#i know i am being very unkind here but let me have this okay? this is my gremlin blog and I really REALLY liked the first season

[legionofpotatoes]

extremely bad faith mandalorian takes, do not engage please i cannot stop hysterically laughing at this season and thus am incapable of level-headed discourse. these are just words I want to write down to see if they look as unbelievable as they sound in my head

my favorite telltale sign of the embarrassing s3 story optics is their like. genuinely hilarious ostrich-neck-in-the-sand rehash of past story arcs down to the aesthetic fucking beats. that's the shit sandwich that really gets me in this whole stank buffet. It is astonishing. Like there was genuinely nothing else they could come up with as to not upset the status quo of their fickle, marketable story limbo, and so they, and I cannot stress this part enough, ignored established character progression beats and just did them again. they just did them again. from the top, using shockingly similar payoffs, right in front of our own eyes. and I just sat there and ate it!!

din has to re-love his toxic death cult after clearly progressing away from their value systems cause he's cooler with that helmet always on. gotta keep the limbo going. his main north star, set up as his way out of said cult, gets recruited into it instead, completely defanging the possibility of interrogating the entire bedrock of trauma and insecurity that kept uncomfortably clashing with his expressions of love and humanity in the past. now they're all one big happy gel of a Cool Dude With Gun and Kid. gotta keep the limbo going.

at some point he also has to re-learn his droid prejudices to then re-unlearn them again, a couple of times even, for no discernible thematic reason other than to make him act like an ass to some type of botched working class allegories (??? the fuck is going on with droids this season in general??). gotta keep the limbo going.

grogu, meanwhile, has to re-earn a mandalorian piece of armor to re-reinforce his allegiance (and here I was thinking the rond would be a pulpy setup for some shot-dead-fake-out but how can chekov's anything exist in this mangled mess), cause mandalorian culture is a live service videogame of tiered ranks now, so the potential upgrades are conveniently endless. gotta keep the limbo going. speaking of their culture, he also, hilariously, has to then be re-adopted by din to re-reveal their paternal bond and re-dramatize their love. cause he's not a foundling anymore, see; he's an apprentice now! the words are different. that makes the emotional meaning reset also. I know this from film school. audiences have no object permanence, right? they're all fish? we're writing this show for fucking fish, right? like in the aquariums? gotta keep the limbo going.

and they just keep doing this. they will dress it all up with technicalities and loud Plot Noise but it is all emotionally the same exact shit that has already happened and it is making me feel insane. same exact payoffs for backpedaled setups that were already, for all storytelling purposes, finished and done away with. it is comical. they're telling nothing. non-stories and recursive sisyphean plotlines that reset primitive character arcs every five episodes like it's the most unmoored bermuda triangle-ass time loop in space. you cannot even really twist it into some type of harmless expression in lieu of episodic TV, or even something more campy, cause like. it does have a rapidly progressing plotline about big and overarching stuff, stuff that is holistic, linear, and goal-oriented, like retaking homeworlds and reforging their broken nation and fighting mr gideon man. it's not a weekly detective romp with B plots galore, not anymore at least. but the characters somehow start and end in the same spots they always were. like the big ole smoking fucking gun that that is.

it feels like the most clear-cut example of plot moving forward - at breakneck speed sometimes - while characters progress either backwards or just. like. sideways and then back again?? almost like dropping a teabag into an empty mug and calling it a beverage. I see the pretty taste-making ingredient sitting sadly at the bottom there, but where's the substance? what is this all for? to wank it to how cool mandalorians look when they fly? I mean they can be pretty cool, no argument there. but some of them could be cooler if they felt things deeply and that changed them, fundamentally. you know, how A-to-B storytelling does sometimes.

and I am achingly aware that I am aging out of this show's target audience, I know that. but the death by comparison within the same bloody show's adjacent seasons is just as harrowing. what happened. it just worked too good is what. a corporation responsible for telling a myth will never allow it to finish if it suddenly starts hemorrhaging this much money. grogu and din can't progress, even aesthetically, past their season 1 selves, no matter how much that same season's story was setting them up to. cause inscrutable sad dad and cute doll baby combo. we'll either throw away those story hooks or keep resetting them. keep the limbo going.

groundhog day-ass show. it's hysterical. I can't be normal about how mask-off blatant this all is now.

and to follow this up to andor of all things. really clinches it, you know. no notes. just no notes, disney. tens across the board

[posallys]

ok 1 ur desktop theme is GORG and 2 i need (if u wanna) ur thoughts about the show (or show sally in gen bc ur the only one i trust with her)

thank you!! i was actually thinking about updating it but maybe i wont 🤭🤭 and i have a lot of thoughts about the show except none only very few of them are good and i will be crucified by the 13-year-olds

im going to tell you anyway.

i will start with something i like....percy being angry. like yes give me the anger of a 12 year old who feels utterly alone in the world and doesn't understand (or does and it makes him more angry)

the fight scenes are dog shit. the only kind of cool one was in the arch but it was only cool because of percy doing the bait and switch and falling through the arch...the fights are bland boring sucky whatever other synonym you wanna use

uhhhhh sally jackson is not and would never be sitting in the rain pining of the god she told to leave....and especially not to teen pop...if she WERE going to act like a 16 year old and do the pining thing it would be to fucking like...billy joel and ricky martin and donny hathaway and stuff llike that okay...

i will preface this by saying that yes i understand that talking back to an abuser the way sally does in ep 1 doesn't make the abuse less abusive....however i DO not like the fact that that scene explicitly goes against sally characterization in the books....i am not digging my book out atm but the part where percy is like "my mother has never raised her voice or said an unkind word to anyone"....me thinks the writers all read the books 10 years ago and are going off of memory alone + or their brains are so clouded by the obsessive Big Screen Need to make women a badass girlboss slay queen i fucking hate it here

LET ANNABETH BE SILLY AND FUNNY AND CUTE AND CRY AND NOT BE AN ADULT THANK YOU....hated that they made annabeth the one to realize that it was medusa and not grover...give me back grover having to wrangle percy and annabeth into backpack leashes just to keep them on task/stop them from wandering off...book trio i miss you

i absolutely ADORE leah, walker, and aryan though the three of them are so so perfect, A+ casting no notes couldn't have done it better myself. if it weren't for the three of them i would have zero hope for the show i cannot lie...they're carrying. without them it's just..bad.

the pacing???? bad.

why did we waste half of the 4th ep on the train with echidna...stupid dumb pointless i hate it here

i do like the whole not all monsters are monsters and the gods aren't inherently good just because they're gods thing they've got going on though...very inch resting...silently hoping that they do a complete 180 and have percy side with luke and redo the series from there because that would be iconic as fuck <3 a girl can dream because at least then i could take the show at face value and not take 80 health damage every time they mess up a key part of the books...im at -29834 heath rn.

where was the time at chb before the quest??? the oh so important vital scene where luke teaches percy to sword fight???? like BRO that's soooooooooooo important to ME how could you get rid of that

not having annabeth show percy around camp

additionally, not having annabeth feed him the nectar and ambrosia, WHICH BY THE WAY they haven't even mentioned in the show yet...plot armor gone rip

not the fredrick chase sympathy while simultaniously blaming the woman...........rick when i get my hands on you...

annabeth having to EARN thalia's love??? absolutely not probably one of their biggest fuck ups fr.

the scene where sally is talking about Poseidon to percy...i do not like it sam i am. bad. not wistful enough not longing enough not sad enough not gut wrenching enough...also not completely here for sally telling percy that his dad was a god because....sallys whole thing was NOT telling him in order to keep him safe...i know they changed it in the show so sally knew he was going to camp immediately but that does not mean i have to like it

the scene with sally and percy in the pool. i hated everything about that. sally would never talk to percy like that never talk to him about money never make it seem embarassing NOT TO MENTION that percy simply wasn't scared of the water. that's stupid as fuck. theres a part in the book where percy literally says being by the water calms both him and his mom like...come the fuck on just admit you can't fucking read or at least didn't read the book.

sally annabeth get behind me so they cant hurt you anymore

i did loveeeee percy praying to sally though...absoutely insane and true of them. also the "I AM SALLY JACKSON'S SON" yesss baby you tell them about your mommy!!!!!!

them making athena moa level bad in tlt is quite interesting. setting up annabeth siding with percy pretty well.

also the whole impertinence thing over medusa's head was weird to me. when annabeth first said that i had immediately thought that annabeth's impertinence was telling percy to pray to poseidon IN ATHENA'S TEMPLE bc that made much more sense to me...but whatever

the annabeth/medusa parallel is intriguing at the very least

the underwater scene with the neraid was cool even though i hated the parallel to the pool scene w/ sally.

the dumbass pinecone fate line. 0/10 did you read the book? did you pay attention to how empathetic and reflective percy was when he found out about thalia?

honestly....i think disney was just the wrong place to go with this show because it's like what...pg? it should be pg 13 and should have more... sustenance.

this medusa was so cool though. which we could've seen a fight.

i need to know how many women are in the writer's room though...because It Does Not Look Good. funny how the characters that they're fucking up are all women....crazy. weird. totally coincidental.

are we just not going to talk about the vitality and pressure of getting the bolt back on time? where is the inherent inevitable danger, the suspense, the fear of not accomplishing a seemingly impossible talk looming over everything

this is 10000% not all of my thoughts but im not going to rewatch in order to collect them all so this is what you get xoxox

[vampire-exgirlfriend]

Okay, this is the last thing that I’m going to say about this entire shit storm that's been happening the last few weeks.

A lot of racism concerns have been brought up in light of the very evidently doctored screenshots that are going around (a post proving that they’ve been edited can be found here - just a request to do some research before we start dogpiling). 

People are accusing Ange of just letting the racism slide, of only severing the friendship with certain individuals when “girl code” was broken and former friends were contacted again, or whatever. But that genuinely wasn’t the case. Now look, she doesn’t need me to white knight for her, she’s perfectly capable of defending herself and owning her part in shit, but I will say for Ange, when certain individuals were sending a slew of hateful anons (many of which were deleted because I don’t need to see that shit on my own blog), some of which referred to me as a “bad jew” or racist against my own people for having a white oc in my current fanfic (for reference, I’m also mixed race), Ange was there for me. And the racist hate I endured was part of what spurred Em on in dropping the screenshots pertaining to these people and how they operate. They decided that they were not just going to let it slide, knowing that the crossfire would be brutal. I’m not going to say that my experience trumps anyone else's, or carries more weight, but I would hope it could be considered alongside everything else. I've endured some foul shit in my time in fandom, but this was the first time that shit was racist and antisemitic.

Could she have been more firm? Yes. Should she have been? Yeah, I'll say so. But she was actively made to feel by this person that it wasn't her place to do so as a white woman.

Honestly, I was ready to just wash my hands of this entire thing. I am only tangentially involved and the entire thing has been super triggering for me for a multitude of reasons. We have all said stupid shit in our time on the internet, we've all been unkind, we've all been *insert whatever here*, but the doxxing and the editing of screenshots is just so beyond insane, and the way it's being minimized is so out of pocket, and frankly, it's dangerous - it's how things like this are allowed to continue.

[sachermorte]

hi roland

i noticed you use a forearm crutch and i wanted to ask for some advice, if that’s okay with you

i just got my very first forearm crutch (and mobility aid in general) today and um. it’s very scary to use it in public :’)) i just wanted to ask if you have any advice on how to give less of a fuck about people staring and judging, and how to feel more confident with using it in public

thank you :’)))

Servus, Anon, you caught me just coming back from the gym. I'm happy to talk about this before I go jump in the shower and pretend I don't exist for twenty minutes.

I've been using some flavor of mobility aid since I was around eighteen years old, so let's just round it up and call it a full decade. I started with a cane, had to upgrade to two forearm crutches three years in, and knocked myself back down to just one crutch around three or four years ago. I've been carrying around a giant metal pole for so long I don't really remember what it felt like to go without it, so I suppose I really am the best person to ask.

This is long. Table of contents provided here, cut to follow.

On Judgment

On Theater

On Discrimination

1. On Judgment

The first point I want to impress upon you is that people really, earnestly, don't give nearly as much of a fuck about you as you think they do. People are inherently self-centered. This isn't the same thing as selfish, mind you. People can be good and generous and kind while still being fundamentally self-centered. That's the price of admission for being an individual. People live in their own bodies and deal with their own problems and primarily concern themselves with their own affairs. They might look at you, but that's because the way that the human brain works is that it wants to take in new pieces of information. A young person with a mobility aid is "unusual", so they're just filing it away in their endless filing cabinet of Things That Exist On Planet Earth. It's no huge drama.

To continue on a slightly different angle, the therapist-esque "no one's judging you I promise!!! do YOU go out on the street and judge people on what they look like?" never worked on me because yes, actually, I do. I think people are out here dressed tragically and with bad haircuts and with the most hideous shoes I've ever seen, and I think it very often. But here's the thing: I see someone, I judge wholeheartedly, and then immediately move on. Any given person occupies less than two full seconds in my consciousness before I go back to what I was doing and forget about them literally forever. This is how random, shitty, petty judgments happen. These people are irrelevant to your life and your story. You will almost certainly never speak to them on the subject*. If people think about you at all, it won't even be unkind. It'll be "Oh, I wonder what's going on there. Anyway." I promise. Kerry Weaver used a forearm crutch on nine seasons of ER before it was explained, and people dealt with it just fine.

I suppose I'm lucky in that I live in Vienna. You would be hard-pressed in Vienna to get anyone to give a shit about you and what you're doing if you were shot in the street. I consider this one of the best things about the city. I've known people who only very delicately broached the subject of my crutch after knowing me for over two years. And it was when I was already complaining about my hip joint. "Ah, that's why you have the crutch, I suppose." "How very right you are." "Anyway, you were saying?" I've had multiple people mention that they forget I even have it. It just melds into their map of what Roland looks like. Doesn't even warrant thinking about. The one time I had a stranger ask me about it was three years ago, and it was a little kid. I told him it was because I never ate my vegetables. I laughed. His dad laughed. Everyone moved on. Aside from that, it only comes up if someone asks me if I might like to take their seat on public transportation (I might, indeed), or someone offering to let me use the staff elevator or waving me through a priority queue. Nobody cares.

*If you live in America, the last paragraph is unfortunately not applicable. I've experienced the height of rudeness in America. People grabbing me to ask me questions, people literally laying hands on me to pray without permission. I once had someone pull out one of my earbuds to ask me what was wrong with me. You are allowed to shout at these people. The best way to get rid of them is to make an absolute scene. I wholeheartedly advocate for tactically losing your shit. Also, your crutch was practically formulated in a lab to be good at hitting people. Consider thoroughly.

2. On Theater

Even taking all of this into account, though, having a mobility aid is new for you, and new things are frequently scary. This brings me to my very favorite tactic for navigating the world: delusion. When I have to do something I'm not used to doing, or go somewhere I'm unaccustomed to, my first thought is always "what character am I playing while I'm there?" I recently started going to the gym and always dress as Favoriten-chic as I can get with my present wardrobe. When I have to file an important piece of paperwork, I dress very respectably in gray and black. When I was at my job in the garderobe last year around a bunch of ÖVP-Wähler, I dressed mostly in vintage menswear.

What kind of characters exist in the greater public consciousness that often use canes or staves? Aristocracy is and always has been my mask of choice. You, however, might choose a swashbuckler. A Tolkien-esque wizard or someone living in The Shire. A knight. A monk. An outdoorsman. Partaker of organized crime. Jay Gatsby roaring 20s billionaire. Whatever you choose is going to be your cover until you feel like your crutch is an extension of your body and you don't need the pretense anymore. You're cosplaying. It might take a few months. A few years. You might decide you like your persona so much you never take it off. That's also fine.

Again, I live in Vienna, and people stare at you here. It's just a thing. It's culturally accepted. Half the time we're not even staring at you. We're staring through you. Einfach nur ins Narrenkastl schaun. But because I dress the way I do and move the way I do through the world, if people are staring at me, the last reason I'm going to even think about is the crutch. It's usually the outfit.

Also, that point earlier about people being fundamentally self-centered? I'm so absurdly self-absorbed it's a miracle I can even see where I'm going. I've had friends, multiple times, go "those people were STARING at you" and I honest to God did not even notice. Not even a little bit. When I have company I'm too wrapped up in saying outrageous shit. When I'm alone I always have headphones in. My leitmotiv is inescapable. Which really only helps to reinforce the vibe I'm pushing out all the time.

3. On Discrimination

If you wanted me to write that no one would treat you any differently, I'm sorry to say that that's not the case. Don't get me wrong, there are many benefits, both physical and social. Your pain will go down significantly, that's for sure. You'll be able to walk faster. You'll be able to be out longer, and experience more things. I personally get to use Cripple Privilege to get out of anything I don't want to do. I almost always get a seat on public transportation, even during rush hour. I can press-gang friends into carting shit around for me. Just yesterday I had help carting two vintage hardwood and leather dining chairs from the third to the tenth. I did not carry either of the chairs. I just trotted along and chattered everyone's ear off.

But people do tend to make assumptions about what you are and aren't capable of. The extreme praise when I started going to the gym didn't really sit right with me, and I'm not going to bother saying anything about it because what's the point? In the minds of other people, they're being supportive, not condescending. Your dating pool will shrink significantly, because again, people make assumptions about what you are and aren't capable of, and often just don't want to date a disabled person. If your partner is okay with it, their family likely won't be. My ex's family said some HORRIBLE things to and about me about how I was "dragging him down" and "forcing him to take care of me". He didn't defend me. This was the least of many, many problems with that entire relationship, but I still found it incredibly unpleasant. My issues in my love life aren't solely due to my condition, so don't fall into despair prematurely, but I can't pretend that it isn't a contributing factor.

After that relationship ended, I wound up cutting out most of our former mutual friends, not only because of their lack of support, but due to them constantly posting those pastel uwu "you're so valid!!!" positivity and (mis)information posts surrounding disabilities, which felt incredibly infantilizing and condescending. Again, I'm sure they would insist they were being supportive. If I ever see another one of those posts again it'll be too soon.

In any case. You will live a long, meaningful, fruitful life. And the crutch will be a part of you. For now. For a while. Maybe forever. That's okay. That's fine. Maybe in ten years you'll be just as jaded and nonchalant about the whole business like I am now. That doesn't make your apprehension about the situation any less real. But I'm telling you now that the life you want always lies on the other side of a massive pain in the ass.

You'll muddle through somehow, with alternating bouts of clumsiness and grace. We all do, after all.

[tubborucho]

Yeah, I am pretty sure he thought of it as a light-hearted way to explain Sunny why Tallulah is moody. Doesn’t change the fact that it was a fucked up thing to say and genuinely hurtful for a literal toddler.

This and your point about people not being able to let go of the whole Dadza thing are two of my biggest problems with q!Phil. I know it's not cc!Phil's fault how people treat him but the way people overhype his parenting does make it more irritating as a viewer. It's not just fans, though, most characters seem to share this view of him as an amazing Dad. The fact that he stepped up for Tallulah when Wilbur left is great and the effort he puts in is great, but his parenting skills are just okay.

It feels like every time he talks to or about Sunny he ends up doing something bad that's brushed off because "that's just how Phil talks" or "he's just protecting his kids".

His reaction to Sunny's train was awful. I know he has a banter-y relationship with Tubbo but he was criticizing her father and her own choices right in front of her. It felt like he didn't even absorb any of what Tubbo was telling him. Like, why did he keep complaining about it feeling sterile when it was a brand new build and Sunny chose the white blocks themself?

The morality test about stealing the panda was completely unacceptable. Genuinely horrible thing to do to a child especially when he told her point blank at the end that it was a test that she managed to pass. Why would she trust someone who might be secretly testing her?

The talk in the museum was bad for both Sunny and Tallulah. Tallulah isn't "in a mood," she has genuine concerns but has still been making an effort with Sunny even while trying to maintain some distance. For Sunny he was playing up a very real insecurity to make a point. It's not really fair to Tubbo either, his game was having issues and he left his daughter with two of the people he trusts the most. I went to watch from the vod for slightly more context and chat reactions and Phil did not waste any time at all. The moment Tubbo was gone he rolled straight into it with Sunny.

There was also a point a few days ago where Tallulah showed some discomfort over Empanada and Phil responded with this:

Empanada’s nice, you like Empanada. You like Em. It’s Sunny you’re not a fan of. Sunny’s just all in your face with money and sunglasses and shit. But, like, Sunny’s fine too. Sunny’s just a bit much though. Sunny takes a while to get used to.

Sunny was not around for this but it's still a terrible way to talk about a child. They weren't even the egg Tallulah was concerned about at the time. And I do believe that q!Phil wasn't trying to be mean here but he still was. He is consistently unkind to Sunny even when he's trying to make a good point or a joking.

Wait, is the last thing a genuine quote? Because I haven’t heard this one before.

And yeah. Listen, Phil is a good parent. He takes care of Chayanne and Tallulah very well. He is a good parent, but it doesn’t mean that he is good that way for every other child ever. I think people forget that Dad figures in stories don’t mean that they are perfect in every adult-child relationship ever.

He is a great dad for Chay and Lullah. He is genuinely very condescending towards Sunny. It’s like every time they interact he just refuses to even try to see past his initial impression of them. Phil wrote her down for no reason as a shallow and tolerable at best kid in his books, and acts on that judgement in a way that he doesn’t care about her in any way past their basic safety and sometimes teaching them stuff if they need it immediately.

The only reason he pays Sunny any mind at all is that he cares for Tubbo. Also not in a parental way that people (and Tubbo lmao) seem to try and picture it as, but he cares. Sunny is just a tag along.

And don’t get me wrong, I am not saying that he should love her like his own or even really like her. It’s fine. I am saying that he still should treat her with the same grace as other kids that are not his – she is a child, you are speaking of and with a child, being mean about and to them is not okay. Especially because this child did literally nothing wrong.

[inkabelledesigns]

-holds head in hands- Girl I have been pushed around enough this month, oh my gosh.

New thing I'm discovering about myself: I have boundaries over leftover nights! I guess this isn't completely new, but I'm feeling it rather intensely tonight. At home, if I can't remember when something is from, I won't touch it, I will dispose of it because that probably means it's been in there too long and is a health hazard. But it is a whole different ball game when I'm at a family member's house. I've been visiting with some family lot this summer, and they're snowbirds. They stay in one place for the summer then another for the rest of the year. And when they're getting ready to fly, it means we have to clean out the fridge and freezer, which is hell on earth. They save everything, and while that's fine and dandy for them, you cannot feed me food from before I got here. I don't trust how long it's been in that fridge after this one particular incident with broccoli from them as a teenager, I won't do it. I'm too afraid of the mold and germs, whether they're real or not.

But they are so pushy about leftovers. They're pushy about food in general, and I tolerate it, because they're family, and I know they need to feel good about everyone being fed. But this is my boundary, this is the thing I won't let you push me on. I will not compromise, I will repeatedly hold my ground. You let me pick my leftovers and fill my plate myself. I don't want help, I will not let you slip things onto it that I can't verify the cook date of, no no no, I will not do it. Let me have some autonomy.

I'm exhausted. I'm so tired of having to hold my ground, to the point where I want to cry. It's frustrating. I don't have a lot of hangups about food, I was praised as a child for being willing to try so much stuff and not being "picky". Which is saying something, I'm autistic, we have a reputation for that that is messy and often unkind. But regardless, I'm supposed to be "easy". But this is the thing I'm not easy about. I've done everything else right, I've been nothing less than graceful and agreeable and kind about every other social convention and thing I'm supposed to do with family. This makes me feel like I'm being punished. And this isn't the last time I have to deal with it. There's one more day of leftovers before I can finally be free. I hate feeling unsafe about food, that is literally one of the worst things to put me through. If I don't have security about that, I am a mess. I don't want to be a mess, I don't want to have another breakdown in front of people I love.

I've been getting pushed about all sorts of things all summer by a wide variety of people, and I can't take much more of it. I just want people to stop pushing me. I don't want to have to defend myself anymore, why is it so hard for some people to accept that no means no? I'm so anxious about the coming weekend, I'm about to be dealing with a different side of my family that has their own series of complications and social nuances to navigate. I want to see them, just like I wanted to see the side I've been seeing now, but I'm so, so tired. I can't take much more of this. I thought I was gonna be okay, but I think I need a little time to not be okay before I can socialize again, and I'm not going to get it, or at least, enough of it to recover in time.

The plus side is, soon I get to sleep in my own bed again, without worrying about waking anyone up. And that means I can be surrounded by all the plushies I desire. I want to hold my big ones very tightly. Just, gotta hang in there a little longer. We will get through this, we will be okay. Just, don't be surprised if I'm running on empty for a while.

[anywaymuahahahaha]

Hello. It’s been a while.

Severe trigger warning for what is under the cut.

To say 2023 was unkind to me would be an understatement. I’m sure it’s no secret that I struggle with my mental health and this would end up being one of the most trying years I’ve had in a long time. I found myself in a dark place very early into the year. I was struggling deeply with depression and anxiety and couldn’t manage my emotions at all which led to a series of mental breakdowns that had catastrophic effects on my life. I try to keep my demons to myself but sometimes it is just…too much. I could feel myself letting the “darkness” take over my life and I couldn’t let that happen again. I sat down and had a moment of clarity and said to myself “I am unwell. I need help.” This moment of clarity would vanish almost immediately as the next day my father unexpectedly passed away. Typing those words still feels unreal. My world ended, my clock stopped. Nothing could have prepared me for this loss. Nothing. Three weeks later I am still in shock and disbelief finding myself confused and angry at all of this. I am not taking it well to say the least. I completely shut down. I was an absolute wreck. Losing my father ultimately led to the worst nervous breakdown I have ever had which almost cost me my life. If it wasn’t for the intervention I had that connected me to help who knows where I would be. After my breakdown I was connected to help and am now getting treatment and help for what I am going through. After years and years of struggling I am finally medicated and have been seeing a therapist. I can’t say things are “better” I can’t even say I am “okay” All I can really say is that I am here. It’s hard to persevere in a universe that I feel like doesn’t want me here but I will try. Thank you for the kind words and messages. I am sorry this year has just been an absolute nightmare. I am trying my best to return to “normalcy” but it’s hard. One day I want to curl up in a ball and die and other days I feel like my dad left me all his strength to hold on and I need to keep fighting for him. He was always there for me. It’s hard without him. So hard. I miss him so much it hurts. I will try my best to carry on for him even though it’s the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do in my life. I’ve been on antidepressants for about a week now. I’ve started therapy (which I’ve desperately needed for a while.) this isn’t the start I wanted but it’s the start I was dealt. Thank you again for your kindness and support. 🩷

[williamrikers]

how (not) to write an office romance

okay so i am livid with rage after watching step by step episode 11 and i will say some very unkind things about it so if you loved the episode, please scroll past this.

in this post i will be comparing pat and jeng's romance on step by step to gun and cher's romance on a boss and a babe, and show all the ways in which the relationship in step by step, for me, fell flat.

yes, i am aware that we are dealing with two completely different genres here. abaab is a cute little comedy show (for the most part) while sbs takes its setting super seriously and tries to say something profound about homophobia. however, they're both at their core office romances with similar set-ups and obstacles, which they tackle completely differently.

the reason i am writing this is that, to me, pat and jeng do not feel emotionally resonant as a couple, and therefore the whole show is falling flat for me. i want to compare and contrast them with gun and cher, who are one of my favourite bl couples to date because of how they were presented to us.

now, pat and jeng had a nine-episode slow burn while cher was kissing gun in the second episode, so take what i'm about to say with a grain of salt. BUT. cher and gun were built up over time as a couple and we could see them grow as individuals as well as together, while all the most important couple moments of jeng and pat got lost in one of the many time skips (if they happened at all).

the thing that bugs me is that by episode 11 of sbs, we are told that jeng and pat have been together for a few months. but nothing -- NOTHING -- that we are shown on screen supports that. they don't treat each other like two people who have been together for a while. they don't even treat each other like they know each other well. they do not have a single normal conversation with each other. gun and cher, on the other hand, are shown being domestic with each other, over and over again. they talk about difficult emotions with each other. the moment cher lets his mask of happiness drop and starts crying in gun's arms is one of my favourites in film history because 1) it's just really STELLAR acting from book and 2) it shows how far they've come as a couple, how much trust they've developed between each other, how close they've grown. on step by step, pat is still looking at jeng exactly the same way he was in the first episode. WHICH HE SHOULD NOT BE DOING. if they've been sleeping together for half a year, he should not be looking at this man like a deer in headlights. maybe this is an issue that stems from ben being a very inexperienced young actor, but imo it's also a writing/direction issue. if jeng and pat were in a balanced relationship, i would expect pat to call jeng out on his bullshit. like for example, telling him in unmistakable terms that pat was trying to tell him about his resignation, and that jeng was unwilling to hear it. (cher would have had a field day with that one, if gun had ever stooped so low.) instead, pat just apologizes, like he has no say in the matter. GIANT RED FLAG!!!

now, cher as a character is set up to be rude and brash and he doesn't care about his job at all, basically, which is one of the only ways this kind of office romance works well: because cher negates the inherent power imbalance of the setting just by virtue of being himself. gun and cher as a couple never feel imbalanced or like gun has more power, even though he is older, even though he is technically cher's boss, even though cher calls him "boss" for like, the whole first year of their relationship. they do, in fact, have several conversations about that in canon, and gun spends months trying to get cher to call him phi in what i like to call the Great Pronoun War Of 2023. it was a form of flirting between them, and a cute quirk of their relationship, and not at all a form of power imbalance.

now, on step by step, pat calls jeng "khun jeng" repeatedly. even when it's just the two of them. even after we had scenes of him calling him "p'jeng" and -- in one memorable moment -- just "jeng" without any honorific (!!), in episode 11 it's khun all the way down. and it's grating. at work, sure, pat is trying to be professional, but in private? no, it rubs me the wrong way. especially since jeng never returns this level of formality, he never calls him khun pat. (this would still be a bit weird but i could accept it if it was done well like on manner of death for example.)

and there's no reason for this given on the show. we don't really have a sense of what they even call each other in private (and i absolutely refuse to believe that pat calls him khun jeng when they're in bed together). now, with gun and cher, we know exactly what they call each other at which point in their relationship. they discuss it! it changes several times! gun goes from pom to phi, then for a while back to pom and then back to phi for himself, all according to what is happening between them in the story and what it means for their characters. they start out using phi/nong during sex, then much later also use these pronouns when they're just hanging out.

sorry for ranting about pronouns for so long but i do think it's a good illustration of this issue: i have a very clear sense of how gun and cher treat each other in their relationship. i have a clear sense of what they might do when they're spending time together, how they might banter or joke around, how they might comfort each other when they're sad.

i have absolutely no idea what a normal day in the life of jeng and pat even looks like. i don't even know how they normally address each other in private, and i have even less of an idea what they're like as a couple. is there flirting? banter? what do they like to do together outside of having sex? what do they like about each other?

i can answer all of these questions for cher and gun. their relationship is given adequate space on the show for us to see what draws them together, and what keeps them together once they've found each other. we know why they like each other. we know how they make each other's lives better, we know how they spend their time, we know why their relationship is important to them.

cher is not romantic at all, in fact, he is the opposite, he ruins every single romantic moment by making a stupid comment like he's getting paid for it. but he is incredibly loving. the combination is absolutely fascinating as a character trait and gun comments on it on several occasions, and it's clear that gun loves cher the way he is, stupid comments and all.

when jeng and pat are together, are they romantic with each other? do they have shared jokes? do they, like, have fun together at all?

these questions keep haunting me because literally nothing about their relationship has been established in any way, and as a result, i find myself not invested in their love at all. at this point, i'm sort of hoping for pat to stay single because the show hasn't shown me a single scene of pat and jeng just. being happy together. you know. the core thing a relationship should be about? (i'm with yok kinnporsche on this.)

what exactly will pat be missing about jeng during the upcoming two year time skip? i don't know. does pat know? do the writers know? what exactly does jeng bring into pat's life that he can't get anywhere else, besides his dick? how does jeng make pat's life sweeter, how does he make pat's life easier, how does he make pat's life brighter? i have no idea. and at this point, i am starting to think that the writers have no idea, either.

anyway. the main plot of abaab was a mess and i won't try to defend it but the relationship between cher and gun was beautiful and deep and we got to see exactly how these two fell in love and why, how they changed each other's lives, how they made each other better, how they learned to be each other's comfort and happiness.

and without that? well, i don't need to watch people working a terrible job that doesn't make any sense. i can just go to work for that.

[eriexplosion]

5 6 7 10 for Star Wars violence 👀

OKAY TIME FOR THE VIOLENCE (I don't know how actually violent these opinions are but pretend I am Very Vicious)

5. Worst blorboficiation?

sdfsdifj REGRETTABLY... OBI-WAN.... I love the man but fandom characterizations definitely show some Popular Guy Character Syndrome where it's all about how sad and tormented he is and while I respect that as a lover of tormented men, it is certainly an experience when you're like, reading a CodyWan fic and Cody is comforting Obi-Wan through his tragic past like he's never gone through anything difficult in his life. Also some of Obi-Wan's fun edges are sanded off, he's more generically sassy but considerate of others feelings and kind, etc, and like. He's not UNkind. But this is a man that faked his death and did not tell his emotionally unstable best friend like that was going to do anything but drive Anakin absolutely batshit insane. He watched like ten clones in a row die without a reaction and then the instant a Jedi died they all had to stop for a funeral. He tried to get Luke to kill Vader WITHOUT telling him who he was. He's kind of an idiot and can be kind of an asshole. Let him hurt people's feelings! Let him be socially inept! He is a dipshit not a harmless weep blob!

(This ties in with my desire to see CodyWan fic where they straight up get in a fight but is not ENTIRELY connected to that)

6. Opinion on canon and/or fanon use of the secret child trope? Discuss.

It works for Luke and Leia and I think it should have stayed at that. I'm not a big fan of the Palpatine reveal for Rey but I didn't want her to be a Skywalker either, sometimes you want a main that is Just Some Guy, doesn't need to be a secret child of anyone. In fanon I just REALLY do not like it, partially because it's plugging in a blood relation where it doesn't need to be. The other part is that I have mostly seen it for Obi-Wan and Satine with that Korkie kid and with how utterly repressed those two are at each other I refuse to believe they ever successfully fucked.

7. What is the weakest piece of canon writing?

It feels like cheating to say the sequel trilogy mostly because I never finished it so a thing that I definitely finished and loved but makes no sense - AOC is not the strongest movie but ROTS was like, fully just a series of cool scenes stitched together to approximate a movie. And don't get me wrong, I adore the prequels. But the only one that I think succeeds as a Movie is TPM. ANAKIN'S FALL ESPECIALLY IS NONSENSICAL AS SHIT. Like the underlying motivations are there but they were not pieced into anything resembling a coherent narrative. You have a start point, an end point, and everything in between just kind of jumps around with I think the weakest point being the Tusken Massacre - it's treated more like a sign of Anakin's potential darkness than anything when like. That's a whole village. He killed a whole village and it never comes up again! Lucas apparently didn't consider it that big a deal!

It's to a point where I actually think the massacre can't be addressed from a fully in universe perspective, because there's no actual way to twist it around so that it makes sense for that not to be enough to Make Anakin Fall without breaking the already very loose rules of the universe. Most other Star Wars points I can figure out some kind of justification for how it works in world, but to explain how Anakin wouldn't fall here you just have to kind of confront that Lucas is both not a very good writer and also approached the Tuskens with an incredibly racist viewpoint given that he doesn't appear to see their deaths as fully Counting, unlike the Jedi younglings in ROTS. It's a plot choice that, if treated with the full weight it would narratively deserve, completely unravels the entire rest of the series, the only way to make the storyline of everything else WORK is to take it out or change it so much as to be an entirely different scenario, and I can't think of any other things that fuck it up THAT bad.

10. What’s a ship you've unwillingly come around to?

I think 'unwillingly' is overstating it (but then I rarely DISLIKE a ship, so there's usually not much Unwillingly about it) but I thought Tech/Phee was cute at most until everyone started being Like That about them. Now I want them to kiss and get married onscreen. I hope that she hits that every night. Phee deserves whatever she wants.

Also Anakin/Padme probably counts because I did not actually go into the clone wars watch WANTING to love Anakin but Whoops. WHOOPS. So that meant I got An Affection for the two of them in all their messy stupid as shit glory.

[monsterfuckerconfessions]

Words are being put in my mouth by some anonymous messages and some very unkind assumptions are being made.

Very long post under the cut-

I need all of you to understand that I'm playing this by ear. Longtime followers will know that every so often I will make a post about a new rule because something was brought to my attention.

Upon the creation of this blog, I had no idea what rules would be needed to foster a safe environment. Therefore, I added rules as things came up.

If memory serves, at the start of this blog, I didn't have any rules and that worked fine for quite a while because no one submitted anything that was harmful. As time went on, that of course didn't last and sadly people submitted things with slurs and other harmful language.

I admit I've made mistakes. A transmisogynistic slur made it onto this blog, which was quickly called out by a follower (thank you for that!) and I removed the submission in question.

When I posted my new pinned post with a list of rules and guidelines, I asked for input. I cannot predict every possible scenario so I admittedly rely on followers of this blog to call out things they think are inappropriate. Which is why when I received the recent message informing me that they found a submission to be offensive, I took it very seriously.

I will admit, I genuinely don't remember queuing the submission in question. It was likely submitted about two weeks ago and I have no idea what my thought process was when I saw it and accepted it. I don't want to make excuses, but I will say that I sometimes queue submissions when I'm not in a place where I should be doing so, such as when I'm extremely tired, or just woke up and still bleary, or after I've taken medication to make me sleepy.

I have made mistakes before when going through submissions when I shouldn't. I've accidentally posted things instead of queuing them, for example, or I've misread what someone wrote in a way that caused issues. I have been trying to do better about that as of late and not go through submissions when my judgement is impaired. I don't know if that was the case for the submission in question. I genuinely don't know. I am just sharing some of the mistakes I've made in the past and telling you I will try to do better in the future.

Though I don't remember my thoughts when I queued the submission in question, I do remember queuing other posts that made me personally uncomfortable when I read them.

I'm a bit torn here, which I tried to voice in my other posts on the subject. On one hand, I want people to feel free to talk about their thoughts and feelings. But on the other, I don't want those thoughts or feelings to cause harm to others. I've queued posts that made me personally uncomfortable (because I felt they insulted something about me) because I didn't want to censor people here. I didn't know how or if I should make a rule about such things. I didn't know how to handle it, so I went ahead and queued things that I found offensive to me personally, hoping that if others found it offensive as well they would let me know. Since no one did, I hoped that meant that I alone was made uncomfortable and thus it was an okay thing to have on the blog.

When the submission in question was brought to my attention initially, I immediately felt uncomfortable in how it was worded. I'm not fond of anything that calls something or someone gross.

I asked for suggestions on how to handle the subject on the initial post because, as I stated earlier, I do rely on followers of this blog to tell me how things make them feel and suggest ways to improve. This is a blog for the community so I always prioritize feedback, especially when I genuinely don't know how to handle the situation.

As stated earlier, I don't want to censor people's experiences. This is a place people should feel free and open to talk about their monsterfucker journey. But at the same time, I do not want the sharing of those experiences to hurt others. Which is why I asked for input. I received a lovely suggestion about making a rule that essentially means "don't yuck someone else's yum" and that is what I added to the list of rules and guidelines.

Ideally, I want people to be able to voice their preferences in a way that doesn't insult others. I hope that in the future, that can be done.

As for the deleting of the submission in question: I've been accused of deleting it in order to hide the full situation. That is not true at all. I deleted it because it was offensive to multiple people. I have not deleted any posts on the subject. I am not trying to hide anything I've said or done.

And in fact, I haven't deleted the post at all. It's been made private. You can view it here, if you wish to have a full understanding of the situation.

As for the other accusation thrown my way:

I don't think I ever stated that "this is a you problem." The post in question made me uncomfortable as well when it was brought to my attention and I 100% agree that it was inappropriate and offensive.

My issue with one of the messages I received is that I simply disagree that discussions about the human body are off topic for the subject of monsterfucking. A suggestion was made that I should have a blanket ban on any mentions of the human body in a positive, neutral or negative light and I cannot get on board with that as I feel that in many cases our views of human bodies influences our monsterfucking journey.

I hope future submissions can word such influences in ways that are not insulting to other people. I will do my best to not accept submissions that are worded similarly to the one in question.

Thank you all for your feedback and patience during this situation. I am always trying to improve this blog so that it is a place for all sorts of monsterfuckers to come together and share their thoughts. I apologize for not always succeeding in this and I do genuinely greatly appreciate when people call out my mistakes so that I can endeavor to do better in the future.

💖

[elliesbelle]

belle what the fuck happened??? are you okay???

long story short (prob won’t be short, knowing me oops):

tw: drug overdose, suicide, hospitalization mentions

work has been one of the biggest stressors in my life lately. i’ve been getting relentlessly harassed and bullied by a coworker (and my boss has done very little in regards to it), and something happened the other day with an extremely cruel parent of one of my kids, and it triggered something in me.

i was already having a difficult time the night before in regards to my ex (had a late night arguing with him and there were many countless unkind words said about me and the kind of person i am), and i was already in an incredibly bad place, so the work thing just pushed me to the edge. so i left work early, purchased a lot of cold medicine, went home, and took it all on top of sleeping pills and other stuff i can’t remember. said goodbye to my loved ones before i eventually went to sleep.

after that, a lot of it was a blur, so what i’m relaying right now is either from the few times i was lucid or from what other people have recalled to me.

live-in ex had been driving around trying to find me after my friends at work alerted her that i’d left suddenly, but she eventually made her way back to our apartment where she found me cold in our bed, and so she called 911. she tried rousing me but she was unsuccessful. paramedics eventually came and they kept trying to wake me up and eventually brought me to the emergency room.

i’m not sure what they tried to do to me in there, but obviously they tried to flush all the drugs out or whatever. i remember very little during this time, just that they had to cut my clothes off of me and i couldn’t stay awake for long. live-in ex was there the whole time, but they didn’t let her in the room until my mom got there and declared her as family (they wouldn’t let her past the waiting area bc we’re not related, so my mom had them list her as my spouse so she could be with me).

eventually, they placed me in the ICU where i was placed on bed rest (literally was not allowed to get off my bed because there were at least like, five or six wires attached to me) the whole time. a nurse has to be in the same room as me at all times, so they rotate these different nurses in 12 hour shifts, apart from the regular lead nurse who does hourly rounds to check on me. thankfully, they allowed visitors, so live-in ex stayed with me for most of it (so did my mom and my dad briefly, but they’re not as important). when they deemed me “healthy” enough (basically they wanted to make sure i didn’t lose my liver or something), they moved me into a regular hospital room.

been in here for the past day or so now. i can still have visitors, so live-in ex, both my parents, and my baby sister have all visited me. one of my coworkers who i’m close to also surprised me with a visit (which was so sweet, i was trying not to cry). they’re thankfully allowing me to have my phone and all (i’d be going insane if not), but i’ve been mostly sleeping honestly.

i tried asking them to not admit me into the psych ward cause i hate being in the looney bin, but i don’t have much of a choice because of the “severity” of my attempt. tried to opt for outpatient, but gonna be put in inpatient whether i like it or not, so i’ll be spending christmas here in the hospital alone unfortunately. oh well.

oops, yeah, not long story short lmao. anyway, sorry for worrying y’all. i really was not as lucid as i believed i was at the time that i’d made all those cryptic posts. i wanted to spend some time writing while i’m in here, but my emotional state has been so raw recently and the past few days being in here has caused me to be a lot more blocked in regards to that. my writing is tied to my emotions, so i won’t be able to write for y’all until i can process my emotions better again.

i don’t necessarily plan to abandon y’all, but if i’m slightly less active on here than usual, please understand why.

love you all.

[renee-writer]

No one who walks this earth goes unscathed by the actions of others, in one way or another.

People impact us. Sometimes they hurt us.

(Even those of us who like to pretend no one can get under our skin.)

But we all have had experiences where it's really easy to feel resentment and anger towards someone. In fact, it's hard not to.

The bitterness inside can easily consume us, swallow us whole, and take over our life. Sometimes for a very long time.

I’ve met people who have been living in deep bitterness for decades.

Sometimes it’s not as long, but still equally consuming.

The thing about bitterness is that it doesn’t change the past, at all.

But it absolutely changes one’s future.

Because when we should be enjoying the moment, we are sulking in anger of the past instead.

Or when we could just brush something off and make the most of our day, we go into an anger spiral that completely takes over our ability to be present.

Bitterness is like poison in our veins.

Yet, it’s so hard not to be bitter when life has been unkind to us, and honestly, we feel like we deserve to be bitter.

Maybe you do deserve it. I know some really awful things happen to people.

But I also know that when we choose bitterness, we are giving power over to the person or thing that hurt us.

Each time we choose bitterness we are saying, “here’s my joy”.

I would never tell you to just “get over” the pain of your past. I wouldn’t tell you it’s not a big deal. No, your pain is valid.

But I would encourage someone to take a look at how much time and energy they are STILL giving the thing that hurt them.

We have a choice to make- be bitter, or be better.

Being better, meaning, choosing a life of freedom for yourself.

And getting to take the weight of the past off of you so you can live a lighter life.

One where you are present.

But the choice needs to be made.

Usually the choice needs to be made daily.

In fact, it might need to be made many, many times a day.

Am I going to let whoever hurt me steal more from me?

Or am I going to release it, knowing God will take care of it Himself, and move forward from this pain?

I know it’s a process. I know it can take awhile to get to a place where you really feel free from the past.

But I pray that you’ll at least start the process.

Really try to make the choice to grab ahold of the better life that’s available to you.

Jesus wants you free from bitterness. Not because what happened was okay, but because when He died on the cross He took on your pain, so you wouldn’t have to carry it forever.

I know it sounds kind of crazy, but it’s true.

Bitter or better- you choose.

Choose with Jesus in mind.

Choose with your future joy and peace in mind.

And when the bitterness sneaks up, which it probably will, make the choice again.

And again.

Because life without the weight of bitterness is better.

~Kelli Bachara, The Unraveling Blog

[sailoryooons]

Hali's Milestone Character Asks

Hi all! In the middle of yesterday's craziness in me having to educate internalized homophobia and getting some very violent and unkind asks (that I ignored and I am okay) I actually hit a milestone! I'm trying to only celebrate the big ones, because I want to thank people for taking the time to read anything I do in this little piece of the world.

To my readers: you mean the entire world to me. Thank you for letting me take up your time with my words, characters and stories. I have so many stories to tell that live inside of me, and you give me a place where I can get them out. I appreciate you, I love you, whether you're a silent reader or a commenter, you are appreciated.

To my mutuals: you are the sun that makes me warm and shines light on my life. I never thought in April 2022 that I would establish myself in this community in the way that I have, and the people that I have met and the friends that I have made are some of the most well-rounded, enlightening, intelligent and emotionally fulfilling relationships I've had in my 29 years of life.

And to those who mean more to me than just mutuals: @here2bbtstrash @gimmethatagustd @nabiolive @goodsoop @rapline-heaux @jjkeverlast @yoongukie-ff @daechwitatamic - being your friend has been an honor and a delight. Thank you for going above and beyond and being the people that I celebrate every day!

Here's how I'll be celebrating:

While I would have loved to do requests for this milestone, I felt really bad about opening them when I have so many sitting in my inbox from my Agust requests and my other milestone requests, so I've decided to do character asks with a little twist: you can ask any question, EVEN IF IT CONTAINS SPOILERS, of any character past or present. This means you can ask characters from my m. list questions OR my WIP list. Unlimited, however many times you want, whatever content you want.

Anything with a spoiler will be marked and left under the cut. I will be writing these as dialogue responses with a little bit of action sequence/setting in them.

I know this isn't as fun as requests, but I hope you get to see a little inside my characters and stories through this! Thank you again for letting me do what I do.

asks | m. list | WIP list

[the-void-writes]

"Remember me" Ruhi and her sister 🥹

Thank you so much for all the fun prompts love! 💖 I know this one was a typo, but you gave me such an amazing idea that I had to write it out, so I hope that’s okay!

Context: Viraj was Ruhi’s arranged husband, but they were both in love with someone else. The day of the wedding, they confessed their love to their childhood friend Avir, but Avir was only in love with Viraj and convinced him to run away. Ruhi’s mother tried to marry her off again immediately, and Ruhi was so distraught that she ran away and accidentally fell into Paradise. Years after recovering from the heartbreak, she finally asks King Gazali to let her see her friends, but she only finds Viraj, dying from illness in a hospital.

The Birth of Paradise - Remembrance

Ruhi couldn't recognize her old friend. Time had worn Viraj’s strong and glowing face down to a dull, wrinkled slab. She half-expected Avir to be sitting beside him, also afflicted by the passing years, but Viraj was all alone in the room. No family, no friends, not even a neighboring patient in the bed next to his own. It was just him and Ruhi.

The view from the window brought a tear to Ruhi’s eye: her town had changed so much. Their old park, where she and Viraj and Avir spent most of their younger years, was completely gone. It was nothing more than a big square of dirt in the moonlight.

Ruhi took a deep breath and approached Viraj. Her gentle hand on his arm roused him from his sleep.

“It’s too early for medication.”

His soft voice broke her heart. When they were due to be married, his voice could have shaken the sea. Now, it was a wisp of wind rushing by on a late afternoon. Ruhi composed herself, knowing that Gazali’s magic wouldn’t last very long. She wanted whatever time she could get from Viraj.

“It’s been a long time,” she said, “and the years have been unkind to you, but I hope somewhere in your mind, you remember me.”

Viraj finally focused on her face, studied her features… and began to cry. His shaky hand came up to her cheek.

“Ruhi,” he whispered, and she cried right beside him.

“Yes, I’m here.”

She pressed her head against his, waiting patiently as he found his words.

“You haven’t aged a day.”

She chuckled. “I know.”

“Ruhi—” he coughed. “Am I dead?”

“No, dear. You’re very much alive.”

“But you’re here. They told us you jumped.”

Ruhi screwed her eyes shut. “They were going to arrange another marriage. I felt hopeless without you and Avir. I’m so sorry, Viraj—”

He coughed again, harder and longer. “No, Ruhi. It wasn’t your fault. We never should have left.”

“Please, don’t blame yourself.”

“I wanted to go back for you. Avir just wanted to run, and— I let him convince me to leave. The next day, we heard you were gone.” Viraj stared out the window at the moon. “Thirty-five years, I’ve had to live with what we did.”

Ruhi hushed him and held his head to her shoulder. He clasped her hand, still mumbling to himself about Avir. His warbled breathing broke her heart.

“Please,” she said, “tell me about your life. What have you seen?”

“Nothing compared to your life, I’m sure.”

“Tell me anyway, please.”

Viraj looked up at her. “We went to France.”

“You did? How was it?”

“Just as beautiful as I imagined. Avir tried to sell his work there, but it never took off.”

Ruhi brushed his brittle gray hair. “So you moved back home?”

“I did… but Avir went to America to sell his art.” He closed his eyes. “He called me his muse, long ago. I must have stopped inspiring him. They let me attend the funeral, at least.”

That explained why Avir was nowhere to be seen. Their love hadn’t lasted, and if Ruhi had still lived on the Mainland, she may have felt even worse about being left that day under the mandap. Now, seeing what Viraj’s life had become compared to hers, she couldn’t help but feel she had dodged a bullet.

“I never did marry,” Viraj said. “Not that I could have, anyway. My reputation crumbled when I left you.”

“Viraj…” Ruhi held him tighter. “I wish I could have brought you with me.”

“Where did you go?”

“You’ll think I’m crazy.”

“You’re not crazy, Ruhi. You were always the smart one.”

She smiled. “Thank you.”

“So where were you?”

“The water took me somewhere far away. I wasn’t entirely appreciative of it, at first, but I’ve come to love it. The people are kind, and you can live your dreams without ridicule.”

Ruhi smiled as she thought about Paradise, of her friends, her life— and her wonderful, beautiful, talented roommate.

“I think I’ve found love.”

Viraj’s eyes brightened up at the sound of her voice. “You have?”

“Her name is Cecilia, she’s a dancer. The most amazing and beautiful dancer I’ve ever seen.”

“A dancer…”

His voice sounded weaker than before. Ruhi tightened her grip on his hand, as though it would keep him with her.

“So please don’t blame yourself, Viraj. I think I’m finally happy.”

“Happy…”

She nodded. “Yes, I’m happy.”

“That’s… wonderful.”

He leaned back against his bed. The noises of the monitor were starting to slow down, to Ruhi’s dismay. She wouldn’t leave him until he was truly gone. He needed her, now more than ever before.

“Viraj, were you ever happy?”

A smile spread across his wrinkled face. “I’m happy now, Ruhi.”

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ruhi dried her eyes as she returned to Gazali’s Sanctuary. The purple, star-covered sky shimmered through the window, and Ruhi had never felt more at home. She opened the doors and stepped into the pavilion, where Gazali and the others were waiting. The king smiled at her gently.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes, sir. Thank you.”

“Of course. I hope you found what you were looking for.”

Ruhi searched through the crowd until she found Cecilia. Her dark skin glowed in the starlight, and her messy curls were more beautiful than ever.

“I did, your majesty.”

She walked over, stood on her toes, and kissed Cecilia until she couldn’t stand upright anymore. Her lips were so soft, like petals in spring. She held Ruhi closer so she wouldn’t stumble and fall away too early. When they finally parted, Ruhi combed her hand through Cecilia’s hair.

“I couldn’t be any happier than I am with you.”

Cecilia giggled and wiped away a tear. “Neither could I, Rue.”

Ruhi kissed her again, not even caring that their friends were watching and grinning at them. Back home, she had been convinced that her life was over. Now, she had a long and happy life to look forward to, with someone that she could confidently say that she loved more than anything in the world.

[hislittleraincloud]

Are you familiar with the concepts of ship and let ship? Don’t yuck my yum? Don’t kinkshame? It’s okay to vehemently disagree with other fandom pairings/scenarios/etc., but posting screen shots that openly shame other users for their preferences is very unkind.

I’m genuinely sorry that you were triggered. It would have been easier to use the block button than to create a post saying “Wyler people are gross” and specifically calling the screen-shotted user garbage.

At the very least, please keep any shaming off the general fandom tags. I would have preferred to not see any of this and I don’t even ship Wyler.

It's not kinkshaming to call someone who said that they hoped that a beloved character in fandom was "ripped to shreds" 🗑️.

Context, hun. Did you completely miss the part of the post where I said I had no hate to the OP/the potential for that story? It'll be a good story if real justice is served. The little screencap was served not against its OP, but to the sentiments that it incurred in the comments. Violent stalking/murdering someone else's boyfriend is acceptable to that person, and that's just rank.

I've posted before that I cannot stand Wyler. Fuck That Monster is my 'vehement disagreement' with that, and I am open to that story... I'm not open towards shitty comments about murdering Joel just because Wednesday was dating him. I would love to read that stalker story for justified comeuppance, but I can't say that's what it'll be about given the comments. The real diff there is that my hope as a reader is for real justice to happen while there are people like the 🗑️ poster who hope, as a reader, for INjustice to happen (since there's a real injustice towards two characters being happy only to have one other be gross, inappropriate, and threatening to their happiness). I would have said that poster was 🗑️ regardless of their chosen ship for having posted comments like that, but so far I haven't seen anyone in the popular ships who post 🗑️ like that...because they don't tend to be 🗑️.

Thick skins only grow in the face of adversity. This fandom is full of the thinnest skins imaginable because somewhere along the line, people got the idea that no one's ideas or comments are open to any criticism; that 'staying in a lane' is the way to drive, even though we're seriously all on the highway to Hell here together (especially in this fandom, let's not sugarcoat that). Why do you think that I don't give a flying 💩 about what anyone says about Wenovan and can defend it (maybe not to everyone's liking since they cannot conceive of AB Wednesday having such strong agency at her age/regurgitate whatever the moral line is atm)? Because I've been through that war before. It's nothing new to me.

Senseless death is already happening in realtime in this world. Don't be 🗑️ and wish death upon...how did the Millennials call it before Gen Z became teens...a precious cinnamon roll like Joel just because Hunter Doohan [in a role that was, by general real world consensus, a milquetoast character] makes your panties wet. Yeah, sure, write whatever the Hell you want, it's all fiction. But it still isn't immune from crit, just as the show itself isn't at all immune to crit.

My story isn't immune to crit either, but not one greyface anon has actually read it to criticize WHY things don't work within or don't make sense to them (those are actually in the comments at AO3, and I've responded to them... like the fan who didn't like AB Wednesday in love, even though that's...what she's been LOL). It's just all general "ew gross" or "it's illegal!" or some inane broad brush about the premise with nothing to react on its substance. "But I don't have to read it to know that it's wrong!!!" ... 😐 ...If I am willing to read a Wyler with the above premise to see where it (hopefully) ends up, I think others could be as open minded.

But anyway

If you seriously yum a murderous stalker over love--even while that's 'cute' in this fandom given the solidly frozen misanthrope that is our favorite heroine--then I can't help you. There's something broken there. 🤷🏽‍♂️ Wenclair and Wavier are at least based on 💕 love💕, so I guess that we've got that to be thankful for.

As for tags, for real? As if the tags on this shit app actually work? 💀 You said you don't even ship Wyler, but I'll give 'em a new tag anyway: Wyner/Wyners. Because that's what it all sounds like rn. Wyners whining about why they can't have nice things because ✨Hunter is so dreamy✨, and no one should ever be called 🗑️ just because they hope for a universally loved character to die a bloody death.

[officialralsei]

Hi, Ralsei! I'm sorry you've been having a hard time lately. If you're feeling uncomfortable with certain lines of questioning, why not just say so? Letting people know what YOU want or even what you don't like when they do isn't unkind or bad, either.

And hey. Not that its comparable to your situation, but from one person trying *REALLY* hard to be Nice and Kind and Good to another:

People arent gonna stop liking you if you get mad sometimes

...Umm, I really, um, appreciate the advice. But I'm here to answer all of your questions, haha! I wouldn't be very good at being a guide if I simply refused to answer, now would I...?

And, um, I'm okay, truly I am. I've got to get used to dealing with PLAYERS someday, after all! I might as well start now!

...Um, but, i-if you wanted me to be honest... if I'm supposed to be facing things head-on... you're right. Our situations aren't comparable.

...

...Sorry. I didn't mean to say anything weird, haha!