#and i've written lots of original work in that time

[rosietrace]

This is a personal rant about my thoughts on Greek mythology retellings, and just the way Fantasy books and the publishing industry is at this point 🧍‍♀️

I have nothing against Greek mythology retellings, or just anything Greek mythology related in fantasy in general!

However, I have certain gripes about the way Greek mythology is portrayed in media, specifically in the way its interpreted in Fantasy.

[ More under the cut! ]

I love Percy Jackson, and I think that Uncle Rick did a wonderful job at expanding the world and making Greek, Roman, Egyptian, and Norse mythology entertaining and easily digestible for young audiences. Genuinely, he does a better job at writing children's books than R*wling could ever be capable of.

However, as much as I can love PJO as much as I do, I still find certain bits of the world building and character writing as... Very hit and miss.

To start, I don't like the way Ares was written in the series. I can understand that it would make sense for his personality to be that way, because he's the God of War and it helps with Clarisse's character development; but I find fault in it because Ares in the myths is nothing like PJO Ares. (He literally killed one of Poseidon's sons because he raped his daughter, Alcippe, and he's one of the only gods who doesn't hump anything that can breathe in air. At least Ares has the courtesy of asking for consent 💀)

The Gods being the reason behind WWII and Hitler being a child of Hades. All I must say.

The portrayal of the Aphrodite cabin

The fact that Athena can have children. Annabeth, pjo fandom at large, I love you are, but you gotta admit it must've felt weird when you first read the books and you find out Athena — the maiden Goddess of Wisdom — can have offspring. Regardless of the reasoning, I still find it weird 😭 (EDIT: I've now just remembered that it was a reference to how Athena herself was created 🤡 I'm a clown)

I get that the Hermes cabin is also the cabin for the unclaimed, but couldn't have Hestia's cabin worked too? She doesn't have offspring, sure, but it probably would've made more sense for the unclaimed to go to Hestia's cabin so that the Hermes cabin wouldn't be so crowded

This isn't really a world building issue, but I think I should bring it up: I'm not saying this against the Kane Chronicles fandom, but... Sadie and Anubis. Why. Like you can't convince me that no one WASN'T weirded out by that.

Less of a complaint and more of a question because I can't remember if the question was answered in HoO or not, but when Percy told the Gods to start claiming their unclaimed children and be more decent parents (as he should, go off king), did that request apply to the Romans at Camp Jupiter too? Because that's gotta have been confusing when the unclaimed kids at CP suddenly started getting claimed 😭😭

I could go on a whole ass tangent about PJO, but that would make this post longer than it needs to be 😭😭 and any of the points might not make much sense, since I haven't read the books in a LONG time

Off to the YA Fantasy segment... Hoo boy.

The oversaturation of Hades/Persephone retellings makes me SEETHE. Why is it always Hades and Persephone why can't it be something else 😭

I just don't like the “modern feminist” retellings of Greek myths in the YA Fantasy genre, in general. They tend to completely miss the point of the original myth, and it's the case with a lot of Hades and Persephone retellings where they try to paint Hades as the good guy taking Persephone away from her control freak mother, Demeter.

Because that wasn't what the myth was about. The myth isn't a love story, at least, not a romantic one. It was about Demeter's love for Persephone and how much she wanted her daughter back after Hades stole her away. Keep in mind, in the historical context of the myth, the daughters of women in ancient Greece never really get to see their mothers after their engagements are solidified.

If they wanted to make a “feminist” retelling of the myth, they'd have it centered around the love Demeter had for Persephone to almost doom the mortal realm to an eternal winter to get her back.

I love the myth of Hades and Persephone, truly, I do. I understand the appeal it has on people, the appeal it has one me. I can see why people adore the myth in the way they do because Hades is one of the better husbands in Greek mythology (a low bar, but my point still stands).

Personally, I blame Lore Olympus and especially the video of the myth by Overly Sarcastic Productions for the way the myth is portrayed in mass media. And I say this as a former LO fan and a fan of Overly Sarcastic Productions 😭

I'd also want to go into my many, MANY gripes about “Crown of Starlight” by Cait Corrain, but in all honesty? I don't think I can properly convey how much I DESPISE Cait and their book. So I'd highly recommend y'all to check out the videos about Cait Corrain by Reads With Rachel, WithCindy, and Xiran Jay Zhao on YouTube if you're interested in going into more detail about the controversies, especially for those who weren't made aware of it.

I feel like the publishing industry just... Isn't good anymore, after Booktok went viral. Reading has been “hot girlified”, and all Booktok seems to ask when they get recommended a book is: “Is it spicy??”

Reading is like fast fashion, now. It's all based around certain popular tropes that that's how books are promoted now. Not for the plot — or sometimes lack thereof — but for the tropes the book has.

The only thing I can thank Booktok for is that they helped me discover The Cruel Prince. And even then, it's marketed as romance on there, when it's a political fantasy with a romance subplot.

‼️ Woah! A secret bonus section! ‼️

I, personally, don't read — nor do I like — Sarah J Maas. (Especially considering the problematic aspects of her storytelling, character portrayals, and is (apparently, correct me if I'm wrong) a Zionist)

However, that isn't to say that I don't like some of the characters she makes. A lot of them have potential, actually! From what I've seen, I think Nesta, Gwyn, Azriel, Eris, Tamlin and Lucien from ACOTAR are the only characters I actually like, based on what I've heard — and seen — on anything in the SJM critical tag on this hellsite.

And while we're at it, let's discuss the elephant in the room with ACOTAR, right? Rhysand.

By all that is good and holy, I hate Rhysand so much and I think I'd hate him even more if I actually READ the books. I don't get why Booktok is so invested in him when Maas retconned Tamlin's character to make him look better as Feyre's love interest.

Also, from what I recall, didn't Rhysand sexually assault Feyre? And he didn't bother to apologize for it, and justified it with his sad tragic backstory??

I can't with y'all, istg 😭 the fact that “Feysand” is apparently a Hades and Persephone retelling too makes me even more mad about it because it isn't even a GOOD retelling. It just takes away what ACOTAR originally was— a Beauty and the Beast retelling, with Feyre and Tamlin as the leads.

Didn't Maas dedicate ACOTAR to her husband because “He would go under the mountain” for her??? BECAUSE IT CERTAINLY WASN'T RHYSAND WHO SAVED FEYRE FROM UTM, I'LL TELL YOU THAT

I think, out of all the series Maas has made thus far, Throne of Glass is the only one I ACTUALLY kind of like, based on what I've heard. Crescent City seems to be too complicated to understand, and even though I've never read it myself, I miss what ACOTAR could've been. (My hope lies with Nesta, Elucien and Gwynriel, at this point)

[dangerpronebuddie]

20 Questions for Fic Writers

Tagged by @tizniz thank you darling 🥰🩵

How many works do you have on ao3?

17! Soon to be 18 (hopefully).

What's your total ao3 word count?

78,569 words

What fandoms do you write for?

Currently 9-1-1 and previously one or two chapters on a Sherlock fic my sibling started YEARS ago.

Top 5 fics by kudos:

1. Lost Control And Rang Your Bell

2. To The Core (I Love You)

3. What Breathing Feels Like

4. Baby, I'm Never Gonna Leave You

5. Our Shoulders Touch, There's A Moment

Do you respond to comments?

Yes! I try to get every single one 🥰

What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

Yet to be published 😉. Published though, probably Baby, I'm Never Gonna Leave You. It's not angsty per se, it's more ominous.

What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

I try for happy endings always (it's the Jane Austen in me), but I'd say the fic with the happiest ending would be The Pain Is UnBEARable. Friends to fiances 😁!

Do you get hate on fics?

Once? I really don't know if it was hate or just frustration? I mean, it was an open ending so just... ¯⁠\⁠_⁠(⁠ツ⁠)⁠_⁠/⁠¯ sorry?

Do you write smut?

I'm trying! I posted my first one last week 😁: And Every New Boy That You Meet (He Doesn't Know The Real Surprise) (part 2 is in progress)

Craziest crossover?

Haven't written any.

Have you ever had a fic stolen?

God, I hope not.

Have you ever had a fic translated?

I don't think so?

Have you co-written a fic before?

Once. The Sherlock one my sibling wrote. They put me as co-author but the majority is theirs.

All time favorite ship?

Buddie! They have altered my brain chemistry.

What's a wip you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

There's a wip I keep going back to that I have a love/hate relationship with. The scenes and the lines and the descriptions are some of the best I think I've ever written. But the premise is iffy at best. We'll see. If I can get a solid enough plot and if Buck gives me an explanation for what the hell he does in that fic, I might finish it.

What are your writing strengths?

Hmmm... I've been told a lot of my fics feel like episodes and the characters' voices are pretty good. So I guess the pacing of my fics? (Which shocks me because I really suck at pacing my original works).

What are your writing weaknesses?

Description. I just don't do the long and beautiful descriptions or the super detailed whump scenes very well. It takes practice, but it seems to be a talent I just don't have.

Thoughts on dialogue in another language?

I like it, but I don't do it very much. I don't want people to tell me I'm an idiot for getting something wrong.

First fandom you wrote in?

Sherlock.

Favorite fic you've written?

My beloved Hildy fic. I treasure it. It freaking flopped but it is my baby. I love the entire Danger Prone Diaz series so far, but They Say She's Gone To Far (This Time) was so much fun.

Tags: @lover-of-mine @monsterrae1 @loveyouanyway @steadfastsaturnsrings @ronordmann @daffi-990 @wikiangela @thekristen999 @bidisasterevankinard @kitteneddiediaz @actuallyitsellie @hippolotamus @diazsdimples @exhuastedpigeon @spagheddiediaz @theotherbuckley @wildlife4life @fortheloveofbuddie and anyone else who wants to! 🥰🩷 (if I missed you I'm sorry)

[lena-oleanderson]

my version of "i wonder what else they have written - RPF hockey???" is my 22 ghostbusters (2016) fanfics i wrote within 2 of my 8 years on ao3

[novelconcepts]

i don't make resolutions, but if i did

it would be to finish this fic

(and to be kind to myself for however long it takes to actually do so)

[ratgirlcopia]

me writing ghost fic and then saying i'm done writing ghost fic is much like cher announcing her farewell tours.

[grassbreads]

I just got a verbal job offer for more money than I ever thought I'd be making in my entire life

[non-un-topo]

At the crossroads between wondering if it's worth it to basically completely rewrite all my WIPs or just take a break from writing for the rest of the summer

[primofate]

Confessions Series - Part 2: Description [Genshin Impact Male Characters]

In a nutshell: He asks if you have your eyes set on someone. You start describing HIS features and watch for his reaction. (Hint: He likes you too)

Other works in this series: (Part 1 - Overheard)

Warnings: The usual, haven't written in a while, please forgive mistakes, bit of angst in Diluc (couldn't help it), I am a sleep deprived mother, some profanity, for some reason did not feel like writing Zhongli though he's one of my faves.

Characters: Aether, Albedo, Alhaitham, Ayato, Baizhu, Bennett, Chongyun, Cyno, Dainsleif, Diluc, Gaming, Heizou, Itto, Kaeya, Lyney, Neuvillette, Scaramouche, Tartaglia, Wriothesley, Xiao, gn!reader

Personal Favourites: Diluc, Wriothesley

Aether

"Yeah, I do," you start. "He's very selfless...He's always running around helping other people,"

Aether nods, intense gaze in his eyes while listening.

"Hmm...He has...a partner. Like a companion he always travels with..."

Aether's brows start to furrow and his head tilts the slightest bit. Paimon flying next to him has no clue who it is whatsoever.

"He's not originally from Teyvat...He's on a journey, you see..." this is where you start getting nervous

You see it click in Aether's head slowly, and his eyes start to widen the slightest bit

"Hey, that sounds an awful lot like you, traveller! Why have we never met this person before, Y/N?" Paimon asks and you only smile.

"P-Paimon," Aether glances at her and then back to you. It's silent for a moment. Paimon is super confused.

But Aether being Aether didn't want to get the wrong idea and racks up the courage to ask you one last question. "He's on a journey...to look for his twin sister?"

You smile the brightest smile you've ever given him. "Correct!"

"Ah...Well..." Aether starts to feel the heat on his cheeks. "That's..." he doesn't say anything else for a few seconds. "Don't get me wrong, I'm just...I'm happy!"

Is basically flustered when he realizes you've technically just confessed to him.

Albedo

"Simply put, I think he's dedicated to his craft," You shrug and smile

"...An admirable trait," he responds.

"He's frequently in Dragonspine. He spends a bit of time in his lab there," you decide to just go straight for the obvious.

Albedo pauses. "I...see..." Turns to you with a small smile "I wasn't aware that you were that fond of me,"

"Now you know," you simply say and try to play it off with a wave of your hand.

He chuckles under his breath and strides over to you while saying. "Well then, I suppose it's my turn to talk about the person I've set my eyes on,"

Proceeds to describe you accurately, down to your likes and dislikes. In his eyes, you seem like something so precious and you can't help but feel a bit embarrassed.

Alhaitham

"Hmm... Sort of," you explain. "He's a little...hard to reach,"

Alhaitham "...and you still pursue him?"

You laugh a bit "I'm hardly pursuing him, I'm just...observing. I like watching him, even though he has the most unreadable face I've seen,"

Alhaitham goes quiet for a moment. He catches on fast, he already has an idea but is cautious about what he says. "...I see," he doesn't ask anything else, but you continue to offer information.

"He likes reading. Really smart guy...but kind of no nonsense type. Very straight to the point," You begin to feel a little nervous so you pretend to read your own book with a small shrug.

The silence is deafening.

"I suspect that type of person will be hard to put up with," he suddenly says aloud and you chuckle in response.

"Possibly, but he seems to be putting up with me too...I guess?"

He suddenly closes his book and leans forward to pry the one in your hands away. He locks his gaze with you. "...'Putting up' is hardly the word I would use." his lips twitch the slightest bit before continuing. "He has little to no patience for other people...so if he keeps you around...perhaps it signals something else,"

"Something else...As in, I'm special?"

Again he quiets for a moment, before he stands up, chair scraping the floor. "...Precisely," he turns to start walking out of the library, waving a hand behind him. "I'll pick you up in the morning tomorrow,"

Ayato

"I do, but he's a very busy sort of man,"

Ayato "Is that so?" he pours tea for you.

"Quite. He's also a very important person,"

He hums and watches the billowing steam from the tea. "It sounds as if I might know this person," but he genuinely doesn't know it's him, he just thinks its another noble.

"...You most definitely know him. He has a sister. Lovely girl." This is where you avert your gaze from him in fear of him instantly connecting the dots.

He talks in pauses "A...sister..." His mind is starting to make connections but he can't be quite sure yet. So he prods further. "...Does she happen to have a vision?"

"A cryo vision holder, yes," you're biting the inside of your lip at this point. There's a moment of silence before you hear Ayato laughing rather gleefully, like he was amused by a story.

"I see." he ends with a chuckle. "I apologize for being so busy, Y/N," he smiles at you "I promise I'll do my best to arrange my priorities in order to spend more time with you,"

Baizhu

"He takes his job too seriously and can be quite reckless...Sometimes he even puts himself in danger,"

Changsheng catches on immediately. The snake had already known for a while. Baizhu was just being dense. "Oh here we go," the snake half whines.

Baizhu gives it a weird look before turning his attention back to you. "That does sound reckless,"

"I've told him a couple of times to think about himself too...but I guess he's just really passionate about his job,"

Baizhu sort of shrugs, "What IS his job?"

"...Well for starters he owns a pharmacy around town,"

To Baizhu the realization hits all too slowly. It's not that he was slow or dense, but he was having a hard time believing that it was him you were talking about, specially when you hadn't said it outfront.

"...You do realize I'm the only one who owns a pharmacy around town?" he asks, eyes piercing through you and awaiting your answer.

Changsheng is the one who answers for you. "Yes you ridiculous doctor, Y/N's pertaining to you!"

It's the first time you've seen him blush and he turns his head away when he does so. "I-I see, well...that's rather, unexpected...but not unwelcome,"

Clears his throat "Just give me a moment"

Changsheng would roll its eyes if it could.

Bennett

"Has a lot of energy...Sometimes I wonder where he gets all of it. I really like him for that though."

Deflates as soon as you start talking about your "crush". What kind of answer was he expecting anyway? That you had eyes for him?

"He has a bit of a...problem when it comes to luck," you continue

Bennett stops, you look at him and you can practically see the gears in his head starting to turn a little faster.

"Y-Y/N? Are you talking about..." then the gears suddenly stop. "Oh what am I saying, it can't be. Ahahaha! Let's go!" starts walking again as if nothing happened

Your jaw drops and you're forced to just DIRECTLY tell him you're talking about him.

"...Oh...Oh! F-For real?! Oh...Sorry... I just thought... there's no way! B-But, I'm really glad! Really!"

Chongyun

"Hmm...He's a little shy...but he's very responsible,"

Chongyun stares at you intently and nods as if taking notes.

"He doesn't like spicy stuff,"

Chongyun nods twice, eagerly.

"He's very dedicated in learning about thaumaturgy,"

Chongyun blanks out, brows furrow but still nods. Slowly.

"He's really good with a claymore too!"

Chongyun stops and stares at you, you see a hint of red gracing his cheeks "Y/N...You can't possibly be...talking about... m-m-m-"

Can't seem to say it, so you outright say that it is, in fact, him.

Combusts into a tomato red

Cyno

"How do I say this...He's a pretty strict guy." The two of you are playing Invokation TCG during this convo.

"Mmhmm..." Cyno is focused on his cards, frankly he doesn't give a craps ass who you're into. He didn't even know why he asked, he just dug himself a hole.

"...but he really only takes his work seriously. It's his job to be serious, I guess. I think that's what Matras need to do," he finished his turn and its yours now, though he's still studying his cards intently. Until you get to the Matra part.

"He's a Matra?" You rarely see a surprised face on Cyno so you focus your gaze on him. "Which one?" He further asks. Honestly he looks about to murder someone.

You blank out a bit at how intense his stare was, "Well...You know. That one, the one who's really into Invokation TCG,"

He immediately follows up without missing a beat "I don't know anyone else who's into--" then it clicks.

It was so damn silent for a good 10 seconds. You clear your throat, tear your eyes off him "Um, it's your turn,"

STILL doesn't budge until he finally goes back to his cards with a whisper, you can't really tell but he looks slightly bashful and you can barely, BARELY hear him "...If I win then we go on a date,"

"Okay, and if you lose?"

Cyno "...I'm not gunna lose,"

"See, I told you he's a really serious guy,"

Dainsleif

"I think he's a very dedicated person," you get lost in thought a little, thinking about him. "Whenever I look at him...Sometimes I feel as if there's a certain sadness in him... Perhaps he blames himself for not being able to protect his nation,"

He IMMEDIATELY knows. And he knows that you hurt for him too. How could he not?

"He searches for answers... I don't know for how long, I suppose a long, long time," you close your eyes, imagining how long he must have been wandering Teyvat.

You only open your eyes when you feel a hand brush against yours. He's looking straight at you, neither happy nor sad. "...You don't have to feel that way, for my circumstances,"

The brush against your hand disappears and reappears next to your cheek, his fingers gently resting on it "...Knowing that you feel that way, has taken away some of the burden that I shoulder,"

His gaze suddenly hardens and his voice drops to a whisper, "But please, just don't end up in the same way as everyone else,"

Diluc (I don't know why I end up writing a whole novel for this guy. I guess he's my OG favourite)

You pause for a moment, wondering how to describe Diluc. "...Sometimes... I feel as if I know a lot about him and yet... he's still far off in the distance,"

Diluc, rifling through paperwork, doesn't even look at you. "...That tells me nothing about him," there's a bit of bite in his statement.

You sigh a little, "I mean, simply said he's a hardworking man. He always has Mondstadt's best interests in mind...but he prefers to work alone,"

He's silent, but you can still hear the paper shuffling.

"....but people love him. They care for him. I suppose I understand why he keeps a distance but..." at this point you don't even realize that you're just rambling and staring into space. Sort of in a daze of thinking out loud. "...isn't it lonely? ...I suppose I shouldn't assume how he feels. Maybe he's fine with it...I just wonder how long till he sees us..." there's silence, no ruffle of papers, you're still just staring at the bookshelf and you continue in a monotone voice. "...or sees me,"

You blink, and all of a sudden its as if a magic spell is cast on you and you wake up to the reality that you've been rambling about him. You sit up straight "Oh," then turn to him with a careful smile. You don't think he knows what or who you're talking about anyway. "I better get going," you stand, "Jean must be waiting for me."

You leave, and he doesn't stop you.

You don't really think anything of it, feeling as if your whole monologue was very vague...but to your surprise he knocks at your door in the evening, there's a bit of rain falling.

"Diluc? You're drenche--"

"I see you,"

The determination in his voice lulls you to keep quiet and only stare up at him, wondering if he had more to say, but instead of saying something, he leans in, wrapping his arms around you and resting his forehead on your shoulder, as if he had been defeated.

You only welcome his embrace, and, for the first time in a long time. Diluc finally feels like he's home.

Gaming

"Passion!" You nod your head as you say it. "He knows what he wants to do and is incredibly dedicated to it!"

Gaming looks surprised, has no idea you're talking about him. "Huh! That's really cool!" He thinks he's the total opposite. "Wish I could be as dedicated as him."

You kind of laugh out loud and he raises his eyebrows and tilts his head. "What?"

"Gosh you really sell yourself short," you shake your head "Anyway, this guy, right, he kinda works two jobs," you put out your hand to count one and two "One, for the Secure Transport Agency and two, he's in a Wushou Troupe,"

Gaming instantly straightens his back and looks at you wide-eyed. You figure you had to be direct when it came to him otherwise he'd never get it with how modest he was.

"...You're...talking about...me?" You smile at him sympathetically.

"You know, Gaming, I wish you saw yourself the way others saw you. You're a great person,"

Big smile, but legit looks like he's about to cry. "Between the two of us? I think you're greater Y/N,"

Heizou

"...Honestly he's kind of a flirt," you raise your eyebrows at the fact and kind of question yourself why you like this kind of person. "Makes me wonder if he does that to everyone, you know?"

Heizou hums and puts his hand under his chin in a "thinking position"

"That's not enough evidence to go by. Perhaps we can investigate this guy together to see if he's worthy,"

You look at him, pursing your lips while musing and giving him a suspicious look. You're not sure if he's figured it out.

He's got no idea. I mean, it was a pretty general description. "Any distinguishing features?" he asks.

You look at him in a deadpan manner. "Red hair, I guess. And moles under his eyes,"

He looks back at you with a matching blank face.

Then breaks into a wide, close eyed grin. "I see! From experience, that person is truly trustworthy,"

You sigh a little, "Is he though?"

He chuckles heartily. "I promise you he is," offers you his hand with a genuine smile. "Let me show you,"

Itto

"Ummm... big, tall, strong looking guy. Intimidating at first look but he's actually a dork," you explain.

Itto crosses his arms above his chest with an unamused face. "Tch! No way! Ain't no one taller than me in Inazuma!" Then he looks smug again. "Anyway, keep goin'. What else?" Only asked you because he wants to see what your "type" is.

"...Popular? Nah... Infamous is the word, I think. He kinda gets into a lot of trouble,"

Itto raises a brow "You serious? Whaddyou want with someone like that?" as if he wasn't a troublemaker himself.

"I mean... He also loves life and somehow always sees the good side of things."

Itto "Eh... guess that's a good thing..." folds his arms behind his head and huffs.

This guy is never gunna get it so you drop more obvious hints. "He's an oni who has his own gang."

For a split second he looked like he was going to get it, and then... "WHAT?! There's another oni who wants to challenge the Arataki Gang?"

"That's not what I--"

punches his fist onto his palm "Lead the way Y/N, let me at 'em!"

"I'm talking about you!"

"Huh?"

"Itto, there's no other oni around town!" leave it to him to make you exasperated.

He quiets for a few seconds. "...But Y/N..."

You expectantly stare at him, curious what he was going to say about your confession.

"...Did you just call me a dork?"

Of course that's what he picks up on.

When he finally processes it though, he's stoked and on an all time high.

Kaeya

"...good at talking to people, and he knows it... Exudes charisma like he breathes air," You're saying this with a glare.

He chuckles and rests his head on his fist. "Why, pray tell, do you look angry when saying that?"

"Not angry..." you mumble under your breath, eyes trailing away from him. "Just... probably a lot of people like him,"

"And you don't like that?" He smirks. He totally knows.

"...No...Well...I'm okay with it... It's just... I think he's so much more than what he shows to others,"

That, he wasn't expecting. He actually feels genuinely touched.

"Sure he jokes around a lot...Is good at making people feel comfortable...but he's also kind...and you can always count on him," there's a faraway gaze in your eyes now, a small smile on your face. "To me, he's...a safe space."

Kaeya's smile drops. It looks like he's unhappy and you think that maybe you've made a mistake. Still...there's no way he knows that it's him, right? It was kinda vague...

You're about to stand and excuse yourself but he catches your wrist easily. "...You know..." he starts, meeting you eye to eye. He looks at you as if he's looking into your soul, his eyes the gentlest you've seen them.

"You make it so hard, not to fall deeper in love with you,"

Lyney (I have no idea how this ended up so dramatic)

"He isn't exactly a trickster...but he has a lot of tricks up his sleeve,"

Lyney "Oh?" Raises an eyebrow. Something kind of clicks in him, but he shakes it off. "The good kind or the bad kind?"

You stall a little, thinking of the answer, knowing that he's Fatui. "The...good...kind,"

"You don't sound very sure," he gives you a lopsided smile.

"It's complicated," you admit. "Regardless of the circumstances though, I think he's a great magician,"

You watch his face turn into surprise quite quickly, but he still looks and feels unsure of himself. "Oh, perhaps...I can learn a thing or two from him?"

Your smile turns forced and hard. He can't be serious? He STILL doesn't know, or...what?

"I...Well..." You don't know what to say next, but he seems to get the idea.

"Sorry, have I put you in a hard place? Ahaha..." Scratches the back of his head. "My apologies, I was just curious,"

This, for some reason, really puts you off and you feel as if you've been rejected, even though you technically had not outright told him that you're talking about him.

It seems silly for you to get upset, but you are. So you stand, and make a request of him. "Can we... just pretend this conversation didn't happen?" and you give him some sort of excuse that you need to run an errand or something, and you're off, leaving him feeling...guilty. But he doesn't know why. Or does he?

Lyney would look like the type of person who would be confident about himself. But, really, as a magician, he had to be 1000% sure about something before he went ahead with it, and so...that's where his doubt stemmed from.

Lynnette is really the one who knocks some sense into him. "...and you...let Y/N leave?" after hearing the story from him.

"Oh, Lyney... Regardless of what Y/N feels... For you, next to Freminet and I, is there someone else that you love dearly?"

That's how he ends up at your doorstep. Though you've seen his disappearing rose trick hundreds of times, he was the most sincere at that moment, when he says sorry that he didn't get the hint and to give him a chance.

Neuvillette

"Serious person. He seems to put his work first, above all else," you say. "I respect him a lot for that,"

Neuvillette is interested in what you say, but doesn't know at all that it's him. "He does sound quite respectable," he says while looking through some files.

"A long time ago he said that he feels like he's an outsider...but really I feel like there isn't anyone who knows Fontaine the way that he does,"

Neuvillette, moves the file he was reading downwards, just to look at you questioningly. "He's from Fontaine?" this was surprising to him.

"Well...he currently resides in Fontaine, yes," you nod.

"Ah," he answered curtly. "And I have never met him?" he asks.

"...He's very busy." you bite your lip, about to say something and you know that the next sentence is the point of no return. "He's the Iudex...so it's hard to catch him,"

You swear you can hear your heart hammering in your chest.

You see him put his files down and just stare at you with a sort of...unsure look.

His shoulders relax, he wasn't even aware he had been tense that whole time. "That... must have taken a lot of consideration and courage to say," he clears his throat.

You only nod your head slowly, moving your gaze away from him with an awkward smile. Hand absentmindedly grabbing a book and flipping through the pages...you had no idea what you were doing out of nervousness.

"I apologize...I'm unfamiliar with what to do in these kinds of situations... However," he pauses and seems to think carefully about what he was going to say next. "Please don't take it as a rejection. I'd be honored to navigate this with you, if you would so graciously have me,"

Scaramouche

"He's an asshole," you bite back a laugh.

He instantly knows.

"Actually he acts all tough only to give in to his inner-kind-of-agreeable-personality,"

He snorts

"What? Am I wrong?" you challenge him. You KNOW that he knows. The two of you have been hovering around each other for a while, and there's a certain closeness between the two of you. Though that line was never crossed.

He doesn't answer you back but prods you more. "Is that all? You like that he's an asshole? Are you some type of masochist?"

You almost laugh. "No, you moron. I'm saying he has a weird way of showing he cares. He's always biting my head about not being careful enough. But if he really didn't care he wouldn't be screaming at me, you know what I mean?"

Scaramouche grumbles something under his breath and crosses his arms, turning away from you.

"Say that again?" You ask, not hearing what he said.

"...I said, you're not as stupid as I thought you were," shrugs his concealed embarrassment off and turns back to you all nonchalant again. "Anyway, stop yapping and get going, we got things to do,"

Snatches your hand and starts pulling you to walk with him.

Tartaglia (I feel like this is ridiculously short but I also feel like Tartaglia would have known a LONG time ago if the two of you had the feels for each other)

"Oh man...Probably the most reckless man I know,"

Also knows. Instantly. But shuts his mouth just so he can listen to you talk about him, but it gets deep real quick.

"In my opinion he's a handsome guy. Real charming," you smirk the tiniest bit. "but I don't know if I can keep up with him, honestly. It's a little hard not knowing when he's going to come back...or if he's even gunna come back at all,"

You weren't going to hide the fact that you were scared shitless he didn't return from Fontaine for ages. You legitimately thought he had died.

Tartaglia stops you there, by suddenly cradling your cheek. "Y/N," he's wearing a pained expression. "I'm sorry,"

"Don't be, it's your job, right?" You reassure him, and shrug.

He sighs "Yes, but I'll promise this to you as I've promised my family," he smiles, the most confident smile you've seen on him. Even more confident than when he wields his blades. "I'll come back to you, I always will,"

Wriothesley

"Er... How do I say this... He kind of has some... big boss energy?"

"Oh?" he sips at his tea, glancing at you while he looks at today's paper. "So he's a bigshot?" he asks curiously.

"Somewhat, yes. Intimidating at first look, but...he just has a great sense of responsibility," you pick at the selection of cakes and cookies he has.

"Huh," he lets out in a quick huff. In the deepest, DEEPEST parts of his mind there is a NANOSECOND that he thinks its him but it gets erased so quickly he's not even sure that he had thought about it.

"Sounds like a good person... Any interesting, weird quirks?" he grins as he says this, yet again glancing at your expression.

Your lips tremble a bit at what you're about to say, because you're SURE he was going to get it once you say it. You gulp and feel the hairs at the back of your neck stand before you say out loud "He likes tea. I kind of wonder if it's an addiction," you can't meet his eyes.

He's looking at the paper he's reading but nothing.registers.in.his.brain.its.like.it.stopped.working.

You shift in the uncomfortable silence but he calmly folds up the newspaper and places it on his table. "...I'm inclined to ask, because it would be embarrassing if I got the wrong idea,"

"Mmhmm," you pop a cookie in your mouth to distract yourself.

"By any chance, are you...talking about me?"

"Mm," you nod your head, still not looking at him and glue your eyes on the cookies instead, out of embarrassment.

Suddenly chuckles. You brave a peek at him, now covering his eyes with a single hand, head tipped back to rest on his chair.

You're not sure if that's a good or bad thing.

"Sorry, no, it's just... I didn't think it would happen this way." Visibly takes in a big breath and sighs it out slowly. Seems to have regained his composure and is back to his confident self, smiling at you. "Thanks Y/N, I... don't think it's much of a secret that I enjoy your company too. I'm just a little embarrassed that you beat me to it...some big boss energy huh?"

Xiao

"...He takes on everything by himself. I worry about him," You look at the stars as you say this. Xiao doesn't say anything.

"But I'm glad that he's opening up a lot more now. It's great to see him among friends,"

Xiao has a feeling at this point, that its him you're talking about, but he still doesn't say anything and keeps his gaze in front of him rather than on you.

"Yes, the road in front of him is long but...he's also already come a long way," you sigh a little "The time of Rex Lapis has long gone, but he still sticks to his principles. I think his dedication is part of what I like about him,"

This is when he turns to you, blank look on his face, contemplating on what to do. When you turn to meet his gaze, its then that he decides to bridge the gap between the two of you, shoulder to shoulder, leaning in sideways to catch your lips in a chaste and rather shy kiss.

"You should give a bit of credit to yourself, for putting up with me all these years, Y/N,"

End!

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[s0dium]

Douchebag

A/n: This is honestly the BEST fic I've ever written! I took a lot from prompts I found on this site and the smut scene is inspired from a book called "The Kiss Quotient." (It was just so damn good). This fanfic is also inspired by my original fanfic, "Douchebag" Tengen x Reader. ALSO, I AM WORKING ON YUTA FICS, SO DON'T WORRY! Word count: 3.5k

Synopsis: Gojo Satrou was a man of many things. It would be hard to find anyone in the jujutsu world who hadn’t heard of his name before, whether that be through his many wins in battle or his reputation as an A-class player. Some describe him as eccentric, and others (mostly girls) describe him as irresistible. You? Well, you on the other hand would describe him as nothing else than an utter, complete,  douchebag. Warnings: Enemies to lovers,  teasing, fingering, intense kissing for a sec, squirting, use of pet names, belly bulge, cervix fucking, breeding kink, virgin!reader, multiple orgasms, unprotected sex, choking ~

You scoffed, watching through the classroom window as a clearly frustrated old man stormed out of the building, no doubt a higher up. No doubt the work of Gojo Satoru. "God I hate him." You hissed, turning to face a dozing-off Shoko and your other friend Haibara. The classroom you sat in was almost empty, bathed in the soft light of midday filtering through large windows. Sparse shadows stretch across the well-worn wooden floor. Rows of desks, mostly unoccupied, face a dusty chalkboard at the front. "Who Satoru?" Shoko yawned, leaning into the palm of her hand to face you. Haibara lets out a loud chuckle. "Why? Because he's an ass to higher-ups?" He nods to the window and you click your tongue against the rough of your mouth. "No, it's because he is an ass in general. His whole 'holier than thou' attitude, and don't get me started on the way he treats girls." You practically shiver as you remember the time you saw some poor girl from Kyoto Jujutsu High profess her love to the white hair man, only to run away sobbing. "I swear to god it's like he expects us to kiss the floor that he walks on, he's.... infuriating" "Who's infuriating?" Oh god, you knew that stupidly deep voice anywhere. You whipped around to find yourself face to face with the very tall white-haired man you were talking about; a shit-eating grin spread across his infuriatingly handsome face.

“You couldn't be talking about me, could you?” Satoru's voice dripped faux shock and you rolled your eyes.

“Well you know what they say, speak of the devil and he shall appear.” You spat.

“That must be why you love using that pretty mouth of yours to talk about me so much.” Satoru lowered himself to close the provoking height difference between the two of you until your noses were inches away from touching. “Cause ya love having me around  doncha.”

In that moment you have to conjure up every ounce of self-restraint to not spit in his face there and then, and luckily your friends catch the drift. "Hey Satoru! What are you doing here?" Perked up Haibara who reached out his hand to dap Gojo up. "Well, Suguru and I are heading for a night out today, small club, and I thought, out of the kindness of my heart," You scoff and Gojo merely grins and continues, "I'd invite you all. Drink on me of course." As Satrou's invitation lingered in the air, you noticed Shoko's ears perk up. Her curiosity was piqued, a subtle lift of her eyebrows betraying her interest. You bit your tongue, the taste of reluctance sharp against your teeth. The idea of going anywhere with Satrou was far from appealing, but knowing your friends might join made it harder to outright refuse.

You crossed your arms defensively, leaning back slightly as you fixed Satrou with a skeptical look. "And why would you want me there?"

Satrou's lips curled into a half-smirk, his eyes lighting up with a mischievous glint."You're annoying, I'll give you that," He took a casual step closer, and leaned in closer, his voice lowering to a conspiratorial whisper, "but I never said you weren't fun."

His words, intended to irk you, did their job well. You glared at him sharply, the frustration evident in your furrowed brows and the hard set of your jaw.

Satrou chuckled.

“Great, I’ll take that as a yes then, I'll text you guys the details.” He turns around to walk out of the classroom. “See you guys there!”

There was a silence as you all watched Satrou walk away before Haibara turns to look at you. “So are you going to go y/n? Come on it will be so much fun!”

“Yeah no way in hell.”

~ You were a liar. You were a liar because here you were, leaning over the counter of a bar in a club that was far from "small." The nightclub was a pulsing, chaotic hive of activity. Neon lights flashed in syncopation with the deafening throb of electronic dance music that shook the very air. The club was jam-packed with bodies moving rhythmically, the heat from the mass of humanity palpable as the scent of sweat and sweet perfumes mingled. The bar surface was sticky under your arms, and the occasional spill from a too-hastily poured drink added to the chaos of sounds and smells around you. You lazily stirred the thin red straw into your drink, trying to politely ignore the creep who wouldn't stop talking to you.

Somehow, in the maze of gyrating bodies and blinding strobe lights, you had lost both Shoko and Haibara, leaving you stranded at the mercy of this clueless conversationalist. Despite the roar of bass and the chatter of dozens of conversations, his words seemed to bore into your ears, relentless and unyielding. He leaned in closer than necessary, trying to make himself heard over the club's cacophony, not realizing or perhaps not caring, that you were more interested in plotting an escape than in anything he had to say. "And might I say you look gorgeous tonight." It took everything you had not to scoff at this creep's words, but before you should shut the man down, you felt an arm wrap around you. "Everything alright love?" Oh god. You knew that voice anywhere. As you turned, you were met by Satrou's piercing blue eyes, their color vivid even behind stylish rectangular sunglasses. The multicolor flashing lights overhead caught in the threads of Satrou’s light blue button-up, making it shimmer subtly, and the fabric clung just right to his broad shoulders and tapered waist, hinting at the well-defined physique beneath. You hated the fact that your brain immediately noted how damn good he looked. His arm was wrapped around your waist drawing you close and you had to bite your tongue from frowning at the pet name he had given you As he leaned in, his voice was low, a soft murmur over the noise of the club, "This guy bothering you baby?" His tone was teasing, and you could detect the challenge in it, as if daring you to admit that his closeness and pet names affected you just as much as he knew it did. "Of course I'm fine baby!" You smile brightly and for a second you think Satrou looked a bit taken aback. If playing along got you out of this situation so be it. "This guy, I'm sorry, what's your name?" You glance back at the creep who had turned bright red. "I'm sorry, excuse me." You watched as the man disappeared into the throng of the bustling crowd, your attention fixed until he was well out of sight. Only then did you turn back to Satrou, the false warmth on your face instantly transforming into a cold, hard glare.

"Thanks for that, but you can get your hand off me now," you said, your voice icy as you tried to wriggle out of his hold. Despite your efforts, Satrou’s grip on your waist remained firm, unyielding.

"And why should I? I think we made a fantastic couple," Satrou cooed, a teasing lilt in his voice. His eyes sparkled with amusement, clearly enjoying the moment far more than you.

You rolled your eyes, exasperation seeping through. "You really think I would fall for something like that?"

"Why? Did you?" he probed further, his smile widening, eyes searching yours for any sign of genuine affect. Anger started to boil up inside you as your attempts to escape his grasp remained futile.

"I don't think you understand the dynamic here very well, Satoru," you began, your voice low and deliberate, each word punctuated for emphasis. You stepped closer, invading his space as much as he had invaded yours, your eyes never leaving his. "Let me make this crystal clear, I'm not someone you can just fucking conquer, and I'm certainly not one of those girls who's gonna kiss the ground you walk on with your whole 'I'm the strongest' act," you seethed.

Your face was mere inches from his now, your breath mingling, the tension palpable. "Because I know what you really are, Satrou," you hissed, the anger in your voice barely contained. "You're a fucking douche bag." "Oh? Is that so."

Satrou's expression shifted subtly, the amusement fading into something more measured, more cautious. He studied you for a moment and you took the chance to wiggle out of his grasp and make your way through the crowd on the dance floor toward the door. The beat of the music pounds in your ears and throughout your body making your synapses jump like beans in a tin can. You can barely see the floor, only flashes of bodies you frantically tried to push past. Before you can make it to the back door, a hand grips your wrist tightly enough to halt your forward rush. Above the din of the pulsating music and amidst the strobe-lit shadows of dancing figures, Satoru's face comes into view. You feel your breath catch in your throat. God his is beautiful. Strobe lights catch and accent every one of his sharp features alighting them in a multicolor color hue. He pulls your wrist to him so you're close, too close. You can smell the old spice shampoo from his hair mixed in with some sort of sweet cologne. It's a smell that makes you want to bury your nose into him over and over again. "Jesus fucking Christ y/n" he breathed his eyes searching yours. "How long are we going to keep this thing of ours going?" You furrowed your eyebrows. “Our thing? What thing?”

“The thing where we act like we hate each other but actually want to fuck the brains out of each other.” Your eyes widen and you feel your face grow deathly hot. You try to step back, get some space, some room to breathe, but the hand on your wrist keeps you from doing so

“I-fuck you” the words come out of your mouth more soft and meager than you intended to, and you find yourself locked into his blue gaze.

“Believe me, I've thought about it.” His voice is low, and his face isn't painted with a shit-eating grin like it so usually is, he's serious and his eyes are soft. Fuck it. You can no longer hear the lyrics to whatever song was playing, only a soft dull hum of the beat in your ears. Immediately your lips are on his. The kiss is frantic, hot, messy. The club's pulse thrummed through you like a second heartbeat, the noise and chaos all but forgotten in the singular focus of his presence. You could feel one of his large hands on the small of your back, drawing you in until there was no space left between the both of you. Your mouths clashed against each other as if you were both seeking something vital, something long-denied. Satoru's lips were insistent against yours, moving with a fervor that matched the pounding bass surrounding you. You whined as his tongue slipped into your mouth, your hands tangling in his hair, pulling him closer. You could feel the heat radiating from his body, the firm press of his chest against yours. The scent of his cologne mixed with the smoky air around us, intoxicating and heady.

Your mouths separated with a soft pop, and Satoru is grinning while you're left dazed, breath heavy and chests rising and falling after it. "How bout you say we get out of here Princess."Gojo's voice was a low murmur, his breath warm against your ear as you broke from the intense kiss.

Before you could even respond, a dizzying rush enveloped you. The loud club vanished in an instant, replaced by the quiet, dimly lit ambiance of his bedroom. You were suddenly on his bed, the soft duvet beneath you a stark contrast to the hard dance floor we'd just left. Right, he can teleport. You forgot about that. Wait was he... where are you going to... Before you can get a word in, he’s once again engulfing your lips with his and pulling you into a feverish kiss in which the two of you can’t seem to get enough of each other. The moment one pulls away to breathe, the other is immediately searching for their lips again; intertwining tongues and teeth clashing together recklessly.

Your hot, everything is hot, your body is burning up by the second and there’s a sickly sweet feeling in your stomach that keeps on expanding as time passes. You whine into his mouth when you feel a hand slip under your skirt and lightly trace the outline of your slit with his index finger. You're painfully wet; your arousal has made a large spot on your underwear translucent. “Just touch me,’ you whined, arching impatiently against his hand. He couldn’t make either of you wait any longer. Slowly, he brought his middle finger down and slid it gently over her folds. You threw your head back. "Ahhhh, more please." He did it again, this time his fingertip slipping between and gathering your wetness. He parted you with two fingers. You let out a gasp when he hit your clit and started to rub it in small circles. You tried to say something, anything to explain how hot you were feeling right now, but your words were lost against his soft lips. The taste of him, the smell of him, the feel of him so close against you, skin to skin. Time and space had no meaning anymore. There was only you and Satrou.

“You feeling good baby? Satrou speaks slowly, breath on your neck and voice in your ear making you shiver. You bite your lip and nod like any words that came from you would ruin it. You almost wince when you feel two fingers slip into your tight hole. "Jesus, fuck. You gotta relax princesses." He chuckled, knowing far to well that the tightness was going to feel delicious around him. Two fingers worked into you, and your eyes rolled back into your head. He began a steady rhythm as his tongue nipped and sucked the tender skin of your neck. You couldn’t prevent her hips from rising to meet his thrusts. Oh God, you were riding his hand. That had to be bad. You told herself to stop. You couldn’t. Somehow, you found your hands tangled in his short white hair. Your body was coiled tighter, grasping at his fingers, so wet now you could hear the slippery sounds every time he drove back into you. "Hnghhh.... so good." You squeezed your eyes type, becoming focused on the tightening feeling of your core and the blossoming warm pleasure. Your legs started to tremble under the unbearable pleasure and your back arched against the bed as if your body was trying to escape the euphoric feeling that coursed through your skin. "That’s it, fuck, beautiful girl... such a natural submissive...." You want to tell him he's wrong, all this pleasure wasn't because of his egotistic ass, but it'd be a lie. And as if on command, all feelings come to a heightened crescendo; explosions of euphoria clouding your brain causing your toes to curl from pleasure and your body to shake like a leaf.

It takes a couple seconds after you calmed down to realize you squirted all over Satoru's hand and all blood rushes to your face turning you a bright red.

“Oh my god in so sorry I didn’t-”

Your voice dies out as you watch Satrou pull off his shirt, revealing his extremely built body and toned muscles, to wipe the liquid off his hand. You don’t even notice that he had pulled out his dick until you feel something pressing against your entrance, making you look down and your eyes widen as you do so. Your stomach inwardly twisted,  filled with the sickly excitement and your breathing started to quicken. "Shhhhh baby," Satoru cups your cheek and kisses your forehead. It was a sweet gesture despite everything happening right now, a gesture that made your heart swell and your mind yearn for Satoru. The stretch of his dick spreading your walls is insane. No amount of preparation could've prepared you for the length of Satoru's dick. You feel it heavy inside you and Satrou pushes into you until he can't push anymore, until his hips are flush against you and the tip of his length is smushed against your cervix. The pleasure of that alone felt numb, unbearable, you needed friction, you needed him to move. You practically faint when he first thrusts into you in earnest. It's euphoric; the curvature of his dick digging itself against your g-spot, scraping against your vaginal walls every time he backed his hips up. His cock pulsed inside of your silky walls, stretching you to the fullest capacity as he bottomed out again and again. "Oh fuck." Satrou groaned. He was no longer grinning, Satoru's playful resolves vanished and his smile quickly dropped. He knew you'd feel good, but he didn't expect how good you'd feel. The feeling of his hand he had fucked himself to the thought of you for so many nights was nothing compared to the real thing. It was too much, the feeling of your wet soft walls gripping him so tightly. How was he able to live without your pussy in the first place? The pleasure built rapidly, too potent, too insistent. He kneeled over you, a groan escaping his lips—a raw, primal sound that vibrated through the charged air between you. Satorus thrust your quick and hard, a clear display of strength and endurance he had gained from years of jujutsu training. "Been thinking about this, so long, bet you have to have ya~"

As Satrou's long, deliberate fingers encircle your neck, a thrilling chill races down your spine. He applies pressure gently at first, then with a firmer, insistent grip that gradually restricts your airflow, sending a wave of exhilaration through your senses. The world around you narrows, focusing intently on the point where his skin contacts yours, heightening every other sensation that courses through you. His other hand slips under your bra bra to grab and massage your breast, his thumb flicking over your nipples.

"Satoru..! Ahhhh..! I..I, fuckkkkk can't handle this.." You had no strength to answer him, only offering wanton moans in retort as he continued to wreck your body with his completely brutal thrusts. The pain of him hitting the tip of your cervix nearly every time mixed with his hand squeezing your throat it was just all too much.

Satoru. Satoru. Satoru

"Slow down.. please im gonna ahhhh~" Drool slipped passed your lips and you writhed and squirmed at the feeling of hot euphoria passed over your body in flesh arrow. "Gonna cum? Fuck baby, let's... let's come together m'kay?" Satrou almost stuttered. His body had kicked into autopilot, and a deep primal need for you settled in as he thrust in and out, creating a methodical rhythm that echoed in your ears. Your ankles lock around his lower back and you cry out when the head of his cock kisses your womb, your legs shaking as you feel yourself start to be thrown into an intense orgasm. You want to say something about the weird feeling in your stomach, how your skin is buzzing but it's all too much, and before you know it your tumbling toward the edge. It feels like your whole body was shot with electricity and color dances in your eyes as you float in ecstasy.

"Sh-Shit, shit, fuuuuck~" He chuckles into your ear, choking over his words as his hips sputter inside of you, hot cum fills you as much as you can hold inside of your stuffed cunny. Satoru doesn't pull out as you both come down from your high, instead watching you intently as you ride through the aftershocks of your orgasm. "Wanna do this again?" He chuckles.

"Fuck, yes, please."

[flanaganfilm]

Good day Mr Flanagan. please what does "the rest is confetti" mean to you and in the context it was used in hill house??

Okay, here we go. Buckle up for a long read.

To answer this, I've got to explain a little bit about what was happening and where I was when I sat down to write episode 10 of The Haunting of Hill House.

Hill House was not a fun shoot. The picture above is from very early in production, when I was still chubby and happy.

It was my first foray into television. I was absolutely terrified that I'd mess it up. So I'd opted to direct all of the episodes myself, figuring that - if nothing else - I'd have no one else to blame if it went south.

It was the most grueling professional experience of my career. The shoot was by no means a smooth one, every day was an uphill battle from a budgetary perspective, and between the three giant production entities involved with the production, I spent a lot of time fighting over the creative and logistical elements of the series.

I began losing weight. I was smoking two packs of cigarettes a day.

By the end of the shoot, I had dropped almost 40 lbs.

I was very depressed. Every day was a battle, and for the first time in my career, I wasn't excited to go to work in the morning. We were fighting for basic resources, fighting for the show we wanted, and even fighting amongst ourselves by the end. It was grueling.

We hadn't written all of the scripts when we started production. I believe we had finished through episode 7, but the rest of the scripts had to be finished while we were already shooting.

We'd mapped everything out in the writers room, and I had great support on the other episodes, but I was writing the finale solo. I'd thought I'd be able to juggle it with everything else. I quickly fell behind.

I finally got to the script about halfway through production. I'd work on it between takes at the monitor, and then get home to our tiny rental house in Atlanta, where Kate was waiting with our baby son. (One of the rare bright spots of this shoot came when Kate found out she was pregnant about halfway through production. We even named our daughter Theodora, in honor of her origins.)

I'd typically fall down from exhaustion when I got home, but I had to push through it and work on the script. My weekends were spent shotlisting and prepping for upcoming episodes. We didn't have enough time to stay ahead of prep, so every available day was used for that... I went three months without a single day off at one point.

I'd sit up late staring at the script. I was in a dark, dark place. Overwhelmed, exhausted, and feeling like I lived in an eternal present. Each day bled into the next and it didn't feel like there was an end in sight. That feeling of unreality was heightened because we kept returning to the same sets, same locations, and even the same scenes throughout the 100 shooting-day production. Stepping back into the exact room we had shot in days or weeks or even months ago made the whole thing feel absolutely surreal. Making movies is always an non-linear experience, but this one felt particularly so... it was like the days of our lives were happening to us all out of order.

I remember feeling something like despair creeping into my daily experience on the show. And I remember dwelling on that when I got into the scene work of episode 10.

As I worked through the draft, I recall that despair coloring a lot of what was on the page. My filter was breaking down. There's a monologue at the beginning of the episode where Steven's wife Leigh (played by my dear friend Samantha Sloyan) spews out a torrent of eviscerating insults about Steve's value as a writer. That is just me vomiting onto myself. She was voicing all of my deepest insecurities about myself at the time, and of what I was doing with this series.

She says "Is anything real before you write it, Steve? The things you write about, they're real. Those people are real, their feelings are real, their pain is real - but not to you, is it. Not until you chew it up, digest it, and shit it out onto a piece of paper and even then, it's a pale imitation at best."

This was the mindset I was in for a lot of the shoot. The writing became a reflection of a lot of that turmoil, and I knew who I was referring to in that monologue - I was talking about my family. I was talking about how much of their lives I'd used as building material for this show. I was talking about the fact that I'd lost two loved ones to suicide, and seen what it had done to my mother in particular. And I knew I was using - possibly even exploiting - those people for this series.

There's a lot of despair in this episode. The Red Room, as we conceived it, was a place that would feed upon those emotions. Grief, sadness, loss... those were the real ghosts of our series, and where our characters find themselves at the start of the finale. They're being slowly digested - eaten alive - by those feelings.

So finally, it came time to write Nell's final scene with her siblings. I knew from the outline we'd constructed in the writers room what this was supposed to accomplish - she was supposed to be their salvation. She was supposed to take all of these feelings that we'd been wrestling with and finally provide catharsis... finally say something that would free everyone.

I remember sitting with a blinking cursor for a long time. The Crain siblings had just turned and seen Nellie standing by the door, and suddenly were able to hear her speak. But what should she say? What would I say? What would I want someone to say to me?

What she ultimately says lays bare a lot of what I was thinking about when it comes to grief. It exists outside of linear time, much as I felt I existed at the time. That sense of eternal present, that sense of a nonlinear eternity of moments and memories - it all came out in her speech to her brothers and sisters.

I remember feeling, looking at my insane present and looking back at my past, how strangely overwhelmed I was by memories. That I wasn't experiencing time in a straight line, and hadn't been for a while - for the better part of a year, I'd felt more like I was standing in a whirlwind of moments. "Our moments fall around us like..." Nell said, and I recall sitting back and trying to find the words.

"Rain," for certain, but there was something too uniform about that. The moments of life as I experienced them weren't that orderly, they weren't that small. They didn't fall the same way. Some sailed by, fast and unremarkable, while others lingered in front of me, twisting and stretching. So it was a good word, but not the right word. I left it on the page though.

"Snow" was my next attempt. Better, in that I imagined the snow blowing in the wind, swirling and dancing and feeling more organic. More chaotic. More like life. But for some reason, the word that stuck with me, the word I felt Nell Crain would connect with was...

"Confetti."

And that was because I was thinking not of Victoria Pedretti at this point, but of Violet McGraw.

Violet played Young Nell, and I wondered what she might have said if she experienced time this way. As an adult, Nell was despairing. Nell was overwhelmed. But as a child... there was an innocence to the word. There was a joy to the word.

I imagined moments falling around her, this little girl with the big smile and the wide eyes. Her moments would be colorful. They would be of different shapes and sizes, some falling fast and some falling slow, flipping and turning and dancing in the air, independent of the others. Sparkling, whirling, doing lazy summersaults as they sauntered down to Earth.

I thought of myself, and of the members of my family. I thought of those we'd lost. I realized what I hoped for them, and for us all, in the end... was to look upon that mosaic of experience, that avalanche of days and minutes and moments... and to smile with some of the joy we had as children.

And this, I thought, was something that gave me hope. This gave me a glimpse of some kind of salvation for them. This was also how I hoped my life might seem if I was a ghost - a cascade of color and light and shape and movement, something I could dance in.

So Nell smiled and said... "or confetti."

It stuck with me. The rest of her monologue gets heavy again, and gets to the real point of the show - the point of the whole series, if I'm honest - and that's forgiveness.

I figured the only thing that would let the Crain children out of the Red Room was to be forgiven. I thought of the losses in my own family, and I thought of what I wished for my mother and for my aunts and uncles and cousins and I tried to pour that into her final words.

"I loved you completely, and you loved me the same," she said, "that's all." And this was the point I wanted the most to make. That at the end of our life, if we can say this about each other, the rest doesn't matter. The rest is that rainstorm, or that blizzard, that fell around this one central truth, and maybe built itself in piles around it, to the point we lost sight of it along the way.

And I thought again of that little girl, and almost as an afterthought, wrote "The rest is confetti."

I liked the way it sounded, but I was insecure about the line. I almost took it out, in fact. I remember asking Kate to read the scene and talking about that last line with her. "Is it too cute?" I wondered. She was on the fence. "Depends on how it's acted," she said, and I figured she was right. We could always take it out if it didn't work. The scene could end with "I loved you completely, and you loved me the same. That's all."

Why not shoot it and see what happened.

I turned in the script, we published it quickly so that we could start breaking it down and prepping it. And the next morning I was back on set. I'd deal with episode 10 when it came down the pipe again, sometime in the coming months. We had a lot of shooting to get through before I had to worry about it.

I recall Netflix asking me to cut a lot of that monologue, and I remember them also having questions about the "confetti" line. I pointed out that it didn't cost us any extra to shoot it all, it was only words, and fought to keep the script intact.

Ultimately, they insisted I make a series of cuts on the page. I begrudgingly agreed, but left Nell's speech alone. I made superficial cuts around it, throughout the draft, and even considered changing the font size to fool them into thinking it had gotten shorter (I ultimately was told I wouldn't fool anyone and not to risk starting a war). But Nellie's final goodbye stayed intact.

It must be said - Victoria Pedretti SLAUGHTERED this scene.

By the time we got around to filming it, things had never been worse for the production. There was almost nothing left for a lot of us. Tensions were sky-high, resources had been exhausted completely, and we were all ready to give up.

Filming in the mold-ridden Red Room was depressing, morose, and led to a lot of arguments and unpleasantness. The room itself just felt gross, always, and we were in there for days at a time. The last thing we had to shoot in there was Nellie's goodbye.

Victoria came to set having to push through pages of monologue, and she did so with captivating bravado. I recall being teary-eyed at the monitor watching her work. And when we finally made it to the last line, I watched her deliver it with... a smile. A sincere, innocent, longing, joyful smile. A smile informed by the sadness, grief, and loss of her own situation, of her own life... but a smile that finds forgiveness and grace after all. Pedretti knew how to say the line, and how that word would work.

And as she said it, I knew it would stay in the show.

Over the years, that sentence has become something of a tagline for The Haunting of Hill House. I'm always a bit mystified and touched when I see people approach me with the line on T-shirts, or even tattooed on their bodies.

I started signing it with autographs back in 2020 after enough fans asked me to. Now it's my go-to when I sign anything related to Hill House.

The line, for me, represents a lot of things.

It's about the insane, chaotic, non-linear experience of making that show. It's about trying to find and hold onto joy, even in the grips of despair.

It's about the way the moments of our lives aren't linear, not really, and how we may be unable to understand them as we exist in their flurry. It's about finding hope, innocence and forgiveness in the final reckoning.

And it's about how, outside of our love for each other, the rest is just... well, it's fleeting. It's colorful. It's overwhelming. It's blinding. It's dancing. And, if we look at it right, it's beautiful. But it's also light. It's tinsel. It flits and dances and falls and fades, it's as light as air.

The rest is the stuff that falls around us, and flits away into nothing.

It's the love that stays.

[ao3commentoftheday]

Idk if this is too broad of a scope for this blog, but if you could answer this, it'd be great.

I've been in a writing rut since I started getting serious about writing, and I've identified the issue in the past month or so: I slant heavily on the gardener end of the writing spectrum and all the advice on writing I've ever seen was for architect-style writing. Not once in the eight years I've been serious about writing did I find any guides on gardener-style writing (and if it says it's gardener-style, it'sreally just architect-style with gardner aspects), and my experience has just been more or less jamming a square peg into a circle hole, getting nothing written and feeling bad about it.

Now I'm unlearning all the architect-style habits that are destructive to me as a writer, but I can't find any resources for gardeners aside from Stephen King's On Writing. If you or any of your followers know how to help a gardener's writing, that would be great. I have so many fic ideas I want to write, but can't since I'm learning to write all over again.

For those who don't know what gardener and architect refer to when it comes to writers, a gardener is a writer who starts with the seed of an idea and lets it grow in whatever direction the light shines. They prune it and weed it as they go but otherwise let the idea lead the way. An architect, on the other hand, plans their stories out first and then writes them. They have a structure and the details all mapped out first and then the writing is just executing on that vision.

As a gardener myself, my biggest piece of advice is to avoid writing advice. Like you've said, the majority of it is aimed at people who do things like plan and plot and worldbuild ahead of time. Because of the structure that that writing style enjoys, providing "one size fits most" writing advice works well for it.

I tend to find a lot of that advice to be counter to what I need to do. Planning a story out ahead just makes me feel like it's already written. Building out the world before I start writing it feels like a hollow exercise - more like writing an encyclopedia than developing a land and culture for my characters to inhabit.

What I find useful is taking an episodic approach to writing. The entire story will be like a season of a television show and each chapter is like one episode. I always have my eventual "season finale" end goal in mind, but any particular chapter can meander closer to or further from that goal. It's alright to take a circuitous route, as long as I get to my destination in the end.

It's also alright if my destination changes as I'm writing. Sometimes those meandering paths take me in a more interesting direction than I was originally going down, and that shifts the story. As long as you're vaguely following a three-act structure (or 5 act or 7 act), the flow of it will feel familiar to your readers and they probably won't really notice it happening.

This advice I'm giving might not ring true to you either. You didn't have a specific problem to address, so I've been wandering a bit in my reply. Really what it comes down to is paying attention to yourself and your needs. Figure out what it is that keeps you writing and what it is that makes you stop. Do more of the former and less of the latter - and don't worry if what you're doing is "weird" to someone else.

I write directly into the AO3 window (which AO3 specifically tells you NOT to do, btw) because drafting first in google docs or something takes the fun out of it for me. I post my chapters without previewing them first. I write in 800 to 1500 word sprints, and I focus on dialogue, and I almost always try to end on a joke or a pun or a cliffhanger. These are all things that make writing an activity that I want to do.

I can't really say anything much more specific given your ask, but I hope something in here was helpful. Let's see if any gardeners out there have some resources or advice that might work for you.

[ghost-proofbaby]

when you know, you know. (e.m.)

summary: air hockey has never been so romantic.

warnings: it's alluded to that reader is wearing red lipstick. not edited.

pairing: eddie munson x reader

wc: 1.8k+

a/n: a very late valentine's day gift for you all (and eddie). also, the fact i've never written proper mechanic eddie... what a shame.

“Yes!” 

If any of the nearby children flinched, you didn’t notice. You were too wrapped up in your victory, going as far as to partake in a terribly embarrassing dance on your end of the air hockey table as Eddie shakes his head slowly. 

“You definitely cheated,” he deadpans, a twitch of a smile nearly giving him away as he leans down to pick the puck out of the slot below on his end, “There’s no way you’re about to beat me in under five minutes, again.” 

You smile, lips painted red under the lowlights of the arcade as you lean over the table and taunt him, “Or maybe it’s just a skill issue. I wouldn’t keep beating you if you were actually a professional in air hockey like you’d claimed, Munson.” 

Three dates – tonight makes four – and you still hadn’t quite worked out how you’d managed to capture the attention of the boy before you. When he’d originally asked you out to coffee, you’d swallowed down all your excessive excitement just to answer him. The local mechanic that you’d been making heart eyes at every few months when you’d go in for an oil check, the one who hadn’t allowed the others at the shop to oversell you on a damn thing when you’d get your tires rotated. Who always smiled shyly as he’d bring you back your keys.

You’d figured the coffee date would last an hour if you were lucky. The two of you would spend more than five minutes in the same room together, he’d realize how overbearing you were, and that would be the end of it. Ridiculous crush effectively squashed. 

But it hadn’t. 

It had lasted hours, plural. Coffees finished and second lattes nursed until they’d gone cold, the outcome had been the exact opposite of your expectations. Your conversation had flowed effortlessly, common ground and common interests found with ease, and suddenly, Eddie was more than just some cute mechanic for your friends to tease you over. 

The first date had only ended due to his shift at the shop that afternoon. 

The subsequent sushi dinner date, and then the movie night the next week, had also lasted hours. 

“For someone who works on cars, you should be a lot better with your hands,” you poke gentle fun at him as he makes the first hit against the puck this time, far more careful than you had been when serving. 

“Or maybe I’m just determined to keep letting my pretty date win.” 

“And why would you ever do that?” 

Another hit from your mallet, the sharp tapping of your aggressive push ringing out over the sound of nearby machines. You don’t dare to glance in the direction of the ruckus, but you’re pretty sure someone has just won an exciting amount of tickets based on the squeals of glee. 

“I dunno,” Eddie pauses to shrug after he hits the puck once more, his guard dropping. You’re ruthless as you take the opportunity to shoot the puck straight into ‘goal’ on his side of the table. A straight shot, far too easy for your liking, but you still celebrate the victory with another embarrassing dance, “Maybe it’s because I’m into that ridiculous dance they keep doing whenever they score.” 

You immediately stop your little jumps, eyes widening, a rush of embarrassment heating you up from the inside out as Eddie’s eyes stay glued on you. The table powers down as he makes his way around it, feet bringing him right to you. 

You’d always thought Eddie would find you weird, or odd, or unappealing after that coffee date, but the outcome had been better than you could have possibly conceived.

He was an absolute weirdo as well. 

Fondness overtakes his features just like it had on that coffee date when you’d accidentally snorted at one of his jokes, and your heart flutters eagerly. You can’t believe there had been a time you’d only watch him from behind glass, trying to not get caught as you would blatantly stare at him as he’d work on your car. A time when you’d only see his curls up in loose buns rather than framing his face as they were now, a time when you couldn’t even shake his hand due to it being covered in oil. 

That had all only been a month ago, but you already couldn’t imagine your life without Eddie Munson in it. 

“Don’t go shy on me now,” he chuckles as he stops in front of you, smirk deepening the dimples you’d only noticed on your second date with him. He’d been too bashful the first date, ducking whenever his grin would grow too wide on you, biting his tongue on half the flirtatious remarks you wished he would have said. “You won, fair and square, so what’s your prize gonna be, valentine?” 

He also waited until the second date to kiss you. That had nearly killed you. 

“It’s not very fair if you let me win,” you whisper, unable to look away from his eyes. They’re a soft brown, a smooth honey, a nice sight for sore eyes. You kind of like the crinkles beside them, too. Kind of wonder what it would be like to wake up beside him, roll over, and kiss them – all before the sun ever rose. 

He reaches out and gingerly grabs your hand, calloused fingertips brushing your knuckles before he entangles your fingers with his. “Psh, who said I let you win? Maybe I just really suck at air hockey.”

“You just-”

You never get to finish your argument. He’s quick to swoop down, capturing your lips in his. The rudest of interruptions, and it still manages to weaken your knees. 

Each kiss only grows sweeter. And more confident, more sure. The first one had been timid, exchanged on your doorstep with boyish hesitation and meek desperation. But now, several kisses experienced since that night, all apprehension has melted. He lets his lips meld to yours, captures your bottom lip just tightly enough to give it a brief tug when he pulls away. Still soft, ever so sweet, and leaving you wanting for more. 

Four dates. All it took was four dates for him to make you a goner. 

“Now, that wasn’t fair,” you breathe out, betrayed by the smile that you wear. Your chest feels shaken up, impending explosion of mushiness and flowers and hearts and every single cliche the love songs on the radio could squeeze out.

“It was your prize.”

“I never said I wanted a kiss for my prize.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” he puts a dramatic hand up to his chest, leaning back so dramatically that your hand instinctively reaches out to loop a finger in his jean pocket to keep him upright, “Would you like me to take it back, my fair maiden?” 

Four dates, and he makes it impossible to not imagine a future of this. Of silly banter, of gentle mornings spent kissing away crows feet, of cutting one another off with the most infuriating of methods. You’re starting to believe you’re just a hopeless romantic, and he’d spotted that from a mile away – he knew every single button to press to have you putty in his hands, and he was taking full advantage of it. 

You giggle, an honest to God giggle, as you say, “Hm, I’m not sure. I heard the return policies on those are a bit wonky.” 

If your friends thought you were insufferable when he was some stranger you just had a crush on, they would be vomiting at the sight of this. 

He leans into your space, close enough to smell his faint cologne and mint on his breath, “Are they? Well, lucky for you, I’m friends with the shop owner. Can definitely accept the return without a receipt. It won’t be a problem, ma’am. I swear it.”

He’s weird. He’s goofier than you could have imagined, snarkier than you could have dreamed, and more romantic than you had yet to uncover. He’s kind of perfect, but you wouldn’t dare say that to his face. Not yet, at least. 

You’re glad you had said yes when he’d asked days prior for you to be his Valentine. And you’re glad he hadn’t gone the boring route, showing up with just chocolates and flowers and calling it a day, but had instead dragged you out to this arcade for a night of adventures as he claimed. 

“And how would one go about returning a kiss, kind sir?” 

He answers wordlessly, bringing up a finger to tap on his lips. He goes as far as pouting them dramatically. 

He wants you to kiss him. 

Lucky for him, you want to kiss him, too. 

Your kiss is more chaste. Teasing as you lift up onto your tippy toes and only press your lips to his for a brief second before falling back. You leave him wanting more – it’s written all over his face, along with a blush that races right over the bridge of his nose. 

He’s cute. He’s cute, and he’s weird, and you really fucking like him. 

“Now that that’s over with,” you have to change the topic, move right along before your heart truly bursts from your chest, “I know what I want my prize to be.” 

He takes a moment to recover, pupils almost resembling hearts as he stares down at you. Eventually he pulls himself from your trance, shaking his head as he asks, “And what would that be?”

You’re the one taking his hand this time. If he gave you the time, you’d like to learn each callous and scar by heart. Trace over them in the middle of night, when it’s just you and him in the darkness beneath your sheets. Memorize the way they feel as he explores every curvature of your body and figure out which of the roughest patches would brush against your most sensitive bits in a way that would make you arch your back right into him. 

The two of you haven’t even discussed if that’s where the night might lead, but you’re sort of hoping the luck in the air doesn’t run out. 

“There’s an awfully pretty ring in the case up at the ticket counter,” you muse, knowing damn well the ring was the ugliest thing either of you had ever seen in your lives, “Think you’ve got the tickets to spare?” 

His hand gives you a squeeze. Something not too tight, something perfectly comfortable. It’s only the fourth date, it’s only the first month – it’s only the beginning. 

“Anything for you, sweetheart,” he says, more earnestly than you’d expected, as he steals another kiss. 

You let him. You have this aching feeling in your chest that you’ll probably let him steal an endless amount from you for the rest of your life. 

When you know, you know. Or whatever the poets say.

eddie's taglist: @capricornrisingsstuff @thisisktrying @hideoutside @vol2eddie @corrcdedcoffin @ches-86 @alovesongtheywrote @its-not-rain @feralchaospixie @cheesypuffkins87 @thebook-hobbit @babez-a-licious @eddies-acousticguitar @aysheashea @kellsck @cosmorant @billyhvrgrove-main @micheledawn1975 @eddiesxangel @siriuslysmoking @witchwolflea @tlclick73 @magicalchocolatecheesecake @mizzfizz @nanaminswhore @mikiepeach @ali-r3n @hawkebuckley @alwaysbeenfamous @darkyuffie-blog @vintagehellfire @lilmisssiren @elvendria @loveryanax @stylexrepp @princessstolas @fangirling-4-ever @eddiesguitarskills @babez-a-licious @josephquinnsfreckles

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[milkpup]

｡⋆ʚ♡ bad luck comes in threes (and in me)

›› nsfw 18+ / 3 part fic

@ace_343 on twt

ch 2 ♡ ch 3

ʚ ao3 ɞ / ʚ kofi ɞ / ʚ fic masterlist ɞ

›› naoya zenin x f!reader ›› megumi fushiguro x f!reader ›› toji fushiguro x f!eader ›› naoya x f!reader x megumi / megumi x f!reader x toji ›› naoya x f!reader x megumi + toji ›› started: 1/12/24 : status: ongoing

‹𝟹 summary: You and Megumi are close friends. He invites you to his family's estate where you start to notice how bad your luck really is.

‹𝟹 fandom: jjk, jujutsu kaisen

‹𝟹 genres / warnings: au - no powers, college au, pseudo-incest (they all want y/n, not eachother), harsh language, abuse, power imbalance, dubious consent / rxpe / noncon

‹𝟹 tags: AGED UP CHARACTERS!, au - no deaths, au - toji and megumi are part of zenin clan still, power imblance, degradation, choking, loss of virginity, name calling, pet names, some fluff and LOTS OF SMUT, slight angst, all the zenins want you basically, vaginal, blow jobs, cunnilingus, face sitting, 4some, mdom, fsub, pseudo-incest, meet the family, breeding, cum as lube, cum swapping, light blood, aggressive choking, will update tags as more is added, praise, being called a good girl

‹𝟹 notes: this is a long time in the making. i probably started this fic over a month ago >< i've been working on it more than my lfls fic that i like more. just smthn abt naoya...... (usually i prefer naoya to be subby but this fic is diff oopsies :3!). lmk what y'all think.i'll be updating my other fic real soon but for now, crumbs of this i guess LOL. i was originally going to do a oneshot but it was already starting to get long and i hadn't even progressed much in the plot i have written up x-x so i figured i'd do 3 chaps since it's like the theme >:3 hope y'all like it!!!

i'll be updating tags as it progresses. i'm super excited abt this fic even tho it's like 99% smut. (idk how to write stuff w/o smut oops) what can i say??? 🤌

!! - again, PLEASE READ TAGS BEFORE CONTINUING - !!

! - ALL CHARACTERS ARE 18+ - !

Chapter 1: Exposed

“So, do you think you can make it?” Megumi asks, taking a sip of his coffee and looking at you inquisitively. “To my family event, the reunion thing, I mean.”

You hadn’t thought about it much. Sipping on your tea, you contemplated. You’ve never met Megumi’s extended family; you had no idea what they would be like. Megumi’s family is huge, and it would be a multi-day event held at their estate. “Oh, what the hell. I have nothing better to do during winter break anyways.”

His face lights up a bit at your confirmation, but Megumi tries his hardest to hide it. You can see the blush creeping across his nose, his cheeks, even reaching the tips of his ears. He was like a little puppy, excited to see you.

“Make sure to bring any nice clothes you want to wear, but there will be pajamas and toiletries provided to you.” He finished his drink and moved to throw his away. “Are you done too?”

You felt bad, you had a little bit of your tea left and he was patiently waiting for you to finish to throw your trash away for you. You hurriedly suck up the remainder of the tea through the straw, and hand him the empty cup. “Thanks, Megs.” You chirp.

Megumi blushes and looks away as he takes your cup from your hands.

--

You’re back at your house, frantically packing last minute before Megumi comes over to pick you up. You’ve always been an overpacker, and you have no idea what to expect. You throw all sorts of garments into a pile that you want to take: casual clothes like leggings and hoodies, dresses and formalwear, and intimates. You blush, picking up matching sets of underwear and bras. You decide to toss them onto the pile anyways, better prepared than not. You didn’t know who you were “preparing” for, but felt your cheeks flush anyways. I’m meeting my close friend’s extended party and I’m packing lingerie, am I a fucking creep? You shake your head, trying to shake the thoughts out too.

You finish stuffing your clothes into your bags, packing some makeup and skincare that they probably wouldn’t have available. Just as you finish zipping your second bag, you hear a loud knock on the front door. It’s Megumi.

You open the door with a soft smile, greeting Megumi. “Thanks for picking me up Megs! Can you help me with my other bag?”

He looks down to where you’re gesturing, noticing the other bag. “Jeez ____, it’s a 3 day party. How many clothes do you need?”

You blush, sheepishly. “I just want to be prepared… y’know?” Megumi huffs and groans before picking up both bags. A lady should never have to carry her own bags, and he noticed it seemed like you were struggling with how heavy these bags were, being packed to the absolute brim.

“T-thanks, Megs.” You croak out as you follow behind him to his car. He doesn’t reply, hoisting your bags in the trunk before slamming it shut. You open the door and sit in the passenger side, buckling your seatbelt with an audible click. He gets in shortly after you, adjusting his seatbelt and turning the car on. 

The silence is thick, but not awkward. You and Megumi were comfortable around each other, not requiring a word to be said as you sat in comfortable silence on the drive to his family’s estate. Your curiosity got the better of you, and you ask Megumi, breaking the silence, “So what are the plans for the event? How big is it going to be, anyways?”

Megumi answers you, not taking his eyes off the road. “It will have pretty much my entire family, extended family, and family friends. There’s lots to do at our estate, from the gardens, movie room, bar room, and more. As for planned events, music and lots of food, maybe dancing?” His tone ends questioningly, he knows his family isn’t particularly fond of frivolous activities like dancing, but there might still be some as more people loosen up.

You nod, taking in his answer. This sounds almost a little exciting. Much better than spending time holed up in your room, studying or watching youtube.

--

Megumi pulled up to the grandiose estate. “Wow Gumi, I knew your family was loaded…. But not THIS loaded,” You gasped in awe. The entire property was large enough to be a mini village. You were shocked, to say the least. The beautiful landscaping, trees, the koi pond that connected into a river surrounding the main building… it was all too beautiful.

“Yeah, they are wealthy on a whole different level,” he responds, as he pops the trunk and retrieves your bags. “Usually they have servants around, but I’ll show you around the estate myself instead.” He starts walking towards the front entrance, you follow him closely behind, not wanting to get lost.

Megumi doesn’t even have to open the door, servants inside let him in as soon as he approaches. He briskly walks along the pavilion, turning left towards a long corridor. You try to match pace, but his long legs gives him an advantage. You take this moment, a few paces behind Megumi, to admire his raven locks bouncing as he walked.

As you’re walking, you pass an entryway, seeing a few figures to your right. Someone clicks their tongue. “I see my cousin Megumi understands,” he starts, eyes following your figure as you walk past him, “that a woman’s place is three steps behind a man’s.” This mysterious man, related to Megumi, smirks as your figure disappears.

“Don’t listen to him. He’s so full of shit it’s festering,” Megumi spits out. He seems to really hate whoever that guy was. Megumi leads you to a room down a quiet corridor and opens the door. “This will be your room for the next few nights,” He announces as he enters the room and sets your bags down. “My room is on the other side of the estate. These are the guest rooms. We can check mine out later, if you’re interested.” He flushes at that last part, looking down and uncomfortably shifting his weight. “Anyways, I have to clean up before dinner in an hour. I’ll be back to see you soon.’

Megumi retreats from your room and closes the door behind him. You decide to unpack, putting things in the drawers and hanging some items in the closet. The room was quite spacious, with its own bathroom attached and adjacent to this room.

You haven’t finished unpacking yet but decided to take a quick shower just to freshen up. You scope out the bathroom and quickly shut the door behind you. Turning the shower on to a scalding hot temp, you wait for it to heat up as steam fills the bathroom. You strip and enter the shower.

--

He stalks the hallway you were walking through but a moment ago. He’s insanely curious as to what you look like up close, intrigued by your fleeting form as you walked by behind Megumi. He wondered if you were his toy, you following Megumi like a puppy definitely gave off that message.

He can still smell a lingering scent of citrus and flowers. He knows it’s you, because women of the clan are usually not permitted to walk this side of the estate anyways. He’s following your trail, like a predator following its prey. He sees the faint glow of light coming from the crack of a door and approaches it.

He knocks once. No response. He knocks twice. Still nothing. Naoya Zenin believed he was a gentleman, but he had his limits. This was his future estate, he believed he had every right to know every single thing going on under this roof.

He lets himself in, and immediately sees the cracked bathroom door, a bit of steam escaping. He hears you humming while taking a shower, and smirks. He silently closes the door, and makes his way towards your plush bed. He sees a bag open, clothes strewn about. Something frilly and lacy catches his eye, and he walks towards the table instead. He picks the article of clothing up, noticing he was holding a black thong, laces and bows, adorned with gems along the thin waistband. He licked his lips, unholy thoughts flooding his brain.

He hears you shut off the shower, and quickly pockets the garment, swiftly moving to sit on the edge of the bed. A few moments pass, and the door of the bathroom swings open. Steam floods your room, quickly dissipating. You have a towel wrapped around your body, still humming as you walk towards your pile of clothes. You had set a specific set on top to put on after your shower. You could have sworn the thong was there, but as you rummaged through your bag the garment was nowhere to be seen.

“Looking for these, little miss?” You gasp and turn around to see a man sitting on your bed, holding up your thong with 1 finger, while smirking and eyeing you down. You nearly drop your towel, but regain composure.

“Who are you?” You ask, unsure of why a strange man you’ve never seen before let himself into your room.

“My apologies, doll, I didn’t mean to scare you. My name is Naoya Zenin. I’m set to be the next heir of the clan and estate,” he smirks, “And I figured I should personally introduce myself to you. It would be impolite of me not to do so. Who are you?”

“I’m _____, Megumi’s friend. He invited me over to meet all his family.” His ears perked up at you mentioning your friendship with Megumi, a devious thought crossing. You were still in your towel, cold air further cooling your already wet skin.

“You didn’t answer my first question, little miss. Were you planning on wearing these?” He practically spins the panties around his finger, staring you down intently. “I didn’t think such a good girl would bring something like this to wear when meeting her friend’s family…” He trails off.

A blushes creeps along your face, you didn’t think someone would know. You didn’t think someone would barge into your room, look through your clothes, and tease you about it. You couldn’t even look Naoya in the eye, shame clearly on display on your features.

“Don’t worry, woman, I won’t tell anyone. You wouldn’t want your close friend, Megumi, to know about this right? I won’t tell; however, my silence has a price.” He finishes his comment, smirking at you. His sultry gaze was locked on you, scanning your body from head to toe. He grinned and licked his lips, thinking about how he could manipulate you.

“What do you mean?” You look up at him, confused and unsure about the situation. “What do I have to do?” At that question, Naoya lifts himself from your bed to make his way towards you. His gaze never once leaving yours, making intense eye contact that sent shivers down your spine and left you trembling. You felt like prey being stalked by a predator.

Naoya is right in front of you now, as he grabs both wrists with his hands and lifts them above your head. You’re startled but have no time to react as he pushes you against a wall, wrists pinned above you. You can feel Naoya’s hot breath tickling your cheek, making you lose all sense of rationality. He grins at you, looking down as he has you in a position you can’t easily free yourself from. Your head hangs low, looking down, trying to stifle your heavy breathing. You don’t want him to know his actions are affecting you.

“I know women are dumb, but seriously, how can you not know what I mean? At least you’re pretty….” He leaves his sentence unfinished, bringing a cold hand to your chin and tilting your head to look at him. “Little miss, I’ll explain it to you once, in an easy way to understand. I want to use you. Your body, specifically. Will you be a good girl and let me? Or do you want me to make you.” Naoya’s tone drops a bit, almost grunting at the end. Thoughts about what “using you” entails floods your mind. You’re inexperienced, but not entirely clueless. Your blush deepens as you look into his eyes, now peering down at you.

You didn’t think being degraded and praised in the span of a few seconds would entice you as much as it would. Normally you’re a very independent woman, fully capable of realizing your own dreams and pursuing your own goals. But something… something about being put down but also called a good girl sent you driving up the wall with insanity. You were hooked near instantly.

“Yes sir,” you meekly respond, looking up at Naoya. Your emotions and lust are on clear display for him, and he’s enjoying every second of it.

“Good girl.” He smirks. “Just to be clear, I have very specific tastes and like to be pleased in a certain way. Try and make me proud, you dumb whore.” Your cheeks flared red at the insult. “Open your mouth, cunt.”

You made no hesitation to fulfill his command. He still had a firm grip on your chin, leaning down as he spit into your mouth. “Swallow, princess.” He instructs as he pushes your mouth closed. You comply, feeling more heat pooling between your legs. “Good girl,” he purrs as you open your mouth to show him.

He leans back into you, lips crashing into yours. He nips at your bottom lip, drawing a tiny bit of blood as he goes back to kissing you. He can taste the blood mixed with both of your saliva as he forces his tongue into your mouth, trying to push his way into every part of you he can. His hand previously at your chin is moving down toward your neck, resting into a firm grip across your neck. You can still breathe, but the firm pressure while he’s sloppily kissing you elicits a few soft moans from you into his mouth. You can’t tell, but he’s grinning as his grip increases a bit. He pulls away before taunting you, “Do you like that? Huh? Are you a masochist or something?” He’s not relenting, grip strengthening as you’re looking up at him, tears beginning to form in your eyes.

You’re unable to speak, so you try to nod your head to show him that he’s right. He notices and loosens his grip before moving his hand towards your chest. “Good girl,” he praises you. “I like that.” He leaves kisses in a trail from your lips to your neck, kissing over the faint marks his hands left before. You’re still against the wall, hands above your head, and he released his other grip before picking you up and carrying you to your bed.

“Next time, I want to see you wear that slutty fucking lingerie you brought. You’re such a dirty girl.” He peers down at you as you’re left exposed on your bed. He’s crawling above you, pushing you into the mattress. He gives you a few impatient kisses before moving back to your chest, grabbing one of your breasts while his mouth moves to the other. His other hand is fervently roamed your body, moving down your tummy towards your hips and eventually resting on your thigh. His hands were soft but rough trailing along your skin, as if he was searching for something.

Naoya’s hand slips to your inner thigh, just shy of your exposed cunt. He lightly grips it as he starts leaving a trail of kisses down your body as he took his hand from your breast and pushed your thighs apart. He left love bites and marks as he made his way to your cunt, stopping to look up at you. He grinned as he spit on one of his fingers, prodding its way through your folds to find your clit. He’s been with many women, and although he has an arrogant attitude, he does know exactly how to please a woman.

He rubs circles around your clit as his mouth leaves a little bite mark against your inner thigh. You softly moan at the pain as Naoya’s eyes flick up to meet yours. Although you can’t see it, you’re sure he has that asshole smirk of his. Your suspicions are pretty much confirmed when he says “Are you some masochist? Some dumb bitch who likes to be hurt. For real?” You think you heard a laugh as he moved his finger down to your hole, spitting some more before he fucked you with a finger. You didn’t need any more lube, you were practically drenched. He pushed his finger in, feeling how tight your hole was with only one of his fingers.

“You have the tightest cunt I’ve ever felt. I’m impressed. Are you a virgin too?” He looked up at you, expecting an answer.

“Yeah..” You tried to hide your face with your hands, embarrassed at your lack of experience. Naoya saw it differently though. His cock twitched in his pants as you replied, and he started moving his finger inside your tight cunt. He loved hearing the little moans you make as he slipped his finger in and out, a lewd wet sound filling the room. He was trying to get you used to it, but he was getting impatient. He was already working harder for any woman he’s ever been with.

His mouth moved above your clit, tongue flicking around the sensitive bud as he slipped in another long finger into your hole. He curled and scissored his fingers, trying to stretch you as his fingers fucked you faster. Your face was flush with embarrassment as you still tried to contain some of your moans. One more finger slipped in, stretching your walls while he moved above you, face aligned with yours.

He kept fingering your cunt as he aggressively kissed you, biting your lip before he shoved his tongue into your mouth. You could feel yourself come closer to the edge, your core tightening. You were moaning into his mouth, arms wrapped around his neck pulling his body closer into yours.

“Fuck... Naoya…” you whined out as you felt the thread about to snap, “I’m gonna—cum!!” His fingers slammed into your cunt as he was leaving marks along your neck. You felt your walls tighten around his fingers as he expertly prepped your cunt for the main event.

“You’re such a good girl… I almost feel bad taking your virginity. Almost.” Naoya takes out his fingers, sucking on a few of them to taste you. He pushes one of his fingers into your mouth, commanding you to taste your own cunt.  “Next time I’ll taste you myself… but I can’t wait any longer,” he says as he’s taking off his shirt and pants, pulling down his briefs to expose his large cock. He moves up above you again, grabbing your legs by the ankle as his body is pushed against yours. He’s putting you in a mating press. He moves the tip to your entrance and spits on his cock before slowly pushing inside, feeling your tight walls around his girthy cock.

He gives you time to adjust, but it isn’t nearly enough. Naoya has been kind enough, but he always takes what he wants. Still, he will be nice one last time. “I’m gonna fuck you how I want to now, okay whore? You’re gonna be a good girl and take it anyways, right?” He gives you no time to prepare as he slams into you, bottoming out, forcibly deflowering you. The pain hurts, but Naoya is relentless. He pulls out and briefly gives you a moment of respite before slamming his cock back into your cunt. Despite the pain, the feeling is like never before as his body is pushed against yours, cock ramming in and out of your hole. Your cute moans are like music to his ears.

He leans down towards your face, seeming like he’s going to kiss you but instead spits on you. He moves a hand to grasp around your throat as you’re looking up at, unable to make any sound as his cock abuses your hole. The pressure and lack of air make your head feel dizzy as he spits again, degrading you. “You like that too, huh, stupid slut.” He hips pick up speed, pulling out before repeatedly bottoming out into your cunt. He lets go of your neck, allowing you to gasp for air. He would never admit it, but the sound of you struggling to breathe drives him insane.

He spits on his hand and moves it to your clit, fervently rubbing your bud, bringing you closer to your second orgasm of the night. You feel the waves of pleasure overwhelm your body as he’s raw dogging your cunt and relentlessly abusing your clit. Your moans are laced with pleasure, dripping with your ecstasy as you cum over Naoya’s cock, tightening your walls around him.

Naoya mercilessly fucks your virgin hole like he deserves it, like it’s owed to him. Whatever he wants, he gets. He’s grunting as moaning as he picks up speed, fucking you like an animal. “Hey bitch, ah fuck—I’m gonna cum in you. You’re gonna take it like a good girl alright?” He lightly slaps your face as he’s finishing his sentence, bottoming out for the last time before he slams back inside your cunt and paints your insides white. You can feel the warmth of his seed filling you; there’s so much of it that it leaks out, a lewd sight before Naoya as he looks down at where you’re both connected. Before he can pull out and clean himself, the door to the guest room slightly creaked open as if it had been left ajar, not fully closed. Naoya cursed himself for not closing and locking the door.

--

Megumi had been standing there for not even 5 minutes when he went to check on you and bring you to dinner. He was approaching your room when he heard faint moaning coming from your room.  He was confused and curious, stopping in front of your door as he noticed it was left slightly open. What he saw left him shocked and speechless, unable to move or avert his gaze through the crack.

He heard you more than he could see you clearly, but your moans that are more beautiful than a symphony of angels was more than enough to make Megumi’s cock strain in his pants. He peered closer, unable to see who was fucking you but still able to see your bodies colliding. He couldn’t deny how erotic it was to see you get fucked, but a twang of jealousy and pain struck his heart that he wasn’t the one making your body shake in pleasure.

He hears a voice, it sounds familiar although he can’t quite place it, telling you he’s about to cum. Megumi leans forward more, slightly pushing the door as he watches the other man breed you. Just as the door squeaks, the man’s head whips to see the door and he makes eye contact with Megumi.

--

“____, what are you doing?” Megumi questions as he practically stumbles into the room. You lift your head to see Megumi looking at you and Naoya in horror. Shame and embarrassment overcome you, and you move to cover yourself with some blankets as Naoya got off of you and faced Megumi,

“I think it’s more appropriate to ask what are you doing, Megumi?” Naoya’s staring daggers into Megumi; he’s unaffected that his family member caught him in a compromising position, almost as if he’s used to it.

“I was coming to get ___ for dinner… I didn’t realize she was busy being a disgusting fucking whore and sleeping with my family though.” He looks over to you, making eye contact as he sees tears form in the corners of your eyes. He doesn’t actually think you’re disgusting, quite the opposite in fact. But he’s so upset that someone else got to be with you first, and Naoya of all people. As if that scum deserved to be with someone like you.

Naoya could instantly tell what was going on here. He can read Megumi like a book, and smirks as he grabs fistfuls of your hair and pulls you against his chest to taunt Megumi. “Looks like you lost. This is why I’ve always been superior to you. You wanted this little slut, huh? Mad that I broke her in first, aren’t you?” His voice is laced with amusement as he provokes Megumi. He pulls your head to be almost level with his as he spits onto your face. “Your little friend is quite the slut, I had a lot of fun using her like the whore she is. She probably wouldn’t even mind if you joined in, isn’t that right bitch?”

Despite the predicament you were in, you couldn’t help but feel aroused at Naoya’s manhandling and suggestion of Megumi joining in. It had never crossed your mind, although Megumi is quite attractive, you didn’t think he was interested. You were only able to mutter out a small “yes” as you look over to Megumi, noticing the flush in his cheeks reaching all the way to the ends of his ears, and the straining bulge in his pants.

“I’m sorry, ___... Be good for me, please?” He was almost pleading as he was walking over to the bed, already starting to strip.

“You can hurt her and call her names, that dumb whore likes it.” Naoya says, moving aside to let Megumi have easier access to you. You’re still lying on your back, barely recovered from getting your guts rearranged only minutes before. Megumi stands in front of you before kneeling down to get at eye level with your cunt. Naoya hadn’t been able to get up since Megumi stumbled into the room; because of this, your womb was filled to the brim with Naoya’s hot cum leaking out of your small hole. Megumi’s eyes were immediately locked on at the lewd sight before him when he used both hands to grip your thighs and spread them apart.

He moved a slender finger past your leaking hole, scooping a bit of cum up with his fingers as he dragged his finger across your clit. The sharp inhale and moan you made sounded absolutely divine to Megumi, urging him to keep going. “Good girl…” he purrs, as he moves his long fingers down to your hole again, once again scooping another glob of cum. “Sit up, slut,” He commands as he stands up. You comply, not willing to play any games in a situation like this. He shoves his cum covered fingers into your mouth; you lap it up and suck his fingers without having to be told anything. Megumi grins. “Good girl, ____. Such a good girl.”

“I bet you like that, don’t you slut?” You hear Naoya’s remark from aside you, he’s watching all of this unfold right before him. Megumi takes his fingers out of your mouth, Naoya grips you with fistfuls of hair and forces you to look at him. “Answer me, bitch.” He glares at you intensely.

“Yes… yes sir… I do.” You try to look anywhere except him but Naoya isn’t having it.

“When men are speaking, you show them the respect they deserve. That means you answer clearly and fucking pay attention. Got it?” He tugs your head to face him, leaning in closer until he’s only a few inches from your face. “Open your mouth, bitch. And don’t swallow until I tell you to.” You comply and he spits into your mouth, before closing the gap and letting his lips crash into yours. He bites your lip, drawing blood. The metallic essence mixes with his spit before Naoya leans back and instructs you to swallow. It feels perverse and humiliating to admit that it turned you on.

Megumi dropped onto his knees again, this time pushing his slender fingers into your cunt. It feels different this time for you; he’s gentler as he stretches you open. He takes his time adding more fingers, taking in every moment and feeling.

“Let’s change the position, yeah Megumi?” Naoya says it more as a statement and less of a question as he’s already moving to rest on the bed against the wall, pillows propping him up. He pulls you away from Megumi while simultaneously flipping you onto your tummy. He pulls you into his lap, supporting your arms until you’re able to prop yourself up above his cock. One hand grips the back of your head and pulls you closer to his thick cock. He pulls you by your hair, aligning your mouth with the tip of his cock as he forcefully shoves your head down. You nearly gag, pushing against him as he tries to use your mouth. Despite your resistance, Naoya doesn’t seem to care and is chasing his own high using you to get him off. You take him into your mouth, inexperienced but trying to adjust quickly. Naoya gives you barely any time to try and settle within the rhythm he’s created. You basically gag on his cock every time he plunges it slightly deeper than the last, but this only enhances Naoya’s pleasure.

While Naoya’s aggressive use of your mouth is going on, Megumi is taking his time to explore you from behind. His fingers are touching every part of your body he can get to, settling on your ass that he starts to spread apart. He’s entranced by the glistening of your cunt in the light, lost in thought about how lewd you look taking Naoya’s cock while bent over for him like a full course meal. He’s done with his “inspection” and moves one of his slender fingers to your entrance. He slips it in easily, listening to you moan with a cock stuffed in your mouth. Naoya pushes your head down farther along his length, trying to hit the back of your throat. You try to control your breathing in time with his rhythm.

Megumi slips another finger inside, stretching your cunt. “Fuck, ____, I didn’t think you were this tight.” He groans as he starts fucking you with his fingers. The lewd sounds he forces out you vibrate around Naoya’s cock. His other hand is grabbing fistfuls of your hair, face fucking you harder as your dripping cunt takes another of Megumi’s fingers. Megumi picks up pace, bringing another hand to your clit to add extra stimulation, but mostly so he can see you writhe and squirm under him while trying to hold yourself up.

“Will you be a good girl for me and cum, ___?” Megumi coos, stringing you along with his praises. “You look like such a dirty girl right now, already about to cum with just my fingers. So cute.” He finger fucks you harder now, making lewd wet noises as his fingers slam back into your pussy. His other hand is toying with your clit, drawing circles and rubbing the little button to bring you closer to your ecstasy. You can feel the knot tightening in your stomach, feeling yourself be pushed over the edge with his fingers alone.

Naoya thrusts into your throat, choking you and momentarily leaving you without air as Megumi pushes you over the edge. You feel your cunt tighten around his fingers as the waves of pleasure wash over you, the lack of air adding to your heightened senses. You moan as you’re cumming, giving just enough sensation to Naoya for him to creampie your throat. His cum is being forced down your throat, yet there’s still so much that some leaks from the corners of your mouth as his cock is pushed against the back of your throat. He finally shows mercy and pulls out as you’re coming down from your high. You force yourself to as much as you can before gasping for air, panting as you trying to calm down again.

“You did a good job taking all of me, slut.” Naoya grins as he lifts your chin with one of his fingers, leaning down to give you a kiss as you share his cum in your mouth. You didn’t think he’d be into some perverted shit like that, yet he’s basically tongue fucking your mouth still full of his cum. He pulls away, a long string of saliva and cum still connecting you two.

Megumi watches you two, his cock throbbing so intensely it almost hurts. He wastes no time in pulling his pants and boxers down before spitting in his hand and lubing his cock up. He’s shuffling behind you, lining himself up with your cunt before he pushes in at full force, giving you no time to adjust to his monstrous cock. You let out a yelp, air evacuating your lungs at the surprise intrusion. He’s balls deep near instantly in your tight hole, stretching you open with a cock that is even girthier than Naoya’s.

Naoya is watching you, grinning, and lazily stroking his cock. You have no idea how he’s able to keep going for multiple rounds, only a little bit of time in between. But you don’t care. The man in front of you is irresistibly hot even though his attitude is garbage. You would do anything he asked no matter how degrading it is in hopes that he would manhandle you again. As these thoughts cross your mind, Megumi reels you back into reality as he pushes so deep into your womb you’re sure he probably bruised your cervix.

“Your pussy is amazing, sweetheart. You have no idea… hah.. how long I’ve been wanting this.” Megumi praises you, unable to control his breathy moans as he continues fucking you with full force. One of your arms is pulled to your side, Megumi interlocking fingers and holding your hand as he drills into you. Even in a situation like this, he can’t help but do some cute shit.

His other hand lightly smacks your ass as you whimper in pleasure, unable to hide the fact that you like it a little rough. Megumi lets go of your hand as you feel both his arms snake around your waist, pulling you up and against his chest as he fucks you. Your back is to his chest, on full display for Naoya in front of you. His shiteating grin is plastered on his face as he has a front row view of Megumi’s cock sliding in and out of you. He gets up from his seated position to face you. Megumi’s arms are still wrapped around your body, supporting you as he drills into your cunt. You can feel his breath against your neck and hear his soft whimpers in your ear. “You’re doing so well, slut. Such a good girl for me huh?” He whispers into your ear. His words send chills down your spine as he keeps ramming his cock into you, abusing your poor hole.

Naoya moves closer to you, his face only a few inches away from yours. He kisses you slowly, before aggressively trying to fill your mouth with his tongue. He pulls away, spits on your face, and lightly slaps your face. “You love taking your friend’s cock, huh? Didn’t think it would be that good, did you? Who knew you’d be the family’s fuckdoll.” He chuckles at his degrading joke, but you couldn’t help but internalize his words. You have no idea how you got to be in this situation, but you were definitely not complaining. Something about multiple men of the same family using you how they liked made your cunt drip at the mere thought of it.

Naoya moves his mouth to your neck, leaving little marks on your skin to prove he was there. Little bruises of his lust for you, marking your skin like you’re property. Megumi start pulling out with only the tip left inside, before bottoming out into your cunt. He groans beside you, lost in the addictive pleasure that is you. Megumi was no virgin, but he believed you were the best person he’s ever fucked, your body insanely attractive and your personality catching and reeling him, unable to resist you.

Naoya moves back before bringing a hand to your neck, gripping your throat and momentarily cutting off your oxygen. “Megumi… fuck this bitch harder when I choke her, okay? She fucking loves it.” And he wasn’t wrong, you did love it. He gripped your throat, a smirk planted on his features as he watched you helpless and at his mercy. Some drool started dripping out of your mouth and you could feel your vision starting to haze around the edges. Megumi fucked into you harder, pulling you closer to his body. Naoya let his grip loosen a bit around your throat, enough to allow some air to fill your lungs again.

“I’m close, baby. I’m gonna fill you up okay? Be a good girl and take all of it for me.” Megumi purrs beside you. Naoya takes this moment to strengthen the grip around your throat, cutting off your air. You feel Megumi’s speed pick up, him desperately chasing his orgasm. You can hear his staggered whimpers as he empties his load into your cunt, filling your already full womb even more. Naoya releases his hand from your throat, making you choke and gasp for air. He’s looking down at you with sadistic satisfaction as you struggle to catch your breath.

Megumi pulls out and lets go of your waist, and you plop down onto the bed absolutely fucked out. Naoya is quick to get off the bed and start dressing. He finishes so quickly it’s as if he was speedrunning it (he has done this many, many, MANY times before). He gives you a quick peck on the lips and gently rubs your cheek before starting to walk towards the door. “See you soon, slut,” he says as he walks out, closing the door behind him this time. Megumi returns with a clean towel, gently cleaning you up as you just lay their like a limp fish.

“You did so well for me. Thank you,” he says as he kisses your cheeks and then your lips before pulling away and picking up some clothes for you. He tosses you a simple outfit to wear and begins dressing himself as well. “Ready for dinner? You’re gonna meet the rest of my family now.” You nod your head yes, anticipating who else you’re going to meet.

--

‹𝟹 notes: this was originally suppsed to be a oneshot, but i felt like it was getting too long. i have plans for all of them and wasn't going to be able to execute it in just a oneshot. let me know what y'all think!

feedback is always appreciated!! thank you all!!!

ch 2 (soon)

‹𝟹 notifs: @vvxxccaa @arylaa @starshipxoxo

ʚ join my notifs ɞ

(･ω･)つ divider creds to @/cafekitsune and @/eloquentreverie

[intimacyequalsdeath]

heyya!!!... Beautiful💐.

I see requests are currently open, so if you don't mind... can I request a sexy wife s/o who loves to cook and will always make slasher food? And prepare all their needs (you know like a good wife in general🙃),My twin sisters really like their slasher Especially for Bo, Lester, Vincent, Thomas hewitt,Charles Lee Ray and Michael Myers...

Oh, I also think it would be great if they had obedient children with the wife s/o. They know how their father is and they choose not to worry too much about it. Please....I'm sorry if I requested when your requests were closed, but, I've been looking for a blog for a long time whose requests are still open and finally I found your blog 😭.

My twin sister is sick and I want her to be able to read the story you made from my request 🙏.

Love you dear

Thank you so much for the request sweet anon! <3 I hope me deciding to do Headcannons for each story was ok to anon. Sorry this took so long, I worked on it in chunks over the course of a few different days.

Also I hope you sister feels better soon Anon <3 <3

Slashers with a good little wife and good little children: The Sinclairs. Michael Myers, Thomas Hewitt and Charles Lee Ray.

Also not my gifs, not of the gifs I use are ever mine and full credit goes to the original creators <3

Notes: Minors DNI, Written with AFAB in mind as per request, suggestive themes. Story under the cut. Request centers around "traditional" wife roles. Talks of pregnancy and children.

<3 : Bo loves the idea of having a good little wife and good little children to boot. He just never thought living in Ambrose and as a man with his hobbies he would get to experience that, until he met you.

<3: You instantly took over cleaning and cooking, even some of the spots in Ambrose no one even went into anymore. You had no idea how the boys had managed to survive so long with living like they were raised in a barn.

<3: Bo also liked how you liked to steer clear of anything having to do with his business and what went on at the gas station.

"it ain't your place" He murmured once into your hair when you asked him about it when the relationship was still relatively new. That was the first and only time he ever had to tell you that.

<3: Bo was thrilled by your want to stay out of his and mind your own that it was surprising when you ultimately fell pregnant after only about a year being in Ambrose. As if he'd let you leave.

<3: Bo let you take care of all the child rearing duties, with him being gone usually all day it was just easier plus the last thing he wants to come home too is crying children after a long day.

<3 As the children grew you had to teach them about what their father and uncles and explain why it would be inappropriate to ask anyone about it. All they needed to know was that they were safe and their daddy loves them.

<3 The sight of you being rounded with HIS baby also does things to Bo, So don't be surprised if he makes it a goal to keep you pregnant as often as possible.

<3 Bo would be a in and out father I think though, not that he means to be he does love the children. His relationship with his own father affects how active he is a lot of the time and since that's the only father figure he has to go off of he doesn't wanna turn out like him.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"Papa!' The children yelled as they ran through the door of the gas station to their father. You had a free instance of free time so you thought you'd bring them down to bring Bo some lunch.

"There's my babies" Bo said opening his arms to catch all 3 of them up in them. He turned to you poised and ready for the kiss you planted on his lips as you set the basket of food down on the counter.

"We made you lunch papa!" Your youngest girl said as he placed her back on the floor. Bo smiled at her.

"You did now didya?" All three children nodded as you opened the basket and began to explain to Bo what you made him. It wasn't long before your family bubble was interrupted by a car pulling up outside.

Bo's gaze hardened as he turned to look outside the station windows he then turned to you and the kids before barking an order.

"You four need to go on and get back to the house now" He said, The children having been through this before nodded before falling in line behind you to head back home.

"I'll come get ya'll when I'm done" Bo said planting a last kiss to your lips before you waddled out of the gas station, giant pregnant belly and all three little ducklings in tow.

<3 Soft mushy Vincent is soft and mushy.

<3 You are his doting little wife and he is your doting husband. His heart swells every time he sees you coming down into the basement with a plate of food and a drink.

<3 At first he was a bit nervous about you growing board of Ambrose since he wouldn't let you be involved but when he saw you begin to clean literally anything and everything he figured you were alright.

<3 Vincent loves your cooking and it actually helps rouse him out of the basement to come and sit at the table with you and his brothers.

<3 When you fell pregnant the first time, He was stunned. Like truly stunned. He never thought fatherhood more or less being a husband was in the cards for him ever.

<3 To know have both he couldn't believe it. A cute little house wife and a baby he hoped would look just like you.

<3 If the baby isn't twins expect to start trying for a sibling right away. Vincent like his brothers adores the sight of you pregnant with his baby. It awakens a primal instinct inside of him to be the provider and keep you safe at all costs.

<3 Vincent would be afraid that the baby would be afraid of his face or his mask, no matter how many times you assured him other wise he couldn't help but worry.

<3 If the children grow up to question their fathers face or what he does in Ambrose, you and Vincent will tell them the loose truth obviously omitting a lot of detail. At least until their old enough.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"Vincent, your her daddy. She'd never be afraid of you" You told him softly, reaching out in an attempt to hand him your daughter.

Ever since she was born Vincent refused to hold her as he didn't wanna scare her off with his mask or his face.

He looked into your eyes as he went to shake his head, before he could though you had shoved your baby into his arms and positioned his hands in the proper places to hold her.

Vincent jumped at your sudden action but was never the less quick to cradle his daughter. He looked down at her once she was settled and when his eyes met hers that matched your perfectly he felt his breath leave his body.

Vincent had never experienced a feeling like this in his entire life and doubted he would ever feel it again. He was head over heels in love with this little human the two of you had made together and from that day he vowed that anyone who tried to come in-between him and his family would have him to answer too.

<3 Lester is used to cooking and cleaning his own space so it takes him awhile to get used to you doing it for him.

<3 He appreciates it greatly but he doesn't fully understand why you would want to clean up behind him like you do though. Like he picks up roadkill all day who would want to smell that?

<3 He doesn't complain about you cooking though, He thinks your food is amazing and it's great to come home to a warm cooked meal every night.

<3 You do so much for him so don't be surprised if Lester comes home every so often with little gifts he's collected for you. Some of them may or may not come from victims but as Lester's good little wifey you never question it, you just press your lips to his and thank him for the thoughtful gift.

<3 When you fall pregnant, again like his brothers, Lester is thrilled. He can't be in the same room as you without running his hands up and down your swollen belly while trying to feel the baby kick.

<3 Lester wants a football team of children, so be prepared to make many renovations to the cabin the two of you share to accommodate all the children.

<3 Lester loves bringing his sons out on the road with him when their old enough and with your permission of course. He'd never let them participate in anything Bo or Vincent do but helping him with roadkill is just fine by him.

<3 If any of the kids ever questions what their uncles do in Ambrose and why Lester doesn't usually want them around it, He'll tell them that it's because of Vincent's delicate projects and that answer is enough for the kids.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"Nah sweetpea, you know why you can't go to Ambrose" Lester softly told your son after the fifth time he had asked to go see his uncles. Your son sighed and pouted slightly before speaking.

"I know uncle Vincent's art is easy to break but I promise I won't ruin anything"

"My love, I've told you it's rude to question your father" You piped up from your chair in the living room, running a hand over your slightly swollen belly. "Why don't you go join your brothers outside for a bit before dinner, and stay where we can see you" He gave you a sad look but nodded and went through the front door outside.

"I know the boys love Vinny and Bo, but I just want em to be safe" Lester told you sitting on the arm of your chair and putting a hand over yours sitting on your belly.

"I know Les, but when their older they'll understand why we have rules" You shot him a smile and he gratefully returned it. He was so lucky to get someone so understanding of the "Family Business"

<3 Thomas was raised to be a family man. Luda Mae had always told him growing up that one day he would need to find a wife to continue the Hewitt family with.

<3 Enter you, ending up at the Hewitt farm like so many others, but not meeting the same fate as them.

<3 Thomas would've easily put babies before marriage but Luda Mae insisted that you two do it the traditional way and get married first.

<3 You were quick to win her over with your affinity to help out with cooking and other house chores. Especially when it came to taking care of her darling boy Thomas. She was thrilled he had found someone who loved him so much.

<3 In the Hewitt house hold with Monty and Charlie both breathing down your neck, it's easy to be reminded to leave the mans work to Thomas and just focus on helping Luda with whatever she needs.

<3 When you fall pregnant with the first baby, the whole house hold is thrilled.

<3 Luda, Charlie and Monty all never thought they would see the day that Thomas would continue the Hewitt family tree so it was a very big deal when you fell pregnant with Luda's first grandchild.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"Now darlin' you know your not supposed to be doing anything in your state" Luda reprimanded as she walked into the kitchen to see you doing dishes.

"I know mama but laying in bed all day everyday is driving me nuts" You told her drying off a plate you were washing. Luda joined you at the sink grabbing a cup to wash it before handing it to you to dry.

"When I was pregnant with Charlie I almost got driven up a wall myself. Just don't let Tommy see, You'll never hear the end of it" She said giving you a small smile before heading back to the living room.

You stood at the sink and continued to wash until you heard familiar footsteps heading up the basement stairs, you tried to pretend like you weren't washing dishes but it was too late, Tommy was on you in an instant.

"Tommy hun it's ok!" You pleaded as he took the dishes out of your hands and herded you towards a chair. You couldn't help yourself but the laugh of how your giant husband could be turned so soft and attentive with you.

You grabbed Tommy's hands before he made you sit down and placed them onto your rounded belly. His eyes met yours instantly and your foreheads pressed together.

"Tommy we're fine, I promise honey." Tommy looked at you incredulously before rolling his eyes and huffing at you, you laughed. If there was one thing in this world Tommy couldn't say no too it was you.

<3 Now Charles I could see being a bit different. Sure he adores having someone cleaning and cooking since he's out doing what a serial killer does most of the time but when it comes to kids he's a bit hesitant.

<3 He loves that you love to cook for him. It's nice having warm meals to come home too for once, Brownie points if their his favorite foods.

<3 Doesn't so much like when you get on him about tracking blood through the house or getting one too many stains on his clothes.

<3 If you really want a baby start telling him how lonely you are when he leaves for long periods of time to go kill people. He'll give you want you want as long as the baby stays out of his way.

<3 He'll be a good dad though don't get me wrong and he'll love the kid or kids just as much as you but he's a busy guy that's got shit to do so he mainly sees them as your responsibility.

<3 Might get jealous of all your attention going to the baby though, he understands it has too but that doesn't mean he has to be happy about it all the time.

<3 Your never going to be the picture perfect family but for your Charles will try his best to give you and the kids everything you'd ever need.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"Charles! what have I told you about tracking blood in the house!" Your voice echoed through the house. You heard a muffled laugh as he rounded the hallway with your 3 month old in his arms.

"Babe I'm sorry, you know I never mean too sometimes it just happens" He said adjusting your bundle of joy in his arms.

"Whaddya think kid should mommy forgive me just this once?" He asked your child you babbled in response.

"You said just this once the last three times chuck" You deadpanned before breaking a smile when he did.

"Just a hazard of the job toots" He laughed, You joined him before your eyes were met with the deep red splotches on the blazer he was wearing.

His eyes followed yours before his froze and turned to walk away with the baby in tow as you yelled out behind him.

"Charles! The blood!"

<3 The only inkling of what a normal family functions like that Michael has ever gotten was from his childhood, and to be honest I think his memories of that are very few and far between.

<3 You want to do what for him? Cook and clean ? why on earth would you want to do that for? Michael is confused.

<3 Though preparing to go out and finding a nice fresh out of the dryer jumpsuit all nice and warm and clean for him is quite nice. Michael thinks this is something he could get used to.

<3 On those late nights where he comes back late and finds plates of dinner wrapped in tinfoil ready for him to either heat up or eat just like that is also something he could get used too. It tastes way better then what he usually eats (Totally not dog, totally not)

<3 When kids get brought up though, it's a different story. I could honestly see him not really being all for it at least not at first.

<3 He's really like Charles but more so into the you can have kids as long as they stay far out of his way.

<3 His feelings towards them also aren't the most parental either. He loves them ? At least, Michael feels an emotion he could probably equate to love about them.

<3 But yeah I think for Michael it's best you just keep the kids clear of him. It's not easy when your father is the shape of Haddonfield.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

"Welcome home Mike!, your dinner is wrapped up on the counter love" You greeted him as he came home after a night of terrorizing the town. Placing a kiss to the cheek of his mask.

Michael nodded wordlessly, as always, and turned to go into the kitchen. Tonight you had made his favorite, or at least what you only thought was one of his favorites by the way he every so slightly changed reactions every time you made it.

You gave him a second before following him into the kitchen and sitting next to him at the island. You watched as he lifted his mask up for each bite of food before lowering it to chew.

You made the mistake of questioning him once as to why he didn't just take the mask off. It was early on in the relationship and his hand instinctively went to his knife before you even finished asking. That was how you learned it's better to just not ask Michael questions at least not about the mask.

The two of you sat in silence, a routine you repeated pretty much every night unless you were already asleep when he got home. You would spend all day cleaning and making sure everything was ship shape for him then you would greet your monster of a man when he came through your front door.

You were brought out of your thoughts when Michael's plate crashed into the sink and broke into pieces. Michael still didn't understand how to not hold the plate too high and just to sit it in the sink.

Looks like something you'll still have to work on. No one said the shape of Haddonfield was smart when it came to chores anyway.

[artbyblastweave]

I think about Star Wars a lot more than I post about Star Wars, and I've had some free time recently to type up some thoughts on Episode 7 that've been swirling around in my head for a couple of years. There were a few ideas and plot beats, and moments of apparent self-examination in Episode 7 which I thought were fairly compelling, even though they ultimately paid no dividends:

First was Finn’s character concept. “Star Wars as experienced from the perspective of a Stormtrooper undergoing a crisis of faith” is a rich hook; humanizing and giving a face to what's basically the platonic implementation of the faceless mook. Unfortunately, the potency of the arc was undercut by the pre-existing textual ambiguity as to what stormtroopers actually are. Star Wars extended canon has settled on the idea that each trilogy features an entirely novel cohort of white-clad mooks, each with a fundamentally different underlying dynamic. The clones and the First-Order forces are different flavors of slave army; in contrast, the stormtroopers are more frequently portrayed in the expanded universe as military careerists, stormtrooper being a thing you work up to rather than a gig for a fresh conscript. A slave-soldier who defects is a very different character from a military careerist who defects, and they invite different analysis. There's a bait-and-switch going on here, in that Finn gestures in the direction of the familiar OT stormtroopers but can't comment on or examine them because he's actually part of a novel dynamic invented for the new movies. And there's one final nail in the coffin here, signaled by the number of times I've had to invoke the expanded universe so far. When Finn debuted, the racists were of course, legion, but I also ran into a number of people who were sincerely confused as to why they'd recast Temuera Morrison. Going off the seven films that existed at the time, it wasn't unreasonable to read the prequel trilogy as an origin story for where the OT stormtroopers came from. Going only off the nine films that exist now, it still isn't unreasonable! It's muddied from so many different directions by their failure to establish the ground rules in the mainline films before they tried to put on subversive airs about it. I am still irritated by this.

Next up is how Han Solo was written. I actually liked the tack they took with him quite a bit. Because initially, right, his role in the movie is just to be Han Solo. He's back, and he hasn't changed! He's still kicking ass and taking names, he's still the lovable scoundrel you knew and loved from your childhood- and the principle cast members react to his presence with the same reverence the film's trying to invoke in the audience, they've grown up hearing the same stories about him. Except that episode 7, at least, is also very aware of the fact that if Han Solo is still recognizably the same guy thirty years on, it indicates that things have gone totally off the rails for him. We find out that the lovable rogue routine is the result of him backsliding, his happy ending blown up by massive personal tragedy rooted in communicative failures and (implicitly) his parental shortcomings. It feels deliberately in conversation with the nostalgic impulse driving the entire film- here's your childhood hero back just as you remember, here's what that stagnation costs. And it also feels like it's in conversation with what was a fairly common strain of Han Solo Take- the idea that Ep. 6 cuts off at a very convenient point, and that Han and Leia's fly-by-night wartime relationship wouldn't survive the rigors of domesticity. Obviously, that's not the only direction you can take with the character; the old EU basically threaded the needle of keeping Han recognizable without rolling back his character development gains. But it felt like they were actually committing to a direction, a direction that was aware of the space, and not a reflexively deferential and flattering one, which at the time I appreciated! The problem, of course, is that for it to really land, you need to have a really, really strong idea of what actually went down-of what Han's specific shortcomings and failures were. And given the game of ping-pong they proceeded to play with Kylo Ren's characterization, this turned out to be. Less than doable.

Kylo Ren is the third thing about Episode 7 that I liked. His character concept is basically an extended admission by the filmmakers that there's no way to top Vader as an antagonist. Instead, they lean into the opposite direction- they make him underwhelming on purpose. Someone who's chasing Vader's legacy in the same way any post-OT Star Wars villain is going to, pursuing Vader's aesthetic and the associated power without really understanding or undergoing the convoluted web of suffering and dysfunction that produced Vader. It's framed as a genuine twist that there's nothing particularly wrong with his face under that helmet. Whatever it takes to be Vader, he doesn't have it, and he knows that he doesn't have it, and the pursuit of it drives him to greater and greater acts of cartoonish villainy. The failure to one-up Vader is offloaded to the character instead of the writers, and it was genuinely interesting to watch. For one movie. The problem, of course, is that if the entire character archetype is "Vader, but less compelling," you can't try to give the bastard Vader's exact character arc. You can't retroactively bolt on a Vader-tier tragic backstory when you spent a whole movie signaling that whatever happened to him wasn't as compelling as what happened to Vader. You can't milk his angst for two more movies when it's the kind of angst on display in "Rocking the Suburbs" by Ben Folds!

There's a level on which I feel like Moff Gideon was a semi-successful implementation of Vader-Wannabe concept; he's the same kind of middling operator courting the Vader Aesthetic for clout, but he's doing it in the context of the imperial warlord era, where there's a lot of practical power available to anyone who can paint themselves to the Imperial Remnants as a plausible successor to Vader. Hand in Hand with this obvious politicking, Gideon is loathsome, which relieves the writers of the burden of having to plausibly redeem the guy; he's doing exactly what he needs to do and there'll never be a mandate to expand him beyond what his characterization can support. Unfortunately, the calculated and cynical nature of how he's emulating Vader precludes the immaturity and hero-worship elements on display with Kylo, which is unfortunate; the sincerity on display in Kylo's pursuit of authenticity is an important part of why he worked, to the extent that he worked at all, and it'd be worth unpacking in a better trilogy. As he stands Kylo is a clever idea, and that's all he is- he lacks the scaffolding to go from merely clever to actively good.

[diedicontroversial]

[discourse] in defiance of the author’s wishes (re: mxtx fandom)

table of contents : context  : moral arguments : addressing the legal side of things  : closing remarks

Context

on March 17, 2018, mxtx posted:

“As long as you don't split or reverse the top/bottom positions of the main couple, I won't mind what you ship. I myself have a lot of fun shipping couples in mainstream shows, and isn't reading all about finding joy? You can imagine freely or ship whoever you like, just don't break up or reverse the top/bottom positions of the main couple.”

(I realise that the 不拆不逆 “no splitting or reversing” rule might be implicit within the entire Chinese danmei fandom, so i do not wish to single mxtx out. for example, i know that Chinese 2ha fans also go around policing people who ship, say, chu wanning with shi mei — so this isn’t just a mxtx thing. although i do not know if other danmei authors have explicitly stated “no splitting or reversing” since i have not been a part of other danmei fandoms.)

Nevertheless, “no splitting or reversing” became the constitution in Chinese mxtx fandom. Fans parade around with the slogan “拆逆死“ which means “kill yourself if you split or reverse”. Since the pronunciation of 拆逆死 (chai-ni-si) sounds like “chinese”, some fans on the Chinese internet have been putting “chinese” in their bios to mean “kill yourself if you split or reverse”.

From now on I will be referring to split/reverse ships as cult ships, as Chinese fans like to call them.

There are two main consequences of the “no splitting or reversing” rule (on the Chinese internet):

You will receive permanent bans with no option for appeal if you post cult ship fanworks in the novel communities on Weibo

It is implicitly agreed upon that you are not allowed to use individual character tags, the novel tag, or the author tag when posting cult ship content on any platform. So, for example, if you write Wei Wuxian x Jiang Cheng, you are not allowed to use #weiwuxian #jiangcheng #mdzs #mxtx. The name given to this conduct of tagging only your cult ship is 圈地自萌, which means “enclose a piece of land and amuse oneself within it”. You are not allowed to step out of your land. 

However, not everyone agrees with the practice of “don’t step out of your land” — this includes people from both sides of the debate. Some official shippers believe that cult shippers should not have any land to begin with, and purposefully leave the cult ship tag unblocked so they can police cult shippers at every opportunity. Some cult shippers believe that because their ship involves the individual characters, originate from the novel written by the author, they are in the right to use the individual character tags, the novel tag, and the author tag, and that people who dislike their ship should just use the block function. 

-

Moral Arguments

There are two main types of moral arguments that Chinese official shippers make.

1. If you split the official ship, you condone cheating behaviour and that makes you a bad person.

The first argument is too trivial so I will leave the refutation as an exercise for the reader to do at home /j

2. You are not respecting the author's wishes and that makes you a bad person.

The author has wished many different things. For example:

Screenshot 1 translation: I strictly forbid any crowdfunding or fundraising related to me, my works, or my characters, regardless of the purpose, whether it be for celebration, group buying, rankings, charity, or any other named activities.

Screenshot 2 translation: Once again, I emphasize: No new social media pages related to my works are allowed, nor organizing readers in a roundabout way, whether it be for celebrations, group buying, rankings, charity, or any other named activities. Please also refrain from flamboyantly organizing any collective birthday events.

Screenshot 3 translation: I've repeated many things many times and do not wish to repeat myself. Could everyone please just listen to my words occasionally.

(A brief aside before I address the second argument, something I used to say when debating Chinese fans: “I don’t think people who violate the author's wishes mean any disrespect. I don’t think they’re shipping or hosting charity events or birthday parties out of spite, but rather, it just so happens that the author prohibits a ship they enjoy or an event they organise. Just because I cult ship, for example, doesn’t mean I hate the author.” And they would respond: “if you really liked the author, you wouldn’t go against her wishes. You do not deserve to like the author. You are a mxtx anti.” And I would say, “I like my mom a lot, but I won’t listen to everything she says, simply because I don’t think everything she says is right. Plus, I don’t think the world can simply be explained by like vs. dislike. Also, Xie Lian said this: [For instance, if you admire or like someone, you won't always treat them well, no matter what happens.]” But then the most hilarious thing happened, in the revised version, a rebuttal for that scene was added:

【”For instance, if you admire or like someone, it doesn't mean you will always treat them well, regardless of what happens."

"Why not?" San Lang questioned. "If that's not possible, it only shows that this so-called 'liking' isn't anything significant."

Xie Lian shifted the conversation, asking, "Then... does it mean that aside from liking someone, the only other option is to dislike them? Are these the only two attitudes one can choose from?"

San Lang chuckled and retorted, "Why not? Right is right, wrong is wrong. To love is to love, to hate is to hate. Why can't things be clear and straightforward?”】

… ah.)

To address the second argument for real, i believe that producers retain no moral authority over the methods by which consumers engage with their products. for instance, i believe that choosing not to follow the official “twist, lick, and dunk” method when eating oreos does not constitute disrespect towards the oreo brand. Or to use another analogy, suppose a farmer selling apples insist that you peel the apples before eating them. I believe that it does not make you a bad person if you choose to eat the apples unpeeled, despite the farmer being the one who watered and harvested the apples from their trees.

I am thinking of potential counterarguments, and the strongest one I came up with is: “but products like oreos and apples are fundamentally different from intellectual property.” And I think the main issue here is that, to employ economics terminology, the content of novels like tgcf is a non-rivalrous good (not the novels themselves but the abstract content), which means that my consumption of it does not reduce availability to others. In other words, unlike Oreos or apples wherein after I purchase them, the specific items I bought are no longer physically in the hands of the vendor; after encountering characters like Shen Qingqiu, Shen Qingqiu still exists abstractly in MXTX’s head. This gives the illusion of ownership on the author’s part. I want to be very careful here because I think it’s easy to equivocate between different uses of the word “ownership”. I am not arguing that the author fails to retain ownership in negation of all the blood, sweat, and tears that went into the creative process, i.e. their copyright. Instead, I am contending that, just as I paid for my Oreos and apples, upon my purchasing of the Seven Seas version, the paperback Chinese version, and the revised uncensored version of TGCF on JJWXC, the author does not own the ways by which I choose to engage with these fictional entities. Once a work is made public, its ontology becomes independent of the author’s intent, and in all its readers’ heads exist distinct versions of the characters, in effect making them belong to all of us.

(There. As a bonus I have also resolved the issue of not being “chinese” enough. Ah, is this a bad place to make a communism joke?)

Addressing the legal side of things

In 2022 I wrote to the legal team at AO3, and here is their response:

Regarding the “moral rights”, that’s actually a thing. Upon receiving lots of spam from 12-yr-old readers that “you are breaking the law”, I did a quick Baidu search (China’s Google) concerning the legality of splitting/reversing ships. Surprisingly, the search results yield “yes, it’s illegal”, and hence the 12-yr-olds' confidence. But that is akin to getting a cancer diagnosis from searching symptoms on Google. So I dug deeper. 

After reading tens of published papers and court cases, here are the key takeaways of what I found:

Given that intellectual property rights are a bit behind in China, they have largely based their laws on US copyright law. As organizations like OTW continue to fight for the rights of transformative works in the US, China probably will just follow suit.

The semantics of “distort, mutilate, or otherwise harm the integrity of their works in a way that harms the author’s reputation” is very vague and debatable. There are at least three ways to interpret it (I think one of the papers I read offered four). The first is that they only have to prove that you distorted the integrity of the work. The second is that you satisfy the condition of harming the author’s reputation. The third is that you satisfy both conditions (integrity of work and author’s reputation). It depends on the court. 

None of the court cases pertained to unserious, just-for-fun fan works. Usually what happens is someone makes a film out canon, for example, and sell it for profit, or someone publishes their own novel which contains characters from another published work. 

And that is for China only^ if you live outside of China, you are under another country's jurisdiction.

-

Closing remarks

I am addressing this issue because it has impacted me and my friends in many ways. "kill yourself if you split/reverse the official ship" is probably the least of our concerns, mainly because it is such a popular phrase that we've become desensitized to it. @/Eleven receives private messages on Lofter on a weekly basis of people wishing her entire family to get murdered. A hualian main friend of mine has been posted to Weibo for following me; and I had to pull a Shi Qingxuan with "hey let's not be friends anymore if being associated with me is gonna get you cancelled".

mxtx has been through a lot and i understand where she's coming from. and maybe, the people who identify as "kill yourself if you split/reverse the official ship" don't truly mean it -- maybe they're just expressing their love for the official ship.

Recently i've been seeing the sentiments I used to only witness in Chinese fandom surface on Twitter and sometimes I worry that western mxtx fandom is going to turn into Chinese mxtx fandom, with the in-group/out-group mentality -- you're either with us or against us. At the end of the day, I do like mxtx, I admire her tenacity and I think she's a brilliant author, I love her works and the characters in them. I simply do not want to be backed into the corner of "anti" due to not following every order she gives.

祝墨香和她的粉丝们平安。