#the things i do in the name of artistic integrity

[classfiedyapper]

LADS MEN WITH DESI GIRL HCs.

Alright ladies its my first time making any post on my own on Tumblr, its 3 in the morning and I am on my leuteal phase so, yeah, the grammar in this sucks cuz if you haven't guessed it already, English isn't my first language, also this isn't proof read either. I just had my phone and messy ADHD brain filled with ideas. Anyways, THIS IS FOR MY DESI GIRLS AROUND THE WORLD. Seriously tho I made this because every time I read any headcanon it was hard to relate with most of the things, so I took matter into my own hand with encouragement from @syluskiwifeyyy so enjoy my Desi babies.(under the cut)

Xavier:

This boy is enthralled by you, its not just the golden tan of your skin that gets him, its those deep dark eye and luscious thick hair too.

Xavier is a foodie I can totally see him loving the Desi meal you both cook together (well you cook and he stands their holding your utensils for you, maybe pass the spices, will pout after handing the wrong one)

I see him as being a gol Gappay fan boy

Xavier will sit quietly and hear you talk about your people.

Also about the shenanigans of your relatives.

If you show him any nakhre, he will be confused at first but do his best to make you happy and fulfill your demands (and you will melt in an instant because...look at him!)

He strikes me as the guy to deeply appreciate the culture, and will actively try to learn more about it.

He will also be the kind that your parents will approve off, sweet kind caring, with government job and oh so innocent looking (but only we know the real deal hehe)

Xavier is also respecting of religion so if it comes down to it he will wait till marriage (tho I bet all boys will since they are respectful, and understanding and oh so very patient, So i won't be adding this point in the rest).

Xavier will partake in all your traditional festivities, and since your parents love him he will be there following you while holding your anchal (catch him glaring at the relatives who did you wrong lol).

Huge fan of saree's, will get you beautiful waist chains to wear over them with his initial on them (because of course he will).

Will give you nothing less then queen treatment because a that is what you deserve.

Will wakeup early just to see the the morning sun make your skin glow.

Xavier will sweep you of your feet so fast your own parents will push you towards the marriage, not to let a gem like him slip

Xavier loves when you put henna on your hand. He finds it so alluring.

I can see him holding your hand and lovingly trace the pretty patterns on it and then kiss the palm. And when he sees his name artistically hidden in the design, he.will.melt.

All blushy and giggly like the love sick fool he is.

"So does that mean we are now together forever my little star"

Rafayel.

Now this man will love the way you will dress, the vibrant colors and intricate designs of your clothing that sets you apart from the others.

He love LOVES that you wear your culture with pride.

Will buy you the fanciest of Bengals and most expensive jhumkas.

Will paint you in them, especially in the golden hours.

Sharara is his favorite because it makes you look like a princess in his eyes.

May or may not use your duppata to wear as his own (he wants to match with you come on)

Like Xavier will also hear you ramble about your relatives, but will not be quiet about it nu huh.

He WILL have a thing or two to say to them if they meet him ( but one glare from you and he is sat)

You parents do like him, yes, but most of the time they are like ???? While interacting with him.

Oh and if you show him nakhre, he will show YOU nakhre. (But you will win the contest ofcourseeee)

Rafayel not only respect culture he cherishes it. I see him integrating few things into his daily lives.

Also he will draw the most beautiful henna design on your hand, not just on occasions but anytime he feel like it, or you ask for it. (might do it on your whole body you never know)

He will share some of his lemurian culture with you too

And you both will end creating a mix of the two and make personal family tradition that will be followed with ages to come.

I feel like once you get to the point of marriage, Rafayel will make it such a beautiful and soulful day. He will be pulling all stops to make the dreamiest wedding come true, after all you are his beloved bride *sigh*

Zayne.

Congratulations you are your parent's second favorite now.

And you will be marrying him.

If zayne is not every Desi parents dream son-in-law idk what he is. (Tall, handsome and DOCTOR)

Now for zayne he loves you, so much. Everything about you is enticing to him. But damn it girl why are you getting dizzy every time you stand up.

Best believe he is going to take Care of your anemic ass.

Will ask for kheer whenever you feel like spoiling him and ask him what he wants you to cook for him.

Zayne is a shalwar qameez enthusiast I don't make the rules.

Its elegant, its classy, its comfy, hell he wears the men one whenever he can.

Especially with floral print and/or embroidery.

Will handle your nakhre like a pro, the fire is extinguished before it could even burn.

And he does it like its an honor for him, his sweet gentle smile and those loving eyes.

Yep zayne loves that he is the one...maintaining you (ykwim)

Brings you gajray almost everyday after work. He loves to see you wear them.

Zayne is the kind of guy will encourage you to embrace your feminity.(is thats what you want of course)

Loves your long hair, no matter the type but he seems like wavy hair kinda guy.

Will put flowers in your braids, jasmine specifically.

Zayne will also be the kind to listen and only speaking when you specially ask him too, he is a rock. The most reliable guy to have with you.

During family events he will socialize to show he is willing to be the part of, not just the family but the whole damn village (cuz you know we Desi have bi as fuck families.)

Zayne will come home to see you doing your thing weather it be work or reading or cleaning he just comes behind you and hug. "It was long day with out you meri Jan" (siiwskjsoshs).

Also also also after you are married he is the type to call you "begum" (I am throwing myself off a cliff aisisisiwow)

Sylus

Someone posted something along the lines that you will make this guy go back to his dragon roots the moment he sees you in a shiny lehnga and gold jewelry

Don't be surprised if you find yourself in a cave being hoarded away by him lol.

But no seriously he loves that you like gold or wear gold because now he has a reason to spoil you with the most expensive accessories money could buy

Now sylus is also a Saree guy but will also appreciate a lehnga too, specially when you do the twirl in them.

"Its for the culture darling" he says "the girls in Desi culture wear gold ear rings straight out of the womb" you have no idea who told him that, he just knows.

Loves it when you show him nakhre, cuz now he has a reason to spoil you rotten.

Your snobby relatives just don't exist any more lmao (jk jk...or am I?)

Sylus is also a foodie so whenever you make something for him he would be over the moon delighted, and will compliment with every bite.

This happens every single time no matter how long you two have been together.

Sylus will go above and beyond for traditional festivals. Will be doing the most honestly.

No you do not need that many pathakay, this isn't some kind turf war damn it sy.

Oh yeah your parents love him too he is so charming, suave and successful fruit seller. (They don't care where the money is coming from their daughter is now rich!)

Also out of all the guys I can only see him being a fan of cricket honestly so if you like that then you two will be having a blast watching it together.

Will stop you from throwing the TV when your team looses lol.

Sylus will always be there for not just you but your entire family, your Lil sibling got in trouble with the wrong crowd, Luke and Kieran are there to kick their ass.

Everyone's favorite damad jee.

And boy oh boy when you get to the wedding stage, yeah, this man is putting ambani to shame, mhm mhm.

Sylus will indulge in everything you ever wanted to do, will do everything your parents never let you do. He will heal that inner child of tours without even knowing.

Caleb

Cooking dates, cooking dates COOKING DATES AAAAARGH.

doesn't matter if you hate cooking, you will be sitting their like the pretty girl you are as he works around the kitchen cooking up the most banging chicken Tika biryani and all you have to do is keep your pretty brown eyes on him.

Caleb is a pilot of course your parents Love him duh.

Caleb is very possessive man so yes you will be accompanied by him where ever you are going. He just might the your duppata with his watch on purpose.

Caleb is more on the side of indo-western. He Loves you in Kurti and jeans and outfits like that but damn it you look good in everything how is he suppose to choose.

"Now we are stuck together for good pips"

Teases you about your nakhre, but will be bending over backwards to keep you happy.

Oh and you are only allowed to show him those nakhre, do it in front of any other male specie and he will be huffing and puffing and all up and over you.

"Pips let me do it for you, tell me what is it that you want?"

You two are getting Desi street food all the time even if he complains his cooking is better he will do it for you.

Caleb will occasionally snitch on you to your parents behind your back tho, but not to get you in trouble but to make sure his parents will trust him more to take care of you (hey in this house we like our men a little crazy)

What can I say he is just looking out for you.

You and Caleb will always be fighting for your lives during ludo and you will flip the board cause why is winning again and again, its YOUR game for fucks sake.

But if you want to short circuit his brain just put those pretty tanned legs of your on display, even tiny bit. He is gone. Caleb exe has stopped working.

When he confesses to you he does it in the mist sharukh khan way possible (ifykyk)

Is pretty sappy and romantic. On your anniversary he will learn and okay the song "suraj huwa Madham" on his guitar (ajwhwusjs)

Every time you bicker he makes it up with gajray as well.

[bookshelf-in-progress]

Once again, I am SO EXCITED to show you guys a retelling, but unfortunately I have to write it first.

[janeyseymour]

The Artist in Me

Summary: a request from a LONG time ago. Reader is the upper grades art teacher, but when the lower grades art teacher has to leave, Reader ends up taking over the arts for the entire school.

WC: ~3.45k

By some Grace of God, Abbott Elementary has it in the budget this year to hire a second art teacher. And you, after leaving your old school due to issues with the principal, were able to snag the position to teach the upper levels of the school.

In the time that you’ve been at Abbott, you mostly keep to yourself upstairs and throw yourself into providing the best education that you can for these kids. Despite being a related arts teacher, you’re also able to integrate different core subjects into your teaching, and you love being able to help enrich students with information that they might not get otherwise.

You’ve also made yourself out to be a bit tougher- the younger elementary art teacher is all sunshine and rainbows, and you can’t find it in you to be like that. So, you’ve gotten the reputation as the hard-ass of the related arts programs. You don’t really care. Some of these kids need discipline, and as long as they’re doing what they’re supposed to (and not trying to eat the clay you have for pottery projects), you really aren’t that tough.

The other thing is… your principal isn’t all that fond of you. You can’t quite figure out why though. You’re always on time, you’re prepared, you stay professional. It is what it is, you suppose. So, you keep to yourself, and you don’t really mind it. You’ve always been a bit more introverted and quiet, yet not timid. The only times you really see any of the other teachers is if you walk past them in the hallways or during a faculty meeting.

During those faculty meetings, you tend to doodle. All of the things that Ava speaks of either don’t relate to you, or they pertain to trainings you’ve already taken care of. You look up at her and her slides every once in a while, just to give off the illusion that you’re paying attention, but after diligently listening to the first meeting, you realized you didn’t have to do that to keep your job.

So, instead… you draw. You draw still lives of the library, you doodle up little flowers and other scenes, and then you take to drawing portraits. You have about a dozen drawings of your own face before you decide that maybe you should attempt another subject. So, your eyes wander around the room. Your gaze immediately focuses in on the beautiful red hair that is sitting with the one group of teachers that Ava always seems to chat with during her free time, which is conveniently a lot.

Melissa, you think that’s her name, rolls her eyes at something ridiculous that comes out of your boss’s mouth, and then she turns to another teacher and fake yawns. You only get a glimpse of her eyes for a moment, but in that second, you’re captivated. They’re a stunning shade of green, and you could swear you could see the little specks of gold in them too. You spend the rest of this pointless faculty meeting trying to get a sketch of her eyes just right.

The next faculty meeting that you find yourself dragging yourself into, you pick a seat where you can see Melissa fully. And… damn. The second grade teacher has quite a figure, and her face is beautiful. You spend most of that meeting drawing the redhead as she props herself up with her elbow. You’re just perfecting the glasses that hang off Melissa’s nose when you hear your name.

“And since we are losing Miss Lee so suddenly, Y/N will be taking over all of the art classes until I can find a replacement,” Ava sighs.

Your eyes widen, and you can feel every other staff member’s eyes on you. “I- Ava, what?”

“You heard me,” your boss shrugs. “Miss Lee is moving away next week, so you’ll have the entire school.” She then continues on about another topic- one entirely unrelated to the absolute bomb that she just dropped on you.

You glance to your lower grades art teacher and give her a questioning look. She just frowns and shakes her head, a tear falling down her face silently.

You spend the rest of the meeting trying to wrap your head around the fact that you are now in charge of the entire art curriculum, and your doodling of the redheaded teacher’s emerald eyes is put on pause.

It feels like an eternity before that meeting is over, but as soon as it is, your coworker is apologizing profusely to you.

“Y/N,” Miss Lee sighs softly. “I’m so sorry. I- I’ve been meaning to tell you, but I just haven’t had the time while trying to prep everything and come up with a way for you to be able to teach everyone.”

“What’s going on?” you ask her quietly as the two of you make it out of the library and into the hall.

“I’m leaving,” is all she tells you. “I- It’s for the best… if I want to live.”

“Soph,” your jaw drops. 

“Just… trust me, okay?” your coworker wipes a tear away. “C’mon. I’ve already come up with a schedule for you. You’ll have two classes at a time, but they’ll all be doing relatively similar things, so… I had the rest of this year planned too, so… hopefully this won’t be too difficult for you.”

You allow yourself to drop your act of not quite caring for your coworkers and squeeze the woman’s elbow gently. You don’t miss the way she flinches- it would be hard to. You immediately know why she’s leaving with such urgency.

“Don’t worry about me,” you tell her softly. “Just… keep yourself safe, yeah?”

“I’m gonna do my best,” Sophie grimaces. “If we meet during our preps the rest of this week, I can help you prepare.”

You nod. “And- and if you need any help with anything, I know we aren’t close, but… I’m here for you.”

As you transition into teaching the entire school for art classes, Sophia helps you as much as possible. You begin to combine classes, and you’re quite thankful that every teacher is a fan of your coworker’s, because they don’t ask questions about her leaving, and they are more than supportive of this decision. Although, those that don’t usually make it to the second floor aren’t necessarily thrilled about the trek they have to take to come up to your room. They just give your coworker a sad smile as they know it will probably be one of the last times they see her before she heads out and on her own. You continue to offer your support to Sophia as the days stretch on.

But she never asks for help. Instead, she whole-heartedly throws herself into helping to prepare you the best she can- everything from lugging materials up to your room to ensuring that what you’re having the older students do at least somewhat lines up with what she was planning for her younger students to make life even the slightest bit easier on you. 

And after Friday, it’s like she never existed. She completely goes off the grid. You can only hope that she’s alright in her endeavors.

It’s been a few weeks since you’ve taken over the arts for your school. You feel like you’re up to your eyeballs in clay, paint, paper mache, and pretty much any other art supply that would be able to stick to your body. You’re exhausted, to say the least. The days where your preps used to consist of cleaning up your room and settling in with a nice book are gone, and they’ve been replaced with a preparation period of running around trying to set everything up while also grading the elders’ art essays, firing up the kiln, scrubbing down tables from glue that the kindergarten and first grade students managed to get everywhere… it’s ridiculous. While you used to leave right as the teachers’ bell rang, you’re stuck staying late, and you usually come in at least an hour early to ensure that everything is as organized as it can be before your hurricanes you call students run amuck in your space. And if you’re being honest, you’ve had enough. 

So, while you should probably be preparing for the next… what feels like ever, you take your preparation period to head down to the teachers lounge and actually relax for once. You already worked through your lunch- you deserve this. 

As it would turn out, your preparation time is when the group that your boss loves has lunch. How convenient for them to all have lunch at the same time…

You give them a small wave as you practically drag your exhausted body over to the refrigerator to grab the small lunch you packed yourself this morning. You take a seat that’s somewhat distanced from the group and begin to eat.

You don’t even realize how tired you are until your eyes begin to droop and your head begins to lull forward. You have to catch yourself with a small gasp before you smack you face on the table. Of course, that draws attention to you, and your face turns about as red as Melissa Schemmenti’s hair.

“Oi,” the woman lets out a small chuckle. “Work wearing you down lately?”

You just nod as you continue to feed yourself from the tiny bag of pretzels you packed.

“Of course she’s exhausted,” another voice pipes up- Barbara Howard’s. “Who wouldn’t be exhausted after taking over art classes for the entire school. Oh dear, have you heard from Sophia at all?”

You shake your head silently before just barely offering up, “And I doubt I will. She left pretty abruptly, and from what I could tell, her situation was pretty serious.”

“Well, we do thank you for helping our classes,” Barb tells you with a sad smile. “As much as we hated to see Miss Lee go, our students are still going to get a fine arts education because of you.”

“I’m doing my best,” you sigh quietly as you finish off the rest of your pretzels. You nod to yourself as you close your bag and take another deep breath. You go to stand from your place at the table, but you find yourself seeing a few black spots in your vision. You force yourself to sit down again.

“You alright there?” Melissa asks, clearly at least a little concerned.

You nod. “Just a little tired is all.”

The green eyes that you still haven’t gotten quite right in your sketches stare into your soul for a split second. “Is that all you had to eat today?”

You shrug. “Don’t have much around the house.”

“No wonder you’re on the verge of passing out,” she rolls her eyes. Before you know it, she has a plate in front of you and is spooning some of her meal out onto it for you.

“This is yours,” you say quietly, in protest.

She dares you to challenge her as she continues to ration out her food. “And I also don’t need you passing out today… my kids have art later.”

You look to her, as if to see if she’s testing you or something. She just looks to the food pointedly and then back to you.

With a sigh, you thank her and begin to eat. “You didn’t have to,” you tell her softly.

The redhead shrugs. “Don’t worry about it. I blame it on my being Italian.”

The rest of your lunch is spent trying to subtly stare at Melissa Schemmenti’s eyes in order to perfectly capture how to draw them in your sketchbook.

When you’re finished, you sigh softly and thank her again before heading for the door.

“You should start having lunch with us if you can,” Janine tells you. “If we’re going to be working with you now, we should probably get to know you, right?”

You bite your lip nervously, thinking. Doing that would give you the perfect opportunity to observe the second grade teacher. You would probably be able to capture not only her eyes then, but different looks of hers, aside from just a standard sort of portrait. You nod. “Y-yeah. If I can fit it into my schedule, I’ll try to start coming down.”

When the redhead brings her class up to your room, she has a mug of coffee in hand too. Silently, you wish that you had a cup of coffee for yourself. The proper meal that you had helped to bring your energy up a bit, but the coffee would certainly be a nice pick me up. Maybe you can convince her to bring you one for when she picks up her-

The mug is being offered to you with the closest thing to a smile you’ve seen out of the tough teacher. “Thought you might like the pick-me-up.”

You tilt your head to the side, touched by this small but sweet gesture. “Thank you.” You take the mug gratefully, allowing the warmth of the steaming liquid to warm your cool to the touch hands.

Green eyes are rolled with a hint of a smirk dancing on her lips. 

Your days go by much nicer when you’re able to join that little crew for meals. They’re actually a lot nicer than you expected them to be. Melissa continues to bring you food, claiming that you’re actually helping her by eating some of the portions because she only knows how to cook for twelve. And when you aren’t able to make it down to the staff lounge, preoccupied with prepping new units for your classes, the second grade teacher makes her way up to you and sits with you while you continue to flit around the room and try to get everything in order. She continues to bring you cups of coffee on days where her class has art, and when her friends have art too, they usually come up with a mug and a soft, “from Melissa.”

As time goes on, you begin to show your less professional side- the side that your friends see. The Abbott crew begins to welcome it warmly, seeing that you aren’t as stuffy as you play. And in doing that, your boss begins to take more of a liking to you as well. It makes working at this school much easier. The only thing that is becoming more and more difficult as you integrate yourself into this school is the growing infatuation you have with a certain redheaded second grade teacher. She shamelessly flirts with you now, and you find yourself reciprocating quite often.

Since growing closer to the quirky little group, you have doodles of almost all of them down to a science. But there’s still one person who you can’t get quite right. Melissa Schemmenti. And for the amount of time you spend watching her and smiling with her, she should’ve been the first person you drew at the school to perfect. But you just aren’t satisfied. Or maybe you don’t want to be satisfied, because then that means you don’t really have a reason to sketch her anymore.

You’re sitting at one of the tables in the library while Ava drones on about God knows what. Your sketchbook sits in your lap as you continue to try to get her look just right- the way her eyes sparkle and her glasses sit on the tip of her nose as she clearly doesn’t pay attention to what your boss is going on about.

There’s something about this drawing that has you thinking you might just get it right this time. And because you have that feeling, you start to focus so intensely on your art that you don’t notice the meeting going on around you ends. In fact, you’re only made aware of the ending of the meeting when you feel a familiar hand on your shoulder.

“Wow,” is all she breathes softly as she looks at what you’re working on. “Is that… is that me?”

Instinctively, you try to slam your sketchbook shut. You can’t believe you got so into the zone that you didn’t realize the faculty meeting was over, and you really can’t believe you were just caught in the act of sketching your coworker.

“No,” Melissa says. “Open it back up. I want to see.”

You shake your head and try to stand.

“C’mon, there’s nothing to be embarrassed about,” the redhead tells you.

You just shake your head again as you head out of the library, refusing to make eye contact with her. You practically sprint up to your classroom and shut the door behind you. Your cheeks burn, and your heart feels like it’s about to burst out of your chest.

Your coworker doesn’t try to approach you right after the meeting. Instead, she waits until her lunch period. You don’t come down, just as she predicted. So she brings you up the portion that she brought for you. As she expected, you don’t turn when she enters your room, instead focusing all of your attention on the papers in front of you and trying to grade essays.

“You ain’t coming down?” her gravelly voice asks you.

You just wave your hand as you continue to bite at the tip of your pen. “Gotta grade,” you tell her from the little corner of your room that has a bean bag.

Green eyes glance over at your desk, and right there is your sketchbook on your desk.

“I’ll just set your stuff over on your desk then,” she says slowly as she toys with the idea of peeking at it.

You just nod along, entirely forgetting that your book is sitting there and open to the page that you were working on during the meeting this morning.

You hear her heels clicking against the tile to your desk, but you don’t hear them walking away. Only then do you look up and see that she’s once again looking at your sketchbook. And then you watch her flip a page, and you’re mortified.

The previous page is quite literally just you trying to get her eyes right- something that you finally achieved last night.

“Hun, this is-“ she’s going to say incredible, but you all but tackle her to get your book back.

“Please stop looking at my things,” you say sharply as you grab the book from her clutch.

“Have you been drawing me during faculty meetings?” she asks you as she takes the book back into her hands. At this point, she’s holding it just out of your reach, and you know she’s already seen your work, so it’s futile to try to hide the sketchpad from her.

“I’ve been sketching a lot of things lately,” you sigh as she flips through.

Her eyes gaze over the still life of the library, of your classroom, of the portraits of your coworkers, but she looks at you with a furrowed brow.

“A lot of these are of me,” she notes quietly.

You worry your bottom lip through your teeth. “I’ve been trying to get your eyes right,” you manage. “They’re a bit more complicated than the others- brown eyes, green eyes, you know?”

The redhead continues to scan your sketchbook. There’s doodle after doodle.

“You’re real good,” she whispers as she allows her fingers to gently trace the pencil marks in your book. “Like… you shouldn’t be an art teacher, but an actual artist good.”

You blush. “I ain’t that good.”

“You are,” she promises you, and her green eyes look into your own. “But if you need help getting my eyes right, you can always just ask.” She looks up at you through those long lashes, and then her eyes flit down to your lips.

“M-maybe,” you whisper, your own eyes glancing down at hers, as you lick your lip subconsciously.

“I’m honored you would try this hard to get my eyes right,” the second grade teacher says softly as she moves just the slightest bit closer. 

You give her a nervous smile. “A beautiful thing deserves to be captured just right.”

“I’d say you captured my eyes nicely,” Melissa mumbles as she allows her hand to cup your cheek.

“Oh?” you raise a brow. “Can I try to capture something else of yours?”

“And what would that be?” You can practically feel Melissa’s breath on your lips.

As you give into your desire to kiss her, you mutter, “Your heart.”

TAGS: @schemmentis @thesapphictimelady @marvel210 @itisdoctortoyousir @morgana-larkin @doesthatsuggestanythingtoyou @marvels--slut @gwennybriggs @megamultifandomtrashposts @lemz378 @http-sam @melissaschemmentisbranzino @imaginesmultifandoms @sexysapphicshopowner @lilfartbox1 @maybe-a-humanbean @imlike-so-gaydude @a-queen-and-her-throne @notinmyvocab @melanielaufeyson @dvrkhcld @cosmichymns @sasheemo @m1lflov3rrr @ricejucie

[dare-writes]

Sorry, did you say something?

Tom crash out, but you get your revenge.

tom ryder x female reader 

genre: fluff at the end, smut; 18+ MINORS DNI

wc: 1.7k

sexual content warnings: female!reader, tom ryder being tom ryder, reader gets their revenge, ignoring kink, reader takes a phone call during sex, exhibitionism, kind of mirror sex, implied face sitting, implied oral sex (f receiving), (m) edging, (f) overstimulation, good boy tom ryder, Miss kink, praise kink !! In relation to I'm Sorry, Miss

__

Tom did his best—all the time. No, he was at his best at all times. He was the best. You knew that all too well, being on the receiving end of the tirade of his amazingness while those who worked for him were insolent and incapable of executing his plans for brilliance. It was always a battle with Tom Ryder. 

It was customary for Tom to go off his rocker with anyone.: his assistant, his makeup artist, his hair stylist, and even his dialect coaches. But to go off on you is an entirely different thing. A freelance editor who he saw online and hand-picked himself. For some reason, the first time Tom attacks you for your lack of integrity, it sets something off.

It’s been a year since you two started working together; you’ve never disagreed this greatly.

“This concept is boring! God, It puts me to sleep. The fans would be uninterested, and I know it because I am! You’re putting me to bed with that shit!”

You get your payback quickly.

Not one person would expect Tom Ryder to be a whiny bitch in bed. The crew would assume he was just a bitch that whines everywhere he went and that he got his way and dominated the bedroom.

Instead, while he fucked into you from behind, you were working on your laptop. The mirror in front of the bed that Tom strategically installed wasn’t even helping. Watching your breasts move while he pounded into you, watching your face twist in pleasure as he worked his ‘Ryder Magic’ inside you, were some of his most incredible parts about the mirror.

The bulbous cockhead dragged along your walls, poking and prodding around until he found the spot that he knew gave you the most pleasure. Tom hated this, all of it! The best he got out of you was just a grunt. It didn’t even sound pleasant! 

What obscured the mirror reflection vision from your lovely tits and face while he fucked away was the laptop in front of you. Tom couldn’t believe it; you were editing away as you simultaneously began working on his promotion scheduling on your phone. 

You liked this plan; the even more strategic laptop placement hid your smiles and slightly gaping expression as he brushed against your g-spot perfectly. Tom Ryder whined, cried, and begged. 

A strangled cry falls past Tom’s lips, “Miss… Miss, please, please pay attention to me.” 

He was entirely naked; even his stupid sunglasses were discarded on the nightstand, his arms were flexing as he held your hips, and his fingers were leaving crescent moons in the soft of your hips. Tom’s grown-out bleached hair was sweat-drenched, and he just kept on whining. 

“Miss! Please, I need to cum…” 

Quiet followed until you laughed and continued to type on your phone, taking a quick break from work. Tom tried to catch a glimpse of the phone screen but failed each time. 

I love when he’s being a whiny thing.

Lucky, I need a movie star who cries while we have sex.

R u busy?

stfu, what

r u busy?

no?

Promise me you won’t record. 

What?

Promise me. You, state your name, will not record anything for the next hour while on the phone with me. State my name. If you do, you will be subjected to a court of law. 

You smiled as you got the mystery contract signed. You knew your best friend wouldn’t. TMI was thrown out the window back in college when she demonstrated how she had sex on a bunk bed with some guy. 

The cell phone began ringing, an impending call to be answered. At the sound of the trilled ring, Tom stopped.

“Miss.. what. What are you doing?”

The phone call picked up. Fear and panic rose in Tom, but he also was intrigued. He tried to lean and peer over your shoulder. Fucking privacy screen, of course, you had one. 

His hand lifted to wipe his sweaty hair off his forehead. His voice trembled as he asked, “Miss… stop, what are you doing?” 

Your eyes glared up into the mirror. An onset glare made him push through. His cock slowly returned to thrusting in and out, encased by hot, gummy walls. 

“You are mean,” your friend said on the other end. 

“What are you talking about?” you asked as Tom sped up. His whimpering and whining quieted immediately. Tom moved his hands to soften the sound of their skin slapping against each other. 

Your eyes flickered up in the mirror as Tom fucked and fucked into you. Tom was losing all composure; Tom just wanted to be acknowledged more than a glance or glare. His hands held the fold of your hips, and his nails dug into your skin. The sound of skin slapping skin returned, filling the room and likely the phone call you took. His lips pursed shu while his throat continued to emit grunts.

Admittedly, you had finished twice already. Tom suffocated between your thighs as you sat above him previously, and second when he begged to touch you as he fucked you. His fingers were gentle and teetered you on the edge, primarily fearful (and eager) that you would say something and take control of the entire situation.

Instead, here he was, edged yet overstimulated, crying, his nails leaving marks across your hips. Here you were, ignoring him, on the phone and working on another project for another job you had.

Your phone call, on the other hand, was quite enjoyable but too quiet, involving Tom’s crying and begging. “Are you ignoring him?” 

“Who?” You felt a twitch inside you. At his subtle slowing pace, you shoved your hips back into him harshly; Tom cried out.

“Bitch, I can hear him crying.”

“Who’s crying?” You asked. Your eyes flicked back up and met Tom’s eyes in the mirror. “I’m alone tonight.”

“You’re toxic, and I never want to have sex with you.”

“I wish I were having sex right now. Are you kidding? I’m bored. So far, my night is unexciting and uninteresting,” you open your mouth to induce a long yawn. “Honestly, I’m being put to fucking bed with how boring my nights are going right now.”

That was it. That was his breaking point. His cock was continuously twitching inside, and you could feel how close he was. You could see the way his neck vein was popping, and his eyes were squeezed shut. Through gritted teeth, “Hang up,” said Tom. 

You kept talking, asking how your friend's day was going. When you did nothing, your friend’s voice crackled on the call, “Do you need to hang up?”

“No, why?” 

“Miss… miss, please,” Tom whined, his voice shrill and weak. 

“Miss? Does he want a threesome? I can be momm-“

You rolled your eyes and slammed your laptop shut. “I’ll call you back later.” 

The phone disconnected, and Tom bent down, his sweat-sticky chest to your back, and whispered into your ear. “Miss… miss, I need to cum.”

Your voice, loud and heart,y responded, “Sorry, did you say something?” 

Tom cried, his lips kissing the shell of your e.ar “Cum…please let me cum inside.”

“Do whatever you want, Tom,” you said uncaringly. Several willful pulsing squeezes around him did it for him. No more than a few seconds later, cum is pumped inside with a withering moan from your boyfriend. Instead of continuing to ignore him, you lied down. Tom followed quickly, lying down beside you, and pulled your back into his face to hold close. His arms wrapped around you, one for your waist and the other for your chest. 

Damp streaks of tears cooled your blazing hot body down. Tom was crying or had been crying from overstimulation.

“Miss… I’m sorry for what I said,” he sniffled. “I didn’t mean it… I took my anger out on you when I shouldn’t have, and my anger wasn’t towards you.” 

Your hand reached up and patted his head softly with a firm kiss to his bicep that wrapped around your body. “You need to work on your emotions and a way to verbalize them in a healthy manner.”

“I know… I Don't know how. People want verbalized emotions, but it builds up, and then I’m mean and rude.” Tom’s voice was muffled, his drool-covered lips pressed against your mid back as he tried to convey his feelings. 

“Well, look into another way, you and I can.” 

“Promise?”

“Of course, Tom.” 

“Can you call me it, please?” His voice asked quietly. Of course, you would. He was still your boyfriend.

You turned in his arms and looked down at him. His face is tucked just above your breasts now. “You did such a good job apologizing to me. Thank you, baby.”

Tom huffed when you skipped over the part he wanted. “You’re my good boy, aren’t you?” 

His huffy and red face in between your breasts, “Yes. I am.” 

“I love you, Tom.” You leaned down and kissed his sweaty forehead gently with a soft hum.

“I love you too,” he said, smiling against your sternum.

[aventurineswife]

Reader LOVES ice skating and can't believe their eyes when the lakes finally get icy, so they ice skate on them. Their partners were skeptical about it since the ice didn't look hard enough and told them to be extra careful. While the two men were busy doing their own things like making snow castles or just chilling with a book. Reader were skating their heart away. But when they did a little spin and landed, the ice broke underneath them. Causing them to go down into the freezing water and leaving their two partners panicking. (Poly Kaveh and Veritas.. this actually happened to me once, and I thought it would be funny to see how they would handle it lmfao. So I guess it's a personal request.. in a way?)

When the Ice Breaks

Summary: When a frozen lake finally invites you to ice skate, your excitement takes over, despite your partners, Kaveh and Ratio's cautious warnings. However, a moment of miscalculation leads to disaster as the ice gives way beneath you. Your fall into freezing water throws Kaveh and Ratio into a frantic rescue mission, showing just how much they care for you in their own unique ways.

Tags: Kaveh x Reader x Ratio, Polyamory, Hurt/Comfort, Ice Skating Accident, Found Family Dynamics, Emotional Angst, Fluff and Angst, Protective Partners, Slow Burn Recovery.

Warnings: Depiction of Near-drowning and Hypothermia, Panic and Emotional Distress, Mild Injury due to Ice Breakage, Mentions of Physical and Emotional Vulnerability.

A/N: 😨... Omg bestie wtf-🫂🥺 that must've been traumatizing for you... I'm so sorry to hear that🤧I hope you're doing well!

The morning sun peeked over a snowy horizon, painting the landscape in soft gold and white hues. The frozen lake shimmered under the light, beckoning you with its gleaming surface. You had been waiting for this moment all season—finally, the lakes were frozen solid enough to ice skate. Or so you thought.

Kaveh and Ratio, your two brilliant yet vastly different partners, stood nearby. Kaveh was sculpting an elaborate snow castle, his hair glowing under the winter sun as he muttered about symmetry and artistic integrity. Ratio, ever the intellectual, was reclining on a snow-dusted bench, a thick tome on the philosophy of ice crystals in hand.

“You're sure it's safe, right?” Kaveh called out, his eyes narrowing as he glanced at the lake.

Ratio adjusted his spectacles, one hand brushing back a lock of hair. “The tensile strength of ice is variable depending on thickness, temperature, and structural anomalies. In short, don’t fall through.”

You rolled your eyes at their caution, already lacing up your skates. "I'll be fine, you two worrywarts! This isn’t my first time."

With a confident grin, you stepped onto the ice, the smooth glide of the skates a familiar and thrilling sensation. As you twirled and spun, the world around you melted away. The cold air kissed your cheeks, and your laughter echoed across the icy expanse.

Kaveh paused mid-snowball fight with Ratio to watch you. “Look at them go! Such grace—”

“—And such recklessness,” Ratio muttered, though his sharp eyes lingered on you. He closed his book with a resigned sigh.

You decided to show off a little, executing a small spin before landing gracefully. But the moment your blades hit the ice, a deafening crack split the air. Time seemed to slow as the ice beneath you splintered, then gave way entirely.

The freezing water engulfed you in an instant, stealing the breath from your lungs. Panic clawed at you as you tried to grab the jagged edges of the broken ice, but they slipped from your numb fingers.

“[Name]!” Kaveh’s scream shattered the silence.

Ratio was already sprinting toward you, his usual composed demeanor replaced by sheer panic. “Don’t move! Stay calm!” he barked, though the urgency in his voice betrayed his own anxiety.

Kaveh, quicker on his feet, skidded to a stop at the edge of the ice, lying flat to distribute his weight. “Grab my hand!” he shouted, reaching out as far as he could.

You managed to lift a trembling hand toward him, but the freezing water sapped your strength. “I... can’t!” you choked out, teeth chattering uncontrollably.

“Ratio, help me!” Kaveh shouted over his shoulder.

The violet-haired genius was already pulling off his belt. “Hold onto this!” He tossed the makeshift lifeline toward you. “Kaveh, anchor it!”

With Ratio steadying him, Kaveh crawled closer, determination etched on his face. “Don’t you dare let go,” he said, his voice breaking. His fingers finally closed around your wrist, and with a guttural yell, he pulled you up and out of the freezing abyss.

Ratio was there immediately, wrapping his cloak around you as he supported your weight. “Hypothermia sets in quickly. We need to warm them up—now.”

Kaveh nodded, tears glistening in his eyes as he helped you to your feet. “You scared us half to death, you know that?”

Back at the cabin, they bundled you in blankets, their hands never leaving yours as they worked together to bring the color back to your cheeks. Kaveh brewed hot cocoa, his movements jittery, while Ratio kept you close to the roaring fire, his arms wrapped protectively around you.

“You could’ve died,” Kaveh murmured, his voice thick with emotion as he pressed a kiss to your damp hair.

“And I would’ve lost my favorite debate partner,” Ratio added, his tone softer than you’d ever heard it.

“I’m sorry,” you whispered, guilt tugging at you.

Ratio squeezed your hand, his eyes meeting yours. “Just promise you’ll listen to us next time.”

“And no more ice skating without us right there, okay?” Kaveh added, his smile strained but full of love.

You nodded, leaning into their warmth. Despite the harrowing ordeal, you couldn’t help but feel grateful—for their love, their quick thinking, and the fact that you were all together, safe and sound.

[writinginaforrest]

Yes, I’m Transgender, but I’m not “Trans”

(31st Aug 2024)

When I think about this too much, I always come to the conclusion that I have got some internalised Transphobia. I identify as Male. I use He/Him pronouns. I dress in a way that conforms to the Gendered Norms of my culture. I’m just a guy. When “Trans” is added as a descriptor, not only does that become a thing about me, but it also sets me aside from other men. I’m not a Man, I’m a Trans Man. I’m a pseudo-masculine thing. When people realise I’m Transgender, I feel Castrated. That sounds pretty dang transphobic, doesn’t it. 

The way people have expected me to be Trans often Superseded what Transness is to me. I had a lecturer in college who insisted that my depression was, In part, a result of my going home every day to a family who did not know I was Trans. She sat there and looked me in the eyes and I watched myself in the reflection of her eyes becoming an anecdote in real time. I’ll always be her “Trans Student” who did remarkably well in her class before dropping off in his second year when he got a different teacher. For reference, my family may not have known that I am Trans, but It’s very rare that my deadname is used in my home. I’m referred to by my Middle name almost exclusively. Jeff (Jeffrey). And in reality. Transness was not something that was always on my mind and even now, I can be sure that it was not fueling my depression. My Undealt with sexual trauma? That’s a different story. But my being Trans wasn’t it. I didn’t even think about it that much. I still don’t. It’s not something that is an integral part of me. I would be no different If I had been born Cisgender. 

And that’s the thing. “Trans” carries a lot of weight to it, doesn’t it? A lot of people really connect to it on a level beyond it being simply a descriptor. It’s a culture, an experience, a mindset, an ideology, and what can I say to those people? Well done? Thank you? I don’t really have much to say, and that’s part of my problem. A lot of Trans artists are, at least partly, inspired by their queer experiences. I’m an artist (I yell into the void) and yet nothing about being Queer inspires art within me. I have nothing to say. My art would be the same if I were Cisgender. If I were Allosexual. I would be the same because I am not these descriptors that have been decided for me based on the way I live my life. 

“Trans” has become a commodity that I can’t escape. It’s something I’m supposed to stick on my laptop. It’s something I’m supposed to pin on my wall. It’s a lifestyle. A trait. A Community. A Culture. An Ideology. A Concept. An Abstraction. It’s everything and it’s nothing. I’m supposed to disclose it with pride when I meet new people. I’m supposed to warn Littluns about the dangers of not expressing themselves and being comfortable in their identity when I can’t even deliver on that. I’m supposed to do all these things. 

But no one is asking me to. 

No one is telling me to be “Trans”. 

I’m looking around at all of my Trans brothers and sisters and wondering if that’s behaviour I should emulate because I  have a) no frame of reference and b) no connection to Transess as a concept. I feel like I’m doing a disservice to those who feel a connection to it as a concept, when I only see it as an adjective. When I try to remove myself from it as much as possible. And again here comes the internalised Transphobia knocking at my window.

I’m an artist, A filmmaker, and a writer. I’ve never felt compelled to tell Trans stories. Is it because I don’t want to be pigeonholed into this idea of Transness that again, supersedes my own, or is it because I’m ashamed of it? Am I acknowledging that I am more than a Trans artist or am I just not taking pride in the fact that I’m going to have to live with being Trans for the rest of my life? It’s not something that goes away. Trans doesn’t stop. I Will always be Transgender and I have to cope with that because I am male and I was not born that way. 

I don’t Identify with Queerness. I don’t identify as Transgender. It is something I am, a thing that I cannot help. I Identify as Male, Transgender was just something that came free in the post. I didn't understand the terms and conditions of it. I'm dyslexic, you expect me to read the fine print?

Where does this end? What’s the accumulation of all of this thinking? I do not know. It doesn’t end. The debate where I am my own interlocutor only ends with more questions that I must ask myself. 

[lowpolynpixelated]

Call of Duty and the beast that must die

Written by: Clair Beckett

Upon booting up Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 for the first time I was assaulted with a modern "Marvel" type banner, proudly declaring the expansive media franchise that is CALL OF DUTY. I was then given three different screens filled with the names of game studios swallowed by the machine in the series' long and crumbling history of game after game after game. Call of Duty claims itself a pillar of the industry. One of the many posts that hold up the very sky of the video game landscape. It stands now before me, million dollar propaganda for the US military starring Spawn and Nicki Minaj for a limited time only, but only if you can pay the price of admission.

The next thing I was told, of course, was to make an Activision account. The game then prompted me to add my phone number and restart the game twice to make sure that all the personal data it wanted from me was set to go. Modern video games have gone so far beyond what they began as and yet they still ride the corpses of the culture the executives strangled to death loudly and proudly. Remember COD4? Remember Modern Warfare 2? Well we do! And we're happy to announce that we've rewritten and re-released them for $70 with extra US warcrimes written to look like the russians did it! Buy now and get a new golden skin for the gun that will only be in the cash shop rotation for the next two weeks!

Loading into the launchers that games like Halo and Call of Duty have become is insulting. But at least Halo has the dignity to somewhat look like a game instead of a collection of repackaged and hastily made content so that you can push its cosmetics exchange and season passes safely underneath some menus so they don't bother while you try to do the thing you paid for without logging in to your Microsoft account first. No, Call of Duty loads you into a fantastic screen filled with games you COULD own and cosmetics it wants you to spend the money on first. But how did this happen? I thought we were going to vote with our wallets? Show those big companies that we're not gonna take it anymore! Well, astute video gameist, we did. Or, folks like you did, and the resounding answer was "more forever so the money we're making off these pre-order bonuses and cosmetic mircotransations." Except it hasn't slowed down? Has it? So called "microtransactions" have ballooned up to upwards of $20 for single weapon skins or character packs, art that is made at the behest of artists who are cycled out of the offices like so many reams of paper wasted on stock reports.

Call of Duty wastes 0 time showing you all the ways you can spend money every way possible. If you select the game you "own" you'll first be prompted to upgrade to the ultimate edition, then when you select multiplayer you'll be prompted to purchase this month's battlepass, when you select what character you want to present as on each team you get bombarded with skins, pricetags displayed proudly larger than the actual name of the skin. Too, damn, far. Is what this nonsense is. Far be it from me to lay down my journalistic integrity for the absolute slog that fucking Call of Duty has become, but is this really what we play now? Is this what the multi-million dollar companies have to offer? Do you think that anyone working on these games had their passion cared for? Their intent respected? The answer, dear reader, is no.

No, no this isn't about video games anymore. But your average "gamer", as it were, hasn't cared about this in about 10 years. The "gamer culture" that has been fostered within the triple A sphere of the landscape is one of complacency and non questioning attitudes of "the next big thing must be the best because it's the next and the biggest!" when in actuality it's just the biggest number of people laid off without notice and the biggest return for five people in thousand dollar suits. Modern Call of Duty props itself up on the idea of legacy. The idea that the name itself is enough to warrant the money you pay for the content it will legally take away from you in a matter of a few short years so they can save on server costs. But what IS the legacy of Call of Duty? The original titles helped shape the first person shooter landscape, and the fourth title revolutionized multiplayer action games alongside the likes of Halo, but what came after? Almost immediately after COD4's smashing success it traded any sort of message and want for things like gameplay innovation or narrative cohesiveness for an iterative cycle at the behest of a publisher in some of the early days of the triple A landscape becoming a barren sprawl of corporate greed. Mind you I said some of the early days, corporate greed has always been intrinsically tied to the video game landscape but I digress. Call of Duty became one of the first annual franchises. Swapping developer each year back and forth to make games that were baseline iterative on the last promising "bigger and better but also the same, we promise" ad nauseam until something had to give. Modern Warfare 2 is heralded as a gold standard for the series, but it mostly has to do with the most memorable levels letting you gun down civilians in an airport. Otherwise it was the same jarheaded OO-RA gun em' down action that the first game had, minus some rather potent anti-war sentiments.

Call of Duty's legacy then is one of "gamer culture", fiercely embroiled in charging the most for the least at the promise of it being the very bleeding edge of what your new several hundred dollar machine can do. The idea of the annual franchise sold more than consoles it sold promises to people, and executives loved that. The culture I speak of you can see everwhere in the mid to late 2000s and early to mid 2010s before the absurdity of it all really started to take root. From Mountain Dew cans boasting cool spec ops dudes in tactical gear and offering double XP should you buy the sugary sludge, to commercials starring then YouTube celebrities famous for blowing things up with military grade firearms on empty land. Gamer culture was and still is top priority in ensuring people don't question the quality or practices of the things they're being sold now. As long as a company can tug on the heartstrings of millions by saying things like "We grew up playing (insert late 90s/early 2000s video game title here) so we get what makes games fun." They have carte blanche to repackage, resell, and further monetize things that should not cost that much if anything at all. The idea that the name "Call of Duty" should stand as the base pricepoint to sell you a launcher to host all the games you could own while barely showing you the ones you do is that corporate greed taken to such a far extreme it's maddening to think about why people aren't more fucking angry about this.

The great Stephanie Sterling has long spoken on points like this about companies like Activision/Blizzard, Nintendo, and EA. Titans of the industry now only famous for how many people they layoff every few months and how much they charge for games that shouldn't cost that much. In a 2019 article on how Apex Legends ended up saving Electronic Arts from major stock crashes, she said the following:

"Last generation saw the rise of the “fee to pay” game. The PlayStation 3 and Xbox 360 made online connectivity obligatory for modern consoles, and it was only a matter of time because videogame publishers smelled an opportunity to make money from constant access to their customers. Full premium expansions for videogames gave way to downloadable content, which in turn gave way to microtransactions appropriated from free-to-play games. Only, they never made the games containing them free.

New “AAA” titles saw their entire in-game economies overhauled for the worse in order to support microtransactions. Dead Space 3, notoriously, had to reduce all its horror elements and become a traditional action game to support a desperate weapon crafting economy. This was excused by pundits and spokespeople as offering players a “choice,” without addressing the fact that psychologically manipulative gameplay elements were not things we could opt out of in the games we were paying sixty dollars for.

Having gotten away with it, however, publishers only grew worse. With traditional DLC, season passes, and multiple special editions, many companies have more than quadrupled down on their monetization, and modern games are slowly - subtly - starting to resemble starter packs more than finished products."

-Stephanie Sterling, "How Apex Legends Saved EA's Ass... In Spite of EA", Feb. 12, 2019

In microcosm I think this perfectly encapsulates what the new legacy of things like Call of Duty is. Full and even fuller priced games being stocked with more and more transactions to pull the most out of the consumer without giving anything meaningful in return. Virtual rewards for real world currency that can be taken away at a moment's notice. Fortnite is most famous for popularizing the "battlepass" style of monetization and rotating cash shop storefronts. By having you purchase funny in-game tokens to buy your skins it hoped to have you forget about the 30$ you just spent on said tokens. Call of Duty and its piers have no such interests. No, cold hard cash is the only way it presents its purchasable garbage and that's what you pay each time you give in to one of it's dozens of FOMO inducing splash screens and reminders. You are taken advantage of for your money. That's not even to touch on the genre destroying concept of "crossover content" which only serves to further drive the idea of sales over substance, with more of your favourite characters and celebrities being added to these games in the form of poorly animated and uncanny models for 20$ a pop.

This new form of selling a legacy can only end in more of the same. More skilled artists, developers, and writers being laid off into an industry that cannot afford to hire them back. Infinite growth has already reached it's glass ceiling and is pretending that it simply cannot see it due to it's see-through nature. These giants of the industry, these beasts, must die to see meaningful creative growth return to such spheres as the triple A landscape. The old must give way to the new, the nostalgia has been wrung out like so many drops from an already dry sponge. Name's are not worth paying for, and neither are concepts. We must think and act critically of these systems if we are to escape them. Voting with your wallet is a false initiative. Participating in the market they have a stranglehold on cannot lead to their downfall. This is all to say the following: Stop buying this nonsense. Look more into the independent scene. Find your new favourite games through channels like itch.io or the "indie" spaces on the other major storefronts. Pay for the games that care about what they are. And for the love of everything stop purchasing US Army propaganda. I'd like to recommend the likes of Stephanie Sterling, as previously mentioned, who's journalistic integrity and strength has persevered through some of the worst of gaming's tumultuous history. Jacob Geller, who's introspective analysis of video games as pieces of living breathing art tell so much about the passion and craft that goes into something as commonplace as "a video game". And finally Noah Caldwell-Gervais, a man who I can only describe as one of the most earnest, honest, and just plain down-to-earth guys to ever grace the gaming landscape. These three along with countless others are avenues into further understanding the type of landscape video games exist in in the modern day. I hope you come away from either this article or their work with something new, be it a game or a thought on all this mess. Thanks for reading.

Sources and links:

"How Apex Legends Saved EA's Ass... In Spite of EA"

Stephanie Sterling's work

Analyzing Every Torture Scene in Call of Duty — All 46 of Them (Jacob Geller)

How Many Clicks Does It Take To Get to the Center of Diablo? [A Franchise Retrospective] (Noah Gervais)

[ryuzakemo128]

Grim Reaper Part Six

Pairings: Poly 141 x female reader / female reader x her mental health x König

Content Warnings: Hint of future darker content?, Kidnapping, mention of miscarriage, possessive & obsessed Austrian man, the affair partner comes in, domestic abuse mentioned, controlling behaviour mentioned, many other possible topics you may or may not find disturbing. Reader discrestion is advised.

Words: 2574

Masterlist - Prequel - Part One - Part Two - Part Three - Part Four - Part Five - Part Six - Part Seven - Part Eight - Part Nine

Supernatural AU - Poem

Credit for Dividers: @cafekitsune + @strangergraphics

Summary:

You felt peaceful at home in Alaska.

Austria keeps you on tenterhooks.

A month into your kidnapping, you were never in the main house for longer than a maximum of three days of the week. König wouldn’t risk the task force finding you so quickly, he finally managed to get you back Mäuschen. Don’t you understand? He wanted to keep you for a little longer. How much longer you ask? Why do you need to know Mäuschen? You don’t have a choice in the matter.

Sit there, look pretty for him. Don’t you fucking move a muscle as a painter etches your new look into an oil painting. Into another canvas he would later neglect much like anything your relationship fostered between the two of you. You were too tired to protest or argue with him. The jet lag getting to you faster than a snail escaping a squirrel.

König’s cooing in your ear didn’t help the matter any more if you weren’t tired and fighting the urge to punch him in the face. He seemed too keen on making sure you had this child in his presence inside of his home.

You felt peaceful at home in Alaska.

Austria keeps you on tenterhooks.

Here screamed danger. Betrayal. Heartbreak. Nothing good for you.

That's a diet level not to recommend; a morgue visit seems more apt.

The cottage's redeeming feature is the panoramic countryside view from every angle.

Things kept inside of it? They were a little too perfect, perfected and placed in a ‘aesthetically’ pleasing view. If someone wasn’t paying too close attention to it. Someone with a keen eye would point out it was purposefully styled this way to get you to stay longer.

From Monday to Thursday, you focused on crafting an escape plan while in a different Austrian region. Upon returning, you had no intention of taking chances. Staring at the harp in one of the rooms. In another life you would be playing it still. In another life you would still be married. You wouldn’t have lost your child the first time. Things would have been…...better?

It didn’t matter. It is what it is and thinking about what ifs wouldn’t change a damn thing about it either. Your mind like a stonewall remained steadfast in your choices leading up to your divorce. There was nothing he would or could say to prove otherwise.

On a Friday morning, you were drinking your green tea while someone waltzed into your room. A smug grin plastered on her face. Painted on her face like a well-rehearsed lyric, line in a play and a notable quote from a novel you liked to read.

You finally saw the woman he was seeing behind your back, your face carefully posed neutrally. If looks could have killed, she would have died the moment she walked through the door. “Do I know you?” You asked raising an eyebrow at her.

Her tactics didn't amuse you at all. In fact, it was a mere joke in a failing comical script by a piss poor comedian. Raised by failing artists who thought they could raise a success amongst two failures. You would have pitied her if you didn’t already want to immediately want to melt her face off.

"You don't remember? I figured you would." She jeered.

“You are no longer an integral part of my life. Therefore, your presence in my mind does not exist. Your name is lost in my history, forever a number in a line of cowards I have met in my life.”

“Fancy words for someone locked away in her old bedroom.” She rolled eyes. “I suppose that’s what happens when you run to a group of men instead of remaining loyal to the one guy who could have given you everything you could have wanted.”

“Oh. You sweet summer child. He told you that or did you concoct inside that head of yours all by yourself?” you snorted as you rolled your eyes at her naivety. You just created a job opening sweetheart. He’s serial cheater. You did yourself no favours by staying with him. I have no pity for you. None for a woman who took the life of my first born child from me. You dug your hole here. Lie in it and stay there.

You didn’t dare speak those words aloud. Not yet. You wouldn’t give this woman the satisfaction of her seeing you emotionally react to her. Once in a blue moon you will find your soul here. A version of yourself untainted by the future hurt you would feel soon after. A piece of yourself forever lying inside of the walls of this place no matter how many coats of paint he will put upon these walls.

No matter how much he denies it. You were first and foremost the one who might end up killing him by the end of it all. As you promised you would have if you ever found him cheating on you. Not one to take back your promise as it would go against your morals, your personal code of ethics. A promise is a promise after all.

Like a mythic fox, you're crafty, sharp-witted, and never succumb to trivial vanity. While König laid the game's foundation, you held more hidden cards. You weren’t going to lay around all day helpless like a damsel in distress this time around.

You had an Italian phrase etched into your forearm the month after your divorce, ‘Fino alla morte ogni coglione ci arriva.’ Meaning ‘Until we die anything and everything can happen.’

The phrase slowly becoming your mantra, your personal hymn and prayer you would say yourself over and over. It became your saving grace. Something you cling onto with vehemently. Close to your chest long enough to burn into your soul.

Yet this woman seemed to be so keen on getting right into your face about your pregnancy. You snapped, ordering her back onto König's cock, claiming he'd already fucked her senseless. Best she returns to her sole expertise before you consider doing it for him. Maybe not the optimal phrasing, but it seemed the sole means to make her retreat into a room that felt like a cave.

“Apart from your girlfriend's foolishness, you've done well,” you said calmly. “Well enough for a man of stature.”

König had never seen your temper rise this much. To this level before, it was pointed, angled at him and somehow, he felt his skin fluster. A bundle of nerves aroused by the thought of you losing your temper at her or him. He wanted more. No, he needed more of it. Aimed at him more than anything. Even when you threatened to fuck his girlfriend for him, which to anyone else, it would be odd to hear about right?

König didn't disagree. It was in fact odd to hear the first time she told him. He felt the need to hear repeat inside of his mind. Like a small voice in the back of his skull. Thoughts lingering around. He didn’t know he could think of you in that way. He only saw you as pure. Delicate. A flower.

Upon hearing this now. He desired you to sleep with her from the get-go. A desire which grew from the depths of his soul straight to his cock. Upon hearing, he was even angrier, you didn't. He wanted you to, solely to prove a point. The point where you weren’t the same woman he met years ago. Yet you sent her away. Slamming his fists against the table, sending a few pens rolling off the other side.

A few papers on his desk jumped from the top of his desk. Grunting at the thought of you taking his girlfriend in such an aggressive manner made his cock rock hard in a way he couldn’t hope to describe. Tempting like fudge he wasn’t allowed to eat. Irresistible like the last slice of pizza he hadn’t eaten in years. An apple from a tree, God had forbade Adam and Eve from picking and eating. Lucious, delicious, irresistible.

He'll confine you another weekday henceforth, leveraging your fiery nature for his gain. The potential is immense and endless, ready for his consumption, much like savouring shreds of slow-roasted pork. Can't you see, Maus? Don't you see his longing? Are you truly oblivious? He wants you face first into the white pillows mewling, begging for his thick cock to be shoved deep inside of you until your legs were weak, wobbly like a fawn learning to walk for the first time.

The deep thought of the mockery you would bring for the name branded things he had bought his girlfriend gave him the urge to jerk off inside of a condom pretending it was your tight pussy instead. Tricking his mind into believing he was cock deep inside of you.

Its your fault you look hotter while you are angry, tears streaming down your face and chest heaving as the sobbing wracked through you. Body and soul. Things he took for granted the first time. Yet if only he could take you like he did recently. Over and over without the fear of you ‘remembering’ somehow or in some way in the future. It was far too tempting to not play with that thought right?

You should understand what he’s capable Maus. You fucked with the wrong man this time. I mean it would always wind up to be your fault right Mäuschen? You get a sniff, a lick, a taste and a bite of freedom. And you act up like this Mäuschen?

You must be punished.

You need to be shown who’s really in charge.

And do you really think it’s you? Really?

Need a wake-up call? König is more than prepared to give you one. Or two.

“Taking her away from me? Laughable excuse among many. Pathetic.” He grumbled. Brow creasing into a frown.

Your mantra from ‘I don’t need you. Just as you don't need me’ to the more comforting ‘Until we die anything and everything can happen.’ Though the process was tough, she felt relief at escaping someone cold and uncaring. Her past often surprised her when she least anticipated it. Finding her miss parts of it more than she felt like she should have.

The same platinum blonde and light brown ombre coloured hair tied with pink hair ties in two piggy tails. The pastel pink headband matching the hair ties. The corseted, A-line pink and white dress. It screamed ‘try hard’ to a desperate degree. You just hoped she liked dressing this way before he met her.

She batted her eyelashes as stepped closer to you, you stepped away from her, yet with each step further away. She matched it with two tiny ones of hers. One step back and two steps forward. Pressing your back against the wall. Her light grey eyes looking into yours like you had something inside you worth keeping for herself.

Thief and liar. Two typically dreadful things combined. Evoking a distinctive atmosphere of neglect akin to that found in a Lovecraft or King horror novel. Commonly appealing to horror fans over partygoers.

Odd. She’s silent this time.

Good. She learnt her fucking lesson.

I wish she would stay out of my face though.

Not my problem for much longer.

Her gaze delved deep, as if manually reorganising your insides, all without a trace of physical contact. As you mustered the courage to ask her to go away, the door suddenly opened, and a maid brought in your breakfast. You moved to the table, the young woman gazing in your wake.

What the fuck is her problem? Doesn’t she have something better to do? Did Konig put her up to this? That stupid sick fucker. Probably getting off to the thought of sending her here.

It's likely he has three to four cameras here now.

I located one above the bathroom door and another right above the showerhead, closer to the shower. The third was likely behind the bathroom mirror.

I wouldn’t put it past him. Even with an affair, he remained controlling. Subtly controlling, unnoticed until my departure. Cameras were just one of the few things I remember. I am sure the meals were just as restrictive as they were back then. Can’t gain weight when your husband controls what you eat right? In this case ex-husband.

It felt odd to be watched in this manner. You expected it to come from a stonewall mute who only spoke in sign language or morse code. Not whatever this was.

His mind has flown the coop. It would have to be long gone by now.

He creates chaos and expects me to fix it, accepting the blame for his actions to ease his conscience. Not anymore. As I told him the first day.

I don’t need him anymore. He’s no longer the first thing on my mind. Yet it’s like he’s not listening to the words I’m telling him through my actions. Deliberately misreading them to a dangerous degree.

I can’t find the words to describe how pathetic he seems to me now. Knowing what kind of person, he has shown himself to be.

To think I’m the monster in your eyes. Especially considering the lengths you go to get what you think is yours. Pathetic. Utterly pathetic.

You are far luckier you’re not in front of me now. No matter. If I need to bide my time. I will bide my time. Inch by inch. Centimetre by Centimetre. You will not get away with ruining my life.

Another strange thing you picked up on. There were no clocks inside the entire place. Not even digital ones. Not a single clock anywhere. No calendars kept anywhere to let you know what day or month of the year it was.

There is no ceramic dishes or glasses. Replaced by plastic plates, cups and cutlery. As if he tried to baby wrap and baby proof every aspect of your time here. You are sure the rest of the furniture has the same theme of ‘safety’. As if he didn’t think you were capable of caring for yourself properly.

Insulting as well as utterly demeaning.

He even cleared the books.

None of the erotic tales he'd suspect you of reading behind his back. He called it cheating to read them. Said you were reading them to get back at him on an emotional level of some kind.

Made him doubt your marital fidelity compared to his.

Stated it was your responsibility for his initial infidelity.

Ludicrous. Absurd and utterly false.

He yelled, calling it the ultimate betrayal for writing it on your own terms. He'd have remained unaware if he'd ignored the mail that day. You sold the manuscript a few months into his deployment for extra cash. You'd typically use this while earning, when he's usually away.

He’d be home. While you were deployed. It was an opposite of each other.

He didn’t know you. Not in the way you hoped.

He'd bring gold jewellery, but you liked silver more.

He’d bring you plain green tea. You preferred hibiscus and strawberry hibiscus.

Purposefully getting things wrong to the point where it felt like he just didn’t care. On purpose to a deeper degree, you couldn’t understand at the time. You couldn’t put your finger on the reason for it.

You guess you ought to be glad you got out of there in one piece the first time.

[sweaty-toothed-mad-woman]

✨ INTRO POST ✨

I’m Kat 👋

(((ik some people put the stuff that’s important in like a specific color but this is kinda just a jumble of random stuff so nothing is really important ngl)))

this blog is pretty much entirely Dead Poets Society, but I sometimes integrate my current obsessions into my posts, so be aware of that

my yapping blog: @barbaric-yap

my writing blog: @gather-ye-fucking-rosebuds (I only have one thing tho lol)

MY FAV THINGS (kinda random ass things tbh)

My fav color is ice blue

My fav movie is DPS and FBDO

My fav artist is Taylor Swift

My fav song is Shake It Off

My fav school subject is science

My fav number is 9, 21, or 47

My fav show is Psych

My fav book is Kotlc or Harry Potter

My fav actor is Matt Damon

My fav yt channel is Kallmekris

My fav snack is Doritos

SOME THINGS ABOUT ME

#undiagnosedautismandadhdandanxiety

Aroace and proud of it

my pronouns are she/her

Sports I do: soccer, basketball, flag football, cross country, tap, jazz, and ballet

Instruments I play: cello, piano, and (kinda) guitar

Clothes I wear: sporty/ athletic or just comfy

i have three irl friends but I get along w everyone so idk if it’s REALLY three friends

I probably need therapy but I don’t feel like it and also my parents don’t believe in therapy so there’s that

Have I mentioned how much I love Ferris buellers day off??? Bc honestly I might like it more than dps (don’t sue me)

I sleep with a stuffed animal dog named Bennett

When I grow up I wanna be a chemist at nasa

idk what else to put sooo

my bestiesssss

@ultr8-v1olence

@snek-of-eden

@prettypinkbubbless

@soobiesworld

@sophie-jane-silver

@anderscuns

@the-undead-poets-society

@dreadedwhim

@yawping-poets-society

@filmbro-girlblogger

@thiamblogger

(lemme know if you wanna be added I need more friends lol)

spam my ask box pleeeeeeeeeease I’m bored 90% of my free time

carpe diem, bitches. go seize the day and sound your barbaric yawps while gathering ye rosebuds and sucking out all the marrow of life.

[multi-fandoms-posts]

The Explosive Mission last part

part 1, part 2

X Men Masterlist

The group approaches the entrance to the underground research facility. A heavy steel door blocks the way, but the team is ready. Charles has already scanned the guards' thoughts and knows their exact positions. Logan and Wade stand at the front, ready for action, while Erik and Y/N wait near the door to secure access with their powers.

---

"So, Logan," Wade begins, casually leaning against the steel door, "how are we going to do this? The classic Wolverine way? You storm in, take out everything in sight, and I stand by and applaud? Or, and hear me out, we do it differently. Teamwork. Like... you start, and I'll deliver the punchline. A killer duo, like in a buddy movie!"

"Wade, if you don't shut up right now, this could become the shortest buddy movie ever," Logan growls, his claws already extended.

Wade ignores the threatening tone and grins. "You and your sharp claws. Always so macho. You know, you could use them on me..."

"Wade," Y/N interrupts with a laugh, "he might really slice you in half if you keep this up."

"Oh, it would be worth it," Wade replies with a grin. "Nothing beats a little physical exercise with Logan."

Logan rolls his eyes and takes a step toward the door. "I'll kill him... but later."

Erik glances briefly at Wade and then extends his hand. With a small gesture, he makes the massive metal door locks squeak before they release with a loud *click*. The steel door swings open, revealing a long, dark corridor.

"Artful as always, Erik," Y/N says as she leans closer to him. "There's nothing sexier than when you control metal."

Erik laughs softly and looks at Y/N challengingly. "You know, I like to keep things in motion."

Charles gives Erik a warning look but can’t hide the slight grin on his face. "Maybe we can save the flirting for later? We should focus on the mission."

Y/N laughs and winks at Charles. "Don't worry, Charles. I have enough focus left for the mission *and* for you."

"I have no doubt," Charles murmurs with a crooked smile, while concentrating on scanning the guards' thoughts inside.

They silently enter the building, and Charles provides continual updates on enemy positions. "Two guards in the left corridor. Logan, Wade, you should take them out quickly."

Logan nods curtly, pulls out his claws, and moves forward stealthily. Wade follows closely behind, like an enthusiastic shadow.

"Oh, Logan," Wade whispers as they approach the guards, "I love it when you’re the silent type. Mysterious, dangerous… exactly my type."

"Shut up, Wade," Logan mutters before darting forward and taking out the guards in seconds.

Wade stands right behind him, clapping. "Bravo, bravo! A true artist at work. Can I book you for my next missions? Maybe for a romantic comedy?"

Logan turns around and glares at Wade. "This isn’t a show."

Wade shrugs. "It is for me. I mean, you, me, and a few bad guys – it screams blockbuster, doesn’t it?"

Before Logan can retort, Charles quietly calls out, "Focus. The prototype is in the next chamber, but there are several security mechanisms."

Erik moves next to Y/N and nods. "Metal grids, I’d say. Shouldn't be a problem."

Y/N leans towards Erik. "You handle metal so well. It’s almost like it’s your superpower – oh, wait a minute." She laughs softly, and Erik just shakes his head in amusement.

Charles, accustomed to Y/N's sarcastic remarks, closes his eyes for a moment and focuses on the security systems. "Erik, the grids are integrated into a complex system. You'll need to be careful not to trigger any alarms."

"Careful is my middle name," Erik replies, extending his hand to manipulate the grids with his powers.

"Oh yeah?" Y/N whispers with a mischievous grin. "You know, Erik, I’ve never seen you as careful."

"That’s because you always make me lose control," Erik murmurs as he silently removes the grids.

"Believe me, that’s one of my favorite moments." Y/N smiles suggestively and gives him a meaningful look.

Charles sighs quietly but can’t help a amused smile. "Y/N, I hope you know that sometimes it’s better to keep control."

Y/N leans slightly towards Charles. "Oh, Charles, you know I love it when *you* take control."

Charles gives a soft laugh and shakes his head. "We really should focus on the mission before something goes wrong."

"I agree," Logan says from the front, without turning around. "If these two keep flirting, we might spend the rest of the day here."

Wade snorts loudly. "Oh, and suddenly you’re the big professional? You and I could finish this in no time. And afterwards, Logan, we could finally have that romantic dinner you always dream about."

"What are you talking about?" Logan growls as he retracts his claws. "You’re crazy."

"Maybe," Wade murmurs, leaning a little closer to Logan, "but crazy fits perfectly with your wild temperament."

Y/N giggles softly. "Logan, you really should consider it. Wade seems totally into you."

"I'll be into him with my claws soon enough," Logan mutters, trying to ignore Wade as best he can.

They reach the final chamber, and the prototype, a shiny, complex device, rests on a pedestal in the center of the room. Charles signals for them to stop.

"There are laser sensors," he explains calmly. "We need to be careful."

"Laser sensors? That sounds like a job for me," Wade says, swinging his katanas. "I mean, who could jump through lasers better than I can?"

"Please, do me a favor and don’t get yourself killed," Logan murmurs dryly.

Wade winks at him. "That sounds like you’re worried about me, Logan. It warms my heart."

Logan ignores him as Erik focuses on the metal in the room. "I can manipulate the laser sensors, but it will be a challenge."

"Erik, you love challenges," Y/N says with a grin. "Especially the ones that take your breath away."

"Not as much as you do," Erik murmurs as he concentrates on the task.

Charles, remaining serious, gives Y/N a stern but affectionate look. "Maybe you could distract us a little less, Y/N?"

"Oh, I’m sure I’m motivating you both to do your best," Y/N responds playfully.

Erik raises an eyebrow and looks at her with a slight smile. "That could be said."

"Good," Charles finally says as Erik disables the last sensors. "The way is clear. Let’s get the prototype and get out of here."

Wade steps forward and takes the device in hand. "And that, my friends, is how you successfully complete a mission. No problem."

Logan shoots Wade a dark look. "Let’s hope it stays that way."

Y/N grins and leans back toward Charles and Erik. "So, guys, what do we do after the mission? I have a few ideas."

Erik smiles and gives Charles an amused look. "Maybe we should listen to Y/N’s suggestions."

Charles shakes his head slightly but can’t help a smile. "I think we already know what your suggestions might involve, Y/N."

"Well, a few relaxing hours together to celebrate the success of this mission wouldn’t be so bad, right?" Y/N’s eyes gleam mischievously.

Erik chuckles and gives Charles a meaningful look. "I think that sounds like a fitting plan."

"I’m not sure we’ll get the chance to relax with Wade and Logan around," Charles says, barely suppressing a smile.

Wade, overhearing the conversation, dramatically turns to Logan and places a hand on his heart. "Logan, do you hear that? They want to celebrate without us! That’s betrayal!"

Logan eyes Wade with narrowed eyes. "If I survive this, it will only be because I don’t kill you on the spot."

Wade just shrugs and winks. "Oh, Logan. The old romantic in you just can’t help it, can you? We’ll celebrate afterwards, our own way. With claws and bullets. Very... intimate."

Logan growls softly and strides forward, ready to fight their way out.

Y/N laughs and whispers to Charles and Erik, "Maybe we should just give Logan and Wade their own little ‘therapy session.’ They clearly have... tension."

Charles smiles indulgently and nods. "That sounds like a good idea. After the mission, we’ll take care of our own relaxation."

"I’m looking forward to it," Y/N says, winking at Erik before lightly brushing his arm. "I have some really exciting ideas about how we could approach this."

Erik smiles and leans toward Y/N. "I’m intrigued."

Charles looks at the two with a bemused expression. "You two will never stop challenging me, will you?"

Y/N laughs softly. "Don’t worry, Charles. We’ll always keep you on your toes. And you’ll enjoy every minute of it."

[kvtnisseverdeen]

This is my humble take…

Joe Alwyn was Taylor’s best boyfriend. She knows this and her fans know this. But he demands actual work and accountability. Taylor is a white rich conservative girl first and foremost. And she’s very narcissist. Joe is the first boyfriend of hers to put actually limits on how her public personal affects him and their relationship. And she liked dating him at first because he was private and reserved and she was desperately trying to scape the industry and she found the most non-industry British man ever. She liked that security and knowing he didn’t attract that much attention. Then, she slowly gained her reputation back on track and realized that she could finally go back to being the person that plays for the media again. And yes, maybe her relationship with Joe was slowly fading — it happens a lot. But she clearly says in her lyrics that wanting to be shown off in public is one of the reasons too. Because she likes that every relationship she’s in gets consumed by her fans and the media.

And Joe Alwyn required her to go and do some work on herself! He comes from a very activist family. He was the one that made her be more open about social activism. It was because of him that she tried to do the bare minimum like encouraging during elections, have more racially diverse people on her music videos and tours, and do a very cringey job at supporting lgbt rights. But it was at least something…

Isn’t funny that the moment they broke up she went back to being very problematic? The climate terrorist that she’s been for the pass year and then wanting to sue people for spreading her private flights information (knowing this is public information). Then dating that racist man that mocked woman of color and admitted to watch what he did, being quiet about the war that’s going on, and the lame and immature issue she created over some of Olivia Rodrigo’s songs (a literal new artist and teenager at the time) to the point she cut total ties with her and her next man being a very typical conservative macho man that seems to love the attention just like her. She’s back at being who she’s always been…

“Your integrity makes me feel small” Yes, Taylor, indeed. I am glad you know this too.

oh you absolutely have said it all. this is extremely well said and on point.

i find it so odd that most swifties can't pinpoint that the real issue between joe and taylor was taylor once again giving into the industry and being a rich white capitalist which is something joe is not and does not want to be, and most likely caused the demise of their relationship. taylor herself has said this in her songs (like the lyrics in peace, as you said). so yeah, maybe she wanted marriage but joe probably wasn't comfortable marrying someone who had completely different morals than him which is his right. let's be real here.

and oh the relationship between her and travis probably set her "redemption arc" far back than ever. she really was finally speaking up on so many matters and now she's dating a problematic trump supporter, giving into the media frenzy with the NFL, and has done no activism despite having the biggest platform. i think what sucked the most was her being times person of the year and using it to talk about travis and how she wasted 6 years of her life being private. so disappointing. and the cherry on top are some of the lyrics from ttpd (ex. 1830s racism lyric) like WHAT?

another thing swifties misinterpret is that no one would've known joe if it wasn't for taylor and that he's living off of his songwriting credits from folklore/evermore. joe who is notoriously low-key and has stated he just wants to be seen as human never used taylor for clout and has avoided saying her name in interviews, even after the break-up. not because he didn't love her, but because he did not want to feed into the media frenzy. and if all eyes are on him, he's using it to make a statement about palestine which is amazing. sure, you may not have known joe alwyn if it wasn't for taylor but he never used taylor's fame to make him more famous. and might i argue, it was taylor who despite releasing positive songs about him sometimes didn't defend him (like in the folklore sessions where jack antonoff was obviously being rude to him? or how she told her fans not to go after john mayor releasing speak now tv but didn't say anything for joe when her fans have been harassing him like crazy?)

on the other hand, we have travis kelce who has most definitely brought her up in every capacity like on his brothers podcast and let's be real, most of the swifties didn't know who travis was (i didn't!) unless they were football fans. we saw proof of that when NFL sales and viewership was significantly higher. so yes, travis is using her name for clout and feeding into the media frenzy. and then you have swifties saying he loves her and supports which yes, can be true, but you cannot deny that taylor and travis' relationship fed the media, fed the NFL, and diverted attention from more important issues like gaza. and while taylor and travis had their eyes on them, they didn't use it to do any good.

so yes, you are right. joe was taylor's best boyfriend.

[idontwanttospoiltheparty]

Paul McCartney Discography Album Cover Ranking

Because I Feel Like It!

25. What was the vision here. I'm genuinely baffled. That pink feels so out of place. Why am I thinking of that one Narnia book.

24. C'mon, man.

23. Denny literally looks like he's about to sneeze. Linda's slaying tho. Why is the contrast so high. You can't even tell they actually took these pics on location.

22. It should probably be lower than London Town but I'm too much of a sucker for red/blue contrasts. It emphasizes his asymmetry way too much.

21. It's kind of a neat picture but it doesn't match the album At All. (Linda I Love Youuuuuuu)

20. The squished artist name and feet upset me. Nice picture though.

19. Striking. I really love the font. The reflection feels like too much.

18. Inoffensive. The colours are lovely.

17. Not super ambitious but a well executed concept.

16. Very cute and cool composition!!!

15. Neat concept. I prefer the cooler tones of the deluxe edition.

14. Love the copper here and the delicate touches of purple.

13. Integrating the album title into the actual subject is always inspired. I wish the tracklist could be found on it too though!!

12. Again: big red/blue contrast fan here. I just find myself wishing the picture (which is good!) was better integrated into the background somehow. Really like the font and the tetris-like blocks though, it feels very in character with the production.

11. Beautiful composition. Just lovely, possibly the most underrated one.

10. Love the handwritten title, the little pie detail, the colour palette, the fact the picture is slightly blurred. this is like if the Driving Rain cover was thought-through.

9. Unapologetically quirky like the album itself. I go back and forth on the blue frame but the portrait itself is so goddamned inspired I have to give it a spot in the top ten.

8. Gorgeous picture. The birds in motion are amazing. I wish Paul's haircut was better but what can you do.

7. This is amazing to me. This cover TELLS a story (I know it's basically a screengrab from some TV special lol). In connection with the title it makes me think "the egg" is earth itself. The way the lighting creates a natural frame. It's just so cool and unique.

6. I cannot decide if the concept of Mike McCartney happening to see his brother through the kitchen curtains and snapping a picture of it or having a specific vision for this image and getting Paul to pose for him is more impressive. This is the stuff of legends. He was fucking 18 or something. Though a part of me wonders if it really works as an album cover. I'd need to look at a physical copy more closely.

5. Back at it again with the blue/red. It works so well with the album's mood as a whole and it's a lovely picture to boot.

4. I just love getting lost in all the details of this one. There's so much to look at without the whole thing feeling over-crowded or overwhelming. I can see the brushstrokes and I love that.

3. The funky af font matched with the super super simple motif. Nothing to add. Having the title vertical and horizontal was inspired.

2. Iconic. Christopher Lee is literally on it.

Sorrrrry but the way it combines black and white with colour and it's VISIBLY homedrawn marker and the yellow is so iconic. This shit goes crazy, I don't tire looking at it.

[idoodlestuffsometimes]

DRAWING BACKGROUNDS: TIPS AND TRICKS

So many people are afraid of drawing backgrounds and I think it's a shame, so here's some tips and tricks, because I'm not perfect at it myself but I think the hardest part is really just knowing where to start.

First off: Perspective

Yeah, yeah, that's the scary word. But I promise you, once you're familiar with the basics, backgrounds are a LOT less intimidating. Don't get discouraged if WHEN you have trouble with it. Even professional artists struggle with it. I promise you, screwing it up is good and normal. That's how you learn after all!

Now I'm not going to go into detail on how to do it here, because honestly there are a thousand and one free resources online and in libraries that can explain it far better than I ever could in a singular broad-strokes tumblr post. But I AM at least telling you you should familiarize yourself with these basics:

Important Terms: Horizon Line: A horizontal line across your canvas, showing your viewer's eye level and providing a location for most of your vanishing points. Vanishing Point: Integral to drawing in perspective. The sides of a 3D object get smaller as they become farther away from the viewer in space. This point is where the parallel lines of a side eventually meet.

The Basic Types of Perspective: One Point Perspective: Good for drawing things that you're looking at straight on. Two Point Perspective: Good for drawing things at an angle. Three Point Perspective: Good for drawing things the viewer is looking up or down at, especially at an extreme angle.

[Click images for ALT descriptions]

And if you're comfortable with these and serious about improving your skills for use in storytelling, I also might suggest looking up:

4 Point Perspective: Great for extra wide or tall shots and for camera tilts if you're doing an animation or animatic. I think some other names for this in animation include "banana pan" and "warp pan."

5 Point Perspective: Fish-eye lens. Good for all your angsty anime boy slipping into madness needs!

Some perspective tips I wish someone had told me earlier:

Objects' relation to the horizon line is constant. A super helpful tip to remember when placing a character or object in space is that they will always (assuming they aren't changing in size or moving up or down) have the same relation to the horizon line no matter how far or close they are. If your horizon line is at shoulder height for your focus character in the foreground, any character of the same height in the background will still line up with the horizon line at the shoulders.

How to pick the distance between your vanishing points: 2 pt perspective uses 2 vanishing points, 3 pt uses 3, etc, etc, but how close should they be? Well, first of all, for anything that isn't one point perspective, one or more points will usually be off the canvas. Super annoying, I know, but the closer your vanishing points are, the more warped your drawing will become. Second, a helpful thing to know is that choosing the distance between your points is basically the illustration equivalent of picking your camera lens! Photography buffs will know that wider (shorter focal length) lenses show more space and make the distance between foreground and background more dramatic, while longer focal length/telephoto lenses are flatter, and more focused and intimate. The same is true of vanishing points that are closer (shorter focal length) or farther apart (longer focal length).

2 point/3 point/etc doesn't actually mean you're limited to that many points total on your page. this one confused me a lot when I was getting started, lol. A lot of examples will show you drawings of nice, neat cities or something, in which all the buildings are facing the same way in order to demonstrate perspective drawing. But in real life, buildings don't all face the same direction. They're at all sorts of different angles. So how do I do that??? Answer: Just because you're drawing in 2 point perspective or whatever doesn't mean you... have to actually keep your 2 points in the same spot. You can move them around, just keep them the same distance apart, so you're not screwing up your camera lens.

Other Tips:

Use reference! The instant you try to draw a house, you're going to forget every house you've ever seen. That's just how it goes. Buildings are complicated. Do yourself a favor and collect a few reference images first, buddy!

Consider details (like architectural style, amenities, and materials) Your building will look more like a building when you keep in mind that buildings have gutters and door knobs and light switches and paneling and stuff, and aren't just boxes with roofs on them. Again: reference! You will forget electrical sockets and baseboards exist immediately. Art brains are dumb.

Use details and texture to fill in negative space Giant stretches of blank space tend to be boring and distracting. Put a few suggestions of wood grain or something on that wall back there, bud, just don't overdo it.

Line weight Darker, thicker lines draw more attention, look heavier, and look closer to the viewer than lighter, thinner lines do. Take advantage of this to draw the viewer's attention to your focal points, de-emphasize less important details, and imply depth. It's up to you to decide how you want to use this and what your style is, especially once you start getting into combining or replacing it with shading, values, and color, but a helpful rule of thumb is to try reserving your thickest lines for focal foreground characters and use thinner lines on backgrounds, especially details in the far distance.

Perspective guides If you're drawing digitally, take full advantage of any perspective tools you have access to! A lot of art programs lately have begun adding perspective guide features that let you set up vanishing points and then literally guide your hand as you draw so you stay in perspective. Some of these include Procreate, Clip Studio Paint, and Adobe Fresco. (still sadly none in Photoshop as far as I'm aware, what the heck, Adobe!). Check through the settings of yours to see if it gives you any perspective guides or other similarly useful tools. They're 100% worth it! And for god's sake, if you've got any skew or perspective warp tools, draw your complicated shapes flat and then warp them instead of spending an hour on it! Don't make my mistakes!

[elliespectacular]

Eccentric Severe Murders raises an important question: who is the guy that’s the common denominator between all three Eccentric videos? Both the A&P tape and the Christie VHS don’t have a cast database from what I can tell, so who is this guy? If you know, how did you find out?

I found the grocery store training videos because I was seeking out that sort of thing in 2019, and stumbling onto Agatha Christie: The Scoop was a happy coincidence. You can find his name in the on-screen credits of the tape which is on YouTube for free. If I find something else from that era where he gives off a similar energy and there's enough to work with we might see another Eccentric Severe _____ but I'm not actively looking to make more.

Importantly, he's just a guy. A real person, an actor doing honest work. My interest in making funny edits of some old projects he's appeared in has equally much to do with his performance as it does with the material he was given.

I presume you're just curious and want to discover more of this actor's filmography. That's awesome and I encourage that! But I feel it needs to be said for anyone else wondering who the actor is - I do not want people to seek him out (or any other subjects of my YTPs) to contact him about my videos or to show him them. My videos are not meant to be a secret but they're also not his business. We're doing our own thing enjoying a fictionalized version of him, and it's vital that we maintain a healthy separation between the parody space and the real world.

In my experience some people love seeing themselves in YTPs, but some people really don't understand them. People in this second camp can feel anything from confusion to indifference to insult, and tend to get annoyed when YTP fans who think they're "kindly informing" their subjects are just reminding them of a thing they know of and don't care for. And they're valid for those reactions! It's a weird thing to have happen to you if you're not prepared for it.

I do maintain that YTPs are a form of speech, remix culture is worth protecting, and that it is my responsibility as a remix artist to demonstrate integrity and transparency in what I do - partly out of respect for the subjects. It's part of why these days I generally try to make YTPs of bigger YouTubers, corporately-produced media, and stuff where the people in them more-or-less know what they're getting into with regards to their face/name being public and their performance not fully belonging to them.

[chaoskirin]

Don't Use GenSlop on your Book Covers!

I am absolutely baffled by the number of AUTHORS willing to use AI art on their book covers. This seems counter-productive. I will not buy a book that uses AI on the cover because it VERY STRONGLY suggests that the writing content is also genSlop. 

Like, why shoot yourself in the foot like that, when there are literally SO MANY WAYS to make an amazing book cover without compromising your integrity? 

It's not just indie authors I put on the shitlist, either. Paolini is on there for the cover of Fractal Noise. He's arguably the one who opened the door to these creativity leeches, because his book was the first.

And there's so many authors who are proud of "taking down" artists, like we were ever on a pedestal to begin with. Dude. We never made enough to survive. By taking us down, you're taking us from "barely scraping by" to "dead in the gutter." The truth is, extremely successful artists will be fine, because their names carry them through and get them work. People want art in Michael Whelan's style, for example. The people GenSlop will hurt are the artists that didn't even make $15K/year on their artwork. 

The most frustrating thing I've seen going around is the whole "LOL artists will need to get a real job now!" and this just reeks of the gutting of arts programs in schools in the 1990s and 2000s. It means that little boys consider "football" a career to aspire to, but not "book cover artist." To me? FOOTBALL is the hobby, and the people who play it professionally get paid WAY too much to do it. To me, art is ten THOUSAND percent more valuable. 

But I'm not going to go around hoping NHL players get "taken down a peg." Even if wishing for that is INFINITELY less cruel than hoping artists go hungry because you think they're gatekeeping. 

I will not buy your book if the cover is AI. I will not buy your book if you even HINT you're supportive of AI. I will not buy your book if you decide you need to be "devil's advocate" or say something like "the AI debate isn't black and white." It is. AI is bullshit. Use of it is theft. You are a fucking criminal in my eyes if you use gen AI on a book cover, and I will assume your writing is AI-generated, too. Full stop. 

There are so many ways to get a quality book cover without breaking the bank or underpaying artists. Those ways existed BEFORE GenAI, and they exist now. You have no excuse for that shit. Knock it off. 

[girlfriendsofthegalaxy]

tuesday again 8/20/2024

a little light this week bc i had a fairly wretched week, medically speaking

listening

hozier's nobody's soldier would have been on every 8tracks mix for every character. THEEEEE blorbo song of all time to the point i am already annoyed at the thought of seeing it on every spotify mix. fuckin owns tho. very fun mod sixties heist taste to the horn arrangement

-

reading

thank you philip.

polished off the Marauders (2019-2022) comics. i liked the first volume way more than these three-- they didn't quite deliver the same quality of art or swashbuckles-per-minute. also this was probably not a great choice for someone who has forgotten what little she once knew about the xmen, even though they came at the beginning of a reboot.

why did i read these? mostly bc they were readily available or with short wait times at my library and my bestie is making me watch all the xmen movies. a girl gets curious about comic books sometimes

surprisingly, i came across this one from the Pocket integration on the firefox new tabs

McDonald likens the functions of Spotify to Google Maps. “Google Maps doesn’t do the exploration for me, but it’s helpful if I go somewhere,” he says. Rather than taking us on guided tours, it provides the tools for us to navigate somewhere new. Much as it shows us what’s nearby and how to get there, and flags notable landmarks others have visited, Spotify helps us access most music, lists global listening trends, and introduces us to artists similar to those we already know. But it’s communities that help us home in on a destination Spotify can help us explore.

part two of breaking down infamous academic paper mill Hindawi and why it was bought by Wiley anyway bc they did seemingly no due diligence, bc as a whole they do very little actual work in the publishing process.

i have included a very long quote bc it is one of only two things that made me genuinely laugh out loud this week (the other was phil unsticking a claw from the couch by backflipping herself out)

One issue of Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing from 2022, edited mostly by Hamurabi Gamboa Rosales, took an average of about 20 days to go from initial submission to revision submission. This is not unlikely, it’s impossible. The easiest way to explain this is with an analogy. Say there’s a pothole outside your house, and you call the council. You tell them ‘there’s a big hole in the road outside my house!’ The person at the other end, rather than tiredly telling you to fill out a form - which is what councils do all over the world, in my experience - instead yells ‘MOTHER OF GOD! WE’RE RIGHT ON IT!’ Twenty minutes later, a bitumen truck comes HURTLING around the corner of your street at full send, with the road workers hanging out the back of it, the driver leaning on the horn and yelling ‘GET OUT OF THE WAY! POTHOLE!’ They pull up outside your house, and you see the brakes go hot. But the guys don’t even wait for it to stop, they jump off while it’s slowing down, and they grab pry bars and a burner and a kettle of bitumen, and they start hammering out the edges, pour the bitumen and start slamming it with hammers almost at the same time. In about six minutes, the hole is filled and flattened, and they admire their work for about four hundred milliseconds and SCREAM off the way they came. No sooner has the truck disappeared, then your phone rings - and it’s the council worker from before. ‘POTHOLE! *pant* *pant* FIXED! Happy to be of service!’ *click* That’s how likely the entire editorial process taking 20 days is.

-

watching

i don't understand why the third xmen movie isn't named x cubed. it extremely is not their last stand there are like a dozen more movies to go. gun to my head i could not tell you what happened in this one. whatsherface did look good as hell though

and now for the movie i actually want to talk about, Monkey Man (2024, dir. Patel). imdb says:

An anonymous young man unleashes a campaign of vengeance against the corrupt leaders who murdered his mother and continue to systematically victimize the poor and powerless.

i am so so so lucky that my favorite kind of fight scene — fast, brutal, right spaces with improvised weapons-- is fashionable. pour it DIRECTLY into my open mouth

i think i generally agree with a broad sweep of reviewers here when i tell you that this movie is gorgeous and grossnasty at the same time, there are a lot of ideas that aren't all quite resolved, and i am much more interested in why it has a hell of a lot of ideas (part of why they don't all get resolved).

patel's first movie, it feels very much like a movie of someone who isn't sure they'll be able to do another one, so throw everything you've got in here. a sort of famously rocky production and shoestring budget, but you would not know it. the club scenes are especially dripping in glitz and, like many stage productions, have a lot of clever editing and strategic deployment of mirrors and repeats. there's a fight scene with hanging mirrors near the end where the mirrors can't have been more than fifty bucks each but it looks SO fucking sick.

i am much more willing to go to bat for this movie and ignore some of the rough edges bc it is so refreshingly earnest, and despite the style references, is very focused on being its own thing. at some points it's going to feel like The Matrix (1999, dir. the Wachowskis) bc every movie made in a post- The Matrix (1999, dir. the Wachowskis) world is going to feel a little bit like The Matrix (1999, dir. the Wachowskis). or like when the above gif happened in the movie it did not make me want to turn it off and go watch the first john wick.

people who live in india or are part of the diaspora are a little cranky about the political parties of the film, which had to be neutered for release. while i don't think i would have grasped all the nuances even if we did have the original cut, i think it's likely some of the characters would have resolved a little cleaner if that original intent was still there.

why did i watch this? i think patel is easily as hot as tumblr darling mifune. while drafting this post i got distracted sooooooo many times trying to pick the perfect gif. some of them are too hot!!!

-

playing

fallow week

-

making

just stayin alive! just livin the fuckin dream!!!