#ngl its the desperation for validation but i think youre cool

[butteredfrogs]

vent in tags

[delugyu]

bae dont be mad at me i promise youre my fav writer to interact with on tumblr 😞 i send other writers silly little asks but you get LONG asks because i love this account so much 😪 its funny that i found it though because i actually read male idol stuff very rarely and most of the kpop things i read are for girl groups so i guess its fate 😛

the subtle hate that chuu and heart attack started getting from orbits genuinely baffles me bc?!???! we're mad that one of the members is really popular and has a larger fanbase? seriously GROW UPPP shes the sweetest person to ever exist and shes such a cutie how could anyone hate her 💔

also i assumed you were american because most writers i find on this app are but dont worry girl there isnt any weird aura around your fics that gives it away LMAO but seriously i dont understand how students over there do it because the college fees are insane?? i thought the uk was expensive until i saw the cost of going to college in america and i start shaking just thinking about it bc the student debt must be horrible.. sending prayers out to all you americans 😭

what is this i hear about sub soobin 🫣 literally anything sub/loser txt related has me drooling on my knees like YES GIVE IT TO MEEEE im in love with your brain you are keeping us so well-fed! a jennifers body taehyun fic sounds amazing i cant imagine my life without darker fics 😌 and from the ask you replied to after mine i will NOT oppose oc cheating on taehyun bc lets be honest we know who she wants!! go get ur man hes DESPERATE! and hes BEOMGYU if it was actually me and i had gyu acting this way trust we would have resolved everything 6 chapters ago 😖

and yes other than the impending sense of doom that naturally washes over me with every exam season, no matter how good i am at the subject, im actually doing pretty well because the thought of a long summer break is keeping me going 🙏 i think i remember you saying youre starting a summer job soon? good luck with that!! starting a new job sounds scary but i hope you still have a lot of time to yourself and dont work too hard 😣💗 and i honestly adore seeing you reply to my asks with essays partially because it makes me feel less bad about sending so many paragraphs every time i check in so matching my energy is a much needed form of validation 😭

- 🪼

i cream so hard every time i see a long ask NNNYEAHHH

i wish there was a mysterious and cool way to react to being told i’m ur fav writer to interact with but im cheesing hard af so it’s hard to be nonchalant lolllllll twirling my hair rn 😇 flattery works…. u win…. i’m telepathically transporting a dozen roses to u rn

i mostly read gg things too lol! i feel like aespa is like the only gg with good x reader fics rn, i can’t find others here we’re in a drought </3 i do equally enjoy ship fics tho ngl LMAOO gg fics on ao3 are so fucking fire. specifically aespa writers like the smut over there literally has me 😵😵‍💫 outing myself as an insane freak but i never liked omegaverse until i started reading jiminjeong fics LOLLLLL

ur right btw it was fate 😏 brought together through txt smut but united through our ten million other interests, wow that’s so beautiful <3

anyone who hates chuu needs to be struck down by a meteor. ALL TONGUES THAT RISE AGAINST CHUU FROM LOONA SHALL FALL!!! orbits should appreciate her music more too cause her discography is soooo good, it’s so sad to see her songs not getting the same love as other post-loona projects

yeah a lot of fic writers are american, i’ve noticed too lol. land of the freak home of the depraved 🔥

that was good… letting that linger for a second…

but i’m glad to hear my fics aren’t like obnoxiously american LOL 🫶 yeahhhh colleges here are insanely expensive, we need a socialist revolution 😭 i considered going to uni in canada or europe, but i ultimately decided against it cause international applications confused and scared me lol. id love to study abroad for a semester though, it’s just sooo hard for me to choose which country cause i wanna see so many

wait now knowing that ur from the uk i need to know so bad. do u feel like u can do a good american accent? LMAOOOO i feel like british ppl are so much better at doing american accents than americans are at british accents… i can do a mean australian accent tho im not gonna lie.

YES LORD sub/loser txt is everything to me!!! the mind control is working i suddenly feel compelled to drop a snippet of the camboy soobin drabble

omg yes i love dark fics so much. i’m kinda shocked it’s been five months here and i’ve yet to write a dark fic!!! i’m soooo excited to write taehyun as jennifer hehe. i already wrote two scenes for the fic, and the first scene i wrote was actually the ending lol. i never write my fics start to finish, i just write whatever scene is calling to me at the moment 😭 i googled jennifer check’s mbti out of curiosity and it showed up with ESTP which is also taehyun’s so 😛 yum

LMFAO the mc cheating movement is alive and well! go get ur desperate pathetic side piece queen!!! “if it was actually me and i had gyu acting this way trust we would have resolved everything 6 chapters ago” REAL AS HELL IM CRYINGGGG

push thru soldier!!! summer break is near!!!! NEVER BACK DOWN NEVER WHATTT!! yess one thing i love about college is that the winter and summer breaks are so long. unfortunately i do spend a significant portion of that free time working LMAO ty for the good luck! i’m only part time rn cause i need to figure out something better for transportation lol, so i still have enough time for myself for now hehe 🤍

glad to hear my essay-long responses have ur approval 😁🤞 i have no self control so anything that comes to mind as i’m typing is getting written down LMAO

just rented jennifer’s body. $3.99 well spent. microwaving popcorn rn. opening up a document for plotting and drafting and other evil nonsense. we are so backkkk 🔥🔥🔥

[ashesonthefloor]

make up your mind (before the salt burns your eyes and you run out of time)

summary: Luke is a selkie, caught between his love for Ashton and the sea. He finds a way to find comfort in both. ao3 found here

word count: 2181

content warning: surprisingly, none. just a ridiculous amount of prose-y writing and being inside Luke's (not empty this time) head. it's fluff, I swear, even if it doesn't sound that way on the tin. or...it's Luke musing on his good relationship with Ashton, kind of?

A/N: ahhhh look at me churning things out! ngl this idea has been bouncing around in my head for a moment, so I'm glad I finally had the mental bandwidth and desire to write it. I decided to try and write in this weird prose-y style I loved writing in in senior year, and I love it as much now as I did then. thank you to my love @clumsyclifford for beta'ing this and giving me both validation and fixing the weird places I wanted to switch tenses! as always, I thrive on validation <3

Luke still remembered the first few times he’d dared to travel on land, tentative and afraid. He’d found his courage soon enough, though his coat had never been far from his hands. His mother’s words and warnings echoed too loudly in his head for him to ever want to venture far from it, to let it leave his sight.

The first time he’d run into Ashton, he’d been afraid he’d know what he was. But the man had been none the wiser, more than happy to carry on a conversation as though Luke wasn’t looking at him in awe, as though he’d hung the moon and all the stars that Luke had always loved to watch from the safety and serenity of the open water.

The time after that went just as well, Ashton content to carry on more than half of the conversation while Luke watched the way the light cast half his face into shadow when he tilted his head, the way it lit his eyes ablaze when he looked up, and Luke felt like he was nothing more than stray kindling that could catch fire in his warmth. He wouldn’t trade it for the world; the ocean was always there to put him out if he ventured too close to the open flames of Ashton’s affection.

And then they settled into some sort of comfortable familiarity. They ran into each other more often than they didn’t, and Luke grew familiar with the way Ashton spoke, like each word held the weight of the world and meant nothing all at once. He could hear him in his head, now, when he tried to sleep, could hear his jokes said with the sole intent to make Luke laugh nearly as loud as his mother’s warnings against humans.

Still, Luke didn’t heed them entirely. No reason for him to, when he had no need to meet more humans. He was content with the life he was living, where he went to meet Ashton right before the sun slipped below the horizon, and he was back in the water with his family before the last star came out into the night sky. It was a double life, perhaps, and one underlaid with anxiety at the knowledge that he could lose everything he loved in an instant if Ashton knew what he was.

Luke wasn’t a fool, and he’d been raised well enough on the myths and legends his family relied on. He’d heard plenty of tales of what happened to selkies when they left the comfort and familiarity of the sea to fall into the arms of humans. That if a human took their coat, they’d be bound to them forever, never to return to the sea, and be stuck in their human form forever. This, to a selkie, was a fate worse than death. Their dual nature was as much a part of them as anything else. To restrict them to one form, to rid them of their freedom…Luke never let his mind linger on what, exactly, that could feel like. He’d never get anywhere if he did.

The first night Ashton invited him back to his apartment, between whispered words and sweet everythings that had Luke weak at the knees and had his heart doing an arrhythmic dance in his chest, just as desperate for freedom as Luke himself, Luke had hesitated. His coat, he reasoned, could be taken here, far easier than it could have been in public, where their other meetings had been. Ashton could take it if Luke was lulled to sleep by Ashton’s secure warmth, human affection stronger than any melatonin or sleeping aid or lullaby. Ashton had mistaken his hesitation for discomfort - or he had read it clearly, Luke was never sure if the man was incredibly astute or just good at guessing, but both tended to have the same result, anyway - and was quick to offer apologies, and an invitation to continue their night elsewhere.

Luke had taken him up on it, allowed him to lead him for a stroll under the streetlights, Ashton’s arm around his waist a reminder of the two worlds Luke adored but felt trapped between. Now he was beginning to understand the lure of humanity, a siren song that selkies could never escape. Even still, he felt the pull of the tides deep in his soul, beckoning him back to the ocean, to slip beneath its dark waves and forget about the way the light flickered across Ashton’s face in the darkness, the way every passing streetlight showed a new side of him Luke had never seen before. He wasn’t sure, then, if he could ever give up the warmth of Ashton’s affection, of his arm around him, for the dark depths of the ocean.

The second time Ashton invited him back - not for a nightcap, but to listen to some new vinyl he’d bought that he insisted Luke will love - Luke had lost some of his hesitation. He took him up on it, allowing Ashton to lead him through the city, fingers laced together with a sense of familiarity that bathed Luke’s heart in slowly lapping flames of intimacy and affection. He was decidedly not thinking about what could become of his life if Ashton was even half as astute as he seemed to be, and he knew to take Luke’s coat to bind the two of them together evermore.

Luke draped his coat carefully over a chair, near enough to the door that he could grab it and run if he needed to make a quick escape. As desperately as he wanted to trust Ashton, and believe in the small corner of humanity he’d defined for himself, his mother’s warnings echoed in his head like the bells of the church near the sea, high and melodic and impossible to forget.

His worries melted away when all Ashton did was turn on the record and take Luke’s hands in his own, twisting and twirling him around his living room the way the waves guided him through the sea. Luke felt, for just a moment, like perhaps his two lives weren’t so different after all. That Ashton could be a guidance rather than a ball and chain, could be an answer to his calls for freedom rather than the prison his mother insisted he was.

He woke up the next morning with a jolt of fear lancing down his spine, but his coat was still right where he’d left it, untouched and unharmed. Ashton had moved to the kitchen - he’d had to walk past his coat, then, to get there - and when he noticed Luke had woken, all he asked him was how he liked his eggs in the morning.

Luke didn’t know. He’d never had them.

The third time Ashton asked, Luke readily accepted, with no sliver of hesitation that he’d had before. The way Ashton’s eyes lit up was more than enough to assuage any doubts Luke may have had, anyway, and he felt comfortably warm, the way he did when he found a warmer stream of water to swim through.

This time, Ashton only wanted to show him a new film he’d heard of, another thing he insisted Luke would love. He’d ordered in takeout from his favourite restaurant, and Luke had allowed himself to be lulled into security.

He woke that morning with a similar start, gaze immediately shifting to where he’d left his coat on the very same chair. Just like the time before, it was untouched and unharmed, left in the same position it had been in the night before. Ashton was, this time, still asleep behind him, his arm left protectively around Luke’s waist. He only murmured unhappily and pulled Luke farther into his warmth. Luke settled in again, eyes leaving his jacket, comforted in the knowledge that perhaps he really was safe here, wrapped in Ashton’s embrace, in the small apartment overlooking the sea. He let his eyes close, allowing sleep to once again wash over him.

The fourth time he spent the night, Luke did not wake up with a start. He knew that when he woke - undoubtedly at an early hour, as Ashton was not one to laze about - his coat would be hanging in the same position, over the same chair, and he’d be free to leave as he pleased and slip back beneath the cool waves and embrace his other side once more. Ashton, it seemed, was none the wiser to Luke’s less-than-human qualities, and Luke was content to keep it that way. Perhaps it wasn’t sustainable forever, but for now, Luke had his freedom, and he had his happiness, and he wasn’t prepared to risk one for the other and ultimately jeopardize both.

The fifth time, however, did not go according to plan. Luke had only now settled into a routine, had become as comfortable and familiar in Ashton’s apartment as Ashton himself. He had a mug in his cabinet - a gift from Ashton, saying the colour reminded him of Luke’s eyes, and the seafoam that topped the cresting waves visible from his apartment windows - and his shoes a place at the door. He finally had a home amongst the humans, and he was truly able to flit back and forth between the land and sea as his heart desired.

He was busy making tea in the kitchen - Luke had found a new love in tea, with the way it warmed him up from the inside out, a facsimile of the way his love for Ashton ran warm and fiery through his veins - while Ashton had been fussing about in the living room. He’d turned to offer to make him a mug, when he watched, in slow motion, as Ashton’s hip bumped into the table, knocking his coat off the chair. Luke felt the wind knocked out of him, unable to do anything to prevent it. Ashton’s reflexes, though, didn’t allow the coat to hit the ground. Instead, Luke felt the last of his breath squeezed out of his lungs by a vise-like grip, forced to watch as Ashton caught his coat - his link between him and the sea, him and his family, as much a part of Luke as the human body he was in - and straighten back up, as though he wasn’t holding Luke’s very soul in his hand.

Luke was in front of him in a flash, mug of tea left steaming and abandoned on the counter. Ashton didn’t bother trying to put the coat back on the chair, instead holding it out to Luke with all the gentleness and care he would take if he truly was holding Luke’s heart in his open palm. “Here,” he’d said, gaze meeting Luke’s. His eyes were just as molten as the day he’d met him, shifting in the brighter lights of his dining room, doing their damned best to melt the anxious ice caging Luke’s heart.

Luke took his coat, fingers digging in like he was terrified to let it go again. And he was. He felt his lips part in a silent question, unsure if he had the words or the strength to say it allowed. It still hung in the air between the two of them, heavy and tangible and sticky, like the tar in the water his mother had always warned him away from. Ashton must have pieced it together, anyway, because he took a cautious step towards Luke, his hand resting against Luke’s hip - the one on the other side from his coat, as though he knew, before Luke did, where his boundaries were.

“I know what you are,” he said, words nothing more than a whisper, curling in the air around them like smoke and solidifying like a heavy blanket, weighing on Luke’s entire being. “I’ve known since I met you.”

“And you don’t-?” Luke didn’t even know how he was going to finish that. But he didn’t need to know, not when Ashton was already ready with the answer.

“No. You’re free to come and go as you please, Luke. I don’t want a prisoner. I want an equal.” The beginnings of a smile pulled at Ashton’s lips, setting Luke’s heart on fire the way he had when they’d first gotten to know each other, comfortable and familiar and hot enough to melt the rest of Luke’s worries.

The sixth night Luke spent at Ashton’s house, he didn’t glance at his coat once. He left it, safe and protected, hung up in the closet in the hall, next to Ashton’s well-worn leather jacket that he’d assured Luke he could borrow if he wanted. Luke felt free, no longer caught between both worlds but able to coexist within them both at once, peacefully and unrestrained. He was a wild thing, born of seafoam and lightning storms and shipwrecks on the open ocean, but he could feel safe enough, here, to let his guard down and be nothing but free, safe in the knowledge that Ashton was there to love him as he was, calm sea or hell and high water.