#it's so shallow and obvious and frankly gross

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

I am so glad about your booktube post. Their entitled, condescending and frankly bigoted behavior is something I am frustrated but utterly powerless about.

I am particularly crept out by just how many of them use social justice language to both justify their hatred for everything and everybody out of the norm and make it harder to spot.

The most blatant and most disturbing example I saw for this is someone named crowcaller. If you don't look at the bigger picture and don't know these books it seems like she criticizes sexist, ableist and queerphobic tropes in obscure bad YA books from 2000-2010. Very necessary work, and without context her criticism seem reasonable and rooted in real life problems.

Then she did that with books I had actually read. And oh by did she not just interpret it in the most bad faith possible and completely ignored the Zeitgeist and conventions and history of the genre, she also just. Did not pick up anything but the most obvious plot beats, character motivations and messages, and then got condescending about the book being too shallow and openly cheered on the downfall of this series.

She also constantly presents herself as this fighter for minorities rights, especially disabled peoples rights, but then I caught her talking about a mental health issue she never had and has no experience with as if she 100% knew how this works and how this needs to be portrayed. I know this issue, and what she claims is only something a small part of the community feels. However, it is what aligns with neurotypicals automatic horror about this, so these opinions are the only ones that spread.

After that, everything fell into place. How she writes "I've seen it all" about tumblr, quirkily saying how good she knows this site without being one of *those* tumblr users. How she made her entire career out of mocking books targeted at girls. How she doesn't acknowledge the things that are progressive about these books at all. How she never outright says how teen girls are so silly and stupid and inferior for liking these books, and how [insert ableist slur] people who hyperfixate on uncool things like these are, but it resonates in every video she does.

I am queer and autistic too, and as I was still too naive to spot it, I was so glad that someone like me for once managed to create a platform and be heard. Turns out she could only do that, because unlike me and most other queer autistic people, she is confident to the point of not being able to see just how unqualified she is, and even more, she only says exactly what neurotypicals (and the more assimilated queer autistic people) want to hear.

And I get it, it feels good to think you are superior to those pathetic boy obsessed girls. Which probably makes this such an effective tactic.

I hate how platforms only ever push people like this. And I hate that people like this are able to shape the publics opinion when they have the least skills for that.

I hate how they get away with hiding their loathing behind feminism, or anti-ableism, or queer advocacy while mocking everybody in these groups who doesn't manage to conform.

Now, crowcaller is far from the only Booktuber who uses these tactics. But it struck me particularly much because she as an queer autistic person really should know better than behaving like this. Peak Pick-Me. And also... using your minority identities and progressive beliefs to hide your bigotry behind is just so gross.

And I hate just how little people seem to pick that up.

I'm gonna be real dude I think my nitpicks of various videos and whatever you've got going on specifically with this crowcaller person are like. maybe totally different issues.

I'd also like to point out that re: your first sentence, referring to the entirety of booktube as "entitled, condescending and frankly bigoted" as if every person posting about books on youtube is sone sort of hive mind is exactly the kind of unsubstantiated overgeneralization that I have been dogging on various booktubers for making. I am by no means trying to expose all of booktube as corrupt or innately bad, namely because that's impossible to do for hundreds if not thousands of unaffiliated creatives with wholly different styles and interests.

[beels-burger-babe]

Try it, I Dare You

*** Greetings! So this little fic is part of Familial Attachments which I wrote ages ago. I randomly got inspired by Big Bro! Lucifer and decided to branch off of it. Quick reminder that this MC is not a Teen! MC and therefore not underage. Thanks, everyone for the love and support! This fic is a long one. -B ***

Summary: As Lucifer forms a more familial bond with MC, the other brothers find themselves falling for the human romantically. Lucifer notes the changes in his brother's intentions and is not pleased.

Gaining you as an honorary little sibling was one of the best things to ever happen to Lucifer.

It gave him someone he could open up to, someone to fawn over, someone he could be soft with.

This change in dynamic between you and Lucifer had caused a number of things to change in the House of Lamentation in general.

You and Lucifer had become practically attached to the hip. Where you went, it seemed he wasn't far behind. The other brothers had joked that he had degraded himself to be your guard dog (a comment that had them all scrubbing the entirety of the hall's floors with their own toothbrushes), and in all honesty, he sort of had. Lucifer spent more time outside of his office, and would instead do his work in the lounge, where he could personally keep an eye on you.

It was this extra time around you that had caused Lucifer to begin to notice things.

It began, as most problems within the house do, with Mammon.

You had been talking with Mammon on the couch as Lucifer quietly did paperwork in the background.

He hadn't been listening in on the conversation (as frankly, it was none of his concern and you did deserve your own privacy), but your bright laugh had momentarily caught his attention.

When he glanced over, he saw you double over, nearly in tears from something Mammon had apparently said. It was nice.

What wasn't so nice, was the openly soft, adoring look that he was giving you under the knowledge that you weren't looking. His cheeks were dusted visibly flushed as his eyes glistened with affection.

Lucifer's eyes narrowed as the expression quickly disappeared once you turned to face Mammon once more and continue your conversation.

Paying closer attention now, he noted how Mammon's hand was draped over the back of the couch, his fingertips ghosting over the tops of your shoulders. A fond smirk remained glued on his face as he watched you talk passionately, and didn't even make an attempt to interrupt you as he would with most people.

Most damning, however, was the fact that the blush never quite left his face.

Lucifer pressed his lips into a thin line.

Mammon quite clearly had romantic interests in you, and that just wouldn't do.

It wasn't that Lucifer didn't trust you to know what's best for yourself. No. He knew that you were exceedingly clever and did, in fact, trust you to make your own choices. It was precisely why he hadn't done anything about Asmodeus's hollow flirtations, or Satan's teasing, or Belphegor's sleepovers. He knew that if you were truly bothered by it, you were more than capable of getting them to leave you alone.

He didn't, however, trust his brothers with you.

With the new pathway of thinking that Mammon's actions had opened that day, Lucifer had noticed that Mammon was not alone in his not-so-innocent intentions with you.

In fact, it appeared that you had captured the hearts of each of his brothers.

It was all too obvious to him now.

Satan's hands lingering on yours as he passed you books. Asmodeus's comments being less shallow and materialistic and more personal and sentimental. Levi's awe-filled eyes, being fixed on you rather than the games the two of you played. Belphegor, cracking open an eye to peer up at you when you weren't looking as he "slept" on your lap. Beel's fidgeting and blush as he asked you to help him work out. Mammon practically melting whenever you ruffled his hair; even as he protested and swatted at your hands.

Lucifer cursed his past self for being so oblivious.

Perhaps the worst part of all of this is that you, the innocent pure soul that you were, were completely oblivious to all of their advances. You would simply giggle or brush it off entirely as just one of the many weird things that his brothers did.

It was unacceptable.

Lucifer, although he seldom admitted it, loved his brothers. He truly did. But he also knew how reckless, moronic, and just overall dangerous they could all be. You deserved better than that. It was for this reason that Lucifer had made it his personal mission to put an end to these revolting advances.

-

Asmodeus smiled as he practically skipped over to where you were reading in the living room, "Hey MC," he draped his arms over your shoulder from behind and nestled his chin on top of your head. "What are you doing today?"

You chuckled and moved your head to gaze up at the bubbly demon. "Good morning, Asmo. I'm not doing much. Just relaxing, I guess. Why?"

Asmo could feel his smile widen at the information. He had been trying to get you all to himself all week, but there was always someone else around or something else that you had to do. Now was his chance!

He hummed as he snaked around the chair to face you. "Then that means you're free to spend the day shopping with your truly!" He shot off a cheeky wink to end it all off.

Asmo felt his heart flutter as your eyes glittered in excitement at his words. "I'd love to Asmo! Just let me gather a few things and we'll-"

"Ah! MC. Are you heading out for the day?"

All the light and warmth that Asmodeus had been feeling instantly plummeted as Lucifer entered the room. His brother was obviously trying to play it off as though he hadn't orchestrated this, not even looking at the two of them as he thumbed through a few papers in his hands, but Asmodeus knew better.

You, however, were none the wiser.

You practically lit up as Lucifer walked into the room. "Yeah! Asmodeus invited me to go shopping with him. We're probably going to be gone for the better part of the day," Asmodeus's bad mood caused by his brother's presence softened as you looked back at him.

Asmo plastered on a smile and wrapped an arm around your shoulder while glared sharply at Lucifer. He hoped that maybe this time he'd actually take the hint and leave everything alone. "Was there something you needed, big brother? Or are you just here to grace us with your presence?"

Asmodeus regretted his words, as the moment he saw them, Lucifer smiled sharply, like a cat who'd just captured its prey. "Well, since you asked, Asmodeus, I was hoping the two of you could pick up a few things for me," Lucifer began to list off rare item after rare item. Asmo could nothing but watch as the dread in his stomach grew heavier and heavier.

You chuckled nervously as Lucifer reached what had to be the twentieth item. "That's quite a bit, Lucifer. I don't think I'd be able to remember it all, and even if I did, I don't know where to begin looking for half of the things you listed," your face scrunched up adorably in thought before you snapped and looked up at the two demons. "I know! Why doesn't Lucifer come with us! That way he'll be able to get his things, and we all can spend time together. Sounds nice, right?"

And there it was.

Asmodeus did everything he could to keep the disappointment off his face, as Lucifer patted your shoulder. "That sounds like an excellent idea, MC," Asmo bit back a growl as Lucifer pulled you out of his arms and lead you towards your room. He glanced back at Asmo with a smug, prideful, look on his face. "We'll go get ready. Thank you for arranging this day out, Asmodeus."

Asmodeus could do nothing but pout as Lucifer walked away with you.

-

Satan had never felt so... tender-hearted before.

He watched you affectionately as you rambled on about your day while effortlessly helping him make supper.

There was something so wholesome and domestic about the entire situation that reminded him of the few romance novels he had read. Initially, when he read those books, he thought the poetic descriptions of the person's heart skipping and the tingling warmth filling their body was a gross exaggeration, but now he knew, and he never wanted that feeling to go away.

He moved by your side and stirred one of the pots on the stove while you diced tomatoes. As he listened to you speak about an enchantment you were trying to get the hang of with Solomon, he suddenly remembered one of the more cliche moments from the books he read.

Glancing at the sauce, Satan carefully scooped up a little bit into a spoon and gently blew on it to cool it down. He turned to you and held the spoon out towards you. "I'm not sure if I got the spices balanced outright. Would you mind-"

Before he could speak any more, a head. that most certainly did not belong to you, swooped down and ate the sauce off the spoon. You and Satan blinked as Lucifer, who had somehow appeared behind you, pulled away from the spoon with a thoughtful expression. "The sauce is good. I'd say it's probably done now," Lucifer stated calmly as his thumb wiped at the corners of his mouth. Satan's grip tightened on the spoon's handle as he snarled at his brother.

You looked awkwardly between the two as Lucifer draped his arm onto your shoulder. "Lucifer? What are you doing here?"

Lucifer's expression softened as he looked down at you, "I just wanted to check in on you," Satan's eye twitched at the excuse. Lucifer tilted his head before he continued. "Also, I saw Mammon sneaking into your room, muttering something about your jewellery box and wanted to give you a heads up."

Your eyes widened as your head snapped in the direction of your room. "What?! Why didn't you start with that?!" Lucifer's smile widened as you made your way towards the kitchen exit. You glanced back at Satan with sympathetic eyes, "Sorry, Satan. I'll promise I'll help you make dinner next time!" Before Satan even had the chance to respond, you had taken off down the hall, yelling his older brother's name.

With you gone, Satan turned to Lucifer with full, unrestrained fury. "What the fuck was that for?" he spat as he stepped into Lucifer's space.

The elder brother merely rolled his eyes and stepped around Satan as though he was nothing more than a hissing kitten. "I could be asking you the same thing. You were getting awfully close there."

Satan's face grew red, though it was hard to distinguish whether the colour was from anger or embarrassment. "That's none of your business!"

Apparently, Lucifer didn't deem a response necessary, as he simply dismissed his brother with a cocky wave of his hand and strutted out of the room in the same direction that you had left.

-

Beelzebub was taking a chance and stepping outside of his comfort zone.

Ever since discovering a small, weak flower in the shadows of the Hall of Lamentation and nursing it back to health, Beel had taken up gardening as a hobby.

None of his brothers knew about it, to his knowledge, and that was okay. If anything, the soft-spoken demon preferred it that way.

But when he noticed that it was particularly nice outside and that you were roaming around with little to do, he decided to let you in on his little secret.

Beel stole a glimpse over his shoulder at you. You were hunched over, humming to yourself as you worked away, your hands knuckle deep in the rich soil with smudges of dirt smeared across your forehead. The gentle dim light of the Devildom sky bounced off your skin and blanketed you in its glow, only adding the beauty you projected.

The sight alone stole his breath and momentarily made him forget about his hunger.

He opened his mouth to speak to you, but was cut off by the sound of heavy footfalls thundering towards you and a loud dangerous growl.

Beel's eyes widened as he notice Cerberus turn the corner, heading straight towards the two of you in a dead sprint.

Without thinking, Beel quickly tackled you to the side, just as the three-headed hell hound rushed past you, demolishing the garden in his wake.

You did a double-take between Beel, Cerberus and the garden as you scrambled to your feet. "Cerberus? How in Diavolo's name did he get loose?" you anxiously ran a hand through your hair began to head in the direction he took off in. "Lucifer taught me a few tricks for catching him. I'm going to go get him! I'm so so sorry about all of this Beel! I'll make it up to you, I promise!"

Without another word you took off after the beast, shouting it's name.

Beel frowned and looked at what remained of his garden. He felt his heart sink a little at seeing all of his hard work destroyed. With a heavy sigh, he slowly made his way towards Cerberus's den to see just how bad the damage was.

Only, when he arrived, the pen's door didn't even have a scratch on it; almost as though someone had let the dog out.

-

Leviathan paced around his room as he muttering to himself as tightly clenched to tickets.

"Alright, Levi. It's not a big deal," he whispered reassuringly. "You just have to go out there, hand them the tickets, and ask them to come with. You already checked their calendar when you were in their room last time, and there are no mentions of any upcoming events on their Devilgram, so they won't be busy. O-Of course, they could always reject you for being a stupid shut-in and a gross o-otaku, b-b-but they're your Henry! Right? They have to agree! Okay!" Levi took a deep breath of courage and quickly flung open his door.

He charged to the living room where he knew you would be lounging with Lucifer.

Upon seeing him, your expression lit up and you graced Leviathan with one of your dazzling smiles. The otaku swore that he could hear his heart go "doki-doki". He stumbled to a stop as his face blushed, and quickly hid the tickets behind his back. "H-Hi MC."

"Hey, Levi-chan!" Oh Diavolo, he loved it when you called him that. "What's up? You look like a man on a mission."

Levi briefly noted Lucifer side-eyeing the two of you as he began to stutter out an answer. "W-Well you see, uh... I-I just um...There's this th-thing that..." He let out a small noise of frustration at his own incompetence.

But you never laughed, or sighed, or groaned, like any of his brothers would have. No. You merely sat there and waited patiently for him to find his words with a gentle smile on your face.

Another deep breath and Levi composed himself. "Did you want to go to an idol concert with me this weekend?" Levi couldn't even bring himself to look you in the eyes as he asked the question. "O-Obviously you don't have to, b-b-but you seemed to like their music when I played it the other day, a-a-and you aren't busy so I thought-"

"Actually," Levi's mouth snapped shut as Lucifer spoke up, "MC and I have plans with Diavolo this weekend."

Levi's head whipped over to look at you and noted the slightly confused expression on your face. "I thought that was next weekend?"

Amber eyes narrowed at the words, as Levi slowly turned to glare at Lucifer. It was all to clear to the Otaku what was happening here.

Lucifer shrugged, not even phased by the venomous stare of his brother, and pulled out his D.D.D. "Barbatos messaged me saying that Diavolo had an important meeting pop up next week and asked if we could move our little get-together to this weekend instead."

You huffed and crossed your arms. "I know he's the prince and can't help it, but making last-minute changes like that is just rude."

Lucifer chuckled at your annoyance and ruffled your hair. "I know, but it's nothing either of us can help. I'll just confirm that we're good with the change and-"

"No." Lucifer and Levi both looked at you in shock. Levi dared to let his heart flutter with hope at the determined look on your face. "I can make plans with Diavolo any time. This concert is a once-in-a-lifetime experience and it clearly means a lot to Levi. Tell him that I'll have to take a rain check. I'm going to be spending the weekend with Levi-chan."

Levi instantly let out a cheer of victory as he stepped forward spun you in the air. "Thank you, MC!!! Oh we're going to have so much fun! I swear you won't regret this!"

You giggled as you were set back down onto your feet. "Thank you for inviting me! This is going to be amazing!"

You and Levi began rambling about all the things you wanted to do at the concert and what you'd need to prepare in advance for the ultimate experience.

Levi couldn't believe it! He was going to spend an entire weekend getting to show you the things that he loved! It'd be just the two of you and it'd be perfect.

"I have an idea," Levi felt himself tense as Lucifer spoke up once more. "Why don't we all go together? That way you can spend time with Diavolo, while also getting to attend the concert?"

Levi's heart sunk as you squealed at the idea, jumping excitedly around a smiling Lucifer.

So much for his perfect, romantic, weekend.

-

Mammon took a deep breath as he stared at your bedroom door.

This was it. He was finally going to tell you how he felt.

He had it all planned out. He was going to go in there, and gift you the necklace he had noticed you looking at the last time the two of you went downtown. Then, he'd explain how through the past months of living with you and being your protector, that he found himself becoming enraptured by every single little thing that you do. He'd explain how he knows that he's clingy and greedy when it comes to spending time with you, but that's because there's nothing he treasures more than being by your side. And then, he'd say that he loves you, and hope that you say the same in return.

Fucking romantic right? Mammon had this in the bag.

He confidently lifted his chin as he knocked on your door before walking in. "Hey MC! I know it's late, but do ya gotta-" he trailed off at the sight before him.

Both you and Lucifer were in fluffy, white robes on your bed. Lucifer had a headband in his hair, brushing his bangs away from his clay mask-covered face. You were beside him, also sporting a mask, your tongue peeking out of the corner of your mouth as you carefully painted his nails.

Lucifer raised an eyebrow at his brother, obviously annoyed at being disturbed, while you smiled over at Mammon. "Hey, Mams! Just a sec," you smoothly finished applying a coat of red polish to Lucifer's pinky finger before recapping the bottle and turning to the white-haired demon. "What's up?"

Mammon felt his face heat up, as he quickly hid the small box in his hands behind his back. "I- Uh- Nothin'! Just wanted to talk with ya. Can ya come with me for a few minutes?"

Lucifer sighed as he examined his freshly painted nails. "Might I remind you that you're the one disturbing us, Mammon? If you've got something to say," Mammon gulped as knowing, irked, obsidian eyes bore into his, "spit it out."

You smacked Lucifer's arm. "Hey! Be nice," you offered Mammon a sympathetic smile as you turned back to him. "Sorry, Mammon. You were saying?"

Mammon swallowed down the lump in his throat as humiliation flooded his veins. He awkwardly looked away and waved off your concern. "Nah. It was nothin' important," he subtly slid the necklace box into his back pocket, "I-I'll talk with ya tomorrow or somethin'. It's nothin' ya need to worry about."

You blinked owlishly at Mammon. He could practically see the gears churning inside your head; you obviously thought something was wrong. "Are you sure? If it matters to you, Mammon, that means it's important. I can spare a few minutes if it's really bothering you."

You began to stand up, but as you did, Lucifer caught your wrist."MC, he already said you didn't need to worry about it. If it was that important, he would've just told us. I'm sure everything is fine," Mammon tensed as Lucifer shifted his cold gaze onto him, "right?"

Mammon quickly nodded as he stumbled back towards the door. "Yeah! Yes! Everything is perfectly fine! I-I'll just get goin' and leave to continue whatever this is. Bye!" He scurried out of the room, slamming the door behind him, before slumping against it.

He could faintly hear the sounds of you scolding Lucifer, and felt himself slump in defeat.

He'd just have to try again another day.

-

Belphegor fluffed the blankets and pillows that he had set up in the backyard.

It was perfect. He had actually put in work to make sure it was.

A sea of blankets would protect the two of you from the chilly, Devildom, night air, while his finest pillows would make sure you were comfortable. He had brought out a thermos filled with tea and some snacks to make the evening extra cozy.

It was everything the two of you would need to take in the meteor shower tonight.

A click sounded behind him. Belphie perked and quickly turned to greet with you a smile.

Only, instead of you, a rather smug-looking Lucifer stood in the doorway.

Belphie growled and went back to arranging pillows. "What do you want?"

Lucifer shrugged and began to set up a telescope. Belphie gritted his teeth at the sight of it. "I'm just here to take in the meteor shower like you are. That's all. It is quite a beautiful sight after all, and it also happens to be very enlightening."

Belphegor sneered at his older brother as he turned away from him. "Well do it somewhere else! I'm watching the shower here with MC, not you. So go away!"

Lucifer tilted his head in mock confusion as he held up his phone. "Oh dear, but I've already invited the others to join us out here."

Belphie's head snapped up at Lucifer's words. "You what?!"

As though summoned, the rest of his brothers toppled into the backyard.

"I was unaware there was a meteor shower tonight," Satan claimed as he laid down his own blanket near Belphie's perfectly structured nest. "To think I almost missed out on it."

"Eh, I don't care about any stupid stars or anythin'," Belphie groaned in annoyance as Mammon plopped himself down beside him. "But if anythin' falls near us, then those meteor pieces have gotta be worth a fortune!"

Levi scoffed and rolled his eyes as he leaned against the house, game counsel still in hand. "Nothing's actually falling, dumb ass. They're just space rocks passing by."

Asmodeus giggled while he snuggled himself up on Belphie's other side. Belphie wrinkled up his nose and tried to lean away from the physical affection. "Then why are you out here, Levi, if they're just space rocks? Can't you admit that they're beautiful, like me, and you wanted to experience something real for once?"

Levi let out a squawk of embarrassment. "There isn't anything that 'reality can offer me that anime can't! I've seen meteor showers at least ten times all with amazing shots and angles that you could never get in real life!"

Asmodeus merely shook his head in response. "Whatever you say, Levi," he reached over to the picnic basket that Belphie for you and him had packed and held it over his head. "Beel! Snacks!"

Belphegor gaped at his twin as the ginger giant grabbed the basket and sat down behind them. "Beel?! You too?"

Beel looked down guiltily and looked through the food. "I'm sorry, Belphie. But Lucifer said there'd be snacks and that everyone else was going to be there, and I thought it'd be nice to have a family event."

Belphie groaned and held his head in his hands. "You knew I was planning this for just me and MC though."

Beel frowned and held out a cookie to his twin. "Sorry."

Before Belphie could argue anymore or even get the chance to kick everyone out, the door opened once more.

"Oh," everyone looked over to see you standing there in your pyjamas. Belphie's heart clenched as your confused eyes found his. "I didn't know this was a group gathering! I would've brought down some pillows for everyone or some snacks if I had known!" you smiled brightly at the group as you walked towards them.

"No need. Belphie went ahead and provided enough for everyone already," Lucifer claimed and patted the ground next him. "You can sit with me, MC. There's plenty of space over here."

Belphie cursed under his breath as you accepted Lucifer's offer and huffed as the meteor shower began.

Lucifer smirked as he took in his brother's defeat with glee, and you babbled away none-the-wiser by his side.

His brothers could try to woo you and corrupt you all they wanted, but Lucifer wasn't going anywhere. For every attempt they'd make, he'd be there to stop it.

You had deemed Lucifer your big brother, after all, and as such, he'd make sure that you were always safe from his brothers' infernal influences.

***The ending is meh, but whatever! I hope you guys enjoyed this fic! It was both fun and hassle to write, but I love it nonetheless! Thanks for your amazing support and love! Sorry for the lack of fics lately. Love you all!***

Taglist @all-oxidized-to-green @candymeowz, @thegrimgrinningghost @henry-and-the-seven-lords @satans-beloved-riv @cosmixbun @sufzku @lovelythoma @mothervictoire @obey-mes-treasure @kissed-by-a-dementor @yukihaie @justtiarra @mammoneybb @obeys-world @poly-bi-mf @armycandy10 @burrixino @arkarul @pumpkins-mainside-blog

[hermannsthumb]

Prompt: Newt has never seen the appeal of threesomes, frankly. They seem like more trouble than they're worth. But now there's two Hermanns standing in front of him, and his first thought (after "Did I take my meds?" , "Do I need new glasses?" , and "What the fuck is happening?") is that he needs both of them, immediately.

Anonymous said: Prompt (if you haven't written it already!) where due to time travel shenanigans, newt gets spit roasted by hermann(s)

i love how many requests i get for this kinda stuff HAHAHAH i technically have written this three times before, but in honor of newt’s birthday, let’s go for a fourth! MAJOR not sfw below cut!!!

----------

Newt is distracted as hell when he half-jogs into the lab one otherwise ordinary birthday afternoon, which might explain why he doesn’t see that there are two Hermanns at first. There’s too much on his mind—picking a club for tonight, what dissections he has to get done today before they can go out to a club, whether or not he remembered to wash his sexy club clothes, and if it even matters, because they’re just gonna get covered in glitter again. Whether or not the barista got Hermann’s coffee order right this time. Whether or not the special birthday breakfast pastries survived the journey. “It’s pouring out there,” he complains to Hermann, pushing his soaked hair out of his eyes and scraping his boots off on the pathetic rubber mat they keep in the doorway. “If it doesn’t let up, we might wanna reconsider going out tonight.”

“Newton,” Hermann says.

“Sweaty, wet bodies in a small room? Gross. No thanks.” Newt inspects the pastries: the brown wrappings of the one on top are slightly water-logged, but the pastry itself is fine. Perfect. “We could just rent a movie.”

“Newton,” Hermann says.

“And order some pizza.” Man, that’d make for a nice birthday. All cozied up in Newt’s bed with a monster movie and pizza. “Actually, let’s do that instead. I kinda wanted to go dancing, but—”

Hermann bangs his cane against the floor. It echoes strangely, almost as if he’s doing it twice at once, and Newt turns to him in confusion—or, as he discovers, them. He drops his pastry. He polishes his glasses free of water, and crams them back onto his face. He blinks a few times. “Oh, shit,” he says. “Dude, there are two of you.”

“I know,” both Hermanns say, and roll their eyes.

Newt approaches them cautiously. Two Hermanns. One of them is undoubtedly Newt’s Hermann, judging by his bad haircut, bad glasses, and bad clothing, which is the same boring slacks and sweater combo he was wearing when Newt left for coffee an hour ago. The other Hermann is a Hermann unlike one Newt’s ever seen before, clad in dark colors, with hair cropped somewhat more evenly and twice as many wrinkles around his eyes. Not two Hermanns—it can’t be two Hermanns. That’s a scientific impossibility. “Your brother,” Newt says. He knows Hermann has an older one, though the odds of Hermann having an older brother who uses a cane identical to his, on the same side as his, is a little slim.

“No,” Hermann says.

“You cousin?” Newt says.

“No,” the other Hermann says, but the corner of his mouth twitches up with an obvious fondness. “Your earlier assessment was correct, I’m afraid. There are two of me.”

Newt glances between them again. Same soft, brown eyes; same dark eyelashes; same weird, wide lips; same elegant cheekbones. Is Newt dreaming? No, he’s sure he’s not dreaming—it’s too, like, real to be a dream. (Besides, Newt’s brain is never this kind to him, and if it was, he would’ve just skipped the boring build-up and gone straight to the threeway.) Is he having some sort of a mental break, brought on by stress, or forgetting to take his meds somewhere along the line? Unlikely—Newt’s been way more stressed before, and he’s skipped his meds before, and he’s never had a reaction like this. It must be real. “Well, shit,” he finally says. “Hermann, this is the best birthday present ever.”

“Er,” Newt’s Hermann says. “It is?”

Newt cups the side of the new Hermann’s face, feeling it, inspecting it, reveling in the warmth of his skin. Yep—real, definitely real. Real and handsome. Newt pats his cheek. “You cloned yourself just so we could have an awesome birthday threesome,” Newt says. “That’s really touching, Hermann, seriously. I promise I won’t let you down.”

“No,” Hermann says. “That’s not—”

New Hermann gently places his hand over Newt’s, leaning into his touch, and smiles. There’s a hint of sadness to it Newt doesn’t quite understand. “I’m not a clone, darling,” he says.

“Oh, I like him,” Newt says. “He’s nicer. Definitely not a clone, then. Who are you, then, hot stuff?”

“He’s—oh.” Hermann sighs. “It all sounds so silly when I try to say it out loud. He’s from the future, Newton.”

Newt hums, considering New Hermann. Yeah, that makes more sense. Eye wrinkles. However far off in the future he’s from, apparently he’s picked up a bit more fashion sense by then, and maybe even a bit of style. “You came back in time just to have an awesome birthday threesome with me?” Newt guesses.

New Hermann laughs. Eye wrinkles, style, and apparently some sort of major head injury where he forgets how bad he and Newt hate each other. The future is now, or whatever. “Truthfully,” he says, “arriving on your birthday was unintentional. It’s difficult to get exact dates correctly with the sort of technology I was using, you see.”

“Apparently there’s some great big event that happens in 2035 that it’s absolutely imperative he warn us about,” Hermann says.

That’s a bit of a let down. Still cool by virtue of time travel, Newt guesses, but awesome birthday threesome would’ve been more exciting. “Oh,” he says. A let down, and a shame, really, because 11-years-into-the-future Hermann is pretty sexy, and Newt was hoping for the chance to get his hands on some of that. Or maybe get those hands on him. He’s not picky. “I mean,” he tries, one last desperate attempt, “what’s the rush, you know? You can always tell us afterwards.”

“Afterwards?” Future Hermann says.

“Afterwards,” Newt repeats. He grabs Future Hermann by the lapels of his dark labcoat and smiles cheekily. “You can spare a couple hours, can’t you, dude? For the birthday boy?”

A sudden warmth blooms behind the future Hermann’s eyes; his mouth stretches into a smile of his own, goofy and affectionate. Future Hermann sure seems to like him. Newt hasn’t got a problem with that in the slightest, actually. “Er, a couple,” he stammers, and Newt hears Hermann—his Hermann—inhale sharply, like he’s just been offended to the utmost degree. “I suppose that’s— Well, I suppose there’s no real problem there. It’s not as if I’m on a schedule. Time travel. After all.”

“After all,” Newt says. “What about you, Hermann?

Newt’s Hermann is silent for a little too long to be anything but considering. “Er,” he says.

“Good,” Newt says.

--------

“Alright, boys,” Newt says, “I’m not as young as I used to be, so I can’t promise I’m very good at this anymore.”

“Anymore?” Newt’s Hermann says.

Newt winks at him over his shoulder. He has a witty joke on the edge of his tongue, but it dies when the Hermann in front of him (older, nicer Hermann) begins to tenderly stroke his jaw without warning. “You’ve always been so handsome,” Hermann says. His hand trails up the side of Newt’s face and stops in his hair, where he begins to twirl a strand around his finger. Newt shivers. “I could stare at you all day.”

“That’s kinda creepy, Hermann,” Newt says. “And cute, I guess? Okay, here goes.”

He opens his mouth wide and takes in Hermann’s—the new Hermann’s—dick as deep as he can, which is somewhere around the three-fourths mark. He used to be a lot better at deep-throating in his twenties. Also, Hermann is somewhat very well-endowed. “Bugger,” the future Hermann moans. His eyes flicker shut, and his grip in Newt’s hair tightens, and Newt feels a surge of pride. He’s always loved being able to turn Hermann to jelly like this, and apparently some things never chance. He hopes future Newt is still giving it to Hermann like this. “Newton, that’s marvelous.”

“Oh, by Jove,” Newt’s Hermann murmurs. He’s standing behind them at the edge of the bed, his knees braced against it gently. He’s also undoubtedly enjoying the view. Newt smiles around Hermann’s dick (puffing out his cheeks for show, just a little), and wriggles his ass obnoxiously at his Hermann. He needed the guy inside of him five minutes ago, goddamn it. Hermann seems to get the hint: there’s a shaking hand placed on his hip, a lone finger prodding his lube-slick entrance to check he’s properly prepared, and then Hermann’s dick sliding into him inch-by-inch. Newt moans. 

“Newton,” the two Hermanns groan out in near-unison, the one as Newt begins to bob his head up and down his dick, the other as he bottoms out and his pelvis hits Newt’s ass.

Newt pulls his mouth off of Hermann’s dick for only a second. “Fuck me already,” he begs. His voice is raspy even to his own ears.

He’s not sure which Hermann he’d intended to direct the plea towards, but both take it to heart: the Hermann behind Newt begins to rock in and out of him, picking up speed with each little thrust, while the Hermann in front of Newt pushes his dick back between Newt’s lips and begins a series of shallow thrusts of his own. Newt feels speared open, and used; Newt feels fucking awesome. “Mm,” he moans. He ruts against the bedsheets lazily.

“Wait, wait,” the Hermann fucking his mouth suddenly says, voice breathless. “Your—ah—your timing is not quite right.”

“It most certainly is right,” the Hermann in his ass huffs. “You’re meant to be following my lead. Yours is off.”

“Hardly,” the first Hermann says. “Stop moving—we need a bloody rhythm. We needn’t overwhelm Newton.”

Both of them still. Newt hears them debating how to proceed in a series of hissed whispers (though he’s too busy happily sucking on Hermann’s dick to bother with proper eavesdropping), and then the Hermann behind him is pulling out, while the Hermann in front of him pushes further into his mouth and down his throat. Newt’s throat burns pleasurably; his eyes begin to water, and he gags very slightly. “There we are,” the first Hermann continues in a grunt. “Now—” He pulls out until the wet head of his dick is just grazing Newt’s lips, while the other Hermann pushes back into Newt’s ass. “Much neater.”

Newt swallows down a hysterical laugh, or maybe it’s more of a whimper, and just grins instead. “You guys work it out?”

“Shut it,” the Hermann behind him gasps. He grinds deep in Newt, hitting all the right spots, and Newt is grateful for the return of the other Hermann’s dick in his mouth to muffle him before he can really make an embarrassing sound.

They keep up the pattern for all of five minutes, which Newt is pretty impressed with. Slowly, though, they start to get impatient; lingering too long inside of Newt, or pulling out a bit too slowly, or jumping the gun just a bit too early to rock back in. The Hermann in behind is the first to snap and forgo it entirely, suddenly gripping onto Newt’s waist and pounding into him as hard as he can. Not that Newt is complaining. “Ah, Newton, that’s so—” he moans, and Newt rewards him with a little teasing squeeze, “I—”

“Mmhm,” Newt says. Part of him wants to start worrying about his own orgasm, but honestly, he’s enjoying this too much. 

Getting an idea, he pulls his mouth off of Hermann and replaces it with his hand. Hermann always gets really embarrassed when Newt lets him come on his face, and he’s curious about if that’s changed in eleven years. “This feels so awesome,” he says. He begins jerking Hermann off quickly, barely a centimeter from his lips. He’s sure he’s gonna say some dumb shit—he loses his mouth to brain filter (which already works at minimum capacity) completely when he’s this turned on. “So, so awesome. I wanna do it again with both of you guys in my ass or something, but I want you to come all over me first, fuck yeah, come on, Hermann, do it—”

“Newton!” the Hermann above him chokes out, throwing a hand over his eyes, which gives Newt all the warning he needs to stick his tongue out and catch a small portion of his jizz. The rest makes a mess of his glasses. Kinda gross. Pretty hot, too.

He’s not surprised when he feels the Hermann behind him stiffen and come in him only a second later, cursing and gasping—he really does like to see Newt messy.

While they both collapse to the bed and attempt to catch their breath, Newt rubs his fingers through the mess one Hermann made of his face and uses it as lube to stroke himself off. He doesn’t take very long, either, considering this is definitely one of the hottest things to ever happen to him. Top five birthdays for sure.

“So,” he says, ten minutes later. He’s positioned himself in bed as the middle of the Hermann sandwich. Both Hermanns (arms draped around Newt) look at him, but Newt only looks back at Future Hermann. “What did you come here to tell us?”

“Oh,” Future Hermann says. He blushes. “Er. Right.”

[badbhye]

fuck buddy! jungkook

Warning: this is literally like 1.5k words of pure smut. I have no excuse so read with caution.

“No kissing, Jeon,” you say moving your face away so his lips barely graze your cheek.

“You’re letting me fuck you in a closet but you won’t let me kiss you?” he raises an eyebrow, moving to your neck instead and suckling on the juncture between your neck and shoulder. You whine a little, grinding your hips on his thigh to ease the need for friction.

“You’re not my boyfriend, Jeon,” you say, as his hands dig into the flesh of your thigh, skirt raised so high you’re practically naked from the waist down.

“Can you at least call me Jungkook, I really don’t want to hear my dad’s name when I’m fucking you into next week,” he says, before pulling your panties aside and continues to barely graze your entrance.

“God, you’re so annoying,” you spit but move your hips in hopes to feel more of his fingers.

“A-ah, don’t even try it,” he pulls away from you, “I won’t touch you until you call me by my name.”

“Is this your way of teasing me? Because it won’t work, Jungkook,” you deadpan and he laughs hard enough that he has to lean his head back, exposing his neck to you. At this, you take action, because clearly, he wasn’t capable of a quick fuck. You had things to do today.

“Listen, we don’t have a lot of time,” you say, unbuttoning his pants and letting them fall down to his knees, “I need to be out of here in the next ten minutes, I don’t need everyone to know what I’m doing here.”

“Relax, would you?” he responds, hand slowly reaching for your waist so you’re leaning against the wall once more, “everyone already knows what you’re doing, why else would you come to the frat house?”

“I’ve been here before, for your information,” you bite, inhaling sharply when you feel him finally insert a finger in you, “Namjoon, unfortunately, lives here too.”

“Uhuh,” Jungkook says, it’s obvious he isn’t really listening to you, he adds another finger and you suddenly don’t even care that he doesn’t buy your stupid excuse, and frankly you don’t even remember why you were making it in the first place. You’re fucking Jeon Jungkook in a closet for god’s sake.

“Let me eat you out,” he rasps, groaning a little when you clench on his fingers.

“W-what,” you say, a little breathless from his ministrations.

He gets down on his knees, spreading your legs further and further apart. “Can I?” he asks, eyes wide, as he looks up patiently awaiting your answer. Your immediate response would have been no, but when you see him on his knees, almost begging, it stirs something within you and you just nod in response. He immediately hooks your leg on his shoulder and dives in. You have to bite your lip to hold back the surprised moan that threatens to break out. “F-fuck, Jungkook, you really just go all out don’t you,” you pant, hands finding purchase in his hair. He just hums in response, tongue teasing your entrance and you hold yourself back from just straight out grinding on his face, you might be hooking up with Jungkook in a closet but you still had some of your dignity left.

“Fuuuck, your pussy is a straight up delicacy,” Jungkook moans, then aims at your clit. Your hips jump and you immediately press yourself harder on his tongue.

“Ugh, why do you - fuck - make everything sound so gross,” you bite back, words punctuated by short grunts.

He ignores you and instead adds his fingers to the mix, and immediately plunges two inside of you. You gasp and the suddenness but it tapers off into a long drawn out moan when he crooks his fingers just right and taps at your g-spot. It’s like your brain is leaking out of your ears and the only words you know are fuck, yes and Jungkook. You’re so lost in the feeling that you belatedly realise that you’re harshly tugging on his hair. You soften your hold on his roots and stop pulling, thinking that he probably didn’t like it.

“Why’d you stop?” he asks immediately, looking up, but fingers still moving at the same pace. You look down at him with wide eyes, he looks so obedient with his chin and cheeks glistening and eyes wide. “Can you pull my hair again?” he asks when you fail to respond.

“Uh, yeah,” you say, strengthening your hold once he’s buried his face back between your legs. The second you pull you feel Jungkook’s entire body shudder and he groans against your folds.

“Fuck,” you can’t help but grind your hips with his movements, “I’m gonna come,” you mewl as he presses his tongue flat against your clit and just lets you grind on his face.

“Fuck- fu- Jungkook I’m cumming,” you whine and he just moans against you, letting you ride out your orgasm. You’re breathing becomes heavy as your limbs loosen around him, and he helps you stand straight. “Need a breather?” he asks, rolling on a condom.

“Just fuck me before I get bored,” you respond immediately.

“As you wish,” he chuckles and slightly lifts you up and your legs automatically wrap themselves around his waist. He teases at your entrance a bit, and every time he would reach your clit you would hiss, still sensitive from your last orgasm. “You sure?” he asks once more, and you just nod, “Just put it in already,” you whine impatiently, moving your hips in hopes of somehow putting his dick in you. He doesn’t tease you any further and enters you slowly, asking if you’re okay again once he’s maybe two inches in. At your confirmation, he enters the rest of the way and groans when he’s suddenly balls deep in you. You have to hold your breath at the feeling, even though you’d been thoroughly prepped, he still feels so full. It doesn’t hurt, it’s more like a pleasant stretch that you hadn’t felt in a while and honestly didn’t realise how much you were missing.

“Y-you can move now, Jungkook,” you nudge him, and but all he does is shudder, a groan muffled from where he sucks on your neck hard enough to leave marks. You have half a mind to stop him but the feeling of him being inside of you and the suction from his mouth just adds to the pleasure and your eyes almost roll back. He starts with a gentle pace, almost as he was testing the waters, his mouth doesn’t leave your neck, teeth gently grazing your jugular. You shiver and start rocking your hips with him. At this, he gets the hint and begins moving at a faster, stronger pace.

“O-oh my god, Jungkook,” you shamelessly whine, “faster, fuck me faster!”

He complies without complaint, and all you can hear are his shallow breaths and soft moans. You want to bite your lip to stop your own noises just so you can focus on him. You never thought you’d find this so sexy but his moans are the one thing that pushes you towards the edge. Your whining gets more incessant and when Jungkook pinches at your nipple you physically feel time stop for a second before an intense wave of pleasure courses through you. The orgasm is so strong you have to stop breathing until it rides out. Jungkook continues to thrust in, and at the flutter of your walls, he comes after you. He stays buried inside you, until your walls stop clenching on his dick, his fingers trailing patterns on your inner thighs, making you shiver.

He pulls out and helps you stand up straight, helping you find your balance when you stumble a little because your legs are still shaking.

“God, that was amazing,” he says, taking off the condom and tossing it aside.

“Don’t you share this closet with your housemates,” you sneer at him in disgust as he pulls up his pants.

“They never throw theirs out, why should I?” he shrugs and you immediately shove him aside, not wanting to spend any more time in his presence.

“God you disgust me,” you say, hastily fixing yourself up and making your way out the door so you can quickly sneak out. The coast is mostly clear, you can hear someone in the kitchen downstairs but you don’t care since it’s not on your way out anyway. You’re almost out the door when you hear, “Same time on Friday, right?”

You flinch and turn back to find an amused Jungkook at the top of the stairs. Immediately after that, Namjoon exits the kitchen and pauses when he sees you, “Oh hey ____, I didn’t know you were coming over today.”

You’re mortified and feel utterly defeated. You want to grab the nearest gross boy sneaker and fling it at Jungkook’s head but instead, you pin him with a glare to match his smirking face. It’s silent for a few seconds, the tension so thick you could cut it with a knife.

“I’ll text you,” you say after a pause, turning to Namjoon, your expression changes slightly, “See you later, Joon!” and you immediately depart, shutting the door loudly behind you.

A/N: ummmmmm so yeah this happened. tell me ur thoughts n send me some prompts pls !!!

[socialattractionuk]

I’m a Black woman who’s only dated white men, but Black Lives Matter has changed everything

I’m a 27-year-old Black woman and I have never been in a relationship, or even dated, a man who is the same race as I am.

Most people are surprised, and when you think about it, it sounds kind of strange to not want to be with someone who possesses the same cultural values as yourself, but it hasn’t been on purpose.

Growing up in a predominantly white area, my options were limited. As I was navigating my teens, love was shoved down my throat on TV; I watched my friends pair off at house parties, and I started to become even more aware of the need to find my perfect match. 

I carefully curated him in my mind. He was tall, authoritative, kind, and loving, but I never thought about what colour he would be. I suppose it didn’t matter to me, as long as he existed.

Aged 16, I entered my first interracial relationship. The topic of race never came up. When you’re a shallow teenager, the conversation rarely stretches past your favourite contestant on Big Brother – or perhaps he saved those conversations for his ‘main’ girlfriend. I was number two, possibly even three, but definitely a secret.

It became glaringly obvious that there might be a reason he had the picture-perfect blonde girl on the outside, and me tucked away behind the scenes.

I know now that if someone loves you they are proud of you, and I deserve to be loved loudly. But I went into my 20s without many Black friends and more interracial relationships followed.

With each relationship, I accepted the fetishisation of the curly-haired, mixed-race babies I could provide (Picture: Jazmin Duribe)

I watched a few of my white friends date Black men. Others shuddered at the thought of it, insisting their parents would ‘kill them’ if they brought someone of another race home – despite the fact I had been in their homes several times.

I often wondered if that was what my boyfriend’s parents thought when they saw me too but batted the thought away. 

With each relationship, I accepted the fetishisation of the curly-haired, mixed-race babies I could provide. One boyfriend’s mother squealed with excitement upon meeting me and said I would give her adorable ‘caramel’ grandchildren.

I didn’t mention the denial of white privilege during a very heated debate about the treatment of Meghan Markle or call out jokes about offensive racial stereotypes. I remember brushing off an ex’s dad when he was surprised that I didn’t ‘look or sound like Kim Fox from EastEnders��. 

It wasn’t because I was OK with any of it – I remember feeling grossed out by it all. But I didn’t want to be seen as angry or confrontational so I tried to let it go and put it down to a few isolated incidents and ignorance. 

I thought that’s how relationships were, because who doesn’t tease their other half about something, even if it does make you feel deflated?

Surely something like race wouldn’t matter when you’re truly in love? (Picture: Jazmin Duribe)

It’s easy to call someone out on Twitter for their questionable behaviour, but when it’s someone you love, kicking up a fuss could end the relationship, it doesn’t always feel worth it.

In a way, just being with someone was more important to me than challenging the microaggressions. 

Often race never got discussed at all. Paul* would actively go out of his way to avoid it, or anything that pointed at us being different. Asking him to describe the Black person nearby would bring him out in a cold sweat, tripping over his words to find every other word but ‘Black’.  

At the time, I took it as a compliment, thinking it must mean that he didn’t see colour. Surely something like race wouldn’t matter when you’re truly in love? To be honest, it’s not something that I had thought about that deeply. 

But then George Floyd and Breonna Taylor’s tragic deaths, and the Black Lives Matter protests that followed, put the spotlight on racial issues worldwide – and I couldn’t help but reflect on my dating life, too.

The race discourse is currently more open now than it’s ever been in my lifetime. On social media and beyond, conversations about colonialism, institutional racism and the systemic barriers that keep Black people one step behind have become our new normal.

If I was in love with someone, someone I thought I knew inside and out, why couldn’t I speak up about racism? (Picture: Jazmin Duribe)

It’s taken me back to all the racist incidents I have experienced, even in my relationships. Frankly, it’s been traumatic.

And it’s not just me; it seems like white people are examining themselves like never before.

Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian – married to tennis legend Serena Williams and the father of a Black daughter – stepped down from the company’s board of directors and asked to be replaced by a Black candidate.

Meanwhile, rapper Eve and Strictly star Oti Mabuse admitted to having ‘difficult’ conversations with their white partners.

These admissions sparked an online debate about the discussions you should have if you’re in an interracial relationship, which I joined with enthusiasm. But had I even practiced what I preached?

Seeing Black people protest just to have equality, and to not die at the hands of the police, triggered something inside of me. If I was in love with someone, someone I thought I knew inside and out, why couldn’t I speak up about racism?

Whether it was comments they had made or the topic as a whole, I could never bring myself to broach it out of fear of causing unnecessary friction. 

True love is being vocal and making sure your voice is heard (Picture: Jazmin Duribe)

So here I am, a Black woman that has only dated white men. I have been guilty of letting things slide for the sake of ignorant bliss but racism will not just vanish by ignoring it, or being silent, because that can be seen as complicity. Acceptance, even. 

I believed that being in an interracial relationship was no different to being with someone of the same race. Like any other couple, you go on dates, meet each other’s friends and family and argue about what box set to watch.

But what I thought was a shared experience is simply a delusion. Even if you and your partner grew up in the same town, on the same street, being a different race comes with a completely different set of challenges and experiences. 

I wouldn’t say no to entering an interracial relationship again – but there will be some rules. 

Race will have to be discussed at the very start. Would a man be prepared, for instance, to raise a Black child who will come with a set of problems they’ve never had to face? What steps will they take to be proactively be anti-racist?

More: UK

Mum says police 'dehumanised' her daughters by 'taking selfies at murder scene'

Jurgen Klopp's wife played key role in Liverpool manager snubbing Man Utd job

Hotel staff 'warned about Glasgow stabbing suspect's mental state' before attack

I will not accept someone who refuses to acknowledge their privilege, thinks racist jokes are just ‘banter’ and who doesn’t read up on systemic racism. I won’t give them a copy of Why I’m No Longer Talking To White People About Race and hope for the best.

True love isn’t colour blind, in fact, it’s the opposite. True love is about the ability to be open and honest with someone without fear of repercussions. 

True love is being vocal and making sure your voice is heard. True love is recognising your differences, not ignoring them.

*Names have been changed

Last week in Love, Or Something Like It: My ex is my best friend

SHARE YOUR LOVE STORY

Love, Or Something Like It is a regular series for Metro.co.uk, covering everything from mating and dating to lust and loss, to find out what love is and how to find it in the present day. If you have a love story to share, email rosy.edwards@metro.co.uk

MORE: What heartbreak taught me about true love

MORE: Dating as a plus-size woman means relentless rejection

MORE: Being a virgin makes it so much harder to find love

[fashiontrendin-blog]

From Cloth of Gold to Spider Silk: On the Strange Evolution of Fabrics

http://fashion-trendin.com/from-cloth-of-gold-to-spider-silk-on-the-strange-evolution-of-fabrics/

From Cloth of Gold to Spider Silk: On the Strange Evolution of Fabrics

From what I’ve gathered in my short life, never in history has a human being looked at a woolly animal, fibrous plant or cocooned insect and not thought about turning that sucker into fabric. And frankly, you have to admire the gall it must have taken to look at some of this stuff — like say, gold — and think, I like it as a lump of metal, but I’d like it more as a coat.

This isn’t a purely historical phenomenon; it has informed an evolving industry. Modern technology has granted us the ability to turn basically anything into anything (listen, I’m not a scientist), and a lot of that’s involved making fabric. Modern people still want to wear crazy stuff, but instead of cocoons and gold, we’re looking for the obscure and strange, like holograms, hagfish slime, mycelium (a fungal filament) and spider silk. Textiles of the future basically have to blow our minds or GTFO — we’re very emotionally invested. Perhaps this emotional investment has something (or everything) to do with textiles’ entwinement within modern forms of self-expression and individuality.

Fabrics may have originated as solutions for covering the body, but they have become priceless signifiers of the wearer’s or creator’s individual qualities, tastes and extraordinary abilities. On the runway, to use a rather explicit example, fabrics – their colors, weights and origins – retain special, nearly talismanic significance in the fashion world. During the Fall/Winters 2018 shows, they showed up in an exceptional way. I know it’s May, but the Paris showings specifically got me thinking about what makes certain ones so covetable and captivating. Here’s what I think: The things we choose to cover ourselves with are intimately linked with how we see our place on Earth. Our pursuit of fine fabric tells a story about our enterprising, curious sensibility and how far we’re willing to go to express ourselves. Spoiler: it is extremely far, occasionally gross, and involves a flexible but significant number of spiders.

Shining silver garments dominated collections by Paco Rabanne and Off-White; gold metallic fabric featured in collections by Chanel and Rochas; holographic pieces were on display at Maison Margiela and Maryam Nassir Zadeh. Balmain had it all: silver, chrome, giant paillettes, tiny paillettes and holographic everything. The delicacy of the holographic print looked precious and priceless, like something woven by David Bowie in heaven. The pearly sheers were more precious but just as otherworldly. Across shows, these shiny fabrics were chased with quieter but still formidable ones – botanical patterns (Giambattista Valli, Valentino); richly dyed wool, silk and lace (Chloe, Carven, Rick Owens, Isabel Marant); lots of shearling and furry fuzziness (Dries Van Noten, Christian Dior, Givenchy, Loewe).

Over the course of human history, we’ve imbued fabric with special and supernatural significance. In both Greek and Norse mythology, fate is measured out by a spun thread, and in Chinese mythology, a red thread binds together people fated to fall in love. Almost every goddess in the aforementioned mythologies is said, at some point, to have woven; Athena, Frigg and Holda did so prolifically. Philomela in Ovid’s Metamorphoses accuses her attackers through her loom when she can no longer speak, and the crane wife’s one rule (one rule!) for her husband is that he not observe her weaving. A Tang Dynasty legend tells us that heavenly weavers were so good, they created seamless robes straight from the loom.

Although mythological textiles tend to have supernatural capabilities and origins, many of them feature fabrics we have here on real-life Earth. For instance, Little Red Riding Hood’s cloak is said to be samite (a heavy silk interwoven with gold or silver) in one story; the Golden Fleece might be byssus (also known as sea silk); Rumpelstiltskin’s thread is certainly the wrapped silk used to make cloth of gold; Hercules discovered Tyrian purple dye after he had to pry the snail that makes the dye out of his dog’s mouth on a beach.

In my view, the weirdest and most luxurious of old world textiles is byssus, a.k.a. sea silk. It is secreted (ew) by a very rare and specific type of clam called a pen shell, then cured, then spun and woven into a supernaturally lightweight, iridescent gold fabric. Since 1992, the clam has been protected by the European Union, and only one woman, Chiara Vigo, still makes the fabric. Everything about the process sounds like something you’d have to do in a fairytale to pay off a talking animal or because a witch told you to. According to this account of Vigo’s process, in the spring, in the moonlight, in a white tunic, Vigo swims in the shallows off of Sant’Antioco. She trims the fiber from the clams. When she weaves, she does so according to the tradition of 24 generations of her ancestors. About 60 artifacts of antique sea silk remain, and because byssus in Latin can also mean “fine linen,” historians cannot be totally sure if it is indeed clam fibers that feature in the Rosetta Stone, the Bible and Cleopatra’s wardrobe. But because sea silk has an extraordinarily light texture and is difficult to make in any quantity, I’m pretty certain it was always prized.

Cloth of gold (also probably worn by Cleopatra) is a uniquely straightforward term; there’s really no ambiguity or poetic license in the name. It’s cloth. Of gold. It is made by hammering gold into a very fine strip and wrapping it around a silk thread and then weaving away. The end product is stiff, heavy and ludicrously expensive. It was a special favorite of the Byzantine court and Henry VIII, whose Field of the Cloth of Gold summit featured so much cloth of gold it’s stupid. Edward Hall wrote that on one day, “Henry’s armour-skirt and horse-trapper were decorated with 2,000 ounces of gold.” Which sounds extra even for Henry. For regular folks, the best way to get near some cloth of gold was, simply, to die. “Individuals of the middling and lower sort could hire funerary textiles from their parish or borrow them from a livery company or guild,” explains Maria Hayward in Rich Apparel: Clothing and the Law in Henry VIII’s England. “Many of these palls and hearse clothes … combined velvet and cloth of gold embroidery.” So hey! Chins up, fishmongers.

24 PHOTOS click for more

Tyrian purple silk also has its origins in special shellfish, and yes, it’s also a secretion. Tyrian purple is well documented in ancient law (it was the jealously-guarded color of Byzantine emperors), writing and existing artifacts. What’s unclear is if it was actually purple in the way we think of purple today. A 1922 edition of the New York Zoological Society Bulletin says that, “[W]ith a certain degree of regularity come to us the questions, ‘What shells did the Phoenicians use for the famous Tyrian dye?’ And ‘Was not true Tyrian purple more red than purple?’” (Clearly not everybody was having fun in the Roaring Twenties.) The zoological society wasn’t confident about the shade. From the vantage point of 2018, its answer is very telling about the ambiguity of purples: “The question as to whether Tyrian purple was more red than purple is a difficult one; for violet, of course, shades into red.” Contemporary sources that compare the most costly mix of the dye to “blackish clotted blood” seem to back this up. Like every other hyper-luxury textile, suffering was put into Tyrian purple production. According to an account by Pliny the Elder, it took more than ten days to boil the snails into dye, and it smelled really, really bad.

In 2018, the fashion industry is looking to sustainability and durability to guide new textile discoveries instead of looking at low supply and high demand. Even still, as with byssus, cloth of gold and Tyrian purple, today’s textile trends come from unexpected places and are mostly rooted in trying to wrestle non-fabric luxuries onto fabric. The top bananas of these trends are spider silk, holographic metallics and, more conceptually, pink.

In 2017, Stella McCartney started using synthetic spider silk in a few garments. Spider silk — the real stuff, I mean — is apparently awesome. It’s very, very tough and very, very light. So why not use spider silk? The obvious answer is that it will result in your neighbor starting a spider farm in his apartment. Fortunately for everyone, this is not how it works, but that fact has been history’s greatest barrier to spider silk production. The man who presented Louis XIV with a pair of spider silk stockings kept running into an issue where a roomful of spiders would not diligently make a roomful of spider silk because they just ate each other. Typical. Spider silk in any sufficient quantity is hell to collect and involves more spiders than anyone should have to think about.

In 2012, after eight years of work by two men and, allegedly, more than a million spiders, a cape made of deep gold spider silk was finally produced and taken on tour. All this is to say: The product is great, but the production is so ludicrously impractical that the only reasonable way to do it has been to genetically engineer it. The good news is synthetic spider silk has the same tensile strength, lightness and tactile appeal (!) of regular spider silk, but minus the bad part, which is spiders. And time. Synthetic spider silk is 98 percent water and 0 percent spiders, involves fermented yeast and has appeared in the aforementioned Stella McCartney collection as well as an Adidas sneaker. In a New Yorker piece titled “In the Future, We’ll All Wear Spider Silk,” Nicola Twilley claims that someday, we’ll all be wearing spider silk. See you there?!?

Holographic color –not really a color but a three-dimensional light field — is honestly so damn confusing it’s hard to even talk about without being arrested by the science police and carted off to science prison. But there is an incredible hubris behind the desire to turn an entire spectrum of light – not even one dimension of it, but three dimensions — into clothes that I find deeply compelling. Not unlike whatever ancient rich guy decided he wanted to wear gold as a coat, in recent years, we have decided we want to wear light. Just…light. Unfortunately for us, it’s super hard to do. If you Google search “holographic vs. iridescent,” you will get lots of results about makeup (and, indeed, Pat McGrath herself did holographic lips for the Maison Margiela show) and none at all about holograms. But holographic color is not iridescent or even prismatic. There’s actually an entire YouTube channel devoted to identifying holographic colors. Holographic prints have the most in common with the rainbow security holograms (which are not true holograms) printed onto credit cards and computer products and just about every outfit the kids wore in Zenon: Girl of the 21st Century. (In this respect, someone should alert the academy that the movie accurately predicted life in the 21st century.) “Holographic” in the fashion sense is not a hologram, or even technically holographic, but the implication of photoscience is enough to be aspirational. Like spider silk, we’re working on it.

While we’re on the topic of colors, it’s worth noting that pink, as concept more than color, has almost reached textile-levels of revelry. It also has a nearly scientific taxonomy: Barbie pink, millennial pink, Nantucket red, rose gold, etc.. Pink exists across a spectrum even wider than purple, and even though it is not the color of royalty, it comes with a lot of assumptions. In August of 2016, The Cut innocently wondered, “Is There Some Reason Millennial Women Love This Color?” If only they knew what was to come. The article theorized that millennial pink was “ironic pink,” but two years later millennial pink is dead serious. As for the reason, it might be nostalgic, it might be a rejection of notions about seriousness in dress, it might be a rebuke of the notion of gendered colors — it might be anything. A 2007 study identified a gender division along the red-green color axis and then goofily theorized that women prefer redder colors because, during human evolution when “men hunted, women gathered, and they had to be able to spot ripe berries and fruits.” Everybody…doing okay over in science?

Anyway, during Paris Fashion Week, pink was featured by Zuhair Murad, Mulberry and Alexander McQueen, among others. This certainly wasn’t the first time we’ve seen heavy pink on the runway; by now the trend has been going strong for about four years. Though millennial pink peaked in 2016 and trend forecasters in 2017 were sure that pink itself would give way to primary colors, it’s hung on in real life as well as on runways, becoming more and more serious, more and more acceptable, more and more mature. Every era has a color; maybe pink is ours.

So, fabric. It’s where we project our creative fantasies, the substance of fate, a vehicle of vanity, the stuff we wear to keep warm and be who we want to be. A lot of it comes from secretions. Textiles and their colors bestow meaning on the wearer — a silk shirt, a red dress, a camel hair coat. Like almost every way we communicate, the meanings are ephemeral, and textiles go extinct somewhat regularly. One day, for instance, we will lose sea silk entirely. Cloth of gold is now limited to the manufacturing of gaudy ties, and we can no longer remember what the exact shade of Tyrian purple was, but something tells me textiles will always have a future. Their ability to combine visual and tactile pleasure with cultural significance makes them uniquely suited to stick around, even if in the form of spider silk, three dimensional light, the color pink…oh, and hagfish slime.

Turn on your JavaScript to view content

Photographed by Miriam Waldner. Styled, art directed and modeled by Stella von Senger; Makeup by Aennikin; Assisted by Sophia Steube.