#this honestly was supposed to be a paragraph long what on earth happened here

[microwavetoaster-selfships]

This was supposed to be a paragraph long shitpost, but it somehow turned into a full blown drabble, which is mind boggling to me how that happened, haha!

It's unedited, so if there's any punctuation or any other sorts of errors it's cause all I did was write it and post it. I normally only ever write from third person so this was quite interesting!

Sitting with A.xlerod in his car after a drive out to who knows where, maybe there wasn't even a destination, and it's dark outside and really late at night and we're parked outside the building to his flat/apartment and I'm sitting there and he knows something is on my mind and the hum of the car still running is audible and he doesn't say anything he just kinda looks over at me concerned and questioning and I know he's looking over at me and I sigh trying to get the sudden weight off my chest but the more I think about it I can just feel it twist and get a bit worse and there's a sudden straining pain the back of my throat for a few split seconds.

I reach my hand over to the side of the seat and pull back on the lever that leans the seat back and I sit there for a few moments laid back a bit. I know he's still looking at me with a concerned look and I take a deep breath as I'm about to say something, just to have all the words taken right back out of me again. I know this feeling, I feel it time and time again, and I know exactly how it makes me feel and yet there's still no label for it. It's too complex.

"Kane?" He quietly calls my name, trying to bring me back to the present. He looks like he wants to ask what's wrong, but he doesn't need to.

I take another deep breath, and end up holding it. Every time I want to speak it just gets lodged up. I can't help but shake my head and ponder at if something happened that made me like this. If somethings happened.

"Miles..?" Was just about all I could get out. I normally don't call him Miles often. I don't know why, I had just gotten into the habit of calling him A.xlerod for some reason.

"Kane?" He said in response.

"Do you..." I had to fight for my words, "Do you ever feel like you can't talk?...Like you can't...speak?"

He was only quiet for a moment, "In what sense?" He asked.

"Like... It's all just nothingness. Weightless." I was trying to analyze the visuals my brain created and communicate it into sensible words, "Like, it just doesn't matter. That it holds the importance of..." I kept having to pause for several moments, my brain just couldn't fathom forming words at the moment.

But he waited. He didn't interrupt and he let me finish my statement, even if it was an empty one.

"Do you think anyone ever thinks about the factory that their T-shirt comes from?" I finally asked.

He looked a little confused at first. But the longer the short silence went on I could see him start to understand.

"Like.. do you think anyone ever really listens to the different noises their oven makes? Thst anyone really cares about hearing their stove turn on? Do you think anyone enjoys hearing their alarms go off?"

He wrapped his arms around his stearing wheel and leaned up against it, looking off into the distance, "I listen."

I don't know why it was surprising for me to hear. I didn't know my eyebrows were furrowed and my lips were tense until my expression loosened and dropped. Do you really? I wanted to ask. But I felt like I'd come off wrong if I said it outloud.

"How many people do you think enjoys hearing their kettle shout at them?" He questioned in response, and I couldn't help but giggle, "I'll always listen, Kane. I'd give you the microphone any day and listen. I want to hear about things that make you jump up and down from excitement and how you don't like the texture of one particular thing. I want to know every little thought that goes on inside your head. And I'll listen to it forever. Everything you say is worthwhile, Kane."

And I couldn't help but feel the corner of my mouth twitch, and the pain in my throat come back, and my breathing get all funny for a moment. And maybe, just maybe, for a moment, my bottom lip trembles and my eyes water up for a moment and I get all solemn. But it was better. It wasn't accompanied by any weight on my chest or like something was gripping at my heart. It felt so much more reliving and fresher, like I could breath easier.

"Miles?"

"Yes, Kane?"

I didn't say anything. Words evaded me once more. But I didn't need words to communicate what I wanted. I reach my hand over to the door and I knew for a fact, that the second I got out this car and he got out and I walked over to him, I was going to squeeze the living daylights out of him. And if it means we topple over and are laying on the pavement, then I'm not getting up until it's all out of my system. And, I think the worst part is, I know he wouldn't mind. I can already picture his iconic smile across his face and him laughing wholeheartedly. He'll probably wrap his arms around me, one in my hair and the other on my back rubbing it, all joyously while he does it.

I don't mind him one bit.

[iciatheguardess]

Hiiii it’s meeee elsie

conflicted Elsie

Look, you know as well as I do that I love TAOCC to freaking death

but like

I may have to partially step away from it after the current arcs are over.

these goofy goobers took over my life for the last three-ish months, and while I’ve had an amazing time, it’s…caused me to neglect other parts of my life, and restrict myself more than I should when it comes to how I am on this site. I’ve stated my intention to try and branch out multiple times but I never go through with it because I just…I have things to write here! I can’t! And yeah it’s fun but sometimes I get hurt even if people don’t mean to, like, I’ve gotten legitimately ill from this once or twice.

But I feel like even trying to step away a bit is somehow abandoning all of you or betraying your trusts. I want to stay friends with you guys, but my actual life and Irlsie has to come first most of the time, because I am not JUST Elsie, if that makes any sense. Elsewhere is and was always meant to be a sona for some interaction, maybe some friendos, but nothing this…involved, because I can’t put all of my social effort onto the internet because no matter what I do, the internet is not a completely genuine place, and I’ve accepted that. There are some parts of my personality I just don’t use. You don’t really ever see calm Elsie or mental illness Elsie or sappy Elsie, maybe once or twice, and that’s intentional. This is Writing Elsie’s blog, lol, but there’s other Elsie that needs to be allowed to exist outside of the internet, and I can’t neglect her or my actual life for the sake of this.

I honestly don’t know what to do here. I love these characters on a very personal level, and have poured my heart into them, and I don’t want to straight up leave them. Even only partially separating myself seems kinda pointless because I know what happens when someone gets really behind on the lore and has to be caught up on even just a day’s events to explain why Character A looks like this now or Character B is referencing this event, etc. etc.

But there’s a point where it’s not healthy anymore. Where things reach a place where I have to admit that this can’t be my entire life anymore. And I’m not entirely sure what on earth I should do about it…

If I do somewhat step back, it’ll probably be right after the vacation arc ends. i’m gonna pour my fluff loving heart and soul into that thing, don’t you worry. But you shouldn’t expect another dungeon or something like that from me unless I have a VERY good reason and a well formulated plan. Yes, I’ll probably still engage in shippery and fluff, as well as analysis, but mostly within the bounds of characters and dynamics we’ve already established, and not much farther than that. My one exception to the “after the vacation arc” rule would probably be Yelena’s arc, because of how long things in that section tend to take, for various reasons. Yelena’s arc is barely started, and stuff takes possibly days to move even a few hours in-universe. Sooooo….yeah, I wanna finish that, I’ve put too much work into it already to just stop it.

…dang this was only supposed to be a paragraph…

…pls halp, I have no idea what to do lol.

Ok. I've read over this a couple times.

First off, I'm talking to you as L here, and not Star. I am very, very proud of you for acknowledging this and understanding that this is getting unhealthy. I think it's very smart that you dont want to neglect your yourself irl and the fact you're saying this, and saying exactly what you'll be doing, I'm really proud of it.

To give you a clear answer, if it's going to help you irl then I think stepping back is smart. Especially from the trauma and angst, because that stuff hurts a LOT and it can be really, really detrimental and negatively affect irl things. What I DONT think is that it's betraying anyone. You need to be able to put yourself and your needs first in order to be your best self, and everyone understands that you can't be on tumblr 24/7 because, well, that's really really really really unhealthy and not good. I'm really glad you're telling me about this though so I, and everyone else who sees this, knows.

TAOCC is really great but there's a LOT of heavy things on here and with everything going on, it can be super weighing and really affect people irl. I can speak from experience because honestly, I'm in a similar situation. I won't speak much about that though. It's definitely addictive and can get really really unhealthy if you let it, and honestly it's not hard to let it.

I want you to do whatever you feel is best for you, no matter what that entails. Fei and Tails and Xeya and Kumo and so many others and I love you so much and do NOT want you neglecting yourself and your life irl for this- it's meant to be entertainment, not a lifestyle.

I think it's smart to finish Yelena's Arc before partially stepping back. And I think it's even smarter to not want to do another dungeon, because that whole thing was a massive angst-fest and I think it negatively affected people more than they care to admit. Shippery and fluff and minor things is a good boundary.

I'll wrap this up now, but again, I'm in full support of this decision because I want you to be at your best. You're right, you're not just Elsie. And it's not fair for you to only be Elsie when you're so much more than that. If stepping away from tumblr will help you take care of the other parts of your life that we aren't involved in or aware of, then please do so because no part of you and your life should be sacrificed for the sake of entertainment.

Again, I'm really, really proud of you for admitting this.

Please know we'll always support you and you're super important to all of us, so don't ever feel bad for putting your needs first. Irl things should always come first.

But no matter what always remember:

WE LOVE YOU SO SO SO MUCH AND YOURE SUPER IMPORTANT AND WE WANT THE BEST FOR YOUUU ❤️❤️❤️❤️

Everything I said is applicable for everyone else reading this too. Taocc is fantastic and we love it but it shouldn't completely take over your life. It's okay to take a break or step back fully if it means the best for your health and irl life. Please remember to take care of yourselves- and everything that Elsie talked about here is FANTASTIC self care. It may be hard, but it's also the best decision she can make for herself and may be the best decision for others too.

Alright- I think I covered everything. Don't ever feel like you're betraying us Elsie- it's not betrayal, it's self care. We'll still be here for you, always. Never forget that ❤️❤️❤️

[elamarth-calmagol]

What actually is LACE? (an informal essay)

What’s LACE?

Laws and Customs among the Eldar, or LACE, is the most popular section of the History of Middle Earth books.  It's available online as a PDF here: http://faculty.smu.edu/bwheeler/tolkien/online_reader/T-LawsandCustoms.pdf .  There’s a lot of LACE analysis in the fandom, Silmarillion smut fics are usually labeled “LACE compliant” or “not LACE compliant”, and I’ve been seeing the document itself show up in actual fics, meaning that the characters themselves are discussing it.

LACE is an unfinished, non-canonical essay split into several parts.  It covers the sexuality of elves, which is mostly what people talk about.  It also covers elvish naming (which I want to make a whole different post about), the speed at which elves grow up, changes that happen throughout their lives, their death and rebirth, and finally the legal and moral issues of Finwe remarrying after Miriel’s death.  The discussion about rebirth conflicts with Tolkien’s later writings about Glorfindel’s re-embodiment, but to the best of my knowledge, LACE is the best or only source for most of the topics it covers.

However, LACE is not canon since it doesn’t show up in the Silmarillion.  Counting all of the History of Middle Earth as canon is literally impossible, considering Tolkien contradicts himself all over the place.  It is only useful because it has so much information that is never discussed in the actual canon.  Many people consider it canon out of convenience.

Another important thing to remember is that, other than presumably the discussion of the growth of elvish children, the information is only supposed to apply to the Eldar (meaning the Vanyar, Noldor, Teleri, and Sindar) and not the dark-elves such as the Silvan elves and Avari.

The rest is behind the cut to avoid clogging your feeds.

Problems with LACE interpretations

But because it’s hidden in the History of Middle Earth (volume 10, Morgoth’s Ring), barely anyone actually gets the opportunity to read it.  I don’t think most people are aware that you can get it online, so it doesn't get read much.

I feel like this leads to a handful of people saying something about LACE and everyone else going along with it.  I definitely did this.  I was amazed by all the things that were in the actual essay that nobody had ever told me about, or had told me incorrectly.  For example, most people seem to believe that elves become married at the completion of sexual intercourse (whatever that means to the fic author).  In fact, LACE explicitly says that elves must take an oath using the name of Eru in order to be legally married.  Specifically: 

It was the act of bodily union that achieved marriage, and after which the indissoluble bond was complete… [I]t was at all times lawful for any of the Eldar, being both unwed, to marry thus of free consent one to another without ceremony or witness (save blessings exchanged and the naming of the Name); and the union so joined was alike indissoluble.

I’ve seen a marriage oath being included in a few stories recently, but most writers leave out the oath entirely and just have sex be automatically equivalent to marriage.  What would happen if elves had sex without swearing an oath?  I don’t know, but I’d love to see it explored.

Then there’s a footnote that might explicitly deny the existence of transgender elves... or not, but I’ve literally only seen it mentioned once or twice.  Overall, I feel like all of LACE is filtered through the handful of people who read it, and we’re missing out on a lot of metanalysis and interpretations that we could have because most fans never see the actual document.

Who wrote LACE?

I mean within the mythology of Middle Earth, of course.  Since LACE appears in the History of Middle Earth and not the Silmarillion, we can be pretty sure that J.R.R. Tolkien himself wrote it and it wasn’t added to by Christopher Tolkien.  But that’s not the question here.  Remember that Tolkien’s frame narrative for all of his Middle Earth work is that he is a scholar of ancient times and is translating documents from Westron and Sindarin for modern audiences to read and understand.  The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings come from the Red Book of Westmarch, and I believe The Silmarillion is meant to be Tolkien’s own writings based on his research (though it might also be an adaption of Bilbo’s “Translations from the Elvish”, but I haven't looked into that).  So what does LACE come from?

Christopher Tolkien admits in his notes that he doesn’t know.  He says, “It is clear in any case that this is presented as the work, not of one of the Eldar, but of a Man,” and I agree, because of the way it seems to be written as an ethnographic study rather than by someone who lives in the culture.  Honestly, it talks too much about how elves are seen by Men (e.g. speculating that elf-children might look like the children of Men) to be written by an elf.  This changes once it gets to the Doom of Finwe and Miriel, but that could be, and probably is, a story told to the writer by an elf who was there at the time.

Tolkien actually references Aelfwine in the second version of the text.  The original story behind The Lost Tales, which was the abandoned first version of the Silmarillion, was that a man from the Viking period named Aelfwine/Eriol stumbled onto the Straight Road and found himself on Tol Eressea.  He spoke to the elves and brought back their stories to England with him.  So it makes a lot of sense that Aelfwine would also write about the lives and customs of the elves for an audience of his own people.

Does LACE exist in Middle Earth?

I keep finding fics where first age elves discuss “the Laws and Customs” openly, as if it’s a text in their own world.  I usually get the impression that it was brought by the Noldor from Valinor.  But did the document actually exist in that time period?  For me, the answer is definitely not.

First of all, LACE was probably written by a Man, meaning it could not have dated back to Valinor in the years of the Trees, because Men hadn’t awaked yet.  In fact, the closest thing to an established frame narrative for it is that it was written by Aelfwine, who comes from the time period around 1000 CE (though Tolkien doesn’t seem to have pinned him down).  This is at least the fifth age, if not later.

But what if you don’t believe that it was written by a Man?  It still couldn’t have been written in the First Age, because it discusses the way the relationship between elves’ bodies and souls changes as ages go by.  For example:

As ages passed the dominance of their fear ever increased, ‘consuming’ their bodies... The end of this process is their ‘fading’, as Men have called it.

A lot of time has to go by in order for elves to get to the point of fading.  As a bonus, here’s another reference to the perspective of Men. LACE also discusses the dangers that “houseless feas”, which are souls of elves who do not go to Mandos after their bodies died, pose to Men.  How would they have known about that in the First Age?  It further says that “more than one rebirth is seldom recorded” (which isn’t contradicted anywhere I know of), and that’s not something you would know during your life of joy in Valinor, where almost nobody dies.  That’s something you learn after millennia of war.  This has to be a document written well after the Silmarillion ends.

So what about the sex part?  That’s all we care about, right?  Well, it is entirely possible that this was written down by the elves and Aelfwine translated it (though my impression is that he mostly recorded stories told orally to him and that elves were not very much into writing, at least in Valinor where you could get stories directly from someone who experienced them).  However, why would the elves write this down?  They know how quickly their children grow up.  They’ve seen actual marriages.  They don’t need that described to them.  And if they did have a specific document or story explaining the expectations of them when it comes to sex and marriage, why would they call it “Laws and Customs”?  That’s a very strange name for a set of rules for conduct.  I’m sure they had a list of laws written out somewhere in great detail, like our own state or national laws (that seems very in character for the Noldor, at least).  But I seriously doubt that those laws are what we’ve been given to read. LACE is not an elvish or Valinoran document.

Is LACE prescriptive or descriptive?

Here’s the other big question I’m interested in.  Prescriptive means that the document describes the way people should behave.  Descriptive means that it describes how people do behave.  And the more I worldbuild for Middle Earth and the culture of elves, the more I want to say that LACE is prescriptive in its discussion of sex, marriage, and gender roles.

But wait.  I’ve been saying for paragraphs that I think LACE is Aelfwine or another Man’s ethnographic study of elvish culture.  Then it has to be descriptive, right?

Does it?  How long do we think Aelfwine stayed with the elves?  Did he wait fifty years to see a child grow up?  Did he get to witness a wedding ceremony?  Did he meet houseless fea?  I don’t think he could have done all of that.  Maybe a different Man who spent his entire life with the elves could, but then when was this written?  When the elves were still marrying and having children in Middle Earth or when so much time had gone by that they had begun to fade already?

Whoever wrote this was told a lot of information by elves instead of experiencing it firsthand, the same way he heard the stories from the First Age from the elves instead of being there.  Maybe it was one elf who talked to him, maybe several different ones.  But did those elves accurately describe their society the way it was, give him the easiest description, or explain the way it was supposed to be?  If I was describing modern-day America, would I discuss premarital sex or just our dating and marriage customs?  Maybe people would come away from a talk with me thinking that moving in together equated to marriage for Americans in the early 21st century.  And I don’t even have an agenda to show America in a certain way, I'm just bad at explaining.  Did the elves talking to what may have been the first Man they had seen in millennia have an agenda in the way they presented themselves?

Or did the writer himself have an agenda?  Imagine going to see these beautiful, mythical, perfect beings, and you find out that they behave in the same immoral ways Men do.  Do you want to share the truth back home?  Or do you leave out things that don't match your worldview? Did Aelfwine come back wanting to tell people what elves were really like?  Or did he want to say “this is how you can be holy and perfect like an elf”?

Anyone studying the Age of Exploration will tell you that Europeans neber wrote about new cultures objectively, and often things were made up to fit the writer’s idea of what savages looked like. For example, my Native American history teacher in college told a story of how explorers described one tribe who (sensibly) didn't wear clothes as cannibals, because cannibalism and going around naked went together in their minds and not because of any actual incident.  Unbiased scholarship barely existed yet. Even Tolkien was extremely biased and tended to be imperialistic, as we all know.  There’s absolutely no reason to think that Aelfwine wasn’t biased in his own way.  (Of course, now we have to consider what biases a Danish or English man from the centuries around 1000 would have when it comes to things like gender roles. I assume he would have been more into divorce and female warriors than the elves are said to be.)

But is that what Tolkien intended? Probably not. He probably wanted LACE to be descriptive. But he also never got much of a chance to analyse the essay after the fact, which might have led to him discussing its accuracy and even the exact issues I just pointed out about explorers. Anyway, we know he's biased, and honestly, what he intended has never slowed down the fandom before.

Conclusion

In short, I take LACE to be a prescriptive document describing the way elvish culture is supposed to be, not a blueprint I have to stick to in order to correctly portray elves.  I also don’t believe the document that’s available for us to read existed even in the early Fourth Age, where The Lord of the Rings leaves off.  There maybe have been some document outlining the moral behavior of elves, as a set of laws, but thats not the Laws and Customs we have.

Of course, canon is up to you to interpret.  If you want Feanor discussing LACE with someone back in Valinor, go ahead.  If you want to throw out LACE entirely, go ahead.  It’s not even a canonical essay.  All of this analysis is honestly useless when you consider the fact that no part of LACE exists in any canonical book.

But that’s Tolkien analysis for you.

[hopekiedokie]

That’s Rough Buddy (Seokjin)

SUMMARY : You were invited to your friends' annual Halloween Costume Bash™ and were supposed to go on a matching couples costume but your date cancels at the very last minute. Nevertheless, you pushed through with going to the party in your costume not knowing that you would still end up matching with someone. But unfortunately, it was with that very annoying (yet very attractive) guy that you despise so much.

PAIRING : Seokjin x reader

GENRE: humor, fluff, a sprinkle of angst in the end, enemies to lovers or frenemies to lovers (kinda?)

WORD COUNT : 16.6k+ words

WARNINGS: A swear word or two or seven, Jin is a crackhead (shocker), too much halloween games, excessive use of Avatar The Last Airbender quotes and references (aka Jin channeling his inner Azula)

NOTES: I originally was gonna make y/n and Jin dress up as Team Rocket and title this AU "Prepare for Trouble" but I ultimately decided on this. It pained me to do so because I am such a simp for purple haired Jin. Even if there are SO many hidden ATLA references here, I don't think you need to see it to understand this AU. Although, what on earth are you doing with your life if you've never watched the show?? Anyways, I hope you like this even though it's well into November now. Also, this is my very first fic so hopefully you’d enjoy this! Appa yip yip!

The smell of pumpkin seems to be enveloping the entire Park residence. You have barely reached the front porch and the scent has already hit your nostrils. How could a simple scent have possibly diffused into such a huge proximity, you wonder to yourself as you knocked on your best friends' front door. It wasn't until you entered the household when things became clear to you. Dozens upon dozens of pumpkins in different sizes were littered from their front hall to their living room. Some were already carved, some were sitting idly, and some were lined up to be carved by Park Jimin and Park Luna.

You were invited here on this lovely afternoon with the promise of free food. But after being handed a plate of pumpkin muffins and a bunch of carving tools, you felt a strong urge to just go home and maybe sleep through the holiday. Of course the two gremlins sitting on the floor, seemingly a pair on a mission, did not allow that to happen. So here you are on your seventh pumpkin, scooping out its contents, definitely not thinking of a million other things you'd rather be doing now. You were just about to stab your eye out with the sharp stabbing tool due to a possible mental breakdown when you got a text from Kim Taehyung.

Taehyung is Jimin’s best friend whom you might have had a crush on for about a year now since you’ve become friends with him. The two of you are going in matching costumes for the annual Park Halloween Costume Bash™ and have been texting non stop for two weeks now. Everyone in town takes this party seriously, including the adults. Even their parents are in on it though unfortunately this year, they're out of town so they aren't really involved. But the chosen winners for best costume are still to be awarded with a free dinner at the famous Park's family restaurant.

Tae Tae 🌻 : So that's a solid no on shaving my head? Cause I really wouldn't be opposed to it if it means a free heavenly meal from Papa Park 👀👀👀

You quietly chuckle at the thought of a bald Taehyung running around. The commitment of this man amazes you. You were about to type a reply when you felt something aggressively tap against your forehead. You look up to see an annoyed looking Luna.

Feeling something is stuck to your forehead, you slowly brought your hand up to touch it and you instantly felt a bit of pumpkin mush. "Did you just hit me with your filthy ladle?!" You disgustingly shouted at her.

"Dude, now is not the time to be all lovey dovey when the party is in three days and we still have about...uhm..." She looked around, started counting and then went to add stuff with her fingers, "A total of 27 pumpkins to stab and a whole house to decorate!"

You groaned loudly and fell on your back on the floor. You feel a headache start to develop from being surrounded by too much pumpkin flavored and scented things. If your two best friends' goal is to put any pumpkin patch to shame, then they definitely have achieved it. At this point, the stench of halloween in this area is strong enough to linger until the holiday comes back next year.

"Okay, but I don't understand why I'm being subjected into pumpkin slavery as well when this isn't even my party to throw?"

"When you're this behind on everything, all hands on deck are needed. We literally have not started on any of our to do list aside from pumpkin carving." It was Jimin who replied to your question. You watch him puncture a bunch of holes on the purple pumpkin he is working on. If you hear the word "pumpkin" one more time, you just might spontaneously combust or repeatedly bash your head with the wooden ladle in front of you. (A/N: Tbh, same here. It's only been a couple of paragraphs and I've already used the word 12 times.) 

"I thought we'd be on top of this without mom and dad's help!" Luna started as she too began poking holes on her [word redacted]. "We are so behind! I mean, this guy still doesn't have a costume!"

"YAH! Stop exposing me like that! I told you, it's a…a work in progress."

Luna snorted at his step brother's remark. "In order for a work to be in progress, it must first be started-" Jimin cut her off by throwing her some [word redacted] meat. 

It effectively stopped her from further embarrassing Jimin from his lack of costume days from the single most important party of their year. But it did start a revolting [word redacted] meat fight which lasted about a good minute. For the good of everyone, you stomped over to the war zone and pried the two idiots from each other. For a bunch of fools who are supposed to be rushing to get things done, they seem to be just fine with wasting their time. 

"OPPA STOP IT!"

"I wouldn't have declared war on you if you hadn't outed me like that to y/n!"

"Well, it's not my fault you're so unready!"

"ALRIGHT THAT'S ENOUGH FROM YOU TWO!" You shouted as you yanked Luna off of him. Why on earth did their parents think it would be alright to leave these two on their own is beyond you. You gave Luna a reprimanding look and said, "Seriously, you'll make no progress if you continue with your antics." 

Her eyes widen, looking like a little child being scolded by her mom. "He started it!"

From behind you, you can hear Jimin snickering. Probably feeling smug from her sister taking all the scolding. Honestly, are they five? You faced him with a much dirtier look than the one you gave Luna and he instantly stood straight, lips pressed into a thin line. 

"And as for you!" You started, "I can't believe you still don't have a costume! This is so disappointing coming from you. How could you have let this happen?"

This may seem over dramatic, but this costume party is really THAT important. It's the highlight of the autumn season. This family really knows how to celebrate it and they do not fail to over shine what they had the year before. So this is really a bunch of steps back for these two.

"I know, I know!" Jimin yelled exasperatedly. "It's not that I haven't been planning. It's just that, how could I possibly top what I dressed up as from last year?"

He does have a point. He and Luna teamed up last year on what might be the most iconic costume ever. They both dressed up as the Wilson sisters from the movie White Chicks. They even had prosthetics on just like how Kevin and Marcus impersonated the twins. You guess you would not know how to beat that costume as well.

"I don't know what you're talking about. Maybe you're just uncreative cause I found a costume that will surely be a big hit to the people." Luna taunted her brother.

"What is it?" You and Jimin asked at the same time.

"You'll just have to wait and see!" She answered in a sing-song tone and proceeded to clear up the mess they made.

Jimin began helping her sister pick up [word redacted] mush with a long face. "Well that sucks hard for me. How about you y/n? What are you dressing up?" 

"Oh, she's going as Katara, alongside Taehyung who is dressing up as Aang!" Luna answered for you, uttering the latter part in a way that sounds like she's teasing you.

"Oh, sweet! A date with Tae! I didn't know you two were finally going out?" 

"What? No, don't listen to her. It's not a date! We're just friends." The two stared at you with a "yeah right" kind of look so you were compelled to explain further.

"Look, we were talking about The Last Airbender a few months ago and I mentioned how much I really wanted to cosplay as Katara. One thing led to another then poof! Here we are going as Aang and Katara to your party. It's not a big deal."

Jimin had a knowing sly smirk that made you somewhat uncomfortable. "Yeah, except Aang and Katara were madly in love and ended up making babies AND you obviously have a crush on each other." He said.

You reached for the nearest bowl of discarded [word redacted] meat and flung it towards the boy whose eyes have now disappeared and is in a laughing fit.

"No, no, no! You've got it all wrong! Y/n doesn't have a big fat crush on Taehyung." Luna defended you. Thank God for her! Between the two goons, she really is the one you can truly count on. You were about to say thank you when she added, "It's obviously Seokjin she has a huge ass crush on!"

Your mouth fell agape.

"Wait, oh yeah it's him!" Jimin agreed and tag teamed with his sister to tease you. Sometimes, you forget that they were born with different parents. Apart from their DNA, they’re pretty much identical. And it's scary.

"Okay, you know what? I take it back. You both deserve this!" You grabbed the mushy bowl and threw gloop after gloop towards the siblings.

Needless to say, you spent more time cleaning up afterwards than working on the decorations.

The next few days went by like a huge storm. Chaos definitely ensued. You spent more time and effort on making this party possible than you ever did with anything in your life. All you see are purple and orange with a hint of red even when you close your eyes. Halloween seems to haunt you even in your sleep. Just last night, you dreamt you were being wrapped in spider webs (Which let's be honest, is pretty much just cotton) by that huge scarecrow standing in your best friends' lawn.

You were out in town with Jimin doing last minute shopping, telling him that weird and disturbing dream of yours when he suddenly told you he has something to do and pretty much dashed away to the direction of a women's shoe store. What's that all about?

He's been absolutely frazzled since that afternoon you spent terrorising [word redacted]. You can't blame the lad. It's hours away from the party and it seems like he still doesn't have a costume. You and Luna don't know how he's gonna pull this off. If he does though, you'll thoroughly be impressed and would never question Park Jimin's capabilities.

On your way to the nearest bus stop, you received a message from Taehyung. You instantly felt giddy. The fact that you're going to a party with him in matching costumes have only sunk in this morning when you finished with the party preparations. You opened the text and your face instantly fell.

Tae Tae 🌻 : Y/n! I really don't know how to say this. But I don't think I can come to the party tonight. My little sister woke up to a very bad fever this morning and both my parents are working this evening. I'm so so sorry to cancel on you. I know we've been looking forward to this for so long 😔

You know you can't be mad at him. It's not like he planned for this to happen. But you can't help but feel absolutely gutted. He's right, you've been looking forward to this for so long. Since April this year actually. If he's not coming, everything just seems pointless.

You : Aww that's a shame. Don't worry about me though. There's always next year. Worry about your sister! I do hope she'll get better soon. She shouldn't miss out on halloween ☹☹☹

Tae Tae 🌻 : I know. She's not gonna be able to go trick or treating. But I'll make sure we'll watch halloween films! 

Tae Tae 🌻 : Wait what do you mean there's always next year?? 

You : We'll just have to wait for next year to debut our costumes!

Tae Tae 🌻 : WAIT NO. Don't tell me you're not going to the party?? Just because I can't come??

You : Well yeah. It seems pointless to go.

Tae Tae 🌻 : Don't be like that! You're making me feel guilty 😭 Your costume deserves to be flaunted. Go or else I'll never talk to you again 🤧

Despite his order for you to come to the party, all desires to go left you the moment you read his initial text. The entire point of coming is to go as a pair. You both have been working hard to make your costumes as accurate as possible. To come alone doesn't make sense.

You were too engrossed with your phone that you did not realize you were going to crash into a person when you took a turn at the corner of the street. "Oww." You clutched the top of your head, as if you hit a hard wall instead.

"I'm so sorry-" the guy began to apologise but stopped short after he saw you. "Ah y/n! Watch where you're going! Don’t just mindlessly walk around!” he said, rubbing his chest where your head presumably collided with.

“Oh! I bet you're going as Wonder Woman tonight. Get it? Cause you wander too much around!" 

The hollering buffoon in front of you, laughed at his own joke so hard that people around you started looking at the both of you. Wanting to get out of this embarrassing situation, you circled around him and proceeded to walk towards the bus stop. But he unfortunately followed right after you.

"Hang on." He jogged in front of you and held both of your arms. He looked you in the eyes with such seriousness that you think he has something very important to say. But alas, you should’ve known that nothing intelligible ever comes out of his mouth. 

He opened his mouth and said, "Are you actually going as Wonder Woman?"

You made an annoyed sound and slapped his arms away as he said things like "I knew it!" and "I am such a genius!".

"No Seokjin! I'm not going as Wonder Woman.” you said as you reached the bus stop.

“Well that’s a relief! Honestly that’s super low and pedestrian even for you.” He jabbed at you but you stayed silent, not wanting to banter with him, unlike the usual. He carried on blabbering for the remaining time, telling you how “Spicy and scorching” his costume is. Whatever that means. At this point, you have half the mind to believe that he’s dressing up as a jalapeño. Knowing Seokjin, you wouldn’t put it past him to do so.

“You know what, actually, I'm not going at all." you butt in as an attempt to shut him up. His head whipped towards you at such a lightning fast pace, you were sure it would have snapped off. Oh how you wish.

"You're not going?" He said in what sounded like a very disappointed tone. Huh, why would he be disappointed, you thought to yourself.

You shake your head no.

For once, Seokjin seemed rather speechless and something else. Dare you say sad. This is really weird for him but you chose not to analyse him further and stood at the bus stop. You both just stood there in silence for a couple of seconds until a bus came parking.

You were already inside, swiping your bus card, when you heard him say, "Well that's rather disappointing. Who would go and scare the little kids away now?" 

The bus doors closed just as his infamous laugh came rolling. You weren't able to hear it but the sound of his signature windshield wiper laugh still rang in your ears. You flipped him off and hastily took a seat after an old man looked at you with such distaste. You took one last look at Seokjin giving him the finger once more but much discreetly as the bus abandoned his still laughing form.

When 8:30pm arrived, you were sprawled on your bed watching this god awful halloween film starring Adam Sandler. You, honest to god, love Adam Sandler. But this film isn’t it. You stopped paying attention half way through the movie and started scrolling through your phone when your mom unceremoniously barged in your room.

“Mom, for the last time! I’m not coming to the party!” You told her for like the thirteenth time since you got home this afternoon. It most probably wasn’t the thirteenth time and was probably just the third time. But you’re really not in the best mood.

“Are you extremely, positively, a hundred percent sure about that, honey?” 

You rolled your eyes at that. Your mom is never the one to keep repeating stuff as she is also easily annoyed just like her daughter. “Yes, mom. I am firmly, undoubtedly, and conclusively stating that I am staying in this room for the rest of the night.” You proclaimed, not even sure you can string up further words to describe how sure you are with your decision.

Your mom sighed as you closed the movie, not interested in it anymore. You look up at her with a raised eyebrow, silently asking why she’s still in the room. She fully opened the door and said, “Well, if that’s the case, then you need to tell that to Freddie Mercury downstairs.”

Not really understanding what she meant, you just stared at her dumbfoundedly until your brain finally started to function properly. “Uh, excuse me. But come again?”

She sighed once more, probably already tired from the night and the high jinks that came along with it. She never really liked halloween.

“Just come downstairs. Now.”

You hurriedly got up from your bed and sprinted out of your room. You haven’t even stepped foot at the top of the stairs when you indeed caught sight of the one and the only Freddie Mercury at your front door, rocking his iconic Live Aid outfit, topped with a lavish red robe, and a completely blinged out crown. Of course, we can’t forget the aviators and his emblematic moustache.

“Ay oh!” Freddie yelled at the top of her-I mean his lungs. It was so loud that your cat ran out of your house. Meanwhile, you shamelessly gawked at the person in front of you as you descended downstairs. You were absolutely confident that your best friend wouldn’t be able to top her costume from last year. Oh you were wrong.

“Darling, I know I’m fabulous but don’t ogle at me like that. Now do tell me, what’s this news I’ve heard from the grapevine that you’re not coming to the party??” She asked annoyedly in a pretty decent posh London accent. You on the other hand, ignored her.

“Woah that looks utterly real.” You touched her moustache and she slapped your hand away. 

“Oi! Focus, lass! How could you possibly spend the last three painful days with us on what seemed like the halloween edition of Amazing Race, only to bail on us at the finale?!" Her accent slowly slipped away as her voice progressively got much louder. Once again though, you chose to ignore her.

"Your crown is so beautiful! Is this custom made? Oooh can I touch it?" You asked while reaching for it, not even waiting for her approval.

"Y/n stop it! I asked you a question. Answer it! Why all of a sudden, you decide to not go--"

"Dude, you really hit the nail on this one! Although I have to say, I don't think Freddie had protruding boobs."

Luna dramatically gasped at your statement and covered her chest using her robe. "I do not have protruding boobs! You make it sound like they're massive!"

"Well, compared to Freddie Mercury's, I guess they kinda are."

She hit you for the second time since she got here. "This is as much squeezing I can handle to flatten them out. Nevertheless, I believe I have normal sized breasts! Besides, I'm sure Freddie would've loved to have protruding boobs anyway."

A couple of seconds passed with you two just staring at each other, feeling the weight of your conversation. Realising how stupid your topic is, the both of you burst into laughter.

"What on earth are we talking about? I can't. This is too stupid. What the heck are you even doing here?" You managed to spit out in between laughs 

Luna stopped laughing and gasped once more. She hit you for the third time now and ignored your protests of pain. "You little shit! What are you still doing here in your pyjamas! The party started 30 minutes ago! Come on, let's get you dressed up!"

She yanked your arm towards the direction of your room but you stayed planted to where you stand. "I can't. I told you, I'm not going."

She dropped your arm and took off her aviators. She had a really disappointed look which must be mirroring your own expression. "You can't be serious. We've been working hard for this. We've been excited for it since the first day of autumn!"

You didn't reply to her, you just looked at the ground. "But what about Taehyung?"

"Taehyung isn't coming."

Confusion spread across her face so you told her about his dilemma with his sister.

“Well that’s just bullshit.” She concluded with such spite. Your eyes widen at her aggression towards Taehyung. You can’t believe she would be this hostile about him choosing to care for his sick little sister. What else was he supposed to do? Abandon her for you?

“What the hell, Luna! HIS SISTER IS SICK! How could you be so bitter to him?”

“Woah! Woah! Woah!” She waved both hands up in a defensive manner, “I’m not mad at him! I’m mad at you!” 

You rubbed your face with both of your hands. You guess it makes sense for her to be mad at you but now is really not the time for you to agree with her. You're not in the best mood to carry out an argument. You just want to crawl back to your room. That dreadful Adam Sandler movie suddenly sounds so temptingly riveting. Having said that, you still made it clear to her as to why you would prefer staying in tonight. 

Luna, being the stoic person that she is, completely disagreed with your reasoning. "Oh quit being dramatic! He already gave you the heads up to go tonight. What more do you need?"

"I don't know, Luna. I just feel like I'm betraying him if I go."

She glared at you for a good second as if trying to telepathically make you change your mind. When it dawned on her that you're not conceding, she sighed the longest sigh you've ever heard from anyone, dramatically placed her aviators back, turned around while flicking her robes on your face, and then strutted away from you. 

"Fine then! If you'd rather sulk here over a boy rather than spending an astounding good time with your friends, then be my guest! I guess all that hard work you've put in will be for nothing. But that's fine! There's always next year anyway, right?"

You watch her shimmy her tush towards the front door as she spews out reprimands after reprimands. And she says you're dramatic. Birds of the feather, really do flock together.

Her hand is on the doorknob when she gave you what meant to be her last look on you. It seemed more of a plea to you though. At that moment, you felt a pang of guilt. Are you really going to abandon your best friends for Kim Taehyung? 

You gave her a small smile and said, "I'm sure you'll have a fucking marvelous party!"

Finally, she gave out a groan of defeat and opened your front door. "Oh whatever y/n! I should've left the second your mom told me you're not coming. Jimin needs my help, anyways"

Jimin. Somehow, you remembered that that boy didn't have a costume even until this morning. You wonder what on earth did he pull at the very last minute. So you called out to Luna.

"Luna, wait a second!"

"WHAT NOW?!" She yelled exasperatedly 

"I just want to know what Jimin dressed up as."

She let go of your front door knob and crossed her arms. "Why'd you wanna know? It's not like you care about this party."

"Oh give me a break! Just tell me what it is!"

The smirk she has on her face tells you that she's not giving you what you want. Which you are absolutely correct.

"I'm not telling you what he dressed up as. If you want to know, then you find it out yourself. All I'm saying is that his costume is literally everything."

Some way or another, that statement of hers stirred something inside of you. Somewhere, a few blocks down, is a Park Jimin dressed up as something "literally everything" (Park Luna, 2020). If there's something you know about Jimin is that his definition of marvelous is a normal person's definition but times ten. She could be bluffing, but your curiosity is really peaked. 

Damnit, you need to know what he dressed up. Right now.

You stood at the doorway of the Park residence living room with your mouth on the floor. 

In the middle of their room is where a really cool light up dance floor is. You already know that since you were there when it was set up yesterday. What caught your attention was the guy dancing wildly right smack in the middle of everyone. A wild Jimin was twerking, doing high kicks, and *gasp*! Did he just do a split???

Beside you, stands a preoccupied Luna, too busy taking a video of his untamed brother. “What did I tell you? Fucking everything!” She hollered and yelled at him to do some more of his high kicks.

You looked at your thick blue Southern Water Tribe coat lined with fur and then at Jimin, wearing his Patrick Star hooker costume. Suddenly, you feel overdressed. He was only wearing a tight pink sweatshirt, Patrick’s famous green shorts, fishnet stockings, and some sexy thigh high leather boots. Yet he is indeed stealing everyone’s attention. How could he possibly bust out those kinds of moves in those thin stilettos? A normal woman can even barely stand in them. Hold on, so that’s why he bolted to that women’s shoe shop this morning, you thought to yourself. It all makes sense now. 

Luna was left enabling his brother's thotty attitude as you walked to the kitchen. Luna was right, staying at home was a dumb idea. You can't help but admire all the halloween decorations the three of you have placed everywhere. Now you understand the vibes the two siblings were going when they said they wanted the house to be illuminated by jack o lanterns only. It looks really pretty here. Let's just hope and pray that this house won't burn down at the end of the night because this is definitely a fire hazard.

A guy approached you as you were standing by the snack bar. You don't really know who he is but he's dressed up as Dumbledore so you felt obligated to talk to him. "Your Katara costume is so cool! I'm a huge fan of the series! (A/N: Honestly who isn't?) Is it okay if I take a pic with you?" He asked and instantly whipped his phone out. 

Who were you to say no? So you awkwardly stood close to him and smiled for the camera. Is this what fame feels like?

"Gee thanks! I'll have to take another picture with you later but with your date too." 

Your face fell for a fraction of a second for being reminded by Taehyung. How does this guy know that Taehyung and you were supposed to go in matching costumes?

"Oh, I'm sorry! Taehyung won't make it tonight which is a huge shame." 

He looked at you weirdly. "Who's Taehyung?"

"Uh my date..?" you stated but ended up sounding more like asking a question.

"Oh, your date!" Realisation hit him and you slowly nodded. "But he did come!"

"WHAT?" 

"Yeah. I saw him arrive earlier. I must say, he looks sick!"

Taehyung came? But what about his sister? Did she magically get better? Why didn't he text you or something? You are so confused.

"Have you seen him anywhere?" You asked rather hopefully.

"Yeah! He's out back giving palm readings in his fortune telling booth."

Well now you're even more confused. That booth was meant to be a prop display only. What the hell is Taehyung doing, playing fortune teller with it? 

You thanked the guy and zoomed out to the backyard as fast as you could. There were no signs of Taehyung anywhere. You roamed around for a couple of minutes, trying to maneuver around the massive crowds towering over your pretty small form, until you heard a loud guy complaining about some drink.

"I'm telling you man! We need cactus juice up in here!" Oh, that annoying voice, you're sure you'd recognise that anywhere. It's only a matter of time until you run into him.

"It'll Quench Ya!" Hold up, that’s a Sokka line! Why would he be quoting from “Avatar: The Last Airbender”?? 

"Nothing's Quenchier, It's The Quenchiest!" You hear him say before he bust out his windshield wiper laugh. His voice seems to be coming from that large group of people by the fortune telling prop. You approached the group not for Seokjin, but to see if Taehyung was around. The two of them are in the same friend group.

It was difficult to scout around the group since everyone is a lot taller than you. You jumped around until you caught a glimpse of the hollering man in the middle, wearing something red and what appears to be a large scar on his face. Why does that scar look familiar? Realisation hit you like a ton of bricks. It seemed like time stopped for all the wrong reasons when you took in the entirety of Seokjin's costume. 

"Hey, look! It's Seokjin's date!", someone said and every single head there was in that group turned towards you at the same time. Even Seokjin, himself. It's so comical and stupid that you'd think you're in some sort of sitcom.

You looked like a deer caught in headlights, just stood frozen in front of the crowd. To be fair, how were you supposed to react anyway?

“Damn, she looks really pretty!

“Those are some fine hair loopies!”

“I don’t understand why they would go as Zuko and Katara. It doesn’t make sense.”

“ZUTARA MOTHAFUCKAS!!!”

One, you agree that you look banging tonight. Two, You also agree that if the two of you were indeed on a date, it wouldn’t make sense to go as Zuko and Katara when they weren’t even a thing. But three, yes, Zutara all the way and you would go down with that ship faster than you can say Bonzu Pipinpadaloxicopolis The Third.

Although the crowd had valid points, you would still think that Seokjin would contradict some of them. You know, like the accusation of the two of you being on a date? So it was a shock when he approached you with open arms and a huge smile while saying, “AH! There’s my sugar queen! Flameo, hotman! I was beginning to think you’ve bailed on me.”

You stepped back even before he got the chance to hug you. 

“Uh what the heck is this all about?” You were pointing out the ridiculousness of him acting like the two of you twinning was planned but he thought you were talking about his fortune telling booth.

“Oh you know me! As a theatre arts major, I can’t help it when situations arise that forces me to slip into a different character.”

You looked at him unamused. “That’s literally a mental disorder you just described and literally, NO ONE forced you to do this. That prop was happily chilling in the background and you just have to go and torment it.”

He shushed you with a finger to your lips and it took all the will in you to not bite it off. “You’re just saying that cause you haven’t tried getting my expert opinion.”

“Expert opinion- You know what? Whatever! I don't have the patience to do this right now. I'm out here looking for my date so this night could get better. So why don't you just tell everybody here that we are not- hmmp!" Seokjin's rather large hands covered your entire face to shut you up or maybe slap you. Honestly you weren't sure. He was intending to cover your mouth but in his haste, he managed to smack you instead.

"Hey, guess what? I think you're the only person here I haven't told their fortune yet! That's just a shame, that won't do. No, no, no. What's that? You wanna go now? What a brilliant idea! Let's go, sugar queen!", he said all that in one breathing then pushed you towards "his" fortune telling booth that YOU had set up before the sun even rose this morning.

It was a very small purple tent (Actually, it was just a massive piece of cloth hanging from a tree trunk) with a little table set up and a crystal ball in the centre. He yanked the front part close for some privacy and you think you've never been more repelled in your entire life. To be stuck in such a small confinement with Seokjin and his ten foot wide shoulders is something that should be illegal.

He pushed you aside so he could sit at "his" table with you nearly falling through the cloth at the process. Once he's settled, he looks at you expectantly with a huge grin as if you actually wanted to get your fortune read by him. As if you volunteered yourself to be in this position.

His brain really is something and whatever that something is, you don't even want to try and decipher it.

Against your better judgement, you dragged yourself to sit in front of him. You're already here, might as well just try and enjoy the ride. Right? 

Your butt had barely touched your seat and Seokjin was already declaring some insights about your future.

"Your future is full of struggle and anguish. Most of it, self-inflicted.", he said in all seriousness.

And of course, this is just some mischievous way to rile you up. What else did you expect from this guy? Or better yet, why do you even bother with him? 

"You're not even gonna read my palms or bust out some tarot cards? Maybe do a little gazing into the crystal ball?"

"I didn't need to. It's written all over your face."

It took you a second to realise that he just directly quoted from Avatar again. You are quite annoyed at his childishness and slightly amused at his apparently extensive knowledge for Avatar references.

"I'm gonna give you the count of three to get the hell out of my face. If you're still here, I'll make sure your destiny ends right here." You replied, also quoting from the series.

He chuckled at your threat, finding it real cute just how easy it is for him to irritate you. "Okay, calm down. No need to get murderous."

"One."

"Hey, it's not my fault you're bound for failure!"

"Two!"

"Wait, are you actually being serious now?"

"THREE!", you yelled and lunged at the scarred boy.

He made a high pitched scream as you went and grabbed one of his shoulders. Your tiny chair went tumbling down and the crystal ball rolled off to the ground in your vicious movements. 

"Please, not the face! Anything but the face! It's too VIP!"

"Oh, I'll make sure that stupid scar becomes a permanent part of your face!"

One of his hands were on your arm while the other was held tightly around your hand that was trying to claw his "VIP" face. For a small person, you seem to be putting up a big fight against him.

The scene that was unfolding inside that small tent is a sight to behold. If anyone ever walked in right now, they definitely would think that a more salacious thing is going to go down. All of the ruckus the two of you are making can probably be heard from the outside. But the both of you are too out of it to even consider the embarrassment you might get if someone barges in. Which is why you didn’t notice Jimin’s head poke inside the tent.

"Wow you guys. If y'all wanted a room, you could've just asked. As a very supportive friend, I would gladly give you one." The voice of Jimin rang from behind you and you instantly let go of each other, feeling a bit flustered.

"It's not what it looks like!", you tried reasoning with the boy. "He's being his usual little shit self and I'm just trying to purge it out of his system!"

Jimin, equally being a little shit like his older friend, brushed your reasoning aside. "Y/n, y/n, y/n. Out of all the people here, you're really the one to mess this perfectly set up prop? Didn't us setting this up at midnight meant anything to you? Couldn't you have just let Seokjin hyung here to peacefully give you his readings?"

You rolled your eyes at him. “Can you just shut up? Also, you knew this shithead was using our prop and you just let him be?”

“Of course he did! He’s taking 25% of my total earnings tonight.” Seokjin muttered. 

“Total earnings- You’re making people pay for your made up bullshit?!” You hollered at the wide shouldered guy. Why are you even surprised about this? It’s Seokjin we are talking about. He could probably convince people to pay him just by walking past him.

“Oh you bet! But don’t fret, I’m not gonna charge you. With that kind of fate that you have, I’m sure you need every bit of kindness.”

Steam could might as well visibly come out of your ears right now with how enraged you are at him. You wanted to strangle him, bloodbend even. You didn’t have the chance to do anything though because Jimin was pulling you away. “Would you two stop with the lover’s quarrel for like a goddamned minute?”

He shoved you outside then did the same to Seokjin. “Everyone’s already inside about to play games and you two are still out here, too busy being all over each other!”

Jimin didn’t even need to say anything else or to further force you two. Just the word “games” made you both run inside at record speed. If people got real competitive with the costume contest, the halloween games are a whole other thing. Usually, after an hour or so since the party has started, the Parks hold a series of halloween themed games. The winners get various coupons. They aren’t as good as a free four course meal but that’s better than nothing especially if we're talking about the Park’s restaurant.

Sometimes, these games are done in groups but usually it’s in pairs. You weren't surprised that this year, all games are going to be done in pairs but unlike recent years, the games are going to be done in a "last man standing" manner. You knew all of this since you helped pick these games. You'd be more hyped up about them if it weren't for the fact that you don't have a pair to play with.

All these talk about games reminded you of Taehyung. You completely forgot you were supposed to look for him. But it became clear to you that he didn't really come when almost everyone who you came across with to your walk back inside pretty much assumed that Seokjin was your date. They all made some comment regarding your matching outfits which Seokjin didn't even try to deny. He was just gobbling up their compliments.

You listened to Freddie Mercury and Patrick Star explain the mechanics of this year's "Halloween Olympics". Now, what you didn't know was that they also changed the prize system. Apparently, they upped the prize since it's going to be a bit more difficult to win and there's only going to be one winning pair. This year, the winning pair is also going to win a free dinner. That got people buzzing.

With that, Luna explained that only the first 20 pairs to find a small, red, and hidden [word redacted] could compete in the games. Chaos ensued as you watch everyone scour around the house. All at once, you felt like you don't want to be competing against anyone in this room. Everyone seemed too terrifying as they went berserk. But alas, tonight doesn't seem like your night.

One by one, pairs came towards the siblings with their [word redacted] until only one was left hidden. Some guy, for some stupid reason, made the wrong decision to point and scream out the location of the last one. Obviously, everyone else made a beeline towards it. 

Everything went in a complete blur for you. All you remember was seeing a tall guy in red jump for it. Then you were yanked by the said guy. Next thing you know, you were competing in the first game. Well, “competing” is a strong word. Seeing as you were dragged here unexpectedly without your consent and were in a total daze, your partner took full control of the reins. Now that you're coming back to your senses, you think this is for the best if you want to win. For once in his life, he can finally put his frat boy skills to good use. 

The first game was announced to be a game of eyeball beer pong. It seems like the siblings are trying to get people drunk this early. You guess it’s a good strategy to easily kick people out of the games. But you and your partner ain’t going to be one of them. You watch your partner make perfect shots after shots, hitting every cup of the opposing pair. It wasn’t long before you both had won and eliminated the other pair.

“I can’t believe we lost! I really thought we had it in the bag.” One of the other guys had the audacity to say in front of Kim Seokjin, a true blue frat boy.

“Oh don’t flatter yourself! You were never even a player.” Seokjin muttered to the guy and held his hand up to you as if you were actually going to give him a high five. Instead, you gave him a long hard stare as cold as any of the water tribes. Any sane person would be decent enough to feel remorseful. He didn’t. Instead, he grabbed one of your wrists and gave himself a high five. 

You smacked him upside his head. “You insolent fool!” You hollered like a villain in a Disney movie.

“Yah! What was that for?” his feigned innocence made you want to tear out not only his hair but also your own.

“You think I want to compete with you?” 

He crossed his arms and slowly shook his head at you. Almost as if he is disappointed in you. “Tsk tsk tsk. I carried the whole bench and this is what I get from you? Just say ‘thank you’ and go.” 

You scoffed. “For your information, I didn’t ask to be paired with you. You just yanked me from nowhere!”

“Well then, you're welcome, sugar queen!”

“YOU’RE WELCOME?? I don’t want to be paired with you!” 

Your seething rage seems to somewhat alarm him. “Okay, okay, calm down!” You opened your mouth to interrupt him but he didn’t let you. “I admit that I did just yanked you and didn’t ask for your permission. Sure, that wasn’t really cool. BUT! In my defense, I was so deep in my competitive zone that I didn’t take the time to notice who I was pulling.” 

He looked at you to see if you had anything to say but the annoyance remained etched on your face so he continued reasoning with you. “Listen, we both just want the same thing and that is to win. That ain't happening to you seeing as you're all alone. So really, I kinda did you a favor here. Come on, it'll be fun!"

You hate to admit it, but he does have a point. Maybe it's not that bad of an idea to pair up tonight. You both are pretty competitive. Besides, you do need a little cheering up err- a distraction, I mean.

"I guess we could try and not tear each other apart even just for tonight. This is for a good cause. We do both really want that free meal. Fine, I'll call truce for now." You finally conceded and held your hand out to him. He took it and you shook hands.

"I'm glad you're seeing it my way. Because to be honest, you're not winning a free meal with that costume." He confidently said with a shit eating grin.

You squeezed his hand a little too tightly and ignored his yelps of pain. "And neither will you because guess what?! Your scar is on the wrong side!"

"Ah! I knew someone's gonna tell me that sometime tonight. I can't even be mad at that reference."

"No Seokjin. Your scar really is on the wrong side."

"Yeah, and tea is just hot leaf juice."

"Uh, it really is though. But I repeat, your scar’s on the wrong side, buddy!"

“No it’s not.”

“Believe it or not, it is!”

"Are you actually being serious?"

You let out a really long sigh of disbelief to what you'll have to put up with. This is for sure going to be a long night.

To your surprise, the night did not go on as a drag. The next game did start off rocky with you not being able to guess any of the given Halloween charades. Either you are not as cultured as you think you are or you just don't get the mind of a theatre major. Or maybe, it's just his mind you don't understand, to be honest.

"How on earth was that Silence of the Lambs?!"

"What do you mean 'how on earth was that Silence of the Lambs'? What else does this even mean?" He replied while acting like his arms are pinned to his sides then proceeded to cover his mouth and then did a fluttering motion with one of his hands that seemed to be coming out of his lips.

"That could literally mean anything! For all I know, that could mean The Mummy!"

He scoffed at you as if you just told him the most offensive thing in the world. "The Mummy?? Oh, you are absolutely hopeless. We are so doomed if we keep letting you guess."

"No, we are SO doomed if we let you act out the things! You dare call yourself a theatre major?" To any other person, you would think that your comment is in fact just downright offensive. But that's not the case with you two because it seems like you could push all the wrong buttons of the other person and somehow still not end up really hurting anyone. You wouldn’t admit it, but maybe both of you find this weird comfort in these silly banters and in the midst of it all, you've unknowingly built some form of bond.

You collectively agree to switch roles and just like that, the tides shifted. The two of you were suddenly getting the correct guesses each round. At the very last round, you drew the movie Caroline from the witch hat. If it were you and Luna playing, you guys would have guessed this in a heartbeat since it's your favorite movie. But you're with Seokjin and you are extremely positive that he has never even seen the movie.

When the one minute and thirty second counter started to tick down, you immediately made a circle around one of your eyes and made a sewing motion to it. You thought it couldn't be anymore obvious than that but he just stared at you. By the time forty seconds have passed, your hope for him trickled down. You could hear the opposing pair celebrating prematurely on the side which ticked you off so much.

Your sewing motions got a lot more aggressive as you gave Seokjin the most desperate look you could ever give him. He in turn, gave you a very rare apologetic look. Yup, you guys were doomed from the beginning. All you can think of is how much this night really sucks for you. You probably should have stayed at home.

Once everyone started counting down from fifteen, you bid goodbye to the grand prize. The idea of it was just too good to be true. You stopped with your motions and gave Seokjin a small nod of defeat. He acknowledged this by giving you a slow nod as well and this seemed like the end for your pair. His gaze on you, however, flitted towards something or someone from behind you. His eyes stayed there for a good five seconds, appearing to be in deep concentration. You didn't even have the chance to look back since right before the audience counted to one, Seokjin was screaming the correct answer.

"CORALINE! It's Coraline! Of course, how could I not know?" He announces while flapping his arms wildy just a second before the timer rings. Everyone cheered at this sudden victory. The turn of events left you stunned. You thought for sure he wouldn't get it. He just keeps surprising you.

Seokjin approached you with a huge smile on his face and you can't help but return it to him. Not only that, you gave him a big hug which caught him off guard. You didn't know what came over you to do that but it felt like the right thing to do. He didn't seem to show any signs of protest as well.

"What the fuck? I really thought that was the end of the line for us!" You told him after sharing a brief hug.

"You really need to put a little trust on me. What can I say? I'm a genius." Just like that, you went back to wanting to punch his face again.

Rolling your eyes, you murmured, "Did the definition of genius change in the last 100 years?"

While you turned your attention to Jimin who was already announcing the next game, Seokjin glanced towards Luna and gave her a smile. Unbeknownst to you, this so-called "genius" partner of yours actually had help. He, did in fact, was never going to get the correct guess. He has never seen Coraline nor does he know anything about it. But your best friend, Luna, decided that she wanted to keep you two in the games so she tried so hard to discreetly mouth "Coraline" to Seokjin a couple of times.

You didn't need to know that though.

He didn't mind receiving a few assistance to win, but it does hurt his pride and it will hurt more if you find out. Fortunately for Seokjin, he didn't need any further helping hands. Even from you. 

Either the games are too easy or you're just completely and utterly incapable because Seokjin pretty much breezed through them without even batting an eye. If you didn't know any better, you'd think he's trying to impress someone. You, maybe? Wait, no. That doesn't make any sense. Why would he do that? Besides, he made sure to gloat on you everytime your pair wins with you contributing nothing.

A couple of games and one harrowing round of What's Inside the Box later, just six pairs remained. It wasn't exactly all fun and games since along the way, your pair or rather, Seokjin made a rivalry against another pair. This couple dressed up as Team Rocket really got on his nerves. You can't blame him though. They kept on flirting with each other after every round and not to mention, they also kept taunting you two. You'll bloodbend them if you hear "Prepare for trouble and make it double" one more time before a game starts. To be fair, they do play very well. Actually, they seem to be the only other pair that puts up a good fight.

By this time, everyone has migrated outside for the last few games. For this one, as you already knew, you'll be playing blindfolded bean bag toss. One person would have to guide the other as they go through three different levels. The pairs that don't make it through would obviously get eliminated.

"Oh, we are so gonna dominate on this one!" You hear the girl dressed up as Jessie says.

"For sure. Why don't they all just pretend to be a tree and leave?" The guy dressed up as James condescendingly said and they both laughed out loud at his joke.

You visibly cringed at that. Can they get anymore intolerable? That's saying a lot coming from someone who knows Seokjin, arguably the most abhorrent creature in your life. Jeez, and you thought his jokes were the worst.

Seokjin made a gagging noise beside you, voicing out your sentiments. You can't help but laugh out loud with him until Patrick and Freddie approached you two.

"Okay, who's going to lead and who's the blindfold wearer between you two?" Patrick said and snickered a little after realising the other implications of his question. This little shit.

"Well, seeing as her skills are lacking, I'm gonna once again step up to the plate and handle this one." Seokjin reached for the blindfold but you snatched it from Luna's hand before he could.

You can't just let this night go down like this. Honestly, you're kind of having fun watching all the chaos ensue from the sidelines. But you're a woman of honour. You can't possibly go for a win while doing the bare minimum. You dare dress up as Katara and let some man take over?

"I'll be playing this one." You calmly but confidently declared.

"Sugar queen, I love the assertiveness. But I think you should-"

"I'm playing this one." You interrupted him with such firmness in your tone, they couldn't do anything but just nod to you.

Hell no are you gonna let Seokjin annihilate this night all by himself. You need to prove that you can match up to him. You'll show his stupidly pretty face and wrongly placed scar not to mess with your capabilities.

You took a long hard look at the three targets. Each one going higher and farther than the one before. You are to be given a practice round each level to get your bearings. Yada yada yada. You tuned the siblings out, of course you already knew all this. As the person who placed the goals, you'd think you have the upper hand. You were overly confident, bordering the line of cockiness, that you could do this. You even had the audacity to sneer at Team Rocket when they uttered their catchphrase to you.

You watched each pair try and make their shot. Surprisingly, everyone made it. That only added fuel to your fire. You were excited. You couldn't wait to finally do something. On top of that, Seokjin kept muttering things to you that if they can do it then so can you. 

When it's your time to play, you are extremely buzzing. Going last is always an overwhelming feeling. All that built up confidence died down though the second you put on your blindfold. The darkness that enveloped you instantly made you feel unbalanced and disoriented. Confusingly, it's as if all your other senses heightened but it also felt like they all shut down at the same time. 

"Fuck, fuck, fuck." You chant in your mind as you feel your awareness of your surroundings slip from you.

This is not good. Why did you subject yourself into doing this, again? You should've let Seokjin play when he had the chance. You clearly cannot do this.

In the midst of your swelling panic, you feel hands place on both of your shoulders. You jumped at the unexpected contact but it was just Seokjin. "You can do this, Okay? Just focus on me." He whispered in your ear with such comfort and softness that you had to shiver a little.

He rubbed small circles on your back with his thumbs, soothing you for a second until Luna gave you the go signal.

You slowly walk as straight as you possibly can even if you feel like toppling over the entire time. Please don't. The entire time, Seokjin was behind you. You halted when he told you and to the best of your abilities, you "delicately", as he instructed you to, tossed the bag to the left.

"Okay, that was shit." He truthfully told you in a nice tone as you hear the people around begin tittering at what you assumed to be such a horrible shot. You think you just heard Team Rocket announcing their victory. Shit, shit, shit, shit. You are royally fucked.

"Seokjin..." You can't help but whine, your anxiety creeping up ten fold.

"Hey, hey, hey. That's fine! What are practice rounds for?" He tried easing you.

"But everyone-'

"Forget about everyone. It's just you and me right now. Calm down and focus." The gentleness of his words and the lulling of his voice somehow allowed your breakdown to dissipate a little. If you're in a better state, you'd be surprised at how he is behaving towards you. You'd probably dismiss it and reason that he just badly wants to win. That's the only fitting explanation.

Sensing that you've calmed down a little bit, he let out a breath that he unconsciously has been holding. Your sudden mood shift made him really nervous. "Okay, sugar queen. I know you're a waterbender but mind channeling a little bit of your inner Toph for now? Just try and maybe get in tune with the surroundings? Come on, you set this thing up. Can’t you, like, use that to your advantage somehow?”

Easier said than done. But the way he’s practically cooing at you as he talks makes you want to subconsciously do anything for him right now. He could ask you to go find him a dragon egg and you’d most probably follow his orders blindly. Which is a concerning thought that you’d mull over later. For now, you focus only on his voice and try your best to toss the bean bag inside the goal.

You took a deep breath and said you're ready to attempt your shot. Seokjin instructed you to make your throw a bit more vigorous. By how much? You have no idea. Hell, you don’t even remember how hard you threw your last shot. This is literally all up to chance, if we’re being real. So you prayed to every spirit out there to put all odds in your favour. 

Around you, some people began cheering. Some people were kind of waiting for you to completely miss again to get some good laughs out of it. Other pairs were taunting you, making a distraction. But you tried your hardest to tune them all out. Right now, all you can focus on is your aim and the nice words Seokjin is throwing at you. With shaking hands, you make a swing with what you hope is enough force to get to the next level.

You weren’t aware of it but to everyone else, it’s as if time went in slow motion. People’s heads comedically followed the direction of your bean bag. Your two best friends were both wide eyed, Jimin had both of his palms on the top of his head and Luna had her mouth wide opened. Seokjin stood nervously behind you with his hands intertwined in front of his lips as if reciting a prayer. Your bean bag’s hang time felt like an eternity but it was more than enough to realise that you still weren’t going to be able to make it. Seokjin almost cried on the spot at that realisation until your bean bag hit the rim of the basket. That split second of it hitting the rim made all the difference in the world. Everyone literally went silent as the bean bag bounced off the rim and went straight inside the basket.

With your vision completely obscured, you were clueless to all the spectacle that’s happening. In contrast to everyone, everything went in fast forward to you. Right after you made your shot, you instantly heard people yelling your name and a pair of arms encaged you from the back. Seokjin lifted you up and started spinning you around, obviously a sign that you made it. 

With everyone’s reaction, you would think you made a championship winning shot. You don’t really understand the hype but you were just glad that you did it and it did wonders to your confidence.

“I told you that you were doing great! You just need to follow my voice.” Seokjin told you as he set you down and you took your blindfold off. Everyone still kept cheering wildly as Luna declared the start of the second round.

“Well, it is hard to ignore.” You joked at him but for some reason it made him blush. If his long hair weren’t hiding his ears, you would also see how harshly they’re flushing. He didn’t have a witty comeback and just avoided your gaze. He is flustered. How cute. You openly thought to yourself without even feeling an ounce of shame. It seems that the tides are indeed shifting and you’re not even fighting against the current.

The game continued with less dramatics, oddly enough. Even more odd is that you easily made it through the entire game. In the end, you weren’t even sure why you panicked in the first place. Two pairs got eliminated so you are now down to four. That’s fortunate for you. What’s unfortunate is that Team Rocket still hasn’t blasted off.

The next game was a round of Paper Dance. You were relieved that you both had to actively participate on this one and not have one of you slacking off to the side. You weren’t quite relieved when you remembered the mechanics of the game. Basically. You are given a sheet of newspaper and are forced to dance around it. When the music stops, both persons need to step inside the paper and stay there. Every round, the paper gets folded in half so the pair gets pretty close and intimate with each other. 

The thought made you nervous and you slightly broke into a sweat. You were feeling rather uncomfortable with your heavy layers so you opt to take off your outer coat. Some tall and lanky guy dressed up as a sunflower, which you believe is also one of Jimin's close friends, started hollering, “Take it off now girl, just take it off!” 

As objectifying his words are, you choose to laugh at how ridiculous he looked. A soft delicate flower uttering such promiscuous things. You thought maybe humour could divert your fluttering heart long enough for one pair to get eliminated so you could all move on to the next game. It didn’t, of course, what were you even expecting?  

As the newspaper shrank, the more agitated you became. The fact that it was taking so long for one pair to get eliminated makes you weak in the knees and you don’t know if it’s a positive or a negative reaction. At this moment, the paper is still relatively in a decent size but it could only accommodate one pair of feet inside. Due to your lack of communication, you both stepped one foot inside when the music stopped and you collided with one another rather harshly. You immediately went flying down to the ground but Seokjin managed to grab your arm and pull you towards him. Once you were flush against each other, both of you instinctively wrapped an arm around the other person to gain balance.

The action might have saved you both from getting eliminated but it definitely put you two in quite a dangerous spot. Just like when you were blindfolded a while ago, everything around you tuned out and all you can focus on is you and Seokjin. Only this time, you weren’t facing just an empty dark abyss. You were face to face with the dark abyss of his eyes. Your faces were mere centimeters away. An hour ago, you would willingly defenestrate yourself, horrified at the idea of getting this close to this guy. But right now, as you two stare and hold on to each other, you weren’t so repelled. Neither is he.

You two were just getting comfortable with each other if it weren’t for Jimin blatantly calling you out for this really personal moment. “Oi! The music is back up! You two can get back to your lovey dovey moment later but for now we game.” The actual buffoon roared at the mic. His very public comment made everyone start hollering and teasing the two of you. Just like that, you went back to square one, an awkward mess.

At one point, Seokjin almost fell off when he gave you a piggyback ride. You thought it was either because you were too tense to even jump properly on his back or you are just plain heavy. You’re not even sure which option is better. The way that you are so conscious around him has never been a problem to you. You have an inkling as to why this is happening but you refuse to say it to yourself.

While you mentally kept cursing yourself, Seokjin was having the same problems. He was too shaky to properly hold you. He too was cursing at himself for acting so muddled around you all of a sudden. This is getting pretty bad. He needed to get a hold of himself fast. By that, he means go back to being a cat and mouse with you. In other words, go back to insulting you. But his inner self is telling him to just let this moment be and to let himself indulge in it. 

Another agonising round later, one pair finally got eliminated. Thankfully for that, Seokjin was only tiptoeing on one foot at this point whilst carrying you. You, on the other hand, had other reasons to be thankful for.

Now, you were down to just three pairs. The semi finals are up next so you really need to get back to your senses. You are so close to achieving the grand prize. Remembering what the next game is, you knew you were monumentally screwed.

The semi finals, as Jimin is explaining, would be a bat doughnut eating contest. Five doughnuts shaped in a bat are individually hung on a string in their clothesline and both pairs would have to stand on either side, eating them all as fast as they could without using their hands. Both pairs are only allowed to work on one doughnut at a time. Now, that’s just on a completely different level of invasion of personal space. But you can’t blame anyone because you came up with half of these games, including this one.

“Let’s quickly push through this one.” Seokjin told you from his side. “We can’t let the others win. Remember, only the first two pairs get in the finals.”

You admire how composed he is right now. Why can’t you be as unaffected as he is? This is for the sake of the grand prize. Do you even want it? If yes, then you badly need to keep your eyes on the prize and nothing else. Definitely not on Seokjin, or on his piercing eyes, or his soft looking lips. NO STOP. Just what on earth is happening to you?

Realising you haven’t given him an answer, you simply nodded. With that, you heard the go signal and all three pairs started devouring the doughnuts. 

They are [word redacted] flavoured. Of course, what did you expect? You try not to gag at that and you also try to avoid accidentally making out with Seokjin while making sure you eat the entire thing at lightning speed. There were way too many things going on at the same time for you to handle. Your brain could not possibly keep up. It’s like your brain and body were being controlled by two separate things.

One doughnut down and you move on to the next one, then the next one, and the next one. “That’s it, keep going!” Seokjin kept on muttering motivating words whenever he could. Again, how could he be so composed at a time like this? Somehow along the way, your brain completely shut down and your body went into autopilot. The two of you fell into an unspoken strategy of having sides so to have some boundaries. The moon spirit knows you badly need that.

Your pair is on the lead when you reach your fourth doughnut. For the first time since this game started, you felt comfortable. Did you stay like that for the entire game? Of course not. Naturally, the universe just loves aggravating you tonight. 

Half way through your fourth doughnut, you accidentally brushed lips with Seokjin. The action was absolutely brief, but it was enough to halt you two and send tingles that you would feel throughout your body down to the tips of your toes. You two stared at each other for a second too long because Luna was announcing Team Rocket to have taken the lead. You two couldn’t care less though. For the third time tonight, all you could focus on is each other. 

Wide eyes filled with something you two are too embarrassed to accept, lips slightly molding into shy smiles, and faces covered with icing and powdered sugar. In that moment, you two seemed to have some sort of self understanding that didn’t need to be said.

The moment didn’t last though. As brief as your little kiss was, you two were back at the game instantaneously. The other pair seemed to have gotten past you two as well. With a new found comfortness, you find yourselves working together without anymore awkwardness. You were back to your old competitive selves. You gobbled up the doughnuts at a jaw dropping speed. All that matters now, is winning especially since Team Rocket is advancing to the finals. The two of you didn’t even bat an eye when your lips would unintentionally touch a couple of times in your haste. You certainly weren’t complaining about it now. As a matter of fact, you felt him linger a few times. So were they really unintentional? We would never know.

You amazingly caught up with the last pair even with a few cheeky antics on the side. The two of you are currently on top of the world and just breezing through. For sure, you would end up beating them. There is no need to worry about anything. 

What sealed the deal was when one person of the remaining pair mildly choked at a particularly large chunk that she had swallowed. You two took that opportunity to finish up your fifth and final doughnut. You swallowed for the last time and cheered for your partner to finish chewing. Everyone else was completely yelling at this point, it was such a euphoric feeling. Once Seokjin finished, you went and engulfed the larger man as best as you could in a bone crushing hug.

You two were all laughs, happily celebrating even if you haven’t won yet. “We are so going to come home with that prize.” You declared with such finality while you break away from the hug. You kept each other very close though.

“Oh yeah? You’re not gonna freak out on me again?” He teased you but you can’t help but just hit him. 

“Only if you keep yourself in check.” You playfully replied. You fell into a comfortable silence, once again staring at each other with shy smiles. His eyes dropped to your lips for a second and you felt compelled to lean in. When he realised what you were allowing him to do, he leaned in too. You were slowly leaning towards each other, taking your sweet time and savoring every second of it. Your lips were pretty much fully touching, you could feel the warmth and softness of his.

“You’re lucky that chick choked up.” James, whatever his real name is, from Team Rocket woefully stepped into your moment. It took every fibre in you to not punch the guy. 

“She’s obviously inexperienced. Couldn’t be me!” Jessie quipped and they both started laughing together. This time, it took every fibre in you to not bash their heads together. But as mentioned before, you are a woman of honour. You are willing to take the higher road and settle this fairly through the games.

Seokjin, well, he is Seokjin so he didn’t let the two slide so easily.

He let go of you and approached the two. He laughed along with them in such a forced and sarcastic laugh that it pained you. “Yeah, you’re right. We are lucky!” He said then squished himself in between the couple and placed his arms around them. What on earth is he on about, now?

“We definitely were just born lucky. But at least we’re not like other people who are only lucky to be born. Right, hotmen?” He said and slapped their arms in a playful manner but ended up being too hard. He left them completely offended, sauntering back to you with his windshield wiper laugh that you know all too well.

"Was that necessary?" You scolded him with both hands on your hips.

"Don't be such a Katara! I know you're dressed as her but please don't take it too seriously. Unless you really do want to be a sugar queen?" He wagged his eyebrows irritatingly. 

You rolled your eyes at his usual foolishness. Glad to know he hasn't gotten fully soft on you. You would prefer for him to stick to his playfulness even if it annoys the crap out of you.

"And then there were two." Jimin starts, grabbing everyone's attention. Yeah just two left and it just had to be with Team Rocket. Oh, it would feel even better to win knowing you were up against them.

You were one step closer from a satisfying free full course meal cooked by Jimin and Luna's parents. Is that heaven or what? In the middle of fantasising and practically drooling about the impending prize, it dawned on you that once you win, (Yes, once and not if) you'd have to go on that dinner with Seokjin. An actual dinner. As in a date???

The thought made you slightly pale. You don't get why the thought of going on a date with him made you all nervous when you were practically stealing kisses from each other just awhile ago. The idea of going serious with him is nerve-wracking when just this evening, you wanted nothing more than to punch his guts. Now, you still do want to punch his guts but also kiss him. 

You needed to snap out of it. All you did tonight is think of this guy. You were probably overthinking things. He probably doesn't even want anything serious with you. Maybe, he's just playing with you. Wait, no. That's too cruel even for him.

Your internal battle was stopped when Seokjin, himself, flicked your forehead.

"Oww! What was that for?" You grumply asked as you rubbed the sore spot.

"Your brain seems to be flying a couple hundred miles away. Y/n, now is not the time to be daydreaming about me. Did you even catch what I said?" Is he a mind reader? Most definitely not but even so, you are too embarrassed to say anything so you quietly hummed to him.

"What do you think? You agree with me?" You absentmindedly hummed again.

He clapped his hands together so loud, it made you jump out of your haze. "Good! That settles it. You're bobbing then." 

"I'm sorry, come again?" You think you misheard him but it sounded like he said you're going bobbing? As in bobbing apples? What?

He stared at your dumbfounded expression. He realised that you weren't listening to the siblings' explanation and you obviously weren't also listening to his plan of attack just a few seconds ago.

He sighed and repeated everything to you even if he didn't want to. "We're bobbing apples for the last game. Since I don't want to ruin my perfectly good scar, you're up for it." 

You scoffed. "And I want to ruin my perfectly good hair and makeup?"

"Hair dries off and without your makeup, you're still Katara. I, on the other hand, would just be some random handsome firebender without my scar. So really, it's better that you do it."

"But I don't want to do it!"

"Well boo hoo for you. You already agreed to it." He said and dragged you towards a large basin near Jimin and Luna.

"Wait, no I wasn't fully aware of the situation!"

"That's what you get for zoning out at a crucial time. It's too late now, you already agreed. A consent is a consent."

He was seriously being mean right now. You pulled your arm back to stop him but he wouldn't let go of you. So you kept your feet planted firmly on the ground. It ended up looking like he was dragging a very stubborn kid. "Y/n quit playing around! You need to do this."

"But Seokjin, I really don't want to do this." Your innocent looking eyes paired with that same whining voice that you used when you didn't make your first shot with the bean bag instantly turned him soft. 

He stopped pulling you and placed a hand on your neck. The way he is genuinely looking at you makes you think that he'll probably switch with you. He didn't. Big shocker.

"Y/n, I know you don't want to do it but you need to." He started using that gentle voice of his that he used on you earlier. You knew you were a goner now. He's definitely found your weakness and he isn't afraid to use it on you. Curse him and his captivating soothing voice. What are you supposed to do now other than obey him?

"I, without a doubt, believe that you can do this. I'm sure you can defeat those two wobbuffets over there and we'd win! Don't you want that?" You nod your head yes.

"So will you please do me the favour of winning this game for us?" You nod your head yes without thinking twice. So much for being a woman of honour.

He smiled at you and caressed his thumb over your cheek. "Good girl." He said and you'll be damned if you're not going to do whatever it takes for him to call you that again. Forget everything. You want him to call you that again.

That is why you find yourself involuntarily walking up to the water and apple filled basin assigned to you. 

"Step aside, filth." Seokjin jokingly muttered at James from Team Rocket. You hear Jimin and Luna giggle but you were too out of it to even appreciate his Zuko reference. 

To your left, Jessie stands in front of her basin. She gives you a sly smirk and winks at you condescendingly. You want to burn your eyeballs. 

You can't believe you're in this position. You can't believe you would willingly let your hair, makeup, and quite possibly even your costume get ruined. Lastly, you can't believe at just how much power Seokjin has had over you in a single night.

You stared hard at the apples. You've only bobbed for apples once when you were nine and it was one of the worst things you've ever done. You weren't even able to successfully capture an apple with how bad you were. Well, you're back more than ten years later and you're back with a newly found determination. Vengeance will be yours.

You hear Luna count down from three.

Seokjin's "Good girl" rang inside your head. No one's letting this magenta haired girl beside you win. You gripped the sides of the basin hard. Alright apples, it's time to face your doom!

"...One and go!" 

Inhaling a sharp breath, you plunge your face inside the deep basin. You tried to keep your eyes open to see the apples but it was proving to be difficult as light was barely passing through the metal basin. Nonetheless, you kept biting around until you reached one apple. You tossed it outside the basin and took another breath, repeating the same actions. 

You don't know how many times you did your little routine. All you know is that this is the longest minute of your life and you just want it to end so much. You were having such a miserable time. Your snot, your saliva, and even your sweat too were mixing with the water. Even though you avoid it so badly, you still manage to drink the water in your haste. Some of it even got inside your nose at one point. Bobbing for apples just might be one of the most disgusting things you could ever do. This must bloody well be worth it in the end.

Everytime you come out of the water, you hear the cheers of the people. You most certainly hear your partner, ear piercingly shrieking your name. It further feeds into your hunger to win. You don't care if you look absolutely ridiculous or that you were probably gonna end up throwing up later. All that matters is to win this for you and Seokjin.

At long last, Jimin blows an air horn to dramatically end the game. You came up gasping and snorting for air. How fucking graceful and beautiful. Seokjin rushes to you with a towel in his hand and wraps it around you right away. He pats you dry, careful to not smudge your very wet makeup. 

Luna began making a speech on how much fun this year's Halloween Olympics were. You didn't pay much attention to her as Seokjin kept murmuring words of affirmation while he was still gently patting you dry. In all honesty, you could've done that yourself. But after what you were just subjected to, you definitely could use a little pampering.

"Again, thank you to everyone who participated in the games. As for the rest, you've been absolutely wonderful, cheering our players. Until next year's Halloween Olympics!" Luna concluded. Well, they did more than cheer, alright.

"And now, let's count the apples these lovely ladies bobbed so we can find out this year's victors!" Jimin continued and everyone counted magenta head's apples with him.

"Twelve apples in total!" Everyone cheered wildly and you felt your heart clench. That's a lot. What if you had less?

"Twelve?? Ha! Suck on that!" James ridiculed.

Seokjin just glared at him and he grabbed hold of one of your hands. He squeezed it tightly as everyone started counting your apples. Oh please be higher than twelve, please be higher than twelve, please be higher than twelve, please, oh please, oh please.

"Eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, and eighteen!"

"A grand total of eighteen apples! Wow that's a lot more! Which means we have this year's victors!" Jimin announced.

Eighteen? You bobbed six more apples than her? Wow, your nine year old self would be proud of you now.

Seokjin couldn't contain himself, he grabbed you by your waist and lifted you up in an embrace. "Y'all hear that? My girl just beat your asses badly! Suck on my poké balls!" He finally cracked and straight up insulted Team Rocket while still holding you up. You ignored the sickly sweet feeling that bubbled inside you when he referred to you as “my girl”.

"You will never rise from the ashes of your shame and humiliation!" Instead of a maniacal laugh, his windshield wiper laugh came out. The punchline was already perfect if only his stupid laugh didn't ruin it. As annoying as it is, you didn’t seem to be complaining about his laugh now in your head unlike always. Actually, it’s kind of endearing in a way. Crazy to think just how much one night can change. You wonder what happens now to the two of you.

Jimin and Luna called the both of you up on their makeshift stage to properly announce your rain of terror- I mean, your victory. Along with that, they are also going to announce the winner for best in costume. With all the action that’s been happening, people have forgotten that the awarding for best in costume is actually the main event of the night.

As Seokjin predicted earlier, you didn’t win. Some guy, Jung something something, dressed up as Shrek won by popular voting. You think he is also a part of Jimin’s friend group. You can’t be too sure as there are too many guys in that circle of friends for you to care. Which leads you to believe that maybe Jimin did some rigging of the results because his Shrek costume kinda deserves to be kicked out of the swamp. Not that you care though. As far as you’re concerned, you already won the grand prize as well.

“Told ya, you wouldn’t win best costume.” Seokjin says as you leave the stage. 

“Neither did you. All because your scar is definitely on the wrong side.” 

He groaned loudly. “You’re never gonna drop that, aren’t you?”

You laugh, thinking just how stupid he is for messing up his scar. For someone who seems to be able to quote directly from the show with ease, it’s really funny that he would overlook such a crucial detail. 

“Neverrr!” You said in a singsong voice.

“Whatever.” He said while waving his hand in a dismissing manner. “It’s not like anyone else noticed it. I guess you were paying too much attention to my face, huh?”

You blushed at his remark. “Jeez, get over yourself, will you?” 

You rushed your steps towards the house to leave him. You are sure Jimin and Luna are now tearing it down on the dance floor. He easily caught up with you though with those long legs of his and draped an arm over your shoulders.

Cackling at your flusteredness, he said, “Okay, then! So let’s say you weren’t gawking at me the entire time for you to notice my mistake.”

You hummed at him.

“Then I guess the only explanation why people seem to have failed to notice is because of my handsome face! They are too distracted by my beauty to notice my misplaced scar. Don’t you agree?” You elbowed him hard and left his yelping, laughing ass. What a weirdo. You giddily smiled though.

The rest of the night went by pretty fast. It was filled with dancing and laughing with people you know and don’t know. You even got to hang out a little bit with Team Rocket. You wouldn’t say you’d become friends with them but they aren’t all that bad. 

The only missing thing though is that you didn’t share any more “personal” moments with Seokjin. He disappeared off with his group of friends after you left him. Not that you were fully expecting anything to happen, but you were slightly disappointed. Luna was quite chill about it at the start. She was probably wanting to discuss it in private. You know, for your own sake. But as she got tipsier and tipsier until she was full on drunk, she was practically squealing about it every few seconds. Hence, why you decided to socialise with other people which you would never do. Honestly, what is going on tonight and who are you even?

After the party, you remained to clean up. But Jimin told you that none of you would have to deal with the mess right now. He understands that everyone is completely knackered at this point. There were still a few people left but he ushered you to go home now. He assured you that he could deal with them and his hammered sister. 

With that, you said thanks and hugged each other goodbye. 

Walking out of their house, you thought back to earlier when you were thoroughly convinced to stay at home. You wonder how things would be if you had stayed. You would have totally missed out on so much! But you also wonder what would happen now. It seemed like Seokjin was unmistakably giving you the vibes that he likes you. You were too. So why did he suddenly vanish?

“You want me to walk you home?” A very familiar voice said from behind you. Ah, speak of the devil.

You faced him and smiled a little too big of a smile. “You live in the complete opposite direction. What are you talking about?”

He chuckled and made his way to you. “I was just thinking, what kind of gentleman would I be if I let you walk home all by yourself at 2 in the morning?”

He stopped a few feet in front of you. You find yourself a bit irritated with the distance between you two. You wanted to be a bit closer than that so you made the move to get nearer to him. “I think I can handle myself pretty well.” You said as you approached him until you were inches away from him.

“Oh, I’m sure you can.” 

There was a brief moment of silence that fell between you. It wasn’t at all awkward or anything unpleasant. Actually, it was the complete opposite. You were just drinking everything in.

“Surprisingly, I had heaps of fun tonight. I never thought I would ever say that in the company of Kim Seokjin.” You said in a hush tone. You don’t know why you were speaking in such a way. The entire moment just seemed too delicate.

“I told you, you need to put a little faith in me, sugar queen.” He whispered. You smile at the term of endearment he had given you tonight due to your Katara outfit.

“I think I already have.” You said and his face started inching down towards yours.

Just the mere thought of finally getting to properly kiss him released thousands of butterflies in your stomach. You wanted to rush him to finally feel his lips but at the same time, you wanted to drag this moment as long as you possibly can. If someone told you this morning that you would be having these thoughts as you were about to kiss Kim Seokjin tonight,you’d laugh at their face. You’d probably also tell them that you’d rather slam your tongue in a car door.

He took his time with you, also wanting to milk every second of this moment. There was no need to rush anything. He was literally ghosting his lips against yours. He was probably teasing you. It annoyed you so much. So much so that you made the executive decision to take full control of the situation. You made the move to press your lips against his but before you could, someone walked out of the house and started yelling towards you two.

“SEOKJIN HYUUUUUNG!” A guy dressed up as Snoopy literally yeeted himself between you two and placed an arm around him. What is everyone’s deal with interrupting you two? At this point, it’s like the universe is telling you a sign or something. Wait, what?

You frown at the thought you just had. It’s a stupid thought. But then why are you having this sinking feeling inside you?

“Hoseok, for the last time, I’m walking home. I live just two blocks away. I don’t have a car to drive you home.” He told the guy, obviously exasperated just like you.

Hoseok started whining and arguing at the older guy. It’s clear that he was dead drunk. You wouldn’t try to argue with him right now. Seems pointless since everything will fly over his head.

“But why walk when you can drive???”

“Hoseok-ah! You’re really gonna ask Seokjin hyung to get you home when I’m here?” Another guy came out of the house. You turned to the voice and saw Yoongi approaching, dressed up as Garfield. You’re friends with him because he seemed to be the closest to Seokjin so you see him more often than not.

Hoseok immediately let go of Seokjin and went to hold on to Yoongi. Yoongi seemed to be in a rush to get home. Can’t blame him. It’s really late and it’s been a long night. So he said goodbye right away. But before they could leave, he turned to you.

“Before I forget, by the way, Taehyung wanted me to tell you to call him. He said you haven’t been replying to him all night. I think he wants to take you out later.” He made a fast but pointed stare towards Seokjin when he said the last part. It seemed like his way of telling him to do something about it. You didn’t notice though.

“Oh, okay. Thanks Yoongi. Good night and drive safely!” 

With that, the two went off.

Another silence fell between you two. This time though, it wasn’t as comfortable. You didn’t know whether to continue off from where you got interrupted and how to continue. The both of you looked like you were in deep thought. 

Taehyung. You completely forgot about him. Now, you feel really bad and shameful.

You notice Seokjin pulling something from his trousers that appeared to be two small envelopes. That’s probably your prize. 

He held them both and looked at them for a few seconds. “I want to ask you something.” He started, not looking you in the eyes. He’s nervous. Is he going to ask you on a date? Well, that just made you nervous. 

“Yeah?” 

He didn’t say anything for a while. You watch him clearly having some sort of argument with himself. It felt like an eternity when he finally looked you directly in your eyes.

“Y/n, I want to-” Once again, he got cut off. Maybe the universe really is saying something here.

Your phone started ringing. It was Taehyung, calling you. 

“I...You should answer that.” He instructed you. You should. But you didn’t make the move to. Your eyes switched back and forth from your phone to Seokjin a couple times. You were completely torn and didn’t know what to do. 

You were just going to answer his call. What’s the big deal about that? It’s not like he knew everything that happened and was supposed to happen between you and Seokjin. It’s not like he was going to chastise you for all of that.

Before you pressed the answer button, the call dropped and you became tense. 

Seokjin sensed your inner turmoil. He didn’t like seeing you like this. But he thought that this was becoming too much to handle right now. He looks at the envelopes he is holding. Sighing, he can’t believe he is about to do this.

He reached out both envelopes towards you. “Here, take them both.”

“What? Why?”

“Take Taehyung with you.” You could not believe what you were hearing right now. To say you were dumbfounded is an understatement.

Seeing as you made no move to get them, he took your free hand and placed the envelopes in your grasp.

“Listen, it’s bad enough that Taehyung didn’t get to enjoy the night. I think it’s only fair if he went with you.” 

“But you worked hard for this too. It was a team effort between us.” You told him, still not understanding why he would give up the prize just like that when he was so adamant to win them the entire night.

“I know. But it’s fine, really. Don’t worry, I could always find a way to get free food from Jimin. Besides, you deserve to spend some time with your Aang.”

You still didn’t fully understand the situation at hand. But it appears that he is not going to let you go until you accept the prize from him.

You finally conceded and pocketed the envelopes.

“It’s getting late. We should really go home. It’s been one hell of a tiring night.” You nodded at his statement. 

“Thanks for being an amazing partner tonight, Y/n. I genuinely enjoyed every single moment of it.”

“Me too, Seokjin. Me too.”

You wanted to hug him. But he didn’t make any other move. He was clearly just waiting for you to leave. You thought, maybe this isn’t the right time with him. With all the interruptions and should haves tonight, it’s most likely for the best to leave things here.

With a heavy heart, you gave him one final look and said goodbye. With an equally heavy heart, he watched you leave and disappear down the street.

“What the fuck was that all about?” Jimin’s sudden appearance from the front door made Seokjin jump.

“Yah! Couldn’t you have been a bit more careful?” He asked the younger boy while placing a hand over his chest to calm himself down.

Jimin paid no attention whatsoever to his agony. “You deserve to spend some time with your Aang.” He mocked Seokjin. “What on earth were you thinking?”

“I don’t want to- hang on. You were listening to our conversation???” Seokjin felt violated. Does this boy not know the meaning of privacy? First he kept interrupting you two all night then now he eavesdrops on your conversation and has the audacity to mock Seokjin.

Jimin did not feel nor look like he regretted what he had done. If anything, he looks really mad at Seokjin. “That’s besides the point. The point is, why are you just letting her go? You already had her!” 

“No, I don’t think I ever had her to begin with. I mean, come on! She went dressed up as Katara and I’m dressed as Zuko. I think it was never meant to be.”

Feeling utterly frustrated, Jimin rubbed his face harshly. He had half the mind to take off his boots and impale his older best friend with them.

“That’s just bullshit! You’re too superstitious. You don’t listen to these signs! You take matters to your own hands.”

Seokjin knew that Jimin wouldn’t understand his point of view. He’s the type of person to chase anything and everything if he so pleases it. Which fair play to him, isn’t a bad thing. But that’s not how Seokjin rolls.

“Listen, you won’t understand me.” Seokjin started and Jimin openly agreed with him. “All I’m saying is if it’s not your time, then it’s not your time. You need to accept that and patiently wait. I did what I had to do tonight.”

Jimin did not respond to him. Truthfully, he does get what Seokjin is trying to explain. He does not agree with it at all though and still thinks it’s bullshit. But he can’t really do anything other than to support his stupid best friends and to let them learn things on their own. When that happens, he’ll for sure throw another party.

“Wow. Just wow. That’s rough, buddy.” Is all he can reply to Seokjin. 

Indeed it was.

[ravenbarley-barn]

okay going off ur dragons, do they have like human forms or are they just dragons? also what's the magic system like I'm a slut for magic mechanics dkfjjfj

just dragons!! I have a human au but that's about it, I want more media about dragons without humans so I had to make my own lol. And the magic system!! I don't think it's that complex, but maybe it's because I'm just use to it lol. either way, here we go! Far in the past, dragons were magicless. One of the two gods at the time decided that having elemental powers would be good for them, but in order for that to happen they had to make an elemental pantheon of gods, and they had to go into what is suppose to be an eternal slumber. So they did, and the new gods were born! And more of those fuckers kept just showing up because the world was suddenly very full of magic which decided to make more and more dragon gods. But back to mortal magic! Their divided into several groups which determine the... species? Of a dragon, idk if this is the right word. They call them different things but the elements are basically Fire, Water, Earth, Plants, Ice, Light, and Dark. Dragons are born with a level of magical ability based on a mix of their parents' power and luck, though how much each affects this seems to fluctuate as some children have vastly different power levels then their parents. Hybrids also exist, and they have a mix of their parents' magic types, though their generally never as powerful as a dragon of one singular element, and so far no hybrids have even been a true master of one element (said masters are currently called Wardens). Hypothetically, a dragon with every elemental type could exist, but they'd very much be a jack of all trades, master of none. Magic also takes something to give of course, and that give is energy, the general rule is the more powerful/larger something is, the more energy it takes based on things like age, skill, and general magic ability. Magic is also used in reproduction because my ace ass wanted to just,,, have a world without sex lmao. They use to reproduce like how real world animals generally do, but they discovered they could also make eggs by two dragons combining their magic to usually form one or maybe two. And while these were much smaller than natural born clutches of eggs, the children were more magically strong and were more likely to survive to adulthood. Eventually, everyone started reproducing that way and their reproductive organs just sorta,,, devolved. Realistically this would take a long time and maybe it did idk the exact timeline of this but maybe magic made it go faster idk. Paragraph break time! And some stuff that's not quite set in stone yet. Neutral magic is an idea I have to explain the two gods that don't have elements and for stuff that, like, probably shouldn't have an element? Like healing magic, it was originally assigned to Plant dragons but idk, don't like that anymore. I'm also not quite sure about the element types either because this use to be a wings of fire fan idea that quickly changed and became whatever this is now. The problem is I have no idea what to change it to so it's like this for now, and it might stay that way unless I think of something else. Wardens are also something I want to flesh out and fully figure out because their part elemental masters, part religious group who communes with the gods? And honestly I'm not sure how big they really are but they feel like they might be to big? So maybe not everyone is a master, but they have Initiates, Keepers[?], and then Wardens? But yeah this was a big ass infodump and ramble but I hope you enjoy! Love you fatal <3

[purekesseltrash]

Okay referring to one of your reblogs here’s my favorite lines from BTD ‘cause it was one of my favorite fanfics of all time (I’m serious)

Non-serious one, : “The scarring was still awful though, he was never going to be able to get past that. But not actively breaking out… that was a good step.” GOD OKAY, I’ve struggled and am still struggling with acne for years now, and that just.. hit home man, the days where your not getting NEW acne and just the old ones you just couldn’t hack being the most prominent make or break your day

Serious one, : “Mezou’s body was a collection of tools that had somehow never seems adequate or correct, despite having been honed for a singular purpose since he had been little.” AHHHHHHHH, this line fucked me up, once again I’m mentioning my background with gymnastics, in gymnastics your body is all you have, sure you have equipment to land on but judges and coaches focus on your body and how it looks, and as someone who had horrendous lack of self esteem being put into a spandex leotard and having to have someone purposely look at you and critique you broke me, sure gymnastics was my passion but it broke me, so safe to say, you struck gold with that one. I’m pretty sure I blocked out all of gymnastics until I was age twelve when I rejoined cause I legit only have two memories of it, and one of the m was when I was refusing to go, so, yea, being good at sports when your young fucks you up, I missed this, sending you a big fucking ask revolving around BTD

Precious worm assssssssssssk! I have missed these too, lol. Ngl, I've been rereading this all day.

I actually never had awful acne, I just have TURRIBAD executive dysfunction so washing my face didn't happen for a long time until I started hyperfocusing on skincare stuff. So it was not great but my own fault. When I was deep in my skincare fixation though, I definitely would have days where the way that my skin looked could make or break me. Which frankly is likely not healthy buuuut it was what it was.

I thought for a LONG time about what I wanted to do with Shouji’s face to make him hate it. I thought about him having had an accident but Bury Them Deep is supposed to feel pretty real and down to earth. Plus I've had so many friends with super bad cystic acne that have reeeeally struggled with their self image because of it, so it felt right. I only thought to make his teeth bad later on and I wish I'd thought of it sooner as I could have worked it in sooner. I've actually based a decent amount of stuff from his upbringing from my partner's and braces were very much so not going to be in the picture for him. It's legit though how much something as simple as bad teeth can make you feel like an outcast.

Brooooo, I'm so glad it connected with you like that! That paragraph is legit one of my favorites in the fic because it really nails the 'nothing in my life feels like it belongs to me, even my body' mood that I was going for. I did get a part of that line from Ken Dryden's book, The Game. In it he describes his body as a collection of parts and it just SLAMMED into my brain when I was relistening to the audio book. I also like it because it feels like a way to tie in the canon aspects of Shouji and 'a collection of tools' is a very good way to describe his quirk. I added in other stuff as a reference to his quirk too, like his intense appetite, how he noticed really fine details and how he heard the car coming up at the car party.

You honestly might like reading 'The Game'. Ken talks a LOT about having been A Unique Talent at a young age and what it ended up meaning for him. He specifically talks alot about how he never really felt like he was apart of anything because he was always the youngest and always the best and how he never really sought that out, it just kinda... happened. He's an extremely good writer and was an incredible hockey player. I had to bring him up in the fic.

I did also want to talk about how we treat prodigies in the fic because yeah man, what you describe is disturbingly common. I've read a lot about the lives of early generational talents and it's fucking brutal how much pressure is being put on kids at such an early age. Sidney Crosby, for instance, would legit have parents scream at him in games from the stands.... in games where he was ten years old and already playing with kids that were bigger, faster and stronger than him. He full on had things thrown at him, like pop and food. And he never really got time off, it was just hockey hockey hockey all the time. I'm sure that he would say that it was worth it but as a society, we have a nasty habit of holding up children that have been made to make horrible sacrifices and we go, 'this is the pinnacle of what we can achieve'.

No. It isn't. It's sad but people's egos and dreams get in the way when they start to put that on children. Man, Hizashi’s little speech must have been a lot for you.

(Also if this is too personal and you want me to delete, I will. <3. I miss your worm asks you are ALWAYS welcome to send them)

[poptod]

hi! can i request an ahk x reader fic where reader was an air force pilot for some time and they and ahk exchange war stories? not to glorify war or anything but i’m interested to see how that would play out. thanks!

notes: hey! sorry that this might be a  bit late, i was spending the day with my friend and had to write the bulk of it before 11.30 and i woke up at 9. sorry I kind of strayed from the prompt, but i hope you like it anyway

WC: 1.5k

+

He hadn't ever considered himself a survivor of a war. Fighting and death came so natural to him, and to many of the people from his time – simply put, it was as unavoidable as death, and would live for just as long. That being said, your logic did make sense; he was still a participant in a war, no matter how small it was.

"Did you stay to fight?" You asked in your soft, low voice. Every now and then he wondered if that's what you sounded like when you were alive.

"I was fifteen at the time, so no," he said with a chuckle, earning naught but a bittersweet smile. "In later years I did, though. My brother and I had rule over our own separate battalions. When it came time for us to make our move against the Nubians, I couldn't do it. I tried to hurt someone, but it's hard when you see their face, and you think of their mothers."

"War has changed a lot since then," you hummed, nodding thoughtlessly along to his story. "I didn't see a single person's face."

"How?"

"Remember Amelia?"

"Oh, yes," he said, recalling her flying contraption.

"You drop bombs from there that explode with fire, and depending on the size, a single bomb could kill thousands," you said as your voice once more turned soft, memories playing out behind your eyes.

It was true that Ahk had trouble picturing modern warfare. The methods that lasted eons were still imprinted in his mind, and as hard as he tried to imagine it, he still had difficulty. Planes that crowded the sky. Tanks that rolled over hills and mountains. Deep trenches and gunpowder. Chemicals and bombs. You thought to show him a movie – something more modern, not from your time, where the special effects would be better and the picture clearer. The first time you suggested it he turned you down, but perhaps he'd changed his mind.

"I could show you one of those movies," you said, watching his expression carefully for any sign of distaste. He showed nothing – blank eyes staring at the floor as he pondered on the state of the world, and the state of you.

"I'd rather spend my time talking to you, honestly," he finally said, a deep sigh following his words, "but does it ever bother you? How many people you may have.. hurt..?"

"I try not to think about it," you mumbled as you stared down at your fidgeting fingers.

"I don't blame you."

You never talked much. Not about yourself, or others, or the time period you came from. While you weren't a reanimated corpse like Ahk, you retained all the memories from a life you lived a couple decades ago. In life your name was (Y/N), but in the museums, most people referred to you as Screwdriver.

Your presence in the museum of natural history was not one that was actually supposed to happen. Actually, you belonged in the aviators museum, where planes hung on hooks, and wax statues and cardboard cutouts waved empty hellos to museum-goers. Due to some error not on your behalf, you were kept in the archives far below the earth's surface. Ahk had found you there one day, looking for silence amongst the many boxes, and not realizing that carrying the tablet with him everywhere was causing everything to come to life, and thus eliminating his hopes of quiet solitude. You were the most human there, so he sat down and talked to you.

For the first couple weeks no one knew you existed, but Ahk soon introduced you to the others. Despite your reluctance you agreed, offering firm handshakes and curt introductions to those gathered, and giving nothing more than your name. He didn't really expect you to talk to many others, and you didn't – your relations with other living people remained quarantined to him, to his word, and to his stories.

The two of you talked every night but for some reason, he knew very little about you. Just that you flew a plane – that thoughts of your sins were avoided, and that you were protective of free ideas and people. What a wonderful friend you were; always listening well, always there for him. Still, he did wish you would open up a little more, but he didn't hold his breath for it. You were still quite solitary, and he doubted he'd ever learn what exactly you did during the Vietnam war.

On a late winter evening he tucked his tablet underneath his arm, unlatching the door to the basement and wandering down the steps as music pounded from above. As he moved slowly along, boxes of exhibits and statues began to come to life, a few of them beating fists against the wood keeping them in place. He paid them little mind, if any at all, and continued his search for you, in the farthest corner of the first basement floor.

Rarely did he ever come here. Most of the time he took a few steps away from the staircase and you were already there, waiting for him. This time, however, you might've gotten stuck in your box, or perhaps were facing some annoying exhibit whose nature wouldn't let you pass. Nonetheless, he made it his short mission to help you.

Once he reached the box with your name painted onto the side, he halted, the sight of a posterboard catching his eye. According to you, you were the only part of your exhibit – that's what you told him, but the image of your face was on the poster, accompanied by several paragraphs of information. He looked to your little coffin, wondering if he could afford to leave you in there long enough to read it.

Nick had been teaching Ahk how to read English for a little while now, and it came time to put those lessons to the test. Finally, he could learn about you.

(L/N) was a decorated war hero who went into hiding soon after their tour duty ended. They never told anyone why, but it is generally assumed that it had something to do with the greatest feat of power they exercised: leading the Rolling Thunder operation. It is also possible that the adverse reaction of the public towards the Vietnam War drove (L/N) into hiding, like many soldiers from the time.

The tactics and morality of the operation has been critiqued harshly, but there's no denying the effect it had on both the war and the people of Vietnam and America alike. The CIA privately estimated that damage inflicted in the north totaled $500 million in total damage. They also estimated that by April 1967, 52,000 casualties including 21,000 deaths had occurred as a result of the operation. The CIA estimated that 75 percent of casualties were involved in military or quasi military operations including civilians working on military and logistical operations.

There is only one existing interview with (L/N), occurring several months before they went into hiding.

"You don't see very much, from up there," they recounted. "All you see is the damage of property. You don't see the kids. You don't see the blood. You don't see the abandoned cribs and you can't see the shattered windows. I think that's the part that really gets me – I'm not proud of what I did. I don't think I ever will be, which is how it should be. What we did was an crime against human nature and I wish it never happened at all. If I had to do it again I'd desert."

"Ahk? Are you out there?" You asked, knocking on the wood door.

The noise brought him out of his imagination, picturing you in a cushioned chair, talking to some journalist. He left the posterboard and undid the latch, helping you out of the wooden case.

"(Y/N)," he said softly, his hand still holding yours. You looked him up and down, a confused and suspicious look in your eye. "I... I read about the, um, Rolling Thunder operation."

Your eyes widened and you stopped breathing.

"... oh."

"It doesn't make me think any less of you," he murmured, cupping your cheek to hold reluctant eye contact with you. His touch was a welcome one, warm and soft, like everything you loved about the Pharaoh.

"I wish I was more like you," you said in a broken, cracking voice, trying to swallow down the lump in your throat. "You at least had the morality to stop before it started. I didn't even stop in the middle of it."

"That's because I could afford to. I didn't face any consequences, but you would've, and I know you regret what you did," he assured you, brushing away the couple tears that made their way down your flushed cheek.

"I can't use 'following orders' as an excuse. Atrocities against humanity have been excused with that."

"You can't carry guilt with you forever," he said softly.

"I can deal with it, on my own time," you mumbled, leaning into the warmth of his hand. "Just... don't tell anyone. I'll do it when I'm ready."

"Of course."

[simonalkenmayeris-still-dead]

CC2 - Parallel Evolution

OR did I just read two chapters of infodump?

I’m sure there are writers here, and any writer will tell you, you need to lead with a hook.  And to be sure, a people eating monster is a good hook, but I don’t think we need two chapters dedicated to it.  I don’t think we needed even one chapter dedicated to it.  

Tell us you eat people, then move on.

However, in a controversial choice, Simon has decided chapter two should be just a little more introduction.

Since we know how much he hates vampires, I decided to compare the length of his introduction to the length of Bella’s introduction in Twilight.  Unfortunately, I couldn’t find my copy of Twilight, so I had to go with the next best thing.  50 Shades.

50 Shades opens with Ana looking at herself in the mirror because she needs to describe herself for us.  Very similar to The Creature’s Cookbook already, opening with a description of the protagonist.

The introduction to Ana is only two paragraphs long.  In it we learn what Ana looks like, that sleeping with her hair wet makes it impossible to deal with in the morning (this is integrated characterisation, even EL James can do it), that she’s at university with exams to cram for, and she’s about to go interview Christian Grey.  And that her flatmate Kate persuaded her to do the interview because she’s sick.

Simon takes two chapters to tell us he’s a monster who eats people, and he’s a hoarder.

Let’s see what he has to say.

Parallel evolution (No, not convergent evolution. That’s another topic) is a scientific term: two species that are seemingly, but not actually related, growing alongside one another.

Here’s a tip, don’t tell us what you googled to remember the phrase you’re looking for.  You might have got convergent and parallel evolution mixed up, but not everyone does, so don’t mention convergent evolution!  

This part of the book is kinda hard to talk about, because there’s honestly nothing happening.  It’s just Simon lecturing at you, and often lecturing inaccurately.  The part when he gets race and species mixed up is honestly a yikes moment.  Saying we never know our genetic makeup, yet call everyone human is an amazing failure of logic from a character who claims to excel at it.

We are your only predator, so when you thrive, we feast. We have always been an adversary to you, and thus, we evolved to be unobserved

I don’t really know that much about apex predators, except that they’re supposed to prevent complete destruction of an ecosystem by animals lower down the food chain.  So if the Cousins are an apex predator, they’re not doing well at it, since humans are basically ravaging the earth (that would actually have been a good premise for this story, though).

I also object to framing biological processes as adversarial. Biological processes have no agenda.

When I opened my eyes for the first time, it was to stand up from a sticky pool of blood and gaze about in recognition.

This chapter is all over the place, and I found it hard to read because of this.  I actually tried to get through it three times yesterday.  For example, this little flashback implies that maybe the story is about to start, but oh no! It’s actually just another prompt for Simon to talk about how he’s different from us.

I didn’t need to read 14 pages of this (including the previous chapter).  It’s too much.  It’s why I’ve always said I don’t want to subject myself to reading this book.

And the majority of this is stuff that the author should be able to integrate elsewhere in the narrative.  Or if they can’t, it doesn’t need to be there.

Just as an example, I’m doing some worldbuilding right now.  I have a folder on my computer with a bunch of documents in it.  I know most of those ideas won’t be explicit in the final work.  But that’s okay, because it’s like the foundation of a building.  Even if you don’t see it, it’s a good idea to have one.

And just looking over this chapter, it really hits like the author wrote it because they feel the need to justify Simon’s – the character’s – actions.

Nine times out of ten, I take a solitary man who often carries a weapon or is under the influence, but I do not discriminate. I have hunted women. I have even captured a teenage boy hitchhiking away from a juvenile record and an outstanding warrant.

Maybe I’m biased but following up “I do not discriminate” with how you usually target people who are largely considered the dregs of society seems like you’re trying to make a point to me.

It is really quite remarkable considering the lengths a man used to go to to have his one knife sharpened at a whetstone.

The person writing Simon really has some remarkable ideas of what life has been like throughout history.

I invested very carefully, in what we now call utilities and viable nascent technologies and simply did not budge. Like Xerox, Apple, Google.

Okay here’s the problem I have with this.  Apple was unsuccessful for years.  Even if you invested in it, you probably wouldn’t want to keep that investment - unless you were Agnes Nutter’s descendant. 

When I was a kid, Apple computers were what schools had because they were cheap.  

Apple didn’t become a prestigious brand until like, the 2000s or something. IBM, meanwhile, were super successful.  And if you can’t give up on Steve Jobs, he owned Pixar, which was already successful in the mid 90s.

This chapter just irritates me, but I’ve managed to keep this breakdown down to just over 2 pages this time, which I think is a win for us all.

[orbitariums]

the man out of time | steve rogers

first ask anon asked: Omg requests are open ☺️. Time Traveler reader meets Steve in the 40s. Steve and her hit it off but she skips around time and just doesn't want to stay, even though she really likes Steve. She goes back to modern time and bumps into Steve again. They are both super confused so they talk to each other again, they still like each other and he ends up learning of her powers and it all makes sense. Sorry for the long paragraph hehe. Hope you are well! 💌 -first ask anon

note: i was sooo fucking excited to write this it just took me a little while!!! of course this request would be your lovely idea first ask anon!! this might not be historically accurate but it is what it is. it's cute n fluffy n funny i hope y'all enjoy :)))

also here’s a playlist i made for it!!! click here ♡ 

the man out of time | steve rogers + reader

         You were really just trying to go back a few years. But your time travel powers worked a little too well. Like, you were fully in another decade - your existence hadn't even been a thought at this point in time. And yet, here you were, decked out in a rockabilly swing dress that you didn't even own. Apparently with time traveling came the plus of looking culturally relevant. Never mind the fact that you didn't know where you were, and didn't know anybody here. At the very least, you knew how to get back. But it would be too dangerous to try going back to the present until a few hours had passed.

    So for those few hours, you would be here - in this crowded dance hall, where many were gathered for some type of party. It seemed to be an important party though, because there were lots of people in uniform walking around and many important looking women and men. You remembered that you were, of course, in the 40s, during World War II. Did this mean you were a part of history? Shivers ran down your spine at the thought.

    You were leaning against the wall just observing your surroundings, taking it all in. Even if you hadn't meant to get here, that didn't make it any less interesting. A bit stressful? Yes. But your thirst for knowledge, which got you labeled "mad scientist" in your hometown (though really you were just a bookish girl with an insatiable need to know and learn more), overran all your nervous thoughts.

They could only hold you back. You wanted to know so much - to ask questions, socialize, even explore. But you decided that just watching was your best option. You didn't want to cause a glitch in the matrix by talking to someone and running the risk of changing the outcome of history as we know it.

     So you were minding your business, leaning against the wall with your foot settled on the wall behind you, gazing around the room. Gazing at history. For years you had only seen this era in black and white, now it was fully blooming in color. It was such a marvel to see.

    A deep voice caught you off guard as a man sidled up next to you,

    "Parties aren't your scene either, huh?"

     Naturally, you responded, because that was your first instinct, forgetting that you weren't supposed to talk to anyone. Still gently gazing out at the crowd of people in front of you, you responded, a distracted smile on your red painted lips,

    "You could say that."

You turned to face the man, about to excuse yourself just so you could refrain from talking to him (because again, "possible glitch in the matrix!" your brain screamed at you). And as you turned to face him, it was like his body appeared before his face. He was huge, hulkish, even, almost unnaturally so. His shirt buttons were nearly popping off, and your eyes were doing the same. But his body couldn't possibly be any comparison to his face, his existence.

You doubled back, having to refrain the potential wild reaction of throwing your hand over your lips. Still, you ogled at him in surprise and shock.

    Earlier you had suspected that this party was for important people, but what you were seeing now wasn't near anything you could expect. Because standing in front of you now was the Captain America. As in Steve Grant Rogers, the man out of time.

    Your heart was racing, and your brain had to take a few steps just to catch up with your body's reaction. Here Steve Rogers was in the flesh, someone you couldn't even imagine speaking to as regularly as this in the present. Someone you could only dream of seeing. And knowing that you were talking to Captain America had you realizing that you were genuinely a part of history. That now, whatever the word "now" meant, you existed in some little compartment in Steve Rogers' huge, not yet frozen, brain.

Was this something that should've worried you? Yes, and it did. You didn't even want to talk to a regular person, now imagine all the things that could happen with you talking to Captain America. A quick calculation in your fast running brain told you that there were endless possibilities, and not all of them were good.

     But your shock and intrigue clouded your better judgment, and you were standing in front of him with nothing better to say or do, just stammering.

     "Cap-Captain," you breathed out hard, nearly gasping for air. You could only imagine how stupid you must look. You suddenly wondered if your reaction made you look out of place. Then you wondered how out of place you looked to begin with, and suddenly it became a bit hotter, and the collar of your dress felt suffocating and tight. "Captain, Steve. Captain America."

    You swallowed hard, and felt your eyes travel down to his nametag bearing the title "Cpt. Rogers." As if he needed one, you almost scoffed. You were somewhere between being incredibly scared and going full on geeky fangirl. You wouldn't call yourself a stan of the present day Captain America, but it was still pretty damn cool to see him, and your naturally nerdy disposition had you fascinated with the fact that you even got this chance.

     Steve raised his brows, but had a smile on his face.

   "That's me. It's nice to meet you," he put out his hand for you to shake and you took it, your entire body nearly trembling with some electric shock when you felt his strong hand grasp yours in a warm, friendly handshake.

    "I'm... shaking your hand. Wow. This is fu-" you cut yourself off, remembering who you were talking to and the conservative nature of the time period you were in, clearing your throat. You also realized that beyond profanity, there was no way in hell you could talk how you normally would in modern times. You'd be found out, or throw everyone off. You continued, "This is amazing. I... really, I can't believe it. It's an honor to meet you."

    Glancing around the room, you started to notice that there were signs indicating that this gathering was essentially, a celebration of Steve and the other soldiers. For all your smarts, you had definitely missed a huge clue of where you were.

    Steve liked you already. You were a breath of fresh air. Lots of people acted over-excited to see him, but it was different with you. It was genuine, thrilling, and kind of cute. There was something about you. It wasn't off, per say, but it was almost strange, in a good way. Like you were walking around with a completely different air around you, like you didn't fit in, but somehow it worked. He just couldn't put his finger on it.

     "Well, thank you," Steve nodded, and he glanced down at your hands, still melded together.

But it seemed you were the one who wasn't letting go, squeezing hard. He raised his brows, then looked up at your face, which gave away all he needed to know. You were transfixed, studying him, and too in it to bring yourself back to earth. All these things, though, he greeted with a warm smile and a warm heart.

    You realized that you were gawking, and that you were squeezing his hand far too tight, as if you were the one with enhanced strength. You laughed nervously and dropped his hand, running your own against your forehead.

     "My apologies," you murmured.

     "All the same. Where are my manners, I haven't even asked you your name yet," he grinned, and you really tried quite hard not to get lost in the depth of those blue eyes, so charming and naturally friendly. But you couldn't help yourself, your eyes darting between his and blinking fast, twitterpated.

    Seeing him up close really put things in perspective. He was handsome, he was Captain America, and he had talked to you for no real reason. You were now determined to find out why he came up to you before the end of the night. Then you would go back.

    "I'm... Y/N."

    "Y/N. It's nice to meet you, Y/N," Steve nodded, and you felt your cheeks go warm with blush.

You felt stupid and girlish, blushing to death in front of this hunk of a man, knowing he probably got this all the time. You pushed hair behind your ear, your eyes gazing down at the floor,

    "So... how- how are things?"

You were well aware of how awkward you sounded, hyper-aware, even. But Steve found it endearing, and he liked talking to you.

    "Things?" he repeated, lightly poking a bit of fun at you.

You chuckled to yourself and looked up at him, a small smirk of a smile on your face. You worked up the nerve to make eye contact with him rather than have your eyes flicker all over the place, and you let out a hefty breath through your nostrils.

    "Like, life. Is what I meant," you shook your head playfully, poking fun at yourself, and Steve grinned, laughing quietly.

    "I know, I'm just teasing you. That is a heavy question, though."

     "Really?" you were intrigued - the part of your brain that ran nonstop wanted to know more. "How so?"

Steve shrugged,

      "I guess no one really asks me that. Not these days."

       You snorted,

     "I can imagine it's a lot of bullshit and work all the time."

You only realized what came out of your mouth when you caught sight of Steve's face. He was a mixture of shocked, offended, and honestly? Fascinated. It didn't take your swearing for him to realize that there was something wonderfully different about you, but hearing such language just confirmed his thoughts further. And he appreciated your brutal honesty and ability to resonate with him, even if it came with language. And surprisingly, it didn't make him recoil, it pulled him in.

    "Wow," Steve dragged out the word - it was all he could see, and looked at you with an impressed smile.

     You bit down on your lip,

    "Woops."

    "You know... we should probably be dancing," Steve joked, and you shook your head playfully, but also frantically. There was no way you'd be able to keep up with this kind of dance, and you were not going to be the girl who everyone could see Steve Rogers dancing with.

"Oh no," you waved your hand warily. "I couldn't possibly. I'm— I'm a terrible dancer. Sorry."

"That was a joke. I'm not too good myself," Steve chuckled, and for a moment you were each just laughing, looking at each other, gazing into each other's eyes as if you were the only two at the event. As if Steve didn't have probably a million responsibilities just within this night. He was enjoying your presence a lot for someone he'd just met.

You folded your arms, bouncing gently on the balls of your feet and swaying back and forth,

"If you don't dance at these things, then what do you do?"

Steve brought his arm up, scratching the nape of his neck as he squinted a little in contemplation. As your eyes followed his movements, your brain blanked -- all you could spell out right now was "muscle" and "bulge." You found yourself wide-eyed, blinking harshly.

"Make speeches, be put on the spot, talk work."

"Anything fun?" you questioned, and he laughed, appreciating the challenge.

"Leave with a girl?" Steve replied, although it was more of a hopeful question.

You grinned, looking up at him. Was he seriously courting you right now? It seemed as though nothing should feel impossible to you, not when in the year of 2020 you had time traveled back to the 40s. But this felt unreal.

"And do what?" you smiled, and Steve became slightly flustered, then placing his hands in his pockets and rocking back and forth. He cocked his head to the side, again replying with a question,

"We could go on a walk. Visit my favorite diner for milkshakes on me?"

You couldn't help but beam at all his suggestions, your eyes glimmering as yours locked with his. You nodded, much too calmly in comparison to the way you felt inside - inflamed and jittery. Nevermind that you had fallen into exactly what you were trying to avoid - it was a beautiful fall anyway. Besides, who would you be to turn down Captain America?

"That's just fine with me. Let's get out of here, captain," you quipped, taking the initiative and linking arms with him, feeling his strong arm wrap around yours.

Talking and walking with Steve couldn't have been any more fun. Somehow it was like you both freed yourselves, rebelling and escaping from something that didn't suit you before. You didn't know what was to come next, and you certainly hadn't expected this. Anything could happen. Although you were nervous, it was just the right amount. You were excited, you felt natural walking the streets with him, arms linked together, gazing up at him like a puppy. Just being in the presence of such greatness felt like a dream.

And Steve was just as wonderful as they made him out to be, even more. In the time you spent together, you'd learned so much about him. He was kind and bright, made you feel comfortable and safe. You pulled humor and lightheartedness out of him, made him feel comfortable. He was glad to be here with you, away from everything else. He was proud of himself for working the nerve up to talk to you, for not ignoring the fact that he was so drawn to this stranger. And it was the best decision he'd made that night.

You were each strolling down the dark streets, only lit by street lights and the dim lights that came from people's windows as they got ready for bed. It felt reassuring to know that even while you were surrounded by unfamiliarity, you could find resonance in all those people, looking through their windows and wondering what they were having for dinner, imagining the ladies taking off their jewelry as they cuddled up in bed with a lover.

"I feel like I'm gonna be on a sugar high," you chuckled, sipping some of your milkshake.

Steve grinned down at you,

"Mike's Milkshakes will do that to you."

You sighed, glancing around at everything. It was beautiful here in the dark, even in the midst of war, with everything going on. Before, you could only imagine what these nights would be like. You wondered if you would've intentionally traveled back to this time instead of by accident. Considering the way things were outside of this moment in particular, you probably wouldn't. But you were glad you did. This felt like a beautiful mistake.

You pulled Steve onto a corner of an alleyway, the two of you basking under the glow of the street light.

"Steve," you said his name gently, but as if it were of the utmost importance.

He looked down at you, becoming nervous himself, feeling his heart beat in his chest. You were undoubtedly beautiful, and the two of you were more alone than you had ever been in the past two hours you had spent together, quite literally just walking and talking, sharing stories and time together. He felt close to you, towering over you, and it wasn't any less nerve wracking for you.

"Yeah?" he uttered out, and you found yourself opening and closing your mouth, trying to find the right way for the words to come out.

You just smiled, reaching your hand up and sort of awkwardly patting his shoulder, then letting your hand trail down his chest gently. He looked down at your hand, then back at you, waiting for your next words.

"Thank you. This night was so beautiful, I can't thank you enough."

At the corner of Steve's lips tugged a smile, and his eyes grew needy and hopeful,

"Don't tell me this is you saying goodbye."

You felt a pang in your chest as he said that. You hadn't considered the fact that you would have to say goodbye at some point, and you knew that meant goodbye forever. But you had been so caught up in your wonder that you hadn't thought of the moment to say goodbye. And yet, it seemed like that moment was creeping up on you.

You didn't want to look at it with sadness, it was as natural as could be, but you still wished you could stay for a little longer. You knew you had to go though, and as magical as this was, you didn't want to live in a world where you had no basis. You belonged in the modern world, it was where you should stay.

"Almost," you laughed slightly. "I do have a question for you, though."

    "Sure," Steve shrugged.

It was the one thing you really wanted to know: why you? Why had Steve chosen to talk to you, of all people? He didn't know you and you weren't boasting an important title. So, why you? You wondered. If you had some secret power to attract people like Steve Rogers into your life, you wanted to know what it was.

    You cleared your throat before you asked this question, suddenly feeling a bit shy,

    "Why did you come up to me? And talk to me... it's been on my mind all night."

Steve took in a breath and shoved his hands in his pockets.

    "I... don't know. I guess I saw a little bit of myself in you, crazy as it sounds."

     "Captain America is a wallflower?" you retorted jokingly, and he chuckled, shaking his head.

     "I just mean, you seemed like you were trying to find a way. And I'm constantly doing that. And something about you... is different. I like that."

You knew exactly what that something was. You literally didn't belong here. You weren't from here. Steve must have sensed that, even if he didn't fully realize it.

    "Hm. Well, whatever it is, I'm glad you approached me because of it. I've had the best night, really. I wish I could stay longer."

    "Oh, don't go. Not just yet," Steve grasped your hand and squeezed.

    "I can't. I have... somewhere to be," you smiled tearfully as you looked at your hands intertwined.

    Steve swallowed. He didn't intend on getting hooked on you as fast as he did, but he did. And now that he was hooked, you were leaving. It was a bittersweet moment, but he understood you had to go— it was like you had some purpose elsewhere, and that was clear to him. It was almost strange.

    "I understand," Steve replied, smiling at the touch of your hand on his, your thumb rubbing against his thumb. "I'm glad we met, Y/N. Can I see you again?"

You grinned. You certainly couldn't make any promises,

    "Maybe. But for now I have to go."

    "At least let me walk you home," Steve pressed, and you shook your head.

    "It's much further than I think you'll want to go," was all you said. Steve would've pressed more but for some reason your answer felt definite and true.

Good night Steve."

    "Good night."

Before you knew it, you were reaching up on his tippy toes to kiss his cheek, feeling his skin turn red hot beneath your soft lips. He held onto your waist gently as you kissed his cheek, and when you pulled away, you stayed there in his grasp for a moment, eyes lingering on his. You wanted more, so much more, but you had had enough already.

    You didn't want to get cocky with time. You patted his chest and took one last look at him with a smile and glimmering eyes. Then, you turned away. As Steve watched you walk down the alleyway, it was almost like you vanished into thin air.

| | |

It had been a week since your beloved encounter with Steve Rogers. It still didn't feel real, in fact you wrote down every detail in your diary so that if it were a dream, it wouldn't wither away. But it was as real as real could get. It wasn't the time traveling that surprised you, you knew that to be natural. It was the experience you'd had on your trip.

You couldn't tell anybody, not that they would believe you to begin with. You didn't want to tell anybody anyway. This was your experience for keeping. You wouldn't share this with anyone else.

    You were on your way to work, the memories of that night still fresh in your head, a cup of coffee in hand. You wondered if Mike's Milkshakes still operated. Like Steve, you too lived in New York. There was no reason for it not to exist. You would be sorely upset if it didn't - it was truly one of the greatest shakes you'd had in your lifetime.

     You were looking down at your phone and typing, coffee in one hand, phone in the other. The hustle of New York was nothing, you could handle it.

    Until you couldn't. You nearly got knocked on the floor by someone who you bumped into- or maybe he bumped into you, it was hard to say. Either way, it was a wild collision. And your coffee fell, and spilled on the both of you.

     What was funny was that the two of you were apologizing like crazy, stumbling to pick the things up that had dropped, speaking over each other.

    "Oh my god I'm so sorry," you stammered. "I wasn't watching where I was going."

    "All the same. Where are my manners?" the man asked, and you chuckled with a scoff.

     "New York will do that to you."

You were each kneeling on the ground and picking things up, scatterbrained. But you both looked up at each other at the same time, catching each other's eyes. And in that moment, something clicked for the two of you. Even when you left that day, you weren't really leaving. Because Steve was right here, a week and a few decades later. You blinked, tried to make sure your mind wasn't playing tricks on you. But it really was him. Captain America. And he wasn't dressed in full attire, but he was still there.

    You made a face, furrowing your brows. All the calculations in the world couldn't have prepared you for this happening. You stared at him, speechless.

    He broke the silence, staring at you just as intensely. The crisp blue of his eyes was piercing, staring into your soul.

    "I know you from somewhere," he said, with absolute certainty.

Your heart dropped. This was exactly what you wanted to avoid when time traveling. Not that you even expected anything like this to happen. You became bashful, shaking your head and blushing, hurrying to stand up, but Steve followed your motions as you stood.

    "No," you shook your head and laughed lightly, looking down so he wouldn't see your face.

    "I'm sure I do..." he squinted, still staring intensely at you.  You looked up, pushed your hair out of your eyes. You couldn't handle his eyes on you, not when you weren't even looking at him.

     His eyes locked with yours again and he seemed to be exploring your eyes, wide and scared and nervous, hopeful. You hoped he'd say he was mistaken. You know you would love another chance with Steve, but that night was to be fully over with. For reasons you already stated.

    But gazing deep into your unforgettable eyes, which had glimmered so brightly, it was like a switch went off in his brain, bringing him all those years back. To that one night. He squinted. How could he remember? It seemed so artificial, like it was a memory that had been falsely implanted into his brain. But that was the effect of you- you had changed his history.

    He opened his mouth, then closed it again, then dared to speak,

    "Y/N."

He said it as if it was an answer, not like he was asking if it was you. Again with absolute certainty.

You pouted, almost cringing as you answered, squeezing your eyes shut. You felt disappointed in yourself, for letting this happen, for opening this window of possibility to begin with. Your life and his life would be changed more than you were ready for.

    You sighed and took in a deep breath,

    "Hi."

Steve was still furrowing his brows at you, gazing at you with every intention,

    "I don't understand. How..."

    It surprised himself that he remembered you, just based off of one night. But you were hard to forget. And it was even more mind boggling that he was seeing you again, the both of you in the same shape as when you had first met. Had you been frozen too? No, it couldn't be. It had to be-

    "Time travel," you blurted. Your heart was racing. "I... I time traveled. I can... do that."

      "What, that's your show and tell?" Steve joked, and you felt a little less worried. At least he wasn't angry. And it felt better talking to him in present day, at a time where you both belonged.

    "You could say that. Listen, I'm sorry. I didn't mean for any of this to happen, that night was a mistake."

    "Mistake?"

    "I- I mean... it shouldn't have happened. And it was great, really, I can't stop thinking about it. But it shouldn't have happened. I didn't even mean to... it just happened. I just got lucky."

Steve looked at you. All those years ago he had sensed that there was something different about you, he just couldn't put his finger on it. Now he knew.

    "I knew there was something different about you that night. You were glowing with this... this thing... modernity, I guess," Steve nodded.

You seemed good enough. He couldn't sense any bad intentions from you, and he had a good feel for those things. It was just you. It was why the situation didn't concern him any further.

    "I'm surprised you even remember me," you laughed.

    "Remember you?" Steve repeated, incredulous. "How could I forget?"

He held eye contact with you when he said that, and it got you blushing, shrinking down and shaking your head,

    "I'm sorry."

    Now Steve raised his brows,

    "I can't see what for."

    "I just didn't mean for any of this to happen. I feel like I've disturbed you."

You apologized, but when you said it it made you realize you didn't really have much to apologize for. Steve didn't seem very upset... at all. It was just your brain telling you that you could mess things up.

    Steve chuckled quietly, shaking his head,

    "No... you haven't. And you didn't that night, either."

    "Mhm," was all you could hum out.

    "But if that's your idea of disturbing me... I think you should disturb me some more. Maybe you can disturb me over coffee. I'll make up for it," he gestured to the spilled coffee on the ground.

You had probably never blushed so hard in your life. Once again, Steve Rogers was actually hitting on you. And all the silly worries and blabber from your brain couldn't stop the feeling you got when you talked to him, when you were with him.

    "Right now?" you asked stupidly, feeling entranced by him yet again.

He smirked playfully,

    "Yeah. Unless you wanna travel back in time for it."

note: THIS WAS SO FUN TO WRITE!!!

[kinda-iconic]

The One Date You Should Never Forget

This fanfic was written for Day 11 of the Choices May Challenge.

Day 11 prompt: Birthday

Author’s Note: I’ve had this one in the works for a while, though never thought that I would be posting it here, for I didn’t think it was particularly good; but it fits my prompt, so after a bit of editing, I decided I was going to post it anyway!

Summary: It’s Amy’s birthday... but has everybody remembered?

Pairing: Adrian Raines x MC (Amy)

Tagging (if interested): @bloodboundismylife​ @adrianadmirer​ @bbchoices​ @adriansbliss​ @god-save-the-keen​ @choicesfannatalie​ @shelley-parah​ @senator-adrian-raines-wifey​ @lexilooloolovessenatorraines​ @bellaraines​ @clansayeed​

Word Count: 3′400+ (Sorry in advance!)

Amy glances at the monitor, her eyes instinctively drawing to the bottom right corner as she tries to read the time; her shift is coming to an end, but as the minutes tick by, the young mortal can’t help but reflect on the events of the past 24 hours, or rather the lack of. She tries to refocus her attention on the pile of contracts that lay discarded on the desk in front of her, absent-mindedly skimming through its contents before retrieving an orange highlighter from the pencil pot; her eyes drift back to the beginning of the paragraph, re-reading each sentence as if trying to scan the paper for a particular collection of words, but soon finds herself unable to concentrate.

‘You look as bored as I am.’

She turns to the source of voice, a warm smile enveloping her lips as she notices him for the first time; Adrian stands in the doorway, leaning against the lintel as he drinks her in, tilting his head as if to get a better picture; his arms are crossed, the sleeves of his shirt rolled up to the folds of his elbows.

‘I thought that I was the only one who is allowed to mope.’

She giggles, her smile widening as he takes a step towards her.

‘I can’t remember that being in my contract…’

‘Oh it is there alright,’ he wraps his arms around her shoulders, pressing a gentle kiss to her temple, ‘somewhere underneath the clause about how it would be inconsiderate of you to look this beautiful during work hours…’

‘I must have missed that,’ she responds with giddiness, leaning into his touch as he nuzzles his face into the crook of her neck, ‘I guess that must be directly under the paragraph that states that I am permitted to date my Boss.’

He chuckles softly, shaking his head in amusement.

‘Then I suggest you read over it again… just to see if there is anything else that you have missed.’ He flashes her a cheeky smile, ‘if I’ve learnt anything during my time as a CEO, it’s that you always read between the lines – and the small print.’

She quirks a brow.

‘Oh really?’

‘Yes,’ he nods in agreement, squeezing her gently, ‘small print can be sneaky.’

‘Like you aren’t yourself,’ she looks up at him with a soft smile, reaching up to touch his cheek, ‘you went straight to flirting… and I didn’t even get a hello.’

He tilts his head slightly, pouting in jest at her words.

‘Well I suppose, being the gentleman that I am,’ he kisses her cheek, ‘that I should remedy that.’ He turns away from her, linking his hands behind his back. She watches him in confusion, a nervous laugh escaping her. When she speaks, her words are soft and gentle, the intonation in her voice rising as she queries his actions.

‘What on earth are you doing?’

‘Starting this interaction again,’ his cheeky grin returns, accompanied by a wink, ‘as promised…’

He ponders back over to her, leaning in to kiss the top of her head; he opens his mouth to speak, but a bashful laugh escapes him.

‘Is this the part where I wish you a good evening?’

She shakes her head in disbelief, her lips curling into a bemused smile.

‘You really are unbelievable…’

‘Oh we knew that already,’ he runs a gentle hand through her hair, letting it rest on her shoulder as he gazes down at the papers in front of her, ‘so, what have you been up to in the past couple of hours?’

She follows his gaze back to the pile, her brows furrowed.

‘Annotating contracts,’ she places the document down, a defeated sigh escaping her, ‘though I don’t seem to be making any headway. This is the tenth one, but I just feel like I haven’t made enough progress tonight.’

‘That makes two of us,’ he hesitates for a moment before continuing, ‘but I’m afraid that it is something we must do, and not a job that we can put off for much longer.’

‘I know; I guess I just wish that there weren’t so many contracts to go through.’

‘There’s usually not this many, I must admit…’ he chuckles softly, retrieving one of the papers from her pile; he holds it at arm’s length, skimming over the details before looking back at her, ‘though I am rather excited to see what may come from our new business partnership.’

‘As am I,’ she taps the paper with the edge of her pen, ‘though just looking at all of these makes my head hurt.’

‘Are you feeling alright?’

‘Yeah,’ she glances down at her hands, nervously adjusting the hem of her skirt as it has begins to ascend slowly up her thigh, ‘I was…I was actually wondering if you wanted to go out for dinner tonight? We’ve been at this for hours and I think we could both do with some time away from the office.’

‘I want nothing more than to spend the evening with you,’ he runs a gentle hand through her hair, ‘but right now it’s...’

‘You don’t want to go tonight.’

‘It’s just… it’s not a good time,’ he sighs defeatedly, resting a comforting hand on her shoulder, ‘when all of this is over, and I have confirmation that the trail is going ahead, then you and I will go somewhere; there’ll be no business calls…no deadlines,’ he inclines his head towards her, capturing her lips in a soft kiss. After a blissful moment, Adrian pulls away, his once sorrowful smile replaced with one of contempt. ‘I know it’s not ideal, but if any of that is to happen, then I need to buckle down; you know I can’t mix business with pleasure at the moment-’

‘It’s fine,’ she bites her lip, her cheeks reddening in her embarrassment, ‘we can just go another night.’

He responds with a curt nod, his gaze softening as he quickly notices her disappointment.

‘Thank you for being so understanding,’ he takes her hand, turning it over in his before pressing a tender kiss to her palm, ‘I honestly have no idea what I would do without you.’

She flashes him a sad smile before glancing back at the paperwork, now left begotten on her desk.

‘You would probably get a lot more done than what you are now,’ she tips her head subtly in the direction of the documents, ‘you might have managed to read over a couple more in the time that you’ve spent talking to me.’

‘Mmm that’s true,’ he kisses her hand once more, his lips ghosting her skin as they travel from the pad of her thumb to the inside of her wrist, ‘you seem to be quite the distraction.’

She collects the pile of completed contracts before pushing them against his chest, her voice taking an almost urgent tone.

‘Well, this distraction believes that it’s about time you go back to work, so that she too can continue doing the task that she has been set.’

‘Indeed,’ he sighs in feigned defeat, ‘these contracts won’t read themselves.’

He heads back in the direction of his office, but it is not long before he turns with suddenness, quirking a brow as he studies her questionable demeanor.

‘Was there a particular reason as to why you wanted to go tonight?’ He folds his arms across his chest, regarding her with a mixture of adoration and intrigue, ‘did they update the menu at one of the restaurants?’

She shakes her head, smiling faintly up at him before focusing her attention back on her work.

‘I just fancied a little break, that’s all.’

‘Okay,’ he tips his head in acknowledgment, though he is able to sense the slight irritability in her voice, ‘well make sure that you do take that break, alright? Even if it’s just to sit at your desk and create those little origami frogs that you used to make.’

She nods in haste, her smile appearing a little more genuine.

‘I will.’

He looks at her for a moment before retreating into his office, gently shutting the door behind him. Once she is sure that he has gone, Amy collects the paperwork from her desk, tapping the ends to align the documents, forming a neat pile in her hands. She opens the desk drawer in the hopes of finding room to store the papers, but a small card catches her attention; she reaches down for it, but stops abruptly as her ears pick up on the sound of movement in Adrian’s office. As the sounds begin to dissipate, she finds herself staring down at the card, decorated by images of flowers and cake. She gazes at it momentarily before tucking it away, letting out a despondent sigh as she watches it disappear from her line of sight.

‘Happy Birthday to me, I guess.’

Less than an hour later, Amy finds herself perched on the edge of Adrian’s desk, her legs dangling over the edge as she watches him read over her work, his brow furrowed in concentration.

‘Well?’

He looks up at her, his focused expression dissipating into one of contempt; he smiles, placing the document on his desk.

‘It is really good,’ he lets out a sigh of relief, ‘you did some incredible work; the attention to detail is exquisite,’ he raises a brow, ‘and the colour coordination is a nice touch.’

‘I thought you might like it,’ she runs her hand along her thigh, ‘I like to keep myself organised… and what better way to do so than having a system that, though can be occasionally flawed, has withstood the test of time and continues to impress the Boss.’

He chuckles softly, resting a gentle hand on her back, his fingertips slowly inching under the material of her jumper.

‘You could just make me a cup of coffee and I’d still be impressed by you.’

He shuffles closer, his hand travelling up her back; she gasps at the touch, playfully hitting his arm as she removes herself from beside him.

‘You do realise that your actions are not particularly professional right now, don’t you?’

He shrugs, his eyes glistening with mischief.

‘What you and I do behind closed doors is not exactly considered to be the business of my other employees, Amy…’

‘But we are still in your office!’

‘Yes,’ he smiles brazenly, his fingertips finding the curve of her waist; he pulls her closer, her knees mere inches from his chest, ‘but if my observations are correct, the door is closed.’

She quirks a brow.

‘But is it locked?’

He thinks for a moment, his mind lost in thought; after a minute, he sighs in defeat, removing his hand from underneath her clothing.

‘No, it isn’t.’

‘So… anyone could walk in if you think about it.’

He reaches up to caress her cheek, taking hold of her jaw as he moves closer, inclining his head towards hers; she subconsciously leans into his touch, meeting him halfway before connecting her lips to his. After a few seconds he pulls away, a satisfied smile tugging at the corner of his mouth as it lingers mere inches from her own.

‘Is that what you think? Or what you are hoping for…’

She smirks, capturing his lips once more; the kiss starts off as soft, but it is not long before Adrian deepens it, his fingers clasping onto her hair as he instinctively pulls her closer, moving her legs so that they are on either side of his hips.

‘Mmm…’ she sighs in contempt, ‘maybe a little bit of both.’

He rests his forehead against hers, a hearty laugh escaping him.  

‘One of these days, you are going to get me into trouble,’ he kisses the tip of her nose, ‘you know that, right?’

‘I count on it…Boss.’

The pair begin to get comfortable, but before long, the door to his office flies open, causing Adrian and Amy to break their focus; Lily enters the room, accompanied by a rather puzzled Kamilah. She takes a couple of steps forward before stopping, noticing the intimacy of the couple’s embrace. Her eyes widen at the sight, her mouth slightly agape in surprise.

‘Ah, well I see that this might not be the best time…’

Adrian clears his throat in annoyance, narrowing his brow as he glares at their unexpected visitors.

‘You know it is polite to knock, Lily.’

‘I know, but…’Lily shifts her attention between the pair, who stare back at her, the shock of the intrusion causing Amy’s cheeks to redden; she pulls away from Adrian, removing herself from his grasp, ‘I wanted to surprise Amy, and I thought that… well, knocking wouldn’t have the same affect.’

Adrian frowns in befuddlement.

‘Surprise her?’

She swiftly makes her way out of the room, returning only moments later with an abundance of parcels, wrapped delicately in brown paper. In her other hand, a lone balloon tied around her fingers, the helium taking it higher than originally anticipated.

‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY, AMY!’

Adrian remains silent, focusing his attention on the young vampire as he regards her in shock and disbelief. He turns to look at Amy, his eyes widening as the realization of the date dawns, ‘it’s...it’s your birthday?’  

She nods bashfully, bowing her head as if trying to avert his gaze; she begins to play with the hem of her skirt, her eyes trained on the threading. Adrian takes a step towards her, placing a gentle hand on the curve of her waist. 

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ He reaches up to caress her cheek, running his thumb across her bottom lip, ‘it is nearly over…’

‘You were busy,’ she whispers softly, ‘there was too much to do here; it wasn’t important.’

‘Amy…’

‘Wait a minute…’ Lily chimes in, holding up her hands as if they are helping her to process what is happening before her; she looks between the pair, her voice tinged with shock and befuddlement, ‘are you telling me that Adrian FORGOT your Birthday? And you didn’t think to remind him?’

Amy shakes her head, nervously tugging at the sleeves of her jumper.

‘We had a lot to do today, and I didn’t want to bother him.’

‘You didn’t want to tell your boyfriend that it was your birthday… because he was busy?’

Lily looks at the faces around the room, her brows narrowing in confusion as she focuses her gaze on Adrian; he shuffles uncomfortably on his feet.

‘I honestly can’t believe what I’m hearing.’

‘Don’t try to make him feel any worse than he already does,’ Kamilah interjects, regarding Lily with an icy glare, ‘when you’re a CEO of a billion-dollar company, it’s easy to forget things…’

‘Like your own girlfriend’s birthday?’

Adrian lowers his gaze to the floor, the upset of forgetting evident in his expression; he runs a dejected hand through his hair, his palm resting at the nape of his neck. He exhales slowly, training his eyes on Amy as he focuses his attention on her once more.

‘The new dress that arrived this morning…the invitation to dinner…’ she nods; he lets out a defeated sigh, his voice lowering to a soft whisper, ‘Amy I… I’m so sorry.’

She remains silent for a moment before responding, shrugging halfheartedly.

‘It doesn’t matter,’ her previous excitable smile has disappeared, replaced with a nonchalant frown, ‘it isn’t important.’

She turns her attention back to Lily, her bashful demeanor soon dissipating into one of intrigue and giddiness.

‘Can we just focus on something else? Like maybe how beautifully wrapped these gifts are?’

‘Amy, I…’ he takes another step forward, his hand instinctively reaching for the small of her back, ‘I…I really am sorry.’

‘It really isn’t worth worrying about, Adrian,’ she tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, biting her bottom lip, ‘it’s just a day…’

‘But it’s the day you were BORN!’ Lily exclaims, her fingers loosening around the ribbon of the balloon as it floats up to the ceiling, ‘the day you were given to us.’

A bashful smile blesses Amy’s lips as she lowers her gaze to the floor, her cheeks a shade of crimson. ‘Given?’ She hesitates for a moment, a slight chuckle escaping her as she tries to conceal her embarrassment, ‘you’re making me sound like an object that you’ve gained over the years.’

‘Not an object,’ Lily skips over to her, energetically pushing a delicately wrapped parcel into her arms, ‘more like a gift.’

Amy begins to untie the ribbon, its golden threading shimmering in the light as she removes it from the package, fixing it into a bow around her wrist. She looks up at Lily, her words etched into her mind like a nostalgic pop song.

‘That’s so cheesy and you know it.’

‘Oh it is,’ Lily giggles, gesturing to the gift laid out before her, ‘but you know how poetically inclined I can be…’

Amy shakes her head, a soft giggle escaping her. 

‘You’re a goofball!’ 

‘Tell me something I didn’t know,’ she chuckles in excitement, gesturing to the present, ‘now come on, Ames; I’ve been waiting to give you this for ages! I even had to ask Kamilah to stash it away so that I didn’t cave in and move your Birthday forward a few days...’

Amy looks over at him, quirking a brow.

‘That insufferable, huh?’ 

‘She wouldn’t stop talking about it until I agreed,’ Kamilah runs her hand through her hair, cupping the nape of her neck, ‘and I didn’t want to find out what she had planned had I said no.’

‘I-’

‘I apologise for interrupting,’ Adrian takes another step forward, wrapping his arm around Amy’s waist, ‘but would it be possible for me to talk to Amy in private?’

Lily chuckles, clearly oblivious to his meaning.

‘Of course you can! We’re not exactly stopping you.’

He pinches the bridge of his nose in frustration.

‘I meant alone… in my office.’

Lily thinks on his words for a moment, clearly befuddled, but it isn’t long before the realization hits.

‘Oh!’ She gestures to the door, ‘you want us…to…’

‘Please.’

Kamilah places a gentle hand on Lily’s arm, carefully leading her out of the room. Adrian waits until they are out of earshot before closing the door behind them, swiftly turning his attention back to Amy.

‘Why didn’t you tell me it was your birthday?’

‘Because you… you were so busy, and-’

‘That’s not an excuse!’ He runs an agitated hand across his face, his gaze softening as he looks at her, his eyes laden with guilt, ‘I love you, I… I should have remembered.’

‘We all forget things from time to time…’

‘But not your birthday, Amy,’ he shakes his head in disbelief, a humorless laugh escaping him, ‘I would have planned something special; a candle-lit dinner…a trip to that cocktail bar that you’ve always wanted to visit…’ he bows his head, ‘instead I dragged you to my office and handed you dozens of contacts to annotate!’

‘It hasn’t been that bad…’

‘Hasn’t it?’ He looks up at her with suddenness, ‘I forced you to work, I… I told you that I was too busy to accompany you to dinner.’ He sighs, glancing at the present that lay discarded on his desk, ‘were you ever going to tell me? That I had forgotten…’

She shakes her head.

‘I pretty much knew that it had slipped your mind when you didn’t mention it this morning.’

‘And was I the only one? That forgot…’

She responds with a curt not. He exhales sharply, running a disappointed hand through his hair.

‘I am so sorry, Amy,’ he reaches up to caress her cheek, running his thumb across her bottom lip, ‘I will do everything in my power to make it up to you.’

‘You really don’t have to, Adrian. I told you it doesn’t matter.’

‘It does to me,’ he retorts, a rashness to his voice, ‘you mean the world to me, Amy; I cherish you with everything that I am, and I mean it when I say that I will make it up to you.’

She smiles sadly up at him, her fingers tugging at the lapels of his waistcoat; he wraps his arms around her, holding her close to his chest. 

‘Is that a promise?’

‘Yes,’ he rests his forehead against hers, leaning in to kiss the bridge of her nose, ‘it most certainly is.’

[ramblings-of-a-mad-cat]

Sorry for bring my comments so late, I have been helping my Mother with her shop and also watching series my friend recommended me, But now I'm here Excited to Read More!

Chapter 18

you know, reading about MC distancing themself from Rowan Never Would not be a total pain for me, Like, The Friendship between MC and Rowan showed in screen was always so wholesome but Yet so sad, because You really don't have an option to keep your Friendship with Them, because The Writing Of The game makes You simply be distant from them. The only thing that makes have a little hope for Rowan It's The Fanfic says loosely follows plot till Year 6 and The Fictober was created I Think Before “that” chapter. God, It's just a paragraph and I'm really thinking in that.

DAMN. For Some reason I never really expected Bellatrix to being mentioned and just gonna Say Poor Tonks, Like in-game She has a Easy going Personality but It's really concerning when You remember What happens and What She dealts with. And can I just Say The Headcannon Of her hating her real face because resembles Bellatrix makes Perfect sense and It's so Beautiful in a really angsty and murky kind Of way? Because It's similar that happens to One Of my Oc's, She has a trauma related to her twin sister that's The reason She has eisotrophobia (Fear to The reflection on The mirror) because She always sees her Twins face and The worst Part Is her Mother stills confusing Them because Never expected The day She Will see The Twins Split up. It's a Story I Thought when I was with my psychologist.

I love The saltiness Of Luca to Dumbledore, It's... actually Pretty Understandable, Dumbledore in The Books was already Shady and The most funny part It's probably Rowling didn't even wanted him to come off as that, Why then make The main Character, One Of The principal victims of Albus, give His name to His son? and in Hphm Albus It's still a manipulator but Like a Dumb manipulator, In The game it's More apparent that He's a Shady person and It's not half as subtle as it Was in The whole series. Having that, I Think It's really satisfying seeing a HP Protagonist actually face him off and see who he actually Is.

Luca is a total softie for Merula, They're really adorable.

OHOH I LITERALLY SCREAMED

Luca Trying so Hard to have a Happy memory for The Patronus It's honestly really... personal to me, like I have Many Intrusive Thoughts when I try to revive a Happy memory because Of my own trauma related Things I Can't even Like things I used to. But I'm really proud Of Them for finally making it, Can't I Even Start to describe how Many soft feelings The memory and The whole “Mitten Is my patronus” give me, Your ideas are so awesome I Can't

Luca comforting Merula It's SO BEAUTIFUL and hits too close to home, I hace Many Friends with low self-esteem believing They're Bad persons and I'm The One who brings Them to earth.

It's Good to see The Racoon Again, I'm already putting On my Inner Sherlock Holmes for knowing Of Who Is The Patronus

This Message really It's too long, I'll keep reading In Other menssage in Other day, I Hope your Mother It's fine and takes care Of herself. Have a Good, Brandon!

— The Remembrance anon

Oh my good friend, I am the last person to complain about late comments right now, believe me. You won’t hear any objections from me because I’ve been responding at a snail’s pace myself (and my beloved anons have been so very patient) and because no matter how long it may take for whatever reason, I am always delighted to hear from you, so thank you for making my day! 

Trust me, the bit about Rowan bothers me as well. I wanted to incorporate the “Rowan is R” theory because it’s almost a little ridiculous that no one in-game brings up the possibility until the middle of Year 5, when MC has known about R since the start of Year 2. Like, I wanted to acknowledge it. Plus I think it can give a good in-universe explanation for the distance between MC and Rowan beyond the horribly cynical idea that MC outgrew them, which I flat out refuse to accept. Luca would never, could never, leave Rowan behind like that for something so shallow. As for what is to come...well, I suppose you’ll just have to see! You are right though, I think we were like, nine or ten chapters into Year 6 at the point I was writing this. 

I have so many headcanons about Tonks and as I went through Luca’s story, I realized that I could absolutely incorporate them. Because she’s canon, she’s one of those characters that it’s easy to forget about or take for granted in the background, but hey - she’s in Luca’s House, part of the best friend squad they formed in Chapter 6, and is one of their roommates on most nights. Plus Luca has a curious tendency to bond with the wildly chaotic types, so of course Tonks would be one of their closest friends. Can I further say that the whole concept you just described about the twins is fantastic and hella chilling? I would read about that. I would read a whole book about that. 

Oh, you like Luca’s displeasure with Dumbledore? Hmm, methinks you’re going to like some of the future chapters then...Truly, I didn’t originally intend for this to be an aspect of their character, but the whole incident with them being punished for dueling Merula in Year 1 really stuck with them somehow. It’s very much something that they inherit from me, the criticisms of Dumbledore, but I never realized that a character this soft would inherit them. Fun fact: I used to have a different MC who basically morphed into my iteration of Jacob that always hated Dumbledore because they were just like him and saw him for what he was, one manipulator to another. In general, I have to applaud what this game has done with him because he’s one hundred percent in character - hence why he enrages me so much. 

See, see now I’m curious what inspired you to scream. Part of me wants to guess, the other half of me doesn’t want to be presumptuous or pompous. Either way, I’m glad to have gotten such reactions! In any case, thank you so much for what you said about Luca and Merula and the Patronus scene. It means a lot to me because with Luca I basically tried my hand at writing a character with a debilitating mental illness, (a fictional one, obviously) and I wasn’t sure if it landed well or not. One thing I feel very strongly about is MC and Merula’s bond, especially this MC. Luca is the one who picked the “We can talk this out” option at the start and never wavered from that. I’m not even gonna lie, I’ve gone back and forth a lot on what Luca’s Patronus would be, but this is a good one for them because it reflects the people in their life that they love. Not just Mitten, but Merula as well. (She’s a cat for sure.) 

Thank you so much once again for sending me these messages and showing me this kindness! I hope that everything is going well for you and that you have a wonderful time! 

[taejeonie]

“taehee’s birthday special

— again, english is italicized

“hellooooooo ( ^ω^ )”

it’s ty track!!! and he’s sitting on an office chair in some kind of conference room

“today is...january 17”

“we’re actually preparing for our comeback but today’s our day off,,,so i thought we should do something special for taehee’s birthday!!”

“it’s not her birthday today, but come to think of it, we never did something really special for her on her birthday”

“her birthday’s two days after christmas, so either we’re super busy, or at home with our families. even as trainees we didn’t get to celebrate properly with her”

taeyong’s looking down and there’s like a guilty aura around him

it makes czennies’ hearts hurt

“we brought her out to restaurants and she’s told us countless times of how she’s greatful for it,,,but i just thought we should give her something more special”

then his mouth lifts up into a smile as if he’s trying to lighten the mood up

“we were watching this movie one time and there was like a big party held for the main lead,,it was like a coming of age party- what was it called again? cotillion? is it cotillion?,” then he brings his phone out to check

“so it’s called a cotillion!! and i was sitting next to her and i heard that she kept mumbling how pretty and cute it was”

taeyong mimicked her, “she was like ‘ahh that’s so pretty”

“‘i kinda want one’ she said”

“so yesterday i thought, ‘oh? we can do a special party for taehee tomorrow!!’”

“like i mentioned, today’s our free day,,ah most of us. taehee had an early schedule today but that’s it and she has the rest of the day off (*^_^*)”

“she doesn’t know anything about this at all hehe”

then taeyong stands up and walks out of the room, and the only thing you can see is the ceiling and the bottom of his face

“i was in the conference room just to talk but..we’re going to the practice room and you’ll see how excited everyone is”

then before you can even see the practice room you could already hear the chaos in it

“YA HAECHAN THAT’S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE THERE!”

“SHE LIKES IT BETTER THIS WAY!”

“TAEIL HYUNG I THINK YOU SHOULD DANCE”

“JUNGWOO COME HERE!”

“ARE WE REALLY WEARING SUITS?”

“WE NEED TO STICK TO THE CONCEPT, MARK. IT’S THE VIBE YOU GOTTA GO WITH THE FLOW”

taeyong laughs at them, “see?”

and everyone’s all over the place

haechan and doyoung are fixing the letter balloons on the wall, along with the fairy lights underneath them

jaehyun and jungwoo are in the corner writing some speech for the party

yuta’s also writing on a banner but in a different corner

johnny scattering rose petals around the room

then taeil beckons jungwoo over near the speaker to work on a dance number

and mark is standing in the middle of it all in a phase of confusion before running out of the room, “I NEED TO GET A GUITAR”

the camera points back to taeyong, “honestly, we didn’t put that much thought into the planning and just went for it,” he giggles

“AS LONG AS ITS FROM THE HEART,” johnny passes by and sprinkles petals on taeyong, making him laugh

he walks over to doyoung who has his hands on his hips, “how’s it going here?”

“hAECHAN WONT LISTEN TO ME! HE KEEPS INSISTING TO PUT ‘BIRTHDAY HAPPY’ INSTEAD OF THE NORMAL WAY. WHY DID I HAVE TO GO WITH HIM INSTEAD OF PREPARING THE SPEECH WITH JAEHYUN??”

“SHE’S GONNA LIKE THIS MORE THAN PLAIN BORING ‘HAPPY BIRTHDAY’!!! WHAT ARE WE? AMATEURS??”

“BUT ITS GONNA RUIN THE MOOD”

taeyong walks away from them, smiling, and moves over to taeil and jungwoo by the speaker, “how bout you guys? what are you up to?”

“actually, we haven’t found a song...yet,” taeil points to the camera, “but it’s gonna blow your mind”

jungwoo makes an explosion noise for added effect, then realizes taeyong was filming

“oh are you filming? hello, taehee!!,” he says in aegyo, “i love you very very very much and i hope you like this surprise!! mwah ٩(^‿^)۶”

taeyong calls jungwoo cute before moving on to the next person, jung jaehyun

“how long is it now?”

“i’ve got one paragraph in but it’s just short, really. jungwoo and i put some cheesy lines in there because you know how much she loves those”

“really? give me one,” taeyong moves the camera closer to jaehyun and the latter licks his lips and runs his hand through his hair

“people say the happiest place on earth is disneyland,” he read from the paper, “but clearly, they haven’t been next to you”

“EYYYY,” taeyong cheers, “isn’t it too corny though? HAHAHA”

“the fact that it is would make her like it more,” jaehyun says confidently

“alright,” the older laughs, “okay, our last stop...yuta!!!”

he sets the camera on the floor and you see yuta’s concentrated face directed towards the banner, sharpie marker in hand

“are you almost done?,” taeyong asks, sitting beside him

“not really, i still need to make it prettier”

“what did you write?,” taeyong lets out a hearty laugh before yuta even answers, making the latter chuckle too

“ahh you guys are so cheesy with this- are you sure we’re not going too overboard?”

“when it comes to taehee, nothing is ever overboard. that girl laughs at anything, really”

then video cuts to them working and finishing on the banner

you hear a guitar being strummed here and there, mark must be back in the room

a few cuts of the video shows taeyong and yuta drawing on the banner, while jungwoo and hyuck make their appearance just to make faces on the camera

you hear the door opening and it immediately catches yuta and taeyong’s attention

“taehee’s done with her shoot, she’s on the way here right now. you have about 30 minutes,” must be their manager

there was a slight commotion behind cam while taeyong’s getting all giddy and bouncing on the floor, “aaaa we need to get this done”

video cuts to haechan in a black tuxedo, somewhere in a makeup room, “this is haechan of haechan cam with 37.5% viewer ratings ( ^ω^ )”

mark complains in the background but hyuck ignores him anyway

“as you can see, we’re all wearing suits because we’re going to hold a cotillion? cotillion for taehee”

he shows off his suit and he looks so good in it he slays every outfit haechan model wbk

mark wanders into frame and poses too

jungwoo joins in and he and hyuck do weird poses, making mark laugh loudly and hit them

the scene is cut to taeyong, now wearing his tux and walking to the middle of the room

“okay guys gather around! let’s go through the plan one last time”

they all stand around taeyong, although they have heard this plan about once or twice, they’re still attentive to listen

“taehee walks through that door and taeil hyung is the only one in the room, holding a rose- you all have your roses right?”

“yESsSS”

“okay, music is already a given so taeil hyung will dance with her first, alright?”

“let’s give a minute or two for you guys to say anything you wanna say to her while you dance,” doyoung cuts in

“great, that’s a nice idea! anyways, uhh we go by age order, meaning haechan is last. haechannie, when the music stops you blindfold her and lead her to the conference room, got it?”

the blindfold part makes mark laugh, “is that really necessary?”

“for the effect mark, it’s for the effect,” johnny tells him

“so right after we dance with her we head to the conference room, right?,” yuta asks taeyong

“yes. so when they’re in the conference room already, haechan takes the blindfold off and then mark you’re playing the guitar, right? i think it would be nice if that would be our opening”

“oh okay okay”

“then after mark plays his song, taeil and jungwoo’s dance?”

“and me, i’m doing it with them”

“jOHNNY HYUNG LEARNED THE DANCE?”

“no, we should have jaehyun’s speech first, then the dance,” that’s doyoung again

i need me some dotae content so bad

“okay, so speech first then the dance. after the dance, she blows the cake? and then closing remarks?”

“i think mark and haechan should make a speech”

hyuck: sure (((o(*ﾟ▽ﾟ*)o)))♡

mark: w-what (°_°)

“okay, mark and haechan speech!,” taeyong laughs and shakes his head because of how this is sooooo not planned

but it’s nct they’ll pull it off

“then doyoung does the closing remarks”

“wait then what are you and yuta doing?”

they were the last ones to get in their suits since they were finishing the banner, so taeyong didn’t get to think about what they would actually be doing

yuta and taeyong look at each other before a knowing look spreads upon their faces

taeyong and yuta, simultaneously: “you wanna become backup dancers for mark?”

“HAHAHAHAHA,” they laugh as yuta goes to give taeyong a half hug

“WE BOTH SAID THE SAME THING!!”

“boys! taehee and her manager are in the parking lot, they’ll be heading up soon”

taeyong whines, “AAAAAAAA OKAY, so individual couple dances, then conference room, mark’s guitar- me and yuta are the backup dancers, jaehyun’s speech, taeil, jungwoo, and johnny’s dance, blowing of the cake, and then doyoung’s closing speech”

“yOU FORGOT MARK AND HAECHAN’S SPECIAL MESSAGES!”

“HYUNG!!”

“okay blowingofcakemessagesfrommarkandhaechanandthendoyoungclosingremarks”

taeyong said it so fast almost nobody caught what he was saying

“oKAY LET’S DO THIS LET’S GO!!”

“LET’S GET IT”

“ah i’m getting nervous though”

“mark hyung it’s just noona she won’t bite”

then the video fades to black

you could hear heels click against the floor and then the door of the practice room is opened

the only light comes from outside and you could see the silhouette of taehee and her manager

“i go in?”

“yeah”

“but the lights are off! (；＿；)”

“it’s okay, they’ll turn on soon. just don’t open the lights, okay?”

“aaaa you’re scaring me,” she goes inside and the manager closes the door slowly

taehee’s bundle of nerves go away when the fairy lights turn on slowly

the lights are bright just enough to reveal her smile and taeil standing on the opposite side, holding a rose

a slowed version of every breath you take by the police starts playing as taeil walks over to her

meanwhile, taehee’s openly cringing on her side and questioning what was happening

“aAAAAAndjakd wHat’S tHis?”

she laughs when taeil does a polite curtsy and hands her the rose

she thanks him for it while taeil puts his hand out for her to take

and once their hands are together, taeil guides taehee’s other hand, the one holding the rose, to his shoulder and puts his hand on her waist carefully

taehee smiles because of their height difference

almost non-existent

“taeil oppa, what’s this for?,” she chuckles

“can’t you read? it’s for your birthday,” taeil teases her

he nudges his head to the side and that’s when taehee reads ballon letters spelling out ‘birthday happy’

she giggles again

“but it’s not my birthday though...?”

“we kind of felt sad that we do nothing special for your birthday....i’m not implying something bad but we just wanted to do it for you”

“ahh,” taehee nods

taeil remembers the time limit doyoung set for them and sweats nervously

‘ahh the cringe’ he thought

“i’m gonna say something alright?”

“go on”

“uhh remember how nervous you were? before debut?”

“yeah...”

“you were the most nervous out of all of us, and i felt that. i understood you,,,so i want you to know now that you are and will be forever part of this team. the reason why you’re here is because of your talent and skills, okay? everyone knows how hard working and selfless you are, so you deserve it. don’t mind what the others say, yeah? we’re always here for you, i want you to remember that”

and taehee’s heart is swelling

she and taeil never got to do any of those deep, heart to heart talks

and this just makes her go more uwu at taeil

“yeah,” she mumbles, “i will”

taeil smiles and thinks his time is up, so he makes taehee twirl in her place before hugging her and moving out of the room

johnny was the one next to enter the room

and he was just doing some kind of waltzing from the door to taehee it really made her laugh

“this is for you, milady,” he hands her the rose

“thank you, noble sir”

johnny leads her like how taeil leaded her hands, but because of the height difference, taehee’s hand rests on johnny’s upper arm instead of his shoulder

“were you surprised?,” johnny asks

“yeah, really. i thought i could just eat or watch a movie with you guys when i get home haha”

“do you like it so far”

“of course,,,this is much much better than food or a movie”

johnny raises his brow at her, just in time for her to ask, “but is there really food though?”

he chuckles, “of course, what’s a party without food right?”

a few moments pass with them just swaying to the song, both of them enjoying the ambience of the room

“are you,,are you gonna say something like taeil oppa?”

“hmm i was thinking i would, but i think i’ve told you everything i wanted you to know”

that’s right

johnny and taehee’s relationship was like this from the beginning

whenever taehee did something johnny was proud of, he would tell her straight away

and the same goes for johnny

taehee felt like johnny could read her whenever he wanted, but that was like a silent agreement between them

“i mean, if that’s okay with you,” johnny continues

“of course,” she smiles up at him

they sway again for a few moments, she and johnny singing along to the lyrics from time to time

johnny gives taehee a spin, “im just gonna say again that i’m very thankful, and proud of you taehee. you’re the best”

that was the last thing johnny said before he exited the room, leaving a dimpled smile on taehee’s face

the next song comes on, and it makes her cringe so hard she crouches to the floor in her heels

the next person who comes in has the same reaction as her, letting out a little shout before entering the room

as christina perri’s a thousand years continue to play in the practice room, taeyong composes himself and gives taehee a rose, a wide smile on both of their faces

“do you like it so far?,” taeyong asks her once their hands are in place

taehee nods excitedly before realizing the look in taeyong’s eyes, “you planned this, didn’t you?”

“yeah,” they both laugh

“i heard you say you wanted something like this when we were watching a movie the other day, so i thought why not”

“ahh”

“im sorry we couldn’t give you the best birthdays for the past years,” taeyong frowns

“it’s okay,” she squeezes his hand, “as long as you guys are there with me, i’m already happy”

she makes taeyong laugh, “i’m serious!! it sounds cheesy but i mean it!!”

“i know, i know. i was just flustered”

taehee playfully rolls his eyes at him, “you’re always flustered”

“couldn’t you have at least given me a tiny heads up? you guys are dressed in suits and i’m just wearing a simple dress haha”

“you’re pretty in whatever you wear, taehee. we just wanted to make this really special for you”

taehee pouts at him and her eyes water a bit, “stop saying that or you guys are gonna make me cry- you know how i cry easily!”

taeyong laughs as she continues, “taeil oppa had a message for me and johnny oppa was so sweet and you’re so sweet,,all of you are”

“don’t cry,” taeyong chuckles, “you’re still a baby”

“i knowww (*´ω｀*)”

and taehee was trying to act cute to keep her tears from falling

she is babie we must protect

“i want you to live a healthy life,,i want you to be happy always. i’m so proud of you, okay taehee? i’m very thankful for you”

taehee nods, playfully she adds, “the music’s making me cry also- who’s playlist is this?”

“jungwoo and haechannie set it up”

taehee giggles

she knows the next member is gonna come in soon when taeyong removes his hands from their place and opens his arms for a hug

they share a tight warm hug until taeyong rubs her shoulder and they both let go

“thank you,” she tells him

a few moments tick by and yuta is already in the room

looking as handsome as ever

with that award winning healing smile of his

instead of doing it like the first three, yuta wraps both of taehee’s arms around his neck and pulls her closer by the waist until his head is on her shoulder

she laughs softly and yuta asks, “how’s your schedule? did you have fun?”

“it was fun! i took photos with ice cream so that’s a bonus”

they weren’t swaying like the other three, no

more like waddling

you know how dads make their toddlers stand on their feet and they waddle when they walk

that’s like yuta and taehee except she’s not standing on his feet

she’s wearing heels ouch that would’ve hurt

taehee hums and pulls away a bit later, making eye contact with yuta

“you kind of remind me of my dad”

yuta smiles amusingly, “really?”

“yeah,,,the way you both act around me. you’re like a dad”

“i am?”

“no, wait actually i’d rather have you as an older brother than my dad. but yes you are like my dad,,in some way or another”

yuta chuckles again before taehee puts her head back on yuta’s shoulder

“this is nice,” she comments

“mhmm”

yuta knows his time is almost up, he lets out a sigh

“thank you”

“hm?,” taehee hums

“for simply existing. i admire your presence and i want us to be friends for a long time, until we have our families and until we’re old. you’re a great person, taehee. thank you”

yuta pulls away and he sees a tear slip down taehee’s face making him giggle, “why are you crying?”

he’s mocking her, and she knows

“i cry easily, what else!,” she laughs

but she laughs harder when yuta pulls out a tissue from his suit pocket

“here,” they’re both laughing at this point

“you knew i would cry!!”

“you’re a baby ヽ(´ー｀),” he pats her head

yuta lets out a breath from laughing with taehee, “i’m gonna go now”

the latter pouts and she goes into his arms to give him a hug, “thank youuu”

“i love you!! mwah!,” yuta gives her a heart and he’s out the door

another slowed version of a song plays, and this time it’s one of taehee’s favorite songs

somebody else by the 1975

“your fifth rose is here!,” doyoung says when he enters the room

taehee smiles as he walks closer, handing her the rose and swaying with her like the first three did

“oppa, you look handsome in a suit,,both angles”

“i know,” he tells her jokingly

“you’re thinking about the food aren’t you?,” doyoung reads her

“is there cake?”

“of course, we got chocolate. there’s also 자장면,” doyoung smiles widely when he notices a glint in taehee’s eyes when he metioned 자장면

“when did you prepare all of this?,” taehee asks, amazed

“i think taeyong had this idea since last night, right when you left we already started preparing ( ◠‿◠ )”

“i like it. it warms my heart, really”

“i’m glad you like it then,” doyoung smiles

“you’re eating your meals, right?”

“yes oppa”

“resting well?”

“yeaaaaa”

“sleeping on time?”

“this is why your contact name on my phone is ‘doyoung eomma’ and not ‘doyoung oppa’”

“i just want you to be healthy, always. try not to get sick, yeah?”

taehee nods, “only if you do the same”

“let’s live long lives”

“let's live long lives,” she repeats with a smile 

dancing with doyoung ended before she knew it, and next thing she knew

a dazzling jaehyun appeared before her 

“my juliet,” he gives her the rose 

“thank you, romeo”

“how are you feeling right now?,” jaehyun asks her once her hand is in his 

“i'm happy...and grateful, for all of you”

“well that’s nice to hear (＾▽＾)”

they both let out soft laughs 

they're so cute :( now that they’re just basking in each other’s presence 

like johnny, jaehyun preferred to simply enjoy the moment than talk 

half because he’s shy 

at one point taehee asks him if he’s cut his hair, to which he denies 

there was more skinship than talking in their relationship 

not in a romantic way but platonically,,,or you could say sibling-y

although some shippers hope for a relationship, most of them are gushing over the brotherliness of jaehyun 

some say maybe it’s because jaehyun’s an only child 

the same goes for taehee,,,she wanted an older brother actually 

but now she has more than one lmao

before jaehyun leaves, he ruffles taehee’s hair and wishes her a happy birthday 

next is jungwoo!!

he’s kinda nervous but brushes it off anyways cause it’s taehee

if anything, they’ll both say or do something weird that’ll make them laugh 

jungwoo had a concept when he entered

the faraway prince courting the popular princess

basically he just kept calling her princess the whole time 

“oh is that your concept? haha”

“i’ve heard of your intelligence from many”

“your cunningness”

“your kind and compassionate heart”

“your witty mouth”

“mY WHAT HAHAHA”

“your diligence and hard work inspires many, including me”

unlike the ones before jungwoo, he ACTUALLY lead her to every corner of the room 

like ballroom waltz or something 

“did you eat before getting here?”

“no :((”

“at least you’ll eat with us, right? eat lots of food later, okay?”

then they were just sharing some inside jokes 

(you can't hear them because they're slightly whispering iT’S THEIR THING YOU KNOW)

you know their dance is over when jungwoo grabs taehee’s face and gives her a long kiss on the cheek

they curtsey to each other and jungwoo is off, giggling 

the next song got taehee like :OO

“i love this band!! (っ˘ω˘ς )”

“going out tonight, changes into something red”

that’s right it’s one direction baby 

mid-verse mark enters the room and when they meet eyes they both smile 

mark lets taehee take the rose first before he clears his throat, making taehee giggle 

“YOURE MAKING THIS AWKWARD”

“IM NOT I JUST DONT KNOW HOW TO DO THIS”

*insert spongebob meme* iM nOt I jUsT dONt kNoW hOW To dO tHiS but takes her elbows so she can wrap her hands around his neck and he puts his hands on her waist

“is this okay,” mark let out a breath when taehee nods 

a few seconds swaying together, mark opens his mouth to say something but shakes his head and closes it 

it looks kinda comical if you're asking me 

taehee: what is on with this boy 

she chuckles, “sTOP MAKING THIS WEIRD!”

mark throws his head back as he playfully groans, smiling 

“it’s just me, relax”

“okay,” and mark looks her in the eye 

markhee stays are thriving ヽ(♡‿♡)ノ

“remember when,,we came into the company?”

“yeah, why?”

“you were how tall? like this *gestures to his hip* tall?”

taehee makes a face before gently kicking his foot

“you're exaggerating,” mark laughs, “shut up im like,,your height now”

“mY hEiGHt??,” he laughs harder 

taehee sweetie theres kind of like,,a height difference

but its her ‘birthday’ so mark just laughs it off 

“what did you do in your schedule earlier?”

“i ate ice cream”

“really? like for the photos”

“yeah, there was a lot of sweets. they had sour belts too”

“you must’ve had a lot of fun then”

“i did (๑˘︶˘๑)),,,but it would nice if you guys would be there too,” mark nods at this 

then mark’s got a look in his eyes that made taehee say, “spit it out”

he licks his lips before telling her not to cringe 

and she's somewhat got an idea of what he's gonna do, so she nods and giggles anyway

mark: *clears his throat* are you from seoul?

taehee, giggling: why?

mark: because i think you're my seol-mate

they both laugh, “okay thats kinda good, i like it”

“kinda good?”

“yea you need to get to my level mr. mark lee”

“sure, 선배님”

then theres a sudden knock on the door which startles the both of them

“thats haechan, isn't it”

“sadly,” they both laugh 

at this point czennies are convinced that they are twins 

like the timing of when they looked at the door?? so in sync

their smiles too ;( 

so before mark leaves, he opens his arms for a hug, ruffling her hair when they part 

and alas, a wILD DONGHYUCK APPEARS ＼(＾▽＾)／

unlike the others, hyuck immediately wraps his arms around taehee’s shoulders and pulls her into a tight hug

laughing, she wraps her arms around his waist and leans her head on his shoulder 

“i love you,” hyuck starts as he sways the both of them 

“i love you too”

“...if we’re still unmarried by the time we retire, i'll marry you okay?”

“you’re still on about that?,” taehee chuckles 

“we’re marrying each other,” he says when she doesn't answer 

later on taehee’s like (・・)

“is this *sniff* is this the cologne i gave you *sniff sniff*”

hicks hums, “it’s about to run out”

“really? you must’ve liked it then..it smells good”

he pulls away and theres this look of disbelief in his face 

like you know that face when he's teasing the members 

its like that uwu he's so cute i love him 

“you don't..you don't know what it smells like?”

“i was trying to test out my skills so i just judged it by the case and the name”

then he runs his tongue along the inside of his cheek like 

hyuck: this girl i swear-

“i guess it worked then,” he just goes along with her cause she's cute 

and he loves her 

so they danced until the song was done 

and hyuck was like ‘blindfold time!! ^-^’

so when he pulled out a blindfold taehee went: oh shit what is that 

her face kinda said everything so hyuck laughed and just told her to go along with it 

she was vvv nervous,,you can tell her grip on hyuck was like really tight 

“oW OW CALM DOWN!! geez HAHA”

when they entered the conference room, taehee immediately said “IS THAT CAKE??”

the other members had to keep their chuckles to themselves until taehee sat down 

hyuck gave her a very wet sweet kiss on the cheek before removing her blindfold 

so when taehee opened her eyes, hyuck took the seat beside her 

on her other side was yuta, taeil, then jungwoo 

meanwhile beside hyuck was johnny, mark, and taeyong 

doyoung was standing in the front with a mic 

“woah woah woah whats this”

and her eyes traveled up to the banner yuta and taeyong made 

in glittery shining letters, it read “OUR PRECIOUS BABY PUMPKIN TAEHEE *heart*”

“BABY PUMPKINNNCDC,” taehee was laughing at the cringiness

then when mark, yuta, and taeyong came to the front she immediately groaned and let her head bump on the table 

“this is gonna be so corny”

“wise men say,,”

“AAFGGGHGHJG”

“only fools rush in,”

“AAAAaaaAaAAaAAAAaaA”

“but i can't help,,” taehee sighs instead and gives in 

at the end of the day, who could resist the mark lee

no one 

“falling in love with you,,” at this point they're all singing along and swaying their arms

meanwhile yuta and taeyong kept laughing at the back 

at one point they slow danced with each other, making the members laugh

they all clapped when mark was finished yay!! 

taehee stood up to give mark a bro hug and a pat on the head 

doyoung: *tap* *tap* mic test mic test 1, 2, 1, 2

“okayyy welcome to taehee’s birthday bash!!”

“BiRtHdAy bASh??!! (´〇｀)”

“first up, opening remarks to be led by jaehyun”

“WOWOWOOWOW *claps hands excitedly*

you notice the grins on the boys’ faces were so happy bc taehee was so responsive yet genuine with her actions 

they’ve truly hit the jackpot with this one 

jaehyun: does the bare minimum such as clearing his throat 

taehee: uR SO CUTE <3

“the sun on a lovely beach shines brightly”

“oooo”

“the early birds chirping happily as they go from flower,,to flower”

“birds go to flowers?”

“mark shh”

“the waves calm, as the kids play on the sand”

“all of this..is because of jeon taehee’s existence”

“wHABJSNAJ”

“the earth will never be at peace without you, so we commemorate this day, december 27,”

at this point everyone’s wheezing 

“its not even december 27 hhhh”

the fact jaehyun’s not breaking character makes it even funnier 

“to celebrate,,the day jeon taehee was brought to this world”

“people say disneyland is the happiest place on earth,”

“BUT CLEARLY THEY’VE NEVER BEEN NEXT TO ME :D”

“but clearly they’ve never been next to you”

taejae soulmates <3

“aAAAA I LOVE THAT HAHAHA”

“it mustve hurt when you fell from heaven, you truly are an angel in disguise”

jaehyun dramatically looks up while a hand is in the air, “but the member’s are here to heal you with our love!! APPLAUSE”

*cue standing ovations and whistles from the members*

meanwhile taehee’s clutching her stomach from laughing too a hard 

“this is so cheesy oh my god *wHEEEEZE*”

next up is taeil, jungwoo, and johnny's dance number!!

the vibe’s similar to the dance they did at yuwin’s bday special 

but this time it’s to britney spears’ “

so they've got taehee laughing a lot more 

to the point she CANT SEE because her eye smile ^-^

she's so precious czennies want to give her the world 

taehee kept shouting that they were cute esp taeil he looks so tiny in between these giants 

when they're done taehee’s in literal tears, “aa i love u guys so much”

blowing of cake yay!!!

the members are laughing because of the look in her eyes 

taehee and food a new ship <3 

hyuck’s cover off happy birthday makes a powerful comeback again 

mark’s just shaking his head at him 

so while they're all distributing slices of cake 

markhyuck takes a stand at the front and they look like they're about to make a toast 

lmao they are

“so this is for our lovely taehee”

“joanieee”

“you've worked hard along with us on this beautiful journey,,you never show us that you're tired and you are consistently selfless, compassionate, and kind with all of us,, we can never ask for a better sister”

mark: LOVE YOU *throws a finger heart*

even if that was short, taehee still finds her self smiling from ear to ear 

god she loved these boys so much 

closing remarks time!! aka picture time 

hyuck and yuta were getting playful with taehee so they swiped a but of icing from the cake then onto her nose and cheek 

she just nose scrunched at them uwu they love her so much 

aaaaa this is so long 

i cannot express enough how much the members love taehee

she has been their friend, sister, mentor, cheerleader, etc. for so many years 

they love her to death 

so as they all said cheese for the photo, their love for each other shines brightly through their eyes and smiles 

in this journey, it’s all or nothing <3 

[janetbrown711]

. There’s a difference between being brave and being suicidal Louie webby

“You excited for tonight?” Webby asked as she adorned a set of her Granny’s pearls and styled her hair into a nice and neat updo that reminded Louie of old photos of a younger and happier Beakley, but God knows he’d never tell her that.

“Excited? Try ‘kinda dreading’. I have to stand around for at least a half-hour saying hi to countless, and I mean countless, duck cousins. Nothing could be more dreadful about this wedding,” Louie complained.

“Oh come on Lou. Where’s your bravery? It’s your family, what is the worst that could happen?” She asked.

“There is a difference between being brave and being suicidal Webs. I am not going to say ‘hi’ to every single one of those weirdos. I swear, some of them might actually be lunatics. I just don’t understand them,” Louie shook his head.

“You’re so dramatic,” Webby rolled her eyes, “I’m sure it’s just your lack of understanding that makes you paranoid. And besides, one could very easily consider Donald or your brothers lunatics so maybe don’t be so quick to judge,” Webby warned.

“Alright, fine. I’ll at least shake hands but I swear if they try to say more than small talk I might have to leave,” Louie said.

“I’ll take what I can get,” Webby kissed his cheek before heading off to the bathroom.

“Oh, and don’t forget, you have to try to talk to Granny like a human being tonight. No being an awkward robot around her,” She added.

“What?! You never told me I have to do that! She scares the crap out of me,” he proclaimed.

“Louie, she’s gonna be your Granny-in-law tomorrow. I think it’s best if you start having normal conversations before it’s too late,” Webby sighed. Louie pondered what exactly she meant by that,

but he still couldn’t grip a reality where he wasn’t at least a little bit afraid of Mrs. Beakley at all times.

After all, she wasn’t necessarily the warmest person when they told her they were dating, or when they told her they were engaged.

“Fine, I’ll... try. But only for you,” Louie sighed.

“My hero,” she popped her head out the door just to smile at him. That stupid cute smile made him want to actually actually mean it, but Beakley really was scary.

This was going to be a long, and difficult evening.

.o0o.

They stood at the door for what felt like an eternity, even Webby couldn’t deny that. Her one regret was wearing heels, bringing flats, but not bringing them to the dinner because “she’s endured torture before”. Biggest lie she ever convinced herself of.

There were somehow many, many more members of the Duck family than Louie remembered. There was Gladstone and whoever he was dating today, Fethry and his brother Louie had never met Abner, this guy named Gus, Donald and Daisy, Della, this old lady who he vaguely remembered someone telling him was his Great Aunt or something??? Her name was Lulubelle and she was a lot like Fethry. Figured they were related somehow. There were also a ton of other people that he just straight up couldn’t recall. He glanced at Webby every once in a while for support but it didn’t look like she knew them either.

The biggest problem of the night though? Dewey was drunk before he even got there (along with hypeman and apparently boyfriend Dante) and Della and Daisy were having some sort of squabble about arm wrestling, which put Donald in the most awkward position in history. Also, Launchpad crashed into someone's car

"This is going to be fun, right Louie?” She asked him, elbowing him slightly when she saw the grimace on his face as he was flipping through what was going on in his brain.

“Right,” he gave back a very forced smile. Webby rolled her eyes.

“Just behave yourself. We don’t need two drunk Duck brothers. And if I have to wake you from a hangover, I swear, I will use a bucket of ice and make it as painful as possible,” she threatened.

“Okay, okay, I get it,” He chuckled, but Webby was not assumed. “I’ll have fun, it’s cool. I can be charming. I bet I can fix all of tonight's problems in no time.” That made Webby laugh.

“I’m sorry Lou, but there are just some things you can’t fix. Besides, we have a schedule. Toasts and food and stuff, remember? Just keep it cool,” Webby reminded.

“Right, keep it cool,” He nodded slowly. Together, Louie and Webby took their seats in the middle of a long table that allowed them to look at the ocean of guests (some that he honestly didn’t recall inviting to the dinner because this was supposed to be smaller than the wedding, but he had let Donald send out the invitations so maybe that was his doing). He had sat down for no more than three seconds when a drunk Dewey stumbled towards him and swung his arm around his brother.

“You know what I love about you bro?” He grinned cheekily.

“Dewey, I swear to god-”

“It’s that you jsut.. you’re so... you so natural. Like no other. Original gangster right here. you lie like legend. I lovvvveeee that,” he said.

“That’s great Dewey. Drink some water,” he handed him a water bottle, which Dewey accepted before Dante swiped it away.

“Uh uh uh! No water til’ 12. We made a deal,” Dante teased.

“A deal?” Louie’s eye twitched as he turned to Dewey.

“Sorry brosef. I’mma gonner,” he kissed his fingers and did a peace sign before running off with Dante. Louie shook his head.

“Guess I’ll just ask Huey to give tonights toast instead of Dewey tonight,” Louie sighed.

“That sounds fair,” Webby nodded along, eating a piece of bread.

“I’ll go tell him. Text me when the food gets here, I’m starving,” Louie stood.

“Good luck. I believe in you,” they shared a brief kiss before Louie found his brother with Violet and Lena in the corner.

“You guys still working on those bets?” he asked snidely.

“What do we look like? Of course,” Huey rolled his eyes.

“What’s the status?” Louie asked.

“Lena has won three, with a total of $25 since the shrimp doesn’t suck, I won one for a total of $5 for Donald only tripping once in the past 5 hours, and Violet is holding the lead with a total of $35 for one bet of Gladstone finding over 10 20 dollar bills today alone. I’m really hoping Dewey leaves his drunk shenanigans to tomorrow because I really need this win,” he whispered that last part to Louie.

“We can hear you, you know that Red? And you’re right. You should be afraid. Be very, very afraid,” Lena smirked.

“Speaking of that, can I borrow fifty dollars?” Huey grinned to Louie.

“No, ask Gladstone if you want money, he always has a lot to spare. I do need to talk to you though,” Louie grabbed his brother’s arm and pulled him aside.

“I need you and Dewey to switch when you’re doing your best man speeches,” he explained.

“Wh-what? Why? It’s not like Dewey is dead, he’s just drunk. He’ll be fiiiiiine,” Huey tried to escape.

“No no, it has to be you Huey. This is our event and Dewey cannot give a speech that hammered,” Louie said.

“My speech isn’t even ready! It’s only one paragraph so far!” Huey pulled out a crumpled and sweaty piece of paper from his suit pocket.

“Bro, I don’t care. If that’s what you have to work with, it’s what you have to work with. If you don’t want to give the speech, sober Dewey before dinner is done,” Louie challenged.

“You and I both know that’s a fool's errand,” Huey scoffed.

“Fine, then give the speech,” he crossed his arms.

“Okay, okay. I’ll fix Dewey,” Huey decided.

“Great, you’re fantastic,” Louie shot finger guns before quickly getting out of there and back to his seat.

“So? How’d he take it?” Webby asked before taking a drink of water.

“He said he’d rather sober up Dewey so I’m letting him,” He grinned at his fiancee.

“You’re insane,” Webby noted.

“Oh, I’m not insane. Just... a visionary on a mission. I did say I could fix all of tonight's problems,” he grinned even more.

“That’s what that was about? Alright, go ahead. I’d like to see how this all turns out,” Webby held back a laugh, but Louie noticed.

“Why? Do you not believe in me?” he questioned.

“Louie, of course, I believe in you. Just not about this,” she quickly took another drink.

“Oh yeah? Bet.”

“Excuse me?” Webby turned her head.

“Bet. If I don’t solve all of tonight's problems then... I won’t wear my favorite hoodie for two whole months. And if I do... you can’t pick all the restaurants we go to on our honeymoon. I’ll at least pick every other night,” he proposed.

“Oooh, that’s intriguing...” She pondered it. “Make it three and we have a deal.”

"What about the schedule?" Louie asked.

"That's on you hon," she raised her hands in the air. Louie considered this deal a moment longer before nodding.

“Fine, it's a deal,” they shook hands.

“You’re so gonna lose,” she smirked at him.

“No, you,” Louie smirked right back. He kissed her on the cheek before running off to who knows where.

“Webbigail, where on earth is Louie running off to?” Beakley asked, appearing to have been just within earshot the whole time.

“To go do the truest of fool's errands; Try to calm down and fix the Duck family.”

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7

[glitchkilldelphinixdj]

Mild Discourse: Of All the Things (Thesis of Anger)

Foreward: This is usually to point out discrepancies of what some things were called out to me by a different individual whose name shall not be stated upon this. This was nearly a month ago when this shit ass "barring" happened to me on three places on a famous app which I will never mention also. I had cried in frustration upon after this shit issue.

I will only mention what the discrepancies are, since I have been noticing after screenshotting of the reasons I saw, were either a bit correct at some parts or incorrect. I'm not gonna show the screenshot either since it's best to not get any criticism. I will point out my own truth in reaction to the statements seen in the screenshot privately. Each one quoted sentence is of the said problematic thing about me, and the paragraph is how I am actually answering and reacting to the said problem as honest and fair as possible.

1 "My family is on the spectrum and doesn't act like you."

That's one thing that infuriated me the most because I am a high func autie with ADHD, but each individual with autism with and/or without comorbidities has a different personality and family background, depending on where they're from. I came from a family who had a military background, specifically the Greek Navy from my dad, plus my maternal grandfather worked as a naval CB in Korea during the Cold War for the United States, prior to his death in Janurary 2019. This sometimes explain my rough, coarse, militaristic personality (henceforth why Heavenly/Monster Triangle Sciences exist and Hellspire Sciences exist, two different military factions) a bit. Plus, being in a rural community in the Southeast United States, there's not much opportunity to socialize in real life, so I pretty much veer to the Internet for socialization since there's not many local individuals who I trust.

2 "You are self-serving and arrogant"

The only times I get into self-reliance is when stuff goes into dire situations. The arrogance is from all the bullies I had encountered in the past in school times when I was a kid. I had tried to play nice with others at least and try to thicken the plot of the HTS and HSS factions during my times here, henceforth a little of the militaristic behavior I have involving order. I also pretty much had faked some of my happiness or empathy because I am trying not to put in any facade of sadness within. I somehow come up obnoxious and rude at times because I'm trying to be nice, but it goes the opposite direction of what is intended.

3 "You need to see a therapist."

Not when the 'Rona is around. The only last time I ever saw a therapist was in Georgetown of last year in Spring once over to see what I have: Autism with ADHD and some instances of paranoia. Only people who have very serious problems would usually seek therapeutic help and interventions to improve themselves and I am not one of those individuals. I've only been to speech and occupational therapy in school as a kid until I was 12, so don't assume things out of the blue that I haven't even been to a therapist. I've taken Adderall to relieve of my ADHD issues before in school, but it made my mentality so fucked up and losing my creativity, so post-school, I had to find ways to regain my creativity where I lost it in school. That's why I made a lot more OCs than what others usually made because my creativity levels amped up after I graduated from high school, away from the bad chaos, some of them were remakes of my old OCs I did in middle school (Jamine being one of my bare examples), but the Adderall overtook me of my creativity.

4 "Why would a couple of characters do self-harm on a budding f/f relationship?" (trigger warning)

Do you mean that budding m/m relationship of two different male characters, the self destructive behavior clinged by it involving with the use my two female OCs, Munphine and Jamine (pronounced Juh-mine, Jamie for short)? Listen here, I already had pretty much stopped that shit a few weeks prior to the barring and several weeks after the barring cos it was getting a bit too boring and a bit out of context, so that shit is quitted out. Both these characters had bits of dark backgrounds, pretty much involving both of their families (Jamie, involved with the death of her father and also her mother Ryuke being buried alive in a metal coffin, Munphine, whose parents whose faces were beautiful had shamed her for having an ugly facial appearance and kicked her from her town, so to cover her mouth from others to see, she uses bandages to cope that.), in general. Or do you mean the one involving my stable B8 Ghost Variant Yellow Missingno OC, Vesparada, and some other female character a few months ago? If it's already stopped weeks and/or months ago, it's already stopped. Period.

5 "You bragged about treatment of a physical problem I had."

What I was meant to say was that a medicine is suppose to help the problem, not actually treat it altogether, though with some side effects. It was an unintentionally misspoken statement, because my mind was in dire thought mode and accidentally typed too fast. I shouldn't have stated about a said medicine in the first place. I wished I thought and knew better about that. I'll leave that behind.

6 "You had guilt tripped in someone's place multiple times."

Most of the guilt tripping was unintentional at most because it's either me trying to come up with at least a statement/sentence and/or if it was a dire situation involving a decision. Some auties, like me, do have some problems making decisions, and at times, I unintentionally chose the wrong decision without thinking twice, though I do mostly think twice before I speak at some non-dire times. Sometimes I usually am impatient to my peers because I'm just excited over certain fun things coming up within my sight. I mostly never intentionally guilt tripped, lest if it's anyone I hate to be fair. I do have occasional preconditions that sometimes come in also.

7 "You had shrugged shoulders on a relationship with two different individuals."

This is me after being told at to stop and the mild shrugging of my shoulders is usually saying a way of, "Okay, I will stop digging into the nitty gritty of a certain relationship and let them do their thing." , as per se. By the words of ebony and ivory, that means I drop my guard of thought and accept it. It's been hard and rough for me to have at least a bit of attention during an RP story. I know that was nearly a couple months ago and it's best not to bring that up, since that is just an old thing. I'm a person whom does go by the cross a bit, being Greek Orthodox and all, but I'm trying my best not to scare anyone from advancing their creativity.

8 "You have been playing around with a victim."

Could you at least please elaborate this said victim and who it was? I didn't know I ever even played around with a victim nor I would recall it. It would be better for me to acknowledge who it is. I cannot fully understand certain things sometimes, lest if it's fully elaborated and stated to me. Who was this victim and how long? That's one thing that I am asking of.

Conclusion: Here on out, after the barring, I have been playing about in my garden, taking care of my own pets and whatnot to live my fullest life. It's been a bit of zen away of what happened. At least I am honestly covering what had been said and stated to me why have I been nixed from these places to others, and telling my actual side to what they had said with my utmost, undivided attention. I pretty much rest my case what I am telling my side of the actual allegations against me. There is no cover-ups or lies whatsoever of what had I said. I am literally straight-up speaking this in my own words. This ends the conclusion.

[threeletterslife]

hi! I'm a small writer on wattpad and I was just wondering if you had any useful writing tips for me and other writers? I love your works and I would really love to know how you write so well! ♡

hello!!

i’d love to give writing tips! thank you so much for your kind words! but i’d say most of my writing skills come from trial and error and experience LOL but here’s what i really have to say:

GRAMMAR

i’m a huge grammar freak when it comes to writing and nothing’s a bigger turn off than reading a supposed emotional scene and spotting a huge ass grammar error lol

i’d suggest (if you aren’t already familiar with grammar) to study up on it

OR you can use sites such as grammarly and hemingway to catch mistakes for you (but they’re not always 100% accurate)

i feel like grammar is over-looked a lot in writing or maybe i’m just sensitive

even the simple wrong usage of the em dash triggers me these days lol (remember, it’s not ‘--’ it’s ‘—’ THERE’S A DIFFERENCE)

immaculate grammar means there’s one less thing that you have to worry about when putting your thoughts on-screen (or paper)

i studied grammar by buying an ACT test prep book LOL but you can probably learn it for free online

INSPIRATION

i think inspiration is really, REALLY important when it comes to writing

it’s always a struggle to come up with an original idea and to flesh it out is even harder at times

world-building is particularly a challenge (especially if that world is set in a futuristic dystopian world)

so i suggest you take time to get inspired (listen to music, get some fresh air, spend time with your loved ones, watch a movie, read a book etc)

writing always comes easier when you feel like doing it

once inspiration hits, don’t hesitate, DON’T DOUBT YOURSELF, just write

write first, edit later (that’s the #1 rule tbh)

gaining confidence through your inspiration is just as important as your writing itself

the writer is only as good as she thinks she is

if you get an idea, DO NOT WAIT TO FIND A NOTEBOOK TO WRITE IT DOWN. 85% of the time, you’ll forget the idea and that is the WORST MF feeling in the world. so please, write it on your phone, piece of scratch paper, on your hand—literally anything

CHARACTERS

my FAVORITE part!! i absolutely love coming up with characters

my biggest rule of thumb is to make a character that would actually fucking exist in the world LOL

well, i guess it depends on the plot or your story, but most times, your story will work better when the characters are realistic

remember, people want to connect to your characters (why else would they want to read about them??)

your characters should be balanced. there is no such thing as a perfect person. (also no such thing as an evil person,,, unless they’re psychologically damaged.) good traits come with bad traits. in fact, their good traits may even BE their bad traits!!

i.e. diligence. let’s say your character is diligent. it’s a good thing, perhaps. they may have a stable job and high income because they work very hard. but, in the end, their diligence turns them into a workaholic and that may cause problems with their relationships with loved ones

i always tell people who are starting off as writers to try to base characters off of the people around them (without making it insanely obvious, of course)—it’s more like picking and choosing traits from a personality pool LOL

if you’re writing romance, the character chemistry should be the plot of the story, which means you’ll have to make sure their personalities don’t exactly clash too much

here’s a character template i made that you can use (i actually use this character template for EVERY story)

PLOT

if you’re starting off as a writer, i can’t emphasize enough how important it is to PLOT

your story will literally flop if you don’t plot (cough cough that one wp ff after)

filler chapters or scenes are ALL RIGHT!! (that’s a common misconception) but they’re only okay IF they offer some insight about the characters’ personalities OR if they deepen the relationship between two characters (probably the future romantic couple)

i personally bullet plot (which means i just sit down and just word-vomit the contents of the story in a bullet-point form)

but the way people plot really differs, so i’ll leave it up to you

here’s a plot template i made that you can use (i don’t use this template very often anymore—only for longer stories, but it helps for beginners!)

sometimes, it works to leave the ending of your story unplotted (but only if you haven’t yet a single clue on how to end your story)

i find that once you write your characters a bit, it becomes easier to figure out what they would do in the future (and thus configure the ending)

A VERY IMPORTANT PART IN PLOT ACTUALLY INVOLVES THE CHARACTERS

your characters MAKE the plot

their choices will DEFINE the plot

if you had different characters, your story would turn out very differently

so always make sure your characters are CONSISTENT (unless they have subtle character development)

i.e. say you have a character who is sort of a curmudgeon lol and they’re living as a recluse and they hate people and romance. you can’t suddenly have them fall in love with the hot neighbor next door. you have to shape the plot so that the story is about the main character learning to understand others and willing to love someone who’s not herself

i.e. but say that you have a character who is a romantic-freak and idealizes romance. when the hot neighbor next door moves in, she’d be all over him (and planning the wedding the moment she sees him lol). the story would probably be about her learning how to be level-headed and lose just a few of her unrealistic ideals. the story would be about maturity, overall. there is such a huge difference in the plot just by switching ONE character

DIALOGUE

i just felt like dialogue had to be addressed because i think it’s SOOO important

dialogue makes up the relationship between two characters. you can REALLY tell where they lie on the line of friendship/relationship just by reading the way they talk to each other

a rule of thumb is to READ the dialogue out loud as you type it out

if you can read it out loud without thinking ‘well that’s not fucking realistic’ or ‘that sounds like a robot not a human’ then you’re usually good

there’s nothing wrong with repeating the word ‘said’ or ‘say(s)’

i’d actually say use other descriptions such as ‘yells,’ ‘whispers,’ ‘sighs’ sparingly. because no one on planet earth sighs 47 times in one conversation

i.e. “you’re not dead yet,” she says.

this is simple. it works. but you can make it better

i.e. “you’re not dead yet, huh?” she scoffs.

even better

i.e. “you’re not dead yet, huh?” she scoffs, shooting him a disdainful look before turning the other way in disgust

great!

try to split up long quotes!!

i.e. “it was always blue outside where i’m from. sometimes we had scheduled rainy days for the private gardens and stuff. you know, at least the food there was good. way better than the crap we're forced to eat here,” he says

it’s just a huge quote block right now

the words blend in with each other

and honestly, if you skim through it, you probably forgot what he’s even talking about lol

but we can fix that

i.e. “it was always blue outside where i’m from,” he says, gazing up rather sadly at the darkened gray skies of the run-down city. “sometimes we had scheduled rainy days for the private gardens and stuff.” he shakes his head in disbelief as if he can’t accept how desolate his home had deteriorated into over the past few years. “you know, at least the food there was good. way better than the crap we’re forced to eat here.” he glares at the muddy bowl of mystery soup he had neglected to touch since it was served

the paragraph is significantly longer, but you’re able to visualize what is happening in this scene much better!!

dialogue is my favorite part of any story LOL so i’m always open to giving more advice if you need it! 

NARRATION

oh god this is so fucking important

i write in 2nd pov PRESENT tense and i’ve been consistent with this for over a year now

it’s important to probably choose a tense to write in; you typically have two options: present or past tense

i personally prefer present tense because it gives the feel of the story unfolding right before your eyes in a very linear way

past tense kind of means things have ALREADY happened, so you have more leeway to jump around on the timeline of your story

i recommend writing present tense if you’re writing action, especially, but otherwise, it’s completely up to you

just STICK to one tense. nothing is more confusing than reading a sentence with two different tenses lol

i.e. he sighed as he looks over at the fireplace with deep sorrow in his eyes. “now i’ll never fucking qualify for the championships,” he gripes as he rubbed his hand frustratingly over his forehead

like... what?? pick one and GO WITH IT

i.e. he sighed as he looked over at the fireplace with deep sorrow in his eyes. “now i’ll never fucking qualify for the championships,” he griped as he rubbed his hand frustratingly over his forehead

OR

i.e. he sighs as he looks over at the fireplace with deep sorrow in his eyes. “now i’ll never fucking qualify for the championships,” he gripes as he rubs his hand frustratingly over his forehead

READ

i cannot emphasize this enough

READ. like literally if you don’t have time to read, you don’t have time to write periodt

reading is so SO important when you write

if you haven’t yet found your writing style, reading will SAVE you

you need to read your favorite works, analyze why you love them so much and try to emulate that writing style

after you’ve tried emulating the writing style, try to tweak things to YOUR taste until you’ve developed your very own style

it’s not easy developing your writing style. i’ve been writing for a decade give or take and i refound my writing style like two years ago LOL

the process takes patience and diligence

you don’t even always have to read good books, either

literally sometimes pick up a bad book just to see why it’s so bad and make sure you don’t make that mistake in YOUR writing lol

also, you get better at writing when you begin to edit others’ writings—it makes you self aware of the mistakes that YOU might make

RESEARCH

if you’re writing about territory you’re unfamiliar with, RESEARCH IS GOING TO BE YOUR BEST FRIEND

please don’t write about heavy concepts involving mental health, gang violence etc. without either researching it or experiencing it

your job as a writer is NOT to relay false, unrealistic information to your readers

sure, your story is FICTIONAL, but that gives you no right to romanticize something dark/serious for your pure enjoyment

it doesn’t matter if it’s fictional or not. some things are not meant to be written about in a light-hearted, romanticized way

there’s no such thing as enough research

i’ve underresearched a lot of topics that i’ve written, and i actually regret it looking back because i know for sure that if i wrote it with a little bit more knowledge, it’d become better and more realistic and OVERALL MORE READABLE

there is always more research available online. it’s fucking 2020. use your resources online lol 

CONFIDENCE

it takes time to become a good writer

no one fucking wakes up one day and can write like a god

so you can always be in peace when you’re not satisfied with your writing

because 1) there is someone who is worse than you out there lol 2) you will IMPROVE (only if you put in the effort) 3) you may not be in the mood to write today, so take a break!! (it doesn’t necessarily mean you can’t write; you just need time and inspo)

confidence comes with experience

experience comes with perseverance

keep that in mind

you will become a great writer one day, and when that day comes, you will know it. you’ll feel it

the day will come when you’ll be able to sit down and write advice for others. if you can teach it, that’s when you know you know it (:

so keep writing and you’ll get there!

idk if this rambling even helped, but my shorter writing advice post is here! wish you a good time on wp!

[venus-says]

Kamen Rider Ghost Episodes 17-50

Ghosts are spooky.

Coming out later than it should, it is finally here, the final review on Kamen Rider Ghost. I avoided writing this review as much as I could, but if I wanted to move on I had to get this out so, here we are.

Yes, by my tone you probably already guessed that I didn't like Ghost. But it's not really that I disliked it, is more that I didn't feel anything for it?

If you asked me to describe Ghost in one word that word would be: forgettable. Because at the end of the day Ghost hasn't left an impression on me, and if it weren't for all the notes I made and the screenshots I took I wouldn't remember a single thing about this show, and it's not because time has passed, because I still remember W, heck I still remember a lot of thing from Fourze and Drive that are seasons that I hate. But for Ghost, I couldn't remember a thing. To write this post I had to read my notes five times, while looking at the screenshots I took, and with the Wikia page open so that I could locate myself, I also needed a help from YouTube to remember a few of the scenes.

But giving credit where its due, my experience with Ghost wasn't just a bunch of boredom and confusion, it had a few good moments, in particular the second part of it. Yes, it had its flaws, most of what I mentioned in my first post was present, but they had new additions that were interesting and that, judging by my notes, got me very engaged. Sadly, when the third portion started all that was interesting was dropped and what we got was a big pile of mess that didn't make a lot of sense, and that had no meaning at all, at least none that I could see hidden in all that madness. That final arc made things look very empty and without a purpose. And it's sad that it went that way because, and I'm gonna sound repetitive here, they had great concepts and pretty damn good visuals but the execution lacked a lot.

I don't really have a direction to line up my thoughts about everything that happened in these 30+ episodes so I'll do the same thing I did for Gaim and go character by character here, starting with the Riders:

Takeru was bland (look at me repeating myself again), to me he had no personality at all. He was very wasted, like the dude died and he's a ghost, that was supposed to be cool, and it wasn't. They could use his backstory with religion play a part in this, but the most it did for him was seeing him meditating here and there, the fact he grew up in a temple didn't make much difference for him. They could've made some cool stuff with his dad, have him like a spiritual guide or something, but no the most we got was a few scenes that lacked emotion and it wasn't fun to see. And another repeated complaint, the number of times he died and came back and had his countdown restarted was a joke, just like his motivational speeches that are generic as fuck and never hit the mark, at least with me.

There was a single time where I started feeling like Takeru was interesting and it was when he started being a bitch and all heroic Eyecons left him because they couldn't sense the heroicness on him or something like that. I thought that moment would give him a personality and it could start a journey of persona growing as he would have to gather all Eyecons again. But then the show dumped a bucket of pig's blood on my face and made all Eyecons get back to him in the same episode and the most we got in the development department was those horrible scenes where the Eyecons would drag Takeru inside them to have vague conversations that are meant to sound deep and smart but that only sound dumb (just like me in this blog). 

Makoto... was useless. I know this is a running gag about secondary riders, but I never felt that SO MUCH like I did with Makoto. The dude did nothing, this whole time. He got controlled by the enemies, AGAIN, then we know his also kind of a ghost because his body is in the Ganma's dimension, but that was just a convenience to give him his power-up, then he spends some time doing nothing just to bump with a side-plot about him having copies of himself that pretty much goes nowhere because most of the times the copies only interact with him and it's just a waste of time. And don't get me started on the implications that he loves his sister more than he should because that's a disgusting hole I don't wanna get in because I don't want this post to become as long as a scientific article.

Alain was definitely my favorite of the riders, I dare say my favorite member of this whole cast. His story is rough, I admit it's very hard to see anything interesting on him at the start. But when all shit goes down with his family and he gets his "redemption arc" it's a true delight to see him. His whole thing with the Takoyaki lady was very pretty and very emotional and it was definitely the high point of the season to me, it really hit me hard seeing the lady die, and I understand that this is a show for kids and they don't wanna be sad and gloomy all the time but I really think the show needed more moments like this, you know? Make us really think about death, and how that affects the living. It's a shame that in the third act Alain had to deal with the whole mess with his family and seeing his own people being pulverized for no reason at all because it felt that they traded something more unique to a very generic thing.

Moving to side characters, Akari remained consistently interesting, of course, I think they could've used her way more seeing that she's supposed to be the scientific side in a very spiritual show, but it felt like they only used her science background when it was convenient for them, they didn't make much of a discussion. Regardless of that I still like her, I like how she's not a romantic interest, she's somewhat very proactive, and even though he sucks at it she does kick some ass. Sadly most of the time they just make her the Straight Man to Onari who's one of the worst characters ever because he's annoying as hell, he's character is very flat-lined, he doesn't have an arc, he doesn't change, he's just there for bad comedy. Heck that guy who's an apprentice in the temple, the one that has the mom with the lamen shop, I think Shibuya is his name, he has more of a character than Onori, he even has more of a character than Makoto's sister who took over the role of the token girl and as a token girl she only serves to be Makoto's motivation and Alain's romantic pair and has nothing of her own.

We also had Cubi and the other Mozart Ganma that were a very interesting concept of a MOTW who develops a personality that is a leftover from their "human counterpart" in the Ganma world, but instead of making something cool with it they just drop the concept, the two go away and disappear for a big chunk of the show just to come back at the end for a very small participation if I'm remembering it correctly and it's just a disappointment.

Closing the good guys' side are Yurusen and Edith. I said Yurusen was annoying at the beginning but that little thing grew on me, also the revelation at the end that Yurusen was actually a cat makes it impossible for me to dislike it so... the same can't be said about Edith. I'm sorry but I hate the guy, more or less because I don't get him. Like, he's supposed to be a double agent? But he always seems so shady to both sides so it can mean that he has his own agenda and that he's helping both sides in order to get what he wants but nothing ever comes out of it and it's just frustrating.

I was planning on doing a section about the villains and go on each one of them, but their plotline is so confusing, I didn't understand it while watching it and I most definitely won't be able to do this based only in my confused notes so I'll just bundle them up in a single paragraph.

So basically their thing is basically an alien invasion plot, their world is bad so they're trying to invade Earth and take over. It seems like a simple plot, but the way they do this is confusing as hell. To begin with, there's that Demia project that on paper sounds amazing but when you have Igor as the head of the project it just makes for something that is really hard to watch and pay attention to because he's head-on-head with Onari trying to see who's the more annoying, and the show seems more concerned in making him have a gag with women hitting him rather than explaining what is going on with this plan. Then on top of that, we have the political/familiar drama with Alain's family that I couldn't care less because they didn't bother to explain well what goes on in this family. And it all just becomes messier when Adel gets to power and the Ganmeizers become a thing because it feels like one of those things that came out of nowhere and they're way too overpowered but they still get defeated in a regular basis somehow. And then they all become a god-like entity or something at the end, and I really don't know what to make out of this. Honestly, if you watched Ghost and understood how this progression happened please explain to me, I need answers.

I feel like I talked a lot and at the same time that I didn't write a single word. There are so many other things in this show that I want to complain, like those ridiculous possessions the Eyecons do, that random idol-centric episode, how inconsistent they are about the difficulty of getting to the Ganma world, how Alain's sister can become a rider but she just gets her ass kicked and we never see her in action again, the way Takeru's dad in so keen on putting so many responsibilities into someone who was just a kid and how they wanted to make him be a chosen one, some of the portrayals of historical figures that seem kinda offensive at some points, the excuses for power-ups, and so on and so forth. But I gotta be honest my energy is starting to run down so I think I'll wrap up here, I know there's a lot else that happens but I pretty much said everything I had to say anyway so I think I made my case and there's no reason to make this post longer than it already is.

Now I'm curious, what are your thoughts on Ghost? Do you agree? Disagree? Should I have watched the show again before making this review? Let me know in the comments. If everything goes right this week I should have the post about the Ghost movies up as well, that'll probably be better since I won't be working from my bad memory. In any case, stay healthy, stay safe, never stop resisting, thank you so much for reading, and until the next time, see ya~