#based on viewer count alone

[prisonpodcast]

Choosing kindness by hitting the draft button

[stupidlittlespirit]

Good Boy

Rating: NSFW (very!), mdni Type: Longform Tags: webcam show, voyeurism, sex work, masturbation, female body described, one use of gendered language ('ma'am'), virgin!Reigen, pathetic!Reigen, Word count: 5797 My other works: here on tumblr and here on Ao3! Reigen finds your webcam show and proceeds to be a pervert.

“Should I send my boss a video of what I'm busy doing?” You ask, rocking your ass back and forth. The skirt lifts when you bend down and Reigen catches a peek of your underwear when you lean over a little more. You turn until your back is to the camera and then begin to lift the skirt higher and higher as you dance, tantalisingly slow.

Reigen squeezes the base of his cock and smirks to himself. “I wouldn't bother.”

He finds the video by complete accident.

Reigen is scrolling aimlessly through the feed of his favourite porn sites, rows upon rows of explicit content at his fingertips as he trolls through videos he's seen so many times before he has them practically memorised. They don't do anything for him anymore.

He's bored of the repetitive scenarios and over the top acting, and if he has to watch another shitty, stilted skit again he's going to stop jerking off for the rest of his life in protest.

Well. Maybe he won't go that far, but he's certainly fed up with the lack of excitement.

It's closing in on one 1AM on a Friday night and Reigen is spending yet another weekend all on his own. Serizawa is busy with school friends, Dimple isn't in the mood to find a host body for a night out and Mob is likely fast asleep. If he's honest, even Reigen knows how pathetic he'd look if he asked a kid to spend his afterschool time with him.

The only other person he has to ask out is you. You're the newest member of the team and even though you've been out with all of them a fair few times, tonight you'd dismissed his suggestions with the simple excuse of being busy.

You hadn't specified what you were going to be busy with, but Reigen supposes it isn't really any of his business. He can't deny his disappointment, though.

He'd hoped you might jump at the chance for one on one time with him, and whilst he stares at the screen of his computer, desperate for something to make him feel less lonesome, the sting of your rejection is only softened slightly by the alcohol he's had for dinner.

At his feet, there are several cans of chuhai. Every time he drinks alone in his apartment, he finds that he only has two options when no one wants to be around him. One: get so wasted that he passes out before he can think too much about his misery or two: jerk off to prevent himself from thinking about his misery.

Right now, Reigen is reasonably drunk, he's totally lonely, and most of all, he's horny. He supposes he may as well achieve both outcomes at once tonight. He isn't looking for anything in particular right now, just something that might take the edge off and help him sleep a little better. His expectations of finding anything particularly exciting are very low.

However, perched at his PC, shirtless and in his sweatpants, Reigen is starting to think it might be a waste of time. Nothing seems of interest to him. It's either too weird or too boring, and he wonders if he might be better off just calling it a night.

In a last ditch attempt, he switches from his typical porn site to a newer one. One he hasn't tried before. Usually he'd watch something pre-recorded, but he faintly remembers reading something on a forum somewhere about the newest trend of cam girls.

The post had detailed how viewers could make requests for a performer to do whatever they wanted, all live and in real-time, and he has to admit it sounds a lot more interesting than viewing the same video over and over.

He clicks the first link that pops up from his search.

The website is simplistic and once he's clicked through his verifications, Reigen begins to scan the rows of people on offer. There are women and men and everything in between, but every time he selects one, the performer seems bored and uninspired. Sometimes, they're not even there.

Reigen tries the second page. He's halfway down it, not really paying full attention anymore, when abruptly one of the little preview windows looks vaguely familiar.

Squinting, he leans in to get a better view to try and place where he's seen that room before. The decor in the thumbnail looks like a place he's seen before, but he can't quite put his finger on where.

Reigen clicks it and at first, he doesn't quite believe what he's seeing. That decor, the colour of the walls, the furniture…. It's your apartment. He knows because he's been there; he's crashed on that very floor after several messy nights out, right beside the cushy bed that the camera is centered on.

He's absolutely, definitely, a hundred percent sure that that's your room.

For a second, he worries that someone might have snuck into your apartment and hidden a spy camera amongst your things without your knowledge. It's not unheard of for creeps to conceal webcams in places to catch footage of unsuspecting victims and although Reigen likes his fair share of voyeuristic content, he would never watch something that wasn't clearly a purposely set up scenario.

He reaches for his cell phone where it rests besides his keyboard, fully intending to call you and make you aware, when suddenly you're walking into frame and sitting on the bed, dressed only in your underwear, some sheer stockings and a ridiculously tiny little skirt.

You shoot the camera a coy smile and offer a little wave. “Welcome back, everyone.”

Reigen's jaw drops open.

You're on his fucking porn site.

You. Of all people.

Stunned, he watches you shift so that you can lie down on your bed, lounging leisurely on top of a thick, comfy looking blanket that covers your bedspread.

The lighting is low and moody, but there's a clearly a softer source of light emanating from somewhere behind the camera to ensure your half naked body can be seen properly.

Music is playing gently in the background, and beside the bed is a small table, on which rests a small selection of intimidating looking sex toys. There are a couple of interesting looking dildos, a chunky vibrator, and a few bottles of oil or something similar.

He watches you lean forward slightly to apparently read something on screen, your eyes scanning back and forth. Your tits press against the fabric of your bra as you shuffle up where you're resting, leaning forward to fiddle with what he assumes is your computer.

Reigen’s throat suddenly feels very dry.

Barely five hours ago, you'd been wishing him a nice weekend as you'd left the office, heading off for home to spend the weekend doing something that didn't include him. When you'd told him that you'd been too busy to go for a drink with them, he hadn't thought much of it.

Perhaps you'd been lying. Perhaps the real reason you'd said no had been to go and do this....

Briefly, he wonders if he's seeing things. Perhaps the room is simply similar to yours and you're not really you at all. Just another person who looks exceptionally similar.

He decides he needs to make sure that what he's stumbled across is the truth and not an unbelievably accurate illusion.

Reigen reaches for his phone again. Your face is just out of frame now and he can't be 100% sure that it's really you, but he's certain that he needs to find out. To test his theory, he types out a simple text, something casual to ensure that you'll have no idea that he's watching, and waits to see what happens.

[Reigen] - Hey, are you busy?

On screen there's a buzzing sound. You twist into a kneeling position to reach behind you and his blood runs cold. There's no way that it's a coincidence your phone is going off right now.

As he watches you shuffle back up to sit closer to the camera again, your pretty face comes into view and so does your cell phone, head aloft like a trophy. No doubt about it: this is no look alike.

You study your phone, reading the text and then glancing over to look at your audience. "Oh," You say, holding your phone up with a cheeky grin. “It's my boss.”

Underneath the video screen, there's a chatbox that's scrolling along, ticking upwards with each new message that pings through, and you look away from your phone to check it.

Several new chats pop up at your announcement and Reigen somehow manages to tear his eyes away from you to see what's being said.

What does he want? asks one viewer.

You laugh, soft and amused. “He wants to know if I'm busy.”

Your voice is softer than Reigen used to hearing it; teasing and intimate in a way that does something funny to his insides. A few more messages spin up in the chat:

is he cute?

Do you like him?

Would you fuck him?

Reigen swallows hard.

It's not like he hasn't thought about it. He's considered it several times, actually. In great, vivid detail. When he can't find any decent porn to get off too, he often finds thoughts of you wandering into his mind. Reigen knows it’s weird and unethical, but if no one else is aware then it's not like anyone can be hurt by it.

He's harboured a crush on you since the moment you'd walked into the office to drop off your CV and he hasn't known peace since. Every time you bend over to pick up files, he sneaks a peek at your ass. Whenever you brush up against him in passing, he prays he doesn't get hard. It's a nightmare.

When he's alone and he's given up on finding an ethical source of arousal for the evening, he’ll think about you in your office wear, or your underwear, or sometimes in nothing at all.

He's always had to imagine what you might look like naked and for some reason, he's never been able to get the vision to seem quite right. With nothing to reference, it's hard to know beyond the silhouette hidden by your clothes.

Until now, anyway.

You're leaning in close to look at the chat messages again, your tits pressed up against the thin fabric of your bra. They jiggle nicely as you move and Reigen feels his cock stir in his sweatpants. He reaches for the half-empty can of chuhai beside his PC and takes a swig to soothe his dry mouth.

“Oh yeah,” you say, biting down your lower lip. “Very cute. I'd fuck him anytime.”

Reigen almost chokes on his mouthful of fruity alcohol, spluttering awkwardly.

You begin to run your fingers up between the valley of your breasts, reaching over to toy with the lace cups of your bra and dipping your fingertips underneath the material to brush against your nipples.

“He's got such a great ass,” you whisper to the camera, biting down on your lip to stifle a smile. “I check him out all the time but he never catches me. What do you think he'd do if he did?”

Reigen's breath hitches. His face feels red hot at your confession and he knows that he's probably bright red, but can't believe what he's hearing.

The chat bumps up several rows, filled with suggestions and fantasies:

He'd punish you.

Probably promote you lol.

I bet he'd fuck you in the office.

“He would,” Reigen groans out loud to his empty room. “You have no idea how much he would.”

He's had plenty of daydreams about that exact scenario; bending you over his desk when everyone else has gone home for the day or letting you ride him while he sits in his office chair, slow and sweet until he fills you up. The thought drives him insane.

Almost of its own accord, his hand slips down to palm at his dick. There's a steadily growing wet patch on the front of his pants as pre cum begins to gather at the head and the slick friction of the fabric there only arouses him more.

“Ah,” you gasp happily as you pinch one of your nipples. “I wish.”

After a few seconds of touching your tits, you trace your hand up towards your collarbone and run your fingertips along them, back and forth slowly. It's teasing, erotic almost, and Reigen imagines your delicate fingers on his own skin, tickling along the soft flesh of his thighs or clutching at his back.

He's still reeling at your admitted attraction to him. He knows there's a chance that you're only playing things up for the camera, but he's so hard and so turned on by the notion that you might be into him that he doesn't care how true it is right now.

Rather than worry too much about the legitimacy, he hooks his thumb into the waistband of his sweats without looking away from the screen and shuffles in his seat so that he can expose his cock fully.

He knows he shouldn't really be watching this. He isn't even sure why you're on this website; he pays much more than he used to and there's no way you're short for cash, so you're not moonlighting to make ends meet. Maybe you just enjoy it?

The idea thrills him and so does the knowledge that what he's doing is forbidden. Again, he supposes that if you have no clue that he's watching you right now then he can excuse his actions…. Right?

“It's so unprofessional,” You're almost whispering now, talking softly as your touch travels to different parts of your body. “But I think about it all the time.”

Reigen reaches for the small bottle of lube that sits in the corner of his desk while you talk, squeezing some out onto the fingers of one hand. He trails it around his dick slowly, ignoring the chill and covering himself until the skin is slick and wet.

The chat pings again, except this time there's the sound of coins dropping. A pink message appears:

[400 coins] Ass shake/Dance

Briefly, Reigen is confused. He has no idea what that means and his hand pauses to check the message. Next to it is a little cartoon coin, and he realises that you've been tipped money to do an activity.

You smile brightly, however, clearly pleased by the strange sound, and slowly you get up from your seat. “Thank you so much!” You giggle, blowing a kiss to the camera.

He watches you stand and fiddle with something that looks like a TV remote, and then the quiet music in the background becomes a little louder. You begin to sway your hips in time with the beat of the music, turning on the spot slowly.

“Should I send my boss a video of what I'm busy doing?” You ask, rocking your ass back and forth.

The skirt lifts when you bend down and Reigen catches a peek of your underwear when you lean over a little more. You turn until your back is to the camera and then begin to lift the skirt higher and higher as you dance, tantalisingly slow.

Reigen squeezes the base of his cock and smirks to himself. “I wouldn't bother.”

Your skirt recedes to reveal the bare skin of your ass. You're wearing lacy underwear that barely covers your pussy and Reigen groans at the sight, watching closely as you wiggle your hips until the fat of your ass wobbles deliciously.

He barely gets ten seconds worth of a look before you're moving back to sit on your bed, and he can't help the disappointment that rises in him.

With his free hand, Reigen takes a chance and bravely types out a message in chat:

[anon] - keep going

“Ah ahh,” you chastise, clearly reading the command he's sent through. “Tip to make requests, boys, you know the rules.”

Reigen isn’t sure what he's more turned on by; the business sense or your bossy attitude.

One handed, he swiftly clicks through on the link that auto generates in chat to make an account. He spares a thanks that modern technology allows him to keep his credit card info saved online and as soon as everything has gone through, he comes right back to your room.

The chat spits out a menu, triggered by the forbidden request, that clearly states an extensive menu of services. There are lots of options, and Reigen's mouth begins to salivate as he scrolls down the list. Whilst he's busy reading, another tip comes in from a different user:

[800 coins] - topless

“Oh,” you say, grinning as you reach for your bra straps. “Stepping things up, huh?”

Your comment makes Reigen look up again and his stomach flips when he realises what's about to happen.

Teasing, you thumb down each strap, letting them fall down to your sides. You reach behind yourself to undo the clasp and very gradually, you lower the pretty lingerie until finally, the lace falls away to expose your chest to the camera.

Reigen stares at the screen, mouth open, and his hand begins to stroke his cock. He's imagined seeing your naked chest more times than he can recall but his mind's eye is nothing in comparison to the real (or rather, virtual) thing. They're gorgeous. Perfect, in fact. He's not sure that he's ever seen anything better.

Embarrassed as he is to admit, Reigen has never actually seen anyone naked in real life. He's never even fucked another person, but he's seen his fair share of porn and none of those videos compare to you.

Every fantasy he's ever had has been completely imaginary and he doesn't dare make a move to find sex in real life; being an adult virgin is horribly embarrassing and he doesn't want to risk being laughed at. For now, he'll stick to his usual viewing habits.

“Fuck.” Reigen mutters, breath hitching. His hand works the length of his cock, fist tight and slick with lube, and on screen you're reaching up to play with your nipples again.

Enraptured by your image, he tightens his grip on the bottom of his dick every time you pinch yourself gently.

You take both tits in hand and squeeze them together, biting your lower lip and grinning as chat messages pour through. It's evident that you're enjoying yourself and it makes Reigen feel slightly less guilty for being a pervert.

The languid strokes of his cock become even slower while he types out the message he'd intended to send before, heart pounding in anticipation:

[950 coins] - remove skirt/underwear

The jingle of the tip plays and your eyes light up. “Oh,” you say, leaning forward to check the request. “You're new here.”

Momentarily, Reigen's hand pauses. His username is just a randomly generated set of numbers. There's no way you'd be able to tell his true identity from, yet he briefly panics that you might have rumbled him. He holds his breath for a second.

You nibble your lower lip and smile, but his cover isn't blown. “You guys are excited today, hm?” You laugh, getting up again and shifting the camera to ensure everyone can see what you're doing.

Carefully, you make a show of lifting up your skirt and undoing the side clasp before letting it fall to the floor with a soft thump. The panties you're wearing are tiny, yet they cover you well enough that it's hard to see much just yet. You give your ass a little shake again and bend over, spreading your legs.

Relieved, Reigen's hand begins to move again and without looking away, he shirks his sweatpants completely. His body feels hot all over and being constrained by his clothing feels unbearably uncomfortable. He kicks the trousers away from him and grins at your excited laughter.

“How's the view?” You ask, squeezing your ass gently.

“Perfect,” Reigen grunts, as though you can hear him.

You're reaching between your legs now, stroking your covered pussy up and down, and Reigen moans quietly. Chat messages are stacking up below your video screen, but he only has eyes for you right now.

Deliberately unhurried, you drag your hand back through your legs and take hold of the waistband of your panties. You pull the fabric down, down, down, slipping it over your round ass until finally you're baring yourself to the world in the most intimate way.

Wetness clings to your underwear when you tug it away and you're visibly aroused by the movement, making a soft sound of pleasure.

Reigen almost cums immediately. He grits his teeth and exhales sharply, letting go of his cock and willing himself not to finish early. It would be a shame to spend himself so soon and he wants nothing more than to spend all night staring into you.

“Like that?” You ask your audience, voice a little muffled now that you're turned away.

Several messages affirm that they do, in fact, like what they're seeing.

Reigen breathes heavily through his nose and rolls his chair closer to the monitor again. He takes a second to calm himself down, though he doesn't stop watching you wiggle your backside, and once he feels capable, he types out another request:

[1000 coins] - touch yourself

This time, he follows it up with a ‘please’ and you turn slightly to see what's happening.

You smirk and move back toward the bed, choosing to sit down and spread your legs this time. The view is still perfectly clear and Reigen finds that he likes this much better; he can see your pretty face, your tits and your wet pussy all at once. Hand firm on his dick, he starts to jerk off again.

“Do you like what you see?” You giggle, hand wandering southwards.

“Fuck, yeah I do.” Reigen groans, swiping his thumb over the head. The motion sends a shiver through his body and he fumbles with his free hand and keyboard to type out an affirmative answer.

You smile, coy, and stop your fingers just above your clit. “And what do we say when we want something?”

Reigen swears under his breath. He likes this; being forced to ask nicely and hope that he's given what he wants. He doesn't know why he enjoys it, but the idea of having to plead for your attention and his own release does something undeniable to his body, and he loves every second.

The flush on his face travels down his neck and burns the tips of his ears, spurred on by his myriad of emotions.

With one sweaty hand he types out:

please

touch yourself, please

The smile that comes to your face when you notice his message is positively wicked and your hand drops lower, gathering wetness. “I think you can ask even more nicely than that, can't you?”

He doesn't care that he's paid for a simple act. What he's getting right now is more arousing than anything he could have ever dreamt of receiving. The way his cock twitches in his hand suggests his body agrees. “Please.” Reigen whispers to his empty room, voice breaking. “Fuck, please, touch your fucking pussy for me.”

Panting and moaning with every stroke of his fist, Reigen shakily taps out another desperate response.

plsaase

pls

im begging u

It's obviously the right response because you do exactly as he asks: your fingers begin to brush over your clit and you gasp at the contact. Gently, you rub yourself in tiny circles. Your skin glistens in the light and even with the music playing, he can hear your moans and sighs when your touches speed up.

Reigen jerks himself off in time with your movements. His apartment fills with the wet, oily noises of his lubed up palm on his dick and his heavy breathing, broken only by his pathetic begging for more. “Oh god,” he whines, leaning forward in his seat to grip the edge of his desk. “Fuck, fuck, fuck.”

He wants to ask for more, to see you get even more explicit, however he worries that if he lets go of his desk he might keel over. Fortunately for Reigen, another request pings in. This one goes even further.

The anonymous user tips a significant amount and much to Reigen's horny delight, asks you to use one of the larger sex toys on the table next to your bed.

A few minutes pass in which you continue to touch your clit and Reigen realises that you're getting caught up in this yourself. You're so lost in your own pleasure that you're too busy to see what your audience want.

It turns him on no end.

Eventually, you force yourself to pause and glance at the chat. There are a few annoyed messages about you ignoring them, but you pay them no mind, instead saying a breathless thank you to the new requester and reaching for a sizable, pink dildo. It's thick and decently long, and you hold it out for him to see properly.

“Should I use this one?” Your voice is fraying at the edges, strained from all your noise.

Oh yeah

Fuck yeah use it

Do it

You don't appear to need much encouragement and you sit back on your elbows, legs spreading even wider as you rub the head of the fake cock over your pussy.

Reigen imagines that instead of cool, false plastic, it's his dick that you're grinding your hips into. He pictures himself between your legs, gently slapping the swollen tip of his cock against the soft, wet folds of your cunt whilst you squirm and groan in pleasure. His moans are getting louder now, unrestrained and wrecked, and he knows he sounds like a girl but he can't find it in himself to give a fuck.

Again, he almost cums, but rather than let it happen he allows himself to get as close as he dares and then stops touching completely. He has plenty of time to draw this out; you haven't even put the dildo in yet.

You're still circling it around your hole slowly, grinning and chewing on your lip in anticipation of what's to, rather ironically, come.

Sweat trickles down Reigen's neck. He's over stimulated and unbearably turned on, body red hot and flushed. He reaches for his drink again and takes a quick gulp before picking right up where he left off.

“Wanna see me fuck myself?” You tease, peering at the message box.

Reigen is the only one who responds. He knows it's likely because every other person in here is too busy getting off to answer, yet he seizes the chance to catch your attention.

yes please

Your warm smile returns and he finds himself smiling too, enjoying the way your expression softens. “You're a sweetheart, aren't you?” You say fondly, sitting up a bit more.

Reigen grins and nods, even though he knows you can't see him. He dials up his politeness, practically gagging for your attention, and moves his hand down to stroke along the sides of his dick, teasing himself as he type:.

yes ma'am

Something changes in your gaze at his message, hot and intense, and you start to circle your clit again. “Ask me again.” You sigh happily. “Be a good boy.”

Reigen's brain almost short circuits at your comment. He moans again and tips his head back, hand working hard between his legs. “Oh, my god.” He chokes out, scrambling to answer via his keyboard. “Fuck, that's- say that again.”

please ma'am

pls fuck urself

ill do anything i swear

just call me that again

You're clearly entertained by his request. Even more so, you appear to be turned on by it. Slow and steady, you ease the dildo into yourself, keening loudly at the sensation yet still managing to fulfill Reigen's request.

“Good boy,” you breathe, smiling wide. “You're such a good boy for me.”

Reigen makes a humiliating noise. It's a mix of a moan and a sob, and he stops jerking his cock in favour of fucking his own hand instead. His hips buck forward wildly, uncontrollable and desperate, and he attempts to match the tempo in which you fuck yourself.

He watches in awe as you drive the dildo into your cunt, arousal dripping down the length of it and leaving it shiny and slick.

“Oh, fuck,” Reigen chokes out breathlessly, grinding into his fist like he's fucking you himself. “Don't stop, fuck, don't stop.”

His moans mix with yours on screen and if he could bear to close his eyes, he might imagine that this is what it feels like to be inside you. As it is, he can't bear to look anywhere but at you.

Your hand is moving quickly now, pumping the toy in and out while you rub your clit just as fast, crying out in pleasure.

Reigen's girly moans pick up in pitch and he begs you with everything he has: “Keep going, please, I-ha! You feel so good, so good, fuck!”

As though you can hear his pleas, you don't relent your movements. Your tits bounce with the force that you're fucking yourself with and you groan every time you hit a good spot.

It's obvious that you're no longer playing along with whatever your audience wants; You're lost in the sensation and Reigen is completely beside himself, right there with you.

His chair rocks and creaks underneath his moving weight and he scrunches up his bare toes against the wooden flooring to stay put, listening to you as you continue to encourage him.

“You're my good boy, aren't you?” You pant, eyes closed. “Touching yourself just like I asked….”

“Yeah,” Reigen whimpers. “I swear, just for you, whatever you want.”

“Fuck,” you sigh on screen, angling the toy. “Fuck.”

Reigen can barely breathe. He's sweating profusely, rivulets trickling down his brow and blurring his vision, and he can feel something tight and white hot coiling in his lower belly.

The pressure is building slowly, growing with every pass of his fist and every moan you make on his monitor, and his ability to speak unravels. He's babbling about anything and everything, eyes darting from your pussy to your face, and the feeling in his belly spikes.

“Oh, god, oh fuck,” he whines, long and low. “I'm gonna cum, I'm- please, let me cum!” His pathetic moans hitch and in their lull, he hears you speak a single word that sends him crashing over the edge:

“Reigen!”

You cry his name quietly, sweeter than a prayer, and shudder as you climax with him.

Unable to stop it, Reigen's orgasm hits him so hard he almost blacks out for a moment. He cums hard, spilling all over his fist and stomach, his toes curling and body convulsing with intense pleasure. He ducks his head and shouts something unintelligible, drool dripping down from his open mouth to mix with the mess on his hand.

The aftershock of his orgasm has him spasming in its wake, muscles twitching and cramping as he heaves for breath. Reigen releases his cock and slumps back in his chair, panting hard like he's run a marathon.

He's fairly confident that it might be the best orgasm he's ever had.

On screen, the music has stopped and there's only the sound of your laboured breathing filling the silence. You're panting hard, pussy spread by your toy, and you look wrecked. Your hair is a mess, your eyes are half-lidded, and underneath you the blanket is soaked.

Reigen wipes the sweat from his forehead with his clean hand and takes a few minutes to gather his bearings. He sees you remove the toy slowly and place it back on the bedside table before you sit back down, cross legged, on the bed. You avoid the wet patch, wrinkling your nose and flipping the blanket over to prevent yourself from sitting on it, and you pause to catch your breath. Your chest rises and falls rapidly for a minute, and he watches you catch your breath.

Clearly you're a seasoned professional however, because you go back to checking your chat messages only minutes later. Every user in the room is overjoyed with your performance and Reigen has to agree. He's never seen a porno anywhere near as sexy as what he just witnessed and he's not sure he ever will.

Reigen reaches over for the box of tissues next to his computer and carefully wipes up the mess on his hand. There's cum on the floor too and when he's confident that his jelly-like legs won't let him fall off the chair, he leans down to clean it up.

Once everything is less sticky, Reigen checks the chat. There are a good few messages pinging up and they make him smile, big and stupid, and more than a little smug:

Who is Reigen?

Fuck, he's a lucky guy

Wish I was him

Listening to you moan his name, watching your face whilst you'd fucked yourself silly, it's all imprinted on his brain forever.

He's still reeling over the fact that it was his name on your lips as you came. You've never shown interest in him like that, at least not to his knowledge, and if you've been getting yourself off to the thought of him anywhere near as much as he has to you, Reigen wonders if it might be worth catching a few more of these streams until he can find the courage to see if you might want to to go out sometime.

You're putting your lingerie back on when he looks back up to you again. There's a glow to you that only appears after a good fucking and Reigen's stomach summersaults. He knows that the small crush he has on you is going to snowball dramatically now.

He won't be able to look you in the eye again without thinking of the sounds you've made tonight. That being said, he’ll worry about how to deal with the awkwardness and the shame of spying on his subordinate once he's sober tomorrow morning. For now, he’ll enjoy the rest of his evening watching you.

You don't acknowledge the chat’s questions about who you're thinking of in your intimate throes, instead choosing to finish getting dressed and then grabbing your phone from where it sits at the end of your bed.

“Now I really should reply to my boss,” you tell the chat, leaning across the gap to click something with your mouse. “One second.”

The stream mutes and your fingers move back and forth over the phone keypad quickly. There's silence, and then Reigen's cell vibrates loudly. It scares the shit out of him and he snatches it up, staring at the screen.

Sorry. I was playing online. Maybe we can hang out tomorrow?

Reigen grins and fires back the smartest reply he can think of.

[Reigen] - Don't wear yourself out ;)

On his monitor, he sees you laugh silently, head tipped back and smiling wide, and his heart skips a beat.

Tomorrow it is.

[we-out-here-simping]

Wasting Time.

(s.h. x gn!reader)

summary: given everything happening in Hawkins, Steve ends up pushing you away too far.

word count: 6k+

warnings/tags: no pronouns used (gender neutral reader); no y/n used; sad; i dont plan on writing a part two to this; s4 stuff; insecure reader; death; loss; injuries; mention of steve's parents; ollie is the real mvp in this tbh; unresolved? yay;

a/n: based off of Lizzy McAlpine’s song, “..what are we?” This was meant to be below 2k. I fought it to keep it below 2k. I lost, immensely and pathetically so. but that's okay.

as for my other stuff, I truly don't know when I'll post it. I've got pretty important things I have going on in life and i really need to do well in a life altering test next year so everything else is on the back burner rn. sorry to those who are really looking forward the next parts but don't u worry I will post them ;)

my masterlist

You shouldn't be at the store alone. 

Considering the recent murders in Hawkins. You really, truly shouldn't be alone. 

It isn't like you wanted to be. But the owner of the store you worked at did not necessarily give two shits about you. Refusing to pay you if you didn't show up for a few days. So, it isn't like you had much of a choice.

You sat on the rickety old swivel chair, that your asshole boss wouldn't change. The news was playing non-stop in the background– never in your entire life have you had the news channel on for so long.

The new chief of police was being interviewed by the reporters, telling the viewers to stay calm and assuring that they had it all under control. It didn't help to ease your mind. 

You were not calm. Not one bit.

With each movement you made, the rusty metal of the chair groaned underneath you. 

You were thinking of calling him again.

You rotated a little. The chair screeched again. 

Why hadn't he even bothered to call you back yet?

Your leg bounced. The metal creaked.

Frustrated, you abandon the stupid chair with a pathetic scoff. Opting to just sit on the counter, facing away from the door. You gripped the edge of the surface, teeth gnawing at your lips as you looked at his jacket draped atop the chair you were occupying just seconds ago. His jacket.

What if he didn't want you to call him? Your grip tightened. 

You haven't heard from your boyfriend since thursday. 

You both had planned to go out on friday— the boy hadn't exactly told you where he had planned for you two to go. He had instead told you to, “Wear something cute like you always do. Bring Ollie with you if y’wanna and I'll pick you up from yours at 5?”

You had bought a new outfit, a couple weeks prior. you had put all your last month's salary into it. Your favourite colour.

You did your hair, a little bit of your face as well. Looking in the mirror, you had looked….. nice.

Something about that realisation had conjured up a lump in your throat. It was rare that you considered yourself good looking. Which is probably why you barely ever dressed up. But at that moment, as you looked in the mirror, a smile grew on your face, one that couldn't be contained. 

You couldn't wait for Steve to see you. 

You were ready before the clock even hit 4:35.

You waited. No sign of him. 

When the clock hit 5:15, you went out onto your driveway, your dog, Ollie following behind you. You waited, pacing the concrete.

6:05, you were sitting on the stairs infront of the door, your dog's head on your lap. You waited.

6:45, your shoulders were slumped, your own head rested on your knees. Ollie napping beside you. You waited.

7:27, it was dark, Ollie whined to go back in. your eyes stung a little. But you scratched him behind his ears and decided to wait out just a little more. 

When the clock hit 8:00, you finally got up, dusting the dirt and dust off your brand new clothes. Blinking back the salty tears, you quietly went back to your room after giving your dog his food and water. You changed into your ugly PJs, not bothering with anything else, as you buried yourself in your blankets. 

Soon, you heard scratching on your bedroom door, your dog waiting to be let in. 

You smiled with a sniffle, letting him jump onto the mattress with you despite your mom’s strict rule to not let the dog onto beds, sofas or carpets. the dog whined a little before laying next to you. 

Ollie loved Steve. They had not exactly started on the right foot when Ollie almost bit the boy when you had tried sneaking him in one night. But after some time, they both warmed up to each other– to the point where it became common for Ollie to tag along with you and Steve on dates. 

“I'm sorry bud”, you stroked the fur on his head, "i know how much you like hanging out with him." He whined again, warm tongue licking your fingers. 

You knew he didn't really understand, a dog couldn't understand insecurities and the utter disdain of being stood up by someone you loved. Yet here he was, sharing your sorrows and wordlessly warming up your blues. Not there because he empathised with you or pitied you but there because he loved you.

The next morning when you woke up, you went immediately to your bathroom, to try and clean the mess that you hadn't the previous night. 

Your eyes were red and puffy. You did look like someone who cried themself to sleep. You tried to scrub it all off, not even bothering with being gentle with your poor skin.

You didn't feel pretty when you looked in the mirror now. You felt pathetic. 

“Honey!” your mom shouted from the kitchen, downstairs.

“Yeah, coming”, you shouted back as loudly as you could– which wasn't very loud at all.

As you climbed down, you were met with Ollie, tail wagging, nails clicking against the floor. 

“Would just not take the breakfast from me”, your brother commented, handing you the dog bowl that was filled with Ollie’s food, “What a dramatic son of a bitch.... literally”

The dramatic son of a bitch in question, looked up at the two of you with big round eyes, tongue out, drool spilling out on the floor. You held up a finger, the dog immediately sat down– wagging tail sweeping the floor behind him. You finally put the bowl down and told the dog to dig in.

“Did you make him sleep in the bed again?” your mother spoke from behind her magazine.

“Why would I do that?” you lied as you refilled his water bowl.

“Because when I came to call you for dinner last night, he was sleeping on your bed, with you.”

“Oh”, a sheepish expression over your face, “I'll clean the bedsheets, okay?” 

“and why did you skip dinner–”

Your mother thankfully got interrupted by the loud sound of the front door opening, followed by quick footsteps. “Did you check the news?”, your dad panted, he moved towards the tv in the living room, not bothering to take off his running shoes. 

“No, dad. It's only you who is boring enough to watch the news”, your brother’s joke landed flat.

“What happened?”, your mother asked, brows furrowed. 

“A Hawkins student was found dead.”

The bell above the door rang, you turned to look at the customer and you felt as if your heart had hit a rib.

There was Steve Harrington, bursting in through the doors, wearing clothes you'd never seen him in before.

He wasn't alone. The boy was accompanied by Dustin Henderson, Max Mayfield, Lucas and Erica Sinclair, Robin Buckley, and Nancy Wheeler. Most of them looked to be covered in dust, grime and worse.

They, without looking in your direction, broke into groups of two, one led by the older girls and the other by Steve, moving frantically through the aisles to get what they needed. It must have been an emergency. Considering all the recent happenings, it might be. 

After a few minutes, the group led by Nancy and Robin stood infront of the counter and you started billing everything. A couple minutes later, the group led by Steve joined them as well. It is when they are pouring the stuff onto the counter when Steve finally notices that it's you. 

His movements stuttered a little as if he'd just remembered that you worked here and he opened his mouth to say something but closed it before anything could come out.

The silence was awkward and deafening– the others definitely noticed. The only sound that came was the beeps of the scanner. You wondered if Steve had told them about the both of you. 

When you moved to put everything in a bag, Steve stepped a little closer to help with putting all the stuff into the grocery bags, it is then that you noticed the boy's skin.

The skin which you knew to be soft to the touch was covered in dirt. Slashes and cuts wound around his neck, a piece of dirty cloth peeking from under the hem of his camo shirt. Blood. 

You didn't realise you were frozen stuck until you heard him clearing his throat. 

You realised that that the boy had already paid the total, the crumbled up cash placed on the counter. The rustling of the grocery bags alerted you that were moving to leave.

“S– Steve?” your voice came out an unsure whisper.

They all stopped. He looked over his shoulder, then back to his friends, “You guys go on”, he said to them, handing the two bags he was holding to Lucas and Dustin, “ I'll be out in a minute” They silently nodded before leaving to get into a van.

You spoke up when the bell above the door rang on the door closing, “Wh– what is happening?” 

He stood across from you, on the other side of the counter, not making any efforts to come closer as he normally would– maybe hoping that you wouldn't see the wounds that you had already seen. “Nothing”, he cleared his hoarse throat,  “I'm– I'm sorry for friday–”

Sorry? Is that all you get?

“You're covered in blood and dirt”, you pointed out.

“Trust me it just looks worse than it actually is”, he let out a dry chuckle.

“Whose van is that?” your vision flickered to the winnebago parked infront of the store.

“A friend’s.”

“Which one?”

“Munson.”

“Munson? Like Eddie munson? Have you heard the news?--”

“Yeah I have”, his words came out quick, “and it isn't him.”

“How are you so sure?” your eyebrows drew together.

“I just.. “, he paused, “I just am.”

“And how did you get those? '', you said, nodding to his wounded neck. You wanted to touch him, to hold him, but there was still a counter between the two of you, and closing that distance felt.. wrong like you weren't supposed to do it.

“I got in a fight.”

“With what, a barbed wire?” it came out snappier than you had intended. You really tried to not hold his face in your palm.

“No”, his tone grew more frustrated with every question you asked.

“Then who?”

“No, why do you–”

“Cuz I'm– I'm worried about you Steve.” you interrupted to continue your rambling, “You could get like– tetanus or shit–”

“Hey, hey”, for a second you thought he was going to hold your face like you wanted to do to him, instead he placed his palm on your shoulder, “I’m fine, okay? I don't want you to be worried about me.”

“How the hell am I supposed to do that?” you whispered. “I just want you to tell me what's happening.” his hands fell back to his sides. “Just let me in”

“Nothings–”

“No! Something is happening”, you interjected, angry, worried, “Okay? I know. I know you don't always tell me everything. And that's fine, y'know– I thought you’d tell me when you felt like telling me but don't–” you take a quick breath, slowing down your quick words,  “Don't– do you not trust me enough to tell me?”

“I do. But there isn't anything to tell you”, he tried his best to shrug while trying not to pull on the scabbing of his bloody torso– he held back a wince, “Nothings happening.”

There’s a beat.

You can tell he’s lying.

“Why didn't you show up on friday then?” you barely give him a couple seconds to answer before continuing, “God, when I heard someone had died that night, I– “ you stopped before he could hear the quiver of your voice, you gulped. “I called you fifteen times”

“I was at work”

“I went there the next morning to check– it was only Keith there. Told me you'd left already." He opened his mouth before closing it up again.

“Why are you lying to me?”

“And what is Nancy doing with you–” you hated that you were jealous, you never wanted to be that person. Hell, you and Nancy were almost friends in high school. But you couldn't lie and say that it didn't hurt to see them together right after he had bailed on you.

“Well if you noticed, it isn't just me and her, y’know. No need to be jealous–”

“Yeah, I will be jealous, okay? I will be jealous if you start hanging out with your ex and start ditching our dates–”

“I didn't ditch you–”

“I waited for three hours steve. You didn't even call me after or give me heads up. And you already know about everything that's happening in town, so I'm sorry I was worried shitless and you didn't even pick up my calls. And now you're with all these people– which is fine– they’re your friends but your ex is a part of these people. And you're bleeding and definitely wounded, and you won't tell me anything.”

“I will tell you okay, I just–”

“So, not now?”

“I'm running a little late–”

“To what?”

“I'll tell you later okay?”

“When?”

“Just later! Okay? I need to go and you're wasting my–”he stopped himself, seemingly having dug himself a hole. He quickly tried to correct himself, “I need to–”

Your heart had surely stopped, “What did you just say? I'm wasting your time?” tears pricked your eyes, “Is that what this is? A waste of time? Is that what the last eight months have been for you?”

“You know I didn't mean it like that”

“Then what did you mean?”

“I didn't– I ….”, he trailed off. The horn beeped and you heard a muffled shout for Steve's name in Dustin's voice.

You sniffled, “are you gonna get those taken care of at the hospital?” you referred to his wounds, your voice was suddenly so much quieter. 

“....yeah”, he said after a moment– lying.

You nodded. “You still need to clean it up and”, you picked up rubbing alcohol, a painkiller bottle from the shelf behind you and some bandages, “bandage it.. ‘til you go to the hospital.” you tossed them over to him. 

The horn of the winnebago blared. Steve looked back at the door, he reached for his wallet but you stopped him, “you don't need to. It's fine.” Steve heard you sniffle again. 

“Baby–”

“For the record… it wasn't a waste of time for me", your voice cracked, “But I'm really sorry if I wasted your time.”

He stepped closer, shaking his head a little but you weren't looking up, eyes trained on the grain of the wooden counter, trying your darndest to not let the tears fall.

“You should go now.”

“honey–” the horn blared.

“Just go, Steve.”

You only dared to look up when you heard the bell above the door ring. Your vision was blurry as you watched the vehicle drive away. 

Honestly, you get it. you understand. 

You understand if the guy you loved wasn't willing to let you in. And despite how much it hurt, you couldn't keep him to yourself. You weren''t sure what this entire thing meant. Did you just indirectly say that it was over? Did you want it to be over? Were you willing to let it be over? To let him go? 

“C’mon”, he stood at your door with expectant eyes. 

You scoffed before looking back at the clock— your parents werent coming home until another half an hour, “alright fine”, you gave in.

After you put your shoes on, you reached for the door handle to shut the door behind you but there was Ollie standing right on the threshold, tail wagging. The dog gave a soft ruff, looking up at you with expectant eyes. 

“Please don't bring him along too.”

You smirked, “Ollie you wanna come for a walk?”, the boy beside you groaned playfully.

The dog barked happily before spinning around in circles. His nails clicked against the floor as he sprinted to where his leash and jacket were kept. “Alright, bud”, you moved to put Ollie's jacket on him and hooked the leash onto his collar.

The dog walked infront of the two of you. The sun had set and the three of you were walking under the warm yellow pavement lit up by the streetlights. Ollie would stop every now and then to sniff at a bush, tree trunk or lamp post. 

“When will he stop third wheeling us?” Steve finally spoke up beside you.

“Never.”

“This was supposed to be a romantic walk in the snow and now he’s pooping and pissing all over the winter wonderland– wont be a white christmas anymore”

“Oh, shut up. You love him, I know it”

“Yeah, whatever”, he shook his head with a smile.

“By the way, to what do I owe the pleasure of a romantic walk?”

“Wha– ? babe, You say as if I'm not romantic”

“No, you are. But I thought you were going to that christmas party with your parents.”

“Yeah that was until my dad started being an asshole after too much egg nog. So, I booked it”, he shrugged nonchalantly.

“Oh, I’m sorry Steve”

“Eh, it's okay– Jesus Christ, Ollie, how much territory are you gonna mark, boy?’

“Steve..”, your fingers reached for his palm. You both stopped, he looked down at where your hands were intertwined before giving it a squeeze.

“I'm okay. Okay?”

You look at him for a bit. Despite wanting to, you dont push further. You squeezed his hand back, “okay.” his shoulders relaxed. 

You started walking again, pulling yourself further into the boy's side, resting your cheek on his shoulder. It dawned on you then that you had forgotten to wear any jacket or sweater and now you were freezing.

“I’m cold”, you whined through your smushed cheek, the boy chuckled.

“Of course you are. You don't wear one, but make sure the dog’s wearing a jacket– great priorities babe”

“Well, I have you, don't I?” you said, giving him your biggest puppy eyes and the most over-exaggerated frown.

“Yeah, “ he sighs, handing you the leash he was holding, “you do.” He took off his jacket he was wearing over his his fuzzy sweater and helped you put it on. “Better?” he gestured towards the leash to take it back.

You returned it and nodded with a proud grin, “you've fallen under my trap”

“Yeah? what trap?” he muses while smoothing down the crinkles in his thick sweater.

“This…..”, you smirked, “is mine now”, you declared, pulling the material tighter around you. 

“Oh, no! The jacket stealing trap! What will I ever do?” he brought his to both his cheeks, shaking his head in pretence worry. You laughed.

“Y’know…”, he started– the corners of his mouth curling up, “I would give you all my jackets if you…… Kiss me?”

“Oh, yeah? That depends…”, you crossed your arms,  “How many jackets do you have?”

“Oh, so many– like a million” he shrugged. Both your steps slowed down to a halt. “Billions….. gazillions”

“Wow, babe, that's a lot of kisses”, you moved in a little closer to him.

The leash in Steve's hand tugs accompanied by Ollie whining, the dog came closer to the two of you who were leaning into each other. The dog started pulling on Steve's jeans.

“Hey! Dickhead, I'm having a moment here”

“Hey! don't call him a dickhead”, you admonished.

“Well, he’s acting like a dickhead.”

You glared at him. 

“What? We were about to have a lovely romantic kiss before he so gracefully interrupted”

“Why do you have a rivalry with my dog?”

“He’s my arch nemesis”, he said with narrowed eyes directed towards the puppy.

You playfully rolled your eyes before taking the leash from Steve's hand and walking ahead. You laughed as you said, “Oh, please, you're just jealous because I love him more”

“I’m not jeal– what did you just say?”

“Wh– what?” you stopped in your track before turning around, brows furrowed.

“Oh, you just said something”

“What did I–”

“You said you love him more than you love me. That implies you love me.” he explained, walking closer to you. “You said you love me”, he stated with a shy smile as he stood directly infront of you.

“.. did I?” heat crept up your cheeks.

“Yeap, it was loud and clear. Even Ollie heard it. Right bud?” the dog barked in response as if actually had a clue of what was going on in the conversation.

“Oh, so now youre both working together? You know what? yeah, well, so what? I said it. I love you. You got a problem with that?”

“No… I'm pretty okay with it actually”

“Just okay?”

“More than okay. Perfect. Infact, I love you too.”

A shy smile grew on your features, same on his. The two of you leaned in but stopped mid-way when Ollie ruffed. You groaned, pulling away before saying with a stern voice, “Ollie, sit.”

“Little shit, only listens to you”, the boy infront of you mutters as the dog settled down and sat down. You glared at Steve. “Sorry”, he apologized, his head hanging low.

“Now, where were we?” you pull him in by grabbing a fistful of his fuzzy sweater, your lips slotting against one another. An arm wrapped around your waist, the other helped tilt your head. You too held his face back, the other hand snaking down to his waist where the fingers hooked through the belt loops.

You pulled away when his movements started to become a little faster and his hand started moving lower, “Okay, okay. I…  its getting late– my parents are gonna be here soon”, you heaved.

“We were only getting to the good part”  he whined through laboured breaths.

“Kissing me wasnt the good part?”

His eyes widened, “I– I mean”, he scoffed when he noticed the sly smirk on your face, “Stop messing with me.”

You tugged lightly on the leash to get Ollies attention who had started to dig a hole in the snow, “c'mon Ollie.”  the dog’s tail wagged before he shook the snow off of him. The dog took the lead as the two of you ambled behind him.

Most of the walk back was holding hands silently, looking around at the christmas lights everyone in the neighbourhood had put up. When you were almost two houses away from yours, you spoke up, “you know. You could… stay the night?”

Steve looked at the pavement as the two of you walked, you looked at him with expectant eyes. He sighed before finally answering,“You know what? Sure.”

“But you would have to sneak out through the window later”

“Window? With these joints? I'm old.” he frowned.

“Oh, my poor, poor twenty year old boy”, you frowned back with a mock pitying look as you unlocked the main door and removed Ollie’s leash and jacket. 

You and Steve wasted no time after that, running up the stairs to your room. As soon as the door was closed behind you, Steve was on you, plump and slightly cold lips moving fast against yours. 

“Well, you're eager aren't you?”

“What? No…” he smiled against your skin, a giggle erupted from your throat as the sensation tickled you.

You were about to go back to attaching your lips to his when you heard a woof followed by the wood of the door scratching. The both of you sighed, foreheads touching.

“That little shit”, Steve huffed, “what an attention whore.”

You laughed through uneven breathing before moving off the door and then letting the dog in.

You heard the door downstairs opening and closing followed by your mother’s voice telling you she was home. You quickly went downstairs telling Steve and Ollie to stay quiet.

The boy took a seat at the edge of the mattress, the dog came to stand infront of him for a bit– tail wagging. The dog hopped on his back legs, front paws scratching at Steve's jeans. Steve reached down to scratch him behind the ears, “y’know Oliver. You're real cute and all. But you're one big cock block”

You really shouldn't have been alone. 

It all happened so fast. One moment you were wallowing in your own self pity, the next moment, the lights were flickering and soon the ground started rumbling beneath you. 

Now, as you were hiding underneath the counter of the store you worked at, the walls shook and ground rumbled. All you could think of was your family, dog and Steve Harrington. 

Of course, the world decides to end today of all days.

There was so much smoke. All you could see was black, maybe your eyes were closed, maybe there was a blackout. But something was on fire– there was so much smoke. Your eyes were watering and your throat burned, coughs uncontrollably tearing from your throat. You felt light headed, soot stuck to your sweaty skin. 

You really wanted to go home right about now.

Some rest sounded nice. Maybe some sleep.

You felt yourself succumbing to sleep, eyes drooping on their own accord. Breath slowing down. The corners of your vision went black.

It quieted down for a second. It wasn't too much for a second. 

Sleep sounded like the perfect thing. 

“Help!” a small terrified voice broke through the silence.

“Help!” it came again from somewhere outside the store. You somehow managed to will your muscles to move. You peeked from under the table and through your watery eyes you saw a boy who looked to be younger than you, flailing his arms in the air, limping. 

Your body worked on its own accord. Muscles and bones working on autopilot. You crawled from under the counter, grabbed your water bottle and Steve's jacket. Your movements were jerky as you spilled the water onto the fabric, wetting it before putting it over your nose and mouth– a makeshift mask. 

You ran. You left your safety bubble and ran. You ran despite the ash in your lungs, despite the shake of your fingers, lightheadedness, and the lactic acid settling in your tired muscles. In your disorientation and franticness, the stupid rusty chair hit your back, the heavy metal smacked hard against your skin but you still ran. You stumbled to open the door, shouted for him to run and pulled him in. You put your bootleg mask to the boy’s mouth.

The rumbling of the earth had quieted down a little; enough to allow you to help him walk over to the desk– your safe bubble. 

You were just about to reach it when another wave hit, the ground shook and both of you lost your footing. The boy huddled to you, you moved to cover him to the best of your ability. The aisle next to you groaned and when you managed to look, it was swaying. 

You tried to get away. 

“Move!” you shouted, your voice barely audible over the rumble. The boy shook under you. In a last ditch effort, you pushed him away. 

You tried to get away, trying to crawl away yourself, but the heavy metal shelves hit your spine. Your head smacked against the tiles. 

You heard shouting, you weren't sure if it was the boy or you. Your ears were ringing. your limbs felt like jelly buried under the rubble. And you really didn't feel like you could get up. You couldn't really see anymore, the darkness from the corner of your vision had finally spread.

It hurt. It hurt so much that you weren't sure where it hurt or if it was still hurting. You tasted metal, felt a trickle run down the nape of your neck. You felt a little cold. The boys voice came in and out, none of the words truly registering in your brain.

God, you really missed your bed. 

You missed ollie. You wished you could pet him again, give him his favourite treat, help him sneak into a bed again.

You missed your parents and your brother. What wouldn’t you do to have one more dinner together.

You missed steve. How you wished you could go back to that winter evening when you fell asleep in his warm arms. When you’d held his hand. You really wanted to hold his hand, hold him close, kiss him.

You felt fingers wrap around your wrist. “I'm gonna try to pull you out”, you barely heard the young boy say through a lumpy throat, you felt a tug on your arm. Pain shot through you. He pulled again, You didn't move. A scream of pain ripped from your chest.

“No!” you screamed, words coming out all slurred up. “No, stop! Just hide under the table and call the ambulance when it's over!” you still couldn't see.

“But–”

“It's okay! You’ll be okay, Ju-- just go!”

“I'm not– your– you're bleeding”, he gripped your shaking palm, “J– Just stay awake!”

“No, Go!” you tried your best to shout but it came out as only a whimper.

The warmth left your palm, you sighed in relief. You really didn't want a kid to see you dying. 

A few seconds later, you felt a pressure on the side of your head, a hit of a familiar scent hit you– Steve's cologne. Steve?

“Steve..?”

The box in your hand was as heavy as lead as the lady led you through the Hawkins high gym which had now been turned into a makeshift infirmary for the people who had been affected by the earthquake. 

You didn't remember much from the night of the earthquake, you remember falling and hitting your head, the pain and someone holding your hand. Your delirious brain in its haze had convinced you that it was Steve's warm hand. That he had come back and held you while the ground shook. The carbon monoxide poisoning had truly got to you.

Much to your delusional brain’s dismay, It was when you woke up a day later; your parents told you it had been infact a boy a few years younger than you. You later found out that the young boy– Andy, although overall fine, had broken his leg. He and his family packed everything up and moved out of town a week later.

Your muscles were still sore. The stitches and the bandaging over the big gash on your back was tight around your ribs. You had also acquired a wound on the side of your head and though you had bled, you were lucky enough to not bleed to your death or die of a haemorrhage. The paramedics had to shave off a part of the back of your hair to be able to apply the gauze properly. And you were a little embarrassed about it– you guessed you'd have to shave it all off now. You weren't sure how long you'd be willing to wear your brother old, musky baseball hat– you also weren't sure if it was a good idea to put that abomination anywhere near a wound.

"seems like you have clothes and blankets; that one", she pointed to a table with heaps of clothes piled on top of it. They looked to be freshly donated as they were in the middle of being neatly folded by--

"Steve, take these as well, will ya'?" the women beside you said.

He looked up, stilling for a second, “Hey.”

"oh, you seem to know each other. swell!" she clapped her palms before leaving the two of you alone.

“Hey… I uh– I came to donate these”, you put the cardboard box on the table infront of him, “Its uh– its mostly blankets”

“Oh, okay.”

“I– I have a couple more boxes in the car.”

“Okay.”

The walk to your car was a silent one, a little awkward. Surely, your last interaction playing in his head as well. As you weaved through the people, you noticed Dustin Henderson, limping as he gave water to some of the patients. And you had already noticed the scars on steves neck. You really wanted to ask what happened.

“Is everyone in your family okay?” he spoke up shyly, clearly trying to ease the tension even a bit.

“...yeah,”

My brother can't hear out of his left ear anymore.

“Yeah, everyone…”

My dog died. 

“Everyones fine.”

“Are you fine?”

You nodded quickly.

You really didn't want to tell him about the giant bruise spread across your back and torso. You didn't want to tell him about the gash on your back or the bandages hiding under your baseball cap. You certainly did not want to tell him about how you were stuck in that rubble for hours with a kid holding your hand, while you had thought that it had been him in your half-conscious state.

“What about you?” you echoed, “Your– your neck?”

“Yeah, yeah– uh.. I’ll be fine.”

Your chest tightened, you swallowed. How did small talk become so hard? 

The two of you approached your car, you popped open the trunk, and there were three more well-taped boxes waiting. 

You picked one up. “Here, let me–” he picked up the other two. Both of your tried your best not to wince at the strain. “Wow this is a lot”, a half-minded comment as he slammed the trunk.

“Yeah, um– I mean, these people need it more. Plus, it would just be easier to give it away, anyway since we--”, you cut yourself off, trying to pretend you hadn't said anything.

“What?”

You look away silently, blinking, “um– how are you holding up?”

“Yeah, you have already asked me– I'm– I'm sorry… are you– what do you—” he stopped. You looked anywhere but him. It clicked. 

“You…. you're… moving, aren't you?” he murmured slowly and as if saying it too loudly would make it real. You nodded. 

“Why?”

“Why? Steve– look around. Everyone is moving. People are dying left and right. People going missing, never being found again?And now what, Murders?! My parents are convinced that it is the end of the world.”

“But it isn't– It was just an earthquake”

“An earthquake does not give you wounds around your neck Steve. Ever since the Byers kid disappeared, my dad has been planning to move… and then that night I– I almost ....”, you trailed off, not wanting to tell him more especially after you had just lied to him that you were fine. “I barely made it.”

“What?”

You took a shaky breath in, Steve's chest tightened. “I should–”

“When are you leaving?”

“.. today. Right now. This was the last thing I had to do.”

After that he quietly walked the rest of the way, helping you put the boxes where they needed to be put. As he did it all, his eyebrows were pulled together, the crease between them deep-- what was he thinking? you wondered.

Once everything was done, he finally spoke up, “Can I walk you back? To your car? For one last time, please?” the desperation in his tone was so clear and it made you want to cry.

You opened the door, Steve's jacket draped over the passenger seat. The piece of clothing that probably saved you. The thick material had stopped you from bleeding to your demise. You really had to thoroughly wash it to get rid of the stain. But you couldn't justify throwing it away.

It no longer had the bloody stain, or the smell of smoke in it. However it also didn't smell like Steve anymore. 

“Here–”, you leaned into the car to pull it out, fighting back the tears and the waver in your voice,  “your jacket… don't worry I cleaned it up”, you held it up between the two of you.

Steve, pushed the material back in your direction, “Keep it. It's yours, remember? It's yours.”

"Considering everything….” you gulped, “I hope I'm not asking for too much", you took a deep breath before finally whispering, "can I hug you… please?"

It was a tight one. It was a desperate one. You hated that you smelled like antibacterial ointment and sweat. You buried your face deeper into his shirt– he smelled like medical gauze, and medicinal cream accompanied with a faint yet familiar scent of his hair products, his cologne and that distinct scent of Steve.

You pulled away, words sticky in your throat, “Take care. Don't die. I'm…..”, you swallowed, “I'm gonna miss you."

You didn't wait for a response, you quickly sat in your car and drove away, not even stealing a look from the rear-view mirror. You only let the tears fall when you had turned the corner to your home.

It isn't like you had a choice of whether or not you were staying. But You hate that he didn't stop you. You hate that he didn’t call your name, to see your face one last time. You hate you still had his jacket in your hands, you hate how tightly you were gripping it.. You hate that there were tears in your eyes. You hate that there was a sob in your ribs. You hate that you said that you were going to miss him. You hate you imagined a life with him, holding hands on romantic walks. 

You hate all that. But you don't hate him. God, it'd be so much easier if you hated him.

[lovelyhan]

— favorite poison (a teaser) ⟢

pairing: wonwoo x reader

summary: no strings attached sex is easy. catching feelings for a person you supposedly hate is hard. it's in times like this when wonwoo wishes he can set the dial on his life on easy mode forever, but everyone knows he's nothing if not stubbornly competitive.

word count 1.8k words

tags: fuck buddies, not quite enemies to lovers, streamer!wonwoo, streamer!reader, attempt at humor, in denial!wonwoo, fluff, smut (in later scenes, although this teaser is a bit suggestive)

warnings: mentions of twitter porn, daddy kink, suggestive situations (minors dni!!), reader becomes visibly uncomfortable around one of the characters

notes: this is the sequel to underlying pretense! as with all my teasers so far, it's always the first scene that comes up in these posts HEH the title is based off fuller's song, favorite poison bc it just screams in denial wonwoo :')

“So when are you introducing me?” 

The buzz of visitors inside the convention hall is already grating enough as it is, but when Mingyu walks over to Wonwoo’s designated booth, all it does is irritate him further.

He doesn’t exactly have to do anything aside from receive gifts from the viewers coming to pay him a visit, and take a few photos with them, but Wonwoo is yet to accustom himself to being the center of attraction in front of so many people. So having to listen to his roommate-slash-best friend asking him stupid questions isn’t exactly helping his case.

“To who? My family?” Wonwoo scoffs. 

Mingyu rolls his eyes. “No. Your girlfriend, genius.”

“What the hell are you even talking about?”

His best friend pouts and Wonwoo is having a really tough time taking him seriously because Mingyu is wearing one of those hats with bunny ears that flop around if you press the buttons dangling from the front. “You’re always scampering off with some girl from time to time. The others haven’t noticed, but I’m your roommate, hyung.”

“What gave you the impression that I’m ‘scampering off’ with just one girl, though?” Wonwoo smirks, shaking his head. 

Roughly three months have passed since Wonwoo bit the bullet and agreed to be your…fuck buddy? Not-so-friend with benefits? Whatever this arrangement is called, he’s satisfied with getting to let off steam every once in a while, and you don’t seem to have any complaints as long as he fucked you stupid and helped you make filthy content for all the world to see. 

Honest to god, it’s a miracle how shit hasn’t hit the fan yet. But then again, you and Wonwoo were both careful and extremely selective about what gets posted on your secret Twitter porn account, and what stays tucked away in the hidden galleries in your phones. That sort of cautiousness is rewarded with having to get away with everything you’re both daring enough to pull off behind the scenes.

Still, it doesn’t change the fact that, outside his sexual relations with you, Twitch streamers everyone_woo and Koyahngi pretty much hate each other’s guts. Even if yours is the best fucking pussy he’s ever had (something you’ll never catch him dead admitting aloud), he’s not about to do a complete one-eighty degrees and treat you any differently in front of his friends and followers. You don’t seem to have any plans on doing that either.

Wonwoo hasn’t once brought you to their shared apartment, so he’s certain that Mingyu is basing all his hunches off pure intuition alone. And just because that intuition turns out to be somewhat right (PSA: you’re not his girlfriend), doesn’t mean Wonwoo has to come clean about his goings-on.

Besides, they’re at a fucking convention. Why is Mingyu trying to hotseat him now? 

“Whatever you say, elusive gamer who hasn’t felt the touch of a woman that isn’t his mom.”

“Fuck you, you know that’s not true.”

“Well, obviously, you’re smitten with someone, and once I find out who it is, I’m throwing the biggest party in Seoul,” Mingyu says with a huff of indignance coloring his words. He says it like it’s a threat, and Wonwoo makes a face at him. 

“Why?” he asks with a scowl.

“Because I love you, that’s why.” Mingyu then takes off the stupid hat and places it on top of Wonwoo’s head—even putting the work into making sure it fits and everything. “Anyway, I’m heading off to Koyahngi’s booth to say hi. You wanna come with or do you still have a stick up your ass when it comes to hanging out with her?”

Wonwoo has to keep himself from blurting out how he’s not the one with anything up his ass when it comes to you, but realizes that if he wants to get Mingyu off his back, he probably shouldn’t make traumatizing allusions to his sex life. 

“I can’t exactly leave my spot until the main program starts. The same goes for you, idiot,” Wonwoo points out. “Who knows how many of your subscribers are looking for you at your booth? Go away and tend to them first.”

Mingyu pouts again, but since his best friend is a guy that’s literally a six-foot wall of muscle, Wonwoo doesn’t feel even an ounce of sympathy for him. “I haven’t even been gone for ten minutes! I just wanted to see how my friends are doing.”

“Then you shouldn’t have set up a booth at all, Gyu.” 

“Hmph. You’re always so stingy, hyung.” Mingyu crosses his arms before turning on his heel. “Anyway, I’m heading over to Koyahngi’s. I heard she’s cosplaying Sage today. Not that you care though.”

He sounds so genuinely sulky that Wonwoo would’ve laughed a little as Mingyu stomps away to head to your booth. But the mention of you dressing up as a Valorant agent that Wonwoo has started to despise since meeting you makes a couple of memories from earlier this week resurface in his mind. 

Aside from the catgirl gimmick, your cosplays are but another selling point for your streams. You dubbed it the catgirlification of every playable character I like right after Wonwoo railed you two days ago in that same Sage cosplay that Mingyu just mentioned. 

What a fucking weirdo, Wonwoo mused for a second before blowing your back out again not five minutes later.

About an hour later, the program on the main stage was in full swing, and Wonwoo just finished doing a little segment with Soonyoung that one of the fans who won a raffle requested for them to do. It was a Pocky Game that got a little too intense because Soonyoung wouldn’t stop fucking squirming, and they nearly kissed in front of the entire audience. Wonwoo doesn’t entirely mind because PR is PR, after all.

The thing he does end up minding, though, comes a little later—after the convention hall settles into a more relaxed atmosphere and everyone is back to booth-hopping. 

Despite what he told Mingyu earlier, Wonwoo took it upon himself to do some wandering around. It’s kind of nice to see other streamers and content creators he’s only ever got to interact with on Discord or their respective streams.

But while he’s munching on a cherry-shaped cookie that Seungcheol is handing out to his visitors, the bane of his existence swoops down on him just when he thought he could finish this entire event in peace.

“Hey, daddy,” you giggle into his ear before swiping the cookie out of his hands, tossing it into your mouth without a second thought. “Didn’t think I’d get to see you today.”

Wonwoo clicks his tongue before shrugging off the arm you draped around his shoulder. “What do you want?”

“Nothing in particular,” you hum before swallowing the food you just stole from him. “But now that I got a taste of Cheol’s cherry cookies, I kinda want some more. Do you know where he is?” 

“I think I saw him flirting with a bunch of cosplayers near the stage.”

Wonwoo startles at the sound of a third party’s voice intruding in your conversation, and from the looks of it, you’re just as startled as he is. Turning around, though, his apprehension ebbs away when he recognizes who it is.

“Johnny,” he says with a small surprised smile before offering his hand for a casual shake. “It’s been a while.”

The famous streamer returns Wonwoo’s gesture gingerly, but he realizes that Johnny’s gaze isn’t trained on him at all. 

“It has been,” he chuckles before turning to you. “I didn’t know you were friends with Wonwoo, doll. How you got someone as cold as he is to warm up to you is beyond me, but at least you’re expanding your network.”

Wonwoo would’ve rolled his eyes. Johnny is just as frank as he remembers. But before Wonwoo can point out that: 1.) you and him are not friends; and 2.) he is not a cold person, and therefore has absolutely no need to warm up to anyone, he quickly picks up on the sudden shift in the air. And it’s not his or Johnny’s discomfort he’s sensing right now. 

“Nah, you’ve got the wrong idea,” you respond to Johnny casually, but Wonwoo doesn’t miss how your fists are clenched at your sides. “Wonwoo would rather get banned from Twitch than call me his friend. I just like pissing him off every now and again is all~ That, and his friends are pretty cool, so I need to tolerate him.”

Johnny laughs before reaching down to ruffle your carefully styled wig. To others, it would’ve looked like a display of casual affection between friends, but Wonwoo is keen enough to notice how you momentarily flinched from the older streamer’s touch. His brows knit together as he attempts to figure out what was going on.

Actually, how do you even know Johnny in the first place?

“Anyway, I’ll be going now,” he laughs before letting one eye drop into a wink. “It’s good to see both of you. Enjoy the rest of the convention, yeah?”

As Johnny makes his exit, you’re a little too quick to fill in the silence that he left.

“You’ve gotta take me to Cheol before he runs out of cookies,” you whine, tugging on his arm with a persistent look on his face—not even breathing a word about Johnny, as if it hasn’t been two minutes since he left. “I’m pretty sure I saw him wearing a Pikachu onesie, so he should be easy to—”

Wonwoo immediately cuts you off with a quick yank of your wrist. As he leads you to one of the unoccupied restrooms near the convention hall, your voice drones in annoyingly repetitive succession in his ears while you struggle to free yourself from his grip, but Wonwoo just won’t budge.

Not when he can’t get the sight of you with genuine fear in your gaze when you first laid your eyes on Johnny out of his head.

“Shit,” you whisper hoarsely the moment Wonwoo slams you against the door—a shit-eating grin resting haughtily on your lips as he nudges your thighs apart. “I knew you were possessive, but not this much. Johnny just gave me a few headpats, daddy. It doesn’t mean a thing.”

Yeah. Wonwoo is totally doing this out of some pathetic, alpha male need to stake his claim after another man got his grubby hands on you. Not because he was bothered by that look on your face, and can’t think of any other way to help get your mind off it aside from fucking you senseless in a public bathroom.

“Shut up,” he murmurs before forcing your cheek against the cold door. “Now take off your leggings before I tear a hole in it myself. Can’t mess up your perfect fucking Sage cosplay now, can we?”

You let out a noise caught between a sigh and a whimper as you do as you're told. From three months ago to now, your general opinion on Jeon Wonwoo as a dom has yet to change. Even if he was about to rail you with a fluffy bunny beanie still resting on top of his head.

He’s fucking perfect.

the full fic can now be found here!

[blueparadis]

3:30 P.M. + CHIGIRI HYOMA.

—› dark content, viewers discretion advised ; fem!sub!reader, soft dom!chigiri, ēxplicit sūmt,( pseudo ) or ( step )incest ( open to interpretation ), light bondage, cūnnilingus, nipple stimulation, use of pet names, sprinkle of angst, slight somno ( consensual ). based on this idea. word count — 1k ; enjoy reading. —› syn; early summer vacation springs a new opportunity for Chigiri to be closer to you, his little sister.

redirect to blog navigation.

Today, the afternoon feels like a day in July. It is the end of May. Chigiri just finished drying his hair out. He notices that you are asleep in his bed, the window is not open, curtains are drawn in and the air conditioner is on. He smiles to himself thinking how you still have some strange habits even though you grew up —so fast and full.

The air conditioner in your room is not working properly and it has not been a day since you crashed at his place, your elder brother’s place. What else you could do when your college decided to announce early start of summer vacation due to excessive heat? Stay at hostel and rot alone? Everyone was going home and so did you.

Seeing you, his little sister, peacefully sleeping in his bed with the air conditioner on made Hyoma smile to himself. She never changes. He walks towards the bed and tries to wake you up. You have a thin quilt covering your body and he thinks you would wake up in a minute if he removed that. After some futile attempts of, “Oye, wake up.”, “sleep after having lunch.” and as such he finally decided to go with his last resort, that is, to pull your covers. Ah geez! she's so handful, part of him does not want to wake you up since he thinks this excessive heat has drained you. So, you need rest after all —

Oya, what's this? His little sister sneaks into his bed with the least clothes on. Just a loose camisole and a panty. Maybe you missed him at the hostel after all which is why you took the first opportunity to come home as soon as the holidays were declared. What a pity it is that you fell asleep while waiting for him, just the way he likes— pretty and all dolled up. Even your hair is tied in a loose ponytail, just the way he prefers.

Chigiri lifts up the camisole and tucks it above your boobs, clustering it around your neck. The sight of your boobs slowly getting coated with goosebumps takes his breath away. It brings back memories. He just showered but it is hard to resist at this point. He bends to pepper dry kisses over your sternum, belly and retreats. He can't, not right now. Mom is in the kitchen but he remembers locking the door behind him. It wouldn't hurt, would it? You shift your body releasing a soft hum but Hyoma’s reflexes turn up. He cautiously holds your arm so that you do not shift to one side. He takes a glance towards the doorknob of his room. It's locked. perfect.

Chigiri untied his ponytail and held the rubber band in between his teeth. Carefully, he placed both of your hands above your head and holding one of your wrists he placed the rubber band around your wrist. A warm exhale follows through before he creates an infinity loop to bind your other free wrist. One more loop and he will be able to hook your knotted hands to the metal headboard of the bed. There is an opening, he can see it, he can see that how he can put it to better use.

He retreats to his original deed, that is, to pepper kisses all over your chest. This time he takes one more step taking your aroused hard nipples in his mouth and sucking them but not too much. He is careful not to wake you up. You hum and try to roll but your fastened arms keeps you from doing so. Hyoma positions himself in between your legs, hands resting along your chest as he keeps sucking your nipples, placing wet kisses and meek bites. The trail of soft moans, long exhales does not help rather it escalates his desires. He can not let you sleep through the main event. You would be furious if you woke up with his cock inside you. Although, he loves when you throw such tantrums but it can wait. He has got whole summer vacation for that.

Chigiri towers above you, again, at your half-asleep form. He has already discarded his sweatpants. The strain in his pants is growing and he is loving the thrill of it as he proceeds to slip aside your panty, run his fingers through your wet folds. It is better than he imagined. You are already so wet just by getting sucked onto your nipples. He thinks you can take his cock at ease. But, at the same time he does not want to take the risk of hurting you.

So, he lowers his mouth in front of your pussy. Licking from the base up to the top of your vagina, he whispers,“ wake up dove, you don't wanna miss the main event do you?” A moment later you find it hard to move your body, restrained moans and squelching noises reaching your ears as you digest that you are, in fact, tied in.

“Nii-san,”  you mewl. Head dizzy and face warm seeing him, your elder brother, in between your legs while sucking and licking your cunt with closed eyes as if he is being permitted to taste the forbidden fruit.

“oh, you're awake.” Chigiri chimes as he adjusts himself to your entrance while pumping his cock. “Glad that you didn't miss the main event.”

“Nii-san,—” you call out wary of being caught, being seen like this but before you could ask him, he has alreday started kissing your dry lips making them wet with your arousal. The tip of his cock nudging your wet folds. He hovers above you so as to push his cock inside you.

“welcome back, princess.” he whispers as you feel his cock deep inside you, so deep that you feel you would black out a moment later. But wait, you feel he is inside you at ease without much pang. So, you glance at him, at his cock and figure out that he is wearing a condom.

Of course, it was foolish to think that he would do it without the condom. It's always been like this.

[mbta-unofficial]

So you want to fix ya City, do ya?

Local activism works better and faster than any other kind, because you don’t need to go as far to get results.

If you want to understand how to make change, here are some steps.

1. Pick a Lane

Your energy is finite. One issue that gets the lions share of it will make way more difference than a lot of blogging and not a lot else about everything. Whatever your lane is, try to pick it thoughtfully and stick with it. A local issue will be way more moveable than a remote one, but the internet can be used to raise money for anything so it doesn’t need to be next door.

You’re gonna worry about other stuff. That’s ok. Let someone else handle it.

2. Lay of the Land

You are not the first person to look at this problem. Organizations exist to take this on, and the knowledge they have is indispensable to your goals. Your first step should be to be to find them: you don’t have to reinvent the wheel here. If you have a local newspaper, read it. If you don’t, go to your city’s reddit page and see where they get their info.

All Cities have an MPO or Metropolitan Planning organization. These are non-profits (usually) who advise the government on a variety of issues. Sign up for their newsletter. Find out when their next meeting is. Go.

Your issue will probably have an activist council, such as the MBTA ROC for transit advocates. Sign up for their newsletter. Find out when their next meeting is. Go.

Your city will likely have public meetings on the subject you are interested in. Find out when they are. Go.

If these aren’t relevant to your issue, you can go find other sources of information but you should try to find

a) a place where you can be in a real room with real people, or at least a zoom room. Watching videos and posting doesn’t count. Twitch streams are borderline, more than 200 or so viewers is just noise.

b) A place with a variety of ages. Old folks know things. they’ve been around the block. Young people have fresh perspectives and lots of energy. A room with just one is unlikely to produce a good plan of action

c) A place with racial and gender diversity. Boys’ clubs are common in politics, as are white only conversations about politics. The city is for everyone, and if you don’t have a diverse movement you will inevitably cater to the interests of your most powerful ally instead of helping everyone.

If you can’t find a meeting that meets these criteria, see if you can change the meeting that exists before starting your own. Institutional weight is invaluable and starting from scratch is possible but a challenge.

When you are at these meetings, do not worry about not understanding technical language. Take notes (or don’t) and google later. You are there to see, and also to be seen, because if you consistently attend public meetings you will recognize the same people there, and they will recognize you. Ask questions if you are given the opportunity but remember that you don’t need to understand everything right away and you will learn more by listening than by guessing.

You are there to make friends and learn, because you can’t do it alone.

3. Planning an action

If you have an idea for something that would help your cause, write it down. Then find out if someone else has already done it. (They almost certainly have.)

Make a list of steps. Ask your new friends about the steps. Revise your list of steps based on that feedback. You should do this at least once, no first draft is perfect. Assess how feasible the steps are. Replace any step that is impossible with an possible alternative. Give yourself twice as much time, money, and help as you think you’ll need. Review your steps.

Start stepping.

Be prepared to throw the steps out, but know that if you do because you had to, you will still have the time, money, and support that you budgeted. If you have to throw the steps out, make new ones. Keep going.

4. Post-op

You did it! You made it to the end of your steps. Get your friends to assess your work for you, and weigh their answers seriously. The problem is probably not gone, but it should be better. More importantly, you have built a system of people capable of carrying out an action. You know more, you are better connected. Go back to step 2. There is always more to learn, and that’s beautiful.

[comradekatara]

reply to this post from @silverknight338 that i wanted to respond to more thoroughly:

To go into sokka’s retreat, it’s because he tried to mold himself into the man/warrior of the village. He didn’t have any mentor there, so he based it on myths and idealizations, putting up a front in order to project safety, even if it’s not much of a disguise. I doubt the older women of the south believed he could save them, but they were still grateful he would try, and would never tell him it wasn’t helpful because it was a way for him to redirect his mourning. He can push the mourning back if he has enough to do, and worry about, and protect. He was just a scared kid, but he tried. And now he’s still on this incredibly exhausting journey, there’s barely any time to truly process what’s going on past the bare minimum let alone old memories and scars. Katara throwing it in his face that he doesn’t love Kya the way she did, because he maybe never showed his mourning, never openly spoke or wielded it the way she did, because if he did, it wasn’t how the warrior he wanted, needed to be, acted. So maybe even in that episode, he still pushes aside that old grief, that he wasn’t smart enough to see around the fire nation’s goal, wasn’t fast enough to get there in time, but he knows on a deeper level how seeking revenge won’t help him. It’s been a really long time since i’ve watched the series in whole, but i think he blames himself. For katara’s anger, i think it’s because she doesn’t busy herself the way sokka did. She reflects and has seen the cause and effect of her father’s absence. Because her father left, her brother became annoying, uptight, and could barely see past his nose (sokka grew up to try to take responsibility, but to katara this is her brother playing, he can’t fill that role). Because of the fire nation, her father left to fight. Because of the fire nation, her mother died. She emotionally connects with people, and empathizes with them, she’s been through a lot, losing her parents in one way or another to the fire nation, and seeing the devastating effects it has on everyone. She has a strong sense of morals, and add in the emotional aspect, that’s a dam waiting to burst. Whereas sokka has a more detached take on it, he empathizes with people, but he has a “mine first” mentality that katara doesn’t. Because we the viewers have seen Katara be the empathetic and caring one, it is quite the contrast to see her lash out, especially with loved ones. because she is so empathetic, she typically calls people out, but this word whipping, it hurts and it is true, is rare as she usually tries to understand. this is such an old deep hurt, something she has had time to stew about. This isnt the first time she’s thought this.

right. what's important to understand is that sokka was told that "being a man is knowing where [he's] needed the most, and that's protecting [his] sister." he also knows his mother died to protect her. he knows she's special in a way no one else is. he knows that the raids will never truly end as long as the fire nation has power, as they have had for a century. to sokka, being a man isn't just fighting for a cause, it's dying for one. in his mind, he was all but told in explicit terms that it is his destiny to lay down his life to protect katara. and the only person who would ever try to dispel that notion is katara herself, but being her protector also means being unable to confide in her (that's not what men do, plus she's his little sister, he doesn't want to upset her in a real way, only in a teasing older brother way) so he's just... distant. distant where it counts, at least. i think if he actually ever spilled forth the contents, the truly hideous depths of his psyche to his sister she would never accuse him of being heartless or arrogant or delusional again. but he never will. he will take those feelings to the grave. perhaps when they're much, much older, or if she gets him really drunk. but even then, i doubt it. i don't think he's self-aware enough to know what exactly he would even say if it came down to it.

i do think there is a part of him that blames himself for what happened that day, because he just always blames himself. although i think he's smart enough to realize that no matter what, he couldn't have killed yon rha, or have gotten to hakoda in time, i think he probably feels like if he had gone to his house instead of trying to fight, he could've done what kya did instead. which is obviously crazy, because kya would not have let him, but he also thinks that it's his fault that yue became the moon, so like. he's not exactly rational when it comes to his guilt complex. but he also doesn't want revenge. sokka is always thinking big picture, not to mention that his mother died at the hands of the fire nation, but she didn't die for him. so to him, kya's killer is just a faceless cog in the imperialist machine. he never saw yon rha's face, looked into his eyes, like katara did. his mother's death wasn't personal the way it is for katara. and he knows that, so he doesn't say anything. yes, she was his mother too, but he didn't grieve her like katara did. he's probably never wondered what yon rha was like the way katara has, he only knows that the flag of the raiders was sea ravens because he has an incredible memory (which makes it even more tragic that he can't remember kya's face, a deliberate act of repression to cope that he now seemingly regrets), it's not like he ever contemplated revenge. clearly katara has. i definitely think she's had fantasies of avenging her mother's death in a heroic fashion long before zuko offered her the opportunity. which is why the banality of the moment when she stares into yon rha's eyes once more and sees his humanity and the futility of what she is about to do is so important. she was always too caught up in trying to be a hero that she neglected her personhood. sokka also neglected his personhood, but in a far less valorizing way. "the boiling rock" and "the southern raiders" is about both of them accepting nuance and humanity into their perceptions of themselves and their respective roles, but in different ways to suit their different needs. but i digress.

i think the fact that katara considers what sokka is doing "playing soldier" to be super interesting. when you hear that line in the pilot, you assume that she's right because she's the narrator and the hero and she's special and immediately likable, so of course she's right about sokka, who so far has only complained and been a dick. but he isn't playing. by the next episode we begin to see that. to him this is a matter of life or death. he was told by his father, by his mother's sacrifice, by his family and his village that it is his duty to protect katara by whatever means necessary. so he's preparing for that day and is trying to use his extremely limited resources to be strong enough to protect her and their village or die trying. i think katara considers it playing because she's in total denial of sokka's worldview. like she just doesn't accept that sokka is okay with sacrificing himself, so to her he's like this because of ego and not because everyone in the village and their father is somehow fine with the idea that he is just a sacrificial lamb in her honor. like that must be so horrifying for her to consider that she just refuses to think about it. it's way easier to rationalize sokka's behavior as annoying useless sexist brother who can't even wash his own socks. don't interrogate why he's depressed and paranoid and hopeless if he's obnoxious. focus on the little things, the small antagonisms and petty arguments, and you don't have to think about how concerning your relationship is! i love when katara says "from now on, you're on your own!" because it's such a ridiculous thing to say. katara, honey, he would follow you to the ends of the earth. (and he does.)

katara's righteous anger thrums through her at the very core of who she is. her inability to tolerate even the slightest injustice (both real and perceived) is why she is so compassionate and kind and helpful but also so quick to snap. sokka doesn't have that. he's also kind and helpful and brave, of course, but he doesn't have this optimistic view of the world where he sees the best in the people and has a beautiful vision for what the world can be. his worldview is very bleak, very cynical. i wouldn't necessarily call it a "mine first" mentality so much as he just tries to approach every situation logically. and in episodes such as "the painted lady," it's not that he doesn't care about jang hui, it's not that he thinks the pollution and oppression and poverty is fine, but he's focused on defeating the firelord, and to him, once that happens, they can work on helping all the people who have been oppressed by the fire nation, not just one village. katara sees someone in need directly in front of her and immediately goes to help them, whereas sokka considers the bigger picture and how to best improve lives overall. it can seem like a callous approach to someone like katara, but they do have the same end goal, which is to help others. (and if she thinks he's callous, he thinks she's myopic. and they're both kind of right, to an extent, but they also both want the same thing, and are both extremely brilliant, so there's also that.) and of course his "logical" priorities also fly out the window when it comes to katara. like he does want to be practical but he cares about katara and his loved ones more. in moments when he is truly challenged it's clear that he feels and loves far more deeply than he lets on.

katara does lash out quite often, not only at sokka but also at toph, zuko, even aang once (although she immediately apologizes, which is unique to aang. she does not apologize to anyone else when she yells at them, not even to toph after mocking her blindness on like the second day of knowing her!) but in "the southern raiders" it's clear that her feelings, coming from a place of grief and rage and buried guilt, are even more volatile than usual (and she's already quite an emotionally volatile person). i think what she says to aang, that she knew he wouldn't understand, comes off very tone deaf because he obviously can empathize with her grief and guilt and rage, but because she's always placed him on a pedestal, she can't imagine him having these dark and messy emotions that she is contending with. even though he does, and she should know that better than anyone considering that she is his primary confidante and best friend, but i think she's too caught up in her own rage to realize in the moment that other people know her pain and yet can choose to react differently. she and zuko process things very similarly and they're really enabling each other in this episode, but their grief also comes from a place of guilt because their mothers sacrificed themselves for them, and they feel like they need to honor their memories and no one else understands that burden. but of course, aang and sokka do understand, aang is plagued by guilt for "abandoning" his people, and sokka feels guilt over... everything basically. but katara and zuko lash out because they're saying things they don't want to hear, and yeah, they've had a lot of time to stew in those feelings.

sokka doesn't resent hakoda at all, because he is simply too insecure for that, but katara feels like hakoda abandoned her, and that's a really complicated well of deep resentment that adds another really fascinating layer to her character (in terms of recontextualization, it really reframes why katara was so willing to let sokka go see their father while she stayed behind in ba sing se. katara is very compassionate and helpful and empathetic, but she is not selfless). katara also feels like sokka abandoned her, at least emotionally. like obviously sokka is physically present for her at all times, but he does not communicate with her, he isn't actually honest about his feelings with her. katara craves people with whom she can have honest discussions about their emotions, and sokka just can't do that. it runs counter to his entire modus operandi of repression and masking his true feelings and being the brother katara needs but not the brother she wants. and she resents him for that. she implies he acts heartless in "the painted lady" because he is admittedly quite callous upon witnessing suffering (although he obviously can empathize with the jang hui villagers in the same way katara can, they grew up in the same tiny, decimated village; his dismissiveness is a combination of "logical detachment" and being nervous about staying on schedule for the upcoming invasion). and i understand where katara is coming from, because if he was my older brother, his condescension would also get on my nerves and i would also point out every single one of his flaws, however minor, to "knock him down a peg" (of course, his ego/self esteem is already underground, he's not condescending because he thinks he's better than anyone, so her tactic is ultimately futile lmfao). but she hears him open up to toph, confide something about his true feelings regarding katara and their mother that he's never actually told katara. the fact that he won't communicate with her must be infuriating. and then again, she's also right. they do see kya differently. and they both know it.

this conflict between them – the mother gap, if you will – is not one that i think could ever be fully resolved, unless somehow sokka learned how to be truly honest and vulnerable with katara, and katara learned how to apologize to sokka. but those are things neither of them will ever actually do, in all likelihood. so they will continue to be codependent as fuck, two halves of the same whole, while simultaneously letting this rift exist between them, perpetually unbridged due to a fundamental lack of communication. but at the end of the day, it doesn't really matter. their love for each other transcends their unspoken gaps in understanding.

[mofffun]

Translator's note on suzuracles post-wedding dialogue

It's hard to direct-translate Suzume's tone indicators to English so I could only do my best to imitate her playful tone at the end of each sentence (even though the content/first half is serious she kept the lovestruck persona ending it in "wah~!")

This passage is a bit difficult to me so I checked the dictionary twice. I spent a long time on Suzume's last line. I can't be sure if it is i-u-hou (the speaker) or i-u-kata (the tone+diction) but combining Suzume's tone I think it's the latter one. And, "tsumi". I'm aware of the better-known from W as "sins" but the word has duality and what is sinful may not be illegal, what is illegal may not be sinful (off-track). And we are talking about a morally grey character.

Analysis

The most intriguing suzuracles to me is, they might be the closest in position in terms of sacrificing their personal self for their country, to present a public persona yet they could never confide in anyone, not even to each other, especailly not, even though they knew the other is in the same position as themself. Yet, they have lived under the same roof with each other longer than they did with their own family. That real? not real? love into hatred? hatred into love? into mutual understanding? The quantum state of it is the most captivating to me for them as foils.

I think Suzume is conscious in keeping referring to Racules as "Racules-sama" instead of in second person to keep a distance between them. Let alone "anata" in the "[my] husband" sense. It's okay to love "Racules-sama", it's easy to play the innocent captive of "Racules-sama", but she has seen Racules. Late at night, in between schemes, behind polite threats. Can one fully hate a worthy opponent?

observations:

ラ 「間に合わせだ。売ったところで二束三文にしかならない」

ス 「私を何だと思ってらっしゃるの！？私とラクレス様の愛の結晶に、値段などつけられませんわ」

Racules is testing Suzume. He has no need to play games with her. He knew she was there for Toufu to profit from the start (alt-shugod aid to Toufu in wake of Wrath of Gods).

Translated: Hold on to the ring (game-changer item)

ラ 「…時に君の正気を疑うことがある」

ス 「無理もありません。ラクレス様への愛が、私を狂わせるんですもの！」

ラ 「愛ではなく、憎しみだろう。スズメ・ディボウスキ」

Racules is letting himself show, if a little, if vulnerability, to gain her trust? Suzume DYBOWSKI. DYBOWSKI. THIS MAN CALLED HIS NEWLY WEDDED WIFE HER FAMILY NAME. He knows Suzume will always put Toufu/Dybowski before him or Shugoddom, but she's the only one he can count on now. Because she said it herself, her devotion (to "Racules-sama") is mad unwavered.

ラ 「国のため、道具にされ続け、それでも正気でいられる道理は何だ」

Convince me Racules is not talking about himself. Do, try.

ス 「…トウフの女は、地に足ついてこそ。信ずる道を、踏み外したりはしませんわ」

This line is so hardcore?? More importantly, I can totally see Kamura-san's delievery. Quiet at first, the cold in her eyes, then the naive switch grin at the end!

ラクレスがふっと微笑む。 ラ 「やはり度し難いな」

Suzume managed to make Racules smile! It doesn't specify if he was amused or relieved Suzume caught his metaphor. This is what we are talking about the actor filling in for the script. Then Yano-san's performance can be interpreted a thousand ways based on each viewer! A more literal translation of 度し難い is "beyond help". I think it can also mean the person is beyond salvage as in nothing can change their determination (positive). Racules is talking about himself too! if wryly!

Translated: "you are part of my plan. don't ever change."

ラ 「その指輪は、太陽を浴びて輝く。目を焼かれぬよう、気をつけろ」

Racules-sama, can you be more obvious. Put the wedding ring under the sun to read my secret message, just like I did with what Vetaria left me in my spin-off. The fire imagery!! (re: inferno, re: takamina's "he who shines on the world must burn himself to do so" tweet!!)

[okayto]

Mini-Review: Komi Can't Communicate

On her first day attending the elite Itan Private High School, Shoko Komi immediately receives an overwhelming surge in popularity due to the unprecedented stoic beauty and refined elegance her classmates perceive her to possess. However, only Hitohito Tadano, an exceedingly average schoolboy who sits next to her, discovers that behind her ethereal appearance, Komi has extreme social anxiety. When Komi reveals that it's her dream to make one hundred friends, Tadano becomes the first and promises to help with the other ninety-nine.

Ah, the first day of high school. A day for first impressions, seeing old friends and making new ones. Unfortunately for Komi, a new school year doesn't get rid of her anxiety, which is so severe she can't bring herself to speak to anyone. Luckily, one of her new classmates is an observant guy who can see that her graceful, stoic exterior is a result of paralyzing anxiety and befriends her in a conversation carried out through chalkboard writing. As the apparently only student so far to have realized that Komi is a normal person who doesn't want to be idolized, he agree to help her befriend others.

Somewhat unfortunately for Komi and Tadano, but much more luckily for the viewer, it's revealed that their high school's admissions process prioritized personality interviews, and so their school is going to be full of weird and off-beat people.

This is a quirky school comedy that entertains particularly on the strength of its characters, most of whom are Weird. Tadano, Komi's first friend and our usual point-of-view character, is the audience expy of Mostly Normal Guy. We spend a lot of time with him, so it's a good thing he's a good character--I really enjoyed his scenes, and his normal responses and thought processes stand out against some of the weirder/more energetic classmates.

Tadano is also shown to be a generally observant guy in general, which keeps that characterization up (making his noticing of Komi less remarkable, because he can do it to others). In the second season he befriends another anxious character who most other people misread.

There is a large cast of characters--at least 12 named classmates in the first season alone, not counting Komi and Tadano, or their sporadically-appearing families--and I found it easy to lose track of what name belonged to who when the referenced character wasn't onscreen. However, character designs are distinct and so characters themselves were very easy to differentiate and remember.

And what characters they are. They are numerous, and they are quirky...and sometimes they are uncomfortably so. Most are fine--Najimi is introduced early on, giving Tadano some confusion (didn't Najimi wear the boys' uniform when they were younger? And now they're wearing the girls'? Correct. Najimi will not elaborate) but primarily acting as a counter to Komi: where Komi is anxious and shy, Najimi is a social butterfly who will be gung-ho about anything entertaining, is friends with everyone, and frequently triple-books themself.

The two most [potentially] uncomfortable characters, in my opinion, are Agari--the green-haired girl a few gifs up who clearly has a kink for being treated as a dog--and Yamai, a girl who worships Komi on sight and spends a lot of time near-sexually obsessed with her. Based on the tone of the series (and how I've seen similar characters handled in other recent series) this is probably supposed to be humorous and not read as horny as it would be if a male character were, say, obsessed with Komi's boobs in the public bathhouse, but it's not great (and still horny). (At least when she notices, which isn't always, Komi is clearly shown wishing Yamai would back off.)

But the majority of characters are fine. You've got the super-competitive person who decides Komi is their rival (and ends up losing all the secret competitions they invent), the chuunibyo who believes they're in a fantasy story, the extreme airhead, the normal older sister, the nerd, and the normal person with a secret love for something uncool, and others.

I really appreciated the show explicitly stating "this school is going to be full of weirdos" at the end up the first episode, because it both answers the question of "why are there so many strange students here," but also because it means every background character or sitting-in-the-corner classmate has the potential to be the focus of a future episode, enriching the cast.

Each episode (with the exception of the first) is broken up into 2-6 mini-sodes, so a ~25-minute runtime shown on your screen will actually be a series of short stories, or scenes within a longer arc. Personally, I like this approach for comedy series, because it allows the show to do a bunch of funny things without having to draw out the joke. Plus, with a large ensemble cast, it means characters can show up fairly frequently without having a huge cast in every single episode.

Despite it being primarily comedy, time does pass in the show and characters grow (at least the main ones). It's small and slow, but you can see Komi working toward her goal and able to do some things, like speak aloud to certain characters, by the end of the season when she couldn't at the beginning.

Komi herself is also a fun character: it's made clear that she has a disorder that impacts her life, often negatively, and the show doesn't take the position that it's something she should find easy to get over. The opening narration also always points out that just because she has trouble socializing and/or communicating doesn't mean she doesn't want to.

Because boy does she want to. She's quiet but earnest, often excited about activities, even when she's intimidated or unsure about a new situation or people.

Verdict

English Dub? Yes, and it's great!

Visuals: Very nice, but be aware there are copious amounts of Japanese text, some of which isn't on the screen long enough to easily read the subtitled translation. I found this series easier to watch on my phone or computer instead of the TV because of how often I wanted to pause (or rewind and then pause) to get through the writing, sound effects, comic bubbles, or whatever other writing was on screen.

(Incidentally, not all was translated, which was annoying. Writing, like when Komi showed a note or a text message, usually was, but sometimes it was done verbally via speech/narration instead. It’s really annoying to have writing on screen that I had to listen for the translation instead of being able to read, and I wish Netflix had made better, more audience-friendly choices.)

Worth watching? Yes! It's an entertaining series overall, and I'm hopeful that the fact that it's been well-regarded and the fact that there is plenty of unadapted material (the manga is at 29 volumes and still going as of this writing) will mean we get more anime in the future.

Where to watch (USA, as of June 2023): Netflix (sub and dub)

Click my “reviews” tag below or search “mini review” on my blog to find more

[dairy-farmer]

Tim is trending in arts for some reason, nobody's sure why until they find out that an artist takes to making Tim Drake his muse. The artist draws Tim like... like he was a goddess bathing in the woods, unaware of the eyes seeing him. The artist draws Tim like he was the love child from pureness, naked with just a sheet covering his lower half as his fingers trace over an apple. The most famous picture is the one where Tim is looking at the viewer, smiling so innocently, so purely, so beautifully. A smile no one has seen since years ago, decades ago, a time before wayne. The art gets sold in museums, the artist well-known and face well-spread so it's to only mild shock when the artist meets Tim Drake for the first time and immediately gets down on one knee to propose.

!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖💖 I LOVE THIS SO MUCH!!!!

an artist and his (unknowing) muse!!!! i love the idea of this artist not having to know anything about tim personally, what his life is like, all the good and bad things he did- those don't matter to him. all that matters is tim. tim alone is what drives him, what fuels his art, what gets him up in the morning. he is the endless fountain of genius and artistic love that this artist has.

tim doesn't have to do anything but exist for this artist, they don't even have to have met before and it was tim's existence alone that brought forth so much success and depth to this person's art. so this artist getting down on one knee and proposing to tim!!!

the two of them would be like all those famous art couples only not toxic.

except for tim's family.

at first when tim was found to be trending on social media it was a little funny. just one of those things to laugh over dinner when one of them becomes mainstream enough to be referenced in pop culture. like how bruce is used in rap lyrics or songs when a man wants to talk about getting bitches, or how dick was used as a famous orphan in a countdown youtube video that included people like Annie and her 'daddy warbucks'.

tim's is just something that they chuckle over and laugh about, pulling up photos of the painting and ooing and aahing. it's only when they're going around the table and reach damian that they start realizing something.

damian is tensed with his jaw clenched, eyes locked on his phone and staring intently on a collection of gallery photos belonging to the artist that had boldly proclaimed timothy drake his muse even though tim was sure they'd never met. afterall the artist was someone based in maine, one of the few states tim had never set foot in.

not that it would matter. there were photos of tim on google totaling in the millions. that didn't even count the ones he posted on his instagram to keep in contact with all his civilian friends who were prepping for college.

it's not until jason makes some jab at the artist about choosing a 'shitty' muse and being a two bit talent hack that damian puffs up in defense of his fellow artist. it's one of the times that they're all avidly reminded of how closely damian follows the art circuits, he's likely knows more about this artist's work than all of them combined.

damian goes on some long tangent, slapping his phone down and scrambling for his backpack where he'd cleared his homework away when the dinner table was being set.

damian launches into a lecture like a college professor as he breaks down an analysis of one of the artists' most recent paintings. he explains how anyone, with enough dedicated time and practice can be a skilled artist.

"but do you know why those youtubers who do realistic colored pencil portraits of celebrities don't have their work hanging in the guggenheim but this person does?" damian is glaring at all of them at the dinner table that's suddenly a lot less light hearted in the face of damian's fierce indignance. "soul! depth! passion! meaning! anyone can create a souless bit of art with enough technical skill to get a few admiring sounds but this is real art!"

damian launches into another tirade of how artists used their crafts the same way a writer does their pen, to transmit meaning, deliver an understanding, a revelation, make a statement about something.

damian punches his finger against his screen so hard they're all surprised it doesn't break. the painting that just went up in a gallery somewhere in new york features tim dripping with rich animal furs, each of their heads visible as he cradles a bowl of pears close. the painting shows juice dripping from tim's red lips, his mouth parted and opened for another bite as he glances away from the viewer, staring at something in the distance.

the painting is done ins browns and greens, dark colors aside from tim's skin and the bowl that he's holding which shines brilliantly with gold leaf.

damian is almost frothing at the mouth and frustrated with them for not understanding the layers upon layers of meaning and depth packed into this one work alone. the pears! a fruit that across many cultures is known to mean abundance, to signify divinity, and femininity! the shape of the pear alone implies the soft slopes and curves of a woman. it's no coincidence that the artist chose pears rather than apples and oranges! look at how timothy in this painting has bitten the pear from the bottom, how juice drips down his lips- if the pear signifies femininity and timothy is eating it with visible evidence streaming down his lips- do they think that's a coincidence! then the furs! the animal heads are clearly perked up and alive! the foxes ears are at attention and listening to timothy, presumably as he chews. timothy is eating a divine fruit and wearing a coat made of living animals. the bowl! golden and made with gold leaf! gold leaf has been used very sparingly in the past and only for something of deep meaning or importance. such as the tombs of kings. but the artist was an anglo-christian raised in america and studied art in italy, meaning the golden bowl was not a bowl but rather a nimbus, a golden disk usually used to imply divinity- popularly seen in depictions of mother mary and her son jesus christ.

can all of them truly be so blind to what the meaning here is!! the artist is trying to convey that timothy is a god who descended among them, cast away divinity to be among mortals and walk as they do!

damian is almost trembling with fury and eventually turns and stomps away because he 'cannot stand to be surrounded with such idiocy for much longer!'

after that dinner is quiet, everyone too into their own heads to notice how tim is blushing so hotly.

after that the family is paying much more attention to this new artist. more than a few of them have bruce shifting uncomfortably because they have tim near naked on a stretched canvas. bruce resists the urge to call up his lawyers and have them contact this artist because timothy is still very much a minor and bruce's son.

but damian would likely protest. he said something about how art deserves a pass and cannot possibly be subjected to the ever-changing sensibilities of society. the rest of the family is discomforted by this artist and their near...obsession with tim.

damian insists that they just don't understand. they don't get it.

this man has found his muse. his muse.

the thing that powers his mind, that guides his brush, and leads him to create.

every time a painting is put up for sale bruce is tempted to buy it...just so no one else can have it. after all what kind of person wants a near naked painting of bruce's son hanging in their living room.

some of the paintings are bordering on obscene even though the internet and this artist are intent on lauding him as a genius.

to bruce they're just....inappropriate.

this stranger shouldn't need to reveal so much of his son's body in such a public way just to convey his "meanings". dick is of the same opinion. very much firmly grossed out by this near fifty year old artist who's developed an obsession with his little brother.

jason is more silent on the matter and bruce isn't sure what to make of that. he's walked past the library and the sight of jason with an open laptop on that artist's website and a book on analyzing art.

when the gotham museum is holding a big charity event and invites both their wealthiest donors and artists- bruce doesn't even need to look at the guestlist to know who will be there.

this artist has made a killing selling his paintings of tim, what few he does sell because even though he's an artist he's apparently very reluctant to part with some of his work.

bruce doesn't like that.

it just gives him a strange...feeling about it.

he instructs dick to keep tim in his sights at all time at the party. bruce needs to mingle and feign getting drunk. he can pay attention to tim but tim is slippery and bruce has more than once lost sight of him at an event.

and it's not strange for bruce to do that. often times bruce will pair dick or jason up with damian and tim to make sure they all keep each other in check.

something must go wrong.

because bruce is mid-swish of some dessert champagne when soft gasps run through the crowd like a wave, people gathered in a circle around something and murmuring to each other.

if anything unusual is happening that's usually a sign for bruce to check it out so he shoulders and stumbles his way through, apologetically grinning and jovially slapping people on the shoulder until the sight reveals itself to him.

the sight of that....that artist that bruce had spent hours digging up information on.

kneeling. on the marble floor of the museum. cupping one of tim's hands so tenderly and reverently, staring up at tim who was frozen and wide-eyed.

bruce sees the man mouth words but with the hushed silence of the room he may as well have yelled it.

"marry me."

bruce isn't sure what he's more shocked at.

the man's proposal. or tim's response.

a soft, breathless "yes".

[denimbex1986]

'A writer is an essentially lonely person. Someone, in fact, who usually prefers to be alone. Except when they start to realize that perhaps they became a writer precisely because of that inherent loneliness in the first place. This seems to be the case for the mononymous Adam (Andrew Scott), living practically alone in a new building that still has yet to lease out any of its apartments to fresh tenants. The apartment tower seems to lie just out of reach of London, though Adam and his soon-to-be-lover, Harry (Paul Mescal), keep referring to how they live “in” London. Indeed, Adam admits that he’s the last of his friends to remain “in” the city, with everyone else surrendering to the inevitable move to the country, where they can properly raise their families. Adam, being a gay man, automatically counts himself out from “that life.” The so-called conventional one, that is. Because, even for as “modern” as these times are supposed to be, there are still so many judgments and limitations projected onto the LGBTQIA+ community. And for a man of Adam’s generation (X), there remains so many lingering insecurities about his sexuality as a result of a childhood spent not only in the “wrong” era to be gay, but the wrong place as well. For Thatcher-run Britain wasn’t exactly open and inviting to the homo set (any more than Reagan-run America was).

Which is why homosexuality started to feel like an “underground movement” rather than a mere sexual preference. The illicit nature of it, particularly in the late 70s and early 80s, served as a means to condition many gay men to get off on the secrecy and anonymity aspects of it more than the sex act itself. Not quite knowing how to “function” sexually once things became slightly less taboo. This is the transitional mind fuck Gen X gay men were subjected to, enduring the repression of sexuality in the 80s, the AIDS scare that lasted from the beginning of that decade and well into the mid-90s and the sudden about-face toward total gender and sexual fluidity in the twenty-first century. It would be enough to give anyone sexuality whiplash, particularly a British person, with their background so fundamentally steeped in stodginess and restraint. This is the place Adam (whose biblical name feels deliberately tongue-in-cheek [no BJ pantomime intended]) is coming from. And it’s compounded by the fact that he’s partially “stuck” at the age he was when his mother (Claire Foy) and father (Jamie Bell) both died in a car accident on Christmas Eve of 1987 (this year is also significant as it’s when the book the film is based on, Strangers by Taichi Yamada, was released).

Our introduction to Adam is one of palpable loneliness as writer-director Andrew Haigh (known for Weekend and Looking, among other things) shows him staring longingly out of his floor-to-ceiling glass window at the outline of London. Which is, again, just beyond his reach. The city hasn’t fully expanded to his neck of the woods quite yet, though with rising prices and a shortage of housing, London will make it to his “outskirts” soon enough. The building, in fact, was actually shot in East London’s Stratford. Which is at least forty-five minutes’ worth of travel into Central London. His perennial position as an outsider is thus solidified to viewers geographically as well. This “outsiderness” extends even to his chosen profession as a writer (though, as he says, not a “proper” writer, but one for TV). This being the most voyeuristic kind of profession there is. A skill rooted in observation and recording. Never being quite “in the story” yourself, though constantly trying to put “a version” of who you think you are in it. That Adam chooses to write scripts wherein he can control the narrative also has Psych 101 implications. Since he couldn’t control the death of his parents or the way in which he was treated by homophobes in his youth. But he can control everything in the scenarios he comes up with on the page.

Unlike trying to control Harry’s direct approach one evening after seeing Adam so many times staring up at his window from down below. This being the umpteenth time he’s done so after a false fire alarm goes off and Adam is the only person (out of two) foolish enough to fall for it by vacating the building. Knocking on his door once Adam goes back inside and essentially begging to, er, enter, Harry makes a final effort to win Adam over by riffing on Frankie Goes to Hollywood’s “The Power of Love” with the line, “There’s vampires at my door.” This specifically alludes to the lyrics, “I’ll protect you from the hooded claw/Keep the vampires from your door.” While Harry likely wouldn’t have any idea what that song is (if we’re to go by Mescal’s own cusping between millennial and Gen Z age of twenty-eight), it’s nice to think that he could be attuned enough with British pop music’s past to make such a casual reference. To that end, there is a moment where he tells Adam he wants to “watch old episodes of Top of the Pops from before I was born” with him. Sit on the couch eating takeaway together like a right proper couple that’s surrendered fully to the dull comfort of monogamy. Because, yes, even the gays have settled for it by now. Gotten used to the idea that monogamy is for everyone. Even though, as Henry Willson (Jim Parsons) in Hollywood put it, “Sure, holding a guy’s hand in public, walking down the street, you know, you wait for a brick in the back of the head. It doesn’t come. Well, then, before you know it, your guy wants to play house. Have you ever spent a Saturday picking out some cheerful, daffodil-colored linoleum for the kitchen? I have, Ernie. And it is enough to make you wistful for the days of secretive sodomy.”

Adam is not necessarily “that type of gay,” but he is very clearly still imbued with the “gay guilt” of his generation. This being one of the reasons why he refuses Harry’s initial forward advances. That and, well, his heart sort of had to close entirely after his parents died. An automatic defense mechanism against ever attaching again. What with getting so badly burned the first time around via every person’s most formative attachment: the one with their parents. This is why Adam seeks so desperately to return to the past—the only known period in his life where he still had two (theoretical) protectors.

While Adam tries to wrap himself as much as possible up into the past by writing about it in screenplay form, he doesn’t seem to realize that he’s been trapped in it for quite some time. Perpetually locked inside that traumatic period of his life. Not just because of his parents’ death, but because losing them, in a certain sense, kept him frozen in a false identity. That is, a false hetero identity. One that didn’t allow him to ever fully be himself, or rather, be known as his true self. Because, although it’s “liberating,” in a way, to lose your parents and be forever free of any judgments they might have over you, it also means that you’ll never know if that formerly hidden part of yourself might have actually been accepted and embraced. As Haigh stated, “What I’ve always been interested in doing, and especially with this [film], is talking about queerness in relationship to family, and how complicated it can be in relationship to family…especially if you grew up in a generation of the 80s and into the early 90s, where it was very different than it is now—thank God.” And yet, there are times when it doesn’t seem that different. And the fact that a still-young Harry can recall his own childhood being rife with anti-gay sentiments (“It’s probably why we hate [the word] ‘gay’ so much now. It was always like, ‘Your haircut’s gay.’ Or, ‘The sofa’s gay.’ ‘Your trainers are gay, your school bag’s gay’”) speaks to how “drastic change” didn’t occur until very recently (something the present generation of twinks takes endlessly for granted).

This is part of why, when Adam tells his mother about his sexuality, she can’t believe he would actually “choose” such a life. Such a lonely life, at that. Still trapped in her 1987 Britain mentality, she asks, “Aren’t people nasty to you?” He assures, “No, no. Things are different now.” She asks again, “So they aren’t nasty?” He shrugs, “Not allowed, anyway.” But, of course, as Trump supporters (and Trump himself) have shown, people always find ways of getting around things that “aren’t allowed.” When Adam also informs her that men and women can marry the same sex now, she balks, “Isn’t that like having your cake and eating it?” Turns out, his confession to Mother isn’t going as well as he thought. Is actually bringing him a worse kind of pain than before. Compounded by her saying, “Oh God, what about this awful, ghastly disease? I’ve seen the adverts on the…on the news and with the gravestone.” “Everything is different now,” he insists again. Or so we would like to believe…

In an interview with Time, Haigh addressed one of the criticisms the LGBTQIA+ community has accused the movie of, which is that it reemphasizes the notion (which was only just starting to slightly go away) that being queer is the most isolating and alienating experience a person could have. But Haigh feels differently about the underlying message of his film, stating, “I understand that that can be an interpretation. Personally, I don’t feel that. There is hope in the fact that he has understood that, basically, he is capable of being in love and being loved and being there for someone else that might need him in that moment. By the end of the film, to me, it is basically saying that what is important in life is love in whatever way you manage to find that, whether it’s in a relationship, whether it’s with your parents, whether it’s with a friend. You go through life finding love, losing love, and finding it again.” And Adam has found it again, however ephemerally, with his spectral parents.

As for Adam’s mother, the more she thinks about it, the more his gayness makes sense to her. He was so “odd” and “sensitive,” after all. And apparently always trying to run away. When she asks where he was trying to run away, he tells her that he reckons London. Making him yet another Bronski Beat cliche. Luckily, Haigh stops short of featuring “Smalltown Boy” in the movie, instead opting for a “less overt” queer band in the form of Pet Shop Boys. Who have never much talked about their sexuality (why bother when all of their music is dripping with the subject and “lifestyle”). But as recently as their latest single, “Loneliness,” it’s clear the duo knows all about the distinct kind of loneliness that a man such as Adam suffers from. A loneliness that his mother is also convinced gay men are more prone to, even if, as Adam asserts, “Everything is different now.”

The past itself is, alas, as much of a ghost as his parents are. And it’s a kind of haunting that Adam seems to relish for its unique sting of pain-pleasure. For example, listening to Fine Young Cannibals’ “Johnny Come Home” as he writes, “EXT. SUBURBAN HOUSE, 1987” on his computer, it’s easy to see that the past is the present for Adam. As it is for many other people who prefer not to admit that to themselves. Even Adam tries not to fully admit it aloud, brushing aside Harry’s heartfelt apology when he finds out that Adam’s parents died in a car accident just before he turned twelve. “It was a long time ago,” he tells Harry. “Yeah, I don’t think that matters,” Harry replies. And it doesn’t. For trauma and woundedness never really go away. Especially when ceaselessly suppressed.

And yes, listening to the music from his childhood is a key part of crawling into the “comfortable” pain of his youth. Comfortable because it is familiar. Seeing his room just as it was when he was a preteen leads him to thumb through records like Erasure’s Circus and Frankie Goes to Hollywoood’s Welcome to the Pleasuredome (which “The Power of Love” appears on). Even when Adam goes out to a club with Harry, the song playing for the dance floor, Joe Smooth’s “Promised Land,” is straight out of 1987. Everywhere he goes, that year, that time in his life haunts him. At one point during post-coital candor, he muses to Harry, “Things are better now, of course they are, but…it doesn’t take much to make you feel the way you felt.” It reiterates what he already told his mother, but with the admission that, if you grow up a certain way, are conditioned to have a certain “look over your shoulder” response to people, it doesn’t ever truly dissipate. Even in the late 90s, when things were starting to shift more palpably, especially with AIDS “calming down,” a Gen X man like Adam was never truly going to feel “safe” enough to be “himself.”

Talking of the 90s, Haigh’s decision to include 1997’s “Death of a Party” by Blur as the soundtrack to a very trippy portion of the club sequence is also pointed. For, in addition to Blur speaking about the end of Britpop’s reign, this song has long been regarded as a metaphor for AIDS. After all, gay men were only too happy to party in the late 70s and early 80s…until an unknown disease, a “mysterious illness” started making people—primarily “fags”—drop like flies. So much for the “party.” A word Madonna famously included as part of an AIDS awareness insert placed among the liner notes of her Like A Prayer album with the phrase, “AIDS Is No Party!” In other words, don’t think you can go around fucking freely as you used to in the days before the novel virus. With AIDS came yet more cannon fodder for suppression. To turn inward and avoid one’s desires altogether. As Adam seemed to do, telling Harry, “I’d always felt lonely, even before [my parents died]. This was a new feeling. Like, uh, terror. That I’d always be alone now. And then, as I got older, that feeling just…solidified. It just, uh, it did not…” He motions toward his heart after trailing off, finishing the thought with, “…here all the time.” Harry looks at him with teary-eyed empathy, prompting Adam to continue, “And then losing them just got tangled up with all the other stuff. Like being gay. Just feeling like…the future doesn’t matter.” Of course, it also felt like it didn’t matter when, as a gay man, death was all around. Pervasive. Perhaps, in some sense, Adam could even associate his parents’ death with the “gay disease” that caused everyone who came into contact with “queers” to die.

Getting the chance to tell his parents—even if only their ghosts—who he really is proves to be, if not “cathartic” then at least a release. When Adam’s father tells his son that he’s proud of him, Adam replies, “I haven’t done anything to be proud of. I’ve just muddled through.” His father rebuts, “No, but you got through it. Some tough times, I’m sure, and…you’re still here.” Even this, too, feels like a nod to the generation of gay men who were not only mercilessly ridiculed, but also forced to watch so many of their own fall prey to the cruelest kind of death. To survive through something like that would, of course, serve as a lingering trauma unto itself. Indeed, there are times when the viewer might think that Adam himself is a ghost who doesn’t know it yet (Bruce Willis in The Sixth Sense-style), that maybe his telltale “fever” was a symptom he had while dying of AIDS. But no, that’s not the Shyamalan-oriented element here. Instead, Adam is subjected to a much more heartbreaking fate.

One that only Frankie Goes to Hollywood (“The Power of Love” is a subliminal essence during the tripped-out club scene as well, its presence seemingly omni—a punctuating motif to cut through the loneliness) can try to even vaguely soothe. The band’s lead singer, Holly Johnson, was himself diagnosed with HIV in 1991. But it was even before then that he sang on “The Power of Love,” “Dreams are like angels/They keep bad at bay, bad at bay/Love is the light/Scaring darkness away/I’m so in love with you/Purge the soul/Make love your goal.” Even when you’ve been burned in such an inexplicably horrible way by it in the past.'

[losinqminds]

(  taylor zakhar perez,  cis man,  he/him )   —    just  announced,  SANTIAGO  VIDAL  has  been  cast  as  JOEY TREVINO  in  the  upcoming  FRIENDS  reboot.  the  twenty eight year  old  is  trending  as  people  are  debating  if  the   diving headfirst when you decide to take the leap of faith, backlog of unanswered texts and ignored phone alarms, opening your mouth before your mind can catch up, drinking cheap beers in the nosebleed seats at the hockey game, the looming fear of missing out  that  they  are  known  for  is  enough  to  make  them  as  good  as  original.  a  quick  google  search  shows  that  their  fans  call  them  sanguine,  but  internet  trolls  think  they’re  more  impulsive.  i  guess  their  newest  interview  for  variety  where  they  talk  about  how five thousand people watched their face reveal live on twitch  will  let  people  to  know  them  better. 

statistics.

name : santiago vidal. nickname : nine out of ten times goes by santi. age : twenty eight. birthday : 26 may 1995. zodiac sign : gemini. gender : cis man. sexual orientation : bisexual. place of birth : butler, pennsylvania. current residence : los angeles, california. traits : sanguine, impulsive, curious, tactless, affectionate, gregarious, undependable, charismatic, scatterbrained. likes : the unexpected, public displays of affection, having a full agenda, saying yes, the pittsburgh penguins, his family's mexican food, the thrill of trying new things, the outdoors, hockey, the colour yellow, proving yourself, coffee, social media. dislikes : sitting still, not being (good) enough, overthinking, being alone, serious conversations, awkward silences, small enclosed spaces.

background.

— born  and  raised  as the middle child in  a  boisterous  family  of  seven,  in  a  town  close  to  pittsburgh.  his  parents  owned  a  mexican  restaurant  downtown,  a  bit  of  a  hole  in  the  wall  but  with  a  rather  hardcore  customer  base. they claim the birria is to die for. santi would agree. — had  a  close  knit  family  unit  in  the  region,  with  regular  family  gatherings  including  more  cousins  than  you  could  count  on  both  your  hands.  the  entire  family  were  hardcore  sports  fans,  and  so  santi  grew  up  sporting  the  yellow  and  black  of  the  penguins  from  the  moment  he  could  walk. — as  a  kid,  you  could  find  him  with  skates  on  his  feet  more  often  than  not.  he  was  quite  the  busy  bee,  the  word  no  not  being  part  of  his  vocabulary  alongside  maintaining  rather  impressive  stats  as  a  winger  and  keeping  up  his  grades.  at  eighteen,  he  was  recruited  by  cornell  university  on  a  hockey  scholarship. — whereas  he  used  to  skate  through  life,  the  college  experience  was undeniably harder.  stacks  of  homework,  early  morning  practice  and  a  constant  fear  of  missing  out  proved  to  be  a  disastrous  cocktail.  by  his  sophomore  year,  mediocre  performance  made  it  clear  he  wasn't  cut  out  for  the  nhl  and  although he continued to play, his  focus  began  to  shift  more  and  more  towards  his  degree. — around  this  time,  santiago  created  his  twitch  account  where  he  began  hosting  study  with  me  streams.  he  needed  a  way  to  hold  himself  accountable,  but  it  helped  others  in  the  process.  study  breaks  turned  into  full  blown  conversations,  and  handfuls  of  viewers  turned  into  hundreds.  his  streams  started  out  as  faceless,  but  a  curious  audience  convinced  him  to  start  showing  his  face.  it  might  have  had  something  to  do  with  a  fair  few  people  falling  head  over  heels  with  the  mysterious,  deep  voice. — his  evergrowing  audience  made  it  easy  to  continue  streaming  full  time  after  graduation.  study  streams  turned  into  weekly  catch  ups  and  gaming  streams,  movie  watchalongs  and  commentaries.  in  the  span  of  a  few  years,  his  social  media  accounts  amassed  half  a  million  followers  and  made  him  a  household  name  in  the  world  of  social  media  personalities.

— his  sudden  career  change  still  came  as  a  surprise,  to  himself  as  much  as  the  rest  of  the  world.  being  an  out  and  proud  bisexual  mexican-american,  he  became  a  popular  fancast  for  alexander  claremont-diaz  in  red,  white  &  royal  blue.  the  casting  directors  hadn't  overlooked  it,  as  they  invited  him  to  audition.  after  multiple  audition  rounds,  chemistry  reads  and  neverending  meetings  with  his  management,  he  was  offered  the  role. maybe becoming an actor with zero experience would be a gamble, but he felt rather lucky and approached the situation with a healthy (?) dose of confidence. — playing  alex  in  the  adaptation  wasn't  a  decision  he  needed  to  think  twice  about.  he  recognized  a  lot  of  himself  in  alex,  from  being  a  queer  latino  to  his  impulsivity  and  the  tendency  to  let  his  mouth  run.  throughout  the  experience,  the  character  became  as  meaningful  to  him  as  he  was  to  others.  and  he  felt honoured  to  be  their  source  of  representation,  and  inspiration. — the  unexpectedly  positive  response  to  his  acting  debut  opened  more  doors.  only  months  later,  he  was  announced  as  joey  in  the  reboot  of  friends.  but  suddenly  he  was  playing  a  role.  with  less  personal  attachment  and  connection,  and  recognizing  less  of  himself  in  the  character  he  was  playing,  he  was  suddenly  faced  with  just  what  it  really  meant  to  be  an  actor. — the  experience  is  new,  and  at  times  uncomfortable.  he  never  imagined  himself  in  his  current  position,  and  hasn't  ever  felt  as  much  like  a  fish  out  of  the  water  as  right  now.  now  entering  a  territory  where  his  career  is  a  make  or  break,  everything  depends  on  the  next  few  months.  maybe  his  deepest  fears  will  come  true,  being  exposed  as  nothing  but  a  fraud  and  an  e  list  star  forcing  their  way  into  the  spotlight.  maybe  he'll  decide  he  doesn't  care  for  acting  much,  fade  back  into  obscurity  from  the  mainstream.  and  maybe  this  is  what  kickstarts  an  entirely  new  career.

post credits.

FILMS. — 2021: red, white and royal blue as alex claremont-diaz TV SHOWS. — 2022 to present: friends as joey trevino

wanted connections.

because  i  am  woefully  unprepared  for  this  part  and  santiago  is  a  brand  new  character,  i'll  be  focusing  on  plotting  any  type  of  connections  (positive  or  negative,  and  platonic  or  romantic)  in  direct  messages.  through  brainstorming,  i  will  throw  some  suggestions  at  you  based  on  how  i  think  santiago  would  mesh  with  your  muse(s).  below  there  will  still  be  a  list  of  specific  wanted  connections  i  am  looking  for,  which  i'll  continue  to  update  throughout.  if  this  is  something  you're  interested  in,  please  do  let  me  know  and  i  would  love  to  chat  more  about  it! — roommates: santi  would've  auditioned  for  red,  white  &  royal  blue  when  he  was  still  living  in  the  northeast.  your  muse  would  have  offered  him  a  couch  to  crash  on  during  the  audition  process,  but  it  turned  into  an  unspoken  roommate  agreement. it has been years.  he  is  now  moved  into  the  spare  bedroom,  he  has  his  own  set  of  keys,  is  paying  rent  and  the  two  grew  thick  as  thieves.  — enemies: this  muse  would've  watched  santi  get  handed  everything,  while  they  worked  their  ass  off  all  their  life  to  have  their  career.  maybe  they  feel  threatened,  maybe  they  are  envious,  maybe  they  believe  he  doesn't  deserve  what  he  has.  either  way,  the  two  don't  get  along  at  all.

[random-ln-stuff]

Headcanon:

The Lady wasn’t harmed by the mirror just because it was unbroken. She was harmed because of what the mirror was made of: Obsidian.

In the world of Little Nightmares, obsidian is extremely anti-magic. Any creature with inherently magic abilities that touches obsidian is harmed and for some even coming close to the stuff can weaken your powers.

The Lady is a lord of this world, so she has a slight resistance to obsidian and her powers aren’t weakened by it’s presence alone (and if they are, it’s not by a noticeable amount), but she’s still harmed if she touches it or sees her reflection in it. The Lady’s powers will also dissipate if they get too close to a piece of obsidian. Light reflected by obsidian also harms and weakens her, as the light cuts through her shadow based powers.

An obsidian necklace is to the Lady what a rosary necklace is to a vampire.

The only reason that the Lady keeps that extremely dangerous artifact around is because it’s a required and central part of her ritual with the Pretenders.

This weakness to obsidian isn’t unique to the Lady either. All Creatures with magical abilities are harmed by it. However, it’s just MAGICAL abilities. People like the Janitor, Teacher and Hunter can pick up and handle obsidian just fine because their powers aren’t magic. But people like the Butler, Thin Man, Ferryman and North Wind are harmed by it because they all have abilities that count as magic.

The Lady, Ferryman, Broadcaster and North Wind all have a slight resistance because they’re lords, but they’re still harmed by it one way or another. Their powers are still weakened and obsidian still burns them to the touch, but they can get much closer to the stuff than other adults before that happens.

The Lady is actually more weak to obsidian than the other lords because she has a lot more magical abilities at her disposal compared to the others, abilities that didn’t come with her shadow powers. The Lady is constantly actively seeking out new magic spells and enchantments, while the other Lords either make do with the powers they already have access to or DO seek out more knowledge and spells, but not to the extreme degree of the Lady, who has a whole study dedicated to this sort of thing. So the Lady is weaker to obsidian than the other lords and is harmed by it in more ways, like seeing her reflection in it or having light reflected off it shine on her.

It also goes without saying that magic can’t be used on obsidian. The Butler can’t pick up obsidian with his telekinesis, obsidian isn’t affected by the Thin Man’s warping of space around him, etc.

If obsidian is brought near a TV in the Pale City, the TV will loose it’s connection to the transmission and only show regular static. If you’re on the outskirts of the Pale City, it may also pick up non-Pale-City-Transmission channels from cities far away from the Pale City. This disconnect from the Transmission also makes the TV unable to pacify Viewers. They’ll pay attention to it at first, but after a few seconds they’ll become enraged and destroy the TV because it isn’t showing the right signals (the Transmission) that they want to see. If the obsidian is taken away from the TV it’ll reconnect to the Transmission.

Placing obsidian near a TV also prevents the Thin Man, Broadcaster and Mono from entering or exiting through it.

Interestingly enough, the Teacher isn’t affected by obsidian, but the Bullies are. If a Bully touches obsidian, they’ll permanently turn into a regular porcelain doll.

Same goes for the hospital. The Doctor isn’t magic and can hold obsidian in his hands without a single problem, but if a Patient touches obsidian, it’ll become unable to move until it’s no longer touching obsidian. The living hands however, are not affected.

But adults aren’t the only ones affected. ANYTHING with magic is harmed by obsidian, and children with powers are no exception. Mono’s signal powers are weakened if he comes near and touching obsidian burns him. Same goes for Six, The Pretender, The Refugee Boy and The Humpback Girl.

Also, despite Six and the Pretender having the same powers as the Lady and the Pretender being the Lady’s daughter, they don’t have the same resistances or weaknesses to obsidian as the Lady. They aren’t resistant to obsidian and can’t come as close to it as they Lady, but they also aren’t harmed by reflected light or seeing their reflection like the Lady.

It practically goes without saying that obsidian is EXTREMELY valuable among children. Some of the most dangerous adults in any given area are the ones with magic, and you’re telling me that these little black rocks not only weaken and even temporarily remove their powers, but also cause serious damage if the adult touches them? Sign me up. The only problem is that obsidian is also super rare.

Some child dens also have pieces of obsidian scattered throughout for extra protection from threats. This has the problem of keeping children with powers out as well, but not everyone views that as a bad thing.

[sieunotes]

me? as in...me?!

❒ pairing - xayn

❒ word count - 884

❒ synopsis - xayn goes live for the first time, and it doesnt go as planned

❒ time - 2024

Italics = spoken in English

indented= comments

"hello everyone," xayn said, looking at his phone screen. he was doing a live stream on his social media account, hoping to interact with his fans. he waited for the viewers to arrive, checking the number on the corner of the screen. it was nearly 15k people watching when he last checked. he felt a surge of excitement and nervousness. he wanted to impress them, to make them happy, to make them love him.

xayn, please say hi to brazil.

he saw the first comment pop up on the chat box. he smiled softly, recognizing the flag emoji. he loved his fans from all over the world, especially from brazil. they were always so warm and enthusiastic.

"hi brazil, how are you all doing?" he said, waving his hand. "i wanted to come on here to talk…i want you all to get used to hearing my speaking voice." he giggled softly, covering his mouth. he was a bit shy about his voice, since he was still learning english. he hoped they would understand him and like him.

are you going to sing for us?

he saw another comment, this time with a microphone emoji. he knew his fans loved his singing, and he loved singing for them. he wanted to show his skills and talent.

how do you feel about the pandemic of a heroin crack pipe?

he saw a third comment, this time with a syringe emoji. he tilted his head, confused. he didn't understand what the comment meant. he wondered if it was a joke

"uh…i'm not going to sing this time, it's pretty late and people are sleeping," he said, avoiding the last comment. he smiled, "but i did want to show you guys this gift that a fan sent me."

xayn pulled out a small plushie of a black cat with green eyes, that he had received in the mail. he held it up to the camera, then beside his face. he smiled, making a cute expression. "do we look similar? i don't see it myself." he laughed softly, playing with the plushie. he loved cats, and he loved gifts. he felt touched and grateful for the fan's gesture.

anncatt!

he saw a comment, this time with a cat emoji. he frowned, wondering what it meant. he had never heard of that word before. he repeated it, trying to figure it out.

"anncatt? what's that?" he asked, looking at the screen. "a type of cat?"

the cat is you! you are anncatt!

he saw another comment, this time with a heart emoji. he realized that the fans were giving him a nickname, based on the plushie. he didn't think he looked like a cat, but he guessed it was a compliment.

"ah, no," he said, shaking his head in disagreement. "i'm not a cat. i'm a human." he smiled. "anncatt? really?" he sighed, as he laughed softly. he wondered if the nickname would stick, or if it was just a joke.

take your shirt off, pretty boy!

he saw another comment, this time with a fire emoji. he blushed, feeling flustered.

"it's too cold to remove my clothes right now…and i don't want to either," he said, firmly. he hoped the fans would respect his boundaries and his wishes. he knew they were curious and playful, but he also had his limits. he glanced at the other comments, hoping to see some positive and supportive ones. he couldn't see them all, they were flooding in too fast.

suddenly, there was a loud crash, xayn turned his head. he heard something fall and break in the background. he looked around, startled and scared. he didn't see anything, the room was dark and empty. he wondered what had caused the noise, and if there was someone else in the building.

"hello?" he uttered, nervously. he looked at the comments again, hoping to find some explanation or reassurance.

is it a ghost? omg

be careful, baby

he saw the comments, some of them expressing fear and concern, some of them joking and teasing. he felt a chill run down his spine, as he imagined a ghost or a burglar lurking in the shadows. he didn't believe in ghosts, but he also didn't like being alone in a strange place.

"it was probably something i forgot to put away correctly," he said, chuckling weakly. he tried to act calm, but his face looked a bit pale. he was honestly a bit scared, but his body wouldn't show it at the moment, as it was prepared for fight mode.

"i think i'm going to end the live here…it's getting a bit spooky," he said, smiling nervously. he decided to cut the live stream short, before anything else happened. he wanted to get out of there, and go back to his dorm. he waved at the camera, and said goodbye to his fans. he thanked them for watching, and apologized for the abrupt ending. he hoped they would understand, and not be mad at him.

he ended the live stream, and put his phone away. he got up, and looked around the building. there was no one here besides himself. it made his skin crawl. he grabbed his bag, and walked out the room. he hoped to forget the night, and have a better day tomorrow.

-

[the-next-shakespear]

The Frozen Touch (part 1)

(Summary)

Anna has always had a secert love, her passion and lust will draw her to squirting concussion. - word count 758-

-----------WARNING------------

Following smut may contain content some viewers may consider indecent, disturbing, twisted, maybe arousing

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Her hair flowed through my fingers, so soft and warm. I couldn't help but gently lift my hand to the back of her neck. Moving my thumb back to rub her cheek as her lips parted. Her smile is ever so lovely. Our lips touched again. Oh God, she is just perfect. But this was different. My heart skipped, and now I'm having a hard time breathing. A worried panic set in. Her hand moved from my neck to my back. Having the lightest of touches. I gasped to catch my breath. Our eyes locked. Her eyes stared straight at me. I felt fear and love, cold and warmth, yet I didn't move as she slowly moved her hand around to my side. Then moving towards my… "Wait, can we maybe? Do this at your place? I can't have my mother walk in. Please?" I stumbled to speak. I still couldn't breathe, and my heart was racing.

She smiled and kissed me, "How about this evening, at the waterfall outside of town?" she said under her breath. The idea of it had already started to make me feel butterflies. Trying my hardest not to pull her back into my arms right there, I smiled and nodded and squealed just a little. As she walked out of my room, she turned around, looked at me, and said "Goodnight" as she shut the door. My heart sank. There she goes, why would I let her leave? Tears started to form. But wait, I'll see her in just over an hour. Must get ready, I thought and quickly found something I hoped would please her.

What to bring, what to get, is all I thought about. But without an answer, I left and headed to the waterfall's base. Disappointed with myself. The outfit I chose wasn't new to her, and still I was empty-handed. Thoughts of her abandoning me kept running wild in my head. Luckily though, I found some bright orange orchids. I had to jump through a bush with thorns and cut my legs slightly. A stick got me pretty good on the thigh as well. The 2-mile hike to the waterfall, luckily, was almost over.

Once at the base of the waterfall, I looked around. But never saw her. So I cried out, "Anna, Anna, you here?"

"I'm up here," she said. I looked up to see a dark shadow outline of Anna. The sun was setting behind her. The curves and contours of her perfect body are mesmerizing. She then jumped off the rock, falling at least 20 feet. Thankfully she didn't stay under the water for long. I walked down the path to the shoreline to see a beautiful picnic layout. Strawberries, cherries, and chocolate chips were in lovely bowls. When I reached the water's edge to sit down on the blanket Anna cried out to me. "Come in, love. The waters lovely." The water did look nice and refreshing. But I didn't want to dirty my clothes. "Come on, please..." Anna said as she notions for me to join her. So I'll have to admit I was a bit surprised to be taking off my clothes to go swimming. But I removed my shirt and pants and started to swim out to meet her. "This way," she yelled out when I just started to get close. Anna had swam to the side of the waterfall. "Where are you going ?" I yelled. The water was quite loud, and I couldn't hear what she had said in response. I just hoped she knew what she was doing as I followed her through the waterfall.

After what seemed like a minute of being pushed underwater by the waterfall, I looked around to see a calm pool of water. The sunlight still broke through the waterfall. Anna was in the middle of the chasm. We didn't have to swim to keep our heads above water, but we were still shoulders high in water.

We were alone. And it was just us. My heart raced, and the butterflies were so intense. I must have frozen because she moved over to me. She slowly ran her hand down the side of my face and pulled down my lower lip as her hand transitioned to my neck. She moved closer. I could feel the warmth of her body so close to mine. I was paralyzed. Couldn't even think. Only feel. As she kissed me, she brought her body to mine wrapping her leg around my right leg, locking us together.

[inmyarmswrappedin]

I also think that with 39 seasons (plus wtfockdown and the upcoming Italia season), it's actually not that difficult to tell already in the first week whether a season is going to be bad.

Just going off the first episode, I was able to make predictions such as Zoe and Yara being paired off for insta content (didn't guess that it'd be as a couple), that Ava would be sidelined and sammified, that Nora would be demoted because the actress would be busy, and that Fatou would play the role of the best friend instead of Nora as a result. I was able to predict the exam storyline would be a major part of the season and others predicted that the Zoe/Mailin conflict would take up a large part of the season. All of this based on the first episode alone!

I understand that people want to be optimistic and positive going into any season, but what I don't agree with is casting those who judge the quality of the season based on the first episode as shitting on a season for the sake of shitting. 39 seasons in I do consider myself qualified to judge the quality of a season based on ep 1 alone, because I've already watched many seasons before that, and the overall quality of the season was already obvious in episode 1. I encourage anyone who disagrees to name one season that ended up being redeemed in viewers' eyes after a shitty first episode.

(And no, wtfock s3 doesn't count because wtfock s3 fans are going by the collective headcanon version where things like Sander not wanting to go to the police was explained, and things like Sander cheating on Robbe after the hate crime didn't happen.)

What tends to happen more often is the opposite. A season that seemed to start well ends up devolving into some mess after ep 1. It happens a lot with Sana seasons for instance.

But the opposite, where ep 1 is worse than the rest of the season, will always be a lot rarer because writers tend to put more effort into the first and final episodes of every season, just because these episodes need to set up and conclude all the narrative and character arcs. These episodes get revised the most because as other arcs and elements get added to the overall season, the first and final episodes get revised to introduce and conclude those elements. When a season/show tackles on a major arc that hasn't been introduced in some way in ep 1, it is an obvious sign of bad writing. That is why Druck introduced Ben in ep 1 despite doing jack shit with him for weeks, because he needed to be in ep 1 if he was going to be the season antagonist.