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ghost-proofbaby · 21 days

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It's summer for you, winter for me. Warm me up with strawberry fluff! As always, my muse, your muse, the one and only, Eddie.

Midsummer's night, because I don't have a lot to inspire you with. I'm thinking something cute but weird? Maybe some human body softness where Eddie is a bit of a freak and we love him for it. And we're told our bodies are lovely, even when they're doing weird shit.

I lalalove youuuuu. xo Rhi

RHI!!!! <3 i adore you. thank you for this prompt - i had far too many ideas for it, but ended up on settling for this one, which coincidentally feels like the most subtle of them all? either way, it definitely turned out being the softest. give me an eddie munson who just wants to sniff me like a dog. this definitely got a bit long but i hope you enjoy, my dear <3

the smell of you

warnings: weirdos in love? idk. i have a skewed sense of what is actually weird i think. mentions of death and coffins jokingly. eddie 'manhandles' reader sort of. not edited.

wc: 2.2k+

come enjoy a sweet summer treat with me <3

“Eddie?”

The entire apartment is quiet – too quiet – as you drop your keys into the old crystal bowl on the counter. The clink resonates through the air, louder than the soft murmur of the stereo static you can hear from down the hall.

“You dead?” you call out again, slipping off your running shoes and tossing down your headphones onto the counter as well now, “Do I need to call the coroner?”

Your tone is lilted, teasing with airiness as you continue to wander deeper into the apartment and head straight for the room you know Eddie has to be in. Like the waves pulled by the moon, there’s an incessant string tied around one end of your soul that connects you to his, and you follow it all the way down the hallway. The bedroom door is wide open, and you can hear his mumbled yell of a response without clarity before you even cross the threshold.

You wouldn’t have even needed him to verbally respond to find him in this tiny apartment. You two could get separated on the streets of a bustling city, of a buzzing New York sidewalk, and you still wouldn’t properly lose him. It’s more than just soul ties and his gravity that keeps you pulled to him.

Something unspoken. Something homely.

“Sorry, what was that?” you hum as you spy him face-down in the bed, pillow muting him by the mouthful, “Say it one more time, and this time not into the pillow.”

When he finally properly turns over, he’s a vision. Sleep lines folded into his skin and a bit of drool in the corner of his mouth, eyes squinting in irritation not at you but the sunlight flooding in through the bedroom window. Messy hair, messy shirt, messy everything. A kind of mess you just want to collapse into currently, curling up in all that he is from the day’s exhaustion.

He’d mentioned wanting to take a nap before you’d left for the gym. Something about the summer heat draining him, trailing off as he’d rambled about how he’d probably thrive as a vampire.

“I said,” he huffs, sitting up, the frizz of his hair becoming a makeshift halo, “If you call the coroner, request the comfiest coffin possible.”

“Why do you need a comfy coffin if you’re already dead?”

“You dare deny me of being buried in tempurpedic memory foam? In my hour of need?”

You roll your eyes as you huff out a little laugh, forcing yourself to turn away from him long enough to strip out of your socks. But just as you reach down for the pieces of clothing, you catch sight of the source of that stereo static flooding the room.

Your shared record player, spinning a blood red pressing of one of your more recent vinyl purchases. The album has been played through, but the player no longer had an automatic stop mechanism, probably from years of use.

The center of the record is probably scratched, and Eddie knows it, from how sheepish he looks when you glance over your shoulder at him.

“Speaking of death,” you walk over quickly, purposefully, before carefully lifting the needle and cutting the static finally, “Care to explain why you’re burning scratches into my Momento Mori vinyl?”

“I’m sorry,” he quickly apologizes, nearly flinging himself off the bed as he scooches quickly to the end, clearly fully awake now, “I put it on and thought I’d just lay down for a quick second, but then the bed was so comfy, and I thought it wouldn’t hurt to take a quick nap, and then…” he trails off, looking up at you through his lashes with big eyes already pleading for forgiveness, “I’ll buy you a new one. Swear it.”

It’s impossible to be mad at him when he’s looking like this, inhumanely soft and easily forgiven, “You’re lucky you’re cute, or you really would be dead.”

He doesn’t respond with words, but instead the outstretch of his hands, fingers flexing as he beckons to you. The needle rests on its perch, the vinyl left behind to gather dust for a few extra moments, as you go straight to him.

When his palms slip beneath your old t-shirt and meet your skin, they’re pleasantly warm.

“You were right,” you admit as his knees spread, delegating even more room for you to stand in front of him as your hand wanders to cradle the side of his face, fingers tangling in sweaty curls from his rest. Your thumb mimics his on your own skin instinctively, tracing a large arch right up over his cheekbone, “It’s hot as balls outside.”

“Told you so,” he murmurs, smiling softly in satisfaction as he leans lazily into your touch.

“You did,” you agree quietly, half-entranced by his relaxed face, no sight of pride in the room currently.

He resembles a cat as he continues to preen under your gentle hand, and you almost expect him to start purring right before you find the strength to pull away, removing his hands from where they'd wandered to your lower back.

One swipe of his finger along your sweaty spine, and you’d remembered what your original intentions had been immediately upon getting home.

“Wai- Where are you going?” he’s seemingly brought back down to Earth the moment he loses the pattern your thumb had been tracing, the press of your fingertips into his scalp. When he reaches back out to latch onto you again, you take a step back, “Get back here-”

“I need to shower,” you laugh, shaking your head and smacking his hands away as he continues to barter, “I’m all sweaty and smelly, let me go clean up and then we can nap togeth-”

“You can shower after we nap,” he nearly whines, finally catching your shirt between his fingers and tugging, uncaring for if he stretches the fabric. A small price to pay to have you close to him, “C’mon, sweetheart. I know you’re just as exhausted as I am.”

You swear you meant to take another step backwards, but somehow, you end up back between his knees, “Did you not hear me, Munson? I stink.”

“Good.”

He doesn’t give you any time to react – in an instant, he’s throwing his face forward, burying it against your stomach as you let out a gasp and immediately try to pry him away with far too gentle of hands in his hair.

“Eddie!”

If it were anyone else, you’d probably be mortified. But Eddie just takes a dramatic deep breath in, nose buried just shy of your belly button, and when his shoulders start to shake with muted laughter, you can’t stop the smile from breaking. Your fingers are still twisted in his hair, still pulling back in an attempt to get him away from you, but he’s resilient.

And all your faux resistance is weak in comparison. Soon enough, you’re back to melting into him.

Only once you’re relaxed once more, no sign of trying to pull away again any time soon as his hands once more evade the space beneath your shirt to wander up and down your sticky skin without a care in the world, does he lift his face away from you long enough to breathe and speak, “I’ll have you know – I love your stink.”

“Shut up.”

“I’m serious.”

“You’re an idiot.”

“I’m your idiot.”

The game of banter is cut short when he goes back to pressing his nose into your clothes that surely can’t smell good. No amount of deodorant or perfume could erase that underlying stench of sweat. Hell, the shirt is still a bit moist from it all: from the walk to the gym, from your workout itself, from the walk home. It’d been through the ringer, and you’re back to tugging him away from you.

“I refuse to believe you like how gross I smell right now,” you reinforce, eyes darting towards the bathroom connected to your master bedroom, “I promise I’ll be quick with the shower.”

“Baby,” he fights back, wrapping his arms around you securely, no intention of losing this battle, “You remember that time we went to the fair, and you were complaining about how you were sweating, so I tried to lick your face?”

Your nose scrunches quickly at the memory, “I do, unfortunately.”

“You really think I’d be willing to lick the sweat off your body but be afraid of you smelling a little bad while we cuddle?” his shoulders drop as he looks up at you, head tilted, almost as if amused with the conversation, “What kind of man do you take me for?”

“The kind that gets off on annoying me.”

His jaw drops, putting on a fake look of offense before he dramatically throws himself back onto the bed, laying flat as he makes a fist to mimic stabbing his chest, “You wound me.”

You’ve heard those words a thousand times in a hundred different ridiculous voices. You’ve seen this scene enough to have it mesmerized at this point, down to the over-exaggerated pout of his lips and the lingering of the fist against his sternum.

You never grow tired of it. You never will.

“Need me to kiss it better?” you joke as you prop a knee up on the bed, following the same script as always.

And he hits his queue perfectly when he lifts his head eagerly at the expected response, wiggling his brows a bit. “Absolutely. Doctor’s orders, in fact.”

“Great,” you see an opportunity, and take it, “I’ll get right to it, after my showe-”

You don’t even get the final syllable of the word off your tongue before he’s clenching his thighs around your own, knees pressing hard before he wraps his legs the rest of the way around your waist to pull you in. A squeak of surprise leaves your lips as you begin to fall forward, but Eddie is quick to break the fall with ease. Catching you with his eager hands, maneuvering for you to half drop to the mattress while some of you still lands atop of him.

He has you right where he wants you, turning his head to be face to face with you, noses nearly brushing, “Unfortunately, the doc said you have to kiss it better now, or else you’ll be comfy coffin shopping.”

“A fatal wound?” you gasp, nearly mocking him. It doesn’t offend him – if anything, his boyish grin only grows wider, “First, I’m smelly-”

“Again, I like when you’re smelly.”

“-And then I inflict a fatal wound upon my lover? Oh, how dare I.”

Slowly, all your insecurity of how you currently smell is simply fading. The entire ordeal has become an art of childlike, whimsical jokes – and Eddie is an artist. A professional at the dance, locked and loaded with his incomparable skill set equipped for disarming you this way. The ability to make someone feel loved, imperfections and weirdness aside.

He likes you, even when you claim you don’t smell your best. And you like him, even when his hair is tangled beyond recognition and one of his socks is half-hanging off his foot from a nap.

You like him when he’s embarrassing you in public, tongue chasing after you with the threat of licking your sweat away, and he likes you when all you can do in response is a weak palm to his chest (that isn’t even making an effort to push him away) as you giggle relentlessly.

You like each other on the good days, the bad days, the weird days.

Disarmed entirely, you don’t even notice when his face conveniently slots itself far too close to your armpit as you two scooch further up into the bed. You’re more occupied with the way your legs tangle up, toeing each other’s socks off properly as he slings a heavy arm across your torso.

“We’re gonna have to wash the sheets,” you mumble, exhaustion catching up as the two of you finally settle.

He hums absentmindedly, nuzzling into your skin a bit further as he makes himself comfortable. “And wash away your sweet, sweet stink? I don’t think so, sweetheart.”

“Oh, fuck off,” you laugh, unbothered as your fingers start to trail up and down his back over the t-shirt, smoothing out wrinkles along the way, “I’m serious. We need to change them soon anyways, I think I got crumbs in the bed the other night with those crackers.”

“Bury me in the crumbs of all your midnight snacks,” he almost slurs, clearly drifting back off.

You snort in response, relaxing and letting your own eyes shut. Matching all your deep breaths with his own, a million different last words crossing your mind to whisper to the boy you’re sure is once again asleep.

I love you.

I adore you.

I would like to spend the rest of my life with you, if you’ll have me.

And maybe some of those unspoken thoughts slip out without you realizing, because he squeezes you just a little bit tighter, presses his face just a little bit deeper into your skin as his scruff tickles you.

The only actual thought you can know for certain that you say, though, is, “Do you think they actually make coffins with memory foam inside?”

To your surprise, even despite the almost-snores that had been escaping him, he answers in a heartbeat.

“Oh, definitely. We’ll order two.”

#ghost's stories #summertime sweetness #eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x you #eddie munson fluff #stranger things #peep me making fun of myself in there about the way i constantly like to write him doing the whole mock stabbing himself thing #i just want to find me an eddie munson to be so comfortable with that afternoons like this would be a regular thing ya know #give me a man who likes my stink #a man who offers to order us matching tempurpedic coffins #i don't think that's how you spell that word if i'm being completely honest #it's canon in my head the two of you would go 'coffin shopping' just cause you both wanna know what it's like to lay in one #also in my process of brainstorming and writing this i realized i really do not understand the concept of being weird because #halfway through writing this #i questioned if it was even weird/weird enough?#this doesn't feel weird to me this just feels like the normal progression of getting comfortable in a relationship #it was this or eddie being unbothered by sounds of indigestion or however you spell it #ANYWAYS im rambling my bad <3 #i hope i made you proud rhi!! <3

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twistmusings · 2 months

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An examination of the New Jade and Floyd Cards

CW: Spoilers for the Japanese Release, Talk of the discourse about the cards and how they were handled, discussions of anatomy, very brief mention of animal death (related to consumption and preparation of Moray Eels for eating - no images are shown and it is not gone into in graphic detail.)

TW: Extensive talks about Sexualization and information on the correlation of sexualization and it's impacts in the second half of the post. There is a heading in purple if you would like to skip this section.

I touched on this very briefly in another post, but I honestly really like how the Jade and Floyd card art is handled for multiple reasons when we're talking about how it's handled and I want to give a bit of an explanation why! I am far from a marine biologist, but I was examining the biology of eels and wanted to give my two cents considering that they boys are both in their merman forms.

Of course, the cards have not released just yet, so we only have the promotional images to go off of as well as the other canon materials.

The biggest complaint I've seen over the cards generally speaking is the anatomy, but I also think that's not considering two important facts - 1: this is a dream as a few people have stated, so we're likely seeing the versions of Jade and Floyd that they see as their "ideal" or internal versions of themselves. 2: Jade and Floyd aren't human. Despite what they look like after the potion, I feel like it's important to note this because Moray Eel Anatomy is wildly different from human anatomy and that doesn't get taken into account. The second highest criticism is that these cards are overly sexualized. I will go into more depth about that, but to give my short thoughts for now, I truly think it could have been argued either way though in this instance a lot of the arguments I've seen have been rather bad faith.

So, let's get started first with the anatomy. Both cards have been criticized, for the anatomy of the drawing. Starting with Jade's card, the thing I see complained about most often is how muscular his chest and shoulders are. I think its a bit more of an issue with the clarity of the image than anything else, which yes, is an art issue but allow me to explain my line of thinking regarding this. First, examining Jade's positioning and anatomy by examining the anatomy of the art.

Bone structure is on the left and Muscles on the right

First, let's start by saying that I definitely think the anatomy of Jade's card is sort of correct, but I think what roughly equates to his trapezius muscles are a bit exaggerated for the position he's in. However, what I believe the artist is going for is that Jade is putting weight on his arms and pushing himself up, which is making his scapulae flex backwards. You see this a lot when people push themselves up out of pools using a solid object.

1. Notice how the scapula pulls the muscles of the back out to a sharp point at the end of where the bone rests.

2. Notice the way that the force exerted by pushing has caused a 'ridge line' between the different parts of the deltoid muscles.

3. The pectoral muscles seem a little more convex when the trapezius muscles are pulling them upwards.

Basically, I think the artist knew generally what they were going for, but the trapezius muscle throws it off a bit. Here's a quick edit to show what I feel like would look a little more natural for this card and likely solve a lot of the issues people have with the art.

Left: Edit to follow anatomical structures strictly

Middle: Edit to maintain the "defined" sort of ridge Jade's Deltoids have in the original card

Right: Unedited original

All of this to say, I don't necessarily think that Jade is "extremely muscular" as a lot of people have argued, because I think there's a misconception that his deltoid muscle is his bicep because of the slightly wonky scapula and trapezius and deltoid anatomy. (TLDR, I think the artist just drew his scapula and delts too low, making his neck look unnecessarily muscular because of the lighting in the card.) It's also worth noting that the pitched angle of the "camera" in this card makes his right shoulder look larger than it would if you were looking at him at a lower angle because of the perspective involved.

That being said, I think it's worth considering that Jade is also a hiker and is confirmed to go climbing, so it makes sense for Jade to have broader and more defined shoulder muscles than Floyd does. I also think it's a bit of a strange thing to argue that at 17 he shouldn't be this muscular. Yes, late teens tend to be smaller than people in their twenties because their bodies are still developing, but 17 is not prepubescent - the average 17 year old can build muscle that would be in line with the edit, especially if they regularly engage in activities that use those muscles regularly for things like rock climbing or swimming - two activities that we know that Jade does.

Whether or not this is a dealbreaker for wanting this card depends on the person - personally the anatomy doesn't bother me too much because for me it's still readable what the intention was. I can definitely see why some people might read it as Jade having a very muscular giraffe neck.

Now for Floyd's card, though I think this is relevant to both of them:

The issue I've seen most people have is particularly with his abdominal muscles being so defined. This one I can see either side of the argument on, I must admit, but I think it is worth noting that Floyd and Jade aren't human.

The reason this is relevant is because moray eels are mostly skin and muscle, with very few bones and very little fat. Granted we're taking liberties with this because they're mermen and it's not like we have x-rays of their bones to go off of.

(If you would like to see what I mean, there are videos on YouTube of Moray Eels being fileted and prepared for food. I will not link them, since that is graphic for a lot of people, but if you seek them out, it's easy to see that a moray's skin attaches pretty directly to the muscles of their bodies, and they have the epidermis (external), dermis, hypodermis, and beneath that, muscle.)

All of this to say, there's a feature we can't be certain whether or not the eel twins have, which is that in humans, there is a layer of subcutaneous fat beneath the skin, then the abdominal muscles, then a layer of visceral fat, and finally the abdominal wall that hold our organs in place.

Now, we know there's differences between Moray Eels and Moray Eel merfolk, as Jade and Floyd pretty clearly have a ribcage, however we also know that their external bodies in their merfolk form have similar fish traits for obvious reasons. To be as non-graphic about is as I can, there's a reason they're allowed to not wear clothes without this being an AO game - likely because their genital anatomy structures would be more in-line with cetaceans or fish. (It's hard to say which, because we don't really have confirmation if Merfolk are mammals or fish, which has a surprising amount of ramifications for their anatomy in regard to fat placement.) We also can't be certain if they have hip bones or if they simply have muscles that may make it appear that way.

That long and roundabout explanation is to say we can't be sure where their 'human' anatomy ends and where the 'fish' anatomy begins. It's entirely possible that below the ribcage, Jade and Floyd's only other bones are their spine. Regardless, I think either way it's entirely possible that a part of the reason their muscles look so defined is because they don't carry their fat in their bodies like humans do. I would say this is, again, pretty much up to headcanon unless we get some kind of canon confirmation that they have an organ structure from their hips up that is humanoid.

Also for any of my long-time followers, I am not letting you forget - these two still pee out of their butts in eel form. It doesn't matter if they're mammals or fish, the structures for an underwater creature would dictate that they pee out of their ass and that's hilarious. :-)

On Sexualization:

Now, finally onto the part of these cards that's controversial, which is that they are sexualized. I would like to start off by saying that, quite frankly, this is going to depend entirely on how you look at the cards and how you personally feel about them and your personal relationship to sexualization. I'm not trying to tell you how to feel about these cards, but I do want to make a case that if that is an argument that you want to make, you should do it with consideration to making your argument sound, and realize that there are going to be bad faith arguments on either side of this issue. Engaging with people who are making these bad faith arguments is going to do nothing but wear you out - they have no intention of changing their stance on the matter and quite frankly are not worth spending your time on. I would advise for your mental wellbeing to not invest yourself too much into these arguments and instead curate your internet experience so that you're not subjected to having to deal with those bad faith arguments and instead giving your time and consideration to those who actually make a case for their argument with proof.

Sexualization is a tricky subject to navigate, especially when it comes to Jade and Floyd. and I can see how an argument could be made for either side, and since there's not really a way to know the intentions of the original artist for these cards and what their biases were when making it, it's a little hard to say whether or not they were intended to be viewed that way. There are a few things to take into consideration with this argument, and I encourage you to come to your own conclusions and research more into the topic, however here are some of the points that should be considered when taking this into account:

Sexualization occurs in several ways:

A few more passages of note from the sexualization wikipedia and the pages for Pornification and Sex in Advertising:

Note: Catherine Lumby - author that frequently examines gender issues, Patrice Oppliger - has written about impact of media and popular culture on teenage demographics, Audre Lorde - Intersectional Feminist and Civil Rights activist that has written on a scope of topics regarding human-rights issues.

If these cards have a negative impact on someone, that's hard to quantify short of an intensive study or survey. Even then, it would be hard to get a good understanding of it because if you are an English Speaking TWST fan, you are limited to what opinions you would get from the rest of the English Speaking fandom. Similar sentiments go for the Japanese fandom - you will get a limited view because of the language difference, and you would likely get skewed statistics.

The age demographics for the game are older than what a lot of people think in the English-speaking fandom. Though TWST is generally pretty child friendly, the largest parts of the fandom are between the ages of 16-26. It can be surmised based on this that TWST's target demographic is older teens and young adults, and is likely designed around this.

From that same survey, Twisted Wonderland's player base is largely female.

Sexualization is a persistent issue through all types of media and advertising, but has been typically more studied in it's impact on girls who were raised in a sexualized environment.

Fans have been requesting a merfolk card for Jade and Floyd since their forms were revealed.

There should be an understanding that if an argument can be made about Jade and Floyd's cards being sexualized, this same argument should be applied to other cards from the game as well. This would include the tropical wear cards, the birthday jacket cards, several of the halloween cards, etc.

Which are the Effects of Body-Objectification and Instagram-Related Practices on Male Body Esteem? A Cross-Sectional Study

All About Sex: Global Childhood Sexualization and Education

#twisted wonderland #twst #mod azul #card analysis #I am conflicted about the cards #On one hand I think they're very cool and Im excited to see the groovied versions of them #on the other I can completely understand why people are a bit put-off by them as outlined in the second half of the post #I personally think the best way to assist people who are going through this is media literacy to be quite honest #I encourage you to critique things even if you enjoy them.#You do not have to stop enjoying TWST but you should analyze your behavior and consider if you are contributing to a problem #though admittedly a large part of why sexualization is complex is because it is one half that media is made in that way #and the other half is because of what media parents allow their children to consume #Personally I will still be getting the cards because I love that they are merfolk #and every day I hope and pray we get an azul merform card because im love him

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