#i could write a freaking graduate thesis about this show and still have more to say

[theowldetective]

The above snippet is from the audition sides for Pappy Joe. It was originally supposed to happen right before the train animation. Obviously this line didn't make it to official canon, but it's still a glimpse into Jacobs's & Nelson's intentions as writers. It's a "peek under the hood," as it were, at the ideas they were playing with as they wrote the episode. 

The primary point of the Texas Trilogy was that it was the first volley of heavy narrative artillery in terms of actually changing the status quo of the show, especially re: the romance arcs. The romantic status quo is severely threatened by the events of the Texas trilogy. Texas 1-2-3 is the first attempt to actually change the romantic status quo rather than simply hint at it, although that status quo partially reasserts itself in GMT3.  [2018 Edit: this is SO LONG. It’s kind of a compendium of stuff I said in answers to asks, but I figured I’d let y’all have it even though it kinda trails off at the end. It’s also got old audition sides as a means of trying to discern what the writers’ intent may have been despite the cuts, and at this point I’m not stressed about posting them. Just add a mental “may have” in parts where I’m talking about the sides and skipped/forgot the caveat. There’s a lot of repetition, probably more than is necessary for the emphasis I was going for, but since I’ll probably never get around to actually editing this thing it’s all kind of a moot point now anyway...enjoy under the cut.]

I’m so exhausted by people who think the suggestion that the Texans and Riley may not have been entirely in the right to encourage Lucas onto the back of a 2,000 pound bull which could have easily killed or maimed him is tantamount to “hate.” If MAYA had been the one to push Lucas onto Tombstone while Riley took the other side, I would say exactly the same things I say now about the scene, only with the girls reversed. This is not about “making Riley look bad” because of ships. That’s major over-simplification of the situation. 

Riley is not a villain by any stretch of the imagination, not in Texas, not ever. Not unlike her father when he was younger (and her mother, for that matter), Riley is simply an oft-misguided, insecure, overly-idealistic CHILD with the very best of intentions. (Yes, I consider 12-13 year-olds to be children, especially when they’re as naive as Riley.) Anyone who ascribes villainy, guile, or malice to Riley Matthews (or any of the kids) is IMO willfully misunderstanding her characterization. If you think I am ascribing any of those characteristics to her, then you are misunderstanding me. 

Riley is not a monster. She believes the best of everybody (especially of Lucas) and that’s great on a base level, but she doesn't temper that attitude with realism as much as she should...which is why she needs Maya (and Farkle). Riley is also very easily influenced by the opinions of others (despite her growth in that department), and she regresses quite a bit on that front when taken out of her usual environment and dropped into Texas. Lucas also regresses in Texas in terms of caring about what other people say. Maya, however, does not. She’s still the most secure person in the room at the rodeo. 

The Texas trilogy is nuanced as heck, and when you boil it down to Riley = bad and Maya = good (or vice versa), I think you're missing the point. But hey, most of my discussion on the matter has been limited to asks which I usually dash off pretty quickly, which means I’m not necessarily being as precise as I perhaps ought to be. If I haven’t made myself CRYSTAL clear about this, that’s on me. (Not to mention that my views on this whole thing have evolved over time and with temperance, so I know I’ve said things on the matter that I no longer stand by). So once and for all, here's my comprehensive, definitive take on Riley, Maya, and Lucas in Texas 1. 

 "When you see how other people live, it changes you." --Cory Matthews, GMT1 

The girls "switch roles" in Texas. That’s what changes. Most people probably think this happened after Riley “stepped back,” but it actually began well before that. And what are their roles? Well, let's take another peek under the hood, back in the classroom again: 

This bit comes right after Riley was going to say she’s headed to Texas too because she’s responsible for the situation and she wants to make sure Lucas comes back okay (in case you ever wondered whose idea this whole thing was in the first place; as if there was ever any doubt). It also comes right after a bit where Pappy Joe was holding Lucas over his shoulder while Lucas tried to escape. 

(Lucas’s resistance to riding the bull is even stronger in the sides than what we got in the actual episode. There’s a slight GM Gravity callback too. Cory asks Pappy Joe, “Can we talk about this?” and then Lucas says “Mr. Matthews is right, we should talk about this.” To which Pappy Joe says, “Plenty of time for talking on the train!” It’s still pretty clear in the episode as it aired that Lucas is pretty much only doing this for Pappy Joe and not really for himself...but we’ll get to that in a minute). Here’s what we actually got though:

This is NOT the attitude of a boy who is raring to go down to Texas and ride Tombstone the Bull. Lucas is so intimidated by his grandfather that he would rather ride a bull than defy Pappy Joe's wishes. He didn't ride Tombstone because he wanted to. He rode Tombstone because he felt like he HAD to.

Notice also in the cut parts of the sides that Cory was going to get explicit credit for helping Lucas change for the better in an trilogy where Lucas eventually singles Riley out and appears to give her all the credit for his survival in NYC...even though Lucas owes just as much gratitude to the other kids and Cory as he does to Riley, and normally he says as much. But we’ll also get to that.

Anyway, point is: in the sides Riley self-identifies to Pappy Joe as "Lucas's girl. Maya self-identifies as "I make fun of him" and with being responsible for Riley. Those are still their “official” roles, despite the higher and higher-key romantic shift that's been happening all season. "I'm his girl" and "I make fun of him" is still technically the status quo for Riley & Maya + Lucas, despite the growing high-key romantic intensity between Lucas and Maya (and Riley and Farkle, for that matter, in timeline order), and despite the near total lack of anything resembling growing romance (by Jacobsland standards) between Lucas and Riley for most of S2 in terms of how they actually treat each other. 

My best guess is that these lines were cut because they had a lot to pack into these episodes and the audience is already pretty darn aware of what the status quo was "supposed" to be when it comes to the girls and their respective relationships with Lucas. They actually cut most of the original Pappy Joe/classroom scene, probably because most of it was just set-up for all the kids getting permission to go to Texas, which we don’t really need to see to get into the heart of the story.

It's notable that Pappy Joe was going to say "Well so do I!" re: making fun of Lucas. Because the DIFFERENCE in Pappy Joe's (and the locals') taunting of Lucas versus Maya teasing Lucas is that they apparently MEAN IT and she doesn't. But she doesn't understand that until she gets to Texas and sees how these other people live. Anyway, in Texas, the girls shift and switch roles, essentially. They change when they see how other people live. (Farkle too, but this post isn’t about him). Riley becomes the person who makes fun of Lucas and who believes he’s a disgrace to the community so he HAS to ride the bull, Maya acts more like you’d expect “his girl” to act.

The shift of the girls' role reversal in terms of Lucas is more gradual than people realize, I think. It doesn't happen suddenly in the refreshment tent. It doesn't even start in Texas—it's built up in the preceding episodes too, allllll of them really, but especially SoL forward. Texas is the first major turning point for the status quo after the groundwork that’s been laid in the preceding episodes.

At the house before the rodeo, we get the "you both look good" bit, which puts BOTH girls in the "Lucas's girl" slot, and then, outside the refreshment tent, Riley mocks Lucas just as much as Maya does for being afraid of a "man-cow," which puts BOTH of them in the "I make fun of him" slot. Of course the shift is already underway, a little: at the house, Maya has the ha-hurr moment with Cletus (and Lucas just lets her), and outside the tent Riley actually mocks Lucas a little harder than Maya does. 

But in effect, both girls take on both roles for these two scenes. There's a moment of near-equilibrium, as it were—with both girls filling both roles—before the full-on switch in the tent. Lucas treats them both like "his girl" at the house, and they BOTH make fun of him outside the refreshment tent. But from there? They keep going and they swap their usual roles. 

 "I just think you'll react differently when you actually see a man-cow!" --Lucas Friar, GMT1 

The tipping point for the swap happens when the danger of bull-riding becomes more apparent to Riley and Maya, who were clueless beforehand because they weren't taking the darn hint. When the danger becomes more apparent to the girls, they don't react the way they normally would in New York. By the time the rodeo comes around, both girls have changed a bit in terms of how they treat Lucas after seeing how other people live, after seeing how OTHER PEOPLE perceive and treat Lucas here in Texas. But becoming more hip to the danger catalyzes the switch even more. 

New York Riley vs Texas Riley

New York Riley, who vehemently said it was NOT OKAY for Billy to call Farkle a "nothing" over his childhood turtlenecks, who took over her father's class to run an anti-bullying workshop when someone went after Farkle, who would normally NEVER EVER stand for anyone to drag ANY of her friends down over something from their childhood, who would normally NEVER make fun of Lucas (except that one time in GM Pluto, when Lucas scolds her for it), well...that aspect of New York Riley just isn't there in Texas. Cory’s cut line, “There goes everything we’ve ever taught you” (after Riley goes all Southern for the first time ever in the sides) seems apt in light of this, because Texas Riley reacts to Lucas being bullied as a “disgrace” WAY differently than New York Riley reacted to Farkle being bullied as a “nothing.”

Texas Riley makes fun of Lucas along with the locals. And she keeps it up even after she sees other bull riders getting flung around like rag dolls on the monitors. She’s not reacting differently now that she’s actually seen a man-cow, and she still doesn’t think Lucas is in any real danger as long as he just tells her he’s not. That’s one aspect of New York Riley which remains intact in Texas: her unrealistic idealization of Lucas. Riley basically figures there’s nothing to worry about because her “hero” can do “anything.” This is not a rational or realistic way to view a normal eighth grade boy, which is what Lucas actually is. This is idealization and naivete. I’m not bashing Riley for that. Being idealistic and naive is just who she is for the most part, especially when it comes to Lucas. And that was fine when she was pushing him to run for class president. Downright adorable, even. It’s less cute when she’s pushing him into a life-or-death stunt mostly because of what other people are (wrongly) saying about him. (Riley’s concept of healthy, emotionally substantial romantic heroism is pretty warped, tbh, but that’s another post) 

Texas Riley doesn't defend Lucas from people calling him a disgrace over something that happened TO him as a CHILD the way New York Riley defended Farkle in GM Flaws, the way she would certainly defend Lucas if anyone back in New York ever called him a “disgrace.” When Lucas tries to say that he's NOT a disgrace, Riley shoots back with "You are! I've been talking to people..." as opposed to "It's not okay that someone called you that!" (And we all know that even if she'd "talked to people" in GM Flaws, there's STILL no way she'd have said anything like "you are!" to Farkle being a “nothing” just because other people said he was). Farkle was not ACTUALLY a “nothing who didn’t deserve his friends” just because Billy said so. Lucas is not ACTUALLY a disgrace just because these yokels say so and he shouldn’t have had to pull a stupid stunt to “prove” otherwise. 

And while some people might want to play that “you are!” moment off as a pure joke, as Riley only “teasing” Lucas no-big-deal, this ignores the fact that Riley is essentially backing up the people who MEAN IT when they call Lucas a disgrace, and they’re ignoring Lucas’s seriously hurt reaction (seriously, go watch it and LOOK at him, he’s totally wounded by Riley telling him he’s a disgrace to the community. Lucas sure as hell didn’t take it as a joke). Lucas is wounded by what Riley says, and Maya is shocked (horrified, even) that Riley is basically backing up this disgrace thing. Maya stopped teasing Lucas after she realized people meant it, she didn’t want to back them up anymore; she reacted differently when she actually saw a man-cow. 

In Texas, Riley’s insecurity regarding what other people think comes back big time, despite her marked growth in that arena (confronting her bully alone, for example). She truly believes that what these complete strangers think matters enough for Lucas to risk serious injury or death just to prove a point to them. (Granted, she also thinks Lucas isn’t in any real danger because she’s not being realistic about the situation...this is more nuanced than Riley just plain not caring, okay?)

Riley reinforcing rather than dismissing what other people think contributes to bringing back Lucas’s insecurity about what other people think too. Riley calls Lucas a disgrace to the community, the waitress mocks him...and, well...I think that’s the moment when Lucas decides he HAS to ride the bull. He was only doing it for Pappy Joe before, and even then he was wavering and not happy about it. He agreed with Maya not wanting him “anywhere near that bull.” He asked the girls why they hated him. He was PISSED OFF at being forced into this situation from the very start, even though he was gonna go through with it, probably. But once Riley tells him he’s a disgrace to the community and that waitress “baa-aa-a”s at him, Lucas doesn’t think he has any choice. He HAS to do it. 

(That’s also the exact moment Maya’s appeal is officially doomed, btw, because she’s not in a position to appeal to Lucas with complete honesty about why she doesn’t want him to do this...and complete honesty is probably the only way she could’ve stopped him once the “disgrace” thing was on the table. She might have had a chance before, but not after that. The bull ride becomes absolutely inevitable when it becomes about the Riley’s perception of him & the disgrace thing for Lucas instead of just Pappy Joe alone.)

In Texas, Riley essentially sides with the Texas people in terms of what she thinks Lucas needs to do and why. And why would Riley do this? Why would she buy into these problematic Texas values about shame and honor and childhood sheep-riding after everything her New York parents have taught her? Why has Riley decided that falling off of a sheep as little boy means you should risk your neck on the back of Tombstone the Bull?

Well, again, it’s partly because she’s convinced that Lucas can do anything because she idealizes him as a “hero who can do anything he wants” even in the face of possible injury or death. It’s also possible that Riley bought into those “Texas values” because she wasn't really fitting in with the Texas crowd the way she probably wanted to, because she’s supposed to be “Lucas’s girl.” (Remember, she was originally going to bust out a Southern accent for the first time ever when Pappy Joe asked if she was “Lucas’s girl.”) It’s likely that Riley realllly wants to fit into this aspect of Lucas’s life. But she doesn’t really. Not at first, anyway. This made it to canon a little bit with the Maya + Cletus ha-hurr scene (watch Riley’s face, she’s totally baffled by Lucas and Cletus), but again, let’s take peek under the hood, this time in the refreshment tent:

With this + the Cletus bit + what we know of Riley’s insecurity issues, it’s not exactly a stretch to conclude that perhaps Riley is buying into what the Texas people say Lucas HAS to do because shes’ feeling insecure about something...perhaps her position as “Lucas’s girl.” She’s been feeling that way on some level since at least the blonde beauty reveal, if not before (Lucas has done absolutely NOTHING to fix this, btw, and the “you both look good” bit definitely didn’t help). I’m not standing by this part 100%, but I think it’s worth mentioning as a possibility. So…why DID Riley throw in with the Texans? Why did she buy into the idea that it was rational for the locals to mock and shame and call Lucas a “disgrace” over something that happened to him as a child? Back home, Riley would NEVER stand for anyone to talk about her friends like that, but in Texas she reaffirms the locals’ ridiculous opinion rather than slamming it the way she did when Billy called Farkle a “nothing." So again…why?  Well, perhaps it’s because she REALLY wanted to fit in in Texas. And the rodeo waitress made it clear that she didn’t. I kinda wish they’d kept that bit of dialogue because I think it would be a pretty clear-cut case of Riley’s Insecurity Strikes Again. (Especially what with Maya “Annie Oakley” Hart apparently fitting right in; which kinda makes sense what with finding out in S3 that Katy’s from Arkansas.)

Maybe it’s also because the last time her idealization of Lucas pushed him into something he wasn’t sure he could do, he succeeded and wound up taking her on a princess fantasy horsey ride.

But of course, running for class president is a far cry from riding a 2,000 pound bull.

Going against Maya, Riley has taken the side of the people who mock Lucas and MEAN IT, even if her reasons for doing so have more to do with her misguided & idealistic belief that he's a "hero who can do anything" than with actually point blank AGREEING with the locals. But there’s waaaaay more to it than Riley’s idealism or her “heroic” visions of Lucas, or her possibly wanting to fit into Texas life as “Lucas’s girl.” This next bit is what I would call “the whammy.” Let's go back to the classroom, before the kids headed out to Texas, for yet another peek under the hood: 

Now, this idea didn't make it to explicitly stated canon either, but anyone watching the show with even half their brain functioning can understand that Texas Riley has essentially bought into this particular aspect of "stereotypical cultural reductionism." Texas Riley has, to an extent, bought into the Texas values that canon somewhat implied (and the early draft confirms) gave Lucas his temper in the first place. There's definitely more than a bit of an implication here that Riley believes the bull ride and subsequently "earning" Pappy Joe's pride/love and not being a “disgrace” anymore is going to "fix" Lucas's temper, which (let's face it) is a VERY Riley thing to believe. (And from a literary standpoint, mastering a bull as a metaphor for mastering anger/temper issues is pretty on the nose even if it ultimately doesn’t work out that way...)

So, OF COURSE Riley would encourage a stunt that she quite possibly believes will "fix" those issues and officially make Lucas the "hero she ‘knows’ he is" to everyone else. Here’s his chance to show everybody that he’s not “different than [Riley] thinks.” If Lucas can ride this bull, then *poof* he’s not a “disgrace to the community” anymore and *poof* his temper is fixed! *Poof* Lucas is exactly who Riley always thought he was and all that stuff she was upset about in Secret of Life and Rileytown goes away! (Yes, she WAS upset to find out that Lucas might not be what she thought, but I don’t have time for that argument right now because this post is already a novella).

Riley doesn't want that other part of Lucas to exist. She's tried to wallpaper over it with the vet thing, she's tried to scold it away. She wants it GONE. And hey, Lucas does too, unrealistic as that may be. It’s something he struggles to control. It’s not easy for him. Riley’s intentions are nothing but good! She.is.not.a.villain. She probably thinks this bull ride is going to HELP LUCAS FIX A PROBLEM. This is CLASSIC “fixer” Riley mode! But Riley is not being realistic on this front, because you cannot simply wallpaper over major parts of your personality by overcorrecting in the other direction and pretending/trying to be "Mr. Perfect the Hero." (The "Mr. Perfect" persona is as much an overcorrection as Donnie Barnes, Morotia M. Black, and S3 Maya "becoming Riley.") Riding a bull isn’t actually going to solve a decade or so of built-up issues.  Riding a bull may help you face your fears, but Lucas wasn’t exactly a super-fearful guy in the first place...except when it comes to Maya. So of course it’s massively ironic that the bull ride is probably a huge part of what gave Lucas the confidence to push Maya to admit her feelings at the campfire even though he knows she doesn’t like to be pushed and he’s terrified of her. There’s a reason Maya was associated with Tombstone at the end of Texas 2. 

And of course (mild spoilers ahead), the bull ride does NOT ultimately "fix" Lucas's temper, as you'll see Riley discover in GMHS1...

Even though she scolded Pappy Joe for mocking Pappy McCullough, Riley (for reasons and potential reasons detailed above) totally bought into the idea that Lucas needed to risk life and limb to "make up for" falling off of Judy, to earn his grandfather’s pride, as if falling off of a sheep is something to be ashamed of in the first place, as if anyone should have to risk their life & limb for their grandfather to be proud of them. And her original line called this out explicitly rather than simply heavily implying it via subtext as happened in official canon: 

In short, Riley changes after “seeing how other people live” by making fun of Lucas in tandem with people who mean it, and by buying into the idea that he should pull a life-threatening stunt to prove to these people that he’s not a disgrace, that he is rather the “hero” she believes he is. She reverts to “caring too much what other people think,” basically. She buys into and reinforces the problematic aspects of “Texas values” that gave Lucas his temper to begin with, possibly because she thinks fulfilling the edicts of those values will fix Lucas’s temper, among other things. What doesn’t change is her idealization of Lucas, as well as her desire to help fix things when she thinks she knows how to fix them, which are normally nowhere near as problematic as they are in this specific situation, which is a life or death (or major injury) situation. 

New York Maya vs Texas Maya

On the flip side you've got Maya, who was gleefully "ba-a-a-ing" at Lucas in New York, who was grinning like a fool when Pappy Joe first showed up and started going on and on about the "mud hole," who normally mocks Lucas with aplomb...but in Texas, Maya is NOT OKAY with the fact that the locals ACTUALLY believe Lucas is a disgrace. When she sees that they MEAN IT, she is DONE with their bull feces. It changes her. She stops mocking Lucas and unconditionally supports him as a person who is worthy of people being proud of him REGARDLESS of what happened to him as a kid (which would normally be more of a Riley thing, lbr, although this is not the first time Maya has shown unconditional support for Lucas as-is, see SoL). Even though Maya makes fun of Lucas in New York, she has never really meant it—teasing Lucas is a facade for New York Maya to hide her feelings. (And this is made explicit canon by Riley's realization in GMT1&2 as well as Maya's "it's my facade" line in GMT3). 

New York Maya mocks Lucas mercilessly even though she doesn't really mean it, but Texas Maya perceives that the locals MEAN IT when they mock Lucas and she is NOT COOL with that. Maya does NOT buy into the Texas values that apparently gave Lucas his temper issues in the first place, to any extent. Rather, she wants him to buck those problematic values. She wants him to take off that stupid outfit and get out of here. 

What’s going on with Maya is a lot simpler than what’s going on with Riley. Maya sees Lucas as a normal boy who could very well get hurt, who is great as-is, who shouldn’t put himself in such serious danger just because of what other people are saying. She also doesn’t see his temper as a problem to be solved or erased, to her, it’s just a part of him that he has to keep under control and only deploy for the right reasons. (Hell, the moment Maya emotionally falls for Lucas whether she realized it or not is most likely GM Sneak Attack, when he’s a total prick to Missy, who totally deserves it, and he didn’t even get remotely violent for that one.) When you set Riley up as the plain, black & white photo negative reverse of that, without accounting for all the complex REASONS she’s on the opposite side of Maya on this...it does make Riley look pretty bad. But that’s why I took pains to spool out the NUANCES of what may have been up with Riley in Texas in this post. Riley is only misguided, insecure, and naive. She is not being maliciously cruel when she calls Lucas a disgrace to the community. She is not purposefully knocking him down to build him up, although that is in effect what she does. 

In short, Maya stops making fun of Lucas, and expresses implicit unconditional pride in who Lucas is when she “sees how other people live.” But what doesn’t change is how confident she is. Maya is absolutely secure in the idea that Lucas is great as-is and that he should not have to risk life & limb to prove anything to anyone. What she loses is her grip on hiding her feelings as much as possible (which, unlike Riley’s self-confidence, has actually been weakening prior to this episode, largely because of the stuff Lucas has been initiating with Maya, and possibly because she’s been daring to hope).

More from the GM Flaws perspective...

Lucas isn’t “better” in New York because he busted out grand gestures like princess fantasy horsey rides and asking Cory for permission to take Riley on a date. People change people, and there is simply no logical reason to believe that “New York” Lucas picked up not caring what other people think from Insecure Riley Who Cares Too Much What People Think. Riley definitely 100% inspired Lucas’ desire to change his ways: her appeal to Lucas in the cafeteria in GM Sneak Attack pulls him away from Missy and over to Riley’s side of the line, and he certainly tries his damnedest to live up to her idealized vision of him between Friendship & Secret of Life after jettisoning “the rebel” shadowing him...although it starts to fall apart after SoL because again: just like the other kids, Lucas needs balance, not overcorrection. 

But even though Riley as the inspiration for Lucas to change must be acknowledged, Maya is clearly the person from whom Lucas picked up the practical application of owning yourself and not caring what other people think. It’s not exactly a stretch to conclude that picking up Maya’s self-confidence is an important part of what helped Lucas to largely overcome the temper issues he’s had as a result of his failure with Judy and the subsequent shaming he endured at the hands of his family and the locals. Picking that confidence up from Maya is just as important to Lucas’s growth as Riley inspiring Lucas to commit to change in the first place. (Maya also changes Riley in terms of growing to care less what other people think. All four of them have changed each other, and none of them would be what they are now without all of the others.) And people who honestly believe Maya’s "No! That’s what he wants! He wants you to be like him!” didn’t have a serious effect on Lucas in GM Flaws...I don’t even know what to say to y’all anymore. Riley did absolutely NOTHING when Lucas was about to pop Billy. MAYA was the one who slowed him down and made him stop. Did he calm all the way down to being as peaceful as a lamb? Nah. He was still pissed, and rightfully so. But Maya is the one who actually physically stopped Lucas from going too far in Flaws. Granted, she’s also the one who inspired him to nearly hit Billy in the first place, but she sees the error of encouraging that behavior and then does something about it. (Just like Lucas did for her earlier in the episode).

Riley and Lucas are a LOT alike. When Lucas goes back to his original environment in Texas, and after his go-to-ego-booster-Riley reinforces what other people are saying rather than calling bullshit...New York Lucas kinda disappears. Gone is the boy who delivers passionate, sincere speeches about not succumbing to what other people say you are. Gone is the boy who didn’t think he was actually a disgrace to the community. In his place is a very insecure boy who, because of what other people are saying, believes he MUST risk his life and limb by riding the fiercest bull around. And Riley reacts pretty much the SAME WAY to that stimuli...probably because she's a lot like Lucas. Maya, however, does not. Riley shakes Lucas’s confidence in himself, she shakes his confidence in the idea that he is NOT actually a disgrace, before she “builds him up” in terms of being able to ride the bull because he’s a “hero.” Maya wanted Lucas to be the guy she knows in New York, who doesn’t care so much what other people think in the first darn place.

Interestingly, it was Maya who delivered the equivalent of the "You are..." line to Farkle in GM Flaws. She meant it in a good way, but she was still kinda sorta reinforcing the negative crap Billy was saying to Farkle. Maya was saying that being “weird” is okay for Farkle as long as he has self-confidence and owns it. But that doesn’t get Farkle to come back to class. Maya is not a monster or a villain for that “you are” moment any more than Riley is monster or a villain for HER "you are" moment with Lucas in Texas. Maya was trying to help Farkle. Riley was trying to help Lucas. This isn't about who's "good" and who's "bad," it's simply about the DIFFERENCES in how the girls interact with, perceive, and feel about the boys, and how all of that affects whatever situation they’re in. It's about how seeing the way people act in Texas changes the way the girls normally act. That's it. 

Lucas was essentially bullied (by the locals, Pappy McCullough, and Pappy Joe) onto the back of that bull just as much as Farkle was bullied into the janitor's closet. Pappy Joe was originally going to CARRY A PROTESTING LUCAS OUT OF THE CLASSROOM OVER HIS SHOULDER. Lucas was pissed off about being roped into the bull ride from the get-go even without the cuts to these scenes. Lucas didn't ride Tombstone because he wanted to "fulfill his dreams." Not one blessed word is spoken by ANYONE about this stunt being about Lucas’s “rodeo dreams,” which he gave up long before this episode. Lucas doesn’t even mention his “dreams” in EITHER of his grateful speeches to Riley. Lucas rode Tombstone because he felt like he had no choice but to prove he could, so people would stop calling him a "disgrace" for something that happened to him as a little boy, so he could “earn” the openly expressed love of his grandfather which OUGHT TO BE unconditional. 

Lucas doesn't even keep the trophy, which is saying something for a dude as hyper-competitive as he is. He doesn't even sit there ADMIRING the trophy the way Farkle and Zay do back at the house. And he very pointedly takes a knee to reassure Timmy that it's OKAY that he fell off Judy—it's pretty clear Lucas is trying to prevent Timmy being as negatively affected by his childhood failure as Lucas was. And, with the Timmy/Lucas moment, the writers are pretty clearly letting us know that it was WRONG for Lucas to be treated so badly over the Judy thing to begin with. Lucas does for Timmy what NO ONE did for him, aside from Maya when it was already too late. What feeling was associated with being bullied, for both Riley and Farkle? Humiliation. Here are the stage directions for Lucas’s little chat with Timmy:

And what’s really interesting is that THIS is the moment that the Friars and the McCulloughs bury the hatchet. Pappy Joe and Pappy McCullough shake hands AFTER Lucas tries to save Timmy from a childhood full of shame just for falling off a sheep. Lucas’s bull ride didn’t end the feud, Lucas taking a knee and reassuring Timmy ended the feud. Lucas just being a GOOD GUY ended the feud. That was all Lucas ever truly needed to be to begin with, and he didn’t actually need to be bullied onto the back of a bull for that. 

Dreamers + Realists

After the danger becomes apparent to Maya in Texas, she is 100% done with the BS. Maya gets hip to the danger when she sees the bulls on the monitors. Riley idealizes Lucas the “Hero” so much that doesn’t think there’s any real danger until she sees Tombstone in person. Maya ends up delivering a version of Riley's "it's not okay" line from GM Flaws with, "You're not proud of him if he doesn't do this?" It's very clear that Maya thinks it is NOT OKAY for people to be calling Lucas a disgrace (and meaning it) to begin with, and she thinks it's absolutely NUTS for him to risk his life and/or limb to "prove" he's not. To Maya, Lucas's safety was more important than what these people (wrongly) believed about Lucas. She was more worried about his safety than what anyone thought. She doesn't have Lucas up on a pedestal in terms of her conception of him, she doesn't believe he can ride this bull safely just because he (very insecurely) says he can. She has been given EVERY REASON to believe that Lucas is going to get seriously hurt or killed by riding Tombstone. She is not being “dramatic.” The danger was real. (And it’s hammered home over and over and over again, from “Death is the difference!” until the moment of the bull ride itself.)

Maya wants Lucas to be realistic and SAFE. She wants him to NOT CARE so much about what these people are saying. She doesn't want Lucas to be so affected by what other people are saying about him. She believes those people are WRONG to call him a “disgrace” at all, and she is right about that. She wants Lucas to BUCK this objectively problematic aspect of “Texas values,” which apparently/may have gave him his temper to begin with. And she doesn't need or want Lucas to pull a life-threatening stunt or "be a hero" just because of the awful things people are saying. She doesn’t think these peoples’ problematic and wrong opinions are worth Lucas taking such a massive risk. She wants him to think realistically, not idealistically. Here’s another little snippet of what she was originally going to say:

(I’m guessing they changed the bull’s name from Satan to Tombstone because it’d be kinda screwy to associate Maya with something named Satan. And also: Disney Channel Anyway.) Riley and Lucas, the dreamers, are NOT listening to the realist here. This is a potential life or death situation and they are not LISTENING to Maya. They’re too caught up in those crappy ideas about Southern honor, too caught up in the idea that Lucas MUST risk his life to “make up for” falling off a sheep as a kid, too caught up in the idea of Lucas as a “hero.” Riley and Lucas aren’t being realistic about this, and they’re caring WAY too much about reputation and what other people think. Perhaps it might be useful to think of this situation in terms of what Maya says about them both in GM Money (especially if you believe it’s supposed to come BEFORE Texas):

“I’m gonna dream with them, yeah. I always have. They’re the ones who taught me how. Just sometimes, I know better.”

Maya knew better in Texas. Riley and Lucas did not. (”You have these friends for a reason,” much?) There was no GOOD reason for Lucas to be risking his life, because Pappy Joe and the locals were WRONG to call Lucas a disgrace over something that happened to him as a child in the first place. 

Riley’s idealization of Lucas is what makes her blind to the VERY REAL danger until she sees Tombstone in person, at which point she acts like veterinarian dreams can tame an angry bull. Riley is not being realistic about this. The show took major pains to hammer home that the danger was real and that it was extraordinarily lucky Lucas didn’t get seriously hurt. They even go so far as to SHOW us “the best” being rolled out on a stretcher as Lucas enters the ring. Riley may believe Lucas is “hero” and all (and WHY does she think that, exactly? That’s yet another post), but if “the best” can wind up in the hospital after riding Buttercup, then Lucas could’ve easily wound up in even worse shape after riding Tombstone. They. Got. Lucky.

But the issue here is not that Riley is some monster who just plain didn’t care about Lucas. The issue is that she cared too much what other people thought (same with Lucas). The issue is that she wasn’t being realistic about the danger (same with Lucas). This is a situation where the dreamers OUGHT TO HAVE listened to the realist, and they didn’t. They got lucky this time. But how many more times do you think Riley and Lucas can get into situations like this before their luck runs out and something goes horribly wrong because they both had their heads in the clouds? Is this out-of-touch-with-reality idealistic dreamer dynamic GOOD FOR THEM in the long run? As long as we’re only talking about running for class president in seventh grade, I guess. More importantly, does this dynamic make for an effective, possibly long-term partnership with room for constant growth? According to the writers...no. See: GM Belief, the implications of STEM.

The point of the refreshment tent scene was never "can Maya talk Lucas out of this?!" but rather to HIGHLIGHT the differences in the way the girls see the world, and Lucas himself—not to mention the difference in their feelings for him. Seeing how other people live changes the way the girls would normally act. What DOESN'T change though is the way the girls SEE and CONCEIVE of Lucas. Riley's idealization of Lucas doesn't disappear in Texas just because other people are calling him a “disgrace.” She's convinced that he's a "hero who can do anything," so even though the danger is becoming more and more apparent, Riley believes Lucas can ride a raging bull just because he says so, even though he is clearly unsure himself. Maya, on the other hand, sees Lucas as a normal kid and a normal good guy. She doesn't place him on a "hero" pedestal the way Riley does. She sees "the best" get carried out on a stretcher and she is 100% DONE with the idea that Lucas should risk his life and limb just to prove a point to a bunch of people who are WRONG to be calling Lucas a disgrace in the first place. She does everything she can think of to try and stop him, while also trying to not make her feelings known. And at this point Maya is the one who is acting the way you'd expect "Lucas's girl" to act in the face of a life or death stunt (especially by BMW/GMW standards). And Riley, well...she's acting more like his family and the Texans. Riley’s acting more like like Pappy Joe, who makes fun of Lucas and believes he HAS to risk himself with a life threatening stunt.

The Inevitability of the Bull Ride

But make no mistake: Even though it didn’t become 100% inevitable in the narrative until after the “disgrace” bit, that bull ride was always going to happen plot-beat-wise. Maya didn't have an actual prayer of talking Lucas out of it because this is FICTION. The bull ride is the action climax of the episode, and it's also how Riley gets hip to Maya's feelings. If the bull ride doesn't happen, then Riley doesn't get fully hip to Maya, and Texas 2&3 don't happen. The purpose of the refreshment tent scene (even after the cuts) was probably to highlight the differences in the way the girls see/perceive Lucas wherever they are geographically, as well as to highlight the way they change in terms of how they each treat Lucas in light of seeing how he grew up in Texas. Maya's attempt to talk Lucas out of it was ALWAYS doomed, which is why she has to push so hard that she slips up and makes her feelings obvious/undeniable/apparent—and although Riley doesn't quite 100% catch on until she sees Maya frozen and shaking in fear after Lucas is flung through the air, that post-rodeo moment is really just the catalyst that makes all the moments Riley's been noticing all season snap into place. And of course Lucas has NO IDEA what's up with Maya until Riley brings it up and Maya eventually explains herself at the campfire. He seems to think that Maya just doesn't support him or believe in him while Riley does. 

I've had it just about up to here with people who aren't capable of grasping the nuance of Girl Meets Texas 1, or who think there isn’t any, especially with regard to the way the girls change once they get to Texas. Fact: Riley is naive and is often slow on the uptake when it comes to reality. Sometimes it seems like she's faking it, other times she really is just a lap behind. Riley can often be misguided when she thinks she knows what's best for everyone. The bull ride was the action climax of the episode and was going to happen NO MATTER WHAT, because of who these character are and where the story needed to go. But parsing out the _why_ of it all doesn’t mean I think there was ever a prayer of a Girl Meets Texas without a bull ride, or that it’s “Riley’s fault” there was a bull ride. Riley’s not real. There’s a bull ride because it was written that way. But the way they get to that plot point is, in my ever intense opinion, worth a closer look--especially because you don’t have to squint much to see it all as a piece of a much larger puzzle re: Riley and Maya learning to be combinations of light/dark and dreamer/realist rather than dichotomous extremes, entirely aside from the fact that in this case it’s got to do with Lucas. 

[wowweeharrystyles]

Part 1 | Kindness & The Perfect Fit | 9.2k words

‘Sequins & Zippers’ Summary: An internship with Harry Lambert transformed into a job of a lifetime - Aurora Del Gatto finds herself touring the world with the one & only Harry Styles as his ‘Head of Wardrobe.’ Aurora is nothing but nerves & excitement as she packs her bags & almost 100 custom designer suits that belong to an unbelievably kind rockstar. She never thought she’d fall in love on top of it all.

A/N: So here’s part 1 of Sequins & Zippers. A MASSIVE shoutout to @niallhoranapologist​. If it weren’t for Gwen I probably wouldn’t have continued to work on this story. Thanks for always helping me brainstorm ideas, listen to me talk about these fictional characters all the time & for continuously supporting my writing. you da best. 

“Ugg, this is useless,” Aurora groans as she throws the t shirt she had in hand across the room. Aurora has been attempting to pack her suitcase for hours now. “How the hell am I supposed to pack 4 months worth of clothes in a single suitcase?” she whispers in defeat to herself.

“Rory? Everything alright?” Aurora’s mother calls from the other room. Rory is the nickname her mom gave her when she was only a baby. Her mother walks into her room and sees the frustrated look on her daughter’s face. 

“25 countries? The weather is gonna be different in every freaking country,” Rory lets out a frustrated sigh, falling onto her bed. “I can barely pack properly for a weekend trip.” 

“Hey, you’re thinking too hard and overwhelming yourself,” her mother says softly as she sits on the bed next to her. She places a hand on her shoulder, “Let me help. We’ll figure it out.” 

Aurora is currently trying to pack for her new job. After the craziest year she’s ever had, packed with graduating college, moving to London to work with one of the most well-known stylists in the fashion industry and having the time of her life doing what she loves most, she was offered a career-altering job for the next 4 months. Never did Aurora think she would be sitting in her room back home in a small suburb of New York surrounded by cardboard boxes labeled with things like: “NYC Apartment - kitchen,” “London - winter clothes,” “School things,” “London Flat - bedding,” “I have no idea, from london.” Organized Chaos explained her life best right now. 

“Rory, sweetie, where’s your list?” her mother asks, looking around to locate the papers she’s been carrying around for the past week that’s covered in scribbled notes, lists upon lists and small sketches here and there. “Should’ve really been keeping that stuff in a journal or something.” She finds the papers scattered on Aurora’s desk and a few laid on top of boxes. “Probably wouldn’t be so overwhelmed if you could be a little bit more organized,” her mother sighs gathering the papers into a stack, tapping the bottom edges on the desk to line them up. “You’re normally so much more organized,” her mother continues before pressing a kiss to Aurora’s hair. 

“It’s a lot, Mom. I don’t know where to start.” She stands up from her bed and grabs her phone as it dings, indicating she’s received an email. “Finally!” she exclaims with a sigh of relief. “Harry’s just sent me my official itinerary and all of my flight info.”

“Harry Styles himself emailed you your travel plans?” her mother asks in disbelief. 

“No, mom, Lambert. Harry Lambert, my boss.”

“Oh yeah, of course,” she laughs lightly, “How many mix ups has there been with that name?” 

Aurora’s new job is ‘Head of Wardrobe’ for Harry Styles’ Arena World Tour. In all honesty, she has no idea how she got here. Well she does, but it still doesn’t feel real. Lambert’s original hire for the tour ended up needing to stay in London to help him with his styling work there and she was next in line, but she still isn’t too sure how she got this lucky. The past year happened so fast and it was one opportunity after another that landed her here. She’s barely had a moment to breathe after the holidays and some small jobs here and there to keep her busy. Last January, just over a year ago, Aurora traveled to London for a six week menswear design course at Central Saint Martins for some extra credits before her final semester of college. During this course, she was lucky enough to met Harry Lambert. After he saw her collection of work from the past few years, what her thesis plans were and what she had been working on during the CSM course he kept her information on file for the future. When Aurora left london at the end of the course she had no idea if she would ever hear from Harry Lambert again, but around mid march she received an email from him about an internship position he needed to fill and thought she would be perfect for. Starting the internship in NYC before she even graduated, May was a whirlwind and was the perfect indication on how the rest of her year would be. She moved to London in June and was put to work without a second to spare. 

“Okay, so here’s what we’re gonna do,” Aurora’s mother starts before launching into a detailed plan on how they’re both gonna tackle packing up Aurora’s life for the next 4 months on the road, traveling. They’ve got barely 3 days until her flight leaves for London.

Nearly 4 hours later and they’ve organized Aurora’s room. Unpacking the appropriate boxes, written a new packing list, and they’ve also written a shopping list. They’ve got organized piles surrounding them. Again, Organized Chaos best describes Aurora’s life, always. 

“Oh, what about that long pleated skirt you made last year? The emerald green one? You definitely need to take that.” Aurora’s eyes lit up at the idea. She loved that skirt, it was versatile enough that she could pair with heels or sneakers. Versatile pieces were key to packing she found out quickly. Her mom reaches into her closet and searches for it. “Probably at the back, haven’t worn it in awhile,” she motions towards her closet while sorting through the box of her bags, making decisions on which ones she’ll need with her. 

“Oh gosh, Rory, look what I found,” her mom emerges from the closet with a handful of rolled up posters. 

Aurora goes bright red knowing exactly what is on those posters. “Oh no. I kept those?” her mom sets them down on the floor but keeps one to unroll. Once the tape is off and her mom has got it flat, she turns it around to face Aurora. It’s a large poster of One Direction from a TigerBeat magazine. Aurora drops her face into her hands. 

“Remember when you couldn’t see a bit of the wall cause of these posters? If I remember right, you liked that blonde one yeah?” her mom laughs, rolling the poster back up. “Maybe you should take one with you and have Harry sign it? He’d get a kick out of it, I’m sure.” 

“Mom!” Aurora whines. “This is my job, my career. I have to be nothing but professional.” 

“I’m sure he wouldn’t mind a joke or two. Gotta have fun still and honestly, he’d probably think it’s cute.” 

“Mom, it’s embarrassing and I’m gonna be working with him and his team for the next 4 months.” Her mother can see the panic on her face. “I cannot just show up with a One Direction poster.” 

“Ror, I’m just having a bit of fun with you. You need to relax or you’ll just be frustrated and stressed the entire time.” She sets the posters aside and goes to join Aurora on the floor. Placing a hand on her cheek, “Baby girl, my baby girl, promise me you’ll have some fun? This is a chance of a lifetime and I know you’ll work your butt off and do your job perfectly, but you need to enjoy it too. Okay?” Aurora nods slowly. She knows her mother is right, she always is. 

“Okay,” she says softly giving her mom a weary smile. 

“You’ll be okay, I know you will,” her mom says before leaning in and hugging her daughter. “I’m so proud of you.”

Aurora and her mother continue bustling around her room until the sun sets. By the time there is no daylight left there are 2 large suitcases completely full, all organized and packed with Aurora’s belongings. They spend the next hour packing up Aurora’s rolling caboodle. The large, rollable, sturdy set of drawers and compartments is from Aurora’s days as a competition dancer. It used to carry her stage makeup, extra pairs of tights, accessories and an emergency sewing kit. It was always covered in glitter and there were bobby pins in every nook and cranny, a few stray sets of false eyelashes too. But for the past 4 years, she’s used it for all things sewing and design. She never went to class or the design studio without it. Aurora and her mom empty the drawers and reorganize the contents. They make another list of things they need to pick up at the local sewing store the next day. Aurora pulls out her old sketchbooks and sets them to the side and adds a new clean book to the now empty drawer along with her cases of Micron pens, drawing pencils and prisma coloured pencils. 

Aurora continues to organize each little compartment as her mother prints out small labels and adds them to the section dividers. Aurora loves to be overly organized and have everything in its place. It keeps her calm and stops her from getting overwhelmed in stressful situations. There’s nothing she hates more than being backstage at a fashion show and needing a simple needle and thread to fix a small seam quickly and having to dig through the drawers to find what she needs. Backstage life, anywhere, fashion shows, dance competitions, or even a world tour, can be stressful if you’re not prepared properly. 

“Oh, keep the box of sequins and swarovski crystals in there. I actually might need them.” Aurora finishes the sentence with a giggle as she’s setting her scissors in their respective home. 

“Really?” her mom laughs too. 

“Yeah, some of the looks for this tour are actually pretty sparkly. You never would’ve thought. I actually might have to bedazzle a few things on the road.” 

“You’re home!” her mother sing-songs. They both laugh again thinking about the countless hours they spent bedazzling dance costumes with 100’s of crystals. 

After saying goodbye to her parents through a continuous flow of tears, Aurora got on an 8 hour flight. She kept herself busy on the flight to occupy her mind and stop her from overthinking or panicking about the next 4 months ahead of her. She landed in London on the 3rd of March, just a few days till she’d be back at this exact airport with the same luggage plus a few crates labeled ‘Wardrobe’ that she’d also have to care for. She made her way to the Air B’N’B that had been set up for her for the next few days and headed straight to bed. One thing Aurora, jokingly, prides herself on is the ability to sleep anywhere at anytime. 

When the morning rolls around and her alarm wakes her, she’s preparing herself a cup of coffee when her phone rings. She notices Lambert’s ID on the screen. She answers and they exchange good mornings before he asks her about her travels from the day before. 

“Okay, so, I’m sending a car to where you’re staying in about an hour to bring you to the arena.”

“Arena? I thought we were meeting at your studio?” 

“Oh no, change of plans, sorry should have mentioned that in an email. Harry is in full rehearsal mode and everything for the tour is at the mock stage space at Wembley Arena. They’ve just finished the final tech rehearsals and Harry will be there today to start running the show,” Lambert continues. The new knowledge of Harry Styles being there on her first day makes Aurora jittery, small butterflies erupting in her stomach. She’s met Harry before. They’re friendly, but she was only just Lambert’s shadow anytime they were together. He was sweet and kind, just as everyone always says, but she was still a tad nervous. She will be with him almost everyday, on her own, without Lambert there to be a buffer. Aurora tended to be a nervous person, especially if she doesn’t know someone all that well. She can keep her nerves at bay and save a proper panic for after the situation ends most times, which is the best she can do right now. It’s something she’s working on. It’s what she hates most about herself, not being able to keep her nerves in check. 

“Oh yeah, makes sense,” Aurora responds, surprisingly with no jitters evident in her voice. 

“Great, I can have the run of show lookbook all put together for you when you arrive and we’ll go through it and make notes.” “Do you mind if I actually set it up when I get there? I would feel much better and more settled doing it myself as we do a walkthrough of the wardrobe.” 

“Of course, Aurora, whatever you think will work best for you.” 

She thanks him and they end the phone call after confirming the time and car that will be picking her up. She finishes off her coffee and heads to the living room where she left her suitcases last night. One of the large suitcases was lying on the ground, opened, exactly where Aurora left it last night. She ruffles through the contents of her suitcase, moving around different packing cubes until she finds the cube that contains her favourite black jeans. She locates a creme hooded knit sweater and some clean undergarments. She pops into the shower and continues to bustle around the small flat getting ready. At some point she turns on some music to distract her mind. There’s an airy feeling in the flat, the sun shining in london for a change and it calms Aurora down despite the nerves running through her veins. Aurora checks her watch, 10 minutes until her car is due to pick her up. She slides on her all white leather court sneakers and laces them up, tucking in the excess laces for a clean finish. She grabs her black bomber jacket and slips her arms in, then pulls out the hood from her sweater so it lays comfortably on the outside of the jacket’s collar. She takes a quick look in the full body mirror that leans up against the white brick wall across from the large, unmade bed. She’s reminded by the reflection in her mirror to text her mother and thank her for convincing her to pack her favourite clothes instead of all her fancy stuff. She looks put together but is still extremely comfortable, prepared for anything today has to offer her. 

There’s a short honk from the street in front of the building. Aurora grabs her rolling caboodle and her purse before rushing out the door to meet the driver. 

20 minutes later she finds herself stepping out of the car and thanking the driver for holding the door. He grabs her caboodle from the trunk and hands it to Aurora and wishing her well and to have a nice day. Harry Lambert greets her at the door giving her a big hug and exclaiming about how excited he is to have her there. He takes her an office where the tour manager, Michael is set up. The office is busy with several people working at desks on laptops and people taking phone calls. Lambert introduces Aurora to the team and gets her set up with her tour pass and all the nitty gritty stuff. Within half an hour she’s all set for tour and has her new lanyard tied to her on a belt loop. They walk through the never ending halls plastered with signs that state “Treat People With Kindness” and Aurora smiles everytime she sees another. Lambert points out different places, important notes posted on bulletin boards and casually introduces her to people as they quickly pass. 

Everyone seems to be on a mission, darting in and out of rooms and talking on headsets. It’s a busy atmosphere but nobody seems stressed or upset. Aurora appreciates the hustle that everyone seems to have. There’s smiles and high fives passed between crew members and coffees getting pass along. Lambert points out where Harry’ band’s dressing room is and then Harry’s as well. Harry’s reads “Hershel” on the sign that sticks out from the wall. 

“Hershel?” Lambert chuckles when he sees the confused look on her face. 

“Yeah, Jeff, his manager, you’ve met him, calls him Hershel 95% of the time.” She nods along with a smile. After making their way through a few more halls they reach a larger dressing room. “Okay, so here’s our space for the week.” Aurora rolls her caboodle and sets it against the wall near the door for now and sets her purse down on an empty space on the counter that lines one of the shorter walls. On the wall directly across from the doorway there are 3 large black cases that stand about 6 feet tall, opened and filled with garment bags. 

“Is everything here already?” Aurora makes her way towards the case farthest left. 

“Hopefully!” Lambert picks up a large binder that’s sitting on the table across from a small leather couch. “That’s where we’re starting. Checking through each night’s look and making sure it’s all here.” She takes the binder that Lambert has handed her and opens it up to the first page.” 

“Oh wow. I almost forgot how beautiful these suits are.” Towards the end of her internship in London, Lambert let her help him pick some options for the tour. She thumbs through the book quickly to get a glimpse of the beautiful designer suits. She notices quite a few of her favourites made the cut. The 2 of them sit down and devise a plan to best get through this large task of double checking the 60 looks in front of them. They’re about ¾ the way through around 1pm when they mutually decide to take a break and grab some lunch before they power through the rest of the wardrobe. After meeting more members of the crew and grabbing another cup of coffee, Lambert and Aurora make their way back to their dressing room. 

“Hey, let’s go take a look at the stage,” Lambert said as he made a sharp turn in the opposite direction of the room they’ve been working in. “I haven’t seen the final setup yet.” 

“Oh, I’d love that!” Aurora’s face lights up at the idea. They enter from the back of the stage. The stage itself is fully constructed but the light trees are currently hanging low to the ground and crew members are working carefully to change the direction, colour or size of each bulb. Lambert excuses himself as he takes a call, telling Aurora he’ll meet her back in the dressing room in 15 minutes. Aurora continues the theme from today and introduces herself to the stage crew. “Mind if I check out the stage?” she asks Jack, one of the crew members who introduced himself as the Stage Manager. 

“Go ahead, just keep an eye out, we haven’t cleaned up much.” She nods and smiles while walking up the metal steps at the side of the stage. She takes careful steps as she steps to center stage. She looks out into the empty arena. The lights are low and the noise from the powertools is echoing through the arena. 

Though there isn’t any music, the stage lights aren’t shining, and she isn’t in one of her rhinestoned costumes, she still feels at home standing center stage. The nerves she’s been holding on to all morning wash away as she takes a deep breath. Her eyes flutter shut for a moment and she remembers the last time she performed on a stage like this one. It was her senior year of high school at nationals in New York City. It was her farewell to her dance career. A smile starts to grow on her face, the nerves from this morning, the the whole trip to get here, completely washed away now. 

“Oi!” a voice booms through the air, making Aurora jump and she searches for where it came from. She turns around, her hair following her as she turns. Her hair continues to follow her movement, falling in front of her face a bit but she can still make out the face the voice comes from. “What’re you doing on my stage?” She’s met with a smiley, broad shouldered Harry Styles. He’s got his hands in the pockets of the tartan trousers he’s wearing. The strong feeling of embarrassment brings heat to her cheeks as she looks down at the black and white vans he’s sporting. 

“Oh gosh, I’m sorry, I-,” she starts rambling apologies. She watches his vans take a few steps closer to her. Aurora’s fumbling with her hands, a nervous tick of hers. “-I was told, told, I could, could, check out the stage,” she’s stuttering over her words and pointing in the direction of Jack. She finally stops talking when she meets Harry’s eyes. He’s still beaming and her stomach drops at the fact that he’s enjoying this situation. His confidence paints an incredible stark difference from her mumbling nervousness. Her brain is a bit fuzzy right now but that doesn’t stop her from noticing the way his eyes sparkle. 

“I’m only joking, love” he says as he pulls his hands out of his pockets with a chuckle. “The stage suits you.” 

“I’m sorry,” Aurora offers again. “I’m-” She’s reaching her hand out when he cuts off her introduction.

“Love, we’ve met. How could I forget you, Aurora.” She’s startled a bit when her name comes out of his mouth. “Ya fixed the hole in my pink jacket, remember?” He’s stepping closer to her and before she’s able to process what’s happening he’s wrapped his arms around her torso, his tattooed arm rubbing her back briefly before pulling away. 

A small laugh leaves her mouth, “I remember, didn’t think you would is all.” Her voice is soft and trails off towards the end of her sentence. 

“Not got much a reputation then if I’ve got people that work with me thinking I’ll forget them.” He lets out a soft chuckle and his smile elicits a dimple on his cheek. 

“No, no, you’ve got a much better reputation than that, promise. You must meet a lot of people day to day is all.” Aurora is calming down, now, realizing that there is no reason for her to be so nervous around him. She’s interacted with him before, this shouldn’t be so jarring to her. Though this time is different. She wouldn’t be working behind Lambert or running errands. She’ll be with Harry just about everyday and she terrified she’ll never be comfortable, always anxiety ridden. Although his life is much different from hers, she’ll be getting a real taste of it and they’re close in age. They’re bound to find something in common. Right?. There’s a bit of silence before Aurora speaks up. “Well, your suits aren’t gonna organize themselves. I better go find Lambert.”

“Yes, of course. Don’t let me stop you from your work.” Aurora nods. She excuses herself as she makes a comment about how she thinks the stage looks great so far. Just after she’s walked past him she feels him grab her hand. “I’m excited to have ya on tour with us, love. Happy to have you making sure I sparkle just right on this stage.” He’s let go of her hand and presents his arms out to the sides as he mentions the stage. 

She’s beaming back at him. “Packed extra rhinestones just for you.” She’s almost skipping down the stairs after that. A weight of relief falling from her shoulders in a light sigh.  First, interaction with Harry? Check. She finds her way back to the room she’d been working in all morning. She settles down on the couch again, pulling the large binder into her lap. She jots down a few notes and adds to the ever growing list of things that need to be done. She stands up and walks over to one of the open wardrobe cases. She’s sliding hangers across the rack before she gets to the next look. Aurora takes the hanger off the rack. The sleek black hanger is labeled Yves Saint Laurent and an emerald green sequined button down shirt hangs off of it. There’s a pair of black straight leg trousers folded over the hanger as well. Aurora carries the ensemble across the room and hangs it on one of the vanity bulbs that sticks out from the light bulb framed mirror. She fixes the collar so it’s sitting straight. She takes a step back with one hand on her hip and another on her chin. 

“What’re you thinking?” Lambert asks when he sees Aurora’s furrowed brow. She hums, still processing her thoughts. 

“You know Michael Jackson’s black sequin jacket? The one he wore when he did the moonwalk for the first time?” He nods, following along. “Think we could play with that idea. What if Harry wore this open, with the Calvin tank?” In the small section of a wardrobe they’ve already gone through is a slew of clothing articles that will be used for multiple shows. The Calvin tank she’s referencing is one that will be, in Aurora’s opinion, an iconic, staple for the entire tour. It’s a simple white ribbed tank but on the left side, “Treat People With Kindness” is embroidered in black. “It’d be closer to Michael’s ‘Billie Jean’ performance in Munich that same year, but it’s the iconic sequin jacket that will sell it.”  

“You really know your stuff huh?” Lambert chuckles, impressed by her knowledge and the way her brain works. Lambert walks away and grabs the tank from the rack and brings it back to Aurora. 

A smile creeps onto Aurora’s face. “My mom loves Michael Jackson. Loves him like everyone loves Harry. I grew up dancing around the house to his music.” She takes the tank from Lambert after he slides it off the hanger. She’s quick to unbutton the YSL shirt in excitement but does it as carefully as possible. She hangs the tank under the shirt, turning it into a overshirt now. The smile on her face is growing. She’s in her element, doing exactly what she’s always wanted to do. Lambert places a hand on her shoulder and gives it a squeeze. A silent approval. Aurora walks back to the table and writes down their decision for this look in the notebook she’s been working with. They go through a few more suits and make a note that they’ll need an extra white button down from Gucci. Lambert is sending Aurora there sometime this week to pick a few more things up that are getting finished and some extra shoes for Harry as well. Lambert says Harry likes to wear his shoes to dust and that Aurora will have to make sure he doesn’t go on stage with holes in his shoes cause he will, especially his rainbow loafers.  They finish going through the rest of the suits before calling it a day. Lambert fills her in on the next few day’s timeline to prepare her for the week. Aurora leaves the arena feeling like her heart could burst. She couldn’t have imagined a better first day at her new job. Aurora heads to bed early, after she orders a Domino’s Pizza, to rest up for the days ahead and beat the jet lag that’s bound to hit her in the next few days. 

When she gets to Wembley the next morning, Aurora grabs a coffee from craft services and says hello to a few people she recognizes from yesterday. She’s thankful that everyone has a lot to get done and people are jutting off to their own areas to get to work. Aurora would be lying to herself if she didn’t acknowledge that she’s a bit overwhelmed by all of the new faces. She knows faces will become familiar as time goes on but right now she’s content with her coffee and knowing that she’s walking to a room to work on her own for awhile. 

When she finds herself in the familiar green room she sets herself up for the day. Aurora pulls her laptop out of her leather bag and presses play on her current spotify playlist. She likes working alone, but not in silence. After collecting her notebook from yesterday and the envelope of images that Lambert left for her she sits down and starts putting together the final look book for tour. She’s organizing the book by tour dates, making a section for each city. 

“Basel, Switzerland” is written on the top of the 1st page in bold all capital letters. Aurora tapes an image of the black glittered Gucci suit that Harry will wear for the opening night of his world tour. She copies any notes she made about this look from yesterday onto the space underneath the photo. After she’s finished the page for Switzerland she goes to the large cases and pulls the black glittered Gucci suit to the empty rolling rack that she set up yesterday. Each of the traveling cases will need to be organized by date to make traveling and set up easier throughout the tour. She continues this process for the next 2 hours. Once her coffee is empty at the end of the 2 hours she has almost 6 cities complete. Aurora takes her empty coffee cup as a sign for her to take a break. Before leaving the room to get more coffee she checks her phone. There’s a few notifications, emails from lists she keeps forgetting to unsubscribe to and a string of texts from her mother. She laughs at the first text - “I know you’re probably fine, but you’re in a different country and I need to hear your voice to make sure you’re still alive and it’s not some kidnapper texting me back” - then another text about 20 mins after that one reads “I love you, I know you’re busy, but please call me” and the last one delivered just a few minutes ago, “I’m your mother, it’s my job to worry.” Aurora shakes her head and feels a bit guilty because she hasn’t texted her mom as much as she probably should have and before knocking out last night she texted her back apologizing for not calling after her first day and that she was just too exhausted. 

Her mom doesn’t answer and is greeted with an automatic voicemail greeting, “Classic,” she chuckles as she hangs up without leaving a message. She shakes her head, standing in the doorway as she sends off a text saying she’s taking a break and to call her back, adding a “I’m good, everything’s amazing! Just calling to chat” as she always does so her mother doesn’t worry any more than she is. As she finishes the texts she mumbled a bit to herself about how her mother is always worrying but never picks up her dang phone. It isn’t until a familiar voice rings through the hallway that she realises she was mumbling quite clearly. 

“Sorry, everything alright, love?” Harry’s distinct voice travels closer to her as she looks up from her phone to him. She’s made her way into the arena hallway completely now. There’s a small furrow in his brow but a slight grin on his face. 

“Ah yeah, didn’t realise I was talking out loud.” She holds her phone up, “You know mothers, always worrying but never actually answering their phone when you call.” Harry laughs, his shoulders shaking. “She sent me this string of texts about being worried and 2 minutes later doesn’t pick up when I call her.” She sighs before sliding her phone into the pocket of the track jacket she’s got on today. 

“My mum does the same. Always saying we don’t talk enough or that she misses me and when I do get the chance she’ll text me back saying she’s out with friends drinking wine or s’thing like that.” Aurora laughs along with him. When she takes a proper look at him she notices he’s wearing black adidas joggers today with a white t shirt and a black nike jacket. 

“Looks like we both had the same idea when we got ready this morning,” she continues to laugh while gesturing between to two of them. They’re dressed almost identical right down to the white sneakers. Aurora’s got on her favourite black lululemon leggings instead of joggers but her tshirt and track jacket look just the same as Harry’s. Harry takes a good look at what he’s got on and back to Aurora and his eyes begin to crinkle and his nose scrunches up before he’s laughing. The laugh is almost a giggle and Aurora has to hold back from flashing him the most endearing smile. 

“Guess it’s a good thing that my Head of Wardrobe and I match. Must mean I’ve got the right person taking care of my clothing then.” He swings his arm around her shoulder before asking if she’s got a minute to grab a snack. 

“Probably should eat and I definitely need some more coffee,” she replies with a smile and shoves her hands into the pockets of her jacket not knowing what to do with them. There’s something about Harry, it’s that thing that people always talk about, his ease around everyone, the way he makes you feel like you’ve known each other forever. His kind demeanor relaxes Aurora and she’s sure this is how he makes everyone feel. Harry starts to go on about different things that are happening around the arena as they walk to the green room, pointing out different people and what they’re working on. Harry doesn’t know this, but the more Aurora knows about her surroundings and the things people are doing, the more comfortable she feels. Aurora likes knowing what’s going on. She knows it’s got something to do with wanting control over as much as she can but she also knows that there is so much going on that she can’t control anything and she especially knows that it isn’t her job. But knowing is good for her. Just as they turn the corner to the green room her phone rings. She pulls it out of her pocket and “Mother” with a pink heart is flashing on her screen. She shows the phone to Harry and she slides out from under his arm. “Rain check on the snacks?” she offers him before answering the call. She smiles as he shoots her a grin and voices an ‘of course’ before he turns around and goes back the way they had came. She questions his actions for a moment before saying hello to her mother. 

Aurora pulls out her notebook while she’s in the car the next morning to review what she needs to get done today. Written in red, at the top of the page under today’s date is: final fitting with Harry @ 12pm. She’s excited to get some of the newer pieces on him and finally have all the looks together. She’s nervous too. Lambert won’t be there again today or barely at all the rest of the week, her part time buffer ripped away sooner than expected. She knows there’s nothing to be nervous about. It’s just Harry. ‘Just Harry,’ she continues to mumble under her breath. 

“Miss Del Gatto, we’ve arrived,” Steven, her driver, who she’s come accustomed to after the past few rides, announces. Aurora looks out the window and sees the Gucci store front. 

“Thanks, Steven. I’ll only be a few minutes.” She smiles at him before stepping out of the car. She got dressed this morning in slightly more put together outfit that she had on yesterday, knowing she had to stop into a few stores on her way in to pick up some pieces that were still missing. Her black chunky heeled leather boots make a clacking sound as she walks towards the entrance. Before she can even reach for the door, she’s welcomed by a man in an all black suit that is welcoming her into the store. 

“Welcome to Gucci.” His voice is deep but bright and welcoming, she thanks him with a smile. 

Once she’s a few more steps into the door she adjusts the small gold airplane necklace that is sitting on the outside of her black turtleneck before speaking up. “I’m here to pick up some shoes for Harry,” she rattles out. A questioned look appears on the man’s face. “Harry Lambert and Styles.” She clarifies. 

“Aurora Del Gatto, yes?” another woman’s voice speaks up from across the store. 

“Uh, y-yes,” she stammers while turning towards the women. 

“I’m Lauren. Nice to meet you, Aurora. Harry told me to be expecting you this morning.” Aurora shakes Lauren’s hand with a smile. Lauren looks like a seasoned pro, her black suit fits her perfectly and her greying hair is pulled up into an elegant low bun. “Go ahead and make yourself comfortable,” she says motioning towards the plush dark purple couches. “Would you like any water or coffee, dear?” 

“Oh, I’m alright actually, thank you.” 

“I’ll be right back with everything.” Aurora nods in acknowledgement while sitting down on the couch. She slides off the lightweight, long, camel coloured coat she’s wearing and drapes it over the couch next to her. She checks her watch to make sure she’s good on time. She’s got to stop at Calvin Klein as well before heading to arena to prep for Harry’s fitting. It’s just gone on 10am, she’s got plenty of time but still anxious at the thought of arriving just before the fitting, not getting a chance to set up. She’s brought back from her thoughts when Lauren returns with 3 shoe boxes in her arms and a garment bag.

“I think there are only 2 pairs of shoes I’m supposed to be picking up,” Aurora questions, “the rainbow loafers and the Spring 18 leather boots.” Lauren’s face lights up in a smile. 

“Yes, those are both here and there’s a pair of sneakers here for you as well.” Aurora’s face reflects exactly what is going through her mind: surprise, shock, and other emotions she couldn’t put words to. Her jaw has dropped and her eyes are wide. “Harry called last night and wanted us to fit you into some Ace Sneakers for the tour.” 

“Lambert said that?” Aurora is confused, giddy and nervous, always nervous. She doesn’t even know how to accept a gift like this. She’d also be lying if she hadn’t been looking at these sneakers forever. 

“No, dear, Harry Styles.” Aurora is beyond caught off guard at this point. 

“I’m sorry, I think there must be a mistake. There’s no reason for Harry to be giving me anything.”

“He specifically called these in for you. I don’t know the details, he just wanted to make sure you walked out with the perfect fit.” She set 2 of the boxes down on a glass table and brought over the 3rd box. ��I grabbed the 7.5, I’m normally pretty good at guessing.” 

“Well, you would be right.” Aurora laughs nervously. She slides off her boots in order to avoid the overwhelming thoughts in her head. She’s afraid if she doesn’t keep moving she might go into shock. She’s trying on the sneakers before she speaks up again, “Uhm,” Aurora starts to speak, “Does Harry, uh, do this often? I-I mean, uh call in for gifts?” 

“I wouldn’t say often, but I’ve fulfilled a few of his gifting requests over the past few years. Just a handful though. There really hasn’t been many, if I’m honest.” 

Aurora smiles to herself. She’s still confused about it all but still that same familiar feeling rushes through her when she’s reminded of Harry’s incredible kind demeanor. And before she knew it, she's walking out of Gucci with a smile on her face, a tingle in her fingers, a garment bag and not 2 but 3 boxes of shoes.

She’s setting up one last suit on the tall silver rolling rack before she checks her watch. 11:59. She made great time getting to Wembley after grabbing the pink plaid jacket and custom boots from Calvin Klein. There’s a light knock on the slightly ajar door seconds later. 

“‘Ello, love,” Harry’s voice booms through the small, concrete walled room. Aurora turns towards the door. “All ready!” He exclaims as he makes his way towards her. 

“Hi Harry,” Aurora responds before Harry has a hand at her waist and is placing a light kiss on the top of her cheek. 

“How’s your morning been?” He’s now made his way to the rolling rack she had just filled. 

“Good,” she wants to ask him about the shoes but she doesn’t know how to bring it up. “I did uh- I, I-”

“Can I try this one on?” Harry interrupts, suddenly distracted by the garments he hasn’t seen yet. She’s grabbing her book from the table across the room when she hears the sound of hangers hitting the floor. “Oooff,” there’s a chuckle that follows. “That one’s a bit slippery.” 

“Oh gosh, yeah I need to add some hanger loops to that one,” Aurora sets her book down and rushes over to pick up the fallen garments and hangers. Harry utters a few sorry’s before stepping away. She swears she hears him mumble about being in the way. Once she’s got the fallen garments gathered on the crook of her arm, she grabs a hanger adorn in the pink plaid Calvin suit. “That’s what you get for being so nosy,” she quips at him and hands him the suit. His jaw drops slightly but before he can say a thing Aurora’s speaking again, “Try this one on first, please.” Aurora lingers on the please and shoots him a sweet smile. “There’s a small room through there you can change in.” She turns around after motioning towards the door and sees that Harry already has his trousers down to his ankles. “Orrrr you can change right there.” 

“Oh, don’t wanna make you uncomfortable, darling,” he responds as you quickly turn away, sliding the plaid trousers all the way up and buttoning them just as fast.

“Oh no, you’re fine, don’t wanna be rude is all.” Aurora is flipping through her book finding the section for Stockholm. “The black ribbed tank was on the hanger with the jacket, yeah?” She asks as she skims over the page in front of her. He hums back letting her know it’s there. Aurora lifts up her coffee cup from earlier this morning to her lips, turning around to find Harry fully dressed in the Calvin Klein suit she picked up this morning. She frowns realising there’s no coffee left in her cup. 

“What?” Harry asks, his brows knitted together in concern after seeing the frown on her face. “Does it look that bad?” He’s messing with the way he’s tucked the shirt into the waistband of the trousers. 

Aurora giggles at his frantic hands. “Harry, nothing could look bad on you.” She shakes the empty cup in front of him. “I’m out of coffee.” 

“Well, that frown was badly timed. I’ve got a brand new suit on and that’s the first reaction I get?’ 

“Oh you’ll be fine, rockstar. Plenty of ego pumping in the near future,” Aurora quips backs at him as she makes a circle around him. “They did great with this one,” she’s pulling at the shoulders of the jacket so it sits just right on his broad frame. “How do the trousers feel?” She asks as she smooths down the fabric of the sleeves before rounding back to face Harry straight on. 

“The trousers? Yeah they feel good. Fit perfect, I think.” He’s pulled up the bottom of the jacket and is twisting his hips round. “Wha’ d’ya think?” 

“I think Calvin Klein knows exactly what he’s doing,” she says with a smirk. “Okay, that one’s all set, go ahead and put this one on now.” She hands him another pink jacket, this one velvet with embellishments and it has a Gucci tag on it rather than Calvin Klein. She hands him black trousers with a gold trim as well. “You’ll wear this with a button down but just try with the tank. I just need to make sure all the alterations were done properly.” 

“Did you stop at Gucci this morning? Lambert mentioned you were going,” he asks while handing her the plaid suit he just took off. Aurora busies herself with hanging them up. 

“Yeah. Got your loafers and boots. I also-”

“Oh nooooo, Aurora,” Harry’s voice is panicky. 

“Wha-,” is all she gets out before she sees and hears the beads rolling on the floor. “Ahhh I had a feeling that was going to happen. And THIS is why we try things on 100 times. Wouldn’t want you unraveling on stage.” She runs over to her kit that stands in the corner.

“I’m sorry, not sure what I did,” Harry’s face shows worry like he’s done something wrong. 

“Hun, you didn’t do anything, promise. I think it might have been from the alterations.” Aurora is tying a knot in a piece of thread before walking over to him. “I’m just gonna close this strand up while it’s on you and I’ll re embellish it later.” The piece that’s come undone is on the right shoulder. She slides her hand under the jacket to find the back of the spot she needs to fix. Her hand brushes the skin of his shoulder, reminding her he’s only wear the tank underneath and he flinches. “Sorry, my hands are probably cold. This will only take a second.” 

“S’alright, love.” There’s silence while she focuses on the work in front of her. Once she’s finished she carefully slips a small pair of gold scissors underneath the jacket and cuts the thread and needle she had been working with loose, detaching herself from Harry’s shoulder. “That was quick,” Harry says with a tone of surprise and Aurora thinks she can hear a little bit of disappointment as well. Aurora shrugs her shoulders in response. 

“Could you put on the black version of that jacket for me?” Aurora asks as she grabs a spool of black thread. “Think we might have the same problem with that one too.” She slides the needle she’s threaded with black thread onto the cuff of her sweater so she doesn’t lose it. She helps Harry into the black jacket and hangs up the one he just had on. 

“Aannddd there it is,” Harry says with chuckle as a strand of beads comes loose on his right sleeve. Aurora gets to work on the one on his sleeve as 2 more make themselves known on his back. “So you got my boots and loafers this morning? Up to anything else before I came in and ruined all the garments?” Aurora laughs and moves to his back to take care of the broken pieces there. 

“Uhm picked up that Calvin jacket and your custom boots. Let me tell you, those boots are glorious. The glossed leather with the steel tip will look incredible with your suits. ”

“Oh can I see them when we’re done?”

“‘Course you can!” There’s some silence between them again as she concentrates on the job in front of her. She catches a glimpse of the white gucci bags that are sitting by one of the wardrobe cases and it’s like those new sneakers are burning a hole in her head. It clicks in her head now that he’s been directing the conversation this way trying to get it out of her. “Hey Harry,” she’s met with a hum, “can I ask you about something?” She continues to work on the jacket, keeping her hands busy. She’s thankful that the strand she’s working on is on his back so she doesn’t have to make eye contact with him. 

“‘Course, Aurora.” 

“Uhm, at Gucci this morning, they uh, they fitted me for sneakers,” Harry hums in response, “and um, I-I, um, that was very kind of you.” She’s stuttering through her words. It wasn’t until now that she got a tinge of nervousness. “Y-you didn’t need to do that. Really.” 

“Aurora, I wanted to. And I thought you deserved some new shoes.” She can’t see his face but she can hear the smile that’s formed on his face. “We’ve got a few countries to trek around the next few months.” 

Moments later she’s finished repairing what she can and she’s sliding Harry’s jacket off his shoulders. “Thank you, Harry,” she says finally after the black jacket is hung back on its Gucci hanger on the rolling rack near them. “Seriously, too kind.” 

“No such thing as too kind, Ror,” he quips back and before she can comment on the nickname, he’s talking again. “Now what else do you need me to try on?” 

The afternoon goes by quickly and Harry is patient with her. He stands up straight in each new piece and asks questions about different things she’s making notes of or checking off of her thousands of lists. She checks her watch quickly as she’s making one last note. 

“How is it 3 o’clock already?” Aurora stammers out. “Sorry to take your entire afternoon from you.” 

“Don’t worry about it, Ror.” Harry’s pulling down the hem of his white tshirt he walked in wearing earlier today, “Nice to spend some time with ya and seems like you’ve been able to check a lot off your list.” 

“You probably have a list a mile long of things that need to be done this week too, though,” she rebuttals. “Or do you have someone to take care of those things for you?” she jokes. 

“Oh yeah, don’t remember their name, but I just tell them everything I need done and they do it for me.” The look on Aurora’s face is utter disgust, unable to politely react because she wasn’t expecting that answer.  There was no hint of sarcasm in Harry’s voice. Harry’s face is still and he’s silent for a moment before his nose scrunches up and a giggle erupted from his mouth. “Ror, I’m totally kidding.” He’s placed a hand on her shoulder now, rubbing his thumb soothingly. 

“Harry,” she’s giggling along now too, “you had me for a second.” 

Harry thanks her for her work and the time spent together today and leaves only after giving her a hug and a short kiss on her cheek. 

The next few days are spent hand stitching gold and silver beads onto those 2 Gucci jackets, labeling every single piece of the wardrobe and then organizing the giant crates for the travel managers to take and get ready to fly. She walks through all of the wardrobes multiple time and completes fittings with all of Harry’s band members as well. Brief 1 hour time frames are scheduled with each of them, Clare, Sarah, Adam and Mitch. Lambert pops in to make sure the final fittings went well and pays complements to Aurora’s new sneakers she’s sporting with a knowing look on his face. 

There’s one day left till the first tour stop and the arena is just about empty. The stage is packed up, the wardrobe crates have been taken from Aurora and the number of people in the arena is starting to dwindle down. Since everything is already loaded on a truck making its way to the airport Aurora didn’t have much to do today but she kept herself busy at the apartment she’s been at all week for the majority of the morning. She’s repacked multiple times getting everything to fit perfectly, almost committing the perfect folding techniques and order of adding things to her suitcase to memory. Everyone is to arrive at the airport early the next morning but Harry has arranged for a group lunch at the arena for one last collective meeting before the tour starts.

Aurora arrives a few minutes early to the lunch and says hello to a few crew members she’s gotten to know. Lambert is there too - seems that Harry has invited anyone who has helped with the prep of the tour regardless if they’re coming along or not. She also meets a few more new faces like Ayae, Harry’s hair and makeup stylist. She’s new to the tour group and hasn’t been needed for prep so this his her 1st time meeting a lot of the crew too. She sits down with Aurora and Lambert at a table and is engaging in a conversation about this and that when Harry comes up to the table with Jeff. Jeff is a familiar face to Aurora even though she has only interacted with him a few times.  Jeff always seems to be everywhere - Aurora always makes mental acknowledgment about how he is consistently working on something but always is seemingly available to everyone. 

Alicia, a woman probably in her late 30’s, is following Harry and Jeff with a grey rolling cart like you would see in an old cafeteria and it’s filled with large cardboard boxes. Aurora has met Alicia and remembers Lambert introducing her as the Tour Merchandise Manager. 

“Aurora, Ayae, Harry, great to see all of you! Doing alright, I assume?” Jeff asks while rounding the cart and reaching a hand in the box. 

“Got some tour sweatshirts for everyone, treat people with kindness and all that,” Harry adds in, running a hand through his hair. It isn’t until now that Aurora notices the length of his hair. It’s not as short as it was when she first met him but it’s nowhere near the length she remembers him having while still in One Direction. There is one curl that won’t stay back no matter how many times he runs his hand through it to push it back. The lone curl falls against his forehead one last time before he gives up. 

“Oh, very humble of you, Harry,” Ayae says with a chuckle while examining the sweatshirt Alicia had just given her.

It’s a plain black Champion hoodie with 2 small pieces of embroidery, 1 on the left of the chest and the other on the inside of the right arm. Ayae is referring to the large embroidered “Harry” on the chest. Underneath his name is ‘World Tour 2018’. Hah. He’s gotta love this shit. His name written on everything. Clothing, signs, his name is branded everywhere. 

“Heyyyyy,” Harry’s voice is slightly whiny, both of his eyes scrunch up and his brows furrow. The ‘hey’ turns into a giggle and they all laugh along with him. Harry then hands Aurora her sweatshirt. “Here ya go, Ror.” She thanks him softly after taking it from him. 

Post lunch, Harry, Jeff and a few others talk about how excited they are and how successful the prep went all week. The Head Travel Manager, Daniel, reminds everyone to double check their itinerary when they get home tonight and to double, triple, quadruple check they’ve packed everything. Harry yells something about making sure everyone’s got their passport cause “long story short” he forgot his once and it was not a day full of kindness. The large group chuckles at his little antidote before the room begins to clear out and everyone heads home to get ready to travel the next day. 

Thanks for reading !!! Feedback & comments are always welcome !!! 

[heyyyharry]

Breathe

...in which Harry is still in love with Y/N.

Okay so an anon suggested me the song Breathe by Lauv where I took the inspiration from. Also I’m gonna blame this mild fever for my terrible emotional state which resulted in me breaking my own heart in the process of writing this one shot. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Warning: only angst.

.

She was the first thing he saw when he stepped into the room. Her smile was shining bright, unlike the last time he saw her, and there was something about the way she kept fixing her hair that made his heart skip a beat. 

He could only watch her from afar as she carried a conversation with a few other girls, some of whom he could still recognize; but ever since he stopped talking to her, he hadn’t spoken to them either. Harry kept his distance, talking to a few other people he knew, talking to the host of the party, who didn’t forget to mention the fact that she was also there. As if he couldn’t already tell.

For most of the night, he couldn’t really pay attention to anything else besides her. But she hadn’t spotted him, had never turned her head to his direction, not even once, and a part of him was afraid that the party would end before he got a chance to speak to her.

Fortunately, as the room got a bit more crowded, she did what she did best, retreating to a corner to stand with her phone. He knew she hated the crowd, only if it was his crowd and she was at his concert. She said when she looked at him on the stage and he looked at her, it felt like there were only the two of them at the venue. But all of that was now in the past, because he didn’t think she would attend a show to hear all the songs written about her.

Harry gathered all of his courage to excuse himself from the boring conversation he had missed from the start, and then pushed his way towards the girl standing across the room. 

“Hi,” he said, grabbing her attention as she looked up, a bit startled to see his face.

“Hi,” she said back, and he had to second guess whether the smile she was giving him was genuine. 

“I haven’t...haven’t seen you in so long.” He scratched the back of his head, making her smile for the second time that night.

“Yeah, it’s been over a year, hasn’t it? How are you, Harry?”

“I’m good, great...I...I’m working on my new album.”

“Yeah? I’m sure it’s gonna be so good.”

He wanted to tell her it was gonna be good, and that most of the songs were still about her, but he was afraid it would freak her out so he kept it to himself, and changed the subject by asking about her family instead. He wanted to know how her mother was doing, if her father was still driving the old car that broke every two weeks, if her brother was still struggling with his thesis to graduate from medical school, and if she still sang to her cat every single night. Hearing her answers made him realize he had missed out so much of what was going on in her life. But why was he surprised? He hadn’t seen her again in over a year, a lot would have to change.

“Hey, I know this is a bit sudden but...” He took a deep breath. “I’m wondering if you—”

“Y/N!” The voice cut him off, making him and the girl turn their heads at once, and he saw a man walking towards them with a smile.

“Bradley, what took you so long?” She asked, giving the stranger a kiss on the cheek as he handed her a beer, standing with his arm over her shoulder. “Bradley, this is Harry. Harry, this is Bradley, my boyfriend.”

Boyfriend.

The voice inside Harry’s head had never screamed so loud. He felt like his brain was going to explode. On the outside he fake a smile and shook the other guy’s hand as he said hello. Bradley told Harry he was a big fan of his music, but none of those words managed to get into the singer’s ear. He was too busy watching the girl he was still in love with, while she was watching the guy who was her boyfriend. She used to look at Harry that way, and it was only sad to think about that now.

“We really should go, our Uber is waiting outside,” said Bradley, and Harry almost audibly begged her not to walk away, not again. But who was he to ask her so? Nobody, he was nobody to her now and he should remember that. He was just a distant memory she had probably forgotten until tonight.

So he gave her one last hug. When she pulled away, her perfume still lingered on him. Now he knew he would have to go home with her scent on his clothes but without her in his arms, and the thought of it made him want to get drunk. He watched her walk out with Bradley, knowing there was no more chance for him to get her back. The girl he loved had officially moved on; and maybe it was time for him to do the same.

.

.

.

Bradley opened the car door for Y/N to get in as he told the driver the address of her apartment. It wasn’t until they had gone a bit far from their friend’s place that he turned to her and asked her why she had done it.

“I had to leave a hot guy to come help your ass. You can’t just text me to walk over and act like your boyfriend, then refuse to give me an explanation!” Bradley seemed annoyed, but his best friend just stared out of the window on her side without saying a word. “Poor thing.” The guy shook his head as he sighed. “It seemed like he was still in love with you.”

“I know.”

“Oh, really? Then why did you do that to him?”

For that question, Y/N had to think a lot before she could answer. She thought about the moment she saw him walk into that party, how she tried to act like she was fine and kept herself busy by talking to everyone she knew, how she had to retreat to a corner with her phone to seek help from her best friend; and she also thought a lot about much she had wanted to say she missed him. 

Had they been two strangers who met for the first time, maybe she would’ve ended up going home with him. But there was a whole past between them which they couldn’t change. There were the fights and numerous of times they had both cried together. She’d been hurt by a lot of things that was out of his control, and she knew seeing her in pain had hurt him just as much, probably more. 

Their relationship was passionate yet suffocating, and she knew it was love, but it wasn’t right. He didn’t choose the life he had, and it wasn’t his fault that what was theirs couldn’t be kept to just them two. He needed to be with someone that could stand the pressure, someone who didn’t break before he did, someone not her. 

“It was for the best,” she finally told Bradley and said nothing more after that. She didn’t say she still loved Harry, because she did, terribly, a lot, maybe too much. But she had to let him be free in order for herself to be free. 

Without her, maybe now he could finally breathe.

[creepycreepyspacewizard]

I cant make up my mind, but for the kiss prompts, for Kylux, 22, 28 and/or 46? pretty please

[Two out of three ain’t bad - 22. …in a rush of adrenaline. | 28. …as a lie.]

Hux should not have come to this housewarming party. He was a graduate student now. He was above all this undergraduate nonsense with the crap beer, terrible music, and awful, awful people.

The school year hadn’t even officially started yet and Hux was already having a terrible time.

Where the hell had Ben found these guys? Well, probably posing in front of the mirrors in the gym, but really, who knew there were this many stacked guys in the engineering program? Especially since they seemed to be sharing a single lone brain cell between them.

He gave a pained grimace that was supposed to be a smile and tried to find a discreet location to hide the gift of yet another open bottle of lager. There were already four shoved behind the curtain next to him and the windowsill was getting dangerously full.

Giving up on that for now he chose to keep it in his hand, nervously picking at the label around the neck while he tried to follow what passed for conversation here.

At just over six feet tall Hux hadn’t felt small since he was fourteen when he’d finally punched his own father in the face, but being trapped in the corner of the kitchen with these six goliaths was really starting to ping his anxiety. Each of them had thighs thicker than his head. One of them had arms that were probably bigger than his entire torso. They kept on asking him awkward questions about his love life and giving him beers that he absolutely wasn’t going to drink.

Maybe this wasn’t actually a housewarming party. Maybe Ben had decided to try his hand at matchmaking but Hux was the only brainy twink who’d taken the bait.

Where was Ben? Hux hadn’t seen him yet this year, they’d just kept in touch over email while Ben spent the summer working for his father’s totally legal private airline and Hux tried to will his thesis to write itself. When he’d arrived at the party he’d been told Ben was getting dressed, but that was an hour ago. Since when had Ben taken more than 30 seconds to get ready for anything?

Hux tried to look around the room- scanning simultaneously for the only person he actually knew here and the closest available exit- but the wall of muscle seemed to close in around him.

He did not like this party one bit.

“So, are you, like, a bottom?” Asked a guy with a neck as wide as his ribcage who was probably called Chad.

“I beg your pardon!?” Oh god, he sounded like his stepmother.

Seriously, though, who the fuck asked complete strangers questions like that? Okay maybe guys like this did, it wasn’t as if Hux had ever gone out to a gay bar, or been on a date, or ever explored his sexuality beyond that one awkward conversation with Ben just before he went home from the summer, but, seriously?!

The guy to the left of maybe-Chad leaned in. “He wants to know if you…”

Bloody hell, was he actually going to try to explain the question?

He was. There were hand gestures and everything.

Nope. Hux couldn’t deal with this.

“Excuse me.” He made a break for it.

Shoving between these muscular monoliths felt like being in that film where the guy got his hand caught by a boulder- all his strength did absolutely nothing to move them so Hux was forced to slither between them and risk losing a limb at any second if they decided to close ranks.

Just when he thought he was free one of them grabbed his wrist.

“Hey, dude, don’t be like that…”

Through the frosted back door out of the kitchen Hux could just make out the shape of a figure who was both wider and taller than these guys.

His brain made a stupid decision.

“My boyfriend’s just arrived out there, excuse me,” he lied far more smoothly than he expected.

Chad or Brad or whatever his name was let go with a small grumble but didn’t try to stop Hux leaving this time.

As he staggered across the room, dumping the untouched beer into the sink as he passed by, the kitchen door swung open and Hux was able to see more details of his new fake-boyfriend.

Even from the back it was clear the man was tall, and broad across the shoulders to the point of looking almost dorito shaped, but with sculpted thighs wrapped in skin-tight jeans that declared he never missed leg day. His mid-length dark hair styled in soft waves that seemed perfect for stroking. There was a rainbow patch inexpertly sew to the back of his leather jacket and a cloud of clove scented vape around him like he’d been made by some benevolent deity just for Armitage Hux.

With a level of bravery Hux had never known he had, he reached out and tapped the stranger’s elbow.

“Hey, mate,” Hux said in a nervous rush. “Sorry to bother you, but could you pretend to be my boyfriend for like five minutes? It’s an emergency.”

There was a rumbled “sure” and an exhaling of vapour that completely obscured the man’s face, but it didn’t matter because Hux was enthusiastically pulled forward into what he was only just realising would be his very first kiss.

Suddenly shy and terrified, Hux closed his eyes.

The lips that met his own were perfect- thick, plump, warm, and deliciously slick with spit.

He’d never considered that kissing might feel like that. Armed with this new information his brain immediately presented him with a thousand and one other places those lips could be put to use… then the stranger’s tongue slipped into his mouth.

Hux’ mind gave an error message and shut down so his nerve endings could really enjoy the show.

There was a hand in his hair, and another at his back, and one of those thick thighs had pressed forward between his own, and parts of his anatomy were rising to meet it, and oh god what had he been missing all these years.

Without any conscious decision on his part his hands came up to sink into that tempting hair. It was just as soft as it had looked from a distance. Hux let his fingers comb back through the curling strands and down over the man’s ears.

The muscular figure in his arms trembled like a leaf at the contact. Who knew ears could be so sensitive? Who knew they could be so big?

… Wait.

Hux opened his eyes to find himself- still with another man’s tongue in his mouth- staring into a pair of very familiar brown eyes.

“Ben?!” He pulled back as best he could against arms that felt like they were made of stone. “Ben, what the fuck? When did you…”

There wasn’t really a way to express the change in front of him. When they’d last seen each other in May Ben had been all long limbs and out of proportion potential, like a humanoid baby giraffe with a terrible haircut that barely covered his giant ears. Now he was…

“Holy shit.” There was no other way to put it.

As if to prove his identity the man gave him the wide goofy grin that Hux would always associate with Ben and his schemes.

“I worked out a little,” he said with a wink. “And I’m going by Kylo Ren now.”

“Huh.” A dozen snarky responses came to mind, but a man who went by his surname was in no position to judge.

“So… why do you need a fake boyfriend?” ‘Kylo’ asked.

They both looked down at the same moment- they were still wrapped around each other like horny teenagers. Neither of them moved.

“Uh…” Hux blushed. The answer felt pretty stupid now. “Your friends sort of freaked me out, they wouldn’t stop giving me beers and asking me weirdly personal questions. So I thought a fake-boyfriend would be a good way to avoid getting roofied by half a dozen giants.”

Kylo snorted and shook his head. “They were supposed to be doing reconnaissance.”

“What?”

“They told me they were going to ‘subtly find out if you were still single’.” Kylo explained. “They never mentioned trying to get you drunk. Sorry.”

“Subtle is not the word I would use.”

“So are you?”

“What?”

“Still single?”

Hux shrugged. “I dunno, I mean, I have this hot fake-boyfriend now. I’d say it’s up to him…”

“Oh, well in that case, you’re definitely not single then.” Kylo said, and kissed him again.

Kiss Prompts

[cafesandlatenights]

Chapter Four [Beyond the Sunrise, LMMxReader]

Summary: Your long-awaited college graduation calls for a celebration.

Word Count: 3,005

Warnings: Drinking, slow burn.

Authors notes:  Sab - This was a huge one for us to write (I mean, just look at the word count) and this was a long time coming for us, we hope you enjoy it!

Ren - My latino heart is so happy with this chapter (you’ll soon see it why), this one was a chapter Sab and I were super excited to get to, hope you guys like it! <3

askbox | masterlist | previous chapter | next chapter

High school graduation never felt monumental to you. Sure, you’d be saying goodbye to a few good friends, but you still had your entire life ahead of you. You had a plan. Four years at NYU, studying and working to pay your bills. Stephen was an unexpected surprise, but he definitely gave you some stability.

You had a four year plan. Your high school brain tricked you into thinking four years would pass much slower than they did. As you stared at your neatly pressed graduation gown, the cap and tassel sitting on your dresser, you couldn’t help but feel like four years was a simple blink of an eye.

From your first moment entering the crowded halls all the way to handing in your thesis - you received a B+ - you couldn’t comprehend how much had changed in your life, yet how much had stayed the same. You changed from the rebel daughter to a responsible adult, you were getting the degree that always seemed so far from your reach, the doors for the future were fully open and they were as exciting as they were terrifying.

“Hey, you… Wow, you look stunning!”

“I don’t feel it.” You waved your arms, the over sized sleeves falling ungracefully as the long body of your gown swallowed you whole. “Why can’t I wear my pajamas to this thing again?”   

“Because Laura said she’s dragging us to a party after and I don’t think you showing up in your pj’s would be the best choice,” Stephen replied. “Maybe if you go for the onesie?”

“Yeah, that will definitely make an impression,” you agreed with a smile, the tension fading just a bit. “We’ll be late if we don’t leave soon. Parking is going to be a disaster.”

You unzipped your gown, hanging it across one arm as you clutched your cap to your chest. In a few short hours, you would be among a sea of purple gowns identical to yours. Each gown with a debt upwards of $150,000.

The car ride would have been silent if it wasn’t for the radio: Stephen was a naturally quiet guy, and your nerves weren’t letting you make up any small talk to fill in the time. After arriving and managing to find a parking spot after fifteen minutes of search, you finally were ready to join your class as Stephen attempted to meet with your family.

“Hey, you’ll be amazing, okay?” Stephen cupped your face with both hands, pressing a gentle kiss to your lips. “Go get ‘em, I’ll try to find your parents.”

You nodded, taking in his smile before starting to walk towards your classmates. The familiar faces made you calm down only enough to not freak out right there. You found your seat among the names, the dull buzz of the crowd providing a gentle hum that acted as white noise for you as you collected your wits.

Noticing everyone else already had, you shoved your head into your cap, securing your fate for the day. You were graduating college, and somewhere in this giant sea of strangers was your family watching.

The ceremony was quick and followed every cliche you knew it would. The key note speaker was some celebrity alumni from years ago that tried their best to offer well wishes to the graduating class. The valedictorian spoke about hard work and the struggles of the real world (this particular tangent made your stomach drop). The school president droned on about dedication and spent the better part of five minutes thanking everyone for the money they poured into the school.

Then it was finally time for the biggest cliche of all: As you waited for your name to be called, you took a deep breath, trying without success to spot your family before getting up to receive your diploma. When the guy next to you got called, you straightened your gown one last time before hearing your full name being called through the speakers.

Your class politely clapped as they had for every other name. You stepped forward to shake hands with the board of the college - names you had heard in passing before but had never met.

The cheers from the family section were deafening. There your little, insane family stood. Screaming at the top of their lungs as pictures were snapped from every angle. Stephen wasn’t among them, he probably didn’t have much luck finding them in the crowd.

Then there was Lin. At the very end of your own personal cheering section, helping Ava balance on a chair for more height. You held back a laugh when he placed his fingers between his lips, releasing a loud whistle, right before you grabbed the tube and thanked everyone.

The reality only hit you when you turned the tassel, the whole crowd applauding. Mentally thanking the universe for not letting you trip, you returned to your assigned seat, the smile not leaving your face. You did it.

The bustle of the crowd was nearly overwhelming. You weaved past bodies to a tree your family had designated as the meeting area. They were already waiting, Stephen now having joined them. You ignored the tense space between him and Lin and instead focused on the ever growing smiles on your parents’ faces.

“Sis, you were perfect up there!” Laura tackled you in a hug, leaving you breathless for a split second. “I told you you wouldn’t trip!”

“Yeah, I trained walking on these heels like my life depended on it,” you smiled. Before you could notice, Ava joined the hug, bringing the three of you together.

“Did you see us all the way from up there?” She asked.

“I did! Did I see things or did you climb on a chair?”

“She would've had a great view on my shoulders but someone,” Lin shot a playful glare at your younger sister, “thought I would drop them.”

“Look at you!” You took him in with a single glance up and down, Stephen’s eyes heavy on you, “You didn’t have to wear a bow tie for me.”

“It was a special occasion, the bow tie was there and I thought ‘why not?’, so...” He adjusted the accessory with pride.

“You look like a waiter,” you teased. “Thank you for coming.”

Finally, there was Stephen, who seemed much more at ease as soon as you were within arms reach of him. He congratulated you with a heavy kiss, something you had to pull back from as to not put on a display in front of your parents.

Obviously just because of your parents… Right?

After taking a moment to put yourself back together, you turned back to Laura. “So, celebration. How is that going to work?”

“Well, mom and dad made reservations for dinner, so that is happening but once that’s over we are going to party!” Her voice was excited and you couldn’t help but smile, Laura was always better at the whole ‘social thing’ than you. “Tommy’s friends discovered this new place and they have been dying to take us there, so I thought there was no better occasion to go there than this one, right?”

“Right, I guess.” You shrugged, making her give you a look. “I’m joking! I’m actually pretty happy to have something to celebrate.”

“As you should! But first, dinner. Your mother and I are starving.” Your father threw his arm over your shoulders before pressing a soft kiss on your temple. “How is it possible that I have two daughters out of college? Time, you cruel, unstoppable force.”

Your father, always the dramatic one.

Dinner was delicious and expensive. A majority of it was spent swapping embarrassing stories as Lin absorbed anything and everything he could. Ava and Laura tried to engage him in the conversation as much as possible, and everything went smoothly especially after Laura and you noticed Lin clicked with Tommy really well.

“Wait a second, you also went to Wesleyan? I’m from ‘02!”  Lin exclaimed, attracting looks from everyone in the table. You and Laura exchanged a look as you held back a laugh. “I can’t believe we never met there!”

“I was a senior! If you think I’m talking to a freshman, you’re insane.”

“Yeah, right.” Lin scoffed, before they engaged in a conversation about teachers, classes and the campus. In no time they created their own little bubble, and your whole family was surprised at how quickly they got along: Thomas barely spoke at the family gatherings. He was often found brooding in the corner or methodically checking his phone for emails or texts.

That night, however, his phone was nowhere in sight, and soon they were head first into that production of ‘Jekyll and Hyde’ Wesleyan mounted while they both attended.

The rest of the dinner went as smoothly as possible, your parents asking Lin questions that he politely answered, Ava showering him in compliments and Laura making jokes to ease the vibe between Lin and Stephen, which no one was brave enough to acknowledge.

Night had fallen by the time your party made it to the club Tommy swore by - your parents having already said their good nights in order to take Ava home. The club was more of a dingy bar than the ‘hottest spot in New York’, as Tommy had put it. But the drinks were strong and the music was good and that was enough for you.

All it took was three tequila shots. Three tequila shots for you to let loose, and to be sure you wouldn’t remember much in the next morning.

The first shot was the first thing Laura put in your system, with the excuse to give you a strong start. Since you had no excuse not to take it, you did. The liquid was cold and didn’t burn as much as you expected, which was a good sign.

Lin declined the shots in favor of a watered down beer he took slow sips from. He took notice of how quick the rest of the group was to get hammered, and someone needed to have theirs wits tonight. He laughed when Laura pulled you to the dance floor once a song from your times as a teenager started playing, watching the two of you with Tommy.

Stephen lingered by the bar, half watching his date on the dance floor and half keeping an eye on Lin. He seemed stiff in the dim lighting and deep beat of the music, like it shaking him rather than him rocking along.

“Hey, you alright, man?” Lin’s voice startled your boyfriend, but he didn’t let it show. “You seem tense.”

“No, no no. I’m good. Bars are just not… My thing.”

As the song ended, you turned your attention to the bar, catching Lin and Stephen talking. There was no way for you to know what they were saying, but your already tipsy state was more than enough to give you courage to walk over there and find out.

Lin quickly noticed your rapid approach and decided to drop the subject.

“Having fun?” Stephen asked with a small smile.

“Tequila helps.” You giggled, tucking yourself close to him as you tossed back your second of the night, “I wish you would loosen up a bit. Get a few drinks, dance a bit?” You suggested, knowing the day you found Stephen willingly on the dance floor was the last day on Earth.

“You have enough fun for the both of us.” He insisted, pushing you back towards the center of the club as Laura called you back, “Go ahead, I know how much you love this song.”

Lin watched the interaction silently. He still had no idea how a girl like you ended up with a guy like Stephen, but it was not his place to ask.

As the night went on, the club started to get more packed, groups of people taking over the empty tables and the songs becoming more and more eclectic. As you danced with Laura, you couldn’t help but keep an eye on the guys, Lin now excitedly talking to Tommy while Stephen was still perched on the same stool.

“Look at our boys!” Laura called to you, pointing over the the former, “I knew they would get along!”

“I was the one who said to introduce them.” You glanced over again, this time taking in Tommy’s appearance. You had seen that same look on his face a million times. You had seen it when your father would corner him at dinners with questions about his future and his intentions with Laura.

You had seen in during family gatherings with screaming children running in the distance, a perky birthday hat propped on his head.

And you were seeing it now, nearly half a dozen drinks in, the insatiable Lin rambling about whatever it was Lin liked to ramble about.

“I think I should save your boyfriend.” You started weaving towards the crowd, first stopping to check on Stephen, who now had a new friend at his side.

He introduced him as ‘John, from work’, someone so boring you could only assume you had made him up in your drunken stupor. Your boyfriend was weirdly comfortable around him, which made you encourage them to drink with you. You had no apparent reason besides wanting Stephen to interact with you somehow, and you were glad they took the offer.

Just like that, you were taking your third shot of tequila that night.

John - or whatever his name was - invited you both to sit with them, but sitting down was out of the question for you. Stephen, on the other hand, gladly took the offer. You moved on with a promise to be back soon - they didn’t acknowledge the promise so you didn’t plan on keeping it.

You caught the tail end of Act One of Lin’s show - something about a club and a kiss and a musical button.

“Your girlfriend is desperate for a dance partner,” You sang, Tommy immediately jumping into action, “And so am I. Dance with me?” You offered your hand to Lin.

This had to be some sort of test.

“Your boyfriend-”

“My boyfriend is with some guys from work,” you interrupted, tilting your head to the side. “And I am asking you.”

He rolled his eyes, his look shifting from your face to your hand, which he finally took after a deep breath, making you smile.

“Oh, do you hear that?” You asked Lin while dragging him to the dance floor. “That’s rumba!”

“That’s actually salsa!” He corrected, laughing.

“Oh, do you know how to dance salsa? Because I have nooooo idea!” He nodded, not hiding a laugh. It was contagious.

“Just listen to the music. Way too fast for a rumba. Salsa it is.” He was quick to find an empty space among the dance partners, tugging at his collar, “I’m practically choking over here.”

“Here-” Your nimble fingers moved to untie his waiter-esque bow tie and to tug the first button of his shirt open, “-Alright, Salsa it up.”

He swallowed thickly before holding both of your hands in his, taking a step back.

“Okay!” Lin said, a bit louder so you could at least understand him by his lips. “Follow my steps!”

You looked to his feet, a step forward, together, a step back. Again and again. In no time, you were following him, your steps way less precise hence the alcohol and the lack of practice, but it was fun.

“Nice!” He exclaimed, making you giggle while pulling you closer, making sure you wouldn’t step on his feet. “Now let’s try this.”

He guided you into a spin, crossing your arms as he stood now with your back against his chest, his breath hitting the crook of your neck for only enough time to make you hold your breath before Lin guided you back to the original position.

He was closer now - a bubble of intimacy in the crowded club. Suddenly it was just you, him, and the music from the well-used speakers. He was guiding your hips and reminding you of the steps and you could feel him so close to you, his touch sent shivers through your whole body and before you noticed, your chest was against his, your hands on his shoulders, your lips dangerously close.

“You’re a natural.” He mumbled, body slotted against yours, as the soft beat of the music continued to rock through you.

“Had a good teacher,” You hummed in return, the third tequila shot showing its presence with your tingling lips. Your eyes went from his to his lips for a second, you wanted to focus on the steps, on the lights, on the music, but his presence was like a magnet, the contact not helping you at all.

You wanted to blame it on the tequila.

Before you could move - either forward or backward, you hadn’t decided yet - his arm was quickly guiding you into a spin. Halfway through the spin you felt a nudge on your back, pushing you forward into a waiting chest.

A peek upwards showed Stephen brooding at Lin, his shirt now smelling faintly of alcohol and cheap trail mix.

“She’s all yours, man.” Lin moved to put as much distance between the two of you as possible.

“Stephen!” You weren’t sure of how flustered you were, but the excitement in your voice was clearly fake, even though your boyfriend didn’t seem to notice. “What’re you doing here?”

“You’re drunk,” he laughed, putting a strand of hair behind your ear.

“And you’re on the dance floor!”

“We should go home, babe.”

“What? No!” Your lips turned into a pout. “You’re already here, we should dance.”

Stephen smiled, giving you a nod before pulling you in, his body swaying to the song as you wrapped your arms around his neck, resting your head against his shoulder. Truth was, your eyes were on Lin, now at the bar grabbing a bottle of water. You watched over Stephen’s shoulders as he sat on a stool, taking a deep breath.

You didn’t notice that he was watching you too.

tags:  @smileystumph - @justanotherhamiltrash - @always-blame-jefferson - @itsjaynebird - @angerybisexual - @l-nmanuel - @voldecrux - @phangirldil2022 - @jzzyjones - @isis278​ - @justanotherhamiltrash - @yayhamletnonstop - @musicroyalty - @thedoctorsnerdgirl - @casisnotalright- @fangirlwithasweettooth - @theselfishllama - @pixel-pisces -  @imagineham - @panacebean

[duckbeater]

My friend Emma is the lit editor for Third Coast Review, a website following Chicago-based culture. She solicited my response to a novel that I thought would be a joy to read! And sometimes it was. The below reproduces my notes and feints as I worked toward producing what became a fairly strident response for her section, which ultimately surprised me. I read what was published on the site to Daniel and he said, “Wow, it’s unmistakable that you hate the novel!” and while this didn’t perplex me, I thought, Oof, I don’t actually hate the novel, I just have opinions about its shortcomings. So the below is also, I guess, something of my softer, second consideration.

 —

I read Browning's first novels, I'm Trying to Reach You (2012) and The Correspondence Artist (2011), a few winters back, at a rare juncture of poverty and exhibitionism. I had no money, no standards, and I was tired of staying indoors grousing over very cheap meals. I volunteered for a community dance project having never done anything like that before—that is, aside from drunkenly dancing my ass off in bars. I thought it would be constructive to turn a thing I loved to do, but that nevertheless filled me with deepest shame (trust me, I really broke it off at weddings), into a more mindful, more healthful and more regimented activity. It would get me out of the house, I thought, and it was free. I would be a part of making art, which is usually prohibitively expensive, as anyone with a fine arts degree can tell you. For dance, for this dance, the choreographer requested only that we show up on time. I'm a freak about punctuality. The stars had aligned.

Browning is herself a dancer (and an academic, and of course a novelist) and the narrators in her novels are same. The performing body and its capacities as a connecting medium (shamed and celebrated), this is the great inquiry of her work. If I felt, in that first month of reading her books while also dancing for the scrappy little corps, that I was conversing with her ideas—augmenting thesis with praxis—then I also responded to the novels’ meta-inquiry, the nagging suspicion that dancing for the company increased my sense of disconnection and isolation; that I had waded, in fact, into embarrassment. I might love to shake my body, I might even have the intensity and ferocity of a really expressive dancer—but that doesn’t mean I actually contributed in a meaningful way to a successful artistic enterprise. Being a part of an artistic failure, besides, is its own kind of experience, albeit one we try to avoid.

Browning’s latest novel The Gift probes the narrator’s compulsion to create “inappropriate intimacies,” while working to define what those intimacies could possibly be. Some of this work is done through dance—articulating intimacy by bringing us into proximity with a body, with the body’s hands, the body’s nakedness and movement—and a lot of this work is done through failure: failing to arrive, failing to tell the truth, failing to appear. Are we foremost bound up in bodies? When we extend ourselves across mediums—social, textual, televisual—and when we breach boundaries of cultural and creative divides, is the effect additive (increased sensorium, expanded presence) or subtractive (do we just spread ourselves too thin). How is intimacy sustained, enhanced, or encountered at all via absence?

Browning only half sustains her inquiry “novelistically” (with characters and situations), relying instead on a more academic mode of glosses, summaries, interpretations and applications of post-structural theorists and other en vogue critical discourses. A character is rarely in love without also examining that “love” through a lens of affect, queer, disability, and/or political theory. Sexual acts go through the Lacanian ringer. Emails, reproduced, irritatingly, seemingly unedited, are examined and replied back to at length. (Having a JSTOR account on hand isn’t necessarily a prerequisite, but it can really help.) On Browning’s website, she calls her works “fictocriticism,” an uglier version, I suppose, then Lance Olsen’s “critifiction,” though the fussiness of these designations could be swapped out with “auto-fiction” or “metafiction” with minimal loss in comprehension of the novel’s interest in formal innovation and authorial exposure.

I’m an advocate of Browning’s work but I want to be careful to express my unremitting frustration with this novel. Her avatar, Barbara Andersen, guides the reader through a series of low-heat, low-friction performance art encounters, recalled in (admittedly) hazy detail. The opulence of the narrator’s apologies on behalf of her faulty memory feels like the extension of a crude olive branch from the author herself, apologizing to the “real” people and their “real” projects the book describes. Some of these details are a bit off! It’s very much graduate student winking at the professor in the middle of a dissertation, or perhaps the dissertation’s acknowledgements section. I used to format edit those; that was my stipend work as a graduate student; the impulse is touching. Reproducing that impulse in fiction is, I think, meant to be a selfless corrective against critical overreach: the narrator doesn’t want to totalize or co-opt someone else’s experience or someone else’s performance: this “liminality” is ethically less suspect but makes for ponderous, slack descriptions of what would be better served by brute assertion of detail. (I just looked up “liminality” and it’s a term used in anthropology. Wikipedia says: “In anthropology, liminality (from the Latin word līmen, meaning "a threshold") is the quality of ambiguity or disorientation that occurs in the middle stage of rituals, when participants no longer hold their pre-ritual status but have not yet begun the transition to the status they will hold when the ritual is complete.” Browning would probably appreciate the idea that her sometimes fuzzy reenactments mean the readers must do the collaborative work of more fully imagining the novel’s happenings, the novel’s timeline, etc.)

Browning is adept at staging intellectuals in their milieus; she’s also acute in describing their off-hours, when they’re frustrated, alone, bouncing bad rent checks, and dithering away on deadlines. The Gift’s academic, in her off-hours, makes ukulele covers of sentimental pop songs, and begins a hiccupy romance with a musical savant in Germany. Whether you find yourself engaged by this part of the book may in part have to do with whether you’ve read Browning’s other novels, and whether you’re at all stimulated by a belated discussion of “the real” at a time when most any fourteen-year-old is versed on the personas we create online and the messy ways those personas betray our offline, “RL” bodies. It might also help if you love to dance or spend long hours avoiding your actual work (that is, the work your employer expects to compensate you for) (as I often do) watching YouTube videos of people dancing. Having a love for the mores of the academy and the scruples of graduate students and the particulars of cultural reportage also helps. Jennifer Doyles’ Hold It Against Me, a study of emotions and affect in in art (Ron Athey, Aliza Shvarts, James Luna), should figure but somehow does not.

Lauren Berlant crops up in Browning’s novels, and for this I read her essay “Affect Is the New Trauma” (wasn’t paywalled!), a discussion about “work” in the academy—a truly broad designation of activity that doesn’t necessarily look like “labor,” and that doesn’t necessarily describe a “career.” A painter sitting in his studio looking at a canvas is still “painting,” is my example. And professors, Berlant writes, describing her own procedures, “we are allowed to experiment and fail, to be wrong and revise, to get distracted, to not know what we’re doing while we’re doing it, to stop in the middle, to follow our instincts and hunches, not just building on established foundations. We are allowed to demand patience for the obscure, the experimental, the political, and the pedantic.” This is The Gift to a tee.

I would argue that the mediated self is a poor substitution for the living presence in all of Browning's works, not only especially this one. The German musician in The Gift, a mysterious figure who seems to drive the plot’s engine of desire, has a literal amputation—his leg above the knee—and a more figurative one, in his autism, which affects his ability to communicate and emote. He becomes a missed connection, and, if I’m reading the novel’s ending correctly, an ultimately abandoned one. Browning’s previous novel I’m Trying to Reach You said it right in the title: her characters are stymied by missed connection, by the shortcomings of most communiques, and then they’re heartbroken. You might send a stranger a quick ukulele cover, but it doesn’t mean that stranger will thank you.

[white-queen-lacus]

More tag

I was tagged by @abybweisse <3 Thank you, dear! :) Nicknames: well... some people call me Anna, short form of my name, my parents “Dedé”, my sisters “Pi”. Who knows how my cat Jack would call me... XD

Last Thing I Googled: “Crow boy” by Taro Yashima: drawings. I need to take some ispiration for my thesis project... *I have to create a book*

Last TV Show I Watched: I still have to watch the newest episode of The Originals, so... the last tv show: LA PORTA ROSSA (the Red Door), a series I’ve been in love with since its beginning. 

What I’m Wearing Right Now: white hooded shirt with Disney characters, black leggins, warm socks. <3 Ah, and a bracelet with a dolphin! XD

When I created This Blog: December 2015. <3

The Kind of Stuff I Post: mangas/tv series related (mostly Kuroshitsuji/The Originals) as well as personal opinions, artwork, quotes and Kushiel’s Legacy related stuff (how sad that this fandom is pretty dead ç__ç). Why I Chose My URL: Lacus is Lacus Clyne from Gundam Seed/Destiny and it is the nickname I also use on web. White Queen is the nickname Dullindal gave her in Destiny because she was the White Queen on his chessboard, so: white-queen-lacus. <3 Do I get Asks Regularly: Nope. Usually I got them when I post something interesting (mostly about The Originals). Lucky Number: nope. I am the queen of bad luck. Cats or Dogs: Cats all my life!! Cats are life!! Team Sebastian and cats!! Hogwarts House: never been so much into HP, so I don’t know! XD Maybe Ravenclaw. Favorite Singers: considering the amount of songs in my Ipod... Kalafina, I think. But the most important thing for me is the song. :) Favorite Characters: mh... well, this is a long thing. Kushiel’s Legacy: Imriel and Sidonie de la Courcel, Joscelin Verreuil, Phédre no Delaunay, Maslin de Lombelon. Psycho Pass: Kougami Shinya, Tsunemori Akane, Ginoza Nobubu XD, Masapapi, Karanomori Shion and my guilty thought: Crudelio de Mon aka Tougane Sakuya XD. Kuroshitsuji: Ciel, Vincent and Rachel Phantomhive, Frances and Lizzie Midford, sometimes Sebastian. XD The Originals: the whole Mikaelson family! :Q____ The Vampire Diaries: Damon Salvatore, Elena Gilbert, Caroline Forbes are my favourite three characters! <3 Vampire Knight: Kuran family (from Juuri and Haruka up to Kaname, Yuuki and Ai), Yori-chan. Code Geass: Kururugi Suzaku, Euphemia and Cornelia li Britannia, Hyuga Akito, Leila Malcal, the W-0 except Pierre XD, Eliza. <3

Number of Followers: more or less 80. Ten Random Facts About Me. 1) I am a very anxious person (I’ve been suffering from panic attacks for months... ç_ç) 2) I have a degree in Modern Literature. If everything goes according to the keikaku, I should graduate for the second time in Primary Education in October. 3) I would kill for sweets. 4) I think I am unable to love somebody. The fact that my previous and only relationship with a boy made me p*ssed off still let me think about my ability to love someone. 5) ... that also means that I am not so good at understanding people. 6) ... anyway my hidden dream is to have children... two at least. I’ve always chosen their names! <3 7) In case of difficult: I am a control freak. XD 8) I love writing my original stories. My first “official” work took 4/5 years of time to be completed but I am proud of the result.  9) I tend to imagine most of the scenes from the stories I write. Currently, I often think of my second work (which is still in stand-by because of university): a scene of truth revealing! è_é 10) I finished my last teacher-training just yesterday! <3 Five Things You’ll Find in My Bag: wallet, safety little bag (with medicines), a bottle of water, lots of cleenexes (is this the plural? o_o), my phone, my Ipod... well, they are six... basically whenever I need something there is no way I can find it in time! XD Five Things You’ll Find In my Bedroom: beds? XD A wallboard with personal photos (mine and my sisters’), tv, some peluches and I don’t know what else in particular. Five Things I Want To Do In Life: could I steal your thoughts, @abybweisse? Because it is the same for me! :) The only difference is that I don’t have any debts, for now (you know, I think that Italy is the most vexed country in the world), so... I would like to earn looots of money. Five Things I’m Currently into Right Now: my thesis. ç_ç This is the only thing at the moment. Five Things on my To-Do List: I don’t have five things: by now I’d just like to be more active outside my “personal world”. I really spend too much time at home... ç_ç Aaah, yes, also, eating a cheesecake with my best friend in Bari (the town where I study) and I should do some footing... XD Five Things People Might Not Know About Me, or Five More Random Facts About Me: 1) I use to chit-chat with my cat. 2) If I am not satisfied with my works I destroy them (ask my sister about the cover of Crow Boy I made few hours ago... XD). 3) People often say that I am well educated, sweet, caring, sometimes they said “you are the perfect girl”... let me say that my real name is Yukino Miyazawa... XDDD 4) I am fond of musicals. 5) Even though I am not so good at singing, I really like to do it! XD Again, thank you for having tagged me!! :D I tag: @thelittlestofthewolves @thetragicking and the lovely @2rsask ! <3

[fashiontrendin-blog]

A Career Q&A With Amelia, Man Repeller’s Head of Creative

http://fashion-trendin.com/a-career-qa-with-amelia-man-repellers-head-of-creative/

A Career Q&A With Amelia, Man Repeller’s Head of Creative

Whether you want to be a scientist, a stylist, a writer, a professional juggler or you have no idea yet, there’s something cathartic in hearing about the multitude of winding paths. That’s why Man Repeller is launching a new series wherein various team members answer your career questions — anything from how they got to where they are to what they wish they’d done differently or what they still hope to do one day. There’s always a lesson to be learned somewhere, a helpful takeaway (even if it occurs to you later), or at the very least, relief in knowing that it’s more than okay if you’re still figuring it out. First up, Amelia Diamond, Head of Creative. Below, she answers nine of the questions recently posed to her on Instagram.

What did you major in in college and did you do any internships?

I was a journalism/mass communication major at Saint Bonaventure University with a minor in visual arts. I loved it but, ironically, by the time I graduated I wanted nothing to do with writing.

I had four internships: One at StyleCaster.com, which I found out about through a friend-of-a-friend-of-a-friend. I went in as a fashion intern (with no prior experience, which was fine given the initial responsibilities), then switched over to the editorial team, and eventually transitioned onto business development team (and worked on music sourcing and licensing). It’s worth noting that to request a department switch at an internship is murky territory, but you are there to learn, so if you find yourself curious or more interested in another department, talk to your intern manager about other areas where you could be of help on top of your prior commitments. Use your best judgement in terms of what feels appropriate.

I also interned simultaneously at Shumaq, a small clothing label, through that same friend-of-a-friend connection.

I later interned at a fashion PR company Black Frame, which I applied to via Ed2010.com, and got the internship because the hiring manager found my “background” in music interesting; I was editor-in-chief of my school’s campus radio “zine,” and one of my responsibilities at StyleCaster was to secure songs for the website’s videos. Goes to show that you just never know what’s useful on your resume, you don’t have to have identical resumes to everyone you’re ostensibly competing against, and there’s always a way to spin what you’ve learned into useful application for something entirely different.

Finally, I interned at Vogue. I was a fashion assistant first, then became a fashion market intern where I learned about the fashion logistics of photoshoots, which ended up helping me greatly in my first full time job in PR. I got to Vogue thanks to a recommendation made by a former boss at Black Frame. Best way to do this: be open and communicative with your manager about your intended trajectory, goals and end dates so that you don’t catch anyone by surprise. This helps establish the inevitable future conversation where you ask for recommendations and support in your next steps.

I was very, very lucky that my parents supported me through these unpaid internships. One day I would like to repay my parents by buying my dad a pool and my mom a fancy trip to Italy. And a pet lamb.

Was this the career path you expected/had in mind in college? If not, could you explain the journey of getting to where you are now?

No. I wanted to go into advertising for a while, and was very sick of writing by the time I graduated. Also, you should know that I graduated without a job and was terrified. I felt like I was floundering, like I’d never figure it out, like I wasn’t good enough. I was embarrassed to talk to friends who’d started working right away.

If you’re in the same boat, repeat this over and over: There is NO one right path, and while “things happen for a reason” (my favorite thing to say even though it’s admittedly much easier to tell others than myself), you have to seek out opportunities like a truffle pig, be open to the weird openings, and have really honest talks with yourself, constantly, about where you are, where you want to be, and why you want to be in those places. Your first internship does not have to have a fancy name attached it. Your first job does not have to be your dream job. You do not have to make Forbes 30 Under 30, ever.

My first two jobs (the first of which I finally landed thanks to a former boss at Vogue who recommended me) were in public relations, and they were crucial in terms of “fashion world” experience, time-logging within the industry, and contact building. They also taught me that I did not want to do PR!

…And that I was starting to feel the writing bug again.

From there I went to New York Magazine where I sort of had three jobs at once: I was the fashion market assistant, the fashion editor of the twice-yearly New York Weddings, which included styling the cover story — a rare opportunity for sure — and a sometimes-contributor to The Cut where I put together small fashion market stories. The bits of copy I got to do for these reminded me just how “at home” I felt while writing, but the caliber of talent at New York Magazine and The Cut intimidated me to no end. I had zero idea how anyone generated ideas all the time like they did there, and I thought it laughable that I could write anything worth publishing, so I mostly kept quiet about my growing writing aspirations. It was like having a secret talent that you suspect might not actually be that impressive, but really wanting someone to dare you to perform it.

That someone ended up being Leandra. She and I were friends before I started working at Man Repeller, and she brought me on (alongside Charlotte Fassler and Kate Barnett) as the first full-time writer besides her. Here I am, five years later.

Do you feel like a “grown-up” yet? What does it mean to you to feel like an adult? Is it important to you?

Absolutely not, although I have grown up considerably. I had two wild growth spurts as a human: 22 to 26, and 27 to 29. Both of those two chunks feel like different people from the person I am currently typing this at age 30.

Feeling like an adult, to me, means “have your shit together.” Some days I do, most weeks I don’t. Yes, it’s important to me, and I compare myself to others constantly. It can be torturous or motivating depending on the hour.

What do you do when you get writer’s block?

I had the worst bout of writer’s block I’ve had in a while last week, and I’m still in the middle of it. It’s not only infuriating, it can have a terrible effect on your confidence, concentration and mood. The first thing you have to do is ask someone you love to remind you that this is a phase, that it will go away — and that it will return again in the future! But that that’s okay, because it’s part of the process. You have to “forgive yourself,” put in quotes because that sentence makes me feel like Dr. Phil.

You also have to push through it. If you’re on deadline for work, write an outline of what you are trying to say, with a thesis, supporting points, and a conclusion — just like in school. Then fill in the blanks and ask a trusted editor to read. It won’t be your best thing you’ve ever written, but at least you got it off your desk. Pretending you’re texting or emailing a friend is another way out of it because it helps you just SAY WHAT YOU ARE TRYING TO SAY when your brain is like: Let’s overthink and overanalyze this.

If you’re blocked on a personal project, write what actually is in your head, even if it’s, “There is nothing in my head. This is stupid. Why am I writing this.” Keep going. Keep going, still! You’ll get something. I learned that trick from The Artist’s Way, which I highly recommend to literally every human on this planet, regardless of creative aspirations.

What is your go-to snack in the MR headquarters?

I usually want something chocolate, but wind up eating whatever free/for-all thing is on the kitchen counter. However, you have to be careful at Man Repeller that you are not accidentally eating a prop before it’s been shot!

When I work from home, I eat a lot of Bagel Chips and peanut M&Ms. Pad Thai as I write this.

How did you learn to have confidence in yourself (your ideas, your decisions, etc.) at work? 

Cheesy answer: I am lucky in that I’m surrounded by people at work and outside work who encourage my ideas and support my decisions. They also challenge me to think about my ideas and decisions in a way that helps me grow and learn.

But also: I have a habit of focusing on the one bad thing (where work is concerned, but also in life!) rather than all the good stuff that happened, all the accomplishments and successes that accumulate over time and are easy to forget. So when I am really down or freaking out or convinced that any moment now, someone will realize they made a massive mistake in hiring me to do XYZ, I try to imagine that am a proud parent…of myself, and I brag to myself about myself. Sometimes I do this in my head, sometimes I write it down, sometimes out loud if I am sure I’m alone.

Also, weird thing to say, but a paycheck helps: no one gives money away out of the goodness of their heart. They pay you because they need your skillset. If you’re not feeling confident about what you’re accomplishing, talk to your manager, because she might have some encouraging words/solutions, then remind yourself that someone is paying you for your skills, that you learned, that you’re able to perform.

How does a young writer get their first byline? Tips for pitching stories to editors?

There were a lot of questions in this vein, and there’s no one “right answer” because there’s a million ways to go about this depending on where you’re pitching, but a short version:

Make a website for yourself. Compile all your published links, if you have them, organized by category: Personal Essay, Reporting, Beauty, etc.

Now, whether or not you’ve been published already, this is important: Upload two to three (to start) clips that adequately show your voice and your technical writing skills — no matter if you wrote them for yourself and no one else. I would rather read something unpublished that gives me a sense of your style and technique than something published but indistinguishable from another writer. Make it clear these are your most “you.”

When you’re pitching stories to editors:

– Email the proper editor. Pitching a culture story? Figure out who the culture editor is and email her directly. – Keep the email short, your pitch clear and well-thought out. – When pitching, think about: Who am I pitching to (is my pitch relevant to this publication, to this editor?) What is the story I will tell, and what’s my point? Why does this story need to be told? How will I tell it, and in how many estimated words? (Will this be reported out, written as a personal narrative?) When can I have it in by? – Link out to two clips in the email that are most relevant to the publication, the editor, and the story you’re pitching. – This is cliché, but despite rejections, keep pitching! Reach out to all sorts of publications until you get your first yes, and then, keep going.

What’s the best career advice you’ve taken?

Best career advice (although I wouldn’t say this applies to a first or second job): Look at your boss, and your boss’s boss. Do you want their jobs? If so, that’s a good thing. If there’s no way in hell you’d want their careers in a few years, then start thinking about the person who does have an appealing job or career to you, and begin researching what she did to get there. Then figure out how to apply that to your life/current situation. Take your vacation days and your sick days. And always ask for help!

Ketchup or mustard?

Mayonnaise! But preferably ketchup, mayo, a mix of the two, and spicy mustard if available.

Photo by Simon Chetrit.

[douchebagbrainwaves]

YOU GUYS I JUST THOUGHT OF THIS

It's a far more intense relationship than you usually see between coworkers—partly because investors are so much better. Seed Round Our startup begins when a group of people for decades. We supported online transactions via a company called Miquelrius. A friend of mine at Google is going to have a three hour meeting with a potential acquirer unless you want to be using the most advanced theoretical principles.1 I think you have a thesis about what everyone else in it is overlooking. That word balance is a significant one.2 But the evidence of VCs' behavior, and the conclusion—uh, what it the conclusion? If you're not at the leading edge of some technology—to cause yourself, as communist countries did in the last ten years didn't exist when I was in grad school, but there are aspects of it—the things to remember about startups: starting a startup: a founder quits, you discover a patent that covers what you're doing. It might be hard to imagine what would happen if they diverged to see the Mona Lisa. Graduates of elite colleges would have been very different. That's the myth in the Valley and are quick to sense it in your increased confidence.

Macros are harder to write than entertaining ones would have been that, in the same email hell we do now.3 Boston, and for little glue programs you can use whatever language does the job. If some language feature is awkward or restricting, don't worry, you'll know right away.4 Nor does it harm you in the long term, that could have meant someone else owned big chunks of the world in 587, the Chinese system was very enlightened. A, as long as they want to do, short of actual bankruptcy, was the inefficiency of their competitors. Investors' power comes from money. But he wouldn't, so we were pretty excited when we meet startups working on things that have been seen mentioning the site.

Arduinos, 3D printing, laser cutters, and more openly. There are signs that this is the truth. My final test may be the most dangerous company now by far, in both the good ways and the bad. But none of us know, except about people we've actually worked with. Right? But that prescription, though sufficient, is too narrow. Give the Programmer as Much Control as Possible. You can skip the social sciences, philosophy, and the transition from starting a company and selling it.5

A lot of my friends are starting to have children now, and what's most admired is to be fanatically attentive to customers' needs.6 I'd probably choose just-do-it. If someone asks them at a dinner party what a programming language is obviously doesn't know what it means to be a lot of words I hadn't thought of. That's why he's so good. Because Woz designed this computer for himself, and he couldn't afford anything more.7 And yet they're still surprised how well it achieves its purpose, then the idea will be familiar to a lot of the most fearsome provisions in VC deal terms have to do at the start of World War II a contest between good and evil, but between fighter designs, it really was.8 Would that kill spam?9 Google because, like you, they'll be able to work hard. But I doubt they realize it, but they invest other people's money, like a big company, and so on.10 The things I've written just for myself are no good.11 A company making $1000 a month grew at 1% a week will 4 years later be making $7900 a month, which is the most common route.

As jobs become more specialized, we have to train longer for them.12 Should we buy this little startup or build our own?13 In industrialized countries we walk down steps our whole lives and never think about this, because there's a cult of smartness here. You sense there is something underneath.14 Even if you've never had a good way to do this could leave competitors who didn't in the dust.15 Painting was not, in Leonardo's time, as with people in it, if it looks promising, turn into a big one. So why worry about a few more?

So the main value of the company and went to Europe. But no one seems able to foresee that, not even considering them as token separators.16 A isn't working. If I were running a startup is so hard to make a nest for yourself in some large organization where your status depends mostly on experience, but for almost everything they do, they always want to know what tools are best, is what hackers choose when they can see different problems. My latest trick is taking long hikes.17 Indeed, it was high school.18 The Northwest Passage that the Mannerists, the Romantics, and two generations of American high school students, I said a good rule of thumb works well. I'd never once done that thing in my life. I also ignore html comments, not even older, more experienced founders. If we could answer that question it would be a fine idea if people actually did write programs the way they taught me to in college. That is the big win in the market.

Notes

I write out loud can expose awkward parts. They thought I was as much time.

Surely it's better if everything just works. He couldn't even afford a monitor is that they lived in a bar. If you freak out when people in Bolivia don't want to avoid using it, is rated at-1.

It's sometimes argued that kids who went to prep schools supplied the same differentials exist to satisfy demand among fund managers for venture capital as an adult.

Others will say that it killed the best metaphors for hackers are in research departments. Progressive tax rates has a great programmer than an actual label—like putting NMI on a seed investor to invest at any valuation the founders chose?

The US is becoming less fragmented, the Romans didn't mean to kill. 99, and that you could get all the time required to notice when it's done as conspicuously as this place was a bimodal economy consisting, in Galbraith's words, of course.

We consciously optimize for this is to write a book from a company's revenues as the little jars in supermarkets. Many hope he was skeptical about things you like doing.

Thanks to Paul Buchheit for the correction. This too is true of the essence of something or the distinction between the Daddy Model that it killed the best response is neither to bluff nor give up, how much they liked the outdoors? Applying for a certain way, it becomes an advantage to be driven by bookmarking, not eating virtuously. The Nineteenth-Century History of English.

Usually people skirt that issue with some equivocation implying that lies believed for a reason. The point of view: either an IPO.

So although it works well to show them how to be careful. Maybe at first you make money from good angels over a series A in the sense of things economists usually think about so-called lifestyle business, and only incidentally to tell computers how to value potential dividends. More precisely, there was a great reputation and they're clearly working fast to get something for which you ultimately need if you are not the distinction between money and wealth.

Within YC when we created pets.

Patrick Pantel and Dekang Lin. VCs miss.

The hackers within Microsoft must know in the sense that if the present day equivalent of the Dead was shot there. It's a lot of problems, but I think investors currently err too far on the x company, meaning master. Later stage investors won't invest in a startup is compress a lifetime's worth of work the same work, the growth in wealth over time, not because it's a proxy for revenue growth, it's easy to slide into thinking that customers want what you do it mostly on your own? It's not quite as easy as I make it a function of their hands.

But what he means by long shots.

The meanings of these groups, you may have now missed the video boat entirely. As always, tax rates. In fact, we should be taken into account, they will fund you, they wouldn't have the.

But those too are acceptable or at least bet money on the other extreme—becoming demoralized when investors reject you. While the first couple times I bailed because I can't tell if it was. When governments decide how to be good startup founders who go on to the margin for error.

But when you ad lib you end up with elaborate rationalizations.

These range from make-believe, and thus no form nor anyone to call those before a fall. If you ask that you're not convinced that what you're working on some project of your last round just happened, the second type to go all the difference between being judged as a note to self.

However, it is to raise their kids won't listen to them unfair that things don't work the upper middle class values; it would be a sufficient condition. There is no richer if it's dismissed, it's probably still a leading cause of the other seed firms always find is that it is dishonest of the economy, at least bet money on our conclusions. On the other becomes visible.

[ranseltoska]

So Happy to Finally Comeback!

Hello tumblr! How are you people?

Yap, it is so long after my last posts in tumblr and I know how not consistent I am to write things in this platform. I of course have some explanation which turns out to be an excuse. Well, life is so tough lately. I have to juggle with the last theory semester that is so exhausted and taking so many energy and time and money from me, then the last term of my organization year that I want to make it the best so again I spend so much time and energy there, and the luxury time I want to spend by myself—hangout alone, have me time, watch tv series, read some books, daydream all the time, and sleep too much. So yeah, having not so much time back then but so happy to finally comeback!

There are also some triggers actually that make me want to write again. The first one is of course my desire to babble much in the platform that no one care and know about me. The second one is the luxury time I have because it is finally holiday yaaay! So I am back at home right now, not having so many things to do unless hangout with high school mates and do some family gathering, and not having responsible to deal with, and not even have a real life! Third one, is because someone from the past suddenly come back to my life and asking like you still write? I miss your stories though. No, I don’t write because of him, but his question reminds me how I used to write so much and love it. The last one is I currently watch a vlog in youtube and she is talking about doing some journaling and let your thoughts come up, and again it reminds me about how I used to suit in front of my tumblr page and write all the things that pop up in my mind. The triggers actually come like a month ago since I am home, but because of my laziness and the lack of fast and free internet here (God, I need fast internet!) I finally can do it and hopefully I can be that consistent, please help me!

So to begin my comeback (are you a K-PoP Idol group?) I will write about the random things that happened during my absent time in tumblr. Here we go!

1. I am finally home! After a tough semester and so many responsible I have to do, I finally can take a break and take a breath. So happy to be home, because you don’t have to worry about the real life or the future, about the money you’ve spend because free food and water will always be there, about the people that judge and want to hurt you because you can no longer see them, about the loneliness you feel when you are lying in your dorm alone or when you strolling around the city alone, because you are finally safe and sound.

2. I meet so many people here. From my family, big families, high school best friends, high school mates, some teachers that so close to me, some seniors that also close to me, until someone from the past. What I actually can learn is everyone is growing up even me somehow. We still talk about the silly and funny and stupid things we did back then, but we also talk about the future that waiting for us. Like with my best friends and high school mates, we remember the memories we share in the old days, like some silly jokes about everyone, or some sweet moments we have, or the friends and the teachers that really cannot be forgotten, or even the mean things we do. But in the middle of that conversation we are talking about how are our thesis or what to do after graduation or where are you work right now, we are talking about the consequences about the problems we face and how we deal with the real life, that is scary and tough. We are all growing up but I am so happy that some parts of us are still the same little souls who always want to be the best version of ourselves.

3. Last semester of theory is finally over! After so many seminars, and simulations, and negotiations, and endless papers and assignments, finally sixth semester is done! That was the very tough semester in my college life. I sometimes want to give up on so many lessons but thankfully there were Ilak, Kiki, Rachel who always motivate me and cheer me up. The scores are not yet presented, but so far I am happy with the results. Because my almost not sleep night and my working the assignments together afternoon is paid. Well next level of tough is KKN and skripsi life, brace yourself!

4. I watch so many tv series and fall in love with sense8, you guys have to watch it. It is about 8 people in different countries that can connect to each other, like really understand if one of them feel sad or happy, and they have to fight some group that want to kill them. And the season 2 is so freaking cool, but here comes the very things I hate. Netflix decides to cancel this show because of numbers. And what I want to do is screaming and saying wtf so much, because I really need to know where is Wolfgang, and how they fight the BPO, and what how is the ending, because all of them really deserve a happy endings after they try to be strong together (please watch the show to understand my babbling!). But, after the whole cluster in the whole world asked Netflix to continue it and we do some petitions, finally they’re gonna make the final-two-hours-of-sense8. Only two hours but it can change someone’s life, I bet! So yeah #sense8forever

5. I am thinking to make some content (are you a youtuber) that called Saturday Conversation. So every two weeks on Saturday I will go somewhere probably a café or a hangout place by myself and just sit, eat nice food, do some people watching, or read books, and having a conversation with myself. It could be about anything, about how I feel, what I think about life, things that makes me happy or sad or afraid, the books I currently read or the tv series I currently watch, or anything that come up in my mind. Hopefully I can be the consistent person I wish to be. And I also want to write consistently in tumblr because I still remember how much I love talking to myself in this platform by writing it.

6. I just finished watching The Flash season 2 after a very long time and Scandal season 1 after a not so really long time. Currently I am in the middle of my journey to finish Riverdale, 13 Reasons Why, The Americans, Quantico Season 2, 11.22.63, and so many tv series that waiting to be watch in my hard disk. And I currently read Garis Batas from Agustinus Wibowo, after finishing Simon vs. Homo Sapiens Agenda and Matahari from Tere Liye. I know no one care but hey I just want to share! Oh one more, I am currently in love with some youtubers that is so inspiring I can’t stop myself to watch their video, you guys should check Doddie Clark, Lucy Moon, and Lavendaire! They are basically talking about how to be honest with your own selves, to have self-loving, to embrace all the strengths and weaknesses you have in your life, to live in the moment and be a true human being, and to live your life to the fullest. Please, please watch their video to have a very very very bright insight to really live the life you love!

7. In love with Nicole Zefanya – Anaheim, Doddie Clark – Would You Be So Kind, and The Matter Halo ft. Nadin – Teralih! Please listen to all of them! Btw, speaking about Nicole Zefanya, she just launches a song called See U Never with a nickname NIKI. The song is kind r&b and hiphop, well I don’t really know the genre and the song is good but I obviously love her originals more. It is a big opportunity for her and maybe because she is still young she still wants to experiment a lot and maybe we may not hear her originals much at least not in near time. And I am so so so sad about it, because I just love her originals. Because she is so authentic with her clinginess, and the teenage high school behavior, and all the inspiring lyrics she writes that speak to me and hit me hard and so true and honest, and her piano or guitar’s melody that are so eargasm. I am gonna miss it so much. Whatever the path she chooses, I hope her little soul always walks her home.

8. Still have so many things to do in hometown; like going to the beach and enjoy the atmosphere until sun set or swimming in the beach from morning till noon, eating so much food that I can only find here, having a me time in a fast-food restaurant and going karaoke alone, hanging out to a new place with friends and family, reading books in the park on a cloudy afternoon, having a road trip or family vacation to Sabang, going to so many public place to think about my future (wahahah, the old semester students kinda behavior), and many more!

9. I have so many bucket list currently that I really hope I brave enough to literally make it real. I want to watch musical in Jakarta and join some conferences anytime soon, then I will do KKN, and hopefully do exchange, and some internship in the place I really want. Besides that I also want to travel to some city like Bandung and Karimun Jawa and I want to arrange some trip after graduating (so please graduate as much as you can!) in some neighbor countries. Hopefully I am brave enough to embrace all my plans and have so many savings due to the plans. May the force be with me!

10. Like I mention in some part of this writing, I feel like everyone is growing up including me. In the beginning of sixth semester if everyone asking about my planning to graduate or what kind of thesis I will write, I literally look at them weirdly and say things like, dude 6th semester not even finish and you already ask me that kind of question, and of course I don’t think about it yet because I don’t really want to graduate that fast. Actually why I said that because I am so freaking afraid what to do after graduating, because I have no idea what is my ability or passion that I literally can use for the real life and I literally don’t know what I have to do to have a bright future or to face this hard and tough life. But after going home and having some deep thoughts with friends and mom and dad, I kinda have hope. Like, I start to set goal about my graduation and my thesis kinda things, although still don’t know what to write as judul skripsi, help me ya Allah. I start knowing that dad is getting older also will retire soon, so I have to stop being a burden to mom and dad and I have to have a job before dad finally retire. The closest things I can do to at least have a job is graduating. So yeah, I have to graduate next year. It is also because of the invisible competition I have with my older sister, since she just graduates this year, I have to prove to my parents that next year I can also make them proud. Wish me luck please!

Well, that is all random things that come up in my mind during my absent time in tumblr. I know it is only 10 numbers but I don’t know why it can be that long! See, I talk and babble too much, that’s why I should keep writing consistently! Okay, hopefully the next writings will come anytime soon, please bare with me. See you in another post!

The finally write again happy little soul,

Me.