#and I feel like this'd be a nice way to do that!

[riveterio]

So I have missed drawing and have been thinking of potentially picking a night to stream doing art again! And I was wondering if that might be something you guys might be interested in?

[poeticpascal]

I've Got You (Dbf!Joel Miller x Reader)

Masterlist | Request here!

Summary: When a date set up by your father goes wrong, your secret boyfriend and Dad's best friend races to protect you.

Word count: 5.2k

Warnings: smut, 18+, MDNI, attempted sexual assault, abusive language, reader's date is a tory prick, soft!dom!Joel, blowjob, unprotected sex, use of pet names.

A/n: So... this is my first time writing smut. I am super proud of this one, so please let me know what you think! Requests are open so for more Joel/Pedro action, you know where to find me x

Dating your Dad’s best friend is hard. And stupid. Really, you have no clue why either of you thought this'd be a good idea. But you were so far down this path now, so entangled in late night meet-ups and whispered phone calls and unspoken thoughts that sounded a lot like ‘I love you’, that it was too late to turn around and steer the sinking ship of this utter mess back to shore.

More than anything, you hate not having any normalcy with him. You can’t fall straight into his arms after a hard day. You can’t cuddle into his side with a bowl of popcorn watching crappy weeknight telly. You can’t go to the store together, holding hands and making him laugh as you insist on buying a flavour of ice cream that you know he’d love. And it sucks.

Because everyone said Joel would never be one to settle down. He’s too wild, too rough to fit into a polished little box like that. And you’d thought the same. Until you fucked him, then fucked him again, and kept going back until you could see the pain in his eyes each time you left. You could practically feel the heaviness settle in his stomach as you left his bed to sneak back home. It hurts him as much as it does you, and if you weren’t so incredibly in love with him, that would’ve been enough to make you run.

Despite how long you’d kept this going now, a good 6 months at least, it never got any easier. Especially when your Dad started talking about dating. He was protective, but more than anything he wanted to see you happy. So when you suddenly became distant, hiding in your room more often and going out on dates much less, he was concerned. Nowhere near as concerned as he’d be if he found out why you were acting that way, you thought, but concerned all the same.

So when he came home one day, beaming and shouting for you to come downstairs, you thought nothing of it. When he explained there was a new apprentice at his work that he thinks you’d like, you weren’t surprised. And when he told you he’d set up a blind date with said boy, you felt sick.

Because you really couldn’t get out of it. You tried.

“Dad, I just don’t feel like dating right now.”

“Oh come on, you used to have a new date every few weeks. I’m just worried about you. Matthew's really nice, and he likes the same shitty music you do-”

“It’s good music.”

“Yeah, yeah. Whatever. I just…” he paused, his worry painted on his face, and there's no way you could’ve said no to him. “Honey, I want you to be happy. I don’t know what’s gotten into you recently” - your best friend, you thought - “but I just need to know you’re okay. So give this a go, for me, alright? And if you have an awful time, that’s it, I’ll never set you up again.”

You sighed. He was right; it’s just one night, one date. One box you have to tick to relieve the pressure that comes from having an affair with your next door neighbour, the one more than twice your age, the one your Dad would call a brother. And besides, your Dad would be working an overnight job, so you’d be spending the night at Joel’s anyway. Something to look forward to.

“Okay, yeah. I’ll go. For you.”

He pulled you in for a hug, tight, and you hugged him right back because you really do hate having to keep this from him. He pulled away, smiling - “great! It’s tonight at 7. He’ll pick you up.”

“You already arranged it?!” You near enough shrieked, but he’d already sauntered off to the kitchen, giggling as he went. 

Typical.

So that’s how you ended up here, at 6:55pm, waiting by the front door for Marcus - or Michael, or something like that - to pick you up. Your phone buzzes, Joel’s name flashing on the screen, that alone making you feel that much calmer.

You’d text him as soon as you talked to your Dad, letting him know about the date. He understood, and you loved that about him; he was mature, compassionate, and he was more than secure in the fact that no matter who you talked to, who flirted with you on nights out, who you were set up with… you’d always come back to him. 

Don’t worry about tonight, baby. It’ll go quickly. I’ll leave the door unlocked for when you get back. Text me if you need picking up. J x

You smile at his initial at the end - it’s such a Dad thing to do, but it makes you happy, especially when he adds a little kiss. He only does that for you.

The sudden sound of a car door closing snaps you out of your thoughts, Joel’s text left on read as what you assume to be your date heads up the driveway. You take a deep, nervous breath, smoothing out your dress and heading to the door just in time for his knock.

You open the door, take a good look at your date, and he’s… okay. Not unattractive, per se. Though you’d come to accept a little while ago that being with Joel had soured your perception of pretty much every other guy. His dusty blonde hair is slicked back with gel, his teeth are way too white, and he’s dripped in designer clothing that just screams, “I have a trust fund.”

“Oh, hi! I’m Matthew.” Right. Matthew. “You must be (Y/N).” He leans in to peck your cheek, and all you can think about is how smooth his skin is as it grazes yours. Nothing like Joel’s coarse stubble that you love so much - especially when it leaves red patches on your cheeks, and your neck, and if you’re really lucky -

Matthew leans back a little, confused, and you’re brought out of your daydream. “Sorry, yeah, that’s me. (Y/N).” 

Well, that was awkward.

You just need to get through these next few hours, you think to yourself, smiling at the boy and letting him lead you out of the house and into his car. You can’t help but glance towards Joel’s place across the street; it looks quiet tonight, though his truck is in the driveway, and as soon as you look up you’re sure you catch the living room blinds suddenly draw shut. You smirk.

──────

The date was going… okay. About as okay as a date you don’t want to be on, with someone you have no interest in, and another man constantly on your mind could go. You could see why your Dad liked him; smart enough, well-polished. His father was a partner in the company, you learned - oh, he’s a ‘Daddy’s credit card’ type you’d thought - and by all intents and purposes he was the sort of guy any parent would hope to see their daughter end up with.

It’s never that easy though, is it?

Because he isn’t rough around the edges like Joel. He doesn’t have his stature, or carry himself with the same brute certitude. You can’t imagine him fucking you up against the wall, working himself up until he’s almost animalistic, somehow using you and worshipping you at the same time. And you can’t see him wrapping you up so tightly afterwards, holding you close and whispering how good you were for me, how proud of you I am.

No, only Joel could do that, and that’s how you like it.

The bill comes, Matthew suggests you split it. You don’t mind. He takes out his credit card, flashing it in front of you. “This is my Dad’s. I can use it as much as I want.” He’s smirking like he’s got something to be proud of, and you really had to fight the urge to roll your eyes. Instead you just smile, before paying your share and making small talk as you head out the door and towards his car.

“So, I thought we could head back to my place.”

You freeze. Yeah, no, not gonna happen. He’s got this shit-eating grin on his face, one you knew all too well from past college boyfriends - that’s a boy who thinks he’s getting some tonight. You shudder, wrapping your arms around your waist and trying to sound sincere as you reply, “this has been lovely, but I’ve got an appointment early in the morning” - not really a lie, if staying in bed with a man over twice your age getting fucked or cuddled or both counts as an appointment - “so I’d rather just head home.”

You reach for the passenger side door, but it’s locked. You try again, pulling on the handle, but it doesn’t budge. You realise then that he’s stepped closer, too close, crowding your vision as you turn to face him while keeping one hand on the door’s handle. He leans an arm against the roof of the car, right beside your head, staring you down. 

“Oh, come on, (Y/N). I’ve got the house to myself tonight, it’ll just be us. I know that’s what you want, don’t be shy.”

His free hand pinches your chin, his touch aggressive where Joel’s is rough but careful, and he tries to close the already too-small gap between you.

You dodge him quickly, slipping out from under his arm and backing up, away from the car, away from him. Matthew just watches you, incredulous, before laughing to himself and taking a step forward. “Look, baby, I know you want this. What is it, are you scared your daddy’s gonna find out?”

“What? No, I-” you splutter, but he interrupts.

“Get in the car, (Y/N). You don’t have to worry about anyone finding out. I can see the way you look at me, I bet you’re dying to fu-”

A heavy sickness has flooded your stomach, your nerves shot from the sudden escalation of what was supposed to be a quiet, albeit tedious, night. But his words hit you, and before you can even think, you’re shouting back at him. 

“You seriously think I want to fuck you? You can’t even pay your half of the bill with your own money. Fuck that. I’ll make my own way home.”

The smug look on his face is quickly washed away with anger, and you continue to slowly step backwards as Matthew follows you. A lick of fear sets in now as the pale streetlights cast shadows on his darkened expression, and you scold yourself for opening your mouth.

“The fuck did you just say to me? Do you know who my Dad is?” - this really isn’t a good time to roll your eyes - “You think you’re too good for me, you bitch? I’ll show you.”

He stalks you, and your eyes frantically dart back to the restaurant you’d just left, though you’d backtracked far enough to be almost at the door again.

People are dining and laughing, some just sitting and watching the world go by. You’re well within their view, and you turn back to see that Matthew’s gaze has followed your own and he’s connected the dots. He can’t do anything in front of them. He locks eyes with you again, scoffing, heading back to his car and loudly shouting something that sounded a lot like “fuckin’ bitch.” Nice.

He drives away; you’re safe, out of the situation, and as the relief floods you the adrenaline does too and tears prick at your eyes. You sit on a small bench just outside the restaurant, dotted with shrubbery and stains from spilt drinks you assume, and take out your phone.

Your last chat with Joel is already open, and you breathe slowly in an attempt to still your shaking hands as you type quickly,

Please come and get me. He was trying to get me to go back with him. Wouldn’t take no for an answer. He’s gone now but I have no ride home.

The text is marked as ‘read’ almost as soon as you send it, though you receive no reply. You didn’t expect to; Joel wasn’t much of a texter. Like, at all. He was slowly getting used to it, what with it being one of the only ways you could really talk when slipping over to his place was too risky. 

In this particular instance, you already knew he’d have read the text, dropped his phone without a second thought and hurried to his truck while muttering to himself what he’s gonna do to the kid, how he won’t see what’s comin’ to him.

Just how badly Joel might react worries you. He’s protective, incredibly so when it comes to you, and that combined with his white hot temper was surely a recipe for some sort of disaster.

Secretly, though, you loved it. And so as you sat on that little bench, frosty air nipping at your skin, you couldn’t help but revel in the warmth that pooled in your core at the thought of what sort of beast Joel would become tonight.

──────

It only takes him around 10 minutes to reach you, and you know for a fact he must’ve ran a red light or two because normally it’s a 20 minute drive at least into town. You stand, walking over to his truck, but before you can hop in he’s already storming out and wrapping you up in his arms, shielding you, eyes darting across the street.

“Where the fuck is he?”

“Joel, I-”

“(Y/N) where the fuck is he? I’m gonna kill that little bastard. Fucking-”

His body is tense, far more so than usual, and anger pours from him in buckets. You pull away to look up at him, his eyes still searching for the boy long gone, and you sigh. “He’s gone, Joel. He left.”

He finally meets your eyes, a cold frown etched on his face, and he somehow looks even angrier than usual. “Did he touch you?” His hands roam your body, searching for you didn’t know what, but you let him do whatever he needed to relax. To know you were safe.

“No, Joely, he didn’t. I’m fine, I promise.”

It usually softens him right up, your little nickname for him. Joely. The first few times you used it, he’d just scoff or roll his eyes, but the small smirk that crept onto his face each time let you know he loved it. Quite how much he loved it was a different story; you hadn’t got together then, though the both of you wanted it, and as your relationship blossomed you became the only one he ever let call him anything other than Joel.

It doesn’t work this time, though, and he remains stern, finally letting you go and searching your eyes for even a hint of anxiety or fear. “What happened?”

“He tried it on, I said no. He tried again, I backed up and made sure there were people watching,” you nod towards the restaurant, still bustling with life. “And he left.”

Joel nods. “You tell him to fuck off?”

“‘Course i did.” 

It seems as if he finally lets up then, giving you a proper hug, one arm around your neck and the other around your waist. He presses a kiss to the top of your head, hard, and the tension leaves him. “That’s my girl.”

You squeeze him tight, burrowing into his shirt and inhaling the scent of him that you loved so much. With one arm around your shoulders, he guides you back to his truck, opening the door for you and helping you. He does it everytime, but it still makes you blush, and you’re sure his lips smirk slightly as your cheeks turn red. Worth it.

The ride back to home is quiet, only the sound of his radio and passing traffic echoing between you. He keeps a hand on your knee, always protective, and every now and then you rub your palm over it to let him know you appreciate it. To say thank you.

Joel was never good with words, and you’d learned over the last few months just how much he relies on touch to express himself. To show love. You’d picked up on his habits, his little signs, his way of telling you his deepest thoughts without having to speak a word.

And when you reciprocated, when you wrapped your hand around his, or brushed his side at the neighbours’ BBQ, or kissed his shoulder in the kitchen, you knew just what it meant to him.

Your driveway is empty as Joel turns onto your street - your Dad must have set off for work already. You sigh in relief; you didn’t have the energy to explain all this to him, and certainly not the energy to try and sneak into Joel’s without him seeing.

Joel steps out first, taking a quick look around to make sure no nosey neighbours were watching, a precaution you were both used to by now. He grabs the door for you again, holding your hand and helping you out, holding you close to his side as he unlocks the door and you both slip inside.

“What do you want to drink?”

“I’m good, thanks.”

He pauses, looking at you, concerned. ”No. You need somethin’ to drink. You need to- to lie down, or somethin’.”

You follow him into the kitchen as he stalks past you, not giving you time to answer and filling a glass with water and ice. “Drink,” he hands it to you.

You take it, thanking him and sipping as he watches. It’s sweet; he cares about you, so much, and when he looks at you like this you can’t help but feel butterflies swirl in your stomach.

“I’m sorry.” It’s almost a whisper, so quiet you wouldn’t have heard if it weren’t so still already in his house.

“Hm?” You look at him, confused.

“I’m sorry he did that to you. S’not - s’not right. I mean, shit, what if you couldn’t get away?” He was spiralling.

“Hey, hey. Joel, it’s okay. I’m okay.” You set down the glass and take him in your arms. He calms, instantly, holding you tightly against him and cupping the back of your head with his hand.

“You shouldn’t have had to go through that.”

“I know.”

He sighs. “I just wanna protect you, honey.”

“I know.”

He pulls back to look at you, framing your face with his hands and running his thumbs along the edge of your cheekbones.  You lean in, letting his lips capture yours in that sweet but desperate way that only Joel can, and moan into his mouth. He slips his tongue against yours, letting one arm fall to your waist as his hand lingers around the hem of your jeans.

The kiss becomes desperate and you reach for his belt, your arousal becoming unbearable as the memory of him so full of anger and protectiveness spins in your mind like a carousel. He breaks the kiss and you groan, chasing his swollen lips with yours.

“We don’t have to do this.” His southern drawl is slick with need, his eyes closed as he rests his forehead against yours. The moment is so sweet, so intimate, that any thoughts of what had happened today were long gone and your mind was full with sweepings of him.

“I want to.”

He grunts, pushing himself further into you so his nose brushes yours like a cat. So much so, you almost purr into him, and it makes you giggle. You curse yourself as he pulls back, cocking an eyebrow and giving you that stare you’d come to know all too well; you’re a pain in my ass, it says. But the corners of his lips turn upwards, and you step forward so you’re once again pressed right up against him, pressing gentle kisses to his jaw.

“You’ve had a big shock today, sweetheart,” he sighs.

You know he’s given up. You know he needs this as much as you do. But you humour him, and tip his head down so you can kiss his lips again. 

“So make me forget.”

It snaps something within him, and you shriek as Joel sweeps you up in his arms, your legs wrapping around his waist in instinct and your head burying itself in his neck. He laughs at the sound you make, something you’d always known to be so rare for him, but that he does far more often now he has you. 

He carries you upstairs, gripping your thighs with his large hands, and the way he holds you so easily just turns you on more. He kicks his bedroom door open, all but throwing you on the bed and watching as you bounced softly on the sheets, undoing his belt that was already half-opened by your shaky hands.

“On your back. Lay your head towards me.”

You did as he said immediately, though your movements were slow, languid. He let you take your time; a part of you thinks he likes to watch you move for him, the way you put on a show, keeping your eyes locked on his and your lips slightly parted and puffy from his kiss. 

You lie on your back, your head dangling off the edge, looking up at him upside down. The hard outline of his cock is just centimetres above you, swollen already, and your desperation to taste it must’ve shown on your face because Joel groans out a soft, strangled “fuck.”

“You need this cock, baby? Need your throat fucked?” You just nod rapidly, desperate for him to do something other than just stand there and watch you, your arousal becoming unbearable. Joel seems to break, too, pulling down his jeans and boxers and gripping his hard length in his hands. 

It’s big at the best of times, but from this angle, his balls level with your eyes and his cock the only thing you can see when you look up at him, it’s painful how bad you need him.

You’d only discovered this position recently, on a night you’d spent at his place while your Dad was away with work, not unlike tonight. Joel had been floored, consumed with pleasure as the stretch of your spine made it so easy for him to slide himself through your mouth and down your throat, the muscles tensing around him and drawing his release much sooner than he’d have liked. 

He slides the head of his cock over your lips, painting them in his precum. You whine, lapping at his taste, desperate but you know better than to lift your hands off the bed. No, you give him control, and he lavishes it.

“Open up, babygirl.”

You comply, parting your lips and moaning as Joel pushes inside, giving you no time to breathe. You try to control yourself, inhaling through your nose and letting your muscles relax before he bottoms out, his groin almost entirely covering your face and your throat full of his thickness. 

It’s filthy, degrading, resigns you to nothing but his to fuck and use as he wants. 

You love it.

“Such a good girl, baby. So good for me, ain’t ya?” You can hardly even nod as your tongue flicks along a particularly swollen vein. He begins to move, pulling out almost entirely before slamming his cock back into your mouth. You moan again, and it hurts, in that delectable way that’ll spend the next few days reminding you of this moment.

Joel’s got one hand on the wooden foot of the bed, keeping himself steady. The other finds its way to your neck, and he stalls as he feels his cock beneath your skin, rapidly pushing in and out. He moans your name, his hips rocking into you harder and harder, chasing a release you knew he wouldn’t let himself have just yet. 

You’re completely at his mercy now, too consumed by his scent and his touch to think, and you hardly register him reaching for your hand and taking it in his own. He starts to mumble, and you only catch a few words - “my good girl. My girl. So- so fuckin’ pretty for me.”

He swells, your tongue working faster against him, his hand squeezing yours and his legs faltering when he suddenly pulls out and stands back with a whimper. Your eyes are glazed over, your sore throat misses him, and your pink swollen lips are trying to say something but you’re not sure what. It feels like his name.

“Come on, pretty girl, come here.” He sits beside you on the edge of the bed, wrapping his big arms around your back and guiding you into his lap. 

His fingers dance over your entrance, collecting the slick that soaked your thighs before pushing a single finger inside, revelling in your arousal. He admires you as you squirm, rolling your hips against his hand, desperate for more and moaning against his lips. 

It’s almost embarrassing how easy you unravel for him, and if it weren’t for your utter infatuation for the man, you’d have hidden your pleasure and at least tried to hold onto some sense of dignity. But you were obsessed, addicted to him, and he knew it. Because god, was he addicted to you, too.

He kisses you, letting another finger slip inside and catching your hiss with his mouth. “So fuckin’ perfect,” he mutters, opening his eyes to look at you, his cock twitching against your thigh. 

“Tell me what you need, angel.”

“Y- you, Joel. I need you. Please.” You hardly register yourself saying the words, but they do the trick, as Joel removes his fingers and instead lines the tip of his cock with your soaking wet entrance. 

“Please, please, fuck me. Fuck-” 

He snaps his hips upwards, driving his cock into your cunt and you gasp as he stretches you. You grip at his shoulders, sure to leave marks, but you know he loves it. 

He sets the pace, guiding you to bounce on his cock as his hips snap upwards again and again, fucking you so hard you can almost see stars. 

His head is buried in your neck, kissing and nipping at the delicate skin, and you try to regain some autonomy and roll your hips side to side making him mewl. 

“So - oh, fuck - so good baby, keep doin’ that.” He spurs you on as your breathless moans and the heavy slap of skin on skin fills the room, lewd but addictive.

The pace is brutal, unforgiving as your thighs tremble and you wonder if he’s feeling the burn of his movements. If he does, he doesn’t show it, just ramming into you and moaning your name against your ear. 

His hand falls from your waist and finds its way to your clit, making you gasp as he circles his thumb around the spot. The near pornographic moan that falls from his lips as you roll into his touch is nearly enough to make you cum right there, but you know better than to cum before he tells you to.

Instead he hoists you further up, giving him better control of your hips, and angles his cock so it hits that perfectly raw spot deep inside you that has tears in your eyes.

“I- I’m gonna-” 

“I know, baby. Just hold on for me. I’ve got you.” You cry at his denial, though it’s quickly forgotten as he flips you over onto your back, his head still tucked under the crook of your neck, his cock still buried inside you. He resumes his fast pace, reaching even deeper inside you with your legs locked around his waist, and you moan so loudly you worry someone’s going to hear you.

Joel doesn’t seem to care as he pulls back to look at you, marvelling at how utterly fucked-out you look for him. His pace starts to falter, each thrust more desperate than the last, and he frantically pushes his tongue into your mouth as you moan in unison.

“Cum for me baby, cum all over my cock, that’s it.” You release on command, crying out as waves of pleasure spread like fire through your body, and the uncontrollable spasms of your orgasm make Joel groan as he spills inside you, still rocking into you and carrying both of your highs.

He doesn’t let his cock slip out of you as he wraps an arm under your back and rolls onto his side, holding you close as he brushes the matted hair away from your forehead and replaces it with a soft kiss. You hum, snuggling into him and trying not to gasp at the feeling of his cock inside you while you were still so sensitive. He can see you flinch and smiles, though he just wants you to rest for now.

“You okay, babygirl?” You just hum again, but he taps your chin and you look up. 

“Answer me, angel.”

“I’m good. Tired.”

Joel nods, running his hand through your hair and agreeing, “me too.” 

You’re quiet for a moment, almost dozing off as the heat that radiates from him lulls you gently to seep, when he breaks the silence again. “What’s his name?”

“Hm?” You reply, too fucked-out to really understand what he was saying.

“That little asshole. What’s his name?”

He’s looking down at you, brows knitted together, and you just sigh. “It doesn’t matter, Joel. He doesn’t matter. I promise.”

“But-“

You cut him off with a kiss, and the tension that built in his shoulders is quickly dissipated. “No ‘but’s. Get some sleep.”

“Aright,” he resigns. “I love you.”

It slips out, sudden, and he freezes before he realises the joy that’s spread across your face from his words. It’s the first time either of you have said it, and the way your eyes light up are enough to let him die a happy man. You nuzzle his nose, your hand gently lay on his chest, your eyes falling shut again. “I love you too, Joel.” He wraps you up tighter, grinning, happy. In love.. “And no asking my Dad, either.”

He scoffs, “I wasn’t going to!” You just cock a brow, eyes still shut, and though you can’t see him you know he’s rolling his eyes. “Let me get you cleaned up, sweetheart.” 

He pulls out of you slowly, making you wince at the loss, and sits up on the bed. When you can still feel his weight beside you, you crack an eye open to see him quickly typing something on his phone, and you frown. “Joel?”

He startles and drops his phone, turning to you and kissing the top of your head. “Sorry, baby, I’m going - just gimme a sec to get you a warm cloth.”

As he leaves for the bathroom you snatch his phone, already knowing what he’d done. Your Dad’s name is at the top of the screen, the chat from just moments ago still open:

What’s the name of that kid (Y/N) went out with?

Matthew Wicks, he’s the new apprentice at work. Why?

Just wondered.

You’re weird, man.

Joel creeps out of the bathroom, frozen as he sees you lock his phone. He offers a small, guilty smile, quickly wiped away as you grab his pillow and playfully launch it at his chest. 

“JOEL!”

──────

Thank you so much for reading! As ever, comments and weblogs are so appreciated, and please let me know if you'd like to be tagged in my future fics!

[journey-to-the-attic]

3rd anni req 2: [DRAGON AU] mammon / first encounter

ao3 link

note: requested by @whensam! i have to admit, i was hoping this'd pop up. i know i can write what i want, but i always feel i need an excuse anyway. you didn't indicate a preference for pov and i also just ended up wanting to do both, so this is a little longer than expected as a result!

∎ ∎ ∎ ∎ ∎

Baker's children don't make good hunters. We’re used to carrying sacks of flour, not sprinting across fields with pitchfork-wielding mobs in hot pursuit. We don't make good kindling, either, but that hasn't stopped about half the adults in the village - for shame, I'd say, if I had the breath to speak.

Here's the thing. Our village isn't exactly a popular spot by any definition of the term. We're too far from any big cities to make good business, we don't make much worth selling, and the people certainly aren't charming enough to warrant a detour.

More important, though, are the creatures we share land with. Through the grassland that border the crop fields, there are invisible lines drawn in the soil - ones that no one crosses.

These lines mark dragon territory, and everyone knows that a dragon would sooner eat you for breakfast than stop for a reasonable conversation. Reasonable conversation is not something I have the luxury of at the moment, which is why I’m already several hundred paces over the line.

Just fifty already takes you into the forest. I don’t hear footsteps in pursuit anymore - they’d have to be mad to follow me so far in, which is exactly what I'd been banking on. The issue now is that, rather than being pitchforked, or burnt at the stake, I’ll probably just get eaten instead.

I pick my way through rotting leaf litter and ridged roots before collapsing against an old oak, wondering if the moisture dripping from overhead is safe to drink - or at least to wash my mouth out with. Gnawing through rope seems like a clever idea until your teeth start bleeding.

I can’t stay here, I think. Dying now would be like letting them win. Then Dad will have smacked the alderman for no reason.

Just as I get back to my feet, something whooshes overhead. I freeze. Those wings were larger than any bird I’ve ever seen.

Surely it couldn’t see me through the leaves. I crouch low to the ground and try to hide in the undergrowth - the wingbeats disappear until all I can hear is distant birdsong.

At least they’re having a nice day. I duck my head and trudge through a hedge - and come face to face with a dragon.

“Argh!”

I leap backwards. Bad move. The sunlight falls across its pointed face just in time for me to watch its pupils expand into full moons, like a cat on the hunt.

It doesn’t pounce. It doesn’t charge, snap or growl. It creeps slowly, eyes fixed on me the whole way forward, as if making sure I know that I can’t escape.

Nowhere to run. I press my back against a wizened old pine and shut my eyes tight - throwing out an arm, as if that might shield me.

Nothing happens. Then something cold presses into my palm.

My eyes snap open. The dragon blinks down at me. Its eyes are such a deep shade of blue that it’s almost dizzying. Oh. Oh, okay.

Its - his? I wonder, noting the ridges on his nose - snout rests carefully in my palm. He seems to register me staring at him, and snorts. The hot air is just on the brink of scalding, but not quite enough to hurt.

Then, almost experimentally, he opens his mouth - a yawning chasm of teeth, poised as if to ever-so-gently bite off my head. Except he doesn’t do that. There’s no pain - no crunch of broken bone or split sinew - far from it. The dragon leans down, carefully hooks his teeth into the collar of my shirt, and takes off.

I’d have screamed if it wasn’t for all the air leaving my chest at once. The forest shrinks to a dark blanket beneath us faster than I can even register it happening, and I realise very quickly that I’d be dashed to bits if I so much as slipped.

Wyvern, says an unhelpful voice in the back of my head as we soar. The dragon’s white-and-gold wings blot out the sun, but they’re so brilliant that it’s hard to tell the difference. They’re good fliers.

Before long, the dragon lands - legs first, digging his talons deep into the soil as he skids to a stop. After a moment, he huffs, then (strangely gently) drops me in a heap on the stony ground.

There’s a rumble, a swoosh - then several thuds, a swoosh of wings. I watch a shadow fall over my field of vision, then slowly raise my head.

Oh, I think a little faintly. 

All sorts of colours, all sorts of demeanours. One in particular steps forward - dark, with crimson eyes, and the sort of air about him that tells me he's the leader. Boss, I'll call him, if only to settle my own nerves. The dragon that brought me here (Goldie, I decide, still trying to settle my breathing) steps forward with a sort of chirrup in greeting.

It's a spectacle, if nothing else. Here are seven dragons, horns and wings and all. I've heard cautionary tales and horror stories, but they never really tell you how majestic they look in real life - scales shinier than any jewel I could imagine. Marvels of creatures, really. If only I had the wits to appreciate it.

Boss is growling now - there's a sort of heat rolling off him in waves. Some of the feeling coming back to my numb legs.

If only I knew what they were saying...

-

It isn’t often that the forest bears treasure - usually it’s all very boring things, like meat and berries and leaves. To be fair, Mammon's used to treasure of the shiny, golden kind - not this weird little critter crouched against a tree.

It smells faintly of smoke and burnt wheat. He stalks closer, but he's testing it more than anything - it doesn’t look like any prey he’s familiar with.

When he gets close, it sticks out a little starfish-shaped appendage and closes its eyes. He smells bitter fear now.

Is it greeting him? Telling him it isn’t a threat? That’s smart. He thought only dragons could be smart, but it’s not behaving - nor does it look - like any dragon he's ever met.

So he returns the greeting with his snout. He half expects to be stung, like the time Asmo brought that little spidery thing home, but all the critter does is look up at him fearfully.

Interesting. On a whim, he scoops the little round thing off, and decides to take it back home.

The weird not-prey goes still as soon as he takes off. Once home, he lets it disembark (drops it on the floor, though he tries to be gentle), then looks up to face his brothers as they land around him.

The others decide to keep their distance. Lucifer is the first to plod forward and investigate.

He sniffs carefully at the air, then makes a crackling noise somewhere at the base of his throat - which isn't usually a good sign.

“That’s a human, Mammon," He says, glaring at the little critter. It’s still sitting, frozen.

“It’s a what?”

“What’d you bring that for? Stupid.” Belphie settles back on his haunches, blowing out a puff of frost. “Can’t go around snatching humans. We’ll get hunted. Stupid.”

“Shut up,” He grunts. “And I didn’t snatch it. Found it walkin’ around in the forest.”

“That’s impossible,” Satan says nearly immediately. His tail swishes back and forth - slow and deliberate, an analytical glint in his clever eyes. “They don’t let their young anywhere near us.”

“Well, whaddya call this, then?”

The human - apparently - suddenly seems to regain use of its limbs. Springing to its feet (Levi shrinks back, crest flattering over his head), it stumbles for a moment, then abruptly ducks under one of Mammon's wings.

The rest of his brothers - who'd similarly drawn back - relax again with a simultaneous murmur of vague confusion. Mammon blinks. Then his tail starts flicking at the end - like it always does when he's pleased.

“...you are not keeping it,” Lucifer says, looking as if he'd very much like to fly off into the sunset.

“It might have a disease!” adds Asmo.

“I don’t care what any of ya say,” Mammon says stubbornly, snapping at Beel when it looks like he might creep in for a bite. “I’m not sendin’ it back to the forest. It’ll be dead in a day.”

"It might be dangerous," Levi hisses. "It's totally giving me the evil eyes."

"Stop scaring it, then,” Mammon says loftily. “Relax, ya big baby - You’ve got teeth bigger than its whole head.”

“You are not keeping it,” Lucifer says again, as if repeating himself will make him sound more in charge.

“Pfft. Can’t tell me what to do.” He snaps at Beel again. “Oi! No bitin’! Go raid your stash or something.”

Beel’s horns seem to droop a little. “...fine. C’mon, Belphie.”

“I was busy,” complains Satan with a huff as the twins flap off. "This is boring. I've seen deer carcasses more interesting than that weird little thing."

"Go look at your stinkin' carcasses, then," Mammon shoots back, fighting the impulse to spit something at him.

Satan does exactly that. Levi soon slinks off as well, apparently still intimidated - and Asmo seems to have disappeared as soon as he decided the human wasn't going to make a good accessory.

Lucifer, meanwhile, stands his ground. His tail is beginning to lash in agitation. If Mammon’s lucky, maybe he’ll even start spitting fire.

“I'm not gonna eat it,” He says stubbornly.

“I wasn't going to tell you to,” Lucifer replies, but he sounds very much like he’s considering it. “Belphie was right. If a hunter sees us with one of their young, they’ll take it as a threat.”

“Like we wouldn’t win,” He scoffs, sitting down with a thump. "Anyway,don't ya smell the fire on it?"

A single scarlet eye narrows a little. Evidently he hadn't - though Lucifer's always smelling smoke, by virtue of the literal furnace in his chest, so he can't really be blamed for not noticing.

The human is peeking out from beneath his wing with a little more bravado now. Lucifer eyes its round little face as if it might start spitting poison at him.

"...humans don't usually try to set fire to their young," Lucifer says after a moment. "You're sure she doesn't have anywhere to go?"

"Wouldn't've been in the forest if it— uh, she did." He glances down. "C'mon! Not like we don't have the space."

Lucifer is silent. Then he gives a long-suffering sigh - sending a plume of dark blue smoke into the sky - and bends down to the human’s eye level again.

“Will you behave?” Lucifer asks her severely, as if she can understand dragon-speak.

The human child blinks up at him. Then she reaches up and plants a hand on his snout.

Mammon holds his breath. After a moment, Lucifer’s wings flutter, then settle.

“I’m not having any part in this,” He announces, stepping back. “This is to be your responsibility only. Don't make any trouble for your brothers. Do you understand?”

“Yeah, yeah,” He says dismissively, occupied with keeping his triumph from showing in his tail. Got it.”

Lucifer glances down at the human one final time. “...take care of her.”

And off he flaps - to attend to his usual nighttime duties. He says he's keeping watch for danger, but mostly they seem to involve gazing darkly into the sunset.

With his brothers dispersed, Mammon takes a moment to actually consider his situation. He doesn’t actually know what taking care of a human child involves. He doesn’t know much about humans in general - it’s not like he usually pays them any attention. Maybe some of his brothers could give him some advice… if any of them were interested in the kid’s well-being, at least.

They’ll come around, He decides after a moment, unfurling his wings and attempting to nudge the human in the general direction of their living caves. First, I gotta figure out what these things eat…

[pochapal]

I shall tempt fate!

Thoughts on the thirteenth doctor?

I didn’t like the era much but 13 is awesome imo ^^

[approximately 1 trillion turrets taking aim] okay SO the thing with 13 is that everyone who watched her and hated her was a needless redditbrained loser who didn't understand a thing. yes she was kind of mid in the end BUT not for a single reason any of her detractors like to espouse.

she was on track for a very good slow burn tragic arc of over-correcting twelve's flaws (he got too attached and this burned him over and over and over again) where in her attempts to protect her companions from the same doomed fate as every previous human to enter the tardis she ends up not showing how she really feels at all until it's too late for it to count because whether or not she's attached or distant all humans die in the end and to travel with the doctor is to in part indulge in a death drive because by nature of being a companion it means eventually you are going to collide face first with tragedy. all the pieces for this are there very much in her first two seasons and this reading even explains why the finales were kind of lacking oomph (her distancing in attachment also extended to Being The Doctor on some level; this could have compounded with all the latent Gender stuff real nicely but didn't) since it was kind of all building to one core tragic break.

this likely would have happened in her third season but then covid kind of destroyed production and obviously every ambition/plan had to be downscaled into flux which was like. fine??? nothing really bad to say about it other than it feels a touch truncated but that was mostly due to pandemic filming restrictions than anything else (and will never be as terrible as the parts of the moffat era which suffered extensively as a result of sherlock existing and taking up the lead writers/producers time and effort). only issue with it was that it shifted tone/direction in a way that kept all of 13's era on this same flat note right at the moment when this naturally should have been shifted up a gear for the third act.

unironically in an ideal world we got a full length third season for thirteen and the one thing that needed to happen was yaz dying. like i liked yaz and everything but girlie needed to die so badly in some episode and for her to die thinking that the doctor never actually cared about her, forcing thirteen to realize becoming disattached doesn't prevent tragedy from happening it just deprives her of love. continuing this ideal scenario the next beat that needed to happen was thirteen absolutely fucking snapping as yaz's death serves as the catalyst for all the other billion emotions she's been pointedly Not Feeling in this incarnation - this in turn would allow us to see shades of the rogue doctor or whatever her name was (renegade doctor? fugitive doctor? exile doctor?) and create an interesting interplay between the two. this'd then lead to an "Oh Fuck I Have Really Fucked Up At Being The Doctor Huh" moment where she starts aggressively Being The Doctor (maybe strongarming dan into being a companion semi against his wishes to fill the void?) and maybe fucking with her own history/reputation or w/e which might've fed into the timeless child mystery thing somehow (don't ask me i'm spitballing on half-remembered information). also identity crisis heartbroken thirteen at the end of her life reaching back into herself and re-using ten's face as a kind of "second chance" at all the parts of herself that ten embodied and she didn't (the absolute love for companions and humanity) where the tension is now whether or not fourteen ignores the literal centuries of history separating himself from the last time he wore this face and that feeding into the new rtd era.

even a small number of these things would have made thirteen probably one of the best doctors in the series in all the metrics that really matter but we didn't get that so we have to contend with what we do have and that was mostly just...okay. thirteen for me is like. she was brimming with potential to go down a certain route i would have eaten up but things never quite fell into place. probably a whole bunch of reasons behind the scenes why thirteen's era fell short of total greatness but i still enjoyed good chunks of thirteen more than certain doctors who i can and will name (doctor eleven they could never make me like you) so she has that going for her at least. also can't be fully mad at the writing because i actually have an unjustified soft spot for chibnall (this is my biases talking but the countrycide episode of torchwood top 1 piece of doctor who media and i'm so mad he didn't lean back into the folk horror aesthetic again for the witch trials episode in thirteen's run) and overall thirteen's era was just. it was consistent. i really wish covid hadn't fucked over the final season so the nascent themes in her arc could've come to a more satisfying fruition because i will always be a forever truther thirteen's era was slow-building up to something really good. the haters will never convince me otherwise.

[elibean]

well this anime season is ending with a lot less shows than i thought it would, lol

there were SO MANY "ok i'll check out the first episode at least" shows on my list this season and i dropped most of them xD

shy-- cute, but nothing particularly stood out to me. also it would've hit way harder if the classmate ACTUALLY died. oh no she was a little more injured than the rest of them. boohoo

bullbuster-- i'm a sucker for anime originals, and this is pa works, right? ah no i'm way off lol it's NUT, same ones who did...deca-dence, i think? yeah, and i loved that one that was fun. but i just generally don't care about mechas, and this wasn't doing anything to really stand out from others shows, so

shangri-la-- ok everyone was praising the HELL out of this beforehand, like they really liked the source material. the first episode was...fine? it just seems like a straightforward "guy gets really into a vr game" thing lol, like maybe sao but without the impending doom. the animation was nice, but there was nothing there to really grab me.

100 girlfriends-- again people were praising the source material here, so i thought maybe i'd enjoy it, even though i usually don't bother with harem or romance. i thought maybe this'd be different. it wasn't. some of the jokes got a snort out of me, but nothing like super amazing. and the heteronormative thing that he can only be in love with girls was annoying lol

i think that's it out of what i tried and dropped. so what i'm following, sequels notwithstanding--

telepath-- ok the premise is really dumb, what high school girl would HONESTLY make a whole dream about ~meeting aliens~. i think younger me would have been more invested in this kind of thing BUT the forehead touch was super cute, and this IS tagged under "girls' love" so i'm....hoping. please. give me like a smooch or something please

yuzuki-san-- awful subs aside, this seemed really cute and promising. nothing groundbreaking, but endearing and i love stories about families.

frieren-- i'm not gonna say it's a masterpiece but like. easily aots, no contest lol. incredible, even if predictable. the idea of her retracing her steps is really interesting, too. and it's a cool storytelling thing to have us retroactively see her journey along the way-- that's just really fun. i'm not sure how i feel about the goal of getting to talk to her dead friend again. it feels like it kind of cheapens what she's trying to do, in a way? unsure, i feel like they might be able to pull it off in a satisfying way, though. i love the idea of her trying to grow and become more empathetic-- that's really interesting. this one deserves all the praise it's getting.

aaaand that's it, again minus sequels. small season, compared to what i thought it'd be lol

[mishkakagehishka]

random question but i need help so i have an oc and she's a big of a tired, overworked timid producer type. so i imagine her meeting valkyrie for the first time, specifically shu, accidentally making the oc cry since when they meet she's in a sad mood.

the joke is that shu was just asking a normal question but he's intimitating enough to make the oc cry and mika's like "oshi-san! you made the nice new producer cry! :(((" and shu panics because how do you deal with a woman suddenly crying and people looking at you like "wtf did shu itsuki just make a woman cry? what did he do?"

a part of me thinks shu wouldn't care much and just tell the oc to stop crying bc it's unbecoming for a producer to cry on the job or panic because (totally a paragraph shu would say /s) "shit i just made a stranger cry what do i do??? please stop!! im sorry???? help??? kagehira what do you do to make people stop crying??"

or maybe it progresses from "stop crying. it's embarassing for a producer like you to cry." to "??? kagehira, i didn't mean to make the woman cry!! how do you make it stop??"

basically i just wanna know how shu would react if someone just bursts into tears infront of him and he's stuck with people looking at him confused and wondering if he made them cry. i feel like he wouldn't have much of a panic but it's still funny to think he would end up panicking. thoughts?

- chicken liver

It took me a bit to get to this !

I think Shu would have a sequence he'd think in. It'd start with not really taking the Producer seriously, right? He'd probably wave her tears off at first, especially if he wasn't even mean. Then, Mika would probably say something like, "Oh, you made her cry :(", I feel like Mika is more perceptive with people's emotions, so this'd get Shu to really notice she's actually crying. At this point, I'd say he'd try to comfort her but in a really weird Shu-esque way. Something that sounds like he's dismissing her tears, but is in actuality trying to build her up (something like, "What possible reason would an esteemed producer of ES have to cry? Surely, you're not intimidated by the very idols you are to produce?" which would make it seem like he's saying she's not cut out to work there, but what he means is that she landed the job, so she has no reason to feel intimidated or scared or inferior, not to a degree that she'd cry).

It's when people start staring, pointing, whispering that Shu would panic, though. Mika probably tries to save the situation by offering her candy or a well-meaning, "Oshi-san doesn't mean it like that" since he's the resident Shu translator, but Shu's panicked state means he's just digging himself in deeper. I think in the end Mademoiselle would properly apologise in Shu's name, to be honest, and Shu would be left in that limbo of "tried his best, but dear Lord, what is his diagnosis"

[sojournerstales]

Belle's 2022 Wrap-Up Thingie.

Hello! I've been quiet on here lately, equal parts due to a new fixation and simply that a lot of my output has been spread across a bunch of different Works-In-Progress as opposed to focusing on finishing just one.

I don't think I'm procrastinating. I think the days are short and cold and these are not conditions in which I am the most productive, so I do what I can, work on things that don't have the pressure of polish, of showing and telling.

Still, that doesn't mean I can't have doubts over how much I'm getting done, how much I've written, so I'm doing this post to take stock of what I did get finished this year and maybe some quick thoughts on them.

If you're a writer and we follow each other maybe this'd be a fun thing for you to do too! (Or don't, I'm not a cop.)

Also some of this stuff won't be in any particular order as memory is fake, timelines don't matter.

SOJOURNER'S TALES, VOLUME 1: WE FEEL AT NIGHT.

5,200 words.

So I released We Feel At Night at around April time, it was the first project I put up on itch dot io and was a bit of an experiment as to whether that would be a format I enjoy. Each story was originally released on a single Carrd, hosted only until the next one was finished. Something a little eerie, a little ephemeral.

The stories within are In The Dark We Look Like Monsters, All I Am Is An Alley Cat, and Late Night Make-Out Sessions, along with I, II, III, IV and an Epilogue.

In The Dark We Look Like Monsters is a moody little look at the night-time rituals of a group of neighbours who all struggle with sleep, and the passing headlights of a car lost on their street. It has a guest appearance from Jackie, ostensibly my mainstay OC who is in a bunch of stuff I write. I think this is a really nice piece? It's about touching someone's life without ever knowing it at all. It's about freaking yourself at night with the shadows in your house.

All I Am Is An Alley Cat is probably everyone's favourite of the bunch, it seemed to touch a lot of people with its shapeshifting genderfreak main character. Alley Cat is a cool dude, guy, girl, creature who doesn't know what they want for themselves, and only just knows what others want from them, and they change themselves to fulfil those desires and to feel a little something. I'm really proud of this one.

Late Night Make-Out Sessions is the longest of this collection - though it is a short collection. It was important to me here to include a non-monster/creature/supernatural non-binary character. I so often write about non-human characters, like Alley Cat, and I didn't want to just relegate any non-binary character I write into the stereotypical shapeshifter, or alien, or robot. The story isn't really about gender, it's about making a friend who is so much braver than you, knows so much more than you, who teaches you strange rituals to reconcile horrible, unfixable memories. It's also about kissing in the dark.

I, II, III, IV are a series of personal ghost stories, each one appearing between the stories above to act as a little breather. They detail my personal, limited experience with ghosts. No, that's not strictly accurate; The stories are me detailing my personal thoughts on ghosts as I try to deal with the loss of my mother, the woman who has me believing in this stuff, the woman who got me into horror. I miss her a lot.

And the Epilogue is just a personal essay about my motivation to put the collection together, what themes I'd hoped to achieve, meeting strangers at night who showed me concern and made me realize that the way the world perceives me has changed. It's thoughts on trans success, I suppose.

A SERIES OF ROOMS

Some amount of words.

So some time after finishing Volume 1 I become enamoured with liminal spaces. I've always been into the quiet eeriness of the backrooms, or empty shopping centres, or roads at night, and I always see these things limited to a creepy, visual medium. I wanted to translate the eeriness of the backrooms into prose, and so what we have here as an experimental exploration of the backrooms. It's best viewed on desktop devices, I never tested the layout for mobile.

It's short, sweet, creepy, and I really dig what I made here.

SOJOURNER'S TALES, VOLUME 2: PARTICULAR MOMENTS IN VAGUE PLACES

11,000 words. Give or take.

So I published this around August time, it's a continuation of my fascination with liminal spaces, but here I marry the eerie horror of them with queer romance - my favourite flavour of horror. The idea I wanted to hit on is that I've always found the typical liminal space comforting. I've fallen in love in an airport, I've snoozed comfortably in the back of a car rattling around dark country roads, and there are so many places I'd love to be alone with a friend in.

I also did something with the titles of the stories here that works best if I write the chapter list out:

(What if-)

Waiting For D5

(-we kissed-)

On Sundays +1

(-between-)

Just Off The A48

(-the walls?)

(What if we kissed between the walls?) is a series of bumper-stories that again act as a breather between each story, and they detail a couple getting lost in the backrooms, this is where I lay the imagery on the thickest of impossible spaces, yellow halls, chlorinated pools. It's all alright, they have each other, these are great make-out spots.

Waiting For D5 is my love-letter to Birmingham airport. Or a love-letter to my partner. We started long distance, but that was okay because the flight was quick and I enjoyed the romance of Burger King at 5AM waiting for my gate to open. It's about travelling together, it's about being about to travel together. These stories are about liminal spaces, but they're also about liminal states of mind, states of being. Waiting For D5 is about holding onto that moment between where you were and where you are going and getting to share that moment with someone you love.

On Sundays +1 was the toughest to write of the bunch. Not emotionally or anything like that, I just struggled with the presentation and plot the most. It's about a girl who keeps waking up on an extra day that exists between Sunday and Monday, and only one other person is experiencing that with her. Together they explore and abandoned version of their hometown, getting to know each other totally separated from the realities of the world, from other people. Like their own private chat. It's about making friends online, in undefined spaces, and the anticipation of bringing that into the real world. It's also about all the transmasculine people in my life who I so often fall madly, platonically in-like with. I adore them all. On Sundays +1 is for them.

Just Off The A48 started off as a complicated beast. It was going to be about this pub in the countryside that every now and then is visited by someone who has just recently died. It was going to be about hitting it off with a woman at the bar and going to bed with her and refusing to turn around the following morning just in case she was gone, just in case she was never there to begin with. I tried so hard to make that story work but everything about it needed way more space than I was willing to give - I wanted each story to match the other in length, so instead I wrote something complete different that fleshes out the ideas of the Volume so much better. Instead JOTA48 completes the triumvirate: Liminal spaces with a romantic partner. Liminal spaces with a friend. Liminal spaces with a stranger. I once again get to introduce Jackie to one of my collections, and this time she helps a frustrated teenager get their car unstuck from a muddy ditch in the road. It's more than that, it's no more than that, it's being in the right place at the right time.

THE LONG FINGERS

I wanna say like 5k words?

Oh boy, The Long Fingers. I wanted to write something scary for October. I finished this in November. That's how it always goes! It's okay, I still managed to write something scary. I remember fretting over whether it was super boring, sending it to a friend who I rely on so often for test-reading, and being sent back:

"Jesus Christ, Belle."

The Long Fingers is about a shame spiral, it's about depression, it's about letting your hygiene slip, your house fall into disarray and mess, and being unable to ask for help because what if they judge you?

Shame is a long fingered thing, and as dire as this story is it is not meant to be without hope, it is meant to be a cautionary tale.

Fun fact! I still get nervous when I take the trash out at home because I based the apartment building in this story on my own home and I scared myself with it! Even so, I'm extremely proud of this work. I made something scary and meaningful and freaked a bunch of my friends out.

It's one of the last things I finished before winter came on strong and my productivity slowed down, I hope to finish a couple of other similarly themed stories to release as Volume 3: Siren Songs, but we shall see about that!

THE OBLITERATION PIT

Maybe 1,5k words?

This one was scary to post, but I wanted to post it. I wanted to post something to affirm that hello I am a lesbian trans writer, which is a shallow reason for posting something so personal I know. I just wanted to get off my chest some thoughts about dysphoria, non-physical dysphoria, the sort of dysphoria you feel in your heart and your brainstem and the bottomless pit in your stomach.

I'm doing good though.

THE WORKS IN PROGRESS

There are so many text files, I'unno like 4-5k words among them?

Between Volume 1 and The Long Fingers I have a whole bunch of things that aren't yet finished, that are only just conceptualized, that have half a chapter written and saved.

There is HERO-99, TRANSGENDER SCI-FI ACTION, a sort-of riff on the vibes of action cartoons aimed at teens, centered around a canonically transgender super-heroine in a cyberpunk city, DIY'ing her hormones and fighting against an evil scientist (and capitalism). I've been structuring this around the idea of lost episodes of a cancelled TV-show before it ever left production and have written the pilot, half of episode 3, and the first half of the finale. Will this ever see the light of day? Probably not. I'm writing this for me. It's so indulgent.

THE KNIGHTS ERRANT, my foray into sword'n'board fantasy writing. I've made a good start on it, motivated by a friend who is desperate for some good dark fantasy that isn't so, y'know, like that. This one probably will see the light of day!

ISTE BY THE SEA, hopefully this will be a part of Siren Songs, and I'm going to remain relatively tight-lipped as I'm likely to finish this within the next couple months.

FANFICTION. Nothing too exciting, just pornography and maybe a little something for Vi League Of Legends because watching Arcane has filled me with that classic spite-fuel. (I won't get into it here. I WON'T get into it here.) Oh, and some Warframe fanfiction too. Don't get me started on Warframe, I owe it my life and more.

There's probably one or two things I'm missing. I haven't mentioned A WARM FIELD or KALIEDOHOUSE because I haven't committed anything to a text document for them yet (though I do have some scenes and chapters handwritten in my notebook, I highly encourage this habit of scrawling some things out somewhere they can't be backspace'd). Taking stock of everything makes me realize I've had a good year for my writing. I got burnt out a little bit after I finished my book - BY THE WAY I FINISHED MY BOOK A WHILE BACK - and so it's feeling good to be back in the saddle and not crunching.

I'm still shopping around GIRLS AND GHOSTS to various publishers, but it's hard to find someone willing to bite on a first-time-author of a weird queer-horror-romance-anthology. It'll happen someday, I'm sure of it. It's a really good book.

Thanks for reading!

[koselz]

Fitting that I just started this blog as a big change just happened in my life. I hope I can go back at this moment in the future and see how things have changed...

I think I just lost one of my best friends for personal reasons. I messed up. We're still working on a project together, we still talk, and they said things are fine between me and them, but I just can't stop thinking that the magic died, the spark is gone. We were best friends, now we're just friendly acquaintances.

They're way dryier than they usually are towards me, I really think they're only still hanging around because of the project we're working on. They reply to my messages about the project, but nothing else. I know them, I was the one who gave them the advice of "If you don't like someone but can'y get away from them, just say the necessary and leave when done." and I think they're using it.

I don't know if I should apologize again, if I should just play it cool and be nice until we're finished with the project, I don't know if I should mention this to them and tell them I think the spark is gone. I don't wanna annoy them and drive them away fully because we've been working and investing on this project for years and we GOTTA finish it no matter what.

I'm just sad and kinda anxious, I just hope things get better. Maybe time will heal these wounds and they'll warm up to me again, maybe not. I'm not gonna force them to do anything and I won't do anything yet. I'm just gonna wait for a while.

Anxiety feels weird. I don't know how it feels for others, but for me, it's a weird feeling in my belly, like hunger. I wonder if I'll become those people who eat a bunch when they're depressed and end up obese. I hate this feeling, but, I'll distract myself with other friends and YouTube videos. I can handle myself.

I really gotta change how I act. I'm lucky my best friends are patient and incredible people but sometimes I do joke too much. I had this group with my best friends, we talked about so many INSANELY personal things, actual deep deep secret things. I thought this'd make our bond unbreakable, now I see that's not the case. I really gotta change how I act and be a better friend. I'm a total fucking asshole.

Feels nice to vent, even if it's just to nobody. I still feel a bit sad and anxious. But I think the feeling left me a bit. I think it left me and entered the text. Isn't that deep? Yes, it is. I'm such a deep and cool person.

This picture of the nameless character has no context. It's just her looking at a rat. I had no idea of what to draw. Imma make a post about her very soon.

[tsuki-sennin]

Ageha's birthday is today (in the U.S. at least). Very based.

I believe this more of an everybody episode than an Ageha one, but I think this'd be a fun way to celebrate~! It's a very fun idea for an episode too.

Spoilers, I guess...

-Ahhhhh, a fireworks festival~! Not exactly my scene, but.

-One mission squat, two mission squat, three mission squat!

-Doin' a little dance for a nursery school exam? I mean I wouldn't know, but...

-Ageeeeee~~~!?

-"Alright, let's run it back, we can't have you firing the missiles now, can we?"

-Cicada Jumpscare!

-Princess Elle stands alone.

-Something really funny I just realized about Ageha's... goddamn shiny Humvee. Yes, I'm complaining about this again, and on her birthday to boot, shush-

-That green and white sticker you see on Piyo-chan in the intro denotes a new driver. This, of course, implies to me that Ageha's first choice in car is a bright yellow Hummer.

-Welcome... to the Baby Game Zone.

-This dimension is like a palette swap of Sweet Cuppin' Cakes from the Homestar Runner universe. Like, I swear, Eh! Steve! is gonna pop up.

-He always does... and when he comes a-runnin', that's when I get a-rollin'~!

-PIG

-Ton!

-Pinkton...

-A training simulator!

-Man, remember Fresh's training episode, where it's casually established that Kento's parents just have like... billions of yen worth of military-grade equipment they invested in? What was up with that? What the heck were they

-...I have to wonder if Toei's testing the waters for a video game-themed PreCure series. ...I'd be totally down with that, for the record.

-I can see how Ageha's dance practice and furthering Tsubasa's aeronautical knowledge constitute training, but I'm struggling a little to see what cosmetic training would do for Mashiro, considering she was doing it already. ...I wonder if it's a similar motivation principle to the Tropica-Rouge Cures?

-Oh, never mind, I get the conceit of this episode now~!

-The hobby shuffle~!

-"This is the boy's domain."

-Ten hours.

-A little under triple the distance!

-"DANCE FOR ME, BORB"

-Overwhelmed by hearts.

-Sora's gotta put her war paint on!

-Mirror Sora!

-Got them shonen anime brows!

-Got them

-Got them Naruto cheeks!

-Work those skinny legs, Mashiron!

-Climb the rope!

-"Ah, the Wild Lesson cheat. Don't worry, we'll make snack time~!"

-"The boy... he would read!"

-Oh, Sora-chan... :(

-An add-on. Like the Sega CD or the 32X!

-There you go, Tsubasa! Put a little pep in your step! Ageeeeeee desu~!

-"My ribs feel like they're exploding!"

-Believe in your force ghost girlfriend, Mashiron! She believes in you!

-TRIP!

-And the save!

-Teamwork makes the dream work~!

-This game sucks~!

-Eight minutes of episode left.

-OH NO I ACCIDENTALLY DROPPED MY MONSTER SUMMONING CARD!

-NAKEWAMEKE!

-...huh, whaddya know?

-Sky Mirage~!

-"Making her streaming debut under sponsorship of Pretty Holic... Cure Sky~!"

-"MY KIDNEYS ARE WHERE MY APPENDIX SHOULD BE! ...Cure Prism~!"

-"Maybe when I get home, I can become the Puni Bird Tribe's greatest dancer! ...Cure Wing!"

-"The Wright Brothers only ever flew together in the same plane once, on May 25th, 1910, with their dad Milton also flying with Orville a little while later! Cure Butterfly~!"

-This is Easy Mode.

-Sky Blue~!

-Prism White~!

-...y'know, I think Force Ghost Sora was a little gay enough, but seeing this again is nice~!

-Sweet merciful crap, there's a lot of 'em!

-"Sorry I made you train."

-Dawwwwww, it's okay Princess~! Next time you too can become a true GAMER!

-Oh, Butterfly~! Happy birthday, Queen.

-Oh! Okay, hi Ageha-neesama! ...if I had to predict what your name is, I'd say maybe a different butterfly species.

-Damn, guess we're giving you double focus!

-

[catgirl-catboy]

Okay I'm too excited about the upcoming chapter 3 talk with you lol, tell me when you play it so I will annoy you further -I hope I do not annoy you though-

Yeah I agree and this is why their relationship impacted me the way they did. And I certainly disagree with Haru. Satsuki with clown outfit is a banger, Yuki and him are so wrong about her, they don't know how appealing a clown outfit is. Cowards

Dude, I am having so much of a good time, I'm probably scaring off the normies with how gorey I'm getting. Come to my blog for fandom discussion, either stay or leave because of the gore obsession.

Alas, this'd go faster if I wasn't hit with the Total drama obsession buttom for most hours of the day, and also real life tasks during my Total Drama obsession hours. Rude! I've got a schedule of being obsessed to keep!

Yeah, I feel like she should wear whatever she feels comfortable in, and that both the clown outfit and prom dress have stigma attached to them for her. As much as I enjoy clowns, maybe we should get her a nice circus themed T shirt + leggings.

[comicaurora]

How do you deal with going from story eater to creator of story? What do you do if your audience sees flaws or perceives lack of depth, finds potential you never saw and feel it's wasted, or can't find what you thought you were writing? Problems you didn't realize? Mistakes? Of course people are positive but i think people who see negative are also valid to say so bc they say it for a reason and often care. But when to balance that? Do your thoughts matter at the end of the day abt the story?

Of course they matter.

The short answer is you cannot be worrying about this when you write. Your goal when writing should be telling the story you want to tell, not telling a perfect story that is completely above criticism and could never be improved, because that is impossible.

You could bake the most beautiful red velvet cake with exquisite frosting and a moist crumb and someone will tell you "you should've added another tier" and someone else will tell you "this cake would taste better if it were square" and someone will add "I think this'd be a little better if you'd used more baking powder" and someone else will say "I don't like cream cheese frosting, you should've used chocolate buttercream instead" and if you try to change your cake to please every one of those people you'll end up with a big pile of frosting-y crumbs. Plus, the people who actually like your cake fine will be disappointed that you took it away from them to "fix" it and they ended up with much less cake than they wanted.

Your audience will have opinions on your work, and you cannot and should not pre-empt those opinions. It's not your job to control how the audience sees your story - your job is just to tell the story. Criticism is good and being open to it is good, but ultimately you need to keep sight of what you want from this story. Do you want to tell a perfect story, or do you want to tell this story? In the pursuit of art, if you compromise your own enjoyment of the creative process too much, you will burn out, and then nobody gets any cake.

To address the other part of your question, the shift from fan-side media analysis to writing helped confirm something I kind of already knew: transformative work of any kind is orders of magnitude easier than building an original work from nothing. This is a huge part of its appeal, of course - if someone wants to flex their writing muscles without doing a ton of heavy lifting to establish setting and characters, they can just grab some established characters and write about them, or take an established plotline and say "I'm gonna tweak like 10% of this and see what happens." It's a way for the audience to engage with media that lets them consume it on a deeper, more personally satisfying level than just watching or reading it - it lets them digest it, turn it into part of their own creative process. I've sketched fanart of characters and scenes that were parked in my head rent-free because it gave me creative energy to do so.

And that's all well and good. It's nice clean fun. But telling your own story is very, very hard. You don't just have to build the world and characters and establish them from the ground up - you also need to guide their movements into satisfying and thematically consistent character arcs, keep the pacing tight, establish stakes that are actually concerning, build up mysteries with actual solutions that intrigue without being frustrating, dodge the yawning trope pitfalls so you don't fall in and drag the story down with you. And then you need to keep doing it as the story gets heavier and heavier and longer and longer behind you, keeping track of all the stuff you've previously established and all the trailing plot threads you haven't resolved yet and planning for where you're gonna lug the whole thing in the future.

And, to put it bluntly, it's real easy for someone chilling with a brisk glass of lemonade watching you drag this enormous tangled mass along inch by inch to sidle over, tap you on the shoulder and say "I can't believe you didn't spend more time on Guard Number 3."

Everyone who ever reads your story will have a version in their head that they think would be absolutely perfect, and some of them will complain at you that their theoretical perfect version is very different from yours, and every one of these people's perfect versions will be completely different from each other's. You cannot take it as a catastrophic personal failing that someone wishes 2% of your story was a little bit differently shaped.

Don't categorically reject all criticism, but you have to engage with that criticism critically. Some of it'll be pointing out legit mistakes (since, as mentioned, you're dragging a huge unweildy pile of tangled plot threads and big heavy chunks of worldbuilding, so you will fuck up occasionally) but some of it will just be personal preference or criticisms of the form "hey I haven't actually read your story but based on what I think it's doing I am very mad at you" and "I think this story would be better if it was a completely different story." You cannot treat all critiques as equally useful, and I'll be honest - in my experience, almost none of it will ever actually help you. Criticism like that is generally for the benefit of other fans and future storytellers learning from other people's mistakes. Your job in those circumstances is to serve as a good example and to just deal with the fact that it stings to be a good bad example.

And in general, anyone who tells you "your story would be so much better if you did my fanfic idea" can be politely and categorically disregarded.

[autisticcassandracain]

Opinions on Joey Wilson?

Ooh, interesting, since I do have some fanfic ideas about Joey but I haven't started any yet! This'll be more core aspects of his character, maybe mixed with 'how I'd write him':

1. Joey's a Nice Lad

He's just a nice lad! Canon keeps trying to make him evil or jaded and it doesn't work because he's, at his core, nice! It's literally his defining character trait right up until he goes evil for the first time. He's a relentlessly gentle, kind person. He finds his mom tortured, after being taken hostage to force her to cooperate (a situation that directly mimics the biggest trauma of his life) and right before they break out, he takes the time to tell her he loves her. Like that's just the kind of person he is. He's kind, and there's nothing that can change that.

2. The Throat Cutting Incident Changed His Life

I mean, duh? But seriously, it's something I've talked before, but the throat cutting incident was the changing point of his life. Pretty much all of his current characterization and insecurities can be traced back to it. It affects how he sees the world on a fundamental level, and I don't think any version of Joey that doesn't consider how this has impacted him can work on any level.

3. Joey has Self-Esteem Issues, and They're Ugly

Joey has severe self-esteem issues that are born from internalized ideals of toxic masculinity. Joey has canonically stated that he connects masculinity with violence and toughness, and doesn't consider himself masculine enough. While we've never seen these ideals be externalized in canon, there's no real reason to assume they couldn't. If Joey ended up expressing those self-esteem issues to others, it's likely to be via uncritically expressing ideas of toxic masculinity. It's something that would've been great to have seen him work through, but I'm unsure whether Marv Wolfman (and maybe Perez? IDK exactly when he left as a writer, I didn't pay attention), like, realizes this was problematic, lmao.

4. Joey is Alienated from his Family

Joey's main character conflict is the way his gentle nature clashes with the harshness of the rest of his family. This had lead him to feel alienated around them, like he doesn't belong, and is, in a way, inferior to them. I think he might feel like he isn't really good enough for them, since Phobia's 'deepest fear' revelation featured his parents dismissing his importance. This affects all his interactions with them.

It also, albeit indirectly, affects his interactions with the Titans; you can go several ways with this, but personally, I take the fact that he's been absent from pretty much all group bonding activities to mean that he's still rather uncomfortable with actually being close to them. While I do think Joey feels at home with the Titans more than with his family and considers them a kind of found family (and this is pretty much canon), I also think he probably has a bit of a case of Imposter's Syndrome and is (perhaps unconsciously) wary of alienating them the way he feels he has his family. This last part is pure speculation and personal interpretation, so feel free to disagree, but if I were to write him, this'd be a point of characterization I'd try to keep in mind.

5. Joey is a Sensitive Artist(TM)

Again, duh, but this really does colour how he sees the world. He's had this internal monologue about wishing he could create music as poetic as the sounds of the city, which really struck me as a great character note. Joey sees the world as an artistic canvas that he is constantly trying to capture and recreate. Any writing about him should reflect this.

[cuntess-carmilla]

Huge news!!!! I got a part time job at a local makeup store chain, 30 hours a week. It all happened REALLY fast and I actually had huge panic attacks (yes, plural) on Wednesday night and Thursday because doing paperwork makes my autistic brain short circuit in distress and I had to send a million of those starting that Wednesday up until Thursday.

I started working on Friday. I'm just annoyed because originally they told me I'd start working on March by which time I was (and tbh still am) kinda sure I was going to have my rollator already (they were very accommodating of my accessibility needs thank God), but they suddenly told me "Actually, can you start TOMORROW?" the day after we first talked and I was like... "Can it be the day after that? 😬"

Thank fucking GOD I didn't go for full time. I've only managed to resist each of my shifts by coming home to use this bubble massage machine for feet with some salts that have an anesthetic effect because I SWEAR TO GOD after like 1 hour of being on my feet or even sitting on a chair that's not the appropriate angle for me my feet are already murdering me and by the end of the day I promise, no exaggeration, I can feel them buzzing and burning in pain, with the inner teeny tiny bones that form the foot all mangled and stuck.

Today on each of my breaks I simply had to take my shoes off in the back and sit there massaging my feet, the rest of the day doing my best to be on my ass as much as humanly possible and with my feet up on another chair at that too. Even then my feet are STILL absolutely destroyed, despite how my parents offered to come pick me up by car this time after my shift ended. It's not even a lot of clients on weekends during February! That's when everyone in Chile takes their vacations and thus leaves Santiago.

Otherwise, the job itself is nice. My coworkers are all really nice, especially the guy and the girl that work the weekends, it's makeup so I know my way around very well, the pay is pretty nice for the job, I get a discount on whatever they sell, I can do whatever makeup I want because it's actually encouraged for us to show off our makeup abilities if we have them, and the uniform is just simple and relatively modest black clothes. They even allow some jewelry as long as it's nothing flashy, so, no spiked collars or my huge silver bat necklace, but I can wear my comfort earrings and gothy but formal looking necklaces.

The only other problem I have is much smaller (compared to the pain at least), and it's that there's something in the environment of our store that gives me an allergic reaction. Like, runny nose and watering itchy eyes. We have no idea what it is.

I swear if I just had my rollator this'd be a breeze.

Welp. Tremendous, unbearable pain and an injury (my knee is fucked, my fucked knee is pinching a nerve that's numbing that leg's big toe and sending some tiny electric shocks now to the pinky toe and the foot sole) weren't how I wanted to confirm that Wow, I Really Am A Cripple, but I suppose now I can say with tangibly tested confidence that yeah, I actually Can't do much more and I do absolutely need a mobility aid. Because, boy... If you guys saw me once I come home not just from work but from using public transport... It's sad, really.

[deluxewhump]

What if one of Max's friends has a dog and Carlo meets it and is very off-put by the way everyone refers to the animal like "Good boy/girl!" He probably also dislikes the memory of Erik's dogs. (this'd be earlier in the timeline, like way before he really starts recovering)

(messing w my own timelines here but its all good)

*****

His Master’s friend Simon has two brindle Great Danes. For the most part, they’re well behaved. Or so Max promised on the drive over. He doesn’t do them any favors by encouraging their excitement when they run to meet him in the driveway, cooing at them and wrestling their giant heads between his hands, seemingly unbothered by the drool flying from their square jaws. One gets on his hind legs and sets his paws on Max’s chest, tail wagging back and forth like a whip. Max, over six feet, is eye-level with the thing.

“Good boy,” he tells it in a doggy-voice, clapping its shoulder like a horse. “I know it. Yes you are. Good boy.”

Carlo’s stomach flips at those words in his Master’s mouth. They can be his favorite words, spoken softly and discreetly, in the private language of praise.

It gives him a funny feeling, unsettles something deep down. His old Master had only kept female dogs, so the term was exclusively for his boy-pet, and used very, very sparingly. 

His new Master looks at him. He hurries to control his face. He smiles weakly as the dogs move on to him, sniffing and drooling and jumping. He winces, puts his forearm up by his face. The girls were always rough with him, moving in an excitable pack. He’s afraid these ones will knock him down without meaning to, and then he will get slushy mud all over the nice jacket his Master has so kindly given him to wear. 

“Hey,” Max calls, seeing his discomfort. “Giddown. Leave him alone. C’mere.” He whistles, pats his thigh. Thankfully, the dogs trot back to him.

“Good boy,” he says again. It’s so casual. He adjusts one of their collars that had gotten twisted in the excitement. Carlo swallows, his own throat quite naked. 

“I’ll keep ‘em off you.” Max promises, smiles at him. 

He nods stiffly. He doesn’t want Max’s friend to think he doesn’t like his dogs. People take offense to that. He wants to make a good impression, for Max to be pleased with him. The dogs are just… pony-sized. And excited. 

As always, he is lucky his Master is so understanding. 

[exploding-jet]

Once they were able to see him, they focused their gaze on him, analyzing his appearance as they had the feeling of being quite smaller, though they were fine with that feeling. His appearance was honestly cool, though the red stuff was kind of unsettling.. Either way, they were pretty sure that they’d be fine with the red stuff that’s on his sharp teeth and hoodie! They knew very well that this isn’t anything related to anime and games, but that’s no reason to fear him or even show that kind of feeling, it also wouldn’t be nice of their part to do and feel. “Really? Same! It is always nice to meet new people, and making new friends, too!” They said, tone being cheerful and soft as they were glad to see that he seemed to be almost ecstatic and that he likes that. They then took a small moment to think, deciding to show theirselves with their usual elf appearance. “Name’s Saro, btw! It’s a pleasure to meet you, Jet, I hope we will get along well! If it is okay to ask, May I ask What’s the red stuff that’s on your hoodie and on your teeth?” She said and asked after showing that appearance, seemingly being curious about that theme.

Oh, someone that was as ecstatic with making friends as he was? Cool! Then this'd be the easiest he ever made a friend! It was almost enough for him to be able to ignore the fearful, hateful gazes cast in his direction. Sure, it was common, but it... Didn't really get any easier.

"Ooh! Nice name!!"

They looked really cool! Definitely better than the humans, the humans were mean and judgemental and never liked him, no matter how hard he tried for them to. Well, except for the few human friends he had, but they were nice and awesome and not like mean people.

"Uh... Blood."

He was hoping she wouldn't ask what kind of blood, already hearing how quickly people were leaving by that one, simple word.

[gayferatu]

I hope it's okay if I request a Hobbit imagine real quick! My birthday's coming up relatively soon, on February 14th (Valentine's Day), so I'd really love to know how Fili, Kili, Thorin, Bilbo, Bofur, Ori and Dwalin (if that's not too much) would celebrate their s/o's birthday. I love your imagines, so this'd be a wonderful early birthday present! Thanks so much!

HAPPY EARLY BIRTHDAY LOVELY!!!! I hope you like it

Fíli :

 Fíli would subtly be trying to figure it out weeks beforehand. Asking around in your friend group or even family members and making them swear to secrecy. He wouldn't settle on 1 gift, he would want to make the day special for you, filled with smiles and small gifts hidden for you throughout your chambers. Small trinkets throughout your day.

 Waking up to him kissing you awake, whispering all the sweetest words to you, a happy birthday between pecks to your lips. You'd find small wrapped gifts by your washbasin, new soaps and hair oils in your favourite scents. Breakfast in bed after you come back from washing up, all your favourite foods arranged on small platters and as you slither back under the sheets, he'll feed them to you, kissing your hair and cheeks and shoulders as you chat about the day ahead. He won't be working today, knowing the best gift would be his presence and time with how busy a Durin heir is but that doesn't stop him from spoiling you with all your favourites today! You will spend a long time in bed before setting off around lunch time, a small picknick outside of the mountain by a herb garden.

 Later, you will have celebrations with your friends and family, and of course the company. Even Thorin takes time from his schedule to make an appearance. Fíli takes your to your chambers beforehand, a new beautiful black velvet gown set with silver lace waits for you there. This gift is more for him, he realises as you wear it, looking resplendent but he hopes you like it anyway. He'll braid new silver beads into your hair, made them for you himself, exactly to your liking and style. You wonder where he found the time, not knowing he's been planning this day for weeks.

 Your celebration takes deep into the night, ale and wine flowing, and you dance with Fíli for hours until everyone is tired and slinks off, the music tapering down and when you find yourself back in your bedroom, he'll help you from your gown, rubbing your tired body gently as your two relax back into the bed for your last present.

Kíli :

 Kíli would be less subtle. He'd have been asking months in advance, accumulating your likes and dislikes from the source. He'd do anything to get the gift you wanted, work tirelessly for it or pay a fortune. But of course, he'd also want to spend the day with you, probably take you out of the mountain early in the morning, perhaps to the woods and soak up the fresh air and sunlight on goatback. He wouldn't be returning you to the mountain until evening, having planned a nice long ride to a hotspring at the other side of the mountain.

 Once there he'll lay out blankets, take out the food he's brought and you'll eat together, joking and laughing, and he'll give you your gift while trading stories and catching up on eachother's lives and jobs, finally having the time for it. He'll have brought cards and games and you play until noon when the sun is high and warm in the sky and you both make way to the hotsprings. Of course it doesn't take long until there's splashing and messing around and competitions of who can hold their breath the longest. You let him win. And then you let him do other things.

 When you return to the mountain you'll celebrate with your loved ones and enjoy the rest of the day, retiring to your rooms with Kíli later, snuggling up and sleeping in late the next morning.

Thorin :

 Thorin would probably make you something with his own hands, a black leather belt with ornate throwing knives encrusted with aquamarine cabochons set in silver.

 He'd have a feast planned for you, half the mountain in attendance. A king throws a party in style, of course. Your favourite flowers decorating the tables, Durin colors replaced with your own likings for the day. There'll be music and he'll commandeer a harp to play you  sweet love songs after getting egged on by Fíli and Kíli but he doesn't mind, really. The smile on your face worth the slight embarrassment of having to perform in front of everyone.

 He'll take you back to your chambers earlier when he notices you tire of the festivities and you two make your leave quietly and he'll give you his gifts there, in private. He'll probably serenade your quietly, his own harp sounding better, his low rumbling tones relaxing you as he sings you to sleep.

Bilbo :

 Oh, he'd be so sweet about it. Planning a more than one party for the day, one for just the two of you, the other later, the whole of Hobbiton will likely be in attendance.

 He'll decorate Bag End after first breakfast and you go out for a walk with some encouragement from Bilbo. Garlands and colorful and nicely scented candles placed everywhere in the dining room, a surprise second breakfast upon it, cooked up in a storm as he doesn't have much time. But he secretly prepared a lot of it already, the night before. Small pastries with jam fillings, sugar cookies and biscuits, decorated with your name and small "Happy birthdays!" in the icing.  Lovely tea with rosepetals and lavender and honey. And a pretty bracelet that he slips on your wrist after you've indulged yourselves with the food, sweet tooth satisfied. Gold and silver chain with a cute carved onyx charm on it shaped like a flower.

 Later, a grand party in the field. Gandalf is there, plenty of fireworks in tow. There's music and dancing and drinking and it's so much fun you actually go to bed exhausted that night, wrapped up in your favourite Hobbit's arms.

Bofur :

 Bofur's a romantic. Not everyone knows it, but he is. He loves to hold your hands and kiss every finger in private moments. Likes to nuzzle your cheek and press kisses to the corner of your mouth, mustache and beard tickling you. He also loves to take you on dates to Dale, walk with you hand in hand from stall to stall, pointing out deals to eachother and shopping. That's how you'd spend this day too, I think. Together, doing mundane things but he's so sweet it will feel like a special occasion. You eat small savory snacks wrapped in tiny parcels in the streets of Dale, drink sweet cherry wine in a small inn, sitting at a table in the back, fingers interlocked on top of the table, just spending quiet, loving time together until later. 

 He'll give you his gift upon returning to the mountain, in your chambers. He mined it himself, he proudly proclaims. A beautiful, football sized geode in the shape of a heart, with sparkling amethysts. He explains that when he found it he knew he had to give it to you, that it was the mountain's gift as well. It's beautiful and you place it on your bedside table, the firelight catching it and making it refract the light on the stone around it.

 There's a party that night, your closest friends and family, the company all there. Dancing, singing, joking and reminiscing. Many tall tales told this night from the mouths of Kíli and Fíli. You all may drink a bit too much. Way too much. It may end with a King snoring on the table, a Dwalin draped over him, nearly crushing him, just as unconscious. You'll remember this night forever.

Ori :

 Oh, Ori. So sweet. Library dates? Library dates. But not today, he'll drag himself from the darkness for you, take you out walking with him, shyly holding your hand. He'll have knit you things. Fingerless gloves with delicate stitches in black yarn. A matching hat and scarf. He'll blush at the sight of you wearing it, happy to have given you things to keep warm with. 

 A small leather bound book finds its way into your hands as well, put there hastily by him, declaring you should read it later, when you're alone. They'll contain little poems about you, haikus and notes, sweet thoughts that he has about you accumulated here in his neat penmanship. Dried and pressed flowers and herbs between some of the pages, sketches of other plants. It's sweet and must've taken a long time to make.

 He probably won't plan a party, but his brothers will pick up the slack. A rented small pub packed with all your favorite people. Ori will stay by your side all night, even shedding some of his shyness after a couple ales, fingers locked with yours as you dance on a merry tune late that night. Giving you small kisses when he thinks no one is looking. Bigger kisses when he's sure about it. And more later, when you drag him back to your room.

Dwalin : 

 Dwalin is practical. He doesn't really ask about your birthday preferences beforehand. Instead when you wake in his arms in the morning, he's already awake and gruffly congratulates you on turning a year older. He'll congratulate you a lot. If you get my drift. 

 His gifts are practical as well, things you needed, and have mentioned to him in the past. Nice to know he cares and listens, right? He wordlessly slips a silver ring with a small white gem onto one of your fingers after, this one a little less practical and more like a promise but he knows the significance of rings to humans and his cheeks feel warm under his beard as though he'd just slipped a marriage bead onto a braid in your hair. It's cute.

 I don't think he'd want to part with you a single moment or share you with anyone today. Celebrations will wait until tomorrow, he had decided and spends all day catering to your whims. No request denied even if you get cheeky with them. He'll just huff a small laugh and do it anyway. Rub your feet, kiss you once, twice, thrice, twenty times. Fetch that quill, and regretting it when you set upon him with it, tickling him. His only weakness that only you know. But he won't mind, loving your laughter and grins and he'll get his revenge later anyway.

I HOPE YOU LIKED IT! It got a bit long lol

Requests still open!