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jjkpls · 4 years ago

Text

the wishlist (m) - 3

“You used it.”

> genre : smut, fluff

> pairing : jeon jungkook x reader (f)

> words : 4.2k

> content/warnings : back at it again w/ the bff2l; one sided love, lot of pining; sextoys talk and use; explicit language; masturbation (f); ambiguous infidelity; awkward oc; koo being cute but insufferable

previous - next

For about a week and a half, you simply ignore the outrageous box sitting in the centre of your living room.

If you omit to remember what’s inside, it’s just a nice-looking decoration, embellishing your messy coffee table. It’s perfectly fine sitting between the unopened mails and the takeout brochures. You see Jungkook glance at it each time he comes over but he has the decency to not mention it. You might have read a little disappointment but he didn’t share it with you, not wanting to bother you, as you rightfully assumed, and in any case, you’re just doing exactly what you said you would: not use it.

Then comes a glorious day of resting from work for you, and miraculously it matches your two closest girl friends' schedules and they owe to come over, celebrate a belated Christmas with you. And as you’re quickly tidying up the place, the question of the box being way too present here is raised again. They will ask about it. One will surely open it before you even get to answer.

The box has to go.

And in your room, hidden in your bedside table where you know no one will peak, it goes.

When you wake up from the fantastic, long-awaited Christmas celebration, it’s with a terrible headache. Mary, the amateur singer, received a ridiculous karaoke mic and if karaoke is involved, so is alcohol. You didn’t know that but apparently, you can get a severe almost deadly hangover from rosé. Well. Starting this new year already learning new things, how great.

One thing that’s unchanged for this new year, as it seems, is Jungkook's talent for psychic arts. He somehow knows you need a copious breakfast made with love and by him, and the curious hangover shot only his roommate has the secret recipe of, to cope with being alive this morning.

“Hello, Sunshine.” Your face feels so bloated and tensed at the same time like it’s made of playdoh and some devilish kid came and punched at it then squished it hard with its chubby mean fingers.

Very unpleasant.

You know you have very little to do with a ray of sunshine at the moment. You're more alike a gremlin or something. Therefore, as a gremlin would, you groan an answer. You catch through the minuscule slits you now own for eyelids a grin from him. It’s not even vexing or upsetting. His lovely, lovely smile is always a blessing. It’s the only thing that makes you not want to head back to bed and just sleep until death ensues. The pretty, pretty thing. With the big bunny front teeth. He is the sunshine.

“Had fun last night?” He asks, still grinning, once he’s served you and himself two good plates of pancakes. He’s sitting in front of you, in front of this delicious looking good, yet he’s ogling you with a strange insistence. When he starts eating because you take too long to formulate a response, he munches slowly, still staring, instead of stuffing his face and swallow down the whole thing like a starving man, like he usually does.

“Yeah. They spoiled me.” You say, quietly. You’re confused. You feel uneasy like there’s something you’re not getting. You hate this feeling. Usually, this friendship is filled with inside jokes you can make up exclusively via telepathy. But here you’re missing something, it feels. Or you might just be confused by the headache and possibly somehow still a bit drunk.

“Oh did they?” The beam is even wider. You frown, nod, decide that it’s too early and your brain too foggy to try and investigate a confusion that might just be the product of your imagination.

It doesn’t click then. It doesn’t click the next three times he asks you again, with slightly different formulations if, really, you had fun last night.

He departs an hour later because he has an appointment with a client, as always leaving some of himself for your guilty pleasure and the marking on your eyelids of that curious grin. That curious mischievous grin. With the crooked shape, the white teeth looking menacing like a wolve’s and the eyebrows arched in suggestion.

How come such an attractive look can be so anxiety-inducing? You’re too fidgety, too confused and concerned to focus on anything. Remnants of the conversation rolling back again and again, trying to make sense of things that probably do not necessitate further explaining.

The whole ordeal made you so nervous, you end up after an hour of trying to go about your day and failing poorly, sitting on your sofa, lotus style, eyes closed and hands turned up to the universe (hoping It might offer you some clearance It would just drop off in your palms). The thing is meditating is hard. Making so your brain would shut the fuck up is hard as hell. And you suck at it.

Spoiler alert, you don’t reach the state of inner peace and quiet you wished to find. Instead, you make enough silence for your noggins to be more performing and suddenly it hits. Your eyes grow ten times in size, you almost fall from your sit for the shock is violent.

The moron.

You or him, probably both.

You

I did NOT use it.

You

I put it away because the girls were coming over but I DID NOT USE IT

He simply replies with a winking emoji and you hate him for it.

You

Jeon Jungkook, ur a dick I said I wouldnt use it EVER and I won’t, have a nice day moron.

And again, this time, you mean it. You’ve never said anything with this much conviction in these twenty-five years of living.

Why would you now? When you now have experienced what it felt to have him look at you thinking you’ve done it. It felt mortifying without even knowing why. In all the case scenarios you could have come up with, you’ve never imagined that one. You would use it, he would know about it somehow, he wouldn’t be disgusted (it wouldn’t make sense for him to be as he is the one who offered it to you but your brain and soft ego sometimes are annoying like that), he would be amused, maybe content, but he wouldn't make you feel mortified.

Having him considering you in a sexual position should be... cool, shouldn’t it? If you really like him that much. Maybe you were confused all along and actually, you don’t, you mistook your own feelings.

Just a quick check of a mental picture you have of him, the fond smile growing just from his pretty face with the pretty everything on it can’t be trusted because, for all you know, everyone smiles this way when they think about him. On the other hand, the swift blush invading your cheeks when you (by accident) linger on parts you really really like about him -like his thighs or the man titties he’s been growing lately- serve to remind you that yes, yes indeed you like him.

But he’s an asshole.

No matter how much you thought about it (and you thought about it a lot even though you’re ashamed to admit it), you've never consider it to realize, you never and you still don’t believe anything non-platonic would ever happen with him. You’re just made to be friends. The best of friends but still just friends.

Not even taking a step but simply dipping the tips of your toes in these unknown waters turns out to be terrifying and you're mad at him because he’s putting you in this situation where you feel awfully uneasy.

It should all remain a very personal, very intimate fantasy: your attraction for him.

He cracked the wall for a second, it felt wrong and terrible but it’s done and over with now.

It’s only you and your thoughts.

You don’t ever mention it, he doesn’t bring it back up. Soon the season of celebrations and wishes is behind you, the world starts rolling slowly, boringly so with its lots of little annoyances and distractions and you’re not even thinking about it anymore, neither is he.

You’re stressed out. Work is being a bitch as it does. And because it sucks most of your time and patience, the only quick way to unwind you know comes to play.

But the hassle is not worth it. Unfortunately this you always need to realize afterwards. After having searched the internet for good masturbatory content for half an hour, working yourself for two hours and then, there’s the safety wee and the freshening up before bed, to wake up the next morning feeling like shit because of course, you sacrificed hours of sleep for an unsatisfactory outcome.

It’s not worth it.

It hasn’t been for months. Even if you’re still more able to take care of yourself and pleasure yourself better than most if not all men you’ve ever been with, something is missing: a man (or maybe just a dick).

You feel bored and empty (in both senses). Stuck because the more you need to unwind, the more you try, the less you feel better.

It’s the snake biting its own tail.

Until a certain pretty blue box, sleeping inside your bedside table, recalls itself to you. It feels like a century had passed since the box arrived in your life, it doesn’t seem as scary as it used to, as stressful. The fact that Jungkook hasn’t mentioned it, might even has himself forgotten about it, help immensely.

And it is the very moment, you forget to remember about this promise you made to him and yourself, the promise that you would not use it.

Right about now, not only stressed and annoyed by everything but also horny for no particular reason, this dildo with the box that matches your planner sounds ideal.

And it is ideal.

Feels like exactly what you needed. The size is not ridiculously big, it’s fairly tiny actually but given you haven’t had sex in a while, it suffices to stretch you out just fine. It’s new and exciting. The texture feels really nice, smooth, slipping perfectly right between your walls. It’s rather long, slightly curved, filling you in deep and teasing the spot that you could never even dream of reaching with your short ass fingers. And in no time (and you actually regret that) you’re on cloud 9, it’s a thought of the Santa that brought this blessing of a gift in your life that sends you there. You feel satisfied, content, fulfilled from the tip of your hair to your toes, smiling like an idiot because damn, that was a good orgasm.

Right this moment, you feel fine about using the present. About quickly having thought about him too because it’s not that much of a big deal. He won’t know about it. He doesn’t really seem to care about your sex life anymore (which is, ironically, a blessing). Therefore why should there be a problem? Why would there be?

Apparently, you’ve underestimated the crankiness of your attitude for the few weeks that passed before the phenomenal orgasm.

Apparently, you had been the worst kind of truculent bitch there is, to a level you didn’t even know you could reach (also no one told you!), because when Jungkook meets up with you, maybe after the third or fourth times of having used your lovely new companion, he noticed something has changed. Instantly.

“What’s going on?” He asks with a bright smile and excited shiny eyes as if he expects you to have great news to share.

“Nothing special...” Tilting your head to the side, you drag the words out as you try to think about it for a second, wondering if there’s something that needs to be told.

“Really?” He sucks on his banana yoghurt with eyebrows frowned, staring at you as if he’s studying you. Once the thing is empty, he tosses it in a nearby bin, crosses his arms on his chest and glares. He looks like a detective about to interrogate you. He would look intimidating if it were not for his lips, sucked in to gather the last taste of his yoghurt. “You look awfully happy.”

“Do I?” It makes you smile, shrug your shoulders. It doesn’t hit just then. It should be fine. He can’t unravel something that you don’t even have knowledge of, can he? But Jungkook is a little weasel. He loves to know everything.

Especially when it’s about you.

“You better not be seeing anyone-“ You should wonder where this is coming from, all of a sudden. Instead, you take offence, how dares he?

“What do you mean ‘I better’? I do what-“

“Without telling me? You better not.” He has that shit-eating grin, his signature brat's smile, because he knows you can’t reach over the table to smack him in the head without risking to tip over your drinks or dip your sleeve in soja sauce.

“Anyway. Nothing's going on.” For a second, a staring contest takes place on this convenience store's terrace. You’re not sure why. He’s daring you for no reason. Until his mouth twitches, wanting to smile and it makes you laugh so he follows along. “Were you not supposed to tell me about your next appointment?”

“Client Amy, yes!” It shouldn’t make you laugh to hear him name her like that as it’s been his trademark to mention his clients as if they were Pokémon trainers but it does.

You’ve always thought that it’s his very personal way of living this childhood fantasy of existing within the Pokémon universe. His life is full of potential trainers. Most of the time it’s just Client Enter the Name here but sometimes it’s Baker Jin -who’s not actually a baker but a salesman at his neighbourhood’s bakery-, there’s Dancer Hoseok, who’s the main dance partner of his best friend and Roommate Park Jimin. Sometimes he calls you Friend Y/N, it’s frustratingly funny. You hate that you spill at least a nose snort at each and every single one of his stupid jokes. His grin always grows ten times bigger, his eyes twinkle in a lovely way but you know that you are encouraging him. Encouraging him to be fucking annoying, like a little brother who’s just pushing unfunny jokes too far, just keep repeating them because he knows he can get a reaction. “She wants me to tattoo the dragon from Spirited Away on her arm-“

You gasp and he smiles even wider.

“I know, right? And I was thinking- to give it flow, I would have it- like fly through cherry blossoms.” Attentively, you listen, squinting a bit when he gets technical to try and picture the project you have a hard time making up alone in your mind.

Imagination and creativity have always been his thing. He had you impregnated with it long ago because he is too passionate and too much of a sharer to allow you to keep away from all arts -because you can’t hold a pencil straight without panicking at the idea of having to draw something- which you would have gladly done if it weren't for him. He’s the gifted one. And his drawings, either on paper, screen or skin, have always been a subject of huge admiration for you. You’re a bit ashamed to admit it but you’ve never really touched to anything really artistic. You often don’t really get it. But his stuff does something to you -and not only because you adore him but actually impartially. There’s no finesse, no pertinency, no trait nor emotion you’ve acknowledged and connected to better than the ones he creates. “You know this scene where he’s struggling against the little paper thingies and he’s flying through them and they’re going everywhere, I was thinking that, replace them with cherry blossoms. And there would be little petals like everywhere around it. Sounds cool?”

“It sounds fantastic.” You say honestly. You’re impressed by every single one of his projects. Always surprised, somehow, by the pieces he ends up making. Sometimes scrolling through the Instagram page he uses as a book, where he publishes his most elaborated, most expensive pieces and while recognizing his touch, the delicacy in his traits, the peculiar curls of certain lines, the overall feel to them, there’s always this sort of paradoxical disbelief. How could this kid make these and at the same time, who else but him to have made these?

Cute nose scrunches up.

“I’ll send you my drawings when I’m done with them.”

“Cool.”

“Cool.” He is mimicking you. Same pose with the head nod and the leg cross. Same tone and same expression apart from the discreet light dancing in his eye. “So what’s up? You needed to talk to me about something yesterday, didn’t you?”

It takes a second for you to remember as the drastic change in your mood makes it seem the distressed text you sent him yesterday, right when you left work, was written a whole week ago. You don’t remember very well having felt so stressed and pissed off, pushed to your very limits by useless co-workers, that you felt the urgent need to rant about it all, vent your anger and frustration out to him. He was busy and didn’t answer right away. You got home, find the comfort of your sweater sitting on the warm heater and the glorious stand of your dildo and it all went away, bad mood, headache, grudges.

Of course, it awakes a wave of shame within you. If you have been able to use it without feeling guilt nor embarrassment on your own, it’s something else to think about it in front of Jungkook. You’ve made sure not to think about this dildo in front of him ever. But here, it’s him recalling it to you without even knowing.

Whatever, you can pretend that everything’s normal. With a barely natural cough, and the even more suspicious dismissive wave of the hand, you try to kill the conversation, “It was just my coworker getting on my nerves again, it’s whatever.”

Jungkook is watching you soundly. It’s nothing unusual for him. He’s the kind of persons that lean in when they listen to you, you never know how conscious they are of it but it’s like they really mean to make you feel important and heard. Therefore it shouldn’t worry you, he’s just doing his usual thing.

It still makes you grow increasingly more nervous.

It is factual that it is never “whatever”. The topic of your stupid dumb bitch of a coworker messing with you has always been a pressing subject you, every now and then, more often than you’d like, needed to ramble about to anyone willing to listen because she tended to make your life a pure living hell. The job sucks in itself but she made it a hundred times worse. And here you are, dismissing it. How suspicious.

“When you texted me yesterday, I thought it was for something bad.” He starts, frowning and staring deep inside the empty cookie package sitting on the table. “Then I saw you earlier and I thought it was for something really good, because of your face.”

“What’s up with my face?” You try to play it cool. Play it nonchalant and oblivious. If you can’t see the aura of contentment he can visibly observe around you, surely you’ve seen the glow up your skin has encountered since you’ve started using this sex toy. Unexpected benefit of using it that wasn’t even listed on the box, the stress it’s relieved and the pleasure it’s given have just cleared your skin out. Unbelievable but true. And apparently, he noticed.

“I don’t know. You look really... contented.”

“Contented?”

“Yeah...”

You shrug, looking down, at the crumbs on your side of the table, praying silently that the embarrassment you feel creeping up your face doesn’t show. “I’ve been used to you looking tired and all but you look-“ Like every single once of misery has been fucked out of your system. “Lately, you look... good.” The chosen adjective makes you tilt your head. For so many reasons, you didn’t expect to hear this one and for similar reasons, you don’t understand what he means. Without having you saying aloud anything, he gets your dubious grimace and chuckles, “Rejuvenated, actually.” Even worse.

To simplify in a few words, you used to look like an old decrepit hag and now that you’ve been thoroughly fucked -by yourself technically but still- you look rejuvenated. A word literally no one ever uses in real life.

You detest that he’s probably right. And now, embarrassment is not creeping but actually moving in, with all its stuff and luggage. Hopefully though, again, it doesn’t show on your stupid youthful face. “Are my compliments making you blush?”

Great.

“You can’t make me blush, moron. And if you think those were compliments then-“ You give him big wide eyes of “well fuck” and of course he laughs at that.

“Indeed, I can’t make you blush.” He has his serious, investigating type of expression again. You almost expect him to fetch a little notebook out of his pocket and start scribbling observations while asking you more questions.

“What’s making you blush then?”

“I’m not blushing, it’s just hot.” His eyebrows jump in a rude disagreeing curve. You don’t get why. It can happen, to be hot outside, at the near end of Korea’s winter, while simultaneously having red and painful looking fingers on the verge of congelation desperately seeking warmth in your pockets.

And maybe because it’s not the first time, he’s getting better at catching the signs, at drawing the lines in between the clues. Your caricatural post-orgasm happy face, your systematic defensiveness whenever the conversation is leading somehow to your sexuality, the blatant tell of shame on your cheeks when there’s nothing else ever that embarrass you in front of him. There’s only the common cause missing and quickly, ignoring completely your attempts at diverting the conversation on something else, a giant light bulb turns on on top of his head. It brings the light of understanding through his eyeballs who suddenly look extra bright.

“You used it.” For a second, you consider packing up your things and just leave this fucking terrace along with the conversation. But you’re cold as fuck, the way home seems like too much torture to be going through alone.

Why are you like this?

Maybe there’s a vain hope that it will lead to some resolution. Some pleasant resolution. Maybe he won’t talk about it ever again if you just accept to have this conversation without showing the stubborn reluctance you’ve used each time.

“Yes, I did. So what?” His grin is blinding. It’s one of the very very wide, very very bright ones. So wide it shows all his teeth and it doesn’t even look like the cute bunny smile anymore. It’s the predatory grin. It’s intimidating to solely focus on therefore you chose to pick the corner of his eyes and the top of his nose, all wrinkled up that have anything but intimidation to them.

“You have no idea how happy that makes me.” You grimace. Indeed. You have no idea because you don’t even fucking understand.

“You’re a weirdo.”

“I’m just happy you used my dildo.” You scoff and almost choke at both his phrasing and the way he so naturally says the word while you’re outside. There’s no one as dumb as you to sit outside with this weather but still, someone passing by could hear.

Maybe there’s no deep further explanation to look for. Maybe it’s literally as simple as him getting you a present and him being happy that you found usefulness to it. Like most people. People are saddened sometimes pissed when they flop with presents. Maybe it’s that simple.

“Don’t say it like that.” He cackles like a witch and you know, that once again he’s just messing with you, knowing exactly what to do or say to tickle your patience.

“So I can gather it was good?” The worse of the nervous wave has passed. He asks quite nonchalantly. Perhaps it’s your ego wanting that but you hate the idea that you’d find yourself in a situation where he’s clearly more adult than you -even if on so many levels he is. If he can talk about it then you can. Try. You can try.

“Hm. Was nice.” You kind of sound the way you do when as a teen your mom would ask you about your day and you just didn’t want to answer because of laziness, lack of interest, lack of willingness to share, but that will do. He nods, smiles with his lips tight, rather fondly.

“How many times did you use it?”

Taking a deep breath, you mumble, shrugging faux casualness, “A few times.” More like a dozen times but he doesn’t need the details, does he? He nods again, still smiling, taking in your answer.

“Cool.” And he’s satisfied. With the answer and the turns of events as it seems.

There you go, you did it.

You resolved the thing.

Now he can leave you alone with your fantasies and your -not his but your- dildo and there wouldn’t be any further occasion to bring it up. You might be a coward but it’s perfectly fine by you.

Sounds absolutely peachy.

If he chooses to play his part right.

A/N: oh myyy, we’re getting somewhere arn’t we? i really hope you enjoyed this part, let me know your thoughts, scream your frustration, i’m all ears (or eyes). next update will be a double one because the first part is quite short. hoping you’re excited. i wish you a beautiful sunday and a lovely week. take care, lots of lots love.

Tag list: @infernal-alpaca @kaepjjangiya @channiespup @jinsonaz @kpopfandomftw @ggukkieland (sorry love)

IF YOU WANT TO BE TAGGED FOR THE NEXT CHAPTER, PLEASE ASK IN THE COMMENT, THANK YOU :))

#btswriterscollective #networkbangtan #ksmutclub #ggukienet #bts fanfic #bts smut #bts angst #bts fluff #jungkook fanfic #jungkok smut #jungkook fluff #jungkook angst #my writing

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artificialqueens · 4 years ago

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Someone I Genuinely Love (Taywhora) - pureCAMP

A/N - I feel like a broken record but it must be said, I feel like I exclusively write for Ortega at this point and I am not mad at it, I love her more than I love myself. Here is a short little Taywhora for my favourite scottish queen <3

The night - er, morning - was a disaster.

To be honest, Tayce had seen it coming from a mile off, and she had warned Lawrence that inviting both A’Whora and Tia was going to be an absolute shitstorm. They just plain didn’t like each other, which was fine, but A’Whora had trouble holding her sharp tongue at the best of times, and mixing in a bucket-load of alcohol and a pretty cramped house, and you had a recipe for chaos.

(And, really? A house party? Were they still seventeen?)

Nevertheless, it was Lawrence’s birthday, and she called the shots, and she drank the shots, and she got to choose who came to her house to get unreasonably pissed into the wee hours of the morning.

Tia was there pretty early - or, at least, she was on time like most of them. She was stood in the kitchen with a Smirnoff Ice in her hand, happily chatting away to Ellie, wearing a dress that Tayce had complimented, if only to make some brief conversation. It was… passable, really, a half-decent outfit if she went that far, but nothing to write home about. Unfortunately, Tayce knew A’Whora was gonna hate it, and A’Whora with a loose tongue was almost certainly gonna make a comment about it.

The girl in question rocked up late and sloppy, as per her usual style. She stumbled through the front door and leant in the frame with a tipsy smile, plush lips painted pink and dabbed with glitter, eyelashes fluttering. Her skin-tight dress was fuchsia, bright, emphasising her soft tan thighs that the fabric rode up against and clinging to every inch of her. Once neat, her dark hair was messily piled on top of her head, falling tantalisingly in front of her face.

Tayce couldn’t help but feel relieved that she’d decided to come.

“The party can finally start!” A’Whora exclaimed, raising her drink in the air with a flourish and slamming the door behind her with her heel.

“It already started, ya lazy fuck!” Lawrence yelled from the back of the house. Tayce, standing at the bottom of the stairs and looking onto the front door, made eye contact with A’Whora and giggled at their friend.

“Isn’t she charming?” Tayce gestured towards the general vicinity of Lawrence’s voice.

A’Whora crept closer, her eyes wide and expectant. “Okay, listen. I saw Tia’s snapchat earlier. Tell me she got changed before coming out tonight.”

Here we go. Tayce bit her lip. “Aurora. A’Whora Borealis. You be nice.”

“I’m not trying to be rude or anything but she looks like a fucking Year Nine at her first party wearing a Pretty Little Thing dress that her mum chose for her. I mean, is she serious about it? Is it like a joke?” A’Whora covered her mouth with the side of her hand, her tone conspiratory and judgemental.

Tayce rolled her eyes, both fond and irritated. “Whory, be nice. She clearly likes it, let her have fun. She’s not hurting anybody.”

“She’s hurting my eyes.” A’Whora rebuffed, pursing her lips. “Not like you, though. You’re a sight for sore eyes tonight.”

Internally she was pleased, but played it off smoothly. It wasn’t like Tayce had cleverly thought out her oversized blazer and thigh-high boots combo with A’Whora in mind, of course not. It wasn’t like she’d tailored her outfit hoping for a good response from her… friend? What even was A’Whora besides a hot girl she’d known forever who she spent 50% of her time blatantly flirting back and forth with and 50% of her time denying that she was doing it?

Lawrence burst through the corridor in a flourish of colour to greet A’Whora and groaned, fanning herself with her hand. “Fuck me, I am sweating.”

Tayce blinked. “It’s October. There’s no way you’re hot, in October, in Scotland.”

“Not from the heat, fuckin’ braindead supermodel. From the weight of the crushing sexual tension in this room.”

She looked pointedly between A’Whora and Tayce, neither of whom were particularly shocked by Lawrence’s openness, having grown used to it. However, in an embarrassingly same wavelength move, both girls cocked an eyebrow.

“Aye, I’m talking about you, pinchin’ your Botox lips at me Miss A’Whora the Explorer.”

A’Whora shook her head. “The cheek! Cheek of you to suggest that something’s going on here.”

“Not sure where you’re getting your sources from, but I’d consider leaving The Sun’s team out of your investigations,” Tayce added, A’Whora trying and failing to conceal her smile as Lawrence playfully whacked her arm.

“Get to fuck with those accusations. You carry on living out your little Gavin and Stacey storyline and I’ll go ask the Pope if he’s still shitting in the woods or if bears are still Catholic. Have fun ya fucking lesbians.”

As she disappeared back into the living room, where Bimini had started blasting something with a heavy, pulsing beat, A’Whora turned back to Tayce with an offended look on her face.

“Did that William Wallace wannabe just imply that I’d be the man in the relationship just because I’m English?” She asked, reeling backwards. “Fucking cheek!”

Tayce laughed. “Well, you don’t have legs like mine…” She trailed off, predicting A’Whora’s outburst.

“Hey! Listen, we’d be a great Naomi and Kim, so shut your beautiful face and stop seducing me with that gorgeous accent.” She paused for a second, thinking, and then blinked. “I mean Naomi Campbell and Kim Kardashian, I realise that sounded like something different…”

Tayce looped her arm through A’Whora’s and started trudging down the hallway, making their way into the living room with most of the others. “I love that you think you’re anything like a Kardashian, babe. The Kylie lips maybe, but you’re no Kim.”

As the music grew louder and louder in their eyes, Bimini wrapping a drunk sweaty arm around them both and bellowing something inaudible, Tayce leaned in close to A’Whora’s ear and added, “I’d much prefer what you’ve got to what Kim’s got.”

That was the game; cat and mouse, a game of chase and coy avoidance. After that, she slipped away to dance with Asttina, sipping on her drink and trying to hide her eagerness. The next move was A’Whora’s, as they both knew, and she could play it whenever she wanted.

It was after maybe another hour of drinking and gushing with her friends about how beautiful everyone looked and how drunk they all felt that Tayce realised the atmosphere in Lawrence’s living room was a little too kind. Nothing wrong with that, of course, and a house full of drunk girls was basically the club bathroom scenario elevated to an extreme level, but a kind atmosphere meant that A’Whora had clearly gone into another room. Not good.

Making to find her, Tayce got all the way to the doorway before Ellie and Lawrence stopped her to chat about whether or not it would be stupid to play spin the bottle (it would) and whether or not they should all do some more shots (they did). Then I Wanna Dance With Somebody started playing, and by the first “Woo!”, she’d totally forgotten about her earlier mission, and ran back inside screaming and grabbing at Asttina to dance with her.

She had to give Lawrence some credit, because her playlist was incredible. Nothing but banger after banger after banger.

About half way through Good As Hell, Tayce became aware of what sounded like shouting, underwater and garbled and messy. Though she carried on grinding against Asttina and singing along to Lizzo’s affirmations, her head checked out a little as she tried to focus on the background voices over the blaring music. It proved to be quite the struggle, being as drunk as she was, but as it turned out, she didn’t need to pay too much attention, as she wasn’t the only one that had noticed.

By the time Tia was standing outraged in the living room doorway, all eyes were on her. She looked furious, cheeks red and eyes spilling over, her fists clenched and trembling.

Lawrence quietened the music.

“So, were you gonna tell me that you all think I look like shit or did you nominate A’Whora to be the nasty cunt she usually is?” She looked down at her dress, back up, and choked back a sob. “Fuck off, the lot of you.”

Immediately, half the room started to follow her with choruses of love, their words getting tangled in a web of you’re beautiful and she doesn’t speak for us and A’Whora’s just a bitch and I like it!

The living room felt significantly emptier with just Lawrence, Ellie and Tayce in it, the three of them frozen staring at the doorway like they couldn’t believe it had finally kicked off. After a few moments, The 1975 now playing at an awkwardly low volume, A’Whora passed the living room, peered inside with brimming eyes, and broke into a run.

Tayce followed her on instinct, leaving Lawrence and Ellie behind. Her heart sank as she rushed through the house; one part of her took in the group of girls gathered in the kitchen, their arms hooked over a crying Tia, their tongues slicing away at A’Whora’s character with every dirty look that they sent in the direction of the now wide-open front door.

As bad as she felt for Tia, no one was going after A’Whora. And maybe that made sense, but Tayce had never cared too much about making sense - not when it came to her.

Luckily, she didn’t have to go too far. A little way down Lawrence’s street, a familiar figure was sitting crumpled over on the curb, her face hidden in her hands, head leaning against the lamppost under which she was illuminated. Like an angel, Tayce thought. Like a sad, stupid angel.

“Whory. What did you do, babe? I wanna hear it from you.”

A’Whora looked up. Flecks of black mascara stained around her eyes, the shadows beginning to smudge into the eyeliner from her tears, and her lip trembled. She lowered her head, prompting Tayce to sit down on the curb next to her, legs stretched out into the empty road.

“I told her the dress was fucking ugly, because someone’s gotta do it. I was just trying to help but I know that was an asshole thing to say and I should’ve just kept my mouth shut.”

Tayce blinked. She hadn’t expected the remorseful part of A’Whora’s answer, if she was being honest. She usually never gave in, never admitted defeat, proudly shrugged off any offence caused while Tayce tried to interject some kindness into her. It never worked, which she’d always found frustrating, but now it was unsettling that it had.

“I mean, I’m right. She looks like the embodiment of the fucking kid’s section of a TK Maxx.”

Tayce kissed the side of her head, A’Whora responding by resting it on Tayce’s shoulder. “I thought she was the Year Nine girl in her mum’s choice of Pretty Little Thing dresses?” She teased gently. To her relief and simultaneous heartbreak, it received a short, wet laugh.

“I didn’t expect her to - to rip into me like that. Like she did.”

“What happened?”

“She stood up for herself. Which is good, right?” A’Whora sniffed. “She told me I’m a vapid self-absorbed little bitch, and that she can change her shitty fashion sense while I’ll be stuck with my fake face and dog shit personality for the rest of my life. And that at least our friends like her, ‘cause they barely tolerate me.”

Tayce squeezed her eyes shut and hugged her tighter. “You gotta understand she’s coming from a place of hurt, darling. I know you know this, but you have been pretty mean to her in the past.”

A’Whora nodded weakly, throwing up a peace sign. “Karma,” She sang, the humour in it betrayed by her wobbly voice. “I deserved it, but… I didn’t realise it would hurt this much. Especially because she’s right.”

“She’s not right,” Tayce cut in immediately, a little surprised by her own fierce defensiveness. “She was just angry and upset.”

A moment of silence fell as A’Whora lapsed into thought, her face still smushed into Tayce’s shoulder. She scuffed her shoes into the stones gathered at the edge of the curb, kicking them into the road and scraping her heels into the gritty dirt. As cold as the night was, Tayce could hardly feel it with A’Whora so close.

She laughed bitterly. “Tay, look at us. Do you see any of our other friends out here? No, they’re all telling Tia how much they love her. Because they do. And I’m the nasty fucking bully that won’t go away so they just put up with me until I give them a reason to talk shit.”

“That’s not true, Whory. Sure, we gotta work on controlling that lip of yours, but the girls still love you.” Tayce paused, and then peppered a few more kisses to the top of her head. “You may be a bitch, but you’re my bitch.”

“Kinky,” A’Whora giggled, softening into her side. “You still like me?”

“I always like you.” Tayce whispered.

Above them, the orange street lamp flickered and turned off, casting them into darkness. A crescent moon shone just above them, partially covered by clouds, and the night was quiet. Tayce leaned back, pulling A’Whora with her, until both girls were laying down, half on the pavement and half into the road, their arms around one another and heads facing the sky. A lifetime or even a minute could’ve passed as they just watched the stars, endlessly fascinated by the tiny pinpricks of light, but when Tayce turned her head, it struck her that A’Whora’s eyes sparkled better than any night sky she’d ever seen.

“I should apologise to Tia.” A’Whora murmured.

“Tomorrow.” Their voices were barely above a whisper, something unspoken and sacred about maintaining the tranquility of the silent night. “Give her time to cool off.”

“And you promise you still like me?”

Her eyes were wide, hopeful. Their faces were so close it was no effort at all. It never was.

Not with her.

The night - er, morning - was a disaster, but A’Whora’s lips tasted like cherry gloss and her touch was soft and gentle, and maybe things didn’t always end badly. Maybe it would be okay as long as Tayce had A’Whora and A’Whora had Tayce.

Maybe Lawrence fucking Chaney was right.

#rpdr fanfiction #purecamp #taywhora #tayce #a'whora #tia kofi #lawrence chaney #submission #rpdr uk #uk2

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thewayshedreamed · 4 years ago

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Secrets Don’t Make Friends— Feysand AU

Prompt submission by Nonnie— Reverse fake dating au where everyone thinks you’re dating and you’re keeping it a secret, but you’re not.

Thank you to whoever sent this one in! I had an idea for Nessian, so I may post that one as well if y’all are interested!

——————————————————————————

It was another beautiful day in Velaris, and Feyre couldn't seem to focus on her newest project assignment for anything. She found herself gazing out of the floor-to-ceiling window, watching the Sidra's soothing flow and mentally mixing her various paints to capture the unique color.

Unfortunately, her firm's newest client didn't care much for river paintings since they were paying for a full digital marketing overhaul. Truth be told, she didn’t hate her job as a creative director for the largest marketing firm in Velaris. It allowed her a steady income, let her flex her creativity to some capacity, and definitely kept her on her toes. She had started as a design team member with the firm several years ago upon graduating from Prythian U, and after several largely successful projects, she started to gain more responsibilities within the team. Once her team’s creative director, Amarantha, had moved on to another firm, Feyre had been promoted to her position.

She turned back to her computer screen, willing the motivation to hit her. Any moment now.

This was a typical pattern for her. Initiating a new project was always the hardest part, but once she got started, she tumbled down the proverbial rabbit hole. She just had to... start.

“Ughh,” Feyre lamented. “I wish I was halfway through this proposal already. I’m way better at that point in the project.”

”You are pretty worthless right now,” Lucien joked. Feyre offered a vulgar gesture in return, earning a hearty laugh from her friend.

Lucien left the marketing side of the firm about a year ago, itching for a different opportunity that would allow him to express himself more freely. He felt stifled by the business side of things; the numbers, the politics, the marketing director he worked under. Tamlin hadn’t been the absolute worst to him, but his leadership style didn’t align well with Lucien for the long-term. He had ended up as a member of Feyre’s team and seemed to fill a void they weren’t aware they had.

“I can’t be that mad at you, to be honest. You’re not wrong,” she replied. “Maybe I need caffeine to get out of the post-lunch slump.”

”Someone say caffeine?”

Rhysand Vila approached, perching on the corner of Feyre’s desk. He was wearing dark khaki slacks with a black button down, rolled up to the elbows. At some point, he had ditched his tie in favor of an open neckline, likely free of meetings for the rest of the day. His casual appearance didn’t readily identify him as one of the firm’s most successful marketing directors, but his authenticity was one of the things that extended his influence the most.

Rhysand’s marketing team often collaborated with Feyre’s creative one, and they managed to create some of the most well-balanced projects within the firm. They worked so flawlessly together that they were starting to become almost exclusively paired, much to the chagrin of some of the other teams. Not only were their proposals solid, their presentations were engaging and convincing. Their perspectives on the projects, combined with their mutual respect of the other’s contributions, presented a solid, united front that built trust with their clients.

Through long work hours and multiple business trips across Prythian, Rhysand had become one of Feyre’s dear friends. When they’d originally started working together, his cockiness had grated her nerves to the nth degree, but she realized over time that it was mostly in jest. In truth, Rhysand was kind-hearted, cared deeply for the people in his life, and an incredibly supportive partner on client projects.

They’d fallen into a comfortable kind of friendship, and they’d only gotten closer with time. He’d confided in her about the toxic relationship he and Amarantha had foolishly found themselves in, and he’d listened to her never-ending rants about her brief coupling with Tamlin, nothing but understanding all over his face.

“I think a coffee run is a necessity,” Feyre said, playfulness dancing across her features.

“I left my wallet in my desk. I’ll go grab it. Meet you at the elevator?” Rhysand asked as he walked backward toward his office.

“Sounds good!” she replied. She turned to Lucien. “You coming?”

He had an odd look on his face, smirk included. She gave him a questioning look, and he let out a low chuckle. “Nah. But if I give you my card, will you grab something for me?”

”Why wouldn’t you just come? I’m not your coffee bitch, Vanserra.” That earned a full laugh.

”And I would never assume you to be. If I’m going to take a break, I don’t feel like being third wheel, is all.” The confused look returned to her face, and he continued. “Feyre, stop. It’s not my company either of you want on this little coffee date. You and Rhysand can go about your charade with anyone else, but you’re not getting that shit by me. It’s fine— you two are great together. I just can’t figure out why you insist on the secret.”

Feyre’s expression morphed into a stunned one, and it took her a few seconds to decide on a response. She and Rhysand had never crossed any lines beyond platonic, so all of this was news to her.

”Luce, I’m not sure who your source was for that little nugget of info, but don’t trust them with anything incredibly important in the future. They’re way off,” she assured him. “Text me your coffee order.”

She made her way to the elevator, finding Rhysand propped against the wall on his shoulder. He was scrolling through his phone, stray black hair falling across his brow, looking as if he couldn’t be bothered by the work day. Once the elevator made it to their floor, they stepped inside and found themselves sharing with Morrigan Reina. She was head of Human Resources, absolutely stunning, and Rhysand’s cousin. She had to admit, their genetic pool was quite impressive, all things considered. She was his opposite in every way with her brown eyes and blonde hair, but they shared immaculate bone structure and a certain elegance. Objectively speaking.

“Well, hi! This elevator ride just got way more fun. How’s is going, Rhysie? Fey?” Her dark eyes sparkled, dancing over Rhysand’s face. She raised her eyebrows at him slightly, silently communicating with him in that way only family can.

”Oh, come off it, Mor. We’re on a coffee run. Care to join?” Something in his tone seemed oddly like a challenge. She realized she hadn’t yet answered Morrigan but felt like a response of “Doing well” would seem out of context, since Rhys had already transitioned away from greetings. She deciding on standing there awkwardly, pretending not to feel incredibly intimidated by this woman in the elevator.

“So sweet of you, but I’ll have to take a rain check. This is my floor actually. Unfortunately, I have a termination meeting to attend. Have some for me!” She brushed her cheek against his in a mock kiss. “Good seeing you, Feyre!” She disappeared so quickly that Feyre started to doubt if she was ever there in the first place.

“Awfully prickly with your dear cousin this afternoon, Rhysie,” she teased.

”Well, dearest Mor can be quite the busy body and likes to think she knows all of my secrets.” He gave a small eye roll, but the smirk on his face gave his affection away.

“You have my attention. I think it’s only fair that I’m let in on this little secret.”

She swore the tops of his bronze ears turned slightly pink. “I assure you I’m not that interesting, Feyre Darling.”

As if on cue, the elevator chimed, and they were walking into their building’s lobby. The coffee shop was right next door, so they made their way there quickly. Within 10 minutes, they had their coffees in hand and were sharing an elevator with a small crowd on their way back to work. Feyre regretted that she wasn’t able to press Rhys for his secrets anymore but supposed it was for the best.

He took the long way to his office in order to drop her off at her desk. She set Lucien’s coffee down on his desk with just enough force to startle him out of his work, earning a laugh from Rhys. Lucien simply glared at her before mumbling his thanks and taking a long pull of coffee.

“Well, Feyre Darling, this is where I leave you.”

Lucien eyed her over his coffee lid, lowering it slowly as he paid full attention to their exchange.

Feyre chuckled, ignoring Lucien altogether. “Thanks for returning me safely. I fully intend on pulling at least one secret from you on the next trip, though. You’ve been warned.”

His violet eyes bore into hers, amusement all over his face. “Do your worst,” he replied, winking at her as he sipped his coffee and walked away.

——————————————————————————

Coffee seemed to be just the inspiration Feyre needed to hit her creative stride for the afternoon. She finally managed to land on a prospective theme for the new account, and she was busy making some rough sketches on her drawing tablet. A booming voice called out to her from down the hall, and she recognized it immediately as Tamlin. Of course he would recruit her attention once she was finally feeling productive.

“Feyre, could you come down as soon as you’re free? I’d like you to do a consult with Ianthe.”

She forced herself to refrain from rolling her eyes, trying her best to be diplomatic.

“Sure, Tamlin. Be there in a bit.”

He hesitated at his office door, poorly masking his impatience when she didn’t immediately jump out of her chair. Typical.

She was already annoyed at his loud declaration across the office that he was asking her to give feedback on another creative director’s work. She didn’t feel particularly protective over Ianthe. It was just poor form, and it set the tone for resentment with no true reason.

Finally, she stood and made her way to his office. He was in his office chair, Ianthe pointing to various items of interest on a flat screen mounted to the wall. She greeted Feyre politely, but it didn’t seem like she was all to keen on getting her feedback.

“What can I help with?” Feyre offered.

“I wanted to see what you thought about the account we’re working on. Considering that you’ve been monopolized by Vila for months, I thought I could at least get a brief consult,” he explained.

Feyre decided to mentally count how many underhanded comments she’d endure over the course of this meeting.

One.

”Sure. What’s up?”

Ianthe launched into the cliff notes of her project, Tamlin contributing nothing the entire time.

“I’m sure you’re probably swamped with whatever you’re working on Feyre, so I appreciate you taking time to look at what I’ve put together.” Ianthe seemed genuine enough. She wasn’t sure if she trusted her, but she felt bad for her all the same.

Before she could respond, Tamlin inserted himself. “Oh, she’s definitely seems busy. Just not sure how much of it is work-related.” Her head snapped toward him, eyes blazing. She steadied herself and turned her attention back to Ianthe to try and keep this meeting on track.

Two.

”Honestly, Ianthe, I think you have a great proposal overall. My only suggestion is that you consider a different color focus. Your primary color for the logo is red, and that happens to be the main color of their largest competitor’s logo as well,” she stated, ignoring Tamlin entirely.

He started to say something about her input, but she quickly interrupted him.

“How unfortunate that the person responsible for doing the relevant market research into any competitors didn’t think that to be relevant intel to bring to the project,” she finished, eyes gravitating back to Tamlin’s face.

”Good catch,” Ianthe said simply.

“It’s happened to me before, too. Don’t create too much additional work for yourself. Maybe see about pulling one of your coordinating colors forward instead, and see how that plays out. No need to reinvent the wheel.”

”I’m not sure how you’ve managed to convince Vila to do all that extra legwork on your behalf, but it sounds like you’re awfully convincing,” Tamlin seethed. He couldn’t help himself, it seemed.

Three.

It was quiet for several uncomfortable seconds. As if on cue, her savior himself appeared in Tamlin’s doorway, a friendly smile on his face just for her. He knocked with his knuckle as he glanced around the room.

“Sorry for interrupting. Feyre, could you stop by my office before you head out today? Nothing big. Our last account sent an email asking for some minor changes, and I wanted to get your input before I tell them anything,” he said.

“Of course, Rhys. I’ll be there in a second,” she replied. He gave her one of his dazzling smiles, that rogue strand of hair kissing his brow yet again. When he walked away, she immediately felt compelled to follow him, as if he took the light straight out of the room when he left.

“You may go, Ianthe,” Tamlin stated dryly. She quickly excused herself, repeating her thanks to Feyre on the way out.

“You realize you two are partners— she doesn’t work for you.”

“Our dynamic is hardly your business, Feyre.” He wasn’t exactly wrong, but she hated the way he spoke to people who worked with him. It had always bothered her.

“Says the guy who all but insinuated that I’m putting out to get Rhys to be a good partner on projects. You’re unbelievable.”

“All of the speculation that circulates around this office regarding you and Rhysand, and you’re caught on what I’ve said? Feyre, sweetie. I thought we were past this.”

”It seems as though the lot of you aren’t busy enough if you have all this time to discuss whether Rhys and I have some secret affair happening under your noses. Maybe if you put half that effort into your job duties, you’d be an almost decent partner to Ianthe,” she snapped.

“You shouldn’t concern yourself with me and Ianthe. We’ll work together in whatever way works for us. Plus, you basically belong to Rhys now, so you won’t have to worry over having to work with the likes of me.” The way he mockingly said Rhys’ name made her want to punch him in the throat.

She turned on her heel to leave, so angry that she didn’t trust herself to respond professionally. Once she got to the doorway, she found the words rolling off her tongue without a conscious thought.

“I ‘belong’ to no one. Your problem is that you see people as assets rather than building relationships. You should consider incorporating a little humanity into your leadership. You may find yourself a little less miserable to work for or be around. From now on, Ianthe can address me directly if she needs me. You, sir, can fuck off.”

——————————————————————————

Feyre made her way directly to Rhysand’s office, still fuming. She probably needed a quick break on the roof to clear her head, but it was already 4:30. She didn’t want to make Rhys stay late so that she could pout properly. Although, he’d probably do that for her if she asked.

She approached his door, knocking lightly when she saw he was on the phone. He waved her in as he finished his call. He let out a polite chuckle at whomever was on the line, and she wondered how even his contrived laughter sounded almost musical.

“Absolutely. I’ll see you for lunch tomorrow. Bye.” He placed the receiver of his office phone into the cradle and faced her fully.

“Hey there, Feyre Darling. Thanks for saving some time for me today. I hope I didn’t overstep, but I wasn’t sure when if I’d be able to catch you later.” He leaned back in his chair, propped his elbow on the arm rest, and cupped his large hand to run it over his face. So he was tired, too.

Feyre let out a low chuckle. “You’re my hero, basically. Your timing was absolutely perfect. Never hesitate to interrupt if Tamlin is the person I’m talking to.”

His bright, violet eyes seemed to linger on her face. “I wouldn’t mind hearing you laugh again,” he mused. “It’s become one of my favorite sounds, I think.”

She couldn’t stop the smile that spread across her face, and she found one mirrored on his own. She cleared her throat, unsure how to tame the butterflies she was experiencing at his words.

“Shall we?” She motioned to his computer, and he nodded. She pulled her chair to his desk so that she could see, but he forced her to switch with him, insisting she take control of moving through the project.

She wasn’t sure if she was reading way too much into the weird comments she had heard today about her and Rhys, but she was acutely aware of his thigh so close to hers. It was far enough that they weren’t flush, but she could feel the heat radiating off of him in the most distracting way.

He already had the project pulled up on the screen and asked her to move through the document to the place of the proposed changes. He reached across her slightly to point at something, and she was instantly immersed in his scent. She found it oddly comforting, if she was honest with herself.

“So what do you think? Is it a simple fix? Or would this be something beyond the originally contracted rate? If it’s going to take you some time, I think it’s appropriate that we negotiate an additional fee, especially considering we’ve just initiated another large account.”

”Mmm. It’s been a while. Mind if I play with it for a minute?” she asked.

”Yeah, for sure. Take your time,” he said, leaning back in his chair as she worked.

Several minutes passed in excruciating silence, causing Feyre to break out in nervous laughter.

“You can talk to me, you know. It’s eerily quiet in here,” she joked.

He huffed a laugh. ”Hmm, okay. Anything particularly interesting around the office today?”

She thought immediately of her conversations with Lucien and Tamlin, and she couldn’t help but include their interaction with Mor in the elevator on the list. It really was such a weird day.

She worked for a couple of seconds before she replied. “It was quite the day, to say the least. I learned a lot about myself via the grapevine.”

”You mean to tell me there’s gossip in this office?”

”This very one,” she replied through a laugh.

“This is the part where you tell me what’s been said about you, Darling.”

She big her bottom lip, nervous of how he would react. “Well, it’s not exclusive to me. It has to do with you, too.” Her eyes never left the computer screen as she spoke.

“I like how that looks,” he said in regard to her edits, jumping straight back into their original conversation. “Now you have to tell me, especially if I’m involved.”

He offered a small poke to her ribs, laughing at her jerking away from him and the glare it earned. “Spill, Archeron.”

Before she could chicken out, she described her interaction with Lucien prior to their coffee run. He went entirely still as she spoke, eyes trained on the screen. When she finished, he said, “I see. I bet Lucien thinks he’s quite clever, then... Oh wait, I like that better.” He pointed to a small change she made.

He seemed so indifferent, and despite her attempts to the contrary, it bothered her that he was acting so cavalier. She had to check herself, remembering how ridiculous she had found the comments only a handful of hours ago. It was certainly unfair to have expectations of him being that she had barely finished processing this afternoon’s events.

“Yeah, I guess he’s pretty proud of himself. I don’t know how much he believed me when I told him he was off-base, but time will tell, I guess.” She immediately launched into her interaction with Tamlin, outlining the full interaction for him.

His jaw was tense throughout the story, and she could see his shoulders tighten when she would share a particularly tasteless thing Tamlin said. They tended to stay out of each others’ ways, so sometimes it was easy to forget how much animosity existed between the two of them. She finished the entire story, and decided to wrap up everything in a brief summary.

”So yeah, according to Lucien and Tamlin, you and I are hiding a super secret little office affair. But apparently we’re really bad at it, because everyone knows.” She let out a long breath she wasn’t aware she had been holding. His response was swift.

“Well, that’s fucking ridiculous.” He stated, so matter of fact. “Go back to that one really quick— if you don’t mind.” His eyes never left the screen. All business, all of a sudden.

Okay. Now, his indifference stung. She thought she knew Rhysand well enough that he would cushion the blow better than this if he were totally shooting her down. She didn’t like how detached he was, and come to think of it, it’s not like she had offered herself to him anyway. For all he knew, she could find the idea of them dating totally repulsive.

“You could do a lot worse for yourself, you know,” she said, anger bubbling to the service. She saw his head snap toward her, but she refused to look at him.

”What?”

”I know you could walk out of this office and take your pick, but you could do worse for yourself than me. It can’t be that ‘fucking ridiculous’.” She clenched her jaw to force herself to stop talking and breathe.

He sat there looking at her, his attention to the project entirely derailed.

“Feyre...” he started.

”It’s late. I’ll finish looking at this tomorrow. Could you save the changes and upload to the cloud? I think I can make quick work of it.”

”Would you look at me, please?”

She let go of the computer mouse and covered her face with both hands. She rubbed her face roughly as she spoke.

“I’m just tired, Rhysand. I didn’t mean to snap at you. Just forget I said anything. Really, I’m okay.” She didn’t want to see the pity in his face or listen to any explanations. She just needed to get out of there.

She felt one of his hands grip softly around the wrist closest to him as he turned the chair to get her to face him. She kept her face covered, leaning forward, and he had the nerve to laugh softly at her.

“You are such a stubborn, difficult woman sometimes, Feyre Darling.” He gripped her other wrist with his free hand and pulled her hands away from her face. She was too tired to fight him on it, so she let him. She fixed her gaze on his thighs, not entirely prepared for what his expression would show.

“Please look at me,” he whispered. She melted at the tone of his voice, imploring her to make eye contact, and raised her eyes to meet his.

He rubbed slow circles on the sensitive underside of her wrists as he spoke. “In no way, is the idea of me being with you ridiculous. What is so ridiculous to me, Darling, is the idea that I could ever be with you and delude myself into thinking I could keep it a secret,” he murmured, the sincerity in his expression overwhelming her. She saw his Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed, readying himself to finish. “Cauldron, Feyre. If you ever let me love you... I wouldn’t have it in me to contain it.”

She was frozen in her chair, in total disbelief. Once she finally regained control of herself, she reached her hand up to smooth his hair back into place. His eyes fluttered shut at the contact.

“That piece of hair has been driving me insane all day long,” she whispered. She was closer now, so much closer to him than she had ever been. She dropped her hand back to her lap to find his again.

His eyes popped open, traveling across her face and landing on her full lips. She watched his tongue dart out of his mouth slightly to wet his own before she regained eye contact. She leaned forward a little more, his hand coming up to brush her hair behind her ear. He cupped her face, running his thumb across her cheek.

“Feyre?” It was barely a whisper, but it was everything.

She subtly nodded her head, and his lips were on hers. He was slow, near reverent as he kissed her, and she leaned in to him, craving more contact. He slid his hand a little farther back so that his fingers could find their home in her hair, just behind her ear. She braced her hand on his forearm, and he pulled her face into his, only slightly, to deepen the kiss.

She let out a quiet whimper as Rhys angled himself to better capture her mouth, and just like that, she was gone. She no longer registered that they were in Rhys’ office or that his door was still open from when she arrived. As far as she was concerned, the world began and ended with them.

They both missed the quick footsteps as Lucien passed by on his way back to his desk from a meeting. They were entirely unaware of his halt as he realized what he’d witnessed and his prompt back peddling. It was when they heard his quiet rasp that they startled, breaking apart only millimeters.

”I fucking knew it!” he whisper-screamed, obviously pleased with himself.

True to Rhysand’s nature, he seemed totally unfazed by Lucien’s discovering them. He brushed his nose over Feyre’s, a grin spreading across his beautiful face.

”Fuck off, Lucien,” he crooned playfully.

His mouth was on hers yet again, neither of them noticing the soft click of the door as Lucien backed out of the office.

——————————————————————————

Just a bit of Feysand fluff for y’all! Feel free to keep the prompts coming, and let me know if you have a particular pairing or mood in mind ☺️

If you’d like to be added to my tag list, you can comment, shoot me an ask, or reblog! I’ll be happy to add you!

Tags (Masterlist):

@polireader // @justgiu12 // @hizqueen4life // @sis-it-dont-add-up // @b00kworm // @bookstantrash // @gisellefigue08 // @maastrash

#feysand #feysand au #feysand fluff #acotar #acowar #acomaf #sjm #feysand fanfic

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lifeofkaze · 4 years ago

Text

An Art of Balance #20

Orion Amari x MC

A/N: As always, Judith belongs to @judediangelo75, I love borrowing her so much!

Word Count: ~ 2.200

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Chapter 20: Support

Orion woke even earlier than usual on the day of their match against Slytherin. The little light filtering into the dorm from the semi-circular windows in the upper part of the masonry was tinged blue with the promise of dawn being near.

He took great care not to wake anyone as he quietly got dressed and left for the Quidditch pitch. Watching the sunrise had become a habit for him ever since the Christmas break; he found it was the best way to greet the new day properly and feel at one with himself and the universe.

One thing he always told his teammates was how important pre-match rituals were to channel their focus; today was the first time he had decided to skip his own. Usually, he would set his mind by meditating over the pictures of his team, his family, he had collected over the years. It reminded him where his heart was lying and why he was doing all of this.

But now, looking at the pictures of them all happily together led to nothing but pain and regret. They were showing different times, when they had been unburdened by the strains weighing down on the bond holding them together.

The whole team had fallen off balance.

Since the tensions that had been simmering beneath the surface had come to a head, Everett had become openly hostile towards him. His derisive tone and snarky remarks would usually have washed off him, Orion’s ease of mind being too strong to let someone as impulsive as Everett get to him.

But as of late, Orion’s patience had begun to wear thin and he felt himself reciprocating the negative energy surrounding him. He knew that he was a good captain and that the majority of his team respected his uncommon style of leadership. But upon seeing the rift that was splitting the Hufflepuff team into separate groups, he couldn’t help but ask himself if he had done all in his power to prevent it from happening.

He wasn’t the only one to be disdainful of Everett’s behaviour; no one really seemed to like him.

Orion almost felt sorry for Judith for having to put up with him as her partner on the pitch. Granted, they worked well as a pair, Judith’s cleverness and experience as a Beater complementing the sheer strength and aggressiveness Everett typically displayed.

But off the pitch, he shunned the rest of the team, preferring the company of the other boy’s sharing their dorm. Not that the other players minded; the only one willing to put up with him was Brian, their Keeper, but even he could be seen rolling his eyes at Everett’s attitude more often than not.

Judith and Lucy kept to themselves most of the time. Neither of them had a factual problem with any of their teammates but they had no sense for the drama either. They just wanted to play and play well; the internal quarrels of the team endangering their chance at the Quidditch cup didn’t sit well with them.

The last faction of their once united team consisted of Lizzie and Skye. Lizzie didn’t have any issues with anyone, except Everett perhaps; but her loyalty had her stick to Skye, who was shunned by the rest after the tantrum she had thrown.

Much to his surprise, Skye had sought him out the same evening to apologise for her behaviour; she had apologised twice, once to him as her captain, and once to him as her friend. Her regret had been palpable and Lizzie’s plea for her still fresh in his mind; so he had accepted her back in the line-up, albeit under one condition.

The greater part of the players was still mad at her antics, no matter what her personal reasons for them were. If she wanted to play against Slytherin, she would have to make a third apology to the entire team. Skye had agreed instantly.

When arguments would arise time and again, he was most inclined to take the side of Skye and Lizzie; not only because they shared a position, but also because they were the ones he had always felt most connected to.

Seeing the fragile construct that had become the Hufflepuff team, however, he didn’t dare rip another cornerstone from its foundation by giving up his neutrality. Besides, it was clear as day that Lizzie wouldn’t have wanted him to.

They had returned to where they had left off at the end of last year; once more, Lizzie wasn’t speaking to him, positively darting from the scene whenever he came near her. She had even missed the Herbology session the day before; Rowan had muttered something about her not feeling well.

As much as Orion had been furious with Skye for blurting out what he hadn’t dared to admit even to himself, he had felt relieved after he had had a chance to think about the matter. The constant back and forth between Lizzie and him claimed the majority of his attention and distracted him from everything else.

He had hoped that after their discussion something would change between them, one way or another. They were standing on the verge of a crossroads and the uncertainty of where the journey might take them occupied all of Orion’s heart and mind. But instead of taking a step forward, they had turned around and moved back in the direction they had come from.

Orion knew which way he wanted to go, but it was not a path he could walk on his own.

All these thoughts were running through his mind as he entered the Quidditch pitch. The mist was still hanging over the dewy lawn as he mounted his broom and flew to a comfortable height before carefully standing up, taking a moment to find his balance and waiting for the day to begin.

He stayed on his broom long until after the sun had gone up and the morning had turned to noon; all the while his thoughts were ebbing and flowing until they became steady, focused solely on what lay ahead.

Before his legs were growing too tired, he abandoned his meditation exercise and headed back to the castle. By the time he reached the Great Hall, it was already packed with students enjoying their lunch. The vast room was buzzing with excited chatter about the imminent start of the match.

The only people not visibly bouncing with anticipation were the Slytherin and Hufflepuff teams; both were huddled at their House tables lining the far ends of the walls, looking rather strained.

His teammates had assembled at the head of the Hufflepuff table, set apart from the rest by their canary and black sweaters bearing their squad numbers. Contrary to the noise around them, neither of them spoke a word, everyone coping with their pre-match nerves in their own way.

As McNully took great care not to sit with them on matchdays due to impartiality issues, Orion sat down next to Skye, who was furiously poking at her food. He could have sat anywhere, but he wanted to make a point to the rest by actively seeking her company; if he could forgive her, the others should be able to as well.

She looked up from her plate, her freckled face paler than usual. “There you are, Captain. Ready for the match?”

“Are we ever truly ready for anything?” Orion asked back while piling vegetables onto his plate. Skye only grunted in reply before she returned to manhandling her lunch. But Orion wasn’t concentrating on her anyway.

To his surprise, the mood between his teammates seemed to be rather good. Everett and Judith had started going over their tactics in hushed voices; Orion could see how Judith tried hard not to roll her eyes at something Everett had just said. It was reassuring to know that she tried to put her disregard for the boastful Beater aside for the time being.

Lucy, who sat next to Judith, pushed her food from one side of her plate to the other without touching it; she was opening and closing her other hand subconsciously as if she was already reaching for the Snitch in her mind.

Unsurprisingly, Lizzie sat the farthest from him. She was the only one who didn’t even bother with trying to eat before heading to the pitch for their warm ups; Orion knew how nervous she got before every single game.

Lizzie hadn’t even acknowledged his arrival except for a minuscule glance in his direction. It had only lasted for the fraction of a second; now, her attention was fully fixed on the empty plate before her. Rowan sat by her side and babbled animatedly, but Lizzie didn’t seem to be listening.

Unlike her friend, Rowan had given him a wide smile and a wave when she had seen him approaching.

Orion had noticed that she was finally starting to relax around him. Although she was still doubtful of anything he said during the tutoring that didn’t agree with the textbook, since Lizzie had taken herself back from the teaching bit by bit, Rowan had learned to open her mind to his way thinking.

He was glad to see Lizzie had such a good friend to give her the support she needed. He’d had the impression that there had been a strain between the two girls, but judging at how adamant Rowan was at sharing her good mood with her anxious friend, they seemed to have overcome their differences. Rowan was a good and solid friend to Lizzie; something he had told her just yesterday.

Orion had been leaving the prefect bathroom he was allowed to use as captain of the Hufflepuff team the evening before. The atmosphere in the Common Room had already been bubbling with anticipation of the approaching match and the nervous energies had been too much for him to properly focus. A hot bath and the quietness of the exclusive bathroom had never failed to soothe the agitation burning inside him before every match.

He had almost bumped into Rowan as he had been rounding the corner of the hallway. He must have startled her because she gave a little shriek as she realised who it was she had run into. She answered his greeting with a stammered response, quickly hiding her bright pink washbag behind her back.

“What are you doing here?” She appeared to be flustered their unexpected meeting.

Orion smiled friendly at her. “I was just taking a bath to calm my mind.”

“Yes, of course, because of the match,” Rowan pushed her glasses up her nose, “everyone seems to be so nervous. Lizzie has been out of her mind for the last days.”

Orion could guess why; Lizzie had always been prone to getting overwhelmed by her nervousness but what had happened between them probably hadn’t done much to help her mindset. Their conversation had been subject of his own musings more than a few times as well. He had told no one of what had been said, not even McNully when he had interrogated him afterwards.

But only because he chose to keep things to himself didn’t mean Lizzie would do the same. He knew how deep her bond with Rowan ran and he assumed that she had told her best friend everything that had happened.

“I’m sorry to hear she feels unsettled,” he said softly. “Despite everything, I hope she can find the focus necessary to perform to her own standard when the time is right.” He smiled sincerely at the girl in front of him. “She can count herself lucky to have such a wonderful friend like you supporting her; how can we soar freely when we have no safe place to land?”

Rowan’s cheeks flushed at the compliment, but it was masked by the dim light of the dark corridor.

“Of course I support her,” she whispered. “Lizzie is my best friend; she means the world to me.”

“Yes, she has a singular spirit, indeed,” Orion agreed wistfully. He shivered, and not only from his still wet hair that was slowly drying in the cold air. He ran his hand through it and shifted his weight in the direction he had been going before.

“Are you coming to cheer her on tomorrow?” he asked over his shoulder as he moved past Rowan.

“Of course I will, all of you,” she beamed back at him.

“Then I’m sure there is no way we can fail,” he winked at her. “I’m looking forward to seeing you on the stands.”

Orion inclined his head towards her and walked off on his way to the now hopefully quieter Common Room. He didn’t turn around again, so he couldn’t see the dreamy look on Rowan’s face as she stared after him.

#hphm #hogwarts mystery #orion amari #orion amari x mc #quidditch #the quidditch squad #lizzie jameson #art of balance #aob

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goron-king-darunia · 4 years ago

Photo

Annon-Guy: Here is Marta’s Overray Mirrage.

(Do you know which scene this is?)

P.S. No translation on the Rays wiki, so this line is a rough translation.

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Two Knights

Marta: “…… Emil. And another Emil… Thank you.” *~*~*~*~* It’s a really cute image but I’m not 100% sure where it shows up in the narrative since checking the game script doesn’t have a one to one comparison. Something about the background definitely reminds me of a scene early in the game but I swear the scene was with Ratatosk and not Emil. If I played the game again I could probably find the scene they’re referencing if it’s an actual scene at all, but I don’t trust my memory so I might just be hallucinating a scene similar to this one because it definitely has the vibes of something that happened in the game. Speaking of Marta, though, this expression definitely reminds me of a makeup I wanted in the dress up mobile game “Love Nikki: Dress Up Queen.” The Makeup is called Shiny Smile but I always call it the Marta Makeup. https://lovenikki.fandom.com/wiki/Shiny_Smile I’m really jealous of the people that have it because it always looks really good in styling and is one of the prettier blue-eye “natural” makeups you can use. I most of the makeups I have in the game are either kind of ugly or have heavy makeup that I don’t really like. Unfortunately I can never get the makeup because the event was a one time only event and since it’s a mobile game, I try not to use real money to play and I spent what little I was comfortable spending already. I especially don’t want to spend because I know the only reason they do these exclusive suits is because the fact that making them ultra limited means people will shell out real money for them and that’s how they make sure they get revenue, but I hate games that do that mostly because I feel like anything in a free game should be obtainable for free and if you’re paying for something, you should be paying to get a specific thing, not for a CHANCE to get a specific thing (basically I don’t like gatcha systems, even if they have a pity pull system where you’re guaranteed full drops after $X amount of money spent.) I mostly just focus on playing Love Nikki to get as much of the free stuff as I can and then cry when really cute Exclusive Events happen and have really cute cosmetics that you either have to pay for outright (During the Disney Frozen Event, they had Elsa and Anna Suits that you could only get by paying outright) or that you have to pay real money to get because unless you just never buy anything ever and save up over 10,000 premium currency for almost a year. The last time I even got CLOSE to getting all the drops I wanted on a Disney Event was with the Little Mermaid and Cinderella event and I basically got JUST enough to be able to piece the full suits together without actually owning all the suit parts (I’m missing little things like earrings or background items but I have the main components like Ariel’s hair and dress and Cinderella’s hair, dress, slippers, and the carriage.) Like, I know it’s a tangent but it’s kind of sad that really cute items are locked behind a paywall and if you’re a newbie that just heard about the game then you’ll NEVER be able to get these items again. IDK, that just leaves a bad taste in my mouth and I hate games that do that. I’m just REALLY not a fan of artificial scarcity and gambling lite as money-making tools. It’s also why I’m really mad over things like Amiibos and Pop! figures. It’s just Beanie babies all over again. Nintendo could make as many amiibos as they wanted up until everyone had one and then stop making them. Then they could do a rerelease 20 years later when new people are born that don’t have them yet. Instead they release a limited amount, sit on a bunch, wait for scalpers and collectors to buy, and then they sometimes decide to rerelease the item when it’s really rare and really in demand because scalpers are bumping the price up for them. IDK, I know there’s nothing wrong with trying to maximize profits or whatever because we live in a capitalist society and until that stops, people just have to do whatever it takes to make money and if artificial scarcity works for your profit margins, I can’t blame people or companies for doing that because that’s just how capitalism works. But I’m the sort of person that thinks that if a thing exists in abundance or can be produced in abundance and people want that thing, people should be able to get that thing. The NFC tags/chips are small, easily mass produced, and easily programmed with a piece of equipment that’s not too hard to get. (There is literally a market for spoofed chips) People were spoofing amiibo to get early access to content in games that already existed but wasn’t accessible because the amiibo wasn’t released yet. Nintendo could do what they did for Animal Crossing and just sell amiibo cards at a discount and then collectors could buy the figures while people that just want the content can buy the cards. They could still massively upcharge for figures and make money on the market for cards (especially since the cards are small and easily lost or damaged, the demand would always be there.) Instead they just run on artificial scarcity and relying on people’s fear of missing out to fuel sales. That’s why I’m really interested in a so-called “programmable amiibo” coming out that would let you use an app on your phone to spoof NFC chips. As it is, Nintendo has a stranglehold on the amiibo market so they can charge whatever they want for you to be able to access content that already exists in a game you own using a resource they deliberately make scarce so they can charge whatever they want. There’s literally a thriving market for “custom Amiibo cards” and people just politely don’t ask about whether the chips are spoofed or not because “I’m paying for the custom art, not the chip, haha.” Like, not to be anti-capitalist on main but, uh… gatcha markets and collectors markets are very coercive and I do not vibe with that and I would much rather live in a world where as long as the resources for something exists, people should be able to get it. I have just… never vibed with limited edition anything or region exclusive anything. Unless there’s a reason other than “I just want to coerce people to give me more money” to limit who has access to a resource, I don’t believe things like that should be limited. That’s why I love libraries and things like that~ IDK this was such a weird tangent I’m so sorry, but yes, thank you for the Mirage art! It’s very cute~

#submissions #submission #Letters from Annon Guy #Long post #rant #in which I discuss breadpill things #anyway #Marta Lualdi #Emil Castagnier

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fipindustries · 4 years ago

Text

list of comics i made so far

i already shared the list of all the novels i tried to write throughout my llife so i see no reason why not to do the same with the comics i tried to work on. no i should clarify, with my lists of novels there was a clear cut distinction between what was a novel and a short story so to parse one from the other was an easy task. it should be known that i wrote hundreds of shorts stories that i havent shared with anyone. now a similar situation occurs with my comics, i have done hundreds upon hundreds of little comics, short jokes, little skits and short lived strips through my life, so in order to give this list some weight and not make it longer than the bible the criteria i used was that it had to be something i did on a regular basis or that tells a self contained story with a beggining middle and end.

now without further ado, lets begin!

spike Vanderville (age 7)

you can tell i was way more into comics than i was into novels from a young age. done with pen and folded paper, it was the story about a young kid called spike, whose design was heavily inspired by bradley from sticking around, who had magical powers which allowed him to manipulate reality. it was a mix of harry potter and a series of illustrates short stories that came in a magazine in argentina. his best friend was a scarecrow with a pumpkin head that he had brought to life, his archnemesis was a fat bully.

curiously enough i was so passionate about this project even though i had no idea what i was doing and no talent that i actually did like three full colored issues of it. my family was really proud of me. sadly those comics are completly lost to time

andrew and the monkey (age 10)

this was the classical story about a boy and his best friend the talking animal. one page comedy strips done in pen and paper. nothing too clever, just a way for me to try lame jokes mostly stolen from spongebob squarepants. not much else to it. i tried to do like a revamp in 2014 but it was short lived, as you can see the jokes didnt get any less lame

FIP industries (age 17)

mostly done in digital. yes as you can see fip is something that has followed me my whole life in quite the variety of mediums. there were as a matter of fact multiple attempts to make this comic a real thing but time and again they would peter off as i saw that my skill was just not up to the task. i think i have talked more than enough about fip industries on this blog, one interesting thing is that if you follow the link you will come across a lot of proto ideas that i had before they cemented and took their definite shape in the novel (and even after the novel i kept retconning and retooling things over and over again, fip industries is an ongoing thing that will probably last my entire lifetime)

Disregarding Reality I (age 20)

the first iteration of disregarding reality, a humorous strip done in pencil and paper, a fairly short lived affair, lasting no more than 3 months. the entire premise of the comic was an MRA activist and a feminist live together, they are friends, they argue a lot. remember 2013 guys? back when this whole politics bullshit truly kicked off online? this was before gamer gate, mind you. but by that point i had seen more than enough of it on tumblr and i was like “someone should do some scathing commentary with wit and penache” and that someone had to be me. mainly inspired by commics like f@nboys and el goonish hive and a thousand billion others that were so popular back in those halcyon days.

i got bored of it pretty quickly and it wouldnt be until three years later than i would finally decide to re-start the project but until then...

Strangers in the forest (age 21)

here comes a rather productive era in my ouvre, ink and paper, based on a short story i wrote, its about an eldritch monster pretending to be human and a ghost girl, killed by her father. they have a dispute because the monster wants to eat the corpse of the girl but the ghost doesnt want to give up her bones because its the one thing that tethers her to the mortal plane. they eventually resolve their dispute. by this point i was actually, unironically trying my best to do comics which i felt looked professional.

Song of a nightmare (age 21)

another one based on a short story i wrote. ink and paper, a private detective wakes up in the middle of the night and sees a mermaid lying in bed next to him. he spends most of the comic trying to figure out how the hell is this possible. still one of my favourite ones and certainly one of my family’s and friends favourites as well. a rather poetic tale, strongly inspired by argentinian fiction and their propensity towards magical realism, i was reading a lot of cortazar back then.

Aika (age 21)

as you can tell i was on a fucking roll that year. ink and paper, this was a story based upon a simple and basic idea that i had in my mind for years and years. i always liked the concept behind the movie “the kid” where bruce willis mysteriously comes across himself as a kid. so of course one day i came up with the idea, what if you recieved a visit from your future self... but she was a woman?

this is probably the most aggresively trans story i ever wrote in my life, it is literally about a guy realizing they are trans and breaking down over it. here is the giant kicker, i did not realize at all what i was doing. i was completly unaware of what was going on here, i was still deep deep in the closet and not even realizing i was there. it really is astounding the honesty and the rawness with which i wrote this comic and it went all over my head. a perfect example of “im such a great ally lol”

oh also there is time travel i guess. my main impetus (beyond whatever my subconcious was forcing me to do) was my desire to make a complete clusterfuck of a story, i was a huge fan of homestuck, i had read fleek and demon, i wanted to do my own take on a hypercomplicated time travel puzzle plot. other things came out on top of it but i didnt noticed them. fucking hilarious

Hello Agatha (age 21)

a comedic strip about a wacky pixie dream girl having wacky adventures with her wacky friends, one of which is a man with a toilet for a head. what a gut buster, what a knee slapper!

there is not much to say about this one, wacky surreal comedy was always my favourite and so time and again i would try my hand at it but it is surprisingly hard to do!

The /co/ ventures! (age 20 - age25)

an ongoing project done in multiple mediums. i think i said more than enough about this in here and here. it was me practiscing comics, practiscing my humor and adding my tiny grain of sand to the 4chan culture. i am proud to say these comics were actually very well liked there and that i would be recognized without a name or signature of any kind, just on the strength of my style.

the vest kind of madness (age 22)

probably one of the projects in which i put the biggest amount of effort to make it look professional. traditional inks and digital colors. a crossover that i cant believe never happened in comics considering how obvious it is. Rac Shade, the changing man and delirium of the endless, the two flagship vertigo characters associated with madness. clearly a match made in heaven.

to this day im flabbergasted i seem to be the only one to think of this.

Disregarding Reality II (age 23)

another work where i have already spilled rivers of bytes explaining my thought process behind it. after having a no good, terrible, very bad day, finding my self aimless and without purpose, deep in denial and depression, i decided to give my self a big project to have something to get me out of bed every day. these three guys came from the depths of my mind to save me.

this time leaning a lot more on silly humor and surrealism than political commentary, still insanely proud of how much i managed to make this last, almost three years, well over 200 pages! and in here i found the inspiration and the creative energy to tackle all sorts of diverse projects of which we are about to see all about.

Mama Bird (age 24)

my masterpiece.

by far the best comic i ever did. a kid with a bird for a mom. hilarious, touching, heartbreaking. it was a concept that i had come up with when i was 21. back then it was supposed to be exclusively a humorous comic strip but then i found a dramatic angle for the story and that was when everything clicked into place. that was when i realized this was a comic i had to do. and i did it. it took me five months but it was well worth it. still insanely proud of this one

Soft boys (age 25)

a weird experimental little story where i decided to sit down and deconstruct one of the most popular superpowers. super elasticity. more akin to me just mashing my toys against each other than me trying to tell a serious story. i am actually really happy with some of the art here and some of the sequences presented. particularly the final one where a brick joke twenty pages in the making finally pays off.

Hexen Snatch (age 25)

a semi spinoff to my novel FIP industries, we focus on a side character that managed to survive after the events of the novel and how they’ll manage to survive further beyond that. insanely soaked by the magical world of pact by widbow i wanted desperatly to share my own take on magic, every page is accompanied by a little text where i expand upon the lore and the way magic is supposed to work on this world. i really like the prose on those snippets and the ideas they work almost more that the comic itself with which i was not happy at all when i was working on it. i didnt like the character design, i didnt like how the art in general was coming out, i didnt like the pacing of the story or how superficially we were getting to expore this world in the comic proper. i had to take a very long hiatus just to accumulate the will to finish the comic and once i did i feel it really petered off without much of a satisfying payoff.

on some level i blame the exhaustion and frustration that i came out of this comic with for the fact that i ended up quitting disregarding reality soon afterwards.

Maxplosive (age 26)

another project that has followed me across multiple mediums. came up with an idea for a videogame back in 2015. saved it on the back pocket for a while, used it as a story within a story on my novel fan.tastic, practisced a couple of animations with the characters and eventually decided that, if my skills at videogame making were not enough, i had at least more than poven myself as a comic artist so maybe that was the definitive medium in which this idea would have to exist.

the original idea was to tell the story in two parts, the first half would introduce the character and the videogame as if the comic was a playthrough of the game. all fun and childlike and innocent. then the second half was meant to explore the life of the main character as an adult, how being “a videogame protagonist” had ruined her body, her mental health and her life. i tried all sorts of weird stuff with the format here, using reciclable assets, static camera angles and generally presenting the whole thing as if it was a videogame.

sadly the project got too big for my breaches, i was fucking exhausted back then, swamped with a bunch of other projects, my job, other responsabilities, unsatisfied with the story and with no idea where to take it. eventually i got tired, decided to skip a day, then the day became a week and then the week became a month and by then i had to face the facts, i was just no longer able to continue the comic. and so i quit not only maxplosive but disregarding reality all together.

i still did the occasional comic here and then but it wouldnt be until the very end of 20-fucking-20 that i was finally inspired to tackle a new project, my newest one, my last one....

Lapsarian (age 27)

an interesting experiment, i decided to do the whole comic in one sit and then post it chapter by chapter on a weekly basis. a surprising result of this was that i managed to do in one month the same amoung of pages that would have taken me 5 months back when i started disregarding reality, is good to see that after al this time i still got it.

took me a while to get the hang of it again and find my own style once more but once i armed up it was smooth sailing for 40 pages all the way to the end. but what is this comic even about?

its... weird, with full disclosure and no shame, it is mostly a fetish story about big lizard creatures commiting vore. the milkman had already shown me that i could do those types of stories and no lighting would come from the heavens to strike me down so i said, why not as a comic? i like to think that beyond the fetish content it is still a decent story in its own right, an interesting feedback that i got from this is that people are suprised how earnest it is, one saying something like “this is the best pitch for a fetish that i was never interested in”

Conclussion:

looking back on this im surprised, turns out i was a lot more prolific and working a lot more regularly than i expected, in here are documented ten years of creative output that never seems to wane. it was fun to do the roundabout trip and see how my style, my technice and generally my work ethic evolved through the years. another nice thing to see is the multiple formats, the multiple tools and mediums i experimented with, i find myself constantly trying new things, new methods, new angles, new interesting ideas for how to make a comic (without even getting into what to make a comic about).

something i always knew about myself was that drawing is a fundamental part of who i am, it is something that just cant be taken away from me and that will always be a part of my life one way or the other, is good to see it so plainly, in black and white, on this list. here goes for what i might be able to do in the future

#art #writing #fip living life

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btsangstisallicanwrite · 5 years ago

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Happy Now?

Summary: You’re a rising singer, friends somehow with the seven members of BTS. Secretly more than friends with a one Jeon Jungkook, until your falling out before his tour sent you straight to the lyric notebook. Now your new EP is out, and everyone’s expecting your new single to be about the mysterious boy you loved but would never name. Yeah, the song’s about him. Yeah, you wouldn’t name him. But you’d sure as hell let everyone know how he hurt you, and no one’s prepared to hear that, especially not Jungkook.

A/N: Hello ARMY, I’ve never published a BTS fic before so this is my first. I hope y’all like it!!

CWs: light mentions of weed, alcohol mentions, I think that’s it? Angsty angst. Also, the song used in this fic is Happy Now by Zedd and Elley Duhé, I do not own the song or rights, I just had this urge to write a fic to this song.

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“Jungkook-ah, did you see, Y/N is releasing a new EP! You think it’s about you this time?” Hoseok waggled his eyebrows at an unsuspecting but unimpressed Jungkook. The truth is, the last EP was about him, but the public couldn’t know that. Y/N was a rising singer in the United States, and he was a famous idol in South Korea; the narrative just didn’t mesh. Besides, the world wasn’t ready for the Golden Maknae to be off the market. That being said, saying that your relationship together was purely work related or platonic like you did in the papers, that’s just not true either. But like you agreed, no one could know. Minus the boys, they kind of knew everything.

Everything, minus the fact that he’d broken up with you (he used the words “take a break”) before their last tour.

All the diving he’d do towards his phone, holding it away from the boys when they’d try to see, they all thought he was talking to you. He wished he was. The dives were driven by hope, the fact he realized he made a huge mistake by letting you go because of your “busy schedules;” you both knew it was bullshit but neither of you would say it. If anything, you both knew heartbreak sold records.

Namjoon pats him on his shoulder, leaning in to show him a little bit of affection and reprieve from the laughs of his hyungs. “Aw, leave him be, I’m sure we’ll all find out tonight when she performs it at that event tonight, right, Kookie?”

Oh. Shit. He didn’t escape Yoongi’s concerned eye when he launched to grab his phone, checking the date. He looked down, a selfie y’all took on your last date lighting up his vision as he unlocked it. He should’ve remembered. He’d seen your tweets about it for the last few months, how you were so excited to perform at this show and that your new single was something your fanbase wouldn’t expect. Jungkook really didn’t know how to take that. He hadn’t tried contacting you (yet) but you hadn’t reached out to him, either, so it really couldn’t be that bad if it was about him, right?

“Uh… yeah, I’m sure we will!” He gulped and nodded his head at Namjoon, who seemed to be fine with his response. Hoseok and Taehyung went about their business talking about whatever had their attention for the next ten minutes. Jimin and Seokjin were deep in debate, leaning over their cup noodles to bare teeth as an attempt to intimidate one another. Yoongi, on the other hand, was staring dead at Jungkook, still. He watched him as he walked over to the liquor cabinet and poured himself a drink, leaning back in his chair as he watched Jungkook take it without a flinch. That was the glitch in the matrix Yoongi needed to prove something was awry, so he took a seat right across from Jungkook in the small booth on the bus.

“Hyung, tell me why you just downed that shot like you’re ready to forget your name when you’re supposed to be happy about seeing Y/N tonight.”

Jungkook gulped, swirling the last few drops left in his cup while trying to avoid eye contact with his hyung, “do me a favor and... make sure I’m doing okay tonight, will you?”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Y/N! Are you ready for tonight?” Your best friend busted into your room as if your door was a figment of your imagination. This was her first fancy music festival, and your first performance at one, so it goes without saying that you were nervous. It wasn’t even that big of a show, it was almost like an exclusive concert style, with the low-watt blue lighting and only standing room in the audience for each performer. Normally, that’d ease your mind and your nerves, but not tonight.

Only the record producers had heard the song you’re releasing tonight. You hadn’t told a soul... maybe one or two... about what really happened with Jungkook. You’d felt ashamed and stupid that you fell into one of those stupid fanfiction tropes, falling for a man that was well beyond your reach for anything more than a good fuck. Well, that’s a little harsh. It was almost like you had been dating, which is the funny thing about all your feelings. You’d sneak over to the apartment and watch movies with the boys in your pajamas. You spent your birthday with them playing drunken card games at your place because none of your friends were in the city and they didn’t want you to be alone. He did all the things boyfriends do, and as much as you wanted to hate him and talk mad shit, you couldn’t. You’d never believed in that “right person, wrong time” figure of speech until you walked out of their apartment that night, the night he broke your heart.

“I can’t wait to hear some more sappy Jungkook shit,” your friend came up behind you as you sat at your vanity criticizing yourself and all your life decisions up to that point. “You might not even need blush tonight, babe, it’s already all over your face.” She squished your cheeks together before you had the opportunity to stop her, making you feel a little bit of something other than despair in your stomach.

“You wanna take a hit before we start doing our makeup?”

“Say no more,” you said sadly, feeling the hit pull between your lips. You weren’t famous enough yet to have a makeup squad, so it was just you and your bff swapping brushes and blunts until you either looked good as fuck or didn’t care anymore. She rolled backwards onto your bed, looking for some shoes or something, and you stole another hit, hoping it’d give you the encouragement you needed to seemingly let everyone you loved down tonight.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

All he wanted to do was get so drunk that he didn’t make it out the door. That’s really all he wanted, and he didn’t know why that was too much to ask. But alas, with the boys talking nonstop about what your new single could be about, and a concerned/slightly pissed Yoongi breathing down the back of his neck, Jungkook knew he’d have to suck it up and make it to the venue.

It looked just like he remembered. Last time he was there, he’d been sneaking around with you in the dim purple lights. All the walls were painted black with thick velvet curtains draping from corner to corner on the stage. The boys came in through the back entrance as to avoid being seen (as much as they could) so they’d come in as the staff was setting up some of the props for the performances tonight. There was a singular barstool that sat just left of center stage and he grimaced. You’d been telling him that for your next album, you really wanted to focus on the acoustics and just sit on a stage, on “one of those really worn leather barstools,” he practically heard it in your voice. But maybe he was wrong, and the stool had nothing to do with you. It seems he’d just have to see; there’s nothing better in his mind to do than hide back here and hope he’d be ready to see you on that stage.

And just having to see, whether that stool was for you, whether he was even ready to see you, more and more things he wasn’t ready to think about, these were all things he’d (at least attempted to) make his peace with. That was on the premise of “for hours from now.” Hours from now was plenty of time, yeah? Hours from now was not right now, not standing right in front of him. He’d put his nose in his phone to check the time, when he didn’t check where he was going and ran straight into you.

“Y/N… I’m sorry, I didn’t see you there.” He ran his hand through his hair and down along the length of this neck, trying to avoid eye contact so you couldn’t see how distraught he was.

“Jungkook. You say you didn’t see me... but I believe,” you grabbed his phone and clicked the unlock button, illuminating the photo of the two of you together, “you saw me, right there.” You looked at him blankly as he managed to disguise his immediate sadness with a cough. He sincerely can’t tell if you’re playing around or if that sharpness in your voice wants to slice through him like he feels it does.

“Y/N, can we talk? Please?”

He swears he almost saw you crack. Maybe you had, maybe he’s just wistfully hoping, but it seems he’d never know, because before you could get a word out, Jimin had flung himself on you.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Y/N!! Oh, how we’ve missed you! Why haven’t you been around since we got back?” Jimin pouted as you leaned your head on his, still making direct eye contact with Jungkook. He’d almost made you break, and you’re sure he knew it. What surprised you more than that was that he hadn’t told any of the boys, or changed his wallpaper. Do you tell them before you perform and ruin this little dream scenario that Jungkook still apparently had them believing in? You took a second to rub your lips together, breaking your gaze at Jungkook to close your eyes and sigh. “I’ve just been working really hard on this EP, rehearsals and things,” you said and then sent out a soft chuckle “Not all of us have the rehearsal experience that y’all do.”

“You’re a natural up there, Y/N, don’t stress about it.” Seokjin matched your laugh with a heartier one, wrapping his arm around your other shoulder. “You’re gonna go up there and show us something crazy, yah?”

“Oh yeah,” you glance back up at Jungkook, whose gaze never left you. You watched it travel from your feet, up the rest of your body as you locked eyes, both wearing the same sad expression. Your breath was a little ragged, which didn’t help, as your silence sat in the air a little longer than you expected it to, “It’ll be something else, alright.”

“Well, we have to go find good standing room since the show starts soon. We wouldn’t want to miss the exclusive look at your new single! Good luck, Y/N!” Namjoon nods at you with a smile. You return it, a nod to all the boys. Jungkook lingers, fighting with Yoongi to be the last in line. “Good luck, Y/N, I know you’ll do well.” He nods his head and scampers off behind his hyungs. You could’ve sworn you saw him look a little teary eyed as you made eye contact once the boys found a spot. He was leaning on the side of the stage, far too close for your comfort considering you’d be singing a song about how he broke your heart. At least he didn’t know that, yet.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Jungkook, I need to tell you something.”

Jungkook wanted to be told nothing. He wanted to hear nothing, he wanted to be nothing. He had glanced up at you once he found a comfortable spot off the side of the stage, and the look on your face told him that he should fully expect what’s coming. He’s not ready to hear it on his own, much less with the boys. At least Yoongi was going to look out for him. He turned to the aforementioned man, taking a shot off a tray floating around, and nodded.

“I kind of have an idea of what’s about to happen.”

“How do you kn-- what do you think you know?”

“Welcome to the show, are you all ready to hear Y/N’s new single?” The host of the show sauntered onto the stage, the glittery train of her dress almost distracting Jungkook from the absolute panic that invaded his body at the words of his hyung. “Well, you’re in luck, she’s our opening act for the night! Everyone welcome her to the stage, give it up for Y/N!”

You walked out on the stage in an outfit far different than the one he saw when he ran into you. You seemed a little flustered, almost, sad but confident as you grabbed the microphone and introduced yourself. You scanned the crowd, eyes landing on the boys. Taehyung and Jimin were screaming so loud that it looked like you might have almost forgotten about Jungkook completely, until your eyes met his.

“I had a whole speech… this whole plan, this whole other outfit I had on backstage and I was ready to show y’all the happy, go-lucky version of this song, because that’s what I’d originally made it for. But, I’m gonna need y’all to bare with me, because… because I can’t sell that to you right now when I can’t feel it.” You’d started to walk off stage, immediately taking the crowd by surprise.

“Listen Jungkook, I’ve seen the song she’s about to sing--”

“You WHAT?” He didn’t believe what he’d just heard. He knew Yoongi said it, but he guessed he needed to add that to the list of things he hadn’t (or rather, couldn’t) make peace with. “Before I ask why or how you’ve heard it, does she--”

“See, that’s the thing,” Yoongi looked up to you and then back to him. “I know what she tells me, and I know what the song says. I know you still love her.” Jungkook exhaled with such a force that Namjoon made a pointed glance his way. He looked up at Yoongi, expecting to see something, anything other than the piercing gaze he was met with. “I know she still… feels some way about you, Jungkook.”

‘Feels some way about you’ rung in his ears even harder than his eardrums had been doing so before. He immediately looked around and grabbed a shot off the nearest tray and downed it. He looked back over with tears fully in his eyes (not like earlier, those weren’t full tears, right?). Yoongi seemed like he was trying to be delicate with him, but he was getting fed up with Jungkook, and they were now both aware of it.

“Jungkook!” Yoongi whisper shouted, “she’s not ready to talk to you, not until you hear what she has to say. Quit taking those shots and hear her out.”

“What do I do, how long have you--”

C L U N K

He barely heard the loud wooden thud over his own heartbeat, but it was enough to distract him and Yoongi. He looked up to the stage and saw you dragging out that leather wooden stool, and he knew he was in for a night.

“Sorry… sorry that was so loud y’all.” He watched you take the deepest of breaths, hands shaking as you held onto the microphone and sat on the stool. “I’m gonna just go off-script here, is that okay?” The crowd cheered, creating a small smile on your face. “I don’t want to say I knew this would happen, but my loving team and my ghost producer backed me up when I wanted to record a second version of this song. They’ll play the upbeat one later, once we’ve all had some drinks in our system, yeah?” The crowd cheered again, whereas Jungkook could only gulp.

“Yoongi, did you--”

“She asked me to ghost produce this EP before we left on tour, Kook.”

“She… she what? How long have you-- what do I do?” He was full-on in tears at this point, doing a decent job at hiding it from the other members, but Yoongi saw right through his “I wear leather coats and am a Virgo so I can’t cry” facade that he tried to put up whenever he got sad. He pulled Jungkook into a tight side embrace, right as you looked down at the two of them.

“I know I’ll need it,” you mumbled, “so here we go, hope y’all like it.”

“You’re a world away, somewhere in the crowd. In a foreign place… are you happy now? There’s nothing left to say, so I shut my mouth. So won’t you tell me, babe, are you happy now?”

“Shit. Hyung…”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“You’re the only one who can up and run, leave me just as empty as the day you came. And you hold all the cards, all the broken hearts, strung over your shoulder ‘til it’s all in vain. And only you know the strength in your teeth, the wash in the weight of your pockets so deep… and lonely.”

You’d made a list, made a plan. You weren’t going to look at any of the boys. Your subconscious was screaming “LOOK ANYWHERE BUT THE BOYS.” But you mentioned you were already off-script. Knowing that, your eyes couldn’t help themselves.

“In the palm of your hands, you can make me dance, spin me around in circles until I’m wrapped in string.”

It doesn’t seem like they’ve processed it yet. You scan the line, seeing scrunched brows and confusion in a continuous line as if you’d written it across their faces yourself. Namjoon looked concerned. Seokjin had a face of granite; for once, you couldn’t read his face. Taehyung and Jimin were staring, eyes wide, and you couldn’t help but try to smile.

“You keep on talking sweet”

Hoseok had his hand reaching for Seokjin, eyes locked with yours. It’s not often that Mr. Sunshine himself can’t bring you joy.

“‘til your fingers bleed,”

Yoongi had the face you expected him to have. You could see he was proud. He was seemingly less confused, but still looked hurt. You’d understand if it had to do with you, but you’re hoping it’s because of the man next to him, whom even thinking about made you growl through your next lyric.

“but don’t you dare ask me how I’ve been.”

After that, you really shouldn’t want to look. It might make it obvious, blow your whole relationship (or crumbled lack thereof) into the public eye. But the shouldn’ts are falling by the wayside as the crowd cheered on your emotive tone. Maybe it was a little harsh. You shake your head and blink out some tears. You’ve got to stop telling yourself you’re being too harsh. He broke your heart, didn’t bother to call, and had the gall to wish you good luck? He deserves to know how it feels.

“Now only you know the strength of your teeth, the wash in the weight of your pockets so deep... and lonely! You’re a world away, somewhere in the crowd. In a foreign place, are you happy now? There’s nothing left to say, so I shut my mouth...”

You’ve managed to avoid it, and you can see it on the members’ faces that they’re catching on. Namjoon, Seokjin, Taehyung, Jimin, Hoseok, Yoongi.

“So won’t you tell me, babe…”

Shit. Here we go. The voice has cracked, the tears are OUT. You wipe your tears and hold your sleeve to the side of your face, making eye contact with the last member, the one you love the most.

“are you happy now?”

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santana-maribel · 5 years ago

Text

who: @santana-maribel and @smythenyu. where: santana & quinn’s apartment. when: saturday 28th march. what: a booty call but with feelings~ warnings: nsfw, sex, swearing etc.

Rolling her eyes at his last text message, Santana tossed her phone in the coffee table in front of her. Whatever Santana and Sebastian had going on, put simply, just worked. It was easy, fun and surprisingly, uncomplicated. There were no bold declarations of love and neither of them were interested in exploring any kind of relationship aspect. Truthfully, the whole damn world was probably surprised that it hadn’t before now. Sure, they got drunk or high and fooled around a ton before but now it was happening more and more often sober. Her thoughts occasionally circled back to their matching, marked wrists. If she believed, truly believed in it, being soulmates with Seb wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world, would it? Unclear. Almost as if he could hear her thoughts, she heard the front door of their apartment open. Of course he had his own key. She was lazy, this was convenient, it just made sense. She didn’t take her eyes off of the television in front of her, where she was scrolling through netflix to find the film he wanted. Normally she would fight him a little, make him watch something that she wanted. But she hadn’t seen him in a few days and though she would never admit it, she missed his company a little. Jesse had already swung by the apartment and picked up Quinn, so they had the place to themselves. “I’m gonna’ start watching Die Hard, you take too long to do anything today,” she called out, waiting for him to join her on the couch.

Sebastian had driven to Santana’s, so it wasn’t long from the last text to him entering the door, shutting it behind him and noticing the girl on the sofa. “I wasn’t long at all,” he shot back, kicking off his shoes and moving to sit down beside her, glancing at the tv and settling back, his arm around her shoulders. “You’re just impatient,” he replied, smirking a little as he finally looked at her. “Gotta learn to be able to wait for a good thing, babe.” He’d been trying his best not to overthink their relationship as of lately. But with everyone going on about soulmates non stop, it was kinda hard to not even consider the possibility. The sex was good, they were almost too similar in nature, and they were both hot, but that didn’t mean that they were soulmates, more like good friends who fucked. Sebastian still thought the entire idea of it was stupid. Why does someone or something else get to decide who you’re meant to be with for the rest of your life? Perhaps, seeing his parents, who had once thought they were soulmates, getting divorced when he was young really thwarted his view, but also he saw it everyday. “Have you got any snacks? Or booze?” he asked Santana, pushing the thoughts from his head. “I really could use a beer.”

Their friendship pre-fwb was startlingly similar to what it was now; he’d come over, or she’d go to his place, they’d drink, shoot the shit, occasionally fool around. It was a comfort to her, that between them, nothing had really changed, too much. They kissed a lot more now and they fell asleep together too. But otherwise, it was business as usual between the two of them. She smiled at his comment, then clicked her tongue. She didn’t even want to make a bitchy remark at him. She was getting soft in the head. “Well, i’m glad you’re here anyway,” she admitted, leaning into his side when he placed his arm around her. How comforting he was. Santana nodded at his question and stood up, walking into the kitchen. Her Mama always taught her to take care of her guests, how to be the perfect little hostess. She grabbed two ice-cold beers from the fridge and several packets of chips from the pantry, before she came back into the living room, placing them on the coffee table in front of him. “Don’t say i’m not good to you,” she muttered, as she resumed her original position on the couch. She had seen this film before and enjoyed it well enough, but her thoughts were a thousand miles away from Bruce Willis, even though he looked like a particular snack in this film. “You know this is a Christmas movie, right? Why the hell are we watching it just now?” she asked, an eyebrow arched at him in curiosity.

“you’re an actual angel,” he drawled as she returned and passed him his beer, settling back again with his arm around her, a soft grin on his lips. he glanced back at the tv then, sipping his beer, his hand tracing patterns on her shoulder. “it’s an every day of the year movie, tana. shut up. let bruce willis be his sexy, masculine self.” despite his complaints, he found himself not paying a whole lot of attention to it, his hand having moved into her hair, finishing his beer and placing it down onto the coffee table. he grabbed a bag of chips and balanced them on his lap so he could eat with his free hand. “okay, bruce willis, alan rickman, bonnie bedelia, as they are in the film right now. fuck, marry, kill.”

She bit back whatever remark she was going to make, when he made his comment about her being an angel and smirked softly, tucking her legs underneath her on the couch, beer resting on her leg. It was a good movie and she ignored his snark laced comment, eyes focusing on the screen in front of them. It didn't take long before he began distracting her. This always happened. She tried to think of a time when they had put on a movie and actually got more than a quarter of the way through or god forbid actually finished it. She couldn't remember one single time. It just wasn't their style. She shuddered underneath his touch, fingers running through her hair and watched as he rustled with the bag of chips on his lap. His game made her laugh out loud and she nodded, glancing between him and the screen. "Ah fuck," she sighed, considering her options. "Fuck Bruce Willis because, look at him," she jabbed her elbow towards the screen. "Marry Alan Rickman because why the hell not and kill Bonnie Bedelia because that hair is giving me anxiety. Perms are fuckin' gross," she answered before taking a gulp of her beer. "Same question to you," she shot back, nudging him in the side with her finger.

Sebastian chuckled, placing his bag of chips aside but continuing to play with her hair, smirking at her answers to the question. He nodded though, "I'd marry Bruce Willis, because then we could also fuck til he lost his hair and I asked for a divorce. I'd fuck Alan Rickman, rest in peace, and I'd kill Bonnie too. Her hair is definitely too much." His attention was no longer on the tv now at all. He'd seen Die Hard a million times anyway, and Santana was right there. He turned his head, nuzzling into her neck. "Fuck, marry, kill. Me, Aubrey, Finn."

It was one of her favourite things about Sebastian, the fact that he didn't see gender; he saw a conquest. Despite the fact she tended to keep exclusively to cock now, she too had been known to enjoy the same gender. College girls were curious and really, it would be rude not to help them out. She nodded approvingly at his answers, fiddling with the label on her bottle. She was thinking of a selection of her own when he started speaking again. She raised an eyebrow at him, mulling over the options as she drained her beer and sat the empty on the table. This was an interesting question, for sure. "Fuck Hudson because I kind of wonder if the whole size = 'size' thing is true and he's like over a foot taller than me. Marry Aubrey because he's a sweetheart and kill you because you've served your purpose now," she teased, fingertips tracing his smooth jawline. She was joking. Mostly. "Same question, but replace you with me."

Sebastian's lips parted as if offended, pushing her back though there was a slight smile tugging at his lips. "Wow, okay. I'd kill you too then, you'll never know my original answers and I guess if you're done with me you won't want to fuck tonight either," he shot back at her, crossing his arms and pouting as he leant back against the arm of the couch, his feet against her thighs to keep them apart.

"I bet I can guess your original answers," she replied, fighting off her own smile tugging at her lips, as he pushed her hand away and pretended to be mad. "Kill Finn, naturally. Fuck Aubrey because hate fucking is amazing and marry me because we would have like the most chill and open marriage ever." She wasn't sure she was correct but her voice was confident as she spoke. She scoffed at his reaction, "c'mon, I was only teasing," she murmured, running a hand up the inside of his thigh.

Sebastian kept his arms crossed, a pout still on his lips as he refused to look at her. "I guess you'll never know if you're right," he huffed, although she was definitely right. "As if you would kill me," he continued, trying not to think about Santana's hand moving up his thigh and focus instead on his fake pouting. "Like I am clearly the superior one out of me, Aubrey, and Finn. Frankly, I wonder now about your taste, Santana."

She couldn't explain why she had chosen Finn as her fuck instead of him, it was weird. She had been poised to kill him off in their little game but when the push came to the shove, she couldn't do it. "Of course you are baby," she cooed, her fingers still trailing up his thigh, settling on his dick. God, she loved their games. "I mean my taste must be pretty terrible if i'm doing this," she countered, an eyebrow raised as she reached for his zipper.

Sebastian bit down on his bottom lip as her hand moved over his crotch, glancing down as she moved to pull down the zipper. "I should at least be your fuck," he murmured quietly, a little distracted by her movements. "Although, really..." he trailed off, forgetting what new complaint he had for now, reaching to pull Santana closer.

He had folded quickly for him, hungry eyes watching as he bit down on his lip. Victorious, he pulled her closer and she pressed a kiss to his neck. "It's a game, you get to fuck me for real, unless you're gonna' be a whiny bitch," she murmured against his skin, as she kissed down, not even needing to look at her hands on his zipper. She'd done this so many times it was like muscle memory.

Sebastian sighed softly, relaxing back into the sofa now, his hand sliding back into Santana's hair as she kissed down from his neck. "No whining," he agreed, licking his lips as he lifted his hips slightly, eager for her touch. "Promise," he continued, pulling her back up to kiss her deeply, his tongue slipping past her teeth and his hand tightening in her hair.

One hand snaked around his neck, pulling him close to her, threading through the back of his hair. The other, found its way down into his boxers and wrapped around his cock, pumping gently. Their kiss, as always, was electrifying, as the two of their tongues battled for dominance. For someone who had such a hard-on for control, Santana always found herself willing to submit to him. This was easily proven as his hand tightened in her hair and she let out a soft gasp into his mouth, breaking the kiss slightly. "Seb..." she muttered quietly.

Sebastian groaned quietly against her lips, thrusting his hips up and into her touch. He kissed her deeply, his other hand smoothing down her back and over her ass, pulling back to catch his breath, his eyes dark. "Mhm," he hummed, "I knew you wanted me..." He smirked, pressing another kiss to her lips before reaching to tug at the hem of her shirt, pulling it up to reveal her bra, chucking it to the side.

She scowled at his words, hating that she was like putty in his hands. She wasn't too mad, really though. This was pretty high on her list of favourite things to do. She allowed him to lift up her top, pulling her hand out of his underwear and raising both of them above her head as he discarded the item of clothing before she returned the favour and pulled at the collar of his. "Off, Seb. Take it off," she demanded softly.

Sebastian chuckled, smirking but sitting up just enough to tug his shirt up and off for her, throwing it aside before lying back and pulling her over him. His hands slid up her back, smoothing under the band of her bra, kissing her slowly as he rocked his hips up just slowly against hers. "Wanna ride me?" he whispered against her ear.

She was grateful that Quinn and Jesse had left the apartment because they were not being subtle in the slightest, as she moved her legs to either side of his, straddling him on the couch. Her body instinctively moved with his, as she ground against him. This. This was why she always wore skirts or dresses when he was around. Easy access. She nodded at his question, shuddering under the feeling of his breath, hot on her ear, but didn't miss a beat to make a bitchy remark. "You're fuckin' lazy," she whispered back, arms circling around his neck.

Sebastian just grinned wider at that, "You like riding me," he shot back, tilting his head so their lips brushed as he continued to rock his hips up against her, growing harder in his underwear. His fingers moved to the clasp of her bra then, unhooking it easily with one hand and raising an eyebrow. "You don't wanna?"

She shrugged off her bra, letting it fall off to the side carelessly, to join their ever-growing pile of clothes, before moving her arms back to his neck. "I didn't say that," she replied simply, pressing her chest flush against his. "Just observing," she joked, as she moved back on her knees a little, giving a gentle tug at his underwear and jeans. "You want me to ride you, gotta take these off."

Sebastian's hands slid up her sides as she pressed against him, pouting as she pulled back but not hesitating to reach down to shove his jeans and underwear down his legs in one go, kicking them off. He bent over then, grabbing a condom from his jeans pocket and settling back as he reached to pull her closer, dropping it beside them. "You need to be naked too," he murmured, his hands moving down to her hips.

She rolled her hips against him a few times more before acquiescing to his request. She stood up and shimmied her skirt down from her hips, kicking it away from her feet. Her underwear swiftly followed and now they were both completely naked, she hopped back on his lap and pressed her face into his neck, sinking her teeth down and sucking gently as she ground on him a little, just to tease.

Sebastian bit his lip as he watched her completely undress, grinning as she moved back over him. He lifted his hips up against her, rocking with her slowly and groaning quietly. His hands moved over her sides and up over her chest as he tilted his head back.

They were a mess of breathy pants, hands running all over one another, mouths moving together in unison. It was consuming and she knew that she needed more. Wordlessly, she lifted the condom from next to them on the couch and lifted it to her mouth, ripping the foil open with her teeth. She didn't wait for permission before she rolled the rubber down his cock, tossing the foil behind her. That would be later hers problem. "More," she groaned in his ear.

Sebastian pulled back as she did, eyes following her as she grabbed the condom, slowly grinning and leaning back as she rolled it down over his cock. “Fuck yes,” he murmured, shifting to place his feet down against the sofa, his hands moving to her hips.

That was the best thing about fucking your best friend; they know everything you like and vice versa. She knew the right way to roll her hips, the dirty words to whisper in his ear, but she always switched it up a little, just so it didn't get stale. Seb's hands on her hips spurned her on a little as she hovered over his cock, small hand wrapped around the base, teasing him.

Sebastian groaned again, lifting his hips up slightly, his hands smoothing up her sides and back over her hips. “You’re so hot,” he whispered, his eyes dark. They knew each other’s bodies so well at this point that they both knew exactly what the other wanted, and it was a large reason Sebastian continued the fwb arrangement they had. People often said how sex ruined friendships, but if anything it only made Sebastian and Santana closer.

She smirked at his comment approvingly, he knew exactly what to say to butter her up. Pleased with his words and feeling like she'd tortured him just the right amount, she finally sank down on his cock, eyes rolling into the back of her head at the sensation of being utterly filled. She stilled her movements for a moment, allowing her body to get used to the feeling. Sebastian not only exuded big dick energy, he had the goods to back it up too.

Sebastian’s head fell back and he groaned once more as she sank down over him, his hands tightening on her hips. He stayed still for a moment though, knowing she’d move when she was ready. “‘Feel so good,” he whispered breathily, his lips parted as he looked up at her.

Satisfied, she began to roll her hips against his, her arms wrapped around his neck, face buried into his shoulder as she let out soft groans at the sensation. Without even trying, he reached that sweet spot inside of her. Every time she thrust her hips against his, she could feel her fingertips start to tingle. "Fuck, so full," she breathed into his skin.

Sebastian gasped, rocking his hips up to meet hers, his hands sliding up her sides, pulling her down to kiss her messily, groaning into her mouth. He pulled back briefly, grinning slightly as he sat up, his arm winding around her waist, continuing to thrust his hips up into her.

If sex with anyone else was good, sex with Sebastian was practically god tier. He was an arrogant prick but god, he could back it up completely. She never could last very long when she was on top, not with the way she rolled her hips smoothly and how he thrust from underneath. She tangled her fingers in the back of his hair and gave a sharp tug, smirking as she did.

Sebastian moaned as she pulled at his hair, tilting his head back but his eyes staying on her, lips parted as he panted softly. “Fuck, Tana,” he groaned, his nails scraping down her back slightly, thrusting up faster.

Falling apart in Sebastian's lap was one of her favourite things in the entire world. Her thighs tightened against his involuntarily, as her moans echoed around the living room, her thrusts going from smooth and measured to erratic and frantic. Another tug of his hair and thrust upwards from him and she was coming, hard.

Sebastian gasped, thrusting up harder, losing his rhythm a little as he felt his stomach tightening. When he felt her tense and come he couldn’t hold back any longer, coming hard suddenly and moaning out her name.

She rocked her hips against his slowly, riding them both through their respective orgasms. She slumped against his chest, listening to his erratic heartbeat thud away in his chest. She didn't make any effort to move straight away, body twitching as the aftershocks ran through her. She pressed a kiss to his temple and smoothed down the back of his hair. "You're so fucking good at that," she murmured.

Sebastian relaxed back against the pillows of the sofa, his arms loosening around her, head tilting back as he closed his eyes. He smiled widely, lazily, humming at that. “You’re pretty good yourself, gorgeous,” he murmured.

She kissed him on the temple again, before she sat back on his lap, groaning at the sensation of him still inside her overly sensitive pussy. "We're good at it," she agreed, before she stood up, disentangling her sweaty limbs from his. Her thighs were slick from her arousal but she felt too lazy to take a shower, so she grabbed her underwear and his shirt, haphazardly pulling them on before flopping down next to him on the couch. "Wanna finish the film?" she asked.

Sebastian breathed out as she pulled off, lying back and not even grabbing his underwear yet. He tugged the condom off slowly and tied it, holding it up to her with a grimace, “Wanna put this in the bin first?”

She went to bite back but instead took the condom from him, wrinkling her nose at the wetness. She turned on her heel, "lazy prick," she muttered as she walked to the kitchen and disposed of it in the trash can. She washed her hands then grabbed a couple of glasses and the open bottle of bourbon that was sitting out on the counter. "Don't say i'm not good to you, Seb," she teased, as she sat back down next to him.

Sebastian just grinned as she took it, moving now to grab his underwear, tugging it on before settling back on the sofa. He glanced up as she returned, “So good to me, babe,” he murmured, moving to take the bottle and pouring them both a glass. “The dream,” he said, lifting his glass to clink against Santana’s.

She smiled knowingly, as they clinked their glasses together. Fumbling around with her free hand, she located the television remote from down the side of the cushions and put the film back a little. "So, satisfy my curiosity. What were your choices earlier, during fuck, marry, kill? Tell me I was right."

Sebastian leant back, placing his feet on the coffee table, sliding his arm down the back of the sofa. He glanced at her as she asked that, sighing and shrugging, too chilled out after his orgasm to actually care about that anymore. “Yes, you were right.”

She curled into him, eyes on the screen in front of them, free hand tracing patterns up his smooth, unblemished thigh. She didn't really care about the game they were playing but she always liked to know when she was right about something. "Good to know," she hummed, a little smugly.

“Because seriously, who would wanna fuck Finn?” he said, raising his eyebrows as he looked at Santana, sipping at his drink, apparently still not completely over that.

She rolled her eyes at his comment but didn't turn to look at him. "Why not?" she asked, fingertips toying with the rim of the glass.

“He just looks like he’s bad in bed,” he murmured, glancing at her again. “Why do you find him attractive?”

She shook her head at his comment, finally tilting her face to look at him. She lifted the glass to her mouth and took a generous gulp of the amber liquid, as she considered his question. Why was she currently interested all of a sudden? "I don't know. He's sweet. Besides, who says I'm going to fuck him, hm?" she countered.

“Since when are you into ‘sweet’ guys?” he pushed, “If you were into sweet guys you’d be fucking mr jaw line who’s always following you around.”

"Are you high?" she asked, a little incredulously, as he snapped at her. This was completely out of the ordinary. "Wait - are you jealous?"

Sebastian huffed slightly, “No I’m not high, or jealous, c’mon. What does Finn have that I don’t have ten times better? There’s nothing to be jealous of.”

"Then what the fuck is this?" she gestured at him, dark eyes trained on his. She would have laughed out loud if she didn't think that it would make things worse. "It's not about anything you have or he has, it was a joke, mi amor."

Sebastian bit his lip, not sure why he’d got caught up on that, sitting back and staying quiet for a long moment. “I don’t know. Sorry,” he murmured, his head ducked as he ran a hand through his hair.

The room fell silent for a moment, the television was the only thing making any noise as she watched him curiously. She had really gotten under his skin with this one. Part of her wanted to push, the other part didn't want to annoy him further. Of course the former won out. "Seriously, what's going on?" she asked.

Sebastian shook his head, “Nothing,” he replied, although a part of him knew he was lying. “Nothing’s going on.”

She laced her fingers through his and squeezed softly. They weren't just friends who had sex, they were best friends. Which meant that she could read him like a book. "It's not nothing, I have way more stamina than you, so you might as well just tell me what's going on," she offered with a slight shrug of her shoulder.

Sebastian clenched his jaw, glancing down at their hands, not sure why he had turned things so sour suddenly, he’d been so blissed out only a few moments ago. “I don’t know! Maybe I just thought if anyone is gonna pick me it’d be you.”

"I'll always pick you," she murmured, "hence why i'm here, with you and not with him." She brushed the pad of her thumb over the back of his hand. She felt her stomach twist a little with what she assumed was guilt. "I'm sorry."

Sebastian’s shoulders sank slightly, “No, it doesn’t matter,” he murmured, pulling his hand away to run it through his hair, eyes moving back to the tv.

"Seb..." she pleaded. This was the weirdest situation that she had been in with him. If not jealousy, then what was this? He must know, deep down, she would always pick him. They were best friends and sometimes it felt like he was her only friend. Sighing, she knew when to stop pushing him. A little defeated and hurt, she settled her own hands on her lap.

Sebastian leant back, his foot tapping unconsciously, sighing, “I don’t believe in soulmates, you know that,” he murmured. “But what if you do? It’s not like you think I’m your soulmate, even if we joke about it.”

She felt her eyebrows lift at his statement. Why did everything in the entire world come back to this bullshit? "You're the closest thing that i'm going to get to a soulmate," she shot back instantly. "You know I don't care about that shit and let's get real, if they did exist, Finn would not be my soulmate, or Aubrey, or any of those idiots."

Sebastian wasn’t the kind to get attached, like ever. But his relationship with Santana was different. It was built on friendship, and he was genuinely worried about losing her. He sighed, glancing at her now. “Sorry,” he said, feeling like an idiot. “I know. I’m being an idiot.”

She shook head head at him gently, before nudging his arm to let her back in. Their relationship wasn't conventional, but she'd never really considered the prospect of Sebastian finding his soulmate and stopping whatever they had going on. Now, it was weighing on her mind. "You're not being an idiot, I get it," she whispered, kissing him on the cheek. "I love you, Seb. You're my best friend."

Sebastian tilted his head, his arm falling around her, leaning down to kiss her softly on the lips. “You’re my best friend too,” he murmured, holding her close again. “And I love you,” he continued, stroking his hand down her arm gently. “Guess I’m just letting people get into my head. Soulmates are bullshit. We have a good thing, and we’re not.”

She kissed him back sweetly, savouring the quiet, real moments that they had together. This was the shift that had been happening in their relationship, their friendship. The rare moments they acted like an actual couple and the layers of snark and bitchyness were forgotten. "Who's been getting in that big ol' brain of yours?" she asked curiously.

“I dunno, I was talking to Jesse and he kept saying how Quinn was definitely his soulmate,” he murmured, pulling Santana into his lap, “And like, he doesn’t really know that. I guess I just started thinking about it. Maybe too much.”

She let out a sigh, of course it was Jesse. He'd gotten in her head too about it. She settled comfortably into his lap, "unsurprisingly, he got to me about it too," she confessed, thinking back to their conversation through text. "I mean how do they even know they're soulmates? It's a stupid concept and I don't like the idea. I always feel that no one decides my fate but me."

Sebastian wound both his arms around her, meeting her eyes. “They don’t. Pretty sure they haven’t even got a ‘bond’ or anything.” He nodded, “But me too. I don’t like the idea of something else deciding who I’m ‘meant to be with’. It’s stupid.”

She nodded in agreement. "I'm fairly certain that neither of them would shut the fuck up about it if they had one," she chuckled, knowing both halves of the couple. It was hard to ignore the elephant in the room but she was an expert at burying feelings and pretending they didn't exist. "So let's not let them decide for us," she mused aloud, before tilting his face up towards hers with his index finger and pressing a searing kiss on his lips.

Sebastian looked at her as she tilted his head toward her, smiling against her lips and lifting a hand to cup her cheek as he kissed back. “Mhm, okay,” he murmured softly, before continuing to kiss her, deepening it as his hand slid into her hair.

It was a tried, tested and almost always, foolproof method to get either of them out of a slump; more sex. She sighed happily into his lips, one hand rubbing at his neck, the other was trailing down his chest, fingernails dragging down his skin.

Sebastian leant back into the sofa, his hands smoothing up her back underneath her shirt, groaning quietly against her lips. Despite having just had sex, he wasn’t going to say no. This was just how they worked.

This was what the drinking and the fucking was for; to forget. To pretend like their momentary blip of emotion hadn't actually happened, that they were just simply two people who liked good sex and a lot of it. She lifted his shirt over her head and tossed it back to the floor, relishing his touch on her bare skin.

Sebastian moved to push her back to lie down, settling over her as he kissed her slowly. He slid his hands up her side again, turning his head to kiss under her jaw.

She shifted from his lap and laid back on the couch, spreading her legs to let him settle between them more comfortably. She brushed her fingers through his hair and ghosted her other hand across his shoulder, shivering as he placed soft kisses down her neck.

“Should we move to the bedroom,” he murmured, raising an eyebrow as he pulled back and smirked, tilting his head, his hand moving down her chest.

Santana nodded, a little breathlessly. It was getting late and Quinn would no doubt be home soon. She didn't think that her roommate would appreciate walking in on them screwing on the couch. She lifted her glass to her mouth and finished off the bourbon, before grabbing their clothes from the floor. "C'mon," she whispered, "you can show me how much you don't want to lose me through there." She gave his arm a sharp tug, leading them through the apartment and to her bedroom, closing the door on whatever doubts either of them had about the future.

#001.#face to face: seb.#face to face.#we started this on dash hence the initial longer replies.

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ptw30 · 6 years ago

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Regarding that post of "my friend told me dw is mad about the large female audience" whether that's true or not, what option do you think would be best for DW to take in this position? making another reboot where the messages and writing this audience hated so much can finally be fixed? so they can relaunch their merch and target it more towards women? Or maybe making this reboot more appealing to men and succed with their "boy toys" and "boy property"? (1/4)

Though i just see this last one failing miserably, they already tried it once and it didn’t work. I might be young (and correct me if i’m wrong) but fandom culture seems pretty female dominated to me? Like even people outside of the binary gender (a minority group in the current society) seem to overtake the few men who engaged in the fandoms I’ve been before. (2/4)

It might be cause I only get into cartoon fandoms and that doesn’t appeal to adult men as much as it does to adult women, it might be cause of the misogynistic “ew! a crazy fangirl” view, probably fandoms are safe places for oppressed groups or they simply have different interests than mine. (¾)

I’m sure there’re more factors at play but whatever it is, DW is just wasting their time trying to appeal to a small part of their audience when they already had this large group (which is pretty diverse in gender and orientation) and they could win us back if they try. This shouldn’t be looked as a disappointment but more like an opportunity (um wtf DW??) But how do you think they should take that step? (srry for the rant, got some strong feelings about this)

First, can I interest you in a cookie? Maybe get your mind off me writing an entire marketing plan for DreamWorks?

Before we go into “boys property” - we need to note that brands don’t focus one target market.

When I headed four brands, each brand had primary, secondary, and even tertiary markets. For our main brand, we had six target segments, three primary. Did we care about the others? Yeah, but we didn’t highlight them half as much in marketing campaigns or collateral.

That means that most likely, Voltron wasn’t a “boys” franchise, so much as one of the target markets DreamWorks wanted to hit were boys, ages 7 to 15. Their secondary market was probably older males who had seen the original series, and either a secondary or tertiary market was older female viewers who also watched DotU.

I need to note - I used to wear Voltron shirts all the time. When I wore VLD shirts, I heard from girls, generally 18-30. Almost all had a favorite character and knew the next season drop date.

When I wore DotU shirts, I heard from guys. When I asked the men, “Hey, do you like the new show?” every single one told me they’d never heard of it.

Now, fandom, as a whole, DreamWorks probably doesn’t care about. No, really. Fandom can make their fanart, celebrate the story, whatever floats their boat; DreamWorks doesn’t care.

What DreamWorks cares about is sales. (They don’t even care about viewership if they’re distributing through Netflix because Netflix releases no numbers. All DW cares about is that Netflix orders more episodes.)

So are the toys selling? No. Then that’s not working. Are the shirts selling? Yeah? Oh, maybe we need to focus there. Who is buying the shirts?

But it’s actually hard to say for sure what’s working when all we know for sure is what’s not working. We can assume by the sudden increase in T-shirt stock on Hot Topic, especially those in women sizes, that these shirts are selling. We can also assume from Amazon having every single shirt in every single style - men, women, and children - that those shirts are selling.

I can also tell you from my sister and mom’s holiday shopping experience that Hot Topic says they cannot keep VLD merchandise on the shelf. I’m not sure if that’s factual or just the ramblings of an overzealous seller.

My point is - from the data we can see, we can assume that women are the majority viewership and it’s women with disposal income, 18-40, or so.

(I also want to note, I actually like the cut of a men’s shirts better.)

However, we don’t know that Voltron isn’t engaging with young male viewers, just that young male viewers seemingly aren’t buying merchandise. And as someone with at least seven different toys from VLD - I can tell you women are.

So what does that mean for DreamWorks?

There are a few factors that will determine what DreamWorks will do or has decided to do going forward. Most likely, they are going to want a variety of series, each one with a focused set of primary markets. So whether any new Voltron series will want to hit the “boys market” depends on if any other show in DreamWorks’ hopper is set to hit the boys’ market. I’m sure currently 3Below and potentially Fast & Furious are the supposed to hit those markets, so if they’re looking to making money on toy sales - well, F&F probably has the most potential.

However, as @nomadicism can tell you in more detail, the toy market is effectively broken, and Voltron did suffer from distribution issues. (The videos from last year’s Toy Fair confirm this.) So I would need to see DreamWorks’ toy sales to know for sure if that’s even something worth pursuing.

Ignoring that for just a moment - recent thought leadership in marketing is looking at agile delivery methods and strategies. Therefore, if DreamWorks stumbled upon a lucrative target market with disposal income, then yes - they should want to milk that and they should have the infrastructure to switch target markets and merchandise - not on a dime but in an acceptable time frame. And they have.

However, as @sol1056 wrote earlier this week - it really depend on the person - or demographic - making the decisions, which will say whether marketing and merchandising will want to focus on women as a target market, despite or because of their monetary value.

After all, Young Justice had a large female fanbase. That was the reason Cartoon Network cancelled the show, and from what I’ve seen from the Season 3 thus far, the EPs focused hard on trying to gain that male market they originally didn’t lure the first two seasons. In doing so, they lost me, at least, as a viewer.

Going forward - what should DreamWorks do?

Young Justice just started streaming this month, so it’s hard to say if this darker turn will affect the story going forward. It’s hard to say if the darker start can’t be changed by a fulfilling ending to the season. What I can say is - Greg Weisman said earlier this week that the show hasn’t been greenlit for a fourth season. (It’s also on DCU, which no doubt has a smaller viewership than Netflix.)

While women dominate the fandom, the question remains - are they buying? If women really are shilling out dough for VLD merchandise (*looks at her Shiro shirts*), then DreamWorks execs should take notice and decide, “This is where we should throw our lot with any sequel.”

I can’t go much into details without getting too personal, but CEOs are beginning to create strategy from social media, thanks to Millennials. (That’s not to say that letters or calls to DreamWorks aren’t weighed more heavily because they are.) Millennials want a personalized online experience. They want to engage with media on their own terms, an experience crafted toward their preferences, and they live with a mini-computer in their hands. They live on social media, though that, too, is dominated by women.

But CEOs see social media posts as not having a filter, and though I have serious misgivings about taking social medias as the only source of research, I’m sure DreamWorks is doing or has done professional market research. They know what products are selling, whose buying them, and what these people want to see, in order to encourage them buy more.

It’s telling that the only shirts ever produced for VLD, especially their newest ones -

- all have the paladins and their symbols, after supposedly the lore was discarded after Season 2.

Ignoring that the lore might be coming back - Marketing has created only a handful of new shirts post-Season 2 with a different paladin line-up - the majority of which were Monster & Mana designs and one shirt with Allura in the split screen.

NOTHING AGAINST ALLURA. I just mean that seemingly, either merchandising doesn’t think post-Season 2 formations won’t sell or they tested in some way and know they won’t sell. Or they aren’t even willing to try, seeing the fandom backlash from later seasons.

But if shirts are selling - and they appear to be, by the number of styles - are those numbers or projected numbers enough to forgo a “boys’ market” and focus all efforts on a primary target market of women?

Considering DreamWorks already made the decision to make Hyperphase Voltron a con exclusive and go from selling less than twenty shirts on HT to more than 100 items, to go from selling few shirts on Amazon to uploading new ones in April and October 2018, and January 2019 - I think the question isn’t if DW should focus on women.

That’s why I question the anon who said that DreamWorks is contemplating what to do with their series - since DreamWorks seems to have completed market research, selected a new primary target market, and made drastic changes to merchandising in order to reach that target market - women.

Now, DreamWorks just need to focus on expanding that market, and how do they do that?

With new content that speaks to that market, or y’know, a fix-it sequel.

#voltron #voltron critical #answered #it's a marketing thing #othxrstar #dreamworks #vld season 8 #merchandising

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its-just-like-the-movies · 7 years ago

Text

Tom & Viv (94, C+)

Why this film: Because it lined up so perfectly with this month’s Smackdown! So how could I not?

The Film: Who exactly was the predicted audience for Tom & Viv back in 1994? I don’t mean this exclusively as a dig on the source material or the finished product, but it’s hard to picture that the story of T.S. Eliot’s tumultuous marriage would’ve inspired that much fervor back in the day. The adaptation of the original play began nine years after it debuted on the West End, receiving one Laurence Olivier nomination before getting an off-Broadway run and vanishing from the stage for over twenty years. This lack of fanfare seems even more exasperated by its legacy nowadays, if it can be called that, saved from obscurity by way of two surprisingly high-profile Academy Award nominations that would still only attract those who’re deeply invested in either of the nominated women, Oscar completists who are doing it just cuz, folks who like watching period dramas about unstable women, or T.S. Eliot fans.

Of those groups, I’d imagine that the Eliot fans interested in a portrait of the artist would be the most consistently underwhelmed by the film, if only because his work is kept strictly in the film’s periphery. It’s talked about but rarely read aloud or shown, the focus on the Eliot’s marriage so predominant that his rising success and the income that comes with it is dramatized through their material wealth more that it is explicitly referenced, at least not to the degree of any of their personal lives. In fact, Eliot’s personal life and family ties don’t seem to exist outside of Viv until his fames grows, while Viv’s relationships to her family is one of the film’s central points of tension. The repercussions of Eliot’s fame are certainly discussed, as Viv worries that Tom is replacing her with his new poet friends and having affairs with women in those circles who’re dazzled by his work. There’s also the complication that Viv frequently claims to be his muse, his editor, and his sounding board, demanding credit for having given The Wasteland its name. This is not a hagiography of the artist, but the film’s focus on Eliot’s marriage and interest in Viv’s artistic credentials might keep this from being the deep plumbing of the artist someone might be hunting for.

Then again, an even bigger preclusion for Eliot fans to get into the film is how unfathomably dull Willem Dafoe is in the part. Any potential into getting a portrait of the man alongside or even superseding a portrait of the artist is stopped in its tracks by Dafoe’s soft-spoken, milquetoast take on the part. The man simply comes off as boring and stuffy, never worthy of the intrigue posed by Viv, his fellow poets, adoring fans, or anyone who presumes him to be a worthwhile figure. Dafoe is so passionless in the part, speaking his lines as softly as possible while infusing them with zero emotion, refusing to cling to any sense of intellect or to make his accent sound remotely natural, that there’s simply no believing that he might be having an affair with any of the women Viv is terrified of and antagonistic towards. What on earth could have drawn Viv to him in the first place?

Dafoe’s performance represents one half of the dichotomy of problems that best defines what makes Tom & Viv such a palpably uneven experience. If he stands in for the moments where the film could easily shape itself up more, Miranda Richardson’s energized but dangerously overmannered take on Vivienne Eliot emblematizes the film’s worst indulgences into overstatement. Richardson is more than capable of conjuring an air of instability and roiling inner turmoil, writing our her character’s thoughts through the darting glances of her eyes and jittery movements, but her madness becomes so prescriptive that it loses almost all spontaneity. In her best moments, which see her being more clearly guided by the director or by her costars, Richardson is able to temper herself slightly without sacrificing her tics, though it’s clear in these moments how little modulation is actually in the performance, aside from the moments where she makes a point of showing us that she’s modulating the performance in a lower tempo. True, she genuinely calms down in the film’s last act, but her impact before this point is ultimately limited, her scene-by-scene choices too obvious for them to build in any interesting way.

The film itself seems to follow a trajectory from being too hopped-up on its own, sporadically ostentatious filmmaking techniques all the way to almost dangerously non-cinematic, not so much a filmed play as just unimaginatively put together. This is not to say that the film is ever a showcase for its makers - director Brian Gilbert seems more than happy to slap his actors in period wares and let them carry the picture - but it’s still noticeable when the editing or the score become the primary method for the film to goose our responses. Its earliest scenes are by far the worst, as the almost 40 year old Dafoe is so heavily made up to impersonate a college-aged youth that his face loses any and all distinguishing features. He looks like a doll whose face has had any gendered characteristics smoothed away, as if he were an uncanny valley animation of an androgynous doll. Richardson’s makeup is fine, but she’s forced to pantomime the free-spirited behavior of a young person by running around with her arms outstretched as though she were a plane, galavanting on a lawn with a sign asking passerby not to galavant on it. In the next scene they meet, and in the next they pack their bags to get married. These scenes are relatively calm, something the film compensates for by showing Viv undergoing an abject breakdown, destroying their hotel room and taking a lot of her prescribed medication after an unsuccessful roll in the honeymoon sack, dramatically cross-cut with Tom’s furrowed brow contemplatively paces the shoreline of a beach.

If the establishing third of Tom & Viv is ultimately its shakiest segment, there’s something to be said for the film’s middle third, as all the pieces start sparking against each other in unexpectedly bracing ways. Even if Dafoe is unforgivably bland and Richardson semi-predictable in her brazenness, the shifting textures of their relationship are more interesting to watch play out than expected. It helps that Brian Gilbert’s direction finds an appropriately undemonstrative but still semi-active mode of shaping his story. Neither truly imaginative nor fully perfunctory, he finds the right distance from Richardson’s whirlwinds that they become more impactful as character beats rather than harried actressing. Watching her mix a boiling vat of chocolate, grow more and more vocally irate at a dinner party, draw on a mannequin with lipstick, all these actions are more compelling for how they’re shot. Simple and effective, enhancing Richardson’s work and feeding into the story with unexpected poignancy as we start to grasp how threatened Vivienne must constantly feel by these invaders who can provide something for her husband she cannot, knowing all the while that they know it too and are talking about it behind her back. This is not to suggest too much of a sudden transformation in the film’s overall style or impact - Dafoe is still left to softly murmur on in his scenes, and the cadres of artists and admirers that pop up around him are never as distinct or entrancing as they might be. Especially as he starts to seriously consider kicking Viv in a sanitarium, growing increasingly weary of her behavior, Dafoe’s performance remains as damp and demure as ever. Her fears of adultery never ring as plausible, Dafoe even drags down Richardson and the script with as little effort as possible on his part. A hot-blooded Tom might’ve really tapped in to the script’s dramatic potential, but the sight of Viv fighting so hard against people who could all have a legitimate claim to her husband’s attention, borne from paranoia that doesn’t seem borne from absolutely nothing is frankly more compelling than it has any right to be. There’s clearly a version of this story about an unreliable man sending his unreliable wife to a sanitarium on dubious grounds, one stifled by a weak leading man and half-baked direction but still able to burst through the interpretation we’re getting at odd, unexpected angles.

There is at least one unabashed bright spot in the film, in the form of Rosemary Harris’s subtly affecting performance as the matriarch of the Haigh-Wood clan. Without ever working to undermine Tom & Viv’s leading actors, she nevertheless coaxes stronger, more consistent performances from Dafoe and especially Richardson, stabilizing the latter without forgoing Mrs. Haigh-Wood’s own characterization. The film is at its best when it follows the lead of her perfectly contained but still very palpable anxiety, and is never better than in the uncomfortable sequence of Tom having dinner with Vivienne’s immediate family for the first time. Viv spends most of the meal asking provocative, blatantly upsetting questions of her loved ones. Her family telegraph exhaustion at having had this kind of dinner table conversation too many times already but still irritated by her behavior, before Rose takes her daughter aside and gets her to actually calm down, only for her lucid confession about her feelings for Tom to startle her poor mother. It takes real intelligence to project a stable grasp of her daughter’s neuroses, worrying about her future with this new man while still finding room to be elated and disappointed by both of them without overacting. Particularly in her last scenes, hurt and confused after realizing that Viv tried to stab her - even if it was with a fake knife - but perhaps even more wounded that Tom packing Vivvie off to an asylum has proven how badly this man has failed Rose and her daughter, Harris proves herself an unfussy and emotionally sincere performer within a film less stable than its central marriage.

Harris is more of a face in the crowd in her second-to-last sequence, as one of several family members and doctors present for a verbal test to see if Vivienne is certifiable for sanitarium care. This is surprisingly the film’s weakest stretch, beginning with Tom trying to warn Viv before the doctors arrive as the two engage in unexpectedly romantic talk about the state of their relationship. Here, Richardson is the primary source of that romance, which comes across as sentimental and unearned considering that Viv is suddenly without her livewire physicality and higher pitched emotions. Now she speaks in a soft voice, speaks warmly, but she undermines any of the film’s complications by stating its theses in such a loving way. She’s not wrong to judge Tom for his own lies and put-ons and for not being able to face the music the way she wanted him to, but the fact that the Viv who’s saying this is so radically unlike the Viv we’ve spent the previous hour with undermines these ideas. And yet, her affectations return in an oddly performative key once the doctors arrive, as if she’s a deer caught in headlights and trying to hurl herself at them as the last defense mechanism she has left. That they even bother with the test instead of carting her right off after Viv attempts to stab her mother with a rubber knife is pretty bizarre in itself, but Richardson’s playing strips the scene of any dramatic potential or ambiguity as she intentionally answers one of the questions incorrectly. More than that, the filmmaking is complicit in romanticizing her last act of self-sabotage, as the score swells under close ups of Tom and Viv exchanging meaningful glances before she gives the wrong answer, the scene abruptly ending as if the test actually ended on the second question.

I said earlier that the film transitions from Viv-like over-enthusiasm to Tom-ish stultification, and though the scene above certainly fits that bill, a better description for the last third might be that they simply have no other function except as being the end to a story. Both partners, gracefully made up into middle age, speak of their devotion to each other despite the fact that Tom has not visited his wife or made any attempt to contact her at the sanitarium in ten years. Dafoe’s last scene is almost completely carried by the overwhelming, piano-heavy score as he gives the cold shoulder to an old friend Viv once said wanted to sleep with her. Meanwhile, Richardson finds the right tempo between containing the energy that’s defined her performance for most of the film while suggesting some genuine recovery over the past ten years. She’s relaxed and unsentimental in her final scene, giving a fond yet forceful line reading to “Chin up.”, as her brother tries not to cry, that’s more impactful than a line so blatantly structured as a farewell forever aimed at the heartstrings has a right to be. There’s little here that’s interesting in the way that the preceding half hour was, and Gilbert ranking the volume on that orchestra as the credits roll certified that I was far less moved than he was clearly expecting. If Tom & Viv ends as unevenly as it began, I’m not sure if what painfully doesn’t work is enough to dismiss the moments where it comes to some kind of bracing life. In the moments where Harris shows the pain of a mother watching her child implode, where Richardson’s neuroses click into place and the script’s darker subtexts are able to be furnished show the rich potential that this story ultimately has. Tom & Viv isn’t crying out for any retreads, and I’m not sure how much this story deserves to be saved from the unusual legacy of almost complete anonymity that only pedigreed English adaptations of biographies of poets resulting in two high-profile Oscar nominations can truly earn. But it’s not without its merits, and something this uneven has the kind of quiet but sturdy highs that can stand against its more visible and ungainly lows.

#my posts #my reviews #where were they then?

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unholyhelbiglinked · 7 years ago

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Pack Mentality | TWO

“Look at me, okay?” the man hissed his words out, almost like his saliva was filled with the very venom that dripped from his teeth. It should have burned, his own words as they slid past his throat, the conscious thoughts he was so prided for sharing. “That thing… that girl. She’s not like me, she’s not like you. She’s not like most.”

Grace resented that statement. One or two genetic differences didn’t’ make her completely different from the group of savage people surrounding her on every side. They were ready; ready for what she didn’t’ know. It’s not like she could take any of them without a formulated plan.

Her eyes darted between the group around her. They were all dressed in dark clothing, most of them bundled up against the cold. Grace was different. She struggled to keep her composure, struggled to keep her hold on something other than fear. If she focused too much on the fear she would end up on the front page of more than one tabloid.

The teenager had a feeling that they knew exactly what she was capable of, though. Her hair was standing up on end. “Look, I did nothing wrong. I’m just walking through the woods.”

One of the only girls in the group, the one the man kept teaching, was looking at the slick-haired human now. He smelled of hair gel and cigarette smoke. Maybe it was from something fancier, like cigars that were flown in exclusively in pine boxes. They were rolled and bound, finally being wrapped in think sheets of gold. But that was just a guess.

“She looks like me,” The girl said, more out of curiosity than anything. “How do you know you’re not in sighting murder here?”

“You’ll know.” The dark man lifted his chin, “But of course there are more blatant ways of figuring out exactly what we want to know.”

Grace tensed. Her heart was in her throat at this point, pounding so roughly against her palm that she could swear the strangers around her could hear it too. They couldn’t though, but someone had to. If she would get out of this alive, they had to.

In one swift motion, the hot edge of a blade slashed against the edge of Grace’s cheek. It was warm at first, the subtly of the pain dripping from the blood that now poured across her cheek. Her eyes were trained on the leaf coated ground. Her breathing was heavy, a rough heat followed, like a bee sting. The girl had gasped, close to covering her eyes, but instead, she grasped the man's upper arm.

“What the hell, Michel?” She glowered, “What did you just do!?”

“Relax, she’ll be fine.” He said, voice still steady with gravel, Grace was too stunned to stop him from placing his could touch under her chin. He lifted her gaze to his. “Won’t you?”

She swallowed unevenly, swatting his hand away. She knew the very wound he had created with a pocket knife was sealing in front of their eyes. It left a faded red line, but not he large scar it should have provided. Once again, the girl with sharp green eyes let out a breath that was similar to a gasp.

“See,” The man grinned “She’s not like us. She’s not human.”

Her mouth was dry, air filling her lungs to the point of not having much room left. Grace wanted to cough, to clear her throat and stop the cold sweat from collecting at the edge of her collarbone, but all eyes were already trained on hers.

The sheet of paper that was set up and ready to be written on for today’s lesson sat sweat soaked and crumbled as her fist tightened around its edge. She panted, eyes darting frantically around the room as the classroom around her seemed to freeze.

“Miss Helbig, is the thrilling theory of everything boring you enough to lose consciousness in the middle of my lecture?” The middle-aged woman leaned heavily against her desk. She stilled looked close to being fresh out of school, although she lost her thrill for teaching years ago. Her deep brown hair getting lighter with every passing year.

Grace blinked a few times, staring blankly. She didn’t even remember dozing off, much less what that incessant woman was droning on about beforehand. “No ma’am, I’m sorry.” Her voice was barely above a whisper, but it seemed acceptable enough for the class to keep moving with the lecture.

The lights had been dimmed, an old fashion projector cast an image into the dully painted walls. The glow was golden, an off-brand expo marker was drawing different graphs in attempts to visualize how everything coexisted in the world that was inhabited today.

The girl was still tense, her shoulders knotted as she gripped the edges of her desk, feeling the grains of wood dig into the pads of her fingers as she lowered herself into a slumped position of her seat. The plastic was cool as it pressed against the nave of her back. She tried to focus on breathing. Again, not wanting to lose control.

“Grace,” A slight whisper came from beside her, her gaze flashing over to the girl that was seated to the right of her. She was smaller, her dirty blonde hair cropped and styled in a way that only she could pull off. She was wearing a flannel that was way too big for her own good, but it looked warm- just like her deep turquoise gaze. “You okay?”

The blonde just nodded, against trying to keep her mouth from staying as dry as it was now. She knew that Hannah could see right through her, but she wasn’t going to grill her friend in the middle of a lecture. Grace was off the hook for now. The scent of rustic blood was sure to soak through the bandages that her mother had painfully wrapped around her leg earlier today.

Demi Helbig had always been the type of woman to think of everything, her cunning solutions and makeshift medicine skills constantly came in handy when it came to the issues that faced their family. She had taken fresh jasmine, layering the herb between each layer of bandages to mask the smell as much as possible.

The loud clanging of the school bell made her jump again, which Hannah was sharp to take notice of. Again, she stayed quiet, watching her friend carefully as she shoved the already crumpled page of notes into her bag. She was usually pristine, never wanting anything out of place, but at this point, Grace didn’t care.

Light poured through the windows of her truck, the grey sky was a collection of bold clouds and deeper colors. Grace had seen stuff like this before; the sign that snow was about to fall and a crisper time of the year would creep in.

When the sun started to set, the sky would fade to a vibrant orange, the clouds painted in deep maroon until everything eventually turned black. Grace always used to watch the color vanish from the sky. She would sit right by the lake, the quiet taking up most of her time.

“She’s not like us,”

The words fogged up her mind, a sharp chill filling most of her body as she let out a gasp. The sound was almost in unison to her side door creaking open. The leather steering wheel beneath her grasp nearly tore and changed shape like putty. It was malleable, her nails digging into the material.

“What is with you?” Hannah stood on the other end of the door. She had her hand resting above her head on the roof of the truck. Her foot was propped up on the base. She had her bag hanging from her shoulder. “We were supposed to meet in the courtyard.”

“Right,” Grace let out a breath. She glanced into her rearview mirror, letting her deep golden eyes take up most of the reflective surface. “I’m sorry. You’re right, I just… a lot has been going on.”

“Then talk to me about it.” Hannah let out a small huff of air as she hoisted herself into the passenger seat, slamming the door shut with a dull thud. She was turned completely in the chair, her fingers pressing against the dashboard. Her cheeks were red and irritated from the cold. “That is why I’m here.”

“That’s not why you’re here Hannah,” Grace scoffed “You’re here because you need a ride home.”

“Well yeah,” She stifled a smile “But that’s not the only reason. We’ve been friends for years, and I know when something more than a test in phycology is bothering you.”

Grace let out a long breath, pressing her back into the plush seat. Just like her father, she knew that Hannah would be upset about her going out in the middle of the night without at least one person by her side. Without her. She clenched her jaw, tasting the familiar copper that often plagued her.

“You have to promise not to get mad.”

“How can I promise if I don’t know what you did.”

“You can’t really, but it helps.”

“Okay,” The smaller girl breathed out “Okay fine.”

Grace swallowed roughly, her nose close to running from the cold. The truck hadn’t warmed up yet, even though the vents pumped scented air into the small space. She started to feel stifled, her fingers pulling at the edge of her shirt. It started to stick to the nave of her back. It felt like a cold. Something she hadn’t acquired for years. Then again, she always healed whenever something like this decided to attack her body.

“Last night I went out,” Grace sounded carefully, avoiding the accusatory gaze from Hannah. It wasn’t like she had been taken out on a date for some pizza and a movie. She never got asked out, and both girls knew exactly what she meant. The smaller girl stayed silent, though. “And a group of people, they uh, they attacked me.”

“They saw you?” Hannah adjusted her position in the leather seat once more.

“They sure as hell did, but it was dark. They were human. I don’t think… I know they wouldn’t recognize me now. Not in daylight.”

Hannah chewed her lip slightly, the metallic taste coating her tongue. It was a nervous habit. She would always have Grace’s back no matter what, and part of her was irked that her friend didn’t come to her first. The taller blonde had a tendency to do without thinking- to rebel even in the smallest of ways. This time it cost her a lot more.

“Was it another pack?” Hannah’s voice was sharp, squeezing the bridge of her nose as she closed her eyes.

“No, god no.” she shook her head “I would smell them from a mile away. Feel them even sooner. This was different. It freaked my dad out. He won’t talk to me about it.”

“What about my mom?” Hannah asked, breath still clouding in front of her in thick condensation. “Do you know if he called her?”

“I’m sure he did,” Grace scoffed, staring down at her hands as they rested lazily on her lap.

They sat in a labored silence for a few moments, their breath the only sound the filled the area. A few people were starting to crowd around the table that their group usually met at. All of them were bundled up in different layers of clothes, Grace’s eyes catching a few stares when she glanced in the rearview mirror.

Anthony was sitting on the blue painted table, the mesh sure to dig into her thighs. He didn’t seem too bothered by it though, Andrea had her arms wrapped tightly around his arm, leaning her chin on his shoulder as the two stared at the glowing screen to his phone. Rosanna had her nose buried in a book, eyes scanning every single page as Jordan occupied himself with peeling a sticker off of an apple. They looked comfortable- like family.

Hannah finally lets out a small sigh before pulling the car door open, tossing Grace a questioning look. “You coming, Helbig?”

“Yeah, Hart.” She let out a small breath “I’ll be there in a minute.”

#grace helbig #mamrie hart #hannahhart #mace #fanfiction

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spideywars · 8 years ago

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prompt- narry!models they know each other by name but never met, bc they have different friends until they merge in a gala, after their both best friends nag about each other and how they'll make a great couple.

This was so cute and I loved every second of writing this. Enjoy!

~~~~~

He just got off his fourth Gucci photoshoot in Rome, settling himself in his fancy hotel room and watching as some people from his management rushed around him, collecting clothes and makeup to put away for tomorrows next shooting day.

“You haven’t talked about the Met Gala yet, it’s a big day for you.” His hair stylist Lou pointed out as she grabbed the last of her hairspray and brushes to pack in her travel bag. She was giving him a questioning look, interested in what he would answer with.

“I’ve been on and off photoshoots for the past month, I don’t have time to think or talk about that.” Harry sighed out, moving his hands over his face to rub at his eyes. They stung, begging for sleep that has been deprived for a few days now.

“Well before you pass out on me why don’t we talk about what you want to wear? Tina wants to know so she can start gathering a team, its your call.” Lou sat on the bed, travel bag in her hands all closed up and ready for her to take back to her own room. People were filing out by now, saying soft goodbyes to them with their arms full of clothes, beauty products, and papers. Harry was glad Lou was staying though, he’d rather chat with her alone.

“I want gold and flowers, bell-bottom pants of course, maybe a see-through black or white dress shirt underneath.” Harry went straight to business, staring off towards the ceiling above him as his imagination wandered to what he’d wear. He’s worn every colour and shade that’s ever existed, but gold was one of those that he’s rarely gotten to wear. What better place to wear it than the iconic Met Gala?

“Ohh, going right in for the kill aren’t you love?” Lou was typing away on her phone, probably sending texts to Tina as he spoke.

“It’s my first Met Gala, I want people to remember me as soon as I step onto the carpet.” He wagged his finger up towards the ceiling, almost like he was making an oath to the world and himself that he wasn’t going to slack on this. He’s been to many award shows ever since his fame sky-rocketed, but those weren’t anywhere near close to as important as the Met Gala where it was swarmed with music, fashion, and movie icons.

“Alright well Tina is already making orders and assembling everyone together, get some sleep now salt.” She got up and walked towards him to give him a short pat on the chest, her bag tucked under her armpit as she exited the hotel room.

The silence was almost too much when she closed the door behind her, it was nice to hear nothing but the sound of his own breath. This was the part that he remembered he was human, no hectic lifestyle, just himself with a beating heart.

Coffee was an essential in the morning, and with only a weak till the Met Gala as well as photoshoots that still went on, he had a completely packed schedule. He went to constant fittings, going in and out of changing rooms and leaving with a good cup of caffeine to keep him awake for the next flight or next drive.

He was in a car right now, getting a drive to his shoot for Tommy Hilfiger in New York. Lou was sat beside him, reading some magazine and silently flipping through it. Harry didn’t pay attention though, just kept his eyes on the window and watched the yellow taxi’s drive past and pedestrians rush around to their destinations on foot.

“Look at this cover, what a face.” Lou mumbled, she grabbed another magazine from the pile beside her that she usually brought to occupy herself while Harry did his shoots that sometimes lasted a full day. She turned it towards Harry, and he nodded in acknowledgement.

It was Niall Horan who was printed on the cover of the magazine, looking handsome and bold standing on a beach with a see-through white dress shirt on, that being it except for the briefs he wore. His brown hair was all wet, it dripping and falling into a fringe across his forehead.

He was stunning, actually, but Harry knows photoshop and the stupid enhancements that the magazine companies make. He’s never met Niall in person, only knows him by name when he sees him on billboards and shop windows, he could be ugly or completely mediocre looking for all he knew.

“Do you think he’s handsome?” She asked with a cheeky look, biting at her bottom lip and wiggling her brows. He wanted to roll his eyes but kept that expression in, instead moving to focus his eyes back on staring out the window. Lou slowly dropped the magazine onto her lap, now flipping to Niall’s exclusive photoshoot at the back.

“Of course he’s handsome, don’t really know him though so I can’t really be sexually attracted to him…can I?” Harry heard Lou snort and he whipped his head towards her, seeing that she was trying to hold in her giggle.

“What?” He asked, poking her in the side playfully and making her squeal and slap him harshly. She hated being tickled.

“You sure as hell can! I’ve seen this man in person many times, I’ve even done his hair when you went on winter break for one of his shoots for Vogue! Harry he’s a gay man that would be perfect for you.” She always was trying to hook him up with other men. It wasn’t in an annoying way, she never pushed Harry to date if he didn’t want to, she just loved playing matchmaker.

“I��ve got shit to do, don’t have time for a relationship.” Harry groaned, retracting his hands and letting her relax and settle down after a long giggle fit.

“Excuses, excuses. Niall is going to be at the Met Gala too, and you will meet him Mister Styles!” She sounded determined, pointing a stiff finger into his bicep to make him squirm.

The next time Harry was reminded about Niall, it was the day of the Met Gala, him standing in his hotel room staring at the door and watching as people raced around him, frantically trying to get him looking the best he’s ever looked.

He had on exactly what he asked, a white suit with gold flowers all over it, snaking around the sleeves of his jacket sleeves and legs of his pants like vines, blooming along his chest and back, all along his bell-bottoms. He had on a white see-through shirt underneath the suit, it had a ruffled collar that was different from what he asked for, but he was happy with the result in the end when his pink and lush skin was seen through the shirt, making him look even better. Everything was coming together perfectly, but then Lou is walking in with her hair supplies, smiling so big he couldn’t help but get suspicious.

“What?” He asked immediately, watching her with careful eyes as she unpacked her stuff and grabbed for the hair gel, making him sit down on the bed to get his hair in a messy quiff.

“Guess who I just had a chat with?” She sang, happily fluffing his curls up.

“Who?” He asked, wincing when she tugged a little too hard.

“Niall’s stylist Laura, she had come along and told me that Niall was going to be on the red carpet around the same time that you were going to be. She said that you two would be cute walking into the Gala together.” Harry was already shaking his head, rolling his eyes and letting out a huff. He was hoping Lou would’ve let it all slide by and forget about this Niall guy and him getting together, but she was a determined woman and when she wanted something she usually got it.

“We aren’t even matching, we wouldn’t look good together walking in with two completely different outfits. You know the Met Gala more than anyone Lou, couples match.” Harry was making every excuse in the book and Lou was catching on to his desperation to let everything go, and she stared down at him after she stepped back from her work.

“I love you and want you to be in a cute and happy relationship, can you at least try and talk to him? For me?” She gave him a small smile, looking all cute and pouty and rocking herself back and forth onto her feet.

Harry couldn’t help but cave in, because he knew if he didn’t agree now, Lou would be back to trying to get him with someone else soon enough. She’s tried to get Harry with many, many guys before Niall, but this Niall guy has really gotten her whipped. She hasn’t been this determined to get Harry to be with a certain man before.

“Alright fine, I’ll have a chat with him but don’t expect me to come back all love drunk.” Lou was squealing right after he said ‘alright’ and her skinny frame came colliding with his as she gave him a large hug. Tina was yelling at her seconds later though, a ‘don’t ruin the couture!’ Screaming across the room.

He had never been more mad with Lou in his life, and that was a fact as soon as he laid eyes on Niall Horan as soon as he came onto the red carpet. Because Niall was matching with him, with a white suit that had gold lining along the cuff and ends and all along the collar. He had on a white turtleneck shirt underneath and a gold bowtie wrapped around the neckline. He looked absolutely fucking stunning, better than the magazines actually.

That’s why Lou didn’t talk back to him when he had said that they weren’t going to match, because they actually were, and his whole body went into overdrive as he walked right towards Niall as he smiled for the cameras.

Niall looked right at him when he was a few feet away, and Harry’s heart felt like it had grew lifeless in his body when they met eyes, both staring each other down from head to toe. It looks like Niall had some realization across his face as well, with the way his brows shot up into his forehead and his mouth almost hit the red carpet.

“Harry Styles? Right?” Niall asked, making the first move as he stepped a bit closer. They were almost toe to toe, their shoulders brushing as they tried to play it cool for the cameras, acting as if they were just taking some photos together.

“Yep, and Niall Horan?” Harry answered and asked through his charming smile.

“Did Laura and Lou do this?” Niall asked, now moving a hand to grab at Harry’s suit sleeve to pull them along to another set of cameras. Apparently they were going along with the ride now, letting the stylists win by being a couple.

This was probably breaking the internet right now, Harry’s notifications were going to be blowing up his phone more than usual. But he hasn’t decided if he minded yet.

“Yep, never saw it coming…but yeah.” Harry mumbled, now staring at the doors that lead into the building where the Gala was taking place. They were close to going inside now, and he wasn’t sure if they should part ways and do their own solo shots for the cameras yet.

“Well, I would love to have you in my company today Harry Styles, I’ll be saving a seat for you inside.” Niall had said that quietly into his ear, skillfully turning his head only the slightest bit so the cameras didn’t catch their secret conversation. Harry couldn’t even answer before the small brunet was pushing himself away and walking off to smile for the cameras somewhere else.

#narry #narry fluff #narry fanfiction #niall horan #harry styles #fics

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ifishouldvanish · 8 years ago

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The Boston Hour (5/?)

In which Belle is an Antiques Roadshow super-fan and Gold is her favorite appraiser.

CHAPTER SUMMARY: As the afternoon session comes to a close, Gold gets an opportunity to talk to Belle. RATING: T WORDS: 2,509 A/N: Enjoy more of these two dorks trying to flirt with each other! Once again, you can catch up on the TMI Tuesday Q&A for this story here, if you're into that sort of thing. :)

[Part One] [Part Two] [Part Three] [Part Four] [Read on AO3]

“...The quality and craftsmanship of these pieces began to decline considerably after the fifteenth century. Prior to that time, they were commissioned almost exclusively by nobility, but as the popularity of the style grew, more and more pieces were being commissioned by the bourgeoisie. The pieces produced for these smaller, more numerous commissions lacked the care and attention to detail enjoyed by their predecessors, and as a result, that popularity quickly began to decline. However, in the late eighteenth century, Carlos III of Spain ordered an effort to–”

Rumford was appraising an impressive example of Hispano-Moresque lustreware when a petite figure in a blue dress stepped into his peripheral, completely destroying what little focus he had managed to keep since his conversation with David. Suddenly his thoughts were filled only with Miss French, and he had to force himself to finish his appraisal.

“An effort to p-preserve the ah… the techniques, which inspired a– inspired… a, um… r-r- revival of the style in the… the ah, mid ninth– I mean mid nineteenth– century. Which is... what I– what I believe we h-have here. Based on the ah, the coloring and the patterns used.”

He tore his attention away from the ornate dish like he'd been drowning and Miss French was the breath of fresh air waiting for him at the surface.

And there she was. Miss Belle French, heading in his direction. A Venus with her auburn waves, her plump, berry-stained lips, and towering heels. Good grief. Was it possible that she'd somehow gotten even more beautiful since he'd spoken with her little more than two hours ago? He watched as her friend showed her something on her phone, and she pouted her lips in thoughtful deliberation before nodding. Her friend then whispered something to her and winked, and Belle blushed– her smile blinding in its brilliance as she laughed.

Rumford swallowed hard.

He was going to talk to this woman? He was going to ask her out on a date? Was he out of his bloody mind?

He coughed and looked back to the dish in front of him. “A um, a piece like this would likely fetch about twelve hundred dollars at auction.” He finished quickly, the words barreling out of his mouth in a jumble. He half-assedly shook the owner’s hand, and as they left the table and the next guest was setting up, he chanced another glance over the small crowd to look for Belle.

It took him a moment to find her, because she was already so much closer than he expected her to be– as close to the front of the line as she could be without actually being in it. His breath caught in his lungs at the sight of her so near, and she bit back a coy little smile as their eyes met– a gesture he couldn't help returning. His whole body felt like it was buzzing, but the sensation somehow felt more pleasant and exciting to him than terrifying. Mostly.

She came back! That had to mean she liked him, right? But also, she came back? To watch him? How in God's name was he supposed to finish the rest of his appraisals for the day knowing her eyes were going to be on him the whole time? He should stop staring probably, but she was staring at him and smiling, so surely that meant he could stare and smile too?

“We ready?”

Rumford started at the sound of Fa’s voice and shook away his rambling thoughts. “Right.” He cleared his throat. “Yes, ah… of course.”

Fa snickered behind the camera and motioned for him to begin, and he finally wrangled his attention onto the pair of Vienna cabinet plates on the table.

The rest of his appraisals dragged on, and he both dreaded and eagerly awaited the moment his line of guests would dwindle down to nothing. His eyes kept drifting to Miss French, and the sight of her made him stumble on his words and his heart leap into his throat every time. The little smiles she kept giving him were so disarming, and he had to keep reminding himself to wipe the foolish grin off of his face lest he look like a complete loon on camera.

Soon enough, the line was gone and the time had come. Miss French was still standing at the front of the queue, watching him clean up his station. He was fully aware of the fact that he was stalling. There were only so many specks of dust he could wipe off of the tablecloth, and he had to be looking ridiculous at this point.

Talk to her. Just talk to her. You can manage that much, you bampot.

He slipped his phone out of his pocket and pretended to check for any missed calls or messages as he stepped away from the safety of his table– because that somehow felt like a good idea. How close should he get to her before he looks up? Should he act surprised? Like he didn't know she was there? Most of the guests had cleared out of the venue by now, it wouldn't be an unreasonable assumption to make, that she'd left with the rest of them. He got closer, closer, eyes fixed on the ground until he could no longer ignore the pair of ruby red heels that were in front of him. His gaze drifted upwards, to the delicate ankles the straps of said shoes were wrapped around, up the pair of shapely legs, over the rich blue of her dress, until– oh God. What a perfect face. Such a winning smile. And how did this whole speech thing work again?

“Uh…”

“Hey, Mr Gold.” She said, and how dare she look so happy to see him?

“Miss French.” He said, but the words came out in a whisper. “Hey.”

“Thanks again. For um, looking at my book.” She said, giving it an affectionate little squeeze where she carried it in her arms.

“Of cour–” with a terrible thud, his bloody stupid phone slipped out of his hand and onto the floor. They both stared at it for a moment while he decided whether or not to pick it up. Sod it. Not important. Just talk to her. “...Of course.”

“Um–” She wet her lips and shifted on her feet a little. “Yeah, I’ll um, definitely be doing some research into Mailys Desrosiers. So... thank you.”

“That’s– that’s good. I’m glad.” He said, the curve of his lips cracking into a full smile. Was he smiling too much? Did he look mad?

Belle glanced at the floor again and dipped down to pick up his phone. “You um, dropped this.”

He just stared at it in her hand for the longest time, far longer than he should have before registering that he was supposed to take it from her. “...Oh. Aye, I did.” He blurted, and since when had his palms become so sweaty? “Thanks. You. Thank you.” He slipped the device back into his pocket and swallowed. Cleared his throat. He should have grabbed another bottle of water when he had the chance. “I ah… It was a pleasure.”

“Yeah. It was.” She agreed, nodding and nibbling her lip, and Christ. Had she come back over here just to torture him like that? Did she have any idea, the effect she was having on him?

This was easily number one on the list of all the worst ideas he’s ever had. How did he let David talk him into this? With his, “You’re a great catch! A good-looking guy like you!” Ha! What a joke! He should politely excuse himself. Surely he had something he needed to do, right? Run to the bathroom? No, not that. Think, think, think...

But then David's voice rang clear as a bell through the mess of Rumford’s thoughts. She's clearly interested. Let her know the feeling's mutual.

He pressed his lips into a thin line, as if it could stop anything stupid from coming out. Took a deep breath. If you back out now, you'll only live to regret it. You can do this. Just talk to her.

“Y-You know, I–” He cut himself off and scoffed. Commit. “We... If you um– If you wanted, maybe we could ah, talk. Again? Sometime–”

“Oh.” Belle’s cheeks flushed pink and her grin widened, and Rumford felt like he would die right there on the spot.

“A-About the book, I mean.” He blurted. The light in her blue eyes dimmed a little at that, and why had he thought that would be a good thing to say? “Or um… anything, really.” He added, and her eyes brightened again. Yes, good save.

“I’d um, I’d really like that.”

“It’s just um– well, I think… I ah, I thoroughly enjoyed t-t-talking with you.” He stammered. “Well, not think, I mean I did. Enjoy. ...Talking with you. Miss French.”

“Me too. Mr Gold.” She was smiling, but she was also pressing her lips together at the same time and it was by far one of the cutest things he'd ever seen before in his whole pathetic life.

“So, ah… yes.” He nodded, his mouth answering a question that hadn't even been asked.

The tip of her tongue poked out and swept across her bottom lip, and she looked over her shoulder to where her friend was waiting. They exchanged slight nods and Belle looked back at him. “You know, my friend Ruby and I were um, gonna try one of the bars in the area tonight?”

“Oh.” Was she inviting him out?

“Aesop’s Tables? It's um, supposed to be two blocks east of here I think?”

“Aye. I've ah, passed by it a few times.”

“So, maybe you could um… join us?”

“Yes.” He nodded again. God bless. “Yes of course.”

“O-Okay.” She said it with a tremulous little laugh, as if she couldn't believe he'd said yes. As if saying no to her was even an option. Preposterous. “I'll… look for you there? At uh, eight-ish?”

“Eight-ish sounds good.” He said, and he noticed his cheeks were starting to hurt from smiling so much. He didn't really care though, because his heart just felt so light and tingly and shiny and good and he'd just made plans with Miss French!

She did that thing again where she bit her lip and smiled. Then her eyes swept over him from head to toe and back again and he felt like he might combust. Like an ant under a magnifying glass in the summer sun. But in a good way? What that possible? It was as if all his senses had been heightened tenfold. He could feel every individual fiber of his shirt against his skin, hear his pulse, smell… well, something mildly offensive.

“So I guess I'll uh, see you then.” She said.

“Aye.”

She bounced on her toes and wet her lips. “I can't wait.”

He laughed, but it didn't make any noise, and he had to stop himself before it turned into wheezing. “I ah, look forward to it. Miss French.”

“Yeah. Well, I'll uh, see you later then?” She asked, and now she was swaying, shifting her weight from one foot to the other..

He nodded quickly. “Yes. Yes, definitely.”

“Okay.”

“...Yeah.”

“Thanks again.”

“You too. I mean, no. I mean–” he coughed into his fist. “The ah, pleasure was all mine.”

She blushed at that and it just had to be from secondhand embarrassment, right? There was no way he wasn't making a complete ass of himself. “Well, um… good luck with the next session.” She said. “Mr Gold.”

His body eased a little, the end of this torturous conversation finally in sight. “Thank you. I... hope you uh, enjoyed the event. Miss French.”

Her eyes lit up and she smiled. “Oh, it was everything I hoped it would be! You were um– you were amazing.”

“Oh,” he chuckled, rubbing a hand over the back of his neck and blushing. “Well, I don't know about that–”

“Well, I think you were...” She murmured, and Rumford was pretty sure the color of her cheeks was deepening. Good Lord. If she was blushing, he could only imagine what he looked like.

“That's… very kind of you to say.”

She pressed her lips into another tight smile and began rubbing her thumb two and fro over the corner of the cover of her book. “You're just always so thorough,” she said. “I mean, I just really appreciate how much of an emphasis you put on not just assigning value to the items you appraise, but on describing the um, socio-economic environment that produced them.”

“Oh.” He blinked and took a calming breath. He could talk about antiques. He talked about antiques all day. “Well I– I’ve always found that to be the most interesting thing about many antiques.” He said. “I like to think that our viewers feel the same way.”

“Well, this one does.” She chuckled. “You um, you just really tell a story with each piece.”

“Thank you.” He tried not to grin too widely at that, but it wasn’t every day that someone barraged him with compliments about his work– let alone someone as enchanting as Belle French. “I ah... I appreciate that. Truly.”

“I remember you were doing paintings and drawings back in Seattle two seasons ago and somebody brought in that um, engraving by uh… the German artist…?”

She remembered the items he appraised two seasons ago? If he wasn’t grinning like a fool before, he was now. “Max Klinger?”

“Yes! And you talked about the great upheaval brought on by the industrial revolution and how it um, influenced the art at the time.”

“Aye.” He nodded. “It is a… fascinating topic.”

“I mean, the segment they aired was only like, two minutes, but I could have listened to you talk about that for hours.”

“Oh. W-Why thank you.”

“You know,” she stepped closer and wet her lips, “whenever an interesting item gets featured on the show, I like to–”

“–Okay!” Ruby cut in. “I hate to break this up, but you two little aficionados will have all the time in the world to finish this conversation later.” She put a hand on Belle's shoulder and started to drag her away. “Eight o'clock at Aesop's Tables. We all good?”

Their eyes darted back and forth between Ruby and each other for a moment. They both and nodded in unison.

“Good. See how easy that is?” Ruby teased. “Well now– have a lovely afternoon, Dr Gold. Me and Belle here are gonna get out of here before one of the security people drags us out.”

Rumford gave an awkward chuckle, his nerves returning with the sudden change of subject. “Right, ah... Have a lovely afternoon.”

They turned to leave, and Belle threw one last look over her shoulder at him. She gave him another one of her precious smiles and waved.

On its own accord, Rumford’s hand reached upwards to give her a little wave back.

#rumbelle #rumbelle fic #fic: the boston hour

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felixluis · 6 years ago

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