#also i normally don’t post my work here but i’m never publishing this. more of an exercise really

[fluttershiesworld]

[ID: text reading,

“broken sonnet

you're 19 years old, and every day

you get out of bed

and brush your teeth

and eat breakfast

and don't want to kill yourself

feels like a miracle.

you want to be a martyr: a new age jean d'arc,

a beautiful symbol of some kind of change,

at least then you could mean something

in death. but you know dying would make you

nothing more than dead.

you want to bleed light but instead

bleed only the same ordinary red.” end ID]

broken sonnet, sunny valentine

[thewinchestah]

"PREY" - Alastor x reader fic

Pairing: Alastor x Fem!Reader

Tags: One-Shot, 18+, Smut, NSFW, edging, begging, overstimulation, Alastor does what he wants, there's plot if you squint really hard, alastor in heat, breeding kink, degradation kink, praise kink,

Fandom: Hazbin Hotel

Word Count: i lost count. it's big.

  | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4

A/N: Helloooooo!!! I write a lot but i never publish it! My lovely friend and also biggest inspiration for this fic @smallershorteranduncut ordered me to post this and i'm nothing but her loyal servent! I hope you guys enjoy the fruits of me writing 10 google docs pages today while i was enraged. Also english isn't my first language, no beta we die like men here yadayayfayada! enjoy <;3 (UPDATE!) Part 2 is now up!

-

Everything about the Radio Demon seemed to be designed to make you desire him, want him. Many times in ways you weren’t even ready to admit to yourself. You haven’t been in Hell long, that’s true. But ever since you manifested here you felt like someone had picked your brain open to make Alastor the perfect bait to lure you into even more sinful, sinister paths. 

He had an inexplicable magnetism around him, a piercing presence that made your eyes stuck on him when he worked a room. He had you bewitched and you hadn’t share more than polite pleasantries with each other since you became a guest at the hotel.

Today, again, you were transfixed in his gaze. Sitting in the corner of the hotel lobby, trying to make your embarrassing attraction to him go unnoticed while Alastor waltzed across the room explaining more of his wicked plans to Charlie. God, how you wish he had his wicked way with you. 

He seemed more… on edge today. His red eyes  glowed a little brighter, his nostrils flared a bit more, static filling the room more often, he was smiling with almost barred teeth, and everyone seemed to be avoiding him. Even Charlie was trying to politely dismiss him, the general feeling of uneasiness inside the hotel  just growing larger when Angel stationed himself near your little corner of the room. 

“Don’t go near that creepy motherfucker today, he’s about to lose it.”  Angel alerted, almost whispering, a pair of his hands making the “crazy sign” near his head 

“Isn’t he always creepy and about to lose it?” Husk added, staring at the exchange between the radio demon and Charlie.

“I’m telling you toots, I know that guy definitely isn't normal, but today he is borderline a mass extinction event. I swear, he’s just waiting for someone to give him the excuse” Angel replied, confirming your suspicions. Something was off.

“Uh. Well, about that, I think it’s time we rescue Charlie” 

As if on cue Charlie turned to the corner of the room, gesticulating really hard to be taken away from the small commotion her conversation with Alastor was becoming. 

“Hey Charlie, do you remember that thing with the hotel’s… personalized stationery you asked me to help you today? Let’s do it!” Said angel gently guiding Charlie away from the Radio Demon.

“Guess that’s my cue Alastor! Greaaaaat chat! As always! Have a nice day!! Byeee!” Charlie’s overly chirpy tone giving away her uneasiness. 

Suddenly it felt like all the air was taken out of the room. Alastor’s neck turned into an ungodly angle, his eyes narrowing in suspicion. Static grew around the group, almost suffocating. As your vision went blurry from the sheer power that was being evoked, you contemplated if there was another afterlife. Preferably one where you didn’t inherit a death wish from your previous ones.

And as quick as it started, it was over. 

Alastor just said a creepy “hm” turned on his hell, and walked away. 

It almost felt like it was all in your head, but your friends standing perfectly still and dead silent next to you gave the reality of the situation away: everyone just had a near death-death experience. Maybe it would be a good topic for Charlie’s bonding exercises, who knows with this place. 

“I told ya’ll. Mass. Extinction. Event. Stay out the psycho’s way”

Angel’s voice became background noise in your head, your eyes focusing on the spot where Alastor just threatened everybody’s life without saying a word. As the voices dissipated around you and normalcy slowly returned to the hotel, your mind sank deeper and deeper into the mystery that was the Radio Demon. 

-

They were so oblivious, so naive. Thinking he wasn’t listening what they said about him behind his back. Thinking he was unaware of him being the topic of the discussion when he wasn’t looking. He could bathe in the smell of their fear, and he was relishing it. 

Alastor stared at the new pretty little thing that arrived at the hotel. Oh how pathetically sweet and innocent she was, thinking she was being subtle about her infatuation with him. Thinking she could hide her interest in him, when she was nothing but a doe caught in the headlights of his eyes. Oh, she was just the perfect prey for him, wrapped in this lovely red bow she wore on her hair. 

Angel was right, he was just waiting for an excuse, and she just offered him one on a silver platter. And alastor was everything but a coward. 

-

You cursed a little bit louder than you intended when you saw the blood dripping from your finger. “Stop. making. a. spectacle. of. yourself” you mentally screamed. You still could not figure Charlie’s “special stationary stapler” out, so stapling your finger was bound to happen. 

Even though it was not much, the silly little cut was stinging like a bitch, and your best efforts to stop the bleeding were futile, considering the mess on the hem of your skirt. Still high on the adrenaline from earlier, your shaking hands searched for something, anything to put on your finger so you could continue your work without anyone noticing. Everyone already had enough for one day, it was fine. 

“My dear, did you just hurt yourself?” Alastor’s voice invaded your ears. Oh, fuck. That’s it, he was going to murder you for being so incompetent with the damned stapler.

Turning to face him, you meet his piercing gaze, not sure if you should run and scream for help. “Oh no worries alastor, it’s just a small cut, i can manage!” you give him your most confident smile. 

Alastor’s head tilts, eyes burning red as he watches the small droplets of your blood make their way down your index finger.  

“Nonsense, I can't have my staff running around with injuries and bloodied clothes. We are in hell, but we are not savages, dear” He seems transfixed by the blood, and you are too scared to move, too scared to anything other than hold the weight of his gaze and hope for the best. Your lizard brain is screaming for you to run, ask for help. Maybe Charlie isn’t too far away, could you make a run for it? Somehow your survival instincts override your brain, maybe all those hours watching true crime back on earth weren’t in vain, and you decide against running. Let him initiate first. 

He catches your wrist, trapping it inside his deadly claws. His face, towering over you, comes all the way down to inspect the offending finger. You can feel his breathing on your skin. 

Your breathing stops. You swallow an imaginary lump. He’s gonna bite off your fing-

“Would you be a doll and let me take care of it? Blood being unnecessary wasted truly abhors me” 

You must have said yes at some point, you don’t really remember, now you are holding the red handkerchief he handed  you, answering his request to “please follow him”. Trailing behind the Radio Demon, both of you walk through the large corridors. 

This might be the time to scream for help. the voices inside your head warn. With every step of his feet you hear his microphone going tsk tsk tsk where it touches the ground. You are walking the death row, the paintings on the wall chanting “dead woman walking, dead woman walking”. 

“Keep pressuring the wound darling, we are almost there” he gently commands you, too gently… it feels almost… soft, pleading. The way Alastor goes from 0 to 100 is giving you whiplash. 

He slows down, reaching for the door knob of an unknown room. Ever the gentleman, he gestures for you to enter first.

the door locks behind you.

 if i’m being murdered, at least i’m being murdered with class. 

“Don’t be silly, I’m not going to murder you” Alastor says, almost singing the last part of the sentence. 

“Oh fuck, i said that out loud, didn’t I?” you blurted out 

“Yes you did. And yes, I also noticed your lovely doe eyes on me every time i’m in the room” 

Your brain short circuits. That 's it. You are dead. He’s not going to murder you (apparently), but you are going to die of embarrassment. It will feel like murder. He knows, fuck, he knows. He knows about your crush (?) and he’s going to drag you for it. You are going to be so dragged the angels will pity you and bring you to heaven. A creative way to be redeemed, Charlie should know about this. Your thoughts are going downhill as a big snowball, there are too many of them and you can’t follow a single coherent train of thought. You don’t even want to know how you look in the middle of this. You must look pathetic, truly like a doe caught in headlights. And then you hear your name once.

Twice now, in a sing-song voice.

Your eyes fly open towards the sound, breaking from the anxiety induced spell as you realize the Radio Demon had just called you, by name. He knows your name???

“Ah hahah! You’re back.” Alastor says, as he starts to circle you like a predator. Your eyes, as always, follow his across the room.

 “I don’t like to repeat myself, little doe. You heard what I asked?” 

Again, you don’t really remember answering, your brain is going AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA as you watch him pace around you, eyes burning red, demanding your attention. Teeth slightly barred, voice on the edge of something. Was that “X” on his forehead always there?

“I asked if you know what you are doing to me” static fills the room as he finishes speaking. Alastor’s clawed hand trapped your bloodied finger dangerously close to his grinning lips. Your brain is doing flips as he stares deep into your soul, and when your thoughts land you make the connection. Alastor is horny. Alastor is horny for y-

“You see, little doe, I know what your eyes hide when you desperately lower them everytime I come near you. I know how you feel you can hide in plain sight if you stay quiet enough. But I can taste it. Your fear. Your lust. In the air. In your blood.” He has a white knuckled grip on your wrist now, same with his microphone. You lower your guard, eyes going from startled to lustful. “Good thing right now there’s nothing more i want in this godforsaken pit than your lust, pet”

You want this. There’s no point in lying to yourself. You want Alastor to fuck you. You’ve fantasized about the Radio Demon taking you more times than you can count. More times than you would like to admit to yourself. This feels deeply wrong, but you crave it. 

Fuck it, you are in hell, there’s nothing to lose. Alastor is still watching you, impatiently. For the first time today you realize you actually forgot to say something. He’s waiting. Alastor is waiting for your permission. 

“Take my breath away, Alastor” 

Your permission might have been really loud, it felt like you were screaming the words. But you can’t be sure, it might have been a whisper. Either way he didn’t miss it, what happens next is fast, angry and delicious. 

Alastor pounces and licks the blood on your finger, something clicks inside him as he tastes the red liquid, because he lets go of his microphone instantly and his arms grab your waist aggressively, so forceful you wouldn’t be surprised if it breaks skin. You shouldn’t be so turned on by this, by the sight of a psychopathic demon drinking your blood. But you are, and there’s no going back. 

“Strip” he orders. You want to say to him that you can’t take your clothes off your person with him holding you like this. He must have realized the conundrum: if he wants you naked, he has to let go of you. To Alastor, letting go of you right now is simply unthinkable. So he doesn’t: you feel his claws cut the bodice of your dress open, sending the most delicious shivers down your spine. Another claw rips your skirt apart, and you are almost fully naked in the Radio Demon’s arms, pressing your body hard on his still impeccable dressed body.

It’s humiliating, it’s dangerous, it’s hot, it is delicious, to be at his complete mercy, just how you always wanted.

Somehow both of you made your way close to the enormous bed in the middle of the room. Alastor cornered you, so the only way you could escape was walking backwards towards the bed. The brilliant bastard. 

You feel your calves hitting the edge of the bed, and Alastor breaks away.

 Pity, your mind complains. Get him back to touching you again. right. now,.

“Now now, we should establish some rules for this, pet” Alastor’s hands might have stopped touching you, but his piercing eyes never did. He knocks you on top of the bed, you lay there sprawled open just for him. His hands move up to do a quick work of his bowtie

“Rule one: you will take what I give you. Nothing more, nothing less. What I give you is enough. You might feel like you can’t take anymore, but you can. You will take it, I will make you take it” He takes his tailcoat off, his frame towering over you, even with your body completely flat on the mattress and his in front of it. 

“ Rule two: every ounce of your pleasure is mine and mine only. Mine to give, mine to take. And you will give me everything. I want to hear every sound, to feel every touch, to know every nasty thought that runs inside that pretty little head of yours. You will not suppress anything, I wanna hear your moans when you make a mess of yourself as I take everything I desire from your delicious body. I will relish on your desperate screams of pleasure.Nothing outside these walls matter” He is climbing on the bed now. You hold the weight of his gaze, underneath your demonic lover’s eyes your skin burns.

“Rule three: don’t you dare cum without my permission, good girls earn their orgasms and you will be a good girl. Or else…” static starts to pick up around the room, you are seeing the blackest black that ever was, his shadows enveloping you both. Nothing outside these walls matter. “Understood?” Alastor says as he pins your hands on top of your head, against the fancy headboard. His hand cups one of your boobs and he is worrying your nipple between his sharp claws. finally finally, your mind sings. You feel a surge of magic binding your wrists in green chains, attached to the headboard. It’s overbearing, it’s ridiculous. His magic feels like him, another part of him for you to take.

He pinches your nipple particularly hard and you moan softly, pleasure and pain consuming any other sensation. You forgot to answer him, you realize. You’ve barely started and you are already being bad. “yes alastor, yes.. but please don’t stop” the soft whimper leaves your lips.

“lovely.” he replies, and with that his mouth is on your nipple, sucking it while he administers his wicked ministrations to your other one. His sharp teeth prickling on the edge of breaking skin, and you already feel like you won’t be able to take all of him. 

His hand trails down to aggressively grip your thighs, his tongue sucking the neglected nipple his fingers left. Your moans become frequent and messy, if he’s already making you go insane with the beginnings of foreplay... You might pass out and die when he starts fucking you, but you don’t care. Let him show you the true meaning of la petite mort.

“My my, what do we have here” his hand leaves your thigh to trace the wetness of your panties. A clawed finger rips it apart, the last barrier between you and total consumption by the Radio Demon. He takes the finger between your glistening lips, not entering, just teasing 

“I don’t think i will get enough of this pretty little body of ours anytime soon, pet” he says as his finger finally enters your sex, He moves his digit with an expertise you didn’t really know he had in him,  making you whimper his name, ooohs and aaaahs, your hips start threshing from the pleasure. If you continue at this pace, you will be  begging for permission to cum too soon. Pathetic. you think to yourself. Because you know how hard this building orgasm will be,you don’t know if he will grant you more than one orgasm. And will you murder you yourself if you don’t feel his cock inside you tonight. You take a deep breath in between your moans and will your hips to stay in place, your nerves to calm down. 

Alastor adds another finger, and it takes all of your willpower not to become a puddle of wetness right there. You bite your lip so hard you taste blood. 

“you do make a mess of yourself, don’t you? you just can’t help it” he says as he curls his digits inside you. Your hips start thrashing hard again, and you sink them deeper into the bed. The chains on your wrists shake with the effort to hold back. As if alastor wasn’t going to notice. “no no no what did I say?” he snaps angrily, he’s eyes flash red at you and he takes his fingers out with a wet “pop”, you feel like crying at the emptiness. “please please alastor, don’t stop” you plead. His hands leave you entirely, you are left with just his piercing gaze, the one that makes your skin burn. “did I say you could hold back? don’t pretend like you aren’t a common whore for me, that you love how pathetic it feels that you are creaming yourself and we haven’t even really started” 

his condescending tone just makes everything even more sublime. It’s so wrong how good being told you are nothing more than a common whore by the Radio Demon feels. But you never felt anything close to this. “please Alastor” you beg again, nothing but a small whisper

“I would love to taste this pussy, so red already for me, but since you broke one of the rules… i’m afraid I will make you understand that are nothing but my pretty cockslut the hard way” 

Punishment? His punishment sounds ever better than his praise right now. You moan at his voice. He laughs. 

His knees cage you, as he lifts his upper body from you and starts undoing his zipper. He is taking his cock out. Oh fuck, he’s gonna fuck you without anymore foreplay. And he’s not going to be gentle about it either. You shiver. 

Alastor pumps himself a few times, his cock is big, thick, and an angry red shade, flush red like that, because of you, just for you. He’s gonna make you pay: pay for holding back from him, pay for making him feel like an animal and almost losing his hard constructed control. 

The look on his face says it all, he’s gonna take it out on you and you can’t do nothing about it.

You don’t have much time to think about the repercussions, in one swift motion his tip is already inside you, stretching you deliciously. Your brain short circuits again, the feeling of his cock inside you is everything you imagine and more. Depraved, heavenly, delicious. You struggle in your binds again, you want desperately to touch him. To feel his skin beneath your finger, to scratch him, mark him. But oh well, he’s the Radio Demon, he’s the one in charge and you are his prey.

Alastor starts to slowly enter you, he’s trying his best to hold back. He knows if he does this too fast it will hurt in a way he doesn’t want you to feel. And by the look on his face going slow is as torturous for him as it is for you. tantalizing inch after tantalizing inch he spreads the walls of your cunt apart. You understand now why this is punishment, it hurts in a perfect way, it hurts even more that he is doing it slowly, and not just thrusting like you imagined  he would, if he had more time to work on you. 

You become a mess of moans and incoherent words. His cock is halfway inside you now “HoLY FUCK ALASTOR” you scream. It’s already too much. 

“There’s nothing holy about this my dear. I’m going to breed you. I’m going to break you” and with that he buries himself to the hilt inside you. Now you truly scream in pleasure and pain “you won’t be able to walk straight for days, you will feel me in every step, and you will thank me for it”. His thrusts pick up at breakneck speed, the bed shakes from the sheer force that Alastor is using to fuck you. Every snap of his hips you moan more and more. 

The sound you make when he takes everything out and enters you at once is so obscene that it would make Angel Dust blush. He’s growling now, his antlers growing bigger as he fucks you like his life dependend on it. As he fucks you like he hates you. 

Alastor pushes your hips higher, and suddenly he’s even deeper. His other hand holding your waist in a bruising grip. The strain on your pinned hands will bruise too. His lips graze the skin of your collarbone, he looks so feral you are scared he will maul, the thrill of not knowing adding to your fucked up sense of pleasure. 

He seems to pick up on your fear, and bites down on your collarbone, hauling as he tastes your blood and buries himself inside you again and again. Moans turned into screams, and the only thing coming out of your lips is his name, spoken like a profane prayer. You would give everything you have to Alastor, and he doesn’t even have to ask.

Your orgasm has been building for a while now, the coil on your belly becoming tighter and tighter, like a supernova about to be born. “Alastor, please please let me come” you beg. His unfocused eyes stare down at you, as he takes a moment from feasting on your sweet blood to address your desperate, sweet pleas.

“Don’t. You. Dare” he says, punctuating every word with a sharp thrust. As much as you want, you are not sure you will be able to hold any longer. “I beg you alastor, please let me cum, i will let you do anything you want. but i need it so badly, please please”

You sounded so desperate when you begged, so beautiful.

“Don’t strike deals you don’t know you can fulfill, pet” his voice is low, a warning. You ignore it. “I promise Alastor, anything”. Alastor laughs.

 his finger touches your clit as he finally allows your sweet relief “you may come now, sweet doe” and that’s it, you are off, you are dead. You see stars, you see the entire universe as you scream out and climax. Walls tightening around Alastor’s monster cock, eyes rowling, his name a scream on your lips. You ride out your wave slowly, but Alastor is not slowing down.

Instead he is picking up his pace, maneuvering your hips even higher, your chains are stretched to the limit. You can feel them start piercing your skin. Thrust after thrust the sensation becomes too much, you are too overstimulated to go through all of this again.

“i can’t take it, i can’t take it!”

Alastor doesn’t care. “I told you not to make deals if you can’t hold them, didn’t I?” You don’t answer, you can’t. you can’t to anything but let him fuck you as hard and as much as he want. “but you are such a little cockslut for me that you can’t help it. What a shame” 

He is gripping your hips so hard it breaks skin, tiny trails of blood on his claws. “you will take it. You better take it, or I will make you take it” static picks up as he threatens the last words. You know you are spent, you know how bad it hurts, you know how bad his words sound, but the lines between pleasure and pain are so blurred that you can’t think coherently. Even this  pain of being broken feels good. 

Still, tears fill your eyes and you start crying, from pleasure, from pain, you don’t know anymore. What Alastor is doing to you has no precedent. No one can do this like he does. He knows torture too well, and he is tortouring you in the most decadent, delicious ways possible. “alastor i want to, i want to so bad but i just can’t” the tears sting your eyes and stain your face. 

Alastor sees it. He slows down just a bit, his voice softening “oh my dear doe, but you can. Just this once more, just for me. One more” his voice is so maddening soft it acts like fuel to your tears. Your skin tingles and you feel giddy, somehow your throbbing hot, wet cunt seems to find the right amount of relief, and you can feel only pleasure again.

Alastor continues to fuck you, your moans returning to normal, you are being so loud now, making a mess of yourself, just like he said, and a big hand comes to cover your mouth. 

“Oh we can’t have you being this loud can we?” his voice goes to that delicious mocking tone. His thrusts are slower now, but as deep as they can go. “what would you friends say if they found out that you moan like a common whore for their feared radio demon.. hum,.?”

You start to feel the pit of your belly tightening again, and alastor doesn’t stop humiliating you. The degradation feels just the right amount of perfection. You are exactly what he says you are. A common whore when it comes to him. “weren’t you ashamed just a few moments ago? trying to hold back the sinful sounds you make when I touch you? I already gave you one orgasm. I’ve been way too generous for my liking. I should stop right now since you feel so conscious about this”  Alator’s breathing is becoming erratic, his thrusts sharp, hard, and out of the breakneck rhythm he was torturing you before.You start moaning even louder through his hand. “ungrateful little pet. You are just so greedy for one more orgasm, you don’t even care that everyone downstairs can hear you hm??”

You can’t think straight. you feel on the edge of glory, this orgasm threatening to be harder than your previous one, as if it is possible. “alastor i’m so sorry, i know i don’t deserve it” you muffle behind his hand, he hears you speaking and takes if off “but can you please let me cum? just this once? just for you. Please Al” his thrusts are truly erratic now. He’s close too, even though you are too wrapped up on your own sensations to notice 

“please” you beg, nothing more than a whisper. Already making peace with the fact that you are going to come without his permission and he will probably never fuck you again

“Good girl, you can come now”

instantly as you are granted his permissions your world explodes, blinding hot pleasure takes over your body, the waves of pleasure making your heart beat so fast you feel like it’s going to stop. The petit mort is coming, and her sweet embrace envelops you, specially now that you feel Alastor’s cock twitching and spilling his seed inside you. You scream his name. Maybe you hear him screaming yours too. You don’t know anymore, your nerves are singing from pleasure unheard of back  when you were alive. Pleasure so great it could only be found in hell. The most heavily, depraved way of torture. 

You come down from your high, still dizzy, your body going limp. You are not dead, but you are positively spent. You give in into the warm and fuzziness of sleep. 

The last thing you remember is the softness of a blanket, a gentle kiss on your cheek.

“Oh my dear, I knew you had one more on you,spending yourself this way just for me! What a truly precious thing, doe”

You might be dreaming now.

-

You weren’t dreaming. Alastor praises you, knowing his words will be the last thing you hear before a night of peaceful, deep dreamless slumber. He makes sure to put the softest velvet blanket he owns on your body, not to make the damage you gladly allowed your body to take for him an inconvenience. Tomorrow you will wake up to fancy letters of praise and sweet chocolate covered strawberries. And no one will know how Alastor found the perfect doe to breed as he pleases during the height of his mating season.

[merrybloomwrites]

You Can Start a Family (Chapter 10)

Summary: Love on Tour comes to an end, and new relationships begin in Italy.

Previous Chapters: One ; Two ; Three ; Four ; Five ; Six ; Seven ; Eight ; Nine

CW: Smut

This is the final chapter of this main story! But don't worry, I have lot's of plans for blurb/ one shots. Check out my last post here for more details about that. And please send me requests!!

Thank you to everyone who has read this story! It's the first things I've ever published like this and the feedback has truly been wonderful. I hope you enjoy this last chapter.

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The second week of traveling Europe and going to shows is just as wonderful as the first. Maybe even more so. You’re more comfortable with everyone, having become friends with the whole band and a fair number of crew members. Things have calmed down slightly, and you learn that there was a lot of extra craziness surrounding the Slane and Wembley shows. Everyone has a bit more free time now, including Harry.

You, Harry, Sarah, and Mitch hang out a couple of times all together. Each pairing also spends some quality one on one time together. Sarah made plans for the two of you to get massages as well and mani pedis during a day off in Cardiff. You and Mitch have lunch together followed by him teaching you some new skills on guitar. Harry had found a hiking trail he wanted to try so the two of you do that together and have a picnic.

Mitch and Sarah each go out with Harry, and have a date just the two of them. After each outing you all tell each other what you’d done but don’t share all of the details. It doesn’t seem necessary. There is an inherent trust that you all have, and this allows you all to keep some of the individual moments special. You’d realized that in a relationship with this many people, each individual pairing needs to be fostered.

The four of you are able to hang as a group two times that week. The first time, you all go for a walk in Cardiff together and have lunch. The next day you have a movie night in Harry’s hotel room. Both times are very casual, and the conversation about Harry officially entering the relationship is never brought up. There’s an understanding that things are to go back to normal until tour ends.

You enjoy the last three shows you are at. There is a chance you’ll be back for the final show in Italy, but nothing is set in stone, so you keep that to yourself. You wander around the stadium with Brad again for the two Cardiff shows and are permitted to sit in front of the barrier during the show in Belgium. You take in every moment in Werchter, ignoring that this time tomorrow you’ll be back home. You latch on to Mitch and Sarah the second the show ends.

The three of you fight sleep that night, staying up too late talking, kissing, exploring each other’s bodies once again. You wake up wrapped in their arms and continue the activities from the night before. You spend time simply pleasing each other with your hands and mouths until your alarm goes off, signaling you need to start getting ready for the airport.

You shower, get dressed and make sure everything is packed. There are about 15 minutes left before your car leaves for the airport, and you hear a knock at the door. Mitch goes to answer and a moment later he walks back, Harry following him.

“I just wanted to say good-bye,” he says. “It truly has been wonderful getting to know you these past couple of weeks.”

“I’ve had a great time hanging out,” you reply.

“Will I see you again soon?” he asks.

“I hope so. I’m working on it.”

“Good,” he says as he pulls you in for a hug. It’s everything you’ve come to expect from Harry’s hugs- comforting, long, feels like home. You say good-bye to him before pulling back, and soon after he leaves so that you have alone time with Mitch and Sarah.

You’ve been holding up better than when they left you a few weeks prior, but as the time to depart draws closer, your eyes start to fill with tears. You look up, trying to blink them away, but it’s no use.

The second they notice Mitch and Sarah wrap their arms around you. For a few minutes no one speaks. You all just stay in this group hug, comforting one another and soaking up the contact. Your phone buzzes, and you have a text from Pete saying he’s available to drive you when you’re ready.

Sarah steps back, allowing Mitch to pull your lips up and meet his. “I love you,” he says against your mouth before moving to press a kiss to the crown of your head. “I’ll miss you baby.”

“I’ll miss you too, Mitch. I love you so much.” After one more kiss you turn from him to Sarah who immediately pulls you in tight.

“I love you sweetheart. And we’ll see you again soon, okay?”

“Okay,” you say, now so emotional that you’re having trouble getting the words out. Your “I love you” is barely a whisper, but she hears. Her hands rub your back and she kisses you just like Mitch had- first your lips, then your forehead. You keep your eyes closed, committing every detail of this interaction to memory so you can hold on to these feelings as long as possible.

You take a deep breath and finally break the hug. You grab your bags, dry your tears, share one more simple peck with each of them and walk out of the room.

Pete is waiting in the lobby along with Madi who says, “Hope you don’t mind me tagging along. A friend of mine is landing soon, and I wanted to be there to pick her up.”

You’re happy to have Madi’s company, so you reply, “I don’t mind at all!” and you give her a genuine smile. It was hard saying good-bye to Mitch and Sarah, which is why you had decided it should be done in private and not at the airport, but having Madi in the car with you raises your mood. It makes you realize that in the past two weeks you have made a lot of new friends, which is something so difficult in your adult life.

You spend much of the flight home thinking about all those friendships, the moments you spent with the band and the crew. Though you are sad to leave, you also feel happier than you have in a long time.

You text Mitch and Sarah once you get home and even though it’s the middle of the night for them, they both reply immediately. It fills you with warmth to know that they stayed up until they knew you were home safe.

*****

The next few weeks are just like those first weeks of tour, except this time you’re on the phone with more than just Mitch and Sarah. You speak to Harry every couple of days, and occasionally get to FaceTime with other members of the band when they hang out together.

A week after you leave you find out that Harry has rented out a number of homes in Italy for the week following the final show. Much of the band and crew would be staying there for a relaxing vacation after these stressful months. At first Mitch and Sarah say that they’re not going to stay, that they want to fly back to you as soon as it’s done, but you tell them not to come back right away.

You tell them that baby Ryan’s grandparents are planning to visit, and that you’re going to get more time off that week. You assure them that you can fly out at least for the second half. What you don’t tell them is that you’re actually planning to get to Italy just in time for the final show. Pete’s been helping you coordinate the details, ensuring that no one else knows. You’re not sure if he’s an incredibly loyal person, or if he simply doesn’t care about your personal life, but he’s a lifesaver for helping you without asking any questions.

The weeks end up flying by. You and Ryan spend as much time outside running around or swimming in the pool as possible. You’re keeping so active that you’re exhausted by the time you get home each night. While tiring, it comes in handy because before you know it, you’re packing for a week in Italy.

Keeping your travel plans a secret from Mitch and Sarah is difficult, especially when they call you while you wait at the airport. You run to find a quiet corner, praying no overhead announcements get picked up by the phone. You keep things light, a normal Friday night phone call before they head to bed. When they hang up you breathe a sigh of relief, as it seems they didn’t figure out your whereabouts.

This trip is definitely more stressful than the last. It’s not a direct flight and the second leg is delayed. Once you land you still have to take two trains, and due to you arriving late you miss your original departure. You get new tickets sorted and grab lunch to enjoy on the way. Finally, you arrive in Reggio Emilia, but Pete is no longer able to pick you up, since he has other jobs assigned to him. He sends another crew member, Erin, which leads to a moment of confusion since you hadn’t met her before and didn’t have a way to contact her. It takes a while but you eventually find her in the pickup area.

It's nearly 6 PM by the time you make it to the stadium. Erin ends up being a literal godsend and shows you a place where you can quickly freshen up and get changed. She also takes care of your luggage and leads you down the hall to the band dressing room.

Luckily the door is open, so you walk right in. Ariza is the first to notice, shouting, “Hey! She’s back!” which alerts everyone else to your presence.

You’re looking right at Mitch and Sarah, and you can tell the exact moment they realize who Ariza is talking about. You blink and the next thing you know Mitch has wrapped his arms tight around your waist to pick you up and spin you in a circle. He quickly puts you down and lets go, not wanting to be too obvious in front of the whole band.

Sarah hugs you next, tucking her face into your shoulder and pressing a kiss there knowing that your hair is blocking the intimate gesture. You’re then pulled into hugs by the rest of the band as well as some crew members who pass by.

After a short conversation with the band, they turn to continue getting ready. There’s definitely a different atmosphere in the room than usual, and you know everybody is dealing with their mixed emotions about this being the final show.

“Do you think there’s any chance I can say hello to Harry before the show?” you ask Mitch.

“We can go check,” he replies, “but I’m not sure if he’ll want to see people right now or be alone.”

“Of course.”

The three of you walk down the hall and Sarah gently knocks on the door. You’re standing behind her and Mitch, and so Harry doesn’t notice you when he opens the door.

“Hey guys, what’s up?” he says with a smile.

“Brought a surprise,” Sarah says before stepping to the side.

The second he sees you his eyes light up. He pulls you in for a hug, one arm secure around your waist while the other holds the back of your head. You stay like that for a full minute before he pulls back and ushers the three of you into his dressing room.

He sits in his chair, gesturing that the three of you take the couch. You sit in between Mitch and Sarah who each take one of your hands in theirs, still in slight disbelief that you’re there.

“I thought you weren’t coming for another few days,” Harry states.

“Yea, why’d you lie?” Sarah asks with a smile.

“Honestly, I wasn’t sure this would work out. I didn’t want anyone to get their hopes up just in case I didn’t make it. And I barely did. I was supposed to get here hours ago.”

“What happened?”

“Typical travel nonsense, nothing to worry about. Now tell me, how are you all feeling?”

Everyone is quiet for a minute. Harry speaks up first, saying, “I’m feeling sad that it’s ending. And proud of what we accomplished. It’s very bittersweet.” He pauses and the others nod their heads in agreement. “And I’m also feeling very hopeful. I will say I’m glad to have something to look forward to.”

You give him a confused look, not exactly sure what he’s talking about. He continues, “I mean if the offer is still there. For me to join you all.”

It clicks in your mind and your expression changes immediately.

Mitch reassures him quickly, “Of course the offer is still there. We want you to be a part of this Harry. You’re so important to us, and if we can make this work, I think we’ll all be extremely happy.”

Harry visibly relaxes in front of you, a content smile spreading across his face. This moment of peace is short lived as there is another knock on the door. Pete is there alerting everyone that it’s almost time for Wet Leg to open the show.

“I should go, I want to talk to them before they start,” Harry says.

You all get up and you turn to give Harry another hug before leaving, as you know you likely won’t see him again before the show starts. You lean in to say, “I am incredibly proud of you. Everything you’ve done is amazing. And I’m very happy to see what the next chapter brings for you, and for all of us together.”

When you pull back you see a hint of tears in his eyes. He blinks them away before looking back at you. He brings one hand up to rest on the side of your face and then hesitates. He moves forward slightly, your eyes meeting and his lips a mere inch from yours. At the last second, he seems to stop himself, and you feel his lips press against your cheek.

He pulls away to press a kiss to Mitch and Sarah’s cheeks as well, and you’re all blushing when you walk out of the room.

After a brief stop in the band dressing room, you all head out to watch Wet Leg. Sarah and Mitch are more reserved, standing together, Mitch’s arm around Sarah’s waist. A part of you wishes you could be like that in public, but you’re honestly just happy to watch them be adorable. Plus, you know the fans are loving how cute they’re being. You dance with Madi, Elin, Ariza, and Pauli and have a wonderful time.

Once Wet Leg is done you join the people who are congratulating them. After a little while you make your way to the band’s room again so you can see Mitch and Sarah before they go on. You don’t say anything, but you don’t have to. They heard your words to Harry earlier and they know you’d be saying the same to them if you had privacy.

You use your all access pass to its limits during the show, moving around to wherever you’ll get the best views without blocking any of the fans or getting in the crews’ way.

You’re mesmerized from the first moment everyone steps on stage. Harry looks amazing in his silver outfit, and you love the denim jumpsuits on the band. You practically melt every time Harry speaks in Italian. The extra songs are so special, and you barely hear the Two Ghosts intro leading to Falling because the crowd is screaming so loud.

At one point you find yourself with Brad, James Corden and a few others mixing in with the fans. Everyone loses their minds when they do the full version of Best Song Ever, including you.

You cheer extra loud for everyone when Harry introduces the band. Fine Line nearly brings you to tears. The piano piece that Harry wrote to play as the final song truly did bring you to tears. It was so beautiful and a perfect ending to the tour.

Everyone takes their final bows. Harry walks across the stage, thanking all of his fans before moving back to the center. He takes it all in, finally falling to his knees because he is so overwhelmed with emotions. You glance at Mitch and Sarah, now standing together with arms wrapped around each other. They’re watching him and you can see the love and admiration in their eyes. They’re just as proud of him as everyone else.

As soon as they walk backstage you and the rest of the family and friends head there as well. Immediately you’re met with celebratory chaos. For a solid half hour there’s cheering, shouting, dancing. Finally, everyone starts breaking away to get changed. After everyone is ready you all head over to a nearby club to properly celebrate the end of tour.

The place Harry chose is perfect. Downstairs in a small dining room, quiet music playing, and delicious Italian food set up along one wall. Upstairs is the complete opposite. It’s darker, there’s loud music, and a bar is set up on every wall of the room.

After scoping out the place Mitch simply says, “food” so you join him and Sarah at the buffet. The three of you are joined at a table by Madi and two of her friends. The food is delicious. Your family may be Italian, but they’ve never made anything this good.

Once you’re all satisfied you head upstairs. It’s gotten extremely crowded, and you have to weave your way through people to get to the bar. Sarah orders for everyone since she has the loudest voice out of the trio. You smile as she hands you your favorite.

For the next hour or so you dance, drink, sing along to the music, and have a great time. It’s been years since you’ve let loose like this, and you’re enjoying the freedom of it. For the most part you stick with Mitch and Sarah, but you also spend time hanging out with other band or crew members.

You find yourself lost in the crowd after Pauli leaves the dance floor to head to the bathroom. A moment later a man you don’t recognize walks up to you.

While the party is mostly for all the people who worked on the tour, there are also others there that you haven’t met. Some are crew members you haven’t had the chance to talk to, and some are friends, family members, or industry contacts that got an invite because of the status they hold.

“Hey, I’m Ricky,” he says, holding his hand out to you.

“I’m Y/N, nice to meet you,” you reply while quickly shaking his hand. You don’t necessarily want to talk to him, but you were always taught to be polite.

“Great party huh?” he asks, trying to keep the conversation going.

“Oh, yea, it’s pretty cool,” you reply, looking around for someone that you know but not being able to see anyone. You can’t explain it, but something about this guy has you feeling uncomfortable.

“What are you drinking? I can get you a refill.”

“Thank you but I’m alright.”

“Yea it’s getting late huh. Maybe we could get out of here, have another after party of our own.” And there it is. You’ve been hit on a couple of times before and you never know how to respond.

“No, I think I’m just going to find some of my friends.” You turn and try to walk away but he grabs your wrist to keep you there. The second his skin touches yours you start to panic. You’re not fully freaking out, figuring he wouldn’t try something in a room full of people, but what if he’s able to get you alone?

“I could be your friend.” If you weren’t so worried about what he might do, you’d be rolling your eyes at that awful line and the way he thought that would actually work on you.

“That’s okay, I’m all set on friends at the moment. Now please let go of me.”

His other hand slides to your hip, gripping tightly and he leans in to say, “Oh c’mon babe, don’t play so hard to get. It’s a night for celebrating. Let’s have some fun.”

Your panic kicks up a notch at how close he is, and how tightly he’s holding on to you. It’s becoming more obvious he’s not going to take no for an answer, and you’re desperately trying to think of ways to get away from him, or at the very least, stay in the crowded party room until someone finds you.

He steps more into your space and your mind goes blank with fear. Suddenly there’s a hand on the small of your back and you jump at the touch. “Shh, love, it’s just me,” you hear Sarah say and take a deep, relieved breath. You’re finally free from his hold and you lean into Sarah who wraps her arm tight around your waist.

You look up and see Mitch leaning over Ricky, talking so low that you can’t hear him, but whatever he says works and the man walks away looking both embarrassed and afraid. Mitch takes a deep breath before turning to you. He cups your face in his hand and asks, “Are you okay?”

Your eyes are wide with leftover fear and panic as you meet his, but you nod. “I’m okay,” you say quietly, but they’re both close enough to hear you.

“Okay. Good. Do you want to leave and go back to the house?”

You shake your head no. “I really don’t want to end the night on that note. Can we stay a little longer?”

“Yea, baby, whatever you want.”

“But just stay with me, okay?”

“Of course,” Sarah says.

Mitch adds, “We’re not leaving your side for a second.”

You take another minute to collect yourself and put a smile back on your face before sliding your hand into Sarah’s and leading her to the dance floor. At first, you’re not as into it as before, going through the motions rather than fully dancing. Eventually the rest of the band joins in and you feed off their positive vibes. By the time people start leaving an hour or so later you’ve basically forgotten about Ricky.

After another little while most of the people have gone. The music is turned down and the lights are still dim but brighter than before. Mitch leads you and Sarah over to one of the bars, where Harry now seems to be sitting by himself, a new drink in hand.

You had lost track of Harry an hour or so before, and it seems he had spent much of that time in this location. You’ve never seen him drunk before, and while he’s certainly not wasted, he’s not sober either. He has a sort of a lost, sad puppy look on his face.

“You alright man?” Mitch asks, placing a hand on his shoulder.

“Yea, mate. I’m good,” Harry replies in a tone that indicates he’s definitely not as good as he says.

 Mitch gently takes the glass from his hand and places it on the bar and says, “I think it’s time to go. They’re starting to clean everything up.”

“I don’t want to go,” Harry replies. A beat later he continues, “I don’t want to be alone.”

Your heart breaks at the sadness in his voice and you share a look with Mitch and Sarah. You know they feel the same.

“You’re not going to be alone, love,” Sarah says gently. Harry looks up at her, not understanding. “We’re coming with you. Tours over. We’re all going to be together. And that can start tonight. Does that sound alright to you?”

His face lights up at this news. He nods and looks between the three of you, seeing smiles on all of your faces.

“Come on, let’s get going,” Mitch says, wrapping an arm around Harry and supporting him out to the car. Harry leans heavily on him, but you think this has less to do with being unsteadily drunk and more to do with seeking comfort from the physical touch. You know that’s what he’s doing because you’re doing the same with Sarah.

A large black Chevy Suburban is waiting outside for your group. You and Sarah climb into the back row and Mitch and Harry take the middle. You try to stay awake for the drive, but it turns out you’re heading straight to the beach villa which is two hours away. You fight sleep for the first few minutes, trying to watch the scenery outside, but Sarah sees what you’re doing. She knows that between working all day Friday and then immediately traveling to the show, you likely haven’t slept in close to 40 hours.

Her arm wraps around you and her hand presses gently on the side of your head. “Sleep my love,” she says. You stop trying to fight it and instead melt into her side, your head resting on her shoulder. You fall asleep immediately.

The sun is starting to rise by the time you arrive at the house. The others had all dozed off as well but wake up when you pull into the driveway. You, however, snuggle closer to Sarah, refusing to open your eyes. Mitch looks back and sees the predicament and says to Sarah, “Go in with Harry, I’ll take care of her.”

Sarah moves you so that you’re leaning against the window instead of against her. Mitch lowers the middle row of seats so that Sarah can get out and so he can reach you. He carries you into the house and finds the other two in the bedroom. Harry is setting out some of his clothes for everyone.

“I don’t think they knew where to bring your bags. We’ll get them here in the morning, but you can borrow these for now.” Mitch lays you on the bed and takes off your clothes from the day, pulling a large t-shirt over your head to cover you.

“If you guys want you can have this room, I’ll sleep in the other one,” Harry says.

Mitch and Sarah share a confused look. “Harry,” Sarah starts. “We were planning on you staying with us here. So that we’re all together.”

“Will we all fit?”

“Of course we will. Y/N typically sleeps on top of one of us anyway so technically she doesn’t take up any room,” Mitch says with a fond smile.

They climb into bed with you, Sarah next to you on one side with Harry on the other. Mitch checks the doors are locked before turning off the light and getting in next to Harry. Everyone falls asleep within minutes.

You wake up to bright sunlight in an unfamiliar room. You’re laying on top of someone, a male someone, but it isn’t Mitch. You think about everything you remember from the previous night, and panic. The only thing that comes to mind that could explain the current situation would be if Ricky had come back and somehow got you to go home with him.

You quickly sit up, moving so suddenly that you nearly fall off of the bed. Sarah catching you is the only reason you don’t fall to the floor. Seeing her is enough to break through the panic, and your brain finally wakes up enough to realize what’s going on.

You weren’t sleeping on Mitch, but he is right next to you. It was Harry underneath you. You’re embarrassed by your reaction, and disappointed that you ruined what should’ve been a sweet moment.

“Are you okay?” Harry asks. “Did I do something to make you uncomfortable?”

“No! Not at all. I’m fine, I just got confused for a minute. There was a guy last night who was hitting on me and not taking no for an answer and when I woke up in a new place, I got scared thinking I was with him. Just freaked out for a second.”

“Who was it?”

“I think he said his name was Ricky.”

“I don’t know a Ricky. He must be one of the people management insisted we invite for networking. I can get the guest list, figure out exactly who he is if you want. Get him fired or something.”

His protectiveness has you feeling incredibly cared for, but you assure him that it’s fine.

“Can we just redo that?” you ask.

“What do you mean?” Sarah says.

“Redo the start of the day. It’s the first time all four of us are waking up together and I ruined it!”

“You did not ruin anything Y/N,” Mitch says. “You expressed real emotions, okay? We’ve talked about this; you can’t feel guilty for having feelings.”

“I know, I know! I’m not trying to ignore my feelings. But I want today to be a happy day. And I want to start it right. So can we please forget all that and redo?”

“Yes, love,” Sarah says. “We can start again if that’s what you’d like.”

“Thank you!” You crash into Harry, pushing him back so he’s once again laying down with you on top of him.

You lift your head off his chest to meet his eyes. “Good morning darling,” he says, and you smile as you say the same to him. You then turn to Mitch and Sarah and they each wish you good morning and place a kiss on your lips.

There’s a moment where no one knows what to do next, but Mitch makes a decision. He leans down so he’s level with Harry. Their eyes meet and slowly they inch their faces closer together. Finally, their lips meet. It’s a small press of their lips, chaste, almost domestic, like it’s something they’ve been doing to greet each other every morning for years.

When they pull back there’s a new light in Harry’s eyes. He looks happy and peaceful, like he’s been waiting for this forever. He turns his head, and since you’re still on top of him you think it’s your turn to properly greet him. But Sarah leans in, capturing his lips with her own. Mitch chuckles as you pout, but the expression quickly fades away as you watch the two of them.

While the kiss with Mitch was one of familiarity, and rekindling a romance, this is two people exploring each other for the first time. After years of friendship and working together, they now get to come together in this new way. They take a minute to get lost in one another, and you smile as you hear soft sighs from both of them.

They break apart and Harry looks to you. He brings his hands up to cup your cheeks and you move so close that your noses brush and you can feel his soft exhale on your skin.

“Is this okay?” he asks quietly, and you whisper “yes” before crashing your lips to his. His fingers slide through your hair, holding you close to him as his lips slot against yours. It’s a short kiss that has you craving more, but as you pull away you know it’s perfect for the moment.

“I want to have a proper date with you all,” Harry says.

“We’d love that,” Sarah answers.

“Tonight. I don’t want to waste another minute.”

The conversation is interrupted by knocking at the front door. You move so that Harry can get up and answer it. He walks back a minute later and lets you guys know that your luggage was just dropped off. Hearing that makes you realize how long it’s been since your last shower and so you open your bag and grab what you’ll need.

Everyone takes turns showering and getting ready. Once you’re done you realize you’re starving and look at the clock. You’re shocked to see it’s already past 2 in the afternoon. You head to the kitchen and see Harry making sandwiches for everyone.

“Anything I can help with?” you ask.

“Got a bunch of fruit in the fridge, can you help me cut that up?”

“Absolutely!”

You get to work, natural light streaming through the windows of the beautiful kitchen. The four of you sit down for lunch and then enjoy the afternoon sitting out by the pool. Luckily the house is set away and is completely private, allowing you all to be yourselves without fear of fans or paparazzi seeing.

By 5 o’clock you’re all inside getting dressed for the date. Harry had planned it all and told you to dress nice, but casual. You’re a bit confused but settle for a blue and white sun dress. You walk downstairs and see not only Harry, Sarah, and Mitch, but two other people as well.

“Y/N, I’d like you to meet Claudio and Mia. They’re going to be cooking dinner for us all tonight,” Harry says to introduce you. You shake their hands and say hello and you realize the date Harry has planned.

It’s perfect. A wonderfully cooked Italian meal here at the villa. There’s no risk of you all being spotted or overheard, and you’re free to have a true first date. If you’d all gone out, then you’d have to be careful about everything you say and do, but that’s not the case here.

The four of you make your way out to the patio and immediately open a bottle of wine, Harry filling everyone’s glasses. A few minutes later Mia brings out the first appetizer, a caprese salad that must be made with the freshest ingredients you’ve ever tasted. Next, she brings out a fig and goat cheese crostini, some of which are topped with prosciutto that makes your mouth water.

Dinner is just as delicious, homemade pasta topped with a sauce that is both decadent and light, bursting with flavor. After dinner, while you’re sharing the second bottle of wine, Claudio and Mia come out one last time. They inform you all that they are heading home, and dessert is plated in the kitchen whenever you’re ready.

You thank them profusely, telling them how much you loved everything, and Harry walks them out. He comes back and the four of you are once again alone. While dinner conversation had been quite casual, everyone learning more about each other, it starts to get a bit deeper.

“How exactly will this all work?” Harry asks.

“Well, obviously communication is the most important thing here,” Sarah replies. “Everyone needs to be honest and open about anything they’re feeling. If we hide things from each other that will create problems.”

“And what about publicly? We can’t really go and tell the fans all four of us are together.”

Mitch answers this time saying, “No but we could just say that you and Y/N are together. She’s been seen enough with us, people probably have assumed by now she’s our friend. You’d say we introduced the two of you and you hit it off. And because she’s our friend it would make sense for all of us to be seen together.”

“Lots of double dates in our future,” Sarah says with a wink.

Harry turns to you and asks, “Are you okay with that? Dating me publicly?”

“I am. I know that it’ll probably come with some pushback from fans and things like that, but I really think this could work. And we’ll all be happy.” Harry leans in, pressing his lips to yours. It’s innocent enough and first, just a couple of quick pecks.

He pulls back and his eyes meet yours. There’s a moment where he watches you, his gaze intense, and the next thing you know his lips are back on you. Even though the kiss is firm, his lips feel wonderfully soft against yours as he takes control of the kiss. You feel his hand move to your thigh and you gasp, opening your mouth and allowing for his tongue to enter.

“Maybe we should head inside,” Mitch suggests. You bite back a whine as Harry pulls away, already missing the feeling of his lips. Everyone stands and heads inside to the bedroom. It honestly should feel weird, the group of you moving in near silence, but the energy is one of excited anticipation.

You pause once inside the room, unsure of what to do next. There are so many options, too many choices, and you do not want to be the one making any. You look to Mitch, who sees the hesitation from all of you, and he takes control of the situation.

“Harry and Y/N, lay next to each other,” he says. You both follow his directions as he turns to speak with Sarah. You’re only left wondering what their plan is for a moment before they also climb on the bed, Mitch straddling Harry while Sarah does the same to you.

She leans in to kiss you, her tongue sliding in immediately. She swallows the whine you let out, and all you can think of is her. It’s been over a month, and you’ve missed them all so much, you’ve been starving for their touches.

After a little while (truly you have no idea how long) you feel Mitch’s hand pick yours up and he places it on Harry’s thigh. A second later you feel Harry’s hand on you. It starts moving higher on your leg, sliding under your skirt. Sarah shifts only so that you can spread your legs a bit but continues to keep her lips on yours.

Harry’s hand moves again, this time to press two fingers to your clit over your underwear and you’re gasping in pleasure at this touch alone. You automatically grab his thigh and realize that your hand hasn’t moved since Mitch placed it there. You decide to follow Harry’s lead and slide it up his thigh. You and Harry let out matching moans as you finally grip Harry’s hard length over his shorts.

You feel Harry pull away for a second before he slips his fingers under your panties to touch you directly. Your eyes roll back at the feeling of being touched so intimately. Summoning confidence that you didn’t know you possess, you slide your hand under his layers of clothing. There’s a moment where you hesitate, unsure if it’s okay to touch him directly. He senses your inner debate and guides your hand to his cock, letting you know it’s absolutely okay with him.

You grip your fist around his length and pump him a few times. The noises he makes only turn you on more. Your other hand travels down to Sarah’s leg, and you move under her skirt and waste no time sliding your fingers into her underwear to rub through her folds.

She’s soaking, and you easily push two fingers inside her.

“Fuck, Y/N,” she moans before starting to leave love bites along your neck. She pulls back and looks to her side, saying, “Mitch, switch with me.”

He gives Harry one last deep kiss before pulling away from him. Sarah gently pushes your fingers out of her so she can move to Harry’s lap. “Are you clean?” she asks him as they help each other out of their clothes.

“Yes, got checked a couple weeks ago, haven’t been with anyone since.”

“Good,” she says, running her entrance above the tip of his cock. “Is this okay?” she asks him.

“Please, yes,” he practically begs, and she sinks onto him. You’re watching them so intently that you don’t notice Mitch at first. That changes the second he pulls your panties off and his hard cock grazes your sensitive clit.

He brings his hand to your entrance, pushing in one finger at a time to open you and ensure you’re ready for him. A moment later his fingers are gone and you feel his cock lining up. His eyes meet yours in a silent question and you nod your head, wrapping your legs to bring him closer to tell him that you want this, want him desperately.

He slowly pushes inside you and you let out a broken moan at the feeling of being filled for the first time in over a month. You pull Mitch’s face down to yours, having realized that you’ve barely had the chance to kiss him all weekend, and you need to remedy that immediately.

The time that follows is both blissful, and a bit confusing. Everyone’s hands are traveling over any limb they can find, kisses being pressed against any bit of bare skin.

You and Harry are the first to come, nearly simultaneously while his tongue is sliding against yours. A moment later you hear the cries that can only mean Sarah has followed the two of you. Finally, you feel Mitch’s thrusts stutter as he finishes inside you.

Everyone comes down from their high, Sarah pulling off and laying next to Harry. Mitch moves to pull out of you but you hold him close and whisper, “Not yet, please.”

“Okay, baby, I’m here,” he answers, leaning down so that you can tuck your face into his neck. After a couple minutes you release your hold on him. Sarah has already snuck out to grab a couple of damp washcloths from the bathroom and she helps everyone clean up.

You all get ready for bed, checking in that everyone is okay with what just happened. Not one of you has any complaints or uncomfortable feelings, and you fall asleep content that the four of you will work just fine together.

The rest of the week in Italy is absolutely perfect. Your group has plenty of time to spend together and your personalities fit together wonderfully. There are a few more discussions regarding the dynamics of the relationship which helps you all feel secure with one another.

During the middle of the week Harry rents out a couple of boats and you all spend the day on the water. Gemma and a few others join you and it is absolute perfection.

At one point Harry wanders to the kitchen area and a moment later Sarah follows him. While he’s been enjoying the day as much as everyone else, she can tell he’s bothered by something and is determined out figure out what it is.

They talk for a few minutes while making drinks for everyone, and after a beat of silence Sarah finally asks, “What is it Harry?”

“Not sure what you mean. I’m fine.”

“No you’re not love, something’s bothering you.”

He takes a deep breath and says, “I know there’s paparazzi watching us. And other people are here. And I guess I am used to hiding a lot of my life but this time feels different. I don’t want to hide our relationship.”

Sarah places a comforting hand on his arm and says, “I completely understand. I know it’s not ideal that we can’t all be together publicly, but if you’re ready, nothing is stopping you from being with Y/N in front of the camera. Whatever comes from that, we’ll make it work.”

Harry smiles, eased by Sarah’s words of wisdom.

They walk back to the main area where the rest of you are hanging out and Harry sits down next to you, closer than he usually would in public. He wraps his arm around your shoulders, and you give him a look. He can tell that you’re confused by the gesture, but not mad or uncomfortable.

He leans in and quietly asks, “Would it be alright if I kissed you?”

“Of course you can.”

“I mean, in front of everyone. With paps watching over there.”

“Yes Harry. That’s perfectly fine with me,” you answer with a smile.

He cups your face, pulling you close to him. He hesitates with his lips mere centimeters away and you whisper “It’s okay, Harry.” A millisecond later his lips crash against yours. He presses firmly against you, a series of chaste kisses on your mouth, nose, and forehead. When you look up you see everyone watching the two of you.

Mitch and Sarah are looking over, warm smiles on their faces. After a beat, Gemma jumps up and rushes over to give the two of you a hug. “I told mum weeks ago you two would be perfect!”

The rest of the day is absolutely wonderful. After sailing in the sun for the afternoon you all head back for dinner at a beautiful restaurant.

You, Harry, Mitch, and Sarah get to the house just after sunset. Immediately you fall into bed, not wanting to waste another moment. You explore each other’s bodies once again. Harry proves without a shadow of a doubt that he is a gentleman, checking in with you constantly as he slides into you for the first time, stretching you more than you’ve ever been before.

As you’re all catching your breath, trying to readjust the mess of covers, you can’t help but start to giggle. It’s contagious and suddenly the four of you are laughing, though no one’s entirely sure why.

You finally calm down enough to say, “I can’t believe this is my life.”

“Well, believe it baby,” Harry says. “Because we’re not going anywhere.”

“Good.” You reply, shifting everyone so that you’re laying across all three of them. With your head on Mitch’s chest, torso being held by Harry, and legs tangling with Sarah, you fall asleep.

Your last thoughts of the night are about how indescribably happy you are that you’ve found your home and have started a perfect family.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

@akkatz @pandeebearstyles @walkingintheheartbreaksatellite @theekyliepage @numafarawayglxy @booberry019-blog @hillzrry @ssareidbby @gem1712 @acesofspadess @houseofdilfs @shaquille-0atmeal-1 @kissitnhekitchen @amateurduck @poguestyleskye

AN: Thank you again for reading this story! Can't wait to share more with you all!

[ddarker-dreams]

Hi Lock~ I wanted to ask you abt how you got into literature, and how you’d maybe recommend someone else to start? I want to expand on my reading (and also you’ve hyped up Dostoevsky sooo much I’m hooked but I KNOW I’m not at that lvl yet haha) but there’s so many different sources and stuff idrk where to start. I have seen your list of recommendations and other people’s lists as well but Im never sure if they’re a good place if someone is just starting into literature; I’ve been really interested in Picture of Dorian Gray, Jane Eyre and Frankenstein right now, do you think they’d be okay? Did you look at books you knew you’d be into? Or did you try out smth new entirely? Also did you look at any sources online that you could recommend? I know I’ve asked a lot so you of course don’t have to answer them, but please let me know what you think!!

I also wanted to ask, as someone who’s read many classics in literature, in your opinion, how would you define literature? And what do you think makes a book a classic?

From a very clueless anon, hope you and bun bun have a great day and stay hydrated!!!!

hello anon!!! there are so many interesting questions here, i'll try answering them to the best of my abilities!!!!

(how i got into literature)

i'd been neglecting published works for most of my life because i just preferred fanfic way more. it wasn't until a bit into 2021 that i saw this Discourse Causing Post that 'you can't grow as an author if you don't read published works,' or something among those lines. i thought this was really interesting because i'd never given it much thought. around that point, even though writing was a hobby, i felt really motivated to improve. i normally spent no more than a day or two on a story before moving onto the next. which is fine, because fanfic writing is a hobby, but i felt i'd be capable of more if i put in the extra time and effort.

so basically i got into it because i wanted to write my silly little yandere fics better jdfklgjsdg

(recommendations for getting into literature)

i focused on the genre i thought i'd be the most interested in: horror. then i branched out from there. i looked up what people considered must-reads for the genre because i figured that'd be a good place to start. if you know what sort of genres you like, doing some research into its most prevalent/foundational works isn't a bad idea. that's the approach i took. authors throughout the centuries influence and inspire one another, i wanted to be able to map those connections out. this also helps give some context to older books with references that'd be loss on a modern audience.

(how i went about looking into books to see if i wanted to read them)

i research everything like my life's on the line, so i do look into books before i read them. i go for a synopsis that doesn't include spoilers and consider if that's a story i'd get invested in. if not, i'll read some reviews for fresh perspectives. if i'm still kinda meh by then, the book gets passed on.

(defining literature/classics)

UHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH literary theory is not my field of expertise ... i'd personally define literature as any written work such as fiction and nonfiction. it can encompass so many things that defining it feels tricky. as for how i'd define a classic, all art is subjective or whatever, but there are stories that just have the It factor. whether that is their cultural impact, or works that are pillars to the genre(s) they were written in. you can see the ripples that it made after its publication.

finally, as for the books you listed (jane eyre, the picture of dorian gray, and frankenstein), i'd highly recommend them!!! all of them are apart of the gothic genre, which is one of my favorites. they've all stood the test of time for good reason.

[jiveyuncle]

Hi omg!!!!! I just saw the book you posted for TNAHP and I am dying! It looks GLORIOUS!!!!! Turned out so beautiful binded like that! And the art is absolutely stunning, may I ask what company printed it? Like what shop did you use? I’ve wanted to print certain stories just for myself so badly over the years but there are so many places and I can’t decide and this is exactly what I’ve been looking for!!!!! 😍😍😍 thank you so much for sharing!

Hi, anon! Thank you! 💕 I was so happy getting to hold it and put it up on my shelf! Look!!! 😭💕

I want to preface everything I’m about to say with this: if you use a third party service to print any material (fics, art, art in fics, etc.) please, please, please reach out to the author/artist and get permission to use the service before printing! It doesn’t matter if someone else already has permission, make sure *you* have permission. Also consider if the art in the fic belongs to someone other than the writer (like if the work was a collaborative piece or if it features fanart of the fic) and get permission from them, too! You may have to wait for a response, or you may never get one (in which case, don’t print without permission), but it really is worth it to make sure the authors/artists feel comfortable and confident that they keep control over their own work.

This is the first service I’ve used, and I have no experience binding, so I’m just sharing what I did and what I noticed with my untrained eye.

First, the service I used is Barnes and Noble Press. Here’s a link:

You can make books publicly for sale or books strictly private for personal use. If printing fanfic, be certain that you are creating a “personal” print. It will appear like this in your projects section (note the “PERSONAL” banner above the cover art):

As you can see - the price is pretty decent as far as books go! After tax, shipping, and handling costs, this book turned out to be $21.82.

You can choose how you want to customize the materials your book is made up of. Different materials cost different amounts (i.e. printing color pages inside is going to increase your price a lot). If you don’t know where to start, here’s the preference settings I selected for my copy:

Now, understand that they are not editing your book for you - you’re still going to have to do all the formatting and arranging in a document yourself and designing your own cover (so be prepared to still spend a lot of time on this project). They simply print and physically put all the pieces together for you.

Lastly, I want to address quality. While this is far better quality than I could manage on my own, it’s still not 100% up to quality of most books I can purchase in a store. For comparison, I’ll show a couple side-by-side images of the fic print next to my favorite published book, The Raven Boys by Maggie Stiefvater.

Dust jacket: Feels great! Literally no complaints.

The hard cover: A bit cheaper feeling. Definitely noticeable difference with a printed visual texture instead of real texture. The printed texture creased and wore away to reveal the white beneath. It’s visible here after just a few openings of the book. Also, unfortunately, you cannot customize the hardcover under the dust jacket, so no spine labels and you’re stuck with this color blue:

Finally, my biggest concern, the binding of the pages: looks a lot more like a paperback that had its cover glued onto a hardcover than an actual standard hardcover. Again, I’m no expert and idk if that’s normal, what anything is called, or how this affects the lifespan of the book, but you can even see where the spine kinda hovers away from the hardcover casing and how that compares to the The Raven Boys.

Anyway, the service isn’t perfect, no, but it works for what I wanted, looks nice, is user friendly, and allows me to hold a fic I otherwise never would have had the opportunity to. I appreciate it for that.

Hope this was helpful! Print responsibly 😊

[sp-high-au]

OOC Info Yapping😔

Hey! Welcome to my little shitstorm of an au! Obviously I’m gonna talk about it for a little bit because I never learn when to stfu and I feel like there’s a couple of things that I need to bring up to tie the whole thing together.

So this layout is kinda new to me. Technically is a roleplay but also at the same time there’s not gonna be any interaction with other rp blogs. Y’all are more than welcome to rb for your own roleplays though. There’ll be plenty of random shitposts that can be taken out of context.

This blog is being made to mimic an old school website. Y’know the ones where there’s an interactive wall for the students to post on? Yeah that. The post on this blog are going to be a mix of three things (technically four but I don’t think my ooc/admin posts really count).

ANNOUNCEMENT POSTS: Announcement posts are going to be used in place of actual posts for a site admin. Most of the time they’re going to be for lore drops that aren’t really relevant but are kinda fun to put into the storyline. For example: a background character or a character who isn’t that relevant to the story arcs birthday.

WALL POSTS: These wall posts are supposed to be posted “by students.” Once again they’re going to be used to drop more lore crumbs because high schoolers gossip a ridiculous amount and I think it’s funny.

FIC POSTS: The final type of posts are going to be fic posts! These will be link drops to my ao3. The fics will contain the main lore/arcs. They’ll also be reblogged to my main.

This story has odd publishing schedule to say the least. There are twenty-two story arcs. The storyline itself starts September 2nd 2024 and ends June 18th 2026. Each story is also planned to be posted on an accurate date, like in real time.

One arc is equal to one month. For example Arc 1: Intro to The Losers Club, takes place throughout September. The first official fic is going to be labeled like this on any master list: 1.1: (INSERT TITLE HERE). These works will either be oneshots or multi chapters. Any multi chapter will be split into “parts” like if a multi chapter is four chapters in total and there’s only two chapter total it’ll be labeled simply like this: 2/4.

Also there are some darker themes in these stories! Firstly, it’s high school. What high schooler doesn’t have issues? Secondly, it’s South Park and that itself is pretty self explanatory. And finally, I’m fucking delusional and think it’s funny.

Speaking of me though, HI!!! If you’re a mutual on my main who’s stumbled upon this mess, yes it’s Clouded. If you don’t know know who I am you can find me at my main: @justyourtypicalwriter where I am much more active and my posts are very much unplanned, unlike this blog. It’s become a favorite project of mine in the short time I’ve been working on it though and I hope you grow to enjoy it as much as I do!

Here’s one of my many, many picrews of myself that I normally use as pfps because I have a problem and that was a lot of writing💀

BUT I’M STILL YAPPING BECAUSE YOU MAY BE ASKING:

“Oh Clouded what are the ships in this au?”

And to my rare pair lovers I say:

“You’re eatin’ good tonight bbg😘”

Because as much as a Style girlie I am, there are SO MANY absolutely amazing rare pairs that get such little recognition. I know how excited I get when I see a rare pair in a popular fic or comic so there’s some food for my fellow rare pair lovers.

SHIPS:

K2

Staig

Weidi

Tyde

Dip

Rebstella

Gregstophe

Jimmy/Nichole (what’s their ship name y’all)

There’s probably more but I can’t think of any lmao-

HAPPY READING!!!

[em-dash-press]

How Traditional Publishing Works for Short Stories

You’ve written a short story and want it to reach readers, but you’re tired of combing through contests. Don’t worry—there’s a path to traditional publishing for short stories and you can follow it to build your writing resume with these steps.

1. Polish Your Work

Reviewing your story before submitting it is crucial. One or two typos may not disqualify you from getting accepted for publishing, but it could make the publisher pause.

Read through your work out loud to catch the tiny line edits that our eyes often skip over.

Ask a friend or family member to read it. A fresh pair of eyes on your work is priceless!

Use a text-to-speech reader to catch typos. You may hear the spelling errors more clearly, so try a site like this one: https://www.naturalreaders.com/online/

You can also use the spell check within your preferred writing software. It may not catch every spelling or tense-usage error, but it’s still helpful.

2. Research Publications

Longer manuscripts would normally look for publishing houses or imprints, but short stories just need publications.

Imagine the publishing world as an umbrella. Publishing houses are the fabric of the umbrella and imprints are the metal arms making the fabric extend. Imprints are subsections of publishing houses. Publications are like the stem and handle of an umbrella. They’re mostly independently owned, so that’s where you’ll find things like:

Literary magazines

Literary Journals

Ezines

Some are run by small groups of people who love making things like short-story anthologies and others will be professionally run magazines or journals with wide distribution. Your work may qualify for all of these publications depending on the length, topic, and what each publication is looking for.

3. Submit Your Work

Personally, I think finding the right places to submit your work is the most challenging part of publishing any story. There are an overwhelming number of places to consider. You might never learn about all of them!

Luckily, I’ve found a few tools to streamline the process.

Chill Subs is my current favorite site to find publications seeking short stories. You can find their site here: https://chillsubs.com/

This is what their homepage looks like—I’m breathing a sigh of relief just seeing it that encouraging welcome!

Once you make your free account (which is what allows you to track your submissions, results, etc.), you’ll find this page when you’re ready to start browsing:

It may seem like a lot, but selecting publication types and finding places that specifically want things like a spooky vibe or a quick response time makes submitting your work so much faster.

Just below this browsing section, you’ll find a list of publications if you just want to select a few without the filters. Here’s a screenshot of the first one I found:

There’s a great summary of the magazine and everything you need to know, like the facts that they have a super fast response time, don’t require a submission fee, and even their acceptance rate!

If you scroll further down under a publisher, you’ll find other invaluable information like:

Normally, you’d have to find all of these things by searching a publication’s website and recent published work. It would take much more time and you might not find what you’re looking for (I struggle when I’m too tired or distracted). Chill Subs will connect you to publications super quickly and easily, without charging a dime!

Next, I also like The Grinder, which you can find here: https://thegrinder.diabolicalplots.com/

Here’s what their homepage looks like:

This site is better for people who are more data driven! Right beneath the top of their homepage, you can automatically see the stats for The Grinder users who recently got accepted or rejected. At the time that I wrote this post, the people in the screenshot below had numerous rejections. I find it encouraging to see stuff like this because it’s a reminder that rejections happen to everyone. It’s just a matter of finding the right place for your work!

If you select “Search” on the top of the homepage, you’ll get a dropdown menu for things like searching for fiction or poetry submissions, plus publishers listed in alphabetical order.

For the purpose of this post, I’ve selected “Historical” as my imaginary story I’d like to submit. There are many other genres in the box if you keep scrolling. Here’s what the start of this process looks like:

Hit “Search” and this comes up:

Right away you’ll see what each place pays, which genres and lengths they accept and their response time. I’ve clicked on the first publisher and found this data:

Enjoy using the charts and data to gauge where your stories should go! There are many publications working with The Grinder, so there’s tons to search through as you get a feel for what’s out there.

Other potential places to submit your work: 

Submittable: https://manager.submittable.com/opportunities/discover (You’ll need to have submitted to a contest that uses Submittable to make an account, but the Discover tab has many publications organized by closest deadlines.)

Your university literary journals (if you’re a university student—most only accept work from students enrolled in that school, but it’s a major perk if you’re paying tuition because you won’t have to pay to send your work off!)

Local literary journals (many only accept work from writers who live nearby, which narrows down your competition).

4. Keep Track of Your Submissions

If you’re submitting more than one or two stories at a time, it’s best to keep a spreadsheet that tracks your submissions. As your writing career continues, you’ll always be able to reflect on which stories you submitted and where they went. It’s a great way to see how your writing has grown and note which publications you liked the most/had the most success with.

My submissions spreadsheet contains labeled columns for things like:

Date of submission

The story’s title

The page length/word count

The genre

The publication mae

The publication type

URL of publication if applicable

Final date of submissions

Date of notice if one is given

Potential prize money if applicable

Rejection or acceptance when notified

Some places only want unpublished writers, but most only want stories that haven't been previously published or placed in contest results. Keeping track of which stories receive prizes/publications makes it much easier to submit qualifying works in the future.

5. Evaluate Your Publishing Contract

Many publishers require writers to sign a contract so the legal reality of the transaction is clear to both parties. This happens for both short stories and long form work. You’ll have to review things like:

Allowing them to have print rights (typically worldwide because things are published online)

Allowing them to publish your picture and bio that is usually included in the submission form

Allowing them exclusivity (you may need to wait a specific time period before submitting the same story to other publishers/contests or selling it on your website)

Agreeing to author’s warranties (this means you agree that you wrote the story, it isn’t plagiarized, it isn’t libelous, and you don’t want it to be public domain)

Agreeing to a termination clause (the publisher typically reserves the right to terminate your publication contract for things like discovering plagiarism, getting sued for libel, if you sell the story to another publication within their exclusive time frame, etc.)

Agreeing to a reversion of rights clause (you’ll get all of the above rights to sell/submit the story if the publisher doesn’t get your story published by the deadline included in your contract)

Agreeing to payment terms (if you’ll be paid based on how many magazine copies are sold, based on your word/page count, or if you’ll get a flat fee). Also, how you’ll get paid (in installments, within a time frame after publication, via direct deposit or check).

A big thing to note—if a publisher doesn’t include a reversion of rights clause, they essentially want to lock your story within their publishing company permanently. You’ll never get the rights back for submitting or publishing it elsewhere. That includes if you write a collection of short stories and want to publish an anthology—you wouldn’t get to include the story taken by the original publisher.

It’s very important to know your rights as a writer before submitting.

You can read more about contract details over at Writing Cooperative.

And you can always look through Writer Beware, which tracks scams and legitimate publication opportunities.

-----

Hopefully this helps you get started with your next venture in getting published! The process doesn’t have to feel as confusing as it often does. Best of luck! 💛

[jolapeno]

Hey Jo, I hope you don’t mind me asking you this but I wondered how you deal with fic popularity (both having and watching others)?? I’m struggling with feeling bad and just wanting to quit. If this feels uncomfortable to answer don’t worry xx

hi anon! i'm sorry you're struggling a bit and feeling bad, just wanna give you a hug! i don't know if i'm the best person to ask this, but i'm gonna give this a little go.

as a concept, i try to remind myself not to get bogged down with numbers, because they're a fickle thing. they change with the wind, sun and the rain. because your worth isn't equated to your notes/followers/popularity.

it's important to remember that there are times fics will do really well because of the tropes, the pairing, the timing - and not the quality of your work. you can sometimes just write one thing and it gains traction, and another time write something in the same style, and it doesn't. the other thing is, some fics grow. they take time to bloom and find their audience, and that's okay too.

fandoms are also different sizes. so you can never compare numbers on numbers, because in one fandom the people reading/engaging may be different to another.

i think i did a post on this a while ago - but my tags are all wonky so i can't find it (watch me find it when this posts) so i can't link it.

but, i know it's super easy for me to say "don't get bogged with numbers", and "try to focus on how you felt writing it" but somedays, even i look at things and wonder to myself what i've done wrong. it's normal, natural - i'm sharing something, and i'm critical and i want to deliver good things to lovely people like you. however, i think you'd tell me that my worth is also not attached to my followers, my notes or my popularity. but it's easy to tell someone else that, than yourself.

and, more importantly, me delivering good things doesn't equate to notes. sometimes, what someone else loves and thinks is a 10/10 is going to be different to another.

because what makes fandom so cool and good, is that it's varied.

people want different things. people write different things. and i preach this far too much, but you just need to find your people - or if you have, give them time. some people are snowed under with tbr's and others are trying to bury their issues in writing (talking about myself here), and others are just trying to juggle too much that their tumblr is less active.

the main thing i hope you takeaway, other than your worth not being a number, is that you have to find and remember why you love what you do. and if you don't know or can't remember, remind yourself.

go back through your work and read it - preferably in a different browser or something (so it looks different to you) and enjoy your own writing. pick out quotes, bask in what you've created. you are your first fan, the person you should write for first. so, be a fan. celebrate yourself. give yourself a pat on the back or a high five, because look, it's fucking hard creating, and it's even harder sharing it. and on top of that, fighting imposter syndrome is hard, fighting dark clouds and rainy days is hard. it is. i can't pretend it isn't.

i can't pretend it doesn't hurt when you stare at your published piece and your brain begins to wonder what you went wrong (for whatever reason that is, whether it's numbers or just something else). because it's normal to look for validation that you did a great thing and it hurts when you don't get it. but, you have to curate your experience - you have to do the things above:

remind yourself you're worth is more than a number

love what you do first. i recommended to someone/people recently to copy some of their fave lines into a document when they're editing so they can be like "fuck yeah, i did that"

also @trulybetty pointed this out to me (and it's been a god send) but on mobile (and on desktop but it's messier) you can filter out your activity. on the top left there's "all activity" but if you click it, you can filter out likes, mentions etc. and for me, i've filtered out likes, which means i can see more of the comments, reblogs (with the hashtags) and mentions - so not only do i not miss anything, but also i'm seeing more of the things that make me smile. it's not a slight on likes, but sometimes it hides all the good things that get buried.

i hope in some small way some of this is nice, and it helps. but if not, just remember you're not alone, we're all human, and you deserve to be here, and pls, pls continue writing and don't quit.

[taiyaki-translations]

Autumn Cafeteria - Prologue 1

Season: Autumn Characters: Shu, Tsumugi Translator: taiyaki-translations Proofreader: raspberrytls

Shu: —You there, waiter, may I get another cup of coffee?

(Whew… It’s nice to sit back and read every once in a while.)

(The library at Starmony Dorms isn’t terrible, but it sometimes gets so noisy that I find it difficult to relax.)

(With classical music gently playing in the background, this makes for a blissful experience, indeed.)

Tsumugi: Oh? Is that you, Shu-kun?

Shu: …If it isn’t Aoba.

Tsumugi: Sorry for suddenly calling out to you. Were you taking a nap?

Shu: No. I was simply closing my eyes and enjoying the music.

Tsumugi: Ahh. I’m familiar with this piano piece. It has a nice, melancholy feeling to it, doesn’t it~

Shu: This isn’t the place for you to stand around and talk, Aoba. Why don’t you take a seat for now?

Tsumugi: You’re right. Since this is a rare opportunity, is it okay if I sit with you?

Shu: …Personally, I’d much rather you didn’t.

However, being spoken to from a distance is even more unpleasant. Do as you like.

Tsumugi: Thank you very much. …Ah, the waiter brought you more coffee.

May I order something too? I’ll have the same coffee, and five loaves of round bread to go, please.

Shu: Five? Do you like them that much?

Tsumugi: No, I’m giving them away. (1) The round bread here is well received no matter what kind of function I bring them to.

The dough is soft and chewy, and the sweetness comes out the more you bite into it, so you don’t need to add anything to it.

Shu: Oh? This is the first I’ve heard of it. I’ve been here several times but never paid it much mind.

Tsumugi: Really? Then please, give it a try ♪

Wai~ter, please bring him some round bread. You can put it on my tab—

Shu: There’s no need. Since I’ll be the one eating it, I’ll pay for it myself.

Tsumugi: Is that so? And here I thought it would be a good opportunity for me to…

Shu: Good opportunity for what?

Tsumugi: Ah, no, it’s nothing.

What kind of book are you reading? It’s paper-back-sized, so is it some kind of novel?

Shu: It’s a recently published book containing commentaries on Shakespeare’s works. It seems to be popular amongst literary scholars for its interesting interpretations, so I was curious to see what it was like.

Tsumugi: Oh, so Shu-kun reads books like that too~ But doesn’t it interfere with your artistic vision?

Shu: It depends on the content. The internet is a place where people can make vulgar posts that have as much value as stones on the side of a road. But books like this depict the sort of high quality views I wish to absorb.

They say art is an explosion, but an explosion requires a catalyst—the accumulation of one’s studies and the skills one has honed.

By combining them, they take on form. Ideally, one could create something out of nothingness. But alas, I am not some kind of god, after all.

Tsumugi: ……♪

Shu: …What’s with that face? It’s disturbing.

Tsumugi: Fufu. Normally you’re so distant with me, Shu-kun, that I’m just glad to have your company ♪ It’s been a while since I’ve been able to talk about trivial things like this with you~

Shu: I beg your pardon? Trivial? …Listen here, Aoba. I was in a good mood today, so I allowed you to sit with me.

But you are a spiteful traitor. I advise you not to try and get too familiar with me.

Tsumugi: How cold~ Even though we’re friends?

Shu: Non, do not get the wrong idea.

Tsumugi: Ah, the round bread’s arrived~ Here you go, please try it.

Shu: I’d rather you not rush me. Hm, so it’s served with fig jam?

Tsumugi: Why don’t you try it without the jam first?

Shu: I was just about to do that. Stop talking for a moment.

Munch munch…

…Oh? The buttery aroma is quite nice.

The sweetness of the sugar is also just right. This flavor would go well with any dish.

Tsumugi: Fufu, I’m glad to hear you say so ♪

Actually, I was looking forward to your reaction. You love croissants, so I figured you would like this too.

But I was surprised to hear you’ve never had it. Do you not eat any bread other than croissants?

Shu: It just never crossed my mind to try it. I actually happened upon this place while I was looking for stores that sold croissants.

While I didn’t find what I was looking for, I liked the atmosphere. I’ve been coming back ever since.

It’s a hidden gem that’s empty even on weekends or holidays. It’s the ideal place for when you are looking for some peace and quiet.

Tsumugi: I know what you mean. Just looking out the window with a cup of coffee is a nice change of pace.

So it's such a shame that this café is going to be closing~

Translation Notes: 1. Tsumugi is bringing the bread as 差し入れ (shashiire), refreshments you'd bring to work or activities as a way to encourage people or help them recharge after working.

Directory | Next

[utilitycaster]

I feel like something so many ppl just don’t get is it’s improv. I’ll see ppl be like “I hate this arc” or “this dragged on” I’m like?? If you want to watch a curated tight fantasy story with a normal beginning middle and end maybe don’t watch long form improv media? Also maybe I’m just fundamentally misunderstanding what ur post is about. I’ll constantly think and say “it’s their game” not as a “they’re above criticism” way but more in a “cmon it’s not like this is a script that’s being poured over by ten ppl sitting in a room debating whether this 30 seconds drags or not”. Like I love Play it By Ear from Dropout but I’d never hold it to the same standard as like Six the musical or whatever. Improv/normal media requires a completely different rule set for criticism imo

Hey anon,

So here's the thing - I agree with this in terms of formal, published criticism (Ebert's Law, if you will) where you are, to an extent, grading on a scale; you should be judging on what the work is trying to achieve and not some abstract ideal that applies equally to all works regardless of provenance.

However, for personal discussion (including your own personal Tumblr blog)? This is totally irrelevant. You're allowed to dislike things, whether it's a 30 minute improvised musical or whether it's the Marriage of Figaro, for any reason. It is 100% valid for someone to look at the Mona Lisa and say "eh, doesn't do it for me," and, moreover, it's just as valid for them to say "it doesn't do it for me because I don't care for representative art and prefer abstract, modern works, but Da Vinci's sfumato technique is indeed masterful" as to say "It doesn't do it for me because it's fucking weird to me that she doesn't have eyebrows." People's enjoyment of a work is not necessarily reliant on effort put in or how much the artist cares about - it should be based on how much the art appeals to them.

It's fine if people hate an arc. If they hate it so much that they aren't able to enjoy watching, then I think they should probably stop watching...but that's a choice for them to make, and as someone who loves complaining, I've talked about arcs dragging and had it interpreted by total strangers as "you clearly seem to hate this" when really it was just a case of me...not liking some aspects of a larger whole, and choosing to talk about that because I had things to say. Like, I do think the early Campaign 3 pacing was deeply frustrating, and I do think that this wouldn't be the case if it weren't improv, but there have been many improv actual plays that I felt had great pacing, and also it was still frustrating to me and I wanted to express that.

In fact, what I was getting at in my post is that if you're trying to provide a counterpoint to other people's criticism, you need to focus on the points they're making; and if you're trying to defend something in general, you need to be talking about what you find good that is specific to that thing, rather than making excuses like "the cast likes it" or "it's improv".

To give an example: I love the Aeor arc, which was, to an extent, divisive. Here's two responses I could have:

"I think the Aeor arc built up to a satisfying and emotionally charged final boss fight that was thematically resonant with the Mighty Nein as a group. I think the path there had a good balance of adventure, combat, and RP scenes, especially given its position as the final arc of the campaign and the one in which many of the character romances were realized. Eiselcross was a fun and well-crafted environment that was challenging for a party of their level, and Aeor provided new insight into the Calamity, which at the time had not been explored in depth, while also providing a lot of opportunities to tie into the arcs of the various individual characters, notably Caleb and Caduceus. I also personally am a big fan of exploring fallen technologically advanced civilizations in a fantasy setting as a trope."

2. "Well, it's the cast's table, and it's improvised."

Both are true, but the first one lets people know what I see in that arc and why I love it. The second one ends the conversation, is true of almost everything Critical Role does, probably doesn't address anyone else's complaints, and doesn't even explain why I like it. And for what it's worth I don't think meta needs to address anyone's complaints - you're allowed to look at the Aeor arc and say "cool, I think it took too long and dragged and was too stressful" and we can part ways knowing we are different people with different tastes. But if I were, hypothetically, passionately trying to defend the Aeor arc and were openly resentful towards people who disliked it, the first option is obviously superior to the second option, which makes me look like someone who cannot come up with a single specific reason why this thing I allegedly love is good, and who is whining because I lack the maturity to accept that my opinions are not universally shared by all.

[intrepidacious]

time after time: reread edition [1]

series summary: After what starts out as a fairly normal mission, you find yourself stuck in a time loop. Which would already be bad enough in itself if it didn’t also mean having to watch Bucky die over and over again.

pairing: bucky barnes x f!reader

word count: 6.0k

chapter warnings: canon-typical violence, accidentally starting a time loop, banter, pretty angsty to start us off with ngl, reminder to read the fic premise. please note that my blog is rated 18+. minors dni. ageless/empty blogs will be blocked without warning.

read the full chapter here | series masterlist | reread masterlist

wouldn't you know it, it's friday already!! this is a reread of already published chapters, so if you're new to this story, i would highly suggest not starting here and reading the actual story first. please be aware that by clicking the read more you're gonna see spoilers for chapter one 💚

how it started

welcome to the reread. i'm pretty sure this is the part of the post i'll only do once, but we'll see how it goes.

i swear to god, i only wanted to write a fun little time loop fic. it was never supposed to be this huge thing; it just kept growing. it's two years later now and i'm still writing—granted, that's after taking several long breaks because this story gives me headaches like no other, but still. i've never poured this much love into one story, i think.

and we can all blame russian doll for it.

turn back the clock – tl;dr

we start with a mission. sam, bucky and the reader, soon-to-be nicknamed twelve, are checking up on a secret lab. against all odds, bucky gets killed right before the fight seems to be won. twelve uses her time powers to prevent this from happening, loses consciousness and wakes up in her bed earlier that day. she goes through the entire day again, thinking her reset worked as intended, only for bucky to die in a different situation during the same mission and her waking up in her bed again.

behind the loop

welcome to my first running commentary on my own story. you’re gonna be sick of me really soon.

depending on how new you are to this story, you might not know that the chapter titles are all taken from movies. sadly i haven't seen most of them but the ones i have seen do feature a little in one way or another. more about that when we get to that point, though. the title cards for this story were also so fun to make because i just recoloured the actual movie posters!!

i’m gonna be honest with you, i keep forgetting that this first flashback exists. but i lowkey love it?? i like how it sets the tone for the angst that’s stitched into the very fabric of this story while simultaneously being juxtaposed with the first actual, very blunt introduction of our main cast.

the start of that mission was one of the first things i ever wrote for this fic, but the whole transition from the upstairs lab to downstairs and the actual fight scene were the last parts before posting.

“Do you think I’d pass up the opportunity to hear the two of you scream in terror when the vampire puppets creep up on you?” “Gotta disappoint you, cap,” you grin and wait for him to check the map. “I only scream when there’s good reason.” “I don’t wanna interrupt,” Bucky interrupts over the intercom, “but they’re heading your way now, so get a move on.”

writing banter is one of my all-time favourite activities. i also already knew at this point that i was gonna write a lot of it over and over again, and so i needed to vary the interjections in order to not bore everyone to bits. i like to think it worked out, but you tell me.

my beloved nightmare flashmob was such a fun antagonist to include. they will be named in the next chapter but if there are comic readers among you, i feel like i have to apologise because i definitely haven’t read enough of them to properly do these guys justice. they did seem like a logical step up from the version of the flag smasher(s) we encountered in tfatws, though. plus, there’s just enough of them to be a realistic threat to three very capable superheroes.

And then his eyes glaze over. You scream.

i’m so evil lmao

You wake up with a start to the sun in your face and FRIDAY blasting The All-American Rejects at full volume.

spoiler alert, you’ll encounter that sentence a couple of times. and i still love it. fun fact, i genuinely set my playlist to shuffle to decide on the song that was going to play to wake her up, and this was the one i landed on. and i couldn’t have come up with a better choice. honestly, look at the lyrics and tell me i’m wrong. i love how things work out sometimes.

originally, the decision to set the story on july 4th was very practical because i needed my available settings to be limited. this isn’t punxsutawney, pennsylvania in the middle of a snowstorm, this is new york city after the blip. i wanted our characters to have at least somewhat limited options what to do during their ever-repeating day. (on a sidenote, do you think we’ll ever see avengers compound again in the mcu? how long are they going to rebuild that thing? anyway.)

“Feels a little … déjà-vu-y.” “I know the type,” Sam says. “Wanna talk about it?” You do. But the time stuff is your problem to deal with, and so you shake your head.

isn’t it great to have a full ensemble of characters who absolutely will not talk about their feelings to each other? (derogatory) is it more interesting from a narrative point of view? … i suppose.

i love twelve’s rings though. are they entirely useless for the duration of this loop? maybe. but i love that she has them to physically show her how stuck she is <3 other things that i love: bucky calling sam bud. it just makes sense.

A surge of emptiness goes through you, unlike anything you’ve ever felt before. Time seems to still for just the blink of an eye as Bucky’s head is thrown forwards.

and there we have it. ✨dread.✨ this is such an evil way to end a chapter, wow. i had fun, though. was it fun for you?

how it's going

well, actually. i've been writing chapter seven as well as a secret bonus chapter this week, and i've made reasonable progress on both which i'm quite proud of. i really hope i can report that i got started on chapter eight this time next week, but we'll see. i think the worst of my writer's block is gone, at least. and all it took was a little self-indulgence and an external deadline. who'd have thunk.

if you made it to this point of my rambles, thank you. lmk how i can keep these interesting for you to read, and if you have any questions about the story, you know where to find me!! also: please please please consider leaving a comment or a reblog on the actual chapter. it would mean the world 💚

[out-of-the-forest-i-come]

On book piracy

This post is probably going to be a long one, and I hope it reaches people. I’m not here to be aggressive and yell at people who do or don’t condone book piracy. This post is mostly meant to be informational, so please, if book piracy is something that interests you or that you engage in, do bear with me until the end. And if you wish to oppose arguments at the end of this post, you are welcome to do so in a civil manner (I can’t guarantee I’ll answer you because I have a lot of things going on at the moment, but if you are hateful I guarantee you I will not answer you either way). 

As a disclaimer and so you know where I am coming from, I would like to inform you I am not in the publishing industry and have never been, but I am a writer and hope to one day be able to be traditionally published. As such, I have done rather extensive research on publishing and inevitably, on book piracy, how authors are paid, and how piracy affects authors. I obviously don’t know all the details of how the industry works, but I know the rough structure of it (this information is easily available online if you want to check) and I believe it is enough to write this post. I’m also a student and don’t come from a rich family. While I am not poor and don’t have to worry about having a roof on my head or food on my plate, and while I am lucky enough to live in a country where I don’t have to worry about being arrested for the kind of content I consume, I am still not able to buy all the books I want to read. On top of that, I nowadays read almost solely in english, while living in a non-english-speaking country, which means I can’t have access to english books through my local libraries at all. 

That being said, I also want to tell you I used to pirate books. In fact, the last time I downloaded a book illegally was only a few months ago. I have downloaded hundreds of books this way (and, frankly, not read a great deal of them). I started during quarantine (I was in highschool at the time) because I wanted to read books I did not have and that I did not want to pay for them. My parents knew and did not care. My arguments to justify it to myself were that I could not afford to buy all the books I wanted to read, that I could not get them through the local library, that I was only one person and it would hurt no one, and that if I liked the book I would buy it anyway. I can only speak for myself, of course, but out of the books I read illegally and enjoyed, I only bought a few in the end. Because when I could afford to buy books, I chose to buy books I had not already read. 

The argument that I was only one person and would not hurt anyone was wrong. Did authors feel the difference when I stopped? No, because I am only one person and do not control everyone who downloads books illegally. But participating in book piracy, even just by myself, does make a difference, especially for small authors. And also because I did not hesitate to recommend this method of acquiring books to others (again, I can only speak for myself here, but I have seen enough posts on the Internet to know that people who pirate books tend to recommend that others do it too, which in the end has a great impact on the number of people who pirate books). 

The belief that it would not hurt anyone, that piracy has no real consequences because not enough people do it, was also wrong. First of all, because more and more people resort to piracy, and not all of them are poor or live in non-english-speaking countries. A growing number does it because it’s easy and they don’t want to spend money on books. Second of all, because I think we don’t realize how the publishing industry really works. I think a lot of us still have in mind an idealized way of functioning of the industry, or the old way of functioning. And it’s normal, because it’s a complex industry and no one ever bothers explaining to us how it works. 

I only started realizing how hurtful piracy could be when I saw a post about how Maggie Stiefvater’s series Call Down the Hawk was almost cancelled because of book piracy. I was aware, at that point, that small authors could be impacted by piracy because they didn’t have many readers and so needed their readers to actually buy the book or at least access it legally. But I thought it was alright if I pirated books by well-known and successful authors. So when I saw that post, I was shocked.

I did research. I think I had in mind, like many people probably do or did, that successful authors were all millionaires who would not need to work for a single day in their life if they chose to. Who could very comfortably live on the money made from their one successful book series, and that any other book they would publish would also be successful and bring in millions. I basically had in mind J.K. Rowling (sorry for the reference, but at least it gets the point across since she is a billionaire) or Neil Gaiman. But we forget that they published their first books decades ago, and that the industry has changed a lot since. The market is getting more and more competitive, and it is hard even for successful authors to stay afloat. 

I highly recommend, if that’s a topic you’re interested in, that you go and look for authors’ social media. I personally found information notably on Xiran Jay Zhao’s social media (I can’t remember whether I found the most information on their TikTok or Tumblr) but also on Victoria Aveyard’s TikTok. (Whether you like these authors and their books doesn’t really matter for this topic.) I learned through both, and a little through Brandon Sanderson as well, that in this day and age, authors basically need to be influencers if they want their books to sell. Back when Rowling or Gaiman first published their books, it didn’t work like that at all. There was no social media, to start with, but the publishers took care of the marketing if they thought the book would work out.

Now, not so much. For really big books that the publishers are confident are going to work, they do take care of the marketing. That does not mean the author can afford to do no promotion at all and be absent from social media. As Victoria Aveyard reveals, there are actually very few authors today who can afford that and still be able to make a living. She is not even one of them. It may sound shocking; the Red Queen series had massive success, and now Realm Breaker does as well. Aveyard lives comfortably, and doesn’t try to hide it, and she’s very honest about how privileged and lucky she got. But her career could still collapse in a matter of years. She could still need to find another job in a few years. Despite being popular and earning a living as an author now. 

This is, I think because of two factors. The first one is that whatever money authors make is not a consistent income. Authos are often paid in two ways: the advance and, if they manage to outearn that advance, the royalties (outearning means that their books basically need to pay back the advance to the publisher before they can get royalties on the excess of money made). Advances vary from author to author, but I have seen posts that said authors made five-figures advances regularly and that popular authors like Cassandra Clare, Maggie Stiefvater and Victoria Aveyard were all millionaires. The five-figure advance cited was a 10k advance that was allegedly given to authors every year, and the person making that argument said it was more than enough to live on in, especially in Europe. 

Now, I don’t know where exactly that person comes from. I live in Europe, and I guarantee you 10k a year is not enough. 10k a year is uncomfortable at best in most countries because life is expensive. In the US, 10k a year is impossible to live on, from what I know of the US. Another thing I want to say is that this number of 10k is false. Most authors don’t make 10k a year because most authors are not popular enough to. Most authors earn four-figures advances that they will never outearn. Most authors can’t afford to be full-time authors because of that. And for those who do have bigger advances and do outearn them, we still don’t know how much they make exactly. Victoria Aveyard has to keep a consistent presence on social media to make sure her books sell enough to keep living as a full-time author. Xiran Jay Zhao had to delay the release of Heavenly Tyrant because they were not making enough money to afford living as a full-time author and thus could not finish writing it in time for it to be published last August as planned. 

Authors definitely don’t earn as much as you think they do, even popular ones. So imagine how little less popular ones earn. 

Is it the publishers’ fault? Yes, it is. Publishers don’t pay authors and agents and editors what they should, and instead increase CEOs’ salary every year. That’s true. But it’s also true that authors, agents, and editors complain all the time and it changes nothing. Which means author’s salary does depend on the sales they make. 

Another thing that people may not be aware of is that series are only continued and foreign rights only acquired if the publisher thinks it will make enough money to be worth it. Maggie Stiefvater almost could not continue Call Down the Hawk because it did not make enough money. And the problem here was allegedly (I say allegedly because I don’t have actual numbers, but I’m willing to believe it is true) that Call Down the Hawk was highly popular but too many people read it illegally, and thus did not buy it. And while authors do enjoy when their books are popular, publishers don’t care about popularity and the size of a fandom if it doesn’t bring them money.

Publishers aren’t doing this for the love of literature, they’re doing this to make money. They think in terms of money only, and they don’t care if you say you’ll buy the book later. They care about now and about making the maximum profit. It’s unfortunate, but it’s true. And so, if foreign publishers see that a book is popular abroad but highly pirated, they won’t buy foreign rights. Which means, in the end, that if you pirate books because they’re not accessible in your country, it’s a vicious cycle that will never end. 

Now, I can’t tell you what to do. I’m not here to tell you’re a monster for pirating books either. I understand. I used to do it, and I’m trying to do better now, but I know how tempting it is. And it’s easy to find excuses, whether they are valid or not. In the end, it’s up to you. Maybe you think you have valid excuses and I’m not here to analyze whether they are or not. I don’t know your situation. But before finishing this post, I do want to dive a little more in the why we pirate books. 

I think there are two reason, and the first one is that we do not perceive creating art as a real job. As someone who writes, I can tell you it’s a fucking real job alright. It’s not my full-time job but it is time consuming and it takes a lot of work to write a novel. But I think our society (because it is a societal problem, not an individual one) does not perceive that as work. I think we see it as a hobby only, and while it is a passion, it is also a job because it takes so much effort. And because of that, it is only fair to remunerate authors correctly. For any other job, you would agree, I’m sure, that the worker needs to be paid a decent wage. It’s the same when it comes to art. Now, again, does the problem lie within the publishers? Yes, it does. I don’t have numbers, but I’m certain publishers could afford to pay the authors a higher percentage and still make profit. But the problem is also in the sales. Because no matter how much a publisher pays the author, if there are no sales, there will be no salary. And in my opinion, art deserves to be remunerated. 

This is tied to the second reason, which is that we (again, we as a society) feel like we are owed art. Now, is art nice? Yes, I love it in all its forms. Do I think we could survive as a society without art? Absolutely not. Which is why access to culture is very important. But we should not create that access to the author’s detriment. That is not the way to create that access. And even if you don’t think authors should be paid for what they do, I want to remind you that if they can’t be paid, they’ll end up not publishing their books, which means we’ll end up without access to literature either way. But also, we are not entitled to every piece of literature there is, or every piece of art. Free-domain books and libraries exist for a reason, and it’s to promote access to culture. But we are not entitled to having free content that we cannot pay for if not paying harms the author. We are not entitled someone else’s work in exchange for nothing. And I think we as a society tend to think that we are, in fact, entitled to everything we want for free.

Again, I can’t tell you what to do. I won’t tell you you’re immoral or that you’re the reason authors will perish. As I’ve said before, I don’t know your situation, and this debate, like many others, is one that demands some nuance. But I wanted you to be aware of the consequences of book piracy, because we too often think it doesn’t have any substantial consequences. As for the argument that book piracy still promotes a book, I think it might have been true once but it isn’t anymore. Or at least, not in any way that’s helpful, because as I’ve said before, publishers don’t care if a book is popular if they don’t think people are going to buy it. So please, be aware of those consequences the next time you want to download a book illegally. Be aware that authors are not being greedy, that the harm is very much real. Weigh the pros and the cons without thinking only about your personal situation. And then make your choice, without harassing people who will have made a different choice and without taking the moral high ground. 

If you’ve read until here, thank you, I know this was an ungodly long post. If you want to argue or if you have questions, you are welcome to do so in a civil manner and I’ll do my best to respond. But no hate will be condoned.

[captjameshookthoughts]

Since I have now taken some time to have some reasonable thoughts, here’s another post about the newest movie. Don’t expect this to be too cohesive, after all, I do remain a neurodivergent nightmare.

Anyway.

The more I think on it (and that has been A LOT today) the more I get the feeling that this might have originally been pitched as a Captain Hook focused feature rather than a Peter Pan remake.

seriously.

Jude law is good, but is he really ‘makes every other character feel like a side character’ good? Because that’s kind of how I felt watching it all. captain Hook and his arc DOMINATED the narrative, his presence was felt even in scenes he wasn’t in, and I don’t think that’s just my devotion to the sad pirate man speaking. He was also the only character that got any sort of real exploration into who he is as a person, every other character we see is just presented as a certain way and we’re expected to take it as is.

His character arc is front and centre whilst everyone else, including the titular characters are just kind of there to further push his narrative onwards. And that just really pings off the part of me that was involved in the film and TV industry. Like it just feels like something that was pitched as a Hook story, was probably developed at least somewhat to go in that direction and then was told to adapt that work into a Peter Pan retelling to fit what Disney was doing with the brand.

Of course I can’t say for certain cos I wasn’t in the board rooms, but it certainly piques my pattern recognition.

I’ve not been shy about how much I hate the costume, I still do. That hat and those epaulettes? Horrible, fortunately easy to ignore. Unfortunately will never compare to the 2003 movie costume.

which leads me into that comparison.

I will always love Jason Isaacs’ Hook, always.I always adored the character, but it was his portrayal that inspired me to start developing and writing my own Captain Hook. However... IDK Jude Law’s performance feels closer to what *my* Hook has become. I think that’s partly owing to him being that bit visually older, but there is more. Both 2003 and 2023 versions have a Hook that is an absolute wreck with melancholy and loneliness. But 2003′s melancholy is guided by anger and a deep need for revenge, where 2023′s is guided by like insecurity, uncertainty, and loss. All those traits are present in both, but they are separated by what’s at the centre of their sadness.

I can’t really compare backstory, because 2003 doesn’t really have one. Persoanlly, I’ve always liked the idea that James was just a well educated guy who fell into piracy and then into Neverland. I’m just a fan of having normal people being put into extraordinary circumstances and the ways they adapt to that. I have no string feeling either way to Hook having been the first lost boy, I know a lot of people love it and will be delighted to see that explored. I’ve read a few short stories about it, and honestly this movie handles it better than the published stories (IMO)

When it comes to my own Hook, I write him with a great attachment to his name. He, too, feels there’s a separation between ‘James’ and ‘Captain Hook’ but there’s some level of yearning to return to being James, the man he was. Seeing in the movie that visceral and opposite reaction was like WOW, I hadn’t ever considered that angle, but probably because I’ve never felt strongly about the first lost boy angle. But the pain there in that shot! Man’s own name is a wound that never healed and hearing it again, a knife cutting through it once more.

Final comparison Hook’s ‘death’ I really liked the way this movie handled it. It wasn’t played off as a joke, he was treated with the reverance and respect that he ought to have...unlike just about every other version. Now I hate to see him die as much as anyone. HOWEVER, IDK it felt a bit cheap for him to survive and then that smile at the end. It’s just like, the moments after his ‘death’ were so poignant and for that feeling to be for no reason actually. It emotional whiplashed me and not in a good way. I actually think the movie would have benefitted from the finality of death hanging over it, since one of the repeated messages throughout the narrative was the inherent nature of change and endings of phases in life...but perhaps that would be a tad too dark for Disney and their current branding.

anyways. those have been some thoughts. I’m sure I’ll have more at some point.

[s-------i-------g]

I've Written a Book for No One to Read

If you’ve been paying close attention to the goings-ons through my social media presences (don’t worry, I don’t expect it), you may have seen a few posts alluding to writing chapters of a book. This was actually not a joke! Basically, I was planning on finishing the whole book and waiting for someone to message back with “can I read it?” at which point I would’ve revealed that the each chapter had been uploaded to this very blog from the start [note to self: edit that for tumblr, cohost, and spacehey], but the most interaction on any of these posts that I ever saw was on twitter, and right before finishing off the book I was permanently suspended (for normal reasons) and so that fizzled right the hell up, didn’t it? Let’s be real here, that’s not a great way to get people to actually read your work anyway.

I cannot stress enough how much of my social network was built onto the racist, collapsing platform formerly known as Twitter, and since that’s gone now/I have to start again and I’m being unduly secretive about it, I have to actually promote my own work which is a huge pain in the ass. So now you can know that exists and you can still ignore it! Seriously, I’m not going to be upset either way.

The book (can it be called it book if it’s entirely online?) is something I’ve been doing in my spare time for the past few months, mostly combining a great deal of ideas I’ve had floating about forever and actually committing to writing them down in a way so that they can finally be excised from my he. It’s not something I put a ton of thought into, just stuff I had a rough idea about, fleshed out a little, went over again, and then published it as I was writing it. It was the first time I approached a project that’s so “big” so loosely, and it was freeing to do. I’m not pinning all my hopes and dreams onto this thing, I’m just putting it out there for someone to read. Or not read, as it may be. It would be great if it lead to something a bit better than what I’ve got going on now, sure, but I’ve learned to not get my hopes too high. At the very least I’m finished with it for now. If this actually gains traction, there’s a possibility of shoring it up a bit more for proper publication.

So now, in a somewhat more formal way, I’m introducing you/the world to CARETAKERS, an experimental, science fiction work (with maybe some fantasy/unexplained shit) that spans multiple viewpoints, locations, and time periods. It might actually be very difficult to read, and that’s not including what it’s about. It concerns an Earth, not too far in the future, that has been destroyed by both climate change and a world war, the response to which has been to launch most of the population into space with the intent of finding a new home, but the majority of the ships are destroyed about a year into their travels (not that most of the people on Earth know that). This work tends toward being bleak and pessimistic, and often addresses real world situations in ways that might be uncomfortable for people to read. CW: Sex, Light Racism, Drug Addiction, Depression, Death, Suicide, Mass Murder, War, Climate Catastrophe, Nuclear War, The Apocalypse. Use your best discretion to decide if it is for you.

I would also say that as I kept publishing it as I was writing, there are going to definitely be some mistakes and inconsistencies. There are characters who aren’t fleshed out much, and there are things I didn’t do much research on that may be straight-up wrong, especially regarding heroin addiction and cultural backgrounds. My intent was never to be problematic, and if you feel like some aspects are, I’m not going to tell you you’re wrong, but I’m doing my best to mitigate the damage in advance. The work itself is fairly short. I would be hesitant to refer to it as a “novel.” “Novella” may be too much. “Novelette” doesn’t sound like a real word. “Series of interconnected short stories told in the most obnoxious, confusing way possible” now that one seems far more accurate. I’m guessing if you were to properly print any given chapter, few of them would surpass two pages of print. I’m going back to trying to make comics again, thanks.

Anyway, enjoy?

[cature]

💌 ) BEST BELOVED. okay time to be normal. here’s a tag for my comfort characters, never specified by name or dug into in any meaningful depth. i am putting them in my mouth and chewing. i am asking at all times to be reading illuminated treatsies on their actions and their subtexts and their costume designs and their leimotifs and to hold their beating heart in my hands (just to look at it!) and yeah, okay, also sometimes to suck their soul out of their body twice a day for the rest of my life.

💎 ) OLD MONEY. this is quite literally just my blair waldorf tag. it’s the newspapers in print and the purses that don’t carry cash and lipstick made custom and champagne from the valley and not just imitation. it’s the world that gatsby could entertain but never enter. it’s the girls who aren’t daisy. it’s a white winter in the city, but every path you walk on is still clean and dried. the grand vizier, the high pope, the dark curl-spilled queen to serena’s lion-haired king among men, morgan le fey come again to wear chanel.

🔏 ) POETRY. another normal tag! i am a horrific poet with barely a handful of daily lit deviations (i hope reading that phrase gave you flashbacks) under my belt, but the self-published poetry scene is finally recovering from the mass damage that instagram and richard siken fanfic did to it. and i for one am fucking pumped. other quotes with particularly good cadence will also be thrown in here just to jazz things up a bit.

📖 ) MEDIA. i’m on a normal tag roll. these are the stories that are important to me in ways unrelated to comfort characters or my deep abiding need to get plowed by questionable anime men. a lot of my favorite posts end up untagged on my sideblog because they’re not as structured as i like my main to be, so the ones that do make the cut are guaranteed to have been heralded by me physically showing one of my spices my phone.

🥠 ) LITTLE THOUGHTS. essentially a text post tag. a lot of them have tended to be sweet or sad rather than silly, but i like collecting the ones that make me react. fortune cookie emoji feels self-explanatory from there. as with my media tag anything that i like enough to have but not enough to revisit or incorporate into my bird’s nest goes over on a sideblog, so these reblogs are fun treats for me to pick back through.

🪶 ) HOPE AS AN ACTION. “empathy isn’t just something that happens to us - a meteor shower of synapses firing across the brain - it’s also a choice we make: to pay attention, to extend ourselves. It’s made of exertion, that dowdier cousin of impulse. sometimes we care for another because we know we should, or because it’s asked for, but this doesn’t make our caring hollow. this confession of effort chafes against the notion that empathy should always rise unbidden, that genuine means the same thing as unwilled, that intentionality is the enemy of love. but i believe in intention and i believe in work. i believe in waking up in the middle of the night and packing our bags and leaving our worst selves for our better ones.” - leslie jamison.

🫖 ) LIKE REAL PEOPLE DO. domesticity, and family, and growing, and trying your best, and singing without thinking about it, and cooking for eachother, and existing in the world as a participant. being housebound on and off for years has not been good to me even as being happily married and content in my triangle has been a massive act of healing. somewhere in between the two i’m holding on fiercely to celebration of the things i can still do together with them and trying to believe that it can be enough.

🍫 ) BITTERNESS. kind of discourse, kind of venting. i’m not overly invested in collating my opinions daily any more, but i have been saying certain things for actively years now while waiting for the wider zeitgeist to catch up to me and it’s always a pleasure to see a widely accepted and welcome new take from the last three months that i got into a fight in my 2018 dms for suggesting. sometimes i just want to hit people i have blocked with a car. being a sex worker who has to ebeg will do that to otherwise perfectly lovely friendships more than you’d think. sometimes you are all just so, so illiterate. essentially a dump for anything that pisses me off.

🔖 ) AUDIENCE ASIDES. this one is for “reblog and tag yourself” memes and is functionally an about me tag that i fill up only with uquiz answers, disjointed facts from my childhood, and either/or games. they’re fun! not everything has to be complicated. scroll around this tag for interaction bait or just to hang out. maybe one day i’ll port my vent app “which major arcana are you” tag meme over here as a uquiz of some kind. that’d be fun, i think. (i’m the moon, btw. just in case you were wondering. mine was the moon.

🫕 ) BESTIES. this is a catch-all tag for my assorted friends to opt-into that is 110% just about being, yknow, kind of a cunt. all of the references to insane internet-specific drama go here, all of the polycule jokes go here, all of the “hey i know you’re high so i invited a thousand people over” jokes go here, and so does all of the sweet stuff. fondue emoji because that way people can dip in and choose to be included in it or not, and also i am too lazy to tag for each individual 🌈/🐰/🎲/📿/🐱/🐻/fruit code/tumblr mutual/etc vibe.

🕰️ ) FIRST FOLIO. because despite the lobotomy i am in fact a washed-out imitation of both english and art history qualification-havers, and sometimes a bitch wants to talk about the way the world shaped a colour choice or a turn of phrase or an adaptational choice between book and stage or stage and dance. constantly fellating the macmillan romeo juliet choreography, my own imaginary staging of ibsen’s fruen fra havet, and prospero’s final lines in the tempest. this is a dump tag for anything that i would pin to a board like a butterfly if given the chance to do so together with my loved ones.

🌪️ ) OIL ROOM. oh, hey, a normal tag again. an art tag, even, for things that rattle around in my brain for a few days after, or things that i’d spend useless hours trying to dig back up on pinterest to add to a board for a fictional character that has (in a similar manner) started to haunt me. probably going to lean more modern sculpture than traditional oil, but to be fair that is because traditional oils find their way into my other tags and didn’t need an invented catch-all for me to skim back through circa pinterest o'clock in six weeks when i get back to that.

🍳 ) THE AI-KYŌGEN. nice little oc tag for my brats. a truly insane overabundance of girls who are crocodiles in the rivers of their own narrative, girls who are self sufficient because they were grown from seed in total darkness, boys who damn themselves and then damn the world in revenge for it, girls who wear their lives wholecloth like a costume every morning until it fits or it kills them, girls who were too young for the tasks they were trapped with and succeeded anyway, girls who died but didn’t because they only remember how to get back up. and clumbo, my orc detective.

📚 ) DEAD INTERNET. short stories, flash fiction, and other pieces i am trying to scrounge up via the wayback machine. i'm an unabashed pirate who lived off of e-begging for 5 yesrs solid and do not have the money to support authors i like. what i can do is collate every short story i've personally cared for onto an un-searchable blog and cross-index my thoughts on them here.

🧦 ) BULLDOZE VENICE. disability talk, encompassing everything from my mental health conditions / sanism to physical disability justice, marriage equality, institutional ableism, and how developmental disability is treated by the wider populace. i don't believe in "mental age" and i don't steal the terms nonverbal/nonspeaking for autistics with high support needs who suffer the most under the pseudo-aba assumptions that you can make yourself speak if needed.

🍱 ) TEXT POSTING. basically the same as my audience asides tag but for posts i personally am making to bitch about running a blog, or changes i am midway through making on this one, or polls about which of my previous tagging system sections i should port over to this blog en masse that day.

📟 ) MIXTAPE. i know i run ostensibly a sideblog for music but i do also like specific songs i want to put here and cross-reference into other tags. since the ancient websites i used to use to listen to just the songs on my rp blogs in another google chrome tab has gone totally under i will have to make that possible another way (that isn't using spotify, because i'm lazy sometimes).

🎫 ) TO REMEMBER. quotable bits that i am going to drop for years into bios. i used to try to run this as a sideblog on its own for cross-referencing but porting the entire mountain goats lyrical discography was hard and i quit. i still need somewhere to store the "spit his cum back at him like a camel" post that has haunted my dreams for a thousand years.

[luninosity]

Whilst I actually remember that I exist here, may I quickly catch you up on some News of various types?

1) the RomPod podcast episode that's got an interview with, er, me, and also the lovely romance scholar Maria Ramos-Garcia, is up now, if you want to hear me ramble about things! We're in episode 2, which you can find here.

2) if you're looking for a good cause to support this month, and some great short stories celebrating queer joy in all sorts of flavors, you might like to check out this anthology kickstarter from Amphibian Press - I've got a story in there! Something brand-new and shiny and exclusive to this collection! (I think we're not supposed to announce the full lineup yet, but there are some lovely author-friends in there too!) Proceeds are going to benefit Club Q!

3) this one’s probably the Big Thing - the Character Bleed box set - with the original three novels, plus new author’s note, and updated cover art - is coming June 10 from JMS Books! Ebook first, then paperback probably in about two months - yes, it’ll be massive! I really want to see it. It’s going to be...wait for it...332,890 words. (Good heavens, did I write that many words?!) It’s actually sort of experimental - JMS said they don’t normally do paperbacks for box sets, but this trilogy has been such a consistent good seller, they’d like to try at least a limited number in print. (So maybe please buy one when that happens? If nothing else you can probably use it as a hammer, or a doorstop, or a weapon.)

This is closer to the way I originally wrote it, as one giant novel - I broke it into a trilogy to, y'know, make it publishable! This volume includes the short stories that came with each book - including the ones that were never on AO3, at least one of those per book. The short stories published separately will get collected into a second volume! (I am STILL working on Leo’s book, which might have to be two books, because it is now 116k and NOT DONE *screams quietly into pillows about not being able to write short things*)

I don’t think the Amazon link is live yet but here’s the JMS Books link!

4) with the Academic Hat on, I am your Fantasy & the Fantastic Area Chair for the Pacific Ancient & Modern Language Association Conference! We've got several great proposals but should have room for 1-2 more - if you are working on some fantasy-adjacent research / creative work with meta-cognitive component, and you want to come to Portland in October, send me an abstract over here! Or, if you are in or near Portland, would you like to hang out, meet up, say hi? Or, any recommendations? I’ve been to Portland once before but also for Academic Conference Reasons, so not lots of tourist time. Awesome Husband might come this time because he’s never been to Portland and he’s got some vacation time. We like history, good craft beer, botanic gardens, water, queerness, and libraries. I think the conference hotel is some sort of Hilton in the downtown area?

5) officially got the rights back from Inkshares* for my first** novel, A Prophecy for Two! (Plus they sent me the last paperbacks they had in inventory, so a- those are I guess rare-ish now, since there'll never be another of those editions - want to buy one for cheap? *laughs* I mean I’m semi- serious; they sent me like 13 paperbacks, and I do not need that many! and b- I think that's it as far as that relationship! *dusts off hands*) Now to give the whole thing a polish and republish it with JMS - we've already had conversations about that, so it’ll happen!

*I’ve got complicated feels about Inkshares. That’s a whole other post. In the short form: did I get a book out of it, when I was an unknown author? Yes. Would I advise someone else to work with them? No.

**first in terms of being completed. A Demon for Midwinter ended up being published first, because of publisher schedules and JMS Books sending me a super-quick offer and having great editorial turnaround.

6) okay, I THINK that’s it! Actually, a totally non-publishing related thing: I just had a student submit - for a 12-page paper requirement - a paper that was 21 pages. Yep.

Honestly, it was kind of lovely - he’s a good student, he’s a good writer, and he already submitted a 14-page version that was excellent, but then he asked if he could send me an updated version “to make it as good as I possibly can,” and I said yes, because he *is* a very good writer, and then. A 21 page paper showed up in my email. Not including his Works Cited section, or the lengthy email in which he told me how much fun he had in my class and getting to write about monsters and monstrosity and ethics and agency. My god, student, I am both impressed and vaguely in shock. I mean, that’s why I do this job, that’s why I love this job, but also - he sent the updated version to me the *day* before final grades were due. (He already had an A.)