#polyamorous main characters

[ameliandil]

Art for chapter 1 of Hidden Phantom! Edward and Danny sitting on their couch, watching television and grading papers. The view is from behind them.

My beta reader is J05U_404 and I had the help of Snow_Siren with polyamory-related things (both people are on on AO3)!

From this chapter:

By the time Danny comes back to the kitchen, Edward is popping popcorn and reading. He needs to grade a few assignments from the architecture class he added (unfortunately, he has to teach it, which means grading. Disgusting. And with the parent-teacher conference in a few weeks and reports coming out soon, Edward cannot afford to get behind on it.). Thankfully, it’s just six papers since the class is small, and they’re only one paragraph each. Some of his students are very long-winded though, which means paragraphs approximately the size of the Angkor Wat. Conveniently, that temple is exactly the topic.

The first analysis is fine, though it leaves out some details. The second, well, even at a short glance, Edward knows it will be messy. He glances up at the creak of the refrigerator door opening.

Danny is poking around in the refrigerator, and after a few moments he fishes out a cup of yoghurt and sits down beside Edward with his own small stack of quizzes and a sticker booklet. He flicks the TV on and they both listen to the news and grade, leaning gently against each other.

Every few minutes they bump elbows as they write feedback, and after some time Edward nudges the bowl of popcorn in Danny’s direction. Danny grabs a few with his left hand and keeps writing with his right, murmuring a soft thank you.

About a half hour into their Saturday night routine, words catch Edward’s attention.

“Breaking news: a situation is developing in downtown Chicago where what appears to be a large robot and a group of unknown individuals are fighting. What these individuals are is a mystery because all of them seem to be…superpowered?”

[lilacs-stash]

I don’t think Knife/Suitcase is inherently a bad ship in fact it makes quite a bit of sense. The problem is fandom wise it’s based off of episodes that completely destroy both characters and their relationship so people aren’t really shipping Knife and Suitcase in the first place.

And mix that with people treating their friendship like it’s the most important thing to both characters when it really. Isn’t.

Both of them have other relationships that are way more important. (Okay Knife has exactly one that being Mic but still Suitcase has THREE). I’m not saying they aren’t important to each other because they are!!! It’s just, others are more. And you CAN ship characters who aren’t each others main guy I’m a Basebulb shipper for crying out loud but when the fandom is so. Monogamous about it. Idk.

Heck Suitcase and Knife’s arcs aren’t that intertwined. They help each other and grow from each other but they’re kinda off doing their own things most of the time. It’s just very weird to see people prioritizing their relationship over the characters who define their arcs. 

[ranchracoon]

Make Me Yours Master Post

For the past few years there has been an empty space inside Carmen that grows bigger and bigger. All of her family has found their mates, and settled down except for her. She finally decides to try and reach out to her goddesses, even her ancestors but is only greeted with silence. That is until strange dreams plague her sleep every night to the point she's restless and decides to act. So she leaves her island home to face the unknown world beyond to try and find the meaning of these dreams. In her search she stumbles upon a village in the middle of the mountains of Romania, where the villagers are every thing but friendly. Her attempts at escape are futile for she soon realizes this is where her dreams meant for her to be.

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

Chapter 4

Chapter 5

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

Chapter 8

Chapter 9

Chapter 10

Chapter 11

Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Chapter 14

Chapter 15

[hazystarss]

I read @xiranjayzhao’s iron widow! It’s SO good. I’ve already pre-ordered heavenly tyrant

Like who needs love triangles when you have polyamory!!

this is your sign to read it lmao..

[atomskdluffy]

I finished Baldur's Gate 3 tonight, and I am almost completely satisfied. It was a spectacular game! A lot of thought and patience goes into it, especially when you play like I do with mods that expand the party and my insatiable need for loot. The story and the characters are all beautifully written, and I can see how there might be thousands of different ways to play it! I think the only addition I could possibly ask for is for something at the very end, one of those sequences where the narrator tells us what each character in the party goes on to do after the credits roll. Other than that, I am quite satisfied with how it turned out! I got the endings I wanted, the mods I used upped the quality of life to the max, and I had so much fun playing! If you have the time for a game as involved as this one, I absolutely 100% recommend it!

[need1etail]

*holding up a set of keys and jingling it in front of people's faces* ASK ME ABOUT MY BOOK

[nightmarecountry]

What element Writer are you?

Water Writer

Just like water, you carry your readers in a new world, and they just can’t do anything but follow. Your poetic writing allures the readers in with beautiful words, just for them to find themselves on the deepest oceans floors, where you make them taste pain in its sweetest form. Water writers are the gentlest liars, they show the readers a small stream, and no one can see the waterfall at the end. If you were a tag, you would definitely be ‘Everything is Beautiful But Everything Hurts’.

Cliffhangers are one of your strong points that, mixed with your incredible versatility, make you a great writer. Your stories have a deep meaning, and never miss to leave traces on your readers hearts. You don’t limit yourself, you like to explore the deepest parts in the human soul, and that’s why readers can sometimes find MCD in your stories. Your endings tend to be sad or open, and your stories have the power to drag your readers with you, from the highest waves of a storm, and to the darkest secrets of the ocean.

tagged by: I stole it from ohsunshine and savagecowboy and now you may steal it from me.

[wendoscillatewildly]

風雲雄霸天下 The Storm Riders pt.1

Origin: Hong Kong  Genre: Wuxia Fantasy Director: Lau Wai-keung Andrew Cast: Cheng Yee-Kin Ekin, Kristy Yang, Kwok Fu-shing Aaron, Shu Qi, Chiba Shinichi

[perlukafarinn]

wait what the everloving fuck happened in the riverdale finale

[catwouthats]

Found family in the way that he found three wives, one husband-wife, one husband, and two wife-in-laws

[dxxtruction]

///

[homunculus-argument]

You know what'd be really refreshing to see? A story where every main character just genuinely, openly, and purely loves each other, and nobody has a problem with it or thinks it's weird. Are they polyamorous, just intensely good friends, is it sexual, romantic, platonic? You can't tell where one ends and another begins. And whatever drama there is between the main characters is about genuinely wanting the best for each other, but disagreeing about what it is or how to get it.

Like imagine a scene where a woman sees her fiancé kiss another man on the mouth and later walks up to the man like "I see that he loves you as deeply as I love him, never dare to break his heart."

And the guy, who just put together that this must be his boyfriend's girlfriend, just goes "my lady I would push my sword through my own throat before I'd let him come to harm."

And this is just depicted as a perfectly normal way for people to talk to each other and about each other.

[planet-magic-land]

deciding all my main characters sleep together in One Big Bed in One Big Gay Polyamorous Lump? best decision of my life 🛏️<-💤

[gangtheway]

🍌

Ask Received: Oct 8, 2022

Referencing This Post

🍌 Banana: You’re fun to talk to!

Now I know some of yall are lying.

[darknight3904]

Every Breath You Take

Tommy Miller x Fem!Reader, Slowburn!Joel Miller x Fem!Reader

Summary: Traveling through the post-apocalyptic world is never easy. Lucky for you, the Miller brothers make decent company, most of the time.

Warnings: This story is 18+. Included, but not limited to: Explicit smut (chapters will be marked with a ** ), canon typical violence, language, gore, and horror. Minor character death, child death, SA / rape , suicide, and depression. These warnings may change at any time, as this story is not completed.

Reader, Joel, and Tommy are not polyamorous; the story explores romantic relationships with both Tommy and Joel, but not at the same time.

Word Count: 48k

Part One

The End of The World

On the Road Again

Strangers

The Cabin in Kentucky

Elephants

Good Vibrations**

Death

Rebirth

Wildflowers

Part Two

Proving it**

End of the Beginning

Tragedy

Under the Same Moon

The Red Armchair

Untitled 1

Untitled 2

The current chapter amount is not decided.

Cross-posted on AO3.

Back to Main Masterlist

[crimeronan]

^^all really excellent commentary and GREAT stuff to think about if you're way past the 'learning what metamours are' stage of exploring poly representation, and/or if you're writing stuff that's very different from typical romance formula.

i've seen a couple people in the notes of this very good post about fictional polyamory by @thebibliosphere say things along the lines of "oh, i've been doing it wrong :(" or "how do i know if i did this right??" or "i should probably give up and start over, i wrote this badly :(" and. no!!!!

(i AM seeing far MORE people say "oh, this clarified and helped me so much, i think i know how to fix issues i've been having with my own story" which. YES!!!!)

listen. if you're a monogamous person who's writing a polyamorous relationship, and you've been focusing mainly on The Triad and All Three Together All The Time as the endgame, that's literally fine. that's a perfectly acceptable and strong starting point for your plotting, imo. you do not need to give up on a story that you've started like this.

but the things discussed in the post Can and Should improve your execution!

you can keep the same plot beats and overall relationship arc 100%. polyamorous relationships are infinite in their formations, every one is unique. "basically a monogamous romance but with three people" Does exist, as a relationship type. you're not hashtag Misrepresenting (TM) poly people with it

BUT i do think it will help to read up on some poly people talking about how their relationships Differ from monogamous ones.

so i have outlined some basic important concepts about polyamory.

MORE IMPORTANTLY though, i've broken down some questions that you can answer throughout the writing process to strengthen your individual dyad relationships, your individual characterization, & your characters' individual feelings/experiences. this is a writing resource have fun

future kitkat butting in to say i spent over two hours writing this and it definitely needs a readmore. it is also NOT comprehensive. but everything should be pretty simple to follow! feel free to reblog if you find it helpful yourself or just want to reward me for how gotdan long this took KSLDKFJKDL.

i've grabbed quick links for a couple of the important concepts, some have SEO pitches in them but the info largely seems to be good. (if i missed anything Egregiously Gross on these sites i should be able to update the links with better ones later, since they're under the readmore.)

sidenote: this is NOT meant to be overwhelming, despite the length. if you can't read all of this, that's Okay. you do not need to give up on your writing.

here we go:

compersion!

compersion is a BIG thing in a lot of polyamorous relationships. it's joy derived from seeing two (or more) of your partners happy together, or joy derived from seeing your partner happy with someone else.

compersion is really important as a concept because it highlights that every individual relationship within a polycule is different -- and that that's a GOOD thing. it's sort of the inverse of jealousy.

by the "inverse of jealousy," i mean that instead of feeling left out and upset and possessive, you feel happy/joyous/content.

i can use personal experience as an example: it's a Relief for me when my partners receive joy/support/sex/romance/etc that i can't (or prefer not to) give them. and i love seeing my partners make each other laugh and be silly together.

it's 100% okay for a poly triad not to be together 100% of the time, it doesn't mean that the third member is being left out or not treated equally when two people do things alone together.

(i have individual dates with my partners all the time! PLUS larger 3-and-4-person date nights.)

if the third member DOES feel jealous or left out, then the polycule can have a conversation to figure out what needs/wants aren't being met, and solve that. this happens semi-regularly in my polycule, as it will happen in any relationship (including monogamous ones)! it's just part of being an adult, sometimes you have to talk about feelings.

metamours!

a metamour is someone who is dating your partner, but ISN'T dating you. this may not be relevant for people writing closed three-person romantic sexual triads, but it's a super helpful term to know.

the linked article also lists different types of metamour relationships with some fun phrasing i hadn't heard before. the tl;dr is: sometimes you'll be domestic cohabitation friends, sometimes you'll be buddies with your own friendship, sometimes you might not interact much outside of parties, every relationship is different.

there's no one-size-fits-all requirement for metamour relationships. sometimes polyamorous people will end up dating their metamour after a while (has happened to me), sometimes polyamorous people will break up with one partner for normal life reasons, but remain friendly metamours.

the goal of polyamory is NOT for EVERYONE to fall in love. it is 100% okay if this happens in your story, it happens in real life too! but it is also 100% okay for characters to be metamours without ever becoming "more than friends."

(sidenote: try to kill any internalized "more than" that you have when it comes to friendship. friends are just as important and special and vital as partners.)

of course there are a million ways for messiness to occur with metamours within a complex polycule, exactly like with close-knit platonic friend groups. however this post is not about that! there's enough "here's how polyamory can go wrong" stuff out there already, so i'm focusing on the positives here :)

open versus closed polyamorous relationships!

i'm struggling to find an online article that reflects my experience without directly contradicting at least SOME stuff. so i'll give a quick rundown

google has a bunch of conflicting definitions of open relationships and whether open relationships are different from polyamory. the general consensus seems to be that an open relationship prioritizes one partnership (often a marriage), but that each partner can have extraneous flings or long-term commitments (most often sexual in nature).

this is not typically how i use the term wrt polyamory. the poly concept is pretty simple. a closed polyamorous relationship is one with boundaries like a monogamous one. there are multiple partners in the polycule, but they are not interested in having anybody new join said polycule.

an open polyamorous relationship tends to be more flexible -- it just means that IF someone in the polycule develops mutual feelings for a new person, it's fine for them to become part of said polycule if they want to! the relationship/person is open to newcomers.

some groups will need to negotiate this all together, others will just go "haha, you kids have fun." just depends on the individuals!

with open AND closed polyamorous relationships, the most important thing is making sure that there's respectful communication and that everyone is on the same page. but there's no one-size-fits-all way to do that.

i wish i could give you guys a prescriptive "You Must Do It This Way" guide, but that's.... basically the opposite of what polyamory is about, HAHA.

feelings for multiple people!

i was gonna tack this on to the previous section but decided it warranted its own lil bit.

a defining feature (....i'm told?) of monogamous relationships is that a monogamous person only has feelings for One individual at a time. they only want a relationship with one individual at a time. or, if they DO have feelings for multiple people simultaneously, they're still only comfortable dating one person at a time & being exclusive with that one person.

this is perfectly fine!

the poly experience is generally different from this. but once again..... polyamorous people all have different individual perspectives on this.

for me, i have never been able to draw hard boxes around romantic vs sexual vs platonic relationships, & i love many people at once. my personal polycule lacks many strict definitions beyond "these are my chosen people, i want to forge a life with them indefinitely, whatever shape that life takes"

some poly people feel explicit romantic or sexual attraction to multiple people at once, some poly people feel almost no romantic or sexual attraction at all. i'd say that MOST poly people feel different things for different partners, which is not a bad thing!

some poly people are even monogamous-leaning -- they have just chosen one romantic partner who is themselves part of a larger polycule. (so this monogamous-leaning person has at least one metamour!)

or alternatively, they might have one romantic partner AND a qpr, or other ways of defining relationships. (this is a factor in my own polycule!)

i made this its own point because if you're writing a straightforward triad, this is unlikely to come up in the story itself -- but it's worth thinking about how your characters develop/handle feelings outside of their partnerships.

like, is this sort of a soulmateship, 'these are the only ones for me' type deal? in which they won't fall in love with anyone else, and can be fairly certain of that?

that's pretty close to typical monogamous standards but you Can make it work. just be thoughtful with it

alternatively, can you see any of these characters falling in love Again after the happily-ever-after? and how would the triad approach it, if so? what would they all need to talk about beforehand, and what feelings would everybody have about the situation?

it's worth considering these questions even if the hypothetical will never feature in your actual canon, because knowing the answers to these questions will help you understand all of the individuals & their relationship(s) MUCH better.

i've been typing this for nearly two hours and there's a lot more i COULD say because... there's just a lot to say. i'll close out with some quick questions that you can ask yourself when developing the dyad dynamics within your triad

first, take a page and create a separate section for each individual dyad. then answer these questions for every pair:

how does each pair act when alone?

how do they act differently alone compared to when they're with their third partner?

are there any elements of this dyad (romantic, sexual, financial, domestic, etc) that these two people DON'T have with the third partner?

if so, what are they?

are there any boundaries or hard limits within this dyad that aren't shared with the third partner?

if so, what are they?

partner 3 goes out of town alone for a few weeks. what are the remaining two doing in their absence?

(doesn't have to be anything special, it's just to get a sense of how the two interact on a day-by-day basis without the third there)

what is something that each partner in the dyad admires about the other -- that they DON'T necessarily see in the third partner?

what problem do These Two Specifically need to solve in the story before their relationship will work?

how is that problem DIFFERENT from the problems being solved within the other two dyads?

doing this for ALL THREE dyads is VITAL imo. that way, you develop complex and nuanced and different relationships that all have unique dynamics.

those questions should be enough to get you started, i hope

then After you've charted the differences in relationships, you can start to jot down similarities in the overarching triad. what does one person admire in Both of their partners? what are activities that all three like to do together? what are boundaries or discussions that all three share?

but the main goal is to figure out how to Differentiate each relationship!

a polycule is only as strong as the individual relationships within it. if two people are struggling with their own relationship, adding a third person won't fix that.

(UNLESS the third person is the catalyst for those two to, like, Actually Communicate And Work Their Shit Out. i just mean that the old adage of "maybe if we just add a third-" works about as well to fix a miserable non-communicative marriage as, uh, "maybe if we have a baby-")

AND FINALLY.

if you're not sure whether your poly romance reads organically to poly people, you can hire a sensitivity reader with poly experience. if you can't afford that, you can read up on polyamorous resources like a glossary of terms & articles actually written by poly people. (and stories written by poly people!)

you can also just.... ask poly people questions, if they're open to it. i like talking about polyamory and my own relationships so you're welcome to send asks if u want, i just can't guarantee i'll answer bc my energy levels fluctuate a lot and i don't always have time.

polyamorous people are in an uphill battle for positive representation right now & so the LAST thing i want to see is authors giving up on their stories bc they're worried about getting things Wrong. well-meaning and positive stories that treat this kind of love as normal, healthy, & aspirational are So So So Needed. even if you guys end up with some funky-feeling details.

seriously, if you're monogamous then you probably don't have a full idea of Just How Nasty a lot of people can get about polyamory. i wish it DIDN'T mean so much for you guys to want to write nice stories about us, but it does mean a lot. and it means a lot that you want to do it WELL.

in conclusion. this is not a prescriptive guide, it's just a way to raise questions. and also, you all are doing FINE.