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annonniiiiieeeee · 1 year

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hey, would it be ok/possible to give writing tips cus i recently started a fanfic and i want it to be as good as yours. Any suggestions?

I am super flatter. I’m I also have no clue what to say.

Guess some basics.

Keep your words varied.

Instead of “he said” “she said”

Try “he asked” “she responded”

It helps the writing run smoothly and also gives you more characterization as you can describe both the mood of conversation and the attitude of characters

Apply this overall. Not just for conversations but fight scenes and movement as well.

Merriam-webster site is great for this. Put it on thesaurus mode and it will give you a bunch of synonyms. They also help with characterization as well.

Words have power and the ones you pick are important. Some words carry different emotions with them. If you want to describe some one as caring you can used the words compassionate or the word benevolent. While both mean caring they symbolize a difference in character. (Again the thesaurus is super helpful for this.

Next conversation

Read back through your conversations. Not the actions or movement but just the quotations. See if the conversation actually flows.

Add movement to the conversation. What are the characters doing while they talk. Are the pacing are hug what is it.

Fight sequences.

These are hard to write. Know that going in. It’s okay to struggle here.

I use YouTube a lot here. There are experts there that break down fighting moves in video games, movies, shows ext. use it.

I watch one three second clip over and over until I write down the movements of the body, weapon, whatever it is.

Research.

This is really important. If you are using something that isn’t from your personal background research.

We have a vibrant community here and people love to share.

I have made plenty of mistakes. But people have been kind enough to point them out and help me fix them. I don’t know Spanish and I accidentally misspelled several words and many people reach out and helped me fix them.

Be open to positive feedback. There are a tone of creative minds here. I encourage people to theorize in my comments and then if I see a really good idea I will sometimes work it into the plot.

Set your characters

I knew my ending from the beginning. This allowed me to know where I wanted my characters to be at the end and create plot points that got them there.

Set some character traits and stick to them.

When in doubt go back to the original material. Donnie has a unique way of speaking he replaces common words with scientific all the time ie phalange sandwich instead of knuckle sandwich. Use that characterization to your advantage.

The video below is a great example of how to write a character and set their character traits. Yes it’s specifically about the scooby dip gang but you can take the criticism given and apply it to all modern media. It breaks down the characters to their core and describes what makes a good character of that archetype and how they fit together as a team. There’s also a good couple segment when he talks about Fred and Daphne. (This came out before Velma and it defiantly highlights how those writes fail without even trying)

youtube

Really great resource if you want to write a group together

Conflict

It’s okay to have simple conflicts or more then one. And it is okay to make a character grow. No character should be perfect.

Usagi had a mini arch. He is a protective person. When Leo was healing he was protecting him and saw him as someone who needed protection. He had a whole little fantasy about how they could live at the Tenshu with Leo’s family. I remember people being a little upset with him because he didn’t understand that Leo was a warrior to. But that was the point. He didn’t know. As soon as he did he could grow and change as well.

It’s okay to have little conflicts like that. But be carful how you handle miscommunication conflicts. If the problem can be solved by the characters sitting down and talking it probably shouldn’t be the main conflict. They are great for side conflicts but can be frustrating if it’s the main conflict of a long fic (short fics are fine)

Remember this is for fun. At the end of the day your here because you enjoy it. This is a creative outlet for people who enjoy creating. Don’t lose sight of that in the pursuit of perfection.

If I think of anything else I will add it here.

#asks #writing tips #writing #a world of samurais and ninjas

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the-meat-machine · 1 year

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4. How do you choose which fics to write?

11. Do you write scenes in order, or do you jump around?

12. Do you outline your fics? If yes, how detailed are your outlines? How far do you stray from them?

17. Do you have a writing routine?

18. Do you enjoy research? Which fic of yours required the most research?

21. Do you prefer writing chaptered fics or one-shots?

80. I have some story ideas but I don't know how to write them. How do I write those stories?

4 and 12 were already answered here!

11. Do you write scenes in order, or do you jump around?

Bruh, I can't even write a sentence in order. That said, lately I've been trying not to get TOO into the details of later scenes or later parts of scenes. I find that when I do, I end up having to scrap most of it because details I add in earlier make the later details not work.

So I guess my process is… I just write down any and all ideas I have as I think of them, no matter when in the scene or story they're supposed to go. But when I sit down to really hash out a full scene, I start from the beginning and use my random later ideas as a rough outline, knowing that I'll probably have to tweak or outright remove most of them once I get there.

It's also really, really common for me to leave placeholders in my scenes to come back to later. Extremely common. You have no idea. My early drafts are more placeholder than fic. The placeholders can range from standing in for "X action(s) need to happen here" to "I need another line or two of dialog here for this to flow right but I can't think of what" to "literally just cannot think of the word I'm looking for and don't want to break my flow right now to scour a thesaurus". Then later I gradually go back and fill in the placeholders, usually in several passes. Honestly, writing for me is more like putting together a puzzle than anything.

17. Do you have a writing routine?

The biggest "routine" thing for me is just that I try to make sure to write SOMETHING every day. On bad days, maybe that's as little as half a sentence, but at least that's half a sentence more than I had the day before. Most days, once I get started, I can keep going for at least an hour.

More specifically, I usually write in the mid-afternoon and/or late evening, laying on my living room floor for some goddamn reason. (Ok, I know the reason: it helps me to sit somewhere other than my usual chair so my brain has a cue that I'm in writing mode and not fucking-around-online mode.)

18. Do you enjoy research? Which fic of yours required the most research?

I love research and probably do way more of it than is really necessary. I tend to get real deep into ridiculous topics like snake reproduction or the chemical composition of semen, learning all sorts of details that don't end up reflected in the final fic at all.

I've done the most research for the lil buddy series, since it's set in the real world and I want to try to make sure my depiction of, for example, the Texas foster care system circa the mid-1980s is at the very least not so inaccurate as to be offensive. I still feel like it's probably not all that realistic, but I'm trying. (I also now know a hell of a lot about the timeline of VHS releases of The Muppet Show, which is obviously a very important detail that would have thrown people right out of the fic if I'd gotten it wrong.)

21. Do you prefer writing chaptered fics or one-shots?

I prefer one-shots. Pretty much all of my chaptered fics started out as one-shots that got out of hand. tear at me was supposed to be a one-shot. Playing House was supposed to be a one-shot. Hell, the entire lil buddy series (including several WIPs that I haven't posted yet) was supposed to be a single one-shot.

As mentioned before, I'm not good at, like… outlining. So working out how to structure and organize chaptered fics can be a challenge for me. This has been a major problem for my longest WIP, which I just have not been able to get to come together at all.

80. I have some story ideas but I don't know how to write them. How do I write those stories?

It's hard for me to answer this since I'm not sure what exactly you're struggling with. But I will say that sometimes I have an idea that feels Too Big or Too Important and I can't get a handle on how to write it in a way that I feel satisfied with.

In those cases, it helps me to just… set aside the big idea for the moment and focus in on one small aspect of it. One scene or one conversation that I feel like I can write. Or maybe a moment from the backstory to help explore the characters' motivations or the setting. Or even shift my focus for a while to some other small idea entirely, if I'm getting too frustrated metaphorically banging my head against this one.

(A few of my fics are actually a result of exactly the above process. Sugar-High Shenanigans is actually a scene from the aforementioned long fic that I've never finished. the perfect prayer was me exploring Bro's character when I felt stuck on tear at me. The lil buddy series is just the result of me breaking a longer fic idea into smaller, more manageable chunks.)

Basically, start out with something smaller in scope. Give yourself space to just try things out and not be perfect.

Along those lines, writing drabbles can be a fun exercise. Like, if you only have 100 words to convey an idea or a dynamic, what do you focus in on? It really forces you to distill the idea down to its essence. And they're pretty low-pressure, too, because even if you don't feel like you get it quite right, oh well, it's only 100 words; you can always try some other approach to the same idea another time.

I don't know if any of that helps, but yeah!

#ask meme #wow this got long haha. whoops

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seasidewriter1-writes · 3 years

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Replying to @elizabeth0020 for: Hello!! I’ve always wondered how you decide what arcs/episodes you’re going to write? There are sooooo many, how do you know what’s a good one for your story vs one that isn’t? And a second question (if you feel like answering lol): how do you picture all the details you wrote? Like lighting, movements, facial expression etc? You’re so good at that and I’ve always been amazed at how you come up with them!

I love answering anything and everything, so never worry about sending me too much! I don’t often get to talk about the technical stuff (like the questions you’ve asked), so I love getting any chance I have to talk about them! (So hold on tight, ‘cause this is a ramble! 😂)

So, for the first question regarding the arcs... I picked out what episodes/arcs I thought were beneficial when I did my first watch through of the Clone Wars this past summer. I had a google doc that I wrote down all the episode names in, then jotted down the preliminary ideas. Let me tell you, with a show that has seven seasons of 20+ episodes, it was... so daunting to even think about narrowing down what episodes and arcs to use. It was what initially deterred me from using any of them at all. So I started to look for things that I felt would directly impact Elara, her character, and her development. For example, I didn’t really use all of “Cat and Mouse” because the episode, on a whole, wouldn’t have Elara much involved in it. It did, however, provide a wonderful backdrop for her time on Christophsis, which is why I didn’t nix it entirely. Aside from forcing Obi-Wan and Elara to be tied together, “Dooku Captured” and “The Gungan General” were used to introduce her to Hondo, whom both allows her to be more playful, and showcases her knowledge of the seedier side of the galaxy. And there are plenty of episodes that I love and adore that I just... don’t think would fit. For as much as I love “Senate Spy” and the introduction of Clovis, there’s no way for me to put Elara into that episode and not have it feel forced. That’s another huge thing I look for when picking episodes; if Elara doesn’t feel like she would naturally fit into the storyline somehow, even if it’s indirectly, I’m not going to force her into it. That’s when I do things like mention the events of the episode in a chapter (like with “Clone Cadets”) instead of doing a whole episode. So Clovis is obviously going to get a mention (she’s Anakin’s sister and Padmé’s bestie, of course she’s going to hear about the debacle), but the whole episode won’t be written out.

Then, of course, you have the arcs. The ones that I had immediately chosen are (and these probably come as no surprise): Ryloth, Mandalore, Mortis, Slavers, and Deception. The arcs I find easier to choose because you have a chance to work with more surface area so to speak. It gives me a chance to really flesh out Elara’s part in the story, focus in on her and her emotions and how she’s tied to this particular plot. With the Mortis Arc, for example––Elara is a Skywalker. She is strong with the Force, and in the “Balance” verse, considered a Chosen One. That ties her into the Mortis Arc very interestingly, since it’s not just Anakin going God Mode. It’s going to lend me the chance to really dig deep into Elara, her connection to the Force, to the Light and Dark (the Daughter and Son), and her relationship to being a Chosen One. At first I was like ‘holy shit I’m never gonna be able to do this arc,’ and then when I buckled down and really thought it over... I realized it’s going to be really important for her as a character, and particularly her relationship with Anakin (stay tuned!). It also probably comes as no surprise that a lot of the arcs (and episodes) that get picked are influenced by whether or not Anakin or Obi-Wan are in them. Which is why I almost turned a blind eye to the Umbara Arc until someone brought it up. I did a rewatch of it and knew I had to include it, too. Because that’s going to be an awesome opportunity to flesh out how close Elara is to the 442nd, and be able to contrast her ideals as a General against those of Krell. A lot of the picking of episodes and arcs ends up being trial and error. I wrote the first four-ish pages of “Clone Cadets” before I realized it just didn’t flow right.

All this being said, I like to envision Elara is around for all of the Clone Wars episodes, so I’ve got lots of fun little random snippets for things that I’ll probably never write, but figure would happen in some part of a CW episode.

And after all that, here we finally are at your second question! ☺️

Coming up with all those small details is actually an amalgamation of things at work. I do attribute a lot of it to my training as an actor/theatre artist. I think about how, if I were directing it, how I’d want the movements to look, and how that would translate on both a small scale, and a large scale. A touch of a hand for Obi-Wan and Elara can feel like a world shifting movement––but come off as nothing but a simple, friendly gesture to their fellows. On a small scale, what makes the difference is the way the touch happens. How light the pressure of the touch is, how long it lasts, how slowly their fingers brush against the other person’s hand... all those things help me figure out the mood of that touch and how they’d respond to it. Also, when choosing words to describe movements I often think about the attitude attached to it. A ‘turn of the head’ when Anakin’s being moody may end up being a ‘swivel,’ or the ‘arch’ of an eyebrow from Obi-Wan is more sarcastic than a gentler ‘raise.’ I often agonize picking out those sorts of words. I’ll sit there and try them over and over again, then put them all into a Thesaurus website because I worry I use the same words too much. The thesaurus (particularly when writing Obi-Wan), is my best friend.

When I write mannerisms for canon characters, I use a lot of reference for. I’ll literally just scroll through gifs, watch movie clips, or rewatch the scene I’m writing to pick up on character-specific mannerisms. A couple chapters ago I was describing Anakin’s angry face, and I just looked at images of him from Revenge of the Sith (him alone in the Council room, him being knighted as Vader, his expressions on Mustafar, etc.) I’ll also do this for vocal ticks/inflections. I will also unashamedly admit I will sit there and compose my face into whatever expression I’m trying to describe. Sometimes feeling it physically, or physically composing it helps me come up with words or ways to describe the look. Same thing with touches AND with vocal inflection. Do I sit by myself and read what I’ve written aloud in my best Obi-Wan Kenobi cadence? Yes, yes I do. And has it helped me figure out what words/phrases do and do not work? Yes, it absolutely has!

Also, a lot of describing the details of motion/facial expression/touch gets affected by music for me. Like, if you listen to “Stairway to Heaven” as played by the London Philharmonic Orchestra while reading, say, the scene in “The Gungan General” where Obi-Wan and Elara wake up pressed up to one another... that song is just THE feel of that moment. Listening to the right music when writing (the little details especially) is big for me. Kinda like how “Blue Monday” is the music that works best for the bunker scene in “Storm Over Ryloth.”

There are also a lot of details that I pull from real life. I remember when I wrote Elara seeing Naboo for the first time—and consequently grass, trees, and flowers, too—it was summer time for me. I was staring out at the trees and the way the light filtered through them, watched how they swayed... the grass had just been cut and the breeze smelled sweet... and I was like ‘god, imagine experiencing this all for the first time.’ So I took what I felt and elevated it a little, tried to add a kind of wonder to the things that we all, for the most part, kinda take for granted. I like pulling on experiences I’ve had in real life as a basis.

I ask attribute a LOT of my detail work to my training as a theatre artist. I think about lighting now differently than I did a couple years ago; because I learned what kinda of light fit different moods. Like the scene of Obi-Wan at Dex’s would feel completely different if I’d described the light as cool toned. It would lack a sense of hope. His reminiscences would be sadder, it would feel more stark. The warmer tones suggest that there’s still heart and hope, a possibility for things to get better, and that reflects his inner life better than colder, bluer light. Or how I used light when I wrote Elara seeing Watto again after 10 years to describe her struggle between Dark and Light in that moment. She stepped out of the sun and into the shade because, for a moment, she almost gave in to the Darkness. (Inspired by the scene in Force Awakens where Kylo asks for Han’s help and the light shines down on them... with hints of red low lighting to hint at the struggle... only to have the light disappear as he overrides his own vulnerability, reverts to the Darkness and kills his own father).

I also love using physical objects as emotional triggers, like is done in theatre quite a bit. A good recent example being Elara’s lightsaber. Obi-Wan having it reminds him of his worries regarding her safety, and his struggle with choosing what path to take in regards to his feelings towards her. Or Elara with the Snow Blossom. These things have the ability to spark different emotions depending on the situation. On a good day, the Snow Blossom will make her smile; on a bad day, it may make her feel more sad than happy. And sometimes they don’t have to be objects—they can be bruises or scars or healing wounds. Having something physical spark an emotional response can be really helpful, and has actually helped me though rough spots in my writing.

I could literally go on for hours about all of this kind of stuff! So thank you for asking about it and giving me a chance to discuss it even a little bit! ☺️

#mary talks balance #mary responds #my writing stuff #detail work #elara skywalker #obi-lara #balance stuff #fic writing

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yaypinecones · 4 years

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Here are fan made fetch moduses. They’re not mine but it gave ideas what they would look like and write my own descriptions. Feel free to use them as you wish :)

Camera Modus: It can take pictures on one focused object to 35-50 cm away on the fetch modus card camera (top right). After taking a picture, it would create a clone of the object on your captchalogue inventory. It can be a great practice to take pictures, just don’t take pictures of yourself.

Settings:

Instagram mode- It doesn’t really do anything special except put any radon filter in your fetch modus over what it displays. It’s dumb, but hey it gives you a ton of likes. likes actually don’t exist in your modus or an app for it.

Snapchat mode- I’m not sure why you would need filters to captchlogue an item. If you use this one, I definitely recommend the dog or flower crown filter.

VSCO mode- It’s more about the aesthetics to be honest. Not for those who dresses up in long over sized shirts with a bunch of poofy hair ties and purposely drop their water bottles to make weird noises

Limit: can take 10 film inventories, more than that can eject the last inventory. The object you want to captchalogue has to be on the cameras focuse or else the picture would look blurry and would not clone the item.

Book Modus: A simple modus that comes with a actual book. When you captchlogue an item, it would gives you their description and their captch code. It would also receive a page inside the book as it could give more its abilities, uses, history, common location, and combinations with other items. Pretty useful and it’s possible to captchalogue the book itself. You don’t wanna carry it around all day.

Settings:

Academic mode- Yup all that math, science, language arts, health, and history you’ve read for school is coming back to you. What sucks is these books are the books you’ve read before when you were younger...so they’re probably out dated. Which sucks.

Encyclopedia mode- AKA Wikipedia, Dictionary, or Thesaurus if you want to call that. Basically find what word you want and look through the entire book to find what it means or what’s similar to it. I doubt you want find the amounted of pages it has because it never ends. Sometimes too much words can lead you the short end of the stick or just completely lost.

Journal mode- A thought of someone their own writing to collect their ideas and observations. You can make your own journal if you want. Like writing down what your doing or your grocery list. Actually just write what it feels like to you.

Magazine mode- Now we’re on the good stuff. Good stuff as in gossip and trends. What? At least there’s something to entertain yourself than looking through those stressful words every single to time. You just need to relax and read the latest celebrity gossip. OooOo.

Newspaper mode- Wait how can there be a newspaper in a book? Well at it lets you know what happening daily in other places or locally. Contains huge headlines, unnecessary words, really big photos, and a lot of advertisements.

Limit: There’s no storage limit on this fetch modus but it’s recommended to have 12 items. Unless if you want to have a bunch of words thrown into you to the point it becomes a encyclopedia. Also item eject? What’s that? Uh oh.

Money Modus: This lets you store any item but you have to access the item by inserting a specific amount of money. It is very different in every item. Isn’t it a mix of an ATMs and a shop? I don’t know, but at least they are in a reasonable price. This is not meant for cheap scapes. Sometimes the capchalogue item is has the similar price to real life price list. [Ex. A real life a fridge cost $1,000-2,000]

Settings:

Currency change mode- Your not sure why people need a specific currency. This setting is so stupid, it makes you wonder who needs this?

Bank mode- Yes you heard it right, you can store money in this fetch modus. It’s great for people that has no where else to store their money. This can be your own personal piggy bank.

Limit: This has unlimited storage. The bigger and expensive the item, the more expensive the price you need to access the item. The more you store items, you need to spend a lot of your money. No, you cannot argue the card to lower the price ya silly goose.

Mask Modus: A modus where you wear many persona’s. The mask are in variety in colors that represents a certain character. You can also type a certain personality on your own personas. To capchalogue an item, you have to match a certain persona that matches or similar to the item.

Limit: The maximum storage contains 16 items. Over 16 items would refuse the recent item unless you remove an item or combine one of them. If successful, the item would be capchalogue and freely gain access with wearing a mask. If your didn’t match a right mask or was unsuccessful, the modus card would eject the last item you capchalogued at you.

Binary Modus: You can summon any item by converting the letters into binary coding. This modus must be navigated manually and you can also search for item numbered too.

[Ex. 01001001 01000011 01010101 01010000] Wait a second...Eww man.

Limit: Unlimited storage unit and when summoning an item, it has to be a real thing. Sorry but no bear-cat-rabbit-elephant thing or completely made up words would appear. Especially, you can’t summon huge items like a building or the sun. That can just break your modus. Please limit yourself there buddy.

Dominoes Modus: No, sadly you can’t order pizza. When you capchalogue an item, many dominoes from the card spill out and you have to assemble each and every domino to the other.

Limit: there are 6 inventories you can capchalogue. Nothing more, nothing less. More than 6 would eject the last item.

Dartboard Modus: You can freely capchalogue an item, but retrieving an item can summon a dartboard. You need to throw a dart at one of the rings or bullseyes. The less important items are on the large farther rings and the more important ones art in the smaller rings and bullseyes,

Limit: you can store 82 items. Now that’s a lot but you need to have good aim. Hitting the center of the bullseye can randomly give you an important item for the future.

Prey Modus: When an item is capchalogued, it would spawn a small animal. These animals would depend on what the item is. if the user wants to get the get the item back, they will have to fight and kill whatever creature the item has been allocated to. once the creature is dead, the item appears

[Ex. a computer mouse would spawn a weak mouse (ayy)]

Limit: You can only store 8 slots and over more than 8 can have an animal come out depending on the item. Hopefully you don’t eject any important items. Anything important would release an animal that is not a prey or maybe a replica of the first guardian.

Shuffle Modus: Every time you capchalogue an item, it changes every second with other items you also capchalogued. It can be lucky or unlucky depending how your going to draw this.

Limit: It can hold as much as any items. The more you add items, the more frustrating it gets to retrieve the item you want.

Backpack Modus: This modus can store items by the cards weight which is also a backpack. You can simply open the backpack to retrieve and item. You can capchalogued the backpack itself, but I don’t think your fetch modus can handle the weight you put into there.

Limit: Feel free to store the amount of junk you can carry as it can weigh you down. It acts like a normal backpack. What else should I say?

“Stack” Modus: Haha no, it’s a Massive Ejection Modus you fool. It may look like a normal stack modus but can intensity eject massive amounts of items at once that are multiplied by 100. Once you want to retrieve it, 99 copies eject violently from the captchacard and explode out of your card. Its mostly going to destroy mostly anything and injuring anyone near you.

Limit: Basically you only have one slot inventory and that’s sad. Is this modus even legal!?!? Ejecting 99 items at someone can be potentially be a strife specibus. Just saying.

Wardrobe Modus: This modus can capchalogued any articles of clothing. Attempting to captchalouge something other than clothing will result in said item being sent somewhere you can no longer receive. This is pretty useless like the other mentioned modus we talked about.

Settings:

Hat mode- A place where your hats can live in harmony with other simpleton hats.

Earrings mode- Fancy, expensive, or cheap earrings can come join.

Glasses mode- Look at you nerd. Or cool kid. Whatever you are.

Shirt mode- Look, there are many things you can put on there. The most likely to be over flowed.

Pants mode- Or skirts, shorts, or anything that goes on your legs

Socks mode- A hell place where all sinful gross smelly socks and clean socks go.

Shoes mode- Just don’t put those dirty shoes on the wood. Keep them clean and dry.

Limit: you have unlimited storage and only meant for clothes. This is perfect for people that don’t know where else to put their seasonal clothes to. Summer, fall, winter, spring, you name it.

#homestuck #hiveswap #fanadventure #fetch modus #capchalogue #fantroll #roleplay #theyre not mine #ideas

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langdxn · 4 years

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The way you write James March always makes my heart full 😭😭😭 It’s so soft and sweet!! I can’t wait for the next time you write him ❤️❤️❤️❤️

aww thank you so much sweetheart! i know most writers interpret JPM as the sadistic, evil manipulator but i don’t see that as his permanent default mode, particularly when he’s around the girl he loves. given the way we’ve seen him turn into a big softie around the countess before things got heavy, i truly believe he has the capacity to have a perfectly normal love life. with the right person, someone that makes him happy and gives him butterflies he can’t force away, James Patrick March is one of the most loving, devoted and considerate partners you could imagine.

of course he has his dominant turns in the bedroom, frankly he wouldn’t be the same man if he wasn’t authoritative and in control between the sheets. but that side of him doesn’t take the form of evil any more so than any dom, therefore it’s a switch that flips off the second things cool down between you. the value of respect is something we see a lot in James and that translates into his personal relationships more than we realise on the outside — give him a cuddly girl that brings out his vulnerable side and he melts into a puddle of upper class new money goo.

also i think a lot of people tend to assume articulate creatures like JPM lack the emotional depth for romance, but i think he’s more susceptible to the all-consuming kind of love than anybody else. James would do anything for love and, unlike Meat Loaf, he doesn’t require a get-out clause. there’s something to be said for this guy’s tenacity in both his career and pursuing the girl he loves — corny doesn’t even begin to cover it. imagine this helpless walking thesaurus trying to tell a girl from the 21st century how much he adores her without using a single archaic word... he’s just the sweetest and i refuse to accept anything to the contrary.

so i’m gonna keep writing adorable fluffy James Patrick March despite how hideously off-brand it may seem to some; there’s so little new JPM content out there right now, i’m just glad to see our gorgeous pencil-moustachioed gent still gets all the love.

wow, i ranted on a little there, sorry anon! 🖤

#james patrick march

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chezforshire · 4 years

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AU where marceline is the school's local harana for hire she writes quick songs for anyone who wants to have a song sung for anyone for whatever reason they want

It's usually a lot of love songs (she's gotten tired of this really fast) but sometimes she gets requests for songs for friends

Anyway, Lady and Jake help her out with this business by making bouquets and playing along with her respectively. And Bon is usually just someone she bounces ideas with cause Marce may know so many people, but there's still a number of rich prissy losers that Bon knows and that's usually her clients. Also, Bon loves getting to stretch her writing skills.

(Though she's also pretty tired of love songs)

Marce gets a commission one day to make a song for Bon and she just kinda. Stares at it. Her clients aren't anonymous. Well, not usually. A lot of her songs are made from shared memories and the small percent made from flowery words are usually douchelords who are too confident about their place to think they'd need anonymity in case of rejection.

So when she sees that this one didn't have a name she was a little... confused. There was also the fact that Bon is notorious for saying no to everyone who tries to ask her out. And not in a way where friends tell friends this, but more of she said no to a guy who payed the whole school to get in on his grand plan to ask her out

(Even Marce tho it wasn't for a song. It was more of he asked her to drive Bon to school at a specific time. She obviously told Bon this but they didn't have a lot of time to talk about it bc the guy texted everyone their roles literally on midnight and wired the cash after sending the message.

A little worrying how he not only got everyone's number but also everyone's bank account. She and most of her friends changed phones then bc that was creepy as all hell)

She doesn't tell Bon. Not because of some customer confidentiality or whatever but because... Well she doesn't really know. It just made her irrationally irritated and sad. Odd.

She takes far longer than usual to reply to this. She doesn't understand the hesitation. Or maybe she does? Bon has called her a bleeding heart a million times and she guesses thats the reason. She feels bad for them and doesn't want to watch another person who put in effort be rejected. Yeah that's it. She should tell him that. Maybe they were new or something. It'll be fine, plus they didn't want a full song so they werent paying much. Yeah, that sounds like a game plan.

The next day she says yes and wonders all day why she did that

For about a month she keeps this commission to herself. She spaces out more than usual during this time. Not quite disassociating, just staring into space and thinking.

Bon isn't worried bc this is usually how she gets when she's got a song in the works. She needles her about what it is and who it's for, but she generally deflects and at some point just straight up lies and says some random names.

She also learns more about her client. They're not new, they've actually known Bon for about 3 to 5 years. They're pretty close apparently and actually knows Marce personally. Theyve talked several times and have hung out here and there too. (That sure didn't make her anxiety and paranoia skyrocket)

She feels a lot of anxiety and worry and trepidation and god other irrational shit about this commission. She doesn't really tell anyone (something her therapist, or Bon more importanly Bon, would frown at) so she's just left to wallow about it on her own. She tries working on it as much as she can but it just feels... wrong somehow. She doesn't really get it but she feels like she'll lose something because of this. She doesn't get it. She knows they'll be rejected and they'll all laugh at it in the end and just.

What is it. What's wrong.

She feels a tap on her shoulder and she almost falls off her bed. Jake's apparently been trying to talk to her for a solid minute and oh jeez now he's got that Worried Big Brother look.

He peers at her and asks what's wrong and not-so-subtly threatens that he'll stay and use his Big Brother mode on her if she tries to lie to him

She just sighs heavily and curls up

"Someone commissioned a suicide mission"

Jake makes an 'o' with his mouth. Theyve always called anyone who tried to flirt with Bon a suicide mission and laughed pretty hard at it. Even Bon calls the poors souls who try suicide missions.

She uncurls a bit and faces Jake with a small smile, ready to laugh with him about it as she should. But for some reason Jake just... Looks at her with this worried look. Not his patented Im-Worried-For-You-Little-Sibling but more of one would give to a friend when they know something they don't.

Marce laughs, shakey and unsure. "What? S'not like this doesn't happen. It's Bon, ya know? The sweatheart of the school." With a mean streak that rivals the devil, she adds quietly- fondly- in her head.

Jake just nods slowly. He drags his eyes away from her and stares at her wall, eyes unfocused.

Marce starts having a bit of a panic because what is that face, why is Jake acting like this, is there somethin on her wall, wait does he know the client, is he friends with the client, is he the client, w-

Jake flops his short, chunky body on her bed and pulls her to lay down too. Roughly, might she add. And not to mention absolutely unexpected.

He's smiling again, big and all teeth. It twitches for a second when he makes eye contact but bounces back so quick she thinks she might have imagined it.

"Ha! You're gonna write for a suicide mission this is hilarious!" He makes a move to ruffle her hair and she just starts flailing to avoid this. "Man! I haven't seen one in a while so this'll be fun at least. Something else to keep us busy other than those stupid douchefucks who thinks a song is a sure fire way to get laid."

Marce is confused but doesn't question this sudden change. Plus it actually helps? She snickers -because no, she doesnt giggle she is cooler than that- at the thought of watching the client be rejected before Marce can even pull out her guitar.

"Yeah, threw me off like hell cause Bon is practically legendary but hey apparently there are still some brave souls out there."

"Oh dude, I've got a great ass idea," Jake sits up and leans on his elbows, "Let's keep this a secret from princess. Oh and Lady cause you know she cant keep anything from her."

Marce kinda laughs at this in confusion. "Uh what? Why? If you haven't noticed my services include a bouquet and unless you've learned flower language I dont think we can take Lady outta the equation."

He snorts "I may not know flowers, but I know my girlfriend. I can just be vague and she'll take it as a challenge and try to make the perfect bouquet. S'no problem on that front.

"I figured we could keep it a secret so we can see Bon's pure and raw reaction. Like I said, there hasn't been a suicide mission in a looooong while so she probably doesn't expect this. And it'll be way more funny cause someone commissioned you for it. Where it is no secret that a) you do this and b) you get help from the three of us."

"You got a point there detective. Bur fair warning, Bon will be giving us the stink eye for days if we do this. Especially me because she's my thesaurus and metaphor maker. You know how she loves taking credit for making them sound like a stupid romance novel."

"Psh, she loves you to hell and back. She'll just pout at you for a while and when you buy her her favourite candy it'll be right as rain."

Okay, that sounded valid but at the same time Marceline kind of shut down after Jake said Bon loves her so uh she guesses she'll just trust that it'll be fine?

" 'nother idea," Jake says softly. He's looking at he- actually. No he's not looking at her, hes just looking her way but his eyes are just. Not there.

"Uh, shoot"

"Make this song the best you've ever made."

Marceline laughs for a second before she realizes okay wait Jake is serious about that. What. Why the fuck would she do that.

He shrugs and smiles again. Soft and pitying -what why why is Jake acting like this what the fuck- and he gestures around a bit before speaking.

"Well, first off it'll be good practice for you. You've been workin with Bon for about as log as you've been doing this so think of this as a test to see how you are now on your own.

"Second, well ya gotta admit if you pull out a banger and Bon actually likes it it'll be way funnier cause you can sing it and she'll look all annoyed but you can see that her tapping her foot and bobbing her head. It'll be funny for everyone involved.

"And lastly," Jake takes a deep breath before speaking, as if this is one of the toughest things he's done in a while. "Call it a father's intuition."

She stares at him. She- she doesn't know hwo to react to that.

After a second, Jake cracks a soft smile and "Did you get Lady pregnant, you fucking askal" just slips out of her mouth.

Jake laughs loud and boisterous at this and Marce just follows.

Yeah, she might as well make this the best one she's ever made. The client won't get the girl, but at least she can make her like it

#chersonal #adventure time #at hc #bubbline #okay this got longer than i expected #i just spout this shit before i go to sleep so i dont usually know what the fuck im saying #yellow yelling

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carewyncromwell · 4 years

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[Carewyn had secretly been very glad to cut her meeting with Penny and Beatrice short. After losing Jacob again and realizing that what she’d thought would be the end of a long road was really just the start of something even more dangerous, she really wasn’t in any mood to try to comfort Beatrice. Things were more dangerous now -- and even if Carewyn could put on a stoic face, she knew it was her responsibility to fix things. It didn’t help matters when Penny was talking about her own relief about being reunited with Beatrice -- Penny had realized her error quickly and apologized, and she’d even tried to comfort Carewyn about what had happened with Jacob...but Carewyn simply dismissed her concern with a reassuring smile and put an end to the conversation with the excuse that she needed to go visit Merula.]

I’m sorry, Penny...but I just can’t listen to you talking about how relieved you are. I can’t look at you and Beatrice together. Not right now...

[Carewyn entered the Hospital Wing and immediately made a beeline for the school nurse, who was standing by the cabinet at the far end.]

“Oh...she’s resting, then.”

Madame Pomfrey: “On the contrary.”

[Out the corner of her eye Carewyn saw something flying through the air right at her head. She ducked out of the way, just barely missing a clipboard that slammed into the cabinet behind her.]

Merula: “I WANT TO LEAVE!”

[Carewyn couldn’t see Merula, as she was no doubt in one of the beds further down, but her old rival’s voice was a vocal barrage of frustration and anger.]

Madame Pomfrey: “As you can see, Miss Snyde has quite the temper -- and a good arm.”

[As Carewyn straightened up, her lips pursed critically.]

“...Let me guess -- she’s throwing a tantrum because she doesn’t want to be taken care of.”

It’s not like I liked Merula looking so broken and sad...but this is just stupid.

[Madame Pomfrey nodded.]

Madame Pomfrey: “Ordinarily I wouldn’t use this level of patience with my...patients...but after being struck by the Cruciatus Curse, I really don’t think she should be moving too much.”

[Carewyn’s eyes narrowed slightly.]

“May I see her?”

Madame Pomfrey: “Yes -- as long as you’re prepared to duck at a moment’s notice.”

[The school nurse walked Carewyn down the row of beds to the one Merula was lying down on. Like before, she showed no physical injury, but she looked incredibly restless.]

[Carewyn frowned deeply.]

“You know I’m not going to do that, Merula. If Madame Pomfrey says you should rest, then you should listen to her.”

Madame Pomfrey: “Well, I’m glad someone is talking sense. I’ll leave you to your visit, Miss Cromwell -- and Miss Snyde, behave yourself.”

[Madame Pomfrey turned and left the two girls alone.]

[Carewyn crossed her arms, slipping seamlessly into “Mom” mode.]

“I’m sorry, Merula, but if Madame Pomfrey doesn’t think you should be exerting yourself, then you should slow down. The Cruciatus Curse is serious. The last time I saw Rakepick use it, the guy couldn’t even stand or talk -- and back then, Rakepick said she wasn’t even going full-force like she was with you.”

[Carewyn’s eyes narrowed, but this time it only served to make them softer.]

“...And...I know how much Rakepick meant to you. However much pain that curse caused you...it could only have been worse, coming from her.”

[Merula looked away, feigning carelessness.]

Merula: “It’s not a big deal. I’ve gotten over it. I mean, we broke the Portrait Curse anyway, didn’t we?”

[Carewyn’s lip twitched irritably.]

“Merula, come on...haven’t we gotten past this already? If you’re honest, it’ll be a lot easier to address the problem.”

Merula: “There’s nothing to address. We all went through a lot. We all were betrayed by Rakepick. But I’m over it.”

“Merula, nobody would be fine after what you went through -- so stop pretending.”

[Merula straightened up slightly, her pink eyes suddenly boring into Carewyn’s.]

Merula: “I’m pretending?”

[Carewyn was taken back by the intensity in her expression. There was anger, but one colder and quieter than before.]

Merula: “I’m pretending? Who do you think you are, saying something like that? You, of all people. Don’t think I’ve forgotten what you said to your brother in the Vault, Cromwell -- how you only ever wanted to save him, and you didn’t even care about Rakepick or the Vaults...”

Don’t you dare bring that up -- I don’t want to even think about you having seen me like that --

[Carewyn felt her face flushing slightly, but she kept her voice very level.]

“I already told you that was all I’d wanted.”

Merula: “And yet I bet you’ve been running around trying to get everyone else to talk about their feelings rather than take your own damn advice. Why aren’t you resting, Cromwell? I noticed you’re still limping a little on your ankle -- haven’t taken the time to fix that, even though you went to the trouble of changing clothes and cleaning up your make-up and hair?”

[Carewyn stiffened, her eyes hardening visibly.]

I changed clothes because I hated looking at them. I fixed my make-up because it’d gotten smudged from me crying. It’s not like I could’ve looked like a mess when Dumbledore called me to his office. And I...I can’t rest. I don’t have the right to rest, as long as R is out there and you all are in danger. It’s my fault you all got roped into this. If it weren’t for me...you wouldn’t have been hurt.

[Despite her convictions, she didn’t have the heart to articulate any of her feelings into words.

Merula didn’t look surprised by Carewyn’s stoic expression or the lack of a response, but she didn’t take any joy from it either.]

Merula: “You remember what I told you back in the Great Hall, don’t you -- when we first transported back?”

[Carewyn considered Merula for a long moment. Then she exhaled quietly through her nose, her eyes drifting away.]

“...Fine. If you want me to back off...then I will.”

I can’t force you to accept my help. And really...do I even need to hear how you feel? I already know it. I guess I just thought it would help you, to get those feelings out...

[Merula’s words echoed in her head again.

“I’m pretending? Who do you think you are, saying something like that?”]

Well, it’s not like I have any other choice! I’m the one person who can’t fall apart -- not when everyone’s in so much danger, when I’m in so much danger --

[Rakepick’s words in the Vault returned to her.

“You can’t stop R! We’re too powerful!”]

I can’t show weakness. Not now.

Merula: “If you’re backing off, going away now would be a good start.”

[Carewyn was startled out of her thoughts by the bluntness of Merula’s tone. Noticing her irritated and offended expression, Merula reacted defensively.]

Merula: “What? I said it nicely...”

[Careyn gave her a beady look.]

“That was nicely?”

Maybe I should find you a thesaurus bookmarked to the word.

[Merula was distracted, however, by Ben dashing up to the two of them.]

Merula: “Why hello, Copper -- have you come to try to get me to talk about my feelings too?”

[Carewyn’s eyebrows furrowed in concern.]

“What is it?”

((OOC: Dang, Merula, actually calling my girl out on some of her crap?? Who would’ve thunk it... o.o;;

Also, love the new dance move, Carey. XDD))

#carewyn cromwell #jacob's sibling #hphm #hogwarts mystery #gameplay #roleplaying #merula snyde #patricia rakepick #penny haywood #beatrice haywood #ben copper #poppy pomfrey #jacob cromwell

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solacefruit · 4 years

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Writing advice meme, 1-10.

I saw this ask meme on this post and I love the concept, so I’m going to take a swing at it myself. The idea is to assess these common pieces of writing advice--i.e., what your interpretation of it, do you like/agree with it, etc.--and as someone who thinks and talks about writing a lot (and is perhaps guilty of giving a lot of advice myself), I have a ton of opinions on what good writing advice looks like and I’m so excited to go through this list with you all. I have to break it up into separate posts because I talk too much, so here’s the first ten!

1. Nothing is perfect. True! But I think this one sometimes feels disheartening to people, because they hear it as “your work won’t be perfect, therefore it’s not good enough and you shouldn’t bother”--which is extremely false. I think this piece of advice should feel liberating, because it’s giving you permission to make mistakes and be human! None of us make perfect work, because perfect isn’t a thing. Your work can (and will) be imperfect and valuable, and powerful, and gorgeous to read, and meaningful to others.

2. Don’t use adverbs. Wrong! A foolish opinion held and shared by people who are silly. There are definitely writers who misuse adverbs--notoriously, Joke Rowling--but adverbs are not in and of themselves bad and I personally love a well-placed adverb. It can so dramatically alter a sentence and frankly I just love the -ly sound, it’s so sleek. Better advice for this one would be “use adverbs with precision.” Fun fact: I have a non-zero number of characters with adverbs as names. That’s how much I enjoy these little guys.

3. Write what you know. This one’s interesting to me because I have a split answer. I think there’s a big truth to drawing on purpose from your personal experience and your unique pools of knowledge when creating, because you can bring so much to a work. You can ground the story in minute details and describe moments with such potency because they are familiar to you. There are so many stories in the world that are enriched by the fact the writer is a historian, or lived through a specific traumatic event that they now explore in their work, or has a love and passion for trains or botany or whatever their joys are. So on that side of things, I say true.

However, I think “write what you know” has a less wonderful underside, which is that writing what you know is often how certain hegemonic ideas and biased are recreated in works and then crystallised within genres. A passive imitation of your personal experience of the world and/or an unthinking loyalty to the tropes and traditions of your genre is not a neutral statement as a creator. I feel strongly that writers who belong to privileged groups--i.e., abled-bodied, white, straight, cisgender, Christian, male--and most especially writers who belong many of these categories simultaneously need to be aware of how writing what you know will produce a very specific, not-universal story.

So short answer: definitely draw on your specific banks of knowledge and experiences, but be aware that you do not exist in a vacuum and neither do stories.

4. Avoid repetition. Depends what you mean by that! A lot of writing is strengthened by repetition: motifs and themes necessitate repetition to be, well, anything. But if we’re talking about word choice, this is a safe general rule. That doesn’t mean grab a thesaurus, though! Just think about another word that you know that will get across the meaning you want--or move the sentence around until it achieves your goal. Swapping out a good word for a worse word with a different connotation is not better and definitely not a solution for repetition.

5. Write every day. Counterargument: write whenever you want. I don’t believe there’s one true schedule that everyone should follow, because people are different and creative processes are different. I myself am someone who tends to sit down and write a lot (sometimes a few days in a row), and then not write anything for the next day or even week. Some people can do the disciplined get-up-and-write-every-morning thing and truly I’d love to be one of those people, but my instinct is that I never will be. My way of doing things is more chaotic and less predictable, but I think any writing is always a win.

6. Good writers borrow from other writers, great writers steal from them outright. Hm. I definitely believe all good writers are discerning magpies who thieve everything that makes their hearts sing, and then spend their careers making nests of said things in different arrangements--but I don’t know if I’d call that “stealing outright.” I absolutely think a great writer needs a certain boldness in order to step out and confidently pilfer without shame or guilt, and then turn all those things into their things, so... I guess I agree? Maybe that’s the teacher in me, but this has plagiaristic connotations to me that I don’t love and don’t approve of, so perhaps I’d say for this one: “great writers make what they take their own.” 7. Just write. Highly contextual advice that is almost never helpful. This is perhaps because, personally, I don’t believe in laziness. I don’t actually think it’s a thing. I think often people will believe themselves to be lazy but what they actually are is afraid or stuck, and with that in mind, saying “just write” to people who’re blocked is about as useful as saying “just walk” to someone with a sprained foot: you need to address the underlying issue before someone can get better. If someone can’t write, it’s not from lack of effort--it’s because either something is wrong and preventing them from writing (which could be fear of failure, or anxiety, or overly stressed, or any number of causes) or they have become creatively exhausted and need to rest and consume art to restore themselves. Sometimes both!

I don’t like telling people to “just” anything, because that word has such a belittling effect. Writing is hard, especially if you’re going through a lot of stuff. I think better advice acknowledges that fact and responds more compassionately: “identify what is preventing you from writing.” Most writers--at least, that I know--thrive when they’re writing and write best when they’re thriving. Not writing isn’t a choice they make for no reason, so if you can’t write, look for the reasons. 8. There’s nothing new under the sun. Basically true! We are all (more or less, some cultural elements are relevant here) playing with the same toys in the same sandpit. However, we are the final component in the work and that makes all the difference. Each of us is the thing that is new under the sun and because of that, our sandcastles are wonderful and unique. I find that very neat.

9. Read. Phenomenal advice. It’s the one I probably give out most often, because it’s true in a way that I personally don’t think can be understated. I think consuming media and viewing art in general falls under this bracket too. Besides being good for you and healthy for your creative brain, it’s going to polish your taste and teach you so much about writing without you even noticing, probably. Cannot recommend it enough.

10. Don’t think! I have never found this relevant or useful. To me, it often comes across as a worse version of seven (see above). Thinking is my primary mode of existence and so far, my writing seems to benefit from that.

#advice #advice meme

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delciastudies · 5 years

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A memoir of a successful student A short story [delciastudies]

Not too long ago I found myself in a strange situation. Baffled, a perceived situation like Gogol; they are rare but they happen, right? Like Gautier in Pompeii. Donʼt be fooled — let me start from the beginning.

Friday morning, jittered from the excessive amounts of caffeine consumption, anticipating the coming hours. More so, reveling in my state of time, which counted to the moments before I entered the doors, signed some administrative paperwork, placed my keys and coffee in a locker and soon found my way to my spot in the back corner.

Jealous by the amount of time I had in the illusion passing before my eyes while driving to Santa Maria. If here I am, it was just my body and my car I would just be idle, burning up time. How strange it feels having time while driving. An allusion like Faulkner, by this time Iʼm getting out of my car and already going in but still 20 miles away— angry at myself for not studying more. Why didn't I study more? Remember high school? Remember then? Itʼs the same thing. Do I have time to finish my coffee?

I had just enough gas to make it to Santa Maria, driving with the Princeton GRE Crash Course in my lap, as if I planned on studying more — more ironic that if I were to study and drive surely it would be a crash course.

Arriving in Santa Maria was shocking but to no surprise; a small strange place somewhere in California like Barstow or does Primm count? Technically not; I make a drive through Primm too often. I canʼt believe I just spent $5 on a white chocolate mocha with soy milk.

Do I remember how to cross multiply? Why does grad school need to know if I can calculate the degree of a trapezoid yet I think I know how to do that? Priding myself in a 31 ACT score as if writing my thesis embodies hundreds of multiple choice questions and a pop-up calculator. I need to start my research!

There I was, finding parking, realizing I didn't drink my coffee fast enough but I better go inside and study. Why am I taking this again?

I made my way to the top floor door-on-the-left office, with green walls and green seats which I sat in not knowing what to do waiting to check in and standing at the check in desk but no one is there, I should sit and drink my coffee and study. Who takes the GRE anymore anyway? Iʼm an anthropology major, is this necessary?

The other students said sheʼs coming back, still too much coffee getting cold and I feel nauseous anyway so Iʼll feel less bad if I leave it in my locker rather than throwing it away. Right?

160 minutes and 7 sections scored — no big deal, I have a timer and pop-up calculator. Iʼve done this before. Have I though?

She finally came back and gave me a green key and then I left my coffee and crash course behind while I went through a metal detector and answered questions.

Soon I entered the notorious room like it was something I had seen before, sat down and acquainted myself with my screen and mouse. Raise your hand if you have questions. Do you know how to cross multiply too?

The GRE: the Graduate Record Examination, founded for the Advancement of Teaching— I thought I was doing research in grad school so I sure hope through this I become enlightened to the the modes of teaching between the surface area of a circle and an annotated bibliography.

I have more time but itʼs useless now, no point in doodling or taking my time putting in my information. Half an hour seems nice until you realize youʼll have the next 7 half hours.

Click start to my future.

My first project was two writing prompts: straightforward and arguable yet convincing, still not a prospectus but I feel like my mind is a thesaurus until I get to the fill-in-the-blank. Fill-in-the-blank the next 30 minutes of words I have never read before in my life and I even have a minor in linguistics, should I raise my hand and ask them if this is necessary? I have entire databases of information through my library access but memorizing unused words is a thing now.

My true self, sheʼs chatty. Sheʼs chatty like the way I write and the way I think. Getting things done but why does my environment feel so strange and Iʼm too in my head — is this normal? When in the past several decades did someone come onto the idea that it was such a good plan, eventually accepted on a national and institutional level to put 20-year-olds in a silent room designated cuticle staring at a computer screen as if these assessments really were the thing we needed?

They gave me the option to wear noise-cancelling headphones but sometimes the lull of noises were nice; the girl next to me tapping her pencil eraser — people still use those? — lots of typing, lots of obsolete desktop computer mouses clicking like water torture but so not historic; millennials could recognize that sound anywhere.

I had already completed 90 minutes, 90 minutes of feeling like I really must have no what idea what Iʼm doing and now its quantitative reasoning and thatʼs kind of ironic, if I think of this as a disassociated lull then can we conclude the sleep of quantitative reason produces monsters?

Numbers blurred together like words on the screen and the brightness and clicking mouses, lulled enough necessary to put myself through this arduous and nonsensical exam in a square cubicle and sometimes hearing one of the office people peering behind my shoulder as if I was watching something I shouldn't be. Maybe theyʼre right.

Numb from the strained thinking— had I already gone through two quantitative reasonings? Or two verbal reasonings and a quantitative reasoning? Iʼm close to done? Do I want to send my scores to schools? Absolutely not — why would I send a score when I donʼt even know what it is yet? How much do I have to pay for score sovereignty?

I canʼt believe Iʼm 21 and here taking the GRE; this was my dream right? Iʼm achieving my goals right? This is the right stepping stone to the next phase of my life, right? Who put a stepping stone here?

Why does it feel like Iʼve taken more than 2 sections of verbal reasoning? I raised my hand how do I figure out how many sections I have left?— you have 20 minutes left of this section, it will tell you what sectionʼs next after you complete this one.

Completed, 10 minute break. Finally. What do I do for 10 minutes? Sit in silence and listen to the mouses and the eraser tapping? I think Iʼll just keep going. I thought I was offered a break already?

Argument Essay - please respond to the prompt with a strong argument, right? I already wrote this, I know how to write this because Iʼve already written this. Why is my test not over?

Delusional from the coffee or the quantitative reasoning Iʼm not sure, but was writing not the first section? Has it not been more than a half hour?

I rubbed my eyes and doodled on my papers which just moments ago were filled with numbers and outlines and now I have 3 blank pieces of scratch paper.

I closed my eyes for a short moment and there I was again looking at the prompt and I got a 5.5 on writing so not too shabby.

Your timer has run out and the module will automatically move on to the next section in 30 seconds, or click next to continue now. I hear typing so other people must be on the writing portion too, should I look around? Why is no one else leaving?

Like drones, endless. I thought Iʼd go to sleep in peace that night, prospects of graduate programs Iʼve dreamt of, but I opened my eyes and I still had 20 minutes to go and she said after this section it would tell me which one is next. Who is telling me this?

#a memoir of a successful student #fantastic #gre #gre exam #standardized tests #short story

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catalinda04 · 5 years

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Carried Away Chapter 59: I couldn’t think of a name...

Masterlist

Lucy flew, with Henry in tow, to New York late on Friday night for her appointment with Jessica on Saturday. It was almost 1:00 am by the time they reached their hotel in midtown Manhattan. Lucy slid into the bed and fell asleep almost instantly. Henry followed soon after.

The following morning, Lucy and Henry took a short cab ride to Jessica’s store front in the city’s Garment District. The bell over the door tinkled, signaling their arrival. Jessica herself peered out from the back room. Her face splitting into a wide smile upon seeing Lucy and Henry.

“Lucy!” The other woman exclaimed, opening her arms to lightly embrace Lucy, and kiss her cheeks European style.

“Jessica, this is my fiancé Henry. He insisted on coming to New York with me.” Lucy explained.

Jessica extended her hand toward Henry. “It’s a pleasure to meet you Henry.”

Henry shook the woman’s hand lightly, “the pleasure is all mine,” he flashed her one of his movie star smiles.

Jessica turned her attention back to Lucy, “are you ready to try on your dress?”

“I am so ready!” Lucy smiled, barely containing her excitement. Jessica motioned for Lucy to follow her toward the fitting area. Henry started following along behind dutifully. Lucy spun on her toe and put her hand to his chest. “Just where do you think you’re going, mister?”

“With you?” He answered uncertainly.

“No. I told you, you’re not getting a look at this dress until the ceremony. You’ll see it in 26 days. For now, you stay out here. Find a chair, and play on your phone or something. I’ll be out in a bit.” He pulled a face, but did as he was told.

Jessica directed Lucy into a changing room, and left her to change her undergarments while Jessica retrieved the dress. She returned carrying a large white garment bag. She unzipped it to reveal the blush sparkle of the dress Lucy had picked out just months before.

Jessica assisted Lucy into the dress, zipping the back, and buttoning the lace closure holding the back of the neckline together, creating an attractive keyhole back. Jessica fiddled with the hem, spreading it out, before allowing Lucy to turn to see herself in the mirror. She gasped at her appearance. The dress fit almost perfectly. The blush pink played nicely off her paler winter skin, and the lace Jessica chose to construct the straps melded perfectly with the original dress design. Lucy brought her hands to her waist to swish the skirt and see it from all angles. She grasped a small piece of the dress near her right hip, only to find a hole in the dress. She looked down in panic, sure she had ruined the dress. Her hand probed the hole it found, “it has pockets!” Lucy exclaimed.

“Almost all of my designs have pockets. It’s one of my signatures. Now what do you think?”

“Oh, Jessica, it’s beautiful. It’s amazing, it’s...I wish I had a thesaurus to properly describe how I feel about this dress.”

“I’m glad. We worked hard on it, to get to done so quickly.” She and Lucy spent the next several minutes discussing the fit, and what, if any, alterations needed to be made.

“Because of the special circumstances, we’ll get these alterations done, and, can you come in again tomorrow for a final fitting?”

“Tomorrow? The dress will be done tomorrow?”

“Ordinarily, no, but because of the circumstances, I have my top seamstress standing by ready to work on this dress, and only this dress. We’ll have you come in tomorrow, and if it all goes as it should, you’ll be able to leave with your dress. If more alterations need to be made. We’ll courier your dress to you in Minnesota by the middle of the week.” Jessica explained.

“And how much is all of this rushing costing me?” Lucy asked tentatively.

“It’s not costing you anything, Victoria Beckham is one of my biggest investors, and she personally asked me to make sure you got exactly what you wanted, as a personal favor to her. Apparently she’s quite fond of you. Though truth be told, I am too,” she explained, giving Lucy a wink.

“Well, thank you Jessica. This means more than I can say really.” Lucy thanked her, as she helped Lucy out of the dress.

“Ready to go?” Lucy asked Henry, as she walked toward him, shrugging into her winter coat.

“You’re not bringing the dress with you?”

“It needs a few alterations, I have another appointment tomorrow for the final fitting. THEN I get to bring it home.”

Henry offered his arm to Lucy as they exited the store, “well darling, it would seem we have the rest of our day free. What would you like to do?”

Lucy slipped her arm through his as they strolled through the brisk December morning. “Other than the premiere this spring, I’ve never been to New York. Do you have any recommendations?”

Henry thought for a long moment, “I think you would enjoy the MoMA. They have Van Gogh, Dali, Picasso. I know how much you love Picasso.”

“I didn’t think you liked art museums,” she looked up at him.

“I don’t visit them on my own, but with you, I do enjoy seeing them. You make it a whole new experience for me,” he elaborated, kissing her temple.

“Are you just saying that, so I don’t feel bad about dragging you to a museum?”

“No, darling, I mean it. You go into teacher mode, and actually, I think it’s kind of sexy,” he murmured in her ear.

“Then the MoMA it is,” she said, fanning her face.

They spent over two hours, wandering the halls of the museum, Lucy admiring the art, and Henry admiring Lucy.

After lunch, they took a stroll down 5th Avenue. Lucy marveled at the Christmas display windows, happy just to be with Henry, she had missed him while he’d been away filming. They returned to the hotel for a rest, before going out for dinner. Henry stopped at the concierge when they entered the lobby. “I’m expecting an envelope? Has it been delivered yet?” He asked the well dressed man behind the desk.

“Yes, sir, Mr. Cavill. And your packages have already been sent up to your suite.” The man said, handing Henry a white business sized envelope. Henry thanked the man, and handed in a generous tip.

“What’s that? What are you up to?” Lucy asked as they walked to the elevator. Once inside, Henry handed her the envelope.

“Why don’t you see for yourself,” he suggested.

Lucy took the envelope and gingerly opened it as the elevator made its way to their floor. She lifted the flap to peer inside, and found two tickets. She reached inside to retrieve the two rectangles, and read aloud, “Radio City Christmas Spectacular! You got us tickets to see the Rockettes? How did you know I’ve always wanted to see them?” She asked, throwing her arms around his neck.

“It was on your bucket list. When you said we would be going to New York, I thought it would be a nice surprise for you.”

“But HOW did you get tickets? I thought they were all sold out.”

“I know a guy,” he said, grinning at her, pressing the key card to the touch pad to unlock their hotel room door. He motioned for Lucy to enter before him, she kept her gaze on him as she entered.

“You know a guy? But, I didn’t bring anything to wear to Radio City Music Hall,” Lucy gasped. Henry settled his hands on her shoulders,and turned her toward the closet, which had two garment bags hanging on it, that hadn’t been there that morning when they left. “Henry, what did you do?” Lucy asked approaching the garment bags.

“You’re not the only one who can make plans.” Henry replied.

Lucy reached for the zipper on the first bag. Inside she found a sheath dress in a deep emerald green, with black lace lining the hem. She turned to Henry. “Henry, it’s beautiful, but its too much, the tickets, the dress, it’s all too much. I can’t possibly reciprocate.”

Henry closed the short distance between them, taking her in his arms, silencing her words with a kiss. “First of all darling, you don’t need to reciprocate, mainly because I don't expect anything in return. But you already DO reciprocate, in a thousand little ways. You love me and care for me. It’s the million little things you do for me that show me you care. I know that it’s not always easy being in a relationship with me, and you never complain You’re willing to completely upend your life for me. I want to show you just how much you mean to me, by making all your dreams come true.”

“You’re too good to me.” Lucy smiled, resting her head on his chest.

Lucy and Henry managed to keep the details of their wedding secret. The only people who knew about the wedding were the people invited, and they had been sworn to secrecy. Lucy didn’t want her students crashing the wedding, while Henry didn’t want any paparazzi ruining their day.

When her students asked if she had any plans for the break, she could barely contain her smile as she thought about becoming Henry’s wife, but managed to lie convincingly that she and Henry would just be having a quiet Christmas with her family.

They spent Christmas Eve with Lucy’s family at her parent’s house, and hosted a Christmas Day dinner for Lucy’s parents and grandmother at The Lodge. The couple took a quiet day to themselves on Saturday before Henry’s whole family arrived on Sunday.

Henry had received a text from one of his brothers that they had all gotten their respective rental cars and were heading north. Everyone had flown in the previous afternoon, and stayed in Minneapolis in order to combat their jetlag before driving to Lucy and Henry’s house. As the time that everyone should arrive approached, Lucy began pacing.

“Why did I say that I was fine with everyone staying here? Am I crazy?” she asked no one in particular, rubbing her temples.

Henry, who was lazing on the couch, stood in her path, halting her pacing. “Well, darling you ARE marrying me, so the jury is still out on the crazy verdict, but I don’t think you are. I think you are unfailingly kind, and you know that I don’t see my family as often as I’d like, so you agreed to everyone staying with us so that the family wouldn’t be separated.”

Lucy released the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding, and collapsed against Henry’s chest. “Thank you. I’m sure you’re going to have to talk me down about a thousand times this week.”

“Whatever you need Cupcake, you just tell me,” he replied, kissing her forehead.

Kal barked and Lucy and Henry saw five vehicles crest the small rise in the drive. “The British are coming, the British are coming,” Lucy chanted under her breath, causing Henry to bark out a laugh, as they both donned their shoes to greet the family.

There was a flurry of activity as everyone greeted the pair. All of the boys ran to give their Uncle Hank the first hug, while Lucy went in search of Heather and baby Sophia. She volunteered to carry the baby and carrier into the house, signalling for the other women to follow. “Henry, you guys get the bags.” Lucy called over her shoulder.

“Yes, dear,” Henry said sarcastically, helping Charlie unload their suitcases.

“You’re going to be such a good husband,” Charlie quipped, patting his brother on the shoulder.

Henry entered the house in time to hear Lucy explaining the layout of The Lodge.

“On the ground floor, we have the kitchen, help yourself to anything in the fridge, a half-bath, dining area, and living room. In the basement is the movie theater, exercise area, game room, and another half-bath, there’s also a bar down there, that Henry stocked. If you want anything, help yourself.”

“On the first floor are most of the bedrooms. Our room is in the corner, with one of the full bathrooms. The bedroom on the other end has the other ensuite bathroom, which we thought Charlie and Heather could take, because of baby Sophia. The other rooms can share the full bathroom in the hallway, but you’re welcome to use ours as well.”

“The second floor has another full bathroom, two bedrooms, and a second living room area, with a pullout couch. Henry and I thought that might be a good place for the older boys. I guess that’s it for now, so you all can fight over who gets which room, and you can settle in. Dinner is in about 2 hours, so make yourselves at home.”

“Heather, I’ll take Sophia, while you and Charlie get unpacked,” Lucy volunteered, holding out her arms toward the baby. Heather handed over the little girl, and followed everyone else upstairs.

Henry found her 10 minutes later, sitting on the couch, cooing to his niece, “look at you. You’re so little. Look at these little fingers.” Henry watched her kiss the baby’s fingers. His heart warmed, thinking about her holding their own baby. She didn’t hear him approach, she was so wrapped up in the infant. “You’re such a pretty girl,” she murmured.

“Luckily she takes after her mother,” Henry commented, taking a seat beside her.

“She’s so precious. I don’t want to let her go,” Lucy commented to him, not taking her eyes off the little girl.

“Well, I think mum is going to have something to say about that. This is her first granddaughter.”

“I know, but I’m not going to give her up until someone tells me I have to.”

“I didn’t think you would.” Henry laughed. He stood, and first kissed his niece on the forehead, then Lucy, before leaving them together.

That night, Lucy and Henry cooked dinner for everyone, a classic English roast, complete with Yorkshire pudding. Everyone raved that it was almost as good as Maryanne’s, to which Maryanne protested that her Yorkshire puddings had never turned out so light and airy. Lucy felt lighter than the pudding.

Even with everything on her pre-wedding to-do list, Lucy cleared Monday to spend with Henry’s family. They all spent the day enjoying each other’s company, and not having anything that needed to be done.

Tuesday was Lucy’s day with her bridesmaids.

“Are you sure it’s not horribly rude to just leave?” Lucy asked, while getting dressed that morning.

Henry sat on the edge of the bed and motioned her over. He pulled her into his embrace, resting his hands on her bottom. “Cupcake, everyone understands that you’re preparing for the wedding. And if anyone tries to fault you, I will remind them as such. Now, go, have a lovely afternoon with your girls, and I will see you home for dinner. I’m making my bolognese.”

“Oooh, that sounds delicious,” she kissed him quickly, “I’ll see you then.”

She met Sarah, Emma, Anna, and Jenn at a local cafe for lunch before going to the salon that would be styling their hair on the wedding day for manicures. At lunch she gave the women their schedules for the wedding day, starting with their hair appointments around lunch time, and finishing with the morning after brunch Lucy and Henry were having catered at the reception hotel.

The women arrived at the salon and decided on their manicure order. They took their seats at the nail stations they had been directed to. Lucy produced several bottles of polish in the exact shade of their bridesmaid dresses.

“Ladies, I don’t care which you do, but please either stick to the blue, or a simple french manicure. I’m going with a classic french manicure.” The women enjoyed their afternoon together, laughing and sipping champagne.

While she was waiting for everyone to be finished, Anna got a text from Clint. He had taken the kids to The Lodge to go sledding with Henry’s nephews, and been invited to stay for dinner. Lucy called her parents and invited them to dinner as well, then called Henry.

“I hear we have extra guests for dinner.”

“Yes, it’s pasta, it goes a long way.” Henry commented unconcerned.

“Do I need to bring anything home? I’m just about to leave the salon.”

He gave her a short list of things that the house needed, and disconnected.

The dinner at The Lodge was just short of a mad house With 25 people, space was at a premium, and seating was limited. They managed to eat in stages. First the boys were fed, then their mothers set them up in the theater with a movie, while the adults ate. Lucy leaned into Henry’s side, sipping her wine, as she watched her parents and brother interact with the people who would soon be her family.

Wednesday found everyone at the church for the rehearsal. Everything went smoothly, causing Lucy to hope everything would go just as smoothly the following afternoon. The whole group, all 35 of them, including the wedding party, the nephews and nieces, Lucy’s grandma, and pastor Meredith and her husband, had a dinner catered at the reception hotel, before returning home to change for stag and hen nights.

Lucy hired a limo to pick up all of her girls and take them around. She invited the Cavill sisters-in-law who wholeheartedly agreed, leaving Maryanne and Collin to watch the grandchildren.

“You’re sure it’s not too much trouble? Lucy asked. “I could get a sitter here in half an hour.”

“It’s no bother, they’re all in bed. It’s no different than Christmas.” Maryanne assured her.

Lucy was the last to be picked-up by the limo, she found Sarah, Emma, Anna, and Jenn already deep into a bottle of champagne by the time the Cavil sisterhood joined them. They settled on one of Lucy’s favorite bars, where they proceeded to monopolize the jukebox and work their way through the bartender’s catalog of fruity drinks.

Henry and the guys settled on a local pool hall to play billiards, drink copious amounts of whiskey and smoke cigars. The women collectively declared their plans lame.

When the night started to wear down, the men descended on the women’s party. The men shared a round of drinks with the women as the bartender called Last Call. The whole group bundled themselves out of the bar to make their way home. Paolo, Joshua, Lee and Clint had driven themselves, and as such, peeled off with their wives to go back to their respective homes.

Jenn, who had decided she was too tired, and tipsy, to walk, requested a piggy-back from her husband. She could be heard yelling from the next block, “Top Night!” causing the remaining partiers to collapse into giggles.

Thursday morning Lucy opened her eyes to find Henry staring at her, is eyes caressing her face. She didn’t speak, just let her eyes roam the planes and angles of his face, until their eyes met and held. A wide smile split Lucy’s face.

“We’re getting married today,” she whispered.

“I knew there was something I was forgetting,” he grinned back at her, before leaning in to kiss her good morning. “Just think, in less than 12 hours, we will be man and wife,” he commented, pulling her close to snuggle into his chest.

“And in just over 48 hours, we’ll have the house to ourselves again!” Lucy quipped

“It hasn’t been so bad having everyone here, has it?” Henry asked

“No,” Lucy conceded, “in fact your sisters-in-law have been a great help, but it will be nice to have some privacy again.”

“That’s why we got the bridal suite at the hotel tonight.” he murmured suggestively. They snuggled in each others arms for a few more minutes, until they heard someone moving around downstairs. Henry rolled out of bed, and slipped on a pair of sweatpants, and a t-shirt. “I’ll see you downstairs in a few minutes Cupcake,” he said before leaving her alone in the bedroom.

Lucy took a few minutes to brush her hair, and trade her pajamas for yoga pants and a long sleeved t-shirt before padding downstairs herself. She found the kitchen a hive of activity. Maryanne had taken up residence at the stove and was swirling batter in a large frying pan. The long counter in front of her was laid out with every topping anyone could ask for.

“What’s this?” Lucy asked in awe.

“Mum’s making crepes for everyone for breakfast.” Henry answered, handing Lucy a mug of tea.

“Oh, Maryanne, you don’t have to do…” Lucy started, but was cut off by her soon-to-be mother-in-law waving a spatula at her.

“Dear, it’s your wedding day, you will be running nonstop, you need a good breakfast.” She thrust a plate in Lucy’s direction. “Now, take this plate, start with 2 crepes, add as many toppings as you would like, and sit down and eat. Mother’s orders.”

“Yes, ma’am.” Lucy replied, following orders. She looked down at her hands clutching the plate and saw the slightest tremble from the excitement the day was about to bring.

Chapter 58 Chapter 60

#Henry Cavill #Henry Cavill fanfic #Henry Cavill fan fic #Henry Cavill fanfiction #Henry Cavill fan fiction #Carried Away

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the-progress-bar · 5 years

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You Wore Out a Path Recap

I haven’t written something this long in … well, I don’t want to check.

The Inception

I don’t remember where the idea for this came from, specifically. I wrote the beginning of the first chapter for Camp NaNoWriMo, along with a whole slew of other FE:A material. It turns out that I’m extremely bad at writing linear narratives, given the absolute mess and if you say goodbye is to straighten out and more casually in the boy across the hall.

Chapter One

The fairy tale was written first actually. I filled in around its scene breaks with Robin being in a Bad Mental State™ as a way to carry this. weird, meandering fairy tale. Also, there’s a much more comedic story in the works that involves Grima and Robin again and I wanted to do something more serious on that vein at the same time.

He strikes to the south east. For some reason, Donnel didn’t stay in the armed forces as Robin hoped but went back home for good.

Donnel! I love Donnel for the sheer comedy of some country boy latching onto the Shepherds, which is otherwise comprised of nobles, and him being able to take on a whole battlefield by himself, leaving the rest in the dust. But he doesn’t stay in Ylisstol and Robin and I are forever sad over that lost potential.

Thunder crumbles around the spirit. They press a stone into the prince’s hand and sighs.

Here’s an instance where it’s clear that I didn’t outline the first chapter at all nor was I thinking about how the pieces fit if I expanded the story. This stone was supposed to do your normal fairy tale shenaniganry with like. Blessings and shielding and magical properties. Then I completely lost that vein and only left the part in where spirit!Robin basically gives Chrom, the prince, their heart. Good job, me. This constantly bothers me, but I also don’t have the motivation to rewrite this bit.

He freezes at Frederick’s stare.

I sincerely love Frederick for reasons that are spoilers for a giant FE:A fic I have in the works, but he’s also so, so fun to wind up.

Chapter Two

So, now I had to actually sit down and outline how this story went. Just a bunch of sentences jotted down, but enough to make me realize how bizarre the geography in this game is. Like, what even is going on with the story’s timeline? Do you know how long it takes to move an army over a continent, when its fastest mode of transportation are horses? I never get how they’re able to run from Plegia over to Mount Prism, then back to the opposite side of the continent and onto Grima’s back. Did Grima just wait for Chrom and co. to arrive? Like, they’re extra enough, but Nintendo, come on.

Let me just say, the FE:A world map has been a permanent fixture in my browser for months and I’m glad to see it gone.

Chrom sinks onto the bed and stares at the coat in his hands.

It’s been almost a decade.

The reason it took Chrom so long to appear among the character tags is because he wasn’t supposed to appear. Not until the last scene. Somehow he snuck into the open and close of the rest of the chapters and I didn’t kick him out.

“I died, Frederick,” Robin snaps. “Please leave it alone.”

Rereading the earlier chapters, I’m a bit surprised myself about how bitchy and defeated (?) Robin is. Being possessed by Grima sucks, and so does slowly turning into a dragon-human thing, but wow boi. Normally my characters are more on the “body slam our problems into submission” side of the spectrum. It all works out eventually, but for a while I had to deal with the nasty problem that apparently only the female characters have any of their shit together.

“Blood magic is a sorry inheritance,” his mother said sadly, thumbs rubbing at the brand on his hand.

I hope you all love Modron as much as me, because I love her and aggressively ignore how Nintendo did her dirty by including her as a key character in a whole bunch of fics coming down the pipeline. Though in this particular fic, her presence snuck in while I wasn’t watching, but not enough to recreate the Chrom situation.

The fisherman knocks on the wooden door of his younger brother’s stone house.

I planned on putting a fairy tale of my own creation into every chapter, with each linked in a tangentially narrative way to Robin’s family. Obviously that didn’t happen. This tale was supposed to be involving Robin and two Morgan’s. That plan derailed immediately.

Chapter Three

Robin’s daughter greets Chrom in Chon’sin’s silks and lacquer, the twists of dark purple contrasting her currently golden hair.

I keep making Say’ri a lesbian. That point doesn’t come up in this story, because Chrom wasn’t supposed to take over so much, but Morgan and Say’ri are together by this point, even if that gets muddled a bit by their weird work relation. I’m just saying, like father, like daughter.

And yes, Morgan dyes her hair. This is more established in the remix I wrote out of boredom of yet another chapter of Robin and Frederick yelling at each other in the snow.

“It’s a wonder your wayward mother never tried fleeing the continent all together,” Grima says.

At this point, I just accepted that I had no control over character barging in because they felt like it. Grima kept the story interesting at least, or else this whole plot would have been the slowest, most boring road trip ever.

At the cost of bloating this chapter and shoving out some other content I initially wanted to cover.

Due to Ferox’s waveringly official stance of neutrality, we spent a few years moving back and forth here.

[Cackling laughter]

Lon’qu and Olivia drop unannounced into the unoccupied seats at the table while Frederick and Robin waited for their dinners.

This scene is … weird. A slight mess. Originally, Lon’qu and Olivia had the same level of screen time as Donnel and Nowi did in the first chapter. But I already had the outline sectioned off into five chapters and writing even more scenes on boats was not a good usage of my time. Presumably, the khans got word that Robin and Frederick were back and heading to Valm and since Lon’qu and Olivia were already in the area with the same destination, they decided to do a favor and sent a message ahead.

What are the Ferox kids doing in Valm? Spying Something, wasn’t important.

A hazy memory of before. Sumia stumbles into Robin’s shoulder, the two of them laughing, drunk on wine and mirth.

In my drafts, there’s half of the fairy tale that was supposed to go in this chapter. Sumia drunkenly tells an equally sloshed Robin the story as they stumble around in the castle. It’s a more standard tale paralleling Modron hiding her children from the Grimleal and made much more sense than whatever was happening in the last chapter. Unfortunately, I cut it out because certain parties used up too many words when they weren’t even supposed to appear.

Chapter Four

Chapter four and five were supposed to come out back to back because I assumed I’d have time to write over the holiday break. As we all know now, that didn’t happen, like so many of my plans.

More importantly though, at this point I realized that Robin needed to start getting his shit together, fast.

A beat from Grima’s many wings carried them on the hot winds blowing off the fires below, covering several hours march in a fraction of the time.

This passage from the bad timeline is one of those sections I wrote nearly immediately since it just clicked. (The other significant passage is the final scene.) Honestly though, I was starting to have a hard time not repeating the same imagery and words over and over again. My grasp of English and vocabulary has never been anything to write home about, first language notwithstanding, and I literally had to pull out the thesaurus a few times in the later sections so I wouldn’t keep writing “scream” but completely forgot what other words existed. Linguistics amazes me, but it is so not my department.

Is it anger? Is it despair? Is it exhaustion, ascending to the Exalt’s throne alone, …

How to Tell I Wrote a Section by Hand Rather Than on My Computer: when the sentences get long and on this roll of phrase after phrase after phrase, that’s me with a pen. This whole section from Chrom was handwritten on my then-new iPad to test out some software.

By this point, I accepted that Chrom was just going to Be There and started working on his scenes to also try ramping up the tension in the fic by going backwards in his history to when the grief gets rawer and rawer. you wore out a path isn’t primarily about grief or depression, but some of those beats snuck in?

Chrom is a Mess™ at this point.

They dream feverishly.

What the fuck was this section.

“How am I supposed to keep this army and your father alive if you won’t tell me what happens? You’re one of our greatest sources of information and you refuse to share with anyone. Stop hiding.”

I hate! This dumb trope! Of not sharing info when traveling back in time! What’s the point of time traveling with the express purpose of changing history and then not! Changing history!

I have strong feelings.

By private captain, Robin means pirates. They must find pirates to board with.

This was entirely for my own amusement. There’s no other reason. Another key sign that my characters are getting a handle on their lives is that the writing starts getting snarkier.

Chapter Five

If by some future machination, the count increases to three out of three, he’s going to wholesale stop trusting magical mountains.

Case in point about the snark.

The master revived, the blood burning, the sacrifice slain, the master revived, the lORD, the FelL DRAGON, death, glory, the gOD and its vessel, returned, returned.

It turns out, messing with AO3’s formatting to have some font fun is a pain in the ass involving work skin shenanigans. The picture work skin already failed to do its job, I wasn’t going to wrestle with another skin just for this sentence. How it’s supposed to look:

A good two-third of this chapter just all came at once, in a sudden dash of productive writing. The muses are fickle that way.

Back on the point about how I Did Not Outline, there were a few items I wanted to reappear through the narrative. Elements from the fairy tales come back in this fight, for example. Another point I decided in the fourth chapter when writing the opening scene are the cathedrals.

(Disclaimer: I’m not religious and thus don’t know the full symbolic significance in cathedrals. What I know can be distilled into: You Thought New York Construction Was Slow? and Very Pretty Because Very Important and Yes, The Organ is Behind You and Very Loud. Not a lot.)

“Why do you fight for Chrom?”

Robin getting interrogated on this point keeps coming up in my fics, but the scenes are always fantastic short bursts that are good at breaking up a section that’s been running too long.

Suddenly, Robin is quite literally on fire.

I already drew the picture. The boy’s on fire. There was a good explanation when I first thought this up, but then when it came time to writing the scene, I forgot why, and my outline didn’t have any notes. Bonds? Naga’s flame? Dramatically dissolving Grima’s marks from Robin’s body? All of the above?

“One last tale for the road,” Modron says to her son, …

Modron’s name. I’ve seen people taking cues from Morgan and going with Morgana, but I’m a contrary soul that always resists whatever fandom decides is a good idea. This works out well half the time.

Morgan and Morgana led my brain to the Arthurian legends, and I decided to see what some of those character’s mothers were called. Went to Wikipedia, clicked a bunch off links radiating from Morgan le Fay and somehow landed on Modron? She’s interesting. Nor did I know about the DnD Bill Cipher thing.

Normally, though, I would not have started with a Welsh name. Some of the name choices for Plegian characters have vaguely Middle East origins (which is a completely different discussion about real world politics in that casting decision) and I would have started there.

I’m not a linguist though. Or someone that knows about naming conventions. So.

Now he stands grounded and as well rooted as the Mila Tree, the fire traded for a calm glow and Robin’s so grateful.

And this line here, this line here, is the sole reason I humored Chrom kicking his way into the story. This final scene was one of the first things I wrote after deciding to expand past the first chapter.

Look at these two dumb boys growing up.

In Conclusion

[staring at my file archives]

Have I ever actually finished a multi-chapter fic before?

#long post #i am #wordy #you wore out a path #I like it when people do these these notes/director cuts #so i'm gonna too #fire emblem awakening

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marksfire · 6 years

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Keep pushing my buttons, I dare you (you don't know why you do it)

The Flash I Harrisco I Humor, Banter, First Kiss I Read it on Ao3

This all started when Cisco decided to try to "bond" with Wells. Now, he's somehow moved on to - mostly accidentally - accusing him of being an awkward lay.

Cisco sat motionless across the table from Wells, hands clasped beneath his chin and eyes narrowed. He’d been trying to get Wells to loosen up for seventeen minutes now. Not that he’d been counting, or anything. Seventeen just seemed about right.

Plan 1.0 - trying to get Wells' to divulge his guilty pleasures - had ended in abrupt failure when Cisco had been told that there was no YouTube on Wells' Earth.

Plan 2.4 - sharing his music - had culminated in Wells looking unamused until Cisco had finally taken the hint and turned off ‘Hips Don’t Lie.’

Plan 3.7 had led to the coffee stain on the white ceiling and all that was left of plan 7.3 were the two broken crayons on the lab table to their left.

Wells was as still just as closed-off as ever.

He was like some serene eagle, Cisco reasoned - standoffish as fuck and oddly majestic. Definitely not Cisco’s best analogy, but accurate, nonetheless.

The fact of the matter was, it was fun, trying to engage Wells, and the fact that he seemed to be annoyed by Cisco’s efforts just made the endeavor that much more enticing.

“I bet...” Cisco drawled deliberately, hands still clasped underneath his chin with an air that made him look like a mediocre auditionee trying to pull off the prompt ‘lost in thought,’ “you’re a virgin.”

Wells raised in eyebrow. “You have met Jesse? You do know how humans are typically conceived?”

Cisco waved his words aside. “She was probably, like, an isolated incident. Fact is, you’re way too awkward. And maybe conceiving is different on your Earth. And also, I’m pretty sure that you treat sex like some stupid mortal activity you would never deign to participate in aside from after a very lengthy, quasi-essential discussion.” He was spouting bullshit, but Wells no longer looked bored, so Cisco was cool was that.

“Mortal? Do you think I’m a god, Ramon?”

Now, Cisco was having a fun conversation. “Is that seriously all you got from that?”

“No. In addition to your misconceived religious notions, I got that you apparently think about my sex life a lot.”

“Not unless I have literally nothing else to do,” Cisco defended. “For examples, see: figure one. Fig. 1: right now.”

“You have plenty of projects to work on. How’s that temperature stabilizer coming?”

“Finished.”

“The polymer you were putting together for implementation in the fiber of otherwise non-notable clothing at risk of being put under unexpected duress exceeding the limits of the non-notable fibers’ torque and endurance?”

Cisco blinked for a second, digesting the sentence.

“Okay.” He raised his eyebrows for emphasis and held up two fingers. “One-” he bent down a finger, “you read way too many books. Seriously. I think a lot of people would have to tackle that sentence with a highlighter, notepad, and a thesaurus in tow. And two-” he ticked off the other finger, “also finished.”

It wasn’t finished - he’d run into an issue with the fire-retardant coating - but it was close enough.

Harry (‘So now he’s Harry?’ Oh well. Cisco wouldn’t overthink it.), sitting back in his chair, held up two fingers of his own, mimicking Cisco. “One-” Harry ticked off a finger, “you seemed to handle that sentence just fine, so I’m not dumbing it down for you, and two-” he ticked off the other finger, “my point still stands.” He returned his hand to the arms of his chair.

Cisco inhaled deeply, then returned to his hands-clasped-under-chin position as he exhaled. “My point stands too. You’re still probably awkward as hell in bed.” ‘Why the fuck am I doing this, honestly?’ Pushing Harry like this was like a habit, but worse. Also, he kept doing it. And at this point, he didn’t even know why.

“Really?” Harry looked a little amused by Cisco’s allegations.

“Yep.” ‘Nope. Cisco, stop.’

“What makes you think that?”

“I mean,” Cisco looked Harry up and down pointedly, “all that.” ‘Cisco.’

“I look,” Harry replied, eyebrows raised, “like someone who’d be, quote unquote, ‘awkward as hell in bed?’”

“That is what I said.” ‘Goddammit, Cisco!’

“I’m not going to take offence to that.”

“Oh, don’t. Nothing’s cemented. Actually, I think that you’d either be super awkward or surprisingly good, I just said the one that seemed more likely.”

‘Did I accidentally download the ‘aggressively bad, flirty compliment’ malware package? Can I uninstall? Can I reboot!? Please!?’

“Not,” Cisco continued, “that I think about it a lot. I actually think about it very little, I’ll have you know.”

‘Oh my god, bury me underneath a skyscraper and leave me to rot so I can haunt some secretaries fifty years in the future. I’ll be the ghost of bad, mostly accidental flirting.’

Harry rolled his eyes and stood up, walking over to stand beside Cisco’s seat. Earlier, Cisco had pushed his chair away from the table, which left him about eighty percent open and facing Harry. Cisco didn’t know how the hell he could look so imposing, hair greasy and wearing a coffee-stained S.T.A.R. Labs sweater, but he somehow managed it.

Harry deliberately leaned over, gripping the arms of Cisco’s plastic chair and maintaining unnervingly steady eye-contact. The corners of Cisco’s lips had just begun to pull up in a smile as he thought about a joke to make - humor was his default communication mode - when Harry leaned in, lips pressing over Cisco’s.

The first thing that Cisco registered was ‘holyfuck.’

The second thing was ‘hot.’ Harry’s lips were hot - literally hot. The way he kissed was hot - figuratively, this time.

And Harry. Goddamn.

Safe to say, Cisco was pretty much brain-fried.

In his defense, it was kind of hard to think. Harry’s lips were little bit chapped and his tongue was sliding gently between parted lips and it was way too nice against Cisco’s own. The calloused skin of a firm hand was cupping his face and he could hear, feel Harry’s breathing. It was gentle, controlled, and feathered against his lips. Cisco was reduced to the sensation.

To be frank, Cisco was half-convinced that he was absorbing oxygen through his pores, because there was no other reasonable explanation for how he was still conscious enough to kiss back when he was so breathless. Harry had somehow managed to send Cisco spiraling into a jumbled headspace of “fuck,” “hot,” “more,” and “fuck,” with a single, albeit, heated kiss. It wasn’t his proudest moment but Cisco couldn’t even bring himself to care.

When Harry pulled back, Cisco followed him unconsciously. He didn’t like the cold on his mouth and his lips were wet and he was a little bit dizzy and so it was only logical that he wanted Harry back.

When Harry spoke, his, “You might want to re-evaluate the respective likeliness of those two possibilities” didn’t fully register. His words sounded foggy, Cisco had forgotten what half of those words meant, and somehow, his ears were ringing. His left brain knew that it was from his racing pulse, but his right brain was still hung up on that fucking kiss.

“Huh?” Cisco said, dazed.

Harry actually smiled.

#ngl i wrote this while watching parks and rec bc its a sunny monday and idgaf #harrisco #cisco ramon #harrison wells #the flash #fic

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atemusluckygal-fanfiction · 7 years

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Hi! I'm curious, how do you usually go about writting fanfics? Your stories are so great and their plots are eloquently told - how do you proceed when you decide to write something? How many drafts do you usually have? And holy molly, how do you manage to have such an rich vocabulary? I could definitely use some tips for my own writting.

Hi anon!

Thanks so much for the compliment! I’m really flattered that you’d ask me about the process. The key to writing good fiction, I think, is endeavoring to connect with your readers through something both relatable and meaningful. Most of the time the why is at least just as important than the how, if not more.

As far as the mechanics go, any ideas that cross your mind more than once has to go on the paper as soon as you can put it down. It doesn’t matter if all you’ve got is a total mess–99% of the time, it is a total mess. But it’s better than forgetting a potentially good story. (Side note: Most musicians remember song ideas by recording a memo with a guitar or piano as soon as they can, and most of the time it sounds like dog shit at first. But sometimes those little voice memos turn into the next Don’t Stop Believin’.)

I’ll give you an example, from my story from a while back “Dreams of Dancing: The Le Cygne Tour”. When the vague idea occurred to me (I was sitting in traffic), I came home and wrote this on a word doc:

Story idea:Tea auditions for a big important ballet thing dream jobtakes a big risk in audition and gets humiliatedYami comforts herTea is sad and discouraged while she waits for verdictShe wins auditionYami and Tea kiss

(lol how messy was that? it’s barely English)

I let that blob of text sit for a while, because not all ideas catch (I have around 18 “rejects” that will never see the light of day). If I read it again and it seems worth my time, I’ll start writing the main sections of the first draft (the major events, like the audition, judges’ comments, interaction with Yami afterwards, reading the verdict, the kiss, and the ending). I let that sit for a few days to a week, then fill it in a little at a time. By the way, when I say let it “sit”, I mean don’t look at it at all until you’re waited long enough. You’ll be able to see it with fresh eyes. In the final editing stage, I actually read my chapter to myself, out loud. If something doesn’t belong, or if it doesn’t flow like it should, you’d know as soon as the words tumble out of your mouth.

How many drafts do I usually have? It depends on the nature of the story. In a playful and not-too-serious piece like “In the Body of a Boy”, for the first two chapters there were no more than 3 drafts each–the third chapter was highly anticipated by the readers since it took so long, so that had more drafts so I could end it decently. The whole point was to poke fun at Atem’s character, not write the next Shakespearean melodrama.

In “Vices”, a much darker and more serious story with LOTS of exposition, each chapter (both parts and interludes) posted so far had somewhere between 6-8 drafts. I’m a bit of an obsessive editor, so it would’ve been more if I didn’t force myself to just post it and hope that, even if my execution is flawed, my message came through.

Something I’ve been doing lately is, after uploading the chapter on the Doc Manager on ff.net, I pull up the “preview” mode and read it top to bottom a few times. For some reason, seeing the piece on the interface exposes more things you’d want to change. Even a few minutes after publishing it, I’ll read it again from the public page, and go back and edit a few things here and there. (These are clearly pretty obsessive habits, which aren’t required to be a good writer. I’m just a slave to my own standard of excellence, and that’s not always a good thing.)

As far as vocabulary… well, I would hope I have at least a decent one, I’ve been writing for over 10 years! The first and most obvious advice I have to give for that is: read a lot. Read stuff that challenges you. If you come across a word you don’t know: stop, look it up, read the sentence again in context. If you do that, you’ll more likely remember the word and can use it for yourself later. I literally have the dictionary.com app on my phone so I can look up stuff wherever I go, instantly. Am I insane? Probably.

The point of sophisticated language isn’t to sound sophisticated, it’s more about finding words that capture what you’re trying to say in a more specific way. Like, for example, you could use a word like “extrapolate” instead of “plan ahead”, if in context, a character is meant to plan ahead using the knowledge they already have, and extending that pattern beyond the present time to predict a future outcome. Then again, broader terms like “plan ahead” might be better for dialogue than narration, if your character can’t be expected to use a word like “extrapolate” or even know what it means.

Just for fun, I’ll tell you what tabs I usually keep open and handy while writing:1) Merriam-Webster dictionary/thesaurus 2) Urban dictionary3) yu-jyo.net (for referencing canon material)4) tvtropes.org5) grammarist.com6) whatever thing I’m researching for the story7) Wikipedia8) ff.net: previous chapters of my story I’m adding to (if multiple chapters) for consistency

My last piece of advice: it all comes with practice! Lots and lots of it! If you read some of my very first stories (please don’t they’re terrible) and compare to my more current ones, you’ll see that it’s not an overnight thing, not even close. Like I said, over 10 years, and I still have a lot to improve on. Just keep reading, writing, learning, and you will see how much that helps you grow mechanically. Keep feeling, socializing, finding things in the world that inspire you, and you will see how much that helps you grow as an artist and human being.

Wow, that got so long! Sorry! I hope it still helps. Thanks for asking, and good luck on your ventures in your writing!

xo ALG

#atemusluckygal-fanfiction answers #atemusluckygal-fanfiction writes a goddamn essay #will atemusluckygal-fanfiction ever shut up #stay tuned

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