#ycmal verse

[youcouldmakealife]

Masking, YCMAL edition

So, after the general info on masking, here's how it specifically looks like and impacts some of the 'verse's characters.

I think I kind of need to preface this with the fact that a lot of my characters have neurodivergent traits because, well. I do. I don't know how a neurotypical person thinks, the same way a neurotypical person doesn't know how a neurodivergent person thinks. You can read about the experience, and, despite shitty stereotypes to the contrary, you can empathize with it, but the wiring of the brain is literally different.

So when I'm listing characters here as neurodivergent, I either a) set out to write them that way or b) in hindsight can't deny that their experiences are written through a very specifically neurodivergent lens. Someone not being explicitly labelled as ND doesn't necessarily mean they aren't, I just..really don't want to go back through my entire 'verse applying diagnoses the same way I happily slap an MBTI or enneagram or kindergarten teacher/assassin label on them, because that feels wrong.

But if you're neurodivergent and see something in a particular character that makes you feel seen, I'm not going to tell you 'nah man, they're actually neurotypical'. Especially because literally every single one of them was written by someone neurodivergent.

Anyway! Canonically ND characters and their masks:

David: masks extensively. Generally does his best for 'unobtrusive, pay no attention', unsure why it doesn't seem to work (mostly because he's talented and beautiful, so it seems less 'unobtrusive' and more 'I think I'm better than you', which isn't helped by the fact that often when the mask does slip, it's to show frustration, contempt, or disdain -- think at the All-Star Game his rookie year, or several points early on with Jake. Also does not help that he often does think he's better than people.)

Bryce: Still laughing at 'straightsona' used to describe Bryce out with his teammates, because it's perfect. His 'I don't care, I'm hot as shit, bitches love me' dickhead behaviour was him picking up those behaviours from popular peers and teammates over the years, partly mistaking that for the reason they were popular (rather than being seen as boy kings making them callous or arrogant), and partly viewing them as the exemplar of someone no one would predict was gay. Jared's worst enemy.

Speaking of, honourable mention to Raf Sanchez AND Julius Halla here, Jared's going around collecting neurodivergent loved ones all through IJ(aoe).

James: 'unobtrusive, pay no attention', much more successfully than David, partly because he has a mouthpiece in the form of Finn. His crashing after road trips is partly extended overstimulation and change, but it's also having to wear the mask more extensively, because he has much less time to himself, especially when he shared a room. (He's mostly unmasked with Finn, that's why Finn is his exception to a lot of No People things, but he wasn't at the beginning).

Holden: Also kind of 'I don't care, I'm hot as shit, bitches love me', but...ironically? He doesn't mask as much as the others, and because of that, he frequently drives away people who originally seem to like him and wonders why. Has been described as 'a lot'.

Fiona: Literally will not leave the house without a full face of makeup and a pair of heels or she'll feel exposed and vulnerable, and putting her make up on is how she prepares to be Outside Fiona. She's very perky and friendly at work. The second she gets home it's an 'uggggh' moment and straight into the shower to decompress/literally unmask. She's more aware than any of the guys that she's putting on a performance, partly because she grew up with all those 'girls are expected to be...' followed by a list of things she definitively wasn't. Has also been described as 'a lot'.

Finn: And How May I Be of Service To You Today?

Now this is where it gets kind of interesting because like -- people often have facades. That's not a neurodivergent only thing. People can be fake, or posture, or pretend to be something they're not. Mike, for example, will lean into the big macho asshole when he's put on the defensive, Willy is Always Performing, Thomas is sunshine even when he doesn't really feel like being that, Robbie will play the buffoon to make people laugh if he thinks they need it, half of Joey's rants are playing to the cheap seats.

Like, there's a difference between pretending you're somebody else sometimes, or behaving inauthentically, and full on 'yeah, they're masking'.

But Georgie is masking. Georgie is, at all times, evaluating his surroundings, monitoring people's emotions and reactions (especially to him), and behaving in the manner he thinks is most likely to lead to his being liked. And he was already doing that when Robbie met him, but it's intensified significantly since.

I think that's where the biggest difference lies between some of the above ND characters and Georgie? David, for example, doesn't care if he's liked (like, yes he does, but also...no). The mask is for safety/to minimize vulnerability. David's in particular was tweaked to get praise and avoid criticism from his parents (didn't work), teachers, and coaches (worked much better), not so much for his peers.

But Georgie's isn't for safety. Georgie doesn't manage his behaviour to avoid harm, Georgie wants people to like him. And he's discovered that people don't seem to like him when he does certain things, or acts certain ways, or needs things from them, so he just...doesn't do those things.

Finn's interesting because he has both forms. Please like him it'll break his heart if you don't.

[freddieandersen]

niche posting but @ycmal-verse enjoyers: Challengers is like if instead of fighting over Evan, Harry and Roman were fighting over/negotiating polyamory with/being psychosexually manipulated by Playoff Willy

[princesstillyenna]

I do want this job, it’s very exciting and will teach me new skills in my field. And, as much as it pains me to say this (grew up as a Pens fan), I do like watching Carter Hart and Gritty…. Currently planning on getting non hockey friends to visit so I can introduce them to the chaos that is Gritty (and Philly fans). Hope all is well with you and small.

There are worse places for a pens fan to be, at least you'll be close for the battle of pennyslvania games?? Also there's a ycmal verse story about a pens fan and a flyers player and you could go live that life...

I am in truly disgusting amounts of pain 😭😭😭 which sucks but is like a normal part of my life but is pretty shitty.

Mini me is doing super well, she got a merit on her first ever performance exam (like poetry reading stuff) AND she just got approved as good enough to take her gymnastics grading which she is super stoked about. She's finally old enough at school to be doing lessons all day long (up to 7 in the UK, you mostly do play based learning which is super good for children) and my tiny nerd is loving it. She's also super stoked that hockey is back and over the summer we did more skate school where she learnt to skate backwards and also do tiny spins.

Good luck with the new job nonny :D go be a sleeper agent pens fan.

[leonify]

Okay. All right. @youcouldmakealife is bringing the drama and I’m just being swept along in joey’s tidal wave of emotions

[nervous-breakdown-hat]

In which Stephen attempts to bully Jared, but Jared is too drunk to notice

[luckylindsey]

The first photo is a chart I made weeks ago to keep track of @youcouldmakealife​ characters. Once I figured out Jared was getting traded, I was completely convinced that he would end up connecting to someone way across the page and I’d have to use another 7 pages of paper to figure out how to connect (almost) everyone.

Spoilers and updated chart under the cut!

Joke was on me and/or Jared was fated to go to Vancouver because Vancouver/Gabe is one of the only things that I could easily link him to in my chart. I only had to find my teal and blue gel pens and it was done!

This is by no means exhaustive; for example, I’m pretty sure Adam and Hank played together with the California Golden Seals in the early 2010s before they were traded to Pittsburgh and Detroit respectively, but there was no way for me to make this work where they could connect. Additionally, with the exception of Kiro and Sandro, who each connects between no less than four main characters, I did not include secondary characters because while it would be easy enough to connect Zach/Colorado and Anton/Vinny/Montreal via Connors, the timeline of Connors going to Montreal vs Sandro going to San Jose and the connections over time in that bottom right corner makes my head hurt. 

And if you’re not sure who some of these characters are, I am a patron subscriber so they exist – I promise I did not make them up. And for patroners who notice that some of them are not included –– I didn’t actually know what teams some characters played for or had no connections (e.g. Harholtz/Wright-Moore from the LA Kings.)

Finally, don’t ask me what I’m going to do if Georgie’s eventual team is not the Buffalo Sabres. (Spoiler: I’ll probably use another 7 pages of paper and cry the whole time.)

[ycmal]

Hello! Im hoping you can help, when starting David Chapman/Jake Lourdes, is it best to read coming in first place or the PDF that has the full story? im a bit confused

Hi!

I love the original story to pieces, but the published book is more polished and has a lot of extra content that is not in the pdf. And I do mean a lot. I’d suggest buying the book (if money is not an issue) and then when you finish, if you cannot wait (which I would totally understand, I wouldn’t be able to haha) continue with the pdf. The book is about the 13 first parts/chapters of that pdf, if I recall properly!

This is my (Ana) personal opinion. Maybe somebody wants to comment with their own?

[davidchapman]

When your boyfriend is scowling at his best friend for taking a photo but it's one of the only pictures you have of you two together, so it goes on the fridge

[little-magicpuff]

@youcouldmakealife

Would Vinny wear this weird shirt I own, yes/no?

[youcouldmakealife]

Are there any characters where you've thought: in another universe, if these two had met first, they might have been interesting to write about?

There are a few, honestly. Every time I write Robbie and Willy interacting, I'm reminded that they get along famously. (Not surprising, really, considering Willy and Georgie have a lot in common with each other), and Robbie/Matty was genuinely considered. I could be convinced to ship Jared Matheson with half of his friends if Bryce hadn't been so clearly it for him.

And of course, it's a setup was originally intended to be Joey/Owen. It genuinely was. But then Scratch started talking and his banter-y chemistry with Joey was so compelling and fun to write that it changed the entire direction of the series.

Growing up in fandom, I'm pretty mellow about pairings (not an 'OTP or death' shipper here), especially with small fandoms where you can't be picky or you'll have nothing to read.

In fact, back in the day, when I was feeling stuck on what to write I'd write a bunch of names on strips of paper, separately do the same with some prompts, pick a couple names, a prompt, and boom, there was my fic writing exercise for the day.

Some combinations really didn't work, and the writing was deleted at the end of the day. Some surprisingly did, and became proper fics. Either way I had fun, wrote more than I would have otherwise, and usually learned something new about the characters.

I think that exercise would apply itself pretty nicely to the YCMAL 'verse, especially since, with very few exceptions, every character already has a pretty major thing in common. Well. Two. Hockey and also, with even fewer exceptions, being completely unreasonable people.

[poprocksromance]

@youcouldmakealife’s Thrown Off the Ice ripped my fucking heart out just like I knew it would.

[kit-moosebuckle]

I just finished Thrown Off The Ice

by @youcouldmakealife and that’s it, the rest of today is cancelled, I have never excreted so many tears and so much mucus. I need pizza and ice cream, this pain will never end, how dare you Taylor, that last chapter BROKE me. Here is the angst, where is the comfort?????????????

in pizza and ice cream, that’s where.

READ IT I GUESS. IF YOU LIKE HOCKEY GAYS AND TRAGEDY.

[leonify]

Thank you for the Joey and Scratch art. They're so cute! Also I had been having trouble visualizing them since this wasn't a series that focused on their attraction to each other so it's really nice to have these imagines in my mind.

Thank you so much!! Haha I love hearing that. Allow me to provide you with some quick tv watching to add to your mental image:

[kit-moosebuckle]

Someone podficced my Gabe/Stephen & Bryce/Jared grad student AU! This is the first podfic of anything I have written! I’m feeling so happy and squirmy inside! 🥰

Gift from @aliteralgarbageheap to sylviarachel

[luckylindsey]

I have determined that for some reason, posting this as a link makes it disappear into a literal void, so third time’s the charm

I made a thing! I may go back and change the thing to add more questions later because there’s so many characters, but for now, I present:

Which YCMAL character are you?

It has most of the main characters and takes a lot of things directly from the @youcouldmakealife blog, and hopefully it’s something fun to do while most of us are not having much of a fun time at the moment!

[ycmal]

Is there a ycmal discord server, and/or would people be interested in making one? I have no real-life friends who've been willing to read any of the verse, and at least at the moment I've got plenty of time to make online ones.

Hi!

There is one, and I can invite you if you want (I think, I’m very bad at discord) but it has been inactive for a couple of years! I’m posting this so that you can see if people are interested in a new one or resurrecting the old one or something :D