#ups and downs <3 i really spent most of it drawing jojos

[cachememory]

hello lgbts <3 i did a lot of art this year (except in september apparently) and for the first time ever can do this summary of art meme :) wahoo! 💛💛

[mimithings97]

Heartache (M)

Summary: You didn’t know such a feeling was so real, so vivid, so hurtful. But it had happened and happened to you before you could stop it. Tae had become written into your life hard and fast, so when you leave you question that maybe, just maybe, you weren’t willing to unwrite him.

Pairing: Taehyung x Y/N

Genre: Angst, Smut, Fluff

Warnings: Heartache for starters, Unprotected sex, Oral (male receiving), Swearing, Nude modelling, Taehyung’s a sappy mess, Mentions of Alcohol

Word Count: 6k

A/N: Can’t lie in saying how morbid it is that I enjoy writing angst. It’s light angst though and a lot lighter than how fucking whipped Tae is at the end. Much love for the bub though, so, enjoy x

Ahhh jungkook features as well forgot to mention. Still love him. Nothings changed there.

Heartache.

Cringy, you once thought to yourself. 

How could you be so dependent, so set and so immersed in something that your heart actually aches? 

It didn’t make sense to you until the day words were spoken that couldn’t be taken back, bags were reluctantly packed and more tears were shed than there is water in the Thames. Heartache was real, vivid and the hardest thing you have ever had to live through in your 24 years of life. 3 weeks of a deep set dropping in your stomach that couldn’t be shaken despite the booze intake, the occasional listening to his voicemails and the relentless tears.

Your mother told you that if you built up too many walls it would hurt so much more when someone knocked them down. You had told Taehyung this on the first date, your first date, ever, with any man. You had always drawn a line between pleasure and dependency, settling for short flings and the occasional online relationship (purely for the sexting) instead of the commitment and responsibility that weighed on vulnerable shoulders when you bear your entire self to another in a relationship. Taehyung knew this. But he fell and you fell harder. You fell completely and utterly under his spell for three years. 

And then he told you he wanted to marry you. Bastard didn’t even propose, just mentioned that one toxic word of marriage and you instantly laid the bricks of that wall he had so unceremoniously knocked down all those years ago.

It felt so adult yet so childish leaving someone over the concept of marriage, but when talks of marriage turn to talks of children and one party wants something completely different to the other, what kind of relationship is there to continue. 

So three weeks later, just as the physical pain of emptiness and heartache has begun ebbing away, the emotional trauma of your decision begins to cave in on you.

To Jungkook:

11:31pm

You: I know I said I’d stop this

You: But I really dont know if this is worth the pain

You: His mum sent me a get well soon card today bc he told her i was ill and that’s why i hadn’t visited

You: I’m never going to not love him

You: How does anyone get over this shit its not fair

11:35pm

Guk: Oh noona

Guk: It’ll take lots and lots of time and lots and lots of tubs of ice cream and wine but youre both adults who want different things and not everything is meant to be

Guk: Sacrifice for the greater good right

11:35pm

You: There’s no fucking greater good here

You: I hate this

11:37pm

Guk: Noona you know that down the road hyung wants children. I don’t think marriage was that big, but he’s always wanted to be a dad

Guk: It’s not fair of him to ask you to have something you don’t want but its also not fair to leave him without the thing he’s always desired the most

11:40pm

You: Its just too hard to take

You: It feels like three years for jack shit

11:41pm

Guk: If you’re really struggling that much, noona, talk to him. I know he wants to talk to you still, he’s tried to contact you everyday. Maybe it will give you some closure or just help you see what’s right

11:41pm

You: Love you

Your phone is down as soon as Jungkook mentioned talking to him. How could you take one step forward and a million steps back by talking to him? It would be like hanging just what you want right in front of you but no touching, no talking to them after that 5 minutes of hell, no seeing them ever again. Closure is what you need but never what you’ll want.

The sheets that surround you, nuzzled closely into your neck and still unwashed even after three weeks just to keep that tiny scent of Tae over you naked skin, warm you to the point your eyes drift. You don’t mean to fall asleep so easily, but when every little action weighs so heavy on you during the day, sleep comes too easily. However, so does the nightmares of crawling alone in the black abyss.

---------------------------------------------

Resuming work was never easy on a broken soul, but alas, here you were, with three weeks of sick pay under your belt you’d rather not have and 20 children at your feet.

Ironic isn’t it.

You break up with the only man you’ve ever loved because you can’t face a future of settling down with children, yet you wake up at the fucking godforsaken hour of 6 am to tend to a bunch of five and six years olds every day. No, you didn’t hate children, but they weren’t the joy of your life either. You were good at your job and you had this mad psychological complex that if you could help a child at five or six like you had so desperately needed at that age, then maybe you’d make their life just that little bit easier and that little bit brighter. Taehyung always found your reason for working so admirable - fuck that look of pure adoration in his eyes when you told him - so he found it equally hard to come to terms with when you told him the opposite. When you told him you couldn’t have your own children because the responsibility scared you. His ears were ringing at the point where you told him you also didn’t want to share him and his kindness, even so, the damage had been done, whatever the reasoning.

“Y/N! Jennie said you were back,” it’s a tight smile from you and a loose hug, but it’s amazing you’ve managed that with the way your head is far from in the room let alone the conversation at hand. “God, I hope you’re better, you were out for a while.”

You squeeze a weak laugh out, “Yeh, it wasn’t all that fun.”

“For a second me and Jennie were thinking you might be pregnant.” The heartache subsides, rivalled by the very distinct feeling of sickness. The ball of energy in front of you persists in conversation, but it’s to drowned ears and for a second you think you’ll faint. 

You miss your name being called. Shit, you don’t even know where it’s coming from, because the all-consuming feeling of this tide of emotions has swept you far from your spot in the classroom. Marie in front of you still calls, asking if you’re okay, but it’s the tug on your skirt, not harsh, but enough to garner a reaction that casts your eyes down.

“Miss Y/N?”

It’s Jojo, eyes wide and glaring up at you, still clung to the material of your skirt.

“Miss Y/N, why are you crying?”

You instantly draw the back of your hand to your face and it catches a cascading tear, much to your shock. You face must morph into a mortified expression at the thought of so carelessly crying at work, in the presence of the kids you look after with a smile and a skip in your step each day.

“Miss Y/N, it’s okay to cry. You can draw with me if you feel crying…” he shakes his head, “sad. Sad I mean.”

You feel Marie’s hand on your back, but Jojo’s eyes sweep you into a frenzy of more tears before you find yourself kneeling on the floor by the table. His table, where he sits alone each day, with paper and paints, or pencils, or chalk, sometimes he just folds it and hands it to you saying he made his paper into a flower. He already has one of his drawings on the go but scribbled over it thoughtlessly before starting out on a series of words. ‘To miss Y/n’.  Your eyes well further, but his words stop you.

“I think sometimes that drawings can make you better. Can make better the sadness.”

---

“Tae are you still going at it?”

You peer around the corner of the door, leaning half in half out of his man cave to study your boyfriend at work. 5 hours he’d been couped up in there.

“Hmm.” 

He didn’t let you see his art until the product was finished, completely finished, because sometimes he’d say he was done and then go back when he’d found the smallest error only to get pissed off that you had witnessed anything other than the completed masterpiece.

“Tae, you’ve been in here for hours, just come out to help me cook.” You plead with him over the canvas, not daring to peak any further.

“I know, I’m sorry.”

He hasn’t looked at you since you came in, his brow well and truely glued into a furrow and the tea you’d brought him earlier cold and untouched beside him. You lower your tone into a more serious one.

“You okay?”

Silence.

“Done.” He doesn’t sound relieved or happy at the finalising of a five-hour art project like most would, like he normally does. He’s merely, ‘done’.

With an apprehensive tone, you ask, “Can I come see?” A gentle nod and you round the canvas, his arm dropping the brush in favour of tugging at the skin of your waist until you’re gently seated in his lap.

It’s beautiful and it’s simplistic and there’s so much life and emotion in it that you know the five hours weren’t all spent with brush to canvas but with him mulling over the memories and thoughts it conjured up.

“Your grandmother’s house?” Your voice is soft, not a pitying soft, but a soft that lets him know he can talk freely.

“Hmm,” he presses a kiss to the shoulder exposed by the shirt that hangs off you loosely. “Wanted to do something for her.”

You let the silence and the painting speak for itself for a while as his hands brush at your sides and you lean into his head that rest against you, chin to shoulder as his warm breath lulls you into calmness.

“You miss her?” 

“So much.”

“Painting makes it better?”

… another kiss and a sigh, warm.

“Mmm. Sometimes painting and drawing just makes the sadness a little easier, just makes it better.”

---

You see Tae in this tiny boy, this boy who draws to ease the sadness, who coups himself away on his table to be alone, too afraid to cry in front of the other boys and girls. Is he doing it too? Is he alone and painting? 

Then Jojo slides you his paper, wordlessly and your eyes with dried tears, prick once again, heartache replaced with something completely different, regret. And now hope. It’s those small boys words on paper, insignificant to him, and probably tiny in the grand scheme of things, but it’s his words that make you seek out for the one thing you know you can’t live without, the one thing that will heal your sadness.

‘To miss Y/N, i hope your crying gets better soon. Its okay to cry but its also good to make you happy. I hope you find your happy. From Jojo.”

You’d already found your happy, you just had to get him back.

-------------------------------------------------------

“Y/N!?” 

And it merely takes your name for you to lose every word on your tongue. Any word you could’ve conjured at that moment couldn’t have described how you felt. He looks dishevelled, and beautiful, hair unwashed and falling into his eyes, white top littered with stains and his pyjamas bottoms you bought him for Christmas hanging off his hips. 

His eyes lull from their immediate shock before he turns to look at his apartment, running a frantic hand through his hair and stumbling on his words. 

“Shit. I- I mean. I wasn’t really thinking- I didn’t expect you.”

You probably shouldn’t have come. Some people would’ve turned and gone the other way. Maybe that was the right thing to do, was that the brave thing? Were you being a coward by rooting to the spot and not being able to speak a word?

He looks at you, then behind you somewhere, then back into your eyes and his gaze sinks so far into yours, you think you might just cry there and then.

“Dooo you want to come in?” He sounds apprehensive, he probably thinks you are too, but all you want to do is be back in his apartment just like three weeks ago, touching him, talking to him unhinged, perhaps feeling the skin beneath his shirt where his heart lies, feeling if his heart has ached as yours has.

With blinking eyes that try not to glaze over, you nod, short and curt, and you miss the puff of air his mouth rings out with relief. 

He dashes away once you’re past the threshold, scampering around as if to distract you from the surrounding environment - it’s dusty, too cold and dark with the way the curtains shut out summer light and you barely recognise his floor as wood with the way food scatters and clothes are strewn.  Small shards of light reflect from out of the study and your eyes naturally draw there only to find a mess, door open just enough for the hoard of half-finished painting and wasted canvas’ to come into view. The door is closed by Taehyung like he knew where your gaze would lead you.

“I-I’m fucking sorry about this, it’s gross and it’s messy and i-”

“It’s just like mine.” The corners of your mouth turn up sympathetically but also because you’re relieved he’s not okay. It’s awful to say but heartache has clearly done a job on him too and for that you’re relieved. “Don’t worry, it’s just fine.”

“Just fine,” he mutters under his breath with a half-laugh. 

You’re still stood stuck to the doormat, jacket hanging tightly to you like a defence mechanism and your hands remain tight to your sides. When his eyes find yours, you seize up further like it’s the first time he’d ever seen you.

---

You’d told Janice one too many times for this situation to be coincidence. You may or may not have told her you were a sucker for exhibitionism. She’d found it all shits and giggles until the art class she headed entered into ‘naked form’ week and it was too good of an opportunity to pass by. 

So the robe drops and you’re way too aware of the last time you shaved - you think you’d be prepared, but pair a hangover with a 7:30 start and bodily care wasn’t the first thought to come to mind.

Janice gives off a flow of instructions, pointing to your body like you were a cow on show, and telling the artists to ‘admire her form, the way her body dips and flows and let you brush or pencil do the responding as though her body was talking to you’ - you almost scoff aloud at her waffle because art is so full of shit.

Exhibitionism kink or not, you’re thirty minutes in and the way your hip cramps and you eyelids lower, there is nothing alluring or desirable about this. 

But then the door on the far wall swings open all too harshly for your eyes to feign jolting away. And they blow out further when they’re met with the masculine figure uttering apologies and skidding halfway from door to seat with his urgency.

‘Just women’ she said. ‘Nothing to be worried about,’ she said. It ruined the whole ‘i like being stared at by fit men’ at first but then put you a little at ease that some 70 year old man, trying to spice up his last years of life with a too expensive art course, wouldn’t be staring your tits down. 

Yet here you were, with a man with eyes too beautiful to be tarnished by the view in front of him, gazing in shock at your naked body.

“Mr. Kim, it’s nude form week. Guessing you didn’t get the email?”

You only have your imagination for what his voice must sound like because he only shakes his head, throat too dried and scorched from you laid out, baring it all in front of him for him to say anything.

But your imagination didn’t do justice in those two hours of torture. Because his voice telling you he’s ‘sorry for interrupting the session’ and even ‘sorrier for being so unworthy of staring at something so beautiful’. 

You’d always hated cringe. But cringe never sounded so good when it was spun off Taehyung’s silk tongue.

---

“Can I get you anything?” 

It’s him who breaks the silence, and it’s a godsend because you were two seconds away from spinning on your heel and cowering out of the entire thing.

“N-no. Thank you, Tae.” 

He groans at the timidity of how you say his name and nickname at that.

And silence soaks the atmosphere again, tenser this time because greetings have been uttered, drinks offered and there’s nothing more to say that unspoken words of the past.

That’s what you thought you were here to do at least. To tell him you’re sorry, first and foremost, because you’d never intend to break a soul as tender-hearted as his. Then you were supposed to tell him that you loved him, and you would always love him, and that sacrifice must be made for the greater good.

Jungkook had told you that once. But he’d said Taehyung must be the one sacrificed and you should be the one salvaged - until you realised there was no greater good in that situation, no salvation to be had.

“I’ll sacrifice myself,” words come out loud and unexpected as your train of thought is voiced. They’re too loud also, and they break the atmosphere to his shock, so his brow furrows like he doesn’t understand. “I- I will sacrifice myself for you.”

His face falls and you can’t bear the way his words stutter and his throat fills with a choked cry, as though he’d held it in as soon as your presence had hit him. It must have done the same to you because your body befalls you and tears and on the floor as you work your feet towards where he is rooted.

“I can’t ask that of you. You know I can’t do that,” he closes his eyes when your  body meets his, hands firm on his cheeks because they’re wet with tears and his shoulders are hunched in pain, “please.”

“Please.” You reciprocate. 

This is it for you. You’ll do anything for this quivering shell in front of you. You’ll plead. You’ll beg. You’ll give up your livelihood and every mantra you have ever told yourself about self-preservation because fuck it, some things are too good that you have to lose yourself in them. 

“You- I-”

“I’m- I might not be ready for kids now. I will though. If that’s what it takes. Fuck it I’ll marry you tomorrow.”

He chokes on a sob when his eyes meet your pleading ones and a quick hand wipes the stains from his cheeks so he can see every expression you give to him - untainted and full of love.

“We can take our time over this or we can have it all at once, but it has to be we. I’ll really do it for you, I have to Tae,” another sob and a whimper, “isn’t that what we’re here for. Kids.” You’re babbling now in a frenzied expression of all you have to give, and you’re so lost in his eyes that you laugh out, “‘be fruitiful and multiply or some shit.’ I’ll do it, I swear to you.”

“You’re not even Christian.”

“I would be if you told me to.”

“Fuck.”

He kisses you quick and without care, wanting to feel everything you have to give him like it’s what keeps his heart beating - and it’s beating fast because you finally find fingertips under his shirt and against the pounding that intensifies underneath.

He grapples at your hair, then waist, then hair again because his hands can’t decide on what he wants most. So you grab at them yourself and intertwine fingers as though he’d never left you. Each knuckle deserves a kiss and that’s what you give when your lips part.

“I’m so sorry-” you keep kissing across his hand, “I ever left,” and bring his hands to your neck, “never again.”

The tears subside in his eyes as they do yours. There is still relief, hot and painful inside your stomach because you have come back to him and he has taken you back, as if there were never to be anything but the two of you as one, yet now he finds your lips in something that claims more than just love. Possession. He has to know you’re his.

You were correct when you thought his room would be as sorrowful as yours - heartache as painful as what you had felt. 

Food containers stripe the floor dirty. Towels strewn and clothes dirty and forgotten. Again the blinds are closed as though you’re not here at 5 in the afternoon when the sun begins to fall into the red and purple hues of evening. 

But the blinds leave enough of a gap that his face is haloed, angelic and all too beautiful for your eyes to feign staring when your mouth departs his. Eyes glow amber and skin glows golden and you never want to look away, not from him, not now.

“You really want this don’t you.” There’s no question to the way Tae speaks. Instead, it’s disbelieving, like he can’t quite fathom that it’s really your shirt he has under his fingertips and your smell that lingers under his nose. Heartbreak had slowed his heart enough that it’s beating too fast for him to keep up with, so he slows it down.

“I really want this- You. I really want you.”

“And everything that comes with me? You’re sure?”

It’s a loaded question but at this point it is so light on your shoulders you laugh, grabbing and pulling up his shirt so you can sink lips to his chest, trying to find the beat of a heart somewhere there. 

“You act like you’re a chore, Tae.” You’re eyes soften when he still looks like you like he’s young and vulnerable. “Baby, I am so sorry I ever did this to you. Left. And made you feel like that.” 

Your hands map his skin delicately and you preserve how it feels because you hope, but never know, if you’ll feel it again.

“Never again, yeh?”

“Yeah.”

Clothes are shed until he looks at your naked body like the art that he first saw it as. He wants to paint it, remember it and cherish it as though he’s never seen it before. Every scar and blemish, precious to his vision, but the painting would only be worth it to him because he’s all who gets to see you.

“You’re not gonna turn off the lights?” 

Something that you’d told him was a habit of yours. Maybe something, a subconscious body image thing that was another way of saying, ‘I can’t give my whole self to you, I’m sorry’. He’d ran with it as though it didn’t hurt his pride. But now, as you push him down on his bed and clamber over his thighs, he’s so grateful he never got to see you in this light, because he loves it all the more now.

Fingertips tremble over your thighs when your hips find his, naked crotch so close to where he throbs. 

“Tae,” his eyes don’t meet yours, pieced, instead, onto where your bodies are so close to meeting like his gaze can fuse them together. “Tae, it’s me. Relax.”

Purposefully, your hands find his hair and coax him into a state of submissiveness, because his body still quaked underneath you no matter the words you uttered. 

You can’t lie when you say sex was a factor in your relationship you had missed. There was a heartfelt bond that went deeper than sex.

Admittedly the flatmate before Tae, the friends before the boyfriend and your parents who knew you better than you admitted to yourself had all said you were sex before substance. Some hated you for it and some laughed. Some said, ‘I wish I could be as emotionally detached as you’ and some thought you were the local gal whoring about like bodies were meant to be used. Then, somehow, Tae flipped the whole thing on its head. Made you feel butterflies before orgasm and it had you spellbound. 

So, no. Sex wasn’t it for you when you were with him. 

Yet, here you were, over your man gleaming with the physical sweat of want and need as well as the even more apparent glow of how his body lit up for only you.

“How do you want me Tae, what can I give you?”

“Fuck.” His hands fall over his eyes, not comprehending that you’re his and you’re this plaint. No, he wants you to take over him. “Anything, baby. Fuck. Anything.”

Instantly nails brush over the hardness that had been laid out under your folds obediently since you’d found yourself on top of his crotch.

A man could only control himself so much and immediately Tae found his dick twitching and his hips leaving the mattress in favour of chasing your hand.

“Y/N, I really don’t know if I’ve got it in me for teasing, I’m so horny I could cum!”

Well then.

The outburst has you struggling to fight off a laugh because he seriously is that desperate. Not the laughing kind either. The all-bearing, stripped clean and pleading kind of desperate.

So, you sympathise and let your lips find his, hand still trailing lightly so he doesn’t cum early, but enough for the need to remain.

“You wanna be inside me Tae?” His tongue is on yours yet the words are clear. 

“Urgh, fuck, please.”

Your eyes peer between your bodies, mapping where his muscles, tight with restrictions, create a V-shape down to the very distinct outline of a red hard cock. You think it’s photograph worthy in the moment, something worth slipping the camera out for, and if you hadn’t kept his dick pics from months ago maybe you would. But:

“Please baby, -need it.”

You deny yourself the simple pleasure of slipping him in because Tae whining and pleading is something worthy for the spank bank. You drop lower down the bed so his hips meet your eyes and the skin glistens so beautifully in this light you have to leave his dick untouched just so you can kiss around the area. 

His stomach, thighs, crotch, they see it all, lips and tongue mapping bold strokes because he tastes just as you remember and you want to savour it.

“Y/N ple- oh fuck,” and the taste of his dick beats anything that preceded it, let alone the noise that came with it. 

His tip is taken care of first, small licks and stripes with your tongue, so he’s unsuspecting when you choke him whole.

“FUCK.” 

Hands grab your hair violently. He’s deep and hits the back of your throat so you choke, unashamed of the noise. You’re past that and you know he likes it anyways. 

You set a rhythm, and it soon becomes clear he’s going to cum from it and that you very much want him to. Your hand finds his balls to fuel the process and the other one snakes to your core because there’s nothing that beats Tae’s moans when he’s getting a good sucking. 

“I- Fuck Y/N, I can’t- Shit!”

He’s close. Stomach seizing and balls throbbing in your palm so you sink back down again and take the choke like you want it and you want his cum more. It’s fast from there.

“Love you. I’m cum- Fuckkkkk,” salt and warmth line your throat, but only for a short while because he came quick. His hips stutter a few times and your eyes water when you continue to take it. 

Then it’s cold and silent. Yet somehow you feel buzzed. Like someone cumming down your throat was enjoyable. Like you’d do it a thousand times over if it meant he’d say he loved you again.

The hands that had once set deep into your scalp and verged on making you horny now pulled at your cheeks to lift you to eye level. 

He’s sweaty and a mess. 

“You’re sweaty and a mess baby.” 

His laugh is unfiltered, wholesome and worthy of the way your heart stutters.

“Because someone’s got a mouth on them sent from the gods.”

Blush overtakes your cheeks, whilst your stomach tumbles over at the fact that your blowjob skills are up to scratch - you thought a month off might have done something to your ability but clearly, you’re still on point. The bitter taste in your mouth tells you enough. 

“What’ve I done to deserve you coming back.”

Sincerity returns into his eyes as well as his words, and somehow you feel his dick twitch again from underneath you. He’s so soft under your hands so you keep feeling at his skin to reassure you he’s real.

“Nothing. You’re enough. You’re it.”

You kiss and kiss again, keep going until the fire ignites in him once more where it still flamed for you.

“Please.”

His voice is low no matter how much he whines so a guiding hand slips him into where you’re filthily wet. And he’s huge despite seed already spilt. He’s loaded like it was meant for you and not your mouth, throbbing enough so your pussy can feel it.

And suddenly you realise it’s bare. Complete bare. As in, bare enough that you are willing to take on a child kind of bare.

His eyes tell the story when yours find his, wide and curious. They roll back into whites when you pull up fully and then sink back down, milking him for all he has so he knows this is your full intention. Naked in every sense.

“Shit, Tae.”

“Fuckkkkk,” he doesn’t swear often, but sex is a must and the quirk of your lips tells him just how much you like him losing himself in pleasure.

He hits deep from here, cock lodged far in and even further when he begins to take control. 

His feet plant and his hands pull you down so skin flushes to skin and he can pump up into you with unadulterated need. 

Your teeth have to clamp onto his shoulder with the way he hits your cervix, it’s uncomfortable yet you love it. That kind of sex where everything is so fulfilling that you just can’t mutter ‘stop’. How could you say such a thing anyway when he’s groaning that he loves you with every upbeat.

It hits good once. Twice.

“Tae, fuck. There.”

Three times. 

“Here?”

Again.

“Oh my fuc- Fuckkk,” and there’s nothing you can do when you’re so stimulated you tumble deep and hard onto him and continue to do over and over in waves. 

He’s finding his end in the way your pussy grips him. 

“Baby. Y/N, Cunt so good, jesus.”

You’re burning when he’s going so fast the headboard bangs louder than your moans. So your hand quickly finds his balls underneath you and that does him, unravels him to the point he quakes.

“Holy- Love you. Love you. Fuck. Love you.��

Your ears might ring but that’s all you hear for the next minute. His mantra that keeps his lust alive until his love is so set in stone the words are not needed. 

Your hand, winding into his hair and the thrum of your heart against his tells him enough.

It’s this. Silence and tranquillity yet with the constant buzz of electricity all around you.

You’re still there entangled, limbs on limbs and lights touches on bare skin as the slither of light through the blinds turns ruby red in the heat of sunset.

You know his eyes must glow golden from where the sun angles on his face so you can’t help but spare a glance. And you’re right when you imagined it as beautiful because the sun bathes him like it was meant to. 

He’s still awake because his eyes flutter when you trail the outside of your fingers down his cheek and then onto his lips. It’s even more apparent when he brings his hand up to yours so he can kiss each knuckle individually.

“You came inside.”

It weighed heavy on you, the obvious factor that had happened earlier. And before allowing the beauty of the moment to settle in you had to see his expression when you mentioned it.

Yet there’s nothing but closed eyes and the slight smile that had been painted on his lips since you’d told him how much you wanted him.

“Mmm.”

“And you’re okay with that?” It’s not harsh, just a question from you. A security query because you have to know what this was for him. Caught up in the moment or something deeper?

His eyes bolt open at the question though.

“Are you?”

You almost have to think. Almost.

“Yeah. Yeah, I am.”

“And so am I.”

[korinsu-t-blog]

May 27 // Kabuki

Oh man oh man oh man. To start off, watching kabuki in real life was honestly a ton of fun. It’s like the Japanese analogue to shakespearean plays: very culturally rooted, lots of deep motifs, and the stories are typically history-based. The particulars of how the plays go aren’t at all like what oldern western style productions tend to do, but I think that’s part of the appeal. It’s a uniquely Japanese take on stage productions.

Overall, we got to see three different kabuki shows back-to-back, with short intermissions. The seats were awfully cramped; I kid you not when I was sitting perfectly straight and upright my knees were flush with the seat in front of me. Supremely uncomfortable in the moment, but I think that looking back on this day in the future will entail a lot more appreciation of what I did get to see. Kabuki performance was, somewhat unironically, a lot like real life Jojo’s: there were a lot of random poses being struck, there was a lot of shouting, and a lot of actors menacingly approaching eachother. Asides from the last play (which was not a historical reenactment, but rather a historical slice of life) the actors spoke veeeeeeeeerryyyyyyyy sloooooooooooowwwwwww. There was almost always a shamisen (3-string banjo), drum, or tap-stick playing to accentuate the lines and actions of the actors, so they didn’t have to deliver everything flatly. Lastly, to reinforce the dynamicness of running and to symbolize the actor striking someone else (such as with a weapon), a single attendant on the side of the stage would slap wooden blocks into the stage to make a really loud clapping noise. This person also used the wood slap to mimic footsteps when actors would enter/leave via the runway going into the crowd- yet another unique feature of Japanese theater.

The first kabuki play was a tale of two brothers who, after being orphaned when their father was killed by one of his allies, spent the next eighteen years tracking down said ally so they could kill him. They were invited into the daimyo’s court by the court jester (sympathetic to their cause), and were about to introduce themselves when the daimyo immediately recognized them as the sons of the guy he had killed eighteen years ago. Deciding that the ruse was indeed up, the sons moved to kill him before the daimyo declared that they couldn’t kill him because “the ancient sacred sword of our people’s is still missing after hundreds of years”. This is very reasonable, of course, so the boys sheathe their swords and are about to sit down again when a runner comes in declaring that they’re found the legendary sacred sword. This ignites the fury of the younger brother once again, but before he can move to kill the daimyo for a second time, the daimyo declares that “I was put in charge of a hunt on mount Fuji for the Shogun in a few months, so you can’t kill me yet!”

This, too, was very reasonable. Taking some tickets to the great hunt as a consolation prize and vowing to meet the daimyo on that fated day, the brothers leave the palace and prepare to... fade to black, ‘cause that’s where the play ends with a little blurb on the text screen that says “they got revenge but died in the attempt.” No ending or anything.

The second play was one of the most popular kabuki productions of all time: Kanjinchou, aka “The Subscription Scroll”. It’s honestly the most well written of the bunch we saw, and tells the tale of an adventuring party consisting of the outcast prince Yoshitsune, the strongest monk in the land Benkei, and their three loyal samurai as they journey away from the lands where Yoshitsune is being hunted by his elder brother. To escape further to the north, they must first sneak through a gatehouse guarded by servants of the elder brother- and to do that, they have to disguise themselves as priests, with Benkei taking the lead and Yoshitsune donning the garb and straw hat of a packman. The gate is on the lookout for priests though, and what ensues is a battle of question and improvisation starting with the leader of the gate guards asking Benkei to read the list of people who are donating money to the stated goal of the monks. No such list exists of course, so Benkei draws out a blank scroll (all while concealing it from the gaze of the commander) and proceeds to improvise a long and grandiose speech using his monk upbringing- basically rolling a Nat 20. The commander knows the scroll is blank, but eventually becomes so enamored with Benkei’s improvisation and constant answers to his deeper and deeper philosophical questions that in the end he resigns himself to an early death and passes Yoshitsune’s party through without letting them know he knows- not before Benkei is forced to beat his own master though. When the party is through the gates, the most touching and emotional part of the play occurs in the form of a conversation between the weeping Benkei- an all-powerful warrior who can lift the mightiest weights yet still faltered when lifting a hand against his own master- and Yoshitsune, who forgives him with a kindness begetting the Buddha.

The last play was, quite simply, Firefighters vs. Sumo in a slow burning drama that eventually ends in a thirty man all-out brawl between the two forces. Well over an hour long, it was entirely worth for the amazing fight scenes at the end which struck the perfect balance of flow, comedy, and drama. Much more a contemporary play, people talked at a normal speed and interacted with much less formality- quite a relief after having to sit through the first two. Not much else needs to be said about it besides that opening sentence.

[The kabuki theater from the exterior. Very nice, one of the largest kabuki-only theaters in Japan.]

[Interior, high up on the third floor balcony.]

[I swear half of these scripts are real life Jojo’s.]

[A painting inside the theater, I thought it was pretty dope.]

[The kabuki theater also happened to be in the supercar district, I saw so many expensive ones rolling around the city.]

[Yes, that is indeed James Bowlingsan.]

[Today’s candid: Ian! He’s a pretty quiet dude but every time he talks it’s absolutely hilarious. His hair is nice, too. 100% a good roommate to have on our floor, I wouldn’t want it any other way- he adds a lot to our day-to-day group.]

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Literature review:

Today’s literature was on kabuki. Some fun facts about it:

-Women weren’t allowed to act in kabuki, so men acted as women. These men were so good at acting as women that they actually set fashion trends for women who traveled to see popular kabuki performances. Generally speaking, they were akin to modern day drag-queens? Only the male actors who played female characters tho.

-Kabuki actors were extremely wealthy celebrities that technically occupied the commoner class, making them socially lower than samurai but far more influential.

-Kabuki was originally a thing of the common folk and very unsuited for high courts. It was only over time and extended cultivation through a specific effort to enhance Japanese-specific culture to compete with Western plays and opera that it rose to being honorable enough for even the emperor to view. Nowadays, it’s analogous to Shakespearean plays... not so much when it first came out.

-Kabuki scripts often had to go to great lengths to mock the samurai while still maintaining social order, as it was originally an outlet for expressing dissatisfaction with and rebellion against the samurai class. These methods often included a protagonist who was secretly a high-ranking samurai but who dressed as a commoner for some unusual reason, allowing him (a commoner) to outwit and defeat the samurai without having an actual commoner doing it. I swear officer, he’s really a 500 year old demon samurai, not a commoner.

[jelloapocalypse]

Could a StiB Homestar Runner ever be a possibility?

I mean I could do that but I think it’d be a really weird video since HR is so surrealist.

So people keep asking what So This is Basically videos are on the table for the future. There’s a certain criteria list that I follow when I pick video candidates.

I need to like the series at least a little. If I don’t the video turns mean-spirited very quickly and then it’s not as fun. People always go “why do you hate Pokemon/Zelda/Steven Universe/Gravity Falls???” in the comments. I don’t, that’s why I’m able to watch and parody them effectively. You want a show I didn’t like? Adventure Time. Crunchyroll asked me to take that one on and I was like “haha okay” and I think it’s pretty obvious how little I enjoy it.

The ideal candidate for a StiB is a series that I enjoy that has significant flaws that keep it from being great. Steven Universe, Star, Ladybug, and RWBY would be great examples of this. Those shows have a lot of really enjoyable elements but if I was a creative consultant I’d have a LOT of shit that I would want to rework. This kind of series gives me a lot to talk about and makes it easy to write.

Live action doesn’t work well for a StiB. The visuals for these videos are supposed to be childlike recreations of the actual series, so the more character and background references I can find online, the better. This is especially easy for cartoons and games since I can just look up the assets in screenshots and on google images. Even 3D shows are hard though. Drawing a background for something like Danny Phantom is actually 100 times easier than drawing one for Overwatch or Miraculous. If I have to spend time converting live action sets and actors into a cartoon format, that’s a lot of time I’m wasting that could be better spent just drawing.

The series needs to have enough content to make a 2-4 minute nitpick parody possible. Sometimes people suggest things like a single movie or a game like 5 Nights at Freddy’s and that stuff just does NOT have enough meat in it for a parody series tackling story structure and character growth.

On the other hand I’d prefer the series not be too long. Some people suggest stuff like Doctor Who. I try to watch/play at least the majority of a topic before commenting on it (otherwise I don’t think it’s really fair to voice criticisms) and I simply don’t have the time to burn through 1000 episodes of a show I’ve never seen before.

The series needs to be relevant. While I do like making StiB videos, they are also my livelihood. I need to make sure they’ll be able to do well. People need to know what the thing I’m parodying is. So 80% of the time when people suggest an obscure anime I have to throw that suggestion on the chopping block immediately (anime stuff never does well on my channel anyways). This is also my reasoning for not doing things that had huge booms of popularity in the past like Homestuck, Undertale, or My Little Pony. I feel like those things had their time and they had their ten thousand parody videos and I don’t need to dig up their graves, even if other people still are. As much as I love Homestar Runner and I still follow all their stuff, I’d be hard-pressed to call it relevant nowadays.

Most Importantly: I just need to want to make a StiB on that topic. There are just some franchises that are easier to write for than others. For example this month I’m making a My Hero Academia video. I watched all the anime, I read all the manga, and honestly it’s just a good show! It was REALLY hard to write a parody for! Took me about twice as long as normal to get the good lines rolling.While drawing the storyboards for StiB MHA I was rewatching The Legend of Korra because it’s one of the possible frontrunners alongside JoJo for the December/January video. That show is a TRAINWRECK. It has a ton of good ideas but executes almost none of them well, which makes it rife for StiB writing. I jotted down about 50 gag ideas in a notepad doc before I even hit the end of Season 3. Some other series I really want to tackle are Fire Emblem, Ace Attorney, and Resident Evil. They’re SO stupid, I love them.

So yeah, tl;dr it’s hard to express exactly what makes a solid StiB candidate but I know it when I hear it and if I like it then I’ll throw it on my patreon poll.

If you guys are interested in picking the next StiB video that I cover, you can always CAST YOUR VOTE HERE on my Patreon!

[recentanimenews]

We Point Out All the Cameos and References in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind (So You Don't Have to)

JoJo's Bizarre Adventure is an epic that spans continents, generations, and even multiple casts of characters. Despite this, it somehow manages to all come together as one cohesive narrative about one man's thirst for power and a bloodline resolved to thwart him at every turn. It's latest iteration--Golden Wind--centers around Giorno Giovanna, a descendant of the Joestar bloodline on a quest for control of the Italian mafia. While this premise might sound very self-contained, it's actually quite connected to the overall JoJo story. The first episode alone contains references to each and every JoJo arc that came before it.

  Now, it's been a hot minute since Diamond is Unbreakable graced the screens of our respective devices--we can't blame anyone for being a little fuzzy on some of the previous crazy capers the various Jojos have all gotten into. To remedy that, here's a rundown of every reference and cameo so far in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure: Golden Wind!

Our first cameo in Golden Wind is none other than Koichi Hirose, the lovable pint-sized sidekick from Diamond is Unbreakable. What he lacks in height, he more than makes up for in heart. After being shot by a mysterious bow and arrow, Koichi avoided death and came out the other side with mysterious Stand powers. Joining forces with Josuke and Jotaro to root out the evil within his hometown, he took down a con-man, swayed the heart of a creepy stalker, and even stood toe-to-toe with a sadistic suburban serial killer! Without the efforts of Koichi Hirose, Yoshikage Kira and his unbeatable quartet of abilities would continue to terrorize the quiet streets of Morioh. Speaking of which, Morioh’s town symbol can be spotted as a sticker on Koichi’s suitcase.

In response to a compliment on his proficiency speaking Italian, Koichi eludes to being helped by a certain man named Rohan. This is, of course, a reference to Rohan Kishibe, Morioh’s resident professional manga artist. When he’s not busy drawing his hit shonen manga Pink Dark Boy, Rohan is often found licking spiders, setting houses on fire, and using his Stand Heaven’s Door to make little Koichi Hiroses everywhere miserable. Heaven’s Door gives Rohan the ability to read people like a book... literally. He actually turns people into books and reads everything about them. He can also write things in the margins of these books that manifest into reality, such as “Koichi Hirose can speak fluent Italian.” He sounds kind of like a jerk, but don’t worry, he’s a jerk with a heart of gold (silver at the very least).

Fun fact: Rohan is a huge fan of the film Pretty Woman, and spent ¥2,500,000 on furniture identical to those used on-set in the 1990 Julia Roberts film.

Not even five minutes after his plane lands, Koichi already finds himself in need of assistance from his Stand: Reverb Act 3. We don’t get a good look at Reverb here, but it’s an impressive display of its ability to add tremendous weight to any object within range. Koichi understandably strikes a pose to punctuate its coolness.

DIOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO--wait, why does GioGio own a picture of a long-dead vampire with the ability to stop time and yell “WRYYYYYYYYYYY” in the sexiest way possible? Why would the assumed heir to the heroic Joestar bloodline keep a photo of their arch-nemesis inside his wallet and not on a pillow underneath a larger picture of said nemesis simply labeled “NEMESIS”? Worry not, we’ll find out soon enough.

Hmmm, Giorno sure likes the word “useless,” doesn’t he? Wasn’t there some other guy in JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure who said that a lot?

Here we get a flashback to Koichi being tasked with his mission to Italy by none other than Jotaro Kujo! Jotaro is, of course, a former vampire hunter turned marine biologist who can stop time and punch people REALLY hard. Jotaro was the hero of his own arc in Stardust Crusaders, before assuming more of a supporting role in Diamond is Unbreakable. As a student, he traveled from his native country of Japan halfway across the world to Egypt in pursuit of the aforementioned evil vampire DIO. After a long, hard journey, Jotaro punched the immortal being so hard he turned into ash and died. He later traveled to Morioh to contact his younger uncle Josuke and investigate a string of local murders. It’s there that he also met Koichi.

Jotaro happens to mention the Speedwagon Foundation in this flashback, a name with a history that extends all the way back to Phantom Blood. Robert E. O. Speedwagon was the name of a common street thug who attempted to mug Jonathan Joestar on the cold streets of London one night. However, he was won over by the gentleman Joestar’s compassion and joined him in his pursuit of the soon-to-be evil vampire Dio Brando. After the suspected death of Dio, Speedwagon left for America, where he stumbled into becoming a massive oil baron. With his fortune he set up the Speedwagon Foundation, a global organization dedicated to the pursuit of evil individuals and artifacts with paranormal abilities, such as Pillar Men and Stand users. After working with them in Stardust Crusaders, Jotaro joined the Speedwagon Foundation.

While Golden Wind has yet to fully reveal Giorno’s true ties to the Joestar bloodline, he clearly seems to possess their famous way with women.

Finally we get the full reveal of Reverb Act 3 and his big shorts.

After Giorno escapes him, Koichi reports back to Jotaro and mentions that “Stand users are drawn to other Stand users,” a common refrain from Diamond is Unbreakable used to explain why so many darn Stand users all live in quiet Japanese suburbs.

In this same conversation we get a shot of the titular Stardust Crusaders: Jotaro, Kakyoin, Avdol, Polnareff, Joseph, and Iggy the Boston terrier. This picture of Stardust Crusaders' main cast was taken during their long journey to Egypt in pursuit of the evil vampire DIO. They will all be missed.

While gazing at this picture, Jotaro reveals to Koichi that he’s the one who killed Giorno’s father. Here, most would assume he means the user of Dark Blue Moon, but he actually means DIO. It turns out that after his reappearance in Egypt, DIO took some time out from killing and eating people to father a son. If you’re wondering why this makes him a Joestar instead of just a Brando, don’t forget that the body DIO used to father Giorno belonged to none other than his adopted brother Jonathan Joestar. Jonathan had supposedly killed the vampire Dio Brando, but it turned out he only succeeded in killing Dio up to the neck. His head lived on and swore vengeance on Jonathan, going so far as to stow away on a ship and murder its passengers, including Jonathan. He attached his head to Jonathan’s body and locked himself inside a coffin that sank to the bottom of the ocean, only to be unearthed a century later.

    It remains unclear why Giorno keeps such a sensual photo of his father as a keepsake.

Koichi then mentions the bow and arrow, an ancient artifact that has the ability to draw Stands out of those with the ability to wield them and kill those without. DIO uses this artifact to recruit Stand users to his side in Stardust Crusaders, and it pops up again in the hands of one of DIO’s associates in Diamond is Unbreakable. Koichi owes his own Reverb ability to being stabbed with this very artifact.

Fast-forward a few episodes, and it appears that a Stand associated with the prisoner Polpo is in possession of an arrow too! What could it mean that another bow and arrow happens to pop up in the same city as the son of DIO? Can Koichi use his knowledge and experience to aid Giorno on his quest? Will any other fan-favorite characters make an appearance at some point? One thing’s for certain: one of the most wild arcs of Jojo’s Bizarre Adventure has only just begun, and I for one can’t wait to see what else it has in store for us. 

Were there any references so far that we missed? Are there any characters you'd like to see come back for Golden Wind? Let us know in the comments below!

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Danni Wilmoth is a Features and Social Videos writer for Crunchyroll and also co-hosts the video game podcast Indiecent. You can find more words from her on Twitter @NanamisEgg.

By: news+feed@crunchyroll.com