#they have this territoriality that feels very specific to divorce

[carefulfears]

mulder and diana literally have the most intense divorced energy anyone could ever have...they have the chemistry of two people who've been married for decades and maybe don't wanna be married anymore, maybe aren't married anymore, but once you're married you're grandfathered in. you're always married. haven't touched each other in years, go most days not even considering the other, but owe each other something, and aren't sure of what it is. diana lies and lies and lies to his face, and then dies to save him. she feels entitled to him, she knows what's best for him, what's his is theirs. always. she was there when he got it. she helped him build it. (she tells him herself: "don't forget that"). so much of what she does appears as she's trying to establish a claim over him, but she doesn't have to try. she just is. she's irreproachable. you don't talk about the wife. (and you don't talk to her, as scully and diana arguing is met only with mulder's impatient, "scully...scully...scully.")

any time she comes up in conversation, his friends are uncomfortable. i love the way byers goes "well....yeah?" when scully asks if he knows diana. he says it like he's surprised that scully didn't know about her. when scully won't stop pressing mulder about diana in one son, all three of the boys tense up. the camera keeps going to their reactions. (you don't talk about the wife. they were there. "i always wondered why they split up.")

scully says "special agent diana fowley" as though maybe if she had one more title to throw in, she would disappear. diana says "fox" like she has something to prove. mulder says "diana" like it communicates everything he doesn't say. and in a way, it does. the first time scully heard him call agent fowley "diana," she knew.

[spacetime1969]

TOAxDC anyone?

I've been a part of the MariBat fandom for years now, and more recently become a part of the BatPham fandom since it grew into a full fandom of it's own.

In all that time I have been sitting on an idea for another crossover with DC that I think has just as much potential to become something entirely its own.

So, allow me to present the idea of Tales of Arcadia x Batman, which I've been affectionate calling the BATHUNTER crossover in my head.

More ramblings and fic recs under the cut.

So, first and foremost:

We have a bat bait, blue eyed, black haired, protagonist with trauma. Comparing this to the other two fandoms we've already hit the ground running.

We also have a reason for them to be in Gotham. At the end of Trollhunters we have Claire and Jim going with the trolls to find a new heartstone in New Jersey. Gotham is in New Jersey.

The trolls traveling across the country and founding New Trollmarket right in the Bat's territory doesn't even require an explanation beyond 'They found the new heartstone under Gotham City.'

The opportunities for identity shenanigans are still just as present as ever. If you stick to the full canon of the Tales of Arcadia universe, sans the time travel reset, then Jim, Claire and possibly Toby are both human and the bats could meet them as human civilians and as vigilantes who go around with glowing face covering armor and the ability to just disappear.

Personally, I'm not a huge fan of canon past the first half of wizards. So I like the idea of Jim using a glamour mask to go to school while being a vigilante in his half troll form. Make the bat's even more confused.

I also feel like the dichotomy between the three rules of trollhunting and Batman's usage of fear as a weapon and no killing rule would be fascinating.

Just:

"Fear heightens your senses. Fear keeps you alive. Arrogance gets you killed."

-vs-

“You prefer to call me Batman. But the reason you can never escape me … is that my name is fear. And I live within you.”

“Always finish the fight.”

-vs-

"Heroes should never kill a villain, no matter the depths of his villainy."

They would probably agree on rule three, though: “When in doubt, always kick them in the gronk-nuts.” Since Batman identifying weakness in both his teammates and villains is a whole thing.

Lastly, the potential for bio-dad aus is fascinating to me. Specifically, not with Bruce as the bio-dad, but with Commissioner Jim Gordon.

For anyone who hasn't happened on Jim Gordon's backstory, allow me to give some context. Jim Gordon's wife was named Barbara Eileen Gordon. They had two children, Barbra Gordon and Jim Gordon Jr. Barbara Eileen divorced Commissioner Gordon because she wanted to get her son out of Gotham.

From what I understand, in canon she keeps the name and eventually moves back to Gotham after her son becomes a serial killer and inmate of Arkham Asylum.

But this is an AU, canon is what ever we want it to be and Jim Lake being the biological kid of Commishionre Gordon and little brother of Barbra Gordon aka Oracle has some real potential in the right author's hands.

Fic Recs:

Loose Lips, by NerdofSpades

Batman wants answers. Jim wants to be left alone, so he can go back to his not so normal life. Too bad those two things aren't at all compatible with each other. At least Jim gets some new friends out of all of this. Probably. Maybe.

One of my favorite fics in general. Jim becomes friends with the Young Justice team while trying to convince Batman that he's 'just a civilian'.

three teenagers are loose in gotham (what will they do), by clayr_of_the_lillies

sometimes you become a vigilante deliberately. sometimes its twitter's fault. aka a tales of arcadia/batman crossover that wouldn't leave my mind.

Very funny and well thought out. I particularly like this interpretation of Gotham's trollmarket and the friendship between the trollhunters and the batfam.

In Their Blood, NerdofSpades

Barbara Lake saw an uncomfortably familiar pattern in the behavior of James Lake Junior. She saw it in almost everything he did these days. She had seen it in her friends growing up. She had lived it herself. She just wasn't sure how to help him, so, instead, she calls in a friend.

Another fun one by NerdofSpades. Barbara, having been Batgirl, recognizes Jim's behavior in herself. It's a shorter one but still a lot of fun

I'm also working on a couple of my own fics set in this crossover, but their still WIP for now

[parachutingkitten]

I’m gonna be honest it just sounds like you’re calling Sora a Mary Sue and I really don’t care for that because of how much the Mary Sue ‘critique’ is rooted in misogyny. I just don’t care at all for the term ‘sympathy card’ in regards to female characters when fandom and even society is just overwhelmingly critical of women. Like Misako for example.

I'm not gonna discount the idea that I don't like Sora because of some sort of internalized misogyny. It's certainly possible, and at the very least shouldn't be eliminated as a contributing factor. But I do think there's a bit more to my criticism than that.

For those who don't know, Mary Sue is a term that sprung up describing a particular brand of bad female character that's often a little too self insert-y. They're good at everything, naturally beautiful, have close to no actual flaws, and generally just don't feel like a real person. For the record, this is bad writing, and are valid things to criticize about any given character. Unfortunately, it has kind of been co-opted by idiots who just want a fancy way to hate on female characters, especially if they think they're 'too empowered'. This is not at all a valid criticism. The most prominent example of this sort of thing is probably Rey in the new Star Wars movies. A lot of people had criticisms that essentially boiled down to "her jedi powers are too powerful" which is kinda whack. Additionally, you'll notice that this criticism being used to describe solely female characters is a bit whack as well. The fact that even the original version of the criticism is specifically about female characters does taint it a bit. All characters can feel fanfic-y, unflawed, and overly bland no matter the gender. For this reason, even if I do feel a character fits the Mary Sue criticism, I try to avoid the term. It's fine that the name originated from a female character, but the fact that it's seen as a female only criticism inherently makes the criticism slightly suspect.

Anyway, back to ninjago.

As for your misako example, I feel like she's a prime target for a mary sue criticism. She's overly kind and composed at all times. She's so attractive that she's the center of a decades long love triangle. She's pretty much good at everything she picks up, and rarely ever has a moment where the narrative criticizes her. That fits a lot of the mary sue criticisms, and I will say that her having a few more flaws, getting into a messy divorce, or being paranoid about how leaving her kid affected him, would probably make her a better and more interesting character. I don't really think she's too overpowered, I think it all seems pretty believable for her circumstances, but if she were to become a more prominent cast member, I could see the need to nerf her a bit. Now, the important thing to note here is that none of this information should make you hate her like... personally, as a character. You should not demonize her for being poorly written. The misako vitriol is way crazy, and though it all sources from some sort of valid criticism, it ends in people making hate posts about her, vilifying her, and blaming her for a bunch of other stuff she isn't even responsible for, when she is entirely a victim of bad writing and nothing else. The way things are presented in narrative, she has done nothing wrong. She made a hard moral choice about her kid a long time ago, which has since been long forgiven, and she's been a saint since then. There is no actual reason to hate her. Again, it's the writers who should be absorbing that frustration from you.

And this is the problem we run up against when talking about characters who circle anywhere near mary sue territory. Most of the time, there are valid criticisms at the core of whatever we're talking about, but if you express them incorrectly, you run the risk of riding a hate train you don't mean to be on. I would like to make clear that no matter what I'm saying here, I don't hate Sora personally. I'm just not connecting with her- and that's fine. Most importantly, in no way do I blame her for that, I blame the (male) writers who had majority control over her portrayal. If anything, I think Sora deserves better.

Now, I listed a lot of reasons I don't like Sora, but admittedly a lot of them boil down to her feeling very main character-y, which is in fact adjacent to a Mary Sue criticism. However, I made this pretty clear in the post that these tend to be tropes I just don't personally latch on to. I hated Lloyd for years while his shtick was the whole "I'm the most important person in the world and it's so hard" thing, but that mellowed out in the eleven minute era and I like him a lot better now! I tend not to like Kai's main character moments. I absolutely despise Jay in Skybound, and Cole isn't particularly interesting in MotM to me. Main characters just aren't my jam. I like Sora much better in season two, when her struggle isn't centered on how important she is, just like all these other characters. So, I think this line of criticism is pretty typical for me, regardless of gender.

The other factor at play is the entire show of Dragon's Rising. I am not connecting with it. I think a lot of the show tends to be signaling the right story beats to gain sympathy and feel deep. It's not a Sora specific criticism. I have a whole long rant about the nightmare scene specifically and several thoughts on how they handle Lloyd's panic attacks which I feel sort of encapsulate my feelings towards a lot of the writing in general. It's surface level. It doesn't have ideas it really wants to share, it has time to fill and some topics they've seen better media cover, and so feel they should include to be meaningful. It feels very by the book. They've plugged in the equation for good storytelling without adding anything to it. And this is how I feel about Sora as well, go figure. I don’t think they wanted to tell a story about a child genius who gets their work turned against them in order to express any ideas or explore any concepts, they did it cuz it's cool, and sounds like a dramatic storyline. It's a bunch of cliche's, unfortunately one's that I'm not partial to, slapped together with no new twist or spark to them. It's fine. It's competent. It's just not interesting to me.

In that way, I think my criticisms are Mary Sue adjacent. It feels a little fanfic-y. The characters feel like they're made to be "ninjago but like with angst you guys!" But this goes for a lot of the other characters too, not just Sora. Lloyd is pretty bad about this in part 2, I'm already getting these vibes from Jay, Arin slips into it in part 2 and I think Nya has it a bit across the board. But Sora, being the main character for season 1, unfortunately feels the most main character-y.

I understand that 'sympathy cheat code' might sound a little dismissive, so if you prefer you can reword my criticism to "does not utilize the backstory tropes they've included in a way that feels genuine or deeper than surface level". But you've got to admit, Sora does have, just a bunch of those feel bad tropes in her backstory, and a lot of the screentime is dedicated to laying that backstory out to you in season one. I am not accustomed to ninjago being a feel bad show. That's not what I'm in this game for. It's the reason I hate skybound. I didn't like it when they did it to jay, and I don't like it when they do it to sora. It just feels a little repetitive to me. None of these cliche's really shine as being particularly well done either, aside from maybe the climax where she turns away from her parents? But even then, I don't feel it was really built up to especially well. The main relationship she seems to care about is Dr. LaRow, not her parents. She seemed pretty secure in her identity when separated from Imperium, so asserting it doesn't mean a whole lot. We don't feel betrayed by her parents, because we never got to like them in the first place. That wasn't a support system we ever saw her benefit from, so her leaving it behind doesn't really mean much. These same tropes could have been played a lot better if they just had a bit more depth to their implementation that actually invited you to care beyond a surface level.

If you've seen the mega video, you'll know I don't typically relate to female characters who have a pronounced tough cynical streak in them, but am sure to make clear that it's just a character type preference. The stem girl isn't a bad character type at all, just pretty overplayed at this point in time (again, because i think male writers see it as an easy way to be clear they want to empower their female characters).

Idk. I think Sora's writing is a little hollow. I also think Dragons Rising's writing is a little hollow. I can see how those criticisms might come off a little iffy in isolation but, the ask was about Sora, so that's largely what I focused on. I think the criticism makes sense within the larger context of my opinions as a whole.

[obsolete-stars-if]

Okay so i was wondering how each RO would react if they found a engagement ring MC was hiding.

Bt then i realized wait. MC is already married. Sooo is divorce a thing? Or are we just having open marriages here?

An engagement ring would be very cute for mikhail if MC was like i want to marry you again because i love you this time. And I'd love to know his reaction but what about the others.. and if we're already married how does tht work? 🧐🤔

Now, I'm feeling in a nice mood, so I'm actually gonna answer all the questions. Keep in mind that these answers would be more of the last chapters / epilogue kind of situation (depending how the relationships go), this is spoiler ish territory. So after general information, the individual reactions and personal needs of the RO will go under the cut.

Divorce isn't a thing, but all of the RO are aware that the marriage you're in is purely political (in non Mikhail routes that is), and that there are no strings attached. Mikhail has no qualms about it either, he is not gonna enforce that you can only be with him, which is kind of the situation in riag marriages being monogamous. Oh yeah, every kingdom has different marriage / bonding rules and rituals.

As we know, Riags marriage is more closely representing a gift, with a necklace to symbolize the bond. Strictly monogamous.

Meanwhile in Malam tradition, their engagement/wedding rings are antlers, decorated with flowers and plants, which each of the spouses take care of, the longer the plants survive and thrive, the better the marriage between them will be. The antlers are collected when they're being shed in their respective seasons, monogamy being more popular than polyamory. (TK specific)

In Abuyo it is a tradition to braid each other's hair together, as well as weaving baskets. Most of their traditions formed around the enjoyment of nature and spices, with a very close and tight knitted, loving community, polyamory being very common too. (Alia specific)

Meanwhile I am trying to not pin the Ita wedding rituals, as you as a ruler can simply change them. But I decided to not specify the monogamy/polyamory likelihood, as well as leaving options for gift giving getting tied to different ideas of marriage in general. Which might get added to the epilogue for the Itan population (Kate, Sammy, Sascha, Gigi)

Now we get to the specific reactions/opinions/needs of the RO and marriage.

So under the cut we go.

TK would want to marry you. Like really badly. Like they're jealous and bitter towards Mikhail BCS of it (even in the poly route). If you put the actual work into learning malam traditions and customs, and offer them the antlers? Jesus, they'll be a MESS. Like sobbing, quietly tho. Being unable to do anything but just nod, maybe kiss and hug. But yes, they so badly would wanna marry you, even without it being official, just knowing you care that much about them, just the best way to make em soft.

Sammy doesn't mind that you're married to Mikhail, and while they'd def prefer you to be married to them, they don't take it that badly. They don't care that much about all the marriage traditions, since they grew up in a part of Ita where marriage isn't prioritized. HOWEVER, they will absolutely take you to their family for a big feast, and call you their love all the time.

Alia would be shocked at first, but then quietly remind you that she is not allowed to marry. She keeps her hair short as a symbol that she cannot get "entangled" with anyone, as her life has been dedicated to the worship of the Gods and the Beyond. If you would ask her to weave a basket with her tho, she'd smile and admit, that it would be a nice activity, and she cannot imagine doing it with anyone else.

Sascha would be mortified. Even at the end of the story, you CANNOT tie this man down. It might even be enough to scare him away. Like he is back on the run. Just don't.

Kate would be so excited. She's secretly already planning your wedding with her (even just as a symbol and not legally binding). She wants a big festival, with food, gifts, and expensive clothing. She is also inviting everyone. Everyone needs to experience the love she holds for you, and love you too. Yes, J and K will visit. Yes everyone she met will be there. Yes even strangers. And you will be covered in gifts and kisses.

Mikhail would be a bit against it. For him marriage is a promise of submission and protection, and he cannot imagine commanding you. Once you tell and explain it's to renew the shared love, he is so down. Very down. On his knees actually.

Gigi is so very sad. She would have to decline politely, not because she doesn't want to. But BCS it is not fair to claim you. She would gently let you down. And while it wouldn't destroy the relationship unlike with Sascha, it would put a strain on it.

[badaziraphaletakes]

As someone who enjoys reading and writing off-canon takes of Aziraphale, could you just... you know. Start a discussion about that final 20% mentioned by OP whose name is very clearly not included here?

Maybe something to do with "fan art and fan-fiction are produced by individuals reflecting their own values through the lens of the blorbo and these interpretations ought not be subject to blanket criticism based on your individual interpretation of the blorbo?"

Please and thank you.

I'm not exactly sure what OP's point was in the screenshot there, I have some trouble understanding things online sometimes, BUT, about what you said:

"fan art and fan-fiction are produced by individuals reflecting their own values through the lens of the blorbo and these interpretations ought not be subject to blanket criticism based on your individual interpretation of the blorbo"

I absolutely agree.

I hope by now most of our followers have noticed that we never criticise fanart and fanfic in here. It's never been featured on this blog. What we feature here are prejudiced metas concerning the canon. We call out ableist, misogynistic (etc) takes about the canon characters. Takes that are trying to "explain" what happened in canon to other fans using veiled misogyny, ableism, victim blaming and anti-autistic bias. Those can have harmful repercussions irl, and we feel we must fight against those prejudices.

However fanfic and fanart are not that at all. Fanfic and fanart are not canon by definition, and are so subjective that they can have thousands of interpretations, so we feel it's not our (or anyone's) place to judge.

It's like playing with your Barbie dolls. You can do what you want with them, it's mostly harmless. If someone wants to make Aziraphale the villain in a fic? Go ahead, that falls into headcanon territory, and headcanon is not canon, it's anyone's land. I personally won't read that specific fic, but you can write it. I'm pretty sure I'd write stuff someone wouldn't read too, it's all ok. The problem is when they start to spread this as canon.

Now it must be said, of course some fics can be triggering (like every art out there), but in my 4 year experience in this fandom, 99% of fics are properly tagged, authors usually overtag for safety, so if you see a fic with a theme you don't like, it's easy to avoid it. Even fanart is tagged in the GO fandom, which is not something I see in every fandom out there. And besides, speaking of fanart specifically, it's so subjective bc what you see there may be just a metaphorical interpretation of feelings and not literal. So if you start scrutinising that you end up falling into censorship territory and that's shady.

Because of all that, we try to focus on calling out bad takes regarding the canon facts only.

That being said, in order to do that sometimes we try to analyse the overall situation of the fandom, bc many ppl try to impose fanon as canon in those metas, consciously or not. So while doing that, we may make commentaries on some fanon stuff, including the most common portrayals of the characters in fanwork. But trust that this is not a criticism of the fanworks at all. Again, it's just an attempt to separate the canon from the fanon, and to try to study the situation to see where the bad takes are coming from. In other words, fanon can be one of multiple tools to understand the fandom's mindset, and we make use of it. Is it possible that we may have (or will) missed the tone while addressing that and come across as if we're criticising fanworks? Of course, we're human, but trust that's not where we're coming from, and we appreciate criticism so we can be better :)

But honestly, if someone writes a fic where Aziraphale and Crowley are a toxic homophobic straight couple that ends up cheating on each other with the Metatron and divorcing, I couldn't care less. Have fun with your Barbies (but pls tag your fic lol).

I know this is a theme discussed over and over in fandoms, but I tried to give my two cents here, and believe me, this blog absolutely believes in "headcanon and let headcanon". Our problem is with ppl spreading misinformation about the canon.

Thanks for your ask, it's a very important thing to address! I hope I addressed what you were suggesting, if I missed anything, @indigovigilance , please share your thoughts in the reblogs/comments so we can discuss/clarify things. I have a feeling we're both coming from the same place here though 😁

Xoxo,

Mod M 🩶

[delurkr]

This was going to be a reblog of @dennisseyebrows 's post and related to @tatjana-fantasy 's comment but their post doesn't deserve to have whatever this is dumped onto it so I decided to make it separate lol

So maybe it's just because I'm all about ✨complexity✨ in characters but I mainly like to see the doubles as facets of the same people instead of Anthony's corrective imagination. Basically like Amy, Anne, and Angela are all separate people but they're also all Amy, all Anne, and all Angela to fill in the gaps of what we aren't shown. About Joseph and Amy, they're happily married indeed but maybe their consistently ideal interactions are more representative of moments James and Anne had/have instead of how they used to always be. This is going into headcanon territory, but with Tanya saying "they've been arguing since we were in diapers" and just with the two of them having such strong personalities my guess is that conflict alternating with kiss-and-make-up is normal for them and, while it's not great for the kids, doesn't necessarily mean anything serious until it does.

And I feel like it's a deliberate point of the game that we get 30 minutes of people being more or less terrible to each other so that we're quick to pick sides and condemn them and assume this is actually how they are since it's our only exposure to them after all (so we think) and we go wow why don't some of them just part ways already, and then we spend the rest of the game learning more about them and their circumstances and seeing how their doubles can act the same while having more to them than that because in reality, there is always more to people (which is neutral btw; I'm not saying it to downplay the bad or the good). Also I'll say here that because of the current day cast's variability and having more than a few minutes with them I'd guess they are really the most comprehensive picture of each Clarke (their personalities and attitudes, not specifics like Taylor and Daniel dating or Angela being divorced and such). We have as good as they get in the 1600s era, as bad as they get in the 1970s, and the determinate present day to establish which side of each character wins out. Learning to look at what happened differently is very clearly the point of Megan's story and I mean why wouldn't it apply to the rest of the family too.

Also it's relevant that I think the underlying story is purgatory since there's hints to it, and if so, everyone's fates can't depend on the ways Anthony characterizes them; it would depend on the actual people making their own choices. But even interpreting it as all his imagination, it still remains that Anthony and the player are learning to make sense of his family being complicated and to see them apart from the last image he has of them that was (almost literally) burned into his memory. And part of the tragedy is that this family in no way "had it coming" (and I've seen players use those words) but they ended so unexpectedly at a genuine low point, like not only in life in general but also in a get-past-tonight-and-deal-with-it-in-the-morning sort of way, basically the kind of regrettable times that most of us have but usually have the chance to make up for later. Of course they didn't and the present day timeline is helping or hindering Anthony piecing together a more accurate understanding of Megan especially but also everything else that was going on with the family.

Anyway if you made it this far, congratulations, my lack of articulacy is annoying me and I don't how to end this but yeah I have these 6 people under the microscope every day and most of the time I like to look at the sets of doubles as 6 big beautiful layer cakes instead of more like how Anthony wished it was, but please know that none of this is me telling people how to enjoy the story of course, this is just how I get the most meaning out of it personally.

[90363462]

Kanye West Allegedly Showed Explicit Images Of Kim Kardashian To Adidas Employees As An 'Intimidation Tactic'

Kanye West, what the f**k??

As the Chicago native continues to make headlines with his past behavior in the wake of his damaging antisemitic comments, this latest bit is really on another level. He allegedly showed explicit, adult-themed shots of Kim Kardashian and other pornographic images to Yeezy brand staffers working on the Adidas partnership.

That’s the accusation levied against the Jesus Walks rapper this week, at least, following a bombshell report that was published on Tuesday night. In a feature released by Rolling Stone, ex-employees of his accuse him of share explicit images of his now-ex-wife and more in work meetings as an “intimidation tactic.”

Related: Kanye Ditches Divorce Deposition Against Kim — Judge Gives Him One Last Chance!

In one allegation, a young staffer claimed the Heartless rapper allegedly pulled up “a very revealing and personal” photo of Kim on his phone during a job interview in 2018. Another former employee remembered a time when West allegedly showed an explicit video of the SKIMS mogul to the Yeezy brand’s entire creative team that same year.

When Rolling Stone asked for confirmation from a third Yeezy staffer, that person alleged he had reportedly routinely ventured into that territory with sharing adult images:

“[Ye was] not afraid to show explicit images or talk about situations that should be kept private.”

Gross…

Staffers alleged to the outlet that Ye often showed adult filmsduring what should have been work meetings. One former collaborator claimed:

“He showed me the video of Francesca Le, a buff porn star with a strap-on dildo f**king another girl in the a**. He’s like, ‘what do you think of it?’ Not laughing at all.”

Two other creatives claim West also showed them “homemade sex tapes” of the rapper “engaging in sexual activities with women.” One employee alleged West “specifically” targeted female staff. Another ex-collaborator explained:

“At the time I found it odd but in line with his persona as an edgy artist. Now, seeing it within a larger pattern, I feel it was a tactic to break a person down and establish their unwavering allegiance to him, testing and destroying people’s boundaries.”

All this comes amid the release of an open letter titled The Truth About Yeezy: A Call to Action for Adidas Leadership. The letter was first obtained by the mag and reported on in Tuesday night’s feature. In the letter, “high-ranking” Yeezy employees called out Adidas execs for having “turned their moral compass off” in allowing Ye to allegedly create an “abusive” culture.

One staffer lamented:

“There was no accountability. Difficult moments happened, with executives in the room — VP level or higher — and nothing would be done. You’d still show up to work the next day.”

The open letter was sent to several Adidas executive board members and the company’s newly-installed CEO last night, in addition to it being obtained by Rolling Stone.

Related: Kim Spotted Rocking Yeezys Amid Kanye’s Antisemitic Acts And Return To Twitter

In it, several former high-ranking employees at Yeezy urged the company to address “the toxic and chaotic environment that Kanye West created,” along with his allegedly “very sick pattern of predacious behavior toward women.” The note added, in part:

“He has, in years past, exploded at women in the room with offensive remarks, and would resort to sexually disturbing references when providing design feedback. This type of response from a brand partner is one that Adidas employees should never be subjected to, nor should Adidas leadership ever tolerate.”

Adidas offered a tepid response to the letter, telling the mag:

“[Adidas] will not discuss private conversations, details, or events that lead [sic] to our decision to terminate the Adidas Yeezy partnership and decline to comment on any related speculation.”

Oof.

You can read the full Rolling Stone feature HERE. Per Page Six, Kim’s reps have not responded to a request for comment. Meanwhile, the mag shared West “recently stopped working with his publicist” and thus “could not be reached for comment through direct messages or intermediaries.” Jeez. What a violation of his then-wife’s privacy! Ugh!! Reactions, Perezcious readers?

[Image via Kim Kardashian/Instagram/WENN]

Sent from my iPhone

[animehouse-moe]

Irina: The Vampire Cosmonaut Volume 5 - Hunting Dogs

Finally, a volume back with Lev and Irina. I don't think it could have come at a better time in the story either. The material, the extension of Bart and Kaye's story, the isolation and internal struggle that face a pair that have seen the world and outer space as they're confined once more to their country. And the fact that we now begin to deviate from history. Impeccable decisions from a story perspective, with plenty to love, and maybe a few jabs to make.

Allow me to start with my more critical remarks. The biggest struggle with a story is time. Trimming down as much as you can to provide a streamlined and effective experience for readers. Makino does a great job overall, but I feel slightly misses the mark with Roza and Mikhail. Being limited to Lev's perspective we're not given enough time with either individual to be as attached to them as possible through their stories in this volume. There's a lot of greatly compelling aspects between the pair of them, and I would have loved to have seen them further explored. Of course, as I said earlier, being limited to Lev's perspective means we're also limited with what we can do with supporting characters, so I really hope Makino aspires to be more bold with future volumes and branch out in terms of perspective and narrative.

Aside from that though, I don't really have any major criticisms for the volume. A piece here and there, how things are shown to the reader for one scene, or the thoughts of a specific character; nothing major.

In terms of praise though, it really starts from the get go. This volume effortlessly converts on the issues raised by Bart and Kaye's tenure in the story, producing natural development from Irina's treatment as a test subject, to Kaye's treatment alongside Dhampirs as people, to now examining how the USZR views and treats its cosmonauts as a whole. It arrives at the conclusion of Lev and Irina's divorce from outer space, and uses that yearning as fuel for the fire that is lit beneath our characters in this volume.

The whole series has done an incredible job of marrying passion and oppression to create a swirling vortex of desire and hatred, and has slowly but surely increased the scales until the tipping point of this volume has been reached. Protest isn't possible, once in a lifetime speeches aren't happening, so Lev and Irina borrow from the ideas of both to produce their seeds of hope for the future in a very grounded and passionate manner.

Enough of that though, allow me to talk specifics to this volume (sort of). We're 5 volumes in, countless spaceflight have occurred up until this point, and we've not been faced with a single death. We knew it would happen, and we had ideas as to who it may be. In spite of that though, and the fake outs and one-two punches, the drama and emotion of the moment remain strong. Why? Because it was well written from the beginning. Resigned to fate, allowing the course of their life to be dictated by the shallow politics of a man clinging to a delusion of success, our hero of this volume is the exact cause for Lev and Irina's actions. The foundation for their push for a better future, the straw that broke the camel's back. Makino saves a character death for the moment that needs it the most, where space development stalls and hope is lost, and finds the best way to use it to propel our story into its newly fictional future.

I mean, we've already had vampires, so isn't it already fictional? Yes, but sorta no. Up until this volume, history has been loosely followed. However, this volume shakes things up in very important ways, and provides Makino with full freedom in his story of fictional spaceflight. It proves that the sky's the limit, and beyond exist an even more infinite boundary. I'm incredibly curious to see how things go now that we'll be into new territory, and I'm very interested to see how the themes of oppression, inequality, and prejudice remain as we shed concrete past and drift towards a more cloudy future.

[tlaquetzqui]

Periodic reminder that if a “medieval” fantasy setting has the approximate social mores of the 1980s, minus the more libertine parts of the Sexual Revolution, it’s actually roughly what medieval mores were.

Specifically:

Slavery was largely abolished in the Latin West between about 750 and 1436, and to own or traffic in slaves was latae sententiae (ipso facto) excommunication from the Catholic Church. Originally this ban only applied to Christian slaves but by the 1000s it was all slaves.

Even where slavery existed (fuck you Venice), no Catholic or Orthodox Christians have ever allowed masters sexual rights to slaves.

Women owned property, practiced trades, filled lawsuits, testified in court, and voted in any assembly (city councils, parliaments, chambers of commerce, I think Imperial elections) open to their social class. All in their own names not as proxies of husbands or sons.

Women learned to read as often as men and the receipts of the bookshops show they bought more books. Arthurian romance, by far the most popular fiction genre, was written for a female audience.

Spousal abuse was grounds for civil divorce and criminal proceedings. Under this heading they included taking one’s “conjugal rights” by force.

Rape investigations were begun on the same basis as any other crime, without the need to show a struggle as in China or produce multiple witnesses as in Islam.

They had the first war-crimes laws in human history, the Peace and Truce of God, which banned civilian atrocities, looting, and damaging infrastructure. Due to those rules, the Nestorian Christian monk Rabban bar Sawma, sent as an ambassador to the Empire by the Mongol Khans, was amazed how small-scale and non-devastating Latin Christian wars were, compared to the one in Asia.

The penalty for violations of those laws was interdict: the clergy go on strike in your entire territory, so nobody gets married, buried, baptized, ordained, or given confession, in your domain, till you make amends (usually concessions to the victim territory combined with charitable donations). This started to break down in the late medieval, as professional mercenaries began replacing the territorial levies, since they weren’t attached to territories.

The main labor force, serfs, were essentially free, except for being allowed to travel without permission or own military weapons. They were allowed to carry agricultural and hunting tools for self-defense, though, and they could not be made to leave the land even if they also couldn’t choose to leave it.

Serfs also couldn’t have the amount of labor or produce they owed their lord increased without their consent (and I wouldn’t compare the percent they owed to my tax rates, if I wanted to keep feeling good about modern life).

Medieval hygiene was as good as most modern hygiene, with public baths being very common, something like 1 facility for every 90 people. Most people bathed at least once a week, and when they didn’t they would still usually take sponge baths (except probably with washcloths not literal sponges).

Medieval medicine was better than 19th century medicine, sterilizing tools in rubbing alcohol and using anesthesia like laudanum (opium mixed with wine, learned from the Kurds during the Crusades), and low doses of hemlock.

Their understanding of disease was less advanced than of surgery (though still not much worse than most of the 19th century), with treatment mostly based on diet and herbal remedies, like a mix of Ayurveda and Traditional Chinese Medicine. But for example miasma theory (which was not abandoned till Pasteur) is largely adequate to prevent epidemics.

[rametarin]

All you need to do to understand the real root of when feminists blame 'patriarchy' for a thing, is understand socialist ideas about what inequality really means. I say understand their ideas, not agree with them, because they're bullshit.

According to the Old Wives Tale of class struggle theory, which arbitrarily asserts this is true circularly, everything boils down to these abstracts called classes, existing in opposition to one another divorced from all context.

Those indigenous people fighting for their property rights against the invaders? Those two different ethnic groups feuding over territory? All the reality gets sucked right out of the situation as class struggle theorists wipe the context and validity of their being away to dissolve them into just being Classes, so they can use class based metrics to consider the worth of their positions and claims. Robbing them of reality to exist on paper, in theory.

And according to class struggle theorists, one party is always The Oppressor. The Oppressor is the bad guy. The Oppressor is serving injustice to the party that which is not The Oppressor. The Oppressor is wrong and always justified in usurping and undermining and committing violence to them, because they are the Bad Guy class.

The Oppressed class is always the victim, and by the nature of being the Oppressed, can do no wrong, for their entire existence is being done wrong by the other class. The Oppressed cannot abuse or exploit or be unjust to the other class, because they are the Oppressed and being oppressed by the Oppressor.

It's at this point the very people that imagining things work in this binarist way ot thinking raise their nose up, smugly, declare that, "both sides are wrong because they're locked in a dichotomy of winner take all," after projecting this simplistic view ON them, and declares the TRUE way of equality is socialism, which would pay lip service to validating both but put themselves in charge of both classes and declaring arbitrary equalities for the sake of validating their new system of governance.

According to Class Struggle Theorists/socialists, the existing status quo system is inequal because it isn't socialist in nature. Not socialist? Then you aren't equal or just, and THAT is why the conflict exists. If everybody would just submit to their ideas and methods of solving things, then everything would be equal and equitable. They don't care the context of the disagreement, and they will define inequality and injustice based on whether different parties and how they relate to one another, relate according to their principles on what inequality means.

And the trick here is, unless you are operating speciifcally under socialist ideas and views of equality, you cannot be fair or equal in a socialist's eyes. There is no such thing as egalitarianism to a socialist, unless the entire economy, social structure and culture are marching to the beat of the same drum that is their vision of how to structure and relate things and operate under power.

You can see this in how they define the patriarchy. Yes, patriarchy in normal dictionary definition means "a literal culture where men by the laws and rules are in control." This is another technique of the socialist. They take existing words you are familiar with, give them a second definition they use in parlance in their own sector of academia, misuse it, and generally it's like when a human body eats lead and their biology confuses the lead particles for calcium. Soon you're both arguing, and they're using the words with their special definition they may not even be forthright telling you about. So you have two different conversations over one another, your arguments wasting a lot of time and energy not quite addressing how they're wrong specifically.

They do this on purpose, because it buys them time and distracts those that disagree with them. Missing the mark in argument lets them feel smart and obfuscates their true intentions.

The way they define patriarchy is, "life outside of a socialist system that uses class struggle theory and critical lenses when determining how to make things equal." To them, the norm is patriarchy, even in a completely egalitarian society that puts women and men on equal footing in the courtroom, makes laws to protect from sexual discrimination, makes laws to incentivize more equal sexed hiring pratices, more trans rights. If there's ANY inequality to be found, defined as statistical diferences in outcomes, they will attribute that to sexism and patriarchy. So that hospital full of female and women nurses? "The product of patriarchy," since 50% aren't male.

To them, the human species is a patriarchy and can't be equal or not guilty of male chauvinist sexism and female oppression without their special ways to define and resolve these things they view as inequalities.

They don't even care about men and women as sexes. To them, those are just arbitrary labels for sports teams. They are also what are called, "Social constructionists." Postmodernists. To them, the very idea of anything legitimately existing indivisible and as a characteristic of its biology, is oppression. To define a man a man because they have XY chromosomes and genitals, they see, as oppression. By culture. Morally, they do not accept the idea you are what you are because of your biology, and refuse to allow labels to hinge on this biology. That's why they argue that gender should not, ever, be attributed to your physiology. They don't just argue this for the sake of the transgendered, they mean to apply it to everything. You are not you because of your biology, in their eyes, and it's immoral for anything to be defined because of its biology.

So to them, sexual inequality is just competing religious doctrine. They view cisgendered males as a dominating imperialist force, women as an oppressed vassal state, and the intersexed and gender nonconforming as minorities that are only minorities because of persecution and oppression. Which is absolutely nonsensical, but hey, they rebuke the idea of biological determinism. They have no other option BUT to imagine this is how it works. They reject reality and substitute theory based on a secular moralism divorced from objectivity. And they believe upon "freeing" society from this oppressive male force as the dominant factor, the number of transgendered or non-binary people will reach parity.

Their doctrine divorces sense and reality from the real, and everything that flies in the face of their theory to them is just further proof of the nefariousness of their enemy and truth of what they say. To them, women cannot abuse men as a gender, because women are oppressed by men. Sexism is something that only exists in a patriarchy, and it's women that suffer under patriarchy, so any sexism in society that hurts me both A.) can't exist because you're a man B.) is the fault of the patriarchy that women are subject to.

So miraculously any changes that these oppressed women make to the state and the laws gets attributed to a change BY this supposed conceptual "patriarchy" that sits somewhere above the state and national legal level, floating somewhere in this invisible collective unconsciousness we're expected to agree exists without ever talking about what the fuck they mean by that. A despotic group of women could vote tomorrow to throw every male body into a steel pot to cook them alive for the crime of being an oppressive man, and they'd still blame the patriarchy for allowing it to happen.

And similarly, when they say, "toxic masculinity," they aren't simply using the radical feminist idea of it. Where just being a male sexed person means you're Calvinistically predetermined spiritually and biologically to abuse female people. These are social constructionists, remember. They do not believe biology matters. A "man" to them is just a series of traditions and thoughts, existing purely as a social construct of culture. And they've taken the liberty of deciding for us that our societies that aren't socialist are just wastelands that give men certain ideas of supremacy over others. Does a man have a problem? "It's because of our not-socialist society and government and culture. You should want to change that." Is a man causing a problem? "He's only causing a problem because he's acting out thanks to our not-socialist society and government and culture. You should change that."

Toxic masculinity as far as they're concerned, is not doing as they expect of you, because they demand you operate that way, and to not act in any other way. Toxic masculinity, in their eyes, is your philosophy or actions having any interaction with physical reality, and your thoughts not coming explicitly from social constructionist thought. To reject their ideas about society by default being white supremacist and male chauvinist just by virtue of not being socialist, is to be no different from a school shooter, Andrew Tate, or fucking religious fundamentalists that preach a very specific, narrow, metaphysical interpretation of reality.

It's way more than just, "boys are bad" or "things would be better with women in charge. :^)" They just used radical feminists and their desire for juxtaposition as a launching pad.

[the-witty-pen-name]

Deadbeat Pt. 1

Lee Bodecker x F!Reader

18+ ONLY

Warnings: age gap (reader is 21), smut/masturbation (implied/mild), cursing, abandonment, infatuation, alcohol, cheating, violence?, mild housewife kink? 

Word Count: 4.3k

Summary: You work at the bar at the edge of town, the Sheriff is going through a divorce and needs to rent a room. 

A/N: I’m terrible at writing summaries and I’m so sorry about that! I don’t think I would consider this a dark!fic, but it does cover a lot of themes, and topics that are darker than I usually write about- but I think that comes with the territory of writing about Lee Bodecker. I’ll make sure to update the warnings for each chapter and do not read if you are underage. I also ignored canon for this one.

There are no tags on this one, because no one has specifically asked to be tagged on smut fics and I don’t want to make anyone uncomfortable!

I hope you all enjoy!

Tags and Requests are OPEN

“Get out of here Lee,” you spat, pointing to the door he just walked into the bar from. “You swore to Janie you wouldn’t touch a drop.” 

“C’mon (y/n),” he said sitting at the bar anyways, a smug grin on his face, making you scoff. 

“I ain’t having anything to do with you breaking your promise to that lovely woman,” you say confirming your point. You wipe your hands on the towel that was hanging from your apron. 

“Jack and coke?” He asks, looking at you with eyes that would be endearingly puppy dog if it weren’t Lee Bodecker. You shook your head. 

“A coke it is,” you say and he gives up trying for now. He regrets telling you on his last visit he’d be swearing off drinking cause Janie finally threatened to throw him out. 

You slide a glass bottle of Coca-Cola down the length of the bar to Lee and he grinds his teeth slightly. The sugar was always his temporary fix. You also sent down his way a small bowl of roasted peanuts, feeling bad for the mess of a man. 

“She’s gonna leave me anyways,” he grumbles and you shake your head, picking up on his attempts to illicit sympathy to coax you into giving him a drop of anything. 

“Stop giving her a reason to Lee,” you point out, gesturing with your hands to emphasize that he was in the same small bar on the edge of town he always wandered into on weeknights. He’d tell Janie he was on duty but he’d really be down in this little box of a building getting drunk as a stunk. 

“She’s the one who gone and cheated,” Lee said in an angry tone, not towards you, just at his situation. “That Miller fellow living a few miles down from me. I see his truck parked outside my house plenty of times to know he’s not just being neighborly.” 

“I’m sorry Lee,” you say with a genuine tone of sympathy. You felt for him and his pain. You knew the stress of the job he led and the pain of knowing the love of your life don’t love you. 

“She’s going to leave me,” he says, staring intently at the condensation on the bottle in front of him. “I’d been trying so hard for her and our marriage and she’s two timing with the neighbor when I’m out working.” 

“And the thing is I don’t even care if she cheated,” Lee continued, “I’d look the other way if I knew she’d be staying with me. But it’s cause I know she don’t love me anymore. That’s what’s hurting me most.” 

“Maybe y’all can work through this-“ 

“This was inevitable,” he says, cutting you off. You don’t point it out, cause he’s clearly distressed but normally you’d have no problem saying to Lee ‘Fuck you, let me finish Sheriff.’ 

“Do you got somebody?” Lee asks you. The question takes you back cause it wasn’t like the Sheriff to ask your about anything personal. He would come in, and you’d shoot the shit, exchange small talk, maybe some harmless flirting for a larger tip, but that was the extent of it. 

“No, not anymore,” you say, having recently broke things off with your boyfriend. “I was seeing Arvin Russell for a couple months, but we just broke it off.” 

“You’re too good for him anyways,” the sheriff scoffed at the mention of the Russell boy and took another swing from his bottle of pop. “How old are you anyways, sweetheart?” 

“Twenty-one,” you respond, not thinking too much about the nickname. He had a habit of frequently using names like that when he talked to the women in this town. You think it started out as a tactic to win re-election and then it just stuck. He nodded. 

“Yeah you two are around the same age,” he said, more so thinking out loud than it being a statement directed towards you. “Why’d you break it off?” 

“Beat up my brother,” you answered, “Granted, the little shit had it coming. Can’t blame Arvin after I heard how the asshole was bothering that sweet thing Lenora. But he just took it too far. Almost killed the kid. The boy saw red so I got myself out of the picture. You can’t be with a boy who does that to your kin.” 

Lee nodded understandingly. You didn’t interpret his actions or questions as genuine concern or interest in you, but that he was just asking you questions to distract from his marital woes. 

“I’d do so many things different if I could be your age again,” he chuckled in a self-deprecating tone. “I’d sure as hell love to turn back time and have myself go down a better path.” 

“It’s not just you, Sheriff,” you reply after collecting money another man sitting at the bar. You nod as a goodbye to the man, and then curse under your breath when he doesn’t tip you. “Asshole,” you mumble, tossing the few pennies into the tip jar. You walk back over to the sheriff and prop your elbows on the bar. “I’m sure everyone is this town wishes the same thing,” you say, trying to make him feel better. 

“I’d love to just be your age again,” he says with a sigh, and then pops a small handful of the peanuts in his mouth. “Young, got your whole life ahead of you.” 

“I’m not sure working in a place like this is setting me up for great things, Sheriff,” you chuckle moving to wipe the bar in the area where that other customer left. “A woman working as a bartender is equivalent to just being a whore according to the eyes of the Lord... at least in this town,” you laugh, using the towel from your apron to wipe the rings left behind on the countertop from the glasses. 

“Arvin didn’t think so,” Lee countered, trying to make you feel a little better about your position. “I don’t think so. Hell, people in this town are so uptight about things that aren’t their business. You’re young, you need a job and you have one. It’s that simple.” 

“I wish more people in this town thought that way,” you reply with a smile. “That new preacher last Sunday-“ 

“Don’t listen to that asshole,” the Sheriff scoffed, and chuckled when your eyes widened at his derogatory words towards the preacher. “He’s a showboating son of a bitch and he’s as phony as they come.” 

“Those ruffled shirts are the most pretentious thing I ever seen,” you say, letting out a big laugh thinking about when he is giving a sermon in what looks like tacky prom attire. 

“Pay him no mind,” Lee said, bringing the bottle to his grinning lips as he looked at you. “You’re a better person than he is.” 

“I appreciate the sentiment,” you chuckle. 

“Have a goodnight hunny,” another customer at the bar says dropping cash on the table as they leave. “Goodnight Sheriff,” the older man tips his hat and then walks out. 

“Have a goodnight Marvin,” you call after him, “Give my love to Loretta!” You clear the empty glass and drop the cash off in the register. 

While you’re moving around, Lee takes a moment to actually look at you. Any man with eyes knew you were pretty, but he ain’t never noticed before just how attractive you were. His eyes lingered for a moment at how the canvas waist apron extenuated your figure. He couldn’t believe this stunning young thing was stuck in a place like this with a dead end job talking to a deadbeat like him. 

“How long you staying for Sheriff?” You ask suddenly, pulling him out of his trance. 

“Uh, not sure,” he says, looking up at the dingy Luger Beer clock that hung on the wall. “Why sugar?” 

“Seeing as though your sober I was hoping I could trouble you for a ride home?” You ask shyly. 

“Of course,” he said without hesitation. “No trouble at all honey.”

“Thank you, Lee,” you say with a smile, making his heart skip a beat. 

He’d talk to you most weeknights and never had this feeling. Maybe he had but he was too wrapped up in his own troubles to notice it. You were such a sweet girl, and he realized what an injustice it truly was for you to be stuck here. 

The thought crossed his mind very quickly about if he wasn’t married- even though he knew divorce was coming around the corner any day now. If he had met you at a different time in his life if it would’ve been better. Instead of meeting you as an overweight, deadbeat of a sheriff which a drinking problem- he’d met you when he was fresh out of school, same age you are now. You all coulda fallen in love, started a family, and that would’ve been enough to keep him from taking up drinking in the first place. 

He knew from the beginning Janie ain’t ever loved him. Hell, he’s not sure if he ever loved her thinking back on the whole relationship. Lustful, without any sort of promise behind it and they both were users. They used each other. He knew he treated her poorly as poorly as she treated him. He definitely had loved her, that much he knew was true, but now she’s cheating- something Lee never thought of doing at all no matter how many fights they had until the early morning hours.  

As you maneuvered around behind the bar, locking up the liquor and wiping down the machines getting ready to lock up for the night, his mind played little tricks on him. The canvas apron was instead a pinafore, and the bar was his kitchen. He’d loved the sight, thinking about coming home to you instead of what was soon to just be an empty house. 

Hell, he wasn’t even sure if he’d even be the one to keep his house. The idea of finding a new house- buying one for you, and being able to start over sounded like a dream life. Hell, he’d run away from this town right now if you said the word. He’s sure he could secure an election in another town, he had the connections to make it happen. 

“I just got to lock up the office and I’ll be ready to go,” you say, untying your apron. He gulps and nods as confirmation. You disappear in the back room, cash drawer in your arms to lock away in the safe. He heads behind the bar to dispose of his empty bottle and the cardboard tray his peanuts were in. 

You come back, your peacoat buttoned and the sash tied around your waist in a bow you had made. You had a small handbag in one hand, and your work apron in the other. Suddenly, he was nervous and didn’t know how to carry himself around you. Undeniably, the Sheriff was developing a crush. He couldn’t shake the feeling. He wanted to ask you out on a proper date, but he knew with his age and reputation- it wouldn’t be fitting. He was moving way too fast in his own mind to keep up with. Just daydreams, he thought to himself, suppressing the thoughts of a future with you for now.

“Okay,” you said, giving the place one more once over to make sure it was all set. “That does it.”

“After you,” he said, holding the door open for you. You giggled, and once you both were outside, you used your key to lock the front door. He held the door open for you to take the passenger seat in the cruiser. As you buckled your seatbelt, he walked over to the driver’s side and then slide into his seat.

You were a little nervous. You weren’t sure why. This wasn’t the first time you’d asked for a ride home. Usually, it’s never this late. When you close, you usually walk home alone. You definitely didn’t live that far, but again that was more dangerous than getting a ride home.

You realized that you were worried about nothing. You thought maybe some would accuse you of something scandalous, getting a ride home from a man so late. However, this was the Sheriff and the streets didn’t have another car on it at all. The town knew where you worked and if anyone were to see you, they’d know you were closing shift and you asked for a ride to avoid walking home this late alone.

“Thank you again,” you said, starting up a conversation as the sheriff was backing out of the tiny lot that was next to the bar.

“Oh, don’t mention it, hun,” he said, “It’s my job to make sure you get home safe. Your house is the white one at the end of Birch?”

“The very one,” you say, looking out the window. There aren’t any street lights, and the only light for miles is coming from the headlights of the cruiser. You don’t catch Lee stealing glances at you as he starts moving forward.

“How’s your ma doing?” He asks, making conversation.

“Oh, she left,” you said nonchalantly, and it makes Lee’s eyebrow raise in confusion.

“Wait. What?” He asks looking over at you for a second before turning his eyes back to the road.

“Oh, I thought you would’ve heard,” you say softly, your façade of indifference torn down. “She left us about a month ago. Met a man from Columbus and moved in with him. The whole town was talking about it for weeks.”

“So, is it just you and Tommy now?” he asks, wondering what kind of a mother leaves her girl to take care of her high school aged brother on what she makes at the bar.

“Oh, he went with her,” you explain, “House is all mine. After the whole thing with Arvin, she decided to pull him out of school and he goes to school in Columbus now. She wasn’t gonna bring him but after that, she changed her mind.”

“They just left you?”

“I chose to stay.”

“No offense but why would the hell would you chose to do that?” he jokes, making you laugh a little.

“It’s all paid off, and my grandpa left it to me and not her anyways,” you explain. “House has been in my name for three years now. And if we sold the house, she’d just piss the money away. Besides, would you move back in your mother now, Sheriff?”

“No, I can’t say I would want to,” he chuckles.

“So, I’m just supporting myself and that ain’t too bad,” you shrug.

“Sounds lonely,” he comments and you nod in agreement.

“It can be,” you admit, as he turns down your street.

“You ain’t worried living alone?” He asks.

“You tell me, Sheriff,” you joke, “If I got something to worry about it sounds like you’re not doing your job.”

“Ouch,” he says and holds a hand clutching his hand to his heart dramatically. It made you laugh, and it made him smile that he made you laugh. God, he loved your laugh.

“Thank you again, Lee,” you say sincerely, quickly kissing his cheek when he parks in front of your house. The gesture takes him back, and he’s relieved you can’t see how red his face is. He’s almost angry at how flustered you make him and you have no idea. “Have a goodnight,” you say.

“Goodnight, (Y/N),” he says, a little shakily. You get out of the car, and he watches you walk up to the porch, your hips swaying naturally, and he bites his lip. He groans, but at his disappointment in himself for staring again. You disappear behind the front door and he hits his palm on the steering wheel, trying to shake whatever feeling this was.

He reluctantly drove home, not wanting to have to talk or see Janie. He knew he was just heading home to a fight for being out so late, even though he knows she takes full advantage having fucking Miller over. His jaw is locked, angry about a fight he hasn’t even had with her yet. His cheek still tingles from your touch, and he thinks about if he should just leave Janie. He could just leave, get an apartment nearby or something. He doesn’t even care if she gets the damn house. He’s bracing himself for another night of fighting as he pulls into his own driveway and heading up to his own house.

He fumbles with his keys in the dark. He thinks he had the right one, but it doesn’t work. He tries another that is the same shape, still doesn’t work. He intakes a sharp breath and tries the first key again- he’s positive that’s his house key. “Fucking Christ,” he mutters when the key won’t even go into the lock. “Janie!” he shouts, pounding on the front door. She changed the locks.

“Fuck,” he exclaims, stomping down the front steps and walking around to the back door. He tries his keys again with no luck. He pounds into the door hard and incredibly loud. He knows she’s there, upstairs in their bed, ignoring his knocks. He tries the kitchen window, but it’s locked. Every window on the first floor is fucking locked. He curses again and heads back to his cruiser. He slams the door shut and his grip on the wheel is turning his knuckles white. Does she expect him to sleep in his car in the driveway?

He doesn’t even think about where he’s going to go, but he knows damn sure he’s not going to give her the satisfaction of sleeping outside of his house in his cop car for the whole town to talk about. He just pulls out of his driveway and starts driving. He isn’t even thinking about what route he’s driving, it’s like he’s driving on autopilot while he screams out every curse word in existence.

By the time he calms down, he realizes he’s driving down Birch again. His muscles in his body tense, and he thinks back to your conversation when he dropped you off. Your mother and brother were gone, meaning you have two spare bedrooms. He knows he shouldn’t but the temptation is way too overwhelming. He has nowhere else to go. If someone saw his car… well, he’d worry about that tomorrow. Your house is two miles away from your nearest neighbor, settled back at the end of a long dirt road. Someone knowing he was there was unlikely. He had people who could save your name. It was all innocent. Janie kicked him out and he knew you had an extra room. Hell, he’d rent a room from you- Wait. That’s perfect. That solved all of his problems and yours. He knows you were downplaying how hard it must be to keep up with the house and by him paying rent, you could take care of the house. It was a win-win.

He felt so confident now and he was so proud of himself for devising this plan. He parked his car out front and then walked up to your front door, knocking gently. The sound of the knock made him now incredibly nervous. He didn’t want to scare you or for you to think he was trying to take advantage. Granted, there would be a lot more than financial benefits to being able to live with you, which he knew were selfish, but the idea of being able to see you everyday was overwhelming. It was the closest thing to the dream he was wrapped up in back at the bar. He could live out his little pretend domestic bliss, and you’d get the money you need for the house. He knew he was insane and this was probably wildly inappropriate, but he knew you were too kind to turn him away.

You opened the door with a small yawn, a yellow bathrobe secured over your nightgown fully, to keep yourself decent when you answered the door. You were going to call the Sheriff when you heard the rapping at your door so late and ignore the knocks, but looking out the window of your bedroom you saw it was Lee’s cruiser parked outside.

“Lee?” you ask quietly, sleepiness very evident on your mumbled voice.

“Janie kicked me out,” he said softly, “Changed the locks on me. Darling, I’m so sorry for intruding but I have no where else to go.”

“Come in,” you say sympathetically, the news waking you up quite a bit. “Lee, I’m so sorry. You can take my mom’s old room; it’s got an attached bathroom you can use too.”

 “Thank you (Y/N),” he says quietly. You close the door and secure the lock and the chain again as he looks around the house.

“Don’t worry about it,” you insist. “I can take you there. Follow me.”

You walk up the stairs, Lee following closely behind and he’s ashamed that he took the opportunity to just openly check you out again. At the top of the stairs there was a hallway lined with photographs in mismatched frames. You point to the door at the end of the hall.

“That’s the master,” you explain, “There’s a bathroom attached inside if you want to clean up or anything. There’re clothes in the dresser if you want pajamas- should be in the bottom drawer.”

“Okay, thank you,” he replies, looking down at you as you yawn again, and he notices how your hair is a little messy. The sight drives him wild.

“Anything in the kitchen is up for the taking to,” you offer.

“Look, (Y/N),” he says, “I know this isn’t the best time to be talking about this, but I really need a more permanent plan on where to go. I know it sounds crazy and out of the blue, but could I rent that room from you? Name your price. I figured… I really need a new place, and you could probably use another source of income to keep up with the house. Plus, it’s safer than living alone…”

“Um…,” you begin to speak, but you bit your lip, showing that you’re intently thinking about his offer. Everything he said was right. You needed the money, and he was right that living alone was dangerous in this town and living with the sheriff is the safest person there was in the whole town. People would talk, of course, but no one would deny that the circumstances were just ideal for the two of you and nothing more. You were an adult, a homeowner, and it was your business who you rented a room too. “Yeah, I think that makes sense for both of us,” you agree. “We’ll sort out the details tomorrow.”

“Of course,” he says with a smile.

“Alright, um,” you say crossing your arms around your chest awkwardly. “Goodnight, Lee.”

“Goodnight, (Y/N),” Lee responds as you head back into your own bedroom. He let’s out a heavy sigh and heads into your mom’s room- or rather his new room. He’d have to figure out how to get his stuff back from Janie tomorrow. He’d really just need his clothes and some other necessities. 

The room was fairly spacious. There was a closet and dresser. The closet still had some clothes of your mom’s left behind, and for the most part, the room looked fairly intact. It was like she up and left with just a few things. Lee shook his head, angry at how poorly you were treated by your mother. He pulls off his leather jacket, tossing it and his hat onto the bed. He opened up the bottom drawer of the dresser, and just like you said, it was filled with men’s clothing. He concluded they had to belong to the man your mom lived with now, more things just left behind.

He tosses a pair of plaid pajama bottoms and a white t-shirt onto the bed, and then he heads to the bathroom.

In the drawer beside the sink, he finds a new toothbrush still in its packaging, that he opens for himself and drops it in the white toothbrush holder on the counter. The towels are all clean and folded neatly on the shelf above the toilet. He finds a new soap under the sink as well, and decided he needed a shower to just wash off everything of tonight off in hopes he’ll feel better.

He strips of his uniform, folding it nicely knowing he’ll need to wear it all again tomorrow morning. He steps into the shower and turns on the water. The hot water just immediately helps him to loosen the muscles that had been so tense. He lets the warm water run down his face and back, just letting himself enjoy the feeling. He lathers up his body with soap and then it finally hits him that he was here, living with you, and then suddenly he’s hard.

“Fuck,” he mutters, resting his head against the shower wall, the running down his back. He was in so much trouble he realizes. As he beats himself off in the shower, his mind is clouded with thoughts of you. The way the apron at the bar looked around your hips, and the smell of your perfume when you leaned into him. The way your body looked as you paraded yourself around behind the bar. The way you have no problem talking back to him when he walks into the bar after saying he’s off the bottle the night before, just making want to shut you up with a rough kiss. The feeling of your lips on his cheek and he imagines your lips on his neck. He thinks about how your hair looked tousled when you just showed him to his room. He lets himself slip back into that same domestic daydream. You being his wife… married to you instead dealing with this goddamn divorce. The absolute sickening sweet domesticity making him groan, as he imagines his hand is yours. Why on earth did he think he’d be able to do this?

PART TWO

[castielcommunism]

thanks for answering my question! I agree that incel stuff isn't the best point of comparison for their relationship. I was thinking of a post where you said that cas did feel entitled to dean's love at first, giving the alley scene as an example, and then saying you wished the confession had more alley scene energy. so I was trying to imagine that and it did kind of seem like cas lashing out at dean for not returning his love. would you ever write your own version of the confession? or have any more thoughts on what it would look like?

re: this last ask for context

yeah no prob! and yeah I figured lol, that post wasn’t super clear.

I do have a pretty specific vision of what I would want the confession to look like, but it would be so divorced from s15 canon (and tbh most of later seasons canon) that it would take a bunch of additional context and build up to explain/land properly.

Basically like (and this is getting far afield of canon and into AU territory), I would want there to be more obvious tells from Dean that he’s unsatisfied with them just being friends. Like basically a more emotionally mature and adult version of the really weird, tense, charged friendship you had with another friend in high school where there’s some mutually unspoken element of attraction or interest, but you both don’t know how to recognise those feelings for what they are so it’s just this extremely close bestieship. Now again I think it would be more mature than that, and there may even be some unspoken understanding that they both are kinda aware That Spark is there but they don’t say anything because (insert various internal emotional problems and external factors). And I want Cas to be aware of it and also on some level reject it because he’s terrified of losing the idea that he’s a worthless asshole incapable of being loved, in much the same way that Dean is terrified of being happy because he believes it’ll be taken from him and he doesn’t want to get his hopes up. Like there needs to be some element of Cas deliberately wanting to wallow in self misery and pity because he thinks he deserves to be punished for his actions, which is again similar to how Dean is comforted by his own unhappiness because it’s familiar.

And like slowly over the course of their relationship they need to both come to an understanding that privately torturing themselves about this is pointless, stupid, and cruel to each other. Like personally I want the “confession”, however that happens, to be a shouting match argument where they’re both like not you DONT love me how dare you say that. That’s impossible. What is wrong with you. I want it to be very messy and emotionally charged and maybe even a bunch of time passes before they’re both like uh hey maybe we should address this and talk about it.

I don’t like straight up miscommunication as a trope (as in like “I incorrectly overhead you say something and now I’m going to be angry/hurt about it”, ala Shrek style), but also like both Dean and Cas are poor communicators who have very little experience expressing their desires to other people, and that is a central facet of the ongoing tension and conflict in their relationship. And of course the ultimate resolution to that is them basically figuring out together HOW to express their feelings, how to take a chance at happiness, how to forgo their own self loathing because it’s cruel, incorrect, and they keep hurting each other with it. Using “we’re making it up as we go” in a much more intimate and emotional way basically.

[f4nd0m-fun]

I love all of that, and they definitely would sniff each other out. Also, I write Kryptonians-as-lizards as getting most of what they need from the sun and such but, well, blood can be a good plant fertilizer, as can decomposing bodies. Basically, heavily carnivorous Clark.

So my baby!Kon au is the same as my Reptile!AU so the was it effects him is that Clark gains the C display, meaning the baby is producing the right pheromones(?) for his system to go "there's no other carer thus it's my job" and make him start producing the Kryptonian equivalent of milk (which imo has a very heavy blood content, like it's not exactly milk bread reptilian but it's still a liquid-sorta with nutritional content). Now on Krypton it'd normally be 'Hide the kid and C somewhere with a lot of sunlight while H gathers food for C and later for kid' but like Clark doesn't have an H he just has himself who is currently displaying as a C. Of course that dynamic is early/proto civilization, by the point in the timeline Krypton is way more modern about it but still.

(honestly half the vibe was trans!Clark rumors, baby daddy Lex, they act divorced)

But anyway, Clark finds out about Kon early and takes him, and the whole scenario devolves into Lex wondering when the hell Ma and Pa decided he was family (they're here parenta than his dad)

I'm now imagining queer-platonic superbat in which Bruce takes on the role of H and probably gets in a lot of fights with Lex. 😂

Although this was also my Strix!Gotham AU which...

P-type Strix are stronger with sharper teeth, often have claws and inhuman eye colors but lose control of themselves more easily. R-Type Strix can regenerate and are designed more for evasion than direct conflict. Not as primeyto losing control but they have a higher metabolism. M-type are a mix of both including both downsides, but tend to lean more one way or another. With this one you'd normally write more of a 'MP-type' or 'MR-type' to denote the primary.

Most of the Batfam was M-type with Bruce leaning MP, Dick was P-type and the the League very specifically made sure both Damien and Cass were P-type because they have the pits, they don't need regeneration.

But I digress, too many rambles that probably don't mix well with the whole idea you have.

I feel like Clark helps Bruce instead of pulling him off Joker in this.

Also I feel like Clark would be more of a blue-green whereas Kara would still have the Kryptonian black-red because she grew up under Kryptonian sky.

Bruce or maybe both of them will need three hands but it still works!

(Brutalina and Clois/Clex - the latter being a Big If)

Anyway, back to the start note about Bruce and Clark immediately clocking each other, in Latin at the idea of them initially going all bristled territorial, slowly approaching then backing away, and eventually 'sparring'. No one else knows why or anything but after the fact they're apparently best friends? 😂

I was reminded of a Thing from the reblogs on the Mermay 03 Prompt

Very similar vibes. But with platonic omegaverse, and dragons. Gotham? Already cursed to hell and back. But then another curse was formed via the museum bringing in this strange statue. That of course got stolen because solid crystal and gold. Then got broken, split in half. And oop. New Curse.

Now before I get into the curse, lemme explain the omegaverse side of things. Everyone is born a secondary gender labeled Alpha, Omega, or Beta. There's also medical conditions where one is neither, usually a mix of genetic and hormonal issues. Gotham however, is Weird. They have no set scent according to Outsiders. Really? They can shift and switch (Yes there's a large LGTBQ percentage in the population) at will. It can take months for someone new to the city, but those that have been there for a few generations can do it in hours. For those like the Waynes or other founders who have been there since the beginning of the city? Minutes. It's more than a little unnerving to Outsiders who are used to things staying the same.

But that curse (or blessing as others call it) mixed with the new dragon one. See, they can all change into draconic form, and do their best to keep that secret. But they also have different forms depending on the secondary sex they are at that time.

@f4nd0m-fun & @golden-buddle idk if u'd be interested in this but-

[themetalvirus]

i would love to hear abt how you came up with ash’s design if you’re up for it :0 i think she looks SO cool -catgirlblaze

OMG okokok well first off, here's the pic of her final-ish design

for context: this is ash, the anti-blaze, meant to be an "evil" version / funhouse mirror version of her from a different dimension akin to the characters hailing from moebius in the archie comics.

she actually was a lot more trouble for me to design than gold was!!! her outfit in particular went through a LOT of iterations.

the first thing i actually made was her color palette! it ended up having to be tweaked so that the blue wasn't so bright and out of place.

i wanted her fur color in particular to be the complimentary color of blaze's violet. directly complimentary colors tend to clash in a palette though, so i went with a split complimentary palette

i also realized that i probably shouldn't JUST make her cyan, so i wanted to include the original purples from blaze to retain recognizability while discarding the pinks. i LOVE blaze but the shades of pink and purple her design uses just clash so hard

then i thought about blaze's very distinctly lemon-shaped head and the fact that she seems to tie her hair back. initially i wanted ash's hair to be all down to represent that her personality is WAY more lax, but that quickly prove to be Very Ugly when combined with the lemon head, which i wanted to retain in some way. so i ended up compromising with myself, letting her keep some bangs to cover her forehead gem (as a representation of her deliberately ignoring her equivalent to the sol emeralds, theyre called the moonstones because this whole thing is pretty cheeky) and giving her pigtails to show that she is much, much less mature than blaze. pigtails evoke youth, at least to me, while the almost scene-esque bangs still reflect that she's 14 and not like 5

her outfit in particular was where i was challenged. here's some misc unfinished sketches from the iteration phase

initially i wanted to give ash an Entirely New Outfit, something youthful and silly and generally just out there. not pictured are ideas i had but didnt draw of giving her a romper or a tutu, which just felt like it leaned WAY too far into baby territory. i also considered giving her a tailcoat with the fluffy arm and leg warmers to make it clear that shes capricious, but it felt divorced from who blaze is, and this character is supposed to be a reflection of blaze. i also toyed with some princessy aesthetics/silhouettes because i find that kind of flouncy fru fru girly stuff very cute (and blaze is a tomboy so would in a way be fitting for her funhouse mirror counterpart), and i thought it might portray how recent her abandonment of the "princess" role really is. but she already HAS abandoned the princess role, so for her outfit to still be super princessy felt out of place

i also realized after some iteration that i was really missing the fur elements of blaze's outfit - they made her feel regal, but friendly. the shapes of the furred cuffs on her design evoke almost flamelike shapes. i generally just really like drawing and designing fur coats. so i started to add furry fringe to places that blaze didn't have furry fringe (the neck and hemline of her coat specifically) and that really clicked for me. i also added puffballs on the sleeves and shoes to make things feel more balanced/unified and also because i thought it was cute. the triangle shapes are both meant to contrast the boxy shape of blaze's outfit and compliment the triangular shapes on gold's shoes and hands.

i eventually arrived at this sketch, which i colored both to test out the color palette and to see if this was It. and i liked it, but a few parts still needed changing

for example, there are more (admittedly faint) decorations on the shoes that just muddy the ideas i had, and the full-length slightly off-green pants just made it look like she had miscolored mutant legs. i tried to add a bit of her actual fur color on the midriff, but having her midriff showing didnt click with me

so then i did the final iteration and its the one i liked the most tee hee. i hit the image limit but its up there at the top

other notes include me flattening out her shoes, no more high heels! they still have some semblance of a "heel" but that's to add visual interest to the thick soles of her shoes, necessary for grip while shes frolicking around and setting things on fire. her fire powers are green instead of red because of fun with opposite colors and such! the "radioactive" nature of her colors is purposeful, to evoke an unsettling otherworldly feeling when you look at her very unnatural-seeming colors AND to bring scourge to mind

her tail is put thru a hole in the back of her jacket instead of poking out from underneath for clarity of silhouette, the gem on her chest is a purely aesthetic part of a closure on her jacket, and her forehead gem is turquoise underneath her bangs

the end!!! i hope that was interesting!!!!!

[nevertheless-moving]

Misunderstanding Meta

So this started out as tags on Misunderstanding 17 but got meta enough that i started wondering if it was getting into spoiler territory? also it was just too many words.

there’s no future chapter spoilers specifically but this might remove some of the mystery around ongoing and future character conflicts. im explicitly stating some stuff that might be better enjoyed sub textually but u do u.

anyway read below if you don’t mind a premature little navel gazing but maybe hold off if you’d rather just enjoy the story as is. probably only makes sense within the context of that chapter cause again it started as tags. 

Thank you everyone for all your support and lovely comments I really really enjoy them!! I’m so glad people are enjoying the story its genuinely making it so much more fun for me! W R I T I N G, who knew!

~ TLDR: General star wars meta and VERY vague suicidal misunderstandings spoilers below the cut so read at your own peril. nsfw.~

-

It’s important to me that people understand we’ve reached the point in the story where anakin would ABSOLUTELY murder anyone Obi-Wan told him to without a shred of evidence (except for two people, one of which is unfortunately the actual Sith master).

(like if Obi-Wan had been the one to say ‘kill him’ on the bridge of the Invisible Hand Anakin would NOT have hesitated to decapitate)

i guess its not THAT different from canon but its still kind of fucked up that I’ve gotten them to where Anakin would happily bring Obi-Wan Yoda’s corpse like a cat with a dead bird.

he doesn’t even have a lightsaber! and he's fond of yoda! but if Obi-Wan asked him to he would strangle that troll with his bare hands!

the specific combination here of Obi-Wan’s active reciprocation of familial love and also (unintentionally but still!) inspiring real fear that Obi-Wan might vanish at any second due to Anakin’s rage issues and a murky unseen threat means his whole relationship with Obi-Wan has taken the natural step to where Obi-Wan is the one (1) person both capable of AND willing to direct that unhinged capacity for violence. 

And I for one am a fan of them both growing VERY aware of that and also comfortable with it to a certain extent.

THEIR RELATIONSHIP IS SO MESSED UP AND LOVING AND CODEPENDENT I LOVE IT

(presumably with some real therapy and soul searching this could all deescalate but we are SO not at the point right now)

The other side of all this is that Obi-Wan is seriously the ONLY one capable of directing that violence. Anakin doesn’t have that many coping mechanisms and now he’s so afraid that his dad/brother is going to go to the corner store for death sticks and not come back he will refrain from using his favorite one without permission.

(im talking about murder btw)

(that’s the coping mechanism)

so that’s, you know. good?????

(honestly theres a limit to far this nonsense can deescalate because on a fundamental level Anakin just goes WAY too hard and has so many neuroses that it would be kindof impossible for him to have a conventionally healthy relationship with anyone without REALLY altering some of his most basic character traits)

(and...i don’t know. healthy is fluid? i feel like if you KNOW you’re bad at morals is it really so bad to outsource them? to someone better qualified. the biggest ethical problem to me there is its an unreasonable emotional burden to put on obi-wan, but after the specific shit he’s been through i can see that weight actually kind of comforting even if he might feel a tad guilty over having that much control. i think what makes it sustainable to me is that obi-wan is establishing early on that there are NO consequences for violating the code. the fact that he’s willing to move so completely past CHILD MURDER AND GENOCIDE means he’s batshit crazy for anakin. so basically anakin gets to establish that he can exit the covenant at any time. its like how the potential for quitting makes a job a job instead of slavery and how the potential for divorce makes marriage marriage instead of slavery)

(but the job/marriage in this case is listening to obi wan kenobi when he says no murder so you know what MAYBE we shouldn’t evaluate it by the benchmarks of a normal relationship anyway jeez nevertheless moving on)

(seriously not even Palpatine ever got this much control cause Vader still murdered at Vader’s orders)

(And Padme is seeking out a relationship just healthy enough to not involve ACTIVELY holding that much of her husband’s autonomy. i mean. she does have that power. but the continued queenly conscious choice NOT to exercise it is almost sweet)

(i am aware that justifying padme and anakins relationship from a conventional lens requires some mental backflips but darn it i saw some really hot fanart of her pegging the shit out of him and also he doesnt think of her as a parental figure so if i want to say padme is just the right amount of crazy to maintain a stable relationship with anakin skywalker than that’s what im going to do.)

 (but i digress)

[hihellogoodbyebruh]

Don’t Provoke Me

Pairing: Dark-ish!Miguel Galindo x Black!Reader

Summary: Miguel was out of his mind if he thought you were just gonna continue on this way. But perhaps you underestimated your man and took his chill behavior for granted...

Warning(s): 18+ only please, cussing, smut (fingering), possessive behavior, dom/sub undertones, controlling behavior, slight angst

Word count: 3,187

Author’s Note: So I finally gave in to my friend telling me to watch 365 days (don’t judge me) and was inspired by ONE scene in it. Also, I’m not a smut writer. This is me dipping my toe in the smut waters so here’s to hoping it’s at least decent. Questions, comments, and concerns are always welcome. My inbox is open! Thanks for reading :)

“No, mi amor. Just stay here and I’ll be back tomorrow.” Miguel insisted, as he was finishing putting on his clothes. He always dicked you down right before he had business to handle to try and keep you from asking to go. Usually it worked, but you had caught on by now.

“Why? Why do I always have to stay here? You hiding something?” You asked, raising your eyebrow at him. His business meeting was at a club in town. You loved going to that club so you didn’t see why y’all couldn’t go together. He could handle business and then after you two could enjoy your night, but no. He wasn’t cool with it. He just kept his back to you and ignored the question as he fastened his belt and buttoned up his dress shirt.

“Is that it then? You got another girl waiting for you? Someone more pleasing to your family I bet. Probably another white girl.” You knew he hated being questioned and he hated any references to Emily from your mouth even more. Those two were divorced and only communicated when it came to Cristobal, but you couldn’t help comparing yourself to her. They were married and he wouldn’t even take you out with him. He still wouldn’t answer you and that made you even more mad. He knew you hated being ignored. “You’re not gonna answer me?” Silence.

You sat up in the bed with the sheet wrapped around your body and chucked a pillow at the back of his head hard. “Answer me, Galindo.”

He flinched when the pillow hit him and turned around, picking it up off the floor while he walked back toward the bed. “What did I say about asking me stupid shit like that, huh?” He placed the pillow on the bed and grabbed your chin with his hand, holding it a little more tightly than was necessary. “Cuida tu lenguaje. Now I’m going to go have this meeting, and I’ll be back tomorrow. Then this weekend we can take a trip out of town, yeah?” You didn’t answer him so he pulled your face to his and kissed you.

As much as you wanted to pout and resist, his kisses always left you breathless. You fell into the kiss easily and pushed forward to apply more pressure, but he pulled away. “Are we good?” He asked, your lips still grazing each other.

“Yeah.” You breathed out and he gave you one more kiss before grabbing his wallet and cellphone and leaving the bedroom. You flopped back on the bed and stared at the ceiling as you listened to him leave. The front door closed and several seconds later you heard the tell-tale sound of the SUV roaring to life before speeding out of the driveway.

You and Miguel had been going strong for several months now, but it was a complicated situation. He was in the process of getting a divorce when y’all got together. You were just a working girl trying to keep your head above water. You weren’t looking for anything when he walked into your life, but now you couldn’t picture not having him. He made you feel so alive and loved, but you hadn’t been feeling appreciated. You knew it was hard because him and Emily were married and had a child together, but the marriage was over long before the ink dried on those divorce papers. You would not and could not continue to be made to feel like his dirty little secret.

You laid in bed for several more minutes feeling sorry for yourself before an idea popped into your head. It was risky. It could end badly, but you were prepared for the consequences. This could make or break your relationship, but if things ended at least you went out like a real one and demanded your respect. You got out of the bed and rushed to the bathroom to take a shower. You had a night out to get ready for.

The slinky dress you had on glittered in the light as you entered the night club. Your usually curly hair was pulled back into a pin straight long ponytail, your strappy heels accentuated your legs, and your makeup was flawless. The music was loudly pumping through the speakers as you made your way toward the entrance of the VIP area. You knew Miguel would be there with his associates. As you made it to the velvet rope, you locked eyes with Nestor who’s jaw almost dropped seeing you.

“He’s gonna lose his shit.” He told you as you walked right up to him. You and Nestor got along relatively well. You both liked each other’s attitudes.

“That’s the plan.” You smirked and Nestor only shook his head with a chuckle. 

“Is it part of the plan for him to kill me and then you? Because that’s what’s gonna happen.” He added, but you wouldn’t be deterred. You’d come too far to turn back now.

“We can pretend we never saw each other. Just let me through before I make a scene and really, I think we both would prefer that didn’t happen.” You lightly threatened, but you were fully prepared to go through with it.

A scene was the last thing he wanted to be a part of. Especially not when Mikey was doing business, but if you wanted to throw yourself in the fire then who was he to stop you? “Good luck.” Nestor commented, letting you enter the VIP and you dropped a quick kiss to his cheek before you ascended the stairs.

There were a bunch of men in suits with girls all around them. It seemed like a typical night for a club with rich clientele. You didn’t know these men, but you knew they were loaded and you knew they did dangerous business. They weren’t your concern though. Your eyes scanned the lounge for Miguel and it wasn’t until you entered a side room that you spotted him.

There was a girl on a pole entertaining the men in the room. Miguel was holding a conversation with a gentleman whose gun was showing from under his jacket. You spotted some fruit lying on the table and popped a cherry into your mouth at the exact moment Miguel noticed you. His eyes raked your form before landing on your face and he did a double take as if to confirm to himself that he was seeing you. You merely looked right at him, smirking. You practically dared him to make a scene in front of everyone.

Without a word, he stood up from his seat and strolled over to you. He tightly grasped your arm before pulling you out of the side room and walking you to a corner of the balcony. “What the fuck are you doing here?”

“Well, this is a club so I came to get drunk and dance. There’s no better way to spend a Friday night.” You nonchalantly explained but Miguel was not amused.

His grip on your arm tightened as he got in your face. “Don’t provoke me, Y/N.”

“Provoke you? Oh sweetheart…” You began, holding his face and brushing your thumb over his cheek. “I’m just doing my part as your plaything. Do you like the dress? It’s really short.” You removed the hand from his face and placed it over his right one. You slowly guided his hand up your thigh and under your dress as you brought your face closer to his. “You could fuck me without even taking it off.” Your lips brushed the shell of his ear.

He stopped your movement and his hand got tangled in the material of your dress as he drew you closer. “You’re treading on dangerous territory.”

“And to think we’re only getting started.” You challenged him, staring into his eyes. You wouldn’t back down that easily. Not this time.

Miguel seemed to realize you wouldn’t just cower at his words and he saw red. Yes he knew you were independent and headstrong, but you had never so boldly stepped to him. He hated not being in control. He let your dress go and dragged you toward the staircase, practically pushing you down the stairs.

“Nestor, please let the Castros know I will have everything written up for them in a week and we can celebrate with drinks then.” Miguel instructed, once they reached the bottom of the stairs. Nestor looked from Miguel to you and then back to Miguel.

“Sure thing, Mikey.” He nodded in confirmation, before watching Miguel drag you along out of the club. He definitely would not be calling Miguel until tomorrow morning. He wanted no part of whatever was about to happen.

The ride back to your place was a silent one. You both had steam coming out of your ears, you were so mad at each other. You also were both too stubborn to speak first. Miguel waited until it was just the two of you inside of your home and then he exploded.

“What the fuck did you think you were doing, huh!? I told you very specifically to stay the fuck at home and yet here you go. Do you enjoy pissing me off? Is that what this is?” He asked, hands on his hips and his voice full of bass.

Your head rocked back at his audacity. “So you can fuck me all day, bury yourself so deep inside me that I don’t know where I end and you began, but we gotta act like total strangers out in public? Really?”

“You never had a problem with it before.” He pointed out. The nature of your relationship has been the same for months and things have been fine in his eyes. He tried his best to be gentle with you, but it seems he let you think he could be walked over. No matter. He would correct that tonight.

“Yeah, because I thought it was necessary! Your divorce wasn’t final and I didn’t want to be seen as some home wrecking hoe when that was not the case. But you’re a divorced man now. There is no good reason we can’t be together fully unless you’re playing games. And if you’re playing games, let me tell you right now that I don’t wanna play anymore. If you don’t love me, just tell me so I can move on.”

Miguel hated being pushed and he despised ultimatums even more. He’s not the kind of man who gets told what to do. He laughed but there was no humor in it. “You are forgetting your place. If I wanna keep you chained to the gahdamn bed all day then that’s what’s gonna happen. Every decision I make is to keep you safe and that is NOT up for discussion.”

You were the black girl embodiment of the white guy blinking gif as you listened to Miguel. “And I don’t have a choice in this? The occurrences in my life aren’t up for discussion?”

“Not anymore. You knew who I was from the very beginning and it appealed to you right? Savvy businessman with ‘rumored’ connections to the drug world.” He practically slithered over to you until he was all in your personal space. He leaned his face in and let his nose graze up your neck, over your jawline, and up your cheek until he was whispering in your ear. “Mmm. I bet it got your panties all wet, but you didn’t truly know what being mine entailed. The list of people that want me dead or want to hurt me is quite long. The moment you become my woman publicly is the moment those enemies look at you as a weakness they can use to get to me. They will want to hurt you, probably even kill you. Have you truly thought about that?”

You were silent because he was right. Yes, you knew he was Miguel Galindo and so he was the head of a criminal family but you never fully processed how you would fit into that. You always just looked at him as your man and his business as something separate from you. His words solidified that those two worlds couldn’t be separated.

“Yeah, I thought so. But that’s okay querida because it’s been the only thing I’ve thought about for months. From the moment you smiled at me, I’ve wanted you and the second you let me explore every inch of your body you signed your life away to me. You made a deal with el diablo and didn’t even know it.” His hand slowly rubbed your back while holding you close, a familiar show of softness that did not match the words leaving his mouth.

“What?” His words both turned you on and frightened you. You suddenly felt in over your head. But at the same time, knowing he was only trying to keep you safe made you love him all the more.

“You give me all of you; heart, mind, and body. In exchange, I give you everything you could possibly want. Clothes, trips, jewelry, opportunities, and security in every context of the word. So if I say it’s not safe for us to go public you take that as fucking law.” You felt his fingers running up your back before they swiftly entangled in your ponytail and roughly pulled your head back. “And yet, you tried to force my hand tonight after you were given specific instructions to stay home.”

“Miguel…” You breathlessly spoke out, but you weren’t sure what to say. Your head was spinning as it processed this new man in front of you. Well, he wasn’t completely new. You’d seen this side of him, but in regards to business. Never in yall’s relationship.

Miguel brought your face to his and kissed you with an intensity that took your breath away. He was completely in control as his tongue expertly explored your mouth. Your taste was already ingrained in his memory and he would never get enough of it. His kiss brought tiny moans out of your mouth that he quickly swallowed. One hand stayed gripping your ponytail and the other slid up your thighs and under your dress.

He pulled away from the kiss and turned you around so your back was against his chest. He kept your head tilted back as he spoke in your ear. “Don’t ever question my love for you ever again. I would kill anyone that so much as looked at you wrong or too long. Is that what it’s gonna take, hm? You need me to put a bullet in someone’s head to know my love is real? Because I can do that no problem.”

You tried to turn your head to face him, but he roughly pulled on your hair to keep your face facing forward. “N-no! Don’t do that Miguel. I believe you.” You certainly didn’t want some innocent person dying over you.

“Tu eres mia. Lo entiendes?” He growled in your ear before walking you over to the couch. He bent you over the arm of it and slapped your ass when you took too long to answer him.

“Sí.” You moaned softly as he slapped your ass again. He gripped the back of your panties and pulled, rubbing your underwear against your pussy. You were already dripping and it allowed the panties to rub over you easier. This drew a squeal from you.

“Let me hear that again.” Miguel stated, pulling even harder on your panties making you grip the couch.

“Mmm…” You moaned, knowing you were soaking your panties as they rubbed against your lower lips.

He pulled on the fabric so tightly that just as it began to hurt a little you heard them rip. He threw it to the side and just admired the sight of you bent over and exposed to him. Your pussy was glistening and he wanted to dive in, but he had a point to prove first.

You tried to stand up straight but the hand still in your hair, forced your head down. “Don’t fucking move.” He demanded, letting the middle finger of his free hand drag over your lower lips. He entered you without warning, making a groan escape you. He added another finger immediately, the ring finger.

His index and pinky fingers rested on your ass as he fucked you with his middle fingers. The pace was agonizingly slow at first. He was punishing you by dragging it out. He knew you loved a good hard fuck and he wasn’t gonna give it to you...yet.

“Miguel please..” You begged, trying to move your ass against him but he just released your hair and pushed down on your lower back leaving you trapped against the couch.

“Please what?” He asked, wanting to hear you say the words. He was still slowly fucking you and your stomach was a knot of nerves but it still wasn’t enough to drive you over the edge.

“Please fuck me harder baby. Please, I need it.” You begged, unable to do much of anything besides take it. He was owning every part of your body.

He finally picked up the pace and the only sounds in the room were the wet noises of his fingers speeding in and out of your pussy mixed with your moans. He slid you back off the couch just enough so his other hand could reach your clit. He wanted to feel you come apart just from his fingers.

“You better cum for me right now.” He growled, his fingers pinching your clit as his other hand fucked you senseless even as your walls closed around him.

“Yes, yes, yes...fuck!” You screamed, as your orgasm swept through your body. You stood on your tiptoes and arched your back. Your juices flowed out all over his hand. You exhaled loudly as the effects of your release slowed down.

“Oh that’s a good girl. You are mine.” He repeated, letting you shakily stand up from where he had you bent over. You turned around and watched as he sucked his fingers in his mouth, savoring the taste of you. Your arousal shot back up at the sight.

“Bedroom. Now.” He instructed, as he began unbuckling his pants. You started this evening out wanting to put your foot down with Miguel, but he quickly took back the reins like the dominant he was. Damn him and his unflinching controlling and possessive behavior.

Just because you lost the upper hand, it didn’t mean you couldn’t be a little defiant. You pulled the dress off over your head and threw it at his feet. You were left naked except for your heels. “Fine.”

The look in his eyes had you strutting to the bedroom….quickly.

Miguel smirked as he watched you head toward the bedroom. He slowly followed behind you, shedding his clothes along the way. He was going to keep you up all night making sure you never have any doubts about who you belong to and who loves you.