October 6: Corn Maze
Just a note that Harry's ace in this one (I'm working through a lot with my sexuality atm). There are lots of different ways of being ace, lots of different experiences, and I'm not trying to imply this is everyone's experience (but it is mine, so) just wanted to offer a sensitivity warning.
Harry wasn't overly fond of mazes. Not since fourth year, in particular, but also not since everything in his life seemed to be misdirection.
Lately, he'd been feeling like there'd been one too many turns, one too many dead ends, one too many miss-steps; at some point, it felt like he ought to have been due a break.
Still, he found himself with his friends and his godchildren at a literal corn maze; a race to get to the center. And Harry couldn't really have cared less about winning.
He turned down another way, heard a child a few rows over shriek with delight as they ran past, corn rustling, and wished in the very depth of his bones that he could feel simple joy like that, wondered if he ever would. Realizing it was another dead end, he sighed and started to turn back.
"I was hoping I'd find you," spoken softly, just behind him.
"Circe, Draco," he breathed, "you startled me."
Draco was standing there, wearing an over-sized maroon jumper that covered his fingers, blonde hair slipping out of its braid leaving strands framing his face. And Harry ached with how he loved him, ached with the ways he didn't (couldn't).
"Why were you hoping to find me?"
He tucked a strand of fine blond hair behind his ear as he stepped into his space, "So I could do this," he whispered, leaning in and kissing him sweetly.
And, oh, Harry loved kissing. He loved his friends, loved Draco in particular. He loved being able to touch him, loved holding his hand and carding his fingers through his hair. Kissing him at the pub a few nights ago, he hadn't meant to, it had- "Draco, wait-"
"Oh," he said, taking a step back, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to overstep, after Monday, I thought-"
"Wait," he said, reaching out to take the other man's hand, holding it, "listen. I-" he broke off, shook his head, exhaled. How had his life become this? "I don't want to mislead you."
"Right," he said taking a step back, shaking his head. "You're not interested. You were drinking, we were drinking. It's fine, let's forget about it."
"I'm ace," he blurted, not knowing how else to say it, not knowing how to tell Draco it wasn't about him, it was entirely about Harry. "And I love you, Draco. You are one of my best friends. If you asked me tomorrow if I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you, I'd say yes. I love you with my whole heart."
Draco sat down on the ground, staring up at Harry. "I'm-" he shook his head, "I am so confused."
Harry collapsed next to him, wrapped his arms around his knees. "I'm asexual-" he started again.
"No, I heard that," he said, "and I heard you tell me that you love me, that you'd spend the rest of your life with me-"
"I would, Draco," he said earnestly.
"But you don't want to kiss me?" he asked, brow furrowing.
He shook his head, "It's not that I don't want to kiss you." He scrubbed his nails through the short hair at the base of his neck before ruffling the curls at the top of his head. "It's that I love you so much but I'll never be in love with you. Not the way you-" he broke off, choking on the words, "not the way you deserve. I would kiss you, I'd cuddle with you; hell, I'd have sex with you and I would probably like it. But I'd like it because I love you, not because I care about the sex," he rambled, seemingly unable to stop himself now that he started, a freight train rolling down a hill unable to brake, "but I'm not opposed, I just won't think about it. And I won't-"
"Harry," he said, reaching out and putting his hands on both of Harry's shoulders, "hey. Woah. Slow down, take a breath," he said softly. "Can I hold your hands?" he asked, moving a bit to sit in front of him.
Harry nodded, feeling teary, reaching out and taking the other man's hands in his.
"I hope you know that I would never ask you to do something you're uncomfortable with," he started. "You're so important to me, I'd never ask you to have sex if it wasn't something you wanted-"
"It's not about the sex." He shook his head, "I like orgasms, I'm not sex-repulsed; it's probably why it took me so long to realize that I'm ace in the first place."
Draco squeezed his hands, "Thank you for telling me, for trusting me. But Harry, I can't understand what you meant by misleading me?"
"I don't," he shook his head, "I don't experience attraction the way that most people do, the way that you do. Sex isn't going to be the thing I think about. The way I love you," he shook his head, "I love you so much Draco but it's not the same as how you love me-"
"Does it have to be?" Draco asked. "Harry, you're everything to me," he breathed. "I love you too, I love you so much. And I'm in love with you. Does it have to be the same?"
Harry shook his head, "I don't know," he whispered. "I haven't the foggiest idea," he confessed. "It's never been enough in the past."
"What do you mean?"
"Before I understood my sexuality," he said. "I loved people before and I thought they loved me," he swallowed, "but I haven't been enough, haven't been right-"
"You're enough for me," Draco said, cupping Harry's cheek. "You're right for me. There's nothing wrong with you," he said gently. "I'm sorry that other people have made you feel like there is."
"Oh," he said faintly, equally wanting to brush him off and wanting Draco to give him more gentle reassurances.
"You don't have to believe me right away," Draco said. "I'm not going anywhere. I'm really rather gone on you," he chuckled self consciously.
He leaned forward, pressing his forehead into Draco's neck, "What if you change your mind?"
"I hear your concern," Draco said, hands soothing over Harry's back, "but what if I don't?"
Harry laughed softly, terrified of even letting himself imagine that as a possibility.
"What if you just let me love you? What if we just," he shrugged, jostling Harry's head, "let ourselves be happy?" he said like a question.
"I'm afraid," Harry confessed.
Draco nodded, wrapping him tighter in his arms, "me too. Terrified that you'll realize that I'm not worthy of your love. So afraid you'll wake up and realize that you don't actually love me."
"Draco," he said softly, pulling back to look at him, "that's not going to happen."
"I'm willing to try to trust you about that, if you're willing to try to trust me," he said with a shrug. "I really want this," he said, gesturing between the two of them, "I promise to be good to you," he added, voice soft and pleading.
"Draco," he whispered again, wanting, wanting, wanting. "Yes."
"Yeah?" he asked, grinning brightly at him.
He nodded, "yeah. Yes, if you're sure."
"Harry, there is nothing not to be sure about. I love you. You love me. We'll figure the rest out."
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written for the @flufftober prompt "Corn Maze"
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I’m not a shipper and I don't usually like this ship, but I’ve been thinking about romance and specifically my AroAce Scout headcanon a lot lately, so I present this:
Speedingbullet, but it was one-sided attraction on snipers part? And we followed how Scout feels about someone being in love with him when he can’t reciprocate it?
Sniper is a pretty distant lover, so Scout matches that distance, thinking that’s what Sniper wants from the relationship, but when they are together, when they are being loving, Scout tries to match Sniper's energy but he just can’t, he tries to put on an act of affection but it’s missing that key component he can’t quite place.
On one hand, Scout likes feeling loved, he likes feeling important, but on the other hand, the pet names and the touches and the kisses and the saccharine tone projected in Sniper's voice just make Scout so sick. He can’t get himself to return the same things with the same fervor with the same emotion behind them, and it drives him nuts because he doesn’t understand what’s different about his attraction for Sniper and vice versa. Does he even think Sniper is hot? Does he even find the man attractive? Or did he simply decide that, because Sniper confessed, he had to say yes, that maybe something would spark in him towards the man once he got into a relationship with him?
He’s never quite been romantically or sexually attracted to someone (sometimes he thinks it is attraction, but it isn’t) but at least with the women he dated, he found them hot in some sense of the word. Attractive, but in a different way, in a separate way from his peers. But with Sniper all he can see is another man, another guy. He feels nothing. And it’s not like he wants to feel this way. He wants to feel something, too, he wants to feel the connection that Sniper has with him, but he can’t, and it’s tearing him apart.
He can’t think to break it off because obviously Sniper’s happy, and it’s not like Scout’s hurt in any way, it’s not like Scout’s being abused by him. Is he the abuser here? Is he the one in the wrong, taking and taking Sniper's love but never giving it back the same way? He doesn’t want to hurt Sniper, but no matter what he does he’ll just fuck everything up, and he doesn’t want to do that. More than anything he’s lost and he’s confused, stuck in a situation he knows so many others would be begging for and knows he should be begging for, knows he should want more than anything, but he just doesn’t. It’s eating him alive.
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Mirabel Thoughts
Writing from the perspective of a villager and trying to decide how the different Madrigals look from the outside, and Mirabel is the one I’m having a hard time pinning. As usual, putting the thoughts to screen helps.
So obviously Mirabel doesn’t receive the same level of admiration as Isabela or Abuela, and she doesn’t seem to be relied upon as heavily as Luisa and Julieta. The warm color branch of the family seems to be high charisma, so they’re probably popular in the more traditional sense. And of course we know that Bruno is the least liked Madrigal. So what social niche is Mirabel fulfilling?
She doesn’t seem to be disliked, although she is shown to be pitied by the villagers (the “not special” special), she’s probably looked down upon just a little. She probably had to deal with some bullying from other kids, but not Complete Social Pariah levels. The threat of being the next Bruno is looming over her head but she’s not quite there yet.
I think, since she must fall somewhere on the middle of Popular to Pariah scale, she’s the sort of person who gets voted Everybody’s Best Friend in school. Idk if you had any one like this at your school, but when I was fifteen I had a few people who I didn’t think of as popular because they weren’t endlessly charismatic, constantly the center of attention, or noticeably cooler than the rest of us. But looking back, everyone liked them because they were just so nice. I’m picturing the girl who eventually ended up being voted Homecoming Queen for my grade specifically. I’ll name drop because it wasn’t her legal name and it’s a very common one.
So, Mary had a lot in common with Mirabel. She was intelligent, easy to talk to, and always happy to help. I didn’t think of her as being glamorously beautiful the same way Mirabel isn’t designed to be the next Disney Princess, but she was pretty and Mirabel is too. I didn’t think of her as being cool or an A-list kid or anything because she sometimes said things in an awkward way, or embarrassed herself, like Mirabel falling over stuff in the movie. While there were people that felt “cool” and who I therefore wanted to impress, Mary was just plain old pleasant to be around, I wanted to talk to her because I felt comfortable around her and enjoyed our conversations. And I thought of her as a friend because she treated me like a friend, she treated everybody like a friend, even people I thought sucked. She was very much down to earth and probably a lot more mature than I was at the time. I remember being pleasantly surprised to see her name on the ballot for homecoming queen, and even more so when she beat out the girl who fell more in line with what TV told me popular looks like. It really reframed the way I saw people. While it’s true that snobs and bullies sometimes gain social currency by convincing people they’re at the top of the ladder, being a genuine friend gets you farther than you realize.
I doubt Mirabel is a one to one comparison to this real world person I knew in high school, but I figure she probably has similar social standing. She has the social currency of being a Madrigal, then add in the fact that she would seem so much more down to earth than the other Madrigals while still being friendly and helpful, and you end up with a Mary. People probably don’t flock to her, but if I were fifteen and in the Encanto you could bet your ass I’d be happy to sit with her at lunch or see her at a party. I’m sure impressionable young me would be just as star struck as the rest of the villagers when it comes to Camilo and Isabela, and wiser adult me would of course want to hang out with Bruno, but I would be pleasantly surprised to see Mirabel’s name on the ballot for Harvest Festival Queen or whatever, and I would vote for her because “that’s my friend”.
Furthermore, Mirabel reminds me of somebody who has some sorta neurodivergence but flies under the radar with it. Considering the Madrigals seem to have a family history of anxiety disorders, Mirabel could too, autism is also in the running since Bruno and Antonio both show signs of it. She does remind me of a guy I knew at college #2 who had an anxiety disorder that bordered on being a physical disability rather than straight neurodivergence. For the most part his anxiety didn’t bother him, then every once in a while his body would decide “Ok! It’s panic attack time!” and he would start experiencing all the physical symptoms of a panic attack with no warning. The first time it happened to him he straight up thought he was having a heart attack because it was so out of no where. He was also not cool, but very kind and friendly, so I’m going to choose to believe that’s what Mirabel has going on. This figures into the equation because I’ve noticed that neurodivergent folks that fly under the radar usually get labeled as “quirky” and it’s considered a good trait, a relatable trait, but not necessarily a cool trait.
Conclusion: I am now convinced that Mirabel is considered the least “popular” Madrigal, but everybody sees her as their friend. She probably has the most genuine connections with the other residents of Encanto, followed by Félix and Agustín, then Luisa and Pepa (who work with the villagers doing odd jobs or watering the crops), then Alma and Dolores (Alma having real friends from before she was A Big Deal, and Dolores having earned a few very loyal friends by keeping their secrets), then Camilo and Julieta each have one or two friends outside the family but are much beloved/admired in a more superficial way, then Isabela is the most popular but also technically the most lonely since not even her family gets hints at her real self until after the movie. Bruno is, of course, in a league of his own because he’s in the walls, so yeah. And Antonio is five, so it’s a little too soon to judge.
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