#it’s also very uncommon bc this is the second one I’ve ever had in my 18 and a half years of life | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

sadgirlautumn · 18 days

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I haven’t seen the bachelorette in a hot min what’s going on??

This was my first season of the bachelorette I’ve ever watched and I binged the last season of the bachelor bc I needed something to hold me over while I waited for new episodes and boy!! This season was a crazy one to start with!

Spoilers under the cut and I’m sorry in advance this is an unnecessarily long summarization:

Basically we were pushed three main guys towards the beginning: Devin, Marcus, and Sam.

From the start Devin wasn’t meshing too well with the other guys and kept doing stuff to piss them off. A big thing that happened was at one of the cocktail parties a fraction of the guys were talking about how they didn’t get much time with Jenn because of the type of group date they went on and Devin was the one to speak up (he’s naturally a very loud and outgoing person) and say “yeah of course we’ll make sure you get your time at the cocktail party.” Well at the cocktail party the second Jenn shows up Devin is instantly taking Jenn aside for a private and chat and this pissed off Sam’s bestie in the house (I can’t remember his name and he was barely relevant) in particular was mad at this and interrupted Jenn&Devin’s chat so he could argue with Devin about this. Devin was then mad because he said the other guy was wrong for leaving Jenn awkwardly standing there while they argued and he should have just talked to her if he wanted to talk to her. Sam eventually starts arguing with Devin (and I was surprised he kept his mouth shut for that long) and they both decide during this argument that they hate each and they both said that they don’t understand how Jenn can be into both of them at once since they’re ~so different~ (funny how they both ended up being assholes in the end!)

Also a random but important detail: one of the guys had to leave early because he got into flight school (or something like that) and he said on the way out that some guys weren’t there for the right reasons and that Jenn should be careful. Jenn tried to get him to name names but he refused (he was talking about Devin and two other guys. Devin was the one who pissed him off the most though). The guys were also mad about this because they didn’t know who he was referring to.

Now after I watched the most recent season of the bachelor I saw that what Devin did here wasn’t that uncommon but I still think it’s a dirty move to take time from other people after promising you’d give them their moment. I really didn’t like Devin for this but I was torn because it felt like the edit was trying to get the audience to like him and I just wasn’t feeling it so I was surprised he made it to the end. Every week I was crossing my fingers hoping he’d go home and he always ended up in a better and better position. In the last couple of episodes some of the vulnerable things he was saying was starting to win me over (just a little bit) because I had similar experiences to him but then he started getting really upset that he told Jenn “I love you” and she wasn’t giving him that same energy back. It felt really immature to me the way he was acting. She was doing the best she could and I could tell that she was waiting to say I love you because it’s a very special thing to her and I think she felt weird saying that to both him and Marcus. But yeah he eventually says he’s thinking about leaving because he wants to be the only one and then she started crying and finally says to him: “I’m in love with you, you idiot.” And from there it was very obvious to me that Devin was going to be the one she chooses.

Now I have to catch you up on Marcus. Basically Marcus was a foster kid and almost died when he was in the military so he has a really hard time opening up to people. He goes on the first one on one date with Jenn and they have a good time. He’s really good at listening to her and making her feel comfortable. He does pretty much everything right and Jenn was really into him from the start but he ended up being his own worst enemy since he couldn’t open up to her. Around the time she said I love you to Devin she also says I love you to Marcus but he can’t say it back. She was okay with this and was willing to wait but when he met with her family he was having a hard time answering the serious questions they were asking him and inevitably this made Jenn really worried so she went to have a chat with him and (not gonna lie I wasn’t paying the best attention during this so might be a bit wrong) he finally said that he loves her but they decide to break up instead.

Now we’re caught up to the part where I started posting about a twist. I thought this big twist they were hinting at was the fact that Jenn decided she wanted to propose to Devin instead of him proposing to her. They made it seem like this big deal because it’s never happened before in bachelor history but in this context considering what followed… respectfully: who gives a fuck about making bachelor history. 😭 But yeah they got engaged! And then they cut to the host Jesse and he was like “now I’m sure you’re wondering why I’m interrupting this beautiful engagement but we decided you need to hear from Jenn first .” So they cut to Jenn and she’s crying in the chair and I felt so bad for her because it took like two minutes for her to even calm down so she could speak and she explains that after her and Devin got engaged there was a shift and things felt off. She tried to empathize with him because it is a crazy transition to go from filming a tv show to your regular life. It took him a whole month to finally tell her that he wasn’t feeling it and she kept trying for another month to fix their relationship suggesting they call off the engagement and just dating instead, going to couples therapy, etc. But eventually he started ghosting her and then reaching out to try and talk about it and then instantly ghosting her again. It’s very hazy to tell what actually went wrong but the fact that he wasn’t ready for an engagement didn’t surprise me at all. He came across immature in his arguments with the other guys and he was always taking pride in the fact that he was “well spoken” and frequently pointed out how Sam wasn’t good at communicating… which was true but Devin said it in a demeaning way which I felt was rude because not everyone is good with words. During their live interview Jenn revealed that he followed Maria (my personal favorite girl from the bachelor and Jenn was also on that season with her) and was clubbing in New York post break up… which is not a good look! He instantly replied saying he had work so that’s why he was in New York. And Jenn responded with “you met your client at the club?” And that took me out. 💀 I felt so bad for her she was crying the whole time and he could barely look at her and he kept staring at the floor. And then worst of all they made them sit there together on live tv with an audience around them and watch their “beautiful engagement” and poor Jenn was crying the whole time while he just uncomfortably sat there.

That’s basically everything that happened! I’m going to talk a little more about Sam just because I feel like it. Watching Sam was a wild ride. Him and Jenn were hot and heavy from the start and I believe he received the first impression rose. They were very flirty and he seemed to be doing really well with her until they went on their one on one date at the space needle. They were supposed to jump off the edge on the cord (or whatever it’s called) and Sam instantly agreed to it without consulting her and he didn’t take her fear seriously until she started crying. They make up at dinner and they were mostly okay after that except for the occasional moments of distrust. A few weeks later they’re on a radio show group date and Jenn asks him what he likes about her. He keeps saying that he likes that she’ll be a good wife and mother and that she’s selfless. She then asks how he knows she’s selfless and Sam could not list one reason why. He couldn’t list one reason why he liked her either. He then tried to say that he expected the bachelorette to be someone else and that she wasn’t his type. He got sent home after this and he kept saying that he wasn’t that into her and she was boring. So yeah poor Jenn did not find love but she did find a lot of reasons to set these men’s houses on fire. She was too nice to all of them.

#asks #anon #I’m sorry this is so long I have no one to talk to about this lmao

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blackradandmad · 3 years

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why blippi is rotting yr children's brains

preface: i literally expect no one to read this. it is an essay length, strong opinion piece critiquing a niche youtube-based children's show that i don't expect most of y'all to even have knowledge of lol. but like, i promise that even if you know nothing about what i'm talking about, in my incredibly, super humble opinion, it's a good piece of writing and interesting nonetheless. anyway if you read this whole thing for some reason yr really hot and we should kiss.

i thoroughly vet everything my child watches before he watches it, episode by episode. and we rarely watch youtube for entertainment; we usually just look up educational videos when he has a question about something and wants more detail than i can provide him. and that's mainly because children's content on youtube is so fucking troubling and distressing. i don't judge parents who give their children a tablet at a restaurant at all bc i've been there and sometimes it's easier on everyone to just put on a video and avoid a giant scene, but i do judge parents who just leave their children alone with youtube kids on autoplay.

take stevin john, a literal millionaire who got famous from dressing up as a silly character called blippi and going on tours of places like aquariums, zoos, construction sites, etc and posting it on youtube. this has branched into a whole empire of blippi videos, hulu shows and specials, live shows and tours (that he outsources to another character actor), merchandise and so on. this 30-something year old man cites his main influence as being mr. rogers, but i question if he's ever even seen an episode of that program.

mr. rogers had no background in early childhood development or media production, but he revolutionized the world of children's media, because he respected his audience and didn't shy away from real world situations, all while creating a show with an enormous heart. mr. rogers begins his episodes by inviting the viewer in, literally changing his attire to be more comfortable, and talking about/doing things he genuinely cares about. whereas mr. rogers calmly and maturely addresses the viewer, blippi puts on a high pitched, contrived voice, interjecting every other sentence with a forced exclamation such as, "teehee! we're having so much fun!"

i don't find it a coincidence that john (blippi) is a veteran, either. his videos are completely devoid of the absurd, abstract, childlike thinking that makes children's media fun, creative, and entertaining. his thinking and process is methodical, devoid of emotion, and very superficial. this line of thinking clearly shows the kind of creative sterilization and emphasis on sameness and conformity instilled in the military. blippi simply observes things and interacts with them in a stale, matter-of-fact way. "this ball is purple! this ball is pink! anyway... what's over there? teehee! a car! vroom, vroom!" objects are colors, toy cars don't do anything but drive, curiosity is simply not encouraged.

he uses the "it's educational!" excuse to hide the fact that his show lacks everything that makes media a valuable resource for children to consume in the first place. further than identifying colors, numbers, and the occasional letter or shape, there is just this total lack of children's need for social and emotional development. when mr. rogers breaks the fourth wall to address the viewer and let them know they're special, it feels authentic and natural, because we've spent the last half hour building whole worlds with diverse characters and unique stories in a pretend neighborhood, learning about and enjoying different musical instruments, being exposed to and making friends with (even if parasocially, it is still a real bond to children when done properly) children who are similar to us in character regardless of physical or environmental differences, feeding the fish, making art together, and so on. when blippi tells the viewer, "you are very special, and i enjoy spending time with you!" it falls completely flat and feels unearned, because the last half hour was spent running around a soft play center pointing at bright, colorful objects, visiting interesting locations like farms or fruit production factories while failing to acknowledge the humanity of the humans actually working there (everything is machine or product focused; the human workers are simply an extension of the machine), learning "fun facts" about elephants that just list attributes of elephants, not taking the opportunity to inform the viewers of elephants' intelligence, or diet, or matriarchal society. it is a loud, sensory overwhelming display of a man so disconnected from the social and emotional needs and desires of children that he assumes they're stupid, easily entertained idiots who only need some silly dances and fast-moving cartoon graphics to give their attention (meaning time and desire to purchase products meaning $$$). john clearly views his audience as a means to gaming the algorithm and ultimately a paycheck by the hollow way he addresses them.

the show is so narcissistic, so focused on all the fun blippi is supposedly having, but he lacks any of the character traits that make individual children's show hosts memorable, so much so that he was able to have someone else who doesn't even vaguely resemble him dress as blippi and impersonate him and host the show or appear at live shows, and it went unnoticed by most of his toddler and child audience. the show is so formulaic and the character of blippi is so unmemorable that instead of taking the blue's clues route of developing a story of the host leaving for college and his brother now stepping in, or making some sort of believable excuse for the change in actors, they can simply swap him out with some random guy and not acknowledge it at all. although a comedy show for older children, the amanda show in no way could or would try to replicate the show with the same name but swapping out amanda bynes with a random teenage girl who is clearly not amanda bynes. it's weird and nonsensical and shows that his character is so much of a farce put on for a paycheck that not even his dedicated audience is affected or even cares when he is replaced by a random, unknown person.

this is completely garbage content made by an opportunist with no experience with children who saw his nephew watching children's youtube content, took it at complete surface level and still hasn't realized that while children's content only looks and feels so easy, entertaining, and enriching because it is so hard to do well. even with outsourcing his music, that aspect of the show still sucks. famous and successful children's musician, raffi, is known for his song describing the life of a little white whale, called "baby beluga." it opens with a calm strumming of his guitar, followed by the lyrics, "baby beluga in the deep blue sea/swim so wild and you swim so free/heaven above/sea below/and a little white whale on the go." is it silly and kind of pointless? yes, but the point is that he is captivating children and showing them the fun of listening to music, dancing, singing, and appreciating art. the "excavator song" featured in an episode of blippi about construction vehicles opens with what sounds like a default garageband loop and the flatly sung lyrics, "i'm an excavator/i'm an excavator/hey dirt, see you later/i'm an excavator." i don't feel i have to meticulously analyze the aforementioned lyrics; the stark contrast should speak for itself.

i have a million more criticisms about both blippi specifically and youtube children's content as a whole, but this is already so long and i doubt many people will get this far anyway. it's an issue i was completely apathetic towards until i had my own child and had to wean him off these kinds of junk food shows because i realized the fast-paced visuals and bright colors and repetitive songs/lyrics were putting him in this spaced-out, fugue state, and he thought he could demand this show or that show whenever he wanted. the moment he started regularly yelling things like, "watch! cars!" or "no! click it!" i knew i had to be a lot more invested in the things he watched even if just for entertainment or as a soothing message. i showed him an episode of mr. rogers yesterday and feared it would be too slow to hold his attention, but he was mesmerized, greeting and interacting with mr. rogers verbally, asking me, "what's that?" to different objects on the screen. since purging this low-brow children's entertainment, he has had a noticeable increase in attention span and concentration, can focus on a task for longer amounts of times, is more likely to "read"/look through books without me initiating it, and doesn't throw a fit when the tv/my laptop is off.

i just know that for me, growing up with so much unsupervised internet access definitely led me to real-world pain and consequences, and it seems like now children are born with an iphone as an extension of their arm. if my child is going to be consuming videos, i'm definitely supervising every second and am going to be highly critical of the videos and the credentials (or lack thereof) of the creators and team behind it. but i also know, from pure observation admittedly, that parents letting youtube kids autoplay parent their children for hours at a time is not an uncommon occurrence. and it worries me that a generation of children are being raised on videos that rely on being as loud and bright and superficially enjoyable as possible. what's the use of a child knowing their colors and alphabet if they don't know how to treat people with kindness and empathy and respect? there is something wrong for a children's show host to plug the spelling of his name at the end of his videos ("well, that's the end of this video. but if you wanna watch more of my videos, just type in my name! can you spell my name with me? b-l-i-p-p-i!") after essentially rotting his audiences' brains for a half hour. there's something so insidious about the prioritization of naming different parts of construction vehicles over honest depictions of and conversations about dealing with feelings, or why someone with autism may act differently than you, or what to do when you feel lonely, or ways to make art and express yrself creatively. also, not to mention the blatant police propaganda and outright worship is seriously jarring; as a black mother to a visibly non-white child, i cannot sit there and watch blippi show kids how to be a bootlicker for the shittiest profession on earth, but that could be a whole essay in and of itself.

anyway, thanks for reading, if yr looking for quality children's content, i recommend, in no specific order: mr. rogers, sesame street, the electric company, molly of denali, daniel tiger, bluey!, blue's clues, the odd squad, word party, trash truck, puffin rock, uhh... that's definitely not an extensive list but that's just off the dome!!! ok bye y'all <333

#lil rambles #long post t #idk why it's formatted like this ig cos i copy pasted from my fb?#whatever anyway idk why i waste my writing skills on shit literally nobody else but me cares abt #blippi #children's television

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tenacityreturns · 4 years

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five times kissed with aokaga

i. new to their relationship, but eager, this kiss is exactly as you’d expect it to be. aomine is an annoying little shit, which is a surprise to no one. and kagami loves it.

ii. kagami’s dad calls him at 2am and leaves him feeling bad. if he’d been by himself, he would’ve let it worry him and probably wouldn’t have been able to get back to sleep. good thing he isn’t alone.

iii. aomine’s really good at ghosting him. he had done it before, but now they’re in a relationship, kagami tries his best to help make him feel better. he feels like an idiot but momoi’s there to help. this is the longest because depression, big mood

iv. the vorpal swords reunite, but things are not as kagami would like them to be. this is my fav one because i love kise so much and he’s HERE so that’s all i care about. also you can tell i care about him more than the others bc he has speaking lines.

v. they’ve graduated, and kagami has been in the states for six months. aomine comes to visit.

i) it’s not their first kiss, but it’s still new. instincts tell kagami to push aomine away when he comes close because it’s dangerous to let someone else hold your heart. and his hands are rough, his eyes are cold, and his temper is short, but kagami trusts him. in this moment, they’re both sitting on the edge of their emotional barriers, waiting for the signal that it was safe to fall. he believes that one of them will go first. their personal insecurities are too great to just rush into it wholeheartedly.

this kiss has a slower build-up than their first. they’re sitting on aomine’s bed, which is dangerous enough territory in itself because kagami is both completely inexperienced and eager to try. as if he could keep his hands off the hottest guy he knows! they inch closer. does aomine know the effect he has? does he feel the same? kagami understands that they both like each other, and want to make out right in this moment, but could he ever affect someone’s pulse like aomine does his? could kagami ever make him speechless? be the only thing he’d want to look at in a room? aomine’s eyes dance across kagami’s face. what’s he looking at? they make eye contact and it sparks a smirk.

“ah, you’re looking at me with the intensity of a game,” but before kagami can get embarrassed and tell him to fuck off, aomine ducks in close. in a whisper, he continues: “you should loosen up.”

“you should shut up,” kagami puts his hand on aomine’s chest and pushes him backwards. he climbs on top to straddle him, and it’s the look in widened blue eyes that’s telling him this was the right thing to do. in an instant, the wit returns and he’s smirking again.

“make me.”

maybe he would growl, say something like you’re a smartass who always wants to have the last laugh, you know that, right? but kagami is preoccupied. his tense jaw relaxes, and the anger evaporates. the judgement calls between calling out and making out with aomine daiki are often very close. maybe next time, kagami will pretend to be annoyed. ( hint: it won’t be the next time. )

♥

ii) kagami’s ringtone shatters the dark peace of his bedroom. his groggy, half-asleep arm drops heavily to his right, where, usually, it would connect with the bed-side table ( painfully ) and he’d find his phone. this time, he isn’t sleeping alone, and he accidentally hits his barely sleeping boyfriend.

“hey,” aomine complains as he pushes himself up, “what is it? your phone?”

kagami doesn’t give a linguistically clear response, but it’s enough of a grunt that aomine gets it. he holds his hand out, and aomine passes it over. it’s dad. it’s 2am. “shit,” kagami presses answer and holds it to his ear. when he speaks, it’s in english. “dad, it’s so early.”

“good! can we talk?”

“no, i mean it’s late. can you call me tomorrow?”

“i’m on a business trip tomorrow, but i won’t be long! it’s friday night, taiga, don’t young people normally stay up ‘til the early hours anyway?”

“how should i know?” kagami reaches over to squeeze aomine’s arm. it’s a sorry i woke you gesture, which gets a don’t worry about it shrug. as kagami’s father tells him not to be so snappy, he’s just checking in, his son is whispering away from the phone that he’ll be back in a minute. then he’s swinging his legs over the bed and going into the living room.

“anyway,” asao continues distractedly, and kagami can tell that he’s multi-tasking. “do you want to go to europe with me this winter?”

“huh?”

“my business trip! it’s in france, but i was thinking we could take a tour.”

kagami thought of the winter cup, of getting to have rematches against the generation of miracles. he thought of school ( last, of course ). “what? no, i can’t. i’ve got stuff going on here.”

“they’ll survive without you for a month! or two weeks, i don’t know, whatever school break is. and you know what they say about french girls?”

kagami groans. “i don’t care about french girls. i have a boyfriend, remember?”

silence.

“go by yourself. or why don’t you grab someone random off the street and tell them to ditch all their plans last minute like this?”

silence.

“sorry,” it’s instinctual, second-nature to apologise like this. he isn’t sorry, but he’ll say it anyway for some paternal approval. “people are counting on me and i can’t let them down. --- are you not coming here for christmas?”

“business trip. alright, taiga. i’ll let you get back to sleep.”

“bye, dad.”

dial tone. ah, fuck, he’d hurt his dad’s feelings. he texts thanks anyway, and waits for a reply. it’s a smiley face almost instantly, but that doesn’t put him at ease. it’s not passive aggressive, but at least they weren’t arguing again like last time. when kagami returns to his room, aomine is sitting up on the bed with his arm draped over his legs.

“everything... okay?” aomine asks quietly. kagami shrugs and plugs in his phone. tentatively as characteristically possible, he continues: “was your dad being a dick again?”

“he called me in the middle of the night,” kagami climbs across the bed to get back to his side. “what do you think?”

silence. the urge to apologise bubbles to the surface immediately, leftover from his phone call, but aomine moves and interrupts it. he lowers to one elbow, but it’s the other hand that provides distraction: tenderly brushing kagami’s persistent fringe from his forehead. he never knows what to say in the face of aomine being gentle like this. it’s not uncommon, just surprising, and kagami isn’t particularly good at returning the favour.

“he asked me to go to europe with him,” kagami says instead, shuffling in a little closer so that his head on aomine’s pillow. his boyfriend is silent again, which is fair, because what the fuck? kagami knows, he gets it. “i’m not going, obviously.”

“rich people are so fucked,” aomine watches his fingers glide across kagami’s hairline. “he knows you can’t just up and leave, and offers anyway. shit.”

“right? i have basketball and school.”

“sounds like it could have been nice, though.”

“he wants to hook me up with french girls.”

“never mind. you shouldn’t go.”

kagami smiles, closing his eyes. “maybe i’ll go.”

“man, shut up,” aomine pushes kagami’s head into the pillow.

“hey!” kagami shoves his hand against aomine’s face. they let go.

“tch,” as if the last few seconds never happened, aomine tucks himself in close. his head fits just right nestled beneath kagami’s chin. “why couldn’t he call you back in the morning, anyway?”

“he’s leaving then, or something.”

“hm. go back to sleep.”

kagami sighs. usually he can, but sometimes the call disturbs him too much and he’ll lie awake for hours. this is one of those times, he can already tell. ugh. his eyes are open again, blankly surveying the other side of the room. after a few minutes, he can feel aomine’s breathing start to level out and the arm around his body goes limp. red eyes close. please go back to sleep. who cares if his dad disregards all of kagami’s hobbies and relationships in one simple they’ll survive without you for a month? not him! kagami doesn’t care.

“are you still awake?” aomine makes him jump, which makes a very sleepy sounding aomine jump too. “oiiiii.”

“sorry! i thought you were asleep.”

“no, you’re too tense, it’s not relaxing.”

“daiki,”

“shhhh,” aomine lifts his head enough to kiss kagami’s jaw. ahhhh!!!! that’s really cute!!!! it gets WORSE. aomine rolls forward, pushing kagami onto his back and lying half on top of him. he holds a hot, red face in his hands and plants three kisses on chin, nose, then forehead. “do you feel a little better?”

“d--daiki, that’s so cute...”

“answer the question.”

“yes?”

“okay.” he makes kagami’s muscular chest his new pillow. “if you’d have said no, i might have done that again.”

“huh!!! don’t say that! do it anyway!”

“shhhh, i’m sleeping.”

kagami hugs him, but also gives aomine a good shake. a blue head raises with a stern look. “you think you’re getting kissed for that?”

but kagami’s smiling widely, unable to hold it in. “i wish you were here every time my dad called me.”

such a statement softens whatever faux grudge had been starting to root itself into the conversation. suffice to say, kagami gets his kisses. brief though they are, because aomine’s half-asleep as it is, it means the world. and it means kagami’s sufficiently distracted to fall asleep again.

♥

iii) aomine hadn’t gone to school that day. of course, kagami wasn’t to know that until after practise when kuroko gets a phone call from momoi asking if he was with them. no, he’s not. they’d been supposed to meet up, but aomine cancelled at lunch time without much explanation. he does that sometimes. at first, it used to annoy kagami, but aomine told him that sometimes he has days when he can’t bring himself to talk to anyone. he’s fine, he doesn’t want pity or anything, just space on days when it happens. i don’t like who i am when i get like that, he’d said. kagami had come to the conversation ill-prepared and hadn’t said anything in reply. he regrets that. so he assumes that this is what today had turned into, one of those days.

the thing is, momoi also knows when he’s not feeling well. kagami had asked her once if there was anything they could do to make him feel better, somehow, and she said that there wasn’t. she usually takes a box of nice things around to his house for when he comes home. those sexy magazines he likes, a couple of cartons of banana milk, some snacks. kagami thinks of this suddenly as kuroko is ending the call. the words form on his tongue at the same rate as forming in his mind.

“momoi,” he pulls kuroko’s phone to his ear, holding onto his friend’s wrist. “have you been ‘round to his house yet?”

“hi kagamin,” she coos, then sighs, “no, i haven’t.”

“let me do it,” his eyes cannot lift from the floor in his embarrassment ( there are so many of his teammates around, and kuroko’s right there! ). “i can be there in an hour. --------please.”

“o-okay! i think dai-chan would like that.”

“i hope so.”

“i’m in town anyway, why don’t you meet me? bring tetsu-kun and we’ll call it a double date!”

“how does that work if daiki’s not there? and ain’t the point of this to look out for him, anyway?”

“ah. yes, i suppose. is tetsu-kun still there?”

“yes, momoi-san.”

“ah, tetsu-kun! were you listening? i’m sorry if we left you out! may i steal kagamin for a little while?”

“i don’t need his permission!” kagami defends hotly, but evens out immediately, letting go of kuroko’s wrist. “i’ll go get changed and see you at that grocery store you mentioned.”

“grocery... store?”

“yeah, the one with the, uh,” kagami presses his finger and thumb together and rotates his wrist. like a... key? “the, uh-- popsicle stick? with kuroko, back in middle school?”

she all but screams a huh down the phone. “why do you remember that!”

“i don’t know!” because aomine and the others used their basketball ability to take down a bag snatcher, obviously! how fucking cool is that? aomine chasing after a guy on a moped and catching up? kagami’s blushing at the thought.

momoi sounds like she’s blushing too, and she tumbles into the steep slope of gushing over kuroko and her own, self-described shyness. kagami grimaces. kuroko stares at him. yes, alright, this one is absolutely kagami’s fault for starting. he’ll take responsibility for that one. kuroko finds a nice, polite way to hang up without making her feel bad. damn, if only kagami had an ounce of the tact this guy has!

but he’ll make do with what he has, and excuses himself from hanging out after practise to attend to something. everyone must have heard that phone-call, but he’s blocking those thoughts from his mind as he speed walks to that fateful store. walking isn’t fast enough. he types out five different texts to aomine that express that he hopes he’s alright, but all of them feel wrong. it’s almost a private joke with himself but as he’s sliding into a taxi to get him there faster, he finds the tiger emoji and the heart emoji. then clicks send by accident. oops. that was... kind of stupid. really stupid. fuck.

momoi is standing outside with her phone to her ear as he arrives in the car. he pays the fare and gets out. is she on the phone to him? but she doesn’t say goodbye before pushing her phone into her purse, nor does it look like she hung up, so the image is a mystery lost on him. they’re quick inside the store. momoi chooses everything first, starting with the magazine he likes ( ah, thank goodness, mai-chan features a lot in this issue. yes, i’m sure he’ll be fine. but isn’t this strange for you, kagamin? // no, i don’t care. he can like what he likes. // huh! dreamy... ), but then kagami will pick up two others beside it and put it in the basket. she’ll pick up a three-pack of banana milks, and he’ll pick up another. she finds his favourite sweet snack of the week and he grabs five. same with the savoury option. kagami insists on paying, since it had been his idea to quadruple the purchases. on their way over to aomine’s house, they pass a toy shop. kagami only half-glanced, but a little, cuddly crayfish catches his eye.

“do you think he’d like that?” kagami stops, and presses his index finger against the glass.

“you want to buy him a toy lobster?” she repeats like it’s insane. he sighs. he has no idea what a good boyfriend would--- “he used to keep crayfish as pets sometimes. you knew that?”

kagami nods. he doesn’t know how, but he does know that.

she squeaks. her twinkling eyes and fingers held delicately against her face are making this into way more of an embarrassing ordeal than he’d wanted it to be, so he’s grumbling as he leaves her outside to go and buy it. the little creature is red like a lobster, and speckled, with big plastic eyes and a smiley face. maybe it’s a lobster. what’s the difference? it goes into the little gift bag and momoi has recovered by the time he’s back. she’s all smiles herself, but at least she isn’t saying anything.

he’s glad she decides to walk him all the way there. kagami couldn’t remember the way. there’s no way of knowing if he’s in, she tells him as they walk up the path. his mother says he’s out, but he could have faked leaving and gone back to bed. he does that sometimes, apparently. it’s cold and wet today, kagami hopes aomine’s in bed. and it’s aomine’s mother who answers the door. she’s working from home today, about to enter a meeting, so she can’t stay and chat, but it’s lovely to see them both. momoi decides to leave kagami to go upstairs by himself. makes sense. she’ll wait in the living room. he takes a deep breath and carries the big bag of nice things up a dark set of stairs. into a dark hallway ( where is the light switch? ).

despite the darkness, he knows where aomine’s room is. and there’s a little window near it to bring in the light of a grey day. it’s like the sky sympathises. there cannot be sun when it is not warm inside aomine’s own chest. kagami knocks on the door but there’s no answer. he’s silent as he walks inside. the curtains are drawn, no lights are on. the bed looks empty. damn. he’s not in, after all. something buzzes on the desk and-- it’s his phone. why the hell wouldn’t he take that, what if something happened? kagami sighs. worry gnaws away at his heart. has something happened?

the decision is made after some deliberation that the best place for the bag is by the desk. the little lobster toy, however, should go on the bed. it’s such a stupid little gift, isn’t it? maybe he should say that momoi chose it. throw her under the bus now, and then when she denies it later, kagami will be long gone and far from the reaches of embarrassment. he snaps the tags off and shoves them into his pocket, carrying it in both hands like a scared offering to a shrine.

aomine must have kicked off the duvet in a sulk, because it’s bunched up on one side of the double bed in a long pile. he must be imagining things when he sits and it shifts. the toy looks out of place on the dark pillow-case of a brooding teenaged boy. maybe that’s not fair, but the longer it sits there, the more out of character it feels and he snatches it away. into his hoodie pocket it goes! the blanket shifts again. shit. is--- is someone under there? an apprehensive hand reaches out to where the shoulder would be, connects with something hard. a shoulder.

“go away, satsuki,” the duvet grumbles.

kagami doesn’t know what to say. why has he frozen! the hand stays put. is aomine really saying he thinks that kagami’s hands are the same size as the petite girl’s? why is that so offensive all of a sudden... he exhales. the best thing to say is nothing, or so he decides, and instead he pulls the top of the cover down. aomine is facing the other way. kagami runs his fingertips gently through blue hair and still receives no reaction. does momoi do this? he feels as though he should feel jealous, but can’t find it in himself to. aomine should be loved, touched gently and often by those who adore him. whether that’s platonically or otherwise, it’s good if she does stroke his hair gently, and if aomine doesn’t mind, then who is kagami to interrupt?

“i blew off tetsu and taiga today,” it sounds like a guilty confession. kagami feels like he shouldn’t have heard it, feels like he’s trespassing. “i’m such a fuck up, man.”

“no, you’re not,” of course kagami knew that once he spoke in his deep voice, and not momoi’s high pitched one, that aomine would roll onto his back and stare in shock. he does, and the heavy gaze makes kagami feel even more like he shouldn’t be here. but he wants to help, if he can. kagami pulls his hand back and reaches into his hoodie pocket for the hidden lobster toy. he produces it. aomine stares at that instead. then back at kagami.

“what are you doing here?”

“i got you a crayfish-- thing. ‘cuz you said you liked them, but not to eat.”

silence.

“it’s stupid, i know,” kagami’s smile is weak, guilty, and he sets it atop the pillow like before. why he thought this would help is lost on him. “i hope you’re not mad that i came over, uninvited and all. i won’t do it again if you don’t like it.”

silence. aomine cranes his neck to find the toy, and lifts his arm out of the cover to pick it up. he’s looking at it like he can’t believe it’s right there in his hand. he’s frowning. ah! but there are other things! kagami leaves the bed and grabs the bag from the desk. it’s the magazines he’s after. he pulls out all three of them at once.

“momoi helped choose, ‘cuz you know i’d be useless.” the magazines are spread where kagami had been sitting.

aomine still isn’t saying anything, which is fine, and he can’t expect him to if he’s feeling like shit! but he doesn’t know what to say to fill the silence, and he doesn’t know if he should just leave! maybe that would be best! however, in his panic, he’s disregarding the point of a gift bag and taking everything out instead. snacks of all sorts crinkle in their packaging. to get a better picture of kagami derailing, aomine has shifted up to sit with his back against the headboard. watching. he opens up one of the packets of banana milk cartons to give to him in an act of that panic.

“well, that’s it,” kagami says in defeat as he meets the end of the bag. “sorry for making a mess. i can go now, if you like. momoi’s just downstairs so i can get her if you wanna talk to her about anything.”

he shook his head. but... to which part?

“you-- you don’t need to worry about cancelling on us, you know. we can always meet another day.”

“or you could come to my house.”

“yeah, sorry. i wanted to help, but i hadn’t thought about what i was gonna say, i guess.”

“come here,” he gestures with his head, but kagami looks instead at the pile of dumb gifts on the mattress where he would have sat. so he starts putting things back in the bag. aomine huffs ( but it sounds almost like it could have been a chuckle had the circumstances been different ), and pushes everything, including the magazines, off the side of the bed.

“careful! what about mai-chan?”

“come here,” aomine demands, reaching over and tugging his sleeve closer. is this good? kagami has no idea. he just does what he’s told and climbs over to sit beside his boyfriend. “you didn’t have to do all of this.”

“yeah, i know that. i hoped it might help.”

“were you mad at me when i cancelled earlier?”

“no, i understood you weren’t doing great today. i-- i dunno, i just wanna say i don’t, like, expect anything from you when we meet up. we don’t have to do anything. if you wanna be alone, i get it, but i just-- i wanted to say you don’t have to be alone either. ‘cuz i wanna be there for you, if you’re okay with that too. i’m not trying to------”

kagami’s sincere, if lengthy, statement is interrupted by a kiss to his moving lips. it’s short, but shuts him up nonetheless. aomine stays close afterwards, leaning on the hand resting just behind kagami’s folded legs.

“do you wanna do nothing with me?”

a little dazed, kagami can only nod. aomine piles the two pillows together and sorts the blanket out. he pushes kagami’s chest to lie down against the pillows, and aomine slides himself under his arm, head on chest. they lie like this quite comfortably. it’s warm-- no, it’s cosy. this feels just right. after a few minutes of steady breathing, with kagami smoothing blue hair ever so gently, aomine is asleep. kagami texts momoi a quick update, and she tells him that she’ll let herself out.

maybe doing nothing isn’t half bad.

♥

iv) they’re at a vorpal swords reunion. it’s more of a meet-up than practise, because the hall they were going to use to practise had flooded and they weren’t able to go inside, and it’s too cold outside to play. so they’re standing with hot drinks in the park. ( kagami isn’t, he’d finished his and aomine’s ages ago. aomine will just have to turn up first. ) akashi managed to get a reservation at this nice, not too pricey restaurant, so they’re waiting a few minutes for noon when they can head over. it takes a little more planning than usual to seat, what? a dozen or so people?

kagami’s talking with kise and kuroko, waiting for his cocoa. to be clear, he’s standing with them, and kise is going off about something. then kuroko says something to shut him down and it makes kagami laugh. he’s so abrupt! and people say kagami’s blunt! kise pulls a tragic face, asks why kagami’s laughing, and kagami calls him lame. it’s fun everyone hanging out together!

“taiga,” it’s a half-assed shout from a little way off, but he knows who it is without looking.

kise’s saying something to him, but kagami’s attention is immediately drawn to the boy in the big puffer jacket, followed inevitably by his pink-haired friend. kagami glares at him. “you’re so late! what’s up with that?”

“i was sleepy,” still shouting.

“don’t say sleepy like you’re cute!” kagami is, unsurprisingly, still shouting.

aomine stops walking and breathes a deep sigh into the air, dissipating in a cloud. “come here then.”

the redhead turns, balling his hands into fists. his cheeks are heating up already, because he accidentally yelled that aomine sounded kind of cute just now... and in his stupid fucking beanie, he looks it too. they have a silent stand off, but aomine wins. kagami can’t resist going over to see what the hell he wants. can’t resist being near.

“come here.”

so he does, and he stalks over like it’s a great effort, or he’s about to end a fight. he’s not, of course, and the balled fists show discomfort and not aggression. he’s still embarrassed. it’s about to get worse. as soon as he’s near, aomine reaches forward with gloved hands and grabs onto the fluffy hood of kagami’s red parka.

“what the hell do you mean looking so cute today?” he said like it’s an insult, kagami yelps and grabs his wrists. “you dress up just for me?”

“it’s cold, how else am i gonna dress!”

“what are you wearing under it?”

“like, three layers,” he grunts, “get off my hood, asshole!”

“aw, your face looks cold, though,” aomine is completely ignoring kagami, except that he decided, probably separately, to put his hands on kagami’s face. that’s actually super nice, and if there weren’t, what, a dozen or so people around that he wanted to look cool for, he’d have just stood still.

“daiki!” he is shouting, once again. their best and only method of communication is to make as much noise as possible. kagami gnashes his teeth, threatening to bite. maybe he just will and teach aomine to: “quit being a pain!”

“quit making it fun, then.”

and quit looking like that so close! kagami isn’t about to kiss him, but he really would if they were in private. it’s the twinkling playfulness in those blue eyes that show kagami that he’s really the only thing on aomine’s mind right now. ugh, shut up, stupid idiot! aomine knows what he’s doing, too. you can tell by the shit-eating smile on his stupid, beautiful face. red eyes, as they often do, roll. he wraps his arms around his boyfriend’s waist and squeezes. it’s not a hug, it’s an attack.

aomine’s turn to yelp. his hands move so that he’s hugging around kagami’s head, which is obviously enough to get him to loosen his grip.

“careful, my hat!” kagami exclaims, as if that’s more important than the structural integrity of his skull. they’re still hugging, and nothing else exists, and god is aomine warm. so warm. “hi, anyway. how come you’re late?”

“satsuki slept in,” aomine nestles his cold nose into kagami’s bare neck. it’s fine if he does this, he doesn’t mind sharing body heat either. and who’s to see if aomine kissed him in that moment? nobody. but everyone will see the wide grin on kagami’s face, worlds away from the irritation he’d displayed seconds ago.

“sure,”

their embrace ended, but aomine still kept an arm slung around kagami’s shoulders. he glances around for aforementioned girl, but she’s already fawning over kuroko. aomine sends his own form of greeting to his other friends and all but drags kagami over to see kuroko and kise. nods over to akashi who stands with midorima, probably talking about how much space there is in the universe, or some other brainy thing nerds discuss.

“i wanna play ball,” kagami groans now they’re standing together. “it’s not that cold, right?”

“kagamicchi, it’s icy! i’m not risking my neck for a one-on-one.”

“i’m getting food then i’m going home.” (kagami’s home, mind you.)

“yes, it is, kagami-kun.”

somehow, being turned down by all three of them at once was less fun than he could possibly have dreaded. kagami deadpans and takes to sulking.

“you’re all just chicken i’d beat you.”

“big words for the guy who lost our last game.”

“winter’s a hard season for you, isn’t it?” kuroko! traitor!

kise puts his hand on his hip, looking at kagami like there’s something WRONG with wanting to play his favourite sport! “he’s really a guy with a one track mind, huh?”

“shut the hell up! don’t gang up against me! we all met to play ball, didn’t we? i got excited about it, alright! winter sucks for everyone, that’s normal!”

poor kagami. if the others have any sympathy for his plight, they’re pretty good at hiding it.

♥

v) six months, is it? kagami spends perhaps too long trying to figure it out. he came over to the states after graduation in march, and it’s september now... but then, daiki came over to visit in may, only staying for a fortnight because that’s all his job would allow. so really it’s only been four months. but those have been hard. lots of facetime, and phone calls at awkward times. but kagami always thinks to check what time it was in tokyo before he called, and it seemed that aomine has been similarly considerate. all the same, kagami has missed his boyfriend more than anything. it’s only after high school is behind him that he’s really appreciating that his youth ( as he thought of it ) is now over. he’s in the nba now. well, it’s kind of complicated, but he’s on his way!

basketball is at the back of his mind now, though. aomine’s plane was due to land at 2am, but was delayed by half an hour on both ends. then there was an issue with the bags which aomine called and raged about. they’re so close. in the same building, even! but despite this, and kagami’s irrepressible nerves bouncing his legs and tearing at his heart, the fatigue gets to him and he falls asleep on an uncomfortable chair opposite the waiting area for arrivals. an unopened can of iced coffee sits loosely in his hands. to make an excuse, kagami hadn’t slept a wink the night before in all of his excitement. he’s fully and completely asleep.

he won’t hear his phone as it rings several times through. he won’t hear the suitcase roll and come to a stop beside his leg. he doesn’t feel the can get plucked from his fingers. the vague sensation of someone touching his hair doesn’t even bother him, but in the depths of his dreamless sleep, he hears a voice:

“taaaiiigaaa,”

and it’s enough. crimson lashes flutter open sleepily, slowly. eyes focus on the dark face before him with the delay that only the deepest slumbers could provide. his head spins. is he still asleep? before he can question it any longer, he jerks forwards and wraps his arms around aomine in the tightest hug. kagami buries his face into his boyfriend’s warm neck, feeling the embrace returned.

it’s a desperate cling. the kind of hug that says more than words could. i missed you so much, i love you so much, please do not let go - i’ve been thinking about this since you got on the plane to fly back to japan. just in case this is a dream and he’s about to wake up. kagami inhales deeply. aomine. right here. in his arms.

“don’t do that,” he says, “i smell bad.”

“no, you don’t,” it’s mumbled, inaudible.

“what was that?”

“i said,” kagami pulls his head back so that he can see his boyfriend’s beautiful, gorgeous, perfect face. it mirrors his own. both hold the teary, tender expressions of lovers parted for too long. his words are long lost. he couldn’t remember what he’d said, what aomine had asked, what day it is. all he has to ground him in reality is a pair of blue eyes staring deep into his, and the arms wrapped tightly around his body.

they move in unison. the kiss is soft, and sweet, and everything he could have hoped it would be. one of kagami’s hands leaves its place on aomine’s back to hold his face. is--- is that stubble he can feel under gentle fingertips? in six months? man! that’s so cool. and hot. god! his boyfriend is so beautiful! the kiss ends as kagami breaks into a wide grin. aomine chuckles. they press their foreheads together.

“tell me what you were thinkin’ about just now,”

“you, daiki,” he holds aomine’s face in both hands, now, smiling so much that it hurts, “i’ve been thinking about you ever since you left.”

#aonon.#aokaga #drabbles.#aokaga.#answered.#some of these i did at 1am and you can tell but i just wrote 3 and now i cant wait for u to read them!!!!!!!!!!#i worked SO HARD ON THESE #for the few months i've been back i've been writing them #i hope u like them................#writing kagami being soft when aomine's in a bad place is my special fav thing.......................#number 3 is my favourite PLEASE humour me and say which scenario u like best #also number 2 #i dont care about number 1 i just wanted to write that aspect of their relationship too JSHDJSHDJSHD #kagami about aomine when aomine does something cool: thats my BOYFRIEND :)#kagami about aomine when aomine is being a giant pain to literally everyone on purpose: thats my BOYFRIEND :)

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kyidyl · 4 years

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Kyidyl Explains Bone - Part 2

(these are collected under the KyidylBones tag bc I have the sense of humor of a 13 year old boy.)

I decided to do this today since the other part was basically like boring intro stuff and that’s not really what you showed up for. So today’s topic is:

Human vs. Animal

Anthropology and archaeology departments the world over are often brought random bones people find to ID whether they’re human or animal, so you might be wondering how do we know the difference? Well...it takes practice. And, honestly, if the pieces are too small we can’t tell without microscopic analysis of the bone structure, but most of the time we can tell.

Human bone is very unique. Our anatomy is unique because we’re the only living members of our genus Homo and the anatomical adaptations of Homo are unique among animals. The weird combination of big brain, walks upright, fine motor control, and used to live in trees is just...weird. Our internal microscopic structure is different than that of any other animal. We grow differently than any other animal because our young take so long to mature and are born so helpless. So anatomically...we’re unique if you know what to look for, but fragmentary remains are super common so you can’t do it by anatomy alone.

One piece of info that’s important. Bone is made of two components: collagen and minerals. Squishy bits and crunchy bits respectively. And, yes, if you’re wondering...scientists DO sometimes remove these bits for Reasons (TM).

Context!

Where did you find this thing? Was it a single bone in a patch of woods in your backyard? Probably animal, but not always. In a pit at a dig with burned animal bones? Probably not a human because people don’t toss the remains of their friends and families in with dinner. Across cultures people treat their own dead differently than their animal dead or their food. So if you find it with the food? 99% chance it’s animal, even at a disturbed site (tho it’s not *impossible* to find people in with animal, especially in caves, very disturbed sites, or very old sites. With very old sites you have to get comfortable with the idea that sometimes people were food and it wasn’t even that uncommon.)

Texture!

I’m doing this one first bc I can’t give you pictures of texture so it can go outside the cut. That microscopic structure I mentioned and differences in bone growth all lead to a different texture in human bone. Now, I want to preface this by saying: this varies with the age of the bone and the age of the individual and the environment in which you found it. But human bone tends to be a bit less....greasy than animal bone. I don’t know how else to describe this, because understanding the difference in texture is literally something you can only do by handling them, but I’ll do my best.

See, animal bone found in association with humans is normally put through some kind of alteration process. Cooking, smoking, etc. Human bone sometimes is - after all, people cremate their dead or dry them out or mummify them or eat them all the time - but buried bone tends to be drier in texture than animal bone. Animal bone won’t leave greasy stains or residue, but it will feel smoother - less porous. As humans (and animals) decay, the collagen goes first and leaves behind the minerals. This happens at different rates for different organisms in different conditions, but human bone that has been buried will have a different texture than animal bone, and it will be slightly less smooth or greasy (listen bone grease isn’t GREASE grease it’s just like a way of talking about how dried out it is. Older = less grease. New things will leave like food grease on your fingers.). But after you’ve felt it a few times - buried human bone has a different texture than animal bone.

Color!

Human bone is a different color from other kinds of bone. It’s similar, but not the same. And! Unless it has been bleached by the sun (something I’ll touch on more when I do the damage post.), it’s not white. Not when it has been defleshed naturally. So halloween decorations? Yeah, all the wrong color. Anyway, this is where we start to get into images, so I’m going to start putting things behind the cut.

Here is an image of mixed animal bone from my own collection:

Ooooo so many cool things in this one picture. There’s burned bone, small bone, big bone, MgO staining, teef!, moar different burned bone...and one of the things that gets mistaken as human most often: turtle shell. It’s the piece that’s in the top row, fourth from the right. It looks very much like human skull when it’s fragmentary and is easy to mistake it as such. It’s flat and the lines look like sutures (place where the bones in the skull fused, and are now the markers of separate bones.), but they don’t go all the way through. Anyway, this is a good depiction of the wide variety of colors animal bone comes in. The large piece in the very lower right is close to what I’d consider an average.

Here’s an image of human femur that has been defleshed, but not buried:

(Source)

Probably a young adult because the bone is in good condition, and the head has been fused but the suture isn’t completely grown over (obliterated).

These are also human femurs:

(Source)

Side note: they all probably had rickets and that center one is a juvenile, and I’ll teach you how to ID that later on. They were found in a cave, a burial, and an archaeological site respectively.

This is another femur:

(Source)

Bottom is the femur, and it has a healed break in the middle. The top is also a femur but it has....so...so...many problems. SO MANY. I could barely tell it’s a femur from this angle.

Anyway, the color and texture on that front femur is what I would consider like an average color and texture for a human bone. And it’s tan, sure, but it’s a different color tan than animal bone, especially IRL.

In short: human bone looks different and feels different than animal bone, even before you take into consideration things like anatomy.

Regarding anatomy, it’s...well, it’s an incredibly complex topic and I don’t know that I can really cover it appropriately here in my blog. It mostly boils down to the impact that bipedalism has on our bodies, the impact that a big brain has on our skulls, and the impact that our manual dexterity on our fingers. The walking thing is especially important because it changes *everything* about our anatomy. Like...head to toe. Everything.

If you’re interested in human bone anatomy I have two resource recommendations for you. First, The Human Bone Manual. This is the one I used for school, and it’s the most useful textbook I’ve ever purchased. I still use it all the time. The ebook version is around $18. Second, this app is called Essential Skeleton 4. It’s free, and it’s the most comprehensive skeletal anatomy app I’ve ever seen (and I’ve used a LOT of them. It’s made by the same people who make essential anatomy - but EA isn’t free.). Unfortunately, it’s iOS only and I’ve never found a decent alternative for android. :/

There is a lot more to telling human from animal, but my hope is that you’ll pick it up as I make the other entries into the series. My best advice here is to develop an eye for detail. Be like Elliot Spencer: it’s a very distinctive ___________.

One final note on anatomy: people almost always do not realize what size bones actually are. Human femurs are long and they’re heavy for their size. They’re usually at least a foot or two in length (I mean...obviously...height is a factor.). The head is good and solid, and the shaft is thick with a lot of compact bone, but when the soft tissue is gone they’re hollow. Most of the long bones are. Foot bones are larger than most people expect. Skulls vary in size between softball-ish and volleyball-ish. And human bone has a distinctive density which, unfortunately, you can’t learn the feel of without handling bone. If you pick up a bone that looks right but doesn’t feel right - you know it. I handled a human femur that felt like bird bone (bird bone is very light with a lot of spongy bone bc they fly.) because of a pathology (a non-standard but usually naturally occurring thing on the bone. Breaks aren’t a pathology, but their regrowth can be. Syphilis damage is a pathology because bacteria is naturally occurring, as are things like bone cancer, osteoporosis, etc.). Other times it’s because your damned osteology prof mixed in a human-looking animal bone with the box of remains to trip you up because the differences can be real subtle and you need to learn that.

Anyway, I think that’s it for today. I’ll seeya tomorrow, peoples!

#science #anthropology #physical anthropology #archaeology #learning #education #bone #human bone #animal bone #anatomy #skeleton #KyidylBones

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jensungf · 4 years

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𝐌𝐘 𝐔𝐍𝐈𝐕𝐄𝐑𝐒𝐄 🌌 𝐡.𝐫𝐣

summary: he was your best friend. you should’ve been happy when he went to go ask that girl whether or not she was his soulmate. so why was the universe pulling at your heartstrings now?

pairing: reader x best friend!huang renjun genre: fluff + soulmate!au word count: 1.6k warnings: none

6:23pm. you rolled your eyes as you read the time. where the hell was he?

your focus drifts to the onyx swirls dotted on your wrist, and you subconsciously trace all the scribbles making up your tattoo. you had been impatiently tapping your foot for what felt like forever, but in actuality, was about ten minutes. maybe i should just leave, you thought ruefully as the digit on your lit-up phone screen changed once again.

you had been through this too many times for you to simply count with your fingers. it was almost like clockwork at this point. despite this only beginning months ago, you knew the cycle. renjun would encounter someone, and would feel compelled to chase them down and ask if they were possibly his soulmate. unfortunately, it always ended in rejection.

you were always the one to comfort him when he returned with the same answer like always— that they had found their soulmate or they didn’t feel any connection at all. despite your annoyance of having to be inconvenienced at random hours of the day and having your quality time with him interrupted, you knew deep down it hurt you just as much as it hurt him.

yet you never once considered the reality that perhaps he would actually find his soulmate one day, and how that mere possibility would change your entire life.

if renjun was seriously going to confront that girl with a simple question of whether or not she was his soulmate, what was taking them so long? surely he would’ve texted you by now if he was successful, knowing you were still waiting for him. or at least let you know he was on his way back.

you winced at the thought that he might be too busy engaging in other endeavors, ones that involved less talking and more touching. you shook your head in an attempt to rid yourself of those thoughts, burying the odd feelings that made your stomach twist and turn. no, that wasn’t the renjun you knew. he wouldn’t be as daring as that despite his growing impatience to find his soulmate. besides, you wanted him to find his soulmate. there was no reason for your heart to twinge at the chance that maybe this time was the right time. you were his best friend. you were supposed to be happy for him, and hope for the best.

you hastily unlocked your phone, typing out a very annoyed albeit passive aggressive text to your heck of a best friend who decided to abandon you in the middle of your weekly dinner date to chase down a girl. you should’ve just left him moments ago, yet your feet stay planted in your spot outside the moomin plushie store.

“stupid renjun,” you muttered under your breath as you realized that the sky was beginning to settle into a hazy cloud of purple and pink. dusk was always your favorite time of day, yet you couldn’t help but feel a bit embittered that renjun wasn’t here with you to enjoy the view with. just when you were about to click send, a shadow casts over your figure and you lift your head.

“hey,” renjun says simply. his hands are shoved deep into his cream-colored denim jacket and he gazes at the sky instead of at you, causing you to stare quizzically at him.

“so....” you cock your head at his silence and wait for him to answer the obvious question. however, he makes no move to look you in the eyes. you hesitate, unsure what to do at your best friend’s abnormal silence.

usually he would be telling you that it wasn’t the right person and he had made a fool out of himself again or something along those lines, but this time, he remained silent. his eyes still avoid yours and you feel panic bubbling up in your chest. why was he acting like this? had something gone wrong?

“can i... try something?” he breaks the silence, asking quietly, almost as if he would break glass if he spoke any louder. he leans in slowly, and you freeze, your breath hitching. your mind screams for you to move away, to question what he was doing and whether he was in his right mind. yet your heart palpitates erratically and you make no move to turn away. his dark brown eyes gaze into yours, and you feel your head spinning.

despite your daze, you somehow feel your head nod ever so slightly, almost out of pure instinct with no control of your own body.

albeit with great reluctance, renjun takes this opportunity daringly. he closes the gap separating you both and gently presses his lips against yours. you melt into his warmth, closing your eyes as your hands subconsciously reach up to pull him in closer by gripping his jacket. his hands raise up to gently cradle your head and his lips feel like velvet, pliant against your own. the kiss is delicate yet firm, all hesitance dissipating as the seconds pass. you both pull away for air, but it felt as if you had just taken a deep breath of air for the very first time in your life.

people had told you about how they felt when they found the one, and you had never understood what they meant about how one person could make them feel just right until that very moment. how complete you had felt. your heart tugs almost as if you had finally crossed the thin line separating you from friends and lovers, something you never knew your heart had been aching for until now. you had always had renjun in your life, but you never knew how much he made you feel whole until this very moment. like he was the last missing puzzle piece that had finally found its place in your life, and nothing more could rival the feeling of this very moment.

he rests his forehead against yours and smiles meekly. your head was still reeling, and renjun moved his hand to gently cup your cheek. your mouth opens ajar, as you wrack your mind for the right words to say. “i… what? injunnie—”

he cuts you off by pressing another soft kiss to your lips. your eyes widen at his impulsive action, taken aback by how uncharacteristic that was. “i know you have a lot of questions, but i couldn’t resist,” he admits as pink dusts his cheek.

he entwines his hand with yours, fitting like two puzzle pieces as he leads you to the park bench. he looks up at the hazy sky once again with admiration before explaining.

“i never understood why it was so difficult to find my soulmate, when my tattoo was one of the more common ones,” he confesses as he glanced down to his moon tattoo. although it was indeed not as uncommon as yours, you had always admired the beauty it held, how beautifully and different it was drawn compared to the generic crescent symbols you had seen before.

it was as if renjun had drawn it with his own hand, with every tiny detail matching precisely with his art, his masterpieces. you look at yours, your wrist adorned with tiny scribbles of planets, stars, and even the sun scattered around all in one area.

suddenly it dawns on you. the space separating the sun and planets and stars is no longer empty, instead replaced with a replica of a moon.

renjun’s moon.

“ever since we reunited with each other, i’ve been feeling more and more desperate to find them because i couldn’t help but feel something towards you, and i couldn’t live knowing you weren’t mine. at least— not until now.”

renjun is absolutely glowing when you look up at him.

“i guess you’re my universe, y/n,” he scoffs with a smile. his eyes meet yours, but despite the firmness in his voice, his telltale signs of embarrassment say otherwise.

and you believe him, because when he smiles at you, it’s as if you were the one who put the sun and moon and stars in the sky, as if you were the center of his galaxy. as if you were his universe.

“i never realized how much i needed you, until i saw that girl. she told me that she was the sun to someone else’s galaxy, and that’s when i realized that i had been trying to push away the pull towards someone who was always beside me for too long. somehow who should’ve been with me all along.”

you both locked eyes before bursting into laughter at his cringeworthy yet heartwarming confession. “when did you become such a cheeseball?” you snort. he locks you in a loving chokehold and your heart nearly skips a beat.

“we both wasted our time, didn’t we?” you remark with a carefree smile. all the worries, the gut feeling that made your head spin, the questions of why you couldn’t feel happy when it came to not having him, disappears within a simple kiss. the puzzle was done. the masterpiece was completed, but what was funny was the mere fact that you had no idea anything was even missing in the first place. you looked down at his wrist, now full with doodles of your galaxy. it glowed just like yours.

“we can make up for lost time.”

you nod and bask in his presence, gazing up at the stars scattered across and the luminescent moon peeking out against the darkness of twilight sky.

soulmates were an odd thing— to simply leave it up to a mere tattoo to connect you both when you had been connected since the very beginning. but you couldn’t have asked for anything more, when fate had already decided that you were his universe, and he was your moon.

you completed each other.

author’s note: i wrote this for @yongiefilms to thank her for being such a good friend and also bc i needed an excuse to post smth while i work on my main wip! i seem to have a curse where i cant write blurbs cus they end up turning into drabbles. oops? also i spent wayy more time on the header than the actual story lol ANYWAYS yay to my first renjun fic <3

#neowritingsnet #kwritersworldnet #renjun scenarios #nct-writers #nct dream scenarios #leyna writes #renjun x reader #renjun fluff #nct dream fluff #nct renjun #nct fluff #huang renjun

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lotusjwy · 4 years

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“Don’t listen to them. Don’t you EVER listen to them.” jiang cheng and wwx - @gremlinmetawin

hello hello again, so! i decided that this prompt fit.. very well with the last xicheng on (which i will link in the notes, bc i’ve heard links break tags? in case u haven’t read it yet), and so this is a continuation of that 😬 and i was 100% meant to finish this earlier today, but i ended up being out of the house until like 9pm OOPS, but i finished it and here it is! also gonna tag u so u see @gremlinmetawin 💜

Wei Wuxian narrowed his eyes in confusion as he watched Jiang Cheng stalk away from the Hanshi, very obviously distressed. Well. Obvious to anyone who had grown up with Jiang Cheng. It was uncommon for Jiang Cheng to leave Lan Xichen’s company in anything less than a good mood, yet here he was storming away as if he couldn’t escape fast enough.

Suddenly, a thought popped into his head. A thought of his Lan Zhan walking into the Jingshi with pain in his eyes, pain that even with all the embraces and kisses in the world, Wei Wuxian hadn’t been able to fix. A pain that was caused by his love’s own brother, because it would seem that the events of Guanyin Temple had affected him more severely than they had originally thought.

He tended to be uniquely cold in these moods, knowing exactly how to stab someone exactly where it would hurt the most. He’d once told Wei Wuxian that he was the cause of the fall of the Jiang Sect, which was something he’d never told even Lan Zhan.

Everyone residing at Cloud Recesses knew to avoid the Hanshi on mornings they didn’t hear a flute sound from the dwelling. However, Jiang Cheng didn’t reside in Cloud Recesses. He didn’t know of this unspoken law of the land; how could he have known? Of course, he hadn’t known, and thus Lan Xichen must have said something that had severely hurt the other.

Quickly turning to Lan Zhan, Wei Wuxian tugged on the other’s robes to get his attention. “Did Xichen-ge play the flute this morning?” Wuxian wasn’t awake at the time Lan Xichen usually played, he rarely was awake that early, relying on Lan Zhan to tell him when he should avoid the elder.

Lan Wangji thought about the question for a moment, before shaking his head. “He did not. If you wish to see him, you should go tomorrow, instead.” He was unwilling to let his husband go through the ordeal of his brother in one of his moods again. He still didn’t know what his brother had said, but it had haunted Wei Ying for weeks afterwards.

“That’s not why. Didn’t you see what I did?!” Wei Wuxian was growing frustrated at the situation, his eyes frantically searching after where he had seen Jiang Cheng stalk off towards, realising that he was no longer there. Without waiting for the other to respond, he continued, “someone let Jiang Cheng go see him, fuck.”

Lan Wangji actually hadn’t seen Jiang Wanyin, but he wasn’t about to question his husbands’ words. However, he didn’t exactly see what the problem was, and voiced as much, “I’m sure xiongzhang would have said nothing that Jiang Wanyin hasn’t heard about himself before. Would he not be fine?”

Wei Wuxian rounded on his husband and glared him for his words, “Lan Zhan, we are going to have a serious talk about this later. But for now, I have to go find my idiot brother who’s probably about to shut himself away from everyone he cares about, again.” Without listening for another word from his husband, Wuxian quickly sped off – ensuring not to run lest he piss off Lan Qiren again.

He made his way through Cloud Recesses, realising that Jiang Cheng would have wanted to leave, immediately. He was hoping that instead of flying back to Yunmeng he’d stay in Caiyi for the day. If he had gone to Caiyi, Wuxian could catch up with, Yunmeng, however, would take a lot more time.

It would seem that he wouldn’t have to worry about either journey, as he had found Jiang Cheng, who was stood frozen not too far from the gates to Cloud Recesses. As Wuxian quickly made his way towards the other, he heard not so hushed whispers coming from the various Lan disciples surrounding them.

“Sect Leader Jiang just got here and he’s already leaving in a fit? You’d think years of being a sect leader would have calmed this infamous tempter.”

“He’s always so angry, it’s no wonder he has no wife.”

“Wife? It’s no wonder all of his disciples are terrified of doing him wrong.”

“Have you heard how many times he threatens to dismember and maim Sect Leader Jin?”

“He used to torture demonic cultivators in the past, so what difference would it make? He killed his own brother after all.”

It seemed that the gossiping would never end, each comment growing worse than the last, Jiang Cheng’s fists clenching even tighter with each spoken word, his entire body beginning to shake. Wei Wuxian had had enough of people belittling his brother.

“If I recall correctly, and trust me, I do, gossiping is forbidden in Cloud Recesses. Scatter before I stop being nice and get Hanguang-jun to hand out your punishments.” Wuxian watched with a cold expression on his face, as the disciples scattered off into various directions, faces flushed with the shock of having been caught.

He approached Jiang Cheng as one would approach an injured, wild animal. With caution. “Jiang Cheng? Are you okay?” When he got no response, he sighed and moved closer to the other, gently placing a hand on the other’s arm. “A-Cheng? Shidi?”

“Who the fuck are you calling shidi?” Jiang Cheng’s voice was rough, as if he was holding back from either crying or screaming, he couldn’t tell yet.

Giving his brother a grin, Wei Wuxian wrapped an arm lightly across the Jiang Cheng’s shoulders, “he speaks!”

“Perhaps I shouldn’t.” He let out a pained sigh and turned to look off into the distance, not wanting to face his brother right now.

Fuck, Xichen-ge had definitely said something bad to him. “No! Speaking is good, speaking is wanted! In fact, let’s go down to Caiyi, have some Emperor’s Smile and have a nice long talk.”

“I’m not great company right now.” He risked a glance at the other, his eyes slightly narrowed, “you just want me to pay for your drinks, don’t you?”

“Hmm? Really? You’re no more different than usual, I’d say. But you’re right, I do, so let’s go!” Wei Wuxian let out a laugh, smiling as he spoke, dragging Jiang Cheng down the path.

Somehow, they had found themselves in the corner of a tavern in Caiyi. Once they had been served, Wei Wuxian turned to his brother tapping lightly on the table to catch his attention, knowing that he needed to say this now rather than later. He couldn’t let Jiang Cheng be stuck in his head for much longer.

“Don’t listen to them, Jiang Cheng.” Wei Wuxian situated himself directly in front of his brother, making sure the other could see how serious his words were, “don’t you ever listen to them!”

“What are you talking about?”

“What those disciples said, earlier. They don’t know what the fuck they’re talking about. They don’t know you.” He hesitated for a second, before letting out a sigh, “As well as whatever Zewu-jun said to you when you visited him today. Whatever he said, it wasn’t true.”

Jiang Cheng froze, “how did you know I saw him today?” Had he been that obvious? Could everyone tell what Lan Xichen had said to him?

With a shrug, he responded. “I saw you leaving the Hanshi.”

“How do you know he said anything?”

“He- uh. I don’t know how much I’m really allowed to say, so I’ll only say my own observations?” He waited for Jiang Cheng to nod, before continuing, “ever since Guanyin Temple he… hasn’t been okay. Sometimes, and It really is very rare, he gets into these foul moods, where he picks at our biggest insecurities to get us to leave. We should have warned you; someone should have warned you. I’m so sorry.”

Wei Wuxian had said ‘us’, that means that Lan Xichen had said something horrible to him as well. Jiang Cheng was curious what Lan Xichen had to say about his brother’s husband, and so he asked, “what did he say to you?”

He shifted uncomfortably for a moment, before letting out a sigh. He couldn’t get Jiang Cheng to talk, if he himself was unwilling. “That I’m the reason yo- our sect burnt to the ground. He told me that if I had minded my own business that the Yunmeng Jiang Sect would have survived, and all those disciples, your parents, would still be alive to this day.” His voice barely above a whisper, the words still piercing through his heard.

Jiang Cheng froze and sucked in a sharp breath. The man really was ruthlessly cruel, wasn’t he? Why did Jiang Cheng get vilified for his angry disposition, yet Lan Xichen was getting away with saying such horrendous things?

Not willing to speak anymore on the issue, as it had passed, and Wei Wuxian had already made his peace with Lan Xichen over it. They were here to talk about Jiang Cheng, not him. “I shared, now it’s your turn. What did he say to you?”

“What didn’t he say? His words more or less mirrored everything those disciples was saying. That I’m a cruel man, who should have shut myself off from the cultivation world.” He took a shaky breath, willing himself to not break down right here. Once he had calmed down a little, he continued to speak, “that all I do is torture innocent people, who I should have given a chance. That there’s a reason I’ve been alone all these years and it’s not just because my entire fucking family died.”

“He’s wrong,” Wei Wuxian had never been more confident than in the fact that his brother was a good man. How many of Jiang Cheng’s insecurities did Lan Xichen have to bring up? Why couldn’t he be done with just one?

Jiang Cheng let out a short, humourless laugh, “is he?”

Grabbing his brother’s hands, Wei Wuxian looked at Jiang Cheng desperately, “yes. Jiang Cheng, please tell me you don’t believe him.” He searched Jiang Cheng’s eyes, shocked as he realised just why the other’s words had hurt as much as they did.

“Who am I to disagree with the great Zewu-jun?” He turned his face away from Wei Wuxian’s, not liking the look on the other’s face, knowing that he had figured it out.

“You have feelings for him.” It was as if a pin had dropped, silence falling upon them for a few moments, as both took in Wuxian’s words.

With a heavy sigh, Jiang Cheng pulled his hands away from Wei Wuxian’s, placing them on his lap, to play with his clarity bell, hoping to find some peace. “I did. Now I’m unsure. This… has taught me some things, I suppose.” He didn’t know if he could try to pursue anything with someone who had dragged his every insecurity through the mud as if it were nothing. Who had brushed him off as if he were nothing.

Wei Wuxian looked at his brother sorrowfully, wishing that he could make it better, that he could take back the words Lan Xichen had said to him. “A-Cheng…”

“It is what it is, Wei Wuxian. It’s not as if my personality is a secret to the world.”

“But it is. Everyone thinks you’re this hateful person, but you love so fucking much, Jiang Cheng. Anybody unwilling to learn that about you isn’t worthy of your love.” He would die on this fucking hill if he had to, Jiang Cheng was and always would be the most loving of the three of them, both in what he gave and needed, yet never seemed to receive.

“Wei Wuxian…” Jiang Cheng looked at Wei Wuxian with confusion in his eyes, unwilling to believe that the other had this opinion of him. Surely after everything that had happened, even his brother wouldn’t believe he was capable of love.

“No! I refuse to let you or anyone else badmouth you. That’s my job and Jin Ling’s fucking job, that’s it. That’s all that’s allowed. No one else.” He would spend the rest of his life making sure Jiang Cheng knew that he was loved, and he knew Jin Ling would, as well.

“Alright, alright, I’ll… try not to let it get to me. Can we fucking eat now?” He had had enough of talking about himself, about his feelings, he wanted to pretend that the first half of this day hadn’t happened.

Pursing his lips, Wei Wuxian surveyed the other, before giving him a nod, “fine, but say the word, and I’ll yell at Zewu-jun for you.” He could always start this conversation another time, when Jiang Cheng was less likely to walk away from him and just fly off because he had gotten overwhelmed again.

Jiang Cheng snorted a laugh in response, choosing to take a bite of chicken, knowing he didn’t require any other form of response.

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technicallyblakebelladonna · 4 years

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i’m not asking for a date on the massage au bc ik you struggle w it and i’d never wanna pressure you but will yang & pyrrha’s relationship ever be explained ? Like how they started dating and broke up?

hey anon! first, thanks for messagin me abt the massage au, it means a lot to me to know that people are still interested and are keeping that fic in the back of their mind -- even though it’s been.... quite some time since i’ve updated. Ooofh. deepest apologies for that

second -- i don’t believe i will be exploring pyrrha&yang’s relationship any more in depth than what the skeleton i laid out in chapter 2. i may include a few more details here and there if it flows naturally into the fic, but otherwise, probably not much within the canon of the fic

HOWEVER. since it’s not really a spoiler or will detract from the story in any way, basically the way their relationship worked was that they attended uni together and began dating at some point during their first year. basically, they spent *a lot* of time together, got very comfortable around each other because of all the hours studying and reviewing at each other’s houses n stuff, spent a lot of time off campus together in general (it wasn’t uncommon for people in my program to go to the 24hr restaurant across the street from the uni and pull an all-nighter there and just order food throughout the night/morning a day or two before a big final)

i was toying with the idea of writing a greekfire prequel, even if it was just a one-shot, to explore their relationship a little more, but basically it was just like, they spent so much time together, they got familiar -- and like, after they finished an extremely hard day of exams, they just collapsed against one another and who knows who kissed the other first, but it definitely happened. and after that, they were together for the rest of their time at uni, and then a little after once they graduated

after that, well, it just got more “difficult” to keep in touch, to see each other. yang started working almost right away, but pyrrha wanted to take a few more courses on things that weren’t fully taught in depth during their program.

at first it was just a few weekend courses and pyrrha was able to pick up a shift at the clinic where yang started (the same one as in the current canon of the fic), but eventually there was an opportunity of a some-months long course abroad that pyrrha just couldn’t pass up

at first, the distance wasn’t too big of a deal -- but the big kicker was just how horribly their schedules no longer overlapped. yang tried to shift her schedule so that she could have daily conversations with pyrrha, but that meant she had to start work at like 8 and she really *wasn’t* a morning person. and pyrrha caught onto that and gently suggested that she go back to her usual schedule -- which yang eventually agreed to

this meant that they really only got to talk to each other two or three times a week (usually weekends) and it started to strain on yang in particular. pyrrha made the comment in chapter 2 “you fell out of love with me” which is essentially what happened. it wasn’t that yang ever wanted to stop feeling those feelings for pyrrha, but the distance and the lack of communication (neither of which was either girls’ fault) and those feelings eventually just faded

by the time pyrrha came back from her studies abroad, she knew something was up -- though, she would tell yang that she had known it for the past little while but didn’t want to bring it up until they could have time to properly sit down and discuss it face to face

they went for dinner and had that hard conversation a short while after pyrrha got back and was readjusted after the jetlag n such. pyrrha still loved yang as strong as ever, but she’s way too gentle and understanding and selfless to let yang put herself through the motions of trying to keep the relationship going. which was something yang wanted to fight her about, bc we know our girl -- she’s also incredibly selfless to a fucking fault, and she wanted to keep being there for pyrrha, wanted to maintain the relationship bc she could see (and pyrrha had stated) that pyrrha was still Deeply in love with her -- but pyrrha definitely wasn’t having that and she stubbornly (but lovingly) insisted that this split was what would make her the “happiest”, bc as much as she loved yang, it was a love that would never feel “right” if she kept yang with her and see her in pain and trying to force the feelings that just weren’t there for her anymore

after that, yang ended up taking time off of work just so she could sort through her feelings -- and not have to encounter pyrrha at work for a little bit just to give herself some space. pyrrha settled into the clinic as the other massage therapist during that time. and then, once yang came back, they found their rhythm and got comfortable with each other -- not quite lovers anymore, but a really blurry line that existed Just Past best friends

....ANYWAY YEAH. so like yeah MAYBE i’ll write this out some day, since i basically have the outline right here (thank u for the ask for the inspiration to go off about that skfhskhsg), but that’s the .... well, not the short story, but. that’s the history for yang and pyrrha’s relationship basically!

thanks for the ask, once again :D

#Anonymous #random reagan rambles #ray writes #rmtau #ray replies #reagan replies #greekfire #greek fire #pyrrha nikos #yang xiao long #rwby #damn if i ever dont want to write this right now #but .... so many... other... projects...#the poor ldau is so close (ish) to finishing and i just sefkhskghsgkh #ANYWAY #thank u again tho

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kurogiriis · 4 years

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may i get a scenario where todoroki has a s/o that has a bad habit of sleeping very late, and he just kinda tries and help her improve her sleeping schedule? good luck with your blog my dude! ^^

A/N: aaaa, I love Todoroki 🥺. This is actually super relatable bc I DO NOT SLEEP!!! + being locked at home all day hasn’t helped either. Anyway, hope you like it! Thanks for requesting :)

Todoroki helping his S/O fix their sleep schedule.

Ever since the school year started, you couldn’t sleep. Over summer break, your sleep schedule was relatively healthy, getting eight hours a night and not staying up too late. It was when you went back to class when things started to go sour.

U.A. was known for its rigorous training requirements for the hero course. However, most people forget to mention that it also applies to the academic department. It was not an uncommon occurrence that you stayed up to finish an assignment, and once you finished it, you wouldn’t be able to go back to sleep, opting instead for watching hours upon hours of YouTube videos or Netflix shows.

Every night, you got minimal amounts of sleep, and after a few weeks, people began to notice. How could they not? You thought to yourself, you had very pronounced under-eye bags, you became very easily irritable, and your constant fatigue began hindering your training abilities. Needless to say, Todoroki was worried.

Ever since the sports festival, you guys had become very close, often hanging out in each other’s dorms until past lights out. Right as your second year was ending, Todoroki, only being guided by shoujo manga and his friends’ advice, ended up confessing his feelings for you under a sakura tree during cherry blossom season. After you admitted the feelings were mutual, you soon got together.

Shouto wasn’t the type of guy who would worry over meaningless things. But your sudden change in attitude and appearance were not meaningless. One night, after a particularly long study session in his room, he confronted you about it.

“Are you okay, y/n?”

The question had come out of nowhere, but you still knew what he was referring to.

“Of course I am Shouto, why would you ask that?”

You tried to evade the question. Was your lack of sleep really that noticeable? You knew you looked a bit tired and that your performance hadn’t been the best the past couple of days, but you didn’t think it would spark any reaction.

“Are you sure? I’ll try to help you in any way I can,” he said, offering a comforting yet worried smile.

“Fine,” you started, knowing there was no way to conceal your problem any longer; “I’ve been having trouble sleeping.”

“Oh.”

“I’m just so stressed with all our projects and assignments and soon we’ll have to attend to our internships and find agencies to work in since we’re graduating in a few months and-” you started to trail off.

“Y/n,” he said softly, placing his hands on your shoulders to calm you down. “How about we leave this study session here and we have a sleepover?”

“Oh, okay.”

As you went to your room and packed your sleepover bag, Todoroki did some short research on how to help someone sleep. When you came back, the lights were dimmed, and a Netflix was opened on his computer.

“Come here.”

You guys cuddled on the bed while watching a movie and you slowly drifted off into slumber.

After that night, Todoroki always makes sure to keep you from getting distracted when completing assignments together. You guys often take naps together and when you have sleepovers, he always waits for you to fall sleep first before falling asleep himself.

A few weeks later, your sleep schedule began to look like a schedule again. As a result, you were less irritable, more energized, and overall happier. You were glad you had someone like Shouto who would always be there to help you fall asleep.

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goldrushzukka · 4 years

Note

1, 2, 7, 8, 9. (Sorry, i know that's like...all of them)

1. what themes would you like to write about that you feel don’t get explored very often?

i love writing coming out storylines. it’s not really that they’re uncommon, i just find a lot of catharsis in them.

2. what are some common elements of stories you are tired of seeing? what would you avoid writing about?

i tend to avoid writing sibling dynamics bc i’m an only child and therefore not really. qualified. i love reading it though!!

7. favourite description in your WIP?

it was really hard to pick one so i have a few answers for this bc i love to talk about myself so. (under the cut bc JESUS this got long but spoilers for and i’ll do anything you say (read it here!) ahead!!!)

- from chapter 2:

Sokka looks at him, a fantasy come to life, and takes off his stupid sweatpants.

He throws them at Zuko’s head, and earns himself a short burst of that real laugh, shocked and unguarded.

“You asshole,” Zuko says. He sits up and grabs Sokka’s hand, pulling him down on top of him. Something comes alive under Sokka’s skin where Zuko’s fingers graze his wrist. He calls it lust and ignores the fact that it feels nothing like it.

Zuko kisses him, his mouth still in the shape of laughter, and the alive thing screams for his attention. Sokka buries it and hopes it won’t deafen him before they’re done.

im very fond of this whole chapter (i think it’s probably my favourite? it was definitely the easiest to write) but i really love looking back on this part particularly now that we’re in the angsty part of the story bc this is where it all started. yes technically it started in chapter 1 but this is when sokka starts to fall for zuko. this is the beginning of all those pesky non-casual feelings that he’s going to pretend don’t exist until someone else calls him out on them.

- also from chapter 2:

He’s forty-five minutes late already, and when he knocks, a woman made of pursed lips and sharp angles answers the door. She looks elegant and expensive the same way a skyscraper does. Or a cache of medieval weaponry.

“Oh,” Sokka says, digging into his pocket to find the map on his phone. “I must have the wrong place, sorry -”

She looks him up and down, her eyes narrowed in a way that feels violent and practiced, and her smirk turns distasteful. Sokka risks a glance down at himself, at his torn up jeans - not distressed, just torn - and the Madonna t-shirt he’s pretty sure actually belongs to Katara, and thinks she might have a point. The bag in his hand feels heavier when her eyes land on it.

“Zuzu,” the woman calls into the apartment, “your dinner’s here.”

“I didn’t order -” Zuko appears in the doorway, bitter frustration in his expression as he looks at the woman.

His eyes fall on Sokka, though, and his face clears into a light-pollution smile.

this is technically two so i will start with: i love azula. i haven’t found any room to bring her back yet but believe me i am LOOKING. she’s hot and mean and gay and i LOVE HER. oh also insider scoop but suki’s date from earlier in this chapter.......WAS azula. they probably won’t see each other again because once azula met sokka and connected his face to the Best Friends Forever picture frame on suki’s desk she stopped answering the phone.

pt 2: i’ve had a couple of comments mention the “light-pollution smile” line specifically and i am always so happy to read them bc yeah. YEAH. i’ll admit it. that line HITS.

- from chapter 4:

He sets his phone down - only, he doesn’t. He misses the table by a mile, and in his scramble to catch his phone before it breaks on the hardwood floor and wakes Momo on the cushion beside him, his hand finds the lip of his cereal bowl, and then that’s falling, too. He manages to catch the phone, but something in his head gets lost in translation on its way down his arms, and he ends up with a boxers-only lap full of soggy Cheerios.

Momo gets a splash of milk on his back and hisses at Zuko for his crimes, and somehow that’s the worst part of it.

haley @fruitysokka said that this passage reads like an action movie and i think about it all the time. (thank u haley i love u)

- lastly this extended metaphor from chapter 6:

The soup is good, once the heat of it clears him up enough to taste it. It’s thick and warm and there’s enough pepper that Sokka gets a kick from it even in his condition. He feels it all the way down his throat and into his stomach, where it mixes with the prickly nervousness he’s feeling from Zuko’s attention.

He sets the bowl down on the table and asks, eyes stuck on his hands in Momo’s fur where he’s climbed into his lap, “How was the date?”

“It was good, actually,” Zuko says. “Jet seems like a nice guy. He’s very - uh - passionate, I guess you could call it? He’s a climate and human rights activist.”

The spines of Sokka’s nervousness turn to daggers.

...

“I said yes. We’re getting lunch on Sunday.”

The daggers are swords now, and Sokka’s heart sinks down, down, down, right to the hilt.

...

“I’ll text you when I’m home,” Zuko promises, and Sokka’s heart skewers itself on a second sword.

Zuko’s smile when Sokka says, “Thank you for the soup,” is a third.

The door closing behind him is a fourth.

The silence as Sokka shuffles back to bed is every single one that remains.

something something canon swordsmen something pride comes before the fall something chivalry fell on his sword from eden by hozier. you guys get it i dont have to explain myself

8. favourite dialogue in your WIP?

ok so i cant share my actual favourite dialogue bc it's a spoiler for chapter 8 and i technically haven't written it yet (it's in my brain just.....plaguing me) but it's GOOD i SWEAR so. once again i have more than one answer bc actually? i love this fic and im proud of it. deal with it.

- from chapter 1:

“Hey, stranger,” Sokka says, still watching him in the mirror. The corner of Zuko’s mouth ticks up.

“You’re not following me, are you?” Zuko’s tone is seductive, endlessly so, and Sokka wonders while he dries his hands if he has to put it on or if he just sounds like that.

“You give a guy one compliment and he thinks you’re stalking him,” Sokka mutters, and Zuko laughs, low and enticing. Not the genuine, endearing laugh of this morning, but one with an agenda.

Well. Sokka always likes a plan.

“Are you following me? ” Sokka asks. He spies a miraculous dry patch on the sink bank and tries to be casual about the way he hops up to sit on it.

“I might be,” Zuko says, and at Sokka’s raised eyebrow, he continues, “I saw you at the bar and I wanted to talk to you. Sue me.”

“You wanted to talk.”

“Amongst other things.”

as a chronically awkward person i am INSANELY proud of the flirting in this fic. no idea if it would work in a real life situation. excited to never find out bc im not about to use lines from my fanfiction on real women.

- from chapter 2

“You must be Suki,” Zuko says. He meets her gaze, and his fingers go still under Momo’s chin.

“And you’re Zuko,” Suki replies, her smile all different shades of intimidating. “I’d shake your hand, but I know where it’s just been.”

i wrote this entire scene just so i could have suki say this. im not even joking. suki is my favourite part of this entire fic and its not even ABOUT her.

- from chapter 3:

When Sokka crosses the room and slips under the covers beside him, Zuko says, “I can leave, if you want. I can go home.”

...

He asks, still barely hovering over Zuko, “What if I don’t want that?”

Zuko swallows. “I can stay.”

“So stay,” Sokka says, and lays his head down on Zuko’s chest.

i just think it’s sweet. i like it a lot. makes my heart hurt a little when i think about it.

- from chapter 4:

[Suki // 15:13] there is a LOT of chmpagrjn

[Suki // 15:13] cahpmhagne

[Suki // 15:13] chsanpghn

[Suki // 15:14] alcohol :)

once again: suki is the best part of this whole fic. i love her so much. she is the reason the word bestie exists. im really proud of the texting in this fic bc it’s my first time actually including it in fic and it’s turned out really well!!

- ok last one bc i just realised this is turning into a novel. from chapter 4:

“How’s my baby?”

Zuko glances down at Momo, batting at the untied laces of his shoes with one determined paw. “He’s doing just fine.”

“And how’s Momo?”

“He’s - what?”

are there better written, more narratively important and emotive lines in this fic? yes. is this the best part of the entire thing? also yes. i invented the jin/yue wedding because i needed a reason for zuko to have a key in what became chapter 6, but sometimes i think the entire fic exists just for this exchange. best dialogue i have ever written.

9. what scene was the hardest for you to write and why?

the start of chapter 6 of aidays was difficult. i kept wanting to skip ahead to the meaty parts - i.e, zuko and his soup - but i didn’t want to do sokka a disservice like that. it was also really hard to maintain the balance of accurately describing the delirium of illness while still being coherent for the reader? so that took me a couple of days to get right.

#dreamrena #ask game #this got AWAY from me #anyway.#theres.....that #asks #mine #and ill do anything you say #might as well go in the tag since its all i talk about in this #uhhh. enjoy?#i have more thoughts on literally all of aidays so. at the risk of sounding even more in love w myself than i do in this already.#if theres anything else anyone would like to know more about (excluding spoilers obv) i am MORE than happy to talk about it #sam winchester voice The Lore

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majicmarker · 3 years

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can i ask why you decided to work on a self publish a novella while also working on your main novel? i can’t seem to work on two projects at once lol! also what’s the self publishing process like?

OKAY SO i had decided to take an actual self-imposed break from sugarcoated — not super uncommon, smtimes i go weeks or, during a depressive episode this winter specifically, months w/o working on it.

i’m well past the halfway point now and the second act’s completely outlined, which is fckin BANANAS incredible, but i haven’t taken the time to find any pride in that. i just kept piling the pressure on myself, which is smthn ppl had been telling me constantly over the past year — to paraphrase, lovingly: “bitch, ur too hard on urself” — but it didn’t *click* until recently. i needed to take some time to rly immerse myself in some good vibes and congratulations.

i didn’t want to Not do anything for those couple weeks, tho. i’d had the idea for the novella floating around for awhile, so i sat down w it one day just to see, hey, can i make smthn out of this? and, dayum, could i ever.

it’s come along very quickly, naturally, almost effortlessly (probably bc it tackles subject matter i’ve wanted to explore for a loooong time but could never quite get at ‘til now), and all within the timeframe i’d set — bc, true, i didn’t want this project to escalate and take my focus from sugarcoated. but it hasn’t run me off-course in the slightest. so all’s well and i’m SO happy i’ve decided to go ahead w the novella.

initially, i wasn’t into self-pub, largely bc of the expense. BUT. when i dug deeper, it doesn’t actually have to run u thousands of dollars (good thing, bc i have skittles for money, but anyway).

your price points are editing, book design, and marketing. bc of my own background, i don’t need a professional editor; i used a free design app for the cover; and marketing can run fairly cheap. amazon provides you w the program to self-pub and basically walks you through all the formatting, etc., it’s super user-friendly.

tbh at this point i feel like the marketing/promotion is going to be the most work. but it’s smthn i’m willing to invest my time in, and a little bit of cash if i need to. ex: amazon advertises your book to buyers interested in ur genre for a minimum of like $3/day, which is smthn i could swing for a week and then we’ll see.

the vibes are good tho and i’m ✨hyped✨ this novella has wound up meaning a lot to me, it’s been equal parts fun and cathartic, and i’m just so looking forward to sharing it. i really am thrilled — and floored, honestly — that i can get it out there soon 💫

#anonymous #ask

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metalchickaf19 · 5 years

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The Bowers Gang: Ship #15 - Henry Bowers

Request: hello i would like to request a ship, if you don't mind +_+ i'm not really tall,average build, really long dark hair. i'm fond of formal office wear and in general prefer dark colors and non-revealing clothes, if that makes sense. as a person i try my best to be a good friend though at some times i'm a bit too caring and at others times i care less than i should bc i'm sick or busy af(i easily get sick.). i tend to be anxious and even a bit paranoid bc of some kind of ocd i dunno ( i get all those unnecessary thoughts like "i should leave the bus immediately bc i've got a bad feeling about this dude" and then i should look 10 times to the left and 10 to the right to calm myself somehow ._.) my hobbies is reading (mostly scandinavian detectives), watching films and playing tabletop role-playing games. also i secretly like date sims. in society i try my best to be polite and patient(i'm this person who takes all the shit goin my way to stop conflict from happening), but with my friends i can be more open and even impulsive. that's it. i hope it's not too much and my english is okay.

First and foremost, it’s kind of astonishing that you were even able to befriend The Bowers Gang at all - let alone start hooking up with their leader

Their reputation (+ Hockstetter’s hardcore creeper vibe) kept your paranoia on high alert for a long time - so much so that it was all you could do not to drop the few classes you had with specific members of the group

... And it was that insane, animal fear that would eventually cause the guys to target you later on

Hey - you were walking down the hall one day, saw the guys standing around Belch’s locker, and instantly turned on your heel to avoid them

I can’t help the fact that Patrick saw you do that

And I can’t help the fact that that gave he and the guys reason enough to start messing with you

Wound up resulting in a super adorable relationship with Bowers though, so yay (and genuine yay this time - not yay with a question mark attached to it)

Joins in whenever the guys make fun of your “office wear” proclivity (and they make fun of it often)...

... but secretly kind of likes the fact that you prefer non-revealing clothing

Mostly because he’s a misogynistic bastard who doesn’t want the girls he dates “on display” for everyone else, but still - Bowers is down with the corporate causal aesthetic

Sometimes lets you read to him, which is one of the most endearing thing I’ve ever heard

Was originally something you only did when Henry got sick (he was in a fever-coma once, and you figured some quality Scandinavian literature couldn’t hurt), but now it happens basically every time he wants to get his mind off of something

... And Bowers wants to get his mind off of something a lot

So it’s not uncommon for people to catch you reading to him while he carves into things with his knife, puts his head in his arms and “sleeps,” etc.

Generally tries to look like he’s not paying attention to the story, even though it’s obvious he’s invested (i.e. glances over at the book for a second when something surprising happens, tends to open his eyes during intense parts when he’s had them closed for a while ...)

Aka: One of the most dangerous people in the city of Derry is becoming a hardcore reading buff, and that’s 100% because of you - congratulations

Makes all the guys check up on you whenever you get sick

... Seriously, it’s so cute - you’ll just be sitting at home, all stuffed up and gross, when suddenly you’ll get a random knock at the door

... at which point you’ll open it to find either Belch, Victor, or Patrick standing there with the rest of the guys waiting in the car behind them

Just let that imagery sink in...

Have you fully appreciated how adorable it is?

Okay, then.

Sometimes you get a Victor Criss care-package complete with aspirin, tissues, and suckers to keep you going (hence why you tend to hope it’s Victor when you hear that knock on your door), but it usually has something Hockstetter-esque added to it in the few instances when Patrick gets to bring it to you

... He once switched out a little book of poems Criss gave you with a pocket-sized copy of the Kama Sutra

Just had that on him for some reason - pocket-sized copy of the Kama Sutra

Regardless though, Henry never comes to the door (even though the guys always show up on his orders) because he’s too macho to show he’s concerned about your well-being even though it’s painfully clear he’s concerned about your well-being

Have fun with that even mix of ice and passionate care

*Somewhat triggering, but kind of lighthearted side-note*

Patrick is the single worst thing that has ever happened for your anxiety issues, and he loves every second of it

Sometimes physically interferes with your compulsions, because he doesn’t want you to be able to calm yourself (holds your face still when you try to turn your head back and forth a certain number of times, will block your exit if you start to feel overwhelmed in a specific setting, etc.)

Also actively triggers a lot of your intrusive thoughts (”You really feel safe right now, princess?” *Ultra-specific Hockstetter smirk created to make you doubt yourself* “Really?”)

Also sits behind you in one of the classes you share together, and constantly does things to fuck with your hair

It’s not really important, I’m just letting you know

Sometimes keeps a lighter under the ends just long enough to create that “singed” smell, twists a few locks around his fingers, etc.

Basically just wants to remind you that he’s there (right behind you) as often as he can, and has always liked your long dark hair, so that’s the route he takes

I’m so sorry for the paranoia in you; truly

*Somewhat triggering, yet kind of lighthearted side-note over*

You, Belch, and Victor are arguably the most tight-knit friends in the gang, and it’s kind of amazing on every level

Ya’ll share 3/6 classes together (without Patrick or Henry), so you really got used to being your authentic selves around one another over time

Nerdy inside jokes, deep talks, genuine “this is me” moments - you guys have it all (and, to be honest, you’d all be super down to arrange a hangout without the other guys if any one of you had the balls to suggest it)

Low-key very similar to The Losers’ Club when it’s just the three of you, but we’ll pretend I never said that

Victor came to one of your table-top gaming sessions once

Only attended the one time (because cold-blooded reputation/genuine lack of skill), but he befriended some of your nice table-top gaming compatriots, so good job being a positive influence

... Alright... now get ready for some pretty legit unpleasantness

Henry unloads on you often because he knows you’re willing to take it, and sometimes the kid just can’t help himself

You know that scene from the movie where he yelled at Belch to shut up (when he was cutting Ben)?

Yeah - that type of rage-filled Bowers energy has been directed at you in the past

Low-key one of the most unhealthy aspects of your relationship, but you tend to default to radio-silence at the first sign of Henry starting to lose it on you (what with your dislike of conflict and such), so it typically never escalates past one hardcore outburst (like Belch’s “shut up!”)

Never outright apologizes to you for it, but tends to try to get physically close to you after he calms down as an indirect way of saying he’s sorry

I.e. Will sit down next to you without saying anything, will come into a room you’re in and awkwardly walk around without acknowledging you, etc.

Basically just tries to let you know he was wrong with his actions rather than with his words

... And if you want a future with Bowers, you’re gonna’ have to get used to accepting apologies you never got like that

Sorry - it’s just the way his broken brain works

Overall though, a great relationship, and one that works well with the rest of the guys

They all love you, dude - you’ve been accepted. Just feel that

#henry bowers #patrick hockstetter #belch huggins #victor criss #the bowers gang #the bowers gang headcanons #it

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ambrvsel · 5 years

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hey there demons! it’s me, sam ( she / her, 22, est timezone ) aaaand here’s a fourth char, which i’ve never had here but we started accepting older muses and daniel sharman is one of my fave fcs ever so here we are. pls bear with me but ok let’s hop into this! character info under the cut and as always please message me here or @ellvie if you’d like to plot!

╰☆╮ DANIEL SHARMAN ─ AMBROSE LANCASTER identifies as CIS MALE and uses HE/HIM pronouns. they’re a POET/ACTOR, and they’re only TWENTY-EIGHT ! they’re said to be INGENIOUS, but also BROODING. i guess that’s why they’re known as THE WORDSMITH in the tabloids. *mia's older brother wc!

so, this is...ambrosius cyril lancaster. we just don’t know why the lancaster parents gave him such a mouthful of a name and then looked at their second kid and went nah just one ( 1 ) syllable for this one, but it happened and now here we are! he tends to go by ambrose, which is just the simplified version of his actual name and takes less than five fuckin hours to say

anyway, as you might have guessed ambrose is mia’s older brother! they’re about seven years apart which is obviously a significant age gap, but it never really stopped them from being v close!

he was born and raised in los angeles, california where he experienced your typical upper middle class sort of lifestyle during his childhood. his parents divorced when he was a teenager, but it was amicable so he was able to kinda just accept it and move on with his life. he and mia lived with their mother most of the time, but both of their parents are cool and he really doesn’t have any issues with them or any serious childhood tragedies at all really

so growing up he was always kinda quiet and timid, but not painfully so. as his interests in the arts developed, his parents kinda nudged him into doing things like joining the drama club, which helped him to come out of his shell a bit

yes, he was a Theater Kid™ i’m so sorry everyone

he was...v v good at acting to the point where he wound up going to hollywood arts a special performing arts high school in hollywood on an acting scholarship. he starred in many of the school plays which usually had a lot of talent agents and casting directors and producers in the audience so he got noticed without really trying tbh

did a couple small tv appearances when he was 16 - 17 in all of the basic af teen drama shows of the time like pll & tvd & gossip girl. so, nothing special or groundbreaking buuuut it got him noticed by a lot of studios and hollywood people who were offering him much bigger roles in tv and film but he was like nah and went to college instead.

so he took a small break from acting in order to study poetry at columbia university in nyc, but he got bored bc it felt kinda easy to him oops. so he quickly went back to acting on the side while continuing his studies and got himself a steady recurring role on yet another basic teen drama to keep him entertained while he went through school.

he got his mfa in poetry from columbia a few years ago and he’s v proud of it aw i love that for him :’)

however after graduating he really didn’t do much with his writing bc he accidentally bit off more than he could chew by taking on a couple more acting roles bc he figured he’d be able to manage it and still work on his poetry but...nah. as a result his writing has kinda fallen by the wayside but he’s still really passionate about it!

was engaged to torrance keynes for a time and it wound up being v...Messy. she got pregnant more than once, but unfortunately miscarried each time. it was obvs difficult on both of them and it turned out to be too much and so they eventually broke things off. he’s still kind of a wreck over everything but like how could he not be? it’s still a very sore subject for him but like what are you gonna do! he basically just refuses to talk about it and pretends everything is fine haha yikes

he’s kinda been switching between la and nyc ever since he started college bc of school and work and going to see his fam ( especially mia! ) and he’s never really settled in one place or the other? but he’s really fallen in love with nyc and it’s where he spends most of his free time!

might have dipped to la for a little longer than usual after his last break up with torrance, buuuut he’s obvs returned and i think he’s planning to stay put for now

extra fun facts! probs a good thing to read if you’re looking for a tl;dr tbh

he’s probs on a tv show right now. think like american horror story or the walking dead or something? i feel like he gets typecast as a dark/brooding/sarcastic type of character in a lot of ~edgy~ type of shows. lmk if you’ve got any suggestions for a specific role bc rn i’ve got nothing

critics and management and even fans often complain that he’s wasting his immense acting talent on all of these smaller roles, but ambrose is happy with his career rn. he loves acting and he doesn’t want it to start feeling like a chore and he wants freedom and flexibility so that he can finally start focusing on his poetry.

“are you mad?” no that’s just his face

hobbies include boxing, throwing knives, surfing, taking walks, watching pretentious films, hanging out in record stores, and some dabbling in drawing.

loves to read, always carrying a book around and sticking his nose in it if he has a few minutes of free time & it’s not uncommon to see him with a new book every single day, or even more than one book in a single day

he’s kind of a hipster i’m sorry

also just kinda...slightly...a little...very Dramatic™

might do music on the side but like……...very far on the side. he’s probs a drummer?? in some arctic monkeys type of shitty indie rock band but he enjoys it so whatever

a total gentleman and a romantic, but also most likely a Disaster in the relationships department so...watch out for that too ig!

personality: ambrose is quiet, perceptive, intelligent, eloquent, creative, pensive, sarcastic, dramatic, tumultuous, and passionate. he can come across as standoffish but it’s just Resting Bitch Face and the fact that he’s an introvert working against him. just start talking about film or books or something and he’ll warm right up. he’s a v loyal and protective friend, nice and polite to strangers, but noticeably a bit closed off ( especially after the miscarriages and failed engagement ). basically - all you need to know about ambrose is that if someone told you that he was secretly a 500 year old british vampire who likes to surf in his spare time then you would probably believe them.

here are a few lame connection ideas that you should not feel limited by whatsoever!

best friend

friends

frenemies

former costars

enemies

romantic - exes, crushes, pr relationships maybe? & all that stuff

people he attended school with - either in la or at columbia

college roommates?

other members of his little side project indie band?

ok that’s it for now! feel free to message me if you’d like to plot and as always, i’m super excited to write with you all!

#excessintro #divorce tw #miscarriage tw #plot with me cowards

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diveronarpg · 5 years

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Congratulations, LINA! You’ve been accepted for the role of TROILUS with an FC change to Henry Golding. Admin Rosey: I am absolutely HOWLING. So, when I was writing Troilus, I was having an amazing time -- he’s so nuanced and seemingly superficial, but there are so many detailed facets that contribute to his happy-go-lucky attitude. He’s so utterly disarming and charming that, from the interview alone, I couldn’t help but swoon over him. Your development for him promises so much, from the sought-after revelation of Celeste’s infidelity to turning him into a hollow and hungry creature. I’m absolutely over the moon to be putting my precious boy into your hands, Lina. By all means, ruin us all. Please read over the checklist and send in your blog within 24 hours.

WELCOME TO THE MOB.

Out of Character

Alias | Lina. Age | 26 Preferred Pronouns | She/her Activity Level | 5 – Med school honestly wipes the floor with me most days, so I can’t promise daily activity but as I’ve said before, I promise consistency and communication. I’ll request a hiatus if needed, and I won’t disappear or drop-out without warning. Timezone | Finally back in EST (UTC-5:00) Current/Past RP Accounts | —

In Character

Character | Tomas Sabello -> Could I request an FC switch to ether Henry Golding or Godfrey Gao? I love Bob Morley to pieces but I’ve used him as an FC for long enough that I really struggle to dissociate him from the role I played. I think Henry fits Tomas’ gentle disposition best, but Godfrey has more versatility in terms of acting roles/expression which seems more in line with the mood in Verona and what he may eventually become… I dunno! I’ll leave it to you guys to choose the preferred alternate FC in the event that I do get accepted. I’d be happy working with either one.

What drew you to this character? | I really liked how opposite he is to Viv, honestly. He’s so enamored with emotion, and despite the fact that he’s an actor by trade, he’s an open book when it comes to anything that inspires feeling within him. I think Tomas loves the idea of love to such an extreme that there’s no thought to guarding himself from it. No amount of pride could keep him from offering his heart up, not even the threat of rejection. He takes and he takes, but he also gives to the people around him, indiscriminately; even to the most insignificant of passersby who’ve touched his life or inspired his creativity in some brief, ephemeral way. While Viv absorbs and safeguards whatever light she finds, Tomas reflects it freely back into the universe, and I really like that dichotomy.

What is a future plot idea you have in mind for the character?

*∆* - Ignorance isn’t bliss, it’s oblivion: I’ll keep this point short and sweet; I want Tomas to find out about Celeste’s infidelity and for his heart to get absolutely shattered in the process. It could be sooner, later or whenever, but I think we’re all holding our breaths for that to happen in the story, and I’d love the opportunity to portray that.

*∆* - To fight one’s nature is a losing battle: This is a plot contingent on the arc of his relationship with Celeste and details pertaining to their marriage (how long it takes for him to find out she’s cheating on him, what they do with that information, if they divorce, etc.). But essentially, I’d like to show Tomas’ struggle with his own fidelity because in his bio, he strikes me as the sort of character that doesn’t settle on one lover easily. And he loves Celeste with every inch of his being and right now that’s what’s keeping him faithful, but I think that even if her infidelity isn’t revealed, eventually Tomas will start to feel the strain. He’ll notice the little signs along the way that hint that she doesn’t quite love him the way he loves her. I think those would put cracks in the marriage even if Isabella wasn’t in the picture. I’d like to explore those, and how little micro-tensions crop up in chronic relationships when one partner feels like they’re pulling all the weight. I want to dig into that and cast the lens on a quietly troubled relationship, and I want to see how far it pushes Tomas in response. Does he grow colder? Does he seek intimacy elsewhere? Does he fall into the same temptation and cheat on Celeste, whether physically or emotionally? Let’s find out!

*∆* - Any way the wind blows: I’ve always imagined Tomas to be the unsettled sort, in all senses of the word. His loves have always been transient and fleeting, his decisions (both in leaving Rome and marrying Celeste) seem rash and impulsive… I think capriciousness is a trait of his that extends to all facets of his life. So one headcanon I have for him is that now that he’s on sabbatical from acting, he’d want to try his hand at something new. Activities or careers that he gets excited by every few weeks and actively chases until something changes and then he drops the ball and moves on, certain he’ll find his luck elsewhere. I think it’d be interesting to see him get into all sorts of mix-ups while catering to this instinct, and maybe unintentionally making himself a nuisance to other characters in their line of work in the rp. Just this over-excited dude picking up positions and then dropping them as if life’s his own picnic… It’s definitely going to rub some people the wrong way and I’m here to see it happen!

*∆* - The hardest of hearts: … I’m intrigued by Tomas’ deep resentment of Roman Montague. His bio implies that it’s his acting experience which primes him to look at Romeo as if he’s also an actor, playing a part he doesn’t deserve. But I think it goes deeper than that. I think canonically, even, Tomas’ character seems to have a lot in common with Romeo from Shakespeare’s original, or at least, the earliest version of Romeo that we see. Lovelorn and lackadaisical, an innate predisposition for goodness, and yet undoubtedly leaving lovers a little carelessly in his pursuit of love, etc. So the way I see it, beyond his judgment of Roman as being unfit to rule, I think Tomas doesn’t like him bc he sees in Roman all of the same flaws he recognizes subconsciously in himself. It’s always easier to see our flaws through a mirror. I’m interested in seeing how far Tomas would go to spite Roman in order to avoid having to confront himself. The fact that Celeste is still tied to the Montagues would also be a continuous dilemma for Tomas, who dislikes both mobs. Depending on what plots come up, I might even entertain the thought of getting Tomas tied up in Capulet business, with the singular goal of bringing down Roman Montague.

*∆* - … Destroys itself in the end: In his bio, it’s alluded that Tomas took from both his parents when it came to his nature. He loved as frequently and as persistently as his mother, but destroyed those in his wake as surely as his father; leaving his path littered with broken hearts. I want to see that side of Tomas again. Except this time, instead of it being an accident of youth and of too much ignorance, I want it to be intentional. I feel like heart-break would leave him hollow and hungry, and I want to experience that side of him. I think his capacity for hurt is almost equally potent to his capacity for love, and that’s what makes him such a compelling character in my eyes.

Are you comfortable with killing off your character? | Through a well-developed plot, yes.

In Depth

These interview chairs are always so stiff that Tomas has to wonder whether it’s intentional. Maybe it’s to keep him from falling asleep, but he’d never do that. He likes giving interviews for the most part. Of course, it was easier in his early twenties; when he had very little in the ways of a filter but was blessed with the circumstances in life that permitted him to get away with it. Oh, and an adoring audience. That always helped of course. These days, as a married man in a new city, he has to be more careful with his tongue.

That doesn’t make him any more careful with his smiles, however. And right now he’s aiming one of his most brilliant at the interviewer who’s already started asking him questions. They’re three minutes in, but she hasn’t returned any of his good cheer so far, and that’s uncommon. He’s remembered all his pleasantries, he’s been considerate enough in opening doors and waiting to be seated - but still, nary a smile. He doesn’t mind too much, but it makes his job so much more enjoyable when they do. And as a result, Isabella Gagliano is both a damper and a challenge. But before Tomas can engage her into lowering her defenses, she’s presented him with the next in a series of fan-chosen questions.

“What is your favorite place in Verona?”

”The Two Gentlemen. Certainly the best bottle of pinot grigio that I’ve ever had.” Tomas tells her, lips pressing together as sweetly as the juice from those sticky wine grapes. “You wouldn’t be remiss either if you tried the risotto al tastasal. That’s a real recommendation, you know?” He stage-whispers with a grin, “Off-the record.” But if Isabella takes note, he can’t tell.

The truth is, it’s a lie. A white lie, he consoles himself, because sometimes, the truth is too heavy a price to pay. The truth is that his favourite place in all of Verona is the recently abandoned Multisala Rivoli. It’s a cliche, he knows, an actor finding his second-home inside of a rundown movie-theatre. But it isn’t for the movies that he goes, nor out of any misplaced vainglory. Rather, it’s the promise of nondescript privacy that draws him like a bee to to honey. There, he can meet his new friends beyond the prying eyes of the media. There, he has a clandestine spot to escape the humdrum of the city for a few hours, alone with his thoughts. But it’s not a truth he’s ready to share, and moreover, the Montagues will like this answer better. It’s a nod to their territory; a little more promotion for their best-boasted restaurant. He refuses to join them, he refuses to share in their cause, but maybe sliding in such harmless tips will convince them to lay off of Celeste’s case and stop pressuring her to pressure him to join. Truth and politics don’t mix. Every time a video begins recording, Tomas is well aware of that. But above all, an actor must always remember his part.

“What does your typical day look like?”

“What, like a twenty-four hour play-by-play?” He asks playfully. “No one’s that interesting,signorina, I promise. I remember I was asked a similar question in an interview two or three years ago. I think it was for Sorrisi e Canzoni? Or maybe GQ…. Either way, it was a much more exciting answer back then. Plays, parties, private jets… ” Tomas reminisces fondly, but not fond enough to want to trade it in for his present. “I hate to disappoint, but it’s not the same anymore. I’m a married man on sabbatical now, remember??” He says, directing the question towards the camera before letting his gaze find Isabella once more. His life is quieter now, but happier too. “Not that it’s boring by any stretch. I’d recommend marriage, actually. I know it’s done wonders for me! But if I start talking about her and all the ways she’s changed my routine everyone will be rolling their eyes and complaining about cavities before this interview’s over.” Tomas chuckles, thinking of the myriad of ways his daily life has become synonymous with Celeste. What time she wakes, what time she leaves, when she comes home or when he gets to persuade her out of the house on little dates… He has a life outside of Celeste to be sure, but it’s only around her that he’s really reminded of what he’s working towards. Like Eros and Psyche, he thinks. He loves, but she sets fire to his love and gives it true sustenance. A future, a family, a very happy ending - That’s all he wants these days.

“What has been your biggest mistake thus far?”

He laughs at that, taken aback by the girl’s directness. “Is that really what it says on your sheet??” He cocks a brow, leaning forward as if to sneak a peek. “Damn… That’s harsh.” Sometimes, his fans seem like tiny mosquitoes; hungry for every teeny-tiny drop of his blood as they submit questions as invasive as these. “I have to think about that one…” Tomas admits with a bemused shake of his head. “I try not to think of my experiences as mistakes. Even the ones that might feel like it initially. Everything happens for a reason, doesn’t it? Don’t you believe that?” He looks to his interviewer as though hoping to coax another answer out of her, but she doesn’t indulge him. He’s always preferred dialogue to monologue, despite his choice of career. It takes an exchange of ideas to see the world through new lenses, and he can’t do that while talking continuously about himself. But another pensive, stolen glance at Isabella tells him that she probably won’t care what his answer is, so long as he gives one. He could make it up right here on the spot - something like ‘I’ve started a third gang in Verona to spite the Mobs‘ or ‘I kicked a dog once’, and she probably wouldn’t bat an eyelash. He wonders why. He wonders why she’s so determinedly expressionless.

“Do you play Poker?” Tomas asks without warning. He hadn’t meant for that to come out of his mouth but somehow it does and it takes another laugh and a wave of his hand to dismiss it. “Sorry. But you could! It’s impressive actually - in a good way. To answer your question, I think I’ll have to keep this one to myself.” It’s apologetic but firm, because his biggest mistake is failing his parents. Of all the roles he’s played thus far, that of ‘son’ has always left him most wanting. He couldn’t fix their marriage. He couldn’t inspire their divorce… To this day, his adulterous mother and destructive, ill-tempered father remain tethered to each other. Two rusting anchors, weighing themselves down to the bottom of the sea-bed… Most days, Tomas tries hard not to think about it. But there are some moments, moments when he’s feeling low, that he wonders if he’s responsible for their unhappiness; wonders if he couldn’t have done more to help them find happiness, along the way. Today is one of the predetermined no-thinkdays though. The days he’s giving interviews always are. “Sorry about that… Got anything else on your nifty list?” He prompts her, hoping to move on to a happier topic.

“What has been the most difficult task asked of you?”

This question too, gives him pause. More than he’d like. There’s the shadow of fleeting suspicion as he steals a glance at Isabella, wondering if they’re posing these questions on purpose to throw him off. But what cause would a reporter have to do that? You’re being silly,he chides himself, mulling over the question. Again, he knows the real answer.

Commitment.

It isn’t easy to choose a single person in this life, Tomas thinks. To narrow his expansive romantic inclinations and promise them to one individual and one individual only. But it’s a choice he reminds himself of every morning when he wakes up, when he cracks an eye open only for his gaze to fall on the familiar comfort of Celeste’s blazing red hair, like a halo around her cherubic face. It’s a choice he must remember when he’s comparing paintings with Juliana and hears the clear-bell tone of her laughter echo in the museum. A choice he must remember when his fingers find the soft, unwritten skin beneath Santino’s wrist as they look for stars in a midnight sky. A choice he recalls even as he listens to Paola recount the tales he’s missed in her life; eyes dancing with ferocious passion and he thinks what if, what if…

… But it’s a struggle he dares not reveal. It would insult his beloved wife, it would make a mockery of the vows they took in front of that altar, all those months ago. Worse still, it would surely garner derision from the audience, especially from his most die-hard fans; some of who still count on the failure of his marriage in order to regain the bachelor fantasy they’d attached to their idol. But idols were effigies of gold and silver. He was not an idol, he was a man of flesh and blood and feeling. Do you understand?… You will never understand me like she has, he wants to rebuke them. But there’s an old fondness that he can’t help when it comes to those who loved him first. And so his countenance softens as he answers the reporter’s question. “The most difficult task for me, has been leaving behind all my loved ones in Rome. My friends, my family, my fans…” He presses his fingertips to his lips for a moment before waving them towards the camera, sending the kiss to those who’ll hope for it most, when the interview airs tomorrow night. “I send my love, and I’m humbled by your continued support.”

“What are your thoughts on the war between the Capulets and the Montagues?”

“It’s-… It’s insanity.“

Now the Montagues won’t like that. But he feels the answer so strongly, and with so much conviction that he thinks the glassy brightness in his eyes would betray him anyway. Some lies are too big to swallow, even for an actor. “Brutal and unnecessary - do they even remember what they’re fighting for?” He asks Isabella, though he thinks she’s probably no closer to answering that than the other Veronesi. “You know, the stories say that it’s been so many decades now that no one knows any more… Isn’t that silly? To fight over something that you can’t even remember?” But deep down, Tomas knows it’s not that simple. Because mobs don’t need an impetus; not when there’s so much profit to be made in criminality. All the rest is just stories, to play on the sympathies of a winsome public. He should know… He played on that same, guileless sympathy, night after night after night on a front-lit stage. But art is one thing, war is another. And Celeste is tied up in this war, much as he hates to think about it.

“Maybe I’ll go back to Rome one of these days,” Tomas announces abruptly, shifting upright in his chair. There’s an ardent gleam in his eyes because he likes thinking in maybes. They’re so much more satisfying than the limitations of what is or isn’t strictly possible. “I’d like to take my wife with me. She’s never been… Can you believe it?? Never been to Rome… We could start there, then maybe a tour of Europe. Maybe a second honeymoon. I’m sure she’d like that.” He doesn’t know if that’s true, he doesn’t know if he can ever return to Rome, but it has a romantic ring to it nonetheless. And when has Troilus ever been able to deny the sweet-nothing whispers of romance, even as a city tears itself apart around him?….

Never, he thinks… Not even then.

——————————————-

(Thank you for Reading!!)

#accepted #accepted: troilus

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thelittlestspider · 6 years

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get to know the writer tag

tagged by @the-color-of-roseblood, @ghost-possum, and @thevajunglebook. thank you for tagging me and i’m sorry it took this long.

i’m bad at coming up with questions so i’m not going to do the 10 questions. but i am going to answer the questions that were listed. also this is an open tag, so anyone who wants to do it can do it.

rules: answer 10 questions, create 10 new questions, and then tag 10 people

from the-color-of-roseblood:

1) We always talk about favorites. What’s your least favorite book?

hmmm. one book i’ve always hated is the scarlett letter. we read it in school and it was awful.

2) Do you have a favorite place to write? What’s it like there?

i didn’t really have a favorite place to write until recently. a few months ago i finally got a desk and i’ve been in love with it ever since.

very, very cluttered. there’s all kinds of stuff piled on it. on one side i’ve got soda cans, plastic bottles, my phone; the other side is junk food, my glasses case, a couple of necklaces. i have an old sugar plum fairie barbie on the top shelf that i tried to sell, that nobody wanted even though i had it for like $5 (i might post a picture of it later bc it’s super pretty).

3) Do you have any artistic endeavors other than writing? If not, what else would you most like to learn to do?

back before the writing bug really bit me, i used to draw all the time. now i barely ever draw unless i get really inspired.

hmmm, i don’t know. maybe sign up for duolingo and learn other languages?? other than that i don’t know.

4) What’s your favorite holiday? Why? Have you ever written a story involving that holiday?

halloween is my favorite, followed closely by christmas just bc i love the tacky decorations and the music and the movies and pretty much everything about it.

looool i have tried to write fics involving these holidays, but they never come out how i want them to and i’ve kind of given up on it.

5) How do you fight writer’s block?

silly answer: drink so much caffeine i ascend to the astral plane to get advice from the writing gods.

actual answer: there’s not really an easy way to answer this. sometimes i see writing posts that are like, “you have to write every day!!” and i’m thinking y’know that’s not always possible. whether i’m out of inspiration/ideas, or i’m in a depression spiral, or i’m tired from work, or maybe i’m just not feeling that particular project. it’s not a sin to need a break from your wips, bc even though it’s happy work it’s still work. and there’s no shame in needing to take a breather to get yourself sorted out.

on days when i’m ready to write, i do different things to get myself pumped up for my wips. i’ll make playlists, make aesthetic boards, sometimes i torture my mutuals with rambles about my ocs or tag them with little excerpts from the project. i really like making an aesthetic tag so i can go and look at all the pretty stuff that makes me think of the wip, so i can remind myself why i want to write it in the first place.

6) At what point in a WIP do you decide to send it to your first beta readers/reviewers?

probably not until i’m at least done with a second draft. the first draft needs to have all those plot holes filled, all those loose threads woven back together, characters need developing. showing a beta reader my first draft would be like taking a person to a room filled with beginning sketches of people where they’re still just shapes instead of having any defining features.

7) What’s your greatest inspiration?

i don’t think i have one lol.

8) A lot of writers have certain things they like to describe - food, clothes, fights, party scenes. What’s your favorite thing to describe?

emotional scenes where characters talk about their problems and they hug and maybe even cry. i’m a terrible person.

9) What’s your approximate ratio of reading to writing? How do you find time for both? Do you do both on the same day, or split it up?

you’re going to judge me for this, but i haven’t been reading actual books lol. the last few months i’ve just been reading fanfic oneshots with like the occasional multichapter fic thrown in. my attention span has been terrible.

10) What books would you recommend to someone to get them into reading?

i think it depends on the person. what i might find compelling, someone else might find super boring.

from ghost-possum:

1. What is your favorite book in a genre that you don’t tend to write? If you do fantasy/sci-fi, what’s your favorite romance? If you write literary, what’s your favorite paranormal YA?

i don’t really like writing stuff that doesn’t have some kind of paranormal element. so i guess i’d say my writing enemy that i like reading is real world drama.

my favorite books that are like idk period pieces i guess?? are Anne of Green Gables and Pride and Prejudice.

as for stuff that’s based in more recent times, there’s a ya series i really like called tiny pretty things that’s about a group of ballerinas competing against each other for spots for prima ballerina?? and there’s a lot of drama and backstabbing. it’s kind of a dark series.

2. What book would you love to see turned into a movie or tv show? Any particular reasons why?

i can’t think of anything right now. maybe green angel by alice hoffman?

3. Have you ever written a character with a certain real-life person in mind. Was it someone you know in real life or someone famous?

some of my ocs were originally based off acquaintances, but as i kept writing them the characters changed so much that they became pretty much unrecognizable.

4. If your latest WIP had a color scheme, what would it be?

paper heart would be red, orange, pink, and purple. the colors of a sunset with the threat of darkness falling over everything.

5. What do you eat or drink while writing (if anything)?

s’mores poptarts if i’m too lazy to get up and fix myself something. chips. different sodas: cherry coke, sunkist, grape fanta.

6. What do you do to restore your inspiration when you’re not writing?

watch movies/tv shows. listen to podcasts or music. look at cool pictures.

7. Coffee, Tea, Booze, or ALL THREE?

coffee and booze. i’m not a big fan of tea.

8. Who is your favorite visual artist?

uhhhh, does studio ghibli count? their artwork is so appealing to look at.

9. Do you have any other creative pursuits outside of writing? What are they?

maybe learning other languages??

10. What is your favorite trope, the one you will always fall for and never get enough of?

AAAAAAAAAAA, ENEMIES TO FRIENDS TO LOVERS.

from thevajunglebook:

1. Describe your WIP as a cross between two movies.

i’m trying to think of what paper heart would be, but i’m drawing a blank. this needs to be its own game where someone else guesses what movies your wip is the lovechild of.

2. What’s your favorite part of writing communities?

cheering on and also being cheered on during the writing process. getting to read all these wonderful stories written by wonderful people. knowing other people are suffering just as much as i am lol.

3. If you could collaborate with any writer (whether friend or idol), who would it be and what would you work on together?

i am terrible at collaborating with other people lol.

4. Do you prefer reading/writing standalones or series?

i love reading series, but i’m not good at writing them lol. yet somehow i always end up writing series.

5. Who is your ultimate OC otp(+)?

canon: for the next three days verse it’s between leana/yvonne and jason/bella for otp status. my ot5 is carter/matteo/violet/tiffany/nina.

for defect i’d say my otp is joe/alec. also ethan/noah later on down the line.

ot3: ned/alec/sage

ot4: ned/alec/joe/ray.

au: joe/ned/carter

for the graveyard of the forgotten it’s definitely orrinaz/eliya/amnayel.

6. If your OC(s) joined tumblr, what type of blog would they run?

i wish i could answer this question with the dedication it deserves. i feel like their blogs would have a lot of memes and shitposts with some aesthetic stuff thrown in.

7. If you could write an adaptation of any story, which would it be?

while i have zero desire to write an adaptation for a story, i’ve always liked the idea of a movie version of Green Angel by Alice Hoffman. mostly bc it’s surreal, a little weird, post apocalyptic, and it would just look really cool.

8. What common writing tips never work for you? And/or what uncommon advice do you swear by?

anything that’s like, “if you don’t write everyday, you’re not a real writer!!” like chill dude. just bc i’m not cranking out 1,000 words a day like some lean, mean, writing machine doesn’t mean i’m not dedicated to what i’m doing.

9. Do you research before, during, or after writing sessions?

it depends. sometimes i get to a point in a fic where i’m like, “uh oh” and i go into a research spiral trying to find this one specific thing. thinking ah yes, this is the specific thing i need at this very moment that i probably could do without.

10. Have you had a writing epiphany that totally revamped your WIP?

if only. there were a few game changers in the next three days series that changed things for the better:

- the way carter and matteo first met lmao.

- violet’s existence.

- sage rescuing and then leaving violet and carter.

- carter and nina’s bromance.

- alec and carter, and also joe and matteo being siblings.

- tiffany seeing ghosts.

#writing tag game

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