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canarymemories · 1 year ago

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lasciare suonare

chapter summary: the first song he writes after those months of silence is something he shows no one.

content warning: he beginning of this chapter delves a little into leo's downward spiral post-checkmate. there is one line where there's referenced self harm, but it's very much blink and you miss it.

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 symphony masterpost

here on ao3

for the longest time, music followed leo wherever he went.

a symphony played in his head, the different sections melding flawlessly with each other to create a perfect harmony he’d hurry to scribble down before it left him. whatever he was writing with — pen, marker, pencil — would end up smudged along the side of his hand, a reminder of all that he was creating. the rhythm would rise and fall with the staccato of his heart or syncopated tapping of his feet or hands, whichever moved to keep the beat first.

his life was full of music and leo loved every second of it, whether it was shared with others or stayed a concert for only himself in his head or on paper. steady for as many years as he could remember, a tune would greet him as he woke and he could just as surely rely on another to send him off to sleep as a lullaby.

it was a constant, and a welcome one at that.

or it had been until leo woke one day only to feel like a soloist abandoned by the group, horribly out of tune with no one left to synchronize with. he was left alone with no one to catch him if he fell off beat, missing notes the longer he stood on center stage.

rather than a reliable thrum of a song in his head, a staff of notes behind his eyelids, leo’s world becomes silent for the first time in his life.

he isn’t sure what to do about it. there’s an uncomfortable quiet that grows the longer he skips school, the longer he stays in his room. so he tries to fix it the only way he knows how: by writing music, the one thing that’d never failed him before.

yet it doesn’t help. he can’t even get more than a few measures out after the first few tries.

leo loses count of how many hours he sits in front of blank pages, the clef symbols staring at him. mocking him. he tries to write, he really does, but every time his pen touches the paper, in the midst of writing a measure, whatever inspiration he’d had, if any at all, would float away, leaving him there again.

it leaves him feeling empty, as if a piece of him is missing. and maybe a piece of him really did get lost somewhere along the way, between the broken pieces of chess, backgammon, othello. knights.

he pulls his legs closer to his chest, hands faintly aching and bandaged, as he tries to ignore the crumpled papers around him, ignore the hollow in his chest and the ink smeared on the pages from tears of frustration. who knew something that had been as easy as breathing for him could turn into something that made him feel so hopeless.

there’s times when it feels as if this is where he’ll be stuck for the rest of time, locked in his room with the blinds drawn. he isn’t even sure what day it is anymore, but it’s not like that matters when he’d resigned himself to a life like this, no use to anyone if he couldn’t do the one thing he was good at.

leo buries his face in his knees. a pitiful little noise falling from his lips breaks the silence. he wishes things could go back to how they were once, back when he thought people loved him and his music, not just the latter.

when music chased him just as eagerly as how he chased it in return.

his music had brought people together once, hadn’t it? now it only feels as if it’s destroyed everything he ever cared about.

leo desired to be on stage once.

he wonders if that’ll every come back to him. after he’d gotten the first taste of performing for more than just ruka or their parents, leo had yearned to return to the stage, to stand under the spotlight and receive applause and praise for a live well done.

he wonders if he’ll ever return to those he left behind and hurt so badly before they could turn their backs on him first.

yet no matter how much he dreams to be free from these dragging, neverending days where nothing gets written and he feels further and further away from ever writing again, leo feels helpless.

so, his world remains quiet.

it takes time and a lot of it for the first tendrils of a song make their way through his mind, whispered and incredibly muted. those notes surprise leo so bad that they disappear once he focuses too hard on them.

he’s spent so long now, months maybe — he truthfully isn’t sure — being stuck in this rut, unable to form anything meaningful. the thought of this block that’s haunted him for all this time going away feels odd. the thought of being able to write a song again feels the same if he’s being honest, but leo misses that part of himself. the part that could love somebody so purely and write a song about that feeling without even a second thought.

while he remains the soloist left behind, he’s no longer so out of tune, no longer fighting his way through the measures on his own. it doesn’t feel so hard remembering a song that had been on the tip of his tongue but would never come out right.

the first song he writes after those months of silence is something he shows no one.

compared to his normal work — can he even call it that anymore when he hasn’t composed in so long? — it’s clumsy. for a self proclaimed genius, the song feels more like a beginner wrote it. of course, leo wouldn’t call it bad. it’s just… a bit messy is all.

when he puts his pen down after writing a finishing fermata over the last half note, leo stares at the music in front of him. it’s almost as if he doesn’t recognize it despite having been working on it for, at the very least, a few hours by now. his curtains no longer cover the windows and the sun had long set, though he hadn’t noticed at the time.

without warning and without trying, he begins to cry.

the past few days have been a bit of a whirlwind to say the least, from running into eichi and keito by pure chance to stepping back onto the stage for the first time in far too long thanks to madara’s gentle insistence.

he’d missed it.

he’d missed it so much .

not just performing or the applause or the wide smiles from those in the audience. he’d missed it all so bad that he’d forgotten at some point that he’d ever enjoyed that kind of thing in the first place.

leo’s hands cover his face though he’s alone in his room. the door’s cracked open, but it’s late enough that no one but him would be awake. “i did it,” he whispers.

he sniffles, wiping away the tears that seem to just keep falling with the heels of his palms. leo peers out from behind his hands as if the song would’ve disappeared in the brief moment he’d taken his eyes off of it.

unsurprisingly, the papers remain on his desk where he left them. there’s a few wet marks at the bottom from his tears, thankfully happy this time.

leo carefully grabs the song and holds it up in front of him. the notes remain just as he’d written them, meaning that as much as this moment felt like a dream, it’s not.

his lips pull up into a smile without him noticing at first. spinning in his chair, another tear rolls down leo’s cheek. what a sight he must be, smiling so wide while crying, but leo doesn’t care.

he’d written a song again. finally, finally written one again and it’s real and in his hands.

“i did it!”

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

leo knows that the other knights have been planning a surprise for him.

he isn’t exactly sure what, but between hushed whispers and quickly hidden somethings whenever he happens to walk into one of their conversations, he knows there’s definitely something going on.

so, when he wakes up to nazuna’s bunny shifting in the bedding left out for him, leo springs up with maybe a little too much enthusiasm for someone who’s only slept for a few hours. if the papers scattered around his bed and now on the floor mean anything, he’d fallen asleep in the middle of writing a song.

of course, his sudden jolt up startles the rabbit, the poor little thing scampering around.

“oh, sorry,” he says, careful as he gets out of bed to crouch in front of where the rabbit’s hidden himself. “i didn’t mean to scare you, i’m just excited! it’s my birthday, y’know?”

all he gets in response is a little nose wiggle.

“hm, you’re right. i guess you wouldn’t know that.” leo hums, reaching his hand out to the bunny, stopping in front of his nose, which once again wiggles slightly as he stays tucked within his little hutch. just as nazuna showed him, leo gives the bunny a few light pets to the top of his head then stands.

the other two beds in the dorm are empty. leo thinks he’d registered that it was just him and the rabbit to some extent, but that at least explains why it’s so quiet in the room. still, it’s a little odd that neither of them are there seeing as it’s still golden week, but then again, natsume doesn’t even return to the dorm some days and leo’s pretty sure nazuna said something the other day about spending time with ra*bits.

or he thinks he remembers nazuna saying that. either way, he decides, it doesn’t matter much.

the only thing is that without either of his dormmates, he has no real way to gauge what time it is. the sunlight coming in through the windows also helps him none, so he stars to search for his phone. luckily it doesn’t take long to spot it as he moves his blanket around.

grabbing it from where it sits poking out from under his bed, leo finds that it’s a bit later than he thought it was. that meant he’d slept longer than he thought he had, though it’s still the middle of the morning.

his notifications are filled with birthday messages and well wishes which only make him laugh a little, pleased at them all.

now that he’s seen the time, leo’s sure he has plenty to finish the song he’d been working on last night; the agency party anzu planned wouldn’t be until later and per knights tradition, their own small gathering is still a couple hours out.

looking forward to finding out what they’ve been hiding helps his inspiration return, so he hastily hops back onto his bed in search of his pencil, which he finds a lot easier than his phone. despite this, he doesn’t get very far back into the song when there’s a knock at the door.

leo ignores it at first, at least aware of it, but he makes no move to answer as he’s in the middle of a crescendoed section and he wants to get the build up perfect before he’s interrupted.

the knock returns, this time with a voice accompanying it. “leo-san, are you here?”

that catches his attention.

reluctantly, leo leaves the piece on his bed and opens his door. “suo, what’re you doing here?”

“did you not see my messages ?”

leo simply blinks at him. “no.”

tsukasa sighs. “i don’t know why i expected anything different,” he says. “well, i’ve come to escort you to your party .”

“wait, i thought that wasn’t ‘till later.”

“i’ve been sent to retrieve you early.”

leo doesn’t quite buy it, narrowing his eyes. tsukasa has never been a good liar, but he sees no reason to continue questioning him. he’d been looking forward to his birthday to see whatever this surprise is and if they’ve sent tsukasa to bring him, then it has to be something big, right?

“okay! lemme get ready first though,” he says. leo only catches it out of the corner of his eye as he turns back into his room, but he’s pretty sure tsukasa’s shoulders lose some of the tension in them. he motions for tsukasa to follow him. “here, you can look at this, it’s not done yet.”

tsukasa takes the song offered to him, placing himself awkwardly on the edge of leo’s unmade bed. “is it a new knights song?”

leo shrugs as he looks through his clothes. “could be, i think it’ll fit.”

tsukasa doesn’t reply, most likely looking it over as leo continues looking.

ever the stickler when it came to fashion, izumi had taken him shopping when they were in florence, saying that if the two of them happened to be out together, it would be best for their outfits not to clash.

leo doesn’t really see the issue, but he went along with it anyway even though he knows any shopping trip with izumi is him picking out far too many things to send leo off to a dressing room to try them all on. in the end, they — more izumi than leo, but he did at least take leo’s opinion into account — managed to narrow down their choices to one outfit that izumi said to consider as a birthday gift.

and if that’s the case, then there’s no better time to wear it than now, right?

speaking of izumi, he’d most definitely nag leo if he shows up with unbrushed hair, so leo makes sure to do that next. he’s been lectured about his unkempt hair plenty of times, but still, it’s really not his fault when he gets inspired and sucked into his next composition to remember do those kinds of things.

the flipping of pages fills the air.

“i think so too. we can discuss it more later,” tsukasa agrees once he’s finished looking through the unfinished composition. “are you ready to go, leo-san?”

just having finished retying his hair, leo says, “mmhm! ready, suo.”

tsukasa returns the song neatly stacked back to the bed as he stands. “then, let’s set off. i don’t wish to leave the others waiting for long.”

leo nods in agreement, more than eager to see whatever they had planned for him. he sets his hands on tsukasa’s shoulders and pushes him towards the door. ignoring tsukasa’s protests at being handled in such a way, leo says, “bye, bunny,” glancing back at the play area where the rabbit lay sleeping as he shuts the door behind them.

leo waits until they step out of the dorm building to ask, “what’s the surprise?”

tsukasa splutters slightly. “what surprise ?”

knowing that tsukasa has more likely than not been sworn to secrecy, leo figures he won’t give anything up. he’ll try his luck a little more anyway. “y’know, the thing you guys would hide whenever i showed up.”

tsukasa very clearly is avoiding his gaze when leo looks over at him. “i’m afraid i don’t know what you’re talking about.”

leo can’t help but laugh at that. “you really are bad at lying, suo!”

that earns him an offended gasp. “the point of a surprise , leo-san, is that it stays a secret ,” he defends.

“so, does that mean there is one?” leo presses.

“i’m not answering that.”

leo gives an amused hum to that.

tsukasa levels him with a tired stare. “please, no more questions . you’ll find out soon enough.”

content enough with that, leo nods and stays quiet even once they reach the building and step into the elevator to go up to newdi’s floor. while on the elevator, tsukasa takes out his phone and types out something that leo can’t make out from the corner of his eyes, trying to make it not obvious that he’s trying to cheat his way into knowing early.

the elevator dings once it reaches the correct floor and leo asks, “is it the same room as normal?” likely thanks to tsumugi doing the boring administrative work in the agency and taking into account leo’s multiple complaints about getting lost in the building, most knights meetings between the five of them tend to be in the same conference room.

“yes,” tsukasa replies, his phone dinging in his hand. “but we’ll have to wait a moment .”

the elevator doors open and leo considers his options. he could do as tsukasa said and wait, but he’d been waiting for way too long now. he wanted to see what they’d been keeping from him, so as they step out onto the floor, leo runs off down the hall in the direction of their conference room.

“leo-san!” tsukasa yells after him.

leo, of course, doesn’t stop. he instead bursts into the room and says, “hi, guys!”

rather than getting an equally enthusiastic greeting, he finds three pairs of eyes on him as tsukasa catches up.

“kasa-kun, i thought you said you could distract him,” izumi says.

tsukasa purses his lips. “i thought i could,” he objects. “but he knew we were planning something, so he ran ahead of me.”

“don’t blame our darling child, secchan,” ritsu cuts in from where he’s setting up what looks like a cake at the end of the table. per usual fashion, the decorations on it are a bit grotesque, but in a fun way. “we all know how free spirited tsukipi is.”

“is that what we’re calling it?” izumi mutters.

arashi waves her hand dismissively, ignoring izumi as she says, “well, it doesn’t matter now, does it? we’re pretty much done setting things up, so it doesn’t hurt to start things a little early.”

leo, though he doesn’t really get what they’re setting up for in the first place since the birthdays they spend together are hardly planned things, nods eagerly. “exactly, naru gets it!”

that gets him an eye roll from izumi.

ritsu, apparently pleased with the placement of his cake, joins izumi and arashi. “i’m all done, so we can start now. i think tsukipi might jump at us if we don’t get to it soon.”

leo bounces on the balls of his feet. “see, i knew you guys were planning something!”

ritsu smiles at that. “you could put it like that.” his gaze shifts to tsukasa and gives him a brief nod.

tsukasa leaves leo’s side and pulls a chair out from the table, turning it so the back is now to the table. “sit, leo-san,” tsukasa says.

leo eyes him curiously but does so anyway. whatever it is they’d been planning has been going on for at least two weeks since that’s when he started noticing them hiding things, so to say he’s excited to be only moments away from seeing what they’d been up to is a bit of an understatement.

tsukasa joins the others as they move to stand in front of leo. arashi looks over ritsu’s shoulder as he searches on his phone for something.

izumi’s eyes catch his. “we spent a long time on this, so you better like it, leo-kun.”

“i’ll love anything you guys give me,” he replies easily.

arashi giggles, glancing up at him. “izumi-chan’s just prickly ‘cause he’s the one who suggested we do this in the first place.”

at that, izumi conveniently looks over to ritsu when leo’s gaze falls on him once more. “can you just start it already?”

ritsu looks up from his phone, an amused little smile pulling at his lips. though rather than the teasing the normally accompanies that look, he simply says, “yeah, yeah, secchan. i just wanted to make sure it was the finished version.”

“then are we ready to begin ?” tsukasa asks on arashi’s other side.

“mmhm.” ritsu nods. he presses something on his phone then hands it to leo. “here, hold this for me.”

leo accepts the phone as the four of them align themselves in front of him. it takes a few seconds, but notes played on piano make their way from ritsu’s phone. the song doesn’t sound familiar, though leo can recognize the playing style as ritsu’s. he taps the screen only for the track remain untitled.

it’s not until the begin singing that he realizes that they’ve written him a song.

for a brief couple of seconds, all he can think of is that they wrote him a song for his birthday. the joy he feels at that is something he could never hope to put into words. a wide smile makes its way across his face as the performance continues.

while the song itself seems finished when it comes to the score and the lyrics — he very easily recognizes the latter as being written by izumi, though he can’t tell if he’s imagining ruka’s influence in certain lines or not — the choreography seems like it was thrown together last minute. it’s nowhere near as polished as their normal dancing, but leo figures it would be hard to schedule practice for this without him noticing around their normal practice.

still, he isn’t about to complain; he’d never complain when someone would give him a gift as nice and thoughtful as a song.

the tune itself is charming, pleasant to the ears, but it’s not like he expected anything less from them. after all, he likes to believe the time spent together rubbed off some of his musical genius onto them, but that would be severely discounting the talent each of them has.

leo finds himself swaying along with the beat, trying to capture and absorb as much of this moment as he can, though it’s hard to pay attention to the chords and the lyrics and the choreo all at once in this first listen.

before he knows it, the song is over. it continues on in his head once the recording ends, the four of them coming together and holding their final pose briefly.

“leo-san?” tsukasa says, falling out of order first. there’s a certain edge of worry in his voice that leo doesn’t quite understand until he blinks and his vision goes watery. he doesn’t even know when he started crying; leo just feels so happy. more tears fall.

leo swipes at his eyes, ducking his head down slightly to do so. “how embarrassing,” he mumbles.

“it wasn’t that bad, right?” izumi asks, a tinge of concern leaking in.

he laughs then sniffles. “no, it was perfect,” he says. “i loved it.”

as he looks back up at them, leo sees the concern on arashi’s face fall mostly away as she quietly sighs. “are you sure you’re okay?” she asks.

he nods. “i’m sure,” leo says, though he’s not sure how reassuring that is when more tears fall even as he wills them to stop. “i just wasn’t expecting that. i’m just so happy.” he rubs a few more tears away.

tsukasa, despite the worry clear on his face, looks a bit proud at that. “see, i told you that he wouldn’t expect a song .”

needing to show his appreciation, leo stands, sleeves coming away damp as he wipes at his eyes. the four of them say nothing, simply watch as he nears just for him to hug whoever happens to be the closest, which happens to be arashi. she lets out a quiet noise of surprise, but her arms fall around him easily to return it.

it doesn’t take long for the other three to join in the hug, even if there’s some quiet bickering about it.

leo feels so warm there in the hold of four of his closest friends, protected and comforted by them all at once.

they’d written him a song . he still couldn’t believe it.

“thank you,” he says. a hand brushes over his hair. he can’t tell whose it is, but it doesn’t really matter.

“of course, tsukipi,” ritsu says by his left ear.

leo wants to say so many things, wants to write so many songs now that he’s received one of his own. it’s such a new experience that he isn’t sure what to make of it all yet. he wants to ask what writing it was like, how each step of it went. he’s almost a little upset they didn’t ask him for any advice, but that would’ve ruined the surprise before it even began.

he wants to ask them for an encore and then another and another until he memorizes it all by heart.

even so, leo knows that he’ll have plenty of time to ask all the questions bouncing around in his head and then some, so he settles for saying, “i love you guys so much,” and hopes that’s enough to get the message across.

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

end notes: i was between two different titles but decided to go with this one in the end. lasciare suonare means allowing a sound to continue (to "let ring") without dampening it. in the past, leo's sound was dampened, but he was able to move through that into where he is now where his music is allowed to continue on, ringing loud and clear. symphony, the title of this fic, refers to a piece that is typically in four movements.

happy leo day!! being done with posting this feels so weird. leo means a lot to me and i'm glad to have been able to put all of that into words for these past five chapters. thank u for sticking around until the end <33 i was already sappy about this ending on twt so i'll spare you all from that but i hope you liked it.

#my fics #symphony #leo tsukinaga #arashi narukami #izumi sena #ritsu sakuma #tsukasa suou #i really am so attached to this fic it's not even funny #and i am really proud of it #i had these couple of months where i really didn't feel like i would write anything again #everything i wrote i hated and that was if i could get myself to write anything #so to end up writing this nearly a year after that really does make me so 🥹#plus i have a horrible track record with long pieces and chaptered things so to finish this really is such a feat #fr an anything for you leo kind of moment laskhdg #and posting it like this is making me feel all of that i felt when i was originally posting it all over again #happy leo debut day everyone 🎉

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abybweisse · 3 years ago

Note

Well I have a question.

So.. we know reapers aren't supposed to interfere with human lives. But my question is, what are the higher-ups in the shinigami realm teaching their up-and-coming reapers to ensure there are very few rule breakers of this particular stipulation? For instance, I know you've said before that you think Undertaker may have had children with Cloudia specifically to break that kind of interference rule or the karmic incarnation theory.

But I was wondering, what are they telling them? If they told them that it was possible to have children with humans, they would probably spread their genes and be less afraid of relations with humans. If they told them that it's not possible, then they could lose the ability to care and just run around the human realm doing whatever they want.

If they tell them that relations with humans would cause timeliness problems or something along those lines, even then there will always be those few who can't be bothered with it.

So, that leaves one thing for me. The reapers must have some kind of fear instilled in them to keep them so in line. I know too you just covered something about the reapers perhaps being forced to stay in line by some sort of procedure to alter their records or personality. But again, there's always going to ne reapers who will talk. Unless they perform a mass alteration everytime a rumor goes around, I theorize they probably threaten the reapers with this alterment or something similar to strike that fear into them to stay in line.

Now, we've only seen a few reapers in the series, so maybe this IS a common problem, but in small side scenes they seem to be very much in line and orderly. None of them have any indication that they're in trouble all the time, plus I get the feeling Grell or Othello would have mentioned it at some point. I'm not sure. I really feel like it's some sort of fear that would stop these kinds of interactions, but I don't know. Thoughts? You always have more insights than I do 😂

⚠️ This is a beast of a long post. ⚠️

Keeping reapers in line

It might be harder and more complicated than we think it is to keep a bunch of reapers under control.

I imagine it’s a mixture of conditioning techniques (brainwashing, basically), an atmosphere where anyone could tattle on each other at any given time, maybe tracking devices in their glasses, and potentially alterations of cinematic records. Even their very design could be part of how they are controlled.

Ever read Brave New World by Aldous Huxley? If not, I highly recommend it. I don’t want to give too much away, but it’s about a dystopian society that uses advanced technology and social conditioning methods to "hatch", raise, and further control the population. Outside the World State, there are still other populations, but they are treated as “savages”. Within the World State, the family unit has been abolished, books are banned, people have been bred to fit into a caste system, and they are raised to fulfill the roles chosen for them. The lowest castes are taught to fear things they would naturally be attracted to (like pretty flowers, furry kittens, etc.), and that’s largely how they are controlled or kept focused on their tasks or roles; they usually don’t seek out what they are intended to avoid, such as random distractions or even nicer things than what they have. While the highest castes are typically controlled through more pleasurable stimuli, like rewards and a reinforced sense of superiority. Oh, but everyone, regardless of caste, has access to a particular drug… called soma. Yes, soma. The basic idea is that everyone has a purpose in the World State, but no one is to stray from the purpose chosen for them. Bernard Marx doesn’t quite belong in the caste he was born into, but enough on that... for now....

Chapter one starts out with:

A squat grey building of only thirty-four stories. Over the main entrance the words, Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, and, in a shield, the World State's motto, Community, Identity, Stability.

Imagine living in 1932 and reading about a future in which a 34 story building was considered "squat". 😦 🤯

Anyway, what I’m getting at is: how reapers are controlled might depend on their rank as a group within the Afterlife, as well as their individual rankings within the reaper organization itself. Like, one of the reapers says (but I can't remember where or who) that the soul collectors are the stars or celebrities of the organization, making them akin to Alphas in the World State. Those "girls in the administrative division" Ronald talks about group-dating with might be examples of the reaper parallel to the World State's Betas. And so on.

As people who once committed suicide and now suffer the punishment for it, reapers must be seen as somewhat lowly, maybe even detestable by others who have been judged differently. And when I say judged, I mean by whatever entity that decides which soul goes where for whatever reason. This is one of the reasons I theorize in favor of karmic reincarnation (aka reaper rebirth theory): the afterlife doesn’t need your body, it just needs your soul, and Undertaker says human bodies (with their brains and cinematic records) stay in the human realm. Reapers don’t judge souls, they only collect them or don’t collect them. And maybe sometimes add a comment to the report. The soul goes “somewhere” to be judged by “someone”.

Which adds to my theory that reapers aren’t even in charge of the reaper organization. They aren’t trusted to govern themselves because that would be like letting inmates act as the wardens of a prison. So, something judges their souls and decides they are to become reapers, as both punishment and chance for salvation or redemption or “forgiveness”.

So “they” say.

So the reapers believe….

But not Undertaker. Not anymore. He must escape and wants to tear down the entire system, and it must be something very big and terrible to make him want that. I have some old posts about this, like the idea that the superiors are angels but that these angels treat human souls much like demons do: they might eat them. Or the angels prepare human souls as meals for the gods to devour... or at least the "god of this world" to devour. This salvation they seek might not even exist. What if even they are eventually on the menu, once they've obtained "forgiveness"?

I do suspect there could be a lot of things going on to control active reapers, like:

Conditioning through threats/pain -- where new reapers are taught to believe they must be punished for killing themselves as humans. This is part of the fear aspect you mentioned. If you believe in salvation and damnation, and you are told you will be damned if you don't repent, chances are you will do as you are told and suffer what you think is temporary punishment... for fear of eternal damnation. This is like the BNW scene where Delta babies are tortured any time they reach out for things like flowers or books with nice pictures. They become conditioned to avoid such things, and this is called neo-Pavlovian conditioning. Similarly, reapers might become conditioned to avoid anything that would be seen as straying from the path to salvation. Having physical relationships with humans would be listed as one of the major no-no's. Fear of too much interaction with humans could be instilled in repetition of physical pain, but this might be harder to do with reapers, so it's probably accomplished with threats of eternal damnation... though it's definitely not 100% effective. Just look at Ronald flirting with Mey-Rin and girls he meets on the Campania. And, of course, there's whatever Undertaker has gotten himself into with the Phantomhives.

Conditioning through rote memory -- All conditioning includes repetition, but in this case it's not necessarily about instilling fear, so the process is painless. Techniques like this might be used for developing daily routines and instilling morals. In BNW, Alpha (highest caste for males) and Beta (highest caste for females) children are "taught" certain things by a process referred to as hypnopædia. It's where a soft voice repeats things to you as you sleep, the idea being that you will eventually (after enough repetitions) immediately recall these words whenever an applicable situation pops up. It's been ages since I read the novel, but I think the example used to explain it was about a kid who listened to geography facts while they slept, like about the Nile River? When prompted to answer a specific question, the kid couldn't think of a reply, but when someone asked them specifically about the Nile River (or whatever), the kid mindlessly repeated the words from the recording. When asked to explain what they just recited, they had no idea. Or they still couldn't answer the original question. It was determined this method couldn't be used to make people actually understand anything they were hearing on repeat, but it could seriously affect their behaviors. It gives them the World State-approved version of moral guidance. For instance, their roles as mass-consumers. Perhaps you have heard the idiom "A stitch in time saves nine"? It's the idea that making repairs to things, like clothing, as soon as you find a rip will make those items last longer. Hypnopædia is great for making these people repeat idioms and live by them without caring about whether it's actually a good idea. They reinforce these behaviors by regularly repeating such platitudes to each other. So one of theirs is "Ending is better than mending. The more stitches, the less riches", convincing them to toss away and replace broken/worn things instead of fixing/mending them. This has a few more examples. This has even more examples, and yes! I was right; the experiments started with trying to teach a boy about the Nile River. (A couple more links, here and here from Study.com, but you have to set up an account -- free, I think -- to read the full essays.) And yet another, including these gems: "Everybody’s happy nowadays" and "Every one works for every one else." In Black Butler, reapers sometimes say things that suggest they have been conditioned in a similar manner, though it might not be while they sleep... though it is definitely mentioned how they "require" sleep. 🤔 Consider these sorts of concepts or beliefs that reapers might repeat to others, whenever the words seem to fit the topic; they might actually be saying these things because they were taught to automatically make these sorts of statements whenever the opportunity arises. This reinforces objectiveness, timeliness, efficiency, and a sense of duty and contentment in their jobs, despite it being a form of punishment. Oh, and the "necessity" to not lose their glasses!

William: "We do this indifferently... level-headedly..." and "clock out in a timely fashion..."

Ronald: "I've always been part of the anti-overtime school..." and "being strictly against overtime on principle..."

Sascha: "I enjoy every day much more than when I was alive."

Othello: (about Undertaker) "...recover every single soul on his list, without mercy or delay" and (about problems) "It's crucial to detect and fix bugs at the earliest opportunity."

Conditioning with pleasure -- All World State citizens are also conditioned to seek out certain forms of pleasure, like recreational drugs (soma) and sex, but they are not to reproduce. In fact, the lowest castes are born infertile, so that they don't reproduce on accident. Betas (female) keep contraceptives handy at all times; the kits are called "Malthusian belts", and the responsibility of avoiding pregnancy really is left to them. Pleasure is a strong incentive. With the reapers, they might also be conditioned to give into their baser desires, but with serious restrictions. If the reaper rebirth theory holds out, they do reproduce, but they would be expected to reproduce among themselves only, so that all babies born are the next generation of reapers. We might not see female reapers in the human realm simply because they are kept under stricter control. That way, they won't become pregnant with a human's child. You would think that if being a reaper is punishment, and if reapers are reborn souls, then the organization could just banish all reproduction, so there would be no one left to require punishment, once the last active reapers are forgiven. But of course not. If they did that, who would collect human souls? How else would suicides receive the punishment they've been told they deserve? So, this system would have to maintain itself with the birth of new reapers from the suicides occurring in the human realm. This entire cycle is being forced upon them just to keep it going, which is a big reason why I don't think reapers are in charge of the organization itself; the "superiors" or "higher ups" must be something seen in the Afterlife as truly superior to reapers. But if reapers have libido and are allowed to act upon it within their own ranks, the incentive might be enough to keep their numbers replenished. We've seen William and Grelle complain about staff shortages, and that suggests this system might be slowly breaking down; fewer reapers are choosing to reproduce, at least among themselves. There seems to be no particular restriction on certain vices, though, like gluttony, smoking, drinking alcohol, etc. Othello has a hefty appetite, Undertaker has some major sweet tooth (apparently), Ludger smokes, and a few reapers have mentioned and/or have been seen consuming alcoholic beverages. It's even possible they don't really need food or sleep, but they've been told they do, and those things happen to be pleasurable for most people. Othello is definitely convinced he needs "sugar" to keep his brain working, and he might be right, but we don't really know for sure. Some other phrases in BNW are "A dramme in time saves nine", "A gramme is always better than a damn", "One cubic centimetre cures ten gloomy sentiments", "When the individual feels, the community reels", "Never put off till to-morrow the fun you can have to-day", and "Progress is lovely." Those first four phrases are all about taking the drug soma. I can imagine Othello going straight to food anytime he feels like he needs to think clearly after a stressful situation. The "fun you can have to-day" quote sounds like a Ronald line, and possibly Grelle. The progress quote makes me think of Sascha... but also makes me think about death scythe modifications. Like the World State, the reaper organization might actually promote consumerism and some other forms of pleasure-seeking. It would help explain why we've seen reapers sporting such high-end accessories, like their name brand watches, shoes, agendas, luggage, glasses, hats, etc. They have a tendency to seek out luxury goods and services, like Grelle's nail appointments. Even Sascha's interest in photography, which seems to be a mere hobby that has been incorporated into their work, since no one else is taking photos of the bodies they just collected souls from, might be one of these consumer-based pleasures that's being encouraged. It's also a nod to the appreciation of technological progress, even if it could be detrimental, which is a huge theme shared by Black Butler, Brave New World, and Mother3.

Control by monitoring -- In BNW, if I recall correctly, there are some monitoring/recording devices around the World State, so the powers that be can keep an eye on you to an extent. However, most of their monitoring is based on conditioning, which includes tattle-telling on anyone who isn't behaving as expected of their caste and of any other suspicious activity. They are not necessarily being tracked, but they are being monitored, to some extent, particularly by their own peers and superiors. I theorize that reapers are monitored more directly, and that there might even be tracking devices in their special glasses. Somehow, William shows up quite soon after Grelle kills Madam Red, who wasn't on the list of people to die. All her victims were slated to die, even if Grelle didn't assist, but Madam Red herself wasn't. This means that word of Madam Red's death got to William almost immediately. Perhaps as soon as her soul ascended for judgement? Then there's the fact William also apprehends Grelle for an unauthorized death scythe modification, meaning that modification must be new. It's the first time we see Grelle's death scythe at all, and we have no idea what it was before that scene. Not a chainsaw! But also not a training scythe, since we later find out Grelle upgraded from that as soon as training was complete. This information could have reached William any number of ways, including a mention of a chainsaw-shaped death scythe in the description of the report on Madam Red's untimely death. But how William knows where to find Grelle -- exactly which back-alley -- is the sort of information a tracking device could provide. And those glasses seem (to me) the best place to hide one. Another part of their conditioning would revolve around their need for the glasses and how they keep reminding each other not to lose them. Grelle has gone the extra step of keeping them on a fashionable chain, so if they come off, they aren't likely to go flying, unlike what happens to William in the reaper OVA and Ronald in the manga. I expect Othello's rimless pair without ear rests to fly off his nose at some point.... Anyway, what better place to put a tracking device than something they are expected to use all the time because they have been "bred" (for a lack of a better word right now) to need them? Only deserters, like Undertaker (and Alan and Eric) would dare to discard their glasses. If there's no tracking device in them, why get rid of them? Why not continue to use the glasses when they are still so nearsighted? They keep their death scythes when they desert.... So, yeah, I think those glasses are meant to be necessary for them largely because there's something in them that helps to monitor their whereabouts, and possibly even their activities. I believe the reason the reaper organization has trouble keeping track of deserters, like Undertaker, is because they don't keep their glasses.

Control by physical tampering -- World State citizens are all born in hatcheries, not hospitals or birthing centers. And these are all "bottle babies" (like "test tube babies"), a very wild concept to be mentioned as early as 1932! The hatchery specialists manipulate the fertilized eggs and the conditions in their artificial amniotic fluid in order to create members of the different castes. I hope that's not too much of a spoiler; it's explained early-on, just like the neo-Pavlovian and Hypnopædic techniques. Alphas and Betas are given the best embryonic conditions. Gammas, Deltas, and Epsilons are given a progressively increased amount, respectively, of ethanol in their amniotic fluid, effectively simulating increased levels of fetal alcohol syndrome. There might be more to it than alcohol levels, but I distinctly recall that aspect. It comes up sometimes, since that guy Bernard Marx? I mentioned him way higher up in this insanely long post -- he's an Alpha, but there's a rumor that someone accidentally added alcohol to his bottle while he was "gestating". So, control over individuals in the World State begins before birth, and it effects every aspect of their lives. If reapers somehow retain their old human bodies, their bodies have to be manipulated to make them change into reapers. If reapers are given new adult bodies -- their souls are judged and placed into fully-formed bodies -- those new bodies have been created/designed to be nearsighted (as an excuse to make them rely on special glasses) and have various abilities that humans don't have. They can withstand severe injury and heal quickly, are fast and agile, and they can become invisible and even achieve some form of teleportation. Grelle can use techniques to change hair color, nail length and color, teeth shape, and other aspects of appearance at will; it could just be a glamor of some kind -- a trick. Undertaker can teleport right out of his clothes! Since some methods of suicide would have destroyed their human bodies, it seems fitting they would all just get new bodies, whether baby or adult. I personally really like the idea of their human bodies being left behind and their souls judged and placed into reapers being born. This gives the Afterlife a long time to condition reapers (using methods already mentioned) for their upcoming punishment, even before they are officially recruited and trained for active duty. As some of my readers have mentioned, they should need more than their souls to have any memories of their past lives as humans. Well, there are two ways to achieve this: 1. Either parts of their old cinematic records were taken, saved, and attached to their new bodies, or 2. They are provided with artificial memories. They would still have to go through something similar, if they weren't born but given new adult bodies. Now, as active reapers, they undergo some extra form of punishment whenever they break rules (and are caught). Grelle has to write a formal apology and undergoes a stint of suspension after being apprehended for killing Madam Red and making unauthorized death scythe modifications. I'm not entirely convinced that "suspension" doesn't already include a reaper's cinematic records being tweaked to make them more compliant and focused on their assigned work. But, more ominously, Othello warns that if Grelle had gotten into a serious fight with Undertaker and Sebastian at Phantomhive Manor (in front of all these humans), Grelle wouldn't get off so easily as before. What would Grelle have to go through, if that incident had occurred?!? When you are expected to work "to the bone until you are forgiven", according to Sascha, what's worse than suspension (which prolongs the punishment)? 👀 And what does Othello know about the possible punishments available? He's also threatened Undertaker with "picking his brains", which kind of suggests looking at his cinematic records, along with really picking at his brains. Undertaker isn't ready to be "dissected in his lab", and I can't blame him. Reapers this is done to might not know it's been done.

In a not-so-subtle way, Undertaker is likened to Bernard Marx in this comparison or parallel. Bernard is different from other Alphas in the World State, even though he is instrumental in developing some of the conditioning techniques (like hypnopædia), and he tries to rebel against it all. It works for a time; he even leaves the World State (deserts his post and everything) and lives among the "savages" for a while. But -- sorry for the big spoiler here!! -- eventually, he ends up back where he started. Back to the hatchery and conditioning center, back to the meaningless sex with Betas, back to all the consumerism and the soma holidays. Like the others, he looks forward to appearing and feeling young, until he's about 60... then dying (pumped full of pain meds) in a hospice bed... just to die and become fertilizer for their food crops and ornamentals. Literally. Plant fertilizer.

Othello might be the one who is actively involved in the process of keeping reapers in line (and something might have been done to put him back in line around the same time Undertaker first tries to escape, roughly 70 years prior to current events), but it's Undertaker who deserts his post and lives among the humans (likened to savages) for many years. And it's Undertaker who develops (or redevelops) cinematic record manipulation techniques... to reanimate the dead... the sort of thing other reapers once worried Othello might do. Perhaps learning about techniques used to control reapers is what finally sent him over the edge, so to speak, and convinced him he needed to escape. Oddly ironic, if the cinematic record manipulation is true, for Undertaker to use similar methods to make and control bizarre dolls....

Now, given that last fact -- that others once worried Othello might become the mad scientist -- Othello might be the parallel to Bernard Marx, and he's already been reconditioned and returned to reaper society. But, depending on what ends up happening to Undertaker, Undertaker might still end up being the ultimate parallel to the unfortunately anti-heroic Bernard. I've said before that Undertaker could get caught (if enough people team up to take him down), returned to the reaper realm/Afterlife, punished way more severely than Grelle ever was, and forced back into serving out the rest of his punishment... extended even more to make up for all the time he wasn't actively working towards their idea of salvation. Seems to me that any previous attempts to reform him failed, but this time?? I highly doubt Undertaker would easily give up and rejoin the reaper realm to become fertilizer become Othello's experimental lab rat... or go back to seeking "salvation". He'd probably rather die in combat....

Well, this post was both a pleasure and a life force-sucking endeavor for me. I sincerely hope it gives you both the pleasure and pain to read as it gave me to come up with (and type on my tiny iPhone keyboard). 😆

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pain-in-the-butler · 3 years ago

Text

The time has come once again

The Bloodbath

“I’m simply one hell of a butler” says Sebastian as he starts cleaning as usual

Okay so Agni’s taking no prisoners

Work Nerd, Science Nerd, and Jock Nerd team up to form the Nerd Trifecta

Team One Brain Cell joins up with Phipps, who is quite possibly their only chance for survival

Ran-Mao remembers how Harcourt beat everyone in the unfortunately deleted round and said “Not in my backyard”

So far, everyone else has simply run away unscathed or grabbed a weapon they won’t use because the game doesn’t record weapons. Rip Tanaka

Day 1

Ran-Mao bringing the canon energy by adding a second weapon to her arsenal

Phipps somehow always turns into Team Dad during these, so I’m glad to see he’s finding time for his favorite hobbies

Undertaker up to his usual Sneaky Antics

It hasn’t even been twelve hours yet. Kind of impressive honestly

Considering Harcourt lost his mace, I’ll just assume the attack Grell “escaped” from was the vicious stabbing of his trim little schoolboy fingernails

Bad vibes

It appears that Lau also brought his canon game

Sebastian in the most recent chapters be like

I’ve actually never had this event come up before and it has to happen between two of the more innocent characters in the series;;;; god Lizzie you deserve better even in the Hunger Games Simulator

Where’s a Safety Nerd when you need one

What’s better than this? Guys bein dudes

This is probably what happened after Ciel left Weston

Sebastian will take care of this for ya, huh bud

Other events:

Agni practices his archery

Wolfram goes fishing

Othello finds a cave

Soma goes ‘splorin

Edward goes huntin

Day 1′s Deaths: Tanaka, Sieglinde, Lizzie, and Macmillan. Someday one of the ladies will win

Night 1

Butler slumber party in the woods, BYOYM (bring your own young master)

It takes a lot of energy to be this blond

I’m happy for her :)

Yeah I’ll bet you probably do Lau

A tonal shift so abrupt I got mental whiplash

Can we go back to when Grell was looking at the sky pls

Thought about science too hard. Got a concussion

Thought about Ciel dying too hard. Got an infection

Aww dad :( Hope you caught some fish tho

Looks like Harcourt won’t be winning this one, gang

I stg the hunger games simulator is misogynist because the ladies always DIE /j

Ran-Mao is hopefully here to prove the previous statement wrong

Other events:

Bard gets a hatchet

Undertaker also passes out from exhaustion

R!Ciel goes to sleep in a tree

Day 2

Oh you five are SO going in my burn book for this. It’s what Grell would’ve wanted

Ahaha just like in the real manga... right guys (;

Idk about you but I’m rooting for her

I don’t think the simulator could’ve picked four people who were less likely to team up than this

I would too if I saw my best friend was palling around with an opium dealer, a grim reaper with a lawn mower, and another grim reaper that the first grim reaper doesn’t like

Other events:

Othello chases Wolfram

That’s the only other event actually

That means today we lost O!Ciel, Mey-Rin, Harcourt, and Grell. ffs, I hope Ran-Mao kills all of you

Night 2

I’ve missed you, rare pair simulator

The “unknown sponsor” was Undertaker and the “fresh food” was O!Ciel

Confirmed: Lau doesn’t get high off his own supply

Once again a ceasefire between the strong hungry boys is formed

Girl, you don’t have to do that

“Did you kill Ciel?” Sebastian asks

“No that was William,” Othello says

Sebastian punches a tree so hard that it combusts. “God damn. Fuck” Sebastian says

Wolfram just realized I put him in the Hunger Games simulator

Other events:

Phipps thinks about “Are you winning son”

Undertaker gazes at space

Ronald becomes Lost Ronald

Soma passes out

Bard gets some water

Day 3

Damn Agni who haven’t you flirted with

Finny sees that Bard has water and thinks Bard cooked it himself, so he wants no part of that (might be burnt)

What did he even have that was worth stealing? A fish?

Well I can tell you who isn’t creating that smoke: Lau

“What’s worse than two young masters? No young masters. Now get over here and make a contract”

Everything about this sentence is a fever dream

Other events:

Undertaker decides he wants a slingy shot too

Edward chases Dad I mean Phipps

Othello gets some ouchies from picking berries

Night 3

When your young master dies, you just get an infection apparently

damn Finny’s playing hardball

I don’t think anything bad has actually happened to Bard yet. It’s just been a grand frolic the whole time

I barely remember reading the first Hunger Games but Ran-Mao’s the Foxface of this journey: she deserves to win and I just know she’ll die in the stupidest way possible

Sebastian’s like a cat that can’t reach the bird it wants to attack, so it attacks the nearest other thing instead. Poor Dad

Two white-haired anime boys and a not-white-haired anime boy talk about who will die tomorrow. Anime doesn’t exist yet so the white-haired anime boys don’t know their hair color automatically spells their doom

Other events:

Edward starts a fire, which means he’s capable of smoking opium

Ronald gets some medical supplies

Othello gets a hatchet

R!Ciel thinks about winning

Lau gets an entire explosive, but he won’t be able to light it, so no it’s no big deal

Day 4

In Soviet Hunger Games, white-haired anime boy kills you

But why murder someone when you could just mess with them

Other events:

Grey scares Bard

Finny goes hunting

Night 4

Have you four even killed anyone yet

The list of “people who didn’t start the manor fire and also don’t smoke opium” now consists of Lau and R!Ciel

The mood is too light now. Someone needs to die and it better not be Ran-Mao

At last, Father Phipps has chosen his son for this round

Agni gushes about all the hot guys he’s simultaneously in love with, giving Ran-Mao a clearer idea of who’s still alive

Day 5

Girl, it’s about time, go claim some trophies

Finny’s easily got the longest kill streak and it’s a little unnerving

Father Phipps finds a new secret fishing hole

Othello doesn’t

Lau continues to put in all the efforts of a kindergarten bully

Oh no. He’s a yandere

Other events:

Sebastian fucks around and explores the arena

Bard fucks around and hunts for tributes

Undertaker fucks around and sleeps

R!Ciel fucks around and picks flowers

Night 5

I’ve never met anyone who ships Sebastian/Undertaker but I know you’re out there

Okay, maybe these four are even less likely to team up than Phipps, Ronald, Undertaker, and Lau

Edward sees I’m making jokes about people who build fires and stays hidden

Day 6

Canonically, that is the only way R!Ciel would win a fight, so

I probably could have predicted this

I hope these are the faces they made when it happened

The “unknown sponsor” is R!Ciel and the “fresh food” is an ear that fell off his own head

I’m not sure if I should be concerned or unsurprised that Bard’s Hunger Games life is more chill than his canon life

the “unknown sponsor” was the fish and the “clean water” was “fish water”

Other events:

Ran-Mao gets her third weapon that she doesn’t want to use, which is a hatchet

Finny finds a river

Agni practices archery again, but he doesn’t kill anyone because he wants this to go on forever

Night 6

Ran-Mao I beg you please. Release us from this purgatory of mediocrity

And suddenly we’re back to canon Bard

I guess not everything can be canon

Other events:

Both Agni and Phipps pass out from exhaustion. It’s 2:50 a.m. so I should really be taking a page from their book, but unfortunately everyone refuses to die

The Feast

Finny has been a stone cold killer this entire match, so I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that the girl I wanted to win would get eliminated by him, but it still hurts ✌️😔

If you cheat on Othello, he will overpower you, killing you

Everyone else decided not to go to the Feast. Honestly, I don’t remember what the Feast is, but everyone who did go either murdered someone or got murdered, so I guess that was probably a good call

Day 7

I’ve had enough of this dude

Jesus Finny I can’t wait to see how many kills you got, I feel like you and Agni were the only two who took anyone down

Bard, Undertaker, Sebastian, and Phipps all hunt for other tributes but they’re useless and don’t kill anyone

Arena Event: Volcano Eruption

In one fell swoop, we lose Sebastian, Undertaker, R!Ciel, and Finny, jeez. But... that means it comes down to.............

FATHER PHIPPS VS. BARD

FATHER PHIPPS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Wow... Unlike his manga counterpart, this boy coasted the whole time and won... He basically went on vacation and he actually won... But then again, it’s Hunger Games Simulator and nothing is sacred

Well I hope you learned a valuable lesson today. I hope you did at some point before you read my post, because you sure as hell learned nothing from this. Thank you for wasting precious minutes of your life with me 😏

#black butler #kuroshitsuji #kuroshitsuji hunger games simulator

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theasstour · 4 years ago

Photo

𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐎𝐧𝐞𝐬 𝐋𝐞𝐟𝐭 𝐁𝐞𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐝.

𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓: 𝟕.𝟓𝐤 𝐍𝐁: 𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲 𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐞, 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐢𝐭 𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐮𝐚𝐠𝐞, 𝐝𝐫𝐮𝐠 𝐮𝐬𝐞, 𝐬𝐨𝐦𝐞 𝐜𝐫𝐞𝐞𝐩𝐲 𝐦𝐞𝐧

A/N: Thank you so much to everyone who reblogged and sent me an ask after last chapter ❣️ I might not have gotten through all the asks yet, but know that I see all of you and I appreciate you more than I will ever find the right words to articulate 🌟 Thank you for the kind words and for reminding me of how fun it is to post my stories on here! Love you sm sm sm 🥰

Tuesday, 4 November 2017

One of the worst things Y/N knew of was seeing someone she cared about go through something troubling. If she knew them well enough, it would be written out on their face and in their gestures, making it so that she could not ever look past it and pretend everything was alright. Her ability to read people, to understand their wants and to see when something was off, was something she had crafted over many years of being a people pleaser. Now, it came naturally to her to study a person’s way of acting, talking, being, and then make them happy accordingly.

She realised when she grew older that the reason she did this was so people would look past her body and like her for who she actually was. She hated herself sometimes for still giving in to this need to please people all the time. She hated the things it had made her do in the past, how she had bent herself over backwards for people who did not, and would never, give a single shit about her. Though she felt at home in her body, she felt content in it, these tendencies to constantly make up for how she looked, to make light of it or make people feel comfortable around her, still hung around. With absolutely everything she was, Y/N hated that part of herself. She did not have to make up for anything. What did she have to apologise for? For existing? It did not make sense to her, but it had made sense to those that bullied her in school and those skinny people whose worst fear was becoming fat. Y/N’s worst fear, because of this, was not being liked. She realised how it all connected now.

Y/N realised how this need to please people came into play as she was sitting in a seminar room with Hayden, Chloe, Thian, Annalise, and three others from the International Society that Annalise often went to. Annalise was whispering in Dutch to the other Dutch girl she had met, while the rest of the room was relatively silent. Hayden had put on some music to lighten the mood, but it was evident that they were unsatisfied and sad. They were eight people; a single game of Uno was being played in a room that had been made so that at least 20 people would show up. Hayden had bought five decks of Uno, only for the one they brought with them to London to be the one the group ended up using. Their eyes drifted to the door every so often, silently begging for anyone else to show up to what looked to be a disastrous start to their Uno Society.

After two hours, they had to get out of the seminar room and go back home. As they were cleaning up, Y/N walked over to Hayden and helped them put their Uno decks and everything else they brought, back in their bag.

“More people will show up next time,” Y/N assured them.

“You’re just saying that.”

“No, I genuinely think more people will show up at one point.”

Hayden smiled at Y/N, though it did not reach their eyes. “If we don’t have at least 15 people by the third meeting, this won’t be considered a society by Helmond standards and we won’t be allowed to meet on campus grounds.”

Y/N felt a small tinge of panic at that. This was not usually the society people would jump to be part of, it would take a little while for people to want to show up to an Uno Society on a Tuesday every fortnight.

“We can hope more people will come, but I doubt they will,” Hayden said.

“There aren’t a lot of people our age who play Uno, though,” Chloe said as Hayden and Y/N made their way to the door.

Y/N furrowed her brows at Chloe’s comment, but did not say a word.

“No, but I love Uno, and it’s a very social game. It’ll be fun if a lot of people show up, you know?” Hayden said, closing the door behind them before they walked down the corridor for the exit.

“Obviously, people just don’t know what they’re missing,” Thian chimed in, showing off his usually wide, happy beam. “It’s a great idea, Hay.”

“Really? It’s not bound to flop?” Hayden asked, scrunching up their nose as if they could not quite believe what Thian was saying.

“Of course not,” Annalise said.

“It’s a nice break from all the assignments,” Y/N said.

“By the way, speaking of assignments,” Chloe groaned. “Y/N, have you started on the Othello presentation yet?”

“You haven’t had the presentation yet?” Thian asked.

“No, different Introduction to English Studies seminar groups have presentations at different dates,” Chloe said. “Since Y/N and I are seminar group E, we have it last. Monday, 4th of December.”

“That’s still a while away, though,” Hayden pointed out. “You still got a month.”

“Yeah, but the presentation’s 40% of the final grade. I know I’ll ace the essay, but we only get to have a five-minute presentation on Othello.” Chloe rolled her eyes. “How am I supposed to talk about how Othello’s a sexist play in just five minutes?”

“Easy,” Thian said. “You talk about how it’s a sexist play for just five minutes. You love to talk, it’ll be easy peasy.”

“I love to gossip, this is entirely different,” Chloe complained.

“Not really,” Y/N said, cocking her head a little to the side as the group rounded a corner. “You’re essentially just gonna gossip about Othello and what’s wrong with him and the way Shakespeare wrote the play.”

Chloe stared at Y/N for a few seconds, pursing her lips as she thought. A grin spread out across her lips and she nudged Y/N’s shoulder. “You’re right.”

“It’s gonna be fine,” Annalise smiled.

“And by the time that happens, the Uno society will be history,” Hayden mumbled, making Thian pout his bottom lip and wrap an arm around Hayden’s shoulders. They all made their way back to Dinwiddy, Lancaster Complex, and Fleming Hall, three of the seven different campus accommodations. Dinwiddy was definitely of a bit better standard than Lancaster and Fleming, but Y/N was sure that, had she decided to live on campus, she would have gone for either Lancaster or Fleming like Annalise, Thian, and Hayden. She said goodbye to all of them and went on her way, walking back to Haggerston while talking to her parents on the phone. They always insisted she call them if she walked out alone at night, no matter how many people were around.

The shops she strolled by were starting to put up Christmas decorations and sales, making Y/N long for holiday. She just wanted a few days off uni. Though it was only the first year, the amount of work they were getting was ridiculous, and Y/N felt like she either spent most of her time in the library with her Literature gang, or at a café with Nathan, doing uni work. The fact that Christmas lights and decorations were already making an appearance, gave her some hope.

Getting to Orsman Road was no problem, and Y/N hung up with her parents when she reached the flat building. The mere thought of her bed made her knees buckle, she could not wait to be snuggled up in a blanket and watching the newest true crime series on Netflix. Once inside, she got her shoes and outwear off, then walked straight for the kitchen. She halted.

In a pair of worn-out black rugby shorts and a black hoodie, Harry stood pouring water into the kettle. The muscles in his legs flexed and unflexed as he moved, making it impossible to look away from his thighs. Y/N could not find the right words to express just how much she hated those tiny shorts. It was as if he knew exactly what he was doing. Except he didn’t. He was very much just trying to wear something comfortable at home and Y/N was ogling him. He looked up as she entered.

“Hi,” Y/N said, walking over to the fridge where she kept her oat and banana milk.

“Hi,” Harry answered, watching her as she walked before putting the kettle on. “Been out shagging old men?”

Y/N blinked a few times before looking over at Harry as he put a teabag into his mug. “You’re very obsessed with my sex life.”

“I’m just nosy.”

Y/N sighed, knowing this was true from experience, and went back to getting her milk out of the fridge. “No, I was at a society meeting. The first one, actually.”

“Oh?” She could see in her peripheral vision that he turned around to watch her. “What kind of society?”

“Uno.”

Silence settled in the kitchen, and Y/N could hear Nathan and Mason in the living room next door playing something on the PlayStation. Y/N could feel Harry continue to just look at her as she poured herself a glass of the oat and banana milk. It was not until the milk was back in the fridge and Y/N met his eyes, that Harry spoke again.

“Uno?”

“Like the card game.”

“That’s… a niche interest.”

She raised her eyebrows. “And you’re being judgemental.”

Harry’s eyes grew wide. “No, no, no! I-“ He stopped himself, taking a grip of the kettle and quickly pouring himself a cuppa before meeting Y/N’s eyes again, something frantic shining within his own. “It’s just a very specific interest and society.”

She raised one of her shoulders. “Which is what makes it so amazing.”

“Yes. Yes, of course,” Harry said quickly, gesturing at her with his hand as if he completely agreed. Y/N wanted to laugh at how fast he was talking, as if he was desperate for her to understand that he was not being judgemental. “How was it?”

“Barely anyone showed up,” Y/N explained, sipping her milk.

Harry frowned. “Really?”

“Yeah, and at least 15 people total have to show up for it to be considered a society, or else Hayden, my course mate, can’t continue hosting on campus grounds.” Y/N sighed, looking at the ground. “Basically, if Hayden doesn’t find, like, twelve more people to join within the next two times, we won’t have a society any longer.”

Harry opened his mouth as if to say something, but just then, the sound of quick footsteps could be heard, and then Nathan’s face appeared in the doorway. A grin spread out on his face as he met Y/N’s eyes.

“Thought I heard you come in!” he exclaimed. “We’re playing GTA, wanna come drive some people over?”

Y/N smiled at that, scrunching up her nose. “As appealing as that sounds, I’m gonna have to decline.”

Nathan pouted his lips and Harry stood watching quietly. “Why?” Nathan asked.

“Have an essay that I need to finish.”

Nathan sighed heavily. “Fine. Guess I’ll let you write that bloody essay.”

“Excuse you? ‘Let me’?” Y/N rolled her eyes and Nathan laughed. She gave him and then Harry a smile, making her way out of the kitchen.

“Have a good night,” she heard Harry say as she walked through the doorway. She gave him another smile before walking up the stairs and to her room. She quickly got out of her clothes and into loungewear, taking all her make-up off and finding a fluffy blanket she could sit under in bed as she started writing her Introduction to English Studies essay. She could hear the boys shouting and playing downstairs and drowned it out by putting her earbuds in and shutting them out.

She ended up reading academic articles and writing down an essay plan until she felt her eyelids get heavy a few hours later. Putting her laptop away and finishing her oat and banana milk, Y/N took her contacts off and started getting ready for bed. The door to the room beside hers opened and closed, she could hear Harry rummaging in his room, though the sound was not disturbing in any way. The only disturbing thing about it was the fact that it was Harry, but Y/N was learning to accept that. It had only taken her two months, but she was coming to terms with the fact that Harry Styles, an ex-good friend of hers and person she had sex with once, was living and sleeping in the room right next to hers.

Friday, 17 November 2017

The pizza at Domino’s was absolutely amazing, but working for them was anything but. This was only Y/N’s first shift, and she was already dreading her next. Not only would she be bringing home with her the memories of a horrible first day on her new job, but she would also be bringing the smell of greasy pizza. She would have to do a deep clean in the shower before going to bed, she was not rubbing that smell onto her bedsheets.

With some experience working for Pizza Express before, Y/N was already well-versed working for a pizza chain. Pizza Express had been her job from 15 until she moved off to uni at 19, which she knew was what must have given her this new job at Domino’s rather quickly. As much experience as she had working at Pizza Express serving people, she had never been the one to drive around delivering pizzas. After all, she had not gotten her license until sometime last year, so it had never been a possibility. However, in the job description for this position at Domino’s, it had clearly stated that Y/N would be working mostly as a delivery driver, something that sounded chill at first, until she realised she would have to go deliver pizza to people that would be anything but friendly. Or maybe a little too friendly. Because of her inexperience in this particular field of the job, she had another employer join her for her first shift.

Isla was very quiet, maybe even a little too quiet for Y/N’s taste. She would mostly just stare out the window, sometimes chime in to help Y/N pick a quicker route, or help her make out how much she owed the customer if they paid a few quid too many. Other than that, Isla did not really offer much conversation wise. Even when the two of them picked up the pizzas for their first drive, the first time they spent together, Isla did not say much.

“Have you worked here long?” Y/N asked, giving Isla a smile so she would know that she was actually asking out of curiosity and not because she felt obliged to.

“A year.”

Y/N nodded as she sat down behind the wheel, Isla sitting down in the passenger seat. “I worked in Pizza Express at home in Nottingham before I moved here. Dunno why, I’ve always preferred Domino’s to Pizza Express. Though, Zizzi is top tier.”

Isla only nodded slightly.

Y/N had waited for a response, but realising she would not be getting one, she started the Domino’s car and started driving in the direction out of the parking spot on the street beside the tiny restaurant on Homefield Street. Y/N almost drove right into the Domino’s mopeds that all stood on the spot in front of the car. She just knew that at one point, she would be driving one of those. She followed the instructions on the GPS, up Hoxton Street, in the direction of Lavender Grove. Without any radio on, the car was very quiet. Too quiet. It made Y/N break out in sweat.

“Do you drive around with deliveries often?” Y/N asked.

Isla shook her head. “No.”

Y/N whipped her head back in the direction of the street in front of her, trying to produce spit so she could nervously swallow. Her mouth was too dry. “You work by the till then?”

“Mostly.”

Y/N smiled. “That’s the best place to work, isn’t it? Don’t have to drive around, don’t have to actually make the food.”

Isla gave a feeble smile. “I suppose.”

God, all Y/N wanted as an okay day. All she wanted was for one single day to be alright.

Isla would twine a single piece of her brown, bushy hair around her finger sometimes, then put it behind her ear, only to go back to fidgeting with it. Y/N was unsure if she was nervous to be in a car with someone she did not know, or if she was just deep in thought. Y/N wanted to get to know Isla, to make a friend at her new workplace, but she did not want to harass Isla if it meant it would make her uncomfortable. It was clear that she did not like being this close to Y/N considering the two had never met before and would now be spending a good six hours together. Therefore, to not push away what she hoped to be a future mate, she only made occasional conversation and then left Isla mostly to herself. She could sense that was what her companion wanted most of all.

In a particularly dodgy part of Lea Bridge, Y/N was delivering three pizzas to what she knew even before knocking on the door, would be to a rather creepy encounter. The man that opened the door was bald with glassy eyes and a blue tee shirt tucked into his grey joggers. At the sight of Y/N, he grinned.

“Three pepperonis?” she asked, wondering if this man just really loved pepperoni pizzas or if he was hosting a party.

“That’s me, yeah.”

“Alright.” Y/N handed him the three pizzas just as another man emerged from behind him, and it was then that Y/N noticed the incredible stench of alcohol and cigarettes. Some 80s rock was playing from a stereo and there did not seem to be much light on inside the flat. Y/N suddenly felt very sick.

“You pre-paid,” she stated, more to reassure herself that she could just leave than to make them aware that she knew they did not have to go get any money to pay her. “Have a nice night.”

“Wouldn’t be nice if you didn’t stick around,” the bald one holding the pizzas said.

“Yeah, why don’t you come inside? Have a bite with us?” the other one offered. “You look like a hard-working girl, why don’t you take a few minutes off with us?”

Y/N could feel her heart begin to beat faster, her hands begin to sweat. “No, I have to get back to work,” she said, giving them a smile before walking off.

“Wait, we didn’t give you a tip!”

“Come back, love!”

Y/N tuned them out as she walked down the stairs, keeping an eye over her shoulder and her ears on alert as she made her way back to the car. Isla was sat on her phone when Y/N sat back down in the driver’s seat, putting her seatbelt on a little too fast and gripping the steering wheel harder than she had previously. She just wanted to get away from those men, she just wanted that shift to be over.

“You okay?” Isla asked. The first question she ever asked Y/N. First time she ever took initiative to start a conversation. Y/N really appreciated it in that moment.

“Yeah,” Y/N said, sighing heavily. “Just hate men.”

Isla must have understood what Y/N was talking about because she nodded, looking straight ahead at the road in front of them. “I’m sorry you met the worst type of customers on your first night.”

“Had to meet them at one point, though,” Y/N said.

“You shouldn’t have to meet them at all.”

Y/N felt that statement reverberate through the car, lay in the air between them for quite some time after it was said. She could not stop thinking about it as she drove to the next destination, feeling disgusted and angry. Had she stayed there a second longer, she would have had to resist the urge to knee them both in the space between their legs. This was just one of the stupid encounters that night, though the rest were more so on the scale of weird than disgusting. Like a man that was clearly high thanking Y/N for his frozen milk when he had ordered three Ben and Jerry’s, or a woman with her hair a mess, make-up completely destroyed, and just her dress robes on, snatching the pizza out of Y/N’s hand before hurrying back inside. It was a strange few hours, and as she drove the car back to Domino’s Homefield Street, Y/N felt absolutely drained of energy.

Walking home after her shift at 3:30am was next to torture, she just wanted to be in bed, cosy underneath the covers, and forget about the fact that she was working tomorrow night as well. Though the Hoxton Street was washed in the yellow lights from the streetlamps and the occasional car driving by, it was anything but empty. Drunk people were walking home from pubs, while others, like her, walked home from another nightshift, and some were just out for a night stroll. She walked without listening to music, not feeling comfortable with not being completely aware of her surroundings when it was dark out. Besides, she was so tired as well, listening to music would probably put her to sleep.

Orsman Road was completely deserted, only a few people walking home from The Stag’s Head passed her smelling of beer and cigarettes. This street was darker, smaller, and less busy than Hoxton Street, so Y/N opted to walk in the middle of the road instead of in the shadows. She felt less vulnerable that way. As she reached the flat building, she got her keys out of her purse and went to unlock the door.

“Fancy seeing you here.”

She jumped, keys falling onto the asphalt. Looking over her shoulder, she saw Harry standing there with the smuggest, most infuriating look on his face. God, how she wanted to slap him until his teeth fell out. While she contemplated how to physically hurt him, Harry bent down, picked up Y/N’s keys, and put them back in her hand.

“Don’t lose those,” he said. “50 quid to get a new pair.”

Y/N only narrowed her eyes, unlocking the door for them both and striding on to the next floor. After opening the door to the flat, she got her shoes off, and walked straight for the kitchen. She needed strawberries, especially after the shift she just had. The door closed behind Harry and she heard him lock it before taking his shoes and jacket off, too. As she turned around after closing the fridge door, Harry stood by the kettle, filling it up with water.

“Didn’t know you worked at Domino’s,” he said, looking over at her briefly, nodding at her black Domino’s fleece jacket before turning his attention back to the kettle.

“Just started.”

“How’re you finding it?” he asked.

Y/N sighed, leaning her hip against the counter. “Considering this was my first shift and I have to show up again to work another nightshift tomorrow…” She pursed her lips as if deep in thought. “I’d say shite.”

Harry laughed, stopping the tap. “Tea?”

“No, I bought myself some banana and oat milk from M&S earlier, I’ll just have that. Thank you, though.” She gestured at what she had placed on the counter while he was busy with the kettle.

Harry watched her as she got herself a glass for the milk. “Can’t for the life of me remember you being a Tory.”

Y/N laughed. “Oh, you don’t remember me hating the poor?” she said, putting on a posh accent, Harry could not hold back his own laughter. “Quite a big part of my personality, don’t know how you missed it. Now-“ She put the milk back in the fridge. “-If you’ll excuse me, I’m going to go spend five weeks at my £1.000.000 18 century holiday house in Surrey.”

Harry’s laughter echoed through the kitchen as he put the kettle on, shaking his head at her. “No, but how’d you like your first shift? Anything like Pizza Express?”

Why the fuck did he remember that? Why did he have to remember everything? Bloody hell…

“Not for me. There were just a lot of creepy men, and some very dodgy neighbourhoods. I’m sure that’s not all there is to the job as a delivery driver, I’m sure I was just unlucky my first time, but I can’t really afford to quit unless I have a backup.”

Harry frowned at that. “If you don’t like it and you feel unsafe, you don’t have to continue doing it.”

She nodded her head. “No, I know, but it’s still the only job I could find and that I could get at the moment. I’ll apply to others later.”

Harry’s frown deepened, crossing his arms over his black, tee-shirt covered chest. No tattoos on display. She wondered why he only had tattoos on his chest and torso.

“Yeah, alright…” he said, voice a little darker than before. “But if you feel unsafe-“

“-Harry, I practiced capoeira when I was younger, remember?”

At that, as if he was slowly unveiling a memory he had not thought about in a little too long, Harry smiled. A small, fond smile that Y/N remembered from a previous life; a life with far less troubles, far less complications than this one.

“Of course I do.”

Not “yes”. Not just “I do”. “Of course”. He had said “of course”, as if remembering was a privilege. As if not remembering would be the strangest thing in the world. Y/N hated that this man did not forget a single thing. Never had, never would.

“Well,” she said, trying to act normal after that. “Well, I can hold my own.”

“Good to know,” Harry smiled, getting a teabag from his cupboard. As he turned his body and face away from her, she saw something glisten in the lights of the kitchen. Two earrings. Two gold earrings right next to one another. In his ear. Y/N would never admit to it out loud, the sight made her mouth salivate. “But I still think you should quit if you don’t like your work.”

Y/N opened the strawberry container and took one out, taking a bite. She needed to look away from Harry, away from his two earrings, and away from him because he was making some points. She knew where Harry was coming from, she really did, but she could not go on living in London, using money every single day, and not have an income. Until something better came along, this would be her job. “How’s the pub?”

“Alright,” Harry said, pouring hot water into his mug. “I’m having my last shift there December 15th.”

Y/N blinked. “You’re quitting?”

“Yeah, I’m starting a new job in January.”

She raised her eyebrows, meeting his gaze again. “Okay, good for you. What one?”

“Tattoo artist.”

He had to be fucking kidding at this point. Y/N had to do everything to keep her eye from twitching.

“Just got my tattoo license, so I’m ready to go come January.”

Y/N did not want to admit it. She could not admit it. She physically could not. But… everything about Harry… everything he did, everything he said… It all hit different. And it did not help that Y/N, who loved tattoos, getting them, having them on her body, and seeing them on someone else’s, was now made aware that Harry could legally give people tattoos. He was going to become a tattoo artist in January. Y/N wanted to eat chalk.

Harry just looked at her, studying her face. “You okay?”

She swallowed the strawberry bite she had just taken. “Fantastic.”

Harry raised his eyebrows. “Really?”

“Did you draw your own tattoos then?”

For the second time that night, Y/N was witness to Harry’s smug smile. He raised his cuppa, cocking his head a little to the side as he said, “You’ve seen my tattoos?”

Y/N wanted to die.

“You’ve been sneaking into my room to watch me sleep, that it?” Harry asked. “You’ve probably seen the tattoo I have by my crotch then, too-“

“-Oi!” Y/N narrowed her eyes at him. “Piss off. I saw them when you were wearing that low-neck top at Footprint.”

Harry took a sip of his tea. “If you say so.”

Y/N rolled her eyes and Harry laughed.

“It’s jokes, Y/N.”

“Good. I’m genuinely scared you think I fancy you.”

Harry smiled. “You mean you don’t? Really?”

She took a hold of her strawberries and milk. “Goodnight, wanker.”

“I’m a dreamboat, what about this-“ Harry gestured at himself, flexing his arm muscles that weren’t really there. “-Doesn’t give you the fanny flutters?”

“You’re disgusting.”

Harry laughed.

“I was just interested to know about your job as a tattoo artist ‘cause I love tattoos,” Y/N explained.

Harry’s eyes travelled down to Y/N’s hand where the ‘M’ was tattooed, it lingered there for a moment too long. For some unknown reason, a tingle started up in Y/N’s thumb, making its way up her arm and to her breasts, then her stomach. Slowly, he lifted his eyes to her ribs where he must have seen her ‘saudade’ tattoo. Though it was not visible right then, it seemed as if Harry was seeing it all the same, sensing it somehow. At last, his eyes met hers, and Y/N felt something in her throat stop working. The tingle that had laid in her stomach just seconds earlier exploded, slithering all throughout her body and making her hyper aware of how knowledgeable Harry was of the tattoos on her body; of her. He must have paid more attention to her than she thought he had. Something about that made it hard to breathe. Bloody hell, she hated how fucking fit he was. She hated how she reacted to his glance, to his attention.

“I can tell,” he said, voice a tinge darker than before.

She was surely about to explode. Blinking a few times, she held her strawberries up, nodding her head to Harry in a silent goodbye, then made her way towards the door.

“Oh, Y/N,” Harry said, making her look over her shoulder at him. “Do you want some Ginger Nuts? I’m having some with my tea-“

“-No thanks. Goodnight.” Y/N walked straight out of the door and to her room, needing to stick her head out her window to cool down in the Regent’s Canal breeze before sitting down in her bed again. How could he be considerate, respectful, smart, pretty, and sexy at the same time? Some otherworldly powers had truly been at work these last few years to make Harry Styles into everything Y/N was attracted to.

She did not even want him as a boyfriend, she never had, there had never been any romantic feelings between them before and there never would be, but he was just so… so… frustrating. In every single sense of the word. He was just… very attractive. Very pleasing to look at. Everything that got to Y/N. And Y/N wanted to scream at Harry for making it so hard to ignore him, and at herself for falling for it.

Wednesday, 29 November 2017

Y/N was originally going to travel home to Nottingham that Friday so she could stay home that weekend. She had not been home since September, and though they only had two weeks of uni left before Christmas break, she wanted to go home this weekend. She missed her parents terribly and wanted to see them so badly, she could simply not wait until Christmas. So, because it was the last Wednesday of the month, Y/N travelled back up to Nottingham.

Every last Wednesday of every month, Davi would invite all of his Brazilian family who had settled in Nottingham after he had, as well as Lottie’s parents, over for feijoada. Brazil has many region-specific dishes, yet the one that best translates into a nationwide dish is the beloved feijoada. The name stems from the word feijão, which is Portuguese for bean, and also the key ingredient of feijoada, which is essentially a bean stew mixed with beef and pork. Though, depending on what region of Brazil you are in, you will find different ingredients added to the feijoada.

In Rio de Janeiro and Minas Gerais, feijoada is almost always cooked with black beans, while in Bahia, red or brown beans are preferred. In Bahia and Sergipe, they also usually add extra vegetables to the feijoada such as plantain, kale, potatoes, carrots, cabbage, and pumpkin. However, in the rest of Brazil, feijoada is simply beans and meat with no additional vegetables. It is served with white rice, shredded kale with bits of fried bacon, crispy pork crackling, and slices of oranges that are meant to aid the digestion of the heavy meal. Which is what Y/N had grown up eating.

Typically, it is served at noon on Wednesdays and Saturdays, as this hearty meal is a thick mixture that will have you full in no time. The only activity Y/N would recommend after it, is bed and a good book. Maybe even a little nap. Their big family often used to eat it during the weekend as it meant more time spent with the family, more time spent chatting and being social, but Davi who worked in a bakery, had often worked Saturday and Sunday afternoons, meaning that it would fit best for the family to keep the tradition of hosting the meal on Wednesdays at Davi and Lottie’s house. Which was why Y/N was on her way home that Wednesday at the end of November.

Closing Vidas Secas by Graciliano Ramos that she had just been reading, Y/N got up from her seat to get off the train. Graciliano Ramos was Y/N’s favourite writer of all time. Though she loved English Literature and especially loved studying it, she always found his works to be better than most. He was the only modernist writer she could stand. São Bernardo was her favourite of his novels. A story about a man who, having been born poor, gets rich using any ruthless means he can and ends up utterly alone. It had stuck with Y/N her entire life. The main character’s ability to love others, his selfishness, and arrogance, make up one of the most complex characters of world literature, in Y/N’s opinion.

In the last chapter of São Bernardo when Paulo Honório reflects on his life alone at night, Y/N found some of the best few pages she had ever read. The closing words ‘I ruined my life stupidly’ express the agony of a man whom Y/N learned to despise throughout the book, but who, thanks to the mastery of the author, leads us with him through his tragic life choices towards self-destruction. Y/N got goosebumps just thinking about it.

Stepping off the train with her small bag and book under her arm, Y/N walked straight for the train station exit. She recognised her mother’s brown hair in a bun at the top of her head, a pair of colourful flare trousers on along with a white buffer jacket. Lottie jumped up and down at the sight of Y/N and ran for her daughter, throwing her arms around her in a tight embrace.

“My baby,” she said, kissing Y/N’s cheeks and forehead. “Oh, my Y/N.”

Y/N hugged her mother back, burying her face in her mother’s neck. She did not care that she could hear Vidas Secas fall into the tiled floor or that her bag would get dirty where it lay, all she cared about was her mother’s embrace and the smell of home around her. She was fluent in two languages, yet Y/N could not find a word that could quite capture how happy she was to be home just now.

“Okay, my dove,” Lotte said, taking Y/N’s bag off the floor. Y/N bent down and picked up her book, bringing it to her chest. “Let’s go home.”

The two of them walked out to the car park, and Lottie quickly started driving them in the direction of Y/N’s childhood home. The familiar ride and the familiar city outside the car windows made her relax, sinking far into the seat until she felt enveloped in safeness and contentment. It didn’t take them long to reach the semi-detached brick house, all their family members’ cars parked out front and visible in the windows overlooking the street. Y/N took her own bag this time, and her mother led the way up the stairs to the house so she could open the door for her.

There was no time for Y/N to go upstairs with her bag and book, because she was bombarded with hugs and kisses the second she stepped inside. Her grandfather, avô, her grandmother, avó, her papai’s two sisters and her aunties, tia Gilma and tia Lara, their husbands and her uncles, tio Jaren and uncle Finnley – who was British and had met Lara after she moved here -, and her seven cousins, or primos. They all came rushing to her, with her British grandmother and grandfather grinning and waiting for her to be done hugging and kissing everyone. Being with them and smelling feijoada everywhere, made Y/N almost tear up. Blimey, ever since moving away to University, she had become so incredibly sappy.

“Amorinzho!” came like a scream from the kitchen. Davi came out into the foyer with his apron still on and the biggest grin on his face. He threw his arms around Y/N. “Eu tenho saudade de você.”

She had missed him, too. So much. She felt safer, more at ease, almost more herself now that she was reunited with her parents close.

So, she told him that as she whispered, “Eu também senti sua falta,” back. Her papai hugged her a little tighter at that, grinning at her with tears in his eyes as he squeezed her shoulders.

“Y/N!” avó shouted from where she now sat in the living room, her grey hair in a long braid down her back and a big knitted cardigan wrapped tightly around her small frame. “Venha comer!”

“I’ll come eat in a second,” Y/N said. “I just need to put my bag in my room.”

“I’ll do that for you, my sausage,” Y/N’s grandfather said, stroking her cheek before he bent down and brought the bag with him up the stairs to her room. Since her mother had been an only child, her parents, Y/N’s grandparents, had always been very caring and constantly present as Y/N and Marcela had been their only grandchildren. Not that her avós had not been present, because they really had, her entire family had, but her grandparents’ life had no meaning if it were not for Lottie, Y/N and Marcela.

Y/N walked past all her family and to the kitchen where her papai stood making her a plate of feijoada. He handed it to her and she smiled at him before helping herself to some rice. Just then, Lottie walked into the kitchen as well, hugging Y/N from behind before she walked over to make her daughter something to drink. Silence stretched out in the kitchen as conversation started back up again in the living room, everyone talking about everything and nothing, in English and Portuguese. But, something that was unusual for her parents, they did not say a single thing. Though this might not be unusual for some, it was extremely unusual for someone who came from a generally very talkative family.

“Charlotte,” Davi said, looking over at Lottie. “We should…”

“Not yet.”

Y/N looked over her shoulder at her parents. “What?”

“We should tell her.”

“She just got home, Davi,” Lottie reasoned. “We can tell her later. Let her enjoy her feijoada.”

“No, what’s going on?” Y/N asked again, turning her body to face them now.

“No, amorinzha,” Davi said, squeezing Y/N’s shoulder. “Your mother is right; we can talk about it later. It’s not appropriate to do it now.”

“What’s going on? What’re you talking about?” Y/N looked at her papai, then at her mum, both of them sharing a look with one another that Y/N did not understand. Over the years, she had become a master at deciphering what her parents were discussing when they shared looks, though she never managed to quite understand the proper subject of discussion, she could detect the mood. She understood this was more of a serious matter.

“Tell me,” Y/N said, feeling her heart begin to beat a little harder, a little faster, the more time went by without any of them saying anything.

“Fine,” Lottie sighed. “Put your plate down first.”

Y/N did so reluctantly, not taking her eyes off of her parents. If it was serious enough for her mother to want her to put her food down so she would not drop her plate, then Y/N was on the fence if she even wanted to know what was going on or if she wanted to live in blissful ignorance of it.

“Your pai and I have decided to sell the cabin.”

Y/N’s heart stopped beating. Her body felt numb, the chatter in the living room deceased to exist as she just looked at her mother, and then at her papai. Her mum, and then pai. Suddenly, as if slapped with a brick, Y/N’s brain roared to life and her body came as hot as coal. She looked at her mother who had been the one to speak, her mouth falling open and shutting again as she continued to process what she had just been told.

“You’re… you’re going to sell the cabin?” Y/N asked them, just to be completely sure that what she heard was correct.

“Yes,” Davi answered.

“You’re selling the cabin?” She could not believe it.

“Y/N-“

“-You’re selling our Newport cabin? The one in Wales?” she asked again, her voice rising now. They did not have any other cabins, but Y/N just had to know she was not mistaken. They couldn’t… They couldn’t just…

“Y/N, we never go there anymore,” Lottie reasoned. “We want to spend the money we use on the cabin on something else, we don’t know what yet.”

“So, you’re just going to sell the cabin where your daughter was murdered?” Y/N asked, voice filled with so much rage she barely recognised herself when she spoke. “Where Marcela was most likely stabbed? You’re selling that cabin?”

“We’re never there because she was… she was killed…” Davi cleared his throat. “Spending time inside that cabin when we know what happened inside it, does not feel right.”

“No, selling it isn’t right,” Y/N said. “What if there’s more evidence inside? What if there’s somewhere they haven’t looked?”

“Baby, they have cleaned out the cabin and there’s nowhere they haven’t looked. There’s nothing more they can investigate,” Lottie explained. “We don’t want to own that cabin anymore.”

“Kit murdered Marcela in there,” Y/N said. “Her murderous ex-boyfriend is running around somewhere because no one investigated that cabin thoroughly enough.”

“Selling it doesn’t mean they are going to stop investigating Marcela’s case, amorzinho,” Davi pointed out.

“We don’t… We still don’t know if Kit did it,” Lottie mumbled. “It was most likely him, but there could have been someone else who killed Marcela, Y/N.”

“Marcela’s body hasn’t been found, there’s no trace of Kit’s blood or remains on that property. That murderer is on the loose, something inside that cabin can tell us he killed her, I am sure of it.”

“Y/N, Kit hasn’t been seen since the murder either. Maybe he was killed, too,” Lottie said.

“Mum, Kit was a rubbish person, why are you sticking up for him?” Y/N groaned, running her hands over her face.

“We decided, Y/N,” Davi mumbled, rubbing his daughter’s back. “It’s happening.”

That was all Y/N needed to hear. She took her plate in one hand and the glass with water her mother had made her in another, and she walked straight past everyone in the living room and up to her room. She felt like a child stomping past everyone like that, but she just needed to be with her thoughts. There was absolutely no way they were selling that cabin. Not that cabin. Y/N was sure there was evidence in there somewhere, the police and the investigators had just not looked thoroughly enough. That was all. And if they had done a shite job, well… that just meant Y/N had to do it for them. She had to go to that cabin and look for herself once and for all. After all, who else would? It did not seem like anyone cared anymore.

NEXT UPDATE: Sunday, 21th March, 9PM GMT!

Huge thanks to my AMAZING beta readers! 🏛️ @aileenacoustic 🏛️ @devil-in-bw-the-sheets 🏛️ @sunflowerstache 🏛️ @fromyourstrulyh 🏛️

FIC PAGE | COME TALK !!!

#harry styles #harry styles fanfiction #harry styles x reader #harry styles x you #harry styles smut #harry styles angst #harry styles fluff #harry styles fic #1dff #:DDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDDD COME TALK PLSSSS :DDDDDDDDDDDDDD

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hamliet · 4 years ago

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Hi, hamliet....why do you like hamlet, romeo & juliet, and othello .....? Now I know what hamliet stands for (so cool)....Thanks...

I find each play (along with many others of Shakespeare’s!) deeply psychologically and thematically interesting. They capture the intrinsic complexity of humanity in how they explore the characters, and that makes them timeless in a sense--you can still read and relate to the characters today, even though they were written 500 years ago.

Othello tackles racism (and sexism and arguably homophobia--Shakespeare was almost certainly bisexual, so that’s not anachronism), and while it is certainly antiquated in certain aspects, it is also sharply relevant. It’s difficult to hate any of the characters except Iago, who provides a meta commentary that makes him fascinating. He never tells the audience what his motive is, and while he drops some hints, the hints all contradict each other, making it utterly impossible to definitively nail down Iago’s motives. These hints are that he’s angry Othello promoted Cassio over him, he’s angry Othello slept with his wife (while not true, we don’t know whether Iago believes this or not), and that he might himself have feelings of a romantic/sexual nature for Othello and projects them onto Othello (he paraphrases Shakespearean marriage vows when discussing Othello).

Iago manipulates different factions of society together, preying on societal flaws (toxic masculinity, racism) to amplify the flaws inside Othello’s character (jealous, insecurity, and a fear of being dehumanizeD) to turn him into a man who commits monstrous acts (murdering his beloved wife), Desdemona’s (she laid it all down and was disowned for eloping with Othello, which isolates her from any person who might be able to save her from Othello’s growing instability), Roderigo’s, Cassio’s, even his own wife Emilia’s. Iago’s lack of transparency behind his motives is actually extremely important in a meta sense: it reinforces that societal flaws (racism, sexism, possibly homophobia), have no purpose or logic to them, yet bring about tragedy. Similarly, Iago’ actions are inscrutable and probably pointless.

Hamlet... oh, where to begin here? Hamlet is The Tragedy of Passivity. Many writers attempt to write passive protagonists with passivity framed as a flaw, few succeed, and none succeed so well as Shakespeare with Hamlet. It posits the question of how, if we pretend to be something, where is the line between pretending and actually being that? To quote Vonnegut (in another story unrelated, but the quote has always applied to Hamlet) “we are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.”

There’s also a brilliant ambiguity in how we never find out if the ghost, the instigator of this whole drama, is actually Hamlet’s father. Hamlet himself muses it might be a demon, and surely, its never appearing again and the utter tragedy that consumes everyone in the play hint that it may have in fact been a demon. However, it also told the truth about the king’s murder, so... much like Hamlet, the audience has no clear answer, and thus we empathize with him.

Anyways, while for most authors ambiguity can be frustrating, Shakespeare brilliantly crafts it to emphasize his themes. Troilus and Cressida, although often considered a problem play, is underrated and perhaps one of Shakespeare’s best uses of ambiguity.

Lastly, Romeo and Juliet. This tragedy is actually significantly more optimistic than Othello or Hamlet, and is more a tragic romance (romance in both the modern understanding and the literary sense, a la Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale, The Tempest, and Cymbeline, the latter of which I adore alongside these three I’m discussing here.) See, while Othello and Hamlet’s flaws bring destruction to everyone around them and indict society for its flaws, Romeo and Juliet’s flaws might lead to their own deaths, but their strengths lead to the salvation of their society.

The “it’s not a love story, it’s about two stupid impulsive teenagers and their hormones” is a cynical modern take that is not textually supported. Yes, impulsivity is a flaw for both Romeo and Juliet, but they are the victims of the feud in society more so than anyone else. The play emphasizes parental and mentor figures epically failing both of them, failing the youth, bringing death upon them all. It is only through love that everyone is saved: because they loved each other, Montague and Capulet make peace at last. It’s actually kind of thematically similar to Eremika’s relationship in SnK, in that yeah it’s flawed, but that love is still what saves everyone. The play also directly states that their love is what saves Verona, and their deaths bring life (it’s alchemy; actually, seriously, it’s alchemical; think of Mercutio’s name). It’s a beautiful love story.

#ask hamliet #shakespeare #othello #iago #desdemona #hamlet #romeo and juliet #romeo montague #juliet capulet #Anonymous

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thinkingisadangerouspastime · 4 years ago

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do you think zuko treated mai fairly? i mean... why didn't he trust her to tell her his deepest thoughts when he abandoned her in the fire nation? i know he loved her but i don't understand why he didn't just tell her instead of hurting her unnecessarily. they're cute but i find it so hard to get past this, i would be so hurt if my bf didn't tell me something so important. and then mai just. forgives zuko so easily even after he locked her in a cell still not trusting her. mai deserves better :(

It’s kind of funny you ask this, because I lowkey have a lot of feelings about the phrase “x deserved better than y”. For one, I’m always cautious around it, because in the A:TLA fandom I’ve seen it thrown around in two main ways:

“Katara deserved better than Aang!” followed by the most ridiculous slander labelling Aang as abusive, toxic, manipulative, etc. (Funnily enough, though, a lot of those people will also go and ship T.aang. Like T.aang is an Excellent ship, do not get me wrong, but it’s clear they just say ‘Katara deserved better’ because they hate K.ataang and don’t necessarily care one way or the other about Aang.)

“Zuko deserved better than Mai!” followed by the most obnoxious bullshit also labelling Mai as abusive, toxic, manipulative, etc. and even - I kid you not - saying she’s “too ugly” for Zuko. At worst, racist; at best, shallow. (And again, funnily enough, a lot of them will then ship M.ailee, again proving they don’t really care one way or another about Mai, they just hate M.aiko.)

Now, I’m not getting into the K.ataang vs Z.utara vs M.aiko ship wars, lmao, but those are the two primary ways that rhetoric is used. It’s kind of embarrassing, tbh, how fandom tends to use the phrase to discredit pairings and demonize characters instead of… you know. Moving on with their lives, lol.

But your ask fascinates me, anon, because you bring up the point of Zuko not trusting Mai, thus leading to the conclusion of “Mai deserves better than Zuko.” Which is interesting, because as I just mentioned, for most people who follow the “x deserves better than y” phrase, it tends to be used the other way around!

Firstly, however, I want to say that you don’t have to ship Maiko. You can read my explanation and walk away still feeling exactly the same way about Mai and Zuko’s relationship (love it, hate it, indifferent to it, all that jazz), and that’s totally okay! But I’m going to do my best to explain what’s off with the rhetoric of “x deserves better than y,” specifically regarding Maiko. My thesis, as it were?

It’s not about “deserve.”

Disclaimer: This obviously does not refer to genuinely unhealthy/abusive relationships. I shouldn’t have to say that, but we all know how Tumblr is. I digress.

Love isn’t about “deserve.” At first glance, that’s kind of a confusing take, isn’t it? Don’t we all “deserve” someone who will respect us, appreciate us, and treat us well? Of course we do! But those are just qualities of any healthy relationship. When I say that love isn’t about “deserve,” I mean that love can’t be simplified quite so easily. Here is a definition of “deserve”:

“do something or have or show qualities worthy of (reward or punishment)”

How do we make ourselves “worthy” of love? I (an optimist) don’t think we do. Love isn’t about worthiness; I believe we are all “worthy” of love simply by existing. Instead, I argue that love is about openness. It’s not about if we “deserve” love or not, but rather if we allow ourselves to be open to it.

All of this is to say that it’s not about whether or not Mai “deserves” or “deserves better than” Zuko; it’s that she is open to receive love from him, and he from her. She wants to love and be loved by Zuko. No one else. She says it to Azula herself: “I love Zuko more than I fear you.” Mai chooses Zuko, full stop, just as Zuko chose her by a) doing everything in his power to keep her out of his betrayal of the Fire Nation (why would he risk putting a death sentence on her head, too?) and b) reuniting with her happily at the end of the show (i.e. he didn’t brush her off; he smiles his widest smile in the entire show during that scene!). So it’s not about “deserve.” It’s about these two kids loving and finding love in one another. A Shakespeare quote is particularly relevant here:

“Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.” (Twelfth Night – Act 3, Scene 1)

We are all looking for love, be it romantic or platonic or anything in-between, and there is no better feeling than we receive love even when we feel we don’t “deserve” it. Mai is willing to work with Zuko to make their relationship work despite his mistakes, because it’s not about if he “deserves” her, but because she knows he is willing to grow and improve (and she is, too).

Also, within the series of A:TLA (specifically towards the middle-end of Book 3), it can be concluded that Zuko believes that he is no longer “worthy” of Mai’s love. That he doesn’t “deserve” her love because of how he abandoned her (and she is the only thing about the Fire Nation he regrets leaving behind). Mai disagrees with him. She is open to a relationship with Zuko because she loves him for an infinite number of reasons (one being that he does what is right, including going against the Fire Nation, even if she did not at first understand). When Zuko realizes this by the time the finale comes around, they reconcile in a tender embrace.

And what reason are we ever given to doubt Mai regarding whether or not she “deserves” better than Zuko? Mai is perfectly aware of her own worth. She breaks up with Zuko in “The Beach” because his behavior is inexcusable and she knows that she doesn’t have to put up with it. Even in the comics, which are handled poorly, I don’t entirely hate the Maiko breakup because again, Mai knows that she does not have to be responsible for Zuko’s well-being. She loves him, she loves him so much, and she tries to help him, but she is not his therapist. So again, why should we doubt Mai? Going back to the A:TLA finale - Mai knows what she “deserves” and what she doesn’t. She knows what she will and what she won’t put up with. And after everything, she is still open to a relationship with Zuko. Because love isn’t about “deserve,” and it never has been.

To address your other questions:

why didn’t he trust her to tell her his deepest thoughts when he abandoned her in the fire nation? i know he loved her but i don’t understand why he didn’t just tell her instead of hurting her unnecessarily.

You almost answer your question yourself, anon. “[H]is deepest thoughts”? Who tells anyone their “deepest thoughts”? We actually talked about this in my Shakespeare class (I know, right? lmao). A very common trope in Shakespeare’s tragedies is a lack of communication. We all read Romeo and Juliet and Othello and were like “dude, if they had just talked to each other, none of those bad things would have happened!!” (and thus those tragedies might have been comedies).

My professor agreed with us. Then he asked, well, why do you think Shakespeare doesn’t have anyone communicate?

One brave soul said, “That’d be too easy.”

Which is… almost right. Perhaps, narratively, it would be too easy. The plays would definitely be resolved much faster. But the truth? It’s too hard. People don’t communicate clearly in real life. They hide certain things because they’re embarrassed, they’re ashamed, they’re afraid. Even couples who’ve been together for years will admit that they don’t tell each other everything, for whatever reason. People are imperfect, and thus their relationships are, too.

(Slightly amusing sidebar: Macbeth and Lady Macbeth are actually an example of a perfect couple, because Macbeth confides everything to Lady Macbeth in Act 1. And, well, we all know how that went down[hill], lmao.)

So why didn’t Zuko tell Mai the truth when he was leaving the Fire Nation? He was afraid! He says it himself in “The Boiling Rock”: “Everyone in the Fire Nation thinks I’m a traitor. I couldn’t drag her into it.” Zuko is afraid of what might happen to Mai! He knows the Fire Nation now has a price on his head - why would he wish that on Mai? It’s bad enough that she’s the (former) girlfriend of a traitor! How much worse might it have been for her if she’d been associated with him after he’d threatened the Fire Lord’s life*? I’m not saying this to excuse Zuko’s decision, because perhaps Mai would have agreed to join him (although we cannot conclude this with total certainty), and I certainly think breaking up by text letter was a pretty crappy way to go about it, but all the same, he was trying to protect her. When Mai realizes this, what does she do?

Saves his ass from Azula and utters one of the most iconic lines in the entire series.

*Also, a kind of interesting parallel presents itself between Zuko and Hamlet here, lmao. One interpretation of Hamlet’s “get thee to a nunnery!” scene with Ophelia is reading it as him trying to cut ties with her in the cruelest way possible so she wouldn’t try to follow him and possibly get hurt as he killed Claudius (aka regicide, the highest crime in Denmark). While it’s arguable that Zuko isn’t quite so perceptive, lmao, there is the possibility that Zuko thought breaking up with Mai in such a callous way would help prevent her from remaining attached to him and thus getting mixed up in his mess (killing the Fire Lord, aka the A:TLA equivalent of regicide, the highest crime in the Fire Nation). Just something to ponder!

and then mai just. forgives zuko so easily even after he locked her in a cell still not trusting her.

I don’t know if I’d call her forgiveness “easy.” Making the decision to betray Azula? That’s hard. Mai was signing herself up for a death sentence, because Azula doesn’t take prisoners (Aang can testify to this, lmao). If Ty Lee hadn’t been there, Mai almost certainly would have died. So yeah. I wouldn’t call her forgiveness “easy,” anon. I think it’s one of the scariest choices she ever made.

Of course, one can argue that Mai’s true forgiveness of Zuko actually came later, which I don’t necessarily disagree with. I think Mai’s initial instinct was to trust Zuko because she knows him better than perhaps anyone (thus she realizes he wouldn’t walk away from the Fire Nation without true cause), hence her betrayal of Azula. When she survived because of Ty Lee’s chi-blocking (since honestly, Mai probably didn’t think she’d get that far) and was ultimately imprisoned, I bet she had plenty of time to think about Zuko and her relationship with him. Working on that presumption, again, I don’t think I’d call her forgiveness “easy,” because she likely took several days if not weeks to process everything.

Also, you say Zuko doesn’t trust her because a) he didn’t inform her of what he was doing when he left the Fire Nation and b) he locked her in a cell at the Boiling Rock. I understand that perspective, but again, I go back to this line: “Everyone in the Fire Nation thinks I’m a traitor. I couldn’t drag her into it.” Does that sound like someone who doesn’t trust Mai? I think the better description is that Zuko feared for Mai, as I mentioned earlier. Did he lock her in a cell because he thought she’d betray him, or because he thought it was the last thing he could do to protect her when everything went to shit as he, Sokka, Suki, and etc. were all escaping from prison? Could it have been a little bit of both? We can’t say for sure, of course, but given how happy Zuko was around Mai in “Nightmares and Daydreams,” I think his love for her ultimately outweighed his worries about Mai’s ties to Azula, which leads me to conclude his locking her in a cell was less about distrust and more a final, last-ditch attempt at keeping her out of his mess.

Plus, Zuko has issues. Mai knows this. She loves him all the same for it. As I said earlier, she is open to giving love to and receiving love from Zuko. I think it’s a bit of a discredit to Mai’s character to assume she forgave him easily. And besides! She told him herself: “But don’t ever break up with me again.” Mai implicitly tells him hey, don’t pull that BS again, and Zuko gives her an embarrassed smile before they hold each other in a gentle, loving embrace. It’s not a direct statement, and maybe that puts some people off from it, but Mai is firmly implying that she wants him to trust her more, and Zuko acknowledges this (and he’s rightfully a little embarrassed that he kept her out of it, since hindsight is 20/20 and he now understands she probably would have gone with him; do remember, of course, that he had no way of knowing that initially).

do you think zuko treated mai fairly?

Well, how do we define “fairly”? I guess the short answer is no, he didn’t, but what other choice did he believe he had at the time? Answer: none. It was either keep Mai out of it and guarantee her safety or drag Mai into it (which Zuko likely saw as a selfish option, i.e. what right did he have to pull his girlfriend into treason just because he didn’t want to lose her company?) and risk losing her. As viewers, we know there’s more to the situation than that, but Zuko doesn’t have our luxury. So his decision to keep Mai out of it and thus try to protect her? I would call that a “fair” assessment, yes.

And besides, anon:

“The course of true love never did run smooth.” (A Midsummer Night’s Dream - Act 1, Scene 1)

Mai and Zuko chose each other. Who are we to deny them their happiness?

#yes i WILL quote shakespeare 24/7 and what about it?#maiko #mai #zuko #avatar the last airbender #atla meta #atla #atla mai #atla zuko #atla analysis #the boiling rock #amy answers #amy analyzes #anon #adding line break after i post btw!!

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hoenursey · 4 years ago

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here it is, y’all, the nurseydex theatre kid au i never finished (and probably won’t ever). if any of y’all remember, this was going to be the othello au lol !! whoops.

_X_

God hated him, obviously. That much was apparent. God hated him or did not exist, because no loving god would do this to him. No loving god would have him, fingers wrapped delicately and squeezing ever so slightly at one (1) William J. Poindexter’s slim neck, and no loving god would force him to have his blocking so that he needed a knee wedged between Will’s thighs and his other hand pinning his wrist to the bed, and there was absolutely, positively no loving god that would have Will gazing up at him, pupils blown wide as a half erection tented the silk nightgown he was in, in the middle of Samwell College’s black box theatre.

There was just no way in hell, Derek reasoned, as Will swallowed and he felt the bob of his throat run down, down, down the center of his palm. A loving god would open up the floor and fucking eat him, just let him die right then and there.

“Will, you should be thrashing!” Monetta yelled, and Derek flinched, then forced himself to relax and slowly pulled back.

It happened like this.

“We have no backup for Desdemona,” Monetta spat. “Who fucking– who changes their major now? Who drops a class in the middle of the fucking semester? Can you even do that?” She whirled around, eyes wild, and Derek backed up slightly. Monet could be kind of… wild, sometimes, when she got going.

“Uh–”

“It’s rhetorical!”

Everyone in the theatre flinched.

“I need a backup. I need one now. I don’t care if it’s a fucking dog. If the dog can act, I don’t give a shit. I just need a fucking actor. Find someone who’s got chemistry with Derek and I will fucking kiss you.”

“I’d prefer it not be a dog,” he said hesitantly, and Monetta turned her head in his direction. Only her head, and a single, mad-looking eye focused on him.

“But you know what? I, uh. Can work with that. A dog, I mean. Anything. The show must go on.”

Monetta’s head turned back, and he breathed a quiet sigh of relief.

“Hey, what about Will?”

Nevermind, he thought to himself bitterly. He turned a flat look on Chris, who was smiling cheerfully, as usual, a wrench in his hand.

“Who?” Monetta asked. Her brow was creased, the script she’d been waving still dangling from her long fingers.

“He–” Derek tried to say, but then Monetta threw the script at him as Chris said, “He’s the one who’s been helping Larissa with sets! Me, Will, and Derek had our freshman humanities course together!”

“What does he look like?”

“Red hair, freckle-y,” Mandy called from the rafters.

“Mega freckle-y,” Jenny confirmed. “And he’s, like, p good at acting. He’s got a great voice, loud and, like, strong and stuff? Super pale, kind of angry just like as a person. He’s a little awkward but like once you get him comfortable it’s fine. We had 1302 together; actually, it was Othello, so he already knows the lines! He’s super rad!”

Monetta turned to him, and he gave her an uncomfortable look. “Please tell me you can work with him. Derek. Please. We really, really, really don’t have time to do another open casting call, and frankly all the non-actors in here suck. Please. We have three. months. Tell me you don’t have any problems with him.”

“He’s an asshole,” Derek grumbled. “A rude asshole who thinks i'm irresponsible and laughs at me when I fall–”

“But can you work with him on stage?”

Derek sighed softly as Monetta turned the closest thing she had to puppy dog eyes on him.

“You’re helping with my calc work,” he said tiredly, and she beamed at him. “Call him up, Chris. See if we can get him here by tomorrow.”

It happened like this: Monetta took one look at William Poindexter and fell in love with him. He monologued for her and she looked ready to propose. They found a costume (after damn near an hour of sizing and shaping and pinning and honestly, his ass was just unfair) and she had their children’s names picked out.

“Thank you so much for this. I’m so sorry we had to call you in so late, and this is so–”

“It’s, um, not a problem?” he said, almost a question, smile curving his pink lips, because of course he had an uncomfortably endearing smile.

“Monetta, one problem,” Caitlin Farmer said muffledly. They looked down at her where she was hemming the bottoms of Will’s pants, a few pins tucked between her lips.

“Yes, Caitlin?” Monetta asked, voice tense. Caitlin pulled the pins from her mouth and handed them to Derek, saying lightly, “Hold these, please?”

“Uh, we don’t have any period clothes for this. The sleep scene, where Othello kills Desdemona? We only have women’s robes and gowns, and I know costuming gets cumulative grades on like accuracy. It won’t be so bad if the rest of the costuming is good, but we’re hella underprepared and I know they don’t want to make an entire new outfit this late in the show.”

“What do you have?” Will asked. Monetta, Caitlin, and Derek all looked at him, surprised– he hadn’t really said much outside of a few words confirming or agreeing with whatever they said.

“Just… silk nightgowns. That’s it. The little strappy shift ones? You probably don’t want to wear those, i’m sorry–”

“It’s-- uh, don't worry about it,” he interrupted gently. “A few weeks in a shift dress isn’t going to kill me. Besides, i’m already gay and, uh, sort of out, so like, what's the worst they can say to me?” Derek’s brain went blank. Will was gay? Will was gay? Was he single? Why did he care?

“Derek!”

“Sorry, what?” he asked, blinking at Monetta.

“I said, go get ready for practice. We’ve gotta get your blocking down.”

“O-okay,” he managed.

“And I want you and Will to practice outside of this period! Go hang out, get dinner in the dining hall together! You’re supposed to be married, okay?”

Shit. Fucking shit fuck shit– “Okay, Monetta. Dinner, dining hall, practice. I’ve got it. I can hear perfectly clearly.”

“But does your brain work? I doubt you sometimes.”

It happened like this: they started having dinner together, and then lunch together, and then breakfast, and then Derek was sitting with the engineering majors and Will was sitting with the poetry kids and they were both sitting with the theatre kids. It happened like this: they bickered, and Derek flirted, and Will snarked, and they practiced until they were dead on their feet.

It happened like this: they hadn’t practiced kissing by themselves, just line work, because they didn’t really have the space to do blocking anyways. Or that was what he told himself, anyways, because he kept thinking about how much he wanted to, and he poured over the kissing scenes in private: how he’d kiss him, how delicately or firmly it would be done, and how most of all there wouldn’t be much more effort to pretend that he was madly in love with him, because of course he had to fall in love with anyone who smiled at him.

It happened like this: Monetta needed them to practice the kissing scenes in rehearsal.

“You’re both single, right?” she asked idly as she checked over the set backgrounds, Derek scanning over his blocking notecards from on top of one of their desks.

“Huh?”

“You and Will. Single?”

“Well... I am,” Derek said slowly. “But I wouldn't know about Poindexter. He's never mentioned a partner though, and it doesn't seem like his style to not, like, say anything. Want me to ask?”

“Sorry, I had to drop off some supplies to the culinary lab,” Will called, the door slamming behind him, and they turned to look at him.

“Will,” Monetta hedged, “You’re single, right?”

He paused, looking at her curiously, then nodded a little jerkily, shrugging off his bag and jacket. Nursey tried not to stare at the way his shoulders filled out the tight red “Samwell Computing” shirt (gay, gay, gay, his brain was chanting, gay, gay, stop thinking about how broad his shoulders are, gay). “Far as I know.”

“Great,” Monetta said, relieved. “Sorry, just… last time, we accidentally caused a few breakups? And chairs got thrown. I really don't wanna see that happen again.”

Will chuckled softly, flexing his wrists a little and then pushing up onto the stage with his hands, rolling into a standing position neatly. Derek was dying. “Well, no angry, uh, boyfriends here. Or girlfriends.”

“Fantastic,” she murmured. “I’d hate for you to have a chair thrown at your head, we really don’t have the time to find another Desdemona.”

“You know you’re supposed to care about other people’s well-being, right?” Jenny called down from above the stage, where she was fixing up some of the lighting that had fallen earlier. Mandy nodded in agreement.

Monetta took a moment to consider it, face thoughtful, and then shrugged, pivoting on her foot and walking away from Will and Derek.

“No time for that either! Everyone get dressed, we’ve got a lot of work to do today and some people still aren’t off book.”

“It’s literally just act two,” Connor said irritably from the fourth row, though he still stood to move backstage. “That’s it. Excuse me for not memorizing every single one of Iago’s stupid little asides--”

March smacked him on the back of the head and he yelped, indignant. “What was that for?”

“You don’t have to get insulted four times a week for a month, Wisnewski,” she grumbled, “So can it.”

#nurseydex #choking mention #my fic #fanfic: mine #my writing #nursey #derek nurse #dex #william poindexter #theatre au

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palbabor-writes · 4 years ago

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So, uh, I got excited with this ask

Anonymous said:

so what if, and I’m just spitballin’ here, you wrote a little something for Tomura, a jealous!reader x Tomura, perhaps? Ik there probably wouldn’t be an actual situation where somebody would try to steal him away or anything but just a little something on the reader seeing something that wasn’t what it looked like and Shiggy kind of reassuring her in his own special way? 😌 pls &thank you sm in advance, but you of course absolutely don’t have to write it if you don’t want to (: love your work!

Pairing: Tomura Shigaraki x Gen!Reader

Warnings: Adult language, angst, jealous feelings, mentions of past relationship and heavy petting, mm, imma say it’s rated T, for the teens and upper betweens

Word Count: 4387

Notes: Lol. I’m pretty sure this was meant to be like, a drabble or head cannon in your mind nonnie. Me, being me, I stretched it out into a freaking fic. I can’t shut uppppp sometimes. First time trying for a Gen!Reader, so hopefully it’s a thumbs up. Not beta edited, so any mistakes are mine, and mine alone.

“O, beware, my lord, of jealousy; It is the green-ey'd monster, which doth mock The meat it feeds on.” ― William Shakespeare, Othello

It’s been two months, two freaking months and you’ve hardly gotten two texts strung together, let alone a call, from Tomura.

While he’s never been what anyone would call a frequent texter, your last message has sat, unread, on his phone for the last 3 days. You know he’s busy, you know he said he’s got shit to take care of, but you can’t help the angry pit of worry that simmers in your gut. He could at least tell you something. Like, hey, I’ll be out of touch for a few days, talk soon. Is that too much to ask?

Apparently it is.

The two of you have always been a quiet item. Most of the League knows, or at least, heavily, heavily suspects. It’s not like you tried to keep it a secret, it’s just the way you both are. Besides, you usually liked how the arrangement worked.

You’d met him through your job. You worked with Giran as a courier of sorts. Sometimes you’d lug shipments back and forth, sometimes you’d make deliveries. It was one of these deliveries that introduced you to Tomura. He was quiet, sulking toward the back of the bar, but you’d managed to strike up a conversation with him as Compress double checked his requested items.

He was waspish, sharp. At first, you worried that your questions had only managed to pissed him off. But then, just as you started to chat with another guy in the bar, a snarky fellow, who was covered in some serious, serious burns, Tomura tugs your attention back to him with a pointed question.

“Can you tell Giran that you’re only one who’s permitted to transport the deliveries to the bar?”

That one query had started a landslide.

You were summoned to the hideout frequently, practically on the daily after that. Giran just shook his head and asked you not to fall too deep. You didn’t know what he meant then. Two months later you understood his meaning perfectly.

How could you not fall head over heels for this guy? Fuck, he was so desperate, so wanting, so fucking needy for you. God, you missed it now that you didn’t have it. After the Kamino incident, he’d called on you even more and you loved that you could help him. He honestly seemed, in his own, gruff way, appreciative.

But, then he’d said he needed to leave the city.

At first, your contact with each other had maintained some semblance of normalcy. You would text and he would reply. You could call and he would answer. Often, he sounded tired, strained, but every once in a while you could pull a laugh from him and all would feel right with the world.

Now?

Now nothing feels right and the only link you have to him is Dabi. He’s the only person in the League that’s responding to your emails or texts. Even Giran isn’t answering anything. That’s not normal either because Giran always, always answers. What the fuck is going on?

It’s starting to feel like you’ll never know. This is mainly due to the fact that Dabi is a shitty, shitty font of information. At first, you’d eagerly taken his calls and texts. In lieu of a tip, you asked him about this mission Tomura was on. He fed you vague, flippant, answers.

“Tch, this again? I already told you, they’re all fighting this giant. It’s some pet of the doctors.”

“And like I said the last, oh, I don’t know, twelve times, giant makes no sense to me. Can you expand on that a little bit? Like, what the hell does that mean? They’re fighting a fucking giant. Is that supposed to be some kinda bizarro hint? Cuz’ it sounds like you’re giving me shoddy information to get me off your back,” you snap, placing your foot on his box of requested medical kit supplies.

Dabi practically keeps you on standby now. The guy has gotten more aggressive in the last month, and the heavy price his fire quirk extorts on his body meant he needs a steady flow of burn cream, meds, stitches and pain relievers.

“Fuck, look, I don’t know how else to explain that fucker. I didn’t give a shit about boss man’s little mission to tame him, so the doctor and I worked out something else for me to do. I’m not around those guys right now, I’ve got other things I’m working on. Now give me my shit and get out of my face. Ask Toga about your little fuck buddy, I could give two shits about his well being.”

“Why follow him if you hate him so much?” God, this asshole is such a prick.

Dabi considers you for a long moment, his vibrant blue eyes lingering on your scowling face. “He’s a means to an end. I’m just here to see this society fall to its knees. Boss wants the same thing, so, for now, this arrangement works for both of us. Now, if I have to ask you to give me my fucking shit one more time, I’m gonna’ singe you where you stand.”

Sucking your teeth, you kick the box toward him and turn on your heel, slamming his door behind you. If he’s not going to be useful to you, why be useful to him? We’ll see how he likes it when you accidentally miss some of his shipment deadlines.

You pace out into the night, shrugging your jacket up on your shoulders. If they’re so far out, if they’re fighting something that sounds like an impossibility, why not ask you to bring them some supplies? Why haven’t they reached out to you?

As you wait for your train, you pull your phone from your pocket, your cold fingers resting against the glass. There’s a missed call from another contact, but no other notifications. You swipe over to your messages from Tomura. Your last text sits, still unopened, unread, uncared for, in his box. It’s not fair, you think, sliding your phone back and pressing your hands into the meager warmth of your pockets.

Tomura used to confide in you and you felt close to him. And not just in a physical sense. At first, the relationship between the two of you was just that, something that eased an itch. But you kept asking him things, liking the soft tone his voice could take on when he lost some of that anger.

Then, he started to wordlessly ask you to stay a little longer, his arms wrapping around your bare form, holding you against his warmth. It was nice. It was so, so satisfying and now it’s gone. Is this his way of moving on from you? You would have thought that he would have said something. He’s never struck you as someone who hides from a confrontation. So why the radio silence?

Another week passes and Dabi keeps calling. He’s practically got your entire schedule blacked out now with deliveries, upcoming shipments and transports. What. The. Fuck. It’s gotten so frustrating that you’ve started to waffle on picking up his calls, sending him straight to voicemail.

“What kinda courier leaves their fucking name on their voicemail? Stop ignoring my calls, (Y/N).”

Yeah, he’s a real charmer. At least he answers your messages though. It’s better than nothing, you keep telling yourself, trying to ignore the gnawing, munching feeling of bitterness that keeps rising. Yeah, Dabi’s gotten to be such a constant in your life that your phone keeps recommending him as a new favorite.

Would you like to add the contact: Dabi, to your favorites list? No, no you would not.

Then, suddenly, out of the blue, Dabi’s not answering you either. Your first, gut instinct, tells you that he’s likely annoyed with your spotty replies or he’s busy with...”Dabi things”. He’s always reminding you about the oh, so important “Dabi things”. ‘Don’t pester me with your shit, (Y/N). I’ve got something big I’m working on.’

But now? Fuck, now you’d kill to hear from him.

There’s absolutely nothing. No response from Toga, Compress, Spinner, Dabi and most important of all, Tomura.

He’d finally read your text. After two whole days had passed from the sent time stamp, he’d read it, and then opted to not respond. It stung. You can still feel that tightening emotion of dread, of abject hurt, that had radiated from your chest when you saw that he’d finally looked at your message and then just decided you weren’t worth his time.

Yeah, after seeing that, the last few days have been nothing but a full tilt boogie of emotions for you.

This must be a planned thing. Why else would they all coordinate their ghosting. He must have wanted to leave you behind and now, this distance has made it possible.

He’s been changing a lot lately.

Even before he left for this, whatever it was, he’d grown in confidence and skill. Fuck, he’d taken on a Yakuza boss and won. He’s becoming a leader, a competent force to be reckoned with. He doesn’t need you to bounce ideas off of anymore. A courier picked up at the start of his career isn’t a necessary piece to add to his collection.

Yeah, chances are, he’s moved on. He’s out of your reach now and you can’t help the thoughts that rise in the back of your mind. What if he’s found someone else? What if he just got bored with you? Did you put too much thought into this relationship? Well, that question has kinda answered itself. You put way too much into this. You had planned for things, hoped for…

Your phone rings and the noise startles you out of your head. You fumble for your vibrating device and lift the screen up before swiping to answer the call. Oh, it’s Toga. Fingers shaking, you lift the phone to your ear and are so happy to hear her babbling voice.

She tells you that she’s been meaning to call you, but, gosh, everything has gotten in the way. Plus, she took a bad hit in a fight. Oh, she’s ok, but it’s been a crazy week for her.

As she chatters about some random series of events that you can’t string together, you let out a long sigh. That coiling that’s been building in your stomach loosens and you’ve never been so relieved in your life. There’s still a chance. Maybe he hasn’t decided to leave you in the dust. Maybe...whoops, Toga asked you something.

“Deka City? No, I’ve never been there.”

“Oh good, well, I wouldn’t try and go now. Tomura sorta, mmm, crumbled it to bits.”

“What?”

“Oooh, and we’re part of a bigger group now…”

She tells you about something called Gigamantia and their new connections. Apparently, Tomura’s made another step up in the world. Now he’s leading something called Meta Liberation? What is that? It sounds kinda familiar, but where have you heard it?

Toga is winding down her conversation, her voice smoothing out. She promises she’ll answer your other texts soon and emails you a set of coordinates, saying they’ll see you there and clicks off.

You lower your phone to your lap, biting back the grin that won’t stop spreading across your face. Ok, so, maybe you’re not as abandoned as you thought. Maybe they, no, maybe he still needs you.

******

You found the building alright. It was impossible to miss. This place is massive, fit for an army. The security is tight, so tight that you’d even been screened by a guard at the door. Once they confirm that you are who you say you are, and you know who you say you know, you’re permitted entrance.

Who are all these people?

As you enter the “meeting room,” which is really a space that looks like a concert area, complete with a well lit stage, you’re pressed into the mass of bodies. There must be hundreds of people here and there’s some hulking creature, dozing in the corner.

Is this that giant Dabi mentioned? You totally thought he was making that shit up. And, wait, wait, is that a pro hero a few spaces away? What is this? Where is the League?

The overhead lights dim and your attention is drawn back to the sage. People are bustling around the elevated area and a plush chair is placed in the center. Looks like the show is about to start.

A loud, booming voice announces the arrival of a man called Redestro. He must be that long faced guy in the motorized chair and, oh, there he is.

He walks up slowly, it looks like he’s leaning on something, but you can’t see clearly. The crowd shifts around you and an inordinately tall man is blocking your view. Huffing out a sigh, you try to maneuver yourself to a better vantage place.

He’s seated now, his long legs spread out in front of him. Fuck, he looks both wonderful and terrible, at the same time. Wonderful because it’s Tomura, terrible because he’s covered in bandages and he’s got a brace on his leg. What happened to him?

Your eyes can’t stop roving over him, trying to drink in everything. He looks like he’s on edge, his fingers clutching at a small slip of paper, as his good leg jiggles against the chair. Why...ah, he’s being introduced. Wait. He’s being introduced as the leader of the Paranormal Liberation Front? So...so all these people...this entire organization...is his to command?

He clears his throat and you hear his voice for the first time in months. He’s halting at first, but as he continues his speech his tone deepens, strengthens, losing that early hesitation. He sounds good, powerful and confident.

You tear your eyes away from him and give the crowd a quick glance. They’re enraptured. A few paces away you can hear people whispering to each other, their voices low, awed.

“He took down Redestro…”

“He’s so young.”

“He’s kinda...I don’t know...handsome.”

“You’re right, he looks regal.”

That coiling, trembling feeling is making a strong comeback. It’s an ugly return and it makes your flesh prickle and cool. He’s left you in the lurch for months and now he’s become some sort of leader, of an entire, what is this...a cult? An organization? An army? How the fuck, would you know? No one, least of all Tomura, has told you anything, about any of this.

When the address and introductions (the League had made a, uh, flashy entrance) are over, someone comes up and taps you on your shoulder. It’s another one of those security guards. She says you’ve been requested, the League wants to see you.

She takes you past the stage and down a long hallway. It’s quiet back here and the silence doesn’t soothe your frayed nerves. You’re pointed to a large set of doors and you bite your lip before pushing them open.

Another large room greets you. This one is filled with plush couches, elegantly carved tables and multiple chairs. There’s so much to look at, you don’t even see them at first. No, you hear him before you see him. He’s talking with a tall woman, who is writing down what he dictates, her pen moving rapidly across her paper.

Fuck, you’ve missed his voice.

It’s quiet now, a little hoarse from his speech and you want to step closer. He’s standing next to some large windows, his back turned to you. He hasn’t even noticed you. What were you thinking? He’s this...God, leader now. What are you? Just a nobody he met when he was still pounding the pavement, looking for anyone who could help their cause, their mission. There’s nothing for you here, he’s…

“(Y/N).”

Your eyes snap up to his. Tomura has turned, one arm braced heavily on his crutch, and is looking right at you. His eyes are hooded, dark, you can’t get a read on him from here. You want to step closer, but that sickening feeling is falling, like a stone, into your gut. Despite your turbulent emotions, you can’t stop staring at him.

The thick bandages are off and his hair is longer, the white strands hang close to his collarbone now, gleaming and pearlescent. He looks, damn, he looks tired and...what’s that? There’s something dark on his hand, it’s black and it covers three of his fingers. Why is he wearing that half glove, oh, oh no. It’s not a glove you realize, horrified, it's a prosthetic. He’s lost some of his fingers.

“It took you long enough, come here, (Y/N).”

His voice has dropped an octave, lingering in that distant tone that he would use when he dragged his lips across your neck, rumbling and murmuring against your skin. He knew that you liked that, he knew that it would make you so desperate for him, your hands pawing at his shoulders, pulling...

No. He’s ignored you for weeks, no, months. You’re not about to just fall to pieces at his feet, crawling and begging for him to want you. Your eyes latch onto his and you minutely shake your head at his request, fingers squeezing into your palms.

The woman, noting the tension that’s suddenly entered the room, looks between the two of you, and abruptly makes herself scarce, her heels tapping against the floor as she walks to the door. Once you hear it close behind her you unstick your mouth, your tongue heavy against your teeth.

“Who was that?” you ask, your voice croaking, thick with disuse. You can’t help the question. It tumbles from your mouth before you can stop it. You’d meant to ask him something else, but the query just, pops out, angry and trembling.

“I don’t know. One of Redestro’s cronies. Why-” His face scrunches abruptly and a wince of pain passes of his features. “Why does it matter?” He finishes, his hand gripping a little tighter against his cane.

“You didn’t have to send for me, you know. It looks like you’ve upgraded everything else, why not me too?”

A scowl echoes across his lips. “What-”

You won’t let him finish his question, you can’t stand it anymore. You also can’t seem to stop. All of the emotions, the anger, the betrayal, the fucking, God, jealous thoughts that you’d slip into, alone in your cold bed. No, you’re not going to back down.

“You didn’t call, you didn’t text, and when you did, finally, manage to remember that I exist, the texts were so far and few between...fuck, sending a letter would have been faster. The only link I had to you was Dabi-”

“What?” He snaps, repeating his question, his red eyes, flashing, gleaming, glaring. “What does he have to do with anything?” His face is set in a deep snarl, his scar lifting along his white teeth. His fingers coil into his crutch, one digit arched away, and he begins the long journey to where you’re stubbornly standing.

You watch him on bated breath. The sheer excitement of his renewed presence is making you shake. The warring feelings that are rising inside you are too much. It’s too much, it’s, oh...he’s right in front of you now.

“Answer me, (Y/N). What the fuck does Dabi have to do with anything?”

You gulp. Tomura has never, ever liked you interacting with Dabi. It was that first subtle flirtation between you and the flame user that had set Tomura off in the first place. He had barely given you a second glance that first time you met him, but once your attention wandered over to Dabi, suddenly he was all ears. That animosity grew as time wore on.

If anything, Dabi took advantage of it. He liked to press you, corner you, it was one of the many things you disliked about him. He was a selfish ass, only manipulating things for his own, twisted amusement.

It’s a low blow for you to land on Tomura, to play up his own jealousies, but turnabout is fair play, right?

“He’s the only person I could reach. You want to know who my phone keeps asking me to favorite now? Fucking Dabi. I kept asking him about you, about what was going on, but he never knew.

So, then I tried reaching out to you, directly. But then you decided to conveniently lose my fucking number, or something. You didn’t answer a single thing after that last text I sent you, what, two weeks ago? You didn't call. You didn’t even act like I exist, it-”

“I told you it would be a while.”

“Yeah, a while doesn’t typically mean two months. And how do you come back to me? With a broken leg and, fuck, three missing fingers? What is going on Tomura? You’re a different person now. Do you even want me anymore? You don’t have to ghost me. You could have just told me that you were moving onto bigger and better things.

Congratulations, by the way. You’re the leader of a cult. Now, you can cut off all those lousy loose ends, like me-”

“You’re jealous.”

His voice has dipped into that low octave again, rasping, deep, and oh, fuck. You sputter at his assessment, your hands clenching into your pants. You need something to tether you, to keep you from reaching for him. You’re angry, remember? He’s left you, all alone, so alone and...

He’s shifted to lean into you, the warmth of him rolling over you in waves. You can hear his breathing, if you move a little bit closer you could feel it, too. He knows what he’s doing. He’s used this tactic on you before. It’s very effective. His crutch taps him nearer. He’s practically flush against your heaving chest and your eyes flick up to his.

The red is dark, tempered, and that swirling agitation has left him. He looks…

No, no, he left you for months, he can’t look at you like that. You shake your head, your eyes wincing shut, blocking him from view.

“I’m not...I-I’m not jealous, I was just-”

“Come here, (Y/N). Don’t make me ask you again.”

His new, half prosthetic hand reaches for your neck and traces over your trembling throat, ghosting over you, forcing you to press toward him. Once he’s satisfied you’re not going to reject his touch, he lets the digits tap onto you, gently, slowly, like he’s coaxing you out of your temper. The contrast of cool metal and warm skin makes you gasp, your eyes fluttering open.

He’s curved over your lips, his white hair drifting softly around your face. Unthinkingly, unquestioningly, you reach for him. Your fingers lace into the silken tendrils and he lets a slow exhale wash over your face. His verdant eyes are so close. They’re fixated on yours, refusing to let you slip from his gaze again.

You can’t breathe. There’s something else you want to scold him for, but...but his lips are so close. His nose bumps against yours and you bite your lower lip. He’s so warm. He smells nice too. It’s a rich smell, earthy, thick with some enticing aroma that’s all him. It floods your senses and you’re downing, distracted and lost.

Tomura’s won this little stand-off because you reach for him first. Your fingertips urge him to you, one thumb dragging a familiar trail across the mole on his chin. His lips are chapped, rough, but oh, oh you’ve missed this.

He lets you lead him, your lips pressing and lifting, planting feather light caresses against him. Your tongue swipes across his lower lip and he groans. It’s a husky, broken sound and it makes you yank at his clothes. His new suit crumples under your hands. You’d almost feel bad, if he hadn’t been such a neglectful ass to you. You’re nipping at him now, your kisses losing that sweet vulnerability.

Tomura approves of this frantic pace and one arm cages against your back, lifting you closer and dragging you against his front. His crutch clatters to the floor, but neither of you have the wherewithal to care.

Besides, you think happily, you can be his crutch now.

He’s biting and sucking, his teeth drifting from your trembling lips and pressing into your pulse. One particularly hard nip has you arching into him, a gasping whimper on your lips. His tongue laves over the hurt, lulling the nip.

Your hips instinctually lean into the his and you moan when you feel the hardness that is waiting for you there. Tomura presses back, dipping his nose into the juncture of your shoulder, his lips distractedly kissing against your skin. Your fingers trace down his front again and one hand goes lower still, running along his pants until you find what you’re searching for.

He growls when you apply just the right amount of pressure and he’s pulling your lips back to his, demanding more. You’re skirting your other hand to the clasp of his belt when someone barges in the door.

Gasping, you start to pull away, trying to turn, but Tomura holds you to him, lifting his chin until it’s resting against your shoulder. He’s glaring out at whomever the fuck is standing in the doorway, but his fingertips are moving against you, pressing and soothing down your fevered skin.

“Hey boss- ah…” Dabi is brought up short by the sight that greets him and you can hear the sneer that he must have thrown Tomura’s way.

Tomura, for his part, is quiet, content to silently stare down the man who stupidly interrupted him. He turns his head a fraction of an inch, but it’s enough room for him to drag his rough lips against your neck. You quake at the stimulation and hear Dabi let out a barking laugh.

“Ew, well this is fucking disgusting. Looks like the two of you can go back to fucking normal, eh (Y/N)? You and boss man can bone and get all that pent up insecurity out of your-”

“Get the fuck out,” you and Tomura say in unison.

You hear another scoffing chuckle and then the door slams shut.

Notes: The Dabi bits miiiight be in there because I finally got my belated birthday present of his Banpresto figure in today ԅ(≖◡≖ԅ)

Tags: @spicy-skull, @xwildskullx, @yixxes, @ghstmthr, @evesmores

*I think that’s everyone for now. If you wanna be added to a list just drop me a line & I’ll get you on the Google Doc: Shigaraki works, Dabi works, Hawks works, BNHA works, All works...works, works. There’s likely more to come, but that’s what I got for now. k byeeee.

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rolotouto · 3 years ago

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Banjou no Geass Gekijou

Before I post a list with all the games Rolo’s been featured in, here's more about my favorite one: the Nintendo DS board game, Banjou no Geass Gekijou. These are some of the lines you get when you land on Rolo’s squares.

へぇ、すごいですね、ライさんって。　何人もの人の声を、同時に聞き分けられるなんて…僕が必ず分かるのは兄さんの声くらいですよ… Wow, you are amazing, Rai-san. To be able to recognize the voices of multiple people simultaneously... The only one that I recognize without fail is Brother's...

すごいですね、ライさん。人を簡単に笑わせるなんて…僕にはできそうにありません。 You are amazing, Rai-san. Being able to make people laugh so easily... I don’t think I could do it.

ライさんはどうして、そんなに簡単に人を笑わせることができるんですか？あ、いえ…　別にうらやましいとかそういうことではないですけど…　ただ、すごいなって… Rai-san, why are you able to make people laugh so easily? Ah, no... It's not that I am jealous or anything like that... It's just, that it’s so amazing...

I think lines like this show how strong Rolo’s true self is despite being trained as an “emotionless” assassin. The sight of someone making another person happy makes him feel admiration. He had the potential to be a really good kid...

やった！僕の勝ちですね！あ、ごめんなさい…　僕ばかりが楽しんでしまったみたいで…　あ、あの…　また遊んでください！ Yes! I won! Ah, I'm sorry... It seems I ended up being the only one who had fun... U-um... Let's play again next time, please!

And he isn’t just in touch with his own feelings, but also those of the individual he’s interacting with. I wish these pretty scenes with Rai could lead to a Good End where, having gained another person he can trust, Rolo actually started believing in his right to be loved simply by being Rolo, instead of assuming his value is tied to his usefulness as an assassin. But yeah, the Good Ends have him killing Rai, so I guess deep-rooted beliefs take long to change...

えっ！事故に遭ったんですか！…兄さんはッ！にィ~さ~んッ！！ Eh! You had an accident?! ...Brother is...! Bro~ther!!

There’s a driving minigame where you play as Rivalz and Lelouch, and this is Rolo’s reaction if you crash Rivalz’s motorbike. Before playing the minigame, Rolo had asked you to please accompany Rivalz-san and Niisan because he(Rolo) doesn’t trust Rivalz-san’s driving skills. I find it amusing that Rolo actually went through the process of learning how to drive a bike and that he probably understands about vehicles (and mechas), while Lelouch likely has no interest or knowledge whatsoever. His fakememory!self was probably initially totally confused by his little sibling’s ability to drive, and it’s things like these that make the time he spent with Rolo be memories with Rolo rather than “with a Nunnally replacement”. Anyway, if you play the driving minigame when Rolo has come to like Rai as well, he will be calmer and say something like “I’m glad Niisan and you are safe”. Rivalz doesn’t even exist for Rolo.

あれ、失敗ですか。もしかしてオモチャのハンマーじゃ本気になれないですか？僕のナイフ…　貸しましょうか？フフフ… Oh, you lost? Maybe it's that you couldn't take it seriously using a toy hammer? Should I lend you... my knife? Fufufu...

This is what you get when you lose on the whac-a-character minigame. Sadly for Rolo, one of the rules in that minigame is not to hit Nunnally.

あ、ライさん。ほら、見てください！兄さんからもらったんです、この回転パズル！ねえ、ライさん。一緒に組み立ててみませんか？ Ah, Rai-san. Look, look at this! I received it from Brother, this rotation puzzle! Hey, Rai-san, why don't we assemble it together?

思ったより簡単にできましたね、ライさん。でも、せっかく兄さんがくれたものなんですから今度はひとりでやってみます。じゃあ… You were able to do it more easily than I thought, Rai-san. But since it's something that Brother gave me, next time I'll try to do it on my own. Well then...

Rolo allowing others to play with something given to him by Niisan? And poor Victor from the OSI had to get killed after touching his locket...

The next part needs some context first. This is from when you overhear his conversation with Villetta and Lelouch at the basement. Once he notices you there, he'll normally just kill you instantly, but if you visit them after he's already grown to like you, he hesitates and, seeing how neither Villetta nor Lelouch noticed you, offers to spare your life with the condition that you don't tell anyone what you heard. You can answer "yes" or "no". As one can guess, saying that you won't keep the secret leads to a game over.

First, "yes": じゃあ、これは…　僕らだけの秘密です…　そう…　兄さんにも内緒の…

Then, this is... a secret that is only ours... That's right... a secret even to Brother...

And "no":

なるほど…　僕がバカでした…　やっぱり信じられるのは…　兄さんだけ…　他のヤツなんて… …ライさん。　あなたならわかってくれると思ったのに…　残念です… I see... I was stupid... Indeed, the one that can be trusted... is only Brother... Of course there would be no one else... ...Rai-san. I thought that you would understand, and yet... It's a shame...

It might be because it’s a game and he’s merely letting the player know what’s going to happen, but still, I like that Rolo doesn’t kill Rai right away and instead expresses his emotions to him/her first. Like Rolo barely talks to people he doesn’t feel a connection with, but once he does feel it, the love he has for that person is really important to him. Enough that he’d die mainly to honor those feelings that made him feel human. Lastly, there’s a conversation between Rolo and Lelouch that you get right before Rolo’s route is completed. (Lulu)やあ、ライ。 Hi there, Rai. (Rolo)あ、ライさん。 Ah, Rai-san. ほらな、ロロ。やっぱりライはここに来ただろ？ See, Rolo, Rai did come here after all, didn’t (s)he? う、うん… Y-yeah... 今、ロロと賭けをしてたんだ。ライが15分以内にここに来るかどうかをね。結果は、俺の勝ち。　ロロ、今日の洗濯当番は代わってもらうぞ。 I just made a bet with Rolo on whether you'd arrive here within 15 minutes. The result is I won. Rolo, today you do the laundry instead. う、うん…　あ、で、でも！夕食当番は兄さんだからね！ Y-yes... Ah, b-but! Don’t forget that Brother is in charge of dinner! む、そうだったか…　じゃあ、こうしよう。俺が今からライと何かのミニゲームで対戦する。俺が勝ったら、ロロ。オマエが夕食当番だ。 Hm, was it so?... Well then, let's do this. I'm going to compete with Rai in some minigame now. If I win, Rolo, you take care of dinner. え、また賭け事？ Eh, betting again? そうさ、わかりやすいだろ？ライ、何て対戦する？オセロか？パズルか？何でもいいぞ。 That's right, isn't it simple? Rai, what will we compete in? Othello? Puzzle? Anything will do. 兄さん、水泳はどう？ Brother, what about swimming? なに！？なぜ体力勝負を…！ What!? Why a trial of strength...! 何でもいいって言ったじゃない？ Didn't you say that anything would do? クッ！いいだろう！速く泳ぐ理論はわかっている！負けるわけがない！ライ！水泳で勝負だ！ロロ！オマエは夕食の献立でも考えておくんだな！ Tch! Fine! I know the theory for swimming fast! There's no way I'll lose! Rai! It's a swimming match! Rolo! Start thinking about what to cook for dinner! It’s adorable how Rolo is so comfortable with Lelouch that he isn’t afraid to show him that he wants him to lose. Lelouch is hilariously slow at the swimming minigame despite “knowing the theory” (lol), so usually you’ll win without trying: やった！これで兄さんの手料理が食べられるよ! ありがとう、ライさん！ Yes! Now I can eat Brother's home cooking! Thank you, Rai-san!

チッ…　しかたないな…　晩御飯はビーフストロガノフだ！いいな！ Tch... There's no helping it... Dinner will be beef stroganoff, okay?!

うん！ Yes!

I’m laughing at how in-character it is for Lelouch to loose his cool when he doesn’t win. And notice how Rolo didn’t actually mind cooking dinner himself, he just wanted Lelouch to do it so he could eat his home cooking ♥ You can also just do nothing at all during the minigame so Lelouch can beat you, in which case the conversation goes like: 水泳で兄さんに負けるなんて…ライさん、遅い… To lose against Brother at swimming... Rai-san, you're slow... ロロ、夕食は何か凝ったものが食べたいな…そうだな…流しそうめんなんてどうだ？ Rolo, for dinner I want to eat something elaborate... Let me see... What about flowing noodles? 兄さん…たしかに凝ってるけど…それじゃ昼食みたいだよ…大丈夫、もっと栄養のあるものを作ってあげるから。 Brother... That's certainly elaborate but... then it would be like lunch... It's alright, I'll make you something more nutritious.

頼むぞ、ロロ。 I leave it in your hands, Rolo.

A Japanese person will probably find this funnier and be able to explain it better, but I think the joke is that flowing noodles are really plain in terms of what the food itself is, and that what is elaborate is the process to prepare them (you have to make noodles slide down a structure of bamboo pipes). So Lelouch seems to be deliberately choosing something Rolo can’t possibly prepare just to feel a bit evil? On the other hand, it’s really cute that he will eat Rolo’s cooking. He isn’t disgusted by it or anything, as much as he’d want to convince himself that he hates Rolo… And that’s it. Afterwards you get the endings, in which he kills you. Yeah, he spared your life at the basement, but now he stabs you out of respect, because he wants your ghost to protect Niisan. And he smiles and laughs when saying so too!? Well, to be precise, that’s the ending if you are playing as male!Rai. As female!Rai he seems more pained and doesn’t want you to leave, and it’s not so clear whether he kills you or not. Maybe he kidnaps you, since you simply disappear after Rolo took you to the airport. Creepy stuff... Someone uploaded a video of Rolo’s route, where you can see everything we’ve been talking about. ---- By the way, the official blog for this game was run by staff members who seemed to like Rolo a lot. The blog isn’t available anymore, but you can find the original texts in Japanese through Wayback Machine: part 1, part 2, part 3.

For example:

“I’m now playing through the previous game LOST COLORS and I was chased and killed by Rolo!”

“By the way, I wear Rolo on my employee badge.

It’s cute how Rolo’s charm is shaped like a heart!”

“So, since the anime’s last episode aired, there’s a new DS ‘Banjou no Geass Gekijou’ advertisement. We tried changing Lelouch and Rolo’s lines! Rolo 'Niisan... is cute' You are the one who’s cute-!”

“Good... mor ning. It’s No... zawa... First, um, yeah, I haven’t posted updates. U.... Usui san is the only one who... was... writing... If you’re... wondering... why, on 17th August’s broadcast... Rolo Rolo d... died”

“You can see Rolo in the advertisement... (tear)”

“Lelouch’s emperor outfit... I wanted Rolo to see it” ----- It’s nice to know the staff was allowed to openly fangirl about their favorite characters. Although we already knew that from Sakou-san...

#banjou no geass gekijou #rolo lamperouge #translation #code geass #please rolo stop killing

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undertaker1827 · 4 years ago

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Hey all!! This is a part two of the story I wrote where Grell’s s/o (Ciel’s mother figure) dies, which was requested in the comments of the original fic. If you haven’t read the first one, please do that as this makes no sense by itself. Also, I’ve reverted back to female pronouns for Grell in this one aaand guess which mortician rocks up 😁 Can be seen as Grell x Undertaker (I do like that one myself) but that’s not actually the idea. And finally (I swear I’ll shut up in a minute) the method used to stop a panic attack is a genuine one, it works very well.

❗️Warnings; heavy angst all the way through, death, blood, a panic attack, spoilers for chapters 140, 141 and 149.

Masterlist

Grell swallowed hard as she turned away from William, striding out into the corridor as fast as possible. Only a few reapers gave her a second glance, but she didn’t run into anyone she knew personally, so for that she was grateful. She left through reception and made her way back to her apartment, swapping the coat she usually wore for a red trench. It was slightly too big for her, so she wound it around herself like a cocoon, tying the fabric belt in a big loop then leaving once more.

The crimson reaper - ex reaper now? She wasn’t really sure - started walking around London. She had no aim or purpose, just needing to not sit still. Her hands were curled into fists and stuffed deep in the pockets of the coat, breath hanging in pockets in the frigid air behind her, street lamps only doing so much to push back the darkness of fallen night. Grell wasn’t watching where she was going, head low and eyes sore. The tears had stopped, but she knew how little it would take for them to start again, even though she had already cried so much. She felt an awful hollowness, left both by your parting and from the exhaustion that comes from truly crying your heart out.

So lost was she in her thoughts that she walked straight into something - someone - and tripped over a cobblestone. She managed to rip her hands out of her pockets to break her fall about halfway down, only she never met the floor. A pair of strong arms wrapped around her, one around her shoulders and the other at her waist then hauled her upright and into a firm chest. The other person held her still for a moment, as if ensuring she was now steady on her feet, before pulling back a bit to see her face. A bout of maniacal laughter quickly drew her attention once more to be met with silver bangs rather than eyes and a mortician’s black robes.

“Well, if it isn’t the reaper who was playing Madam Red’s butler! We meet again...” He trailed off into a giggle and stepped back, taking in everything Grell’s features and body language were telling him.

“Undertaker..?” She murmured, suddenly at a loss for what to do. She should be utterly repelled by him, right? What he did back on the ship was unforgivable for a reaper, and he certainly was one even if he did quit dispatch. In fact, now she had too, didn’t that make them kind of the same? She didn’t know, too tired to work it out. A nail tapping against her forehead made her blink rapidly and focused her gaze once again on the grey hair.

“You don’t look all that grand now though, do you? What’s happened to you, I wonder..”

Those few words were enough to send Grell’s mind careening back to the warehouse, the To-Die list, your crumpled body and your blood staining the concrete crimson. The blood pounding in her own ears and the sound of that wretched death scythe dragging on the rough floor, the look on William’s face.

You monster. You knew what they meant to me when you gave me that list.

A fresh wave of nausea took over the reaper’s body and she screamed in agony, tears streaming from her eyes and breathing heavy and erratic, yet still she clutched at her chest, unable to breath, unable to think -

The mortician saw the warning signs, thought process calmly identifying panic attack, the supplying him with chamomile, lemon. They had crossed paths right outside the parlour anyway, so by the timeUndertaker had half dragged, half carried the other reaper inside he doubted she even realised they had moved. He snapped her out of it by shoving a lemon in her mouth, engaging the automatic reflex of biting down and the resulting horrible taste preventing her brain from continuing to panic.

“What the hell do you think you’re doing?!” She yelled, launching herself at the older reaper only to stop halfway through. “How did you do that?” Undertaker just grinned and brandished the lemon at her.

“Forces your brain to focus.” Grell gave a non-commital hum but said nothing further, eyes becoming slightly glazed in thought. Undertaker was no fool; he knew what that type of crying meant. She’d lost someone incredibly important to her, which was a feeling he knew only too well. It was fatal for a reaper to involve themselves with humans. Since she was here anyway, the mortician made some chamomile tea and offered her a cup, surprised to find she accepted it. She must have been too exhausted to retaliate.

The pair sat for a while in silence, though Undertaker did eventually ask what Grell was doing in London. He did so idly, as if asking about the weather so as not to pressure her.

“I quit.” That certainly drew the older reaper’s attention, the small movement of his head so sharp that his bangs shifted enough the reveal part of a glowing chartreuse eye. It was enough to set an alarm bell in Grell’s head, something Othello had said about her not being able to win against him one on one.

“Quit what?”

“Dispatch. I deserted, just like you.” She gave a small, humourless scoff. “Suppose I know now how you felt.” The mortician let out a silent breath, his own mind straining and wanting to wander.

“Being seduced by the lives of humans is always a mistake for one of us,” he murmured softly, the feeling of dusky blue hair under his fingertips and a gentle, loving voice in his ear suddenly far too real.

“They-” Grell’s voice caught, “they wanted me to… to reap-” She gave a single, suppressed sob, rubbing the heels of her hands into her eyes and trying to take calming breaths. “I couldn’t do it. Wouldn’t do it. But Will knew. He knew and he did nothing!” She rested her elbows on her knees and dropped her head into her arms, sighing once more. She barely registered the sound of movement as the other reaper sat down next to her on the coffin, though she couldn’t help but tense and turn her head when she felt his arms around her once more.

“I’m not going to hurt you,” he muttered, voice dropping to the softer one she remembered from the Campania. Too tired to care if she was making a mistake or not, Grell allowed herself to be slowly pulled into a tighter hug, wrapping her arms around the mortician in return. Neither spoke for a long while, though she had allowed her eyes to close when she felt his chin come to rest on top of her head. “Was there a reason you came to me?” He asked at last, voice quiet in the predawn stillness.

“It wasn’t intentional,” the other reaper whispered back, “I was just blindly walking. Coincidence, maybe.”

“Maybe,” he hummed back, “though I have a proposition for you. What would you do if I told you there might be a way to bring them back?” Grell moved so quickly Undertaker found even he couldn’t easily follow it. Her head knocked back into his jaw and he huffed in annoyance, though said nothing of it when he saw her face. Pure, unadulterated desperation was ingrained into her every feature, though the look turned gloriously murderous with her next words.

“If you’re lying to me, even in the slightest way-”

“I can swear to you, in full confidence, that I’m not. Look here.” He stood and walked over to another coffin lying horizontally on the floor, gently taking hold of the lid and pulling it back. Grell’s eyes widened at the sight of the boy laying inside, body suspended in fluid and attached to medical equipment far too advanced for the Victorian era of the human world. She met Undertaker’s gaze once more, who was now starting to smirk. “Go get them back.”

#undertaker #grell sutcliff #undertaker x grell #undertaker x reader #grell sutcliff x reader #undertaker black butler #black butler undertaker x reader #black butler grell x reader #black butler grell #black butler undertaker x grell #black butler #kuroshitsuji #adrian crevan #black butler x reader #kuroshitsuji x reader #adrian crevan x reader #black butler reader inserts #black butler reapers

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jenniferstolzer · 4 years ago

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Babylon 5 rewatch Episode 2.22: The Fall of Night

Babylon 5 is at the center of not one but three conflicts as John Sheridan agrees to shelter a wounded Narn cruiser. The Centauri don’t like this. Earth doesn’t like this. The Shadows don’t like this. But Sheridan has a strong moral compass and what he doesn’t like is how much the institutions around him are willing to sacrifice in the name of forging some kind of cursory peace.

Things I liked about The Fall of Nighit

1, Lennier and Vir’s friendship. If you ask me Vir, could be friends with literally anyone. He’s such an understanding soul. Lennier is by nature a little judgey. More closed off. So when they sit down next to each other and discover how much they have in common both of them look at each other like “hello what” and automatically agree to meet again. But even this exchange is done almost like spies meeting and I don’t think we stop to think about that very often. These are the attaches of two ambassadors for two of the most powerful races in the galaxy… they could very well be exchanging state secrets instead of expressing solidarity for their equally frustrating jobs.

2, The Centauri are apparently willing to put their ships on autopilot and black out from g forces if it means when they come to they’ll be in a better firing position. This seems extremely reckless and VERY Centauri. It is the spacebattle equivalent of the hair. Big. Flashy. Not well thought through.

3, In the wake of the mass driver bombing, Sheridan gives Londo an opportunity to speak and Londo is like “NOPE” and jets before he says something that’s going to get him and his whole race in more trouble than they already are. Garibaldi then reads Londo like a literal book, delivering one of my favorite analyses of the character. Everyone thought Londo was a clown, indulging in opulence, going into debt at the casino, drinking himself to a stupor in public, but Garibaldi was his friend and knows that Londo’s not dumb, he’s actually very smart and his mind moves really fast. His error is in his judgment and priorities and he’s currently in waters he did not expect to tread. He’s scared, and he’s going to keep darting in and out of cover until he feels like he has a handle on things or he gets picked off by a hunter, whichever comes first. Also a very classic JMS line “He’s a pain in the butt, but he’s our pain in the butt.” Hunt for that or similar lines in other JMS stuff, he loves that line.

4, The ache of watching McCarthysim at work is very effective. Zach knows the guys he’s ratting on don’t deserve to be ratted on and even says so. “They’re just fooling around” but we can tell by the level of interest and tone of the Nightwatch captian’s voice that they’re gonna get blackballed. Zach can’t deny that they said what they said, but can tell that ratting them out is the wrong thing to do. In the end he relents with a bunch of qualifications but the Nightwatch doesn’t want qualifications. They want names. Thank you for your service.

5, I love that the guy there to ally with the Centauri is from the Ministry of Peace. So poignant. They’ll get peace all right, by paying off the aggressors.

6, When the Narn ship was coming under threat by the Centauri warship, Sheridan opened a line to Londo just to spit in his face and hang up. It was amazing. Also during this crisis, Sheridan whips out a law book to smack the Nightwatch guy back in his hole. Sinclair would be proud.

7, Watching B5 come under attack is so emotionally stirring. Even on a rewatch, I don’t want to see it hurt.

8, We have arrived! The scene where Kosh reveals himself. I love that G’Kar is hiding in the plants – like he’s not a huge gecko man who people are going to notice. I also love how plaintiff his voice is, thinking if he speaks on Sheridan’s behalf it’ll help him in the political shitshow he’s currently in. I mean he’s issuing this apology for helping a Narn ship and G’Kar is very very very grateful for that. Also B5 blew up a Centauri warship so he’s pretty grateful for that too, I mean come on… I like that B5 has like a standard subway system in the middle of it and that they let the Puppet Friends ride. I miss the puppet friends. I love that the rotational gravity system means there’s a weightless portion in the center of hydroponics and that we used that to our advantage in this story. Also the vorlons in their native form play on the perception of the lesser races. They are light beings, and humans see them as angels. The rest of the races see them as prophets or gods, but none of these perceptions are perfect. We see wings and white robes and think Angel, but Kosh didn’t appear like a rennaissance painting. He’s got a butterfly look to him, too. The face he wears is a facsimile of a human not an exact human. He’s not perfect, we’re just in awe. Love that.

9 And finally a lot has been said about why Londo doesn’t see anything when Kosh appears. He’s been touched by the Shadows, so he can’t be converted by the Vorlons b/c we’re playing a game of Othello today I guess. Maybe because he doesn’t actually believe in his pantheon of gods so he doesn’t have any deities to witness. Maybe he’s lying because what he saw was his own greed and vanity. The general consensus is the first – that he’s incapable of seeing the light because he’s in the dark. For a fresh take on it, let’s look at the Vorlons through this lens. Kosh said before that if he revealed himself everyone would know him… I take this as being a side effect of being Vorlon. Vorlons are a feeling not an image. Like Magenta. Magenta’s not a real color, it exists on the color wheel because something has to connect red and purple on the color spectrum… but the spectrum of visible light is actually a straight line. The wavelengths for red and purple are far from touching, but our brains can perceive when they’re both present, so Magenta occurs. It’s imaginary, but we see it for real with our eyes. That’s Vorlons. Perhaps Londo saw a shapeless light thing in the sky, perhaps that’s what Vorlons really are… or perhaps they have no visible representation at all until they hit our brains. Our eyeballs behold something, but our brains have to construct it out of pieces. When the rest of the galaxy looked at Kosh they used the color wheel to construct him, but Londo was only given the wavelengths. He saw nothing, because nothing was there to see. I really wish there was another Centauri there to be like “I saw the goddess Li welcoming me to her arms!” and Londo’s over there like “I’m the problem” instead of not really answering that question. Maybe it’s answered in season 3, I don’t know. Did Vir see anyone up there? He must have been on break.

What I like Less about 22

1, So here’s where I’m going to talk about Keffer. I know the origin story…. that he was an unwelcome addition to the cast added per network request, but who the hell is he other than that? I think its remarkable how he slips right out of my head the minute he is off camera. We know he’s a pilot, that he was close to Carlos (whose story/death you may recall I was laughing at in a previous episode because its significance ALSO came out of nowhere), and that he made friends with the GROPOS grunts (who we incidentally learned to care about enough in that one episode that we were sad when they died…. Awkward considering Keffer’s contribution to this episode…) Honestly the most interesting thing about him is that he’s got an old-timey fighter pilot scarf he wears and he believes in ghosts and I bet you all forgot about the ghosts. Honestly, the most interesting thing about Keffer is how he’s a lesson in how not to write an interesting character – and no shade on JMS for that, I know he did it on purpose. Significant things happening to a character does not automatically make them a strong character. Keffer experienced loss, came face to face with the shadows, got in fights… a lot of stuff happened to him, but he was almost always the only named character in those scenes. We cared about the GROPOS because they cared about each other and we responded to that. Keffer was there to play cabbage head and ask questions. He’s not tight with any of our main cast who we’ve had tons more time to grow attached to, and dies for plot reasons without leaving an impact with his loss. Heck, you can see the value of interpersonal relationships on character development in action when the show used a shoehorn to try and force some in in context to Carlos a second and a half before he died. We had him drinking at the bar with command staff suddenly, we had him die as a result of a flight mission Sheridan was part of to make Sheridan feel guilty about it. Everyone was standing around going like “No, Not Ramirez” and if you recall on my previous episode writeup I was LAUGHING at how tortured this sudden human connection was. Keffer could have been made interesting. Follow me on this.

My treatment on how to make Keffer interesting:

Let’s say Keffer was introduced as an old friend of one of our characters – Fraknlin let’s say. He was a friend from the Minbari War days that helped him sneak behind enemy lines. Perhaps he was complicit in the covering up and destruction of Franklin’s notes on Minbari anatomy. As a result, the two hang out in medbay sometimes, talking about old times and comparing the current war to the one they fought together. We learn that Keffer has a fire for justice. Hates bullies. Sees the strong as absolute defenders of the weak and that any stronger race picking on a weaker one is a bigger coward than the unvierse can hold. Then when Carlos gets killed by the ghost he starts researching what it could be. Kosh and Delenn tell him to stay out of it. The audience assumes he’s going to uncover something and bring Franklin and other characters into Delenn and Sheridan’s confidence about the shadows through curiosity and honor, but we’re learning through the episodes that the Shadows are IMMENSELY powerful and have no patience for flies. When he breaks off from his squad to go have a looksee at what he suspects led to his personal friend Carlos’s death, we know this is going to kill him. He ignores the warnings of those who have more awareness and dies to bring back evidence of the Shadows to the station. Sheridan recognizes how Keffer’s curiosity and sense of judgment led to recklessness, something Sheridan himself is prone to. He vows not to let Keffer die in vain, but also states that the proof he got has changed everything… and that Sheridan would have done the same. Killing your men in the name of a mission is never the goal but there’s a line everyone crosses when the safety of the universe is at stake and sometimes things are worth dying for. Franklin walks into medbay, casts a look to the counter where Keffer used to sit all those nights, and turns away.

But that’s not what happen. Keffer’s dead now and I don’t miss him. Glad he emailed the Shadows to ISN five nanoseconds before he died.

Babylon 5 is now the last best hope for victory because sometimes peace is another word for surrender and because secrets have a way of getting out. On to season 3!

#Babylon 5 #babylon 5 rewatch #season 2 #episode 22 #babylon 5 spoilers #art #jenstoart #kosh #john sheridan

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lizardrosen · 4 years ago

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National Theater Live King Lear

Hello, here is a ridiculously long review of this production! I just had a lot of feelings and thoughts!

Setting/Staging/Mood

I really loved the sound design for this one. It’s hard to describe, but the chords gave it a real presence and sense of motion. It was vaguely reminiscent of horror movie music in the way the chords lingered and didn’t blend in seamlessly, but I wouldn’t call it horror music exactly. The BELL tolling while Lear zips up his folder was such a good first image and bit of sound. And there were drinking songs, which I always love to see in a play. Put that Epic Theater technique straight in my mouth!

The circle in the middle that’s red in the first half and white in the second was a really creative detail, and the actors used that space effectively, especially with overlapping exits and entrances to make it feel that scenes happened in different locations while still being thematically connected.

The opulence and ceremony of the first scene gradually gives way to the more sparse and modern staging of act five — formal military dress to fatigues

I love how Lear raises his hand in prayer and command, compelling everyone else to follow suit to show their devotion and allegiance (and is there a difference between their king and their gods in this world?) even when they’re unsure about whether he’s right to be so cruel to Cordelia.

The recurring imagery of money changing hands really fits in well with the theme of love as currency that’s already in the text!

The single tree in the background of act five gave me Waiting For Godot vibes, which works SO WELL with the absurdism and nihilism of Lear.

Thoughts about specific characters under the cut!

Edgar! My SON!!

Luke Thompson is the reason I’ve wanted so badly to watch this production; ever since I saw his standout performance as Laertes in the 2017 Almeida Theater production, and found out he’s also played Orestes and Edgar, I’ve just been rabid about it!

It’s neat to see him actually at the ceremony of the first scene, with Edmund already Literally in his shadow.

He’s a little less hapless and distracted than most of the Edgars I’ve seen, a little more watchful. In 1.2 he’s actually pushing back against Edmund’s insistence that he’s in danger, and then in 2.1 there’s a long moment of just Looking at Edmund’s knife before he flees.

Similarly, his decision to become Poor Tom felt a bit more calculated. It’s not that he isn’t scared and lost and desperate, because he definitely is, but the plan itself doesn’t seem to grow out of that feeling as much as he (sort of) calmly looked at his options.

Of course, he doesn’t stay calm; that agonized scream when he actually cuts himself, and later on when he sees his father blinded and screams “World, world, o world!” really feels like he’s letting something out, and more than usual he seems to have been holding this part of himself back for a long time.

The counterpart to that is the self that does the watching — it’s a part of all Edgars that makes him a really compelling character, with his self-aware asides, but it’s particularly pronounced here — there’s a moment where he says “Bless thy five wits!” in his normal voice, and then catches himself and has to reassert the role he’s playing for his own safety.

At times he’s very impatient and frustrated while leading Gloucester, but he also cares about him a lot and is so terrified that he’s actually died when he “fell” from the cliff, this poor boy’s entire body is trembling!

He instinctively moves to protect Gloucester from Lear when he gets more violent and unpredictable with “find these son-in-laws and KILL KILL KILL” and it was a good moment

Gives into his own viciousness in the fight with Oswald, and then, Hamlet-like, lugs the guts into the neighbor room.

Edgar doesn’t seem to know if he wants his dad to recognize him or not — he puts Gloucester’s hand on his face, but then as soon as he seems about to realize who he is he very quickly takes it away again and gets them moving

He’s even more desperate and reckless than Edmund in their duel, but then once Edmund is fatally injured, he’s right by his side, holding his hand, helping him through it!

He needs Lear to recognize Kent, he needs Lear to not be dying, he’s so sincere, but then he decides if he can’t save anyone here he can at least help Albany to help the country heal and pledges himself to the future.

Lear

Awful but also very pitiable, more like a human losing his grip and knowing it, than just a Vessel for themes that are echoed in other characters.

Lashes out at himself more than at other people, but he definitely still does both.

“But they shall be the terrors of the earth” is just a man who’s terrified to be losing his words.

He has bad knees and everyone knows it but he keeps trying to kneel, and sometimes it feels like he’s mocking his daughters — look how much I’m suffering for you even though you’re ungrateful — and sometimes it feels like he’s forgotten his own body’s limitations.

Spends a lot of time offering physical comfort to other characters, since he can’t be a dad for his real daughters.

His flower crown scene was Just ophelia, and I think that’s beautiful.

aaaaa, his helpless grief for Cordelia! He moves the noose from her neck to his!! and then he takes out a handgun and threatens everyone away from him, but he’s just so helpless and sad!

Edmund! my other son!

I was a little surprised to see that this actor is James Corrigan, because I recognized him as Roderigo in the RSC Othello, and he’s sort of the anti-Edmund, so I was excited to see the contrast, but honestly there wasn’t as much of a contrast as I expected. He had many of the same cringing appeasing mannerisms, but in a way that makes it clear that he’s aware of his unfair situation in a way his Roderigo really isn’t. Despite being a bastard he has a lot more social power and mobility than Roderigo so he doesn’t seem nearly as pathetic.

Other Edmunds are composed and precise in their soliloquies because this is the one place no one will see them planning things out, and this Edmund is babbling and overwhelmed because this is the one place no one will see him feeling things, because feeling things is dangerous.

He’s so! scared! of his dad! It’s painful to watch, and it’s almost as painful to watch how he’s still looking for approval and respect from Gloucester. Someone save this boy!

He gets in WAY over his head, and it feels like he’s scrambling at every turn, but then at some point he just levels up and strides with confidence, and it’s really good to see.

oh my god, oh my god, he saw everything that happened with Gloucester! After everyone else leaves he comes out from his hiding place looking just devastated. He hated his dad, but he never hated him that much, and by the time he couldn’t stomach it any longer there was no way for him to escape, and then he’s still processing it when he sees that the Fool was also there, and he has to kill him because no one can know he was there. I SCREAMED when this moment happened, it was so good!

WOW, he’s so smooth, it’s no wonder both the sisters want a piece of that! It’s more of a power play with Regan, and a little more courtly with Goneril, and he just knows what each of them want and need from him.

When Lear and Cordelia are captured, Lear says “As if we were God’s spies” and he’s still kingly enough that the soldiers drop to their knees and lift their hands in allegiance, and Edmund has to rush in to make one of them stand up while saying “Take them away” sort of impatiently, and then he immediately checks the order he’s written for their deaths, because he’s just seen how dangerous it is for these two to be kept alive. aaaaa, and then when the captain hesitates, he holds a gun to his temple on “Either say thou’lt do’t, or thrive by other means” !! I love that line and I love the sheer range of deliveries I’ve seen for it!

The wonder in his voice at “Yet Edmund was beloved.” is really good! He’s so desperate to do some good by the end, and I love! Edmund of Gloucester!

Kent

Having Kent played by a woman does some really neat things to the character, not least of which is crossdressing Caius! She sort of feels like she overperforms toxic masculinity to fit into the culture of Lear’s retinue. Other Kents seem to be allowing their latent desires and bluntness to emerge with this role, but this Kent isn’t suited to it, and sometimes she gets a little carried away or makes missteps like beating up Oswald, but she has to see it through, for Lear’s sake.

Kent also doesn’t feel Big In Love with Lear, but she’s definitely devoted to him — and even more than that, she’s devoted to the image of loyalty itself.

Her genuine affection for Cordelia, and pride to see how she’s doing as a queen, is really sweet and good!

After she’s been banished, she rushes out of the throne room as Burgundy and France enter, covering her face like she’s desperately trying to hold back her tears.

She’s with the French soldiers looking for Lear, and is the one who tells him “You shall have anything!”

At the end she’s not exactly surprised that Lear doesn’t connect her with Caius, and she’s not upset (about that part of it anyway, plenty of things in this scene are upsetting), but she’s definitely feeling something.

ahhhh, she picks up Lear’s handgun and sort of cradles it to her side when she prepares for her final journey! sweetheart!

Gloucester

he’s just! a terrible father!! simply the worst!

A lot of the time Gloucester isn’t a very good dad just because he’s friendly and careless and just not paying attention to how he’s treating his sons; this one is actively awful and I actively hate him!!

From the very first scene he’s so scornful and dismissive of Edmund and hitting him for no reason, and then turns around to show off photos of Edgar, and that doesn’t even really benefit Edgar either, because he’s held to an unfair standard he can never live up to.

It really shows in how both of them are touch starved but also extremely cautious about being touched. Someone save them!!

(In fact, in the serial killer Claudius AU, a certain Earl does get himself murdered when Edmund is sixteen)

Not a Bad Dad thing, but not really showing Gloucester in a good light: he does think Lear’s age and reverence should be respected, but his motivation seems to be a lot more based in his indignation that Regan and Cornwall have taken over his home and order him around. For this Gloucester it seemed to be less about feeling sorry for Lear, and more about reasserting his sovereignty.

But because this is Lear I don’t just hate him, and he’s not just a bad father, you also feel for him a lot after he’s been blinded and his legs are just trembling and he’s so scared and lost.

Even after he’s blinded he keeps turning to his photos of Edgar in his wallet, and it’s sad and regretful instead of showing off.

He had a really good cliff fall! He goes up to what he thinks is the edge, and then turns around and braces himself to fall backwards, and then Edgar has to rush to catch him, and lay him gently on the ground, and panic that maybe he’s actually died.

Lear Sisters

No one was prepared for Lear’s announcement and the way each of them responds informs so much of how they act through the rest of the play!

Goneril is startled and unsure and fumbling, and I really felt for her and her “hateful life”, and the way she’s stunned in the wake of Lear’s abuse, but then needs to pull herself together again when he returns. For so much of this play she feels small and adrift, but then she’s so happy for once whenever she’s with Edmund. Albany really does seem to care about her and he’s trying to be good for her, so he takes it when she yells at him, and then stays behind to pray for a bit. He’s a little less nice later on but to be fair she is cheating on him and not bothering to hide it very well.

Regan! With her fake tears and her constant flirtiness, and the way she’s always twirling and showing off! She is a hot mess, and she only gets hotter and messier as the play goes on, but she and Cornwall love each other a lot, and she wants to be suited to torture the way her husband is, but she gets into it by the end of that scene. And then!! her hand on Edmund’s throat! W o w

Cordelia is calm and sure and knows exactly what her sisters are, and in that first scene she comes so close to reaching her father and getting him to change his mind about disowning her. And that carries through to the rest of her performance — she’s competent and precise and loving, and France is smitten with her and listens to her and respects her. When she’s reunited with Lear she wants him to wake up, but also isn’t prepared for it to actually happen, and then she’s so surprised when they say she should be the one to address him first.

Cornwall

I first saw Daniel Rabin as Reynaldo in the Almeida Theater Hamlet (ask me about how Reynaldo and Laertes are half-dating whenever he follows Laertes to France, because I have Opinions), and his Cornwall is SO different

He’s not just manipulative, but violent and enjoying his violence, but he’s also sexy and possessive and commanding, and it’s no wonder Edmund falls for him as hard as he does!

TYING HIS SCARF around Edmund’s hand after he wounds himself for love and validation!? The soft tender look of surprise that Edmund gives him in response!? wow! wow, what a MOMENT!

And then he shoves Edmund into the room after he’s been shown Gloucester’s letter, he has to punish the messenger and assert his position. And after “Thou shalt find a dearer father in my love” Edmund HUGS him, and he’s startled at first but half-returns it (and probably thinking about how he can Use this) (and then cornwall/edmund/regan happens, shhh)

Like Daniel Rabin’s Reynaldo, his Cornwall is very Watchful, just stepping back to observe what’s going on, and then quietly making his judgment before he says anything — and when he does speak he absolutely has the other person’s number.

Good commanding headtilts!

Oh, the laugh right before he uses the hook from the slaughterhouse on Gloucester is just terrifying and compelling, and he’s so turned on by this. Good for him because then he gets to die, and he’s so disgusted and vicious when saying the first servant should be thrown onto the dunghill.

Miscellaneous Moments

Lear puts his jacket on Edgar, and Kent puts her jacket on Lear, and then he immediately takes it off and puts it around Edgar’s shoulders and ties the arms together, but while he’s trying to take off his shirt too, Edgar’s already getting on the ground and letting the jackets fall off of him. Just! Jackets and touch as a form of affection!!

When Gloucester comes out to find Lear, he and Edgar see each other, and there’s just a moment where they’re frozen, Edgar terrified that his father will recognize him, and Gloucester perhaps feeling there’s something familiar about this madman but having no idea what.

While Gloucester is telling Kent about how he had a son he loved who betrayed him, Lear and Edgar are in the background sharing a long hug that almost feels like a beautiful dance! It was such a striking moment, I loved it sooo much.

the HUG with Edmund and Cornwall!! Not over it, never over it.

when Cornwall tells Edmund to leave with Goneril, he gives Goneril his jacket and she’s just quietly surprised and pleased, and it’s cute, and I want her to be happy!!

#king lear #edgar #edmund #gloucester #kent #cornwall #goneril #regan #cordelia #my writing #sort of

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abybweisse · 4 years ago

Note

If you accept any family headcanon, this is how I see the Shinigami as parents:

Grell-> The easygoing mum, but still can discipline the kids

Will-> Totally not the kids person. But if he's portrayed as a father. Then quite stern with his sons, but if he does get a daughter? Daddy's princess. No more say. He even will go work in glitter and cute girly stuff.

Ronald-> Has no idea how to raise kids. When they were babies, oh dear. Constant freaking out over baby crying, and having no idea how nappies work XDDD

Othello-> Hm. I don't know. If he does get a kid, then poor kid. Experimented on all hours.

Undertaker-> Kids person. Oh no rules indeed. His kids are very much spoiled rotten. I don't even see him as the type to punish his kids when they're bad. Just like "My child, don't get hurt too much, okay?" And that's it 😅

What do you think?

The only one (parenthood) I can truly get behind is Undertaker, but that’s because we are probably getting the reveal of his relationship to the Phantomhive family within the next few... years. 🗓 👀 😭 Anyway, your headcanon for him works well with how I envision him playing with the kids as much as possible but not being the disciplinarian; that would be Cloudia/Claudia... or even Tanaka.... And it was Rachel later being the disciplinarian with the twins, not Vincent. Vincent says the Phantomhive women are strong-willed, and we see it with Frances/Francis, too. However, I get the feeling Undertaker wasn’t always around, or that he was around as much as he could be but wasn’t open about being a relative, let alone the father/grandfather. Because he had to play the eccentric funeral director/informant role pretty much always and distance himself... presumably for their own protection.

The rest of it looks like purely fanfic material. Fun to think about, but I cannot take it too seriously. I have to somewhat agree with your ideas, though. Here’re my thoughts on them:

I know Grelle mentioned wanting kids, during the ripper arc and in the Character Guide, but I don’t know what Grelle would actually be like as a parent... or how those desires might have changed since being punished for killing Madam Red. Don’t forget Grelle lost interest in even having Madam Red around for protecting her own nephew. Grelle might actually let kids get away with waaay too much, honestly. And, if Grelle’s hypothetical children were harmed, Grelle also seems like the sort who would chase the perpetrators down and kill them three times over... while the children were left to bleed out. Like... some of the softer parts of Grelle’s parenting skills might hardly exist; the focus in that moment would be utter destruction of the perps, instead of taking care of the injured children. I’d expect Grelle’s blood lust to rear its ugly head again.

Ronald strikes me as the sort who would either leave the kids to be raised entirely by their mother, even when he’s home... or actually ditch the woman as soon as he finds out she’s pregnant. I have trouble imagining him as the sort who would ever settle down. Reaper female, human female, whatever. He might be more interested in the chase, so to speak.

William I can see as being a more responsible father figure, if he even wants kids. He might be the reluctant sort, but I agree he could be very strict if he had kids... but with both sons and daughters. I don’t see him as the sort who would show up to work wearing glitter from a kid, but I can see him being particularly soft (from time to time) with a daughter. Discipline, yes, but also soft-hearted. Let her glitter him up? Maybe. Wear it to work? No.

Othello? I simply cannot imagine him as a parent at all. I cannot imagine him even wanting children. The only thing to keep him from dissecting (or even vivisecting) it would be strict reaper realm laws against such things... and him being constantly monitored by the RCPS (reaper child protective services). 👀 Good thing I cannot imagine him getting anyone pregnant to begin with.

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theasstour · 4 years ago

Photo

𝐅𝐫𝐞𝐬𝐡𝐞𝐫𝐬.

𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓: 𝟏𝟎.𝟏𝐤 𝐍𝐁: 𝐚𝐥𝐜𝐨𝐡𝐨𝐥, 𝐚𝐧𝐱𝐢𝐞𝐭𝐲 𝐝𝐢𝐬𝐨𝐫𝐝𝐞𝐫, 𝐛𝐨𝐝𝐲 𝐢𝐦𝐚𝐠𝐞, 𝐞𝐱𝐩𝐥𝐢𝐜𝐢𝐭 𝐥𝐚𝐧𝐠𝐮𝐚𝐠𝐞, 𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬 𝐨𝐟 𝐬𝐞𝐱𝐮𝐚𝐥 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐞𝐧𝐭

Monday, 25 September 2017

It was strange to Y/N that she was enjoying herself as much as she was just then in an educational setting. In school, she had never really liked any of the subjects besides English, and here at uni, she got to sit and listen to professors who were truly experts on English literature ramble on about Othello and specific analysis on act 3 scene 3. She loved every single second of it, and was sure she could sit there for hours on end just listening to her professors. At one point she was sure this would all get tiring and she’d hate University, but in that moment, hearing her professor, Richard, talk about things that truly interested her, was such a breath of fresh air compared to what she had experienced previously.

The door to the lecture hall opened, and since the doors were right by the blackboard where Richard stood talking about Othello and the ‘temptation’ scene, all eyes landed on the blonde girl in pink shorts and a white jumper. She smiled at Richard, mouthing a “sorry” before taking the first free seat she could find, which was conveniently right beside Y/N. The two girls shared a small smile themselves before Y/N went back to focusing on the lecture happening in front of her. Y/N was hunched over her notebook, writing something off from the PowerPoint slide displayed on the wall in front of her. She did not know how much time went by, she was listening too intently to care about that, but suddenly, the blonde beside her rested her back against the seat and leaned a little closer to Y/N.

“This is quite boring, innit?”

Y/N looked to her left, and to her surprise, realised that the girl who had walked in late was Chloe. The same Chloe who she had met when she registered a week and some ago. She must have been too caught up in the lecture to pay proper attention to her surroundings.

Chloe let out a small chuckle, nodding in the direction of the PowerPoint before she continued to whisper. “The lecture. I knew we’d be discussing Shakespeare in Introduction to English Studies, but Othello’s just fucking boring, innit?”

“I…” Y/N looked at the PowerPoint for a few seconds, then back at Chloe. “Sure.”

They were quiet for a few seconds, Chloe just studying Y/N, eyes searching her face. “You like Othello.”

Y/N felt a sudden urge to relate to Chloe. Since they had met earlier and since she hadn’t made tons of friends on her course yet, she wanted Chloe to be her mate. If they got off on the wrong foot today, they might never sit next to each other again.

“It’s not as good as Twelfth Night, not as bad as Julius Caesar.”

Chloe continued to just look at Y/N, but suddenly, a smile came creeping over her lips. “Take it you like Shakespeare.”

“I like analysing his work, yeah.”

“More of a Modernism, and sometimes Postmodernism, girl myself.”

“I’m not big on either of those.”

Chloe let out a small chuckle again. “You won’t be taking Postmodernism next year then?”

“Not if I can help it.”

Chloe only crossed her arms and stared ahead, still smiling. For a second Y/N was afraid she might have said something to make Chloe detest her, but the next, she reminded herself that she had to live her truth regardless of what anyone said about it. “Guess we’ll just have to enjoy each other’s company in the core modules then.”

Y/N felt a few butterflies in her stomach at that and could not help smiling back at Chloe when their eyes met again.

“How come I haven’t seen you at any Freshers parties yet?” Chloe asked.

“Been busy applying to jobs and such,” Y/N explained. “Gotta get one as fast as possible ‘cause I need money to live.”

“Ahh, fair.” Chloe nodded. “One of my course mates, Hayden – think they’re up there somewhere –“ Chloe pointed with her thumb over her shoulder, indicating further up the lecture hall. “Has decided they’re going to start an Uno society.”

“Uno?” Y/N frowned. “As in the card game?”

“Yeah,” Chloe laughed. “I’m sure it’ll be nice and all, but they’re very passionate about it. Have yet to come out with me, Thian, and Annalise. Those are my other course mates, by the way.”

Y/N nodded. Was she just incompetent at making friends or was Chloe just very good at it? How had she made so many friends, made a small group by the sounds of it, and Y/N had barely talked to anyone on her course yet?

“Hayden promised to come out this Friday, though,” Chloe smiled. “You should come, too.”

For some reason, both nerves and excitement rushed through Y/N at that. She smiled back. “I’d love that.”

“Wicked. It’s at my Dinwiddy flat.” Chloe rolled her eyes. “Uni accommodation at Helmond is a huge piss take, I tell you. I feel like there’s mould everywhere.”

“That’s just UK houses in general. We’ll all die from it one day.”

“It’s literally disgusting,” Chloe said. “Also, one of my flatmates never does his dishes. It’s minging. And it’s started smelling, too.”

“Oh, my days.”

“Yeah.”

“I’m glad I just immediately moved in with my best mate instead of going through the whole uni accommodation thing. At least I can be assured that they do their dishes and no food’s left on the kitchen counter for too long.”

“Oh, that sounds lush.”

The people around Y/N and Chloe were all starting to pack their things and get out of their seats. Seeing as the two of them were sat by the edge of the row, they had to get up rather fast and let people through. So, that’s what they did. Y/N put her notebook and pencil case in her rucksack and slung it onto her back before she and Chloe made their way out of the lecture hall and out into the hallway beyond.

“There they are,” Chloe grinned, waving as she saw a small group of three standing by the wall a bit further down. “Come say hi.” Though Chloe wasn’t looking at her, Y/N assumed she was talking to her, so she followed her over to the rest. “Gang, this is Y/N, the one I met while we were both registering.”

“Ah, you’ll be Y/N, then,” a man with protruding cheekbones, a strong jawline, and deep set, brown eyes said. The Viet man’s smile lit up the room they were standing in, and it made Y/N’s overthinking ebb. “I’m Thian, pleasure to meet you. Chloe told us she met you, but never saw you since.”

“Proper rude of the universe to keep us away from each other for so long,” Chloe said.

“I’m Hayden,” a smaller person said with the greenest eyes and long brown hair. They too had a smile like Thian’s, but this one displayed crooked teeth, which made Y/N more at ease with her own bottom teeth that were the same.

“And I’m Annalise,” the last one said, her hair dyed an unnatural dark red colour that Y/N absolutely loved. “I think I saw you in a Critical Reading seminar.”

“Oh, yeah, I think we might be.”

“We’ll have to sit next to each other next time!”

Y/N could detect a slight accent, but she could not tell where Annalise was originally from. She suspected Germany, there were tons of international students here after all, but Y/N did not want to assume.

“Guys, we have to plan the first Uno society meeting,” Hayden said, looking at the time on their phone. “It was so nice to meet you, Y/N, but we’re in a bit of a hurry.”

She just smiled. “No, totes get that. I need to get back to my flat, anyway.”

“See you around, then,” Chloe smiled, waving as the four of them walked off.

Y/N walked home to Orsman Road. Though she knew there would be less walking if they took the tube, it would also mean that she had to walk on and off boiling hot tube trains and stations, and she was not about to do that. She was sweating enough in the late September sun as it was, she did not need the tube to contribute to her sweat moustache as well. Instead, she plugged her earbuds in and listened to her most recent playlist on Spotify, humming along to her favourite tunes as she walked.

She stopped by Gregg’s by Dalston Kingsland station, buying herself a sausage roll and an iced latte before walking the rest of the stretch home. Hackney bustled around her, with tons of cars, double deckers, and mopeds driving by, as well as all types of people milling to and from work. The early autumn sun was still a little too hot, but it seemed like most Londoners were soaking up the sun while they could. They were walking by in shorts, tee shirts, and summer dresses, while the only reason why Y/N was dressed in her tee shirt and trousers, was so she would not quite literally go up in flames on the way home.

Y/N arrived at Orsman Road not long after her trip to Gregg’s, and walked up to the flat. She locked the door once she was indoors, checking the kitchen and the living room to see if anyone was there. To no one’s surprise, none of her three other student flatmates were home in the middle of the day on a Monday. She walked up the stairs and to her room, letting her door be open so she could air out a bit more. Her windows had been open all day, so her room smelled fresher than normal as she entered. That just reminded her that she had to buy some scented candles or air fresheners to liven up her room.

Putting her rucksack down by her door, Y/N started looking through the two bags that she had yet to pack out from. In one was most of the stuff she’d put on her desk when she finally bought that, and in the other were loads of decorations that she had yet to bring forth. She started pulling out fairylights that she wanted to hang across her room or over her wall, when she heard footsteps. Out of the door directly to the right once you came up the stairs, came a man with short dark hair and a strong build, thin lips and pale skin. He must have heard movements outside his door, because his eyes landed on Y/N almost right away. However, he smiled at her and Y/N immediately knew who this was.

“You’re Y/N, then,” Mason said, walking over to stand in the doorway of her room. “Mason, your third flatmate.”

“Thought I’d never run into you,” Y/N smiled, making his smile grow.

“Yeah, got here like two days ago, and have been all over the place since. Helped some of my mates move into their flats, been at work, and at rugby practice.”

She nodded. “Busy man.”

“Very busy.”

“Lucky I caught you now, then.”

Mason nodded his head. “Would have eventually. Knowing Nath, he’ll probably end up forcing us all to bond as a flat at one point.”

“Sounds horrific.”

“It was. It will be,” Mason laughed, leaning against the doorframe and pushing his hands into his grey joggers.

Y/N furrowed her brows. “It was? He’s done it before?”

“Yeah, our first year. He made everyone in our flat bond, he especially talked about flat yoga sessions and shopping trips when he was drunk or high as a kite.”

She dropped the fairylights and turned her full attention on Mason. “You lived together your first year?”

Mason just looked at Y/N, blinking a few times. “Yeah.”

“All three of you?”

“All three of us. Me, Nathan, Harry, and like five girls.”

Y/N felt like screaming, but lucky for her dignity and Mason’s ears, the front door opened and closed. Nathan’s singing could be heard all the way upstairs. Instead of screaming, Y/N called Nathan’s name, not caring that Mason saw just how annoyed she was now. Poor bloke had no idea what he’d just said. Nathan strolled up the stairs and looked in Y/N’s room’s direction, his face lit up at the sight of Mason and Y/N together.

“What a view!” he grinned. “What’re you two bonding over?”

“Right now we’re bonding over being your friend,” Y/N said.

“Which I’m sure you’re both honoured to be, yes.”

“And I just heard you’ve lived with Mason and Harry for the last year, but have not told me,” Y/N said, ignoring Nathan’s previous comment.

Nathan looked to Mason, and then back at Y/N. “No, Harry moved in later. He lived in another flat first, hated it, and since him and Mason were good mates, he got to move into our place since one of our flatmates dropped out our first week.”

Not caring that she would smudge her makeup, Y/N ran her hands over her face. “How long did he live there, Nate?”

Silence for a second or two. “Start of second semester till we moved out.”

Y/N let go of a heavy sigh. “Nathan, why didn’t you just tell me?-“

“-I know, I know, I know,” Nathan started, walking into Y/N’s room and sitting down on the floor beside her. “I’m a shite friend.”

“You really fucking are,” Y/N said, swatting Nathan’s hand away when he tried to take hers. “Harry was both of our friend when he lived in Notts those months, and I literally had sex with him.”

Mason took a small step back in pure shock, blinking rapidly as if an eyelash fell onto his eye.

“Don’t I have a right to know you’re living with him?” Y/N asked.

“You do. Of course, you do. I just… I thought I told you at one point, and when I got home and I found out I hadn’t told you… I didn’t know how to break the news.”

“How about just telling me?” Y/N shrugged her shoulders. “Instead of hiding it from me like that.”

“Technically, I didn’t hide anything ‘cause I thought I-“

“-Nathan, I’ll literally skin you alive-“

“-Fine, I should have told you,” he groaned, taking her hand this time and holding it tight in his. “How can I make it up to you?”

Y/N thought for a moment, but came up with the perfect solution. “By coming with me when I go out with my course mates on Friday?”

Nathan just looked at her, blinking once. “My punishment is to… go out with you and your mates?”

“Yes. I barely know them, I need moral support. No matter how bad the person giving me said support actually is.”

Nathan looked down at their hands, patting hers slightly. “I’ll come.”

“Thanks.”

He continued to look down at their hands as Mason’s quiet footsteps back to his room sounded throughout the first floor. “I do have a lecture that finishes at 7pm-“

“-You’ll skip that lecture if you so have to.-”

“-Yes, ma’am,” Nathan answered without hesitation, kissing her hand and getting up from the floor. He gave her a small smile. “And I’m sorry. I know I should’ve told you.”

Y/N nodded. “Is there… Is there more you haven’t told me? In regards to Harry?”

Nathan pretended to think for a few seconds, eyes getting big as if he remembered something.

“Nath?”

He chuckled. “No, nothing.”

Y/N hit him on his calf before he walked away. “You’re bloody buying the first round of drinks on Friday.”

“As I should,” was all Nathan said before he danced off to his room. Y/N picked up her fairylights again, trying to get them out of the messy tangle they were currently in so she could finally make this room look like her and her new home.

Friday, 29 September 2017

Y/N was nervous. She was usually nervous before going someplace she had never been before, or to meet people she had never met, but it was never like this. Her nerves were almost always drowned by her natural eagerness to be around people, to be surrounded by friends and strangers. However, this, her first pre-drinks at uni with other people, had her feeling a little too nervous for her own tastes.

She loved parties. Fuck, if she could party every single day, she would. She did not care about the hangover that came the following day, as long as she had a good time the night before. At home in Nottingham, she would have loved to party as much as she had in London, but for some reason, meeting as many new people as she had, made her nervous for some reason. It was weird to Y/N because she loved making friends, but it was different here. She had yet to figure out what about University that triggered this reaction out of her.

A knock sounded at her door and she grunted, which Nathan took as a good enough sign for him to be allowed entrance. He grinned, sitting down on Y/N’s fluffy dark blue duvet cover and looked his best friend up and down.

“Lush,” he said.

Y/N glanced at the mirror in front of her again, running her hands down her sides. Her black ruched detail ribbed crop top fit her perfectly, making her tits look exceptionally good, and the gold necklace and earrings topped it all off. The crop jeans in light wash blue were tightened at the waist by a black belt with silver eyelets, the black lace up boots made her almost as tall as Nathan. Though Y/N had been out on town in Nottingham with this very same outfit, she was unsure about it now. There was a familiar fear in the back of her head; one that had not visited in a while, one that would lay low until it saw fit to paralyse her. Y/N was experiencing only the tip of the iceberg now. The rest would reveal itself later, it would all melt and drown her in nervous ticks and anxious tendencies.

God, she hated how nervous she was. This was not like her at all. Nathan knew this, which was why he picked up on how unusually quiet his best friend was. He got up from where he was seated on the bed, walking over to Y/N and placing his hands on her shoulders.

“What’s up?”

She took a deep breath, looking at him in the mirror. “You remember the party at Jack Lloyd’s?”

“When we were 17?”

“Yeah, and I was nervous to wear that tight-fitting dress? ‘Cause of my stomach?”

“Yes, even though you had no reason to be nervous.”

She sighed. “Well, I’m feeling like that now,” she admitted. “Not as intensely, but it’s there and… I haven’t felt this nervous about being seen in a long time.”

“What do you mean ‘being seen’?”

“When… When you’ve had and still have a hard time accepting yourself, it’s hard to let others look at your body ‘cause you don’t want to exist outside your own head, if that makes sense? Being seen means people will have an opinion, it means they’ll piece together this image of you before even getting to know you. It means them judging you on your looks alone before they get to actually know you.” Y/N shrugged her shoulders a little, Nathan squeezing them ever so slightly. “My confidence is much better now, but I still have those moments every so often when that 17-year-old girl I used to be will come back and whisper something discouraging into my ear.”

Nathan nodded, wrapping his arms around her neck and bringing her to him. She melted into her best friend, taking a grip of his forearms. “I know it’s much easier said than done, but focus on now. You’ve come so far, and though that 17-year-old is part of the reason why you are who you are today, she’s got nothing to do here. 19-year-old Y/N has come so far, she has no time revisiting the past ‘cause she’s going to a party tonight, and it’ll be fucking fantastic, yeah?”

Y/N chuckled, closing her eyes as Nathan planted an encouraging kiss to her cheek. “Guess you’re right.”

“Of course I fucking am.”

She laughed.

“Now, get your vodka, tequila, sourz, or whatever the fuck you’re drinking, and let’s go.” Nathan let go of her and walked to the door, opening it. “You got Chloe’s address?”

“Yeah, it’s Dinwiddy, flat 10.”

“Uni accommodation?”

Y/N huffed, reaching for her purse and putting it over her shoulder. “Did you expect my first-year mates to live anywhere else?”

“Not really. Dunno why I’m shocked.”

Y/N searched through her purse, checking she had everything she needed before reaching for her plastic bag where her drinks were.

“Still remember when I lived in Coopers Court with Harry and Mason. Oh, how time flies.”

Y/N stopped short, narrowing her eyes. “I still cannot believe you didn’t tell me anything about you living in the same flat as Harry your first year at uni.”

Nathan sighed.

“Cannot believe you didn’t tell me he went to Helmond. Cannot believe you wanted us to live together without at least informing me-“

“-Mate, are we done with this?”

“Don’t think I’ll ever be done. You tricked me into this.”

“I did not.”

“What did you think was gonna happen when I found out?”

“We’ve been over this,” Nathan said. “I didn’t think it’d be that big of a deal. Harry did not react like this when I told him I promised to live with you my second year, your first year.”

Y/N rolled her eyes, having already heard this.

“In fact, he did not mind one bit living with you.”

“I mind living with him.”

“Clearly, or else we wouldn’t still be having this conversation.”

Y/N tutted, walking past Nathan and down the stairs. “I’ll let this argument be for the time being, but expect me to pick it back up again tomorrow when my mind’s not all over the place. I want to be able to fucking destroy you.”

“Great. Can’t wait.”

Y/N and Nathan started walking in the direction of Dinwiddy, the biggest uni accommodation at Helmond, where most students ended up staying. Parmiter Street was a mere 30-minute walk away, and though they could have easily taken the tube, they both knew that it would be best for them to get some fresh air before drinking. Y/N also wanted to walk off some of her anxiety, though she was fairly certain that would not happen. On one hand she was looking forward to meeting Chloe and the rest of her English Lit gang, on the other, she was nervous. Her nerves came more from fear of experiencing the same blinding anxiety she had when she was younger, for that same feeling of helplessness and bottomlessness that it had brought her. What if it appeared when she was drinking? What if it got worse as she got drunk?

She hated how moving away to London and to University had brought her so much doubt. It was like she had to figure out who she was all over again. Here, it was only Nathan who knew her. Well… him and Harry, but the latter did not count. If Y/N so wanted, she could become a new version of herself. She knew that was something uni offered; finding a new you and shaping it into a person you want to be. There were several things Y/N wished she could change about herself. She had a horrible temper, was a little too loud at times, took many things far too personal, and more. She was unsure how much independence and a new environment could help make her a better version of herself, but she hoped Helmond and London could help her to some degree.

Once they arrived at Parmiter Street, Nathan walked straight onto Dinwiddy campus grounds and showed them the way to flat 10. The brown brick buildings rose five storeys high around them, shaping a small T formation with some benches along the stone path where people could sit on the few occasions when the weather would allow it. Nathan had been there the year before, loads of his friends from his Criminology course had lived at Dinwiddy accommodation and therefore hosted pre-drinks there. Nathan knew his way around, and, sure enough, he showed them right to flat 10. On the right hand-side, the first building, Nathan strolled over to the entrance.

He met Y/N’s eyes, trying to get a picture of just how nervous she was. After all, these were her friends, and had they been home in Nottingham, she would not have been this nervous at all. Nathan was not anxious at all, and he had never talked to – never met – Chloe or any of Y/N’s course mates.

“Listen,” Nathan said, giving Y/N a small smile. “If it gets too much, we’ll just go home, yeah? I won’t leave your side.”

Y/N smiled back, nodding her head. “Yeah. I’ll send Chloe a text saying we’re here.”

“We could just ring the doorbell.”

She looked at him. “Nath.”

“Y/N.”

“What were phones invented for if we’re just gonna ring people’s doorbells? I’m sending her a text.”

Nathan reached forward and rang the doorbell, making Y/N raise her eyebrows at him and take a deep breath as not to throw him against the brick building.

“Yes?” came from the speakers beside the doorbells. It was Chloe.

Nathan nudged Y/N, nodding in the direction of the speakers. She glared at him. “It’s Y/N.”

“Ahh, brill!” Chloe unlocked the door for them and Nathan opened it, letting Y/N enter first. They walked over to the stairs, looking at a sign there that showed them flat 10 at the topmost storey.

“They don’t even have a bloody lift, do they?” Y/N asked Nathan as she looked around.

“Gotta walk, mate.”

“Fuck me,” Y/N groaned as they began their ascent.

“I’d rather not.”

Despite herself, Y/N laughed a bit. They made it to the fourth floor, and Y/N knocked on the door as Nathan breathed heavily beside her.

“Hi,” Chloe smiled as she opened the door, stepping aside to let Y/N and Nathan in.

“Hiya,” Y/N smiled back, feeling her heart beat hard inside her chest. Something about Chloe’s smile, the reminder that she had invited Y/N over, that she wanted her there, settled atop Y/N’s shoulders, making them sag to a comfortable level. “Brought my housemate, hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all!” Chloe said, turning to Nathan.

“Nathan,” he smiled. “Thanks for letting me come here.”

“Don’t mention it,” Chloe said, closing the door and showing them the way down a corridor towards the shared living space where a heavy bass was throbbing. The fluorescent lights overhead in the hallway resembled those at a petrol station, making Y/N squint as she entered the living room. There sat everyone she had the pleasure of meeting earlier that week. Hayden, Annalise, and Thian were all around the table with a glass each to drink. Y/N smiled at them, waving her hand as they all grinned back at her. She still felt like she was intruding.

“Y/N, Nathan, do you like sambuca?” Chloe asked, walking over to the kitchen bench to fetch plastic shot glasses.

“Never say no to sambuca, ey?” Nathan grinned, nodding for Y/N to go sit down so he could follow her lead. “We’ll have a shot each of you’re handing out.”

“I am, indeed,” Chloe said, getting two shot glasses and walking over to the table, placing the glasses in front of Nathan who looked absolutely ecstatic.

“Thanks, babe,” Y/N said.

“You lot playing a drinking game?” Nathan asked, getting his drinks out to mix them all together into his paper cup.

“Yeah, we’re playing Never Have I Ever,” Hayden answered. “However, if no one drinks, everyone’s got to take a sip except for the person asking, but the person asking’s gotta take two if no one drinks.”

“Ahh, alright,” Nathan said. “Creative. Love it.”

“This is Y/N’s friend, Nathan, by the way, guys,” Chloe said as she came back over with shots for everyone.

“Oh, yeah, this is Nathan. He’s a second-year, we live in a flat together in Haggerston.” Y/N suddenly felt stupid for not introducing him right away so that Chloe had to. She felt her cheeks heat up, but she refused to look like she felt headless. Instead, she got her vodka and cranberry juice out, mixing it as Nathan spoke beside her.

“We’ve known each other forever, so she moved in with me and my flatmates this year instead of moving into uni accommodation,” he elaborated.

“You knew each other in Nottingham?” Chloe asked, and, for some reason, the fact that Chloe remembered that made Y/N feel all kinds of warm.

“Yeah, been best friends for years.”

“How nice that you got to live together here,” Chloe smiled in Nathan’s direction, then at Y/N.

“It is, isn’t it?” Nathan said, looking at Y/N and giving her a small wink before going back to his drink.

“Right, we need to take advantage of being first-years and get drunk as often as possible,” Thian said. “So, tonight needs to be good.”

“It’ll be good regardless,” Annalise retorted, taking one of the shots from the tray Chloe had brought to the table.

“Where are we going, anyway?” Hayden asked.

Thian nodded. “Pub or club?”

“Don’t really feel like clubbing tonight, you know what I mean?” Chloe asked, the other three coming with exclamations of agreement or nodding slightly. “Pub then?”

“We have a pub right by us,” Nathan said. “Only 30 minutes away and it’s the best one in Haggerston, in my opinion anyway.”

Y/N wrinkled her nose some. “The Stag’s Head?”

“Yeah, it’s always full and they sometimes got live music and everything.”

“We could go there, yeah,” Chloe said. “If everyone’s in.”

“Could we take a bus there?” Hayden asked.

“30 minutes isn’t a long walk, though,” Chloe chuckled. “As long as Nathan and Y/N show the way, we won’t get lost.”

“Don’t count on my navigational skills when I’m under the influence, babes,” Nathan said, making the others laugh.

“We’re better off using Google Maps, he might just show the way to the Gregg’s by Dalston Kingsland where he thinks the entire staff’s got a crush on him,” Y/N said before taking a sip of her drink, laughter erupting again. It felt good, like a pat on the shoulder, and Y/N instantly eased. Maybe she had not lost her old self at all, maybe she could still feel at ease, even around new people.

“They all flirt with me, and who can blame them?” Nathan shrugged his shoulders, whipping his head to the side so his lush, curly red hair dangled at the top of his head, grinning his wide smile and making the lip piercing shine in the fluorescent lights overhead.

The rest of the night went on, and it was easier to talk to everyone as time progressed. Not only because Y/N got more and more intoxicated, but she also just felt better after getting to know them all. Hayden always laughed the loudest, and their laughter was also very infectious, making it hard not to chuckle along with them. Annalise, though she sometimes stuttered over a few English words, was incredibly considerate and would urge Y/N to continue on with her story when others did not hear her. Thian offered Y/N tons of shots and complimented her on her outfit, making it easier for Y/N to feel good and seen, as she had been terrified of back at the flat. Chloe was easily the boss, and did most of the talking, though no one seemed to mind. After all, Chloe had introduced everyone to everyone, so people knew her the best out of everyone.

As time went on, Y/N just felt better. It was easier to talk to everyone and, at one point, she thought she was back at home in Nottingham, introducing herself to strangers at a party. They all made it easy to forget just how nervous she had been. It made her look forward to seeing them in her other lectures and seminars the coming week and all those weeks after that. Maybe these were the people she would spend her time at University with, and that excited her.

Bottles emptied and the volume inside the uni flat had increased massively. It was close to 9 when Chloe suggested they leave, and assured Y/N that she could leave the little she had left of her vodka at her place to pick up another day. Y/N took her up on the offer, insides warm from both alcohol and Chloe’s hospitality.

Nathan showed the way towards Haggerston and The Stag’s Head, arm entwined with Y/N’s for most of the way there. At one point however, Y/N let go of him and ended up walking beside Annalise and Thian, talking about one of the texts they had to read by Tuesday. It was such a mundane conversation, complaining about course work and talking about coming deadlines, that it felt like they had been mates for ages. The chat flowed so easily, the laughter rolled off their tongues, and it just made sense for all of them to be together, walking along the dark London streets in their tipsy states, making their way towards what would hopefully be the first of many trips to a pub.

They arrived at Orsman Road and they could hear The Stag’s Head before they saw it. Y/N had never paid it much attention. She knew she would end up popping by once or twice during her time at uni, but she had not envisioned her checking it out that first week. Nathan held the door open for everyone, resting a hand at Y/N’s back as he followed her indoors last.

The pub was small, but Y/N was sure that it was bigger than it appeared late on a Friday evening. Straight ahead, in a V formation, stood the bar, a wall filled with bottles of all alcohol imaginable behind it, lit up by red light which fit the dark red of the counter surrounding it. Far down to the left, it seemed the rest of the pub disappeared from view, but judging by the stairs Y/N could see, she supposed there was a loo somewhere in that direction, and it also looked to be where one could go to reach the smoking area. People were both sat and stood by the bar as well as booths along the walls. What appeared to be the stage further down to the right was unoccupied by any performers, though a few lads stood there with a pint each. There were no free tables, and this put a damper on the mood quite quickly.

Nathan, however, pulled them all towards the smoking area and they were all pleasantly surprised to see a free table and two benches untouched. Fairylights hung over the outdoor space, from the house and over to the fence on the other side. It lit up just enough, made it possible to see, but not too bright for people to squint when walking out into the night. A few empty pints and a smoky ash tray stood in the middle of the table, but Nathan put the glasses on the brick fence before everyone sat down.

“Alright, I’ll pay for your drink,” Nathan said, smiling at Y/N. “Anyone wanna come to the bar? Y/N’ll watch the table.”

“Ah, yes.” Chloe got up, the rest of the gang following along and walking towards one of the two entrances to the pub. Y/N got her phone out, looking to see if she had any notifications she had to check out, but there were none. She was about to resolve to scrolling aimlessly through Instagram, when she heard a slightly familiar voice.

“Hi there.” Mason sat down on the edge of the opposite bench, a cigarette in hand and a small smile on his lips. “Didn’t know you and Nath would come here tonight.”

“Oh, hiya,” Y/N smiled. “No, we didn’t know where we’d go after pre-drinks. He suggested this place, so we brought some of my course mates with us here.”

“You going out later?”

“No, think we’re just gonna stay here.”

“Yeah, this is a chill place,” Mason said, puffing out some smoke.

“This is my first time here.”

Mason raised his eyebrows. “Is it?”

Y/N smiled. “You think I should’ve come here earlier?”

“More to do with the fact that our flat just loves this place, thought Nathan would’ve at least taken you here already.”

“He did now.”

“It’s my favourite pub around here, and Harry-“

“-Mase!” Nathan exclaimed, grinning as he came over with two gin and tonics. “You’re here as well!”

“Yeah, it’s a Friday night, innit?”

“Hi,” Chloe said, sitting down beside Mason with a wide grin on her face. It seemed like she wanted to introduce herself or to be introduced, but before Y/N could say anything, the conversation resumed.

“Hey,” Mason answered, looking back to Nathan who seemed to be ecstatic to see one of his flatmates. “Hear you haven’t taken Y/N here till now.”

Nathan sighed. “Not like I didn’t want to, just haven’t gotten the opportunity.”

“What’s so good about this place?” Y/N asked, looking from Nathan to Mason.

“Just close, innit? Also, it’s crowded, but it’s not as crowded as most pubs down by Kingsland Road,” Nathan elaborated.

“You lot have a good night, yeah? Need to get back to my mates.” Mason leaned past Chloe, stumping the rest of his cigarette into the ashtray before he got up, walking over to a big group of lads. Chloe stared after him as the rest of the conversation around the table started back up again, Y/N pretended to not see how she was checking him out. It felt like she was intruding on a moment that was not meant for anyone but Mason to see.

“You’re living with him?” Chloe asked.

“Yeah.”

“He’s well fit.”

“Guess.”

Chloe giggled. “You’re taking the rule to not shag one of your flatmates seriously, then?”

“Shouldn’t everyone?” Thian asked, furrowing his brows. “It only complicates everything.”

“How? It’s only a shag. It’s not like you’re gonna fall in love with them,” Chloe said.

“Can’t really control your emotions, though.” Nathan shrugged. “Two of my flatmates last year shagged. He had feelings for her, she just wanted a one night stand. Didn’t end well.”

Y/N put her drink back down on the table after a long sip. “Well, if you’re clear beforehand and make it clear that it’s only for this night and there’s no emotions behind it other than temporary bliss, then that’s okay, isn’t it?”

“Nah,” Hayden said, shaking their head. “It’s an unwritten rule. Don’t shag your flatmates.”

“Is it a serious rule?” Annelise asked, furrowing her brows.

“It’s got serious consequences,” Hayden answered.

“But if you’re both aware it’s only a one time thing, then is it serious?” Y/N asked.

“Babe, sex is complicated. You’re always just gonna be connected in a way, you know?” Nathan said.

“I can promise you I’m not connected to Ollie Lee in any way, shape, or form,” Y/N huffed, sipping her drink again as Nathan laughed, the other joining in because of Y/N’s obvious distaste in this Ollie Lee.

“Was he awful in bed?” Chloe asked, smiling as she looked between Nathan and Y/N.

“No, I was just desperate one night last year.” Y/N rolled her eyes at herself. “Let’s just say that mid-shag he asked me if I had to go to the toilet, and when I said no, he told me that whenever I felt like I had to, just pee on him instead.”

Gasps erupted around the table, and a second later, everyone started howling with laughter. Nathan kept on hitting his thigh, leaning into Y/N and laughing. Though it was a fairly embarrassing story on Y/N’s part, her definite lowest of low, she could not help feeling good about making everyone laugh like this. Looking around at everyone, she suddenly felt very good about herself, despite this being her worst sex story ever.

It was not like Y/N had fucked her way through Nottingham and had tons of stories to tell. In fact, she hadn’t shagged that many. She had had sex with eight people, three of them being women, one non-binary, and the other four men. She had been very vocal about the fact that the best sexual encounters she had had, were with women. They had all been so nice, and though it had never escalated to anything romantic beyond that one night together, they had made Y/N feel the best she’d ever felt. She suspected women just knew what to do, that they cared how she felt and did not solely care about their own release.

The group ended up just sitting around and talking for a while. It was nice to go somewhere outside of the uni setting and get to know some people, this was what uni was all about, or so Nathan had told her countless times. These people were as anxious about making friends and being liked as she was, but there they all were, making friends and going outside their own comfort zone.

At one point, Y/N had finished her drink and went to get another round for her and Nathan. The pub seemed to be even more packed now that it was closer to midnight. Everyone wanted to drink the week away, to forget about their lives for a little while and just spend time in good company. Y/N strolled over to the bar, looking up and down the counter to see if any of the bartenders were free to help her. The second her eyes landed on a familiar figure, she halted.

Harry’s eyes were already on hers as he stood almost right opposite her mixing a drink. He let go of a sigh, looking down at whatever he was mixing.

“You…” she started, raising her eyebrows. “You’ve got to be fucking everywhere.”

“Only ‘cause you’re every single place I usually am,” he said, continuing to make whatever drink he was making.

“Do you work here then?”

He looked over at her, raising one of his eyebrows. “I’m not a hallucination now?”

Y/N rolled her eyes.

“Can’t believe you thought I was a bloody hallucination.”

“Believe it. It’s all Nathan’s fault anyway. I’ll never forgive him for forcing me to live with you for a year.”

Harry let out a dry laugh. “To answer your question: no, thought I’d help out behind the bar to get me adrenaline going.”

“Well funny,” Y/N said. “You got me cracking up, can you tell?”

“Last time I checked, I got you laughing pretty hard, yeah.”

“That’s literally two years ago now.”

Harry finished the drink, putting it in a glass and placing it in front of the person standing just beside Y/N. Her eyes first landed on the watch on his wrist, the nice brown leather, and then her gaze travelled upward. She looked up at the man who was already staring at her, giving him a smile when she smiled at him. Their eye contact was put to an abrupt end when Harry poked the man’s hand holding the drink with the card machine. Y/N looked back at Harry, and then at another man with strong build and big, curly hair who stepped into view beside Harry.

“I’ll take care of her, Kai,” Harry said.

This Kai looked at Harry, blinking once before he met Y/N’s eyes again.

“She’s my flatmate,” Harry elaborated, making Kai study Y/N a bit more closely before he nodded once. He was very good looking, with a broad nose, almond-shaped eyes, and full lips, his brown skin glowed in the dim lights of the pub.

“That new one,” Kai said.

“Yeah.”

Kai smiled then, nodding in Y/N’s direction. “Nice of you to come check on Hazza. It’s always hectic on Fridays.”

“Oh, our other flatmate took me here, I didn’t come by choice.”

Kai’s eyebrows rose on his face and he looked at Harry who barked out a laugh, shrugging his shoulders at Kai as they exchanged a look. Harry walked over to stand right in front of her, signalling to Kai that he could take care of this one. Kai walked off, taking someone else’s order.

“Even feistier than I remember, you are,” Harry said.

She cocked her head to the side as Harry gathered a glass for her drink, already assuming that was what she was going to get. “You didn’t seem to have a problem with it before.”

It left her lips before she even registered she was thinking it. Harry only took a deep breath before meeting Y/N’s eyes again, clearly choosing to ignore her statement. “What can I get you, Y/N?”

“Sex on the Beach, please,” she said. “Two of them.”

“Alright.” Harry started making them right away, signalling to someone that he’d be right with them after this. Y/N looked around her, meeting the gaze of the man who had just stood by her at the bar. He raised his glass in her direction and she smiled back. She definitely had to go talk to him after this. He seemed to be a bit older, maybe five years older than her, but just for tonight, she did not care.

Y/N glanced back at Harry and watched him, fascinated by how fast he managed to make the drinks. “How long have you worked here, then?”

“A year abouts,” Harry said. “Worked in a hotel when we moved to Brum. Tended to work at the bar when the bartender was out.”

Y/N nodded, eyes on his hands as he poured ice, shots, and all types of alcohol and liquids into her drink. “You lived there till you moved to London?”

“Yeah.” They were quiet for a moment, both of them remembering all of the things that were left unsaid between them. All of those words, moments, and memories they had created during those months the two of them had crossed paths in Nottingham.

He cleared his throat as he put the drinks down in front of her. “If it makes you feel any better, I didn’t much like Brum.”

Y/N took a grip of the glasses. “And why’s that?”

“Dunno. Just didn’t find my footing proper.”

“In the two years you lived there?”

He shrugged. “Guess not.”

Y/N clicked her tongue. “Was it that bad?”

“Nah, I met tons of ace people and Birmingham’s a decent place, but…” He shrugged again. “Dunno.”

“Hmm,” she said, trying to decipher his words and if he was being truthful or not.

“Anyway,” Harry said, nodding to the drinks. “Take that other drink to Nathan – as I’m sure it’s for him – and when you bring that middle-aged man home later: please, be quiet. I have rugby at 11 tomorrow morning.”

Y/N’s mouth fell open. “How dare-“

“-Y/N, what’s taking so fucking long?” Nathan shouted as he came up next to her. His eyes fell on Harry behind the bar. “Oh… forgot to tell you Harry works here.”

“Nath, shut the fuck up,” Y/N said, looking from Nathan and back at Harry.

Harry nodded towards the door, silently telling them to fuck off, and they did. They walked back to the rest who were still sitting by the same table outside. Nathan took his drink from Y/N and sat down, but just as Y/N was about to sit down, she heard someone clear their throat behind her. She looked over her shoulder rather fast, blinking a few too many times when she locked eyes with the same man who had been standing beside her by the bar.

“Hi,” he said, giving her a broad smile.

Y/N almost felt herself blush. “Hey.”

“I’m George.”

She smiled. “Y/N.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Y/N,” he said, he gestured at the bench where she had just been about to sit down. “Mind if I sit down with you?”

Her smile widened. “Not at all.”

Y/N felt fucking terrible. Her room was too hot, too humid. Body sticky with sweat, limbs aching, throat burning with yesterday’s alcohol, and head throbbing, she opened her eyes slowly before shutting them again, groaning into her pillow. She hated herself for not drinking as much water before bed as she usually did when coming home from a night out. Sitting up, she looked down at the man beside her, racking her brain to remember what his name was. She ran her hands over her face, reaching for her glasses so she could see something, but quickly realising she left her contact lenses in the night before. Her eyes were so dry it hurt to blink and she suddenly realised why her head was hurting more than normal. Cursing herself, Y/N got out of bed with her glasses perched at the top of her head, picking up a tee shirt and some tights, pulling on her fluffy dressing gown before she made her way out of her room as soundlessly as possible.

She stumbled her way to the bathroom, locking the door behind her. First thing she did was take her contacts out, struggling to do so as the contacts were so dry, her eyes having dried out with them. She splashed water in her face next, then drank the equivalent to the Atlantic Ocean before splashing even more water on her face. She then put her glasses on, realising that she had to let her eyes relax some after what she had just put them through. It took her awhile to gather up the courage to go to the toilet, where she made herself throw up the nausea she was feeling before having a very long peeing session.

Moments of the night before came rushing back to her, and as she sat there on the toilet, she remembered more and more. The name George came to her like out of a fog, and then the details started falling into place. She remembered how he’d bought her more drinks, how the two of them had sat talking all night about nothing in particular. She remembered his hand on her thigh and him leaning into her to whisper in her ear. Then they were in her room, her front against the mattress and his weight on her back. It was all hazy after that, most of it just a mess of limbs and chasing a release that she had never caught up with. Though Y/N usually made it clear that she hadn’t come, she was too worn out to tell George. She remembered falling asleep almost the second they were done. To say she had been underwhelmed was an understatement.

When she was done, she walked down the stairs for the kitchen. Once again, she was left stopping right in her tracks as she walked in. Harry stood by the stove, eyes on the pan in front of him where he was making eggs, a few asparagus and peppers cooking beside the two frying eggs. For a moment, she debated walking back upstairs and leaving Harry to it, but then he glanced over at the door to his right, meeting her eyes right away. He gave her a tight-lipped smile before turning back to his breakfast. God… Y/N wanted to set herself on fire. It’d be better than staying inside a room with Harry alone after years apart.

He wore rugby shorts that reached mid-thigh, a white tee shirt to go with it, and a hairband to keep his hair out of his face. Y/N realised just then that he was getting ready to leave for rugby as he had told her yesterday he would. She could remember him doing rugby when they knew each other three years ago as well, but she didn’t think he’d still be doing it.

The small conversation they had in The Stag’s Head the night before lingered in the air between and around them. That was reason enough to turn and walk upstairs again. But as Y/N remembered who was waiting for her in her room, she stepped into the kitchen. She got two slices of bread and put them in the toaster, getting some butter and milk out of the fridge as she waited. She watched Harry’s back as she filled the kettle with enough water, quickly looking away when he moved to put his eggs on the two slices of bread on his plate. Biting her lip, Y/N got a mug and a teabag, looking back over at Harry as he stood holding his breakfast plate. Y/N took a deep breath, knowing exactly what she had to do.

“Okay,” she said only a second before Harry turned around to face her, mouth open as if to say something. He must have noticed the tension as well. “We need to talk this through. We can’t live together for the next year if it’s gonna be like this. Just gonna put that out there right away.”

“Yeah,” Harry sighed. “I’ve been thinking the same thing.”

Y/N leaned her hip against the counter, feeling relieved that she was not the only one out of the two that had thought about how incredibly awkward this was. “You’ve thought about it too?”

“Of course. I’ve been fuming ‘cause Nathan didn’t tell you sooner, and I’ve also found it annoying how I’m the bad guy in your eyes when this wouldn’t have happened if it wasn’t for Nate.”

Y/N rolled her eyes. “I haven’t thought of you as the bad guy-“

“-Y/N,” Harry said, putting his plate down on the counter again. “You’ve been angry at me this whole time. I can tell.”

“My frustration with you has got nothing to do with this situation, but all to do with how you just left without even saying goodbye before you moved away.” Y/N crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m trying to not blame you for this as well, but you’re right, Nathan’s the one that made this happen, we should be angry with him.”

“So you have been mad at me.”

“Well, you’re here, aren’t you?” Y/N narrowed her eyes. “Isn’t it just easier, no matter how stupid the reason, to just find more things to make you angry at a person? To make you hate them even more? Isn’t it just satisfying to find other ways to be frustrated with them?”

“No.”

“You’re no fun.”

“I am.”

“Anyway,” Y/N continued, getting her bread slices out of the toaster to put butter on them. “Why didn’t we say anything? If we’ve both thought it’s been awkward, I mean.”

“You’ve been busy shagging men 10 years older than you, I didn’t get the chance.”

“Look at you not being frustrated or annoyed with me.”

“I told you to be quiet last night,” Harry said, getting a fork and putting some asparagus and paprika in his mouth. “You weren’t.”

Y/N got the kettle as it finished, pouring some hot water into her mug. “So, what you’re saying is that you’ve been angry with me.”

“Not angry, just…” Harry sighed. “Fine. A little angry last night, yes.”

Y/N smiled. “And he wasn’t 10 years older than me, he’s five years older.” She paused. “I think.”

“Right,” Harry said, eating more of his breakfast. “Listen…” He swallowed. “I think we should just… We should just address it.”

“Yeah.”

They were both quiet, looking at the other and waiting for them to say what they were both thinking. Though it looked like he was about to reach for his bread to take a bite, Harry stopped himself. Instead, he took a deep breath, and said, “It was fucking terrible. That first time…” He trailed off, narrowing his eyes before he ran a hand over his face, remembering it all over again. “I didn’t even last a minute. It was mortifying.”

“It wasn’t half as mortifying as you trying to go down on me afterwards.”

Harry let out a small laugh. “Yeah, that wasn’t really…” He sighed. “I’m sorry.”

“No, we were both part of it. You don’t have to apologise for that.”

“You hear all these stories about how losing your virginity is supposed to be so beautiful, but it’s not. It’s really fucking not. Especially if you lose it to someone else who hasn’t had sex before, it just makes it double as awkward.”

Y/N nodded. “It was shit. Both of us were shit.”

“Exactly.”

“But I hope you know the reason I’m frustrated with you isn’t because of that.”

Harry looked away, biting at his bottom lip before he said, “Yeah, I know why.”

“Good, just wanted that to be clear.”

Harry nodded, taking his bread slice in his hand, making sure the egg wouldn’t fall off before he brought it to his mouth. “Well, now that we’ve addressed that, let’s just move on.”

“Let’s.”

She gave him a small smile before taking her teabag out of her mug and throwing it in the bin. There was still some tension in the room, but not enough for Y/N to want to set herself on fire like she had wanted to before. Just as she was about to take a grip of her plate and cuppa, the sounds of footsteps made her look up. George, who had been asleep last time Y/N checked, walked by the kitchen, halting as he saw Y/N and Harry standing there in the kitchen. He gave them both a smile Y/N could tell was forced, and then walked straight for the door without a single word or a second glance. Y/N and Harry looked at one another, sharing a look before they both chuckled ever so slightly.

“Cracking bloke,” Harry mumbled.

“Innit,” Y/N huffed, picking up her breakfast. “Have fun at rugby practice.”

“Cheers.”

She walked by him, hoping that her room did not smell of George or anything resembling alcohol or sweat. If it did, she would hit her head against the wall. But, lucky for her, George had left the door open, which had given the room a little bit of time to get the smell of last night out. After putting on her fluffy duvet cover, she opened the windows to let some fresh air in, and left her door open as she sat down in bed with her laptop, tea, and breakfast.

Just as she was about to put her plate down on the nightstand, she noticed something already laying there on top of her books. Adjusting her glasses, Y/N squinted at the object. She put her plate down on her duvet cover and reached for the wristwatch George had left. It was the nice leather one she had seen last night by the bar, the one that had caught her attention first. The digital clock seemed to have stopped working, displaying a random time that Y/N in her hangover state could not tell anyone what was. She was too fucked to even try and understand the numbers in front of her.

She put the clock back on her desk, hoping that she’d run into George soon so she could give it back to him. Or maybe Nathan could stalk Facebook and find him so she could message him there to tell him. She was glad she hadn’t exchanged phone numbers with George as she did not want to meet him again, but right now, she wanted to give him his watch back.

Y/N heard the front door open and then close, indicating that Harry had just left for rugby, and, as far as she could tell, she was the only one currently awake in her flat. The morning was quiet, she felt oddly at peace as she put on Fleabag and sipped her cuppa, and little did she know, this would be one of those rare moments over the last three years that this emotion inhabited her body.

NEXT UPDATE: Sunday, 7th March, 9PM GMT!

Huge thanks to my AMAZING beta reader! 🏛️ @aileenacoustic 🏛️ @devil-in-bw-the-sheets 🏛️ @sunflowerstache 🏛️ @fromyourstrulyh 🏛️

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