#they literally always do... but what if they don't and i'm lying to my audience...

[fifteenthousandroses]

Sorry this ended up so long!

And yes! He encourages Will to get a girlfriend as "catching up", something Dustin and Lucas don't do - they never want them to have girlfriends out of a need to have one, but because they genuinely like girls, and assume Mike and Will feel the same way. But Mike and Will evidently do not see it in this light, Mike particulary interprets this as "having a girlfriend would be normal" (i.e. "if you were normal, you'd have a girlfriend") and although he does not necesarily explicitly recognise that he dates El in order to have a girlfriend as 'expected' and not because he likes El romantically, it's almost like some part of him does.

He seems to echo this to Will, but in a way that makes it sound like these are things he tells himself, because truthfully S1 and S2 Mike would have never tried to force Will into having a girlfriend so he can go an spend time with her as Mike does El if Mike wasn't trying to justify his own actions.

It also emphasises how Mike feels validated in his relationship if his actions are echoed by those around him, but also very specifically Will, and he can compare their relationship to 'normal' relationships, rather than actually just feeling contentment within it itself.

We see my previous point, as well as prev's final point, also reiterated with Rink'O'Mania and then the car (i.e. we have another 'argument' then a wonderful, albeit one-sided heart to heart).

First, with Rink'O'Mania we get another scene where Mike projects his homosexuality onto Will (which works so well as a sort of fearful moment for them both for an audience who knows the full truth) as well as his relationship insecurities. What it results in is another:

Will: "Our friendship is going downhill because of your actions."

Mike: "I'm not gay! You're the gay one! I'm not in love with you!"

He absolutely projects onto Will here as well - "We're friends. We're friends." Mike always repeats something twice verbatim when he's trying to get someone else to take his point seriously (the first instance of which is "Will is alive. Will is alive." and Nancy does this too) whether he's lying or not - so why would Will not believe him when talking about them being friends? Why is that something he felt he had to say with such conviction? Obviously he and Will are friends, and despite the wording of Will's question he knows that, and it's posed as a "Why am I not important to you anymore?/Why are we not still best friends?" but Mike sees it as something different entirely, becoming defensive, and his tone mirrors his "I say it". The only reason he would lie about them being friends is if he saw them as something else - or if what he felt for Will was more than friendship.

Secondly, the reason I think this ties into his insecurities in his relationship with El is not just because it's a follow up of arguing about El, but because he's realised how little he's been paying attention to his girlfriend all day. Even though Will's been off to the side or behind them while El's been holding his hand and right next to him, he hasn't caught a single thing off about how she's been acting, but he's completly picked up on Will's behaviour - even the subtle things - and to Mike it must look like Will's pointing that out ("You've been moping" vs "She's lying to you!"), especially knowing that El has taken something like "friends don't lie" so seriously as it was literally the first concept she learnt (from Mike even) after escaping the lab.

After that he seems to have another internal reflection/chiding moment, realising Will wasn't implying Mike had romantic feelings for him, just that he was being a bad friend - this is so similar to his S3 reaction. And he doesn't bother mentioning the phone-calls he's been making - because he's too caught up in his own head? Really, i think it's because he's just avoided a scare with sounding like Will is more than a friend to him, and doesn't want to cause another one with "I called. + [Why Will wouldn't have realised]" which could only ever result in "Why not write like you did with El?" because that would just loop back around to "She's my girlfriend" etc.

I'm not even going to get into the car because my plan for that post is longer than my current draft for chapter 6...

(Also, I took the rabbit hole of your posts (this one, the apology comparisons, the analysis of the mileven "no, you don't" scene) and they were so good! I love how that scene is basically pathetic fallacy with colouring rather than weather.)

"Its not my fault you don't like girls" Small Analysis.

CORRECT ME IF IM WRONG BUT MIKES, "Its not my fault you don't like girls" wasn't mean't in the harsh, rude and homophobic way (most) mileven's think. Mike doesn't know Will is into guys, let alone having feelings for him. Mike mean't it like saying, its not my fault you don't like anyone. Implying that Will isn't interested in dating or having a crush on anyone.

[genshin-impact-updates]

Hello, travelers! The Version 5.2 update is coming in less than 24 hours! All servers will go down for maintenance tomorrow, Tuesday November 19th, at 5 PM Eastern time (4 PM Central, 3 PM Mountain, 2 PM Pacific). The maintenance is expected to last for five hours, and all players will receive Primogems ×600 as compensation.

Click here to see the start time in your time zone, and click here for a countdown!

[corseque]

I keep thinking about the interview with the motion capture actor who played both Gustave and Verso, and how brilliant it was that the director wanted the same person to play both characters. I think it worked even better because the actor who played them (Maxence Cazorla) seems like he has an enormous and empathetic and kind heart, and listening to him talk about how it was to play both of these characters over a year of work made me realize some more things about the story.

My favorite thing in stories, even above wizards, is when the story can make you feel empathy for anyone and everyone in the story. The story can allow you to see from every angle and understand it completely. The most dissatisfying thing to me in a story is coming away from it feeling as if I didn't quite understand why someone was acting the way they were, or if a story seems to discard an entire viewpoint or person as evil or not worth exploring. I dislike it when especially fantasy stories invent and introduce a faction as pure evil, it just seems very pointless or masturbatory to me. I understand that a lot of people enjoy those kinds of stories, but I'm personally not out there exploring alternate worlds trying to encounter an enemy that just makes me feel righteous. I just want to Understand Everything. I want to understand things that are not understandable and things I will never experience. I want to understand the full spectrum of human experience.

And so the way this actor described his experience of playing both of these characters is fascinating to me.

Clair Obscur spoilers

Aspects I find fascinating and keep turning over in my head:

the fact that Maxence simply played HIMSELF as Gustave, how Gustave moves just like Maxence, how he simply played Gustave as he would play himself. How he didn't have to study or prepare in any way for Gustave because he simply played himself as he would, and leaned into being surprised by what was coming in the way that Gustave did in the story. Gustave's lovability and gentleness just came straight from this actor's open heart and his personality.

that Maxence knew from the very beginning that Verso allowed Gustave to die. How Maxence struggled deeply when he had to say goodbye to Gustave and how he resented Verso extremely for letting him die, feeling the same feelings that the audience felt (and probably on an even deeper level than we can understand).

that Maxence had to study and prepare and grill the directors about Verso's motivations because he's always lying all the time. So he played Gustave so naturally and so easily, but he had to put so much work into doing justice to Verso and understanding him

The way that Maxence's gentleness and kindness and caring still came out through Verso, giving him this wonderful depth. You get this feeling that Verso is a truly good person underneath, a feeling that I had playing that was so strong that I literally ignored all the foreshadowing (and only realized the true extent of his actions like long after the game was over) because I felt so strongly that in his heart he was good and that he cared. I think this was a combo of Maxence and Ben Starr's incredible delivery of the lines, but I don't think that it would have been nearly as successful without Maxence's generosity of heart.

So my favorite thing in the world, when you have to understand your enemy and learn what drives them, when you have to become the one who kills you and learn to feel their feelings, the actor actually embodied this. That he actually struggled and did his best and even at the end Gustave is STILL his favorite, but he came to understand and feel for Verso enough to portray him so honestly, and put himself into Verso and Gustave as the emotional core of the entire game.

And then the director also made him play Renoir in the epilogue scene as well, to borrow again from his subtle, expressive body language to portray Renoir's love and mourning to close off the story the way it began with Gustave's love and mourning.

It also helped so much to draw the parallels between the characters, since Gustave obviously dies to allow the audience to experience the loss of Verso in a visceral way, so we can actually understand what it's like to have that loss so we're all on the same page. And the ideas that the story has of bringing the dead back but it not feeling quite right because they're not the same, to see Verso's body language changed from Gustave but played by the same man is so brilliant. I want to watch Clair Obscur as a stage play where one actor plays both Gustave and Verso (and Renoir in the epilogue).

I truly think that this actor and his large heart was a huge key in the success of this game and the success of the storytelling. The way that he played Verso so honestly and put his soul into his eyes after feeling betrayed by Verso and feeling like Verso killed Gustave, who was a part of him is so wonderful to me. And then to do the same thing for Renoir, who killed Gustave and Sophie. Idk it's so hard to explain, but this contrast and coming to terms and understanding and drawing very deliberate parallels is my favorite thing in the entire world.

So yeah this knowledge of how the actor felt playing both characters is so key to my understanding of the story now and I'm always thinking about Maxence now when I'm watching any of these cutscenes.

[ariaxco]

hi aria! i love your posts but i need some help. i wanna upgrade my personality this summer. i wanna be cute, kind literally a total sweetheart! but i have no idea where and how to start. help me, angel 🫠

hi angel! okay first of all, i love that you want to be genuinely sweet - but let's get one thing straight. everyone thinks being sweet means saying yes to everything and letting people walk all over you. wrong.

how to become genuinely sweet without being a doormat ⋆.ೃ࿔*:･🍯

real sweetness comes from being secure enough to be kind without needing anything back. it's confidence dressed up as kindness.

✦ start with yourself first. listen babe, you can't pour from an empty cup. be sweet to yourself before you try to be sweet to anyone else. talk to yourself like you would your best friend. forgive your mistakes. celebrate your wins. mean girls to themselves make terrible sweet girls to others. how are you gonna love others if you don't love yourself first?

✦ listen more than you talk. this is where most people mess up - they think being sweet means talking more, complimenting more, doing more. nope. sweet people make others feel heard. put your phone down when someone's talking to you. ask follow-up questions. remember what people tell you. "how did that job interview go?" hits different when someone actually remembers you mentioned it last week.

✦ compliment genuinely, not desperately. please stop throwing around empty "omg you're so pretty" to everyone. it's not sweet, it's shallow. find something specific you actually like. "your laugh is contagious" or "you always know the perfect thing to say" means way more than generic pretty comments. make people feel seen, not just flattered.

✦ be kind, not naive. here's the thing nobody tells you - sweetness doesn't mean stupidity. you can be gentle and still have boundaries. you can be caring and still call out bad behavior. "that's not okay, but I still care about you" is peak sweet girl energy. don't confuse kindness with being a pushover.

✦ show up consistently. sweet isn't a weekend costume you put on when you feel like it. check on your friends when they're going through it. remember birthdays without facebook reminding you. bring coffee to your coworker having a rough day. small gestures, big consistency. that's what makes people think "she's just genuinely good."

✦ stop keeping score. the second you start expecting reciprocation, you're not being sweet anymore - you're doing business. be kind because it feels good in your soul, not because you want something back. that energy shift? people can feel it.

✦ defend others when they can't defend themselves. real sweetness has teeth, baby. speak up for the quiet girl being gossiped about. include the person sitting alone at lunch. sweet girls protect other people's feelings, not just their own. that's when you know you've leveled up from performative nice to genuinely sweet.

✦ remember people's small details. their coffee order, their pet's name, that thing they're stressed about at work. sweet people make others feel important by paying attention to the little things that matter to them.

✦ apologize when you mess up, mean it. don't just say sorry to make things go away. actually acknowledge what you did wrong and how it affected them. "i'm sorry i was late, i know your time is valuable" hits different than "sorry i'm late."

✦ celebrate other people's wins like they're your own. hype up your friends' achievements. share their good news. be genuinely excited when good things happen to them. jealousy is the opposite of sweetness.

✦ learn to give without announcing it. help people quietly. don't post about every good deed on social media. real sweetness doesn't need an audience.

✦ master the art of gentle honesty. sweet doesn't mean fake. if someone asks for your opinion, give it kindly but truthfully. "i think the blue dress is more flattering on you" instead of lying or being brutally honest.

you've got this, angel. start small, be consistent, and remember -

true sweetness is strength in a soft package. be sugar, not saccharine. 🍯

what other topics do you want me to dive into? drop me an ask if you want posts about confidence, friendships, getting your life together, or literally anything else that's been on your mind lately! i love hearing what you're struggling with

[delicateperspective]

https://www.tumblr.com/delicateperspective/783819826239078400/httpswwwtumblrcomdelicateperspective78376202?source=share

You know? I used to think that Harry really gained freedom over the years and that his situation has gotten better, BUT now that I have done some research and understand some things...I guess he did win some freedom in expressing himself, but that has come with a price. There are a lot of ppl within the community that accuse him of queerbaiting and believe the womaniser image. And I don't blame them, but why do you expect from someone who is the closet to be explicit in the way he feels? Harry always tries to choose his words carefully without outing himself and giving too much away.

And the saddest part of all this is that you can literally see that he really struggles with that. He struggles with the fact that he can't be completely open ("he's hoping I'm hoping someday I could be open") and I think that's why he loves performing. The atmosphere of acceptance that is created in his shows impacts him emotionally.

i usually try not to dive into this too deeply because people have strong opinions on both sides—but here’s where i stand:

yes, H has gained some freedom over the years. he’s expressing himself more boldly through fashion, lyrics, collaborators, and stage design. but that freedom isn’t total—it’s conditional. it came at a cost, and it’s still heavily managed. from the very first x-factor audition contract (which - according to former x-factor contestants - included clauses about obeying every instruction and never speaking out about the company or its people, even after the contract ended), to the syco and columbia contracts that followed, we have no idea what restrictions are still in place. but if you pay attention, you can see him walking that tightrope every time he speaks about his identity.

like in 2019, when an interviewer asked him directly about his sexuality:

“It’s not like I’m sitting on an answer, and protecting it, and holding it back. It’s not a case of: I’m not telling you cos I don’t want to tell you. It’s not: ooh this is mine and it’s not yours.”

that sounds like someone trying to avoid lying and trying not to get himself in trouble. someone who doesn’t want to fake it, but can’t actually say the truth. then just a few years later in 2022, he said this:

“I’ve been really open with it with my friends, but that’s my personal experience; it’s mine.”

the shift there is subtle but real—he’s more direct about the fact that he has an experience to protect. that’s not someone playing games. that’s someone locked in a long, complicated situation who’s doing his best to carve out space for himself without breaking the rules he’s still bound by.

so yes, it’s true that he expresses himself more freely now—but it’s also true that he often can’t say what he wants. and when he does speak through lyrics, visuals, or even a lyric change like “hoping someday i could be open” (at coachella, with his stunt girlfriend in the audience), people call it fake. but what do we expect from someone who can’t be explicit? when honesty is dangerous, subtlety becomes survival.

[hannieween]

opening night | backstage series | l.sm

“Just play along,” he said softly, his lips curving into a playful smile as he leaned his head to kiss you deeply in front of everyone who, until that night, thought you were heartbroken for someone else.

♡︎ pairing: lee seokmin x afab!reader ♡︎ genre: smut. 18+ mdni you'll get blocked ♡︎ word count: 9.3k ♡︎ aus: theatre performer!seokmin, fake dating with benefits

₊🎧: love me a little – shownu x hyungwon

₊ nsfw tags under the cut

♡︎ a/n: i am only posting this for fun, but do let me know if you like it pls pls pls. thought of this idea while doing the dishes, quite literally.

♡︎ warnings: swearing, alcohol use, minor mentions of drugs, pet names: baby, noodle (hers), smut with plot, soft dom seokmin, big dick seokmin, seokmin is kind of a simp, teasing, making out, sexual tension, unprotected sex, couch sex, creampie, hand kink, fingering (f), oral sex (f), reader is quite dramatic, might contain some minor spelling or grammar mistakes and for that i'm sorry.

part 1

Nothing could compare to opening night jitters. There were some shows in which you didn't feel this nervous, small shows, small audiences or those times you had to act in front of other colleagues. It always made you jittery in some way. Tonight, the feeling of not being able to breathe was worse.

It was as if a bubble of air got trapped in your chest, and no matter how much you breathed in and out, nothing could get rid of it.

And not to mention the inescapable tunnel vision. It was something you suspected that it only happened to you, though. You could not focus on anything at all. Food? Not hungry. Thirsty? Maybe. But those were things that you could tend to once the first show is over.

"Shit. I think I forgot my lines," you blurt out with a shaky sigh.

The script was lying on the single chair propped in front of the vanity mirror. But the dressing room was so crowded with people getting ready that you just didn't see the chance of reading out some of it again.

"You know," someone started behind you, "for someone who has been doing this for years, you certainly can't control your pre-show emotions."

You didn't have to turn to know whose voice it was. "Sorry," you reply shortly. "I haven't done this in a short while."

"Well, put yourself together. We begin in five." Minghao told you. He was just finishing dressing the supporting cast, so he gave you a look.

"What?" you say, and look down at what you were wearing, thinking that somehow you had managed to ruin your dress that he carefully confected for your role.

Minghao grabbed you by the shoulders, a soft smile began to show on his lips and he said. "You're going to do alright. Just breathe, and show them what you're worth. It'll be over in two hours."

And with that, you released a long sigh. "Thank you."

"Anytime," he nodded, patting you on the head. "Is that Soonyoung's vest?" He said suddenly, snatching the vest from a chair and exiting your dressing room. "Soonyoung, come here you little rascal!"

It has been about five months since you stepped on a stage. So, there were a few things you need to get a hold on before the show begun. You used to have a pre-show ritual, which consisted in getting into character as much as possible.

However, things changed when you had to take a break after you and your ex called it quits. Now, you don't feel as connected to that ritual anymore. Besides, you haven't had a lead role in a play since your final year at uni.

It usually got really quiet backstage when the show was about to start. Everyone was aware that voices carry all the way to the audience, so movements were quiet, and noises kept at minimal. You closed your eyes for a moment before going to the stage and play your part.

Opening nights were always a challenge. Despite rigorous rehearsals, you were faced with doubt, often believing you could spot the smallest flaws and exaggerating them to fix them.

But this opening night was sort of different. You felt at ease. Exhilarated, even. Once the play was over and you finished bowing to the audience, you went back to the dressing rooms to get rid of your dress and make up.

You changed into something more comfortable. And as you were cleaning your face, you listened to the other girls in the dressing room gush about the people they saw at the seats. Apparently some more renowned actors had come to see the play, as well as some journalists.

That made you think that you didn't invite someone to come see you. You did your part to promote the play in social media, but nothing more.

However, you did see some familiar faces as you made your way out of the dressing room. Seokmin and Seungkwan were bantering loudly about something unbeknownst to you, their voices and laughter were so sounding that you were quick to locate them.

Seungkwan had Seokmin on a playful chokehold when they both saw you. Before you could ask, Seungkwan snapped his head at you. "We're settling a matter like men. Be there with you in a sec," at the same time that Seokmin blurted through his teeth: "Help."

"Ah, they're at it again," you turned to see Soonyoung who was throwing a backpack over his shoulder. "Seokmin has been teasing Kwannie a lot these days."

"What else is new?" you hummed.

You two watched for a brief moment, only to Soonyoung turn to you and chirp. "Anyway, want to leave these two behind and go buy some booze? 'S on me."

You watched his cheeks grow fuller as he pursed his lips. He had one thumb raised, pointing towards the exit.

"That sounds great," you say, grabbing him by the arm.

You turned to the exit, leaving your two other friends fight over yet another stupid thing.

The cold air of autumn hit your face as soon as Soonyoung pushed the door open.

"So," Soonyoung begun and suddenly you knew what was coming, "how you've been?"

The question was simple. But you knew what he meant.

"I've been doing okay, Hoshi," you replied shortly. "You don't need to worry about me."

He hummed. "You can talk to me anytime. You know that, right?"

You two arrived at the liquor store. It was friday night, so there was a couple of people buying alcohol for the night.

"You have done enough for me," you gave him a reassuring smile. "Letting me crash in your apartment for months until I found something for my own is something I will always be grateful for."

He sighed. "You don't have to do that. And you don't owe me anything, you dumbass."

"Do what?" you objected.

"You're avoiding it," he shrugged. "But hey, you don't wanna talk about it, fine. I'll wait."

You smiled and slapped the front of his cap down. "Come on, Soonyoung. Don't get all sappy on me. This is supposed to be a fun night."

He finally smirked, fixing his cap. "Right. Soju."

When Seungkwan and Seokmin finally got to the liquor store, they were sweaty and panting, they probably had to run to catch up with you and Soonyoung. But they were laughing about something as you reunited with them on the sidewalk outside the store.

"Hi there, noodle," Seokmin raised his hand and patted your head at the same time that his other hand reached for the six pack of beer you were holding to carry it himself.

You cringed at the name he used to call you. Which was born after a professor called you only by noodle arms in a dance class you four had to take at uni.

"Dk, it's been ages since you called me that," you whined, but as soon as he propped his arm around your shoulders you couldn't help but smile in his familiar warmth.

"Well, I've suddenly forgotten your name. You're Noodle now," he spoke in an old man's tone. But broke in a laugh as you poked his rib with your finger. "Sorry."

You walked in pairs towards the fancy apartment building down the street.

"Were you in the audience?" you asked.

"Yeah, obviously. Soonyoung wouldn't shut up about the play for weeks," he pressed his lips into a smile. "Besides, it's your first lead role in a while, I wouldn't have missed it."

"Did you like it?"

Seungkwan turned, and you understood he could listen on everything you and Seokmin were saying. "He fell asleep. Obviously," he sassed.

"I dozed off for two minutes!" Seokmin bellowed, but a wide smile formed on his face. "I did get to see your parts, though. And Soonyoung's."

"Thanks for coming, guys."

"No problem," Seokmin smiled briefly. "Hey, I heard that you moved out of Soonyoung's. Why didn't you tell me? I could've helped."

Just five months ago, your world turned upside down when you found out your ex had been cheating on you for weeks. To make matters worse, it was with that one girl he told you not to worry about.

You had to move out of the apartment you shared with your ex, leaving behind many things you couldn't take with you. That is when Soonyoung came to your rescue and offered his place for you to crash for a while.

"Well, I didn't need much help anyways. It was just a few boxes, really."

"I was still sad you didn't call though. You haven't even shared your new address," he pouted as he spoke, and you could tell he was joking. "It made me contemplate the whole meaning of our friendship, you know."

You snorted. "Not you too," you exclaimed. "First, Hoshi gets all corny with me and now you."

He showed a downturned smile. "You know I'm only playing with you. Soonyoung, however, thinks you're still a ticking time bomb."

You glanced at your friends, who were walking some steps ahead of you. Soonyoung was showing Seungkwan some TikToks he recorded for the company's official account, so you were out of their earshot.

"And you don't?" you asked.

He shrugged, looking at the floor as you made your way towards the tall building's lobby. "I think you're doing alright. Better than any of us would in your position. Honestly."

You let out a long sigh. "I just wish that people would stop asking me about it. I'm tired of it, the pity treatment, the tiptoeing around the subject."

"Well, you can't just expect us to not worry," he said softly.

"I know," you coincided.

You were still walking together, since Seokmin had his arm in your shoulders. Lately he did it often, and you didn't mind. You liked the the warmth with which he always treated you.

"I sometimes think that I was emotionally checked out from the relationship some time before I found out," you say, and felt that you could've dropped a bomb with that confession.

"So that's why you don't want to talk about it," he reasoned, his brow furrowed, deep in thought.

"I think so," you shrugged. "But I'm being honest when I say that I'm okay."

"And I believe you," he assented, pulling you closer for a brief moment and then dropped his arm from your shoulders. "I won't bring it up again."

The four of you entered the elevator that took you to the large apartment of the show's director, who was a young man you knew from your early days at uni. He had suddenly found his way through and had started to direct full plays in local theatres. His name was Yoon Jeonghan. And he hosted a party for every opening night.

It was your first time in that apartment. You knew the director in person, however, the three guys riding with you in the elevator knew him better, as they have had more roles than you these past few months.

You feel a slight tug to your side. "You know he's most likely going to be there, right?" Seungkwan said quietly, eyeing you with caution.

"I know," you mumbled. "'M going to be alright."

Now, why would you go to a place where you probably would encounter you cheating ex? Some part within you was deeply uninterested to see him again. And the other part was just enraged that he somehow mattered in your life still.

The opening night after party was almost like a tradition now, at least for most of the people who were close to Jeonghan.

The apartment was crowded, and you could tell it was set up to avoid bothering the neighbours. It had cushioned, soundproof walls, shaded windows, speakers kept at a reasonable volume, and many guests were congregating on the spacious terrace.

Jeonghan was a great host. He was kind of shy, but eager to meet everyone personally. He welcomed you with a warm smile, however he did hug the boys as they stepped into his large apartment.

You were quickly left to your own devices as your three friends were absorbed into the group of partygoers. Then you remembered how popular they have been since you met them.

The trio kind of took you in from that point forward because you were the one who organized university projects and stayed on top of schoolwork. But short after that, you found a close group of friends who were always there for you.

You decided that the only way you were going to get through the night was with some alcohol in your system. You weren't either an introvert or extrovert, you always thought you were in some middle point.

But your ex was there, sitting outside in the terrace with a girl beside him. You never knew the girl he cheated on you personally, but you knew it was her.

You snorted.

Suddenly, you felt a hand at your back. Seokmin looked at you, wariness in his eyes that dissipated quickly. "Want something to drink?"

"Yeah," you nodded.

"I feel like a bad influence," he simulated a shudder. "It's exciting."

You two downed your first glass of soju.

A few moments, the one glass of soju turned into the whole bottle. You drank while singing karaoke with strangers or with your friends. You drank while meeting new people and getting to know those who were part of your cast.

As you said, you were alright.

You just finished singing a song in the karaoke with Seokmin, who could hold his liquor a lot better than you. Both of you laughed at the way you couldn't keep up with the lyrics anymore and became a slurry mess.

"Never again," you say as the karaoke score marked a 10% on the screen.

"Remind me to never let you do this again," he agreed, teary eyed and red on the face from laughing with you.

The microphones were passed to other people, and soon after that, the party settled for just music.

Your chest still hurt from laughing.

"I'll go get some air," you announced a bit breathlessly as you made your way to the terrace.

Suddenly, Seokmin's hand made its way to your waist again and you glanced at him, his face had hardened.

And then you understood why.

As you were heading outside, your ex was leaving the terrace with his new girlfriend causing an awkward encounter. Your ex gave you a casual nod as if you were friends still, and his new girlfriend shot you a sly smirk as your arms brushed past each other.

"Hey, y/n," your ex goaded as they made their way inside the apartment.

You didn't reply.

Within this awkward exchange, you don't know how Seokmin's hand ended up intertwined with yours.

The air on the terrace smelled like a mixture of weed, vape and cigarettes. But it was cruelly cold enough to cool your body.

Seokmin mumbled something under his breath. And you noticed he was glancing at the back of your ex's neck with a scowl on his face.

You squeezed his hand, still not knowing how he grabbed you.

"How drunk are you?" he asked, his face was still serious.

"A bit. I think I'm beginning to sober up."

"Good," he breathed, pushing his bangs from his forehead and with them his furrowed brow. "Can you do something for me, noodle?"

You hit him in the shoulder. "Don't call me that," you smiled. "What do you want?"

"How about," he begun, not letting go of your hand, "I pretend to be your date for the night? Make the bastard realize he has no room in your life anymore."

"What," you blurt out and blinked feeling a bit perplexed at his offer. "You've finally lost it, Seokmin."

"I'm sorry. I know I said I wouldn't bring it up again. But I hate the way he thinks you still give a shit about him."

"I don't," you blinked.

"Then why would he go out of his way to even speak to you?" he countered.

"Seokmin, are you angry?" you gasped.

You could count on the fingers of your hand the number of times you'd seen Seokmin angry. And the other times it didn't matter because he was more the sulky type when something was bothering him. But at that moment, he was pissed off.

"A bit, yeah," he admitted with a sigh, but immediately flashed a sincere smile, almost as if his anger was a little embarrassing to him. He raised his brow. "But my offer still stands, though."

"D'you think it will work?" you mused.

"It might tell your ex a thing or two about leaving you alone. And as a plus, everyone else will also stop asking you about what happened between you and him." Seokmin added, almost casually.

You glanced towards the other end of the terrace briefly, and realized that Seungkwan was eyeing you too, a worried look on his eye as you caught him.

Licking his lips, he grabbed you by the shoulders. "What do you say?" He seemed relaxed, even focused; he tilted his head slightly as he looked into your eyes.

You held his gaze, listening to his words. Realizing that they were very much real and that Seokmin was dead serious about it.

Then, you realize how close you were to his body. His hands slid from your shoulders to your arms, where he traced soft lines with his fingers.

"Just for tonight," you murmured, but it came out sounding like a question.

"As long as you want," he offered. One hand found your chin, his fingers pressing softly on your hot skin.

You looked at his dark brown eyes. The relaxed look on his face was almost unsettling. As if he knew your answer already.

"Deal," you breathed.

His fingers angled your face towards him. "Just play along." He said softly, his lips curving into a playful smile as he leaned his head to kiss you deeply in front of everyone who, until that night, thought you were heartbroken for someone else.

Your hands found the back of his head, burying your fingers in his soft copper hair. You couldn't ignore that it had been a long while since your body felt so ablaze. Maybe it was the remaining alcohol on your system doing its part.

But even before you and your ex split, you felt kind of longing for the touch of someone. Something real. And although Seokmin was playing a role as he did on stage, kissing him felt different. It felt good.

As the kiss deepened, his tongue brushed your lower lip almost hungrily and you thought your knees might buckle under the shudder. A moan was quickly supressed in his mouth when his hand moved from your face to the back of your hair, his fingers tangling in a soft fist.

"I never imagined you'd be this good of a kisser," you confess.

Your chests were now pressed together, so you felt him chuckle. "Well, you know now," his demeanour had changed completely.

You wanted to look if anyone had seen you. But Seokmin was quick to read your intentions. He grabbed your chin again softly, forcing you to keep looking at him.

"Act normal," he ordered quietly with a look of endearment on his face, as if he were saying something sweet to you.

"I've never done this before," you sighed.

"I can tell," he smiled sweetly.

"Don't tell me you've done this before!"

He removed his hands from you, and made a gesture with his head, pointing towards the couch on the terrace. "Come with me."

You sat next to him, and as you did so, you saw Seungkwan's face, he was looking over at you both with an expression on his face that clearly read, 'what the fuck?' to you.

Seokmin scooted close to you on the couch, and placed one hand on you thigh and his other hand rested on his own thigh.

"I haven't done this before either," he confessed. "But you're an actress, and I'm an actor. We can act this out."

You snorted. "Thanks for pointing out the obvious, Lee Seokmin," you said drily.

Seokmin was smiling sweetly at you. Your shoulders were pressed together and your thighs were also so close that you might as well just sit on his lap. You fought against the thought.

"Then, act like you're my girl," he said idly, leaning down to place a kiss on your cheek.

An exhilarating feeling roused deep within you. You fixated on how comfortable his hand on your thigh looked, and the ease to which Seokmin took your face with his other hand and captured your lips with his.

Your hand met the one that was holding the side of your face.

"Afraid to put on a little show?" he coaxed.

A smirk crept on your lips, almost involuntarily you find yourself saying. "What do you want me to do?"

He blinked slowly, almost as if he was a little startled by your new demeanour. "Just relax." he put in softly. "And if you don't like something, tell me. Okay?"

You nod. "Okay."

His thumb caressed your jawline softly, before pressing his lips with yours. What started as a sweet kiss, slowly evolved to a enticing one. His mouth explored yours, biting softly at your lower lip, and his tongue lapping yours, testing what made you whimper or what made your hand clasp his.

You rested your forehead against his for a bit, catching your breath. "I hate that you are so good at this."

He laughed, taking one strand of hair and tucking it behind your ear. "Why is that?" he asked quietly.

"Dunno. I never thought of you as anything other than my friend."

His eyebrows shot up. "You never thought of me doing this?" he asked almost amazed.

"You did?" you quipped with half a smile.

Then you thought of doing something with your hands, since they were laying flat on your thighs. You pushed some strands of hair from Seokmin's forehead, and brushed the hair that you had messed up when you kissed.

His eyelids fluttered briefly. "I mean, I did wondered."

You pointed a finger to his face. "Don't lie, Seokmin."

He smiled sheepishly. "I just wondered what you'd be like. Honest."

"And?" you ask.

Seokmin shrugged. "You're not terrible."

The tingling sensation in the lower pit your stomach only intensified. Almost as if Seokmin had just challenged you. You laughed at his words, seeing his chapped lips smile at your reaction.

You locked your lips with his again, but this time more confidently, and your slipped your tongue to meet his. Your hands grabbed his face, and travelled to the sides of his neck, earning a small moan from him.

Feeling embarrassed, you broke away to breathe. If Seokmin noticed that you were getting all worked up, he said nothing about it. Yeah, you were both actors and have known each other for years, but you were human. And somehow Seokmin knew where to put his hands and how to kiss you perfectly.

You pulled out your phone from your pocket and opened your camera. Seokmin understood immediately and took your phone from your hands and angled it to capture you both for a few photos.

He took photos of you leaning your head on his shoulder, one in which you kiss him on his cheek and he smiles, and another one of him kissing the top of your head.

The photos would be kept in your album, as you didn't intend on actually posting them. Not yet anyway.

You tried not to think too hard about how crazy this all was. A part of you didn't feel awkward, as if the familiarity of his body near yours was meant to be this way anyway.

Testing your own boundaries, you turned to him, grabbing his chin to kiss him again, and you realized just how much you liked his lips on yours. But you didn't think it was anything else.

You nuzzled to his side softly. "D'you think that was enough of a show?" you mumbled to his ear, feeling embarrassed that you were so breathless from kissing.

You felt Seokmin smile again as if you had just spoken sweet nothings to his ear. "I think. Wanna get out of here?"

"Sounds good to me."

You stood up from the couch at the same time as Seokmin. He promptly grabbed your hand and interlocked your fingers in his. As you made your way out of there, you and Seokmin waved at your friends goodbye. Making a show that you were leaving hand in hand with Seokmin.

As soon as you stepped on the elevator, your phone buzzed in your pocket. Before you saw the screen, you knew what you were about to read.

[10:39 PM] boo: hello ??? [10:39 PM] boo: wtf are you doing? [10:40 PM] you: wdym? [10:40 PM] boo: with dk ?? [10:40 PM] boo: since when ?

"We have to come up with a story," you tell Seokmin, who was leaning his back against the wall of the elevator.

He was looking at his own phone. And you couldn't help but eye at his lithe fingers. You sighed, pushing your thoughts away.

"I agree," he said and showed you his screen. Messages from Seungkwan and Soonyoung were popping on the screen so urgently that you couldn't read any.

You buried your hands in your pockets along with your phone. "I think we did stir up some waters," you muttered.

Seokmin pressed his lips into a content smile. "Hopefully they stop nagging you with questions of your ex."

"They're going to ask questions about you now," you countered with a smile. "Though I rather talk about you than that jerk."

"That is the plan," Seokmin smirked.

"Why, though?" you find yourself asking.

Seokmin eyed you for a second. "At first it was because I really despise your ex," he confessed. "But I think I'm obligated to tell you that I really liked it. The attention."

"That's it?"

"That's it."

"Promise?" you insist.

He came to a full stop on the sidewalk and you were force to stop too. Seokmin held out one pinky finger towards you wordlessly.

You breathed out with a smile. "This is not necessary." You say, linking your finger with his.

It wasn't just a pinky promise. It was something your group of friends took too seriously. You didn't lie to each other, and promising it with your pinkies could very well serve as an oath.

It was childish. But your friend group liked it that way.

Seokmin walked you to your apartment building, which also served as a way to show him where you lived now.

"Talk to you tomorrow," Seokmin said as he pull you into a bear hug and patted your head affectionately.

"Sure," you said.

He watched as you entered the building, and waved at you goodbye before disappearing behind the elevator doors.

Someone peeked over your shoulder to look at your phone screen to the point where you can feel their breath on your neck.

That someone was Boo Seungkwan.

You've been typing nonstop for five minutes, your fingernails snapping at the screen in a frenzy.

"Stop snooping," you tried to tell him while typing.

The coffee shop where you both work part-time has been quiet, as it's almost 9 p.m. and you're both about to clock out. There have only been a couple of passing customers during the last hour of your shift, so your attention has been diverted elsewhere.

You hear a sigh and then, "So you're not going to tell me what happened yesterday?"

"'Bout what?" you said absentmindedly.

"About what happened with Seokmin," he answered pointedly.

"What about it? We just kissed."

You heard him scoff. "You two did not just kissed, you made out on a dirty couch. And then you both disappeared for the rest of the night. Yeah, you're not fucking fooling me."

You didn't find it strange to hear him curse. He's been your friend for years, ever since you met at university. But he's lately been expressing his annoyance with you for your decisions, so you hear him cursing a lot more lately.

That is what pulled your gaze from the phone screen. "Don't put it like that. The couch was decent."

He rolled his eyes, and cursed some more. "Now, you're trying to be coy. The couch doesn't matter. What matters is that you kissed with your friend, our friend!"

"And? We're two consenting adults," you shrugged while trying to keep a straight face. But you couldn't help feeling a little embarrassed.

"Are you guys a thing then?"

You stared at him, racking your brain to come up with an answer.

A customer entered the shop at the same time you opened your mouth to tell Seungkwan everything that happened last night. Somehow, you didn't see far up ahead your actions and didn't think Seungkwan would react like this. So you feel secretly grateful that the customer drove you away from that conversation.

"Listen," Seungkwan said as soon as you two finished closing up. "I really don't care what you two are, I just hate it when you keep me in the dark on important stuff like this. Before last night, I though you were still broken over Youngho."

You two usually walked home together whenever you had to close the shop. Seungkwan lived a couple of blocks away from you so you kept each other company.

You contemplated sharing with him that what happened with Seokmin was improvised on the spot. That you were just as surprised with the turn of events as he was. But, telling him would just trump the deal you had struck with Seokmin.

And you were a bit too greedy to let that happen.

"I'm sorry, Seungkwan. I know it was shitty of me to not mention anything," you found yourself saying with a small shrug.

"That and playing dumb," he said, shooting a resentful glance at you.

"Yeah, and playing dumb or whatever," you said, rolling your eyes but couldn't help but smile. "How can I make it up to you?"

"Can you cover me on monday morning?" he answered a bit too quickly.

You snorted. "Sure. But only if you promise to stop berating me."

"I am not berating you."

You continued walking to the apartment complex in silence. For a short bit, though. You knew what was coming.

"So you two are a thing or not?"

"Sorta," you shrugged again.

"Sorta," he parroted.

You stopped at the door of the building where you live.

The weather was cold, to the point that Seungkwan's breath could be seen as he sighed with a weak smile.

"Well, just don't fuck this up, okay?" he said, raising his eyebrows. "I know that you are a big girl and can take care of yourself but, just don't do something stupid just because you can't move on."

"I got it, Kwannie," you tried to brush off with a hand gesture. "I promise not to fuck it up, okay?"

"See you tomorrow." He turned around and walked towards two buildings down the street, where he lived with his roommate Vernon.

"See ya!"

In the elevator, you scrambled for your keys, which were in the pocket of your jacket. You tried to play it cool with Seungkwan, however couldn't help but feel anxiety pulsating on your stomach as the elevator doors opened with a ding noise.

Seokmin lifted his head to the sound, he was leaning back next to your apartment door, phone in his hand. "Hi there," he said with a soft smile that reached his eyes.

"Hi. Have you been waiting long?"

He stood up straight and pocketed his phone as you walked to the door and opened it. You glanced sideways at him, he was wearing the oversized hoodie from last night, but instead of jeans he was now wearing grey sweat shorts.

"Nope. Just ten minutes."

"I couldn't shake off Seungkwan's prying," you informed, as you both entered your apartment.

You closed the door behind you two, removing your boots at the entrance. Seokmin followed suit and removed his Nike's, carefully placing them next to your boots.

"I imagined as much," he hummed. He still had a content smile on his face.

You two held each others gaze for a moment. Only to realize that you hadn't even turned on the lights, or fully invited him to your apartment.

"Make yourself at home," you chimed, turning on the lights of the living space. It was empty except for the lone large sofa, a TV screen perilously propped up on a plastic table, and a pile of boxes from when you moved out of your ex's apartment.

Seokmin smirked.

"I haven't had the chance to unpack yet... or buy more furniture," you murmured briefly.

He noticed the pillow and the pile of blankets that were tossed in the couch. "I assume that you don't have a bed yet, either."

"I just have the bed frame," you reply as you remove the pillow out of the way and fold the blankets in half. "It's still packaged, though."

"Hey, don't think I'm judging you," he raised the palms of his hands innocently. "I use to sleep on the floor at a friend's place when I got to this city, remember?"

Seokmin was a great friend. If you could describe him succinctly, it would be that. A great friend. You knew he wasn't judging you, since the curiosity in his smiling eyes didn't fade as he sat on the couch and eyed the piles of boxes that were labelled with your name in your ex's handwriting.

You also knew that Seokmin sleeping on the floor when he moved to the city to study was not the same as being kicked out of you and your ex's apartment after he cheated on you. But you were glad that his mind didn't go there, evidently.

"Can I offer you anything?" you sighed heavily. "I may not have furniture yet, but my fridge is full and the rent is paid."

"Well, that is what matters as far as I'm aware. I'm fine, thank you," he pressed his lips. He then scooped to the side and patted next to him on the couch.

Right.

"So..." you breathed, sitting down next to him. "You wanted to talk."

You were now sitting next to each other. Being so close to him sparked something deep within you, something that last night made you feel alive.

Then, you knew that you were in trouble. It was alarming the fact that you couldn't take your eyes off of him. You were aware of every gesture, every movement Seokmin made. You gulped.

Seokmin sat with his knees spread slightly apart, his hands resting comfortably between his thighs. "About last night," he begun.

"I, uh-"

"If we're going to do this, we need some ground rules," he declared.

"Wait. Seriously?" you blurted out.

"Wha- what did you think I was going to say?" He looked up to catch your gaze.

"I thought you were going to back out."

"Oh, you want to call it off?" Seokmin retorted, his eyes searching your face.

"No. Not really. Last night was..."

His eyes lit up along with a playful smile. "Fun?"

"Yeah, exactly," you matched his smile. "Well, I don't enjoy lying to Seungkwan, but at least I didn't get the pity treatment, for once."

"Wait. What did you say to him?"

"That we are sort of a thing," you mumbled.

His eyebrows pushed up. "And he believed that?" Seokmin laughed, brushing his hair hastily with his lithe fingers.

"He seemed to," you shrugged. "He stopped questioning me after that."

"Well, that is what you wanted, isn't it?" he shifted beside you, so that he was facing your body. Then he took that same hand to fix his watch on his other wrist.

You mirrored his movements, and now the two of you sat facing each other on the couch. You leaned your head on your hand, with your elbow resting on the couch's headrest.

"So what happens next?" you asked.

Seokmin shrugged slightly, a relaxed look on his face. "Whatever you want, I told you."

You bit your lip for a second, aware of the fact that Seokmin was gazing at your mouth and your eyes, silently waiting for your response.

"I'm still thinking of last night," you confessed, the act of being that blunt made your cheeks heat up.

"Me too. I couldn't think of anything else," he smirked. Your eyes lingered a bit on his lips too.

He toyed a bit with the sleeves of his black hoodie, and pulled them up to his elbows, then crossed his arms across his chest. You swallowed at the sight of how veiny his forearms looked.

"D'you think that we could talk about the ground rules later?" you asked sheepishly.

Seokmin couldn't help but notice the way you inclined towards him slightly. And you couldn't help but notice him swallow hard. "What do you want to do?"

"I really want you to kiss me again," you mumbled, feeling something rouse within you.

His eyes twinkled with excitement. "Oh, yeah?" he hummed.

He seemed as if he were waiting for you to say something inviting, you noticed the moment he smiled when you nodded a bit too eagerly with your head.

He lifted his hands to grab you by the sides of your head. "C'mere," he whispered, his lips quickly finding yours in a soft kiss.

You felt his breath on your neck as he pulled away slightly. "Again?" you sighed.

His mouth was smiling as his lips found yours again, and as the soft kisses turned more demanding, you couldn't ignore how your body responded.

This felt different from the make out session of the night prior. It was entirely carnal, at least, Seokmin kissed you with more eagerness, unafraid of being seen and judged. You heard his breath catch in a gasp and his lips smack. You both were not acting.

You broke away from him, all thoughts in your head quieted down when in a sudden movement, you moved in the couch to sit on his lap, straddling him. Seokmin said nothing either, and you silently thanked him, as his hands returned to the sides of your face to kiss you deeply.

The sizzling feeling at the lower pit of your stomach, the warmth all over your skin when one of his hands slipped from your face to the back of your head and fisted your hair softly, sending chills down your spine and making you moan in response.

"Yeah, I thought you liked that last night," Seokmin mumbled gruffly.

"Shut up," you smiled.

"Make me," he whispered back.

You leaned in to kiss him again, a rush of adrenaline filled you as his hands that were on the sides of your head moved to your back to press your body against his. Fingertips trailed softly on the sides of his neck, you felt him shudder as you made your way to his collarbones where you shyly touched his skin like never before.

Seokmin left a trail of kisses from your lips, to your jaw and ended on your neck. You gasped when he found a sweet spot effortlessly, and made something flutter in your stomach. Hearing your reaction, Seokmin sucked on the spot gently, eliciting a moan from you.

It had been a while since you felt like this. Even with your ex, you felt that the last few times you were together like this were more of a obligatory act from both of you.

So, being close to Seokmin like this was like unearthing feelings that your body had long forgotten. And it was really hard to control.

You let your hips sit fully on his lap and started grinding on him suggestively. Seokmin groaned in your mouth and broke away.

"What are you doing?" he asked, his voice sounded raspy.

"Oh, fuck—sorry. You don't like that?" you whimpered and made a gesture to move out of his lap.

But Seokmin grabbed you tightly to his body effortlessly, since his hands were still on your back. "No, it's not that," he put in briefly.

You stared at him, puzzled. "What is it then?"

"What do you want?" he countered.

He watched you swallow hard. "I want you," you muttered, hoping that the emphasis you put in the word was enough for him.

A few strands of hair had stuck to your wet lips, and Seokmin pulled them away with gentle fingers as he asked: "How do you want me?"

You couldn't help but smile. "Don't tease me like that."

Seokmin just shrugged calmly, but his eyes were burning with lust. "I won't do anything unless you tell me."

You planted a soft kiss on his jaw, then one on his lower lip. "I want you to fuck me, Seokmin," you whispered into his lips.

He reciprocated the slow, wet kiss. And groaned again when you grinded your hips one more time. "I didn't bring any condoms," he mumbled.

"Really?" your voice sounded obnoxiously high.

"I just came here to talk," Seokmin laughed. "It never crossed my mind that we'd fuck."

"Really?"

"Really. I didn't think you'd be this needy," he started laughing when you landed a playful smack to one of his shoulders.

You rolled your eyes at him. "I'm on the pill."

His hand grabbed your chin and he pulled away to look at you in the eyes. "Are you sure you wanna do this?"

You both understood what this meant for your friendship. Seokmin didn't seem concerned at all about you being on his lap, or that you were practically begging him to fuck you right there and then. He seemed willing, but like the good gentleman he was, he needed you to say what you wanted.

You nodded. "Yeah. I'm sure."

Seokmin's lips parted briefly as he scanned your face with his eyes one last time. "Fuck," he groaned, and pulled you to his mouth again.

Your lips latched onto his, hungrily, teeth grazing, tongues clashing. You could feel the wetness from his saliva beneath your mouth as the kiss turned sloppy and more fervent.

His hands casually made their way from your back to your hips, where they rested comfortably before giving you a gentle squeeze.

"Take these off," he murmured in your lips, his fingers pinched at the fabric of your jeans.

You stood from his lap to take your jeans off, aware that Seokmin had his eyes on you. He rest his head on the back of the sofa, his hungry eyes watched your body up and down. His hand grabbed yours and tugged you his way to gesture you to straddle him again.

Your lips explore his neck, licking the spot below his ear, and he breathed out a moan. His fingertips dug slightly on your hips, and then he cupped your ass when you left wet kisses and sucked in the spot again.

Seokmin pressed your body back and forth, rubbing your clothed pussy against his hard cock. You moaned and hid your face in the crook of his neck and grinded some more on him.

"Let me see you," he muttered in your ear.

Your lips searched his tentatively, kissing him with haste as his hands moved from your backside to underneath your top. You broke the kiss again, and let him remove your shirt entirely.

Seokmin revelled at the sight of your half naked body, his fingers trailing softly from your collarbone, to your sternum, all the way to your bellybutton.

"Pretty," he mumbled when his fingers tugged at the band of your pink panties.

He looked at you, as if asking for permission. But he quietly trailed his fingers to your clothed core, and there he found that your panties were already soaked. You could feel yourself grow more aroused at the mere act of him feeling you without breaking eye contact.

You shuddered a sigh when he pushed the soaked fabric aside and had to bite your lip from moaning loudly when his fingers found your wet core.

Seokmin sighed. "You're so fucking wet," he smiled softly.

"God, Seokmin–," you breathed and your eyes fluttered close when he slowly moved one of his fingers inside you. And then, he pushed another finger in.

He bent his head and planted a kiss on your shoulder. "Ride my hand, baby," he said hoarsely.

A shiver went down your spine at hearing what Seokmin called you. You started moving on his hand almost immediately grinding on his fingers the same way you had done on his lap.

Your forehead found his, a tingling sensation travelled your body when you his breath caressed your face. "Seokmin."

His lips were formed into a smile when he pressed his lips on yours in a chaste kiss. "Mmyeah, that's my name, baby."

His other hand unclasped your bra expertly, and you helped him with the straps and threw it somewhere on the floor. You felt his breath on your skin and your nipples grow hard.

It was almost embarrassing to you to hear the squelching sounds you were making against the hand between your legs. But you could barely pay some thoughts to it, all you could think of was the way he moved his hands on your body. And that you wanted more.

He rubbed his thumb around your nipples, and you watch him do it, watched the hand buried in your pussy as you grinded on him, close to your release. Then, his hand rested on your neck for a bit and you shuddered when his thumb caressed your skin and curved around your throat.

"You like them?" he asked peering at your face. "My hands? I've seen the way you look at them."

"Yeah," you breathed. "I wondered what they would look like on me."

"Oh, yeah?" he smiled. Then pulled out his fingers from your core, just about when you were about to cum. You blinked at him, confused.

"Lie down," he muttered, pointing to the sofa. You did as he said, and moved your back to the sofa, your knees pulled up.

"I knew you'd be bossy," you confessed, feeling hot on your face.

Seokmin's eyebrows raised a bit. "Been thinking about me a lot, huh?" he asked, cocking his head to the side. And then his hands reached up to the collar of his hoodie, he threw it over his body in one swift motion and tossed it aside.

His bare chest was the first thing you saw, it was wide and lean. You also got a good look at his strong thighs when he undid his shorts, and step out of them.

A shiver shot up inside you when you saw the outline of his hard cock pressing against the tight fabric of his black underwear.

His toned arms as they came to the sides of your head to lean and kiss you fervently. "Stop looking at me like that," he groaned softly in your mouth.

He placed his knees on the sofa and patted you on one of your knees gently. "Spread your legs for me," he placed himself in between your legs as soon as you did what he ordered.

Seokmin left a trail of open mouthed kisses from your neck, to your collarbones as he palmed and squeezed your breasts with his hands. Your fingers tangled in his soft hair and moaned his name again when he sucked one of your nipples gently as his fingers pinched the other one.

He stood on his knees, hooking his fingers on your panties and dragged them along your legs, and dropped them to the side of the sofa.

Seokmin held your legs with his hands, as he placed kisses on the inner side of your thighs, sucking and licking softly on your skin. He gave you a glance one time before lowering his mouth to your core.

A whine reverberated on your chest quite loudly as your back arched almost involuntarily. Feeling his tongue lapping on your core, licking almost hungrily but patiently too, as if he wanted to take his time pleasuring you.

Seokmin revelled in your taste, in the sounds you made. He groaned when your fingers tugged at his soft hair again, he groaned when you whimpered his name as you neared your orgasm.

"Fuck, fuck, fuck," you muttered with eyes shut. Just as when you thought you couldn't feel any closer, Seokmin slid his two fingers inside you, pumping in and out. Your hips rutted desperately against his face and he was quick to hold them down with his free hand.

"Be still," he said softly, before dipping his head down on you again.

"Sorry," you replied breathlessly.

He hummed in response, and you could tell that he was amused at the desperate mess he made of you. But all you could think of was his mouth on your clit, as he had quickly found out how you liked to be stimulated, eliciting moans and half pleas.

You heard him moan with you when you reached your climax, as if he enjoyed the noises that you made, along with his name. Seokmin pulled his fingers out and placed sweet kisses on your clit.

You watched him lick his lips and fingers clean, and you could see that the tip of his nose was slightly wet with your arousal, making you grin at the sight of it. You cleaned it with your fingers as you brought his mouth to yours to kiss him fiercely.

"You taste so good," he muttered lazily on your lips and you could taste yourself in them.

You started tugging at the band of his underwear, pulling it down as best as the position of your bodies let you. Seokmin sighed, and you noticed that he was smiling.

"Be patient," he groaned, his demeanour seemed elated still. But he stood up from the sofa, and quickly got rid of his underwear, revealing his large cock.

You gulped almost involuntarily. "You have a pretty cock," you mumbled once he was between your legs again.

That took him off guard. He gave you a breathy chuckle. "Well, that's a first," he confessed.

Yeah, you were quite sure he didn't get the word 'pretty' as often as 'big'.

He gave you a small peck on your lips, pulling you out of your trance. "You're ready?" he asked.

You winced in anticipation the moment you felt his cockhead align with your entrance. Your fingers cradled his face as he watched you nod.

"I need to hear you, baby," he crooned, placing another sweet kiss on your lip.

"I'm ready."

He held one of your legs angled for him as he eased himself inside you painfully slow. You grabbed at his shoulders, letting your fingertips dig at his skin.

"F-fuck," you whispered, releasing the air that caught between your teeth and Seokmin sighed deeply too as he stretched your pussy slowly.

It had been a while since you last had sex, so the feeling of having someone, let alone someone as big as Seokmin took a bit more from you than expected.

"Good girl," he muttered through gritted teeth when your hips met fully. You felt your walls flutter a bit around his cock, easing from the sting at having him stretch you open.

His eyes searched your face briefly, but wasted no time and started moving slowly and with shallow thrusts until you both adjusted to each other's bodies. Then he effortlessly picked up his pace and his thrusts started coming and going deeply inside you.

He kissed your moans with wet lips and released your leg from his grip. "Wrap your legs around me," you did as he said, also wrapping your arms around his neck as he kissed your lips again.

His hands buried in your hair, closing in a tight first and his forehead leaned on yours. "You feel so fucking good, baby," he gritted his teeth. His hips buckled once before taking a faster and harder pace on you.

"Fuck! Right there," you moaned on his mouth. And gripped him tighter with you hands.

The grip on your hair tightened and he turned your head to the side slightly to make way for his lips on your neck where he had found a sweet spot.

When you opened your eyes, you found yourself on the reflection of the tv screen. You hadn't noticed it before when you were so busy staring at Seokmin, but now, you could see your face wild with lust, and your body entangled with Seokmin's; as his hips rammed against yours.

You almost fell in love at the image of him fucking you, passionately, hard and fast. Just seeing your bodies melted like this made your body quiver almost sending you to the edge.

He lifted his head and found you staring at both your reflections, he smiled at you and cooed. "Look at you, so flustered and pretty."

His thrusts quickened, but they didn't relent on their depth. And it was exactly what you needed. Your hands travelled down his back and dug your nails in his ass, earning a throaty moan from the man above you.

You were panting, feeling all sanity lip out your mind and you could hear yourself call his name in whispers, but couldn't make out another word.

Soft, wet kisses trailed down your neck to your mouth as the lewd noises you made filled the room.

"Are you going to cum again, baby?"

"'m so close," you whimpered. You closed your eyes, savouring the feeling as you reached your second orgasm.

"Look at me, baby," you heard him whisper and opened your eyes to find his.

"God. Seokmin. Don't stop, please," you cried as your body trembled with hot waves of pleasure.

A long moan escaped your mouth but was quickly supressed by a wet kiss. "I know baby," he whispered as you came on his cock, whimpering and twitching uncontrollably under his body.

Then he sat back down on his knees, grabbing you by your hips with a tight grip, and the change in position made you moan lazily. You didn't think you could keep going, but the sight of Seokmin's face riddled with pleasure made want to chase after a third orgasm.

Seokmin threw his head back before letting out a deep moan with his eyelids shut, his lips parted and twitching slightly once. You could feel your body tremble again at the thought of his cum inside you, and moaned at the same time he did, his thrusts on you not relenting until your cream started dripping at the base of his cock, mixing with his cum.

As his hips came to a stop on top of you, he glanced down to where your bodies remained connected and sighed in pleasure at the sight.

You also could feel yourself get lost at the sight of him for a bit. His heavy breathing made his chest and shoulders move up and down in a languid manner, a light layer of sweat covered his neck and collarbones.

He moved to rest his head on your chest for a moment, without saying a word. You knew he could hear your heartbeat, as you could feel his own heart stuttering against your body.

His forehead also glistened with seat, his hot breath caressed your breasts and even though you could see his relaxed features, you noticed that he was lost in thought.

You pushed his wet bangs from his face, drawing his attention to you. "We're still friends, right?" you asked jokingly.

His lips rose in a lazy smile and nodded. "Still friends."

♡︎ Final notes: I haven't posted fanfic for years sooo... well, if you liked it please show it some love, a reblog or leave a comment, i'm all eyes. click here for part 2 ( · ❛ ֊ ❛)

[momentomori24]

I swear to God, Twitter being able to accumulate so many brain-dead, malicious, pseudo intellectual low lives all in one place at the same time is a phenomenon worthy of being studied under a microscope in a science lab. And no, that is not a compliment.

Thankfully people have already spoken out against this bullshit-- the fact that people needed to is already maddening to think about-- but as someone who got the basic gist of what happened literally yesterday I'll also put my voice out there: Don't you fucking dare try to paint Hbomb as a murderer over this situation.

Somerton may be a lying, misogynistic plagiarist and conman, but he obviously doesn't deserve to die and while I do make fun of the guy, I genuinely hope that he continues to have a life after the dust has settled on everything. Not on YouTube or any social media platform for a long time at least, but just a life nontheless. I don't wish what he's potentially going through on anyone, and I hope that he makes it through this. But regardless of if he does or doesn't-- and God forbid he doesn't-- none of this is Hbomb's fault. It's not his fault, or Kat's fault, or Jessie's fault (because apparently there's people blaming her too cuz WHY NOT), or anybody's fault. All they did was call out his actions, hold him accountable for the harm he's done. They have done nothing to deserve having to carry this on their shoulders should the worst happen. They did nothing wrong. They didn't kill James (he's not confirmed dead yet either btw). They are not murderers. And to the people saying they are: say those words out loud, listen how they sound like, and re-evaluate. Just cease.

And to people like this:

''Oh I'm not blaming him for anything I'm just blaming him for what his audience did because according to HIM you're responsible for your audience'' Yeah, you people can shut your mouths too. Of course you're responsible for your audience, and that includes Hbomb too. However, your tiny, godless little monkey brain can't see why your argument is still rubbish even with that in mind. The difference between James, Internet Historian and Hbomb is that Hbomb never promoted problematic behaviour to his audience. If you promote problematic shit like harassment or misogyny or racism, then yeah, you're absolutely responsible for how your behaviour influences your audience. But that's not what he did. He made it very clear where he stood on those things, literally stating that ''if anyone were to harass Somerton on his behalf they are worse than him and will not see the light of heaven''. He's done his part in making it clear that harassment is wrong, so if someone went out of their way to go against that and harass James anyway that doesn't reflecf on him at all. Also, what the hell do you mean ''hatemobbed'' to suicide? I don't doubt there are people who went to extremes because those bad apples always exist, but most of the things I've seen are valid critisisms, memes and call outs about that guy. If holding people accountable for their actions and poking fun at them a little counts as 'hatemobbing'' (which has Filip calling his critics a ''lynch mob'' energy tbh) what the hell do you call actual hatemobbing then? Do we just let people continue being shitty because calling them out ''damages their mental health'' or ''drives them to suicide'' then? Is that a world you want to live in?

Same thing goes for people like this:

Criticing someone for their objectively bullshit content and wanting them dead are two seperate things. What the actual hell is wrong with you. The plagiarist in question is a person. Those ''harshest critics'' are still people. And because we're people, we care. I'd rather James pump out more plagiarised slop than commit suicide. I'd still hate him for it, but I'd prefer him being alive over the alternative any day. We all do. None of us would sleep easier knowing he's dead just because he wouldn't be ''committing the cardinal sin of putting out a 'pure content mill' video'' because someone taking their own life is horrific-- especially Hbomberguy, how dare you even try to imply that?

And this gets me to the reason I'm furiously typing all this out in the first place: Hbomb is the fucking victim here, so stop treating him like he isn't. He tried making things as right as possible by compensating those that were burned by James through a video where he revealed everything there needs to be known about the guy so that less people fall victim to his actions and lies. To just ignore the harm James was causing while he had the evidence to prove it and platform too big to threaten into non existence should he speak out would've been bad. So he didn't. He did the right thing by sticking with the people James had stolen from, giving them a voice and making them known after they've been scrubbed from the picture by decidedly being uncredited for their works or bullied into silence. He shouldn't have to deal with this for doing the right thing. He shouldn't be labelled a murderer for doing the right thing. He shouldn't have to have the death of a man on his conscience for doing the right thing. People claiming otherwise are obviously wrong, but I can't imagine what all this must feel like right now. Because even tho they're wrong, guilt isn't a rational thing, and I know that if I were in his position I'd still feel like a morally bankrupt individual were the worst to happen even if I knew that it was not my fault. This isn't a funny story. So to add to this dumpsterfire by using it as a prop to bash on a creator you don't like and immediately write Somerton off as dead even when he's not even been confirmed dead yet to do that shows how little these people actually care about the thing they're talking about. They don't care a guy potentially killed himself-- what they care about is using it to paint Hbomb in a bad light because they don't like him. Here they are, posting memes and ill jokes about this very delicate situation while barely a day since the news broke out had passed. It's opportunistic, it's sickening, and literally the exact thing he criticised in his video when talking about 'content mills'. Like, I know none of these clowns bothered to actually watch it, but have some self-awareness. And some shame too, while you're at it.

This long story short: I'm writing this to contribute to the narrative not getting twisted to make Hbomb out to be the villian. Same goes for everyone else. Don't let these people paint them as the villians. If I see another person pull this shit again I will literally bite you and shred you into salad and spit you back out because I hate you so much and I mean that wholeheartedly.

To Hbomb: you will never see this but if you do, take care of yourself.

To the asshats this post is about: Delete your account. Cease all together. Stop talking about this. Just leave him the fuck alone.

[simplydnp]

idk why this matters to me but in the last few months they've been acknowledging so many things I never ever thought they would. pinof and the touching. the phude multiple times. dapc slime (ok they had merch to sell for that one but still)

no but actually. phil literally said 'i thought we weren't acknowledging it' about the phude and now they just bring it up all the time.

pinof reacts... i still can't believe we're in a post pinof-reacts universe. how did that happen. i was changed permanently--like something shuffled in my dna when i got the notif for pinof reacts 1. this is not a physical reaction but a chemical one that cannot be undone. for something that was so... sacred. and integral. to their existence and history. pinof wasn't generally talked about unless it was pinof time. and even then it was 'it'll be up soon' or 'we just posted it' and then Never talked about outside of that. especially not the first one! we freak out about the We Know You Know in the newsletter but it's Always been like that with pinof 1. so to see them--new (& natural 🥺) hair for them both, in a house they bought and built together, in the first few months of giving the gaming channel a second chance--reflect on how it all began? absolutely devastating. and to lean into moments and discuss them in new ways. in territory previously not breached! the 'they're toUching'?!?!? the '11 hour fuck session'!?!? the '£9000 champagne'?!?!? like hey we're not supposed to talk about that, dan and phil might see!! shhh!! but they're the ones saying it!! absolutely wild.

in a way, it had to happen. especially with where we're at now (them literally selling merch of them holding hands). in order for them to move beyond that... mindset? i guess? that a lot of fans had, they had to defang it. i really see it as one of the biggest walls they've broken down in the way they communicate with us. the 'hey. it's okay. we've seen it. it's not a big deal. we will absolutely make fun of you for it though. but we're good.'

i'm just really curious whose idea it was. (lbr it was probably phil given dans not a react kinda guy. but i'd be lying if i said i didn't want to be in the room where it happened when they talked about actually doing it or not, and what it would mean) (big ad revenue thats for sure 🤣 get it kings)

i will never be able to get phil's 'they touched' out of my head and at this point i wouldn't want to. it's absolutely earned. and i guess it makes me a masochist to enjoy the psychic damage it inflicts on me, but such is life i suppose.

the crafts mention really surprised me! i had contemplated a few different scenarios in how they'd go about it, and i'll be honest i feel like they could've committed to the bit a little more but they're forgiven. like what about glitchy interstitials! cuts to the merch website. found footage inserted between sections! i recognize they don't want to 'scare' their usual audience wirh sudden cuts to intense/graphic content but my immersionnn. absolutely shattered by 'oh we have new merch now btw'. cmon boys you love to lie to us. say theres merch up but you dont know where it came from. just that we should buy it 👀 or idk, something clever. and i recognize i may sound like a spoilt brat bc i just got a 14 minute long masterpiece of an unexpected dapc revival, but my immersion. i mean i already bought the merch before they shilled it anyways so it didn't influence me regardless 🤣

ultimately we really are in a new era. even beyond just the revival. i think they're really finding their stride--not only in their content (evidenced by a semi-regular schedule) but also creatively, in doing what they want to do, how they want to do it, and truly not giving that much of a fuck anymore. and i'm really happy for them. phil talked a bit about this in his 'rating my icons' video, where he's kind of decided he doesn't care what people on twitter think, and how it's been good for him, and i think we're seeing that reflected in not only his content, but also the gaming channel. they play what they want. they say what they want. and it's just fun. dan going on the record to say he's really enjoying it makes me so happy to hear, because literally december 2022 he believed he'd disappear after WAD. and now, instead, he gets to play games and make stupid jokes and smile and laugh multiple times a week, and he's really happy about it. he gets to be silly and goofy and crude without having to Stress about it. i keep saying it but they're so settled now. and as someone who's followed them through big changes and turbulent times, getting to see them happy after everything... it brings a lot of hope. and i know theyre millionaires. but there's something to looking at someone you fell in love with 15 years ago the same then as you do now. but instead of it being something scary, something you have to hide, something that feels like it can consume you and everything you have--it gets to be something beautiful. and regular. and embraced. you've read this far you get to listen to me wax poetic about them.

we've been thoroughly boiled and maybe, just maybe, it's warming our hearts too.

[howlingday]

Do you know why people say Bumbleby ruined Rwby? Do you think that's a fair statement?

To an extent, I can see why people blame BMBLB more than anything else for RWBY's writing becoming... let's just say less than what it used to be. Or at least more apparent.

I'm gonna say my piece about BMBLB for... the umpteenth time. Full disclosure, I don't like it, so if you're a Wasp looking to harass me, my full name and address is

Part of the reason a lot of fans don't like BMBLB is because it's pretty much the flagship of the FNDM and it... doesn't do anything. It's kinda like Arcane had... what was it, CaitVi, but they didn't say or do anything in the two seasons you saw them. Don't get me wrong, the fans were going nuts with all the BMBLB art and fics and whatnot, but... the show didn't do anything with BMBLB until 9 Volumes in, with their story not really being explored until Volume 6/7.

Which brings me to my biggest issue with CRWBY handling BMBLB. I've always made the comparison of BMBLB being like a steak that was left to thaw for WAY too long. Blake and Yang started off great as friends and even had a nice little friction in that friendship in Volume 3. But from Volume 4 to 6, all we had was Yangst and a LOT of Blake hate, with the latter having the worst evidence against her as a character.

Speaking of characters, I wanna talk about how bad CRWBY flubbed BMBLB as characters. Yang was struggling in her room with survivor PTSD, then pulled up her bootstraps, and rode off to join RWBY. Blake fought against the rising White Fang insurgence in Menagerie, learning to trust her friends, Sun and Ilia, and making a firm step forward for herself and her people with a NEW White Fang. And then they reunited in Volume 5, had a moment in the Volume 6 finale, and...

NOTHING. After that, there was no character development for Yang OR Blake, because neither of them did anything wrong (except murdering, lying, conspiring, etc.). Look me in the... pfp and tell me what their characters were after Adam died. The most character development we saw was them PINING for each other. Look, I love Arkos as much as the next guy (except for that one guy who REALLY doesn't like Arkos), but the whole "pining for my love interest" trope doesn't really fit the grounded theming RWBY decided to take after Volume 3. It's fun to watch for a few episodes, but when you keep being like, "Oh, it's gonna happen! Just you wait~!" then the audience is going to lose interest when nothing happens.

Or worse, you flub the actual scene like V9 did. The actual kiss is fine, and the song for it is so... tragic, because you have this perfect song for this perfect moment, but everything leading into the moment is just... bad. CRWBY literally pulled Blake and Yang to the side, threatened them with a gun, and said, "JUST KISS ALREADY"! And unlike Barbarossa, it was NOT fun for anyone me.

Like, when you compare other kiss scenes in, not just RWBY but other scenes, BMBLB was a long overdue kiss with a result of the exact opposite intent of the show. Hell, it's almost as bad as the KatAang kiss, and that one sends the A:TLA fans into a frenzy (from what I've seen and heard)!

TL;DR: I don't like BMBLB because it's hyped up to be this big thing, but it does nothing.

[zvtara-was-never-canon]

I saw this one post tagged under Aang deserved better and Katara deserved better. As someone who loves both characters. I hate how people mischaracterize them while saying they supposedly deserved better, when really they’re just salty about shipping when it comes down to it.

Here’s the post:

https://www.tumblr.com/empressofthesunslittlecorner/748486832898048000/a-rant-about-aang-and-byrke?source=share

"What does a 14-year-old want with a 12-year-old?" Same thing a 16-year-old wants with a 14-year-old, aka maybe a romantic relationship, maybe just a hook up, maybe just friendship, maybe nothing at all. You can't put people in a box like that. When I was 14 I wouldn't have cared if the person who had a crush on me was too years younger, two years older, or the exact same, all that would matter would be "Do I like them back or not?" Plenty of girls my age were the same, others would be caught dead with someone younger, and others thought that it was weird to date anyone older.

"It's just creepy, no matter the gender" *proceeds to ship Zutara, that has the same age gap, but the guy is older*

"It would have been better if they got together at like 22 and 20" Why? It's a two year agep gap, not twenty - why age them up to adulthood? 12-years-old is right around the time most people either start having crushes, or already have been having crushes for a while, it's not weird. And again, why it Zutara acceptable with Karata being fourteen, but Aang needs to be at least twenty for it to not be creepy, even though the only thing that changed was the gender of the younger character?

"I haven't read the comics" good for you, don't do it, they're terrible, every character was ruined and Yang should be as hated by the fandom as Shyamalan.

"But what I saw on tumblr" Ah yes, because you can always trust that people online are not biased, mistaken, or full on lying. Just ask the leader writer, Aaron Ehasz, about all the times he had to say "No, zutara was never going to be a thing, please stop sharing that fake interview in which people claim I said otherwise"

"Legend of Korra" Korra is also terrible, that's why the audience for it got so bad that Nick just dumped the final season online without a care.

"He kissed her TWICE, TWICE, without her consent and never said sorry for this" Nope, it was ONE poorly timed kiss that he immediately felt sorry for. Katara is seen blushing and thinking on that kiss during The Invasion because she enjoyed that kiss.

"He thinks he deserves her love because he is the Avatar (the hero) and that's how it be" He thinks the girl that got offended when he said he didn't want to kiss her, that has flirted with constantly, and has consensually kissed twice already is at the very least a potential girlfriend. When he is made to question if that's really the case, he full on ASKS HER if she only thinks of him as a brother and he simply misinterpreted her signs, to which she openly says THAT WAS NOT THE CASE. He explicitly mentions "After we kissed, I thought that meant we were together." He never, ever, ever said "I'm the Avatar, therefore you have to like me." Just because AN ACTOR in a play about THE AVATAR called her "the Avatar's girl" instead of "Aang's girl" doesn't mean he thinks his role means more than her feelings - again, he literally went to talk with her to clear things out. This is not how an entitled person behaves.

"He replaced the love for his people with Katara" No, he did not. The Guru explicitly said "Your love for them lives on the form of new love." When he saw Gyatso's dead body, Katara saying she and Sokka were his new family was what made Aang calm down. Yes, Aang is in love with her, but that moment was much more about general, familial love than romantic love. Honoring the people you lost by valluing your connection to the ones that are still in your life is not placing a burden on them, or being obsessed with them, or thinking that being loved by them will fix your trauma.

"He needed to let go of her" He did. Twice. First in Ba Sing Se, which led to him being killed and KATARA bringing back to life, then again in "The Awakening", in which he just up and leaves to focus on his mission and Katara is heartbroken because SHE DOES NOT WANT TO BE LET GO OF!

"Aang could still love Katara, he just needed to stop to put her on a pestal!" He never put her on a pedestal. He knew she was flawed and would openly disagree and even argue with her at times. Cherishing someone is not the same as idealizing them.

"Book three was... bad, and so was the finale" No, it wasn't. It had it's issues and it is the weakest season, but it is still good. Most of the problems were caused by poor pacing due to them sticking to three seasons instead of four. Aang's feelings for Katara were not a problem to be fixed, because the "entitlement" you complain about doesn't exist.

"Aang is a self-insert of Bryke" Bryan and Mike have repeatedly said that they're like Aang AND ZUKO, in the sense that one is goofy and the other is grumpy. By that logic, Zuko is also a self-insert, therefore shipping him with Katara would also be "bad."

"They act like Zuko is a bad boy instead of a dork" Zuko is a dork with social anxiety, who spent two and half seasons SUPPORTING GENOCIDE. "Bad boy" doesn't even BEGIN to describe him.

"No normal 14-year-old girl would date a 12-year-old and if she did call the police on her ass!" Go touch grass, you're insane, two children having feelings for each other is not pedophilia.

"Avatar was only amazing because of writers like Aaron Ehasz" Ehasz himself disagrees with you, and a lot of the "good changes" you made were decided by/along with Bryke.

"A lot of writer wanted also Zutara to happen and not Kataang" Ah, I see you DID read that fake interview. The writers were all on board with Kataang, even though some of them did like Zutara AS WELL. They're not mutually exclusive, you know?

"If I remember right season 3 was so rushed and lacking because the movie-who-shall-not-be-named was in production" You're remembering made up bullshit just right. Fans keep repeating that, and even I once wrongfully believed that in the past, but it's not true. The movie was going to happen regardless of when the show ended, and Bryke genuinely only wanted three seasons instead of four. Bad idea? Yes, but nothing to do with Shyamalan.

"Aang would find other airbenders" If that's true, I'm glad it was scrapped, THE LAST AIRBENDER needs to be THE LAST AIRBENDER for the show's premise and name to make any sense. Korra was also heavily criticized for a later seasons plot point of random people just magically becoming airbenders because it cheapens the gravity of the genocide by going "Lol, fooled ya! They're still running around!"

"Broodmare to repopulate" Three children is not exactly repopulating a nation, you should have paid more attention in math class.

"I'm a big fan of the theoretical season four" You being a fan of a thing that doesn't exist is surely on brand for a zutarian.

"Also, people who make fun of their own fans because they ship a pairing themselves not like are the worst!" Scream the zutarian that is doing exactly that. If you can complain about ships and call people creeps for it, you can take people pointing out your ship is just a figment of your imagination. Either suck it up or change your behavior so you're no longer a hypocrite.

[pruneunfair]

Now seems to be a good time to reexamine this little rant

I encountered it when Navier was being hated or so and was still in my Navier fan phase

I don't mean this as hate towards the ranter, just that thinking about how the perception has changed since 2 years ago

The things Rashta is called out to be bad in this felt EXACTLY like Navier actually is

I'm not going to deny that Rashta did resort to full blown sexism against her own gender, home girl knew that women were easier to ruin than men and she took full advantage without even bothering to think how much their lives would be ruined because of her.

But is Navier also not misogynistic? Sure, she won't go after just any woman, but she has been way more unforgiving towards women who mildly inconvenience her compared to her husband literally lying to her and actively trying to destory her homeland. "But Navier is the most supportive of her ladies in waiting-" Yeah, because her ladies in waiting are EMPLOYED to be both her most personal servants and companions 😭. Their job is to always be by her side no matter what. Its the same way with how maids aren't really loyal puppy dogs in real life when part of their job is to do whatever their employer asks of them.

Yes, Navier has been groomed by other forces to have no identity outside of being an empress, being a noble woman did have its cons but maybe we could actually feel for Navier if we actually got to see more than one panel of her (that wasn't even that sad, mind you) not being allowed to be a child roaming outside, then maybe the audience could understand WHY she doesn't like the idea of Rashta taking her place. Only telling the audience why Navier should be an empress and not Rashta instead of showing us why Navier believes that is a big reason the fanbase knows she's a classist.

[stagefoureddiediaz]

Hi Kym! I apologize if you have answered an ask like this before, but I am curious for your opinion.

You've talked a lot about how intentional all the Buddie parallels are in terms of costuming for several seasons now, both with Buck and Eddie together, then with their respective girlfriends, and in comparison to Bathena. We are now even getting throwbacks to season 2 and Eddie's first episode with Buck's stonewash jeans! Tim is adamant in interviews that he never planned this bisexual awakening in advance (we know that Eddie was originally meant for Maddie ofc) and that he doesn't know where the characters are going yet, but even Oliver has said he intentionally leans into the Buddie of it all with his acting, or at least into Buck's then-presumed bisexuality.

My question is, with just how pointed and intentional the costume choices have always been, is Tim is lying? Or are the costume designers secret Buddie shippers and intentionally lean into this storyline too? How much of what we see in terms of costuming is the decision of the show runners/directors vs creative expression of the costume designers? Is there a point in the show for you where it became clear how intentional it was becoming with the costuming, where they may or may not have said, "we're going to commit to telling this story in subtext until we are allowed to tell it overtly"?

Thanks :)

Hey Cookie-Kat!!

How lovely to have you in my inbox, and what a great question!

putting my answer under the cut - because it got long!!!

The answer I give is going to have to be a bit vague I'm afraid because the reality is that as I don't work on the show and I'm not 100% sure on the set up of their various departments, I can't categorically state how they are going about things in 911 land! I can share my experience and knowledge of how things can be done and try to give you some sort of framework - but I can't definitively say that this is how they are doing things.

First up let's address the whole Tim lying thing.

Tim is all about subterfuge in interviews - its literally his job as a showrunner. I would take every thing he says in an interview with a giant grain of salt. the entire purpose of his interviews is to tease and hook people, without giving anything way becasue why would he spoil all the things he has planned that make people watch the show he is creating. If he came out in an interview at the start of the season and said

'yeah, we're going to do a cruise ship disaster and all these things are going to happen, and in episode 4 Buck is going to get kissed by a guy and figure out he's bi and Eddie is going to find out his girlfriend was a novice nun and its going to send him into a catholic guilt spiral, and maddie nad CHim are going to get married, but x, y and z are going to happen before they can get down the aisle'

Why would anyone tune in to watch the show? we'd already know what was going to happen so there wouldn't be any point - there would be no buzz and the viewing figures might be ok, but they wouldn't be remotely close to what they are. I know for a fact I probably wouldn't be tuning in - people like to be surprised, they like to speculate - we in fandom take it to a higher level, but even the general audience speculate - water cooler conversations about what you watched the previous evening and how you think it's going to play out are part of a show's appeal - part of how it keeps people watching - shared experiences are a powerful commodity, especially in network television and they cannot be shared if we all know what is going to happen.

I would also add that this season is the most explicit acknowledgement of buddie that we've had in interviews and that means something. The show - writers, actors etc have all been incredibly careful before no to ensure that they haven't crossed over into queerbaiting the audience - which is something I really appreciate them for. But this season, things have definitely changed. whether that is down to being on a new network, that actually has a marketing strategy and that actually seems to care about the show and the stories that they have wanted to tell, I don't know, but it is so refreshing and exciting to see.

Tim is a clever person - he knows exactly what he is doing and every single season, without fail we have him saying things in interviews that can be read in multiple ways - none of them have ever been lies - subterfuge is the name of the game - then if you reread them in the aftermath of the season, you can see what he said did in fact play out as he hinted at - he has the context that we didn't have at the time and that is why he can subvert and talk his way around things.

I genuinely don't think Tim planned to give Buck a bisexual awakening from the start - we know he never planned on the buddie of it all, but a good writer will go where the characters take them. As soon as you create something and put it into the hands of others (the actors, directors and crew) things can very quickly take on a whole new direction and a life of its own.

If you ask me, I genuinely don't think Buck could've had a bi awakening before this point - it wouldn't have made sense from a narrative perspective (and his death and rebirth actually make the perfect jumping off point to explore) until now because of the very nature of Buck.

There isn't a single show (by show I mean one that isn't a limited series which will by definition have a planned arc) on network television that knew where each and every character would end up at the end of the show or that characters journey (by this I mean when cast chose to leave a show). Yes they might have planned a few beats to hit along the way, but they wouldn't know the end point for the character. We have a perfect example on 911 - Michael - the show hadn't intended to end Michaels arc in the way it did - his journey as a queer man coming out later in life was an important part of the show - important for representation as much as anything - they had to adapt and change in light of what was going on with Rockmond and write out a character that they would've had other plans for.

The other thing I should mention is that When Tim says he hasn't decided or written the scripts for upcoming episodes, that doesn't mean he doesn't have a plan. He very much will have a plan. There would've been clear arcs for each character laid out at the start of the writing process for the season - they would want to get character a from one point to another by the end of the season. Its the how they get there that is the unknown - at this point we don't know the end points for any characters this season, but if we take season 5 Eddie as an example - at the start of the season he is post shooting and back at work, seemingly perfectly fine. By the end of the season he is genuinely in a good place having gone through his trauma arc. The arc they would've decided on for Eddie that season was to explore his trauma and how to get him from a 'seemingly' good place to a genuinely good place. From there they would've decided on various touchstones - so Ana being mistaken for Christophers mother and them being a family is his trigger to launch his arc. Chris being scared of loosing his father a major touch stone, pushing him into leaving the 118. His then feeling on the outside - left out and replaced by Lucy is his next one, followed by the fact all his army buddies are gone, another touchstone - coming in quick succession to build momentum and leading to his breakdown. Pushing him to actually get help - therapy is another touchstone - one that helps to get him to the end of the season in a vastly different place - healing but still working on things.

So you see - they generally plan an overall direction, but how they get there is the bit that is a bit fluid and can be determined to a certain extent by audience reaction (I don't mean that they would out and out rewrite the entire plan for the season for a character, but they might chose to lean into different aspects if the audience react in a certain way - we saw this with Lucy - planned for a bigger arc, but the audience reaction to her was pretty negative, so they changed direction with her character and cut her part down).

In terms of Bucks bi arc - they will have been waiting on how it was received before fully determining how to play it out for the rest of the season - I genuinely think we'll be seeing more of Lou as Tommy later in the season as a part of Bucks arc - The way Lou has spoken about it being initially a 4 episode arc, suggests to me that its always been intended to run it longer if reaction was good - which we know it was. My explectation remains the same - that Tommy will be around until either the end of episode 9, or the middle of episode 10, to get Buck to where he needs to be by the season end.

I am on the fence as to where exactly that is - Everything from set, costuming and the script is screaming at me that it's about Buck figuring out not only that he is bi, but that he is also in love with Eddie. That is his arc for the season. What I am unsure of is how they are going to leave things at the end of the season (and I think a part of that will have been determined by audience reaction), whether or not we'll leave him acknowledging his feelings to himself, to a third party (Tommy and or Maddie), or to Eddie himself. Of course part of it will be determined by Eddies arc and how far they plan on getting him in regards to dealing with his catholic guilt and what form and direction t hat is going to take, but I cannot see any reason to start exploring that aspect of his character if you weren't going to use it for a queer arc of some description.

In terms of costuming - which was the main point of your ask - sorry I get rambly in these replies some times - I always view it as the first 2-3 seasons at the very least will be about establishing a characters look and vibe within the wider show, and from then on you can start to play into themes and colour theory etc. Somethings you can establish earlier - especially if they are centric to a character more widely. Examples of this are Eddies army green tees and shirts - establishing him visually as ex military, or the black singlets that he wears when in an emotionally vulnerable place, or Buck wearing his white trainers as part of his search for self, or his white shirts as a signal of him being in danger. You can do this, because they aren't playing on anything in relation to other characters at this early point.

So the decision to take Buck out of jeans (stone wash jeans specifically - he's been wearing jeans they've just been black or dark navy) and have him in very obviously shorter trousers, creating a specific aesthetic for him - this smarter, fitted clean cut style that is different from his season 1 looks, has been about playing into his journey of searching for self - that is his big overarching arc - the one that spans multiple seasons.

The intent to do that, wasn't about Buddie (or bi Buck) when they started to use it as a visual marker for him. It was (and always has been) about Buck. about his search for meaning in his life and who he is, who he wants to be - about being his authentic self.

The reason I got so excited about seeing him in jeans once more, when the first stills dropped at the start of the season - was because I knew that it was a signal that this bigger arc was coming to fruition and moving into its next phase. The costume team have been sitting waiting for when the time was right to do this - its being done with such intention.

Of course I hoped that it would be buddie related - things were pointing in that direction from other costuming choices. And to me at least, I still think its very much buddie related - because to do this now - for this bi awakening arc - its too loud and too big for 'just' a bi awakening arc - its about something bigger for Buck - something long term (and I'm not saying Buck being bi is't long term, because obviously it very much is - bi rep is so important!) him figuring out he is bi is a smaller part of a bigger whole for his character. The implication of the jeans returning is that this part of himself he has unlocked plays into a bigger story. Bucks search for self has always been about finding love - about being wanted and seen and accepted for who he is. As a costume designer, I wouldn't personally be putting him into jeans at this point unless it was related to his endgame - being bi isn't enough on its own for them to decide to visually show that he has fully found what he has been looking for on his search throughout the seasons (the white trainers still being in used also play into this) because he is still looking for that lasting happiness - he's just taken a massive step forward to figuring out what it is and where it lies.

With regards to colour theory and the paralleling of Buddie with other ships such as Bathena or Madney. Colour theory alone it wouldn't be enough to convince me, it is in combination with other factors such as the paralleling of Bathena and Madney that it comes into play. The thing is, creating those parallels and colour theory combinations doesn't have to lead to something. I'm going to do a terrible job of trying to explain this, but I'll give it a go.

Various people, who work on the show in some capacity have all commented over the years that they weren't expecting the level of chemistry that Oliver and Ryan have. We also know that they have played into the buddie of it all with some of the scene choices they've made - sort of an acknowledgement of what we're seeing - the elf scene in s2 is a prime example - a nod to fandom and the fact that they are being shipped together - and an acknowledgement of the chemistry - without it necessarily needing to mean more (the same goes for things like the text comments on the botfly influencer livestream call etc).

Back then wardrobe are still very much in character establishment mode - creating and defining the looks of the characters, and playing into colour theory on an individual level, not necessarily on a partnership level (S2 Bathena would've been treated in this way as they were already intended to be an end game couple so you can play into colour theory much earlier), that comes later. I wouldn't have been able to write costume metas in season 2-3 in the way I do now, because the parallels didn't exist and the ground work hadn't been laid.

Once you get past that intial establishing phase, hat is when you can start to play into the colour theory much more in relation to specific characters and pairings. One of the clearest examples of this is Eddies black shirt green trousers combo that he wears at the loft when having serious conversations with Buck. He first wears it in season 3 at the end of the lawsuit/fightclub arc (3x09), and then we dont see it again until season 5 (5x04) at yet another scene in Bucks loft.

The meaning of the colours in that scene are important sure, it is playing into colour theory, but what is happening visually is that we're subconciously connecting dots and remembering that Eddie has worn this outfit before to talk to Buck - that means it must be a serious conversation, one very much focused on something Buck has done (or hasn't done depending on which way you look at things). Eddie has been in Bucks loft on multiple occasions between those two scenes, and Buck and Eddie have had multiple serious conversations in the intervening episodes as well. so why that scene if its not meant to make us connect dots?

Now on a fundamental level, those two scenes can be read as establishing the close friendship Buck and Eddie share - that they are following through on their s2 promise to have each others backs. its entirely correct to assume that - it is after all what those scenes are establishing. But what it is also doing is laying the ground work for if they want to take Buddie further. we know that the conversations about Buddie have been happening in the writers room and on set for a good long while, and even if you don't yet know if you're going to go in that direction, you would be foolish not to lay the ground work in a subtle way if you can, so that the option is there if you did decide to take that direction.

A show will use what ever tools are at its disposal to lay various foundations that it can then pick and choose to build on as it wants or needs to. It is why we see the pictures in Eddies house moving around, why things on the fridge change (fridge theory is not as out there as some people would have you believe - there is a whole thing coming up on Eddies fridge in reaction to guts and the digestive system - which will very much be playing into his catholic guilt arc!) in Christophers room move around and change - its not just about him being a growing (soon to be teenager) boy, its also about laying foundations for story arcs they might choose to develop down the line and the Buddie groundwork is no different.

Its not about the wardrobe team being shippers of Buddie - its much more about them knowing where a season is headed (in brad strokes, even if they don't have specifics) being really good at their job and now being able to bear the fruits of their labour from earlier seasons - they had been doing the same with buck and Taylor - now they're doing it with Buck and Tommy (and Eddie). It would've been super easy to spin the costuming for Taylor into more positive colours - especially on Buck - in season 5, but they had the bigger picture and knew she wasn't going to remotely be endgame, so they were able to play into that throughout the season. Establishing Tommy as a version of Eddie is building on the Eddie groundwork they laid and using it to make it very clear that we are supposed to see the similarities between them - its steering us as viewers towards thinking 'oh Buck has a type - He's dating someone like his best friend - he should just date his best friend' is all about subtly nudging the audience in the right direction - towards Buddie - its just most people won't pick up on it in a conscious way.

I'm not sure if this makes any sense or if it even answered your ask, but essentially the show is using everything at its disposal to tell the story its telling and they have been laying groundwork that can take things in various directions - they are just choosing to push the buddie agenda to an increasing degree (and I have said groundwork far too many times in this post!!)

Thaks for the great ask 💜💜💜

[eightofpents]

A collection of rambling thoughts about London under the cut. spoilers, obv.

The idea that the butterfly's champions Never remember is straight up Canonically not true right? First thing the special says and it's straight bullshit.

The Gorilla grabs Bug Noire's hand to stop her from destroying the door. Can we talk about how stupid dangerous that was? If she doesn't react in time you Die. Bro.

Kagami definitely disapproves of the lying plan, but the "go away ladybug" line, doesn't strike me as angry at her (which is a read i've seen). It feels like Kagami giving her an out before she says something stupid and outs herself, to me.

"And you will need it." The fuck was that Tikki? Oh. Oh you little shit.

"There's no such thing as ghosts." Excuse me you have a fairy literally inside you right now but ghosts definitely DO NOT exist, sure.

Both of Lila's akumatizations being boy shaped could easily be a laudable commitment to disguise. Certainly she's known to be good at it. But. Do you think she has Gender? (also, it was ridiculous (utterly ridiculous) when they tried to play off Kagami's gender as a big reveal. but this is worse. it'd be one thing to they/them akuma!Lila just because the audience knows. but 'Bug says he once and Bunnyx corrects her. they Always assume gender! sometimes incorrectly! (see Kagami) and they commit to it. (is this an english only problem??))

We all love Nathalie for waking up from dead and saying "Time to kill Gabriel again." But she knows she's only awake because he made the wish. She goes down there, crossbow in hand, expecting to find Gabriel And Emilie. (i don't think she coulda killed him in front of her.)

"The light is already on. They were always here." There is only one timeline forever. But then what the hell is Bunnyx's job. Timetagger, yes. A villain gets timeywimey powers, gotta stop em, a reasonable use of time police. "Marinette you made a wrong decision for the timeline (what? how?) and now you gotta stop Chat from blowing up." Stupid. The elder buns knew this was coming. But they still fade. This show has a fixed timeline. But parts of it explicitly involve risking the timeline itself and pretending there's a world where they might lose? Astruc get your shit together.

Using papillon to refer to the new unnamed butterfly holder makes sense. Translating that as Hawk Moth does not.

Marinette: Should I lie to Adrien about his dad? Everyone else: Definitely not. But you're Ladybug and his girlfriend so we trust your decision. (what?) Marinette: Got it. Time to lie.

Calling the lucky charm to get untangled is fucking great. (i'm never gonna be over this actually.)

Completely in love with the London fight. A portal fight is always sick. And the fact that it's Bunnyx in control of the portals, not Chronobug? the team work! And I'm, like, distractingly into the song in the back half. The bug's out here sayin' all this cool shit and I can't hear her cause my brain is Locked In on the music. (and i am not known to notice a soundtrack)

Lila has never interested me. I Love Chloé, and Gabriel and Nathalie are the loves of my life, but Lila's villainy just doesn't do anything for me. (Maybe if she were allowed to be a person, I guess.) But. If Lila's willing to get Fucky with it, poke around with the rules of the miraculous. I think I can get behind her. (a villain with more cunning than gabriel will be fun. the butterfly is immensely powerful and he was too dumb to use it well <3)

[velvetvexations]

Possibly they mean the current row over transphobes seeing people as their assigned sex? Some people are desperately insecure and seeing any even hypothetical relation to what they're transitioning away from to be so terrifyingly abhorrent that they entirely misunderstand what's being said. Case in point:

Not to psychoanalyze, but, like, wow, right? This is either maliciously lying or an incredibly sad coping mechanism. People are literally just saying that transphobes don't see people as the gender they identify as, but somehow this has led to the completely off the wall takeaway "trans women are men."

Like, no one is saying that. Literally no one is saying that, except for TERFs who I and every transmasc in this discourse shut down when they try to insert themselves into the conversation with their obviously wrong and vile bullshit.

And it's telling transradfems never actually...engage with what's being said at all. Like they never take a post and argue with it, they exclusively post about takes that don't exist. They're shadow boxing.

It breaks my brain a little. Like, how? How do you do this? How do you get this twisted a perception? Every single day anti-transandrophobia activists are repeating endlessly that they don't think transfems oppress them or anything remotely like that. Beyond intentionally trying to deceive their audience, it feels like transradfems are driven by an intense fear of anyone - even actual transphobes - seeing them as as the gender they were assigned that they not only deny that, but also take any acknowledgement of how transphobes think as misgendering them as well.

Which is just sad. It sucks that a transphobic society has made them this unbelievably skittish as to have a meltdown over the very thought that anyone could view them incorrectly. A person's gender validity is not dependent on what others think of them and it's not misgendering each other to understand that some people we are all aligned against have incorrect beliefs.

The "so you're saying we OPPRESS YOU?" reaction to "maybe don't slur other trans people?" may also arise out of this. It's plausible transradfems can't acknowledge trans women and trans men are on the same plane, with equal capacity (no more, no less) to harm each other, because they feel like they're somehow not getting the full Fymyle experience of being maximumly oppressed by all definitions of man at all times. Their problem with cis radical feminism is purely that they aren't allowed into the club, so naturally they can only relate trans men talking about their issues or expressing a belief that trans women are capable of causing them harm with MRAs. Cis men oppress all trans people, but to copy-and-paste the experience of being a cis woman as closely as possible, you can't be equal with any men whatsoever, even just trans men.

TERFs are well-understood to define womanhood around suffering and asserting themselves the biggest sufferers of all, and that's the definition transradfems have inherited.

I'm sorry, anon. You're a man and I'm so, so happy for that, your masculinity makes the world a better place. Please always be who you are. <3

my proposal is that we all start casually referring to all trans people as transmisogyny affected

"TMAs have it so rough" "yeah, trans women, men, and non-binary people of all sexual characteristics and assigned genders do have it rough, you're right"

trans radical feminism's one and only distinction form radical feminism is that they want to make a small edit to how it determines if someone is a man or a woman

I AM awesome!

Trans radical feminism and being a tankie are practically inseparable so it's a much more politically homogenous group taking a swing at a number of people likely to severely disagree on several things, like people who support Israel as a concept if not it's current actions vs. those who see the concept as the problem regardless of who's in charge.

Good instincts.

He seems like a very miserable guy.

Ideally we should make an effort to do work on behalf of others, but yes, it's not surprising and completely understandable that people tend to work on their needs first.

Yeah. It's based in radfem ideas of men being the ultimate evil and literally incapable of restraining themselves from harming women.

[amethystina]

Hi ˚˖𓍢ִ໋🦢˚

I hope you are doing well and feeling better ૮ ˶ᵔ ᵕ ᵔ˶ ა

I would like to ask the following questions from the Fan Fic Writer Asks that you recently relogged:

7. How many ideas for fics do you have right now?

8. What project(s) are you currently working on?

19. Give us a small teaser from one of your WIPs.

22. Do you know how your fic will end before you start writing?

25. Have you ever upset yourself with your own writing?

I apologize for being greedy 😅

May you have a happy new year ‧₊˚ ☁️⋅♡𓂃 ࣪ ִֶָ☾.

Hi there! I'm exhausted and a little wonky, admittedly, but I'm hanging in there 😊

7. How many ideas for fics do you have right now?

Please don't ask me that 🤣 I have so many. Like, WIPs are one thing, but ideas? I literally can't count them because they keep slithering around at the back of my mind, steadily growing or, sometimes, fading in favour of other ideas.

But, if I'm to give a rough estimate, I'd say I have around 70 ideas percolating away right now. Not at the same time or with the same intensity, but there are a lot of them. Though, to be fair, very few of them will ever see the light of day because I can usually tell when an idea is worth writing or not and therefore try not to entertain them all. But that doesn't automatically mean that they leave me alone, you know? So I have to carry them around for however long it takes before they fade.

Which, I shit you not, can be years.

My ideas are as stubborn as I am, in other words.

8. What project(s) are you currently working on?

While I have a lot of WIPs, I would say that I'm currently working on three projects with a bit more vigour. And those are:

Who Holds the Devil - Does this even need an introduction at this point? The long-as-fuck Devil Judge fanfic that won't leave me — or anyone else — alone. I love it. But god knows when it'll be finished. I'm hoping to be able to post a new chapter in a not-too-distant future.

A New Dawn (Begins With Us) - A Black Knight fic I'm hoping to finish during 2025 because there are only four chapters left and that's, like, 40k. I can bang that out in two weeks if I am at the top of my game. Unfortunately, I'm not at the top of my game, but still. It's doable and I'm going to do it.

Will You Tell (If They Ask About Me) - A Losers oneshot that I dug up from the WIP graveyard because I really like it and I miss Cougar and Jensen. Should hopefully not be too difficult to finish.

19. Give us a small teaser from one of your WIPs.

Here's a snippet from the aforementioned Losers fic Will You Tell (If They Ask About Me). I don't know if there's an actual audience for it anymore, but I'm just really excited about it so yeah. That's what you're getting 😆

___

Jake exhaled and closed his eyes. He felt pleasantly lethargic, tired, and perhaps a little sore, but blissfully happy all the same. Lying there in Carlos's bed, listening to him breathe, was a much better end to his night than Jake had dared hope for. He was definitely going to appreciate it to the fullest.

"Let me know when you're ready to go again," Jake mumbled. "It might cost me the last couple of brain cells I have left, but I want a repeat performance."

The laugh that bubbled out of Carlos was both fond and a little startled, as if he hadn't expected to laugh but was too endeared not to. His hand wandered from Jake's shoulder, burying in his hair instead, and Jake eagerly raised his head when Carlos twisted to give him a deep, enthusiastic kiss.

"You are—"

"Insatiable?" Jake suggested, grinning against Carlos's lips.

Carlos smiled, too, his other hand rising to run reverently along Jake's jaw. Without his permission, Jake felt his heart skip a beat.

"Wonderful." It looked like Carlos meant it. "Absolutely wonderful."

22. Do you know how your fic will end before you start writing?

Nine times out of ten, yes. I don't always know the journey there or the exact details of the ending, but I always know what point I want to reach before I start. That said, I'm not against certain things changing as I go along and, more than once, I've tweaked the events of the ending because I ended up exploring something in the middle that I then had to tie into the ending.

So while I know the general idea of what I want, I keep it loose enough that I can change it as I go along. I would feel too hindered if I didn't. The one time I did try to plan it in detail to the very end was my first fanfic The Thunder Moon Chronicles because that's what I was told that I should do. But I found that around 60% of the last instalment had to be altered compared to my original plan, simply because the story had evolved in a way I couldn't predict when I first structured it.

That's not to say that I ever lost track or control of it — I am very much in control the entire time I write — but rather that new and better ideas kept popping up as I was writing it and I wasn't stupid enough to discard them just because they weren't in my original plan. Sometimes, the story just has to be allowed to evolve, otherwise it might feel stilted or stagnate (or at least that's the case for me).

25. Have you ever upset yourself with your own writing?

Oh, for sure. I've almost written myself straight into a panic attack a couple of times because I get so into it. I have a tendency to try and picture the emotions myself as I write them in order to better convey them and that can get a bit risky — especially with panic attacks. I've had them since I was fifteen so they're easy for me to trip into on accident.

I have also cried once or twice when I write because I, again, sink into the emotions a little too much. But it is, in all honesty, surprisingly rare considering how emotional some of my fics are. But that could be because I don't cry easily.

The most memorable occurrence by far, however, is Until Death Do Us Unite, especially the yet-unwritten bonus chapter. Because Jong Woo is so unstable, I become a little unstable when I write him or ponder his emotions too much. If I try to imagine how detached and unmoored he must feel when he's having his episodes, I end up feeling very unmoored myself. So I'm currently not allowed to think too much about it because it's so distressing 🤣

But if we mean upset as in "angry at my writing" or "upset it doesn't go my way" or even "I'm so upset with these characters" then no, not really. I can get annoyed if I have to do rewrites and certainly be displeased about the actions of some characters, but the writing process itself doesn't upset me.

Thank you so much for the ask! And it's okay to be greedy, don't worry 😉

Happy New Year to you too! 💜

Fanfic Writer Asks

[dark-night-star-light]

Things in Spirit Animals that piss me off:

Abeke and her father making up. He's abusive to her her entire life and then he suddenly makes up with her because she's a hero now? Wow, well, wonder where that change of heart came from. I do indeed wonder. It drives the idea that you should forgive family for everything because they are family. Where did my found family themes go? What about Rollan and Tarik?

Lord MacDonnell not getting what was coming for him. The guy sucks. He's horrible, I don't care if he's on the good guys' side. In fact, it makes the story more complex that he's on the good guys' side. I quite like that, actually. Lord MacDonnell was a good addition to add to the nuance of the Greencloaks not being the source of supreme good all the time. Proves how low the Greencloaks are willing to stoop to get allies to defeat the Conquerors, shows how desperate they are. Rollan literally seethes with rage at him during their last encounter in Hunted. Then suddenly he's fine with him in later books because he's on the Greencloaks' side? Rollan joining the Greencloaks eventually makes sense. Rollan immediately forgiving all the Greencloaks' allies for everything ever because of joining the Greencloaks does not. Look, I understand that in fiction, people can be bad people, have the audience understand they are bad people, and still not get what they deserve. I get it. (That's actually what happens with the Lord of Trunswick. He actually gets a semi-happy ending. But it's made explicitly clear in every possible way that he absolutely sucks and did not deserve that ending whatsoever.) But that doesn't change the fact that the whole narrative about MacDonnell shifts in the later books in order to make him out to be some sort of hero. And that harpist never gets justice.

I like that Kirat got character development. Look, I really do. But doing it by telling the kid that he's related to a hero was not the way to go. Please. What was that. Again, it drives home very family-defines-who-you-are vibes which I am not a fan of.

The two legendary bond tokens being lost to sea. Please, what the hell was that. And everyone just accepts it? Why. It couldn't have been difficult to write in a single paragraph, nay, a single sentence in the last chapter expositing that the Greencloaks searched the sea and found them eventually. Please, what is this.

Conor's entire personality changing in The Dragon's Eye. That was not character development. That was character assassination. I honestly would've been down for Conor ending up the way he is in The Dragon's Eye, but it needs to happen over the course of several books, not off-page between the last and second-to-last book.

Rollan and Meilin's jealousy and miscommunication arc in Stormspeaker. Despised it. It was vile, and ruined everything I love about them. Thankfully, we go back to normal Reilin in The Dragon's Eye. So at least we didn't finish their relationship on such a horrendous note.

Shane and Devin/Worthy never interacting on page, as far as I am aware. Correct me if I'm wrong. Then, in The Wildcat's Claw, we're given a bunch of lengthy exposition from Worthy talking about how great a leader Shane was and how he taught Worthy to fight and all those other stories. They always felt so empty to me because Shane and Worthy's bond has next to no canon basis whatsoever.

Connecting to the last point, Shane not appearing in Hunted. Perfect opportunity for him to bond with Devin, manipulate him a little, be a disingenuous lying little shit, appear sympathetic toward Abeke while trying to get her back (and failing), then disappear right when times get tough and leave Devin and Karmo stranded in the dungeon. This would give Worthy mixed feelings about Shane, complex-ifying their relationship. Then, before the Redcloaks-are-former-Conquerors reveal, we could see Shane and Worthy fighting side by side. Abeke and Rollan could note their mask designs, which would help identify then as Shane and Worthy later.

The Tergesh not being able to summon spirit animals. Please, what is that nonsense. I hate it. Also, if they can't summon spirit animals because of their existing connection to rhinos, the logic follows that Conor shouldn't be able to summon Briggan because of his existing connection to his sheepdogs. (Although it is interesting to think about an AU where Stetriol gets its hands on this knowledge and tries to use it to their advantage. They start animal shelter programs and such to try to keep people from summoning spirit animals and contracting the bonding sickness.)

How the heck did Meilin's father get his hands on the Bile? How was he convinced to give it to his only daughter? I adore the Meilin-Bile arc, okay, but its origins are kind of a plot hole.

The Wyrm as a villain. You're telling me after all the complexity and nuance we get in the first arc, the second arc's villain is a stereotypical giant blob of fleshy goo that, get this, literally wants to eat the world? Who came up with this? You could argue that the real villain is Zerif, but even then, he's incredibly flat as an antagonist. You could also argue that this is meant to redeem Kovo and Shane, but that also feels weird, as there are almost certainly better ways to do that.

Shane dying right as he was getting redeemed. I'm going to be so honest, I think Shane had to kick the bucket. I love him, but he had to die. But not before he and Abeke could have a proper conversation and get to a better place and have some bonding moments that are full of trust and friendship! Please, what the heck is this?

The other Great Beast summoners getting little to no fleshing out or understanding. By far, the most interesting one is Anuqi. She hates the Greencloaks, and for a valid reason, too. This is literally so interesting. Please, they could've done so much with her during the second arc. Raisha is a close second. Not a fan of the fact that her backstory is literally just "I was a bored rich girl" which apparently voids her of any human compassion, but whatever.

Shane and Zerif's relationship never reaches a good climax. (Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight! Fight! Fi-)

What do you mean Abeke didn't kill Zerif? What do you mean? After vowing to, and failing, not once, but twice, Zerif sacrifices himself? Where's the thematic significance in that?

Conor's Wyrm arc. He's next to useless the entire four books, he doesn't do anything of actual value to the quest, and he's treated like a burden the entire time. Honestly, if you hadn't read the first series, you wouldn't even realize he's a main character aside from the fact that he gets a few chapters. He gets very few moments to truly shine in the series. Instead, it should've been Takoda who was infected. It would also strengthen his relationship to Xanthe, because she'd first insist they leave him behind, then she'd grow attached to him and decide to bring him. It gives Xanthe a character conflict between wanting to leave Takoda behind because she's been taught all her life that the Wyrm is the supreme evil and not wanting to leave Takoda because she likes him. It also does the same with Kovo, who has spent his entire existence fighting the Wyrm, only for him to be bonded to someone who's infected. Conor would have more opportunities to act like a real main character. And Takoda has chapters from his perspective, too, so it's not like we couldn't have had some perspective on what it's like to be infected. But Conor is still a primary main character, and he does nothing except hike with the group and cough for the majority of that arc.

Zerif not being at all fleshed out and just being a mustache-twirling, evil-laughing cartoon villain that just wants power.

The bond tokens. Not the concept itself, but the execution. So many of them were just what they could already do, except stronger, and Meilin's didn't even work? Please, what is this.