#'i hear youre a hell of an artist byers. you down with making some character sketches for the next campaign?'

[pettyprocrastination]

jonathan and argyle had a stronger emotional bond and chemistry than steve and eddie ever did in canon. In this essay I will-

[rax-writes]

Title: Torn and Frayed Fandom: Stranger Things Characters: Jonathan Byers x Reader Word Count: 1,845 Warnings: None Notes: Request from anon for “Something for Jonathan from Stranger Things? Reader is an artist and Jonathan takes his pictures. Reader has a huge thing for Jonathan. They are always drawing him and sometimes they don’t even notice they are. One day Jonathan notices and reader tried to cover up the drawing but he sees it. And ahh fluff and maybe they meet up again like at his place because he forgot his camera”

There are certain people in this world who seem to have been made just so that they could come into your life. They are the ones who share your interests and passions; the ones who never fail to make you feel comfortable and loved. You had only ever known one such person – a young man by the name of Jonathan Byers. And from the very first day you met him, you were invariably thankful for him.

You hadn’t intended to fall in love with him. In fact, you didn’t even want to. Jonathan was your best friend, and you wanted it to remain that way – nothing more, nothing less. However, in hindsight, falling in love with him was the easiest, yet most monumental, thing that you had ever done.

Jonathan understood your love for drawing, as it mirrored his love of photography. He never thought it was stupid that you would occasionally come to school with a large cup of coffee in hand, and dark circles beneath bloodshot eyes, simply because an idea had struck you in the middle of the night, and you just had to draw it. He only gave you a pitying smile, and half-heartedly chided you for not getting a decent amount of sleep. And he never stared at you like you were crazy for abruptly telling him to stop the car, because you saw a beautiful scene that compelled you to draw. He always did as you bade him, often taking a few photos of it himself.

It only made sense that your sketches began to drift away from strangers and scenery – to images of Jonathan.

He became the only thing that you had any interest in drawing. And, since you were vehemently against allowing yourself to fall for him, regardless of how inevitable it was – you simply stopped drawing altogether.

Not allowing Jonathan to take up all the space in your sketchbook was not enough to quell your feelings for him. So, you slowly began to distance yourself from him, spending less and less time with him, until it became where the only time you saw him was during class. You knew that it bothered him, and that it wasn’t fair to him, but you weren’t about to ruin the best friendship you’d ever had on some stupid crush that you were certain would disappear.

But days turned into weeks, and weeks turned into months, and your love for Jonathan remained. If anything, it only became stronger, spurred on by your desperation to be with him. You knew that you were only making you both miserable – you could see it on his face every time you turned down an invitation to spend time with him, and you could feel it in your heart each time that heartbroken look crossed his features.

You were up late one night, lying in bed, staring at the ceiling as you lamented on all these factors. Would it be best to just resume your friendship, and keep your feelings hidden? Or would that ultimately become too much for you to bear, resulting in you ruining your friendship? What if you were to focus all your romantic attention on someone else? Would that help your feelings for Jonathan go away?

You nearly jumped out of your skin when you heard a faint tapping against your bedroom window. You were on the first floor, so it wasn’t exactly a feat for someone to be outside room, but it was nearly midnight – why would someone be there?

Brandishing the only weapon you had – a small pocket knife – you flung open the curtains, only to be met with the hesitant face of Jonathan Byers.

“What the hell are you doing?” you hissed, but nevertheless, unlocked and opened the window for him.

Jonathan wordlessly climbed into your room, before taking a seat at your desk, which sat against the wall opposite from your bed. The way he moved about the room with ease showed how many times this had occurred – him sneaking into your room via the window, in the dead of night, and sitting with you – but it had been months since this had last happened. And something about the way his shoulders hung, and the pained expression on his face, told you that that was precisely the reasoning behind his visit.

“Why have you been avoiding me?”

The words hit you like a truck as you took a seat on your bed, facing him. Jonathan had never been one for bluntness; he tended to beat around the bush for a bit before arriving at his point. You could tell from his direct question that he had been preparing himself to ask it for a while.

“I haven’t been avoiding you,” you lied – then realized it was for naught, because he always knew when you were lying. He said that you tucked your hair behind your ear before every lie – and he was absolutely right.

“Bullshit,” Jonathan retorted, and the mixture of hurt and anger was evident in his voice. “You’re not even drawing anymore, and you’ve been avoiding me for nearly three months now. A thousand times, I’ve thought about anything I could have possibly done to upset you this bad, but I can’t come up with anything. You’re treating me like I’ve done something terrible to you, but you won’t even tell me what it is I’ve done.”

“That’s because you haven’t done anything,” you said softly, unable to meet his gaze. Instead, you fiddled with the frayed end of the blanket on your bed. He said nothing, clearly waiting for you to elaborate – but no more words would come to you. You couldn’t tell him that you didn’t want to be friends with him anymore, because that would be a blatant lie – nor could you tell him the truth.

“Then just tell me what’s wrong with you, Y/N!” Jonathan said, his tone rising in pitch with clear exasperation. As he often did when aggravated, one hand flailed out, managing to knock a few things off of your cluttered desk. He exhaled slowly, calming himself, then bent to pick everything up.

You felt your heart stop when you realized that one of the items he had knocked over was your sketchbook, and it fell open to one of the pages that contained numerous sketches of him.

“Jonathan, wait –” you began, but he had already picked up the book, and he froze when he saw what was clearly various drawings of himself on the page before him. Your breath caught in your throat, and you found yourself entirely unable to move.

As Jonathan began to flip through the pages of your sketchbook, revealing page after page of him – everything from his face, his eyes, his lips, his hands, to his damn shoes – you remained motionless, frozen by fear. He only stopped when he reached the blank pages, and he continued to stare at those blank pages for what felt like an eternity before he looked up at you.

“Why are there so many drawings of me in here? You used to never draw me – you said that you hated drawing people that you know.”

“I… I was, uh… practicing portraits. My art teacher told me that I needed to practice portraits,” you managed to stammer out, and you immediately realized that it was the worst lie you had ever told. Jonathan realized this too, and he didn’t look the least bit convinced.

“Why have you been drawing me, Y/N?” he repeated, his tone soft and tentative. You attempted to come up with another, more convincing lie, but not a single thing came to mind.

“Because I’m fucking in love with you, alright? You happy?” you blurted out, the bitterness of your defeat making your voice harsher than you intended. “That’s why I was drawing you, and that’s why I started avoiding you. I thought that if I steered clear of you, I’d stop loving you, but I haven’t.”

“You… you’re in love with me?”

“Yes, now you can leave and never speak to me again, because I know that you don’t feel the same way. So, go on – leave,” you spat, crossing your arms to hide your heartbreak with anger.

Jonathan only sat there, staring at you for a few moments before slowly rising from his seat, and coming to sit next to you on the bed. You couldn’t bring yourself to look into his eyes, because you knew what was coming next: a forced lecture about how he’s sorry that he doesn’t feel that way about you, but you’re a great person, and he’s just not the one for you. And this would undoubtedly be followed by a series of horribly awkward encounters throughout the remainder of your friendship, as both of you tried, and failed, to ignore the fact that you were hopelessly in love with him.

Instead, however, Jonathan cupped your face in his hands, before pulling you into a kiss.

Yet again, paralyzed with shock, you froze – but that didn’t last long. You were quick to recover, your hands falling upon his upper arms, and pulling him close to you. The kiss began slow and hesitant, as neither of you were certain that this was what the other had wanted. Although, it didn’t take long for the both of you to deepen the kiss. His hands lightly traveled from your face, down your back, to rest on your waist, as your arms wound around his neck.

After a brief eternity, you broke the kiss in an attempt to get air – and you smiled with Jonathan’s lips momentarily chased yours, indicating that he was just as reluctant to end the kiss as you were. He settled for resting his forehead against yours, and both of you relaxed with your eyes closed, breathed heavily as you calmed from the high of the kiss.

“So… I take it that means you might sort of like me back?” you inquired, your tone lighthearted despite the fact that you wanted a serious answer. Jonathan’s response to your confession of love insinuated that your feelings were requited – but you needed to actually hear him say it.

Jonathan let out a light, breathy laugh, before nodding.

“I’m in love with you, too, Y/N,” he affirmed. “I have been since… well, I think since the day I met you. But I never thought for a second that it was even possible for you to feel the same way, so I never did anything about it.”

“Well, for someone so smart, you were pretty damn wrong about that,” you teased, earning a laugh from him.

“I guess you’re right,” Jonathan admitted, smiling at you, which you reciprocated.

The two of you sat like that for a few blissful minutes, simply smiling at one another, before Jonathan cleared his throat and nervously ran a hand through his hair.

“So, uh… can I kiss you again?” Jonathan inquired, his voice timid, as if there were some nonexistent chance that you’d say no. His bashful demeanor brought a bright smile to your lips.

“Absolutely.”

@v-writings @emmcfrxst @skywalkingdixon

[generallyspecificblog]

  I watched episodes 1 & 2 of the new season of Stranger Things on Netflix this weekend, its been a long time coming. I’ve been waiting patiently for this season since the last one ended. The show grew on me in a big way, i did not like it initially. Something about it is mysterious and innocent and this season looks to have more of a suspenseful and scary vibe. I’ve only watched two episodes thus far so this is an incomplete project but I felt I needed to write about it because i haven’t blogged a long one in a few days. What follows are my hot takes, conspiracy theories, and honorable mentions of “Stranger Things” Season 2.

Ah, the ’80’s, things were slower back then i’m sure, i wouldn’t know though because i was -10 in 1980. The fact that in one of the opening scenes the boys are scrambling for quarters to go play arcade games just tells me that those were the good days. Reminds me of the movie/documentary, “The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters”, if you haven’t seen that i suggest that you stop reading this blog and go watch that documentary, you will not be let down, you will also have your masculinity tested by a man named Billy Mitchell. Also that is probably the only time i’ll suggest that you stop reading the blog so you know its worth it. Anyways, quarters are king and Mike robs Nancy of her piggy bank which i think is just great, but also i feel like Nancy is a bit too old for a piggy bank.

So the boys (Will, Mike, Lucas, and Dustin) rally at the local arcade room, Those for sure were only around for laundering money i imagine, and get to playing. At some point Will hears something and wanders off and somehow he is pulled into the upside-down place, his home pretty much the whole 1st season, and sees a dark sky with red lightning and a shadow demon thing with tornadoes for arms and then snaps out of it. First off i would like to say that i do not completely understand what the show writers are going for with the existence of the “Upside-down” place. I guess the easiest way to explain it is an alternate dimension that’s evil and terrible, but i just don’t know how it all works. I will admit that i think that if i were to somehow be instantly teleported to a place like that, i would for sure only be able to cry and close my eyes until i inevitably died because that place, and that monster thing seem completely terrifying. With all of that being said i think that calling it “The Upside-Down Place” is a rookie move and who ever came up with it needs to go to prison. It’s like calling it “Creepy Avenue” or “Elm Street”, how about a better name for the place that your main characters fear and where pure evil resides. As a matter of fact i will no longer refer to it as the “Upside-down” place and from here on out it will be called the “Thunderdome” or “Satans Basement” or “Oklahoma” ANYTHING but “Upside-down” place.  So, Will snaps out of it somehow and his excuse to his friend for being outside is that he needed some air, I found that funny because this show is set in the 80’s and no chance kids were as messed up and snowflakey as they are now. “Needing some air” in the 80’s was just something you said when you wanted your 3rd cigarette from your 2nd pack of the day, i assume. Be more dramatic Will.

The cameos in these first two episodes were very interesting and i didn’t hate them, i’d actually be excited if they all stayed on as regulars. First we have Brett Gelman playing Murray Bauman, aparrently some kind of private investigator with suspicion of Russian assistance in the events that transpired last season. Gelman is killing it lately with the cameos and honestly is just a really funny guy, i will never forget him in The Other Guys as the Arnold Palmer obsessed wanna-be swinger who begs Will Ferrels character to bang his wife.

Next and my favorite so far is the incomparable Mikey Walsh, the lovable Samwise Gamgee, Rudy HIMSELF, Sean Astin playing Bob “The Brain” Newby. Sean Astin is top 10 in my favorite actors, all around good dude, and just as lovable as they get. His character in Stranger Things is Joyce Byers’ new love interest it seems, and he does a fantastic job. The dynamic between him and Joyce is weird but i am fully invested after 2 episodes. Sean Astin nerding out about video cameras and radio shack is grade-a television folks.

Other than that there is a new pair of sibling characters in the show, Billy and Maxine AKA MadMax, that i just don’t know about yet. Billy is an absolute psychopath that resembles a younger Zac Efron who is fond of younger Zac Efrons who drives like a bat outta hell. This Billy dude is like a cross between Kurt Cobain on a bender and Jack Nicholson from The Shining. Pure crazy, but an entertaining character. His sister, i’m assuming, Maxine (or Max as she so rudely corrected the zany teacher at the school) is a very boyish little girl who is apparently good at arcade games and skateboarding, possessing some of the same crazy traits as her aforementioned brother. Some subtle yet understandable misogyny is featured in a scene where the boys are spying on her and say something along the lines of “girls cant play video games”. There is a new psychiatrist guy that talks to Will too but he is very boring and on the bad guys side so i don’t particularly care for him. Out of the new characters i mentioned above i would rank them accordingly: 1. Bob 2. Murray 3. Billy 4. Maxine 956. Doctor Boring D.O.

As for our returning characters a lot has changed in good ole Hawkins and its nearing the one year anniversary of the finale of last season some time around Halloween, obviously. The iconic Reagan Bush ’84 Campaign signs make an appearance in these episodes a couple of times in peoples yards and i love it, shout out Rowdy Gentleman.  The boys are still up to their nerdy shenanigans riding around on bikes and talking on their giant walkie-talkies. An exciting part is that they dress up as Ghostbusters for Halloween and being the season is set in 1984 i give 1,000 kudos to the kids for being such trailblazing fans of the film, and 2,000 kudos to their parents for making the costumes from scratch. There is a pretty comical argument between Mike and Lucas on who gets to be Venkman, Bill Murrays character, with an awkward reference to the only black Ghostbuster, Winston Zeddemore played by Ernie Hudson, being lame because he was late to the team.

  Mike is emotionally invested in 2 boxes of toys for some reason and misses the hell out of his superhuman girlfriend, 11, just being an emo little baby pretty much the whole time. Will and Mike make some weird pact while trick-or-treating where Mike says “If you’re weird, I’m Weird” kind of like Ryan Gossling does in the Notebook (If you’re a bird, I’m a bird). Lucas and Dustin fight over who is gonna date Maxine.

Our guy Will, who spent the majority of last season in the Thunderdome, has turned into a monster in the eyes of the kids at school. He gets bullied a bit, being called “Zombie Boy” and getting notes put in his locker saying the same thing, thank god Twitter or Facebook didn’t exist back then or this dude would of 13 Reasons Why’d his way through the rest of this season, probably. He takes it with stride though, animating his new nickname pretty artistically, wouldn’t be surprised if he creates a comic book about his Zombie alter ego and becomes a millionaire.

Steve and Nancy are still an item, probably my second favorite couple behind Johnathan and crippling loneliness. Nancy has become annoying because out of the clouds she starts actually caring that her friend Barb is dead, probably because she feels guilty, i mean you’d have to be an idiot to not blame Nancy for the demise of our homely heroine, Barb. There is a scene where Nancy and Steve go have dinner with Barbs parents and enjoy some KFC #fingerlickingood. Barbs parents are delusional at this point, in denial that Barb is dead. They are not in good health, mainly because of the fried chicken, and have plans to sell their home to fund a wild goose chase led by the wacky ex-journalist, P.I. Bauman. That should be successful. R.I.P Barb. Some how Steve has become more likable. Probably because of his hair which has some how become bigger, the higher the hair the closer to heaven, i see you Steve. Nancy and Steve go to a Halloween party together where she gets tipsy on some jungle juice, or as the raging toga bro, who is later seen yakking his brains out, calls it, “Pure Fuel”. Nancy, in typical white girl wasted fashion, says “bullshit” 9 million times after getting a cup of hunch punch spilled on her and brings up the past (Her and Steve basically murdering Barb, gone but never forgotten). Surprisingly Steve peaces out instead of taking advantage of Nancy like he did last season. Johnathan, in typical lonely guy fashion, swoops in like a sad pigeon and saves the day by taking her home and tucking her in. I feel it is necessary to say that i think Johnathan looks like an anorexic Bill Hader from SNL and i hope other people see that too.

  My favorite character, 11, or Elle as Chief Hopper adorably calls her, has taken up residence in a cabin out in the sticks. Chief Hopper is my 2nd favorite character in the show and he has become some type of father figure to 11 letting her stay in his cabin and is keeping her safe from the Russians or whoever is trying to get her. 11 is still a super hero and controls stuff with her mind. She has grown her hair out lookin like a jerry curl gettin real high up there, watch out Steve. Hopper is still whippin around in that dope ass Trailblazer and totin that 6-shooter like a rootin tootin cowboy, they should call him Sheriff instead of Chief. The interaction between Sheriff Hopper and 11 is perfect and comical. 11 is still very robot-like and says “five one five” instead of 5:15 at one point alluding that she hasn’t become much more normal than the first season. There are a few flashbacks to season one including one where 11 is breaking through some gooey womb-like substance out of Thunderdome and it reminds me of Jim Carrey being born from a rhino in Ace Ventura: When Nature Calls. In another scene 11 kills and begins to cook a squirrel to eat and then beams it at some hunter dudes face in the woods because i guess that’s what Russian cyborgs do. Sheriff Hopper misses hanging out with Elle for Halloween and that broke my heart, do better man.

As usual the soundtrack for the show is the absolute best, the beginning credit song that sounds like Daft Punk time traveled back to the 80’s is up there with Game of Thrones intro song. So far the show is fantastic and there are a lot more witty references and noteworthy things to say but i have just realized that i have written 2,000+ words and most of this was just mindless stammering on and so with that i give my superlatives and predictions thus-far:

Most likely to die alone: Jonathan Byers

Worst Father of the Year: Sheriff Hopper

Most likely to Smash for sure: Hopper and Joyce

Most Improved: Barb

Best Hair: Steve

Probably Gonna Finish Last: Bob “The Brain” Newby

Most Athletic: The Bike Boys

Life of the Party: Yoga bro

Most Likely to Become President: Reagan Bush ’84

Biggest Twist: Barb is alive!

Token Black Guy: Lucas

Least Likely to do Anything, Ever: The dumb psychiatrist guy

Most likely to end up in jail or an insane asylum probably: Billy

Most Likely To Confuse The Millennium Falcon with the Starship Enterprise: My Fiance while watching the show with me.

      Stranger Things: Season 2 Return of Barb, Maybe. I watched episodes 1 & 2 of the new season of Stranger Things on Netflix this weekend, its been a long time coming.