#but now one of them is an entire full scene with a lot of stuff going on

[damnikindadontcare]

A comprehensive list as to why I think Carmy x Claire shouldn’t be together:

It took Carmy a good 10 seconds to remember Claire’s name at the store

Carmy originally gave her a fake number, so she hunted down Fak to get his real one

Claire had to make him repeat his real number to her even though he looked like he was fighting for his life to not hang up the phone

Their dates weren’t dates, they we’re running errands and not the sweet “I love doing mundane stuff with you kind” the “my cars not working so I need a ride kind”

When they attended the house party Carmy was clearly uncomfortable and quite literally pretended to be someone else the entire time (Logan)

Mikey and Richie pressuring Carmy about Claire in fishes even though he clearly just wants them stop and let it go

THE PANIC ATTACK SCENE, Carmy trying to his damndest to picture Claire to help himself calm down but it’s not working and the moment he pictures Syd he can breathe again

They had brief crush on each other in high school and nothing more, they were never close friends if anything Mikey and Richie seemed closer to Claire than Carmy ever was. Their conversation in the car backs this up because Claire talks about knowing and thinking Mikey was cool, but not a lot about Carmy

Every time Carmy was asked if Claire is his girlfriend he couldn’t answer, he even has to ask Fak if Claire is his girlfriend

Not to make this about SydCarmy but to make this about SydCarmy he does all these intimate things with Syd (i.e. the table scene, the monogrammed jacket, you deserve my full focus, opening an entire restaurant with her) but he can’t even bring himself to call Claire his girlfriend

There was no point where Carmy showed any interest at starting or being in a relationship with Claire it was all forced by someone else (i.e. Giving Claire a fake number, Fak giving Claire his real number, Richie and Mikey pressuring him in fishes, Richie and Fak pressuring him even now, only calling Claire his gf after someone told him that’s what she’s supposed to be, hanging out with her only when he runs errands and needs a ride, having to be reminded to invite her to family and friends night)

Their entire relationship felt like an obligation (specifically to Mikey) from Carmy’s part, he never pursued it and never put as much work into it as Claire did

The obvious indications that Claire represents Carmy’s past while Syd represents his future

Claire telling Carmy she loves him for the first time via voicemail after only dating for a few weeks

Carmy unintentionally breaking up with Claire whilst locked in a fridge

[all-pacas]

I finished my Rome book and have now begun one about Pompeii. I’m 65 pages in and I already love it: yes, it covers the volcano, but most of the book is about “this is what the town and daily life of it would have been like, actually.” Fascinating stuff. Things I’ve learned so far:

- The streets in Pompeii have sidewalks sometimes a meter higher than the road, with stepping stones to hop across as “crosswalks.” I’d seen some photos before. The book points out that, duh, Pompeii had no underground drainage, was built on a fairly steep incline, and the roads were more or less drainage systems and water channels in the rain.

- Unlike today, where “dining out” is expensive and considered wasteful on a budget, most people in Pompeii straight up didn’t have kitchens. You had to eat out if you were poor; only the wealthy could afford to eat at home.

- Most importantly, and I can’t believe in all the pop culture of Pompeii this had never clicked for me: Pompeii had a population between 6-35,000 people. Perhaps 2,000 died in the volcano. Contemporary sources talk about the bay being full of fleeing ships. Most people got the hell out when the eruption started. The number who died are still a lot, and it’s still gruesome and morbid, but it’s not “an entire town and everyone in it.” This also makes it difficult for archeologists, apparently (and logically): those who remained weren’t acting “normally,” they were sheltering or fleeing a volcano. One famous example is a wealthy woman covered in jewelry found in the bedroom in the glaridator barracks. Scandal! She must have been having an affair and had it immortalized in ash! The book points out that 17 other people and several dogs were also crowded in that one small room: far more likely, they were all trying to shelter together. Another example: Houses are weirdly devoid of furniture, and archeologists find objects in odd places. (Gardening supplies in a formal dining room, for example.) But then you remember that there were several hours of people evacuating, packing their belongings, loading up carts and getting out… maybe the gardening supplies were brought to the dining room to be packed and abandoned, instead of some deeper esoteric meaning. The book argues that this all makes it much harder to get an accurate read on normal life in a Roman town, because while Pompeii is a brilliant snapshot, it’s actually a snapshot of a town undergoing major evacuation and disaster, not an average day.

- Oh, another great one. Outside of a random laundry place in Pompeii, someone painted a mural with two scenes. One of them referenced Virgil’s Aeneid. Underneath that scene, someone graffiti’d a reference to a famous line from that play, except tweaked it to be about laundry. This is really cool, the book points out, because it implies that a) literacy and education was high enough that one could paint a reference and have it recognized, and b) that someone else could recognize it and make a dumb play on words about it and c) the whole thing, again, means that there’s a certain amount of literacy and familiarity with “Roman pop culture” even among fairly normal people at the time.

[smusherina]

yard work - chapter 14 (regina george x reader)

fandom: Mean Girls (all media)

pairing: Regina George x OFC/Reader

summary: You'd been in the same class as Regina George since kindergarten. You'd lived on the same street even longer. Once upon a time, when life was sandbox disputes and who got the swing first arguments, you'd even been friends. Now, in junior year of high school, you doubted she even remembered you. The same couldn't be said about you. You definitely remembered her.

chapter 1 / chapter 2 / chapter 3 / chapter 4 / chapter 5 / chapter 6 / chapter 7 / chapter 8 / chapter 9 / chapter 10 / chapter 11 / chapter 12 / chapter 13 / chapter 15

You told Mrs George (or was it Ms George now? Too soon?) that you'd drive yourself to the school. Under no circumstance did you want to sit in close quarters to Regina. Besides, you knew she'd have to be there significantly earlier because she was performing. If the thought of being near Regina made you uncomfortable, that of being in that building made your skin crawl.

Why you were even bothering to go was beyond you. You'd been made into a laughing stock, a subject for people to talk about and twist around for the rest of the break. There was no PR response you could concoct to fix this, because for one, there was no time, and secondly nobody would want to hear it.

Maybe this wouldn't ruin your entire fucking life. Maybe you'd get over it eventually. Maybe it would all turn out fine. But it didn't feel like that. You could understand Regina more now, could see more clearly what she'd been talking about when she went on that rant.

Thinking all your problems would dissolve once you were old enough was stupid. That could only be applied to something vain, like pimples and pit stains and body odour. But issues like Regina's, utter self-hatred weaponized against society and everybody around her, and yours, chronic doormat syndrome with a side of people pleaser, could not just resolve. One could not pray the gay away, could not sweep it all under the rug.

You looked at the chicken sandwich in your hand. Mrs George had made some for lunch earlier and you'd swung by after the grocery trip to get you one. Then, she'd driven back to yours, helped you pack it all away, and made a weekly meal plan with you while you ate. It'd been nice. And the chicken sandwich was divine.

Your tummy was already full, but you didn't want to stop eating. You almost never got to really stuff yourself. The feeling of it was luxurious, though painful.

You put off going for as long as you could. You left at just the last minute, cutting it dangerously close. Didn't bother changing your clothes or anything. A hoodie and jeans, your usual jacket and scarf. By the time you arrived on the scene, the parking lot was pretty much deserted. You hustled to the gym where the thing was set up and easily found Mrs George and Kylie.

"C'mon, it's- it's- it's almost starting!" Kylie hissed at you, patting the seat next to her.

"Okay okay!" You whisper shouted back, mustering a little excitement for the little girl's sake.

Most of the performances were utterly dull. To be fair, the talent show was also an opportunity to get extra credit for some classes. Several people from your Spanish class took the stage. There was poetry and a couple songs, all mediocre at best. A pair performed a salsa number, which was surprising on two accounts. One, they were both dudes and two, they were good.

After Damien's dramatic rendition of Christina Aguilera's Beautiful, it was time for The Plastics to take the stage. Karen, Gretchen, and Cady were slowly revealed by the curtain. Cady stood front and centre, Gretchen to her left and Karen to the right.

Unlike many of the other dance performances of the night, the highlight was certainly not the choreography. The wow factor was hinged on the simple fact that it was them, specifically these girls, in latex, borderline slutty Santa costumes doing a provocative dance. The audience was not thrilled, the adults' reactions ranging from mildly uncomfortable to downright scandalized, while the other high schoolers looked on in either lust or disappointment that the act was missing the thing that had made it interesting in the first place.

Regina George had been the main attraction. Without her, without her effortless stage presence making the dance seem interesting, it was actually pretty embarrassing.

You had to look away when they started doing stunts. Karen went to the floor on all fours crab walk style, while Gretchen positioned herself behind her, and Cady geared up to- you couldn't watch. Suddenly, the music cut out and a heavy thump accompanied by someone's breath wooshing out of their lungs echoed through the gymnasium.

Kylie covered her mouth in a valiant effort not to laugh. You bumped your shoulder into hers. She bumped back. Mrs George had gasped and almost surged out of her seat. A beat of silence. Then, like water rippling, laughter began to bubble out of people.

You still couldn't watch. You could hear heels clicking on stage, groaning, and some frantic whispering. Kylie had tears in her eyes and her whole body was shaking.

"What's happening?" You whispered to her.

"Cady... She... Belly flopped the stage." She managed to get out before bursting into giggles.

"What? Is she, like, okay?"

"She's getting up. The principle's getting on stage." Kylie reported while you kept your eyes firmly on your lap. "He's gonna say something, oh, Gretchen's taking the mic-"

You had to look up when you heard your full name being spoken into the microphone, but regretted it as soon as Gretchen finished the sentence:

"-is a lesbian!" Quiet. Again.

You looked down so fast your neck cracked. Through the tinnitus in your ears, you could vaguely hear the principal admonishing Gretchen, the murmurs in the hall, their heels clicking off stage.

Why was Gretchen of all people announcing your sexuality at the talent show? What did she have to do with any of this? Maybe Regina had put her up to it. It didn't seem planned, though. You thought that Regina and Gretchen weren't talking.

"What's a lesbian?" Kylie asked you, all innocence and wide eyes.

"Kylie, don't ask that, it's not appropriate." Mrs George said.

"Why? Is it a bad word?" She turned to her mother. You took deep breaths and clenched your fists. Unclench. Clench. Everything was going to be fine.

"No, but it's not good to accuse somebody like that." Mrs George tried to explain gently, but you could tell she was out of her depth.

"But what does it mean?"

"Kylie, I said don't-"

"It means a girl that likes girls." You cut in.

"Huh... So like how boys like girls, but a girl likes a girl?"

"Yeah."

"Oh. Okay."

You would've paid so much money for it to be that simple. Why you couldn't be afforded the benefit of the doubt that you weren't a pervert, riddled with disease, and out to get people? Why was it so unbelievable that you didn't want to change the world, you just wanted to get married someday? Why did kissing girls on the mouth make you a predator?

You suspected there were no real answers to those questions. Fear. Repression. The patriarchy. Religion. The wage gap. Whatever.

The show went on. You felt numb. Realistically, what could you even do? Stand up and shout that it wasn't true? That would only serve to put a name to a face. The next talents came and performed their mediocrity to the mildly interested crowd. There was a pretty good sleight-of-hand magician. Somebody had trained their cat to do tricks.

Eventually, it was Regina's turn to take the stage. You couldn't help but perk up when they announced her. Mrs George was out of her seat immediately, kneeling on the pathway to the stage with a video camera poised to film her daughter.

The curtains parted. She stood in the centre of the stage, mic stand in front of her. She smiled a little, eyes on her mom presumably.

Her hair was done in soft waves, framing her face so beautifully. Natural makeup kept light, a compromise between the bare face that you liked and the full beat she was into. She was wearing an old white tee shirt, the logo so faded you could barely make it out. That had been your shirt, you realized as you narrowed your eyes. You'd gotten it from summer camp, one that Regina hadn't been able to come with you to. After you came back she'd confiscated all the stuff you'd gotten there. Tee shirts, crafts projects, a whittled duck, braided cord. You'd always assumed she had thrown it all in the trash. On her wrist was a braided leather cord and a wood bead friendship bracelet. She had on Lee jeans that hugged her hips and thighs exquisitely. Those had been her mom's.

In her hands was the photo album. Everybody could read the front, Reggie & Jorts.

"Notice me... Take my hand..." She crooned into the mic as the soft melody of Briney Spears' Everytime began to play.

"Why are we strangers when our love is strong? Why carry on without me?"

You felt like you couldn't breathe.

"And every time I try to fly I fall without my wings," Her eyes scanned the crowd. You wondered if she was looking for you. "I feel so small, I guess I need you, baby,"

She found you. Your eyes met, hers clear and blue and somehow so sad, even as she glittered up on stage. Even with everybody's eyes on her, she was looking at you.

"And every time I see you in my dreams, I see your face," She sang so prettily, every note like a gentle caress, a soothing balm to your ears. You did so love to hear her sing.

"It's haunting me. I guess I need you, baby," Her eyes closed, like she couldn't focus on two things at once; looking at you and singing. She swayed gently with the rhythm, feeling the soft instrumental in her feet. Sneakers. Simple, white sneakers.

Her eyes opened again with the next lyrics. You tried not to overthink it, tried not to imagine things that weren't there, but maybe there was a glassiness to her eyes that hadn't been there before.

"I make-believe, that you are here. It's the only way that I see clear. What have I done? You seem to move on easy."

You swallowed, eyes closing. You weren't sure what to think. Was this her way of apologizing? Was she trying to make up for what'd been said? Hadn't she just earlier today made your life living hell?

You leaned your elbows onto your knees and cradled your face in your hands. What were you supposed to do now? She was singing to you. This was the ultimate show of sincerity, of vulnerability, but what were you meant to do with it all in your hands? Your chest tightened and your breaths shortened.

The song continued, you knew the lyrics by heart, but only once she sang the next part did you open your eyes again.

"I may have made it rain, please forgive me. My weakness caused you pain, and this song's my sorry,"

You understood. Cowardly as it may have been, Regina was apologizing to you. Though the references were obscure enough that most, if not all, people would not know who she was singing to, it was quite clear this was a song for somebody.

You rubbed at your throat. It felt constricted, like something was tightening around it.

You couldn't shake the feeling that it was too late. As much as you would've liked to weep in gratitude, be swept in the relief that she was taking you back, irreversible things had happened. None of this made sense. If she hadn't pulled the stunt today then who had? Had she told somebody? Had Janis told?

Regardless, you were an outcast. If not, then ridiculed. You were scared. You had become a target. You didn't think anybody at Northshore was capable of the atrocities you saw reported on the news, but nobody who'd become a victim did until it was too late.

As it was, it didn't matter whether or not you forgave Regina. It didn't matter if she forgave you.

"I guess I need you, baby," As the last line of the song carried throughout the gymnasium, and after the split second of stunned silence before people began cheering and clapping, you got up and left.

You'd smoke a cigarette and get out of here once and for all. Then, you'd drive home and call dad. You'd tell him everything, tell him you needed to switch schools and that you were gay and that you'd made a real mess of things.

You'd take what was given, reap what'd been sown, and forget all about this goddamned town.

Forget all about Regina George.

Notes: Took a bit longer with this one. Sorry for the suspense! Here, have some more unresolved stuff! Also, I fucking love that song by Britney Spears. I've known Regina was gonna sing it for J since pretty much the beginning and finally, she did.

Taglist will be posted separately. If you want to be added to the list, please comment on that post! Thank you!

[just-j-really]

Another Dreamling fic I'm probably not going to write: amnesia AU, but played for comedy/fluff. Hob forgets everything from the night he met Dream onward because of some sort of curse. Dream decides to look after him until the curse wears off, because he is Being a Good Friend.

So from Hob's perspective, a Mysterious Hot Guy told him he'd see him in 100 years time and then he woke up in the future, with the Mysterious Hot Guy refusing to let him out of his sight.

Hob is under the impression he's being kidnapped/seduced by some fey creature, and "show him the delights the future has to offer" is just how this guy flirts.

Hob is not opposed.

Meanwhile Dream is being dragged along on a whirlwind tour of the year 2023 by a Manic Pixie Dream Medieval Peasant who wants to see absolutely everything there is to see in the future right now immediately.

(I am a little bit thinking of the festival dance scene in Tangled, with Hob as Rapunzel. Only instead of Festival Activities he is enthusiastically dragging Dream around to the various Sights of modern London.)

The Sights in Question are this bizarre mix of 'things a modern person would consider an attraction in modern London' and 'entirely banal parts of modern London' and Hob is having the time of his life. The future has stores full of more food than he's seen??? And types of food he's never seen??? And spices and off-season fruit just sitting there??? And fabric is so soft now???? And medication and pest control are just??? Available??? Life is so rich!!!!

(And on the other hand like. This man was excited about playing cards. Someone please show him an arcade. He is forcing Dream to play every multiplayer game available. Especially the driving ones. Neither of them knows how to drive.)

(Dream takes him to a museum and he's staring at a display from the 14-1500s marveling at how futuristic the technology is. He's actually more excited about that stuff than he is about the whole 'computers' thing because it's close enough for him to have some point of reference.)

(Also sidebar from the comedy- Maybe Dream shows Hob the ruins of the White Horse. Hob stares at the building for a long time, then starts crying. Not outright sobs, just tears steadily slipping down his face like he's not really aware of them. Dream panics and tries to comfort him, mentally kicking himself for showing Hob the one connection to the life he knows in ruins. But Hob, laughing now, explains that this was the first time it really hit him? That he's actually 600 years in the future, not in some fairyland Dream created. And that means that all the disease and starvation and war and world-ending horror he was staring down 600-odd years ago didn't. He was going to grit his teeth and live no matter what but the fact that the world made it here along with him? That humanity's still here? And managed to create antibiotics and planes and chimneys in the meantime? That's a goddamn miracle.)

And Dream is getting dragged along with Hob, at first reluctantly, but slowly falling for Hob's enthusiasm throughout the day/week/whatever. And this version of Hob is like. Outright flirting with him. He's outright flirting with a lot of people, fair, but Dream especially. And of course Dream's having a feeling about it, because of course the version of Hob who doesn't actually know him, doesn't know how cruel he was over the centuries, is the one who'd be interested in him.

The Manic Pixie Dream Medieval Peasant Tour of London ends up taking on a decidedly romantic note, after a few days. And one night, after an evening in a restaurant that Dream knows is one of Hob's favorites, where everyone around them was silently willing them to get a room because the tension between two people who are very carefully sitting on opposite sides of the table and not actually touching, just talking to each other, was far too palpable, Hob caves, and drags Dream into a kiss the second they get back to his flat.

It's a good kiss, and Dream lets himself enjoy it for a moment, because he'll never get to kiss Hob again so at least he can have the memory of this one. Then he gently breaks the kiss and tells Hob, equally gently, that they can't. That Hob doesn't remember the majority of their relationship, how cruel Dream has been to him. That his present self doesn't feel the same way.

And then Hob, who's been staring starry-eyed at Dream this whole conversation, says "I do, though."

And Dream is like "Yes I know you like me now with but the you with your memory intact does not."

And Hob's like "No, I do. I got my memory back right when I kissed you."

And there is, unfortunately, more confusion (Hob explaining that yes he has always liked Dream it's just that 600 years have made him minutely less reckless and also the current him remembers that they are friends and doesn't want to ruin that. But no, Dream is wrong on all counts, he remembers every moment of their friendship and he does like Dream the same way and holy shit??? There is a 'same way'???? Dream wanted to keep kissing him????)

And then they clear all that up and live happily ever after.

(Yes it was a True Love's Kiss thing)

[teeny-tiny-revenge]

It's home cinema manufacturing time! 🏴‍☠️ Gonna put my pirate show on my shelf! (I'm doing an Arts and Crafts Project and I'm making it everyone's problem.)

After seeing how much they cost, I abandoned the idea of getting a Blu-ray writer for now. For the time being, good old DVDs is what it's going to be! My TV is old and not very big, so DVD resolution is gonna be fine.

It's been ages since I last burned a DVD. For the full experience, I'm gonna create nice menus and pretty sleeves for the boxes. Graphic design is my passion! Um.

Well. First needed to find a program to do stuff with. I'm a Linux guy, so I'm using Devede. (Which is free, btw. In case someone else wants to do a low cost spot of putting pirate show on the shelf.)

DVDs fit a maximum of 120 minutes of video. So, four episodes, I thought. But after a quick attempt, the program refused to do more than three (maybe because of the menu also taking up space, and four episodes cutting pretty close to the 120 min mark?). Anyway, three episodes per disc it is. It's a pretty nice runtime for watching the entire disc, IMO. An hour and a half, and then you can return to reality to realise you should probably eat something, or go to bed because it's midnight.

OFMD with its current two seasons has a total of eighteen episodes, which is divisible by three. You get the following setup:

Disc 1: Pilot, A Damned Man, The Gentleman Pirate - That's pretty good, Stede's introduction to piracy all on one disc!

Disc 2: Discomfort in a Married State, The Best Revenge is Dressing Well, The Art of Fuckery - All bangers. Great to watch together, our boys meet and shenanigans happen!

Disc 3: This is Happening, We Gull Way Back, Act of Grace - Many romantic moments, lots of great scenes, shit hits the fan at the end there. Alright!

Disc 4: Wherever you go, there you are, Impossible Birds, Red Flags - ... Pain and angst! What have I done!?! The disc of horrors. Gotta make sure to have tissues at hand when I watch this. But hey, it also has messy bun Ed! Small mercies.

Disc 5: The Innkeeper, Fun and Games, The Curse of the Seafaring Life. - Another disc with all winners. I love all these episodes so much! (You can watch this disc to recover from the trauma of the previous one!) But seriously, this one slaps.

Disc 6: Calypso's Birthday, Man on Fire, Mermen - Great combination again. Season finale! Love and excitement!

... Honestly, except for the psychological damage of putting all the most painful episodes together, this is coming out pretty cool. Says a lot about how good the show is. I actually really love all the episodes (yes even the painful angsty episodes of massive depression). Thinking about this little project really reminded me how much I love this entire show.

So, we got a tracklist, now menus, then we can burn this stuff!

I did the menu backgrounds in GIMP. Realised I have a big folder full of screenshots I took myself, screenshots someone else took and posted on Tumblr, official promo pics for the show, and I have no idea anymore where most of them are from, because I named the files according to what's on them. Which is useful for when you want to find pics (Need a picture of cursed suit Stede? I have files named that, easy peasy!), but not so great if you wanted to give credit to whoever took a given pic you used. (It's probably @sherlockig or @ofmd-ann or @blakbonnet. Please feel credited, your beautiful screens and gifs brighten my day, and some of them are now probably part of my DVD menus. Shrunk down and cropped, but, yeah.)

I originally wanted to structure my menus as having the title of an episode, then some pics from it, then the next episode, then pics from that, and so forth, but I couldn't convince the program to give me the necessary padding between the menu items, so I ended up just putting the episode images below the menu. Still like it.

Anyway, DVD menus can also play sound! Behold a crappy video of my beautiful creation (provided entirely for sound):

It plays Gnossienne N°5!

More crappy pics of my other disc menus:

Gonna make them some nice sleeves next. Some day. Gotta make sure they all work properly first. So. I'll be on my sofa, watching my DVDs. With menus! (Edit: here are!)

[angstics]

As our chat comes to a close, I ask one last question: What’s up with all the homoeroticism in My Chem’s live show when, most nights, mixed in with the scene kids, they’re playing to a bunch of dudebros? After cracking up, Gerard answers honestly and passionately. “That’s the idea; that it’s an audience full of dudes. And if we can make them understand us, I think it will make them more open-minded people. And I think the most fulfilling thing about this tour has been that single thing. Like we love playing for our kids, but to play for a guy with no shirt on and a backwards baseball hat who would probably beat the crap outta me…but maybe not, cause that’s generalizing and I don’t want to generalize, but if you make that person say ‘You know what? I don’t know if this dude is gay or straight, and I actually don’t care because these guys are just going for it, and I could accept this guy, and I could accept all these guys on stage’, then that’s a great thing. And that’s actually why we’ve done a lot of the homoerotic stuff that we’ve done on stage throughout the years, cause it started in the basements, it started cause of a similar type of people coming to those shows. And it’s all about changing that perception, you know, and pushing the envelope in that regard. Yeah, there’re a lot of radical ideas out there and up on that stage and I think that’s why it’s really fulfilling, you know?” As we talk a bit more about it, I mention the infamous kiss between him and guitarist Frank Iero. “You know, it’s not a real common thing, we’ve been doing that kind of thing…not much…I seriously think it’s happened 5 times, in our entire…” “But now it’s been Youtubed,” I cut in. “Yeah,” says Way sheepishly, “Now they’ve made it a big deal. It’s not the kind of thing that was done for publicity. It’s done for the same reason that you would put on a slightly sexy or homoerotic show, like you’re trying to push that type of notion. And actually the main idea behind it is that if it makes people angry who just can’t accept that kind of thing, then that’s great. That’s actually what you want to do. But sometimes, honestly, what it is, is that you get caught up in a moment, and you’re thinking to yourself ‘What is the one thing right now that’ll just really aggravate every homophobe in the audience?’ and you just get caught in this moment, you just do it. Sometimes there’s not even that much thought behind it, it’s just like ‘I’m just gonna put my hand down this guy’s shirt’ and it’s more for me, it gets me really amped.”

(2008)

[akiizayoi4869]

Azula In The Spirit Temple

So, I read the comic yesterday. And while I was confused about it at first, like I'm sure many people were, talking with some friends about it made me come to a conclusion. This comic was a reset button. That's why we didn't get anything new about Azula, and why what we actually did get was something that every Azula fan has known and has been saying for years now about her character. But this comic wasn't just for us. It was for the entire fandom as a whole. And as we all know, much of the fandom doesn't share our thoughts when it comes to her.

I'm not going to talk about the beginning of the comic since that part didn't interest me at all. What I want to talk about is when Azula is inside of the temple. A lot of interesting stuff happens there.

The first part being this. We see what happened when Azula firebended for the first time. We see how Ursa is afraid for Azula and not of her, because she knows what this means for Azula going forward. To Azula, however, she can't tell if Ursa was afraid for her or of her thanks to the fact that the relationship between them was never really good. Also, I need to make one thing clear before I move on: that turtle duck isn't real, it's a toy. I know that people are going to use and say that it proves that Azula is a psycho, but please use your brains for a minute. If it was actually real, do you really think the damn thing would be still? It would have been writhing around in pain and screeching to the high heavens. Not to mention that Ursa's reaction would have been very different. Heck, the entire scene would have played out differently.

Next up we have this part:

After so many years, the writers finally made what every Azula fan has been saying for years canon: that Azula was indeed abused by Ozai, Ursa's neglect hurt her deeply, and that both of these things played no small part in how she eventually turned out. We see Azula coming to terms with the fact that Ozai abused her, and that Ursa failed to protect her from him because she was so focused on Zuko that the way Ozai was with Azula seemed almost natural to Ursa. It didn't register that it was full on abuse. What really interested me about this scene was how Azula says that if Ursa has just allowed Zuko to be killed, she would have been able to stay and protect her. Is this fucked up? Yes. But it makes sense that Azula would think like that. In her pov, everyone left her for Zuko. Everyone wanted to protect him, but nobody felt like she needed protection too.

We get some scenes with Mai, Ty Lee, and Zuko as well:

These scenes show us how Azula feels about the betrayal at the Boiling Rock, as well as how she viewed her friendship with Mai and Ty Lee overall. It also shows us the harsh truths that Azula has internalized about herself: that her treatment of them wasn't ok, and that her overall attitude towards others in general is a problem. Ty Lee sort of says that to Azula, albeit in a kind way, which is reminiscent of how Ty Lee actually is. She tells Azula what she wants to hear. Mai, though? She straight up tells Azula the truth, very bluntly at that. Holds no punches at all. Mai tells Azula what she needs to hear, whether she likes it or not. Then the spirit takes the form of Zuko, who proceeds to tell her that everything that ever happened to Azula is her fault, and that nobody is responsible for her but herself. At first, this came across as victim blaming to me by the writers, which made me mad. But when I thought about it some more, I realized that that's not what this scene was. The spirit doesn't know anything about Azula. It's just showing her what she's thinking. It created a play of her innermost thoughts. So when you think about it like that, you come to one conclusion: Azula blames herself for her abuse, and how her life turned out. Which is actually common with abuse victims. They can acknowledge that they were abused, while at the same time simultaneously blaming themselves for it. Because the person who abused them loved them, right? So if they felt the need to harm them, obviously it's the victims fault for doing something wrong.

Then we get to the part where she's "offered" a chance at redemption:

Now, I know that there's going to be idiots who will look at this and go "See?! She had her chance at redemption but rejected it! Proof that she's evil!" but was it really "redemption"? Think about it. Like I said earlier, what the spirit was showing Azula was what she's been thinking for who knows how long. What it offered her was basically a false reality that it created where she could be happy. In other words, it wasn't real. Things would still be the same for her in the real world. And if you know that something is fake, are you going to take it? No. Not to mention, the damn thing tried to kill her😭. So is it really any wonder that she said "yeah no fuck you and your redemption offer" and blasted it full of lightning?

Azula escapes from the temple and eventually finds the rest of the Kemurikage in the end, but she ultimately decides to leave them alone, saying that they are unworthy of her leadership.

All in all, this comic wasn't bad and I actually like it. Now, as for why I say that it's a reset on her character? Because certain things from the previous comics that were centered around Azula aren't mentioned. One topic in particular, something that you would think would have been mentioned considering how much it hurt Azula in The Search.

Ursa choosing to forget about her and Zuko. Abandoning them to they're abuser.

When we see the spirit version of Ursa and Azula says what she does to her, nothing about that is ever mentioned. And if Azula was supposed to be unloading her grievances to Ursa, why wasn't this mentioned?

In the beginning, when they fight Ty Lee, Ty Lee says "Fire Lord Zuko is tired of your mischief, Azula!" which can honestly mean a number of things. The kidnapping incident from Smoke and Shadow doesn't get spoken about here either. Which brings me to my next point: Kiyi is nowhere to be found in this. Considering that Azula saw her as a replacement daughter for Ursa, we should have seen her at some point. Not to mention that Azula kidnapped her. And if the spirit was supposed to be showing her all of her past misdeeds and that she was wrong for them? I'm pretty sure that kidnapping a bunch of kids would have been pretty high on the list.

So going by all of that, I think it's pretty safe to say that the writers are trying to move away from Yang's writing, particularly with Azula, considering how much his portrayal of her is hated, especially in The Search. And in a time where more and more people are vocal about how things are shown in media, especially sensitive topics like mental health? It's no wonder that they would want to move away from that. And I mean really, this is what we've been asking them to do for a long time now. To retcon the Yang comics because he ruined every character, and if they want to redeem Azula, his writing of her would make it incredibly hard to do so. This comic I feel is a start to said retcons. With that being said though, I can understand why people are disappointed. The marketing for it made it seem like we were getting something else, and not this. For the Azula fans who've been waiting for 15 years basically for the writers to release some quality Azula content, I can see why this would be a let down.

[still-a-morosexual-help]

okay so lately I have seen a lot of people claim they hate mammon bc he steals from mc, and like there's nothing wrong with disliking a character lol but I don't recall mammon ever stealing from mc?? like the only thing I can think of is that one time in season 1 I think where he was going through their stuff and said he was looking for something to sell (I think?? it's been a while) and beel straight up calling him a liar lmao l'm just wondered if I missed something? or if this is just newer players who maybe misunderstood that one scene? and I figured if anyone would know it would be you lmao

I got so fucking pissed about this (not at you anon <3) cos this is the third time I got an ask like this, that I scrolled all the way down my 'Obey Me Mammon' tag to June/July 2020 and then slowly scrolled my way up pulling all the receipts I could.....I saw this immediately after you sent it and I just finished now...... turns out it takes 5 straight hours to go through my Mammon tag😶

I have answered this exact same ask twice before and I can only assume it's new people? Like honestly you can't play the game for a long time and still think this (they prove this false within the game in LESSON FOUR)

Not only does Mammon NOT steal from MC, he also:

a.) Gets legitimate/legal jobs whenever he wants to buy MC something (which is pretty frequently)

b.) Shares the money with them when he comes into a large sum of money

But anyway here are the links to the posts talking about all this:

(everything is directly taken from canon or based off canon)

A.) No he doesn't steal from MC

• Full Summary of the Lesson 4 locked chapter where he goes through MC's stuff and a compare and contrast of what we know about Mammon from future lessons, events, devilgrams

• First post talking about this, goes more into detail about him not stealing from them

• Second shorter post about how he doesn't steal from them

• They're literally Partners in Crime

• He straight up refuses the Midas touch (multiple times I believe) after realising it means he won't be able to touch MC anymore

• HEADCANON that maybe he steals/borrows their clothes, with their knowledge, to wear

• In the small introductory manga page they say the thing he likes as much as money is MC

• In S3 he admits to loving MC more than he loves money

B.) He goes out of his way to get MC Presents (which we works actual jobs to earn money for)

• Mammon at the Office Devilgram, where he gets an actual office job so he can buy MC a watch he saw them looking at

• In the Movie Date Devilgram he rents out an entire theatre for the two of them because it was the anniversary of the day they first met

• In the You Always Ride Shotgun Devilgram he rents out a pool for the two of them

• He's always giving MC presents

• Usually he buys matching things for them

• He buys them shoes in their favourite colour

• Mammon's love language

• He wants to share his winnings from a lottery with MC

• He finds a secret second map in the pirate au event and tells only MC so they can share the treasure

C.) It's not just MC, he puts the others before Money too

• In the Presents From Mammon Devilgram he buys presents for everyone

• In The Guardian Demon Devilgram he saves a 9yr old orphaned homeless human girl from a mugger, fosters her and plans to pay for all her needs until she's an adult/can provide for herself - which is why he's always in debt to the three witches who look after her for him, there's also extortion going on from them towards him

• He'd rather lose the entire fortune he won than make Luke upset

• List of times he's put others before money

• He straight up tells Luke he doesn't mind missing out on a reward as long as it means Luke is alright

• Socks for Beel

• He gets a stone for his birthday which can give him whatever he wishes for, he wishes for fortune to come to whoever has the stone and then gives the stone to a student who tried to hurt him

D.) How Mammon works as a character

• Solmare makes you form certain expectations about him and then starts breaking them within the next few lessons and it's amazing to witness

• Friendship, Actions & Reality Vs Calling MC 'Servant'

• Mammon, MC and their Friendship

• Mammon being smart and why he comes off as an idiot

• His thoughts about himself vs MC

• He's actively changing and growing as a character and he knows it

• How Mammon actually views himself

• Why there's a difference in his level of affection in public vs privately

• Jerk with a heart of gold trope but better

• Mammon and how much he cares about consent

• How outsiders see Mammon vs how people from the city see Mammon vs how his close friends and family see him

• Chasing some creep away from MC

• How his relationship with MC changes and grows throughout the season

E.) Other reasons to love him

• Examples of how much he loves MC

• How supportive he & MC are of each other

• Some of his funniest moments

• He's objectively terrifying

• Mammon being a good brother

• He's extremely ride or die for MC

• He waits for MC when they've got to stay late at RAD for other work

• Despite being an ancient being all his best memories consist of the time he's spent with MC

• He created a whole line of toys based around missing MC

• Everything he says about loving MC in his 2022 birthday event

• List of things he's good at

• The amount he loves MC

And this is just a few of my posts about mammon, his character and what there's to love about him

And look it's MORE than okay for people to dislike a character but at least dislike them for something that actually happened?

[bysaber]

Decorating the house ft. Kento Nanami

Day 04 of 31 Days of Ficmas!

summary — kento nanami indulges your love for christmas and helps you decorate your shared house because there isn’t a thing he wouldn’t do for you.

word count — 1k

content — tooth-rooting fluff, one kissing scene idk, gojo’s mentioned (and insulted), bad writing

notes — wrote this one in some sort of a rush and didn’t reread so if there’s any mistakes im sorry :/

Kento Nanami is ready to flee from his office when the clock ticks and his shift is over.

His coworkers don’t even see him leaving as he grabs all his things and speeds to the elevator to escape from that environment as fast as possible.

Nanami always disliked the concept of working in a big company, but today he has a couple of other reasons to want to rush home, and it all comes down to you; his full-of-life girlfriend who’s decided to bring the spirit of Christmas to your shared apartment.

That morning he left you with a pang in his chest, filled with some sort of guilt for not being able to share the same excitement you had as you went on and on about the plans you had for the day; set up the tree, some lights, decorate the tree and then the house.

His guilt only worsened when he arrived at his workplace, wondering how he could be unaffected by your undying light and the things that made you smile when he had to endure such a soul-crushing, dead place, day after day.

The blonde man stops at a local café to buy you some pastries and coffee before finally making his way towards home, careful not to drop anything as he paces rather hurriedly, sighing in relief only when he’s in the elevator and going up, up, up.

To you.

When he opens the door, everything already looks different – there’s a tree, now. It’s not fully decorated, lots of things splattered on the ground, but you also hung Christmas signs on the walls and covered the living room table with a Christmas tablecloth.

Nanami keeps scanning the room until he finds you, sitting on the floor with your face so deep inside a box he’s sure you’re not aware of his presence just yet. The ever so serious man can’t help but smile fondly at the sight, taking his glasses off and putting them and the coffee he bought on one of your shelves before making his way toward you.

“I’m home, love,” he calmly announces, trying not to startle you.

“Kento!” you are quick to stop everything you’re doing and get on your feet to have his arms wrapped around you, his lips pressing on your forehead. “How was your day?”

“I spent the entire day wanting to come back home and help you with the decorations,” he confesses in an attempt to redeem himself for the lack of interest he had shown earlier. Your eyes glow as you let out a low ‘Oh?’ and he continues, “Speaking of, since when do we have all of this?”

You follow his gaze to all the decorations around the living room and giggle, detangling yourself from his arms as you take some lights from the box you were previously checking and place them in his hands, “I went out and bought some things today. Gojo helped me with the tree because it was too big for me to carry alone. He left about thirty minutes ago.”

Nanami immediately frowns, “Gojo? Don’t hang with that degenerate,” a genuine laugh escapes your lips when he complains. “Next time I’ll help you.”

You smile widely at him, sick in love. You know Kento’s not one to celebrate things, especially if it involves spending money and doing extravagant stuff, but he understands your love for Christmas and the way your eyes shine so much brighter when you can see it in the small decorations.

“You can help me now,” you say softly, hands cupping his cheeks before you kiss him lovingly.

Nanami always gets lost in your kisses, your warmth. When your lips meet his, your soft touches on his face and neck, your love filling him, he feels complete. And he never wants to let you go; still holding the lights, he wraps an arm around your waist and pulls you closer, his free hand caressing your cheek oh so gently until you pull away.

“Hmm… Miss you so much when you’re away,” you whisper close to his face. “But we gotta finish this first, Kento.”

“I know, love,” he sighs. “I bought us some coffee and pastries, but it’s probably cold right now.”

“I’m gonna heat it, then.”

Nanami nods and you grab the things he brought, going with it to the kitchen while he stands in the living room. He analyzes everything for a few seconds before starting to work; putting the Christmas lights on the windows – since you already have put some on the tree – and placing the star on the top of the tree.

“This looks beautiful, babe,” you praise when you come back, handing him one of the cups of coffee while you sip on your own. He just smiles softly at you, and you both start working together.

He laughs when you show him you’ve bought Christmas cushions, organizing them on the couch alongside a soft new blanket, “Good for movie nights,” he comments.

A fond smile grows on his lips when he sees you’ve also bought several Christmas cups. You are both coffee addicts and all the cups look adorable, just like you. He will make sure to drink on them every day.

At last, you place candles all around the house. Some aromatized, some not. “Don’t light them up at the same time, my nose can’t handle it,” he warns and it makes you laugh so loud he feels embarrassed.

“I guess that’s it,” you say as you exit your closet, where you’ve put the empty decorations box, going back to the living room to turn the normal lights out.

At the same time, Nanami turns on the Christmas lights.

You feel your heart beating faster, all the good feelings Christmas brings you washing over your body and making you smile like a little kid. And the fact that Kento’s there with you, that he built that with you, makes everything feel so much better.

Nanami is watching you as happiness overflows your body. He has a smile he can’t contain on his face, a happiness of his own, good feelings he never thought he was capable of having.

And it’s not about Christmas, it’s you.

[merakiui]

PLEASE WRITE THAT SPY AU PLEASE

I'M SO TEMPTED AAAAAAAAA,, orz but I can't write anything else until I finish tmdg (and the rest of the fics on my list). But just know that if I do write Floyd spy au, it would naturally have to include these very crucial details and scenes:

✧ hand-to-hand combat training with Floyd and you're one of the only other agents (aside from Jade) who can match Floyd's pace and sporadic fighting style. Exchanging blows is fun, even more so if you manage to give Floyd the ass-kicking of a lifetime. He's lying flat on his back and you're standing over him and he's never been more horny in his life before.

✧ reader finding out that Floyd's father is the head of the mafia they've been investigating on the sly. Perhaps it's one of those scenarios where the mafia has taken something from you or you're on the run from Mr. Leech's debt collectors, so there's lots of angst to be had when you find out Floyd is the son of your enemy. The betrayal is so yummy... orz Floyd being a wolf in sheep's clothing all along. Oh, you thought he was an agent allied under the same cause as you? As if. <3 (or the misunderstanding angst!!!! Floyd trying to tell you that he's different and not like his father, but you won't hear any of it.)

✧ things get particularly perilous during a mission and maybe the enemy has you cornered. You think this is the end, but then Floyd's there, killing them in the most brutal, cold-blooded way. And you don't see his usual goofy, carefree grin or hear his nasally laughter. It's just this blank, dead-eyed stare and the ever-so-subtle curl of his lip as he sneers at the one who dared to threaten his Shrimpy's life. He shrugs off the bloodlust afterwards just to give you a silly smile and say, "Aww, did I scare ya, Shrimpy? My bad."

✧ missions with Floyd as your partner never go to plan, which means you're both often called into Azul's office so he can scold the two of you (although most of his ire is usually directed at Floyd) for "fucking up the mission." And Floyd has such a smart mouth on him, so it drives Azul insane (even though Azul knows what he's getting into when he assigns these missions to Floyd; it's mainly why he has a partner. You're there to keep him in check). T_T

"But we got the stuff you wanted, Azul."

"Yes, but I specifically said it was to be entirely covert."

"But we got the stuff."

"But you weren't covert."

"So what? We got the stuff. Who gives a damn about—" and you're already dragging Floyd out before he can continue bickering with Azul.

✧ Floyd who always gets you into the most dangerous situations during missions and he's always the one who saves you from said situations. Danger just follows him wherever he goes, but he also has a penchant for inciting it.

✧ his code name is "Bind the Heart," but Floyd thinks that's so lame and so he just uses his real name even though Azul's choked him out for it every time. So now he settles for BTH as a shortening and if anyone asks what it means he says, with full seriousness, "Bacon Tomato Hamburger." LOL

✧ Floyd who is so down bad for you that he's always flirting with you in his own weird, Floyd way, and each time you shut him down with a stern, "Never gonna happen," because you're dedicated to your job (and love is a distraction in this line of work). But Floyd's not one to give up and he keeps trying because according to him, "Never might be today and tomorrow, but Shrimpy doesn't know what'll happen in the future..." (He's right; the two of you end up fucking months later because Azul booked a hotel room for you to share on one of your missions and it did have more than one bed, but why sleep separately when you can sleep together?)

✧ despite how closely you and Floyd work together and how chatty he can be when he's in the mood, neither of you know much about the other's personal life. Cue Floyd wanting to know more about you and you getting suspicious each time. And he always answers your questions with, "Because. Can't I ask about Shrimpy's life if I'm plannin' on bein' in it long-term?" He will be the death of you........ orz

✧ Floyd gets himself badly injured on a mission, so he's stuck on bed rest until he heals up. Which means you're transferred to Agent Shock the Heart in the meantime, and Floyd does not like the idea of you and Jade cozying up during missions. >:( he's in Jade's ear the entire time the both of you are on the mission (he dragged himself out of bed and to HQ's tech room just to steal the microphone from the agent who was in communication with Jade) and he's saying stuff like, "Jade, you lay a finger on Shrimpy and I'll break all of yours..." and Jade just has to be annoying, so he's like, "We get married in June. I do hope you'll be my best man."

✧ a classic confession in the midst of an argument. Maybe the mission got too risky and you have to leave behind your team; you and Floyd get into an argument about it and essentially it ends with him yelling, "Cuz I ain't ready to lose ya!" And you look at him with so much confusion because what is he talking about? And Floyd's so angry he's even tearing up and from there it's a soft admission of feelings: "Cuz I like ya... A lot. A whole fuckin' lot. And I'd rather those other guys take the fall than let you get hurt for 'em." AAAAAAAAAAA OTL

[just-antithings]

So antis are harassing one actor in the Baldur's Gate fandom HARD. Dave Jones, who played Halsin, gets tagged in fanart of Halsin a lot, and often RTs spicy stuff (not full on porn, but spicy) with comments. Antis have started to claim this is sexual harassment (a claim they notably don't make to ANY of the other actors who share NSFW) and that Dave has a responsibility to censor his blog in case minors follow him.

He has a responsibility to not tweet NSFW for an NSFW game he was in. Not just in, but playing one of the most sexual characters in the entire game. The "bear scene" was used to promote the damn thing. But he needs to make his twitter child friendly?

Then there was one exchange where a fan tweeted that they love his contributions to an app of bedtime stories being read out loud, and Dave joked that lots of people love to go to bed with him. An anti claimed this was sexual harassment.

And now it's gotten so bad he's taking a Twitter break because of the harassment.

The punchline: these antis are almost all fans of Minthara, a villain who owns slaves, has killed past lovers, and suggests enslaving the refugees of Baldur's Gate, among other things, and until recently, the only way to recruit her was by massacring the residents (including refugee children) at a Druid's Grove. They hate Halsin, his fans, and anyone associated with him because Halsin and Minthara are opposite choices and most people choose Halsin instead of her. So they don't like problematic behavior unless it's their problematic fave of course, then it's "god forbid a woman have hobbies".

I hate antis so much JAT I hate them.

ugh that’s so shitty

[ssweeterthanfiction]

Wait for your love.

Content Warnings: use of drugs and alcohol, billy being toxic (pressuring if you squint), parental issues (abusive father/recovering alcoholic mother).

↳ currently playing ;

America’s Sweetest Girl - 1976

0:56 ——•———————— 3:24

↺       <<          ll          >>     ⋮≡

In the early summer of ‘76, Y/N rose to the top. With ‘Groupie Love’ rising in the charts and hitting number one just a few weeks after releasing, anyone and everyone knew who Y/N was.

Eddie: “She was everywhere in the late 70s. Magazines, runways, radio shows, late night talk shows, you name it. People even had a nickname for her…it was America’s something.”

Warren: “Oh that nickname? Yea of course I remember it. It was America’s…america’s….”

Y/N: “America’s Sweetest Girl.”

“I was America’s Sweetest Girl.”

Billy: “Oh god. America’s Sweetest Girl.” he laughs “She hated that nickname”

Y/N: “Don’t get me wrong, I was grateful for everything that Groupie Love brought me. But America’s Sweetest Girl?”

“And it’s not like absolutely despised being America’s Sweetest Girl, sure I didn’t love it, but I wanted fame. So I did what I needed to do. What the people want, the people get.”

“My 1st album was full of songs that were soft sounding. Teddy said that I shouldn’t try to strain my voice since its natural register was so soft. He was definitely trying to take me down a different road than the band. I didn’t know why at the time, maybe to protect me. I mean I was 19 and hanging out with some of the world’s biggest rockstars.”

Warren: “Everyone knew she was 19 at the time. No one had a problem with it. It wasn’t rare to find a young girl in the kind of scene we were in.”

“Besides, I think I speak for everyone when I say that they all treated her like she was their little sister. Except Billy. And she was starting to spend a lot of time with Billy.”

Karen: “After Groupie Love, Billy and y/n definitely got closer… Now I never like to interfere with people’s lives and decisions, but I did speak with y/n about Billy.”

“I didn’t want her to go down the same path that Billy was going down. But you try telling a 19 year old that the guy she’s starting to develop feelings for is an asshole who’s an addict.”

“But if you ask me, she was denying the feelings she was gaining for Billy.”

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

You were in Billy’s room, just laying on his bed while he fiddled with his guitar. You’d been spending a lot of time there. Not just in Billy’s room, but throughout the entire house the band lived in. You had been having breakfast with them, having dinner with them, going to parties with them and coming back to the house with them. Your stuff was lying around the house.

You had been sleeping in Billy’s bed at night. After parties you’d stumble to his room and crash on his bed. A few minutes would pass and he would do the same. Some nights he would even cuddle with you. You never thought of it as anything more than two friends cuddling. It didn’t feel different from when you would lay on Warren’s chest while you guys would lay on the couch. It was innocent.

At least you thought it was innocent.

Clearly some people didn’t think the same. You found that out a few nights ago when Karen came and spoke to you.

“y/n, can I talk to you?” you hear Karen say from behind the door. “Yeah sure, come in” you say, putting your guitar down.

Karen sits on the edge of the bed, she stares into your eyes for a moment before speaking. “So…what’s going on with you and Billy?”

“What do you mean? There isn’t anything going on between me and Billy”

“y/n…don’t lie to me. You’ve been spending a lot of time with him.” she laughs “I mean, you’re sleeping in his bed at night with him!”

“It’s nothing like that Karen, we’re just friends” you say, your tone coming off more defensive than intended.

Karen sighs, “Just…listen to me y/n.” she says in a soft tone as she takes your hands into hers. “Be careful around Billy, he’s…he’s not someone you want to start being with. I don’t want to see you get hurt because of something he does.”

You avoid her gaze, how could she think you would have feelings for Billy?

“Yea. Yea okay thanks, I’ll be careful.”

You’d think about that conversation whenever you were with Billy. You were thinking about it now.

Staring at the wall, you thought carefully about what Karen said. To be careful around Billy. To not start anything with Billy. You couldn’t even imagine starting anything with Billy. This was someone that would be with a different girl every night. Someone that did lines off groupie’s bodies. You couldn’t start anything with him, even if you wanted to.

“Something on your mind?” you hear Billy say.

You quickly snap out of your daze and look at him. “Nothing, just…thinking”

“Thinking of what?”

‘You.’ “Nothing much…just about my parents”

Lie. Well, not a full lie. You had been thinking of your parents lately. You wondered if they had heard your song, if maybe they were finally proud of something you’d done. At least, you hoped your dad was finally proud of you.

“Your parents huh?” Billy says as he puts his guitar down. “Warren told us a bit about your parents. Your mom sounds nice…but your dad…”

Billy gets up and walks towards you, he settles down next to you on the bed. “Your dad…isn’t the best is he?”

You shake your head. “Nope…not really, but from what Warren and Graham told me…your dad wasn’t the best either.”

Billy laughs. “Yea you could say that…but I think having a dad that hits is much worser than having a dad that just up and leaves.”

You roll your eyes playfully. “It’s not a contest Billy”

You hear Billy chuckle, but then hear him go quiet. Looking up at him you see that he has a somewhat serious look on his face.

“Really though, why are you thinking about your parents?”

He scoots closer to you and puts a hand on your knee. “You know you can tell me…anything right?”

You gaze into his eyes for a moment. He was so close to you. Closing your eyes and taking a deep breath in. “I was just- just thinking if they had heard the song yet. And I haven’t heard from them in a while…so yea”

Billy looks at you with a sad, sympathetic look on his face.

“Y’know…I know it doesn’t mean much coming from me, but I’m sure that your mom is proud of you.” he says, softly rubbing your knee in a comforting way. “And I bet your dad is regretting everything he’s done to you.”

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

Y/N: “…My relationship with my parents…has never been the best.”

“I grew up with an abusive father, and a mother who was a recovering alcoholic.”

“My mom was never as bad as my dad. Sure she had her moments. We fought, but it never went as far as yelling at each other for something stupid.”

“But my dad…my dad was bad.”

“I went to bed almost every night crying, bruises on my arms and legs. I hated my life. I always dreamt of making it big. Of running away from my life and becoming this…superstar. When I got the opportunity to become one, I took it.”

“If anyone was in the position I was in, they would also do anything to get out of it. Just like me.”

“Billy was like me. He dreamed of making it big. He dreamed of selling out stadiums. He dreamed of a better life. He did what he needed to do. What needed to be done. I felt a connection to him. And I guess that’s what got me so attached to him.”

Billy: “I wrote ‘Daddy Issues’ for y/n. At the time, I wanted to be the person that took away all the pain she had.”

“But I didn’t know how.”

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

“Hey y/n, I got something I wanna show you.”

You were in Billy’s room again, lying in the floor you were trying to figure out the details for your album.

“Hm? Oh alright” you say as you put away your notebook.

Billy sat down next to you, he took out a tape recorder and then he looked at you.

“Go ahead, press play.”

He takes your hand and guides it to the recorder. Feeling his calloused hands on yours felt electric. Sparks flew between the two of you from this simple touch. He then made your finger press play so the song could start.

You closed your eyes and slowly bopped your head to the beat.

It wasn’t like any song he’d written before. It was full of emotions that he had never shown in any of the songs he had written.

It was beautiful.

Opening your eyes you looked at him. You didn’t say anything. You didn’t need to say anything. The expression on your face was enough.

You stared at him for what seemed like hours. He was now dangerously close to your face. This was it. You two were about to kiss. But right as you were close enough, you heard someone call your name.

“Y/N! Teddy’s on the phone! He says it’s important!” you hear Eddie call from downstairs.

You sigh. Slowly you move away from Billy. You get up and head for the door. Looking back once, you give Billy a small smile as you walk out the door.

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

July 4th, 1976. The official release date of Y/N’s first studio album.

Y/N: “My first album was called Paradise. It had 10 tracks. National Anthem, Million Dollar Man, Radio, Cola, Lolita, Brooklyn Baby, West Coast, Off To The Races, Summertime Sadness and Video Games”

Billy: “My personal favorite was National Anthem”

Eddie: “I hated National Anthem.”

Warren: “Cola was definitely my favorite”

Daisy: “Lolita. Easy winner”

Karen: “My favorite track? Probably West Coast”

Graham: “Um…I would say my favorite track was Radio. Actually, all of them were. It was a good first album.”

Y/N: “Since it came out on the 4th of July, the aesthetic of the album revolved around…what’s it called again?”

“Oh right, vintage americana.” she laughs. “Oh god…Teddy really had me playing into the America’s Sweetest Girl role.”

“Well…everyone did really. The band even threw a release/4th of July party at the same time.”

“I think it was at that party that I tried drugs for the first time.”

“Let me be more specific, I tried two drugs. Coke and Billy Dunne.”

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

There wasn’t a cloud in the sky. It was a perfect summer day.

You were helping out with the set up for tonight’s party. It wasn’t gonna be anything too big. At least that’s what you were told.

While you were helping Karen put up streamers you didn’t even notice Warren and Graham rolling in four huge kegs.

“You guys didn’t have to do all of this for my album’s release…you know I would’ve been fine with something small” you say to Karen as she places a small basket of flowers on the table.

“Oh I know that, and that’s what I tried telling the boys, but you know how they are”

“After all, they would do anything for America’s Sweetest Girl” she snickers, nudging your arm playfully.

You scrunch your nose and laugh. “Oh god…don’t even with that name”

Karen laughs, “Oh come on! It’s a cute nickname, very fitting for you”

“Shut up” you say as you roll your eyes.

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

Y/N: “I remember that night very vaguely.”

“The first part of the night was more clearer than the second part.”

“The party was small at first. Just me, the band, and a few of our close friends.”

“Somehow other people started hearing about the party.”

“I think it was a little close to midnight that more and more people started pouring in. And then of course that’s when Warren pulled out the kegs.”

“So now we had at least over 100 people in our backyard and house. I didn’t mind at first. I was actually having fun.”

“But then the drugs came out.”

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

It was late, you didn’t know how late it was but it was late. Music was blaring throughout the house and the backyard, people were chugging down cups of beer and taking shots.

You were stumbling around with your fourth cup of beer. Or was it the fifth? Sixth? Maybe the seventh? You didn’t know, you just knew that it tasted pretty good.

You passed by Karen a few minutes ago. She had asked you if you were okay. You giggled and said you were fine as you stumbled away.

Now you were in a room where Billy was with a bunch of his friends.

“Hey there’s America’s Sweetheart!” he exclaims as he walks over to you. He seems drunk, but not ridiculously drunk.

“Come sit down babydoll, the fun was just about to get started.” he puts his hands on your shoulders and guides you to a couch.

“What do you mean?”

You watch as someone pulls out a small bag of white powder. They start pouring out a small amount of it and distributing into lines.

“Oh Billy, I really don’t think I should-“

“Oh come on babydoll, don’t be a buzzkill.” he says as he rolls a hundred dollar bill into a tube.

Billy’s the first one to do a line. Then the two others. Billy looks at you, he nudges your hand with his own. He passes you the makeshift tube.

“Go on babydoll, it won’t hurt.”

You take the tube in your hand, looking down at it for a moment and then at Billy. Reluctantly, you place it towards the white powder.

Billy and the other two people laugh and holler as you do a line.

You take a breath in afterwards, it feels like there’s a rush going to your head.

“That’s my girl! See it wasn’t that bad now was it?” Billy laughs.

Your heart races. You don’t know if it’s from the coke or from the fact that Billy just called you ‘my girl’ but you try to brush it off.

You laugh weakly. “No…no it wasn’t that bad”

Billy smirks and laughs. The other two people pour out more of the powder, making 6 more lines.

You do two more, Billy does four more.

By your third line, you have a huge rush through your body.

The other two people have gone, it’s just you and Billy in the room, the music from outside is muffled. You’re both lying on the floor, both of you laughing and giggling.

“How is America’s Sweetest Girl feeling right now?”

“Like I’m flying”

Billy laughs. “You know, everyone’s gonna love your album”

You laugh weakly. “Everyone…everyone but me” you say as you blow your tongue.

Billy sits up. “Everyone but you?”

You laugh and groan putting your hands over your head. “Don’t get me wrong, it’s a good album. It’s just…it’s…it’s not…it’s not rock and roll enough”

Billy laughs, “Not rock and roll enough?”

“I know. I know it’s stupid, but all the songs on that album are something that everyone is telling me to be. Not who I am, or who I want to be”

“Then write what you want. Make the music you want.”

“Hard to do that while I’m ‘America’s Sweetest Girl’.”

“Then just, tweak that persona. Make her more you.”Billy scoots close to you. “And for what it’s worth. I like the whole America’s Sweetest Girl thing. And I like that one song on your album even more, National Anthem.”

You gaze into his eyes. “Thanks”

There’s silence for a moment, the only thing filling the room is the music playing from outside.

“You wanna get out of here and do something fun?” Billy says, smirking.

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

Y/N: “We ditched the party and went to this local carnival. I was surprised it was still open. It was well over 2am.”

“And let me tell you, being high and at a carnival was definitely an experience. The bright lights, the loud music, the food, it was all so…uplifting.”

“Anyways, we walked around for a bit, went on a few rides, Billy won me a stuffed bear.”

“And then we went on the ferris wheel.”

‿︵‿︵୨˚̣̣̣͙୧ - - ୨˚̣̣̣͙୧‿︵‿︵

The carnival was something out of this world. At least that’s how it was feeling to you and Billy.

You were both on the ferris wheel when it suddenly came to a stop. Both of you were giggling as the cart rocked back and forth.

“You know, I’ve been keeping a secret from you”

Billy raises his eyebrows and smirks. “Oh really?” he says as he stands up, causing the cart to rock more.

“Oh my god! Billy sit down you’ll get us killed!” you squeal.

He plops down next to you and puts an arm around your shoulders. “No I won’t…” he says, twirling a piece of your hair around his finger. “Now tell me that secret”

You felt blood rush to your face, your heart was pounding.

“I wrote National Anthem about you.”

Billy didn’t respond. No, instead he took your chin in his hand and brought you closer to his face.

“I know, there’s a reason it’s my favorite.” he says smugly before kissing you.

You felt your stomach do flips as he kissed you. And to add to the moment, fireworks were exploding in the background.

As you both pulled away you smile and laugh. You gaze into eachother’s eyes for what seems like an eternity.

It seemed like nothing in the world existed. It was only you and Billy.

You wished it would be like that forever.

But not all wishes come true.

(AHHHH ITS OUTTT!!! I HOPE YOU GUYS LIKED THIS ONE 💞💞 I LOVED WRITING IT SO YEA!!! u guys should def reblog if you enjoyed it 💞)

[moonshynecybin]

thinking about FCO Rosquez at their first PR-forced public dinner (like a week or two after the announcement, Wednesday or Thursday night) and how their conversation is supposed to go when Marc was dying to talk to Valentino all winter (still has a string of unanswered texts in his phone) but now he’s closed off and Valentino wants to make this work but can’t have them fight in public or be silent for an entire hour, do we think they find a middle ground or Vale just talk about random things on his own or they somehow ignore everything and are able to tell each other about their winter or subjects that have nothing to do with MotoGP or—

court mandated date night nooooo poor marc :(

this is so nuts to think about... like even outside the insane emotional reality of getting outed and the violence of public scrutiny and like. marc having (once again !) his ability to control his own narrative ripped away from him by his association with valentino— which is his LEAST favorite thing (i do think he blames himself for the photos though... like maybe if i wasnt such a whore we wouldnt be in this mess :((( which. marc buddy naur.) on TOP of that he is having a romantic candellit dinner with his ex situationship that he is still in love with. one million points lightning damage. so everyone is extremely strung out at this shitty little date night table (michelin restaurant lbr) and marc has justtttt gone dark on his whatsapp thread with valentino. maybe he is trying to maybe exert some control over his life here in small ways... put up SOME walls in clumsy self protective fashion...

but VALE is like okay. so if this thing between us is public he doesnt want it or want me. interesting. okay im cool im fine im good np who cares i hate him anyway (girl.) and he's also um. kind of reeling from the abrupt reversal of the status quo here tbh. marc has never played hard to get ever ever not once in his entire life. no self preservation on that man 5ever. he's literally always been there giving vale flattering attention and being in love with him !!! so vale is kind of off-balance here being met with some version of the marc marquez freezeout, not sure how to react but missing marc's attention. and he chooses to compensate as he does with most roadblocks in his life: full charm offensive. (he also, in some selfless and tender corner in the back of his mind that he is trying to ignore, just really and truly knows marc is FREAKED and misses seeing him laugh. he wants the evil jajajas.... he will do anything for the evil jajajas....) so he is trying. SO hard to get him to crack a smile. lowkey causing a scene in the restaurant by being such a clown... but marc isnt really biting. is still responding, like they ARE having a conversation, but its nothing like it used to be. clearly he is just being polite. smiles twice ALL night—all wan and pale and beautiful and so clearly exhausted—and vale's mouth gets all dry and his ribcage feels like its going to implode. and of course in response to this he is like wow. my heartburn is going crazy. damn. [chugging wine].

like looking to real life, as awkward as rosquez have been in their years of estrangement, they have always had to share space. for 6 years in that paddock ! that's a lot of years of small talk ! they can have and will do it if necessary... so as the night drags i think marc talks about riding and the season to fill in the gaps... goes home and gives himself a list of regimented rules to stick to when interacting with valentino (i see him texting exclusively the PR thread more as his classically unpracticed self protection style than like. a deliberate fuck you to that end. i cant drunk booty call vale if karen from PR is also there type stuff). that being said, eventually i do think he makes elaborate excuses to BEND these rules bc he still wants valentino's attention. and also his tongue in his mouth. hes like okay! i am only kissing valentino in front of tv cameras if we both podium! and then they DONT share a podium and hes like. okay! it would be WEIRD if i didnt kiss vale after i podiumed even if he didnt! because thats what i would do if we were actually together! [starts jogging across the paddock like a dick-seeking missile.]

[angstywaifu]

The Lost Sister - Part 9

Synopsis: Xaden is known as an only child due to his sister who 'died' during the Rebellion. Little do they know she didn't die and has been so close this entire time.

Garrick Tavis x OC

A/N: From here on out you will see a few things pulled from the books. Especially moments where we have Garrick. Cause lets be honest we have some amazing moments from him where I can slot Ophelia into the scene. So there will be a mix of my stuff, and some dialogue from actual Fourth Wing with some tweaks to make it fit. We have some really good moments coming up, that I am so excited to show you guys to! As per usual requests are open for any one shot or scenarios you may want. And if you want to be on the tag list just let me know! The Lost Sister Masterlist | Masterlist

All of our current squad make it up the gauntlet. And now we wait our turn for presentation. And of course Garrick is over seeing the squads before they walk in. He’d been at the top of the gauntlet when I’d climbed up, but he had been dealing with an issue of how Violet had gotten up the end of the gauntlet. I was actually impressed with her idea to use the rope and dagger. I knew Xaden had given her some guidance, but I knew he hadn't told her to do that. But it worked.

This was the closest I’d been to Garrick in a while as we all stood in a single line waiting to go in. Despite me somehow tying for first in Gauntlet time, we aren’t the first group to go in. Slowed down by Violets time. But at least we all made it.

Ahead of us is a clearing lined by dragons, lined up in their own formation. All close enough to pass judgement on us, as well as dispose of us quickly as we walk by.

”Let’s go Second Squad, you’re up next.” Garrick says sternly, beckoning us forward with a wave that makes the rebellion relic on his bared forearm gleam in the sunlight. “Into formation.”

Garrick’s tone is all business, he’s in full leadership mode. It’s one of the first times I had seen it and it reminds me a lot of Xaden’s style of leadership. But Garrick is more mission first, niceties last. And currently his mission is to prepare us for presentation. It is also one of the first times I’ve seen him in full uniform, usually opting to forego his jacket around the grounds. Which I don’t blame him with how warm its been. But winter is starting to set in, and its definitely a fair bit colder up here. I notice the line of patches on his uniform, show casing his as the Flame Section leader, and an abundance of patches advertising his skill with multiple weapons. I wasn’t sure how many patches there were, but I wouldn’t be surprised if there was only a small amount left he didn’t have. I notice daggers isn’t one of them.

We all get into formation as hot air rushes towards us again. Another cadet claimed. Garrick’s hazel eyes skim over our squad before landing on mine. “Hopefully Aetos has done his job.” His eyes flick to Violet at the mention of Dain. “So you know that it’s a straight walk down the meadow. I’d recommend staying at least seven feet apart -”

”In case one of us gets torched,” I hear Ridoc mutter a few places in front of me.

”Correct, Ridoc.” I can’t help but smirk at the slight sass in Garrick’s tone. “Cluster if you want, just know if a dragon finds disfavour with one of you, it’s likely to burn the whole lot to weed one out.” He warns us as he holds our gaze. “Also, remember you are not here to approach them, and if you do, you won’t be making it back to the dormitory tonight.”

”Can I ask a question?” A cadet whose name I can’t quite remember says from the front row.

Garrick nods, but I noticed the tick in his jaw. He’s annoyed. And honestly don’t blame him. I may not remember their name, but I know they annoy me. And have since day one.

”Third Squad, Tail Section of Fourth Wing already went through, and I talked to some of the cadets….”

”That’s not a question.” He states as he lifts his brows. I note another tick in his jaw as he places his hands on his hips. Definitely annoyed now.

”Right. It’s just that they said there’s a feathertail?”

“A f-feathertail?” Someone I think called Tynan sputters. “Who the hell would ever want to bond a feathertail?"

I feel most of our squad roll their eyes or shake their heads. I see Garrick restrain from doing the same.

”Professor Kaori never told us there would be a feathertail.” Sawyer says. “I know because I memorized every single dragon he showed us. All hundred of them.”

”Well, guess there’s a hundred and one now.” Garrick states sternly, clearly wanting to be rid of us and this job. “Relax, feathertails don’t bond. I can’t even remember the last time one has been seen outside the Vale. It’s probably just curious. You’re up. Stay on the path. You walk up, you wait for the entire squad, you walk back down. It really doesn’t get any easier than this from here on out, kids, so if you can’t follow these simple instructions, then you deserve whatever happens in there.”

Kids? We were barely three years younger than him. But with most of our squad not bearing rebellion marks, I could easily see why he would refer to us as kids. He turns and heads over to a path before the canyon wall where the dragons are perched. We follow, breaking away from the crowd of first years.

“They’re all yours.” Garrick says to the quadrants senior Wingleader. A woman I’ve only seen a few times in Battle Brief.

As Garrick turns to walk back, he locks eyes with me as his hand lightly brushes mine, setting my skin on fire where his touch lingers.

“Single file.” She says to us, drawing my eyes back to the front.

We all form a single line, I end up at the very back behind Rhiannon. With the final instructions of talk to each other, she steps aside revealing a dirt path that leads through the centre of the valley, and up ahead, sitting so perfectly still you would almost mistake them for statues are the dragons. We start to move, each of us leaving the suggested seven feet before following the cadet in front.

As I enter the valley the smell of sulphur is thick in the air, and I note multiple black patches on the path.

As instructed we talk amongst each other. But talk is a loose term. Its mostly bickering. Towards the end I nearly have a heart attack as two greens approach Violet. Then I remember the corset she told me about. The one made from the dragons of her sisters green dragon. They can probably smell it As we get towards the end, our squad is down to seven first years.

As we’re about to leave the area I feel something. An extra presence at the back of my mind. I turn around, trying to keep my eyes down as best I can as I look around. At the back amongst the trees I catch a glimpse of…. Was that white? No, dragons aren’t white. I know I saw white though. But I can’t have. Dragon’s aren’t white I tell myself again.

“Ophelia, you ok?” Violet calls from the exit.

I turn to see her looking at me, her eyes also scanning the area I was just looking at. Did she see it to?

“Yeah, just thought I saw something.” I say, trying to pass it off as casually I can.

She nods, seeming content with my answer. But the tall figure just inside the pathway stares at me as if they are not convinced. Garrick’s eyes are narrowed me in almost a glare. Luckily the next group walks up and I’m able to slip past him without him talking to me.

Part 10

@riorgail @going-through-shit @fw-gt @bbkissme99 @xceafh

[fallingdownhell]

May I have Kaeya, Diluc, and or Zhongli with a pup hybrid reader who gets consistent night mares?

The pup just tosses and turns in the night to the point of either waking up crying or just can't sleep. So they go down to the kitchen to find something to calm their nerves (like tea.) Then the guys notice that their partners gone or hear them moving around then follow after to go comfort them.

Just silence in the kitchen besides the kettle boiling and the men just hug their partner, saying things to comfort them or get their tail wagging again. After tea and stuff, they just get carried back to bed and the pup falls asleep with a 200+ pound man cuddling ontop of them.

Something cute and you can make it as angsty as you'd like 😈 thankks

Angst, you say..? I like making things angsty 👀 Characters Included: Diluc; Kaeya Content: gender neutral reader; puppy hybrid reader; mentions of nightmares; whole lot of fluff and comfort Word count: 1,8k words Enjoy <3

Diluc

With a loud gasp, you awake from your sleep. Heavy breathing and sweat dripping down your temples, you try and catch your breath while also reorienting yourself to your surroundings.

It takes a while until you recognize the shape of the room again, the bedroom you share with your boyfriend. Who was still peacefully sleeping right next to you, an arm loosely draped over your waist.

Feeling still shaken up from the nightmare, you know that you can't go to sleep right away again, so you decide to get up, careful not to wake Diluc up as well. He's been working so much lately, the last thing you want to do is disturb his well earned rest.

Once you managed to slip out of his arms, you quietly tiptoe out of the bedroom and gently close the door behind you. You listen to for a few seconds, of any sounds come from the room. When you hear nothing, you turn to find the mansion quiet and dark, everyone else asleep as well.

You contemplate your options for a bit, in the end deciding to go to the kitchen to make yourself something warm to drink. As you go down the steps, your ears perk up a bit, listening to every little sound in and outside the mansion for anything unusual.

The nightmare still clings onto you, not letting go of its grasp on you, which shows in your tail weakly hanging down, only very few movement coming from it.

When you arrive at the kitchen, you immediately go for the kettle to brew yourself some tea. While you're waiting for the water to boil, you sit down on one of the chairs, facing the window. The scenery looks beautiful at night, the lake in full view, the moon reflecting on the surface of the water, making the whole scene feel so serene.

While looking out the window, your thoughts once again drift back to the nightmare. You know that it was just a dream, but the things he said to you in them... they haunt you. What if that was how he truly felt about you..?

What if he really thought of you as some monstrosity? Was he only with you out of pity? Or because he could get some sort of benefit for himself? What if he was after something else entirely and never loved you in the first place? What if-

Your spiraling thoughts get cut off when you suddenly feel a pair of arms hug you from behind, Diluc's scent and warmth instantly enveloping you. You jump a bit from the sudden action, but quickly relax again as you realize that it's him.

You hadn't heard him come down at all. Were you really that deep in your head?

"Nightmare?", he asks, his voice sounding still rough from sleep as he burries his face into the crook of your neck, nuzzling his nose against your skin.

Not sure if you were able to speak right now, you simply nodded as an answer.

"Want to talk about it?"

You think it over for a second, but ultimately shake your head. You couldn't, at least not right now.

Diluc accepts that and just continues to hold you like this, unitl the kettle signals that the water is now properly boiled. Before you can even attempt to get up yourself, he lets go off you, goes over and prepares the tea for you, handing you the cup when he returns to your side.

You take the mug from him and thank him quietly, half expecting that he'd go back to sleep now. Instead, Diluc gently picked you up and carried you over to the sofa, sitting himself down and placing you in his lap, careful that you wouldn't spill any of the hot tea.

"..Shouldn't you be going back to sleep?", you ask in a hushed voice. Diluc looks at you for a second, hums in response but doesn't move a single muscle to try and get up. Instead, he lifts a hand and begins to gently comb his fingers through your hair.

Sighing at his action, you close your eyes as you lean your body further into his, enjoying the calming effect his presence has on you. The sound of his steady heartbeat, combined with his scent always puts you at ease.

After taking a sip from your tea, Diluc then bends over you, placing a soft kiss to the top of your head. "You don't have to talk about it right away. But I want you to know that I love you. And I'm here for you whenever you're ready."

Hearing these words from him, it seemed almost like the reassurance was all you needed from him. You felt yourself feeling a lot happier again and a small smile grazed the edges of your lips.

"...I love you, too.", you tell him back, resting your body against his chest. You felt so secure right here in his arms, that you didn't even notice your tail starting to wag the tiniest bit.

Kaeya

Nightmares were a somewhat regular occurance for you. You suffered through them frequently your entire childhood. And while noone really knows what causes them, they seemed to come and go at random.

You could go for months without any nightmare whatsoever, only for them to come back and haunt you for days and weeks on end, before leaving you alone again.

Most of the times, they were okay to deal with. But every now and then, the dreams could get so bad that you'd be waking up either crying or screaming at the top of your lungs, almost like you were about to get murdered. The first time that Kaeya had witnessed this, he was panicing, asking you what was going on.

You had a long talk with him the next day and since then, he's always asking you how he can support you should something like this happen again. He's always making sure you fall asleep before him, claiming that it makes him feel more at ease when he knows that you can at least fall asleep and get a good dose of rest.

He tells you that he wants to be woken up by you should you ever wake up from a nightmare. And though you told him you'd do that, you don't always follow through with your promise. He has an exhausting job and you'd feel bad for waking him up in the middle of the night every time you got a nightmare. But you have done it a few times, when the dreams were really bad.

This time however, it seemed like you wouldn't have to do anything.

It was a bad dream. Worse than the worst you ever had. You can't recall the contents of the dream, but you remember that you were terrified, screaming. You must have been screaming in reality, too. Because when you came to yourself again, you saw Kaeya's worried face looming over you, fear written all over it. He was shacking you, trying to wake you up.

"(Name)? Gods, you finally woke up! Are you alright?", he looks relieved when you finally gain consciousness again, backing off a bit to give you more space.

You jolt up in the bed, eyes blown wide, panic still settled deep into every bone of your body. You suddenly feel hyper aware of the clothes clinging to your body from all the sweat and you begin to mindlessly pull and tear on them.

"Hey, hey shh, it's okay.", Kaeya's voice comes from next to you. You can hear that he has to force himself to sound calm, and that doesn't exactly help you to relax.

He then gently takes ahold of both your wrists, placing your hands of his chest as he begins to talk to you. "Hey, focus on me, (name). Focus and take a deep breath in. Here, I'll do it with you."

He guides you through it and after a couple of minutes, it helps and you feel yourself calming down again. He still continues on like that for a bit longer.

"Better?", he asks after you calmed down enough and your breathing evens out again. You nod slightly, but the memories of the terror you felt still haunt you, your ears and tail tucked close to you.

Kaeya also takes notice of this and tries to think of a way to help you out. He comes up with an idea that might help you relax, so he gives you a kiss to your cheek, before he tells you his idea. "How about you take a quick shower, hm? Your clothes must stick uncomfortably. While you do that, I'll make you something hot to drink. Does that sound good?"

Again, you only manage a weak nod of your head, but it's enough for him. Kaeya then helps you stand up and walks to the bathroom with you, helping you out of your drenched clothes. He makes sure you get in the shower safely before shutting the door. He then goes back to the bedroom and takes out a set of your favourite, comfy clothes for you to put on afterwards. Then, he's in the kitchen, preparing a hot chocolate in your favourite mug, since this one can hold the most content inside of it.

After several minutes, you open the bathroom door again, dressed in the clothes he put out for you, hair still wet from the shower. He softly winks you over and you go to sit next to him on the bed. He offers you the hot beverage and you take it from him, thanking him silently.

Then, he takes a comb from your nightstand and turns around to you. "May I?", he asks with a soft smile. You look at the comb in his hands, then at him and a small blush spreads on your cheeks as you nod and turn around, allowing him to brush out your tail.

He goes to work, gently working through the hair and combing it out tenderly. Moments like these are when you truly feel loved by him, when he does those things for you without expecting anything in return from you.

It's quiet in the room, but your ears still pick up on silent sounds, and right now, you close your eyes and focus on Kaeya's calm and steady heartbeat as he grooms your tail.

Soon enough, the nightmare is pushed to the back of your mind and you find yourself cuddled up against him, your tail wagging happily behind you as he holds you close to him, whispering sweet nothings into your ear, telling you over and over again how much he loves you, that he'll always stay right by your side.

[barbwritesstuff]

1/?

Ashdhdhsg ok if you don’t mind my Chris obsession in your inbox, here’s some more!

Some disclaimers:

1) this is going to get. um. pretty granular.

2) I'm code diving for the sake of optimizing my Comparative Chris Studies.

3) My analysis going to be filtered through the lens of my own playthroughs and emotional reactions.

4) I will be asking lots of questions, mostly rhetorical - I am simply enchanted by the possibilities of the text. Please don’t answer any of them unless you really feel like it - I don’t want to bombard you!!

5) This is already pretty lengthy and I'm far from done -_-; I'm numbering these asks to avoid confusion.

Beginning from the beginning: Chris suing for everything is sooo awful I love them. The later reveal that they’re a lawyer is insane context for the first divorcee scene:

“there is no going back once there are lawyers involved. There is no hope for a reunion, or even an amiable end. Lawyers mean two things. Pain and paper. That's the only way this can end now. Pain and fucking paper.”

Jesus Christ mc, tell me how you really feel. The way this frames their perception of the entire relationship as doomed from the beginning, even if it's just subconscious? The way it frames their perception of Chris as a person? ouch.

Early Chris is so interesting from meta perspective. In these early scenes, your reading of their character changes pretty drastically with your assumptions about the relationship and the character/personality of your own mc. You can totally play as an mc who justifies this kind of treatment and is as uncommunicative, unreliable, and unable to let things go as Chris later accuses them of being and has imploded the relationship on the strength of their own bad behaviour, but if you interpret the relationship as ending more from mutually terrible communication skills and regular stressful life stuff? Going scorched earth like this can’t be seen as self protective in the same way - it’s so extreme. It's fun to ponder on Chris containing all of these messy and intricate possibilities regardless of worldstate. This is the kind of thing I love about interactive fiction as a medium, and you handle it so precisely and delicately here, leaving so much room for the player to build their own character while remaining grounded in the story.

The line that’s been stuck in my head since the first time I read it was this one:

“You got Spaghetti before you even met that lying arsehole.”

The mc is either accusing Chris of being a liar in general (which strikes me unlikely from the sense of the character that we get later) or of being a liar within this specific scenario, the divorce. So what did they lie about? Are they not honouring a prenup? or was there no prenup, only a verbal agreement to split things fairly and lovingly in the impossibly unlikely event of a divorce? Is the mc upset specifically about the breaking of marriage vows? Chris clearly has gotten their ducks in order before serving the mc with the divorce papers (another revealing fragment of character that I obsess over. what was up with that). Is it the fact that they must have been planning to break up for a while and instead of navigating it mutually decided instead to blindside the mc? How do you go from wanting to raise a child with someone to coming right out of the gate with a litigious divorce within a few months?

I want to live inside their walls. who said that.

Copy + Paste:

2/?

Side note 1: that waitress seems really sweet cool and genuinely concerned over the mc :(

Side note 2: vampires flush when sated 👀

Side note 3: 911 calls are generally recorded and can often be accessed after the fact with freedom of information requests. Could Chris have unearthed it during their later search for mc? How creepy, if they did. Heavy, panicked breathing, the crunch of broken glass, the call just disconnects. Confirmation of something awful but beyond understanding.

They way you get me immediately into full breakup mode with one line:

"Come back in the morning," Chris says in that slow, specific way, as if speaking to a very young, very stupid child.

IRL that would be an instant blind rage button for me lmao. How dare you speak to me that way. And again! From Chris’s perspective this is a pretty reasonable boundary! but they way they lay it out is so. IDK. Unbecoming. Unworthy of them. plain mean.

There’s this real sense I get from both sides of the relationship of “I’m not sure I ever even really knew this person” the love WAS there and it was real but in the fog of bitterness and anger they both lose sight of it and each other. There's a through line in this part of the game of the way high emotion can mess with your perception of reality and rational decision making.

“It wasn't all bad, was it? There were times you were happy together. Not that anyone would believe it, reading this.”

I interpret this line as the MC doubting Chris's fundamental intentions and affections. Coupled with Chris's lack of concern over the mc's disappearance (put a pin in it) it's just so INTERESTING to be the way that these two have come to see each other almost as strangers, which is really scary and alienating! Neither can give the other an inch of grace or benefit of the doubt. the cognitive dissonance is so compelling to me.

You've had all of these intimate moments, potentially a CHILD (a grandchild, a whole lifetime), with a person you now cannot recognize, who's actions you cannot understand. Of course Chris isn't going to let mc into their house, they could have been anywhere, doing anything, for two months now! the thought that it might not have been by anything but MC's own volition is anathema.

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I'm living for this Chris deep dive that landed in my inbox.

However, I really don't know if i can say anything without spoiling the game... so I'm sharing without comment. 💙