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#where was this motivation to write an outline when i was still a student
nanowrimo · 11 months
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5 Tips for Building a Sustainable Writing Practice
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Every year, we’re lucky to have great sponsors for our nonprofit events. First Draft Pro, a 2023 Camp NaNoWriMo sponsor, is a great writing app—whether you’re writing solo or with a co-author. Here are a few tips for building a sustainable writing practice, brought to you by author Ariana Brown and First Draft Pro.
We’ve all heard the advice to “write every day,” as if it were that easy! Translation: suck it up, no one cares if you’re tired. But what if there was another way to get writing done, without being unkind to yourself? 
Hi, I’m Ariana Brown, and I teach writers how to create a writing practice that is sustainable, flexible, and fulfilling. Most of my students are chronically ill, disabled, neurodivergent, or simply exhausted from the daily stresses of life. I know writing isn’t your only responsibility—capitalism makes sure of that! But I strongly believe that writing should be an enjoyable activity you look forward to.
Below I’ve compiled my top tips for exhausted writers who want to be kinder to themselves—and still get the work done.
1. Add pleasure to your writing routine.
Sensory pleasures are neither frivolous nor are they only for children. They’re a crucial part of being alive! They give us something to look forward to when times are tough and we need motivation. Candles, soft blankets, cold beverages, mood lighting, dance breaks, yummy treats—whatever you choose, make sure it’s something you love. Paint your nails a fun color so you have something beautiful to look at while you’re typing away. Make a playlist of your favorite songs and after you finish a chapter, blast one song so loudly you have to get up and dance. Then, get back to writing. Remember, even for the most focused among us, pleasure is a better motivator than shame.
2. Be clear about your intentions.
What brought you to writing in the first place? For some, it was the ability to escape into our imaginations. For others, it was the chance to finally express what we’d been holding inside. Identify your reason for writing, then ask yourself: Am I still enjoying this? Do I still feel connected to my reason for writing? If not, explore how you can strengthen your connection to your inner child’s reason for writing. 
3. Work with your brain, not against it.
If we know that everyone’s brain works differently, why do we force strict discipline and linear processes on ourselves? My advice: find or create a writing process that works for you. Maybe you love outlines; maybe you prefer to see where the words take you. Either way, make space for wandering, play, and discovery as you write. Take brain breaks. Doodle, map, dance, and draw when you get distracted. Body double with other writers, try new exercises and prompts to make the writing sing, and take plenty of breaks to stretch your body and talk to friends. We come to writing with our whole selves. Listen to your body, don’t shut it off.
4. Find a writing community.
You don’t have to wait for a community to come to you! I offer co-writing sessions on Zoom four times a month for my Patreon supporters, but do what works for you. Attend local open mics as an audience member and cheer on your peers. Invite your best friends to your living room once a month for a two hour writing/crafting session. Or check your local library and bookstores for free workshops and author events. You don’t have to do this work alone.
5. Develop a gratitude practice.
Finishing your draft is a huge accomplishment, but it’s not the only milestone to be celebrated. Consider creating opportunities to thank yourself throughout your writing practice. You’re doing an amazing and difficult thing. The fact that you keep showing up is worthy of celebration. Whether you decide to journal, rest, pray, meditate, or reward yourself, a little gratitude goes a long way.
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Ariana Brown is a queer writer from San Antonio, TX, based in Houston. She is the author of We Are Owed (Grieveland, 2021) and Sana Sana (Game Over Books, 2020), and a national collegiate poetry slam champion. Ariana holds an MFA in Poetry, MS in Library and Information Science, and a BA in African Diaspora Studies and Mexican American Studies. She has been writing, teaching, and performing for over a decade. Follow her online @ArianaThePoet and www.arianabrown.com. 
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moonyeyedstar · 5 months
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Punish You- Professor Lupin x Student Reader Smut Oneshot
*18*
“Y/n!” Professor Lupin shouts, snapping you out of your daydream.  It was very rare for him to shout in class.  Everyone was mostly well-behaved in his class so he rarely gave out detentions or took house points.  He was always very easygoing and didn’t seem to care too much if students were having an off day and not paying attention as long as they were not distracting others.  However, today was different.  Today he seemed to mind your lack of concentration during his lecture.  You always had good marks and participated a lot during lessons but today was just a strange couple of weeks for you.  You recently developed a crush on Professor Lupin.  It started off slowly, thinking about him at night or in the shower but now it consumes your daily life.  All you can think about his cock, and you just know he must have an enormous length from the outline of his trousers.  You can hardly ever focus in his class anymore because all you think about is him, the way his hands grip the chalk when he writes notes on the board, the way his face lights up when he is passionate about a topic, how sexy his face is when he is focused and showing the class a spell.  
“Y-yes Professor?” You stutter a bit, still shaking yourself from your daydream.  
“What did I just say?” He says through gritted teeth approaching where you are sitting to bring himself to stand directly in front of you.  He was looking down at you and his hands shoved in his pockets as he stared at you waiting for you to answer.  He knew you did not know and that you were not paying attention but chose to embarrass you in front of the class instead of letting it slide.  
“I-I don’t know sir” you mumble and stare at your hands on your desk.  Your embarrassment and nervousness earns a few laughs from the back of the class.  
“Enough!” He snaps at the rest of the class, “Class is dismissed, everyone out!” He growls.  Everyone quickly gathers their belongings and hurries out.  You shut your textbook and begin to slide it off the desk to put it into your bag but before you can finish doing so Professor Lupin slams his hand on your textbook.  “Not you,” he says firmly, “I need to talk to you about your lack of concentration during my lectures,” he says through gritted teeth.  
“Yes sir,” you say quietly, worry evident in your expression causing him to soften a bit and remove his hand from your textbook, however, his annoyance in you was still obvious.  
“You have been inattentive in class these past two weeks, you have failed two quizzes, I chose to ignore this before but it is evident you just have no care for your school work anymore.  I try my best to not act this way in class and towards my students, but to the ones who care about their studies.  I do not understand what could be distracting you this much but if you do not plan on working hard in my class then do not bother showing up, do you understand me.” 
“I understand Sir it’s just-“You stop yourself from embarrassing yourself further, you could never confess why you have been so distracted lately.  
“Just what?” He stays hovering over you.
“You are what is distracting me, sir,” you admit, your cheeks flushing red.  You stare at the closed textbook on your desk to avoid the awkward tension from your confession.  
“Oh?” His body tenses up.  He never would have expected you to say such a thing.  He never would have thought someone so young and beautiful could be so distracted by him.  
“I am sorry sir I never should have said anything-“You rush and grab your things and go to stand up but his hand grips your shoulder forcing you to stay seated.
“Wait,” he says firmly and runs a hand through his hair, so visibly aroused by your confession.  He cannot help but doubt himself, convincing himself that he took what you said the wrong way.  “What about me is distracting you, darling,” he says innocently but you both know the true motive behind his choice of words.  His choice of words makes your skin prickle and your stomach does a flip.
“Everything about you Sir, you’re intoxicating, I cannot get you out of my head,” you say with a seductive tone, gaining confidence as your eyes dart up and down his body but stop to watch his growing bulge in his trousers.
“God” he growls under his breath and shifts how he is standing.  “This is so wrong,” he says firmly, “Can’t you see what you’re doing to me,” he says through gritted teeth, his eyes roaming your body but the guilt of the situation is not as strong as his growing desire for your body now.  “You cannot be saying these things to me, Y/n, you need to learn your place, this is out of line,” he say pained by the idea of not getting to ruin you right then and there.  
“If I’m out of line professor maybe you need to punish me, to make sure I learn my lesson,” You say biting your lower lip.  Your voice was so enticing.  He could not control himself anymore, he was going to give in, he had to, there was nothing he wanted more at that moment than to do what you said, to punish you.  He begins to palm himself as he is uncomfortably hard, staring at you, “I think you’re right,” he says lowly, still palming himself.  You giggle a bit to yourself, you couldn’t imagine him ever being rough although you know that is the facade he was trying to portray.  Your lightheartedness only makes him more worked up.  Maybe it was the upcoming moon tomorrow night, maybe it was his growing desire for you, but whatever it was it was going to make him go feral on you.  “Why are you laughing?!” He raises his voice causing you to jump a bit, “Do I look like I’m messing around? Do I look like I won’t punish you?” He growls and stops palming himself, taking on a much more intimidating stance.  The bundle of nerves in your stomach grows, and you feel yourself begin to soak through your panties.  His dominating demeanor is both frightening yet arousing.  
“N-no Sir,” you say softly reacting just the way he wanted you to causing a smirk to grow across his face.  
“Good.” He says firmly and goes to lock the classroom door before returning to you, standing in front of your desk, “On your knees,” he growls making your heart skip a beat.  You nod and do as told getting under your desk and crawling until you are right in front of him, taking his belt in your hand before undoing it as you stare at his protruding bulge.  You place his belt on the floor and undo the button on his trousers and the zipper before pulling his pants down.  At first, you begin to palm him over his boxers but your Professor grabs your wrist roughly, “Use. Your. Mouth.” Professor Lupin scowls pushing his boxers down, his cock bouncing in front of your face.  You swallow hard before sliding your hand down his shaft, following this movement by pressing your lips against his tip, coating them in his precum.  You lick your lips and look up at him 
“You taste so good, Professor,” you say breathlessly earning a low growl of annoyance from him.
“Do not tease me, Y/n” he scowls before roughly gripping the back of your head and forcing his length in your mouth.  You gag when his cock hits the back of your throat as you it was unexpected.  “You can take it, I know you can, you’ve done this plenty of times you slut,” he groans before gripping your hair tighter and you whimper around his length and bob your head and press more weight onto your arms in front of you holding yourself up.  “Hands behind your back,” he sneers, kicking your hands away.  You cross your hands behind your back and struggle to keep yourself balanced.  You slobber around him sloppily from lack of balance.  He uses his grip on the back of your head to keep you still while he begins fucking your mouth.  You choke on him and tears well in your eyes.  “You dirty little whore you love choking on my cock don’t you?” He groans and his cock twitches in your mouth.  Tear spill down your cheeks as he fucks your mouth ruthlessly.  His hips jerk further going down your throat.  He pulls your head off his cock, your lips make a popping sound as you come off him.  He pants a bit and stares down at you on the floor, “Take your clothes off. Right now.” He demands making your clit throb.  
“Yes, Professor,” you whimper and strip quickly.  Your Professor stares at your body taking the sight of your naked frame in, “Jesus fuck” he mutters to himself and places his hands roughly on your hips before bending you over your desk roughly, keeping his hand tangled in your hair to press your head down on keeping your face flush on the desk before leaning down to whisper into your with his cock pressed against your soaked folds, “I’m going to fucking ruin you,” he growls before slamming into your tight, soaked cunt.
“Oh Professor Lupin!” You cry out gripping the desk.  You feel a hint of pain from the stretch and have no time to adjust to his size as he continues you fuck your tight throbbing pussy at a merciless pace.  
"You like that don’t you slut!” He growls and uses his free hand to spank your ass roughly, “Count for me,” he sneers before spanking you again.
“Two!” You whimper and squeeze your eyes shut.  He continues to fuck you at a brutal pace whilst spanking you eight more times.  You count every single one and are left out of breath.  “God you’re so big, Professor!” You moan, your body shaking under him.  Your walls flutter around his cock every time it twitches inside of you. 
“I bet you’ve never been fucked like this before, with a cock this big,” he smirks and pulls your head back with his grip on your hair.   
“Fffffuck!” You whined loving the feeling of him filling you up.  His tip hits your G-spot repeatedly leaving you shaking under him.  The familiar bundle of nerves builds up in the pit of your stomach and you knew you would cum undone in any second.  “Oh Professor Lupin! Please! Im so so so close!” You whine gripping the desk and holding your orgasm as best as you can.  Professor Lupin stops thrusting and keeps his hips in you still.  “No! Please!” You beg on the verge of tears looking at the feeling in your stomach.  You are so desperate for him that you begin to push your hips back and forth fucking yourself on his cock.  The sight of you pleasuring yourself on his cock makes him feral.
“God look at you, such a good whore making yourself feel good on my cock all on your own,” he says condescendingly.
“Please finish me off Professor Lupin, I love the way you fuck me,” you beg.  This is all it takes for him to grip your hips and pound into you.  Your stomach does flips and you feel yourself close to your orgasm again. 
“Cum for me your filthy whore!” He growls into your ear leaning down to it before kissing your neck roughly and nibbling on it.  His words send you over the edge, a wave of ecstasy washes over you as your walls clench around his cock and you release onto him.  
“Oh, Professor!” You cry out, your body writhing under his.  His thrusts get sloppy in you before he gives one last powerful thrust before emptying himself inside your throbbing cunt.  His cock twitches inside you as he fills you up, flooding you with his seed.  The feeling of his cum filling you up sends you over again and you contract around him and your walls continue to flutter as you cum a couple more times.  Your Professor topples over you and lays on you but does not put all his weight on you and presses soft gentle kisses on the back of your neck.  His demeanor has completely softened. 
“You did so well for me,” he says with a small smirk, “took your punishment very well,” he says pulling out of you, his seed spilling from your cunt.  
“T-thank you, Professor,” you stutter still blissed out from your multiple orgasms.  He chuckles lowly and rubs your back before grabbing a towel and cleaning you off gently.  You blush at the unexpected aftercare.
“I hope you learned your lesson,” he smirks as you both get dressed.
“No, Professor,” you blush and head for the door, “You only gave me more to think about,” you smile to yourself replaying it in your mind over and over as you walk back to your dorm. 
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zsakuva · 4 months
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hello! i love your works a lot (andrew and zaros, especially). i'm a fledgling writer and i really am in love with how you flesh out the characters and the world building is absolutely insane. how do you do that exactly? any tips? please take me as an apprentice xd thank you and have a nice day! 🌸
Thank you!
I could talk for hours when it comes to world-building. It's something that's exciting, fun, yet challenging, and there have been plenty of times where I've lost myself to research and ideas.
The way to world-build is dependent on what the main goal is and how deep down the rabbit hole you want to jump. I, unfortunately, like to dive pretty deep because I want to mould the present time of the story to its past as seamlessly as possible. However, try not to let yourself wander too far or you'll get stuck (like I've done on countless occasions). It's great for the writer to have an arsenal of information, but the most critical detail is allowing the story to breathe.
OUR WORLD, MODERN TIMES
For characters in our world, it's much easier to focus on their backstory. I always build motivations through their personality and history; without them, characters become two-dimensional and boring.
I'll use Andrew as an example.
Andrew is the first-born son and an older twin. Due to how he was raised, this alone provides a blueprint that can shape his personality:
A sense of leadership by caring for his younger brother, coupled with more responsibility as the eldest and smartest son (according to his parents).
Setting an example that their parents accept.
But what happens when the younger twin resents being compared? What happens when he begins to rebel, and Andrew is stuck between wanting to console and comfort his younger brother, but also uphold the role of the dutiful first-born son that their parents desire?
There will be conflict in his decisions, and regrets that continue into his adult life. Asking 'what ifs' is an amazing way to flesh out scenarios with multiple outcomes!
And then, when his parents noticed how proficient he was in academia, pushed Andrew. In so doing, he was:
Forced to study, and found acceptance through excelling. This likely created his need for perfectionism that later bled into every aspect of his life. However, it also transformed into him feeling inadequate whenever he wasn't working which informs why he works so hard regardless of what he does.
Isolated for majority of his childhood and teenage years. This stunted him socially, and even though he was able to experience some because of his twin, the lack of bonding, long-lasting relationships, and the knowledge of working through hardships damaged his ability to do so in adulthood. Pair this with him attending classes for older students (who were likely envious of his intelligence), and that forms a distrust of befriending people older than him.
Andrew's beliefs are all informed by what he was taught, and his experiences. This is only a little of the world-building I've done with him, but I hope that gives you some inspiration on where to start with your own!
A WHOLE NEW WORLD
When it involves a world outside our own, it's more difficult (yet way more fun) to build. You have free reign because the world is your own! Go crazy with it!
Again, dependent on the characters you're writing, you can start with something that is intrinsically linked with them and expand from there. For Zaros, the location's history is especially important because of his status, who he's surrounded by, and the relationship he has with Earis. As a character who is knowledgeable about a plethora of things, that means he would use such information; and that also requires its existence in the world-building notes!
I won't give much more away as his series is still ongoing, but with any character, there will more often than not be a motivation behind what they do and say. You don't need to outline the events of every birthday and holiday and what not. It's the events in which conflict arises that impact and change a character to define who they are in the present moment.
This was longer than I expected, but I hope this helps with your writing! Good luck!
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agentravensong · 8 months
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two scenes i would add to nerdy prudes must die
the thing about being autistic is that i will have no motivation to sit down and write stuff for my grad school applications all day, but then at night i'll find it in me to spend 3+ hours writing a tumblr post about my latest hyperfixation ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
this time that hyperfixation is nerdy prudes must die, a show that, despite still not being my favorite starkid hatchetfield musical, has really dug its claws into me. i'm gonna detail two scenes that i think would add to certain character arcs, give ritchie (and ruth)'s death(s) more impact, and really drive home the show's themes. don't think i need much more preamble than that, so, here we go!
1. Second Lauter family scene
A scene set between Ritchie's death and Ruth's, fitting best in the plot as is right after "Hatchet Town".
Primary purpose: Show more of Steph's character and her relationship with her father; show that the attitudes that made the teens' high school experience hell (pre-ghost!max) are reinforced by the adults
Basic outline: Steph and her dad are having a convo, prompted by the mayor, about how school is going; a kind of convo that, with how awkward it is, clearly doesn't happen often. Lauter says something half-hearted about how it's a shame her high school experience is being ruined by these events, because it was the happiest time of his life (as a contrast to the opinions our protags express in the opening number).
Steph doesn't want to talk about the murder stuff (duh) so she redirects to how her grades have genuinely improved (or at least did for a minute there) thanks to her studying with Pete, in a way that makes it clear she's genuinely proud of her improvement.
Mayor Lauter, in response, tells her that he doesn't want her hanging out with the nerds anymore, in or out of school, because it makes her a target (and also a suspect).
Steph gets upset at this dismissal; what kind of dad, she scoffs, would tell their daughter who was finally succeeding academically to stop trying? Especially when he was the one who told her to get her grades up?
And Mayor Lauter says something to the effect of, "You don't need to be a star student. I know you, Stephanie; that's never going to be you. All you need to be is good enough. Can you just do that for me?"
We have the mayor leave at this point; let's say he gets a phone call, cause that makes sense, and also is a deeply ironic reason for him to leave a family conversation considering his criticism of Steph's phone use. Steph could even point that out as a joke.
Here is where, if we have time, we give Steph a solo number. Well, it could be a solo, or it could be a duet with her dad — the kind where they're not singing to each other or aware that the other is singing, but they're basically singing their different perspectives on the same thing (in this case, their relationship). I propose the duet version because Corey deserves to get to show off his vocals more prominently in these shows.
Alternate ending if we're not doing the song: Steph can storm out, and the mayor can have an ominous line foreshadowing the drastic measures he'll be taking when we see him again.
The idea with this scene is that I want to give more weight to the whole "she's smarter than she thinks she is" angle to Steph's character. Show that she has found something through her bond with the nerds (Pete mainly) that makes her want to be more than just the "cool girl". And show that there is a part of her that wants a better relationship with her father (because if he won't believe in her, be proud of her, then who will?).
But also, we see how her dad has pigeonholed her into being that kind of airhead. All he cares about is that she stays out of trouble (which is to say, anything that would cause trouble for him). He doesn't care what she's genuinely interested in, what she aspires to; he's spent most of her teenage-hood assuming she's not interested in anything worthwhile, that she doesn't aspire to anything. He doesn't see her as a full person.
And, perhaps most importantly, him telling her not to associate with the nerds draws a direct line between him and our main antagonist, Max. Which matters for reasons that will become clearer as I discuss the second additional scene I came up with.
For the record, if I only got to add one of these scenes (NPMD is the longest of the Hatchetfield shows already, and both these scenes would have to be Act 2 additions), I'd pick this next one. So let's get to it.
2. High School Regression scene
Primary purpose: Showing how the murder(s) has/have affected the student body, and making the point that the hierarchies Max represented can't be disposed of that easily when he's still, literally and metaphorically, haunting the place.
This one would happen in between when the protags find out about Ritchie's death and when Grace informs Pete and Steph of Ruth's death. Practically, this means it would have to be set either:
A) right before Ruth goes to the BBQ Monologues rehearsal, with the scene centering around her, and leading directly into her arrival there (maybe replacing the cop convo entirely? maybe they're at the end of it)
or B) as basically a replacement for the Beanie's scene, but still leading into "If I Loved You" (and everything that comes after)
The beat-by-beat for this one is less solid in my head compared to the first scene, but the idea is that we see some of the cheerleaders and jocks going back to bullying Ruth in version A or Pete in version B (though in a less confident and malicious manner than Max did, as if their hearts aren't fully in it). Ruth or Pete gives some pushback and asks what changed to make them revert to this behavior.
I'm not sure how exactly the bullies express the "why", but in plain-speak, it's this: the students know about Ritchie (and Ruth)'s murder(s), and, maybe more importantly, the "nerdy prudes must die" that was written in Richie's blood. The message they've taken from that is that there is a killer reinforcing the social hierarchies they all abandoned when Max died. And so, with that latent threat hanging in the air, these students have decided to fall in line, in the hopes that they'll therefore be spared. Maybe, even, the murders will stop.
(you could also have one or two kids who are genuinely almost as cruel as max and are using this as an excuse to going back to being the assholes they were before, but you'd need more proper set-up for such a character i think)
Version A is pretty straightforward. I like the idea of Pete and/or Steph being there as well so it isn't just Ruth experiencing the misery (considering where things go from here)... but I know that they need to be dressed as different characters for when Ruth gets to the auditorium, so that probably isn't practical. Maybe there'd be time for Mariah to have made that quick change if Joey really stretched out his bit? But I know the change was tight even for Angela as is.
For version B, you could have the bullies find Steph and Pete at or on their way to Beanie's and be assholes to them there (because it makes sense to me that Steph and Pete would want to have their potentially incriminating conversation off high school grounds), but I think it has more thematic punch to set it in the high school.
Wherever it's set, in version B, Steph and Pete talk a bit about how the bullies' regression sucks, how things are even worse now than they were before Max died, which then leads into their conversation as it is in the actual show over whose fault this all is.
With Pete specifically, I think it'd be neat to call back to what he said to Steph way back in the show about his desire to blend in, to be invisible. That maybe, for a little bit, he liked being accepted, being important (to one person in particular), but it wasn't worth it. And with Steph, if we do have the second dad convo in this version of the show, we can maybe have her comment on how even her dad seems to believe in this bullshit social hierarchy, how they might never escape it.
I mentioned in my post detailing my initial nerdy prudes thoughts that I wished Pete and Steph had a convo that felt like Paul and Emma's convo right before "Join Us and Die". Basically, this is my attempt to give these teens that, without adding an entirely new scene just for that.
As a whole, this scene is my best attempt to Make Something of the themes and plot threads that are so well set up but get kind of lost in the last... third? of the show. Plenty of people have rightly posted that the adults are the real villains of this story. Max isn't scary just because he's one guy; he's representative of larger ideas, a larger system, perpetuated by those adults. Hierarchy, competition, and domination, treated as the natural, necessary state of the world. A system that reduces the personhood of all those ensnared in it.
Those ideas won't just disappear with his death. Max might have peaked in high school even if he lived because of the specific brand of boisterous asshole he was, but the world that instilled those ideas in him, the world beyond high school, will keep fostering and enforcing them, in its more mundane, subtle (comparatively) ways. It will keep producing more Maxs, and more Solomon Lauters.
Like, the whole "fuck clivesdale" bit is a running joke, and a funny one! But, also, I think there's something to be said about the fact that both the teens and adults are all in on this seemingly one-way rivalry, and how much focus is placed on it, in a show about *bullying*. A show about people who have arbitrary labels slapped on them as an excuse to be cruel to them.
"you're fucking losers, and we'll kill you!" isn't that far off as a sentiment from "nerdy prudes must die", is it?
and, like. their team name is the clivesdale chemists. chemists, like, nerds. it's supposed to be part of the joke, i'm pretty sure, that they're named after something nerdy, not a cool animal. if that parallel isn't intentional, then, i dunno man. it's still there either way.
(see also: the musical motif underneath the "who will pray for me" section of nerdy prudes must die also appearing as the chorus of "hatchet town". a motif that plays both when max asks ritchie who will remember him (who will remember *them*), right before enacting his ultimate "justice", and when the adults twist their memories into an excuse for a witch hunt, their own paranoid search for "justice".)
In real life, getting rid of the one asshole at the top of a rotten system doesn't fix the system. If the non-nerdy teens in this school were impressionable enough that one asshole could make them all act in line with his arbitrary beliefs, then his haunting presence (even if they don't know it's literally his ghost) should absolutely have *some* effect on them too.
And I think if you included a scene like this, it would make all that stuff in the script that's subtext, or half-developed, feel like it really was intentional, purposeful.
Does that all make sense? I hope so.
I know that actually trying to fit both of these into the show would require cutting some other stuff down for time, and it would complicate scene transitions and maybe fuck with the overall pacing. Really, this is more a thought experiment than anything else. I'm just glad to have it out of my head after it's been brewing there for multiple days, There's other stuff I'd change if I were to do a full edit of the script, sure, but these are the big things that really would've made the show click for me on the level tgwdlm does.
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chayscribbles · 1 year
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chayscribbles’ monthly writing update ☆ february 2023
☆ STATISTICS.
words written: 11 606
projects worked on: Andromeda Rogue; The Gemini Heist; and a Third, Secret WIP
proudest accomplishment: i'm about halfway through with AR1 draft 2! and i finished like, a bunch of drawings
books read: Architects of Memory by Karen Osborne; All Systems Red (Murderbot Diaries #1) by Martha Wells;
☆ GENERAL COMMENTS.
why do i feel like i wrote a lot less than i actually did. like i looked at my total and thought "now that can't be right... there's no way i wrote that much."
things are going better for some wips (AR) than they are for others (GH) so maybe my head is cancelling it out lol.
reading comments: Architects of Memory was basically "a corporate war over alien weapons featuring messy sapphics in space" and i liked it but it wasn't quite a coup de coeur, 4/5 stars. All Systems Red was an absolute delight, 5/5 stars, will be reading the rest of the series once my holds on Libby come through.
(also i started reading Hell Bent by Leigh Bardugo this past weekend, and i blame it + it's precursor Ninth House for putting me in the mood to work on Third Secret WIP lately, as Ninth House is partially responsible for the genre shift in Third Secret WIP.)
more specific wip-related comments + featured excerpt below.
☆ COMMENTS: ANDROMEDA ROGUE (draft 2)
i'm about halfway through this draft! i've passed 40k this month!
things are going super well. when i have the magical combo of time and energy and motivation to write i can get through scenes pretty easily, now that i don't have to worry about overall plot as much. plus i get to add little things here and there to beef it up.
i've mostly worked on the second act this month, which is where the team really starts going through things together.
there's one particular Azami chapter right before the midpoint that's a monster of lore-dropping. i had to rework it several times as i had an entire page of editing notes to make sure everything is coherent... and i'm still not entirely sure i've gotten it right 😭
☆ COMMENTS: THE GEMINI HEIST (outlining / draft 0.5)
not much to say about this one. didn't work on it as much. the plot for this wip continues to frustrate me. i'll find myself coming up with little ideas for the characters and the world... but when i try to sit down and come up with actual scenes and plot, my brain turns to soup.
☆ COMMENTS: THIRD, SECRET WIP
this wip is consuming me. devouring me with its teeth. i'm surprised to find i may actually have a plot. turns out letting it hibernate for 3 years and tweaking with the genre has done some good.
i might cave and post an intro in the next month. stay tuned...
☆ FEATURED EXCERPT.
this is from the like, one scene i wrote for gemini heist this month. i just think it's funny. for context, Leo and Gabi are trying to get access to some archives in a university library, and are posing as students.
As [Leo and the archivist] talked, Gabi slipped her hand into the pocket of her ridiculous jacket. Her fingers closed around a small round device. She glanced around. While Leo was doing a great job at keeping the archivist distracted, the commotion had caught the attention of nearly everyone in the room.
Just be normal, she told herself. She inched her hand out of her pocket.
“Which archives exactly do you need access to?” [the archivist] asked.
“Art of the early Viheldan Empiric era,” Leo said. “My paper is on the Gemini statuettes.”
“Ah, that might be why. You need a special authorization form from a professor or another faculty member to access those.”
Leo pouted. “But my professor said he got access for me!”
“Perhaps you can message him—”
“Ugh— can’t you just call him right now and ask? I don’t have time for this.”
“Alright. I’ll give him a call.”
Shit. Gabi wasn’t ready. She fumbled to take out the device, concealing it as best as she could in the palm of her hand. All she needed was to place it on the archivist’s computer terminal without him seeing a thing before he made that call.
The archivist’s fingers hovered over the screen for a second before pressing an icon at the bottom. With a starburst motion of his hand, he expanded a search window and began typing in the name of the professor. Panicking, Gabi slammed the device in her hand onto the side of the terminal.
The already quiet room went completely silent. All eyes turned towards her. The archivist’s were wide and stunned. Leo’s were sharp and furious.
“I, uh,” Gabi sputtered, awkwardly keeping her hand glued to the terminal. The device whirred to life, vibrating softly under her palm. “I-I thought I saw a bug.”
☆ TAGLISTS. let me know if you want to be added/removed to any of them.
general taglist:
@nicola-writes @dgwriteblr @the-orangeauthor @retrogayyde @quilloftheclouds @ashen-crest @writeblrfantasy @celestepens @stardustspiral @pepperdee @extra-magichours @avi-why @lefttigerobservation @chazzawrites @bardolatrycore @innocentlymacabre
andromeda trilogy taglist:
@bebewrites @nicola-writes @dgwriteblr @the-orangeauthor @retrogayyde @akindofmagictoo @quilloftheclouds @nora-theteawriter @ashen-crest @corpsepng @writeblrfantasy @toboldlywrite @celestepens @stardustspiral @pepperdee @cheerfulmelancholies @extra-magichours @writeouswriter @cilly-the-writer @lefttigerobservation @rose-bookblood @drowsy-quill @chazzawrites @cynic-and-chief @enchanted-lightning-aes @aesa
gemini heist taglist:
@florraisons @akindofmagictoo @cream-and-tea @nicola-writes @memento-morri-writes @antique-symbolism @rose-bookblood @afoolandathief @pepperdee @avi-why @zonnemaagd @chazzawrites @analogued @enchanted-lightning-aes @innocentlymacabre @kahvilahuhut @celestepens @cilly-the-writer @extra-magichours @retrogayyde
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sleepyowlwrites · 2 years
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💥💡🤝
💥 - What is the main conflict of the wip?
I assume you're mostly interested in city story so I'll answer for that.
the external main conflict is that Rune's ex-sort-of-adoptive-family - the two sons, specifically - are after her to bring her back into the fold as a trophy, kinda (they're terrible people) and Jet decides to help her out even before he knows what all went down that made her decide to leave them and Jet and Rune have to do a lot of scheming and fighting to stop Max (evil son #1) from continuing to run his fighting ring, drug dealing and chronic manipulation and abuse of literally anybody in his life.
the internal main conflict is Jet deciding what kind of person he is, what he stands for, who he wants to trust, who he wants to protect, where he draws the lines of his boundaries, what he won't do even for someone he loves, and allowing himself to experience emotions and have good things without self-destructing.
isn't it so nice that he gets to do both at the same time, mm.
💡 - What inspired the wip? When/how did you first get the idea?
I follow several drama blog (asian dramas) and a few were showing clips of a thai drama called Not Me and it had some interesting scenes in it with good (or bad) hurt/comfort (which I LOVE), so I watched a couple clips since it's all on yt, and I was really interested in the character of Black - and we don't get to explore him enough, it's very sad - and so I was writing a little bit of fanfic to console myself and explore that character, but I very quickly realized that I'd accidentally just invented a character with some similar traits but totally different goals, so then I borrowed the most basic template of the series: angry guy with an estranged twin brother, some friends he sort of doesn't really trust half the time, the setting is a CITY, there is fighting - and then I dumped the entire plot, all the character motivations and most of their backstories, eschewed extra characters, invented my own antagonist, invented Rune, invented a new plotline, and here we are! (oh wow that was a single sentence)
like, if you knew the series, you could see how dirt in the doing was absolutely inspired by it, but even though you can match up aspects, none of them are the same anymore. like, there are 7 main characters, but their outlines are all different now, and they're all connected in different ways.
this happens to me a lot. I start writing some introspective character exploration fic and then I get a lot of ideas and poof! it's loosely inspired and 98% just my own thing now. which is cool. but also not because I do not need any more ideas, brain.
🤝 - How do the characters meet? (antagonist included!)
it's from Jet's pov so I'll just say how he meets each of them.
Copper - is his twin brother. their parents did a parent trap separate and each take a twin thing, but less extreme, but then later extreme because they did their level best to keep them apart from each other for purely selfish and self-absorbed reasons.
Rune - he met when she started participating in Moss' "collect things in semi-legal ways and distribute them to people who need them" venture. then she randomly met him on the street one night and they bonded over being lonely. (I think you read that part)
Moss - he met after he dropped out of school. he needed a job after getting fired for starting a fight with a coworker (who was an asshole but still, great adulting there Jet) and Moss has this nose for "wayward youths in need of productive things to do with their hands" so he kinda just picked Jet up off the street and was like "you work here now" and Jet works at his garage now. Moss is the mentor Jet will never admit he needs.
Yarrow - Jet met him at the garage when he came over to see Moss one day. Yarrow is a part-time art student and works at a coffee shop. his energy levels are absolutely too much for Jet but he has a way of worming his way into people's hearts, Jet included.
Hawk - he started working in Moss' garage doing the accounting (after Moss did his "this is a wayward youth" thing) and later also working on the bikes. Jet didn't like him at first because Jet doesn't like anybody at first but Hawk just was like "oh I can be your antagonist, sure" and then Moss was like "I will not tolerate murder so get along or else" and then they eventually bonded over both having trauma and now they sort of respect each other but pretend they don't.
Shadow - Jet met him at the garage, technically, but he really met him when he found him sleeping on the street. Jet doesn't really know what to do with Shadow. he tries to look out for him but Shadow isn't good at letting people do that, so it's tricky. they'll bond over trauma eventually. it happens every time. it's a theme, you could say. yay.
thank for ask, Klaus, looking forward to reading your comments on dirt in the doing.
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woodelf68 · 1 year
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Trying to go through and get rid of some old stuff, and I found the letters the school sent my parents saying I had passed the screening done to identify students for the gifted program in 7th grade, which was a class that would take the place of one of my elective choices for the year.
From the first letter: "The course curriculum deals with divergent thinking skills in developing creative problem solving, decision making, analysis, syntheses, and evaluation".
I assume I was just as horrified reading that then as I am now. Just because I liked to read and got good grades in the subjects I was interested in (English, social studies, etc.) did not mean I was academically-minded or wanted to feel more "challenged" in class.
From the second letter, Premise One: (Yes, the points laid out in the letter are labeled "premises", and let me tell you, that kind of stuffy language puts me off immediately.) "Gifted children will be among the leaders and problem-solvers of the future."
Me: AHAHAHAHA (Definitely not me)
"Activities: Future problem solving bowl techniques (Bowl???), Time capsules (not interested, and I think we'd already done one in 6th grade?), a library search of the origins of war (oh boy, just how 12 year old me wanted to spend my time! (not)), group discussions involving values, education, self-concept, death, social security, nature-nurture, vocation (I literally cannot think of anything less interesting), and future shock (I have no idea what this was about, and couldn't care less.)
The next bit's about learning how to research and outline and write a paper, but we did that in regular classes. And then Premise 3: These children are more likely to be vocationally motivated than average students, so the program should assist them in making intelligent occupational choices.
Me: AHAHAHAHA no. Never been vocationally motivated in my life. And I had just gotten out of elementary school, the highlight of my week was probably still watching Saturday morning cartoons, some vague future where I had to get a job was not something I was concerned about. Six years in the future was literally half of my entire life at that point, and felt a very long way away. Asking kids if they have a future dream job is one thing (and suggesting things they could do at their current age to pursue those dreams), but all the tests and stuff they mentioned seem better suited for kids moving into high school.
The only statement the letter made that I agree with is Premise 4: "Gifted children should be given the opportunity to determine the activities they are most interested in." Well, yeah, all children should, but I didn't need to waste one of my elective classes to find out what I liked; I already knew.
Premise 5: "Gifted students have a tendency to become workaholics if they do not learn the importance of a good balance between work and relaxation."
Me: AHAHAHAHA, this is so not me. In fact it sounds to me that this class would have been forcing me to do extra work. 'Relaxing' activities listed are skating (nope, never was able to learn how to skate, I have weak ankles and crap balance), bowling (boring), baseball (boring, too much standing around under a hot sun), and volleyball (only one that I might have found fun, although I sprained my ankle so badly in high school gym class playing volleyball that I started repeatedly spraining it on a regular basis just by like catching a toe on a crack in the sidewalk; even months of physical therapy failed to break up any of the resulting scar tissue or improve my near non-existent range of motion in my ankle. Athletics and me do not get along.).
Premise 6: "The society of the future needs these "movers" and "shakers"...
Me: AHAHAHAHA again, SO not me. I am not a mover and a shaker, I am a sitter and a reader. I think my parents tried to encourage me to take the gifted class, but I am so glad that they didn't force me when I very firmly said no. Idk, maybe there are kids out there who enjoy thinking about death and social security and self-concept, I enjoyed learning practical skills in woodshop and the home ec cooking class that I took that year.
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Hello! I’m a big fan of your work. I write some myself, but I often have a hard time sticking with my stories, even if I love the idea and characterization. As soon as something isn’t coming out exactly like I envisioned, I kind of just rage quit lol.
So I was wondering if you could explain your process? Do you make an outline? Does it come to you as you go along? How do you stay excited about what you write?
Hello there! First of all, I'm SO sorry this took me forever to answer, but I was having a bit of a mess with my own writing and process and then just... life. All that. But here I am now, and I'll try to explain what I can!
Ok so first of all, I think everyone has some projects they just rage quit or sputter out on, and I think that's part of the writing process. But I do think there are ways to make staying at it easier!
Here's my big one, which I also tell my students with academic stuff: a first drafts only job is to EXIST because you can't revise a blank page. So remember that when you're writing, it's most likely NOT gonna be perfect on the first write though! Sure, sometimes you have moments that are just genius right away, but often, stuff takes work. I rewrite and revise ALL THE TIME. Probably more than is healthy, honestly, but letting go of that perfectionism and just trying to get the first draft to exist on the page can make a big difference in continuing to write things to completion.
As far as outlining, my answer to that is sort of weird? Because I don't do any formal sort of outline but I do basically always have a general idea of the end of the story when I start writing. This could be the big climax moment (the couple gets together, the hero saves the day, etc) or even just the internal development I want to see a character work through by the end (the protagonist starts out closed off from others but learns to accept help by the end, etc). Either way, I see my stuff mostly fizzle out if i don't know what I'm writing toward. That ending point might (and often does) change through the writing process, but there's almost always SOMETHING I'm writing toward.
I also do make ridiculous notes for myself about character and plot points and ideas of endings just so I have them to refer back to. Again, they usually change a lot bc I'm not a rigid outliner, but it helps me to have some sense of what's happening and why. Let me see if I can find an example.
Haha OK, here's a WILD example of my notes for The Play's the Thing way back in the day:
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Is it a Google doc of slightly messy nonsense? Yes. Did it give me a place to brainstorm and refer back to later when I was writing? Also yes.
So I'd say figure out what sort of notes/outlining/planning works for you. Also remember that you don't have to write in order! No one reading it will know, so sometimes it helps to jump around in the narrative if you feel like you're getting stuck.
In that respect, I also sometimes use brackets if I'm in the zone and don't wanna derail myself with looking for the write word or figuring out details of some little scene that doesn't matter at the time. My first drafts are littered with [add word] [characters travel to next scene] [time period specific clothing] etc that I can then find via searching " [ " and revise later. That can help keep you from getting hung up and/or bogged down by the fiddly details when you're writing for the broad strokes.
As far as staying excited about what I write, I'm not sure what to offer except that I like knowing what I'm writing toward and also allowing the story to grow and evolve as I'm writing it. Characters come to life when you get writing, and sometimes letting them surprise you can do wonders for keeping a story going. It sounds crazy, but allowing a story to grow and adapt and head in different directions (as long as you've still got that sense of where the story's headed and that it's heading toward something) can really keep you interested and motivated. I'm also just weird and usually enjoy the writing/revising process as long as I'm still feeling excited about and enjoying the story.
Which leads to the reminder to write what you want and what makes you happy! It sounds like you've already doing that if you like the characters or ideas, but maybe finding plots and styles you enjoy more could help too. :)
OK, that got very long and was definitely a look behind the curtain at my chaos, but I hope maybe some of it could help keep you writing and feeling good about it! I hope so, and I hope to read some of your stuff someday!
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mhsargent · 1 year
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Practice, practice, practice
“Writing is not necessarily something to be ashamed of, but do it in private and wash your hands afterwards.”
― Robert A. Heinlein
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I stopped writing - in that active, artistic sense - in my early 20s, shortly after leaving my eldest children’s mom (a reflection-confessional for another time.)  In the 2 ½ decades since, I have written, but sporadically and either in my role as a student or in my role as a teacher.  I have completed a master’s degree, and a great deal of reflective writing was a part of that. However, it was very much couched in an academic context, and my motivation for completing the writing was entirely about earning a certification, not about sharing what I had learned.
Something changed (or clicked, or hatched, or emerged, or something) a few years ago.  I discovered I had something I needed to say, and, strangely, it wasn’t about me.  Still in the context of work, I started writing a paper (a small book in the end) outlining the foundations of teaching in an inquiry context (I will be making that document public very soon.) Composing and editing that document allowed me an opportunity to reconnect with writing.
I have recently emerged from a very dark and difficult period related to my ongoing bout of Chronic Migraine.  Quickly, for those who do not know, I have had Migraine my entire life (no, it is not just a headache) and this is the second period in my life where my Migraine status has been “chronic.”  This particular period has been going on since October 2013, with more intense and less intense stretches over those nearly 10 years.  The past nearly 10 months have been particularly hard and dark, but I have recently come back to some semblance of life!
One of the first things that I had an overwhelming urge to do, once I could think again, was to start writing. And I did - I wrote things I expected to write, and then I went on to things I wasn’t sure I was ready to write, and then I started planning other pieces of writing I had no idea I had been thinking about.
And from all this, I realized how important writing is to me - as an activity, as a form of expression, and as a way to recognize my own thinking.
The quote at the top of this blog I first read as a teenager, and it resonated strongly with me then.  My younger self’s writing was undoubtedly and (retrospectively) uncomfortably masturbatory.  Which, I suppose, is fine.  Writing can often be an indulgent process.
But writing has changed for me in the decades of my hiatus.  I am less satisfied with self-indulgence with my writing.  I am more interested in grappling with issues in the outer-world rather than the issues of my inner-world.  And, for all those times I do need to spend some time on my inner-world, I now have this blog space and all my self-indulgence can be poured in here. 
But this space is about more than just self-indulgence.  I’ve set up this space for myself to “work out” in.  Writing takes practice - like with all other things, it has a set of muscles, both literal and figurative, that need to be exercised. I have discovered that, although I am not entirely out of shape, I can certainly improve my conditioning.  Additionally, writing to meet an assignment is very different from writing for the public.  
This process of writing and posting for any and all to read forces me into different considerations as I lay out these words and sentences.  As they emerge from my fingertips, I hear my voice and I wonder about how it will be received.  Who will stay to listen?  What will they hear?  WIll they listen again in the future?  
This new motivation, this new intention for my writing means that I need to learn a new way to listen to my voice.  When I was younger, I listened to what I produced with the intention of making myself sound better - improving the writing so everyone would know how clever and smart I was..  Now, I find myself more interested in making the writing more effective for the audience.  I am less concerned with what the audience thinks of my writing, and I am more concerned with whether the audience connects with my writing.  In other words, I find myself concerned about wasting the audience’s time and energy.  
Annie Dillard, a writer whose writing moves and inspires me, offers much by way of writing advice; I find myself often returning to this one:
One of the few things I know about writing is this: spend it all, shoot it, play it, lose it, all, right away, every time. Do not hoard what seems good for a later place in the book, or for another book; give it, give it all, give it now. The impulse to save something good for a better place later is the signal to spend it now. Something more will arise for later, something better.
Annie Dillard (https://archive.nytimes.com/www.nytimes.com/books/99/03/28/specials/dillard-drop.html)
And so, I write.  I lay words out in lines.  I seek to make them alive and present for the reader. I practice. I post. And, as I practice, and post, and as I wait to see if I have an audience, I will go wash my hands.
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starlit-dreaming · 3 years
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[WMMAP] The Slow Burn AU
oh boy guess who’s (a teeny bit) sleep-deprived and back on their bullshit with [concept ideas that they swear to never write]? this pal right here
fun fact, this post is roughly 3400 words :’D
@lithium-15​ @d4ddylucas​ i hope this update brings you joy because i’ve finally convinced myself to open yet another google docs tab for a fic that will cause suffering for us all around, whether it be waiting for, reading, or writing it
i’ll be titling it as “beep beep (answer the phone already you asshole)” just so i can just shorten it to [beep beep] when i tag it on here
the potential titles it could’ve been called in case you didn’t see one of my misc posts about it:
• it was an opportunity missed • call me if you want to reach me • voicemails • this aching heart of mine • may i take your order • it really doesn’t seem like there’s anyone for me • beep beep (answer the phone already you asshole) • a series of bad advice (note to self: don’t listen to helena) • i lost my number; can i have yours?
also im ngl. lowkey got the idea while i was writing this of a pjo au where diana is aphrodite or claude is zeus (which is funny considering that ive been having athy getting nicknamed with “athena” and lucas being nicknamed “luke” for the longest time and only NOW thought of a pjo au)
vague, non-spoiler-y ideas:
• i definitely want lucas and athy to go “lmao they may be attractive but i would Never date them” and then later go “fuck maybe i do want to date them”
• in their pre-irl reveal, they go by athena and luke as nicknames when they text each other
• even though athy seems to be very sociable, i definitely want lucas to call her boring tbh??? also, she Definitely plays otome games in her free time.
• athy definitely has blackie. but i’m not sure if i want to make them be a cute lil pug or a chow chow. case in point:
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• fucking adorable, isn’t it? meanwhile, a chow chow is a cute monster of floof and at this point im just being self-indulgent:
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• if i wanted to be manhwa-accurate, blackie looks more like a wolfdog or maybe a doberman whatever (i’d have to look more into different types of dog breeds if i really wanted to narrow it all down except i Know i’ll probably start weeping over cute dogs cause i fucking love animals and will coo over it so no, i’m not gonna do that), but because i’m very much a “it’s an au i can do as i please” so i’ll most likely have blackie be a chow chow fluff ball
• athy getting her wisdom tooth removed at one point and texting like an inebriated drunkard that is only coherent thanks to autocorrect
• in the beginning, helena is established to have a romantic interest in lucas, while cabel has a romantic interest in athy. misunderstandings ensue
• i’m deadass rereading last game for this au because of all the pining this fic is gonna have. so there will probably be a few scenes here and there that i got the inspo from the manga. might draw some inspo from other manga/manhwa (i.e. yanagi’s proposal to kujou is a Maybe???)
• college club life even though ive literally never joined any clubs before i dropped out and know nothing. im basing the clubs off of what’s at the community college i went to. taekwondo lucas and tennis player athy?
• cabel being part of the astronomy club, along with helena. tempted to make her be a paralegal but that’s diving a little too close into [it was only one night] ngl
• so lucas canonically has 2 brothers, 1 younger, 1 older. meaning that since lucas is 24 y/o, his younger brother is roughly 14 y/o and his older brother would be maybe 27 y/o. his older bro’s gonna get married in this fic
• lucas has a matchmaking grandma constantly on his case, even more so now that his older brother will be getting married
• “be my matchmaker repellent” lucas @ athy
• lucas is gonna have familial drama in the fact that he’s got brothers and has to Deal with them. meanwhile, athy’s familial drama is that she was raised in a single parent household and has never known her father and ended up meeting him at someone’s goddamn wedding
i’ll essentially be rehashing and expanding on details down below, laying out an outline for the info i mentioned before, but in a more organized manner for my future self’s sanity. it’ll technically be spoilers, even if i might not follow the outline perfectly, since i’m still working through my thought process on how i’d like for this fic to go
OVERVIEW
• AUs: coffee shop + college + wrong number + modern setting + social media??? + strangers to friends to lovers + minor fake dating
• rated: M (no E, no smut, no violence, the only thing that’s E for this fic is Emotional Suffering)
• slice of life vibe, basically
• Ships: lucathy, calena, felily, mentioned claudiana, probably jennkiel, onesided athykiel
• general word count goal: 5k min to 10k max (per chapter)
• total chapter goal: 100 (200 based on the goddamn outline Help)
note: there’s more if you want to read the entire fic outline and get possible in-story spoilers
INTRODUCTION: the setup
• essentially going over a regular day in lucas and athy’s life
• establishing a worker-customer acquaintanceship (meaning that there’s next to no direct interactions)
• the wrong number trope ends up happening -- luke and athena being their nicknames.
• chapter goal from beginning to end: 1 to 5
PART ONE: the getting-to-know-you (mostly via texts)
• essentially thinking that the other person is cute irl but believing that they have such a shitty personality that they would never want to date the other person (after seeing their interactions with their friends -- lucas being blunt and dropping the customer service smile around cabel, athy ranting to helena about what would sound like dumb shit to him)
• helena catches feelings for lucas. cabel also catches feelings for athy. athy helping helena get a date with lucas. lucas decides to try and get cabel a date. it goes exactly as one would expect -- not well.
• there’s a huge misunderstanding, and eventually cabel and helena end up accidentally going on a date together. they realize that they’ve got a lot in common and decide to give it a try
• tl;dr, the “attempted wingman” arc
• athy probably gets her wisdom tooth removal at the beginning of this arc
• the “haha me liking him/her? that’s dumb” portion
• chapter goal: 6 to 15
PART TWO: the friendship portion!!!
• as in. lucas and athy end up becoming proper friends irl instead of the impersonal acquaintanceship.
• i want lucas to have some major family drama going on. like a “i need someone to be my plus 1 for my older brother’s wedding and my grandma’s been constantly trying to matchmake me with every eligible girl my age -- basically, be my matchmaker repellent” type of drama not drama-drama being in something sob-worthy
• note: he does not ask athanasia, he complains to her about it through their text convos by mentioning that his brother’s getting married and his grandma wanting to pair him off with a family friend’s daughter, but he doesn’t ask her to help him whether irl or through the screen and its only mentioned as a minor thing (foreshadowing, basically)
• another note: the wedding would not happen asap, rather his brother’s engagement and marriage is essentially going to be setup in this part of the story. its more of a matter of lucas needing to repel his grandma’s matchmaking attempts. it’ll be a “in the next couple of months” and will most likely be happening in part 4 of this outline
• lucas and athy end up catching feelings for each other. as in their minor attraction from part 1 returns to slap them in the face. they agonize over this with their “wrong number buddy” (who just so happen to be the crush in question)
• the “i kinda wanna hold their hand” to “fuck fuck fuck fuck i wanna hold their hand fuck”
• chapter goal: 16 to 29
PART THREE: the pining
• suffer with me
• there’s essentially the mIb love square as lithium called out. at one point they’ll be talking about maybe doing a phone call one of these days (since one of them called by accident) and just nervous realization of “oh no i like this person AND my texting buddy”
• lucas asking athy if she’d be willing to be his plus one at his brother’s wedding -- his matchmaker repellent. we can turn it into a valentines thing, too so that it’ll be all the more ridiculous, because athy would think he’s about to ask her to be his girlfriend, so she just keeps nodding until she hears the question of her being his plus one so that he’d have a friend that could help him put an end to all the matchmaking attempts. plus, he can’t ask cabel to help him out because then that would invite granny hwang’s attempt to push eligible bachelors at him instead
• athy was 100% not amused to hear that she wasn’t even his first, second, or third choice. but she’s pining and begrudgingly agrees to help him out
• little did she know that she WAS his first choice, it’s just that he didn’t Ask her until everyone else was a definite no. she’s also his last choice because if lucas was desperate enough he would’ve deadass asked his texting buddy
• helena will Probably try to set athy up on a blind date, but since it takes place at the coffee shop/cafe lucas works at, he essentially helps athy out when they realize that helena unintentionally agreed to set her up with her EX???? idk yet except that they’re not really Friends, but regardless lucas manages to help her. it’s kiel who’s the blind date btw
• the one-sided athykiel -- essentially ezekiel establishing that he likes athy. athy mentions him to lucas in their text convos by mentioning that she’s pretty sure he likes her but she’s just Not into him like that
• the “it’s fine we’re friends and friends hold hands and they hug all the time so it wouldn’t be strange right” reassurances
• chapter goal: 30 to 56
PART FOUR: the panicking
• they have their first phone call :’)
• lucathy simping for the other person’s voice and lowkey thinking “wow they sound so familiar haha” and more or less going “you have a really nice voice if you did audiobooks i’d buy them just to hear your voice”
• idk what the fuck’s gonna happen by chapter 100, but its going to be when they FINALLY get a clue that they might have mutual feelings and hold hands and it’s very obvious (to everyone) that they’re into each other
• there’s gonna be the wedding for lucas’s older brother with athy as lucas’s plus one. lucas is from a prominent and rich family, so a lot of his family’s business associates are invited to the wedding. cabel’s family shows up, cause cabel’s older brother is a businessman; cabel is lucas’s childhood friend btw
• so after the family drama that lucas has with his family prior to part four dies down, it’s athy’s turn of familial drama :)
• in the fact that claude shows up to the part and he’s just. “diana???” and athy, having grown up in a single parent household that consists of her and her mom, is surprise pikachu face like “you know my mom?”
• so athy’s familial drama is essentially a “holy shit my dad’s a multibillionaire bachelor and my mom never told me until AFTER i met him”. cue the whole awkward “fuck,,, guys my dad wants to marry my mom after finally finding her thanks to me and my mom still loves him and im so fucking confused because this whole time i thought mom left him cause he was a piece of shit but it turns out that it was because my mom thought he deserved someone better than a part-time dance instructor and now everything i thought i knew is Shattered”
• yeah i didn’t want anything too angsty with athy’s family drama. so i decided to give it a cinderella kinda vibe. like the prince at the ball (claude attending the wedding) and finding cinderella’s shoe (athy being the shoe) that leads him to cinderella (finding diana). i was gonna make a joke about it being like cinderella but then i ended up making That connection tbh
• also, at the wedding lucas planned on telling her that he realized that she’s been his texting buddy, but then claude interrupted them because he was pretty sure that athy is his daughter
• it’s the “what does this mean does that mean they like me back or???” (mostly panic on athy’s side) of the story, but it’s also the “fuck man i’ve got shit going on with my family that i don’t know if i can even Think about romance”
• chapter goal: 57 to 100
PART FIVE: the adjustment period
• athy essentially dealing with the fact that her entire life she thought her dad was a dirtbag but it turns out that it was all a misunderstanding so she’s trying to learn how to get along with the guy
• meeting her cousin jennette who’s all “!!!!!!! i have a cousin that’s almost a year younger than me!!!” and wants to get along with athy. she’s trying to see if jennette’s being genuine or not (spoilers: she is)
• also lucas manages to FINALLY tell athy that he thinks that she’s his texting buddy. and it’s that awkward relief that the person they like is the same person. although now lucas thinks that athy has a crush on a coworker of his or something while athy thinks that lucas is interested in a customer of his
• despite both of them being genuises. helena has the shared brain cell and she’s crying at the level of misunderstandings that’s going on when athy tells her about her crush on lucas and her adamant belief that he’s crushing on a customer
• cabel not so subtly trying to figure out who lucas likes -- it’s obvious to helena who highkey thinks lucathy is definitely gonna happen and will Definitely win the lucathy betting pool against lucas’s older brother, but cabel’s like “idk though athy doesn’t seem like his type”
• claude and diana deciding to get married; felix being claude’s best man, lillian being diana’s maid of honor, with athy taking part in the overall wedding planning
• during the wedding planning process for claudiana, athy is just looking at all these pictures and thinking “getting married,,,,, actually sounds kinda nice” and that comment more or less ends up slipping out while she’s sitting on the sofa at lucas’s apartment while looking through wedding pictures. and lucas just. freezes, staring at athy as she’s staring at her screen.
• lucas making a bet with her courtesy of Last Game (not gonna be the same words as yanagi since athy is Very much aware of social cues unlike kujou, but lucas WILL say “then i’ll be putting a ring on your finger” or something along the lines)
• chapter goal: 100 to 150
PART SIX: FINALLY TOGETHER
• i don’t know i really don’t know i just want them to finally get together by part six because if i keep delaying it in this outline i really might go insane the more slow burn i add to it
• wedding #2 except this time its claudiana getting married. they wanted to get married asap, but claude and athy both agreed that it would be worth it to see diana in a wedding dress because they both simp for her
• athy’s plus one is lucas since they both agreed to be each other’s emergency plus one after his brother’s wedding since. they’re both from prominent families so they want to avoid shit
• everyone’s asking lucathy if they have plans on getting married (a lot of claude’s wedding guests assume that athy’s dating lucas and lowkey wants to know if their sons or daughters have a chance)
• this is where the fake dating Really kickstarts which makes athy feel immensely guilty cause she’s lying to her mom tbh but lucas just swoops in and smoothly answers that it’s only natural that he intends on one day marrying athy and they’re pretty much #relationship goals despite not actually dating
• which is probably when she realizes that he Did mention something about marriage during their bet since his win meant that he’d be putting a ring on her finger
• only reason why claude hasn’t tried to lowkey murder lucas is cause it’s athy’s decision on who she dates and loves, but he Will murder lucas if he ever breaks her heart -- which, luckily for everyone, he hasn’t and won’t be
• especially cause lucas and athy Do start actually dating after claudiana’s wedding (because they end up talking because athy really stopped to think “holy shit am i the person that you like???” and cue lucas going “thanks for stating the obvious -- btw i won the bet” so guess who’s boyfriend/girlfriend but are Also technically fiance/es via bet)
• i am going to cry when lucathy are finally dating
• chapter goal: 151 to 178
CONCLUSION: lovey-dovey fluff
• it’s. as the title indicates. fluff. lovey-dovey pure fluff
• athy moving into lucas’s apartment. athy wearing his sweaters and clothes. matching scarves. athy “accidentally” leaving a lipstick mark on his cheek or lips idk yet but it’ll happen
• ring pop proposal ft. drunk athy. lucas ends up snickering and will ruthlessly tease athy over it, especially since cabel drunkenly got it all on camera and bawled over how “beautiful” it was. lucas said yes btw, and then a drunken helena started crying over it too repeating “he said Yes!!!!”
• then a proper lucathy proposal (although technically athy already gave lucas a ring and lucas already said he’d put a ring on her finger if he won the bet). it’s annoyingly casual for athy’s tastes, and if anyone ever asks how the proposal had gone, there will ALWAYS be a completely different story (“she proposed to me with a ring pop while she was drunk” or “he proposed via a bet before we were even dating” or “he proposed to me when we were having dinner and i choked on my cake” or “she thought i was joking about buying her a ring, but then i actually knelt down on one knee and proposed to her at the cafe when i was still on the clock” “i proposed to him after he made me dinner because of how good his cooking is”). all of it is true and valid, but Nobody knows and everyone thinks that they’re just joking around until the lucathy wedding invitation arrives in the mail a few months later
• maybe a lucathy wedding will be written cause i hate myself and want to make the chapter goal a nice round 200 and you know what they say -- 3rd time’s the charm
• do i want claude and diana to give athy a younger brother that would, undoubtedly, be like almost 21-22 years of an age difference between athy and the lil bro. i did the calculations guys, since in this au diana was 18 (claude was 17-18) when she gave birth to athy, and since athy is 21-22 in the present day, that means diana is 39 years old. it’s still very much a possibility for her to get pregnant and have another kid
• chapter goal: 179 to 200
i planned on posting this earlier, but i guess its an early valentines day post now LMAO
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mypoisonedvine · 3 years
Text
𝖙𝖜𝖎𝖈𝖊 I || professor!helmut zemo x reader
𝖘𝖚𝖒𝖒𝖆𝖗𝖞 : history is so much more interesting when he’s teaching it.  you’d better be careful before the two of you end up with a history of your own.
𝖜𝖔𝖗𝖉 𝖈𝖔𝖚𝖓𝖙 : 6k
𝖜𝖆𝖗𝖓𝖎𝖓𝖌𝖘 : smut (incl. semi-public sex in an office and oral f receiving), significant age gap (reader is 20, zemo is 39; it isn’t actually mentioned though but it comes up in the next part), the slightest bit of angst?, nearly pwp at this point lol
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                                    You wouldn’t know it by the way you were enraptured with his lecture, but you weren’t even a history major.  
Quite far from it, really, well outside of the college of liberal arts, and yet here you were in the front row, watching him gesture over a large map of Western Europe while he explained the sociocultural impacts of the Treaty of Versailles.
It was probably pretty obvious why you took such interest in all this, though.  After all, you were the only one who dressed as well as he did, your blazers and skirts and loafers standing out amongst a sea of hoodies and sweats and flip-flops; and, you were the only one who paid close attention and yet never seemed to be taking any notes…
Why would you, after all?  Looking away to write in your notebook would mean missing out on all the fun, and unfortunately you had found that when you copied down the words he spoke, his accent was not retained in writing.
Some kid in the back of the class had asked about his accent the first day; you thought it was kind of a rude question, if you were being honest, but he didn’t seem to mind too much (if perhaps a bit surprised that anyone cared).  He explained he was from a small country called Sokovia, but that his accent was a bit unique since he spoke Russian, German, Spanish, and Italian as well.
Because of course he did.  Like he was specifically designed to target all your weaknesses.
“Well, I could talk about that for the rest of the evening but I’ll spare you all and let you out a bit early today, how does that sound?” Professor Zemo offered.  The other students weakly cheered, a few claps here and there as you heard binders shutting and backpacks being zipped, but you were disappointed.  You didn’t want to go back to your dorm, all you were going to do there was think about him anyways.
Damn, I’ve really got it bad, you thought to yourself, shaking your head as you stood up and gathering your things, slinging your bag over your shoulder.  You glanced up at the podium where another student was chatting with Professor Zemo, and either he said something really funny or she was trying way too hard to flirt with him.  You rolled your eyes, irritated by the display and yet envious of her audacity to just go up there and talk to him.  Imagine having a crush and actually being able to look them in the eye and hold a conversation; you could barely do that with people you didn’t happen to find attractive.
Just as you were about to make it out the door, you heard your name and spun around.  You were shocked to realize it was the Professor trying to get your attention.  If only you’d thought to pretend you hadn’t heard him.
“Could I speak with you for a moment?” he requested, motioning you over with two curled fingers.  With a swallow and a nod, you stepped out of the flow of students exiting into the hallway and approached the desk at the front of the room.
“What is it?” you asked.
“I just wanted to discuss your most recent paper, if you have some time,” he explained, and your heart sunk.  Of course it was garbage, you’d written the whole thing last minute during a near-all-nighter.  “I still have the copy you turned in here in my bag.”
“Right, of course— sure,” you nodded.  By now the classroom was empty spare for the two of you, your words echoing slightly; presumably that was intentional, since these places were built for acoustics, but it made you worry you’d have to hear whatever criticism he had for you multiple times.
He pulled out the slightly-wrinkled paper and took his glasses off of his vest to wear (fuck, did he have to wear the glasses, just to personally attack you?) as he glanced over the top page before folding it over the staple.
“This essay,” he continued, “it’s—”
Ridiculous.  Idiotic.  A blight on humanity and a waste of printer ink.
“Fascinating,” he finished, surprising you.  “After I read it, I searched your student profile on my office computer—”
You gulped, trying not to take that as a compliment.
“I’m looking at your information and I’m seeing you aren’t even a history major— is this a mistake, when it says your major is computer science?”
“No, that’s my major,” you nodded.
“Well, that’s a shame,” he decided, “because you have some really interesting ideas in here, clearly you must have studied history before.”
“I mean, not really,” you shrugged.  “I didn’t even care that much about history until, you know, you...r class,” you finished quickly, realizing it sounded too odd otherwise.
And that smile, the way he looked down at the floor suddenly, was he blushing?  “Thank you.  I’m always… glad to inspire.”
If only you knew everything you’d inspired in me, Professor.
“If you didn’t care about history, what would motivate you to register for an honors history seminar?” he asked suddenly.  
“Well…” you trailed off, reaching up to scratch the back of your neck as you dodged his gaze.
“It couldn’t possibly be because I’m teaching it,” he realized.
“I came to your talk last year, the one you did about the Sokovian civil war,” you finally admitted, letting out a lungful of air as you said it and looking up at him sheepishly.
“Ah,” he nodded, “yes, that might make a bit more sense.  But we still haven’t found the real reason, have we?”  His eyebrow raised slightly and you felt like he was toying with you— but you liked it, the shiver that ran up your spine made that obvious.  “Because the question remains of what would possess a computer science student to take time out of her busy schedule on a Friday night— if I recall the night correctly— to listen to some stuffy visiting scholar talk about a bloody war in a country she may not have even heard of before.”
“My friend brought me,” you defended.
“Under what guise?” he pressed.
“She… may have mentioned something about… a cute professor with a sexy accent…” you stammered, cringing slightly as you spared a glance back up at him.  He was staring back at you with the most bewildering expression.  His eyes said ‘you thought I was cute?’, and yet his smile said ‘I knew it.’
“You must’ve been horribly disappointed when I took the stage,” he finally replied, voice a bit lower, softer, not echoing around the room anymore.  
“Not at all,” you returned, almost below your breath now, and suddenly you became very aware that you were standing too close to him, but you couldn’t move away, you couldn’t even look away anymore.  “I’m here, aren’t I?  Taking your class?”
“And you make it nearly impossible to focus, did you know that?  I swear your eyes never leave me, I can feel them on me.  It’s quite unfair, because I can’t stare back at you no matter how much I want to.”
Just as you looked down at his lips and back up to his eyes, which seemed to be following a similar pattern on your own face, just when you thought this might be it and you were about to do something you really shouldn’t (but really wanted to), you heard the door open behind you and you spun around so fast you nearly hurt your neck.
“Oh,” the man in the doorway mumbled, apparently surprised to see you enough to nearly drop the papers tucked under his arm.  “I’m teaching the next class in here— Honors History of Islam?”
“Professor Waters, yes, my apologies,” Zemo nodded, “we were just… our discussion ran a bit long, we’ll get out of your way.”
You and Zemo awkwardly gathered your things and made a dash for the door as the older professor took his place at the podium.  Once the two of you were out in the hall, you let out a sigh and gave each other a glance, like you were each waiting for the other to either acknowledge or ignore what had just (almost) happened.
“I have my next class across campus in a half hour,” he remembered suddenly, lifting his arm and pulling back the brown sleeve of his coat to look at his watch.  
“Right, you should… get to that,” you nodded.
“Walk with me?” he proposed, and you hoped your smile wasn’t as beaming as it felt.  
“I’d love to.”
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So maybe you ended up skipping your evening class to sit in the back of his History of England course.  And, perhaps, he ended that one early, too, this time to buy you coffee at the student center; and your discussion ended up going on so long that the coffee shop closed and you had to go to his office to finish the conversation.
But, in a certain sense, it could be argued that you never really got a chance to finish that conversation after all… because a few moments after he shut the door to his office, you, for lack of a better term, jumped his bones.
“Fuck,” he mumbled against your lips as you pulled him closer by his jacket, “we can’t do this.”
You nodded, reaching up to wrap your arms around his neck.  “Mhm, yeah, you’re right,” you agreed breathlessly.
His hands took their place at your waist as you both stepped back, the back of your legs bumping into his desk which you jumped up slightly to sit on.
“I mean, we really can’t do this,” he continued, kissing your neck instead now while your legs wrapped around his hips, your skirt riding up slightly, your fingers fumbling with the buttons on his collar.  “I want to, overwhelmingly so, but we can’t.”
“I know,” you sighed; your head fell back when his teeth grazed over your pulse, and his hand was right there to catch it and hold it up, gripping the back of your neck.
“This absolutely cannot happen,” he groaned when your legs pulled him closer, something hard and hot pressing up against your thigh through his trousers and you were really hoping it wasn’t just his cell phone.
Then he rocked his hips, just barely, and you felt the outline of the ridge of his head and it was definitely not his phone unless he had the most suggestively-shaped phone case of all time.  You gasped and grabbed his face to kiss him again, shamelessly desperate now, weaving your fingers into the hair just above the back of his neck.
By now you had managed to get a few of his buttons open so when you slid your fingers down from time to time, they ran over his chest and the patch of dark blonde hair there.  Funny enough, you couldn’t remember having any strong opinions on chest hair before this afternoon, but now you felt your walls fluttering around nothing.  
He helped you shed your blazer just before tossing his own coat aside, never breaking the kiss, holding your face gently while he pushed you down to lay on his desk— he reached behind you to clear a few stray papers out of the way first.  
Your back hit the glossy wood and his weight pinned you down, rough hands sliding up your legs and under your skirt as you tried to push your hips up for more friction where you needed him most.
He pushed your hips back down, not too roughly but definitely enough to get your attention, before sliding his hands up your skirt again where he toyed with the hem of your panties.
You wanted to say something, more specifically you wanted to beg him to touch you, but you had this fear that if you spoke now it would all become real and he would stop because, as he had so poignantly noted, this can’t happen.  And both of you knew that… so maybe it would be easier to let it happen if neither of you really acknowledged it.
Luckily, he didn’t tease you too long, reaching under the fabric and swiping the rough pads of his fingers over your slickened folds.  You choked on your gasp, accidentally digging your nails into his shoulders when he drew delicate circles around your clit.  All at once, he suddenly pushed those fingers right inside you and your back arched; you needed so much more than just his fingers but the way they twisted and curled against your walls was nearly perfect as well.  
They didn’t stay long, quickly pulling back as you watched him quickly open his trousers just before you felt the head of him pushing up to your entrance.
His eyes met yours, dark with need, yet somehow clearly asking you for permission, making sure this was what you wanted: and fuck, you wanted it more than anything.  The moment that you nodded, he began to push forward— slow and deliberate, but unyielding.  
Perhaps as a perfect healthy college student in a male-dominated major, you had no real excuse for it to have been so long since you’d had sex.  As you liked to put it: dating as a woman in computer science means the odds are good but the goods are odd.  Truth be told, you weren’t sure at this point if having had sex any time in the past year would’ve prepared you for him anyway.  It felt like he was forging a new path inside you— certainly a wider one than anyone else ever had since he was so thick.  
With his hips fully seated against yours, the tip of his cock just reached the end of you, just barely brushed over those sensitive spots you didn’t even know you had before.
It stung a bit to be filled this thoroughly, so it was no wonder you were biting down on your lip hard enough to bruise it, your fingers clutching at his shirt tightly.
“Am I hurting you?” he whispered, finally breaking the silence, voice strained like he was struggling just as much as you were (though in an entirely different way).
“A little,” you admitted.  “Please don’t stop.”
He groaned a few curses as he started to move back, and forth, and so slow you could hardly stand it.  
“Fuck,” you breathed, “oh my god, harder, please…”
A little smile crossed his face, a sharp exhale almost like a laugh, and it made your cheeks burn even hotter than they already were.  But, he obeyed, regardless, more aggressive in his movements yet not any faster as he held your hips to keep you from sliding across the desk’s glossy wood surface.
Your moans were starting to echo around the office’s beige walls at this point, and he snarled as he bit down on your neck.  “You need to stay quiet,” he hissed in your ear.  “Can you do that for me?  Can you stay quiet even when I’m making you feel so good?”
“I-I’m trying,” you whimpered, “your cock is… so deep…”
“Oh, I know,” he cooed, voice heavy with faux pity, “poor thing, you can’t take it?”
“No!” you yelped.  “I can take it!  Please, please don’t stop.”
“I won’t have to if you stay quiet, darling, we can’t have somebody hearing you now can we?” he chuckled, licking and sucking at your pulse point as your eyes rolled back in your head.  “We can’t have somebody hearing you cry for me, and coming in here, and seeing you laying on my desk getting fucked by your professor, right?”
What the hell was wrong with you that that idea actually turned you on?  Why did it actually make you want to moan louder until everyone could hear you?
And when his cock speared right against that spongy spot inside you, you did exactly that and he had to suddenly clamp his hand down over your mouth.
“Fuck,” he growled, “you’re going to get us both in trouble.”
Your attempts at apologies were totally incomprehensible with his hand over your mouth, not that they were likely to have made much sense either way.
Blinking your eyes shut, your legs began to quiver slightly as he rutted into you, your toes curling inside your loafers.  You felt so full you could hardly stand it, stretched so wide that you were forced to feel every detail of his cock as it filled you.  Already your walls were bearing down on him; you couldn’t help it, it was like your body was just his instrument now and instinct had taken control of your movements.  
His accent was definitely stronger now as he whispered in your ear, praising you gruffly.  You knew from the beginning that you loved high marks and encouragement from your teachers, but this… this was different, and you hadn't known how much it would affect you.
"Good girl," he breathed, "you're taking me so well, draga, you feel so perfect around me."
You whined from behind his hand and he chuckled at your obvious neediness.
"You like making me feel good, darling?" he presumed, his smile pressing against your neck between nipping kisses to your pulse point.  "You like knowing that I can barely take this tight cunt gripping me so well, that I'm already addicted to your precious body and want to fill it with my seed?"
With your eyes rolling back in your head you nodded feverishly, heavy in your state of total delirium as he pumped his cock deep into you over and over.
You reached up to try to pull his hand away from your mouth, and he met your gaze with fire in his eyes.
“If I take my hand away, will you be good?” he challenged, and you nodded feverishly.  He was a bit hesitant but slowly moved his hand down, and though you did have to keep biting your lip, you managed to restrain yourself.
Every drag of the ridge of his head inside you was somehow more intense than the last, somehow hitting right at your spot and it was like each rough thrust knocked his name out of your mind and onto your lips until you were chanting it like a prayer, or a plea.
And each time you said it, he fucked you harder, snarling and whispering your name back to you a few times, in between little praises; "Beautiful," he mumbled, "such a sweet little girl… such a perfect cunt."
“I— fuck, I’m gonna—” you stammered your warning.  
“Will you come for me?” he finished for you, and you nodded quickly.
“Fuck, I’m so close,” you hissed.
It was obvious just by the build-up that you were going to come hard, pleasure tightening in your core until you were sure that it would spill over but it just kept going, making you wonder if it would ever reach the breaking point.
And oh boy did it, it slammed into you in fact, and your legs quivered as you struggled for air.  He growled in your ear, fucking you harder through it all, stroking every place that had only become even more sensitive.  The moment you could form words again, you were wasting the ability on a string of swears and promises you couldn’t keep.
“Yours, fuck, it’s yours,” you sobbed.  He chuckled a little, pulling back to examine your face which must have given away how fucked-out and cockdrunk you were already.
“Say it again,” he demanded darkly, holding you tighter, fucking you a bit more deliberately though not any less aggressively.
“Yours,” you gasped, cut off by a rough and dominating kiss.  Your moans were lost to his tongue but he didn’t need them to know you were coming, the way your body gripped him tighter than ever was sign enough.
“So good,” he whispered against your lips, “you’re doing so good for me…”
His words washed over your skin and soothed you like a salve, bringing some relief from the overwhelming feelings his body was assaulting yours with.
All things considered, he was still moving rather slowly, each of his thrusts measured and patient, and never really changing speed even as you were coming around him.  Weak little cries fell from your throat each time his hips met yours and the tip of his cock kissed the deepest parts of you.
Your body went limp in his arms and you hadn't noticed before how good it felt for him to hold you, for his strong hands to support you like it was nothing.  His thumb gently stroked your back through your shirt and you mewled weakly into his shoulder.
"So good, draga, so fucking good," he mumbled, holding you closer.
"Please… faster," you whimpered, "I want you to come."
"Is that what you want?" he taunted, ignoring the way you nodded immediately.  "You want to make me come, darling?"
"Yes, please, want it so much," you gasped.
He finally sped up, though it was still nothing like the lightning-speed jackhammering you were used to from guys your age: it was better, certainly, especially when he lifted your leg onto his shoulder and pushed so deep you saw stars.
The second one seemed to hit you all at once, almost out of nowhere, and you heard yourself mumble, “Professor, I’m coming.”  It sounded a bit pitiful, the way you said it, but he apparently didn’t mind as you felt him nod encouragingly in the crook of your neck.
You felt totally drained by now, exhausted even though all you’d been doing was lying there and taking it, but you knew he wasn’t done with you yet.  But, if the way his thrusts were becoming more desperate and erratic were anything to go by, he might be done with you soon.
"I'm going to come inside you," he groaned against your ear.  You were, like, 99.9% sure that if you told him not to, he would pull out, but the way that he phrased it, like a demand, like you didn't have a choice and he would do it either way… it had an effect on you, one he noticed when your channel tightened around him instantly.  "Oh, you like that idea, hm?  You want to be full of my come?  Your sweet little cunt is already trying to milk every drop from me."
"Yes," you breathed, "fuck, I want your come in me, please!"
He sped up quite a bit then, each slam of his hips into yours making you choke on a whine, your arms weakly clinging onto him for dear life.
You could feel his cock swelling, flexing, pushing your body to its limits as he moaned lowly through his teeth, streams of come making you feel warm and full.
He didn't stop until every drop was in you, thrusting in time with each pump of his release until he slowed to a stop.
Strands of hair fell into his face as he hung his head, panting hard and fast.  You melted back onto the desk, realizing this might be the first time in a solid half hour your back wasn’t arched.
It was a bit of a struggle to keep your eyes open against the heavy fog of afterglow that filled your mind; you couldn’t remember the last time you felt so… satiated.  As a college student, you were always thinking about the next assignment, mentally re-evaluating your calendar, or preparing for something— and usually all on less than six hours of sleep.
But now your mind was as close to a blank slate as it had been in at least a decade.  Even though you probably should’ve been, you weren’t even thinking about the potential consequences of this, the implications, the risks.  No, you were just staring up at him, thinking about kissing him again.
He would have to lean down for that, though; there was no way you were going to sit up now.
You hadn't even noticed that you had closed your eyes, almost falling asleep right there on his desk, until you felt his hand cradle your face softly, a calloused thumb rubbing over your cheek.
In unison, the both of you sighed deeply.
As much as it felt like a real effort, you blinked open your eyes and looked up at him, watching him comb his fingers through his hair.  It only messed up the style even further yet he looked better than ever.
He slowly moved his hips back, leaving you annoyingly empty, and readjusted himself until he almost looked put together again… but his collar was still uneven and his lips still looked bitten and there was still that precious pinkish hue on his cheeks.  If anyone else saw him in this state, they’d either know what happened between you two or think he’d just run across campus or something.
If anyone else saw him in this state, you’d be a little jealous, to be totally honest.
You got back to work trying to right your appearance as well, though you knew the best you could hope for was only mildly presentable; he looked at you like you’d never looked better, though.
“Well, this was fun,” you chuckled breathlessly, “but it’s getting pretty late and I have an eight a.m. tomorrow…”
“Yeah, so do I,” he nodded, glancing away.  
You picked up your bag from where you’d dropped it by the door, lifting the strap over your shoulder and starting to turn to leave.
"I… I should walk you back to your dorm," he announced, making you smile.
"That's sweet, but save your chivalry.  I can take care of myself just fine."
"But—"
"I think it's safer if we're not seen together walking together by my dorm," you interjected, "especially when I'm walking a little funny…"
"I hope I didn't hurt you," he winced sympathetically.
"No, trust me, that was… exactly what I needed," you breathed.  He smiled a little, looking down at the floor.
"Then I'll see you in class," he nodded, watching you closely as you stepped back and picked up your bag, starting to leave his office with one last small wave goodbye.  “Wait, wait!” he whispered harshly just before you could let go of his door, and you giggled as he leaned out into the hall and glanced around to make sure no one was nearby.  
When he confirmed the coast was clear, he smiled and grabbed your face with one hand, pulling you into a sudden kiss.  And you smiled too— you couldn’t help it— as you kissed him back, almost ready for him to drag you back into that office and start this all over again.  He did let you go, though, with one more whispered ‘goodnight’ and a look that made your heart do little somersaults.
As you finally did make your way back to your dorm, you tried to figure out if that was a goodbye kiss or a ‘see you soon’ kiss.  Or maybe a ‘thanks for the one-time office quickie’ kiss?  But you didn’t know enough about this sort of thing to know if that was even an option.
All you did know was that you really hoped it wasn’t the last kiss you’d have with him.
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Can I speak to you in my office today after class?  Thank you.
-Z
You may ask yourself: can one simple email, in only thirteen words, strike fear into the hearts of those who read it?  And the answer is yes, assuming that email is from Professor Helmut Zemo and read by the lovestruck student who slept with him two days ago and hasn't stopped thinking about it since.
Only one of a few things could happen in his office after class, and there was a massive gap between the best and worst case scenarios.  You dressed for the best but prepared yourself psychologically for the worst.
You caught him staring as you walked past the teaching podium to your seat in the front; you just hoped nobody else caught him.  And if you'd thought paying attention in class was tough before, boy oh boy was it a challenge now.  The nerves of what he wanted to discuss with you were bad enough alone, but that combined with memories from two days earlier randomly assaulting your psyche was just overwhelming.
When he pointed at the map with two fingers, you could remember exactly how those fingers had felt inside you, twisting and curling and getting you ready for his cock.
When he spoke, you could hear the difference in his voice compared to how he groaned out his praises while he was fucking you within a damn inch of your life.
And every once in a while, when he couldn’t help but glance at you for a moment, his gaze burned right through you; you were helpless to those brown eyes, completely paralyzed by them, and it must’ve been hours of that before class finally ended.
For the first time, you were the first person out the door when he released the class.  As much as it was going to be a little bit weird to beat him to his office, it was certainly better than any of your other options.  There was a chair in the hall beside the door, and you took a seat and pretended to read a book just to look busy (there was no way you could actually turn symbols on a page into readable language right now, not when you knew he’d be here any minute to talk about… something).
Your peripheral caught him coming down the hall, but you pretended to be deeply immersed in your book until he was right beside you, unlocking his door and opening it for you and himself.  Tucking your book away and following him inside, you found him already staring at you, expression completely unreadable.  Your gut sank in anticipation of whatever conversation this was going to become, and a moment passed in heavy silence.
"Hi," you greeted plainly, letting out a quick breath.
"Hi," he returned.  "Close the door behind you."
You nodded and did as you were told, quietly pushing the wood back until the door latched before approaching where he had come to stand beside his desk.  Though you didn't originally intend to, you found yourself standing a bit too close.
"I'm not quite sure where to start," he admitted, chuckling breathlessly as he reached up to rub the back of his neck.  He looked cute flustered, which was a shame because his tone seemed to imply you needed to not be thinking about how cute he was.  “Listen, you should know that what happened before… it was a mistake,” he sighed.  “It can’t happen again.”
“Do you regret it?” you asked point-blank.
“It can’t happen again,” he repeated in lieu of a real answer, and you looked closely at his face; you didn’t find as much confidence there as you were looking for, it wasn’t the face of a man who knew he was making the right choice.  You certainly didn’t think he was making the right choice.
“Why did you want to have this conversation alone in your office, then?” you challenged.
He cleared his throat slightly.  “So no one would hear us.”
“Hear us talk?” you pressed.  “Is that all?”
“That’s… definitely the plan,” he nodded, swallowing dryly.  "Like I said, it was a mistake— my fault, not yours.  And I just hope we can put it behind us respectfully."
“All the best mistakes are made at least twice,” you whispered, reaching up to trail your finger down his lapel.  “Don’t you think?”
“Don’t do that,” he requested tensely.
"Do what?"
"That," he hissed.  "Stop being… irresistible," he clarified, eyes darting from your lips to your finger to your eyes and back again.  "A man can only take so much.  I'm trying to do right by you."
"You already did when you fucked me that good," you smirked.  "Nothing else could be as right as that."
Your fingers were just barely brushing over his belt when he grabbed you by the wrist.  Jaw tight and eyes solemn, he shook his head.
You wrenched out of his grasp with a nod.  It was worth a shot, but you didn't want to be that person who couldn't take no for an answer— so, you gave him a little smile and readjusted the strap of your bag.  “Well, if it was just the once, then you should know that I’m still glad it happened.  Even if it shouldn’t have.”
He nodded, strategically not speaking— but you knew he would agree, if he could.
“And if it’s any consolation to you now, you were the best I ever had.”
You reached for the doorknob, just starting to turn it and open your way out when he suddenly slammed it shut with a hand right above your head, making you gasp and spin around to look up at his dark gaze.
“Professor…” you whispered.
“The best you ever had?” he repeated, grinning proudly when you nodded.  “Oh, sweetheart, I wasn’t even trying.”  He leaned down to brush his lips against your ear as he whispered to you: “You don’t even know yet how good I can make you feel.”
A shiver ran up your spine; your tongue darted out to lick your lips.  “Are you going to get on with it and show me?”
He didn’t even let you step away from the door, dropping to his knees right there and pushing up your skirt to kiss and bite your thighs.  “Only if you ask very nicely,” he taunted with a brow raised in challenge.
“Please,” you breathed, “fuck, please, want you to taste me.”
His hands slid up your legs, grabbing the hem of your panties before sliding back down.
It wasn’t like you’d never been eaten out before, but this still felt like a first considering your skirt was pushed up to your waist, your panties were pulled down to your ankles, and even just one slow lick over your folds made it obvious he knew exactly what he was doing.
“F-fuck,” you choked, reaching down to weave your fingers into his hair.  He grinned against your skin and kept going, exploring you carefully before finally sucking on your swollen clit.  Your knees threatened to buckle, your head fell back against the door so hard it almost hurt, but all you could really feel was his mouth on you, moving like he knew your body better than you did.
So it was no wonder, then, that you already began to spiral towards your release, legs shaking around his head as he devoured you mercilessly.
"Oh my god, I—" you tried to warn him, but he already knew, and he pulled back to wipe his mouth with his sleeve and stand up.  He grabbed your jaw and kissed you roughly, stopping to whisper to you so close that his lips brushed against yours.
"I'm sorry, draga, but you've spoiled me… now that I've felt you come around my cock, I can't imagine making you come any other way.  I need to feel your cunt grip me so fucking tight… it's all I've been thinking about since I last saw you," he admitted.
"I thought about it, too," you sighed.  "I was up all night trying to make myself come as good as you did but I couldn't… your come was still leaking out of me."
He growled and leaned in to nip at your ear.  "Oh, poor thing… I can imagine it so easily, you laying in your bed with your legs spread, fingers getting exhausted from playing with your little pussy too much, these perfect lips whining for me because you need me to take care of you."
"H-Helmut, please," you whimpered.  
"Yeah, something like that," he smirked.
"I can't wait any more, just fuck me.  Need you inside me," you breathed.
"Then bend over my desk."
{part 2}
2K notes · View notes
inkyquince · 2 years
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Sexting with Leighton
content warning. Feminization, lingerie, sexting and nudes, blackmail, masturbation.
Sending
Shall send "tasteful" pics of himself, the same way Avery would but it still comes across different. Avery placed his hand on the base of his clothed cock, mainly showing the outline through his underwear, making sure to have some stomach too, and its quite pleasing aesthetically? He's showing off his body but Leighton wants you to know how hard he is. Precum stain where the head of his cock presses against the material, hand slipped into the underwear, obviously jerking off. Cum spatters along stomach and happy trail.
Will also send pics of the videos he's watching, definitely of you, and making it obvious exactly what he's doing, his cock lying hard and heavy against his thigh, leaking against his trousers material, frame on the screen paused at any shot with a toy or him inside of you, maybe his cum on your face.
Sends the Thinking Of You text with the photo
Quite bored, would be shame if I shared some pictures of you around. Entertain me.
Touch yourself before coming to my office, not in the mood to play around today.
You weren't in school today. I guess we have to do the photoshoot in my home this time then.
Good morning. Show me how pretty my favorite student looks in the morning as my motivation for the day.
Receiving
Leighton generally wants to be surprised with nudes in the morning, maybe in the evening and in the night. Not because its to clear his head for the actual work day, but because it proves you're thinking of him outside of school. Wants to be teased, maybe just starting with a selfie, but shirt open a tad, trousers slung low or skirt tugged up high. Loves the chase, the build up, the tease. Obviously want pictures in their school uniform, but also generally "safe" clothing, soft jumpers and turtle necks, snug jeans or long skirts. All lifted up by the 4th picture, holding fabric between teeth to show off a scantily clad chest. Wants to be able to peel away protective layers to reveal something slutty, lewd. Nipple clamps, lingerie, cock rings, maybe some body writing like "Teacher's pet".
With a female pc, he wants them showing off their body in lingerie. Wants them draped in pretty things, sending pictures of them cupping their breasts, practically spilling out of the fabric. Underwear taut against their body, he wants to see every single part of you pressed against the soft material. Wants you trussed up all pretty, but obviously ready to be ruined. Nipples just peeking out of the bra cups, obvious arousal marks on the underwear. Better yet if there's a toy inside of you. Favorite one shall always be the dildo handle straining against your underwear, lifting the fabric away from your cunt enough to show off how big the dildo is, snug inside of you.
Male pc? He wants an entire photoshoot of them in the girl's school uniform. Leighton was bullied when he was in school, and nothing makes his stomach flutter than humiliating boys. He gets even harder if you actually enjoy it, if you're encouraged to keep wearing it all. Wants pictures of you in the soft pink striped thigh highs, short skirt just brushing the soft flesh spilling out the top. Another picture of your fingers lifting the skirt, clear outline of your cock against the simple panties. Shirt unbuttoned to reveal your nipples. The last picture must be cum stained underwear, the entire outfit ruffled with an obviously spent PC.
That much of a needy little student, needing your headmaster at this time of night?
My my, who knew the little rebel wanted people's eyes on them in such a whorish way.
Maybe panties and cock rings should be put in for all the boy's uniform.
Good girl, hiding your slutty side from everyone but your headmaster.
Send another, this time from the back.
My cock is still hard from the last picture. Don't you want to come and make your principle relax?
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robertreich · 3 years
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Why I Remain Hopeful
A bit over a month ago, I began a newsletter with the goal of starting a different kind of conversation with people who wanted to go beyond the headlines, to connect the dots between various political and economic phenomena, and to have a thoughtful, ongoing dialogue about where we're headed as a society.
I have been overwhelmed by the responses -- the enthusiasm, and the level of engagement and respect people are bringing to this community dialogue. (Some of you have even kindly said you like my daily drawings.) 
I was delighted to learn that one reader named Herbert voted for my favorite leftie vice president, Henry Wallace, in 1948. (By my math, Herbert must be 94 and is still on top of politics!) Another reader, Robin, asked a provocative question about whether oral arguments before the Supreme Court really do change minds. And Kathy reminded us all of the importance of dignity and respect at work. I could go on and on.
With all the news coming out of Washington DC, I’ve been sharing my take on the week ahead every Monday morning. Most Americans are utterly confused or misinformed about what’s at stake in the ongoing negotiations of Biden’s Build Back Better Agenda and what’s happening behind the scenes, so I’ve tried to provide clear analysis by outlining the issues, the players, and their motives (and you can bet that I took a close look at Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema — and their big money backers that seem to be calling the shots.)
Frankly, I've been disappointed with the job the mainstream media has done reporting on Biden's initiatives, so I’ve been working to fill in the gaps and give more context to the news.  For example, the media completely misinterpreted the latest jobs report. The coverage was almost universally gloomy, emphasizing “weak” growth and the number of unfilled jobs. But the real story is not bad news, it’s good news! For the first time in decades, American workers are standing up and demanding better wages and improved working conditions. In the wake of so much hardship, illness and death during the past year, I think many peoples’ priorities have shifted. I’ve called it an unofficial general strike.
And then sometimes I share personal memories, like the time I went on a date with Hillary (then) Rodham or when I went to law school with Clarence Thomas, Bill Clinton, and Hillary.
I’d like to add: Sometimes when I write pieces about corruption, our rigged system, corporate hypocrisy, or money in politics, I worry that pointing these out will make people even more cynical than they already are about American politics, resulting in a kind of fatalism or resignation that causes many to give up — and thereby cede the entirety of our democracy to the moneyed interests. 
But my hope is that when people hear about this sort of thing, they're outraged enough to become even more politically active. (One reader, however, did ask me what keeps me optimistic about the future. For me, it’s a no-brainer: my students, who are among the most diverse, intelligent, and committed I’ve ever taught.)
Many have shared that they’re feeling isolated – physically, politically, or otherwise. So my hope is that this newsletter becomes a space where we can re-ignite our optimism, gain solace from the views and experiences of others, ask the hard questions, and get beyond frustration or isolation. We are building a community committed to learning, with an ongoing conversation between you and me and among one another.
For those who’ve yet to sign up, please consider joining us.
.
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myhoneststudyblr · 4 years
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This is a post where you can find all of my advice and asks very easily, all in one place, so you don’t need to search through the tags. My ask box is always open and I will try my best to answer as fully as possible and help you out. I will update this post with posts as I do them. 
My Ask Box is always open if you want advice or support. 
Find me on Instagram as @/myhoneststudyblr
Find me on TikTok as @/myhoneststudyblr
Find me on Pinterest as @/myhoneststudyblr
I have most items that I use linked in my Amazon Storefront: [US AMAZON STOREFRONT] [UK AMAZON STOREFRONT] 
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How To Start A Studyblr 
this is one of my most commonly asked questions so here is a really long post where i give you all of my tips on how to start a studyblr and also get involved in the community
How I Edit My Studyblr Pictures 
i go through exactly how i edit my studyblr pictures using snapseed to make it bright and white but still have the colours pop!
How to Stop Procrastinating Series
This is a mini series that I have created to really explore procrastination and the strategies you can use to break the cycle
All About Procrastination
Tips - Part 1
Tips - Part 2
Tips - Part 3
Types of Procrastinators - Part 1
Types of Procrastinators - Part 2
How To Study When You Really Don’t Want To
sometimes studying can be really difficult, particularly if you have no motivation to do so. therefore in this post i give a selection of different tips to try and help you get to work even when that is the last thing you want to do
7 Strategies to Improve Concentration
Do you sometimes realise that your mind is wandering only 10 or 15 minutes after sitting down to work? Do you often read the same page repeatedly without remembering any of it? Try these strategies to monitor and improve your concentration!
7 Strategies to Manage Distractions
As a student, distractions are all around us and they can really effect our productivity! So I hope that this post will help you find out how to recognise distractions and also give you strategies to manage various different types for more effective studying!
Common Study Mistakes
No student is perfect and it is really easy to fall into bad habits. These tips will hopefully help you recognise the problem and give you solutions so that you work smarter, not harder. They will help you study efficiently and save yourself from burnout.
How to Make Your Notes Aesthetic 
One of my most requested topics and so in this post i cover everything you need to know to write pretty notes!
The Notetaking Process
one of the issues with writing notes for a lot of people is that they aren’t completely sure how to go about it, particularly when they need to take notes in lectures or fast paced classes.  this post will cover everything you need to know for before, during and after class!
7 Ways to Power Up Your Notetaking Strategies
in this post I give you all some strategies to make notetaking more efficient and helpful! these strategies are ways that you can make sure you are really making the most of notetaking by helping you stay actively engaged with content 
How to Focus in Online Classes
i know a lot of people still have online classes so i wanted to give some tips that i’ve learnt from experience on how to focus and make sure that you are getting the most from online classes. 
How To Do Uni Readings
in this post, i give advice on how to tackle lots of academic reading for university. i cover reading goals, selection, active reading and different reading techniques! also see here for the additions from @bulletnotestudies​ for med specific tips  
Active Revision Techniques 
in this post, i explain: active revision and the questions you need to ask yourself to deepen your understanding. i also outline some of the best techniques to make sure you are revising actively!
The OSCAR Revision Model
The OCSAR Model is designed to help you tackle questions that need interpretation, discussion and analysis. This tactic is designed to improve your subject understanding and ability to apply what you learn to new contexts.
How To Revise Big Subjects
this post gives you step by step tips on what to do when you are revising for subjects with lots of content to cover, from the very initial steps to the hours before the exam
7 Ways to Power Up Your Notetaking 
in this post I give you all some strategies that can help you make notetaking more efficient and helpful so that you can actually *learn* from your notes
Busting Notetaking Myths 
There are so many myths about notetaking and i hope this post will bust some of the most common misconceptions to help you have some more effective notes
Study Hacks to Improve Your Memory 
As a student, you probably have to memorise a lot of stuff. Of course, revising actively is always best but sometimes lots of memorisation is necessary for tests and exams. These study hacks will help you boost your memory for learning information before an exam!
Quick, Click and Stick Memory Strategies
We often have to memorise lots of information for school and uni and these strategies are designed to give you new ideas and ways to approach memorisation. They are divided into three different categories so you can choose how well you need to know this information and how quickly!
How To Study Languages
a post for everyone who wants to start learning a language but doesn’t know how to. these tips are some of the most important tips and strategies you need to do to develop your language skills (not related to a specific language)
Studying Flashcards Using the Leitner System
in this post, i explain how to make the best flashcards and then how you can study using those flashcards effectively using the leitner system
Why You Need to Forget About Learning Styles
If you have spent any time in the studygram community, you are bound to have heard of the ‘learning styles’ theory. However, attempting to just learn through one ‘learning style’ has been proven to be ineffective despite becoming part of a popular myth. In this post, I explain why and look at whether we can still use them!
The Diffuse Mode of Thinking
I think a lot of people know this partially but have never actually seen it explained fully so I hope that this post will help you understand why this is such an important concept for learning and studying to really create something valuable and balance out focused time
Top 10 Tips to Boost Motivation
in this post, i share 10 tips that can help you increase your motivation for studying, both some practical things and tips more to do with mindset
Unusual Study Tips
there are a million and one study tips posts so in this one i try to give some ones you might not have heard before in order to give you some new ideas to boost your studying! 
Mildliner Hex Codes
here is a guide with all the mildliner colours with their hex codes so you can use them whenever you want, including in your digital notes!
Why You Need to Think Like a 4 Year Old
4 year olds know where it’s at with learning! We could learn so much from their natural curiosity and hopefully this post will tell you how!
How I Use Google Docs To Take Notes
i got asked how i use google docs as part of my notetaking system and so in this post i explain what i like and dislike, about google docs templates and my overall notetaking system: cascading bullet points
How To Annotate
i give you all of my best tips for annotating - both in general and more specifically for literature (novels, plays and poetry) - from my own experiences and some research 
Google Search Codes
in this post, i list some of the most useful google search codes because i know that google is often the first step for people when researching. 
How To Sleep
so many students struggle with sleep which is so bad because it is so important to help boost studying. therefore, in this post, i outline all the best - and proven - tips to help you sleep better
The Complete Guide to the British Education System
this post is a detailed, in depth explanation of the the British school system, from primary school to university. i explain the differences between private and state schools and between the different UK nations.
My Experiences With GCSEs
in this post i talk about what i did to revise for the first external exams i’ve done. even though the title sounds very specific, it mostly gives all my advice on revision techniques and preparing for exams.
The Best Apps for Students
as the name suggest, in this post i give some of my favourite apps for students and the ones that i use all the time
List of Essay Questions for Foreign Languages (for Beginners)
this was answer to an ask but i think it deserves to be in this section. basically i give a bunch of questions separated into different categories that could be used to build an essay or just as writing practice for beginners in a foreign language. they are all given in english but they can be easily translated. 
My Favourite Pens (2019)
i am a huge stationery lover so in this post (which was my very first big post) i give some of my absolute favourites
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My Study Routine during Exam Season
Tips for Staying Focused (with ADHD)
Motivation/Discipline tips
Talking about My Motivation
Tips for When You Are Feeling Overworked or Anxious and How Keep Up with Your Work
Tips for When You are Having a Rough Day
Tips for Taking Studyblr Pictures
My A Levels and How Hard They Are
Tips for Starting a Studyblr and How to Get Involved in the Community: [Ask 1] [Ask 2]
How to Make Friends on Studyblr [Ask 1] [Ask 2]
Tips for Doing Languages at A Level
Books, Films and TV Shows to Practice German
Motivation for Posting
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2020 Quarantine Challenge : March - July 2020
2020 Summer Studying Challenge: July - September 2020
The Studyblr Community Challenge: Can be done at any time
Winter Studying Challenge: December - January 2020/21
The 2021 Summer Studying Challenge: July - August 2021
2021 Autumn Studying Challenge: October - November 2021
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In this section, you can find links and discount codes for various brand partnerships that I have. 
For those marked with [*], I will receive a small commission if you use my discount code. 
Use HONEST18 to Get 18% Any Purchases from Stationery Pal [*]
Use HONESTSTUDY21 to Get 25% Off Your First 3 Months for Your Perlego Subscription [paid partnership]
Use HONESTSTUDY30 to Get 30% Off The Edu Pro Plan on Genially [paid partnership]
Use HONESTSTUDY100 for 100 AI-Generated Flashcards on Revision.AI [paid partnership]
Use Sophie to Get 20% Off Ecosusi [*]
Use Sophie to Get 10% Off any Purchase from Seventeen London [*]
Use SOPHIE25 to Get 25% Off Wakeheart
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The Ultimate Studyblr Taglist
this post is a collection of tracked tags from blogs in the studyblr community! if you want to be added, please send me an ask telling me your blog name and your tag
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thebluestbluewords · 3 years
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HEIST HEIST HEIST
I saw this post today and got inspired, SO here is Descendants Could Have Been A Heist Movie, thebluestbluewords take :
(this is very much an outline and not a full fic yet, but I might yet write this someday)
Taking this whole heist movie idea very seriously, this would be (and might yet be if I have the time for it) a fic about how the first Descendants movie would have gone if it had been a heist movie, rather than a fairytale.
The main plot of the movie is no longer about learning to choose good and seeing that kids don’t have to follow in the footsteps of their parents- it’s now a high school political intrigue about stealing a wand.
(don’t worry about the larger themes there- the wand might be stolen for many self-serving reasons that go beyond 'doing what their parents say'. Maybe they’re stealing it to make a larger statement about opening the isle. Or about how treating villains as villains is wrong and they deserve trust because it makes things so much more fun for them in the long run)
(can you tell I haven’t decided on the overall tone of this AU yet lmao)
The story starts when the VKs are being told to get the wand, hand it over, it’ll be easy.
Sure, they say.
Sounds great, they say.
Give us your spellbook and magic mirror and whatever else you’ve got to give, and we absolutely won’t use them to betray you and open the isle on our own terms, they don’t say.
(this story ends before we get to that point, but the implication is there)
The kids arrive in Auradon, as in canon.
Unlike canon, they don’t immediately go for a break-and-enter approach to the museum, because if they’re going to heist this, they’re going to do it right. A good heist takes planning, and patience, and research.
What they do is wait until the weekend, and then inform the school admin that they want to get to know the culture of Auradon.
The museum seems like a great place to start, Evie says earnestly.
We didn’t have anything like it back on the Isle, adds Mal. It would be such a good learning opportunity for us.
And we could see the town. And the candy store. Say the boys.
The school admin caves, because it would be wrong to deny these kids a chance to get to know this history of goodness! They’re just teenagers, and they’ve been doing so well with their first week, and of course they can go into town, do they want a school car to drop them off?
They do not.
The museum is kind of a bust. They spend some time scoping out the security, but they’ve had a whole week to magically-google everything they can about this place, and it’s not much of a surprise that there’s a functionally unbreakable magical alarm system set up around all of the objects.
Time to reassess the plan.
(this is where the political intrigue comes in)
Ben is still a Fundamentally Decent (if slightly boring) guy in this.
Of course, he’s also the one on the line if this whole villainy exchange program goes wrong. It shouldn’t be a surprise that he would come to check up on his flagship students after they have a day out exploring the town.
Oho, Mal thinks. Here’s something they can work with.
Ben is sweet. He’s not terribly interesting, at least at first, but he seems like a guy who genuinely cares about the idea of bringing villain kids over, and can probably be manipulated to their purposes without too much effort.
So the VKs think over their potential plans to get the wand, and decide that yeah, if they can get an in with the future king of Auradon, that’s probably a pretty solid place to start.
Unfortunately, they decide to start this attempt by blatantly flirting.
Audrey is very much a political presence in this fic. She’s not evil by any means, but she is goal oriented and doesn’t necessarily love the idea of VKs coming in and altering her five year plan for herself and her boyfriend.
(I think Aurdey is an interesting character, and I wish she’d been given some better motivations in the first movie beyond ‘mean girl in a high school movie’. So in this fic, where they do still crown the incoming royalty at sixteen, they also believe in setting up children for advantageous marriages. Audrey and Ben have been pushed at each other since they were kids, and yeah, maybe there’s not a lot of actual love between them, but they’re friends and it’s way easier to just date each other and make their parents happy than refuse and risk losing the sway they get with their parents by being the good little obedient golden children who are happy to be put together if it’s what’s best for the future of the realm.)
The point of this is, the VKs send Mal in with her very best flirting, taught to her by Evie in a truly hopeless training montage, and it just-
Fails. Completely.
And now Audrey sort of hates them.
Great.
The other unfortunate piece of this heist is that the relationships between the co-conspirators, the core four, are….somewhat intense. Charged, if you will, with a certain kind of tension.
I’m not saying that Malvie hook up in their pink princess dorm room on the first night and then don’t talk about it for the rest of the story despite blatantly flirting with each other all the time, but yeah actually that might be what I’m saying.
This is the middle of the fic now, and there’s some kind of political drama that leads to the VKs finding out about the coronation.
Maybe it’s teammate bonding, because I think it’s tragically underutilized that Ben and Jay are canonically both sports bros and I want more of that sweet high school sports team drama content.
The point is, they find out about the coronation, and that the wand will be out and about during that day.
Oho, they say. An opportunity.
Building on the sports bros theme, Lonnie gets to be in this story! She’s a cool character and I have a couple of unfinished ideas for her kicking around my fic drive, so she’s going to be here too.
Lonnie finds the VKs in a somewhat compromising state of planning.
Uh, what the fuck is this, she says.
What do you THINK, says Mal, who is not known for keeping her mouth shut.
Looks like...some kind of statement that you’re going to make during the coronation, says Lonnie, who is a nice person and also didn’t hear/see all that much of the planning before she was noticed. (as I’m typing this up I am also remembering the School of Secrets shorts?? Lonnie is absolutely going in this fic as someone who spies on her new friends. It’s almost like canon. She’s the daughter of Mulan. She can sneak when she wants to)
Yes. Exactly. A peaceful political statement, says Evie, who is often a quicker thinker than the others. We are going to… sit at the front in protest. Of how we have been treated. As villains. We deserve the same respect as other students, regardless of who our parents are.
Lonnie is surprisingly on board with this, because honestly, based on some of her costume choices in d1, magical disney utopias seem to be overwhelmingly white for the most part and do not know how to support their international students very well.
(am I still mad about the awful dress she was wearing during the family day scene?? yes.)
So now they have Lonnie on board with their made-up protest plan, and they’ve got Ben and Jay being… actually bros, weirdly enough, and somehow there’s got to be high school political intrigue that I haven’t thought through yet (maybe a group who doesn’t approve of the villainy exchange program is trying to get Ben declared unfit?? Idk. Maybe it’s just different mini kingdoms angling for a good position, and it matters Very Deeply who sits where at the coronation and it’s a whole deal. That one probably works a bit better.) and it’s altogether getting Pretty Far Into Things.
Family day isn’t a big conflict in this AU, because the VKs don’t really care about the whole family gathering and party business without Mal being involved with Ben. They decide to have a chill time hanging out and plotting their heist instead. The wand is going to be taken out before the coronation, but rather than try and grab it in the middle of things, it’s got to be easier to grab it right before or after, while it’s in transport.
They have multiple people who can pick locks. People who can charm guards into letting their guard down for a bit. Ways of getting around even electronic lock systems, given some time.
They hang around the classroom a bit longer after their parent phone call, and get to talking with Fairy Godmother about how maybe, possibly, they could get a real place up at the front during the coronation. It’s a good distraction, and hearing more about the logistics of how things are going to go on the day itself is a perfect segue into asking more about the objects that are used during the coronation. It’s important to understand their new home! No other reason they’d want to know about the history and powers of her wand.
No other reason at all.
They learn that the wand is going into secure storage in Fairy Godmother’s office for the day before the ceremony. Of course, it’s going to be safe enough there. The magical wards at the museum are mostly there in case of emergency, and they’re really more about making sure none of the objects get damaged than they are about theft.
There are no more villains in Auradon, after all.
All things considered, it’s shockingly easy to break into Fairy Godmother’s office the night before the coronation. The wand is in a safe with some magic barriers around it, but Mal has her mother’s spellbook, and Evie has a magic mirror that can look up the answer to pretty much anything they ask, so it’s short work for a pair of magic users who have been practicing their spellwork since they day they left the isle to break the temporary barriers down.
There’s a regular human lock as well, and they give that one to Jay. He’s their lockpicking expert, after all.
And there it is.
Mal grabs the wand. There’s a surge of magical energy up through her hand, burning everywhere she’s touching the silvery metal, but in a way that feels like strength.
And all hell breaks loose.
#my fic#descendants fic#disney descendants#this got long very fast and I might need to write at least part of it now#core four#mal bertha#evie grimhilde#jay son of jafar#carlos de vil#i realize that I did not go very far into what these kids are actually DOING beyond the plotting and the answer is Simply Vibing#making friends and influencing people#stirring up drama just because they can#Audrey might actually need to be a major character in this#she's not necessarily the antagonist but she's not an ally either#she and Ben don't break up in this AU but she does let Ben get away with plausible deniability when it comes to flirting with other guys#partially because she doesn't really care if he's into men so long as he's going to marry her#and he does care about her#they've been friends since childhood and it's a weird political landscape when children are coming of age at sixteen#and expected to start participating in governance#also there's a whole lot of tiny kigdoms that basically have their own ruling systems in place#they just also have a larger king who keeps them together for a couple things#like kicking out villains#and having unified borders in times of outside conflict#so that the smaller kingdoms don't get wiped off the map#but that's not the POINT the POINT is the HEIST#steal the wand in a way that is meticulously planned for the whole story leading up to the moment of actual theft#a thruline that's not romance#this is loosely canon pairings as of the beginning of d1#so like#no actual ships
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cozy-the-overlord · 3 years
Text
Whole
Summary: After surviving years of torture at the hands of the Mad Titan Thanos, a broken, weary Loki returns home to find his childhood sweetheart has moved on with another man.
Word Count: 2,809
Pairing: Loki x OFC
A/N: I swear I didn't plan this. I had a nice, fluffy, lovely, sweet little fic planned out for Valentine's Day. I outlined it, I started writing it ... and then I turned around and wrote this angst fest. I feel kind of guilty about it-- I swore I'd let up on the angst for a bit after Now, Forever, and Always, but I got inspired and decided to run with it. I promise the fluffy fic is coming, although I can't say when. Also, fun fact: when I wrote out the description for this fic, I stopped and said "that sounds too depressing" and started deleting it. And my sister, reading over my shoulder, said "no, keep it. It's accurate."
Anyways, hope you all have a lovely Valentine's Day, and thank you so much for reading.
Tags: @lucywrites02 @gaitwae
If you want to be tagged, feel free to send an ask :)
Read it on Ao3!
He found her in the gardens.
Runa was sitting on a bench across from the lake, the silver skirt of her dress trickling around her legs in the breeze. She cradled an infant in her arms as she chatted with the woman besides her.
Loki watched her, hidden away behind the tree line, the illusion of another face masking his own. He had heard about the baby. They had told him back on the Sanctuary, after they had dug through his memories and ripped her from his mind.
Poor princeling. Have you not heard? Runa Birkirdottir is married and with child. She cares not for you.
Loki hadn’t known whether to believe them. They had told him many things there—his home was gone, his mother was dead, his father was seeking his life in retribution. Once, he could’ve discerned what was truth and what was falsehood as easily as he breathed, his time with the Mad Titan had turned his instincts to syrup. He had found himself crumbling with the weight of their words, even as he fought to ignore them.
The Children of Thanos had lied about many things. But in this instance, it seemed they had spoken the truth.
The baby had started to cry, shrill little squalls that Loki could hear even from where he stood. Runa rocked it gently against her shoulder, murmuring under her breath. Soon the infant stilled, and the conversation continued.
Motherhood suited her, he realized. It was a strange realization. Never had he thought the devious girl he had met sneaking through the catacombs beneath the palace would melt into such a matronly role, but she glowed with the same fire that had always burned within her as she lulled her child to sleep.
He had always been entranced by that fire. From the moment they had run into each other, deep within the hidden passageways they both knew they weren’t allowed to explore, he hadn’t been able to take his eyes off of her.
Loki had thought he had been alone down there—as far as he was aware, he had been the only one in all of Asgard who even knew of those concealed tunnels. When he turned the corner and nearly collided with a girl from his lessons, he couldn’t hold in his gasp of surprise.
Runa hadn’t even skipped a beat. “I won’t tell on you if you don’t tell on me” she hissed before scuttling down the corridor, hiking her skirt up above her knees. With a bewildered nod, Loki had found himself following her.
They had both come down there to hide, but her motive was much more impressive than his quiet desire for escape. He remembered how she had smirked as she showed him a sword with a gleaming handle, smothered in a leather sheath.
“My brother says girls aren’t strong enough to carry swords,” she whispered. “Apparently boys aren’t smart enough to guard them.”
Loki snickered despite himself. He knew of her brother—a tall, stiff thing who accompanied Thor and his friends on their various adventures. Loki couldn’t say he particularly cared for him.
“Does he know you took it?” he asked.
“Nope.” She was grinning ear to ear. “I’ll bet he’s tearing his bedroom apart looking for it like the bear he is. Father said he wouldn’t let him go to sparring practice for a month if anything happened to it.” Runa sighed, cradling the sheath like a doll. “I’m going to keep it hidden here forever—he’ll never find it.”
“Wait—I have a better idea,” Loki whispered excitedly. He had pulled this trick on Thor earlier, and it had worked like a charm. “What you should do is keep it here until he realizes he didn’t lose it, but that someone has actually taken it. Then, when he goes to tell your father it’s been stolen, put it back in his room, somewhere really obvious. He’ll look like a complete buffoon for not seeing it.”
Her eyes lit up. Even then, Loki thought there was something magical about the way she smiled.
His mother joked that the whole of Asgard braced itself the day Loki Odinson and Runa Birkirdottir became friends. Runa was already beginning to be known as headstrong and argumentative, the type of student who would interrupt a lesson to point out the instructor’s mistakes with a self-satisfied smirk, and Loki had long since been labeled as a problem by every adult who had ever interacted with him. The two of them together … it was a beautiful nightmare.
In their defense, most of the hijinks they got into were fairly benign. They stole things from their brother’s rooms and placed bets on how long it would take them to notice. They snuck into locked classrooms and switched out the textbooks with the pamphlets they found under Runa’s brother’s bed, the ones with the vulgar illustrations that she claimed would send her mother into shock if she knew they were there. One time, she got him to transform the figurines on the desk of their tedious government instructor into live cockroaches. The monotony of the classroom was shattered as the creatures scuttled every which way, students screaming, running, climbing on chairs or frantically attempting to squash them. Across the room and through the chaos, Loki caught Runa’s gaze, mirth bubbling in her shining eyes. He was quite certain he was grinning like a fool.
She never had his gift for magic, but she seemed to understand it better than some other seidr-wielders he had met. There were times as they grew where it seemed they almost shared one mind. She somehow always knew what he was struggling with and what steps to take to fix it. She knew how to help him focus when he was distracted. She could see through his illusions.
That used to frustrate him. Surely he had to be doing something wrong then, if it was so easy for her to brush them aside. He used to practice in his room for hours, honing his skills until he could create illusions realistic enough to fool his own mother, but when he’d walk by her in the hallway wearing another’s face, Runa would stop and laugh.
“I know it’s you, Loki!” she chortled, grabbing his wrist and pulling him forward. “Can’t fool me!” The image shattered at her touch.
Loki glared at her. “You are the most infuriating woman on this planet.”
“I know.” Runa grinned, hooking her arm in his as they continued on together. “That’s why you like me.”
She was as fierce as she was infuriating. Asgardian tradition barred women from practicing the art of war alongside their male counterparts, but Runa had not been deterred. When Loki first ran into her beneath the palace, she had already become quite handy with a sword—the result of hours of mimicking her brother’s fencing lessons alone in her apartment with a fire iron. She had been fascinated by Loki’s daggers.
“I wish I had something like these,” Runa mused, turning the blade in the light. After a moment’s thought, she held it to her hip. “I could hide them under my skirt, and no one would know the difference!” She began bunching up the fabric of her dress, as if to attempt such a thing at once, and Loki ripped his gaze away with burning cheeks.
She wasn’t the woman who felt Asgard’s status quo was lacking. Pressure for a more equal environment had been building throughout their youth, and by the time they had come of age Odin had succumbed to the demands and opened Einherjar training to the fairer sex. Runa had been the first to apply.
Loki remembered the first time he had seen her in her armor, her sword hanging in its ramshackle sheath at her waist, strolling up to the training grounds as if she was the instructor rather than another faceless student. He had been waiting in frustration for his brother to finish lacing up his boots so they could spar, but he lost his impatient scowl when she walked by. She exuded such … confidence in her stride, such carefree power, it was impossible to take his eyes off her. Loki hadn’t even noticed Thor standing besides him until he smacked him on the back.
“Close your mouth,” he said. “You’re drooling.”
They had their first kiss on those training grounds. It had been a summer night, the date of some grand feast Loki couldn’t quite remember. He hated feasts. They were all the same—loud and stuffy and obnoxious, the kind of noise that seeped into his bones and throttled him from within. When Runa sidled up to him with the offhand suggestion that they sneak out to the gardens, he had jumped at the idea.
They had ended up on the sparring grounds. Runa had almost immediately hitched up her skirts and challenged him to a fight. It had been somewhat facetious, and looking at her in her voluminous gown, scowling through her makeup, Loki couldn’t hold back his laughter.
She glowered. “You see something funny, Odinson?”
“Of course not,” he chuckled. Perhaps he had had a bit too much wine at the feast—he felt rather lightheaded. Still, the feeling seemed almost freeing. “I’m looking upon the fiercest warrior in all of Asgard!” he teased.
“And don’t you forget it!” Loki barely had time to react before she had tackled him to the ground with a ferocious battle cry. He fought back with a giddy giggle, wrestling for control as she tried to hold him down. It must have been quite a sight, the two of them rolling around in the dirt in their fancy dinner clothes. His mother would’ve had a fit if she could see them. In the end, Runa had him pinned, although in Loki’s defense he hadn’t truly been trying. Holding his wrists above his head, she leaned towards him until their noses were nearly touching.
“Well,” she whispered after several moments of silence had passed, the scent of wine sweet on her breath. “Are you going to kiss me or not?”
Loki let out a hoarse laugh. “Must I kiss you?” he asked. “Why can’t you kiss me?”
She rolled her eyes. “I have to do everything around here.”
“If it’s such a chore for you, my lady, then I’m not certain—” Runa planted her lips on his before he could finish. All at once, he couldn’t remember what exactly he had been saying.
When she pulled away, they were both breathless, her eyes holding a million sparkling stars and a galaxy of questions.
“Still uncertain?” she breathed. Loki pulled his wrist loose from her grasp without much effort, reaching to cup her cheek with her hand.
“Never,” he whispered against her lips.
No one was surprised when they got engaged.
“Took you long enough,” Thor muttered, not even looking up from the sword he was polishing when Loki came to tell him the news. “It was about time the two of you stopped pretending to be subtle.” Even Odin’s attempts to persuade him into a more advantageous match were half-hearted.
Loki and Runa were meant for each other, and everyone knew it.
They were meant for each other.
Loki watched her from his hiding spot, cradling the child that should’ve been his. There was a numbness in his chest that he had become quite familiar with these past few years, the empty ache that took the place of pain once his body could take no more.
Why had he come back? What had he expected to find here? Runa waiting patiently for him at the edge of the sparring grounds, hands folded and unchanged since he last saw her?
He couldn’t remember the last thing he said to her. That had to be the worst part of all, because he knew it couldn’t have been good. Runa had accompanied them to Jotunheim that fateful day. She had been the only one to take note of his distress upon their return, a distress that went beyond Thor’s banishment. Loki remembered that she had asked after him, and that in his fright he had snapped at her. His memories were far less tangible after that. Clammy hands grasping eternal frost. His father choking under the weight of his own lies. Gungnir’s burden in his fist, his mother’s words ringing in his ears.
Runa sobbing his name.
And then there was nothing, nothing but the weightless fall, the swirling abyss that ripped him apart over and over again until it seemed that there could be nothing of him left, until the sound of his own screams was broken by a slithering voice thrust into his mind …
Hear me and rejoice!
Did they tell Runa what he was, he wondered, after they had given him up for dead? Did they tell her what kind of monster she had almost irrevocably tied herself to? Perhaps she had been relieved to have been spared such a fate. Loki knew he would have been.
He had clung to her memory on the Sanctuary, clung to the mischievous girl under the palace, the sparkling goddess under the stars, the breathtaking woman who had always been there besides him even when he felt no one else was. Until they found her and tore her from his head along with everything else he held dear.
Runa’s conversation with her friend seemed to be reaching its conclusion. As the other woman made to leave, Loki’s eyes went again to the child. He knew of the father, a minor noble of the court that neither he nor Runa had ever paid much mind. They had been married shortly after Loki’s fall. He imagined it had happened in a rush, with Runa’s family scrambling to save her from his disgrace. A part of him wanted to be angry, but he couldn’t muster the strength. Who could blame them?
She was alone now, alone with her baby. Loki knew he should be leaving as well. What good did it do for him to linger? Runa had moved on with her life. It was time he did so with his.
Even so, he found himself approaching her bench, cloaked in the illusion of a palace guard. He had to talk to her. Even if it wasn’t truly him she was talking to, he had to hear her voice.
The baby was fussing again and Runa was rocking it back and forth, murmuring nonsense in a singsong voice. She didn’t look up as he approached.
Still, he bowed before he could think the better of it. “Good afternoon, my lady.”
Runa gave a nondescript nod. “Good afternoon.”
There was a silver dagger strapped to her hip. The realization brought all sorts of emotions frothing forth in his chest, but Loki swallowed them down.
The baby seemed to have calmed some. It gurgled, grabbing at its mother’s necklace. Runa only laughed as she tucked the chain beneath her dress.
Loki inhaled. “If you don’t mind me saying, my lady, you have a lovely child.”
“Thank you. I’m very proud of him.” She held the infant’s wrist up and mimed a wave. “Say hi, Loki!”
His voice caught in his throat. “Loki?” he choked. Runa nodded, eyes still on the child. It was a moment before he regained the ability to speak. “That’s a … controversial choice.”
“Oh, you don’t know the half of it,” she said, shaking her head. “I thought my mother-in-law was going to murder me in my sleep.” She smiled, turning to him. “But I knew what I wanted, and I can be quite—”
It was then she finally met his eyes. Her mouth dropped open. Recognition bloomed across her face. For a moment, Loki panicked. Had the illusion failed? How? It was the simplest form of magic—
I know it’s you, Loki. Can’t fool me!
Of course.
There were tears glistening in the corners of her eyes. Loki’s own eyes burned as he sank to his knees before her, the illusion crashing down to pieces around him. She reached out to stroke his cheek with a hesitancy that suggested she didn’t quite believe he was real. Her fingers were warm—warm and tinged with the sweet sort of familiarity he only ever felt in dreams. He melted into her touch.
Her voice cracked when she spoke. “Loki.”
Words bubbled to his lips: apologies, pleas, vows, none of which he had the strength to utter. This moment was temporary. They both had to know it. Their fates had diverged long ago. They had gone too far down their respective paths to double back. Nothing could change that now.
And yet, just for this moment, it was all right.
Just for this moment, he was whole again.
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