#the rules of ever after

[renthony]

🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈🏳️‍🌈

(Drop a 🏳️‍🌈 in my inbox and I’ll respond with a queer media recommendation!)

The Rules of Ever After, written by Killian B. Brewer, is a young adult M/M fairy tale romance. It's very cute and fluffy, and it's a lovely read if you're looking for a lighthearted happily-ever-after. It takes classic fairy tale tropes and makes them gay, and it's just fun.

I got it from the local library after seeing it recommended as a soft, casual afternoon read. I got through it pretty quickly, so if you're looking for something simple, fun, and wholesome, this is a great one to check out.

Here's the official plot summary:

The rules of royal life have governed the kingdoms of Clarameer for thousands of years, but Prince Phillip and Prince Daniel know that these rules don't provide for the happily ever after they seek. A fateful, sleepless night on top of a pea set under twenty mattresses brings the two young men together and sends them on a quest out into the kingdoms. On their travels, they encounter meddlesome fairies, an ambitious stepmother, disgruntled princesses and vengeful kings as they learn about life, love, friendship, and family. Most of all, the two young men must learn to know themselves and how to write their own rules of ever after.

I think I would have probably been obsessed with this book if I'd had it as a teenager. I love fairy tale homages and retellings, and I used to re-read all my favorite MG & YA fairy tales until the books fell apart. Finding it as an adult was a fun throwback to the sort of books I loved best when I was younger. If you're looking for cute young-adult MLM romance, give this one a try!

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[upathosarts]

laios shrimp

context:

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Gaslight, Gatekeep, Girl found dead in a hidden room.

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[hellspawnmotel]

even after settling down, theyre pretty cautious.....

.......it doesnt last long

[jeeaark]

Ok but imagine. greygold porting back and finds the emps panicking and trying to figure out to locate them and then turns around and sees they are completely fine. Except for a now beautiful full stash on their squid face.

Aight, I imagined, I loved, and I'm ✨inspired✨ Although perhaps not the cute stash bit as Greygold got a lil too GloomGold saying goodbye to Lae'zel, but have a silly nonetheless-

Bonus when Greygold's feeling better again:

[rb9]

we have gone from mclaren being annoyed that max knows the rules too well to them openly admitting lando doesn’t actually know them.

multiple drivers (including max, charles, esteban) knew exactly what they should do in this situation and turned off their engines.

[atoriv-art]

older designs for my specialest guy

[cherubchoirs]

danse macabre

[lycandrophile]

today, my coworkers’ refusal to see me as a man put one of our patients in a position where they felt unsafe for the third time. i’ve been at this job for less than two months total. i don’t even care about getting misgendered anymore, i just want the people we’re supposed to be taking care of to feel comfortable around me.

i work at a hospital where we have to supervise our patients in a lot of vulnerable situations. there are safeguarding rules in place for certain things that male employees aren’t allowed to be present for when it comes to female patients. and yet, the people training me and telling me what to do have repeatedly put me in situations where i’ve been forced to do things that the female patients aren’t comfortable with me doing. and because they have repeatedly failed to teach me the rules for doing my job as a man, i have no way of knowing when i’m crossing one of those lines unless one of the patients tells me.

i’ve had to watch a victim of SA stare at me in abject terror as my coworkers asked her to strip naked with me still in the room. it took several minutes for her to even be able to speak enough to ask if i could leave the room. i found out after that she broke down crying the moment i walked out. my biggest regret is that i didn’t realize what was happening fast enough to leave before she ever had to say something, because she shouldn’t have had to say it. i never should’ve been allowed in the room in the first place, because that’s not something male employees are supposed to be present for. but i didn’t know that yet, because i was training and i thought surely, they wouldn’t train me to do something that directly violated their own safeguarding rules. that moment was the first time, and it’s haunted me ever since, but it wasn’t the last time. not only did it happen for the third time today — it almost happened for the fourth, and would have if someone hadn’t spoken up to say they should pick someone else. i care for these people so deeply, it’s why i took this job, and i’m so tired of hearing the fear in their voices when they have to ask me not to do something i never should’ve been told to do.

i’m very used to the personal discomfort of being misgendered. i willingly deal with it a lot at work as well as in other situations, not because i’m in the closet (at this point in my medical transition that would be impossible), but because it’s such a frequent occurrence with my coworkers that we would never get anything done if i took the time to correct them every time. but to see it get to the point of causing such visceral discomfort in other people? people i’m supposed to be taking care of and keeping safe? that’s something else entirely, and i’m fucking exhausted.

and after all of that, some of them still look at me like i have two heads when they tell me what to do and i say “i can’t do that, only female employees can” because i’m learning now. clearly i’m already seen as a man by our patients, but my coworkers would still rather put them in an unsafe situation than just train me as a man.

[inkskinned]

im having a particularly terrible night with urges and imagery that i dont know how to handle. i gave in to some things. held back on some others. but im barely holding on, dear internet stranger.

you do not owe me your time or your words.. but if you could write some hope into existence for me.. i would be unendingly grateful to you.

please. tell me how you do it. tell me how you survive. because im not so sure i can get through the fifteen days it'll take to get to my seventeenth birthday.

could you please give me something to place my faith in? i dont think the universe is watching out for me anymore.

i don't usually answer these, because i am not a professional, and you deserve professional help. when i was 17 i was terrified of the idea of professional help, because my household was extremely unsafe, and made it clear that if i ever chose to get help, i would be punished for it.

i hope this is not your case. i hope that you can call someone, and they can take you where you should go.

but i will give you the advice that i wish i got, when i couldn't get help at 17, when i was so bad that years later, i literally don't-know-how-i-survived it: what you want is peace, not death. your brain is sick. it has romanticized an ending where there are no consequences. where effort isn't necessary. where you can just... forget.

you want peace. that is a normal, human thing to want. maybe it feels more like you want quiet. or just... to take a break for a second.

here is what i will say: to end yourself means you never get to experience what it's like to actually be happy. i thought i knew what it was like, and i was bitter about it. i'd say - i've been happy, it's not worth it, because i didn't know what i was missing. i thought that happiness meant having a partner or having a job or money or a college degree. it sounded like effort. it sounded like something that had to happen to me.

for the first time in my life, just this week, i was able to go to a concert and just-enjoy-it. no liquor, no drugs. just stomping my feet and getting caught up in it. i didn't feel nervous or self-conscious or overwhelmed. i just had a good time. these days have a lot of these firsts for me - it is the first time i can eat cake without crying. it is the first time i can be around an exacto blade without supervision. it is the first time i have too many people to call when i am crying.

i can't tell you where you'll run into happiness, only that, for me, it started once i was out of that fucking house. it started once i figured out where the pain was coming from. once i figured out that i was not possessed, something medical was wrong with me. that i am not stupid or lazy, i have depression and adhd. the first few years were difficult. at 19, during my efforts to recover, i actually got worse by a considerable margin. and then, with time and patience - i got better.

happiness doesn't feel like what you think it will. in movies it's so golden and all-encompassing. but it doesn't fly into your hands when you buy your first car nor does it arrive in the arms of a partner nor does it require passing your classes. happiness came to me on a tuesday in the form of a red-winged blackbird, and i looked at her, and she looked at me, and i said - oh. the whole world suddenly filled itself in with color. like i had been forever-asleep. like every corner of every room was suddenly glistening.

it ended quickly, back then. it just stopped in to check in on me. but it was enough - this thing i had never experienced, but that i knew (logically) could happen. before that, i was only staying because it would make my mom sad if i died. that was my only reason. and then the happiness came, so strange and brilliant and lovely that for years i couldn't even look at it directly.

these days, things are so different. life is so much easier. i don't wish for death because so much of what i have is already at peace. my boss understands when i need a mental health day. people in general are less prone to high school drama. entire communities hold my hand and have my number. i have a car and a dog and a little apartment garden and candles on all available surfaces and today i bought myself a little cake just-to-celebrate-nothing. my body is my own and we are both dancing.

there are so many things i've gotten to taste in the last 10 years. i know, for you, that is an eon, because it's more than half of your life. but if it helps? in the 5 years between 17-21: i filled myself with laughter and love. i got to be a lead in a ballet and got my first tattoo and then my second and pierced my ears the way i'd wanted to (one of them professionally the other over a hot stove with a potato) and i discovered hozier is my favorite singer (i know. he was new back then) and i got my first real job and my first real paycheck and i hadn't ever been seen as smart but then i started to actually treat my adhd as a condition rather than a burden and people started saying you're like the smartest person in the room and my best friend met her husband who i will one day stand next to as maid of honor when he is her groom and i got to help people and make a stupid blog called "inkskinned" and find out that writing is actually my passion and that maybe i'm actually kind of good at it if i just practice and i got to meet my parents' dog (his name is kaiju) and i slept on couches and kissed people and tried new things and learned how to breathe without feeling my chest tighten and that peace is here, on this planet, that peace echoes everywhere, it is in my hair and my homework and my houseplants, it is quiet and divine and mine because i fought for it and i built it and yes i lost hair over it but holy shit the whole world feels like it is shifted through a sunbeam

recently someone asked me if i could go back in time to 6th grade, with all the knowledge i have now, would i? and without thinking, i barked absolutely not. i know i should say it's because i wouldn't want to risk losing any of this stuff - but really it's because i would never survive being a teenager again. it sounds incredibly lame and impossible, fake - but being a teenager was the hardest thing i ever did. i had no voice, no control, only fear and hatred.

but i did survive it. nothing about me is special. nothing about me is stronger than you or better prepared or more efficient. i didn't survive it perfectly. i made a lot of mistakes and lost a lot of friends and harmed myself in ways that i'm still recovering from. but i did survive it. and there is a part of me looking at you in the past and saying - i'm you in the future.

and holy shit. every day. every goddamn day i'm glad we survived to see the rest of it. because you hit 18 and everything changes. like, everything. and holy shit, it is infinitely worth it.

[currentlyonstandbi]

[arttsuka]

Jedediah and Octavius

Some wips (but I forgot to take pictures of most of the steps) + the 'clean' version (basically without the hearts because I posted this on Instagram too and people I know irl follow me there 🥲)

[arrestedexgirlfriendafterhigh]

These two as roommates kills me😭😭

[hawnks]

Iida trapping you into a quirk marriage with him because he’s truly in love with you but you don’t even want to look at him……

[binah-beloved]

Punishing Bird has taken a liking to you. perhaps it's because of how you never brush away its pecking, perhaps it's due to you giving it seeds when it ventures down to Extraction- either way, it seems to enjoy your presence, making a beeline for the lower part of the facility whenever it breaches to simply sit on your shoulder and give you the occasional peck. your shoulders have small gouge scars now, but you endure it so the Bird won't disturb any other agents during its breach, nor do you mind the company, so Punishing Bird simply stays.

Binah is a little perplexed when she sees you with the Bird on your shoulder or in your hands, carrying it around casually as you go about your day. Punishing Bird has even begun allowing you to simply bring it back to its containment cell to end its breach, although often you don't find time until the end of the day, when your coworkers have retired for the night. Binah approaches you one of those evenings, holding a roll of gauze for you to patch up the bleeding pecks in your skin. you're holding Punishing Bird in your hands, and feel Binah's stare from across the room as you look up. without even thinking you ask if she'd like to hold the small Abnormality, and for a second you see a flash of surprise cross the Sephirah's expression. but slowly, she holds out her hands, and you place the Bird in her open palms.

Binah stares.

you stare.

Punishing Bird stares.

then it settles into her hands, feathers ruffling, and you and Binah merely watch. her fingers twitch, trying not to squeeze too tightly, and after a moment she reaches out and places the Bird back on your shoulder. she takes your own hand instead, her touch unusually light and delicate, and you blink in surprise.

"I much prefer this, if I must hold anything." is all she says, calmly, and you give her a soft smile.

[horatio-fig]

He defected from the Empire to follow a big purple hunk across the galaxy but forgot to say ‘no homo’ afterwards.