#how to get activation code for netflix

[wuahae]

☼ dayglow

pairing: mingyu x f!reader

wc: ~19k

synopsis: in which it's the summer before college, the new lifeguard is a pain in your ass, and you just want to have fun surfing before you have to leave it all behind.

notes: lifeguard!mingyu, surfer!reader, brief one-sided enemies-to-lovers, summer-before-college!au, netflix coming-of-age romcom coded, set in hawaii, special thanks to @husbandhoshi for helping me with the finishing touches mwah <3

It’s the sign of summer—water glistening in midday sunlight, loud chatter from families with beach blankets and baskets ready for a relaxing day out, people littered throughout the expanse of sand ready to sunbathe their vacation time away. Sun and sea salt, what more could you ask for?

A lot, apparently. And quite frankly, you think it’s ridiculous.

It’s almost unfair how the cards have so ruthlessly turned against your favor, especially on what you consider your turf. As hard to believe as it may be, especially with the current…state of things, your favorite beach used to be quiet before this summer. The only activity you would really see would be an occasional elderly couple taking their evening walks along the sand or rare sparse picnic blankets spread out for a quiet sunset date. Even the seabirds didn’t cause much of a ruckus here.

That was until him—the bane of your existence, the unwitting source of all your social migraines, the tragic end to your peaceful solitude: Kim Mingyu.

Apparently, spending his summer as a beach lifeguard was of the utmost importance to him, and with his grandpa as the previous lifeguard for the past decade, getting employed at this particular beach was basically guaranteed. Not much to complain about, in concept, just a guy fresh out of high school looking for a quick, easy buck—you respect it, even. But when his idea of ‘summer fun’ comes at the expense of your own peace and quiet, you think it’s only reasonable that his name leaves a distaste in your mouth.

His first day on the job, someone (you think it was the girl who pretended she couldn’t swim) had spilled that local hottie Kim Mingyu was working shifts as a lifeguard at this hidden beach, and no less than twenty-four hours after, googly-eyed teenagers (and single moms) ready to take in the latest local attraction began populating his shifts. And unfortunately, the googly-eyed teenagers just happened to include your best friend, meaning you were spared no solace from the presence of your worst enemy.

“I just think he’s so…” Chaeyoung sighs, hand under her chin as she lays sprawled on the beach blanket. You think she would start kicking her feet if it wasn’t so unbecoming to do outside of the privacy of her bedroom. “So…”

“Annoying?” you pitch in, popping a strawberry in your mouth. “Obnoxious? Tacky? Unnecessary?”

“Dreamy…” she finishes, a long glance drifting to his lifeguard tower. You can practically see the hearts coming from her eyes. Her head snaps to you, finally registering your interruption. “What do you mean unnecessary…” She’s incredulous. “He’s serving his community! Protecting the local beachgoers!”

“Exactly, this is a beach,” you point out, gesturing around you. “What even happens here?” 

Chaeyoung sits up, passionate. “A lot!” she exclaims, hands gesturing in emphasis. “Rip currents! Heat strokes! Drowning kids…drowning kids!”

You look at her plainly. “You know none of that happened here before Mingyu came along.” The last lifeguard spent his time falling asleep on the tower balcony, sunscreen smeared on his nose and all.

“Exactly…” She leans in, eyes narrowed. “You know what, I think those single moms are telling their kids to fake-drown so that Mingyu will have to save them. I heard this lady tell her eight-year-old she’d buy him malasadas if he went into the deep end.”

“Chaeyoung.”

“What! It’s true…" She ponders a little, shifting the sunglasses on top of her head. "They're definitely onto something though. Do you think I—"

"Chaeyoung."

"It would be the perfect opportunity!" Chaeyoung clasps her hands together, voice dreamy as she imagines it in her head. "I'd 'accidentally' make my way into the deep end—suddenly I can't swim, I've ingested too much water and by the time Mingyu's able to rescue me…" she trails off, turning to you with starry eyes. "He gives me mouth-to-mouth…"

"He'd break your ribs with chest compressions."

Chaeyoung places a hand on your arm, grave. "It would be worth it."

You can’t even control the utterly exasperated sigh that escapes you, pinching the bridge of your nose as you reach for another strawberry. “What do you even see in him anyway?” You wrinkle your nose, feeling yet another Mingyu-induced migraine coming. “He’s not all that.”

"Yes he is!" Chaeyoung insists, waving the tiny fruit fork at you. "He's hot, he's well-mannered, he's good with kids, he's hot—"

"You said that already."

"It needs to be emphasized twice." This is serious business for Chaeyoung. "Have you even seen him?"

"Yes," you respond dryly, rolling your eyes, "and he's still not all that." You hold your hand out, counting down your fingers. "He takes this job way too seriously for one—"

"It shows dedication—"

"There is no job where he needs to be doing all…" you gesture to him up on that lifeguard tower sitting on that stupid stool of his—shirtless, binoculars strung around his neck, his red swim trunks an inseam inch too short. Insufferable. "...That. He probably does it on purpose."

Some girl in the distance, too busy watching Mingyu, trips over her little brother and faceplants into the water.

Chaeyoung shakes her head. "No way is he trying to look that hot."

"Of course he is," you retort. "Just look at the amount of sunscreen he wears." Mingyu downright glistens with the amount he puts on his body, only serving to accentuate his tanned, toned muscles. (You won't deny what's right in front of you, after all, but only to yourself. You would rather die than admit you find any part of him attractive out loud, especially to Chaeyoung.) It just has to be on purpose. 

"What does he even need that much for?" you add on, insistent. "He's up in that tower all damn day."

Chaeyoung lightly swats at you. "That just means he takes care of his skin…" she lets out another dreamy sigh. "Isn't it nice that he cares."

"That is just some guy."

Chaeyoung flops defeated onto the blanket. "You just think that because you knew him in high school."

Ah, yes. Kim Mingyu, fellow classmate for all four years of high school. Before he was the bane of your existence, he was just that kid you knew in homeroom, the boy who kept trying (and failing) to balance pencils on his nose, the centerpiece of the notorious sophomore year incident where he tipped back his chair too far back and crashed right as the vice-principal walked in for the monthly classroom evaluation, the kid who napped through most of your third period precalc classes because he couldn't, for the life of him, care about unit circles and piecewise functions. He still never returned that pen you let him borrow in English that one time during senior year.

So no, you really don't get all the hype around him. 

Chaeyoung is still off in her own little world. "Do you think he needs help putting on sunscreen? Or better yet, do you think he would help me put on my sunscreen—"

You let out a noise of dismay, reaching over to your bag and tossing a can of spray-on sunscreen over to her. "You can do it yourself."

She slaps a hand over her chest, wounded. "You're always so mean to me…" Chaeyoung wipes a fake tear, clutching onto the spray can. "Where is your sense of imagination, of romance?"

Standing up, you brush off stray sand from your bottom before you reach for your surfboard lying next to the blanket. "Sorry if I'm not delusional, Chaeyoung."

She grumbles your words under her breath, imitating your cadence and all, and she makes sure you catch all of it before you walk away. "'Delusional deshmusional,' no wonder you're single."

You send her an unamused look. She counters with a petty "Hmph," nose turned up in the air, then flips over to sunbathe. 

Rolling your eyes, you hoist your board up to your side and make your way towards the shore, expertly sidestepping the little kids playing tag, and you walk past Mingyu's lifeguard tower.

"Hey, Y/N," he calls down from above, a little smile and wave accompanying it. You squint up at him, a hand on your forehead to block the sun. You suddenly recall a past conversation with Chaeyoung, similar to all the conversations concerning Mingyu you have with your friend. 

("It's like when I look up at him he glows…"

You dryly retort back at the memory of your friend. That's just the sun blinding you.)

"Catching waves again?" Mingyu asks, and if it weren't for your crippling desire to not make enemies with people who don't reciprocate the same animosity, you would have given him a sarcastic gesture to the surfboard in your arms and a dry "what do you think?" to accompany it.

But Mingyu is nothing but earnest and unknowing, much to your chagrin, and you can sense his puppy-like desire to be friendly with an old high school classmate even through those obnoxious designer sunglasses he has sat on his nose. So you settle for thinly veiled politeness instead, nodding your head when you hum your confirmation. "Just the usual."

He grins at that, along with his standard "have fun!" and you give him a civil smile and thanks before making your way to the water. 

The waves lap at your feet the instant you arrive, sand between your toes, and you think you'll miss this when you leave. The ocean, the air, the people.

But if there's one thing you're certain of, you think, paddling further into the water. Kim Mingyu is not going to be a part of that list.

"So let me get this straight," Seungkwan says, agonized. "You're telling me you haven't even started sending in profiles for your incoming freshman class's Instagram?"

You're slow on the uptake, apparently. "Yes… Was I…supposed to?"

No amount of caricature drawings could truly encapsulate the horror in Seungkwan's face. "It's already August!"

“Again,” you repeat, leaning against the counter. Island music crackles quietly out of the old speaker in the corner of the room. “Why does it matter?”

“You leave at the beginning of September, which means there’s only a few more weeks until you’re up in the mainland all alone—in California, no less!” Seungkwan places a hand on your shoulder, pitying eyes looking you up and down. “You know you need all the help you can get making friends…”

“Hello?” you exclaim, dismayed. “I have friends!”

Seungkwan is unconvinced. Unimpressed, even. “Yeah? Who, the fish you surf with?”

“You literally just hung out with Chaeyoung last week.”

He dismisses your defense with a handwave and a shake of the head. “Chaeyoung doesn’t count, she’s the unfortunate product of childhood friend loyalty.”

You feel so wronged. “What about you?”

Seungkwan sighs dramatically, hand to his chest in faux sentiment. “I do have a knack for charity, don’t I…”

“Says the guy who practically begged me to work here with him so he wouldn’t be lonely on shift.”

Boo’s Shave Ice, the go-to local favorite, your place of employment for the past four summers ever since Seungkwan met you in freshman Racket Sports and dragged you up the rankings in Badminton King’s Court until you were reigning champions for the rest of the semester. He had claimed that working at his family’s shave ice place with him was payment for having him carry you all semester (not that you asked), but you figured having an easy place of employment for extra money towards college savings was always a good idea.

“I’m just saying,” Seungkwan insists, and you can almost sense a shred of sincerity in him. “Me and Chaeyoung aren’t gonna be there with you up there, Y/N. I’m worried.”

You let out a long sigh, and you’re about to open your mouth to retort some cliché reassurance you’ve parrotted a hundred times before when the bell jingles at the door. Your best customer service smile slips on your face and you turn to cheerfully greet the incoming customer. “Welcome to Boo’s Shave—” your breath hitches “—Ice.”

It’s Mingyu. With his gaudy board shorts always an inch too short, his button up shirt with too few buttons actually used, his toes exposed in flip-flops just to top it all off. Like you needed your day to get worse.

“Hey, man!” Seungkwan calls, extending his hand over the counter for a crisp handshake. All of your friends are uncaring of the torment this man adds to your mortal coil, you lament. Maybe Seungkwan was right, maybe you should start finding some new friends on the incoming freshman Instagram page. “What can I get for you?”

“Just the usual,” Mingyu responds, fishing out his wallet from his pocket. “With mochi this time.”

Seungkwan nods, reaching for the stack of paper bowls. “On it!”

While he gets to work with the three bottles of fruit syrup and freshly shaved ice in the bowl, you slink away to the cashier to check out Mingyu’s order. “Rainbow with condensed milk and mochi?”

“Yup,” he responds, grinning, his canines annoyingly sharp and obvious. You call out his price and spin the iPad around for him to insert his card, and while Mingyu waits for the payment to process he starts talking. “I saw you do that aerial yesterday,” he says, and you almost startle. “Very impressive.”

You almost want to be defensive about it, badger him on why he was watching you surf when there were clearly more people on that beach yesterday in need of his…attention. But you tamp it down, laughing awkwardly as you look to the side to check on Seungkwan’s progress before looking back at Mingyu. “Thanks, I…” Just what are you supposed to say to that. “Worked hard on it?”

Mingyu laughs, tapping on the screen before taking his card out. “Yeah, I’m sure. I’ve heard a lot of highlights from Gramps about your old surf meets.”

Your smile tightens a little, heart squeezing at the mention. “Ah, yeah. The good old days.”

“You’re going to California for school next year, right?” Mingyu asks, eyes brightening. “Congrats on that, by the way! It’s not every day you hear about someone local going out of state for college. Are you gonna keep surfing when you’re there?”

“I, um—” you make a quick glance at Seungkwan—how long does it take to make a single shave ice—and his eyes meet yours, catching your silent cry for help.

“Your shave ice is ready, Mingyu!” Seungkwan exclaims loudly, half-slamming half-sliding it across the counter. “Have a nice day!”

“Oh,” Mingyu’s attention is successfully diverted, grabbing his bowl. “Thanks, man.” He turns, not before waving at you with his spare hand and a spoon in his mouth. “See you around, Y/N.”

You never thought the door jingle would be such a relieving sound until you heave out a long breath when the door closes, bracing your hands on the edge of the counter as you slump forward, eyes closed. Seungkwan’s presence looms over you, and you know he’s standing arms crossed and foot tapping without having to look.

“So,” he starts lightly. “What was all that about?”

Turning your head slowly to face him, Seungkwan has his lips tilted in a slight frown, forehead with a slightest crinkle of worry. “I know you’re not the biggest fan of him, but you’ve never gotten all tense like that before.” His frown deepens, opening his mouth to choose his words carefully. “Was it because he brought up surfing when you—”

“Seungkwan.” 

It slips out harsher than you mean it to, and you’re already fumbling over your words trying to pick up the pieces, but Seungkwan’s mouth snaps shut, apologies written all over his face. “Sorry,” he mumbles, fiddling with the rim of his plastic glove. “My bad.”

You make a small, pitiful noise, waving your hand to clear the air. “No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to snap like that.”

Crackly island music continues playing through the speaker, air conditioning whirring loudly in the background. Seungkwan tries again, hesitant. “Are you okay, though?”

“Yeah.” Your chest is tight. You can’t breathe. “I’m fine. Look,” you nod your head to the family walking up to the store, chattering away excitedly. You can spot a tourist family from a mile away. “Customers are coming.”

The bell jingles, and a smile plasters on your face again. Like truth, like habit.

“Hi! Welcome to Boo’s Shave Ice—what can we get started for you today?”

The view of the beach was always best looking from above, you think. Feet dangling from the edge of the open back of your Jeep, you soak in the sound of the waves crashing into the rocks and the way the sun warms your skin as you sit parked on the beach lookout.

Chaeyoung swings her feet next to you, bikini top and denim shorts clad, peering over at your acai bowl before pointing with her spoon. Wordlessly, you tilt your bowl over, to which she takes a spoonful with a happy shoulder wiggle and a grin.

“So, what’s the verdict?” she asks, spoon in her mouth as she swipes through her phone gallery. “I think the first three are the best for posting, but also I don’t want to overlap pictures in our posts.” Chaeyoung taps a manicured finger on her chin, then nudges her phone at you. “Which ones do you want to post?”

You hum, swiping through the favorited pictures. The pictures themselves were nothing special, if you were being honest. Just the casual beach day poses and candids, but Chaeyoung had insisted on having as many pictures taken this summer as possible to keep as an archive before you had to leave.

“I like this one,” you point, handing the phone back to her. “I’ll just post that.”

“That’s it?” Chaeyoung questions, eyes wide. “But… but the slideshow…”

“You can post a slideshow,” you tease, taking a spoonful of her acai bowl. “You have all the rest to choose from.”

She pouts at you, taking a bite of her own food. "If you wanna be that way.”

“Send me all of the pictures though,” you add on. They’d be good to add into your collection of ‘The Summer Before College’ memories.

Chaeyoung rolls her eyes, scoffing. “Duh, I’m already on it. By the way, I heard from Seungkwan you were gonna send in a post to the freshman page?”

You groan, flopping back into the open space of the trunk. “Don’t even remind me, he was nagging me about sending one in all shift last weekend.” Spoon held with emphasis, you shake it in indignancy. “Did you know he said I didn’t have any friends?”

“Well, babe…”

“Et tu!”

She winces, and at least you can say she’s more apologetic about it than Seungkwan was. “Aw, don’t be like that. You know you take a while to warm up to people. Besides, I’m your friend!”

You turn over to your side, grumbling. “Seungkwan said that’s only because of childhood friend obligations.”

Chaeyoung blows it off with a small “psshh” and turns to lay down beside you, propping herself up on her arms. “Please, everyone knows that childhood friends have a four-year long-distance expiration date. And look,” she tucks her chin into her hands for extra effect. “I’m still here!”

“Bummer…”

Chaeyoung coos, wrapping an arm around you and pulling you onto your back again. “You know you love me. And Y/N,” she says, poking your cheek. “Stop being a worrywart.”

“I am not—”

“Yes you are,” she insists, bobbing her head. “See, you’re already developing wrinkles right here—” a thumb presses between your furrowed brows “—and college hasn’t even started yet!” Chaeyoung sighs, fretting. “No wonder you’re single—”

“I’m fine,” you counter, exasperated, swatting her thumb away for good measure. “Both you and Seungkwan have nothing to worry about.” You pause, before snapping your head to her. “And stop saying that! You’re single too!”

“But I have options,” Chaeyoung emphasizes, tucking her hand back under her chin. “You know Joshua from the oriental medicine shop?”

“Hong?”

“Yeah, Joshua Hong…” Her legs start kicking and her hands fly to her cheeks. “I think he likes me, Y/N!”

“What makes you think that?” you ask, doubtful.

“You know how my grandma always drinks her medicinal tea, right? Well, last week I went to pick up her prescription ‘cause my parents were busy with work, and when we looked at each other…” Chaeyoung pauses her tangent to look at you with sparkling eyes. “You just had to be there, Y/N, it was love at first sight, I’m telling you! And he was such a gentleman when I asked for the medicine…”

“Chaeyoung, I’m pretty sure he was just doing his job?”

“I’m in love…”

You snort, patting her on the arm. “Good luck with that.”

“Do you want me to set you up with someone too? I know some people!”

“For the last time I’m not dating Soonyoung—”

“But why not—”

“Because he thinks he’s a tiger!” you exclaim, and Chaeyoung pauses before bursting into giggles, falling down next to you. As infectious as ever, your smile rises despite your previous objections, which then turn into matching laughter alongside Chaeyoung. You think it’s nice, not being made to think about your worries when you’re with her.

There’s an unwritten rule, put into play ever since Chaeyoung moved back to the island after four years away: to not mention the future. As trivial as it may have seemed, it was important. To two kids between the cusp of childhood and adulthood, you wanted to at least have somewhere you didn’t have to worry about anything the world threw at you, where you could just be yourselves.

You knew too much of what you were supposed to become, and Chaeyoung knew too little, but at least you had a place where none of that mattered.

“Oh,” Chaeyoung perks up, still giggling. “I almost forgot. Do you have a shirt you could lend me?”

You hum, reaching over to a small bag you have stashed away in the corner of your trunk. “Yeah, why?”

“My shift is a little after this and I forgot to bring an extra shirt,” she agonizes. “And my manager already doesn’t like me.”

You toss your extra shirt to her, and she sighs in relief. “Thank you, you’re a lifesaver.”

“Should we get going then?” you ask, hopping off the back of your Jeep. “I doubt your manager would be happy with you being late again.”

Chaeyoung protests, desperate to prove her innocence. “I was late twice—”

“And you’re gonna be late a third time if you don’t get in!”

You didn’t expect anyone else to be here.

Not at the early daytimes of the morning when the sun has just barely peeked its head out from under the horizon, not when the sky is flushed a soft rose and gold over the ever expansive sea. It was rare to see people at the beach this early in the day, and even rarer to see people at this particular beach at this time. Most people wouldn’t start flooding into the beach until noon, when Mingyu’s shifts would start.

Which is why it shocks you to see Mingyu walking out of the water, hair dripping, surfboard in hand. He doesn’t seem to expect seeing you either, with how he visibly jumps when he catches sight of you.

“Oh, hey,” he says, the greeting still slipping out despite his surprise. “You almost scared me, you’re not usually here this early.”

“Ah, well, I heard the waves would be pretty good today. And you know me,” you respond awkwardly, gaze slipping down to the board at his side. “Always itching to ride the best waves.”

Mingyu laughs at that, carding a hand through his hair, wet tips already starting to curl at the ends. “Yeah, I remember. You used to skip first period all the time when the surf was good. Mrs. Kim ended up giving up on you showing up for class during surfing season as long as you would make up the work later.”

You smile wryly at that, a rush of embarrassment warming your chest, diluted only by the nostalgia of it all. “I never ended up apologizing to her for that. I think I stressed her out way more than I should have.”

“Couldn’t have stressed her out more than me,” Mingyu jokes. “If you ever end up going back to apologize to her, take me with you. I never said sorry for sleeping through all of her classes either.”

You stifle a laugh at that, grinning up at him. “That’s right, I almost forgot. I don’t think you were awake for any classes before lunch.”

Mingyu whines, shaking his head. “Can you blame me? Those classes were earlier than any normal person could be awake for.”

Teasing, you raise your brow. “And yet here you are now, up even earlier than any of our classes ever were. By the way,” you mention, gesturing to his side. “I didn’t know you surfed?”

He pauses at that, like he almost forgot about the surfboard in his hand. If you didn’t know any better, you would almost think he starts fidgeting at the mention, with how he rotates the board up and leans it from one hand to the other. As if he was nervous at being caught, like he wanted it to go unmentioned—unnoticed.

“I don’t, really,” Mingyu says eventually, rubbing the back of his neck. A drop of water falls from a strand of his hair, soaking into the sand. “Gramps just taught me when I was young, and I just do it sometimes for fun.”

“Isn’t that what surfing is though?” you question, tilting your head. “Fun?”

“Yeah, but, I don’t know,” he fumbles hastily, trying to think of the right words to say. “I wouldn’t really say I surf though,” Mingyu settles on eventually, and the word carries a weight you’re unfamiliar with. “Not like you.”

Like me?

Mingyu can see the visible confusion in your eyes and he just smiles, picking up his board. “Nevermind. That probably sounded stupid, huh?”

“Huh? No, I—”

“Hey,” he interrupts, and the tilt of his lips is something you’ve never seen before. It’s appeasing, subdued, almost like he’s let go of something important for the sake of something else. “Don’t even worry about it. Have fun surfing, okay?" Mingyu takes a few steps, before turning back with slight embarrassment on his face. "And if it’s not too much to ask, could you keep this whole thing—” he gestures to the board “—a secret?”

You want to pry for an explanation, press him until he's forced to spill. He was never good under pressure, which is why you’re almost tempted to make him crack to satiate your curiosity, but maybe it's because you know that about him that you decide to bite your tongue. Because the way Mingyu talks about surfing is unfamiliar to almost everything you thought you knew about him—like you’ve stumbled across something you weren’t supposed to see, like you’ve accidentally dug a nail into the soft skin of a tangerine with the secrecy he’s asked of you.

So you utter a single “okay,” and watch the relief wash over Mingyu’s face at your small nod. He thanks you in the same breath he says his goodbyes, and he doesn’t wait for your response before he jogs away.

The moment still lingers in your mind when you paddle out into the ocean, and even afterwards, when you’ve satiated your appetite for a morning surf. It comes back into the forefront in flashes at unexpected moments—the light blush of sunrise, quiet waves lapping at the shore, the sincerity in Mingyu’s smile before he left. The orange stain of the rind doesn’t feel as bad as you thought it would, you come to accept hours later, laying on your bed. 

The smell of citrus is almost nice, the way it lingers.

It was supposed to be a small occasion. Just your parents and a couple of aunties and uncles that were close enough to share your goodbye dinner with. But like all small occasions go, your parents get ambitious and prideful and suddenly there's a feast in the kitchen hefty enough to feed a dozen people.

If you were being honest, the party was mostly for them. 

You personally couldn’t have cared less if they’d thrown an extravagant celebration complete with confetti and party poppers, or if they’d just given you a pat on the back and a gift card for future Starbucks runs—your parents had already done enough for you to feel loved. But for them, they wanted every chance possible to celebrate their little girl getting into college, moving away from home, taking her first steps into adulthood. So you bite down your objections about the festivities your dad insists on hosting, try to match your mom’s enthusiasm for DIY dorm decor and tourist destinations around campus, and let your parents enjoy what’s left of the summer with the child they’ve grown to know.

“Here,” your mom says, shoving a batch of napkins and plastic utensils into your hands. “Set these on the table in the garage, I need to get ready before the guests get here.” And almost as if on signal, your uncles’ muffled guffaws from outside make their way through the house’s walls, and your mom lets out a gasp of panic. “Tell your father to keep them busy,” she says frantically, scurrying out of the kitchen. “They can’t see me like this.”

“Mom, you look fine,” you chide softly, walking to the door. “I’m sure no one will mind if you don’t have makeup on for a family dinner.”

“Tell that to your aunt,” your mom bites back, poking her head out of the bathroom. “I’ll never live down the shame if she ends up looking better than me at our party.”

You give her a good-natured eye roll and twist the doorknob to the garage, greeting the guests outside. At your appearance you’re met with a chorus of overlapping cheers and congratulations from everyone, pulled into hugs by aunties and having your hair ruffled and back patted (way too violently, in your opinion) by your uncles.

As lamely as you say your thanks and try to weave between sneak attack bear hugs, you can’t say this felt like anything but home—the familiarity you’ve grown accustomed to. But still, you have a reputation to uphold, so you quash down the sentiment of it all and set the napkins down onto the plastic table with a firm announcement. “Dinner’s ready in five! There’s more in the kitchen if anyone wants extra.”

There’s a cacophony of cheers, your mom finally enters the garage with perfectly touched up eyes and lips (a smug glance sent to your aunt, with a near identical makeup look powdered on), and the dinner party finally starts.

It starts off good-natured, as it always does. Calls to pass around the mac salad and shoyu chicken, empty beer bottles accumulating by the second at every uncle’s feet, the insistent ushering of aunties for you to have more food. But the topic of conversation veers into California, to the major you're studying and what you're bringing to the dorms and "Y/N, are you bringing your surfboard with you?"

Your mom asks it with the purest of intentions—something about how the surf must be good up there and she's always wanted to know what California beaches were like, and your dad adds with a puff of his chest how you'd only surf the best and you have to break their bubble of excitement with the news. 

"Oh I'm, um, not." Everyone at the table goes quiet. You push around the extra fried rice your auntie had scooped onto your plate. It tastes like sawdust. "Bringing it to California, I mean."

The table blinks at you (your uncles set down their beer bottles on the table in shock), and your aunt asks a single, “But why?”

The heat of everyone’s gaze bores into you, but all you can think of is the wood paneling peeling on the side of the house, the cabinets that your parents never got around to replacing even after the past termite infestation left them eroded and worn, the pictures and decorations your mom picked out and places purposefully on the walls to cover up the bits of chipping paint. “I just don’t think I’ll keep surfing when I’m there,” you say finally, stuffing a piece of chicken in your mouth. You try to resist the urge to shrink in your seat at the silence that follows.

(“What a waste,” your aunt whispers under her breath. She is rarely as subtle as she pretends to be, but you don’t even think she bothered pretending this time. )

“O-oh,” your mom tries, looking around the table to dissipate the mood. “That’s fine, sweetie, I was just wondering.” She nudges your dad, who proceeds to cough on his barbequed short ribs, then joins her in your defense.

“It’s normal for kids to grow out of their interests, we won’t force her to do anything she doesn’t want to do,” he agrees. “Besides, the surfboard is always going to be here waiting for her when she comes back, it’s not like she has nothing to come back to.”

“But what if she forgets everything?” your aunt prods, disapproval in her voice. “Then all those years of hard work would be for nothing.”

“Have some more faith in her!” your mom scolds, standing to get more food from the big platters at the center of the table. “Besides, she’s going to California! It’s only natural that she’d want to try new things!”

Your grip on your spoon tightens.

Want. Isn’t that a funny thing? You’re sure your parents wanted many things too—to finish college, to get a nice job in their respective careers and work to save up for a house in that nice area near the beach that they always dreamed about having, the same one they reminisce on every time they drive past it. Maybe even have enough savings set aside to send their kid to college all four years debt free, to not have to debate between buying monthly groceries and splurging on an expensive item to treat themselves. And you want too, of course you do—what person doesn’t? But ‘want’ is a thing of privilege, you’ve grown to accept. An object of desire for those who can afford it.

You are not one of those people. So you try to not torture yourself with unattainable possibilities, and you accept the things that simply cannot be.

Your mom tries to divert the topic of conversation to other things, tries to dissipate the thick and heavy sense of disapproval in the air. She asks you what else you’re packing for the flight, if you know anyone else from the islands going there, if you’ve made friends yet, to not hesitate if you miss anything from home because she’ll send a care package and all you can hear is the muffled roaring of ocean waves and seafoam at your fingertips and god you can’t do this. 

The chair almost topples over with the speed at which you stand up, half-eaten plate of food growing cold at the table as your mom gapes at you with a sentence left unfinished, still waiting to be spoken.

“Y/N…?”

“I need to go.” You can’t fucking breathe.

And there’s so much you can tell everyone there wants to say. You haven’t even eaten anything, there’s still cake they bought from your favorite bakery waiting in the fridge, you can’t just walk out of your own party and if this were a different day or maybe even at a different time you would have bitten your tongue until you could taste the metal and eat your cake, copper-coated and all, but in this very moment you just can’t do it. So you ignore your mother’s wide eyes and pretend not to hear the words lodged in her throat, and you run.

Past the balloons and banners your dad had strung up on the outside of the garage, past your uncles’ trucks parked along the sidewalk in the front of your house, all the way to your Jeep parked a couple blocks away, your surfboard still tied to the top of it. The sun is already deep below the horizon, the last bit of it turning the sky a rich orange and pink.

(Waves crashing on rocks. Sand troughs at the bottom of the ocean. Seafoam. Everything you love, everything you have to let go of.)

You drive.

By the time you get to the beach, the sky has already turned into more of a dark blue than its previous wash of color. Distantly, you remember the warnings your father had always told you about the sea, the dangers you could find yourself in if you didn’t go in with a clear mind. But through the haze of dinner flashing through your mind and the buzzing in your fingertips as you untie your board from the roof of your car, you can’t bring yourself to care.

Things flood your mind in short bursts yet all at once—care packages and chipping paint and scholarship funds and that look on your parents’ face when you told them you’d gotten into the business program and shit you just want to make them proud and pay them back for everything they’ve done and—

“Y/N! Hey, the beach is closing soon where are you—”

It’s Mingyu’s voice, you register, somewhere within the fray. Funny. You didn’t even know he worked this late. 

The thought is brief before you dive straight into the water.

It’s muscle memory from there, your body doing what you’ve trained it to do for years and years and years. You paddle out a long distance away before stopping and waiting for your next chance. Darkening waters, light dimming from the sky, you’re the farthest you’ve ever gone.

You need this, you tell yourself, eyeing an incoming cresting wave. You need this, you need this now, because you’ll never have it again. You can never have it again.

And as the wave comes, you do what you’ve done for what seems like a million times (you swim towards it and your foot plants onto the board and everything goes right), until you feel your balance shift, the board slips out from under your feet, and you go crashing into the water below.

Immediately, the current thrashes you back and forth, the pressure from above bearing down on you as you try not to flounder your way up to the surface. You feel your surfboard around you in the middle of the chaos, the leash attaching your ankle to the board circling around the coral reef beneath you. Dread swells in your chest as you tug your foot once, then twice. It doesn’t budge.

Water roaring in your ears, adrenaline thrumming through your muscles, you try to break the leash again, and again, and again. Panic fully setting in, you try to pull your foot out for the last time, and in the same second it manages to slip out, a small shadow of a rescue float splashes onto the surface of the water, followed by a much bigger splash of someone jumping in after.

You reach your hand up, a trace of longing within your fingertips, and a hand plunges into the water, traveling the distance to grasp onto yours. 

Grip firm, you’re pulled upwards in a quick surge until you break the surface of the water, coughing and gasping in desperately needed air. You cling with weak arms onto the float, eyes burning with seasalt, and you meet Mingyu’s gaze from across the tube. He holds your gaze for a split second before turning and grabbing the handle of the float, dragging it towards the jet ski he had ridden here.

It's a silent affair, the way he hoists you up onto the jet ski before getting on afterwards. Mingyu collects the tube from the water and speaks for the first time since he pulled you out of the water.

“Are you okay?” he asks, giving you a glance over. You want to say yes, I’m fine, but the words lodge in your throat before you can even start to form them on your tongue. 

In the distance, floating a ways away, is the top half of your surfboard, cracked and split clean into two.

You can only manage a quiet nod, the unspoken words melding into a lump. Mingyu follows your gaze out to where the half floats and he lets out a soft “oh” at the sight. Gently, he guides your hands around his waist to hold as he starts the jet ski again, riding back to shore.

Dusk turns the air cold, the wind drying the water droplets lingering on your skin. The rush of current still echoes in your ears, limbs aching from fading adrenaline, and your mind buzzes in a static standstill all the way back. The flush of embarrassment heats in your chest as you think more about it—the fact that you of all people would have to be rescued like this, that you would wipe out this severely on a wave and routine this simple, something you had regarded innate like clockwork. You almost want to crumple into yourself at the thought, and then you remember that you had left halfway through dinner in a big scene all for this.

(For the shame, for the twist of the weight in your stomach, for a broken board at the end of it all. You were just so tired.)

Mingyu gets off with you when you arrive at shore, leading you to the lifeguard tower and up the stairs with gentle hands, grabbing a towel from one of the tables and a stool for you to sit down on. He flicks on the lamp by the table.

“Stay here,” he tells you, draping the towel over you. “I’ll be right back.”

You almost want to ask where, but by the look he gives you, he doesn’t even have to tell you for you to know.

You clutch the towel tighter around your frame and you nod again, a quiet “okay,” to accompany it, and you watch as Mingyu goes back to the water, his figure growing smaller as he rides out to find the remaining pieces of your surfboard. It’s almost funny, the way everything turned out. You don’t even have a board left to take with you, even if you wanted to; you tell yourself it’s for the best, that lack of temptation.

Mingyu returns a few minutes later, tells you that he placed the board in the storeroom and when you’re ready to take it back you can just grab it from here. You nod again, silent, and he lets the tension stretch until he snaps it himself.

“What were you thinking?”

The question is asked calmly, maybe even with a little underlying heat in it, but you think you would have preferred if he was just angry at you. To yell at you, to tell you how stupid you were to go out and surf a wave you knew you couldn’t handle, that you should’ve known better. But at your silence, he crouches down to your level and asks again; he does everything but yell.

“What happened out there?” His eyes are wide, searching, sincere. Your nails dig into your palm, salt pricking your eyes. “Don’t you know it’s dangerous? I told you the beach was almost closed, didn’t you hear me? Do you even know what could have happened if I wasn’t…”

The sting of sea salt turns into a burn, the heat behind your eyes lodging in your nose, your throat—you can’t just blame it on the sea salt anymore when you sniffle, wiping the first few tears that escape with the back of your hand. “I’m sorry,” you warble, your apology thick and teary as the dam finally collapses. “Fuck, I’m so sorry—”

Mingyu looks positively lost the more tears slip down your cheeks, former scolding evaporating into thin air as he fumbles his way around the shed searching for tissues. “Hey, no, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make you cry, let me find you some tissues—” Mingyu knocks over a first-aid kit and stubs his toe onto the desk, stifling a whimper as he continues to hobble around “—I am so sorry please don’t cry—”

You sniffle through a giggle, and Mingyu stops. He turns to look at you with pitiful eyes and you wonder why exactly he looks like he’s about to cry too. Maybe the table leg really did do a number on his pinky toe. He offers you a tissue box, a little helpless. You take it with a watery smile.

A part of you still wants to hold onto the grudge you’ve held against him all summer, the you that stifles a sigh when he sneezes into his hands and laughs when he trips on the sand. It’s what you’re used to, what you’re comfortable with, a tiny slice of normalcy you’ve been aching for all evening. But the truth is—anything left of your pride has washed away with the tide and splintered with your broken board, and you can’t find it in yourself to be mad at him. Not even a little.

Mingyu shifts awkwardly as you dab away your tears, looking out the window before rubbing the back of his neck. “I’m gonna do a last check of the beach, okay? I’ll be back really soon.” He opens his mouth again as if to say more, but decides against it, turning back and forth before finally exiting the cabin and descending down the stairs. Looking down from the balcony, you can hear him muttering under his breath and smacking himself lightly on the head as his shoulders curl in from embarrassment.

You watch the sun dip completely under the sea as you wait for Mingyu to come back, the sky turning almost black in its absence. Trying to repress a shiver, you rub your arms absentmindedly through the towel as you watch Mingyu survey the expanse of the beach for any stray visitors, his single flashlight leading his location in the darkness. The last check is mostly just for warning. There wasn’t anyone to really stop people from trespassing after hours, but you know that Mingyu has to do his mandatory check and announcement that the beach was closed before any uncles wanting to do late night fishing or reckless teenagers hungry for quick thrills decided to pursue their activities at their own risk.

On his way back, the flashlight stops a little distance away from the lifeguard tower, hesitating, until you hear his soft steps outside before the door creaks open. Mingyu’s head pokes in.

“I’m done for the day,” he says, almost timidly. His eyes scan your face in the lowlight, as if searching for any remaining traces of tears in your eyes, and you can practically see the tension leave his body when you smile back at him.

Hopping off the stool, you meet him at the doorway, peering up at him still towel-swaddled. “Are you ready to head out?” Mingyu asks, and in the scattering dim lamplight, your eyes drift to the mole on the cusp of his jaw, the second on the tip of his nose. You wonder why you'd only noticed them now.

“Yeah,” you agree softly, ducking under his arm through the door. “Let’s go.”

The walk back to your Jeep is a quiet one, your feet shuffling in flip-flops as you and Mingyu try to match each other—Mingyu syncing his steps with yours, you quickening your pace to keep up with his long strides. It isn’t until you arrive that he speaks again, between the unlocking and opening of your trunk.

“What are you going to do now?” Mingyu asks, the lightpost flickering above you in short bursts (blink—blink—stay). The question is innocent, earnest, just like how Mingyu normally is. But still, your gut twists at the thought of ‘after.’ 

Sighing, you reach to pull a duffel bag from the back of the trunk to the edge. “Well,” you start out tentatively. “To be honest with you, I don’t really know.” 

Biting your lip, you zip open the duffel bag, rifling through the items. “It’s a little…complicated to go home straight away,” you confess, pulling out an extra pair of shorts, setting the extra undergarments you have to the side of the bag (Mingyu has the decency to avert his eyes). “So I really don’t…” have a plan, you mean to finish, but all that comes out of your mouth is “...shit.”

“Huh?” Mingyu’s head snaps to you before snapping away, squeezing his eyes shut to avoid catching unwelcomed glimpses of underwear. “Is everything okay?”

“Yeah,” you respond, but it sort of comes out as a mix between a pitiful moan and a mournful cry. You look at the inside of your bag in utter defeat. Even in the midst of the chaos of unfurled clothes, the absence of your extra shirt is glaringly obvious. You forgot to put another one in your bag after Chaeyoung took it last week. 

Imaginary Chaeyoung’s face appears in your mind, giving you a wink and a thumbs up with such gusto and infuriating enthusiasm that you’re already drafting your fifteen-line malice-filled text message to her, cursing her and her future generations and all. That is, until—

“Y/N?” Right. Mingyu was still here. You’re pretty sure he could see the despair radiating off of you in heavy and visible waves.

"No, everything's fine," you slump, face in your hands. "It's just my friend borrowed my only extra shirt and now I…" The wet swimsuit seems to cling even colder at the confession.

"Oh, I have an extra shirt in my trunk if you want?"

Perking your head up, your eyes practically sparkle. "Really?" You trail after him as he walks to his parked truck, opening the backdoor and taking out a small black bag and a wrinkled shirt inside it.

"Yeah, here—" he begins, but stops himself, taking a small sniff of the cloth before wrinkling his nose. "Actually, um, maybe you shouldn't borrow this after all…"

Your face falls; Mingyu catches it the moment it does.

"My house isn't far from here," Mingyu tells you, jabbing a thumb in the opposite direction of the beach. “I can lend you one of my shirts if we stop by?” His eyes are hopeful when he brings it up, like he wouldn’t be able to sleep well if he just let you go home in a cold, half-wet swimsuit top. “And—”

The distinct noise of your stomach growling interrupts him, and you both stop for a moment to truly register the sound. Mingyu looks down to your stomach, blinking, then turns away quickly to stifle his laughter. Heat flushes up your neck as your hands fly to your face, squeezing your eyes shut. 

There’s no way this is happening right now.

“I am so sorry, please ignore that,” you squeak, willing yourself to shrink down into microscopic particles and disappear, but Mingyu puts a hand on your shoulder right as you’re about to spiral in shame. 

“We can stop by my house,” he says gently, lips still quirking up at the corners, “and then we can get something to eat on the way back, okay?”

By the way he’s talking to you, you have a brief but horrid vision of your uncanny resemblance to a petrified hamster. But the warmth of his hand is still on your skin, and his eyes wait patiently for you to take up on his offer, so you let out a quiet, “okay.” 

(You figure it would be okay for you to run away for just a little longer, right?)

Mingyu grins in response, wide-toothed and lopsided, his hand slipping off of your shoulder to circle around to the driver’s side. You try not to notice the absence as you tug the handle of the car door open.

The little hula girl bobblehead on Mingyu’s dashboard wobbles to the tropical tunes playing through the stereo. 

You try not to stare at it for too long at a time (the rhythm is quite hypnotizing), but Mingyu notices your drifting glances making its way back to the figure and he jumps to explain. “It’s not mine, I promise,” he says lamely, gesturing towards it with a nod of his head. “My dad insisted on keeping it there when he handed the truck down to me; said since it’s older than me it has the right of seniority or something.”

Laughing, you shake your head, lips curled upwards. “No, no, it’s cute. Sounds like it means a lot to him.”

Mingyu exhales, exasperated, but it’s all lighthearted by the ease in his shoulders. “You could say that. A little too much, if you ask me.”

"But it's nice, isn't it?" you ask, peering at him. "To have him pass something so special down to you?"

He pauses, eyes fond when he nods. "Yeah, I guess so."

You soon arrive at a large gate a couple minutes later, sandwiched between two stone walls surrounding the perimeter of the property. It opens with a press of a button, Mingyu casually pulling into a driveway you’ve only ever had the privilege of seeing from a distance—longing looks from the sidewalk before you inevitably had to walk past, pictures online of houses one could only dream of having. Gravel crunches underneath the truck’s wheels as it slows to a halt, and Mingyu looks over at you, gesturing to the house. "Well, this is my place."

Hopping out, you try not to gape as you follow him to the front door, catching on the minute details of it all. The sleek pavement of the sidewalk leading up the front porch steps, the flowers and ferns in the front garden lush and vibrant with color alit with small garden lamps planted in the soil, an unblemished white painted on all sides of the house. The porch light flickers on the moment Mingyu steps on the smooth wood—warm, steady, alive.

Mingyu fumbles with his keys for a second before unlocking the house, shifting to the side for you to walk through first before following after. You wait patiently by the door while he flips on the lightswitch on the other side of the room, and it isn’t until he looks back at you and beckons you over that you trail behind him, feet shuffling in the house slippers he lends you.

“It’s a nice place,” you say softly when Mingyu slips into the laundry room, tossing his dirty spare shirt into the hamper. “Close to the beach, too.”

“Ah, yeah,” Mingyu shrugs, a half-hearted smile on his face. “It’s honestly more of my gramps’s than mine or my parents—he’s the one who bought it a long time ago—but I can’t say it’s not a nice place to live.”

You appreciate the honesty over forced humble pretenses; not that Mingyu was ever the type to try to appear different than who he really was, but you've spent far too much of your life trying to wade through false platitudes that his openness comes as a pleasant surprise. 

But even with its newly refurbished furniture and what Mingyu says to be freshly installed hardwood flooring, as you wander through the house, you realize it shows its age through the people living within it—the worn soles on his mother’s slippers that you’d borrowed, the gallery of pictures frames scattered across the hallway walls, scuffs on the family table you could only imagine came from old, infamous Mingyu mishaps.

Mingyu tells you he’ll be right back with an extra shirt and to make yourself comfortable, and you give him an acknowledging hum and nod in response, brushing your fingers lightly against the pencil marks etched into the wall beside his bedroom door, each line marked with an age as they climb up the wall. As you wait for him to rummage through his drawers, you turn back to the assortment of photos displayed on the wall, a small desk in the corner to display the trinkets that couldn’t fit on the main display. 

Sepia photos mixed with more modern, saturated prints, they’re all shots of who you deduce is Mingyu’s grandfather surfing, posing on the beach, a sweet wedding photo of Mingyu’s grandparents’ wedding reception with a matching picture of Mingyu’s parents’ reception placed right below, interspersed with pictures of Mingyu through the ages, his baby pictures and school graduations and everything in between (there’s a specific one you stop on for a little laugh, his middle school graduation picture with slicked gelled hair and a stiff, awkward smile appropriate for a thirteen year old in a suit too big around the shoulders). You stop on a particular framed film picture of Mingyu’s grandfather, smiling brightly at the camera with a surfboard in one hand and a shaka sign in the other; a smaller picture sits tucked in the corner of the frame—eight-year-old Mingyu, gap-toothed and cheesing, doing the same matching pose with his dad.

You’d be lying if the pictures weren’t adorable enough on their own, but what evokes an uncontrollably fond smile from you is Mingyu’s almost uncanny resemblance to his grandpa, down to the wolfish grin that both wear with ease. Everyone had always teased him about it, especially back in high school, but you had always thought that it was all just cliché small talk from adults until now.

His home wasn’t so different from yours, you think, when it boiled down to it. Beneath all the polished wood and marble countertops was just a place that stored memories, love told through marks of youth and increments of time.

“Hope you’re okay with this spare,” Mingyu calls as he exits his room, gently breaking you out of your rêverie. “If not, I can find something else?” 

You hum in response, glancing at the black shirt in his hands. “No, that should be fine,” you say, holding out your hand. “Is there a bathroom I can use?”

He points down the hall, then crooks his finger. “Go straight and it should be on your left at the end of the hall.”

“Great, thank you.”

Following his directions, you find the bathroom and shut the door quietly. You allow yourself a split second of admiring the interior (what a fancy sink.) before changing quickly into his spare clothes, stuffing your still-damp bikini top into the bag you had brought inside with you. Questionable print on the graphic tee aside, you would rather gratefully accept his kind gesture than be shivering and cold in your damp swimsuit.

When you return, you find him still standing at the photo gallery, the tips of his ears tinged scarlet; you think you’re imagining it at first, maybe a trick of the light, but when you walk closer and look again, his ears still burn, arguably even brighter with you staring at him like that.

Blinking, you almost ask if he’s okay before he speaks, his voice seeped in embarrassment. “You were looking at the pictures before, right?”

“Yes…?”

“Did you see the, um…” Mingyu squeezes his eyes shut, looking away. “Did you see the one from my middle school graduation.”

Covering your laugh with a short, obvious fake-cough, you shake your head vigorously, hands waving in emphasis. “What? I can’t say that I did.”

Mingyu’s voice borders on a whine. “You’re lying, you did see it, didn’t you?”

 “No, no!” You hold your arms out in front of you in an ‘X,’ shaking your head again. “Not a single thirteen-year-old Mingyu in sight! Promise!”

Narrowing his eyes suspiciously, Mingyu grabs his keys from the counter, walking towards the front door. He holds it open for you to walk through first (a common habit, apparently), but you can’t help the teasing remark that slips past when you pass through the door. “You were quite dashing with that hair, though. Did it take long to gel like that?”

“I knew it!”

The diner Mingyu drives you to sits on a wind-up path from the road between his house and the beach. It’s quiet when you enter, the bell above the door jingling quickly followed by Mingyu’s friendly greeting towards the diner staff. The cook waves at him through the kitchen window the minute he spots him, a welcoming holler shouted his way, and the waitress smiles as she reaches for the stash of menus hidden under the counter.

“Sit wherever you’d like,” she calls, “I’ll be right there!”

Mingyu nudges you with a prompting motion, and you rock on your heels looking around the diner before taking a seat at the booth second-closest to the door, Mingyu sliding into the booth across from you. The waitress comes seconds after, handing a single menu to you, along with two glasses of water; you look to Mingyu on instinct, but the waitress has you beat to it.

“The regular for you, right?” she asks, a brow quirked up in amusement, and Mingyu grins.

“You know me so well.”

She pokes at him with the butt of her pencil, teasing. “How could I not—you come here too much.”

Mingyu slaps a hand over his chest in faux hurt, but she ignores him smoothly, instead turning her attention to you. “Hi, I haven’t seen you here before? My name’s Hayoung, by the way!”

You startle at the sudden attention. “Oh! Yeah, I, um,” your eyes flicker to Mingyu, “Mingyu recommended it for a late night snack, I was kind of just following him.”

 She raises a brow at that, nudging Mingyu again with the pencil as she whispers. “Late night, huh?”

He smacks it away, hissing. “Not like that!”

Hayoung hides her smirk behind her notepad, waving his objection with a flippant hand. “Anyway, enough about him,” she says, turning to you again. “Have you decided what you want yet? I can totally come back if you haven’t!”

Scanning through the menu, you point to the first item that catches your eye. “Can I just have a club sandwich? With the fries as a side.”

“Yeah, of course! I’ll be right out with those in a second!”

Hayoung places her notepad back in her apron and skips back to the kitchen, though not without another sneaky glance at Mingyu and his returning exasperation at her not-so-subtle implications. Mingyu shoots her a dirty look with her back turned, ears burning, before turning back to you while he grumbles under his breath about how they were never going to let him live this down.

(Hayoung and the cook gossip in loud whispers a few feet away, something about “he brought a girl here…” and how they were so proud, they thought he was going to be single forever—)

You stifle a laugh behind a sip of your water, and Mingyu looks at you with a hand shielding his face from the other side of the diner. He is just exhausted.

“What’s your regular order?” you ask, throwing a line to help drag him out of sinking embarrassment. It was the least you could do, especially after filing away the knowledge of his middle school photo for a later time.

“A double cheeseburger,” he replies, slowly pulling himself out of his wallowing. “With fries.”

You nod. “Of course. You can’t skip the fries.”

“See! I knew you would get it!”

You settle into comfortable small talk soon after, reminiscing about old classmates and sharing stories from the summer. According to the grapevine, Soonyoung had landed himself into a bit of trouble after he was almost caught running around your old middle school track half-naked after a poorly executed dare. All the security guard’s flashlight had caught was a head of platinum hair and a glimpse of tiger print boxers, but those details could only really narrow it down to one person. 

(You had raised a brow in between laughs at Mingyu's involvement in the whole incident, but he insisted on his innocence and that he only heard about it from other people afterwards. You believe him, if only because of his inability to lie.)

Though, even if Mingyu tried his hardest to act natural, it wasn’t hard to pick up the way he tries to skirt around the elephant in the room. You think it’s more for your sake than his, but with the lull of silence that falls after each brief burst of conversation, his awkward flitting gaze from you to the table to the kitchen and back to the table reminds you of everything that’s happened tonight.

You don’t necessarily want to bring it up yourself either, what with the embarrassment that still clings to you at just the thought of the memory. You were the one who’d made a big scene out of something you definitely could have prevented, after all. And even after everything, Mingyu was still kind enough to invite you back to his house and lend you his clothes, going so far as to invite you out to his favorite diner. It seemed a little too much to ask him to bear the weight of your emotional burdens on top of everything else he’s done for you tonight.

But when Hayoung comes over with both of your plates and Mingyu begins to open his mouth to say something, only to stiffly eat a fry instead, it really hits you. He saved your life.

Mingyu had already seen the most vulnerable parts of yourself, your crumbling and the aftermath—what was a little more of yourself bared? Maybe it’s the clatter of the kitchen cleaning up and the warm, yellow light of the diner that allows your shoulders to drop; or maybe, maybe—

(You’ll be gone in a month, anyway. By the time you’re back, it’ll be winter, and you’ll come back to the eternal sunny skies, and this will all be behind you. But when the wound is still fresh and the sea salt still stings too much to tell the difference between honesty and shame, you allow yourself to indulge in your selfishness a little more tonight.)

“So, um,” you start, nibbling at a fry on your plate. “About what happened tonight.”

Mingyu stops, eyes widening. “You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to, it’s totally fine—”

“Mingyu,” you interrupt gently, meeting his gaze. “I want to.”

And so you tell him everything: the way your graduation dinner had fallen apart, that you ran away in the middle of your own party, the reason why you’d stupidly dove into a wave you knew you couldn’t handle.

“I just couldn’t do it anymore.” Your confession comes soft, an exhale more than anything. It was a relief, in a way, finally saying it out loud after months of stifling it down. It wasn’t that you hated the idea of knowing what your future was going to be—it had always seemed like a given, the foundation for a good life you’d been building since you were in high school: graduate with top marks from a good university, get a good internship and job offer straight after school so you could start earning money as soon as possible. All of that meant you needed to give up any distractions in the process, even if one of those distractions was the thing you loved most. “It’s like there was always this pressure on me, you know? From my parents, my other relatives, my friends…” It’s almost hard to admit, saying out loud for the first time. “But I guess most of it comes from myself. It always has.”

Mingyu keeps his eyes on you, nodding intently when you glance back at him periodically. But after you fall silent, finally relieving everything off your chest, he opens his mouth for the first time since he started listening. “Do your parents know? About the reasons why you’re really quitting surfing?”

You shake your head, a soft “no,” accompanying it. “I know they’d try to stop me. Try to convince me otherwise and maybe even send me that stupid surfboard a week later to make sure I still keep it.” You laugh a little at the image, surfboard crammed inside a big cardboard box taking up half the room in your shared dorm. 

“It’s not like they’ve ever put any pressure on me to do this for them or anything, and they’ve always supported me in whatever I wanted to do, but…” Your voice trails off, eyes falling to the half-eaten plate in front of you. “They gave up their dreams because of me.”

It’s strange, really. You never once thought you would one day expose the rawest part of yourself to Kim Mingyu of all people, but the words spill out before you can stop yourself. (Maybe when the night ends, you can blame this moment of vulnerability on him, on the earnestness in his eyes when he looks at you.)

“They should have completed school like they wanted to,” you say quietly. “Mom wanted to be a doctor, and Dad wanted to be the first one in his family to finish school and graduate. And they never did, because they chose to have me instead.” Your head tilts to the side, observing the diner. Hayoung types something rapidly on her phone hidden underneath the register, to which the chef sees through the kitchen window and tells her to get off her ass and start cleaning tables or something. She snaps back in a hushed voice that ‘Mingyu was having a moment…!’ which you pointedly ignore. “They’ve already given me so much love, I wanna show them that choosing to have me was the right decision. It wouldn’t be right of me to keep doing whatever I wanted without paying them back first, you know?”

So what if you had to give up surfing? That was why you went into the sea in the first place, right? To give yourself this one last thing, because you could never have it again—not really, not like this. Not that it mattered much in the end, anyway. 

The memory of the broken board floating on the surface of the waves flashes in your mind with a pang. With the surfboard gone, so is the temptation. Maybe it was for the best.

You breathe out, almost shakily, steeling yourself to look at Mingyu again. “That’s it, really. And I’m sorry. This wasn’t the kind of night I pictured having today, and I’m sure this…” you trail off, gesturing vaguely, “wasn’t the night you envisioned for yourself on a Friday night either.”

The fries are almost cold now, as you take another one to nibble on gingerly.

“No, don’t apologize,” Mingyu says, shaking his head. “It sounds like you have a lot on your plate.”

You shrug, smiling a little. “I guess you could say that.”

“But…” His next words come carefully, almost gentle, and you get the feeling he’s trying to avoid touching any nerves. “I just don’t think this is what your parents would have wanted for you.”

You must make a face, because Mingyu immediately backtracks, scrambling to rephrase his point. “Tell me if I’m overstepping, I really don’t mean to at all and I’m really sorry if I do, but...” He hesitates, slightly. “Do you remember when you saw me on the beach that one time?”

“You’d asked me to keep it a secret.”

He rubs the back of his neck. “I think I just didn’t want it to get out. It’s a small town, people talk.”

You tilt your head to the side. “Why would it matter, though?”

It was just surfing, wasn’t it?

“It’s like…” Mingyu trails off, pursing his lips in thought. “I like surfing, really. But it’s no secret who my gramps is.”

(His grandpa was the local legend, after all. Both breaking the record of the youngest to win the highly acclaimed annual surfing competition on the island and the one to hold the first place for the most years in a row, he was a pillar in the community, almost a local celebrity with how much he was admired and loved. It was how they could afford the house that they all lived in, why so many older adults looked at Mingyu with a generational fondness in their eyes, why there were so many childhood photos of Mingyu and his dad by the beach even though none of them really indulged in it as professionally as his grandpa did.)

“If people knew that I liked surfing, it would only be a matter of time before they would start expecting things from me, you know? Stuff like living up to my grandpa’s name or taking his mantle because my dad chose not to, continuing my grandpa’s legacy—it’s not what I want, and it’s not what my parents or my gramps want for me either.” Mingyu pauses. “They’ve always encouraged me to do things that I want to do, not things that I think that others want from me… and I think your parents feel the same.

“I get it, I really do,” he says, smiling a little, “but it’s not about what you feel like you owe them, or what you feel you need to do as an obligation. It’s about what you want, right? That’s what your parents would want for you too.” The bell jingles as a group of high schoolers come stumbling in, greeting Hayoung cheerfully, but it all fades to the background. ��And I know it feels wrong from everything you’re used to, but it’s okay—it’s okay to have both.”

You swallow hard, your cup of water empty of everything except for the little unmelted ice left. A small part of you wants to let his words bounce off you the way you have in the past, like how you’ve done every time Chaeyoung or Seungkwan tried to offer their own well-meaning advice, but you know it’s different this time.

Because he’s not Chaeyoung or Seungkwan, and you can tell he’s not just saying empty words to lift your burdens. And maybe there are still the differences you’d felt since the moment you met him, his house still a nice place near the beach, the paint not old and peeling, his family never having to live paycheck to paycheck to make ends meet, but he understood you in the ways that mattered. There was love in his house, the pencil marks etched in his bedroom doorway echoing the marker flowers still kept on your living room walls from when you were 3.

When you look out the window, his reflection stares back at you as much as yours does, and you see it clearly now. His desire to return the love given to him, the same steady weight of home that’s been like an anchor to him, all this time. It’s in him as much as it is in you.

You wonder for the hundredth time tonight how you ended up in this position, nearly dying and then pouring out your feelings out to the person who saved you, the same boy you had sworn to yourself you would never think of fondly. But you find that in this small diner, with holes in its leather cushions and chips and scratches on the edges of your ceramic plate, yellow light warm in the beginning of a dark night, you’re almost glad it happened, if it meant it turned out like this.

“Thanks, Mingyu,” you say eventually, fingers wringing together in your lap. The AC thrums faintly in the background. “Really. That means a lot.”

He breathes a quiet sigh of relief, smiling at you. “Of course. Anytime.”

Smiling back, you finally take a bite of your sandwich left to settle into a room temperature on your plate. The lettuce and tomato has grown a little soggy from how long it’s had to sit wedged between the mayonnaise and sourdough, but you keep craving another bite after your last. You’re not sure if it’s because of how hungry you are, or if it’s the atmosphere that allows for it, but you enjoy the taste regardless.

It’s almost 11:00PM by the time you and Mingyu walk back to his car, ready to drive you back. It’s 11:20 when you arrive back at the beach parking lot, waving each other a goodbye that feels almost gentle, the way you linger by the half-open door of his truck before hopping out.

It’s 11:23 when you make your way back to your car, head resting on the steering wheel in the silence, that it finally clicks. A late night dinner. A heart-to-heart. You even saw his goddamn childhood photos.

Did you… just become friends with Kim Mingyu?

Before you fall asleep that night, you make a mental checklist of everything you need to do the next day.

Apologize to your parents. (They probably had to do damage control after you left, and your mom would most likely have to make snippy retorts to your aunt’s passive remarks for the rest of the year.)

Head to the beach to give back Mingyu’s shirt, freshly washed.

(VERY IMPORTANT!) Make sure everything that happened last night is kept tightly under wraps, lest your well-meaning (read: gossipy and overly interested) friends find out.

Only, when you wake up the next day, your carefully curated plans crumble in front of your eyes. Checking your phone for the first time since last night, you find it flooded with messages from Chaeyoung, Seungkwan, the group chat with Chaeyoung and Seungkwan—frantic, all caps, a few missed calls to add onto it. Scrolling further down the notifications, you also find a single desperate email that Seungkwan sent to you at 8AM. (Subject: WAKE UP!!!!)

Squinting, you open up the messages to see what the world-ending crisis plagued them this time. Two weeks ago, it was Chaeyoung’s Hinge match she’d ghosted after the first date spotted at Target, and the week before that, Seungkwan’s favorite breakfast place ran out of almond butter. Needless to say, the panic doesn’t really set in until you make out the letters M I N G Y U in the plethora of texts and your stomach drops.

Chaeyoung: Y/N EXPLAIN Chaeyoung: WHY WERE YOU HANGING OUT WITH MINGYU LAST NIGHT?!?!

Your eyes widen, rapidly sending a text back.

You: ??? who told you? Chaeyoung: YOU’RE AWAKE Chaeyoung: FINALLY Chaeyoung: I CAN’T BELIEVE YOU WERE HIDING THIS THE ENTIRE TIME Chaeyoung: [sent photo]  [Seungkwan laughed at image] You: CHANGE MY CONTACT NAME BACK? Chaeyoung: BUT YOU’RE THE RIZZARD OF OZ…. [Seungkwan loved the message] 

Groaning, you dislike the message with a fervor and try to move onto another topic. 

You: ok can someone please tell me how you know about mingyu i just woke up and i’m not backreading Seungkwan: my cousin works at the diner Seungkwan: asked me why i didn’t tell her about mingyu’s cute new gf Seungkwan: lol

There’s a muffled scream that only your pillow ever hears. So much for taking this secret with you to the grave. Actually, maybe it wouldn’t be too late to start your funeral preparations now.

Chaeyoung: ok well. obviously we need to talk about this. Chaeyoung: secret hideout meeting in an hour!!!

And without any further argument,  you know that your fate is sealed, the final nail in the coffin. You can’t even find the energy to retort back how it’s not a ‘secret hideout meeting’ if all she was doing was barging in before your and Seungkwan’s scheduled work shift.

But regardless, here you were, an hour later, back at the shave ice shop sat at the tables with Seungkwan and Chaeyoung staring intently at you.

“So,” Seungkwan starts out, ignoring the slightly crazed look in Chaeyoung’s eyes as she nearly vibrates out of her seat. “Spill.”

You don’t even try to fight the headache incoming, pressing your fingers to your temples instead to appease the ache. “There’s not even anything to spill. I went out surfing last night, I let my guard down and I almost drowned.”

“What?” Seungkwan blurts out, his and Chaeyoung’s eyes widen simultaneously. “Are you okay? What happened?”

You wave them off with a tired smile. “I’m fine, I promise. Mingyu was there to save me.”

They both look at you with poorly concealed worry, running over your body to make sure nothing was amiss. But then, Chaeyoung interjects lightly. “So you fell in love because he was your knight in shining armor?”

Your face falls straight into your hands. “For the last time, we’re just friends! There’s nothing going between me and Min…”

When you raise your head to make eye contact with both of them to hammer in your point, the bell jingles as the door to the shop opens, and you meet eyes with the man himself.

“...Gyu,” you finish lamely. Speak of the devil.

Mingyu grins and waves. “Hey!”

Chaeyoung and Seungkwan whip their head from Mingyu to you and then back again, zeroing in on him. It suddenly feels like you’ve been dropped in a shark tank and—from the way the intensity of their gaze amplifies as they snap back to you—they’ve caught the scent of blood.  Wading through it, you smile and wave back casually, ignoring your friends mindlessly tapping on their phones, pretending that their ears weren’t twice as big trying to listen.

“Hey, Mingyu. I don’t know if you saw,” you jab your thumb at the window, “but we’re not open right now.”

He tilts his head, frowning. “Oh, really? That’s not what the sign out front says, though?” Mingyu points to the same window, the one that hangs a sign that says in big red letters, ‘CLOSED!’. You frown, brain whirring. If your side of the sign says ‘closed,’ that means that from the outside, it says…

“Seungkwan,” you call dryly.

Seungkwan shoots his head up, dropping his phone on the table. “Haha! Sorry, man!” he says, running past Mingyu to flip the sign over properly. “We’re closed!”

“But I thought—”

“We’ll be open in an hour,” Seungkwan interjects, flashing him a big thumbs up. “See you then!”

Mingyu looks at him quizzically, furrowing his brows in confusion, before responding with a slow, “Okay… See you in an hour then?”

All three of you nod at him, waving goodbye. Mingyu turns around to exit the store, and you almost breathe a sigh of relief. Sure, him appearing right as you were trying to convince your friends there was nothing going on between the two of you would put some extra work on your plate, but it was nothing you couldn’t handle. You’re just grateful that Mingyu didn’t act overly friendly and mention anything else that happened last night that would carry any innuendos, like—

“Oh, Y/N,” Mingyu says, right as the door opens. “About my shirt, don’t worry about it. You can just give it back to me whenever, it’s all good.”

Like that.

The door shuts with a short jingle. Chaeyoung and Seungkwan slowly turn back to you, mouths gaping. You feel like you just witnessed a bomb dropping in the distance and you’re left with the debris flying straight towards you.

You blink.  “I can explain.”

Seungkwan whips out his phone and immediately starts typing something in the search bar, while Chaeyoung leans over, hitting him enthusiastically on the arm, whispering loudly and rapidly. “Make sure to order the cake with custom frosting on the top! I’m thinking maybe in fancy cursive, ‘NOT BITCHLE—‘”

“Stop it!”

Needless to say, you return Mingyu’s shirt as soon as possible the next morning.

If this were Chaeyoung or even Seungkwan, you would have just thrown it in the wash with everything else at the end of the week, but this was different. The chaos that had happened after Mingyu left the shop and leftover cake in the back of your fridge (half-eaten, icing still managing to spell out the letters ‘N—T B —CHLE—’) had haunted you enough to be proof of that, so you cut your losses and piled in a premature load with scraps of other clothing around the house. If, by the end of the day, you had this wretched shirt off your hands, then it would be worth it.

At least, that’s what you tell yourself as you make your way to the beach. The absence of the surfboard atop your car was something you were still trying to get used to, but you try to tell yourself that it’ll get better eventually. That one day, maybe you’ll walk by your car and not have your eyes linger at that empty spot at all.

When you finally get to the beach, Mingyu is sitting at his regular spot at the lifeguard tower: binoculars hanging from his neck, sunglasses resting on his head, shirtless—just like always. Everything is normal. Nothing has to be weird.

“Mingyu!” you call, waving. He glances down somewhere in your general direction before his gaze finally catches on you, grinning the second he realizes who it is.

“Hey!” he greets brightly. “What’s up?”

“Oh, nothing much, just—” you take his neatly folded shirt out of your bag, holding it up so he can see. “I wanted to return this.”

Mingyu’s mouth opens slightly, a silent ‘ah’ forming on his lips before he waves you over cheerily. “Come on up!”

Instinctively, your response is to politely but firmly decline. After all, the last time you were up in that tower wasn’t exactly something you remembered fondly, and you didn’t want to be more of a bother to Mingyu than you already have been. You couldn’t stay for long anyway, so you try to deflect subtly.

“Oh, are you sure? I can just leave it—”

“Y/N…”

Even from a distance, his earnest concern in the gentle insistence makes it hard to say no. So you sigh, admit defeat once again, and respond with a single, “Okay.”

It’s how you find yourself up in that lifeguard tower once again, stepping cautiously past the bags lined against the wall, filled to the brim with miscellaneous supplies. Now that it was brighter, you could see what was in the tower better: the Hydroflask sporting a few dents on his desk next to a walkie talkie station and landline, an old safety protocol manual with its age shown in the sun-bleached pages, a big megaphone laying near the edge of it.

The place looked different in the daylight, none of the quiet intimacy that you had felt when you were here last. The sounds of waves crashing on the shore and families playing on the beach ring out in the air—children laughing as they chase each other around, the crackling of the charcoal as a family grills meat by the picnic tables further down. That night, it had just been you and Mingyu and the weight of everything you still couldn’t face, but now in the sun, the cold sea-chilled wind was now the warmth of daylight on your skin, all the things you had taken for granted given to you again.

“Thanks for the shirt,” you say, holding it out in front of you. “I feel like I didn’t say it enough when you let me borrow it.”

Mingyu laughs, running a hand through his hair while his other hand takes the shirt from you. “Seriously, it was no problem. You could have kept it if you wanted, you know.” 

He says it jokingly, but the implication of the words has your heart stuttering for a split second before you breathe out a slight laugh, pulling your hand back. “No, I’m good. But thanks.”

“What, you weren’t a fan?” Mingyu places the shirt inside his bag, careful not to mess up the folding you’d already done. “And here I thought everyone would have been honored to show off that they were ‘Raised On Rice’...”

You give him a lighthearted chuckle. “You know, I’m afraid I can’t say the same.”

Mingyu turns his head and hits his chest once, with feeling, exaggerated dismay written all over his face. “That hurt. Right here.”

You follow the motion, about to roll your eyes at his dramatics, but all of a sudden your eyes are lingering a little too long to be normal. Or appropriate.

“As much as I would love to agree,” you blink, focusing mostly on dragging your gaze above his bare chest (his eyes are up there), “I really think you’re the only one that could pull that off.”

MIngyu tilts his head, blinking, before the corners of his lips turn up slightly. “I dunno, I kinda liked you in it though.”

What the hell. What the actual hell.

“Do you say that to a lot of girls?” you manage, still trying to navigate your way back to normalcy. You were not doing this with Kim Mingyu, of all people.

Mingyu shrugs. “You’re the only one I’ve ever given my shirt to.”

You were so not doing this with Kim Mingyu! Except you are, and you have been this entire time, and you can practically hear the echoes of Chaeyoung cackling as the devil on your shoulder.

“Okay, well,” you grind out, praying desperately to swat away any memories surfacing where you’d heard other girls squeal about his glistening, defined muscles, or the swim shorts that sometimes rode a little too low on his waist, or the—Chaeyoung’s voice starts to meld in with your thoughts—idea of him having to perform CPR and giving mouth-to-mouth— “I have a shift soon, so I have to go, but I’ll see you around. Thanks again for the shirt.”

“Hey.” 

You stop mid-swivel and turn around slowly, peering up at him. His eyes shine too sincere for you to look away. “I’m serious, it was no big deal. I’d do it any time.”

Not just the shirt, you know he means, but everything that happened that night. The invitation to a safe place, the warmth of the diner, the way he had sat there with his hands cupped ready to catch everything you had spilled out. Heart lodging in your throat, you swallow hard before you respond. “Yeah, um. Same for you—if you ever wanna talk about anything.” 

“Of course,” he grins, the ‘thank you’ you’d almost tacked on at the end of your sentence understood without being said. “What are friends for?”

Before that night, you might have just brushed it off with a polite and restrained agreement and never thought about it again. ‘Friend’ had always been a loose word—maybe ‘former classmate’ or ‘acquaintance’ would have been better fitting to describe what Mingyu was to you. But now, as you stand in the middle of the lifeguard tower, the subtle scent of smoke from the family barbeque floating in the air, a mesh of different music from various speakers playing quietly alongside the chatter of ordinary beachgoers, you’re sincere when you answer.

“Right,” you smile back at him, warm. “Friends.”

You turn the knob to your front door carefully, entering your house with small steps. The lights to the living room were off, the kitchen was quiet, two pairs of shoes were still missing from the rack at the front.

Your parents weren’t home yet. You almost let out an audible sigh of relief.

It’s not as if you wanted to avoid them, but ever since the party, there was something a little awkward hanging in the air that none of you knew how to navigate. They didn’t want to be the ones to bring it up first, and you could never find the right time to talk about it—your parents both working long hours during the day and coming back home with aches in their necks and a plethora of new things to stress over. You just didn’t want to add onto the load of things they already had to think about.

Your mom had tried approaching you the night you came back, gently asking where you had gone and where your board was, but there wasn’t much to tell her, really. You’d settled for a short, ‘I went surfing and it broke,’ and left it at that; they already knew you were quitting, it wasn’t like telling them why your board broke was going to make any difference.

Setting your bag down on the couch, you shuffle into the kitchen in your house slippers and start prepping for dinner. If your parents weren’t home by now, that meant they would both be out until late evening today, which also meant it was better to just make something small for yourself for a meal. 

(The more you think about it, the better it sounds to just leave that night in the past. It would all smooth over soon enough, and you’re certain things will fall back to their normal rhythm well before you have to leave. Keeping it bottled up neatly inside of yourself, it was cleanest this way. It was fine—it would all be fine.)

But after you finish rifling through your fridge for ingredients, after you shut the door with a resonating snap, the old photo stuck to the front of the door stares back at you. Your dad had insisted on taking it in commemoration of your first time surfing—you, gap-toothed and smiling brightly in the middle, and your parents, grinning proudly with their arms wrapped around you.

And no matter how you try to convince yourself that you’ve long grown past that little girl in the photo, you know that she’ll always be a part of you, especially to your parents. The people who would gently blow on your barely-bleeding scratches and scrapes, the ones that would always be ready with a towel and your favorite snack every time you would come back to shore, dripping wet with fists clenched and tears brimming in your eyes. They would always be there with open arms, waiting until you were ready to come to them.

At the very least, you wanted to be a daughter that wouldn’t misplace their trust, someone who wouldn’t keep them waiting forever. You owe that to them; you owe that to the little girl you used to be. It’s why you needed to tell them everything.

(Though, that was easier said than done. If it were really that simple, you would have done it by now.)

You know if you try stalling and plan for the next day then you’ll keep stalling and never actually do it, so when your parents come home that night, you attempt to rip the bandaid off all at once. You ask them if they have time to talk and that you need to tell them something, but when they immediately agree, you worry far too late that you’d ripped that bandaid off before you were ready.

“So, that cake in the fridge,” you start, wringing your hands together. The granite counter is cool against your skin as you lean against it, grounding you in the middle of the kitchen.  “It was pretty good, right? Chaeyoung and Seungkwan said that it was the best they could find at the grocery store, especially since it was so last minute.”

Your parents give each other a confused look before nodding slowly, letting you ease into it without rushing. You’re not even sure where to go from here, if you should tell them only the necessary parts of the truth or lay down everything insignificant as well.  Maybe if you just kept talking, it would come out eventually.

“It’s funny actually,” you continue, palms clammy. “The only reason they got me that cake is because they think I’m dating Mingyu—I’m not, don’t worry! They’re just trying to be funny about it because he and I have gotten close recently. I mean I get why, I’ve been going on and on about how Mingyu working at the beach has made it a lot busier recently and for some reason I just kept seeing him around this summer and—”

“Y/N.”

Your breath catches. “Yeah, Mom?”

“Is this…about the party last week?” Your mom begins to take a step forward, but it doesn’t become more than a slight shuffle of her feet. “Because if it is, I’m the first person to agree that your aunt went too far last time! Don’t worry, we made sure to give her a good talking to after you left.” 

She nudges your dad lightly to back her up, but at his startled nod, your mom shoots him a dirty look before continuing. “Really, you would expect at her big age she’d know what’s appropriate to say and what isn’t! Your uncles came to your defense too, so everyone’s on your side! We made sure to chew her out real good, so you don’t need to talk about it anymore if you don’t want to—”

“No,” you interject. “No, it’s not that it’s…”

You could have taken the offer—and maybe a few days ago, you would have. Let your parents brush off whatever happened that night and leave it in the past, allow it to wash away into the tide with the waves. But they deserved to know; it was now or never.

“That night, I went to the beach.” Your words come out static. “And I tried surfing, and I wiped out so badly that my board broke because I wasn't thinking straight when I swam out.”

Your mom opens her mouth to say something with furrowed brows, probably something along the lines of ‘You should have told me if it was that serious,’ but your dad beats her to the chase. “Why did you go out then?” He has an instinctual scolding born from worry on the tip of his tongue; it was one of the very first things he’d ever taught you, before you even got on the board. “You’re not a child anymore, you should have known better—”

“I know.” Your fists clench at your side as you try to fight the shame that threatens to boil back up inside of you. “I know, it was stupid and a rookie mistake and something I shouldn’t have ever done, but—” Your voice breaks off. “I told you I wasn’t going to surf anymore.”

There’s a confused silence, one where you can’t gather the courage to look at their faces. “It’s not because I didn’t want to keep surfing, it’s because I felt like I had to stop.”

“Y/N, what—”

“I—” you interrupt. You have to get it out or you’ll never get a chance like this again, clumsy as your words may be. “I just—I don’t—” 

Pressure builds at the back of your nose and eyes as you try to fumble your way around the words, vision blurring. “I just wanted to make you proud.”

Your gaze locks onto the kitchen floor, nails digging into your palms. “I’ve only ever wanted to make you proud, and I know raising me wasn’t easy, and I wanted to pay you back for everything you’ve ever done for me. And I figured—” God, it sounds so stupid when you say it out loud, but how else could you say it? This was how you’d felt for the past four years. “If I gave up surfing to only focus on school, then maybe—I don’t know—” (fuck it, you’ve already made it this far.) “Then maybe all your sacrifices wouldn’t be wasted on me.”

There’s a beat of silence, one where your mom takes in a shaky gasp of air and your dad goes quiet, previous anger already forgotten. For a moment, it all feels like a mistake, something you can never take back. 

(But then again, it was better this way, wasn’t it? Like it was a necessary kind of hurting—to cleanse the wound, to feel it once and then let it heal for good.)

“You know we’d be proud of you no matter what you do,” your dad says, finally. He places a hand on your mom’s shoulder, to which your mom nods and touches her hand to his. “As long as you’re happy, that’s all we could ask for.”

The night in the diner comes back to you in brief flashes, Mingyu’s words echoing in your head. At the time, you had let it wash over you, a small warmth you’d allowed yourself to indulge briefly in the night, but it sinks in now, pooling in the pit of your stomach. He was right—of course he was. 

“Besides,” your dad says, joking, “if you really quit, then the real waste would have been all that money we put into surfing lessons when you were a kid—ow!”

Your mom jabs him sharply with her elbow, hissing out his name in a low voice. “What he means to say,” she intervenes, taking a step forward, “is that we would have done it all over again, because it was all for you.” Warm hands cup your face as your mom slowly raises your head to meet her eyes. She gives you a watery smile, brushing away the wetness on your cheeks with her thumbs. “We’re your parents, Y/N. Nothing could ever be a waste.”

Your dad places a hand on your shoulder, and you shift your blurry eyes onto him. He gives you a warm smile and a slight squeeze, and gestures his head to the door. “Come with me.”

“It was supposed to be a surprise,” he starts, taking out the flashlight in the drawer. Walking towards the backdoor, he twists the knob and waits for you and your mom to follow, turning on the bright beam of the flashlight as he leads the way outside.

Your mom nods beside you, her hand in yours. You furrow your brows in confusion, realizing they were leading you towards the backyard shed. “We had a whole plan, you know! Complete with balloons and confetti and even a nice bow to stick on top of it.”

Unlocking the shed, your dad holds the door wide open, motioning for you to enter first. “We were hoping to give this to you at the grad party, but then after everything happened, but well…” Your mom ushers you in. “That party didn’t exactly go as planned either.”

“What are you guys talking about—”

The flashlight flicks onto the wall of the shed, and your question is cut short at the sight: a surfboard, brand new and unwaxed, its surface smooth and shining.

“When…” you gape. “When did you—“

“Like we said,” your dad answers, wrapping an arm around your shoulder, “we bought it as a graduation gift. Before everything went down, obviously.”

“And,” your mom continues gently, “if you still decide to leave surfing behind when you go to school, we can always just keep it safe here—for when you come back.”

You wonder if it was always this simple, if you’d agonized over your dreams and your future and your own happiness for so long without even considering that you didn’t need to let one or the other go. All the pieces you’ve been desperately trying to not let spill out of your hands finally click into place, gently, and the realization makes you feel so silly you almost want to start crying again.

“Okay,” you sniffle, pulling both your parents into a hug. It’s almost like you were that little girl again, sand stuck to your damp skin, sea water dripping from your hair, running into her parents’ arms after a long day. Stable, safe, warm. “I’ll keep surfing.”

The rest of summer passes by in a blink of an eye.

After everything that happened the past month, you were grateful that the rest of your days at home were spent peacefully—afternoons working with Seungkwan at the shave ice shop, sleepovers with Chaeyoung where she tries to fit in a whole week’s worth activities into a single weekend, nights spent with your parents in the living room, T.V. playing in the background as you indulge in what little Family Movie Nights you have left. 

It falls into a smooth rhythm, one you come to expect every single day, the same rhythm that has you up in the early morning, sitting on your board as the ocean waves sway you gently atop the water. The sky washes a pale blue, a band of orange barely visible over the edge of the horizon. It’s a familiar sight, one you’ve become accustomed to ever since you’ve made it a habit to come to the beach every Saturday morning.

“What are you thinking about?”

“Hm?” You turn, tilting your head at the boy on the board next to you. “Nothing, really—why?”

Mingyu points at the dip between his brows, furrowing it in imitation. “You get this look on your face when you’re thinking too hard.”

“I do not!”

“Seungkwan and Chaeyoung can attest!”

You reach down to splash him with water, rolling your eyes at the yelp he lets out at the sudden attack. “Don’t even start with them.”

“I’m not even—” Mingyu starts, but shrinks away at the threatening look in your eye as you dip your hand into the water again. “You were thinking about something though.”

Sighing, you retract your hand. Mingyu visibly relaxes. “Just thinking about all the things I still have to pack when I get home.”

“You’re leaving tomorrow morning, right?”

You hum, nodding your head. “It’s an early flight and we have to get everything ready by tonight, so this is my last fun stop of the day.”

Mingyu leans back, water sloshing with the shift in weight. “You’re not hanging out with Seungkwan or Chaeyoung later?”

“I already saw them yesterday,” you reply, exasperated. “They tried getting me another cake but I put them on a cake ban because of what happened last time.”

He looks at you quizzically. “What happened last time?”

“That’s not important.” Clearing your throat, you redirect the conversation. “Anyway, why do you ask?”

“Seungkwan told me they wanted to throw one last surprise goodbye party.” Mingyu pauses. “Well, I guess it’s not really a surprise anymore.”

“Seungkwan just wants another excuse to throw a party where he can smuggle in alcohol,” you point out. “Besides, they’ve thrown me like, five this summer.”

Mingyu laughs. “Come on, I’m sure that’s not all there is to it. You know how he is, maybe he just wants to make the most of your time left and give you a goodbye you’ll remember. He’s really proud of you—you know that.”

After all, you were the only one leaving, really. Seungkwan was attending the local college on top of helping out at the family business on weekends, and even though Chaeyoung had decided to move back to another island, she was still attending the state school there. Seungkwan had induced quite the ruckus when you’d opened the acceptance letters together, complaining about how you were both leaving him to this boring town with his little shave ice shop as only companion. (And then a few weeks later, he’d given you one of the pineapple plushies they had on display at shop so that you could bring it to California without missing home.)

Your shoulders slump in defeat, half-heartedly kicking your leg under the water. “Yeah, maybe you’re right.”

“But the alcohol is probably a big reason too,” Mingyu adds.

You point at him triumphantly. “See!”

The tide picks up slightly, bobbing both of you gently with the water. A couple miles away, the waves crash on the rocks near the cliffs, just close enough to hear the ebb and flow of water on the shore. This far out, there was only you and Mingyu.

“After you leave,” Mingyu says, cutting through the low roar of the ocean, “that means we can’t do this anymore.” His voice carries an underlying hesitancy that you haven’t heard since that night of the diner, and instinctually, you go to deflect.

“You make it sound like I’m leaving forever,” you tease gently, but you know what he’s trying to say. It wouldn’t be the same.

(After you had received your new board, you’d gone almost immediately to tell Mingyu the good news. In turn, he’d invited you to come surfing whenever there was a high tide at sunrise on Saturdays, something that eventually settled into just sunrises on Saturday instead, regardless of the tide. It was why you were out in the water this morning, even without the waves—a habit that still clings strong.)

Mingyu runs a hand through his hair, droplets falling as he shakes his head a little. “Do you even know how many Saturdays are between now and when you come back? It’ll just be me during sunrises again… all alone…”

“You’re starting to sound just like Seungkwan.”

Mingyu counters with a single sad look resembling a sopping wet dog. You roll your eyes.

“Well, what are you going to do?” you ask. “You have a whole year before you go back to school.”

Mingyu contemplates, humming. “I’ve been thinking about traveling—see the world a little before I come back here and decide on anything else.”

You tilt your head, light glistening off the surface of the water. “Really? And go where?”

He shrugs. “Who knows? Australia, Korea, maybe I’ll  even go backpacking through Europe.” Mingyu stops, a teasing look in his eye. “Why, is there any place you want me to go?”

Your breath hitches, clamping your mouth shut. “I mean, not really, I was just—you know. I just thought…”

Mingyu props a finger to his chin and nods sagely, pondering far too long to be sincere. “I did hear California was nice… But it all depends.”

You eye him warily. “On what?”

“If you’ll let me.”

Fighting the initial swoop of your stomach, you stop and try to think realistically. Mingyu would be the same no matter where he went, and when you imagine what it would be like if Mingyu brought his earnest local boy charm over to the mainland, your nose wrinkles. It was already bad enough on your small island, but the image of his crowd of fangirls multiplying and spreading even more gossip about the new ‘hottie in town’ makes your head hurt just thinking about it. Maybe it was best if you waited until Christmas to go sunrise surfing with him again.

Mingyu thumbs the space between your brows and furrows his to mirror you, and you slap a hand over your forehead. “Oh, so you don’t want me in California?”

Your face burns, chest flushing as you whip your head back. “You are so annoying!”

You move to splash him again, but when you meet his eyes, expectation glows so sincere it makes you stop. Briefly, you wonder if the entire reason Mingyu presses so hard is because he knows it would be the only way for you to be honest about your feelings, especially concerning him. (On the other hand, he could just enjoy watching you squirm. It was probably a little bit of both. So annoying.)

“Well,” you mumble, turning your head to the other side. You try to test the words on your tongue, but it all comes out sickeningly sentimental and sweet no matter how you phrase it. “It wouldn’t be the worst. If you came to visit.”

Mingyu nudges you so suddenly you almost topple off your board, water splashing as you flounder to regain your balance. He wears a dopey grin, even as he grabs onto your arm again to stabilize you—cheeky and victorious, like he just caught the biggest catch of the day. “You should have just said so from the beginning!”

“For the surf!” you sputter, still recovering. Maybe a small dunk in the water would cool you off quicker. “I meant for the surf, don’t be ridiculous—”

Mingyu’s grin gets even wider, and even as you fumble for more excuses, you know nothing you can say would really help. He’d latched onto the truth, and no amount of water you tried to drown it under would ever make him let go. 

“So I’ll see you again?” Mingyu asks, and even with the teasing glint still left in his eyes, the sunlight in his eyes sparkles earnest.

There wasn’t much out here this early in the day, just the ocean and each other—and despite the embarrassment that floods your body, maybe you didn’t mind it all that much. The way it was just you and him.

“For the surf,” you repeat, tacking it on at the end of your nod, but the smile Mingyu gives you knows otherwise. Yeah. You didn’t mind that at all.

It’s the small, unexpected things you’ll miss when you leave: the sun-sated and salty skin, not just the paddle out to the open ocean and riding the wave, but the rush that comes from the return to shore, wanting to do it all again. A place you’ll always belong, no matter where you go. But really—

(The sunrise colors the sky in a peach-gold glow, and you follow the scattering of light across the water to meet Mingyu at the center of it all. There’s a fondness you can’t describe, but a feeling you understand all the same; the way the sight of the horizon and the sky and the ocean means love, the way it means home.)

—you think you’ll miss Kim Mingyu the most.

[suzukiblu]

Expanded version of the "the Core Four gangs up on Kon's objectification kink" WIP, including a read-more because it's up to like 2k now, hah.

It's nice to all be alive and in the same reality and time period with the guys, which should really be easier to arrange than it actually is. Cassie had an easier time getting Cissie and Greta and Anita all together for a two-week road trip last summer than she has ever had getting Tim and Kon and Bart all alive and local and not replaced by a clone with fucked-up ethics for five fucking minutes. 

Last time she'd thought she'd managed that, Match and Thad had shown up, plus Tim'd had to cancel last-minute for an Arkham breakout anyway. 

It was so annoying that she hadn't even bothered telling Match and Thad that she'd known they were them until they'd both let her get to second base. Like, she wasn't actually gonna fuck them, obviously, they're supervillains and also she doesn't want to give either Kon or Bart any weird complexes or anything like that, but second base had seemed fair. Just for the inconvenience and all.

Also they'd both clearly needed more practice at making time anyway. Like–definitely. So really she'd figured she was doing them a favor. 

They'd been hilariously shy about touching each other, for guys who'd been pretending to be Conner "No Regrets" Kent and Bart "No Restraint" Allen. Cassie had politely pretended not to find it adorable, because supervillains, and had just given some helpful tips disguised as voyeuristic requests. 

And like, well, third base had been fine for them, she'd reasoned, since they were both supervillains. 

They both blush way, way more easily than Kon and Bart do, she has learned. 

Also if they're dating now, that's her bad and she probably owes the superhero community some very serious apologies for it? But like, she's not gonna be the one to bring it up. So as long as Cissie doesn't break the Sis Code about their last dish session, it'll be fine. 

Though she does expect invited to that particular wedding, if it ever comes up. 

Anyway. Off-topic. 

Cassie spent three full days and a favor from both Oracle and Supergirl arranging this date night, so she has no intention of it going to waste or getting interrupted. She was not fool enough to plan an event or activity outside where criminals and idiots and idiot criminals and, worse, people they know abound; she'd just told the boys all when to be at her apartment and then very theatrically locked the door once she'd gotten them all inside. 

Said lock is made of promethium and also full of godly magic, because fuck interruptions. 

Aphrodite understands when a girl just really needs to get some with her sort-of boyfriends/ride-or-die teammates, thankfully. 

Technically Young Justice is a situationship more than a superhero team these days, but they are just not gonna be explaining that to the Justice League. Like ever. 

Maybe at their wedding. 

Kon had suggested Netflix. Bart had suggested getting delivery. Tim had suggested a card game. 

Cassie had taken her pants off, which had fortunately gotten them all on the same page. 

So that’s how they’re here right now, with her straddling a half-naked Tim on the couch in just her shirt and panties and Kon and Bart on the other side of the coffee table and all tangled up together fully naked, because the bastards both have ridiculous amounts of super-speed and can therefore cheat their way out of their clothes and through the prep stage and foreplay without even letting her and Tim get a show, the brats.

And also because Kon can fly, so he doesn't really have to “weigh” all that much. 

So that's how he's currently completely wrapped around Bart and being held up in his arms like he doesn't weigh a thing at all so Bart can fuck him standing. Cassie can fly too, obviously, but she doesn't like being held up like that without an anchor point or any contact with the ground or at least a wall–it makes her feel unbalanced, distracted, vulnerable. 

Kon, apparently, really likes it. 

Well, he was born able to fly, so maybe that's part of that. For her, the ability was a later development. For Kon, it's as natural and normal as walking or running. 

Probably more so, actually. 

And the visual of Kon's whole big broad body being held up in Bart's lithe, narrow arms like that, of him deliberately making the effort to keep himself there, to keep himself on Bart's cock–well, she likes that. 

"Holy Hera," she mutters, and even the direct stimulation of Tim's dick rubbing up just-right against her cunt through their underwear and his hands on her hips pales a little in comparison to the show. 

Look, she's just the visual type, okay? 

"Don't take this the wrong way, but this feels kinda like I'm just using a toy, not holding a whole person," Bart says distractedly, his voice and hips both practically a blur. Cassie and Tim both bristle reflexively against each other, because that has got to be just about the stupidest possible thing he could've said to–

And Kon–bites his lip, a little, and shudders. 

"A–toy?" he repeats unevenly. 

"Oh," Bart says, freezing in place and then blinking lightning-fast a few dozen times, or maybe just once or twice. It's hard to tell, with Bart. "I mean, not like–well, yeah? I don't mean I think you're–" 

"It's okay if you do," Kon blurts, his face flushing. Cassie kind of forgets she was about to get on Tim's dick and nearly falls off him. Tim nearly falls off the couch, so at least she's not alone there. 

Bart's a lot faster on the uptake than any of the rest of them, though, so he just blinks one more time and then tilts his head. And then, casually–

"You would make a pretty good toy," he says. "We could pass you around a lot easier. And maybe you'd stop running off and getting lost on us all the time, too." 

"Ngh," Kon says, ducking his head as his face gets even redder. 

"I don't really have a toybox, though," Bart muses absentmindedly, watching Kon's face intently. "Might just have to leave you in my bed when we weren't using you. But then you'd be easy-access for playtime anyway, so–" 

"Bart," Kon chokes, and Cassie sees the very obvious way his whole body clenches up. 

"That setting's too tight. Go back to the last one," Bart says in that same casual, matter-of-fact tone from before, and Kon makes a strangled noise and visibly forces himself to relax again, just barely trembling. 

"Well, this is a development," Cassie manages, which is more than Tim's apparently got; he's just staring. 

"Kon–" he starts just a little warily, and Kon just shakes his head mutely. 

"The off button's 'friction', if you run out of battery," Bart says, stroking up the small of Kon's back. "Got it?" 

Kon nods, snapping his eyes shut, and still doesn't say a word. 

"Good toy," Bart says, and Kon shudders. Bart stares at him for one last very, very intent microsecond that probably lasts about forty minutes in subjective time, then turns his head to look over at Cassie and Tim instead. And then he goes back to fucking Kon, but this time he isn't moving his own hips at all–just moving Kon by his grip on his, like he really is just holding a toy and using it how he pleases. 

Kon lets him. 

Cassie is going to spontaneously combust, she's pretty sure, and Tim looks like he might just keel over and die. 

"Its hole feels pretty good," Bart tells them instead of Kon, his tone a little breathless but mostly just conversational. Kon digs his teeth into his lip with a strangled noise and his dick twitches sharply; outright spits precome. So apparently Cassie is going to spontaneously combust and Tim is going to keel over and die and Kon is probably going to do both, fucking hell, Bart is trying to kill them all, the little bastard. 

"Does it?" Cassie manages only a bit faintly, because if they're doing this they're at least gonna do it right. Generally speaking Kon's the one with the most submissive tendencies, though they've all tried it at least a couple times. Cassie just doesn't really like the way subbing makes her feel and Bart gets restless and Tim gets neurotic, though every now and then one or the other of them is in the mood for a bit of it. 

Kon will do it whenever one of them asks, though, and Cassie's pretty sure he'd do it even more often if he felt comfortable asking for it himself. Like–they talk about sex a lot, and Kon has to talk around the things he likes or wants a lot. Even more than Tim does, really. Tim can treat it like a mission report and Bart just has no shame and Cassie–well, it still takes some effort, but she's getting better at it, at least. 

Kon just doesn't seem to be able to say the words at all, though, which considering his usual tendency to charge face-first at every single obstacle is . . . notable, maybe. 

Cassie's never been sure if it's that he just doesn't feel safe asking for things he thinks he wants "too much", or if it's that he feels comfortable enough with them to not have to demand space and attention, and can just wait for it to come to him. 

Kon's only ever full-stop safeworded when he was Domming, though. Never as a sub. He's used "yellow" a few times when he was getting overwhelmed or needed a little reassurance, yeah, but never once called a full stop to a scene. 

That's not a thing any of them has ever pointed out, but Cassie's pretty sure they've all noticed it. 

Maybe not Kon himself, but . . . 

"Yeah," Bart says. "It can take a lot, too. I mean, duh, it's a toy, but still. Sturdy thing, y'know?" 

"How much is 'a lot'?" Tim says, sounding not unlike he's been punched in the diaphragm. Cassie was definitely doing something with him a minute or three ago, but fuck if she remembers what it was. They've both got their pants off, that's her only clue here. 

"Like, a lot," Bart says. "See?" 

Then he tightens his grip on Kon's hips and they blur, electric and barely visible and crackling with the Speed Force's lightning. Faster than he can fuck Tim or even her–much faster than he can fuck Tim or her. Kryptonians are built for super-speed too, after all. 

But not quite as much of it as a dedicated speedster is. 

Cassie can't imagine how overwhelming that actually feels, come to think of it. 

Kon just stutters out the quietest sound she thinks she's ever heard him make. It sounds like a sob, almost. 

He doesn't say "friction", though. Doesn't even say "yellow". 

He doesn't do anything at all, except keep himself in Bart's arms and keep letting Bart use him. 

Cassie is never, ever going to remember what she and Tim were doing. 

"That's a lot, yeah," she manages. Bart's the best at doing scenes, really, but he's played a lot of games and thinks very fast and has very little sense of self-consciousness, so no surprise there. But Tim is a Bat-trained–and Pennyworth-trained–natural liar, so he's no slouch either. Cassie usually feels a little awkward getting into a scene herself, especially compared to those two's respective experience and Kon's own eternal teen-idol levels of putting on a show and commitment to literally any bit, but right now, she could not care less about "awkward". She just wants to see Kon get taken apart. 

She wants to help take Kon apart.

[doodleferp]

The Callie/Vergil Brainrot

I am bagging both of the Sparda twins and nobody can stop me. A lot of these are attempts to fill in the gaps in Vergil’s backstory and aren’t necessarily reflections of how he felt in the canon. A lot of this takes place before Devil May Cry 3.

These brainrots can apply the OG games and the reboot game. I’m not quite sure about the Netflix series yet, we’ll have to wait for Season 2 before I make any big decisions about that.

——————————

Potential triggers include canon-typical violence, death, cheating, references to underage sex

As previously mentioned in the Dante post, Callie and the twins are 2 1/2 weeks apart and they grew up together for the first eight years of their lives. Vergil had a bit of a contradictory relationship with Callie as a child. He was happy that Dante wouldn’t be bothering him while she was there and then he could read his books in peace. But that became boring pretty fast when he saw that they were, in fact, having a great time without him.

That all changed when the fire happened. As it turns out, Callie’s mother Fran had a really sinking feeling that something was wrong with Eva and decided to drive out to the house to see her. She found the bloodied Vergil when she arrived at the house, and, after learning Eva and Sparda were dead, took Vergil in as her foster son. I think it would be interesting if Vergil and Dante ended up having opposite childhoods after the fire and ended up having opposite personalities to the way in which they were raised. Vergil has an upbringing with a loving foster family, but he refuses to properly work through his trauma and becomes hard.

Before they could be left home alone, Callie and Vergil would get to hang out in the hospital's daycare. But when that became boring, they snuck off and wandered around like children often do. I want to believe that Vergil stole the code to the research library so they could look at all the books. Boy, oh boy, were they in trouble when they got found out.

Fran waited until she felt like Vergil was okay to interact with people before she sent him to school with Callie. She couldn't continue the education he was getting from his parents due to her being both a surgeon and a human, so it was off to public school for him. Vergil was the kid who was super scary smart and played by himself at recess and pretended the other kids didn't exist. He would practice swordplay by himself at the far edges of the playground and Callie eventually wormed her way into it. Every recess, they would be going at each other with big-ass sticks that keep breaking, much to Vergil's frustration. So they start stashing sticks in places so they won't have to go looking for them when it happens. The teachers were mildly concerned but they knew Vergil was...different, so they just kept an eye on them to make sure they didn't take each other's eyes out. Then one day, Callie found a discarded pipe and annihilated Vergil in the stomach with demon strength she didn't know she had. Then the principal forbade them from stick-fighting again.

Come high school, Vergil and Callie ended up forming a romantic relationship. This short-lived romance mirrored my own high school romance. They were a sexless, moderately-affectionate couple who moved like a pair of lesbian tortoises and looked like best friends to anyone who hadn't seen them kiss. They talked a lot about poetry and Shakespeare and all the classical English lit stuff because Callie was a nerd in high school and lived on that shit. It got to the point where Vergil was not only anticipating doing her English homework with her, but Callie was actively photocopying her homework and giving it to him so they could do it together. Imagine two kids sitting on the floor of the living room coloring in coloring books except it's two teenagers writing about the symbolism of Beowulf or the greater themes of the god's eyes in The Great Gatsby. Grades be goddamned, the teachers would have loved to read Vergil's interpretation of Gatsby. And you know what? Dante did. Because Callie’s broken-hearted tenth-grade ass saved that shit. Vergil's ramblings about Beowulf, The Great Gatsby, A Midsummer Night's Dream and To Kill A Mockingbird are all saved in her mom's place.

The worst thing that may have come from Vergil's high school days was Vergil taking out a few agro varsity athletes without even unsheathing his sword because it was the 90s. But the effect Vergil had on the student body was insane. I'll go into detail in a separate post, but the emos and the goths were foaming at the mouth for him. He was an ice-cold drink of water with an unbreakable poker face, some mad drip, and a katana. He was their Emo Jesus. Many a girl had pictures of him in their lockers and he inspired a trend of dressing up in trench coats and cravats.

I think they had Game Night at Fran's post-divorce apartment bc she needs a little time with her kids due to her busy schedule and Vergil gets really into it. He dominates Scrabble and he always gets unnecessarily offended during card games. There wasn't a Monopoly incident, because this family isn't stupid. There was, however, a Sorry! incident wherein Vergil cut the board and the table in half after one of his pieces was sent back to Start. He actually refuses to feel bad about it and feels he was justified.

Nero is….a touchy issue. Callie ended up being more of a parent to Nero than Vergil ever was, but it was hard for her to come around and accept his existence for a bit. Vergil was the love of her teenage life, and knowing that he had slept with someone behind her back, after she'd given so much to him, devastated her. She doesn't put anything on Nero for it, it's just...it was hard for her to look at him for a while. He looks so much like his dad, after all.

Since Callie was also an important part of Vergil's childhood, I really want to play around with the way she would disrupt Nelo Angelo's brainwashing. I think Mundus orders her to be captured for the first game, and Nelo Angelo abducts her while she's on her way back from the hospital. There's this feeling that comes over him when he looks at her. He knows she's important, he's drawn to her -- he just doesn't know why. And when he hears her shout for Dante, reaching out to Dante when he arrives, it awakens this fury inside him.

Going into DMC 5 territory, I'm still playing around with how V, Urizen and the Nightmares viewed Callie. As of right now, my ideas for them revolves around my interpretation of Urizen as Vergil's passionate side and V as Vergil's logical side. Kind of like the Skeksis and the Uru from The Dark Crystal. V recognizes Callie on a superficial level -- he knows she's important to Vergil and to him by proxy, he just doesn't have the feelings attached to the memories he has of her. Meanwhile, Urizen immediately feels a deep affection for Callie when she inevitably rolls up to do battle with him, so he doesn't take her seriously as a threat. Their battle is not about eliminating a threat to his power, but asserting his dominance as the proper mate.

taglist: @brightlycoloredteacups, @missmermaidsoaps, @athenaluciscaelum, @merumely, @wastelandsrunaway, @t34rfulm00n

devil may cry © capcom

fanfiction © doodleferp

[zoniteillusion-pyritedreams]

i loved your jay “how he’d pursue his crush” writing, could you make one for jungwon??

“How Jungwon Falls (and Fumbles) for His Crush | A Chaotic-Softboy’s Guide to Love”

(brought to you by your neighborhood tarot gremlin with a sass mouth and a heart full of memes)

So. You wanna know how Jungwon acts around his crush?

Buckle in, bestie, because this boy is a romantic mess of contradictions wrapped in emotional origami.

Emotionally constipated introvert energy

When Jungwon catches feelings, the first thing he does is… retreat.

Like, full-on “delete his social battery, hide in his metaphorical cave, and overanalyze everything” vibes. He’s not running away he’s just panicking. Internally. Quietly. Elegantly. (Cue ‘The Hermit’ core.)

He's the kind of guy who starts liking you and immediately gets really weird around you. Stiff smiles. Nervous silences. Avoiding eye contact like it’s his job. Suddenly can’t speak like a human. Iconic.

Lowkey control freak, highkey softie

Listen this man WANTS to lead the romance game, he wants to be confident, in charge, the cool one.

But the moment emotions enter the chat? King of Wands reversed + Emperor reversed energy hits like a truck.

He's stumbling through vulnerability like a baby deer in designer boots.

He’s thinking 30 steps ahead: “What if I confess and it ruins everything?”

“What if I don’t confess and they move on?”

“What if they see my weird side??”

(Newsflash, Jungwon, we like your weird side.)

Mr. Subtle Flirtation (aka do they even know I like them??)

He’s not the “loud flirt, heart-eyes in public” type. Oh no.

He’s the “remember your coffee order, silently worry about your jacket in the cold, makes sure you’re on the right side of the sidewalk” kind of guy.

It's giving “love language = acts of service and panicked glances.”

That said he’s not going to rush anything.

Knight of Pentacles reversed says: snail pace activated.

He’s building a foundation, earning your trust, making you laugh all while pretending it’s totally platonic. (Sir. Very Haechan coded no lie)

Internal crisis arc

As the feelings grow, so does the inner chaos:

He's obsessing over mixed signals, regretting every slightly awkward interaction, and replaying convos in his head like a Netflix rerun.

There’s some heartbreak trauma in there too (hellooo Ten of Swords reversed + Five of Cups) so he might be scared of being too much or getting hurt again.

Result? He second guesses everything.

One minute he’s plotting the perfect moment to tell you, the next he’s spiraling about whether you even like him back.

But when he does move? It’s magic.

Eventually, the boy wakes up and says: enough overthinking, let’s make a move.

The Magician + The Lovers energy kicks in and suddenly

Boom. Confession arc unlocked.

It’s not flashy. It’s not over-the-top.

It’s genuine. Earnest. Straight from the heart.

The kind that makes you go: “wait, you liked me this whole time??”

Yes, bestie. The whole time.

Relationship vibes: tender chaos

Once he's in, he's all in. Loyal. Devoted. Soft. A little possessive (lowkey jealous but will never say it out loud) and occasionally overwhelmed by how hard he’s fallen.

He’ll learn to open up more, trust more, love more openly.

But baby, you're gonna have to be patient at first.

He needs gentle encouragement, emotional safety, and a bit of teasing to coax him out of his self-protective shell. But once you do?

He’s a walking love letter with a silly smile.

Final vibe check?

Jungwon is a quiet storm of affection, nerves, and deep sincerity.

He acts chill, but he's got crush-on-you butterflies doing parkour in his chest.

He’s not the fastest mover, but once he makes his choice?

And that? That’s the kind of love that lasts.

He’s all yours. Softly. Completely.

[hawkinsschoolcounselor]

hi! i'm currently reading a novel (that was actually recc'd by finn wolfhard lol) and part of the story involves the publishing of a novel. there's lots of mise-en-abyme style plot points about how the publishing industry works, image management, pr, pop stars, music biz, etc etc. and in it, the narrator (a writer) bickers with his agent about what sells, and the agent says, of the target market of a pop star on his books, 'she's already got the tweens, it would be great if she could get the gays, too. BOOM!' and he mimes a cash explosion.

the book is not cynical nor celebrating such capitalism, just a complex and realistic portrait of how people in the world operate. and reading it made me think of the prevalent 'if byler doesn't happen it'll be queerbaiting' argument i see a lot in fandom, which is something that, while true, simply appears to me as the unhappy voice of the powerless; hopeful viewers. its an argument that assumes that people who work in production care about something like that, about the ethics and morals of it, when actually, often, they're actively using those techniques as part of their business acumen.

of course we hope for better from our artists - the writers, the duffers - but i think people here say 'that would be homophobic' or 'that's queerbaiting' as if doing those things is illegal, against the rules, or unjustified within an industry like showbusiness, when actually, while it's morally wrong, it certainly happens and also wouldn't necessarily mean that the creators would lose their jobs or careers or anything like that.

I'm not sure what you're trying to get at here. Of course, there are no laws or ethical codes against queerbaiting. I don't think anyone has claimed that as a reason to have faith here. However, in most cases, it is not a desirable accusation for a creator to have to contend with. It wouldn't directly impact anyone's job, but there could still be a negative impact depending on the severity of the fanbase's reaction. Queerbaiting doesn't impact the financial output of a product, but it sullies its legacy, which, in turn, follows the creators through their careers. It's not a killer in situations where the creators are mostly behind the scenes folks who don't get publicity, but the Duffers are prominently out in front of this show. They are a brand unto themselves now, and that brand needs to have market appeal. They do seem to have painted themselves into something of a corner regarding Byler, but it's largely because they gave the audience far more credit than it deserved. However, I think the fear that the general audience would revolt against Byler is far overblown. The Duffers have nonetheless written the show they wanted to write.

There is no reason to expect the Duffers to knowingly queerbait anyone. Netflix? Perhaps. It only cares about numbers. However, the Duffers went with Netflix in the first place because they were given full control to create the show they wanted to create. They passed on the major TV networks because the execs pressured them to change the show. They were also furious when Netflix merchandising spoiled a good amount of season 4, and they brought that up with Netflix. They aren't afraid of Netflix. And we're way past the point of the Duffers stumbling into this storyline by accident, so we can write that option off, too.

Honestly, this whole situation, and whether someone has faith that it won't be queerbait, simply comes down to trust. I trust the Duffers because they haven't given me any reason not to. They've so far championed the outcasts, and I see no reason why they'd slam the door on a gay teen who spent the entire duration of the series suffering, mostly in silence, at that. I trust them to do right by Will.

If they make me regret that, then it will likely cause me to never watch anything they make again. Until then, however, I will trust them to follow the story they've created to completion. And I think that Netflix probably needs them more than they need Netflix, anyway. After the success of Stranger Things, the Duffers could probably write their own ticket with any distributor they wanted.

tl;dr: Yes, business is business, and companies will gladly do whatever to get money, but the Duffers have shown themselves to be social champions. My only worries lie with Netflix, not the Duffers. However, I think Netflix needs the Duffers more than the Duffers need Netflix, so I'm not worried about executive meddling in this particular case.

[ixhika-jsx]

Resources and study tips to get you in cyber forensics

Master post • Part1 • part2

let's get you prepped to be a cyber sleuth without spending any cash. Here’s the ultimate tips and resources.

Ps: you can't become one while doing these pointers but you can experience the vibe so you can finally find your career interest

### 1. **Digital Scavenger Hunts**

- **CTF Challenges (Capture The Flag)**: Dive into platforms like [CTFtime](https://ctftime.org/) where you can participate in cyber security challenges. It's like playing *Among Us* but with hackers—find the imposter in the code!

- **Hunt A Killer (Digitally)**: Create your own digital crime scenes. Ask friends to send you files (like images, PDFs) with hidden clues. Your job? Find the Easter eggs and solve the case.

### 2. **YouTube University**

- **Cyber Sleuth Tutorials**: Channels like *HackerSploit* and *The Cyber Mentor* have playlists covering digital forensics, cybersecurity, and more. Binge-watch them like your fave Netflix series, but here you're learning skills to catch bad guys.

- **Live Streams & Q&A**: Jump into live streams on platforms like Twitch where cybersecurity experts solve cases in real-time. Ask questions, get answers, and interact with the pros.

### 3. **Public Libraries & eBook Treasure Hunts**

- **Library eBooks**: Most libraries have eBooks or online resources on digital forensics. Check out titles like *"Hacking Exposed"* or *"Digital Forensics for Dummies"*. You might have to dig through the catalog, but think of it as your first case.

- **LinkedIn Learning via Library**: Some libraries offer free access to LinkedIn Learning. If you can snag that, you've got a goldmine of courses on cybersecurity and forensics.

### 4. **Virtual Study Groups**

- **Discord Servers**: Join cybersecurity and hacking communities on Discord. They often have study groups, challenges, and mentors ready to help out. It's like joining a digital Hogwarts for hackers.

- **Reddit Threads**: Subreddits like r/cybersecurity and r/hacking are packed with resources, advice, and study buddies. Post your questions, and you’ll get a whole thread of answers.

### 5. **DIY Labs at Home**

- **Build Your Own Lab**: Got an old PC or laptop? Turn it into a practice lab. Install virtual machines (VMware, VirtualBox) and play around with different operating systems and security tools. It’s like Minecraft but for hacking.

- **Log Your Own Activity**: Turn on logging on your own devices and then try to trace your own steps later. You’re basically spying on yourself—no NSA required.

### 6. **Community College & University Open Courses**

- **Free Audit Courses**: Many universities offer free auditing of cybersecurity courses through platforms like Coursera, edX, and even YouTube. No grades, no stress, just pure learning.

- **MOOCs**: Massive Open Online Courses often have free tiers. Try courses like "Introduction to Cyber Security" on platforms like FutureLearn or edX.

### 7. **Scour GitHub**

- **Open-Source Tools**: GitHub is full of open-source forensic tools and scripts. Clone some repositories and start tinkering with them. You’re basically getting your hands on the tools real investigators use.

- **Follow the Code**: Find projects related to digital forensics, follow the code, and see how they work. Contribute if you can—bonus points for boosting your resume.

### 8. **Local Meetups & Online Conferences**

- **Free Virtual Conferences**: Many cybersecurity conferences are virtual and some offer free access. DEF CON has a lot of free content, and you can find tons of talks on YouTube.

- **Hackathons**: Look for free entry hackathons—often universities or tech companies sponsor them. Compete, learn, and maybe even win some gear.

### 9. **DIY Challenges**

- **Create Your Own Scenarios**: Get a friend to simulate a hack or data breach. You try to solve it using whatever tools and resources you have. It's like escape rooms, but digital.

- **Pen & Paper Simulation**: Before diving into digital, try solving forensic puzzles on paper. Map out scenarios and solutions to get your brain wired like a detective.

### 10. **Stay Updated**

- **Podcasts & Blogs**: Tune into cybersecurity podcasts like *Darknet Diaries* or follow blogs like *Krebs on Security*. It’s like getting the tea on what’s happening in the cyber world.

### 11. **Free Software & Tools**

- **Autopsy**: Free digital forensics software that helps you analyze hard drives and mobile devices. Think of it as your magnifying glass for digital clues.

- **Wireshark**: A free tool to see what's happening on your network. Catch all the data packets like you're a digital fisherman.

### 12. **Online Forensics Communities**

- **Free Webinars & Workshops**: Join communities like the *SANS Institute* for free webinars. It's like attending a masterclass but from the comfort of your gaming chair.

- **LinkedIn Groups**: Join groups like *Digital Forensics & Incident Response (DFIR)*. Network with pros, get job tips, and stay in the loop with the latest trends.

### 13. **Practice Cases & Mock Trials**

- **Set Up Mock Trials**: Role-play with friends where one is the hacker, another the victim, and you’re the investigator. Recreate cases from famous cybercrimes to see how you'd solve them.

- **Case Studies**: Research and recreate famous digital forensic cases. What steps did the investigators take? How would you handle it differently?

There you have it—your roadmap to becoming a cyber sleuth without dropping a dime. You don't have time find your interest after paying pennies to different ppl and colleges. You can explore multiple things from comfort of your home only if you want to.

[dukeofdelirium]

https://www.tumblr.com/dukeofdelirium/760911562701701120/do-you-just-have-those-characters-that-you-see?source=share

You're so real for this...2024 and I still see people said, "Aw how cute it is between Light and Misa or (any female characters)...."

See, even for someone who don't really like shipping, since the first I watch Death Note anime, then read the manga, I can't get it if people don't ship Light with L...

When I found your blog : Lawlight & Kataang shipper, yes? Kindred spirit...See, when I tell people I ship Kataang, most people will be 😁😆🥰🤩 but then I said I'm Lawlight shipper, people be like 😑😭🙁☹

Like, why people can't love 2 very different ships, right?

So, in ATLA, are you Zuko/Mai or Zuko/Sokka shipper or neither? Why?

Right?? I don’t get it fr. Shipping Light with Misa specifically is like.. LMFAO I CANTTTT he literally hates her so much but it isn’t even that he hates her, he actively avoids all sorts of intimacy with her and when he Does do something, he only does so to continue using her as a pawn. I mean, the only reason he even kept her alive was bc he didn’t have a choice in the first place bc of Rem. And like, his avoidance and internal rejection of her and other women isn’t even a “Kira” thing, bc he still did so when he was memoryless and we also know he avoided dating girls pre death note/Kira persona bc he said he was “waiting until college” etc. So there’s a clear canonical pattern of Light avoiding romantic relationships with women. Which on its own would be like ok whatever, but at the same time there is a clear pattern of an active interest in male characters even when they are equal to the female characters such as Takada vs Mikami. There’s also the fact he shows no discomfort whenever L touches him specifically during Yotsuba arc, and also the fact that in the manga he asked one of his friends to send him a holiday card to which his friend replied “I only send them to girls” which is essentially stating this is a romantic gesture and Light did just ask for it.

I mean, I could go on and on but there is quite a lot of gay coding going on in the manga and then of course in the anime and subsequent DN adaptations (minus the Netflix movie that we shall pretend doesn’t exist)

I don’t rlly get the hatred toward Lawlight tbh? It’s pretty weird, because their relationship is like… 90% of the appeal of Death Note imo. But to each their own I suppose. Personally, I just think there is a lot of canonical justification and intentional gay coding/subtext to warrant it.

If Ohba didn’t want us to ship lawlight then perhaps they shouldn’t have written them to be some sort of fucked up soulmate pair who complete each other and perhaps they shouldn’t have make jokes hinting at L and Light having a homosexual undertone to their relationship and PERHAPS they shouldn’t have had an entire story arc where L literally handcuffs himself to Light for 100 days straight and where they share an UNMONITORED room…. LMFAOOO that right there was 100000% ship tease idc what anyone says. Ohba knew what they were doing idgaf

And yeah I know about the kataang stuff. It’s weird for me too. See Lawlight is my OTP hands down. Kataang is a strong second contender. I love both pairings about the same but in very different ways. It’s funny because they’re very drastically different pairings of course, but that also is the stories themselves and the narratives.

Kataang is about the most wholesome ship you could ship meanwhile Lawlight is inherently fucked up butttttttttt Death Note itself is a fairly mature story dealing with inherently fucked up subject matter and characters so there’s rlly no avoiding that.

I don’t rlly care what someone thinks of my ship preferences, the only thing that annoys me is antis who misrepresent canon like with Kataang or antis with Lawlight who basically say we’re bad ppl for shipping it. Like as if Lawlight isn’t a huge ship in anime/manga lol. Truly one of the forefathers of toxic yaoi 🤣

As for who I ship Zuko with: I do ship Maiko though I’ll say I’m not hugely invested in the pairing. I don’t have much to say on it other than I enjoy their scenes in the show and I think they are a nice couple. I don’t care for Zuko and Sokka, I think it’s kind of in that same category as zvtara and I don’t care for that ship at all.

I actually ship Zuko with Aang lol. Like Zuko and Aang when they’re older, I can get behind zukaang 100% in part because they are like that kindred spirit thing similar to lawlight to me. I really enjoy that aspect of their relationship and I again think canonically, zukaang would be plausible if it weren’t for maiko and kataang.

Anyway, thanks for the message! Hope this answered your question :)

[wandafiction]

The Friends - Just Us Chapter 23

Warnings: None

Word Count: 4167

Series List | Chapter 22 | Chapter 24

================================

"Dorogoy." Wanda's voice travels up the stairs of the penthouse. We finally made it back here after a very long session of adult activities.

"Yes princess?" I call back as I start making my way downstairs doing up the last few buttons of my shirt rolling the sleeves up neatly past my elbows.

"Could I maybe invite my friends here?" She looks down at her phone screen as her fingers tap the back of the device.

"Of course. It just means some of the wine I've been hoarding will get drunk. I will get a guest code set up for them each, it's just the three of them right?" I wrap my arms around Wanda's waist bringing her close to me, trapping her arms between our chests as she rests her forehead against my shoulder.

"Yeah, just the three of them. What sort of time should they come here?"

"Whenever you want. We can just have a relaxed day if you want. Continue watching stranger things, maybe sit on the chairs on the balcony. It's a nice day for it." 

"Okay well if I tell them to get here for 7, so food will be ready for when they get here and we can just relax and cuddle on the couch. How does that sound?" 

"Sounds good to me princess. Or we can snuggle on the bed and watch the TV in my room, it's slightly more comfortable than the couch." 

"Mhmm, I agree. I like the idea of being a loaf for the day."

"Why don't you go and get some comfy clothes on and I will come and join you on the bed in a second."

"Bring popcorn." Wanda shouts as she scurries up the stairs inpatient as ever.

"Anything for you princess." I shout back, making my way to the kitchen to prepare a bowl of popcorn each.

As I make my way into my room, Wanda is already under the covers sitting against the headboard with a few cushions to relax against with one in her lap resting her arms on it. I look to the TV to see the show up and ready to play, a small smile on my face as I make my way over to the bed. Wanda pulls back the covers grabbing one of the bowels, placing it on the cushion in her lap so I can get comfortable on the bed.

"I'm sorry, I didn't ask if I could just log on to your Netflix and set it up. I should have waited." I sit criss-cross applesauce pulling the covers back over mine and Wanda's legs as I look down at her. 

"It's okay princess, you can use my Netflix anytime you want. Oh that reminds me, I left it logged in on your TV so you can watch it at your place." 

"Thank you. Can the boys use it too?" 

"Of course they can Wanda, that's why it's on there. For you guys to be able to have family film nights so the kids can take a break from whatever kids do nowadays." 

"That's really lovely of you dorogoy. I think I got lucky with my boys, they love their music. They are even a part of the school band. I don't have any instruments at mine but I know their dad has a guitar and drum set at his place." Wanda presses play on the show, as we settle in to continue watching stranger things and have a lazy day.

I don't even notice how much time has passed, until Wanda's phone goes off next to her and her eyes widen. 

"The girls are on their way. They will be here in thirty minutes. Shit I forgot to cook, and I look a state!" Wanda jumps from the bed in a rushed state.

"Princess calm down. Why don't you get washed and ready, and I will get something cooking. Do the girls have any allergies at all?" I move from the bed to stand in front of Wanda placing my hands on her shoulders allowing her to calm down.

"Yes, right, I will go get myself sorted. The girls don't have any allergies and are not fussy with what they eat. Sorry I'm just a little nervous." 

"It's okay princess, but shouldn't I be the one who's nervous." Wanda huffs out a laugh as she finally relaxes leaning her body against mine so I wrap my arms around her neck gently. 

"You're right, why aren't you nervous." 

"Oh I am, I've just learned how to hide it. Now is spaghetti bolognese with garlic bread okay for food?" 

"It's perfect, you're perfect. Thank you dorogoy." Wanda stands on her tiptoes to give me a sweet kiss that I reciprocate. 

"Now go get yourself ready and I will get everything sorted in the kitchen." I playfully swat Wanda's butt as she makes her way into the ensuite causing a cute squeak to leave her lips. 

I straighten out my clothes as I walk down the stairs. I am wearing some simple skinny fit jeans, plain black socks and a white button up shirt. I mean I could wear shoes but we are not going out, so I can't be fucked to wear them. What a way to meet Wanda's friends... in my socks. I get into the kitchen, immediately placing a pan on the hob setting it on a low heat so it can warm up before I put the mince in. 

I'm swaying my hips to the music that's echoing through the kitchen, getting the last of the dinner ready. The spaghetti has a few more minutes and the mince and sauce is just simmering away so it stays hot, the aroma of the garlic bread is also spread, letting me know that it is most done too. 

"Dorogoy." Wanda's voice brings me out of my cooking trance, but I don't turn around as I keep an eye on the pasta to make sure it is cooked perfectly but hit the pause button on my phone,  which is next to the hob, stopping the music.

"Yes baby girl?" I hear the clearing of a throat.

"Uh, y/n." This time I turn around when I hear Wanda mumble and am met by the faces of her friends and a very red faced Wanda. Whoops.

I recognise two faces from the night I met Wanda. Natasha is the one with short blonde woman. Sharon is the taller blonde of the three. The third blonde must be Yelena. Wow, I don't think I've seen so many blonde's in a room since highschool, where all the cheerleaders try to look the exact same. Both Natasha and Sharon are smirking at Wanda while Yelena's jaw is wide open, her eyes flicking between me and Wanda.

"Right, okay. So food is just about done, why don't you guys get settled at the island and I will bring it over for you and we can open a nice bottle of red to go with the meal." I clap my hands together once as I turn back around to strain the pasta: turning the hobs off. 

Wanda joins me in the kitchen moving to the cupboards to grab out 5 plates, the cutlery and each of us a wine glass. As she moves past me to put the plates down on the counter so I can dish up the food, she leans up to give me a peck on the cheek and we hear a chorus of ews behind us which make me laugh but I see Wanda send them all a middle finger.

"Could you just grab out another plate for the garlic bread princess?" 

"Yeah. Can I put some music on?" Wanda moves to grab me another plate as I use the oven glove to remove the garlic bread.

"Just ask S.U.S.I.E. to play what you want." I say nonchalantly, kind of forgetting that I have other people around me even though I am dishing up food for 5.

"Who's S.U.S.I.E?" I hear a stern voice with a very prominent Russian accent. 

"S.U.S.I.E is my in home computer system, Yelena. It is Yelena right?" I smirk as I hear her murmur a 'how the fuck.'

"S.U.S.I.E play some dinner time tunes." 

"Playing some dinner time tunes, Miss Maximoff." I see Wanda smile from the corner of my eye at the robotic voice, soft music starts echoing through the room.

I finally finish plating up the food, grabbing three plates at once, turning around and placing them in front of the three women who I haven't actually spoken to properly yet. I gently place their food down for them, giving them small smiles as I turn back around to see Wanda holding a bottle of wine to my face. 

"Could we open this one? It's the same as last weeks yeah?" Wanda studies the label of the Ausone, which is just another bottle of what we had last week.

"Of course."

"Was this one a gift as well?"

"No, I think I splurged on that one. Here I will put the glasses on the island and we will pour it once we are both sat down." I grab the cutlery and garlic bread placing it on the island before grabbing mine and Wanda's food as she takes a seat at a stool starting to pour wine for everyone. 

"Sorry I haven't really introduced myself yet, I thought it was important not to burn the food on our first meetings. So hello everyone I'm y/n and I think I know who you all are. You're Natasha and you're Yelena. You two are sisters. That leaves you, so you must be Sharon." I point to each blonde as I address them, I can feel Wanda's nerves from here so I gently place my hand on her thigh giving it a squeeze so she knows we are okay.

"You're right Wanda, she has intuition and a good guessing game about her." Sharon speaks as she starts her food, a low hum leaving her lips. "Guys you have to try this, it's so good." She covers her mouth as she speaks to avoid us seeing her full mouth.

"You should try the wine." Wanda smirks as all three women take a sip of their wine, their eyes growing wide at the rich taste. The other two blonds also try the food and a satisfied hum leaves their lips too. A proud smile makes its way onto my lips as I dig into my food.

"So what do you do for work y/n?" Natasha curls a questioning brow.

"I am a CEO." 

"CEO of what?" I can already see they are going to try and gang up on me, game on.

"We practice in medical advancement including that of research and development of new equipment or medications and improvements on previous." I give them the full business woman voice.

"Cool. You practice that in the mirror?" Sharon asks as she continues to drink and eat.

"I do, or well did. I had to get it perfect to get the rich white men to listen to me "

"God I know the feeling. Rich white men are the worst!" Natasha explains as she throws her hands in the air to add to the dramatics.

"They are indeed. You are a business woman." 

"No but I work for a rich white man as an associate to try and get the rich white men to invest." 

"Anywhere I would know?"

"Stark industries. I work in the international relations section, alongside Wanda actually. So we cover Eastern Europe and Russia." I guess I never really asked what Wanda did for a job and am quite surprised I've never seen them before with the amount of times I visit the tower.

"Stark is actually a good friend of mine and one of the few rich white men I actually like. I'm surprised we have never run into each other with the amount of times I've visited the tower." 

"Odd, but not impossible I mean the tower is huge and like a fucking maze." Wanda joins in the conversation, her nerves dissipating slightly. 

'What do you two do for work?" I ask the remaining two blonds to keep the conversation going.

"I work at shield." Sharon places her knife and fork on her plate as she grabs a few bits of garlic bread to wipe up the remaining sauce, damn she eats quickly...or I just eat slowly.

"The weapon and security place right? In the defence sector?" 

"That's correct. Don't tell me you know people there too." 

"Eh, I've helped them, they've helped me. Just mutual agreements and all." I shrug as I turn to Yelena waiting on her answer.

"I'm not currently working. I just did a year away in Russia helping my mother and father on their pig farm and I'm not really looking for work at the moment." 

"I think I recognise you, now that I'm looking closely enough." Natasha says out of nowhere.

"Probably not, just one of those faces." 

"Hmm, maybe I've walked past you in the tower or something." Natasha squints her eyes at me as she looks me up and down. "No it's not that...I don't know but it will come to me."

I look around the island to see everyone has finished their food, continuing to drink their wine as they lose themselves in conversation with one another officially starting their girls night. I pile the dishes one on top of the other, putting all the cutlery on the top plate. Stealing a bit of garlic bread and holding it between my teeth I slide off my stool, turning to the sink to wash the dishes. As I am filling the sink up with hot soapy water, finishing off my bit of garlic bread, I hear the movement of stools against the tiled floor as the girls get off of them and head towards the living room. I thought Wanda would have joined them, but instead she wraps her arms around my waist from behind me resting her head against my back. I hear her let out a loud sigh.

"You okay back there princess? Do I need to get another bottle of wine?" I hear Wanda mumble something as she nuzzles her head against my back, so I turn the taps of turning around and wrapping my arms around her neck so I can play with her hair. "What did you say princess?"

"I said I'm okay, I just want them to like you. Not that you're not likable but they always had something against vision and I. I don't know." She shrugs as her face rests on my chest.

"So your friends didn't like vision or they always thought he wasn't good enough for you " I bring my hands to her cheeks, rubbing my thumb against them to try and help calm her down or at least let her know I'm listening. 

"I think a bit of both. I think maybe I'm hoping they will like you, because if they like you that means I won't end up in the same situation as vision. Not that you're like vision. Oh god I should stop talking. I'm sorry, I didn't mean to compare the two of you." I move her face to look up at me.

"Okay first of all I need you to take a breath and calm down a little for me okay?" She takes a shaky breath as her eyes become slightly glassy, a pout growing on her lip. "Secondly, I understand what you are saying. If your friends like me it means they don't sense something is up, it means that you can allow yourself to dive in. 10 out of 10 dive, dive right in. It means you don't have to be scared about how our future will end, because your friends can tell that there will be a future and that you are safe and you will be happy. Am I close?" 

'You're spot on, you always know how to convey mine or your own feelings in such words that make it make sense even if it's all confusing and my mind is racing at 100mph. Thank you dorogoy, for calming me down." 

"Always princess, always. Now you go join your friends on the couch, I will finish up the dishes and I will come and join you. Netflix is already on the TV so start something up, don't wait on me. Oh and take another bottle of wine with you." I peck Wanda on the lips a couple of times before releasing her from my grasp so she can go join her friends. She grabs a bottle of wine from the wine fridge and disappears down the corridor, so I turn around, turning the taps on again to continue filling the sink.

(Wanda POV)

I walk into the living room, where I see my friends sprawled all over y/ns couches, a smile growing on my face at the sight. I sit next to Natasha on the large couch that directly faces the TV, opening the bottle of wine to pour myself a fresh glass and offering it up to the girls. I roll my eyes as they all eagerly nod and hold out their glasses to me, standing up so I can pour Lena's and Sharon's who are sitting on the couch to my left. As I sit back down, the room is engulfed in silence, every now and again we hear the clanking of pots and pans as y/n washes up.

"Soooo, what do you guys want to watch?" I drum my fingers of my free hand against my leg, and sat nervously in this unusual silence. 

"I like her." Sharon breaks the silence a few moments later, smiling softly at me as I smile so wide it hurts.

"Yeah?" 

"Yeah, I really do. I don't know why but she is so easy to like. I mean she is down to earth, really calm and collected. She knows what she wants in life. And let me not forget she is fucking rich, like rich, rich. Also hot, sorry Wanda but those muscles that can be clearly seen in those jeans and shirt, I mean wow!" Sharon rambles on and we all laugh at her descriptionof y/ns muscles, I mean she is not wrong she is so fucking hot. "I mean she is also humble, you may be able to see her wealth from what she owns but she doesn't show it off like other millionaires. She also doesn't have a lot of in-home helpers, I mean she is doing the dishes. So yeah I like her."

"Me too." My eyes move from Sharon to Lena as she thinks about it. "I mean all the things Sharon said are correct, but from what you've told us and from what I've seen she cares a lot about you and how you feel. I mean I saw your moment in the kitchen just now." 

"Wait, you saw that?!" I blush as I remember the small moment we had in the kitchen. She is so good at calming me down and seems to know how I'm feeling and how to deal with it.

"Yeah I came to see what was keeping you two and I sort of overheard what you said about us not liking vision." 

"Wait what did she say?" Sharon's head moves to look at Lena then back at me.

"Just that you guys didn't like vision, or you always said there was something off about him and then he did what he did. And it sort of was like a big 'I told you so' and that if you didn't like y/n I wouldn't know what to do because I really like her, like really really fucking like her." Nat moves closer to me wrapping her arm around me. 

"I may not have liked vision, and I may have felt something off but I never thought he would cheat on you. I just didn't think he was right for you, you deserved a lot better than what he was giving you." Nat speaks in a soft tone as she explains her feelings towards my ex-husband. "So please don't think I would ever hold it over you as an I told you so, okay?" 

"Okay." I nod my head as I lean it against her shoulder.

"Anyway, back to me." We laugh at Lena who now has our attention again. "As I was saying you said that thing and I thought maybe she would say something like why are you comparing us we are two different people, or some shit like that, but she didn't. What she shared, which I won't share because that was a moment between you two that I sort of overheard. But what she said was amazing and heartfelt and it helped you calm down quicker than I ever saw vision or really one of us do. She made you feel safe, wanted and made sure you were okay. So yes I like her."

"Thank you Lena." I smile over at her as I turn my head to look at Natasha, whose opinion matters the most to me. We have known each other for so long and she is so good at reading people, their emotions being able to tell if they are lying or not. Better than I ever could. 

"She is good for you Wanda, but I think she is keeping something from you. I recognise her from somewhere and I can't place it. But I agree with the other two that she is good for you, just don't let her hide from you for too long." 

"We've only known each other since last Friday. I only know a little about her past, her ex girlfriend really doesn't sound like a nice woman and has created a small amount of insecurities, I guess you could call them." 

"Like what?" Natasha's voice steady as she looks at me with a curious gaze.

"I mean I opened up about Pietro, you know how he is in hospital and all that. That night when she washed her face she wiped all her make-up off revealing a black eye. I asked her what happened, she replied with the fact that she had a moment shrugging her shoulders like it was nothing. Then I thought the worst, maybe she had said something to someone and they reacted by hitting her. She then opened up to me about how she had a panic attack." I take a breath, I don't really want to tell my friends what she said because that's her business but if I don't they aren't going to trust her.

"And?" Sharon asks from the other couch.

"And, she told me that she fell backwards hitting her head on the counter because her friend touched her and she reacted badly to the touch in the haze of the attack. I then thanked her for trusting me enough with the information, and she just looked at me with pure shock. Her next words cause me to mirror her face. She said something like 'isn't that what is expected, you open up so I have to too'." I stop there, not wanting to tell anything else from that conversation of ours.

"So her ex got it in her head that she couldn't deal with stuff herself and that she needed to know anything and everything that is happening in her life. Like zero privacy." Lena voices her conclusion.

"Exactly." 

"So whatever she is hiding, or at least not wanting to tell you straight away you've told her that it's okay and that you will be there when she is ready?" Lena continues her observations.

"Exactly." 

"Okay. But if she hurts you I hurt her…" Nat starts but goes quiet when we hear someone entering the room.

I turn to see y/n with a soft smile on her face at the sight of me and my friends on her couches just conversing, I don't know if she overhead anything but if she did I hope she feels like she is welcomed and liked by all three of them. It means everything to me that they like her. 

"Do you guys need anything else, before I come and join you on the couch. If I am allowed to join girls night that is?" The three girls shout out an 'of course' and usher her over to sit. She nods and starts walking towards us, leaning over the back of the couch behind me so I look up as she gives me a spiderman kiss. We hear a chorus of ews which makes y/n smile and give my friends the middle finger at the same time as me. I beam up at her as she jokes around with my friends.

That's my girl.

Wait, that's my girl?

================================

[peachyqueenly]

Cookie Run, Queerbait, and why the concept does not apply to SeaMoon... 2!!!

//This is a repost of an older post, as something else came up that I wanted to add to this analysis. If you don't want to reread the entire thing, feel free to skip to the section headed with 'Queerbait: Lost in Translation'.//

There are a lot of issues with the way Devsis, the developers behind Cookie Run, handle diversity in their games. Most notably, it falls into the common trap many, MANY gacha games do in that it partakes in a lot of orientalist tropes. But one debate I’ve seen that I just cannot get behind, as a lesbian, is the idea that they have queerbaited-- most namely, with SeaMoon.

Below the cut, I will explain why: what queerbait is and what it looks like, queerbaiting vs coding, and why comparing WlW tropes from other countries to queerbaiting is unfair (and also maybe don’t apply a Japanese literary concept to a Korean game, more on that later). All in a bid to show why it is not only wrong to compare SeaMoon to queerbaiting, it is harmful.

SeaMoon, for those unfamiliar, is the name popularly given to the ship between Sea Fairy Cookie and Moonlight Cookie in Cookie Run. Aside from the ocean and the moon being a common motif for romance in fiction already, the game had hinted at their romance in a lot of in-game and side material. Most namely, Sea Fairy’s line about Moonlight’s heart ‘being the warmest’ and the “I want you Everyday” music video with their moment together + the lines that went along with that moment...

Your love brought spring to my endless winter...

For more examples of where their romance was suggested, I recommend this doc: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LPJU8yBYD8Ng7lhh_lR0bA2XRwmJTtbRceGuKahFxFs/edit

The point is, most WlW in this fandom caught onto the romantic ramifications of the ship long before Moonlight was expanded on in Kingdom and the recent updates all but confirmed their mutual affection towards one another. The two of them even got matching costumes and a bond story that was as close to romance as Cookie Run would do (as it is ultimately not a romance centered franchise).

With who they are established...

Queerbait: What is it?

Queerbaiting most popularly is understood as a marketing gimmick where creators and multimedia companies suggest queerness to draw in LGBT people and allies, only for the rug to be pulled out from underneath fans. Though it has other meanings, especially in other cultures as I'll explain more below. Whether this is utilizing the ‘bury your gays’ trope, the rep being constrained to insignificant side characters/moments, or just not existing at all.

The two most popular examples of queerbaiting would be recent Disney movies and Voltron. Though special shoutout to Harry Potter, as if we didn’t have enough reasons to hate the book series and JKR. As the stuff with Dumbledore was an obvious retcon to go ‘look how progressive I am!!!’.

Voltron’s last season had two key things regarding queerbait: the Klance drama (the ship between Keith and Lance) and Shiro’s bait and switch with his partner.

To the show’s credit, Shiro was actually gay. Even revealed to have had a partner he was engaged to. However, this rug was pulled out from underneath fans when they actively killed said partner. He was given another partner in the epilogue, but the fact he was revealed to be gay only for his partner to be killed off (coupled with the next thing) upset many queer fans.

Klance is a lot more insidious. In the run up to the final season, Netflix and the crew actively promoted the show using Klance and its popular support. Despite the fact they knew the relationship was never intended to be canon. This is one of the most explicit examples of queerbaiting out there, and is foundational to understanding the specificity and insidiousness of the marketing ploy.

For Disney, I would like to focus on the Star Wars sequels and Beauty and the Beast (2017). The last movie of the sequel trilogy had the creators talking about how there would be queer rep... leading many queer fans to believe they were talking about Finn and Poe for obvious reasons, something the creators never corrected/confirmed. Only for the rep to merely be two background characters in one scene.

As for Beauty and the Beast, Le Fou was celebrated as Disney’s first openly gay character, leading folks to believe they’d explore him having feelings for the titular bad guy. But that was never really explored in any meaningful way, and the rep we got of him was a ‘blink and you’ll miss it’ moment between him and an unnamed character. Arguably he could fall more into coding, but the fact Disney actively marketed him for his gayness is where it bleeds into queerbaiting.

In general, queerbaiting is a more modern problem, as companies feel they can say the word gay now. But are still wishy-washy on actual depictions of queerness. So we get them celebrating their inclusion, even if it’s ultimately little to nothing.

Queerbaiting vs Queer Coding

This is when an important distinction needs to be made: what is queerbaiting and what is queer coding. Queer coding is when media uses subtext, but never explicitly says, a character is gay. A good way to understand this is to compare 90′s disney movies to modern ones.

As discussed above, modern Disney will often go on about having queerness in their movies only for it to be minimal at best if not existent. 90′s Disney meanwhile never marketed their movies as having LGBT elements, but many fans could see the way in which queerness came through from characters like Ursula (literally modeled off a drag queen), Scar, and Hades. 

Queer coding can be seen as a product of the Hays Code era-- where positive depictions of ‘perverse sexuality’ (including homosexuality) was not allowed in film, relegating a lot of queerness to the roles of villains (hence the association Disney villains have with it). That, or queer creators had to find ways of coding their heroes in ways that went under the nose of cishet audiences.

Queer coding exists in a net-neutral space. As queer coding, while in many ways is outdated in a world where media can show explicit LGBT rep, was integral to the ways in which queer creators told their stories for years. And actively influences the way many queer creators continue to tell their story (for better and for worse). It can also perpetrate stereotypes against queer people, as we saw with the Disney villains, however.

Still, this is different than the relatively modern concept of queerbaiting as that is largely a negative phenomenon. Queer coding was a tool used and is still used by actual LGBT people, while queerbaiting is more often than not the work of cishet folks or corporations wanting to make a quick buck.

Queerbait: Lost in Translation

Another element of queerbait I did not previously address is how its more commonly understood in the context of cultures' media (such as in Eastern countries like Korea and Japan). As the financial reasoning behind the idea isn't as front and center (for a myriad of complicated reasons regarding how explicit queer rep can be from country to country). Though this definition of queerbait can also apply to US and English based media.

To some, queerbait also applies to coded LGBT relationships that are primarily centered on or meant to appeal to straight audiences (WlW rep meant for the male gaze, MlM rep meant for girls).

In other words, fetishized LGBT coding.

I would personally argue (as a queer non binary lesbian) that this meaning is less insidious than the money making logic behind modern queer baiting that happens in the US mainly, but its for an important reason...

A lot of this queerbait relies on elements of coding still. While the way many Western viewers see queerbait in American media relies on using explicit queerness as a marketing ploy. To compare, let's look at idol/sports anime and the previously mentioned Disney movies.

The idea that idol/sports anime is queerbait is... contentious. And one I'm not entirely sure I even agree on. But it is undeniable that some of its more WlW centric scenes appeal to the male audiences that view these shows or games. Still, nothing is ever made explicit. It utilizes elements of queer coding originating from the yuri/gl genre that was built up by queer people themselves.

To some, this may be more insulting. For me personally though coding has always been a net neutral, and this form of coding is just more on the negative end for me. Still, there is something there for queer people to take away.

Meanwhile, the way in which disney queerbaits its audience is by saying their character is LGBT then... doing nothing with it. Not even elements of coding. Just-- 'yep there's a gay character in our movie come watch it'!!! Its a lot more soulless compared to the previous one, and therefore to me is more insulting.

Why SeaMoon falls more into Coding

With the two elements defined, let’s explain why SeaMoon falls more into the realm of coding rather than baiting.

First off, the way the devs write romance is consistent with how they wrote SeaMoon. Most of the ways in which things were left vague before Kingdom could be explained in the devs unfortunate habit of not elaborating on things they really should elaborate on. On top of romance in general being coded rather than explicit in the franchise.

As an example, lets discuss the two closest things to M/F romance we have in the franchise-- PureLily (Pure Vanilla and White Lily) and MintCocoa (Mint Choco and Cocoa). 

PureLily became more explicit in the same update as SeaMoon (with Pure Vanilla wondering aloud if he still loves her), but in general the way their relationship was shown before the Crunchy Dreams event was largely through subtext (how the two spoke of one another, PV’s garden, etc) and outside material (the love quiz).

This also applies to MintCocoa. During the days of OB, the game itself did not elaborate much on either of the two’s characters (just as they didn’t with Moonlight). With most of their romantic subtext (like SeaMoon) being in outside videos, media, and merch. Kingdom in general seems more willing to elaborate on romance, as we saw in the story that came with Cocoa’s release.

And secondly, the devs never really threw SeaMoon around as a way of saying ‘look how progressive we are’ or to appeal specifically to LGBT fans. Anytime SeaMoon was included in media, it was often alongside other coded relationships such as MintCocoa or things like RaspRose (Raspberry Mousse x Rose). And even the times they did do things like promote themselves during pride month, they never used SeaMoon. Instead they used the Hollyberry kingdom (due to its bg having same-gender couples dancing and having drinks together). 

The way SeaMoon was treated up until the recent Kingdom update was more in line with queer coding rather than queer baiting. Which is NOT perfect, as media should go beyond coding in the modern age. But it is not as bad or as insidious as queerbaiting implies.

Not as insidious as either definition of queerbait; as nothing about the relationship between them is really centered on being for the male or fetishized gaze either. They're Cookies... in a series where romance is not a focus. While one could argue their romance is stuck more into the background compared to say MintCocoa and PureLily, it still isn't designed to be fetishized (in canon, what fandoms do with SeaMoon and other LGBT ships is its own matter).

Extra Note on S Class Comparisons

S Class is a trope in Japanese media where two girls will often have a very close bond, akin to romance. However, it is ultimately still platonic and disappears upon either graduation from school or marriage. It is over 100 years old, with some of the first pieces of the genre being in the early 1900′s. And was a major influence on the yuri, more commonly called GL now, genre.

Before anything else, I want to offer a brief aside that maybe we should be careful when comparing a Japanese literary trope to a Korean game. Comparing the two countries can be a very... very touchy subject matter. Especially in the context of this being a genre that rose in popularity during the colonization of Korea by Japan.

I do NOT think you can compare SeaMoon or anything in CR to S Class tropes. But I will discuss it just to clear things up, as I find comparing the trope to queerbaiting problematic.

It is more akin to queer coding rather than queer baiting. Why? Many of the authors who utilized the trope were queer themselves. In fact, “Obuko Yoshiya, a lesbian Japanese novelist active in the Bluestocking feminist movement, is regarded as a pioneer of Class S literature”. Again, a key factor that separates coding and baiting (being that queer creators will often code but won’t bait). 

The genre is at its worst stifling and harmful to the modern day GL genre in Japanese literature, and extremely heteronormative. But to compare it to things like queerbaiting or to entirely dismiss it as a form of WlW rep in the context of how it was used by actual queer people in Japan is entirely unfair to the genre; queer rep does not look the same in every country.

S Class also evades the way in which queerbait can mean being meant for the male gaze, as it is a trope whose origins lie earnestly in media meant for girls. That does not mean it can't be used to appeal to the male gaze, but it is not where it started.

Ending Notes

Are the devs perfect in their representation of SeaMoon and WlW? Of course not, there is a valid conversation to be had on how queer relationships constantly being merely coded rather than explicit is annoying and hurtful. And more and more queer people have this critique of the concept of queer coding. On a personal level, I can forgive it in this specific case cause its in line with how the devs do romance in general. But if it bothers you that it was merely coded for the longest time rather than explicit, that’s entirely valid.

But the idea the devs ever queerbaited audiences is unfair and actively makes many WlW feel invalidated in how they easily saw the coding present in the two’s relationship. Again, queer coding is a net neutral phenomenon while queerbaiting is mostly negative. To subscribe such a notion to what is important rep to so many WlW is hurtful.

Sources

https://www.animefeminist.com/escape-yuri-hell-flip-flappers-critique-class-s-genre/

https://bookriot.com/what-is-queerbaiting-vs-queer-coding/

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1LPJU8yBYD8Ng7lhh_lR0bA2XRwmJTtbRceGuKahFxFs/edit

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Class_S_(genre)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queerbaiting#:~:text=Queerbaiting%20is%20a%20marketing%20technique,romance%20or%20other%20LGBTQ%2B%20representation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queer_coding#:~:text=Queer%20coding%20is%20the%20subtextual,character%20in%20media%20as%20queer.

[ourflagmeansgayrights]

yeah my tl;dr opinion on the second billboard is that it’s gonna have very little impact on making us more visible and probably very little direct impact on our chances of getting renewed, but if it makes some ppl feel like they’re doing something then i don’t rlly care bc it’s not my money. that being said, i’m a little worried that the second billboard might end up hurting the general ofmd fandom’s morale more than helping.

elaboration under the cut bc this shit got long

so the ofmd fandom has already caught the attention of the media, we have new articles being written about us pretty frequently. hbo/wbd is also facing a lot of public backlash for their continuous cancellation of tv shows, especially diverse shows, AND they are specifically getting a lot of shit abt refusing to sell coyote v acme. they have a lot of money to gain via tax write-offs from shelving thay movie and refusing to sell, but refusing to sell ofmd isn’t gonna make them that kind of money. so public pressure + financial incentive combined, there’s a pretty good chance of wbd selling ofmd to another studio.

ironing out a deal with netflix/apple tv/amazon+ is gonna take time tho. from a fandom perspective, it’s already been be a very long, very demoralizing waiting game, and personally i would be surprised if we’re even halfway through it.

so there are two things at play when it comes to the fandom giving djenks et al the best chance of securing the best deal for this show: maintaining visibility and maintaining fandom morale. obviously visibility is more directly affecting the negotiations, but morale is important in keeping as many ppl in the fandom active as we can during this gravy basket of a waiting period.

so the question is, how does the second billboard serve those goals? will it maintain or increase our visibility? will it boost fandom morale?

before i get into the second billboard tho, i wanna talk abt the first billboard.

i think we can all agree that the nyt billboard boosted morale: cast and crew were posting about it, djenks shared a selfie in front of it, the energy on ofmdtwt and in discord servers and here on tumblr was very hopeful and excited. it was an emotional high point that i think we’re all kinda missing as the weeks drag on and we approach the two-month mark since the cancellation.

but did the nyt billboard increase or maintain our visibility? more specifically, did it increase or maintain our visibility to a degree that was proportionate to the amount of money spent?

i’ll be honest, i don’t know the answer to that one. i don’t know much about advertising or about tracking ROI for things like billboards and flyover banners. i think, though, that any significant increase in visibility came not from the billboard itself, but from the social media response to the billboard. the excitement of seeing cast and crew talking abt the billboard had us all hyped up and posting/tweeting in our excitement, and that got us trending. the livestream of the billboard probably had an increase in viewership, which i’m sure is something that gets tracked somewhere. and i’m also sure wbd execs were aware of the billboard, and djenks tagging netflix, apple, and amazon means those executives were definitely made aware of it, too

but i’m doubtful abt how much the nyt billboard raised our visibility outside of a few ppl in the streaming/entertainment industry and outside of the ofmd fandom. there were already articles being written about us by that point—did any publications decide to write more articles abt the renewal campaign directly because of the billboard? did the campaign for s3 reach the general public? did site traffic to the petition actually increase? did anyone on the streets of new york or LA actually follow the link/qr code/whatever to learn more about what was being advertised?

on twitter, at least one person who had been supportive of the renewal efforts and who claimed to have relevant industry experience said that the return-on-investment from the billboard/truck/flyover was shockingly small, meaning that for the amount of money that was spent, we should have received more site traffic, more social media buzz, more mainstream awareness than what we got. this is not me saying the ofmd fandom was scammed—the people who donated money were told what the money was going to be used for, and the money was used exactly as promised. but the criticism was that if the goal was to increase our visibility, perhaps the money could’ve been spent differently.

so that’s the nyt billboard: successful at raising morale, unclear exactly how effective it was at increasing visibility. now for the london billboard, located on the vue cinema on leicester square

first, a few things about the site of the london billboard: the ad space being purchased is not, as i have seen claimed, on a hugely iconic billboard and venue. arguably, it is not even located on leicester square. the giant billboard is on a budget movie theater that is right off the corner of leicester square. people have been confusing the vue theater with the odeon theater, which is an iconic landmark in the middle of leicester square where movie premiers happen and where many tourists stop to take pictures. from what i’ve seen (and heard from various uk fans), the foot traffic by the vue theater is not really comparable to the foot traffic at the location of the first billboard.

so, billboard 2 and visibility. the question of if this billboard increases visibility of the campaign, whether that be via successfully advertising to the people walking by or via generating social media buzz.

the thing with the foot traffic issue is i’m honestly not sure how much of a boon the high amount of foot traffic was to the first billboard. bc honestly, how many pedestrians pay attention to billboards enough to actually check out the thing that’s being advertised? probably not very many, hence why there was criticisms that the billboard yielded a low ROI. if there was any increase in our visibility externally (by which i mean, not within studios or within the industry, and not within the fandom and other ppl already aware of the existence of the renewal campaign), it most likely came primarily from articles and social media buzz.

i personally am doubtful that the second billboard is gonna generate the same kind of attention online. the location is less flashy than the first one, david jenkins probably isn’t gonna fly over to london to take a selfie with it, and simply the fact that it’s a second billboard is gonna decrease the energy in how ppl respond to it. like, we already did this in a very famous tourist location. now we’re doing it again, only it’s around the corner from a different, slightly less famous tourist location. the surprise and excitement we saw from the cast and crew will inherently be lessened when we pull the same trick twice. that might also extend to media coverage—how many times do we think journalists are gonna cover the same media stunt pulled by the same general group of people? there is a possibility that the answer to that is only once.

but, to be fair, i did say that visibility was only one part of the equation. the other important thing was morale and keeping the fandom’s energy up, something that is going to get harder and harder the more time passes without us hearing any news.

a second billboard is definitely one way of tackling that issue. fans can meet up at the billboard, post selfies with it, hang out. it’s kind of a cool thing, to see a huge sign on a billboard and know that it was a bunch of passionate fans put it there. and we already know that the first billboard had everyone pumped. more than increasing visibility, maybe this is the primary goal of the second billboard: to hype up the fandom.

i worry, though, that it’s not going to hype up the fandom in the way people are hoping for. like i said, i doubt we’re going to see the same outpouring of excitement from cast and crew that we did the first time around—even already some of the actors have said to the fandom that it’s not worth it for us to spend our money this way. and even within the wider ofmd fandom itself, i would not be surprised if fans just aren’t as excited by this second billboard simply because it’s the second billboard. already, it seems to me like ofmd fans who aren’t directly contributing to the renewal campaign aren’t responding as enthusiastically to this billboard as they did the first one—there’s a question of why it’s necessary, what it’s going to accomplish. so a less encouraging response to this billboard might make a lot of people feel disheartened, disappointed.

and christ, that’s not even mentioning the fact that that almost every time this fandom is trending, there’s a wave of “ofmd fans kys” sentiment that is quick to follow. i have long ago accepted that suicide baiting as a regular part of my internet experience, but most people have not (and frankly, they shouldn’t). a lot of people just will stop posting about ofmd if they get attacked for doing so. if that happens, it is 100% going to negatively impact the renewal campaign and our chances of getting picked up by a different studio.

even if none of this happens, even if the morale is boosted tenfold by the new billboard, i just feel like there are other ways to keep the energy up without crowdfunding ridiculous amounts of money. we already have samba gradually doling out bts content in tiny doses and catapulting us through the roof with each one. i’m also a fan of what AdoptOurCrew is doing on twitter, sharing articles and info and coming up with silly little games to play with their followers. it’s not a huge stunt like a billboard, and it’s not gonna get us on the front page of a huge pop culture publication, but we already have a pretty consistent stream coming in of articles mentioning ofmd and the renewal effort. also, yes, what aoc is doing is not the huge adrenaline high of the nyt billboard, but this is gonna be a marathon, not a sprint. there are a lot of ofmd fans, so if we just keep the general fandom feeling reasonably good abt posting ofmd content, that’s more than enough to keep our online presence consistent enough that studios will know we’re invested in that s3. but if we keep chasing highs we’re gonna burn out fast—at the very least just bc ppl are gonna run out of cash.

that’s what my concern comes down to, really: the money. because to me, the use of actual real-world money should go towards boosting visibility, and boosting morale can come from simply engaging in the fandom, doing fun projects, spreading positivity. and i am very, very doubtful that this second billboard is going to increase the show’s visibility to people who aren’t already aware of ofmd and what’s going on with the renewal. i understand that the idea was to capitalize on s2 airing on the bbc–a good idea, but if the intention is to reach this new audience, shouldn’t the ads should go somewhere they’re going to be more visible, more inescapable? the underground would’ve been a good choice, imo, bc the cell service down there sucks and ppl have no choice but to stare at the walls while they wait for the train. but this might have been less effective at boosting morale, because it’s less flashy and a significantly worse place for fans to meet up. so it’s about what the priority is here: is the money primarily for boosting morale, or boosting visibility?

like i said, i think prioritizing morale-boosting is the wrong choice. and even if that wasn’t the intention, i think that’s the only thing that’s gonna be affected in any way by the billboard. but like, that’s why i didn’t donate to the crowdfunding for this billboard (or to the first one tbh). bc ppl can spend their money however they want, even if i think it’s a waste. currently the average donation to the SaveOFMD ko-fi is abt £34, or $40. i’m not gonna get that worked up over a few hundred strangers online spending $40 for something i think is a waste. ppl spend all sorts of money on stuff i think is a waste. who cares.

if everything backfires and the billboard ends up hurting the renewal campaign then… idk. i hope if it blows up into drama that the drama gets to be funny, at least.

[bloodboundsiege]

project update/where i've been/other stuff

Hey everyone! I know it's been a loooooooong time since I posted anything or gave any updates, but since I just updated the demo with some bug fixes--you can go here or to the pinned post on my page to download the new patch if you want to take the demo out for another spin--, I figured it was as good a time as any to talk about what's been going on.

This is probably going to turn into a long post, so if you don't want to read all of that, here's the tl;dr: Bloodbound: The Siege is still underway, I just was going through a really difficult period. Thank you all for your support of me and your continued enthusiasm for this project. It doesn't go unnoticed, and I'm really thankful for it.

Where I've Been

You know how sometimes someone will take forever to post an update to their fic and then the author's note will be like hey, sorry it took me so long to upload a new chapter, I was kidnapped? This is nothing like that. It's a lot less juicy, but I figured I'd still talk about it.

When I first started working on this visual novel, I was doing some freelance social media work, living with my family, and had a ton of free time on my hands. I would literally wake up every day and sit at my desk for 9+ hours a day, working on this project, making music, or writing screenplays.

At the end of last summer, I moved across the country, started grad school, and started working a pretty demanding job to support myself. It was also the first time since 2020 that I was doing any kind of significant socializing, and I was still working on this project, along with my other endeavors.

I felt like I was killing it. It didn't matter that wasn't getting a lot of sleep or really taking care of myself. I was somehow doing everything I wanted to do and needed to do.

And then...it caught up with me, right around when I released the demo for BBTS. I was having panic attacks at work, barely making deadlines for school, and it would take me half the day to work up the energy to get out of bed. It felt like I could do was sit in my room, watch Netflix, and doomscroll. Everything else was left to the wayside. Even though I was able to finish out my spring semester with good grades and left my job on good terms, I was hanging by the skin of my teeth. I also had some really messy stuff going on in my personal life that exacerbated these issues.

I had to spend this summer trying to rebuild myself and find a balance again. I'm in a much better place now--I started working out, which has been great for my anxiety, I quit vaping, I'm starting to be more conscious about what I put in my body and how it affects me, but I had to prioritize myself and my well being in order to get to this place.

As a side note, the experience of announcing this project and releasing this demo has been...strange. I put a lot of work into this project, from teaching myself how to code to writing the story, and this is the most visible thing I've ever put out. I was hoping maybe fifty people would play this demo and be like cool, but it's a much higher number, and a lot more feedback.

And that's both really cool and really scary. Cool because it's awesome that people appreciate something I created. Scary because now I want to make it good. I don't want to disappoint you all.

A Brief Tangent On How People Interact With Fandom Creators Sometimes

Even though I'm not always super active/interactive on here, I really enjoy getting asks about the project, whether it's hype, an inquiry, or feedback. Even if it's negative feedback, I know that it's coming from a good place. I also am really appreciative of messages that are either letting me know about bugs, or expressing any concerns about the story I am planning to tell. I don't take those kinds of things personally at all.

But I have noticed--and this is not just exclusive to the Choices fandom--that sometimes, people will interact with fic writers, fan devs, or really anyone that makes any kind of ContentTM in a way that isn't any of the aforementioned things I described above. Sometimes, the way that people interact with me--or other creators--is demanding, passive aggressive, or outright hostile. Other times, it may be well-intentioned, but it still feels like it's crossing some boundaries.

I'm extremely thankful to everyone who has reached out to check on me, but there's a huge difference between doing that and accusing me of abandoning this project and framing it as a deep moral failing on my part. I know I'm not the only person in this fandom that's experienced this. It really doesn't feel good, and it isn't helpful. Even if I had just decided I was no longer feeling BBTS and decided to dip, that isn't okay.

I additionally ask that in the event of another pause in posting on this project, people not reach out to me on my personal tumblr to ask about the status of this project, or to tell me to check my DMs or inbox on this page, or anything of that sort. To my recollection, I have never posted the URL my personal tumblr on this page. Like I said before, I'm appreciative of the fact that people are passionate about this project, but it's important to me to be able to keep this space and that space separate from one another.

I would absolutely understand any of this kind of behavior if there was money involved. If I had investors to answer to, or people pre-ordered the completed game from me and paid up front, people would absolutely be within their right to be frustrated with the radio silence that's been coming from my end and reach out to ask about the status of the game, or even be upset with me. But that isn't what's happening here.

This project is supposed to be fun. There's something really liberating about the fact that I can't ever monetize this or put it into a portfolio. It means it's for me and for you. We're all just supposed to be here because we like being here.

But part of the reason why the burnout and the anxiety I was experiencing spilled over into this project was because of these more pushy interactions. It made me feel like I was letting people down, or like the stakes of this were higher than they actually are.

I don't want to sound ungrateful, or like a diva. Like I said, I'm really appreciative of the reception of this project, and I'm grateful for any and all feedback, inquiries, or curiosities. But I just ask that everyone be respectful, and I don't think that's an unreasonable request. We'll all have a good time--both here and in the larger Choices fandom--if we're kind to one another, and if we're respectful of each other's boundaries.

Is Bloodbound: The Siege Still Happening?

Bloodbound: The Siege is still happening, but it is not going to be coming out this year, unless I somehow gain the ability to freeze time. Most of the sprite work is done--though I might do another round of retrofitting sprites into their respective dialogue boxes because I'm a glutton for punishment--and I'm pretty close to completing the more detailed outline of this story.

While I'm not ready to do this yet, it is extremely likely that by the end of the year, I'll start seeking out additional help for this project, mostly with programming. There will be a more detailed post about that when the time comes.

Until then, it's good to be back. Catch you on the flipside.

[devitalise]

omg imo I could've sworn there was at least one full week left of november for some reason but dec 1 is on friday BYE locking myself up to finish my books 🏃‍♀️ HOW WAS YOUR NOVEMBER READING!! are you already in the holiday spirit are you planning on reading/watching some holiday related things to get you there? this one's rando, but do you have any favorite holiday foods/desserts/drinks you're excited to indulge in during this last month o 2023 ☃️

november being 30 days always goes by SO quickly she knows we're ready for the main event. november was a very good reading month for me let's get into the

november book wrap up

Small Island by Andrea Levy

i finished this pretty early on in novembr, my thoughts are along the same lines as my goodreads review: Great piece of historical fiction. I found parts of this so funny and I'm not sure if that was the original intention but I did have a giggle! The humour was found moreso in Gilbert and Hortense who are just so, so different to each other and Hortense's wilful misunderstanding and naivete as she tries to be a Model Minority was just so funny it was a much needed brevity compared to the heaviness of the rest of the story. Such foul racist thoughts that can be burdensome after a while, though. Yeah! I don't need to read the POV of a white British man stationed in India in the second world war ever again, actually! I enjoyed reading though.

A Game of Thrones by George R.R Martin

reread this because I hadn't picked up a high fantasy book I'd actually enjoyed in a little while. Great! I love ASOIAF as a series love returning to a known entity. I can't find my copies of A Storm of Swords or A Clash of Kings so continuing my reread is on pause until those unearth themselves.

Drive Your Plow over the Bones of the Dead by Olga Tokarczuk

Brilliant! So, so atmospheric. Incredible translation to me, obviously I won't know for sure until there ever comes a day where I can read Polish, but I got so much of the story out of this. It was just so cool and not what I expected at all going into it. I've never read anything like it before so getting to grips with all of the quirks of the style, subject and character was its on experience.

Butcher's Crossing by John Williams

Stoner was one of my top 2022 reads, so I saved this knowing that I'd like it. Rachel Cusk coded. It didn't blow me away like Stoner did, but I appreciate these are two very different books with completely different approaches. Where Stoner is so insular, things are kind of bursting in Butcher's Crossing. William isn't a complete active character, but he's participating in his life. Really cool setting, one of the most tense books I've read which I find can fall short in books with more action but the way tension builds and builds and builds in these fraught interactions between the four men on the mountain is fucking incredible. Immediately watched the film after this, and I love Nicolas Cage as much as the next person, but it fell short for me as an adaptation and as a film, sadly! Will be reading Augustus very soon as the last novel Williams' acknowledges as his own work.

The Power of the Dog by Thomas Savage

Another Western! Apparently I couldn't get enough! Not long finished this, so bear with for complete thoughts. Realised that I haven't read a book with such a sinister character in a while. Phil is sinister and strange and he's complicated, and I just really liked this book! Took me a while to get through because it is so dense at parts, but I think playing the long game definitely paid off. I love books that can make life so dramatic, all of the small stuff builds up to this big moment kind of thing. Netflix removed this film??? Will be making time to watch it this weekend for sure!

Outlawed by Anna North

3/3 with Western's which is so out of left field for me I feel. Finished it today, but on my top 2023 shelf, for sure. I think reading these back-to-back has made me appreciate the difference in style and storytelling so much more. I was a bit nervous because I've found previous Reese Witherspoon book club picks really juvenile, and whilst this is way more accessible than BC or TPotD, there's still a lot of complexity that I was able to enjoy. I love communities and found families, and it just really got me reading this book about these "women" ostracized from society making something of their own at risk of imprisonment and hanging. Thought it was really neat :)

December Reads

I'm on the Kindle through to the end of the year (10 days to New York!) so I'll be getting a couple new titles to diversify my options more. I don't have anything set in stone but I did download pdf's of The Hunger Games series which I've never read before so I might do those.

My Christmas mood started on November 1st! Multiple plays of Ariana Grande's Christmas & Chill, and I've already watched a few Christmas films. I watched The Holiday for the first time recently and found it boring :( I'm not a Jude Law enjoyer sorry.

Oh I love a hot cider! Ferrero Rocher's, stuffing, anything Christmassy really! I'm also so excited for a Christmas in New York! I have an itinerary going and many pictures to take!

[multapohja966]

some fav things this year

Read

Detransition, baby - Torrey Peters' book. just adding a one more assurance that it is just as good as everyone says.

Shopping Star as a semiotechnical code modulating Greek femininity in pharmacopornographic capitalism - fun opulence of hard words discussing interesting things. (article utilising Preciado's analysis tools to discuss (post)recession Greece)

Chimamire Sukeban Chainsaw - Rei Mikamoto's insane gory gross, hard to explain, manga about a girl with a chainsaw trying to kill the person responsible for turning her classmates into grotesque minions.

One Piece - caught up finally. yes, it is worth it.

67,292 Things Car Guys Can Teach Transsexuals by Adrian Glenn - part of the 2 Trans 2 Furious zine. as a car guy associate and transsexual i deeply loved this one.

The Shape of Premodern Nonbinarity: A Conversation with Leah DeVun - I'll never stop talking about this article.

Watched

Bronson - Tom Hardy movie, biography of "Britain's most violent prisoner " Charles Bronson. It doesn't completely highlight everything essential about his story (having a less than nuanced view on untreated mental illness and its relationship with incarceration) but it's such a good fucking movie!! And at least artistically very loyal to who it's depicting (insane and absurdist).

this video of jack harlow at a chiropractic appointment - we live such weird fucking times. like it isn't heartfelt but it isn't disgusting either it's just, w-what? eh?

Little chinese everywhere - vlogger Yan who travels though less tourist heavy provinces in China, really respectful look to everyday life in more rural communities. these have given me a lot of peace and joy. a lot of extremely intresting architecture as well.

Inflatables and the adults who love collecting them - by furry youtuber Ash Coyote. Truly a gem of respectful by fandom, of fandom documentaries. Touching and lovely!!

MerPeople - don't touch netflix anymore but this documentary of the mermaid community and industry is incredibly good.

this rose ramdin x html jones vid - the well read terminally online gen z musical artists who get their estrogen money from twitter shitposting are the modern greek philosphers. in the sense that i'd sit on a stone public square step and listen to a convo like this for the whole day.

A normal creepypasta retrospective - there's hope for youtube actually

Cat soup / Nekojiru-sou movie

Earth Maiden Arjuna - early 2000s environmentalist anime series lovers make some noicee. this one is sooo lovely and gorgeous. real hidden gem.

Gigs

Sabaton - as expected, bit of a weird vibe in the crowd demographic :--------D but show itself is an insane fucking spectacle I'm happy I saw. You can really sense these men are swedish, the "my country hasn't been in an active war for two centuries" theater kid energy is wild. Tank on stage.

Death Grips - I'm pretty sure this rebooted my whole brain. Went with close friend, pretty sure my biggest bruise came form her hands.

Antti Tuisku - Farewell gig of the best pop performer in finland. I do not understand how he doesn't pass out on stage with everything he's doing. The jesus allegory album is forever my favorite, it's so genious in how it discusses fame so well while staying funny and self-avare. Neck hurt for the next week due to headbanging.

Suistamon sähkö - small gig yet one of the absolute best this year. (i cried) You need to see these guys live, the vocal ability of the main singers is absurd, it doesn't come through fully in recordings. And they create a very special atmosphere and community within their gigs, literally joined hands and danced in a circle.

[lawodcom]

Steal a Squid Game Codes

If you’re searching for the newest Steal a Squid Game codes, you’re in the right place! This article is dedicated to helping Roblox fans and survival game enthusiasts get the most out of Steal a Squid Game, a game inspired by the iconic Netflix show where players compete in a series of intense challenges for in-game cash, revives, and exclusive items. Here, you’ll find everything you need to know about Steal a Squid Game codes, including how to redeem them, the types of rewards you can expect, and how to stay updated with new codes as they’re released. Whether you’re a returning champion or a first-time contestant, using Steal a Squid Game Roblox Promo codes can give you a real advantage—think bonus coins, revives, and special boosts that make every round more exciting. Bookmark this guide for the freshest Roblox Steal a Squid Game codes and updates! What Is Steal a Squid Game? Steal a Squid Game is a popular Roblox survival game that draws inspiration from the global phenomenon Squid Game. Players compete in a series of mini-games—such as Red Light, Green Light, Tug of War, and the Honeycomb challenge—each round eliminating participants until only one remains to claim the grand prize. The game captures the tension and excitement of the original show, with added Roblox twists and community-driven events. Whether you’re strategizing to outlast your friends or teaming up to overcome obstacles, Steal a Squid Game offers a dynamic and competitive experience for all Roblox players. Active Steal a Squid Game Codes Here are the latest working codes for Steal a Squid Game. Enter them exactly as shown, as codes are case-sensitive and may include special characters: CodeReward400K_LIKES100 coinsONECHANCE20 coinsPROPLAYER40 coinsDAILYBOOST30 coinsQUICKWIN40 coinsPERFECTRUN30 coinsWINBIG40 coins350K_LIKES100 coinsRISKYPLAY40 coinsREWARDTIME40 coinsRAININGCASH20 coins$1M$40 coins$500K$40 coins$250K$50 coinsFRONTMAN75 coins150KLIKES55 coinsPENTA35 coinsREVAMP33 coinsUPDATE11RELEASE75 coinsMINGLE45 coins$100K$50 coins Note: Codes may expire quickly, so redeem them as soon as possible to claim your rewards! How to Redeem Steal a Squid Game Codes Redeeming codes in Steal a Squid Game is easy. Just follow these steps: Open Steal a Squid Game on Roblox. On the left side of your screen, click the Shop button. Select the Codes button from the menu. Enter your chosen code exactly as shown (codes are case-sensitive). Press Enter to redeem your reward! If a code doesn’t work, double-check for typos or expired codes. Codes are often time-limited, so act fast! Where to Get More Steal a Squid Game Codes Follow the game’s official Roblox page and social media channels for code announcements and updates. Join the community Discord server for exclusive news and code drops. Bookmark this guide and check back frequently for the latest codes. Participate in special events or milestones, as new codes are often released during these times. Final Thoughts Steal a Squid Game brings the excitement and suspense of the hit series to Roblox, offering players a chance to compete, strategize, and win big. With the latest codes, you can boost your chances of survival and enjoy exclusive rewards. Keep this guide bookmarked for regular updates, and may the odds be ever in your favor as you fight to be the last one standing! Stay tuned for more codes and updates—happy surviving in Steal a Squid Game!

[jenniferphilop0420]

Best AI Software Development in USA: Features & Benefits

Artificial Intelligence isn’t just the future—it’s the now. From recommending your favorite shows on Netflix to optimizing supply chains for Fortune 500 companies, AI is everywhere. But here’s the big question: Why is the USA dominating AI software development? And more importantly, what are the key features and benefits that make the best AI software in the USA stand out?

Let’s dive into the heart of the matter.

Introduction to AI Software Development

What is AI Software Development?

AI software development is all about creating intelligent systems that can mimic human thought processes, learn from data, and make decisions. Think voice assistants like Siri or chatbots that actually understand what you’re saying—they’re all products of AI development.

Why the USA is a Global Leader in AI Development

The United States is home to Silicon Valley, where tech innovation thrives. With tech giants like Google, Microsoft, and OpenAI headquartered here, it's no wonder the USA leads the AI revolution. Combine this with top-tier universities, robust funding, and a culture of innovation, and you've got a breeding ground for world-class AI software.

Core Features of the Best AI Software Development in the USA

Advanced Machine Learning Capabilities

AI is only as smart as the data it’s trained on. That’s where machine learning (ML) steps in.

Supervised and Unsupervised Learning

Whether it’s recognizing images or clustering data without labels, the best AI software in the USA integrates both supervised and unsupervised learning methods for optimal performance.

Natural Language Processing (NLP)

Understanding human language is no easy feat, but American developers are pushing boundaries with NLP models that can translate, analyze sentiment, and even generate text that sounds convincingly human (like this article!).

Predictive Analytics and Data Modeling

Ever wonder how Amazon knows what you want to buy next? Predictive analytics. By analyzing historical data, AI systems forecast trends, behaviors, and outcomes with surprising accuracy.

Integration with IoT and Cloud Platforms

Smart homes, wearable health tech, and connected cars all rely on AI’s integration with the Internet of Things (IoT). The best AI platforms also run smoothly on scalable cloud systems like AWS or Google Cloud.

Real-Time Processing and Decision Making

Whether it's a self-driving car avoiding a pedestrian or fraud detection software flagging suspicious activity, real-time AI decisions are life-saving and business-critical.

Key Benefits of Choosing AI Software Development in the USA

Innovation-Driven Ecosystem

From startups to established enterprises, the USA is a hotbed of innovation. Companies are encouraged to experiment, fail fast, and pivot, which leads to revolutionary AI applications.

High Talent Density and Expertise

With access to Ivy League graduates, PhD researchers, and self-taught coding prodigies, American AI development teams bring a mix of deep theory and real-world pragmatism.

Scalable and Secure Infrastructure

AI development companies in the USA prioritize secure, scalable infrastructures—perfect for enterprises needing to deploy AI solutions across global operations.

Access to Cutting-Edge AI Technologies

Be it OpenAI’s GPT-4 or Google’s Gemini, American companies get first dibs on the latest AI breakthroughs, helping them stay ahead of the curve.

Regulatory Compliance and Ethics

AI ethics and data privacy are taken seriously in the USA, with increasing efforts to create explainable, fair, and bias-free AI systems.

Leading Sectors Leveraging AI Software in the USA

Healthcare and Medical Diagnostics

From AI-powered MRI scans to predictive models for disease outbreaks, healthcare is being transformed by American AI innovations.

FinTech and Fraud Detection

Banks are using AI to detect fraudulent transactions within milliseconds, saving billions of dollars annually.

E-commerce and Personalized Marketing

AI algorithms segment customers, analyze behavior, and tailor product recommendations, boosting engagement and conversions.

Manufacturing and Robotics

Factories run smoother and safer thanks to AI-driven robotics that optimize production lines and detect equipment issues before they arise.

Autonomous Vehicles and Transportation

Tesla, Waymo, and other US-based companies are leading the charge in self-driving vehicle development using advanced AI systems.

How to Choose the Best AI Software Development Company in the USA

Evaluate Industry Experience

Not all developers are created equal. Look for companies with a proven track record in your specific industry.

Check Technology Stack and Tools

Do they use TensorFlow, PyTorch, or custom ML libraries? Knowing their toolkit can help gauge their technical depth.

Look for Customized AI Solutions

One-size-fits-all rarely works in AI. The best firms will tailor solutions to your exact needs, data environment, and goals.

Analyze Past Projects and Client Feedback

Testimonials, case studies, and reviews provide insights into a company’s ability to deliver on its promises.

Consider Ongoing Support and Maintenance

AI isn’t a set-it-and-forget-it solution. Ensure your development partner offers continuous support for updates, bug fixes, and scaling.

Future Trends in AI Software Development

Generative AI and Creative Algorithms

From writing songs to designing product prototypes, generative AI is opening doors to creativity never seen before.

Explainable AI (XAI)

No more black boxes. The future of AI is explainable, allowing users to understand how and why decisions are made.

Edge AI and Low-Latency Applications

Think smart devices processing data locally, reducing latency and preserving privacy—especially useful in remote locations or IoT setups.

AI-Powered Cybersecurity Solutions

Cyber threats evolve fast, but so does AI. Expect more proactive, predictive, and intelligent cybersecurity defenses.

Conclusion

AI is no longer optional—it’s essential. And when it comes to the Best AI Software Development in the USA, you're tapping into a world-class ecosystem built on innovation, talent, and technological prowess. Whether you're in healthcare, finance, retail, or manufacturing, there's an AI solution waiting to unlock your next big breakthrough.

So, what are you waiting for? The future is intelligent—and it's already here.

FAQs

1. What makes US-based AI software development better than others? The USA offers top-tier talent, access to cutting-edge technology, a mature innovation culture, and strict ethical standards.

2. Is AI software expensive to develop in the USA? It depends on the complexity, but while initial costs may be higher, the ROI from US-built AI software tends to be substantial due to its quality and scalability.

3. How do I know if my business needs AI software? If you deal with large volumes of data, repetitive tasks, or need smarter decision-making tools, AI can add significant value.

4. Can small businesses also benefit from AI software? Absolutely! Many AI firms now offer scalable, modular solutions that cater to startups and SMEs.

5. What are the risks of using AI software? Risks include data bias, privacy concerns, and algorithm transparency, but these can be mitigated with proper development practices and ethical guidelines.

[airqualityandhealth]

Shared Accounts and Password Cracking Down: Is Disney Plus Restricting Access?

Disney Plus has become a household name. However, many subscribers now ask if account sharing is coming to an end. As the platform grows, Disney is tightening its password rules. This change is making waves among users.

“Sharing your Disney Plus account may soon become a thing of the past.”

Why Disney Plus Is Cracking Down

Disney Plus is taking steps to stop password sharing. Like Netflix, it wants to ensure only paying users access the content. According to Disney executives, shared accounts cut into profits.

Moreover, the company is planning to boost revenue without raising prices too fast. By limiting access, Disney hopes to gain new subscribers. For example, if four friends share one account, Disney loses potential fees from three of them.

The Role of Industrial Supply in Streaming Technology

The industrial supply behind platforms like Disney Plus includes data centers, network cables, and servers. These components keep the service running smoothly.

For example, when too many people stream from one account in various places, it strains bandwidth. However, with strong industrial supply support, Disney Plus can detect irregularities. These signals often flag account sharing.

“Modern streaming relies on industrial supply chains, from data centers to high-speed internet.”

What This Means for Families

Disney Plus still allows account sharing within the same household. However, they may now track IP addresses and device usage. If an account logs in from two different cities often, that’s a red flag.

Moreover, Disney might limit the number of devices allowed. Subscribers may receive warnings or get locked out. This policy is similar to what other streaming platforms now follow.

How the New Policy Works

Disney Plus started testing its new rules in early 2025. These include:

Blocking logins from unknown locations

Sending verification codes to primary users

Requiring location checks through Wi-Fi

The platform may also prompt users to pay extra to add non-household members. This optional fee helps keep content prices down while preventing abuse.

INDUSTRIAL SUPPLY and Streaming Infrastructure

Streaming services depend on solid industrial supply chains. Data centers use industrial machines for cooling, power, and storage. These machines are key in managing growing traffic.

For example, when password sharing increases, so does system load. However, with efficient industrial supply support, Disney can monitor traffic patterns better and identify misuse.

“Behind every stream is an invisible but powerful industrial supply chain keeping the service running.”

Alternatives for Shared Users

If you shared an account and now face restrictions, what can you do?

One option is Disney’s new “extra member” feature. This allows the primary account holder to add others for a small monthly fee.

Another option is switching to Disney Plus bundles. These often include Hulu and ESPN+ and provide more value for households.

Moreover, Disney offers plans at different price points. For example, ad-supported plans are cheaper. This may make it easier for users to afford their own account.

Reactions from Subscribers

Some users understand the move. After all, content creation and streaming aren’t free. However, others feel frustrated. For example, college students who share family accounts now face added costs.

Online forums show mixed reactions. Some users praise the move for protecting content, while others threaten to cancel.

What Other Platforms Are Doing

Disney is not alone. Netflix, HBO Max, and Amazon Prime are also monitoring account activity. Password sharing used to be overlooked, but in 2025, it's a major focus.

These changes reflect how streaming has matured. What started as a user-friendly perk has now become a revenue leak.

“As streaming evolves, account sharing is no longer just ignored—it’s being actively managed.”

INDUSTRIAL SUPPLY in Data Security and User Privacy

Another angle is how industrial supply impacts data protection. Disney Plus uses industrial machines in server centers to encrypt and store user data.

Moreover, they use advanced algorithms to detect threats and unauthorized access. This level of security wouldn’t be possible without top-grade industrial supply support behind the scenes.

For example, if someone hacks into a shared account, the system can quickly detect and respond using machine-driven monitoring.

Is Your Account at Risk?

If you share an account with friends or extended family, your access may be restricted. However, if you use Disney Plus in one home with registered devices, you should be fine.

Moreover, the company will likely notify users before enforcement. You can expect an email or app alert first. This gives users time to adjust or upgrade.

Tips to Stay Compliant

Use One IP Address: Stay logged in from the same Wi-Fi.

Register Devices: Make sure all devices are recognized by Disney.

Avoid VPNs: They may flag your account as suspicious.

Upgrade if Needed: Consider a multi-user plan or add-ons.

“A little planning now can help you avoid surprises later.”

Conclusion: Change Is Inevitable

Disney Plus is taking a strong stance on password sharing. While this may be tough for some users, it supports the platform’s future.

Moreover, industrial supply systems allow Disney to implement these policies without glitches. From data tracking to secure logins, every step relies on a strong technical backbone.

For subscribers, the key is to stay informed and adjust. After all, streaming is still one of the most affordable ways to enjoy quality entertainment.

“Streaming access may change, but the magic of Disney Plus remains the same—just more secure now.”