#they are both in the opposite edge of the same spectrum

[senandikadini]

They are the same person in my book

[rafedarling]

𝐩𝐞𝐫𝐦𝐢𝐬𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧

pairing: sweet!rafe cameron x pogue!reader

summary: you and rafe have known each other for years, despite being from opposite sides of the social spectrum on the outer banks. while you’ve always been a pogue and he’s a kook, there’s always been a connection between the two of you, one that has deepened into friendship over the years. but when rafe shows up at your parents’ house one day with a bouquet of your mom’s favorite flowers, asking for permission to take you on a date, it becomes clear his feelings for you run deeper than you ever expected.

warning(s): english is not my native language. fluff, friends-to-lovers, pogue vs. kook tension, supportive parents, a kind and sweet rafe cameron.

au: like, reblog and feedback are much appreciated, actually i wrote this for drew but i though oh why not a sweet rafe for this. taglist | tagging: @rafeyslamb @tracymbcm @enjoymyloves @akobx @rubixgsworld @xoxohoneymoongirl @mileyraes @maybankslover @noobmazter69 @littlelamy @wearemadeofstardust0 @xoxosblogsblog @saviorcomplexrry @bisexualcvnt @stuffyownswrld @anamiad00msday @httpsdrewstarkey

The Outer Banks was always divided—two worlds coexisting on the same stretch of sand and water, yet so far apart. The Pogues, like you, lived on the south side, where hard work, loyalty, and tight-knit community defined your way of life. The Kooks, like Rafe Cameron, lived on the north side, where money, power, and status were everything. Growing up, those lines were clear, and you were taught to stay on your side of them. Yet, as you got older, you began to realize that not all Kooks fit the mold.

Rafe was different.

He wasn’t the Rafe that the rest of the world saw—the Rafe who threw parties at Tannyhill, who had a reputation for getting into fights or drinking too much. With you, he was kind, thoughtful even. You had known each other for years, despite the social divide. It started with brief conversations on the docks or passing each other on the beach. But somehow, over time, those small exchanges turned into something more. Late-night talks when no one was around, shared glances across bonfires, and moments when it felt like the world around you faded away.

Still, you both kept it platonic—safe, avoiding the possibility of crossing a line that might complicate your lives. After all, what would people think? A Pogue and a Kook? No one would understand. But that didn’t stop the quiet tension that always seemed to linger between you two, the way his hand would hover just a little too close to yours, the way his eyes followed you when he thought you weren’t looking.

You had convinced yourself that Rafe was just being a good friend. That his kindness didn’t mean anything more than that. But everything changed the day he showed up at your parents’ house.

It was a warm afternoon, your mom sat at the table with her cup of coffee. Your dad was nearby, flipping through the latest fishing magazine, savoring the rare quiet weekend. The sound of the doorbell suddenly interrupted the peaceful atmosphere, drawing your dad’s attention.

“Who could that be?�� your mom mused aloud, glancing toward the door.

Your dad stood up with his usual slow, deliberate pace, not expecting anyone. He made his way to the door and opened it, only to find Rafe Cameron standing on the front porch. Rafe, with his light brown hair and piercing blue eyes, looked as out of place as ever in your Pogue neighborhood. He held a bouquet of gardenias in his hand, the white petals stark against the casual but expensive clothing he wore.

Your dad blinked in surprise, not expecting to see him here. “Rafe?” he asked.

Rafe smiled, but there was a nervous edge to it. He’d been here before, of course—your parents knew him, albeit from a distance. He wasn’t a stranger, but he certainly wasn’t someone they saw frequently outside of the occasional gatherings. Still, Rafe had always been respectful, polite. And today, something in his expression told your dad that this visit wasn’t just a casual drop-by.

“Hey, Mr. Y/L/N,” Rafe greeted, shifting the flowers in his hand. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”

Your dad tilted his head slightly, raising an eyebrow. “Not at all. Come on in, son,” he said, stepping aside and holding the door open.

Rafe walked inside, his gaze sweeping over the familiar interior of your home, which was far smaller and cozier than his sprawling family estate, Tannyhill. The warmth of the space, the lived-in feeling, was a sharp contrast to the cold elegance of his house. That’s what he always liked about coming here. It felt real.

Your mom appeared in the doorway of the kitchen, a curious look on her face when she saw Rafe standing in the foyer. “Rafe Cameron,” she said, her tone lifting in surprise.

“What brings you here? Is everything alright?”

Rafe smiled politely, but you could see the tension in his shoulders, the nervous energy beneath his cool exterior.

“Everything’s fine, Mrs. Y/L/N,” he assured her. He lifted the bouquet in his hands and offered it to her. “These are for you. Y/N told me once that gardenias were your favorite.”

Your mom blinked in surprise, her lips parting slightly before a smile spread across her face. “Oh, Rafe,” she said softly, reaching for the flowers. “You didn’t have to. They’re beautiful.”

Rafe’s smile relaxed, his nerves easing a bit. “I just wanted to bring something.”

Your mom took the bouquet and inhaled the sweet scent of the gardenias. “You’re too kind, Rafe,” she said, her voice full of warmth.

“I’ll put these in a vase. Y/N’s always telling me how thoughtful you are.”

Rafe chuckled lightly, his eyes softening at the mention of you.

“She talks about you all the time too.”

Your dad, who had been observing the exchange quietly, leaned back against the kitchen counter, crossing his arms as he gave Rafe an appraising look. “So, Rafe, what brings you by? You and Y/N got plans today?”

At the question, Rafe’s heart skipped a beat. This was the moment he had been preparing for, the reason his palms were sweating despite his efforts to stay calm. He straightened slightly, taking a deep breath before answering.

“Actually,” he began, his voice steady but filled with a quiet intensity, “I came here to talk to you both about something. About Y/N.”

Your parents exchanged a look, their curiosity deepening. Your mom set the vase on the counter, her attention fully on Rafe now.

“Go on,” your dad said, his tone neutral but not unkind.

Rafe swallowed, his eyes flicking briefly toward the floor before meeting your dad’s gaze again. He wasn’t used to feeling vulnerable like this, but he knew he had to do this. He had to be honest, not just for himself but for you.

“I’ve known Y/N for a long time,” Rafe said, his voice calm but carrying the weight of his emotions.

“And she’s always been important to me. We’ve been friends for years, but over time, I realized that what I feel for her isn’t just friendship anymore.”

Your mom’s expression softened as she listened, her maternal instincts kicking in as she sensed the sincerity in his voice.

Rafe continued, his gaze steady but full of emotion. “I care about her, more than I ever thought I could care about anyone. And I didn’t want to move forward without talking to you first—without getting your permission.”

The room fell into a brief but meaningful silence as your parents processed his words. Rafe stood there, feeling the weight of the moment, knowing that this was more than just asking permission for a date. It was about showing respect—not just to you, but to your family, to the life you had built on the south side of the island, so different from his own.

“I know there’s a lot of history between Pogues and Kooks,” Rafe added, his voice softening, “but I don’t care about any of that. I just care about her. And I promise, if you give me a chance, I’ll do everything I can to make sure she’s happy.”

Your mom smiled softly, her eyes shining with affection. She had always liked Rafe, despite his background. She had seen the way he looked at you, the way he treated you with care and respect. And more than that, she knew you cared about him too, even if you hadn’t admitted it to yourself yet.

“Rafe,” she said gently, “you’ve always been a good friend to Y/N. And I can see that you’re serious about this.”

Your dad, who had remained quiet for a moment longer, nodded thoughtfully. He wasn’t blind to the tension between the Pogues and the Kooks, nor to the complications that could come with crossing those lines. But he also wasn’t blind to the fact that Rafe, despite his wealth and status, had always treated you with kindness. And as a father, that meant more to him than any social divide.

“Rafe,” your dad said, stepping forward, “if you’re sure about this—about her—then you’ve got my permission. But remember, this isn’t just a casual thing. If you’re serious, you’d better be ready to prove it.”

Rafe’s heart swelled with relief and gratitude. He had expected this to be difficult, but the approval in your dad’s voice, the trust in your mom’s eyes—it meant more to him than he could put into words.

“I am,” Rafe said, his voice filled with sincerity. “I’ll take care of her. I promise.”

Your dad extended his hand, and Rafe took it, the handshake firm and full of unspoken understanding. Your mom smiled warmly, her eyes twinkling with affection as she watched the exchange.

Just then, the sound of the front door unlocking echoed through the house. Your parents turned toward the door, and Rafe’s heart skipped a beat as you walked in, the sunlight streaming in behind you. You had just returned from the docks, your hair slightly tousled from the wind and your skin warm from the sun. You kicked off your shoes and set your bag down by the door before looking up.

“Hey, everyone,” you greeted, smiling as you stepped inside. Your eyes landed on Rafe, and your smile faltered slightly in confusion. “Hey, Rafe Cameron? What are you doing here?”

Your mom exchanged a knowing glance with your dad before turning to you with a warm smile. “Oh, nothing, sweetheart. Rafe was just stopping by to chat. Why don’t you two go sit in the living room for a bit?”

Your heart did a little flip in your chest as you looked between Rafe and your parents. Something was definitely up. There was a tension in the air, a kind of nervous energy that made your stomach flutter with anticipation. You had known Rafe long enough to know when he was holding something back.

“Uh, okay,” you said, your voice uncertain as you led Rafe into the living room. You sat down on the couch, motioning for him to join you. The air between you was thick with unspoken words, and your mind raced, trying to figure out what was going on.

Rafe sat beside you, his hands resting on his knees as he took a deep breath. He turned to face you, his blue eyes locking onto yours, and for a moment, the world around you seemed to fade away.

“Y/N,” Rafe began, his voice soft but steady, “there’s something I need to tell you.”

You felt your heart skip a beat as you watched him. Rafe had always been sweet to you, always treated you differently than the other Kooks, but you had never let yourself believe it could be anything more than friendship. After all, you were a Pogue, and he was a Kook. That was just how it was. But the look in his eyes now—it made you wonder if maybe you had been wrong all along.

“I care about you,” Rafe said, his voice low and full of emotion. “More than I’ve ever cared about anyone. And I know we come from different worlds, but that doesn’t matter to me. What matters is you.”

Your breath caught in your throat as you stared at him, your mind reeling. Was this really happening? Rafe Cameron, one of the most popular Kooks on the island, was sitting in your living room, confessing that he had feelings for you.

“I talked to your parents before you got here,” Rafe continued, his hand reaching out to gently take yours. “I asked for their permission to take you out on a date. I wanted to do this the right way.”

Tears pricked at the corners of your eyes as his words sank in. Rafe wasn’t just confessing his feelings—he was showing you, in every way possible, that he was serious about this, about you.

“So,” Rafe said softly, his thumb gently brushing over the back of your hand, “will you go out with me, Y/N? On a real date?”

A tear slipped down your cheek, but you were smiling, your heart swelling with emotion as you nodded. “Yes, Rafe. I’d love to.”

Rafe’s face lit up with a smile that could have melted your heart on the spot. He leaned in, his forehead resting gently against yours as he let out a soft, contented sigh.

“I’ve been waiting for this moment for a long time,” he whispered, his breath warm against your skin.

As you sat there, your hands intertwined and your hearts beating in sync, you realized something: maybe the lines between Kooks and Pogues didn’t matter as much as you had once thought. Maybe love was bigger than the social divide that separated your worlds.

And with Rafe, you were ready to find out.

[netherfeildren]

Kiss, Kiss, Kill, Kill!

Pairing: Joel Miller x F!Reader

Summary: Joel is a long haul truck driver. One day he finds a pretty girl in a diner and decides he’d like to keep her. 

Murder and sex ensue!

Rating: Explicit 18+

Content Warnings: No outbreak; Graphic depictions of violence; Murder; Blood; Gore; Threat of SA; Impotence; Unprotected sex; Creampie; Loss of virginity; Virginity kink; Breeding kink; Spit kink; Rough sex; Pussy slapping; Dark!Joel; Mean!Joel (also kinda crazy and pathetic); Obsessive behavior; Possessive behavior; Discussions of suicidal ideations; Unreliable narrators; Alcoholism; Consensual non consent kind of (But not previously discussed - they're both into it tho); Use of misogynistic language; Grief

A/N: Hi :) Another one just bc I have no self control. 

Parts of the narrative read a little disjointed and/or confusing. This is intentional. I was kind of trying something weird out here, I guess.

Word Count: 9.7K

Read on AO3

The first time Joel sees you, it’s a Thursday. His least hated day of the week, but not his favorite, for he doesn’t really have any favorite things anymore. Your eyes’d stunned him at that first look. They sparkled as if dusted with frost – speared him with an intensity that burned.��

But no… that was a lie, and Joel is trying not to be such a liar anymore. He does have one favorite thing now. This middle-of-nowhere diner, this place where’d he’d found you. 

The first time he’d actually talked to you, you’d interrupted his own stubborn, sour silence with a silence of your own. Different, agonizing, compared to your usual persistent fishing for his attention. 

“What’re you doin’ out here in this wasteland, sweetheart?” Because you look sweet as that cherry pie you’re always trying to push on him. 

“Been here my whole life.” It’s verging on evening, the sky gone to melancholy, and there’s a young girl with dark hair weeping on the shoulder of an older woman in the booth over. He wants to snap at her, demand to know what the fuck she could possibly have to cry over? He’s sure she mustn’t have a dead daughter like him, and so there really seems to be no reason for tears. 

“No plans to leave?”

You shake your head, hum a little, set the coffee pot down on the edge of the table to pop a hip out and think on your answer. “Guess you could say I’m a little bit weak or scared, don’t know.”

“Doubt that,” a surprised laugh forced out of him. Entirely improbable, he knows this just by looking at you. “You’ve got eyes that seem as if they’ve never held fear within them in your entire life.” And he makes you laugh at that, head thrown back, throat rippling. The sound like the tolling of the bell indicating the start of the rest of his life. 

When you’re done gifting him your laughter, you ask, “What about you? Why are you here?”

“My daughter died.” Plain. 

Your eyes seem to shutter or flicker, something like a chimera about them, “When?”

“Two years ago.” He watches the crying girl and the old woman get up to go. And then the two of you are alone. You move to sit in the booth across from him. He’d been coming in here to see you for more than half that time since, and now, the first time the two of you are having an actual conversation, and this is what he’s decided to open with. But really, it’s the only story he has to tell anymore. He watches you watch him for a long moment, as though you’re searching for something within him, or mulling over what it is you want to say to him, the shift of your jaw from side to side as you chew on your words. He feels easily frightened now – fragile – and yet vibrantly malignant, at the same time. A juxtaposition on two opposite ends of the spectrum of good and not so good, or perhaps, verging on very, terribly bad, in the grocery store line of human morality. Two Joel’s at the start and end of the queue who could not seem to come to terms with one another. Enemies – they were enemies of each other. A Joel who’d once had a daughter, and a Joel who now did not. A Joel who’d pulled a trigger at his own temple, and one who’d never even considered such a thing. He draws his finger along the line of scar tissue at his temple.

For a long time he’d wanted to tear a hole in his world and escape, but he was no master of inventiveness. On the contrary, he found his attempt rather miserly – had short changed himself at the last moment and flinched. But perhaps, it had been for this reason – for you, to find you. He wishes he could peer inside your mind, crack open your skull and read everything you’re hiding away from him inside there. A violent thought, but you make him feel slightly violent, or – no, that’s not it – for Joel is already a violent man. It’s more that you pull a specific hue of violence out of him, incite it, like he needs to move, to howl, to claw at something, at you, scream and scream and scream to keep your undivided attention on him forever. 

“I’m sorry for your loss,” you say finally, voice quiet. “How old was she?”

His loss. That was a funny way of putting it. It had never felt like a loss. The word was too small. Four letters was not enough to describe what it really was. There was no word for what it felt like. An emaciation of his very self until he simply ceased to exist. Something that had sucked his soul, his heart, his brain out of his body, but they didnt feel lost. They felt destroyed, decimated, or like they had never existed. Sometimes the feeling left him confused, disoriented – this strange purgatory he’d been relegated to, it was like it had never happened in his mind sometimes, or like it had happened to a different man. Like that life with that beautiful little girl with the green eyes who’d had a father who loved her, who’d then died, had happened to someone else. Someone who wasn’t Joel. Like a war that had raged and raged for centuries, and now nothing was left in its wake. Only that terribly fraught reminder of a violence too grotesque for a human mind to conceive. 

How could he miss something, wish for something so, so, so fucking desperately he’d peel his very skin from his body himself to get it back, but also feel like it didn’t belong to him anymore? Like it had never happened to him, like he remembered it out of his own body? A dream that belonged to someone else, and Joel’d only been told of it second hand. His mind was fractured now, he knew this. He wasn't right – broken or glued together the wrong way. His bones didn’t fit in his joints the way they were supposed to anymore. He was all wrong and ugly and fucked. 

“She was twelve.”

“My whole family’s dead,” you say it almost casually, with a half shrug of your shoulders. “Is that why you started driving? To get away?”

He’s been a long haul truck driver for going on two years now. Started just after Sarah – needed to get away, to get lost. He didn’t enjoy it – he does not enjoy it. Not because the work is bad or boring or what have you, but because he doesn’t enjoy anything anymore. But it’s productive and pays well and… well, he does appreciate the solitude. There is that, at least. He’d been on the route from New Mexico to Washington for several months now, and it was fine. Occasionally, he’d head up to the Dakotas – not so fine, longer, harder trek, but he managed it. He preferred this one, preferred the darkness of the north west corner of the country. He never went further south than New Mexico, though. Absolutely never into Texas. He’d never go back there again. 

“Sure… to get away.” He couldn’t be there anymore afterwards, had nothing left. “My neighbor, Anna, she’s got a teenager, Ellie. Sweet kid. Weird kid,” he laughs fondly, remembering the two of them. “The kid was friends with my daughter, Sarah. And after everything– well, after everything, Anna made sure they both stuck around. Didn’t let me shut myself away the way I wanted to,” ill-shaven recluse, confused, fractured, “They’re good people. You’d like them, I think. They’re… they’re my friends.” They were another reason he kept doing the driving, he liked to send money back to Anna and Ellie. He knew they didn’t need it, didn’t want it, but he had to. He needed to feel like he was still taking care of someone, contributing to someone’s well being. It was just part of who he was. 

“I’m sure I would.”

He watches your silent enrapture as you listen to him tell you of his pseudo life. After a while he’d realized that was all he’d started doing, making his way back to you, to this diner where you work. A sad place for ugly men to stop in on a pause from their interminable journeys and lay eyes on an angel. He hadn’t even really realized that’s what he was purposely doing or that it’d become a pattern. He just needed something to see at the end of the tunnel, a light to look towards when he was lost in the darkness. That’s what you are, a single flickering light in the abyss of darkness he exists in now. 

You’re small – tiny compared to Joel’s own hulking size. He thinks he could break you, easily, if he isn’t careful, if he so felt like it. And you were – you are so fucking pretty. He thinks of you so often. Almost as often as he thinks of his dead daughter which might seem wrong or strange, but it’s really nothing more than the two opposite ends of a spectrum of perfect beauty that he’s known within his lifetime that now he cannot reach either end of. Sarah – dead, forever out of reach. And you. Too perfect for consideration, too beautiful and good for these monstrous hands of his. The thing he’s become in his grief is not worthy of a gorgeous creature like you. His existence post Sarah’s death had become some sort of apocalyptic dysphoria where the only monster here was Joel. But he does like to watch, and he does like to think of you. To come to your diner and sit and watch you serve coffee to your customers – the scum that muddles through here isn’t worthy of laying eyes on you – men like him. Sometimes, when he sits here silently, pretending to ignore you and not be entirely beguiled by you, he feels as if he has a purpose again, like the money for Anna and Ellie, getting to inconspicuously watch over you, make sure no one gives you a hard time gives him purpose. And when he goes, even though he never really wants to, he takes you with him in his mind through the long stretches of his hauls. When there are nothing but ghosts to keep him company. When thoughts of Sarah and that dead life become too overwhelming, he calls you to mind, plans his routes to make his way back to you. 

You’re also fucking persistent – not giving him the chance to wallow away in his silence and brooding. He was rude at first, gruff and unresponsive and wouldn’t ever acknowledge your queries of, How’s it going today, and, Oh, back again I see. Sometimes he wanted to snap and just spit the truth at you, ‘course, I’m fuckin’ back, I’m here to see you, I’m obsessed with you. And rounds and rounds of, Can I get you another cup of coffee? The same as usual? You’d memorized his order. Pestered and pestered and pestered for his name until he’d finally ceded it to you, and, How ‘bout some cherry pie this time? After a while you’d gotten sick of his recalcitrant bullshit and just dropped off the piece of pie, slipping it onto the edge of the table and sliding away without a word or a half look back at him. He’d eaten the whole damn thing, savored it, and caught your sassy, little smirk after he’d finished. He’d wanted to bend you over the counter and spank your ass until you cried after that. He bets you’d taste as sweet as that pie, that if he slapped your cunt enough times he could get it red as a cherry. He bets you’d like that – that you’d like it a little rough, a little dirty, a little mean. You might look like an angel, but Joel’s seen the way you look at him, the way you follow him with your eyes, leaning against the counter, chin cupped in your small palm watching him eat his eggs and drink his coffee. 

You want him. 

But Joel is frightened – frightened and cowardly and not right, and as much as you look like an angel, he also worries you might have the ability to entice him into very, very bad things – to provoke him into depravity, even. There is a part of him, large or small given the day and the mood and the weather that he walks in here on, that has the rotten half of his mind whispering at the not-so-rotten half that he wants to defile and debase you, and that he’s pretty sure you’d like it if he did. He wants to fuck you full of his come and then watch it leak out of your used, gaping hole. Then he wants to lick you clean, kiss it all better so that he can do it all over again.

The first few times he’d stopped at your diner, he’d pretended he hadn’t even noticed you, would lie to himself in his mind and tell himself that he had no interest in a little thing like you. He had no interest in women, in making connections, in having conversations. Occasionally… well– no, not occasionally. Twice, it had happened twice now, when the urge had struck, the itch had become too persistent, and his hand not enough, he’d gotten a hooker. The first time he’d shut down completely, lost his hard on and not been able to finish. The second time… he’d finished. He might’ve even made the woman come, he hadn’t bothered to ask, but he thought he might have. Then he’d gone back to his truck and cried great heaving sobs. Like he’d said… not right, he wasn’t right anymore. Couldn’t even fuck a whore without blubbering like a baby. He’d wondered if perhaps his grief had made him impotent. That’d be funny. That type of funny thing that is also a humiliation… you know the sort?

But after a while, the lie had become too much of a farce, even for his own mind. He knew, from that first moment he’d walked in, and you’d spun around, a bright smile and chirpy, little voice telling him to sit anywhere you’d like, be right with you, mister, that he’d taken notice. More than notice. He’d put you in his pocket that day and had carried you with him in some way since. Like a stone chosen off the beach, washed up by the tide and deposited in the sand just for him to come across, or maybe like a fucking infection, like the plague, for he did not want this. He did not want to think of you. He did not want to think of anyone or anything. He wanted to be alone and without anything or anyone for the rest of his life. If he did not have anyone, if he remained alone, then he could never again experience that loss which was not truly a loss, but something much worse and devastating, and even, perhaps, a little hilarious, in that way that a hilarious thing can also sometimes be humiliating and shameful… there it is. A loss that is not a loss for it is a thing so devastating it becomes something else entirely. A humiliation to one’s very existence, a decimation, emaciation, all the things, all the things, and nothing at the same time.

His mind was wont to ramblings, on occasion now. Perhaps, incoherence, was the better word. Anxiety, as well, panic, tears. Couldn’t even fuck a hooker without weeping, howling, a few sobs. 

He had wandered so far, and sometimes he thought, I want to go home, but of course, that home no longer existed. It had been put in the ground two years ago and lost forever. The dissatisfaction of constant ennui. He could, perhaps, return to the geographical place, but nothing familiar would remain. He couldn’t live with the memory, he couldn’t live away from it. It was like it had simply ceased to exist that day that she’d died, and every moment since that moment was just a series of moments filled with a yearning for some place that no longer existed. He didn’t think he’d ever again feel at home anywhere.

And yet…

He turns back to look at you. 

“How did they die? Your family.”

“Home invasion – murdered. He never found me, hid in the boiler closet.”

“Little rabbit.”

“Hmm,” a huff of a laugh, “Maybe. Someone once said I was lucky. Pretty fucked up, no?”

“Do you feel lucky?”

“Never. Angry – that I’d been left behind.”

“Yeah…”

“Alone.”

“Are you alone?”

You turn back to him. Inspect him. He watches the slant of your eyes take in his hair, his face, wrinkled, haggard, his chest, his arms – he feels a flush flare beneath his ribs, then back up to his eyes. He wonders if you’ve ever been fucked before. You’re young – but he can’t imagine how you wouldn’t have been. He thinks he’d do anything in this moment to get between your thighs, but also, he hopes you haven’t, hopes you could be all his, only his, his his. Mine. 

He hopes he won’t cry if he gets the chance. 

“Entirely,” you say finally. 

“I had– have– ” shakes his head, “I have, I guess, a brother. Tommy. But the last time I saw him… I was horrible.” They seldom saw each other now – lie – they never saw each other now. Truth, Joel. We’re telling the truth now. 

You laugh lightly, shrug, “Happens.”

“Sure…”

“What’d you do to him?”

“Ah, just couldn’t get a handle on myself after everything. Things got bad enough eventually, and we fought�� a lot. Violently. I was violent. One morning I got out of hand, terrible – one of my biggest regrets. We hurt each other with our words and our fists, and in that way only two people who know each other too well can. He cracked my ribs, gave me half his orange in the evening, afterwards – said our apologies. He was gone the next day. Haven’t heard from him since. I just got to be too much for him,” he says again, needs to reiterate it, make sure you understand that he is too much and too dark, too unmanageable – ugly. That you should not be sat here with him. That he has a violence within him, and that you should probably run as fast and as far as you can, but that he cannot promise he will not follow. “I had…” he is ashamed of this part, surprising for he sometimes wonders if he still possesses the heart to feel shame, “I had a problem with drink for a while – not anymore, though,” he says quickly. “I promise, not anymore.” He should not be promising you anything. “I got control of it – knew it was making it all worse rather than better. Felt like I was trapped underwater with my damn ghosts – that … What's that thing called when – when sick people get like – like trapped inside themselves or somethin’? You ever heard’a that?”

-

“Locked-in syndrome.”

“Yeah– yeah. I read about that once or heard it somewhere – that’s what it felt like when I was drinkin’ – fuckin’ terrible. Let it go after a while… but by that time… Tommy was gone, done with me. I was – dunno… like some sort of demon or somethin’ – somethin’ bad.” He huffs a small, derisive laugh, looks at you with that ridiculously charming, crooked half smile. 

That laugh sparks a kindling of anger inside of you for him. This is a broken, angry, creature of a man, you think. Something fractured – not whole, and he must be handled with care and gentleness. “How could he just leave you?

“Didn't give him a choice. Sometimes people deserve to be left.”

“I wouldn’t have.” That sobers him, wipes the smile right off his handsome face. You think of the invisible giants hurting this man in some unimaginable fashion; of the endless tenderness coiled up inside of him and how the crushing of that tenderness – the death of it – has given way to what may be considered madness. Because after all these months of watching him, of him watching you, you can see it, recognize that tenderness for what it is, but also the madness, for it is impossible to ignore if you’re really looking. Soft marrow at the center of a hard man. 

“I did other things… worse things.”

“Try me.”

“I tried to kill myself.”

You whistle, long and low. You actually had not been expecting that one, at least, not the admittance of it, “You’re just full of truths,” for looking at him – the sort of man he’s built as, the thought that he could be felled by anything, even his own hand, is a little hard to believe. 

“Feels like a sort of confessional in this–”

“Shithole–”

“Diner–”

Your voices overlap. You both laugh. You think you quite like the sound of your voices intermingling one on top of the other. 

“What happened?”

“Flinched–”

“I flinch all the time.”

“Have you ever thought about killing yourself?”

You hum, tilt your head side to side on your neck as if you’re letting the thought slide from ear to ear within your skull. “Perhaps only the peripheral idea of it, but never with much imagination or dedication. I don’t think I have that much to kill myself over, you know?”

“Your family?”

“Not really – it’s sort of become just this… this thing that happened once. I don’t feel much ownership over it anymore. Don’t know why, exactly.”

“Sure, that’s how I feel about it sometimes too. That belongs to a different man now – like– like some actor or a facsimile, and I just look in on it as if from a distance. Enjoy the sight of someone else's suffering…” He shakes his head, “That doesn’t make sense.”

“No, no, I understand. Something to do in the way that a tragedy can be compelling to watch. You can let go, let go of your awareness of yourself and experience it in a way you’d never do so in the present moment.”

“A dissociation.”

“Yes. Why would you want to go and relive the basest parts of yourself all alone, over and over again? Not likely.”

“But it was me.”

“A dissociation,” you repeat, smile. 

“Yeah,” he pauses, turns the coffee cup round and round with the slow spin of his wrist as if to dissolve the remains of the grounds you know the shitty machine has left deposited at the bottom. There is a small dusting of golden brown hair covering his wrist and disappearing up his forearm beneath his flannel. You want to taste it, follow the trail to places unknown. “Not so well adjusted, us two,” And he laughs then. A real laugh. He lets you have a real laugh of his, and it is powerful – special. 

“Well… no.” Of course not. “I don’t think either of us could ever claim that.”

“Bet you’ve never been bad a single day in your life, have you?”

You cock your head, let your eyes slide from him to peer out the dark window. His lonely semi is parked under the single flare of light out there. The evening has sunk into a deep blue, the hue of mourning, of melancholy, and the pavement is wet with evening rainfall.

You'd heard that some trucks had spaces behind the seats where truckers could put a bed, have a place to rest. You wonder if he’ll take you back there and fuck you in his little bunk. And honesty is a fickle thing when discussing a topic like this, isn't it? There’s a depravity about him, and you can’t tell if the truth or the lie would placate him – incite him – more. To be similar in such a way as that which he’s imagining. A little bit of both, then. After all, intent holds weight – imagination, desire, it has a mass to it that can, if enough pressure is exerted upon it, be transformed into something else. 

“Not yet,” you tell him, sliding your gaze back to meet his, “Haven’t had a chance – but there’s still time.”

-

“What would you like to do?” He wants to take a bite out of that soft flesh you’re encased in, draw blood.

“Something depraved?” You’re taunting him – trying to provoke. It makes him slightly angry, but also hard. You should know what it is you’re toying with here. 

He frowns at you, at the lilting song of your words trying to beguile him into doing whatever it is you think you want him to do to you. “What is it that you think you want here? You don’t know what I was, how I lived. Shouldn’t be sat here with me, little girl,” he scoffs. “I was– was not– I don’t fucking know, not a man. I’m not, I’m not. Not a person anymore, just this thing that continues to exist. I should not have been expected to survive. This should mean something to you too. You also have no one. You’re alone too. You’re alone in the world. You know what it feels like to only live in the winter.”

You’re quiet for a long moment, and then you say: “I think I’ve come to quite like the winter.” And at that he knows he’s taking you for himself, whether you agree in the end or not. You’re going to be his. 

But he knows he must also let this roiling anger, this depraved hunger settle before he lays hands on you. Like this, in this state, he’d be too rough, break you, nothing compunctious about him or his jaggedness. He excuses himself for a smoke, your only response simply more of that inciting silence – more thoughts of cracked skulls and a cherry red cunt and tears after failed trysts with someone who doesn’t even know his name. He’s fucking embarrassing. What would Tommy say if he knew Joel couldn’t even get it up for a paid fuck anymore? He’d laugh in his face, never let him live it down. He misses his brother very much. He misses lots of things. 

He’s sucking on his Red under the awning of the diner’s entrance, imagining what it’ll be like to suck on your little clit, when he hears them. 

“She’s usually out about midnight. We’ll snag her then.” Grating, guttural voice.

“But I get to fuck ‘er first. This was my idea so I go first.”

“Yeah, whatever. S’only happenin’ ‘cause of me. Too fuckin’ stupid to see the plan through after all these months of watchin’ ‘er.”

“Fuck off.” Silence, and then almost with giddy elation: “We gonna kill her too?” Something cold and terrifying settles within Joel. 

A beat, “Should we?”

“Dunno, man. Might be fun, huh? Never done it before.”

“She’s fuckin’ pretty,” the voice draws the vowel out in a high pitched, sacharine whine. “Got the face of an angel.” Joel’s angel, his, his, only his.

He’s got his Bowie in a sheath on the back of his belt. Perhaps, this would be a useful exercise in release. After he’s dispelled his excess energy he can come back and touch you, take you. 

“Can’t wait to taste that cunt.” His cunt.

“Seen her tits, man? Fucking round and bouncy. Wanna make ‘em bleed.” And there’s only one avenue of consequence after that. After all, this is not the first time Joel’s done this. 

His most well kept secret.

Sometimes, when the itch cannot be eased, abated, by his hand or a fuck or a drink or any of the other readily available vices, he turns to this. Only when the straits were dire. Only when he saw no other recourse. Only after his daughter was dead and in the ground and his brother gone away from him

. 

But sometimes… sometimes it’s just fun. Sometimes it’s useful for a man to do that thing that he really feels he wants to do, if only to enjoy himself, if only to let go of some of that suffocating tension. If only to keep vermin like this away from an angel like you. 

“We’ll chill in the woods for a while, wait the little thing out, yeah?” Joel edges his way towards the edge of the building closer to them, peeks a lone eye around the corner. Two men, middle aged. Not a problem. Not for a man like him. 

He waits for them to make their way to the edge of the tree-line, watches them disappear into the gloom. He looks back into the diner through the murky windows. The warm glow of the overhead lamps washing you in a hue of golden light that brings out all the warm goodness in you he’ll take for himself once he’s snuffed out this issue. 

No one’s going to touch you but him. No one’s going to hurt you but him. 

As he rounds the corner of the diner there’s a piece of metal pipe propped up against the building by the dumpsters. Very nice. 

He goes after them. 

At the edge of the tree-line, under a swaying, low hanging branch, there is a tiny unfledged bird, helplessly twitching its way towards death in a puddle. He pauses to watch its struggle, gathers his skin about him, tightens his seams – prepares to gorge. He watches the inch by inch pilgrimage towards its last breath, then stillness. He feels so much older than his years, like he’s lived a thousand terrible years, watched a thousand terrible deaths. But there is a buoyancy about him, as well. Filled with a saccharine sweet fizz of sticky anticipation. He’s going to taste your cunt after this is done.

 He moves into the gloom. He’s going to kill them for you, and his cock is hard at the thought.

Stepping beneath the canopy of the trees, into that cold, damp darkness, he sees the absolute truth of the world. On the heels of two men who’d do you harm, he knows that he’d failed to save someone he cared about once, he’d not be bested by failure a second time. Darkness implacable, the crushing black vacuum of their overheard words buzzing in his head like flies, of the harm they’d do you. Two hunted animals moving away from a creature much darker than they could even imagine, scurrying on borrowed time. What most moves him is that the things they’d do to you are not so dissimilar to the things he plans to do to you, as well. The only difference being that after he’s done defiling you, he’ll keep you for himself, with all the care and gentleness a little thing like you so deserves. 

-

You press your ear to the cracked open door leading to the back of the building. It’s not the first time those two’ve talked their filth regarding you. The murdering is new, though. You’d not thought they were smart or inventive enough to come up with an actual kill plot. Rape enough of a hardball for minds as shallow and small as those two’ve got. 

You’d never really considered them much of a threat. Or maybe you’d just never really cared enough to pay them much attention. But as you watch the broad, rippling expanse of Joel’s muscled back stalk after them, his pause at the tree-line to look down at something on the ground, you think he must be more in the vein of taking a stupid man’s shit talk to heart than you’ve ever been. 

He has a thick, forearms-length of steel pipe gripped in his huge fist, and there’s a wicked looking knife strapped to his belt on the back of his hip. 

Interesting. 

You look back at the empty diner, the lonely parking lot beyond the glass of the windows, only Joel’s semi still taking up residence on the wet pavement. You turn back to follow after the three men. 

One you want, two you’re interested to see what fate awaits them.

For some reason, when you step outside, you’re expecting there to be snow on the ground, but there is none.  

You move across the pavement towards the forest-line, and the pilgrimage towards the verdant darkness feels very much like your one-way ticket out of this forlornness you’ve been trapped in your whole life. You’ve been stuck in this small town for so long, for too long. One man had already tried to forcibly evict you, had taken your entire family with him, maybe this one, maybe Joel, would do so in a way you’d more likely enjoy. 

There’s been a steady, faint drizzle all day long, and the puddles of rain look like holes in the dark pavement, apertures into some other realm that glide past underground. You wonder if you stepped through if you’d disappear below into some other place. You wonder if he’d be able to find you even in that unknown other. 

You cross the line into darkness. 

The familiar terror of silence – you don’t seem to find it here. There is only the sound of your rushing blood, the cadence of his voice rumbling through your psyche, firing your neurons up into a frenzy. There is a twisting heat low in your pelvis, dampness between your thighs. What’s he going to do? Why’s he going to do it?Is it for me? Is it for me? It’s for you.

You let out a low whistle between your teeth and move beyond the trees. There is a giddiness about the darkness of the wood – the motley of shadows, the aroma of mushroom rot. 

The familiar terror of silence. Perhaps, that is what they are experiencing now. The great horror of being set upon by a beast more terrifying than anything they could have ever conjured up on their own. 

That infinite tenderness from before, that acute madness – it coalesces in the gap in the trees as you come upon the three men. 

Joel has already started on the first. He murders almost tenderly. With great care, but infused with an aroma of agitated frenzy that seems flavored in the same notes of erotic buzzing that hums beneath your own skin. There is blood and viscera splattered on his face and clothes, in his hair. That great hunting knife embedded in the throat of the first man. The body lays facing you now, eyes open, shocked at his own death. Funny. Perhaps, that’s how they would have liked you to have ended up once they were through with you. 

Oh, how the tune changes when the monster is on your side. 

What are you? Be a creature. Be a creature. Be a creature!

You take Joel in. Thick, massive frame. You love his hair, it was one of the first things you’d noticed, thick dark curls streaked with the silver veins of his age and experience. Something that promised of care and knowledge and patience. His patchy beard with the heart shaped gap in it, you’re going to write your name into that space. His powerful arms, muscles coiled tight, his shirt stretched tight across his broad shoulders as he brings the steel pipe up above his head, pauses to look down at his next victim. 

“We won’t bother her anymore, never again – p– please, please, I swear,” the man on the ground begs and cries. There are tears and snot bubbling down his ruddy, pocketed face. 

Joel is silent and terrifying and glorious above him, and then a small nod: “That’s alright… I believe you.” The metal comes down in a whistling arc, makes contact. 

Flesh and blood splatter, the sound of it is pulpy and wet and vindicating. He starts with the man’s knees, then his head, caved in like the shell of an egg, the yolk spilling out like vermilion drool. 

He heaves silently above the man that would have done you harm. Makes the threat go away. 

You step forward, cunt pulsing and wet and eager for him. When he’s gotten his fill of bludgeoning he turns slowly back towards you, as if he’d known the entire time that you’d been stood there watching. 

And the look on his face, it makes something electrifying and sticky buzz up your spine and ooze down your veins. You shift back on your heels

He shakes his head, his eyes are huge, pupils blown wide. “Don’t run,” he says slowly. If you hadn’t just watched him murder two men in cold blood – no, in your defense, he saved you, he protected you, fizzy heart full of satisfaction – you’d say he almost looks a little doe eyed. 

A hollow pounding begins in his heart, as if it had remained silent for the past two years and was only now taking notice of its own silence. His cock, hard enough to burst, angry and throbbing beneath the confines of his blood soaked jeans. Fuck this scum laying on the ground beside him, look at what he has infront of him. Nothing else matters but you. A goddamned angel. Damned for he’s found you now and nothing good can come of this. He takes a step towards you, and you match him with one backwards, away from him, his blood starts to howl in his veins. Different to the humming frenzy that had filled him as he did his murdering. This is hot and viscous and ravenous, and he knows he’ll get to keep his catch once he’s gorged himself on it. He knows he’ll get to keep you once he’s caught you. 

You take two more nervous little, quick steps away from him. Your eyes are slightly manic, face flushed, frame jittery, excited. A rabbit that knows it’s about to be caught. He watches the pause of your limbs as they fill with coiled energy, getting ready to make the bound and leap towards escape. He lunges, goes in for the kill, teeth bared, talons  brandished. 

Faster than you can even comprehend, he lunges, takes you to the ground with one massive, powerful shoulder to the vulnerable, soft of your belly, one huge paw cradled at the back of your skull to protect you from the hard ground. Your spine hits the cold, wet earth, the breath knocked out of you. You think you let out an animal noise, high pitched and supplicant. A thing that knows it’s been caught and is soon to be devoured. Your limbs scramble against the dirt, heels digging into the ground for purchase, you feel the loss of one of your shoes, as you try to get away or to crawl closer, who can be sure. A spider caught in the web or a larger, hungrier arachnid. He sets the huge heaviness of his muscular weight over your much smaller frame, one strong hand caged around the column of your throat, the other pushing your chest into the earth as he shoves his hips into the cradle of your own, forcing your thighs apart and your skirt to pool at your waist. You feel the stretch of the center plaque of your tights as his wide breadth settles between your legs, making room to take you for himself. You bring your own hands up to the wrist holding your throat and dig your nails into the skin there. You can feel the light smattering of hair covering his forearm beneath your soft palms, the cold, wet dirt beneath you, the searing stretch of the inner muscles of your thighs spread wide for him, the damp of the air surrounding the two of you. He leans forwards, pressing you down into the ground, and you have the fleeting thought that you want to transfuse yourself into the earth, into him. 

He pauses then to look down at you, appreciating the gloriousness of his catch. “Caught ya.” And he’s filled with an exuberance, a sort of victory. Look at what he’s snared – all for himself. 

You try and struggle again, if only to see the flare of annoyance in his eyes. It makes your cunt tight and achy. Even more than it already is. There’s a part of you that thinks you want him slightly angry – rough or mean. That you might like it even more if it hurts. Be kind enough to be cruel about it, you want to beg him. He leans forward to press his nose to your cheek, drags the cold vermillioned flush of it along your jaw, down the line of your throat, bites harsh and painful at your collarbone then over the peak of your breast. 

“Are you a virgin?” He whispers into your skin. It sounds very much like a threat. 

“Yes.”

“Saved this cunt all for me.” And it is not a question. Yes, you moan anyways. Let him know. Let him know that this defiling is a gift you’re granting him. He sits up on his haunches between your thighs, his hands sliding down to press on your lower belly and digs his fingers into the center of your tights and pulls, ripping a hold in them for his pillaging. You try and press your knees shut at the feel of the frigid air on your sensitive inner thighs, dig your nails into the ground above your head to try and drag yourself away from him. 

He digs his own fingers harshly into your flesh, his nails biting painfully into the soft skin of your thighs and ass and brings you back towards him. There’ll be streaks of pain left in his wake after this. Bad little rabbit. He smacks the inside of your thigh, watches the smooth flesh ripple for him. You let out a warbled, angry screech, little nails still trying to claw yourself away from him. He laughs then, a little mean, condescending. “Fight harder, little baby. This is pretty pathetic.” He rips your thighs apart, keep your fuckin’ legs open for me, his hands slick with the blood of his victims slide up the back of your thighs, anchoring his palms beneath the damp creases of your knees to press you open and wide for him, slaps your cunt, hard, over the soaking gusset of your panties. 

“Who the fuck’re you wearin’ this tiny little thong for?” he growls. It’s white lace, with a sweet, little pink bow adorning the front. “Me? Wrapped yourself up all nice and pretty for me?” Your little foot sneaks up under his armpit and tries to push with, what he’s sure is all your valiant might, at his chest, trying to unseat him from his conquering position above you, but he takes your ankle in a vice like grip, bites harshly into the meat of your calf so that an animal squeal of pain is clawed out of your throat at the same time that he slots his fingers under the damp center of your panties. “Sing as loud as you want, sweetheart. No one’s gonna hear you out here.” He can feel the soaking wet seam of your cunt against the backs of his knuckles, and he rips them clean off you. The sound of the last remaining barrier of protection of your cunt against his ravaging being decimated has you going shock still – prey that knows it’s caught and has decided to give up. Good, this is how he wants you. Your big, wet eyes look up at him as he flings the lace towards the still steaming dead bodies. That’s all they’ll get of you. The rest is only his. Mine, mine, fucking mine. 

You let your arms go limp above your head, soft and pliant and ready for ravaging, melting into the earth.

He presses your knees back and up, letting the red blossom of your wet cunt bloom for him. It’s slick and swollen, and he knows when he shoves his cock inside it’ll be burning hot. “Look at this gorgeous virgin pussy, baby. All for me. Only for me…” he murmurs, hypnotized, mesmerized. He drags the back of his knuckles over your slit, uses his thumbs to spread your lips apart, admires the swollen nub of your clit. You’re just as hungry for him as he is for you. Messy, eager little whore. He moves to undo his belt and free his aching length. Huge and brutish, thick veins pulsing just beneath the thin skin. He’s going to split you in half, break you, mold you in his image. 

He spits right onto your soaked folds, watches the thick glob of saliva slide down to mingle with your own leaking slick. He’s not even going to make you come first. Little virgin cunt and he’s not going to even bother getting you ready – just gonna shove the whole, unforgiving length of himself inside of you. Force you to take it. He fists his thick fist around himself, jacks his cock once, twice, squeezing at the bulbous head so that a trickle of precum seeps out of the slit. He presses his head to your clit, slides down to give you a small threat of pressure at your opening. When he looks back up at your face your eyes flutter shut, a look of pure contented submission washing over the gorgeous planes of you. 

“Not gonna be gentle, baby. Don’t got it in me.” He notches the fat head at the slick mouth of your entrance and crams his cock inside of you in one go, meets that thin barrier that says you still belong to yourself and rips through it. Mine now. No reprieve, no respite. And God, the feel of it, cleaved in half, scorching hot, filled to the brim and never deep enough. He is a rabid, snarling beast of a man as he hits the very end of you, grinds his cockhead at the mouth of your womb. You let out a warbled, pained moan, little fingers coming up to claw at his throat and chest with kitten-strength, down to dig into his thick thighs as he pins you down, and you tilt your hips to let him in deeper or escape him, he doesn't know. He doesn't care. He pulls his hips back and forces himself back in, too thick cock wedged into the too tight space. “Christ, goddamn tight fuckin’ pussy – made for me,” he grits through bared teeth.

He fucks you raw and cruel, and he needs you to just lay limp and still and take it.

And you do. And he does not cry this time. 

He sets a brutal pace, throbs deep in your belly at every pause as he grinds at your cervix. It must be painful for you, perhaps, but the flush in your cheeks, the fever in your eyes, the ripple of your cunt around his driving length tells him you also like it. “What a good girl, taking my big cock,” he coos. You preen, tilt your hips this time in supplication he’s sure, hitch your feet higher along his sides. There are tears running back down your temples and into your hairline. His cock makes you cry. If he could, he’d split your throat and drink, he would. But he cannot, so he’ll split your cunt instead. He thrusts into the hilt, complete negligence for care, for gentleness lost in the dark wood, for the desperate necessity of feeling your virgins blood coating his cock. Your protestations lost to the louder song for more, for harder, for deeper

Joel, Joel, Joel. 

He’s going to listen to you sing his name for the rest of his life. 

He feels unhinged, a thread picked at too many times, spun loose, unraveled and frayed. That edge that separates good and evil – his bloody fingers clamp down hard on the edge of your jaw, forces you to open for him, and he spits into your mouth – direct, dirty … warm. “Lemme see…” he rumbles, and you stick your tongue out for his inspection. Once he nods, pleased and smug and conquering, you close and rub the slick of his saliva onto the roof of your mouth with your tongue, savor the taste of him. This was the taste that you’d longed for… that which teaches you what that professed edge really is. Is he good, is he evil – he’d just killed two men, you’d watched him, cunt wet at the sight of it. Albeit to protect you… sure – but does it even matter? You swallow his spit down. Probably not. 

He is huge and life altering inside of you. Your virginity scoured away on his invading length. 

He leans forward, hand clamped around your jaw to pierce you with his manic gaze, like his cock pierces your cunt. He smells like the forest and sweat and power. “Little fuckin’ tease,” he grits, “Bringing me cherry pie like that all the time – fuckin’ provoking me. You just wanted me to pop your cherry for you. Didn’t you, little girl?” All you can do is nod dumbly and take what he gives you. He hooks one of your knees over his elbow, the other propped over his shoulder, foot bobbing limply at each slam of his hips. He has you bent entirely in half, cunt splayed wide open for him to fuck down into the deep, devastating end of you. Your vision goes blurry, black stars streaking across the back of your eyelids. All you see is him. Perhaps he’s all that exists now. Maybe you’re just as dead as the two bodies laying beside the two of you. You wonder peripherally what the sight of the four of you must look like. Joel’s hulking form fucking you like an animal into the dirt. You open your eyes to look up at him, there’s blood splatter across his face, in his hair. His skin is burning hot against yours. You think that perhaps you’ll have scorch marks in the shape of his fingers in your skin after he’s done with you. Two dead, brutalized bodies cooling beside the place where the two of you are fucking. 

“Can feel ya tightening up, baby. Gonna come all over my cock.”

He does something to change the angle, and it fucking hurts. “Too much,” you beg, try to push him back weakly, but your cunt pulls sharp and tight, and then your muscles are rippling around him, womb contracting painfully as your orgasms blinds you with its sudden intensity. 

“Don’t care,” he growls back. “Do not fucking push me away.” No, he must not care. Prey doesn’t decide how it’s felled, after all. 

He pulls out and back then, suddenly, slaps your cunt harshly, once, twice. You mewl, high and shocked, writhing around in the dirt. He grabs you by the hips and flips you so fast you’re left disoriented, pulling your ass up, up, up. 

“Fuck, you’re so fuckin’ pretty,” he croons, bends to bite down on the meat of your asscheek, and then notches back at your gaping, fluttering hole, orgasm still running through you, and pushes back in. You’re soaking wet, slick and fucked open by him and the taking is much easier this time. You feel his thumb press down on your asshole, “Gonna take this too. Gonna have every part of you, every piece. Gonna swallow you whole.” All you do is arch your back further, cheek smushed into the dirt, fingers digging into the cool earth for purchase, for salvation.

The sight of you stretched around his thick base, so slick he feels you dripping down his balls and further below, into the bloody earth. There’s a red tinge of your own blood coating his skin, and he’s going to come. He’s going to fill you up with his spend and fuck it deep into you until it takes. Until no matter how far you want to run, he’ll be with you, always. He lets his head fall back on his neck and stares up at the dark canopy of the trees, groans low and deep.“You’re gonna be my little hole now,” he promises, presses one large palm into the small of your back to deepen the angle and fuck down into you. “Gonna take you with me and fill you up whenever I feel like it. My gorgeous little cumslut.” The ramming of his hips starts to grow sloppy and stuttered, close to the edge now. Victory is so, so near. 

You start to claw at the dirt and wiggle again. Little knees chafed raw and scrambling against the hard ground trying to get away. He slaps your ass hard, hopes there’ll be the print of his hand to appreciate later. 

“Not inside, not inside – not – no birth control,” you stutter, beg.

“I’m not fuckin’ pulling out.” He twists a cruel and unyielding hand into the back of your hair and presses your face harshly into the ground. Your eyes pinch and tears seep and mingle into the blood and dirt beneath you. “Gonna pump you raw and full. You don’t gotta worry about anythin’ anymore, baby. Gonna take care of you,” he grits and you press yourself harder back into him. There is an existential seesaw inside of you – a volleying of your wants – you want him to hurt you, to force you, to take care of you and keep you, all at the same time.

“Promise – promise me you won’t leave me,” you cry and beg because really, that’s all you want. All you’ve ever wanted. For someone to stay, for someone to never leave, no matter what.

“I promise – fuckin’ swear.” And you go loose and passive again at that – his to do with as he will. Nothing else really matters after all that.

He senses the change. The loosening of your muscles into capitulation. He stops his thrusting and grinds, strums at your clit. “Oh fuck, you want me to fill you up? And what happens if I do? What happens if it takes? Want me to get you fuckin’ pregnant?” Starts to fuck into you again, “I think you do.”

Don’t care, don’t care, don’t care.

“You’re mine. Fucking mine.” He says it again and again and again, yes, yes, yes, lets himself fall forward, anchored above you with one strong arm as he presses as deep as he can physically go and starts to fill your pulsing cunt with his come, the heat of his spend inciting you to roll into one more throbbing orgasm. He brings his face down close to yours, open your eyes, little thing, lemme see you. The fluttering of your lashes, sweaty, dirt-streaked face, and you are seraphic, the wet crimson heat of your blood pounding beneath the delicate membrane of your skin. Gorgeous, perfect, conquered and his. 

“Fucked full’a me now,” he whispers, presses a soft kiss to the tender skin of your eyelid. You nuzzle into him, and then look up at him with the warmest, most vibrant gaze he’s ever seen. Fucking pleased and sated. 

“They wanted me, but only you get to have me now,” you whisper. “How does that make you feel?” Provoking, provoking again. 

“Like I fucking own you.” He grinds his still spitting cock further, feels the pull of your muscles milk him deeper. 

He lets his weight fall partially over you, too heavy for the full mass of himself. You are, after all, a delicate thing, and he must remember to handle you with care, occasionally. He feels the pulsing and quivering of your cunt around his softening cock, and the two of you settle to lay there in the dirt, bodies still dead, virginity scoured and stolen, and stare at each other. 

“Have you ever been in love?” you whisper, dragging the tip of one little finger, whisper soft, over the arch of his brow, the slope of his nose.

“I feel a little in love with ya right now,” he confesses, and you press that finger against the seam of his mouth, begging for entrance, and then inside, against the flat of his tongue to inspect the wet gleam of it. It’ll be inside of you soon enough, you should take a look at that which you’ll be writhing against in due time. 

“Good. That was my plan all along.” Smug, conniving little creature. 

-

Once it’s full dark, he packs you into his truck, buckles your seatbelt for you, tucks a blanket around your dirty knees and drives off as if he hadn’t just murdered two men and taken your virginity with their blood still hot on his skin. He goes for miles and miles, eventually finds a dark, secluded spot to park the truck for the night. He takes you into the back bunk and fucks you like you’d wanted him to, on your side, one leg slung over his shoulder, hand gripping the lush of your ass to pull you onto his impaling cock, watches your ass bounce against his thrusts. A demanded play with it, lemme see ya push it back in, as he watches himself drip out of your messy hole. Eats your cunt until you cry. Afterwards, the two of you lay, naked and damp, facing each other, tracing the lines of one another in the quiet dark. 

Sometimes he’s worried he’s blood hungry – or pain hungry. Starving for something he doesn’t have a name for. But he thinks that, perhaps, he can use your name to fill in the blank space now. He’d always felt as if his devotion was a punishment to the receiver. After all, everyone Joel has ever loved has left him. But as he looks at you, there’s something in your eyes that tells him that perhaps, you’ll remain. Perhaps, he can compel you to, force you to. Perhaps, he can anchor you to himself, and in turn, give you everything. 

“Are you a ghost?” he asks.

“No. Are you?”

“Sometimes I think I am.”

“I don’t think so.”

“You’re like a fuckin’ angel or somethin’. What were you doin’ out here in this wasteland?” He asks you again.

“Maybe I was waiting for you.” This answer he likes.

He’s quiet for a long time after that – taking you in, cataloging you, memorizing you. His fingers ghosting over your face, your hair, strumming the fan of your lashes. Later he asks: How do you remember the memory of someone else? How do you keep them when they’ve gone somewhere entirely unreachable?

“Because you love them,” you tell him.

“That’s enough?”

“Of course. Will you ever forget that you loved her?”

“Never.”

Netherfeildren's Masterlist

[starry-bi-sky]

Cannon Danny, Danyal Au and CFAU met, waht does each other think of the other and do they get along?

I'VE TALKED ABOUT THIS BEFORE WITH FRIENDS IN DMS! WOOO I'M GLAD YOU ASKED! beCAUSE.

Cfau Danny and Canon Danny get along, but Danyal and Canon abso-fucking-lutely do not. It's hillarious. Danyal is appalled that this fucking white boy is another version of him -- that Al Ghul arrogance and pride really shines through here, you can’t get rid of all of it.

Cfau Danny is a sleeper agent, honestly. I'm putting all three of them around the 15 age range because any younger and CFAU won't be as Sleeper Agent. Him and Canon get along pretty well because they’re both pretty similar to each other when CFAU's not in active grief. CFAU is a bit rough around the edges, and canon is surprised by his smoking habit and sharp tongue, but he’s a relatively friendly dude. Just snarky and no-nonsense at times, and intolerant of bullshit.

However the moment a ghost fight starts?? BAM. he shifts into a house of horrors who can and will rip out your throat with his teeth. Banshee boi haha. Canon is floating there all “???? HUH???” watching as Danyal and CFAU full on tackle the opposition.

Canon Danny watches in 4k as Danyal hunts Skulker down mercilessly and tears open the “damn poacher’s” suit with his bare hands. Vlad is only safe because he isn't showing his face (yet).

Frankly all of canon’s rogues are gonna have a blast meeting CFAU and Danyal. They’re both two different flavors of unhinged violence, and they’re on the opposite side of the spectrum. One is an elegant storm of blades with years of fine-tuned practice, and the other is the brutality of the backstreets and Gotham’s cruelty; messy, bloody, and merciless.

Canon and Danyal will eventually start getting along, but they’re pretty — well, correction, Danyal is pretty hostile to canon at first. Its a combination of tension, stress, and frustration with canon and what Danyal perceives as canon’s incompetence. Danyal struggles to understand how canon is anyway a version of him beyond the name and halfa status. He starts understanding better when he sees Phantom fighting and sees his resourcefulness and quick thinking.

I have this funny mental image of the three Dannys all in the quad at school (with Sam and Tucker). Danyal is sitting on the table giving off Major Gargoyle vibes, warding off Dash and other bullies through pure "Little Orphan Tom Riddle" Energy alone, while CFAU is standing off to the side with Canon showing him how to throw a proper punch. Sam and Tucker are staring at Danyal, or they're just casually eating their lunch.

Dash isn't going near Danyal with a ten foot pole, but he'll try his chances with Sleeper Agent CFAU who, despite the "edgy" smoking thing and more alternative style, acts and looks almost the same way "Fenturd" does. He gets socked in the jaw the moment he goes over and grabs CFAU's shirt, and CFAU releases the full verbal force of Crime Alley's fist down unto him.

----

To properly answer your question:

Canon Danny: Thinks CFAU is pretty cool, and views him as kind of like a cooler, terrifying version of him. He's off-put by the smoking thing and totally thrown off by CFAU being a banshee. He's only heard from word-of-mouth about them, and it sounds like a shitty existence to be in permanent grief. He's glad he's never had to fight one.

If this is purely canon Danny and not DPxDC adjacent-canon Canon Danny, then he's glad that Gotham doesn't exist in his world because holy fuck that place sounds like the home of nightmares. But he also kinda wishes there was a Jason in his world, the guy sounded like a really good friend if CFAU is to be believed, and Danny needs more of those in the world. He's infinitely more grateful that Dan is nothing like how Rath sounds. Because Rath sounds like something straight out of an apocalypse movie. (Granted, Dan could be argued to be the same, but he gives off more 'generic supervillain' vibes.)

He thinks Danyal is an asshole at first who needs to get that stick out of his ass, along with his head. But once they start getting along, he finds him rather funny and enjoys his dry wit, along with CFAU's. He's unnerved by Danyal's willingness to kill if necessary, but he admires his dedication and love for his little brother (if Danyal brings him up). He knows he'd be in the same boat with Jazz or Ellie if he was in Danyal's shoes. He recognizes that their core fundamentals ring the same, even if the both of them tend to show it differently.

CFAU Danny: Thinks Canon is pretty cool too. Is thrown off and very unsettled by the idea that Jason might not exist in this world, and that he and this other Danny aren't friends. He genuinely just. cannot comprehend the idea that well, and if he thinks about it too hard he's going to go into a Banshee-Grade Level Grief Spiral and nobody is gonna wanna see that. Soothes his own nerves by telling himself that this other him will meet Jason eventually.

Kinda thinks Danyal is also a jerk, but he recognizes that it comes from a place of fear and general self-defense. He's seen other kids do similar stuff in crime alley where they completely close themselves off from other people -- hell, he does it. It's a safety mechanism, so he's more empathetic with him. They're not buddy-buddy with each other at first, but they're certainly not hostile like Danyal is with Canon. Is entirely baffled and thrown off by the fact that Danyal is related to Bruce fucking Wayne when Danyal tells them about his brother Damian. Can't help but ask about Jason and if he's alive, and is insanely jealous but so happy when Danyal confirms that he is.

Danyal Al Ghul: Homie hates this fucking white boy at first. Canon Danny's general playful behavior and inexperience drives him up a wall because he's incredibly tense and in an alternate dimension. He unintentionally slips back into a League Training mindset, and criticizes Danny's every move during a fight. He eventually apologizes, but just like his father, it's like pulling teeth because he's emotionally constipated. Canon asks Danyal if he was in pain while saying anything, Danyal readily admits to yes, he was. But not because he wasn't sincere about it. Afterwards, Canon still kinda annoys him, but once DAnyal reframes his mindset into viewing him more like a civilian and being more like Ella, rather than being an alternate version of himself, his mistakes become easier to bear.

likes CFAU! They both took one look at each other and thought "wow there is something Fucking Wrong With You" and instantly shared solidarity in that. CFAU is still a sloppy fighter in Danyal's eyes, but he recognizes his own bias, and at least CFAU is ruthless and swift with it compared to Canon. He silently.. mourns??? pays respects?? He Has Somber Emotions about CFAU being a banshee, and offers him basically the Danyal Equivalent of "that's rough, buddy". He's very weirded out about how neither of these Daniels are related to his father, and are not Damian's brother. Has no idea who this "Rath" and "Dan" are because he doesn't (to his knowledge) have an alternate evil self.

[cringesatan]

thoughts on towa and madarame's relationship and "likeliness", victimhood and slow damage's theme (currently at 60 hours of gameplay, about to finish madarame's route)

so madarame keeps saying he and towa are "the same", and sure, they somewhat match each other's need and viewpoint on violence, but i wouldn't say they're the same. in fact, it seems like he and towa are the exact opposite of each other, in fact. what they have in common - operating on instinct, the need for violence - both takes them and comes from very different places. towa's need for violence comes from a place of deep self hatred, and to anyone who has experienced that level of self hatred - especially one drive from sexual trauma - knows how deeply ingrained it gets and how it turns you so twisted you start experiencing the self hatred as a good thing. we see it when he gets hurt, and we see it during sex, towa feels good and gets off on being treated like scum, of being hurt, of being abused. its a sense of deserving, almost, like a "reward", in a way. euphoria, as much as it is an artistic movement, is also an elaborated excuse for towa to receive the punishment-reward he deeply feels like he deserves, its a way to experience the root of his trauma, over and over again: being an outlet for someone else, an object of pleasure, not necessarily sexual, as rape is not necessarily sexual, but of power, of desire, of the need for control, and for indulging. towa used to live on edge, back in his mafia days, his traumatic episode was never really over until the fight that killed his brother. once he adjusted to a somewhat happy, comfortable life, that's when he started to "heal", in a sense, but let a traumatized person heal on their own and watch them incessantly try to relive their trauma, over and over, am i right?

a lot of times traumatized people are drawn to their trauma, and towa, of course, much rather say he has a taste for violence, rather than admit he is a deeply traumatized individual. slow damage is, at its core, a read on the many facets of victimhood.

on the other side of the spectrum of victimhood, dare i say on the complete opposite side, we have madarame. madarame wants violence because inflicting violence is all he ever knew. it solved all his problems, and violence was, too, the root of all his problems. madarame is perpetually stuck in a cycle of violence, and he feels entitled to inflicting it as much as he feels obligated to. he and towa both romanticize their issues so they can ignore and deny the fact that they are, too, victims. madarame couldn't possibly be a victim, ever, if he is always "in control", right? if he is the one punching, if he is the one going after the fight, if he is the one winning the fight, he must always be the perpetrator, never the victim, never again. if he is calm and composed, if he doesn't give way for his own thoughts to get under his skin, then it doesn't bother him. it is the same for towa - when he says he is attracted to violence, when he convinces himself he enjoys the pain, he enjoys the abuse, when he seeks it out himself, then it isn't that he's a victim, it's that he's getting what he wants. he takes control by convincing himself the abuse is what he always wanted, like a kid who loses their toy and says "i didn't want it, anyway". towa and madarame would do anything before acknowledging they might need help, but in that sense, the strategy they choose for their mental gymnastics are directly opposed. comfort in inflicting violence, and comfort in receiving it. that is precisely why they work together.

what makes madarame and towa "soulmates" is both a combination of what makes them different and what makes them equal. the denial of their trauma and their view of themselves, the violence and the vessel, the boxer and the punching bag. if i were to point a character that is truly "equal" to towa, I'd point ikuina, and that is why towa shows such a small, fleeting interest for ikuina, especially in madarame's route. ikuina wants to be violent as much as he wants the violence done to him, he wants to drown in it, he is fascinated by it and willing to inflict it upon himself directly, as much as towa is. they crave it, are addicted to the violence, but especially addicted to the pain, on both a sexual and psychological level. ikuina's trauma is related to violence in a way that made him view himself like towa views himself, not only as a carrier for violence, but mostly as deserving of violence, like a deeply religious person thinks themselves deserving of divine punishment, it is, in their eyes, a reward just as much.

but to towa, that isn't what fulfills him. he doesn't want another to share his desire for abuse, because he doesn't want to abuse, not really. what towa wants - and here we're not really talking about towa, the person, but rather his subconscious, his instinct built on his traumatic experiences, not his rational self, not his personality exactly, but a much deeper force inside him, one he never really learned or even had the chance to learn how to deal with, and so made it part of who he is, or believes he is: his ptsd - what he wants is someone willing to abuse him, someone who both cares for him and is willing to abuse him, that is the dream of anyone seeking self destruction, but who isn't necessarily suicidal, which is towa's case. as much as he denies it, as much as he despises it, he hates it precisely because he knows its true: he does want to be madarame's pet. he wants someone who will give him what he wants, someone who will take responsibility for him, someone to hurt him and dress his wounds, so that he doesn't have to do it himself, to himself. that is towa's euphoria, as it is, in a way, anyone's euphoria, to relive their trauma, or a crucial part of it. for towa, it is being abused, being cut and raped, and not have to seek it himself. it is having it done to him, like the first time, like the times before, and mostly - by someone he trusted.

and madarame, he of course loves towa, in his own twisted idea of love, and a pet is exactly what he wants, too. because inflicting violence is his penitence, the only way he could ever love another is by showering them with violence. it is not that he's abusive, or toxic, not in his eyes, because to him, violence is beautiful - and that is what made him fall in love with towa, because that's what towa understands. violence is beautiful, both inflicting it and receiving it. it is a recurring theme in slow damage as a whole, of course, the damage, obviously, of violence, but especially the beauty of it. every character believes violence to be beautiful in their own way, maybe not as obvious as towa and madarame, but we have the minor euphoria models, we have characters like taku and rei, a doctor and a body modification professional, who are at their core also deeply related to violence, to pain, in order to heal, in order to turn into art. we have toono and sakaki, who we can say are the main "antagonists", in slow damage, who, despite being deeply connected to violence, also despise it. sakaki believes it to be a necessary evil for the greater good, and toono sees it as merely a tool. in most instances where towa's scars are brought up, words like artwork, body art, uniqueness, are brought up, except for when toono brings them up. what paints toono as a villain in slow damage is not his acts and much less his moral compass, but rather his refusal to accept violence, to embrace it, to find it beautiful.

i guess I'd say that is the main point "slow damage" wants to come across with, after about 60 hours playing it. from the roots of shinkoumi, the city itself fueled by violence, to the thing that gives purpose and fleshes out each of the side characters - and that could be another rant of its own entirely

[berlingotesque]

What are your ships for Batim? :D

VERY GOOD QUESTION- I know my answer should be rather straightforward but I feel I have to put some context to my answers since they may seem contradictory/paradoxical otherwise, so bear with me-

Sammy x Norman : Well. I think that one was pretty obvious, anyone who's seen more than 3 of my posts knows that I'd die for these two. They're just so PERFECT for each other, from their complementary personalities to the fact that their relationship allows us to delve deeper into batim's historical and social context. Sammy and Norman have one of the few relationships that develop the most during the game's lore : Norman originally complains vehemently about Sammy's frenetic behavior, only to end up lamenting to Buddy and Dot how 'Sammy isn't the same anymore'. What's interesting about this statement is that he says it in relation to Sammy's strange behavior : clearly, the two men have grown close enough for Norman to differentiate Sammy's extravagant habits from his ink-influenced behavior.

Furthermore, Sammy is a very gray character morally, a perfectionist who is extremely socially maladjusted (surely due to the fact that he's coded on the spectrum and autism wasn't properly diagnosed at the time), naturally ostracizing him. For his part, Norman comes from a rural background (which surely earns him the animosity of the people at the studio, given the historical context and the fact that he could very well be poc) and also seems ill at ease socially : to me, it's fascinating to see two characters excluded from their peers because of differences they can't change (being autistic or poc and gay) getting closer to each other, to the point where Sammy, who is deeply misanthropic, naturally compliments Norman by describing him as very bright. To me, Norman is the perfect partner for Sammy : ready to apprehend him as he is, since he's completely free of social conventions, without taking any shits from him.

I think Sammy and Norman can really get the best out of each other, during a historical period when being different was strongly proscribed. I think I'd have trouble enjoying Batim as much without their dynamic at its heart (considering how narratively rich it is) : Norman is Henry's confidant, Sammy is Joey's, both remain morally gray deuteragonists fundamentally opposed to the ink machine, while remaining fascinated by its powers. And who wouldn't love a good old enemies to lovers ending tragically with the unwitting murder of one by the other ? After all, Norman's main flaw is that he's too curious for his own good, and it was Sammy who inevitably led him to his doom..

Allison x Tom : what more can I add. She's everything. He's just Tom. I've always been drawn to characters/ships with a vibe completely opposite to the vibe of the work they originally came from, and the 'turning poison into positivity' energy that Tom and Allison bring to Batim has always fascinated me. In a world as tragic as their own, I find it touching to see these two find beauty in all the ugliness and manage to ask themselves 'what if we were happy after all ?' It's really striking and brings a narrative richness to the work, since they directly mirror what failed with Sammy and Susie : Allison is perfect, but that was never what was at stake in Tom's eyes. Tom was looking for humanity, not perfection, and he managed to go beyond the image of the muse to discover a friend, unlike Sammy with Susie. They're literally Romeo and Juliet but, well... Not dead.

Joey x Henry/Henry x Linda : oh boy. These three... Let me get it straight right away : Henry and Linda are perfect for each other. She's exactly what he needs to be happy : she's present, patient. There's no denying that he loves her immensely. But Joey... oh Joey is undoubtedly Henry's soul mate. The subtlety is that Joey can't bring him the stable happiness Linda can : Joey tugs at him, pushes him over the edge. He knows exactly what to do to push him beyond his own limits. The love Joey offers Henry is an uncomfortable but unconditional one, one that would allow Henry to go beyond what he thinks he's capable of achieving because no one knows Henry better than Joey ! And let's be honest, Batim only exists because Joey refuses to move on, to live his dream without Henry in it. He's stuck in unrequited love and refuses to learn to live with it. And that's the tragedy of this trio : Henry sincerely loves Linda but is truly himself with Joey, which prevents him from hating OR loving him (And Joey exploits this information by remaining extremely toxic and convincing himself that he can wear him down lmao). Henry is stuck with this dilemma : Existing peacefully with Linda or living painfully with Joey. And that's why I love the dynamic of this love triangle : because there are no solutions that will satisfy everyone.

Joey x Sammy : okay, don’t get me wrong : these two are HORRIBLE for each other. Does Sammy periodically want to quit just to piss Joey off? Yes. Isn't Joey's fascination with Sammy intimately tied to his refusal to forget Henry, who was a genius like Sammy? Yes. Nevertheless, it's impossible for me to read The Illusion of Living without feeling embarrassed and like I'm reading Joey's diary : whether you ship them or not, Joey is practically canonically smitten with Sammy. I sincerely don't think Joey and Sammy can sustain a healthy relationship with each other, but oh boy, surely that won't stop me from exploiting their bizarre obsessive love-hate relationship, where it's hard to determine whether they're going to throw hands or make out.

[bougiebutchbinch]

thought of the day... hughtrain but hughie falls first. A-train has his redemption arc, he starts helping out The Boys, and he saves Hughie's butt a whole bunch while asking only for Hughie's forgiveness in return (though deep down, he never really expects it)

And Hughie never expected to give it

But somehow... here they are, five years after Robin's death.

Weird... friends?

Hughie is working alongside the man who killed Robin - the man who set his whole life on this fucked-up path. They have so many similarities, and so many differences. They both lost a parent (or both in A-Train's case) at a young age, while Hughie is still overcoming both the death of his father and the reappearance of his mother. They both have a traumatic relaitonship with the whole superhero business, albeit from opposite ends of the spectrum. They both lost their girlfriends (because A-Train killed both of them lmaooooo).

And sure, Hughie's faced things as a normal human that A-Train hasn't, and A-Train has faced a whole lot of awful shit as a very public-facing Black man in modern-day America, ranging from constant microaggressions that he's been taught from childhood to grit his teeth and smile through for the cameras, to the awfully overt racism from Stormfront and Tek Knight, explicitly permitted and endorsed by the people who run the goddamn country - a burden Hughie can't quite comprehend the gruelling extent of. But somehow, they just seem to... get each other? They're the exact same age, and their lives have been so wildly divergent, but also somehow led them to the same spot. It feels weirdly like fate....

Which Hughie doesn't believe in, to be clear. Just like he doesn't WANT to believe that A-Train is changing, but he blatantly is, right there in front of him. He's helping people and obviously really enjoying making people's lives better, rather than just chasing celebrity status and big bucks!

Plus, he's still teasingly flirting with Hughie at every opportunity. Only nowadays, it feels more friendly than a challenge. They work surprisingly well together, and Hughie starts enjoying his company. Possibly... more than enjoying it...

A-Train, meanwhile, is suffering under the burden of that classic celebrity crisis - i.e., 'I have never been allowed to explore my sexuality because What About My Brand, but I want this pathetic, powerless, skinny dweeb to fold me in half; what the fuck is happening, help'

One day he congratulates Hughie on his nice cock or his big dick energy or something, and rather than getting flustered Hughie flirts back and OH GOD NOW A-TRAIN IS THE FLUSTERED ONE; WHAT THE FUCK IS HAPPENING; HELP

so obviously he runs away at 3000 mph and leaves Hughie stood there, confused, on the edge of the street~

[tesseractrave]

The Happy Mask Salesman's design makes me wonderfully crazy, and I have to talk about the way my brain processes it because it's a big part of why I love him so much.

[Analysis is under the cut]

——————————————————————–——

The first detail I'd like to point out would be the color theory.

He has the bluer purple on both his tunic and trousers, or the whole piece if you consider it a jumpsuit (I personally don't draw it as a jumpsuit, but I do admit that it might be the most game-accurate interpretation), and it gives him a very direct foundation and center for the outfit's base.

The vest and shoes are a darker magenta, however, which adds hue variation while staying analogous with his tradmeark purple shades, and the light grey is a value used to balance the more saturated purples as an accent.

The golden accessories are a complimentary (opposite) color to purple, which Nintendo seems to be very adept at in general (cough, Splatoon, cough).

Of course, we can't forget his hair. Whichever specific shade you see it, it's always agreed that the color is at least somewhere along the ginger spectrum. The red, orange, auburn, etc. hues are analogous between the contrasting gold and purple, adding a transitional color to link them.

His skin serves the same purpose with the varied addition of having a lowered saturation and a lighter tone to aid the grey in balancing the depth of the color of his clothes and hair.

Though we unfortunately have no canon answer to what his eye color is, Ember Lab's creative decision to make them green may have been the best choice from a design standpoint because it balances out the purple in his clothing and makes his face stand out more.

The distribution of color in this design as a whole is pretty genius to me, as well.

His hair, being the only part of him that's that ginger color, directs the eyes upward to his face, while the main, deep purple is focused on the direct center.

The gold is arranged widthwise across the center, most heavily on the neck once again to direct the eyes upward while also distributing down to both of his wrists for balance on either side, almost like a scale.

The magenta and grey both run lengthwise down (and wrap around) the center and sit in mostly horizontal detailing at the bottom of his legs like the base of a pillar.

It's not something I added to the example image or spoke about before, but his white teeth in his smile are another aspect that is, of course, very eye-catching for his face and important for his design.

There's also the topic of the geometry.

I'm using my own art as an example because this is the way I interpret it, but the first image is just a breakup of how the edges of each section line up with one another in a way that fans out from the center, and the second image is the addition of marks measuring the estimated centers of each section.

Looking closely, you quickly realize how his gorget makes everything line up geometrically, and as a whole, the design is entirely symmetrical apart from the way his hair is parted, which adds all the asymmetry needed to make him feel natural, albeit incredibly well-groomed and organized.

The color of the inner edge of his vest and the the soles of his shoes is the same as the two rows of stitches running down the front of his torso, which gives the otherwise separately-coloured pieces of the outfit a common detail to link them as a set.

(At one point, I think I had an exact estimation for the number of stitches in each row, but I think I started ignoring it in my art to save my sanity. I know it's on my cosplay, though.)

His gorget and bracers also have a matching scallop pattern (though it seems to be debated on whether the scallops of the bracers face up or down), which adds an additional sense of uniformity.

The majority of details follow the lengthwise median, and everything suggests an overall polished feel and a balanced center of gravity. All in all, it's a fantastic design. I've seen so many wonderful takes and artistic adjustments on it, and I've even made my own, but the character designers at Nintendo really popped off with this one.

[ijustwantogohomehogwarts]

c o m f o r t

c o m f o r t

Sirius has just left home, and regulus isn't handling it well. He and hufflepuff!reader are still developing their friendship, but he comes to her in his time if need

warning and such:

- sx is mentioned in passing , not proofread, written at 3am

-----------------------------------------------------------------

Regulus has always just “blended in.” He wouldn’t dare be caught at the center of attention; even being in the foreground was pushing his limits of comfortability. He and Sirius couldn’t be more opposite, but that was the only comparison I would ever make between the two Blacks. 

It wasn’t a secret that the most noble and ancient house of black was nothing shy of cruel and torturous, and the boys dealt with it on polar opposite ends of the spectrum. I have the privilege of knowing them both for who they are, I know first hand that they couldn’t be any more different, and yet still so similar. 

I would like to say that I have gotten “somewhere” with Regulus. The boy who once wouldn’t make eye contact or hold a conversation, will now sit down and study with me. He can manage small talk during meals, and I’ve even seen him laugh when we’re alone. I’ve grown fond of him, but I know better than to push.

So I’m content to exist and let him seek me out. I tell myself that being there, should he need a buffer between him and himself, I’d be happy to play the part. 

…

Regulus had seemed quiet, more on edge the last few days than I had ever seen him. Rumors spread, and I knew first hand, that Sirius had left home, with no intention of returning. I couldn’t imagine being in the same house, alone, with Walburga and Orion Black. I had met them only once, and that was more than enough to last me in this lifetime and next! Regulus tried to assure everyone who pushed on the subject that he was “fine” and wouldn’t let the conversation continue beyond that. 

I saw right through his charade and knew that he was in fact much less than ‘fine,’ probably the furthest from it, but again, I bit my tongue and tried not to push. I didn’t want to feel as though I was walking on eggshells around him, that he was so fragile he could break with one wrong look, but it was impossible to continue life as if it was “just another day.”

To compensate, I made more of an effort to keep Regulus from being alone. I stayed up later to study in the common room. I got up earlier. I made excuses to pass him in the hallways when I knew he would be wondering about the castle. Anything I could think of, so long as it didn’t border on stalking. I had never been more relieved that I didn’t need much sleep to function, and I did the same for Sirius, of course I did, but I worried about him less. His friends were far more open about being supportive and available. 

It was Sunday, and we only had a few more days before break started and we would be gone for a week. I heard soft knocking on my door, so soft I almost thought I had dreamt it. But it continued, never amplifying. I peered at the clock on the table beside me, it was barely 6am. I stretched, throwing the covers off to the side and stumbled across the cold floor. I opened my door, squinting at the light that poured through the big windows. There, a few feet down the hall and turning back to face my door, was Regulus. 

He was dressed down, a white t-shirt, sweatpants and black socks. For a boy who didn’t wear anything that wasn’t tailored before I met him, I would call this progress. His curls were hanging loosely in front of his face, his eyes were red and puffy, and his whole body showed evidence of his lack of sleep. He tried to smile as he crept slowly back towards my door.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“I was already awake,” I smiled, trying to hide a yawn. I pushed my door open further, inviting him in. “Allez, parle-moi.”

Regulus didn’t say anything about my speaking French, though it was normally something that would excite him. I sat on the edge of my unmade bed and watched as he nervously looked around, scratching the back of his arm. This wasn’t the first time he’s been in here, the first time we’ve been alone together, or the first time he’s come to me at odd hours, but there was definitely something going on in that beautiful mind of his. 

“Regulus, are-”

“You don’t have to call me that,” He sighed. 

“I’ll call you anything you want me to call you, love. Reg? Reggie?”

He smiled at ‘Reggie,” nodding quietly,  but the excitement seemed to fade just as quickly as it appeared, and I could see tears brimming in his eyes. I grabbed his arm and pulled him down to sit on the bed beside me, my arm staying on the small of his back, his head resting, reluctantly at first, on my shoulder.

“I know what you’re doing,” he started, trying to collect himself as he spoke. “I see you everywhere I go.”

“Reggie, I’m sorry. I just-” 

“Thank you.” He sobbed. 

I didn’t know whether to feel pride or guilt, so I settled on sympathy. I don’t know how long this had been brewing inside of him, perhaps a few days, perhaps since the night Sirius was sorted into Gryffindor. However long, I was content to sit and comfort him for twice as long. I didn’t press, I just let him let it out. 

Eventually, he stopped and tried to compose himself, rubbing his cheeks quickly and sniffling a few more times. 

“Do you mind if I use your bathroom?”

“Of course not,”

I gestured to the door at the other end of the room, and watched as he disappeared behind it. I could hear the tap running and took a minute to wave my wand around the room, tidying up and making the bed. 

I was pulling a jumper on as he reemerged. 

“I should go. Y/n, I’m sorry again I shouldn’t-”

“Come here,” I smiled, climbing up to the head of my bed, leaving plenty of room for company. I didn’t know what to expect from Reggie, I’ve never known him to be intimate, or otherwise share a bed with anyone before. Why should I be any different?

“I don’t want to take up any more of your time-”

“I’m not asking you to have sex with me Reggie,” I chuckled, patting the bed beside me. “Come sit, let’s talk.”

He hesitated, but sat anyway.

We talked. We talked about school, Reggie's favorite classes, the potions and charms he was working on outside of class. We talked about Barty and Evan and the nonsense they get themselves into.... This was the most I had ever heard him talk, more than all the other times in the last 3 years combined, and so, rather quickly, we ran out of things to talk about, without talking about the elephant in the room. 

“How is he?” Reg eventually asked, playing with a loose thread on my pillowcase. He was laying on his stomach beside me. 

“He’s surviving. Having a go around with James on the daily.” Reg chuckled. “He’s safe, Reggie. He’s worried about you though, he feels guilty for ‘leaving you behind.’”

I watched as the smile dropped from his lips and he buried his face in the pillow, trying to hide the tears that began to fall again. I scooched down next to him, draping an arm over his hips as I began to rub his back again.

“Can you hear me?” He nodded, but didn’t look up.

“Reggie, no one should have to endure what you and Sirius had to. There’s no love in that house. No hope, no admiration, no family. It was only ever you and your brother, and I can’t imagine what it’s like now that he’s gone, but you need to understand that what happened, it’s not your fault!” 

He turned his head, arms still tucked under himself, curls covering his face. I rubbed his knuckles, pulling his arm from his chest and putting it behind my back. His breathing hitched, nerves and unease settling in his body. My fingers danced up his bare arm and across his shoulder. I smiled at him, tucking a strand of hair behind his ear, letting my fingers linger in his curls a moment longer than necessary. He closed his eyes again, sighing heavily as he relaxed into my touch. 

I repeated the motion, tucking strand after strand of hair behind his ear, until all the pieces were nestled back into place. My fingers trailed back down his shoulders and to his arm, my nails dragging the skin causing goosebumps at the gentle touch. Regulus smiled, but didn’t open his eyes. He felt for my hand and returned it to his head. 

I carded my fingers through his curls, scratching lightly at the back of his head and repeating affirmations with every pass. 

“You are strong.”

“You are brave.”

“You are smart.”

“You are loved” Regulus shuttered. 

“You are loyal.”

“You are kind.”

“You are careful.”

“You are loved.” Regulus shuttered again, gripping the fabric of my jumper tightly.

“You are gentle.”

“You are confident.”

“You are safe.”

“You are loved.” 

I repeated this, over and over again, each time the word love was mentioned, Regulus pulled himself closer to me. I couldn’t tell if it was embarrassment, or if he was trying to hide himself from the word, as if the word itself was cursed.

Eventually, the shuttering was replaced with heavy breathing, and I resolved to believe that Reg was asleep. I sighed happily to myself, content that he felt at peace, safe enough to sleep. The feeling was overwhelming, and I too found myself beginning to nod off, still tugging lightly on his hair as he slept.

When I woke, Reg was still asleep, though his death grip on my jumper was gone, his cold fingers lay delicately on the bare skin of my stomach, his head on my chest. I stirred quietly, trying not to wake him. I kissed the top of his head, smiling at the realization that, despite knowing he most definitely had been awake at some point, he stayed.

I glanced at the clock and laughed to myself; we had slept for nearly 10 hours. Dinner would be starting soon, and the common room outside was coming to life. (Rather, it had been alive for hours now, but this was the first I was hearing of it.) I reached for my wand, drawing the blinds slightly, silenced the world outside my door, and summoned my book.

I read for about an hour before the boy beside me stated to come to life. He gripped me tightly as he stretched. I kissed his head again, and smiled as he groaned contently.

“Wait a minute,” 

“Hmm?” Regulus let go of me entirely and quickly, looking up at me as his hair began to fall in his face again.

“How did you get in here this morning?!” 

He looked at me, nervous for a moment, before we both dissolved into a fit of laughter. 

[baconsoapp]

Stevie Rogers and Gender Dysphoria

if you're unfamiliar with my trans Stevie Rogers head canon, check out this post here. Anyways, more under the cut.

So, I’ve been thinking a lot about this post and how others perceive Stevie.

Like stated in the linked post, Stevie has always dealt with people not finding her body acceptable. Both in the purely aesthetic sense and the medical sense. After the serum, she has to grapple with the opposite side of the spectrum. So many people view her as a specimen, as a sex object and the paragon of man.

I think it would be interesting to view this in a trans lense. Stevie's hyperawareness to how she fits in along with others. How others behave around her and treat her.

Pre-serum, a lot of her gender dysphoria was physically-centered. Stevie wished she was fuller and smoother all over, like the typical woman seen in all the pin-up paintings she was told not to look at.

Post-serum, the same physical thoughts remained. Frequently, she wished that she could be softer around the edges and over all her new muscles. But now, the majority of the thoughts were socially-centered. She wished people still treated her with fragility and care, like a distressed dame ready to fall over at any moment.

When she comes out of the ice, the socially-centered thoughts only get worse. Now the rest of the world had the rest of a century and then some to catch up on Captain America, and how competent and masculine and assertive "he" is.

Stevie knows this is often a conflation between Captain America, the Figure, and Stevie Rogers, the person. But she can't help but balk at the expectations set for her. Maybe it's just because she has the world on her shoulders at all times, but maybe it's also because the gender roles are amplified and applied to her. That's what everyone expects of Captain America, anyway.

I just love the idea of Stevie completely rejecting gender roles and societies standards, especially after Civil War when she's already an enemy of the state lol (^^;

[captainofthetidesbreath]

The Circle of Needle & Thread has the same expansive dread and horror and anxiety and stress and calamitous stakes as the Ring of Brass, but their finales also exist at extreme opposite ends of the "comedy and horror are separated by a razor-thin edge" spectrum.

It's fucking hilarious. Good for both of them.

[justafriend-ql]

2024 gmmtv bl + gl predictions/wishlist

okay okay, i know it's only july. but i'm a little crazy, so i'm already thinking about the 2024 lineup. some general observations that are informing my predictions:

the 2023 lineup features 9 bls and 1 gl (out of 22 total series). 2 of the bls are ensemble casts (our skyy 2, only friends). so we can probably expect ~10 ql series next year.

as a general rule, it seems like gmmtv's main pairs will get a series every other year or so, although some popular pairings may be mains two years in a row.

they also seem to give lead roles to one or two new main pairings per year - usually pairs that have been floated as side couples in series that aired the year prior (e.g., milklove, perthchimon)

*please note that this is entirely speculation and i don't intend to start any wars in the notes. also: i will be talking about the pairs from an analytical/business perspective; if that makes you uncomfortable, i recommend you just keep scrolling*

bl predictions (in no particular order)

winny x satang series

rationale: given the success of their pairing in my school president and the many fanmeets/brand sponsorship events they've had together this year (including some solo events abroad), this is almost a guarantee. genre prediction: i'm guessing it will be a romcom with a bit of a darker/angstier edge to it, since winny and satang are great at the enemies to lovers trope and are talented dramatic actors.

2. pond x phuwin series

rationale: since fish upon the sky, these two have been a very popular pairing (particularly in thailand, it seems). along with joongdunk and geminifourth, they're part of the 'new gen' group that gmmtv has do a lot of fanmeets/brand sponsorship events (which means $$$ for gmmtv). their last series, never let me go, aired mostly in 2023 but was scheduled for 2022, so a 2024 series would be in keeping with the every-other-year rule. genre prediction: i think their next series will lean more towards the romcom end of the spectrum, given that never let me go was a lakorn and (regrettably, in my opinion) wasn't as popular as fish upon the sky.

3. gemini x fourth series

rationale: this is another no-brainer, really. this pair is so wildly popular that they're already having a solo concert together. both are very good actors (and performers) despite their young age. gmmtv would be stupid not to capitalize on their popularity and skill. genre prediction: probably still romcom, but with a little more "maturity" than my school president. they're young, but that hasn't ever stopped gmmtv from upping the intensity of the physical intimacy, in particular (e.g., phuwin was 19, about the same age as gemini and fourth, when never let me go was filmed).

4. first x khaotung series

rationale: though these two certainly aren't bound to the branded pair model, they excel when they act opposite to each other. the eclipse garnered a lot of popularity for them, and that's only going to grow after only friends. genre prediction: these two can carry heavy, emotional scenes and dark themes extremely well, so it'd be great to see them in a darker genre (the eclipse, while dealing with heavy topics, still had a lot of lighter romcom moments). personally, i'd love to see them lead a p'aof production, which might be likely since p'aof worked with (and was impressed with) the two of them on moonlight chicken. a period drama with these two would be super interesting.

5. neo x mark series

rationale: these two are the wildcard pairing in only friends and were originally the side couple in cooking crush (before they switched out mark due to overbooking him). this is consistent with gmmtv's tendency to float a couple in a series or two before giving them a series of their own. they're both in the same boat, having been relegated to the "funny side character" role for a while, but they have tremendous potential to do more, and gmmtv seems to recognize that now with their decision of casting them in only friends. genre prediction: hmm this one is tricky, since these two can do romcom and drama equally well. if i had to guess, they'll give neo and mark an "edgy"/"sexy" sereies because they're willing to go there and they can execute it well, which isn't necessarily true of all other gmmtv pairs.

6. force x book series

rationale: okay, i know i said gmmtv usually doesn't give pairs a main series two years in a row. but in forcebook's case, i think it's likely. for some reason that i don't personally understand, enchante didn't seem to resonate with a lot of people, but their popularity has skyrocketed since a boss and a babe and will only grow more when only friends airs. i think gmmtv will go with the momentum and give them another series in 2024. genre prediction: forcebook have done two romcoms already, so hopefully they'll get to branch out into another genre. personally, i think a mafia-type series led by these two would be really sick.

gl predictions (in no particular order)

gmmtv is testing the gl waters with milklove-led 23.5 this year. given the popularity of idol factory's gap the series (which surpassed 2gether's viewing stats by a wide margin), gmmtv will need to invest in the gl market in order to remain competitive. that's why i think there will be at least 2 gls in 2024, rather than just one.

view x june series

rationale: view and june will star in dangerous romance and 23.5 this year, indicating that gmmtv is looking to brand them or at least give them main roles in 2024. they're both talented actresses who have a lot of experience and can easily handle heavier material. it's just a matter of how well they're received as a pair in the series that air in 2023. genre prediction: we don't know what their dynamic will be like in their 2023 series, but i think a lakorn-style, enemies to lovers narrative would suit view and june well and give them a chance to showcase their great acting skills. a sci-fi series would also be really neat!

2. sizzy girl group series

rationale: this one might be more of a personal wish than a likely prediction, since gmmtv hardly gives sizzy the time of day. but! jan and aye have played queer characters before, and ciize has repeatedly expressed interest in doing a gl (even talking to jane about being paired together). they're all great actresses and performers (sizzy concert when??), so it really would be amazing if they got their own series. genre prediction: i'm feeling a rom-com for them. my personal dream is a series about a literal girl group of performers (like sizzy itself) so that there can be original music for each episode like in my school president. bonus points if nanon can guest star as their slaytastic manager (i'm never getting over their love score collab).

ensemble predictions (in no particular order)

given the growing number of branded and un-branded pairs within gmmtv, gmmtv will have to lean more into ensemble series (like only friends) in order to give everyone screen-time.

a light-hearted romcom (like our skyy 2)

rationale: this would be an opportunity to give airtime to any branded pairs that don't have their own series, or more work for popular pairs. a light-hearted romcom with a stacked ensemble cast would be a huge moneymaker for gmmtv with lots of fanmeet/concert opportunities (like my school president). cast predictions: we could see many members of the my school president gang (geminifourth, markford, potentially also aun and prom) here. this could also be a chance to float new gl pairings!

2. a more mature, jojo-style series (like only friends)

rationale: other production companies are ratcheting up the heat of their series; gmmtv will do so too in order to stay competitive. for better or for worse, sex sells, and like only friends, a series like this would attract a lot of attention and excitement on social media. cast predictions: this is where some of their older, more established pairs come into play. we could see jimmysea or offgun here. or even joongdunk or pondphuwin, since these two pairs are being pushed in the direction of higher heat. this could look like a mafia or gang-war style series, or maybe something with paranormal/horror themes.

bonus: things that probably won't happen but i would desperately like to see

namtan, tu, ploypach and/or prim gl (please i'm begging i would DIE; can you imagine a period piece with these four?? the costumes alone would have me on my knees)

joongdunk/pondphuwin vampire series (i don't care if it's cringe; did you see joongdunk's dumdum performance??)

breaking up branded pairs (imagine, for example, if joongdunk/pondphuwin switched partners; or winnysatang/markford; or jimmysea/forcebook)

fluke pusit main series (i mean, come on)

midnight museum season 2 khathadome canon (not brothers, please be serious)

okay, that's it. feel free to add your own predictions/wishlist. remember: these are just my own ideas and opinions! don't take anything i say too seriously haha

[sun-pluto]

half formed thought but oppositions in a chart can actually manifest as a point of protection for the native. the opposition line draws a shield between two sister signs that the native can lean on since they can operate both sides of the same coin. yes it can be a struggle for balance and confusing for the native, but i think it’s possible that the native can also use it as a double-edged sword.

oppositions, i think, give rise to a cycle of sorts. what one sister sign begins, the other will end, and other factors like planets, houses and the sign itself play into how this manifests. the energy is sort of like a see-saw the native has to practice balancing in order to get benefits of the aspect.

let’s say you have an aquarius rising opposite leo moon in the 7th house. how you present yourself to the world and how people see you (asc) is the opposite of what you want to nurture in yourself (moon). how? people might think you’re electric, aloof, knowledgeable, humanitarian or you could present yourself this way (aqua) when deep down you have a flair for drama, are actually outgoing and warm-hearted (leo), and the 7th house focuses these leo traits into relationships with others.

i think when the native uses this as a point of protection while maintaining the balancing act, it’s like… nobody else could win in this area because you have BOTH sister signs to help yourself. this duality could be helpful, as in this example, to bring abundance and warmth into your relationships while still maintaining a strong sense of self and personal vision/independence (leo-aqua).

oppositions bounce off each other and the goal here is to manage the power of both sister signs. but when you do it? it’s powerful. you’ve got both ends of the spectrum. it can create strong boundaries because you’re seeing both sides, one sign has the other’s back and vice versa, so to speak. attack one side of the native, and the other can defend them. so although it’s difficult to manage harsh aspects, the upside to this, in this case oppositions, is the native basically got everything covered. try to beat them in their sister signs’ game and they’d end it. the dynamism and flexibility of the native can truly be beneficial, hence oppositions also being a shield, and it looks like one in a chart too!

[triviareads]

ARC Review of Late Bloomer by Mazey Eddings

Rating: 4/5 Heat Level: 3.75/5 Publication Date: April 16th

Premise:

A sapphic opposites-attract romance; Opal gets conned into buying a flower farm with her lottery winnings, only to find out it's already owned by Pepper. The farm is failing and the two women decide the best way to save it is entering a national flower show competition.

My review:

This was the sapphic cottage-core romance of my dreams! Opal wins the lottery and in an effort to distance herself from her mooch-y fake friends, she escapes by buying the Thistle and Bloom. Enter Pepper, grumpy flower farmer and actual(?) owner, and the two of them quickly come to the agreement that they'll live together as roommates while they sort out the situation and enter a flower sculpture competition for the prize money.

I loved the idea of both Opal and Pepper finding refuge in the Thistle and Bloom at different points in their life. Both have been hurt in the past and the farm is their safe space as well as the source of inspiration for their art (the way the author describes growing flowers absolutely sounds like an art form; not to mention Opal's shoe-painting business), which is why it's all the more important that they save it from bankruptcy. However, things get further complicated when they begin a no-strings, no-feelings sexual relationship when obviously, there are some very real feelings growing between them.

I really like the way Mazey Eddings wrote both Opal and Pepper's characters; they come across as somewhat messy zillennials (complete with doctoring their own hair to fit their mood)— and they are! Opal and Pepper are 24 and 26 respectively. I saw some reviews call them immature but as someone around their age, I completely sympathize with the way they're both just trying to get by financially while navigating a new relationship. Like, there is a third act break-up that some might see as an overreaction, but I think it fits the pattern of their prior relationships, and the way they react makes sense. What I could have done with less of is the amount of zillenial pop culture references— from 3 different Taylor Swift references to Phoebe Bridgers and Timothee Chalamet. I feel like constant pop culture references tend to date a book.

This book has queer rep and neurodivergent rep; Opal is bisexual and Pepper identifies as queer, and both women are on the spectrum. I appreciate how Mazey Eddings also wrote in multiple queer side characters, as well as how she portrayed neurodiversity— everything from Opal's autism and ADHD causing her use alcohol as an unhealthy coping mechanism to Pepper's sensory sensitivities that cause her to dislike large crowds.

The sex:

I was pleasantly surprised by the sex scenes in this book! They're pretty damn hot and varied, super emotional as time goes on, and I loved the dynamic— Opal is the more assertive one in bed, which leads to some solid dirty talk on her part (it's also in contrast to how she is out of bed because she tends to waffle over a lot of decision making), while Pepper is a little more rough and uncertain but she also has this stern edge. And of course there's greenhouse sex because what even is the point otherwise.

Overall:

I had so much fun reading this book— it had so many laugh-out-loud moments while at the same time Opal and Pepper were such intensely sympathetic characters, perhaps even more so because they were not above messing up (also can we talk about the epilogue?? What Opal did for Pepper is literally the most romantic thing a person can do in this economy). I would recommend this book to anyone looking for an emotionally satisfying romcom that also brings the heat.

Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my review.

[mantisgodiveblog]

Good to hear that you are okay! I was wondering it you were doing better, and it’s good to see hear that you are at least somewhat! Take your time to recover- being sick sucks!!! (((I debated whether or not I should speak on Mira- didn’t want confirm or deny but decided to: Honestly, just seeing rep is so rare. And from my small vantage point of being the the vanilla flavor of aroace (I tried to word that in a different way, failed, and landed on a joke lol), I think she’s a pretty good one.)))

Currently, mostly Doing Tired. Fairly standard state of being for us, admittedly. We will persist regardless. Unclear on what you mean by "vanilla flavor of aroace", here - perhaps a sign of the fact that an incredibly disproportionate percentage of our friend circle is on the spectrum, but we cannot for the life of us figure out what would be treated as "default" here. In our books, any representation is good - what someone might like varies enough by person that it's a bit hard to gauge "good" versus "bad" compared to just... what appeals more or less to any given person.

Our personal preferences when it comes to most media, for example, are in an area where something like 90% of what we really want to see is stuff where we have to "make our own food", so to speak - though, admittedly, the way that our own personal preference tends to complicate things a bit. Our love for picking things apart is a double-edged sword, in that being capable of picking apart things to the extent that we do often offers them far more opportunity to wear thin.

We are very capable of identifying trends, both in stories and people, and this has been both a great source of fun and a great source of frustration, because at the point we're at, we're often very well capable of picking apart underlying patterns of behavior to a degree that we're not necessarily "supposed" to. Because we are who we are, this means that a lot of stories can draw... dull, after we've seen enough of it. Because we know the motions, and we've most likely analyzed the underlying structures to death and back, if the story itself falters or does not succeed at offering enough new to interest us, we tend to have our interest rapidly drop off.

The degree of this, of course, varies. Body horror, transformation, gore, and a great deal of similar topics are very unlikely to wear thin for us. Good character studies tend to be the sort of thing where we can reread the same words over and over again without it getting dull. On the opposite side of the spectrum, pure fluff is the sort of thing that we struggle to get through more than maybe once every few months, and we're of the personal opinion that fandom as a whole has worn the idea of "found family" thin enough that you could stick its cloth in front of your face without noticing any difference in visibility.

This is, of course, thoroughly in the realm of "tangent" by now. A trope, like any other narrative tool, is a building block - how well it works out will depend almost entirely on execution, and if executed well, pretty much any building block can be used to spin a damn good story.

We are, however, ourself, and knowing ourself, we're going to have to start taking breaks just to make sure that the game remains enjoyable if we stray too. We're banking on things getting worse, we're banking on the warnings on the site paying off, we're hoping that the narrative we're walking into won't dull its teeth, and we're... admittedly, mostly hoping that whatever they do with Mirabelle is interesting, because we generally prefer "interesting" to "something that would be considered good representation", and we've spent enough time being aro by now that explaining things to us will feel thoroughly... plastic.

[adapembroke]

Weaving Together Firdaria and Progressed Moon Phases

Learning astrological techniques is fun, but the magic really happens when you start to put different techniques together to answer big questions about your life. When you learn how to synthesize, astrology becomes like baking. An egg, a cup of flour, some sugar, and a leavening agent or two aren’t much to talk about on their own. Together, they make a cake. 

Recently, I was experimenting with Firdaria and progressed moon phases. Both techniques allow you to divide your life into chapters, and I was curious to see if looking at them side-by-side would illuminate anything for me. 

I created a chart with a chronological timeline in one column, the Firdaria chapters in another column, and my progressed moon phases in a third column. When the chart was put together, I was shocked by how clearly the dialog between them revealed a pattern in my life that I had been unable to see any other way. 

All my life, I’ve been fascinated by binaries. I’m shy saying this because binaries are controversial–and rightfully so. Binaries have traditionally been used to perpetuate stereotypes and lock people into identities and roles that don’t suit them. 

My society has been learning a lot in recent years about the damage the abuse of binaries has done. We are exploring ways of being that are between the extremes of binary or off spectrum line between them entirely. I think that path of exploration is exciting. 

At the same time, I love the contrast of opposites. I love the pleasant way my head hurts when I encounter a contradiction. I love stark contrasts and tension. I love dialectics. I love thesis, antithesis, synthesis. I love playing with these ideas while loving and respecting the ways that ideas and people don’t fit in neat little opposing boxes. 

Until now, I haven’t been able to find anything in my chart that explains my love of opposites. The closest I’ve been able to get to an explanation is my lonely IC in Libra. 

Libra is the sign of the autumn equinox. It is one of the seasons two signs where light and darkness balance on the knife-edge of equality. While Aries (Libra’s opposite) is balance tipping in the direction of light, Libra is the balance tipping in the direction of darkness. It is this relationship between light and dark that gives Libra and Aries their meaning.

It is at night that humans, as diurnal creatures, are most at risk. We are strongly visual creatures, and when our vision fails, we need others to help us navigate the world. This need for the other is the reason Libra is so strongly associated with relationships and compromise. Aries can roll over everything in its path. It is strong and getting stronger. it can charge ahead without considering other points of view or compromising its clarity of vision. When Aries encounters a contradiction, it picks a side and hits the other side with a stick. Libra has to stop and resolve it, and the resolution frequently involves compromises. 

While I’ve been coming around to the idea that the IC is vastly underrated lately, having the IC in Libra didn’t feel like enough to explain my love of opposites. For Libra, resolving tension is the necessary step on the way to peace. Peace is the ultimate goal. I like the heat of negotiation too much for my love of opposites to come from Libra.

When I saw my Firdaria chapters and my progressed lunations together, though, my love of opposites made sense because I was able to see that my love of binaries isn’t just a philosophical oddity. In the story of my life, as told when these two techniques are brought into dialog, the tension of opposites is one of the main themes. 

Firdaria is a very simple system. There are only two ways of dividing up a life. You are either on the moon path or the sun path. Whichever path you’re on determines your lesson plan in life. The progressed moon cycle introduces chaos into the system (as the moon always does), and it is in the moon’s chaos that creates the space for interesting things to happen. In my case, there is a clear relationship of opposites between the progressed lunations I am scheduled to experience and the lesson plan of my Firdaria.

The first time I experienced a progressed New Moon was at the end of my sun chapter. The lesson of the sun chapter is learning how to shine. Just as I was (metaphorically) preparing for my final exam in shining, I entered a dark night of the soul. I experienced depression for the first time, and I learned how to create a convincing smile through tears. 

In my 20s, I experienced my first Full Moon. My progressed moon was in Sagittarius while I was experiencing my Mercury chapter in Firdaria. Sagittarius is ruled by Jupiter. In traditional astrology, Mercury is debilitated there. The reason for this is because Jupiter and Mercury are opposites. Jupiter is the planet of wisdom, and Mercury is the planet of intelligence. 

If you’ve ever played Dungeons and Dragons, you know that wisdom and intelligence are two different ability scores. A person can have the intelligence to launch a rocket without the wisdom of knowing when and where to launch it. While you can be smart and wise at the same time, it is rare, and intelligence and wisdom usually come up with opposing answers to the same question.

Fundamental tensions between my Firdaria chapters and my progressed moon phases are scheduled to happen for the rest of my life. Right now, I’m going through a New Moon in Gemini during my moon chapter, and I’m learning why the heart and the mind have classically been seen as opposed in European philosophy. 

If I live long enough, I will explore the tension between expansion and contraction (Capricorn Full Moon during a Jupiter chapter), threat vs. safety (Cancer New Moon during a Mars chapter), and the individual and the group (Full Moon in Aquarius during a sun chapter).

With my love of opposites, the lesson plan that is created by this mixing of progressed moon phases and Firdaria seems custom-made for me. I don’t believe that we signed up for everything that happens to us in this life. I’ve seen too many horrible things to believe that is true, but the elegance of this system and how it plays so neatly with my love of opposites is the closest I’ve come to a real challenge to that belief. 

After I charted out the relationship between my progressed moon phases and my Firdaria chapters, I wondered if my results are an oddity of my personal astrology. I shared my findings with the members of the Narrative Astrology Lab on Discord and showed them how to replicate what I had done. 

So far, I’ve only had the opportunity to look at a few examples, but I haven’t seen an example of the progressed moon phase and Firdaria working together as clearly and consistently as they do in my chart. 

I doubt that I’m the only one with a pattern like this, though. So, if you chart out your progressed moon phases and Firdaria, let me know what you find. 

Interested in the experiment but need help looking for patterns? Let’s have tea and chat about it.

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