#when I say friendship I mean they were probably gay but never admitted it to one another and settled on calling themselves friends

[xuqijie]

< new jeans as love tropes 𖥔 ͙ࣳ

# genre ; fluff, hints of angst

# tags ; ot4 x f!reader (no hyein), probably ooc but use your imagination okayy ! [requested]

< kim minji ๋࣭ # your sister’s bestfriend

spends all day in your house and never leaves it, just because she says that the wifi was better in your living room than hers.

spends all day in your house and never leaves it, just because she says that the wifi was better in your living room than hers.

spends all day in your house and never leaves it, just because she says that the wifi was better in your living room than hers.

doesn’t know the effect she has on you with her always being around your room like it’s her own.

you always had a crush on her but minji was your sister’s bestfriend, so naturally you were off limits for any relationship. but that doesn’t stop her from having feelings (not that she recognises them anyway).

minji will lie and say she was forced by hanni to stay by your side the whole day to protect you even though hanni didn’t say shit.

will deny having feelings for you and only starts to admit it when she sees you with another one of hanni’s friends 🙈🙈

probably ends up confessing in a super stupid way; like thinking you were asleep and minji just starts saying how much she likes you and how she got jealous seeing you with sunoo.

“minji, sunoo’s gay.”

“i didn’t know that! and does that mean you don’t like sunoo?”

“are you serious? i like you back, you idiot.”

< pham hanni ๋࣭ # rivals to lovers

will quite literally do anything to make sure she’s number one, and you’re not. like purposely sending you the wrong dance practice and embarrassing you on the day of the rehearsal. (maybe she does feel a little bad when she catches you crying in the toilet).

hanni doesn’t really know why she wants you to know she’s the best. maybe it’s because you two have been pitted against each other since you joined ador.

thinks you’re super pretty but can’t translate it well to korean and ends up just telling it to you straight in viet. too bad you think she was talking shit about you :(

disguises her jealousy as hatred for you. “y/n, i can’t believe you’re slacking off again. seriously, hanging out with jungwon is just going to make you even worse.”

“i’m not even hanging out with jungwon? what the hell is your problem?”

purposely makes you mad because it’s cute to her. but when you really get upset she feels so so bad and you will find chocolates in your bag the next day.

and when you get praised by the instructor, hanni can’t help but feel happy at your beaming expression. only for her smile to dim when jungwon congratulates you.

“see that, hanni? i finally beat you!” you would grin smugly at her and all hanni can do is wish quietly for you to continue talking to her.

so what does she do? suck up her pride and relish in the shocked expression you carried when she says, “i’m happy. you did well.” and leaves the practice room.

and hanni’s feelings are left undiscovered for another day while you are stunned.

< danielle marsh ๋࣭ # sunshine x grumpy

meets you on the first day of kindergarten and thinks you’re super mean after you tell her to leave you alone. but danielle is persistent and she really wants to befriend the grumpy girl that sits at the back of class.

calls you ‘her moon’ and it embarrasses you but secretly, you like it a lot. and her contact name is your phone is ‘my sunshine ☀️’.

it wasn’t until you two got older when you realised that you had feelings for danielle. but you didn’t want to act on them in fear of her rejecting you and losing your friendship forever, so you just keep quiet, hoping she catches on.

you also didn’t want danielle to choose between you and her other club friends, so you just sit alone during lunch. normally, danielle would join you but you sneak off before she finds you at your designated table.

of course dani gets confused when you start to distance yourself but she doesn’t know what to do. only until she gets ahold of you, she confronts you.

“why are you acting like this? i thought we were friends, y/nnie. and i’ve told you before, i don’t care about anyone else, i just want my moon back. please, y/n.”

and when you finally work things out, danielle smacks you on the shoulder and scolds you for keeping things from her. you deserve it but you also don’t deserve someone like dani.

the sweetest angel you’ll ever meet when you start dating. always brings you your favourite drinks when you’re studying, makes sure you’re well taken care of when you’re sick and tries her best to help you out when you’re feeling upset.

< kang haerin ๋࣭ # hates everyone but you

haerin is an enigma. a person you would describe as eccentric. she would repeat all the swear words you said, randomly stare blankly at you and sometimes steal your sweaters. she also bears uncanny resemblance to cats.

since you two live in the same dorm, whenever your personal friends come over, haerin will glare at them warily but when her eyes filter to you, her gaze softens and she waddles to your side for cuddles.

“even though you look like a cat doesn’t mean you have to actually act like one, kang haerin.”

“shut up, hyein.”

“no, hyein’s right, rinnie.”

“okay, y/nnie.”

[jaskiers-lutkulele-of-sex]

i was struck with an idea: steddie peeing in the pool together

they're just hanging out in the pool and talking and eddie suddenly feels the water turn warm and starts to spiral about why he got turned on by feeling his friend pee in the pool right next to him?? maybe he teases steve, and steve makes a joke how he's so used to swimming he just did it without thinking. maybe eddie scoots closer and pees too, noticing how different it feels to pee with swim trunks on, and can see the arousal in steve's face.

i don't know where it would go from there, probably becomes a regular thing between them that escalates further.

oh hell yes. Thank you!

Love Eddie going from, like, kink discovery to kink enthusiast faster than Samwise agreeing to go up to and beyond the gates of hell for Frodo.

Like maybe Steddie have been gay-chickening a bit, like maybe Eddie's never dated at all, and he's always policed his friendships pretty hard to keep himself from crossing lines, has gotten Pretty good at talking himself out of treating anybody else's reactions as if they mean what he wants them to mean? And maybe the closest Steve has been to this is like fooling around with Tommy when they were younger but he number one knew that it was something he was never supposed to talk about ever and number two it means he actually doesn't have great boundaries for like what falls within like a normal close male friendship? Like he knows something about it was taboo and that he shouldn't look too hard at it, but the not looking meant that he doesn't have like a paradigm to fall into really.

So they've been kind of orbiting closer and closer and doing shit like cuddling on the couch when they're high and have an excuse and going on what's basically little dates together without like admitting that that's what they're doing and Eddie got paint in his hair the other day and Steve offered to help him wash it out in the sink and still hasn't shaken the feeling of Eddie's scalp under his fingertips and Eddie fucking dreams about it...

So here they are swimming, It's fully night, everyone else has either gone home or maybe this was a spontaneous thing just the two of them cuz I don't know they got high and thought it was a good idea or maybe the air conditioning was on the fritz and so they quit the movie to go cool off etc and they've been just like hanging and paddling around and chatting, and they've been in the water long enough to be completely acclimatized to it. They're both kind of leaning against the side, close enough that their shorts brush as their legs move gently, and suddenly Eddie's thigh hits a warm patch.

For a half-second, Eddie is puzzled. No sun out to warm the water, and he didn't pee or anything, and his eyes dart to Steve's face, eyes closed, completely relaxed, grinning a little-

"Dude, did you just piss in the pool?"

Steve cracks one eye open.

"'s my fucking pool."

Eddie Doesn't know what to say about that, finds himself tounge-tied and weirdly, like, hot under the collar he isn't wearing. fuck. good thing it's too dark for steve to see him blush.

Steve sighs, wiggles, and offers, with a yawn-

"honestly I almost don't notice, in the pool. Got so used to pissing in the water when I was swimming-"

"What, all the time?" eddie hears himself squeak-

and steve laughs-

"Yeah kinda. I mean, athletics, we're always chasing hydration, you know, and it's not very convenient to have to, like, get out all the time and jog for the locker room. Basketball was a lot more awkward, but especially us distance swimmers, yeah, we were always pissing in the water."

And Eddie doesn't understand it, but he's suddenly rock-hard in his shorts.

"This one time," Steve continues, eyes closed again and Eddie is desperately grateful and also kinda feels like he might die, "This one time, It was supposed to be my heat, but a 200 IM had been rained out, earlier, and they didn't want to keep those swimmers hanging any longer, so they bumped mine backs, and we'd already been bumped once because of the lightning watch, and I had to pee so bad! I'd been focused on getting in the water, where I could go, but with the delay, I was Fuckin' Desperate, man. I tried to slip off, but my coach wouldn't let me, cuz 200 meters really isn't that long, and I-"

and steve falters for the first time, clearly thinking better of what he's gonna say next-

And eddie is So Fucking Hard, but he makes himself offer-

"Y- You what?"

Steve opens his eyes, and he's so close to Eddie, he's gotta be able to tell-

"Well, they start the race, and suddenly I knew I couldn't hold it, but our speedos are a pretty good color- don't look much different wet than dry- and there's that, you know, that overflow grate? to catch the water when it splashes up?"

"steve, you didin't!" Eddie gasps, almost involuntarily.

Steve grins, and laughs-

"I did! felt myself start to loose it, and I didn't want anyone to see it, like, run down my leg, so I sat down on the grate and, like, pretended to stretch."

"And you pissed?"

Steve was looking straight at Eddie, and didn't appear the least bit embarrassed.

"And I pissed." Steve was still grinning. "I had to go so bad though that when I gave in, it actually kinda like shot up through my speedo?" steve made a little arcing motion with his hand. "So I had to like clamp down kinda and go slow so it wouldn't like bubble up, and would just kinda flow down under me-"

And eddie closed his eyes, and came in his shorts without touching himself.

When he opened his eyes again, steve was staring at him, mouth open.

Eddie was gonna m\have to flee the state.

"Did you just-"

"Sneezed!" Eddie scrambled "UH, I-" his voice broke, fuck, "I sneezed."

Steve frowned

"Because it looked like you just, uh, creamed your shorts, man."

Eddie let himself sink below the water, and considered drowning.

A hand shot down and pulled him back up.

"Hey- what- Eddie. Stop freaking out."

Eddie tried to submerge himself again.

"No seriously it's fine. Eddie. Chill out."

Eddie covered his face with his hands and his hair.

"I'll leave," he mumbled, " I'll just- please- I'll leave. I won't-"

"hey." and Steve had one hand on his shoulder, and was peeling his hair away from his face and Eddie didn't wanna look, didn't wanna see the disgust on his face, even though he was being kind cuz he was always so fucking kind these days-

but steve didn't look disgusted.

Steve's eyes were huge, but he was still touching eddie, holding both shoulders now, and his eyes were so big and he was so close-

"I hope this means-"

and Steve kissed him.

.

(this definitely leads to a discussion, later, and Eddie explaining he didn't know he was gonna find that that hot, and steve being Absolutely Unfazed, maybe even a little bit relieved cuz he kinda has to pee A Lot and it's much nicer that Eddie, like, sometimes finds that hot, rather than annoying, and if sometimes even when they're in company Steve will slide into the pool with a sigh and send a smirk over Eddie's way so Eddie Can't Miss exactly what he's doing, well, that's no one's business but theirs.)

(TBH tho probs dustin and Certainly Robin pick up on the fact that SOMETHING soppy is going on, even if they don't understand what exactly that is. Thank God.)

[pocketramblr]

For the five ask game, if that's still going on, how about an iideku au where OFA ships them?

Torn between thinking this means the vestiges ship them, or that it means the quirk itself is a very excitable puppy dog that wants Tenya around as much as possible...

1- Tenya did not make a great first impression on 5/7.5 vestiges. Kudo and Bruce were like 'let 👏 him 👏 speak 👏' because they do, you know, kinda think Izuku's annoying but they sorta all did a 180° turn about him after the exam when Tenya apologized and praised Izuku's choice. Most of them like him. Bruce and Kudo are wondering how this kid keeps getting people to decide to like him after all.

2- OfA reacts differently under Izuku's hands, but he never realizes it because he assumes it's his own emotions and projecting. Yeah, his quirk feels jumpy and volatile around Kacchan like he could set it off and blow up his arm too easily, and fun and bubbly around Uraraka who's sure he'll figure out how to use it soon, and ok Izuku isn't sure why OfA races up to his skin faster around Iida, pushy, but maybe it's because he feels competitive with his friend.

3- The vestiges are actually in agreement for once when Izuku looks at Tenya at the train station. That Kid Is Going To Try To Commit Murder (and probably die in the attempt). "Is that what I looked like the last time you saw me alive?" Kudo asks Bruce. "No. But it's what I looked like to Shinomori." They want to help him. They want Izuku to help him. Izuku wants to help him. But they can't do anything except try to bend the power into something Izuku can actually use, and hope it's enough when the kid jumps off the train to find Tenya.

4- Nana, romantic she is, keeps getting excited when it seems they might lean in closer, might take each other's hands. Kudo asks if she and her husband were high school sweethearts to have such optimistic expectation of such a relationship, but Banjo says that dang it, Izuku at least deserves boyfriend even if they split after school, and Yoichi who has little concept of school and had a max relationship length of two months just wants them to confess already. Tenya's admiration is clear to everyone in Izuku's head except Izuku, and they can feel the boy's heartbeat in return. But sadly, they can't do anything while Izuku can't hear them... But, once he can...

5- "Good job training today, you'll master Float as soon as it comes to you at this rate!" Nana cheers Izuku in his dreams. He blushes, still unable to talk in the fog, but they figured out how to have him write in a notebook while he's there. "Hey, you know, White Day is coming up. Any plans? I can help you make something." Izuku raises his eyebrows because he's been warned Nana is a bit of a lethal chef, and also he's already made plans to make chocolate in return for his classmates, and more than triple the chocolate covered apple slices Eri was so excited to present him with a month ago. "I mean, other than Eri and the courtesy chocolate. Any confession plans?" Izuku starts waving his hands because he didn't get any confession chocolate and haha, why would he need to give any now, and En just sighs and breaks in with a "they need a third day for gay chocolate, bet Iida-kun would have made something for you then."

Izuku is eventually cajoled into making some orange chocolate treats for Tenya, only because he'd have plausible deniability that he just wanted to gift to his friends, but then Tenya presents him with All Might shaped chocolates and admits that maybe they are not purely platonic but that he still highly values Midoriya's friendship and would never mention the feelings again if he didn't want them and completely understands rejection and truly he- wait he didn't get rejected? Wait, it's the same for Midoriya? Both of them are very red, but happy. They don't really change much, neither is one for pda and calling each other their boyfriend feels like A Lot, but they do share food more often and move to calling each other by their given name in a manner that is adorably both shy and excited. But ah, we're halfway through March, and at the end of the month...

A couple weeks later, Izuku tapes letters to the doors of his classmates, then packs a bag to go, not planning on returning to the dorms again. He picks up the little bag of All Might chocolates that he'd slowly been going through. There's only two left. He slips them into the side pocket of his bag, then slips himself out of his window and down the building to leave campus, the vestiges silent around him and his quirk burning to go back when he can't.

[waitingforeddyneddy]

Lmao I AM the old mod from Reddit. Just a few points

1) my friend did see them at merrily we roll along. Idk why this changes things. I still don’t like Ariana, she’s an ass. And I find it very telling that JB hangs out and associates with her and it HAS dimmed my interest in him, I still like HIM, but it’s definitely annoyed me. I won’t be seeing wicked, and I’m not convinced it will be good. 2 parts? Why?

2) I do still feel like the JB sub is very strict with voicing opinions. One of my comments recently got locked because I mentioned that I didn’t think JB should brag about meeting president Biden at the moment and I was told not to bring politics into the sub. Somewhat difficult, when JB is angling himself as a political activist/foundation member. But fair enough, it’s their sub and their rules.

3) I didn’t say Simone was jobLESS, I said it was weird she didn’t book as much as her counterparts. I put 0 blame on Simone for this btw - I said I feel like her management team was dropping the ball. Being the lead in a top show on Netflix should have put her on the short list for actresses that year. Fast forward to now, & the strike has delayed whatever project she’s in. That sucks. Because the only thing we’ll have seen from her in the last two years is Bridgerton s2 & 3.

4) I agree JB didn’t do much press for s2. And I still say, he won’t for 3. I didn’t say he’s too big for it. I said he might not want to, and if he’s busy (wicked reshoots and whatever project he books next - a play? Idk) he probably won’t make room for it. Also? Why would I think he’d do press for 3 when they *barely* promoted him for 2. He got his solo articles for 2, he’s not going to do that for 3.

I don’t really remember what else was in the comment but here you go!

Y’all don’t like JB (some of you even hate him) and that’s fine, everyone’s allowed an opinion. I wouldn’t say I’m a huge fan of Simone, I don’t hate her, I just don’t really care either way and people were really pissed at my opinion that she should have booked more after s2 lol.

I read your comments because I agree with some of the things posted, I disagree with a lot. But isn’t that what open dialogue is about?

Anyways, happy holidays!

happy holidays to you anon

listen, you know what I think about JB, I won't say that I hate him cause at the end of the day I can't hate a person I will never meet. I feel an intense dislike for him based on his public persona. Kudos to you for admitting that your interest in him has dimmed. If I was his fan I would be much the same cause you have to admit he surrounds himself with nasty people. Ariana Granda was an asshole way before she came out as a serial homewrecker, there's no one I hate more than privileged celebrities who use their fame and money to treat regular people as trash and we all know those horror stories that always surrounded her about her treatment of workers. Lmao she basically admitted she's a cunt in one of her songs, when people tell you who they are, believe them. As for JB, I don't know if his friendship with her is PR or not, It kinda doesn't make sense since I think his Wicked character doesn't even end up with her right? (I don't know Wicked very well) but it was very obvious those photos were staged because the way they were acting was embarassing and the fact that he keeps bringing them up and the buzz they generated as something surprising is even more embarassing for him. This is why I think he's fake as hell. What do you mean you can't believe people were talking about them and the fact some people thought they were a couple? Not everyone knows you're gay buddy, and they way you and and one of the most famous pop stars were all over each other is bound to create talk so stop acting kind of annoyed about the "straight allegations". Then there's his whole friendship with Matt Bomer, another gay man who wasted a good opportunity to shut the fuck up and punctual as a clock posted an israeli flag on his insta. The reality of Fellow Travelers is there for all to see. Paramount, the conservative author, the producers, writers and cast members seem to be zionists and JB himself was part of Israeli pink washing propaganda. Honestly kudos to you for saying your fave talking about being happy about meeting Biden is not a brag and them telling you to keep quiet is another reason JB fans are the biggest hypocrites cause what the fuck does it mean keep politics out when JB himself said he wants to be political lmao? he photodumped his israel vacation, he's proud of his zionist show, he's happy about meeting Biden. Ladies and gentlemen, I think it's best if you start accepting your fave is not on the right side of things at all, yikes. He's one of the cast members of Bridgerton who said he wants to be political but couldn't bother to post ANYTHING regarding a simple call for a caesefire, in the name of human rights being stomped and all the kids who are losing their parents or even worse their lives. Fucking yikes. And he wants to be political? Does he think being political is only about going to galas, meeting famous people and having drinks? Or does he think it's only all about queer rights? He's white, he's rich, I think he can afford to speak about queer rights AND human rights since he wants to get "political". Nah, I don't think he's a good person at all and the more I see and read the more I feel validated in my opinion.

As for Simone and her career...I don't know what's going to happen, I'm patiently waiting for news, she seems happy and I'm good with that. Of course I wish for more, we'll see. I don't think it's right to compare her to her other costars. Actors from Bridgerton who have been booked and busy are Phoebe and JB, they're both white with connections. Even Rege, who was the actor everyone couldn't stop talking about when Bridgerton came out, didn't book much. I mean he did a couple of movies but nothing that matched the level of hype he got. We all know why.

[golbrocklovely]

Yk what I wonder (don’t mind me, it’s late and i am crazy) how many people who ship snc together or shipped brolby in the past would actually go mad crazy and turned out to be actual homophobic piece of shts if snc would ever come out (i am not saying they are not straight, i am saying hypothetically speaking… like a scenario that never will happen).

Ik most of the people do it for simple fun and they do not really mean it, but there are still people who mean it and i wonder… if they genuinely would support snc if they ever would say smth “hey yk i am actually kinda into guys” or they only like idea of sam AND colby (if you get what i am saying). Or how many of them are actually homophobic people who just find snc hot and the idea of them tght just seems hot to them, but irl they despise couples like this? Idk if that makes sense, but ik people like this exist, who be like shipping two men tght, but then would bash one of them if they actually turns out gay….

Ok, i know those are out of nobody knows where, but it’s past midnight here and i just decided to share this little crazy thought here (probably gonna regret it tomorrow) and sorry for bringing up the Voldemort name in snc fandom.

i get what you're saying, anon. i'll be honest tho, idk the answer to that question lol

(this became such a rambling mess good god lol read at your own risk)

as someone that has talked to a lot of fans over the years, both anon and not, there is a good chunk of ppl that genuinely believe that at the very least colby is bi in some capacity. whether those ppl admit it publicly or not is a different story. personally i think he's straight bc he himself says he is, but if he for some reason came out and said he was also into guys, i wouldn't care/wouldn't be surprised. sam would be a bit surprising tbh lol

but the question of "do fans ship snc together, or would they hate them being gay if they were not with one another" is a good one to ask. i think it's a bit of a mix bag. definitely i do think there would be fans that would not be into it whatsoever. and i do think certain fans would be happy knowing they were together. but i think the ones that would hate them being gay with other men are the ones that have always given me the ick. bc they don't see gay online men (like influencers or actors or whatever) as actual ppl, just characters.

bc there is something to be said about groups of women online being obsessed with gay men/male friendships and shipping them together. the dan-and-philification of certain male friend groups is an interesting one to observe (tho, dnp may not be the best example of that since they are both gay and possibly together idk about that tho so don't quote me). i'll say it this way, as someone who is bi but claimed to be straight for a long time - i always find it a little bit worrisome when i look at a straight woman and see that she is obsessed with a gay male couple. it reads as a fetish, it reads as a weird sexual thing in some way to me no matter what. i can't explain why it feels that way, but it always had. now granted, maybe some of those women are secretly queer in their own way and being into a gay couple is just their way of connecting to their own identity. that's a possibility for sure. but there are plenty of straight women, ones that are 100% straight, that are just way too into gay guys.

i'll be honest, i've had this thought for a long time, but i haven't fleshed it out fully, so i'm sorry if this is all over the place. and i do think some of this can also apply to male fans/nb fans, but i've seen this happen a lot when it comes to a popular guy who's friends with another guy and the fandom as a whole is predominantly women. for some reason, they will get shipped together like crazy and the idea that they aren't into one another is just not accepted.

i do think some of this happens bc parasocial relationships make certain fans see these real ppl as characters and bc of that, they ship them like they would characters on a show. and all of this happens without them taking into account how these guys would actually feel or what they would want.

as for snc, i think most of the fandom would be fine with them being gay if they came out and said they were. i think a lot more would be accepting if they came out and said they were dating, weirdly enough. i've joked with friends on here a bunch that sam is really the only person everyone seems to agree on colby dating, and vice versa.

but i do think weirdly, bc so many fans kinda see snc as characters, that's why they get upset when they do go out and date women that aren't those the fandom has "agreed" upon. that's why there was so much vitriol for katelyn and malia. they were two randos we knew nothing about and had no choice in choosing. how dare snc decide for themselves ! how dare colby date outside the holy trinity ! how dare sam move on from the best gf he'll ever have kat !

okay, i feel like i've rambled enough. sorry if i didn't answer your question, but like i said in the beginning - it's a good one to ask. i'm just not sure if there is a clear cut answer to it.

[forabeatofadrum]

Just Some Guy (2/9)

Notes: Welcome back to Matty's second year at Watford! This year, he and John will meet some new friends and I am happy to introduce them to you. They were all named by @raenestee. Thank you Raen!

AO3

--

Year 2

MATT

It’s time for another year at Watford and I already miss the summer. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t mind being at Watford, but I am not looking forward to classes, especially Greek.

At least John is here. He couldn’t hang out during the summer due to ‘not existing outside the main story beats’ or something. He said he’d look into it for next summer.

Look, I like John. He’s probably my best mate at the moment, but that’s because he’s my only mate. I don’t mind. I’ve met loads of people last year, but we never became friends. Now it’s time to change that. This is going to be my year!

Sports might not be it for me, though, but according to John there is a Watford Chess Club.

“I’m joining,” he says one day, “You should come along.”

“I don’t know how to play chess,” I say, “I didn’t even know you played chess.”

John shrugs.

“Learnt it over the summer ‘off-screen’,” he uses air quotes when he says that last word. I have no clue what he means. “I can teach you. Come on, it’ll be fun!”

To everyone’s surprise, I am amazing at chess. John teaches me all his tricks but after a week at chess club, I surpass him. Chess club is huge. It’s actually quite nice to be part of something. I recognise some other members from our year. We hang out at chess club, but also outside of it.

Friends. What a concept. I had friends before Watford, but living at an exclusive boarding school does put a damper on those friendships. I saw my mates during the summer, but it’s different.

We’re sitting on the Great Lawn, eating crisps and drinking soda.

“Did you all see Agatha Wellbelove at lacrosse?” Arnold says.

“Don’t start,” John says, “You have no chance.”

“No one does,” I grumble. I admit I like looking at Agatha Wellbelove too. I think every guy in our year does, except Ryan, who is gay.

As a result, Ryan rolls his eyes in an exaggerated way.

“Please, let the poor girl live!”

“That’s because you have a little crush on the Chosen One!” Leslie teases.

“I do not!” Ryan sputters back.

Scott, his roommate, snorts. “Sure, mate.”

“You did seem to be interested during Magic Words,” Sam adds.

“Well, that’s because he was fighting that Pitch guy again!” Ryan says. He has a point. The Chosen One seems to have an ongoing rivalry with the Pitch Heir.

Politics, amirite?

Others agree with Ryan as well. You cannot ignore the Chosen One. If he’s not out there leaking magic, he’s fighting our classmate Tyrannus, or he’s doing some weird shit. The other day, the Humdrum sent counting sheep. I luckily wasn’t affected, but John was. The Chosen One broke the spell on his friend and Agatha Wellbelove and for some reason that broke the entire spell.

I’m glad he saved John, but apart from that, I do not really keep track of the Chosen One’s antics. That’s what I tell my friends when Sam asks me for my opinion on him.

“Honestly, I agree,” Luis says with a shrug, “Simon Snow can do all that saviour stuff. I just want to pass the upcoming Magickal History exam.”

I almost choke on a crisp.

Shit. I completely forgot about it.

--

“Aren’t we breaking the rules?” I whisper to John. The two of us are roaming the grounds past midnight.

“It’s common decency to stay in the dorms after a certain hour,” John answers with a mischievous grin, “But there is no hard rule. Look.”

He holds out his lantern in a certain direction and I see more people sneaking around. I wonder if we’re going to a party or something. John was very vague, or more vague than usual. He just insisted that we had to go outside.

“John, where are we going?”

“Shhhh,” John stops abruptly and he pushes me behind him. I look over his shoulder and I see the Chosen One. He looks like he’s been crying and he’s walking towards Mummers House.

“Do you think he’s okay?” I ask. Unlike Ryan, I do not really pay attention to the Chosen One outside of class, but he looks harrowed. It would be an asshole move to not worry about him.

John shrugs, which is odd. He’s usually so in tune with everyone.

“I think he’s going through some shit,” John answers.

“What could he be going through?” I ask, “He’s our hero.”

John raises an eyebrow, as if I said something stupid.

“He’s still a boy, Matt. I think he’s realising that being the hero is not all fun and games.”

We watch the Chosen One walk away and he does look awful and beat up. John is right. He’s my age. I can’t imagine having the weight of the world on my shoulders and being a twelve year old at the same time.

The Chosen One.

Simon Snow.

Maybe I should stop referring to him by his title and start thinking of him by his name. We will never be friends. We pass each other in the corridor of our rooms and we know each other from classes, but that’s it. Because of that, he’s always been this elusive entity in my life. The Chosen One, the Saviour of the Magickal World, the Mage’s Heir and all that jazz.

But when I see him like this, cheeks wet from the tears, shoulders hunched, I am reminded that he’s just Simon Snow.

I heard that he’s chasing two snakes for the Mage. What kind of snakes must they be? Simon Snow really looks terrible.

When he enters the building, John and I snap out of weird concentration. We look at each other and I shrug.

John shrugs too.

What else can we do?

“Well, let’s keep going,” John says and he starts walking. Really, what else can we do? “The others are waiting.”

“What?”

That distracts me from my Simon Snow sadness.

John and I walk to the drawbridge. My friends from chess club are there as well. Luis is holding ice cream.

“Gentlemen, let’s indulge!” he says.

“What’s the occasion?” I ask.

“My twelfth birthday.”

My eyes widen, but it’s clear I’m not the only one who didn’t know this fact. Leslie throws her arms around him.

“Luis! Oh my God, congrats!”

Luis hands out his treats and the eight of us have an impromptu party. The Chosen One- I mean, Simon Snow is long forgotten. How can I care about him when I have my own life with great friends? I am so glad I joined chess club.

--

I did it!

Well, I had to bitch and moan for it, but I did it! I convinced my parents to gift me one of those fancy smartphones for my birthday. Now I can surf the internet on my phone and send memes to John in the summer. John looked into his situation and he says he exists in the summer as long as I keep messaging him, or whatever that means.

I’m just glad I have an easier way to talk to all my new friends.

Another year has gone by and we’re at our last breakfast for the school year. We’re sat relatively close to Simon Snow, and it’s noticeable. His magic is leaking, as usual, and he’s pushing scones down his throat, it’s almost grotesque. He’s eating as if he’s expecting to go hungry in summer.

Huh.

Where does he go during the summer? He’s famously an orphan. He has no family to go to. But then I see his chatty friend sit down next to him. I assume he’s going to her place in the summer.

I push any thoughts about Simon Snow out of my mind. I don’t have to see him for weeks.

[strangewillb]

You can read this here on ao3. A sweet conversation between Karen and Mike. (Will is Mike's person) ♡♡♡ In the quiet confines of their kitchen, on just another Thursday evening, Karen finds herself immersed in a rare, heartfelt moment with Mike.

The soothing melodies of her favorite radio station waft gently through the air, acting as a gentle backdrop to their conversation. After dinner she and Mike came to an agreement; she does the dishes if he cleans the table. The latter was admittedly a much quicker task, but she has to admit that her heart swelled with affection when he put the last container of leftover dinner in the fridge and stayed to keep her company. Will is supposed to come over at any moment now, which is probably why he keeps glancing out the window. Not too long ago, Mike made the decision to come out to her. Or, well, he told her that he was in love with Will, his best friend of many years and that they were a couple. She figured that means he was gay, but after he told her she went to the library to do some research herself, and she stumbled upon the term bisexuality, which is apparently when you like both girls and boys. He used to have a girlfriend after all; one she never got to meet while they were dating, and one which during their relationship Mike wasn’t really the happiest version of himself. In the end, she decided it didn’t matter to her. He was happy. Happier than she’d seen him in a very, very long time. That’s all that mattered to her. What she is most grateful for is how since he came out to her, there has been a noticeable difference in their relationship. Gone are the days of tension and defensiveness that have marred their interactions for the past couple of years. Instead, a sense of ease has settled on Mike, and Karen gratefully embraces this opportunity to delve into conversations where he finally lets her in on what is going on inside that head of his. It’s been a mystery to her for a few years, but lately, she thinks she is starting to understand. 

As they stand together in the kitchen, Karen can sense the burgeoning closeness between them once again. She has attempted to steer their conversations toward topics that had previously shrouded their silence - the details of Mike’s academic progress and school life, and his overall well-being, all of which were on a downward spiral in his freshman year of high school, and during the following summer, before they started getting better again. It never went unnoticed to her that his rekindled friendship with Will, and their romantic relationship, definitely played into him feeling and doing better again. Whenever she tried talking to him about it, however, he always diverted whatever she tried talking to him about to something more superficial. Instead of talking only about Will, he’d make them talk about the Party. And if she tried asking him about how he’d actually been doing in his freshman year of high school, he’d find a way to talk about it in a way that wasn’t anywhere close to emotional.

However, tonight is different. Tonight he is leaning casually against the kitchen counter, fiddling with his fingers the way he always does, but otherwise relaxed in his demeanor. It’s a visible sign of his growing comfort in Karen’s presence. Before, he’d slip out of the kitchen as soon as he’d put his dishes in the sink for her to clean up, and she’d hear his quick footsteps down the stairs after closing the basement door behind him. 

“Will had dinner at home, right?” she asks him, still careful with approaching the topic of Will, still afraid to say something that will make Mike retreat into himself again. 

“Yeah, he had dinner at home, otherwise I would’ve waited to eat with him,” he replies nonchalantly, and she smiles at him. That’s sweet. 

Soft muted lighting suffuses the kitchen, casting a gentle glow that accentuates the warmth that she feels right now. Outside, it’s dark, and Karen vaguely detects a faint staticky hum emanating from the living room, where Ted is undoubtedly absorbed in whatever show he is watching. She hopes fervently that he remains there, and that Holly, despite her deep, deep love for her young daughter, stays in her room where she is playing with her dolls. Just for a little longer, so that Karen can enjoy this moment with Mike a little longer. See where it can lead them. 

There are only a few plates and glasses left in the sink, and she deliberately takes her time with them to, hopefully, make this moment last a little longer. 

“And your hellfire club, that isn’t tonight?” 

The Hellfire Club is another topic she tries to speak about with grace, considering how she and Ted used to undermine its importance to Mike before. 

He shakes his head. “That’s tomorrow. We’re starting a new campaign so we might be there for a few hours, just so you know. I might be home late for dinner.” 

“Well, that’s exciting. Thanks for letting me know,” she reaches out to squeeze his arm with her slightly wet hand, bubbles from the dish soap covering the top of it, and he jumps at the sight. 

“Hey!” he playfully slaps her hand out of the way, covering the damp spot on his arm with his hand. “I just changed into this shirt.” 

Laughing, she holds the hand up and makes an oops kind of expression. “Oh, I’m sorry. I thought I noticed that you cleaned up particularly nicely tonight.” 

It’s true. His hair is freshly washed but styled once more, and his curls look simultaneously wild and contained, and shiny, which she knows is from the leave-in conditioner that she managed to convince him to start using. 

This comment makes him tilt his head and shoot her an exasperated look, and she laughs again, thinking he’s too cute not to tease, and the unspoken meaning behind her teasing clearly doesn’t go unbeknownst to him. 

“Oh, please, Michael. I think you two are so sweet,” she raises her eyebrows, a hint of teasing lingering in her expression, and this time she quickly wipes her hand on a towel before gently squeezing his arm. A way of saying I’m just teasing you. 

“Yeah, yeah, whatever,” he rolls his eyes but smiles when he averts his eyes to his hands. He enjoys this, too, she can tell. 

“I heard they were talking about college preparations in school last week,” Karen mentions, placing another plate in the dish rack. Mike nods but doesn’t say anything. “What did they say about it?” 

He shrugs. “They just talked about different colleges and that we should start studying for the SAT. And that we can take it now if we want to, sort of to practice.” 

“Do you want to try and take it now?” 

“I might. I talked to the guys about it, and we’re definitely going to study together. It’s been working pretty well so far.” 

Another thing that has happened since Mike became, well, just a generally happier person, is that his grades have gotten better. A big part of this improvement is that he started studying with his friends. Not just pretending to study, either. She has actually found them sitting at the kitchen table, noses in their books for a few hours before doing something they actually find fun. 

“That sounds like a great idea. You boys are really doing great, you know that? I talked to Mrs. Sinclair the other day, and she was raving about all of you. We were both raving about you boys,” she corrects herself. 

“Yeah, well, it’s that whole balance thing. I guess we’ve got it figured out,” Mike shrugs again, and there’s a hint of pink on his cheeks. She won’t comment on it, however, because if she does he might just run away from her. 

“It looks like it,” she replies, sending him a proud smile. “And Will, has he started thinking about college?” 

Leaning back, Mike crosses his arms, looking thoughtfully ahead of him before lifting his shoulders. 

“He has, but he’s… it’s always a little hard for him this time of the year, so he’s not focusing so much on it right now, but we’ve talked about it.” 

Ah. The anniversary of Will’s disappearance. She’s heard him talk about it before, but she never wanted to ask too many questions. Such a traumatic experience to live through, and now, of course, every time November comes around it’s like pressing a button to replay the events of that horrific week. 

She’s heard many people talking about Will behind his back, calling him names that are equal to weak or sensitive. And, sure, she can admit that he seems like a sensitive guy, someone with his heart in the right place so much that he looks like he thinks he takes up too much space just by uttering a word. But weak? Not a chance. Not after living through all of that, and still managing to smile at strangers and talk so nicely about people he must know played along with some of the theories that spread surrounding his disappearance. 

“How is he doing with that? Is it just nightmares, or…”

“No. Or, he gets nightmares, but he’s also struggling with panic attacks and stuff like that, so. Yeah. He’s dealing with it, but it’s hard.” 

“Of course it is. I can only imagine,” Karens nods, looking sympathetically at her son. “And how are you doing?” 

And Mike gets this look on his face, like he wasn’t expecting to get the question and have to be vulnerable all of a sudden. So Karen looks back at the sink. Only a few more dishes to clean. She picks up a glass, looking at it thoroughly, letting Mike gather himself. 

“I’m okay. I- speaking of college, I guess, I think I’m just a little worried that Will and I won’t be able to go to the same college. And I mean, Jonathan and Nancy figured it out eventually, but it was pretty hard for them at first, so, yeah. I guess I’m a little worried about that.”

Karen nods, letting her eyes slowly shift between her working hands and her son. He gets through the sentence, stumbling over his words and speaking a little too fast for it to be totally coherent, but she understands. 

She’s just about to answer when he continues, “I mean, we drifted apart when he moved to California, I guess you noticed that. And I just don’t want that to happen if we have to move that far away from each other again, because it’s so hard to keep in touch, and you start overthinking everything all the time. And I missed him a lot, when he lived in California. It was hard. I don’t know if I could do that again.” 

So he has given college some thought, after all. Especially this. Karen definitely remembers noticing that they had drifted apart, how every time she asked about Will, Mike would give some generic answer that was definitely provided by the weekly letters he got from his ex-girlfriend. Which, speaking of, is Will’s sister, and apparently, it isn’t weird at all.   

“Of course you missed him. He’s your person,” Karen provides softly, the sentence leaving her mouth before she can really think about just how true it is. Will is Mike’s person, and judging from the look with which Will looks at her son, Mike is Will’s person, too. It’s a beautiful thing to witness. 

“My person?” Mike echoes, blinking, and it only half-sounds like a question. If she didn’t know him as well as she does, there’d probably be tears brimming his eyes, judging from the expression on his face. 

Karen puts the last glass in the dish rack and wipes down the counter until it looks squeaky clean. 

“Yeah. Isn’t he?” she smiles fondly at him. 

He half-laughs, half-chuckles, and it comes out almost as disbelief, or maybe more realization, and he’s trying to play it down right now but oh, can Karen tell what is going on inside his head right now. He is so in love, that boy. She can only imagine the butterflies that are most likely wildly rumbling around his chest. 

“I guess,” he replies after a little while, now back to leaning against the counter. 

She settles beside him, rubbing soothing circles into his back with her palm, and he leans into the touch, closing his eyes. “Hey, it’ll be okay, alright? You’ve got plenty of time together before you go off to college.” 

He nods, and he’s humming something in response when headlights shine through the kitchen window, landing on the wallpaper and photographs on the wall in front of them. She feels his breath hitch underneath her hand, and he swiftly turns his head to look over his shoulder. 

“Will is here,” he says unnecessarily, now turning his whole body to look out the window. 

Karen mimics him, and now they both watch as Will turns off his car, turns around in the front seat, and then not reaching back since he’s still got his seatbelt on. Mike laughs when the realization seems to hit Will and he looks like he’s cursing under his breath, undoing the seatbelt before continuing the movement to grab something from the backseat. 

Will shuts the door and manages to swiftly lock the door despite its rusty lock, and waves when he walks up the driveway and sees them through the window. They wave back. His smile is shy but kind, and he’s holding a backpack containing whatever he needs for school tomorrow and maybe something to sleep in. Bringing a toothbrush would have been unnecessary, considering the fact that he has his own in the upstairs bathroom. 

Most parents wouldn’t let their teenage kids sleep over this way. But -  and this is a little bit of a funny story - not too long ago, Will had asked his mom and the Chief if Mike was allowed to stay the night. They hadn’t immediately approved. They had to speak to Karen and Ted first, which Karen appreciated dearly. But. And here comes the funny part: Joyce has said to Karen that it’s nice that they actually asked if it was okay instead of just sneaking into each other’s rooms like Jonathan and Nancy used to do. Well, that was news to her, but it was true, nonetheless. 

“Is that Will?” Ted calls out, sounding distracted by the sounds from the TV. 

“Yeah,” Mike calls back, and Karen thinks she hears her husband calling back alright or something along those lines, but it’s too quiet to make out. 

In Karen’s opinion, Ted didn’t seem to know how to react when Mike told him about his relationship with Will. Karen had sat at the dinner table, knowing the conversation was about to take place, watching Ted closely, ready to give him a piece of mind if he dared to say something offensive to their son. Instead, his expression changed about seven times after Mike dropped the words Me and Will are together. Together as in a relationship.

First, he looked concerned. Then, as if he thought he was expected to, he looked… unhappy. Following that, he stared at the plate below him, and he placed the fork and knife gently on the table. He’d been quiet for over a minute. Probably longer than that. Karen had looked at Mike, and he had looked scared, his hands had been shaking, although he’d put on a very strong face. And then Ted had taken a deep breath, looked at Mike, and said, well, I have to say, that makes a lot of sense. 

And when Joyce and the Chief had come to their house to talk about the whole Mike-and-Will-sleeping-at-each-others-houses ordeal, they had all come to the conclusion that the safest option was to agree. Better they spend time with each other within the safety of their own homes, than making them feel like they have to sneak off somewhere. And Karen doesn’t know if they are having sex and she doesn’t feel the need to know, either. Another thing she and Joyce agreed on was to separately give them the safe-sex talk with their boys, giving them whatever they might need to stay safe, including pamphlets with the information they might need.

Mike had gone completely red, almost forcing Karen to stop talking before she even started. After she promised it would only take a few minutes of his time and she would never bring it up again (unless it was necessary, of course, and he could always come to her with questions), he allowed her to talk. It was difficult, but it was needed. And she wasn’t going to treat him any differently than she treated Nancy.

The front door opens, and Mike leaves her side to go greet him. Mumbled words are coupled with the sounds of shoes being removed and jacket hung among the other winter clothes. A brief kissing sound, and then another, and then they laugh, and shortly after Mike comes back into the kitchen with Will trailing closely behind him. 

“Hi, Will,” Karen greets him, smiling. “How are you?” 

Mike fiddles with the strings on Will’s shirt, making them hang even, and he rubs something off Will’s jaw, and he’s completely lost in his boyfriend’s presence. 

Will smiles sweetly, blushing a little when Mike starts rubbing at his jaw. “Hi, I’m good, but I helped Hopper bring in our new couch and get rid of the old one after school so I’m a little tired. How are you?” 

“Oh, that’s nice of you,” Karen replies, then gestures around the kitchen. “Mike helped me clean up after dinner, so I have time to take a bath tonight. That’s something.” 

When she mentions that Mike helped clean up, Will looks at Mike, impressed. Mike just shoots him a look. What can I say, I’m the perfect son. And Will laughs. 

“Is there anything else we can help with?” Will asks, and Mike immediately shakes his head, putting a hand on Will’s back and pushing him in the direction of the basement. 

“Not tonight. We’re watching a movie, remember?” 

Will shoots Karen an apologetic look. “Oh, right, yeah. Sorry.” 

She laughs. “There’s nothing you could have done. Enjoy the movie, and I will grab one of my books, pour myself a glass of wine, and take a relaxing bath.” 

They thank her and turn to leave, and as she pours herself a glass of red wine, she catches sight of  Mike’s hand gliding down from Will’s upper back, settling at his waist, pulling him closer.

With all that has happened, lately, she has realized that what she wishes most for her kids is that they get to experience love. She got to witness Nancy fall in love, although her love with Jonathan has been a little rocky, as has Mike’s and Will’s, and seeing her kid's experience love is the most beautiful thing she knows. 

And with Mike, she has witnessed him be self-destructive, isolated, mopy, and sometimes downright, severely depressed, refusing to talk to anyone about how he was feeling, and why he was so sad. Ever since he patched things up with Will and they went from best friends to boyfriends, all signs of heavy footsteps and slow speech have been completely erased. 

She knows that Mike wasn’t a broody teenager that was acting out just because in his freshman year of high school. Now that they are together again, he knows that a big part of the reason why Mike was depressed - because depressed he definitely was - was that he was missing his person. 

She grabs her book from her nightstand and struts up the stairs toward the bathroom, heart full from knowing that all of her children are healthy and happy, and she has to say the same for herself. Who knew life could feel this good.

[soul-wanderer]

Alright, it’s been a few days since the last episode aired, and I figured I wouldn’t become any more chill about this, so we might as well tackle this rant regarding people’s judgement of Theo’s character and the underlying racism issue in this debate.

Let’s start off with the fact that we’ve slowly been learning more and more about Theo’s past, which is relevant when it comes to unpacking his current behaviours. In 05x17 we learn that Theo’s best friend, who turned out to be gay, was rejected by his own parents due to their beliefs and that Theo let his friend crash at his place until said friend’s dad showed up at his house with a gun, ready to kill his friend. We then subsequently learn that this both highly affected both Theo and his friend, to the point where Theo is still getting emotional over it when telling this story years later.

We also know that Theo grew up in a tight-knit but poor community and that he lost his dad when he was eight years old and that he still misses him, which becomes apparent after the barbershop fire. We also get glimpses at the overall tone within the community, when his friends/family sort of tease him about the person he’s become, and it’s clear that Theo is struggling with that, because on one hand his career is important to him, but on the other hand it has removed him from his community, especially because he tried so hard to blend in at the SFD and part of him is probably still trying to prove that he is worthy of his career, despite where he came from.

In 05x04 Theo tells Vic about his previous relationships and pretty much admits that they were all toxic (”I didn't think it was real if it didn't make you want to kill yourself”) and that Vic was the first person he didn’t have to prove his love to.

Fast-forward a few years, we get to Theo’s time as a captain at another station and to his friendship with Travis and Michael. The three of them were best friends until the tragic accident that cost Michael’s life. There’s never been any doubt that his death has absolutely wrecked Theo, to the point where he asked for his own demotion, meaning the SFD did not find him guilty, simply because him misjudging the situation was a mistake - a grave one, but a mistake nonetheless, and mistakes do happen, because we’re all just humans after all. It is also important to note that Travis, at this point, has fully forgiven Theo, which he keeps making clear, by reassuring Theo in everything he does. He even goes as far as saying, “No, you’re not [screwing it up]. You’re figuring it out. There’s a big difference. You got this, man. You’re a great firefighter. I’m proud to call you my captain”, which is a big deal, because the last time Theo was captain, it got his own husband killed and Travis, of all people, was ready to forgive him for the mistake he made and trust him to be captain again.

So, let’s get to the good part now. The part where Theo is clearly stressed to the max and to the point where he has seemingly random outbursts because he feels like he’s losing control left and right - something he absolutely wants to avoid, because he wants to do better, because he doesn’t want to lose another person, because there is so much pressure on him, and large portion of it is coming from himself. And Vic keeps pushing and probing, which is absolutely understandable, but Theo clearly isn’t at a point where he is ready for confrontation, but needs reassurance and support instead. It doesn’t make him a terrible human being, it just makes him about as flawed as any other person on that goddamn show. I mean, remember how much Maya screwed up as a captain at first? And the team still managed to give her another chance, so why not extend the same second chance to Theo?

And this is where we get to the uncomfortable part, because part of the reason why Theo is very much judged differently than Maya (or any other captain on this show), very much feels and looks like underlying racism and very much matches what we know about his past. Theo himself has told us between the lines that he is working hard on his career and to be professional and be taken seriously on the job. Which, given his ethnicity and upbringing, is probably really fucking hard. If we take one look at the captains and other people in leadership positions, it’s not hard to figure out that the majority is middle-aged white men. And well, Theo is not that. But Theo worked hard to get there, to prove himself worthy and capable of this position. Even when he doubted himself after the mistake he made. And he still does - doubt himself. Which proves that he has the heart in the right place, because he cares. He cares about his team, and he cares about doing things right, and he knows when he is messing things up.

And most of all, he knows he is going to be treated differently, he is going to be judged harder, for messing up. He is going to get judged for his temperament, for his words, for his manners. He is going to get judged for everything he is and for everything he isn’t. And even Vic acknowledged his code-switching as a means of survival, but sometimes that still isn’t enough and Theo is painfully aware of that, too.

The bottom line: Does Theo need to learn how to handle the pressure differently? Sure! But what he needs, is the support and reassurance of his team - and Travis gave him exactly that, and Andy was trying to give him that, too, and I’d like to believe that this kind of support is what is going to help him find a balance and escape this crushing weight of responsibility he is facing, simply because of who he is as a person.

And I am sure Andy and Theo will get past their “argument” soon enough, because they both have a similar temperament and grew up in similar communities, so if anyone understands Theo, it’s going to be Andy, of all people at the station and because Theo clearly felt terrible once he learned that Andy was trying to do something nice for him.

[squidkidnerd]

Operation Atlantis Notes - “Brewing Up Friendship” (chapter 5)

chapter 5 chapter cHAPTER 5 CHAPTER 5—Woo, it’s finally out! There are some big leaps forward in this chapter, as Three and Eight are finally starting to bond! Yay! We’ve also got a short scene with Lila in the beginning, (dad) Iso Padre, and more! But, mostly Three and Eight bonding lol. Let’s talk about it! (rest under cut).

Compared to chapter 4, this chapter was relatively easy to write. Writing Three and Eight interacting together is always very fun and very enjoyable, especially now when there’s a language barrier and a lot of awkwardness between them. Neither of them really know how to interact with people normally, nevermind when there’s a language barrier in the way. Because of that, this chapter is full of a lot of really awkward yet really sweet moments that I just love. I had so much fun writing them, and I hope you enjoyed reading them! Anyways, on with the notes.

Opening poem: Okay, I gotta admit—I don’t like this one as much as chapter 4′s. Even after I changed the last two lines during my revision process, it still feels a bit too generic for my tastes. That’s okay, though. These poems aren’t meant to be much other than a nice opener. The second and third lines in my original version were more focused on Three in general and not Eight sensing the connections between, which is the whole theme of the chapter so yeah, I changed it. It’s a little on the nose, but hey, I like it.

Lila: Oh, would you look at that, it’s everyone’s favorite character (sarcastic)! Yeah, this scene is more of a tease for later than anything that has to do with this chapter itself lol. After she didn’t appear at all in chapter 4 I thought I should at least give her a short scene as a brief update if you will. This is probably how she’s going to appear in the story for a while, with a short scene or two here and there but not much of a major focus. She may be a perspective character, but she’s not necessarily a protagonist like Three and Eight. We also get the tiniest of hints at her backstory here... what could her last job have possibly been?

Eight: I LOVED writing Eight this chapter. She’s just so sweet and clueless and ADORABLE I love her so much ASFKLASDJFAKLSDF! After I struggled with her in chapter 4 and earlier, it was nice. The issue with her chapter 4 and earlier, actually, is that she didn’t really want anything. Now, though, she wants to be friends with Three—so she has a reason to act. And act she does. Thanks to her amnesia, Eight really isn’t sure how to interact with people yet, never mind befriend them. The only people she’s really talked to are Iso Padre, Madame Katrina, and Miyo. Only one of those characters is her own age, and all of them are overtly friendly. Three, as we know, is not overtly friendly. She also seems like she doesn’t even want friends. But, as Iso Padre says, those who choose to be solitary often need companionship the most. It might be a challenge to be friends with Three, but it’s a challenge Eight’s willing to accept—after all, they might have more in common than they might think.

Eight’s 100 percent heterosexual activities: Fun fact—my plan for Eight’s feelings towards Three was to have them start out more platonic and have them become romantic later on. Right now, Eight isn’t supposed to have an overt crush like Three is, it’s supposed to be a more “This person is so cool I really wanna be friends with them!” kinda feeling, if you know what I mean. However... uh, Eight, staring at your coworker through a doorway like that is uh, a little gay. Just a little. A tiny bit. I’m okay with it though because gayness is the direction we’re heading and also the platonic/romantic binary is fake. So, yeah. Eight’s feelings regarding Three, and more importantly, what Eight knows about those feelings, will change and grow throughout the rest of Operation Atlantis. Look forward to it.

Iso Padre: My man!!! Iso Padre has officially become my underrated fave. He shows up so rarely in fics if at all and it’s such a shame because I think there’s a lot to do with him. Before this chapter, I struggled to really pin down what I wanted him to act and speak like, but after this chapter, I think I got it. Iso Padre is only middle-aged, but he has a sense of wisdom beyond his years that comes from his experiences. He cares a lot about Eight and the other test subjects who are/were under his care, but he’s also afraid of caring about them in case it hurts too much when he has to let go. This is why he agreed with Kamabo to have his memories taken away, so the pain can be erased too. We all know the real reason though. From what we know in canon, Iso Padre has memory loss but, like Eight, it’s unclear what the source of that memory loss actually is. I chose this interpretation because it’s interesting from a character standpoint and it shows how Kamabo subtly manipulates people into cooperating with them. Iso Padre, of course, is not the first person to be manipulated like this, and unfortunately, he’s far from the last.

The First Interactions: Three and Eight are interacting! Yay!!! The first one from Three’s POV was actually not in my outline, but I decided to add it after I wrote the first few sentences of an Azalea scene that I ended up cutting. Poor Eight is very nervous, as anyone would be, but hey, Miyo is right. Three doesn’t bite. The oven scene was one of my earliest ideas for this chapter, and it’s absolutely adorable. Not only do we get Eight trying to help and almost burning herself due to a lack of knowledge, but we also get Three teaching her how to use oven mitts! Don’t tell Three I said this, but, I think it was pretty cute of her to do that. To Three it’s just doing the right thing, but hey. Maybe there’s more than she thinks underneath her icy exterior ;)

Dork/Dumbass: Okay, okay, guys there is something about insults used affectionately that just sends me. I’m not sure if it’s the playful teasing or “Yeah, you’re an idiot, but I love you anyways” but AAAAAAAAAA. So yeah, when I came up with this idea for Three and Eight I immediately loved it. The best part, I think, is that while “dork” and dumbass are insults, they are kind of technically true. Three, stoicism and hero complex aside, really is kind of an awkward loser. Eight isn’t “dumb” so to speak, but she can be a bit of an airhead sometimes who doesn’t use common sense (see: not using oven mitts). Hence, why they call each other this. And, as you probably could’ve guessed from Three at the end there, it doesn’t end up being used entirely meanly. It becomes quite affectionate, actually.

Three’s Crisis: Three. Three my beloved, gay, absolute disaster of an inkling. We’ll see this a LOT throughout the entire rest of this fic, but, Three’s basically built a rigid set of standards for herself one could call a “hero complex.” This hero complex, among other things, forces her to be calm, stoic, and focused at all times, and it’s in overdrive now that they’re in Atlantis. It’s encouraged by Cuttlefish and it’s also the only way Three knows how to cope with everything. Is it a good way to cope? Hell no! It makes Three repress her emotions to hell and back. Don’t do that kids. And one of the emotions she’s been repressing is, well—Three is lonely. She’s convinced herself that two busy idols and a grandpa are the only people she needs in life because she can’t imagine anyone else taking an interest in her. She can’t imagine anyone else caring about her. But, then there’s have Eight, being nice and doing all these favors for her because... she wants Three to be friends with her? What? It goes against everything Three’s forced herself to believe. Hence, she’s stunned by it lol. But, Three’s on a mission, and she can accept Eight’s offer to be friends based on that. Besides, it’s not like it will last. It’s not like it will mean anything, right? Yeahhh good luck with that THREE.

Tendril ties and friendship: If there’s something I love about writing, it’s symbolism. It gets a reputation for being pretentious, but like— there’s just something unique and interesting about connecting an intangible theme to a tangible object. It doesn’t even have to be complicated. Like, with the tendril ties—it’s not about the tendril ties themselves, it’s about the friendship. Eight first sees them being exchanged between friends, so she immediately associates the two because she’s still learning what friendship is. Hence, her offering one to Three is offering friendship. Woo. For a slightly more complicated interpretation that I just thought of while writing this, I think you can say that the tendril ties represent shared experiences. That’s how friendship is made, after all. And then, Three and Eight tying their tendrils up could show how they’ve become similar as a result of those shared experiences. Just some food for thought. But yeah, I had this idea before I started writing this chapter (kinda like the oven scene), and it’s included here because why not. It also ties (haha, get it, ties) nicely into some stuff with Three and Eight much, MUCH later on. Like post-Operation Atlantis levels of late. So late that I can’t talk about it but hey, I think it’s cool. 

So that’s that! I think I’m gonna do what I did for these notes in the future rather than going scene by scene like I did in chapter 4. Chapter 6 will be... a while most likely, I have exams coming up and unfortunately that takes precedence over funny gay cephalopods 😔. Late May/Early June maybe? I dunno. Hopefully progress on this fic will speed up in the summer. No promises though.

[wendytestabrat]

why cartman & kyle think of each other as more than friends

honestly it’s so fucking obvious that cartman & kyle view each other as something other than friends bc they have such a hard time putting a label on what their relationship even is LMAO. that’s gay af. the retarded anti-kyman flat earthers will just perceive this as them clearly just being rivals or enemies then bc they take cartman & kyle’s word for it (as if cartman & kyle are actually honest people who tell the truth which they aren’t LOL) there are so many moments where it’s like they stumble on their words trying to describe their friendship or whatever i def think the first example of this was in “the entity” when kyle was introducing his cousin kyle to cartman and was like “this is cartman…he’s my sort of friend-ish” and then in the episode “casa bonita” when cartman was giving that speech to kyle he was like “if that doesn’t make us friends it makes us something” implying that they do have a relationship that is different from being friends with someone. but i feel like it was rlly in “tonsil trouble” where they took this to a whole new level and deadass made fun of this when kyle would be like “WE’RE NOT FRIENDS!1!1” so then everyone assumed they were a couple instead BWAHAHAH. but yeah i feel like kyle is mostly the one who keeps switching up the label every other day LMAOOO in some episodes he calls cartman his friend but in others he says they aren’t friends and that he hates him. in newer episodes it seems like cartman has mostly just settled on calling kyle his friend probably bc he realized kyle is a stupid friendzoning cunt and will never admit his feelings BWAHAHA so he had to learn to get comfortable just being friends with kyle. i mean at this point they clearly are friends with each other they hang out more than stan & kyle do yet when it comes to using the word “friendship” to describe each other they get uncomfortable LMAOOO.

[camazofenwa]

I have finished The Owl House. I burden you with my thoughts.

Pretty much binged all of Owl House last week. I knew it was probably something good when it kept breaking into my orbit when it was airing, and I was super not disappointed. Fuck an actual review though, Ima talk about the characters. Also spoilers rampant.

Adorable weird child. Optimistic without being insufferable, eccentric without being annoying. One of the most likable MCs I've seen in a minute. Loved seeing her whole journey, felt believable the whole time and I was rarely, if ever, questioning why she was doing something. The absolute worst thing I could say about her is that her palisman reveal was... I mean, I'm willing to admit that if they ever mentioned a snake shifter before that moment, I forgot. But even still, the whole "be anything you want to be" idea was kind of already communicated with the fact that it was an egg. It doesn't really really matter all that much, the thing's only around for like 10 minutes maybe, it just stuck out.

Outside of that, love Luz. Stuff with her mom, her being critically gay with Amity, fun character. One of the best things about her is that she doesn't have to be a part of every single plot for the show to carry on. The cast and setting is strong enough to survive without Luz's involvement, and it gets stronger as the show goes. Great character.

Never have I seen squalor and hobo-esque behavior look so appealing. I don't think it's making waves to say she's the best character in the show. If "fuck it, we ball" was a person, they'd be shaped like Eda. I think it's sometimes hard for writers to make a character who's pretty much got it all while still being sympathetic, but they hit it out of the park with Eda. Strong, funny, likable, all wrapped up in a blanket of painful regret and an uncontrollable condition. That's why I wanna be when I leave my 20s and finally grow up.

I'll leave certain parts of her deal for another character later, but Eda just consistently gets the best stuff in the show. Her background, her VA, her character design ESPECIALLY Harpy Eda, aces. The only thing she's really outdone in is her romance subplot, and that's just because I actually got to see Luz and Amity's evolve. Love me some Eda.

There are two characters in this show that I predicted I would not care about in the slightest and would groan whenever they were on screen, only to grow to love them and enjoy their presence. This is the first.

King's deal about being small and cute while wanting to be big and bad inevitably gets old, but luckily the show knows that and pivots enough away from that at a certain point to keep in line with his own development. He has an ego and can be a dick, but it never feels like he's an irredeemable dick. I can tell he loves his family, and not knowing what or who he is becomes a very sympathetic plotline for him. Bro just wants a padre. Plus, he does have some other good comedic bits. There's hardly anything too bad to say about King, even if the big ego schtick isn't for you.

Him, Luz, and Eda all having their own unique but connected stories throughout the show helped me endear them to me a lot. Incredibly fleshed out characters that have arcs that go beyond just having emotional trauma or something like that. Great trio of main characters. Well. "Trio."

This is the second.

Fuckin' hated Hooty at first. Even if he was meant to be annoying, that didn't stop me from not wanting him on screen. I think him being this eldritch abomination canonically, combined with him being like an actually competent character helped to move him away from unlovable to me. Love me a dumb idiot who's good at their job, and damn if Hooty isn't a great owl house.

I think another thing that helped him out was his friendship with Lilith. They play off of each other fantastically, and you get to see a lot more of Hooty when he's paired with someone who appreciates him than you do just when he's a nuisance. Love a Hooty.

It's the biggest bitch in the uuuuniveeerrrrse!

Okay not really. Lilith in S1 was definitely on the top of the shit list for the whole "curse mah sister" deal, and I was of the opinion she couldn't fall far enough. But the show treats what she did with an appropriate amount of weight and she puts in the work to make up for what she did, even at several costs to herself. Whether or not that makes up for 30 years of suffering she caused Eda is... ya know, up for debate. She tries, though.

Once S2 kicks in and we get lame dork Lilith, I was all in. She's such a fuckin' nerd, it's almost impossible not to love her. Her dynamic with Eda is also a treat, one of the best duos in the show. Her being Hooty's best friend also does a hell of a lot to kick her into the good graces.

The worst thing that happens to Lulu is the fact that fucking what, four or five episodes into S2 they put her on a bus?! Like, okay, go spend time with your mom I guess, but we barely get any Lilith! Why are we forcing THIS one out of the house, she's wonderful! It kind of stays that way for the rest of the series, too. She doesn't get a lot of play near the end, and is definitely a character that says lines in S3.

Ah well. Still a treat.

[mejomonster]

So this doesn’t have to be a feature of all danmei and bl (and in some cases it’s refreshing or adding something to the story to purposefully Not include it which i can appreciate for that), but i personally tend to appreciate when danmei does treat sexuality as somewhat significant. In the sense that like, a straight person is going to view the world a bit differently than a queer person. In terms of what is safe to share and with who, in terms of what norms in society they never questioned versus realize they don’t fit and perhaps its worth considering if some of those molds aren’t things they need to fit (or conversely things they’d like to make compatible to their life), in a lot of ways one’s sexuality somewhat affects how we navigate life.

Not Me the Series, the thai drama, I think is written from a viewpoint of these characters know they’re queer, and that means yeah they sign petitions for queer rights and marriage - and are aware life isn’t already Ideal for them and trans friends, and that intersects in other ways with how they view the law and activism and disability and other minority rights (they all have their own different viewpoints, but it does effect their lived experience and ways of relating and connecting to the wider world). Or pretty much any of my favorite bls honestly - 3 Will Be Free, a lead being bi, a lead being gay, and all 3 leads being polyamorous affect how the world they’re in views them. New show Never Let Me Go used Ben to highlight how just being out or not out effects one’s life and friendships, The Eclipse had the femme queer kids be the protestors for freedom of expression, Ayan’s character being brave about investigating is at least somewhat shaped by being out already and having already Had to be brave and love himself and believe in himself and his friends, in having role models that were queer like him he looked up to and became brave with the help of. To me, I appreciate when this kind of stuff is an influence on how the characters act because like. Me being demisexual sure doesn’t affect me much you’d think, but it effects how I understand or don’t conversations with others, media, how I view important relationships with friends in society and the lack of legal ways to help each other compared to spouses, etc. Even if in theory it should only come up when i’m dating, in reality it still shapes how i’m living in the world. so i like it being at least present in the background of characterizations. (Like? Even if they live in a perfect idealized world where there’s no homophobia, no lack of rights, like some bl, surely being different from the majority sexuality still effects them idk maybe wanting to be More Overt about their attraction so people get they’re being flirty? Something. Bad Buddy isn’t a perfect example, but it’s a servicable one I’d say, of a story that minimizes the real world effects of one’s sexuality’s in experiencing life but still shows some ways it changes how people relate to the world. Pran is secretive, not super open to admiting he’s dating someone, liking men is fine but societially its still more Daunting to admit - especially Pat given the specific ‘enemy families’ thing. Pat’s little sister Pah likes Ink but doesn’t even realize liking girls is an option until someone says it - which is true to life, plenty of people don’t realize they might be queer until they learn its even a Possible Thing. Pat has his past with Pran click into place when HE realizes he could like a guy, and probably no doubt a lot about being bi clicks into place when he realizes in retrospect. For me this is a nice middle ground when you want to play with “more idealized world” than say Moonlight Chicken’s reality, but you don’t want to make it so fantasy that it’s like the Sims games and sexuality has zero bearing on their interactions with the world. Like... not for everyone but for some people, finding out you’re gay might affect your politics and if you consider worrying about minority rights. It might affect how you consider discussing/admitting things to a doctor or boss, if you’re as open about your dating life to colleagues as they are. Sure people might have supportive circles and no issues, but somewhere down the line in the real world they might worry ‘if i cross into x place am i even safe to be me’. When the story gets SO fantastically ‘ideal’ that part of our real experience is gone. Which again - in some stories thats the point, its interesting to explore a world unlike ours. But for me its not my favorite story to sink into usually. 

(Also now that I’m thinking of it, Kabe Koji was one jdrama bl that was ‘realistic’ in a way I really liked. It handled jpop in a critical way, but gently. Mangaka industry in a critical way, but gently emotionally. The difference between out and proud mangaka and more reserved private ones like the lead, and the lead’s friend being both a bit critically overt depiction of a fujioshi but also with her heart in the right place. Akin to the kind of girl you maybe met in your teen years, or really might still meet at a yaoi doujin convention. The stalker paparazzi guy following the jpop guy, an acknowledgement that outing someone as gay can be cruel and horrifically just ‘part of the job’, again handling the issue critically but gently on one’s heart. Ending optimistically, reminding one that even in our real world with all these problems - where even the gay mangaka making yaoi for a living is dealing with them just as real for him, we can make our way and be happy and have a good life with friends, family, and loved ones.)

Priest is one of my favorite danmei writers for including that character’s sexualities do have life-wide effects in how they interact with the world (that I’ve read so far because surely there are A LOT of great writers who include this sort of thing as they’re most of the authors i’ve read so far, so there must be more). We’ve got Zhao Yunlan who’s got perfectly tolerant/accepting coworkers, is certainly confidently out when it comes to hitting on crushes or discussing his relationship life with friends (<3 same Zhao Yunlan same), but a dad who’d be disappointed in and hate him even if he Were straight, a mom who probably wanted grandkids and is realistically not perfectly-happy she might not get any but she loves her son and it doesn’t really matter. Silent Reading where... fuck every single main character’s sexuality REALLY shapes their life interactions. Tao Ran being straight is critical - so much literally just would NOT go the same if he were bi. Luo Wenzhou being gay in the police, his higher ups having ‘bad rumors’ about it as if it’s not a good thing, but his close higher ups also admiring his good work and talent and realizing they’re too fond of him to really care if he’s gay, how that does in fact affect his work life and how Good must he have been these years for potentially biased/homophobic fellow police to still promote him. Being the kind of man who even can have a best friend - and a best friend who’s very open to all of who he is without secrets. Him being less warm to women than say Zhao Yunlan, another ‘talented police chief’ who’s much more suave/smooth with all parties. Him viewing his singleness in a less guilty way then say someone who’s parents expect marriage and a family (like Tao Ran’s family does), and that affecting how he views him and Tao Ran’s similarities and thinking TR could’ve kept on like Captain Luo - but also realizing acceptingly when TR cant - he’s got a different life path and different concessions/choices he’s got to make. And Fei Du like? How he related to and understands both Tao Ran and Luo Wenzhou’s pov is affected by being bi and getting both of their povs a bit, he surrounds himself presumably by bi friends (Like Zhang Donglan) so he can be himself, he mainly flirts with women when he’s alone possibly because it’s more socially easy to do without anyone being surprised, he’s probably aware in some way he has yet another aspect of himself that’s not mainstream society and does that influence him feeling like an outsider (or that’s perhaps not what his dad envisioned of the perfect successor). It’s a trait he can relate to Luo Wenzhou over, and one of the Easiest traits he finds to relate over as he grows up (their rival crush on Tao Ran being the first easiest point they can see “eye to eye” on). In Tian Ya Ke, Wen Kexing being into men affects his personality, how Zhou Zishu is immediately sure and weary he’s being hit on, the way Wen Kexing is very overtly flirty and flamboyant and himself implies he doesn’t care or fear standing out or being unacceptable to someone in society, helps show his confidence, his propensity to enjoy things, if he wasn’t gay how different might his character be. He wouldn’t be the same. I haven’t read much of Can Ci Pin, but set in the future I can imagine sexuality (like say in Bad Buddy) has very little world-life restrictions. I have read enough to know one of the leads is bi and that’s stated at some point early, which to me implies it will still show in how it effects his interaction with the world. (Also just... as a bi person... I very much appreciate the plethora of bisexual lead characters in priest novels who are out about it. It makes me feel seen, and real, and when I was growing up biphobia was intense and everyone insisted bi people weren’t real, that I needed to ‘pick’ and I had nothing to really look to and go but i am real i’m like X. It wasn’t until i was older and found the queer community online I felt like i belonged and was seen. And it wasn’t until maybe the last 10 years I saw a lot more explicitly bisexual characters in media. So maybe someday someone grows up, like me, but never feels they don’t belong and aren’t supposed to exist. Maybe they always know bi and pan and queer people are around, just like them, and so it’s not so isolating when they figure out about themselves.)

[burntotears]

Coming Out?

How I erased my bisexuality through shame.

[I originally wrote this in 2020 when I "officially came out", but thought I would share it here today.]

I have always considered myself as straight. Most of my relationships in high school and beyond were with men. However, at the end of high school and the beginning of college I realized that I was in love with my best (girl) friend. We were very tactile as friends and I absolutely got aroused when we would cuddle — which is something we did quite often. I liked to pretend that it was just an instinctual reaction that a depressed individual who has always been comforted by physical touch would have, but 15 years of reflection and growth on my part has told me quite clearly otherwise.

My first two years of college were in Boston, Massachusetts, a mere 1,587 miles from the small, conservative town in Texas that I grew up in. I was always progressive by nature, so hiking up to Beantown was an unbelievably exciting adventure for me. Also scary as hell, but I will never forget the time I spent there, the friends I made, and how refreshing it was to live in a more loving and accepting culture.

My best friend from high school actually moved to Boston too and we became roommates with another friend of ours. Once I was submerged in this liberal society, I began to really comprehend how I felt about my best friend. A large part of that was my tendency toward horrible jealousy — a personality flaw that is accredited to my depression and which I have battled with in every single relationship I’ve ever been in. I told myself, “If I am this jealous of my best friend having these interactions with other people, obviously that means I am bisexual and want to date her, right?”

I ‘came out’ to my mother, though I never told anyone else in my family. My mom was nice and understanding about it, but she also doesn’t believe that bisexuality is ‘real’. She is of the mind that once you settle down with a gender, that means you are gay or straight. I don’t fault her for this belief — it’s one that a lot of people can’t seem to reconcile in their heads. But she did tell me that she didn’t think I was bisexual and that sort of stuck with me.

My best friend and I started dating. There honestly wasn’t a lot that changed from our friendship before. I was still a virgin and had never kissed anyone and for some reason sexual intimacy had always scared me. In fact, back in high school I had a few of my good friends come to me and solemnly admit, “[Emmie]… I had sex.” It was as though they thought I would condemn them for doing so. I didn’t; I told them it just wasn’t something I was ready for. I hadn’t even kissed anyone when I graduated high school. Actually, I never really participated in anything considered ‘bad’ in high school; the craziest thing I did was write fanfiction that involved gay characters. I know, I was wild.

So my first kiss (which was just a peck) was with my best friend while we were dating. I continued to be uncomfortable by sexual intimacy regardless of the fact that I was consistently turned on when we touched. So our relationship never evolved toward sex.

I don’t rightly remember how long we dated, but it was probably only around three months. When I went home for Christmas break during my second year of college, we were still dating. This was when I started the ball rolling toward fucking my friendship with her up forever. I wrote her an email while I was back home and to summarize it, I said, “You’ve helped me realize that I’m not bi.” Yes, it was horrible to say and yes, now that I am older and wiser than I was at 19, I understand just how hurtful it was.

When I went back to Boston in January that school year, I got very homesick and decided to move back to small town Texas. I was obviously still depressed and after making my life extremely awkward with my best friend while still being her roommate, I decided it was time to go.

We tried to keep in touch and remain friends, but she was rightfully hurt and I was also quite selfish. I had a terrible time comprehending why she found it difficult to talk to me like we had when we were just friends. I had not even considered the implications of the statement I gave her for our breakup. Unsurprisingly, we didn’t stay friends for much longer. I still have the emails that I exchanged with her back then and I am honestly appalled by how I spoke to her; it is a part of my past I will never be able to look back on without shame.

This wasn’t meant to chronicle the disappointing behavior I conducted myself with back then, but it is important to explain if only because it was then that I decided to be ‘only straight’. As years passed, I realized that a) I absolutely am bisexual, b) I used straight as an excuse to run away rather than face my own issues, and c) I had been a horrible friend to someone that I loved dearly. As a result, I think I closeted myself in a sort of personal penance. In June of every year I explode with love and support for my LGBTQ friends, but continue to deny that I’m bisexual enough to claim the moniker. I say, “Because I mostly date men, I have no right to call myself bisexual. Because I only dated one woman and terrorized her and the relationship, I don’t deserve to be bisexual or claim a part in the community.”

I’ve been married (to my husband) for five years now and we’ve been together for six. I love him and he’s stuck with me forever, so I think that I should at least stop using my marriage as a smokescreen for my bisexuality. Admitting to it really just gives me the chance to be more open with myself and to own that the mistakes I committed in the past were my fault. And hopefully, one day, I may be able to forgive myself for them.

[whyrubuyingclothesatthesoupstore]

hey do you think that keiji ended up being somewhat close to alice (enough for alice to start clearing the rubble with him if he lives in 2-2) because they were both murderers and keiji felt like they were “on the same level” morally so being too horrible to deserve a friendship with alice wasn’t an issue

[tomatograter]

Do you think Dirk saying that he doesn't like to label himself as gay means he has internalized homophobia? Or does he really just don't like to put labels on himself? I've seen ppl saying it's homophobia but there's ppl in real life that don't feel comfortable with labels so I'm a bit confused honestly, cus we are talking about Dirk and he's... Dirk after all

Easy answer: Dirk is Gay.

Prolonged answer: I think it's kinda weird how some fandom discussion around "Dirk dodging the label in One pesterlog" has largely spiraled way outside of its original context to be talked about in a vacuum, especially when that context is crucial to understanding what is actually being said, AKA — it belongs to a deeply awkward conversation between Dirk and Roxy. One of Many they are implied to have had about the subject of Roxy's sustained, unwelcome, and oft drunken advances towards Dirk (& his splinters).

I'm going to reproduce it plus another bit of text down below, for the sake of comparison.

(To prevent the trickster text from looking like absolute shit, I have altered the background. Read the original here, if you're nasty: https://www.homestuck.com/story/5754 )

Now that we've been reacquainted with how and where that sentiment is expressed, let's try to break down what Dirk is doing here.

He is not receptive to Roxy's early advances, and spends most of the 'intro' for this conversation (not pictured) ignoring when Roxy flirts with him, until she gets upset at how 'boring' he is being right now.

Dirk is the one compelled to apologize.

He proceeds to shut the scenario down as an unwanted probability, eliciting further guilt-babbling from Roxy over how Dirk never wants to play along with the perfect traditional family fantasy, until she finally blows up and says it's because he's gay.

"I mean, yeah, that's what I thought."

Dirk, rather than saying I Am Not Gay, since he looooooves changing a conversational subject, claims that "Gay" is not entirely historically appropriate for this situation, given the non-negligible passage of time and the wildly dystopic circumstances* they find themselves in.

Dirk reassures Roxy he does still care about her.

Dirk is absolutely terrified of a similarly inclined (and intoxicated) Roxy up close. This is the most exclamations he's ever used.

Now, *These circumstances? The loss of 99% of the human race, including their society, customs, culture, and prejudices. (ALLEGEDLY.) It's important to remember that from Dirk and Roxy's side of the timetable, troll culture has been pushed as "the norm" for actual fucking centuries. HIC tried to recreate the caste system by artificially coloring human blood, leading to the death of billions. Faygo came out of the water tap, not water. Troll slang was incorporated into the English language. Humans ceased to organically reproduce. They were actively Discouraged from reproducing, since that's not something HIC could have total genetic control over; rendering traditional marriage and the concept of the nuclear family pointless.

You could also argue that same-gender relationships are not uncommon in Alternia, making "gay" altogether unnecessary by proxy, and that's true! But my point is this one: any union (or at least our society's holy concept of it) between straightie humans would be by definition undesirable under HIC's rule, too. She is the church, the president and the governing body. The population is only as good as they are assets for her to do whatever she wants with, including mass murder.

But wait! While that tracks… Roxy clearly still holds onto very 'conservative' definitions of romance for most of Homestuck. We see this multiple times. Dirk, as proved in conversations with Jake, uses 'gay' as an ironic pejorative. Suddenly it's not Historically Inaccurate anymore, Jake's interests are just gay.

Does this mean the context above is basically worthless, since they don't seem to have internalized it? No.

What must be kept in mind is this: Dirk and Roxy's only "active" link to de facto humanity is our society as it was in the early 2010's. Those glimpses they get by talking with jane and jake. They have all that dystopic context, yes, but the reality that seems the most "unfucked" to them for a grand majority of their lives are the halcyon years before the Condesce's rise to power: back when weed was illegal, BlogSpot was popular, movies sucked, MTV was still a hip channel, and gay generally meant something real bad. The wave of homophobia as a punchline or fear mongering tactic was at THE HEIGHTS. Marriage equality was a hot debate topic. Those were the dayz.

Dirk is keenly aware of the taboo implication the word "Gay" as a self-denomination carries. He's no dummy. But he's rarely direct with his intentions either. He's slippery as a bar of soap. (He's never "straight about his feelings", if you prefer.) And for a guy that cares so much about his reputation and maintaining a curated sense of utter coolness, he wants to avoid outing himself as any sort of weirdo no matter the cost.

But that's not all. I think the gravity of just how much Dirk believes he *owes* Roxy simply for existing as the last human in the same timeframe as her is a severely underplayed aspect of Dirk's core character, together with how much he tries to avoid her sexual advances only to end up feeling like absolute shit over it, because — if they truly are the last people on god's blighted earth, isn't he being "selfish" and "irrational" about not feeling shit for Roxy, in the grand scale of things? Is Roxy not his only friend in tangible reality, even if he avoids the mere suggestion of visiting her? Even if she gets black-out drunk and tries to push him into indulging her, regardless of how many times he's already said no?

(Spend enough time here and you realize how it directly mirrors the jane/jake experience.)

Dirk cares a lot about each and every one of his friends.

He pointedly adapts his speech based on whichever one of them he's talking to in an effort to express that investment. May it be reassuring Jane, fooling around with Jake, or trying to prevent Roxy from falling into a total catatonic doom-spiral; he avoids telling them anything that would be too crushing to hear. That's not what he's trying to do here. Not to say that he isn't bitchy sometimes, but that’s far from the central thing he does. The Epilogues have retroactively led people to believe that Dirk abhors and despises every single person he's ever been close to before (god forbid) LIKING them, and I think buying too much into that assumption ignores the foundations of his canon text, as well as the central motivation behind 99% of his actions in the story. This is the guy that grew up on Friendship Is Magic, has a picture of rainbow dash shamefully glued to one wall and a rainbow poster of Jake's symbol stapled to another, and everything he does is a little cringe attempt to demonstrate his worth by showing how much he cares about people, even when he's punching his actual feelings down instead of up and saying them.

Which brings us back to the load-bearing part of this question: Admitting to Roxy that there is absolutely no fucking way he will ever agree to having her babbys because he is gay is precisely the opposite of what Dirk wants to say, if his intention isn't pulverizing her. So he doesn't. And his worry on this regard is such that it prevents Dirk from even telling Roxy that he does love her, in the platonic sense, as a friend and hell-earth survivor, because he knows that specificity is what that would disappoint her greatly. (He only ever confesses this to Jane, on the death slabs.)

But also I think this is a really funny visual of Dirk's relationship with the word gay, to put statements into perspective:

[beepboop358]

Anti-Byler Argument Refuttals

Although I discussed all of this in my Byler Proof master slides post, I wanted to do a separate post specifically just refutting the most common anti-byler arguments.

1. "Mike and El's relationship is too developed" and "They have been through too much together to break up now!"

This is probably the thing I hear the most when people argue that Byler will never happen. The weirdest part of this argument is that people assume that they will never drift apart, and that they will never ever break up, as if we didn't just see them drift apart, break up, and not officially get back together in S3? Yes, they have both been through a significant amount of trauma, but their relationship is not as developed as people think it is, they barely even know each other really. They spent a week together in S1, then El was gone for a year. Mike and El don't reunite until the very end of S2, probably a few days after halloween. If we work out the timeline between Halloween of 1984 and July 4th of 1985 in S3, that's 246 days, so it's actually less than a full year they have spent together, getting to know each other.

The “development” people argue that Mike and El have just doesn't stand up. Mike and El do not have intimate conversations, their conversations are incredibly awkward, and they just kiss frequently in the beginning of S3 before they break up. That's not development. Hopper even refers to their constant kissing as "not normal and not healthy." Mike couldn't tell El he loves her to her face, which is a parallel to the failed relationship of Stancy where Nancy couldn't tell Steve she loved him, and we later find out it's because she doesn't, which all happens during the blank makes you crazy scene that is extremely similar to Robin's coming out scene. And yes, Mike and El have endured a lot of trauma together, but so has the rest of the group and people don't seem to use this argument the same way with the other couples, or between the friendships. History doesn't determine the future if there's no feelings involved, things can always change. This is idea of staying in a relationship where there is no real love but there is history/benefits is hinted at in S3 when Mike dresses almost identically to both of his parents.

2. "Look at how much Mike cares for El! They're in love!"

No, they're not, and how they treat each other proves that they're not. I firmly believe neither Mike nor El is seriously, romantically in love with each other.

If Mike was really deeply, romantically in love with El, why did he treat her like he did in S3? If he really cares about her that much, why did he wait for Lucas to guide him at all times in matters regarding his relationship with El, instead of just taking initiative, but he does take initiative with Will? Why can't her apologize to her? Why wasn't Mike more upset about El dumping him? Why couldn't he tell El he loves her to her face? Why did he consistently lie to her throughout the whole show? Why did he stop calling her in S2? Why did he give up and say she was dead, but never gave up on Will? Why did he scream in her face in S1? And no - it isn't because he's just shy or awkward. Mike doesn't act like he is truly in love with El because he isn't. He is projecting his feelings for Will onto El, and he is deeply in denial about his sexuality due to his internalized homophobia and hasn't fully processed how he feels about Will throughout the series (up until the ending of S3). And why does Mike have such an odd reaction to El saying she loves him if he does love her? If he loves her that should be exactly what he wants to hear, so why does he look so confused and scared? And why doesn't he just say it back right then?

El isn't seriously, romantically in love with Mike. They meet in S1, and he immediately takes her in, saving her life. He looks out for her, and actually cares if she is okay, and no one has ever done that for her before. El was abused her whole childhood until Mike lets her live in his basement. He was the first person to treat her like a human being, and show her compassion, which she has never experienced before. It makes total sense that she would cling to their relationship like a security blanket. Mike is an emotional attachment for El. He makes her feel safe, because of how he saved her life previously. El has very limited knowledge of love, life, friendship, relationships, and social behaviors since she was locked in a lab for over a decade of her life, she was never truly exposed to these concepts like the other kids in the party were. Everything El thinks she knows about love she learns from watching soap opera's alone in Hopper's cabin. Of course her perception of what romantic love is, is warped. If El was seriously romantically in love with Mike, why was their break-up no big deal to her? Why was she smiling, laughing and looking at pictures of boys with Max right after she supposedly dumped the love of her life? Why did she not seem even the slightest bit upset about it the entire season?

If they're both seriously in love, then why are their interactions so awkward to watch and why does it feel so unnatural and forced? Why don’t Mileven’s interactions feel romantic? The official released scripts on 8flix describe several Mileven scenes as "awkward". It's no coincidence that detail was included in the script.

3. "But they already have Robin"

I mean this comment basically means that sense the show already has one confirmed lgbtq+ character, there can't possibly be any others. What?! There isn't a "one gay character limit per TV show". This comment really bothers me because it reeks of homophobia. If you don't ship Byler that's fine, but refusing to even explore the possibility there could be more than one lgtbq+ character in a TV show just because one already exists? Yeah no. Queer people existed in the 80's, definitely more than just one, so capping out the amount of queer characters in the show is just icky.

Also, Robin was not originally written to be a gay character. It was decided during the filming process that Robin should be a lesbian, because Maya Hawke and Joe Keery were not getting romantic vibes between their characters. Just because the show introduced a new gay character in S3, it does not mean the queercoding of Will and Mike is erased to make room for Robin, and keep Mileven together. Making Robin a lesbian, does not cancel out Mike and Will being gay/liking each other, and the show's future plans for byler.

4. "Mike's not gay."

Does this seem straight to you?

Giving your girlfriend a drawing of your male best friend, that was drawn by him, but telling her it's your drawing so she'll hang it up on the wall you coincidentally face while you make out with her, to remind you of him.

Taking your girlfriends hands off of you while you're making out with her, and keeping your hands folded in your lap away from her.

Only being able to apologize to said male best friend and being more emotionally invested in that relationship than your relationship with your girlfriend.

Mike is the only other person besides Will pictured in close up shots with rainbow and fruit imagery.

Even the die-hard Mileven fans have to admit that's more than a little coincidental, and if we know anything about the Duffer brothers, it's that they love incorporating intricate details in their show to reveal things about the characters/plot.

If you want more examples, some images, or just a more in-depth analysis of byler throughout the series, I suggest you check out my Byler Proof master slides :)