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[vitxt]

im going to have a stroke

[vitxt]

Wait, wait wait. What is this intriguing Publish to AO3 Google Doc? I write all my stuff in Google Drive, but I agonize through fixing the formatting when I paste it from there into AO3. Have I been missing something magical?

THIS IS ABOUT TO CHANGE YOUR LIFE.

So, on the AO3 “Cool Stuff” FAQ, there is a link to this document under “Posting and Managing Works.”

THIS IS THE BEST DOCUMENT IN ALL OF HISTORY. Basically, it has a script in it that has a “Post to AO3″ option and it will go in and fill in ALL the HTML you need - italics, bold, paragraph breaks, you name it!

It has directions in it for how to use it, but it’s real simple. You just always chose “Make a Copy” when you start writing to make a new document that you can then re-name. Change the language to American English (or whatever language you use) and type away. Then right before you post, click the button, get all the code in there, copy, paste, AND POST. 

It is literally so, so glorious and I want to tell everyone. 

(Also, the AO3 Cool FAQ page has some other cool stuff too!)

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When you are writing a story and refer to a character by a physical trait, occupation, age, or any other attribute, rather than that character’s name, you are bringing the reader’s attention to that particular attribute. That can be used quite effectively to help your reader to focus on key details with just a few words. However, if the fact that the character is “the blond,” “the magician,” “the older woman,” etc. is not relevant to that moment in the story, this will only distract the reader from the purpose of the scene. 

If your only reason for referring to a character this way is to avoid using his or her name or a pronoun too much, don’t do it. You’re fixing a problem that actually isn’t one. Just go ahead and use the name or pronoun again. It’ll be good.

[vitxt]

day five: pictures

“Found these while I was unpacking earlier,” Parker says, lifting a small box onto the table where Adlai is chopping vegetables for dinner. They raise an eyebrow at Parker, setting aside their knife as Parker opens the box. Inside are photos, old polaroids from Parker’s youth, from his time in New York, then pictures the two of them took together back in their college days. Adlai laughs slightly, leaning in close and squinting to see better -- they’ve misplaced their glasses again. Which is, by the way, making cutting vegetables a little bit of a harrowing experience.

“You were a looker back then,” Adlai says calmly, looking between Parker’s hands. “So was I, actually.” They lean back and keep chopping.

Parker laughs quietly. The pictures with the two of them, those are fine. The ones where he’s younger are a little harder to look at, and it shows on his face. Adlai furrows their brow and goes to the sink to rinse off their hands. They pluck one from New York out of Parker’s hands and set it back in the box. Then they lift Parker’s hand to their mouth and brush their lips across Parker’s knuckles.

“You’re still handsome,” they decide, and let go just as quickly as they picked it up. They return to the vegetables. “Now put those away and help with dinner.”

Parker leans forward and presses a kiss to Adlai’s cheek. “You left your glasses in the bedroom again,” he says. “You want those?”

[vitxt]

day four: graveyard/coffin (death of a loved one)

She’s crying.

It’s to be expected.

Thalia clings tight to Zog’s hand with her left hand, clings to her brother’s hand with her right. She hasn’t felt this lost in such a long time, not since she lost her parents, and she thinks this one might hurt worse. Anemone had always been there, had been a rock, an anchor, and a lighthouse all in one.

It isn’t raining like it should be, like it is in the movies, when they lower Anemone’s casket. (Nothing about this is like it should be. Good people shouldn’t die.)

It’s Zog that will pull her out of it later, pull her kicking and screaming. “People die all the time, Thalia,” they say, and their voice is chipper as it ever is. Thalia withdraws from where she lays on their chest, wetting the rough fabric of their black shirt. She beats her fist against the bed.

“I don’t want to hear it.”

“Good people die all the time. Everybody dies.”

“I don’t want to hear it!”

“It’s natural.”

“Shut up!”

She rolls onto her side, buries her face in her hands. It’s a moment before Zog speaks again, and they place their calloused hand on her shoulder.

“We’re supposed to fight harder because of that, right? You and Emmy say that.”

Still too chipper, too upbeat.

But it grounds her.

Not a rock, not an anchor, not a lighthouse, but however weak, a tether.

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day three: future

It takes them both too long to think about the future, to really think about it. Their lives have orbited each other for so long, it’s only rational that they’ll continue to do so, but neither of them think about it.

It’s to be expected of Robin, who lives by the skin of his teeth, who was always going to be an artist, who went to law school on a whim. It’s stranger for Victor. He thinks about everything, has plans and dates laid out for the most minute details. It could be that that’s why it takes him longer to come to that conclusion, that idea of a future. He hadn’t planned for that. It takes him time to adapt.

So Robin realizes first that he wants to spend his life with Victor. It still takes him a long time. They’ve been together -- functioning, cohabitating, helping each other when they feel broken -- for five years when it dawns on him like the first rays of sunlight. Victor falls asleep at the kitchen table again, working on cases, and that’s when Robin knows. He doesn’t wake Victor. He knows at this point it’s better just to let him sleep there. If he wakes him up, he’ll just want to keep working. He won’t come to bed. So Robin sits down at the table across from him and watches him for a long few minutes, the hunch of his usually stiff back, the movements of his breathing. He takes the pen from Victor’s hand and a sheet from the legal pad laying nearby and he sketches. He’s rusty, but it isn’t bad. He realizes then, as he compares real life and his drawing. He loves Victor, and of course he’s known that for years, but something about this, so intimate and simple, tugs on his heart in a way he knows he’ll never escape, even if he wanted to. He fetches Victor’s favorite blanket and wraps it around his shoulders before going to bed himself.

It takes Victor longer to realize, and of course, they’re in court. They’re on opposing sides again, and Robin has his brow furrowed, his fists clenched. He’s almost backed into a corner, and Victor can see the gears turning in his mind. He’s obvious like that, not subtle like Victor is -- like he tries to be, at any rate. Victor sees Robin there, how hard he’s working, how much he believes in his client, and his realization is like a bolt of lightning. It’s a eureka moment, he thinks later, or a punch in the gut, and it’s all he can do to hold it together until the trial is over. When they leave the courthouse, he stares at Robin, who always looks so energized after a win, and he knows he wants to see him after every victory. Even if it’s against him.

Robin will be the one who asks, in one of only a few moments in his life of meticulous planning. They will have discussed it beforehand, because Robin knows Victor hates surprises like that. There will be a perfectly timed swell of music, and Robin will be on bended knee, and of course, Victor will say yes.

They’ll make their future together.

[vitxt]

day two: love

The song reverberates in her chest. She can only hear it distantly. It makes the world around her seem rosy, like some filtered light is shining over her skin and the walls, painting everything the softest pink. She pulls the blanket further up, tucking it underneath her chin. When she looks at her phone it’s with such terrible fondness, soft eyes, hands curled around it gently like they might curl in someone else’s hand. If the song reverberates the text tone overwhelms, fills the senses with joy before she even reads the message.

[vitxt]

day one: flowers (abuse implied, violent imagery, body horror) (this is utena fanfiction, essentially)

She plants a garden in his chest.

There had been one on her skin for years, blossoms spreading out over flesh, vines as their scars, red and purple and angry and ugly. It grew easily where he placed his hands, petals blooming and withering over weeks, hidden under clothes, never seeing the sun. She’d closed her eyes to them, ignored their growth, smiled as the roots grew deeper and deeper into her body. The inside decomposed to feed the blooms until she was only a rose.

One day, a girl came into view. There were no flowers inside of her, none growing from her skin. In the garden of time she was barely a seedling, and she didn’t stay for long. But while she was there she took a petal from the rose, and soon it shed the rest; petals fell to the ground and left nothing but a stem, and from its core she fell out.

Now the rose is a girl again, and she plucks the last seed from her body and tucks it between his ribs. Roots take hold and vines spread out slowly, creeping through his ribcage. Thorns puncture his lungs. Brambles constrict his heart. It isn’t long before he’s torn apart.

She leaves gardens behind and goes to find the girl without flowers.