#you're so cool and I would talk more if I wasn't super shy

[fangirlanxiety74]

💌 :)

YOU'RE SO NICE DUDE I SEE YOU REBLOG EVERYTHING OF MINE!!! Like every time I see you reblog or like something I post it makes my day!!! Also your Loss of Eden AU is SO GOOD I think about it a lot and I want to ask more questions but I have no questions to ask besides "Aw man I wonder where it's gonna go from here!!!"

You're part of the inspiration I started posting my art on here too tbh :)!!! I'm just really happy to have you as a mutual dude

[forever-rogue]

Omg for miguel requests!! Can i request one where spider-reader is very bold and always flirting with miguel and one time he flirts back and she gets super flustered and doesnt know how to respond😭

Thank you so much!! I love your writing youre so talented

AN | No, but this concept was aces! I hope you enjoy 🥰

Warnings | [Suggestive] Language

Pairing | Miguel x Fem!Reader

Word Count | 2.6k

Masterlist | Main, Spider-Man

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

You could hear his angry footsteps before anything else and you braced yourself for his fury. Instead you busied yourself with looking at your suit to make sure everything was intact…or at least pretending to do so.

"What the fuck were you thinking!?" ahh yes, there it was. He was definitely angry, but you tried to keep it cool. You weren't about to admit that he made you nervous, even if the nerves were slight. You looked up from your sleeve and blinked innocently at him, "don't do that!"

"Do what?" You kept your voice sweet and soft, "what are you talking about, Miguel?"

"You - I - you are so infuriating!" he waved his finger in front of your face and you simply shrugged, "you never listen to me! I don't know why I even let you stay on the team!"

"Oh Miguelito," you gently reached up and brushed his hand out of your face. You were well aware of what he was talking about - you'd directly gone against his orders. But, to be fair, things had turned out just fine despite choosing your own method. It wasn't like you'd fucked up some cannon event, "everything's fine and no one got hurt!"

"But you don't listen," he sighed heavily, "that's the problem. And one day, it's going to get someone hurt. I'm not going to let you do that to anyone…or yourself."

"You're so cute," a dreamy sigh escaped your lips as you touched his face, brushing your knuckles across his cheek. He lightly slapped your hand away, "but you're going to give yourself wrinkles if you keep worrying."

"I'm being serious!"

"So am I," you raised your eyebrows and sighed at him, "I won't do anything bad and I'd never put anyone else in danger. You know that."

"One more fuck up from you and you're done," his voice was low and dangerous and you pulled back slightly, "I mean it. Just because you think you're so cute and charming doesn't mean I can't see right through you."

"Miguel," you looked at him with wide eyes, "I don't think I'm cute - I know I'm cute. But not as cute as you, handsome. Now if you'll excuse me, I've gotta go and make a few suit adjustments."

"This isn't over!" His cheeks darkened as he watched you walk away. 

"I'd be disappointed if it was," you gave him a small salute, "see ya, Miguelito!"

He let out a sigh of exasperation as you walked away. It was definitely a challenge not to stare at your ass but he was just a man after all. So he definitely stared at your ass.

"Stop staring," Peter popped up behind him, causing Miguel to flinch, "just tell her you're in love!"

"I'm not…" he pinched the bridge of his nose, "I'm not in love with her and I'm not doing this with you right. Get back to work, Parker."

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

It had been a few days since what you had decided to dub the incident had occurred. You'd more or less ignored Miguel, deciding to let him cool down on his own terms. You missed getting to give him a hard time and missed getting to tease him as you loved. 

The thing was, you didn’t hate Miguel. It was…quite the contrary in fact. Over the last year that you’d been working for the man, or on his silly little team as you liked to tease him, you’d found yourself getting more and more attached to him. You really liked him and you weren’t shy about letting him know. You thought you were being obvious, but apparently you weren’t obvious at all because he didn’t seem to get it. Or, if he did, he really wasn’t interested and chose not to acknowledge your moves. It was Miguel though, and you were sure he would have just told you…but then again, would he have? Maybe he was just a simple-”

“What’s wrong, princess?” you started at the sound of his low, gruff voice. You hadn’t heard him sneak up and his sudden appearance almost scared you off your chair. Clutching at your heart, you looked over to see Miguel leaning against the edge of your desk, a lazy smile on his face. You were stunned by both his appearance and his casual display of affection, and could only manage to open and close your mouth a few times, “cat got your tongue?”

“Miguel?” you looked at him with wide eyes, “w-what are you doing…here?”

“Just wanted to come and see my favorite girl,” okay, there was definitely something going on. You highly doubted you were his favorite girl (that was probably Jessica or Mayday), let alone his favorite anything, “I have something for you.”

“For me?” your mouth ran dry as he nodded. Was he flirting with you? Surely he couldn’t be, “what would that be?”

“Here,” he reached behind his back and pulled out what looked like your suit…only this was slightly different. He placed it on the desk in front of you before moving to stand behind you. His larger frame easily dwarfed yours, and that was something you tried to push out of your mind. You looked over the suit, trailing your fingers over the soft fabric, “I made some adjustments to it. I think you’ll find it easier to access web fluid and its got better repair tech. Something new Parker was working on.”

You let out a small breath of amazement; this was an incredibly kind gesture from anyone, spider-people did happen to be generous for the most part, but this was next level. You re-familiarized yourself with the pink, blue, and purple fabric. A smile crossed your features as you turned your head to look at him. You found him watching you intently, “thank you, Miguel. This is…amazing.”

“You’re welcome,” his voice was near your ear, causing goosebumps to erupt all over your skin, “maybe it’ll help you to listen next time, hmm?”

“Miguel,” you turned in your seat and found yourself face to face with him, noses almost brushing. Whatever you were about to say quickly left your mind as you looked into his pretty brown eyes. A sharp inhale escaped your lips and you noticed the smile on his face grow larger, “I, ugh…I…”

“Hmm?’ it was a small sound of the back of his throat as he regarded you. He reached up and touched your face, brushing his thumb over your cheek, “what’s up?”

“I umm,” you stammered nervously, trying to ignore the feeling of his skin on yours, “I gotta go. I-I think Peter needed me for something.”

“He’s out on assignment right now.”

“Mayday then,” you volunteered slinking out from under his arm and grabbing the new suit, You felt your entire face warmed up as he started to chuckle, “Mayday needs me-”

“She’s a baby!”

“And I love her,” you squeaked, “so I gotta help her!”

You took off before he could say anything else or fluster you even more. Something had gotten into Miguel O’Hara and you weren’t sure you could handle it. You weren’t sure you’d survive the man you’d longed after for so long returning those very same feelings. 

Well. This was going to get interesting.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

You came to the decision, made after much contemplation and tossing and turning at night, that you were going to ignore Miguel. Not ignore completely but ignore his advances. If he did happen to flirt with you again, you weren't going to say or do anything. Not that you expected them…but, you know, just in case it happened.

When you got to the headquarters the next day, you kept to yourself, taking your coffee and making your way to your little assigned corner and refusing to make eye contact with anyone. Maybe if no one saw you, you could get away with being practically invisible. 

But the universe wouldn't have it, of course it wouldn't.

"Hello there," his voice was sticky sweet like toffee and that didn't land well with you. Rather it did land well in the sense that it shouldn't have made you feel the rush you were currently experiencing, "you look pretty today."

"I, ugh," you looked down at your outfit and shrugged helplessly. You were dressed simply in a pair of jeans, a t-shirt, and sandals; nothing that you would consider exceptional, "umm…thanks?"

"What's wrong?" He knew exactly what was wrong, the bastard. He could probably hear the erratic and wild beating of your heart, "you seem…nervous."

"N-no," you shook your eyes but your wide eyes and pretty pout were anything but convincing, "just…tired?"

 "Are you sure about that?"

"No," you answered. You could have beaten around the bush all you wanted, but you knew that he wasn't going to give up. That wasn't Miguel at all. The best option - the only really - was to just come out and tell him the truth. Once it was all out, the chips would fall where they may, "why are you suddenly flirting with me? W-wait, are you flirting with me?”

“I am,” he admitted this so easily that it caught you off guard. You knew he wasn’t one to lie per se, but you didn’t expect him to just outright admit it. Confusion colored your features as you tried to get your mind to function again, “I am…flirting with you.”

“Oh,” you nodded and turned back to your computer screen before it all set in, “oh?”

“Oh,” he teased, reaching forward to brush some of your rogue locks of hair behind your ear.

“Why?” you reached up and wrapped your fingers around his wrist, gently pulling his hand away, “is it because I’ve been flirting with you?”

“It’s one of the reasons…among others,” alright. Now you were curious, even more than before, as to where this was going, “is that a problem for you?”

Nope. No. Nah. Not. At. All.

“Ummm…” you felt ditzy and dazy as you looked over at the handsome man. He really had you thrown for a loop, “I just…if I made you feel uncomfortable with it, I’m sorry. I never meant it to be mean or anything. I just…meant it.”

“Meant it?” he parroted as you swallowed thickly, “you meant it all those times you were flirting with me?”

“Y-yes,” your confession was soft and gentle as Miguel practically preened under your words. He wasn’t sure what answer he had been expecting, but somehow it wasn’t this one. He hadn’t flattered him with the idea that you would seriously like him, “I did - I do, Miguel.”

“Hmm,” he mused softly as you blinked at him with wide eyes, “do you want to know something?”

“Y-yes? Yes,” you nodded, tummy fluttering with butterflies and heart pitter-patter rapidly.

“When I’ve been flirting with you,” he leaned down so he was almost face level with you, “I’ve meant it too, princess.”

“No way,” disbelief flooded your veins as the first conclusion you came to was that he was lying. Perhaps this was all to get back for going against his direct orders during your last mission. That must have been the reason, right? You leaned away from him and almost slid off your chair as you rolled back to create a bit of distance between your bodies, “y-you’re lying. You have to be…”

“I’m not lying to you,” this time he was in disbelief. He’d never once lied to you…why would he start now?

“You have to be,” you sounded so pathetic as you grabbed your stuff and almost ran away, “you can’t like me like that!”

“Why not?!”

“I dunno, you just can’t!” you almost ran into Peter as you tried to get away, “sorry!”

Peter was dumbfounded as he looked between your quickly disappearing figure and Miguel, “what happened now?”

“I wish I knew,” Miguel exhaled heavily as he pinched the bridge of his nose, “fuck.”

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

You kept your distance from HQ for a couple of days after your embarrassing outburst. You had replayed that very moment over and over in your head, trying to see it from all different angles.

The only conclusion you kept coming to was that he was telling the truth. And that reality was hard to come to terms with at first…but then it was blissfully exciting. Miguel liked you! But then it was more like Miguel liked you…holy shit. 

But then you decided that more than anything, you needed to know the truth. 

You practically ran over to his office, causing the curious glances of other spider-people to follow you. You could hear their hushed murmurs, but didn’t stop to address them. News traveled fast around this place and you had no doubt that as soon as whatever happened between the two of you, the news would spread like wildfire. 

“Miguel!” you didn’t even bother to knock and announce your presence, bursting into his office without ceremony. He turned around to face you, a few different expressions crossing his features before settling on surprise, “I…”

“Yes?” suddenly every single coherent thought escaped your mind as you stared at him. He cocked his head to the side and looked at you expectantly.

“Did you mean it?” you whispered, taking a step closer to him, “the other day when you said you flirted with me because you meant it. Did you mean it?”

“Yes,” he promised, closing the gap even more, “of course I did. I wouldn’t lie to you.”

“Me neither,” you insisted, catching yourself, “lie to you, I mean. So…”

“So we’re on the same page now?”

“I think so,” you smiled hesitantly at him, and the two of you locked eyes for a few moments. 

Before you could stop yourself, you closed the little bit of distance remaining between your bodies before practically jumping into his arms. Almost as if he had known what you were thinking, he effortlessly caught you, wrapping his strong arms around you. You beamed at him, melting as you watched him practically glow at you. 

“I want to kiss you,” you touched his face, and he practically leaned into your touch, “may I?”

“You may-” you prevented him from saying anything else as you crashed your lips onto his, kissing him with a fierce determination and eagerness. 

Neither of you dared to pull back until you were both breathless, looking at each other through hazy eyes and soft smiles. He gently set you back on the ground and you stared up at him. 

“Do you want some more honesty?” he asked gently, stealing a few more kisses, which you eagerly gave him.

“Of course.”

“I plan on doing that a lot more,” and yeah…that made you practically jump his bones then and there, “if you’re down for it.”

“Yes,” that came without hesitation, “I definitely am.”

“Better close the door then,” you did as you asked, looking at him with round, eager eyes, “you know how nosey they can be.”

“The nosiest…”

“Now, c’mere,” he held his hand out to you, “and let me prove I wasn’t lying to you.”

“Yes, please.”

[3vergr3en]

hi! I love your work! I noticed you've been a fan of eujoo lately... me too :,) if you have time or are interested, how do you think the andteam members would act when they have a crush? thank you!

❥ How &Team would react to having a crush on you

(🥐) PAIRING . OT9 x fem!reader

(🥞) A/N . ANON. I LOVE YOUUU. and thank you so much for requesting this !! and yesss, byun euijoo has all I've been thinking about (he's so cute that I'm getting pissed off.)

(🍮) ADDITIONAL INFO . everything below is just cutesy filth.

Koga Yudai - K

hes actually quite shy surprisingly.

you'd expect him to be all like, "I like you!!" when he first realized that he thought more of you than just a friend.

but he's actually quite sheepish when it comes to you.

one glance from you has his heart pounding in his chest.

or one 'hi, yudai!' has his knees buckling.

he tries to make himself look and act perfect when being around you, deathly afraid of any mishaps happening bc all he wants is for you to think that he's cool :(

but he's so busy trying to perfect himself, that he fails to do the part where you had to be yourself.

"Yudai. You didn't need to do all of that if you wanted to impress me. You could've just asked me out." You smile fondly, combing back his curtain bands with your hand.

"I messed up my chance, didn't I?"

"Not yet."

Murata Fuma - Fuma

honestly not surprised when realizing.

he loves having you around with him and the guys,

or when you ask him to come over to help with some appliances.

He doesn't mind fixing them bc not only does he get to see you more, but he also doesn't want your place collapsing on you <3

you're independent, funny, and super sweet to anyone around you.

who wouldn't like you?

When he decided to go tell you,

he's SUPER straightforward.

"Y/n, the reason why I asked you to come see me today was because.. I found myself having feelings for you than I would for just a friend."

He knows what he wants, and he acts on it. he hates beating around the bush. (which is so attractive btw)

If he can have you as his now, why would he want to wait any longer?

"Oh! I.. wasn't expecting you to be so straightforward about it. Usually guys would just--"

"Well, I'm not like them." He chuckles, "I'm a man who knows how to treat a woman right."

Don't gotta say anymore, you're already planning a date with him.

(and possibly your guys's future together)

Wang Yixiang - Nicholas

he first realized he had a crush on you when the smallest things you'd usually do for him, start to have more of an effect on him.

like asking him if he had eaten yet, or grabbing an extra umbrella for him when it was going to rain.

YOU thought you were delusional-- no, HE'S delusional.

'she thought about me. omg, she wants me so bad, its embarrassing for her.'

NO. it's embarrassing for YOU, yixiang.

but he doesn't tell you right away, although his ways of showing that are teasing you even more than usual.

"no one wants to see you chowing down that, like calm down, no ones gonna take it from you." He snickers, finding joy in you glaring daggers at him.

"and no one wants to see that ugly face of yours, but hey, unfortunately, we all can't have what we want."

God. He's gonna marry you one day.

One day.

Byun Euijoo - Ej

SOOO shy whenever you walk into the room.

"Hi juju!" You greet happily, a bright smile over taking your face.

"Oh-! Uhm, hi.." He responds, a faint smile appearing on his lips.

HES SO AWKWARD THAT ITS CUTEEEE.

he's terrified that if the guys stopped talking, everyone, especially you, would hear his heartbeat drumming in his chest.

he truly finds you the most beautiful girl he's ever laid eyes on, and unfortunately, Nicholas has to hear all about his fanboy behavior.

"Euijoo, buddy." The older clears his throat as his hand grasps euijoo's shoulder, "If you won't tell her, I will."

"You wouldn't.." Euijoo trails off, a hint of betrayal was clear in his tone.

But the more he thought about it, the more he realized that nicholas may not be joking.

"wait-- no, I-I'll tell her, okay?"

and surprisingly, he did.

you found it adorable btw when he confessed his feelings.

he was fumbling over his words and unintentionally avoided direct eye contact the whole time.

he was just so nervous :((

"juju, you're so cute. you know that, right?"

"ah.. really? thank you then 😊"

Nakakita Yuma - Yuma

honestly, i feel like he would be in denial at first.

BUT NOT IN A BAD WAY.

just more of a, 'what if she doesn't like me back? I don't want to ruin our friendship' type of denial.

So, he tries to suppress them.

How did that turn out?

He barely lasted a couple hours before going out to your place for dinner.

and you greeted him with open arms and a warm smile.

It took him some time to process that newfound feeling.

With the help of responsible fuma and surprisingly taki (I know. but I think that boy has some good advice), he was convinced to tell you how he truly felt.

"You know, make sure you're clear, okay? Don't be vague or ambiguous." Fuma hums, patting the boy's shoulder.

"But like, also be mysterious too! Girls dig that." Taki chimes in.

(okay, perhaps I take that back.)

Asakura Jo - Jo

shy boi #2

he would want to spend more time with you, actually.

I mean yes, he is afraid to confess because he fears rejection.

but like, he cares about you too much to be distant.

so he just accepted it and opted to spend his last few times with you as a friend until you eventually let him off.

but it kept going for longer and longer.

he questioned why. maybe you were just oblivious to his obvious crush on you?

Nope. You weren't oblivious.

You knew right from the get-go that Jo might've felt a different way.

How?

His more frequent visits, asking questions about hypothetically dating a guy who so happens to perfectly fit the description of him.

He's so cute.

Shigeta Harua - Harua

shy boi #3

but he's the most composed out of all the members (besides fuma)

He hides it so well because he makes it look like nothing changed about him.

but even if he doesn't show, he feels it ALL internally.

and poor you, you don't even notice at all.

"Harua! Want to go to this restaurant that just opened recently?"

"Oh,, as in, like a uh.."

"Like in what?" You question, attention focused on your phone that holds the restaurant's website in.

"Ah, nothing. Let's go!" He smiles, watching you slip on your shoes.

I'll tell her one day.

Takayma Riki - Taki

HES SO PAINFULLY OBVIOUS, OML.

hes quite literally like a clingly puppy around you.

"Y/n! Where do you want to go today?" He'd question, eyes wide in anticipation.

"Oh, I was actually planning to stay home and just watch some TV-"

"I'll come accompany you!"

"Thanks.. Taki." You giggle, admiring his devotion to you.

"Should we get matching pj's for our sleepover?" Taki suggests.

"Oh, since when did I say you were sleeping over?"

But when you see that pout, you feel some heart strings being pulled.

"Okay, okay. Fine. Yes, you can stay the night-- but NO matching pajamas.. yet."

"THERE'S A YET?!"

Hirota Maus Riki - Maki

just like K, he tries to play it cool.

But he doesn't go all out like the other.

He's actually hidden it pretty well, just like Harua.

You guys already established a friendship that deals with a lot of skinship.

You guys pretty much act like a couple, just without the title.

It's no surprise that either one of you starts to form a crush.

It's so normal, it just felt right.

But to his surprise, you were the one to confess first--

completely taking him off guard.

"Wait- no! I was going to tell you first!"

"Well, you took too long."

"I was literally going to tell you 10 seconds ago."

"Yeah right."

"..."

"..."

"Want to go get some Ice cream?" Maki suggests, raising an eyebrow.

"Um, duh."

(all of the boys coo how cute you guys are <33)

[sunshinebuckybarnes]

college!ari + elevator

Want you to want me

Pairing: college!Ari Levinson x female!reader

Summary: Ari really likes you but doesn't know how to ask you out.

Warnings: super fluffy, Ari is a shy beefy boy and should be protected always! This blog is 18+ only. Minors DNI.

Authors note: feels like I haven't written in soooo long! I've had this in the pipeline for a while but just needed the muse to cooperate ✨ this sits in the same universe as our lovely college!Andy and will most likely have more parts 🩷 (word count: 1.2k)

"Just ask her out."

Ari turns his gaze at the sound of his friends voice, already missing having you in his line of sight.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Ari grumbles, fiddling with the pages of the book he's been pretending to study from for the past hour. If only he could pull his gaze away from you.

Andy let's out a chuckle, "she's cool, she's nice and she likes you, just go over there and ask her out."

Ari sighs as he looks over to you again. You're talking animatedly to someone from your class and Ari can't help the soft smile that graces his face as he watches you.

It's not like he hasn't spoken to you before, you both had a similar group of friends and you shared a couple of classes. It was the fact that every time he spoke to you he'd get all flustered and tongue-tied and you'd give him a smile that both calmed and tortured him.

"It's not that simple, man," Ari huffs, pulling his eyes away from you again.

"Sure it is, just go over there and ask her out."

Ari stares at him, "I can't just go over there and ask her out."

"Sure you can!"

Ari sighs, dropping his head as he thinks it over. He wants to ask you out, god he really wants to. But what if you say no? It's not like you'd laugh in his face or anything, you're not like that. But you're friends and what if that's all you see him as?

"Is that how you got your girl? You just asked her out and it all worked out fine?"

Andy smiles as he looks at his friend, his dumb, clueless friend.

"Well I tutored her for a while and then we fucked in that room over there," Andy grins, gesturing to one of the study rooms.

Ari stares at him wide eyed, "so you didn't even take her on a date?!"

"Christ you're old fashioned," Andy laughs, "I took her on a date after. When two people want each other you don't have to stick to a timeline, dude."

Ari can feel his cheeks warm up, he wasn't a prude or anything but he was raised by a single mother who instilled chivalry in him. And he liked you too much to risk doing anything stupid. He wanted, no needed, you to like him - in whatever capacity you were willing to give.

"I just want her to like me," he mumbles quietly, almost hoping Andy doesn't hear.

"Pretty sure she already does, man. And right now she's coming over here and I would put money on it being to talk to you and not me."

Ari's head whips up and he catches your eye as you reach their table. You flash him a sweet smile and Ari swears he loses the ability to think.

"Hey beefcake," you grin as you come to stand in front of him.

Beefcake.

That name, and the way you say it, has lived rent free in his head ever since the first time you called him it.

You'd been drunk at one of Andy's parties and to say you had two left feet would be an understatement. Ari had arrived late after working a double shift at the garage and honestly all he wanted to do was go to bed, but as soon as he saw you dancing and stumbling he knew he could stay for just one.

You caught his eye from across the room and he swears the smile you sent him could light up a whole town. He didn't know why you were so happy to see him but in your excitement and inebriated state you tripped over the leg of a table. You would have fallen flat on your face if it wasn't for Ari's quick reactions and strong arms.

He caught you with ease. His arms wrapping around your waist and pulling you up like you weighed nothing.

The giggle you let out has played on repeat in Ari's mind ever since. Your small hands resting over his biceps, giving them a squeeze and giggling even more.

"So strong," you giggled, "so beefy."

"How much have you had to drink?" Ari mused, unable to hold back the smile as he looked down at you.

You wrapped your arms around his waist, resting your chin on his chest as you peered up at him pouring, "only a little. Thank you for catching me, beefcake."

Ari's brows lift as you descend into another fit of giggles. With your chin against his chest he just prays that you can't hear his heart thudding.

"Beefcake, really?"

"I think it suits you," you beamed.

And well, who was Ari to disagree.

Andy's voice snaps Ari back to the present.

"So, are you coming to the Halloween party on Friday?"

Ari feels his cheeks heating up, wondering how long he was staring at you before his friend jumped in. Looking anywhere but you, Ari just wishes the ground would swallow him whole.

"I don't know yet," you say, Ari's eyes flicking to you at the sound of your voice, surprised to see you're already looking at him, "are you going, beefcake?"

Ari stutters as he tries to form a coherent thought, "me? I, um, yeah I think so, maybe?"

Ari can see Andy smirking out the corner of his eye and wishes he could whack him in the face with his text book.

"Well I hope you decide to," you smile, biting your lip slightly and Ari feels his chest constrict, "who's going to catch me when I fall otherwise?"

Ari laughs and he swears your eyes get brighter, "well in that case I might make an appearance."

"Look forward to it," you wink, "well it was lovely seeing you boys. I'll see you in class Ari."

You send them a final smile before turning and heading to the elevator.

Ari's eyes remain on you until Andy throws a pen at his head.

"Dude, what the hell?"

"Ari, seriously go fucking ask her to the party! She clearly wants you to go."

"What? No, she was just being nice, making conversation," Ari tries to brush off, his eyes connecting with yours before you quickly turn away and step into the elevator.

"I swear to god, go ask her now or I will set her up with Steve!"

Ari shoots daggers at Andy before he's up and out of his chair and rushing towards the elevator. His brain doesn't catch up with his body until he's squeezed himself through the closing doors and is stood face to face with you.

"You okay there, beefcake?" You chuckle, taking in his rosy cheeks and the way his huge chest heaves under his shirt.

"Um, about Friday, err Halloween, I um, was wondering..." He trails off, scratching the back of his neck and looking anywhere but your eyes.

"I'd love to go with you," you smile softly, placing a gentle hand on his arm.

Ari's face splits into the widest grin as he breathes out, "really?"

You let out a soft laugh as the elevator doors open on your floor, "really."

Leaning up onto your tip toes you place a chaste kiss to his cheek before turning on your heel and walking away.

"Make sure you wear something pretty, beefcake," you sing over your shoulder. Sneaking a quick glance back at your favourite shy, beefy boy before the doors close. You see him smiling and touching his cheek and you know you're already in too deep.

Aw I'm so happy to finally share this! My college boy universe is expanding and we have Ari in the club! As always comments and reblogs are super appreciated 🩷 also please send me thots for more college!Ari ✨

[denimbex1986]

BRIE LARSON: Hi.

ANDREW SCOTT: Hi, Brie.

LARSON: Hi, Andrew, thanks for coming over.

SCOTT: Thank you, it's pretty tidy.

LARSON: I tidied up for you; I know how you like it.

SCOTT: You know the way I like it. You got my text: 'Make sure it's sparse.'

LARSON: Yes. So I'm excited to talk to you because I don't know how to talk about acting at all, so maybe you can teach me to talk about it or what we do - because I don't even know.

SCOTT: Yeah, it's hard to talk about.

LARSON: First of all, do you know how to act?

SCOTT: I don't know how to act.

LARSON: That's what I thought - nope, not at all. Don't know. So I'm glad that we got there first - we can get that out of the way.

SCOTT: You started as a kid, so it's playing when you're a kid.

LARSON: Yeah, exactly.

SCOTT: And then it turns into acting.

LARSON: That's exactly right. Well, I didn't know that there was anything beyond auditions for a very long time, so I was devastated when I learned that I wasn't actually booking anything.

SCOTT: Oh my God, that is so sweet.

Yeah, I thought that was it.

SCOTT: Did your parents just not tell you - ?

LARSON: That there was more? I think they just assumed I understood, but I didn't and that mentality actually really works because then I really started to enjoy the audition - at certain points.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: Sometimes it's very hard of course but -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: Just to think that the audition is -

ANDREW SCOTT: The thing is an opportunity to act.

LARSON: To learn, exactly - yeah.

SCOTT: When was the last time you auditioned for anything?

LARSON: Not that long ago. I insisted that I do it because I wasn't sure if I could do it. The team believed in me but I was like - it was so far away from anything that I had done I was like: 'I don't even know how to grasp this' so - ...What about you?

SCOTT: It's been a while since I auditioned, and I sort of - I sort of miss it because you know the way you used to come out of auditions, and you'd be sort of elated - you'd be flushed with excitement? And then if you didn't get it, if you did a good audition, you would be sort of thrilled and you, you'd be okay. It's when you don't get the audition; I think it's so hard for us actors - is when you don't get a chance to get in the room.

LARSON: Yeah.

SCOTT: And then if you've done your best, and you go: 'Okay, well they've gone with somebody that's famous or they've gone with somebody that looks completely different to you', then you don't mind.

LARSON: Yeah.

SCOTT: But I love the idea that you can sort of test it out for yourself a little bit, because we don't have much power.

LARSON: No. No actually very limited - I've learned...So, you didn't start as a kid -

SCOTT: Well I sort of did, a little bit.

LARSON: I thought so.

SCOTT: I just did a - I did a little, not like um -

LARSON: You did theatre?

SCOTT: A little bit of the theatre and commercials when I was a kid.

LARSON: Cute.

SCOTT: And I was reading that you were shy as a kid.

LARSON: Yeah. Not anymore. I’m totally fine now. I’m totally confident and cool.

SCOTT: That's - I, really related to you when I was reading that, because that’s kind of why I started as a kid.

LARSON: Interesting.

SCOTT: I think there’s a slight myth about actors — that they’re very outgoing or sort of precocious in some ways -

LARSON: Yeah.

SCOTT: - and, um, or confident in some ways. So did you ask to, to start acting?

LARSON: I did, yeah. My parents were chiropractors; they wasn't - that wasn't in the family or anything, and I was super shy; so my mom was like: 'She must be repeating something', I wouldn’t let it go. And when I think back on it, I mean, of course, it’s changed the course of my life in so many ways, but it - at a young age, at a time when I was so shy and had such a hard time expressing myself, looking people in the eye, at like 6 years old, I was basically given, like, 'OK, here’s a script for how you have a conversation.'

SCOTT: Oh my God, totally - totally.

LARSON: So it's like the actual, like, fiber of how I understand how to like, have pleasant conversations with people is based upon weekly acting sessions.

SCOTT: Absolutely; and then you all of a sudden, I - I used to go to these drama classes on a Saturday, and I would be fully shaking before I go in. And then you’d have to do like - get up in front of your other 7-, 8-year-olds, and do an improvisation, or say a poem or something.

LARSON: Oh no.

SCOTT: And something just happened where you go 'Oh' - it's like an - a weird sort of escape from yourself or, or something. And I feel like - I don’t feel like it’s an overstatement to say that I think it’s, it's completely changed my life — not just my,my career. I think if I didn't - I had a really bad lisp when I was a kid as well, so I had to do elocutions - elocution lessons. I had to go, “He sees seashells by the seashore,” and all that stuff, and it just completely got rid of it, and got rid of so much stuff that you go to, to play - it actually can really, really help you.

LARSON: Yeah, I really think so.

SCOTT: And do you feel shy now? (they laugh) No, no, no - but do you feel shy - do like it's helped you like -

LARSON: Yeah.

SCOTT: - because you have to do so many public facing -?

LARSON: I had to face myself in so many different ways; that’s part of the thing that I actually seek now....I mean, I’m so grateful that I had so much rejection growing up. It’s wild.

SCOTT: It toughens you up.

LARSON: And maybe you had a similar thing where like - I was very much like a slow burn in my career. It was not easy for me. I’d get close to things, so I knew that I had something, but I wasn’t booking, or I’d book like one job a year or something — just enough to give me hope....It gave me so much experience so that when I was given the opportunities, I was truly ready for it.

SCOTT: Absolutely, absolutely.

LARSON: I never had a time on set where I was like, 'Oh, gosh. This is bigger than what I understand.'

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah.

LARSON: It was always, like, well paced...now when I look back on it, I'm like: 'Oh someone was looking out for me.'

SCOTT: Absolutely. Because to be exposed too early, you know, to be able to sort of play around without too much scrutiny I think is so beneficial. I think that people who get an awful lot of scrutiny at an early, early age, I think, find it harder to experiment a little bit, because auditioning is experimenting because you're going up to play a policeman and a detective and then a psycho in a thing and you're like: 'Well, I don't know, you choose.' So you're playing with all those different sides of yourself, whereas if you're cast in something that's very famous when you're 20 - I don't know, you can - you have to work quite hard to sort of, to sort of, um, you know, get yourself out of that, that, that, that space - so it’s good that I was unemployed for so long.

LARSON: It turns out I’m so happy that it seemed like it wasn’t working out for me! Look at us now! But, yeah, when I was stalking you online, I was like, “Wow, it feels similar.”

SCOTT: Yeah, similar vibes. Yeah.

LARSON: Similar. I was like: 'Oh wow, you've been doing this for so long.'

SCOTT: Yeah - a long time.

LARSON: A long time.

SCOTT: And do you know - somebody said a really good thing - just on the - to wrap up that shyness thing up - but somebody said a really brilliant thing to me which was like, “There’s nothing wrong with being shy. Be shy...Like, it's fine to be shy. It’s a nice thing you go a little bit red.” That's why I'm wearing this - just so I could be -

LARSON: I blush very easily. It’s horrible.

SCOTT: I might do it now.

LARSON: Yeah, I'm gonna do it. Let's do it...

SCOTT: It's working.

LARSON: Yeah, yeah...

SCOTT: So “Lessons in Chemistry.”

LARSON: Let’s talk about our shows.

SCOTT: Your character; she's a little bit - I wouldn't say she’s; actually she's probably not shy - would you say?

LARSON: No.

SCOTT: She's just - she's singular, but it’s not, it's not shyness. She’s actually quite forthright. What a character.

LARSON: Yeah, yeah, it's great.

SCOTT: And you’ve been involved with it for …?

LARSON: A long time.

SCOTT: A long time.

LARSON: I developed it for like - I think it took two years. Maybe longer. But I think it was about two years when we started working on it to then actually filming it.

SCOTT: Are you so proud of this?

LARSON: Yeah, I think so. I’m proud of what we achieved in the time that we did. I don’t have a connection to when it goes out in the world; it just feels like then it’s not about me anymore — it’s just images and feelings. I am proud of how much we said in the show.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: I felt like we got a lot in it, and a really amazing group of people that worked on it.

SCOTT:  And you assembled the people, right?

LARSON: Yeah, I did...I was like: 'If I could be in it earlier -' - we have these amazing production meetings that happen; actors aren't invited to them -

SCOTT: No.

LARSON: So to me it always felt like playing a championship basketball game and like, your star player doesn't train with the rest of the team.

SCOTT: Absolutely.

LARSON: So, I was like...if you include me with more information, it's not gonna stress me out; it actually just helps me understand how I can better do the organizational part of my job.

SCOTT: Absolutely.

LARSON: Like the artistry is like - part of what it needs is like: 'Just tell me if we're running out of light and we only have two takes - '

SCOTT: Yeah, exactly. Yeah.

LARSON: You know, I'm so okay with that.

SCOTT: Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

LARSON: ...lots of other departments get moments where they have to - you know, they get to shine in like a spot where it's like: 'Okay, you gotta take one for the team', and I feel like the acting department could really use more opportunities to do that.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: ...it really worked; the dynamic really worked because it felt like everyone was working together and assisting one another to make the same thing.

SCOTT: I, I, I sometimes find that difficult, and it's a big thing as an actor - maybe not so much in the theatre - but, but where you're so involved with so much of your character's journey and then the edit comes and you're like: 'Wha -?' And sometimes I feel like it's important, you know, if you're an artist - and I've never had any shame about calling myself an artist because that's what we do - you may be an interpretive artist, but sometimes it can feel like you're not a co-artist, you're just the paint. You know, you just feel like: 'Okay, well, you can just take whatever' and you go: 'Well - ', you know, because I don't care about having - sometimes actually it's about having less time, you know? It's like, it's about - or less screen time; it's not about vanity, it's just going: 'Oh, well, you know, you know, how you think the, the set is of the character you - sometimes I've had that experience where you walk on and you see your character's - the set of the, the house - and you think: 'This isn't - '

LARSON: I know; isn't that amazing?

SCOTT: Yeah. And that's, that's - it's just about communication.

LARSON: I know. Also I find that you learn about the character through these department heads as well.

SCOTT: Yeah. These really skilful people.

LARSON: ...it becomes like we're finally admitting to what we're doing -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: - which is a massive team sport.

SCOTT: Yeah, absolutely.

LARSON: It's a lot of people making one piece of art.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: And I think problems arise when we act like that's not what's happening.

SCOTT: Absolutely.

LARSON: So I want to talk about your show.

SCOTT: Ripley - yep.

LARSON: That one - I know you've got a lot going on, but we're talking about that.

SCOTT: No, no - that's it.

LARSON: So what kinds of conversations did you have ahead of time, and I'm thinking specifically, when I was watching it, I was like: 'I love minimalism' and I'm like: 'You are a minimalist', and I mean that as like the highest compliment.

SCOTT: Oh wow.

LARSON: It's like you're just - and for so long not talking.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: And I was like: 'Oh, it took me my surprise.' I was like: 'Oh yeah, he still hasn't really said anything.'

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: And you're also playing someone who's lying a lot -

SCOTT: Yes, yeah.

LARSON: - which I think is one of the hardest things to do.

SCOTT: Yeah, it's hard - yeah. Yeah.

LARSON: And so in thinking about how you do something SO minimal with lies -

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah; I know what you mean.

LARSON: - you're doing a very fine dance there. What kind of conversations are you having, and does it feel good to be in that minimal space, or do you second guess yourself?

SCOTT: I second guess myself, I think.

LARSON: ....I'm not a good interviewer.

SCOTT: No, you're a beautiful interviewer. Do you know what? I know exactly what you mean - your concern sometimes, or my concern, and maybe it's from, from a theatre thing, is that I always have had this slight terror perhaps that I was doing like too much - a sort of shame I remember that I would feel in my early film stuff - I'm like: 'Oh God, pull back a little bit.' But then in the theatre, there's something I think is completely wonderful about people being, um, wonderfully expressive with their body, but also some of the, the film actors that I love are actually incredibly expressive as well - it's not all just, you know, completely poised. And if I'm honest, I think I gave Steve Zaillian, our writer/director quite a lot of, um, options; I feel like that's my duty, and he chose the ones that, that are probably a little bit more to his taste, which are, you know - he's very, very sparing, um, he likes minimalism himself, and I'm happy to provide that for him.

I find it so difficult to watch myself, I don't know - that's one of the, one of the things that I was going to ask you when, when, in Lessons in Chemistry, like, do you - are you looking at the edit and all that kind of stuff?

LARSON: Oh yeah, all the time...

SCOTT: Do you find that you were able to…

LARSON: … detach?

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: You have to. The first time I edited myself was years ago and the editor so smartly always referred to 'her' as 'her.'

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: 'She's this' or 'I wish she was - ' and it really helped because it's not about us criticising; like, no one has to feel like there's something wrong with saying that something wasn't right in front of me.

SCOTT: Absolutely. Exactly, absolutely.

LARSON: I’m just like, “Of course I didn’t do it all right.”

SCOTT: Who'd want to be right? Exactly. I think there’s maybe a fear that people are going to say, “We need another close-up of me, please. Why is no one focusing - push in, push in!” And it's actually a lot of the time, because it's a collaborative actors are used to, we're not - you know, a lot of writers or even directors don't get to see other directors' work in a rehearsal room, or what their process is, whereas actors are always looking at other actors and how they're doing on set, or how they - you know; it's - you're very like, open to being told: 'That wasn't so great.'

LARSON: I like that.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: ...I felt very committed to finding what things weren’t working...a lot of the time I'd be looking things every night -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: - I'd look at the dailies from the day before -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: - and so you can kind of see like...are there ways to save this a little bit?

SCOTT: Yes. Map it out.

LARSON: Especially with a character that I also felt was very different from me, and how little she emotionally expresses.

SCOTT: I love that about it.

LARSON: I struggled with it a lot, and I felt very lost with it. I am just very used to my understanding of when something’s working — when it feels very true and I’m just in it. And I would be in it with her, but I felt like the part of me that would want to cry, for example, was being pushed. She’s always twisting the knot inside, and won’t give it to anybody.

SCOTT: Yeah, I love that about the performance.

LARSON: ...the third episode is about grief and...I realised that like the little part inside of me is like: 'Are people going to think I'm not doing enough?'

SCOTT: Yeah, that's the fear isn't it?

LARSON: Yeah, it's like: 'Why? What is she doing? She's not doing anything.'

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

LARSON: ...it takes a lot of confidence to not telegraph every little thing.

SCOTT: Have you had a lot of experience where you've been on a project and you think the stuff that you provided has not been seen and they've used takes or they've manipulated your performance into, into something where you feel like: 'That's not exactly what my taste would be but I -' Yeah.

LARSON: Yeah.

SCOTT: It's difficult that, isn't it?

LARSON: ...you just go and you give them raw materials -

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: - and then a year later, you sit with your friends and family -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: - and it's on a giant screen, and you see how your stuff was edited together that doesn't seem right.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: And I think there's a part of it though that I like -

SCOTT: You give it up.

LARSON: Yeah, I like that...sometimes I want to drive the car, sometimes I just want to be the passenger -

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: - and there was something about this show -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: - this story, that I was like: 'No, I want to be in every part of it.'

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

LARSON: ...it would have felt really strange not to.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: But I'm happy to live in like another director's world for a while.

SCOTT: Absolutely.

LARSON: I've worked with people that are like - never blink...

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

LARSON: ...and you learn all these different ways of expressing -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: - which is cool.

SCOTT: And it's one of the reasons I think that I like; I quite like to move from different - because I'm not sure if I would be able to cope with that if that was for like 10 years, where you're like: 'This is this person's vision and you have to slot into it without having some sort of - without wanting to sort of break free a little bit.'

LARSON: Yeah, I agree.

SCOTT: So I, as you say, sometimes it's okay to be in that world, and then you watch and you go: 'Okay, well that's - I'm there to serve that person's vision; there are things that I would do differently', but I think that's the struggle. And I think - what I never want to do is to be able to be on set and think: 'This is the way I see it, so I'm not going to provide them with any options.' You know what I'm saying?

LARSON: Uh-huh.

SCOTT: So you just do it. I feel like your job is to be like -

LARSON: Yeah, give a bunch.

SCOTT: Give a bunch. You know, I think it's pretty courageous - I'm, you know, a huge advocate for actors and the kind of courage and vulnerability it takes to be an actor; I really do. I really - I, I think, you know, to put yourself out there and then to have to watch your big face on, on like, on a big screen with other people -

LARSON: I know, TV's better.

SCOTT: TV''s better - exactly.

LARSON: It's like iPad size; I can deal with that.

SCOTT: Yeah exactly. Watch it on an iPhone.

SCOTT: Do you watch a lot, a lot of your stuff?

LARSON: No, not at all.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: No, no; I mean with Lessons -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: I have watched it a lot -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: - because I was editing the show but -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: But normally, no.

SCOTT: It's so extraordinary. It must feel - do you have a different feeling of pride now that you've been, been so involved with it, so its success - does it have a sort of -

LARSON: It feels good, but you know, it came out during the strike -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: And so it felt very -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: It just came out and it lived its life, and I really appreciated having that experience to truly just let the piece speak for itself.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: That I couldn't come in and explain myself.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: And I realised how much of our artistry is then us trying to explain -

SCOTT: Or sell -

LARSON: - a lot of questions about like: 'What do you hope people get from it?' And I'm like: 'I'm more curious to know what you do get from it than what I thought I was saying.

SCOTT: Well said. That's exactly it - it's like, sometimes it is, you know, we are contractually obliged to talk about this stuff, but sometimes you think: 'Did you like it or did - did you not like it?'

LARSON: Yeah. Like I want people to have their own experience.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON:...I struggle with talking about acting because I didn't go to school for it.

SCOTT: No, I didn't either.

LARSON: You didn't?

SCOTT: No.

LARSON: I knew l liked you - we have so much in common.

SCOTT: Oh, not a minute's training.

LARSON: ...So I have a hard time understanding fully...there's the preparation part, which I care a lot about and enjoy -

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: - and there's there's just something that happens on set that seems to be truly divine that I can't even take credit for.

SCOTT: Yeah, that's exactly right.

LARSON: I don't even know how to explain it.

SCOTT: It's not, it's not; but it's - again, you know, it's something I say endlessly, but you play a part - you play a part, people - so your work of course, your work of course is important, but if you were to say a kid is able to just do it, and you don't go: 'So what did you - why did you just make that teacher, why did you, why did she arrive on a, on a unicorn? Where did that come from? What do you think about unicorns?' The kid's just like: 'I don't know.'

LARSON: It's just free.

SCOTT: It's just - it's sort of, it's sort of freeing, and to be able to hold onto that as much as possible; and that's not to say that the work isn't - you know, the preparation and all that kind of stuff - but the first priority is to be there, on the set, and to be like: 'Well maybe we don't know what's going to happen now.' So we have to unlearn what - the, the idea that, that we do.

LARSON: Just being present, yeah.

SCOTT: Just be present, listening.

LARSON: So what about the lying part of your character? How did you -

SCOTT: My own? Oh, Tom Ripley.

LARSON: Yeah, sorry, sorry. I jumped. So when you’re playing Tom Ripley -

SCOTT: Yes?

LARSON: - what does it feel like to lie when he’s lying?

SCOTT: Well, I tried to make him lie as little as he could get away with, so that he lies in order to get himself out of a situation. And he murders to get himself out of a situation. Like, so he's not going: 'When am I gonna -?' He’s not bloodthirsty. He's, he's doing it because he had nothing else to do - sort of - I mean, he could have not murdered, I suppose.

LARSON: Yeah, yeah.

SCOTT: We all make that decision.

LARSON: Yeah, no, it’s a choice you make every day.

SCOTT: Yeah...so I tried to sort of - it's that thing of just going: 'Okay well, it's seeing somebody think', although, you know, it - a lot of the time I think the best acting opportunities is when someone like; the thing that we really, really want to see when we're, um, watching a movie I think, or at least I do, it's when someone goes: 'I'm not in love with them at all' and you know that they are.

LARSON: Uh-huh.

SCOTT: That's the best. When you're - when, when the thing that you are expressing is, is in opposition to the thing that you're feeling; and that sort of is lying, but it's lying sort of in a way that we find acceptable. So all that stuff and you go: 'How is she?' and you know you're - that brilliant acting that when people when we disguise what we're feeling, which we do so much. Um, so I suppose any of those things about him being a liar or socio - sociopath, or any of those kind of things I found kind of unhelpful. And actually the kind of stuff that Tom Ripley I suppose is famous for as an iconic sort of literary character is him being — “Is he a psychopath?” or “Is he a murderer?” or whatever. But the murder-y parts actually only took up - we shot it for nearly a year - they only took up for a few weeks, so the rest of them was actually -

LARSON: He’s mostly not murdering.

SCOTT: He's mostly not murdering.

LARSON: I noticed that too...I guess it's like the times where I've had to do a scene where it's lying or trying to get away with something; it's an interesting and very fun dance where you know in order for the scene to work, you can't let on to your scene partner that you're lying, however you're kind of giving the *clicks tongue* to the audience like: 'Go with me here.' And that's so fun...it felt like I was doing target practice...it's very fun.

SCOTT: Yeah, and it's like when someone's playing an evil character in a bad piece of television, and then they've manipulated someone and they hug them and then over their shoulder -

LARSON: Yeah, oh gosh - fabulous.

SCOTT: It's like - when has anyone ever done that in real life? But I do think it's extraordinary how human beings are, are - we're able to disguise absolutely what's, what's going on. Recently, my mother died very recently, so I'm doing a lot of press at the moment and, um, I've had to do a lot of, you know, in, in the grieving process, and I re - the thing that's really al - alarmed me, or it's certainly something that I found really um, uh, astonishing, is that I know that when I'm talking to someone on the street or like you're getting into your Uber or whatever, you're like: 'Hey, how's it going?' But there's no part of me - even though I'm going through this devastating time in my life - there's no part of me that's conveying that to, to, to, um - to, to the taxi person at that time.

And it's like when you're doing period dramas, when people talk about war, wartime stuff, that you're not spending your whole time talking about the war. It's like during the pandemic, you - when we were all dealing with the pandemic and somebody would come round like: 'Can we please not talk about that? Do you mind if we don't?' So sometimes when you're going through the very thing that's the stress - where is it living? There are some people who actually don't want to talk about it, and I think sometimes the unconvincing things when we're seeing things like that are set in World War II, that they're always talking about World War II. And the rest of us are like: 'Oh My God, can we just lighten up or, you know, whatever'. And, and, and I suppose that idea of what we're able to disguise I've always found so interesting about acting, you know, and um, and so that we get a story that's perhaps very comedic and you play the soul, or you get something that's very tragic and you play the, the lightness - I think that's what the, the great actors are sort of able, sort of able to do. It's a fascinating thing to discover; it's never like - it's never one thing. And so did you find it hard, when you finished Lessons in Chemistry, to let it go?

LARSON: ...it's a true loss of purpose.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: My purpose was this thing; it's not there anymore - what do I do now?...

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: ...I was pretty tired by the end of it.

SCOTT: I bet you were.

LARSON: ...it felt very complete.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: But I missed it. Like, I missed that feeling of having a purpose that was beyond myself.

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: ...that feeling - it's so rare too.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: ...it felt really satisfying.

SCOTT: Yeah. The obstacle sort of becomes, becomes the way. There's a - a director that I, that I worked with that I - he said a thing that I really, just really loved which is: 'Of course in artistic situations, you're going to argue and you're going to have differences of opinion, but that you should argue as allies not as enemies.' And I thought it's such a beautiful thing to say because I think sometimes a difficult set, and I don't believe that I, I don't believe that there isn't anything that through communication you can really just, everybody mostly wants to make it - do it right.

And there's a, there's a choice that you can make to say okay; to set up an environment where you're able to just communicate things a little easier and, and people who are just, um, in the business of making sure that they get their own way I think - it's; it's - I think that can happen to really very talented people, and in a way sometimes understandably, because I think actors have to save the day an awful lot of the time and, you know, I don't like it when people say: 'Oh you know - ' Sometimes it can be: 'Oh that actor is difficult.' I've never really - maybe that's just my experience - but I've never really seen an actor go: 'I don't like my costume. I've got, got, got, you know; I'm not coming out of my trailer.' Usually I've seen actors saying: 'My character just wouldn't say that; the audience isn't going to buy that, and I don't want to let the story down or the audience down - that just doesn't make sense and so, you know, let's not do that. Let's not proceed until we've solved this problem.'

And I think that's an honorable thing to do because then what happens is it comes out and everybody goes: 'Oh God, that's really clever' and you think: 'Well, that was going to be passed over because people were only interested in completing the call sheet that day.' Sometimes you've gotta just go: 'We've covered it, but we haven't captured it' and I think that's -

LARSON: Oh, I like that.

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: Okay, so I have a question about playing a character that has existed in many different iterations and forms.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: And I feel like you have experience with that, because you do theater as well.

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: Do you have the same approach every time, in terms of researching and watching previous versions of it?

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah. Yeah.

LARSON: Or do you just block it out?

SCOTT: Absolutely, I block it. Because, No. 1, I adored the film “The Talented Mr. Ripley” — the Minghella movie with, with Matt Damon and Jude Law and Gwyneth Paltrow and all those amazing people. But mercifully, I hadn’t seen it in a very long time, and I knew that this was going to be a very, very different prospect. Um, one of the first conversations I had with Steven Zaillian, our writer-director, you know was “What? Why?” And he had such a singular vision for it, you know; he wanted it a very particular way. He wanted, you know - I was worried that I was too old and blah, blah, blah — because I had just a very specific idea that was based on the film, but I suppose I had to remind myself that that's - that film was also a re - a reiteration of something: there was another version with Alain Delon before, and there were diff - you know lots of different Ripleys and there were loads of different ones. So it has been reinterpreted a lot. And I feel like it’s very important that, you know, he said, you know, “We want to age the characters up.” And then, you know, he was talking about this very particular kind of noirish black-and-white version that he had. And that made me feel very comfortable. He had no interest in, in doing that again. And I always think that it’s important, you know, because it happens in the theater so much — if it was a Shakespeare character, you know - you know, thousands of people have played, played one character. And I always find that really interesting. And I think the response I suppose is to be respectful, but not too reverent. Because what’s the point of doing it if you’re going to do it exactly the same way? So I didn’t look - no way, because you know, I don't want to do it for myself; I don't want to do it for myself - I don't want to do that because I love that film, and I see them as two very, very separate entities, which they are. I mean, anyone who would see it, you'd go: 'They - they're miles apart.' Thank God, yeah.

LARSON: What do you think about some sort of Ripley universe — you know, into the Ripley-verse? Just all the Ripleys.

SCOTT: Like little - like Marvel? Oh, sort of like the Fantastic Four? Is that a thing? Oh, and they all get together?

LARSON: Yeah, Ripleys together. I’m just curious because I got a couple studios interested, so I just …

SCOTT: You do? So kind of you! You are good. You make things happen. Are you not tired? You’ve been setting up projects for me? God, you’re kind.

LARSON: No, I’m writing a part for myself as well.

SCOTT: Oh right, you're gonna be in it too? You could play - you'd be a good Tom Ripley!

LARSON: I'll be a Ripley as well.

SCOTT: I have to ask you about working with Lenny Abrahamson, because it was such a moment of Irish pride. A sensational movie. Do you get bored talking about Room?

LARSON: I actually don't talk about it that often...I had someone come up to me and say: "You know what film you were good in? 'Room'." I was like: "Okay." (laughter)

SCOTT: "Yeah, thank you. Where is my Oscar?"

LARSON: I was like: 'Yeah, I kind of thought that was like my one thing I've done...'

SCOTT: I thought you were good in that; I don't care what anyone else says. I thought you were quite good.

LARSON: 5000 years later, I was like: 'Glad it holds up.'

SCOTT: That's amazing.

LARSON: But what part did you want me to talk about? Lenny?

SCOTT: Did you know what it was going to be so -

LARSON: Did I know he was Irish? (laughter) No. Did I know it was going to be good?

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: No...

SCOTT: In Lessons in Chemistry, did you have a feel - because you had more control over it? Did you think: 'We're onto something here?'

LARSON: Yeah, because also you're doing everything at the same time...with 'Room', it was my first time - I mean I'd been a lead in one other thing.

SCOTT: Wow, really?

LARSON: I auditioned for it though...it took a lot of time and I did not have the technique that I have now.

SCOTT: Meaning like?

LARSON: I was like what I think actors are like where they like have headphones in and they're kind of like this (leans forward and over). I was that kind of actor.

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: I was listening to really intense music; and it's like I didn't fully truly myself to go in and out.

SCOTT: That's so interesting.

LARSON: ...after that movie I was like: 'Woah, I need to figure out a plan' and I started scuba diving, and I realised that it was the perfect metaphor, because you don't get to like strap a tank on your back and just jump in the ocean. You have to be like: 'Okay, this is how much I have in my tank; if I go down deeper it takes more, I have to go really slowly on the way up.' And was like 'Oh. That's what I need to be doing.'

SCOTT: Wow, yeah.

LARSON: And I need to give myself the grace of that. So then moving forward, when I'd have big emotional scenes, I'd make an announcement and be like: 'Hey, I'm gonna go underwater for a little it. It might take me a while to get back out, but I'm here and I'll be okay.'

SCOTT: That's really wonderful. So as a producer, you felt like it's your job, when you have a big scene on, on Lessons in Chemistry, where you think: 'Okay, but now today, all I can do really is act'?

LARSON: Yeah. Sometimes you have to put the phone down -

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: - and other times, you want it though.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: Other times it was very helpful to be like - to snap out of it and to be like: 'Okay, now I need to deal with whatever is going on.'

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

LARSON: ...that was the learning lesson from 'Room'...I didn't want to mess it up.

SCOTT: Well, you didn't. I agree with that guy. I actually thought you were quite good in it.

LARSON: ...I even remember seeing the movie for the first time...it's just a white wall to me -

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah, yeah.

LARSON: - so I just remember the first screening and everyone was like: 'What the hell was that?' And I was like: 'Is it good?'...it's maybe my own performance, maybe on a good day I can receive 40% of it through the screen - like, on a good day.

SCOTT: On a good day. Like, it's hard.

LARSON: ...it'd be really weird if I was like watching myself being like (motions looking teary and proud)

SCOTT: 'Oh, you go, girl'.

LARSON: Yeah, it's not for me...

SCOTT: Well that's why I'm asking about when you have a producer role, and I've definitely had it in, in the theatre, but in the theatre - what I love about working in the theatre is that you; it's the only art form - stage work - where you don't get to see the result of what you're doing. You're a painter, see the painting, you make a movie, see the movie, the book, you read the book, if you write, write a book, but this - you only see it through the feeling in the room and the audience sort of reflects it back to you. And I love that about it because sometimes when I see my own work, or like when they film theatre, I find it horrific because I think: 'Oh God, I, I - like just stop, or whatever you're doing, desist.' And uh, so that's why I'm asking about the producorial thing where, where I do think there must be some other hat that you have on that actually goes: no, I think - that actually your, your development of your, your ability to be able to discern what your performance is must have to - must, must be quite strong.

LARSON: Oh yeah...Lenny would talk to me and brief me on what he was trying to achieve...and then once the doors closed, it was really hard to get in and out, and so it was much easier if I understood what Lenny's agenda was, and I could just be there instead of constantly resetting. And so, there was one day in particular where I realised I could hold this scene with the boy, with Jacob, and also fix the props that were needed to be reset, and wait and hold...I remember being like: 'I think I've just unlocked like a new level of focus and flow -

SCOTT: Yeah, yeah.

LARSON: - and it's a really amazing thing.'

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: You felt that too?

SCOTT: I know exactly what you mean.

LARSON: Isn't it the best thing ever?

SCOTT: It's great. It's like - it's, it's, it's a challenge and everybody's like doing that together; like isn't the best thing I think about filming is when everybody's got a big, big job - I don't know, some big shot, everybody, somebody's going to have a change of clothes; it's all sort of quite theatrical - theatrical - and you're really involved all together. I find that really the most exciting thing. That's why I think it's beautiful what you say about everybody just doing the same thing; we had it on - again, to go back to the theatre - but we had it where we were all called co-creators, but that's exactly what you're doing. You're all co-creating together, and so if you were to just take out the job titles and go: 'Well, everybody has an opinion here; what's the thing', and everybody, you know, everybody's just little, little cogs in this amazing machine.

LARSON: Exactly.

SCOTT: Yeah.

LARSON: We need it all.

SCOTT: We do; we need everything.

LARSON: Well thanks; I feel like I kind of understand acting now.

SCOTT: Yeah I've fully - I've fully got it.

LARSON: Yeah, I'm ready. Okay, well -

SCOTT: Nothing more to learn.

LARSON: There we go. Now we're good to go. (laughter)

[autobots-in-training]

Do ignore the other question from this account; it was my very chaotic friend. However, I do have a question for two of you and just a little thing to say to one more of you, and I do suggest not letting the others see this question. Hotshot First aid and Springer First off, this one is for first aid. I say as a medic myself quite simply that a lot of bad stuff is going to happen in the future to you and all of your fellow younglings, and you are going to lose a lot of bots under your care, but it will not be our fault, and you will become one of the best medics known to the cybertronian species, and I highly suggest you don't read this out loud to anyone else since I sound insane. Now since this "ask" just got a bit quite dark, let's lighten it a bit. Question for Hotshot: Since you are clearly aware your caretaker Optimus Prime is the greatest autobot to exist, have you ever heard of an autobot by the name of Elita-1?

Question for Springer: Since Prowl is clearly your carrier by the looks of it and just by the way you talk about him, did he ever tell you any stories and did he ever teach you anything cool?

- Medic Knockout (PS Im super srry that this is so long)

First Aid- Woah. Uh. Thanks! Are you from cybertron? I've never heard of you. I can list all the medics i know on one hand. Carrier, Lotty, Pharma, Red Alert and Hoist. Though they are all autobots, are you a neutral?

Arcee- First Aid, are you answering a question without us?

First Aid- Oh! Sorry i was just reading the question. These are for Springer and... Hot Shot? I think he meant Hot Rod. *takes a deep breath*

Arcee- Wait don't yell!-

First Aid- SPRINGS!!! RODDY!!!

Arcee- I hate you.

Springer- Hey Aid, whats up? I brought Roddy with me.

Hot Rod- Hi!

First Aid- Cool. Was your time with Hound and Mirage fun?

Hot Rod- Yeah!! Hound took us around the ship in his alt mode!

Springer- Illy got tired, so they stayed with their creators.

First Aid- Ah. Anyway, i called you guys cause you have a question each.

Springer- Nice!

Hot Rod- I wanna answer first!

First Aid- Do you know Elita?

Hot Rod- Riri talks about her sometimes. She's the autobot leader on Cybertron, since not everyone could or wanted to leave.

First Aid- Yeah, i think you were still too little when we left Cybertron to remember anything. You might have been 2-3 thousand years old when we left. Elita is basically on parr to Optimus. I watched them spar a couple times, they were 50/50 on terms of strength and skill. They were best friends too.

Hot Rod- Woaaah!!

Arcee- I was still a bit shy, so I didn't talk with her much. She was nice the times i talked with her. She's actually why i chose to be pink.

First Aid- It's terrifying sometimes. You look like you are covered in dried energon.

Arcee- Exactly.

Springer- What's my question?

First Aid- Has your carrier taught you anything or told you any stories?

Springer- About what?

First Aid- I dunno, thats just what the question is.

Springer- Hm... my riri has taught me quite a bit! I know some stuff about genetics, he knows a LOT, the study of cybertronian genetics wasn't allowed before the war, but both my carriers studied it in secret. I was actually one of their expiriments.

First Aid- Oooh, so they had you to see what traits you'd have from each of them?

Springer- Uh. Yeah. Kinda. He also tells me about my other carrier. I remember very little of him. His optics were... they were yellow. Carrier says i look a lot like my other carrier when he was younger.

Arcee- Thats really sweet!

Springer- I want to meet him again. I'm hoping he's still out there.

Arcee- When the war is over, we'll team up and look for our carriers together!

First Aid- I'l help! There's nothing we can't do when we work together!

Hot Rod- Can i come too?

First Aid- You're too little for that. And wouldn't you miss your riri?

Hot Rod- Oh... yeah :[. I'll stay then. Illy would be lonely without me too.

Springer- Wanna see your carrier now?

Hot Rod- Yeah!!

Springer- Let's go then!

*end transmission*

[losrtphu]

LOVE&HATE VICIOUS MAY 1999

FROM  A SHY SPEECHLESS BOY TO TODAY'S MOODMAKER DIE, WHAT MADE HIM CHANGE? IT SEEMS HE NOW ADMIRES PEOPLE WITH A COOL AURA

-Die what is your type in girls? and what type of girl do you not like?

if we're talking about personality, I think I like girls who are themselves, and I'm more interested when I talk to them and they're a bit strange. if I were to say it rougher I like girls who are kinda stupid (laughs) when they're not normal I'm more interested. it makes you want to know more about them right?

- I see, it makes it more intriguing. then on the other hand what girls do u not like?

someone who is strong-willed and people who lie. well, when I mean lie I mean lying about their relationships with other guys

- why do u not like strong-willed girls?

it's because I'm faint of heart (laughs), but that's also why girls who cry easily, or are just weak/delicate are also no good, I prefer feminine girls, girls who are boyish on the outside are fine too, but on the inside are feminine. but I easily fall in love.

- eh, really? like if they do something small you're easily charmed?

head yea exactly. but I can't pull the people that I'm into at all (laughs), I'm not purely talking about looks but that femininity or cuteness that person holds, that's what makes me interested. I don't really have a type, ah but, I'm not really into pretty model-type girls. I have this image that they're out of my reach. back in middle school, I was really quiet and there was this girl that stood out in my class and I wasn't able to get close to her. She felt special, she was like a flower on a high peak. you could say in my head I was constantly trying to get that flower.

-ehh~ you were a really shy middle schooler then.

I had always been since elementary, when I would talk to girls I would get butterflies. I was silent (illegible) and the type who wasn't able to raise my hand in class, so talking to a girl was unthinkable. in middle school, I sat next to a girl and she/I (not too sure sorry) said "Oh they finally laughed" It was rather simple (laughs)

- was that the same with the boys in your class?

yea pretty much. on the day of our entrance ceremony I wasn't the type to be the first to talk to other people I was simply too shy, so I waited to be talked to.

- so when were you able to talk to girls?

I think around when I entered high school. I was in English (illegible), and there were 10 guys and 30 girls. In those 3 years (illegible) when I looked forward or back it was all girls (laughs). but because of that I learned how to talk to girls, but even then I would still get butterflies.

- but you were still able to talk in front of a girl you liked right?

well, that's true but because of my shy personality it was rough. we went out for a month and she was a good person. I get nervous, it's pretty easy to talk with a girl who I'm not romantically interested in but once it's a girl who I like...

- so then even with the girl who you dated you didn't confess to her?

I was able to, still being nervous, but now when I think about it, it was like I fell in love with the feeling of being in love to put it in a cool way I admired the thought of it. which meant even when it was just us two we/I wouldn't talk, and when we would I would always be thinking "Ah- what are you saying!" or "I'm not funny at all~" and thought that it was all over and go home all depressed.

- for the 3 years you were in high school was it always like that?

yeah, ah, but in my third year, there was this girl I dated who was a super big fan of Yoshiki and she would always talk about how much she thought he was cool and I'd just respond like "ah~ yeah"(laughs). back then it wasn't like I was devoting my life to being in a band, so Yoshiki was a person in a completely different world to me. and then years pass and now I'm doing work with him. if that girl knew that now I wonder if she regrets, or something like that (laughs)

- she probably would a lot

yeah probably, I mean I/she (not sure) was the one who ended things *sorry unreadable once again*

- is that so?! I can't believe it.

no, but I was not that dependent because even I hated my personality, I was negative, it was even written on my school report card, "It'd be nice if he talked more positively".after all with girls, its better if you can have fun just by being together. like we're going out but I barely even talk. That's why I was jealous when a normal girl ended up with a confident boisterous guy

- I can't think of you as anything but the guy you've just described

right? Being able to be part of a band has changed me. I've met a lot of people and my opposition to speaking has gone. but I kind of still don't like myself now. it seems like I talk too much now.

- I don't think that's the case

well, it's still fun, but there are times that I want to pretend that I'm a quiet person. or pretend to have a cool character, the type of person with that atmosphere can say a few words and make it sound deep.

- but Die you have a personality that attracts others, so I think that's impossible. you wouldn't be able to take it and eventually start talking (laughs)

yeah probably, if I just met u and I wasn't able to speak I wouldn't feel satisfied(laughs)

- hahaha you'd be a completely different person (laughs). in that way aren't you happy that you're in a band now?

yea, and the fact that a became able to drink alcohol. like at parties when you get drunk you're able to freely speak right? I think that situation rubbed off on me

- and now you're better with girls

yeah, I've overcome it (laughs)

- I'm glad, then to the Die now, is love something that's important to you?

I think it I important, I think there's a lot to learn, things you learn from dating and things you learn from breaking up. it's just that I'm not the type to get obsessed with it. it's the band over girls. It's also business too, and because being in a band was my dream, the band is the most important to me.

- so you're a person who doesn't fully understand people who think love is the most important

yes. that's why if I was ever to go out with someone we would need to influence each other. I would of course take time to spend time with them but when I say im free/ on a break it isn't something definite. so a person who misses me a lot and wants to be together all the time is definitely out of the question. I want someone whos able to understand that the band is important to me, someone that will be relieved even after not meeting or seeing each other for a while, a bright person. deciding to go ahead with the band is my duty.

[pjsk-writin]

Hey Amilein!! (I saw a post of a anon calling you that so I hope o could call like that as well since I’m German😿)

I wanted to ask if you could the Akito and toya hc w a reader that is a popular streamer (idk if you have written this) !

btw merry Christmas! :D

-📦 anon

omgs ya ofc you can !! and this was super fun to write weheh <3 a very late merry christmas to you 📦 anon, and I hope you like this !! <3

♡ POPULAR STREAMER - Akito Shinonome and Toya Aoyagi x Reader

Akito:

Akito has always been interested in streamers, but he would never be one himself

It would take away from his time to practice, and he would never want to record himself practicing for people to see anyway-

So, when you tell him that you're a streamer, he thinks it's pretty cool! He jokingly asks if he can feature in a stream and is incredibly surprised when you say that your fans had wanted him to anyway-

You explained that you had told stories about him, and while he was honored to hear it, he also hoped that you didn't say anything too embarrassing-

You arrange a day where VBS isn't practicing for him to appear on stream, and he's just stunned speechless when he sees the amount of people tuning into the stream

He's even more stunned when he introduces himself and your fans go crazy, but you just laugh and talk to him as though nothing was happening

Doing this helps a lot, because he's quick to just melt into his usual self so that he can fun of you and your audience-

Seeing the behind the scenes of a stream is rather bewildering to him, he definitely makes sure to give you props later because it was a lot-

You have a fun stream with him, which includes your chat making fun of you for being a ginger liker and Akito yelling at them for it-

At one point, he kisses your cheek before he leaves to grab a snack, and he comes back to people going ballistic-

Overall, he respects you and your work a lot! He definitely does want to be a guest on your stream again, if only to spend more time with you <3

Toya:

Toya also thinks that streamers are interesting, but he would never want to be one himself

He was focused on music, but he also knew that he really wouldn't have a lot to talk about if he ever streamed in front of an audience-

So, when you tell him that you're a streamer, he's very impressed! He asks questions on how it works, and you say that you can show him on the stream he's a guest in

He's shocked that you want him to be a guest on your stream, but you explain that you and your audience wanted him to be there. He's more flustered than anything at that-

You arrange the stream on a day where VBS wasn't practicing, and he's once more shocked by how many people tune into the stream

He's even more shocked by how everyone reacts when he introduces himself, but you simply grin and talk to him like usual

He's still a bit camera shy, but he grows comfortable the more time he spends with you! He still grows shy when your audience compliments him though-

He was very impressed by everything it took to be a streamer, he knew that he played a lot of video games but they didn't really compare to what you had to do

You have a fun stream with him, which is full of both of you trading stories about the other and having a fun time with it! (Bonus points if you're a video game streamer, he'll definitely have a lot of fun playing a game!)

At one point, he kisses your forehead before leaving to use the bathroom, and he comes back to everyone losing their minds-

Overall, he greatly admires your work! He definitely tunes into your streams to leave you sweet messages, and is always up to be a guest if you'd want him to be one <3

[gen0c1de]

I got my first tattoo!

A longer post about the details of my experience and whatnot. Hopefully a bit of a stress/anxiety relief for those who are getting their first tattoo and want some form of reassurance. <3

I'm 19 years old, and in the state of Michigan in the US, idk what tattoo laws are anywhere else, but when you turn 18 years old, you're considered a "legal adult" although you can't legally purchase nicotine or tobacco nor can you purchase or drink anything alcoholic. Can't go into a casino or even rent a vehicle. But I digress.

The tattoo I got is in memory of my father who passed away July 12th, 2017. Just a few minutes shy of my 13th birthday... so that was fun to wake up to. He had an all black tribal armband tattoo around his left upper-arm, which was his dominant arm, and it wasn't finished because it hurt him too much to finish the underarm part.

I was gonna get his tattoo or something close to it on my left upper-arm, but I have an implant where the tattoo would be so I chose to have it mirrored and put on my upper right arm, my dominant arm.

I was nervous as fuck and I was low on iron at the time so I was twitching like hell, so that didn't help calm my nerves or anxiety about it getting messed up. The outline didn't hurt and he did the underside of my arm first because that part is a bitch to do last cause of how sensitive the area already is. So adding on it being tender from doing an outline would've made the ordeal WAY worse. I likely wouldn't have been able to get it finished so it would have been unfinished like my dads was lmfao.

The filling part of the process was decent in the beginning, it only really hurt when he would have to go over the same spot multiple times to get it filled, much like when you color in a book or on paper, you have to go over the same area a few times to make sure its all even and complete. So when he reached the back of my arm it was more painful because it had an hour untouched, so the newly sore areas were being abused again.

It wasn't as painful as I had expected though, I'm a bit of a cry baby when my body actually LETS me cry and I surprisingly didn't cry, so the anxiety of me crying and embarrassing myself went away after a while. I did flinch a time or two and I apologized a lot throughout because I wanna be a good client and I don't want the artists to have a bad impression of me so when I go and get another tattoo they won't be annoyed that they have to deal with me.

The artist was super cool and talked to me every now and again and let me rest my arm when I had to have it above my head so he could do the underside. He said if I needed a break to let him know and complimented me on how I barely reacted in the beginning and how, although I was shaking from adrenaline, my right arm was perfectly still for him. He did grab, pull, and stretch my skin some and I had a large bruise but it didn't hurt, just looked weird for a few days.

When it was peeling it was SO HARD to not pick at the skin... I ended up picking some off and so there's a couple little places that are discolored, but if I make an appointment to get it touched up within the next 3 months then the touch up is completely free, so that's a plus! I'll make sure not to pull at the skin when I get it touched up...

Also, it's at the itchy stage. It's so hard not to scratch it... so if anyone has any tips or pointers on what to do, that would be great... cause I can not ignore it... I have ADHD. If it bothers me, I will focus on it and won't be able to distract myself. If I do manage to forget about it, my brain will suddenly be like: "Yo, remember how itchy it is? Wonder if it still itches like a motherfucker." and then the cycle repeats.

My dad's tattoo

My tattoo!

[lovelytayforce]

I agree with this comment here so hard, I remember getting blasted for calling readers who don't comment "leeches" on R/Fanfiction and I'm glad people are seeing that for what it is even if it's four years late

So, I'm gonna share my own little story here because discord has actively ruined communities for fanfic (and art too I'm not gonna leave y'all out cause my bestie @zoetiger-1106 is an artist who deserves way more praise than she gets!!) The reason why authors and myself see the "I'm shy" shit as an excuse is because the same people will type long ass tirades on Discord without a single thought. YOU CAN EDIT AO3 COMMENTS PEOPLE! If you make a mistake, read it back over and edit it. I've watched it happen in real-time with one of my favorite commenters on my one-shot where they left a short gushing comment and then came back and wrote more, you have no excuse much less reason to go "Man fandom keeps telling me to not critique and I might make a mistake so I will say nothing and consume like the average TV and Streaming consumer who thinks there doing something!" YOU have a lot of power with comments and even those bookmark tags hell just copy-paste what you put into those bookmark tags as a comment I DON'T CARE AT THIS POINT USE THAT LIL BOX TO VOICE SOMETHING!!!! God this is all over the place idc but I read back at those bookmarks, and saw people call my works the best and super cool and I APPRECIATE THAT but tell me! Stop taking the easy route, I been blasted for misunderstandings over comments multiple times cause people take my "tone" terribly cause it sucks being black and emotive online yay and for some reason people think !!!! Is bad? yes, I've been hit with that but I keep on trucking cause fuck whatever some weirdo thinks about exclamation points! Anyways back to discord and why I hate it now, I was in a small fandom, KFP got invited to a discord cause ONE person commented on my works and saw they talked about my fic, and at first, I was happy and people TALKED about my chapters at length in the fanfic channel. I basically was the ONLY ONE posting consistently in that channel and it was great but also I wanted that on my fic to show I improved so guess what I did? I went all in trying to one-up myself to be noticed, to have the acclaim my peers did so it would evolve outside of discord channels but it never happened. And Imma tell y'all now; it never will. Readers prefer convenience over your hard work, they are not gonna take time for you no matter how much you improve. People told me over and over while I looked for solutions for this; "We can't make commenting look like an obligation." "Add more prose, space these paragraphs better" all this just for no one to take the initiative and say something SINCERE towards a work they love on it. I've had to tell my own ex-friends now to go leave comments on works they called Masterpieces while ignoring me. Despite the fact they wanted Gen content in which I WROTE. Or met people who have very weird "I don't review" rules for themselves despite getting motivated by reviews themselves!! We're in a shitty time for creatives much less community cause we don't see each other as humans much less want to treat each others as we desire to be treated. Fanfic readers want to treat authors like showrunners and I hate it. But then your peers will tell you 'not to worry about engagement" and no I am because why is my hit count going up every day but ain't no one saying shit? Make it make sense!! I sat in that community commenting as much as I could, especially on long fics; it wasn't all perfect but I TRIED. I didn't expect shit back but hey it would have been nice but it never happened and again I learned; it never would. That's the real issue, no one wants to give no more; just take and take and take til you're sucked dry of passion worse than any corpo out right now. It's why I thankfully switched fandoms. I got ONE consistent commenter and they are better than that ENTIRE SMALL CLOSED COMMUNITY!! So, to any discord reactor for fanfic you better skip on to that message you made and copy and paste it in this box right here and never utter "I'm shy" ever again cause we see you, our friends tell us about you. You are not as anonymous as you think! 🫵🏽

A writer friend told me something that broke my heart a little bit today; they're going to quit publishing their fanfic.

My instant thought was that they had been trolled or attacked or that something terrible had happened in their life because this person is so passionate about their writing. It wasn't any of that. Engagement with their works has been going down, as it has for many of us. Comments are like gold dust a lot of the time, and just looking through the historical comment counts on old fics on ao3 demonstrates this trend very clearly. It was not simply the comments dropping off which caused them to decide to stop posting, however.

My friend came across a discord server for their fandom (I should point out here that their fandom interest and mine diverged a couple of years ago, we stay in touch but don't currently read each other's posts because I'm not into their fandom and they would rather gouge their eyes out with a wooden spoon than read anything Star Wars) and specifically to share fic in that fandom. They joined, because we all love a good fic rec, only to discover that their latest multichapter fic, which has almost no comments and very few kudos, is being hotly discussed in this server as one of the best stories ever. Not one of these people has bothered to say this to them on the fic. When they asked, none of participants could see the point in telling the author of the fic they apparently loved so much that they love it.

This discovery has absolutely destroyed my friend's love of sharing fic. They share because they love seeing other people's enjoyment, and fic writers do that through comments and kudos/reblogs/likes because we don't get paid. There is no literary critic writing a blog post/article about how amazing the story is for us to copy and keep/frame. There is no money from royalties. All we have are the words of the people reading our works.

Those people on that server could have taken five minutes of the time they spent gushing about how amazing my friend's story was to other people and used it to tell the one person guaranteed to want to hear that praise how much they loved it. They could have taken a moment to express their opinion to the person who spent hours upon hours plotting, writing, editing, and posting those chapters. Instead, they deprived my friend of thing that keeps them sharing their writing, and in the process have killed their love of it. My friend now feels used and unmotivated.

I won't be sharing a link to their fic, they said I could share their experience but not their identity. I know they plan to post one final chapter. I know they intend to express their hurt at being excluded from the praise for the thing they created, and I know they intend to announce that as a consequence they will not be posting for a long while, if at all.

So please, I beg you, don't hide your love of a story from the writer. It's just about the only thing we have.

[rosetinteddrms]

ALYSSUM.

hi, i hope you're well. i would like a free reading. 👋🏼

- gow will my future partner act when he flirts with me?

before we make the relationship official.

i'm E, she/her, straight. - pls and thanks. 🔥

queen of wands, five of wands, three of swords rx

your future partner may be very hesitant to flirt with you or may take a while to express his emotions. see, he may flirt with you by being around you first and seeing how you talk to him vs other people. he may over analyze your behavior and get into an internal struggle about what the best way to express his interest in you is before finally letting go and trusting himself to do the right thing. i think he may go through a major internal struggle just going over things like: will she like these kinds of compliments, was i too forward, maybe i should cool down, etc. before just going all in. he may fluctuate between hot and cold when he's with you. not to say that he'll be toxic, but one day he may be a bit more loose lipped and shower you in compliments. then, if he doesn't think you liked them, he'll tone it down the next day, and try a different approach. if you're in college, you may meet him there, or maybe at work. when reading into the three of swords energy, i do think that when he gets to know you better, all his swords will 'fall out of his heart'. he'll be very positive and just happy when he's with you. i think that he may exude golden retriever energy when he decides that he's had enough emotional distress from trying to figure you out. his main ways of flirting with you will be giving you inconspicuous gifts and compliments. like, if you're in a group project, he may compliment your work or be like: wow, i never thought of doing it that way. he may bring you a drink when ever he gets one (like coffee) and play it off as: 'oh i just got an extra one because i wasn't sure if anyone wanted one'. things like that. he'll try very hard to be nonchalant before just losing himself in you.

if he is not shy with you, he may flirt with you when having a rivals to lovers. you guys might be academic or workplace 'rivals'. you guys may spend so much time just thinking about each other (and how to best each other) that you just end up falling in love because of proximity lmao. like, one day he might just be like: i hate how pretty she looks when she's focusing: and then the above scenarios may occur. except it'll be super obvious because you'll see how nonchalant he's trying to be lmao.

[cryptidsurveys]

Thursday, August 8th, 2024.

what form of communication did you last use to talk to the person you're currently interested in? I'm not romantically interested in anyone at this time.

if you were to leave the house right now, would you change your outfit all? Yeah. I did wear it to go grocery shopping earlier, but I will be showering and changing before going to lunch with my parents.

when was the last time something really cute happened to you? It didn't really happen to me exactly, but last Tuesday, the woman who adopted Sammy and Bella Donna (two kitties at the shelter) sent in a kitty gift package. The text on the envelope was so cute; it said, "To open, chew along the dotted lines." :') Gifts included some cat-safe long-lasting bubbles, a whole bunch of fuzzballs and these little plastic guns to shoot them, and these really cool misting brushes (you fill up the reservoir, turn them on, and they mist while you brush). Paris was going around giving all the cats "~secret baths~," lmao.

why aren't you texting the last person you kissed? They aren't part of my life.

has anything happened to you within the past month that's made you really happy? Again, this didn't happen to me as much as it was something I did, but becoming a full-time volunteer at the animal shelter. I'm amazed at how well my body is holding up to the oftentimes 10+ hour days. I pretty much already knew my mental health could handle it, but my physical abilities were the real question. At this point, in order to make the jump to being fully employed, I feel like all I really have to do is get my migraines under much better control.

do you want to see someone right now? Not right this second.

did a boy or girl text message you last? The last person to text me was my dad.

when was the last time something bothered you? Ehh. Something is almost always bothering me, at least on some level. Nothing major at the moment, though. Just vague fears, thoughts, frustrations…

what was the last thing you looked up on YouTube? I was watching a Zachary Michael video just before taking this survey. After a lengthy drought, Gorl World is experiencing a veritable flood of drama. I can hardly keep up!

have you held hands with anyone in the past 24 hours? No.

did the last guy/girl you kissed have any piercings? Yeah.

what exactly did you drink the last time you were intoxicated? I wasn't heavily intoxicated, but I had a few sample beers at the fundraising event I went to a couple of weeks ago.

do you actually love your parents? Yes. My dad is my favorite person in the whole world. My relationship with my mom is stable but still complicated, but I would say I love her as well.

have you ever had a school picture turn out absolutely dreadful? Naw. I might have hated them at the time, but looking back, there was absolutely nothing wrong with them.

are you more prone to being the social butterfly, or the wallflower? I'm more of a wallflower because I'm super shy and sometimes find it difficult to relate to other people because of my life's strange trajectory, but I think I'm a social person at heart. I was wondering the other day if it was possible to be both shy and an extrovert, and I realized those two things don't necessarily have to be mutually exclusive. I might not know how to open up to or connect with other people, but I still find myself energized by positive social interactions. Even though the animal shelter can be kind of crazy, it's still like this gives me LIFE.

would you rather go to a katy perry or taylor swift concert? Neither.

have you ever thrown up from working out? I've thrown up on backpacking trips. However, while physical exertion was obviously involved, it was probably more related to migraines/altitude sickness.

what pattern do the sheets on your bed have? They're just plain gray.

are your days full and fast-paced? Some of them are full, some are more in the middle, and my days off are pretty lowkey (those days typically only involve cleaning, grocery shopping, therapy, maybe a movie with my mom or a trip to the Mountain Park with my dad).

what languages can you count to ten or higher in? English and German.

where did you get the underwear you are wearing right now? Walmart.

are you good with painting nails with your left hand? I'm not good at painting my nails period.

do you feel uncomfortable sharing drinks with other people? Yeah. It just icks me out.

have you gone through a lot emotionally, or has life been easy thus far? I've been through it. Life is so much easier now and maybe that's why I can be so chill about so much. I felt like I was in hell before, so this is nothing in comparison.

have either of your grandparents ever told you a sexual joke? No.

do you spend more time outside or inside? Inside.

would you rather give up the computer or the tv? TV. I don't even watch regular television as it is.

do you own any fake designer purses? No.

who was the last person you were with that smelled really good? I'm not sure.

do you think braces are sexy? No. I don't think they're ugly, but I don't think they're attractive either.

what were you for halloween in first grade? I have no idea.

last person to make you seriously mad? Maybe my dad, but it's been a long time since I've been seriously upset with him.

don't you hate when people have cell phones but never answer them? Lol. I am that person. My phone is always set to silent (unless I'm actually expecting a call - then I'll turn up the volume so I don't miss it). It's one of the things I had to explain to my mom - like, aside from listening to YouTube videos, my phone is little more than an afterthought. I've had to get used to the notion that someone might actually try to contact me. A couple of weeks ago, it was an absolute miracle that I caught the text from Alex asking if I could come in to the shelter that afternoon to fill in while she took a cat to the vet.

who have you recently made up with after fighting? No one.

what kind of toothpaste do you use? I think it's Aim…idk.

last thing you bought at the grocery store? A bunch of stuff - including the doughnuts I wanted to get for tomorrow.

what were you doing this morning at 1am? Sleeping.

funniest name you have ever heard? Idk.

what could someone do to irritate you? Hmm.

have you used a tissue today? No.

the last person that slept in your bed gets arrested, what do you do? Nothing. I wouldn't even know about it.

what color hair does your mom have? Greying brown.

when people ask "how are you?" do you say "good" even if you aren't? Yep. Unless you're my dad or my therapist (and sometimes my mom), I'm always "good." ;D

honestly, did you really love the last person you said i love you to? Yeah.

when was the last time you were told you were cute? No idea.

how was your friday? Good. I was at the animal shelter all day.

when is the last time you were in a swimming pool? Not since I was a teen.

did you speak to your father today? Yeah.

what was the last thing you drank? Coffee.

is there anyone you want to come see you? No.

how did you wake up this morning? I just woke up naturally.

[windalchemist001]

It was early in the morning and the perfect of ramshackle and the feline known as grim arrived near the front of the mirror hall. Though said place was less of a hall and more of a room. But none the less everything was going well.

The two managing to meet up with the the ones who were originally going though the mirror. The perfect ingoing the taller male greated kailim with a a friendly tone , and thanked him for inviting them to his homeland. Again ingoring his advisor unless she had to address him in which case glares and cold and curt response were all he got.

The perfect would also roll her eyes and click her tounge at a point or two. Treating the advicer as nothing more than benth her. And had it not been for kailim and grim twisted her arm behind her back (metaphorical that is) she wouldn't have even bothered to come, since the perfect made it clear she would rather deal with anyone but the adviser.

Soon though the four were joined by Carter, and the perfect try not to again show discomfort and while she wonder if maybe she should try to get out of this again

Carter and grim interacted with one another while the perfect wasn't really paying attention at least till Carter's plus one made his appearance. And to those who had a decirning eye, could visible see the change in the perfect as the cold annoyance quickly faded from their expression and replaced with affection

"Hey Trey!" The perfect who had been a bit feather from everyone seemed to not only quickly waves the second she saw the male, but than quickly moved to get closer clearly giving full attention to the second vice on this trip.

Shifting slightly in her spot, she Kept glancing at him and than away, as a soft (almost unnoticeable behind bagie skin) blush cover her cheeks. "So you're coming along? Cause that's like super cool!"

The male that was getting the attention chuckled. "Yeah, when Carter invited me, I figured it would be an interesting experience, since I heard about several unique confection there, and I'll never pass up on the chance to seek out new inspiration for my unbrithday party desserts."

"Ah!" The girl was about to say something else to the male only for the advicer to cut the perfect off. Which only the darkest of glares to be shot his way as the conversation was between her and trey had been interpreted.

After a bit more talk from the guy and more dark glares at Jamil the group headed to the mirror chamber, where the headmaster was waiting, and he not so slyly slip in how he wanted a reward for allowing the wealthy kailim and his servant Jamil to return home for their cultural celebration.

Though once he was done asking for his reward. The headmaster decided to remark that the last of their group was waiting for them.

At first everyone had expected the third vice warden that would join their group was informed no, and their second guess was also incorrect for they had thought it to be the second year silver. But from the shadows of the mirror step out the prince of the fae and current head of Diasomnia: Malleus Draconia.

"Good morning!" The fae smiled at the group rather excited to be invited to something since he was left out a lot.

Though before anyone else could say anything the perfect practical shouted "Horton!!!" and ran past everyone once again. But unlike with trey where the feeling were shy and more reserved almost afraid to be pushed away.

With the fae it was diffeent as the perfect practical attempted to tackle the male. But that was mostly because in an attempt to run had them tripping over their own feet and falling forward.

Though that didn't bother either as the perfect was easily caught and malleus only laughed while moving to wrap his arms around the perfect. Who while clearly small looked even tinier when compared with malleus massive frame.

In fact while the two talking about things that only they both seemed to know about. With soft touches. Like the perfect lightly brushing her hand against his hand or arm, and malleus moving hair from the perfect's face or moving to lightly kiss the perfect's hand, which made her giggle and look away.

The both of them seeming to be speaking to one another as if they forgot about the rest of them. And while it might seem odd to most. the two had gotten to be rather close over the months that despite how odd or crazy it seemed to outsiders, to the perfect and prince, it seemed perfectly normal for them.

It would be noted how polar opposite they were. The heir apparent was over six feet, with pail almost porsalin skin. And eare green eyes that reminded you of a prediter ready to strike at any moment.

The perfect on the other hand was small and while most in the room would compare her to Heartslabyul housewarden, stating she was smaller than him. didn't perfectly describe her height, rather the perfect was only slightly taller than the robotic child that acts as idia's (the house warden of ignihyde) little brother. With a more warm binge color to her skin tone and dark brown eyes while not round, like a pray animal, would still remind you of one when they would widen in fear.

But despite this rather comical size difference and the overall friendly atmosphere the two seemed to have. After a moment the perfect seemed to recall that lila was meant to join them and asked if his vice warden was just running late. In which malleus mention he had gotten sick and that he would be joining the alone.

Which seemed to be the trigger that seemed to snap out Jamil (and sort of everyone else to a lesser extent) of what ever shock he had been under and decided to that it would be wise to protest that the most powerful mage in all of twisted wonderland could not go. This would pause the happy atmosphere and both figures who had been lost with each other would turn to glare at Jamil.

Jamil would try to point out that since Malleus was in fact royalty, that should something happy it could be devastating on an international level.

Malleus glared darkly before speaking "someone of your magical ability need not worry about me. I'm hardly fragile."

The perfected nodded in agreement to malleus's stament and gave a small response. "Yeah~!"

Jamil glance to the side stating he did see the fae's point, since he did agree that malleus was powerful. But still he tried to protest before being cut off by the fae again.

"Than what's your issue viper? Judging by the look on your face, you seem to think I'm a nuisance." Malleus kept glaring as the perfect beside him, deciding to make things worse for Jamil nodded.

"Yeah! Whats your problem? Horton really wants to come, I mean shit he was here before us! Obviously he woke up earlier than us so he can come, and it's sort of a dick thing to play take backs. And sure if you did it to me I would get it, but don't do it to him!" The perfect was glaring more.

And while the sounds or thunder were heard before it seemed thay the did quieted a bit while the perfect had been defending mallues. And it seemed even the headmaster wanted to dig Jamil a grave as the man mention the fae having waited for three hours.

Honestly that shocked everyone. And while the perfect lightly and playfully scolded malleus. Carter and kalim convinced Jamil to agree to taking mallues along.

And so with his arm twisted behind his back Jamil agreed to it. And grim who had been quiet for most of all this decided to say his peice already wanting to head out for all the food he can eat. And this begin the trip to a different land for what will hopefully be a fun time.

Entering the mirror they group would soon end up in the very sunny nation of scalding sands. Which shouldn't be surprised when the sound of an umbrella sounded and glancing to the perfect was doing her best to stay shielded from the sun. Despite not needing to worry about a sun burn to badly.

Though while at first cater spoke about wish he had thought to bring something or having an sun screen.

"Yeah. I should've worn a hat. Yeesh.." those words had only just left trey's mouth before he would find himself under some shade the perfect struggling to try and keep him shaded with her umbrella before giving up as she held it out to him.

"You can borrow it, I've got other ways to handle the heat, since I'm rather use to deal with it, since while not desert, my home was close enough to the equator that our summers were always hot while our winters were normal to hot that snow was once a generation thing." Trying to push the umbrella more to him.

"I'm fine, I wouldn't want to take something from you." Trey politely refused. But clearly those words effected the perfect who looked hurt.

So with a sigh trey wiped some sweat from his forehead and nodded. "But if you insist I guess I have no choice."

The perfect would smile brightly clearly truly happy to have helped the male not noticing that the prince behind her was unamused with how close she seemed to be with the vice warden from Heartslabyul.

At this point everyone listing to Jamil talk about the lands while the perfect put a white bandana on her head to help keep the sun's rays away from her head. While this was going on grim being him made his way closer to the canal, and it was only realized when try noticed him.

Which in turn had the perfect looking up to see the feline to close to the waterway. Whicj caused her to panic and ask grim to step away from the waterway.

Unfortunately for the perfect's heart grim who just gloating about find ended up slipping into he water way and not caring that she couldn't swim the perfect almost jump in after him had it not been for trey who grab her and pulled her close so she wouldn't do something out of panic. They might have had two to save.

As the perfect yelled for grim seeming to be hyper focused on the feline escpaslly when a boat was coming near the feline. Though as the fear grew worse it seemed the man in the boat didn't run over the cat, but rather lifted him from the water and return him to land.

In between sobs as trey let go of the perfect who scooped up grim and hug him close. She thanked the man, cuddling the cat closely

The man on the boat would scold the group about not keeping an eye on their pet. And grim would protest being called a pet, but the perfect would quickly smother him and thank the man before moving to try and dry grim, the panic was slowly starting to fade but was still there but once it was fully gone it would be annoyance and anger at grim for doing such a reckless thing.

Though as she took of her coat in an attempt to draw the feline Jamil offered a towel. Which for a moment the perfect had paused shooting the male a dark glare and quickly snatched the towel with a huff and soften looking at grim to dry him.

Carter frowned at how harsh the perfect was towards the male but than again he was the only one in the group that didn't know what happened over the winter brake since the perfect did in fact complain a lot about what happened to those she was close too. Though the guys she talked to kept that to themselves.

Once grim was dry to a point kailim always a braker of tension distracted everyone pointing out his house and than everyone was getting in the car or rather a limio which for most of the group was at awe to be in such a thing.

Thus everyone moved to get in and with a bit of luck and slight ploting, the perfect ended up between trey and malleus. Content to be next to both the perfect tened to grim with pets and head scratches as the guys talked among one another. Quietly listing to everything being said since she didn't need to comment on anything.

After the ride they all would get out and walk though the zoo/park/front yard of the al-asim estate. Grim made a few comments here and there and the guys continued to speak to each other, while the perfect was rather quiet still eyes with an almost far away look.

It would be kailim who would notice the perfect silence and ask if she was ok. Who would nod and smile saying she was fine, which wasn't actually true. But kailim knew that burying ones feeling was the best for most people, after all he did it all the time. Bad emotions nope locked away deep inside, nothing bad about that!

So while still a bit worried he decided to take the perfect for her words, so long as she doesn't suffer everything is fine.

For the perfect it was just one of those painful headaches she's only gotten here in this world, only when something seems to trigger something like a forbidden memory, and thus her head rejects the thought.

None the less just something to try and hide and pertented didn't happen after all the best thing to do in moments like these is lock it away, cause nothing bad will happen. Nothing at all.

Now despite the concerning thoughts of the two outwardly vocal and happy people they along with the others manged to make it to the fount of what kailim calls home.

The day seemed at this point seemed a simple affair with everyone getting outfits, well not grim or kailim anyway. And than after a bit of talking Jamil would lead the party around the city to look about and buy suverners. Again nothing seemed to wrong.

Though they did end up meeting Jamil's sister which the perfect spun a tail about being part of a trail run to determine if nrc could hand being co-ed or not, which was believed, but she also was ploting since she seemed to ask for more info along the way that the girl was with them.

So basically everyone was just hanging out though when they were at the stand to buy coconut water drinks. And while the perfect, had been rather reluctant had accepted the drink. Grim had decided to try and eat it by biting the out side of the fruit.

Which had the perfect worried about the feline and Jamil scolding said feline for doing so after all a coconut is meant to be broken with a tool as to get into the inside.

"Then we'll just get a clever from the stand" trey motion to said stand since they thankfully hadn't walked to far away.

"... allow me, clover." Malleus held out his hand for the fruit.

"What? Um, ok..." trey moved to pass over the coconut to the fae prince.

Meanwhile watching the exchange the perfect was trying to keep her inner pterodactyl inside as to not look like a crazy woman just because the two guys she loves are interacting.

"You just need to split it open, yes?" The prince seemed smug as he than used his hands to snap open the fruit.

"Oh!" The words slip out of the perfect was breathy in nature, as her eyes widen softly and it was clear the action was /very/ much appreciated.

"There" the fae actually looked rather smug like a peacock that was finished dancing, as he held out the peices of the snapped coconut to trey. The younger male moved to take it with some hesitant.

"Uh... thanks." Trey than took a bite from the flesh of the coconut his eyes closed as to increase his sense of taste, since he planned on getting the full experience of the ingredients.

After a moment trey begin discussing the taste in a more detail depth. Which honestly even if she didn't fully understand the perfect knew she could listin to trey's voice for ever (she also felt the same about malleus and was super giddy about them interacting with one another.

Though he mind was pulled from.her thoughts when both nijma (Jamil's sister) and grim (the trouble maker) begin trying to get malleus to snap their fruit as well and thougj malleus seemed ok with it the perfect apologized for the inconvenience they were causing. Making malleus laugh and informed her that he wasn't and wouldn't be for maters involving her.

Honestly those words made the perfect feel happy and a bit or rather a lot giddy as she had to move some hair out of her face suddenly feeling a bit warmer than before.

Though this wasn't the end of the trip, so once fruit had been broken apart it was off to the next thing on the list. Sighing the perfect hoped for the best, though mildly wonder if they left the boy alone for a few minutes, would everything stay ok or would it get messed up and she would end up feeling like the meme with the room on fire and the guy just holding the pizza box.

[notebookmusical]

Hi! It's so great that you're feeling better. Aww did you not even know what was wrong? Or was it just multiple symptoms? I hope it wasn't Covid and you get good results. Those are also my favorites on Red! I know it's long..honestly sometimes usually I just play the newer verses..but it was really awesome live! I totally get loving a song cuz it's your surprise song. That's me with Castles Crumbling..I liked it of course cuz of Taylor and Hayley but now I love it even more. My favorites on Speak Now are probably I Can See You and Timeless but they switch all the time. Like Timeless is such a classic Taylor song so I love it..and Foolish One is so relatable to me lol but maybe that makes it harder to listen to all the time. But I also love Electric touch and Emma Falls in Love! I think I told you I am a huge Emma Stone fan so to have that song makes me so happy..along with Hayley on Castles Crumbling. They are my two favorite friendships of Taylor and I was a fan of all of them around that time. My favorite Fearless songs are probably Don't You and Mr. Perfectly Fine but I also like them all. I won't be trading but I am excited to have more people enjoying the show in the theater this time compared to the Twenty One Pilots livestream show. I think we are planning for a late show like 11PM so it might not be as many people though. What time are you going? I'm so excited! My bday is June 14th..cuz we are Gemini twins and I love that. It's also Flag Day on the calendar haha. But otherwise I'm not really like what people usually think of a Gemini cuz I'm shy. Your birthday is so close to Taylor's. Do you also love the holidays or have Sagittarius energy like she does?

Haha I don't know if I loved it but I do enjoy Dr Seuss stuff so I did like it. Wow..now it makes sense how you've seen so many shows! I think that's super cool that Ooh I've never seen Phantom but I wanted to go to the tour a few years ago and sadly missed it. I think it would be cool with dropping the chandelier. Oh I noticed the Waitress playbills and had no idea her mom wrote the musical. That's so cool! Haha ya I told my parents to watch it eventually..I showed them the trailer and they said it looked funny so maybe they will. I told them they might not understand the jokes though.

Oh haha..no wonder you were excited or skeptical for the musical..especially if it means a lot to you or you know it really well. I might read it eventually by the time the musical is on Broadway or both musicals are. Maybe he will..I hope. I'm happy he has the role but I wonder if someone else would be a better choice..or who it could be in the Florence one. Or is there anyone you think could be a better fit? What did you think of the music overall? Cuz ya..it wasn't like 20s really but after watching the videos a few times..it was a little better. I think the performances are next week so we will find out if the full musical is any better and eventually how the Florence version is. By the way, kinda off topic, but I remembered the Little Women ask I sent a while ago and was wondering if you were ever gonna reply since it came up talking with my sister. No pressure obviously but it was funny to me.

Oh good..I'm glad I let you know then. I've never been to Seattle but I'm excited to read it so I can learn more about it. I will definitely read it by the time the sequel is out. Aww that's special and sweet to have that connection..and ya that's sometimes why I still enjoy reading YA cuz it makes me nostalgic or remind me that everyone has similar experiences. For a while, I confused the title with Tomorrow Tomorrow Tomorrow from your poll actually..but then realized they were two different books haha. But maybe I can read that one with you too since that one is also on my long list and I heard it was good! Yay okay I will and I know I was a slow reading partner..but I finally finished some Mistakes were made so you can finally share your thoughts. I thought it was okay. I think the conflict wasn't that developed or dramatic..but I guess it seemed realistic and the characters choices made sense at least. The ending was a little rushed but at least it was a happy ending I guess. I would probably rate it a 3..I just don't have strong feelings about it but I also wasn't like bored reading it or anything. I couldve read it sooner but there were just some days I would forget about reading. I wonder if reading it in a day made you feel differently or not. Well I don't know if I will read Enchanted to Meet You but if I do..I will tell you how it is. I read the princess diaries before but can barely remember it. Oh I am familiar with Emma Lord and Sophie Gonzalez books. I've read Tweet Cute and was in the middle of Perfect on Paper at some point.. I usually enjoy more serious YA but I still enjoy their writing. Begin Again is on my list. There was more than I thought actually and probably even more. I guess it's kinda cool but it's like using a title that doesn't have to really do with the book..but the point is so more people will wanna read it. I guess it kinda works though since that's what made me interested in Enchanted to Meet you, and having a catchy title is important nowadays and I imagine coming up with a title is pretty hard. but I feel like popular authors usually have pretty good titles..like Emily Henry. Actually one of my favorite books..which is If He Had Been With Me I read based just on the title without reading anything else. But The Stepping Off Place..which is my other favorite, I always wanted a better title but I don't know what else I would name it either. Sorry I know I talked about these before, but I just realized this right now while typing, and these are always like a pair in my mind. So sorry if that seems random. Anyway I know this is long now so I hope you have a good rest of your week and enjoy the movie if I don't reply by then!!! Even if I don't, I'll probably send you another ask at least saying to have fun and a good time! 🩷

hi hi!! so the thing is is that i had a bad bout of bronchitis which set off my asthma, but i've also just been trying to get some other things diagnosed for ... forever, including my migraines! i'm feeling a lot better now from bronchitis-y things, but am unsure where the diagnosis for other general health things is going!

also i really do love castles crumbling! what's your favorite taylor collab? i think mine is either nothing new, the last time, or castles crumbling, but i also really love cowboy like me, exile… okay, i'm just listening every collab now. 11pm is so late!! especially since it's a 3 hour movie — get home safe!! i'm going to a 6:00 pm showing on friday, and then an afternoon showing on sunday! so i'll be seeing it twice this weekend! i'm very excited! are you going to be dressing up for it? i think i'm going to dress up a bit more (not like DRESS up though, just wearing a sweater + skirt) for the first showing since it's opening night but i think i'll wear very comfy clothes (probably just my eras quarter zip) on sunday!

june 14th is really close to one of my close friend's birthdays! i think it's so fun that you're a gemini and you and your sister are twins!! i believe taylor is also a cancer moon, which is what i am! i'm a sag sun, cancer moon and a capricorn rising, if that means anything to you — and i am very much like all of those things. i do love the holidays, but i am also very nostalgic about them! it makes me think of hong kong/home, and i get a bit sad. do you have a favorite holiday?

i also was very, very lucky, and seattle has a really good program for teenagers where you can see shows for $5 — it's called teentix (they also do museum passes, and other art stuff!), which is really how i got to see a lot of shows! and then once i was no longer a teen, i did student rush a lot! phantom is SO cool with the chandelier; i saw it in london (my first west end show!) when i went to london with some family earlier ths year, and i forgot how much i really like it.

if you want to read gatsby, we can always do a buddy read! i have no idea who i'd want for the florence one, but i'm hopeful it'll be someone good! and you're fine about the little women ask — i meant to save it for a time where i could reread little women, but then i got buried in other books and then i never got around to rereading little women (hence why it is still unanswered)! i see it every time i open up my drafts though 😂

and yes, definitely down to read tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow if you want to start that soon! i think i'm going to try to start that next week, but it depends on how busy i am!!! i have not read ... much ... this week ... (aka: i have not even picked up a book this week) and probably won't get the chance to until next week). i'm glad you thought that the book was okay — i wasn't particularly like, impressed, or disappointed with the book, i also just felt like it was fine! i think it was also really predictable, and i think there were some storylines that felt a bit rushed/that could've been handled with more care. i saw if he had been with me at the bookstore on saturday and thought of you, but already had way too many books in my hands! i'm always really curious about book titles too, like how many books stay with the original title vs. publishing/marketing suggests something else!

i hope you're having a good day/week! enjoy the movie! i can't wait to hear your thoughts after (even though we've both seen the tour hehe) 🤍 xx

[intergalactic-chameleon]

gender thoughts: friendships with straight boys + girls

i've sort of talked about this before but god being able to make friends or just silly conversation with boys, especially straight boys, really is something that is fun for me. in general, i dont really care about straight men -- i far prefer queer men, and i look up to them way more that i would a straight man (excluding celebrity actor men that i like lol). but regardless, sometimes, having some silly goose banter with another straight guy that i deem Okay enough to enable myself to talk to can be such a special little treat for me. i grew up loving being friends with boys, and had many successful friendships with them, but especially as i went into middle school, rarely did the majority ever truly want to be my friend back. either they had feelings for me that were unwanted/not reciprocated OR more often than not, they just... didn't care. they didn't see me as a Real friend probably bc didn't see me as a viable dating candidate AND i would not dumb myself or my morals down for them to see me as "one of the good ones." and it fucking sucked!! guys in high school were absolutely atrocious when it came to feminism/LGBT stuff which was super disheartening.

but now that im in college (even tho it's ending soon), i feel a lot more... respected as a human being than before. which isn't saying a lot lol, straight men still are misogynist and bigoted in various other ways which make them unappealing to me. but i noticed as soon as i transferred to art school last year, men and women were far more integrated than what i had seen in high school. and seeing that really renewed my faith in making friends with another man, even tho i still probably will stick with queer men as my buddies for my sanity's sake.

in the perspective of my genderqueer identity, getting to positively interact with other masculine people (including men of course) feels so EUPHORIC... even if the other person only sees me as a Girl, i still express myself pretty openly and authentically if given the chance and i feel like they respond well to it. i've noticed a couple guys that ive interacted with once or a few times before that give me a glance while walking past me every now and then, as if to say "i think you're cool. im probably not gonna try and talk to you cuz im shy and unsure if i actually wanna be friends or not, but you intrigue me." of course, i may just be projecting what i Want them to think hahaha. but i swear, when i talk to straight boys like they're my equal, i think that genuinely makes an impression on them. and so they wonder about me. straight boys wanna be my friend but they're emotionally repressed and/or dont deserve my friendship!! and honestly? i kinda... dig that. lmfao. feels like i have the upper hand for once in my life. i swear im not being delusional HAHA.

but yea, anyway... i was just thinking about this because masculinity is weirdly important for me. being able to express it while in camaraderie with someone else is !!! so exciting! feels like im making up for lost time all those years that my male peers rejected me, forcing me to only really interact with girls. and just to be clear, i didn't have a problem with girls at all. they were a far better option than the boys so ofc p much all of my friends were girls for a very long time and expressing myself femininely wasn't like, totally inauthentic. but since i felt like girls were my only choice back in the day, that lead me to sort of repress any masculinity i wanted to express because i knew a lot of girls wouldn't "get" it. i've always felt different from most girls in general - being queer and neurodivergent and all - and trying to fit in with any of them who had any semblance of popularity (and who were usually very pretty + feminine) just... never really worked. to this day, i just dont feel feminine enough to really connect to the vast range of girls i've come in to contact with. a lot of them have access to a certain kind of social capital that i just never will be able to access simply by being more feminine that me. which is ok, i like spending my time exclusively with queer, trans, gnc, neurodivergent people. but yea, i've always kind of felt like an outsider to the womanhood that a lot of my cis female peers seem to experience, yet i don't exactly feel explicitly left out. this outsider experience is voluntary in a lot of ways because i know this experience just isnt exactly for me. womanhood as i know it is very informed by heterosexual dynamics and compulsory femininity and that just isn't my vibe at all!

[quickdeaths]

All things being equal, Anzu loved talking about Shinobu. Her best friend of over a decade, even if they'd drifted apart for a couple years in the middle, was someone who Anzu could always count on for support and protection, and while people usually weren't fair to her, to Anzu, she was the coolest person around. Even so, the idea of someone referring to Shinobu as kind and friendly was enough to earn a little laugh from the actress. "I don't know that everyone agrees with that." She had a lot of good traits, but those weren't necessarily among them.

Although, Anzu did think it was pretty undeniable that Shinobu had been uncharacteristically warm to Sonia. People didn't stick around too long, and while she'd like to be able to blame others alone, Anzu knew that Shinobu could come off as harsh to people she didn't know. For someone to befriend her, and not leave or be pushed away even after a few months? Not usual at all, and that was without even getting into those creepy Valentine's chocolates that Shinobu had seemed so charmed by. "Hmm... I wouldn't say she's shy?" No, that didn't really fit her. "I think Shinobu-chan just... prefers to put her energy into other things than making a lot of friends," she explained, pausing to think of the most diplomatic way to put it.

But maybe that wasn't right either, and Anzu shrugged, as though she wasn't super invested in her answer either way. "As for why her and Rui-kun specifically don't get along? I don't really know." It was then that Anzu realized she might have given Sonia a slightly worrying impression, prompting her to quickly correct herself. "But, I think she definitely likes you, Sonia-san! Shinobu-chan doesn't want a lot of friends, but she cares a lot about the friends she does have." And with Sonia, more than that... Well, Anzu had seen the way Sonia looked at her shirtless bestie, and she'd seen the way Shinobu's expression softened whenever Sonia was around, and how she, noted neutral party when it came to sweets, had practically melted at opening Sonia's gift. Oh yeah. She was shipping.

Anzu, too, was dressed up for the outing. It was an usual sight in the entertainment district, probably, but Anzu always liked to wear her cheaper kimonos on a night out. It was nice to draw attention, and the inner layer kept her warm on cool nights. Most of all, though, dressing up that way - even if it was time-consuming and complicated, even if it would be a bit of an issue if her clothes were damaged or stained - made her feel pretty. Tonight was no different, with a deep purple kimono with a golden feather pattern and matching obi with geometric patterning. Her clip-in hair extensions were gathered up in a low, loose ponytail that helped to lend her a bit more of a mature feel - very fitting, Anzu thought, for someone who was soon to turn eighteen.

With the conversation about Shinobu temporarily tabled, Anzu returned her thoughts to the matter of the club. "Mmm... It's not exactly like that," she corrected. "Normally, you meet the hosts, and pick one as your sort of "personal" host, and then just have them every time, although there's a little more leeway here than most places." Monsieur, as far as she knew, was adamant about giving his staff days off and breaks, meaning that it wasn't unusual for super regulars to have a secondary and tertiary host, just in case. Anzu, though, came for Rui almost exclusively - both since they were friends, and she wanted to support a fellow entertainer, and also because Rui was hotsexy and knew exactly how to dote on her in the way that made her feel special.

"Rui-kun is mine, usually, but since she's not here, that complicates things a little." But, not necessarily too much, and Anzu shrugged. "But you're new, so even if you don't come back, it wouldn't be weird for us to have anyone, and log the visit as a new customer." That would add extra discounts too, so they could probably get the nicer stuff, if Sonia was interested in drinking. Again, Anzu shrugged. Monsieur said he'd drop by soon and help them figure things out, so there probably wasn't a real reason to worry too much. "And as for hotsexy qualities... Hmm..." She tapped at her cheek, thinking it over.

"Well, I don't think it's necessarily the basis for dating someone," she admitted. "But if it's just for a few hours of entertainment, I think just aesthetic attraction is fine." As a starting point, when there wasn't very much to go off of, at least. Still, if there wasn't anyone in particular that Sonia was interested in, that might leave things more to chance, she thought, lightly kicking her feet underneath the table. On some level, it was a good thing that she wasn't the type to immediately chase a handsome face, but Anzu had been looking forward to understanding Sonia's type. For Shinobu's sake, of course.

And then the conversation circled back around to that girl, prompting Anzu to sit up. "Huh? Shinobu-chan texted you?" Multiple times??? Oh, Shinobu-chan, she thought, fighting back a wince, you have to be more relaxed than that. It makes you look way too eager. "Hahaha, I think Shinobu-chan just doesn't text much. She doesn't really know textiquette." Do you appreciate what I'm doing for you, Shinobu-chan? I'm keeping your chances up, so she doesn't think you're some socially-deficient weirdo! "And don't worry about it!" Of course, it was something worth worrying about, and the thought of that afternoon sent shivers down Anzu's spine.

Yuck. "Shinobu-chan's too popular for her own good," she said with a sigh. Valentine's Day had been rough the year prior, but this was on another level. "I'm glad I could help you out." Then, an impish thought crawled into Anzu's head. Shinobu probably wouldn't want her saying anything, but... "You know, Shinobu-chan doesn't like sweet things very much, and she definitely gets too much to eat even if she did." Sorry Shinobu-chan, but this is for your own good. "After everything finally got squared away and the police left and all the reports were filed and stuff, Shinobu-chan and I were sorting things in her lab." She fixed Sonia with a bright smile. "Your chocolates were the only ones she kept for herself. It seemed like she really liked them!"

At that time, Monsieur arrived at their table, wearing a tired smile. "Hello again, beloved guests," he said, setting a small booklet with the alcohol offerings down in front of them. "I'm Monsieur, and while I am certainly too old to sit with the two of you, I'd be happy to get a bottle or two for the table?" The introduction seemed to be for Sonia's sake, and his smile towards her invited an introduction in turn, should she wish. "Anzu-san has a line of credit, and between the unfortunate situation with Rui-san, and a new customer welcome gift, our prices can't be beat." The man gave a gentle laugh, his performance warm and familiar towards Anzu, lacking any stuffy qualities, but neither being too flirty or forward. "As for the matter of your entertainment tonight, if there's someone you'd like to see, I'm happy to arrange it, or I could have some of the hosts who are free come over in shifts until you settle on someone?" For both questions, Anzu looked to Sonia, willing to go along with whatever she wanted.

In front of her, as they approached the district known for its nightlife and many clubs and bars, Sonia smiled genuinely in return. Anzu couldn't see it of course, but that didn't mean it didn't matter: her friend was a vivacious and fascinating person, with a heart and soul so large and bright it was seemingly difficult to contain to the stage. A natural performer, to the point that Sonia had been quite surprised when she'd suggested what to do on a night they both had off. The Ultimate Princess had incorrectly assumed that Anzu, after spending so much time in the spotlight, would want a break from it all. Perhaps that was Sonia's own self-projection.

"I am glad as well," Sonia told her, realizing her smile would be of little help in adding to the conversation. "I shall rely upon your guidance, Anzu-san! Truth be told, it is my first time visiting an establishment such as this."

Not that Sonia hadn't heard of host clubs and bars. Anime, manga, and dramas offered plenty of various insights into the host club world, from pastel school blazers to evenly applied spray tans. But it was one of the more controversial, thus discreet, ways the truly wealthy Japanese spent their money: unlike the flashy sports cars and "garish and loud" designer labels (her mother's words, but it was fitting) beloved by plenty of wealthy offspring around the world, the old moneyed Japanese were so discreet that, at best, they blended into crowds on trains and on the street in perfect camouflage. Yes, she'd visited single family detached homes with their own private onsen or luxury condos a two minute walk from Shibuya station, but the cars and clothes were quiet luxury, and many of those with drivers' licenses drove themselves (barring a night of drinking where the family chauffeur was called upon to take care of them).

Money, instead, was spent on experiences: elite boarding schools in Europe (including Novoselic. There were several Japanese teens whose families had sent them to In Utero purely for an excellent education and to befriend the Princess of Novoselic, only to become gravely disappointed that Princess Sonia had opted to finish her high school education in Japan), first class or private flight accommodations for luxury vacations, booking an entire 10-seat sushi restaurant for two or obtaining a last-minute table at Joel Robuchon (despite reservations being booked four months out), touring a building or business they intended to buy to celebrate their 20th birthday, and host and hostess clubs. The latter was done as quietly as possible: a common knowledge that it was widely practiced but an unflattering habit should it ever be revealed to fellow members of the upper crust. Wealthy and power young men and women alike bought their hosts and hostesses all the loudly branded, sparkling, and engine-revving items they'd never be able to sport themselves, but Sonia knew enough future CEOs, politicians, and trophy spouses who felt like they 'owned' their favored host or hostess, as high school or college students, because they'd bought them an Italian sports car or a closet full of designer handbags.

She couldn't tell Anzu, she thought as they turned a corner, but she was a little nervous: she trusted her friend to have planned a safe and comfortable outing for them both, but she hoped she wouldn't accidentally meet anyone who would eagerly inform the King and Queen of Novoselic about their daughter's whereabouts that evening. From gossip at various events she'd attended as Princess, she also had managed to overhear various tips and suggestions from young men and women who visited such clubs: if you're under twenty, dress a little older. Nothing too loud. Offer gifts and compliments with discretion. Choose a host or hostess who knows how to keep their mouth shut.

Thankfully, the swirling questions in her mind would soon be put to rest. Sonia's gaze followed Anzu's direction to the elegant silver banner depicting the club's name. It seemed different than the rest of the businesses on the block: with reds or pinks or brighter, if not blinding, lights. She followed Anzu to the professional headshots created for each host, not a spray tan or spiky hairdo between the lot of them. "I think I have seen her before," Sonia commented, the heels of her Roger Vivier mary janes clicking against the pavement. "But I have never met her. She seems to have many friends at school: I believe I remember her being surrounded by many girls, from our school or otherwise. And if you believe she is a good person, Anzu-san, then I am sure I shall be delighted to meet her too!"

"Still," Sonia continued as she followed Anzu inside, "It puzzles me as to why your friend Rui-kun and Yaguchi-san do not get along. Yaguchi-san is a kind and friendly person, courteous and helpful and wonderful to talk to." She pointedly left out the amount of rippling, defined muscles that highlighted Shinobu Yaguchi's arms and torso, something she'd personally witnessed for herself a few months back when she'd returned her samue and presented her with flowers that, to Sonia's delight, Shinobu had accepted. Granted, Anzu had been present for all of it too, so it was a moot point to mention anyway. "I imagine she would have many friends. Perhaps she is shy?"

While she spoke, she took in the atmosphere of the club: the cool-toned, sleek decor, the abundance of glittering chandeliers above their heads, a few booths already occupied with young women and their selected hosts. To Sonia's relief, none of them seemed to embody quiet luxury: many of them chose cutesy styles not out of place in Shibuya or bold luxury labels mostly from Europe: from apparel to accessories to shoes, they seemed enamored by their hosts who, albeit far more discreetly, sported a few similarly luxe items as well. From the chatter she'd heard at various parties, it was likely these women were hostesses as well or in a similar service industry and it was their time off, their turn to be pampered. She could not blame them, she thought as she approached the front of house behind Anzu. Soon enough, Sonia found herself trying to stifle a chuckle at the older man's joke that Anzu clearly hadn't understood: two younger cousins obsessed with various Nintendo products and being best friends with Chiaki Nanami ensured that was a reference Sonia could not miss.

"Thank you," She smiled at the man, once she was able to contain her amusement and slip off her deep green overcoat, to be handed off to one of the hosts to hang presumably from the way he stretched out his arms in offering. It was necessary for that time of the year: the deep green lace dress, lined through the bodice and skirt only, ended at the middle of her thighs and left her arms and wide scalloped neckline only covered in a single layer of green lace. It ended in a deep V in the back, one that bared a good amount of her skin when she walked, thanks to the high ponytail she'd chosen to style her hair in that evening. Her mother had hated the dress, mostly because of the short length and how fitted it was over her hips, but it did make her look older than her seventeen years. At least the black tights she'd worn with it would keep her legs suitably warm.

Her amusement faded though, when she noticed Anzu's disappointment. "Oh no, Anzu-san...well, perhaps we could simply return sometime and I may meet your Rui-kun at a later date? I am sure we may still find reason to enjoy our time here. We shall have a proper girls night, fo' sho'!" She beamed, nodding her approval to Monsieur's idea and following Anzu's lead.

Or so she was, for when they reached the booth, she'd asked her the most peculiar question as Sonia slid the chain strap of her handbag off her shoulder. "Are the hosts...not simply assigned to you when you enter?" She inquired with a puzzled tilt of her head. "Forgive me, I thought it was like a cafe where one is simply assigned to you when they have availability."

She looked up at the chandelier over their booth in thought, trying to do her best by Anzu and take her question into consideration. She'd only had a quick glance at the photographs when they'd entered, and the hosts seemed to range from playfully easygoing to semi-formal, or at least a stylish sort of business look. But Sonia found herself facing the same problem she had at every party, at every ball, at every gala where she was expected to swoon over a potential partner.

She gave Anzu an apologetic look and a small shake of her head, just as her phone began to vibrate several times in succession in her grey quilted leather handbag. For so many messages, Sonia thought, it must be important as she reached for the double C turnlock: she hadn't shown up entirely unlabeled, so to speak. "I do not know if they are 'hotsexy,' really," She admitted. Perhaps she was visiting a Host Club all wrong? Was it truly so simple to see someone physically attractive and decide to love them, just like that? "How would I know if they are 'hotsexy' unless I speak with them? I suppose I have always found others attractive by their thoughts, and values, and passions first."

Speaking of attraction, it had been another surprise of the evening for Sonia to find out that it had been Shinobu behind the five text messages in a row. Shinobu, with her interest in reading novels who enjoyed kaiju movies and doted on the koi in the pond in her house's front garden. She'd read the two books she'd lent her and had returned them before she'd left for Novoselic for the required Christmas holiday events: it was entirely possible, after all, that her friend would want to read her books during the time away from Hope's Peak, when she wasn't practicing her archery of course.

Archery...a mental image Sonia did not need to preoccupy herself with for the second time in the span of an hour: Shinobu shattering a target, Shinobu who made such a thing look effortless, with her raw strength and power of her arms and back and-

"O-oh, though as we were speaking of Yaguchi-san, she has messaged me several times in a row to say she enjoyed the chocolates you helped me give her for Valentine's Day and she regrets not thanking in me in person, due to the circumstances of the day," Sonia explained. It would be rude to leave Anzu in the dark unless it truly needed to be private. "Thank you again for your assistance with that, by the way. I was certain that crowd would have trampled me otherwise. She also wishes us a pleasant evening."