#i have some genuine positives to say about the third movie. a few things got better. and baby steps is still movement

[littleaipom]

I think Disney Zombies 3 cemented my unironic love for this wacky franchise. I simply believe! in the power of unrestrained creativity! and emotions conveyed thru song and dance!!!

[thetimelordbatgirl]

Genuine Question. Why are you and so many other people deeply upset when TV shows and movies kill off characters when their long-standing actors die. I have always thought that is the most respectful thing that can be done. Honoring an actor by retiring a character. Am I wrong to think that way?

If the shows or movies were to handle it respectfully and not copy the actors cause of death for the characters, I would agree with you that its respectful, speaking as someone who while I have issues with Farewell Sarah Jane, I will acknowledge they handled Sarah's death respectfully and never once mentioned how she died, just giving us her funeral and how many people whose life's she's impacted in a positive way.

But sadly nowadays, shows and movies really seem to vary in how they handle the characters deaths, sometimes just seeming to copy the actors cause of death. MCU is the biggest example as look, I get it, Wakanda Forever was always going to be difficult with Chadwick's death, but quick question: when killing off T'Challa, why did he have to die from some incurable disease that not many knew he was suffering from, disturbingly similar to Chadwick dying from cancer which sadly has no cure yet but was confirmed to have not told many non-family friends he had it??? Why couldn't it be any other cause of death??? Like yes the movie handles the funeral and grief well, but the cause of death being similar to Chadwick is just gross in my opinion. And then you got Descendants where...honestly, it just came off as them wanting to get Carlos out of the way so they can have no shame in continuing to milk a franchise that should have ended at the third film. Like yes, I'll give them this: they didn't outright say his cause of death so hey they didn't copy Cameron Boyce's cause of passing....but the fact that in Royal Wedding, a set up for future Descendants stuff, implies Carlos', Cameron's character who was alive last we saw in Descendants 3 (as it was one of last few projects Cameron had filmed), is now somehow dead cause leaving Descendants finished was just hard for Disney. And now you got Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Once & Always where...so far from the specials description Minh, Trini's daughter, seems to be out for revenge after a tragedy took place and in behind the scenes photos, Minh along with Billy and Zack seem to be at a cemetery and on a hiking trails website, someone in their review, uploaded a photo of a upturned car while confirming Power Rangers was filming it in that area....I'm sorry, but if they not only proceed to kill Trini but also proceed to kill her in a similar way to Thuy Trang's cause of death, it is beyond disrespectful and feels gross of Power Rangers to do as up until this point it had been clear for them to avoid associating Trini with cars, but now its worrying if they just stopped caring about that.

And I really need to ask this: even if the actor is dead, why does the character need to die with them??? Sarah Jane Adventures ended on Sarah Jane still being alive with a later Doctor Who comic confirming she was alive still, it was only in 2020 lockdown adventures they confirmed she was dead. And this is really only something I learnt from a lost media video, but Father Ted when Ted's actor sadly died during production of the finale, still ended with Ted being alive. Hell, let's go back to Power Rangers quickly: Rita's Japanese actress, Machiko Soga, had sadly passed away during production of Power Rangers: Mystic Force, so what did Power Rangers do? They confirmed Rita since being turned good at the end of Zordon era, had become the Mystic Mother who appears in Mystic Force, keeping the character alive even with the actress's death.

Like, I do get sometimes killing the character off (Princess Leia coming to mind....even if her death was still badly done), but at the same time, it wouldn't hurt sometimes to leave the character alive and if you must kill them off, do it in a respectful manner and for the love of all things holy, please don't copy the actors cause of death. That's just gross to do and only serves to upset already mourning fans of the actors.

[eyrieofsynapses]

I wasn't planning to split my "hey, so you're gonna see some Star Wars stuff around soon, but I'm not properly rejoining the fandom" into two posts, but here we are. Mostly so that I don't subject all of you to a long explanation.

So: like I said over here, a couple good friends of mine convinced me to watch The Mandalorian, and it's all going downhill into the trash heaps of Star Wars from there. Once I've gotten to a couple other things--which might take some time--I may reblog some GIFs and possibly metas.

Here's the thing: Yes, I might put stuff up. No, I am not getting into the fandom proper again. And I do mean again--as in, I was in it around four or five years ago, quite a while before this blog existed. (You can look at my Ao3 for proof, but... uh... maybe don't. You know how it is with old fic.)

For the sake of clarity, and also because I kind of want to talk about it, I'm going to explain why.

For reference: I've seen all of the movies. I've also seen The Clone Wars up until the newest season. I watched all of Star Wars: Rebels, and that remains my favorite. (No, I've not seen The Bad Batch, so I don't know everything about what they did with Caleb.) I'm also fond of Rogue One despite my dislike of tragic endings. Aside from that, my knowledge extends to a scattered few books, comics, and a few other things. I have, only as of the last few days, finished The Mandalorian's second season; the rest of my knowledge is largely older.

As usual, my attention veered away and I hit my overload point. That's normal, by the way. But there's some other reasons.

First: Star Wars deals a lot with tragedy. I've increasingly found I don't much like too many sad endings, especially when they feel unnecessary. I like my characters whole and safe and happy at the end of the day, okay? Beat them up in between all you like, but... look, I like happy endings. That’s a me thing, by the way, not a flaw in Star Wars itself (mostly). If you like tragedy, go for it! I’m just not a fan.

Second: The Rise of Skywalker poisoned a lot for me. Between that and the way Disney's been beating the shit out of the MCU, I figured the newer Star Wars shows were rotten cash grabs and nothing more. It wasn't until my friends lured me into watching The Mandalorian that I realized otherwise. Somehow, despite Disney's hell-bent obsession with killing everything it touches, there's some good stuff coming out of Lucasfilm yet. (For now.) I am duly impressed.

Third, and most importantly: Whatever TRoS and co. didn't poison, the fandom often did. I've met a lot of awesome Star Wars people. I've also seen a lot of toxicity, especially online.

I cannot tell you how much "oh, this sucked because of A, B, C, and D, and this part is irredeemable, and I can't believe anyone could stand this bit--what do you mean you liked that? Fuck you!" stuff I've seen around. Mind you, I like constructive story critique. But much of the time it was just complaining, with zero positivity or genuine love. (It isn't just Star Wars, by the way; I see a massive amount of this in the DC fandom too. There’s others. It’s common in many large fandoms, I think.)

I get it, it's fair to rant about stuff you don't like. I do that too. I’m not going to say I won’t keep doing it here and there, because I’d be lying. Hell, I have a lot of bones to pick with Star Wars. I can and have torn TRoS apart. But it's one thing to do that, and another entirely to claim that you enjoy the thing while only ever hating on it. In particular, I'm sick of seeing people coming into spaces where people are enjoying the content, and then spoiling it rotten by only ever complaining. That was what really got to me: being in places where people were meant to be enjoying it, only to see endless complaints about everything bad.

That was the thing I really disliked about the fandom while I was in it--there was this constant cycle of people saying they enjoyed some piece of Star Wars media, then turning around and smacking it over and over without ever providing any positive feedback. I'm not here for that. I'm here to smack-talk TRoS, sure, but then talk about a) what went right, b) what could be done better, c) the context of the mistakes and the reason for them, and d) where Star Wars has avoided the same mistakes, because it turns out they've done a lot better elsewhere.

Look, I don't want to hear about every single flaw and nothing else. Media is flawed! That's part of it! Plot holes exist! Problems exist! I get pissed off about them too! I rant with my real-life friends about them all the time! But suspension of disbelief is a thing, and historical context is a thing, and recognizing the fact that writers are human and flawed too is a very important thing. If you've got a problem and you want to say it, say it, tag it, then move the hell on and don't press it on the people who want to enjoy that media for what it is. (Unless those people are being blatantly discriminatory and offensive, in which case, sure, call them out. But don't be an ass about it.)

For the record: I am absolutely down for calling Disney out on its racist/sexist/queerphobic/etc. bullshit. We need to do that, and we need to do it loudly. TRoS fucked up a lot with that, and it deserves to be called out.

But if we're going to do that, we also need to talk about where they went right. We need to talk about how supportive many of the actors were. We need to talk about how Rebels and Rogue One brought in characters of color and treated them right. We need to discuss the importance of Finn and Poe, both for being POC and where their implied romance worked despite its ultimate knock-down. We need to talk about why women like Leia, Rose, Ahsoka, Hera, Sabine, and Jyn--among many others--are good representation. We need to talk about how The Mandalorian and Andor are both led by men of color. We need to talk about the many wonderful platonic relationships in Star Wars. We need to celebrate the good, too.

...er, anyway. I'm gonna hop off the soapbox now.

Basically: I got lucky when I landed in the Leverage fandom and found out how positive a fan space can be, and I don't want to go back to only ever seeing people ragging on my favorite media. Past experience has taught me that the Star Wars fandom does a lot of that. I'm once-bit and twice-shy, so I'm not getting deep in on this. I'm not trawling tags, I'm not getting into arguments, I'm not interacting much at all. If somebody wants to have a positive and constructive conversation, I’m here for it. If I post and someone decides to start an argument for the sake of arguing, I'm blocking and moving on, and that is that.

Anyway. Upward and onward, and all of that. May the Force be with you.

[tailsrevane]

[movie review] d&d: wrath of the dragon god (2005)

liiiiiiiiiiike. okay. here’s the thing.

this movie and the 2000 theatrically-released movie are probably not actually all that far apart in terms of quality? though, good gods, can we just stop for a minute and reflect on how genuinely pathetic it is that a theatrically-released movie is roughly comparable to its tv movie (direct-to-video in some markets) sequel?

the thing is, i remember being a kid sitting next to the kids i played d&d with just unbelievably hyped to see it brought to life in a movie. and then… not seeing that. the way i found out that wrath of the dragon god were even a thing was when i was a more active letterboxd user i was doing a cult movie challenge and there was a category for scifi original movies i was looking a list of them & came across this and said, “wait, what? there’s a sequel to the bad d&d movie? and it was a scifi original movie???”

before i continue talking about how these two, y’know, slightly different experiences impact my opinion of the respective movies attached to them, let me just pause here for a second and say… yeah, until recently d&d was an on-again/off-again thing for me. i think it’s rather decisively planted itself in the “on-again” zone over the course of the past year or so as i’ve become a more confident fan and (more importantly) player. but still. i was playing a 3.5 edition campaign when this movie came out and i had no idea it was a thing? i just think it’s worth taking a moment to recognize what a massive failure of marketing that was, even for a scifi original movie.

so, yeah, i found out about it fully a decade after the fact. so when it came time to watch a movie for the scifi original movies category in that challenge, i had to regrettably avert my attention from the bad tornado and/or werewolf movies i had imagined were gonna be the winners (wait has there ever been a movie about both tornadoes and werewolves that sounds metal as fuck), and the sheer curiosity i had about this fucking movie cannot possibly done anything but favors for it.

it still sucks ass, though. is the thing.

like, look. i don’t think it’s worth my time or yours for me to tear into this movie considering the scale (or lack thereof) of the thing. suffice it to say the script is awful and the most charitable thing i can say about any aspect of the production is “it’s possible they were genuinely doing their best with the resources they had? maybe?”

instead of getting into all of that boring shit, i want to talk about the one aspect of this movie about which i have unambiguously positive things to say. and that’s that between the two d&d movies i’ve seen as of this writing (i never got around to seeing the third one a few years ago), this one has the only good character in either one. and that’s lux, the party’s barbarian.

like, look, i don’t have any illusions about what happened with this character. they even give her one of those eyeroll-inducing “omg the party’s muscle is a girl???”-type introductions that immediately had me on high alert for Strong Female Character syndrome the first time i saw this. and i’m sure they woulda gotten around to damseling her or otherwise doing something dumb to undercut her at some point if they had had the time & resources, but the thing is they didn’t? so she’s in the movie just enough to only ever be depicted as a totally competent warrior? and it’s just glorious.

(it’s obviously entirely possible that i’m being overly pessimistic here and this woulda been the case even if they had more time to fuck it up, but idk, it just hasn’t been my experience that the same writing that gives us “omg the barbarian is a girl???” also gives us treating that character with the same respect it would treat a male character in her place.)

so, yeah. this movie has exactly one (1) thing going for it, which is one (1) more than its predecessor did. congratulations, i guess? this still seems like a lot of trouble to go to just to help your girlfriend change her character’s class from wizard to cleric, though. like, i get that it’s more rewarding to roleplay that shit out, but seriously.

d-rank

[emptymanuscript]

Review for Gideon the Ninth

Well I finished the Science Fantasy book, Gideon the Ninth...

And I’ve got... mixed feelings, 5/10.

Gideon herself is pretty great.

Her main foil, Harrowhark, also pretty good, if absent more than I feel she should be.

And I feel about the same way about the secondary foil, Dulcinea.

The others in the cast... I could take or leave. They were nice enough without actually moving me much emotionally. They definitely felt secondary to those main three to me.

I feel I should also say that this is barely a Science Fantasy. The science-fictional aspect is so deeply subservient to the fantasy aspect that it honestly could have been replaced by a couple of spells and I don’t think the story would have been altered. There’s zero wrong with it as flavor, it simply doesn’t do anything besides that little bit of flavor. Put this story in a moldering old fantasy castle instead of a decaying platform on an ocean and it would read the same.

I definitely liked the second act, quite a bit. At least 4 stars.

I definitely disliked the third act. Which left me feeling fairly dissatisfied. I am thinking about reading the sequel, not because I want the sequel or even because of liking that second act but because I want the closure I feel I didn’t get from the first book.

The best way I can think of to describe my feelings about the third act without giving any spoilers is if a Pharmicist with anger management issues decided to solve a math problem by punching the next person at the window in the face. It suits the character but not so much the problem at hand.

Spoilers under the cut because I don’t know how to express it better without them.

Last chance.

Spoilers coming.

The thing is, the problem is right on the cover: “Lesbian Necromancers.”

The greatness of the second act is that it is a beautiful mess of magic puzzle mixed with soft politics mixed with murder mystery mixed with, “Let’s not talk about our real issues because fee-fees are for losers.” It’s great. It feels like it is setting up this:

Maybe not actually a love triangle but at least an affection triangle between Gideon, Harrow, and Dulcinea. They’re all competing for attention in the high stakes live or die contests set before them. It’s beautiful. It works. I want to see it emerge from the shadows into a full scale battle. Who are you going to pick Gideon? Will she pick you?

But the third act, in my opinion, marginalizes the affection triangle. It doesn’t even really center on the murder mystery or the magical puzzle. The third act shoves all that into the secondary position in favor of the main plot playing out like the climax of an MCU movie.

FIGHT!

This fits Gideon’s personality, she is a fighter, she fights, and where the affection triangle does come up, that fits her personality ok as well. But it felt like the vast majority of what I really wanted, LESBIAN NECROMANCERS - the quieter emotional battle between the three of them - were MIA. A few confessions and we’re moving on.

I wanted Gideon to solve the plot with her filthy fucking mouth (and yes, still kick some butt). Instead I feel like what I got was Bone and Blade, with a little lip for flavor. And so I feel like I didn’t get the catharsis for what was set up. It ended up feeling like it ended because time got called, when I didn’t particularly care about the clock. I knew they could win the fight, I didn’t know if they could be genuinely affectionate partners for more than a bracing minute at confession time.

The only reason I want to read the next book is the hope that I might get some of that catharsis of some romantic interaction but the end doesn’t give me much hope that the sequel will give that. The end read like what I got, what dissatisfied me, really was it. Which makes me extra bitter at it.

[finelinevogue]

Just wanted to say 2 things:

1)Love the fic where he proposed over a cup of tea…so sweet💗

2) we all know how H has asthma sometimes so…could u write something w/the reader helping him with an attack idk or during an interview/concert/family gathering do as u pls

A nice day

XOXO

firstly, thank you so much that’s so sweet of you <33 and secondly, um yes i would love to give this a go at writing for you! hope you enjoy;

Harry couldn’t breathe.

He was in a panic, completely terrified of the uncontrollable situation. He was having an asthma attack concocted with a panic attack and it was brutal.

“Shit,” Jeff whispered as he watched Harry breathe heavily and loudly on the floor. His friend was currently on his hands and knees trying to gasp for air, whilst dressed in his notorious Fine Line outfit.

It was the big night. The one night only at The Forum for the release of his new album Fine Line, hence the costume. He had been nervous all day, with shaking hands and a tendency to forget simple things. You had been with him all day; having a slow brunch together out in the Hollywood Hills and then just chilling around for the afternoon. You didn’t want to anything to strain his voice, so talking hadn’t been an option. That left you either to sleeping and cuddling, whilst watching a movie, or sex. Now you were all for sex, but Harry complained that he liked talking to you during it and so that got shut down pretty quickly. You didn’t forget what he whispered to your ear though just before you cuddled into watching Bambi;

“Keep your moans for later, you’ll be fucking needing them for what I have planned.”

But that was over two hours ago now. Harry had been whisked away to start getting ready, what with hair and makeup first. You’d left him to it, telling him you would just lounge around and wait for him. It was when he was getting into costume had you announced you were just going to go down the street to get some coffee from Dunkin’ - seeing as there were few of them back in England, where you most commonly lived with Harry. The problem was you hadn’t come back yet, and it was an hour later.

“Harry mate, you need to calm down.” Kid Harpoon told him carefully, kneeling down next to his good friend. Nothing was working though and Harry was too breathless to ask anyone for his inhaler.

It had started by thinking about how nervous he actually was for tonight. It was such a huge show and one of a kind too. He was playing his new album and it wasn’t even 24 hours old yet. There was so much pressure weighing him down that he couldn’t breathe - he was suffocating in the anxiety of his own mind and he couldn’t escape at all. Then because he was in so much of a panic his asthma hit him and added another reason to his breathlessness. It was finally made worst when he realised you weren’t by his side to help him. You weren’t there to quickly eliminate the asthma and focus on helping him overcome the panic attack, instead he had his mates surrounding him - crowding him - and they didn’t know the first thing to do.

“Sarah, where’s Y/N?” Mitch shouted, making Harry squint the thought away. He didn’t want to think about how something back might’ve happened or might be happening to you. Where were you? Sarah’s response did no better to help him.

“I don’t know.”

“Harry bud. Talk to us.” Jeff spoke, crouched down in front of him. Harry shook his head, tears running from his eyes as he began crying. The sobs were really harsh and embarrassing. The tears were heavy and mixed with snot running from his nose to pool on the floor below him. He was not doing well at all, coughing when the asthma choked him up. He couldn’t do this. He felt like he was in a small box and it was only getting smaller. He felt as if he were going to die. Genuinely.

“Does he look like he can talk, dickward.” Adam’s voice came from the other side of Harry, messing his head up even more. There was so many voices and he couldn’t focus on just one, but he didn’t want to. He wanted yours. He needed yours. You.

Whenever this has happened before he was always luckily in the comfort of his home, or the tour bus and always with you. So this was unfamiliar and terrifying. He was beginning to think you’d left him or you’d gotten seriously hurt, but he couldn’t do anything to help. He was stuck - paralysed to this position as his lungs collapsed in on themselves and his brain sped the same speed as a train. You were his comfort person and it was only ever you that he wanted in situations like these. Just you.

“Move out of my way. Move!” Harry thought he heard you and your voice, but he hated that his mind could be playing tricks on him in desperation for what, or whom, he truly wanted.

He felt someone crash on the floor in front of him and the almighty smell of lavender and soap hit him all at once. This time, he was glad to have someone sit so close to him, because it was you.

“Harry look at me, hey, hey. You’re okay. Look at me bubs.” You spoke calmly, trying not to sound panicked yourself, even if you were heavily worried. You watched as he looked up at you, eyes ridiculously red and puffy whilst his nose was dripping like a leaking tap. You wanted to rub his tears away and dab away the snot, but your main priority was on his breathing first. “Okay good, okay.”

Your hand went into your bag and picked out his inhaler. You shook it a few times, before putting it into Harry’s mouth. “On three, one, two, three…” Harry tried is best to breathe in and you pushed down on the canister. “Good, bubs, really good. Okay again, one, two, three…” You repeated and then a third time until you could tell that the wheezing of his asthma attack had disappeared.

“T-than…” Harry tried to mumble out, but couldnt because he was still in panic and his throat was so dry.

“Sshh you’re okay.” You turned to one of the crew members and asked for them to fetch you a bottle of water. You asked people to clear out of the room and leave you with Harry for a bit, knowing he wouldn’t settle in front of all these people. You sat on the floor, crossed legged, and brought Harry to lay his head in your lap with his body trailing behind. You offered him one of your hands to squeeze if he wanted to, which he appreciated, cupping both of his around yours. Your other hand laid to stroke through his gelled hair - that would no doubt have to be redone now.

Instead of going straight into talking to him, you sang his favourite lullaby to him in aid of calming him down. It always worked, or at least helped a little. You sang quietly, noticing the beat of his heart soften with every line you sung. You were by no means a professional singer like him, but he liked the way it was so imperfect and mellow. It calmed him to hear something so simple and so you. Whilst you sang the crew never came back with your requested water and you thanked them, before you were the only ones left in the room.

After you finished singing you noticed how calm Harry was, almost still - the complete opposite to how he’d been all of 10 minutes ago. It was amazing what the power of you could do to him.

“What colour are we feeling?” You and Harry had created your own little system by which you would let each other know how you’re feeling by a colour of the rainbow. You’d designated a meaning to all of them that only you two could understand and used them on the days when you weren’t feeling great, to help understand each other’s feelings better.

“The whole bloody rainbow.” Harry mumbled out and you passed the water around so he could take a few sips, to which he thanked you graciously for.

“Oi, you can’t have that as your answer.” It was a rule that you could only use one colour to some your most intense emotion in that moment, otherwise there was kind of no point to the system.

“But it’s true. I feel grey with confusion, blue with sadness, purple with frustration, yellow with fear and even light yellow with cowardice. Yet I feel pink with happiness and light red with love.”

“What about red red?” You teased, not being able to help yourself.

“What? Lust? Always, for you that is.” You leant down to kiss his head as he cracked a joke, showing you that your Harry was still there beneath all this worry.

“Tell me what the colours represent in real life.”

“Purple because I am frustrated that I had to have a panic attack right before the biggest show of my career. Yellow because I am frightened that nobody will like the album and it will be a complete fail of a night. Grey because I can’t choose one colour and focus on it. I.. I—”

You could tell he getting himself worked up again, so cut him short. “Bubs stop, you’re okay. Listen to me.” You tucked his hair behind his ear as if to open it up for him to hear better. “Don’t ever be frustrated with yourself for something like this. You are allowed to have moments of weakness; you wouldn’t be human if you didn’t. Did this compromise your show? No. Did this show off how strong and brave you are? Yes. That’s what is important, therefore we can swap purple for dark yellow because you were brave. Which means yellow can also turn to dark yellow because you are so brave for doing something so huge and so wonderful. People already love the album H. Can’t get enough of it. Everyone will sing along to every word, I can promise you that. Or at least I will. You are amazing, so never undersell yourself. That’s important to me and for you. Bubs, you are so amazing for what you’re doing here tonight and I couldn’t be prouder of you. Yes, a panic attack isn’t nice and it isn’t convenient, but it just helps show how much you care about tonight and it going a success. That must count for something.”

He didn’t say anything for a bit and that was okay. He was most likely getting his thoughts together and mentally preparing himself for the greatest night of his life. You bent your body over so you could hug him, since his back was to your front, and just give him a squeeze to reiterate how proud you are of him.

“Y/N.” Harry spoke quietly, as your body encased his. You embraced his warmth and inhaled the beautiful scent that he was wearing. He both smelt and looked phenomenal.

“Yes bubs.”

“You know I love you right?” Of course you did, but it still made your heart flutter as crazy as the first time he said it to when he tells you now.

“I do.”

“And you know you’re it for me right?”

“Well.. I—” You didn’t want to get too ahead of yourself.

“Because you are.” Harry turned himself around, making you sit up so he could move. He was lying with his head facing upwards now, face looking less red and puffy, and staring right into the souls of your eyes. He looked magical. Beautiful. He thought the same of you. “And,” he moved his fingers to take off his S ring from Gucci, that probably cost more than your annual salary, and place it onto your ring finger of your right hand, “I give you this as a promise to share my last name with you someday.”

Seeing the initial of his last name sat on the finger opposite to the one he claimed he would one day put two more rings on, brought you to tears. “Harry…” You didn’t know what to say, you were speechless. You had never expected for him to do something as monumental as this and had never experienced it before to know how to react.

Of course you’d always dreamt of marrying him and being his for eternity, but never thought of it possibly becoming your reality. Now, Harry was completely devoting himself to you and only you and it suddenly all felt like the dream was settling in place.

“I swear to you Y/N, i’ll love you until the next lifetime and i’ll find you again. I love you so much, I can’t even tell you how much because it is so infinite. You’re so kind and patient with me and you see me for me, not for the Harry Styles, just Harry. I’ll never let a day pass without you on my mind and I think it’s because you were always meant to be mine. My heart is yours.” He smiled once he noticed you were crying, moving one of his hands up to wipe the tears away.

“How do I top that?” You whispered to him, but mostly to yourself. Both of you laughed.

“Just tell me you love me.”

“I do. I do love you Harry.” You nodded and then he sealed your confirmation with a kiss to his lips. You rested your hand upon his cheek, placing the coolness of the S ring upon his cheekbone, as he placed his hand under your chin to guide you into the kiss. He tasted divine and you smiled knowing that you got to have him like this, taste him like this, for the rest of your beating hearts’ days.

[itsallyscorner]

just like magic with marvel cast, the vibe is----- a perfect song for a lil b*tch with a good heart and a sarcastic mouth

just like magic is the song we ALL need for 2020😌 Start manifesting ya’ll🖤 Also thank you sm for the request I am so so sorry this took so freakin’ long😭 Love u, happy reading🖤🖤 Tried to add my own lil twist to your request:)

(A lil different from the request, but I tried to make the reader have a bit sas.)

💌.

just like magic

Growing up within the Marvel Cinematic Universe was probably one of things you were most grateful for. When you first started out you weren’t that social. You were new to the business, you didn’t know anybody and you were intimidated by every single actor you crossed paths with.

At first you didn’t feel like you fit in. You felt as if you were a burden to everyone else. You barely talked to anyone which made the others approach you out of force by the Russos. Everyone around you was talented while you were just some newcomer who had jack shit as experience. The first few years you were insecure of yourself mentally and physically. You weren’t as pretty or fit as the other women in the MCU nor did your skills live up to theirs. Which led to some unhealthy habits. Plus there were haters and movie critics who would say horrible things about you and your acting.

You had a rocky start unlike Tom Holland and even Lexi Rabe. Until one day when you realized that you had to change how you were thinking. It took you a while but all that negative thinking you were doing was only bringing you negative energy. So when you had a break from filming movies, your number one goal was to improve yourself.

Wake up in my bed, I just wanna have a good day (Mmm, ah)

Think it in my head, then it happens how it should, ayy

Twelve o'clock, I got a team meeting, then a meditation at like 1:30

Then I ride to the studio listening to some shit I wrote (Oh)

You woke up with smile on your face in a sense of calmness. The sun shined bright hues into your room as you got up from your bed. Today was the first day back on set. You guys were finally filming Civil War and you were honestly so excited. As you did your morning routine, you went over how the day would go in your head. You’re genuinely excited to see the entire cast. It has been almost half a year since you’ve seen everyone and you couldn’t wait to be back.

You took one last look at yourself in the mirror. Compared to the previous year, you looked and felt healthy. Your eyes shined and you looked well relaxed. You know like one of those face cleanser commercials? That’s how you felt. You felt like a breath of fresh air.

The ride to the studio took a good 30 minutes but it felt like seconds. You entered the set with a new sense of confidence and pride. The energy was practically radiating off you.

“(Y/n)?” You hear someone call from behind you. You turn around and see Scarlett looking at you.

“Hey!” You greet her as you approach her. You pulled her into a hug, startling her.

“Oh! Hello to you too, honey.” She laughed as she wrapped her arms around you. “How are you?”

“I’m doing great! Life’s been good.” You answer as a toothy grin graces itself on your face. Scarlett’s eyes are filled with shocked. From the previous times she’s talked to you she’s never seen you so loud or open. You were always shy and closed off from everyone on set.

Good karma, my aesthetic (Aesthetic)

Keep my conscience clear, that's why I'm so magnetic

Manifest it (Yeah), I finessed it (I finessed it)

Take my pen and write some love letters to Heaven

Eventually everyone on set caught on to your new attitude. Though they tried to be discreet about their reactions and shocked expressions, you could still see how they were caught off guard by your sudden change of nature.

Anthony watched as you conversed with Elizabeth and Scarlett on the couch in Robert’s “village” . You were probably the most smiliest person in the room beating Evans, who was eating his lunch.

“She’s like different. But in a good way. It’s like she’s bloomed.” Anthony thought out loud to the men beside him. Chris (E) and Sebastian look in your direction.

“Bloomed?” Chris snorted as he swallowed his food.

“Yeah, like she’s growing into a woman.” Anthony hummed proudly as he went back to his own lunch. Sebastian smiled at you, “I think she’s gained some confidence in herself and finally realized how good of a person she is.”

“If she’s finally realized that, I’m glad she did. She’s like a ball of sunshine, it’s adorable.” Chris smiled proudly at you as your hands move around animatedly while explaining some story to the two women in front of you.

“Y’all think it’s a boy?” Anthony wondered. Sebastian rolled his eyes at his friend. Before he can even respond Anthony is calling you over. You approach the men with a smile and take a seat beside Sebastian.

“What’s up?” You greet them. Chris nods at you as he chews on his sandwich. Sebastian greeting you with a quiet “hey”.

“So who’s the lucky man?” Anthony asks teasingly. Your brows knit together head tilting to the side.

“Man?”

“Yes man, or boy, whatever. Who’s got you feelin’ yourself, (y/n).” Anthony wiggles his brows as he shimmies closer to you. Sebastian, who’s in between you two, cringes at the man to his left.

You didn’t take any offense to the question, knowing that everyone was curious as to why you were so unlike yourself.

You chuckled before smirking at the older man, “Anthony, honey. I don’t need a man to be feelin’ myself. I did this on my own.”

Chris and Sebastian’s mouth drop at your answer. Chris laughed as he pointed out Anthony’s face. Sebastian slung an arm around your shoulder bringing you into a side hug as he laughed with Chris.

“To be fair” Chris began to say but started to laugh, “To be fair, you deserved that.” Anthony’s face went flushed as he nodded to himself. You suddenly felt bad that you put him on the spot.

“Alright, stop laughing at him.” You playfully glare at Chris and Seb. You poke Anthony’s arm, “To answer your question, I’ve just been working on myself. Thinking more positively, I even tried manifestation.”

“You know what, that’s good. You’re taking care of yourself mentally and physically. I’m proud of you for doing this for yourself, we all are.” Anthony tells you as he motions to the two other men.

You look at all three of them, all of them looking at you with pride, “Thanks guys.”

Just like magic (Baby), just like magic (Oh yeah)

Middle finger to my thumb and then I snap it

Just like magic (Yeah), I'm attractive (Oh yeah)

I get everything I want 'cause I attract it (Oh)

As the months passed, the more you evolved into another version of you. You walked with determination, carried yourself with such grace and you’ve gained confidence in your career. You didn’t let your insecurities get to you, instead you faced them and overcame them. You were tired of letting them control you.

Your change in attitude and perspective on life has definitely affected your life in many ways. Manifestation was one of the things that have helped you the most. Writing about your goals and putting that energy out to the world has helped you persevere in your job. You’ve only faced good karma; sending out positive energy and receiving it back from the universe.

So far you’ve been casted in two new projects and have a campaign lined up with Gucci. If you were told a year ago that you’d be working with big time directors and freakin’ Gucci, you wouldn’t have believe them. Life has been unreal ever since you decided to change your life around. But of course you had to thank your Marvel family, without them and their support you probably wouldn’t haven gotten to where you were today.

Looking at my phone, but I'm tryna disconnect it (Oh yeah)

Read a fuckin' book, I be tryna stay connected (Yeah)

Say it's tricky at the top, gotta keep a slim ego for a thick wallet

Losing friends left and right, but I just send 'em love and light (Oh)

As many people recognized your success many people still tried to pull you down. Some fans on social media have noticed your change in behavior and have even praised you for practicing self care. While others still tried to push you off the mountain of success you were currently on and drag you across the ground.

These were the reasons as to why you were barely on your phone anymore. You used to be invested in your phone but after realizing how much negativity it brought you, you’ve decided to slowly disconnect from it. Which led you to becoming more interested into books.

Chris (E) had even brought some of his favorite arts of literature for you to borrow. You were currently on your third book of his, Sapiens A Brief History of Humankind by Yuval Noah Harari. You were sitting outside your trailer in a fold up chair under the shade. Your peacefulness was interrupted by Tom (Holland) who had a worried expression on his face.

“Have you not seen it yet?” He asked you as soon as he was in front of you. Being the two most youngest actors on the current set, you guys were closer to each other than with the adults.

“Seen what, Tommy?” You put a finger in between the pages you were reading to save your spot. Tom pulls his phone out and began to type. He tapped on his screen and turned the screen to you.

“She’s been talking crap about you for days.” You read the article and saw that one of your “friends”, Sabrina has been speaking out about your success and how it’s changed you as a person.

“She’s going off about how the more money you get in your wallet, the more bratty and arrogant you become.” He grumbled as he turned his phone off.

“I could care less, honestly. I know I haven’t done anything to her and if I did I was unaware of it. Plus, she stopped talking to me after I said I couldn’t get her a part in a movie.” You shrugged as you placed a proper bookmark in the book.

“You’re not upset?”

“I mean it’s sad that she’s acting so two faced. But if that’s how she wants to roll, then be my guest. It’s her loss, not everyone has great taste.” You flicked a piece of hair away from your face with your hand.

“You’re not gonna release a statement against her?”

“No, probably just wish her well with her life and move on with my own.” You answered much to Tom’s dismay.

Redesign your brain, we gon' make some new habits

Just like magic (Just like magic), just like magic

Filming has officially ended a few months ago and now you guys were doing press tour for Civil War. Before you were the new and improved version of yourself, you dreaded press tours. Some interviewers were nice and respectful, but there were those who would ask inappropriate questions and were just rude in general. All you could remember during those past tours was wanting to leave those rooms as soon as possible.

The q&a panel at New York had a packed room. There were many journalist crowded in the room shoulder to shoulder. You were sat in between Elizabeth and Scarlett, two of the women who have been guiding you and teaching you about life as a woman in the business. They were also like your older sisters.

The panel had been going smoothly for the first half hour until a man with a snobby face and cocky demeanor approached the mic.

“Hello, I’m Keith and my question’s for (y/n).” He began. You nodded in his direction, motioning for him to continue.

“I think everyone’s noticed how you’ve changed and developed as a person. Obviously something’s changed in your life. So I want to know if you’ve had any intimate relationships with any of the men in the cast?” You were surprised at the man’s question. First it was bold of him to ask such a question and second it was just disrespectful to you and the others on the cast.

“I mean someone’s gotta be fucking you good to make you crawl out your shell.” The man finished shrugging nonchalantly. Robert was about to interject but your mouth was quicker than his. The men of the cast were disgusted at the man while they sat at the edge of their seats.

“Well last time I checked my contract, my job was to act, not sleep around with the men who are part of these movies.” You spoke into the mic. All the attention was on you while the room was at a standstill.

“It’s also very upsetting that you think a girl needs to be fucked in order to be confident in herself. I hate to break it to you but women are completely capable of turning their lives around without the help of men and that says a lot about you, sir. So if I were you, I’d take myself back to my seat and rethink my life because if one of us has to redesign our brains it’s you.” You finished as you placed your mic on your lap. The room was silent until the cast began to clap. This was your first time standing up for yourself, usually Robert or Scarlett would swoop in and save you but this time, you were saving yourself.

You shook your head as you blushed, shoving your head in your hands. You felt some pats on the backs and cheers from your dysfunctional family. You look up and see Scarlett and Elizabeth smiling at you proudly.

“Isn’t she amazing?” Robert asked the crowd as he hugged you. The crowd cheering you on.

Just like magic, your life felt like a dream come true, knowing that you were worth it and enough for the people around you and for yourself.

[bookishofalder]

Rainy Days

Spencer x Reader

Request: @starwithoutdarkness - Hey! I heard you were looking for requests! Maybe Spencer Reid x reader fake dating fluff? Combined with Request: @paulaern  - Hello!  What about Spencer Reid x reader when they realizes they love each other? Like reader makes something for Spencer and he thinks like "I can't deny anymore, I'm completely and hopeless in love with her" or something like that  (G!neutral if you want)

A/N: Thank you so much for sending in requests! Hope this makes you smile!

Warnings: Swearing, moderate BAU violence, creepy men, fluffiest fluff, intense headache description. Set randomly post prison Reid but Hotch is still there because he should have been! WC-2,488

Spencer was staring at the geo-profile he had been working on all day, very glad to be inside. The weather in Seattle had stayed consistently rainy for the two days the BAU team had been in town assisting in catching a killer, who had been committing serial robberies/murders with no apparent rhyme or reason. And while Spencer didn’t mind the rain, he did mind loud, busy cities. Combined, they usually led to a headache that would take a day or two to recover.

The door to the conference room he was working alone in burst open and slammed shut so suddenly he nearly jumped out of his skin, turning to see-

You.

Spencer hated it when you appeared without warning, catching him entirely off guard and presenting the risk that you would notice the visible effort it took for him to compose himself around you.

While he’d noticed how beautiful and hilarious and empathetic you were the moment you joined the team, he’d fallen in love with you when you had your first case with them. Spencer had begun to ramble about the specifics of casinos, and how ‘beating the house’ was nearly impossible, when the rest of the team had tuned out. A temporary member, Agent Seaver, had sneered ‘I’m sorry I asked.” Effectively shutting him up. But then you had turned in your seat next to him and, after shooting Seaver a look had asked him to continue. And though he didn’t have that much more to say, and it wasn’t all that interesting, you listened to every single word and thanked him.

It had been years since that had happened, your friendship had blossomed into best friends, something Spencer cherished immensely. This was partly why he shoved his feelings down. The relationship did not need to change for Spencer to remain happy; as long as he got to spend time with you at work, or watch movies and make tent forts in his living room. And visit his mom (who adored you and always gave you book recommendations that you would be sure to read the moment you could), or go to comic conventions and museums...yes, as long as he could always do those things with you, he was happy.

No need to risk changing a perfect thing.

Now though, you were shutting the door and giving him your most panicked look, wide-eyed, with your hair damp from the rain you no doubt had run through to get inside, accounting for your breathlessness. If it weren’t for the worry that had sprung up inside of him upon seeing your expression, he would have fixated on how beautiful you looked at that moment.

“Spencer, you’re my boyfriend.” You whisper yelled at him, quickly stepping closer and setting your bag down on the conference table.

“Wha-“ He began, but you cut him off frantically.

“I’ll explain-just, oh fuck-“

Spencer stood frozen to the spot as the door reopened and one of the senior detectives sauntered in, a friendly smile somewhat overshadowed by the almost predatorial glint in his eyes. You awkwardly stepped closer to Spencer, raising a hand in hello.

“Agent (Y/L/N), great to see you’re back, I was hoping to catch you before the end of the day!” He said merrily, placing two hands on the back of the nearest chair. Something about the way his hands gripped the chair made Spencer feel...on edge.

You gave the fakest little giggle Spencer had ever heard from you, “Oh, nice to see you too Detective! Just had to catch up with Agent Reid here...”

When his eyes moved from you to assess Spencer briefly, he felt a protective force rear up, instincts entirely at alert. Without hesitating, he casually draped an arm over your shoulder, brushing some hair back as he did, and replied, “And you promised we could get some coffee from the Starbucks down the road, hon.”

He enjoyed the way your cheeks flushed and noticed the pulse in your neck pick up. You glanced up at him, trying to look coy but he knew you too well and could see you were partly surprised, and also trying not to laugh.

“Um, of course, I nearly forgot, babe, let’s go in about 5-unless, did you need something specific, Detective?” She broke off to glance back at the now scowling man, who gave an annoyed jerk of his head before stomping back out of the room.

Once the door banged closed behind him, you let out the biggest sigh of relief, raising a hand to your face in dismay.

Spencer hadn’t removed his arm yet, “I’m assuming I just helped you avoid being asked out, but why-?”

“Uhg, Spencer, I’ve already turned him down TWICE since we’ve arrived! He’s literally the kind of dude who doesn’t take no for an answer unless another man has some fucking misogynistic claim over the woman!” You exclaimed, before moving to stand right in front of Spencer and lean just your head to his chest, staring down at the floor, “I hate everything.”

Spencer laughed, patting your back softly, but internally making note that he wouldn’t be letting you go anywhere alone for the rest of this case-that detective gave him the creeps. And while you were beyond capable of protecting yourself, he just knew he wouldn’t be able to focus on anything if he thought you could be hurt.

“Well, just so we’re clear I would never want to be called ‘babe’ in a relationship.” He joked and the desired effect was his immediate reward when you lifted your head and giggled-your genuine, beautiful little giggle-and then grinned.

“Spencer, you called me ‘hon’ like we were 70.”

Spencer considered a moment, “We could be, you’ll be Gladys and I’ll be-“

“Winston!” You supplied eagerly, and he frowned at you, trying not to laugh.

“Winston?”

“It’s really very dignified, the kind of name where people call you ‘sir’.” You replied cheekily, and while Spencer grinned, a part of him felt a swoop of pleasure when your lips formed the word ‘sir’.

He decided very quickly that he liked the idea of you calling him that. And then, just as swiftly dismissed that train of thought and chastised himself.

As you both stood together and laughed, the door swung open and Hotch and the team followed him in, all in various stages of the results of exposure to the rain, looking equally grim. Spencer and you abruptly stopped when you saw their expressions and launched back into work mode seamlessly.

———

Two days later, the team was closing in on the unsub and everyone was on high alert. Taking the profile and applying it to the geo-profile he had been working on, Spencer had narrowed down this grubby old apartment that sat above a nightclub as the most likely spot the unsub was staying at. Of course, they were arriving at night which meant the club was busy and loud, people lined up out the doors waiting for their chance to enter, pay too much for a drink and grind their bodies against strangers.

Spencer’s headache from the unforgiving rain was thrumming now with the music that seemed entirely unencumbered by the walls of the stairwell, the team slowly climbing. It was bad enough that his eyes narrowed somewhat, but he didn’t lose focus.

You were behind him, watching his six as Hotch and Morgan approached the door ahead and prepared to breach. Spencer slipped a hand behind his back and, on cue, you’re pinky wrapped with his. A brief promise to each other, ‘I’ve got you.’.

They had anticipated violence and heavy arms, so when their announcement was met with silence and the door was kicked open, the tactical response was to secure positions and carefully proceed. Agents and SWAT members lined the building and were, at that moment, securing the club below to ensure the unsub couldn’t flee into a room full of potential hostages.

Spencer and you were the third pair to enter, quickly moving ahead of the others to secure more rooms, eyes peeled for movement. The floor was covered in litter and random spots of dirt and dried substances. It smelled like body odour and axe body spray-which immediately went to Spencer’s headache and caused it to throb in protest.

“Freeze!”

You had shouted right as Spencer noticed the movement from a back room down the hall, as the unsub leaned out and, not abiding by the command, opened fire. Spencer grabbed you and swung you both behind the wall of the kitchen, out of the line of fire while he shouted the unsubs location.

You recovered quickly, dropping to the ground and leaning out to return fire as Hotch and Morgan ran across to the living room to join the battle. It only took a few moments after that before Morgan managed to get a shot to the suspect's shoulder and he fell with a cry of anguish.

You popped up from the ground, watching as Prentiss and Rossi moved forward to secure the man, and barked into your radio for medics to come in.

Spencer, meanwhile, was reeling. When the shots in the room had all joined together in a cacophony, sound and noise piercing his skull, it had converted to pain and panic in his skull, overwhelming him. He had used his own body to shield yours when he pulled you with him into the wall, and the caution he took with you meant he hadn’t caught himself carefully enough, his head bouncing lightly off of the stone wall.

Which, on a normal day would have simply been annoying. But today, with a headache so severe he was beginning to get spots in his vision, it was detrimental. The scene was secure, so he allowed his eyes to shut, a meagre reprieve but at least it was something, at least he didn’t have to see the beams from the flashlights or the pulsing of the neon signs outside of the windows...

“Winston, take my hand.” Your voice was so, so soft. Spencer let his mouth open slightly, a small rush of air all he managed, trying to say ‘I can’t-it hurts, make it stop’ but you grasped his hand tightly and pulled and he followed, his other hand reaching and grabbing that back of your vest, he let you lead him.

He knew from the reduced foot traffic of agents and crime scene workers that you were taking the rear exit, a stairwell that was narrower than the main. He peeked through his lashes to take the stairs, and then suddenly, the cool night air hit him and the door was closing behind you both.

You kept walking with purpose, leading Spencer further away from the loud building. The rain spattered his face but with each step the noise reduced and after a short walk it became relatively quiet.

“Sit.” You murmured, halting. Spencer opened his eyes and saw that you had led him to the farthest spot in the parking lot from the building, where trees lined the lot along a community park that was probably utilized by vagrants and drug dealers more than families. But there was a bench, and you were waiting for him to take a seat. You had pulled out a compact, expandable emergency rain shield from one of the pockets on your FBI utility belt and tossed it on the bench, protecting you both from soaking your underwear.

Spencer sat, setting his elbows on his legs and leaning forward with his hands pressed to his face. He took deep, steadying breaths as you joined him, your hand on the back of his neck. At first, he thought you were just resting it there because his FBI vest would have prevented him from feeling your hand on his back, however, a moment later it was joined by your other hand and a very cold object.

Resisting the urge to pull away, he gasped at the contact, “What-?”

“On-the-go cold compress, Doctor.” You explained, leaving it in place and then rummaging again. Spencer wanted to look but the compress, combined with the quiet, was already doing wonders. He continued to take deep breaths.

“When you’re ready, try this.” You said softly, pressing something to his hand. Opening his eyes, he saw a mini flask that had his name written on the side.

He turned his head slowly so as not to move the compress and met your eyes, which were assessing him with concern. “(Y/N), when did we start drinking on the job?”

You giggled quietly, “It’s just water mixed with this like, vitamin powder that’s supposed to be good for rehydrating you quickly. I did some research on how to help headaches like yours on the go, just in case, and I made this ‘Spencer’ care bag.” You rambled a little when he didn’t reply.

Spencer looked back at the flask and opened it, quickly downing the contents. It tasted pretty fruity and he realized he was thirsty, this taking the edge off.

“Is it okay?” You asked. Spencer raised his head and met your eyes, searching them.

He was overwhelmed, the headache already fading, in its place an intensely warm feeling building inside of him as he considered the time and effort you had taken to care for him. He hadn’t asked you, or hinted, you had just taken it on to find a way to help him and you were right there when he needed you the most.

You had always been there when he needed you. When he had been shot protecting Blake, when he struggled to care for his mother, when he had gone to prison, when he was freed, you were there.

The words tumbled out, unable to be contained a second longer.

“I am hopelessly in love with you.”

Your mouth opened and closed in surprise, taken entirely off guard. Though he worried what you would say, he couldn’t deny the relief he felt having finally said it out loud. He watched patiently as your mind processed his confession, holding his breath.

“I-Spencer,” And then suddenly your lips were pressing into his and the pain from his headache ceased entirely. Spencer was consumed by the feel of you against him, of your hands holding his face and the hum of content you gave when he returned your passion, dropping his flask and sliding his hands up your neck, gripping tenderly.

After what could have been hours, weeks, or years, you both broke apart, pulling back just enough to make eye contact without your eyes crossing. Neither of you let go, your breath puffing out in wisps in the cold night air.

“I love you too,” You breathed, “I could grow old with you, Winston.”

Spencer laughed, relief and happiness swooping through him at your words, “Gladys, I couldn’t imagine anything more perfect.”

Did you enjoy this story? Please consider reblogging or commenting to ease my inner turmoil as a writer. Likes are basically just a bookmark!

You grinned back at Spencer, and then he kissed you again.

[limenysnocket]

Cartoon Warfare

Summary: You and Taika are arguing over which you think the best Studio Ghibli movie is.

Warnings: Light swearing. Dropping another fluff on y'all.

A/N: Alright @honorarytenenbaum . Totoro Taika is among us. I plan to make this nice and soft.

“I can’t believe you would say that. I liked you before you said that.”

You roll your eyes at Taika’s wine-drunk statement. His cheeks are flushed with pink, and he has dramatically thrown his leg across his other. His red wine is sloshing around in his glass, and he may as well have taken the rest of the bottle, because very little was even left after you two got to it.

All the lights had been turned off except for a few candles in the kitchen keeping the house smelling good, while lit enough for two drunk adults to make their way back and forth for an endless amount of microwaved popcorn.

“Oh, come on, Spirited Away has to be one of the best Studio Ghibli films ever. I’m positive everyone has seen it,” you argue back with him, raising up your hands, sending a few pieces of buttery popcorn stuck to your fingers flying. Taika scoffs and sinks lower into his seat, just to make sure you were eye level with his Totoro stocking cap.

“I say that you’re wrong,” his voice gets a little higher and his head bobs side to side, to add some kind of emphasis to his speech. “My Neighbor Totoro has to be the best Studio Ghibli film of all time, and that is final. My hat says so. Plus, I don’t see any No-Face stocking caps that are as cool as mine circling the internet. So, ha!” He breathed heavily in your face, grinning wide. You flap your hands in front of your face to get rid of the smell, giggling to yourself.

“You are so making that up,” you huff, grabbing your phone and opening google. You frantically type in and search for any Studio Ghibli themed stocking caps that could be better than Taika’s. Sure, there were plenty to see, but there wasn’t a single No-Face stocking cap in sight. You feel the weight of his head nestle on your shoulder and a low, sarcastically whimpered hum leaves his lips.

“Aw, would you look at that,” he heckles in your ear and you squirm and squeal as he makes baby noises in your ear too close for comfort. He does two rounds of a sing-song voice, “My stocking cap is better,” off beat, and to a random tune. He leans back in his seat again with a nice, long sigh, and he tosses his arms over the back of his couch, not being too cautious about his wine glass. His eyes gloss over again and stare back at the screen. It was like he had forgotten how colorful, “Howl’s Moving Castle,” really was and he quickly became immersed in it.

You’re still scrolling through your phone, genuinely interested in finding a cute stocking cap so you and Taika could be a team, the next time someone decided to throw a random costume party. Taika lets out a longing groan when Sophie and Howl do something romantic. He sets his wine glass down and slowly lowers himself down on your lap, begging for your attention. He turns on his back and looks directly up at you when you lower your phone. His mustache wiggles side to side by his own devices and he smiles, looking drunk and adorable. You don’t have the heart to resist him, so you set your phone down and give him what he wants.

You hand slowly takes a hold of his cap and you slide it off, seeing the wild forest of curls. You set his cap down beside you and you just run your fingers through his hair. He looks so sweet as he closes his eyes and just hums with the feeling. “Best massage ever,” he giggles beneath his breath and sighs. You shake your head, laughing at his stupid pleasure. 

“You’re such a dork,” you whisper.

“Yeah, but you love me,” Taika grins back up at you, opening his eyes again, just to watch your expressions. He loved your pretty face. “You know what would make this even better, though?” he chimes in, reaching his large hand up and caressing your cheek. He smirks suddenly and pushes his lips out for a kiss, making a few smooching noises. You laugh, still petting his head, and you keep the hair out of his face for him.

He lifts up on his elbows just to be closer to you, and his lips meet yours once you bear through your breaths colliding. The kiss is sloppy, but you feel his sweet intentions through the wetness. His thumb still runs over your cheek and he slowly sits up, getting closer and closer to you until he is practically sitting in your lap. He doesn’t notice and neither do you, since you both never find the time to break away to watch the hell fire and flames going through the television screen and Howl is indubitably saving Sophie and his friends.

Your cheeks ran with red when he finally pulled away. He had a tough time pulling away, actually. It was followed up by many pecks and attempts at pulling you in for another long haul, but you would always turn you head the other way, giggling while he tried to hook your lips with his. Not long after, he had finally noticed the significant amount of weight he had sat on your lap, and he started giggling too.

“I think this situation turned a bit backwards,” he grinned. “See you’re the one supposed to be on my lap.”

You shake your head, eyes hinting with the faintest tint of orange from the television screen. “I think being the dominant one is nice for a change,” you stick your tongue out at him, and he attempts to nip at it.

“Ooh... kinky,” he smirked, obviously wanting to kiss you again, but you were quick to put your hand on his chest. You kissed his forehead.

“Your breath stinks,” you tease him. “You’re gonna have to eat a tictac, brush your teeth, or something... or, you could admit that Spirited Away is better than My Neighbor Totoro.”

He gasps, “Evil woman.” You throw your head back and cackle at him.

“You have to say it sometime,” you whisper, pursing your lips. “You’re lucky I don’t make you call someone and have you say it.”

“First off,” Taika points a finger at you, while getting up from your lap, “fuck you. Second, you couldn’t possibly get someone on the phone this late. Third, I’m gonna go brush my teeth, and I expect to have you in my lap and you make out with me, the moment I come back down stairs.”

You wave your hand at him while he slurred his way around the living room, stumbling slightly and using his phone for a flashlight to get up the stairs. You grab his Totoro cap and put it on, just for fun, and you lean back on the couch again, trying to catch up with the story on the screen, even though it’s nearing the end.

Heavy thumps indicate that Taika is heading back down the stairs. He’s rubbing his eyes and back with a pair of slippers on, instead of his lemon-colored socks. He flops down next to you on the couch and it takes him a moment, in his drunk state, to remember why he went to go brush his teeth in the first place. He pats his lap slowly. Well, it’s more like he slaps his lap twice to get your attention.

You smile, yawn and climb into his lap. You expect to be met with another sloppy kiss, but instead, he just tucks his face into the crook of your neck and takes in the deep scent of your skin. You smile into the air and just stare at the wall while he has his moment, hugging you close. “What happened up there in that bathroom, Taik?” you whisper.

“Well,” he breathes onto your skin after moments of silence, “I started missing you... then I can’t quite remember what happened after that.”

You slip your hand into his hair and scrub at his scalp tenderly, still smiling. “Did you even get to brushing your teeth, Mr. Waititi?” He just groans and buries his face deeper in your neck.

“I don’t remember that either,” he says, then lifts his head up. He leans forward. You know what he wants again. The kisses shared weren’t too long. Many whispers flew through the air, and everything was kept tender and wholesome. Although, a few things did walk a fine line.

He leans back slowly, putting himself flat on the couch. You squeeze in next to him, putting your back against his chest, knowing you both were too tired to get up to anything frisky tonight. He keeps his arms wrapped around you, brushing your hair away and placing random kisses to your cheeks, jaw and neck.

You were the first one to fall asleep, surprisingly, your eyes on the screen as Porco Rosso played and kept you entertained besides the tender kisses placed on your skin from time to time.

Taika has his hands on your stomach, rubbing it softly and wishing you sweet dreams. He buries his nose into your hair, nestling right under his cap that you were wearing, and breathes in deep. He cherished every moment like this that he shared with you. All the playful arguments and heated sessions made a storm rise in his belly. He was so in love with you, you didn’t even understand half of it. He would drive himself half-crazy just trying to write it down, or even find a single word to describe you. Leaving your side felt so painful, even if it was only for a few hours. It was like he couldn’t live without you.

Now, as you lay cuddled right up to his chest, breathing deep and sleeping softly, he snuggles up to you and closes his eyes to sleep.

“I love you...”

[justmenoworries]

Not Up For Interpretation - An Essay On Nonbinary - Erasure

(Trigger Warning: Misgendering, Transphobia, Nonbinary-phobia)

If you’ve been following me for a while, you probably know this was a long time coming. I’ve made several posts about my frustrations concerning this topic and how much it hurt me just how socially accepted erasing an entire identity still is. While representation marches on and things have become better for nonbinary people as a whole, we still battle with a lot of prejudice - both intentional and unintentional.

In this essay, I want to discuss just how our identities are being erased almost daily, why that is harmful and hurtful and what we all can do to change that.

Chapters:

What does Non-binary mean?

Nonbinary- representation in media

So what’s the problem?

How do we fix it?

1. What Does Non-binary Mean?

Non-binary is actually an umbrella term. It includes pretty much every gender-identity that’s neither one or the other so to speak, for example, agender.

Agender means feeling detachment from the gender spectrum in general. If you’re agender, you most likely feel a distance to the concept of gender as a whole, that it doesn’t define you as a person.

There are many identities that classify under non-binary: There’s gender-fluid (you feel you have a gender, but it’s not one gender specifically and can change), demi-gender (identifying as a gender partially, but not completely) and many others.

Sometimes, multiple non-binary identities can mix and match.

Most non-binary people use they/them pronouns, but like with so many things, it varies.

Some nonbinary-people (like me) go by two pairs of pronouns. I go by both she/her and they/them, because it’s what feels most comfortable at the moment. But who knows, maybe in the future I’ll switch to they/them exclusively or expand to he/him.

There is no one defining non-binary experience. Nb-people are just as varied and different as binary people, who go by one specific gender.

There are non-binary people who choose to go solely by she/her or he/him and that’s okay too. It doesn’t make them any more or less non-binary and their identity is still valid.

If your head’s buzzing a bit by now: That’s okay. It’s a complicated topic and no one expects you to understand all of it in one chapter of one essay.

Just know this: If a person identifies as non-binary, you should respect their decision and use the pronouns they go with.

It’s extremely hurtful to refer to someone who already told you that they use they/them pronouns with she/her or he/him, or use they/them to refer to a person who uses she/her.

Think about it like using a trans-person’s deadname: It’s rude, it’s harmful and it shows complete disrespect for the person.

Non-binary people have existed for a very long time. The concept isn’t new. The idea that there are only two genders, with every other identity being an aberration to the norm, is largely a western idea, spread through colonialism.

The Native American people use “Two-Spirit” to describe someone who identifies neither as a man nor a woman. The term itself is relatively new, but the concept of a third gender is deeply rooted in many Native American cultures.

(Author’s Note: If you are not Native American, please do not use it. That’s cultural appropriation.)

In India, the existence of a third gender has always been acknowledged and there are many terms specifically for people who don’t identify with the gender that was assigned to them at birth.

If you’re interested in learning more about non-binary history and non-binary identities around the world, I’d recommend visiting these websites:

https://nonbinary.wiki/wiki/History_of_nonbinary_gender

https://nonbinary.wiki/wiki/Gender-variant_identities_worldwide

https://thetempest.co/2020/02/01/history/the-history-of-nonbinary-genders-is-longer-than-you-think/

https://www.teenvogue.com/story/gender-variance-around-the-world

Also, maybe consider giving this book a try:

Nonbinary Gender Identities: History, Culture, Resources by Charlie Mcnabb

2. Non-binary Representation In Media

The representation of non-binary people in mainstream media hasn’t been... great, to put it mildly.

Representation, as we all know, is important.

Not only does it give minorities a chance to see themselves in media and feel heard and acknowledged. It also normalizes them.

For example, seeing a black Disney-princess was a huge deal for many black little girls, because they could finally say there was someone there who looked like them. They could see that being white wasn’t a necessity to be a Disney princess.

Seeing a canonically LGBT+ character in a children’s show teaches kids that love is love, no matter what gender you’re attracted to. At the same time, older LGBT+ viewers will see themselves validated and heard in a movie that features on-screen LGBT+ heroes.

There’s been some huge steps in the right direction in the last few years representation-wise.

Not only do we have more LGBT+ protagonists and characters in general, we’ve also begun to question and call out harmful or bigoted portrayals of the community in media, such as “Bury Your Gays” or the “Depraved Homosexual”.

With that being said: Let’s take a look at how Non-binary representation holds up in comparison, shall we?

This is Double Trouble, from the children’s show “She-Ra And The Princesses Of Power”.

They identify as non-binary and use they/them pronouns. They’re also  a slimy, duplicitous lizard-person who can change their shape at will.

Um, yeah.

Thanks, but no thanks.

Did I mention they’re also the only non-binary character in the entire show? And that they’re working with a genocidal dictator in most of the episodes they’re in?

Yikes.

Let’s look at another example.

These three (in order of appearance) are Stevonnie, Smoky Quartz and Shep. Three characters appearing in the kid’s show “Steven Universe” and it’s epilogue series “Steven Universe: Future”.

All of them identify as non-binary and use they/them as pronouns.

Stevonnie and Smoky Quartz are the result of a boy and a girl being fused together through weird alien magic.

Shep is a regular human, but they only appeared in one episode. In an epilogue series that only hardcore fans actually watched.

Well, I mean...

One out of three isn’t that bad, right?

Maybe we should pick an example from a series for older viewers.

Say hello to Doppelganger, a non-binary superhuman who goes by they/them, from the Amazon-series “The Boys”.

They’re working for a corrupt superhero-agency and use their power of shape-shifting to trick people who pose a threat to said agency into having sex with them. And then blackmail those people with footage of said sex.

....

Do I even need to say it?

If you’ve paid attention during the listing of these examples, you might have noticed a theme.

Namely that characters canonically identifying as non-binary are either

supernatural in some way, shape or form,

barely have a presence in the piece of media they’re in,

both.

Blink-and-you-miss-it-manner of representation aside, the majority of these characters fall squarely under what we call “Othering”.

“Othering” describes the practice of portraying minorities as supernatural creatures or otherwise inhuman. Or to say it bluntly: As “The Other”.

“Othering” is a pretty heinous method. Not only does it portray minorities as inherently abnormal and “different in a bad way”. It also goes directly against what representation is actually for: Normalizing.

As a general rule of thumb: If your piece of media has humans in it, but the only representation of non-white, non-straight people are explicitly inhuman... yeah, that’s bad.

So is there absolutely no positive representation for us out there?

Not quite.

As rare as human non-binary characters in media are to find, they do exist.

Here we have Bloodhound! A non-binary human hunter who uses they/them pronouns, from the game “Apex Legends”.

It’s been confirmed by the devs and the voice actress that they’re non-binary.

Nice!

These are Frisk (bottom) and Chara (top) from the game “Undertale”. While their exact gender identity hasn’t been disclosed, they both canonically use they/them pronouns, so it’s somewhere on the non-binary spectrum.

Two human children who act as the protagonist (Frisk) and antagonist (Chara), depending on how you play the game. (Interpretations vary on the antagonist/protagonist-thing, to say the least.)

Cool!

......

And, yep, that’s it.

As my little demonstration here showed, non-binary representation in media is rare. Good non-binary representation is even rarer.

Which is why those small examples of genuinely good representation are so important to the Non-binary community!

It’s hard enough to have to prove you exist. It’s even harder to prove your existence is not abnormal or unnatural.

If you’d like to further educate yourself on representation, it’s impact on society and why it matters, perhaps take a second to read through these articles:

https://www.criticalhit.net/opinion/representation-media-matters/

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/arts/why-on-screen-representation-matters-according-to-these-teens

https://jperkel.github.io/sciwridiversity2020/

https://www.forbes.com/sites/quora/2019/05/22/why-is-equal-representation-in-media-important/?sh=25f2ccc92a84

https://www.theodysseyonline.com/why-representation-the-media-matters

3. So What’s The Problem?

The problem, as is the case with so many things in the world, is prejudice.

Actually, that’s not true.

There’s not a problem, there are multiple problems. And their names are prejudice, ignorance and bigotry.

Remember how I said human non-binary representation is rare?

Yeah, very often media-fans don’t help.

Let’s take for example, the aforementioned Frisk and Chara from “Undertale”.

Despite the game explicitly using they/them to refer to both characters multiple times, the majority of players somehow got it into their heads that Frisk’s and Chara’s gender was “up for interpretation”.

There is a huge amount of fan art straight-up misgendering both characters and portraying them as binary and using only he/him or she/her pronouns.

The most egregious examples are two massively popular fan-animated web shows: “Glitchtale”, by Camila Cuevas and “Underverse” by Jael Peñaloza.

Both series are very beloved by the Undertale-fanbase and even outside of it. Meaning for many people, those two shows might be their first introduction to “Undertale” and it’s two non-binary human characters.

Take a wild guess what both Camila and Jael did with Frisk and Chara.

Underverse, X-Tale IV:

(Transcript: “Frisk lied to me in the worst possible way... I... I will never forgive him.”)

Underverse, X-Tale V:

(Transcript: “I-It’s Chara... and it’s a BOY.”)

Glitchtale, My Promise:

(Transcript: (Referring to Frisk) “I’m not scared of an angry boy anymore.”)

Glitchtale, Game Over Part 1:

(Transcript: (Referring to Chara) “It’s ok little boy.”)

This... this isn’t okay.

Not only do both of these pieces of fan-art misgender two non-binary characters, the creators knew beforehand that Frisk and Chara use they/them-pronouns, but made the conscious choice to ignore that.

To be fair, in a video discussing “Underverse”, Jael said that only X-Tale Frisk and Chara, the characters you see in the Underverse-examples above, are male, while the characters Frisk and Chara from the main game remained non-binary and used they/them (time-stamp 10:34).

Still, that doesn’t erase the fact that Jael made up alternate versions of two non-binary characters specifically to turn them male. Or that, while addressing the issue, Jael was incredibly dismissive and even mocked the people who felt hurt by her turning two non-binary characters male. Jael also went on to make a fairly non-binary-phobic joke in the video, in which she equated gender identities beyond male and female to identifying as an object.

Jael (translated): “I don’t care if people say the original Frisk and Chara are male, female, helicopters, chairs, dogs or cats, buildings, clouds...”

That’s actually a very common joke among transphobes, if not to say the transphobe-joke:

“Oh, you identify as X? Well then I identify as an attack helicopter!”

If you’re trans, chances are you’ve heard this one, or a variation of it, a million times before.

I certainly have.

I didn’t laugh then and I’m not laughing now.

(Author’s note: I might be angry at both of them for what they did, but I do not, under any circumstances, support the harassment of creators. If you’re thinking about sending either Jael or Camila hate-mail - don’t. It won’t help.)

Jael’s reaction is sadly common in the Undertale fandom. Anyone speaking up against Chara’s and Frisk’s identity being erased is immediately bludgeoned with the “up for interpretation”-argument, despite that not once being the case in the game.

And even with people who do it right and portray Frisk and Chara as they/them, you’ll have dozens of commenters swarming the work with sentences among the lines of “Oh but I think Frisk is a boy/girl! And Chara is a girl/boy!”

By the way, this kind of thing only happens to Frisk and Chara.

Every other character in “Undertale” is referred to and portrayed with their proper pronouns of she/her or he/him.

But not the characters who go by they/them.

Their gender is “up for interpretation”.

Because obviously, their identity couldn’t possibly be canonically non-binary.

Sadly, Frisk and Chara are not alone in this.

Remember Bloodhound?

And how I said they’d been confirmed as non-binary and using they/them pronouns by both the creators and the voice actress?

It seems for many players, that too translated to “up for interpretation”.

(Transcript: “does it matter what they call him? He, her, it, they toaster oven, it doesn’t matter”)

(Transcript: “I’m like 90 % sure Bloodhound is a dude because he could just sound like a girl and by their age that I’m assuming looks around 10-12 because I’ve known many males who have sounded like a female when they were younger”)

(Transcript: “I don’t care it will always be a He. F*ck that non-binary bullsh*t.”)

(Transcript: “Bloodhound is clearly female.”)

(Transcript: “I’m not calling a video game character they/them”)

(Transcript: “exactly. The face was never fully shown neither was the gender so I’d say it means that the player is Bloodhound. So it’s your gender and you refer to “him” as yourself. It’s like a self insertion in my eyes.”)

So, let me get this straight:

If a character, even a player character, uses she/her or he/him, you can accept it, no questions asked.

But when a character uses they/them, suddenly their identity and gender are “up for interpretation”?

This attitude is also widely prevalent in real life.

Many languages only include pronouns for men and women, with no third option available. Non-binary people are often forced to make up their own terms, because their language doesn’t provide one.

Non-binary people often don’t fit within other people’s ideas of gender, so they get excluded altogether. Worse, non-binary people are often the victims of misgendering, denial of their identity or even straight-up violence when coming out.

People will often tell us that we look like a certain gender, so we should only use one set of gendered pronouns. Never mind that that’s not what we want. Never mind that that’s not who we are.

Non-binary people are also largely omitted from legal documentation and studies. We cannot identify as non-binary at our workplace, because using they/them pronouns is considered “unprofessional”. We don’t have our own bathrooms like men and women do. Our gender is seen as less valid than male and female, so even that basic thing is denied to us. I’ve had to use the women’s restroom my entire life, because if I go into a male restroom, I’ll be yelled at or made fun off or simply get told I took the wrong door. It’s extremely uncomfortable for me and I wish I didn’t have to do it.

And since non-binary people aren’t seen as “real transgender-people”, we often don’t receive the medical care we need. This often renders us unable to feel good within our bodies, because the treatment and help we get is wildly inadequate.

It’s especially horrible for intersex people (people who are born with sex characteristics that don’t fit solely into the male/female category) who are often forced to change their bodies to fit within the male/female gender binary.

And you better believe each of those problems is increased ten-fold for non-binary people of color.

We are ignored and dismissed as “confused”, because of who we are.

Representation is a way for Non-binary people to show the world they exist, that they’re here and that they too have stories to tell.

But how can we, when every character that represents us is either othered, barely there or gets taken away from us?

We are not “up for interpretation”.

Neither are the characters in media who share our identity.

And it’s time to stop pretending we ever were.

For more information about Non-Binary Erasure and how harmful it is, you can check out these articles:

https://everydayfeminism.com/2015/08/common-non-binary-erasure/

https://www.dailydot.com/irl/nonbinary-people-racism/

https://nonbinary.wiki/wiki/Nonbinary_erasure

https://traj.openlibhums.org/articles/10.16995/traj.422/

https://medium.com/an-injustice/everyday-acts-of-non-binary-erasure-49ee970654fb

https://medium.com/national-center-for-institutional-diversity/the-invisible-labor-of-liberating-non-binary-identities-in-higher-education-3f75315870ec

https://musingsofanacademicasexual.wordpress.com/2015/05/11/dear-sirmadam-a-commentary-on-non-binary-erasure/

4. How Do We Fix It?

Well, first things first: Stop acting like we don’t exist.

And kindly stop other people from doing it too.

We are a part of the LGBT+ community and we deserve to be acknowledged, no matter what our pronouns are.

Address non-binary people with the right pronouns. Don’t argue with them about their identity, don’t comment on how much you think they look like a boy or a girl. Just accept them and be respectful.

If a non-binary person tells you they have two sets of pronouns, for example he/him and they/them, don’t just use one set of pronouns. That can come off as disingenuous. Alternate between the pronouns, don’t leave one or the other out. It’ll probably be hard at first, but if you keep it up, you’ll get used to it pretty quickly.

If you’re witnessing someone harass a non-binary person over their identity, step in and help them.

And please, don’t partake in non-binary erasure in media fandoms.

Don’t misgender non-binary characters, don’t “speculate” on what you think their gender might be. You already know their gender and it’s non-binary. It costs exactly 0 $ to be a decent human being and accept that.

Support Non-Binary people by educating yourself about them and helping to normalize and integrate their identity.

In fact, here’s a list of petitions, organizations and articles who will help you do just that:

https://www.change.org/p/collegeboard-let-students-use-their-preferred-name-on-collegeboard-9abad81a-0fdf-435c-8fca-fe24a5df6cc7?source_location=topic_page

6 Ways to Support Your Non-Binary Child

7 Non-Negotiables for Supporting Trans & Non-Binary Students in Your Classroom

If Your Partner Just Came Out As Non-Binary, Here’s How To Support Them

How to Support Your Non-Binary Employees, Colleagues and Friends

Ko-fi page for the Nonbinary Wiki

The Sylvia Rivera Project, an organization who aims to give low-income and non-white transgender, intersex and non-binary people a voice

The Anti Violence Project “empowers lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and HIV-affected communities and allies to end all forms of violence through organizing and education, and supports survivors through counseling and advocacy."

The Trans Lifeline, a hotline for transgender people by transgender people

Tl:DR: Non-Binary representation is important. Non-Binary people still suffer from society at large not acknowledging our existence and forcing us to conform. Don’t be part of that problem by taking away what little representation we have. Educate yourself and do better instead. We deserve to be seen and heard.

[msmarvelouswinchester]

Irresistibly Yours

Chapter 2 - Noise Complaint

Summary - Y/N Y/L/N moves to NYC in hopes for a fresh start after a nasty breakup. There she meets her neighbor, the cynical lawyer, Dean Winchester. A love-hate relationship starts evolving between them ever since they met in the elevator one morning but a desperate situation and a string of lies forces the two friendly rivals to go on a date or rather a fake date. Will sparks fly between them when Dean gets to know Y/N real and up close? Will Y/N finally find her Prince Charming in the grumpy, workaholic, divorce lawyer?

Pairing - Lawyer!Dean Winchester x Y/N

Warning - None expect meanie Dean (Suspicious, isn’t it?)

WC - 2154

Square Filled - Don't put me in this position ( @anyfandomgoesbingo​ )

A/N - I promise the next chapter will have more of Dean and more conflict! This is just the beginning of a very long ride. Enjoy!

Beta’d by @miss-nerd95​

Dividers by @firefly-graphics​

Series Masterlist               Masterlist 

The silence in the cab on her way back to her apartment gave her the quality time she needed to think. In a few weeks, Meg was getting married and now, since they knew, Y/N had to show up with her 'boyfriend’. She racked her brain, scrambling to come up with a good excuse because it was all a big lie.

Every time, however, she reached two conclusions - either make a fool of herself and admit that she lied or tell everyone that she broke up and be the one person at the wedding that everyone looks down on with pitiful eyes.

There was a third option, which was risque as hell too, cause Y/N barely knew the man and their first meeting did not go so well, but there was definitely something about him that made her blush every time she thought of him.The way he carried himself and the dominating vibes he gave off, sent shivers down her spine. Maybe he wasn't a morning person and she did start blabbering in the elevator the minute she stepped in. She swallowed hard when she remembered the way her name rolled off his tongue. ‘How did he know?’ She wondered.

As Y/N boarded the elevator, she thought about how, she wanted nothing more than to see a certain green-eyed man again. She had been residing in this complex for almost three months but she had never seen the man before. Maybe he was new here, in this apartment building, who knew? Mind plagued by millions of thoughts, Y/N trudged down the empty hallway to her cosy little home.

“Who invented these fucking heels?” She grumbled as she freed her feet out of the painful, yet pretty high heels when she reached the comfort of her own home. Shrugging her coat off, she relaxed as her ass hit the soft mattress of the couch.

“I need a date in seven weeks.” She said, making a mental note of the wedding date. This was the only wedding she ever looked forward to attending where she knew she wouldn't have to face the constant stream of questions involving her dating life and a particular man. All she ever wanted was to be with her close friend on the best day of her life.

“First dress fitting - tomorrow at 10.” Her phone lit up with an incoming text and groaning, she dropped her head backwards. Y/N couldn't even skip the wedding if she wanted to. She was one of the bridesmaids and it wouldn't be fair to both Meg and Cas, if she didn't attend it. A smile graced her frowning face when she remembered the time Cas proposed to her friend on Valentine's Day. Cliche- Y/N would say, but deep down, she knew she just wanted what Cas and Meg had.

A sigh left her lips as she got up, still in her work clothes. She put on some light music as she went into the bathroom to freshen up. After the long, tiring day she had, a warm bath and a Ryan Gosling movie were very much needed. Quickly stripping off, she stepped into the tub. She leaned her head backwards, closing her eyes, as the warm water soothed her aching body and her troubled mind.

“Romeo, take me somewhere we can be alone,” Y/N sang along the song, slightly off tune but she didn't care, as she stepped out of the bathroom after some time. She let go of the towel wrapped around her body and stepped into a pair of comfortable pjs. Getting a box cold pizza out from her refrigerator, she turned up the volume of the music playing in her apartment.

“He knelt to the ground and pulled out a ring, and said,” Y/N yelled out the chorus when she started to heat up the pizza. Her private singing session, however, was cut short by a sudden knock on the door. She grudgingly pressed pause as she walked up to the door to find out the unwanted visitor.

“Excuse me- Ms L/N?” As soon as she opened the door, she was met by a very familiar, deep baritone that had been haunting her.

“Dean Winchester. And please, call me Y/N,” she breathed out. The formality in Dean’s voice made her cringe. Her eyes fell as she took in the man in front.

Dean had gotten rid of the dapper grey suit and slipped into a much laid back look. A black polo t-shirt fitted over his body and plain blue jeans hugging his bowlegs perfectly. The look on his face mirrored the one from the morning and Y/N wondered if he would look better with a smile on. Her train of thoughts were again rudely interrupted by the man speaking.

“I assume you're having somewhat of a casual evening,” Dean said, his hands waving to point at her pjs, making her suddenly self-conscious of her clothing state.

“Y-yeah. How may I help you?” She asked, genuinely curious.

“See, I moved in the apartment right beside you a few days ago, and I think you might have noticed sometime or the other that there are other people living in this building as well,” Dean said, his face not imparting any sort of emotions, “You might be having a casual evening but I can assure you that there's at least one person who is certainly not. Turn the music level down.”

Y/N’s mouth fell open at Dean’s words but she wasn't going to turn down the volume just because a man turned up at her door, asking her to do so. His words were sharp, but his tone was downright rude, and it was definitely not because he wasn't a morning person. The least he could have done was ask her nicely.

“Well, listen here pal, no one's having a problem, other than you. So you can go back to your room, put on some earplugs and do whatever the heck you were doing before you decided to make my day more awful,” Y/N said, taking a threatening stance with hands on her hips, a deep frown on her face.

“I'll file a noise complaint report against you.” Dean warned with his pointer finger right in front of her eyes.

“It's just music. Learn to appreciate the little things in life.” She said while rolling her eyes.

“I'm a very busy man and I got work to do, alright? And speaking about music, play something actually good like Zeppelin and people will personally come up to thank you. This song is not even a classic.” Dean spat back.

“Believe me or not, everyone is a Swiftie at heart.” She smirked with a sarcastic shrug. Dean’s lips twitched in anger as his face grew more rigid before he said, “If you don't lower the volume, expect a noise complaint report delivered with your newspaper tomorrow.” He walked away before Y/N had a chance to even think of a comeback.

Glancing over his shoulder, Dean went inside his own apartment room right beside Y/N’s. She glared at the empty hallway before swinging her door shut and walked back to her room towards her amazon echo, turning the music down anyway. She couldn't risk getting a report filed against her, and the man appeared to be dead serious about what he threatened to do.

“Stupid Dean Winchester.” She grumbled.

Squinting at the clock, Y/N woke up the next morning to loud bangs on her door. 7:30 am, it read. Removing the covers, she immediately shivered when the cool air hit her bare legs.

Hair still a mess, she grabbed her robe from the nearby chair, putting it on along with her slippers before she warily made her way to the door. “Dean will be complaining now for sure.” She grumbled as she unlocked her door to reveal her friend standing on the other side in a dishevelled state, eyes red like a mad woman.

“Meg?” Her face scrunched up in confusion as the said woman shoved past her into her apartment. “You’re wearing your shirt inside out.” Y/N closed the door behind her as Meg took a seat on the couch.

“Can I have some water?” Y/N dumbfoundedly nodded at her friend’s request and went to her kitchen to retrieve a glassful. Handing the glass over to her, she sat down next to the brunette who gulped down the entire glass of water in one go. Setting the utensil down on the wooden coffee table in front, she turned towards Y/N with slightly glossy eyes as she spoke, “I don’t want to go and finalise the dresses.”

Her words elicited a laugh from Y/N before she said, “Okay, bridezilla, we can reschedule it. Cas should better watch out!” She chuckled out the last words.

“No, y-you don’t understand!” Meg grabbed her friend’s hands, surprising the latter, “I don’t want to try the dress on at all.” Y/N was utterly surprised over her friend's outburst.

“Honey, you have a wedding in less than two months.” Y/N cooed as a few drops of tears rolled down the bride-to-be’s cheeks. “Meg, talk to me. Did something happen between you two?”

The woman shook her head, letting the other lady in the room know that she didn't have to kick Cas’ ass to her relief, but it confused her even further. Since their engagement five months ago, Meg had been over the moon and had started planning every minute detail with high precision and finesse for her big day.

“What if I'm making a huge mistake?”

“Don’t put me in this position. You know how I am when it comes to-”

“But I need to know, and I trust you.”

Y/N pressed her lips into a thin line before she said, “Cas is the best thing that has ever happened to you-”

“You barely even knew me when I started to go out with him. We have only been together for fifteen months - five of which I have spent being engaged to him. What if I regret this later?” Meg's words were correct. Y/N used to barely talk to her when she had started dating Cas, but all through those eighteen months, as she slowly got to know the pair well enough, she knew that they were clearly meant to be in it for the long haul.

“But I have never seen you regret your decision to be with Cas even once… so why start now?.” Y/N politely answered, her hands letting go of her distraught friend's iron-clad grasp and reaching out to soothe her.

“Sometimes even if you have been with your man for what feels like forever, marrying him might seem to be the worst decision you can ever make, but it doesn't matter how long you have been with him. When you know, you know. Follow your heart.” Meg looked up at her as she mulled her words over before speaking.

“I love him.” She said.

“Then go, be with him.” Y/N smiled. Crisis averted.

A smile started to appear on Meg’s tear stained face as her eyes twinkled with a suggestive glimmer in them. Fiddling with her sparkling ring, she said, “Dean’s good for you. Don't let him go.”

Y/N was taken aback by her friend's supposition. She sat up straight in her seat as heat crept up her neck. Her mind was stuck in a turmoil as she tried to come up with an appropriate response.

“He’s not-Dean is not-” She stuttered, the words got stuck in her throat when she tried to think of a decent excuse. Maybe, this was the universe giving her a chance to take back everything she had said before, but the disheartened look on her friend’s face made her rethink her decision. After all, a little white lie never hurt anybody. “Yeah, he is a good man.” Meg smiled as Y/N played her into the deception game once again.

“Will he be at the wedding?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“What are you waiting for? Unless he is a figment of your imagination, ask him! I want to meet this certain Dean Winchester.” Meg giggled.

“I don’t have such vivid imaginations, Meg.” Y/N let out a nervous chuckle. She was now being given an ample amount of opportunities to tell the truth, then why was it so hard for her to deny everything she had said? Maybe she liked living in this utopian world where for once, no one deemed her as the broken, pathetic girl who failed to make a man stay. Maybe deep down, she wanted this damn lie to be true.

“I’ll ask him but you do know how men are about weddings.” She replied, having no knowledge of how to keep her end of the promise.

Chapter 3

Feedback is highly appreciated

If you want to be tagged in the series, lemme know!

[bittydragon]

Tired and Confused

Notes: Lookit! Sleepy bois meeting time! I may have wrote them a bit out of character, but who cares? Tommy and Tubbo don’t get much time in this one shot, I focused this one on the others. I have so many ideas for these as a whole AU. So it’s happening. And I got a couple things planned, one of which turned out a little angsty, whoops- ANYWAYS. Enjoy some sleepy bois with a tiny Wilbur! “You two sure you’re going to be alright while I’m out?” Tommy and Tubbo both looked at him, Tommy much more exasperated than Tubbo. Tubbo just looked apologetic for Tommy’s behavior. He still nodded with a wide grin on his face.

“We’ll be alright, Wilbur! I’ll keep Tommy out of trouble! Promise!”

Wilbur just shook his head and smiled. “That’s good, I’ll be back as soon as I can,” he said, knowing full well that when he returned Tommy will have found some sort of trouble and dragged Tubbo into it despite what Tubbo said. There was no stopping that chaotic duo and genuinely, Wilbur didn’t want to. It’s what made life so much fun for them.

So, despite knowing full well the two boys were going to get in some form of trouble while he was gone, he left for his borrowing run. This run was most definitely not as essential as most of the other runs, he knew it was highly likely that Tubbo may yell at him for this run but he knew he could get back at him for all of his strange outings he would never explain. Seriously, Wilbur was scared that the humans were going to find out about them with how much Tubbo goes out. And Tubbo is far from careful, though Tommy is still arguably worse. Hence why Tommy has his borrowing rights revoked.

But strings and wire were far from the list of essentials in this moment. Wilbur just wanted to make himself a guitar. He had made one for himself a couple of years back when it was just him and Tommy. There was a human child in the house who had the strange instrument and played all the time. He even sang along to the sounds he made, which Wilbur later learned was actually called music. When he learned that Tommy really liked the music as well, Wilbur created a guitar and sang for Tommy whenever he could. He had to leave the original behind when the exterminator was called on them. 

Tommy had started getting stressed out lately. They’ve been in the same house for nearly two years now. They had never been in a house that long without being chased out. And Tommy has also begun to share Wilbur’s uneasiness over how easy it was to just live. Something was obviously off and Wilbur hated it. But Tubbo always insisted that the humans were just painfully oblivious so they continued their way of life.

Wilbur quickly snapped out of his thoughts when he realized he reached the entrance to one of the humans’ rooms. Well, this human was definitely less human than the other one but that changed nothing. He pulled back the loose pink wallpaper and slipped inside.

He began his careful trek to the desk where the string was normally located. He paused at every noise he heard before speeding up to finish his journey faster. When he reached the base of the desk he lifted his hook off his belt and threw it upwards only for it to fall back down. With an annoyed huff he threw it again. 

Only for it to fall again and clock him in the head.

“Ow! What the heck? Just latch you damn thing!” He muttered his angry curses at the hook while rubbing the sore spot on his head. He maneuvered the hook back into throwing position once more. “Third time’s the charm.” And with a hard toss the hook flew up, landed on the desktop, and-

Clocked him on the head again.

“Dang. You’re havin’ a rough time there, little nerd, aren’t ya?”  

Wilbur whipped around, eyes wide, to meet the rather amused gaze of the piglin hybrid. The owner of the room Wilbur was currently trying to borrow from. Oh gods, what will happen to Tommy and Tubbo? How will they know that Wilbur has been caught? He knows he can’t escape, especially not from this one. The other one Wilbur may have had a small chance of escaping but not this one. Not the one who fought other humans for fun. Wilbur hopes that Tommy and Tubbo can take care of themselves. Tubbo probably could, he could take Wilbur’s place. He could-

“Breathe, little buddy, breathe. You can’t do anything in a state like that.” Wilbur hadn’t even noticed how heavy he was breathing. His panic completely overwhelmed him in the moment. His lack of response did something for the human because the next thing Wilbur knew two large, pink tinged hands reached down for him. All Wilbur could do in his panic driven state was fumble backwards and let out a pathetic “stop” as they wrapped around him and lifted him upwards.

The fingers wrapped around him and Wilbur braced himself to have his breath squeezed out of him, but they only laid on him with enough force to keep him from falling. He could leave the grasp if he wanted, but Wilbur wasn’t keen on falling to his death just yet. He looked up to meet the gaze of the piglin hybrid. 

Neither of them spoke for a few minutes. They just remained in a silent standoff with no reward to the winner. The gaze of those red eyes was unnerving but Wilbur found no malice towards him. No greed, no curiosity. Really there wasn’t any emotion Wilbur could find other than the small crease of worry on his face. This piglin was good at hiding emotions.

“So what now?” Wilbur stared up at the hybrid, awaiting his response. He was met with a flash of shock on his face before he once again concealed it into a vague look of disinterest. But Wilbur could find a small hint of relief hidden there. Perhaps because he spoke?

“I’ll just let you go on with your day, I guess.” The hands suddenly began shifting again and Wilbur instinctively grabbed one of the fingers as support as his heart began racing again. The hands suddenly parted and slid him onto the desktop, his initial destination. The piglin then raised his now free hand to the back of his neck and let his gaze wander away. “And I apologize for scaring you. Was not my intention.”

Just as suddenly as he had arrived, he turned around and began walking back out of the room. “Techno, you idiot, borrowers are easily startled. Remember that!” He whispered to himself. Wilbur whipped around at the statement, he doesn’t think he was supposed to hear that. This human, Techno he assumed, knew about borrowers. Wilbur didn’t want to dwell on it for too long, so he quickly located the string and left as fast as he could.

---

“Phil. There’s more.”

“What?” Phil looked over towards Techno, completely confused at what Techno was so worked up over. “There’s more what?”

“Little guys. More borrowers. There are more in the house.”

Phil’s eyes widened. More borrowers? But wouldn’t they have noticed that earlier on? Techno took Phil’s silence as an indicator to continue.

“It’s not just one in the house anymore. Phil, I accidentally met another today. No clue on how many are here now, but the number is now at least two.” Phil mulled it over for a second before speaking. He then shrugged.

“I guess we have more friends to meet then, right Techno?” Silence. “Techno?”

“...Phil. I basically adopted the new one already. I have a new brother now, Phil. He is my new brother, Phil.”

Phil couldn’t help the laugh that escaped him. Techno looked down, ashamed at himself. Phil walked over to his brother and put a hand on his shoulder, trying to stifle his laughter.

“You’re gonna have to tell him- ha- tell him that he’s your brother. And maybe introduce us- oh my god Techno I can’t.” And with that Phil dissolved back into his laughing fit. Techno could only look on as Phil laughed at him. He couldn’t deny that the situation was absurd, but the borrower caught Techno’s attention like nobody else ever has.

And in their conversation, neither of them noticed the shadow move across the kitchen counter and into the wall.

---

“My name is Wilbur, by the way. Just thought you should know your brother’s name. Cause it’s important, Techno.”

Techno could only stare at the borrower who just hauled himself onto the coffee table right before the two brothers could start their movie. Phil could only laugh at the situation playing out in front of him.

“Techno! He knows your name but you don’t know his! What an amazing brother!” Techno glared at his brother on the couch and elbowed him before returning his gaze to his tiny new brother on the table. Wilbur just smiled, and Techno could see the blatant look of no regret plastered over the borrower’s face

When Phil finished laughing, much to Techno’s relief, he turned to the borrower who was still waiting on the table. Phil noted that despite the playful behavior and act of courage, he was still nervously rocking back and forth on his feet. Phil sent him a small smile.

“Good to meet my brother’s other brother, Wilbur. My name is Phil. I’m your new brother’s other brother.” Phil smiled a little wider when Wilbur laughed.

“Don’t say it like that, it sounds weird. Just call me your brother and I’ll call you mine.”

Phil didn’t have a response to that. Techno nudged him with a look that screamed ‘see?’. Phil is also adopting this borrower as his next brother. It’s official, Phil has two brothers now. He snapped back into a more normal train of thought when Wilbur suddenly let out a large yawn. He reached up and covered his mouth with a nervous chuckle.

Techno went to laugh at his brother before getting cut off by a yawn of his own. That was then followed by Phil. They all looked at one another in shock. 

Phil broke the shocked silence. “I guess we are sleepy boys, huh?” That earned him the laughs he was hoping for. Phil noticed that Techno looked towards Wilbur and made some vague motion with his hands that Phil couldn’t decipher. After a moment of contemplation, Wilbur nodded and Techno reached forwards to scoop him into his palms and leaned back on the couch. He deposited the borrower onto his chest and Phil was gladly surprised to see Wilbur relax into it.

Phil was happy to have another member of the family.

Techno was glad to have someone other than Phil trust him like this.

Wilbur was excited to have two more people to call his brothers other than Tommy-

Shit. He still has to tell Tommy and Tubbo.

[fukurodaze]

five stars: part 3 | three words

IT’S EMBARRASSING: a third year cheerleader!reader x second year athlete!suna au

wc: 4.1k warnings: swearing

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you hate mornings. 

they feel restless and empty and full of longing to have something worth waking up to. sometimes it’s hard to even get up when your mind is full and your heart is worried.

but you do not hate suna rintarou. in fact, you’ve learnt a few new things about him.

one, he has a little sister.

two, he has a nice laugh.

three, he is only “occasionally lactose intolerant”, but not if he “tries his best”.

the things you already knew - his volleyball position, birthday, grade, home town - were never brushed up on, but somehow made their way to the forefront of your memory the more time you spent with him. you began to see him as simply ‘suna’, instead of ‘the boy you helped with physics last year’.

you wonder how you ended up spending every morning of the last two weeks with him. he seems nonchalant, almost lazy, when you see him around with his teammates: back slouched and face relaxed almost all the time. yet, when you let him walk you to class, he’s talkative. he’s eager. he’s walking slowly so you can keep up.

it’s a bit of a question for you, why he’s suddenly popped up into your life once more after waking you up on an unlucky monday morning. 

(he had told you that you had slept with your eyes wide open, and it took you some time to process everything as your chest fluttered with embarrassment.)

then again, you’re not complaining.

“if you notice over here,” suna leans into your side, pointing at the phone in your hand as the two of you walk through the school, “there’s a little cockroach at the corner of the room going out.”

“oh my god,” you laugh. the video on suna’s phone displays today’s fight between the miya twins at the gym. 

it’s your third week with him.

now, as he lets you hold his phone, the literal embodiment of all the volleyball team’s blackmail material, there comes the familiar urge of yours to steal a few glances, adjust your hair, or maybe do something absurd and see how he’d react.

it’s a strange feeling. stranger than when he walked you to your classroom once and you, in your half-awake genius, slipped him a tube of your lip balm in the open pocket of his bag in case you didn’t have an excuse to see him again.

“what were they fighting about again?”

suna shrugs, “osamu was having a bad day, and atsumu got pissed, so, naturally, osamu got pissed.”

“shit. everyone was crowding around i couldn’t even see them throwing punches,” you mutter.

“anything that the twins do usually gets a crowd, really.”

you pass the phone back to him. “yeah, the twins are crazy popular. especially with the girls. they’re like idols.”

“right,” suna pockets his phone, “you’re popular too.”

your brows are furrowed. “stop it.”

suna playfully tenses his shoulders up, hands shoved in his trouser pockets, “you’re, like, the kind of person that organises the culture festival and is like the secretary for the student council.”

“i actually am.” 

“you probably are.”

you two pause when the sentences come out at the same time, and it takes no time for the two of you to laugh it out, lightly, with snickers and giggles that you’ve never really heard from his mouth. 

“you know, i finally got to watch a movie last night,” you begin, changing the conversation.

he looks at you slowly, sweetly. “oh yeah? what did you watch?”

“uh, totoro...”

he stays silent, and you find his head tilted and his eyebrows raised. he looks amused. you ask him, “what?”

“solid movie.”

there is a questioning look that you give him, and you know he sees it, pupils focused to your side. he speaks again, “you like ghibli movies?”

“yeah. i think everyone does. don’t you?”

suna looks like he’s staring down the sky, thinking. he hums, and then tells you, “i don’t.” 

now he exaggerates his normally poor posture, chin tilting up to get a view of your reaction. the two of you keep walking, in an unusual silence, and you’re left watching his eyes as they stay indifferent.

“didn’t you just say totoro was a ‘solid movie’?”

the boy looks ahead, “yeah, so?”

you click your tongue, eyes narrowing, “whatever. i don’t believe you.”

suna has a satisfied smile on his face. he makes sure you don’t know it.

the two of you enter the building, even taking extra time to go to each others’ lockers. it’s only been two weeks since he had seen you laying on the bleachers, eyes embarrassingly open; two weeks since he had walked you to class the first time; two weeks since he had really started to know you.

when you reach your classroom, suspicious eye contact from classmates and the increasingly busy hallway tell you that it’s time for him to go to class, too. he sneaks in a cynical remark, and you playfully hit him on the shoulder, for the first time.

“i’m betting you and him get together by august.” your friend, honoka, chimes in as you enter the classroom. your neighbouring seat mates agree.

you’re starting to look forward to mornings.

unbeknownst to you, suna has a deadline.

the interhigh is only a week away, and so he’s told himself that he’ll do one thing before completely shutting himself out for volleyball training: asking you out on a date.

in other words, he is fed up with the volleyball team’s rendition of his “showoff mode”. he doesn’t lift his shirt up that much!

his first strategy is the straightforward, nonchalant way. he eagerly waits for you at practice.

“hey,” suna almost chirps, feeling a skip in his step.

“hey.” your squint your eyes at the unexpected energy, “are you- are you up to something?”

suna’s ears turned beet red at your statement. he couldn’t have possibly guessed that you knew what he was about to do.

a smirk crawls onto your lips. “oh, so you are up to something…”

“yeah, right. it’s nothing.”

you slap a hand on his shoulder, “hey, i get it.”

“what?”

“i mean, whatever pranks you and your friends are up to, just try not to get expelled, ‘kay?”

suna’s shoulders relax, but his eyebrows furrow, “wait, wha-”

“the volleyball team’s up to something, no?”

suna nods cautiously, not sure if he should be relieved or sad at the miscommunication.

“anyways, thanks for waiting for me after practice. i have a some paperwork to do for the student council, so you can go on ahead,” you give him a genuine smile. he always likes to see it, but it’s a little less lovely when the thought of a failed asking-out attempt is circling his mind.

“right. bye.” suna dashes off, hand fisted in his pockets. 

he tells himself it’s a work in progress.

“what the fuck am i doing making breakfast so well,” suna mutters under his breath one morning, preparing a cut of fish in the kitchen. he doesn’t even have practice this morning, and yet he’s skimmed through the entire oven manual and has found the joys of cooking fish meat. 

he even takes some of the fish and puts it in a metallic lunch box with rice to bring to school. normally, he would settle for the canteen’s average meat buns. 

“two bentos…?” he breathes. he has an idea.

it’s not long before he’s meeting you at the bus stop. he finds you sending him a small wave and an immediate groan about how your english teacher “is the definition of a nerd-bully equilibrium, what goes on.”

he laughs along with the complaints you have, even joining along with the flow of conversation. sometimes he thinks he changes a little bit when he’s around you, but he doesn’t mind. he likes talking and laughing and enjoying his time with you without worrying about what other people say.

he’ll give you a bento, maybe, he thinks, because he’s seen lots of girls give their boyfriends bentos in the past. maybe it would even give you a nod in the right direction.

right before the school’s building entrance, he stops you and takes you by the arm. it makes your heart skip a beat, but for him, all his heartbeats are centered around the lunchboxes in his bag.

“suna, why-”

your words are cut off when you see the boy eagerly rummaging through his bag, at first with a smile and then with a worried look. his hand is in his bag for a little too long.

there was only one bento.

so he gives you a beat-up ballpoint pen. 

it’s transparent, and from the outside you can see the ink tube only one-eighth full. it looks old.

“um, it’s a good luck charm... for your english test today.” suna keeps his mouth pursed and his look unfazed.

“oh.” you smile at the absurd charm. it seems questionable at first, but you try to convince yourself to trust in it. to trust in suna.

“i know, it’s kind of… beat up, and every-” it’s clear that suna is worried, for what you don’t know, but the way he hangs his head and his other hand fumbles with the strap of his backpack is enough to tell you to accept the surpising gift.

“no, i like it. even if it doesn’t work.” your hand keeps the pen in your fists. 

“it does work, by the way.”

you chuckle, “i’ll return it after class?”

suna shakes his head, “you don’t have to. if you do well you can keep it.”

you nod an okay, and he has a tiny look of satisfaction on his face. he had thought of giving you his lunch and not eating, but he decided against it when he remembered he didn’t bring any money to school that day. temporary success, fuck yeah.

(you get a ninety-two on the test. you keep the pen.)

as a last resort, suna tries through text. at least he’s proud that the two of you have been texting for two weeks straight. he still has you under “y/l/n-senpai (physics)”, and it makes him crack a small smile under his covers from time to time.

from y/l/n-senpai (physics): 2 notifications

suna slides the notification open. it’s always a pleasant surprise.

from y/l/n-senpai (physics): just watched arrietty its a ghibli movie

to y/l/n-senpai (physics): ik hv u watched howl’s moving castle

from y/l/n-senpai (physics): yes ofc

to y/l/n-senpai (physics): well. i havent

suna runs out of words to type. he’s not sure how to phrase it...

still, by the way that you’re typing, it seemed like he hasn’t messed it up. he rolls around to the other side of his bed.

from y/l/n-senpai (physics): then go watch it… (READ)

to y/l/n-senpai (physics): let’s watch together|

to y/l/n-senpai (physics): let’s watch tog|

to y/l/n-senpai (physics): let’s|

to y/l/n-senpai (physics): let’s go on a da|

suna sighs, thumb pressing the delete button like there’s no tomorrow.

except his thumbs are big. and phone keys are small. and his train of thought has jumbled up past usual cognition.

to y/l/n-senpai (physics): lets go, toge (SENT)

suna starts to stare down the volleyball in the corner of his room, wishing it would explode on command, when another ping lights up his phone.

from y/l/n-senpai (physics): 1 notification

he makes the slowest visit to his contacts to change your display name on his phone. he wants to stall.

but he always gives in.

from y/n: whos toge? (READ)

“fuck,” he grunts, burying his head into his pillow.

out of sheer shame and fatigue of asking-out attempts, suna doesn’t see you in the morning that monday nor text you for the rest of the weekend, having left you on read every time you sent a message. he thinks that if he reverted back to the time when the only interactions with you were stray thoughts in his mind, life would go on and this too would pass. 

it’s not like you would care, right? he would tell himself.

but suna seemed to forget that you were on the cheerleading team, and that the cheerleading team shares the gym with the volleyball club on mondays and fridays, not tuesdays and thursdays like he had very cleverly remembered.

“suna!”

you call out to him that afternoon. you have your cheerleader uniform on, having received them just today, and make sure to catch him while he’s on break.

big mistake.

you knew the volleyball team was tall, but you never really expected them to be slightly off-putting, too. it seemed like one call of his name made the entire team, consisting of over twenty boys, turn their heads at you simultaneously. then they looked at suna. then they smiled.

you find in your peripheral vision a wide-eyed kita, glancing back and forth once before going back to the volleyballs and game plans even during his break. 

you put on your sweetest smile, as expected of a cheerleader who’d just recently gotten her summer cheer uniform: v-neck, sleeveless top, pleated skirt, inarizaki lettering plastered across your chest in maroon and white.

he steps in front of you, eyebrow raised, “yeah?”

“can i talk to you about something?” your hands are behind your back, body weight shifting from left to right.

he nods, and as you take him out of the gym, you hear the volleyball team cheer and a certain miya twin shout, “fuckin’ suna!”

“fuck off, atsumu!” suna voices.

outside, your smile falters. you lean against the wall of the gym.

“did i do something wrong?” you say it softly, but firmly. you see his shoulders tense up, just slightly.

“um, no?”

you squint your eyes suspiciously, “but you’ve been ignoring my texts...?”

suna rolls his eyes instinctively. he regrets it when he sees a genuine frown on your face. “dunno,” he says.

your frown persists, and you start to bite on the inside of your mouth. “well, the last thing you texted me was, uh, ‘let’s go toge’. i’m so sorry if i missed something, or if it made you feel bad, so-”

“no, don’t be sorry,” he has his hands on his hips, “i never meant to send that.”

“what do you mean?”

“it was supposed to mean something else,” he looks down, scuffing his shoes against the brick floor.

“oh, was that message not meant for me? and who’s toge? sorry if i’m-”

suna gathers himself. he opens his mouth. he says eight words.

“i meant to ask you, ‘let’s go together’.”

the conversation comes to a halt. his words ring ambiguously in your ear, and it flusters you when the first thing that comes to mind is a date with the boy. you try to shake it off.

“like- like what do you mean?” you feel sorry for having him repeat the phrase twice.

suna shrugs, “i chickened out.”

“dude, you’re not making any sense.”

there’s a sharp pang in suna’s chest, and he visibly grimaces. “did you just call me dude?”

“maybe.”

“ouch.”

“wait, so what do you mean!” your arms flail around a little too dramatically for someone as tired as you.

suna contemplates whether or not to tell you that he wanted to ask you out. by the way you’d just called him dude, he wonders if you’d rather him give you a fist bump and tell you ‘nice toss!’ instead of hold your hand and take you out on a date.

so he counts his stars and he goes for the leap.

“actually, i wanted to ask if you wanted to watch a movie together.”

you back up into the wall at his words. there’s a heat that crawls through your body and beats through your heart.

“is that what let’s go toge meant?”

he nods, shoulders relaxing, arms to his side, “let’s go, together. like- like a date.”

his words take you by surprise. still, you’re nothing but glad.

“yeah,” you lick your lips, “i’ll go. and i take back the ‘dude’”

“oh, really now?” his shoulders relax. 

you roll your eyes.

“so he asked you out, right?” honoka asks during a water break in pe class. you couldn’t say no.

“yeah, i’m going to his flat next wednesday.”

“why not today? friday?”

you pouted, head turning slowly, “stuco meeting. we have our cultural festival late october, remember?”

“ah.” honoka sips on her water bottle, “i won’t be here by then.”

“what date are you leaving again?” you try not to darken your tone, pouting at the idea of losing one of your dear middle school friends to distance. 

“august eighteenth. a month away.”

you begin to slouch on your bench. there are more classmates that come to your bench after hearing honoka telling you her leave date. ‘oh my god!’s and ‘i’m gonna miss you!’s fill the corner of the gym, and soon the whistle blows, signalling the end of your water break.

the rest of the day proceeds as normal, and yet there’s that familiar emptiness that seems to continue to fill up even more of your days.

it’s tiring.

suna’s flat is extremely well put, for some reason. you’d always passed him for a boy who simply didn’t care, but now you see him at his own place, grabbing his laptop from his desk one-handedly.

you’ll admit going to a boy’s place alone is an awkward concept in itself, but it seems like suna doesn’t pay no mind. he’s plugged in his laptop to a charger, set it on the table, and has sat himself down on a floor cushion.

it’s a relief that you don’t know how suna’s heart is almost threatening to beat out of his chest.

“what do you want to watch?” you’re quick to sit down on the floor next to him.

he shrugs, “maybe you can convince me to like ghibli.”

you tsk at his line, yet it eventually brings you an ear to ear smile. you reach over to the laptop, scrolling through netflix. “i guess we could start with howl’s moving castle?”

your head turns to him, and he nods, before standing up all of a sudden. you look at him questioningly, but you find him walking over to his kitchen and returning with two paper bags and two glasses of water. 

your eyes follow him as he rests the items down on the table and scoots back on the floor. he gestures the paper bag towards you, “popcorn. it’s salty, so i don’t know if you’re into that.”

“ah. thanks,” you smile, and he reaches over to the laptop, pressing play. 

you don’t expect the movie to be the first thing on your minds - the both of you knew this. though you and him had spent some time marvelling at the movie, you find that for every other time you dip your hand into your popcorn, a pair of eyes turns to glance at you. 

you two spend your time silently during the movie, however. your eyes have developed a habit of simply tracing suna’s figure with your eyes, and it comes in embarrassingly when he had looked back and found your attention on him instead of the laptop at one point.

you’re surprised, though, because he does seem to be paying attention to the movie, more or less, and you can hear his small hums of amusement and surprise as the movie progresses. you colour yourself proud.

suna doesn’t even touch his food nor his drink, having felt too nervous to do so. he wants to know how you’re doing, silently, but whenever he meets your eyes, he decides that he’d rather fix himself on the movie. he wonders if a date like this means holding your hand or even saying goodbye with a kiss hug.

when the movie ends you ask him why he hasn’t eaten his popcorn, and how you feel kind of bad about it, but he ends up telling you how good the movie actually was.

“i don’t believe that you don’t like ghibli movies.” you squint playfully.

there’s a grin that grows on suna’s resting face, “i never said that i was saying the truth, i just said that i didn’t like them.” 

he stands up, bringing the food and drinks on the table to his kitchen counter, and you follow him over. the realisation hits you then, “oh. oh.”

“in truth i haven’t really watched many of them so i don’t know, but, yeah.”

“it’s funny because i feel slightly played.”

“well, you’re here now, aren’t you?” 

you watch as suna reaches into his refrigerator for some eggs. he glances at you, and you’re sitting on his tiny dining table. 

“do you want an omelette?”

your eyebrows raise. your heart skips a beat at the thought of eating his cooking. you tell him, “sure.”

suna takes the time he’s faced away from you to think about what’s next. he knows that you have some kind of inclination towards him, having agreed to his explicit naming of this hangout a “date”. still, his mind wanders towards the timing: is it too early to properly confess? hasn’t he technically already confessed? the omelette flips and suna thanks the world for having it look like the prettiest one he’s ever made. 

this one’s for you, he thinks.

when you do take the omelette in your mouth, you sigh a little bit. it looks pretty - almost beautiful, in fact - but also seems to be half-half-cooked. 

you don’t care, though, because it still makes your stomach flutter thinking about the fact that he had made this with his own hands. and if it takes some half-half-cooked omelette to eat, then, hell, you’ll eat it.

it’s not all bad, though, since he offers you some rice along with the egg as well, and it eventually turns into a filling meal. you hadn’t had one of those in a while.

when you look over to the other side of the table, you find he’s already finished with your food, and normal chatter makes itself more comfortable in the confines of his small flat. this is how it’s supposed to be, you tell yourself, just meaningless banter and humorous talks.

you find yourself growing to know him even better.

“isn’t it funny, how, some weeks ago, i had only seen you as that ‘one guy i tutored last year’?” you say after the date as he walks you out of his apartment. he tells you he’ll be walking you home, and though you tell him no, you ride the bus, he says he has some extra money in his wallet for the month.

suna agrees, “yeah. i would’ve just carried on with my life.” suna lies through his teeth. he’s been through the volleyball team’s teasing for his obvious crush on you. hell, they’d even dubbed it suna’s “showoff mode” (ginjima calls it ‘beast mode’) whenever you were within a five meter radius of him. 

you tell him time flies fast, and he tells you it walks slowly. for you, getting to know suna rintarou has been something you finally look forward to after all your work. but for suna, getting to know you is something he savours every second of, remembering how he wants to make up for the times he used to pine over your unknowing self.

when the two of you get on the bus, you sit next to him, yawning. he wants to have an arm over your shoulder, or your head on his shoulder, but he doesn’t exactly know how.

“my house is actually a few stops from here.” you say. it’s already nine at night, and though you’ve spent over five hours at his flat, you don’t want to lose your time with him to sleepiness.

suna notices how you try to fight it, even having told him, “don’t worry, i usually sleep at two am everyday anyways. i’m not going to fall asleep.”

he tells you, “you shouldn’t be sleeping at two every night.”

“it is how it is.”

he chuckles, “i once got shouted at for sleeping at five in the morning during a training camp. they forced me not to train at all that day. it was-”

the bus comes to a stop and your head falls on his shoulder. he calls your name softly.

you’re asleep.

suna keeps still as the bus ride continues, remembering the stop you said was yours. he counts them - one, two, three, four, five stops - and with each, his breathing steadies. he feels like the luckiest boy in the world.

“what am i to you now?” suna’s head tilts back, whispered question dissolving into the atmosphere. he doesn’t expect an answer.

instead, your arm circles itself around his.

taglist: @maitenight​ @natszoo​ @ssuna​ @erens-piss-cleaner​ @osamus-onigiri​ @volleybloop​ @etherealiwa​ @agaashesmilktea​ @bicchaan​ @anngelllla​ @tycrackculture​ @sins-over-tragedy​ @tsumuluv​ @daichibrainrot​ @underratedmage​ @sunasexual @kenmei @daydreamingtetsu​ @sunareii​ @bebegi​ (if your url is bolded, it means i couldn’t tag you)

send an ask to be added to the taglist!

as always, thank you to roo @yooroomi for beta reading this series!

[epicfangirl01]

Random HCs of The Bois™️ Finding Out About AFAB!MC's Period

Honestly, I'm only writing this because of Mammon's reaction that popped into my head, and I wanted to see how the others would react. Also, these are on the basis that you and the brother are dating a couple months after your arrival.

TW: 18+ because some of the brothers are needy af

Lucifer

You knock on Lucifer's door shortly after school, feeling anxious. Your period came in the middle of your final class, when you realized you were out of pads and tampons. As you were in the Devildom, there isn't a stock of supplies for your already miserable week. And the only way to go to the human world was through Lucifer or Diavolo. As much as you love the gentle giant, you would rather talk about the situation with your boyfriend.

Lucifer tells you to come in, and the eldest brother's eyes soften as he glances up at you. His gaze doesn't linger, however, turning back to his stack of paperwork.

"Do you miss me already, MC? The academy bells have just finished ringing." You shift nervously, your period making you feel uncomfortable, before speaking up.

"I do, but that's actually not why I'm here... I need to go to the human world to pick some things u-" Lucifer sighs, scratching the paper with his pen.

"Darling, I'm sorry, but I am very busy. Besides, you just got home from school. You can wait to go on a shopping spree with Mammon and Asmodeus." You step closer, frowning, and you try to explain.

"No, Lucifer, that's not-" Lucifer's eyes narrow in irritation, still glancing at his paperwork, but his words become a firm warning.

"MC, you must finish your homework. You can go shopping this weekend." Your lower stomach twists in pain, cramps rapidly increasing, and you snap.

"Lucifer, my vagina is FUCKING BLEEDING, DAMMIT!!! I need to go to the store!" The demon's eyes widen as he drops his pen, and he looks up at you, surprised.

"I'm sorry, what did you just say...?" Frustration overwhelms you, until you catch the confusion and concern in his eyes.

"In all your years of existence, you haven't heard of a period before???" Lucifer doesn't say anything, clearing his throat awkwardly.

"I really am overworking myself, aren't I? I suppose it's been a while since I've been to the surface...." You shake your head, chuckling, and you relax when Lucifer is finally ready to listen. You take a couple minutes to explain what is happening, and what you need to take care of yourself. When you're finished, Lucifer nods, glad that you will be okay.

"I apologize for my behavior. I will be more supportive in the future. Here, have some money for your errands. Will $100 dollars be sufficient?" (Yes, Luci, yes it is.)

Mammon

You sit down on Mammon's leather couch, shifting to a semi-comfortable position, and enjoying a movie night with your lovable boyfriend. Mammon grabs some blankets for you, before plopping onto the couch. He smiles at you, and holds you close, making sure that you are settled. You watch the movie for a while, enjoying the movie, when you catch a mischievous glint in your boyfriend's eyes.

"Mammon, wha-"

He smiles and pulls you into his lap, gently kissing you neck. You sigh a bit, uncomfortable with sitting in general, but loving his kisses and nips. You didn't expect Mammon's hand to cup your crotch, but you especially didn't expect him to scream in your ear.

"WHERE THE FUCK DID IT GO?!?"

The pissed off side of your brain fumes for a moment, until your eyes meet Mammon's. You burst out laughing at the panic on Mammon's face, realizing that he felt your pad. The demon of greed doesn't appreciate your laughing, feeling genuinely worried for his beloved human. When you calm down, you turn back to him.

"Mammon, I'm fine. It's still there. I'm just.... kinda on my period..."

He looks at you like you grew three heads, and it quickly becomes apparent he has no idea what you're talking about. You take a few minutes to explain, and he listens patiently, but he still continues to panic.

"You're saying you can bleed FOR A WEEK and be fine?!? And you constantly have cramps and migraines? And this happens once a month??? Why the hell didn't you say anything? How can I help my human when you don't say you need me?!"

He carefully sets you down, before bolting of of the couch and out the door. You gape at the doorway for a moment, wondering what Mammon is up to. He returns for a moment, his arms holding a pile of pillows, medicine, pajamas, and snacks.

"Does this help? I got the pillows and pjs from your room, medicine from the bathroom, and I kinda took snacks from Beel's stash under his bed.... But it's fine! I made a note that you'll buy more later."

You shake your head, smiling, and you thank him as he walks over to help you. Once Mammon knows you are comfortable, he sits down beside you. You gently kiss Mammon on the lips, before you lay on your side, resting your head on his lap. The demon blushes, and he pulls the blanket over you. His hands gently stroke your hair, and you watch the movie together until you both fall asleep.

Leviathan

The third born invites you into his room for anime night (every night, lol), and you walk into the room with snacks in you arms. Levi welcomes you in as you set the bags onto his coffee table, before grabbing a couple drinks from his mini fridge.

"Good, you're early! The pilot is about to start!"

You chuckle, happy to spend time with him, and you bend down to place everything on the table. As you do so, your shirt lifts just enough to show a small stain on the back of your pants. Levi's eyes accidentally catch sight of it, resulting in a blush.

"Uh, MC? You have a s-stain on your pants..." You turn and look down at your legs, turning to try to find what he's talking about, but you can't see it.

"I can't find it. I'll just wash it off when I get back to my room." The demon tenses and shakes his head, trying to think of the least awkward words to say.

"No, no! I-I mean, you have a blood stain. Y-your period kinda started...."

Your eyes widen at his words, and you look in the reflection of his glass aquarium, cursing at the stain. You hadn't noticed this time, the monthly curse being subtle throughout your busy afternoon. You start to apologize to Levi, when he shakes his head.

"It's not your fault. I-it's fine. I just... I know it might be weird that I know about it. I found out from a high school anime. In the episode, the protagonist goes on their way to school, getting bullied by the leader of the popular girls, and the bully turns away but the protagonist stops her because of a stain, and despite being enemies, the protagonist is kind and knows how she feels, so they take her to the bathroom and helps her clean up... And I- I know it probably sounds weird or creepy for someone to watch anime like that, but I thought it was kind and empowering, an-" You stop Levi mid rant, smiling at his anxiousness, and you give him a small hug.

"Thanks, Levi. I appreciate it. It's part of the unspoken period code, ya know? It can be awkward and embarrassing enough, so even just a discreet heads up can be very helpful. Don't worry about it, okay?"

He nods, glad you understand, and he gently hugs you back.

"O-okay. I'll be back, alright? I remember seeing in the episode that it helps to have a hot shower sometimes to ease the cramps and feel less uncomfortable, and that blankets and pjs can help. I guess if you don't mind a loser like me, you could use any blankets or hoodies I have if it makes you feel better..."

You smile and nod, grateful for the demon of envy. He shyly smiles back, and he spends the rest of the night making sure that you're comfortable during the show.

Satan

The library is quiet and warm as you sit at a table with Satan, working on your assignments. You struggle and struggle through a complex spell for your potions class, irritation and fatigue clouding your brain. You are already sore and pissed off from the beginning of your period, but now stress and anger bubbles beneath the surface.

"MC, you have to say it calml-"

You huff, throwing up your hands, and you scowl at the unaffected spell dummy in front of you.

"I know, Satan! I've been calm for the past half hour, and it's still not right! Can you just actually give me some fucking advice for once so I can get this shit over with?!?"

The middle brother looks at you for a moment, stunned, before chuckling.

"I didn't know you could hold so much anger, MC. I'm almost impressed, although, it is very out of character for you... Are you alright?"

A sigh escapes your lips as you awkwardly cross your arms, looking away. You explain that you are just tired, but Satan can hear the hesitation in your voice. The demon of wrath doesn't speak for a moment, thinking about your recent behavior, and everything snaps into place. Satan has read enough books to last an eternity, including ones about human biology. He knows exactly what is happening, and he generally understands how you are feeling. And through his readings, Satan knows not to ask you directly, should your anger grow.

"Ah, I understand. Well, why didn't you say that you needed a break, kitten? I could have helped you unwind a little."

With that, Satan pulls you away from the table to rest on the couch, grabbing a book from his bag. Once you are both settled, Satan pulls a blanket over you both and opens his book while you rest your head on his lap.

With his human in his arms, Satan calmly reads to you, his voice silky as you eventually drift off to sleep.

Asmodeus

The demon of lust practically barges into your room, Majolish bags in tow as he squeals with excitement.

"MC! Look, Majolish's exclusive swimwear line came out! I found this ADORABLE swimsuit for you to try! It was the last in your size." He pulls out the swimsuit from a bag, showing it to you.

You look up at Asmo, gasping at the swimsuit.

"That looks perfect! Thank you, Asmo. I'll try it on later. I'm not fe-"

Asmo pouts, tossing the swimsuit to you, and reaching for another outfit from his bag.

"Come on!!! I have so much stuff for us to try on! And then we could maybe go to the beach tomor-"

You shake your head, sighing.

"No, Asmo. I'm not up to swimming this week", you lie, shifting in your seat uncomfortably.

Asmo notices, and immediately drops the subject.

"Are you alright, hun? Is it a rough cycle this time?"

Your eyes widen in surprise before you look up at him. His eyes are filled with concern, before you nod.

"Yeah, but it's nothing I haven't dealt with before. I'll be fine. Let's go swimming next week, okay?"

The avatar of lust smiles, before carefully pulling you out of the chair.

"Come on. Let's have a spa day instead. I'll make sure you feel stunning and comfortable."

Beelzebub

You look through the kitchen in your pjs, craving all of your favorite foods, when you hear the door quietly squeak open. Your head turns back, and you see the sheepish gaze of the 6th born.

"Do you need a midnight snack, Beel? I was about to make something myself. I can make some for you."

Beel nods, smiling, before coming into the room.

"I smelled something delicious coming from the kitchen, so I came to check. That's strange, though. You haven't made anything yet?" Beel takes in the large amount of food on the table, much more than you normally eat. Maybe the gluttonous demon was rubbing off on you, he wondered.

You shake your head, just as confused as he is.

"Maybe you were so hungry that you started imagining it. You've done that a few times before."

Beel sniffs the air, before walking up behind you.

"You smell different today... MC, you smell so good..... Can I have a taste?"

You choke on air, trying to understand what he just said.

"Beel! You can't just ask that! That's perverted!" He looks at you with confused, innocent eyes, like a kicked puppy.

"What do you mean? I just wanted to kiss your head. Oh.... You thought I meant or-"

A small screech of panic escapes your lips, and you stop Beel mid-sentence, telling him not to spend too much time with Asmo.

"Right. Sorry, MC... Can I ask a question? Why do you smell different today? You're not as sweet and salty as usual. And you're a lot hungrier today.... Are you okay?"

Realization punches the wind out of you as you understand what Beel has been smelling. He was attracted to your blood, without knowing what it was. An awkward laugh fills the air, and you look away from the red head's gaze.

You spend the next few minutes explaining what was going on, and Beel listens intently as you go on.

"Okay. I'm sorry for being rude... I didn't mean to. To make up for it, I can make you whatever you want. Sit down, and I'll get you some water. You'll lose a lot of hydration for the next few days. Then when food is done, we can go watch Devilish Desserts in my room. Belphie is in the attic tonight."

You smile, pulling Beel into a hug before spending a relaxing evening together.

Belphegor

The sound of your DDD alarm fills the cozy attic, waking you and Belphie up from your after school nap. The youngest brother groans before pulling you closer.

"Did you really have to wake me up? I was having such a nice dream..."

You push yourself off Belphie and the bed, feeling as if you were hit by a truck. Why did you have to feel awful now, when you made plans to see the angels?

Your body aches as you stand, attempting to wake up enough to get ready. Belphie mumbles with irritation, rolling onto his side.

"What's more important tha- Huh? Is that blood?"

Your eyes widen, and you look back to the bed, and your eyes find the red stain on the bedsheets. You look at Belphie in horror, and he sits up, now wide awake.

"MC, are you okay? That's where you were sleeping."

You want to die. You want to shrivel up into a ball and die because how are you going to explain to your boyfriend that it came out of your vagina, and that it's NORMAL?!? Blood coming from anywhere brings some sense of concern anyway, no matter what realm you are from.

"Haha- Yeah, um, about that, I kinda need to tell you something...."

Belphie stays surprisingly alert as you explain, only relaxing when you state that it's normal and frequent.

"Ah. Okay. Tell Simeon to fuck off. You're sick, and you're staying here. Go get a spare hoodie and sweatpants. I'll get you meds, a heating pad, and some spare pillows. Tell the others you're with me tonight."

You smile, glad he understands, and Belphie gets you a couple of things while you get comfortable. When you walk back into the attic, Belphie is fast asleep with his limbs curled around a log of blankets, waiting for you to return.

[bullshittierlists]

MAJOR SPOILERS FOR DANGANRONPA V3 (and probably the other games, too, just to be safe)

So, just as a heads up, I made this list a few months ago, I think in the middle of chapter 4. I was going to update it, but I realized that any feelings I had were just made stronger and the list was still relatively accurate. Here are my thoughts:

I see no god up here other than me

Kirumi Tojo - As you may know about me, I can typically tell who my favorite characters are going to be before I indulge myself in a series. This has especially rung true throughout Danganronpa, I was able to correctly guess Taka and Gundham as my respective favorites before actually seeing them in action. Let me tell you that Kirumi surprised me. I originally guessed K1-B0 as my favorite and while he’s still up there, he is nowhere near Kirumi. I realized she was my favorite the moment chapter 2 ended. Not only were her execution and plan wonderful and brilliantly done, her last-ditch plea to convince everyone to let her live sold her for me. Not only did this plea make sense, it almost worked and I kinda wish it would’ve. Her motive was almost completely selfless and she worked damn hard to escape. Her execution was the only time I cried during this game because I wanted so badly for her to escape, but I knew that all of her efforts were futile. I know her biggest criticism is that her plan from hiding Ryoma’s body was completely unnecessary, but I like to believe she was just nervous and overthought the whole thing. I mean, this had to go perfectly in order for her to save her country, of course she’s going to add a few too many steps.

Miu Iruma - Okay, I know this is going to sound fake, but I actually really love the dichotomy of her character. The way that she acts so self-righteous but is actually quite self-conscious really stood out to me. Of course she’s funny and hot, too, but I feel it’s important to really appreciate the way her character was written. It amazes me that she was written to be the least likable character in the entire series and still ended up being one of my favorites.

You’re the best

K1-B0 - Yes, I type out his name every time. As I already mentioned, he was my original guess for favorite character, but it obviously didn’t work out that way. He stayed in his position of first for a while, but I always knew it wasn’t meant to last, I just didn’t know which character would take his place. Even besides my doubts, I still love K1-B0, I just wish more could’ve been done with him in the earlier chapters. There are several opportunities for him to be a really funny character and have good interactions with Kokichi and Miu, but he just comes off as annoying. I feel like he only really started to be utilized after Miu died with Monotaro and I really enjoyed their dynamic, I just wish we could’ve had some of this side of K1-B0 before this point.

Kokichi Oma - This spot probably isn’t as subjective as I’d like it to be. Every time Kokichi was on screen, I would get visibly annoyed, but I knew I was in for a treat figuring out his deeper intents behind what he’s saying. The only reason I really like Kokichi at all is because he’s fun to analyze. It gets boring to analyze Nagito because his motivation is pretty much just a mix of “hope” and “he’s crazy.” Kokichi’s character trait of lying makes it so fun to individually analyze each of his lines to figure out whether he’s telling the truth and why or why not. Other than that, I guess he has some funny dialogue with Miu sometimes.

Gonta Gokuhara - I really don’t know. I know this is way too early to be unsure about characters, but I just know I couldn’t put him any lower, but I also couldn’t put him any higher. He’s just such a sweetheart, but that’s about where the substance ends. I adored every time he was on my screen, but everything that would’ve been fun to analyze about him just leads back to Kokichi. I still really enjoy his presence, though. I’d like a big Gonta hug.

Kaede Akamatsu - I’ll just say it, I think she would’ve made for a better protagonist. I’ll talk about this later, but Shuichi’s character development doesn’t really feel like it goes anywhere and the twist doesn’t feel worth it because of that. I think the twist should still have been incorporated, but with the roles reversed. Either way, we got what we got, and what we got was tears from Clair de Lune. But seriously, she really is a great pianist. I’ve been trying to learn the piece for ages and it’s still too complicated for me. I mean, it’s in 9/8 for God’s sake. Good for her, regardless.

Tenko Chabashira - Tenko’s a weird case. I didn’t actually care for her that much until quite literally a few lines before she died. Fun fact: I spoiled this entire series for myself before I ended up playing it and I’m still mad at myself. This meant that I was just waiting for all of the deaths to happen, especially Tenko’s. I was fully aware that every line could be her last during the seance, but I wasn’t aware that she would pull on my heart strings before she went. When she tells Himiko that she’ll do the seance in her place so she can talk to Angie, I literally almost started crying. Before this, Tenko was just kind of annoying, but not too bad, but this moment really solidified her spot for me. She really just wanted to help Himiko and I wish she had chosen a better target for her affections.

Hey, I think you’re pretty cool, I like you a lot

Shuichi Saihara - Time to elaborate on what I said for Kaede. I actually really enjoyed Shuichi’s character development throughout the first three chapters. Before coming to Hope’s Peak, he was afraid to hurt people with his detective skills. Kaede notices this and helps him through it, passing the reins to Kaito once she passes. Shuichi convicts Kaede and later Kirumi, much to everyone’s detriment, but they’re all okay with it (Nobody was really super sad about Korekiyo to begin with, lol). Then, starting in chapter 4, everyone just kinda flips on him. Shuichi + the rest of the gang - Kokichi all believe that Gonta is innocent and Shuichi tries to prove this. Instead of supporting him, everyone (especially Kaito) tries to... stop him??? from proving it??? They’re all just in agreement that it wasn’t Gonta, but don’t want to proceed with the investigation to figure out who it was instead. It’s really frustrating and made my overall experience much less enjoyable. This is bumped up a few notches in chapter 5 with Maki. I understand that she was part of the whole case, but that doesn’t make it any less annoying that she won’t let me prove Kaito was the victim. It just feels like the character development was all for nothing and every student feels like a human obstacle (except K1-B0, of course). Still relatable and emo, though.

Rantaro Amami - I would make the joke everyone expects, but I’m on my laptop and I don’t know how to get to the emoji keyboard.

Ryoma Hoshi - I genuinely don’t have anything to say about Ryoma. He’s my halfway point because I don’t have anything particularly for him and I don’t have anything particularly against him, either. Go off, funky little cat man.

Kaito Momota - He got on my nerves in chapter 4, but he was a genuinely sweet character that I really enjoyed talking to. Any time he would talk about the stars, I would swoon because he’s just such a natural romantic. Not really my type, though. Very average.

Monophanie - Legally you can’t ask me why the monokubs are where they are. She’s voiced by Natalie Hoover (Sonia) and I guess that’s my only reasoning.

Monotaro - I really just liked his interactions with K1-B0 in chapter 4. Other than that, I greatly disliked his and Monophanie’s presence in Gonta’s execution. 0/10 worst use for monokubs.

Monodam - A nice, non-distracting addition to Korekiyo’s execution. But he had so much potential and just threw it all away. Apparently I’m a basketball dad from a high school movie now.

I remember you

Angie Yonaga - Many times, I’ve found myself asking who I ship from the series and this love triangle comes to mind. Of Angie, Himiko, and Tenko... I only really like Tenko. I don’t hate Angie’s cult stuff as much as everyone else seems to, but she didn’t have nearly enough of a presence for me to latch onto outside of the cult stuff, which was funny, I will admit.

Maki Harukawa - I was so excited the whole game for her to get cool. I knew she was going to get cool, I just didn’t know when or how. But then, it was chapter 5 already and she hadn’t gotten cool in my eyes yet. I was really meh on her by that chapter anyway, but her being annoying really knocked her down a few pegs. She got a couple extra points for surprising me during the case, but not enough to bump her up any spots.

Himiko Yumeno - I was rooting for her to be crushed under the rock at the end. She was fine before chapter 3, but then they tried to develop her with the Akane treatment and it didn’t work for me at all. She just got on my nerves during the third trial and continued to contribute nothing throughout the rest of the game. During chapter 5 and 6, it’s like the writers just completely forgot that she was there. This would’ve been fine if they weren’t the last couple of chapters and she was one of about 6 people left alive. She had a role to play and didn’t play it in the slightest. The most she was utilized after chapter 3 was as Miu’s replacement post-chapter 5. Someone needed to fill the dirty jokes quota and I guess Himiko was chosen. #GiveTenkoABetterLoveInterest2021

Monosuke - The only thing I remember him doing throughout the entire game was distract me from Kirumi’s exectuion. Not a fan.

You are the worst. Literal scum. Leave this planet and never return

Korekiyo Shinguji - Okay, listen. He’s not that bad. His design is actually one of the best, in my opinion and I love his dedication to his craft. However, he just creeps me out whenever he’s on screen and I’d prefer not to be around him. It’s not even the sister thing, I honestly think that’s funny and a nice change of pace, but his overall demeanor is creepy. Not to mention he’s played by Todd Haberkorn and he’s been in one too many roles recently. Hopefully I’ll get over it, but as for now, that loses him points.

Tsumugi Shirogane - I know, not exactly an unpopular opinion. She’s just annoying and downright pisses me off a lot of the time with her “plain” shtick. I already knew she was going to be the mastermind, so most of the game was just me waiting for her to reveal it. I swear, I almost couldn’t take it every time she said something like, “What if there isn’t a mastermind?” “What?? There’s a mastermind????” Just stfu Tsumugi. You all are lucky I don’t have the energy to talk about 3-6 right now.

Monokid - Hate the tongue sprite, that’s literally the only reason he’s down here. He’s also kind of annoying, but made the best addition to an execution out of all of the monokubs. His death was one of the few things that surprised me in this game and it was a welcome twist. I was sick of him by this point, but was still incredibly shocked when he was pushed into the execution. Then, his severed head rolls out to all of the students looking on in shock at Kaede’s death. Masterful. Still hate the tongue sprite.

There we go. Definitely my least favorite cast out of the whole series, but it’s still fun to love on and hate on a lot of the characters, as per usual. There are just a few too many in the middle tier (metaphorically speaking) that are either uninteresting or just don’t get their time to shine. Maybe they’ll eventually grow on me more, but I doubt it.

[sincerelynamkook]

Hennessy (01)

Latina Y/N x Jungkook

Genre: Angst, Fluff 

Warnings: alcohol/drunken behavior (drink responsibly friends), mentions of smoking, sexual tension 

Word Count: 2.6k

Playlist: “Yo Perreo Sola” by Bad Bunny // “Frikitona” by Plan B // “Te Extrano” by Xtreme // “Imitadora” by Romeo Santos”

Series Masterlist

“You ready?” I roll my eyes with a pout instead of verbally answering my best friend’s question. I’m still lowkey butthurt she not only forced me to get up from my umpteenth day in bed, but also forced me to get dressed and put on makeup. I’m barely into my 30th day of getting over a breakup, I had plans to dive deep into the pits of my depression and despair for another month or two. 

“Stop being a brat and get over it. It’s not like you were in love with the guy.” Britt sasses back.

“Maybe so. But I really gave that fucker 6 months of my life thinking he would eventually be the one only for him to go out and cheat on me...let me be depressed, damn bro.” 

“Dude, c'mon. Tony said this would be the party of the year and you know how Latinos love to throw a party.” She grabs my hand and drags me up the driveway to the front door. I could hear the loud blast of Merengue music all the way from where we parked down the street. Serves us right for being 2 hours late to this damn party. But we were running on Latino time. 

“Bitch did you forget I’m Latina?” I ask her. Of course I know what Latin parties are like. 

“Really? You sure ain’t acting like the bad bitch Latina I know you are.” 

“I-...whatever.” I mumble, not having a retort. 

She giggles and opens the front door, coming fact to face with Jimin who has the brightest smile on his face. “Finally bitches! I’ve been waiting for y’all for over an hour.” 

Music, laughter, singing, mixed with conversations from every direction bombard my ears. Jimin drags Britt and me to the back of the house, bee-lining straight to the kitchen counter that's covered in alcoholic beverages. He goes around to stand next to Tony who’s behind the counter, dressed in an all black fit, gold chain around his neck, nose pierced with a stud and a septum, and small black rectangular framed glasses perched on his nose. 

“What, you on your Bad Bunny phase or something?” I ask him as Jimin hands me a cranberry vodka, knowing it’s my favorite drink. 

With a smile, he sticks his tongue out and places his pinky fingers near his glasses doing the iconic Bad Bunny pose, “You already know babyyyy,” he says garnering a laugh from me. “I made sure to stock up on cranberry and vodka for you babe. Britt warned me so we on that ‘Bring Y/N back to life’ gang shit tonight.”

“Oh god,” I grimace. When Britt and Tony get together on their “missions” there is no hope for us. “Well you got food around here? I ain’t getting shitfaced on an empty stomach.”

“This ain’t the first time at the rodeo, Y/N.” Hoseok says as he appears behind Tony with a platter of appetizers on a plate for me. “We take care of our favorite girls around here, Y/N, c'mon now, especially when you're my girlfriend’s best friend” he winks at Britt and she giggles. Gross. 

“My hero.” I respond sarcastically, inspecting the chips and guac. With a raise of a brow I ask, “This better be some legit guac boys, not that store bought kind y’all got that one time at Costco.”

“Omg get over it! I didn’t realize it was expired!” Jin yells from behind me. He gives Britt a kiss on the cheek before pinching my arm. I stick my tongue out before giving him a genuine smile. “I wasn’t even the one who bought it. It was Jimin!” 

Jimin giggles, “Well that’s what y’all get for sending me grocery shopping when I’m hungover.”

“I was sick for days! I almost died!” I yell back. Not gona lie, this guac is hella good. “Dude, who made this guac. It’s legit, I’ll give you that.”

“I asked my sister to make some for us. She also made some tamales for you and Britt, you know she loves y'all more than me.” Tony says as he pours me another drink. Tears start to well in my eyes, food being the only thing that weakens my tough exterior. 

“Tony...tell your sister to divorce Jackson and marry me. I’ll treat her better!” I exclaim making the group laugh. 

“Y’all lets move this party to the den.” Hoseok says, grabbing Britt’s hand and leading us to the next room, away from the bigger crowd. 

We each take our usual seats. Being a tight knit group since our college days, we have our traditions, one being movie night at Tony’s every weekend, thus leading us to have our own unofficial assigned seats. 

The music can still be heard from the den, albeit not as loud as it was in the main rooms. 

“So we getting Y/N shitfaced tonight right?” Jimin asks with a smirk in my direction. 

“Hell yeah. I can’t believe you skipped out on movie nights this whole month.” Jin responds with a shake of his head. “I thought we were family.”

I roll my eyes at his dramatics. “Whatever. Y’all know how I get when I’m in my moods.”

Hoseok stands and comes around the couch to hug me from behind. “I know you’re not a hugger but accept this quick hug and let go of your sadness friend.”

 I giggle and hold back my witty remark, knowing his heart is in the right place. “Thanks Hobi. Give me a few more drinks and I’ll be begging for your hugs.”

He jumps at that and runs to the kitchen yelling, “You don’t have to tell me twice!!” Brittany gets up and follows him, muttering something about going to make sure he doesn’t get dragged into dancing. 

“But in all seriousness, Y/N, are you okay?” Jin asks next to me. 

“Not gona lie, I’m hurt because y’all know how I feel about cheating. But it is what it is right?” I exhale and gulp down my third cup of cranberry vodka. 

“You’ll be okay babe, c'mon lets go get more drinks.” Jimin takes my hands and drags me out the den, just as Yoongi and Joonie were walking into the den. 

“Hey fuckers. I brought the Henny!” Yoongi announces with a smirk. At the sound of Henny I turn around and walk back into the den, grabbing the Hennessy bottle from Yoongi’s grasp and opening it to pour myself some shots. 

“Oh so that’s what we doing huh?” He smirks and I just wink at him raising my shot glass at him. 

“The night is young my friend.” I say as I raise up my second shot in a toast. Joon takes the bottle from me and pours me another one, clinking his own glass with mine. 

“Let’s get this bread!” he says to which I grimace and retort back, “Grandpa, don’t ever say that again.” He chuckles with a roll of his eyes and downs his shot. 

The heat from the alcohol going down my throat and coursing throughout my body has me removing my jacket. Jin whistles saying “aight mami, you sure you're getting over a break up?”

Giggling, I look over at him to see him checking me out. I’m donned in black ripped skinny jeans, black platform Jadon docs, and a green satin tank top; meaning my tattoo covered arm is out on display. “Boy please, be quiet before you get me in trouble with Tree. Where is she anyway?”

“She had to work tonight. She’s gonna come after her shift which should be soon.” He says checking the time on his phone. 

Another shot is placed in my hand by Jimin, “bottoms up bitch!”

I down my shot just as I hear the sounds of “Yo Perreo Sola” by Bad Bunny start to play. “Oh shit! This my song!!!” I yell, clearly feeling the effect of the alcohol contents fueling my body. I grab Jimin’s hand and drag him over to the crowd dancing in the large living room. 

Jimin positions himself behind me, holding my waist as we start to dance to the song. We grind up on each other, perreando like the song describes, screaming the chorus together with the crowd. I turn around to face him and push him backwards, ready to perrear sola. The other girls around me start to hype me up and start to grind against me. We put on quite the show but the crowd goes even wilder when the song switches to “Frikitona” by Plan B. Jin dances up next to me with Tree on his arm and hands me two more shots, “double fist time babyyy” he yells over the crowd. I take the shots all the while I’m dancing, I don’t even notice when the two empty glasses are replaced with new full ones by Jimin, knowing it's him with the pink hair on his head, but I down those two. I vaguely notice Hoseok and Brittany dancing not too far from me, practically making love on the dance floor. Wouldn’t surprise me if they disappeared upstairs real soon. The reggaetón bops keep going and Jimin and I keep dancing amidst the crowd. Whoever picked this mix deserves a reward because it got all the throwbacks. I smile big when I hear Don Omar’s “Dile.”

I’m sweating, pushing my hair back from my face every few seconds, regretting not bringing a scrunchie with me to put it in a bun. The reggaetón mix fades off into a bachata mix with “Te Extrano” by Xtreme being the first song to play. Not wanting to go back into my feels, I decide to take this time to grab water and sober a bit. Now that I’ve stopped dancing I realize just how drunk I really am. I lean against the counter and grab a cool water bottle from the cooler, snickering when I see Yoongi making out with some girl across the kitchen. 

The bachata mix turns sensual, as “Sobredosis” by Romeo Santos starts to play. I sway softly in my spot against the counter, singing along to the song as I try hard to sober up. 

I hear Tony yell a “Look who finally made it” and the crowd starts to shout their greetings at whoever just walked in. I turn around to see what the commotion is all about and see Jungkook walking in holding two bottles of Hennessy, one in each hand.

“What the fuck” I whisper softly, but not soft enough when I hear Taehyung reply, “yeah, he’s back.”

“Whoa when did you get here TaeTae? And when you say ‘he’s back’ you mean cause of summer break right?” I ask without turning back around to look at him, my attention at one man and one man only. 

“I got here a while ago with Janet, we were outside smoking though.” Ahh that makes sense. “And no, he’s back for good. He graduated last week.” He says with a smirk in my direction. 

My eyes go wide, muttering a soft, “fuck.” I turn around to face the kitchen, hands in my hair in exasperation. How did he graduate already? He’s like three years younger than me! I close my eyes and focus on doing the math only to realize that he in fact was graduating college this year. Shit. 

Tae pats my back, “what’s got your panties in a twist love? It’s not like you fucked the guy on his 21st birthday and never spoke to him again even though he’s one of your best friend’s, Yoongi’s to be exact, younger brother.”

I open my eyes and face Tae. He yells an exaggerated ‘OW!” when I twist his nipple. 

“Kim Taehyung what the fuck?! I told you never to mention that again.” I exhale and make the decision to continue my “getting shitfaced” mission. Pouring a line of shots, I start to take them one after the other until Tae decides to take the last 3 himself earning a “fuck you” from me. 

I lean against the counter, facing the living room only to see Jungkook walking towards me. I roll my eyes at him when I see his smirk directed at me. He walks up next to me and opens the bottle of Hennessy, not saying a word. Taehyung chuckles and leaves with a “have fun lovebirds.” Jungkook pours two shots and hands me one. But he doesn’t just give it to me like any decent person would, no way, he has the audacity to bring the shot glass to my lips , softly nudging my lips open with it to make me drink. Not one to back down from a challenge, I hold his hand holding the shot glass against me and throw my head back to down it. His big brown eyes, those that were so full of innocence, are now full of lust and focused on my lips. I don’t miss the way they subtly move down to look at my neck when I swallow the alcohol, or the way his hand still near my lips slightly twitches when my tongue flicks out to lick my bottom lip, making sure I take every drop of alcohol he gave me. 

He leans closer to me, his scent which now surrounds me making me even drunker. My hands go up to his chest instinctively, as if I had the willpower to actually shove him away. I could feel his heart beating faster against my hands, his pecks feeling tight...woah when did that happen? 

I feel, rather than see, his face lean closer to my ear where he softly whispers, “wana show me what else you can swallow?” His deep melodic voice has me closing my eyes and gulping in a millisecond, feeling a rush of wetness pool at my core.  

I open my eyes, reminding myself who I’m talking to and laugh the nerves away. I shove him back, needing some room to breathe and he chuckles at my antics. 

The playlist starts to play “Imitadora” by Romeo Santos and I can feel a change in the atmosphere. Jungkook takes a step closer to me, arm going around me to softly push me against him. He leans close to my ear again to whisper “dance with me” but I’m too high off his scent and to the beat of his heart that’s vibrating against where my hands rest on his chest to answer. He takes it as a yes and walks us backwards to the center of the makeshift dance floor. 

I bring myself back to the present and raise an eyebrow at him, “You sure you can keep up Korean boy?” I feel his chest softly vibrate from his chuckle.

“I have a few tricks up my sleeve preciosa” he answers with a smirk as he twirls me around. I swoon at his honey like voice calling me “preciosa,” with the subtle hint of his accent. But I feel my pussy clench when he dances bachata like a Latin born man. 

My heart feels like it’s about to burst out of my chest when he starts singing the chorus of the song in perfect Spanish close to my ear. Hitting every note like if he was Romeo Santos. 

He must've heard my swift intake of breath by the way he smiles. A smile I feel on my neck as he leans even closer to me to drop a kiss at my nape, sealing it with a lick. 

The song comes to an end, quickly transitioning to a more up tempo bachata song. Jungkook drops another kiss on my neck and whispers “wana see what other tricks I got?”