#they are just blowing everything out to MAJOR proportions and I’m sorry but it’s just fucking weeeeeeeeed

[rosicheeks]

💖

[eiightysixbaby]

Have you heard the song love at first fight by LANY? If you haven’t you should the chorus gives me major Eddie/Reader vibes. The chorus is:”Under the moonlight, clenching your jaw. And that's when I saw the fire in your eyes. Clothes on the floor, you stormed out the door. And that's when I knew that I can't live without you. It was sparks at first sight. But it was love at first fight.”

And OMG. Can you imagine? Eddie and her are still in puppy love honey moon stage and they have their first fight. Over nothing too serious, but serious enough to warrant an argument. And she storms out of his trailer slamming the door and all of the anger just washes from Eddie, and he’s standing there feeling alone, and sad, and helpless and panicked. And it slaps him in the face “oh my god I’m in love with her, I can’t let her leave mad.” And he runs after her scooping her into his arms before she gets in her car and just keeps telling her he’s sorry and he’s an asshole and he’s not letting her leave mad 🥹

ohhhh lordy. 😭

the first fight feels like the world is falling out from under both you and him. it’s not even anything big, a stupid argument over a miscommunication and a forgotten date on eddie’s part. you hate the pain in his eyes when you raise your voice at him, but for whatever reason you don’t back down and it just turns into both of you yelling back and forth, saying things neither of you really mean. there’s so much unspoken love and passion behind it all, and the fear of jumping off the ledge into new depths of a relationship definitely spurs on some of the anxiety riddled into the argument. you decide you’ve had it and you slam the door, harder than necessary, feet stomping on gravel as you go to your car. eddie’s dead silent inside, staring at the door hoping it’ll open again and you’ll come back in. but you don’t, and he gets so scared. he feels like he can’t breathe as he thinks over the possibility of having lost you, and everything just hits him like a train. it’s so obvious to him then that he loves you, adores you, and he can’t let you leave angry. he can’t let this ruminate and become something unrepairable. and so he’s running out the door after you, in his socks because he couldn’t be bothered to put shoes on. he doesn’t care if the ground is wet from the previous night’s rain and his feet are getting muddy, he doesn’t care about any of it when he sees you leaning against your car with your head in your hands. he just scoops you up without thinking, pulls you so tight to his chest you’re surprised your bones don’t shatter. he’s kissing the top of your head over and over, mumbling ‘I’m sorry’ between presses of his lips. all of your anger just melts away, all of the stupid things you said swirl around your head and shatter to the ground. “baby, I-” is what you start to say before eddie cuts you off. “don’t apologize, I was an asshole and I need to be more careful. I didn’t mean any of those hurtful things I said,” his eyes are huge and glassy as he looks at you, and you just hold his face in your hands firmly as your lip wobbles. “I love you, I love you so much. please don’t leave me, I can’t let you leave angry,” he whimpers, and it makes your heart ache and swell at the same time. “I’d be a fool to leave you, because I love you too,” is all you say back before he’s pressing his lips to yours and you’re both standing there with tears streaming down your faces, salty wet lips colliding. you can’t even remember why you were so mad before, why you let something so small blow out of proportion. all that matters is that you love eddie and he loves you, and you’ll figure all the rest out as you go.

[frozenprincessshay]

Our Puppy, Our Firework- Bakudeku X Reader

Prompt: Your boyfriends, Katsuki and Izuku, want to punish you for not denying that you’re not in a relationship with Hawks. 

Tags: Polygamy, Jealous Bakugou, Jealous Izuku, Polyamory, Bondage, Punishment, Voyeurism, Blowjob, Explosion Play, Hair pulling, Double Penetration, Aftercare

You enter your house, feeling exhausted from the major fight you’d been a part of earlier today. You had stopped the villain, but not before he’d managed to propel you into the sky. Your quirk was useless against the gravitational pull bringing you closer and closer to your death.

Luckily, your mentor, Hawks swooped in and caught you in his arms. Your mentor and you had a less than professional relationship, having only a 3-year age difference. He’d teased you lightly as you landed and you’d laughed, grateful for the save. A reporter had pushed their way to Hawks and you and asked, abruptly if we can confirm that we were a couple.

You always preferred to keep your personal details to yourself and normally would have just replied with a nonchalant ‘No comment’. Hawks was different, “It’s a secret.”

The growing crowd had cooed and you laughed it off as nothing, knowing full well that Hawks was just having some fun. He knew that you were in a committed relationship with two pro-heroes… who were probably sound asleep just at the top of those stairs.

You sighed, you figured you’d have a quick shower before you joined them.

You tiptoe up the stairs, opening the door to the main bedroom to catch a peek of their peaceful sleeping faces. What you did not expect was to be yanked into the room and slammed into the adjacent wall.

Your eyes widen to meet the glaring ruby eyes of your boyfriend, Katsuki. “So, you’re home. Maybe you can explain what the fuck this is about?!”

Your gaze shifts to your other boyfriend, Izuku, seated on the huge bed with a frown. He held up his phone, playing a video recording of Hawks saving me and the short interview with the reporter. From here I could have easily seen how everything was taken out of context. Hawks, being the playful touchy person he was, also hadn’t let go of me through the recording.

“Aw come on, Katsuki, Izuku,” You meet both their eyes as you speak their names,” Hawks just saved me from a make-out session with the cement. You know how reporters blow things out of proportion.”

Izuku pouted, “He made it seem like there was a thing going on between the two of you.”

“And you, fucking dumbass, didn’t even try to deny it!” Katsuki finished.

“I work for his agency! And I didn’t want to be rude, especially since he just saved my life. If he wanted to have a stupid joke, I wasn’t gonna stop him. There’s always rumors circulating about Hawk’s potential girlfriends. I give this a week before there’s a new sidekick, he’s having an explicit affair with.”

Katsuki leaned over you, causing you to press yourself into the wall, but you hold his gaze. You didn’t want to admit that, his fiery glare intimidated you. “I still think you need to be punished. Don’t you agree, Deku?”

“I’m sorry, Puppy, but Kacchan is right.”

Suddenly, Katsuki has both your wrists clamped firmly in his hand and is tying them above your head against the wall.

You all agreed to have a hook on the wall for experimenting, but now the angry glint in Katsuki’s eyes spiked fear in you.

“What are you doing?”

“You’re going to stay there and watch.”

Your eyebrows scrunch in confusion until Katsuki walks away from you to a patient Izuku sitting on the bed. His legs were already partially open to let Katsuki slip between them and swoop down for a kiss. Katsuki’s hand caressed Izuku’s face, his right hand slipping down to his throat and squeezing gently.

You swallow, already feeling a warmth at your core. Watching Katsuki choke Izuku conjured a phantom hand around your neck. Where you wanted Katsuki’s hand to be.

Katsuki’s hands traveled lower to the hem of Izuku’s shirt, tugging at it until it was thrown to the floor. Katsuki kissed down Izuku’s toned chest, simultaneously unbuttoning his pants. Izuku’s head hung back, his hands grasping the edge of the bed, but his eyes fixed on yours. He wanted you to see him so flustered because he knew it turned you on. God, forbid he starts moaning and you’d be done for.

Katsuki pulled out Izuku’s cock, shooting a taunting smirk at you as he gripped it. Then he licked the tip. Izuku gasped, “Ah!”

Officially, done for.

And Katsuki continued. He placed Izuku’s cock in his mouth, bobbing his head, each time pushing Izuku deeper into his mouth. Izuku’s moans flooded the room and wet your core, “Kacchaan~”

Katsuki let up, but continued pumping Izuku with his hand, “Why don’t you describe everything I’m doing to you for our little firework over there.”

With that statement, he was back to Izuku’s cock. Deep throating it like the pro he was.

Izuku groaned, “Kacchan is -ah- sucking my cock. He -ah- does it so good. When he pulls out, he swirls his, -ngh- tongue-” Izuku clutches the bed tightly, breathing heavily, “His tongue around the tip before taking it all- Aah~.”

Your core was practically on fire from watching your boyfriends go at it. You shift and rub your thighs together, trying to get some friction. Your hands grip the bonds suspending you and binding you to the wall.

Izuku’s keen observation didn’t fail him even as he was being deepthroated, “Kacchan, I can tell she’s already so horny- Ah!”

Katsuki lifts off Izuku’s cock and turns to you. His smug expression showed you that this is exactly what he wanted. “Is something wrong, little firecracker?”

You gulp, unable to speak, you just shake your head. Not wanting to give in.

Katsuki glares and in a low growl, he orders, “Deku, take your fucking pants off!”

Izuku doesn’t hesitate, he slips his pants right off. Katsuki grabs Izuku by his waist and flips him onto the bed. Izuku’s plump ass stuck up as the side of his face was smushed against the bed. Katsuki hovered over him, then delved right into his butt. He licked and gripped his ass with bruising force.  

Izuku couldn’t contain himself, his moans pitched high and louder. Each one strikes your core like a whip with fire. Izuku pushed back against Katsuki’s active mouth.

That just about did it, “Okay, okay you got me. I’m sorry, just let me join. Please?”

Your eyes didn’t leave Izuku’s flustered face. Katsuki sat up but replaced his tongue with 2 fingers.

“I don’t think you mean that apology. Do you, Deku?”

Izuku panting and clutching onto the bed covers, moaned out, “No, Kacchan~”

“No, I really am sorry. It won’t happen again, I promise.” You plead.

Katsuki stared at you a long moment, his fingers still thrusting in and out of a squirming Izuku.

“Not good enough.” He said, finally, and you almost whined in disappointment.

Katsuki pulled out his fingers and ordered, “Deku, suck my dick.”

Izuku trembled and you wondered if he was close to cumming. Nevertheless, he rose, throwing a glance at you. You could see the daze of lust in his pools of green.  He then turned and engulfed Katsuki’s cock in his mouth.

Katsuki groaned, his hand gripping Izuku’s head, buried in curls. This time you do whine from the conflict of whether you would want Katsuki to be pulling your hair while you go down on him, or whether you’d want to be pulling Izuku’s green curls while he goes down on you.

“Katsuki, please,” you beg, “Let me join you, I’ll be a good girl.”

Katsuki glared straight at you, as Izuku bobbed on his dick. His flushed face driving your sanity away.

Katsuki spanked Izuku’s ass, causing him to gasp out and Katsuki’s dick to fall out of his mouth. “Izuku, please, let me join you.” You plead, with the sweeter one of your boyfriends, “I really am sorry, sweetheart.”

Izuku looks to you with sympathy, “Kacchan, she really does seem sorry.”

Katsuki scowled, “Fine,” he pushed off the bed, walking over to you until he was directly in front of you. His body so close, yet purposely not touching, “We’ll take pity on you since you’re such a needy brat.”

He unlatches you from the hook but kept the restrains. He tugged you forward before pushing you harshly onto the bed. He leaned down, barely brushing against you, and growled lowly, “But you’re not getting off easy, Firecracker. You’re going to have to earn it for what a little whore you were being today. Serve us, slut.”

You gulp, “Yes, sir.”

A gentle hand takes your chin, turning you away from the aggressive man in front of you to meet soft green eyes. Izuku smiled down at you, slyly, “Come here, Puppy, don’t let my faith in you be in vain.”

His hypnotizing gaze beckoned you forward as he leaned back. Almost on instinct, you sank lower to face his cock. Leaning on your elbows, you lick a long line up Izuku’s cock while keeping eye contact.

His lips parted, slightly, before you latched onto his tip and sucked like a lollipop. Giving Izuku’s cock your full attention, you’d almost forgotten the angry blond behind you, tugging your pants down and away.

The explosive fingertips at your ass reminded you and cried out with Izuku’s cock still in your mouth.

“Don’t you dare stop sucking, slut. Don’t forget this is your punishment.”

You engulf Izuku’s cock again, enthusiastically bobbing your mouth around it. Licking and sucking just the way you knew he liked it. Listening to his moans of encouragement egging you on, “That’s a good Puppy. Such a good bitch sucking me off like that.”

You whimper against his cock at the word. Loving the praising degradation. Another array of fingertip explosions went off at your rear and cry out around Izuku’s cock.

“You’re enjoying this way too much, Slut.”

Katsuki grabbed onto your upper thighs and spread them. His grip is dangerously close to your core making you squirm. “Deku, this little whore is soaking wet from sucking your cock.”

Izuku looks down, adoringly, “Is that so, Puppy?”

You hum, desperately, around his cock and he let’s out a delicious gasp. His fingers slide into your hair, gripping it gently, “Naughty Puppy. You want to be stuffed with cock?”

You whimper against him.

“I think she’s wet enough to take us both.”

Your eyes widen, Izuku suddenly yanks you off his cock by your hair.  “Don’t look so surprised. You just admitted you want to be full of cock.”

“No, wait, guys-” A piece of fabric suddenly came around you, gagging your mouth and tightening around your face.

“Shut up! We’re going to fill you up and show you who you really belong to!”

Katsuki pulls you back by your hips onto his lap and slowly pushes into you. Your eyes shut in pleasure as inch-by-inch slip into you. Katsuki growls as you clench around him.

Izuku, who’d been watching mesmerized from against the headboard, rose. He undid the binding around your arms before placing his hands over Katsuki, pulling you up carefully to ensure Katsuki didn’t slip out.

You were on your knees, balanced by the two men’s grip on your hips.  Izuku leaned down to your ear, “My turn, Puppy”

Your eyes blow wide as Izuku guided his cock next to Katsuki’s and started to push in. Your hands fling out to grip Izuku’s shoulders and you cry out into the gag. Izuku stops.

“Are you okay, Puppy?” he asks with a look of genuine concern in his eyes. Even Katsuki, who found it hard to voice affection, was rubbing soothing circles with his thumbs at your hips. A silent question if they should continue.

You take a few deep breaths in to calm the overwhelming feeling. Slowly, you nod for them to continue. Katsuki laughs in your ear, “I always knew you were a cock hungry whore.”

Izuku smiled down at you with admiration, “You’re taking us so well, Puppy.”

And he slowly slid in, causing you to grip his shoulders and shudder, trying to bear it all. When Izuku and Katsuki were both in, stretching you to the fullest you could possibly be, they paused to allow you to adjust.

Katsuki rubbed small circles into your hips and peppered soft, encouraging kisses at your neck. Izuku leaned on your other side, whispering praise, “You’re amazing, Puppy. Taking us all in like that.”

They waited for you, not rushing, just enjoying being connected. The three of you.

You lean forward on Izuku’s shoulder, before surprising both boys by lifting your hip up and down.

A moan from Izuku,

A growl from Katsuki,

A whimper from you.

“Fuck.” Katsuki groans, gripping your hips tighter and pulling you up and down. You grip Izuku’s shoulders. Your legs were shaking way too much to support you.

Pressure is added at your sides as Izuku presses over Katsuki’s hands, helping guide you to fuck yourself on their cocks.

Nothing else registers in your mind but the fullness of your having both your boyfriends inside you, pressing against your inner walls and hitting every pleasure spot. Strangled, pleasurable noises spill from your mouth. Your brain couldn’t process anything beyond the euphoria you were experiencing.

You were tugged backward, falling against Katsuki’s chest and head lolling onto his shoulder.

He grunted, breathing labored, “Show us your fucking face, slut.”

You barely processed his words.

“Come on, puppy. Look at us.” Izuku panted in front of you.

You struggle to process the words they spoke but in your fit of moaning and vertical movement, you catch their eyes. First Izuku’s, holding his gaze until a special spot was hit with more force, causing you to throw your head back and cry out.

One of Katsuki’s hands slid up your body, tugging your boob on its journey before gripping your jaw. He turned your head to face him, “Look at me too.”

He leaned down, his ragged breaths mixing with the beautiful mewls leaving your lips as your lips met.

The tempo of the movements increased. Your voice rose higher and higher in pitch.

Katsuki swore in your ear, “We’re gonna fill you up, Firework. Fill you up so good, you’ll be dripping cum until next week. Everyone will see you dripping our cum and know you’re ours.”

Izuku mumbled a little softer in your other ear, “Hear that, Puppy. Fuck, I can’t wait to see how much more your tummy will bulge when all our cum is warming your precious cunt.”

Those words they spoke shoved you over the edge. Falling into the most intense orgasm you’ve ever had and clamping down on both men’s cocks.

Izuku and Katsuki suddenly pressed their bodies onto you, sandwiching you in, and let out their own roars of pleasure. Their grip tightening and hands still fucking you through the orgasms as they filled you. Your moans quieted but your body still spasmed with pleasure as the warm cum filled your insides and never seemed to want to stop.

The high started to die and Izuku and Katsuki fell back onto their ankles, catching their breath.

Exhaustion overtook you, you tilted to the side, falling onto the disturbed covers of your bed. Izuku and Katsuki both slipped out causing a small sound in your throat. You felt cum trickle from your core, but you were beyond caring. In your post-orgasmic state of exhaustion, your eyes closed and you blacked out.

Not too long after, as you slept, strong arms slipped under you and hoisted you up. You groan in dismay from being removed from your comfortable bed.

“Shut up, you’re a mess.”

You open your eyes only a little to see Katsuki’s blurry form. “Katsuki,” you say, your voice raw and drowsy, “You know I’d never cheat on you, right?”

You look up at him, as much as you could as you fought your eyes shutting.

Katsuki’s ruby eyes found you, softer than their usual setting, “I know, Firework.” Then after a pause, he grumbled, “Just fucking get stronger already so you don’t need bird lice to come and save you.”

You didn’t have the energy to laugh but a tired smile graced your lips.

The harsh light of the bathroom caused another groan of discomfort from you.  You pushed your head further into Katsuki’s bicep, trying to escape the light.

“Suck it up.”, Katsuki said.

You were being lowered down; your eyes still tightly shut until you felt warm water against your skin. Hands went around you from under you and you knew it was Izuku helping you into the water.

You settled down slowly in between his thighs, submerged into the soothing warmth of the water and Izuku’s chest against your back. Your eyes had already closed again, ready to sleep in the mirror of her comfortable bed. Soft splashing made you aware of Katsuki entering the bath.

“Don’t sleep, Puppy. We need to clean you.”

You let out a small sound of protest, already sinking into sleep. A hand pulls your leg partially out of the water. The sudden rush of water added to the calm you felt. You feel a hard object glide over your skin. Without opening your eyes, you reason it was soap.

Part by part, Katsuki meticulously soaped and washed your body. He took care in massaging as he went. Izuku, behind you, hummed so sweetly and trailed his fingers up and down your arms. You couldn’t imagine how he expected you to not fall into sleep’s clutches.

When they had washed you and finished washing themselves. Katsuki exited the tub and not long after, you were being pulled out of the water.

You whimper at the cold as the air attacks your wet skin. “If you stay there, the water will get cold anyway. Hurry up if you want to be warm, dumbass.”

“Kacchan! Don’t be mean.”

Your feet touch the ground but won’t support you. You nearly fall, but Katsuki readily caught you. His hands at your waist steady your shivering self.

Izuku had left the water himself and after drying himself hastily, encircled his arms around you, allowing Katsuki to towel you down.

Satisfied that you were dry, Izuku swung you into his arms. Cradling you against him to share his warmth for the short walk back to the bed.

He laid you down, carefully, onto the bed.  You relax into the long-awaited comfort of your beloved bed. Izuku’s muscled arm wrapped around you, “Are you okay?”

“Mmm.” You reply.

You feel a soft kiss at your temple, “I’m glad you got out of there safely. I was worried about you, Puppy.”

As tired as you were, you pulled enough energy to reply, properly, “I’m okay, Izuku. I’m safe, here with you. And Katsuki.”

He tightened his hold, as though to reassure himself that you were indeed here.

In front of you, the bed dipped as Katsuki joined them. You feel a cooling burn on your butt and without thinking, you know it’s gel for the explosions Katsuki had set off.

When Katsuki is finished, he lays down and places his arms around you, just under Izuku’s.

Feeling well-taken care of, safe, and loved, you finally let your fatigue pull you into nothingness.

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

Hi. I know this doesn’t fall under the purview of sex ed, but google hasn’t been helpful and I feel like I’m going insane. I have a history of anxiety and mild paranoia and I feel like I’m blowing this out of proportion.

I take walks regularly in the same park. For the last couple months I’ve seen the same guy riding his bike there - youngish looking, I thought maybe he was a kid from the nearby high school or community college. He would sometimes yell something at me as he rode by, but i wear headphones so I didnt hear it. The last time i saw him, i actually took off my headphones and he was talking about bear tracks in the woods and offered to show them to me, which I declined and kept on about my business.

Last night, he actually got in my way, got off his bike, bowed to me and called me madam and offered me a rose. I told him i didnt want it and that this was weird, and he basically begged me to take it and started trying to play everything off like “oh I just picked a rose and thought it would be nice to give it to someone and well I saw a pretty girl and thought it should be for you.” And then rode off on his bike. I had to call my girlfriend to walk home cause I was afraid he was going to follow me.

Is this actually as creepy as it feels? Do you have resources you can direct me to for how to like. Deal with these sort of incidents? I’m 23 and I’ve never had anything remotely like this happen before. Thanks for your time, and I’m sorry, I know this isn’t the sort of ask you’re used to answering.

I mean yeah it sucks and that's annoying and unsettling even if he doesn't have any malicious intentions (which he almost certainly doesn't; the vast majority of men who do shit like this are normal dudes who just. don't realize how it comes across). it would rattle me for sure and we all know I'm an unflappably heartless bitch.

love that you made it 23 years without a dude being a pest to you while you're trying to mind your own business; congrats on that. as someone who's drawn a truly insane amount of street harassment due to the part of town where I live and work and the sheer amount of time I've spent on public transit, I recommend getting really comfortable avoiding eye contact, keeping your gaze straight ahead, and either fully fucking ignoring problem guys or getting real comfortable making them uncomfortable. say no, keep walking, headphones back in immediately if you took them out at all ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[bestiesenpai]

Timorous - Itadori Yuji

I love hybrid au’s for the fact that I can google deep dive animal research for hours lol and speaking of research I went with a bunny, breed being a French lop with speckles. also this is a college au my guys, gender neutral reader! 6k words

A bit of a size difference thing here? Itadori is a tiger and tigers are bigger than rabbits...so I made him bigger and by that logic he’s bigger than you...tiger big rabbit small...I hope that makes sense lol and both reader and itadori are adorably skittish in this :) at least I think it’s adorable

To say Itadori had a problem would be both an understatement and an over exaggeration, depending on who you asked. Megumi said he was blowing things out of proportion while Nobara agreed that this dilemma he had was probably the biggest problem of their generation.

He had a crush on you, a rabbit hybrid. A soft, wonderful little thing with long ears and cute speckles all around your body. And it wouldn’t be such a problem if not for the painful fact of who Itadori was: a tiger hybrid. A predator nearly directly above you, much larger and stronger than you could ever hope to be.

He laid eyes on you during your first year of university, back in a prerequisite class for the major both of you had chosen. Seeing you walk in surrounded by other rabbits and sitting at the front of the class, he could barely take his eyes off you and when you said your name, he committed it to memory.

Everything about you was perfect, everything Itadori could ask for in a partner and more, but he knew there wasn’t any hope out there that he could approach you, at least not alone and especially not in your first year. So he waited patiently, almost too patiently, for the right opportunity to talk to you.

He waited so long it was now almost the end of your second year.

“Alright everyone, I’d like you to think about who you want to pair up with for this project and report back to me by the end of the week. Anyone that doesn’t have a partner by then will be paired up.” The professor announced at the end of class, closing up the textbook you’d been pouring over for an hour. This was the perfect opportunity for Itadori to get close to you.

Lingering in the classroom, Itadori packed up his things slowly and watched as the usual people you were with left class while you hung around to ask the professor a question. Holding his breath, Itadori walked out of the classroom at the same time as you.

You didn’t look in his direction at all, keeping your head down and ears framing your face. Itadori could smell the subtle unease rolling off you in waves and it disheartened him enough that he watched you walk away.

“H-hey (Y/N)!” Mustering up the courage to say your name, Itadori rushed over to your disappearing form. Looking over your shoulder, your eyes went wide seeing Itadori running toward you.

“What uh, what can I help you with?” This was the first time you were speaking to him and your voice was trembling. Your fingers were pulsing from how hard you were holding onto the strap of your bag, and you only briefly made eye contact with him.

“I was wondering…” Itadori’s tail twitched nervously and a lump began to form in his throat the longer he looked at you. You were just so cute it physically hurt him and all Itadori wanted to do was bundle you in his arms and nuzzle your fuzzy ears.

“I was wondering if you want to be partners for that project in class?” Seeing you flinch when he raised his hand up to scratch at the back of his neck, Itadori winced and tucked both hands behind his back.

“Uhm…” Worrying your lip, you took a look up and down the halls. There was a decent amount of people milling about, giving you a little more peace of mind. Even though Itadori was an arms length away he still took up a large portion in your field of vision.

“Y-you don’t have to give me an answer right now!” Putting both hands up in surrender, Itadori gasped as you stumbled back, clearly frightened by the sudden movement and his long claws. “Sorry! Sorry, I’m so sorry!”

Now he really felt bad. He scared you bad enough that you were pressed against the wall behind you, slightly crouched like you were ready to run away. Taking a generous step back, Itadori once again tucked his hands behind his back, idly grabbing onto the base of his tail as well.

“Can I give you an answer later?” You whispered, slowly coming to a full stand again.

“Of course! We actually have a few classes together later, so you can tell me then if you want.”

“Okay…”

“Itadori! M-my name is Itadori!” Blushing lightly as he told you his name, he watched you think it over.

“Okay Itadori.” Nodding curtly, you pressed your lips into a thin line and started to shuffle down the hall. “I’ll tell you later.”

“Bye!” Waving at your retreating form, Itadori felt a trickle of hope. Even if you didn’t say yes to being his partner, at least now you knew his name.

“Excuse me, Itadori?” Two classes later and you approached his desk, keeping a fair distance away.

“Yes?” Looking at you with hearts in his eyes, Itadori sent you a beaming smile with all his sharp teeth on display.

“Why do you want to be my partner?” The question was unexpected, at least for him, and his smile fell.

“Well I- I just thought it’d be nice?” Panicking as he saw confusion flash across your face, Itadori sat up a little straighter in his chair. “N-nice to get to know my fellow classmates! We’re in the same major, so why not get more acquainted?” Stretching his mouth into a tense smile, Itadori let out a breath the same time you did.

“That’s actually a relief. I thought you wanted to be my partner to make me do all the work.” He visibly watched your shoulders relax, the unease in your stance somewhat gone.

“No, never! I would never do that to you! In fact, I’ll do all the work if you want me to! Just say the word, (Y/N)!” Bolting up from his chair, Itadori slammed his hands on his desk. It was probably a good thing you weren’t close to him, you didn’t flinch as hard at his sudden movements.

“We can work on it together.” Laughing under your breath, Itadori’s chest tightened up at seeing a soft smile grace your face.

“So you’ll be my partner? For the project?” Nearly running around the room when you nodded, Itadori forced himself to take a deep breath instead. “That’s great!” His tail swayed happily from side to side, and Itadori had a silly smile on his face as he looked at you.

“So uh, I’m going to take my seat now.” You said slowly, unnerved by his unmoving smile. “But we should meet up later? To discuss what we’ll do for the project.”

“Good idea!” Ripping a piece of paper out of the corner of his notebook, Itadori scribbled his phone number down and held it out to you. “Text me anytime, I’ll answer!”

“Good to know.” Chuckling softly, you took the paper and Itadori swore he would never forget the way your fingers brushed against his. With one last final goodbye muttered under your breath you went to your seat.

Itadori watched you for the rest of class, just waiting to see you take out your phone and text him. He hadn’t seen you do anything with the paper he gave you except tuck it away into your pocket.

Keeping his phone clutched in his hand for the rest of the day, Itadori experienced the highest of highs whenever he got a notification, and then the lowest of lows when it turned out not to be you.

At seven pm, just after eating dinner, Itadori finally received the message he’d been waiting for all along.

(Unknown number): Hello, Itadori? It’s (Y/N) :)

(Itadori): HI HELLO HOW ARE YOU

He immediately cringed after sending the message. What kind of person replied like that to someone they’d just met?

(Y/N): I’m good lol I was wondering when you were free to meet up? I don’t have any classes tomorrow if you’re free

(Itadori): yes yes I’m free whenever tomorrow!

(Y/N): that’s great, how about we meet at the north library at 1?

(Itadori): I’ll be there!!

Itadori could hardly close his eyes let alone calm down enough to go to sleep that night. Much to the chagrin of his roommate Megumi, Itadori got up several times during the night to pace around the room and rummage through his closet to choose the perfect outfit.

He was nearly late meeting up with you, having properly gone to sleep just before 4am and sleeping through his alarm. Stumbling through his room, Itadori just barely remembered to grab his bag before he sprinted out of the room and to the library.

“(Y/N)!” Screaming your name as he got closer, he caught a lot of stares from people and from you.

“Did you run all the way here?” You asked, looking over his breathless, sweaty body nearly collapsing.

“Were you waiting long? I’m sorry I was late!” Fumbling to grab his phone, the time read 1:10pm.

“No, it’s okay, don’t worry about it!” Your cheeks were flushed with embarrassment. Not only had he ran all the way here just to meet you, but he had made quite a scene while doing it. You were eager to get inside and away from all the people passing you by and looking curiously between the two of you.

“Let's...let’s go inside…” Itadori panted, light headed from the run but still making his way to open the door for you. Slumping into the first available seat at the first table he saw, Itadori let his dry, narrowed eyes look over you.

It was a warm spring day and you’d chosen the cutest outfit, one that showed off the speckles on your ears and skin. Itadori always liked them, likening them to his own tiger stripes on his ears and tail. He wanted to compare markings with you, trace a line with the dots on your body and learn more about them.

“Have you had a chance to go over the list of topics our professor gave? A few others have already chosen their topics, so we have to cross some out.” Pulling out the assignment, you showed Itadori the ones you’d crossed off and the ones you marked having interest in. Even your handwriting had Itadori wanting to coo at you.

“Whatever you pick is fine.” He replied dumbly, staring at the way you’d written your name on the top of your paper.

“You should have some say in what we choose!” You pushed back, slightly shaking your head.

“No, whatever you want is fine, I swear.” Looking up at you with rosy cheeks and a dry mouth, Itadori watched the gears turn in your head before you looked away and back to the paper.

“If you say so.” Shrugging your shoulders, you looked over the list more seriously before circling a topic and showing it back to him. “Is this one fine?”

“It’s perfect.” Just like you, Itadori almost said. Pulling out his laptop, Itadori put it between the two of you. “We can start researching and making a rough draft, I was actually looking some stuff up last night about the different topics.”

Not using a private browser last night was Itadori’s first mistake. His second mistake was opening Google with you right next to him, where you saw exactly what he’d been looking up during his sleepless night.

French lops, French lops with speckles, French lop ears, how do bunnies get speckles, what do rabbit hybrids like to do for fun, rabbit hybrid favorite food, favorite things to give rabbit hybrids, how to befriend rabbit hybrids, can prey and predator hybrids be friends, what to do if you’re a predator that has a crush on a rabbit hybrid-

Letting out an indistinguishable noise from the back of his throat, Itadori slammed his laptop closed. His face was bright red, not that you could see much of it because he had slammed his face into the table in shame.

Your soft giggle was immediately picked up by him, and Itadori nearly melted from the chair and onto the floor, dissolving into a puddle of nothing but embarrassment and regret. He thought about switching classes or switching majors entirely, anything to save him from having to face you again after this.

“All of my spots grew in by the time I was five, in case you were still curious, Itadori.” He actually was, almost more than he was last night. The internet had given him answers, but just as many questions he still wanted to ask you.

“Really?” Smooshing his cheek against the table, Itadori turned to look at you. You didn’t seem phased at all from what you’d seen, not if the small smile on your face was anything to go by.

“Mhmm.” Opening up his computer again, you took a brief glance at some of the questions he’d looked up. “And I’m assuming from your research you learned I’m a strict herbivore? My favorite type of food is fruit, mangoes and melons especially.”

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to.” Still hanging his head low, Itadori pulled himself up from the table. He had wanted to get to know you more naturally, not have you find his obsessive search history.

“I want to! And It seems like you want to know, too!” Gesturing to the screen, you giggled when he hit his forehead against the table again. Patting him on the back for a few seconds revitalised him, the fact that you initiated physical contact enough to have him sitting straight in his chair again.

“I do, a lot! I’m really curious about-” Meeting your eyes for a second, Itadori screwed his eyes shut and forced the next words out of his mouth. “I’m really curious about you, (Y/N). I really want to get to know you more.” Nobara and Megumi were going to be so proud of him for finally saying those words to you. He’d been lamenting about wanting to befriend you for nearly two years, it was time to act on that desire.

“You can ask me any question, Itadori.” A soft warmth settled over your face and you tilted your head forward, blocking out your view of the world with your ears. Truth be told, you’d never had a predator show such genuine interest in you before, and it had your heart bumping hard against your ribs.

“My first question is: can we be friends, (Y/N)?” There wasn’t a doubt in Itadori’s mind that you hadn’t seen the last question he looked up, about having a crush on you. He almost wanted to address it, wanted to get his confession out of the way. But it wasn’t the right time or place, and there wasn’t a doubt in Itadori’s mind that if he confessed to you right now you wouldn’t reject him.

“What did your search say about that one? Is it possible for us to be friends?”

“100% possible.” Itadori said with no hesitation.

“Then yes, we can totally be friends.” There was a brief pause between the two of you, one filled by your nervous laughter and Itadori’s relieved sigh.

“Alright then friend, let’s get started on this project.”

Itadori tried his best to focus on the project, he really did. He typed up everything you said, bookmarked everything you wanted and even went back and forth between the stacks to get the books you needed for the project. But his mind was wrapped up in the new title of your relationship, and the greed he felt deep inside himself to make it something more romantic.

By the time you left the library it was well past five pm and the sun was already beginning to dip behind the campus buildings and to the horizon. Helping you clean and pack up, Itadori was astounded at the amount of time that passed; it barely felt like an hour had gone by.

“Man, I’m starving!” Itadori exclaimed as you left the library, throwing his head back and inhaling the fresh air.

“Me too.” You agreed, fatigued from all the work you’d just done and still needed to do.

“You wanna head to the dining hall together?”

“Sure.” Following his lead, you walked through campus. You still kept your distance from Itadori, not quite able to shed how nervous being around him made you, but with time he hoped it would come to pass. Someday, Itadori hoped to hold your hand in his.

Sitting down at a quiet table together, Itadori wasn’t sure how to make conversation with you now. At the library it was easy, there was the project he could talk about and keep a conversation going with that. But here, he was drawing blanks.

“So Itadori, what-”

“Yuji!” Just as you’d started to speak, the familiar voice of Nobara cut in all the way from across the dining hall. Both of you turned to see Nobara waltzing in with a big grin on her face and Megumi trailing after her.

“Oh god.” This was the one time he didn’t want his friends to come and sit with him. But there they were, already collecting food and coming to sit down at the table.

“Found you!” Nobara giggled behind her hand, her own tiger ears relaxing flat against her head.

“Yup, you did.” Speaking behind tight lips, Itadori took a glance at you. Megumi had taken the seat next to you and he easily dwarfed your smaller body. All of them did, it almost looked like you were a child among adults.

“Nice to see you again, (Y/N).” Making sure his large fluffy wolf tail wasn’t brushing against you, Megumi gave you a polite nod and you returned it.

“W-what?! You two know each other?” In all the time Itadori has been crying over you, he never knew of Megumi's connection to you.

“Yeah, Tsumiki and (Y/N) are roommates.”

“Really?” Itadori gasped loudly, exaggeratedly turning his back to you.

“Mhmm!” Picking up your utensils, you began to eat. “Having a wolf as a roommate was kind of scary at the beginning, but we get along great now!”

Itadori was floored. Positively flabbergasted. He could have gotten to know you this whole time by using the excuse of being Megumi’s roommate and best friend as a reason to drop by and ‘check in’ on Tsumiki and see you by extension.

Sending a sharp, pointed look to Megumi, Itadori began to eat in a huff. He would have to grill his friend later on why the connection was never brought up.

“Have you two been here long?” Nobara asked, tapping her long claws against the table.

“No, we just got here.” Your voice only sounded a little meek when you replied, only able to meet Nobara’s intense gaze for a moment before looking down at your plate again.

“Yeah, we just came from the library. We’re partners on a class project.” Mumbling childishly, Itadori snorted at the surprised looks on his friends faces.

“You are?” Nobara almost gasped. “Who asked who?”

“I asked.” Itadori raised his hand.

“And you agreed, (Y/N)? Just like that?”

“Well, not really.” Giggling softly behind your hand, you took a glance at Itadori. “I told him I’d think about it first. I know we’re all in university now and should be adults, but I still get so scared around predators, I needed to weigh my options.”

“Did Yuji say he’d do all the work?” Megumi chimed in.

“He did! It was pretty funny, I thought the desk was going to fall over.”

“Sounds like Yuji.” Snorting, Megumi gave Itadori a look before eating his food.

“Hold on, I still got a couple questions.” Rapidly tapping the table, Nobara flicked her fingers between you and Itadori.

“Can’t they wait until we’re done?” Itadori already had food stuffed in his mouth, his cheeks were bulging out quite a bit. You had also started to eat the mountain of vegetables on your plate.

“Alright, fine.” Heaving a sigh, Nobara grabbed the juice she’d gotten. “But don’t think I’ll forget!”

It was a blessing that Nobara ended up forgetting that she wanted to grill you and Itadori because there would have been no avoiding all the awkward questions she was sure to ask. As your meal progressed, she got onto the topic of beauty products for tiger hybrids and that was all that occupied her mind for a good while.

“(Y/N).” Catching you by the elbow as you walked out of the dining hall almost an hour and a half later, Itadori looked up at the dark sky. “Let me walk you to your dorm.”

“You don’t have to, I wouldn’t want you to go out of your way! Nobara and I can walk back together, we live in the same dorm.”

“Ha well, uh actually…” Scratching the back of her head, Nobara grabbed onto Megumi's sleeve. “Actually, Megumi and I are going to go to a…” Swatting him on the back, Nobara fell silent.

“My father sent Tsumiki and I some more things and I promised to give Nobara some old books.”

“Yup, books! Exactly! So you two walk together and we’ll see you later!” Grabbing onto the back of Megumi’s shirt, Nobara sprinted away, her orange and black tail the last thing you saw before she turned the corner.

“Let’s go, (Y/N).” Itadori tugged on your sleeve gently, bringing your focus back to him. Walking side by side, the night time didn’t seem as scary compared to if you had been alone. You generally tried to avoid being out alone at night, but with Itadori it felt like the sun was still high in the sky.

“Are you cold?” Itadori broke the silence that had settled over you.

“Huh?”

“You just shivered.” Right as he said that, another gust of wind went through the air and blew your ears back, making a strong shiver go up your spine. “Here.” Itadori was already taking off his thick hoodie and pushing it into your arms.

“But you’ll be cold!” Looking at the long sleeve he had on underneath, surely it couldn’t be enough to keep him warm.

“Nonsense, I’ll be fine. Put it on.” It was a miracle that Itadori hadn’t fallen onto the ground from how lightheaded he was. He had given you his hoodie in the spur of the moment and now his actions were catching up to him.

“Okay.” Giving him one last look, you put it on. Swimming in fabric and with the scent of Itadori all around you, it was truly a sight to behold. “How do I look?” You chuckled, trying to adjust the giant hoodie onto your body.

“You look good.” There was a high lilt to the end of his sentence, and Itadori slapped a hand over his face and turned his back to you. If he looked any longer, he would pass out from how cute you looked.

“Thanks Itadori, it’s really warm!”

“N-no problem.” He seriously couldn’t look at you, and seeing your sweater paws out of the corner of his eye had him tripping over his own feet. Thankfully and tragically, the walk to your dorm wasn’t too long, so Itadori didn’t have to deal with it for too long.

“Thanks for walking me back.” Giving him a smile, you began to take off the hoodie.

“K-keep it, keep it on.” Planting his hands on your shoulders, Itadori looked down at you. “I have a million, so just keep that one.” The mixture of your scent and his that was wafting up to his nose was going to be ingrained into his mind forever.

“Wow Itadori, you’re so nice! We should have become friends way sooner!” Patting him on the arm, you shuffled closer to the front door. “Text me when you get back to your dorm, okay?”

“I will!” Waving at you until you went inside, Itadori let out a breath he’d been holding in. The feel good chemicals in his brain were all flooding in at once; the day had gone from good, to great to perfect. Seeing you in his hoodie was one of the things Itadori had wanted for so long it hurt, and now that goal was finally reached.

His happiness turned to adrenaline, making his hands shake and body tremble from how excited he was to see you tomorrow and the next day and the day after that. He was so excited for the future that he ran all the way back to his dorm, letting out cheers and excited screams as he went.

(Itadori): made it to my dorm :)

(Y/N): have a good night!

(Itadori): you too! See you tomorrow!

Clutching his phone to his chest, Itadori threw open the door to his room and immediately made eye contact with Megumi.

“You!”

“Now let me explain-”

“Save it, wolfy! Tell me all about your relationship with (Y/N)!”

As days turned into weeks, Itadori noticed a subtle change in your demeanor around him. You slowly started to walk closer to him, sometimes close enough to occasionally brush shoulders. The fear that was so pungent before was now gone, only replaced with some unease whenever Itadori threw his hands around too much or chewed with his mouth open. All in all, Itadori felt like you could call him a true friend.

And what did friends do? Invite each other to parties of course! Being so personable and easy to get along with, it was only natural that Itadori got invited to a lot of events around campus, and he wanted you to join him.

Which is how you found yourself at probably the biggest party of the season, people pouring out of the doors and spilling into the yard around the university house chosen for this night.

“I’ve never been here before.” You mumbled to Itadori as you approached the house, flanked by Nobara and Megumi. Sure you’d been to parties before, but none this size.

“That’s okay, just stick by me!” Over the past few weeks the level of physical contact in your relationship with Itadori had risen high enough that he was able to put an arm around your shoulder and pull you a bit closer to him.

“Yeah (Y/N) we’ll make sure you have a good time!” Nobara chimed in, her words just a bit slurred. She had pregamed on the way to the party, the flask she kept offering you tucked snugly against her hip.

“Let’s find Maki and the others.” Fushiguro was the first to step into the house and take the lead on where to go. Pushing through the crowds of people for you, Itadori made sure you stayed close by his side.

Meeting up with Maki and a few other upperclassmen, you felt safe among the group. There was a plastic cup in your hand mixed with god knows what, the music was loud and overbearing, but you had been welcomed into the fray with open arms. No one looked twice at your floppy ears and tense body, they just launched into conversation like you’d always been there.

“G-gotta go bathroom.” Your words were slurring more than you expected after finishing your second cup of horribly mixed liquor. Standing away from the wall you’d been leaning against, the world was spinning.

“Need help?” Itadori held onto your elbow tightly, helping keep you stable.

“No.” Shaking your head slowly, you pushed him away. “I got this.”

“(Y/N), lemme show you where the bathroom is! I’ve been here like a million times!” Swooping in between you two, Nobara took confidently drunk steps with you under her arm.

“M’kay!” Giggling, you gave Itadori a wave and stumbled away with her.

“I’ll stay out here and keep guard!” She announced to not only you but to the people around you as well. Throwing open the door, you gave her a big thumbs up before slamming it closed and locking it.

Doing your business as quickly as possible, when you opened the door, Nobara was gone. You could hear her voice echoing throughout the house and when you turned a corner she was at the dining table playing beer pong and losing horribly.

Looking up and down the hall, you were at a loss at what to do. You didn’t remember the right way back to the group and Nobara was too ensconced in the drinking game she was a part of to be of any help.

Dragging your feet down the hall, you ended up at the front of the house, a far cry from where you wanted to be. There were so many people pushing past you to go deeper into the house, or yelling for others to come to them, some of them didn’t seem to care when they bumped you against the wall or nudged you a little too hard.

“Hey little bunny, you look a little lost.” You could smell the fox hybrid before you could see him appear before your eyes, cornering you against the wall as another wave of people walked by.

“I- no, I’m fine.” The lie was evident in your voice and he caught it right away.

“You sure? A little thing like you shouldn’t be all alone.” His voice was condescending, mocking you in plain sight. His soft red fur gleamed under the light of the house and while you would probably admire it from afar, now wasn’t the time.

Nodding instead of speaking, you looked down the hallway again. Surely someone would come looking for you and Nobara.

“Who’re you looking for, bunny? I could help you find them.” Leaning more into your space, the unnamed fox gave you a once over, flashing his teeth once he met your eyes. “Or maybe you were looking for me?”

“No.” The alcohol in your body was making it difficult to string together more than a few words or thoughts in your head, but you knew one thing for sure: you didn’t want to be around this guy anymore. The party was overwhelming enough as it was and adding him into the mix, a predator directly above you, was only making it worse.

“Aw, no need to be shy! All your dreams have come true!” Chuckling to himself, he grabbed onto your wrist. “Let’s go get you a drink, I’ll introduce you to some friends.”

“No.” You said a little louder, but he just ignored you. Trying to get your wrist free wasn’t working either and you quickly found yourself being dragged away from the wall. Digging your heels into the ground, you kept looking for a familiar flash of pink hair. “Itadori!” You shouted, voice mixing with the others in the air and hopefully travelling to the person it was intended for.

“You’re lookin’ for Itadori? Why, I know him! He’s my best friend, I’ll take you to him!” The fox hybrid sent you a sleazy grin, running his free hand through his hair.

“(Y/N).” A familiar heavy hand landed on your shoulder, preventing you from going anywhere.

“Who the hell are you?” The two men shared a sneer, sizing each other up. Finally getting your wrist free, you attached yourself to Itadori’s side.

“I’m their boyfriend. Now get lost.” Wrapping an arm around you, Itadori gave one last glare to the other man before turning and walking away. Getting you to the kitchen, he quickly got you a glass of water. “Drink this.”

“Thanks.” Downing it immediately, the growing tension in your body subsided just from having Itadori next to you.

“If anyone else gives you trouble, tell them I’m your boyfriend. I’m in sports clubs with a lot of the people here, they’ll know who I am.”

“Thanks.” Repeating yourself like a fool, you were overcome with sudden emotion and hugged Itadori. Burrowing your face into his chest, you muttered thanks over and over.

“S’no problem.” He grunted. Itadori was glad you couldn’t see the bright blush on his face right now; he’d only dreamed about hugging you almost every second of the day. Hugging you back, he let his hand come up and stroke your ears and your fur was just as soft as he imagined it to be.

For the rest of the night, Itadori was like your second shadow. He made sure you didn’t drink anymore alcohol, filling you up with water and snacks until you were as sober as he was. He also introduced himself as your boyfriend whenever the need arose, like constantly shouting ‘boyfriend coming through’ as he pushed through crowds for you.

“I hope you had fun, (Y/N).” Itadori said at the end of the night with Nobara passed out drunk being carried on his back.

“I did!” It was nice to meet some upperclassmen, a couple you learned were in your major as well. Fushiguro was walking with them a few feet in front of you, talking animatedly to them.

“That’s good. I was worried that the whole ‘boyfriend’ thing was making you uncomfortable.” A bashful blush coated Itadori’s face as he gave you a sideways glance. Your own cheeks got warmer as well.

“I uh, I kind of liked it.” You said quietly, hoping that he wouldn’t catch it.

“You did?” Of course he heard it. Stopping in his tracks, Itadori’s mouth hung open slightly. Biting his lip, Itadori checked to make sure Nobara was truly out before speaking again. “Well then, can we maybe make it official?”

Maybe it was the lingering energy from the party that was giving him the confidence to ask or maybe Itadori had finally lost it, either way there was no backtracking from what he had just said. Taking your lack of immediate answer as skepticism, Itadori quickly spoke up again.

“If you want, I can take you out on a proper date first! Truthfully I already have everything planned in my head, I’ve wanted to take you out on a date for a while now. B-but you don’t have to if you don’t want to! I just- I want you to give us a chance, but don’t feel pressured to say yes!”

His face was completely flushed, adrenaline pumping through his body. Whether you said yes or no, Itadori was just glad to have finally gotten it off his chest.

“I want to go on a date with you too.” You smiled gently at Itadori, playing with your fingers nervously. “I just have one question.”

“Yes?”

“Did you also Google best first dates to take a rabbit hybrid on?”

“(Y/N)!” Laughing breathlessly, Itadori felt the tension in his body release.

“It’s a fair question!” Laughing along with him, you started to walk down the street again.

“For your information, no I didn’t look that up.” A comfortable silence settled over you as the laughter died down. As soon as Itadori could get a second alone with you, he would. There was actually a lot to discuss for the date that he’d been planning since the first year of university.

“Mmmm…” Nobara groaned and both of you looked at her curiously.

“Nobara? Are you awake?” You asked, brushing the hair from her forehead.

“Kiss...kiss each other.” Her words just barely made sense and Itadori nearly dropped her once he made sense of what she’d said.

“Go back to sleep!” He shouted, nudging her with his shoulder. The blush that had managed to subdue itself was now back tenfold.

“We’ll kiss each other later, Nobara.” You added, fixing her hair and letting her relax onto Itadori again.

“Promise?” She sighed.

“Promise?” Itadori echoed.

“Yeah, I promise.”

[aureutr]

I feel like shit bc I love reading dark and dead dove fics. Like they def should be tagged properly but seeing people complaining they exsist at all and that ppl who read/write them are freaks makes me feel so isolated.

(Part 2): I should also say I love happy/fluffy fics too but sometimes I just wanna read stories that are unapologetically problematic and gross.

Hey, anon, I feel you. It’s been a rough week out there. In truth, dark fic authors and readers are some of the kindest, most considerate people I’ve met in fandom. They go out of their way to tag things and most of them also make sure to remind their readers to double check tags.

This got long so Imma put a cut in

In all honesty, I haven’t seen much mistagged darkfic. I’m sure there is some, we’re never going to have a perfect system. But I have seen a lot of what you’re describing, including insults on a fic with perfect tags. A lot of people are using any amount of blow-up as an excuse to act as though they have moral superiority due to their taste in fiction.

The fact of the matter is, so long as everything is labeled there’s nothing wrong with reading or writing whatever you want. As in, I do not care at all what people write about (there are plenty of things that gross me out and I wouldn’t want to read, but I don’t have a problem with some things not being for me). If it’s tagged, it’s golden. AO3 is a safe space for authors, not readers. It is the reader’s responsibility to read all of the tags.

I also saw something recently that made me wonder if people are complaining about dark fic also using non-dark tags? As in, it’s marked DD:DNE and also “Luke Skywalker needs a hug” but that the poster seemed to think that dark fic shouldn’t be “allowed” to use the latter. If that’s truly what people mean by mistagging then I’m sorry, but that’s ridiculous. I hope I’m wrong and people are just blowing a minor issue out of proportion, because that makes no sense.

Anyway. There are always going to be people who think that certain things shouldn’t exist at all. It doesn’t make you gross or weird for liking it. Especially when you consume fiction through the lens of a critical mind.

Tumblr is very loud, but it is not the be all and end all of fandom. I’ve spent a lot of time talking to people about this stuff over the last week, not all on Tumblr. Not everyone agrees completely, but the majority are for the “YKINMK” approach.

I understand feeling isolated, but you aren’t alone. There are plenty of us who either also enjoy dark fic or at least can live and let live. That being said, I think most of us are going to stay out of the Dinluke tag for a bit because of the bullying.

And it doesn’t mean you are only allowed to like one variety of story! I like all sorts of things in my fic, it depends on my mood. Writing goes that way, too. I write dark fic because I love it, but I also write enthusiastic consent and stories with no sex at all.

No one has to participate in something they’re uncomfortable with, but they don’t get to make you follow their standards. My life has taught me that people who set up goal posts in that way tend to move them whenever it’s convenient. You’ll chase them forever and always fall short if you play their game. So play your own instead.

[bookofmirth]

I saw your recent response to an anon where you mentioned the drama that occurred the other day based around bookprofessor’s post. Obviously you don’t have to respond to this or publish it if you do not wish but I just wanted to bring up that while it is important to focus on the real life issues at hand, the OP was hypocritical in her post which is why people were getting upset. She was preaching against ableism while simultaneously flaunting her IQ and degree which is a form of ableism. She was speaking out against racism while ending her post using the racial slur “cracker” when talking about the possibly Caucasian Twitter elriels.

Obviously she had some important points but it was completely overshadowed by her participation in the hate speech and prejudice that she was speaking out against.

This does not in any way justify the nasty messages she received but on the same hand, I do not blame anyone that called her out for her hypocrisy. I hope you can understand why her post was so negatively received and how flawed it was. My hope is that one day everyone can just ignore the negativity, report those who are being racist/prejudiced in any way, and block those who are just being loud and who you don’t wish to see content from. But unfortunately I do not see that happening any time soon.

There are a few things I want to address in this because I think it's a good moment for the fandom to step back and reflect on how we treat one another, how we react to such issues, and how we behave moving forward.

First off, thanks for explaining your point of view without being antagonistic. I do think that everyone's emotional reactions to the post were valid. I do NOT think their responses, in terms of words and actions, were valid. Now before I move forward, I want to clarify that when I use the word "you", I am referring to anyone who may have had the response I am describing - not you personally, anon. Also please don’t freak out about how long this is, as a majority of it is a response to the fandom in general, not you in particular.

What was - and wasn’t - said in the original post

In this post, there were completely valid criticisms of the way that people in this fandom behave, and it wasn’t “generalizing” a certain group, it was literal, actual proof of things that had been said, by multiple people. I’m not going to get too into what Alyssa argued because her critiques of those tweets was flawless. The original post had very valid criticisms of what was happening on Twitter. Alyssa exposed the actually racist, homophobic, and imperialistic underpinnings of those tweets.

However, a lot of people are stuck on the bits before and after those critiques. @bookprofessor apologized for different aspects of her post in a few different asks. There were perhaps better ways that some of those things could have been phrased, some things that could have been left out. And she apologized. People can accept that apology or not but we can’t act like it didn’t happen. Like she didn’t reflect and learn to do better.

However, the people she was calling out have not done the same thing, and if anything, comments that focus more on Alyssa’s tone than why she wrote the post in the first place lets those people off the hook.

On cracker - Using the word "cracker" is not racist in the same way that using racial slurs against POC is. Is it prejudiced? Yes. But you cannot say that it is the same thing when that is demonstrably untrue, given centuries of oppressive history. No one has been oppressed for being white. Those are not the same. Reverse racism is not a thing because a white person punching down on POC is NOT AT ALL the same thing as a POC punching up at white people. The actions look the same, but the impact is so unequal it’s not even funny.

Racism is a systemic, institutionalized problem. It is not defined by individual actions, though those actions can either support or challenge racism. When someone calls a white person a cracker, there isn’t centuries of oppression giving power to and reinforcing that statement. That is not a “gotcha” moment.

Saying “I have x IQ” or “I have X degrees” is not ableist. I’m sorry to whoever told you it was ableist (again, not you specifically anon but people who had read the “aw shucks guys” vagueblogs about it), but it’s not. Those are facts. I have no idea what my IQ is, but I have five degrees from institutions of higher education. Me saying that is in no way ableist. 

Often, people mention those things to be elitist, yes. Sometimes, they can be used to say “hey I know more about this than you”. They can be used in a way that tries to make themselves feel superior. I suspect that this is the impression that a lot of people got of the post. However, there is a fine line between saying “hey that’s elitist” and professing anti intellectualism. Which is perhaps a side issue so I’ll let that go for now.

Another reason that people mention their degrees or qualifications is to establish their background knowledge and credibility. If I were to say “hey y’all I have two MA degrees” (which is true) I am not being ableist! It is a fact! It is factual! And I worked my ass off for those, I will be in student loan debt until I die for those, I have every right to mention them if I want to, and often I do so in order to establish my credibility, to explain the position I am coming from. And my prior knowledge of these topics is relevant when we are talking about literature since that’s what my degrees were on - literature and linguistics. That is why Alyssa mentioned her background, though she did pair it with comments about other people, for which she has apologized.

My final point about this is that I 1000% understand feeling insecure or less than because of educational attainment. I dropped out of high school. I had a complex about that for a long, long time. But I also know that if I took offense at someone else saying they had a PhD, then that offense is about me, not them. Someone else’s inferiority complex is not reason for people to pretend to be less than they are.

If those two comments are what overshadowed the bigger, more important issue for a lot of the readers of that post, then y’all allowed them to overshadow those more important issues. I am 99% sure that someone right now is reading this and thinking “but Leslie, it was the way that she said it!” Boy have I got some news for you!

How we react

This next section is not specific to this ask; instead, it is a discussion of how the fandom responded. If it were only one person who had said “but her tone” then I wouldn’t need to make this point. The fact that multiple people are exhibiting the behavior explained below is what makes this a cultural problem within the acotar fandom.

The main argument I saw on the post itself, and indeed any time I see people bring up how nasty Twitter can be, is that “it was a joke” and “that’s how stan Twitter works”.

No.

Those responses were quite useful for this post, though! So buckle up everyone, because I am going to talk about gaslighting, racism, respectability politics, and tone policing. While I understand that some people might have taken personal offense to what was said, there is a much bigger issue at stake that has nothing to do with individual feelings, and everything to do with ensuring that POC stay silenced and white supremacy is upheld. 

Back to the “but it’s a joke” thing. Thanks for gaslighting! Great example of that, person I’m not going to tag! Gaslighting is when you make someone question their experiences, when you try to make them think “wait, did I really feel that way? Is my feeling about that valid? Do I need to re-evaluate my response to this?? Am I blowing this out of proportion???” And saying “it’s just a joke” is a perfect way to do that. Did I say something accidentally sexist? It’s just a joke, nbd! Now you’re the problem, because you didn’t understand my joke and laugh!!! 

Saying “it’s a joke” or “oh they are old/young/ignorant, they will learn” is not a good response to... anything. It takes the responsibility off the people who are doing the harm, and putting it onto the people who were hurt. And in this case, anyone who read those tweets and found them harmful (which should be everyone?) is completely valid. You aren’t lesser for being angry or emotional or for seeing a problem where other people saw a joke. The people who see those things as acceptable jokes are the ones in the wrong.

This is a tactic that is used against women all the time. Any time a woman is sexually harassed at work or online, for example, and she gets upset about it, and someone chimes in with “oh they weren’t serious, can’t you take a joke?” So you can imagine what this is like for women of color.

It is a very, very common tactic for people of color to be silenced via tone policing and respectability politics. Tone policing and respectability politics are very closely related, especially in this context. The idea is that if Alyssa had just written that post in just the right way, it would have been more palatable to white people, and therefore okay to write. The idea that if she had tried to be “understanding” or “see it from their perspective” or understand that it’s “just a joke” are all ways to silence and de-legitimize any accurate, valid criticisms that were made of those tweets. It effectively re-routes the conversation away from the real issues, and to the person trying to bring them up. It’s essentially an ad hominem attack in disguise. 

We see respectability politics in media when people of color who act or dress or speak like white people are afforded more respect. Or any time that a person of color is pulled over and people say, “well if they had just done what the police officer asked...” There is a pervasive idea that if people just “act” properly, aka if you act white, then the police won’t feel antagonized and try to kill arrest you. If we are nice enough, meek enough, smile enough, etc. then we will be accepted.

When we tone police, we refuse to allow marginalized people the right to be angry. We say that "hey, we can only have this discussion if you leave emotion, which you rightfully feel, at the door, and we can only continue this discussion if you behave in a way that makes me feel comfortable." But guess what? It isn’t about you! These discussions are often highly uncomfortable. There is no nice way to tell someone they are being racist. And yet somehow, that is the ever-moving goalpost. It seems reasonable, right? “Just be civil, be nice, don’t insult each other!” And there is that. But those criteria change constantly, to the point where anyone (white) at any time can say “WHOA WHOA THIS IS MAKE ME UNCOMFORTABLE???” Then we find ourselves at zero, and suddenly the focus of attention has shifted away from the actual problem.

Before we go further, I want to say this: people have a right to be angry. They do not need to make their anger palatable or tasteful for the consumption of others (read: white people). 

We saw this last summer, and I’m not sure how the message didn’t get across. But people are rightfully angry about racism. They are angry about the murder of people of color by police, they are angry about lack of quality education, or clean water, of centuries of oppression that have led to this very moment when all of that ceases to matter because a white woman’s feelings got hurt one time. 

And that is what pisses me off so much. There is no way in this world that we could criticize tweets like those that everyone would agree with, and that everyone would “approve” of, that would be “nice” enough and yet still be impactful and make the authors of those tweets understand the gravity of what they have done. 

The least we can do is allow one another to express our anger, our outrage, because it’s highly likely that those people know exactly what the fuck they are doing, and they do not fucking care. By criticizing a woman of color for the way in which she chose to engage with this topic, we are avoiding the issue and letting the people in those tweets off the hook. 

There were many responses to that post that were positive, that agreed with Alyssa. There are a ton of people who disagree with those tweets, who find them disgusting, who understand exactly how and why they are problematic. That should be what we are talking about. Getting to the core of the argument, on that post or any about racism or other problematic behavior in fandom, requires getting past our own egos. It requires us to be able to step back, say “hm this thing is frustrating but there is a bigger picture here”. It’s not easy, and I recognize that. 

The fact that it is a common tactic though? To say “hey this hurt me personally and so I’m going to ignore any valid points you made?” That feeds directly into centuries of white supremacy because it, once again, silences POC and makes them try to play a losing game. And they will always lose, because no matter how hard they try to play the white game, the goalposts are constantly shifting. So you know what? Fuck the game, and fuck respectability politics, and fuck tone policing and “uwu be nice guys” because when it comes to things like racism and sexism, I don’t expect the people who deserve to be criticized to be nice. In fact, trying to be nice only serves to fuck POC over in the end.

Indeed, in response to that post, certain blogs have taken the opportunity to position themselves as “the nice ones” or “the ones who would never” or “uwu let’s be nice guys” while completely ignoring the fact that a woman of color was attacked for calling out racism. And yes - that was the point of her post. People getting hung up on mentions of her degree are (intentionally or not, it doesn’t matter) completely obfuscating the fact that that is not what her post was about, which was to call out disgusting behavior. idk how many words the post actually was, but essentially, people are focusing on 5% of it to the detriment of the 95% that was actually really important shit. These types of vagueblog posts about the issue fall into exactly what I am talking about - these are people who have decided to look at this issue, see how Alyssa (and anyone else who dares speak up) has approached it, and intentionally try to act like they are “better” because they can be “rational” and “kind”. Newsflash, if you don’t have something to be angry about, then being “nice” about racism isn’t that much of a flex. If it didn’t bother you, then congratulations. That doesn’t make you better than people it did bother. You just got lucky this time, and decided to use that to your advantage to look like the good guy.

I am not saying that all calls for peace are doing this. Obviously it’s what we all want. This is the worst I have seen this fandom in the 4+ years I’ve been here. But we cannot have that by ignoring the real problems and pretending that if we are all just nice to each other, then we will solve racism and sexism and all bullying in the fandom will stop. 

So combining all of this - the gaslighting, the tone policing, and what do you get? You get a fandom that refuses to actually engage critically with its own problems and take accountability for them. You get a fandom that decides that it’s easier to be distracted by this one mean comment over here than it is to engage in the fact that you know what, the culture in this fandom has actually turned incredibly disgusting and a lot of people are just okay with it. You’ve got a fandom that is using the tools of white supremacy to avoid the discussions that should actually be taking place. Maybe people don’t realize that that’s what they are doing. But if someone still thinks that after reading this post, then godspeed my friend, I hope you enjoy Twitter.

Okay so my last thing I want to say is that I didn’t come to all of this knowledge fresh from the womb. I do a lot of work, in my personal life and my professional life, to be better. So here is a list of books that I have found particularly helpful:

How to Be An Antiracist by Ibram X. Kendi

Stamped From the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America also by Ibram X. Kendi

White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism by Robin DiAngelo (side note, I was kinda meh about this one but the chapter “White Women’s Tears” is particularly helpful)

So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo

Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness, and the Politics of Empowerment by Patricia Hill Collins

I’m not going to talk specifically about Alyssa’s post anymore, but if anyone wants to continue talking about these broader issues going on in the fandom, I am game. (I really should be grading papers though, so it might take a bit.)

[footballxixstars]

Angst with Scott McTominat where ur in a relationship and he wants you to move to manchester for him but he doesnt get that u have ur own stuff x

The Move… or Not Move • Scott McTominay

“I can’t Scott,” You shouted at him. You had been having this argument for what seemed like hours now yet he still wasn’t understanding you. All Scott wanted was for you to move to Manchester so you could live with each other and see each other more often than you currently do which may not be a lot to ask however you have a lot of your own stuff going on that you can’t just drop instantly. Scott didn’t seem to get that though. Scott thought that you would just drop everything for him and move to Manchester but life doesn’t work like that. He wouldn’t be able to drop everything and move to where you live and it’s the same for you yet he doesn’t seem to understand any of that, he expects you to just drop everything and move. You’ve been having this argument for a while now and you just can’t seem to break through to him. You would love to move to Manchester to live with him but it’s just not that straightforward, unfortunately.

“All I’m asking is for you to move to Manchester. I’ll support you fully until you can find your own job,” Scott told you, taking a deep breath so he could try to keep himself as calm as possible so this doesn’t completely blow up more than it should. It could easily blow out of proportion and he doesn’t want that to happen. If you’re getting worked up over this then he has to remain calm no matter what just so this doesn’t completely spiral out of control and cause a massive argument which would be unnecessary. He’s finding it difficult though because he is getting really frustrated with all of this.

“I know Scott and I appreciate that you will support me but everything that I have is here. Majority of the things I love are here, my life is here apart from you. I can’t just drop it all for you. I’m sorry. I do love you and I want to live with you eventually but right now I can’t,” You tried to explain to him once again. It wasn’t that hard to understand but he wasn’t getting it. Or he was and just didn’t want to understand it because he wanted it to go his own way and it wasn’t.

“You’re always going to have your own stuff there though so you’re never going to move to Manchester to live with me then,” Scott stated, sounding very fed up with you right now. It’s the same argument every single time from both of you but neither of you will budge on it. Scott wants to live with you but you can’t leave everything behind, it’s a difficult one and you both believe that you are in the right for it although there probably isn't a right person in this instance. Scott should just understand where you were coming from but he wasn’t. He wasn’t understanding that you have your own life here where you currently live. He wasn’t understanding that you can’t just drop everything for him.

“You can’t just spring this on me and expect me to agree instantly. You know what I have going on here and you know how much it all means to me yet you expect me to drop it all to live with you. I’ve been working on this for a long time. I can't just drop it. What if this relationship doesn’t work? I would’ve then dropped this whole thing for nothing then,” You shouted at him. The louder you scream the better your points get across, right? That's what seems to be true most of the time anyway but not this time since neither of you seem to be able to get your points across to each other. Well, you get them across but the other just doesn’t listen to them.

Tears started to brim in your eyes as this argument continued and escalated into a screaming match. This was the worst part about getting into arguments, you could never hold your tears back and you would struggle to get words out as well as continue with the argument. This was important to you though so you wouldn’t stop arguing against Scott. You want to live with Scott, Scott is important to you but so was your life here where you have all of your stuff, most of your life. What was more important? Scott or your life here? Why did you have to pick?

“You don’t think this relationship is going to work out? What's the point of us continuing this if you don’t think that we’re going to last?” Scott asked, voice getting incredibly louder as well. When one of you gets louder the other has to as well.

“No I want this relationship to work out but you never know especially since we are having an argument over me moving. I want this to last, I do, but you can never be certain with relationships since you never know what’s going to happen. I can’t move and then this whole relationship be over. What will I do then?” You started to say to him. Scott just scoffed at this not saying anything but you already knew what he was thinking.

“I never said never, Scott. Just give me a few months. A few months to figure out what to do with my stuff here and if I can manage to do it in Manchester too,” You told him once again. He was switching your own words against you right now. Not once did you say that you won’t ever move to Manchester to live with him because you do want to move to Manchester just not now, sometime in the future but not now. He was trying to guilt-trip you into moving to Manchester by switching your words against you. You don’t know whether or not he was meaning to guilt trip you but that was what was happening, that's what it was feeling like and you weren’t liking it. You opened your mouth to tell him to stop guilt-tripping you but he spoke back to you before you could say anything else.

“Whatever,” Scott said before leaving the house. All you could do was look at the door in shock, not expecting him to actually leave the house over this. Scott was getting frustrated and you could tell that but you didn’t think he would actively get up and leave the house. You thought maybe you could actually talk about this and sort it all out but then the shouting started and you knew that you weren’t going to be able to talk it through properly. Maybe you should’ve just stopped the conversation there and moved onto something else whilst you both calmed down so it wouldn’t escalate but you continued and then Scott suddenly decided to leave so you definitely couldn’t talk it through then.

When there was still no sign of Scott coming back you just decided to go to bed. You were getting too tired to stay up any longer and wait for him to return so you can talk this through properly like adults. Not turn it into another screaming match. Talk and sort this out like the adults that you are, well adults that you were meant to be. The both of you can talk tomorrow and sort everything out. You were about to fall asleep when you heard the front door open and close. Scott was home. Movement could be heard around the room and you just kept your eyes closed listening to his movement around the house anticipating when he would come into the bedroom. It was bound to happen at some point so you were just waiting for it so you wouldn't jump or give him any indication that you were awake. Just then you heard the bedroom door open and close meaning that Scott was now in the bedroom with you but you kept your eyes closed pretending to be asleep. You can talk in the morning. That’s what you thought anyway Scott had different plans and apparently knew that you weren’t actually sleeping and was just pretending.

“I’m sorry for shouting at you and getting mad when you said that you couldn’t move in with me,” Scott said to you as he wrapped an arm around your waist pulling himself closer to you. You wanted to push him away from you but didn’t want to show any indication that you were awake so you moved a little bit like you would if you were actually asleep but didn’t turn around to face him just keeping your eyes closed, laying on your side not moving at all and just allowing him to speak. You were still too made to speak. He let out a little huff when he realised that you weren’t going to talk to him and give him the silent treatment for a little bit longer.

“I know that you can’t just drop everything to live with me but I want to wake up every day with you, go to bed with you in my arms, spend more time with you. I just want to live with you so we don’t have to travel to spend time with each other,” Scott tried explaining to you and you understood where he was coming from because you felt the same. This time you decided to turn around and actually face him. If he was going to speak about this now then you might as well talk too. Best not go to bed angry. That’s what everyone says anyway.

“I can’t move now Scott. Sometime in the future but not now,” You told Tim once again but this time he actually listened to you and didn’t jump in with something ridiculous.

“I know,” Scott replied. He knew he really did but it didn’t mean that he liked it. You just hummed at this letting him know that you heard him but you didn’t know what else to say so just kept quiet. At least the argument has gotten settled tonight so hopefully, it won’t get brought up again.

“Now we’ve got this all sorted, can we go to sleep?” You questioned Scott since you were once again falling asleep. Scott breathed out a soft ‘yeah’ allowing you to collapse onto the bed whilst his arms wrapped around you properly and more firmly and finally you could go and fall into a peaceful sleep. Scott was next to you, neither of you was going to bed angry because you actually managed to sort out the argument. Kind of anyway.

Maybe sometime later this year or next year you can find a way to take everything to Manchester so you can actually live with Scott so the two of you won’t have to constantly move between two places just to see each other. You know that Scott could fully support you if you move to Manchester but you have your own stuff, you want your own stuff and you don’t want to fully rely on him ever so he has to wait for a bit. You just have to figure out how to bring all of your stuff to Manchester with you, as well as find a similar job and then finally you and Scott can live with each other. Just a little bit longer to wait.

MASTERLIST | MORE MCTOMINAY

[magicianapprenticelyra]

Day 2: Touch(y)

@sweetalnazar

Featuring Lyra Nguyen and Asra Alnazar; Modern AU

(Close Friendship, Pre-Romantic Relationship)

“How long do you think she’s going to be angry at me?”

“Asra, she has no right to be this pissed at you.”

“You didn’t answer my question.”

“I’ll probably know for sure in about . . . two hours?”

Asra winces at that assessment, barely able to prevent himself from tripping over a tree root in the sidewalk as Lyra continues ahead.

“It’s not your fault!” she calls back, slowing down enough for him to finally catch up.

“Wh-when you said that your mom can blow things out of pr-proportion—” Asra chokes on air, coughing. Lyra reaches into her drawstring bag, handing her friend a plastic water bottle. Asra takes it with a quiet thanks, waterfalling the contents into his mouth.

“This is actually mild compared to the other bullshit she’s pulled.”

Asra grimaces, struggling to keep up with her when she resumes power walking. This situation is flipped from when Asra wanted to go go go somewhere; he didn’t like this one bit.

“Where are we going?”

“I’m going to stuff my face with food,” Lyra replies simply. “There’s a small Vietnamese place that cooks the best popcorn chicken with their rice down this way—” Lyra walks on, rattling on with commentary about a third of the menu before she stops and turns to face Asra again, giving him a small smile. “I’ll even pay for whatever you want to get, too. Cap is $200 altogether, for the both of us. Is that okay?”

“Y-yeah . . . no, no problem . . .” Asra's breathless. He gets properly upright once at the door of the establishment. When Lyra opens the door, the bell above clangs into the metal frame it hangs off of.

The smell of good food welcomes them both.

⁂ ⁂ ⁂

Later . . .

Asra, having the end of his chopsticks hovering close to his lips, watches Lyra consume another bowl of fried rice and a side of dumplings. The aisle-side of the booth’s table has a wall consisting of plates, bowls, and various utensils. Asra looks to the busser, sympathetic when they stop by the table for the third time to clear it. He places his chopsticks horizontally over his bowl of phở, exhaling softly.

“Ly?”

“Mmph?” Lyra stops eating, one cheek full of food as she looks at him. Seeing his expression, she carefully turns to the side.

Shielding the lower half of her face with her hand, Lyra quickly chews what’s in her mouth. With each swallow, she chases it with her tea, wincing at the heat. Once she’s done, Lyra quickly grabs tissues from the napkin dispenser against the wall. With one hand, she works on getting rid of what’s leftover on her mouth and lips. Her other hand rubs the area under her hyoid bone.

“Ow . . .” she rasps.

“You’re not Faust!” Asra teases, but there’s still that edge of worry in his voice.

Lyra glances at him, her dark brown eyes unexpectedly meeting Asra’s own. Her eyes widen, taking in the brown curls framing his face. She quickly averts her gaze to the table itself. Her eyes bore into the resin tabletop.

“Do you think you’re done?”

She nods.

“Okay. You still want to pay for all of the stuff we ate?”

She nods again, taking the table’s number stand with her as she goes to the register a ways behind Asra. He finishes up his bowl of phở and leaves a hefty tip on the table when the busser comes. He thanks them, getting to his feet when Lyra returns soon after.

After they box their leftovers, the pair walk single-file out the door. Outside, they maneuvered themselves to walk side by side.

“Where do you want to go next?”

“I don’t wanna go back to my uncle’s yet,” Lyra murmurs.

“I know . . .”

⁂ ⁂ ⁂

Lyra is much, much slower with a stomach full of food. Asra's relieved, especially since he has an inkling he might have pulled something while tripping over the tree root earlier.

"How are you feeling?" Asra asks, looking over at her.

"Not that good." Lyra hugs herself around her abdomen, looking a little green.

Asra winces. He looks around them, immediately spotting a bodega up ahead.

“Ginger ale or—?"

"The lemon-lime one this time, please," Lyra rasps, swallowing thickly.

He's off like a shot, making Lyra laugh when he zips past the front door. In a few moments he zooms back to her, quickly wiping the top of the can with his shirttail before passing it to her.

Lyra gently taps the top of the can with a fingernail. She holds it away from herself, tugging on the pull-tab before shuffling to the side of the sidewalk.

The both of them stand under the awning of a boarded up building, graffitied with all sorts of art.

"No 'splosion," Lyra exhales in relief. She carefully sips on the drink, lightly coughing.

Asra nods, barely able to hide his concern as she closes her eyes.

Lyra was prone to eating her feelings. That wasn't the surprising thing. Asra has seen her stress-eat during final exams back in high school, but this was something else.

Bzz. Bzz.

"That's you," Lyra murmurs.

You left your phone back at your uncle's? Asra didn't voice these thoughts, instead checking on the messages he's received. As expected, they were all from Lyra's family.

🏒Neha: Where are you guys?

💻 Walt: Still a bit dicey back here. I think you kids can come back around 4 or 5 o'clock though.

🍰 James: Bao and Mai are still yelling at each other. Going to be a while yet. Everything ok?

Asra answers them all to the best of his ability, immediately pocketing his phone.

It's only just after 2 p.m.

"What they say?"

"Your uncle and mom are still discussing things—" He blinks in surprise when Lyra snorts derisively, shaking her head.

"Well, what do you want me to say about it?" Asra shifts his weight from one foot to another, assessing her body language.

"I know they're at each other's throats still. You don't need to protect me from that." Lyra gives him a rueful smile.

"I'm sorry,” Asra murmurs softly.

Lyra gently nudges her elbow to his upper arm. "It wasn't my fault, much less yours."

"She got really angry today."

"We were just snuggled together—" Lyra stops to scoot back from the sidewalk, allowing a parent and their gaggle of children to pass before continuing,

"—we fell asleep watching t.v. in the living room. Mom didn't have to surprise us with a visit."

"It's just her up here, right?"

"Mhm. Vinh is back with Theodore. I'm just happy my mom didn't hit you with anything more substantial."

Asra laughs. "The pillow was within reach—better than the lamp on the side table.”

"I would feel terrible if she did."

"She didn't though."

Lyra nods, exhaling softly. "I'm sorry I freaked you out earlier. I must've looked like a Sarlacc pit."

"You're nowhere near that" Asra nudges his upper arm against hers. "I don't blame you for what happened."

"I still say she's blowing it out of proportion!"

“Perhaps, but she wanted to protect you.”

“She assumes the worst in everyone around her, Asra. Theodore is the only one that’s not subject to it anymore. It’s really not healthy. Aside from my father being a major part of why I left, why do you think I wanted so badly to stay with my uncle?”

“Mmm . . .” Asra hums, exhaling.

He scoots back over to her, positioning himself so that shoulder to shoulder, they’re touching. In turn, Lyra leans over just enough to have the side of her head rest upon his shoulder.

They still had a few hours to kill. There weren’t any NO LOITERING signs nearby, either. For the time being, this was a perfect spot to rest in.

A/N: I took it in a bit of a different direction. (^w^)

Context for who is who in here—

Lyra Nguyen is related to her uncle Bảo through her mother, Mai. Theodore is Mai’s current significant other, but not married to her (yet). Vinh is Lyra’s biological younger sister.

Walterine Aster is—from the canon Arcana timeline—the aunt Ly inherits The Shop from in Center City. In modern AU, she’s a single mother who has a daughter named Neha. She’s known James and Bảo for years, having met the former back in their college days.

James Cionaodh is Bảo’s partner (married). These two live with Walterine and Neha because living where they are—modern equivalent to San Francisco—is expensive as all hell.

Neha is roughly the same age as Vinh in this modern AU. She is technically Ly’s cousin by marriage from the canon Arcana timeline (long story), but in that timeline they’re essentially sisters, at least Pre-Red Plague and post Upright/a few Reversed timelines.

I’ll probably need to make a separate post for this but, thank you so much for reading!

UPDATE JUNE 12TH, 2021: [NEXT]

[sohotthateveryonedied]

Always By Your Side

Read here on AO3!

Summary: 

The kid looks horrible, full offense. Tim is wearing one of Dick’s old Hudson University sweatshirts which just about swallows him, hanging a full inch over where his fingertips end. His hair is tied up in the messiest bun Jason has ever seen, and there’s a purple welt on his chin big enough that a helicopter could use it for a landing pad. His lip is swollen, blood still crusted over where Tim’s teeth must have torn it open on impact. Big yikes.

“If you’re here to raid my fridge, then you already know it’s bad pickings. I haven’t been shopping in weeks.”

“That’s not why I’m here, actually.” Not the only reason, at least. Multitasking is key when you’re a semi-contract killer who needs Sundays free for tea time with Alfred.

(Disclaimer: THIS IS THE ONLY BAD PARENT!BRUCE FIC I WILL EVER WRITE OKAY I SWEAR I ALWAYS AVOID THOSE KINDS OF FICS BUT I’M SALTY THAT THEY NEVER ADDRESSED BRUCE PUNCHING TIM IN COMICS SO I HAD TO DO IT MYSELF.)

It doesn’t take long to break into Tim’s apartment. Record time, actually. In less than ten minutes Jason is sliding up the window to Tim’s kitchen and climbing over the sill, easy peasy. He should really talk to the replacement about his lack of security against fellow batkids. “Timbo?” he calls, closing the window and re-locking it. “You here?” He’d better have the right place. It’s so hard keeping track of everyone’s safehouses these days, and Jason is not eager for a repeat of what happened the last time he got it wrong. That old lady looked scared to death when Jason crawled in through the air duct, covered in blood that was only thirty percent his own. (The lady was super understanding when he explained the situation. She even fixed up his stab wound with her sewing kit and made him some freshly squeezed lemonade. Jason drops by every couple of weeks to check in on her and her cats.) But Tim is the priority now. “Come out, come out, you little shit.” Jason crosses the kitchen toward the living room, then stops and backtracks. He opens the fridge for a beer, momentarily forgetting that the kid is a hopeless health nut. Jason resigns himself to a package of deli ham only two days past the expiration date. It smells fine, so it must be safe to eat, right? Of all Tim’s apartments, this one is by and far the nicest, barring the expired deli meats and un-Jason-proof security system. The living room is pristine with white sofas and a glass coffee table, making the whole setup vibe more like a hotel suite than an actual home. Definitely not Jason-proof. He sits right in the middle of the fancy sofa, kicking off his boots. “If you get mud on my carpet, you’re cleaning it up.”

Jason looks up at Tim in the doorway and grins. “Don’t I always?” The kid looks horrible, full offense. Tim is wearing one of Dick’s old Hudson University sweatshirts which just about swallows him, hanging a full inch over where his fingertips end. His hair is tied up in the messiest bun Jason has ever seen, and there’s a purple welt on his chin big enough that a helicopter could use it for a landing pad. His lip is swollen, blood still crusted over where Tim’s teeth must have torn it open on impact. Big yikes. “If you’re here to raid my fridge, then you already know it’s bad pickings. I haven’t been shopping in weeks.” “That’s not why I’m here, actually.” Not the only reason, at least. Multitasking is key when you’re a contract killer who needs Sundays free for tea time with Alfred. “Just leave whatever data you have here and I’ll look it over in the morning.” “Again, not why I’m here.” “Then can you just tell me whatever it is so I can go back to bed?” It’s five in the afternoon. “Well, jeez, kid. You don’t have to rush me out the door.” Tim’s eyes flit to the ground and stay there, giving the impression of a puppy put in his place. “Sorry.” Jason eyes Tim carefully. He takes in the timid stance, the way Tim wrings and twists the sleeve of his sweatshirt until it’s stretched beyond saving. He clearly hasn’t showered or even bothered tending to his face, like keeping the wound fresh is his way of punishing himself. “You doing okay?” “Fine, why?” “Because you look like shit, that’s why.” “It’s been a hectic few days. I’ve been meaning to crash for hours.” “How about that bruise you got there? Looks nasty.” Tim touches the bruise as if he forgot it was there, biting back a wince. “It’s fine. I got it on patrol and haven’t gotten around to icing it yet.” “Must have been a big guy to do that kind of damage.” Tim’s eyes narrow. Jason eats his ham, a picture of innocence. “If you’re trying to get me to circle around and ask you about your problems, then I’m sorry, but I’m really not in the mood to play therapist tonight. You can stay here as long as you want, but I’m going to bed.” He turns and starts toward his bedroom. “You’re really not going to tell me who gave you that bruise?” Tim stops, a shudder running down his spine. He doesn’t turn, not yet. “Did Barbara tell you?” “I can’t believe you didn’t. What, did you think this would all go away if you just kept quiet about it?” “There’s nothing to talk about. Nothing happened.” “My ass nothing happened. Bruce hit you last night. He hit you over nothing.” Tim whirls around, fists clenched. “So? I get hit all the time. Am I supposed to have a breakdown every time someone punches me?” “Getting hit by a criminal and getting hit by your dad are not the same thing, and you know it.” “I’m a big boy, Jason. I can handle it.” Jason leans forward, forgetting all about his rancid ham. “You realize how fucked up this is, right?” “Oh, give me a break—” “Hey. The adult is talking now. Our father nearly shattered your jaw a few hours ago and here you are, hiding from him like it was your fault.” Not that Jason blames him for not wanting to be near the manor after what happened; he wouldn’t either if he were in Tim’s place. Hell, he was in Tim’s place. “You weren’t there, Jay. You have no idea what happened.” “Oh, yeah? Enlighten me, then. What gives that asshole the right to put his hands on you?” “The fact that I shouldn’t have gotten involved in the first place! Bruce was dealing with enough as it was without me making it worse.” “Only if you call trying to help someone ‘making things worse.’ From what Babs told me, you didn’t do Jack shit to deserve what he did.” “I don’t care what Barbara told you. I was there, I know what I did wrong, and I’ve accepted that.” “Except you did nothing wrong.” “You have no idea what you’re talking about.” Tim’s voice is raised, his eyes narrowed. “You didn’t see how upset Bruce was. He wasn’t himself. I should have seen that and backed off, but I didn’t. He was hurting and angry, and...I provoked him. It was my own fault.” “Do you have any idea how insane you sound? You tried to help him, and he punched you in the face for it. I know you’ve dealt with this exact situation a million times, you know the protocol.” Tim rolls his eyes. “This is completely different.” “Why? Because you’re not a minor? Because Bruce isn’t your father? Or maybe because you threw the first punch? Oh, wait. None of those are fucking true.” “What do you want from me? Do you want me to start crying, call up child services and tell them that my adoptive father gave me a little bruise because I was being insubordinate while we were all dressed as vigilantes? Will that magically ease your conscience?” “I want you to stop fucking covering for him,” Jason says. “You know that there’s no excuse for a parent hurting their child.” “I’m not a child!” “Sorry to break it to you, pal, but you fucking are! And Bruce? He’s your father. It doesn’t matter if you’re twelve or seventeen or thirty—his job is to be a fucking parent to you. And instead he punched you so hard Babs said you were unconscious for a good thirty seconds.” Tim crosses his arms and leans on the wall. He doesn’t try to come closer or sit on any of the furniture, keeping his distance from Jason. “You’re blowing this way out of proportion. Maybe those rules apply to normal people, but we’re different. Violence and anger, that’s how this family communicates. Hell, Bruce and I spar all the time and you’ve never lectured me about it being abuse until now.” Jason runs a hand over his face, thoroughly done with this shit. “I can’t believe you’re still trying to rationalize this.” “Because it’s a rational thing!” “Is it?” “Yes.” “Would you ever hit him?” “It wouldn’t be the first time.” “No, I’m not talking sparring or some stupid teenage angst-fueled outburst. I’m asking if you, Tim Drake, would ever intentionally hurt Bruce in a way that would do damage. Even if he did something shitty to deserve it. Would you hurt him?” Tim hesitates. He bites his swollen lip. “I might. If I were really angry.” “We both know that’s bullshit. The guy’s got a hundred pounds on you and your hand would probably shatter if you tried to sock him in the face, but you still wouldn’t hurt him.” “So?” “So, he knows you’re a twig and he beat the shit out of you anyway. That’s not fucking okay.” “It wasn’t on purpose,” Tim says, but he’s losing momentum by the second. He looks years too tired for this conversation as it is. “It was...instinct. A spur-of-the-moment reaction. It’s not—I mean, he’s Bruce. He would never hurt us intentionally.” “He already did.” “And I’m perfectly fine. It’s not like he punched Damian or Cass, just me. He knew I could take it, and he was right. I’m fine. This bruise will heal up in a couple days, and then we can all forget it ever happened.” “I won’t.” “Why not? Why are you being so goddamn uptight about this? It has nothing to do with you, anyway.” Jason can feel his eyes smolder Lazarus green as he surges forward and hisses, “It has everything to do with me.” Tim flinches. It’s not major, barely even counts as a real flinch, but it happens. Tim flinches away from Jason, and the anger dissipates as quickly as it came. Jesus, what did Bruce do to this kid? Jason sits back, takes a breath, tries to make his voice gentler. “Bruce hurt me too, okay?” Tim’s expression doesn’t change but for a twinge of his eyebrows. “It was a misunderstanding, but...he hurt me. Badly. I was out of commission for two fucking months. Probably would have died if it hadn’t been for Roy.” That gets a reaction. Tim’s mouth drops open and he flounders for a moment, like he can’t put the two things together. Bruce attacking Jason? No results. Does not compute. “What—why would he do that?” “It doesn’t matter. What does matter is that, as irritating as you are, you don’t deserve to be treated like that.” Like he has any right to be saying this. Tim still has the scar on his neck from when Jason’s brains were made of gruel. “Not by a parent. Not by someone you’re supposed to trust. So this is me looking out for you, alright?” Jason reaches into the inner pocket of his jacket and pulls out a crumpled paper. “I know you’ve got your own setup for when you need time away from the manor, but these are all of my addresses and phone numbers. If something like this happens again, I want you to call me.” Tim takes the paper but protests, “It’s okay, really. I don’t need—” “Yeah, yeah, you don’t need to be coddled. I get it. But keep it anyway. And if you start feeling unsafe at the manor, you call me and I’ll take care of it. I already gave Damian, Cass, and Duke copies too. Just...look out for yourself, alright? All of you. Look out for each other.” Tim folds up the paper and slips it into his back pocket. “What about you?” “The old man and I are…” That’s a whole other can of worms Jason really isn’t in the mood to unpack right now. “It’s still rocky between us. I’m keeping my distance. But for you guys, I don’t care. If one of you needs help, I’ll be there. Got it?” Tim blinks, and lucky for him, Jason is courteous enough not to make fun of the tears he is clearly holding back. “Thanks, Jay.”

[bi-kisses]

Imagine being so darn stupid and pressed about what a few consenting adults do behind closed doors! LMAO! What are these people? Catholics? Like chill out, stay out of peoples business. They arent hurting you. They arent involving you. It isnt about you. It isnt harmful. So shut the fuck up! Stop putting your nose where it isnt needed.

They're so invested in finding any particular way it could be Bad and thus they have to blow everything out of proportion and bend over backwards to involve children or the general public. Like... The vast vast majority of pro kink people will agree 1) it shouldn't be easily accessible to children 2) it shouldn't be public 3) people shouldn't have to know/hear about it if they don't want to. And yet they fixate on every instance where it HAS gone awry and affected children, as if that means we should condemn every individual act of BDSM thereafter.

You don't hear them freaking out about how religions are horrible for children or how they don't want religions pushed upon them or their kids or the horrendous things people do behind the shield of "God's will" or a botched scripture interpretation. You don't hear them losing their shit over people who hunt recreationally and take pleasure in killing wild animals. You don't hear them focusing on the ways competitive sports destroy the bodies and minds of its top athletes. The second it touches sex, a taboo subject, all bets are off and it's the end of the goddamn world for a girl to enjoy being choked while she gets railed, even when no harm is done, when it's shown that the changes in air and blood flow can create extremely pleasurable responses, even when she's perfectly safe and can tap out any time. It's always "what if!!!" Or "how about this time when-" like bitch I'm sorry but kids have been decapitated going down water slides, people die all the time while rock climbing, the psychological effects of even casually smoking weed regularly are actually substantiated, and not a single damn thing about kinky sex is a unique or pressing issue.

If they're so worried about the psychology of it all, how come they avoid all real psychological studies regarding kink like the plague? If they care so much about dangerous sex, why aren't they actually talking about preventive measures to keep people safe? What about using things as lube that you shouldn't? I can guaran-fucking-tee that's a WAY bigger issue that does more physical damage to more people, as a yeast infection can transfer between partners like you wouldn't believe and, untreated, can become even worse shit.

It's ALL about the puritanical feeling that sex must be done just so or else. There's not an ounce of logic behind it.

[davidmann95]

Thoughts (if any) on DC's April 2021 solicitations?

Let’s take ‘em in order! I should be able to muster up a comment on just about everything one way or another.

Green Lantern #1: Oh this is gonna be bad. Heard only the worst about Thorne’s Future State: Green Lantern, and I assume Jo Mullein’s DCU debut will be wasted here to either function as some kind of ridiculous ‘popularity contest’ with Teen Lantern for who gets the bigger push, or as a way to put TL over with a few “good work kid, you got a future” comments. Also, and granted I don’t know how Morrison will end or this will begin, is the New Guardians angle being immediately dropped?

Robin #1: Dope suit, art, and premise, but it’s Williamson so I don’t care.

Batman: The Dark Knight #1: I’ll read this and I expect to like it, but between this being Kubert’s first big Batman project since Master Race, the ‘old but not quite retirement age yet’ angle, and the title, I’m concerned the shock ending here is that it’s actually a stealth DKR prequel.

The Next Batman: Second Son #1: So they really are committing here, though weird that this kinda makes Ridley’s Future State book basically a longform teaser for this. And I’ll get it as it comes out since it turns out this won’t be in that John Ridley’s Batman collection after all - sorry Dustin Nguyen, I love your stuff but I won’t buy an entire trade of material I otherwise already own just for one new story by you.

The Batman & Scooby Doo Mysteries #1: I got that whole great-looking Scooby Doo Team-Up run by Fisch for free on Comixology, I should read that sometime and see if this’ll be worth getting too as well, because it sounds like a hoot.

Challenge of the Super Sons #1: Glad people who want it are getting it, I do not care.

RWBY/Justice League #1: WILL BE GETTING A POST ALL ITS OWN

Action Comics #1030: His powers waning definitely won’t help the standard pre-run fuming by a lot of Superman fandom, but it’s an interesting pairing with PKJ apparently doing mainly cosmic Superman adventures so I’m curious where he’ll go with it. That it’s particularly cited as being tied to Death Metal might validate my suspicion that the new ‘everyone remembers their entire mainstream publishing histories’ thing will play into Johnson’s description of Clark really feeling his age at the start of the run. And Janin on covers even before he gets in on the book proper! And that Midnighter description!

Superman #30: This sounds like where Johnson’s gonna start with that worldbuilding he touted, and I’m curious; definitely reads in this instance like him shoving Clark and Jon into some swords-and-sorcery-esque territory he’s familiar with.

American Vampire 1976 #7: Not reading, don’t care.

Batman #107: I assume ‘the events at Arkham Asylum’ are the ‘A-Day’ ominously brought up in Future State solicits. Tynion Batman, Jimenez as the regular artist now, whatever the Unsanity Collective is, all entirely my shit. More importantly than any of that though, GHOSTMAKER BACKUPS. And drawn by Ricardo Lopez Ortiz, artist on Steve Orlando’s excellent The Pull! Dope!

Batman: Black & White #5: Any other issue and ‘Jamal Campbell doing a life story of Nightwing’ would probably be the highlight, but in case you somehow hadn’t heard Gillen/McKelvie are making their DC debut on a Batman vs. Riddler story here, absolutely wild.

Batman: Urban Legends #2: Even more excited for this now that I’m onboard for the Grifter and Outsiders stuff given how much those features pleasantly surprised me in Future State.

Batman/Superman #17: Injecting it isn’t enough anymore, I need to be on some kind of constant IV drip with this book. I was wondering whether it’d take the premise to further generational riffs or follow a history of mass-media Supermen and Batmen, but instead it’s veering off in a direction I never could have guessed and I couldn’t be more excited.

Batman vs. Ra’s Al Ghul #6: NOTHING CAN STOP THE ADAMSVERSE. NONE MAY DARE TRY.

Batman/Catwoman #5: Wondering how this Harley involvement plays in - I don’t imagine it’s quite what it seems given how King’s written her before. And love that Joker by Mann on the cover, major Clown at Midnight vibes.

Catwoman #30: No reason to assume this run won’t continue to rule.

Crime Syndicate #2: Dammit, I don’t think this book is going to be good, but I’m kinda tempted.

Detective Comics #1035: Wouldn’t be psyched, but Dark Detective was another pleasant surprise so I’ll give this a chance.

The Dreaming: Waking Hours #9: Again, not reading.

Far Sector #11: Sucks a little knowing we’ll never see that little ‘Young Animal’ label in the corner again after this wraps. At least it’s going out on its highest note.

The Flash #769: In a vacuum this would sound dope but I have less than no faith in this, and goddamn that’s a terrible cover.

Harley Quinn #2: I’m sure it’ll be fine, no interest.

The Joker #2: I wanna believe Tynion will be able to make this work, he keeps talking like he has more freedom on this than he has some other books, but everything about this reads like the price he has to pay for relative post-Joker War freedom on Batman.

Justice League #60: It’s Bendis/Marquez on Justice League, lots of people will complain but I’ll mostly dig it. More interested in Ram V briefly getting to write the main crew in the JLD backup.

Man-Bat #3: I’d ask why this exists - and as a matter of fact I still do - but checking out some of DC’s digital-first output recently I see Dave Wielgosz has something on the ball, so maybe he’ll be able to make this work? Perhaps I’ll check it out in trade someday if worth-of-mouth is on its side.

Nightwing #79: I maintain, this is gonna be huge. And clever move to make for how to justify Nightwing keeping up his standard way of business after Bruce loses most of his money.

Rorschach #7: A comic I will purchase and let’s continue leaving it at that.

Scooby-Doo, Where Are You? #109: DC’s highest-numbered comic (that hasn’t gone through an interim renumbering), astonishing. Not getting it myself, but respect.

Sensational Wonder Woman #2: Can’t say this sounds like my thing.

Suicide Squad #2: I’ve been swayed into checking out the Future State debut, but that’d have to really blow me away for me to follow into the main book.

Superman: Red & Blue #2: Sadly if unsurprisingly DC’s clearly not stacking this with AAA attention-grabbing names in the same way as this latest version of Batman: Black & White, but there do seem to be some interesting names from outside the usual big two roster here. And the main and Bolland cover may disappoint but holy cow that David Choe variant.

The Swamp Thing #2: I have no doubt it’ll be incredible but time and again I learn I simply don’t have it in me to care about Swamp Thing regardless of the objective quality of the effort put into him.

Sweet Tooth: The Return #6: Another one I’m not interested in.

Titans Academy #2: Oh lord so this is where they stuck Billy Batson.

Truth & Justice #3: I continue to have no idea what if anything the unifying idea of this anthology is supposed to be.

Wonder Woman #771: Wonder Woman as troubleshooter for mythological mishaps isn’t a permanently sustainable or desirable status quo but I’m down for it for as long as it lasts if it’s any good (though that Immortal Wonder Woman preview...concerned me, in spite of Jen Bartel’s jaw-dropping art).

So that’s 19-23 out of 37 I’ll be getting - if DC’s standard for success with Infinite Frontier is the proportion of their line people will be checking out, I guess it’s winning with me.

[roxa-sos]

impossible - rafe cameron

rafe cameron x kook!reader

tw; major abuse in this one bud,, manipulation, blame, fear mongering, being trapped in an emotionally abusive and threatening relationship, trying to see the good sides of it. 

not requested; this is the fic rooted in my daddy issues alkNFDEl, reader does something that’s inconvenient for rafe but he blows it out of proportion. the reader is used to this kind of stuff, so they keep the blame on them even though it’s frustrating, and like always, they’re the bad guy, always taking care of rafe. 

a/n -- i fucking LOVE drew starkey i’m sorry,, i kinda want to write some fluff for younger rafe (before the drugs, before he let his dad get to his head, all that good stuff) but i need ideas for that lmao. nobody asked for this. literally,, everyone’s talking about rudy on my dash and i’ll just sit here with my drew pfp going ‘hey want some rafe angst? no? here u go anyways :)’ also if it isn’t obvious. i crave happiness. but i don’t have that so for now all i shall give you is angst. 

“you’re always fucking yelling at me!” rafe’s voice seemed to bounce off the walls, or it echoed in your head as you sat on the edge of his bed, toying with the promise ring on your finger. you felt numb, but you had to say something. 

“rafe, i’m not yelling, i just don’t understand how-” 

“no, no, if you want to argue i don’t want to hear it.” he was barking at you, laughing when the words left his mouth. “you’re just impossible to deal with.” he was pacing around in front of you, blowing things out of proportion, like he always did whenever you did something he didn’t like. 

what had you even done? you didn’t remember. maybe it was something about cutting your hair? based on how he was treating the situation, it seemed like you told him you were sleeping with some kid from the cut. 

somewhere deep down, it almost felt like you would never be good enough for him. where had the time gone? it felt like it was yesterday when you two were sixteen and he gave you that promise ring in front of his dad, topper, your parents, your friends, everyone. you hadn’t felt that good for a while. 

“are you listening to me?” he asked harshly, taking a threatening step towards you. “what am i supposed to do if you’re not even gonna take this seriously? christ, every day i regret chasing you when we were younger.”

you didn’t want him to leave you. he was all you knew. and you knew it was dumb to stay with him at all, but he was good to you. really good to you, even if it was only on occasion. 

just a month ago he’d taken you shopping on the mainland like it was your birthday. he called you hot when you were trying on ridiculously fancy dresses for no reason, and he even bought you one just because he knew you liked it based on how you looked at yourself in the mirror.

a week ago, he had you under his arm, sitting across from the bonfire that had raged while your parents and friends drank and mingled. the light had died and most people had gone inside, but he stayed out with you after you said that the sky looked nice. 

the night before, he sat you on his lap as he laid down on his bed, telling you all about the party he went to that you hadn’t been able to make it to. omitting the parts about the dumb drugs he did, because he knew you didn’t like it. 

how could he go from that to screaming at you over nothing? 

“rafe, i know you’re angry, but can you just... stop yelling?” you pleaded, looking up at him. he was so overwhelmed with anger that his face was red, his hands balled up on either side of him. you felt tears threatening to leave your eyes. you hated it, but it wouldn’t stop. god, you were so overdramatic sometimes. 

you were taking erratic breaths, trying to calm yourself down. the thought of losing everything you ever knew - the thought of losing rafe - it stressed you out to a degree you couldn’t describe. so you always panicked when he yelled. you were always scared, even though it would probably be better for you if he did leave. 

“you’re so emotional.” he groaned, turning away from you. 

he couldn’t even look at you. 

you shouldn’t have said anything at all. you were an instigator. you knew he got mad easily, and he’d been good for too long, so you knew he was gonna break soon. his good streaks never lasted long. 

you loved him. and you knew it was dumb, but you really did. all you wanted to be to him was a good partner, you wanted him to respect you, you wanted him to see some worth in you. 

it just felt like he never did. 

sometimes you’d distance yourself from him. usually it was after he yelled, and for a few days after that. you’d convince yourself that you didn’t care about what he thought about you, or you’d say that you needed to seriously talk to him about what was going on between you two. 

yet somehow, that intrusive thought always came back to you;

you care about what he thinks. 

because he was the most influential part of your life, and he had been for years. someone out of your grasp, someone who you just wanted love and attention from. he baited you with it, giving you bits and pieces, and when you were getting good again, he’d lash out at you for no reason.

it was exhausting, but at the end of the day... you stayed. 

“i... i’m sorry, rafe.” you finally caved and apologized for whatever you’d done. whatever you’d said. whatever he was mad at. 

he didn’t answer you that time, but he turned back to face you.

“i’ll see you later.” he spoke to you like you were a child, leaving the room. he slammed the door behind him, leaving you to crumble back onto the bed that you two usually shared. 

uncontrollably sobbing, because there was nothing you could do to make him happy and proud of you, but that was all you wanted to do. 

a/n -- do NOT romanticize this relationship. im begging you. this is very unhealthy and it’s a little bit of a vent for me. if you’re going through this, please contact a help line (1-800-799-7233) and stay safe. you are worth it, they just can’t see it for themselves, their expectations are unrealistic. if it feels wrong, it probably is. 

[handonhaven]

Sometimes this fandom really scares me. Just when I think I saw everything I find out that I was wrong. Like I just saw someone say that the writers are homophobic for putting Josie and Finch together. I'm sorry but do they not know what homophobic means? Or is it only homophobic because it's not your ship. I swear each week H*sies get worse and worse. I'm so tried of seeing stuff like "I can't wait to see Hope be jealous of Finch" "notice how hoises have actually romantic content going on" "why are they trying to force Josie and Finch on us they have no chemistry" " I don't know people keep saying we bully people we don't. We just want Hosie to happen." And so on.

Hopes not going to be jealous of Finch because she has no feelings for Josie. Just like Josie has no feelings Hope. I mean even Josie said Hope is just her friend. I actually thought that would help them calm down. Boy was I wrong.

Two nothing that happens between Hope and Josie is anything romantic about it. So they have they're moments but that's nothing but friendship there. That's all.

Three they're not forcing anything. There was a bit of a build up for Finch and Josie. And there is chemistry there. I think they're just choosing not to see it. Plus before they casted the person who plays Finch you know they did a chemistry read. They only they being force is H*sies trying to make their ship happen.

Three okay that one just made me laugh. Like each week they get worse and worse. And now that whole homophobic thing. They're really grasping at dust here. And they did ever stop to think why Hope and Josie only had 2-3 actually scenes this season so far. We're over half way through the season. The writers did that for a reason. And I just like to point out there was an interview say that Hope and Landon are going to grow closer and stronger this season. So I still have hope for Handon and that they will get through this very very ruff path.

BTW I love your blog/gifs and all your thoughts ❤❤

Same, this fandom scares me most of the time tbh haha. Oh yes, I’ve seen a lot of hatred towards that ship now, but wow. That does not make any sense whatsoever, they must really not know what homophobic means. Or, exactly, it’s literally just because Josie is with someone other than Hope. Right? They still somehow manage to surprise me with the awful things they say, I’ve really never seen anything like it. Ugh, I know. I’ve seen comments like that too. At least they’ve made it perfectly clear that they will hate and attack anything that stands in the way of their ship, Handon/Landon or not. Good for the writers to know, since they’ve responded so well to how these fans have behaved. 🙄

Yeah, Hope is not gonna be jealous of Finch because why would she be? She’s with Landon, has not wanted to be with anyone but Landon for all this time, has had feelings for only him since she was 15, and exactly, has no feelings for Josie. And Josie obviously only has feelings for Finch, and that’s been a major part of her storyline all season. And yes, the writers have repeatedly had Hope and Josie specifically call each other their friend, but these fans still aren’t getting the message.

And I have no idea where they’re getting that from, because there’s absolutely nothing romantic going on between Hope and Josie. I guess you can see what you want to see if you try hard enough and have the ability to twist everything and blow the tiniest details out of proportion. But it is just friendship between them, which has been confirmed on the show.

I agree, I don’t think they’re forcing Josie and Finch. I mean, I’ll admit, it did kinda feel forced to me at first because it seemed like they were gonna put Josie into a new relationship pretty quickly. But they went about it differently than I expected and it actually has had build up. And maybe they did decide to give Josie a new love interest as part of their efforts to shut H*sie down, idk. But whether or not they did, they’ve given their relationship depth and development and it’s not forced. And true, I’m sure they did do a chemistry read. Yeah, if anything is forced, it’s the way those fans try to make everything about their ship, as if it would make any sense for it to happen in the show.

But they honestly think they don’t bully people? Like I know there are some okay H*sie fans out there, and I know there are some nice multishippers as well. But a large majority of them, from what I’ve seen, are terrible. They’ve spread so much hatred, have bullied so many other fans, have attacked Aria, and I’ve seen that they’re starting to hate on the actress who plays Finch too. They really do just get worse all the time. And yes, they’re grasping more now than ever before because there has been hardly any Hope and Josie content all season. Exactly, can they not see that the writers are clearly not happy with them and are trying to get them calm down? Yeah, there are only 8 episodes left and Hope and Josie have only interacted in 2 episodes so far. And now that Landon is back and gonna need help recovering, I can’t imagine Hope is gonna suddenly be spending a bunch of time with Josie when she didn’t even when she thought the real Landon was with her and everything was okay.

And yes! I saw that interview too, so I hope we’ll get to see that for the rest of the season! It would make sense for what they’re going through now to make them closer and stronger. So I have hope for them as well! And wow thank you so much!! 🥺 That’s so kind of you, I appreciate it!! ❤️❤️

[artificial-daydream]

reach the zenith

Rating: T Fandom: Bleach (Ichigo x Rukia) Summary: They both had a fight and for the whole week, Rukia decided to avoid him like the plague. Ichigo would have tried to approach her faster if only she didn’t have different alpha’s scent marks covering her every day. Pissed was putting it mildly. (ABO Verse)

Notes: Participation of IchiRuki month, day 3 and 12. Also posted this on my ao3. Majorly inspired by @everything-withered ‘s work, “Push My Luck”.

Big thanks to @hesesols because halfway through this fic, I was on major block but their participation pushed me to struggle through it.

Today sucks. No, scratch that- this whole week sucks.

Right at the corner of the hallway, Ichigo can see the person he has been looking for these past days. He can recognize those pair of violet eyes anywhere in the crowds. However, before he could actually approach her, she had fled from his sight- again.

He sniffed the spot Rukia had been. The stink of another alpha was thick enough to overlap her own scent. Ichigo snarled- That’s it. He didn’t care if Rukia was still mad. He had to talk to her.

To live up to his determination, he stormed out to the places Rukia usually went to the university. However, the omega in her was so fast to figure out how near he was, he didn’t even catch anything besides her leftover smell.

A vein popped on his forehead. She thinks she can get away avoiding him like this? Oh no, today she won’t. Ichigo could barely hold his anger for a second, let alone another 24 hours.

Ichigo sighed. He was about to go crazy with all these pent-up frustrations. They both had a fight and for the whole week, Rukia decided to avoid him like the plague. Ichigo would have tried to approach her faster if only she didn’t have different alpha’s scent marks covering her every day. Pissed was putting it mildly.

This was all Rukia’s fault. Usually, he would let her cool off a bit before actually chasing her down, but his patience was running thin. She really had the nerve to let another alpha marked their scent on her just to drive him off. Contrary to her belief, the scent of another alpha taunts him. If he knew who the alpha was, he definitely would have ripped their head off.

He almost fist-bumped himself when he discovered her figure from the distance- near enough for him to recognize her, but far enough for Rukia to not discover him. This was it. His chance was handed to him on a silver plate; he just had to figure out the best approach so she could never squirm her way out.

The best course of action was the last thing expected. Ichigo decided to face Rukia upfront, and once she was caught off guard, he had his grip locked on her wrist; firm enough to keep her movements in bay.

His eyes glowered, his teeth gritted. “Where do you think you’re going?” He knew the woman in front of him would not be fazed by his intimidation; or even if she was, she would never show it. Yet there was something inside him roaring to be shown- to be acknowledged by his partner and needing attention.

The stink of another alpha was thicker once they met. He noted that she didn’t even try to conceal with blockers. The actuality nerved him. He felt her slight shudder when he instinctively growled. “Where I’m going is none of your business.” Violet eyes glared back unwaveringly at his strong stare.

“Look, Rukia,” Ichigo began, “the least you can do is tell me what went wrong.”

“Nothing went wrong.” Rukia replied in matter-of-fact tone.

“Then what the fuck are you so pissed off about?!”

“I am not pissed.”

Ichigo glares, “Don’t lie. You are mad because of what happened with Senna.”

“What happened? Oh, how you were on top of Senna that night when you knew she had been pining on you since the first semester?” Rukia fumed. “That has nothing to do with me.”

“You say that,” Ichigo began, “but you doused yourself with another alpha’s scent right the very next day.”

“That is an entirely different matter,” Rukia justified, “and you have no right to inquire about this subject.”

Ichigo scowls, “You don’t understand-”

“You’re right, I don’t,” Rukia cut off sharply, “and I don’t want to so just fuck off.”

You know Rukia was intensely furious once she emphasized swearing words in public. This time, he didn’t try to resist when she tried to break off his grip and walked away.

-----

It came close on blowing out of proportion.

The moment he interrupted, he wasn’t even trying to. Ichigo didn’t even plan on bothering her tonight, he only wanted to take a look of her from afar. He assumed he should wait for Rukia to calm down by the weekend and maybe the next Monday, they could talk. The plan was thrown out of the window, however, once he saw Rukia on the barstool with someone next to her.

At first he was only watching, his eyes attentively trying to make out their dialogue. The insistent alpha was coming close- too close to actual cross personal boundaries. At first it was palpable how much Rukia constrained herself. The crossing line was the moment that alpha actually tried to cop a feel.

It didn’t take long until Rukia decided to kick the alpha in the shin. Ichigo restrained himself on butting in because he knew Rukia could handle herself and for the love of Chappy, everyone knows how much she needed to blow off her steam. His plan went well until he saw Rukia getting hurt; the alpha actually dared to attack back and land a punch on her.

He just, snapped.

Everything went red. He didn’t think when he furiously launched. Ichigo didn’t even realize what happened after- his thoughts were filled with unyielding killing intent. He tried to calm himself but he was downright enraged. His shoulders were rigid, his throat felt tight. His whole muscles were tense and his eyes flared with full animosity.

A tug was felt on his sleeve. The familiar sweet scent reaches out slowly, crippling his senses and altered his attention. The alpha he just attacked fled in such hurry at the chance, lost in the crowds and forgotten by the more important presence across.

Once his head was starting to get clear, the first thing he felt was pair of soothing palms cupping his cheeks. His sights were still blurry and his knuckles felt sore.

“Ichigo, focus.”

And he did.

Once his sight was centered into one point, the blurry lines slowly came into apparent picture. The first thing he noticed was pair of violet eyes staring intensely towards him, locking him with the gaze that pierced something within him. He was heaving, gasping for air as sweats trickled his facial features- his whole body was trembling.

“Rukia,” he instinctively called out, flinching at his weakened voice as he frantically scanned her whole body. He searched for any possible bruises or scratches, but his roaming hands were halted before he could finish his attempt.

“You fool,” she barked, “you are more hurt than I am.”

He didn’t even realize until she stated so. Now that his attention averted to his own self, he noticed his sore knuckles were dripping with a mixture of his wound and the opponent’s blood. The sight was enough to make an eleven-year-old to grimace but-

“This is nothing,” Ichigo replied, “you’ve seen me ten times worse.”

Rukia frowned. She opened her mouth as if she was ready to counter back but then paused with no words coming out of the syllables. She decided to settle with a sigh, eyes still glaring as she tugged his shirt to follow her- so he did.

She led him to the parking lot, telling him to get his ass inside the car before drove it herself. The whole journey was filled with silence, then Rukia decided to drag him inside her flat so she can tend to his wound. Again, Ichigo complies- most of his intention was to make sure her flat wasn’t raided with the stink of another alpha.

He was ecstatic to learn it wasn’t. The living room was filled with the usual scent, no leftover of another person’s sleepover which meant Rukia did not actually sleep with anybody else. Once Rukia left to retrieve her first aid kit, Ichigo sat on the couch- the usual spot he trademarked inside Rukia’s flat.

Rukia came back with a box of kits with her. Once she began to treat his hands, Ichigo decided to break the silence.

“So,” he began, “you didn’t bring anyone here after all.”

“Bold of you to assume we weren’t doing it in his flat instead.” Rukia countered, head not looking up as she still concentrated on the task at hand.

Ichigo growls, “did you?”

“No.”

It was to be expected. No matter how angry Rukia was, she would still have common senses. There was no way she would actually bring herself to another alpha’s flat just to piss him off. Still, Ichigo needed to ask for confirmation anyway.

Once Rukia finished her treatment, she was about to head to the kitchen and return the kit. Before she could, her wrist was locked by Ichigo, his amber eyes now filled with certainty as he speaks, “We need to talk.”

The tone was final; without room for Rukia to argue. He was tired as hell and he was sure Rukia knew that. Probably being most of the reason why Rukia actually relented despite a full week of stubbornness.

“I don’t think there is anything we actually need to discuss.”

“Rukia,” Ichigo groaned in frustration, “tell me. What was the actual reason you have been avoiding me?”

There was the silence. It was always that pause of silence whenever Ichigo guessed something right. Something was bothering her but he didn’t know what.

Rukia sighs, finally relenting. “I know what you want to say.”

Ichigo furrows his eyebrows in confusion, “What do I want to say?”

“Don’t do this, Ichigo. Senna already reached out to me.” She said. “I just- I just needed time to prepare-”

“Hold on,” Ichigo cut her off, “Prepare for what?”

“For bracing myself to actually listen to you,” She inhaled, eyes averting his stare as she proceeds to say the next word, “because you want to say that Senna is your true mate.”

Ichigo blanked out, thinking he had actually heard that wrong. “I’m sorry, you were saying?”

“… That you and Senna are true mates.”

“And how the hell did you come up with that conclusion?”

Rukia frowns, “what do you mean? That night at the party proved everything.”

“You mean by me falling on top of Senna, either of us fully clothed, with no single strand of hair misplaced?”

“Wha- Fine, I was there before you two started, so what?” Rukia huffed. “Not changing the fact you two actually did the deed.”

“Oh my God,” Ichigo gaped, “you can’t be this stupid. I never did anything with Senna, there was nothing going on between me and her.”

“What?” Her brain trying to register the sudden take of information, “that can’t be, Inoue testified and everything…”

“I can’t believe you actually believed in Inoue.”

She glares, “Inoue likes you, Ichigo. Why would she actually said that about you and Senna if she wanted people to believe you like her?”

“Because,” Ichigo breathed, “she wanted us to grow apart,” then he actually delved deeper, “because I love you.”

Her eyes glisten in the soft flickering light, “you drank too much.”

“I didn’t drink. I was at the bar because I wanted to watch over you.”

Her train of thoughts stopped its tracks. Love was a heavy thing to weigh on, especially for Ichigo. He did not confess with a ‘like’, it was as if he was so sure about the way he was feeling- about where this was heading. Rukia couldn’t help but wonder how long had he known and controlled it by himself. Alphas were known to be adversely possessive.

Rukia did not immediately reply because this was not what she prepared herself for. There was Ichigo, her best friend in this lifetime professing his actual feeling they both had never bring up in their relationship.

“You can’t say that out of the blue,” Rukia muttered, “we never talked about any of this.”

There were many things to consider between them. What was the becoming of their relationship? What will go differently? What if they decided things were not working out- will they still be friends then? Even if they were, will things ever go the same?

 “I’ve got to get it off my chest,” Ichigo admitted, “you keep speculating each time and I know this might ruin everything, but we can’t keep pushing it down- I can’t keep pushing it down because it’s driving me crazy. And,” he took a deep breath, “and if you don’t feel the same then-”

“Whoa, whoa, slow down your horses,” Rukia quickly cut him off, “and you say I’m the one who keeps speculating.”

Ichigo arches an eyebrow, “so does that mean you feel the same?”

“It’s funny, isn’t it.” Rukia considered with a glint of amusement. “That we both knew, but never said anything.”

“Never felt like it needed saying.” Ichigo’s gaze was intent, a finger teased over her lip as he leaned closer in half-whisper, “would you like me to say it now?”

Rukia hummed, slightly parting her lips in complement as she decided to reduce the distance between them. Once they were mere few centimeters apart, she swore her stomach did a flip.

“Maybe after,”

Then their lips met.

[catradoramma]

Day 3: “You’ve ruined everything for me, I can never be happy with anything until I kill you.” “Then kill me. I’d give anything to see you happy.”

Content Warning: Major Character Deaths. Suicide. Extreme Angst. 

I struggled a lot with whether or not I should actually post this one or not due to recent events. However, I had written this drabble before I even finalized the list and figured I should stick with what I have.

That being said, I did come up with a compromise: As I’m sure y’all have noticed, I’ve been reblogging my fics multiple times a day for time zones. For this one, I’ve decided not to do that. I won’t be tagging this one with She-Ra or catradora just because I don’t want this one to accidentally show up in the tag. This one does not have a good ending.

Maybe I’m blowing the content of this fic out of proportion, but I would rather be safe than sorry. Please be careful reading this one, y’all. Don’t worry, the next one is gonna be better. I promise.

|  Prompt submitted by @queercomingnear  |

Catra held Adora over a cliff, her hands fisted in Adora’s jacket the only thing keeping her from falling over the edge.

“You ruined everything for me!” Catra screamed, her eyes overflowing with tears. “I can’t be happy with anything until I kill you! All anyone does is compare me to you! I hate you!”

Adora let out a sob, her bruised body aching, her heart splintering in her chest at the words. “Then kill me!” She exclaimed, the words tearing out of her chest. “I’d give anything to see you happy! Please!” Adora begged. She didn’t want to fight against Catra any longer anyway.

“I hate you! I hate you, Adora!” Catra screamed. “Stop giving in! Fight me!” She shook Adora violently, and Adora just went boneless. Adora was done with this war.

“I have nothing left to give, Catra,” Adora said, her voice hoarse and her spirit broken. She glanced to her side where her sword lay shattered. Adora couldn’t bring herself to look beyond Catra, afraid of what she might’ve seen. The Princess Alliance had lost. Surely, there was no one left.

Adora was their last hope and she had failed them all. Just because she couldn’t bring herself to really hurt the woman she believed was the love of her life.

“Let me go, Catra,” Adora said, suddenly desperate for it all to end. “Kill me! End this! Finally be happy!”

“I can’t!” Catra shouted. “I can’t be happy without you!” She sobbed and Adora broke.

“It’s too late for that Catra! There’s nothing left of me or you! It’s all over! Stop dragging this out!” Adora screamed, shaking Catra’s hands, hoping to loosen her grip.

“Adora stop!” Catra shrieked just as her grip loosened and Adora slipped right through her fingers. Adora smiled, finally at peace.