#those tiktoks were happening simultaneously

[astraystayyh]

skz quotes series masterlist

these are the fics i am currently working on, where the quote is part of the dialogue or it inspired the fic as a whole!! brainstorming these was very fun, i hope you'll enjoy reading it <3 2/8 done.

chan x reader. soulmates!au. strangers to lovers.

in a world where you can only see colors once you meet your designated soulmate, you already know that you and chan weren't destined for another. but maybe, just maybe, the stars were wrong about you both.

"on purpose. i love him on purpose." - Casey Mcquinston.

Echoes of love- minho x reader. lovers to (one sided) strangers. memory loss trope. [posted]

if given the choice to, would you love minho again? yes, you would've once said in a heartbeat. but now, you aren't sure of your response anymore.

"to love someone is to firstly confess, I'm prepared to be devastated by you." - Billy-Ray Belcourt.

changbin x reader. fwbs with so much emotional and physical tension.

things were clear and simple between you and changbin- a strictly physical relationship with no strings attached. until those same threads bursted at the seams, making you question everything you thought you knew about him.

"if i kissed you right now, i don't think I'd be able to stop." - unknown. & "please forget your scarf in my life and come back later for it" - Mikko Harvey

hyunjin x reader. art students. forced proximity. slow burn. hanahaki disease!au.

working on an assigned art project for three months with hyunjin is an easy task, right? not so much when you're both exactly what the other is afraid of, and simultaneously, terribly longing for.

"f i loved you less i might be able to talk about it more." - Jane Austen.

Volcano- han x reader. enemies to friends to lovers. uni au. [posted]

you've never gotten along with han, your mutual prejudices ruining any prospect of friendship between you both. but you slowly realize that you are more similar than what you originally thought- your darkness recognizing his, and his light yearning for yours.

"I'll take care of you. it's rotten work. not to me, not if it's you." - Anne Carson.

felix x reader. exes to lovers. second chances. [au is yet to be determined]

in which you meet your ex felix years down the road, and you realize that maybe, just maybe, the love never truly deserted your heart.

"for a while it was love, wasn't it? for me, it was love." - Unknown.

seungmin x reader. best friends to lovers with a taste of unrequited love.

seungmin believed he was content with only being your friend. of being the one picking up pieces of you that others carelessly broke. but in the depths of his bruised heart, he desperately needed you to stitch him back together, for once.

"oh god, please. please. love me. love me. desperation sits heavy on my tongue." - a.m.

jeongin x reader. strangers to lovers.

jeongin hated the commute he took daily from his hometown to his work in Seoul. Until the day you stepped in the train and sat on the seat facing him, changing his view of this train ride, and his life.

"on the train we swapped seats, you wanted the window and i wanted to look at you." - Mahmoud Darwish

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

the taglist for this series is open, there is no set schedule nor a particular order. comment or send me an ask if you want to be added. (general taglist is also open :))

p.s: if u happen to know whose the owner of these quotes, please tell me. most of them come from tiktok slideshows ajdjdh

[fernlessbastard]

So, what's the deal with this tnt duo art?

I've explained it in my reblog of this post, but I've decided to copy this over to a brand new post as well, because especially with qsmp happening I'm sure we have many newer people here who don't get what's the deal with this piece

Ok so first off: the artist is _olga.exe_ on Instagram (I think also on twitter but i don't use Twitter so you'll have to check that one yourself)

To the best of my understanding this art just came out around June 2021, which was immediately after the first Revivedbur/Quackity interaction. The first two or so months the ship was exclusively seen as a crack ship - I'm not fully certain why, I think it's just that quackbur before wasn't all that known and popular, so it seemed like it came out of nowhere to the majority of the internet (which, it didn't, holy shit, those sluts have been so gay with each other for so long). It also was a time when most people only began realising that ccQuackity was capable of serious lore, which most likely added to how the ship was seen. Even I myself actually was very hesitant to bring it up to my partner, when I began slowly getting into it - of course while simultaneously deluding myself that it's nothing more than a crack ship for me (@octobre-ackedia oh would you look at how we ended up--).

This art was one of the first pieces that were fully serious, and couldn't be construed in any way shape or form as /p, so it got picked up by people on twitter and memed on. Around September 2021 tntblr began reclaiming it (and if I remember correctly we had a boom of posts sharing the original artist about that time).

In this surge of new people beginning to ship those two that's been happening for the past year or so, I need you all to remember that quackbur started off first as a very underground ship that almost no-one spoke of, and then became a crack ship. The header on my blog doesn't come from a "ha ha funny" self deprecating meme. #twquackburshipping was a tag that someone seriously used to tag a post about how Eret commented on some tntduo/r tiktok.

I get how easy it is to forget how anti-mainstream of a ship quackbur used to be (or simply miss that, if you're newer - which, for the record, no shame, I'm happy to see the new faces!), considering ccQuackity's endorsement of it in the last months of dsmp, not to mention what's happening on qsmp, but all those "omg I'm a quackbur shipper ha ha don't hate me ha I'm cringe I know" jokes used to genuinely not be jokes something like 1,5 years ago.

I hope this explains it thoroughly, and to everyone a little bit newer to the ship: welcome! Glad to see you here, remember to have fun, and if you've got any questions, feel free to ask me :]]

[lazywitchling]

Alright, here we go. My review for The Dabbler's Guide to Witchcraft by Fire Lyte

Final rating: ??/10 - it broke my numbers system.

TL;DR - I like the book. I'm angry at the author. It's great for new practitioners. If you're going to get it, please get it from the Spiral House Shop, get Alex Wrekk's two witchcraft zines to go with it, and go look at/reblog/contribute to the original Dabbler's Week project.

(Also I think this is the longest review I've written yet. I'm sorry.)

This book is very good. I'm mad about that. The author is an excellent writer. I'm mad about that. I want to dislike this book but I can't, and I'm mad about that.

So let's get into the breakdown of why.

First up, a housekeeping thing: "Fire Lyte" is a pen name that I don't believe the author uses anymore, so I will be referring to him as Don Martin, the name he is using on his current projects. I know he's on TikTok, formerly of Inciting a Riot podcast, now of Head on Fire podcast.

Second, some links relevant to the review-which-is-actually-just-a-rant:

The breakdown of things I found that were taken uncredited from Tumblr

I COULD be making this up and reading it in bad faith, but this bit about 'heteronormative marriage' has my alarm bells ringing

Why I hate the title of this book

The original Dabbler's Week project links

Anyway.

I picked this book up specifically because of the title. It's been 3 years since it was published, so it took me a while, but I remember looking at that title when it was first out and thinking "Hey... the timing of this... did this person just wholesale lift the 'Dabbler' idea from Tumblr?"

The answer is: Yes, probably!

(He also summarized the Malachite Dick post from February 2020, but he actually credited Tumblr along with relevant usernames, so that's good and also made me laugh.)

But... yeah. The fact that he's crediting Tumblr from something that specifically happened in February 2020, when the original Dabbler's Week was from late January 2020 and seems to have inspired his whole book? Don, would it have killed you to mention ANYTHING about that project and the people involved?

He's very big on talking about following trails of information, listening to podcasts, listening to the podcasts of people talked about on those podcasts, reading books talked about on those podcast, and so on. But if he doesn't start off by saying "Dabbler's Week was a project issued by asksecularwitch on Tumblr", then how is anyone supposed to follow THAT chain of information, hmm? If his whole advice on finding good witchcraft resources is to follow the chain of people who are sharing information from each other, but he makes no mention of where he got the whole idea for his book, then what?

Side rant: I'm real tired of how Tumblr information is simultaneously treated as too shitty to ever bother reading or mentioning, but good enough to screenshot, repost on other sites, recite word-for-word on tiktok, and apparently write a book about.

ANYWAY. I'm angry about it. I'm gonna be angry about it. Here, please look at these links to the shenanigans that began the original Dabbler's Week, because Don certainly won't tell you about this part.

Anyway.

Some bad things:

I mean, the plagiarism. I keep hesitating to use the word 'plagiarism', because to me that seems like wholesale lifting entire works and slapping your name on them, when all Don did was fail to credit a few Tumblr users he quoted. But then again, if I did that on a research paper in college, it would be called plagiarism, so.

This book is in fact not a great guide for 'dabblers'. The point of Dabbler's Week was that if someone didn't know if they wanted to commit to witchcraft but wanted to fuck around with casting some spells for a week to try it out, there were week-long guides on things someone could do to try that. This book is not for fucking around with magic, it's for people who are already sure that they want to make this a thing in their lives. It handles some heavier topics (e.g. vetting mentors and not getting sucked into a cult) that are very very important for someone who is BEGINNING, but may be too much for someone who just says one day "lol I think I'll cast a spell for fun". A far more accurate title would have been "The Beginner's Guide to Witchcraft", but then he'd lose that punchy and marketable and googleable term 'dabbler'. (Yes, I'm going to be petty about this.)

"Wow Jes, it sounds like you really hated this book."

NO I DIDN'T, AND I'M SO MAD ABOUT THAT!

Some good things:

The author has a writing style that I enjoyed very much. This is a personal preference, but I like when books are either written so that the author is fully invisible (Bree Landwalker's books do this wonderfully), or the author is fully visible, like they're sitting at the table having a conversation with you (Kelly-Ann Maddox's 'Rebel Witch' comes to mind, as does Alex Wrekk's 'Brainscan 33: DIY Witchery'). Don Martin is the table conversation kind. That makes this book very easy to read, while also getting information across in an easily-understood sort of way.

This book fills a very necessary gap in modern witching books. It talks about the online community of witches, and a lot of the pitfalls that have come along with the bonuses of having so much witchcraft available at our social-media connected fingertips.

He gets very in depth with things like cultural appropriation. That's something that you can find in a lot of modern witch books, but Don actually spends the time breaking the concept down and explaining WHY it's harmful, HOW it affects people, and quotes people from the affected minority groups. I have seen the appropriation topic come up in a lot of the witch books I've read, but Don is the one who has covered the topic the best, imo.

He spends time on topics that I myself would have been dismissive of. The example that comes to mind is the chapter 'Can I Make Sh*t Up?' My knee jerk reaction was "Yes, you can make your own spells, you don't need to get someone else's permission. Next question." But Don goes through the full breakdown of yes you can make up your own spells, yes you can make your own correspondences, but no that doesn't mean you can just throw a water soluble crystal in your water bottle because you think it's good for cleansing.

Actually on that topic, he covers a lot of the why not just the what. It's not just 'appropriation is bad', it's 'and here's why'. It's not just 'research your herbs', it's 'here's some examples of things that can and have gone wrong.'

SPELL CANVASES! There are 11 'spell canvases' in this book, and they're pretty much all just kids/teens science experiments (e.g. dissolving an egg shell in vinegar, lighting a tea bag on fire so it flies, and using food dye to color a white flower). He does not give intentions for these spells, but gives a spell technique and then some examples of how you could apply your own purpose/intention to it as needed. It's actually pretty smart, and now I wish there was more stuff like this.

He actually explains what UPG means. Man, 'UPG' is one of those things that I keep seeing as a 'I don't know what that means and I'm to afraid to ask' blog post. When someone pops into the witchy social media circles, we can throw the term 'UPG' around as if everyone knows what it means, and forget to actually explain that it's Unverified Personal Gnosis and what that means. Don's got us covered. Good on you, Don.

The one throwaway line about why you don't have to buy fancy witch things. Tucked away in chapter 12 is this almost nothing-sentence mentioning why you shouldn't be "going broke hoping to buy your way into 'effective' magic" (pg. 161). I have seen, reblogged, probably written posts about 'No you don't need the fancy tools! You can just use whatever! But you CAN buy them if you want, you just don't NEED them.' And we've all seen those around, right? But damn, if Don didn't just get to the heart of it. You can't buy your way into skill. YES, Don, THAT!! THANK YOU.

Alright. I'm running out of words. This isn't a review, it's a rant. Holy shit. Let me shut up with a TL;DR

Almost without doubt, Don liked Tumblr's idea enough to write a book about it, but failed to give credit. But he's an excellent writer and covers a lot of topics that are not often written about in printed books, and to get those blogosphere-ideas onto bookshelves is invaluable. This is a good book for beginners starting out in witchcraft, but not for dabblers who just want to screw around with some spells. Do the pros outweigh the cons? Is it ethical to buy a book when the author gets royalties but the bloggers he got the idea from do not? I don't know. I can't tell you that. You'll have to weigh all this against your own moral compass and decide for yourself. My recommendation is that if you're going to buy it, please buy it from the Spiral House Shop, because if Don Martin's going to get paid for this book, Alex Wrekk should too. Buy Alex's zines. Reblog Sec's posts. Links are up at the top.

[damnfandomproblems]

735268800396656640 I'd like to add my 2c to this, because I have seen it a lot, and I have some theories.

The rate of people faking (and really believing they have) DID seems to have totally skyrocketed during the pandemic, and mainly among people under 18. Though I've seen it in people as old as 40! And I think there were a combination of factors at play. The first was the ease at which Tiktok videos can be consumed and even come off as suggestible to people. I've seen videos of kids sitting in front of a television reiterating very specific "tics" (better called tic-like behaviours) because they found a famous person with Tourette's and their brains started mirroring it.

The second was the lack of support systems for kids during COVID, which left them to their own devices online, often in spaces designed to garner views without any accountability or control over scientific accuracy. The lack of support systems also meant that during COVID, a lot of kids were trapped at home in abusive environments, and were, actually, being traumatized. They were experiencing real effects of trauma, like dissociation, maladaptive daydreaming, even viciously trying to imagine themselves as certain characters in the hopes if they tried hard enough, it would change reality and they would actually become that character (talking from experience here. I had a rough few years as a kid!). But because of Tiktok, they ran into people who were suggesting if they dissociated in any form, they could have DID. Then they watched another video like this, and another video. After enough times, it just becomes normal, and you start to accept it. There's a similar process to how cults work, they purposefully inundate people with BS over and over until the person just accepts it one day, except in this case it's not so intentional, just a sick accident. When this combines with the real trauma-induced escapism needs, you get kids of 15-16 thinking they have DID, when really it's more like complex PTSD or depersonalization/derealization disorder.

But on top of this, during COVID, a lot of kids didn't have the crucial opportunity to socialize with other people. They don't know about code switching. They don't know how people act, for instance, in a customer service job versus school around their friends, versus at home. Maybe they remember from previous years, but it becomes harder and harder to see it as a tangible reality after a long enough time. So they think the different moods, bubbliness, etc depending on their company isn't just normal behaviour, but actually some kind of pathology. This seems to be "corroborated" by all the videos they see online, all the people they see in servers.

Hence, we now have a young generation of people growing up believing they have an incredibly rare disorder, while simultaneously saying insanity like "I have 2,000 personality states", and somehow getting new personality states every week as a new show comes out, when DID mainly happens if someone experiences severe, EXTREME (unthinkable) ongoing trauma when they are very, very young. Not when someone is 15 or 16. You have lists of hundreds, if not thousands, of labels, and even a wiki made by people like this. And it's all over the place in fandom because, well, fandom is an escape for people. Characters are comforting. It gets very close to the heart of whatever trauma these people have gone through. Of course it's impossible to point this out, because some of those made-up labels include pejoratives that try to equate "being aware that someone is not actually suffering from DID" to being bigoted. It's anti-intellectual and effectively, again like how a cult works, cuts off the people in the group from any unbiased feedback, and it keeps them from healing.

I'm genuinely worried.

This is a response to this previous ask.

[anais-shiv]

How serious are we allowed to take this ship?

Hello! Anais here!

This post is going to be pure word vomit, inconsistent thought chains, and a giant rollercoaster of emotions. 

Before I make many of my points, I will add a caveat or disclaimer that seems redundant but is actually completely necessary for readers to get the whole picture. (See, I’m doing it now.) 

It’s very difficult for me to complete a thought without setting it up with another. 

Anyways…

You ever heard the question “What’s that one fanfiction that altered your brain chemistry?”

For me, there’s no particular fic, but there is a specific fandom/ship that has rewired my neurons as a whole. And that fandom is none other than Dramione. 

(Note: this post will not be a critique of the fandom or any of its works in any way. This post is about me and how I’m slowly descending into madness in the most fragile of ways. [Did you catch that? Eh? Ehh? winks] And it’s about time I spoke my truth.) 

I was introduced to fanfiction at the tender age of 13, in the height of the Harry Potter and Twilight movies. And I was a Twilight girl through and through. (Team Jacob till I die!) 

I only read fanfiction for one purpose and one purpose only, to read about Jacob being with characters other than Bella or her daughter Raincoat. If it weren’t for those early days on Wattpad, I would’ve never discovered that I had a kink for pain, and that I would always choose warm brown skin over a pale cold alternative. 

Then some things happened in my life, I got older, stared dating and hanging out and I simply forgot about it. 

Then, the trailer for Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows dropped. And in order to prepare, I consumed all seven books of the series in a week. (Oh to still have the young and focused mind that could consume a book in mere hours.) 

To say I loved it was an understatement, so much so that I refused to read any Harry Potter fanfiction I saw pop up on my Wattpad screen. (The old Wattpad that had a brown banner, and a similar font to Times New Roman, and that allowed people to upload entire real life books so long as they purposely added grammar mistakes to not get caught for plagiarism, not saying that’s right but Lordt, what a time.) 

Most of the fics I saw weren’t even about specific ships, they were just about life after the epilogue, with many writers opting to create entirely new characters, usually being children of the originals. Regardless, I ignored them all. Harry Potter was perfect, it didn’t need expanding or alternate universes. 

Fast forward some more, more life happened, and I sort of stopped reading books and fanfiction all together. 

I’m 27 now. 

I found Dramione only last year, through TikTok like many others. And my first fic, like many others, was Manacled. 

It was life changing, riveting, mind altering, and absolutely heartbreaking. 

I needed more. 

So I read and read and read. Joined the Reddit, joined a discord (I love you DADA!) and even started trying to write my own fics. 

Then, all of a sudden my hyper fixation began to wear off, and I started to get bored with the whole thing altogether.

I was kind of disappointed, as it was very difficult for me to start and keep hobbies and even more difficult to make friends. It was nice having something to relate to other people with, even something as specific as liking an HP ship. As someone as socially awkward and shy as I am, I was worried I wouldn’t find another focal point to relate to other people with, and I would go back to wallowing in my own bloody slutty and pathetic despair. (Did you at least catch that one?)

Then I found a new WIP that made me feel like a brand new fan all over again. 

Our lovely Gryffindor and sulky Slytherin had sunk their claws back into me, bone deep this time, (Did you fucking catch that one?!) and I was right back where I started.

So of course, in between replaying smut scenes in my head over and over and over and over again while simultaneously wallowing in my self inflicted isolation, (COME ON PEOPLE IM THROWING EM AT YOU!) I started to ponder: Why in the fuck do I like this ship so much?? 

The romantic relationship between Hermione and Draco is based off a trope as old as the London bridge. Our wonderful beautiful cliché: enemies to lovers. 

We love the idea of someone seeing you when you’re not at all trying to impress them, be friendly or mindful or considerate or empathetic or even cordial, and still falling in love with you anyways. 

Just the raw authenticity behind such a love is so entrancing, that we’ll read the same story over and over again in different fonts. 

At first, I resisted my curiosity regarding Dramione, as I thought Hermione was the walking embodiment of girls get it done, and Draco was nothing but sniveling spoiled bigoted coward and bully. (Not to mention I never noticed how hot Tom Felton actually was in the later movies. Why didn’t anyone tell meeee???)

His feud with Harry added to my dislike of him, but that could somewhat be dismissed as boys being boys. It was intolerance and ignorance towards Hermione that made me hate him. As well as his quick use of threats in his fathers name any time someone so much as disagreed with him. Needless to say, Draco Malfoy was a punk bitch. Through and through. Not my words, take it up with JKR. 

So why on Earth would I ever enjoy reading about him, of all people, falling in love with and being chosen by the Hermione Granger, one of the greatest representations of nerdy awkward beautiful bad ass girls to ever exist, after he regarded her so horribly? And over Ron at that? 

It was a hard adjustment. 

Because to me, their story wasn’t simply enemies to lovers. To me it was a story of a member of an oppressive group, experiencing the mortifying ordeal of being in love with a member of the oppressed. (If you didn’t catch this one just log off.) 

"Anais, it’s not that deep."

I know. I know. But this thought process can’t be helped. 

To put it simply, Dramione reminded me of that one movie with the black girl falling in love with the Nazi soldier. Or another better written version of the book about the Latina girl who fell in love with the klan leader's son. Or even on a less extreme note, about the Asian girl falling in love with the racist boy who actually turned out to be not so racist, seeing he only used the slurs because it’s what his dad taught him and peer pressure made him and he was going through such a hard time back then but he knows better now, and honestly they were only kids, and you can’t help the environment you were raised in and-

Ok, so I made that last one up, but you get the point. 

Manacled being my first fic didn’t really help diminish this connection my mind was making while trying to enjoy this fandom. And that wasn't the only fic that influenced the analysis, because the main premise to many other fics was acknowledging ones ability to grow and change for the better. And the only way to do that, was to acknowledge the ugly shit of their past. 

And no other example made such a direct reference to Draco's past and sometimes present ideologies (depending on the fic you read) as the use of the word mudblood. 

Ah, mudblood. 

Such a dirty, disgusting, abhorrent and absolute slimy fucking use of the English language. 

So obvious in its implication, no different than Shacklebolt or Cho Chang (you really popped off with those didn’t you JK?) that the lack of subtlety almost made the slur hit harder. 

Mudblood. It was simple in it's meaning. Dirty. Inferior. And worthless.

Reading about Draco calling Hermione the ugly name for the first time in CoS made me cringe, but experiencing similar real life altercations made me loathe it’s existence entirely.

"Anais, it’s really not a that deep."

I know! Just, hold on. 

It was such a fucked up word, I hated it. 

So imagine my surprise when I read and heard the word being used so freely and casually in fics, cosplay TikToks, edits and other forms of fandom media. 

And no matter how much I reminded myself that the word wasn’t real, these characters weren’t real, and that the word had no real history because the world it came from didn’t even exist, I could not for the life of me, stop hearing another word as an afterthought every time I read it and heard it. 

Can you guess which word that is? 

Here’s an example of what my mind does whenever the word is used: 

“If you're wondering what the smell is, Mother, a mudblood (n*****) just walked in.”

“Haven’t I told you? Killing mudbloods (n******, he means n******) doesn’t matter to me anymore.” 

“I don’t need help from filthy little mudbloods (n******) like her!”

Do you understand what I go through?! 

Needless to say I prefer fics where the word isn’t used at all. 

Oh to be able to enjoy harmless free fiction without constantly comparing the plight of the imaginary world’s minorities to the very real systemic racism experienced by black and poc people every where. sigh

Yeah, I’m that girl at the party (not really, mostly I’m quiet. Because if I talk, I'll be that girl at the party.) 

It can’t be helped. 

So here’s me, experiencing this fandom for the first time, enjoying enemies to lovers that’s really not enemies to lovers but more like racist learns that racism is bad through falling in love with the very kind of person he was raised to be racist towards and what better way to unlearn bigoted indoctrination than through spending time with said person who just so happens to be extraordinary and not like the others from said group (because if Muggleborns aren't extraordinary are they really worth loving?) and also insanely beautiful and also clever and extremely desirable and the unlearning had nothing to do with that attraction right? He became better purely from his own desire to evolve....right?????? 

(Obviously my interpretation of the ship is extremely biased and a gross generalization. There is no right way to do Dramione. Of course Draco had the capacity to better himself without Hermione. That much is canon. And even though the wizarding world has extreme prejudices within it's society, it was probably nothing compared to how any of them would be treated if the statute of secrecy was broken. There’s levels. Don’t worry. I get it. There's layers.) 

But do you see the implications as it pertains to these two as individuals? Especially regarding their backgrounds?

After my adjustment period, I realized that these implications meant that Draco’s growth was actually extremely complicated. It wasn't just enemies to lovers, it was a complex narrative that called attention to how difficult unlearning toxic and harmful ideologies could be. And while I have no idea if writers and creators ever intended to highlight the parallels between his and Hermione's story and that of very real people who fell in love even when it was dangerous and against all odds, they were impossible not to notice. Thus making his character, one of the realest and most realistic characters of the entire fandom.

And that is precisely why I fell in love. 

(No but seriously, reading about Draco from a such an intimate standpoint from either his or Hermione’s POV had me rethinking my entire dating history, taste in men, and marriage goals. And I’m not just talking about the smut!) 

Listen you know you’ve got a problem when you sit and consume fanfiction for two days straight with barely any breaks for food or sleep.  

I consumed several fics in a short span of a couple of weeks, most of them being smutty one shots. I came to develop, as we all have, a specific preference for certain characterizations. I commented, liked and shared. And I even attempted to write my own (to be announced) Dramione stories. 

I discovered new kinks, was inspired by my oh so talented friends and other writers, and I even considered (still am) dying my hair brown. 

(What? Obsessed. Psh. No. Of course not.)

Now, I’ve entered a phase of careful curation. After having deleted all of my Ao3 tabs by mistake, (fuck the iphone) I’ve been finding fics through very specific filtering rather than recommendations. And when I have the time, reading for hours and hours on end. As well as joining the occasional writing sprint. 

Eventually I’d like to start creating fan art and posting full fledged Dramione stories. This fandom is one of the most beautiful, sexy and entertaining fandoms I’ve ever come across. And when I'm not thinking and about the political and economic state of the wizarding world and how deeply that plays into our favorite ship, I'm actually just fangirling. 

Anyways, that’s all for now folks! 

Anais: out! 

[reflections-in-a-critical-eye]

I find myself questioning why I'm still bothered and how I let it get to me the lack of nuance in fandom discourse. Especially with K-Pop and everything I've witnessed in the last 3 years. The bigger the fandom, the less chances for it to be cohesive and attract a specific demographic able to participate in a certain high level of discourse.

I remember a few years back I was lurking in the Black Sails community here on tumblr. I was usually someone who would read the weekly reviews to tv episodes and that would be enough. In the case of that series, it didn't feel enough because to me, the reviewers were missing or ignoring the complexity of that show. And to my surprise (although it shouldn't), the fandom on tumblr was one of the best I had the chance to observe. There was dedication, yes, but more than that, smart people were writing these amazing essays and analysis worth of getting published in established journals. Well beyond a simple review. They were media literate, which is something that gets lost more and more as time passes.

Of course I don't expect that same thing in a fandom like Army. They can barely be compared. Army is way, way larger. It covers a wide demographic which is good and bad simultaneously. Theoretically, there's a place for everyone, regardless of their identity/background. So in cases like that, people tend to choose their own corner, subsection depending on where they fit and their interest. Perhaps a teenager is more likely to spend time on tiktok making edits and looking at clips, without following each and every type of content out there. Because they don't have to. Fans using weverse are also their own category that exhibit a specific type of mentality. Twitter and tumblr are places that offer the platform for a more discussion-type of engagement, with twitter taking the first place.

So, we find our community and that's supposed to allow fans to live in harmony. I know, funny. It's never like that because we like to peak and invite ourselves in other spaces. And the places can easily become echo chambers. But what is interesting to note is observing what the fandom deems as an echo chamber. A solo stan account or a shipper is an echo chamber, but an account focused on the group as a whole and only their achievements and updates is not. It doesn't matter that the user feigns ignorance when confronted with weird hashtags trending because they had no idea. They curate their experience. It's perfectly valid, but the danger of creating/becoming part of echo chambers happens to all of us, regardless of our type of engagement. The longer we sit comfortably in our corner, talking to people who are of the same opinion as ours, the greater the risk.

Nevertheless, there is still this need of showing one's superiority based on the type of subsection of the fandom we are part of. Which automatically fails because it shows our ignorance and getting to what I wanted to talk about, the incapability of engaging in a nuanced discussion. Of course this is not something that we should expect from everyone. Like I said, we need to know our "audience". I won't go to the weverse/IG pages wanting to talk about Asian fetishization in kpop fandoms. It would be pointless. But we do touch on those types of topics on twitter and tumblr. Which is why I don't find it completely absurd to have expectations.

Shipping within the fandom has once again been under fire today, more than usual. And it showed, as each and every time, that there is simply no bridge, no way of finding a common language, of willingness to have that nuanced conversation without resorting to generalized statements. The result of that usually creates more harm, divides the communities even more and sweeps under the rug the normalization of a specific type of shippers who transform mentions of sexual assault into a weapon to attack and offend. As serious as this is for people who are not online 24/7 in fandoms, it has indeed become the norm for those who are part of it. So then why we ignore it? Why do we generalize it instead of addressing the exact person or community who does it regularly? Because it's the crazy part of the fandom and those who are not part of it consider themselves to be better than others. Feeling superior is the ultimate goal. In a fandom of millions, we all try to differentiate ourselves in one way or another. And that leads to our fandom identity and automatically our position towards issues within the larger community. Being for or against, wanting to engage or not, is sending a message. It's always more about us than the people or content we talk about.

I know I haven't touched on 1% of what this topic should cover, but these are just some thoughts. We can't all be the smartest and better than everyone else when we are completely fixated in some beliefs that come to exist based on how much we want to use our intelectual abilities or simply refuse to.

[buckysimp101]

Fics with Sixx

a/n: alright folks! Time to try my hand at a lil Sixx fic! enjoy! (p.s. this one was a little weird to write lol you’ll see why)

current!Nikki x YN

Summary: You and Brittany have been hanging out a lot during the Stadium Tour. Following your husbands, keeping up with fan posts on social media, and making TikToks in your free time for the hell of it. But what happens when you two discover that the world of fanfiction has grown? 

warnings: age gap ( ~35 years)

June 25, 2022

The Stadium Tour was in full swing. You had finally made it to Philadelphia after a few days in New York and you and Brittany had been hanging out all day in preparation for the show tonight while your husbands hung out, just the two of them, for the first time in what felt like forever. Over the course of the last couple of years, you and Brittany had gotten close. You had followed her on her Vine days and when you and Nikki started dating you bonded over your proximity in age and your love for the Terror Twins themselves.

But now you had been scrolling through tumblr for almost an hour. After Brittany and you had discovered fanfictions involving your husbands you had spent half an hour reading some of the raunchy works together. Some were way off the mark, others were spot on and it just made experience all the more fun. Hell, you had even decided to look up stories about each others’ husbands to send to each other for the fun of it.

You were a few years younger than Brittany, and more than a few younger than Nikki, so you had always known that fanfiction existed, it just always seemed to be focused more on fictional characters and taking stories pre-existing stories and making them your own. But fanfiction about real people, your husband in particular, well that just took things to a whole new level. 

Like every other site on the internet, tumblr was a vast ocean of... interesting things that lead to some equally as interesting discoveries. You were reading a particularly good fic about Nikki and his mommy kink that Brittany had found when the door to the hotel suite opened revealing the man in question. His hair held out of his face with a bandana and his sunglasses covering those green eyes that you swore you loved more and more everyday. You should have noticed him, you should have said something, but the fanfiction was just getting to a particularly juicy part, and for once you had eyes for something other than your husband, well the physical version of him at least.

Nikki’s eyes scanned the hotel room until they landed on your figure lounging on the couch. Your bottom lip between your teeth and your legs squeezed tight all Nikki could do was smirk. Taking advantage of the fact that you hadn’t heard him come him, he snuck over to the couch and plopped down next to you, causing you to jump and almost throwing your phone at him in fear.

“Nikki! I didn’t know you were back!” you said hurriedly while scrambling to find the hold button on your phone. But Nikki was smart, he knew that look you had on your face just moments before and he knew that when you squeezed your thighs together it was to try and both deny yourself while simultaneously giving your body the friction it yearned for. Nikki leaned in to press soft kisses along your jaw, your body slowly giving in to the pleasure your husband sought to give you. 

“Whatcha been looking at, kitten? Anything you want to tell me about?” Nikki practically purred, a sense of enjoyment overcoming him when he saw the light pink blush rise to your cheeks. He took your small silence to imagine you watching porn on the couch, waiting for him to come home and give you all the pleasure you could scream for. He knew better than to think you were shy, especially when it came to him.

You debated about whether to tell Nikki about fanfiction. On one hand, you weren’t sure he’d understand what it was you were talking about. On the other hand, it could lead to some pretty fun conversations, almost as fun as the one you had with Brittany earlier that led to your current discovery.

“I was just reading, baby,” you whispered coyly as he began to lay kisses against your throat, a soft moan escaping your lips.

“Mmm? Reading what, honey? You can tell me, you don’t have to be shy. Maybe I can help you out, you were making that face I like so much,” he murmured as his hands came up to rest on your stomach, his fingers playing with the hem of your shirt. It was that moment that you made up your mind.

“I was reading you, Sixx,” you stated, a smile forming on your face as the confusion grew on your husbands’ as he pulled his face away from your neck causing you to groan.

“Come again?” he asked, his brows furrowing as he tried to comprehend the words that had just come out of your mouth.

“I would if I could finish this fic,” you mumbled under your breath, “I was reading about you, baby. Your fans are very creative,” you added with a wink before opening your phone again to continue where you left off. But Nikki was still confused.

“Baby, honey, I love you, but the words you’re saying aren’t making any sense. Were you reading Instagram comments again? Shit, what could they be saying in the Instagram comments to make you make that face?” Nikki said, scrambling to find his own phone but he stopped after hearing your laugh. It started off as a giggle and eventually turned into a full belly laugh, your face turning red from laughter.

“Baby, no. it’s not Instagram, it’s fanfiction. Your fans have been using their creativity to write stories online about you in different situations, many sexual ones too might I add, and I just think it’s great. Here, this is what I was reading,” you said, showing Nikki the particularly spicy moment he had interrupted. You could practically see the gears turning in Nikki’s head as he realized what he was reading. He turned his head up from the phone to look at you, a grin playing on your lips causing him to lick his in turn.

“Well sweets, what do you think of these “fanfictions”?” he said, putting finger quotes around the word causing you to chuckle.

“Well some of them are hilarious, you should see the ones that Brittany and I found about you and Tommy, they do a great job capturing the essence of the Terror Twins,” you noted with a teasing tone causing him to roll his eyes as you continued, “and some are super sweet and soft, but others...others are pretty damn hot baby, I’m not gonna lie,” you said, biting your lip yet again.

‘Quit biting that damn lip, baby. You know that’s my job,” he growled leaning forward to pull you into a deep kiss, his fingers moving from fiddling with the end of your shirt to tangle in your hair. As he pulled back from the kiss he had a self-satisfied smirk on his face.

“What’s that face for, Sixx?” you asked warily, unsure where your husband’s head was at.

“I just want to know how those fanfictions compare to the real thing, baby?” he teased as he leaned back in to kiss along your neck, giving a small bite as well causing a louder moan than earlier to bubble past your lips. You threaded your fingers through his hair to bring his face up, making eye contact with the green that you wanted to see every day for the rest of your life.

“Guess you’ll just have to give me something fresh to compare it to, huh Sleazy Sixx?” you whispered, pushing him off and running to the bedroom, Nikki hot on your heels.

taglist:

@youlightmeupfinn

@la-undercover-latina

@ali-r3n​ 

@sekhmetkingscholar

[filmbyjy]

😁 So...if anyone is interested, it's a 700+ drabble of-

WHAT REALLY HAPPENED THAT NIGHT:

It was a fun night for sure, seeing the Nishimura's new place and getting to meet most of Heeseung's and Riki's friends in person - with the exception of Jay, of course. Yvette cannot help but smirk at the thought of her best friend, alone, with a guy the Australian hopes will be good for her. Although, after six vodka mixers and the constant reverberations from the loud speakers, Yvette feels the pounding in her head mimicking the beats, her vision is starting to spin and, maybe, being just that tiniest bit of flirtatious and a lot more affectionate with Heeseung is all thanks to the liquid courage coursing through her bloodstream.

Speaking of, why is said person of her affections trying to climb the kitchen island in the state he's in. Well, having watched enough Young Adult movies, Yvette can only assume something embarrassing at least, hurtful at worst, can happen.

"Oh, no, you don't, Seungie" Yvette declares, strutting up behind him and snaking her arms around his waist, as she pulls herself closer to him to hold him up with her lips close to his ear, "My love? What do you think you're doing?"

It takes a few seconds before she hears the spill of the most adorable giggles and allows Heeseung to turn around in her arms to face her. Judging by his glassy eyes, his flushed face, and his inability to keep himself upright, Heeseung surpassed his limit and yet, Yvette can't help but match the giddy smile lighting up his face.

"Yvie," Heeseung giggles, her name wobbles and almost lost in his slurring voice, as he raises his hands up to lightly squish Yvette's cheeks, "My pretty Yvie, there you are!"

"I'm here," she reiterates, nodding, as she manoeuvres him around the island and towards the fridge, "Were you looking for me?"

The adorable little pout on Heeseung's lips simultaneously clenches and races her heart. "Thought I lost you."

But when she tries to pull away to open the fridge, he just pulls her right back in his arms.

"Don't leave me."

Yvette's mouth hangs open, her reason halted with those three words, as she let's Heeseung burrow his head in the crook of her neck. Gently sealing her lips closed in a tender smile, she reaches one hand up to massage the back of Heeseung's head as her voice drops in volume when she speaks next. "Never, you know that; just want to get some water for ya so you don't wake up with a massive hangover tomorrow."

A little hum is all Yvette gets in response...Maybe her Heart needs a little rest before they call it a night.

Holding onto his hand, just so Heeseung knows she's not walking away from him, Yvette grabs a bottle of water from the fridge and retrieves her little present for her girl, before leading Heeseung out of the kitchen.

-

Once the noise has been muted behind the closed door, Yvette guides Heeseung towards their best friend's bed and settles him down.

"Now," she begins, uncapping the bottled water, "I want you to drink this, while I set out my little present for our sakura.”

She hands the bottle over, waiting for Heeseung to accept it but the pretty boy before her is just staring up at her. With adoration. Fondness and something a little bit more…

“You. Are. So. Pretty.” Those words are accompanied by the biggest and dopiest smile Yvette has seen on Heeseung's lips.

This boy. Young man.

“So you've been telling me,” Yvette fondly smiles down at him, unable to stop the exaggerated eye roll, and gently shakes the bottle in her hand, “Now, drink up, my love.”

“What? You're going to say, ‘If you drink this, then we're dating?’”

She's heard that line used so many times by now through various tiktoks of some of her favourite idol groups and finds it so mortifying and yet, none of that second-hand embarrassment is evident when Heeseung uses those words.

“When you're sober.”

The thing about Yvette, she isn't without shortcomings but when it comes to the people who are precious to her; the ones she cherishes, the ones she loves. As long as it's within her power, she'll never do anything unjust to them.

"Don't you love me like how I love you?"

But sometimes, Yvette just wants to slap Heeseung because how can he not see that her heart is no longer hers? That she willingly placed it in his open palms all those years ago?

"You bloody idiot."

~ 🧛🏻‍♂️🐕

a little yvette side story🤭

[solarwynd]

https://www.tumblr.com/solarwynd/747651444915748864/can-i-share-my-opinion-about-jungkook-and-that?source=share

Diff anon. Solar your points are so valid and I think you're right. I still have doubts this anon is right though just because all the points you mentioned also seem to apply for those smoking pics of JK and those I'm almost completely sure were staged. Also tkk's media strategy last year was crazy. JK would frequently go on a public Jimin love fest mode and Tae would go on a public JK love fest mode and simultaneously Tae tried to launch him and Jennie (I think a failed PR move) and the JK smoking pics (which made no noise). So in between all that if the video happened to be a deliberate leak, I feel that's too tawdry for BTS but with 🛴 at the helm, who knows what depths we might fall into.

Also I'm 100% sure that it was Tae and Jennie but a pap just coming across them? In France too. I'm not well versed in the practical situation but I've heard that the paparazzi laws in France are strict after the incident with Princess Diana's death. And taking photos that looked like they were taken on a potato? Doesn't seem random to me. I'm less sure with JK but there's some similarities. I know ssngs are the worst but they have so much time and money to track him but the moment they have to take a video it's potato time again? Meanwhile I'm watching the trend with those zoom tiktoks where people use their samsungs from the back of a stadium to zoom in and watch Taylor during eras tour. I think the bad quality is a feature too - just enough terrible quality that you can plausible deniability but still get buzz and people talking about you and building a certain image.

I'm just saying it's been ten years of half-rumors and hearsay and flat out lies about the guys' private lives but in 2023 we suddenly have two incidents for the both of them? Coincidentally before their solo release? I dunno. Might be a series of coincidences but it's interesting

Was TH’s hard launch with Jennie really just last year? Man 2023 was busy.

“I'm just saying it's been ten years of half-rumors and hearsay and flat out lies about the guys' private lives but in 2023 we suddenly have two incidents for the both of them? Coincidentally before their solo release? I dunno. Might be a series of coincidences but it's interesting”

No but this is so true. BTS have always been so careful about the details of their private lives and barely sharing anything. You can say that this is there way of freeing themselves from any previous restrictions they might’ve felt before chapter 2 but why go about it that way? I know that even Joon had a “slip up” where he posted a pic of him smoking on insta and then he deleted it but the amount of “confirms” you have to go through to post on that app? That for sure wasn’t an accident.

With JK’s smoking pics not making any noise I mean it did on twitter. People were thirsting after it but in terms of the audience they were trying to grab which was most likely American media considering he was in LA doing it out in the open, no one bit. No one in the US was gonna run that as a headline. Even with America’s perception of the kpop industry having strict rules, it’s just smoking. It’s not illegal. That’s why you have to ask (again if it’s staged) who’s planning these things out? And why are the operating off early 2000s or 90s rules to blowing up new acts in 2023? It just reminds me of that one Victorious episode where Tori was made into a big pop star and her manager turned her into a “bad girl” to interest the masses. But it just needed up turning people off from her.

“Also tkk's media strategy last year was crazy. JK would frequently go on a public Jimin love fest mode and Tae would go on a public JK love fest mode and simultaneously Tae tried to launch him and Jennie”

Jk’s Jimin binge was…something. I don’t think there was a particular strategy from him by doing that because fandom wise he had nothing to gain by mentioning jimin. Armys don’t care for jikook and jikookers are mostly biased towards him, they were gonna support him regardless. I believe there was some genuine interest there to see what was doing. (In retrospect, he was never gonna do it, but to be so in Jimin’s business, yet couldn’t still congratulate him publicly on getting that #1 on hot 100 🥴) Idk it just wasn’t expected considering they had barely been talking. Him and TH were at the hip so much last year, I would’ve thought he would’ve been the go to choice. (ig in a way he still was) Now TH was a strategist. It’s very obvious he wanted the best of both worlds with the actions he took, but neither helped him at all.

“I know ssngs are the worst but they have so much time and money to track him but the moment they have to take a video it's potato time again?…just enough terrible quality that you can plausible deniability but still get buzz and people talking about you and building a certain image.”

Ssngs are so particular about how they sneak videos and pics too. Like these people will literally be in trees to film these idols with those high grade cameras. “Building an image” as a member of BTS is a crazy sentence because while I get that everyone doesn’t know the members well individually, why would you want their introduction to you to be potentially staged cheap drama and not your music/talent? At their caliber it should be beneath them.

[bleachbleachbleach]

went for a jog and all I got was this thought experiment

This is not a very hinged post, even by the typically low standards for hingedness on this blog, so I’m just going to. Put a cut in here nice and early.

It’s deer season right now, so I while I was out for a jog this evening I heard a gunshot and got to thinking, like, what does a bankai release sound like, and from how far away can it be heard?

I mean, maybe it depends on the bankai, though in generally they tend to be pretty flashy in general, and everyone’s gotta release, regardless of what happens after that.

We know that when actually fighting (with either bankai or shikai) friendly fire is a big consideration, to the extent that there are protocols for implementing third-party shields/etc. that don’t have to be put up by the combatants themselves--like when Yumichika orders a bunch for the Advance Team in real-time. And of course we end up with these 1v1 fights all the time, for reasons of tradition and practicality both. (Though the fact that so many of the fights during Fake Karakura are SEQUENTIAL rather than simultaneous cracks me up, because they really all just watched Ikkaku lose that pillar, huh??? Even if these fights take place over a matter of minutes rather than the 45min they feel like to us, still--!!)

This isn’t about sound, specifically, but thinking through what information we do have about bankai/shikai distances: People were fighting pretty far away from each other in that arc, given the entirety of Fake Karakura was below them. Kyouraku and Starrk got to see some snow crystals, but that’s it, so I assume they were 3 ri or more from Hitsugaya and Halibel:

[Bleach 132]

NB: The 3 ri is a radial measurement, as he says “3 ri in all (4) sides/directions.”

This very random number is honestly a neat detail--TO ME--because that’s around the average size of a storm cell! (Possibly related, but I was recently told by a child that I spend an above average amount of time on the Weather App, and that instead I should look at TikToks in bed like a normal person.) Don’t get me started on the fascinating history of antiquated Japanese units of measurement, because that was also very interesting to me. I think the wildest part is that there are measurements for area rather than just length, but since Hitsugaya doesn’t use them does this mean that Soul Society was just like “fuck it, we have had to change calendars and writing systems and units of measurement and vocabularies TOO MANY TIMES to keep up with these fucking living human people, we are eliminating some of these!!!” because boy nothing would excite me more than reading the AP Style Guide for Soul Society-- 

But anyway, that’s just what we know about the potential impacts and their range. I want to know about sound! How far away can you hear that release? Can you hear it from as far away as a rifle? As far away as thunder? How much of an impact re: temperature/relative humidity would tensou juurin have on these distances? What about standing up in the sky vs. on the ground where all the buildings and trees are?

I don’t have any desire to know these things for applied use--this is one of those things where making up the questions is way more interesting than any answers--but yes my jog was very cold and uphill and I had a lot of time to think about ephemera why do you ask

[lovemesomesurveys]

When was the last time you were sick? How incapacitated were you by the illness/ailment? Well, I recently spent 3 weeks in the hospital. I had what turned out to be an infected abscess on my back that required surgery. Found out I had a staph infection from that. I also had pneumonia they think due to what's called "silent asphyxiation." I actually had several other things wrong as well, but I don't want to get into it. Anyway, during my time there I had a code blue, a breathing tube, and a couple times where I was disoriented and confused. It was a whirlwind 3 weeks to say the least.

Do you often reflect on your past in terms of "eras" or “milestone” time frames (eg, looking back and saying, “it’s been 10 years since X”, etc.)? I do the "it's been 10 years since..." thing.

Is there something you would like to do or be, but have pretty much accepted it won’t happen because it’s just “not the kind of person you are” or is otherwise incompatible with your personality, character, etc.? I don't even know what I want to do or be. I feel I'm not cut out for anything to be honest. I don't know what I'd be good for. I went to school for psych and got my BA, but I didn't pursue it for those reasons. I just feel completely useless to be honest.

When was the last time you experienced cognitive dissonance? I looked up examples of cognitive dissonance and one was, "you want to be healthy, but you don't eat healthy or exercise" and I mean yeah, that's me. Despite all my health issues and scares, I'm still stubborn as fuck.

If you use Letterboxd, what causes you to “heart”/“like” a film? I don't know what that is.

Do you like people watching and is it something you do often? If so, where are your favorite locations to do so? It can be interesting sometimes, like places like an airport.

Whether you want to have children or not, what do you think has had the greatest influence on your views of children/childrearing (eg, your parents, your own upbringing, your interactions with children as an adult, etc.)? I don't want children. I'm not really sure, I just knew very early on I didn't want to be a mother. My parents were/are awesome, so it has nothing to do with that.

Is there anything that you enjoy that you simultaneously find intensely cringey? Is it so cringey that you wouldn’t normally admit to actually enjoying it? No. I do what I like, I don't give a fuck. It's like the guilty pleasures thing, I don't care I like what I like.

When was the last time you felt someone was being dishonest with you — not necessarily downright lying to your face, but acting or responding to you in a way that seemed false or did not feel like their true self? My mom and I kept going back and forth earlier cause she claims we watched Catching Fire the other night but I have absolutely no recollection of it. I have memories from seeing it before of course, but not from seeing it recently. I feel like I'd definitely remember that. I was worried for a sec my memory was all fucked up again like it was in the hospital. We decided to agree that I must have fallen asleep and she didn't realize and kept watching the movie. I believe her, I know she'd have no reason to lie about that or about anything, I trust her, but it was just so weird cause I really don't remember.

Similarly, when was the last time you saw a side of someone that made you question your preexisting perception of them? There was a situation in a mod group I'm in on TikTok with one of the mods being kinda sketchy.

If you were a doll, what outfit(s) and accessories would you come with? Oversized tees, leggings, Adidas, bracelets, choker necklaces, glasses, different wigs.

What was the last bit of praise you received? From lots of people for being "so strong" and for getting through the hardships I went through.

When you hear or see your name written out (as in /your/ name, not someone else who shares your name), do you immediately recognize it as your own, or is there a moment of disconnect before that recognition? Sometimes when I'm at a doctor's office and they call my name it takes me a sec and I'm like oh, they're calling me.

[dekusleftsock]

This is just a quick train of thought post but I still wanna share it

Either way I’ve seen this phenomenon where people hate the mha fandom because of how shippy it is. People want to act like bc this shonen then that means romance hardly exists. But you’ve got to understand how fandom EVOLVES!

I’ve not been in this fandom for long. Maybe since October of 2021. But I HAVE been in other fandoms before. Fnaf, undertale, and Minecraft come to mind first. (The old and new mc fandom btw, yes I watched dsmp. I don’t like the creators now but the fandom taught me how to analyze storytelling so ??? Idk how to feel about the fandom with my fondness lmao) And after a bit of research, pre-existing knowledge I have of the internet as a whole, and a TON of thinking and mulling it over in my head, I’ve come to my personal conclusion of why THIS FANDOM SPECIFICALLY gets so much hate and is so “shippy”.

The actual reason the fandom itself is so focused on ships and characters is because horikoshi writes characters well. Simple as that. It’s a character driven show, and compared to other shonens that’s a bit out of character for a show of the “genre”.

Anyway, let’s give a bit of background to the general internet. Up until about I wanna say, 2018? The internet was really really bad. The main social platforms running the show were YouTube, instagram, Reddit, and Twitter. Tiktok wasn’t exactly a thing, it was musically or however it’s spelled. 4chan was also still relatively popular as was tumblr. Tumblr is an interesting character during this time but I’ll get into that.

The general ideas of the internet were all relatively “right leaning” and cringe culture was still VERY rampant. This is because when the internet and, more specifically, the gaming community was being born the alt right communities that were pretty small migrated to the internet. This made a trade off: in exchange for organizational power they now had more reach. That’s why nazis and bigots have always been so common on the internet. It’s also why a lot of our amab siblings, children, uncles, etc in their teen years were so far gone into the alt right pipeline. It directly targets young white boys who like video games. YT created a lot of parasocial relationships by letting those people get the platforms they did. (I recommend watching “the alt right play book” by innuendo studios, they voice this better than I did)

The anime community, parts of the art community, 4chan/Reddit, and political spaces online were filled to the brim with nazis due to this phenomena.

And here’s comes tiktok. A platform who just gave themself a brand new face and name ready to start the trend of shorter videos instead of images or longer videos. At first, we still have the remnants of the alt right with the furry vs gamer war specifically, and then comes vsco girls. And you know what’s so weird about this trend? They TRIED to memeify it, they TRIED to shame women into not getting metal straws, into not dressing in the certain style. But it was a turning point in the entire worlds political spectrum. More specifically, gen y and gen z.

This was the start of a “new era” on the internet. And TikTok’s algorithm is probably the best one I’ve ever fucking seen! It was able to completely cut people off from different ideas and parts of the platform, while simultaneously sharing content that would make people argue. This, was tiktok 2020. BLM happened as a trend (blm has been around for a lot longer than tiktok, it was just a trend on the platform itself), trumps rallies happened. For the first time organization on a platform fucking worked. It was what the alt right WANTED to do, but never could.

Now, why am I saying all of this? Because tiktok opened the gate to fandom. For the first time since I’ve been on the app, (and I was on in 2018) fandom has started to pop up more. Toh and some anime communities have gotten more popular there.

But given this context, it starts to make sense why people HATE that it’s so shippy. Tumblr was the weird kid of the internet for a long time, and as that’s shifted to being 4chan, I’ve got to say that shipping and the mha fandom (along with other more known “toxic” fandoms) has gotten to a point where it’s more socially acceptable. And since a show like stranger things can now have a fandom, I can solidly say that fandom has become more mainstream because TIKTOK is mainstream.

So, yeah, people hate fandom and more specifically the mha fandom because of nazis. Cringe culture still exists and it’s kinda hard to not think a fandom that’s already been painted as terrible is actually, not all that bad. It’s like literally every other fandom. Stranger things has the same problems we do, death note has the same problems we do. Mha is not an exception.

[worldismyne]

The fandom culture in the past was a time and we're still learning...

This is 100% my opinion based on my internet experience growing up.

A common take I see coming up is that late 00s early 10s fan culture was cringe and problematic. It's usually to do with things like Yaoi fan-girls and genderbend. (there's probably others that fall in this category, but these were the main ones that came to mind.) I just think there's something to be gained by asking why these online phenomena happened rather than writing it off as bad and don't look back.

This is a something I've been thinking about a lot lately as someone who grew up with the internet.

Which is that, at that time, a lot of us were kids/teens seeking representation. We were growing up in a time where trans/queer characters weren't readily on TV. We didn't have the language to describe the dysphoria or ostracization we felt; or a jumping off point to explore things like gender expression safely.

So we took to the wild west that was the internet, we came across fetishized examples of what we were searching for and latched onto it without critically analyzing why.

It led to people regurgitating foreign vocabulary we didn't fully comprehend and while others tried to co-opt it into what they found into actually were looking for. And yes, I mean regurgitate, whole and unanalyzed, fiercely defended without an alternative readily available.

Because the truth is sometimes Stacy, age 13; was looking for a role model on how to live as a queer man; and now is a married 20-something that really doesn't want to think about the years they latched onto uke/seme junk when really they were looking for gender expectations for cis/queer adult life.

That genderbend is very appealing to a young person that didn't realize they were gender fluid themselves; and liked the idea of their favorite characters living in both spaces simultaneously but was forced to share the same spaces with shippers that just wanted to 'no-homo' certain ships.

It was hard to look for stuff without getting bombarded by overly fetishized stuff made by straight creators for straight consumers. And adults were reinforcing that it was all part and parcel irl. (Legit wasn't allowed to say lesbian at the dinner table growing up, because the very idea of a queer relationship was assumed to be inherently sexual in nature by my parents' generation; we see this still argued about at Disney all the time)

Fandom was and, in some ways, still is one of the easiest 'safe' (as is safe from family) places to explore those topics of identity and idealized futures.

I think as my generation's gotten older, we've realized that we need to create safe places in fandom explore queerness. That it's important to divorce queer stories from fetish (though they aren't always mutually exclusive. I's the distinction that matters). And there's been more of a push for genuine queer rep on tv (especially kid's media)

I've found tumblr to be relatively kind compared to other platforms like tiktok, or amino; but some fandom tags are still a homogenous mix of nsfw, sfw, and fetish.

I 100% agree it's on creators to properly tag their stuff. To help people filter out things they don't want to see. Things like safe-search only work if human beings cooperate.

But I also sincerely urge people to not to mindlessly consume fandom content. It's a sure-fire way to accidently absorb notions/vocabulary you don't fully identify with or understand. Normalization is a passive action, not a conscious decision.

Those bad habits in art/writing/etc, they're hard to shake unless you look back and critically analyze why you like/hate the things you do. And it's still really easy to pick up flawed ideas wandering around anywhere on the internet. It's a constant process, and everyone goes through it regardless of age or orientation. Internet culture is always changing

Also, look back at what you make. The commonalities between your OCs and yourself. What about those ideas actually appeal to you? What ideas are you recycling out of habit because that's the way every other thing like it was made? It's the only way to make new spaces/tags/etc for what you want, versus settling for what's already there.

[wouldnt-it-be-hilarious-if-i]

🌿🍄🌿🍄🌿🍄🌿🍄🌿🍄🌿🍄🌿

Currently listening to: 100 years by Five For Fighting

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Thinking about this poem I wrote in 2016. It's very timely. I really always had the answers, didn't I? I like the line where I say, "Come back to the world, stop loving her and love yourself."

And the line where I say, "When you see her fire burning your heart away, shoo it. Pour water on it and tell it to go." The hurricane references a girl I really loved when I was younger. We used to quote John Green to each other, "If people were rain, I was drizzle and she was a hurricane." I was always the drizzle.

I wish I could say I wish I'd have listened to my own advice sooner, but I think that's a naive thing to say.

I think knowing is different from accepting.

I always knew I needed to love myself more. But I couldn't accept it because I had never learned how. I wasn't in an environment fit for growth and self love.

Now, I think I'm getting closer to an era of self love. I saw a TikTok earlier that was talking about how healing and growth aren't about becoming the perfect versions of ourselves. It's about loving every version of ourselves, even the ones that we think are hard to handle or love.

It made me think about my best friend. We both refer to me as a swamp monster because I live in absolute filth either when I'm in a very creative season or a several weeks long depressive episode. Some of my other friends call me a goblin.

I try really hard to appear as if I know what is going on, but I'm generally confused as hell and distracted halfway through any given moment. I am never as put together as I appear. I'll say I'm the happiest I've ever been and just straight up forget about the massive crying panic attack I had like two hours before that over a hypothetical problem I created in my head. I forget that I am simultaneously unmedicated and mentally ill and doing better often.

My room is never, and I do mean never, in a state of organization unless I am trying very hard to Be Normal About Things or I'm Turning Over A New Leaf (that will last about a week at best). I'm actually really gross, and I'm very insecure about it. I'll never be one of those girls who has a skincare regimen that they stick to every night or who wake up, smell like magic and pixie dust and then get everything done before 9 am.

But even more than that, I'm generally just really freaking anxious and depressed. Most people who meet me are surprised to learn this. They see me as sunny and put together and sure of what I plan to do next.

And I'm never any of those things without all of the fear and doubt and tears behind it. I am constantly dealing with crippling self doubt and hatred. Knowing all of this about myself, I genuinely never thought anyone could possibly love me if they knew the real me. My parents always told me so: For example, "You'd have such pretty lips if you didn't pick them. Nobody will ever want to kiss you with those crackhead lips." (That's an OCD trait, and it goes hand in hand with my trichotillomania. I pull my hair out often, and it's another thing I'm insecure about.)

I tend to lie about who I really am. I don't tell people that I peel the skin off of my lips until they bleed all over my fingers until they see it. I don't tell people that the reason I don't wear makeup is not just because I'm allergic to most of it, but because I don't want people to be disappointed when they see how I really look. I don't tell people that sometimes I sleep with dozens of half finished bottles of sprite and candy wrappers in my bed because I'll go weeks forgetting that I'm living in a space and that mess does accumulate into a mountain if you don't take care of it. Hello, ADHD.

I'll always tell people about all the things I can do and carefully arrange myself to seem a lot less confused than I am. Sometimes, rather than admit that I fucked up, I'll lie and blame things that did not happen because I'm terrified of getting into trouble with others for disappointing them. I hate lying. But damn, I do it a lot when it comes to making sure no one ever knows these things about me.

I never thought anyone could possibly love me if they knew the real me. And then I met my best friend and she taught me otherwise. She's seen every side of me, and has never once made me feel bad about it. She's heard my scariest, most traumatic intrusive thoughts and loved me regardless. She's seen my room at my worst (poor girl has been a bit shaken, but she's good now I promise 😂) and me in the depths of some of the worst depressive episodes of my life and she's held me through them.

And I knew she meant that she loved me no matter what when after I started taking antidepressants, my family didn't care at all that I was happier. But she hugged me and cried a little because she had not seen me smile in months.

She told me that she missed me while I was gone. She knew I was still there behind those depressive episodes, but she missed the me that belts out songs off key and serenades her with old Justin Bieber songs. And that was when I realized that through all my depressive episodes, she had been there. To comfort me. To love me. To make art with me. To pull me back from letting it consume me entirely.

She literally taught me what it means to be unconditionally loved outside of familial obligation. And she's part of the bigger reasons why I believe that I am capable of not only healing, but learning to love myself unconditionally.

I think meeting her was a step toward teaching my higher self. I really think almost everyone since her has been.

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[decaffedthoughts]

That Flower Was You

pairing: Son Dongju (Xion)/Kim Geonhak (Leedo)

word count: 8.2k

Equal fluff and angst, I'd say

summary: After an innocuous conversation with Hyunjin, Dongju begins to question what he likes to wear and what that means for who he is. What follows is a tumultuous period of internal self-discovery and change. At the same time, Dongju continues to deal with his feelings for Geonhak, and there are a lot of those. His roommates and friends are all very aware of all those feelings, much to his dismay.

a/n: Inspired by this fic on ao3 by gardenjins! Also crossposted on ao3. In the texting sections other characters will be bold and Dongju will be regular text. Fulfilling the clownracha quarterly prompt: new year, nugu

Dongju had plenty of friends his age at college. So many of them were so cool that he had to befriend at least some. Currently, his dearest of those was Hwang Hyunjin. Of course, Hyunjin had xyr own set of friends, and boyfriends and partners of all ages. Dongju was proud to say they had regular contact, so he wasn't surprised when he received a random picture with no other message attached.

He opened it, walking back from class one day, and was surprised to see Hyunjin in a pretty little skirt. Xe was clearly standing in a dressing room and was typing while Dongju stared.

do you think i should get it?

why me specifically

gc is 50/50 split, so you’re the chosen one

i totally think you should, it’s really pretty

that’s what i said! good financial choices mean nothing when i can have pretty clothes

And that was where the conversation ended for the day. For Hyunjin, at least. For Dongju, the skirt just never left his head. He had never seriously considered wearing a skirt before. In that photo, Hyunjin looked good, and Dongju wondered if he could pull it off like xem. Probably not exactly, because Hyunjin was somehow one of the prettiest people on campus, but in xyr own way.

So, the next day, he went back to their message thread.

hey hyunjin do you have other skirts too?

ooooooooh yes i do! good morning to me

Dongju breathed out a laugh, watching Hyunjn type, likely taking longer because xe was trying to type and take photos simultaneously. What followed was about an hour of Hyunjin going through their impressive skirts collection, some highlights from other closets, and a nice long tangent on Changbin's dresses. Dongju only sent a word occasionally commenting on a particularly nice item. Hyunjin always responded with "noted", but he didn't mind.

It culminated in Hyunjin finding xyr own only dress, to which xe assured Dongju xyr getting more soon. The picture immediately took Dongju's breath away. Hyunjin was wearing a gorgeous strawberry dress. Dongju was never interested in the dress while it was a tiktok trend, but suddenly, he understood why everyone else was. The original dress was a little expensive at $500, but Hyunjin found a silhouette they liked for a little less. More than Dongju would spend on a single clothing item in college, but that's what would happen when you had 2 rich boyfriends who loved to spoil you.

Dongju couldn’t stop staring that time, but it felt different in a way he couldn't explain. Hyunjin emphasized that clothing was just pieces of fabric and said little to nothing about your gender, but Dongju felt something different when he looked at Hyunjin spinning in a field in a dress. He both could and couldn't imagine himself doing it at the same time. It was an abstract feeling. Like he couldn’t because he hadn’t ever done it before, and it sort of felt like he wasn’t allowed to, for some reason. But he could, and he wanted to, to feel the freedom that Hyunjin embodied in that photo. 

All of that stayed inside for now until he could make a little more sense of it.

"Oh." Dongju breathed.

It felt better than anything he had ever worn, and he couldn't imagine anything else being even better. It felt so right. He spun, and the translucent layer hung long and brushed over his calves softly. Slowly, he looked up at the mirror he knew was there. It's hard because despite the pretty, flowing skirt, everything else about him is still distinctly masculine, or so he thinks. Maybe Hyunjin would say otherwise, but some things weren't meant to be spoken out loud yet. They'd just live in Dongju's head for now.

It was more apparent when it was on him that the gold pieces were meant to be little fireworks. It was pretty. Not a word Dongju thought he would ever be allowed to use to describe himself, but it felt good. He likes being pretty. Inside, his childhood self is clapping and watching with adoration. This could be the beginning of everything that child wanted.

Now, it was different. Because he'd thought that Seoho was pretty and Seoho was a man. He thinks Geonhak is pretty on a daily basis, and Geonhak is probably more secure in his masculinity than anyone else Dongju knew.

"Ju? You all good out there?" Hyunjin's voice came, muffled, through the door.

Dongju mentally curses, he forgot Hyunjin was here, how rude. But it's so easy to just keep staring at himself in the mirror and going over 50 arguments about why this is a good and a terrible decision.

"Yeah! You can come back now." Dongju said.   

Hyunjin flings open the door, only stopping it from slamming back against the stopper with the tips of xyr fingers. Dongju would be impressed with xyr reflexes if he wasn't otherwise occupied. And he certainly is, swaying back and forth and feeling it brush softly against his legs. A little bit ticklish but mostly pleasant.

Hyunjin squeals at both a pitch and volume too loud for what is meant to be happening in the dorm today, which is nothing. Dongju hurriedly shushes xem, and Hyunjin apologizes softly but kept xyr eyes on the skirt.

"It's like it was made just for you, Ju. Look at you." Hyunjin lifted xyr eyes to Dongju's face and practically melted at what xe saw.

Dongju was staring at himself in the mirror again, wholly entranced. "I look like myself. I feel like myself. This is incredible."

Hyunjin didn't have any words to answer with, xe just smiled at Dongju through the mirror, glad xe could bring this piece of joy to xyr friend.

"I'm gonna bring you so many pretty skirts. I don't think any of Changbin-hyung's dresses would fit you, though, sorry. His shoulders are stupid wide."

Dongju sighed, but he didn't expect much from that. And the idea of being small, smaller than Changbin is kind of nice. His group of friends was great for that because all but one were either the same height or taller than him. And what Hwanwoong lacked in height, he more than made up for in energy and feistiness.

They did this over and over again. Dongju suspects that not all skirts were recycled hand-me-downs but new gifts, but he didn’t say anything. It's not like he had a receipt or anything to prove it. Just a feeling. Either way, it's nice to be spoiled by someone else without asking. The last time he felt like that was when his parents would bring home the toys he wanted without asking. Or would the times that the others show up with food count? Either way, he felt spoiled in a way that he rarely did.

It happened so often that the others were not necessarily suspicious, just a bit confused. Hyunjin came in with a bag, stayed for an hour, and then left with nothing. No one knew what was in the bag or where they went because Dongju made them disappear.

Internally, he was becoming more confused by the day but said nothing to anyone. He'd noticed being out in public is a little more uncomfortable, and he didn't like people looking at him. Sure, he didn't really before, but it wasn't so visceral and uncomfortable then. There wasn't an apparent reason why in his head, so he just kept moving along and trying to avoid being around many people in public.

The other strange thing is the slight wrongness under his skin when someone calls him a man. At first, he just attributes it to not feeling like a proper adult despite being almost done with college. It lasts a few weeks until he googles it to see if anyone else felt like this and how they deal with it.

The results he got were... different. Reddit post after Reddit post, ranging from one reply to almost a hundred.

I don't feel like a man, but nothing else seems right. What do I do?

I feel uncomfortable when people call me a man or a boy, it feels wrong. Anyone else feel this way?

I have long hair, and someone behind me assumed I was a woman. Why did I like it so much?

Dongju had thought about growing his hair long once, and Hyunjin regularly oscillated between shoulder length and short hair. What if someone mistook him for a woman in public because of his hair? It didn't feel *wrong* per se, but that was probably just because it was a theoretical experience, and he wasn't actually experiencing it. If he was called a woman, he'd definitely be weirded out. Definitely.

The googling continued, and Dongju found other pieces he related to in some people's stories, so he kept looking. However, the more he looked, the more similar the results became.

Trans, egg, trans woman, trans femme, agender, non-binary

He'd heard some of the terms from Hyunjin, who also gracefully explained what they meant personally, but Dongju would never have connected them to his own experience. And he continued to be determined not to.

There was no moment in his childhood where he wanted to try on a dress or makeup or anything like that. Nobody teased him for being different like that. Mainly, they focused on him being nerdy or quiet or something. He never found himself wishing his body was different or that his puberty was wrong.

But... sitting in his room in the dark, Dongju let himself wonder for a little bit. What happened at 2am didn't count, so he ignored it until morning.

What would it be like if his voice hadn't dropped in middle school and stayed slightly higher? Or what if his body was smaller and rounder, rather than the muscle his roommates had encouraged him to build?

Dongju clicked his phone off and slapped it down, throwing both hands over his face as if to avoid looking at his thoughts. Surely, there was no way that he liked some of these thoughts? There was no way he would want a different body or a lighter voice or to be accepted in longer hair and skirts. No, this was just slight sleep deprivation and a sign he should stop staying up so late googling this nonsense. He silently resolved to get a better sleep schedule over the next few weeks, which would solve everything.

Getting more sleep was pretty good for him, but it didn't solve anything in thinking about what he'd be like as a woman. If anything, it was worse because it also started being in his dreams. Some were more like his current self and experimenting, but some looked completely different.

Dongju would wake up and lay in bed, turning the dreams over in his mind until he woke up more and realized what was happening, shaking it away and ignoring it for the rest of the day.

Eventually, it wears him down a little, seeing the same dreams and thinking about the repetitive results he got when googling such personal experiences. There were some queer clubs/groups on campus, so he went out to one of them.

Thankfully, Dongju hadn't met any of the people before, so they just nod and accept him. They don't ask him any questions, and he didn't say much in return and instead just listens. It didn't provide any answers but is a friendly little community.

He went for a few weeks, becoming somewhat of a new regular. It came to the point where they start asking him questions.

Name? Easy. Pronouns? Dongju hadn't properly admitted it to himself yet, but exclusively he/him didn't feel quite correct anymore, and he didn't know what to replace it with either.

"Um... not sure yet. That's why I started coming here. He/they, I guess?" That was the best answer he could get out.

The person, Moonbyul, just nodded and didn't question it. She seemed really chill. He kept going, talking to more and more people and becoming less and less sure of everything. At some point, Moonbyul and another girl named Yoohyeon. He was a little scared at first, and it must have shown on his face because both laughed and assured him they were committed lesbians.

One night, he texts Moonbyul impulsively before he could convince himself not to.

Hey

Hello there

Can you try something out for me? She/her pronouns. Not in person, just like. A short text

interesting. sure Dongju is a new friend of mine. I think she's kinda cool

Dongju stared at the text for a while without responding, internally repeating it again and again. I think she's kinda cool. She is. She.

You alive over there?

Oh, um yeah Just.... yeah

It felt good?

Hah, I guess so

Well, welcome to the club I guess

Lol the club of what? Womaning? Am I a woman? Oh god

Hah, I'll let you figure that out I can't answer it for you Want me to tell anyone, or are you doing it yourself?

No, I'll do it myself. Just... give me some time He/they for a while, if you don't mind

Yeah, whatever you need Just lemme know when it's gonna be okay

Dongju sends a simple heart before closing her phone and then her eyes. Now what? Seriously, how do people deal with this and then move on? Who should she tell first? What should she tell them? How long should she wait? Now she knew, and there was only so long she'd be able to handle the wrong pronouns now that she knew the right ones and what they feel like.

She picked her phone back up and looked at the time. Damn, no time for a crisis right now, she had an assignment due that night that she'd done hardly any of.

After submitting the assignment Dongju was so exhausted from several hours of adrenaline-fueled work that she was exhausted and went right to bed. It took her a while to fall asleep, but she had no space to think of much.

The next day, she had nothing else pressing, so she spent almost an hour wondering what to do. After she eats breakfast she just sits at the table and stared into space. Her other roommates seem to be out or asleep, so none of them were there to ask what the fuck is going on and she could zone in and out in peace. The clock on her phone ticked over to 11am, and she decided to get out of there before her luck ran out and she had to explain or find some excuse.

When she returns to her room, Dongju is struck with sudden inspiration. Hyunjin! Xe'll obviously be okay with it and might even have some advice on what to do now. It's not a 1-1 exact experience, but it's something, and god knew she needed anything right now.

Hyunjin answered fast, and she was there a 30-minute bus ride later. One I'm here text and a knock later, and Hyunjin is practically bouncing as xe lets them in. Most of their boyfriend roommates were also home, so it was much louder, and Dongju stared wide-eyed. She'd been here before, but usually, it was much emptier and quieter. It made it less likely that someone would hear them talking over all the noise, which was nice.

Minho, Chan, and Seungmin all nod at her, and Jisung and Felix take a break from intense Mario Karting to wave. It was nice because she'd hardly talked to any of them, but they accept her like it's nothing just because she knew Hyunjin so well.

Hyunjin closed the door behind them and plops down on xyr bed, looking at Dongju.

"So, what's up? You never ask me to come over, and it seems serious."

Dongju starts fidgeting with her clothes awkwardly. How the fuck should she do this? Ugh.

"Um... well. Okay, I'm not sure sure yet, but I think I might be uh. Fuck, I hate this. Why is it so hard."

Hyunjin snorts before slapping a hand over xyr mouth to stop anything else. Xe stands up and forcefully pulls Dongju over to sit next to them.

"Unless you say you're like... getting married or something, I'm not gonna judge you. You see the fucking circus of people I live with. You're so normal in comparison to all of that."

It's genuinely a little reassuring to be "normal" for a minute. Dongju had been so caught up in feeling alone and not knowing who to go to that she forgot she was not completely alone. Personally, or just in other people who have these feelings.

"Thank you. I'm... I think I'm trans." She lets it hang in silence for a moment. "But you know, I'm not totally sure! I just had someone call me she over text, and it felt really nice. Yeah."

Dongju waits, staring down at her hands in her lap and waiting for Hyunjin's response.

"Okay, I was waiting to make sure you weren't gonna blurt out anything else. This is so exciting, though, oh my goodness! Am I the first person you told? Other than the friend you texted, who I definitely need to know more about." Dongju nodded slightly, and Hyunjin clapped in excitement. "Ah, I'm so honoured!"

Hyunjin launches xemself forward into a forceful hug on Dongju, who freezes for a minute but melts into it. She wasn't the biggest fan of hugs and whatnot, but she felt like she needed it now. They pull back, and Hyunjin is seriously beaming. It made Dongju a little less nervous, that this wasn't a bad thing and that maybe she'd make new friends or get closer to other friends.

"I get to be your little trans fairy godmother, this is wonderful. So, do you wanna tell me more about all of this? How did it happen, what are you doing now, any of that?"

Dongju laughed nervously, biting the inside of her cheek. "I'm not sure there is much to tell. It was months ago I started looking online cause I didn't feel like a man and thought it was just because I didn't feel like an adult yet. Then I started going to one of those college queer club things. That's where I met Moonbyul, the friend I texted, and she's super chill and open. I just randomly texted her and was like, hey, can you do something for me, use she/her pronouns in a message about me. She did and I don't even know how long I sat there looking at it, and it felt good, so I thought I was actually going insane. Like, no way. Yeah, that was, like, a week ago. And now I'm here."

Hyunjin looked at her with this strange little look on her face, like xe was proud and upset at the same time.

"Oh, my goodness. Little trans egg Dongju, not knowing what's happening. So you said not a man, but do you know what you might be more comfortable with now? Like, are you a girl, a woman, or not quite all the way that way? I just don't wanna say trans girl or trans woman or call you girlie if you're not, you know. And you don't have to have an answer yet! It's only been a week, so we can just keep testing what you like."

Dongju sits momentarily and thinks about it because she hadn't allowed herself to do so thus far. Is she a girl or a woman, or is she closer to some of those other terms she had seen?

She didn't know yet was the honest conclusion she came to, and she tells Hyunjin as much.

"Yeah, that's so fair! You've only known for like a week. So just tell me if I say something weird, or if I say something good!"

Hyunjin's the best person Dongju could've asked for on this journey. Xyr knowledgeable but also accepting and often upbeat. Of course, xe had xyr own serious and sensitive moments, but in general, xyr is just kind of chilling.

She spends another few hours there, just hanging out with one of her good friends, and it's lovely. Maybe she should get out more often, like Seoho said. God forbid she tell Seoho he was right about something, though, never.

As Dongju heads home, she considers when and how to tell her roommates about this. They're roommates and some of her closest friends, so there's no world where she didn't tell them. For now, everything was going perfectly fine. Her marks were good enough to pass, she'd got good friends, and she'd been learning more about herself. What more could someone ask for? Well, probably a whole lot more money, but that's beside the point.

But something had to break eventually, and in Dongju's opinion, it happened in the worst way.

It was another day, another Hyunjin visit.

In the house, they weren't in the habit of busting into other people's spaces, and to be fair, Geonhak did knock first. Unfortunately, the two seconds of warning provided was not enough for Dongju to make any meaningful attempt to hide. Geonhak must be way more flustered than Dongju could have guessed because it took a solid few seconds before he noticed.

His face got all red, and he couldn't stop staring. Dongju would like nothing more than to somehow evaporate. Or turn invisible, or teleport, or literally anything to make Geonhak stop staring like that. It made her feel itchy, and wrong. Even though she knew she wasn’t doing anything wrong, it's a piece of fabric.

"Are you gonna say anything? I feel uncomfortable and I'm not even involved." Hyunjin speaks, breaking the tenuous silence.

Dongju couldn't tell if she should thank xem or smack xem. Geonhak flinches like he was hit and starts about 6 different sentences before he commits to one.

"You look good, Dongju. Seriously. But, uh, if my laptop isn't in here, I should go. Have fun."

Geonhak waved awkwardly and then closed the door behind him. Dongju breathed a heavy sigh of relief. Could he have been lying? Sure, maybe. He wouldn't do that, he wouldn't say something like that just to spare someone's feelings, and certainly not Dongju's. They'd known each other for too long to pretend like that.

She'd take what she could get because it was nice. Hearing it from Geonhak directly gave her a little confidence boost. Maybe she'd show him more pretty things in the future, if the mere thought of doing so didn't make her want to explode.

"That was good! I've been telling you they won't care. First guy down, and he was the one you cared most about!"

Now it's Dongju's turn to flinch, because she certainly had not told Hyunjin about her crush on Geonhak. She would remember that.

"Who said he was the most important one? Who are your sources?" Dongju raises one eyebrow, trying her best to look suspicious and not nervous.

It did nothing for her, so the effort was really just wasted.

"Oh come on. Whenever I brought up telling somebody you'd always mention him first. Every single time. I'm not that stupid."  

Dongju had no counter to that, unfortunately. She simply sighed, then nodded and watched as Hyunjin grinned in triumph.

After the Geonhak skirt fiasco, Dongju decided to move along a little more because clearly, things would come to light whether she wanted them to or not. And Dongju did not like being out of control like that, not about her own identity. So she planned, and she wondered, and she panicked, and she cried a little. Ultimately, she knew she couldn't control her friend's thoughts and reactions and would just have to trust that they would accept her.  

"Hey, uh, guys?" Dongju peeked around the door, and all their heads snapped over to her at her voice.

It's clear they're all anxiously waiting, because she gave them almost no information on what was happening. Just that she had an announcement. Geonhak looked a little more relaxed, he must assume he already knew what this is about. If it were any other situation Dongju might have laughed, but she was too stressed about this to even try. He was about to get the shock of a lifetime.

"Okay, first of all, this." She hesitated a moment before stepping out from behind the door.

Hwanwoong is the first one to say anything, "cute!"

Agreements from everyone else ring out after. Geonhak leaned back onto the couch a little bit with a smug smile.

"I already told you I think you look good in this one." He said.

It's true, and precisely why she chose this skirt specifically. Geonhak wouldn't steer her wrong, which gave her peace knowing he would be behind her for this part. The rest of them explode, demanding to know why he got to see before the rest of them. Dongju rolls her eyes, these guys never change.

"It was an accident! Stop all your complaining, my ears hurt." She shuts them up fast, but they still don't look happy. Hwanwoong in particular side-eyes Geonhak and if she didn't want to avoid another argument Dongju might have laughed.

"But you said first of all right? So I feel like there's something else still." Seoho said, turning back to her.

Ah, trust Seoho to pick up on and remember that. Oldest of the friend group, always paying too much attention.

"Yeah." Dongju sighed.

She went over her mental script and the answers for the immediate questions she had a feeling they'd have.

"This is really hard, so I'll tell you when I'm done. Just… wait." She pauses, trying to force the words out of her mouth. "I'm trans. I'm a girl. And if that changes anything between us I'm sorry, but I can't live like this anymore. Hearing 'he' is grating, and being called a man makes me want to claw my skin off. I'm sure you have questions, ask away. Unless you just wanna kick me out right now. Yeah, I guess that's all.."

A few seconds of silence pass as they all process everything she'd said. Geonhak got there first, his face twisting in displeasure.

"We're not kicking you out. If anyone wants you to leave just because of this, I'm telling them to leave, not you."

A few tears well up, but Dongju starts blinking them away, determined not to cry about this in front of them. They all agreed quickly after that, and Dongju couldn't be more relieved.

"It might be hard at first, and I'm sorry for when I say something wrong. But you're still you, and I still love you." Seoho said.

Damn you, Seoho. That did it. Dongju crouched and hunched in on herself, suddenly sobbing almost violently. An explosion of emotion that no one was prepared for. All 4 men close in quickly to try and comfort her, murmuring comforting words. What Dongju is even less ready for is Geonhak petting her hair. It felt so good that she leaned towards him a little, only realizing when her side hits his knee, and she jerks back.

He didn't push it, which Dongju was very thankful for. She could only handle so many emotions at once, and flustered embarrassment would not be one of them. It took a while, and at some point, they all have to sit down to avoid their legs and feet going numb. Eventually, Dongju's tears slow, and she begins to breathe correctly again.

Someone's warmth disappears from behind her, and half a minute later, Keonhee crouches in front of her, a large glass of water in hand. She took it gratefully and downed it, not realizing just how dehydrated all that crying made her.

She did feel a little more clear-headed now. No one was upset, they all rushed to comfort her, and everything was still okay. Nothing is perfect, but things should get a little easier now.

What did not get any easier is having feelings for Geonhak, but at this point, Dongju expects that. She wasn’t even sure if her gender complicates things because she'd never heard of him with someone else, and he didn't talk about it either, at least not with her. And she'd rather fling herself into space than ask him, so she did some information-gathering first. In the process, she learns some harsh truths.

"Oh, are you thinking of finally confessing to him?" Hwanwoong asked.

Alarming statements all around, considering she had not spoken a word of her feelings to him. Lying to Hwanwoong was useless, especially since she was sure her shock was written all over her face already.

"Who told you? I bet it was Hyunjin. I never should have trusted that snake." Dongju bit her lip and contemplates the best method of revenge for this betrayal.

"What? No. I figured it out because when he's not looking, you look at him like he's the best thing since iced americanos. It would be sweet if it weren't so awful."

What if she murders this guy one day because spewing such absolute nonsense should be a crime. Surely, she looked at Geonhak in a completely normal way.

"Like he personally puts the moon up every night. I think it's sweet, but you didn't seem ready to talk about it, so I didn't say anything." Seoho said, staring at her and shrugging.

"This may be the worst day of my life," Dongju declares, and Seoho sputters. "My roommates know I have feelings for this guy, but I didn't tell any of them. What am I doing wrong?"

"Are you always this dramatic? Or does Geonhak just inspire that in you?"

Dongju ignores him in favour of pondering how her life led to this point. If she was so obvious about it, did Geonhak know too? He wasn’t the most observant guy, but it wasn’t like he was completely oblivious. Now, she had to deal with a new layer of nervousness around him, as if she wasn't doing badly enough already.

Despite that, she manages to be reasonable and normal around him, or she assumes. It all crumbles when they're out one day. They're all just walking around together, being menaces and taking up the whole sidewalk. Suddenly, Seoho flinches and sidesteps into Dongju, who yelps and glares. Seoho defends himself very quickly by pointing to the kid attached to his leg, who looked to be on the verge of tears. Geonhak moved so fast, and Dongju took a half-step back in shock.

"Hey, little buddy. My name is Geonhak, what's yours?"

The kid hesitates, clearly heeding stranger danger warnings but too far from any parental figure to say no.

"Hajun."

"Nice to meet you, Hajun! These are my friends. Can we help you find your parents? I bet they're very worried. Where did you see them last?"

"Back there. But they were going that way. I just wanted to look at the cool toys." His eyes start welling up again, but Geonhak is faster.

"Very good! You wanna go up on my shoulders? Then you can tell us about them, and we can all look together."

That dried the tears quickly, and Hajun nodded so fast that Dongju worried for his neck. Geonhak crouched down, and Seoho leaned down to assist Hajun's little legs up. Hajun squeals when Geonhak stands, and he flew up. For a moment, Dongju relived the weightless feeling she remembers as a child. She snapped out of it when they started walking, and Hajun began to talk.

"My mommy is kind of short, and she says one day I'll be taller than her. I'm so excited. But I won't be taller than my dad 'cause he's tall like you, Geonhak-ssi!"

Incredibly cute but not helpful. Many women were short, and plenty of men were tall, like Geonhak. Dongju was hoping that Hajun's parents recognized him and come over because she wasn’t sure that he would be helpful in their search.

"I bet you'll grow tall like your dad, Hajun. What are your parents wearing? Some cool outfit just like you?" Geonhak asked, and thank goodness for him. Dongju didn't know where they'd be otherwise right now.

Of course, Hajun only locks on to the most important part of that message. "You think my outfit is cool? Thanks Geonhak-ssi! I think your outfit is cool, too."

Dongju had to admit the kid had taste. Geonhak had a monochrome outfit on, and Dongju had been staring. A black and white jacket, a white shirt with some indeterminate design, and lethal black skinny jeans. She had tripped several times today because she was staring at his ass. In her defense, it's a nice ass!

"Thanks, buddy. What cool outfits are your parents wearing?" Dongju mentally congratulates Hwanwoong on the seamless transition.

"They're not wearing cool outfits! Not like you, mister." Hwanwoong visibly preened at the compliment, and in Dongju's opinion, it was horrifying. "My dad is wearing his weirdo One Piece shirt, and my mom is wearing her nerdy Sailor Moon shirt. They always argue about which one is better. I think it's dumb cause Naruto is better. Obviously."

"Obviously." Keonhee laughed, and Dongju found herself laughing along, too, amused by this child's certainty about his opinions.

They walk, and they keep walking. Dongju was starting to get worried that Hajun's parents were behind them somewhere or crossed the street to look and that they weren't going to find them. But she didn't say anything, so they just kept going.

"Hajun!" They hear, and they all whip around to find the source.

Two people frantically pushed through the crowd towards them and shouted for Hajun. Hajun himself starts wiggling, and it took quick moves from Keonhee to avoid either Hajun or Geonhak getting injured. Hajun and his parents meet in the middle in a heartwarming moment. His mother looked near crying, clearly frantic about losing her son for several minutes. His father hardly looked any better, but Dongju could see the panic melting away into relief. After a minute or three, they stand and look at the group.

"Thank you so much for helping him. We were so afraid when we looked down, and he wasn't there anymore. I should have been paying more attention." Hajun's mother said.

"No, no, it was my pleasure. He's a very well-behaved kid, you're doing well with him." Geonhak said sheepishly.

"You're very kind, thank you. Okay. Hajun, buddy. What do you say to the kind people?" Hajun's father bent down and asked.

Hajun gasped, bowing to them all. "Thank you, Geonhak-ssi and friends! I had fun."

Hajun stands and beams at them all, and they all look back at him, smiling just as sweetly. Of course, Dongju is drawn to look at Geonhak's smile. He seemed to be smiling the widest of them all, and Dongju would bet 10 bucks that he was already attached to Hajun.

It was devastating, and Dongju is barely holding herself together. She was able to keep it together while searching because that was much more pressing, but now Hajun is safe, and she had nothing else to focus on. The family walks away, talking happily amongst themselves and moving on with their day.

Thankfully no one is paying attention to her, and she had a few moments to pull herself together while they all discussed Hajun's cuteness on a scale from 1-10. Or, she thought no one was looking at her, but she heard her name in the middle of one of her deep breaths. It's a tone so familiar that her eyes snap open and immediately slide over to him. True to form, Geonhak is looking at her, practically staring her down and analyzing her from head to toe. She knew the man better than almost anyone else and still found it intimidating.

"You okay, Ju? You seemed upset." Geonhak asked.

"Of course! Just a little tired and stressed from being surrounded by all these people, you know how it is." Dongju throws on her best little smile and prays it's good enough for him to believe.

It seemed to be, as Geonhak watched her for a few seconds longer, then nodded his head, seemingly seeing what he needed.

"Okay. Let me know if you need a break. We can go to the side, or I can take you home."

Dongju could kiss him on the damn mouth right now, but that would defeat the whole point of her holding her feelings in. Instead, she just nodded, and they kept moving on with their original plans for the day out. They still circle back to Hajun occasionally, talking about how cute he was or how it was good he found them and not some creepy people, but mostly how cute he was. It's mostly Geonhak leading that part of the conversation, and Dongju had to actively and viciously squash down the thought of Geonhak with his own children and what they would look like.

They enter some random store, and a few minutes in, Seoho pulls her over to the side and starts whispering before Dongju could even process what was happening.

"You looked like you were in pain while Geonhak talked about that kid. Are you okay?"

Dongju externally just sighed, but inside, she was crying and about to lose it. Was she really that obvious? Oh, god. Hopefully, Geonhak was too distracted thinking about Hajun and didn't notice. But he was so observant, so he probably did, and thought she was a total weirdo. It was over.

"Dong. Ju. Shut that head up and answer me." Seoho hisses.

"Fine, I'm fine. Typical crisis about how cute he is with kids, no biggie. I just have to pray he didn't notice me being weird." Dongju shook her head.

Seoho waved it off. "Not much weirder than you normally are, it'll be fine."

Dongju is about to ask exactly what the hell that is supposed to mean, but Geonhak decided it is the perfect time for him to appear.

"Why are you two hiding in the corner? You could've told us if you wanna leave." Geonhak tilted his head, and Dongju had to take a deep breath before she said something stupid. It was really a problem.

"Nothing, nothing. Our little Ju is just having some boy problems." Seoho grins wickedly and casually strolls off, leaving Dongju silently plotting how to murder him quietly but painfully.

When she looked over, Geonhak looked... strange. When he saw her looking, he smiled and put on his older brother face.

"Boy problems, huh? You know you can come to me for those. We gotta make sure he's good enough for you." Geonhak said seriously, and it took everything in Dongju's muscles not to react in any of the immediate ways she wanted to.

"Ah.... seriously. You'd like him. He's protective, kind, smart, and funny. Too good to be liking someone like me." Dongju sighed, staring at her feet.

Geonhak made some strange set of offended noises. When Dongju looked up, she saw his accompanying twisted face and knew what was about to come.

"He'd be an absolute fool not to like you! If he's that dumb, then you're too good for him." Geonhak said.

Once again, Dongju had to tamp down the ironic laugh that wanted to jump out. She wishes she could tell him not to be so mean to himself, but she categorically refuses to confess publicly. If she had to do it, it would not be in some tacky clothing store in the middle of the day.

"Thanks. Anyways, not like I'm going to do anything about it. So, if he likes me back then we'll never know."

Geonhak wanted to protest, she could see it in his face, but Keonhee popped up from behind a rack and told him to come look at something. How neither of them saw that man the size of a tree walking over was entirely unknown, but Geonhak smiled awkwardly and shrugged. Dongju laughed a little at him and waved him off.

It hurts to be so close yet so far. Was Geonhak's praise a platonic or, romantic or other type of praise? At least it was genuine, which always felt good, but it made her heart go wild in a way that she shouldn't know if she should be accepting or not. He didn't seem overly bothered by her so-called "boy problems," which told her nothing.

Dongju had always and would always go to her mother for help if she needed something. That bond hadn't broken through time and change, and she loves her mother through all of it.

The first piece of advice is entirely expected.

"Give him food, honey! Everyone loves food, and not having to make it is nice. You've always said that man of yours is like a vacuum for food, and you know he'll appreciate the effort."

Dongju felt herself light up like a fire truck at "that man of yours" and immediately starts whining. It's a good thing she remembered to put her headphones in before this because if anyone else is home, they do not need to hear this. They'd teased her about this enough as is. Her mother laughed and ignored all of Dongju's very valid complaints.

"I've seen that man, and I know you'll get him. Though, you should do it quickly, just in case. Someone else might come along, and he might choose them if he doesn't know you're an option." Her mother said wisely.

Dongju just sighed because she knew, but hearing it from someone else was scary. Sitting back and watching Geonhak fall in love with someone else would tear her apart. If she tried, she'd know it wasn't meant to be and could try to move on.

"Ah, yeah. I know."

"If you know, then why haven't you done it yet, my girl! Make him your man properly."

Dongju's heart warmed hearing "my girl" come so naturally from her mother's mouth. It had taken a bit of accidental slip-ups, but her mother was so proactive that it was over quickly.

"I should do it soon, right? Kick everyone out and then surprise him after the gym or something. Yeah."

"Yes! It'll be perfect, he'll be so hungry, and then you can get out of your own head and talk to him when he's done."

Dongju's jaw nearly cracks at how quickly it drops open in sheer offense at her mother calling her out. She might be correct, but damn, she didn't need to say it like that! Her mother just cackles through the phone and waves goodbye, hanging up before she could get upset. Dongju lets out a short yell and then groans loudly, flopping back into her pillow pile.

After a short moment, a knock came at her door and opened after she called out some strange, probably affirmative, noise. Of course, Geonhak peeked around the corner, smirking in amusement when he saw her body flopped haphazardly all over the blankets and pillows.

"Everything okay in here? Nothing seems broken." He cautiously looked around, searching for anything broken or injured.

"No, I'm okay. Sorry. My mom was teasing me when I called her, and then she hung up before I could get her back."

Geonhak laughed, and Dongju pouted at him until he noticed.

"I love your mom, seriously. Is she gonna come down again soon? It's been a while."

"Why do you like my mother so much! She's gonna adopt you as her own damn son at this rate."

Geonhaks clicked his tongue and shook his head at her. Dongju felt slightly offended by it but let him speak before she ripped his head off. He should have felt lucky that he was so pretty (and kind and funny and-) because Hwanwoong would absolutely not be given that grace.

"You gotta make good impressions on everyone's moms for 2 reasons: they would believe you about anything and give you banging free food." Geonhak nodded slowly, like he'd just told Dongju the secrets of the universe.

He wasn’t wrong, but it was a little lackluster. For now, he lived.

Dongju had planned everything out, and it would convince Geonhak that she was very dateable. Until that confession happened, Dongju's roommates would still have to deal with her rants regularly. She loved them, even if she'd never say it.

Today's victim was Seoho.

"Seriously, dude. Seeing him with that kid permanently rewired my brain, I swear to god." She groans.

Seoho looked at her for a moment. "I don't know how that's possible, given how down bad you were before."

Dongju sits up, mouth hanging open and glaring at Seoho. She flops back into his pillows when he simply raises an eyebrow, silently screaming and kicking her feet.

"1. Rude. 2. It is possible. My brain is losing it 24/7. Do you understand how hard it was not to say something like 'hi, Geonhak! After seeing you with that child, I can't stop thinking about having an apartment with you and seeing you wake up in the morning and you coming home to me after working your day as a teacher!' He'd have me committed to a fucking psych ward. I'd probably deserve it at this rate 'cause what is this."

Seoho opened his mouth to say something, but someone hesitantly knocked at his door before he could. Dongju immediately freezes and looked about halfway to passing out then and there. Seoho stands but waits a minute to ensure she won't be doing that before swinging the door open.

She couldn't see Seoho's expression from there, and there was no time to say anything before he went past the person in the doorway. And who else walks in but Geonhak himself. She couldn’t do this right now, absolutely not. Apparently, she was rooted to her spot by some freeze instinct and possibly some masochistic will to see what he'd say. Assuming he heard what she had said before and didn't just happen to come in.

"So. You wanna live in a cute apartment with me and see my horrible morning bedhead?" Geonhak asked sheepishly, playing with his fingers and not looking at her.

Internally, she wondered how he was acting like the nervous one right now.

"I mean. Right now I'd much prefer going to drown in the nearest body of water, actually." Dongju stared at the ceiling, wondering how her life had come to this point.

"Um, I'd appreciate it if you didn't do that. Taking a soaking, drowned body on a date seems like a pretty bad time for everybody."

She had to sit and blink for a good 30 seconds or so just trying to process what that man just said. Surely, he didn't say date. Surely, he just said... something that sounds like date and had a similar meaning but wasn't. She had to sit up and look at him when he said nothing else. He was still fidgeting with his fingers and not looking at her.

"Did you just say date? Like a romantic type of date?"

"Yes. And if you're not going to drown yourself, then I'd like to take your very alive self on one instead. If you want to anyways, we obviously don't ha-"

His nervous rambling gave Dongju the strength and rage to push herself off the bed and stalk over to him.

"How did you hear me telling Seoho that I want you to come home to me and still wonder if I want to go on a date with you?"

Geonhak stayed silent and just took one, then two, slow steps toward her, stopping just far enough away that she could feel his presence.

"Can I kiss you?" He whispered.

She nodded before thinking and stared at him, waiting and not daring to move. He raises his hand and lays it lightly on her cheek before leaning in. Dongju's eyes flutter closed and she stayed in the dark for a moment for him. When their lips touched, he put his other hand on her waist, and all she wanted to feel was more. She couldn't tell him that, but she tried to push a little into his hand anyway.

Their first kiss is short, and sweet, and she pulls back less than a centimeter before going back for more. Her arms feel awkward by her side, so she put them on his broad shoulders. Finally, she got to feel the results of all his workouts instead of just staring longingly. And, presumably, she'd be able to do that a lot more now, too. Delightful.

It still wasn’t enough for her, and Dongju looped her arms around his neck and pushed herself closer, pressing their chests together. Geonhak made a surprised little noise, but it only seemed to inspire him to grab her waist firmer with both hands. Exactly the way she wanted. The half-second pull away to breathe quickly stopped being enough, and Dongju leaned back then laid her forehead on his shoulder.

"Fuck." She breathed, and then giggled a little at her own breathlessness.

Geonhak laughed with her, holding her close. It's perfect. Everything is warm and comfortable, just as Geonhak always had been for her.

[rededgerp]

Congratultions Abel! You’ve been accepted as your first choice of Shawn Mendes (Donny Keller)! Please send in the account within the next 24 hours!

✖ ABOUT YOU

↳ Name: Abel

↳ Pronouns: He/Him/His

↳ Age: 25+

↳ Activity: At least once a day, anywhere between 1-5 hours. Weekends I’ll be online the least, as I’m the busiest then.

✖ ABOUT YOUR CHARACTER 

↳ Celebrity Desired: Shawn Mendes

↳ Second Celebrity: I don’t have a second face claim for this particular character. If the celebrity becomes unavailable, I’ll happily apply for a different character!

↳ Character Name: Donald Keller

↳ Character’s Pronouns: he/him/his

↳ Occupation: TikTok Accountant

↳ Birthday: February 17, 1998

↳ Background:

Donald Keller, hailing from a small southern town, grew up in a tight-knit family with his fraternal twin brother and a single mother. Love and encouragement were the foundations of their small family unit, yet despite their shared upbringing, Donny and his brother couldn’t have been more different in personality.

Donny was the easy-going, social butterfly of the family, a party animal always up for trying new things. However, he wasn’t known for his intellectual pursuits; rather, he was an attention-seeker with a beloved pet ferret. In contrast, his brother was quiet, a bookworm with a tendency for anger issues and a judgmental nature, who happened to be a cat lover.

Their doting mother gave both boys immense love, but her attention naturally gravitated more towards the quieter, introspective brother, Sean. This consistent dynamic left Donny feeling overlooked and led to his sometimes extreme emotional reactions.

Much of Donny’s insecurities, however, stem from the early childhood trauma of their father abandoning the family when he was just three years old. This experience left him hesitant about sudden changes and highly sensitive to the possibility of friends turning their backs on him. He often felt jealousy towards those who stole the limelight from his loved ones.

Growing up, Donny cherished being the center of attention and continually honed his talents with aspirations of stardom. In his teenage years, he was certain that fame was his destiny. Although he hasn’t reached those heights, social media, particularly TikTok, provided him with the recognition he craved.

Throughout his childhood, Donny frequently attended theater camps, and worshops. However, when it came time for college, his mother’s financial limitations forced him to make a difficult choice. He opted not to attend college, allowing his brother to pursue higher education while he worked at a hotel and attended a local community college.

When the time came to transfer to a university, Donny still faced financial constraints. However, it’s worth noting that Donny was accepted into a couple prestigious performing arts schools. Despite these opportunities, he decided to embrace the life of a drifter, seeking adventures and experiences beyond the confines of traditional education.

His journey took him to diverse places, three memorable months in Alaska, before that an eight-month stay in Nebraska. Prior to that, he spent a year in Northern California. Thanks to his current job, Donny could now afford to move back to the Golden State, often seen as a land of opportunities.

In recent years, Donny’s life took an unexpected and exciting turn as he found success as a TikToker, using the platform to share messages of love and positivity with his engaged following. Also, it didn’t hurt that he’d post shirtless a lot of the time, and he showcased his adorable pet ferret any chance he got. It was through this growing online presence that he secured his current job, which he could accomplish simultaneously with his travels.

As he navigated this dynamic and ever-changing path, Donny wasn’t overly concerned about the future. He had learned to embrace the present moment and make the most of each experience, prioritizing the joy and adventure in every chapter of his life. His optimism and zest for life remained his guiding lights, ensuring that whatever destination awaited him next, he would face it with an open heart and a spirit of grand enjoyment.

↳ Para:

“Anyone want to go out of town with me, for the day?” Donny heard the question come from behind him. He turned to see a tall, beautiful girl with long wavy hair. How could he say no to her? Donny loved adventure, and he also loved beautiful girls.

“Yeah, I do, immensely pretty girl I’ve never met before.” He wasn’t a flirt by any means. He certainly wasn’t trying to flirt with the girl, because she was way out of his league, the type of girl who didn’t typically end up with a guy like him, no matter how good of a boyfriend he would be.

“Alright. Jump in.” Her car was expensive, but that didn’t faze Donny. He treated everyone the same. “Why are we going again?” he asked, already in the car, making himself comfortable.

“To do some shopping, spying, more shopping. You know, fun stuff.” Donny was getting more excited by the second. He simply shrugged off the mention of spying, as if it were just another item on their adventurous to-do list. “Oo. Alright. That’s what I signed up for!” He buckled up, threw on his favorite pair of sunglasses, and got ready for the adventure that awaited him.

He seemed to be the type of person who could dive headfirst into any escapade without getting too caught up in the details or potential consequences. Fun and adventure were what mattered most to him in that moment.

↳ Anything Else? Okay, so Donny’s pet ferret is named Maisei. He loves that animal more than anything in the entire world. His brother and mother don’t live in the area. Although, his brother did go to UC Berkeley. Donny will be new to town, and not know anyone. Hope that’s okay. Yes, I read them rules.