#because that is like catnip to me

[thetarttfuldickhead]

A week or two after the Dubai Air protest Sam happens upon Jamie lounging listlessly on a bench in the otherwise deserted gym. He’s not doing any exercise, just sitting there and staring out into nothingness with a curiously vacant look on his face.

Sam hesitates, hovering in the doorway. He’s come for a little bit of extra weights before heading home, and he hadn’t expected anyone to be here this late, least of all Jamie. It’s been a long day and Sam’s not sure if he’s up for dealing with the (possibly) reformed bully right now. Even if they are edging towards friendly, and even if that’s no small thing given what’s come between them before, there’s still an undercurrent of charged uncertainty to their interactions, a stilted hesitancy to their cautious politeness and careful attempts at casual camaraderie.

Jamie hasn’t explicitly told Sam that he’s sorry for the things he’s put him through. Sam has decided that he will not let his decision to give Jamie another chance be contingent upon this. It’s very tiring, being angry and resentful of the other’s presence: so much easier to accept the taped up logo for the peace offering it was, and let that be Jamie’s apology.

(If it rankles, it only rankles a little.)

Reminding himself of his decision to let bygones be bygones, and that they won’t ever get anywhere if they don’t actually learn to talk, Sam steps into the gym. Asks as he would any other glum-looking team mate he’d unexpectedly happened upon, “Are you all right, Jamie?”

Holds himself ready, holds himself steady, if Jamie should bare his teeth and bite, now that there’s no one around to see it.

But Jamie only starts a little, like he hadn’t noticed Sam or he’s surprised to be voluntarily addressed. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, I’m good, man. Great, you know. It’s just… I’m a bit tired, I guess.“ He pauses, then his face suddenly collapses and he gives Sam the most plaintive of looks. “It’s just so fucking exhausting being nice all the time. I don’t know how you do it, mate.”

Ah. Sam tactfully doesn’t say that it’s usually no effort for him and that he doesn’t really understand how it could possible come that hard for anyone.

He also doesn’t point out that not actively being mean to people isn’t quite the same as being nice.

Because Jamie is trying, isn’t he, even if it’s painfully evident that he still needs to try, that it doesn’t come quite naturally.  

“Bit like when Spike had that chip in his head and had no choice but to team up with the good guys, isn’t it?” Colin had muttered a few days after their wayward striker had re-joined them, and yes, Sam had had to agree: it is a bit like that.

But there’s no chip in Jamie’s head (Sam is pretty sure). He’s here of his own free will, trying to be a good team mate and a better person because he wants to be. That has to count for something, doesn’t it?

Sam is pretty sure his dad would say it does. Sam wants to be the sort of person that lets it count.

And Jamie is looking genuinely dejected, in a way that has Sam feel a small surge of something that isn’t affection but isn’t too unlike it either. A little bit of pity mingling with amusement; enough that he’s moved to brave sitting down next to Jamie.

“Well, I have had more practise,” he says lightly. “I bet you will be really good at it if you give it a bit more time.”

“Yeah?” It’s offered casually, but there’s no disguising the faint hope in it. Sam can feel Jamie watching him out of the corner of his eye.

“Of course,” he says, and then, feeling bold, “You are Jamie Tartt. Aren’t you good at everything?”

A pause, and Sam holds his breath, praying that Jamie will understand that he’s being teased rather than mocked—

Then Jamie snorts, a sound halfway to a chuckle. “Yeah, man,” he retorts, bumping his shoulder against Sam’s, very carefully. “I’ll be the fucking best at being nice. Swear down, I’ll be so good I make you look like Geezer Scrooge.”

“That, I’d like to see,” Sam says drily; says sincerely. Standing, he nods towards the weight bench. “Do you think you can be good enough not to let me be crushed to death while you spot me?”

For a moment, Jamie looks taken aback, and Sam braces himself for a snide retort to his presumption – but it doesn’t come. Instead Jaime’s face clears, and he gives a sharp nod.

“Course, mate,” he says, and rises to follow Sam.

[wallissa]

One thing I love about Hughie is that he’s the main character, but in such a “y/n” way. Completely unremarkable, ordinary loser who gets dragged into a life of crime and adventure by accident and whom everyone falls in love with upon meeting him, most of the time for absolutely no reason. Butcher wants to be his manic pixie dream psycho so bad, but then also breaks his own back to protect him. Frenchie and MM would kill Butcher if it weren’t for the fact that it’d make Hughie sad. Annie is a 10000/10 and wants to spend the rest of her life singing cringy teen music with him and and easing her way into pegging him. A-Train ended up with his life hopelessly tangled with Hughie’s and can’t seem to let it go. Victoria spent her breaks sharing snacks with him, knowing he’s murdering Supes — and never stopped trusting him, to the point where she came to him when she had every reason to believe he’d want her dead. Soldier Boy literally escaped endless torture and spent 90% of his newly won freedom trying to impress Hughie by putting on a little macho man show for him. The only person who’s truly immune to Hughie and his “putting his hair in a messy bun before getting sold to 1D” charm is Homelander, who genuinely just hates him. Fascinating character design, all in all.

[zmediaoutlet]

can i ask you what you think of dean leaving the body of sam in the cave in season 13? i always hated that narrative choice of castiel stopping him to get him back and dean going along with it 😭

Jensen hates it too, lol. But I love it, because it says something interesting about the character.

(nb: if you hate it because Cas is involved and somehow that means that destiel is real then I can't help you. He's a character in the show, you gotta just accept it. But with that said--)

There's a super melodrama version of the show -- and the show is a melodrama already, so this would be cranking the melodrama to 11 -- where Dean does indeed stay with Sam's dead body and the tears trickle down his face and then he... what. Makes a deal? Shoots himself? Sobs all night and then just wastes away there like a big ol dork? Certainly there are shades of that in Dean, but it's kind of the... most boring part. Because what also exists in Dean, and makes him an actually-interesting character to watch, is a deep sense of responsibility, that overcomes even the things we'd think should be most important.

If he were the big drama queen of the above paragraph he wouldn't even 'let' Sam go on hunts. Sam would be in a crystal tower somewhere (braiding his Rapunzel hair, I guess) because Oh No, What If Something Happened To Sammy. But Dean accepts that something might always happen to his brother every time they step foot on a hunt, and it happened to be vampires this time but every other time it could've been a ghost or a demon or, fuck, getting hit by a car. Stumbling unluckily backward into rebar. Anything. What I love is that Dean does almost forget himself but it truly only takes half a reminder for him to remember -- wait, this is a job. This is what has to be done. They swore to help people who weren't strong enough to help themselves, and that doesn't change when one of them is dead. He will do the job and save this idiot girl who slowed them down in this cave anyway and Sam won't be any more or less dead by the time he does it.

Anyway, he already did it once. Red Meat (beloved by wincesties everywhere) had the exact same scenario. Sam was dead and Dean had to escort civilians to safety and he was obviously, obviously going to come back, and fix it if he can and maybe die if he can't. You can see in the camp when they get there that he's dead inside, and he's all set to go trudging back to the bloody dark but then Sam shows up with Lucifer, anyway. (And thank god, bc it provides some of the coolest scenes in s13 as a result.)

[edwardallenpoe]

hey who was gonna tell me that House is a Sherlock Holmes adaption. Huh. Who was gonna bc the epiphany i had this morning while watching a hilson edit was not Okay. You guys KNOW i'm autistic about Sherlock Holmes.

[bigcats-birds-and-books]

Books of 2025: THE DEAD CAT TAIL ASSASSINS by P. Djèlí Clark.

Tore through this today! It was very fun--I've really enjoyed all of Clark's novella-length work that I've read so far, and this was no exception. Gorgeous descriptions, neat worldbuilding in a little package, and I liked our MC (Eveen) and all of her reckless decisions (which I suppose is allowed if you're a badass undead assassin under contract and on a time crunch).

The jacket/Goodreads blurb captures the ~assassins~ part of this story really well, but I don't think it does justice to the Inherent Weirdness--there's more loadbearing magic going on that is, unfortunately, spoilery, but super cool and mind-bendy and verging on timey-wimey (is that proper usage?? sorry I don't go here).

Overall: fucked up funny weird little story! This definitely startled laughter out of me in spots, and I love that. I had a really fun time, which, per his acknowledgements, is what he set out to write. Mission accomplished, sir!

[littlegalerion]

Latest news on Zenimax:

Never forget that Zenimax was present HERE ON TUMBLR, actively engaging with the fan base and reposting art. Then Greymore came, and when the reviews started to come back negative from us on here, they flew to Twitter and only acknowledged feedback on there. They never addressed the issues, instead pandering to those who liked the Chapter with more "character lore", then played suck up by giving us "Verandis" back, plus adding Wes Johnson to voice a character.

This would have been water under the bridge if they had just addressed the mistake on their part. They never did.

[quietwingsinthesky]

overcoming the way my brain waffles around making whump about female characters because it’s stuck on if it makes us look like Bad Person by writing tons beating the shit out of evie frye <3

[unopenablebox]

anyway i spent too much time reading offbe/at wedding and now i’m involuntarily scripting out my online cancellation in a universe where i for some reason send in our wedding to them to profile but get called out for asking them not to refer to it or us as “queer” anywhere in the article

[possamble]

realizing im kind of a weirdo about laios and marcille

[butts-bouncing-on-the-beltway]

Local parent visits child and comments on the shyness of one of the cats in the household, child decides not to mention that said cat has literally never met a human she didn't try to climb like a cat tree while headbutting them for attention, more at 11

[since-times-long-forgotten]

can’t keep my fucking plants alive

[readwing]

From what I've seen so far, Roddy Ho has one fan. It me

[littlestarpjm]

I haven't caught up yet unfortunately, so I may or may just write a lil something something YuanYi ¯\_(ツ)_/¯?

[moraygrotto]

OK you got me into Malleus thank you very much. •~• I sort of didn't notice him amongst all the spicy characters but the prim types wanting a break is something I have realised is a weakness of mine (which has me constantly coming back to your Azul works). I spent the day going over his canon and found that he did indeed eat an entire birthday cake by himself and did threaten to eat people, he is the gift that keeps giving.

OMG THANK U SO MUCH‼️‼️‼️ i feel like an influencer even though malmal isnt even in my top 5

[amberedcorpse]

Deleting this later , just wanted to say I'll hopefully be writing here tomorrow. taking it slow at the moment. But take a look at these for now. Exactly the vibe I was thinking for Felix's new vegas verse.

[queerofthedagger]

i'm about to finish rotk on friday (am working 24 hours tomorrow 😔) which means i'll have read the entire trilogy in like. 10 days. i can't remember when i breathed through something this quickly and joyfully, and I don't want it to end, and the real question now is if i can read the entire silm in one week before I'll be on vacation or if i should take a lil break because man. man