#idk i think its kind of fun now in retrospect

[machinerot]

i smack them together like dolls to make them kiss

[mecachrome]

Hi k! Glad you’re back! I was wondering, now that Oscar has taken another step this year, what you think he will want to focus on/you think he should focus on in the future re improving as a driver? He’s the first driver that I’ve followed since their rookie season and it’s been exciting to see the momentum this year so far.

hi anon!!! sorry for the late reply >__< this is a wonderful thought exercise though hehehe oscar has been progressing at such a commendable rate and ia it's been wonderful to witness :') tbh in 2025 the sample size is still too small to make any sweeping arguments but we can take it race-by-race and attempt to lay out his weaknesses anecdotally...

back in the day i actually wrote up a 2023 retrospective to dissect how we approach rookie performances & specifically mclaren's expectations for him as a rookie, which i felt were important to contextualize relative to dr's woes and the under/overhype for him entering f1 thanks to the drama surrounding his contract:

i think this is still a decent way to frame the axes of development for a driver because it's easy to say that at the end of the day, pace and race craft are all that really matter (actionably true in many circumstances), but there are so many intangibles necessary to attain these targets. knowing this, i think oscar's always had really remarkable self-awareness and accountability, which in turn allows him to learn at a fast rate and rarely make the same mistake twice... which i think will always be the most impressive thing about him! just like, not only consistency at its face-value meaning, but also consistency in terms of continuous learning and maintaining a drive to keep improving linearly. the only problem is that f1 is such a variable sport that this alone isn't enough to get you up to speed with something as tricky as tyres in only a handful of races, due to the myriad of conditions that influence how you learn a track, so he really did need the entirety of 2023 to properly hone his weaknesses in tyre management and race pace...

anyway i feel like the big narratives for oscar were tyre management/race pace in 2023 and especially in 2024 quali pace... which is fun to see because i do believe that he improved majorly in management by 2024! so seeing those incremental gains over the seasons has been really rewarding. i have no delusions over his competitiveness vs. lando during this time (21-3 quali h2h in 2024), so i feel like for him a big thing really was just learning how to put together that proper quali lap—he's had the pace on different occasions but would always drop the ball when it really counted, so i wanted to see him improve on that. which... i think he has so far, but it's still too soon to make any sweeping statements! overall though i'm very very glad he finally got that first pole and successfully converted it too T__T

looking at it race-by-race:

australia: a really solid performance overall MINUS the grass moment, but you see this is a tricky one because i could be like "well i think he needs to be better in the wet and not make these mistakes" but it's also like... idk sometimes shit happens you know? like there's obviously a spectrum in evaluating Error Proneness, wherein there's crashing/causing a red flag/dnfing and then there's having 30+ consecutive finishes and one wet-weather incident that still ends in a p9 finish with an extremely committed last-lap overtake as the cherry on top. so obviously you wouldn't want these things to happen, but in the grand scheme of things is that something he needs to regularly focus on or improve? idk!

china: kind of impossible to have notes on this, just a solid weekend overall which is esp heartwarming after how much he struggled here in 2024!!! great quali with two laps strong enough for pole and then comfortably in the lead from start to finish... honestly couldn't ask for more.

japan: considering the nature of this track and its lack of raceability for the current gen of f1 cars, the finishing order was determined by quali which in turn was determined by oscar's middling s1. so i suppose if anything we can once again point to needing to maximize quali potential here—max is just suuuch a machine when given the opportunity and i think there's always that little bit more to eke out that oscar hasn't 100% optimized. this is obviously anecdotal though... but either way i'm sure he himself is like "well obviously i want to qualify on pole every race weekend" just as like, a base fundamental of competitiveness, although whether that's the driving mentality he actually practices with himself is another question. well tbh this is also a reflection of where the mclaren is as a car itself—because oscar's personal philosophy that he's mentioned before is he calibrates his expectations to the potential of the package and is appropriately celebratory of his achievements relative to their scope of possibility so NOW i do believe he comes in every weekend like this car should be on pole so i should put it on pole! Next! which means every time he loses out to lando or someone else he probably does on some base level think to himself well this is something i need to keep working on and get better at. obviously i don't think he's bad at quali and he's seemingly improved significantly in pace since 2023/24, but that's not the ceiling being set for mclaren right now. So!

bahrain: similar to china but with more general excitement 🧡

saudi arabia: honestly overall really impressed with oscar this weekend because this track was pretty favorable to rb and max's avg race pace was actually marginally better and like yes i think oscar could have/should have gotten pole but i appreciated that he showed off his strong race craft/commitment/ability to weather and overcome 1st lap fuckery... like genuinely quite touched by how he got through that first corner and didn't let himself get bullied by max's you-or-me attitude at the apex LOL.

thinking about all of this it's like... oscar's season has honestly been soooo good so far that anything he needs to work on is frankly anecdotal and marginal and likely dependent on what he and the team specifically pinpoint weekend by weekend. SO FAR THAT IS! i'm sure as the season progresses there'll be larger moments of weakness and insecurity that appear, and there'll probably be results much worse than we've seen atm... well i'd prefer if that weren't the case but i'm just saying that the sample size is simply too small for me personally to sit back comfortably. but otherwise i really really like everything i've seen over the past 5 races T__T sure, he could be putting together perfect pole laps but overall he's managed to get his glaring pace issues behind him while still remaining calm and collected and knowing when to take necessary risks and make Big Overtakes without jeopardizing his race. sob!!!

let's revisit this in a few months tho 😖

[workedupovernothing]

i think an interesting part about posting fanart is you really learn where the community for something is and in retrospect it was stupid to not realise that of course the critters were all on tumblr so i come with an offering of a jester

-ramblings under cut-

i could probably and should probably take a better photo but 1. its 2 am i cant sleep and honestly its been a while since ive routinely posted art and i kind of dont know how to make it look nice outside of just. the drawing. ive been having fun with trradtional art its helped a lot with the fact i just kind of started hating my art? traditional art is very sensory and its good sensory to me. alcohol markers have a smell and a sound and are very fun to play with. im aware the piece is messy but also it was SO MUCH fun to doodle and i think it leaves a really colourful and sweet impression

i want to do some less samey but well done portraits particularly of mollymauk because i need some of my own art as a pfp on stuff like instagram and molly is my faveourite and i draw him a lot but i wasnt really proud of the face of the first full proper-y portrait i did also i want to study some other artists particularly what makes their posts look good on a grid because it is also a visual thing i suppose, i dont care about *clicks* i care about having people that care about my art and enjoy it and at least seein smthn nice it always makes my day to see nice tags and comments and stuff anyway idk what im on about i should stop and also go to bed hopefully ill sleep well haha there was a spider on my wall and i think hes lost under my junk piles now but he was kinda a bad climber

[katatonicimpression]

Guys straight up bizarre opinion incoming:

So, I watched A Fistful of Dollars last night. (Ah young Clint eastwood, back when he was hot and not predominantly famous for being a piece of shit... nostalgia...). And, despite everything, it slaps. Deserves its reputation as a classic.

Anyway, so the stranger/man with no name/joe/blondie is kinda an odd character to look back on. Nowadays, post 80s, post Schwarzenegger and Stallone, it's odd to see an action hero ever be treated as human. Maybe john mcclane in die hard? But mostly they're superhuman, hypercopetant at everything. Every act is impressive, nothing they do is normal. In contrast, blondie is very human, just very good at what he does. He gets his bombastic "get a load of this guy isn't he awesome" moments, but there's something very real about him.

He's also got this fun energy to his characterisation, basically because it's subtle and sometimes ambiguous. But he's not "oh I'm a stoic action hero I'm not gonna say anything". No, he's friendly enough. It's a weird performance because it was criticised at the time for it's blandness, but to me he comes across as great because he seems real, just understated. He lacks a stock characterisation (this is before his own character became a genre trope of its own), and I personally think that makes him more interesting. But to many at the time, the lack of recognisable trope in the performance made it bad. This is all hilarious in retrospect given how iconic the character now is.

Anyway so two things, and I said they were weird

1: That person saying sam has no personality? And inconsistent characterisation? Full of absolute shit.

Like, they'd be wrong anyway, but I will draw the comparison that just because a character isn't a stock persona, doesn't mean they don't have a strong presence. A huge thing with sam is his subtleties, his lack of adherence to stereotypes of various kinds, and the nuance of him. He's really difficult to put into a box and that's kind of the point of him. And the performance was great, I do think we - and especially the general audience - know sam better now.

They're wrong for other reasons but, idk just the comparison that's on my mind.

2: cap 5 should basically be a fistful of dollars.

I'm serious.

Ok so less murder, obviously. Sam's not got that energy. And his friends can be his canon entourage instead of some randos. But the same idea.

Sam puts himself between two warring factions, plays both sides. Things go to shit when he acts rashly to save someone who's plight reminds him of his own trauma (cue flashbacks). But sam does manage to escape and save the day, with a badass entrance and an iconic beat down of the villains.

Like... I cannot tell you how much I want this kind of structure now. I think it would really work.

Anyway, tune in next week when I watch for a few dollars more and somehow make it about Iceman

[skyburger]

hmmmm whos your oldest oc and how have they changed?

ojh my glooooorb endfire lulamoon my baby. she is still dear to me i still have a twilight sparkle i drew on to try and makje her look like endi she sits on my desk usually i think she might be behind my monitor atm.

but OHHHH shes changed so much i toned her down becayuse like ie know a lot of characters get hit with mary sue labels unfairly but to be entirely fair. that very much was her. she was part changeling from being bitten and infected i think(?) and had a robot leg (also lost in the changeling attack iirc) and one robot wing also i think? and her other wing was like night-sky patterned. and she had one eye that was completerly black with a scar over it and i think it also had the sans undertale blue wispy trail thing people draw sometimes when she used her powers. she also had sans powers i think? IDK also her still remaining legs were also covered in scars because thjats cool when youre nine years old. and still is c ool tbf.

she was princess lunas daughter and i think also king sombras? this was at a poinmt where i kind of shipped them i think cause like ill be real my parents got divorced and i wonder if that was me trying to make myself feel better which is rewally funny in retrospect. i used to be like this about asgore and toriel from undertale also. and she had this ridiculous extended family i think i also decided trixie lulamoon and snowdrop (from that one fan short film if u know) were her siblings and i want to say there was another one that im forgetting. i might find evidence of this on my wattpad hmm.

anyway she was called lulamoon because well its trixie lulamoons surname but also i was OBSESSED with mlpstopmotion on youtube as a kid (i met her at a convention once she was very nice) and she had this series called just different iirc? anyway the characters were sorted into houses a la hairy porter and lulamoon was lunas house (the four houses were based on the princesses) (and chrysalis maybe also had one if orget? she was the villain) but me and my bff at the time were obsessed with this and she had a matching oc who was celestias daughter iirc and her name was north wind. (Wherever u are now i hope youre doing well and i wonder if u still like tostitos as muchj as we did in third grade)

i have some old as balls ms paint base art i can probably dig up of her + some recent artfight stuff from after i toned down her design considerably LOL i might bring back her craziness shes fun. shes my baby. i will update after i dig through my wattpad and like gmail LOL thankyou for asking i loveyou

[absurdly-overpowered-astronaut]

Assigning TMCOTC OCs parties are for losers songs (now with 100% more vague yapping ^_^) (I ended up talking alot…I kinda regret it? Oh well)

(Will come back and assign them ferry songs in general like I did with deco and milgram)

Kat - PUNCH IT PUNK - personality fits really well! This is the kind of silly I was going for with his character and the story lines up surprisingly well with kat finding a ghost run away with lavation powers as apposed to a mutant one - “But, ah! Crap, no I had it coming! I got in trouble again, but now this isn't funny! I could really use a prince charming now or anyone if they could help me somehow-And a hero busts onto the scene! The cutest, coolest boy that I have ever seen! I guess not all is lost for this pathetic place Oh god okay, he's not that strong Oh no, come on guys, not his face - Hey are you okay, are you there, hey Blink three times if you hear me, alright? "Eh?" Awful, awful, it may be too late” / “I may not know anything at all And something tells me this is out of my control I guess in retrospect I could've figured that At least that way the shock wouldn't hit like a bat And spastic light specs brighter than the bluest skies Begin to dance around as panic clouds your eyes And you can call me dumb, impulsive and unwise but there's no way I'll stand here and watch, paralyzed Who would've thought! No, really, this is quite a scene The cutest, coolest boy that I have ever seen Turned out to be a monster mutant death machine! "I wouldn't call myself-“ "You will not turn him in!"”

Tory - KT’s official guide to coolness - ummm spoilers pretty much everything fits 100% from characterisation to Tory’s story and the lyrics matching up really really well I can’t go into it but essentially tory = KT and dimitri = this girl who doesn’t have a name final name (I’ve called her rin in all my drafts and notes but IDK if it makes her role in story to obvious) but I’ve drawn her few times

“But what's this you say? The merciful lie that I live til this day has crumbled to dust and there's no other way cause some things are simply meant to be contained and one of them is me…So are you happy to be proved right? I only hope he won't lose sight of his own future clear and bright.Please take this song as my goodbye”

Grey - STRIKE 3 - “and in a thousand years I’ll see a tepid autumn day and only think about its grace but blinded by the sun you spin the barrel of a fully loaded gun if there’s no winning might as well just have some fun when will you get it through your skull that I will not let you drown.”

Morgan - 100 epitaphs - morgan’s and grey could be swapped in all honesty the main reason grey got 100 is because “and in a thousand years I’ll see a tepid autumn day and only think about its grace” fit grey so well and I wanted to give morgan “What's the point of picking at your wounds,your scratches and your scars?” - “Overindulgence in grief is only immature , Forgetfulness is both the sickness and the cure. Lay your emotion with them like a mourning wreath , I chose to shut my eyes, you chose to bare your teeth. What's the point pushing back against the mill that grinds the world to dust? What's the point of picking at your wounds,your scratches and your scars? One would think so, I believed so, and it was the wiser me But the wiser you knows better,But the wiser you is (free)”

Tolver - cleave - I was so close to giving him like a dog…and like a dog does fit! Tolver has dog symbolism but I just got stuck on “come back like a dog” because…he doesn’t and cleave would reference on Tolver and Tory’s relationship which is one of my favourites in the story so my bias won…letting myself use tart pafl songs because I didn’t know if there would be enough otherwise (and I knew I wanted to give one of the characters foot note) - “And it’s in my brain deep within her holy graves…still rotting all the same” / “yet I don’t know anything (though it’d be nice to set you free) you’re no different to me (just take my hand and then you’ll see) time for my final decree (too naive I should’ve seen) you take what you want and then leave so it seems I KNOW I KNOW EVERYTHING THE LONELY BOY AND HIS ENDLESS REPRIEVE ALL I AM IS HELPLESS IT SEEMS…I’LL SAVE YOU THE WAY YOU SAVED ME SO IT SEEMS”

Alex - Parties are for losers - song doesn’t fit but none of them do even if I let myself double up…there is the odd line here and their I associate with “will you help me bare this stone never seemed to work when trade someone else’s hardship for your own was what I ment” her but mostly got parties are for losers because it was either that or cleave. She does feel the need to fill her self up and meets a monster (ghost girl) who she tries to help and that goes horribly wrong - “On a night like any other my mind started to wander, then I froze -Out from the flickering shadows She arose..The loser looks in the eyes of the monster The room is caving in it’s okay, it’s okay, I say And just like that, it turns into a girl, hey A friendly baseball bat comes to save the day Eternal rest never seemed to be closer Than in that passing moment, but quickly my fear was gone A lapse of reason, I figure, can be pretty fun And so the party goes on and on”

Cory - I ate my twin in the womb - I mean he kinda has a twin and he kinda sorta metaphorically eats them in the womb? If you look at it from one characters perspective and tilt your head at just the right angle It also means both tory and cory get kt songs - (so since his actual assignment doesn’t have lyrics heres some from like a dog I think fit him) “Like an obedient dog…So won't you tell me ,What do you know of devotion? Be grateful for the freedom of lacking emotion. Accept your future path wasn't yours to be chosen and even if it takes you decades, I know that , You will come running BACK LIKE A DOG A WOUNDED DOG RUN BACK LIKE A DOG A WOUNDED DOG” / “you’ll run back like a dog to her”

Joycie - false disposition - given to her kinda because no other song really fits and you could argue on its own false disposition is about a requited crush. I picked it because the pov idolises the other person and demeans themself and tries to hide their feelings but fails at it all of which are very joycie things to do. Pov personality is completely off tho I could potentially see morgan saying some of those yura lines but joycie is not a sanya - “Once again I was left in the dust…Destructive ones like me fold when there is nothing to bust! I couldn't see past the bright facade - layers of rust…It's not like I'm saying goodbye! Hey, why are you smiling still, cool guy?” / “Yet the walls around my sheltered heart. Begin to break and fall apart,Your smile is brighter than the most relentless sun”

Diana (formerly Juliet) - Occam’s razor - all lyrics fit her character perfectly and line up surprisingly well with the actual events of TMCOTC like pretty much perfectly - “It's a dead-end endeavor, it's time you understood ,That this whole situation won't bring you any good. Oh, I know that your heart's beating faster than it should But I can't let you in - wouldn’t even if I could ,So, I see, I found myself trying to win another inconsequential fight. Hah, my bark turned out to be much harsher than the bite.All right, sometimes life doesn’t give a damn about how hard you try But forgive my helpless spite what's the point of this self-pity? It's not pretty…”

Aidan (formerly james) - the mill - the feeling of the song fits really well and the general more experienced / jaded feeling to what the characters are doing. The characters in the song focus on a event that happened in the past that one hasn’t forgiven the other for and that is very similar to Aidan and Diana’s situation and the focus on zone work since Aidan is a character super tied to , traumatised by and experienced in ghost hunting - “this isn’t my first time sinking lower then the low…how hard can it be to not let it overflow oh I’ve gotten used to being haunted long ago…all I need to hear is a simple hello”

Nadia (formerly jayme/jaime/jamie I don’t remember how I spelled it :’) - footnote (like I said earlier I’m letting myself pull from tart pafl songs too but if you want a ferry pafl assignment convergence (but I associate convergence with Nadie at a very specific part of the story and less with her character as a whole) - chosen for toxic codependent yuri reasons sanya spends most of the song talking about yura and it makes sense that Nadie would spend most of her time talking about diana rather then herself because she is perpetually down playing herself/see’s herself as just an extension or tool for other people -“I don’t need you to take everything in your wake it’s the thought of me that keeps you run though. I don’t pretend to fake. To not know what is at stake to only give and not take not in your nature”

Madeline - message lost - her whole thing is haunting the narrative so gave her the song that is connected to dying thoughts and to abandoning some who felt close to you. The creepy vibe also just fits her really well - “day can’t break when the sun has burned to a crisp ,there must have been some supernova i missed , my ultimate snapshot - “sky overcast” go out with a whimper, not with a blast”

[the last 4 characters are in group together and I wanted to make maddie feel like she doesn’t belong there / single her out as different so I gave all the other characters j name (picked jbecause I have a j name) but then as the story changed these guys show up really early in the story and if there are like 3 characters with similar sounding names all introduced at once then it’s probably going to be really hard to tell their names apart so I changed it so now their names are anagrams]

[aropride]

speaking of psychosis- i wasn't speaking of it here but i was speaking of it- i've been trying to figure out what was up with the great psychotic episode of freshman year, because i had assumed it was a trauma-induced psychosis type of deal, but it occurred to me that i was definitely having sort of thought broadcasting types of beliefs, probably some other stuff but i can't remember atm and don't feel like digging thru my old vent account lol. (ramble continues under the cut this got VERY long)

(line with text so tumblr doesn't eat the image. idk if it still does that but better safe than sorry)

(the months with "2" are split into first and second half of the month bc it was relevant, couldnt figure out how else to signify that succinctly)

i cut out the labels of each belief for safety + in case that's triggering to ppl but each row is a different belief i had that in retrospect was probably some sort of delusion? top two are very similar but different enough i tracked them differently. bottom two might have just been anxiety+ptsd but i do really think they're connected to this

it was definitely at its worst mid nov-end of jan, but started in september and didn't really let up til like june

anyway like i said i had assumed it was a combination of trauma and being off my meds and isolation that made the perfect situation for me to go fucking crazy, but i hadn't really thought about it that hard . but now that i Am thinking about it, again, i was definitely having these kinds of beliefs before The Trauma

and in my past self's defense. one thing about my thought broadcasting beliefs specifically was that i was straight up being essentially cyberstalked at the time and didn't know, so i was completely right that certain people knew more about me than i had told them, but i was wrong about the reason why

anyway i was reading up on schizospec disorders for class (kind of. also just for fun) -- also important context schizophrenia does run in my family i think on both sides? but my parents are weird about talking about it. so that's part of this also.

but i noticed that of the three labels i was looking at- brief psychotic disorder, schizophreniform, and schizophrenia- (i didn't look into schizoaffective bc i dont think i have many bipolar symptoms, and didn't look into stpd bc i don't think it counts as a personality disorder if it lasts like 10 months lol, and delusional disorder because i do think i had some negative*&cognitive symptoms (*psych term meaning absence of things present in nonschizospec people, not literally just bad symptoms lol)-- though to be fair, that may have just been a combination of situational aspects & autism?)-- either way, it's not on this beautiful and awesome diagram in mspaint i made so i could illustrate the timeline aspect of the diagnostic criteria:

bc a diagnosis of brief psychotic disorder requires symptoms to only last a month, and schizophreniform for 1-6 months, whereas schizophrenia is lifelong .

basically the problem is- while the worst part of my psychotic(?) symptoms lasted ~4months, they were definitely there in some form for around 10 months, which is too long for a diagnosis of schizophreniform, but i don't feel comfortable just, assuming it's schizophrenia lol, especially when most of the symptoms i experienced dont affect my life anymore? it does make me nervous though that this happened right around the typical age of onset.

this might just be a problem with diagnoses being too specific to cover the entire spectrum of human experience, and i might just be outside of any area where a specific label could be applied . also, i know it's been written about but not become an actual diagnostic label- but there are places where ocd and psychosis can over lap, and schizo-obsessive disorder has been suggested as a diagnostic label, but not officially used anywhere afaik..

i think my main concern at this point is just, whether or not i should be concerned about it coming back. like, is it possible to be in various stages of active psychosis(?? it still feels very strange to refer to it that way but i guess that's what it was, so) for ~4-10 months, and then just be chilling after. or should i be worried. was this a one-time thing starting because i was off my meds and being worsened by isolation and trauma or is there a possibility of this happening again. and i think that's a question that can't be answered with any certainty, probably

[dateamonster]

what’s your opinion on the love magic in strange magic?

ok so at the time that i first watched strange magic, i was very much not into the whole love potion trope, and i do think i carried that sorta gut feeling into the movie with me. in retrospect, i think its a fun little device that in this context makes apparent how much this story took inspiration from midsummers night dream, which i think is kind of amazing.

but further than that!! the love potion and its place in the story is soo fascinating to me now looking back bc its one of the MANY things in strange magic that it feels like they didnt think through AT ALL, and once you do think it through, it raises a ton of compelling questions. like, the existence of a potion that can make you fall hopelessly in love by its nature forces you to think about consent, and by extension its presence in the story forces you to reckon with the fact that multiple main characters, not even just the villain, make the decision to override another persons autonomy in a pretty objectively upsetting way!! thats crazy to me! i love it!!

like with barely a few lines of dialog we learn that at some point in his youth the bog king was so desperate to be loved and so certain that this couldnt be achieved by typical means that he tried to basically bewitch someone, and that when she realized what had almost happened she was so horrified she presumably left his life forever, and that bk has lived with that guilt and the bone-deep belief that he is inherently unlovable ever sense, and then we just fucking move on! the implications there are nuts! hes a king, and canonically has multiple goblin women vying for his attention. what fucking happened to get him to stoop that low? what happened to him after? we will never know! and thats not even getting into sunnys or the imps whole deal.

im just a little obsessed with how like the entire story hinges on this single essential element and as a result this sillygoofy fantasy romance movie becomes kind of implicitly a story about autonomy and desire? and they never even rly define the terms of the magic beyond "true love overrides the potion" so it brings up all these questions about what constitutes "true love" in the first place that of course are never even remotely touched on. idk it compels me! it rly does!

[scourgefrontiers]

i think a lot about how much ive grown and changed as a person, not the least of which being how i went from a super heavy kinnie to someone who hardly kins at all

my journey with kinning was like...idk. it started with learning about what otherkin was, and i realized that damn i have a super strong connection with demons for some reason, and i genuinely wished i was an actual demon. this was in 2013 ish. that was my first time calling myself a kinnie

then my first experience with fictionkin specifically was with...unfortunately, prussia from hetalia lol. that was my first fictionkin. then shit got out of control from there bc then i proceeded to keep tacking on fictional characters onto my identity until they BECAME my identity.

i became a kinnie at a very interesting and formative part of my life--the mid-teen years. and honestly? i dont think it was the healthiest thing for my growth. b/c my identity sort of became...nonexistent for a while? i based my whole self around fictional characters. i didnt want to be myself because i didnt know who "myself" was. and unfortunately this lasted into my...well, mid-20s. im 26 now and it took me until i was ABOUT 24 to actually find my real core identity outside of fictional characters to the point of where i was proud and happy to know myself and call myself just...dan. thats me! im not dan plus fu, kidou, raditz, etc....im just dan. and thats enough!

so for me, being a kinnie was a result of not knowing who i was and using fictional characters to sort of fill in that hole in my identity. i wanted to be them b/c i didnt know who myself was, or maybe i didnt like who i was either and wanted to replace myself with them. i loved fu and lots of other ppl did, so i wanted to be him so i could be loved like that. i wanted to be funny like him. i wanted to be strong like raditz. i wanted to be smart and athletic like kidou. i wanted to be cool like dan phantom. i wanted to be anything but the real me and that hampered my growth as a person for a very, very long time

it took me a long while to reach the point im at right now--where im confident in my identity and dont need to use fictional characters as a crutch. and im not necessarily saying being fictionkin is inherently bad--it can be fun or even used to cope with situations such as trauma, i understand that--but when it came to me and my own situation, i excused it as being a "spiritual" thing and sort of clung to the idea that i was "soul-connected" to fictional characters who existed in another universe at the same time as me...which in retrospect was kind of a reach lol. but like. idk. it ended up not being spiritual at all even though i convinced myself it was. it was due to identity issues and, to an extent, actual real delusions--i genuinely thought that i HAD to uncover and piece together my "canon" lives to the point of obsession. it was super unhealthy for me and brought me so much unnecessary stress, everyone around me could see it too.

so uh. what am i tryna conclude here. i guess like. be careful? if youre a fictionkinnie, especially a young one, please take the time to do some introspection. is it just for fun? is it a lighthearted thing? or are you so intensely deep into it that its a huge part of your identity to the point of where you lost your actual self? to the point of having breakdowns over doubles? can you function in life without the kin part?

for the record, i still consider myself generally otherkin--i do still heavily identify with demons and have dreams of being a demon and all that good kin stuff. but its not who i am. i have a list of fictional characters i kin still--hidden and not advertised anymore--but its at the back of my mind now and is more of a casual "oh yeah im raditz haha" kind of thing if that makes sense? its not affecting my life as much as it did anymore and im happy about that

i hope nobody takes this personally lol. im just basically airing my thoughts about my own kin journey out and sharing my experience and thoughts abt the thing as a whole. end text post

[bawbio]

My Media Thread

Ok so before i get started i just want to say that i'm gonna be doing recommendations vs giving things an x/10 score like on my twitter media thread since the scores i gave were honestly arbitrary and a recommendation would give a much more clear view on how i feel about a game. Down below are the categories this thread will be using Don't recommend/Don't play it (Whichever one my brain remembers in this category at the time of writing) - I personally think no one should be subjected to playing this game and i would highly recommend not engaging with it at all costs like not even as a joke

Play at your own risk - I personally wouldn't seriously recommend this game to someone but if you want to give it a try go for it it could be really funny who knows

Maybe - This one will mainly be used for if i recommend the game but i think it's definitely not for everyone whether it be for difficulty or for potentially triggers in the game or even just some really weird shit

Recommend - I recommend this game wholeheartedly and would gladly suggest it to pretty much anyone

MUST PLAY - PLAY THIS GAME IMMEDAITELY RIGHT NOW

Oh and one final thing i'll be using the tag #beeb's media thread for this whole thread idk if you can mute tags or anything but if you can you can use it to mute this whole thread

So i guess without further ado i'll be starting my media thread here with danganronpa trigger happy havoc, So the first danganronpa game sure is an experience that's for sure and my opinion on the series has changed a LOT since i first played through the series and wrote my original media thread posts so i guess i'll just say this now. I don't like danganronpa as much as i did back then since my recency bias for the series went away ages ago and i've had plenty of time to look over the series retrospectively but the first game still has some pretty fun stuff. The whole mystery of why they're all in hope's peak i'd still say is pretty cool and hope's peak itself is a fantastic killing game setting and gives off a perfect atmosphere for the whole thing. The characters in one are kind of a mixed bag, on one hand you have characters who i think are genuinely pretty solid like sakura (She's probably my favorite character from 1 it's either her chihiro or mondo and maybe hina) and on the other you have whatever the fuck toko (in this game at least UDG helps her out a fair amount) and hifumi are where they honestly really suck just kind of being really annoying/weird most of the time. The chapters in this game are also mostly ok aside from like chapter 3 which is probably the game's lowest point trialwise and chapter 2 for how it handles chihiro (I refuse to get into any chihiro related drama so i won't go really in depth on that here) and just that really chapter 2 is mostly ok otherwise. Chapter 4 was especially nice and is my personal pick for my favorite chapter in the game and chapter 1 while it starts out slow imo has one of the absolute best executions in the trilogy. Thankfully this game also sticks the landing fairly well with its ending and it didn't completely fall flat on its face and seriously fuck up the rest of the game by ending on a sour note (Don't worry danganronpa 2 you're next) Personally i'd give danganronpa trigger happy havoc a...

Maybe - While danganronpa's concept of the killing game is something i unironically think is one of my favorite mechanisms for telling a story with how much cool character shit it can cause the execution the games do with the concept can be uh, less than stellar at times. Also aside from the obvious (violence, blood, and a whole lot of murder) stuff that would lead to me seriously consider giving a game a maybe. The game (and the series in general tbh) has some really weird shit in them like both toko and hifumi are really big offenders in this game and i don't even want to get into the chihiro discourse not to mention the gross shower peeping bonus scene in chapter 3 although that one is completely missable (thankfully) if you didn't get a certain item from the monokuma machine but still regardless all of that is enough for me to give this game a maybe, if you think you can handle the blood, gore, everything else and more in danganronpa i'd honestly say it would be worth picking up and trying the series out.

[livecharliereaction]

manga ep2 big post last one

shes soooooooooooooo

ONE OF THE SCENES EVER LETS COMMENCE though its clear to me now that this probably just straight up didnt happen its only miss servants in the room oh idk about gohda

girl

its so awesome

kumasawa n nanjo corpses disappearing ohhh ur so obvious again some key fuckery though

iconic and i dont use that word often

i love it when they title drop

the pacing is fast as hell sure but like not really in a bad way im taking it as a recap for me anyway + i do rly like the artstyle i mean it

like cmoon. omg

i used to be happy that shes having so much fun but im not sure i want to say that anymore it feels pained. Hm. But i like that shes playing around with it. Actually yeah i think she genuinely is kind of having fun w the game at this stage... Whatever it is its fun to watch its her theater its her stage shes great at it. just look at all the shit she does No locked room mystery where she needs to do all that and at the same time i believe she needs to be doing all that all the time. OK

its about the mirror SHANNONS ASS DOES NOT LOOK RELIEVED LMFAOOOO

i honestly dont remember what else happens now i mean i remember post-game but i feel like someone else will die but i dont remember who. maybe only battler maria rosa remained i dont rmb

shannon i like u so much shannon

oh beatrice people go to war for people like you beatrice

SHANNON SAID SHE WANTS TO HEAR GEORGE SAY HE LOVES HER ONE MORE TIME OH BEATRICE UR SO FUNNY

they match each others nasty

rosas banquet time. another peak scene of the series for sures

font made me giggle

hi girl. ohhh another reason to read higurashi first i remember exactly how seeing this in vn felt

in retrospect theyre so fucking funny in question arcs. they kind of have nothing to do with this game theyre just here to idk. scissor

after erika shows up its all downhill for them too all culminates to that ep8 scene i do love it theyre so much fun its true its true

someones said this before me but something can be said about the language they use to describe their love as witches VS the language they used as satorika something something breaking free from the confines of heteronormative human expectations and its not a matter of "oh we have to be in the closet khyaa #secret #girllove" nuh uh it sort of claws its way into their very feelings and perceptions of themselves and each other and i dont know etc etc etc everyone knows this lambdabern been crazy ok anyway

fun manga im not gonna have a crazy pace but ik theres some differences in ???? ep8 ??? or answer arcs anyway so i def want to read there. specifically interested in 4 and 678 but ill prolly read them all this one at least wasnt very long yup yup ok gn

[askaniritual]

fanfiction wrapped 2023

here's my 2022 one

total fics: 7

total words: 42,965

total kudos: 889

most kudos/hits/bookmarks/chapters/words: how can there be more when this is done

my favorite: this was hard to pick! let's go with satisfied body (and a hungry soul)

director's notes/retrospectives on all my fics this year under the cut

completed works (in publication order)

satisfied body (and a hungry soul)

i really really love this fic and i honestly feel like it was a little slept on considering it has the lowest kudos of anything i published this year that wasn't a WIP but i get that stuff that's not explicitly shippy doesn't tend to do as well

words too small for any hope or promise

just a nice quick fic written at the absolute height of my trigun obsession. i'm very happy with this! i think it definitely captures the vibe i was going for. i tend to write fic for tiny or inactive fandoms so it was fun participating in such a large/active fandom

names of heat and names of light, names of collision in the dark

i actually wrote this one last year while i was watching tiger and bunny and completely forgot about it until i found it on my google drive this year! it's one of those ones that i've been kind of surprised how much positive attention it's gotten but i do think it's a fun little fic. it's basically just like a rewrite of the first season but like "what if they were fucking the entire time" which is maybe kind of a cop out premise but also the kind of fic that queerbait media like that begs you to write

how can there be more when this is done

probably my most ambitious fic ever conceptually! this was very fun to write and VERY fun to publish, the reader feedback i recieved on this was super rewarding. i still feel like i i kind of ran out of steam/didn't quite stick the landing with this, but that's always been sort of my weak spot when it comes to fic

the dreams we should be having

the fact that this is my only homestuck fic on the list given that it was the fandom that completely consumed the last 6 months of my year is wild lol. i do really like this fic and as i said in the authors note i see it more as an explication of a thesis than a full story in and of itself. that being said idk my personal theses about these characters are always changing so i think even if i rewrote it now it would be different

works in progress

there is very little left of me and it's never coming back

i swearrrr i'll come back to this eventually. i really really love the premise for this, i've just had a really remarkable string of brain worms this past year. but i always seem to come back to ricstar so i'm confident that this will eventually get its time to shine

just as good as anybody

my jean/emma fic!! and also my attempt to explain what the fuck was going on with jean during krakoa era. obviously this is unfinished but i am really excited about what i have written for chapter 2 and i hope i can get this up pretty quickly in the new year

[foxelfprincess]

[book review] northern lights by philip pullman (1995)

i first read this in college around when the ill-fated movie adaptation was coming out. i had seen the trailers and was thirsty for more fantasy type stuff, which it turns out was literally the entire cynical motivation for making the movie because they totally lotr-ed it up. the book is actually much more a response to narnia (which itself received the lotr-ification treatment in its film adaptations), but has a much different aesthetic/genre that the movie largely ignores, but we’re not here to talk about the movie rn i’m just setting the context of my first reading.

i was in the middle of reading it when the catholic church & others started calling for boycotts, and that was back during my misguided religious phase so at that point i was like “well, fuck.” but i was already in the middle of the book and i was really enjoying it so i kinda shrugged it off & decided that i enjoyed it but i didn't like that the church was the bad guys, and it was ok to enjoy something i disagreed with.

obviously now the anti-church stuff is a feature for me rather than a bug, so i was interested to see how i would feel about the book now with that in mind. and uh yeah, i do love that aspect of the book, very much so, yes. but it’s also so far in the background that a reader could be forgiven for it not being one of their biggest takeaways if they’re not paying close attention? like, by the end of the book it’s pretty fucking obvious that that was the entire point, but that turn happens in literally a line of dialogue at the end of the book (which i fucking love), but it’s not difficult to see in retrospect why even at my most brainwashed (not the fun/kinky kind, the boring religious kind) i was able to shrug it off and enjoy this as a silly little adventure yarn. which btw makes it pretty fucking hilarious that the church was so fragile about it, but whatevs!

but yeah, even though i don’t think it’s actually going to change anyone’s mind, that last interaction between lyra & pantalaimon that i alluded to earlier was everything to me this time. when pan says, “if they [the church] think dust is bad, it must be good!” and i forgot that that point was made that explicit in this book. it’s possible to miss its import if you’re just caught up in the breezy adventure the rest of the book has been, but it just absolutely turns the world upside down. i fucking love it.

also, another thing that hit me on a completely different level this time was this passage:

his hands, still clasping her head, tensed suddenly and drew her toward him in a passionate kiss. lyra thought it seemed more like cruelty than love, and looked at their dæmons, to see a strange sight: the snow leopard tense, crouching with her claws just pressing in the golden monkey’s flesh, and the monkey relaxed, blissful, swooning on the snow.

“strange sight”? idk man, sounds pretty normal to me.

other things i loved included serafina talking about feeling the starlight & moonlight on her skin. even though it wasn’t particularly foregrounded, all the witchy stuff was wonderful. i also loved iorek byrnison. as if having a magical little animal spirit that was part of yourself & you could talk to & cuddle wasn’t enough, lyra also gets a fucking armored bear king protecting her! what a lucky girl!!

and of course lyra herself was a wonderful protagonist. she’s just so fucking good. strong desire to protecc.

in the category of things i didn’t so much love was all the casual, careless racism. like, don’t get me wrong, this isn’t as bad of an offender as the aforementioned lewis or tolkien books, or a lot of its more direct influences like say the works of jules verne, but it still is rather frustrating all the same.

kinda par for the course for stuffy british adventure stories tbh, but again it’s not like outlandishly racist or anything, just… there’s an undercurrent throughout that i wouldn’t feel right not mentioning.

i also think it’s worth noting that while these books are marketed as y.a., they’re probably, uh, a bit heavy for the average kid? like, some genuinely traumatizing stuff happens!! but also idk kids are a lot more resilient than people give them credit for, i know this wouldn’t have phased me if i had read it when i was 12, just feels worth mentioning that it gets pretty dang dark.

so yeah, if you can shrug off the fairly commonplace racism of someone who seems like he’s trying his best but is too british not to be casually racist, this is a pretty great read. i find it very easy to get sucked in. lyra is such a great protagonist who you genuinely want to be safe, and the writing style hits that really nice sweet spot where it has a lot of inherent personality that leaps off the page, but it’s also still extremely approachable, which is just the perfect recipe to make something compulsively readable.

a-rank

[syn0vial]

Top 5 Boba moments 🥺

ohh fun! :D i’m gonna go in chronological order for these, just for organization’s sake. i’m also going to try and only include moments i haven’t talked much about before, just to keep things fun and fresh!

1. freeing the sea mice: starting from the very first boba fett junior novel the fight to survive, bc, well, chronological order! i like this moment bc it really emphasizes how innocent boba used to be. basically, there’s an aquarium with an eel in the fett’s kamino apartment and while jango and zam are off making bad decisions on coruscant, boba is tasked with it feeding aquatic rodents called “sea-mice” to the eel, something he’s never had to do before. but he doesn’t like doing it. the sea-mice always seem to trust him when he picks them up and he feels guilty for betraying them by feeding them to the eel. so, one day, he decides it’s going to be different. that morning, he feeds the eel his own breakfast (which is like, both sweet and hilarious, like honey did you really just throw your lunchables into an eel’s tank bc you wanted to make sure it was fed even while you’re out here freeing feeder mice? A+ for good intentions, F- for knowledge of how animals work) and tries to free a few of the sea-mice into kamino’s oceans. unfortunately, they don’t survive. the next day, boba reluctantly goes back to feeding the mice to the eel, telling one before he drops it in, “sorry; life is hard on the small and the weak,” echoing a saying of his father’s. this then becomes horrible foreshadowing for the rest of the series, in which boba is orphaned and suddenly finds himself being preyed upon by all sorts of antagonists. i know it’s a kids’ series and it’s Not That Deep, but i do really like that there’s a parallel created between boba and the mouse and the implication of the series as a whole that boba fett didn’t become a notorious hunter because he was always that way, but specifically because he started out as prey. also, it’s kind of hilarious in retrospect that boba felt compassion for rodents, but literally days later attempted to take obi-wan’s life without hesitation. kid’s really got his priorities in order.

2. standing up to jabba the hutt: this is from the junior novel boba fett: hunted, which is my favorite of the junior novels for him. in the story, boba pretends a short-statured adult by concealing his face with his father’s helmet and attempts to find work from jabba the hutt. however, when he finally gets an audience with jabba, jabba indeed offers to bring him back to his palace—as an indentured servant. and this freaking, like, eleven-year-old, staring down the criminal kingpin of tatooine with no weapons and no armor besides a too-big helmet, snaps at jabba the hutt, “my debt to you? what do i owe you for?” naturally, he is immediately set upon by one of jabba’s guards, and, well, i’ll let you read the rest :D

Boba had no time to think. He acted.

Without a sound, he leaped to one side. The Drovian’s knife whistled harmlessly through the air where, a nanosecond before, Boba had been.

“Huh?” gaped the hulking alien.

A small table stood near the viewscreen. Boba grabbed the table and swung it in front of himself, fending off the Drovian’s blade. Jabba himself watched, laughing coarsely.

“You will pay for this!” croaked the Drovian.

As the guard bore down on him, Boba thrust the table upward. The knife stuck in the wood surface. While the Drovian struggled to free his weapon, Boba pushed the table up farther. Then, he darted sideways, kicking at the lumbering guard’s knees. With a groaning thud, the Drovian stumbled and fell. Jabba’s guests laughed as Boba turned to breathlessly face Jabba.

“I am no one’s slave or servant!” Boba said. “I will work for you, for a price—but I will name that price!”

like, this kid really just brought down an armed adult with nothing but an end table AND finishes it off with a badass line defending his autonomy and defying jabba the hutt! definitely one of my favorite moments from the junior novels.

3. the Look he exchanges with lando while han is being tortured in the background

look, idk why this is so funny to me, but it is. lando’s just so full of loathing for this man who is complicit in forcing him to betray han and boba’s just like “you got shit to say to me. or nah?” he’s such a fucking asshole, i love it.

4. staying conscious just long enough to express his displeasure with the situation in iiiiii think the mandalorian armor, idk it’s been awhile: this story takes place post-RoTJ, after boba has escaped the sarlacc pit, killing it in the process, and is being gradually regaining his strength with the help of fellow bounty hunter dengar and amnesiac former slave neelah. at this point in the story, he’s still quite weak and spends most of his time slipping in and out of consciousness. unfortunately, some of boba’s enemies find out he’s still alive and just start fucking carpet-bombing their general location, so dengar and neelah go “shit, we need a bomb shelter, stat!”...and then slowly turn to look at the subterranean corpse of the sarlacc pit. they thus drag boba’s unconscious body back into the pit so they can all hunker down and wait out the bombs. except, surprise, surprise! the sarlacc ain’t completely dead. one of its giant tentacles starts attacking the group and is succeeding in getting the upper hand over dengar and neelah, when suddenly, boba wakes up. takes a look around and realizes where he is. and then grabs the nearest blaster and just goes apeshit firing on the tentacle, finally managing to kill it. too exhausted to talk, he then turns and fixes dengar with the angriest, most hate-filled glare the man has ever seen... and then promptly passes out. i remember just dissolving into giggles the first time i read that scene. just the mental image of boba fett giving dengar the scariest fucking “why the fuck did you fucking bring me back here” deathglare in the galaxy and then immediately losing consciousness. energy well-spent, boba.

5. that time boba did a mission completely in his underwear for no discernible reason, because daniel keys moran: this one’s just like. so delightfully bizarre that i’m not even going to try justifying it logically bc literally the only reason it exists was bc renowned EU author and certified mad man daniel keys moran really wanted to give boba his strong female character moment, because he deserves it. so, in this subplot, boba is tracking this devaronian war criminal who is holed up in a safehouse equipped with security systems that are triggered by the presence of, like, metal. which means boba can’t wear his armor plates and can’t use any blasters or other gadgetry. so boba loads up a compound bow and knife and makes to hunt this guy down. now, what about his armor? obviously, the most logical thing to do would be to just remove the metal plates and hunt in his flight suit. or, if that isn’t satisfactory, go out and buy like, leather armor or something? or just clothes? BUT NOPE. boba apparently goes, “well, if i can’t wear my armor, i’m not gonna wear ANYTHING” and just. does the entire mission in his underwear. he tracks and stalks this man, shoots him with an arrow, and then chases him down with a knife, ALL IN HIS UNDERWEAR. daniel keys moran even goes so far as to explicitly specify that these ain’t no long-johns, either. he’s like, “and the underwear...... MAINLY COVERED HIS DICK.” LIKE, DANIEL? DANIEL? HOW IS IT THAT OUT OF THE TWO BOBA FETT STORIES YOU’VE WRITTEN, BOTH OF THEM MENTION HIS DICK IN SOME CAPACITY? DANIEL? WHO KEEPS LETTING YOU GET AWAY WITH THIS??? and, like, can you imagine being this poor devaronian? you’re just living your fugitive war criminal life when an arrow hits you in the shoulder and boba fucking fett comes sprinting out of the woods at you in his underwear with a knife? what the fuck. this was canon at one point. what the fuck.

[1ore]

this medication is wild because its like. damn. you guys are switching tasks? you guys are switching tasks from a Fun Task (TM) to a WORK TASK? your entire day does not get derailed by one (1) websearch on hadrosaurs????

It's nice to be able to do things that I care deeply about that are also Work. I was honestly scared for a while there that my academic interests in rivers + science communication were somehow going away forever, because if something is missing for more than two weeks I start to think it doesn't exist anymore. The end of this last semester was such a slog for writing science papers-- something that is normally completely doable, but for some reason became the actual devil to me-- that I felt like I was losing my last marble. like What is Going On

In retrospect it makes sense that Spring happened the way it did, because I started my other medication in fall of last year. I feel like it annihilated any remaining social anxiety and fear of failure that I was holding onto, which I had already done the lion's share of work on. However it did Not do anything for my focus. So basically what I had was a normal, healthy relationship with failure (great!) which suddenly made the idea of disappointing other people or turning in sub-par work or missing deadlines... ffffffine, I guess. And that was bad news for my usual ADHD hack, i.e. if I am beholden to someone else, then the task Will get done and it will get done very fast because I hate having tasks and expectations rattling around in the back of my head.

Weird to have the other puzzle piece now. Idk if this is gonna continue to be true or if I'm just having a good couple of days or what. Anyway I'm going to switch tasks now. As if I don't have some kind of dopamine imbalance. Wrow

[aitarose]

A HUNDRED LIVES (H. IWAIZUMI) pairing: iwaizumi hajime x fem!reader

synopsis: only real relationships stand the test of time, some fair better than others—but in the end, all that truly matters is telling them you love them. all that mattered was how hajime would finally confess.

word count: 2.2k

genre: childhood best friends to lovers, fluff, slight angst, mutual pining

warnings: mentions of death

notes: i hated the way this was and i’ve had it finished for like a week and a half but now it’s in second person because i rewrote the whole thing ok aha enjoy! reblogs are very much appreciated like pls tell me what you think about this i kind of love it?? or do i? idk

↳ DIRECTORY

You knew that congratulations were in order, one for not only you, but the entire third year class of Aoba Johsai. The third year class that you’d grown up with, the people that’d graduated together from their high school duties. The very people that you’d grown up with, known for years on years, were moving on from Miyagi and saying their goodbyes.

It was saddening, knowing that you’d all have to leave your past behind, grow up and move on as an individual. You, yourself, hadn’t yet come to terms with the fact that you’d be moving to Tokyo—the city of stars and big dreams. There was something solemn about the thought—beginning a life on your own, away from the friends and family you’d grown used to seeing every day.

Which was why today was all the more important, why it mattered so much in the hole of your mind. It was one final hurrah, one final farewell to all of the fleeting people you’d come to love. All of the classmates from first period, advisors who’d suggested career paths, family friends and relatives that’d seen you grow up—and him.

Iwaizumi Hajime.

As children, you and Iwa had been as close as you could possibly be—spending nearly every day with one another as you were next-door neighbors, only separated by a thin wooden fence. One that was commonly crossed, as it was impossible to stay away from his energy—he’d been your first friend, first crush, the very first boy you’d ever daydreamed about while the sun was awake. 

Perhaps it’d been his smile, the joy on his face as he’d swing you back and forth on the playground. How he’d try his best to teach you how to set and spike, lecturing Oikawa as he’d complain about how you were never going to be good at the sport, and ignoring his best friend’s claims of a secret little crush on his favorite girl.

And though those times had been fun and all, the moments in which you’d meet each other between the dividing fences of your backyards during the evening hours, Oikawa long gone—and run off to the countryside to play in the old and sturdy tree house that your father had built the two of you, had always been amongst your favorite memories.

They were the memories that were always on the back of your mind, itching to be recalled, reenacted—the longing you had for him never truly going away even as you grew apart as time went on. That part of your brain, the part that might’ve loved him only taunted you—taunted you with the brokenness of the bond you thought would always last.

Your greatest wish was that you would’ve been able to keep in close contact throughout the late middle and high school years—but life had come in the way, life had ruptured your attachment to him—the responsibility of upholding your family after the death of your father had surpassed your need for Iwa, creating an abyss with no bridge to cross.

No bridge except a tiny, frail wooden beam that would only be stepped on in the times where Iwaizumi and his boasting best friend would stop at his house to hang out when after-school practice had ended. While it was rare that his path would cross yours, there were some sparing moments in which you’d miraculously be outside to greet them. 

It wasn’t like you and Iwa weren’t friends anymore, it was just that you’d each let the void amass for so long that there was nothing you really had in common—nothing except the bright pink flush on the both of your faces as Oikawa would poke fun at his ace’s face, causing Iwa to drag him into his house with a stoney and angered expression. 

And that was it. That was the only interaction you’d ever have, the only time you’d speak to the boy you thought you loved.

Which was why you weren’t all that surprised when he hadn’t decided to show up to your graduation party despite the handwritten letter you’d dropped off on his doorstep. His absence was deafening, making it all the more difficult to say your goodbyes as the person you wanted to see most, didn’t care enough to bid a farewell.

So, you’d decided to take matters into your own hands and somehow move on from the lost dreams that you’d once shared with Iwaizumi. The only reasonable way being to let go of that broken connection, the connection that had started with your little hideaway—the hideaway amongst the trees that you’d found yourself climbing up now. 

The calloused wood of the ladder splintered beneath your hands, scratching the taut skin, sanding its softness—no doubt blistering it to oblivion. You winced, curses flowing under your breath as you hesitantly reached the top, not exactly knowing what to expect as the treehouse had seemingly been abandoned for years.

Pushing your nerves aside, you crawled into the tiny space, forgetting how much younger and smaller you’d been the last time you’d sat in the little alcove. Looking up, your eyes grazed over the clean walls of the hideout, free from overgrown plants and cobwebs and dusted to near perfection—there wasn’t a single thing out of place.

It was surprising, the sight of your childhood playhouse having been taken care of after you’d assumed it had been forgotten—after you’d forgotten. Someone had to have been maintaining its structure, keeping it tidy and homey—that someone being the boy sitting directly across from you, scaring you half to death as his irises grew wide in shock.

“What the—” You started, tripping over your own feet as you fell backwards towards the opening of the doorway. A small scream grew on your lips as you began to free fall, nearly out into the open air before Iwaizumi reached out—catching your wrist in his, reminding you of the times when this was a common occurrence—when he’d never fail to keep you on your feet.

“You alright?” He breathed out, large hand gripping your wrist, continuing to hold on even though you were standing between his arms. It was comforting, the feeling of being so close to him, back in the presence of the boy who’d you’d lost oh-so-long ago—the boy you’d been hoping to see at some point before you had to leave for university. “I see you’re still a bit clumsy.”

Rolling your eyes and stepping away from his familiarity, you crossed your arms, one resting over the other, clear confusion in your eyes. “And I see that you’re still attached to this little shack.” There was a hint of humor in your tone, laughter being vocalized, but pain within its context. “It looks amazing, though—for how long it’s been.”

Iwa scoffed, shaking his head as he bit his lip—mouth itching to say something, then refusing to do so. Perhaps it’d been a snarky remark, or maybe one of sadness, whatever it’d been was lost, now a mystery to your ears. Instead, he patted the stray couch cushion next to him, offering you a seat—the seat that had used to be yours.

You sat in silence, together yet apart as the sun was setting over the far away fields. With every second, every sun ray splitting off and being reborn in moonlight, you could feel your adolescence slipping away—the thought of being dependent and a child losing meaning, losing importance, losing validity and need.

Thoughts running wild, chaos in your mind, the only constant being fear and anxiety in retrospect to the unknown that was your future—your future miles and miles away from everything that you’d come to love. Noticing the stress in your stature, Iwaizumi took a deep breath—wanting to hold your hand, but stopping himself before he could try.

“It hasn’t been that long, you know.” He said softly, glancing over at you. A little smile grew on his face at the furrow in your eyebrows, the slight upturn of your lips, and scrunched nose. If there was any beauty in the world, any beauty at all—Iwa believed that you were gifted with all of it. “I used to come here every night.”

“Yeah, Hajime—I know.” You responded, scoffing as you called him by his first name, the only name you’d ever known him by. “We both did, I was here too—” In the midst of your smart-assed response, he shook his head. There was something about his posture, energy, that made you stop in your tracks—it was one of his little ticks, one of the things that you’d never failed to remember. 

“But that’s just the thing—you weren’t here.” He mumbled, tapping the top of his knee with a finger as he leant back against the wooden walls, a reminiscent look in his eyes. “I’ve always been here, Y/N—always kept this place perfect for you, on the off chance that you’d come back. On the off chance that we’d keep our promises and not forget about each other.”

There was a sense of solemnness to the words spouting from his mouth, the truth that she had in fact left him behind—all with reason that he undoubtedly understood—but that didn’t make up for the lost years and memories that they could’ve had had she not been so distracted with the troubles of life and reliability.

“This is going to sound ridiculous since you’re leaving soon—” Iwa mumbled under his breath, internally cursing at himself at the horrible placement of his timing. “—but I’m not going to lie, Y/N. I really did think we’d end up together, somehow. When I proposed to you in that corner over there with that grass ring, I meant it. I meant every word.”

“Even if that ring had fallen apart two seconds after I tried to slip it on you.” A laugh bubbled from your throat, recalling the memory from when you were children—how he’d given you a kiss on the cheek along with getting down on one knee. The two of you had had a makeshift wedding after that, gathering all of your stuffed animals and placing plastic chairs beneath the tree—saying your vows with your parents in attendance, watching fondly at the pure sight.

Biting your lip, you turned to face him and his gaze that had already been intent on seeing you. There was a ghost of a grin on his features, wistful wonder in his irises, his hair messy and sticking in every direction due to the static—yet he was still the most handsome boy you’d ever seen. “I’m sorry.” You placed a hand on his, stopping the fidgeting nerves in his lap, and calming the rushing blood in his veins. 

“I’m sorry I kept you waiting for so long.” Wincing at the thought of your carelessness, the complete disregard you’d kept for his feelings along with your own. You’d had no intent on leaving Iwa behind, you’d just been so caught up with your own problems that he’d gotten lost in the mix of it all. “I must be a pretty shitty wife.”

Iwa laughed loudly, head dropping back at your remark. The moment was filled with deja vu, reigniting all of the feelings and love you’d buried under the hauntings of your mind. He always seemed to manage to make that broken part of you feel whole again, with his directed remarks and little jokes. “You’re not wrong, left me all alone after the altar—that doesn’t exactly scream ‘perfect wife’ material.”

Those words seemed to trigger something in him, a feeling that he hadn’t yet overcome as his expression turned stoney. Placing his empty palm above yours, hands stacked atop one another in a tower, Iwa grimaced, choosing his next set of sentences very wisely—knowing full well that they could make or break whatever chances he had with you.

“It’s alright though.” He whispered, his warmth heating the radiating coldness that was you. “Since I’d rather live a hundred lives of loneliness, then see you suffer even a minute of sadness.”

With his emotions bare, confessions out on the table, the things he said were more meaningful than those three little words themselves—you couldn’t help but feel your heart grow. The love you held for him overcompensating for every mistake and pain that you must’ve caused him—the only goal listed in your head being to make the rest of your time count, make the rest of your lives worth something together.

Leaning forward, ignoring the look of surprise on Iwa’s face as your nose touched his, you smiled through the outflowing sentences—outflowing thoughts that were spouting out like raindrops in a thunderstorm. “Sounds like you might be living a pretty lonely life, then.” 

He chuckled, calloused hands cupping your cheeks as he pulled you in, pressing a soft and long-overdue kiss to your awaiting lips. It was euphoria, the absolute bliss that was being with him, the boy of your dreams. It was a kiss that you’d spent countless nights thinking over, countless fleeting wishes of him holding you exactly as he was now. 

While your future had always been uncertain, there was at least one constant—a constant that would hopefully always be right within your grasp, right within your arms to hold on to, listen to, love wholeheartedly. Iwaizumi Hajime was it for you, he was the endgame that you’d always been searching for.

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