#the only thing that my brain thought during their brief interaction lol
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keistance · 2 years ago
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samuel: talks
dean: hm remembering killing you is the only thing stopping me from doing it again during this conversation. also jack will get mad
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whataphantasia · 1 year ago
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ok it's nighttime where i am which makes it PERFECT to go on about my
✨post-crystallized ninjago brain ramble and non-critical retrospective✨
because. ninjago do be making my brain go !! and i need to yell abt it to myself to my blog void b4 i go onto dragons rising and stuff. i talked abt this on discord but only 2 ppl following me are in that server so wtv (hi btw X3)
i want to preface this by saying i dont interact with the ninjago fandom at all, and i know near nothing about behind-the-scenes things or stuff said by production. this is all my thoughts babeyy (which means im going to sound absolutely clueless and talk abt things that hav probably already been resolved. wtv) none of this is supposed to be critical thinking LOL pls dont attack me. i sound complainey but i dont hate the show, this is how i show love for media <3
really the most pressing thing to me was. being really frustrated about garmadon’s whole arc at the end of tournament of elements. yknow when misako finds out about the letter. i feel like they didn’t really go into depth about RESOLVING that whole thing, like showing the repercussions and thoughts of all parties involved after the fact? how does this affect their family? i suppose misako and lloyd talked about it during day of the departed, kind of? but. my needy ass just goes “IT WASN’T ENOUGH.” really, i don’t really like character death or sacrifice as the resolution to a conflict or arc unless it’s done really well, and. is this supposed to feel unsatisfying?! because it is to me!!
yes. i know it’s a kids show. its super likely something's going over my head right now, but. it really made me think again because misako and garmadon didn’t really even talk after harumi revived his oni side, and especially after all the interactions lloyd and garmadon had during crystallized. seriously, someone rec me fics that explore misako and garmadon talking post tournament of elements please JDKWNFJSND. and really i didn’t hate the resolution of tournament of elements... this is my single major nitpick about it LOL
continuing with that thought, like. lloyd has lost his dad multiple times... this isn’t fair to him!!! give bro a break!!! (silly) (i know its fiction LOL) honestly why doesn’t he have WORSE trust issues after considering his mom and harumi and all the other people who’ve abandoned slash betrayed him?! and yeah misako really is the least terrible offender here, and i’m not blaming her— but ya can’t ignore that it DID affect him. this is why i was really excited for the prospect of a corruption arc for him during crystallized, however brief. he deserves it! let him destroy a few buildings, maybe kill a guy! let him fulfill his rise of the serpentine dreams, but for real this time! again REC ME FICS RAGHH
...though yes. i know he’s developed really far to the point he’d never hurt people like that, and tbh you could say he was never really evil in the first place but. you gotta understand that the corruption arc is one of my FAVORITE tropes. i’ll do anything for em... it’s my fatal flaw...
heck like. this is why i was really excited for the ice emperor because i KNEW that was zane the moment i saw him LMAO. he’s my favorite character how can i not tell. but in the end he just lost his memories and was being manipulated by some other bad guy... same thing goes for possession, lloyd wasn’t the bad guy, it was morro possessing him... its not the same </3 let them be lead astray even WITH their past memories and relationships and feelings... i need the angst... (you can tell im insane because im saying this about a lego show)
anyways point is. i like corruption arcs. and i WILL write fic about the ice emperor gaining more agency no matter how out of character and detached from the original message it is. (even sillier connotation)
okay thats the end of me nitpicking for now, i think. i mean i have a lot of qualms... esp about wu characterization in the new animation studio half, but. thats one thing i know that has been talked abt AT LENGTH. and idk if this is an unpopular opinion but i liked all da seasons for different reasons, they all appeal to my different happy little facets of media i enjoy :) im still fresh off of watching the show again for the first time in forever so this opinion will probably change, who knows.
really im just happy to have gone thru the whole main series! including wu's teas! not including dragons rising tho. ill get around to that after this. and maybe look into more production and behind the scenes stuff, and the games and supplementary content too. i love consuming content 🥰
anyway... uhm. can you tell zane is my favorite. because i said it explicitly some sentences ago. god he is so. ykwhat heres a screenshot bc i dont want to write this all out again
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thanks for listening bye :3
ninjago... my favorite piece of inherently kind of problematic but overall very fun and well meaning media (esp in the later seasons compared to the earlier ones)... kisses it
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OKAY I'M FINALLY DOING THIS!!!!!!
How many works do you have on AO3? 13!
What's your total AO3 word count? 119,813 but I have cyn chaos on there so it's kinda bloated lol
What are your top 5 fics by kudos? Most of my stuff posted there aren't actual fics, but it goes: Cynical Chaos (93), To the Best-Selling Abled Authors Who Love to Write About Disability (41), The Girl Who Refused to Die (25), I Almost Died and All I Got Was This Fucking Home Video (9), and Loyalty (7)
I think it's really funny that, on the fanfiction site, my actual fanfic has the lowest kudos out of these😂 (and Love is A Liar's Game didn't even place!)
Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? Absolutely!!! As soon as I see them. I have yet to get a bad comment, but that's probably the only time I wouldn't. I live for positive dialogue about my writing and I know how nerve wracking it can be to leave a comment on someone's work, so I always like to encourage more interaction when someone does make the leap!
What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending? Loyalty, for sure. Out of everything posted tho, I think To Whom It May Concern takes the cake cause it's a poem about the endless cycle of gun violence.
What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending? HMMMMMMM Well it's not done, but Love is A Liar's Game is planned to have a pretty happy ending when we finally get there.
Do you write crossovers? As a teenager, me and a friend were writing a GIANT crossover called Search Beyond the Twilight Horizon that I am still extremely fond of (it's one of the few old writings that survived The Great Data Loss of 2011!!!). It was a crossover between Sonic (our characters' main verse), Kingdom Hearts, Zelda, Yu Yu Hakusho, Jak and Daxter, and DNAngel, but we only finished it to YYH before she started college and I started focusing on Cyn Chaos. Then behind the scenes, I WAS writing an Undertale x OFF crossover during my brief Sans craze, but I never got past the first few chapters.
For my own funsies, I've also written crossovers with my own Chaos Series! I did MHA and Gravity Falls.
TL;DR I love crossovers and will probably write more!!!
Have you ever received hate on a fic? Nope!
Do you write smut? If so, what kind? I wrote a very tiny snippet of something for Touya a month ago on my NSFT blog, and I plan on expanding it, but that'll be my first time writing and posting anything sexy! Hopefully not the last tho ;p I've really come to like smut as an artform.
Have you ever had a fic stolen? LOL no. I don't know why I would.
Have you ever had a fic translated? No, but what an honor.
Have you ever co-written a fic before? Yeah, that crossover I mentioned above! It was fun!
What’s your all-time favorite ship? AxelxRoxas changed my brain chemistry so I'm gonna say that for now.
What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will? The Gyuutarou one I was outlining before Touya took over my brain 😭I recycled most of the major things from that fic and used it for Hex!fic and Siren!mc, so it really wouldn't stand up well on its own anymore. I know I need to officially scrap it, but I still have it sitting in my WIPs section cause I really liked what I was doing with it 😭
What are your writing strengths? Very strong voice, great dialogue, great characters and character dynamics, web weaving. The neurodivergency makes me really good at seeing connections between characters and details.
What are your writing weaknesses? Plot, description, 3rd person omniscient (if I write 3rd, it's gotta be close). I'm not BAD at descriptions once I finally hammer them out, they're just a slog for me so it takes me forever to finish them.
What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic? It's fine as long as A. You know what you're doing and can do it accurately (or at least have a beta that does) and B. You're doing it purposefully, as in there's a specific point to its presence in the story.
What was the first fandom you wrote for? Sonic
What’s a fandom/ship you haven’t written for yet but want to? I think writing KH or Final Fantasy would be nice someday. Especially KH.
What’s your favorite fic you’ve written? Hex!fic has been really fun!!!!!!!!
Let's harass all the other writers I know...@yinyuedijun @prettyboykatsuki @hidinginmyhands @starlightbelle @bunni-bun and any other mutual I missed that also writes fic!!!!!!!!!!
Fic writer interview
@goingsparebutwithprecision tagged me in this one and then i had it in my drafts for six or eight months so now it is out of the drafts and into the queue
How many works do you have on AO3? a grand NINE
What's your total AO3 word count? 82,429, which is almost the length of a short novel.
What are your top 5 fics by kudos?
Grace (SPN), Between Friends (Magnus Archives), Yellow Asters (SPN), In the Valley of the Ever Young (Umbrella Academy), and The Steward (Discworld)
I guess i'd hoped Another Journey (The Untamed) would do better - but I'm not at all surprised that my quick and dirty post-finale (by like a DAY) Game of Thrones thing didn't do well. On the other end of the spectrum, my quick and dirty post-finale-by-eleven-hours SPN thing did great it's my top seller. That's 600ish kudos so we're not talking phenomenal, but still. Goes to show I think the difference between how game of thrones fans handled the ending (buried heads in sand, wept and gnashed teeth, rent hair and clothing, ranted for hours on a slow monday worknight shift to me while i listened, horrified and enraptured) versus how spn fans, who never had expectations to gradually and then all at once disappointing, handled the ending (shrug, make some jokes, cry not because it's ending but because it happened, and then crack open the laptops for some quality writing about the whole thing). We were already prepared for things to be bad, so when they were even more bad than all THAT? We were actually, I think, in a way kind of pleased and satisfied. If it had ended well i think it would've been a bit of anticlimax after all that time. Whereas in Game of Thrones there was still the slim chance that they might turn it all around at the eleventh hour, so when they didn't the viewers just wanted to hide and lick their wounds. Produced much less immediate fic.
Do you respond to comments? Why or why not? It really totally depends on the comment and my mood honestly. If it's especially long and glowing I try to give it at least a little bit of attention but it might not be right away.
What’s the fic you’ve written with the angstiest ending? Tie between Another Journey and In the Valley - In the Valley ends RIGHT before a character death in canon, Another Journey ends right after a non-canonical character death. So take your pic. I don't tend to do death for death's sake, but for these two stories it felt cheap to avoid it.
What's the fic you've written with the happiest ending? FINISHED fic? That people can SEE the ending of? Grace, which I now don't like because it's not complex enough and I completely mischaracterized Jack, but that's what Wishes Were Horses is for. Whenever I get around to it. You know.
Do you write crossovers? Not really. I love worldbuilding but trying to marry two disparate worlds is too much for me, I don't like having to do all the logistics. Probably a less pedantic writer would just not care about the logistics but I also don't READ crossovers because the logistics or lack thereof is such an issue for me, so.
Have you ever received hate on a fic? No but back when I was regularly updating Book of Gold (which I'm linking even though I'm probably going to retire that version at some point and start working on a better rewrite) I had a reader who REALLY liked Steve, a character I had no plans to write from the perspective of because I barely remembered him and did not care about him, and still don't really, and that reader would constantly ask me with waning hope if I was gonna do anything Steve related. And I'd avoid saying a definitive no.
Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Prev apparently has some good Cyrano de Bergerac smut which I now want to read. I personally have never posted any sex in fics, but not for lack of hoping someday to tastefully get it all out there. I just was raised catholic so if I say anything sexual where people can see it i get embarrassed.
Have you ever had a fic stolen? I hope not I haven't checked lol but I only have nine and they're not well known so who give a shit
Have you ever had a fic translated? No.
Have you ever co-written a fic before? Nah. When it comes to writing I don't think I could ever split the work I'd want too much control.
What’s your all-time favorite ship? I do not have favorites because the other ones might get sad . this extends to foods, stuffed childhood animals, and books in my reading stack . also fountain pens
What’s a WIP that you want to finish but don’t think you ever will? At this point any of them lkajslkdjfasdf but i really REALLY doubt the immediate future of the Book of Gold, which is a shame because I have all the major beats mapped out in my head. It's just so much more ambitious than even the other long fics I have in my documents files, the scope is years instead of days or months, and it's a lot of planning and prep work that I can't help but feel I should instead spend on either quicker-to-finish stories or original ones.
What are your writing strengths? I think I have a strong voice, a good turn of phrase, that sort of thing. I also think that after years of trying I have gotten good at realistic dialogue that's not TOO realistic as to be unreadable, and I've learned how to be funny. Worldbuilding.
What are your writing weaknesses? Complex plotting, which sucks because I love complex plotting and want to do more of it. Also punctuality, which is not a writing weakness so much as a regular one, and the really big one is character relationships and consistency over time. I struggle to fit all those pieces together/remember whether they fit together when I started. This probably has to do with my social struggles in real life lol it's very hard for me to write characters thinking/believing/philosophizing/reacting differently than I would, at least without falling back into the 'everybody is me' mode that risks them coming off flat. I think my way around this for most of my writing life has been to write from one person's first-person perspective, which helps alleviate that problem, but I'm trying to do different things and expand my skill set/comfort zone.
What are your thoughts on writing dialogue in other languages in a fic? It's cool and I like it but I only know one other language than the one I speak and I speak it at a second grade level. So I don't do this much but I enjoy reading it. Love to copy and paste the language I don't know into a dictionary of words and parse it out it's like a fun secret treat.
What was the first fandom you wrote for? Discworld TECHNICALLY . but really The Outsiders and really really even before that I have an unnamed undescribed thing that I hope to turn into a short story that is almost not at all like the fic. so i will not discuss it
What’s a fandom/ship you haven’t written for yet but want to? Star Trek (I've written for it but haven't finished and posted yet). Perhaps True Blood. I have some ideas.
What’s your favorite fic you’ve written? Again I cant play favorites BUT. It's probably Another Journey. It just came together so easily and the structure fell right into place and I managed to do a lot of stuff that was challenging in a way that felt successful. Book of Gold is next to my heart so close that I'm sure it's not actually GOOD and I don't wanna call it 'favorite' because it's a different thing. It's a sibling.
@whileyoureinschoolidothisallday do you want to do a tag game? and any of the other writing mutuals on here who've plied their hands
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purplehoodiesimon · 3 years ago
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Okay seriously, I can't stop thinking about it and I might be projecting a little but autistic Wilhelm? Totally. Fucking. Works.
1. The way he interacts with people
- He doesn't lol.
- Expanding on that, Simon and Erik are really the only people he truly makes an effort to interact with on a regular basis out of his own volition. He does interact with Felice a bit on his own, but it's on a much more superficial level and they really only become actual friends after Erik's death. Other than them, pretty much everyone he interacts with is obligation or by default of being around Simon.
- He says in the beginning of s1ep1 that all his friends are in Stockholm but...we never see them. Or see him text them. Or mention them at any other time. Do they even exist? Probably but he clearly wasn't actually that close with them.
- His behavior changes completely person to person. He's most relaxed and open with Erik, and he starts to act in a similar way with Simon towards the end of s1ep3 but then Erik dies and he's back to Public Persona Wilhelm until his breakdown and the brief time they have together in ep5. He has a somewhat friendly but still very polite persona he uses with his classmates at Hillerska, can be seen in the dinner scene when he's talking with Henry and the other boys before sitting down and almost any scene where he interacts with Felice, the I'm A Normal Teenager persona—see s1ep1 party and s1ep4 Society initiation—and then the prince persona, of which the most notable scene is definitely the Society meeting where he shoots down August's plan. And of course, everyone acts differently around different people, but like please, this is textbook masking or as I like to refer to it, the autistic chameleon vibes.
- Just. The entire fucking scene in s1ep3 where he's trying to tell Simon he wants him to stay at Hillerska after Parent's Day. Emotions to mouth disconnect. It's a vibe.
- And again in s1ep5, he has a hard time putting his thoughts into words during the argument with Simon. He's clearly trying but his brain just won't word things right.
2. Physical behaviors
- The head hitting thing he does after his argument with Simon
- Using pressure on his chest to calm his anxiety
- Constantly running his hands through his hair
- That one movement he does in his s1ep4 panic attack after returning to Hillerska where he's like lifting his arms. That. I do similar stuff when I'm overwhelmed.
- Self soothing by running his hands over his body at night in bed, again literally me all the time.
- Nail biting/gum chewing. Honestly this one's a toss up to anxiety or autism, it's common for both.
3. Extra notes that don't fit into either of the above categories
- Autistic people often have some form of anxiety, it's like, really common for autism to be comorbid or whatever the word is with anxiety.
- Those LED lights are totally a sensory thing, ESPECIALLY sitting with them around his neck. I cannot begin to describe the euphoria I get every year at Christmas and I get a whole month of staring at pretty lights up close, and I always wear them around my neck like that while we're decorating, so I 100% think it's a sensory thing for him too.
Autism isn't just special interests and the hand flappy stim. There's a lot more to it and like again, this may just be me projecting cause I do know a lot of the stuff I listed can be attributed to anxiety or just being a teenager under a lot of pressure, but it genuinely would make so much sense to me for him to be autistic.
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yoonpobs · 4 years ago
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bad boy good thing v.
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pairing: jeon jungkook x oc
genre: angst, smut, fluff, miscommunication (we hate her lol), pining
warnings: smut, jungkook is really an asshole, the angst hurts a lot tbh, unhealthy relationships (?)
words: 2, 435
summary: a series of drabbles where you're confused and jungkook's confusing
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a glimpse into the past
“Yes. I’ve literally just stepped foot into my apartment.” Jungkook huffs with his phone between his ears and his shoulders as he attempts to multitask, hands moving a box of the dining table.
But Jimin is persistent and he’s yapping his ear off, something about dropping by in a few but Jungkook is barely paying attention, not when the existential crisis of no longer being a high school student that could hide under an institution with a false sense of security. College was different. He was on his own, even with the presence of his friends; and Jungkook was both terrified and excited.
He’d always dream of the start of his college life. Jungkook was a bit of a dreamer, and he aimed to live out the best life possible; all while trying to juggle his academics and do some extracurriculars on the side. When he told Taehyung about his ambitions, his friend just blinked and him and offered a snort; with an almost taunting pat on his shoulder.
You’ll see.
Jungkook didn’t know what he meant then, and he can only wait to find out.
“Do you need help moving in? Tae and I just finished a lecture and we’ve got the rest of the day off.” Jimin asks over the phone, and while Jungkook wants to start off his journey being independent; there were boxes of his belongings that looked way too unappealing to deal with alone.
“You’d to that?” Jungkook sighs, eyebrows furrowing when he searches for the box that goes into his bedroom.
“Come on, Kook.” Jimin whines, “You think your own hyungs won’t help you out?” His jibe is lighthearted, which only makes Jungkook roll his eyes at his friends' words.
“I know.” Jungkook affirms, “Just college life, you know? Thought you’d be busy having your third existential crisis of the week to help out.”
Jimin snorts over the line, “Try this day, kid.”
Jungkook chuckles, and mumbles something under his breath before puffing; grabbing his phone with his hand as he thinks of a question he’s meant to ask for a while, ever since he stepped foot onto campus and his accommodation.
“Is ____ with you?” Jungkook asks.
Jungkook did so some growing in the time after you’d graduated, and he supposes that he relied a little too much on you as well as Jimin and Taehyung growing up in high school. Because once the three of you graduated, Jungkook was essentially left to fend for himself when you no longer were able to pick him up with a call away or help him out with difficult math problems when you had college to worry about.
It was horrible at first, purely because Jungkook missed you and your kindness. Sure, phone calls and texts worked—but your presence was always more than what words could ever offer, and Jungkook found himself searching for other methods to survive the next two years in high school without you there looking over him.
His football teammates had always been just his football teammates until he was forced to fraternise with them on a deeper level, and he realised that they weren’t too bad. They were fun and full of life, definitely the type of people that he found himself having fun with. He’s always been surrounded with people that were older than him, you, Jimin and Taehyung for example—and having peers his age to hang out with was a pandora box he never knew he’d ever get used to.
Take Eunwoo for example. Jungkook was petrified of him because there was no way a sixteen-year-old could look that could, and if he looked like that before puberty finished its course—then what the hell was he going to look like after?
But he was a nice guy, a fun person to hang out with and he definitely taught Jungkook some things he’d never dare ask Jimin or Taehyung. Things about women and men; the interrelationships that could be navigated with enough practice.
And enter Yuna, the first girl he’s ever had the ability to get to know in his life besides you. It was the typical cheerleader-meets-footballer trope that Jungkook would always scoff at, but according to Eunwoo “it’s only right that the same type of people minded together.”
Jungkook furrowed his brows when Eunwoo clasped him on his back when he told him that with a wink, suggestive eyes when he exposed a not-so-secret that Yuna had on Jungkook after one of their football games during his senior year.
But Jungkook thought otherwise, probably because he remembered you telling him that people were fundamentally different and social interactions with different walks of life only made life more beautiful and worth living. Seeing the diversity in cultures and experiences opens up our hearts to a world that doesn’t exist for us—it keeps us humble.
Jungkook blindly agreed then, likely entranced with you in general to consider the weight of your words. But Eunwoo was like a constant reminder, and he was older then—a little more subdued enough to pay attention to the words of his friend.
And when Jungkook continued his high school life, it seemed like more and more people seemed to pay attention to him. It wasn’t like he was unpopular before, he definitely caught the eyes of many—but it was different then. It was like Jungkook was his own person and people thought he was cool enough to approach.
So when Yuna shyly asked him out for a date, Jungkook said yes even though he still thought of you.
And when Eunwoo slapped a pack of condoms into his palm while his other football teammates hollered, Jungkook took the leap of faith and lost his virginity the same night.
So, yeah. Jungkook did some growing up—and he hopes that it’ll be enough for you to see him as a man.
“—she’s always doing so much that she barely has time for us and I get that she’s always been an overachiever but we miss her, you know?” Jimin complains, and Jungkook just about returns back from his flashback.
“Sorry, what did you say?” Jungkook says sheepishly.
“Were you not listening to me rant for the past five minutes?” Jimin exasperates and Jungkook hears some shuffling and a chuckle, possibly coming from Taehyung, on the other end of the line.
“You do have the tendency to go off tangent, Jimin,” Jungkook mutters.
Jimin scoffs, “It’s called paying attention to the details you brat. But anyway, to sum it up for you since you wanna be annoying—_____ isn’t with us. She’s got this student council thing and a meeting with a bunch of ambassadors visiting the campus in the evening.”
Jungkook blinks, taking a moment to process the information. He smiles fondly to himself, realising that you always did fine on your own—and he supposes it’s always been that way. You were quiet and never imposing, but you still did your best.
“Oh.” Jungkook says, “Will I be able to see her soon?”
Jimin snorts on the other end.
“Why are you asking me? You have her number right?” Jimin retorts, “Though it may be difficult reaching her cause she takes like five business days to reply if you aren’t work-related.”
Jungkook chuckles while he fiddles with his thumb. He can see you working hard, eyebrows furrowed as you type out emails and organise events like the efficient woman you were.
He’s seen pictures of you on social media, courtesy of Jimin and Taehyung who’d post stories of your pouts when they’d drag you out for some social time, according to their captions. And God, did you grow up even more beautiful than you were in high school.
Jungkook saw you as the girl he admired in high school and it was mostly his puppy-loved up brain thinking of you like this super smart and out of his reach senior that he wanted to respect. But now that Jungkook was … older. He still thinks you’re admirable and smart, but he can’t lie and say he didn’t notice other things.
Like how certain tops flatter your collarbones so nicely that he wonders what it’s like to sink his teeth into them. Or how you’ve experimented with tennis skirts that look like easy access for a territory Jungkook’s used as one of many of his spank bank materials. Even the way your eyes innocently glance up in pictures makes Jungkook’s brain hazy.
Jungkook was older, and so were you. The two of you were in college and it was different. You weren’t just his high school senior and he wasn’t just the little kid that worshipped you. It was free game and Jungkook wanted to make to most out of it.
“I will.” Jungkook nods with a declaration and a sense of determination in his chest. “What time does she finish?”
A brief moment of silence until Jimin responds, snorting to himself.
“She usually gets off her meetings at—10 pm?” Jimin ponders out loud. “You’re really going to wait for her?”
Jungkook wants to add he’s been doing that all this while, but keeps it to himself.
“Just can’t wait to see her.” He shrugs casually.
“You still have that schoolboy crush on her?” Jimin teases. But Jungkook doesn’t flush this time. He’s had his handful of experiences to navigate his way with feelings and desire.
“Not a crush.” Jungkook rolls his eyes. But he wasn’t going to admit that to Jimin or Taehyung just yet. “Is it bad to want to see an old friend?”
“Whatever you say, Jungkook.” Jimin sing-songs. “But I will warn you; _____ isn’t the type.”
At this, Jungkook furrows his eyebrows.
“What?”
Jimin sighs, “Whatever it is you’re thinking … stop.” And his words oddly set off an uneasy feeling in Jungkook’s chest that he doesn’t like. “You know _____. She’s not the kind of person that dates or fucks around. I don’t think she’s even looked at any guy on campus ever since we were enrolled two years ago.”
Jungkook rolls his eyes, feeling slightly ashamed that he’s been caught so early on. But along with growing up, Jungkook’s grown quite a bit of an ego too.
“What makes you think I want to fuck her? What if I really just miss her?” Jungkook snaps.
“Kook, I love you and you’re my best friend but I’ve seen your Instagram stories and escapades. I have no problem with you being sexually active or whatever—you do you, as long as it’s consensual and within respectable boundaries. I know you think college is like this unobstructed territory where you can just fuck around with people but _____ really isn’t like that. I’ve been there and I’m telling you to drop it.”
Jungkook clenches his jaw, “You’ve wanted to fuck her?” Jungkook accuses.
He can practically hear and feel Jimin’s eye roll over the phone.
“No, you idiot.” Jimin sighs, “I’ve had the same intentions as you with other women. While they may be receiving and comfortable with that, _____ won’t be. I hear and recognise your tone and I’m warning you against it.”
Jungkook purses his lips, wanting to defend himself further. But he realises, who is Jimin to tell him what to do with his life? He isn’t a kid anymore.
“You’re reaching.” Jungkook tells Jimin, “You don’t have to worry okay? I just miss ____ and I want to see her before orientation on Friday. Is that a crime?”
“Again, I don’t know what you really want so I won’t project anymore. But I’m telling you, ______ is _____. You don’t think dudes have tried with her before?”
Somehow the revelation of the fact that you did have two years to mingle around with other people and potentially get with men (or women) that weren’t him causes a different type of dread to fill his stomach, an ugly emotion of jealousy. One that he’s never felt before and he doesn’t like it at all.
“God, I haven’t even seen you yet and you’re already micromanaging my entire life.” Jungkook scowls.
“The double standard is real.” Jimin scoffs, “You used to follow _____ around like a lost puppy when we knew each other first? I feel betrayed, man.” Jimin is joking but the reminder makes Jungkook still.
"That's ... different." Jungkook protests.
Jimin snorts as if he doesn't believe his friend.
"Oh, it is different all right. You, my friend, are whipped." He snickers, "Too bad the two of you are basically polar opposites, huh?"
Jungkook freezes on the other end when Jimin casually lets it slip the thought that somewhat plagues his mind, too.
"We're not that different." Jungkook defends himself.
"Says you Mr Athlete all throughout high school. I bet you ten bucks that you were already recruited by one of the football dudes here."
Jungkook scowls because Jimin was spot on.
"Okay. I do sports and she doesn't. That's it." Jungkook snaps.
Jimin clicks his tongue, "You're all for the attention, dude. _____ always keeps it on the down-low while you do your best when people are cheering you on. It's like the spotlight follows you wherever you go and she does her best avoiding it."
Jimin clenches his jaw because while Jimin's words were lighthearted, and he knew better than to ever put you down because the three of you were all good friends—the fact that someone as close to the two of you as Jimin; was laying out the obvious makes Jungkook doubt himself a lot more.
"Oh, and you're the best at psychoanalysing people right?" Jungkook sneers.
Jimin snickers on the other end but Jungkook can't find it in himself to laugh.
"Relax. I'm joking, all right?" Jimin reassures his friend. "You don't even like her that way, right? That's what you said anyway."
Right. He didn't. That's what he told Jimin.
"Right," Jungkook says stiffly.
"If the two of you ever ended up together, though ..." It's as if Jimin was the one dead-set on pushing for it as Jungkook wishes for him to drop it. "Nah. It wouldn't happen. It probably wouldn't work out either."
Jungkook forces a dry chuckle before muttering a lame excuse and hanging up.
He loved Jimin, the guy was a good friend on an average day and an absolute sweetheart on better ones. And Jungkook knew that Jimin meant no malice when he spoke of the potential relationship between you and Jungkook because, well ... Jungkook has always been the younger guy. And that would be weird, wouldn't it?
But Jungkook knows he's done some growing up. And he'll prove it—in whatever way possible.
Jimin doesn’t need to know.
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idk how many people would even want to see this BUT i wanna yell about Leela and Brax so here's a list of all their scenes togethr/scenes pertainng to them that i can recall (pLEASE add on if i missed anything/ you have any additional thoughts!! i could talk about these two all day!)
right off the bat in Weapon of Choice when Leela is on the outskirts of the Citadel and Brax goes to bring her back (which is interesting in and of itself, bc usually i would imagine a chancellery guard would go do that so what made Brax decide to instead??), Leela kinda goes off at him bc she's hurting and instead of trying to actually explain what's going on Brax doesn't even try to argue he just says "we need you" which is great bc Leela has that instinctive desire to be needed and to help people and he's speaking right to that -- also as far as we know, this is Leela and Brax's first actual meeting in canon? it's implied that they know of each other, which makes sense, but it doesn't seem like they've ever directly interacted before: Brax seems almost slightly uncertain, and Leela is combative, but when he's gentle with her she's actually quite receptive
the literal next scene after that, where the OT4 is all in one room for the first time (they still kinda hate each other at this point but still !!!). Narvin explaining Gryben and being a real jerk about it and Leela (understandibly!) questions if Gryben is a prison world, and Brax (who to this point has been mostly quiet as Narvin and Romana brief Leela) jumps in to both clarify Narvin's previous xenophobic statements while also maintaining the inherent questionable/negative connotations
(btw it's actually pretty important to note that Romana self-edits herself a lot when talking to Leela, especially in the earlier seasons; you can actually hear her revising the things she says to put it in terms that she thinks Leela will better understand. and i mean she does it out of genuine consideration for her friend associate but it often comes across as varying levels of patronizing. Narvin also obviously "dumbs things down" when dealing with Leela early on, but like... Brax never does that on any level. the only difference i can tell in how he addresses Leela vs how he talks to anybody else is that he seems much more kind with her than almost anyone else???)
their conversation about the Matrix in The Inquiry: this is REALLY important (and if you've ever talked to me on ao3 i've probably gone off to you about it lol) because it's layered. they're talking about the Matrix but they're also not because in answering Leela's question Brax is making a very thinly veiled allegory (which he outright states a minute later) to Time Lord society/politicians/most importantly HIMSELF -- he's actually strangely open about his morals/beliefs in this scene and i'm living for it tbh -- and i find it very interesting that even though he does directly explain what he means ("how do you know all this?" / "because i am a politician.") he also leaves it for Leela to work out the implications. like it's a very nuanced conversation bc there's double meaning in it and most people on Gallifrey seem to think that Leela is tone-deaf and can't pick up on that stuff (even Romana sometimes oversimplifies things to her) but Brax totally just lets her take from it what she will bc he believes her intelligent enough to understand. he doesn't think her any lesser because she's human.
ALSO on a secondary note to the above: the fact that Leela has a question/needed clarification (sorry, haven't listened to this in a while i forget how it actually happened) and actively sought out Brax to talk to about it?? like she knows Romana better she could have gone to her but i feel like Leela kinda imprinted on Brax and someone she can go to for help if she needs it; maybe it's partly bc she knows he's under marginally less pressure than Romana is but also the truth of the matter is that Brax was the most genuinely helpful person to her in the previous stories and that probably means a lot to her (esp. bc he acts like the essence of everything she hates about Gallifrey but he doesn't treat her the way she would expect from that). btw this topic is gonna come up again in a hot minute
that part where Brax gives her that information that might help her re: the Andred thing, even though he really probably shouldn't have done that -- it kinda makes me think about what he must have been like with Theta tbh???
actually this is mostly my own conjecture but there's some neat stuff in Spirit bc during the *waves hand vaguely* bodyswap dream sequence thing, Romana is very "!!!! Brax can help us !!!" which is tecnically Leela brain talking, so like there's the implications of the stuff i've said above about Leela having this idea of Brax where she knows he's someone she can go to for help
can u tell i'm soft for them
Leela sounding really sad/distracted when she talks about how Brax isn't there YES i'm grasping at straws but a lot of this relationship really is conveyed through the voice acting bc of how little direct focus there is on the characters. there's actually several scenes in Mindbomb where she mentions him and she outright says that she misses him during her discussion with Matthias
that implied scene with them in Mindbomb!! i have a Lot of thoughts about that!!! it's all conjecture and fanfic fodder!!! but the reason i mention this is because it seems pretty meta that out of the whole Gally Gang, it's Leela who first sees Brax when he comes back to Gallifrey and in turn she's the first person (besides Matthias, i guess) that he sees upon his return?? idk i just feel like that's somehow a meaningful detail??? also her reaction of utter shock after spending the entire episode missing him and how worked up she is when she tries to tell Romana, like I desperately need to know what happened in this missing scene MR RICHARDS PLEASE TELL ME WHAT HAPPENED
Leela insisting on going with Brax when Pandora starts hurting him and their whole conversation there is just. so good. like they're both just so soft and then when Darkel comes in Leela instantly goes into protective mode. like they just have such an open relationship bc Brax doesn't even try to be all pretentious with her, like he doesn't even try to keep up any facades when he's with her he's just very genuine and it really says a lot about both of them -- Leela is so good at seeing people, like getting down to the core of who people are and what makes them them (which is why she's good for Romana, btw, bc Romana has a lot of identity issues) and Brax is so tangled up in who he presents himself as that he barely knows who he actually is anymore but Leela can see that and she makes it so he can truly be himself and he doesn't have to hide. also she's so gentle with him when they talk about Pandora, she's very caring and empathetic and wants to make sure he's okay and i am WEAK
it's been a hot while since i listened to Panacea but I think i remember Brax being really soft with Leela when he first brings the gang to the Axis, like just sounding really glad to see her
ok other than the fact that Brax is lowkey relatable in Reborn (daydreaming fanfic about yourself/people you know? simping for Mary Tamm Romana? yeah mood, my man) there's that scene where they're first appraoching the Citadel on the alt!Gallifrey and it seems like none of them, and Brax specifically, have seen it from the outside in a good long while bc he's very in awe and he tells Leela that he wishes she could see it and he sounds sO hEcKiNg sOFT oh my word-
and once again with Leela thinking of Brax as someone she trusts for help: in Dissassembled when everything is going to crap she straight-up says that she wants to go find Brax bc he'll know what to do/be able to help
at the beginning of Annihilation when Romana is depressed and questioning if Brax truly was her friend and Leela INSTANTLY, NO HESITATION assures her that he was; i lost where i had her exact lines written down but she actually kinda goes off to make sure Romana gets the point
literally forcing myself to talk about this bc it makes my brain stall out but like,,, the Brax Hound in Annihilation,,, Leela being like "goodbye, Braxiatel... again" she sounds so sad and like UGH i always kinda forget how sad it actually is for them to lose Brax in Dissassembled bc like, it was so sudden and they didn't get to say goodbye and Leela is always losing people and i have many many feels about this scene and how all that emotion is made very clear in how they each respond to the Hound (might make a separate post abt this later if anyone is interested ::eyes::)
Enemy Lines is utter bullcrap about these two and I will never stop being salty about how they not only sidelined the very good, very subtle friendship they had in s1-4, but they??? made Leela acutally not trust Brax??? when literally this entire time she's been the one person who probably genuinely trusts him the most?? what the heck, David
I haven't heard TW3 or 4 yet but i'm assuming there's nothing worthwhile in those with regards to this duo (correct me if i'm wrong tho lol, i would love to be mistaken in this assumption)
TL;DR Leela and Brax mututally imprinted on each other and have probably the most open and healthy relationship within the OT4 and it is an absolute CRIME that nobody besides Gary Russell and Justin Richards cared enough to actually build on it in canon
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itsgoldleaf · 3 years ago
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1, 14, and 23 for the asks?
I’ll keep this one brief, because I’m sure everyone is like shut up about the Pacific Rim AU but it’s the Pacific Rim AU. I loved the whole process of this one, I really pushed my writing style and tried something new with its not-entirely-linear format, and I just really ENJOYED the worldbuilding. This fic just flowed out of me - in fits and starts though, I didn’t write it all in one sitting, but whenever I did sit down to work on it I never struggled for the next sentence. I also tried to make the romance more understated, it’s there, it’s overt but not, you’re not getting a full blow-by-blow sex scene but it’s happening between the lines, which is pure self-indulgence because that’s absolutely the sort of thing I love reading but this whole fic was utterly selfish, haha. Sequel is coming along very nicely but it’s a little pet project so will def be probably like, February before it’s finished.
14. Honestly I could give the same answer here but I think I’ll be a bit more abstract and say ANY McShep fic whatsoever? This ship just came flying out of left field and wrapped itself around me like a plastic bag in the wind, like, I went from 0 to 100 in ten sentences when reading my first McShep fic in like, April this year. And it’s not like I wasn’t entirely unaware of the ship, like, I managed to be spectacularly oblivious during its heyday despite being 100% glued to livejournal around that time but I mostly via osmosis was aware that when you look for Stargate fic (because I am and always have been a huge Stargate fan from day zero but just never really got into the fic until this year) you’re gonna get a hell of a lot of Sheppard/McKay stuff and I just… never gave it a second thought past ‘wtf why do people ship them’. LOL. Fast forward to the wiser version of me (who actually, y’know, READ A FIC TO FIND OUT (thank you, War Bride)) and hello, I have 8 trillion WIPs and am solid gone forever goodnight let’s have the second McShep renaissance, I’ll bring the popcorn.
23: OOOH okay this is a tricky one, since I like to consider all of my ideas like, not not written but just not written yet, and I don’t like to go too much into detail with them because my brain mentally checks them off and I lose all enthusiasm for actually working on them if I reveal my sEcReTs. Actually okay, I probably won’t get around to this one, but I really wanted to write a little gen thing about Rodney and Jonas set during the Redemption 2-parter from SG1, because I love post-Siberia still-an-asshole SG1-era McKay and I just adore Jonas and I think they’d be really cool to bounce off one another since they’re both gigantic nerds but at the opposite ends of the personality spectrum. They’d be good foils for one another, I think, but alas we only got like a 1 minute long interaction between them in the show. (Jonas, I will write a fixit for the end of your storyline one day, I promise.)
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seelestia · 2 years ago
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well, since you’re ok with it… here’s the reveal!
hello it is i, the harbinger of tears, 💠 anon <3 this is my main blog, while my writing blog is at @genshrineimpact. just block the tag: “minors dni” and you should be good!!
now, back to the topic at hand…
*war flashbacks* i-i need a moment *lays on ground and pulls blanket over head*
[ we’re having technical difficulties at the moment - please enjoy the brief intermission. ]
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*wipes tears* ok am back what were we talking about again? oh yes, plot bunnies! i think that used to be an actual term, kind of like how we say 'brainrot' these days haha but yes, it certainly makes an adorable image!
i’m glad that you think so! thank you for being understanding and kind about this <3 ok we can compromise - you just tell me if i ever make you uncomfortable and i shall bonk myself lol
that’s so intriguing, i think most people wouldn’t know about it! ohhh an au, hm? very interesting indeed… maybe i should try and do some research myself hehe
i think you’re spot on for the superiority complex! a love triangle between these three sounds like it’ll get very messy… the two albedos playing 3d chess while the reader is just stuck in the middle like (· ω ·) ??
*clears throat* lia you are hallucinating wdym /j hahahah i know right??? literally none of them have similarities…. what is a ‘type’…. just like the concept of time, it is but an illusion to me… “you just fall for whoever you fall for” - yeah that sounds about right lmao
feel free to browse around my blog, but i don’t have much lol the 'god of war!reader au' series seems to be popular the past few days, and it’s been a super fun thing to write! but don’t feel pressured to do it, really! <3
IKR i was complaining to my brother about it like- seriously??? for the first day??? xiao is my main dps, and he’s practically useless (i’m so sorry bby) against that stupid thing ;_;
also yay, a taglist, sign me uppppp!
OML. HI, RIN !! it's nice to know the true identity of my 💠 anon without having to employ heizou. (/lh) and if you see a new follower with a melancholic albedo theme and a bio that says i follow cool people, that'd be me~
hehe, already done filtering the tag~ i am respectfully looking at the god of war!reader, (ab)normal day, and the universe abound series 👀 i also saw your edit of the game's voicelines to fit the god of war!reader AND IT FITS SO WELL. i don't have much experience with javascript or editing other than tumblr html, which may be why i am so in awe !! ;( i love the lore of the reader like the sibling adepti and the god of sun HNGGH this is what i meant when i say your brain >>> (/g)
who is this fine grandpa (/lh) man on the intermission screen??? 🔍 and the thought of saying, "psst, i have a plot bunny to give to you" is so cute <3 hehe, i'm always down for a new series made by you because fjejkdkks they're so good, HELLO?!?! but feel free to only focus on the ones you're working on, they deserve your attention the most rn ;D
BEING IN THE MIDDLE OF 2BEDO'S PLAYING CHESS, HELP. just know if susbedo lost, he'd bore hateful stares into the back of albedo's head and likely about to flip the whole table. (/lh)
the intermission is so suspicious that i can't help but suspect that you feel smth for that very same man... HMM. "just like the concept of time, it is but an illusion to me" rin, i think you've been spending too much time with zhongli. (/j)
YESYESYES !! the popularity of your god of war!reader au is SO VALID because the lore and their interactions with morax??? >>> your brain never ceases to amaze me !! fjekrksjds i can tell you put a lot of thought into it and the fact that you executed it so well??? aaaa, i love your works sm <3 (/g) i shall definitely find the time to binge your masterlist soon !! >:)
i don't think xiao's burst reaches that abomination when it's shooting missiles??? i don't have xiao because i lost the 50/50 to keqing on his first rerun and then pulled for yelan instead during 2.7 <//3 but i'd definitely pull for this boy the next time he comes around !! i got klee at guaranteed pity and tried pulling for heizou cons but ended up getting c1 kazuha at 15 pity instead (which i could've gotten for yoimiya but that is alright, i'm not one to dwell on regrets for longer than i needed) fwfjkekds
speaking of, is there anyone you're planning to pull for in the future, rin??? i'm at 13 pity + 50/50 rn on yoimiya's banner after getting c1 kazuha and if no one comes home, then i'll try my luck on the 3.0 banners !! saving particularly for al-haitham cough cough
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makeste · 4 years ago
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this is pretty random and you don't need to answer it, haha, but could you share your personal hcs regarding platonic todobaku with me??? 🥺🥺🥺 i'm in need, LOL, and your takes on characterization and relationships on bnha are always so spot on, so... i hope you're having a good day/night!!!!!!!💖💖💖
thank you so much! sorry it took a while to gather all of these; my TodoBaku headcanons weren’t as immediately forthcoming as my general Baku headcanons were. but here goes. the first half of these ended up being more just my general thoughts about their relationship than actual headcanons, but I eventually steered myself back on track.
first of all, this is important to note: when Katsuki says in ch. 241 that “there’s no correlation between time spent [together] and friendship”, it’s not purely out of denial. this is something he genuinely believes, having learned it the hard way growing up. for someone who seemingly led a pretty charmed life for most of his childhood, Katsuki hasn’t actually had a particularly sunshiny experience when it comes to his friendships. all of his closest childhood friends eventually left him (Tsubasa), turned on him (Deku -- from his perspective lol. obviously this wasn’t actually the case at all, but it’s how he interpreted it, and it definitely had a big impact on him emotionally), or abandoned him (that long-fingered kid, who notably fled and never looked back when the sludge monster tried to eat Katsuki back in chapter one. like, thanks for nothing, my dude).
so it’s not surprising that all of these experiences would have a profound impact on Katsuki’s ability to trust other people and accept them as real, genuine friends. in its own way his childhood was almost as isolating as Deku and Shouto’s. it’s only since coming to U.A. that he’s started to make real friends again for the first time since kindergarten. and even then, in the case of Kirishima and Kaminari and Sero, even though I think he does consider them friends, he still isn’t very open with them. because he’s learned the hard way that that can lead to hurt, and I think he’s very hesitant to ever let himself be vulnerable to that again.
but having said all that, Shouto is still absolutely correct when he says that they’re friends. and the thing is Katsuki knows it too, but he’s just reluctant to admit it. partly because the part of his brain that processes everything as rivalry isn’t sure whether Being Friends With Shouto = Losing To Shouto (IS THIS A TRAP??), and partly because of everything else I just explained above. even though by this point he knows Shouto pretty well, well enough to be reasonably sure he’s not just gonna be another fakeass groupie who turns tail at the first sign of trouble, there’s still a part of him that’s hesitant to admit that connection is there, because doing so opens him up to potentially being hurt again at some point. goddammit. why is this shit so complicated.
meanwhile on Shouto’s side of things, this poor lil bubba never had any friends growing up to begin with, so he’s not nearly as paranoid or prickly as Katsuki is. instead, he’s still discovering for himself just what friendship is all about. the interesting thing about Shouto is that since he never had any childhood friendships, in a way, the friendships that he’s making now at U.A. are his childhood friendships. and so they tend to be straightforward and uncomplicated in much the same way that very young children’s friendships are uncomplicated. “I like this person; I am going to make them my friend.” boom. done. friendship is mad easy yo.
and he does like Katsuki! sure, his personality is a bit unconventional, but there’s a lot to admire about him even so, and they actually have a lot in common! they’re both rather introverted. they’re both very serious, and I think this is something that Shouto particularly appreciates, because jokes and idioms and playful insincerity sometimes fly over his head just because he doesn’t have a lot of experience dealing with other people. but Katsuki NEVER jokes around, and he is never insincere. he says what he means, with the exception of insults, which are 90% more bark than bite. and so once Shouto figured that out, it became very easy to figure out how to interact with him. aside from that, they’re both close with Shouto’s Other Best Friend Midoriya, they both have incendiary quirks, and they both tend towards the quiet side (yes, even Katsuki) with the occasional burst of hotheadedness (maybe a bit more than “occasional” when it comes to Katsuki’s end).
and like I said, there’s a lot that Shouto admires about Katsuki as well. he really respects how determined Katsuki is, because he himself lacked any sort of clear goals for quite a while growing up. all he knew was that he didn’t want to end up being like his dad. but Katsuki is someone who has always known what he wants, and he goes after it with a singlemindedness that Shouto is almost envious of. he’s also very intelligent and quick-thinking, and Shouto knows he can rely on him in a tight spot. he’s also honest, and surprisingly principled, and while he’s definitely not the nicest guy around, I think Shouto can recognize to some degree those same types of walls that he once spent so much time building up around himself. and so he knows that to a certain extent, Katsuki’s hostility is just a front. and I think he’s both intrigued by that, and drawn to it. because every so often when Katsuki’s guard does drop and his better self briefly shines through, Shouto can see that he’s someone worth getting to know.
anyways, but enough of my rambling about their relationship, and on to the actual headcanons. first of all, I firmly believe in my heart of hearts that at some point during all of those mentally and physically taxing weekends spent training for their provisional exam, they have each fallen asleep on the other’s shoulder during the ride home. Katsuki was actually the first to do it, and it was only for a couple of minutes, but when he woke up he was absolutely mortified. but much to his relief, Shouto never said another word about it. (and if Shouto still remembers the warm, cozy feeling in his chest during those few brief minutes when Katsuki was dead to the world, with his face smoothed out and completely trusting and his breathing strangely in rhythm with the movement of the car, and if doing so brings him a sense of calm that’s hard to describe, well then, that’s no one’s business but his own.)
anyway, so because life is Just Like That, eventually of course the reverse happened. and with anyone else, Katsuki would have violently shoved them aside without a second thought, and he was almost gonna do the same here, but then he remembered he owed him (because he really did keep his mouth shut about the earlier incident, thank fuck), and so he didn’t. for almost two whole minutes, anyway. whatever. that’s more than generous, really. meanwhile no one else knows about this except for Aizawa, who was chaperoning them that day, and took mild notice at first on account of it being unusual behavior on Katsuki’s part, but then immediately forgot about it afterwards. he was proud of them both for upping their napping game, though. he respects naps.
both Shouto and Katsuki were actually scared shitless during the test of courage at the forest training camp, and if Katsuki hadn’t been kidnapped and everything had instead gone on as normal, they would have both had trouble getting to sleep that night. Katsuki actually can’t stand scary movies or ghost stories (fyi this is canon according to the third light novel, and EXCUSE HIM FOR HAVING A HEALTHY RESPECT FOR THE SUPERNATURAL. you wanna go and get your own dumb ass cursed or dragged to hell or whatever, BE HIS GUEST). whereas Shouto has next to no experience with them and doesn’t really see what’s so scary about ghosts because GHOSTS AREN’T REAL DUH, but even he feels a little unsettled when an undead swamp girl suddenly rises from the depths and crabwalks towards them in the middle of the woods.
Katsuki has on rare occasions been so drained by provisional lessons that he goes into autopilot and forgets to pretend not to be friends with Shouto, which can result in them having completely normal conversations for minutes at a time before he eventually regains enough of his senses to realize he’s fraternizing with the enemy. this is how Shouto learned about things like Katsuki’s favorite foods, and his love of hiking. the latter is actually one subject that Katsuki can go on and on about if you get him started, and Shouto very much enjoys hearing about it and never tries to stop him.
by contrast, Katsuki never intentionally seeks to gain any new knowledge about Shouto because he feels like he already knows way more than he ever wanted to. however, this doesn’t stop him from absorbing knowledge against his will by simple osmosis, and then discovering to his dismay that he’s retained the information afterward. this is why he also knows Shouto’s favorite food in return (although to be fair, I think everyone in Japan knows Shouto’s favorite food), as well as other tidbits like the fact that he likes strawberry-flavored things (because he always gets the same brand of strawberry milk from the vending machine during their lunch breaks). he hates himself a little for both noticing and remembering these stupid little details, and would rather be kidnapped again than ever admit to Shouto that he does.
Katsuki thinks of Shouto as “Todoroki” in his head rather than “IcyHot” or “Half n’ Half”, and has to make a conscious effort to use the nicknames whenever he addresses him out loud. more and more often he finds himself forgetting to do so nowadays, much to his dismay. Shouto was pleasantly surprised the first few times it happened, but quickly stopped taking notice of it, as he’s come to realize that the way Katsuki addresses people carries very little meaning regardless, since something like 75% of his actual feelings are conveyed through his actions rather than his words.
Katsuki does wish that Shouto had had the decency to choose his surname as his hero alias rather than his given name, though. he lives in fear that one of these days he’ll be required to call him “Shouto” while on duty. number one hero or not, there’s a good chance he would resign from his internship at the Endeavor Hero Agency before he ever willingly agreed to that.
and last but not least, the number one thing that Katsuki would rather jump in a freezing lake than admit to Shouto or even himself is that he actually cares about him too. and has even mostly forgiven him for wussing out at the last minute during the sports festival. he still doesn’t fully understand why he did it, but he gets that Shouto was Going Through Some Stuff, and okay yeah, he can admit that his family situation is pretty fucked up, so whatever. there’s an uncomfortable feeling he gets whenever he’s reminded of this; sort of a weird, squirmy feeling in the pit of his stomach whenever the subject of Endeavor comes up, or whenever he sees Shouto talking to the man himself. it makes him feel restless and on edge, and he never knows what to say or do afterwards, especially if Shouto goes all quiet and sullen and reflective. he wants to scream at him, or slap him on the back of the head, or grab him by the shoulders and shake him; whatever it takes to snap him out of it and ease the tension. but he knows that’s not the right way to handle it. and more to the point, he knows that he’s not the right person to handle it. and sometimes, if he’s not quick enough to squash the feeling when he senses it coming, he wonders how Shouto would react if he ever found out what Katsuki used to be like back in elementary and middle school. and he wonders whether Shouto would still be so dead-set insistent on calling them friends. and then he does squash out the thought, as viciously as he possibly can.
anyway so that turned weirdly angsty towards the end whoops. not even sure what happened there, since this is supposed to be my cute and funny ship, while BakuDeku greedily hogs all the angst for itself! lol my bad. but don’t worry, they still love each other, and Shouto is still fond and soft and equipped with bullshit-radar, and Katsuki is still rabid and in denial and a dumbass.
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stanharu · 4 years ago
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beastars episode 21 thoughts!
legosi and louis have finally reunited!!!
i have a lotta gripes with this episode, but i think overall it was still a very good episode. this week's ep covered chapters 75, 76, 81, and a lil bit from ch69. i was very excited & happy to see legosi and louis finally interacting, and finally seeing some of my favorite legosi & louis moments animated & fully voiced was also great.
the ep opens with an anime original scene of louis and ibuki discussing stolen goods in their supply chain. its very brief and seems to just be setup for legosi and louis' reunion in the BAM later in the ep, so i'll come back to this later.
i liked seeing this lil smoky deer form in legosis head when monologuing about his smell lol. usually this only happened when legosi was tracking haru's scent so im glad they did it for louis too lol. ot3 real.
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i really liked the scene of legosi's training. the intense fight paired with legosi's matter of fact tone while narrating was great lol i really love his voice.
the tao & kibi moment in the hospital was great omg ;-; i loved it. no complaints only emotions and tears.
now. the moment we've all been waiting for. the long awaited lougosi reunion. i have mixed feelings about it bc during my first watch i was very excited to see the boys finally interacting, but also in the back of my mind i was filled with dread while coming to the realization that the anime had changed how they meet again. i was kinda right about the anime quishing together ch66 along with ch75/76, but really they only pulled some lines from 66 and put them into this anime original scene in the warehouse :'^)
i dont think this scene is bad tho, i still really enjoyed watching it. but im still disappointed that it's different from the manga djflksjldf. at the very least i wouldve liked if the anime kept their brief interaction from ch66 and letting louis stew in his feelings of seeing legosi buying meat for a couple eps. very sad we were robbed of that.
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i liked this lil moment where theyre just looking at e/o and thinking a million things. something i've always loved about this part (in both the manga & the anime) is how legosi got a fur cut so the shishigumi wouldn't recognize him but louis recognized him immediately lol. the music for this part was really great too. and seeing legosi's tail get all waggy was So Cute.
i will say tho that louis' lack of expressiveness in this season continues to be an issue. in the manga we get to see how hurt louis is to see legosi in the BAM and how he's almost embarrassed at legosi's visible happiness at seeing him again after everything. in the anime louis seems rather stone faced for most of this scene. he just looks either angry/annoyed or kinda neutral. his expressions are very subtle, like you can tell he's holding back a bit but we're not getting the same range as manga louis.
i think louis' expressiveness is a lil better in the next part when legosi is eating with the shishigumi and the balcony scene, but still not the same range as manga louis.
it was really funny to me about louis eats the steak and then just looks legosi dead in the eyes while he chews. like louis is challening legosi and legosi is just confused about why he's doing something so ridiculous. i've always wondered what legosi was thinking in this moment lmao.
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as for the balcony scene... i fuckin loved it lmao. the voice acting was phenomenal. my lougosi brain was in OVERDRIVE
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legosi literally said 🥺 while hugging louis i cant 😭
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louis 🥺🥺🥺💕
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also i really enjoyed this lil bit of legosi playing with the banner strings out of shyness. very cute.
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i also really like how the anime did this part. i gasped and i knew it was coming lmao.
while i think the legosi & louis centric scenes were pretty well done overall, some people have pointed out that the anime doesn't let some of the really important moments from it linger long enough to hit with as much impact as they do in the manga, and i have to agree. i think it's another consequence of adding so much anime original stuff & shuffling many scenes around. like, i think the anime did well, but as a manga reader i know these scenes could have been even better.
the last thing ill say about this part is that when legosi launched himself over the banners i literally laughed out loud
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this is the funniest clip ever lmao
i thought the last part of the ep was good, tho im a lil sad we didnt get legosi growling in the anime lol. once again im so in love with pina's voice acting ❤_❤
legosi's talk with pina about riz is supposed to set up the moth scene, which is when legosi's fur grows back, but based on the previews for the next ep, im not sure if we'll even be getting it, which worries me @0@ the preview pics that were posted all show moments that happen after legosi grows his fur back in the manga but it doesnt look like his fur has grown back yet in the anime.
this change is super weird to me, idk why the anime would push the moth scene or legosi's fur growth back so late in this arc. based on how things have been going im afraid the anime may have legosi grow is fur back in a different way, and cut the moth scene, which will be super disappointing for me bc i really love the moth scene. im still gonna hold out hope for it not being cut tho. crossing my fingers!!
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bigskydreaming · 4 years ago
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hood-ex
i was like well he could just date some random dude who's an artist or something and then i was like oh wait. kyle. lmao. did dick and kyle ever have interactions when donna wasn't around? i mean i know dick found kyle's.. spirit? or whatever in jla. but any other major moments between them aren't coming to my brain
LOL, nope, Dick and Kyle have barely ever interacted ever. Just at Hal’s memorial and then the Obsidian Age, which was well after Kyle and Donna split......they never hung out with Dick when they were together, as he was....busy in Bludhaven. Like Donna and Kyle were together during that period when Roy was running the Titans and they had that weird lineup with Terra the Second and Impulse and Fake Supergirl and just....yeah. But point being like, that was basically right after Dick left the team and Kory left to return to Tamaran, so Dick was kinda deliberately avoiding most of the Titans at that time, as far as I’ve always viewed it.
But yeah honestly all my Dick/Kyle thoughts pretty much stem just from their very brief Obsidian Age interactions and then me going like, huh. I could see it. Its more based on just their characters in general, and the fact that I think they have such similar priorities and mindsets as to be more alike than different, but without being so similar that they’re in any way derivative of each other or like....immediate analogues. Like you think of either Dick or Kyle, you don’t immediately jump to the other because they don’t particular stand out as being interchangeable or anything, but when you dig a little into their characters you’re like, oh wow, they have a lot in common actually.
In particular I’ve always keyed into the slightly lonely nature of Kyle’s position as Torchbearer in the GL Corps. A nod to his time as the only GL left, and the fact that he resurrected the Guardians and restarted the Corps, essentially.....so he’s always stood a little apart from the rest of the GLs, even Hal and John and Guy who were still around in some way or another back when he was the solo GL. Its not that he’s not close with them, its just that he has a very unique experience among the GLs where for most of the Corps, they always had the support of the Corps behind them as they became more experienced as Green Lanterns. And the weight of what they all did as Green Lanterns and what people looked to them for, it was always spread among like....the whole Corps, whereas when Kyle was Green Lantern during his solo tenure, like, it all rested on him, there was no one else to look at or look to....all eyes were just on him. 
That pressure, that absence of anyone who can fully relate, its always made him stand slightly apart from the rest of the Lanterns, even now that the Corps is back, and its only been heightened by the fact that he continues to have very unique experiences. Like how he was the only one to ever master the full emotional spectrum on his own, without external additives, the unique way in which he became the White Lantern, the fact that he has such a different relationship with the Ion entity than even those others who’ve hosted it, etc. Also the fact that like, despite his reputation among the Lanterns and others, despite how highly he’s regarded by them, that doesn’t always translate into the camaraderie and support you’d think it would, and most of his most intense adventures or most emotional storylines still happen when he’s off completely by himself with no lifelines. Because as much as he matters to the Corps and is valued by them, there’s always this kinda disconnect that frequently translates into a lot of distance between them and him, both physical and emotional.
And I’ve always thought there are a lot of parallels to the way Dick often feels like he’s alone even when in a crowd. That unique kind of pressure that comes from being the FIRST Robin, the original leader of the Titans, the guy who so often has acted as a trailblazer that others followed but without fully being able to relate to that experience of being first, of not having anyone TO follow, to have to make it up entirely as he went and hope that he wasn’t screwing up too much because it wasn’t like he had any precedent to look to or others to compare himself, his triumphs and his failures to. The way so often the buck stops with him and there’s no one really to pass it off to even when its not actually his fault, its more just.....people feel a need, a want to blame someone, and there’s not really anyone else to look at in his stead there. The similarities in how he also has such a positive reputation overall, and is seemingly so valued and respected by his various communities, and yet despite this it doesn’t always translate into direct and tangible support, leaving him often actually being cut-off and isolated during some of his most emotionally intensive storylines.
I think they have a lot of insight they could lend each other stemming from their respective experiences with the weight of legacy, which parallels without being the same....because the angle, the perspective is different with them. Kyle struggled with the weight of having to carry the entire legacy of the Green Lantern Corps by himself and feeling the responsibility of not wanting to let his predecessors down. Dick struggles with the weight of having his legacy carried by so many others and feeling responsible for what they go through as a result of that. And then at the same time Dick also struggled with the weight of carrying Bruce’s legacy as Batman at different times, such as Knightfall/Prodigal and then when he was lost in time, and now Kyle struggles with the weight of his legacy as Ion being carried on by others and the legacy his existence as the Torchbearer is creating for after he’s gone.
Additionally, they both have abundant experience with feeling under a microscope, like their every action is being scrutinized and they’re constantly being compared to the larger than life figure they’re most directly linked to. For Dick its Batman, for Kyle its Hal. That thing where they’re simultaneously expected to BE the equal to Bruce or Hal, or even better than them, but also at the same time being not exactly blamed for Bruce’s and Hal’s mistakes, but treated as even though they had nothing to do with their actions, they might as well have, kinda? Constantly compared to Bruce and Hal and with people saying they would have done this or that instead, but also with people quick to act like Bruce and Hal are their personal cautionary tales and tell them how dangerously close they are to becoming them whenever they do something that even slightly parallels the older two. 
Also, they have this distance between themselves and Bruce and Hal....Dick because of the chasm between them during the early years of Nightwing and Kyle because Hal was basically a villain and then dead during his early years as Green Lantern.....but without anyone ever really factoring in that they’re not as joined at the hip to Bruce and Hal as people act like and they not only have nothing to do with the worst of their mistakes, but the older two weren’t always as involved in the younger two’s successes as people credit them as being. And that very niche feeling that only they can really relate to, where Dick and Kyle so often end up being Bruce and Hal’s biggest defenders, and how often this overwrites or gets in the way of Dick and Kyle ever getting to fully express valid resentments they have of how Bruce and Hal’s own actions and choices and reputations impact Dick and Kyle’s lives and actions and choices.
Plus I think they’d just be good for each other - Kyle actually does have the ability to relax and unwind with his art and other hobbies in ways Dick could definitely learn from and benefit from applying to his own life, and Dick has the gravitas and weight of history and experience that means he can really address in actionable ways that Kyle can truly internalize, like the longing Kyle has always had, despite his many accomplishments, to really feel like he isn’t just a hero by happenstance or mistake, that he really belongs among their number. Kyle was a diehard superhero fanboy before he ever got the ring, and you can’t tell me he didn’t have a crush on the first Robin when he debuted back when Kyle was probably in middle school (they’re actually pretty close in age, with everything lending itself to the idea that Kyle’s of a similar age with Dick and the original Titans). Likewise, you can’t tell me Dick has anything but respect for someone who manages to establish himself and his own reputation despite how easy it’d be to be overshadowed by his predecessors and their actions.
They both have extremely parallel storylines even in their particulars......both have been briefly killed then presumed dead and then isolated from their loved ones for a period for a ‘solo mission’ and then blamed for that upon their return, even though Dick wanted nothing to do with that mission and was forced into it by Bruce just like the same is true of Kyle who was backed into his by the Guardians. Both have struggled with suicidal ideation in the past, most notably in the aftermath of Blockbuster and then with Kyle, his subconscious literally created a nemesis for him named Oblivion, who wanted nothing other than his death, because Oblivion was literally Kyle’s own death wish made flesh and blood by Kyle’s willpower and leftover Ion energy. 
Both have nightmares of being hijacked by someone else’s will and used as their puppets, with Dick and his many times being brainwashed and Kyle and his time possessed by Parallax. Both have extremely complicated feelings about children that were never truly theirs, both have been the scapegoat for crimes they didn’t commit, both are wracked with guilt for things they choose to take responsibility for but only because nobody ever told them it wasn’t actually their fault. Both are rape survivors whose rapes were never taken seriously or treated like they matter, and both are desperate for the approval of loved ones and mentors who actually do approve of them very much, but just often struggle to show them that in the ways they really need in order to BELIEVE it.
I could go on, lol, but like, you get it. Don’t worry, you’re not forgetting about some super significant story between Dick and Kyle, it really was just me latching on to that one story from twenty years ago where Kyle’s like if we get out of this alive, I want a hug, and Dick’s like deal, and I was like SOLD. And then my brain manufactured all these other reasons why clearly they are soulmates, and thus you have the Good Ship Dick/Kyle, which I shall sail forever more, no matter if I am only ever a crew of one.
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thefanficmonster · 4 years ago
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And My Heart Burned In That Lodge
Michael (Mike) Munroe x Reader (female)
Warnings: Death, Grief, Dealing with loss, Heartbreak, Swearing
Genre: ANGST
Summary: None of them will ever be the same, who knows if they’ll even heal. However, the case is different for Mike. He’s left to be dealing with the guilt, grief and the haunting memory of his friend’s death. He’s angry with himself for all the wrong things he did and all the right things he was too much of a coward to do. Now, his only closure is talking to a gravestone, hoping the wind in the graveyard will pass the message onto the person who the words are meant for.  
Requested by Anon. Wish I could tag them, they have such amazing ideas ❤
PS - Sorry this is hella long, I got carried away LOL
I stand aside, watching as my friends place their flowers on her grave. I can hear their cries. For some odd reason I can’t find it in me to feel sympathy or the need to go over there and be with them. I can’t see how that would do anything but make me feel more miserable. Standing here, seeing this scene unfold in front of me, I can’t help but be reminded of how it all started.
Fuck Mondays, man. Fuck them from the bottom of my heart. Even worse, this is the first week of school after winter break so no one wants to be here. Even even worse, this is the first time I’ll be seeing Emily after out breakup. We broke up over text and while I’m aware that’s the worst way to break up with someone, I must admit it was the only way for a lot of arguing and awkwardness to be avoided. 
It’s the first time I’m coming to school alone in a while. Without Emily, the car was pleasantly quiet aside from the songs on the radio. Not gonna lie, it felt a bit lonely. Being single for the first time in what feels like forever is both liberating and oddly melancholic. I try to push the self-loathing and the depressing thoughts away as my eyes scan the hallway, looking for the group of familiar faces. My gang. We used to be ten people but we lost two girls during our winter getaway at the Washington lodge. Josh’s sisters, Hannah and Beth, went missing and are presumably dead, all cause of a stupid prank Jess, Emily and I concocted, convincing Matt and Ash to go along with it. In retrospect, I don’t know what we were thinking.
‘Seriously, Mike? From one depressing thought to another? Is your brain lacking serotonin today more than usual or what?‘ I mentally scold myself just as I spot two familiar faces - Sam and Ashley. 
It doesn’t take long for me to notice the rest of the gang - Matt, Jess and Chris - all standing near by, surrounding a girl I have never seen before. She sticks out immediately with her long H/C hair and shiny E/C eyes. Jess has her arm linked with the girl, a gesture really out of place for Jess. I mean, her and Emily are pretty close and I’ve never even seen them hug.
“Hey, man. How are you?“ Matt notices me first, lifting his head and smiling at me. His greeting leads the others to look in my direction as well, including the girl. I catch Jess lean down in and whisper something to her. I can’t hear what she’s saying but it clearly aggravates her. I have never received a dirtier look from a girl in my entire life. I usually have the opposite effect on women but I guess there’s a first time for everything. 
“Mike...” Jess steps away from the girl and towards me, “this is my best friend, Y/N. She just got transferred here.” She turns her attention back to the girl, “Y/N, this is Mike.” 
Y/N looks unamused as she outstretches her arm in my direction. “Nice to meet you” is what she says, but her expression clearly tells me she would like to see as little of me as possible. At least she’s polite, right? 
“Likewise.” The handshake is brief and, despite her obvious distaste for me, she still gives me a firm handshake. 
“Wait, you were transferred? I thought Jess said you came here cause you moved.” Sam furrows her brows in confusion. 
“Well, it’s really a chicken and the egg type of situation.” Y/N laughs, rubbing the back of her neck almost nervously, “We moved because I had to transfer.”  Yikes.“ Ashley comments, “Not to pry or anything, but why did you have to be transferred?“
Y/N looks me dead in the eyes, as if she’s sending me a message that I better not overlook, or so help me God I’ll be dead. ”Noses randomly broke when I was around.”
It hurts so much to look back on those times and not pick up on what I was feeling. I foolishly decided that if I can’t give the feelings a name or find them a purpose I should turn a blind eye. I wasn’t that ignorant, I could tell she was the cause, but I could never admit it.
And then there’s the situation with Jess...
“You hurt her, and I’ll kill you.“
I found Y/N by the bleachers and let me tell you, she’s quite the paradox. She’s a straight A, no nonsense, intelligent beyond her years girl. With all these characteristics, you’d think she’d know better than to smoke cigarettes. Wrong! She’s a smoker. Jess can never not complain about the smell of cigarette smoke, it’s a miracle these two get along.
To my ‘hi’ she responded with what looked to be an eyeroll and an annoyed release of smoke through her nostrils. Even though I know I’m not welcome to be in her proximity, I still decide to sit down a little ways away from her, for personal space and all that. Definitely not cause I’m slightly afraid of her. No way.
We just sit in silence until she hits me with the aforementioned threat. I am caught off guard. All I can do is stare straight ahead of me like a deer in headlights. After maybe thirty seconds of absolute confusion I manage to turn my head to look at her. “What are you talking about?” The question is supposed to sound harsh but compared to the way she spit out that death threat it sounded more like a whimper.
“You are such an ignorant asshole.“ She shakes her head, throwing her cigarette on the bench below her. She stomps on it and walks away. I can’t help but stare at her until she’s out of sight. I feel like I’m watching something non-human. A phenomenon you can experience once in a lifetime - if you’re lucky. 
She’s the complete opposite of Jess: grounded, smart, rational. The only time I’ve seen her be so unpleasant is around me. I catch her interactions with the rest of the gang. From afar, she seems like the nicest, friendliest girl. And then she catches a glimpse of me and her mood changes. I don’t know what’s her problem with me but I know it most certainly isn’t something I’ve done to her. She’s been like that since the first moment we were introduced, so either Jess has talked a lot of shit about me or she just hates people named Michael. I may never know.
I had no idea what she meant at the time and only found out three weeks ago. Speaking of three weeks ago, the group once again headed for the Blackwood Pines, trying to hide their uneasiness with make excitement. I was pretty hyped when I heard we were going because that also meant our friend Josh was finally starting to get better. He hadn’t been in a good mindset since his sisters went missing and we were all really worried for him but weren’t allowed to show it because he always insisted he was fine.
He wasn’t. He was as messed up as ever and served as only the prologue to the nightmare of a night we had to live through.
But before all that could happen, the night started off well. Better than expected. The eeriness of the mountain combined with the bad memories we had of the place we still there, we could all feel the tension, but we did a good job masking it with jokes and whatnot. I’ll be honest, I wasn’t really looking forward to go and not only because of what happened the year prior.
“Wait, wait, wait. Y/N’s coming too?“ I ask, looking at Josh with wide eyes.
The guy is clearly confused by my overdramatic reaction to him counting down the names of the ones who had already RSVPd ‘Yes’. “Is that a problem or something?”
I sigh, hiding my face in my hands. It’s embarrassing to admit, really. “She doesn’t like me, and that puts it mildly. She hates me.”
He looks even more baffled than before, “Why? What’d you do to her?”
“Nothing, for fuck’s sake. Not a single thing. I haven’t even had a proper interaction with her.“ Talking about this matter exhausts me, mostly cause I can’t even express half the things I’m feeling.
There’s been a time or two I’ve caught her looking at me but her eyes weren’t filled with that distrust I’m used to. She looks away quickly when we make eye contact, as if she can’t put the mean mask on in time and she has to look away to do a system reset. I sometimes catch myself looking at her without realizing. I try to tell myself I do it for the purpose of solving her. 
‘Who are you kidding, Munroe?‘
                                                                  * * *
And here I am, climbing up the mountain to the Washington lodge. I’ve made it a goal to use this getaway to mend things with Y/N. It’s the only way for me to get back to normal. To get my mind back since she’s recently been living in my head rent-free. I’m bullshitting, not just recently. She’s taken over my brain since day one. I can’t place what’s going on with me, I can’t find a term to label it with and I most definitely can’t find a way to stop it. So, I’ve come to the conclusion that if I can’t stop it on my own, she’ll have to do it for me.
Another thing - I’ve never felt nervous or self-conscious around a girl all my life. Never. My friends joke that I’m a ladies’ man and I’d say that’s pretty true. So I have a tough time understanding how I turn into an awkward turtle that’s missing confidence when she’s around.
Once we all get settled in and there’s a fire going, giving the lodge a cozy atmosphere, it’s every man for themselves. Everyone picks a activity they want to occupy themselves with and the living room of the lodge empties out, leaving me there alone.
I scroll stare at the screen of my now useless phone. The thing has no reception and no way of keeping me busy, leaving my attention to wander to the voices that are getting more and more distant as my friends walk out of the room.
I can’t help but overhear Jess say to Y/N, “You haven’t even set your bag down yet and you’re going for a smoke? Jeez, Y/N.”
“You say as though you don’t know me.“ Y/N laughs, the sound of a door opening following after her voice.
It’s such a nice sound, her laugh. I’ve never heard it before. I’ve seen her smile and seen her chuckle at someone’s joke, but it was never actually a laugh. Seems she keeps those for special occasions. 
If she’s in the type of mood to laugh, she’s in the type of mood to be civil with me. Before I can talk myself out of the on-spot decision, I mentally slap myself and get off the couch, walking to the door to the side deck.
“You’ve got this, she’s just a person” 
“Who’s just a person?“ her voice cuts through the silence of the outdoors.
‘SHIT I SAID THAT OUT LOUD‘
I decide to carry this all the way, no shortcuts. No backing out. Somehow, now that she’s standing in front of me - a cigarette between her fingers, her shoulders tense from of the cold - I find it easier to get the words out. She’s just as human as everyone else. The cold causes her to shrivel up. She’s addicted to tobacco. She’s not some riddle I need to solve, just a person I need to talk to in order to understand.
“You.“ I reply, “Why aren’t you wearing a jacket?“
She shakes her head, her shoulders trembling a bit, “It builds the immune system.”
“No, it makes you suffer.“ I shrug my jacket off, cautiously approaching her and wrapping it around her.
Surprisingly, she accepts it with a nod and a murmured ‘thanks’, holding onto it with the hand that’s not holding her cigarette. “Why were you reminding yourself that I’m just a person? Do I not look like one?” She scoffs, facing away from me to look at the snowy hills ahead.
“No, no, not that. You just make me nervous that’s all.“ 
She whirls around, giving me this look as though she has no idea what I’m talking about.
“Really? Why’s that?“ she puts out her cigarette on the wooden railing, focusing all her attention on me.
My hand instinctively goes up to the back of my neck, feeling my face start to heat up. “Well, you’re not really fond of me. And I don’t know why, and....” I trail off, sighing in self-disappointment, “And I wanna know why.”
Her expression turns the complete opposite, a smile spreading across her face. “It’s not about something you have done. It’s about what you might’ve done.”
Despite feeling slightly relieved, I am no less confused than I was a minute ago. “And what is that?”
“Break my best friend’s heart.“ She looks a lot more serious now, “You really had no idea she was head over heels for you just a month ago. You were so oblivious and she was so whipped...“ frustration radiates off of her, “I just didn’t want her to get hurt.“ She closes her eyes, stabilizing herself before finishing her statement, “I didn’t want to hurt her.“
��Wait, what?“
The hurt that paints itself on her face is contagious. I feel it too and I don’t even know what’s causing it. “She always told me about you. Mike this and Mike that. She made you sound like the best guy in the world. And...I really wanted to be let down when I met you, but you were nothing but nice to me and to the other people in the group. But you were also such a jerk from time to time. You are just too...Fucking forget it.” 
In a blink of an eye she puts my jacket over the railing and runs inside the lodge.
“Y/N, wait!“
Needless to say, running after her was the best decision I’ve made. I didn’t get her to admit to anything, but at least we lied down the armor and agreed to give each other some time to get to know one another. Drop aside the assumptions and give a this acquaintanceship the chance to become a friendship. 
Sadly, all good things come to an end way sooner than we want. The rest of that dreadful night I witnessed her transform. When everyone was freaking out, she held them and comforted them. I saw the fear in her eyes but she never let it shine through in her actions. She was the one still holding it together even after she saw that disgusting creature. Her and I were the ones to turn that sanatorium upside down. We were with Josh in the mines. We were the ones to see the Wendigo first. We were by each other’s side the entire time. We had each other’s backs. 
I’ve never felt such a connection with someone. I was experiencing the most intimate understanding with a person in the worst moment of my life. It was bittersweet. The poison mixed with the cure.
Even when she knew her death was approaching, her only reaction was a single tear. A single crystal drop running down her cheek.
We can make a break. We can run right out of this hell hole and turn it to ash, all we need is for this fucking to focus its attention elsewhere. Thankfully Chris, Ash and Emily have made it out already and they’re safe. However, Sam, Y/N and I are trapped. The silent looks we exchange are laced with fear and panic. We have to calculate our next moves down to a millisecond and we don’t even know what those next moves should be.
Suddenly, a sharp pain starts spreading from my hand shoulder. My adrenaline is no longer doing a good job blocking out the pain of the fingers I had to sever. I slip up, letting out a hiss. The pain is just that unbearable.
That thing turn at the speed of light, letting out a screech and heading in my direction. My whole body is tense I couldn’t move if I wanted to but my arm is in such a horribly painful position, I think I’ll faint if I don’t readjust it.
“HEY!“ The voice comes from opposite me and my heart drops.
Sam’s next to me. It’s not her. It’s Y/N. 
The Wendigo loses interest in me as soon as it hears her yell turning and heading straight for her. It all starts sinking in. Now that it’s facing away, Sam and I can make it out. But she can’t. It’s over for her. There’s no way she’s leaving this lodge.
I catch her eyes from across the room. Her posture says a fighter, but her eyes scream ‘petrified’. She knows it too. She knows it’s game over. A single tear rolls down her cheek, shattering my heart.
That’s the last vulnerable moment, however. She turns her head, deciding to go out without showing a glint of fear to that piece of shit. I don’t have to look at Sam or tell her what to do. We’re both aware that we’re about to make it out, losing Y/N in the process.
It happens in a split second. Y/N spits at the Wendigo and then next thing I see is her laying on the ground in a pool of blood. 
The dash out of the lodge is a blur. The last thing I remember is sitting outside of the burning building, staring at the flames. The lodge wasn’t the only thing burning. Years of memories; history; wendigos; and my heart burnt in that lodge.
I see the group leave the graveyard. I struggle to move forward, my limbs heavy. I feel gravity is a lot stronger all of a sudden. 
I didn’t go to the final goodbye. I knew it wasn’t her. There was nothing left of her to bury. Sam told me they buried things that reminded people of her and objects she cherished. 
Well it’s time I give my goodbye.
I shrug my jacket off - the same jacket from that night - and put it around the gravestone like I put it over her shoulders. There’s a box of the cigarettes she smoked in the inner pocket.
“I hope you felt what I felt, Y/N. I hope I didn’t have to say it for you to notice it. I wish I knew...cause now it’ll haunt me for the rest of my life.” I can’t stop the tears, I’m too weak and I’ve been holding them back for far too long. “I’ve never believed in an afterlife. But I really hope there is one, just so we can meet again.” I scoff, shaking my head, “Who am I kidding, I’m probably going to hell.”
I believe that’s where I deserve to go, anyway. I’m the reason she died. And I will never let myself live that down. I will never forgive myself. A flame like no other burnt out so mine could keep burning.   I will make sure it haunts me till the day I leave this world behind.
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ssixa · 4 years ago
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CHANCE ENCOUNTER//MARK TUAN X Y/N
Description: Walking into the night shift at the hospital proves to keep you on your toes. Nights are left to the universe so you can only hope that tonight will be decent. What happens when you find out that one of your patients is THE Mark Tuan from GOT7? how do you try to deal with the chaos erupting from this chance encounter? and how many times do you have to tell yourself that you love your job?
Genre: fluff, slight cringe
Pairing: Black Fem Reader x Mark Tuan (though I will say there isn’t much description of black characteristics)
Word count: 3.5K
Warning: explicit language, slight heavy kissing
A/n: the way I actually wrote this story initially I included my real name and the friend in the story is actually based off of my irl friend. When I was talking to her about the story she really doesn’t have a bias in Got7 (but still loves the group). So she texted me one of those rapid gifs and told me to take a screenshot and which ever member it was was who was going to be in the story (she wanted anyone but BB. Don’t worry she doesn’t hate him, but homie is a whole different level of crackhead lol). So I wrote about her and the winning member, but she told me not to tell her who it was until I was done writing her sections which honestly made it a lot of fun to write.  
*All pic collages are made by me unless I state otherwise. Individual pictures in the collage are not mine and I give credit to where credit is due.
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Chapter Seven 
The conversation keeps proceeds further and constant laughter fills the room. The boys slowly traded places to get their makeup removed, get freshened up, and jump into some more comfier clothing. This meant that JB was all finished and traded places with Youngjae to get freshened up. JB took the seat that was once occupied by Youngjae that sat between Jackson and Jinyoung. He made brief eye contact with me, but then suddenly looked away. Now, I have a problem. Did I do something wrong? We had been talking for a while before now and nothing seemed off. Our conversations were great and he was honestly the second member I spoke to the most following Mark. The brief shock of being able to talk to my bias on a daily basis faded, but I couldn’t help growing a little more feelings for him. The feelings I had previously were from a fan to an idol, but now these feelings were more.
“Hey is there something wrong with JB” I lean over to whisper to Mark
“Nothing that I know, why?” he whispered back
“Well he’s been ignoring me ever since y/f/n and I showed up. I had been talking to him just as much as I have with you before being here and even on the stage he was really energetic and he saw that I was there and made the chance to interact...well kinda...from the stage. So now I’m just really confused if I did something wrong” I commented sadly.
“Maybe he realized how ugly you are up close” Mark sarcastically replied. The reply called for me to hit him on the shoulder and him faking like it hurt. We ended up both laughing at the ridiculousness of his reply. It really felt like we were true friends. While laughing my eyes wandered the room and for a slight second I saw JB give a slight glance towards Mark and I having a laughing fit, but then suddenly look away once he was caught. I mustered up the little courage I had and went to go kick Jackson out of his seat to the right of JB. Of course he looked at me with a pout on losing his seat, but then remembered who my bias was and just gave in.
“Hey” I looked to JB
“Oh, hey” he replied
“How are you? The concert was amazing you all did an amazing job...especially you” I shyly commented
“Really? Thank you! I was genuinely surprised to see you that close to the stage, but it was really cool seeing you in person instead of over facetime” he commented excitedly 
“Ok, now I’m confused” I snap back
“W-what?” he looked frazzled 
“Let’s go somewhere else to talk please” I sigh
“O-ok” he agreed. We both simultaneously get up and walk towards the door turning heads of staff, members, and y/f/n. y/f/n and I made eye contact and I “eye-splained” what I was doing. Well...hopefully that’s what came across, but she might be thinking we’re going somewhere more private to do the devil’s tango. JB and I leave the room and I search around for somewhere more private where we could talk. After looking around for a few more minutes, I found a backdoor that led to the outside back corner of the venue. I looked around making sure there weren’t any fans that happened to sneak around or anyone else of that matter. I put a little block to keep the door propped in case it’s locked from the outside and turn to JB. 
“Ok did I do something wrong or say something wrong” I look to JB
“W-what do you mean?” he replies anxiously 
“We’ve been talking perfectly fine before today and even at the concert you seemed perfectly fine. Even going so far as to look me dead in the eye during the chorus to ‘A’”
“Well, you see, I” 
“Mark said it’s because you realized how ugly I was in real life, is that true?” I question nervously
“y/n, god no, it’s not that. I- was just taken aback when you came to the dressing room. It was the shock of seeing you in person for the first time. It had my mind backwards” 
“I could understand that, sorry I gave you a heart attack” I laughed
“But you ignored me the whole time and avoided making eye contact like you were mad at me so please tell me if I did something wrong” I replied almost begging like.
“You did nothing wrong I swear. Avoiding you, I...I think my mind was made up. Well it was made up before, but seeing you in real life really just sealed it” he said nervously
“W-what did you make your mind up about?”
“My feelings towards you”
“JB, I-”
“y/n...I’ve liked you for so long. Might even say it was around the first time we ever talked, though I wasn’t sure of my feelings then. I just thought you were cute in the beginning” he said with scratching the back of his neck
“I can’t believe this...so during the concert when y’all were performing ‘A’ was that-”
“Yes, it was my confession to you. I’m actually kinda glad you caught that” he said with a nervous laughter
“But why did you glare at me back in the dressing room when you saw Mark and I laughing?”
“I was hesitant confessing to you from the stage because I thought you and Mark were close” he comments
“Of course Mark and I are close, you forget how we met. Even then I’m lucky to be close to you and all the boys”
“y/n that’s not what I meant and you know it. I thought Mark and you were in a secret relationship that he was even keeping away from us or that you had feelings for him or for each other...I don’t know”
“I know what you meant and Mark and I are really just friends. Sometimes I don’t know what goes through his head, but one thing is for sure, my feelings for him are simply amicable”
“So, where does that put me then” JB asks hopefully 
“I...think I like you too”
“‘You think?’” he quirked an eyebrow
“My feelings are there for you, but I’m not sure if it’s from me just being a fan or it being more”
“So, does that mean there’s hope for me?”
“Honestly, I don’t think there’s much to hope seeing that my feelings feel like they run deep”
“So...can I?” he questions 
“Can you what?”
“Kiss you,” he said. I was shocked. My brain seemed to send out signals before I fully understood what was being asked. I was partially halfway through a nod of my head giving him permission when he leaned down and kissed me. The kiss was soft almost like he wasn’t sure if I actually agreed. When he slowly started moving his lips I reciprocated and that’s when he knew that he didn’t imagine it. 
The kiss got deeper and before I knew it our tongues were battling for dominance...he won. What felt like hours was really minutes and we separated to catch our breath. We stared longingly into each other’s eyes in total awe that what actually happened happened. No words were spoken for what felt like forever, but the silence wasn’t awkward. It revealed the true feelings that were never brought up during our long talks and laughing fits. 
“Wow” the word that pierced the silence uttered by JB
“Is it safe for me to assume that you feel the same way?” He pondered 
“JB if that didn’t prove it I don’t know how else to convince you” I laughed
“I mean, there is something else we could do...you know...just to make sure” he muttered. I thank the heavens that it was dark enough and that, for the millionth time, I was black so a blush wouldn’t be noticed. I look up to JB once more
“JB are you sure?” I ask. He takes a step closer, pinning me against the wall leaving no space for escape,
“Of course, that is if you want to. I don’t want to force you to do anything you don’t feel comfortable with” he says in a sweet voice 
“I-I want to” is all I could reply. He leaned back in and our lips touched once more, but the feeling was different. It was like he was savoring every moment, but was holding himself back at the same time. This kiss got deeper and deeper and I slowly felt his hands reach to my chest. 
‘Bbbzzzzzz’
‘Bbbzzzzzz’
‘Bbbzzzzzz’
Just like that, the moment was stopped. JB separated his lips from mine in order to answer his phone. I was a bit taken aback that everything was just halted by the vibrations of a cell phone, but I was grateful because I realized where we were and how much trouble we could’ve gotten in if anyone saw us. JB answers his phone with an almost breathless sadness, 
“Hey wassup?” He answers. A muffled chattering can be heard from the caller but nothing I could make out. 
“Oh, ok, we’re coming back right now” he replies and hangs up. 
“What’s wrong?” I ask worriedly 
“Nothing Mark was saying the manager was looking for us because we’re about to leave” he says
“Oh~ um ok” I sat a bit saddened. JB walks towards me and picks my chin up, 
“Why so sad?” He asks caringly, but I have a feeling I saw a slight smirk.
“Um, nothing, nothing at all” I tried to move, but was kept on the wall. 
“y/n, c’mon are you sad that we didn’t finish what we started” he asks slyly
“I- um” I panic. JB leans down by my ear, though unnecessary seeing no one else is around, whispers,
“Don’t worry we can finish later”
~Mark’s POV~
I’m laughing along to the story y/f/n is telling though it was similar to the ones before. To sum it up, y/n getting drunk and saying stupid shit. y/n leans over to me and questions why JB was ignoring her. Of course I didn’t realize this but as her...friend...I felt obligated to reply with something stupid. Of course that led to her hitting me on the shoulder, but it didn’t hurt. We start laughing and when I open my eyes for a moment I thought I saw JB glaring at me, I wonder why? Next thing I see is y/n kicking Jackson out of his seat and him of course looking mad, but budging anyways.
I keep my eyes on both y/n and JB as they’re making some obviously awkward conversation. Next thing I see is both of them getting up to leave and of course that didn’t go unnoticed. The room went slightly quiet, but neither of them turned around. After they left, I switched places with Yugyeom to get my makeup off and change into something comfortable. They both seem to have been gone for a while because I finished up and went to go sit back down. After sitting and enjoying more of y/f/n’s stories (which made me realize how much stupid stuff y/n has gone up too especially with y/f/n) I got up to use the bathroom. 
“Yo where you going?” Jackson questions
“Need to pee, be back in a bit” I replied. Jackson shrugs his shoulders and as I leave he says to be safe. That idiot is exhausting sometimes. I leave the room and make my way to the bathroom. After relieving myself, I leave the bathroom, but something catches my eye. It was a cracked door. I walked towards the door and began to get worried that maybe a fan actually snuck in here. As I reached the ajar door, I heard a voice that sounded all too familiar,
“I know what you meant…” I hear y/n say and continue on. So, we really must be good friends in her eyes...funny. I know I shouldn’t be eavesdropping, but I can’t help it. I don’t know why I’m becoming so hopeful about anything. I don’t know what I’m expecting to hear, but I feel like I’ll know when I hear it. I keep on listening when I get a sudden text from the manager saying to meet back at the room because we need to plan out how we’re going to get the girls out of the building. I replied that I got it and that I would be back in a minute. 
By the time I started paying attention to the children outside. Oh how I picked the worst time to listen back to the conversation. It was oddly quiet so I decided to take a peek through the cracked door. JB was kissing y/n, my...friend, and she was kissing him back. I really shouldn’t be surprised since I know JB is y/n’s bias and JB asked about her after the surprise facetime call, but why does it hurt to see her… with him? I divert my eyes from the scene outside and make my way back to the dressing area with everyone else. I made it a point to figure out my emotions enough to call JB (though I knew he was busy) so we could devise a plan to leave before walking in the room. 
“What is going on with my feelings?” I mumble to myself.  
 ~Y/N POV~
I’m dumbfounded. Utterly speechless and yet JB takes the chance to give me a last quick peck before grabbing my hand to walk inside. We separated hands once we saw a staff member coming and it didn't seem like she noticed. We walked side by side with our hands lightly grazing each other until we entered the dressing room. All heads turned as we walked in and faces full of suspicion. Before anyone could ask anything, the manager walked into the room in order to devise a plan on how y/f/n and I could meet back up with the boys. Leaving together could cause major issues and that’s something that is wanted to be avoided. 
“So there’s still fans waiting outside to see the boys so we can’t let the girls leave with them” the manager says
“Sorry…” He shyly apologized
“Why apologize? We understand. If there is a side door we could go out of, we could do that...actually I think I might know one” I speak up. JB and I make slight eye contact and I turn away quickly. The interaction did not go unnoticed. 
The manager nodded along and y/f/n and I made our exit. We said our goodbyes to the boys and made our way out. I pulled y/f/n towards the exit JB and I took earlier and stopped at the exit. I opened the door slightly and looked around to make sure there wasn’t anyone around. After I gave the coast clear, y/f/n and I walked out and headed towards my car. I get a message from Mark updating us on where to meet. I sent him a reply to confirm I understood. I turned to y/f/n,
“Mark messaged me and said some of the boys decided to head back to the hotel while some decided to go out to a restaurant” I mentioned to her. 
“So who went where?” She asked nonchalantly. Oh ok, I see what’s going on here.
“Alright, spill the tea bitch” I said teasingly. 
“What?” 
“I already know you don’t have a bias in the group so there would be no point in asking who is going where. You would’ve probably just gone with me” I say tauntingly. 
“So explain where you’re going?” She said with a smirk 
“Wherever JB is” I reply shyly.
“Oooo so are YOU going to spill the tea then? What kind of conversation did y’all have out there?” she asks with a smirk
“Um well I confronted him about why he was avoiding me. Turned out he has feelings for me. He confessed to me during the concert-“ I confess 
“Hold up, you didn’t tell me your mans was ignoring you and when did he confess to you during the concert?”
“Oh...that might’ve been Mark I told and do you remember that one part during ‘A’ where JB came to our side of the stage during the chorus? Well that was his confession. When we were talking he was scared he made a mistake because he thought Mark and I have feelings for each other but I convinced him it was completely amicable. So~”
“So~ what?” She side eyed
“I think we’re...you know...a thing” I say with my hands covering my face 
“OOOHHHHH BBBIITTCCHHHH” she screamed 
“Shhhhh shut up, you’re too loud” I said trying to cover her mouth. She starts laughing, but calms down after a while. 
“Well congrats boo, you got yourself a mans and a FOINE one at that” she said laughingly 
“Lol thanks, but now for you, I didn’t forget. Spill. The. Tea. Bitch” I demand laughingly 
“Well, when I started dishing out your messy moments upon Mark’s request”
“You know I hate both of y’all for that right” 
“Love you too bitch” y/f/n winked 
“Anyways, I started to go on and on and we were all having a good time. The boys were switching out getting that all ‘boyfriend’ look...aka lookin foine in a pair of sweatpants” she added. I rolled my eyes, but agreed anyway.
“Well after you and JB left, Yugyeom came to sit beside me after switching out with Mark. I greeted him and he just smiled. I didn’t pay him too much mind until he tapped me on the shoulder. I looked at him curious and he asked me my age. It was cute...he was cute. He just seemed so shy, completely opposite of what he’s like on stage, around cameras, around his members, or even around other fans. So I told him my birth year and his ears got really red. He was shocked that I was older than he was. He couldn’t make eye contact with me for a little so, you know me, I decided to tease him a little every now and then. Well I guess my teasing got to him eventually because out of nowhere he grabbed my arm and looked me straight in the eye. He didn’t say anything just...stared. Bitch the goosebumps I felt were close to unmatched. Then he just let my arm go with a smirk and that was it. y/n now you know I’m not into younger guys, but genuinely this boy has me confused and I kinda want to figure him out, ya know?” she continued. At this point we were just sitting in my car talking, letting no stone go unturned about all the events of the night. Looks like we both found someone...funny.
“So you have the hots for the maknae huh?” I say teasingly
“Oh shut up” she replied with the roll of her eyes
“Like you seem to really have an eye for him though. He is taller than you and he is an amazing dancer and has a great personality. Though he is a crackhead most of the time. I mean, apart from trying to figure out what he’s about, why don’t you shoot your shot too?” I say meaningfully 
“Ah~ I don’t know honestly”
“I mean what kind of harm would be done? He wouldn’t get your attention in the first place if he wasn’t curious about you now would he? And also, imagine actually dating him and I’m together with JB so~”
“So what?”
“Bitch we get our own personal Jus2 performance now wouldn’t we” I reply with a joking smirk
“Ooooo you right” she replies with a sudden understanding 
“But honestly get to know him out of wanting to please, not just because of what I said as a joke” I say
“Yeah I know, he’s just really fascinating” 
“Well there it is...and Yug is going back to the hotel by the way. Something about ordering food and just having a little self drinking time” I replied. Her eyes had a glint and I already knew her thoughts.
“Let me do you one better,” I continued. I get out my phone and open Kakao to Yug and mine’s chat.
“Yo fetus” I message
“y/n, I’m older than you, why can’t you treat me better?” he replies with a crying emote
“Because you’re a lovable crackhead that’s still the baby of the group hahaha” 
“Hmph I hate you…”
“Well you won’t hate me after I tell you a certain someone was just talking about you” I reply with a smirk emote. It takes a little while for a reply, I guess he caught on.
“Oh…” is all he replies
“Well do you want me to give her your contact so you can keep talking? I’m not the type to give away contacts without asking permission”
“WAIT REALLY?!” he replies suddenly and excitedly 
“Of course, so I’m taking that as a yes”
“Yes please” he replies. I look to y/f/n who is caught up in her social media feeds to notice what I had been up to. I send Yug’s profile to her and I know she received it by a slight gasp of ‘bitch’ coming from the passenger side. I turn to her,
“A Mr.Kim seemed a little excited to talk to you again” I sly
“Did he now? Well ok then...off we go”
Previous/Next
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A/N: so I found a little bit of time this evening to post the new chapter, hope y’all enjoyed!
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madzilla84 · 5 years ago
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VidCon London 2020
I wrote up some rambly thoughts on Vidcon, my trip, and Phil day!
I arrived in London the night before the others, last Thursday (a week ago?? WOT), so went straight to my friend’s place in London – we went to a pub near his for pizza, and while I was there I saw Dan’s cute tweet. After a few wines, it made me super emotional as you can imagine. I love him. <3
We had some more drinks once we got back, which made the next morning … well.
Friday – Day 1
YUP, HANGOVER. But luckily not a ‘can’t function’ hangover, so once I’d packed up I made my way over to the Airbnb (it was fuckin WIMDY) to leave the luggage (too early to check in). The previous occupants were a group of Lads who’d left the place in a state, so it was still being cleaned. HONESTLY BOYS SMH)
Then I headed to the complex’s on-site café (ooh errr) and spent some time trying to figure out what to write in the card I wanted to give to Phil. My roomies @yikesola, @ahappydnp and @calvinahobbes arrived a little later and we checked into the flat, and basically hung out and chatted until it was time to head to registration. Which was a good decision as the line was super small on Friday night. Gotta say, the feeling of seeing Phil so big and so central on all the banners and posters for the con made me feel so proud of him. As other people have mentioned, there was some – curiosity, I guess? Worry? – about whether it would be weird seeing him there doing his first event like this on his own in a *very* long time, but somehow it wasn’t, at any point.  
We spotted Martyn checking in further down the hall, which was probably the first moment it all started to Feel Real. We (slightly awkwardly at first in my case lol) met a bunch of online folks in the registration area, and tagged along for a cable car ride over the river (did I mention it was WIMDY) to the O2 arena for dinner. When we all sat down to eat I realised I was sitting opposite two friends from IDB! \o/ We headed back after the meal to hang out and PREPARE for what was about to come.
Saturday - Day 2 - PHIL DAY
We started off by going for breakfast – naturally pancakes – and then headed across to the con. The first event of the day was the comedy panel that Phil was on, so we went across to the panel room early and ended up sitting through the panel before that one, ‘Out and Online’, which was probably – Phil notwithstanding – the better of the two I saw.
During that first panel – and really all morning up to that point – I’d started to feel increasingly nervous. I’d never met Dan or Phil before, and the fact it was happening imminently was suddenly hitting me. Not to mention it was very hot in the panel room that day, and – yeah. By the time the LGBT+ panel finished, I was just like the *screaming internally* meme.
The only other time I’d seen D&P in person with my own eyes was at Interactive Introverts – non-VIP, and I was quite far from the stage, so I couldn’t see them well, y’know? So when the panellists walked in for the comedy panel, I turned around and saw Phil properly in person for the first time. And… wow. I’m sure I hardly need to tell anyone on this forum how attractive he is, but I was just blown away by how beautiful he is in person. He just seems to, like, glow. 
And I was absolutely in love with his jacket, which I thought was new at first (it took me a while to place it was the one from the II promo photos). He just looked wonderful, and I went full Heart Eyes Motherfucker as he took his seat with the others. And once I’d actually seen him, somehow I felt less anxious and stressed. 
The panel was okay – I wasn’t familiar with the other attendees and I’m not sure theirs is the sort of content I’d necessarily watch – lots of prank vids and the like, but they def had some fans in the room. But it was obvious the majority of the attendees were there for Phil, and I noticed him looking around the room at all the people there for him throughout, making eye contact with lots of people. I’m sure he made brief eye contact a couple of times, which made me go !!!!! It was obvious the panelists were at quite different stages of their careers, which was a little dissonant sometimes, but also quite sweet – Phil was very encouraging to the younger, more inexperienced members of the panel, which was very lovely. Lucky them to have such a kind senpai.
After that we only had a quick break (mainly to down water after being boiled to death in the panel room) before it was time to get in line for Phil’s meet and greet. The wait for him to arrive was weirdly fast but also interminably long, and I spent most of it panicking about what I was going to say to Actual Phil Lester in a matter of minutes. 
But soon enough he arrived, shook hands with the photographer, did a lil hop to wave to everyone in the crowd who was waving at him, and then off we went.
I wasn’t sure what to expect – I’ve had pics before with celebs at conventions, and every con is different in how they handle photos. Some really rush you through, but this one was pretty good, I thought – you had plenty of time to say whatever you wanted to say, or give gifts – I thought we were supposed to leave them in a box somewhere, but no, we were to give them directly to Phil, who had a little table to put them on. Obviously I wanted to give him a hug, too, but would I be too awkward to ask for one once I actually got up there, I wondered?
But as it turned out I needn’t have worried; I could watch people meeting him from where we were in the line, and from the very first person, he opened his arms for a big hug from everyone who went up to meet him. Watching people running into his arms was making me really emotional – he just has such a great connection with his people. You could tell he was happy to be there and liked meeting us all. He took so many cute photos with people. We noticed he had a Sharpie and was signing things, which we hadn’t been told about beforehand, so I hadn’t brought anything special - ended up getting him to sign my con badge as a souvenir.
There were 3 of us, and @yikesola took one for the team and volunteered to go first. I watched how much fun they were having, how easily they chatted and hugged and posed for their cute photo and thought to myself, please don’t be a total buffoon when you go up there…
Soon enough it was my turn. Walking up for these things is always nervewracking and awkward – except this time, once it was time, Phil turned around, looked at me, smiled and opened his arms and I knew it would be okay.
I walked over and hugged him, and he probably had to bend down quite a lot, lol. I reached up over his shoulder to hug him, which meant being on tiptoes, of course; as many people have said in the past, he didn’t let go until you did. He was so gentle. <3 I maybe hugged him for a little longer than I might usually with someone I didn’t know because of it; he just has such comforting and welcoming vibes. And no, before anyone asks, I didn’t notice what he smelled like – we were talking about it after and I don’t think any of us did. I don’t in general unless someone’s wearing reasonably strong perfume/cologne, I don’t think, unless I’m hugging them for a really long time. ANYWAY.
The now-famous jacket (which looked so good!!) was soft AF. I handed over my lil gift – he spotted the chocolate and was pretty happy about that.
I then had a little time to talk to him but, like, how do you condense into a few seconds what someone means to you, how much they’ve helped you or how much you appreciate them? So I ended up going with one of the main reasons I came to love Phil so much as a creator – someone around my age still making such fun content. I don’t mean it like, ‘wow, at your age!!’ lol, which I’m not sure he would have appreciated, more like – when you get to a certain age, people often expect you to leave certain interests and behaviours aside (we see it all the time with these ‘ew people over 30 in fandom?? Gross’ posts), and Phil is still being himself and doing what he wants and not letting that affect him, and I just think that’s really great and it’s meant a lot to me. So we talked about that a bit. He said you should be able to be creative at any age. <3 Talking to him wasn’t like I expected – I don’t know what I expected, really, but I thought he might have more of a – nervous energy, maybe? Or just a bit more – y’know, ‘AmazingPhil’? But no, he was chill and confident and had this ease about him that was so comforting in person. I know he’s an introvert and probably holed up on the couch for a week after meeting all those people (hard same), but he really is so good at talking to people and making them feel at ease; everyone looked so happy walking away from him.
About halfway through the convo I had to work really hard to keep my brain on track and not just descend into babbling nonsense because he was looking me in the eye and listening attentively and bruh!!! That is … a hell of a thing! Not only is he so beautiful, but he really listens, and cares about what you’re saying, and is actually interested and not just going ‘uh huh, uh huh …’ like other celebs can do. His expression and demeanour was so friendly and open and welcoming, and honestly I just felt like I could talk to him for hours.
We then posed for the official photo they took, and hugged for it – when I’ve had other photo ops in the past where I’m standing close to the person I’ve been prone to nervous giggling, but this time I felt really relaxed and happy.
And that was it! I reluctantly said goodbye and headed off and was so flustered I a) forgot my little card to collect my photo, the guy had to chase after me, though it looked like everyone was doing that because they were on cloud 9, and b) picked up someone else’s sequin Dan bag from the bag pile. (Which I immediately noticed because I had a keychain and pin on mine, but I mean they *are* identical.) We went to get food and download our photos and watch all the videos we took. Even though I now had pics, I still almost couldn’t believe it was actually real.
And, wow. We were just floating for the rest of the day. It was such a wonderful, positive experience and I’m so glad it worked out that I was able to meet Phil. I didn’t think I could love him more but after that day I definitely did. Obviously, because it’s me, I spent a lot of time thinking about what I said to him and how I said it and was it the right thing and did I say it right and lejslkdjkjfkdhks, but at the end of the day he was lovely, I said more or less what I wanted to say (of course there’s more I’d have wanted to say, but there’s never enough time), and it went wonderfully well. So I really shouldn’t worry too much.
We paid a quick visit to the AP shop booth in the Expo Hall – they didn’t have a ton of stuff but they had all the t-shirts (I think it was just all the t-shirts, corgi jumper, corgi keychains, glitch hoodie), so I bought the yellow Try New Things shirt from Sarah. (And got a free pixel Phil sticker; they really want to get rid of those huh)
The only other Phil-event for the day was his appearance at the Night of Awesome that evening, so we went along for that. Apparently the theme of the evening was ‘collaboration’, so most of the performers didn’t appear by themselves aside from a couple of music acts. But it quickly descended into madness – most of the performances were some sort of challenge which involved the loser getting a pie to the face or gunged – i.e. perfect Saturday night entertainment if you’re ten. So maybe it was more aimed at kids, I thought, until one of the music acts started swearing up a STORM and a load of horrified parents started dragging their kids out while I almost died trying not to laugh. There was a lot of TikTok stuff, but the animators challenge was pretty good and a couple of the music acts were great.
You probably read about the guy who crashed the performance to make an offensive anti-trans joke and then got chased out by security … when I figured out who it was later I wasn’t surprised, he’s done stupider shit in the past, but Vidcon didn’t react very well to it right away. Throughout the event I generally thought security and staff were very good, but they really dropped the ball on this. The music act gamely carried on though, as did a number of other acts after them, and *just* as everyone had pretty much lost the will to live, Phil randomly appeared on stage with Kian and JC (…no, me neither) along with a science Youtuber. Yay! I thought his bit was really cute; kind of random but that made sense when he explained the original plan had gone awry shortly before the show started. He was *so* into it and I thought it was so sweet how, again, he kept looking for his people in the crowd. He was so confident on stage and even when the stuff he was being asked to do was so random and weird he just owned it, went for it and made it funny. Thomas Sanders came on after science!Phil to do a very wholesome set which kind of saved the evening, lol.
And that was the end of Phil day! Naturally we had to order Domino’s in the evening after our emotional and intense day (and to recover from whatever tf most of that concert was). I feel like I’ve become some sort of addict, and now the rest of my existence will be sad and grey until I can hug Phil again (which might well be never). I have peaked. I also remembered what I like so much about (good) conventions; being with your people and feeling so free to express yourself and what you love - between the phannies and the fanders there were so many pride flags, and so many people walking around wearing merch. (Also it was the first con I’d ever been to where there were no cosplayers! Which is unsurprising given it’s youtube fandom, but still – new experience.)
Sunday - Day 3
Sunday we slept in after staying up until like 3am chatting (whoops), so I missed jacksepticeye’s panel but I did get to the Buzzfeed Unsolved/Watcher one, which was really funny. I wish I’d gotten to meet the boys but what can you do. I also went to the Expo Hall and met PJ (who was very nice, and friendly!! But had exactly that nervous energy I was talking about earlier, which I’m more accustomed to when I meet celebs at cons; Phil really is something special), and bought a few enamel pins, because ENAMEL PINS.
And then … the worst bit of any con, people started to leave. :( My 3 roomies left first, which was the worst bit of the weekend. I ended up tagging along with some twitter friends to get coffee, and we ended up sitting around for like 3 hours outside the cloakroom because no one wanted to leave.
We found out about Dan’s half marathon during this time, and I know people have this view of phannies like we’re all obsessive, invasive weirdos who just want to find out things for – I dunno, clout? But honestly everyone there was so proud of him and just like the whole weekend, it was great to be with people who understood. Like, I can hardly tell a co-worker that a youtuber I follow ran a marathon, they’d be like - okay, and…? So it was nice to sit there and sort of – celebrate it, in our own lil way.
We all parted ways on the train - I went back to my friend’s and watched Phil’s liveshow there, which was really a perfect way to end the weekend. I’m glad it sounded like he had such a nice time at Vidcon. Someone tweeted about him seeing all the people who had come to see just him and how excited they were to see him, and that warmed my heart. And hopefully his too.
The next day I returned to the Excel to have pizza lunch with the last two friends who were still in town, which really helped with the post-con blues, and then it really was it. Since then I’ve been hanging out at my friend’s flat and taking a couple of trips out to various shops or whatever, but I’ve mostly been tired and lazy and catching up on sleep a bit.
As I mentioned, I’m now a filthy addict. I will be … keeping an eye on future vidcons/events, for sure. >_> And I might be back in London in April, maybe. >_> many thoughts head full
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sergeanttpoliteness · 6 years ago
Text
➹one make out session, please➹ (peter b. parker x reader)
The sad and divorced man who's become a regular for the past year is constantly spilling his emotions to you, his favorite bartender. This wasn't something new; you can't count with both of your hands the times you've heard someone recount the odyssey of their life. But these flutters in your stomach were definitely something you didn't experience with your customers, and you definitely did not end up making out with them at the end of the night. Maybe Peter B. was your only exception, though.
(PART II) 
word count: 7.1k (sorry)
a/n: i tried like 8484 times to add a gif but tumblr wouldn’t let me so ((:: hello @ whoever’s reading this tho!! love how i went from 2k to 7k words lol, i’m sorry about that i don’t know how it happened. feel free to help me out w ideas and send requests if you want (: hope u enjoy !! Tiresome was a massive understatement when it came to having to describe enduring the same routine most nights. Not that you slept peacefully like a newborn baby all the time before taking a job as a bartender at the bar; but once in a while, when you returned home and watched the bright red numbers of the clock switch to 5 o’clock in the morning since your brain was punishing you by not giving you your well deserved rest, you sure did miss those simpler times when you didn’t work at night. Yes, at first it may be amusing to watch a drunk customer go haywire as they try to understand the meaning of life, and it’s nice listening to the story of how someone ended up drinking five shots of tequila that evening. You relished listening to other people’s problems, their stories, their lives— perhaps because, as much as it ashamed you to admit it, you didn’t make much out of yours. However, two years of the same old passed, and soon enough, every conversation and dusk began to blur together; everything became a monotonous daze, like an old movie replaying endlessly every week. The obvious route would be to quit your job as a bartender before you lost your mind, but the old lady who owned the bar paid somewhat generously considering the career— both with affection and money— and, despite how cocky it might’ve sounded, you knew well that the customers would be lost without your glorious daiquiris and margaritas. You’d also grown fond of the few people there and the new friends you made once in a while; you didn’t have the exact explanation as to why, but whilst you were in that hazy trance, you were quite the charmer. 
Every night was just like that: nothing more than a few more hours to your life, until a man who you guessed was probably nearing his forties and with a really, really nice nose (what could you say? You had an appreciation for the art of beautiful noses), dropped on the stool directly in front of you with a heavy sigh.
“One whiskey served over ice, please.” He muttered, resting his chin on the palm of his hand. You didn’t think much about it as your hands got to work and moments later handed the man his drink. You later spent your time trying to distract yourself with the preparation of other beverages, yet your eyes were drawn to him momentarily once or twice. Even as you talked with a tourist— a woman from Croatia asking about the best restaurants and stores in the city— the image of the guy itched at the back of your head, and you couldn’t figure out why. He was attractive, you decided, in spite of his rugged looks; he honestly appeared as if a train had hit him. Whether it was a physical or emotional train, you wouldn’t be surprised if it had been both.
The tourist sadly ended your conversation, distracted by the game on the TV, but you took it as an opportunity to comply with your desires and approach the man. You see, you liked to believe you possessed powers— useless ones, to say the least: just by a quick scan, you knew if a person needed a good talk; it could’ve been after their third drink, maybe even when they’re still sober. Suddenly, though, your bartender-senses abandoned you along with your charm and you simply couldn’t find a way to spark up a conversation with the guy. Really? You thought to yourself. Right now, when a cute older dude is sitting right in front of you, probably in need of your comradeship? Yeah, he was most definitely older than you, perhaps by some ten years, but did you really care? 
You were stuck, unable to crawl out of the crater until, eventually, he asked for his third drink. Showtime, you breathed in, the confidence hugging your entire body. “Just saying, but I could already sense this third drink once you walked in through the door,” You tried to joke.
He huffed through his nose, a hint of a smile on the corner of his lips. “Do I look that bad?” He asked, a playful tone in his voice. A lopsided grin found itself onto your face and you slightly leaned over to wipe the surface next to where his hand rested.
“The opposite, actually. You’re quite the handsome guy.” Oh, there it was. He didn’t seem repulsed, which could’ve been a good sign, except that he didn’t look like anything— his expression was unreadable.
He raised his glass up to his lips. “Yeah, well, don’t really feel like it right now,” He said before taking a swig of his drink. You picked up a wet empty glass and dried it with your towel, like the true bartender you were.
“Well, do you feel like talking about it?” His eyes darted up to you and he lifted a brow. “There’s obviously a reason why you’re sitting here right now, no?”
You waited for an answer, but he swallowed his entire drink before he set the dry cup on the bar. “Maybe another time, kid.” Ouch. Kid? Really? You thought this was over once you turned twenty-three. “But I gotta get going now.”
That was the first conversation you two shared, and you bit the inside of your cheek as you watched him leave, disappointed that it also could’ve been the last one. You should’ve learned by now, though: this wasn’t the first time you made a “friend”, hoped that they would drop by again in the future, only to never see their faces again. You took in his appearance one last time then, cherishing the fleeting buzz in your head. But you were lucky when two weeks later he entered through the same door again. Nonetheless, not lucky enough, since he arrived the only day your shift ended early.
“One whiskey served over ice, please.”
You didn’t realize he was there until you heard that scratchy voice, the one you thought you’d never have the pleasure of hearing again. Your head jerked up and you didn’t miss a beat before gladly serving him— there was no way you were leaving without interacting with the older man, regardless of how small and brief the action was. It was a Greek tragedy in your eyes: saying goodbye to the back of the head of the attractive man in his thirties. You jokingly (but not really) warned your coworker to not make a move on the man; and, of course, you asked him to update you the next day if he mentioned you even just once. The next day (or rather, night), the first thing you obviously did was pester your friend to spill all the juicy, if any, details.
“I don’t know, he didn’t really say anything. He so checked you out when you left, though. Like— okay, maybe not check you out, but he definitely stared at you for a few seconds.”
You deflated. Anyone else would’ve cheered, but all you needed to hear was the first part; your friend had the poor tendency of overanalyzing and exaggerating every small detail— you learned that when, after some customers had a lousy argument, you both recounted the event to your boss during your monthly coffee session. What had probably happened was that the man merely breathed in your direction and your coworker’s eyes jumped out of their sockets. You brushed away your discontent, though, reminding yourself of your principles: you never hooked up with customers, especially since your boss was adamant about that after an incident with another bartender, and you didn’t want to endure new job interviews for as long as you could.
But the rush made you want to have fun with this guy.
Another entire month went by; no sign of mystery guy, no whiskey served over ice. No drops of your stomach, until one evening you couldn’t believe your eyes when you saw that beautiful mess of a man, a scratch on his forehead you didn’t think much about since you’d seen much weirder things, sat in front of you. “Would you look at that! We meet once again,” He smirked. You placed your hand on your hip, biting your lip.
“Thought I’d never see you again. Tell me, do you want to try out something different tonight, or your boring, usual—”
“—whiskey served over ice. Yeah, please.”
Whiskey served over ice was quickly becoming your favorite order.
You didn’t exchange any other words— you were too engulfed into the breaking news playing on the flatscreen: a poor quality clip— something that still occurred even if it wasn’t 2005 anymore— of Spider-Man stopping a truck before it crashed into a hurt kid in the middle of the street. You grabbed the remote control and boosted the volume a bit, deciding you could perhaps multitask for a while. “So,” You started while maintaining your attention on the screen, catching his own. “You ever met Spider-Man?”
An odd question which made him snort as he turned his head to watch the screen. “No, not really. Wouldn’t want to, though, he’s kinda overrated.”
Your eyes went round, and you had to unstick your view from the TV to search for any sign of playfulness in the man’s face. He seemed dead serious. “Overrated? Full offense, but I can’t let you say that about Spidey, an actual superhero.”
He rolled his eyes, amused and defensively holding up one hand. “I’m just tired after hearing about him for the last twenty years. Can’t believe he’s not going around with a walking stick yet.”
You returned to your previous position, your forearms resting on the counter as you continued to observe a recap on a football game of the night before. “Yeah, I won’t argue against you on that. I remember watching him swing on TV back when I was seven-years-old. Big part of my childhood, the guy.”
He inclined closer to you, his brows drawn together. “What’s your age?”
“Twenty-nine.”
He let out an ‘oof’. You would’ve been insulted if it weren’t for the exaggeration in his tone. “You’re getting old. Soon you’ll be complaining about how much your back hurts and wishing for the sweet release of death.”
You chuckled, eyeing his appearance. “Ah, well, too bad because I already do that. How old are you? You’re acting like you’re sixty when in reality you’re probably just like forty, or something.”
“Eh, close,” He grinned, and then took a deep breath. “I’m thirty-seven.”
“And you’re calling me old?!” You exclaimed, earning a laugh from him. “You’re basically almost on your deathbed. Age doesn’t hold me back, though.” You winked jokingly and he bit his lip, his eyebrows raised.
“Is that so?”
“Yeah, you know— more experienced, sometimes wiser, sometimes more of a gentleman…” You mused, drawing patterns on the bar. You didn’t notice him giving you a once-over. Someone called for your attention, and you let out a disappointed sigh, pouting at him. “Gotta go! Duty calls.”
“Have fun,” He raised his drink, bowing his head. As you walked away, you allowed your face to pale with terror and you began to wonder if the air-conditioning suddenly malfunctioned, for you were too heated for your comfort. You took as much time as you could with the rest of the clients, too frightened to face the man after your shameless flirts, dreading the repercussions. But you were finishing the preparation of a mojito, wishing you could down it yourself, when he lifted his empty glass and whistled at you. You nervously glared at him, motioning for him to wait before you served the finished beverage to its rightful owner and you met him once again.
“Tell me,” You began as you poured the liquid in his cup, trying to change the subject and mask your trembling hands. “I’m tired of thinking of you as the whiskey man. What’s your name?”
He let out a short laugh, thanking you before he took ahold of his drink. “Peter. Peter… B… Parker,” He moved his head along to each word and you sang out an impressed ‘ooh’.
“Peter B. Parker. Catchy. Giving me some boy band vibes.”
“Boy band vibes?”
“Yeah, like, ‘pretty boy in a band who’s a total teenage heartthrob’ type of vibes. You definitely fit the description.” Goddammit, you did it again. Just this once, you wished, just this once shutting your mouth would make everything easier for you.
Peter, his face finally having a name, licked his lips after sipping the alcohol. “So you think I’m pretty?” He inquired, a crooked smile on his face. You were good at holding back the tingling that wanted to suffocate your cheeks, the way you wished you could with your words. You hummed, surveying him quickly.
"Well, I did say you were handsome last time, didn't I?"
"Yeah— yeah, I remember that," He squinted his eyes, pointing his finger at you. "And you're...”
“Y/N.”
“Well, Y/N…” He took his phone out from his back pocket and frowned down at it with concern. “Can you help me? There’s something wrong with my phone— it doesn’t have your number in it.”
Oh, my God.
You glanced down at his cracked screen and then back up at his face. Snorting so loudly it hurt your nose, your hand flew up to cover your mouth. “Oh, my God. I’m sorry, I’m just—” You pinched the bridge of your nose, wheezing. “I can’t believe you just did that. That was so cheesy, oh my God.”
“Are you gonna fix it or not, though?” He smirked, offering you his device. “‘Cause it’s a real problem.”
He got your number. After you returned his cell phone, you noticed his yet again empty glass, wondering how he downed it in just the time you were adding your phone number to his contacts. You grabbed it and poured more ice, seeing as the previous had already melted. “Since you successfully made me want to walk away from you and stroll around the place to try and heal myself after that awfully cheesy pickup line, this next round is on the house.” You declared as you opened the bottle of whiskey. He declined, emphasizing his refusal with the flutter of his hand.
“That’s not necessary.”
“Whatever, I’m gonna do it anyway,” You slid the alcoholic beverage towards him, and his eyes softened along with his entire face, too.
“Thanks.”
Your conversation continued the entire night. You talked non stop— so much that you might have forgotten about the existence of other customers. But it didn’t matter. Despite their annoyed expressions, it was worth it. You heard the story you had so desperately yearned for him to tell; he reminisced about his dead aunt and uncle— the lovely angels who raised him and the ones he looked up to the most. But your heart cried out when Peter sorrowfully stared into his whiskey, and you first heard the name. MJ. His ex-wife. The owner of his love for the longest time, the woman who crushed him a year ago. The one whose heart he broke, too, though, all because he was too terrified, too much of a wimp to take the next step, ‘not enough’, he said. You remained silent, realizing your flirtatious exchanges earlier were solely a way to muffle Mary Jane’s memory in his mind. Nevertheless, your hand reassuringly rubbed his shoulder, the action alone speaking the comfort he needed.
It wasn’t the last time it happened. After that, he began to show up at the bar more frequently, once a week. And whenever he did come, he left until your shift neared its end.
“Like, what type of father would I even be? Look at me!” Peter pointed at his head, stirring the whiskey with a finger of his other hand. “I’m a mess, I can’t even take care of myself— how could I take care of a child?! I just… I don’t have the time,” He sighed, laying his head atop the bar. You frowned as you prepared a second margarita for the mother of one of your classmates from high school, which was what initiated the conversation of parenthood and such in the first place.
You shrugged, aggressively rattling the shaker with your two hands. “I don’t know, maybe you’re underestimating yourself,” He peered up at you, doubt in his expression. “And you do have the time to come here every week, though,” You pointed out, wiggling your arms from how sore they were.
“Yeah, but you’re… this is different, this is…” He slurred, waving his hand. “Whatever. Work always ruins things for me. It has ever since I was a little tot.”
“Damn, what is your work?”
Peter began to gulp down his entire drink after your question and seconds later slammed it on the table with wide eyes, attempting to digest the liquor. He cleared his throat, rubbing his eyes. “It’s… it’s, uh, I-I work at the Daily Bugle.” You opened your mouth with astonishment, stopping in the midst of rubbing a lime on the rim of the glass.
“The Daily Bugle?” You asked incredulously. “That one newspaper with the dude who’s obsessed with Spider-Man? J-something-Jameson?”
“Yeah… yeah, that’s my boss.”
You grimaced, instantly comprehending his daily fatigue and he nodded, agreeing with you. “What do you do? Write?”
“Nah, I’m a photographer.”
“Ooh, so you’re a photographer? That’s hot,” Moments ago he’d been complaining about his marital issues yet there you were, calling Peter hot. You might have slipped the compliment right before you left to give the margarita to your ex-classmate’s mom in fear of his response, therefore missing the faint heat that overwhelmed his cheeks and ears. 
“Is… it’s nothing, really,” He dismissed your words, being all humble and shit. You placed your elbows on the counter, coming closer to him.
“Could I ever see any of your pictures?”
He threw a block of ice into his mouth. “Mm, thure,” He said, his mouth full. Your mouth twitched in amusement, and you decided to sit down considering the night was particularly slow. Your boss lectured all the time that there was never time to sit down and there was always something to do; keeping that in mind, you still ignored the four dirty glasses, instead choosing to spend time paying attention to the man with ice in his mouth. “I’m boring, though— tell me more about yourself. There’s gotta be more to the attractive barista who works at the bar near my apartment.”
You were taken aback, both by the fact that he considered you were good-looking and that he was pushing to hear about you. “Me?” You blinked. He nodded, looking at you expectantly. You lowered your head, picking at the skin around your nails— damn past you for cursing you with the habit and, consequently, terrible nails as well. “This is… weird. I don’t really talk to customers about my life. They even tell us to not do that specifically.” You laughed.
“What? Why?”
“Well, because you don’t want to hear about me: my childhood and the drama in my life, I guess,” You said with an obvious look. He scrunched his brows together.
“But I do.”
You despised the way your heart missed a beat. “Alright, well… I don’t know, what do you want to hear about?”
“Were you born here? In New York?”
You shook your head. “Nah, I moved here after finishing college. I thought I was gonna be a successful artist and stuff.”
Peter gasped with wonder. “Artist?! Cool! What, what type of artist?”
“I paint,” He whispered an adorable ‘whoaa’ and your shoulders shook with laughter. “It’s really not that cool. I do paintings once in a while. Pays well and can help with the bills if someone buys them.”
“I’d buy many if I had the money.” 
“Nah, I would paint you one for free,” You smirked, leaning closer to him.
“Oh, sweet— you can paint me naked. You know, like one of your french girls.” He hummed, a goofy grin breaking out on his face. You quirked a brow, giggling.
“That’d be interesting.”
“I know, I’d be a great muse. Tell me more, though, you got any friends? Family?”
You hesitantly nodded. “Yeah, except they’re all back home. The only people I’ve got here are at the bar, my boss basically adopted the few people who work here.”
“Wish my boss was like that,” He grumbled, grasping more ice. “Well, now you’re stuck with me too, though.”
You gripped your knee, your lips pressed together to retain the beam threatening to appear. “Is that so?” The ice he had shoved into his mouth was too big for him to speak without drooling all over his chin; so with his chipmunk cheeks, he moved his head up and down. “Is this us officially becoming friends?” You waggled your brows teasingly, your lips now stretching widely.
“I thought that happened the second you gave me a free round of drinks.”
Three more months passed by. You realized your nights weren’t a blur anymore. No— now they were Peter B. Parker, his weary brown eyes, and his whiskey served over ice. You couldn’t help the scrunch of your nose and your slight smile whenever someone else ordered whiskey, since, as ridiculous you knew it was, those words were Peter. You held yourself back each night you two shared from leaning over the bar and tasting the cold liquor in his tongue. You wondered if, perhaps, that’s what Peter Parker tasted like. But it didn’t matter how strongly you craved to find out; you couldn't be anything more than a friend to your customers, you constantly reminded yourself. Not that it even was a possibility with Peter, anyway— it was evident he still cared about Mary Jane. It was clear she lingered in the fog of his memory, despite how much he drank or how hard you attempted to take her place with every conversation. You tried to convince yourself that it was alright, and it wasn’t working, but you hoped someday it would.
It was a Saturday night— or more like the early hours of Sunday— when you went to joyfully take Peter’s order after he sat down, only to be met with an awful bruise on the bridge of his nose. You winced, unconsciously reaching out to touch his face, but drawing your hand back before he noticed. “Pete, what the fuck happened to your face?”
“That’s not a nice thing to say about someone.” He simply responded, evidently trying to disguise the swelling with his hand, but sighed after seeing your scowl. “Fine, it’s embarrassing. Like… really, really embarrassing—”
“I’m listening.”
He squirmed, his gaze moving to his right and his voice coming out high pitched as he searched for a way to explain himself. “I tripped.”
Something you’d learned throughout the past months of weekly meetings with Peter Parker was that the man was not subtle. Far from it. And this wasn’t the first time he arrived with a scratch or sort of bruise, which truly clutched at your stomach in the wrong way, but although he’d talk about anything— from what he ate for breakfast that day to confessing a pestering fear in his head, he never ever talked about how or why he got hurt. He always managed to steer away from the subject; the sneaky bastard, you’d think to yourself when minutes later you two were thoroughly discussing the best ways to eat an egg. You never budged, though, for you couldn’t bear to lose his trust or him getting mad at you; which hadn’t occurred yet, and you wished to keep it that way. You questioned your decision, however, as you grabbed the box of bandaids hiding under the counter (the bartenders there could frequently be quite clumsy), and grasped one with your fingers. You opened it, detaching the paper from it.
“It’s really nothing,” He continued insisting, trying to erase the creases between your eyebrows. “I just gave the ground a real nice smooch—” He stopped talking when you leaned over to touch his face, your hand cupping his cheek as you smoothed the plaster over his nose.
“I… what?”
“Sorry, it just looked really gross,” You lied, truthfully concerned about his well-being. “You couldn’t go around walking like that.”
“But I can go around walking with a…” He inspected his reflection on the cupboards, squinting to make out the pattern of the bandaid. “Spongebob bandaid on my face. And how is that supposed to heal a bruise?”
“I’m sorry—”
“No, it’s alright. I… I like Spongebob. One whiskey served over ice, though, please.”
You scoffed, picking up a glass from the cabinet. “I’ve held myself back from asking, but…” You shut your mouth as you continued preparing his drink, doubt winning its battle again. He tilted his head.
“But?”
“But… how come you’re always getting hurt in some way? It’s kind of concerning,” You laughed nervously, not wanting to reveal how much it truly worried you. He shrugged one shoulder.
“I guess I’m just really clumsy.”
“This isn’t clumsy, though,” You argued, your forehead furrowed. “This is… getting beat up type of stuff. Is that it? Do you get into street fights or something?”
“No! No, I, uh…” He hesitated, avoiding your gaze. “That’s not it.”
“Then what is it?”
Peter searched for words, his mouth ajar. He closed it and rolled his lips. “I want to tell you, I really do, but now is not the time. I promise I will in the future.”
You prepared to question him more, until a tune filled your ears. You raised your hands up to your head, your palms squeezing your temples as you gasped. Peter raised an eyebrow, entertained. “I fucking love this song,” You explained as ‘I Wanna Dance With Somebody’ by Whitney Houston played on the TV. Peter sat still as he paid attention to the music, confusion glinting in his eyes until he recognized the melody and his body lit up.
“Wait, so do I—”
“Clock strikes upon the hour, and the sun begins to fade…” You shouted, your head jerked back. Peter put his fist against his mouth, embarrassed by your hilariously terrible singing, but at the same time holding himself back from joining you in your performance. “Still enough time to figure out how to chase my blues away!” You sang, pointing your finger at him. He muttered an ‘ohmygod’ under his breath, his face beet red.
“I’ve done enough ‘till now, it’s the light of day that shows me how!” You dramatically laid back on the counter, true singer-like style, holding an imaginary microphone up to your mouth. “And when the night falls, loneliness calls…” You turned your head to face Peter and booped his nose, an action which you would undeniably regret once the euphoria of hearing one of your favorite songs ended.
“Ah, fuck it…” He whispered, beaming at you and grabbing your fist to sing into the invisible mic as well. “Oh! I wanna dance with somebody! I wanna feel the heat with somebody!” He cried out, his eyes passionately closed and his hand pressed flat against his chest. You scream-laughed at him, holding your torso. However, you quickly rolled onto your stomach, your faces now in close proximity.
“Yeah! I wanna dance with somebody! With somebody who loves me!” You both sung into your clenched hand, incredibly out of tune. “Oh! I want to dance with somebody!”
“I wanna feel the heat with somebody...” A customer in the background yelled out. You two exploded with laughter, your head pressed against his cheek and Peter gripping your hand tight.
That night, you sang with somebody you loved.
The end of the year arrived too quickly, and you were disconnecting the plug of the Christmas lights adorning the windows of the bar as you wondered whether you should get Peter a present for the holidays or not. Some new sweatpants, you considered; they were his favorite piece of clothing, you had come to learn, and in the times that he wore a pair, you noticed it was always the same. But you also questioned if it would be bizarre to hand him a gift— you only saw each other at the bar, after all. There weren't any instances where he called you to meet up for lunch, or something similar; and once in a while, you hoped to hear your blaring ringtone and to answer your phone to him. That never happened, though; your relationship would never evolve from the occasional text throughout the week. To make matters worse, you hadn’t even seen him for three weeks, three days, and counting. And, my God, did it sadden you that you knew that. Every time you’d type a greeting along with a question about his whereabouts, you’d stare at the screen of your cell phone for far too long and eventually delete your words— the exact process repeating over and over again. Maybe he’s with his friends or remaining family, you concluded. Hanukkah did end yesterday, stop being so obsessive.
A knock on the door provoked a startled squeak out of you. You jerked your head, confused, because who in the world was knocking on the door at three o’clock in the morning? Your terror was fleeting, however, for behind the foggy glass existed Peter B. Parker’s guilty smile. You exhaled and headed to open the door to shelter him from the violent and raging winter wind outside. He barged in, the tip of his nose the color of raspberries, most likely a repercussion of his poor clothing coverage for the season. “Hey,” He greeted you, rubbing his hands together.
“Wow, I think you got here a little too late,” You teased, folding your arms across your chest. The bags under his eyes were particularly prominent that night, not that it surprised you in any shape or form. He leaned against the wall, resting the back of his head on the timber.
“Yeah, sorry about that,” He apologized and you shook your head. It was useless. You were aware that there was no chance you could be mad at him for finally visiting you; in fact, you were ridiculously elated to be seeing him at such late hours, in spite of your bed crying out for your company. “I guess I lost track of time.”
“What are you doing here, anyway? I haven’t seen you for three weeks and when you do show up, it’s at three A.M.”
“I don’t… know.” You quirked a brow, wondering if he’d had a few too many drinks. “I sort of just walked and my feet got me here.”
“Are you drunk? And did you get in a bar fight or something, because you’ve got a bruise forming under your jaw and it looks too animalistic to be a hickey,” You asked with a gesture of your hand toward his face, relieved the jealousy didn’t bleed through your voice if the latter turned out to be more than a mere speculation. The scarlet on his nose spread to his cheeks. “I hope not, because that would mean you cheated on me by going to another bar.”
He chuckled, rubbing a hand over his stubble. “Nah, I wouldn’t ever do that to you.” You walked up to him and patted his shoulder, congratulating him for his great response but also to move him away from the window to check if it was closed. “I’m just tired.”
“Long day?”
“Awfully long.”
You still didn’t get an answer to why he was out so late, but you didn’t have the energy to continue budging. “Yeah, same.” You whispered, lifting a chair to place it upside down on a table.
“Wanna talk about it?” You looked at him confused. “Your day?”
“I would, but, uh, I kinda have to close this place. Y'know, it’s the holidays, so we’re not open 24/7 because my boss likes spending time with her family,” You explained, hearing his understanding hums. “Everyone already left and I didn’t have anything to do, so I promised her I would do it for her.”
He moved to stand opposite to you and copied your actions of setting the chairs atop the table. “That’s not safe— you being here alone, I mean. I can help!” He offered, as if a random spike of energy flourished in him.
Your brows drew together. “Shouldn’t you go home?”
He paused in the midst of reversing a seat, the furniture cradled in his chest like a baby. “Yeah, but so should you. It won’t hurt to sacrifice one hour of sleep just to help a friend,” He smirked, shrugging.
You allowed him to give you a hand in arranging the place, not that you had much of a choice, anyway; he would’ve done it nonetheless despite your refusals. Thirty minutes later, you were standing outside, your body aching tremendously. Peter noticed your soreness and, before you could even react, he was lowering the roll-up gate. “I could’ve helped with that,” You mumbled as he wiped his hands on his sweatpants. “Don’t want you breaking your back, grandpa.”
He laughed, shoving his hands inside his jacket’s pockets. “I’m a cute grandpa, though, right?” He asked with a flirty smile. You rolled your eyes.
“Hm, yeah, a total gilf.”
“Gilf?”
“Yeah, you know, like a ‘dilf’ but instead of a dad it’s a grandpa.” You both giggled as you began to walk to who knows where, visible breaths leaving your mouths like small dragons puffing out smoke. 
You stopped in your tracks, gripping the straps of your backpack tightly. “Oh snap, I forgot!” He turned around with a questioning brow. “My car broke down, so I have to take the subway back home.” You explained, nudging your head back at the green stairs heading down to the metro station. He tilted his head, frowning.
“Y/N, it’s four in the morning. I don’t think going to the subway this late is such a smart idea.”
You rocked on your heels. “Yeah, but… how else am I gonna get home? You want me to sleep in the bar?”
His gaze shifted as he pondered, grunting. “Do you, uh… do you want to go to my place?”
Your stomach clenched, your heart starting a run when you heard his suggestion. He doesn’t mean it that way, you idiot,  you scolded yourself. Yet you wished he did. “...Your place?”
“Yeah, it’s just a few blocks away from here, like a ten-minute walk.” There was a prolonged silence as you entered deep in thought, making him panic and stutter. “T-that’s if you want to, though. Don’t want you to feel pressured—”
“No, Pete, I…” You stopped him, grinning. “I mean, you sure?”
“Yeah,” He clapped his hands and held them together up to his chest. “Why not?”
“I guess I’ll take you up on that offer.”
“Cool! Uh, cool.. just… c’mon,” He pointed his thumb over his shoulder and you began your trek to his apartment, your shoes thudding lightly against the concrete of the sidewalk, wet due to the rain two hours ago.
“Thanks…” You started, wiggling your fingers, numb from the bitter cold, but to wake yourself up as well. “I actually am sort of terrified of taking the train, so I’m glad you offered. I’ll sleep on the couch, don’t worry—”
“What? No! No, I’ll take the couch, you’re the guest.”
“No, no, no, I insist—”
“Y/N.” You looked up at him, a teasing smile on his face. “You keep the bed. Plus, the change of place will be nice.” You groaned, your eyes closed.
“You’re such a great dude: offering me to sleep at your place so I don’t get mugged and shit, and here I am, stealing your probably comfy bed.” You then moaned, your eyes going blank. “Bed. God, just thinking about sleeping really turns me on right now.”
He huffed softly, bumping into your side. “What… what’s happened, though? We haven’t seen each other for a hot minute.”
You looked heavenward, your mouth ajar as you tried to recall your previous three weeks. “Mm, well, I honestly can’t even remember if I had breakfast or not— oh!” You exclaimed rather sleepily. “Well, this pretty boy working at a Taco Bell I went to asked me out on a date.”
“Oh?” He scrunched his brows together and you hummed. “And what did you say?”
“No.”
“No?! Why not?”
“I just…” Your eyes darted up to his curious ones, your face softening after inspecting him for a while, but not long enough to embarrass yourself. “I don’t know. Wasn’t feeling him, y’know?” He nodded comprehensively. “What ‘bout you?”
His entire mood shifted. His shoulders slumped, and he nibbled on his bottom lip, his jaw tightened. “I… I saw MJ today.” Your heart broke.
“Oh.”
“Yeah.”
“Wh-what, like, you two met somewhere?”
“No, more like ‘saw her coming out of the coffee shop while crossing the street and then a pedestrian yelled at me because I was standing in the way’.” He grumbled. You didn’t know what got in you, but you grabbed his hand and squeezed it. He glanced down at your linked hands and then up at you. That’s when you instantly let go, your pinkies still connected for a bit until completely detaching. You were too busy ogling the ground to see his fingers searching for yours.
“You’ll be alright one day,” You cleared your throat, a bashful smile on your face. “You’ll figure this out.”
He prevented you from continuing with your walk with a hand on your shoulder. You hesitantly turned your body to face him, gulping. Oh, no— you worried, your heart picking up its pace again— did the hand holding make him uncomfortable? Is he now gonna question me? Why am I such a damn idiot? But then you saw his dilated pupils, and your mouth went dry. “I…” He began.
“You… okay?” You questioned when his stare lingered on you. He blinked, his arm dropping by his side as he coughed.
“Yeah, yeah. Sorry, that was weird. I’m just—”
“—tired.” You finished for him and he scoffed, giving you a half-smile.
“Wow, you know me so well,” He joked, and scratched the back of his neck, pointing at the building you two stood in front of. “Uh, this is where I live.”
“Oh!” You spun around, studying the apartment complex. It appeared simple: not too big or small, modest-looking. “That was faster than I expected.”
“Yeah…” He muttered as he climbed up the stairs, holding the door open for you when he reached the top.
The man’s apartment was tiny, somewhat too messy, you decided; there was an empty pizza box on his bed, and he awkwardly dumped it in the trash can when you two walked in, apologizing for the mess. You sat on his bed and he stood at your feet, stroking his neck. "Do you want some clothes? I can give you a shirt or some—” You stopped him when he turned to go to his dresser, gently pulling his arm. “What?” You continued to wordlessly tug on his sleeve until he sat next to you, sighing deeply. Slowly, you leaned backwards until your back bounced on his mattress. Peter’s confused by your actions, but you simply patted the area behind him. He got the message and lied down on the rumpled sheets. 
You looked at each other, a few inches apart, yet for some odd reason, you felt closer to him. Perhaps you could blame the different location, or the way in which your silent gazes stayed on each other. Somehow, you were both alright with it. No discomfort took ahold of either of you as you remained like that for a while, no words or sounds other than the city outside, both later with your eyes closed. To your embarrassment, you were on the brink of dozing off, but you couldn’t help it; you drowned in tranquility, and the exhaustion of your body cooperated— it was surprising you hadn’t fallen asleep yet. You could hear Peter’s steady breathing, and his voice brought you back to consciousness when he spoke. “Y/N?” It was soft, softer than your pillows back at home. Softer than your lonesome bed. You acknowledged him with a mumble, opening one eyelid. His eyes were almost shut, but you could still see the glimmer in his dark eyes. His whiskey eyes. “You’re really nice.”
Your eyes sealed closed again. “You’re really nice too, Pete.”
“No, but…” His sentence died out and he did not continue for a long period. You believed he had fallen into a slumber until he talked again. “You’re really nice. Like that hot chocolate I had in the morning while I was freezing type of nice.”
“I… I don’t know if it’s because I’m about to pass out, but I don’t get it.” When you blinked your eyes as wide as you could, he was closer than before. Closer than ever. You took the chance to discover, note every part of his face more closely, every freckle, every lash, his growing stubble. Everything.
“What I mean is that… you really bring warmth to my life, Y/N. Not to sound too cheesy like I usually do, or anything. But everything’s a mess and you’re there, and I’m glad about that.”
“You’re just tired.”
“Yes, but a drunk man’s words are a sober man’s thoughts.”
“You’re not drunk.”
“There’s really no difference.”
You could now feel his breath on your face. It was as if with every flicker of your eyelids, he had managed to inch nearer to your body. “Pete…”
“Y/N…” Your lips were roughly touching. You felt his arm slip around your waist, his fingers ghosting over your prickling back.
“We can’t do this.” You said, regardless of your hand cradling his neck. Your foreheads were now touching.
“Why not?”
“Because…” You tried to claim that he was your customer, but you truly did not care about it anymore, and you never did. “What about Mary Jane?”
He hesitated for a moment. “What about Mary Jane?”
“You still want her back.” You breathed out, your body quivering as his eyelashes tickled your cheeks.
“I can forget about her just tonight.”
You kissed. Your lips remained interlocked for a few moments, the both of you too tired to move them. It was like sixth-graders kissing for the first time— a lingering peck on the lips. But an energy sparked within you, and you moved your lips. Soon, you were on top of his body, your shirt almost completely off except for one of your arms still inside one sleeve, your fingers desperately tangled in his greying hair, his crooked nose bumping with yours. He didn’t taste like whiskey or ice, but he did taste like a year of laughing with each other in the bar, and him not noticing as you slowly fell for him.
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jewpacabruhs · 5 years ago
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hi guys! so this post is gonna be a rambly mess but fuck it, here ya go. if u dont wanna read all of it, u dont have to; skip down to underneath the tl;dr in bold text for the important bits :)
(there’s a brief & non-graphic mention of a triggering topic in the next paragraph. please be sure to skip this next paragraph if the thought of suicide is going to upset you.)
alright. so i didn't share this originally, but i spent some time in a psychiatric unit this month. suicidality related. 1000% unrelated from anything online, i've just struggled with depression for a very long time & shit happens. i didn't intend to share that at all & i certainly don't want pity; i'm telling u guys bc my time in the unit was extremely eye-opening, and i have some insight to share. since i've gotten out, with the help of my newest anti-depressant (fourth time’s a charm lol), i'm seeing the world in a better light & i finally have the energy to and the interest in exploring what it has to offer, which frankly i've never had before.
with that has come the realization that i’ve come to do something very unhealthy, and i want to break out of it. and that’s how much i’ve come to rely on my fandom life. i don’t want to get too candid publicly, but mental illness took a lot from me, and i lost most of my life, my future, and my options in the last few years. next year will involve a lot of working on rebuilding things. but in the time that i let things fall to pieces around me & i absolutely couldn’t get out of bed, i had a phone and i had a laptop. so when i couldn’t get up and physically face the world, i built up a new world online.
and i don’t think that’s a completely uncommon experience. most people are able to better manage things, and evenly juggle real life with an internet life (like i did back in middle school), because most people can’t abandon their real lives entirely like i managed to; but i do think a lot of people nowadays rely on their fandom life and their fandom friends when their irl situation isn’t ideal. and that’s an excellent coping mechanism in theory, but i think it’s debilitating in the long run.
forgive me for sounding like an old person, but i’m a heavy nostalgist and a bit of an anarcho-primitivist in that i resent modern technology's influence on society - but that hasn't stopped me from letting it be a big part of my life out of accessibility. the internet kept me occupied during my low points, and i became dependent, but i've realized i don't wanna live like that anymore. i’m vaguely grateful that it usually kept me busy enough that i wasn’t thinking the bad thoughts as frequently, but more than anything, i’m resentful that my grasp on reality got lost somewhere along the way, and i let time get away from me, too. because, again, an internet life should be a fun hobby, but when it’s a lifestyle and it becomes an excuse to avoid dealing with our real lives, bc our real lives aren’t as rewarding or as exciting, then it’s unhealthy.
everything’s at our fingertips these days, but i deeply believe human interaction, fun, and fulfillment shouldn't be spoon-fed to us through a screen. it's easy access, sure, but at the end of the day, is it any way to live? compared with how much world there is to see, i’m no longer satisfied with the thought of sitting behind a screen for another five years. i used to be, when i had no hope and no drive, but not anymore. i’m not gonna let myself settle for staying busy with the thing that takes the least amount of work & movement. not only because i’m a whole ass adult who needs to start sorting my shit out for the long run, but also because i deserve better.
and it’s fucking hard! especially for those of us who are neurodivergent. i dropped out of school three fucking times due to crippling social anxiety and utter lack of ambition and energy. i lost all my friends through that (making friends post-school is hard af); the thought of having to go out and remake friends makes me wanna fucking cry. i have a hard enough time making friends online, i’ve even come to struggle with correspondence thru text & email. phone calls? outta the question. but that’s therapy shit, and i know i’ll get there. i just have to stop putting life off by staying in a comfort zone.
and it’s interesting; depression and anxiety really took everything from me, and while i was dwelling in my own misery, my adhd worsened and decided to make my entire brain revolve around my fixations, so i didn’t have to deal with my own life. can’t think about how much you wanna die and how much you can’t function in society if you’re busy thinking about a ship you like or a character you find interesting. so i latched onto the safety of that. aggressively. problem with that is that once you let your “happiness” (as much of it as you can feel in the midst of your depressive episode, anyway) revolve around an interest, that’s all you have. so you become dependent and reliant, and that’s never good, especially if you’re someone like me who feels pathetic & ridiculous when you realize it’s all you can bring yourself to care about. 
and i think that’s what i realized in the psych ward (where there’s legitimately nothing to do; i did soooo much more thinking than usual, and i already think too much haha); mental illness will try to fuck up your lifestyle, so you have to eradicate the things that’ll let that happen in the first place. for example, like i said, my adhd tries to counteract my depression by making me hyperfixate and/or hyperfocus on something else to protect me from bad personal thoughts, and that’s good in theory (doing something you enjoy when you feel bad, to distract urself, is the number one most basic coping skill you learn), but i can’t do it in moderation, i let it run my life, and that’s made me worse in the long run. so i have to force myself out of that completely and not let myself fixate on things that make me happy in the short term, but don’t ultimately further me as a person. having fixations helped me through some awful times, but now i need to force myself to grow up, you know?
and while tumblr and other social media is an excellent way to indulge those fixations, it’s an aggressive enabler, in more ways than one. what i mean by that... okay, so while i’m the type of person who self-destructs while unhealthy, i do occasionally lash out. and i know some people completely explode rather than implode when they’re not doing well. and that’s how you get discourse, i think. because when mental illness makes us care much more about our interests than we ought to, and someone has a differing opinion about that interest, the instinct is of course to attack, if you’re that kind of person. i don’t think i am, but depression and boredom go hand in hand, and i might be inclined to care more about discourse than i would if i were healthy, purely because it’s entertaining and something to do. 
that’s a long winded way of saying, while i stand wholeheartedly by my past positions, i do regret starting shit in the first place. i’m not the kind of person who genuinely cares about much and i have little to no sense of morality (im a chaotic neutral bastard), so the fact i was bored enough to start shit really goes against my character and says a lot about how bad i’ve been. so i apologize for all that. but, again, i think that's just what happens when something is truly your everything. and i think the chronic negativity of modern fandom is a result of how damn seriously we all take it, because we care so much and we’re so dependent. fandom’s supposed to be fun, but it’s just too damn stressful this way.
idk my point in sharing all this, but i do think it'd be cool if this kinda got yall thinking. even if you don't engage in discourse, if fandom is just one of your only consistent sources of happiness, that's not healthy either. we all gotta break out & exist more & louder & more positively. and unfortunately i think tumblr fandom (and maybe all modern fandom) is no longer a place that encourages positivity and health.
but for all my criticism, i do just wanna say how eternally grateful i am that i was fortunate enough to meet the people i call my best friends through tumblr. they're my family, truly, and all the bullshit in this fandom has been worth it simply because it brought them to me. i love them to death and i always will, even if interests change, even if we grow apart, even if we quit speaking entirely in the next few years, i love them with my whole heart in a way that transcends a simple fandom friendship and i'm so glad we bonded over sp in the first place. that’ll never change.
i will also always love south park itself. now that the cat's outta the bag about my hospital visit, i can brag about my most pathetic and obsessive accomplishment; the fact that i've never let circumstance stop me from watching a new south park as it airs, and i've now watched sp on 1) an airplane, and 2) in a psych ward. i win for most dedicated fan tbfh. dsjkf & i'll keep that tradition, and i'll still watch this stupid show til it ends! it'll always hold a special place in my heart, & kyman's still my most meaningful & long-term ship. i'll never stop loving it. 
tl;dr
so, to recap; for 2020 i'm making myself step back from fandom (not just sp fandom, but fandom in general) and quit letting my world revolve around my fixations so i can enjoy the outside world a little more, mental illness be damned, and the first step is gonna be quitting tumblr. this blog won't be deleted and i may occasionally post (maybe when next season airs) but you're absolutely free to unfollow bc this'll be a mostly inactive blog. i’m also unfollowing everyone, so mutuals, please don’t take that personally. 
i will, however, try to write more prolifically, bc fic writing is something i'm able to do in moderation & enjoy, and i hope to get back into it. so if you'd like, you can keep an eye out for any upcoming fanfic i may post - my ao3 is leere. i also have snapchat, instagram, & twitter my mutuals can ask for asap (bc ill be logging out for good by the afternoon of the 31st, which is tomorrow) - though i'm not very active on any of them. still, if you wanna have access to me, i’ll be there.
i want some connection to the fandom still, albeit without letting my life revolve around it, so i'll be starting a new open-to-the-public kyman discord server! the post with the invite for that will go up soon. nvm im too anxious  
thank you for reading, thank you for the good times (thnks fr th mmrs), and i hope everyone has a good 2020! 
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