#bad buddy bait and switch

[telomeke-bbs]

BAD BUDDY'S BASEBALL MOM – ROOFTOP RUGBY WITH LUCY IN THE SKY… OR ON A BASEBALL DIAMOND?

One of the most mystifying aspects of Bad Buddy was the decision to have Pat wear the now-iconic Baseball Mom tee for the Epic Rooftop Kiss at the end of Episode 5.

It's so utterly incongruous with the drama onscreen. The scene was a pivotal moment for the narrative, with Pat's big coming out to Pran followed by the very steamy demonstration of mutual emotions, after episodes of unending turbulence around where they stood with each other. And The Kiss they delivered was so stupendous, it rocked the Internet to its very foundations.

And for that hugely important moment, Director Aof decided Pat should wear – a big woman's t-shirt more associated with loud, overzealous American moms cheering on their kids at Little League baseball? 👀

At first I thought production simply wanted something open and sporty for Pat, to contrast with Pran being all covered up (mirroring their states of mind – Pat actively seeking to confess his feelings on the rooftop, Pran all closed-off and repressed). That line of thinking was definitely behind a lot of Pat and Pran's outfits, and I assumed they just used a random tee and cut off its sleeves for this.

But in retrospect this seems altogether too blasé an approach, especially since we can see how purposeful the wardrobe decisions were throughout the rest of the series. (The Soon Vijarn Recap video for BBS Ep.5 also makes it very clear Director Aof was closely involved in wardrobe selection, choosing all the outfits for their appropriateness to the narrative – see this link here, at timestamp 23.24.)

(above) The Soon Vijarn Recap video for BBS Ep.5 timestamp 23.49

The examples of the wardrobe reflecting the characters' inner states are copious. Pran's emotional journey in the first half of BBS – learning to open up, getting his feelings returned, and falling into a relationship – was mirrored by his sartorial journey, and he went from all colorless and buttoned-up to a wardrobe filled with more relaxed, expressive and colorful outfits when out in public:

(above) Pran all buttoned-up in his early whites (Ep.2 [1I4] 1.56, Ep.3 [1I4] 12.40 and Ep.5 [1I4] 6.03)

(above) A selection of Pran's more relaxed and colorful sweaters that he wore outside later in the series (Ep.7 [3I4] 2.52, Ep.10 [3I4] 0.26, Ep.12 [3I4] 6.36 and Ep.12 [4/4] 10.14)

Loud extrovert Pat on the other hand was decked out almost from the beginning in bright prints and wacky t-shirts (with some rivaling Baseball Mom in wackiness), all the better to broadcast his outgoing character and personality:

(above) A selection of Pat's bright and wacky tops (Ep.2 [2/4] 5.03, Ep.6 [3I4] 4.37, Ep.8 [2/4] 8.30 and Ep.10 [1I4] 4.52)

The mystery deepened further when the fandom tracked down the maker of Baseball Mom – it looks like a small, possibly home-based business in the US, and the t-shirt is part of a line, one of several related tops (see this link here). It simply wasn't a random tee from some small Bangkok shop (unless the vendor had gotten it secondhand off some American tourist, and was re-selling it locally). This looks like a t-shirt that was specifically procured for the show (possibly even sourced from overseas), rendered sleeveless with low-cut armholes to echo the openness of Pat's personality, and then put on Ohm with absolute intent.

But why?

I'm convinced that there is an element of subversion about this (not the least because the t-shirt undercuts the heavy drama of the scene so drastically). @ranchthoughts has already pointed out in this write-up linked here that the feminine Mom is an allusion to the subversion of gender roles embodied by Pat's character, and I very much agree. It's also possible that this particular tee was chosen because the baseball standing in for (and thus somewhat obscuring) the letter 'O' in the word Mom kind of makes the word call out to M🤍M or MLM. (And here's an afterthought that occured to me watching Only Friends and the promo trailer for My Golden Blood – the baseball bat is also visual shorthand for the emotional violence that Pat and Pran wreak upon their relationship when each figuratively beats up on the other – and on himself too – while acting out their strange, rambunctious relationship as enemies who are secret friends and later lovers.)

But I also do think that there's still more to Baseball Mom than the above, and this particular train of thought was triggered by an Ask from @pandasmagorica about Ep.5's rooftop scene (linked here).

I now think we can piece together a reason for Baseball Mom on the rooftop, but it's only fair to signal that this wackiest of wardrobe choices is getting possibly the wackiest of explanations (and it's a doozy).

Now what @pandasmagorica's Ask triggered for me was the realization that Pat's directness on the rooftop was actually almost the complete opposite of something that he'd been doing very often, right up until Episode 5 – and that was his propensity to torment Pran with the bait-and-switch.

Time and again, Pat would reach out with the offer of something precious to Pran – a smile, a kind word, a tender moment, a suggestion of intimacy – but then quite suddenly he would subvert the situation and switch out the proffered affection with something wholly discomfiting, crushing hopeful Pran's expectations.

There are several examples:

During their childhood, Pat returned Pran's watch after Pran saved Pa from drowning (Ep.1 [4/4] 9.46), signaling the start of his friendship with the lonely little boy next door – only to impose the caveat "But…don’t talk to me in front of people. They might think we're buddies."

That (almost shirtless) bedside conversation at the end of Ep.4 (beginning at Ep.4 [4/4] 10.43), when Pat kept bombarding poor Pran with personal, leading questions, half-begged to be allowed to share his bed and cuddle, before shattering his neighbor's heart by declaring that it was Ink whom he liked romantically.

Tending to Pran’s injured shoulder at Ep.4 [3I4] 7.07, before suggesting he only wanted Pran to recover so that they could compete in rugby again;

Returning Pran’s long-lost guitar to him, then ruining the tenderness of the moment with “I just like to see your face… when you lose” (Ep.3 [4/4] 10.30).

And with Pran deep in his feelings for Pat, the constant intimations of closeness and deeper feelings, shell-gamed away at the last minute, must have been soul-crushing for our poor yearning boy. (This is also what the lyrics of Pran's theme – Just Friend? – are all about, e.g., "I can’t make sense of what you’ve done"/"Are we just friends or are we more?"/"If you don’t mean it, don’t act that way".)

No wonder Pran was trying so hard to keep a distance from the cheerful boy next door, who was always invading his personal space (after having taken over his heart). So much so that Pran on the rooftop was expecting more of the same, which explains his blunt statement "Pat, you've got to stop doing this to me. We are not a thing" in response to Pat telling him that it hurt to see the song they co-wrote in high school played with someone else.

Pran saw this as more of Pat's teasing games, but irony of ironies Pat was being totally serious this time. And yet, even on the rooftop in Ep.5, Pat did a version of the bait-and-switch one more time, but with the polarity reversed for once – he listed all the ways Pran's exile should have brought him joy, only to end with "It was so depressingly lonely for me." 😢

I think Pat learnt early on that this is what you do to your loved ones – because there's actually an example of Ming doing something similar to his son at Ep.8 [2/4] 16.12. Helping to wash Pat's car, he quietly allowed his son to natter on about his day with fibs about rugby practice, before landing a sledgehammer blow saying "When did I teach you to lie?" at Ep.8 [2/4] 16.41. This was an ambush, intended to take Pat by surprise and inflict the maximum amount of damage – and judging by Pat's despondent moping after, Ming certainly succeeded.

But it's not only Pat doing this to Pran, or Ming doing this to Pat, that we see in BBS. Director Aof and his writers actually littered the narrative with other examples of the set-up and switch-out as well, doing it to us the viewers:

Pat may have started out Ep.1 a ruffian, but then we saw that he was really a cheery big kid who needed his popsicles and cuddles from Nong Nao for comfort (Ep.1 [4/4] 8.37 and Ep.2 [1I4] 1.36).

Ink was introduced as a demure girl from the north (remembering that northern Thailand is seen as close to the birthplace of Thai culture) in Ep.4 [1I4] 7.41; then she tripped and let out a curse word at Ep.4 [1I4] 8.01.

Pa's glow-up at Ep.7 [1I4] and subsequent story arc subverted her initial (albeit not very successful) portrayal as the frumpy kid sister with no life and no agency as a character.

BBS placed the emotional burden of Episodes 1 to 4 solely on Pran's pining shoulders, and then suddenly whipped it away in Ep.5 and dumped it squarely on Pat (kudos to Ohm, who gamely played Pat as a shining object of affection for the first third of BBS, before showing us that Junior Jindapat was so much more than a lovable, empty vessel himbo, and was instead someone who actually did possess an inner life that he could access).

And perhaps the biggest BBS bait-and-switch of all – Pran's unrequited love for inaccessible Pat turns out to be requited after all, but then without warning it's Pran who spins out of reach on the rooftop.

Looking at BL as a genre, the bait-and-switch is sometimes employed as a storytelling device to provide an unexpected dramatic twist (though whether or not it satisfies is debatable). For example there is the trap set for Lhong in TharnType, the aloof ice prince Sarawat turning out to have been carrying a torch for Tine in 2gether, and Nubsib's reveal in Lovely Writer as someone who also shared a past with Gene.

And if you think about it, all of Bad Buddy itself was kind of one big bait-and-switch as well. They set it up so that – at the start – it looked like the series would be shaping up into a run-of-the-mill, formulaic romance. The roadmap was laid out quite clearly – enemies to lovers, Romeo and Juliet or Kwan and Riam but the BL version thank you very much, star-crossed and kept apart by their warring families.

So we were expecting BBS to follow the usual romcom beats and rhythms, delivering the standard tropes, with the main storyline about how the enemies would fall in love against the odds, then find a way to beat the odds and stay together, or fall victim to it and be forever driven apart.

Except that Director Aof and his team pulled the rug out from under us time and time again, after setting this all up. The idea that Pat and Pran were enemies got turned on its head (they'd been secret friends since childhood). The process of falling in love didn't follow conventional beats at all – Pran was already in love, while Pat was… possibly already beset by emotions, just getting them all mixed up and projecting them onto Ink.

Instead of showing us the main couple falling for each other over the course of 12 episodes, this was firmly established by the end of Episode 5. Instead of their families being the primary conflict driving them apart, it was Pran's overthinking and emotional walls that drove a wedge between them in Episode 6. When family conflict finally did rear its head to threaten their relationship, well Pat and Pran just sidestepped it and carried on.

And the tropes? One by one they fell by the wayside as well. Ink turned up in Ep.4, looking like a formidable love rival for Pran (and he believed it too). Except that she wasn't the stereotype of the evil girlfriend at all – she turned out to be Pat's supportive bestie, while her eye (and camera) were focused on Pa instead. Any stereotypes overhanging macho Pat and pernickety Pran got subverted too, with Pat ditching sports practice for musical theater and Pran a credible street fighter and also a star player on his rugby team – so much for the seme and uke in this BL. The "gay for you" trope got put down (Ep.9 [2/4] 1.41), as was the "wifey" one (Ep.9 [4/4] 8.48). There are so many examples.

Even the end of Ep.11 was a bait-and-switch as well, when a large portion of the fandom was hoodwinked by Director Aof's Ep.12 preview into thinking that we were headed for a break-up. (Fortunately they switched it out for the happy ending that we got instead, thank goodness.)

There's so much of this going on, it seems as though BBS was actually celebrating the bait-and-switch (and in that way kind of subverting its use in BL as well). The thing is, nothing was ever what it seemed in Bad Buddy, and it was all intended to be so, from Day One, because it's solidly a thematic preoccupation underlying the series.

I now think Baseball Mom really plays into all of this glorification of and subversion with the bait-and-switch as a storytelling device. But in a really wacky way, as perhaps is only fitting for the wackiest of Pat's t‑shirts.

So looking back on decades of popular media, who's been crowned the Big Boss of the Bait-and-Switch, the Grand Poobah of Switcheroos, the Queen of the Short-Con, the House Mother of all Bamboozlers?

It’s this little lady right here: 😍

This is Lucy Van Pelt, from Charles Schulz's comic strip Peanuts. Lucy is many things in the Peanuts universe, but one thing she's iconic for is a bait-and-switch prank, where she holds a football and then goads Charlie Brown on to kick it. He usually takes a bit of convincing, but eventually he goes for it and at the last second, Lucy pulls the ball away and poor Chuck ends up kicking the air, sent flying in the process. It's a running gag in the comic strip, first appearing in 1952 and recurring every year after that:

So what's the link with Baseball Mom though?

Football aside, in Peanuts Lucy is also a member of Charlie Brown's baseball team – and significantly she's absolutely terrible at the game. She misses the easiest of pitches, and even when perfectly positioned she gets hit on the head by the ball instead of catching it in her mitt.

So while she may be totally, confidently in charge of the situation baiting Charlie Brown with the pigskin, when it comes to baseball instead of football – Lucy is completely out of her element.

The parallel with Bad Buddy is that master of the bait-and-switch Pat Napat Jindapat – the BBS manifestation of Lucy – was pulling different versions of the Charlie Brown football prank on hapless Pran over and over again, causing much anguish to the latter's battered heart.

But suddenly on the rooftop, the tables got turned and Pran pulled the big switcheroo on him instead – by confirming their mutual feelings with a kiss so dizzyingly sensational that Pat must have been delirious with happiness… only to send it all crashing down by abandoning him there without a word of explanation.

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.5 [4/4] 12.58 – an abandoned Pat stares uncomprehendingly as Pran walks away from the wreckage of their broken hearts

In that moment Football Lucy morphed into Baseball Lucy, from self-assured manipulator to incompetent klutz, all alone in right field when the ball came zooming in from way out left. And what better way to mark this moment than with a t-shirt loudly proclaiming Pat's newly-minted Baseball Lucy status on its front?

(above) The Baseball Mom graphic – BBS's own version of The Scarlet Letter

Yes, I know this explanation is outlandish; that's how it sounded to me too when it first took shape in my head. So I decided to test it, by looking for supporting information elsewhere in the context of Bad Buddy. And the findings are truly surprising. 👀

No characters from Peanuts actually appear (in canon form) within any of BBS's visuals (not that they could, I suppose, for licensing reasons). But Charlie Brown and his cohort of characters aren't unknown in Thailand – there is a Charlie Brown Café (79/335 แขวงช่องนนทรี เขตยานนาวา, Bangkok, Thailand, 10120) that was previously at MBK Centre and a Charlie Brown's Restaurant (315/303 ซ.นราธิวาส24 แขวง ช่องนนทรี Yan Nawa, Bangkok 10120, Thailand) at Belle Park Plaza/Fortune Condo Town:

(above left) Charlie Brown Café; (above right) Charlie Brown's Restaurant

And even though we don't directly see Charlie Brown, Lucy or any other Peanuts characters in BBS, there are oblique references. One of the more obvious ones alludes to Lucy's younger brother, Linus Van Pelt:

When we see Pran out in the world with his PP hobo bag (written up here) or Pat snuggled in bed with his beloved Nong Nao (written up here), we know by now that the bag and the stuffed doll-pillow are our boys' favorite comfort objects, providing psychological security even as they face their personal fears.

(above left) Bad Buddy Ep.2 [1I4] 3.01 – Pran and his PP hobo bag, that he deploys like a shield when outside; (above right) Bad Buddy Ep.2 [1I4] 1.37 – Pat cuddling Nong Nao for comfort when he's all alone

But another name for these comfort objects actually has a connection to Peanuts – they can also be called Linus blankets, after the security blanket that Lucy's brother carries around with him all the time. Just a coincidence? I'm not so sure. (I think it's also significant that all three objects have blue as their predominant color.)

There's also a nod at Charlie Brown himself later, on the rooftop in Ep.7 [4/4] – Pat's tee is an unmistakeable visual reference to Charlie Brown's signature yellow top with its zigzag motif:

(above left) Bad Buddy Ep.7 [4/4] 1.48; (above right) Charlie Brown in his own iconic t-shirt

After their roles were reversed on the rooftop at the end of Ep.5 (with Pran pulling the ultimate bait-and-switch move back on Pat by walking away after The Kiss), the mantle of Charlie Brown the football prank victim was thrust onto Pat instead, and that is what we see here in Ep.7.

The brand name emblazoned on Pat's t-shirt also rings some bells – it's Patriots, which immediately calls to mind the NFL team from New England, and is another nod at Lucy's American football. (There is also a Minor League baseball team called the Somerset Patriots based in New Jersey; not as well-known as their counterparts – compatriots? – a few states away, but still… 👀).

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.7 [4/4] 2.13

And looking a bit closer the Ep.7 scene on the rooftop (the last one to be filmed among all of Bad Buddy's queues) really starts to overflow with meaning because it's actually a parallel to Ep.5's rooftop bait-and-switch.

It's far too much to include here, so I've put it into its own separate post (see this write-up linked here) – the short of it is that Pat as Charlie Brown plays the bait-and-switch one last time on Pran in Ep.7, but for the very first time turns the last-second switch-out into a win for his beloved instead, rescuing Pran who was floundering with the musical. And this reversal of the bait-and-switch, a redemption of sorts, is what convinces Pran to end their courtship competition and enter into confirmed couplehood instead. 👍

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Now all that aside, there's still one more element in Bad Buddy that I think is a direct reference to Lucy's bait-and-switch in Peanuts – and that's all the rugby, doing its part as a stand-in for Lucy's American football.

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.4 [4/4] 2.04 – the boys face off on the rugby pitch

It would never have been possible to feature American (gridiron) football authentically in Bad Buddy (it's not a popular sport outside of North America, to be honest, and would have been totally alien in a Thai setting). So they shone the spotlight on rugby instead, most probably because the ball used for play there is ovoid and almost the same as the one used in American football – it seems like the rugby in BBS is pointing at Lucy and the American football she deviously deploys.

(top) Bad Buddy Ep.7 [2/4] 13.01; (bottom) Bad Buddy Ep.7 [2/4] 13.02

This would explain why Director Aof and his team opted to feature rugby instead of soccer –the latter is far more popular in Thailand, and would have been a more obvious choice. In addition, soccer would have been far easier to stage – all the BBS rugby scenes had to be filmed at a completely different campus from the primary uni location (Bangkok University instead of Rangsit University) because the latter doesn't seem to have a rugby pitch, though it does have a soccer one. In case you were wondering as I was, the goalposts are starkly different so they couldn't just pretend to play rugby on the soccer pitch – it would have been a terribly obvious fake-out if they had.

They couldn't substitute another team sport even if it was easier to accommodate, because rugby (or rather the ball) was integral to this aspect of the storyline. It needed to be rugby if the intention was to evoke Lucy's favorite weapon of torment.

Further evidence in support of this can be found when you look at the original (rough-draft promo) Bad Buddy trailer that was released in 2020 (I think) to promote the 2021 lineup, before actual filming of the series itself in mid-2021:

The rugby was present even at that early stage (and Toto was on Pat's team! 😂). But what's mindblowing is that they're actually using an American football (the AF500), not a rugby ball (you can tell from the laces, which modern rugby balls do not have). 👀 So the gridiron football was very much part of Bad Buddy's primordial DNA, way back at its inception, even before actual filming began. Another nod at Lucy in Peanuts here.

(above) A screenshot from the original Bad Buddy promo trailer at timestamp 1.48

(above) A screenshot from the original Bad Buddy promo trailer at timestamp 2.15

Now all of this is dandy I suppose, but even with Linus blankets, Pat dressed like Charlie Brown, the oval ball and BBS's insistence on rugby (masquerading as American football) over soccer, for the longest time the hardboiled skeptic in me still wasn't fully convinced that Pat wearing Baseball Mom was actually Lucy in disguise getting her comeuppance, Bad Buddy style.

UNTIL I DECIDED TO LOOK MORE CLOSELY AT THE RUGBY MATCH IN EPISODE 4. And that was the clincher, that cemented the intentionality behind Baseball Mom in my mind, because there actually is a sequence where Pat executes Lucy's signature bait-and-switch move, with the rugby ball standing in for an American football, and with Pran as his fall guy.

The sequence in question starts at Ep.4 [4/4] 3.33, when we see Pat running with the ball, coveted by Pran (in more ways than one).

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.4 [4/4] 3.33

Pran tackles him, but in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it moment, Pat flicks the ball away and before any of us (Pran included) can realize what's happened, Korn is off and running with it instead (and I think he scores the rugby version of a touchdown too).

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.4 [4/4] 3.38

Meanwhile, Pat and Pran are still locked in a full-body clinch – and if you look closely, it's Pat who's actually holding on to Pran, not letting him go (with obvious delight, even if he's unaware of exactly why he's relishing the contact so much).

Much of Bad Buddy is really chaste, but there's something about this moment here that makes it seem like a line has been crossed, and that things have turned inexplicably raunchy somehow. There's full-body grappling, legs spread wide, crotch jammed to butt, a whole lot of heaving and panting. Pat is clearly enjoying every second, almost as though it’s the successful climax of his great big plan to waylay Pran with this bait-and-switch. And of course it's the perfect cue for him to deliver that now infamous, golden line: "If you hug me this tight, you might as well take me as your boyfriend." 😂

Actually Pat had been teasing and taunting Pran with hints of romance even before the game (going so far as to acknowledge that his behavior was flirtatious, at Ep.4 [4/4] 0.48) so it's impossible not to see that body tackle on the pitch as anything but a close encounter suffused with sexual tension – and Pran would of course be the first to notice it. (It's possibly also a subversion of the accidental "falling on you" trope, since it's at once contrived yet consensual.)

If you break it down, Pat used the ball to get Pran to tackle him, only to switch it out at the last minute with something else (close, practically intimate body contact) that poor Pran (drowning in his crush) would have found absolutely devastating. This is practically a playbook version of Lucy doing the football bait-and-switch with Charlie Brown.

To be honest though, I'd always found this rugby clinch a little odd and confusing, and had wondered why they even had this scene. It was logistically complicated to set up (two whole teams of players!), and the bait-and-switch portion would have been extremely tricky to choreograph and film. The whole rigmarole was also a lot of work for just a few seconds of screen time. That the ball slips away unseen also makes it seem anti-climactic for the viewer – but not for master gameplayer Pat, who successfully got his planned payload nonetheless.

And because he did it using Lucy Van Pelt's signature move, I now think the reason for this scene is for it to be held up as the paragon of Pat's bait-and-switch traps in Bad Buddy, and a parallel for the Epic Rooftop Kiss when Pran slaps the old switcheroo back on Pat instead.

On the rugby pitch Pat baited Pran by pulling away (with the ball), and then crushed his heart with physical intimacy (hugging him like a lover, but making it seem like he was only play-acting at returning Pran's love). On the rooftop Pran baited Pat with physical intimacy (The Kiss, proof to Pat that his feelings were returned), and then crushed his heart by pulling away (and taking with him all promise of his love).

Atop Chana City Residence at the end of Ep.5, perpetual prankster Pat couldn't stop himself and went in for the bait (Pran offering himself up romantically), only to see it whisked away from him at the very last second.

Suddenly the rules changed and Football Lucy, the House Mother of all bait-and-switch bamboozles, became the victim of the biggest bait-and-switch of them all, and was thrust into a different game instead. Bereft of Pran and denied his moment of victory, Pat became Baseball Mom indeed. 😔

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.5 [4/4] 13.06

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P.S. You can order Baseball Mom (the t-shirt, not Pat 😂) from Amazon at this link here. (If the link doesn't work, you may need to change your "Deliver To" location at the top left of the landing page on Amazon to another country – not useful if you want to buy it when they don't deliver to your location, but useful if you just want to view the page, or get them to deliver to a third party who can then forward it to you. If changing the location doesn't work, try following the other instructions in this post linked here.)

I suspect the fandom has been buying up Baseball Mom like crazy, because it went from limited stock and availability on Amazon (selected locations only), to becoming available for other global locations and on Walmart.com as well – so maybe demand from the BBS fandom has boosted sales so much they started marketing it on more channels? Thai BL soft power trickles down. 🥰👍

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P.P.S. OK, just a little aside – this Peanuts fan theory for Baseball Mom is really wacky, but I think the universe is telling me to put it out there anyway because just as I was finishing the write-up, this random post about the Peanuts football bait-and-switch appeared on my dashboard.

What are the odds of it crossing my dash at the same time I'm writing about it, when I've not seen it referenced before throughout my history on Tumblr, ever? (There were a few random Peanuts and Charlie Brown posts that appeared at the same time as well.) I'm not superstitious, but I do think the universe has spoken. 😂

[mhokday]

im trying to enjoy vice versa ep 11 as much as i can but the next ep preview has me so distressed

[harryssattelitestomper]

Watermelon Sugar 🍉

my masterlist

A/N: Here it is; the second part of the Fine Line series! I'm still learning how to write and learning as I go so rly appreciate you reading my series :)

warnings: cursing, VERY poorly written smut (I tried😭)

word count: 926

in which, Harry thinks you taste so sweet he decided to put it in a song. 🎶To prove I'm right, I put it in a so-o-ong🎶 ,sorry

------

As you were taking the watermelon out of the fridge, you yelled out to Harry who was making his way to the garage. "Baby, d'you want some watermelon?".

"Yes please". He yelled back as he got inside the car

'It had been very cloudy in Los Angeles recently so when they woke up today and saw the sunrays peaking through, they decided to make the most of it. Therefore Harry had just brought all of their stuff to the car to bring with them to the beach; sunnies, waterbottles and their books. All while Y/N was in the kitchen making them a snack to bring along as well.'

As she had cut and put the watermelon and strawberries on a container, she made her way to the car to join Harry.

"It's so fucking hot today", you commented as you connected your phone to the cars aux

"Yeah, feels nice after it being so gloomy"

Then, you were on your way to your private beach.

------

After a while of laying in the sun, Harry being the restless person he is decided he had enough and went for a quick swim in the water.

As he was swimming you became bored. Already having finished your book and without your gossip-buddy, you decided to do the one thing you loved to do: tease your boyfriend.

You began by slowly untying your bikini top making it slowly fall down to the floor beside you.

Harry noticing you moving he glanced in your direction, his eyes doubling in size as he saw what you were up to.

"Holy shit", he whispered quietly to himself as he got out from the water and made his way towards you.

By the time he reached you, you had already taken off your bikini bottoms and were acting like you didn't notice him.

"What do you think you're doing?", he asked as his hungry eyes were scanning your very naked body.

You shrugged. "Didn't want any tan lines."

Harry made himself at home on top of you. "Oh really? No other reason?" Grabbing your legs and wrapping them around his waist, he put his forearms on either side of your head.

"Nope." You smirked at him, finally taking your sunnies off and properly looking at the god of a man on top of you,

He started kissing your neck, letting out a "mmhm" letting you know that he knew exactly what you were doing. He continued to kiss down your neck making sure to also kiss you collarbones before making his way to your breasts. Sucking slightly harder on the top part of your breast and causing you to let out a small whimper. He detached himself from your boob to look at the hickey he just created before latching onto your nipple, sucking and slightly biting it just to muster up a moan from your lips.

He continued to kiss down your body as he slid himself a little lower between your legs so he could rest comfortably on his stomach. As his kisses reached your lower stomach he switched to kissing your inne thighs.

You loved his kisses, loved how he always took his time with you, but you were getting impatient. "Harry please"

"What'd ya want, love?"

"Please, I need you so bad"

And that did it. Harry with his praise kink and need to please others took the bait like a fish and dove into your pussy. Flatting out his tongue, he licked a long stripe from your opening to your clit, repeating the motion a few times before moving up and sucking your clit.

The sounds you were making, the absolutely obscene fucking noices you were making had Harry rutting his hips against the sun lounger, looking for relief for his cock which was now rock-hard.

As he continued to suck on your swollen clit, he dragged his fingers to you entrance, pushing two fingers in and immediately curling them so he could reach your g-spot.

The motion made your back arch, and mouth falling open to a soundless scream. "Im gonna cum!" were the only words that could escape your mouth as the unbelievable pleasure was on the edge of taking over you.

"Cum for me love, come on baby". Were the words that had you tumbling down the edge as the pleasure finally took over.

Harry never stopped his movements, only slowing down so to prolong your release. Only when he saw you getting uncomfortable due to the overstimulation he stopped all together.

Crawling so he could be face to face with you he asked, "You okay?", while smoothing down your hair. "Yeah", you answered, still feeling like you were on cloud 9.

"You know I could eat you out everyday", Harry said eyes looking slightly glazed over.

"Oh I'm sure you could, H"

------

It was a few weeks after and Harry had just came back from being at the studio for the whole day.

"Baby, wanna hear the song we finished today?"

"'Course, lovie", you said excitedly as you made yourself comfortable on the couch, waiting for Harry to get his phone so he could play it to you.

"Alright, you ready?"

"Mmhm."

As the song started to play, you couldn't help but make a face as some of the lyrics made sense and didn't at the same time.

"What the fuck is watermelon sugar?", you asked him absolutely flabbergasted at the metaphor. Instead of answering you, Harry just smirked making his way on top of you, and showing you exactly what watermelon sugar was.

------

A/N: I know it's bad okay?! 😂 I'm trying so would really appreciate any feedback from you guys.

[papermonkeyism]

Thinking about the new DnD character. So I'm making the tabaxi fighter into a battle master, and her point is to be the team tank and protector. We're probably going to get to level 3 pretty soon, so all of us can unlock our subclasses, and I got to thinking about which maneuvers to pick at the start.

I know I want Bait and Switch for the whole protector role (I already could have used it in our first game last week), and Trip Attack is probably also good to take, for knocking enemies prone, though I'm kinda waffling about what to take as the third option. Distracting Strike would give an advantage to the next attack made by party member, which is very useful, but I could also see Disarming Strike to come in handy. I do want Maneuvering Attack at some point as well, though I might willing to wait for level 7 for that.

My character's point is to get in the face of the bad guys to be the meat shield between them and my squishier buddies when needed, and I'm willing to put all my points to make that happen. Just wondering what would be the most optimal way to do that. 🤔

[alienaiver]

A Christmas Surprise

Suna Rintarou x gn!reader

warnings: none! fluff! minor christmas theme but thats almost a side theme. there's a minor mention of domestic violence but it's nothing delved into.

wordcount: 1.6k

content: fluff, christmas, gender neutral reader, post-timeskip, poc!friendly reader, married couple, not beta'd or proofread

notes: if the formatting is weird its bcos ive written this entire thing on my phone!! (never again sksksk) i made it while doing christmas stuff so if it's a little incoherent, thats why! i hope you all have a lovely holiday and that this brings a smile if they're few and hard to come by these days <3333 i will come back and reformat this after the holidays if needed!

part of my "domestic life with suna" series! here's part 1 and 2! (it can be read seperately)

”I thought you were supposed to be a big shot, Rin.” you bend your back awkwardly to properly get into the farthest back of the family-friendly stationcar his aunt owns. There are two extra seats in the back and you’ve been charged to keep an eye on your husband by those since he's mischievous to a fault during these car rides. It’s the holidays and every year the entire Suna family gathers in the mountains by an old cabin your husband’s uncle owns.

”What does that have to do with anything?” he answers dryly as he bends his knees to follow you into the car. You try to straighten your back but end up hitting your head on the roof. Alright, crouched sitting it is then. You put on your seatbelt as you reply, ”what’s the point of a rich athlete husband if he doesn’t provide a limo for his family?”

His aunt laughs then, loud and deep from her stomach as she settles on the passenger seat next to her own husband. In front of you, her two young sons settles with bags and suitcases and most importantly, they told you, the snacks for the drive.

”Aw, come on, don’t be like that.” his face is already buried in his phone but there’s a mock-pout adorning his features. In front, his uncle looks back at you with a glint in his eye, ”if there’s no limo next year, Rintaro, I’m assuming you’re a bad player.”

He looks up immediately, taking the bait and making you suppress a giggle. He really does turn quite childish in his family’s grasp.

They argue back and forth as the kids in the middle gets settled with their gadgets. The aunt yells several times to quiet them but to no avail. It’s not until after an hour that the only thing heard in the car is the tap-tap-tapping of a nephew’s Nintendo Switch and the rumble of the motor.

Being married to Suna has been a journey for you. You’ve bought a house, bought the furniture and appliances to go in said house, two cats and a few months back Suna started talking about investing in a car. The adult life you’d never envisioned yourself having is suddenly blasted in your face at every turn.

It's terrifying. But so, so exhilarating and freeing.

You’ve met most of Suna’s family before, having been high school sweethearts but this is the first time you’re going to join the annual Christmas holiday trip and the nerves are getting to you.

It’ll be fine, right?

“Does Rintaro ever hit you?”

Before you can even react or gasp at the question coming from his nephew, Tanjiro, his mother yells his name so loud that the uncle swerves from the shock. Good thing you’re out where no one else is driving right now.

“Please don’t mind him, his manners are a bit wriggly,” she scowls at her son and Suna just huffs out a laugh at the question but doesn’t further react.

“What? Rintaro hits me all the time and ma’, you say it’s because he loves me!”

Suna reaches an arm up to hit his nephew lightly on the head, “you got that just right, buddy.”

It seems the air in the car immediately lightens at Tanjiro’s reasoning for asking the question and you heave out a sigh of relief before Suna continues talking, “but don’t worry, I hit them too, especially if they do something dumb.”

“Hey!” you punch his forearm with mock offense and reprimand him. “You better behave back there!” his uncle yells from the driver’s seat, “I don’t want to crash before we get to the party with the main guests!” you laugh with the aunt and pet Suna’s arm.

Wait.

Main guests?

Out of the corner of your eye you notice Suna stiffen, his eyes glued to the phone but it’s stuck on the home screen. Your eyebrow arches as you send him a look you know will make him break. A sweat breaks on his temple and you poke him, “what are you not telling me?”

Everyone in the car is silent and you hear someone suck in their teeth. Suna sighs and puts his phone face down on his thigh, “it was supposed to be a surprise but… they’ve prepared a small celebration for us, as well. Seeing as we got married during lockdown.”

You gasp and his uncle laughs, “you prepared a small celebration, we were simply pawns in your plot.”

“ay yea thanks Uncle, we don’t need to spoil more, yeah?”

He makes a zipping motion on his lips and turns his focus back to driving, although a warm smile never really leaves his face. You stare with wide eyes at your husband, who’s never really enjoyed being the center of attention – to him, lockdown was a perfectly good excuse to celebrate a small wedding with just the two of you. So you have a hard time wrapping your head around the fact that he has planned anything.

With your staring, a small, victorious smile appears on his lips – he’s proud he kept this secret as long as to this point. There’s been a lot of worrying about who was going to spoil his little plan.

His eyes stays on his phone, scrolling TikTok but his other hand quests slowly towards you, wrapping his fingers with yours, enjoying the way he can feel your wedding band on his skin.

He leans into you and whispers gently, “merry Christmas baby."

You laugh and kiss the top of his head, “and to you too, you little trickster. I love you.” You hear him scoff but he doesn’t pull away from you.

As soon as the car is parked and his nephews are out, you struggle to crawl out faster than Suna, who’s blocking your path to get out first. Outside, his nephews are booing him and cheering on you – mostly because you gave them your share of the candy on the ride and Suna ate his (and stole from theirs).

You immediately stretch your arms above your head and feel a satisfying pop. Suna brings his arms around your waist as your arms come down, “are you ready?” he whispers as he sneaks in a kiss to the shell of your ear.

“How can I be? Dumbass.”

He chuckles before he retracts himself, asking if he needs to help carry stuff in. You vaguely register that they ask you to just head inside but that Suna insists on waiting for them.

“Do you love Rin?” the youngest, Moya, looks up at you with big, questioning eyes. You bend down on your knees to face him properly, “mhm. More than anything. Can you keep a secret?”

His eyes lights up like a Christmas tree’s candles and he nods, a big toothy smile appearing. You lean in to whisper into his ear, “I even love him more than I love chocolate.”

His eyes widens and he stares at you in shock. You have to hold back a chuckle. “But chocolate’s your favorite candy!”

You nod with a smile that matches his. “Whatcha doin’?” Suna asks as he approaches and you hurry to put a finger to your lips, signaling to Moya that this is a very big secret. His gaze hardens and he nods before running to his mom. You get back on your feet with a sing-a-song voice, “nothing at all!”

Suna laughs and wraps his arms around your waist, “let’s go inside. We’re the last to arrive.”

“Oh, we’re fashionably late now are we?”

He chuckles and squeezes your waist, “what? Of course we are. I had to get my hair right.”

Inside, there’s chain lights at almost all the walls. All of his family are gathered in the main room, cheering as you enter. There’s a cake in the middle of the room. It’s not a traditional wedding cake, but you can easily see it’s your favorite cake sized up to fit the size of the entire family. There’s a table to the side filled with presents, both wrapped in Christmas paper but also in white and silver wrappings. You can’t help but laugh in amazement and hide your face behind your hands, flustered to the core at the attention.

“Merry Christmas!” they yell in unison and you begin to greet and hug each other, starting from the left. There’s quite a few congratulations thrown in there even if they’ve all FaceTimed and seen each other quite a few times since the wedding.

It’s well past midnight and you’re currently cuddled up to Suna on the couch, blankets wrapped tightly around you as you share a cup of cocoa. Suna insisted he didn’t want cocoa but now that you were tempting him with the cup, he had to steal some from you.

You’re laughing at the whipped cream on his nose when he starts moving around, trying to get something from his pocket. He reveals a small, wrapped package. The paper is bent and there’s holes in there and no ribbon. You figure he didn’t want to bother with that. “It’s for you.” He whispers, looking almost shy.

He takes the cup of cocoa so you can unwrap it and you laugh, “who would’ve thought? I thought it was for someone else in the room.” you refer to the empty room around you.

He hits you lightly and scoffs at you, muttering a curse at you.

As you unwrap it, it reveals a small piece of jewelry. A black ring, coated with a golden line in the middle. You look up at him and he smiles proudly, “you talked about a wedding band in black to match some of your outfits,”-he brings up his hand to show you his ring-“I made them take some gold from my ring to put on that one.”

You hide your face in his neck and he almost drops the cup of cocoa with the force, “I love you so much, Rin. So, so much.”

He mirrors your movement from the car ride and kisses the top of your head, pulling you tightly into him. “Merry Christmas my love.”

[citystoryscapes]

bad buddy fandom getting-to-know-you meme!

yayyyy thank you for the tag deepa, who is the best! @fiercynn <3 I've been meaning to participate in this for agessssss

since there are both recent newcomers to bbs fandom and people like me who are new to bbs tumblr, i thought i'd create a getting-to-know-you meme for people to introduce themselves if they want! all questions are optional

note: i consider "fanworks" to pretty much everything people create related to a fandom, including but not limited to meta/analysis/discussion, gifs, fanvids/edits/fancams, filk, fanart, fanfic, fan food, fan crafts, etc. please include this note with the meme unless you have a different definition!

name and whatever you want to share about yourself

hey, I'm rain! that's not my actual name but it's all the internet is getting. my pronouns are she/they. I'm in my 20s and a grad student, and fandom has been a (selectively) great place for me in terms of finding supportive, brilliant friends. I like to write a fair bit; occasionally, I post it too. I also like cats, big cities, good tea, and old houses.

when did you watch bad buddy/join the fandom?

I'd heard about bad buddy because it was airing around the same time as another show I was watching, but I wasn't toooo interested until episode 5, part 4/i4. when I tell you that kiss UNLOCKED SOMETHING IN ME... I caught up on the first 5 episodes pretty much immediately after that while quarantining alone over Christmas, and it pretty much kept me sane. I watched the rest of the show as it aired- please spare a moment of silence for the people who had to wait out the two-week gap between episodes over New Year's.

bad buddy has always made me SO genuinely happy and hopeful, reminding me that there is hope for queer Asian people even if our families aren't always supportive.

favorite ship(s)

patpran, inkpa, and some comic relief waikorn

favorite character(s)

in terms of fanworks, it's a very close call between pran and pat, but I think pran is my favorite by a hair! I love his character arc throughout the show! I especially love his confidence and the way he grew into himself. pran might win in terms of being inspirational, but I have to say, I LOVE well-written pat meta.

in terms of who I'd like to channel in real life, it's obviously ink. she is the absolute coolest, a proud simp, and a protective girlfriend.

(I'm great at avoiding making choices)

favorite episode(s)

episode 5, because what could ever compare? I also love parts of episode 3 and 11 (I'm saying this as if I don't love the entire show).

favorite scene(s)

ep 5 rooftop kiss!!!! ep 3 bus stop and mini elevator scene; ep 4 pran's injury and the three wontons dinner; ep 6 beach scene where they're paired up in the game; and their trip to the market, ep 7 confession scene; ep 9's 'anyone taller than me is fine'!!!!! ep 11 bus scene, beach scene, and song montage; ep 12's entire bait and switch reveal, and pat pran's dinner out with friends.

see what I meant about avoiding making choices?

one thing you would change about the show if you could

seconding deepa, WHY DID INKPA NOT KISS??? also this isn't a change I would definitively make to the existing show, but I'd love a b-side where we see patpran's relationship in the years between their graduations and pran's return from Singapore.

what are your some of your favorite fanworks made by other people?

I can't believe this is a question I am legitimately choosing to answer:

Fic:

make my body say ah, ah, ah by Sabulum

heart in a cage by sunshinedobi

paradox by Everybodyknows

dynamic by riddles2

a nose boop and the rest is history by seekingmoonscapes

don't forget me when I let the water take me by gilly_bean

your love is your life by threewontons

Videos:

same page by dkyth73

just friends by fiercynn and scribe

dancer by coldties

(if you create fanworks) what are your favorite fanworks that you’ve made?

technically I've only published one bad buddy fanwork (it's a fic called these violent delights). my favorite thing I've created for the show is an unpublished canon-divergence fic where patpran have sex and possibly get together during their ep 6 beach trip

a song that makes you think of bbs (the ones in the show don’t count lol)

I'm sticking to the classics; same page and just being friendly by tilly birds are my top choices. I also made playlists for pat and pran, for said unpublished fic, so here's some of the songs I picked for both:

for pat: the loneliest time by carly rae jepsen, double take by dhruv, better by khalid, the enemy by andrew belle

for pran: washing machine heart by mitski, 18 by 1D, and dancer by leon

idk anything else you want us to know?

I love all of you smart meta writers, I'm kissing your big beautiful brains

okay i'm literally going to tag all of my tumblr mutuals that i think are still in the fandom (if i missed anyone sorry!!), but also if you want to do the meme consider yourself tagged! please don’t let this flop lol 🤞🏽

[buddieisgoingcanon2024]

ABC and Tim are definitely shipbaiting, and it is getting ridiculous at this point. I realize that Buddie is not happening this season and Tommy is staying at least until the end of the season, but having R&O do interviews was a bait-and-switch. It might not be as bad as queerbaiting, but if they are not careful this could hurt them in the long run. Most people are still Buddie endgame, but if they continue to use fans and Buck ends up with Tommy this could be very bad for them. Don't get me wrong, I am not saying that Buck and Tommy can't be endgame, but if they use Eddie and Buddie to help the other couple be endgame there will be backlash.

💯

[cursedcomics]

The trouble with Phase 4 and what it is doing to Phase 5...

I had mentioned at the start of Phase 4 that it looked problematic.

Here is the list from Wikipedia.

1 Black Widow (2020)

2 Eternals (2021)

3 Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021)

4 Untitled Spider-Man: Far From Home sequel (2021)

5 Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)

6 Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)

The Black Widow was a huge disappointment.  It very much failed to sate the Marvel viewer’s hunger for more Scarlett Johannson. Taskmaster was wildly unexciting. The movie was like most Phase 4 projects ---  all about laying out the setup for other projects. 

Eternals was horrible.  It was probably the worst Marvel movie of all.  You can’t take a vanilla concept, throw in a very in your face gay kiss and think you have created something the public wants to see.  

If you want to make a successful gay superhero movie, you can easily do it.  Trying to create one out of basically an existing pile of dogshit ideas that have no hints of any gay relationships is just mind blowingly arrogant.  Eternals not only failed, it probably cost marvel 20% on all the following phase 4 movies as well as Black Panther 2 and Quantumania.

Shang-Chi veered way the hell away from the source material, but it wasn’t awful.  They decided to make it a buddy film with him partnered up with Aquafina but that seemed counter productive... Don’t get me wrong, they had chemistry and worked together, but you have a feature actor who seems to have the kind of charisma you definitely need now, but you and the fans can only speculate whether or not he can carry a movie because you didn’t trust him to do so.

I am not in love with the ten rings and the further guarantee of no Mandarin, but whatever.  Not the worst film in the lot.

The Spiderman film was obviously the best of this lot.  not much to say there.  It does lead into the Doctor Strange movie well.

The Doctor Strange movie is sadly where things really fell apart for Marvel in this phase.  I think you could bear the Eternals if Dr. Strange was really on point and carried the phase. It did not.

It’s an OK movie, but it also is nonsensically feeding wokeness to Marvel’s largely/mostly male core audience.  I think you can look at the Captain Marvel movie plus phase 4 as a lot of overly liberal storytelling thrown at a much more conservative comic superhero audience.  

I think that movie has turned off as much as 30% of their possible audience.

Multiverse of Madness was a Sam Raimi- type film when they needed it to be the rousing rallying point to the multiverse.   They needed it to be bigger.  They needed Tom Cruise as Iron Man.  They needed Nightmare.  They needed Sleepwalker.  They needed Nova.  They just needed more.

Additionally, the fans had come to love the Scarlet Witch and this took yet another of Marvel’s best assets off the board, which again, doesn’t help fan excitement.

Thor Love and Thunder was thoroughly disappointing for tans who wanted a ton more from Gore, the God Butcher and the classic Jane Foster Thor stories in the comics.  It very much felt like a bait and switch with a variety of silly moments but none of the cleverness of Thor Ragnarok.

Black Panther 2 like it’s predecessor is a specific product aimed primarily at a minority crowd and just speaking bluntly,  that isn’t most of marvel’s core fanbase.

I think that  overall failure to connect in phase 4 explains a large portion of why Marvel fans have stayed home for Quantumania.

Multiculturalist pushes have “little victories”  in comics.  Ie. sometimes a character resonates. (ex. Ms. Marvel).  But big multicultural pushes tend to fail.

In the Marvel Movie Universe, it seems like the same thing is true.  That isn’t necessarily a bad thing.   It just dictates the studio be a little more subtle in their efforts to expand their fanbase.  The white male core’s dollars make the other efforts possible.  There is nothing wrong with acknowledging that. If you still can’t make films that expand your appeal, it is a fault in your strategy.

You can’t tell a fan base “hey we are going to spend the next 6 movies telling some stories with bluntly forceful messages to appeal to a portion of our liberal audience that you won’t appreciate rather than just tell cool stories ---- Catch us in Phase 5!”  and expect them to support your films when phase 5 rolls around.

Disney made an empire by giving their buyers the kind of film they wanted.  Marvel would do well to step back for a moment and rethink their strategy.

[telomeke-bbs]

BAD BUDDY EPISODE 7 – BAIT-AND-SWITCH WITH CHARLIE BROWN ON THE ROOFTOP

When Pat wore his Baseball Mom tee on the rooftop in Ep.5, one possible reading is that his wacky outfit was actually a call-out to Pran playing a massive bait-and-switch prank on him, after all the times he'd done it to Pran before.

And through this lens, you can also read Pat and Pran as incarnating Lucy and Charlie Brown respectively from the comic strip Peanuts, while the various bait-and-switch games can be seen as renditions of the iconic football gag that Lucy always played on Charlie Brown. (Yes I know this sounds really crazy, but you can read more explanation and justification at this write-up linked here.)

Prior to Ep.5, Pat had always been pulling the bait-and-switch on Pran, just as Lucy did with Charlie Brown. Some examples:

Pat returned Pran's watch at Ep.1 [4/4] 9.46 in a gesture of friendship, only to impose the condition "But…don’t talk to me in front of people. They might think we're buddies."

The tragic bunk-over beginning at Ep.4 [4/4] 10.43, when Pat subjected poor Pran to all sorts of affectionate moments, before exploding any hope of a romance with him by announcing his romantic feelings for Ink instead.

Gently comforting an injured Pran with soothing medication at Ep.4 [3I4] 7.07, and then suggesting it was only to get him back to fighting fit as Pat's competitor in sports;

Returning Pran’s guitar, then whacking down his romantic hopes with a callous "I just like to see your face… when you lose" (Ep.3 [4/4] 10.30).

Just as Pran was always the one subjected to Pat's bait-and-switch, in Peanuts canon Charlie Brown was always the victim of Lucy's prank with the football (she'd whisk it away just before Charlie Brown could kick it, and the momentum of the run-up would send him flying).

But on the rooftop at the end of Ep.5 BBS continued its subversive agenda and had Pran (a version of Charlie Brown the bait-and-switch victim) pulling the switcheroo on Pat instead (who before that was always a version of Lucy, the historical perpetrator of the prank).

Pran suddenly reversed the roles and gave prankster Pat a taste of his own medicine, by walking away after confirming Pat's romantic hopes with The Kiss. And Pat found himself the victim of the very same kind of short-con that he'd been subjecting Pran too up until then.

Since Pat and Pran had switched roles on the rooftop at the end of Ep.5, their very next rooftop encounter at Ep.7 [4/4] 1.44 has Pran now incarnating the persona of crabby fussbudget Lucy, while Pat is Charlie Brown – and Mr. Jindapat is certainly dressed for the part with his t-shirt there calling loudly out to Charlie Brown's iconic zigzagged yellow top:

(above left) Bad Buddy Ep.7 [4/4] 1.48; (above right) Charlie Brown in his own iconic t-shirt

And this scene then becomes loaded with meaning when we look at it in the light of all the other bait-and-switch encounters in BBS, especially on the rooftop in Ep.5.

Pat calls attention to Pran's previous prankstering (at his expense) in Ep.5 on the rooftop by saying (in the subtitles) "You tricked me here for what now?" at Ep.7 [4/4] 1.44. (I think what he says is "หลอกกูมาทำอะไรอีกเนี่ย?", which – if so – probably translates to something more like "So what else are you duping me with, huh?" i.e., he's asking what more trickery is afoot from Pran).

Pran offhandedly denies any duplicity ("Come on. I’m not always playing games with you") but that's a lie of course – it's Ep.7 and they're still deep in the throes of their Beachside Bet™.😂 And Pat dismisses Pran's trickstering immediately because he knows Pran's ulterior motives in calling him there ("Yeah? If that guy didn’t quit the play, would you still want to see me?").

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.7 [4/4] 3.33

Pat then tops it off with his comment at timestamp 3.33 ("I love to see your face when you lose"), a reboot of what he first said in the Tinidee corridor at Ep.3 [4/4] 10.30 that also calls out to his bait-and-switch with the guitar there. And this firmly grounds the scene as another comment on his signature pranking.

So Pat as Charlie Brown refuses to take the bait offered by Pran. And then we see Pat/Charlie Brown, the erstwhile prank victim, flipping the script to perform a bait-and-switch back at Pran (in a parallel with what Pran/Charlie Brown did to Pat/Lucy on the rooftop at the end of Ep.5).

But this bait-and-switch on the Ep.7 rooftop is the antithesis of all the previous ones. Maybe Pat has learnt something?

Before this, whenever Pat played the bait-and-switch game with Pran, he would be dangling something of value as bait only to dash Pran's hopes with a last-minute substitution. The promise of a precious moment, replaced with something quite the opposite instead.

Here on the rooftop in Ep.7, Pat changes his modus operandi. He's stringing Pran along by imposing terms that are impossible for him to meet, in return for taking on the role of Riam. What he wants is a public confession of love, a demand that privacy-obsessed Pran (at this stage of his emotional/psychological journey) is intrinsically unable to fulfil. (Of course, Pran's journey will eventually get him to a point when he can and does make that very public confession in Ep.10, and he will pay Pat back for this Ep.7 moment by using another bait-and-switch to get Pat to their khan maak on the Archi steps. 😁)

But Pat is playing hardball here on purpose. He's dashing Pran's hopes upfront in a reversal of all their previous bait-and-switch games, by offering up only defeat and disappointment (without him as Riam, Pran will have to deal with a furious Toto and the musical in a shambles). Except that this also allows Pat to switch things up in a final flourish when he appears on stage as Riam at Ep.7 [4/4] 4.26, saving the day for his beloved.

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.7 [4/4] 6.40

It’s both a parallel with and also the absolute opposite of their previous bait-and-switch encounters (especially the one on the rooftop in Ep.5), because the initial proposition here is all doom and gloom, while the switched-in coup de grâce turns out to be a win instead for the recipient. It's hugely clever of BBS, and I'm kicking myself for not having seen this buried in there before.

No wonder this was the final play that won the match, worthy enough to have ended their Beachside Bet. And in this moment I think Pat made up for all the times he unwittingly broke poor Pran's heart with all his silly bait-and-switch games – by playing it one more time.

But this time around, instead of whisking his affection away, Pat deployed the ultimate switch-out and gave to Pran the prize he'd always wanted instead – Pat himself, no longer an elusive prankster who would offer and then pull away the possibility of romance, but someone Pran could rely on instead, to be there for him in support and love forever.💖

(above) Bad Buddy Ep.7 [4/4] 6.52 – Pat and Pran bask in the afterglow of Pat's redemptive bait-and-switch, with Pat doing it right by Pran for the first time

‌

[kaleidoscopic-quiddity]

things i loved about episode 12

i owe p’aof my fucking life 

the way they had us in the first half!! bbs rlly said ‘ep 11 curse? break up? separation arc?? fuck that’ 

patpran acting emo not bc they broke up but because they were in a long distance relationship for a year 

the way pat pulled pran into his apartment 

‘you only served me for 5 minuets’ ‘i was excited’ jhjhgfgh oKAY 

inkpa being the cutest gfs ever god i love the two of them so much, ‘its like we have 2 daughters now’ aawwwww

pat and pran’s smirks when they lied to their parents about breaking up 

pran and wai fucking winking at each other when pran told his friends that he and pat had ‘broke up’ 

pat going to the wrong airport like the himbo he is 

the return of pat’s scent kink and pran finally indulging him 

pran speaking english 

the bait and switch with wai and korn, i bet their respective girlfriends hate going on double dates bc the two of them spend more time flirting with each other than them 

the way dissaya and ming both know that pat and pran are still spending time together, even if they dont necessarily know they’re still dating, and have decided to let it happen 

pat and pran going bacl to visit tong and junior after graduating 

pat aggressively pushing more food onto his family bc he’s a habitual caretaker 

‘now thats my little sister :D!!’ 

korn an wai doing the arm wraparound beer thing 

the way they switched to the child actors during the tin can phone scene 

‘this isn’t a porno pran!!’ had me howling with laughter 

pat getting a turn to narrate along side pran

the way the drama between their families wasnt magically resolved but instead the parents have come to realise that their shit should stay between their generation and not be pushed onto their kids 

yes yes its pretty sad pat and pran had to back to hiding their relationship BUT the fucking comedy of that car scene is unparalleled  

plus them linking pinkies as they walk past each other and just generally being dorks 

the return to the noodle truck 

all the fuckin cheek smooches this episode 

that guy from their high school who was like the MC of the reunion, my mans was bringing so much energy to that scene 

prans’s very obviously green screened view from his room in singapore made me giggle 

pat putting the shirt on nong nao

korn and pat teasing wait for being such a ‘religious man now’ 

that engineering boy in wai and korn’s bar who asked an architecture girl if she had a boyfriend and the way she replied ‘i have a husband, your dad’, queen shit right there 

pat jokingly telling the engineering and architecture students in the bar to not fight bc they might end up with a lover and pran jokingly telling them it’s not worth it if they end up with a lover like pat 

korn with his hair down for basically the whole ep 

that classroom scene with pat and pran flipping each other off, it was like the definition of pigtail pulling 

wai calling pa ‘my girl’ only to immediately get dunked on 

pran making pat think he was gonna do something sexy and then just pulling a fuckin judo move on him 

pran teasing pat by joking that wai had also snuck into his room before 

‘good luck, buddy’ happy edition 

the dumb drinking game and pat’s overblown reaction to the shots 

pran getting the lyrics wrong when he and pat were singing together in his room and the two of them laughing like total goobers 

the way bad buddy went it’s entire run without homophobia ever being an issue or source of drama, that’s super refreshing to see 

the recontextualization of the red shirt scene in episode 11 not as a breakup but as a vow to always stay by each other’s sides, even when it feels like the whole world is trying to push them apart 

pran being just as much of a horndog as pat is lmaooo 

the call back to their early dynamic and calling each other ‘the guy with the fierce eyes’ / ‘the guy with the dimples’ 

pat telling pa to drink her water every time she says she wants to try liquor 

pat crying at the end op ep 11 not being bc they’re breaking up but bc he’s a dramatic little shit and is upset he cant flirt with pran in public or gush abt him to his friends anymore, which, like, definitely is sad in it’s own right but mans was acting like he’d just had his heart ripped out 

ive said it before but it bares saying again: the way pat and pran also feel like best friends who genuinely have a solid foundation to their relationship as well as loving boyfriends 

the way there wasnt a proposal but pran did say that he wanted pat to be the one to sneak into his room for the rest of his life 

the zoom out on pran’s door handle thingy showing the smiley face at the end of the final scene ):) 

[thestarrynightslover]

It’s a Good Day to Have a Bad Date

Pairing: Jay Halstead x Reader

Word count: 2,383

Warnings: Slight mentions of an OC with criminal priors, violent tendencies, and a juvenile record. A teeny-tiny bit of angst.

Summary: The reader meets Jay as she's trying to find out stuff about the guy she's about to go out with and ends up switching dates.

Disclaimer: I don’t own any of the One Chicago shows, or its characters, also not associated with it in any way or know anyone involved with it.

A/N: Just to make one thing clear: I did some research on Illinois's laws  (not sure I got it right tho) and, apparently, this fic is very inaccurate. But I really wanted to pursue the idea, so just humor me, please 🙏🏻. Anyways, I had a lot of fun while writing this and thought about making a part two... But I'm not sure. Tell me what you think! 💗

| masterlist |

You inhaled deeply one more time before you walked into the police district. There wasn’t even a real reason for you to be so nervous about it. You weren’t a victim and you weren’t a criminal. So, what’s the worst that could happen? 

The worst that could happen was, of course, you getting a bunch of cops mad at you because you went to waste their time with some pathetic whining. It was decided, you were gonna turn back around right now, while you still had time, and just go home.

On second thought, though, it was a matter of public safety. Your safety. Which was just as valid because you were just as much of a U.S. citizen as anyone else. So you went in. 

Shit. The place was almost empty, which meant everyone would notice if you left. And they’d ask questions, so you figured you’d, at least, get ahead of them, as you walked shyly towards the front desk. There, you were met by an older woman who looked bored, and still, terrifying.

“Can I help you with something?” She asked you, while cautiously checking you out. Oh my God, she thought you could be a victim! You were such an idiot.

“Um, it’s, um, it’s actually nothing, really. I shouldn’t even have come here in the first place.” You told her while smiling a little. What you didn’t know was that what you said had only raised more flags in the sergeant’s mind, even catching the attention of a tall man writing some things down on a paper at the corner of the counter. The young detective stayed back because he knew that Platt would know how to manage the situation, but continued listening to every word of the conversation.

The sergeant, then, took her glasses off, setting them on the counter. “Listen, miss, my name is Trudy Platt and the reason why I became a cop was that I wanted to help people, in every way that I possibly could. So, if you need my help with anything, just tell me what it is. And, I promise, I’ll do everything in my power to give it to you.” She assured you and, as much as you felt this huge sympathy for the woman, you also felt even worse about making her waste her time. So you tried to fix things.

“Oh, my God! I’m so, so, so sorry! I’m not a victim in any way, thank God. I said that I shouldn’t have come here because I’m not even sure if what I wanted to ask is legal…” You told her with a nervous laugh. Hearing that, the Sergeant’s eyes sparked with curiosity.

“Well, then I probably won’t be able to help you.” She told you, stressing the ‘probably’ and making the man at the end of the counter shamelessly turn his face in your direction in order to better hear your conversation. “But… Since you’re already here, and it’s been such a slow day for the District, maybe you should just ask me whatever you want to and I’ll be the judge of whether that’s legal or not. After all, unless you’re some sort of lawyer, I should know more about the law than the average civilian.” The Sergeant skilfully baited you.

“Um, no, I’m not a lawyer.” You confirmed with a small laugh while tugging some of your hair behind your ear. “Actually, since I’ve just recently moved here to Chicago ⎼ to Illinois, really ⎼, I’m probably a lot below your average civilian.” You stated with a giggle. At that, the guy that had lost his discretion about eavesdropping started chuckling a little himself, to which the older woman responded with a look you’d absolutely hate having directed to you.

“So, Chuckles, you have nothing better to do than to stay here listening to other people’s conversations?”

“First of all, it’s detective,” he started in a mocked smug tone, “and, second: no, uh, I actually don’t. I came to fill this paperwork down here exactly because we were about to kill each other upstairs, just to get out of the boredom.” He added, raising some paper files he had in-hand. “Besides, you know how much I, too, love to help people.” He said while shooting you a charming smile. Okay, that guy was pretty handsome. “Jay Halstead, nice to meet you.” The detective informed you, holding out his hand.

“Right, um, nice to meet you too, sir.” You replied, shaking his hand. “I didn’t even say my name, what a clums!” You joked while patting yourself on the forehead. “I’m (y/n) (y/l/n).”

“Okay, just, please, lose the ‘sir’ with that one, otherwise, he’ll never let it go.” Trudy chipped back in the conversation.

“So, what was it that you wanted to ask the sarge? I can assure you that we’ll let you know if it’s illegal. After all, two judges are better than one.” He suggested, all smiles.

“Since when?” The sergeant practically barked at the younger man, just to add: “You know what? You wanna be here at my front desk, Halstead? Then be here, but be quiet and let the lady talk.” She bluntly ordered him, who decided to do as he was told.

“Alright, um, it’s just that this guy who I don’t really know anything about asked me out and I said yes, even though I got a bad vibe from him?” They just stared at you with their jaws dropped, so you added: “Pathetic, I know. But I didn’t really wanna judge him without any proof, or anything like that, so I figured that, maybe, I could try and check if he has any criminal priors or something.” You finished with a tiny embarrassed smile.

“And why on Earth would you think that we could give you this type of information?” The sergeant asked you, her expression being one of pure shock.

“I, uh…” You didn’t really want to embarrass yourself even more but felt the urge to explain anyways. “It’s just that I’m a small-town girl, okay? And, over there, everybody knew my family, so, whenever I wanted to go out with someone, my dad would just ask his buddies at the Sheriff’s office to look the guy over. And he always told me that that was really important, so, when I moved to the state’s capital, I just wouldn’t go out with anyone unless a close friend vouched for him. Because I was terrified of what I’d see and hear on the news. But here… I don’t really know anyone yet.” You blurted it all out, to two strangers! To two cops who probably had something, or somethings, better to do than to listen to your whining. “Anyhow, I’m really sorry that I wasted your time, guys. Won’t happen again.” At that, they exchanged a look, and the sergeant said:

“You know what? You’re right, kid. The world is a dangerous place. And, unfortunately, it is even more dangerous for us women. So I’m gonna look the guy up. But I’m not gonna tell you exactly what it says if something comes up.” She told you, much for your surprise, and, then, turned to the detective, saying: “If you say a single word about this to anyone, and I mean anyone, Chuckles, I swear to God that I’ll cut your tongue out myself.”

“Geez, sarge. How can you swear such an ugly thing like that to God?” He asked her, in a mockery tone, while making a hilarious expression.

“Ha! Keep that up and your tongue won’t be the only thing I’m gonna cut.” She threatened him again and you couldn’t help but burst into laughter when he made a shocked expression and put his hands protectively over his crotch.

“For your information, I wanna help the girl just as much as you, so I wouldn’t say anything. You didn’t have to threaten me.” He tried to recover, as you handed her a small piece of paper with your possible date’s name.

“Oh, I know. But I wasn’t about to miss out on the opportunity.” She shot back at him while typing the name on the District’s computer. “Okay, here it is... Wow."

"What? What is it?" You asked her, as you watched the detective perk himself over the counter to look at the screen.

"Jesus. This guy's got himself quite a rap sheet." He commented, making you shiver, thinking of what could happen to you, if you went on with the date.

"What exactly do you mean by that, detective?" You asked the man who probably noticed your discomfort, because he spoke again, in a tranquilizing tone:

"No, relax. It's nothing too bad, like violent or anything. But there's some pretty nasty stuff here." He told you, not really making you relax.

"There's something here, though." That caught the detective's eye again. "His juvenile record is sealed, the only thing I can see without a warrant is an observation from his caseworker. She says something about him having violent tendencies." She told you with a sigh, taking her glasses off again. "Look, I know that I can't tell what to do and what to not do, (y/n), but, as a suggestion? Stay the hell away from this piece of work. You seem like a nice enough girl, I'd hate to see you come in here as a victim someday."

“Oh, God, no! I heard you loud and clear, sergeant! Don’t worry about it, I’m canceling that date ASAP!” You exclaimed, agreeing with her.

“That’s great!” The detective spoke this time, sounding a little too happy about the fact that you were about to cancel a date with a man who had criminal priors and violent tendencies. So both you and the other woman stared at him. “Err, I mean because you’re not gonna go out with him.” You just giggled a little at the way he was digging an even deeper hole for himself. “Because he’s a bad guy.” He added, once again getting a glare from Trudy. “You know what I mean.” He finished, defeated, not looking in your eyes.

“Well, uh,” you started, trying to keep yourself from laughing too hard, “anyways, I can only thank you both. You guys got me out of something that could be really unpleasant, to say the least.” You told them, a bit more serious this time.

“Nah, don’t worry about it. Just glad we could help.” Detective Halstead said, smiling kindly at you.

“Yeah. This time, I actually agree with you, Halstead.” The sergeant half-joked.

“Aw, that’s very kind, but, really, thank you!” You restated your gratitude, then asking: “I should probably get going now, right? Stop wasting your time?”

“It’s not like we were doing much before you got here-” Trudy began saying, but was interrupted by the detective, who quickly told you:

“Yeah, you should go. You know, cause a police District…” You knew he was right, but those two seemed like really nice people, especially after having helped you dodge a bullet, so to speak, and you’d hoped that you were finally making some friends in the Windy-City. “Anyways, um, lemme walk you out.” He offered you while motioning to the door. At that, you and the sergeant shared a look that told you she also found it weird that the detective would wanna walk with you through such a minimal distance.

“Uh, um, o- okay.” As you and Halstead walked towards the exit, you couldn’t help but notice what nice features he had. Like, your mind just kept going back to what a good-looking man he was.

“So…” He trailed off.

“So…” You answered, not really sure about what to say.

“You know, um, it’s gotta be a hell of a bummer for you. Being here in Chicago without knowing many people. This city… It’s all about finding your community.” He told you in a sympathetic tone.

“Hum…” You breathed out as you thought about it for a moment. “Yeah, well, I guess that I can only hope I’ll have better luck at making acquaintances the next time I go out to explore it.”

“Right.” The detective agreed. “Uh, listen, I know that this may sound a little too forward, but, maybe, I could show you some of my favorite places, someday? I mean, only if you’re interested! Because I don’t want you to feel like-”

“Actually, I’d very much like that! If it isn’t going to be any trouble for you…” You cut him off excitedly.

“No! No trouble at all!” He quickly assured you. “Um, thi- this is my card.” He said, lifting up a small business card for you to see. “I’m gonna write my personal number on the back of it. Call, or text me when you have some time to go out. Or if you just want someone to talk…” The handsome man added with a smile. God, what a smile.

“Okay, um, thanks, dete-”

“No, please! Call me Jay.”

“Alright,” you acknowledged, a little nervous this time, “then, thank you, Jay. Just, be advised, I can be very talkative sometimes, which means you might regret giving me this.” You warned him with a sly smile while waving the card in front of his face.

“Huh.” Jay pretended to consider it for a moment. “Is it too weird if I say I have a feeling that I won’t regret it?” He then asked you with a cute shy smile.

“Well, it sure isn’t weirder than me saying that I really hope you don’t regret it.” You confessed to him with a wink.

“Hey, are you two gonna take that flirting elsewhere on your own, or do you need me to get you a room?” You heard Sergeant Platt call out, blushing immediately.

“I’m so sorry about that!” Jay told you, looking a little flushed himself. “You should probably go now.” He added with an apologetic smile.

“Yeah, I think you’re right..” You agreed, but, as you were turning around to leave, he grabbed your wrist lightly, saying:

“Just… Don’t forget to call.” Hearing that, you snickered a little.

“I have a feeling that I won’t.” You told him, almost repeating his previous words, which got some chuckles out of him.

Now you understood the nickname.

[shortpplfedup]

Ganked from @absolutebl because it looks like fun!

1. your all time favourite bl and why?

I think at this point I may be Chief Obsessive of ITSAY/IPYTM Nation, only because I love both parts and I can't stop writing about them it seems. Why do I love it? Have you seen it? It's probably my favourite piece of any genre of TV/cinema from the past decade, period. Writing, acting, cinematography and every bit of the production from lighting to sound to costuming to hair and beyond...it's the pinnacle.

2. the one bl that scarred you for life

The bait and switch of Fish Upon the Sky has caused me severe trust issues.

3. is there any bl that made you feel very single

Honestly, Why R U? That is the singlest I've ever felt watching a BL.

4. if you could change one thing from a bl which one would it be?

I'd cut all the dubcon from TharnType. It's 75% better without it, even considering the terrible plot.

5. that one bl you detest (don’t hold back):

I hate hate HAAAAAAAATE Theory of Love. Khai reminds me so much of my first serious boyfriend and to this day I couldn't tell you why I ever bothered with that motherfucker. I wanted him to end up miserable and alone and for Third to realise he could do so much better.

6. Your top five:

I Told Sunset About You/I Promised You the Moon

Gaya Sa Pelikula

He's Coming to Me

Life Senjou No Bokura

We Best Love: No. 1 For You

7. that trashy bl you lowkey like:

A category made for Together With Me. MaxTul combined with quite possibly the worst plot in all of creation is still MaxTul.

8. your favourite korean bl (it’s important that we know):

To My Star is the best of them. It's super soft, super sweet, and SUPER GETTING A SECOND SEASON.

9. season 2? which one?

In terms of work left undone, Gaya Sa Pelikula is the one that really needs another chapter, and the one whose second season I'm looking forward to the most.

10. a bunch of dramas will air soon. which one are you the most excited for?

I know everybody is excited about KinnPorsche and Not Me and Enchante and all that but for me the only answer is Bad Buddy because first of all look at the source material and secondly look at the pedigree and thirdly look (respectfully) at Ohm Pawat thank you and goodnight.

Consider yourself tagged if you wanna.

[chalkrevelations]

UGH. I’m sure I’ll have something to say about this once I get around to the Ep 12 Reax, but I’m already skimming back through Bad Buddy Ep 12 tonight for Waikorn fic-writing purposes, and if you’re watching with a Waikorn focus, it’s PARTICULARLY noticeable how the timeskip and the bait-and-switch they pull r/t the Pat/Pran relationship weakens the episode. The curry-restaurant lunch sequence - which is also one of the places where they attempt a Waikorn no-homo - is not only unfortunately weird and awkward, acting-wise, but it makes NO sense, given what we learn later about Wai and Korn owning the bar together AND what we’ve already been told about them working together. Why does Wai have to ask Korn, and Korn have to ask Wai, about bog-standard basic gossip that should be passed during routine interaction as friends and co-workers, like how many of your faculty have gotten married? Why in the hell is Wai making small talk with Pat about whatever’s going on with Pa, when Pat - and probably Ink and Pa - are familiar with the bar and probably interact with Wai and Korn on some kind of regular basis there? It’s all very “as you know Bob” info-dumpy, and it’s not well done at all, and it irritates me to watch it, because it’s one of the places where I feel like the show was more concerned with being clever at its audience than with being consistent and organic and well-written.

Not to mention, it seems to set up a scenario in which Pat is not only isolated from Pran, but from his friendship support system, if he has NO idea what’s going on with Korn and his new BFF and co-bar-manager Wai. If so, WHO IS PAT HANGING OUT WITH THESE DAYS? His Dad? Wow, that’s bleak. Only no, the later part of the ep seems to contradict this? It makes no sense!

[woodrokiro]

Bar Service (fic)

Fandom: Bleach

Characters/Pairing: IchiRuki

Summary: Bartenders--especially bartenders around the corner from her apartment--are strictly off limits. Restaurant AU. Written for @ichirukimonth . TW warning for mentioned child abuse. 

She doesn’t think much of the restaurant a few blocks away from her new apartment.

She always passes it to and from her work commute, of course. Maybe from time to time she glanced over, musing how it looks cute enough--a great place to take a date or some friends....

Before Rukia remembers: 1. She doesn’t have the time or capacity to date, and 2. She has no friends here yet… And probably won’t for a while, considering her lifelong difficulty making them in the first place. 

It’s fine by her, honestly. She likes throwing everything she has into her job, loves doing her best to earn a smile or laugh from her patients. That’s enough social interaction for her, and at the end of the day she can go home, pour a glass of wine, switch the television on to some silly drama and order takeout without mourning the “loss” of a Friday night.

So for the first few months that she’s living in Karakura: no. She doesn’t even think about stepping foot in Amore e Morte. 

Until she gets a particularly bad case at work. 

The fact that it was a foster child case alone makes her heart hurt--but of course, there’s always more with these sort of situations. 

A little girl named Hina, aged eight but looking so much smaller waiting there in her office. The social worker sitting with her--a woman named Rangiku, who Rukia knows a little and actually quite likes--squeezes Hina’s tiny hand before pulling Rukia to the side, quietly explaining the situation. 

Physical abuse from her former home where she had been for a year. Her teacher kept noticing bruises in odd places and finally called CPS, who did nothing for two months before the behavior escalated and Hina ended up in the ER.

Her new foster mom is a real nice lady, says she hasn’t been acting out or anything but… Rangiku shrugs, flashing a reassuring smile when the little girl looks their way. You know. 

She knows. 

So Rukia does what she does best: she goes to the little girl, introduces herself by her first name, and focuses on her work until she can sob angrily in her car at lunch break. 

And when her workday is done, when her emotions are fried and she’d really like a drink or three anywhere but her lonely apartment--she sees the restaurant’s sign, glowing warmly in the dusk light. 

Amore e Morte. Love and death. A weird name for a restaurant, she thinks, and wonders if the owners either don’t know Italian and thought the name was cool or are just uppity snobs. 

If you’d stop being so cynical you might go out and actually enjoy life. She can practically hear Renji’s voice scoffing in her ear now.

She parks her car at home before walking back over to the restaurant.

--

The outside of the restaurant is nice enough, but the inside is… Well. Lovely.

Brick walls painted white make the entire place look minimalist yet cozy. A couple of trendy paintings hanging sparsely through the restaurant makes the environment chic, but not overbearing. A few hanging lanterns bring just enough light to let everyone see where they’re going, but otherwise candles are utilized at each of the tables for a romantic touch.

Rukia sees by the sheer number of couples there that it is indeed a good place to bring a date.

And by the looks of one dish smelling deliciously of chicken and bell peppers that passes her by in a waiter’s hand, the food isn’t too bad either. Rukia’s mouth waters. 

“A table for one, miss?” 

Rukia startles from her musings, feeling rather silly as the bright and cheery hostess smiles patiently back. 

“Oh! No, I don’t think that’s necessary. I wouldn’t want to take up one of your tables. Do you have bar seating?”

“Of course! Right this way.” 

The hostess leads her into an adjacent room that sits tucked away from the main dining room. There’s still a couple of tables in this room, and two of the eight bar stools are occupied but it’s so much quieter here, the noise of the dining room a mere buzz. She breathes a small sigh of relief as she takes the stool at the far end. She wanted to be out and about, just… Not that out and about.

“Our bartender Kurosaki-kun will be taking care of you. I believe he’s just in the back talking to Chef, he should be right back.”

Rukia thanks her, taking a glance at the menu. 

She quickly finds out Chef Yasutora Sado’s menu inspiration is Mexican-Japanese fusion cuisine, which is… Interesting, considering the restaurant’s name is Italian. In any case, she’s fascinated. Rukia by no account considers herself a foodie, but the thought of blending traditional Japanese dishes with Mexican spices and turning them into something like sukiyaki tacos makes her stomach growl. 

“Can I get you something other than water to drink?”

Her gaze flickers from the menu to the well-toned arm extended out toward her, pouring a glass of water. Her eyes move up the arm to the man it’s attached to. 

A handsome guy, she’ll admit: if it wasn’t for the obviously bleached orange hair, the sword tattoo on his forearm peeking out from under his rolled sleeve, and the fact that he looked like he wanted to be literally anywhere else.

If she had to pick him out from a crowd, there’s no doubt she’d know him as a bartender. What a walking cliche. 

“Yes, I’ll take--” She didn’t even take a glance at the drink menu. She looks down quickly. “Sorry. Can I get a matcha mojito?” 

He nods, his hands suddenly flying through liquors and shakers and mixes to make her drink. “You ready for food, too?” 

“Any recommendations?” 

“Everything.”

She snorts. She’d be irritated by the subpar service if it wasn’t for his small smirk at her response. 

“Seriously, everything’s good here. If you get something you don’t like, drinks are on me.”

“Risky.” Rukia lifted an eyebrow. “You place that bet with every customer?”

“Every single one.” 

She highly doubts that, but she appreciates the trust in his workplace nonetheless. She orders a couple of small plates, and he tends to his other drink orders while she sips her own. 

The food, when it comes out, is… Infuriatingly good. Infuriating because she would have loved to have scored a couple free drinks off the arrogant punk bartender, but she’ll have to swallow her pride because the sukiyaki taco is absolute divinity. She sips her second drink, already accepting that she’s gonna have to admit to him she’ll be paying full price for everything she ordered.

Unfortunately, it doesn’t look like she’ll have a chance to gloat. From what she hears next door, dinner service has picked up and with that: drink orders. He’s doing as well as he can--hands expertly flying through the liquors, garnishing the cocktails with an expert flourish before passing them on to a server--but she can tell he’s feeling the stress, particularly when he reads his second to last ticket in the rush.

“Fuck,” she hears as he rolls his eyes, stalking over to the wine cabinet. A server comes by, concerned. 

“You need anything, Ichigo?”

He waves a hand, not turning to look at his coworker. “No, no I’m fine. Just annoying when I don't open a bottle before rush, that’s all.”

The server scuttles off to tend to her tables while Rukia watches him bang a (very expensive looking) wine bottle on the counter, clumsily ripping into the foil with an opener. At one point he cuts his thumb, and he half-hazardly wraps a paper napkin around it while he tries helplessly to pull the cork up. The wine opener doesn’t grip the bottle steadily a couple of times, she waits on baited breath to see if he’ll break the bottle. After a few dangerous-looking test runs, he manages to hoist the cork up, cursing out a “fucking finally” at the sound of the cork popping.

The whole thing must have taken ten minutes.

Maybe it’s the matcha mojitos finally hitting her, but she can’t help it. She laughs. 

He shoots her a wild look and she covers her chuckles with the back of her hand. 

“Sorry, sorry! I’m not--it’s not funny. I just… That was the most atrocious opening of a wine bottle I’ve ever seen.”

Ichigo stares for a moment before scoffing, turning back to his (finally opened) bottle and pours the wine into a glass. “Yeah, well… I don’t do wine service here, lady.”

“Excuse me? That’s ridiculous. You’re a bartender.”

“Exactly. Bartender. I do cocktails, not fancy wine stuff.”

“Let me guess, you consider yourself a mixologist.”

“Don’t ever call me that. Ever.” He’s shaking his head as he moves on to his next order, but oddly enough Rukia feels like she knows he’s suddenly having a good time. “Like I said, I don’t do wine etiquette and all that. That’s for the servers.”

“I’m just… It’s hard to believe you’ve made it this far in a nicer restaurant’s bar without knowing how to open wine.”

“Not that far. I’ve been here for like, six months.” He shrugs at her inquisitive stare. “Old buddies with the chef. I bar backed in college where he was a line cook, so… And if he ever got sick of me, my sister is his sous chef. Then again, she’s more likely to fire me than he is, the brat.”

“Especially with you not knowing how to open a fine vintage.”

“Get over it. When it’s not busy I get one of the servers to help me.” He looks down, having seemingly forgotten about his paper toweled thumb. “Shit. Hang on, I gotta get a bandaid from the back--”

“I have some, if you want.” Rukia starts digging through her purse. “If there’s not some restaurant code for the kind of bandage you’re supposed to use, of course.”

“If it looks neater than a shoddy paper towel job, ‘should be fine. Thanks.”

“You’re welcome. Here.” 

He stares at her outstretched hand. She stares back, getting more irritated as she waits. 

“What?”

“... It’s a Chappy bandaid.”

“So?”

“So why are you a grown ass woman carrying around Chappy bandaids?” 

“They’re for my patients, for kids.” She’s telling the truth, technically. To say she also quite enjoys Chappy as a character does not need to be mentioned. “Do you want it or not? Swallow your manly pride or go looking for an ugly beige bandage while your tickets pile up again. Tick tock.”

“Fine! All right, already.” He takes the bandaid and starts unpeeling the paper adhesive. “You a pediatrician or something?” 

“Child psychologist.” Suddenly Rukia remembers Hina’s sweet face and feels terrible for not thinking about her once this entire dinner. 

“Jesus.” Ichigo’s shaking his head, pressing Chappy to his cut.

“What is that supposed to mean?” 

Maybe it’s the alcohol, maybe it’s the guilt, maybe it’s the fact that it’s such a weird response to her revealing her profession, but Rukia can’t help it. She narrows her eyes and crosses her arms.

If he’s uncomfortable with her sudden hostility, he doesn’t show it. He shrugs. “It’s just… I can imagine it’s a hard job. Sometimes, anyway.” 

Oh. 

“Oh,” she exhales. “I’m sorry, I--yes. It can be, yes.I just… That sort of response I’ve only ever gotten from people that don’t believe in the importance of mental health. ‘Shrink talk’ and what have you.”

“Nah, I believe it.” He’s finished his job of covering his wound and moved on to his next drink order. 

She’s abashedly stirring the ice in her glass when she barely hears him say: “I had to go to a children’s therapist once, as a kid. Helped me a lot.”

She raises her head to look at him. He hasn’t changed his facial expression, nor is there any change to his body language as he continues to do his job--but as a psychologist, Rukia can’t help but wonder whether she’s the first person he’s ever told this to. 

“Me too. When I was a child, I… A therapist had helped me, too.” She raises her glass and clears her throat. “To recognizing childhood trauma, I suppose.”

He lets out a short laugh at the sudden dark joke, a sound so quick and so… So nice she can’t stop the fleeting thought that it’s a sound she’d like to hear more of. She shoves it away. 

Bartenders are absolutely off limits. 

He raises the glass that he’s mixing a cocktail in. “Yeah. Cheers.”

--

Later when she finally picks up the check, she pauses.

“Excuse me.” She waves Ichigo down, maybe just a tad tipsy. “You got the check wrong.”

He frowns, taking the bill from her and scanning it. “What are you…”

“You forgot to put a drink on there. My third one.”

It clicks and he rolls his eyes. “Oh my god.”

“What? I’m being honest.”

“It’s on me.” He slides the receipt back to her. 

“But I didn’t dislike any of the dishes!”

“Take some advice, will you Doc? If the restaurant staff didn’t put something on your bill and you still got it, chances are: we wanted to give it to you.” They lock eyes for an intense moment before he clears his throat, looks down to wipe his (suspiciously clean) bar. “‘To childhood trauma,’ and all that. Now stop yapping so loud about it. You want everyone in the restaurant to hear about me giving out free stuff?”

She shuts her mouth at that, but one small detail about what he said is bothering her.

“It’s not ‘Doc,’ so you know. I have a name. It’s Rukia. Rukia Kuchiki.”

“Okay. Whatever, Rukia.” He turns around and waves his hand. “And I’m Ichigo. Just pay your damn bill and come back soon or whatever.”

And with that: she guesses she has a new spot.

[clusterbuck]

the brainrot is real and i am once again at a wedding thinking about buddie

i’m thinking about buck as maddie’s best man and taylor as his date, but they’ve long since decided they’re friends with benefits at the most.

i’m thinking about buck really wanting to dance, but taylor’s wearing new shoes and it’s not really working out for her. so he bothers eddie into dancing with him so he won’t be by himself, because that’s what best friends are for, right?

eddie groans but he’s good-natured about it, gamely following buck out to the dance floor, except the dj pulls a bait-and-switch and changes the music to a waltz. and buck kind of shrugs and is like “come on then,” but it turns out he doesn’t really know how to waltz, because when would he ever have had the opportunity to learn?

so eddie puts a firm hand on his waist and is just like. “buck. just follow my lead.” and starts waltzing, and buck is like *gulp* okay.

i’m thinking about how there’s no yearning quite like dancing close with someone when you think the love is unrequited, when their hand is on your waist and maybe it slips under your jacket to get a better grip, when you’re looking into their eyes and holding your breath because you’ve long since stopped being able to tell whether there’s something in their eyes or you just want it so bad you’re seeing things

[icouldhyperfixatehim]

bl/gl tag game

tagged by @pharawee bless you for thinking of me 🥰🥰

i need to put some limiters on this or i will actually wreck the head off myself trying to do it so: this will be thai shows exclusive (sorry to all my censored chinese babes, well lit korean darlings etc etc)

your all time favourite bl character and why.

pran. he's just such a full and well-deep character, so much of which is down to nanon's performance but still. he's the character whose driving "want"s i've most believed and also find beautiful; the want to inspire pride in your parents and through the things you make. the want to cook a meal for a lover you don't even have yet. the want to feel absolute safety before putting down the weight you're carrying. i just love him so much and he feels achingly tangible to me.

special mention for mork from dbk though...i love a tenderhearted bruiser. it's the ryan atwood stan in me 🤍😌

what’s your one character from a bl you wanted to punt into the stratosphere (you only get one so choose wisely).

can i choose a character type? because fujoshi. faen fatales can be rehabilitated, but fujoshis go in the black hole tysm

the best music moment from a bl

i'm not a big fan of the random singing trope, unless it's really good it gives me second hand cringe. but i do love pran's music competition rendition of just friend, and pat's coinciding crisis moments. and the deeply visceral reaction i have to the dbk theme song, if theme songs can count.

what’s a popular heterosexual text that you would like to see adapted into a bl/gl?

about time (the richard curtis movie) could be fun, a playful time travel concept with strong underscoring themes of family and joyful mundanity. or legally blonde, which truly only needs to take a step to the left to be a bangin gl

a scene from a bl that always makes you laugh?

stupid but the first thing that popped into my head was enchanté and akk's dorky moments. particularly when he makes his weird penny whistle noises at theo's very swish car. bless him. or the scenes in he's coming to me where thun is observed by non-ghost-seers in ghostly shenanigans. like the bike riding scene.

what two random bl/gl characters would make hilarious exes?

i think sammy and yacht could do something pretty off the wall with a love by chance pond and uwma manaow exes relationship 👀

and not hilarious but i still get all chinhands thinking about it: dbk kitty and bad buddy ink ft. queer women staying friends w their exes bangs my milk/apple drum.

biggest disappointment?

i love the show overall, but even w some distance i still think what happened with gram's arc and the bait and switch of gramblack in not me was a huge misstep, and it sucked to see eugene catch shrapnel over it. gramblack had a really rich and interesting dynamic and narrative to pull from, it was a shame to see it wasted and replaced w something that came off so poorly in execution, and had one of the female characters w a wedge of screen time to play with acting like a plot mannequin

who would be the funniest person to watch a bl in its entirety and which one would you make them watch.

i couldn't possibly answer this one. i watch it all with the dash baybeeee, you are all completely gas 😂🤌

best wardrobe moment/or character wardrobe from a bl.

3 will be free: mew (special mention for neo's crop tops)

bad buddy: pat (special mention for ink's big pink lesbian shirt)

dark blue kiss: pete

not me: eugene

theory of love: khai

there's a fair length on this one so feel very free to give it a hard pass but tagging @patprans @nongnaos @seeking-moonscapes @jemmo