#both changed Kpop history!

[ohmuqueen]

x

[alexxncl]

obey me hcs (mainly the brothers)

masterlist | more drabbles/hcs | pt 2

keep in mind my mc is black lol

slight nsfw warning ?? it's just asmo shape-shifting

also this is so long i apologize

first and foremost, SIMEON AND DIA AFROLATINO KINGS

the two of them and mams always help mc with wash day

barbatos also does bc he helps dia with his hair and will silk press the FUCK out your hair

mams can do locs and helped the angels in the celestial realm who had them with their retwists and detox

mc convinced him to start a business on the side bc they could tell how much he loved doing their hair

beel loves kids and they love him, he's a jungle gym

levi used to (and still does) go mute when he's overwhelmed, luci and mammon taught themselves sign language in case they need to communicate with him

luci was ridiculously overprotective of the brothers when they fell, but the longer they stayed in the devildom, it was less obvious bc his pride didn't allow him to show those emotions outright

asmo can change his genitalia at will depending on his partner's needs/desires

all the brothers are some sort of neurodivergent, and so is (my) mc

this is kinda canon but all of them are queer and luci is the only cis one out of all the brothers

mc helped them become more comfortable with stimming both in the main tl and in nb bc they do it a lot themself

mams, barbatos, and luci are the best to go to when your anxiety gets bad bc they all have it and know how to handle it best/take your mind off of it

idk if this is canon or not but luci advocated for a hybrid-like rad so levi would be able to take some of his classes virtual when his anxiety gets too bad

mc has touched everyone's tails/wings out of pure curiosity once everyone was comfortable enough around them

mams always carries around crow food and birds are almost always following him around bc of it

luci and dia fucked before the fall.

mc started singing wade in the water whenever luci made them do shit and now mams does it too

mc rarely left their room after the lesson 16 incident and everyone but belphie checked up on them

lucifer forbade him from going anywhere near them but he still tried to at least see if they were ok

lucifer is *almost* physically incapable of apologizing bc of his sin

mams rarely uses his powers to their fullest extent, he did it once not too long after they fell and vowed to never do it again out of fear of hurting the people he cared about

satan's powers are equally fueled by wrath and grief

satan was with lucifer from his creation, god didn't wanna make both of them bc he knew satan would be the catalyst for a war

asmo and solomon almost dated but asmo pushed himself away bc he's scared of committment

levi had to physically hold mammon back from *seriously* hurting belphie after the lesson 16 incident

solomon is lilith's son

solomon is actually a decent cook when he doesnt try to experiment...but he always tries to experiment

magic can't even fix whatever he makes when he cooks

simeon can't see for shit but never wears his glasses

beel had and still has a lot of body image issues, his gluttony worsened them and he works out nonstop to cope

belphie listens to white noise on the rare occasion of him not being able to sleep

simeon would've fallen with luci if he found out what was happening and had more time to think, part of the reason why he was so ok with being demoted

dia wanted to be the closest to belphie when they first fell bc of their shared interest in humans and was hurt when belphie was standoffish

luke will be one of the most powerful, if not the most powerful, angels in history

i feel like he was a human and he died when he was really young and became an angel after

mephisto is a kpop stan and ults stayc

he compensates for his low self esteem and jealousy of luci and dia's friendship with the newspaper position

he also has a crush on both of them but wont admit it to himself

raph scolded the brothers so much bc they were his favorites, he didn't want them getting caught by god

felt guilty for letting the brothers fall alone, but not nearly as guilty as simeon

thirteen is a lesbian and i love her and we're married <333333

she hates solomon bc he was one of her assignments and she failed bc he's immortal

familial issues bc of the failure, she's the baby of the family but was still outcast

mc taught mams how to play spades and he's terrible at it

i'm so sorry 😭

[17isrighthere]

— what’s up guys 😭 i just wanted to share my own little two cents on some colouring trends i’ve seen lately (particularly for kpop gifs!) which includes really distorted pink/red hues for skintones or oversaturated yellows so maybe i could give some tips that also helped me in the past!!

and of course because i love to talk a lot — this is a very long and image heavy tutorial...

❓ why is it an issue? i think its a very clear given that whitewashing is wrong and problematic for a vast number of reasons (with a history steeped in colourism and racism) and how there’s no excuse for changing the skintone of a person-of-colour.

— but with that said i want to make it clear that this is not an accusatory post! i’m not jumping on any one content creator or tumblr user to call them racist or colourist or a bigot 😭 and i don’t want to accuse anyone of having bad intentions with their gifs or images that they post! i really just want this to be a helpful post for anyone who is struggling to colour their gifs properly and more of a learning step instead of a call-out! 

however pink-washing (i’m aware there is another definition for this term but i’m referring to washing out a skintone to make it red-pink) and yellow-washing are equally as wrong! and they are also easily avoidable!! 

in the past it was a commonly held (and incorrect) belief that european people (a term i’m going to use broadly for non-poc) had a ‘fair’ and ‘pink’ undertone to their skin [and it was an encouraged beauty standard to try and emulate that fair pale pink skin] while asian people (particularly east asian ethnicities) had ‘yellow’ skin (as seen in racist caricatures and a plethora of terrible and outdated race theories).

thus pink-washing and yellow-washing both embrace two extreme ends of the scale and it’s simply better and more respectful to try and maintain the skintone of the idol in your gifs! there are deeper contextual explanations of this if you would like to learn more!

❓ identifying pink/yellow gifs

let’s start with recognising what colouring is a no-go ❌ if you’re a gifmaker you’re probably fighting a battle on two fronts — against the whitewashing music shows and then the struggle to restore skin colour without turning the dial up so much that you’ve changed their entire skintone.

for this example below i found a kpop psd posted recently (in the past few months actually) and applied it to a basic bright-lighting sort of facecam. 

the original facecam has no heavy stage lighting (as stages can often have really strong red or pink lights that also darken the colours) so it’s an easy one to follow along with.

the gif on the left has only a basic curves layer while the gif on the right has the added kpop psd on it. it’s a very stark difference in jungwon’s skintone and i would definitely classify this as an unnatural skin tone.

following a selective colour layer (to subtly increase the warm tones of his skin) / a photo filter (to counter the pale blue sort of lighting) and a colour balance - we can end up with a product like this.

now of course, this is only a very simple sort of colouring. and everyone has different colouring styles so you can go bonkers with all the colour manipulation for the blues and greens and purples as you like!

but what if the stage is just naturally red? 

may i introduce you to the dreaded seventeen stages during face the sun era then 😭

as you can see there is already a very heavy sort of pink-red cast on his skin (that only gradually got worse as the stage started because of those damn lights and shadows 😭) but we can easily work around them!

so here’s our stage lighting with no adjustments 

and now even though we got rid of the pink-tone it’s been replaced with a very strong yellow. (you might think i’m exaggerating out here but there are unfortunately a mite too many gifs like this). jeonghan’s skin (not to mention the members in the back) have been dialled up to a wasp yellow.

and unfortunately (at least in my experiences) there have been quite a few of the below instances (especially for this stage) so ultimately it is all about finding the right balance between getting rid of the harsh, unsaturated lighting while also bringing back warmth to the skintone while ALSO not giving the idols a spray-tan.

❓ so what can i do?

well i’m glad you asked! let’s go back to the jeonghan example we just used. here’s the stage gif once more without any adjustments or layers.

now i’ll add a simple curves layer (to even out the general lighting) and we end up with this. it’s obviously much better. the red-brown cast has no become darker creating a greater contrast with jeonghan’s skintone versus his black and white outfit! it’s a nicer gif overall but i want to bring out his skintone ever so slightly to make up for the harsh white lights on the highlights of his face.

i added another selective colour layer (increasing the reds with the cyan slider and then the black slider while also pushing on the yellow slider as well) and a gradient map (fading from black to orange and set to soft light at a 20% opacity)! and this is my final result!

❓ tips and tricks

— colour balance is your best friend! if a gif seems too blue (and hence giving your subject a pale purple-red sort of look) bring back the slider to the yellow side. or vice versa. it often sorts out all the little hiccups that a curves layer might have provided. — create layer masks to compare skin colour. it’s always useful to just have a little circle where you can see the skintone before and afters! — don’t just rely on selective colour to bring colour back into skin. this is where i find that i often trip up to overcompensate for whitewashing. a gradient map works wonders if set at the right opacity and you can adjust the skin colours minutely afterwards! — this might seem like a reduntant theme but it’s more than okay to ask for help! even i’ve found that i struggle with colouring a gif right and it’s better to get two or three heads in the game than one 😭

there is no one method or psd that will automatically graces oneself with perfect and correct colouring but it’s a matter of practice and figuring out what methods works for you!

i’d take a look at these very helpful tutorials! how to colour east/south-east asian celebrities how to fix orange-washed characters

[absolutebl]

Hi! Why do so many BLs have one character meet the other when they were a child and love them since then…. I’m watching History 5 and the second couple has this trope with the older one loving the child but loads of them have a child ‘loving’ the older guy for years (Minato, second couple in History 4, lovely writer)

Is this a common trope in non-BL Asian dramas? Maybe I’m missing some cultural aspect but it makes me feel a bit weird… I’m fine when they both meet as children but when one’s a child and one’s an adult it feels off to me!

We Met As Kids, Therefore I Love You

Yes, it's a super common trope in ALL Asian romances.

There's a human cross-cultural claim-to-care around having met someone "first" giving one person priority to another's affection and in their life.

For example, think about how many fans (of say a Kpop group or band or actor) will claim to be "better" or morally superior to other fans of that same talent, because they have have liked that group/person "since the beginning" or "before they were famous." How about those who claim superiority because they read the book before the TV series became popular?

To have loved something FIRST is often allied with being better at loving it, there is a value judgement to longevity of association. (This is also true around disliking someone/something first.)

There isn't a name for this logical fallacy, although there should be. I would say something like appeal to tradition argumentum ad antiquitatem (which is a red herring fallacy). So appeal to time, argumentum ad tempus?

(The 8th Sense is doing some VERY interesting things to philosophically battle this concept right NOW, actually.)

Narratively speaking, if you have only a short amount of time to unfold the story (for example We Best Love) this trope gives writers a quick way to justify pining and affection (usually from the seme character). So backstory can be cribbed for character development. That character is already in love, so we don't have to show him falling in love, only one character is in play for that.

In longer narratives (like Word of Honor, Lovely Writer) this is a secret that gets to be slowly uncovered and explored as a plot point. If you have them meet as children, or when one is a child then it justifies one character not remembering the other (because peoples appearances change from childhood to adulthood).

I think the popularity in Asian dramas in particular has to do with collectivist cultures and family obligation/intimacy priority. To have known (or met) someone as a kid adds a level of intimate connection that justifies any affection that much more than meeting later in life.

There's a very funny scene in Kdrama (noona romance) Thumping Spike (recommended) that directly mocks this trope. Near the end the main couple openly together and they are in the car with the (former) love triangle dude. He lost, even though he's the one with the childhood crush. He directly combats this concept by saying (basically): If longevity guaranteed romance, I should be married to the grandma who runs my local convenience store.

Another well known Kdrama that combats this trope is Strong Woman Do Bong Soon (recommended) which goes out of its way to have the love triangle character who would normally lose the girl, actual win her this time. (So the one who loses is the moot crush from childhood.)

In BL, I tracked this one for a while:

Also here are a few BLs that DO NOT use this trope:

(source)

[godsmenusuperbowl]

Just Like Gretzky ~ *Seo Changbin*

Disclaimer: I did not edit this photo. All rights to this edit goes to the owner (if the owner wants me to take it down, I will).

Summary: Changbin and you have a friendship built on hockey (although you often argue over who the greatest player of all time is). However, when he catches feelings, things get complicated. And there's this tradition regarding who should wear his other jersey to his championship game this weekend...

Pairing: Seo Changbin X Fem!Reader

Genre: Fluffy Oneshot

Word Count: 5072

Warning: N/A

Masterlist

Taglist: @plutonieve @maeleelee @mxnsxngie @kpop-will-kill-me

A/N: As a lifelong hockey fan, I needed to write this. I've thought about making it a series multiple times, but I didn't. I like it this way.

Changbin has known you pretty much his whole life. The two of you grew up together, your houses right next to each other in your neighborhood, and the two of you were practically glued to the hip since you first met. The glue that kept the two of you together when you were children was a shared love for one sport: hockey.

The two of you would spend hours watching every interview and going over the statistics of every team and each player. Any game that was playing that you both had time to watch, you would. Of course, the two of you would get into heated debates over the game and the players during commercial breaks, but that's what made watching the games that much more fun.

“Obviously, Wayne Gretzky is the greatest hockey player to ever play in the history of hockey.” Changbin exclaimed, making you roll your eyes with a scoff.

“Absolutely not. Gordie Howe is called Mr. Hockey for a reason!” You shot back.

Changbin frowned at just how crazy you sounded. “That doesn’t matter!”

“What do you mean it doesn't matter? It totally does!”

“Gretzky can skate circles around Howe in his sleep!”

“But Howe has his own hat trick named after him! What does Gretzky have?”

“Everyone knows Gretzky more than they know Howe!”

You groaned, flopping back onto your bed, making Changbin smile in spite of himself. “I don’t even know why I’m still friends with you.”

He shrugged before he teased you again. “I’m not sure. Maybe it’s because I’m the only person you can freak out about hockey with.”

A chuckle escaped you. “Yeah, I guess you’re right.”

“Of course I’m right.” He nodded all matter of fact like. “I’m always right.”

“You’re not right about the best hockey player of all time.”

“Okay subject change!” He whined and made a face at you. “I do NOT want to go through all of that debate again.”

Again, you laughed before sitting up. “Alright, alright. Then let me ask you this. When’s your state championship game?”

Changbin froze. It’s not that he didn’t want to tell you about his championship game. It’s just every time you came to one of his hockey games, he got all nervous and made dumb mistakes on the ice. Not only that, but there was a tradition of the players giving their away game jerseys to a friend or significant other to wear during the game for good luck. He wanted to give you his jersey to wear, but he was just too scared to ask, so he was planning on just giving it to Wooyoung tomorrow.

“Oh, uh, it’s coming up.” He tried to avoid the topic, but sometimes you were just too smart for him.

“Like this weekend?” You asked, scooching closer and making his heart skip a beat.

“Maybe…”

You nodded. “Well, I will most definitely be there!”

He was hoping you wouldn’t say that, but he knew you would come as soon as you guessed when his game was. “Are you sure you want to come? It’ll be so boring. And it's not like you haven't been to any of my games before. It'll be just like one of those...”

“Boring?! Since when is hockey boring?! And this is the championship game! There is no way it's going to be boring!” You screeched, causing him to jump a little, yet a smile tugged at his lips. “I’m so going to be there! It’ll be so fun! And I know you guys will win!”

“Hehe, yeah…” He trailed off. 

"Well, I'm starved, do you want anything?" You asked, standing up and stretching.

He was thankful that you changed the subject and he shook his head. "Not right now, but hurry up. The second period is about to start."

"I'll be quick, I promise!" You assure him before slipping out of the room.

Changbin sighed as soon as you left the room. He was no longer looking forward to his championship game now. 

As soon as his head hit the lunch table the next day, Seungmin laughed at him. “Something on your mind there, defense?”

“I heard that it’s Y/n.” Felix also teased him. The rest of the team turned to face their depressed defenseman, knowing what the girl meant to him.

Changbin’s head shot up at his words. “Where did you hear that?”

He shrugged, “I’m friends with Wooyoung too, you know.”

Now he really regrets telling Wooyoung what happened last night at her place. Groaning, his head hit the table once again. Since Seungmin and Felix knew about his plight, he was preparing for all of the team to start relentlessly teasing him. This was not what he wanted at all. He just wanted to vent about his frustrations to his close friends and not to his team. Granted, he should have known better because Wooyoung was known for having a big mouth.

“So what’s wrong with you and Y/n?” Hyunjin asked.

“Nothing’s going on.” He tried in vain to explain.

“Right…” Minho snickered as he rolled his eyes. “So what’s really on your mind?”

Changbin sighed. There was no way he was getting out of this one. When Minho wants to know something, he will do everything in his power to get it from you. And it was never a pretty sight. So he might as well spill his guts.

“It’s just, she asked when the playoff game was and she managed to figure out it’s this weekend.” He explained.

Jeongin narrowed his eyes on his teammate, as if he was talking nonsense. “And that’s bad, why?”

“Because I kind of maybe, sort of want her to wear my away jersey to the game…” He could feel his cheeks turn a bright shade of red.

Within an instant all of the boys at the table were jeering and teasing him to no end. He felt himself shrink into himself from embarrassment until he felt someone throw his arm over his shoulder. It didn’t take a genius to know that it was the team captain, Chris, aka Bang Chan.

“Hey, it’s okay 'Bin.” He consoled him. “I already gave my away game jersey to my girlfriend. It’s not a big deal so don’t make it a big deal.”

“But it’s so cute!” Felix teased, pulling at Changbin’s cheeks, making him groan. “Our big, tough, and scary defenseman has a little crush!”

“You have a crush too, Felix!” Jisung shot back, also throwing his arm over Changbin’s shoulders from the other side. “So you have no room to talk.”

It was at this moment that the forward blushed just as red as Changbin was at the moment. However, Felix managed to stammer out, “Yeah, but, I threw my jersey in their locker with a note telling them where to go this weekend.”

“Yeah, if they even decide to show up.” Jeongin teased him.

“They will!”

“Hey!” Jisung exclaimed in an effort to get them to stop fighting. “Felix’s problems aside, how is Changbin going to get Y/n to go to the game this weekend with his jersey?”

Hyunjin shrugged. “Why not just do what Felix did? Throw it in her locker and not tell her anything in hopes she figures it out instead of being a decent human being and talking to her?”

Felix frowned and flicked a French fry at him. “Low blow dude.”

“Doesn’t change the fact that you’re an idiot.” He sighed as he shook his head, causing the forward to scoff.

Chris huffed before turning Changbin to face him. “Look, you’re not going to get any good advice from these guys, so let me try to help in some way. You seem to really like her and I’m glad you do. Anxiety is normal, but don’t let it get in the way of trying to talk to her. She might surprise you.”

“I suppose…” He trailed off, unsure of what else to say. It was a good thing because Chris then went into a rant about strategy for the game that weekend and he was more than willing to change the subject. 

However, the previous conversation was still nagging at the back of his mind through the rest of lunch. All he needed to do was give you his jersey and ask you to go to the game. It sounded easy in theory, but he knew deep down that as soon as he saw you, he was going to freeze like he always did when he was near you nowadays. 

Sometimes he wished he was still a kid who liked to pull on your pigtails to tease you and watch hockey games with you. He wished he didn’t have all these unnecessary feelings overcomplicating things. Sometimes he wondered if you felt the same way he did, if you froze up just like he did, but he knew you didn’t. Why would you like your best friend who has only really ever been a friend to you? There was absolutely no way. So he was left to sulk in his own little pity party.

That afternoon during practice, Changbin was beyond distracted. He kept missing the puck that was passed to him and kept tripping over his own skates. The other boys at first laughed at him, but as his distracted clumsiness continued, they began to grow worried.

Being a good Captain, Chris pulled him to the side with a frown. “What has gotten into you? I understand having an off-day but we really  can’t afford off-days this close to the most important game of the series. So what’s wrong?”

“Nothing, nothing.” Changbin shook his head, trying not to let it show what he was truly thinking. “I just haven’t been myself today.”

“You’re thinking about Y/n again, aren’t you?”

He sighed. “Is it really that obvious?”

Chris chuckled. “Yeah, a little bit. Look, just tell her, okay? Worst that’s going to happen is-”

“She says no.” Changbin finished. “Yeah, I know. I just wish things could have stayed the same, you know? Like when we were still best friends who loved hockey more than anything else in the world. I wish I never had feelings for her because they just overcomplicate everything.”

Again, Chris chuckled, patting his slightly younger teammate on the shoulder. “Love doesn’t always happen the way we want it to. And it just so happened to have worked out this way. Maybe you two are meant to be together. Or maybe you’re not. You’re never going to know if you don’t give her a chance.”

"But what if she doesn't give me a chance?"

"That's a risk you're going to have to take."

Changbin supposed his captain was right. Besides, Chris has been in a relationship far longer than he has. He ought to know more about romance than he does. Heaving a sigh, he shook his head in an attempt to get back into the game. Like his captain said, the most important game of the series was this weekend and he needed to bring his A-game.

It was a slow start but eventually he was back up to parr. Everyone was relieved to see their best defenseman back to his old tricks again. Even Changbin was feeling better about the big game that weekend. Practice finished well and he found himself laughing and joking along with his teammates in the locker room before getting ready to leave.

However, upon leaving the locker room, he saw you.

He couldn’t miss you; no one could. You were wearing your Red Wings jersey and a Gordie Howe cap. You must have seen him practice because the only time you wore all that was when you went to watch a hockey game. Changbin immediately felt self-conscious about practice. Did you see him before his talk with Chris, when he was playing badly because you were plaguing his thoughts? However, the thought of you actually hearing the conversation he had with his captain made him want to turn right around and hide in the locker room until you went away.

“Changbin?”

Welp, he was screwed.

Giving you an awkward smile, he hefted his bag of gear higher on his shoulder. “H-hi Y/n. What are you doing here?”

You chuckled. “I had to make sure you guys were in tip top shape for the game this weekend. You guys looked amazing out there. You’re going to kill it.”

“Yeah? You think so?”

Nodding, you answered, “I know so.”

He nodded as well, feeling his cheeks get warm at your praise. “Well, thank you, Y/n. I really appreciate it.”

“But that’s not the only reason why I came by.”

Changbin was afraid you’d say something like that. Again, he hoisted his gear even higher onto his shoulder, trying not to grunt from the strain of the weight on his shoulder. “Oh yeah?”

You nodded. “Yeah. One of your teammates, the back-up goalie, Seungmin, told me to meet you here. He said you have something to talk to me about? He said it had something to do with the game this weekend?”

Leave it to Seungmin to make his situation worse for him. Now he couldn’t back out. He had to give you the jersey. It was now or never. 

Dropping his bag of gear, he didn’t look you in the eye as he dug out his away jersey and forced it into your hands. “Here. Wear this at the game. I’ll see you later.”

And with that, he was gone, praying you didn’t see the red on his cheeks or ears. 

As he was rushing out of the arena, he bumped into someone. Apologizing, he was ready to mumble an apology while moving past them. However, they grabbed his shoulder.

“Hey, hey, hey. Where are you going in such a hurry?”

He lucked up and felt a small twinge of relief. Jisung was smiling at him, though there was concern in his eyes. “Are you okay, Changbin?”

Taking a deep breath, he explained, “I gave Y/n my jersey.”

“Did you now? What did she say?” He asked, a bright smile tugging at the corners of his lips.

Changbin looked away as he bit his lip. “I didn’t stick around long enough to find out.”

As Jisung laughed, Changbin felt his ears grow hot with embarrassment. “No, I’m sorry, I shouldn’t laugh. But it’s kind of funny and kind of cute! I’m sure she appreciated the gesture and I’m sure she’ll be at the game, cheering you on like she always does. Only this time she'll be in your jersey, which I'm sure will be a sight to see. I’m even willing to bet she’ll pair your jersey with her Gordie Howe hat.”

Changbin couldn’t help but laugh at that. “Yeah, I’m sure she will.”

“Just relax.” Jisung continued. “Deep breaths. You’re going to be okay, I’m sure of it. As long as you do your best this weekend, everything is going to be just fine.”

He nodded and hazarded a glance back at the arena. “Yeah, everything is going to be just fine.”

On the day of the championship game, Changbin was a bundle of nerves. They had already practiced on the ice and he hadn’t seen you in the stands. A part of him assumed you were weirded about by the jersey and didn’t want to come. But when he went back into the locker room, he caught sight of a Red Wings hat. He wasn’t sure, but his heart fluttered in his chest at the sight. Nevertheless, he didn’t want to get his hopes up.

In the locker room, Hyunjin nudged his shoulder as the pair laced up their skates. “Did you see her?”

Changbin shook his head. “I didn’t see her.”

“What are you talking about?” Jisung asked, his eyes wide and his jaw dropped. “She was right there above the tunnel! She’s sitting practically right behind our bench! She’s got the perfect seat for today's championship game!”

He felt his cheeks turn pink. So that Red Wings hat really was yours. He should have said something or at least waved at you. That would have been the nice thing to do. Why hadn’t he noticed you?

“Hey, calm down, Changbin. I can't have you getting this distracted before we've even hit the ice.” Chris gave him an encouraging smile as he patted his shoulder. “You got this. Do your best out there and she’ll be proud of you no matter what, okay?”

Nodding, he took a deep breath. “Everything is going to be okay.”

“Yeah, you got it!”

“And we’re going to destroy those Gorillas and win the championship!” Felix shouted, causing everyone else to cheer. “Show them no mercy!”

For a brief moment, Changbin forgot all about you in the stands. All he was thinking about was bringing home the glory to his team and his fans. He was Seo Changbin, the toughest, meanest, scariest defenseman on their team. And he was going to win.

Stepping out onto the ice, he was calm, cool, and collected. He was ready for this. He could do anything and he was ready to play.

And then he looked at the stands.

The world stopped. There you were. Cheering him on once the national anthem was sung and the players were getting ready for the first puck drop.

And you were wearing his jersey.

Minho tapped his stick to get his attention. With a teasing grin, he mumbled, “Get your head in the game, lover boy. We have a championship to win.”

Nodding, he focused on the player in front of him. Changbin made up his mind. He was going to win this not only for his team but for you too.

The puck dropped.

He charged forward.

The first period was pretty uneventful, save for two events. One of the Gorillas had tripped Chris and then started to pick a fight with Felix, which caused him to drop his gloves. Usually, the team didn’t fight, but it was an uncalled penalty and the other player was a known cheater in the league. Besides, Felix was the tough guy on the team, though Seungmin was a close second. But Seungmin was the back-up goalie, so he didn’t get to fight ever. After a brief fight, Felix managed to pin the guy to the ice, which meant the fight was over. Changbin tapped his stick on the ground with the rest of the team as he was led to the penalty box to serve his five for fighting.

As Changbin got back to the bench so another player could go out, he glanced at Chris. “You okay?”

Changbin nodded. “Yeah, just a little discombobulated, that’s all. I’ll be back out there before you know it.”

Before he even sat down, half the crowd started to cheer and he looked up. The opposing team had just scored. He groaned, slumping down on the seat with a thud. If only he had been out there for a couple seconds longer, he would have been able to help Hyunjin save the puck from going in. He had no idea what Jisung was thinking as their goalie, but he didn’t seem so happy about it either.

“It’s okay boys.” Their coach assured them. “It’s still early in the game. We got this. Just shake it off and move on, got it? Now, Minho, this is what I want you to do when you go out there…”

Changbin stopped listening to his coach then. He had turned his focus back to the game and absolutely nothing could break his concentration-

Someone tapped on the glass next to him. He knew he shouldn’t, but he glanced over. As soon as he did, his eyes widened and his breathing almost stopped.

There you were, smiling at him with encouragement. In your eyes, he could see you reassuring him for the goal scored against them. It was almost as if you were trying to tell him not to worry about what happened. He felt himself smiling at you, trying to tell you that he understood and he was going to give it his all.

The period ended and the boys headed back down the tunnel. As Changbin headed inside, he didn’t know what came over him, but he winked at you. You laughed and winked back, making his heart pound. Why did you always have to be so cute? Did you even know about the effect you had on him?

After Chris was given a once over to make sure he was okay, their coach addressed the players. “Alright guys, I know it looks bad. It’s zero to one and these guys are tough. But we’re tougher. We have Jisung’s speed, Minho's tricks, Chris’s leadership, Hyunjin’s quick-thinking, Felix’s toughness, Seungmin’s moral support, Jeongin’s sharp eye, and Changbin’s surefootedness. We have teamwork that is unmatched by any other team in this league. If we work a little harder, we’re going to win this. So, are you ready to fight for what’s rightfully ours?”

“YEAH!” Everyone started chanting and cheering, the desire to win fueling their determination.

Second period began and Changbin was quicker and smarter than before. He outmaneuvered their best goalscorers and even had their Captain tripping over his skates. He truly owned the ice during this period. Storming the crease, he passed the puck to Hyunjin, who slapshot it into the back of the net. 

The score was now tied.

Changbin couldn’t help but let out a yell before going over to his teammate and patting him on the head, as hockey players do. They then skated to the bench to get high-fives from the rest of their teammates. As the rest of the team congratulated Hyunjin, he snuck a quick peek up at the stands. His smile only grew as he saw you freaking out, screaming your head off as you clapped wildly. It made his heart full to see you cheering him on. It felt like he was the one who scored the goal, even though he only got an assist.

After that goal, the second period passed uneventfully, yet incredibly tense. The pressure had increased significantly since the start of the game. It was tied. If someone didn’t break it, they would have to go into overtime and then a sudden death shootout. He didn’t think he could take the kind of pressure a shoot out had. They needed to break this tie.

Back in the locker room, everyone congratulated Hyunjin again for the goal and Changbin for the assist. Even their coach was beaming with pride. Standing before the players yet again, he spoke, “Alright boys. Last period of the championship game and it’s all tied up. If we don’t score now, we have to go into overtime, and I really would rather wrap this game up all nice and neat with a bow, don't you think?”

“YEAH!”

“So, let’s get out there and show them we mean business! All we need is for at least one more goal! Can we do it?”

“YES WE CAN!”

“Alright then! Let’s get out there and win!” And with that, they charged out of the tunnel, ready to finish this.

The third period was tense. The Gorillas didn’t seem to have winning on their mind. Instead, they were roughing up their team. It seemed every minute someone got a penalty called on them, whether it was for cross-checking, hooking, holding, high-sticking, or tripping. Even Changbin wasn’t immune to their tricks. More than once he was tripped or cross-checked as he attempted to gain control of the puck. But he knew not to give in to the urge to drop his gloves. He couldn’t, not when they were so close to winning. 

Every time he’d get back to the bench, he would look at you from the corner of his eye. He couldn’t lose this game. Not with you sitting there, glued to the edge of your seat, totally enraptured by the game. He couldn’t break your heart like that. So he would give it his all and win.

It was the last puck drop of the game, considering they had less than a minute left, and everyone was on their feet. Changbin was thankful to be on the ice because he was going to help his team win. He didn’t even care about the Gorillas that were going to try and stop him. He was going to win.

The puck dropped and Minho won the face off. He passed it to Chris, who passed it to Hyunjin. Changbin could see them lining up the shot and he got into position, with Jeongin nearby. The play was simple, pass to Jeongin and he’ll squeeze through the Gorilla defense to score the game winning goal. Easy.

But when the puck was passed to him, he noticed a wide open net. All it took was a split second decision. One flick of the hockey stick was all it took to send the puck soaring.

It hit the back of the net, top shelf, right as the buzzer sounded to announce the end of the period.

They won.

Their team won because of him!

Before he knew it, his life was practically being squeezed out of him by his teammates as they also pounded him on the head. Even Seungmin, still dressed in his backup goalie uniform and pads, practically jumped on top of all of them, making them all topple over. Their coach came over and congratulated them. As the final score buzzer sounded, they raised their sticks in salute to their victory. After that, they shook hands with the opposing team before both teams went down their respective tunnels to change and then celebrate.

“Changbin, you were amazing!” Felix yelled, a grin threatening to split his face.

“You’re the best defenseman ever.” Seungmin added with a cheeky smirk.

“Congratulations, Changbin. You did amazing.” Jeongin gave his friend a hug before patting his head again.

“MVP! Star of the game! Best player to ever grace the ice here!” Jisung shouted through the locker room, causing everyone to laugh.

“You did it, Changbin! We’re so proud of you.” Minho nodded to him with a proud smile.

Chris and the coach were the last two to offer their congratulations to him. When the coach left to pack up, Chris added, “We knew you could do it. Now hurry up and go change and freshen up. I’m sure Y/n will want to congratulate you as well and you don’t want to keep her waiting now do you?”

He felt his cheeks heat up and Minho snickered. “You know what you should do? Go ask her out on a date tonight. Use that leftover adrenaline for good.”

Changbin frowned. “What about you guys? Don’t you want me to come celebrate with you all?”

Hyunjin scoffed. “Don’t worry about it! There’s always tomorrow!”

“Yeah!” Jisung added. “Love is fleeting. Food is forever.”

Felix pretended to cry. “That was beautiful, man.”

Chris rolled his eyes. “Get going already. Just know that we expect details tomorrow, okay?”

“Or you should just bring her with you!” Seungmin called out from the showers.

“Oh, I like that idea.” Minho nodded, and everyone laughed again.

Changbin, with bright red cheeks, hurried to get ready. Showering and changing as quickly as he could, he shoved his gear into his duffel bag before rushing out of the locker room. He didn’t want to get teased anymore by his teammates tonight. Besides, Minho was right; he needed to put his leftover adrenaline to use.

As soon as he left the locker room, he searched for a Red Wings hat and an away game jersey. But there were so many people everywhere. It was hard to see anyone.

“CHANGBIN!” He almost had the wind knocked out of him as you ran into him from behind him and pulled him into a tight hug. “YOU WON! YOU SCORED THE GAME WINNING GOAL AND WON! I’M SO PROUD OF YOU!”

He chuckled, hugging you back. “I know! It still hasn’t quite hit me yet that I did it! But, Y/n, there’s something I need to tell you-”

“There’s something I need to tell you as well.” You replied. “But you first.”

Taking a deep breath, he spoke. “Y/n, I like you, a lot, as more than a friend. And I was wondering if you wanted to grab a late dinner to celebrate with me? As, as, like, a, you know, like a date?”

You beamed before grabbing the lapels of his suit jacket and smashing your lips against his. At first he was shocked. Just like the goal he scored roughly twenty minutes ago, it didn’t hit him yet. But then it came crashing down on him: his crush was kissing him. AND HE WASN’T KISSING BACK!

Quickly, he let his eyes close and pulled you in closer. You giggled as his hand found its way to the back of your head. The kiss was everything he wanted and more. But all good things must come to an end and he was starting to run out of air. So he unfortunately had to break the kiss. But your hand found his as you smiled at him.

“I’d love to go on a date with you. As long as your teammates don’t mind.” You exclaimed.

“They don’t. They actually encouraged me to ask you out.” He felt his ears go red as he scratched the back of his head with his free hand.

You laughed. “Of course they did. Now c’mon! I’m starving! And after dinner, I say we head to a twenty-four hour convenience store and load up on snacks so we can watch movies at my house!”

He smiled softly as you started to leave him through the crowd. “Sounds perfect.”

“Oh and here.”

You placed something on his head and he realized it was his Oilers hat of Wayne Gretzky’s first Stanley Cup win in the 1983-84 season. It was his lucky charm, just like your Gordie Howe Red Wings cap from 1955 was your lucky charm. It was fitting and it made him fall in love with you just a little bit more.

Giving you a cheeky smile, he asked. “So how cool did I look when I scored that final goal? Did I look like Mr. Hockey Gordie Howe when I scored?”

Laughing, you shook your head. “Nope, more like Wayne Gretzky. Just like Gretzky.”

[mrs-monaghan]

Hey shaz,

I definitely think that Jikook will be loud af when they get back from MS, or as loud as they can be. Major things will start adding up and making sense in our usual subtle (ISH) breadcrumb way.

But I suspect it'll be a new chapter for BTS, as a whole, on the relationship front. The boys are extremely successful, only getting older, and I think a lot of chapter 2 was them prepping the fandom to see them maturely as well. It's highly likely some of the guys are starting to think long-term both career-wise and family-wise (they're pretty young actually but the idol life moves FAST)

With how famous they are, though, (idols in general), it's so risky to make relationships public unless you're really serious. Read somewhere that they're pushed to keep things secret as much as possible unless it's like a marriage announcement? I'm curious, how do you think the guys will handle this? Cause they're known to break stereotypes and in a way, they could be tired of the airtight romance lock..they're not exactly teenagers sneaking around anymore

Take Taennie (or just Tae with any partner), all this time they had their reasons for keeping it on the down-low, and I suspect partially with the engagement shipping brings in for the company. But I feel like everyone's in new phase of their lives now, so idk if those reasons would still apply to push ships in 2025+ content.

Would love to hear what you think and if you guys know how older K-pop groups handled marriages and transitioning from that ''teenage/young adult, flirty image"?

I honestly believe BTS will be the ones to pave the way when it comes to normalising Idols having rlships. They start everything and others follow. I mean, watch other groups start enlisting together. Boracity did a video about how BTS paved the way

And then also these 2 videos about things BTS started and others followed.

So I can picture the dating thing going on this list. They've never been into fanservice much anyway to begin with and like u said, 2022 & 2023 was them reminding us they are adults. So high chances are when they come back they might be done pretending they don't use their private parts.

V was the first ever idol to somewhat publicly out his rlship. Yes, he later backtracked 🙄😒 but still, he will go down in History for having had the guts to do it in the first place. But damn this man has some shitty fans. Have y'all seen the reactions since the fri(end)s teaser came out? He may have the most fans out of all 7 but they are just horrible. Absolutely horrible. Jimin had so much support when he had a woman in his MV... Heck I don't even remember anyone giving JK shit for his female features but V.... gosh. Do these people even care about him?

Anyway. I digress.

Back to your question. I am not really a Kpop fan, just a BTS fan. So the only person I know is Taeyung. When we first found out Jimin was gonna do a song with him, people were calling him problematic. Turns out his only crime was getting married. That's literally his biggest scandal. Fucking SK, man. 🤦🏽‍♀️

This thing of idols treating fans as their girlfriends is super problematic. I imagine BTS realised that and stopped doing it the older they got. You bring up a good point; It's not just Jikook who will change when they get back, the other members too. Jikook will stop hiding, sure. But... I wonder which other members will do the same. Whatever the case, I'm all strapped in and ready for the ride.

[noodlefluid]

Random headcanons about the ✨Dumbass twins✨ that no one ask for

Tw: mention of death, anxiety (separation anxuety to be precise), swearing, minor spoilers from the movie, tcest dni

English isn't my first languge, if there's any grammar mistake please lmk, I'm dumb and is 4 fcking 30 in da morning omg I should be worry about my sleeping habits

☁️Fluffy ones☁️

Leo has says dumb shit like "The sun is a planet" with a straight face just to start a fight with Donnie, Raph try to calm Donnie saying that he just wanna see him angry and to not mind him

They actually have the closest relationship among the brothers they just don't wanna admit it

They shared a room when they were kids, they still do it time to time, even when they complain for months to splinter about having separated rooms

Leo call themselves twins, Donnie say that it is imposible because of them being different species and how he would rather die that share another singular dna particle with him

Absolutely go to eachothers room to stared at them say sometime like "Fuck off" throw some shit at them and just leave (Leo close the door a little and the just smash it open when leaving)

There's a show that they watch together, if the other find them watching it without them, they would throw the most dramatic tantrum of history

Donnie: I swear is not what you think

Leo: *sobbing*: How could- *sob* and I thought of you as my brother

Donnie confused: but...we...we are bro-

Leo: DON'T TALK TO ME YOU CHEATER *leaves dramatically*

Raph who just enter the room to grab something: the hell is goin on?

Neither of them know who is the oldest, Donnie says it him cause he is smarter, Leo says is him cause he is the "handsomest"

They absolutely adore team rocket as kids, they always would say "prepare for troubles and make it double" whenever they enter a room (mikey was meowht and Raph wobuffet)

We all now that Leo's straight as a circle. Donnie was the first one he came out to, inmediately went to his brothers screaming "You guys owe me 20!!"

The brothers make a bet about Leo's sexuality and when he would come out, Donnie won both

They didn't wanna share a birthday as kids, but neither of them wanted to be the youngest twin, so they choose 2 days and they rotate who's birthday goes first (like, one year Donnie gets the first day and Leo the second, next year Leo gets the first one and Donnie the other and so on) Now neither of them mind having the same day but they think that the other one wouldn't like to change the tradition

They send dumb memes to eachothers

Donnie can sleep whenever he wants, it's his super power, however he often won't sleep because of his projects

Leo has insomnia and can't sleep, he has to be knocked out

There's a 3am twins reunion in the kitchen, they make a whole pizza party once, Raph ground them

They both know ASL, well...something similar, both have non-verbal episodes, so one time they found some ASL book or something, the thing is that neither of them fully understand them and since they have just 3 figers there were sign that were imposible to make, so they kinda made up they own sign lenguage (they call it TSL turtle sign lenguage), they teach Mikey and Raph, Splinter try but couldn't figure it out, and April knows the basic

Even without the TSL, they can tell what the other think right away without any form of comunication, they just look at eachothers and kinda know what the other wants

Leo looking at a non-verbal Donnie: sup?

Donnie:

Leo: Oh really?

Donnie:

Leo: mmmh...sucks to be you, sorry bud...anyways, want sum pizza?

Donnie:

Leo: what? but we had that one the last time

Donnie:

Leo: ugh, fine. But only because you sound pathetic

Raph who once again just enter to grab something: seriously, what the hell?????

Leo loves kpop and somehow convinced Donnie to practice some choreos with him (Donnie loves Twice but he would not admit it in front of Leo. Leo's favorite groups are BlackPink and Everglow)

🧅Angsty ones🧅

Both of them can feel when the other is in danger

They have something similar to "littermate syndrome" (is when two puppies from the same litter are adopted together and develop a really strong bond, to the point to become dependent to eachothers and have horrible separation anxiety, to thw point to stop eating if the other isn't around for a few dahs) when they were kids if they couldn't find the other they would start crying in one place until someone bring them together

Of course they calmed down as they got older, they were fine knowing the other was alive, but after all the Krang stuff happend they went back to how they were before, sobbing and shaking if the other wasn't around and they didn't know where the other was

In the Krangified future after Donnie died Leo didn't speak to anyone for a whole month, and didn't eat until Mikey or April forced him to, he was pretty much an empty vessel for a while until he decided that Donnie would wanted to see the end of this shitty situation

When someone ask him why he kept fighting his answer was "For Donnie's honour"

One of the things Casey Jr love the most about his time travel is seeing Donnie and Leo together, joking around and just being brothers, just how it was

Leo didn't want to used any of Donnie's tech after he died, cause he was afraid to break it and it was everything that was left from him, sometimes he stoped other from using it unconsciously, he stop once he realize that Donnie make them because he knew he would eventually die, and wanted people to use it

When Casey told the others about their deaths Leo went "I'm the superior twin lmao", everyone just stare at him with a what's wrong with you face "what? That's how I cope" he say while waking up from the 38 hours of sleep he had after defeating the krang

[megafaunatic]

hi lore ^__^ i just picked up the dear prudence collection after seeing you talk about it in a tag and it interesting me, and i’m really enjoying it so far. i was curious if you have any other book reccs, or favorite books you have read this year? it can be any and unrelated to this one. thanks and hope you’re well!

HI ABIBI I LOVE U !!!!!!!!

THANK YOU FOR ASKING I HAVE LOTS OF BOOK RECS

for readers at home abi is referring to dear prudence by daniel lavery in which lavery goes on a lengthy aside about how "love languages" are bullshit. daniel lavery is hysterical and correct as always

some other books i've read and enjoyed in the last year or so (excluding older books like discworld and jeeves+wooster stories, both of which i have been tearing through and really enjoying; also excluding the super popular (gideon the ninth) (you should read gideon the ninth)):

OBVIOUSLY, WHEN THE ANGELS LEFT THE OLD COUNTRY BY SACHA LAMB. READ WHEN THE ANGELS LEFT THE OLD COUNTRY BY SACHA LAMB. see further lore yelling about this book here [literary ya fantasy]

our wives under the sea by julia armfield for a deeply sad lesbian eldritch horror take on submarine disasters. this book will ruin your day (honorific) [literary horror]

the singing hills cycle by nghi vo for a series of novellas you can read in any order! all about storytelling and what storytelling is and does and does to the teller and the listener. also has a super cool jianghu badass side character [fantasy]

y/n by esther yi for an absurdist story about how kpop fandom makes you insane and worse and grad school also makes you insane and worse and GOD FORBID you combine the two [absurdist literature]

witch king by martha wells for book 1 of what has GOT to be I KNOW IT'S A DUOLOGY i KNOW it is the sequel has just not been officially announced yet. but i think she said something at a con about how there's one in the works. THERE MUST BE. anyway really fun and interesting worldbuilding here [fantasy]

beyond ridiculous by kenneth elliot for a look into the world of DIY gay theater in NYC at the height of the aids crisis. REALLY artistically inspiring and also super fascinating just as a history of a scene and a friend group [nonfiction/theater history]

ok this one's both backlist and was very popular when it came out but probably most 25 year old tumblr users have not read it. well they should read the hare with amber eyes by edmund de waal for a deep DEEP dive into the complicated world of rich jewish art collectors + socialites in odesa, vienna, and paris in the 1800s through the early 1900s by tracing the object history of a collection of netsuke from the opening of japan through the changing landscape of central + western europe and then back to japan [nonfiction/art history]

currently i'm reading cancipin by priest which is a space opera danmei that seeks to answer the questions "could it ever be ethical to do genetic engineering" "how do you build a just society" "is it ever worth it to give up your freedom in exchange for safety and convenience" "how do you keep going after the destruction of your entire planet" "what if data star trek were a beautiful young man and part time robot arm who was best friends with the worst gay people in the entire world" [sci fi/romance]

[wooahaes]

shelter

pairing: wonwoo x fem!reader

prompt: im depressed bitch

word count: 1.6k~

warnings: depression. self neglect. some shitty depression talks thrown into a conversation. mentions of therapy. unproofread + lowercase intended. also everything from a little before the shower onward was written without glasses on so i can barely see my screen rn

daisy’s notes: i started this one back in late april. might as well finish it. ig wonwoo is one of my emotional support kpop men </3  /hj

“oh, jagi.”

there were little things that wonwoo grew used to in dating you. one of them came early into the relationship, an admission you made yourself once you felt like he wasn’t going to abandon you when you said it: you dealt with depression. even though you insisted that you could handle yourself, that it was genetics working against you because there was a history of it on both sides of your family, he pulled you into his arms long enough to give you a warm hug and to thank you for being honest with him. it didn’t change his opinion of you, and he said that outright: you were still his girlfriend that he cares for. but he became a little more aware, after that, of your moods. of when things started to change. he asked you about therapy, about medication, about what treatments you were going through: none, at the moment. you’d gone through plenty of things before, and nothing seemed to fully work. he left the discussion there on that day: he’d bring up therapy again, one day, but that was a future conversation to be had. pushing you would only make things worse, and you seemed to be fine on your own for the time being.

and yet he noticed when it was getting bad as much as he could. he was busy, and he couldn’t always be around you, but he tried to check on you often. to ask if you’d eaten, to make sure you were taking care of yourself when your texts and calls became less frequent. he had made it a point to at least call you every night, even for a minute or two, just to hear your voice. if nothing else, he’d text you goodnight and promise to call in the morning.

it was bad again. worse than he’s seen you before, because at least you’ve bounced back. it hurt him to see how much you were struggling. you told him had called in sick the past two days, but seeing you? with that distant look on your face, lying in bed with nothing but your blankets wrapped as close as they could be to you? he knew, and that pained, quiet “oh, jagi,” had fell from him before he could think twice about it. you hadn’t moved, instead staring at your phone as you watched something mindlessly.

so it was time for a little self care. wonwoo tugged at your blankets, gently taking your phone from your hands. the bed dipped underneath his weight as he sank down in front of you, gently taking your face in his hands. “when was the last time you ate something?”

you just leaned forward, pressing your forehead into his shoulder. you didn’t answer.

he turned his head, pressing a kiss into your unwashed hair, before pulling you into his arms. he traced shapes onto your back, eyes fluttering shut as he held you for a moment and started to make a plan. either a shower or a bath first, and he could order your favorite food just to entice you into it. or he could call mingyu for a favor, if he was up for it, but wonwoo didn’t think you’d want his friends to see you like this--even though you knew mingyu, and mingyu had seen you when things were stormy before.

“what do you need from me?” he said after he leaned back, looking you in the eyes again. “i can turn the water on so it’ll get warm. do you want me to order something for us to eat?”

“you don’t have to get me food--”

“i haven’t eaten yet, either, so let’s eat together,” he said, thumbs tracing over the apples of your cheeks, “okay?”

he watched you consider it, and then nod as best as you could with him still holding your face. “okay,” you said, gently pulling at his hands. “thank you.”

he pressed a kiss to your forehead. “do you want to take a bath or a shower? if you take a shower, i might join you.”

other times there might be an underlying implication there--either with the intent of acting on it, or just to see the cute way you’d get flustered--but the low, calm tone he said it in was enough to show you it was innocent enough. plus, you knew he had practiced earlier. he was probably tired and sweaty from that.

“a shower would be nice,” you finally said.

wonwoo left you to enter the bathroom, turning on the water so it could be heating up. he’d find one of his spare sets of clothes in a moment, and find something clean for you to wear. there was always a worry in the back of his mind that he was treating you like a child when he came over, when he did your laundry and cleaned your fridge and tidied up--sometimes on his own, sometimes with an equally-worried mingyu who tagged along (and, truthfully, wonwoo would always find it sweet how much his own best friend cared so much about you just because you were important to him). but this was never a one-sided experience: he’d heard about times he’d be busy and you’d show up, let in by one of his friends, to tidy up for him. to make sure his things were in order, that there was at least one home-cooked meal from you waiting for him when he came home (and always extra servings for his friends, whoever could get to them first: he didn’t blame you for not wanting to cook for thirteen). he felt bad that he personally couldn’t return that favor, but you never faulted him for it. you had told him that you’d teach him one day.

you trudged your way into the bathroom soon enough, and wonwoo was gentle when he kissed your forehead before pulling off your shirt. he helped you out of every article of clothing, setting them into a pile to be washed with the next load of clothes he’d do, and you could feel his hand stay at the small of your back when he helped you step into the shower and under the warm water. with a deep breath, you just stood there, letting it all wash over you as wonwoo undressed outside the shower door and then stepped in behind you. he easily pulled you into his arms, shutting his eyes and he buried his face into your hair, the two of you just standing there as the water ran over you.

“we can try therapy again,” he mumbled into your shoulder.

“i don’t think it’ll help.”

“would you try it?”

the sound of water droplets hitting the shower filled the space between.

“maybe,” you admitted after a moment. “it didn’t before.”

“just one more,” he whispered against your skin, pressing another kiss into your temple. “and then we’ll try something else.”

“what if i’m just broken?” you shut your eyes, leaning into him. “wonwoo. what if i’m just not meant to be happy?”

he said nothing and pressed another kiss onto your skin.

“sorry,” you mumbled a moment later. “that’s... stupid. i’m being stupid.”

“you’re depressed.” he turned you to face him, taking your face into his hands again. “even if your brain is telling you wrong things, you aren’t doing it on purpose. you’re trying.”

“not enough--”

“but you’re trying.”

you held back a bitter laugh. “barely eating for days and calling in sick to work is trying?”

“you got out of bed on your own,” he smoothed your hair down. “you’re standing here with me. we’re talking.” his wet skin pressed against yours was comforting. “you’re trying. even if you feel like you’re losing now, you’re still here with me. you’re alive. that’s enough.”

that pulled a hiccup out of you, and he pulled you back in tight as the waterworks began to flow. your arms wound tightly around him as you sobbed, and he stood there to carry you through this storm. a quiet “i know” when you told him you were tired of this. another when you told him that you just wanted to stop hurting, to stop feeling like a burden, to be someone better and that you feel like you’ve lost too much time--because he knew that was all you needed. just to be heard the way that every person’s struggles deserved to be listened to. and when the skies were only cloudy, he gently took care of you: carefully washing your hair the way he’d seen you do it in times before, lathering your skin with sweet-smelling soap that reminded you of the vanilla birthday cake he brought you barely a few weeks ago, and leaving you with a innocent kiss over every inch of your face. soon enough, he washed up and helped you dress after toweling himself off, and gently brought you back to your couch.

and as he told you about his day maybe half an hour later, watching you slowly eat your favorite takeout, he felt a little seed of hope get planted in the way you seemed to nod alone more enthusiastically. it wasn’t much--you weren’t the happy you that wonwoo knew you could be--but it was a start. all he could do is help you water it when you didn’t have the strength to do so on your own. if that meant taking care of you in times like these, then he was happy to do it.

wonwoo was a shelter in a storm that you knew would be there when you needed it the most. and for that, you were thankful.

[discluded]

I am very new to the world of BL fandom but are cp fan reactions always this extreme if the actors move on in their career and work with other people or is this week just a bad week with the massive BBB posters at Bible's event and the truck protesting outside of GMMTV about the Ohmnanon "breaking up". I know that popular actors get paired up for multiple projects but I assume they must change up couples and act with others as pairs every once in a while or after a few years?

hey friend, I'm going to answer this in a way that is circuitous that I think will better address your question.

the first part is: have fandoms always been volatile to the extent a segment of fans will organize to engage their ability to bully / cause harm rather than engage positively?

yes and no, in the sense this is a relatively new phenomenon in the entirety of organized fannish history (which let's just give due credit to our foremothers of fannish history the star trek fandom and their zines.)

but it's not so new because this started around 15 years ago, when people in fandom realise they could also organize to to create very targeted harm

these are the primary examples coming to mind:

Girls Generation (snsd) black ocean

Super Junior's official fanclub members organizing to buy company stock to prevent an 18 year old boy from joining the group lineup

In both these instances, tens of thousands of fans (for fantastics here) organized specifically to harm a person or group of people. the intent objective was specifically to harm.

the bad learned lesson from both these incidents (2008) is that fans can bind together to throw a fit if they don't get their way.

the second is: is it common for fans / fandoms of actor pairs to act this way?

and the more complex answer to that is, fandom is not a single conscious entity, and categorically similar fandoms often do not have a high overlap of active fans, usually at most 1-2 fandoms at a time. don't get me wrong, you'll see a lot of mileapo fans who are also bts fans, and I would bet you'll see a much smaller count of bts fans and exo fans overlap than you would see of bts fans and mileapo fans. any similarities you find in how fans between the first two groups act like one another is more the result of the categorical meta fan culture (here: kpop) rather than because the same people are perpetuating these behaviors while acting as fans of both these groups

for this reason I hesitate to call fandoms drama-mongering because these behaviors are perpetuated by individuals, or by a group of individuals, and not even necessarily by a group that represents the majority belief of the fandom. the fact of the matter is, people will participate in fandom regardless of if you like them or not, and some of there people are bullies or stalkers or overall terrible human beings. you can't make them stop engaging with your favorite actor or musician or couple because you can't control anyone but yourself. the only thing you can do is take the wind out of their sails by not engaging.

if you're wise to Ye Olde Harry Potter fandom lore, you'll know there was a specific segment. of fandom which known as highly dramatic but it wasn't because they liked a certain character or couple - it was because these individuals were drama mongering bullies to begin with, who continued that behavior in other fandoms. One of these infamous people bullied two different friends of mine in two different fandoms 6 years apart, and continues to instigate negativity in the fandoms they choose to engage in. you can't stop this person from joining a fandom... you can only limit their power by not engaging.

so the the answer to your specific question are all fandoms this dramatic? no, or they don't act in that way at least. MewGulf (TharnType) fans continued to invest in delusions by "I've connected the dots.jpeg" normal posts by both parties despite Mew's explicit rejection of their fantasies and his refusal to engage. However, they didn't have a problem with MG moving onto other acting projects without the other. Mew even worked with Tul of MaxTul/Manner of Death on a project but it wasn't BL. however, Max will be involved in the new mafia Thai BL releasing next year that's already been cast and as far as I can see, Tul isn't involved. I haven't heard of any grievances thus far from their fans but that doesn't mean there aren't any, and even if there are, I doubt the reaction would be organize to specifically harm Max's career / limit his opportunities.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, you have what Apolaris did in August, which was purposefully sabotaging Man Suang promo and embarrassing Apo in front of business partners and sponsors because they want the opposite: for Apo to stop working with Mile.

to circle back to the beginning: 1) it has nothing to do with the specific fandom topic, people can feel a sense of entitlement and desire to control regardless of who it is what behavior they want to happen and 2) a small group of people can disproportionately cause harm if they are organized enough and vindictive enough. that doesn't necessarily represent the majority fan view, but it can over time if their bullying behavior towards other fans drive the more reasonable people out of fandom , leaving only those who agree with theie toxic mindset.

do fandoms always have these people? in this day and age, almost inevitably, yes. and they are unfortunately also resilient to being bullied out of fandom themselves but plenty good at playing the victim. the best thing one can do is ignore their entitled, obnoxious behavior (private shit talking totally allowed)

*please in advance forgive my typos. the keyboard is generating weirder autocorrects of correct words every day. Please pretend to not see it

[sollucets]

get to know me tag

as tagged by @ranchthoughts, @twig-tea, and @troubled-mind! thank u everyone 💜🥰

do you make your bed? literally never!

what's your favourite number? 52. i picked it as a child and i don't remember why, but it pleases me still

what is your job? i'm a humble lil grocery store employee

if you could go back to school, would you? if i could quit my job and go to school and still have my same money, then yes, i should think so, but that's super not happening! it might be nice to have a second degree. i think history would be fun

can you parallel park? yes i can! i used to have to do it every day to park in front of my last house. >:c

a job you had that would surprise people? i think all of my jobs have been either rather generic or right on the nose for what people would expect of me so probably not. i was a nighttime gas station attendant for a fair bit of college, which could be a surprise i guess? everyone always goes ":0 but werent you scared????" and like, no, not most of the time, but sometimes you do it scared yknow

do you think aliens are real? yes, but real in a way that there are many real things i can't see and don't understand (protons, gender, etc)

can you drive a manual car? i could do that once and probably still can, but it's been a long long time since i practiced

what's your guilty pleasure? as far as media goes, i do my very best not to have things like this. if i feel bad about liking it i generally do not like it for very long. i would say the closest is being into kpop, but it's not like i keep that a secret, i just dont really want to engage with kpop fandom, so i dont often post or talk about it publicly. a real guilty pleasure is that i like cherry pepsi too much

tattoos? i have one; he's on my left forearm & he's an abstract little spaceman with a fern for a head. i call him my cosmonaut. i have plans for more but i never have the time or money lately

favorite color? we know this one already surely. 💜

favorite type of music? ohh, i don't like to discriminate hehe. my very favoritest songs usually have fun harmony or funky rhythms, though, and it's best if i can sing along

do you like puzzles? sure! i used to have a book of fairy puzzles when i was a kid that i love dearly even now

any phobias? i am afraid of all bugs, but i can be a grownup about most kinds of them. i Cannot be a grownup about moths or centipedes, which i am terrified of (using those words will cause this post to be filtered for me on tumblr). i try not to kill them if i can avoid it, since it isnt their fault i'm like this, but i,,, i really can't, i'm useless if i see one. when id find centipedes in my room at my last house i wouldnt be able to sleep.

favorite childhood sport? i did tennis all of middle and high school, explicitly because of ryoma echizen prince of tennis lol. i was on varsity! i also figure skated as a kid. both are still fun when i get the chance

do you talk to yourself? oh yes all the time. i keep odd hours so i used to accidentally wake my roommate cause i just kind of absentmindedly chatter abt everything

what movies do you adore? i am not really a movie person if i'm perfectly honest; i don't watch them often as an adult. from my childhood my favorite movies were kenneth branagh much ado about nothing, the princess bride, pokemon 2000, and return of the king

coffee or tea? neither, i dont like most hot drinks. apple cider is ok now and again but i usually drink it cold, and im horribly picky about hot chocolate

first thing you wanted to be growing up? i changed this answer all the time as a kid and i have records of me doing so in my old notebooks lol! answers i know about include "pilot", "author", "dragon", and "eowyn"

this one seems like it might be a little personal so im shy to tag people hehe. go ahead and put me down if you want to do it though; i will be happy to know :)

[dlstmxkakwldrlarchive]

Genie Music K-pop Exploration Team's listening session — O (Circle) PICK by Kim Yoon-ha, Kim Young-dae part i

source x

YOUNG: Who is it today?

YOON: Today, like Woojin, I brought the work of an artist who released a solo album. However, this artist has already released solo works

YOUNG: He did

YOON: He's the main vocal of a group we're really familiar with

YOUNG: Yes

YOON: Who is it?

YOUNG: ONEW. LEE JIN/KI LEE JIN/KI. Our Jinki.

YOON: We prepared ONEW's new album Circle. This is his first full lenght album in..?

YOUNG: He debuted in 2007 or 2008?

YOON: 2008

YOUNG: Then it's his first after 15 years?

YOON: In the meantime, he released two mini albums, the solo debut was a bit late. After releasing his first mini album in 2018, he only released a japanese album, another EP and now his first album.

YOUNG: As the main vocalist of one of the greatest groups in K-POP history there weren't many releases so it's pretty meaningful that it's first album in 15 years

[...]

YOUNG: A little curiosity. What is the difference from a mini album and a full lenght album?

YOON: I think it depends on the times, based on 2023 KPOP standards, 'mini' showcases chapters organized like 'this is me' and 'this is me'

YOUNG: That's right, a mini is a sampler menu in a restaurant: this restaraunt is good at this and that. If it's like this a regular [album] is a full course

YOON: Yeah, it's eating the main dish [...] Basically the ingredients are the same but it's inevitable that the point is what flavor and what kind of eye candy you show them. Onew released two mini albums called VOICE and DICE: VOICE is a calm album filled with ballad-like songs while DICE is very refreshing, it's onew's colorful side. What album would you think is the real ONEW? With that feeling, I think this album, 'Circle' , is an answer and a question.

[...]

YOUNG: Let's go with the general evaluation

YOON: How was it?

YOUNG: For me, this recent talk about SME incident. Hybe and Kakao...There are things like that, right? If you like SME music or your favorite artist is under their agency, what we're curious about is how SME music will change after lsm, will it change? Critics are flaggergasted about this, right? Opinions are divided, it'll be similiar, it'll change... I don't own this CD and I haven't seen it in person but lsm isn't in charge

YOON: Oh

YOUNG: So in a way this is the first album without LSM..? Kind of like that, I don't know exactly. [...] is this the grand post lsm era?

[note: lsm place as executive producer for this album was taken by onew himself he revealed it in hot tracks circle fansign event x]

YOON: I didn't feel much of change, compared to the existing sm sound [...] commenters are saying 'uh but it changed a bit'

YOUNG: We'll know when the number of cases increases!

YOON: I thought it was an album where I focused on the voice of the singer

YOUNG: Yes

YOON: While listening to it, we also check things like 'oh, this music is this kind of genre' and 'this kind of songwriter in this is essential' but the more i listen to this album, the more i think 'oh, this person wanted to express his voice like this' or 'this person can sing with this voice'. I think the most important part of this album is the fun of finding things like that

YOUNG: It's one of the two [things to find]. 'Which song penetraded through this voice and showed its presence' or 'or, did you really use it in that direction by collecting only the songs that are really optimized for this voice?' But i think it's both

[...] Of course, his voice is unique. to be honest, Onew's voice

YOON: If you hear the first note, you'll know that it's SHINee's Onew

YOUNG: Right. that's a very gentle voice

YOON: The more I listen to it, the more I think it's the result of Onew's obsession with his voice

O (Circle) PICK - O (Circle), Cough, Rain On Me, Caramel & Anywhere

YOON: In that sense, the song that really obsessed me was the first song, O (Circle)

YOUNG: To add a bit of exeggeration, the image of this album, should I say it's a sound effect? Should I call it tone? I think 70-80% of the colors that I feel when i think of the album are decided here

YOON: I think so too. As soon as I listened to this song, I got to listen the whole album

about O (Circle)

[...] YOON: You mentioned the first part and I think that the most of it was very anomalous and completely different. As soon you hear that sound, in a science fiction movie, you know? The feeling of trascending time and space

YOUNG: Like a warp

YOON:Yes, that kind of part. That part starts with Onew's voice, as soon as I hear the sound, it's like changing time and space

YOUNG: You're coming out strong from the start, a voice that changes time and space?

YOON: I've told you that before and I think that feeling came straight to me, I thought 'Wow that's good'. But honestly it's not that easy to approach, right?

YOUNG: Some people might think 'it's not the sound I expected'

YOON: It's a song that's actually pitchy or contemplative rathar than pop

YOUNG: Yes, so I thought that the atmosphere of this song... its core is Onew's rich voice who floats on the mood and atmosphere rather than the melody or anything like that [...] There's no meeting, the lyrics are all floating around. The image itself. When time goes quickly, the seasons go like this, it's kind of like the clock goes backwards when the time goes back, Onew's voice feels like that. [...] If you think of the theme of this song, we think that time is going foward with renewal because we're crossing the calendar but there's a cyclical time structure where we can come back and find a common ground, right? I think we're moving foward while turning around? What he's [Onew] trying to say is tha we look alike and go against each other. It's exquisite that those parts are expressed in a floating sound unknown to us, like you mentioned earlier

YOON: It's very attractive, I found it very attractive. On the other hand, it's not easy to write lyrics for a song like this, it has all the sounds. I don't talk about lyrics that much but I really want to talk about it in this song. Kim Eana wrote them for this song! When the song starts, they give us words to the melody and the beat of 'nana-nana-nana-(sun cloud wind)', the words continue to throw nouns, and of course, there's a message afterwards but the words continue to contain the image of the sound we talked about, it plays a role in making it separate from the reality. So if there's a sentence, we keep thinking of the narrative but if we throw a word like this, we start to imagine it, right? The chemistry between them is really good

YOUNG: In terms of generation, Kim Eana is a lyricist who's both old and new school? These days, there's a way to make impact with your lyrics in k-pop, there's a new style but Kim Eana is not really that style, she stuck with, I think, a strange sound that we can't exactly say is a trendy k-pop song

YOON: It's not a song that can lead in terms of trend but Onew's voice is a actually a bit trendy in terms of sound. Since it's close to an alternative R&B sound, I think it's a song that creates a strange appreciation by adding lyrics that emphasizes the taste of korean words, it's a song with a high level of completion. Everytime I listen to it, I think about it. [...] It's one of my three favorite songs.

[...]

about 'Cough' and 'Rain On me'

YOON: Before we came in we talked about the album and said "1, 2 and 3 punches are the best"

YOUNG: I think the beginning [of the album] was done not until the end but it got the upper head and completed the big frame?

YOON: The songs after O (Circle) that created the atmosphere are 'Cough' and 'Rain On Me', they're slightly warm, aren't they? For me O (Circle) feels rich and dreamy but it makes me feel lonely emotionally, 'Cough' melts my heart. It's like when the snow melts in winter and it becomes spring? It's a perfect song to listen to this weather these days

YOUNG: To me, 'O (Circle)' is close to the sky. I mean, if it's more of a philosophical and contemplative thing in the world of metaphysics then 'Cough' and 'Rain On Me' feel like they're on the ground

YOON: 'Rain On Me' isn't a heavy rain either, it's a spring rain: it's like a sprout is going to come out after the rain stops. These two songs go really well with this spring vibe. 'Cough' has a moist feeling while 'Rain On me' has a rain theme but it feels a bit dry, I liked the twist

YOUNG: There are a lot of reasons for that dry feeling, the singing style... but also it's just Sam Kim's style [note: 'rain on me' composer & lyricist]. All the songs he made are like this, his style is kind of dry and the music itself has a lot of echo and there isn't much of dynamic in general. The music is stretching out? There's nothing cute about it.(YOON: Yes, it's very calm) I think 'Cough' is a bit cuter?

YOON: It's lovely to me

YOUNG: Cuter and more lovely

YOON: That's right. The strings spread in the chorus and then he goes back to his voice and guitar. It just ends dryly and I realized that's where Sam Kim and Onew meet

YOUNG: First of all, a guitar should be dongdongdongdangdongdongdang, here is just dreungdreungdreung and Onew fills in the middle with a warm voice

YOON: It feels warm but a bit rough, that charm is really amazing

about Caramel

YOUNG: I'm dancing right now because of the next song. Isn't it something that anyone can dance to? (laughs) In a way track number one, two and three are too calm. 'Cough' is cute but slow, this is the first track to raise the groove

YOON: In terms of sound 'Caramel''s role is connecting the front part [of the album], it also raises the tempo slightly. Also, Giriboy featured and took part in the work

YOUNG: "More, more, more, more into space" ['Caramel' lyrics] This is the only part where you get excited while listening to it, it goes up at that moment. 'Rain On Me' remains stuck on the ground while, I really like the expression of walking, in 'Caramel' you start walking faster

YOON: Yeah and also it's a bit witty the, how do we call it? A mouth trumpet? Lip trumpet? Louis Armstrong did a great job!! I think you can listen to 'Caramel' while walking lightly in a spring day, it's a representative pop track

YOUNG: It's cozy, but it doesn't have that cozy feeling in slow songs. I'm sure people who will listen to it will relate to it. It feels like a breeze, like a blanket? It feels like a breeze and a blanket. I really like that feeling. I really like the voice Onew uses, he's so talented. I love his song with Lee Jin-ah, 'Starry Night' is always in my top playlist

YOON: I really like that feeling. [...] If you look at the album as a whole, this kind of song was necessary as bridge, the previous three songs we discussed before penetrate the album emotions but from the heavy part to the end [of the album], it goes more to pop and k-pop route. I think this song needed to play that role. It's also good to meet Onew's skilled vocals. The lip trumpet that we mentioned earlier is a small skill but it's an advantage of this song, you can meet Onew, a skilled vocalist who sings naturally to a beat, soul and rhytm that you haven't seen in k-pop tracks

YOUNG: His pronunciation is so good. 'Sweet like caramel' It melts...

YOON: That's right, that's right! It's like it's melting into something...

YOUNG: When I first heard it, I thought it stood out? I thought it might break the album's emotional line but when I heard it for the third time, I was happy the song came out and that's the advantage of a full-lenght album. I rarely change my mind when it comes to mini. (YOON: the songs are few...). Since there's no flow. That's the fun part of a full album.

YOON: Giriboy's feature helped

about 'Anywhere'

YOUNG: SO, where are we going? Let's go somwhere else? Are we going to 'Anywhere'?

YOON: 'Anywhere'!! Yes, that's right. I choose it as one of my top two songs in the album. I like it because it feels like the middle of the album, after 'Caramel', which brought some of the rhythm, this songs explodes with a slight change of temperature. I think it's a song that makes you feel comfortable, I like this album section. If it's a full lenght album, there are a lot of songs and of course we care a lot about the songs' flow. Tracks one, two and three, as we said before, came with a dark and luxurious vibe, with Giriboy's help we came into 'Caramel' rhythmically and then in 'Anywhere'... there was a lot of emphasis on things like rough but cozy acoustic sounds in the first part but here, it naturally leads rhytm and cools down [the album's vibe]? Do you know the pop-like feeling? I like that feeling

YOUNG: Uh, sure. It has a bit of city vibe. I feel like I'm staring straight at lights at night and I gradually lose focus without even realizing it or like if you keep looking at the surroudings reflectively while driving, there's a dreaminess that you feel when you pass a line and feel nothing.

YOON: It has a bit of speed

YOUNG: With a sense of speed, the beat goes like this 'I'm not going anywhere', the sound is all around me

YOON: The notes are actually that low? [note: youngdae was singing]

YOUNG: No, it doesn't have a crescendo, it doesn't sound like it, but it feels like he's praising you. It's a city pop style, it has a good vibe

[dangerliesbeforeyou]

tag game~

tagged by the amazing @coquelicoq to list 5 topics i can talk on for an hour without preparing any material! thanksss <3 <3

this is honestly a really difficult one for me cos as much as i love to ramble, the prospect of having to do a talk for an hour about anything would a) make me INCREDIBLY anxious and 2) i would promptly forget everything i know about said subject literally the second i have to do the talk pfft.... wait... the prompt doesnt say i have to do the talk in front of people so hmm... maybe i'd be ok lol

anyway topics time lol (these aren't really in any order btw just writing them as i think of them)!

art history ofc... i could equally talk as much about art i love as much as art i HATE lol (duchamp's goddamn toilet fountain you're going fucking DOWN bitch)... can't promise my hour speech won't just be a list of fun art-y facts lol (like uh in medieval paintings that used gold leaf, artists would put down this red gesso/glue like mixture (called something like boll?) because the red gave the gold a warmer glow than just sticking it onto the plain wooden panel lol) or that it won't be me massively misremembering parts of my degree pfft...

history of the british monarchy lol! ok so i may not currently like the monarchy, but i am a MASSIVE fan of the history of the royals lol... especially the tudor era! a lot of my talk would be me trying to remember the order of the monarchs from william the conqueror until now (which would mean me singing the horrible histories monarchy song lol sorry not sorry)... i would also spend the time being like 'yeh so this one had allegations of being gay, as did this one, and THIS one had several male favourites who he was definitely in relationships with' lol

kpop lol... not really sure what i would talk about? maybe specific groups (exo would be in contention for sure, they have a very interesting history tbh), or just the wider cultural phenomenon and history of kpop? or just like talk about niche kpop groups that basically no one remembers pfft (like that group that jackie chan made lol! already mentioned it on my kpop haveyouheard blog but people in the notes were like 'wait jackie chan did WHAT???' lol...) like i definitely don't know a lot of stuff, but i know more than the average joe so like... it might be fun idk??

queer films lol... i'd also say films in general, but i definitely feel like i have more niche and interesting knowledge specifically of queer films so.... i DEFINITELY could talk for well over an hour about that lol! this would also definitely include me complaining about films like call me by your name and blue is the warmest colour lol... (i actually was speaking to myself the other day about both films and how perceptions of both have changed SO much over the years since they came out lol...) but i'd mainly want to talk about the amazing queer films i've watched over the years!!... i'd also throw in some talk of asian queer media here since i've been watching it for literally 6 or so years at this point lol...

back to history, this time ancient egypt! returning to my childhood roots with this one lol i know a lot of random things about ancient egypt that i could potentially string into an hour long talk? actually recently went to an exhibition at the place where they film downton abbey (it's not called that btw lol) where it had a whole thing about the discovery of tutankhamun's tomb in 1922 which had a lot of interesting info tbh! dont come to this talk if u dont want to hear me talk about all the incest that went on in ancient egyptian royalty pfft... (like...historians believe that tut's mother was also his aunt, and his sister was also his wife, which kinda explain why none of their children survived... royals of all eras really were like 'we have to intermarry to keep the bloodline pure' and it's like (breaking bad bald guy meme) jesse NO that's what's KILLING you!!!!!!!!!!)

for most of these i'd basically say something and then immediately be like 'don't fact check me on that though' because chances are i remembered the thing wrong pfft...

tagging (no pressure to do it ofc!): @abnerkrill @asoftspotforangels @sylvasa @dollopheadsandclotpoles @zelvuska @micamicster & whoever else wants to do it!!

[creepylittlelady]

I WANNA HEAR MORE ABT NINA AND JEFF IF U CAN:33

OO, this is a dynamic that I've enjoyed exploring in my AU :3. I believe that Nina's canon has changed quite a bit over the past few years and I might incorporate some of that in my AU but besides that keep in mind that certain things in Puppet Strings may not match up to their canon counterparts. Anyways, enjoy! I'll do a separate segment on each of their personalities and then do a section on their relationship with each other ;)

Hope you enjoy!

Nina

-Nina is quite a controversial figure in the Mansion. Although her manic personality is toned down a lot now that she's getting professional help and has moved on from Jeff quite a bit, saying that she's over him is an understatement.

-I have my own backstory for Nina, but to shorten it down (I may make a master post of this someday), Nina grew up in a home with no stable parental figure in a very toxic environment so because of this has a lot of attachment issues. She doesn't really see Jeff as a human; she sees him as a symbol of her own freedom.

-She's close to a lot of girls in the Mansion and proclaims herself as a 'Girls Girl'. She may be a lot of things, but she is NOT a pick-me. She'll never let down her friends for validation (except from Jeff). She doesn't have a 'best friend' in particular, but she's very good friends with all the girls in the Mansion.

-She's the one girl that somehow knows everyone's business. You're in a secret relationship? Nina knows. You're actually a half demon? Nina knows. You have a tragic past that nobody knows about? NINA FUCKING KNOWS.

-Adding on to this, she has a talent for reading people. She can tell just who you are, the things you like, your strengths and your weaknesses just from a simple interaction. She's not a naturally manipulative person but if she wanted to be she definitely could be.

-She's a fanfiction writer! She's a rather popular one at that and she's definitely good at getting you in your feels. She definitely will write the most HEART-WRENCHING, GUT-DESTROYING angst that you'll ever read in your life and you'll never know that she's actually a giggling bipolar serial killer.

-Because of the fact that she's permanently a young teenager (around 13-14), she's definitely into a lot of things and has a long history with every fandom in the history of the internet. She's had interests from all throughout the years. From MHA to Danganronpa to Supernatural to One Direction to KPop, she's been in every phase! There's not one fandom that you're in that Nina hasn't been in. She can tell you all about FNAF shipping wars in vivid detail like she's a war veteran.

-She and Ben share secrets about people in the Mansion and own a black-mailing business where they'll give you the embarrassing secrets of your enemy for a price, ranging from $2 to $200 depending on how high-profile the person is and how juicy you want the secret to be. They've actually made a huge profit, since they also swear that to keep everything anonymous.

Fun Fact! Slenderman actually won a Political Debate in Hell once due to paying Nina and Ben $150 to tell them all of Zalgo's secret plans. (Him and Zalgo don't really hate each other though)

-She's got a great sense of fashion, and has a strong relationship with Trenderman and has held a bunch of make-shift fashion shows in the Mansion. She actually designed both Jane and Mary's wedding dresses!

-Although she loves being people's hype-man, she's deeply insecure about herself, her obsessive tendencies and the fact that Jeff will never love her no matter what she tries. She believes that nobody cares if she's upset so she always smiles no matter what. (Bit of an emo headcanon)

-She LOVES LOVES LOVES to throw parties. She'll throw one for every occasion, from Weddings to Smile Dog's birthday.

-When she first came to the Mansion, a lot of people disliked her immensely and didn't want to talk to her, seeing her as Jeff's creepy stalker who was let in out of pity. This actually regressed her mental progress a lot and for a while was an angry mess who'd snap at anyone who even looked at her funny.

EJ helped bring her out of her shell and now people at the Mansion like her a lot better, and she's made a lot of friends. Because of this Nina and EJ have a strong bond. She may or may not have a crush on him, but due to his personal hang-ups with romance and their age difference she'll never pursue it.

-She suffers heavily from BPD and somewhat from Bipolar disorder. Her mood swings are CRAZY, and usually Jane and EJ are the few people that can calm her down when she's in a rage.

-Due to both her and Toby's issues with emotional regulation they get into fights a lot. When one of the two does something that pisses of the other the screaming matches can get intense. In fact Masky and Hoodie have even had to tranquilize the both of them.

-When it comes to killing, she'll do it on occasion. She is definitely the kind of kid who'd kill people that she got in an argument with on the internet, but she hasn't done it in a while.

Fun fact!: Nina once got into a fight with someone on a Danganronpa RP server, found them in real life and killed them. She was never caught but she did feel guilty about it afterwards.

-She's really into anime, specifically old 2000s anime and her favourite anime is actually Clannad.

-She has a lot of obsessive tendencies and also somewhat suffers form OCD. She has the compulsive need to overclean everything until its shiny and sparkly and frequently re-arranges her room, it never looks the same for more than a week.

-She's a cosplayer, and a damn good one at that! She's good with makeup so she hides her mouth incarcerations quite well, and because of this she actually goes to Anime Conventions a lot. She's cosplayed basically every semi-popular character you can think of.

-She's actually quite a recognised figure in the True Crime Community, and the name 'Nina the Killer' came from the True Crime fans who became obsessed with her and her story. She actually has a rabid fanbase of fangirls and fanboys, and she's very aware of this and loves every bit of it.

-In my AU Chris (I believe that was his name) is still alive, although Nina doesn't know. Chris is still actively trying to find his sister to this day, and Nina is none the wiser and still mourns his death every year. In my AU at some point in the future Chris sees Nina again and they have a bittersweet reunion.

-She's the one who found Zero and brought her into the mansion, the reason for this headcanon? For some reason my dumbass thought they were the same person when I was really little.

-She has a whole week dedicated to her birthday (Which I believe is either October 29th or November 29th) where she gives all of her favourite people a present on each day of the week. Just a strange little tidbit about her.

-She's a member of the Mansion's Literature Club! She likes to believe that she's the Sayori of the group.

-She's really scared of Smile Dog and dogs in general even though she gives him a lot of treats and celebrates his birthday even more than Jeff does. She's not a cat person either. SHE'S A LIZARD PERSON!!!

-Her room is basically like a time portal back to the early 2010s. Her room is absolutely decked out with Scene stuff and she unironically listens to Bring Me Back to Life (is that what the song was called?). She's just a kid forever and she wouldn't have it any other way.

-She has a fear of growing up. She loves the fact that she won't age in the Forest and uses it to her advantage, giving herself the childhood that she never had.

-She's a terrible singer just like Toby and sings so incredibly tone-deaf that people think she's doing it on purpose. She'll loudly sing 'WAKE ME UP! WAKE ME UP INSIDE!' In the shower the point where Slender had to modify it to make her bathroom soundproof.

-She genuinely uses Poser as an insult.

-She's way more aware than people think she is. She knows way more about the Forest and the secrets hidden in it than she would have you know and is good at pretending to be innocent. She's gotten away with a lot of stuff over the years because everyone was like 'Nina's just Nina'.

-Her favourite show is Gravity Falls, her favourite character is Mabel of course ;)

-I have a lot more on her! They're all pretty angsty though since she's my favourite angsty pre-teen, second only to Benny boy himself

Jeff the Killer

-Oh Jeffrey, where do I start? You bumbling little lunatic, you.

-Well for starters most people in the Mansion either fucking adore him or fucking hate him. Toby is his biggest hater and Ben is his closest friend.

-In this AU, he's an incredibly famous serial killer out in the real world. He's been caught a few times but Slenderman always bails him out. However his fangirls sometimes break him out, and once they even rallied outside of a police station to get him released.

-He has so many fangirls that it's crazy. He actually hates it and wants them to leave him alone, but at the same time he relies on the idea of them for his own validation. This is a recurring character trait for him and will be mentioned in more detail in the section talking about his relationship with Nina.

-He's been in the Mansion the longest, since around May of 2008. Because of this he knows every part of the Mansion despite its size and can actually list every Pasta who lives in the Mansion in completely accurate order of when they first moved in.

-He hates Masky and Hoodie, he finds them weird as hell and doesn't go anywhere near them if he can help it. But every once in a while he teams up with them for events, but he always ends up abandoning them afterwards.

-Ben is his best friend, even though he won't admit it. He and Ben are the two very first residents of the Mansion besides Slender and are undoubtedly the closest, since they've been with each other since Day 1. They've been though so much together that you can't call them anything other than best friends.

-He's only ever told Ben that he loved him (as a friend) once, when he believed that he was going to move on to the afterlife. Once it turned out that it was all just a prank that went wrong, Jeff kicked his ass so hard that Ben couldn't float around properly for DAYS but he couldn't say that he was lying. Nobody's ever seen such raw emotion in his voice.

-He's very close to Slender too, and sometimes in his sleep accidentally calls him dad, which is something most Pastas won't really have the confidence to say to him. Although he adamantly states that he sees Slenderman as a loser and an old fart, he actually thinks he's cool. He won't ever say it to his face (get the joke there?).

Okay now that's enough good headcanons for him.

-He has prosthetic eyelids. Yep you heard that right PROSTHETIC EYELIDS. When he initially burned them off he regretted his decision since a lot of dust flew into his eyes and his eyes got infected a lot, causing them to become severely irritable and tear up a lot. Slender got tired of Jeff's eye problems and made Dr Smiley make him fake ones.

-Okay one more silly headcanon. He has an arsenal of knives and his favourite one is named Sir StabsALot.

-Since I kinda have my own version of the Jeff backstory that involves some psychopathic levels of bullying, Jeff is so incredibly sensitive to any kind of bullying that he won't hesitate to stab someone if he thinks they're trying to make fun of him. He also craves validation and wants to be called cool.

-When it comes to Liu and Jane, he does regret what he did and he truly appreciates the two of them for how they helped him, but he also hates them with a burning passion for the ways they didn't help him and left him to suffer.

-The first time he and Liu met they got into a fight which left the both of them with permanent injuries. The same thing happened with Jane, and Jeff has permanent injuries on both his head and his stomach because of Liu trying to swing an axe onto his head, and Jane stabbing him through the stomach.

-His former self was a massive nerd. He took every type of AP class (I think that's what they're called I don't know how American schools work) and was the smartest kid in his year. Nobody in the Mansion is aware of this besides Liu and Jane (also Slender and Ben) and frequently underestimate his intelligence.

-He can play the piano incredibly well, although he hasn't touched one in a very long time. Sometimes he plays in the dead of night when he's having a panic attack. He was a former young concert pianist, and there are actually recordings of his performances on Youtube (in my AU).

-Lots of his old stuff goes on Dark Web auctions for millions of dollars. Slender secretly buys it all back for him.

-He suffers from ungodly levels of Night Terrors. It's a normal occurrence to wake up at 2am to Jeff screaming bloody murder. He sleep walks too and sometimes wakes up to dead bodies in his bedroom that he swears up and down that he knows nothing about.

-He suffers from visual and auditory hallucinations and has attempted to murder a Mannequin because he swore it was making fun of him.

-He gets sick a lot, mainly infections from his mouth gashes. He's even had to be genuinely isolated in his room because he got some strange disease from god-knows-where.

-Sometimes him and Liu have little moments where they act like brothers again but they smoothen up their act once they realise what they're doing. They both swear that they’ll never be brothers again no matter what, but who knows what the future has in store right?

-He's attempted cannibalism many times with EJ but he just hates the taste of human flesh so much that it even turned him off from regular meat for a while. He can't even stomach a liver.

-When it comes to murder, he's quick but incredibly brutal with it. He'll often pin his victim down when they're trying to sleep and stab them to death while muffling their screams.

-He claims to hate anime and find it weird and fetishy, but truth be told he actually watches it sometimes with Ben.

-Has a secret interest in literature. Like he's got his own secret library filled with books like Pride and Prejudice and Anna Karenina. He can quote them from memory and has done so unintentionally, but swears that he just heard Slender say them.

-Don't tell anyone, but he actually knows about Nina's fanfiction accounts and has deadass cried over a bunch of them. He actually made a Wattpad account to follow her. Ben found this out and laughed so hard that he electrocuted himself (that's something Ben can do).

-The dude is edgy and doesn't want to admit it. He listens to Skillet Nightcore but claims that that type of music is cringe. He actually hides a lot of aspects about himself because he wants to appear cool, just a habit he picked up from his previous life.

Nina and Jeff's "Relationship"

-Ah, now this is where the fun starts. Not really all that fun, but this section was fun to write and it was fun to think up of this stuff in class instead of doing the work. Why do algebra when you can maladaptively daydream (is that a real term?) about two fictional serial killers' paradoxically toxic relationship.

Tbh this is a more serious take because that's just how I see them.

Now let's get one idea out of the way;

They both hate each other, but co-depend on each other as they represent something the other deeply desires.

In my Nina backstory, Nina became so unhealthily obsessed with Jeff because he represented something she dearly wanted; freedom from her life, anarchy. Growing up with extremely strict and narcissistic parents, freedom was the one thing she wanted desperately but felt that she couldn't have. Seeing and hearing Jeff's story through True Crime internet circles made her believe that there could be way out of her situation.

Of course, this is not healthy at all. Jeff is a serial killer who hates her guts and wants her dead, and would have most likely killed her had he ever met her before she became Nina the Killer. However, due to her obsessive tendencies beforehand, she became incredibly obsessed with him and would dream about him, write stories about the two of them dating and getting married, and would 'write letters' to him asking him to take her away so they can live happily ever after together.

Nina is aware of the fact that Jeff will never the person she wanted him to be; in a way she's ashamed of herself for even idolising him like that in the first place. But she still desperately reaches for his validation, because he represents anarchy, rebellion. Something she wanted for 13 painful years. She wants to be anything more than an annoying nuisance to him, and swings between periods where she moves on from him and periods where she's so obsessed with him that she breaks down wanting him to like her. He's who she wants to be and who she wants to destroy.

Jeff hates Nina. He hates her and if she died right in front of him, he wouldn't care. She makes him feel uncomfortable, but at the same time co-depends on her adoration for him. He's always trying to do things that he knows Nina likes so she can like him more. He doesn't like her, he likes what she'll provide for him; validation. Suffering through dehumanising levels of bullying for 4 years destroyed his self image and he craves Nina's praise.

Every time Nina's in one of those phases where she hates him and wants nothing to do with him, he'll purposefully try and act more like the way she sees him to get him back.

Jeff hates Nina, but he can't stand the idea of losing the only person who thinks he's cool.

I firmly believe that maybe one day Nina and Jeff will recover from their mental issues and maybe start to treat each other like equals. But in the mean time, they co-depend on each other in an unhealthy and paradoxical way. It only hurts the both of them, but they can't stop.

Jeff will also never date Nina because she's eternally 13 and he's eternally 17 (yeah I aged Jeff up a bit since in his original story he's about 14 and I didn't really like that).

Hey, thanks for requesting again! This was so fun to write, if you wanna hear about any other characters don't be shy to ask ;)

That goes the same for anyone who reads this post! My Creepypasta AU is called 'Puppet Strings', and it features a lot of its own lore, its own interpretations of Slenderman (and his brothers) and Zalgo, and its own worldbuilding! If you want to ask for any character in particular, don't be shy to ask!

(Um, also some self promotion here. I'm currently writing a fanfiction based on my backstories for Slenderman and Zalgo. Chapter 5 should be out by this Sunday! It's called Puppet Strings, and there's a post about it on my blog!).

Thank you so much for all the likes on my last post of this nature, I wanna write more for you guys!

Don't be scared to request!

[absolutebl]

Thai Names & BL

Why SO Weird (to Westerners)

You're looking for information on the Thai chue len.

We might say "nickname" but the actual translation is "play name." And it's what an anthropologist might call a "use name." So this is the name you go by IRL, not necessarily your legal name.

First I should say that this is a lot more common than westerns realize, even in our own past. Many Roman women, for example, we know operated under what amounts to a chue len. And it was probubly quite common among the lower classes in Ancient Egypt and Greece, too. But since the poor and females are chronically understudied there isn’t a ton of data (or written records, for that matter).

The chue len has to do in part with the history of names in Thailand, and the fact that until relatively recently most people only had a given name and a chue len, and then when government regulations went into effect mandating a last names it quickly became really complicated.

You can read a great article on Thai naming conventions here. It’s fun to learn about. I highly recommend it. And I am going to assume you did read it and now talk only about the bits left out and odd. 

The bit most BL watchers ask me about is answered in this statement: 

“Many Thai nicknames are derived from English words. They may be English sounding names (such as ‘Anna’) or more obscure words that are chosen for their meaning, e.g. Book (symbolising intelligence), Bank (symbolising wealth).”

However, like most English words used in Thai, they aren’t pronounced the way we would pronounce them. (Hell when have you ever heard an American pronounce something like a Brit, anyway?) 

One amusing example is “bur” which is Thai for “phone number.” It’s our word, but they made it... better. You can watch Dean ask for Pharm’s digits using just this one word (in the scene where he drops him off for the first time in UWMA). 

What the article doesn't say about chue len is that sometimes they are chosen for fun/silly as a baby name (like fatty) and then changed by the person themselves at any point in their life. 

You can opt to change your chue len whenever you want, since it's not a legal name. Also its not uncommon to have different ones with different groups (so one for friends, another for family, one for the public if you’re a celebrity, another for your lover). 

Daonuea (literally starnorth AKA Polaris or the Northstar) in Star in My Mind does this, he uses two: Nuea with friends, Dao with intimates.

I hope you can see how in a language where you use your OWN NAME for the I pronoun regularly, this is VERY easy to do?

Also, the article doesn’t say that a chue len can also be based on a popular band/idol/actor at the time of birth. I understand from my Thai bestie that Golf/Gulf was one of these for a while back in the 90s? I think.

Anyway, I also found Thai names odd to start, now I barely notice or register. Partly because what we read in English captions often doesn’t really sound like what’s being said.

For example, both Tine & Type sound the same to me, like Tyyyyee.

Also I amuse myself with wondering how they got that name. Like if a baby is named Bbomb - erm, did they blow out their diaper all the time? Probubly not because that’s very English culture specific, but I’m still amused. Was War a really violent child? Are all those Flukes happy accidents? Why is Gameplay called Gameplay? Was he a big gamer who chose it for himself? Or did his parents get together because of an in-game romance?

It’s fun to think about the reason, because there usually is one. 

There’s another naming convention the article doesn’t really talk about, which is all the chue lens amongst siblings often either rhyme (e.g. Win & Lin in Cupid’s Last Wish) or start with the same letter. Thai BL Kpop idol Bambam of GOT7 talks about this (he and his sibs all have B names). And also, hilariously, the fact that he actually doesn’t know his own brother’s given name because they have always just used the chue len with each other so he never had to learn it.

Some actors will take and go by (at least for a time) a more western sounding name (Phoom --> Pavel) but you’ll hear their Thai friends using their Thai name or a different chue len (much like some Korean idols). Others will go by a Thai name for in country work (Stewart --> Perth). 

There is an episode of 2022′s Safe House where GMMTV actors all talk about their use names and where they come from and their siblings names etc... but no one ever translated it and I’m a dumbass who didn’t save that ep to link, sorry.

Here on Tumblr we tend to tag actors by their chue len + given name, partly because many actors choose that as their social media handles on IG etc... 

Finally, you can watch Perth talk about some of this here on his YT channel.

from a question from @doorajar​ 

(source)

[reflections-in-a-critical-eye]

That's Jimin×Taeyang Collab rumor got both fandoms crying lmao

I hope it's true tho... he was someone jimin had looked upto and I would love to see both main dancers to a choreo song !!

And considering jimin was the only member invited to Bigbang docu screening back in time he must be close with T and the rest

Also saw this and I hope its true🤞

https://twitter.com/itboypop/status/1601041173979615232?t=7w5eY-_OlY0EEGaT_eYbGQ&s=19

Anon 2

Really don’t know how to feel about it. This group makes my skin crawl. You can’t tell me the others didn’t know what Seungri was doing. I know Jimin is a fan and seemed in good relationship with these men. I always side eyed him because of it, but because he stopped interacting publicly at least with them I thought he is no longer associates himself with them. Just to see this.

Alright, this needs to be unpacked.

As far as I know, only Seungri was convicted for what he did, so why would the people that are associated with him, including coworkers such as Taeyang, be judged? Especially since he hasn't done anything of the sort? Because if we are to apply this logic, then we should judge a lot more people which once again, puts us in the position of the moral inquisition, as if we're all morally superior. Which I guess it's easy when we do this in internet discourse. This is not on the same scale and situation, but as much as I personally side-eye Bogum and his religious extremism, I don't actually believe that in association, Tae is exactly like that. Or if he is, those views did not rise to the surface. But ultimately, regardless of who they are, what they do, I can't stop you or make you change your mind because it's your choice and right to do so, but I'm perfectly aware how these stances came to be in online spaces. So I don't agree with it, but I get it. Also, no one sent me any similar complaints when Taeyang was at Hobi's listening party and how him and RM took a photo together. Or how Hobi clearly hangs out with groups that G-Dragon is part of. Was the moral police on vacation back then? Lastly, just because someone is not seen in public with another person, doesn't mean they can't have any sort of relationship. It could be simply professional.

My advice to anyone who hates or dislikes artists because somehow they wronged BTS in Army's views, to prepare themselves to either adapt, or stop with the imaginary conflicts. Because it's ridiculous and pathetic to bring out something that happened in 2015-2016, when in present day, BTS has no fucking issue. Army fighting with VIP and vice versa is dumb fandom drama, but hating group members and calling them irrelevant, fossils, bad singers, etc., while Jimin and Taeyang clearly want to work together if this rumor has any truth to it. So, what the actual fuck?

And now to answer the first anon, I am excited. Seeing the fandoms crying is annoying, but also satisfying because clearly they have no say in this, but they keep acting stupid. Let them cry, I really hope the collab is real and is happening. I was so tired of the Chris Martins and the Charlie Puths, that this one might be a breath of fresh air. Similar to what Yoongi did with Psy, which was clearly a successful collab. We know Jimin was a fan of Taeyang since his rookie days and for those who say that Taeyang needs Jimin to be relevant and to get some attention, is clearly an army that doesn't know their kpop history because for them kpop is only BTS.

And in doing that, they fail to understand how huge this thing is. And if they could leave their hate aside, they would see that Taeyang and Jimin can be such a good match vocally. They have the range and it could result in something really good. Either a ballad, or a song for fucking. I hope it's the latter, but I'll take anything, lol. And if they do only one live performance, I'll be happy. I really want to see them both on a stage, with or without a choreo. Rookie Jimin could only dream of this. And now it's (possibly) happening.

And if all this is nothing but a rumor, at least we get to entertain the idea for a few days.