#but i've just read my like third book in a row where there's a whole posse of gay/bi friends and somehow none of them do drag or are butch

[seven-saffodils]

.

[sovvannight]

My Year in Writing, 2023

And this is another situation where I wish I could pull up last year's post to use as a pattern, but I can't because my writing blog got deleted, so I'm feeling a little lost.

But I can at least see the graphs I made last year in my writing progress tracking spreadsheet, so that give me a bit of a hint as to what I would normally post here.

I wrote 183,465 words on 2023. It's my third year in a row of increases (thank you, Julie and the Phantoms!) and my first year over 150k, which was my goal for the year. I'm at 856,124 words since 2017.

I'm also super excited about winning NaNo for the first time since 2017. November was my most productive month, followed by February, when I spent most of the month working on Baby, This Rain Changes Everything, which I guess I was just excited about because I had a lot of 1k+ days.

Part of the 44k increase from 2022-2023 was due to NaNo, but I also increased my average daily word count for non-NaNo months from 291.8 to 387.5. And I do write every day--December 31 was day 2,395 of my write-ever-day streak.

What I Wrote

Other than 2% of my words for the year for Garfield, a Teen Wolf Movie fix-it fic, everything else was for Julie and the Phantoms: 81% on various scenes for Electric Boogaloo, 12% for Baby, This Rain Changes Everything, and 5% on two different AU fics that I may convert to original fiction instead.

Plans for 2024

So, the saying goes something like, "Write a million words, throw them away, now you're ready to be a writer." I didn't realize it until I was writing this up, but I'm going to hit a million words next year.

And I have to admit, in the last few months, I've started to think about writing and publishing original fiction. And that's partly because the JatP fandom is dying--I'd think the drop in kudos was because I suck, but I've seen declining kudos for new fic by big name fans, too, so it's not just me. No judgement on the fandom, it's just the nature of things. I've left a couple of fandoms myself because of a new hyperfixation. But at the same time, I had this AU idea in the spring, and thought to myself, are you really going to write a whole novel-length fic for 20 kudos?

I think I'd rather earn a couple hundred bucks instead, which seems like about what I would net if I self-pub. And I'm poor, so any little bit helps. Plus, I don't know, I just feel ready. It's partly because I read some pretty bad books this year, and it's like, OK, this got published, and in one case it got optioned and made into a TV show, and I feel like I can do better.

So, my plan for 2024 is:

Write the last ~9 scenes for Electric Boogaloo.

Write season 3, AKA the Electric Boogaloo sequel. Boogaloo is probably going to reach somewhere around 300k total, but I'm aiming for something more like 150k-200k for the sequel.

Finish the two Arrow fics I still can't give up on, even though I haven't worked on them in years. One just needs another 2k, and the other maybe 15k.

Transition to original fiction, taking the idea I had for a JatP boy band AU and "filing off the serial numbers" as I go. (Or something else--who knows what I'll be most interested next fall!)

In terms of word count goals:

I want to hit 50,000 for NaNo in November. For April and July Camp NaNos, I want to write 1,000 a day, so 30k and 31k.

I want to take it somewhat easy in the three months after NaNo events, so May, August, and December - 600/day, or 18,600 words/month.

For the other six months out of the year, I'm going to try doing "NaNoWriWeek" or 1,667 words/day for the first week of the month and then 600/day for the rest of the month, which will get me around 25k per month.

All of this totals up to about 300,000 words.

[jorrmungandr]

(￣﹃￣)

Ugh, man, I slept okay last night, but I was interrupted by a cramp.

It's so embarrassing to go from horrible, agonizing pain back to feeling compeltely fine in like 30 seconds. Still have a little twinge, it was right on the back of my calf, very odd.

Workin' from home again today. Don't know how much I'm really gonna get done in these last two days before my long vacation. I get 11 days off in a row! All next week, and then monday of the following week for New Years Day.

I've been getting back into Warhammer 40k lately, just a bit. Someone I follow on tumblr (you know who you are :P) got really into it recently, mostly Necrons because of some books (The Infinite and The Divine, I believe). That got me curious, so I looked up what's new. Apparently they're on the TENTH edition now, which is wild. There are a bunch more Imperial factions... and exactly one new Xenos faction (space dwarves are back!).

I was super into Warhammer when I was like 7-10 years old. Not, like, playing the game, obviously, but reading rulebooks and lore and whatnot. I remember I somehow had a Citadel Miniatures Catalogue for like 1997, used to just sit around looking through it. Plus a bunch of issues of White Dwarf, of course. I was way into Chaos Space Marines, I got that codex and absolutely loved it. Had so much cool art and little snippets of fiction.

40k was in its second edition, and I remember with third edition came out and started introducing these wild new plastic model kits. Almost everything was metal back then. That edition change was the first big attempt to simplify the game, as it was wildly complicated before. The vehicle rules were incomprehensible, many units had whole pages of special rules, there were tons of percentile tables to roll on, scatter dice, etc. But third edition slimmed everything down and introduced a lot of suffocating structure to army rules that I didn't like.

Looking at the new rules, it seems like things have swung back in the other direction a bit in the intervening years. Or, at least, they've ended up back there in the latest course correction. Army-building rules are very loose, and all the rules about resolving combat are very simple now. The focus of complexity is on these like... tactical maneuvers, which I still don't quite understand. Seems to works similarly to how magic worked in Warhammer Fantasy back in the day.

Speaking of, I'm still mad that that game is essentially dead. Age of Sigmar is lame. Lame, I say! It seems bizarre that GW decided to kill it when that Total War game was gaining steam, but whatever.

Anyway, I haven't like bought any models, I'm not going crazy. Just bought an Adeptus Mechanicus codex. I like the look of their models, it's really cool that they're finally a proper army faction. Especially the Kastelan Robots, I love the idea that they just... found these ancient, invincible robots and strapped guns to 'em. In 2nd edition, there would definitely be some insane rules where you had to roll to maintain control of them or they'd wander in a random (scatter dice!) direction every turn....

[markantonys]

You're on Gathering Storm? I am curious on your thoughts on the Sanderson books cause the fandom is pretty divided on them (for a variety of reasons). Curious on your takes of what the fandom has dubbed "Darth Rand"

i think it's still too soon for me to say (currently about a third into TGS, maybe a little more) because i honestly have not noticed much of a difference so far! mat's characterization seems to be one of the biggest points of contention, but i haven't seen him yet where i am. and i was already v unhappy with the direction rj took mat's character in COT and KOD (for me he became MARKEDLY more misogynistic and less anti-slavery than he ever was in previous books, and forcing him to have genuine feelings for tuon completely changed (and butchered) his character imo because making mat extremely OOC was the only possible way to make those genuine feelings happen so quickly), and some people have said that what sanderson does is only a continuation and perhaps exaggeration of the bad trend that rj already started for mat, so we'll see if i find TGS mat significantly worse than COT-KOD mat or about the same.

the only big change i've noticed so far is that the pov/plotline switches every chapter instead of staying in one pov/plotline for a long chunk, which i see as about equally good and bad - good because it spares me from getting bogged down for 100 pages in a row of a plotline i don't care about, but bad because it prevents me from really sinking into a plotline i DO care about.

as for Darth Rand (jdkfgj i love that) i actually haven't seen too much of him yet in this book, though from what little i have seen, he definitely feels in a significantly worse mental/emotional place than he was in the previous book. i do kinda feel like his downward spiral arc has been rushed - he was meandering along in a fairly-bad-but-not-as-terrible-as-i-expected-from-what-everyone-said place for a very long time and then suddenly jumped to MUCH WORSE in this book. and i think he has a really big breaking point later in this book that i haven't even gotten to yet, it was just that even from his first chapter he did abruptly feel so much worse than when we last saw him - granted this is the first time we've seen him since semirhage blew off his hand and told him he was terminally insane, so a sharp decline in emotional wellbeing does make sense, but still. i heard so much about the whole "rand loses the ability to smile" thing and i was really expecting that to be FAR more painful than it's been so far lmao, so far it's been A Bummer rather than The Most Agonizing Thing I've Ever Read. i'm probably jinxing myself aren't i?

while i'm on the subject, i think that min being plastered to rand's side has badly interfered with his Decline arc - we're supposed to feel "oh no rand's isolating himself and pushing all his loved ones away and not trusting anyone" but he's just been taking min along on all his trips for 6 books and confiding his plans and problems in her, resulting in a nonsense double standard of rand going "i'm a danger to everyone i love and must push them away to protect them, and i can’t trust anyone but myself! except for min, whom i trust with all my feelings and plans and who is allowed to come with me into any number of extremely dangerous situations even though she is by far the least capable in a fight of all my loved ones." and so i feel that rand's self-isolating arc has not been as effective as it would've been if he had TRULY been keeping everyone across the board at arm's length, rather than making special exceptions for 1 person. (also, since i hate min and min/rand, her constant presence in rand's chapters makes things Difficult for me jfkgj i honestly have not taken much genuine enjoyment in rand's plotline since she became a permanent part of it, which sounds dramatic of me but it is true! i'd probably feel much sadder about rand's arc if my reading of it wasn't constantly undercut by annoyance about min!)

[c-is-for-circinate]

Okay! I did it! I renewed my library card after a pandemic-and-then-some's worth of years, and I read now.

Which I think means keeping a record or something, probably. If only to keep track of things I do and don't like, for future reference!

Books I've tried to read in the past two weeks, in roughly chronological order:

Gideon the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir -- never have so many people whose taste I respect disagreed so forcefully on a work of fiction. Plus I had a free epub of it on my harddrive from a Tor thing ages ago, so it seemed like a good place to start. I found it genuinely enjoyable! Gideon was a fun headspace to follow along, and while I absolutely did not go in expecting 'Agatha Christie locked mansion murder mystery, with lots of bones', I was down for it when it happened. A solid choice.

Tooth and Claw, Jo Walton -- DID NOT FINISH. Another random free Tor download. Got about a chapter in and then decided that there was too much cannibalism going on in the weird Regency-esque dragon religion for me, thank you no.

The Way of Kings, Brandon Sanderson -- DID NOT FINISH. I was sad to not like this one! Tumblr keeps raving about Brandon Sanderson! But man, once you've hit the fifth chapter in a row (sorry, third chapter, there were two prologues first) with a brand new narrator, and one of the previous narrators is dead and you're pretty sure you'll never see two of the other POVs ever again, and you've had three timeskips and you're a hundred pages in and maybe the story is finally actually starting, and there have been a whole two female characters so far (well, one female character and one 'sprites aren't supposed to have gender but this one has boobs so I'll give her female pronouns') and we're supposed to like this one because she's Inappropriately Witty in a way her brothers like but her nursemaids scoff at, which mostly seems to consist of arch remarks about how men don't want to date her...big nope!

A Dead Djinn in Cairo, P. Djeli Clark -- A fun (queer) detective novella, prequel to one of this year's Nebula novels. The worldbuilding was very cool -- 1912 Cairo in an alternate history where magic has recently entered the world, very very grounded in its place and period while doing interesting things with magic and djinn. The mystery felt pretty bare-bones and formulaic in itself, but it was a short novella, without a lot of space for twists. An easy read, and you've got to love a dapper lady detective in a suit.

Harrow the Ninth, Tamsyn Muir -- I am now officially Up To Date with my various tumblr friends who raved about these books. I enjoyed it! I enjoyed it slightly less than Gideon, I think -- I liked a lower percentage of the characters, and the ones I liked were present a much lower percentage of the time, plus Harrow is just so miserable for so much of the book that it's less fun -- but 'enjoy' is slightly different than 'appreciate', and I did very much appreciate it. Not going to go rabid over the series any time soon, but I'll probably check Nona and Alecto out when they happen.

The Wolf of Oren-Yaro, K.S. Villoso -- DID NOT FINISH. Oof, another one I wanted to like, a random browsing pick when I went to grab a hold from the library. The protagonist of this book feels incredibly realistic and relatable as a woman who got married young to a man her family chose, who fucked off and left her with the kid and the family business after an argument, and then showed back up after five years with divorce papers because he wants his 50% of the communal property she's been taking care of the whole time. Which is cool! Unfortunately, said 'communal property' is an entire kingdom, and the protagonist makes zero sense as a queen. She's BAD at her job, in a way that could be interesting to explore as part of her youth/shitty support network, but it really feels like the author does not get just HOW BAD she is at her job. Or what basic logistic decisions could have been made to imply that the progatonist or literally a single member of her staff were even marginally competent. This could be a great setup for a novel about a merchant or a homesteading farmer or a clan leader, but it flopped hard for me.

A Master of Djinn, P. Djeli Clark -- Sequel to the aforementioned novella, and Nebula award winner! This one was, like its prequel, fun, and the imagery and really excellent worldbuilding is 100% its best part. It's very much a detective novel, with certain conceits. None of its characters are particularly layered, everybody is improbably good at sword-fighting, and there was definitely a point at which I was tallying up just how many different incredibly dapper, well-tailored suits in dazzlingly fashionable colors our heroine had worn so far, apparently bought on her civil servant's salary. But at a certain point, you just open yourself up to the joy of an extremely dapper lady detective with a sword cane and a bowler hat and an Extremely Hot Girlfriend who is sometimes a thief. There's an underground jazz club which functions as a speakeasy for no apparent reason but features a brass band direct from New Orleans. At one point Kaiser Wilhelm II shows up. There may or may not be a mecha. Again, the mystery itself is nothing to write home about (a lot more intricate and interesting in the middle than the prequel but still somewhat predictable in bits, and the bad guy at the end was pretty obvious), but the book is fun. Shouldn't dapper lesbian lady detectives get to have that?

In Other Lands, Sara Rees Brennan -- I enjoyed this way more than I expected! I read The Demon's Lexicon years ago, and was DEEPLY unimpressed (I mostly remember it as a mediocre British Supernatural AU made more boring by the process of filing the serial numbers off), but it looks like Brennan and I have both grown as people, because I liked this a lot. It sidesteps the low-hanging fruit of 'why do fantasy lands always need kids to save them? isn't that kind of fucked up?' and goes right for the throat of 'what the fuck kind of sociopolitical system is implied by this child soldier bullshit in the first place, and why is it so easy to be okay with it?'. I found the whole elven reversal of gender tropes grating sexism somewhat wearing, but I liked Elliot as a protagonist a lot. Here's a kid who knows down to his bones that he's bad at people, that he's abrasive and mean and judgemental and impatient, who still values people on just the most fundamental level. Kid's got a -2 to charisma and is still the party face because he's the only person in the entire system who wants to talk first and stab never. I appreciate that, and I appreciate him.

The Unspoken Name, A.K. Larkwood -- An interesting book! I read the whole thing and liked most of the beginning third and most of the end third a great deal, and the middle third well enough with a smidgen of 'I'm a little too ace for this, the Love Interest showed up and it's boring now'. It's a story about...isolation? Abuse, but not the kind that recognizes itself as abuse. In some ways the story feels very scattered, thematically -- a lot of theme going on but I'm not sure how much some of it actually resolves -- but I did really like it. Most of the relatively few relationships in this book, be it friendship or co-worker-ship or acquaintanceship or even just the relationship of a person to a place, are brief and thin, negative or unhealthily one-sided, or just absent, which isn't exactly my taste but does make Csorwe and Shuthmili's mutual understanding the sweeter for it. Fans of Gideon the Ninth would probably like this, although it felt a little less original than I think it might've had I not read that first, and the interplay of traditional fantasy language and extremely casual modern talk felt a lot more uneven. All in all, I think it's a rec if you're into vague unsettled feelings about gods and stories that are more about learning to stand up and leave your abuser than about said abuser ever getting any sort of comeuppance in return. Plus, stubborn lesbian orc girl with a big sword, always a plus.

I have a pile of recs from my last post! I will continue to collect recs! Toss 'em my way, I'm beginning to remember that, oh right, last time I regularly read books I read them voraciously. This is FUN.

[justatypicalwizard]

The Weight of a Butterfly | Chapter 1

✦ Shinazugawa Sanemi x femReader

✦ Synopsis: Sanemi gets a new Butterfly Girl who he really doesn't like at first, or even at all. Or maybe he does? Short, heartwarming, fluff story.

✦ Warnings: reader is described as an orphan, no smut

✦ From author: This is my first book written in English. It does contain a bunch of mistakes and overall isn't that great when it comes to writing skills. Nonetheless, I have a great sentiment for it and still adore the plot, that's why I decided to (re)post it. If you want to see my writing progress you can catch up on one of my more recent works.

Word count: 0,8k

That was outrageous! You just got information about the whole division process from Shinobu. You could pick your own Pillar! Well... at least you could try to get to the Pillar you chose. Every Butterfly Girl got a small piece of paper where she was about to write three Pillar names, beginning with the one they most wanted to work for.

Most of your friends, including Miki, sweated over Rengoku. You liked the guy, but you didn't know him well. Heck, you also knew about his father living in his Estate. No matter how hot Rengoku was, he was not hot enough for you to deal with an old grump.

I think I will choose Mitsuri.

You thought to yourself as you've written her name in the first place. Now that you thought about it... you didn't know any Pillar except for Shinobu. You've heard about them, but that's pretty much all.

''Who do you guys write down, aside from Rengoku?'' You asked all your friends.

''I've heard that Giyuu is not much of a problem.'' One of the Butterfly Girls answered your question.

Yeah, you also heard about him. Might as well write him down in the second place. Now you only have to find the third one. You started to ask a bit around. It turned out that most of the Pillars had a bunch of votes from everyone. There was nearly no one who was left unpicked. There was only one exception.

''Who is that Shinazugawa?'' You asked Miki.

''Oh no girl, don't pick that. He will eat you alive.'' Your best friend warned you.

Asking the rest of the girls you noticed that none of them wrote that guy down. You felt kinda down about it. Shinobu told you that with this voting they also wanted to test the popularity of the Pillars within bystanders. They definitely had some kind of a contest. You felt really bad about the fact that this Shinazugawa guy had zero votes. You wrote him down in the last place. It's not like you will land him, right? You had two other propositions and Shinobu really liked you so she wouldn't give you away to any meany. Right?

✦✦✦

All the skilled Butterfly Girls were standing in a row in front of the Pillars. The Demon Slayers looked rather relaxed, in contrast to their new pupils. You didn't feel a lot of stress, you were also relaxed. You knew no matter what you would get a good Pillar. Because all of them were good!

''Welcome everyone, we may get straight to the point.'' Shinobu found herself a place in the middle of the both sides, Aoi was helping her, holding a chart that only they could see. ''I'm happy to say that every one of the Pillars got at least one vote!''

There was a murmur of satisfaction hearable from the Demon Slayers.

''I would also like to congratulate Rengoku for being the most popular Pillar, nearly every vote has your name on it. You are lucky I didn't take part in the voting.'' The bug Pillar was sharp as always. ''As this was a contest I will read the names of my Butterfly Girls and the Pillars in the order from the most votes to the least votes. Please remember that if there was more than one vote for a certain Pillar there was a draw deciding who will get the job so don't whine that someone was favourised!'' With that she started.

''Our winner Rengoku, welcome your new Butterfly Girl Miki, treat her well.'' You could swear that you heard Miki scream internally.

Your friend hopped to Rengoku's side and waved to you. If you weren't standing in the row you would wave back, for now you had to focus and listen to your name. Next was of course Mitsuri. You also didn't get her. Giyuu got third place which shocked the other Pillars. The girl that got him looked like her eyes were about to pop out from looking at him so everybody quickly got what was going on. You swore you heard someone say 'that handsome bastard'.

Time went by and there were less and less Pillars yet, you were still standing in the row. Finally there was only one girl left next to you and her name was called out first. You sweatdropped.

''Last but not least, with one vote, Shinazugawa, welcome your new Butterfly Girl Y/N, treat her well.'' Instantly, you felt someone's eyes dart your way.

Wait... it was everyone's eyes, but one of them especially drilled holes in you.

One vote? It's like... the Pillar had to get only my vote. It looks like I did it on purpose. I barely remember the third name. I just know I wanted to get a job for Mitsuri.

You looked up at your Pillar, already standing in front of you. It was a man with white hair and a lot of scars. He looked like he wanted to kill you.

''Hello... master?'' 

SERIES MASTERLIST

[otrtbs]

bestie i am seeing lots of ungrateful bitchies on tik tok saying some ungrateful shit about Art Heist and i am about to pull a muscle!!! i just want you to know that whole book!!! and i Mean WHOLE BOOK slayed it self. no other explanation needed. you are the hands down on of my favorite author and i've been in 1D/Harry fandom and have read lots of wattpad and ao3 and i can assure you, you slayy as an writer!!! i am waiting for anything new, it doesn't matter how long it's going to take i am sitting in 1st row!!!!

First, I want to say thank you for the kind words about Art Heist! Everyone's kindness means so, so much to me <3

Second, this is sort of the reason I'm not super active on tiktok (on my non-personal account at least) because not every fic is going to be everyone's cup of tea and that is totally okay and valid! and people on tiktok have a lot of opinions (sometimes not always super respectful opinions and it is what it is) but it makes me nervous going on there ngl. it's my job to curate the experience i want online which is why i like platforms like tumblr where it's super easy to filter out things and blogs i don't want to interact with and see (for my own sake)

Third, I'm a little bit of a fragile person haha and this is my first fanfic, my first anything I've ever written. Ever. So, I realise it's not perfect, and some people might not even think it's good or like the direction it went in, which is fine! But it's still a personal thing to share your writing and to share something you worked hard on and are proud of with the world. So, all I can ask for is patience and understanding (and so many of you have been so unbelievably kind and supportive you've done so much more than I ever imagined and im so grateful for that <3)

but yeahhhh i don't think i'm going to be going on tiktok for a while at least for my own sake haha <3 I didn't really expect the last few chapters to cause sort of an adverse reaction so it's taken me a little bit by surprise ngl but we move 😎 🤪

[fancifulpurposelesslovely]

Okay I put this in the tags if another post last night but deleted it bc it wasn't actually the place and I'm gonna share my thoughts but might not even tag this idk.

Re: that post abt the trc fandom disappearing post greywaren

First: I like a lot of the dreamer trilogy. I pretty well liked greywaren. I'm not as attached to either as I am to trc, but I did genuinely enjoy them.

Second: I am a trc fandom baby. I am a fandom INFANT. I got into these books about 3 weeks before Greywaren came out, and got to Greywaren about 3 weeks after it came out.

Third: They ate my brain for 3 months. I read TRC twice in the space of two weeks, then TDT, with greywaren specifically twice in a row. I then followed with Scorpio Races and All the Crooked Saints. I genuinely coukdnt read anything not Stiefvater for THREE MONTHS bc my brain was like "this is where the dopamine lives, nowhere else".

Third: I also read a fair amount of Maggie's blog and her thoughts about the series, including the notes that came out right after Greywaren was published. I've read 11 of her books. I own the writing seminar she put together and have watched about half of it just to listen to her talk. I like her art a lot and think her music is neat. I am Not Normal about Maggie Stiefvater.

So. Given the givens, my thoughts. The post I saw was the one going around about how the fandom died after Greywaren came out. I can't really speak to this bc I couldnt look at the tags until I finished Greywaren. So I only really know the fandom post-Greywaren. TRC is what brought me back to tumblr tho, after probably 4 years of only casually being interested in what was happening over here. I needed people to yell with and I found them here.

What I can speak to and apparently cannot prevent myself from speaking to is a lot of the notes on that post. There was a lot of talk of her being bored with the series, of wishing she had taken more time, of feeling betrayed by it not being the series she wanted/she had promised.

I am in many ways a Stiefvater apologist. I am. Yeah, she was probably kind of bored with the series. She was overwhelmed. It was 7 books and 10 years, and she was tired. She's stated that she's never going to write a series again. She's over the whole concept. Series are hard, the final book in a series is especially hard. I think we can look at George RR Martin and Patrick Rothfuss for truth there.

And maybe it feels as tho she should have gone the way of those 2. Not finishing the story, or putting it odd for longer to get it right. But a- I feel like that actually would have sucked more and gotten her more shit, and b- I have a feeling it wasn't an option given her contracts. And taking more time was probably not an option given her contracts. She had signed on for 3 books, possibly within a timespan, and three books she had to give them.

As go "this wasn't the Ronan series she promised" and "I hated the universe/big pieces of thr plot", we go back to the scholastic contracts. They didn't let her write the story she wanted. She had different titles she wanted, there was a whole different plot and vibe. The fucking Moderators weren't her idea. And yeah this comes directly from her statement post greywaren publishing, where she still had to be careful and still needed to sell books, but personally I believe her. If you've ever listened to her talk about writing, you know she has specific stories she wants to tell. Stories that matter to her and feel important. She'll make concessions based on marketability or what she believes the audience would like more, but she wants to tell a specific story. And she didn't get to do that with TDT and I think it pissed her off more than she let on.

I also think it's pretty fucking clear she isn't super happy with Greywaren. She literally nailed a copy of it to the wall. Like pounded a handmade wrought iron nail through a hardback copy of the book and then put it on the wall in her study. She was soooo fucking done. And it might feel like a betrayal of her readers and the series to be tired of the series and to give us a book that feels tired of and annoyed with the series, but she's a person as well as an author. She has opinions and desires and things she does and doesn't want to be doing. And for the sake on contracts, commitments, and not disappointing readers, she kept writing books she maybe didn't care about anymore. There's enough neurodivergence in the fandom that the difficult nature of that should make sense, right?

I saw at least one person say they aren't going to get any more of her books, and like obviously that's a choice you get to make, it feels like a shitty one. Personally I'm pretty excited to see what she does next. She's apparently working on a fairly long adult novel that's got her excited again. I love reading stuff written by people who are excited to be writing it, so I think this none is gonna be a good time. But idk, her writing style just makes my brain go brrrr.

Also i don't know how relevant is to the point I'm making but I still need to say it:

Idk how many people know/remember/consider that 2 of these seven books were written and published while she was like. Actively dying. Or suffering from a condition that was pretty damn close to killing her. TRK and CDTH were written in the fucking height of her symptoms while no one was paying attention and getting a dx was really fucking hard. She talked about putting a lot of her experience with illness into Ronan, and Addison's is a disease of lack of energy and sleeping too much and missing a lot of your own life because of it. And maybe thats why Greywaren felt right to her, and maybe that's why TRK and CDTH feel different to the books before and after them. Or maybe I'm reading too much into it all and my hyperempathy is getting the better of me.

Idk yall I just. Like Maggie.

[jonwongton]

12/31/23

I know I say every year flies by really fast, but 2023 has been one of those years that's felt like it lasted forever. When I was looking back at pictures of what happened in January and May, I couldn't believe those both happened this year.

My plan from the start was for 2023 to be like a soft year off. I wanted to maintain my career while placing a light emphasis on health and real world/self improvement education. I wasn't looking for a lot of change, and on paper, this year should have been great since a lot of positive things happened for my family.

However, when I really think about it, I spent a good chunk of this year not at my best. I had a pretty bad neck injury in May that I still haven't fully recovered from, and emotionally I've had to step out of my comfort zone to make room for a special person. On top of that, I haven't had the time like past years to keep up with kpop. I've really leaned on kpop during my first six adult years so I can really feel my anchor being gone.

Something that really stands out for me in 2023 is the lack of that one magical special moment. So far, they've been

2017 - the moment I clicked on my first GFriend b-side (Neverland)

2018 - Nagyung's 반반 hair reveal at KCON Thailand

2019 - getting a selfie with Hayoung at Washington Square Park

2020 - the release of the Feel Good mv after 15 months

2021 - standing atop Namsan tower during my first Korea trip

2022 - Nakyung's shh to open Hush Hush during the first concert day + the Stay This Way fanchant on the last concert day

2023 - ???

so they're all kpop related. I really just don't have a single moment this year where all my emotions pour out again. That probably leaves my year ranking at

2018 > 2019 > 2021 > 2017 > 2022 > 2023 > 2020

Not everything was bad: I still learned a ton about a lot of random things (sports, politics, history), improved my social skills, *worked on* my emotional maturity, and got physically stronger. If this is considered one of my worse years, I'll consider myself lucky.

Minor kpop dump:

Song of the year: 눈맞춤 - 프로미스나인 (fromis_9) [#menow was good too but I like 눈맞춤 more)

Album of the year: EXIST - EXO

Top 5 b-sides of the year:

What I Want - 프로미스나인 (fromis_9)

OMG - NewJeans (뉴진스)

One Kiss - Red Velvet (레드벨벳)

Lucky Star - NiziU (니쥬)

Oh Ma Ma God - EVERGLOW (에버글로우)

Seasonal songs:

겨울: Sugar Rush Ride - TXT (투모로우바이투게더)

봄: WHY - Kep1er (케플러)

여름: 여름이 들려 (Summer Comes) - 오마이걸 (OH MY GIRL)

가을: 7HEAVEN - 퍼플키스(PURPLE KISS)

Current top 5 DDR songs (song + chart combo)

Ace for Aces

Possession (20th Anniversary Mix)

Gerbera

London EVOLVED ver. C

mathematical good-bye

Milestones

Spent the whole year in a relationship :)

Made my annual Korea trip for the third year in a row

Significantly improved my reading, timing, and stamina when playing harder songs (912k on snow garland fairy, my first few 15 GFCs, solid GFCs through the 14 folder, three 12 AAAs)

Went to my first football game (49ers wiping the seahawks in the wildcard round)

Attended my older brother's (first) wedding

Attended my sister's wedding

Saw all my extended family in Oregon for my cousin's wedding

Made two SoCal trips

Learned a lot about personal finance

Goals for 2024

Get promoted to senior staff

Get a 900k on an 18 + PFC a 13

Learn to cook six traditional Cantonese recipes

Work on my flexibility (shoulders, back, and hamstrings) to prevent injury instead of focusing on weight

Read all five books currently sitting on my bookshelf over the past two years

Sleep earlier, wake up earlier

Talk less, listen more

I really coasted throughout 2023 (+ the second half of 2022), so I want to put my foot on the gas a little more next year. It's time to get back to growing my career, improving my health, and applying that conscious effort towards my personal goals.

24 is my favorite number, so I hope it's gonna be my favorite year too. :)

[demiurgentg]

So far today I've swapped out the faucet and plug for our downstairs bathroom, booked dental surgery, knitted two more rows of my jumper and tried to come up with a million excuses to avoid editing.

Here's my current excuse: you need my plumbing adventures in detail.

On Monday, a plumber came round to replace all the emergency stop taps around the house. The house was built in the 80s and we still have the original faucets (I hate them) which I'm now even less fond of as the supply lines are the old straight copper sort, and the fitting does not accept the new supply lines. Well, when the plumber was doing his thing, one piece of pipe ended up too short to connect.

Project for yours truly! Replace the faucet!

Now, it's important to know that in my English home my kitchen sink had a faucet I didn't like, so I replaced it with something far prettier. When I got my power washer it turned out the new tap completely didn't fit to the hose. The old one, however, which I'd kept (why? Your guess is as good as mine!) did fit. So every time I power washed, I swapped out the faucets. I really was not intimidated by the prospect of doing the same here.

Yesterday, went to Lowes and bought a faucet. Got home, realized it came with a pop up plug. Nice! I don't like the lever ones anyway... The more experienced among you may realize where this is going.

Faucet unscrewed, I try to haul it out, but it's still attached to the plug. Silly me, I just learned how to clean out the traps on these, I already knew I needed to unscrew the lever. Unscrew the lever. Haul again. Curse a bit. Decide that since I don't want to keep any part of this thing it's not a problem if it bends/ breaks. Finally navigate the wonky joint through the tiny hole.

Now is when I realize that the whole of the plug fitting has to come out. The new plug didn't just sit nicely inside the existing pipework, oh no. It's a whole new job! But I rise to the occasion. I put the faucet in situ.

Then I see the label on the box that points out supply lines aren't included.

Well. Since the drive to Lowes was horrible, I went to Home Depot. Double checked the box for anything else I might need, but I have it already. Bought my supply lines, then visited my dental surgeon. Wisdom teeth have to go, and insurance only covers a third of the cost. American medical system strikes again.

On my return home I take another look at the drainage situation. It occurs to me it'll be easier and safer to fit the supply lines after the drainage is fixed, so I shove them somewhere safe and set to work unscrewing the drain fitting.

It. Does. Not. Budge.

Not even a little. The nice guys renovating my kitchen hear me swearing and come to see what the issue is. After about ten minutes of effort they get it moving. I finish unscrewing, pull the top seal out and realize that I need to get rid of the u bend to disconnect the pipe.

More swearing ensues and this time even the strong among us couldn't get it to budge. My wrenches open wide enough to get a grip, but are not long enough to lever it. So I messaged Betsey and asked to borrow her monkey wrench. Husband and I were spending Valentine's evening playing board games with her and her husband anyway, so it worked out perfectly.

This morning I went at it again with the bigger wrench. Biggest wrench, biggest effort, biggest success, right?

Wrong.

It did not budge.

When the men arrived this morning I flagged down my aide from yesterday and he called a mate over who tried, then fetched a complicated toolset and tried again. Within three minutes it moved.

I'd been twisting the fucker in the wrong direction.

*sigh*

So I took it all apart, cleaned it out a bit (might as well, while it's easy) and started assembling the new stuff. At this point I did something very unusual for me.

I read the instructions.

Super easy job to assemble and secure it all. The supply lines fought back a little, but once they were loosely on they tightened up to waterproof in no time.

I've still got the bucket under the emergency stops though, because I'm convinced one of them is leaking.

I don't think this is quite traditional, but my preferred testing for waterproofness is: connect supply lines to main line, run water through, check for leaks. Connect supply lines to faucet, run water through (very slowly) and check for leaks. Run water more strongly and double check all connections and drainage. Plug sink, full sink, empty sink, check drainage for leaks.

If your house floods, there's a leak.

It's not a perfect system, I'll give you that.

But the downstairs bathroom is usable again. And my upper body strength failed at every point.

I don't know what I did to deserve it, but the universe seems to provide me with really kind tradespeople who'll let me get on with stuff, then intervene when stuff is clearly problematic. Long may it continue.

And now I need a new reason for why I can't edit.

[bourbon-ontherocks]

🎢 A reason to fight 📽 A part of it ⭐ It's all coming back to me

Oooooh, excellent picks!! ❤️❤️❤️

A reason to fight: 🎢 - Were there any scenes you were nervous about? For audience reception or otherwise?

Bhahaha, practically each and every scene of this fic?? I mean it's probably the darkest thing I've ever written, and I was so nervous it would be too dark (initially the first chapter ended on Beth losing consciousness. I only added the narrative paragraph in italics where Rio shows up because I was too scared people would just think she died and wouldn't read the rest of the story haha!).

The fact that this fic is about very difficult and sensitive topics also made me super nervous. I was afraid of portraying these in a too artificial and stereotypical way, and I think that the scene I was the most apprehensive about was the self-harming part. It's not something I've ever experienced myself and I didn't want for it to read as completely ignorant and superficial to people who suffered from that. It also made me struggle a lot with my characterization of Beth because I was afraid it would feel too OOC.

A part of it 📽 - Were there any tv shows, books, or movies that influenced this verse, if any?

This question got me puzzled for a while because I couldn't decide whether 'verse' is short for universe or stands here for 'verse' as, like, the title of the story... Eventually, I decided on the first option because they'd have put songs in the list of possible source material otherwise. Anyway...

I mean... I know, it comes as a plot twist, but shockingly the Good Girls universe, for sure!

Love and War was also definitely influenced by fireinsideforfun's A Rational Choice. I mentioned this in the author’s note but I’m not sure I’ve ever shared the specific circumstances? So this whole fic was born because I couldn't wait for an update and decided to write my own version of it. So I wrote what would eventually become the chapter five of Love and War as a follow up to the third (I think??) chapter of A Rational Choice, and then I built the rest of my story from it and started posting (and then fireinsideforfun updated and both stories took different directions).

I can't really think of another universe that would have inspired this series although there are probably a lot of things that I more or less consciously borrowed somewhere else!

It's all coming back to me ⭐ - What’s a scene/paragraph you’re proud of?

Mhhhh... I like a lot of things about that fic!

I'm very proud of the Beth-Rio confrontation at the end of chapter 8, especially that part:

Her hand gestured between the two of them in an including motion and his face crumpled with anger. Possibly disgust too.

"Well, maybe you should have thought 'bout it before you shot me!"

And why did they always have to come back to this? She was sick of going in circles every time they tried to address something other than counting cash. Ever since he'd come back into her life they'd tiptoed around the Unspoken. Swept it under the carpet of void interactions, probably hoping that it would just disappear if they didn't try to solve it. But it was still there, hanging above their heads and trapping them in a loop where he'd play this trump card every time he'd need to escape from her. And she was tired of it. It was just unfair.

"Okay, you want to have this conversation now?" she angrily snapped. "Fine. You have the right to be angry. But you cannot say that I didn't do my job back then."

I also really really love the whole Rio POV chapter (chapter 9) and there are a lot of lines I'm proud of, like the front row metaphor  for instance:

Cause here's the thing. This whole shit has a terrible air of déjà-vu. Look, he's already been sitting in the front row when it comes to seeing where this goes when he's obsessin' like that about her. He got the best fucking seats, the ones with panoramic view and everything, on that insane and unhealthy show. And guess what? Ain't no such thing as a happy ending. Shocking, right? Nah, seriously, this shit doesn't end good. For both of 'em. But mostly him. For the record, she ain't the one with three ugly scars disrupting the smooth and creamy skin of her pretty tits.

(in which you can see that my 2.13 obsession is still ongoing 😂😂)

  Ask me emojis writing stuff!!

[your-high-lady]

Realisation

AN: Hello, I reside in the lovely country of Aotearoa, more commonly known as New Zealand. That is why the way I've described school/high school differently. It is pretty similar to the US education system but just in case, here are a few guidelines:

-Year 13 is the last year in high school before we go to university. Primary=elemantary, intermediate/senior college=middle/high school.

-I've kinda mixed up the arrangement of the timetables in the US and NZ.

-None of this should cause you to rack your brain because you don't understand what's happening.

Hope you enjoy!

Disclaimer: Everything belongs to the beautiful Sarah J Mass.

—

High School.

Ugh.

I stood three steps away from the threshold. Three steps forward and I would enter my first class in Year 13.

I didn't want to do it, but I also did. I wanted to finish high school so that I could go to college. Since I was thirteen, I'd wanted to just get it over with. Rush through primary, intermediate and then finally senior college. All so that I could fulfil my two dreams. Stanford University and a loving boyfriend. Cheesy, I know. But those were my dreams, deal with it. To study art at Stanford and to find a handsome boy there who would love and cherish me.

The second I knew I wanted to go there, I started saving up. And after five years of saving up every single note and coin I got, I'd finally done it. Yes, I would have to get a small-sized student loan and another loan from my parents(I insisted I give them back their money), but after all that money was put together, I would have enough for my first year plus tuition and then some. Once I settled in I would get a job or two and pay off the loans. It'd be perfect.

But to do those things, I had to finish high school first. So those three steps, I took.

—

Heading to my usual seat at the back, I took out my sketching book. I'd had a dream last of the sunset rising behind snow-capped mountains(I had no idea why) and wanted to get it down on paper before the picture got out my brain.

It barely took a minute before I was completely engrossed with my sketching. In fact, I got so occupied that I didn't realise how much time had passed before the bell rang. Jumping at the loud noise, I quickly shoved my sketching book into my bag and took out my maths book. But instead of taking the roll, the teacher called up a new student. "Tamlin, would you please come up here?" Miss Smith said to the golden-haired boy sitting two rows in front of me. He was quite handsome for his age. He was tan and muscled. I was willing to bet he was a jock, always playing basketball and football and all the other ball-sports. And weirdly enough, I had to resist a gasp when I saw his deep green eyes which were flecked with gold. They were quite pretty and unusual. Miss Smith flicked her red-gold over her shoulder. Everyone knew she was the school's slut-teacher. I shook my head in disgust, wondering why the heck the school still employed her. "Why don't you introduce yourself?" She asked, turning him to face the class. He looked over his shoulder at her, as if nervous, before turning to face the class. His Adam's apple bobbed as he swallowed. But he didn't look nervous. He looked as he didn't feel like standing up at the front of the class, as if he were some showpiece to stare at. Understandable. "Umm. My name is Tamlin. I come from Christchurch. My parents decided to move here because of the earthquakes. I love basketball, and was the captain back at home." Knew it.

"Oh, he's so hot. It's like I want to eat him," A sickeningly sweet voice whispered. I slowly, incredulously turned my head to the left to find Ianthe sitting in the chair beside me. If Miss Smith was the teacher-slut, Ianthe was the student-slut. Those two must have slept with at least seventy-five per cent of the school's boy population by now. Can't wait 'till I get to Stanford.

Thankfully, Miss Smith didn't take long to start the class after that.

—

Just because my school wanted to be different then the others, they decided that instead of having a new class for every subject, there will be just one group of students and they will, together, move around to each class. This meant that I had to spend the rest of the day looking at and hearing Ianthe lust over Tamlin. I was the first student out of class when the bell for morning tea rung.

—

Ring!

I smiled to myself. Finally, lunchtime. As I was packing my bag, I heard Ianthe approach Tamlin, followed by her menagerie of friends. "Hey, Tamlin." She purred, twirling her blonde hair around a manicured finger. She had the Look. Mor and I had come up with the term a year or so ago. Whenever she was trying to woo someone or not-so-subtly inviting them to bed, she got the Look. Her eyes glazed and her voice became all breathy, with her skin seeming to glow with arousal. It was disgusting. I pitied Tamlin. "Do you want to come to my pool party tonight? There'll be food, booze, girls." She practically drawled the last part. She had a finger rapidly sliding down his t-shirt covered chest. Tamlin caught before it could go beneath his pants. To my surprise, Ianthe let out the tiniest of whimpers. Tamlin had such a tight grip, her fingers had gone white. "No thank you." He said, smiling tightly, just as his eyes flickered in my direction, sensing my gaze. I blinked and quickly looked down, but not before seeing his lips twitch up in a small smile. I quickly hurried out of the classroom.

I was in third in line, in the cafeteria, when I felt a tap on my shoulder. I looked over my shoulder to find him there. He put his hand out for a handshake, "Tamlin."

My eyes widened before I got them under control. "Feyre," I breathed, taking his hand.

"Nice to meet you, Feyre." His smile was blinding. No one had ever made me this nervous before. I wished Mor or Nesta were here. Or even Elain. But Mor had taken the day off because she was sick. Nesta and Elain were down in Dunedin, studying literature and botany. So that left me. Alone. In front of the most beautiful man, I'd ever seen.

"N-nice to meet you, too." Why, why, why did I have to be such an introvert; why couldn't I be like Mor, all outgoing and loud and confident?

The smile grew, brightening up his face. My breath caught in my throat. "You needn't be so nervous. I'm not going to bite you or anything." I wish you would. His eyebrows rose. Shit, did I say that aloud? He nodded. I clamped my hand over my mouth. I really need to get my mouth under control. He chuckled, took my hand, and kissed my palm. A jolt of electricity ran through my body when his lips came in contact with my skin. It was a surprise enough that I snatched my hand from his, and spun around, probably hitting Tamlin in the face with my hair. The person in front of me was paying for his food. As the cafeteria lady came to serve me, I heard a light chuckle behind. I was unable to suppress my own small grin.

—

Ten and a half months later

Life was amazing, after that.

The week after the meeting, Tamlin sat with me in each class and during break time. He came with me to the art room when I felt like painting, or to the library when I needed to pick up or return a book. He stayed by my side the whole time.

And during all this, I got glares from Ianthe. The whole time, I could feel her rage coming off her in waves. Big, giant tidal waves.

Multiple times, she tried to take Tamlin away. But every time she asked, he turned her down, saying that he would rather spend time with me. I laughed every time, partly because of the expressions that would cross her face, but more because of Tamlin. Every time he told Ianthe no, he would add a word at the end. For example, "No Ianthe, I would rather spend time with the beautiful Feyre." "No thank you, I much rather appreciate the company of pretty Feyre, here." For the first few times, I blushed, looking away. But then it got funny, and I kinda wanted Ianthe to hit on him if only to hear what word he would use.

It was magic. I'd never felt like this. But I'd read about it. This is what I wanted. It was one of my dreams: a beautiful boy who would love and cherish me.

One week after that, he asked me out.

Two and a half weeks after that, he asked me to be his girlfriend.

One week after that, Ianthe stopped chasing Tamlin and upped the level of her death stares that she was still giving me. She tried to spread rumours about me, but every time they got out of hand, Tamlin shut them down. Either with his bold voice or hard fists.

Eight and a half months after that, we had sex. Were it for him, we would've done it long ago, but I wanted to wait. It was my first time. I couldn't help it; I was nervous. But I couldn't have asked for anything better than what he gave me. It was heavenly. For the first time, I felt like a real teenager, doing things that were normal at my age. Parties, drinking, sex. Of course, the only person I actually had sex with was Tamlin, and I was careful to stay away from the bad stuff like smoking and drugs, despite Tamlin pushing me towards those things. Mum would kill me if I ever did that stuff. Though it did surprise me a bit that Tamlin was into this stuff, what with him being a basketball player and all.

But that's not the point. The point is that I achieved one of my dreams. Yeah, it didn't go exactly as I had planned it, but I'd always believed everything happened for a reason. As did meeting Tamlin.

AN: Please review, it really helps me with motivation. Hope you enjoyed this chapter. The next chapter is going to be a lot more moving, trust me. Thanks for reading.You may find it surprising(but that not much) where I plan to take this story. Just know that ship Feysand and that this chapter is necessary for the story.

Rowaelin fanfiction:

[bettsfic]

I've just reread "Riptide". It's so good and heartbreaking ;-; are you still planning on writing that Kylux sequel or have you changed your mind? :) have a lovely evening!

i am going to be completely honest with you. i have started this fic over and over again. i don’t know what my hangup is. it’s all in my head. like. all of it. but i just can’t write it down.

here’s the most recent iteration:

The reality of the situation is this: Ben has just undergone a massive breakup with a girl named Rey. He cries all the time now. He lazes about watching action movies back to back even though the glare from the window obscures the screen. He writes lovelorn poetry sometimes on a goddamn typewriter whose keys clack loudly enough to rattle the house, and leaves the tattered shreds of it on the floor beside the trash can. A nest of potato chip bags, Oreos, empty beer cans, and tiny hot sauce bottles make a half-circle around his permanent perch on the couch. He smells. He’s annoying. He’s undisciplined. He’s crass and oblivious and pedantic and cruel and ignorant.

And Hux has been in love with him since they were fourteen years old.

Hux finds Ben’s hulking form curled onto a barstool in the kitchen, tiny iPhone in his massive paw, shoveling Honey Nut Cheerios into his mouth. He’s wearing a rumpled t-shirt and boxer shorts and his pores emanate whatever booze he consumed last night, likely enough to kill most of the population but just enough to put him to sleep.

Hux lumbers past, three-fourths still dozing, and says, “You’re not on the couch.”

This apparently does not warrant a reply. Hux fills the kettle with water, puts it on the stove, and flips the burner on. Ben did the dishes, it looks like--the counter is spotless except for the open box of cereal hiding Hux’s view of whatever Ben is doing on his phone.

It’s been a little over a month since Ben took up residence on Hux’s couch. And it’s not as if his presence is entirely unwelcome; Ben does have some redeeming qualities. He puts Hux’s dirty laundry in with his own and then folds it and puts it away. He pays for all the rented movies they watch with his mother’s emergency credit card (“She’s not going to notice three and four dollar charges,” he says, for the twelfth night in a row). He stays up late with Hux after the movie is over and they talk about it and whatever else until he has one too many beers and starts crying about Rey again, and Hux puts his grandmother’s afghan over him and goes to bed. Some nights after dinner, they sit on the porch and watch the fireflies bumble past while the sun sets, not saying anything at all. Ben cooks decently healthy meals compared to Hux’s norm of take-out, makes playlists for Hux on Spotify to introduce him to new music, and asks questions about, or happily listens to, Hux rant about his job. Ben is the only person alive that Hux knows--with every atom in his pitiful body--loves him.

Ben picks up the bowl and slurps the dredges of his milk. Hux leans against the counter waiting for the kettle to boil, arms over his chest, eying him.

“You look different,” Hux says.

Ben finally looks up at him over the cereal box. “How?”

“I don’t know. Something’s different about you.” Hux reaches over and plucks the cereal box out of the way. Ben slips his phone under the table, still doing something on it with one thumb, swiping one direction and occasionally the other.

“What are you doing?” Hux asks.

“Nothing,” Ben mutters.

“You’re never on your phone. You let it die between the couch cushions most days and I have to plug it in for you.”

“It’s nothing.”

Hux lunges forward and tries to grab the phone. A wrestling match ensues where Ben falls off the barstool onto the ground, Hux manages to straddle his stomach, all four hands are on the phone (which does not have a case because Ben is a fucking savage), and there’s maybe a bit of biting extremities involved. Eventually Ben rolls Hux to his back, and they’ve made their way to some dusty corner of the kitchen where Hux can feel cobwebs in his hair, but Ben’s hips are crushed between Hux’s legs (“Stop it, stop it, just give me my fucking--” “Let me see it, I just want to--”), and Hux realizes:

This is a very bad idea.

Ben seems to come to his own realization and freezes. For one glistening moment, a slat of light shines through the kitchen window into a simulacrum of glass, dusty specs dancing between them, and Ben’s hair is falling out of its ponytail around his face, and their eyes are locked, limbs tangled, wide-eyed and raw.

Then Ben’s face clouds over (or reddens?) and he lets go of the phone.

Victory. Hux presses the unlock button (no password, the idiot) and finds--

“Tinder?” Hux asks. “You’re on Tinder now?”

Ben, settled on his haunches, grabs the phone away from Hux again, who lets him have it. “I just. I need--something. I don’t know. I can’t handle this, okay. This--this emptiness.”

Ben. Ben Organa. Benjamin Lucas Organa. Ben, whose mother forces the most up-to-date iPhones into his hands for Christmas every year, who made a Facebook in 2013 at the insistence of his family and never uses it, who refuses to read eBooks because “paper books are important, Hux,” who only buys and listens to vinyl records except when fiddling with Hux’s Spotify account, who pluralizes “Twitters.” This is the man Hux sees before him, probably swiping right on girls who claim to be laid-back, adventurous, love to travel! Just looking for some fun!! Last pic is my dog!!!

Hux is about to say something when the kettle goes from a whistle to a scream. He climbs to standing, pajamas in twisted disarray, something crumbly falling down the back of his neck, and goes to the stove to take the kettle off the burner.

Once the kettle falls silent, Hux says, “You’re not going to find anyone on there.”

He takes a coffee cup down from the cupboard. Halfway to the counter, he notices Ben hasn’t replied. When he closes the cabinet door, he sees Ben scratching the back of his neck.

“You already have a date, don’t you,” Hux says.

Ben nods. The phone is on the table. It lights up but doesn’t make a sound. Ben picks it up and checks the message.

“What are you expecting, Ben? You’re going to bring her back here to Netflix and chill on my couch?”

Ben types a reply and then says, “No, we’re just grabbing a beer.”

“But--but what if she’s a psychopath? What if she’s luring you to her apartment where some dude twice your size is waiting with an axe to murder you and take your wallet? If you get kidnapped, I’m not paying your ransom. I’d have to take out another mortgage on the house. I’d--”

“And you think I’m obsolete? Jesus, Hux, welcome to the future, where people use the most convenient and readily available technology to find sexual gratification.”

Hux’s lips purse as he puts the filter in the pour-over lid and measures out a tablespoon of coffee.

“Just because you haven’t gotten laid in a thousand years doesn’t mean I have to restrict myself to the same fate,” Ben says.

“I’m not interested in one-night stands,” Hux says. He lifts the kettle and pours the steaming water over the grounds. “I’m looking for a connection, a spark. I’m looking for…” someone better for me than you, he thinks. And he’s not sure that’s possible.

The reality of the situation is this: Benjamin Lucas Organa is a heterosexual who has been in a long-term relationship for nearly as long as Hux has known him. In this time, Hux has dated mostly men but also the occasional woman or non-gender-conforming individual. He’s been on more double dates with Ben on Rey than he cares to count, and eventually in the last few years, dwindled into just hanging out with the two of them as what he perceived to be the third wheel at first, but was in actuality something like being in the presence of a relationship so codependent it was as if Ben and Rey were just two halves of one whole person. Hux never consciously took sides between them, but seeing as how Rey ran off to Europe for a while and Ben ended up on his couch, his loyalties now lie with Ben.

He’s been in love with Ben since the beginning--this beautiful ethereal boy with an uncanny sense of whimsy, an innocent obliviousness, endless love for the most mundane of things, it’s the way he sees the world, Hux thinks, years later, like everything is art--since the three of them were freshmen in homeroom together, and Hux has put up a long-suffering struggle against the feeling, the falling, the this is love, this is love, this is love. Only in the last few years has he given up that struggle, after relationship upon failed relationship where Hux expected his partners to live up to his adoration of his best friend yet fell miles short, and it just never seemed worth it to continue pursuing such a lost cause.

So he’s resigned himself, not to getting over Ben, but getting over the idea of romantic partnership. Curbing his want, like eating less overall so you don’t need to consume as much to feel full. He doesn’t need Ben’s heart, he thinks. He should be grateful enough to have him in his life at all, in any form that takes.

“Looking for what?” Ben asks. His thumb is poised over his phone, paused. Hux can see the glaring white smile of a blonde girl wearing a baseball cap and holding a pomeranian. Left? Right? Outside of Rey, Hux realizes he has no idea what Ben likes.

“I wish I knew.”