me know! frequent updates will be coming soon after the character intros are up :) this is quite a lengthy post, but i hope you'll enjoy if you choose to stick around until the end.

BASIC OVERVIEW

GENRE: — romance

POV: — first person, present tense

STATUS: — rough first draft in progress

TROPES: — friends to lovers, opposites attract, slowburn, forgiveness

WORD COUNT: — making a last minute decision to (somewhat) start fresh because why not. starting at 0. will update this everyday :)

WARNINGS: — smoking. will update this along the way.

SUMMARY:

Aniyah Hope is a wishful thinker who wants more than what she has. As a reserved poet, she has documented her most inner personal thoughts and feelings inside her poem journals. Her poetry contains the most critical parts of herself, and exposing that to a world beyond her own is not a risk she’s often willing to take. So when Aniyah meets Noah Ford, an outspoken musician who proudly wears his heart on his sleeve, around the same time her journal goes missing, she initially hides further in her shell. What she doesn’t expect is how quickly she comes out of that shell, and the unexpected comfort she finds from what she usually shields herself from.

CHARACTERS, SNIPPET, PLAYLIST, AND MOODBOARD UNDER THE CUT!

CHARACTERS

ANIYAH HOPE has always kept to herself, finding more comfort in poetry than she ever has in people. She never wanted to cruise through life in the shadows, but she couldn't take another rejection of friendship due to superficial judgments. When she discovered poetry, she found the safe haven she needed to explore every little piece of herself. Because she couldn't connect with others as easily as she hoped, she'd put the pen to paper and write down all the things she wished she could say. Aniyah’s heart desires nothing more than to have these words spoken through a microphone. Unlike the boy who sees the world as his playground, she just isn't ready to let her guard down.

NOAH FORD has been on a mission to prove his parents wrong ever since he’s gone off to college to pursue music. His father always expected him to follow in his footsteps of becoming a well-respected lawyer, despite the countless times Noah emphasized his fiery passion for music. Instead of supporting his dreams, his parents brushed it off as a silly little phase he would eventually grow out of. It’s been a year since he’s gone no contact, his uncle and younger sister being the only familial support system. College provides him the freedom to make noise, to be reckless, and to meet a girl who has yet to experience the spotlight’s glow.

JACQUELINE TRẦN has never been the type to back down easily. She’s always up for a challenge, which often makes her appear intimidating to those on the outside looking in. Everyone in her life knows the opposite to be true, as she’s the kind of person everyone wants to have around them. Jackie is self-assured, loyal, supportive, and will be the first to defend those she cares about against any and all wrongdoings. However, taking advantage of her genuine kindness results in getting cut off with no hesitation. Now that she has her core group of people she knows she can rely on just as much as they rely on her, she pushes them to thrive and win, even if it means going beyond the safety net.

NADIA "EVIE" LOUIS has a curious mind that is eager to seek knowledge everywhere she goes. She isn’t afraid to let her curiosity take direction and lead, especially when a new opportunity presents itself at her front door. The world has too many offers for it to remain unexplored. As much as she enjoys diving into the unknown, she still needs some sort of certainty when it comes to her personal life. She has her future mapped out down to the last detail. With her ambitious nature, she puts in the work to show up on time for every milestone with ease. But not every meticulous plan is meant to be rigid when unexpected curveballs exist. When she can’t find the answers to her own crisis, she doesn’t shy away from finding help from others.

ELENA FORD is one year away from starting a new chapter in her life as a college student. She’s a go-getter that knows what she wants, and will find a way to make it happen. Ever since her parents have cut Noah off, she's made it her duty to sway their minds. She's had no success with it, and it bothers her a great deal. Ellie is used to getting her way— and in a timely manner— without having to suffer any consequences. Her persistence on the issue came with the cost of her relationship with her parents, which has left a strain that might never be repaired. Even though Noah has accepted the fact that he won't ever get his parents' support, Ellie continues her attempt to be the voice of reason for her brother and his future.

(VERY ROUGH) SNIPPET

Another silence falls upon us, and I come to the conclusion that our silence isn't an indication of the end, but rather an ellipses. It's a momentary pause for us to gather our individual thoughts and feelings. A continuation of savoring the moment without forcing ourselves to speak when it doesn't feel natural. The silence catches all of our spoken and unspoken words when they fall and speaks for us until we are ready to talk again.

PLAYLIST

Here's the playlist on YouTube for those who don't use Spotify.

MOODBOARD (coming soon!)

TAGS: @pixies-love-envy @honeybewrites ♡

[moonlightspencie]

tricks up your sleeve

Part 2 of ‘the sweetest con’

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x fem!Reader

Word Count: 1k

<- PART ONE

I twisted the ring on my finger, unsure why I still had it on, but not taking it off. It was something that used to mean so much: a lifetime commitment, love, a family. Now it was a flash of gold that served to feed my nervous habit.

Jack was due to go home at any moment. He was fast asleep, and it was everything in me not to wake him in order to soak in every moment. Instead, I watched his little eyelids flutter as he dreamed in my bed. He looked so tiny on such a large mattress. He was tiny. Too small to deal with visits to dad’s house once a week and parents who couldn’t be around one another. I rested my hand against the soft hair on top of his head and pressed a kiss to his forehead.

Haley came to take him away five minutes later, giving me the cold shoulder entirely as she carried his sleeping form away. I wished more than anything that I could have given him a real goodbye, scared he would think that the time we spent together was just a long dream when he woke up in a different bed than the one he fell asleep in. Maybe one day he’d be able to forgive me for everything. I hoped he would.

The next phone call I got whisked me away to Florida. We were tracking down a killer who was going after college-aged women, doing things to them I didn’t think I’d ever be comfortable hearing. It made me sick every time, without fail.

It’s a lie to believe that it ever gets easier. It doesn’t. You just have to learn how to deal with a constant barrage of bad news.

I held the door for her as we walked into the house of the latest victim’s parents. She gave me a soft smile and a curt ‘thank you’ before slipping back into the persona she puts on to speak with others on the job. I let her take the lead, admiring the way she could break down walls so easily. Her voice was soft and sounded like silk as she spoke. She occasionally looked at me to give a word or two, though I much preferred to let her continue without my interruption. The family responded so well to her.

“That went surprisingly well,” she muttered under her breath as we walked back to the car.

“Of course it did. You always know what to say,” I noted, a tiny small pulling at my lips.

We got in the car, and she looked at me, unimpressed.

“You’re being such a suck-up. Remind me, who’s the head of the unit, again?” she asked, a cheeky smile on her face.

My own smile came through now, and I shook my head, pulling out onto the road.

“I’m trying to compliment you. Just take it.”

“You know I don’t take compliments well.”

“I know.”

“Then why do you insist on giving them?”

I sighed. She was so delightfully stubborn sometimes.

“Because you should hear it.”

“I disagree.”

“Disagree all you want. I know you secretly like it,” I said, glancing at her briefly out of the corner of my eye.

“You don’t know anything, Hotchner.”

“Keep telling yourself that.”

She laughed, rolling down the window to see the trees and buildings pass us by as we drove along. It suddenly felt so silly and domestic. Her smile still stuck in place as she watched the city, and the radio playing low, a breeze seeping into the usually-stuffy vehicle.

“When was the last time you had a vacation?” she asked.

I hummed, thinking on my answer. It had been a long time, that’s for sure.

“A couple years since I had a real one. Little trips here and there, but I’m not sure those really count.”

“You deserve one. Like, a real vacation. Sitting by the pool and frying like a piece of bacon in the sun. I think that would suit you.”

“A sunburn?”

She laughed again. “No. Relaxation. You don’t get enough of that.”

“It would be nice.”

“Why don’t you take one? You deserve time off more than anyone.”

I shrugged. “Not sure being all alone right now would do me any good.”

“Oh,” she said, going quiet.

“That sounded really—“

“No! No,” she cut me off, almost panicked. “I get it. Maybe we can convince Strauss to let us stay an extra day next time we’re in a warm climate. Then you can hang out with the whole team and get some rest.”

“Does that count as a vacation?” I asked with a chuckle.

“Baby steps, Hotchner. We’ll work you up to a full-fledged one.”

“Right.”

Our time in Florida was short. We were lucky to catch our unsub quickly. Though it meant that, at least for the time being, the woman I was paired with for much of the case would be away from me again. She deserved time to herself, much like she tried to convince me I should have, but I couldn’t help but wish I could stick around her a little longer. It was probably selfish, maybe me slipping down a slope I couldn’t return from, but she made the slide down so comfortable.

I found myself in my bedroom, all alone, but feeling a little less lonely. As if on cue when I started feeling that familiar weight on my chest, she sent me a message.

- ‘I have the sneaking suspicion you’re still awake. If I’m right, please get some sleep. At least for my sake if you won’t do it for your own. I’m bringing you breakfast tomorrow morning and I don’t want to deal with a grumpy Hotch.

- Sweet dreams, boss man.’

I bit back a smile, setting my phone and the wedding band on my finger on the nightstand.

NEXT PART ->

[lxdymoon0357]

Can you do hcs for yandere! Unmarried queens? Like yandere! Navier?

(I don't know what to do in this world.....I love this! I missed this.... Yandere! Rashta)

Yandere! Unmarried Queens

(Navier)

❤ Navier met Rashta in the garden and though Rashta greeted her informally and inappropriately, something about the concubine made Navier curious about her, as she invited Rashta to have tea with her.

❤ Navier there asked her if she would like to study etiquettes and learn about how to be a lady, to which Rashta hesitantly agree, Navier immediately who would help Rashta with etiquettes, manners, talking skills and more.

❤ Navier would often find Rashta in the garden with a few of her maids who were given to Rashta by the emperor, Navier went to the emperor to ask if he was truly in love with Rashta, to which the emperor got mad and dismissed her…

❤ Navier would still talk with Rashta and send her tiny and tiny gifts to her as a friendship token and allow her to call Navier “sister” even though she hated that word from Rashta’s mouth, not realizing how she was getting obsessed with Rashta…

❤ Soon all the things with Heinry happened, where Navier then asked if he would allow Navier to reveal a few things about herself, Navier then told Heinry about how Navier liked this lady, not revealing it was Rashta, Heinry promised to her wingman.

❤ Navier was absolutely transfixed on Rashta during the ball seeing her dance and even invited her to dance with her later on in the night seeing her look so pretty, she had the urges to kiss her and take her right then and there, but she couldn’t she is an empress. And Rashta is a concubine.

❤ Navier slowly and slowly had some of her maids planted in as Rashta’s maid, who gave Navier every single information about every motion done by Rashta. They were also very much sure to treat Rashta nicely because if a single cut or a single tear from her eye would result in them wishing they would die.

❤ Navier in all honestly would send her gifts and love letters telling her how she was the most beautiful person in this world, the one who would bring happiness to her face, how she should be the one to rule over them with kindness and all that, but would never send it to her.

❤ Whenever Rashta would do classes with her, Navier would be touching her to show her how it’s supposed to be done and how she should be doing it and how a single thing could completely change the meaning of her gesture.

❤ Navier upon kidnapping Rashta and killing everyone who defied her (Sovieshu/ heinrey/Kosair/others) , she’s hellishly touchy and loving to Rashta, doesn’t care that everyone can see her kiss, hug or love the new second empress of the empire…

❤ Navier wouldn’t ever let anyone see Rashta with their eyes, if they look wrongly at her, she will get their eyes gouged out, don’t worry she will never show anything to Rashta, Rashta rarely ever sees anything, she’s lucky if she even gets to go to the garden of the castle or she gets out of her and Navier’s shared room…

❤ Rashta doesn’t usually see many people other than a few chosen maids, who get changed every day, but she doesn’t mind she’s happy to receive so any gifts from her wife, he one who spoils her and her daughter rotten, RimWell are all dead and Ahn is back with her because Rashta tells Navier of her past on their wedding night…

❤ Navier hates when Rashta disobeys her, but nothing one hard slap from Navier to Rashta can’t solve, Navier’s anger does scare everyone including Rashta, who cries herself to sleep those types of night, but always forgives Navier the next day…

❤ Navier is very adamant on the behavior she accepts from people around her, including Rashta, her punishments aren’t too hard, just enough to engrave a lesson on Rashta’s head. Just some slapping, starving and locking up nothing too bloody

❤ Navier will 100% engrave her name in Rashta’s body somewhere, while she’s knocked out as to stop her from whining, crying, wailing and sobbing so loudly, also to slow down the bloodshed from Navier’s side…

[coraniaid]

Buffy for the character asks?

General opinion/how much I care about them:  What can I say about Buffy Summers? When she was fifteen years old a representative of an ancient mystical order told her that she alone had the power to stop bad things from happening in the world, thereby confirming something she had hitherto only strongly suspected.  She had to keep a fundamental part of her life secret from the world for years but she never learned how to tell a convincing lie because she was too busy thinking up puns.  She had a 95th percentile SAT score despite mostly studying in between fighting vampires in a cemetery every night and cutting classes to sneak out of school and fight yet more vampires during the day.   All her favorite teachers died or never noticed she existed.  She is both a quintessential only child and somebody who would fight a god to save her annoying little sister.  She blackmailed the management of a fast food chain so that they would let her keep doing a minimum wage job she hated with co-workers whose last names she can’t remember.  She burned down her old high school gym and blamed it on mice and blew up her new high school library while she was at her graduation ceremony and she sunk her hometown into a giant hole in the desert and drove away in a school bus.  She died twice before she turned twenty-one.  She is one of my favorite fictional characters in any medium.

A ship I love: I didn’t really talk about why I love Fuffy in my Faith answer, so let me try now.

Of all of Buffy’s shadow selves, Faith is the one who spends the most time actually in her shadow.  She doesn’t get later character development that takes her in a different direction and makes her her own person; she didn’t start out as something else entirely and get reworked later when the plot required it.  She doesn’t even get the illusion of a family and moments of happiness, like Drusilla has in Season 2.  When Faith’s not hanging out with Buffy she’s sitting alone in her motel room or lying in a coma or counting down the months in jail.  She exists to be a version of Buffy who is not Buffy, who is worse than Buffy, who doesn’t have friends or family or any external support.  That’s really all she is.  And she knows it.  And she hates it.  How could she not?  “You get the Watcher, you get the Mom, you get the little Scooby gang … what do I get?”

Because Faith is Buffy – the part of Buffy who never came back after she ran away from home and got kicked out of school; the part who can admit to craving a little more than low-fat yogurt after a night patrolling; the part that never got to make friends with Xander and Willow in Season 1 and never had a Watcher who cared about her –  so on a fundamental level Fuffy is about Buffy accepting those suppressed and hidden angry parts of herself.  But it’s also about Faith accepting the forgotten and ignored parts of herself that are present in Buffy: the idea that she can be a hero, that there are people in the world who care about her, that there are people who she can trust.  It’s about asking what if all of the Season 3 subtext – Faith’s whole arc this season paralleling Angel’s a year ago, and “what are friends for?” and “It’s kind of a Slayer thing”, and Joyce marching in the Slayer Pride Parade – was text, and what if the show existed in a world where the characters could act on it?

And because of how Season 3 turns out, it’s also about Buffy and Faith forgiving themselves, and each other, for doing almost unforgivable things to each other.  Because there were never meant to be two of them, and they’ve never been able to tell each other what they mean, and because “kill me, you become me”, but she tried and it didn’t help.  And it’s about crappy presents and knives to the throat and forehead kisses and shared dreams and hopelessly entangled destinies.  It’s ”She could be terrified.  Maybe [...] she’s sorry and she’s alone” and “You think you matter, you think you’re a part of something, and then you get dumped” and “All my life there was one person who tried to be my friend” and “I tried so hard to help you and you spat on me” and “Willow said you needed me.  Didn’t really give it much thought.”

As much as I wish Faith was in Season 7 more, part of me is glad that this is all we got, because I really don’t think the show could ever have done all this justice. And the little we get is enough to make me a bit crazy.

A non-romantic relationship that I love: I already talked about Buffy and Willow, so I will try to subvert expectations a little here and go with Buffy and Giles.  Not the fandom version of their relationship I like to complain about where Giles is an uncomplicated Good Dad, but the messy and complicated and heartbreaking version where he just won’t allow himself to be that person.  

I mean, I think it’s very clear from the show that Giles really does care about Buffy far beyond the extent he is supposed to as a Watcher (he tries to go and fight the Master in her place! Even though he knows it would kill him!  Even though this is Season 1 of the show and we’ve not yet seen Giles fight a single vampire!) but that everything about his training and his past tells him that he shouldn’t.  Buffy cares about Giles a lot (“You can’t leave me, I can’t do this alone” / “it’s a little like having Mom back”) and it’s clear that she would really like Giles to be more involved in her life (she wants her Mom to invite him around for Christmas, she goes to his house for Thanksgiving, she tries so hard not to show how hurt she is when she confuses his attempts to be dispassionate with genuine disinterest) but Giles is convinced that he cannot be that sort of parental figure for Buffy and it would only hurt her if he tried, and so – by purposely distancing himself from her and not letting her get close to him– he ends up hurting her in exactly the way he fears.

And the tragedy is that I think Giles really does believe the line he keeps feeding Buffy about how important it is not to be “distracted” by “personal concerns”.  When Quentin Travers told him he had “a father’s love” for Buffy, Travers meant it as a rebuke – and that’s exactly how Giles takes it.  He thinks getting closer to Buffy would be bad for her!  He thinks by leaving her in Season 6 he is helping her become self-reliant and a better Slayer!  Of course he is wrong, but that’s what he thinks, and it is consistent with how he’s always thought.  It’s not character assassination or some unjust subversion of his previously established personality: it is a natural and predictable and awful thing for him to do.  And he does it because he cares about her and doesn’t know what to do about that!  He thinks she’s a much better person than he is (“she’s a hero, you see.  She’s not like us”) and he doesn’t want to bring her down to his level!  “If you care so much about [these people], why didn’t you leave town?” Ethan asked him in The Dark Age, and Giles didn’t have an answer!

The NOTP: Going to cheat a bit here (honestly, mostly because it feels a bit mean to keep picking on Xander at this point), and say that the ship I don’t like isn’t with a specific person but rather with an idea that I see applied to all sorts of ships.  Namely the idea – not supported at all by the text – that Buffy’s various romantic interests are Good People who teach Buffy important life lessons and make her a better person or protect her from the dangerous world around her.  I mean, sorry, but this is not how it works! This is a boring fantasy you have projected onto the show in place of what it was actually telling you.  The feminism of BtVS is paper-thin, but give it some credit!

In canon, Buffy absolutely does not learn from her boyfriends.  She does not rely on them for emotional support.  They all cause her more problems than they help her.  She rescues them.  She makes them better.  Honestly her boyfriends all kind of suck.  Because that’s her type!  She likes losers with no friends who are kind of obsessed about Buffy Summers! (Losers just like Faith!)

Buffy textually hates it when Angel talks down to her: we see repeatedly how furious she gets when he treats her “like a kid” or makes important decisions about their relationship on her behalf.  She doesn't mind physically upstaging Riley (“I was holding back a little”) and secretly likes it when he gets hurt because, to quote Dawn, “she says you look even cuter when you’re all weak and kitteny”. The iconic twin shots of Spike and Buffy in The Gift and After Life are deliberately staged so that Spike is looking up the stairs at Buffy and she is looking down at him (“you’re beneath me”, as she told him in Fool For Love).  And as she says later in Conversations With Dead People:  “Their opinions don’t matter.  They don’t know.  They haven’t been through what I’ve been through [...] I feel like I’m better than them.  Superior.”

So, you know, the preferred power balance is pretty explicit here! I don’t think the show is being excessively subtle. And yet people keep insisting that, oh no, Buffy learns a lot from her boyfriends, or that she can’t possibly cope without their support, or writing fanfics where they swoop in to town to rescue Buffy from trouble. But that is not who Buffy is!  She is not some unsophisticated naif or damsel in distress.  She would hate that so much!  Ship Buffy with whoever you want, but let her be Buffy!

… but also, yeah, rewatching the second season really reminded me how awful I’d have found Buffy/Xander and how glad I am that the show stops hinting at that after Becoming.  Sorry, Xander.  You can take solace in being … well, a loser with friends?

My biggest headcanon about them:  Some time after Chosen Buffy definitely goes back to college and gets that English degree she deserves.  I don’t want to think about Buffy living in a gloomy castle in Scotland and still being forever isolated from the world or about her becoming a cop with superpowers or whatever other nonsense the comics insist happens to her after the show ends.  I want her to be able to have some time off and read some poetry and make Willow jealous academically.

An idea for a fanfiction I would like to write/read about them: One day I will finish my Season 7 rewrite in which Drusilla is the Big Bad and Faith gets broken out of prison earlier and Amy and Willow get to have a proper resolution and Kennedy is another Slayer from the start and Marcie and Ethan come back for cameos and people remember that Jesse and Kendra ever existed and Dawn actually gets something to do.  But first I will probably have to start writing it.

Something that makes me think of them: Nothing makes me think of Buffy.  I choose to be like this (for some reason).