#wasn't he actually meaning it??

[hopeswriting]

[ID: Panels from the manga Katekyo Hitman Reborn.

1: Tsuna says "Don't cry, Lambo!!"

Reborn says "This is my fault. Treating brat Lambo the same way as the other guardians, like a man. I was wrong about that."

2: Reborn continues, saying "I shouldn't have brought him here."

"That's not it!! I'm the one to be blamed!!" Tsuna says, and Lambo from ten years later is surprised by it. "I could have stopped him from coming along if I wanted!! But I couldn't reject him!!"

3: Lambo's speaking over panels of his five years old self watching Tsuna and his guardians with admiration, saying "I was happy to be there and I enjoyed it more than anything. I wanted to catch up to them as soon as possible. To the world that young Vongola and others live."

4: Lambo continues, saying "You must take the younger me with you whenever from now on, too. I'm the one that wants to stay with you." /End ID]

this isn't the whole scene but this is such a heartwarming scene, my heart. 🥺😭💖 lambo just wants to be included, wants to be with his big brother wherever he is, and with the people his big brother cares about too who also care about him. he wants to do whatever they're doing too because for how much he may be annoying with them and not listen to them, he does, in fact, respect them. he admires them, and wants to grow up to be just like them, so of course he wants to stay close to them as much as he can so he can learn from them.

i still think they could let that happen in a better way because bringing him along with them doesn't have to mean letting him fight too (tho i'm aware that ever since they gave him the vongola ring the choice wasn't fully theirs anymore), but i stand corrected that he's the one who wants to stay with them. because he only wants to belong with his family, and catch up to them as soon as he can and be seen and treated by them as equal to them.

and in that light it makes perfect sense that his desire to play with rauji, to "make him his subordinate", was enough resolve for his vongola gear to come to life, and that his pride is about how he never rejected an invitation to play. because for one, it makes sense that as a five years old he'd understand such things through concepts he can have a clear grasp on, like playing, and also of course, as a child, playing is high on the list of the most important things to him, so it does have meaning and weight in his mouth. but most importantly, play is his love language. it's how he bonds with people, how he shows them he likes them and trusts them and wants to grow close to them. and it's a little bit heartbreaking to think about his pride with that in mind, because then he's saying "i know what it's like to be denied play (love), so i'm not ever going to be someone who denies it to someone else" on one hand, and on the other is also saying "i've been denied play (love) many times and i'm starved of it, so i can't afford to pass up any opportunity that might give it to me".

but tsuna & co give him play all he wants. like yes they get annoyed at him and snap at him and scold him when he goes too far, but they still indulge him. and when he makes mistakes they forgive him and keep indulging him. reciprocrate his desire of play, and namely here, by bringing him along too whenever they have to "play" their adult games.

also i like how tsuna says he couldn't reject him. because whether subconsciously or consciously or somewhere in between, it seems he was already aware that it was all about belonging for lambo. and tsuna, who'd know what its like to crave for belonging and be starved of it, of course couldn't bring himself to reject him even as he knew better.

and okay amano, you got me here, i may be crying a bit over this 😭💖💖💖

[egophiliac]

IT WAS ERIC AFTER ALL!!!! I'm so glad we got to meet him (before Vil snaps him away with those Infinity Gauntlets) (can't wait to see what happens when we get the matching Infinity Tiara to go with them, there will be no survivors)

(sorry to be so slow/rough lately, just got a lot of stuff on the ol' brain at the moment! alas, if only I could spend all my time drawing incredibly stupid characters I mean I do but)

[funblogoftricks]

Noshir during the first 2/3 of Downfall: Playing low INT character for laughs, but also uses his habit of repeating others' words in meaningful ways, both bringing lightheartedness to the group and accidentally (?) highlighting and reminding us of recurrent themes in the work as a whole

Me:

Noshir during the last 1/3 of Downfall: "I'm scared", referring to The Emissary as the Lawbearer's son, USING A CHILD'S VOICE AS THE EMISSARY ENTERS DEATH'S DOMAIN

Me:

[alchemistc]

i like your voice in person

Evan's staring at the bed like he's trying to navigate a minefield.

Six months ago that would have sent Tommy on another journey of self-deprecation, a reminder that he'd known Evan wasn't ready for this, known this was a possibility, but Evan, for all his own insecurities, knows what the hell he wants and if he'd felt even an ounce of pressure or remorse up to this point he'd have said something long before now.

Sometimes Evan likes to work it out himself, and sometimes he needs a little nudge, and Tommy watches the head tilt and the angle of his pursed lips for cues as he settles under the sheets.

"Something on your mind?" he prompts, and Evan blinks, like he hadn't realized he'd gotten lost in his thoughts.

"Uh...nothing, maybe."

"Sounds like something, probably."

Evan's smile tilts up at one corner, and he settles on the bed a little stiffly. "It's nothing major. Just. Something I've been thinking about?"

He can feel his brows jumping, can see the way Evan takes in the look with a fond expression. Evan steels himself for something -- they're still muddling through past experiences and learning how to be a bit more intentional in some of their conversations, because they both have a bad habit of reverting to flirting and deflection.

"You remember what we talked about last weekend?"

Tommy can genuinely remember about 93 percent of what he and Evan talk about at any given time, which is an astronomically high number and not at all an exaggeration. He'd be embarrassed about it if he didn't have clear evidence that Evan was as deep into this as he was.

They talk a lot, is the thing, about inconsequential shit just as much (definitely more) than the important stuff. They talk far more than Tommy can remember talking in any other relationship he's been in. But Tommy can pinpoint the exact one he means.

"You mean the roles thing."

Evan hadn't been a stranger to a little daddy talk in bed when they started to explore it, and he'd brought it up right at the start for a reason, but Tommy had taken a while to come around to the realization that Evan had sort of internalized the 'I don't have daddy issues' of it all in a way that Tommy hadn't actually meant it. There'd been little things, here and there; like Evan reaching a door before him and then bashfully waiting with it half open like he'd made a misstep; like twisting his mouth a little funny when he snatched the bill from the table before Tommy could get it. Little things.

Things that, in the abstract, yeah, Tommy liked to do for his partners, but in reality weren't actually that big a deal to him.

He'd needed to clear the air.

Evan nods. Curls a hand around his knee before he shifts his body so that he's facing Tommy. "So, I like taking care of people."

(A conversation, a month ago, Evan grimacing around "My therapist says I have to stop calling myself a people pleaser in a derogatory way.")

Tommy hums, something to remind Evan he's listening.

"And I guess I sort of built up this idea in my head that that was like, a hard stop with you."

("Everyone likes being taken care of sometimes, Evan.")

"And I'm not -- I'm not upset at you, or like, feeling guilty, I just -- I've been thinking about it, and I feel like I forgot to ask you how you wanted to be taken care of."

The thing with Evan is that no matter how often he'll deflect with a joke, when he wants to say something serious he's blunt as hell about it. There might be some hemming and hawing to get there but sometimes he says things that just make Tommy wonder if he'd ever actually learned how to say things before Evan.

"I don't really have a list, babe," he says, and then sort of hates himself for it. Deflect, distract, hey baby how about I blow you about all these big feelings inside my chest I can't articulate.

Evan, though, Evan squinches his eyes and runs a heavy hand through his hair. "I...sort of do?"

"Lay it on me."

Evan grins. "That's actually one of the things on my list."

Tommy blinks. Tries to figure out that trail of thought, but he's coming up with nothing. "Okay, can you expand on that?"

"Like --listen, you know I'm a huge fan of being the little spoon. I'd let someone put screws back in my leg just for continued little spoon privileges. But sometimes I miss being the big spoon, and in my head the idea sounded so stupid to bring up but now I'm wondering if, like, maybe I've just been denying you the joy of being the little spoon?"

Tommy thinks of Evan's hands spread big and warm across his belly, of knees tucked up behind his, warm breath on the back of his neck like when Evan stumbles up behind him in the mornings whining about coffee, and maybe he blue screens a bit because he's never actually dated someone so close to his own size, because there's always been an assumption at the outset that he wouldn't want that.

Alex had been a little too into the same dynamic he'd seen Evan stumbling through, and Colin had hated sleeping with someone's flesh touching his own. Beyond that he hadn't really dated anyone long enough to really form a preference.

Maybe Kara might have been willing, back when he'd been closeted enough to pretend it wasn't an effort to get it up when she had his dick in her mouth, but they'd been young enough that staying the night wasn't really a consideration.

"And like -- listen, I don't necessarily prescribe to gender roles as a thing in general, but a few weekends ago I spent like twenty minutes staring at a bouquet of flowers in Trader Joe's and convinced myself you wouldn't like the gesture so I didn't buy them but you have a few vases in your moms old china cabinet and the moment I remembered them I felt stupid for not buying the flowers."

There's something curling tenderly underneath Tommy's ribcage that he's not sure he's ever felt quite like this before. It's not new, exactly, but it seems to be thrumming particularly hard tonight.

Three months in, Tommy had gotten the man-flu from hell, temperatures so high he'd been grounded and sent packing to rest it off, and he'd texted Evan a jumbled mess of barely discernible things when they'd tucked him into the Uber.

Evan and Bobby had made chicken noodle soup at the station and Hen had sent Evan off with a laundry list of things he could do to help drop the fever, and Tommy had spent the duration sulking and glowering and dragging himself out of bed every time Evan had wanted to change the sheets, to keep Tommy as comfortable as he could, but when Evan had caught it four days later he hadn't hesitated to do all the same shit with gusto. Evan hadn't been particularly grateful either, because neither one of them liked being laid up when the world was out there waiting for them, but he'd at least had the grace to not be an asshole about it.

He had, though. Been grateful. A little awestruck, too, at the mere idea of someone so unafraid of just being there through all the moaning and groaning and hacking and coughing, keeping the tissues from piling up on the bedside table and switching out cold packs to the freezer so he always had one ready in case he wanted it. In the clarity of a full day without fever making his brain feel like cotton candy he'd stared down at a sleepily wheezing Evan and known he could absolutely lose his heart to this man.

"Also I don't want to toot my own horn here but I give excellent foot rubs, and I feel like there's about a million other things I've just been -- holding back from doing?"

"Because of the role thing, or because all your stupid exes told you you were needy?"

It's not a night to pull punches. Also Tommy wants to send thank you cards to every single one of them and attach them to boxes with a bark scorpion inside.

"Both," Evan says without a second of hesitation. His smile crinkles at the corners of his mouth, and Tommy is suddenly annoyed with the space between them. When he holds out his hand to tug Evan into him, Evan melts into it for the space of a moment before he pulls back. "I actually kind of desperately want to be the big spoon right now, if that's something you'd be into." Evan had definitely clocked the look on his face when he'd mentioned it, but he's keyed into the way Tommy checks in and reciprocated in kind since the start of this, so.

Tommy peels his glasses off, snags his bookmark to keep his spot in the monstrosity of the Wrangler maintenance manual he'd stopped being cagey about the fifth time Evan caught him flipping through it, and watches Evan settle comfortably into bed next to him. The problem is, Tommy actually isn't sure where to go from there, which is a ridiculous thought to have because Evan hadn't either and he'd figured it out just fine.

"How do you want me, Buckley?"

The roll of his eyes is so bitchy that Tommy has to remind himself that for all his people pleasing attributes, Evan Buckley is, at heart, a huge fucking brat. Evan tugs and twists and maneuvers his arms and Tommy sort of sinks into it, head tucked in the crook of his shoulder, draping his leg over one of Evan's when he shifts his knee pointedly, a massive, unruly breath escaping Tommy once they're all done shifting.

"You should absolutely try out the rest of your list," he murmurs into the space where Evan's shoulder meets his neck. "Although you don't need to woo me anymore, I'm actually fully wooed."

Lips against his crown, pressed tightly enough that he can feel the smile against his scalp, Evan chuckles. "You don't know how good my wooing is."

The fingers shifting up and down his arm feel somehow different, from this position, even though Evan has done it a hundred times before from the spot he likes to claim with his head right over Tommy's bleeding, three-sizes-too-big-for-him heart. It's ridiculous, and it shouldn't feel any different, but it does. He wants to be greedy with it, soak it in and then never let Evan do this again because he finally understands the appeal and he doesn't want to deprive Evan that.

"This is nicer than I expected."

Evan's soft laugh ruffles his hair, and Tommy wonders if he's dumb enough to ask Eddie how long he should wait before he can reasonably beg Evan to spend the rest of his life with him.

"Save the reviews for when I actually spoon you. It's gonna rock your world." His hand drifts up, fingers digging into the dimple of Tommy's skull.

The hum in his throat has a mind of it's own, going thin and reedy and --

Evan pauses, and Tommy can practically see the gears whirring in his mind, because this is new information.

To both of them, actually, but Tommy doesn't have time to process it because the fingers on the back of his skull spread and sink deeper, just enough pressure to be more than a glancing ruffle, and Tommy can't quite help the way he tilts his head back into it, or the way he hitches his leg to press his groin a little more firmly to the outside of Evan's thigh.

They're both too tired for it to really mean anything -- both off 48's and a fumbled round in the shower while they were already bone weary -- but Tommy wants the reminder for them both when they wake up in the morning.

He can feel his eyes drooping the longer Evan scrubs his fingers against him, and the thought pops into his head as he's drifting off. He doesn't want it to disappear into the fog, though, so he murmurs it into the soft, warm skin of Evan's neck. "I like camellia's. White ones."

Evan hums, and Tommy just knows that the moment he drops off, Evan will be reaching for his phone to google the language of flowers.

[dootznbootz]

Fascinating how Polites, the character who is the personification of Odysseus' optimism and is only in 5 songs, is more grieved and appreciated than Eurylochus, a character who is his own person and is in 11 songs.

[welcometogrouchland]

(ID in alt) hi sorry for back to back marvel fanart I swear I still have dc stuff lmao. However I did recently read X-Men: first class and got a bit carried away doodling this after Lmao

[ruegarding]

the entire point of the blue food was that it was the only way sally could consistently rebel against gabe without getting her or percy punished. sally is not and never was submissive in the books. percy himself says sally has "a rebellious streak, like me." however, sally and percy were under threat of serious abuse from gabe and therefore had to pick their battles. blue food was sally's way of telling percy "i am here and fighting with you" and "there is hope in the world still."

[stiltonbasket]

sue me but I think Shen Yuan as an old man with crow's feet, laugh lines, and gray streaks in his hair could cure Bingge completely. It would just fix All of his problems.

[kingslionheart]

A good King relies upon good advice, Uhtred. I speak only as a man who has made mistakes before.

[muninnhuginn]

Still weird seeing Twilight be so honest with Yor about struggling to turn his brain off and just *be*. A good kind of weird, of course. I could never imagine volume one Twilight being so open with her (or anyone, really). This chapter was so nice with its references to all the way back then and showing how far they've come since. Still some sneaky Project Apple seeds being laid, of course, but overall, this was a pleasant checkpoint. A little calm before the next storm, which was sorely needed after the last arc

[la-pheacienne]

Mystery of "Night begins to descend upon Grantaire" solved (continuing this post)

@everyonewasabird @pilferingapples So because I am insane and couldn't sleep I went through hundreds of pages of the manuscript on Gallica and finally found the text and it's CANON. What Grantaire said with an "indescribable sweetness" was not "let me sleep here", it was "you know I believe in you" (tu sais que je crois en toi) but Hugo wrote it on the margin of the page and so faintly I almost missed it but thankfully I spent 1 hour scanning every centimeter of this page because I'm nuts.

Also if anyone wonders (no one) Grantaire said "you'll see" only once, not twice as some translations show, and here is the proof:

Two remarks:

At first the "you know I believe in you" seemed random to me, because I was not used to it (since my version doesn't have it). Then I realized that ACTUALLY it has to be there. When Enjolras says "you're incapable of believing, of thinking, of wanting, of living and of dying" he's referring to two things Grantaire said : that he believes in him, and that he's willing to die there, for him. "Believing", and "dying" are the beginning and the end of his phrase. He's wrong in both, as we know. Grantaire is capable of believing (in Enjolras) and of dying in the barricade. The text has a perfect harmony this way.

What is driving me absolutely crazy is that Hugo added probably the two most meaningful exchanges E x R had on the margin as an afterthought, as a correction, and I'm talking about "you know I believe in you" and "you'll see". Like he wrote the draft and then was like, that's mid. I'm not going for mid, let me throw a phrase there to give it an extra oomph that will make tumblr girlies lose their minds and their sleep 200 years later. You don't get it, he was working for us. First incident of fanservice recorded in the history of human kind - and the editors MISSED IT. CRIMINAL BEHAVIOR

[ffcrazy15]

"Oh so when James Kirk refuses to believe in no-win scenarios it's 'changing the conditions of the test' and 'commendable original thinking,' but when I, Bradward Boimler, can't accept the possibility of failure and retake the Kobiyashi Maru sixteen times–"

[egophiliac]

LET THE BOY HAVE AN EDUCATION

officially at the point where we're starting to see where it's all headed and I am just going NYEEHEEHEE in delight at it all. ahhh...next week can't come soon enough...

[jklpopcorn]

crying and sobbing i was supposed to draw doodles of my ocs but instead all there is is Siffrin

they're so shaped i have to draw them

also

100% :)

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Bestie Deficiency

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[gambitandrogues]

Hey friendly reminder that Jesper Fahey was supposed to be attending Ketterdam University, the same place the royal family decided to send Nikolai to (and assumed he was also attending). If I see one more person dumb Jesper down to comic relief when he was smart enough to get into the same school a prince was attending, it's on sight.