#I love having a long absence from tumblr and immediately saying THIS lmao but like! idk! on my mind! | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

kerryweaverlesbian · 5 months

Text

2023, cawis created...

Last year I made a post (which I cannot find) delighted to have published 81,932 words to Ao3 over 20 fics. This year I beat that with 111,227! 25 fics new last year! and that's not including poetry or things I only posted to tumblr! How wonderful!! I'm gonna do a little commentary on each of them (and I will thoughtfully put it below the cut because as I said there are 25. There is a "horny" section with some explicit quotes so just scroll past to the next heading if you don't want to see that lol.

Comedies I like to go hehehe hahaha

Stakes Aren't Just For Vampires Cas and Dean get high and silly "You're repulsive," Dean says by rote, and he isn't sure if he meant it to but it comes out cloying and sweet, like an affectionate nickname.

The first one I posted last year! It took me until March :0 I wrote this one. For maybe a slightly mean reason haha. I saw a fic where Cas did a bet for money and I was like ?? why would CAS care about getting money?? So I tried to think of a situation where he would make a bet and this one materialized!

Did you notice! I used the old reliable Rule Of Three to make the ending of Dean not sure if he said "I love you" or just thought it more potent? He thinks and then immediately says what he's thinking twice before: Cas is perfect/"You're perfect" - Dean wants to kiss him/"I want to kiss you" - and then: "I love you Cas," he thinks he says. I chose "1000 dollars" from the CBBC comedy sketch show Stupid sketch where 2 old ladies ask how much something costs and it's a normal amount and they mishear as "A thousand pounds?! You can't expect me to buy a bun for a thousand pounds. Shame on you!! I am taking my business ELSEWHERE!". The comments won't all be this long lmao (<- edit: she's wrong)

I'll Drink To That Sam and Dean both come out as bisexual at the same time late in life and they're both flabbergasted "What, do you think about how every friend we have would be in bed?" Dean tips his head to the ceiling thoughtfully and Sam wants to melt into the floor. "You're horrible. I hate you. I hate spending time with you."

The SECOND one I posted last year!! I had to cut off a joke where it's suggested that Cas may have had sex with Jesus Christ (but it's very possible he's just messing with Dean) for the sake of flow. First fic I chatted with @homoangel about so I always think of him when I think of this fic <3

I'VE CRAWLED FURTHER INTO THE VCR Cas's dream of being vored by the VCR machine is finally realised Intricate, high effort collaboration, all for the relatively unimportant end of entertaining other humans for somewhere around an hour and a half. The entire enterprise amounts to making pleasing shapes and noises for each other. Fruitless. Pointless...To spend months, years even, producing something, the only purpose of which is to waste more time…the decadence was astounding. [horny]

Speaking of fics that make me think of my friends! Wrote this for dear @castielsprostate's 1k event. Get weird get wild!! He is THE teevee angel and I love him I love him I love him for it!!!!!!

Tragedies Auogh ouch ow ouchies. Hehe <3

The Aftermath Dean and Cas have sex. It was great. Dean can't let it happen again. "He wonders - and he shouldn't, but - he wonders if Cas will sit here again, later, feeling out the absences that Dean is going to leave behind."

The THIRD one I posted this year!!! I went directly from silly silly silly to "[Dean] is a practical man, always has been. If there's something behind you that would kill you to look at it, you just don't look at it.". I think this is one of my best (<- guy who is going to say this about most of her fics sajbfhsv. I wouldn't post them if I wasn't proud of them!!)

Time/Body Problem Cas and Dean make out in the car before Cas's date in Heaven Can't Wait. It doesn't change anything. he's all sensation now, mind-body-time melted together like carved figures on a wax candle.

I wrote this and Aftermath on the same day. I was THINKING about how Dean and Cas so so so often ALMOST have it. Dean, here, is enthralled by the idea that Cas is human now and could want him (although, Cas definitely also wants him as an angel lmao but this is what Dean thinks) but also put off by it. When they kiss, he sees Cas as angelic, with a streetlamp halo, able to melt time, but when Cas is walking away from him, he's just some human guy who, crucially, can't save Dean anymore. Cas had reliably been the guy who could blast into any dangerous situation and come out on top (hot) and while that's not the only thing Dean likes about him, it WAS such a relief for scaredboy dangerlife Dean to have a guy who makes things SAFE. And now he can't. So the risk of making their relationship deeper feels even greater. Perhaps it is a selfish thought for Dean to want Cas to be able to rescue him still, but they're both in such perilous positions. He's worried for Cas too.

Oh did yous get the title by the way? It's like the mind/body problem which is, 'is the mind separate from the body or are they completely inextricable'? 'If I think of something sad and start crying while I'm hormonal, is that feeling from by body or from my mind' is how I understand it, but I'm not a philosopher haha. So time/body problem is like, all three of: Does their relationship need human senses and physical touch in order to be meaningful? Does Castiel's new experience of linear time (aka not being an angel) change how he and Dean relate to each other? And also, the more straightforward, they don't have enough time. Not to say I thought all that when the phrase came into my head, it's just bc I knew the phrase mind/body problem and mind slant rhymes with time, but that's why I liked it enough to use as a title haha.

Smoke Breaks series Dean and Cas share cigarettes at different points in their lives. Cas trails off, taking another long pull. He's going to smoke the whole thing at this rate, rude and overindulgent. Dean doesn't begrudge him, neither the cigarette nor the silence. He knows what he means.

Someone told me in the comments that reading the first one fit exactly into their actual smoke break I was like WOAH :0!!! Smoking is, unfortunately, really sexy.......I keep trying to think of a way to add another fic to make this thing end on a positive note but the theme of smoking thwarts that haha. Inherently, it is about doing something you know is unhealthy and grey and makes you feel worse, like hunting, like endverse Cas's relationship with endverse Dean, like coming back to see the lover you hurt when you can't touch them or change anything, but it's always bitter sweet because you sometimes get that burst of relief. (That's not a commentary on smokers, just on the theme of smoking as used by this series!)

The last one I think drives that home most bluntly, "No amount of talking is going to change anything." but they still hold on to each other. Also in the last one, I just wanted them to be in kind of miserable surroundings and decided on a weird, dank, alice in wonderland themed motel room, which is a) something interesting to describe when I need space between dialogue and b) the ill-advised freaky looking murals of half-humanoid Wonderland characters is a reflection of how Castiel feels - not human enough, not Other enough, twisted out of shape and c) it 'reflects' (I'm about to do a pun) their relationship has gone 'through the looking glass' (teehee) from the understood 'brothers in arms' to a strange, uncertain place where the rules have changed.

Shaking Out The Nest John gets frustrated by Dean asking to visit Sam at college. "I talk a lot of shit, but [Sam]'s always gonna be family. He's..." the only reason I'm alive, same as you, John can't quite get to come out of his mouth, so instead he repeats, "He's good."

In the demon plane episode where it's revealed that John would rave about Sam getting a full scholarship to Stanford. I think about it SO MUCH. John loved his kids but that didn't make him a suitable parent. I wanted to explore those complicated emotions and the thought patterns that might lead him to what he does. Like I don't think it's deliberately thought out scheming malice that makes him say things that make Dean feel worthless. But he only sees him as a kid when he "fails" at being an "adult" (as in, when Dean disagrees with him) and he thinks it's his job as a parent to tell Dean to knock that off. He wouldn't see his reframing of Sam leaving to "He left both of us because of his pettiness" as playing them off against each other, even though he IS, he'd see it as telling the hard truth and trusting his son to be a grown up about it. John is very emotional and parenting just via your own emotions rather than being able to step back and go 'am I being fair? is this a reasonable response to what's actually happening?' leads to situations like John blaming Dean for the Schtriga incident or saying he should 'rot in jail' for stealing peanut butter.

Horny ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Close Zoom (too close) Dean and Cas make out for the first time while watching a movie. Cas gets overexcited. [Cas] replays the experience of holding Dean; the way his eyelids had fluttered shut with relief when their mouths first connected; the lean in by increments that ended with Dean on top of him....He wants to touch him. No, he amends the oft repeated thought, he wants to touch him again.

I also wrote this inspired by going huh??? from another fic where they watch a movie together on a date on a first date and DON'T make out like. What are we doing here gang. If they are "watching a movie" and enjoy making out, then they ARE making out before the credits roll lmao. (In MY humble opinion!!!) Obviously chose The Mummy bc Dean's bisexual and I KNOW that man is showing Cas all his Formative To My Sexuality movies as a move to try and suss out what Cas's preferences are. The Lost Boys, Mr & Mrs Smith, Van Helsing, Labyrinth, Indiana Jones, Charlie's Angels, the list goes on.... Also my first installment with Cas having a bit of a pain kink (excited by the thought of a shock collar lol which I havvve been thinking about doing something more with.)

I have. by the way. a second work in progress where Cas gets wayyy more worked up than he was expecting and Dean is similar to here, slowing him down so it's not overwhelming, so look forward to it!!!!

Thunderstruck Cas has them struck by lightening while Dean sucks him off. HELL YEAH. Emanating from Castiel are intermittent bursts of white electric light, shocking across the black sky, sketching outlines of six invisible spread wings. That same light forms thin circular halos behind Cas’s head, some small, some so massive Dean can only see them in pieces. His eyes too - completely obscured by brilliant white light. He is radiant in all senses of the word.

hehehehe. If your boyfriend can make it safe to be struck by lightening like you GOTTA do it just for the experience. I decided to have Dean not be like, blown away by it (but he is blown away by seeing a bit of trueform Cas) and instead find it just kind of weird but not bad to try and be true to life. sometimes you try something and don't love it or hate it and that's okay! Normal part of having sex. Sex is just another activity with lots of things you can do with it. That, and, it can't all be high points lol. That's why Cas is a little subdued when Dean says he only has 6 wings. peaks and valleys :)

The Feeling Is Enough Service top Dean :) "Cas - Cas, please...please can I come?" Cas doesn't say anything, just smiles up at him adoringly.

This one was bc @faithdeans lamented the lack of service top Dean destiel and I raced to his aid. Literally Dean would LOVE doing this.

Red Velvet Lines The Black Box Vampire!Dean sucking Cas's blood :) Cas is the only angel human enough to have workable blood.... And even if there were anyone else, Dean wouldn't want them. His is the only blood in Dean's veins.

This one was bc @domesticatedangel lamented the lack of vampire destiel smut and I raced to her aid. Castiel the rebel angel being horny over being given an order that he chooses to follow of his own volition? It's more likely than you think! The unmissable return of Castiel's pain kink lmao, even moreso in the second chapter. His penis! in peril!!!!!

The Girl Is Dead. Long Live The Woman. (Anna/Pamela*) Anna visits Pamela to find out what she wants and they have sex :) "I'm not used to - being part of things still. Being touchable. I didn't make the most of it, as a human. I didn't do enough. I was afraid. Embarrassed of my own feeling. I think I wasted my life." "Be fair. You were a kid for most of it. You didn't know who you were."

THIS one was because @honestlyhaunted lamented the lack of Pamela/Anna smut and I RACED to their aid. You may be noticing a theme. It's quite possible that if you sigh forlornly over a lack of erotica and I see it that something will be done about it. No promises though lol.

I tried to go for a more season 4 and 5 "everyone just fully states their unique moral philosophy out loud" vibe. And a "Pamela's disability actually affects her life in a practical way" vibe that the show itself elected to ignore. I DID get distracted a few times from my goal of "they have hot sex" because I got too invested in Anna's weird life. As I said in a comment response, Anna is the butterfly that wants to squash herself back into her cocoon. She went from being very emotionally present in her body as a human to having a very flat affect as an angel again (in part because she didn't feel the need to mask her autism anymore. Anna's autistic just like Cas and Hannah and people are not saying this!!!!). And, finally. I wanted a woman to have sex with a woman using a strap on because I hadn't done that yet LOL.

*If this ship was more prominent we could be calling it Pamelanna which is very fun to say.

The Dog, the Lamb and the Butcher Dean and Crowley are having sex during their summer of love and Cas is caught watching them >:3 Then again, fairness doesn't seem to be the watchword here. Dean's looking up at him with what could be adoration, but there's a wildness to him too, a sparkling mischief that undercuts any implied promise of loyalty. "You like me, don't you Cas? You like me. Uhhn -" A groan born out of Crowley picking up the pace again, making Dean rock into the mattress, "You like me. You like me all the time, no matter what I do. You even like me now."

Nobody asked for this I have no one to blame but myself. I love and adore the Dean who cannot speak his feelings no matter how much he wants to but there is always room in my heart for an overemotional Demon!Dean who says and does whatever he wants because he's lost the ability to care about the consequences. We could have had it alllllll.

Ask for it Cas caught casturbating by Dean. What happens next WON'T surprise you. His breathing is labored, and he's making quiet sounds of effort, which probably have something to do with the fact that his fingers are pushing in and out of the wet, open pussy between his legs. The pace doesn't slow at Dean's interruption, giving Dean ample time to absorb the image of Cas’s long fingers being swallowed to the last knuckle.

I am asking here now. I am the one sighing forlornly. I don't CARE that there are already 232 accidental voyeurism destiel fics. MAKE MORE. SHOW ME MORE. SHOW ME MORE. I WANT TO READ MORE. MORE SHAMELESSLY SELF-PLEASURING CASTIEL AND/OR DEAN AND THEY DON'T HAVE A SOCIAL SCRIPT FOR THIS SITUATION SO THEY'RE JUST GOING ON INSTINCT AND THEIR INSTINCT IS TO BE CRAZY HORNY ABOUT IT. SHOW ME MORE!!!!!

Ahem. Or don't teehee. This was my most self indulgent smut (and that's really saying something!!!!). I highly recommend just fuckin going for it because it means I get to reread something all the time that is exactly suited to my tastes!! Hell yeah!!

Fluff :3 this is uwu-hat uwu've aww been uwu-ating fow :3

Pretty Wife Closeted to even himself genderqueer Dean inadvertently insists that he's Cas's wife. Neither of them are opposed! "I think I understand," Cas says, nodding to himself with his 'I got it' smile, "Yes. We are playing roles. I will 'take out the trash' while you 'sit there and look pretty'."

My kingdom for genderqueer dean. He's literally butch. Helloooo!!

Okay that's all for fluff. LOL. SORRY. I post most of my fluff directly to tumblr!!

Carefully Plotted!!! These are the big ones!!!!!!!! All three of these are "One of my best".

A Light Above Descending Cas gives Dean his Grace to calm his Mark of Cain rages. He assumes Dean doesn't remember what he tells him when he's being fed, so he allows himself to be kind. He assumes Dean would prefer that he quietly sacrifice his life for him. He assumes that he hasn't got any family left who love him. He's wrong. A rat gets what a rat gets, is the phrase that repeats in his head, although he can’t speak them over the pounding of his heart, a rat gets what a rat gets.

I have talked about this one at great length in my #cawis commentary tag so I will not reiterate here. Other than that I am sooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo so so so so proud of it and I love it so much.

The Voice In My Earpiece Thinks You're An Idiot (Jo/Bela) JoBela heist fic!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

“If anyone touches you again, I will cut off their fingers.” The fierce darkness of the promise plunges into Bela’s stomach, like a punch. Nobody has ever made her a promise like that before. Not one she believed, anyway. “Do you believe me?” “That would -” Bela clears her throat, finding her voice croaky - “That would blow our cover.” “I don’t care.” She means it. Bela remembers what Jo said when they properly introduced themselves - “I make a promise, I keep it.”. Stupid, it is, to throw away their plans over a few moments of discomfort. Ridiculous. Childish. “Do you believe me?” Jo repeats, and Bela nods, jerky, unpracticed. “Yes.” She takes a breath, then says again, “Yes.”

They get the biggest quote because theyyy mean so much to meeeee. I'll probably do another cawis commentary on this at some point bc there are too many things I did on purpose to say them all here. For now: when the woman who's learned to never trust anyone comes to trust the woman who's never felt trusted. And they banter and have hot lesbian sex. ROMANCE.

In Case of Emergency S1 Faith!Dean gets a new roommate at the hospital who's weird and intense and unexplainable things happen to him at night. I wonder who it could beeeee surely no one who's significant to Dean!!! (It's S5 Cas when he did the angel banishing sigil on his own chest) One of the machines on the other side starts going crazy with noise just as the curtain is cast back in a dramatic swish. The shadow of a man looms, sinister and ominously silent. He's watching Dean, but Dean can't do the same, his face impossible to make out. A red light flashes off kilter to his head from his monitors, and Dean gets the absurd thought that it looks like a knocked off halo.

You know it you love it it's In Case Of Emergency. I just think. They DON'T have a supernatural soulmate connection but they just get on as people. If they met at any time in each other's lives for the very first time (aside from Godstiel lol) they would end up getting along! They click! They LIKE each other!

I thought a lot about the Sam role in this fic. If you have 3 people and 2 of them want something (to hang out all the time) then the 3rd person SHOULD be getting in the way of that (closing the curtain) for a believable reason (Dean needs to rest and stop tiring himself out with this random stranger!!!). Sam comparing Dean's imminent demise to Mary's death and Dean eventually asking what he'd want Mary to say to him (with the subtext; what can I say to make it better that I'm dying) made me cry as I wrote it and every time I reread it. It's making me cry NOW lol. augh fuck im rereading i'm crying. turns out. when you write exactly what touches you emotionally. you feel touched. emotionally. to read it.

Also this fic now makes me think of darling @forestofsprites bc they've left such wonderfully kind tags every time they've reblogged it :') ily

Misc I dunno. These don't fit in the other categories lol.

6th Life's The Charm! Sarah Blake/Bela Meow!!!!! Sarah gets a mysterious commission to find a painting, and a strangely perceptive cat follows her home the same day. But those can't possibly be connected I'm sure. Smiling with her eyes closed, Sarah puts a hand on B's back and touches. Skin. She startles awake and jerks her hand away. By the embers of the fire, she can see the woman lying on top of her....The woman is watching her, smiling, and her pupils are strange. They creep a little too far into her irises. She's also the most beautiful woman Sarah has ever seen. Stunning, in both senses of the word. "No questions?" The woman asks eventually, as Sarah's silent stare ticks on. Her tone is a) British and b) faintly mocking, like she knows something Sarah doesn't.

Little turned into a kitty cat romcom!! I do fun little asides in footnote format! Middle aged yaoi ummmm but what about middle aged YURI??? Sarah references Sex in the City and is having a midlife crisis what more do you want from me!!! I did want to have a little moment of Sarah saying "sorry about the collar attempt" and Bela flirtily going "hmm, I think it'd look better on you" and Sarah spontaneously combusting but it didn't quite flow. Maybe in the horny sequel I kinda want to write...

MEOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Hello, Sun In My Face Cas realises he's in love with Dean. The natural thing to do is to tell him right away. "Don't," Dean pleads, and it's not clear whether he means don't love me or don't tell me. Either way, Cas is going to let him down. "I love you," Cas repeats, firmly, "I have loved you. I will love you. That's all."

Too angsty for the fluff section, too sweet for the tragedies. What are you. As may be clear from previous works, in MY world, Dean and Cas platonically sleep together every night and snuggle the whole time :3 even if it's a world where they're aromantic I firmly believe this would be the case. When I say platonic I am not saying it with a wink and a nudge, as a few scattered comments seem to suggest they think. But also in this one they are also romantically in love haha.

How Do You Go From Wanting To Having? When Cas stumbles back to life after escaping from the Empty, Dean can't speak the words in his heart. But he can write them. You can have it, and variations thereupon: You can have it, damn it; could have fucking taken me, asshole; what do you think is supposed to make me happy now, you arrogant, stupid son of a bitch?

I don't know if I made the most of this premise lol but I had fun building the evidence of grief into the Bunker. They pushed a heavy object in front of the door to the dungeon so they didn't have to see it, Dean filled his room with lights so he didn't have to be in the dark (a general post-canon headcanon of mine that both Dean and Cas have lamps on all night), Dean's stiff position during his nightmare. Little clues that Cas does NOT pick up on bless his heart.

This Is A Love That Lasts Forever It's about Claire giving Cas a haircut. It's about grief. It's about love. Cas remembers - though he shouldn't, ethically - sending Claire for a time out for saying the word 'damn' when she was 6, though she surely couldn't have known what it meant. Swinging her hand on the way to church on Sundays. Clapping for her awkward turn at playing Mary in the Christmas Nativity. Loving Claire had only deepened Jimmy's love of God, and this was the love that Castiel had taken advantage of. He doesn't deserve even a moment of Claire’s forgiveness.

Last one! I uploaded this on the 29th of December but it ISSSSSS absolutely 1000% one of my best. Cas and Claire's relationship in canon is so WEIRD. One doesn't typically accept grumpy cats from the guy wearing your dad's corpse as a skin suit??? Even if he's kind of nice to you?? So this is my way of figuring out how to make it make sense. She can't ditch Cas because that's where all her dad's love is stored and nobody else in her life knows her dad anymore. And they both have to try and make that work.

I had a different ending in mind for a little while - Claire completing the haircut and then going oh my god. now you don't look like my dad anymore. what have I done now I won't remember him I'm so stupid!!! put it back how it was!! and Cas is like um I can't do that though I'm low on Grace and Claire cries herself out about it and they talk about having to get used to new, unfamiliar circumstances. But I like what I went with more (obviously. because I wrote it lol).

Little headcanons that I carried across from other works: - Claire will allow Donna to be as cutesy and affectionate as she likes and Donna calls her "Claire-bear" and nobody can figure out why it's a shy little happy smile when Donna pats her cheek and beams at her and she would kill anyone else who tried it with her laser eyes. I do though, I know why. It's bc of Donna's easy open affection that genuinely isn't trying to hide anything. Claire knows Donna isn't faking it because Donna is kind to everything and everyone. She would have a harder time with Garth though even though Donna and Garth are very similar in this regard, just because. Well. The girl has been traumatized and betrayed by so many "nice" men. God how did I get onto this. Donna is the mom/aunty figure Claire has needed for a long time. I talk about this in Growing A New Half Soul - Angel's were never children I talk about in A Light Above Descending.

THE END.

If you've read this. Are you sure you didn't have anything better to do with your time avhsbv but thank you!!! Go follow all the friends I've @'d because then they might do follower events and I might write more things as a result!!!! Also go and write some dean walking in on cas masturbating fic and then send it to me.

My challenge for you is to think about women falling in love with other women. Wow, beautiful, right? And also to think of ONE thing you did that you are proud of this year. Even and in fact especially if it's something you're not "supposed" to be proud of. Did you find something new you liked. Were you kind to someone. Were you kind to yourself when you didn't have to be. All these and more are things to take pride in.

I, for one, am proud of having written 111,227 words of complete short fiction!!!!! So much so that I wrote another 4936 words talking about them here :)

#cawis commentary #fic recs #this post is actually really just for me to reflect on my own work and remember all the fun stuff I put in there #and this number also isn't including my many many many WIPs teehee #anyway. MWAH!!!!!

7 notes · View notes

turquoise-skyyyy · 3 years

Text

The Solution To Everything(Is Hair Dye)

Note: Human AU! First time posting writing on tumblr lmao, and I wanted to try a bit of a different writing style... so there’s that.

Just a little writing practice paired with Marellinh fluff n kinda angst ig :)

Word count: uhhh i went overboard

Blurb: Linh is lonely, with no one in the world left by her side, hurt, by all that she’s lost, and possibly has an ever-so-slight crush on her elusive blonde neighbor. Marella needs someone to dye her hair within the day, and Linh happens to have exactly what she needs, in more ways than one.

When Linh wakes late in the night, startled from her dozing state on the couch in her dimly lit living room to the sound of persistent knocking, she certainly doesn’t expect to find the blonde neighbor she’s been inconspicuously watching— she’s still trying to convince herself that casually watching the girl enter her house anytime she got the chance wasn’t stalking— for the past three weeks since she moved in next door to be on the other side. And when the panting girl in front of her sucks in a breath, Linh definitely doesn’t expect the words that spill from her lips—

“Can you dye my hair?”

Linh blinks with bewilderment, still trying to process that the girl is here, on her doorstep. Not to mention really, really pretty. Annoyingly so, to the point where Linh’s tired brain has to avert her eyes to focus on forcing her mouth to form words.

“What?”

The girl smiles apologetically, and suddenly Linh’s throat feels dry. The girl’s beauty is much more manageable from a distance, through subtle glances out of the corner of her eye across the hall.

“My roomates— screw them— dared me to dye my hair bright green by tomorrow. I lost a bet.” She looks away. “And you have green hair dye, so...”

Linh stares dumbly, trying to puzzle out how to respond to such a random, odd request. Though she moved into the apartment complex almost a month ago and her maybe sort of possible little crush lives just next door, her mind is still trying to register the fact that they have finally crossed paths. And the girl has come to her, no less.

“How do you know I have hair dye?” The hair dye is something she’s gotten to send to Tam. The silver in his hair is something he kept in long after she cut it off and cut off their parents. He still hangs on, and Linh wants to change that, even if they haven’t spoken in a year. She isn’t going to send it though, she knows. She always chickens out. Her brother’s silence for the past year isn’t easy to face. Still, she buys brightly-colored dyes frequently on the off chance that a lightning strike of confidence will hit her. It hasn’t happened yet, but it’s a comforting routine anyway.

The girl blushes, scratching the back of her neck bashfully and shifting from foot to foot. The movement draws Linh’s eyes to her shoes. They’re ratty sneakers, and upon closer inspection, it looks like there are messy, multi-colored words scribbled all over the sides. The weird shoes match the long, tacky rainbow socks that go up to her knees and the bright, tie-dye, too big sweater draped over her surprisingly small frame, with black leggings to top off the outfit underneath.

“Well, I saw you coming back in from the supermarket yesterday and there was a box of green hair dye poking out of the bags...” she trails off. “Oh my god. I sound like a stalker, don’t I? I swear I’m not.”

Linh can’t help the delirious, sleep-deprived giggle that escapes at the words. It’s ridiculous to her, that the girl she’s been following and observing as subtly as humanly possible because she’s just so pretty and Linh wants to know everything is the one worrying about being a creep.

The girl grins at her laughter, the question still burning in her eyes, which are an even brighter shade of blue than Linh realized up close.

She clicks her phone on, checking the time discreetly. It’s late, nearly midnight. The hair dye takes at least an hour, most likely more, to finish. She has an exam at nine the next day that she still hasn’t studied for and she hasn’t yet messaged Tam for her daily one-sided check-in that he never responds to, or even reads.

She looks back up at the girl with thin braids threaded through thick, golden locks, framing beautiful ice blue eyes set in a still blushing face, waiting for her at her doorstep with an open gaze and just maybe, an open mind.

Her stupid, fluttering heart makes a decision before her rational mind can catch up.

“Come on in.”

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

The girl, who introduces herself as Marella, asks her if she’s always so quiet.

Linh snorts, resisting the urge to point out that Marella is the one invading the house of a relative stranger in the middle of the night. Of course, there’s also the fact that she let her, and that isn’t even considering how flustered the blonde makes her. Especially in such close proximity, where she can smell the faint lavender wafting off her hair. Linh never would have pegged her for a lavender girl.

And when she leans closer to touch up the roots again, she realizes that Marella smells of something spicy. It’s good, comforting, like the home-cooked meals made with love that Linh only ever got to experience in other people’s houses because hers never truly felt like home, or the smell of wood when it was burned in a desperate attempt to keep the warmth in the winter because woolen hats and group hugs were never quite enough to warm everyone’s toes.

Linh has to remind herself to keep working her fingers through the hair.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

Linh is thankful when the summer sun finally leaks away and is replaced by autumn wind. There’s something calming about the crisp air blowing through the hair that escapes from tightly-zipped thin hoodies and the leaves bleeding red and gold. She much prefers it to the heat of the summer, or the harshness of winter, the temperatures of which she can never quite escape from completely.

When she pulls open the doors to a nearby cafe and lets the smell of warmth and caffeine wash over her face, and falls into line to order, she isn’t expecting to be behind a girl with a mane of blonde hair that’s streaked through with bright green that hurt the eyes and small braids that sway when she shifts. And Linh’s weeks of watching from a distance pay off— and the hard-to-ignore green certainly helps— because she recognizes the girl immediately.

It’s Marella, sporting the new, significantly greener look that she gained by Linh’s own hands. Linh blushes at the reminder of the night weeks ago. She’s surprised to find that it was the first time she’s seen the girl since their unintentional night together. She’s been so occupied with settling in, getting organized, figuring out independence, and attempting to reach out to her absentee brother, that she hasn’t even noticed the girl’s absence. It seems her creeper skills have gotten rusty, which should make her happy but instead causes the barest amounts of disappointment to creep up. Even from afar, Marella is lively and brightens, or at least eases, the monotonous days that all seem to bleed into each other in one eternal, never-ending passage of pain.

“Hey!” Marella’s voice jolts Linh from her thoughts. “Nice to see you here!”

“H-Hi!” Linh stutters. She thinks the girl’s impossibly blue, intent gaze will always catch her off guard.

Her gaze shifts to the green in Marella’s hair, the harsh coloring softened by the sunlight streaming in through the windows of the cafe and bouncing off the bright strands.

“Your hair looks nice.”

Marella touches a hand to her neon green-streaked look and smirks. “All thanks to you.”

Linh’s cheeks warm at the praise. By the time they reach the orders taken down, Marella has somehow convinced Linh to sit and drink with her. She takes Linh’s wrist lightly and guides her to a table, an action that makes Linh’s face heat again. She looks down at the thin fingers encircling her arm to make sure she isn’t dreaming, and is elated to find that she isn’t.

And sitting in that booth, sipping their warm coffees and exchanging even warmer smiles, Linh’s romantic fantasies from afar suddenly seem a lot closer than she ever thought possible.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

Linh isn’t sure exactly how she’s gone from watching her neighbor from a(very far) distance to being dragged into her unfamiliar apartment to be introduced to her roommates, but she can’t say she’s complaining.

As nerve-wracking as it is to be inside Marella’s house, she has to admit that the chance of pace from routine is something she would have been too scared to do herself. Had Marella not knocked on her door and practically shoved her out of her own with an evil grin on her face and into the girl’s shared one just minutes before, she might have stayed holed up in her own apartment forever, seldom leaving and only ever for basic necessities.

Patterns are nice, reliable, and most of all, consistent, something that Linh has never had before, and up until a year ago, had given up on attaining, but there’s something undeniably exciting about throwing caution to the wind and launching herself into a new situation.

However, there is the slight problem of said new situation happening to be making a good impression on her crush’s roommates, who are all staring down at her stoically in a solid line of four with their arms crossed and their gazes narrowed. It reminds Linh of the stereotypical movie tropes in which the overprotective dad interrogates the unnecessarily perfect Mary Sue’s new boyfriend when she brings him home for the first time, and she has to force herself not to laugh in the faces of the people glaring down at her. They’re all at least half a head taller than her, excluding the brunette girl, who has the most terrifying expression of them all on her face.

Three hours later, Linh is laughing tears of joy and drinking hot cocoa with whipped cream and cinnamon with the scary roommates in their warmly lit, cozy living room, who’s first impression couldn’t have been more wrong.

The scary-looking brunette girl isn’t actually one of Marella’s roommates, instead living with the other brunette, her brother, at home with their parents. Her name is Biana, she has an attachment to the color purple that everyone else seems to make fun of her for, and an affinity for randomly throwing out the others’ clothes and replacing them with ones she deems good enough to be seen out with.

Her brother, who’s name is Fitzroy— everyone teases him about this— is better known as Fitz. He is smart, put-together, and as Marella refers to him, their group’s resident “tired dad”. He’s dating Dex, the nerdy but sarcastic actual roommate of Marella.

Then there is Sophie, who was in the kitchen when Linh first came in, and Keefe, the former being Dex’s cousin and Marella’s second roommate who is constantly done with everyone’s shenanigans; Marella claims that Fitz, the actually responsible one, can never be bothered to do anything about their spontaneous endeavors most of the time. The latter, on the other hand, is the most mischievous of the bunch who Linh also knows the least about. His smiles and grins are the most abundant, but also the most weighted. Linh suspects there is a lot more to him than she’ll ever be able to fully grasp.

Linh’s surprised with how well she fits in with these people. They seem so much lighter and freer than her, a girl still tainted and chained down by the past and the experiences that came with it. They welcome her with open arms, and hours later, when dusk falls and it’s time for her to leave, the wrap her up in a hug and make her swear she’ll come back .She sinks into the hug, thinking that after knowing their light, she can’t possibly stay away.

Linh will forever owe all this new warmth in her life to Marella, who is perhaps the warmest of them all.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

Fluffy blankets are good. Warm, cozy, comfortable, the kind of little thing in life that makes most people feel fuzzy feelings of nostalgia as they think back to the times they wrapped themselves up in warm blankets on the days they were feeling overwhelmed by the world, when they sat in messily-built blanket forts with their best friends and told scary stories during the devil’s hour with only a flashlight illuminating their evil grins, or the fights with their siblings to get the bigger portion of the blanket when they were forced to share a bed.

Unless that person is Linh, in which case all chances of that were stripped away by a pressured childhood where no room felt safe when her parents were near, friends were disapproved of, and anything that could knock the Song family from the top was discarded before either of the children could protest.

But whether it’s a childhood like Linh’s, or one where everything went perfectly, the fact can generally be agreed on: fluffy blankets are a good, good thing.

But Linh doesn’t think she was ever aware just how perfect fluffy blankets can be until they came piled in the arms of a blonde girl with tiny braids and green threaded through her waves at the door.

“Movie night?” Marella asks, wiggling a laptop in her other hand. “I noticed that you don’t have a TV yet.”

Linh lets her in, eager to spend more time with just her and especially eager to share another night with just the two of them. The idea of being in a dimly lit room wrapped in blankets with their bodies pressed together and only the light of a screen illuminating their faces doesn’t hurt either.

They curl up together on the couch without a second thought, as if they’ve been doing so all their lives. Linh adores the way Marella’s head fits in the crook of her neck like the last missing piece of a puzzle, and holds her breath as the blonde reaches across her and presses play on Netflix once they’ve settled.

When the girl falls asleep on Linh’s shoulder an hour later, she cuddles closer to the warmth of the fluffy blanket and her— crush, or love, maybe, she doesn’t know— pressing to her side.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

As nice of a distraction as Marella and her strange roommates can be in the months that pass, Linh has to come crashing back down to reality at some point. And crash she does, when the banging on her door at nine o’clock at night opens to the face she knows as well as her own.

Her brother, approaching her for the first time in years, bringing nothing but news of their father’s death.

Linh knows she should be feeling something. That she should be falling to her knees and sobbing dramatically, like a protagonist in a drama novel, or maybe grabbing his hands and begging him to tell her that it isn’t true. Instead, when Tam bears the news, all she can do is match his emotionless expression. After all, what is there to feel?

And why is she in such desperate need of comfort when, truth be told, she feels no suffering?

She can’t explain her mind’s twisted way of thinking, but she does know that it’s what leads her next door, and what pushes her to throw her arms around Marella’s neck when she comes to the door decked in pajamas and those long, irritating rainbow-striped socks that she loves so much.

Linh likes to believe that it’s her petty grudge against the annoying socks that makes her cry on Marella’s shoulder that night, but hiding from the truth isn’t as easy as she likes to believe.

And when Marella wraps her in a fuzzy blanket that rains tufts of fine fluff on their heads and pulls her in close, Linh has a hard time believing fluffy blankets aren’t the answer to all the world’s problems.

Confidence has finally come to her, and she’s able to give Tam a box of hair dye before he leaves. She doesn’t know if he’ll use it, or when she’ll see him again, but the smallest spark of light in his eyes when he takes the dye and turns it over in his hand is enough hope for her.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

When Marella appears at her door in the middle of the night this time, weeks since Linh’s father died and they last saw each other, Linh is surprised that she isn’t surprised. After all, surely there’s something seriously wrong if the only thing she says when someone comes knocking at her door at exactly three minutes past midnight is, “Did you bring the hair dye?”

She pulls the blonde inside softly, takes the fuzzy blanket still draped on her couch from their movie night, and wraps it around the girl’s shivering frame. Marella starts to sob on her shoulder. Her fingers wrap around Linh’s neck and latch onto her, bringing them both down to the carpet when her knees give. Linh immediately wraps an arm around her and holds her close.

Linh doesn’t know what’s wrong, but she does know that Marella is leaning on her for support, and she does know that she will always be here, for as long as the blonde might need.

When she finally stops crying and lets Linh reach gentle fingers to wipe her cheeks, and pulls out electric blue hair dye that brings a smile to both of their faces, Linh has a hard time believing that hair dye isn’t the cure for everyone’s sorrows.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

Linh finds it funny that one can promise themselves one thing-- that they are going to try as hard as they can not to connect with others as a means of protecting themselves, for example-- but still end up breaking the promise if the right temptation crosses their path.

And her temptation? A certain blue-eyed blonde with now bright blue highlights who’s devious smirks and snarky words can snap Linh’s resolve in a second. She knows she should hate her for it, but surrounded by mischievous roommates with twinkling eyes and light smiles filled to the brim with warmth, she can’t help but snuggle closer to her weakness.

Her weakness, who is currently failing to dominate the board in a (not-so)friendly game of Christmas Monopoly. Marella informed her that it’s a holiday classic when she dragged her inside the house just an hour before, but judging by the rabid way the players are screaming at each other, Linh can’t say she agrees.

“What do you mean, the empire kind is the wrong kind?” Keefe screeches. “Duh, it’s easier!”

“For you, maybe! But it’s not the original!” Dex retorts.

Keefe jabs a finger at the board. “Then why are you still playing and why are you in second place?” He throws his hands up. “If you’re so mad about it, then stop playing and let the rest of us noncomplainers win.”

“Noncomplainers isn’t a word, Keefe,” Fitz says, idly shuffling the assortment of multi-colored money laid out in front of him. As banker, he’s the calmest and least angry of the bunch, though there’s something oddly menacing about the way he rearranges his money with careful, poised fingers.

Keefe, Dex, and Fitz are circled around the board, all nursing mugs of hot cocoa(which Linh has realized is a sort of trademark for them) in between bouts of shrieking, while Sophie left a little while ago to buy original Monopoly just in case Keefe and Dex destroy the board. Linh laughed when the exasperated blonde said it, but now she can see why it’s a legitimate concern.

Linh curls her cold feet in from her position on the long couch, and Marella automatically shifts the fluffy blanket they’re sharing to fully cover her toes again. Linh smiles up at her gratefully, and Marella offers a small smirk back. Then she goes right back to screaming. Linh debates calling Sophie and asking her to bring back ear plugs too.

“Whatever,” Biana scoffs. “You’re all sore losers.”

She is currently winning, as she has been for the entire game, and she glares down at the boys huddling around the game board from her perch in one of the armchairs.

And on it goes. At the end of the night, when Monopoly money is scattered on the floor and a smoking dinner that’s just a bit too salty is shared and hastily wrapped presents tied with glittery bows are exchanged(Marella is too impatient to wait for Christmas morning), Linh finds herself full of more love and joy than she thinks she ever has been in her entire life. There’s something oddly comforting about being with people who care for and accept her, even if it’s by default or association. Having someone who cares is a rare light in her life that most people take for granted.

Especially when there’s the smallest chance that the person who truly holds her heart returns her feelings.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

It’s the night before Christmas and Linh can’t sleep.

It’s the tossing and turning type of ‘can’t sleep’, the kind where Linh lies awake long after dark waiting for her mind and conscience to stop running around in circles around her head, the kind where her insecurities grow claws and fangs and sink them in skin-deep, where there is no light slipping through the cracks to keep them at bay.

And Linh hates that kind of ‘can’t sleep’.

It makes her antsy, on edge, and the urge to pace itches at her feet. The unfamiliar surface of the floor of Marella’s bedroom only makes matters worse, and as softly as she tries to twist under the thin covers, it doesn’t take long for the rustling on the floor to alert the blonde girl dozing off above her.

Marella slides to the floor sleepily before Linh can whisper a protest and lands next to her on the mattress with a grunt. Linh rolls over to face her, and is startled by how close their faces are. She can count the light freckles on Marella’s nose and cheeks when she’s this close. Moonlight is streaming into the room through the cracks in the shutters of the window, painting streaks of glowing white on the blonde’s face. She always looks beautiful, but Linh finds there’s something especially intimate about her in this moment. The air is suddenly buzzing with palpable tension, making her palms go slick with sweat and her mind hyper-aware of every movement. She can’t take her eyes off Marella.

Then, girl of Linh’s dreams breaks the stillness, leaning forward and pressing soft, sleepy lips to her own.

She’s asleep by the time she draws away, but Linh is shaking with adrenaline. It’s the moment she’s waited for so long she can hardly think of a time where she didn’t want the blonde.

And yet.

Linh’s the kind of girl with baggage, with the kind of ‘skeletons in the closet’ that people run away screaming from, not because it’s scary, but because it’s messy. Complicated. It bogs everyone who knows down, making every action in her presence laborious and painful with the knowledge of her past. Even her brother, who once promised to be by her side forever, wouldn’t stay.

She knows it’s irrational, but suddenly she can’t imagine how to face Marella.

She slips out of the apartment in the early hours of the morning so Marella’s blue gaze can’t stop her from running away. But despite her misgivings, the insecurities that still haven’t retracted their claws, and the voice in the back of her head whispering that she has to have imagined it, Linh can’t stop touching a finger to her lips, long after she’s left the buzzing moonlit atmosphere that allows slips of self control under the cover of night.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

It’s been weeks. Three weeks and five days, to be exact, and Linh still can’t figure out how to face her.

With every day that passes, she can feel the strong bonds they formed weakening. That’s one thing about relationships. They need an equal amount of effort. If Linh doesn’t put in enough, the object of her affection slips between her fingers before she can blink. That’s how she lost her brother, her friends, and any last semblance she might have had of “family”.

That is, until Marella.

She was persistent, even in the beginning, fighting to spend more and more time with a mildly resistant Linh, until she found it impossible to stay away. Her light is unlike any Linh has ever known, wild and fluid like an eternal flame that can’t be doused. That flame kept Linh alive for all these months, and yet here she is, ignoring it. Maybe even putting it through pain.

It takes a month, but it finally comes to her.

She realizes now that love isn’t something that affects only her, and that she isn’t the only one to win or lose in it. She isn’t the only person in love.

Love is two people, three people, ten people, a hundred people. Love is everyone who forces themselves into her life with the intent of staying no matter how dark it gets. Love is the flickers of light in the night and the bold streaks of sun in the morning. Love is the twinkling stars splattered across a purple painted sky.

Love is illumination. Love is clarity. Love is a path paved special, with different twists and turns for everyone.

Love is...

Marella.

Love is Marella.

-ˋˏ *.·:·.⟐.·:·.* ˎˊ-

Weeks of radio silence after months of talking nonstop is hard to bounce back from, and they both know this well.

But Linh comes back anyway. She comes knocking on Marella’s door exactly a month after they last talked, this time she being the one to approach at random in the middle of the night. When the door opens and she smiles apologetically, pressing a butterfly kiss to Marella’s forehead and pushing a big blanket and a bright, eye-melting color of hair dye into her arms in a silent apology, all Marella does is smile and pull her back in for a real, proper kiss.

Yeah, neon green and fluffy blankets are the solution to everything.

#i did a thing #well this was fun #kotlc #kotlc au #marella redek #linh song #marellinh #the amount of times i wrote 'marellinh' instead of marella is ridiculous #i refuse to go through and edit this again #skyyyy'swriting

47 notes · View notes