#when is the last time i tried to write something that wasn't jalex

[reveriesofawriter]

alright here we go: 4, 13, 16 (i may be baiting you slightly. or indulging depending how you take this), 30, 32 i love you very much xoxo bella

4. Link your three favorite fics right now.

you expect me to remember the titles of fics? (answering all the questions under a break bc I don’t know how to be concise)

not to be a copycat but daydream fic oh my god you know those songs that have such a specific and deliberate vibe that feel unbroachable because there’s no way to write something that fits it perfectly and it deserves nothing less than perfect? a daydream away is one of those songs and the tone of the song got stretched out to full story length like a warm quilt that just kept growing to the perfect size it’s so good

can I link a whole series? I think about sam’s bach au so much it lives in my head, I know so little about the actual bachelor universe but especially now that she’s kinda living her own fic it brings me so much joy and was also the first thing of sam’s I ever read I think, also it’s really funny how she accidentally wrote two jalexes without thinking about it

this fic that I never remember the name of but I think of as the dodie fic even tho peyton has written more than one fic with a dodie title, I read it before I knew peyton, back when they were one of bella’s anons, and I remember being so impressed and wondering why they didn’t want anyone to know who they were bc it was just so good and it’s so creative in the way it incorporates books into the story

13. Do you outline your fics? How much of a headache would someone get if they just looked at an outline of yours without reading the fic?

if they’re complete ideas that are longer than I think I can write in a day or two yes I will outline them, if they’re not complete ideas I’ll jot down a summary of the idea at the top of a doc and use it as a reference but those are usually not very helpful and rarely end up going anywhere. my current wip has a separate 8k outline doc that is pretty comprehensive, I think it would lead to a satisfying conclusion even without reading the story itself, tho the story is shaping up quite nicely I’m excited about it

16. Do you research for your fics? If so, how deep of a rabbit hole have you gone down by accident when researching?

I am interpreting this as bait thank you bella. is it still a rabbit hole if it’s productive and leads to plot breakthroughs? I currently have 3 tabs open on music, 2 on 90s tech, and 5 on lgbt movements/history :)) this wasn’t a result of a rabbit hole adventure but this https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Patch_(bar) is one of the best fun facts I know that is slightly relevant to the research I’m doing

30. Post a snippet from your current WIP without context - no more than 300 words.

no context but I am so proud of these two paragraphs

In the distance, at the edge of the yard where the dying lawn gave way to the wooden fence, fireflies floated up and down against the darkness. It had taken one mistake as a kid for Alex to learn that jars of fireflies need holes in the lid to keep them alive. He and Jack had spent hours catching them on summer nights like this when they were younger. Whoever caught the most before Jack had to go home was the winner and got to decide whether they kept the bugs in their jars or released them. Funnily enough, Alex had always been the one to want to let them go back then. Jack would hold tight to his jar until Alex told him he had to follow the rules and then they’d let them go all at once, watching the light show as the fireflies thanked their lucky stars that Jack had lost. When Jack won, Alex would keep his jar on his bedside table, watching the lights flicker and dance until his eyes drifted shut.

Alex thought from that to once when he was even younger, before he moved to this neighborhood, his grandma had told him to stay very still with the lightning bugs because if one of them landed on you, it would give you good luck. Alex could never quite stay still enough, but the luck must have found him anyway.

32. Copy and paste your top three favorite lines/jokes/sentences you’ve ever written. What fics do they come from?

this is hard because some of my favorite things I’ve written are just quippy exchanges and it’s hard to copy and paste full conversations here. this one from my jalex/malum one, idk why I like it so much it just feels natural but then I love most of their back and forth in this, they’re so easy to write and so fun

“Ah, yes, us. The experts on how to date your friends.”

“That’s us.” Jack wraps his arms around Alex’s waist and looks up at him. “We should get business cards made.”

can I say the entirety of starlight fic? my favorite part of it is the structure more than any one line but this just feels so 🥺

What he really wants is to pull Alex to the upper deck with a couple glasses of champagne and face the cool air head-on, to say yes he’s tired of pretending but it has nothing to do with all those other people and more to do with how easy it was to fall into a lie in front of them, and one lie in particular.

what if I threw one of sam’s lines in here from all too well fic? no one would know except her 👀

Jack can’t remember what he was talking about but he remembers Alex kissing the back of his hand, remembers looking over at Alex for half a second too long and hitting the brake a little too hard so he didn’t drive straight through a red light, remembers his heart pounding from a mix of his own bad driving and Alex’s guilty smile, still holding Jack’s hand, tighter than ever.

[reveriesofawriter]

omg hi!!!! lemme hit you with some Qs: D for all too well fic but other than all too well, E for starlight fic, merrikat elevator fic, and street lightning fic, F, I, J for psycho fic AND atw fic/series/whatever, N, R, V sorry i just love ur writing what do you want me to say XOXO UR FAVORITE ARCH NEMESIS

you made me put the answers under a read more bella that's how many letters this is (I've written an essay for you)

D: I do not have an all too well fic playlist but sam might? if I did it would only have all too well on it for the first part and then how you get the girl for the second half, we stuck so close to the lyrics for the plot that it would have been hard to add more songs to the playlist

E: I can't think of a worthy sequel to starlight fic like I could extend it a bit but it's a certain kind of magic that wouldn't last beyond the night elevator fic worked that well because it was based on tweets, it wouldn't be half as funny if it wasn't So based in real life so I don't see a sequel for that either unless there's another incident they all live tweeted that I don't know about yet 👀 street lightning sequel is based on what music tss releases next honestly, it's such a specific vibe that no other band could do justice. I guess I could write a non-songfic sequel but that feels more precarious as far as capturing that same feeling

F: favorite dialogue (from what I've posted) would have to be something from What are you after? Some kind of disaster (I haven't been tagging fics I've mentioned but I have it open to look for the dialogue so might as well)

“Jesus, Jack why can’t we just tell them they’ve already basically been dating all tour? And probably have been for even longer?” “We have to let them figure it out on their own! After all, no one told us.” “I think a lot of people told us and we just didn’t listen.” Jack waves his hands dismissively, so Alex starts listing. “Zack and Rian both, our old manager definitely tried to tell us, I think your sister said something one time—” “And that was all unsolicited.” “We made out in Rian’s bunk one time just to piss him off, I think it was solicited.”

their banter writes itself honestly, plus this is the first jalex fic I wrote plus I adore malum so I have a soft spot for it, also this part just flows well

“Shut up. You’re a fucking sap.” “Hey, you said you like sensitive boys.” “Yeah, I like horses too but I wouldn’t want one telling all his horse friends to date each other with reckless abandon.” “That’s cause your horses are prudes.” “My horses could get dates if they wanted.” “Oh yeah, I’m sure Tino’s a player.” “Tino is a distinguished gentleman, thank you.”

I: guilty pleasures... I don't feel guilty about much that I enjoy? I will gladly admit to reading every one of bella's jalex prompt fics when I'm having trouble sleeping

J: oooh psycho fic alternate ending okay I had one written that was basically just the last line changed that made it clear that they killed dickhead and the image of alex and cutie making eye contact while blood spatters across alex's face and the wall behind him is vivid in my mind but it made the tone darker than I wanted, esp considering it was in the end a sam bday fic all too well alternate ending 👀 imagine if we left it without a sequel. alternate ending: no redemption arc ahhhh that's a nightmare I could never do that to them, we did briefly discuss a sequel where alex had a ring in his glove compartment but we decided it would be too hasty (but not necessarily out of character for alex to overcorrect like that ((and then regret it)) ) and that jack wouldn't be able to say yes after six months with no visible growth

N: I can't think of a fic I want someone else to finish however I do wish I hadn't written so much of the core adventures in babysitting fic so fast bc I really would have loved for that to be a co-write with you (we brought up the idea in passing I think but by then I'd already written like 2k of it) maybe... it's not too late 👀👀

R: my leap back into fic writing was bc of helen like not only reading her quar fic but also some random tags she left on a post that I was like I could write that. you have this wonderful way of hearing a song and catching the tone of it perfectly (like daydream, the tone of which was indecipherable to me until you wrote the fic) and I admire that, also you write banter in a very fun way that I always aim to emulate. writing with sam made me a better writer I think in a lot of ways 🥰 not limited to finding something closer to balance between dialogue and description

V: I was thinking about this the other day with one of yours what was it omg I can't remember but every now and then I think about helen's holyverse malum and I'm like... what if I wrote ficfic