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mrsmaybank · 3 years

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Crushing - Spencer Reid x Fem!Reader

“Reid, stop giving JJ’s intern bedroom eyes. It fuckin’ weirds me out.”

A/N: I love baby genius, season one Reid so much. I wanted to give him a soulmate. Soulmate is you: shy and also a baby genius. Okay, thanks for reading. This was honestly just for me.

CW: Implied Smut, Mild Cursing, shitty writing

“Who...Who is that?” Dr. Spencer Reid, debatably the wordiest boy Derek Morgan had ever met, was suddenly at a loss for words. Maybe it was your perfectly sculpted face, your shoes, the copy of The Kreutzer Sonata held to your chest, your chest, or maybe a mix of it all. Whatever it was, at sight of you walking through the office doors, he was stripped of his ability to speak.

“That’s JJ’s new intern.” Morgan said plainly, before noticing the completely enamored look on his friend’s face. “What, pretty boy?” Reid couldn’t even be bothered to reply. He was too busy studying every detail of your frame.

“You think she’s cute or something kid?” Morgan playfully jabbed his shoulder, Spencer’s face instantly flushing an embarrassing shade of red.

“What?!” He shrieked, “I-no! That’s not..No!” That’s a lie.

“I just..I didn’t know JJ was getting an intern.” That though, was true.

“She’s supposed to be pretty impressive. Let’s go meet her.” he started in the direction of the coffee stand, where you and JJ had begun chatting. Before Spencer could protest out of his shyness, he was being dragged along.

“Morgan,” JJ smiled, “Spence,” she nodded in his direction, “This is Y/N Y/L/N. My godsent savior.” JJ beamed in your direction.

You smiled more sheepishly then you would’ve liked, muttering a “Hopefully.” that got a laugh from Morgan and a “Oh, please.” from JJ, but nothing from the man in the glasses. You did your best not to read into it.

“Derek Morgan.” the muscular agent extended his hand to shake yours, an offer you timidly but happily accepted.

The taller, lankier, younger, incredibly cute man next to him stuffed one of his hands in his pocket and shifted uncomfortably with a small wave, “I’m uh, Doctor Spencer Reid, oh! Uh, you don’t have to, uh call me Doctor. No..” He shook his head, “Just Spencer is fine.” He looked at you with wide eyes that sent butterflies berserk in your stomach and swiped his tongue in between his lips that only made them go crazier. JJ had told you all about the team. About the magnificently brilliant Dr. Spencer Reid, his 3 PhDs and eidetic memory, and all the other quirks you’d have to know in order to work with him, but had failed to mention how utterly hot he was. You felt a crush hijacking your system already. Dear god.

“It’s nice to meet you both.” Your hands gripped your book tighter as you shifted onto your tiptoes, “I’ve heard really exceptional things.”

The conversation was set to continue, but Morgan and JJ were summoned by Hotch to the closed doors of his office. Leaving the resident genius and you starting at each other with tight lip smiles.

Spencer started first, “The Kreutzer Sonata is great.” He excitedly continued, “It uh, it actually used to be a pretty bold book to carry around. After the work had been forbidden in Russia by censors, there was actually a mimeographed version that was widely circulated. Then in 1890, the United States Post Office Department prohibited the mailing of newspapers containing serialized installments of it too. Theodore Roosevelt even called Tolstoy a-”

His enthusiasm was beyond endearing. You finished for him with a soft smile, "Sexual moral pervert.”

Spencer’s lips upturned in a smile. It was rare somebody in the office could finish his sentences. And he couldn’t help but replay the crass words being said in your soft voice. He felt a crush hijacking his system already. Dear god.

“Most people don’t recognize it in the original Russian.” Spencer heard you say.

“Most people probably wouldn’t recognize it in English.” he retorted.

You laughed, “Yeah, you’re right.”

Spencer wasn’t even kidding. “I’m not joking.” He shook his head. “It’s unfortunate how many people aren’t even vaguely familiar with Tolstoy.”

“It is.” you agreed. “You went to Caltech, correct?”

He smiled, “Yes.”

“I almost did too. Decided last minute on Columbia.”

“You went to Columbia?” he asked.

“I just graduated.”

“How old are you?” he asked before quickly correcting himself, “I’m sorry! That was forward! I am not...I’m not trying to undermine your studies with your age, I promise. I’m just curious.”

“No! It’s okay!” You got out fast. “I’m 19. I graduated high school a little bit early.”

“Me too.” He smiled. “12, actually.”

Your eyes went wide, “12?”

“Yes, um, in a Las Vegas public high school.” He winced, but the self-deprecation somehow came out charming, “I uh,” His eyes narrowed, “didn’t go to a lot of parties.”

That made you wholeheartedly laugh. “Me neither! I graduated at 15, which you know is the age everybody else starts. It created a really weird dynamic because the older kids in my grade didn’t like me, but the underclassmen my age really didn’t like me.”

Instead of the laugh you were expecting, Spencer just gave you a pensive stare.

“Um..I can’t see why. I think you’re very likeable.” The compliment would’ve been strange exchanged by anybody other than Spencer to you.

“Wait till you get to know me.” You said it through a smile but so softly you were afraid he might not be able to hear it, but he did.

And that was confirmed when he flashed you the most incredible, toothy grin you’d ever seen. “I uh, I doubt there will be any change in opinion.”

“Well, um, I’m sure- I think! You’re very likeable as well Dr. Reid.” you said.

“That’s what you say now.” He retorted in the same coy tone you had earlier.

You shook your head, “You’ll find I can be insufferably stubborn.”

-----------------------------------

After two weeks, there was little Spencer could do to hide his massive crush affinity for you from the team.

In the bullpen:

You guys had locked eyes and were mouthing out exchanged of No’s and Yes’s from across the room. There was an ongoing half-serious dispute about whether or not Xanthippe slept with Plato.

Morgan glided in his wheeled chair to whisper into Spencer’s ear.

“Reid, stop giving JJ’s intern bedroom eyes. It fuckin’ weirds me out.” He said, shoving files into the cabinet below Reid’s desk.

“I’m..I’m not.. I--what? Bedr--No!” Reid whisper-shouted back.

On the jet:

“Reid?” Gideon called Spencer, “Chess?” He motioned towards the board.

“Yes, sure. Just give me a second. I’m almost done. I’m reading Infinite Jest. I don’t usually enjoy literature if it isn’t classic, even less so if it’s American. But..” Spencer smiled, “Y/N likes the author.” He continued his fast-paced reading of the third-to-last chapter of the book.

Morgan and Gideon exchanged glances.

Even in front of you:

You opened a sugar packet and began stirring.

“De Revolutionibus Orbium Coelestium is still some of the best work on heliocentric theory out there, I think. Copernicus knew what he was talking about!” You spun on your heels to see Reid’s face contorted in disagreement. You giggled, “Don’t give me that face! I’m right!”

He took a sip of his coffee as to keep himself quiet. “Listen, cosmological theory is for…”

But the pair of you were interrupted, it was Elle, standing behind you and in front of Spencer.

“New skirt?” Elle asked as you turned, back now facing Reid. She was pouring herself a cup of coffee too.

“Yes!” You excitedly nodded. “You like it?”

Elle looked up and down, but not at you. The judgmental eyes were for the man behind you. She pursed her lips, “Not just me.”

The only face redder than yours was Reid’s.

-----------------------------------

Nights spent in a bar after a case that had dragged on far too long was nothing new, but the energy tonight was especially light. Gideon had refused, but everybody else was just relaxed, even Hotch, and the team just got happier at each other's happiness. It was great, really. As Hotch and Morgan sipped on whiskey, JJ and Penelope had already downed four sugary, colorful cocktails and were in a whispered fit of giggles. Elle and Spencer settled on a tamer option of an IPA Spencer couldn’t name.

“SPENCER!” Penelope excitedly shouted, “Y/N is literally you! You’re both adorable! You’re both geniuses! You’re both young!” She drew on her rant, “And if you have a crush on her you should just tell her!” JJ’s eyes widened in embarrassment as she tried to cover Penelope’s mouth.

Morgan and Elle erupted in soft laughter while Hotch cracked an uncharacteristically amused smile.

“Spence, I swear, I didn’t say that! I just...I may have mentioned how happy you get every time she’s around! And how you guys can talk for literally hours!” JJ defended, her words slurring in silly drunkenness.

Spencer rolled his eyes. This wasn’t the first time they teased him about you, and it probably wouldn’t be the last time either.

“I don’t have a crush on her! We just….we like the same things! It gives us a lot to talk about.”

“Yeah?” Morgan said through a laugh, “And what is it that boy and girl wonder talk about so much?”

“Well, uh.. a lot of things. But I find she gets the most excited when we are discussing the theories of postmodernism, in that apparent realities are actually just social constructs and veritable realities are subject to change, and uh... we like to talk about linguistics….political philosophy….history... mathematic theory...and uh, oh! Doctor Who.”

Spencer was blushing and spoke about you like a teenage girl did their boyband crush, and the team noticed. They didn’t even need to say it out loud. Spencer gathered from the way they looked back at him.

“I heard she lent you a book too, Reid.” Hotch said before taking a sip from his glass.

“Yes! She did!” He smiled, “It was her copy of Pale Fire. She has an impressive collection of 19th century Russian literature. All in its original dialect! Some of it’s even annotated, which usually would annoy me but since it’s her thoughts and notes I sort of find it endearing.”

“Dr. Reid is endeared!” Greenaway shrieked.

“Yeah,” he nodded, pushing his glasses up a little higher on his nose, “I find her incredibly endearing.”

“Y’all that sounded like a dorky love confession.” Morgan said as the team erupted in laughter and Reid’s head fell in a smile. There was no point in denying it anymore: He really, really liked you.

--------------------------------------

Within two months, you and Spencer had finally put your shyness aside, and spent a very lovely evening at watching an orchestra at the Smithsonian Music, and sharing noodles at your favorite Thai restaurant. And then you guys spent some time on your couch. And then in your bed. And then in the shower. And then in the kitchen. You were both very sexually frustrated.

For the following two months, as soon as you both stepped out of the office, it was very, very hard to keep your hands off each other. Could either of you help it though? Teenage geniuses don’t experience parties, or football games, or clumsy sex. The time was perfect to make up for it.

And you guys did. The sex part at least. “Football involves a lot of dirt. And germs. And sweat.”

“Oh my god!” you shrieked. His hands were in a place they found themselves more and more often: Your pants.

“Does it feel good?” he asked, continuing his pattern of small circles on that particular bundle of nerves.

“It feels great.” You nodded.

“I uh, I’ve been researching the female anatomy.”

You closed your eyes and nodded your head, but trying to focus on your boyfriends newfound intellect. “It’s fascinating, isn’t it?”

He watched your undoing with boyish adoration and curiosity before swallowing, “Very.”

“Oh fuck!” Your legs began to shake, “Spencee...I’m gonn--”

--------------------------------------------

You and Spencer just understood each other.

#drspencerreid #dr spencer reid #dr reid #criminalminds #reid criminal minds #spencer reid x you #spencer reid x reader #Spencerreid #spencer reid reader insert #spencer x y/n #reid x reader #spencer reid #professor reid x reader #professor reid #season1 reid

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notquiteaghost · 3 years

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alex keeps having wilde not be fine but not giving zolf any time to fix it and i, for one, am sick of it. this is a conversation they have immediately post-211 and i will only accept it not being canon if in 212 they have it instead. it’s 970 words and it’s also on AO3

"Right," Zolf says. "Okay, legalese with the lich, that's not gonna be quick. Can I just–" He glances round, and yep, they're still in a featureless crypt with no other exits. There's shit they need to do, and they can't afford to stop, but nothing is currently trying to kill them (probably, shit he's paranoid about gases now and all), and he can't get the look on Wilde's face out his head. "Look, sorry, but can you all fuck off? I wanna talk to Oscar."

Wilde, naturally, immediately starts up with, "Oh no, I'm fine, Zolf, there's no need–"

Zolf ignores him. Raises an eyebrow at Azu, who says, understanding, sympathetic, "Yes, yes, of course," and Hamid adds, "We can ask about the Cult of Hades, in the meantime," as they all awkwardly shuffle out. It's not a very big crypt.

Just before he pulls the door shut again, Hamid says, "Oh!" And jogs back over to Zolf, holds his hands out. It takes a moment, for Zolf to remember about Babbage. He hands the backpack over, and Hamid nods at him, and leaves with it.

Wilde's stopped protesting, at least, when Zolf turns to look at him. He sighs, instead. "Really, Zolf, it's fine."

"Sure," Zolf agrees. "Haven't had a chance to chat, though, have we? Since– Y'know. And I think you're getting all in your head about it."

"Well," Wilde says, with that horrid kind of cheer he's so good at, "Being fatally stabbed twice in such a short period of time does feel rather like someone's trying to tell me something–"

"Yeah. To wear some damn armour."

Wilde's face just– shutters. He's all layers, Zolf's learnt, a mask over a mask over a mask. And this one isn't even a good one, which means he's definitely more fucked up about this than he wants to admit. Which is fair. If he wasn't fucked up about dying twice in a fortnight, that would be worrying.

Zolf takes a breath, shoves away the memory of anything sticking out Wilde's chest, and says, "Look," as he takes a step closer. "You keep going into dangerous situations with only fancy clothes for protection, you're gonna get injured. You're gonna get injured badly. That's not, I dunno, a sign from the Gods that you're s'posed to be dead, okay, that's basic probability. And," he swallows, glances away, "No matter how many times they try it, I am always gonna bring you back. Kicking and screaming, if I hafta."

Wilde says, "Right." He sounds like Zolf just headbutted him in the gut.

Looks like it, too. Fuck's sake, why is Zolf so bad at this.

"I don't give a shit what the universe has planned," Zolf says. Swears. He reaches for Wilde's hands, twists their fingers together. "I can't do this without you, and no one can fucking make me. You're not– This isn't about whether or not you deserve to be here, okay? 'Cuz I don't care. I'm selfish and I need you. And, y'know, pretty sure I've done a lot worse than you, so if it's you that's meant to be dead it's definitely not about deserving it."

"You are so shit at comforting people," Wilde says, but it's fond.

"Working, ain't it?"

"Yes, I am just as emotionally challenged, we're all aware–"

"Shut up, I'm not done." Wilde huffs, a shadow of a laugh, and gods, Zolf would do absolutely anything to hear that sound. "You don't get to beat yourself up about this, you hear? I'm forbidding it. It's irrelevant. You deserve to be alive, 'cuz everyone does, innately, and there's plenty of people who're genuinely evil who've never been stabbed once. I'm not having fucking Barret make it through this but not you. Okay?"

Wilde huffs, again, and drops to his knees so he can press their foreheads together. It means Zolf's taller than him, too, which is always nice.

"Okay," he says. "I've conned the world's most stubborn cleric into loving me, so now I'm functionally immortal. Finally, all those months of reading your terrible novels and pretending to like your cooking have paid off."

"Nope, changed my mind. Next time I'll let you go."

"No, you won't."

"No, shithead, I won't," Zolf says, because that's how you get anything to sink in with Wilde; you have to catch him off guard. "You're gonna live to a hundred, at least. Two hundred, even. Has a human done that yet? You can be the first."

Wilde huffs another skeleton's laugh. "Not satisfied with cheating Death itself, then? Going to square up with modern medicine as well?"

"I'll fight anyone and anything that tries to take you from me," Zolf swears. Wilde swears, too, dropping his face into Zolf's shoulder and letting out a shuddering breath. Zolf wraps an arm round him, other hand still tangled with Wilde's. "Fuck, I wish this was someone else's job."

Wilde doesn't say anything, not even to make a shitty self-deprecating joke, so Zolf lets the silence sit, too. Pulls Wilde close. Listens to him breathe.

He's okay. He's here, and he's okay, and that's enough. Zolf can keep telling him that. Will keep telling him that, as many times as he needs to. Embroider it on a shirt, maybe.

Eventually, Wilde moves back, runs a hand through his hair, scrubs at his face. Says, "Thank you."

"Yeah," Zolf says. He squeezes Wilde's hand, swallows. Shoves all his feelings back in their box. "Right, then. Lich negotiations."

"You know, there's a lot I could say about our lives of late," Wilde says, as they walk out the crypt, as he pulls his own mask back on in a way probably only noticeable to Zolf, "But I'll give the universe this: They're definitely not boring."

And they get on with the job.

#rusty quill gaming #rqg #zoscar #fic tag #let! them! talk!!!

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painted-crow · 3 years

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Did you model Bookkeeper Badger or Courtier Badger most of the time ?

In regards to the past tense you're using--it's the Badger primary model I dropped. Which, I've held on to some of its ideals, but they're just another part of my Bird primary system, and that feels very different.

My Badger secondary model is still good and kicking though!

I was just gonna write about how I use it (and how I try not to use it) to answer this ask, but then it turned into

Secondary Toast Revolving Door, Part 3

(Badger model edition)

and I'm just gonna roll with it.

I did have an unhealthy way I used my Badger secondary model that was... either extreme Bookkeeper, or it's actually been unhealthy Lion secondary all along and I've been mis-Sorting it and this is why the idea of using Lion secondary wigs me out a little. (It's fine when other people use it, but I find the prospect of using it myself at least slightly terrifying.)

Part of my problem is that I'm way too used to situations where pushing through despite feeling like I was about to collapse was the only option. It's probably got to do with... well, some childhood stuff I won't go into too deeply. My mom was in the hospital a lot. The school situation I was in just made everything worse. It's complicated.

Anyway, if I'm under stress, I dissociate out exhaustion, hunger, emotional distress, and even physical pain for hours or days at a time, and I can buckle down and hyperfocus on work (in what would be panic mode if I were more aware of my emotions during these periods). It sounds useful and badass but it really isn't.

Downside #1 is that I will eventually feel the effects of that panic, and any other needs I've been ignoring--it might be at a more convenient time, but those effects definitely won't be lessened.

Downside #2 is traumatic burnout. Do not try this at home. (I always hesitate to use the word "trauma" for my experiences, but the physical reaction I get to writing about some of this stuff says otherwise.)

Downside #3 is that I don't get to choose when my brain does or doesn't do this. It just happens when I'm under stress. I can't count how many times I've had an actual migraine and not noticed why I was so irritable for hours, when I could have taken something.

Downside #4 is that it works. This is possibly the worst one, because the phrase "do your best" takes on a cold sweat-inducing new meaning. My little "ability" has led to some absolutely buckwild performances under deadline, none of which I want to repeat, and I'm not sure I like knowing how much I can get done if I prioritize not failing over not burning out.

(On that note, if you thought my Badger primary model was Exploded last year, you should've seen it 3-4 years ago. I remember when this Kitten Witch post first went up, because I was like "...what? wait--")

In short, this is a very shitty superpower and I would like to re-roll.

I'm undecided whether this is a Badger flavored emergency mode, or the only Lion secondary I can recall using. I lean towards Badger because I have this pathological inability to half-ass anything, and it does not go away during emergencies. But it's possible that it felt Badger flavored because my unhealthy Badger primary model was egging it on with its self deprecating (...self dehumanizing?) exploded Badger crap.

So, wanna know how I got into these nasty deadline crunch situations where emergency hardcore Badger mode became "necessary"?

(I feel like I should reiterate my trigger warning on this series about now: we're talking about gifted kid burnout stuff and I'm about to sarcastically skewer some of my old thought processes here.)

Adequately warned? Great! Here are the step by step instructions to a real shitty time!

Take on a bunch of work while you're feeling okay, based on how much you think everyone else is doing.

Depression gets inevitably triggered somehow, by life stress or overwork or winter or whatever. Burn Bird secondary because that's been a stress response at least since high school.

Have absolutely no clue about the fact that your "limits" vary drastically and your productivity has huge peaks and valleys due to various forms of undiagnosed neurodivergence, which school/college is not designed to accommodate. So, rather than taking a rest and sorting out the stressful thing, get mad at yourself for "being lazy"!

Continue trying to work. Struggle wildly with executive dysfunction. Panic. Get frustrated and angry at yourself. It's cool, I'm sure this will make your Bird secondary start working again soon. (just kidding lol it's making it worse)

When you've aggravated your depression enough, shut down for a few months! Your work will still be there. Piling up. Taunting you. you're falling so far behind what are you doing everyone else can keep up except you

Get sick for a week. Feel relieved that at least now you have a legitimate excuse to not be working. This benefit may feel like it outweighs the symptoms of the flu or sinus infection or whatever you have.

Go into emergency hardcore mode, complete a ridiculous workload in the week before deadline, turn it all in, be almost too exhausted to feel guilty about doing everything last minute.

me: "I don't have ADHD! My focus is usually fine."

also me: this. ^ what is this.

So, I avoid that now. If I notice when Step 3 is happening and I can switch tasks--maybe clean my living space, do some laundry, get some good food, take care of tasks unrelated to whatever project it is that I'm too freaked out to work on--then Bird will be back in a week or two, assuming nothing else huge and stressful happens, and I'll have another productivity peak that'll let me catch up.

This is not the conventional wisdom. Conventional wisdom says you must never break momentum, you must schedule your work out 6 weeks ahead so you always know if you're on track, you must...!

Totally counterproductive for me. My brain is weird and did not come with a manual.

These days, on top of my Bird secondary, I model a mixture of Bookkeeper Badger and mirroring (a Courtier skill), for a number of purposes. I find work satisfying, I'm not afraid of long projects (that I choose), and that shifting, empathetic mirroring response is my default social mode.

But Badger's most important job is to gently take over when Bird is stressed out, and give it space to recover while methodically fixing anything about my situation that's not helping. It's good for that.

I prefer it to the alternative, anyway.

#sortinghatchats #secondary toast revolving door #hufflepuff secondary model #burned ravenclaw secondary #shc models #asks #paint speaks

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subtlereferencetomyinterests · 4 years

Text

Sharp Spikes and Glamour - Fusion AU

Ao3, MasterPost, More of This AU

Relationships: Romantic Dukeceit, mentioned Romantic Royality and Analogical.

Warnings: Swearing, mentions of sex/sexual innuendo, violence against inanimate objects, mentions of injury- for perspective this is Remus-centric, and he’s just like that. Also mild arguing, some self-deprecating thoughts. The Dukeceit fusion uses it/its pronouns (as do I, so no clowning).

Word Count: 3,992

Remus let himself fall backwards onto the hardwood floor, huffing. A satisfying thump echoed through the empty room, but the dull pain at the base of his skull stopped him from slamming his head down again. If Remus kept tripping over himself when his body was in top condition, he probably wouldn’t do any better with a cracked open skull and shattered vertebrae all the way down his back (however fun that might be).

Schmaltzy music lingered in the room still, and with a snap Remus willed it into silence. Now, Remus hated silence, but in that moment it felt like a blessed mercy in the wake of fucking classical fucking ‘music’. He laid flat on the floor, enjoying the quiet and wallowing in his aching muscles. As disgusted as he was by the orchestral garbage, he liked the dancing that went along with it even less- maybe for the simple fact that he was so very bad at it.

So, the big question was why he was doing this to himself. Why had he gone through the trouble of making a dance studio in his side of the Mindpalace? Why the hell was he using it to learn waltzes, rather than his usual style of fast-paced and very suggestive movement?

The answer was simple enough: Janus.

Now, just a month ago, Remus could very confidently say that his and Janus’ relationship was perfect. And it still was, really, but back then he’d been safe in the knowledge that they were also as affectionate and intimate as they could be! Which is to say, very very intimate. Wink, wink, if you catch his meaning. That was the way he liked it; Remus didn’t want there to be a step he hadn’t taken in any situation, but especially a relationship like that!

But then, that month or so prior, a very weird and crazy and impossible and fucking awesome thing happened right in the middle of the goddamn living room, proving Remus unfortunately and/or fortunately wrong about his boyfriend. His brother and his best friend had fused. Like, actually, Roman and Patton had pulled some cartoon bullshit that none of them had ever known they could even do before!

Obviously Remus was floored; everything there was to know about his (and other people’s) physical forms, he knew it and he’d pushed it to the limit before! Except for now, with something he had somehow never found out about that his brother got to first. That was the kicker, that was what made it both shocking and anger-inducing.

There was no question. Remus was going to learn to do that.

So, here he was, trying to learn, but he was not good at like, actually dancing. Which would’ve been fine, if he was dating anyone other than Janus- the most elegant, classy, coordinated side of them all! And Remus knew, somewhere in his sick-and-twisted guts, that Janus deserved to have something special, something that wasn’t more fitting in a sleazy nightclub. He wanted to give him that, no matter how hard it was.

Which was much harder than he’d originally assumed, actually. Before Remus knew it, Virgil and Logan had also managed to form a fusion before he had even gotten the hang of a waltz. And those two hadn’t even danced to get it! Wasn’t that just cementing his confidence?

Remus shook his thoughts away with a frustrated growl. He sat up on his knees braced against the ground, scraping his talons down the shiny wooden floor of his horrible, horrible dance studio. He was gonna get this right, because if there was one thing he wasn’t, it was a fucking quitter.

Swinging up to his feet, Remus pushed his hair back from his face and fixed it into a tangled mass of ponytail. He brought his arms down, and then back up again, shaking them wildly. When he deemed that job done, he kicked his legs out in much the same way. Seeing as he was the embodiment of energy, he never managed to get rid of all of it, but the wiggling definitely helped his focus. With a huff of finality, Remus settled, stared at nothing, and snapped his fingers. Shitty ballroom music filled the room again, and it took all of Remus’ effort to count his steps instead of willfully vomiting onto the floor.

But he did restrain himself, he kept his focus for once and propped his arms up on the empty air. Under his hold, the very absence of material wavered, shaping itself into something like a person. And so he laid his hands on that, in relatively respectful places, and began to lead the mannequin around the room in choppy movements. It matched him beat for beat, but it could not offer its own, organic responses like an actual dancing partner might- and that was by design.

It was boring, that was the real problem. How was he supposed to get invested if it was the same four movements, over and over! Each new attempt, he got maybe five minutes in before the fatigue hit, the need to do anything more interesting. What was just a couple of twirls, maybe a dip? Janus would still probably appreciate those additions anyway!

None of the flair attempts went well. He stumbled, hit the wall, tripped, all of it. By the end of twenty minutes Remus was waving the mannequin out of existence, feeling frustration pricking the corners of his eyes. What was he thinking, he wasn’t Roman, this was so stupid!

Remus straightened up (ha, ha) and spun around. He made his way to the corner of the room, fell into a crouch, and sunk his claws into the edges of the glossy wooden floor. Splinters bit his fingers, but he barely noticed them as he began to peel back the panels. They came free in a series of crunches and snaps, spitting shards of wood out and revealing the void beneath the ground. Remus held the chunks of flooring, feeling sharp edges digging into his palms, and he shredded them to pieces. When they weren’t much bigger than pencils, he let them fall into the newly made hole. Once done, Remus set his hands on the new edge, and he did it again.

But, like almost everything he did, the destruction was loud. Shrieking, splitting, crunching kinds of loud. The kind of loud that didn’t go unnoticed.

And the mindscape was as infinitely big as it was claustrophobically small.

Within minutes there was a sharp knock against the doorframe. Remus jolted upright, spitting out the hunks of plank that had one way or another found their way to his mouth. As he turned, he grinned manically, tucking his hands behind his back.

Janus lifted a brow at him from across the room. The side stood with one hand propped on his hip, the other raised above his head so that he leaned on the doorway. His mouth was a thin, quietly concerned line, his eyes flicking around in tiny movements as he assessed the situation.

“This is quite unlike the other rooms you've created,” He observed, clicking the back of his heel on the floor. Remus turned his gaze to the wall just above Janus’ shoulder, discreetly picking the splinters from his hands. In all honesty, this situation wasn’t unexpected- Janus was known to wander around in Remus’ new creations, whenever he wanted to catch his attention- but Remus had been under the impression that when that happened, he wouldn’t be right in the middle of tearing it all down.

Which had clearly been a stupid assumption from the start, because he was. Himself.

“Hey, J.D.!” he chirped, scraping the last of the rubble from his fingertips, “Thought I might try out something new!”

Janus’ eyebrows arched up, a bemused smirk gracing his lips.

“An empty room?”

“Yeah, but obviously it got boring, so-” he gestured at the corner he’d torn into non-existence. “Time to get rid of it! It was probably a dumb idea, anyway.”

Even to his own ears, his cheery tone sounded forced. He threw in a gargled giggle to make up for it, but that came out even worse. Janus narrowed his eyes in that knowing way of his, then, and Remus knew he’d have to explain himself properly.

“Darling,” Janus slipped into the room with long strides, “What is so wrong that you’re using half-truths to talk to me?”

He wasn’t embarrassed that he’d been learning to dance- he was 99% sure he wasn’t able to feel shame (which was very sexy of him, in his opinion)- but he was upset that he was so disappointed at it.

He didn’t need anyone’s approval… but he certainly wanted Janus’.

“It doesn’t really matter,” Remus’ statement rang with honesty. He met Deceit in the middle of the room, his smile challenging, only to be met with calm and patience.

“I don’t care if it doesn’t ‘really’ matter. I just want to know why my partner was angrily devouring housing material in a brand-new corner of the mindscape.”

“It’s not that weird, I’ve eaten a lot worse than plywood!”

Janus huffed, crossing his arms over his chest.

“You’re clearly frustrated.”

“I’m frustrated all the time,” Remus argued, “There are so many stupid things to be frustrated about, you know that. It’s a very easy feeling to have, you get it without even noticing! Like, if it were an injury, it’d be a papercut; everyone has a papercut somewhere on their body most of the time.”

“What?”

“It’s an analogy, I think!”

Janus gave a long-suffering sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose. Remus felt a small bit of pride at how annoyed he looked, despite the uncomfortable situation he’d gotten himself into.

“Whatever, if you’re really doing so well I suppose I should spare my worry and save us both the headache.”

“Exactly! See, just because I’m feeling a bit manic-panic doesn’t mean it has anything to do with you, scaleface.”

And that was his mistake.

Janus stopped turning away as soon as he’d started, his mouth curving into a deep frown. He crossed his arms over his chest, and he almost seemed to be offended.

“You just lied.”

Remus, internally, screamed. He hadn’t even fuckin’ lied on purpose! That couldn’t be fair!

“So it is about me, then,” Janus went on slowly. “Are you angry with me?”

Remus blinked, falling untense oh-so quickly at what he now saw was Janus’ nervous face.

“Wha- no! That’s not what this is about!”

Janus only narrowed his eyes suspiciously. Remus grabbed the snake’s hands with his own scarred ones, pulling him near. He felt his hesitation leave as soon as it had arrived, replaced by his usual affinity for just spitting out whatever he had to say. It wouldn’t turn out any worse than having to see his baby hurt or worried.

“It was supposed to be a surprise. For you.”

The suspicion melted off of Janus' face in increments, leaving him with a confused little half-smile.

“For me?” He echoed, “What was it?’

Remus huffed, snapping his fingers. The lyricless music returned to the desecrated room, and he gestured around with both hands.

“It didn’t really work out the way I planned, so,” he rolled his eyes and huffed. “I was teaching myself to dance all proper.”

Remus could basically see Janus’ thinking, and for some reason it was grating him.

“You want to dance with me? Dear, you know you don’t need to give me traditional romantic gestures like that-”

“It was to fuse!” Remus blurted, “I wanted to fuse with you. Like, properly.”

Janus made a soft sound of realization, his eyes going wide. He was silent for a long moment, holding too-tight onto Remus’ hands. But he had yet to let go, which the creative trait counted as a good sign.

“Oh, Love,” he whispered at last, “You’re really serious.”

Remus would’ve winced, if not for the fact that Janus' face was split in a smile, open and sincere in a way that showed he'd really been caught off-guard. His face was warm, and he looked pleased for all the world. He wasn’t judgmental, then, only surprised.

“Um… yes? I wanna fuse with you?”

Janus shook his head musingly, laughing almost exasperatedly.

“No, no, I understood that bit, but-” he waved a hand at the barren room, smirk growing wider, “Ballroom dancing? You? Really?”

He had a point. The walls were a pristine white, shot through with neat marbled patterns. There were mirrors stretching the surface of either wall, reflecting onto each other with clean clarity. There was no clutter, no objects, nothing but the little box itself. And Remus felt no more frustration as he burst out laughing. He tipped his head back and cackled, tugging Janus’ arms until they were pressed together.

“I don’t know why I thought this would work!” He cackled.

“I never know why you think anything that you do,” Janus’s nose wrinkled as his own resolve cracked, leaving shrill giggling behind. Remus snorted, holding onto his partner just to keep himself upright.

“Sorry, Jay,” he almost wheezed, “There’s no way we’re gonna be able to fuse like this, I’m horrible at it.”

Janus’ giggles tapered to a stop sharply, turning to trills of confusion before cutting off completely. Remus met his eyes, and was surprised to find renewed concern.

“Now, that’s entirely what I meant by that remark, you aren’t misinterpreting at all.”

Remus squinted at him, at the sudden spout of backwards talk.

“...What?”

Janus scoffed.

“Of course I don’t want to fuse with you, it’s not like we’re in a committed relationship, or anything.”

Janus got very lie-ey when he was heated; the ferocity had Remus taken aback.

“Soooo, you… do want to try it with me?”

Janus glared in a very duh-obviously--you-idiot kind of way. Remus might have been annoyed with his little tsundere, but the snake’s grumpy face edged just too much on the endearing side for it to spark any of that. It wasn’t too much of a shocking revelation, he supposed, but when he admitted to failing before it felt pretty final, in his opinion.

“Uh, Okay! You have to lead, though, and I’m at least 60% sure it won’t work, because like I said I have no idea what I’m doing.”

Janus hummed in satisfaction, his grimace curving up into a smirk.

“To start, we’ll need a change of scenery.”

Remus nodded agreeably. They couldn’t risk falling into the nothingness pit he’d made, after all- those were very difficult to get back out of and not a whole lot of fun in general. So when Janus held his hand out invitingly, Remus took it, letting the trait transport them to wherever he had in mind.

But that place was no better than the destroyed dance studio at all. The room they ended up in was also very much destroyed, and cluttered, and generally very slimy.

Remus’ room. From the corner of his eye, he saw Janus’ lips twitch in amusement.

“Dear, let me explain,” he tilted his head back just so, making eye-contact with his boyfriend. “We’re going to fuse. It could be in here, for all I care, or somewhere bigger for our needs, but whatever it is most certainly will be a dancefloor. Because we’re not doing this your way.”

Remus made a startled chuckling noise, almost convincing himself that the doublespeak was somehow triplespeak- which just looped back around to ‘speak’, come to think of it.

“You- that’s a really bad idea.”

Something teasing glinted in Janus’ eyes.

“Aren’t bad ideas your specialty?”

“Yes,” Remus ground his teeth together, “But not yours!”

“Your point?”

Remus breathed exhaled, loud and puffing, as he tried to explain. He wasn’t going to deny the excitement this was all bringing him, but it was hysterical, an almost negative side to enthusiasm. There were so many things that felt needed to be said. To be warned, before Janus made a horribly bad decision for himself.

“My point,” he managed, words heavy in his throat, “Is I don’t think about things, so one of us has to. I want to do this the right way, Jan, this is like the one thing I don’t want to fuck up.”

Janus narrowed his eyes, the corners of his lips twitching down.

“You think it won’t work this way.”

“You like doing things so fancy and dramatically!”

“You called it the ‘right way’,” it was hardly above a whisper, he looked surprised at his own words as he said them. Remus could only scoff.

“Well, yeah! If we do it how I would, then you probably won’t wanna be part of the creature that comes out of that!”

Janus’ pupils went from circles to slivers in no time at all, pain washing over his expression. Remus held his hands tighter and leaned in, ready to apologize for whatever he’d said to hurt him, but he couldn’t get a word in.

“It’s going to end up more of you than me. That’s what you’re worried about.”

It wasn’t a question. Remus felt some of his usually infinite energy slip away from him. It left a hole behind.

“I know you, baby,” he was tired, maybe desperate, “You won’t want that.”

“Why shouldn’t I want it?” Janus snapped suddenly, “I’ve already made it clear that I want you. Clearly I must find some of your qualities desirable, why else would I spend nearly all my time with you, around you, thinking of you?”

There was a fragile kind of quietness, broken only by Janus’ hitching breath. Remus found himself blinking and blinking, his eyes stinging like someone was pushing needles into his tear ducts, agonizingly slow. He pulled Janus to his chest, propping his chin on the side’s hat and shivering.

And Remus, to his own shock, had no words. He didn’t have much on his mind at all, knowing only that he felt so much in the moment, so much and so powerful and all serving to remind him why he loved Janus as much as he did.

He wanted to ask more questions, to make sure that Janus was as sure as he said he was, but he couldn’t. His snake was stubborn, would stick to his words no matter how much Remus badgered him, and he wouldn’t have had it any other way. He pressed a kiss to the top of Janus head, closed his eyes, and let the emotions wash over him.

He breathed in, out, and suddenly the second wave hit him in the chest, his eyes forced open.

Or…

It. Its eyes were forced open. Yes, that sounded right.

It stood in the middle of a room- a familiar room, but certainly not Remus’. It was much bigger, the ceiling higher to accommodate the inhabitants height, and much more organized. There was still plenty of clutter, plenty of skulls and bones and preserved creatures, but all in neat little rows on pretty rustic shelves. The place had the distinct vibe of a house belonging to a very ominous, eccentric, wealthy old murderer. Perfect.

The new creature turned its attention to itself, stretching out its limbs curiously. All nine of them, it turned out; seven arms stacked on their torso, four on the left and three on the right, all of which ending in sharp talons covered by gloves. A wicked grin split its face, and it wasted barely a moment before dashing out of the new room and down the hall. It came to the bathroom door, threw it open, and leapt inside. Two hands gripping the basin, it peered at its reflection. Two piercing, yellow eyes peered back, the pupils mismatched in shape and size. Lime-green scales covered its face and neck in splotches, smooth and diamond-shaped.

As its gaze traveled downwards, it appreciated the too-wide mouth filled with dangerous fangs, those snake-like slits up both sides of the face. Its hair was kept pinned back from its face, partially hidden beneath a black, metal crown. It was clearly messy- probably greasy- colored very dark with shocks of silver running through.

The collar of its shirt rose to nearly past its jaw, then plunged down to reveal a lot more of its chest than necessary. Its clothes were almost entirely black, broken up by the lemon/lime embellishments travelling up its arms and around the clasps in the front. The overcoat had long coattails and striped sleeves, ending in cuffs of fabric about the wrists. Moving lower it had very tight pants that did not leave much to the imagination, and boots that were more than a little over-the-top. Finally, there was the cape, hung around its shoulders and reaching floor length. It billowed when it moved even as much as an inch, looking at first like more black. Then the material caught the light, showing a dazzling display of green and yellow, glittering like a perfectly formed geode.

A laugh sprouted from it, giddy and exuberant. It twirled in the small space, its many hands twisting and toying with its outfit, hair, anything it could reach. From its hazy mind came then came its first intelligible thought, just from its appearance: it was called Rennet.

It stilled, hands hovering in scattered positions. The sharp laughs were quieting, but it still shook like it was laughing. Just shaking in general, probably. The worries of its more excitable half weren’t all gone, not that easily, and it knew it wasn’t yet stable.

Rennet took a breath, but its head didn’t clear, if anything it grew fuzzier. It was two creatures, two creatures that spent hours and hours inside their own heads as it was, and now both of those over-stuffed brains were in one too-small skull. It could almost feel the weight, leaning heavily on the wall just to keep upright.

“Should we stop?” Rennet verbalized the question in a thickly accented voice, knowing that otherwise it would never be able to understand the words through the mess of its mind.

“I don’t know,” it’s tone dropped in pitch, the sharp edges smoother, “Is that what you want?”

But it had barely gotten a chance to be. It couldn’t give up already.

So what was wrong with it?

“Oh, I don’t know. Everything?” Rennet threw its head back, because of course the worst thought was the only one that ended up audible. It sighed, dragged a hand down its face, shook its head. “Just remember the saying- two wrongs don’t make a right!”

Rennet’s mouth shut with a snap, and it felt quite angry with itself. On behalf of itself. It wasn’t sure, really- the indignation was much like something felt when a loved one was insulted, not when one’s self was insulted. That somehow made the sting worse.

“You think you’re wrong?” It said in a whisper, clutching its own wrists tight. Rennet knew the answer, though, knew it as it was ingrained into them.

And with that, its resolve sharpened. It was not going to come apart so easily, it would not accept either bits of it thinking anything so bad about himself, and…

Rennet was going to be the sexiest, baddest bitch the Mindpalace had ever seen. That was for damn certain.

It stood straight up, clapping three pairs of hands together and snapping its fingers with the seventh. It had to bear in mind that it was, for the time being, a giant sparkly monster babe. Now, being sad under those conditions just wouldn’t make any sense, and it intended to keep that thought at the forefront of its newly formed mind. Because Rennet was smart, it’d certainly retained that part of Janus, and it was peppy, if Remus had any part in it at all.

And, it mused, as it walked through the hall and down into the living room- it was undoubtedly very mischievous.

Taglist: @glitter-skeleton-uwu @donnieluvsthings @intruxiety @thefivecalls @did-he-just-hiss-at-me @gayformlessblob

#sanders sides #ts #fanfiction #dukeceit #fusion #my writing #sanders sides fanfiction #ts fanfic #fanfic #janus #remus #WijjFusionAU #I kin rennet and also i want it to maul me so it was a very fun character to write

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somethingusefulfromflorida · 3 years

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TLDR: I need help getting started writing and actually committing to it

I want to consider myself a writer, but I’ve only ever finished three short stories. The first two were homework for a creative writing class, the third was a Terminator: Dark Fate fanfic, and looking back on them none are particularly good. Oddly enough, the fanfic is my best work; the original stories are generic and reek of amateur writing cliches, too many adjectives, multiple POVs in the same paragraph, tense changes, BLAH. I have dozens of ideas for stories, many of them with ENORMOUS outlines, I’m talking hundreds of pages of back story and build up and Wikipedia-like description of scenes I want to include, but I can’t for the life of me actually sit down and write anything!

Writers write, and I don’t write, so I’m not a writer. I think I’d work well in a partnership, I’m good at coming up with stories, I just lack the skills to execute them myself. It’s like in Hollywood, I wouldn’t be the screenwriter, I’d be the “story by..” or “based on characters created by...” guy. I dunno, that feels pretty lazy to me, like I’d be making someone else do all the heavy lifting; I could never use a ghostwriter, I’d always share the credit, probably give them the lion’s share, in which case I’m still basically a nobody...

I want to talk to people about the stories I want to write, but I’ve heard that doing so is bad for the creative process because your brain thinks of it as equivalent to having written the story; like, now that you’ve gotten it out of your head and told someone else about it, you see it as a job well done, and you lose all motivation to finish it. I can confirm this from experience, it’s cathartic in the moment but it ends up ending the story before I’ve even started it.

I was motivated to write when I had a deadline and a grade to look forward to, but since graduating I’ve been completely listless. This is what I want to do, more than anything! I WANT to be a writer, I WANT to make a living doing it, I WANT fans and critics and analyzers and essayists to pick apart my work and figure out all the little hidden tidbits I included consciously or otherwise! This has been my dream for longer than I can remember, but I don’t yet have the discipline to do it. I’m afraid of failure, and I know that the odds are against me from the start; the greatest book ever written is probably shoved away in a box somewhere because the author received twenty rejection letters and thirty ghostings. It’s more luck than skill; some really shitty books get published, and some really good ideas get glossed over, it’s a crapshoot, and I my problem is that I’m afraid to put in the effort if it’s not gonna work out. What’s the point? It’s next to impossible to get published, and after that it’s next to impossible to make it big. I’m not a shark, I’m not even a minnow, I’m just some phytoplankton drifting around at random.

This isn’t meant to be self-deprecating, nobody wants to read that. I’m just trying to put words to my fears so I can better address them. I could use some advice, tips and tricks, anything! Any real writers out there, how do you do it? How do you actually begin the process? How do you stop yourself from getting overwhelmed and giving up? How much of writing is intentionally setting things up and paying them off, and how much is just throwing random stuff at the screen and noticing that it occasionally falls into place as if it were intentional? That happens to me a lot in the outlining phase, like everything starts coming together.

If you want to check out the Terminator fic, DM me and I’ll send you an AO3 link. It’s not bad, but I wouldn’t go so far as to call it good. The other two stories are word documents, I wrote them when I was 19 or 20, I guess I could email them to you if you really wanted to read them, but I’d rather not.

#help me #writing help #help wanted #writing #writer #writers #authors #write #books #writing books #authorships #author #short stories

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codevassie · 4 years

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Canonverse VLD Fic Recs

[***Let me know if I’ve missed anything on the Content Warnings!]

[**Do Not Ask Authors for Updates!]

[*Leave these authors Comments, please and thank you!]

Keith’s Type by AmbitiousSkychild

Status: Complete

Summary: “How would anyone notice what anyone else’s type is in the middle of all this?!” Matt demanded, laughing. “What’s Keith’s type?” Lance blurted out like an idiot. “It’s… obvious,” Pidge said. “He gets all flustered over shitty puns and most physical comedy. And have you seen the way he stares at Hunk when he’s going on about the mechanics of something? Like how the lions work? I’ve literally seen him blushing when Hunk goes into explanation mode.” “So, you think he has a crush on Hunk?” Lance squawked. “No. You bonehead,” Pidge laughed. “I’m saying any dad-joke-telling, klutzoid with good grades has probably got a pretty good shot at Keith.” Or: It figures that after years of getting it hilariously wrong face-to-face, Lance finally gets good at talking to Keith through a screen, which is, like, one of his biggest accomplishments. Then, Pidge makes the comment that Keith has a type, while heavily implying that it's Matt. But, listen, with everything going on with Voltron, the coalition, the Blade of Marmora, and Coran, Lance isn't going to get distracted worrying about it. Ask anyone, he's always been great with measuring levels of importance....

Relationships: Klance

CW: Jealousy, Referenced Suicide

My thoughts: As disappointing as canon can be, the canon universe has so much potential that authors take full advantage of. When canon posed the problem of Keith being apart from the team for oh so long, our wonderful authors simply took it as a challenge. This is one of the brilliant fics that roll with the long-distance thing, and it takes place throughout season four. I love fics from this season because A Lot happens and I thought there was so much more to it than what canon gave us--the team breaking apart was a big deal to me, so focusing on team dynamics, Keith’s time with the Blade, and--gosh--the end of this season, just means a lot to me. It focuses on a klance relationship in the heat of utter turmoil, and Lance’s jealousy was a cute and humorous aspect, especially with how harmless it was through Lance’s personality and the realization that he likes Keith.

The Loverboy Trials by PM_Writes

Status: Complete

Summary: He can tell Shiro is struggling to remain collected. “And why do you think Keith is your…sex…god?” And geez, that would be so much funnier if this wasn’t so disturbing. The representative leads them to the back of the council room where she pulls aside a large curtain. Behind it, a huge mural stretches to the ceiling. It looks exactly like Keith.

Relationships: Klance

CW: Referenced Suicide, Violence, Talk of Dubious Consent and Sex, Suffocation, (Alien) Alcohol, Injury

My thoughts: Another #FuckNaxzela2017 fic. This takes place after season four and Keith stays with Voltron for a bit after what happened. The team goes on a mission and things get weird--so, like, a regular canonverse fic, but when the war is getting really serious and we most need a bit of that Voltron normalcy (discretion: Voltron “normalcy” is missions going wrong and wonky). It’s really cool because the team is sort of back together, but Keith is still separated from them for the majority of the fic--just not with the Blade. It’s really weird circumstances, but Keith and Lance still interact throughout the fic a lot, so don’t let that discourage you. Its absurdity is hilarious; there’s excellent klance banter, and great fluff and angst.

Of Escorts and Espionage by hisboywriter

Status: Complete

Summary: Lance preened. Escort? That sounded kind of sexy and badass. “Why, of course, Princess,” he said, standing up to offer his hand at Allura. “I would escort you to the most Galra-infested reaches of the galaxy if you asked.” Allura’s arm rose but the hand she placed in Lance’s palm was not hers.It was Keith’s. ~ AKA I just really wanted klance blossoming through an adventure

Relationships: Klance

CW: Sexual Content, Blood and Violence, Vehicle Crash, Injury, Alcohol, Jealousy, Nightmares, Hyperventilation, Attempted Kidnapping, Fainting, Torture, Death

My thoughts: Remember this one? No? Seems like you’ve got an exciting read ahead of you. This is one that I read pretty early on in the fandom, so it’s a big nostalgia pick. It really emphasizes that enemies to lovers trope, and there’s secrets across the freaking spectrum. Lance and Keith are keeping secrets bc they’re undercover, but there’s also a whole bunch of shady stuff going on at this planet, and Keith is getting those Bad Vibes constantly. It is exciting and breathtaking and so beautifully written.

and, we dream of home by mothpoem

Status: Incomplete, Continuation Not Determined

Summary: “Then come see me,” Lance murmurs, and it makes Keith’s heart pound behind his breastbone. “Us, I mean. Once a week or something? Like mental health check-ins. We can just hang out, or...or go on low-priority, low-stress missions? Scouting, or flower-picking for Coran, or supply runs. Dumb stuff. Just...so we know how you are. I don’t want...I mean, we all miss you. And I don’t want to sound presumptuous, but...it feels like you’re not...not okay, Keith.” Well, Keith thinks, a little weakly. He never really stood a chance, did he? “Okay,” he says, right away. No fight. No refusal. His life is a hell of a lot easier when he lets himself cave under all the ways he wants Lance's luminous attention, and company, and friendship. All the ways he wants Lance, full stop.

Relationships: Klance

CW: Swearing, Immature Teen Humor, Canon-Typical Violence, Alcohol, Dream Major Character Death, Referenced Suicide, Death Mention, Self-Deprecation, Bullying, Injury and Blood, Miscommunication

My thoughts: This fic makes me. So Happy. It’s another one after season four--really, during season five--because I have a problem, but oh my gosh look at how happy these boys are and tell me your heart isn’t full of joy. I’ll wait. Really, that’s the point of the recs; go read. Stupid teenagers in love stuck in the middle of a war, but they really need a freaking break and I support that. They deserve a break. They’re like fucking twelve. This fic just is so cute and so soft and so funny; it gives me life every time.

Crossroads by manamune

Status: Complete

Summary: When Keith crashed his Lion into a Galra warship in order to stop it from destroying a solar system, and more importantly, his friends, he was fully prepared to die for it. What he didn’t prepare for was to wake up in an alternate universe where he and Lance were dating.

Relationships: Klance

CW: Panic Attacks, Dubious Consent, Referenced Suicide, Blood and Violence, Injury, Coma, Medication Mention, Sex and Sex Tape Referenced, Trauma, References to Hallucinations

My thoughts: Another throw-back! The Naxzela of its time, if I may say so. I'm joking. Sort of. It really kind of predicted that shit, though, didn't it. Anyway, this was another fic I read early on in this fandom and can I just tell you how blown away I was? It's labeled as a murder mystery, and, you know what, it is. You are absolutely trying to figure out what's going on the whole time, and it keeps you on the edge of your seat. It doesn’t... technically... take place in canonverse the whole time, but the main Keith is from canonverse. So it counts. Absolutely enthralling read.

#fic recs #vld #voltron #klance #friday fic recs #as y'all can tell i love season four so if you've got any recs for that PLEASE send them my way #maybe i'll make a rec list specifically for season four one of these days haha #looking for CWs has once again caused me to go bonkers #this is the best i can do #just let me know if i should tag anything else #have a good one y'all #and if you have any tropes you want me to do for banana fish next week let me know

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taxicabinmemphis · 4 years

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Love with the Help of Remus and Wine

Inspired by @somehow-i-got-an-account ! Fae had this idea and I thought I’d write it for faer. Part 1/2. [tumblr] won't let me fit the whole fic so two chapters it is.

chapter two

Pairing - Roceit

Word count - 3,318

Warnings - alcohol, swearing, self-deprecation, kissing, Remus being Remus (sexual innuendo, vomit mention, non pg nicknames)

Roman kicked on Remus’ door loudly, as if to knock. He was carrying a bottle of red wine and two glasses. Fortunately for Roman, he had recently begun to make nice with his brother, so it wouldn’t be weird for him to come knocking and asking for someone to drink with.

“Remus!” Roman exclaimed dramatically. “Are you there?”

After half a minute of waiting, Remus opened the door. “Roman! What brings you here?”

“I had a terrible day,” he said bluntly. “Would you like to drink with me?”

“Sure,” Remus responded. He let Roman in.

The creative side snapped his fingers to make the bottle open and poured glasses for both of them. He sat on the floor, Remus sitting on a beanbag in front of him.

“So, Remus. How was your day?” Roman asked, taking a sip of wine.

“Could’ve been better,” he replied. “Though it’s likely ass-tacular compared to yours.”

“Yeah, probably,” Roman agreed.

“What was so shitty about your day?”

“Oh, where to start?” Roman asked, finishing his glass. “All my ideas were objected to by either Logan or Virgil. Patton gave me the puppy-dog eyes to convince me to watch a cartoon I do not like, I slept horribly, Thomas didn’t ask for my input today, and I had another god-awful interaction with Janus.”

Remus perked up. “What happened with Janus?”

“We’ve been starting to get along better recently, as you know,” Roman said, pouring himself another glass. “We’ll have normal conversations and maybe even watch a show together. But today was just like how it used to be. ‘Hi.’ ‘Hi.’ ‘What are you doing?’ ‘Getting food.’ ‘What food?’ ‘It totally isn’t Pop-Tarts.’ ‘Oh cool.’ ‘I’m gonna awkwardly sink out because I hate you, Roman.’” He took a long drink of his newly poured wine before sighing. “The stupid snake can’t even talk to me about Pop-Tarts.”

Remus didn’t have a response for a moment too long. “At least that isn’t how all your interactions go.”

Roman rolled his eyes. “It seems like it is when you’ve had a terrible day.” He sipped his wine. “Has it all been for nothing, all this healing him and I are trying to do? Does he still hate me as much as he used to?”

“How am I supposed to know?” Remus asked with a shrug.

“He’s your best friend, right? I think that’s what you mean when you call him your ‘snake slut’.”

Remus blinked, taking a moment before speaking. “Nah, Roman, he doesn’t hate you. And the healing we’re doing isn’t for nothing. I think you could say the same for you and Janus.”

Roman shook his head. “Sometimes a weird part of me misses the times where he pretended he liked me and was good at it. Now, he’s terrible at it! Even I was able to see through his act today. He’s getting worse at hiding that he’s forcing his fondness.”

“Maybe that’s the difference,” Remus suggested.

“Hmm?”

“The way he acts with you now is different than the way he used to act with you. Maybe what you think is badly veiled dislike is actually fondness he doesn’t know how to show well.”

Roman looked at him strangely. “What in Neverland could make you think this?”

“I’m just saying, whore,” Remus said immediately, “Janus doesn’t seem the type to let a deception become so hard to believe.”

“He did it when he impersonated Patton,” Roman mumbled into his wine.

Remus hummed in thought. “The ending of that lie did leave much to be desired. Then again, he did really want Thomas to lie.”

Roman nodded, finishing his wine. “I just want him to stop pretending to like me. Can’t he just act and treat me in a way that mirrors the way he sees and feels about me?”

“Well-”

“It kinda hurts to be the side he tries to deceive the most.” Roman bit his lip. “I mean, I know I’m stupid, but I don’t need the fact that everyone knows it rubbed in my face all the time.”

“Roman, you’re not-”

Roman laughed, pouring himself a third glass. “Says the guy who called me stupid three times last week. It’s not a big deal! I know I don’t have half the brains as the rest of you.”

“You create the shit that Thomas puts out, I think that counts for something.”

Roman snorted. “Sure.”

Roman paused as he brought the glass to his mouth. He already had two drinks, and he had not been drinking for a long time at all. But, this was Remus. He didn’t have to worry about being judged while drunk with him.

So, he continued to drink the wine.

Part of Janus was starting to regret helping out Remus this evening. Remus didn’t have too great a day and was really exhausted, and was talking with Janus when Roman knocked. Remus begged Janus to impersonate him as he couldn’t bear being around anyone other than Janus. Janus begrudgingly agreed (neither had any desire to hurt or lie to Roman in any way, but Remus was feeling absolutely terrible) and Remus sunk out, letting Janus do his thing.

But when Roman mentioned him, Janus couldn’t help his curiosity—and now he was hearing things he wasn’t supposed to. He couldn’t help but want to hear what the dashing prince thought of their interactions, but things were on track to getting out of hand. It was only getting harder for Janus to refrain himself from breaking character, explain why he had been acting the way he was with Roman, and tell him just how much he liked him. Also, Roman was close to being drunk—he was already failing to keep eye contact with Janus—and if Janus didn’t change the subject to something unimportant or inconsequential soon, he would hear personal things Roman wouldn’t want anyone to hear.

So, no matter how much Janus wanted to hear his love’s every opinion on him, he changed the subject. “Are you sure you should be drinking that much?”

Roman scoffed. “Since when are you the one to scold me over drinking habits?”

“What? I just don’t want you to vomit on my floor.”

“I’m sure you’d take a picture and frame it,” Roman shot back. “Either way, I practically never do this. I have just had a really bad day and I will allow myself to drink like it.”

Janus rolled his eyes, sipping his wine. He was still on his first glass. “Still want to complain about Janus?”

“No, I think I’m done for now,” Roman declined. Janus noticed his words were starting to slur. “Do you want to complain about Janus?”

Janus gave him the most Remus-ish laugh he could muster. “Besides him being a buzzkill and a drama queen with no taste, there’s not much I have to complain about right now.”

They sat in silence for a few minutes, Roman drinking more of the third glass of his wine while Janus rationed his first. He could not get drunk while impersonating someone.

“More wine, Dukey?” Roman slurred.

Janus shook his head. “Nah, wine isn’t close to being my favorite alcoholic drink anyway.” It was true of Remus, but not of Janus. “But maybe you should stop?”

“And why’s that?”

“Your words are slurring.”

Roman frowned. “Even if I was trying to do that, it seems like something you’d enjoy.”

Janus snorted. He didn’t reply, though, worried what would happen if he started a conversation. He didn’t want to violate Roman’s privacy. (Though, he already failed on that front. Remus really did owe him.)

Eventually, Roman finished his third glass. He sighed, putting the glass down. He stared at who he thought was Remus intently for a few minutes.

“Remus?” Roman was lying on his back, looking up at the ceiling.

“What?”

“He’s so wonderful.”

Janus closed his eyes, trying to process what was going on. “Sorry, what?”

“So smart,” Roman continued, “and interesting.”

Janus opened his eyes, slowly starting to realize what was happening. Roman’s drunken state was making him speak everything that came to mind—and now he was confessing an admiration for someone.

“He’s sometimes really kind to me,” he said happily. Roman then frowned. “But he doesn’t mean it, which is okay I guess. That’s the way everyone is with me.”

Janus tried not to listen to what Roman was saying, though he couldn’t help but feel terrible for Roman from his last two sentences. “Roman, you really should stop talking.”

“Why should I stop talking about him when my mind never shuts up about him?” Roman replied. “Besides, I know you won’t tell anyone. Do you feel this way about someone, Remus?”

“Umm-”

“It’s so awful,” Roman stated. “Painful. It hurts a lot. But you also get a new appreciation for things, and there’s nothing like the feeling you get when they give you a genuine smile.”

Janus was silent. He knew everything about what Roman was saying too well. Yes, it did hurt—especially when they were talking to you about who they loved instead of you—but Roman was right. There was nothing like the feeling you get when they smile.

Janus couldn’t help but wonder who Roman was talking about. Maybe it was Patton. He smiled a lot and was very kind.

“Who do you think he has feelings for, if anyone?” Roman asked. “I...I bet it’s Patton.”

Maybe it was Logan. Logan was the smartest of them, and if someone felt for him romantically, they’d likely find him very interesting. His smile was rare—so treasuring it made a lot of sense. He and Roman argued a lot too; that could be a source of emotional pain for the creative side.

Roman laughed bitterly. “It could never be me though, which sucks. After all I’ve done to him, he could never.”

Virgil made sense too. They had a terrible feud at the beginning of things, which explained Roman’s latest comment as well as being so painfully in love. His smile was almost as rare as Logan’s, and he was smarter than anyone gave him credit for. And if Virgil was ever kind to Roman—it made sense that he didn’t think he meant it. Not with all the unconcealed distaste that used to plague their relationship.

Yes, it was either Virgil or Logan.

Janus didn’t dare entertain that it was him. They had wronged the other so many times. Yes, they considered themselves friends now, but there was no way Roman felt for him further than that. Hell, Roman was just complaining about him!

So it was either Virgil or Logan.

“I’m sure he’ll forgive your actions,” Janus assured him, trying to lift Roman’s spirits.

“Oh, he’s said he has,” Roman replied. “But that doesn’t mean he’ll like me. Especially not like that. He’s too good for me anyway.”

Roman went to refill his wine, only for Janus to stop him.

“No way,” Janus said, getting off the beanbag and pushing Roman’s hands and his glass down. “No more for you.”

“But I want more,” Roman whined.

Janus shook his head. “You’re already drunk.”

Roman glared at him. Janus, satisfied, went back to sitting on the beanbag.

“He deserves someone like Patton,” Roman said after a moment. “Sweet, kind, not a fuck-up, not stupid like me.”

Janus suppressed a noise of pain. It hurt to know the man he loved thought so low of himself. “Roman, you’re not-”

“And yeah, no one could ever be good enough for him. I’m not saying anyone could. But, since I’m the last on the list and he deserves love, I gotta prepare myself.”

“For his rejection?” Janus asked.

Roman shook his head. “I’m never gonna tell him, not if I can help it. I gotta prepare for when he loves someone else.”

“Either way, maybe we should wind down for the night, I can take y-”

“He’s just so amazing,” Roman said dreamily. “How is he so amazing?”

“I…”

“So talented, brilliant, persuasive, charming, and so much more. I don’t know how I’ll get over him. I’m not sure I can.” He took a deep breath. “Then again, how could I be expected to? How could anyone who loved him be expected to? Loving him...I don’t think there’s a way out. And hell, do I love him. I love him so much, I think it might be illegal.”

Janus looked down at his lap. No matter how much he wanted good things for Roman—for him to be happy with someone he loved and was good for him—this still hurt. To hear him confess his undying love for someone that wasn’t him was absolute torture.

“I love Janus.”

---

Janus didn’t hear anything Roman said after that. The words echoed through his head, Janus unable to focus on anything except the declaration. He heard it over and over in his mind, sentences overlapping and overwhelming his ears.

Roman loved him?

How was that possible?

Roman was so talented, creative, and charming. He was interesting, funny, magnificent, and so incredibly handsome. Roman used to hate Janus. And now he loved him? In that way? It didn’t make any sense to Janus. How could he love Janus? Maybe...maybe it was just the alcohol.

Yes, that could be it.

Did Janus want it just to be the alcohol? No. But it was a plausible—and very likely—idea. That must’ve been it. Sometime between his first and his third drink Roman’s mind had gone from complaining about Janus to claiming he loved him. It was definitely just the wine.

Or, at least, that’s what Janus tried to tell himself. He couldn’t let himself get his hopes up.

It didn’t matter that Roman said his name like it was a sacred and beautiful spell, that he talked about Janus like he loved him more than life itself, that he looked more lovestruck than someone struck with one of Cupid’s arrows when he spoke of Janus. He was just drunk. Janus wanted Roman to mean what he said so much—but there was no way he would set himself up to get let down like that. No matter how much it hurt to suppress the initial delight.

“Roman,” Janus said, interrupting the silence that had occurred after Roman stopped talking. “I think it might be time to take your drunk ass back to your room.”

“But Remus,” he dragged out his brother’s name. “I like being here with you. And aren’t we supposed to be hanging out more?” Janus could hardly make out what Roman was saying.

“Yes, but I think it would be nice if you were able to remember what we did together, hmm?” Janus argued.

Roman groaned. “Whatever. You sound like Janus.”

“The snake bitch is my best friend, of course he rubs off on me a bit,” Janus said, rolling his eyes. “Besides, he acts as a significant part of Thomas’ self-preservation, so it makes sense for me to channel him when I need to make sure you’re keeping your mind and body healthy.”

“You’re right, except Janus doesn’t care about me.”

Janus was so close to removing the disguise and lecturing Roman on just how much he cared. “As his best friend, I can say that he most definitely does.”

Roman squinted at him. “Bullshit.”

“Nope,” he said. “Now, I will sink us both out to your room.”

“Nooooooo,” Roman protested.

Janus walked over to Roman and picked him up bridal style and sunk out and into Roman’s room. He put Roman down on his bed. Janus conjured a glass of water and pain medication and put it on Roman’s nightstand for the morning. When he looked back to Roman, the prince was already making himself comfortable on his bed.

“‘M exhausted, Remus,” he mumbled. “Tiring day. Imma sleep now.”

“You do that.”

Janus switched off Roman’s lights and sunk back into Remus’ room. He made Roman’s wine glass disappear but kept his glass and the bottle itself. He removed his disguise, returning to his normal form. He poured what was left in the bottle into his glass, made the bottle disappear, and, with his glass in hand, sunk out of Remus’ room and into the living room.

Remus was sprawled out of the sofa and was watching some horror television show Janus wasn’t familiar with. He immediately paused it when he noticed Janus’ presence.

“Oh, hey Jan!” Remus greeted. “Did Roman give you too much of a bother?”

Janus stared at him for a moment, his mental and emotional exhaustion starting to take effect. “You owe me big time.” He then took a huge gulp of wine.

Remus’ eyes widened. “Oh my Jeffery Dahmer. What happened?”

“Move over,” Janus demanded. Remus did so, and Janus sat on the couch. “He came in with a bottle of wine and two glasses, claiming he had a terrible day, and suggested we drink together. He complained about his day and about me and my interactions with him.” Janus took another drink from his wine. “I mean, it was my fault for being curious, but still.” He took yet another sip from his drink. “Then he got drunk after downing three glasses of wine. I had to stop him from getting more. And then he…” Janus trailed off, not sure he wanted to finish that sentence.

“He what?”

“He confessed his ‘undying love’ for me,” Janus said, using air quotes. “It was horrible.”

“Oh my god,” Remus said, eyes wide. “He did it.”

“It wasn’t painful at all, Remus,” Janus complained. “He tells me he loves me as if he isn’t drunk off his ass and being influenced by red wine. Why must the universe play with my heart in such a way?”

“Janus…” Remus started slowly, “are you sure it was just the alcohol?”

“Yes!” Janus exclaimed.

“Are you sure it’s not you wanting to spare yourself potential but unlikely heartbreak?”

“Yes!” Janus lied. “It doesn’t matter that it looked honest, or that I couldn’t sense a lie, or that his beautiful eyes were filled with love. It was just the alcohol making him believe he loved me.”

“Janus,” Remus said seriously, “I don’t think it’s just the alcohol.”

Janus rolled his eyes, electing to not respond. He finished his wine and conjured another bottle. He opened the bottle and refilled his glass. It may have been a terrible idea for him to drink excessively earlier, but he didn’t have to keep up an act anymore. And after all that happened? He was in no way going to stop himself.

“You know,” Janus started, breaking the silence, “Roman sees himself terribly.”

“Yeah,” Remus agreed, likely having experienced Roman’s self-deprecation first-hand. “It’s a problem. A bad one.”

Janus nodded. “I didn’t know how bad it was until today. Hearing him say such terrible things about himself—it hurt so much.”

“Maybe you could help with that,” Remus suggested.

Janus frowned. “What do you mean?”

“You’re all about self-care, right? You could talk to Roman, compliment him, tell him how much you love him, show him how much you love him if you know what I mean-”

“Remus,” Janus interrupted. “Maybe. Not those last couple things, though.”

“What? I know you want to.”

“I just want him to know how wonderful he is. I want him to see himself the way I see him.”

“You want him to lust after mirrors?”

“I will push you down the stairs.”

Remus shrugged, picking up the remote. “Is that all I need to know for tomorrow?”

“I guess so, I’ll tell you if there’s anything else you need to know so Roman won’t catch onto us,” Janus replied. “Can we watch The Twilight Zone?”

So tumblr's being a bitch and won't let me fit the whole thing in a post so y'all just gonna have to deal with a chaptered fic. There will only be one more chapter, tho! Don't worry lol if you're scared of commitment to a long series or smthn lmao. Hope you liked it!

#sanders sides #swearing tw #alcohol tw #tw alcohol #roceit #romantic roceit #drunken confessions #roman sanders #janus sanders #remus sanders #fic #kill writes

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isa-ly · 3 years

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HOW TO EMOTION?

TW: mental health, therapy, repression, dissociation

Today’s just one of those days where I’m questioning whether or not I’ve completely lost the ability of functioning like a normal human and kind of feel like the Tin Man from Wizard of Oz. You know, casual Friday.

I know this is a written blog, but since I am also very much a woman of images and metaphors, I shall once again try and elaborate the issue of today’s post by making it into a well-known, kinda dead and yet very accurate pop culture meme:

I am not kidding, this is what I look and feel like in most of my therapy sessions. I’m pretty sure Kerstin would agree with me here, as the topic of feeling, or more like my inability of doing so, has been pretty much been the red string winding itself through my mental health journey so far. I mentioned it briefly in the last post, but I figured since today is just one of those pesky overthinking ones, I might just dive in a bit deeper and try to detangle my knotted thoughts into something a bit more coherent.

I’ve talked about this before to some of my closer friends and honestly, every time I tried to explain it, I just felt like an absolute mad psychopath. Don’t get me wrong, I know that I’m not, but it’s kind of hard to get people to understand what it feels like to just ... not feel. Okay, that sounds a little bit too dramatic, let me try and re-phrase it in a way that makes more sense.

I talked all about the metaphorical elephant and it’s even more metaphorical stake last time and this is kind of the extended version of that issue. The Stake Supreme, if you will. Basically, one of the earliest coping mechanisms that I picked up when I was very young, was to simply swallow down any feelings of anger, rage, sadness or hurt and pretend that they just weren’t there. Now, that’s not really something very unusual, as we generally live in a society that doesn’t leave a lot of room to healthily express or work through our emotions with the crushing weight of professional, educational, financial, social and personal pressure constantly weighing on our shoulders. So, again, I’m very well aware that me pretending that my bad feelings don’t exist, does in no way, shape or form make me a special snowflake.

It does, however, make me a very emotionally repressed and mentally inept snowflake. And that’s not really great either.

It took me many therapy sessions to figure out that what I had used as a necessary protection mechanism for all my childhood and young adulthood, had slowly but certainly turned into the root of pretty much all my current mental health issues. And here I was, thinking that mommy and daddy issues were just a try-hard-to-be-relatable brand that pseudo-depressed people on Twitter liked to use to excuse their shitty personalities. Oh no, am I one of them now? Alright, back to the point.

I’m just going to try to explain, both to myself and you, what happens in my head whenever the aforementioned process of ~A Feeling~ occurs. Where normally, I would experience something that elicits an emotion that I then experience and feel, lately (and by that I mean ever since some of the more severe of my mental issues started happening) I instead feel like the actual emotion gets stuck somewhere between having been produced and actually reaching my consciousness. In a way, to get back to that earlier visual, it feels like I’m the Tin Man. The feeling gets dropped into my empty tin chest and while I try my absolute hardest to actually feel it, it just sits there. Not really arriving, not really unfolding, just existing while remaining completely detached from me. And I continue to feel how you would imagine a man made out of tin and air would feel: hollow.

I’m trying really hard not to make another load of self-deprecating jokes here, as sharing and trying to explain this makes me beyond uncomfortable. Instead, I’m just going to keep going because that’s kind of the point of this blog. When I told my therapist what I typed up there just now, she explained to me that this strategy of processing (or lack thereof, actually), is commonly referred to as repression and dissociation. And that with my history of handling emotions (or, once again, lack thereof), it actually made quite a lot of sense for me to struggle with this.

She then went on to explain that one could imagine it like this: Whenever anything triggers an emotion to be formed (which, you know, happens quite a lot, since that’s kind of all that human brains do), my self-taught mechanism is to immediately replace it with a so called ‘non-feeling’. I know, that word seemed strange to me too in the beginning. What it means is that by having constantly invalidated and swallowed down my own feelings of anger and sadness through the course of my youth, I unintentionally created this perfect, well-oiled machine of repression that unquestioningly does its job without me even noticing. In a way, I somehow mastered the art of literally, fully and completely detaching myself from my emotions and simply viewing them as separate entities to my own mind.

Now, while that sounds like a sick villain superpower, I’m gonna be honest: It kind of fucking sucks. Especially on days like these, where old habits resurface and I once again find myself looking at my own emotions as if they were statistics on a computer, knowing that they are there, knowing that they exist within me, but for the life of me not being able to actually feel them.

That’s yet another thing I also learned in therapy. There are miles, literal continents, if not even multiverses, between rationally knowing you should feel something and actually feeling it. I’m not completely insane and oblivious, I very well know that I am capable of having emotions and that they are there and being produced by many funky chemicals working together in my brain. However, simply knowing this on an intellectual level is no where close to satisfactory if you cannot actually feel it too.

It’s like looking at ice cream, knowing that it’s there, seeing it with your own two eyes, remembering and being able to imagine the taste, the texture, the sweetness and yet never really actually being able to eat it. Never really feeling it melt it in your mouth. It remains an idea, a concept, close to smoke in thin air that you can very clearly see, and yet never really grasp.

And that, as you might be able to imagine (or even relate to, if you’ve experienced it before), is just not a lot of fun, to be quite frank. Emotional repression? Yeah, no, that one definitely gets a bad Yelp! review from me. Wouldn’t recommend. Zero stars out of five.

In addition to accidentally failing to process my own emotions (are you proud of me, mum?), there’s also the other half of the problem which is, as my therapist already mentioned, the dissociation. Now, I want to be clear here: While I’ve gotten quite a few medical diagnoses in my time in therapy, the actual condition of dissociation or dissociative disorder, which is actually a personality disorder, is not one that I ever received. The dissociation my therapist talked about, ergo the one I am experiencing, is more situational and linked to the repression. Funnily enough, it is literally happening at the current moment, while I’m writing this post.

Actually, it’s been there for every post I wrote. It is also there during almost every therapy session and whenever I attempt to talk to someone about my problems or feelings. If you ask me how I am and we get talking about my mental health, you can assume that I’ll be dissociating about two minutes into the conversation. Usually, it’s not something that is very noticeable. At least that’s what I like to believe, maybe it’s also super obvious, like my soul leaving my body, and people are simply confused or kind enough not to mention it. Who knows.

My therapist, however, did notice it, as she let me know after a few sessions, when I first tried to describe what dissociating felt like to me. “Oh, yeah, I can tell whenever it happens. I just thought I’d give you your space until you wanted to talk about it”, was what she had said. Oh, Kerstin. You’re a real keeper.

So, what does it feel like to dissociate? (I once again pretend that someone is asking so I don’t feel like I’m talking to myself about myself). It’s a little hard to explain but here’s what I have told some of the friends I have talked to about it before: Imagine from pretty much one second to the other, your entire head is filled with cotton, kind of like you’re really tired and exhausted and everything that you see or hear doesn’t really get through the thick wool that seems to have replaced your brain. Forming thoughts and staying in the moment gets harder with every minute that passes. There’s this weird pull at the back of your neck and the front of your forehead that kind of just wants you to close your eyes and drift away. Far away to somewhere where it’s quiet and cotton-y and there’s no one or nothing else around you.

It’s not just mental, it’s physical. It feels like your brain hit the shut down button without your consent, like it’s slowly closing the blinds as it gets darker and darker and you just want to fall asleep. Speaking seems to become almost painful, thinking coherent thoughts is close to impossible and following what others are saying is a million times harder all of a sudden. It’s like the world has gone out of focus and you’re trying to sharpen the lense again, to no success.

Actually, I think that a lot of people have experienced dissociative symptoms before. Not to play Dr. Freud here, but it happens quite a lot, for example during panic or anxiety attacks. Some of my friends have told me that it felt like they had suddenly left their body and were watching themselves as from across the room. That’s why often dissociating is also described as an out of body experience. Because in a way, it literally is one.

As my therapist explained to me, and as I experience it too, it’s comparable to your brain throwing a metaphorical fuse because it’s in danger of short circuiting. My dad would be so proud if he saw me making electrician references (yes, he is a trained electrician, okay). Anyway, what I’m trying to say is: Often, when I’m exposed to emotions (and that includes talking or writing about them), my brain will run a little too hot like an old, wary car engine, and before it gets too close to exploding into a fiery death, it simply flips the switch and disconnects itself from the body and the emotions that are happening in it. Just like the repression, this is yet another safety mechanism that my brain came up with in reaction to me never really learning how to correctly process emotions. So, whenever some of those stronger feeling resurface or leak out, it tries to protect me from them by cutting the connection between the both of us.

In almost every way, it feels like I’m being locked out of my own head and can no longer really use my own brain. To someone who’s never felt that before, this might seem a little terrifying. And I agree that, objectively, it is. Knowing that the grey goo behind your skull has the power to shut out what in the ever-loving fuck is considered your conscious self, is a bit worrisome, to say the least. However, to me, it’s something that I have a) gotten very used to by now and b) in the moment don’t actually experience as something scary at all. I’m disconnected, remember?

Which is also why it’s sometimes very, very hard to get grounded again and find the way back into my own head. Like a bird that’s accidentally escaped its cage, proceeding to go fucking rogue in the living room, then crashing into a wall, all while trying to figure out what the fuck is happening while it’s on the verge of blacking out. I’ll often feel so dull and dizzy that all I really want to do is curl up and stare at a wall until eventually, my mind and body connect again and things are back to normal.

To kind of circle back to the whole theme of this post: This whole dissociation thing is very strongly connected to my tendency of emotional repression. It’s somewhat of a vicious cycle, which is why days like the one I’m having right now, can be a little tricky. It starts with me feeling empty and hollow, bim-bam-Tin-Man, and is usually followed with feelings of isolation and depression, since I cannot seem to get joy, satisfaction, or any emotion, really, out of anything. This then often leads to me trying to force some sort of emotion into myself, struggling to dig through my subconscious in hopes of finding something, anything, and eventually becoming even more frustrated. Aha! Frustration! That’s an emotion, right? It’s there! Can you feel it? I think you can, oh wow, there it is! Oh, wait, no ... no, now my head is getting heavy. Everything’s blurry. Is the feeling still there? Maybe. Who cares, just close your eyes now. So sleepy, hm ... floaty float.

Okay, sorry, that just turned into a weird combination of a badly written slam poem and a pretentious high school theater class rendition of some old play no one has ever heard of. I’ll just use the fact that I’m still dissociated as hell as an excuse for now. Wait a minute ... if I’m this spacey and zoned out right now, how am I even managing to write this post? Huh? Isa? Explain yourself!

Well, I haven’t been in therapy for nothing. It’s been over eight months of Kerstin and me figuring all of this out, finally putting a name and label to it and therefore understanding why it’s there and how it works. Which has helped me a great lot in actually handling it. That’s kind of the whole point of therapy after all, isn’t it? Don’t get me wrong: These days where I feel repressed, empty and dissociated, can still be hard and they’re rarely ever fun. They honestly make me want to bash my head against a wall in hopes that that will make it go back to normal.

But since I don’t really favour having a concussion on top of feeling depressed and detached from my body, I have learned to use other counter-measurements to help the process of finding my balance again. Rebuilding that mojo, am I right? This post is already pretty long, so I won’t go into even more detail on all the different methods and mechanisms of bouncing back, but I’ll say this much: I spent a good portion of therapy trying to learn when to push and when to rest whenever I’m feeling dissociated. And yeah, it’s a fine line and I still haven’t fully figured out how to walk it without falling from one extreme into the other.

But take this blog, for example. I know that writing it, actively facing my problems and the very strong, repressed emotions connected to them, will make me dissociate like hell. A few months ago, that would have been reason enough for me to not do it and simply ignore it again. Now, however, after working with my therapist and on myself, I have learned how to push my own limits just far enough in order to, in this case, continue to write even though it feels like my brain is about to burst into a cotton explosion. It’s a give and take, a sort of push and pull I’m playing with my own mind and head. But as time progressed, I figured out the game plan a little better, I learned my own rules and the secret short cuts and cheating methods (because come on, who really plays fair, that’s for boring losers) and the resting time it takes for me to restore my strengths again.

So, today for example, I woke up as Mr. Tin Man, progressed to being a lost, numb and rogue dissociation-bird (man, I really gotta work on my metaphors, this is just getting worse by the minute) and then decided that the best way to counter-act all of it, would be to sit down and write my lovely new blog. Has it helped? A little, yeah. It took my mind off the right things, made some others a bit worse and intense but now, I feel a little more stable and like I managed to talk some sense back into my spiraling, detached brain.

Kerstin, please tell me you’re proud of me. Because as we all know, therapy is about impressing your therapist and not about getting better for your own sake. Pft, who needs that. What do we want? Validation! When do we want it? All the time, because we never got it as a child, so now it’s the only thing we crave in life!

Yikes.

Alright. So, here we are. Since I’m still feeling a little zoned out and dopey, I’m not fully sure if everything I wrote made complete sense. But hey, while this blog is for others to read should they feel like it, it’s still mainly there for me to sort my own racing thoughts before they can spiral out of control. And I think I managed to do that just now. And I know that that feels kind of nice.

Actually, I feel it too.

P.S.: I just had to. A little self-deprecation doesn’t hurt anyone.

#therapy #retrospection #repression #dissociation

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likeshipsonthesea · 5 years

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how you made me feel

...hello. so. remember two months ago when i fulfilled a prompt from a list, “I could never forget you,” and dumped, like, a whole bunch of nurseydex graduation feels on everyone’s laps and just, like,, sprinted away?? well the sequel i promised is now here. (to any who haven’t read the first part, it’s like kind of necessary)

my apologies for the long gap between then and now. i’ve been having weird writer’s block recently, where i can write but then halfway through i get doubts and think the whole thing is shitty and stop.. so i;ve started a whole bunch of things but finished none, and this is the first substantial thing i’ve finished in a while, and while it’s not, like, monumental, it feels like a lot to me right now :)

AND me finishing this was due in no small part to @rhysiana who beta’d this and helped me feel confident in writing again.. so thanks :))

no warnings for this (i know, a surprise for me, right?) but thought i’d tell y’all that the title is from a maya angelou quote that i repurposed a little.. now without further ado, here’s the sequel

It’s not the type of place Dex would pick to spend an afternoon. It’s not even the sort of place Dex would spend a five-minute break, if given the option. Coffee houses make Dex feel on edge. The thick, rich smell makes him nauseous, gives him a headache like long car rides do. He’s always gotten carsick on long drives—that is, if he’s not the one driving. The lack of control makes him sick, he thinks, or that’s how he imagines Nursey would put it, if Dex ever told him about it.

Dex stares up at the menu board above the counter. The drinks are all named with literature-themed puns and their descriptions—the fancy type of coffee, the origin of each individual bean—doesn’t clarify anything. Dex sways slightly and glances out the window of the shop.

It’s still pouring. He still doesn’t have an umbrella and his apartment is still too many blocks away to run, risk the wetness seeping through his bag and reaching his laptop. He sighs into the coffee-laden air and swallows, turning back to the counter.

It’s his turn.

“Um, hi.” Dex smiles awkwardly at the barista, who smiles back, big and blank. “Do you have, like, regular coffee?”

The barista winces and tries to stifle it, and Dex opens his mouth to apologize, instinctive, when he hears a heavy, incredulous utterance of his name.

Dex turns, the chill running through him completely unrelated to his soaking clothes, and—yes. It’s him.

*~*

A summer rain in New York is a heady thing.

The sweet, cool weather smothers the hot asphalt roads in steam that clings, heavy and metallic, on the back of Nursey’s tongue. A rain in the city is an inconvenience—those that walk are forced into cabs, subways, packing everything too full of frustration and humidity. The streets are barer, eerily. Nursey stands in a thundering cityscape, utterly and intoxicatingly alone. There are two things Nursey thinks could clear a city street—rain or the apocalypse.

The rain around him, then, is to him the reminder that the world has not ended yet. It makes his blood surge in that desperate kind of way, that want to live kind of way. It pushes him, jittery, as he runs down the empty street, feet pounding against the sidewalk in slapping splashes of water. His hair is ruined, a mop of unmanageable curls that drifts into his eyes, sends water cascading down his forehead, lets raindrops cling to his eyelashes, clumping, blinding. The smart button-down stretched across his shoulders is freezing and drenched, tight like a second skin and peeling. His shoes, and the socks inside, squish with each pounding step and he knows—in that inevitable way that tends to send him into anxiety attacks—that he will be unbearably uncomfortable when he reaches the coffee house and he is then the only soaking thing there.

Even with all that, though, Nursey grins as he sprints.

What a thing it is to be one with the world around you. The raindrops against his skin, cold and [cloying], are the same ones shuddering all around him, and even as Nursey’s body recoils at the drowning, it knows in that way all natural things do that it is simply returning to something it was, once, or will be, one day. It’s a comfort that does not know its own name—a comfort older than its name, even.

And for moments, as he runs through the streets on the familiar path to his favorite coffee place, Nursey feels home like he hasn’t since the day he stepped off campus for the last time.

Even the ache of knowing it is fleeting can’t touch him, now.

*~*~*

The coffee cup in his hands burns. Dex juggles it between his left and right, holding it in each until it hurts more than he can handle.

He could leave. It’s a fleeting, foolish thought. The door is there and his feet work and, yes, even the rain seems to be mellowing in the wake of this monumental shift, but none of that means that Dex can actually walk away. For one, Dex doubts Nursey would let him. For another, it’d been hard enough to do it—to leave Nursey—the first time. Dex doesn’t want to see if he can do it again.

Nursey orders. Dex watches for a lack of anything else to do. The barista writes Nursey’s name, Derek, on a cup, then works out Nursey’s change. She holds out a few coins and Nursey takes them quickly, dropping two in his rush. He hurries to pick them up and smiles in that charming, self-deprecating way. Dex used to think it was put-on, one of those things rich people learned, like dining etiquette or handshakes, that kept them above the rest, above Dex. He doesn’t remember when he figured out that it was one of Nursey’s more honest reactions, that smile.

Dex’s fingers twitch against the coffee cup, burning.

*~*~*

The coffee shop is warm in a grounding, shocking way. Nursey has come to be familiar with the place, enough that the judging looks he receives from its dry patrons can be interpreted as the confusion of visitors who will be gone soon anyway.

It is not quite Annie’s, but then again, most things here are not quite Samwell. Even the rain outside, though liberating, is not New England rain. A rain in New England is less heady. It does not distract, fleetingly, but awakens. A New England rain, thick and clean, characterized by dew-drenched grasses and shuddering, screaming trees, it is a wholly sobering thing. Late-spring rains, the ones caught between winter and summer like the unsure smile following silence but before the laughter. Post-playoffs rain, when the seasons were dictated by nature once again, when life stopped happening between game days and practices and plays, when life just started happening, once again. When bare skin in shadowy spring sunshine made the need to touch all that more insistent. When flower petals tucked around edges of yards and landscapes, behind ears for jokes and softness, made for contrasting reminders of the winter preceding it. When possibility was perched on the edge of every blade of grass, twined within the tunes of birds, newly home, all a reminder that things will change, always change, and sometimes that can be good, too.

This is what Nursey tells himself, has been telling himself, when he steps into the coffee shop, since he came home to this foreign place.

He takes a deep breath and sighs against the not-quite-right. He steps up to the line, musing to himself over which drink he should order today, when the voice, “Um, hi,” shudders through the world like the right kind of rain and Nursey’s heartbeat—too fast like the endless rush of people through his streets—for a brief moment, settles.

*~*~*

Nursey turns from the counter with his drink, still smiling. It’s duller, this smile, more conscious than Dex would prefer. “The good table is open,” he says, gesturing with his cup. Dex follows the direction to a circular two-seater by the window, squished between a bookshelf and a decorative wall. Dex takes a seat in one of the cushy armchairs, lower than he likes, and understands instantly why Nursey deems this table “good.”

The coffee shop chatter dims the moment they sit, and Nursey’s smile twitches a bit wider, honest, in response.

“So,” he says, and takes a sip from his drink so he can raise his eyebrows at Dex over the rim. Dex looks away, drumming his fingers on the lid of his own drink. “You’re in New York.”

Dex wishes they were in a place, still, where he could just nod and Nursey wouldn’t push any more than that. (Quietly, though, he really, really doesn’t.)

“Yeah, uh. I—I work here.”

Dex doesn’t look at Nursey’s face, where he knows eyebrows are rising impossibly high.

“You work here?”

Nod.

“How long?”

Clench jaw.

“…oh.”

*~*~*

It’s difficult, has been difficult, to be himself in this place. In the city, Nursey’s skin is itchy, tight and ill-fitting, and his steps are heavier, like each forward movement simply increases the distance between the safe person he used to be and the stranger he seemingly must become. Calls with the team make it easier. Facetimes with Chowder and Dex as Nursey hangs upside down on his bed, hoping it isn’t too obvious the way his eyes lock onto the screen in spreads of constellation-tan freckles. With the pixelated gaze of his two closest friends focused on him, smiling, even from hundreds of miles away, he felt settled, comfortable. Home.

Now, with Dex watching, that familiarity returns to his fingertips—if, unfortunately, in the form of his typical clumsiness. He fumbles his coffee order, stuttering, and drops the cold coins the barista hands him, his body suddenly warm from the cold. The raindrops dripping against his skin are hot, confusingly, and he doesn’t know what to do with the knowledge that it is Dex’s gaze making them so.

Dex waits, seemingly patient, and Nursey worries at the change until he notices the way Dex shifts his cup from hand to hand after a handful of blinks, the way his body sways with the movement. As an editor, it’s probably worrying that Dex has been the easiest thing for Nursey to read since he came to this city. Maybe, he thinks, as he collects his drink, it’s the writers’ fault, and not his.

Then again, he thinks, falling into step behind Dex, an impossible standard is hardly fair.

*~*~*

Nursey says nothing for a long while.

Dex, greedy, grasping, stares unrestrained. He didn’t know how much he missed this, wouldn’t let himself dwell on it, until now. Nursey eyelashes, drying but still glistening, flutter against the dampness of his cheeks. Green, bright eyes, like all the good parts of Maine Dex wants to remember. The softness of his ears, hidden under sodden curls, the hard lines of his neck, his shoulders. He’s been working out since he left, Dex can tell, but nothing like the routines they had at Samwell. And after the heavy playoff season, after the summer sun, Nursey looks smaller, calmer. More at ease.

This is what I wanted, Dex thinks, breaking. I wanted him to be happy without me.

Even without speaking the words, the familiar bitter taste of a lie sits heavy on his tongue.

*~*~*

Nursey doesn’t know what to do with this.

With Dex, sitting here all sun-soft and freckly, real and in person and absolutely way too much. With the fact that he’s been here, been within seeing distance, visiting distance, for almost two months, and he said nothing about it. With the part of himself—the aching, lovely, desperate part of himself—that doesn’t even seem to care, wants to reach out and hold and pull comfort from regardless of mistruths or omissions.

“Why?” he finds himself asking, without quite knowing if he wants the answer.

Dex’s eyelids flutter momentarily, the way they do when he’s wondering whether or not to be an asshole, and Nursey loves it—missed it too much not too—and wants to curse, yell, something, because Dex didn’t want to see him, has been here in this foreign place and didn’t want Nursey as much as Nursey has wanted him and—and he’s going to be a dick about it?

“Dex.” Nursey swallows, fingers pressing too hard against the paper cup. “Why did you—why didn’t you—”

“Nursey.” Dex’s lips flatten. He’s decided, it seems, and Nursey exhales, slow, thankful. “I didn’t tell anyone,” he says, and going by how he doesn’t look up from the table, he knows that is a shit excuse. “I—I don’t know how to—it wasn’t you. Well. Sort of. I…”

Nursey waits. Dex has taught him a kind of patience he didn’t think he could have. A kind where his hands do not shake, his shoulders do not tighten. When the waiting isn’t worrisome, because the result—long-awaited and slow-coming as it is—will be worth it, must be worth it, because Dex does not know how to leave expectations unfulfilled. Good expectations, that is. Dex is the smile at the end of a good play, the laughter after a clever chirp, the summation of four years of growth, both a constant reminder pushing for the best and the monument to the work it took to be better. Dex is what Nursey has learned to wait for, for better or for worse, and he realizes as he waits that this is the thing that’s been missing since he got to New York.

Someone who knows what he came from, someone who can appreciate the progress, someone who loved all of it and will continue to do so, no matter what.

“Your life here,” Dex says, and Nursey’s too-quick heart suddenly doesn’t care what he’s about to say. “I don’t fit.”

“Bullshit.” Nursey’s mama always told him his quick tongue would get him in trouble one day, and that was before he sorted his body out enough for his mouth to work along with his mind. He’s ruined, now, Nursey thinks, watching Dex’s lips part into a pretty pink ‘O’. Dex is in New York, Nursey thinks, delirious. Dex is here.

“Really,” Dex continues, because he’s nothing if not the stubborn, snarky ginger Nursey met on Taddy Tour, and fuck, Nursey missed him. “You—you’re supposed to be a fancy New York writer, with friends who read, like, interesting novels, and travel to places I don’t even know the names of, and you go to weird hipster places like—like this—” he gestures all about himself, absurdly insistent and frowning all wrinkled up and Nursey can’t help the smile pulling his lips apart, because it’s ridiculous, and Dex is ridiculous, and he’s here— “I feel like you’re not listening to me,” Dex says, mildly deflated, pouting a bit but mostly just annoyed, and the laugh bursts from Nursey’s tongue, sweet.

“I’m totally not, dude, wow. First of all, this place? Not hipster. You want hipster, go to Totally Caff’d two blocks over. That place is hipster. Second?” The smile feels too wide and Dex is staring at him like he’s crazy and everything feels right in a way that would be worrying if it was their frog year, or Nursey liked himself a little less, or Dex wasn’t the bright ginger ball of change and assurance and perfection that he is now. “Just so we’re clear, my life is always better when you’re in it. And third,” Nursey says, barreling on doggedly even as the lovely pink embarrassment flush floods Dex’s freckle-tan face, “you are the most ridiculous person I have ever met.”

Dex blinks, sighs, and—after a moment—says, “Frustrating but probably true.”

“Most def true,” Nursey says, just because it makes Dex’s nose wrinkle the way it always does when Nursey uses bad slang. “Now come on, Dexy-do.” Nursey stands from the table and the coffee-house chatter floods in, but he hardly pays it any mind because Dex stands up without hesitation even with the adorable confusion on his face. “We’re going to go on a walk,” Nursey says, reaching out to take Dex’s hand (prompting a darker, lovelier shade of pink to overtake his face), “and catch up.”

Dex, delightfully, lets himself be led out of the coffee shop into the freshly washed world. Nursey’s shoes squish, wet, against the sodden sidewalk, and Dex still has this dazed look on his face—though it is distinctly pleased. The air is warm, and damp, and unquestionably, wonderfully new.

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fanforthefics · 5 years

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sometimes the way to process trade feelings is angsty fic, so...

Colin waits to call.

He tells himself it’s because he wants to wait a respectable amount of time. He figures Tyson has to call his parents, his sister, his agent. Gabe. Whoever on the Leafs one calls, for things like this, when they don’t have a captain. And—well, Colin figures Nate will take a while. He’s suspiciously silent in the exploding group chat, where everyone else is throwing anger and best wishes and sadness and Toronto recs. Even Tyson had said something, something light and self-deprecating about how the nutritionists must be throwing a party now, like the team didn’t know him. Like Colin hadn’t seen the video Biz had posted, hadn’t seen Tyson’s face, and—

Colin takes a deep breath. This is hockey, he reminds himself. Trades happen. He knows that as well as anyone. And it’s not like he isn’t still friends with the guys from the Preds, even if it’s not quite the same. Distance is a construct. Colin can be mindful of how to keep friends over it.

He just—he’s never had to imagine Denver without Tyson. Tyson was there when he came, pulling Colin inexorably into his circle with the gravitational pull of his smile and his laugh and his easy charm. He’d thought, when he signed for another year—well.

His phone buzzes. He leans over to look at it. Talked to him yet? Gabe’s asked. It’s not an accusation, Gabe doesn’t work that way, but—yeah, Colin gets it. It’s time.

Calling him now. Wanted to give him time with Nate, Colin replies, then flips over to his recent calls. Tyson’s close to the top, because sometimes text can’t contain Tyson’s need to talk and Colin like the personal connection of talking for real, not through text. They’d talked just a few days ago, about nothing at all—Tyson had gone hiking, Colin was at the beach, Ralphie was getting bigger and probably didn’t hate the bandanas Tyson got for him no matter what Nate claimed he was wrong.

Now, Colin takes another long breath, closes his eyes for a second. Centers himself. Then he hits call.

The phone rings enough that Colin thinks he probably misjudged his timing, but then it cuts off and there’s a “Hey,” in a low, tired voice.

“Hey,” Colin replies, after a beat where he was startled by Tyson actually picking up.

“If you want the spiel about how we’ll still be friends forever and yes we can make friendship bracelets if it’ll make you feel better, I think I’ve got it down,” Tyson goes on. Colin winces at the tone. It’s the tone Tyson uses when he’s stretched thin but he knows that other people need him upbeat, so he’s sticking with the jokes. “I’ve worked out the kinks by now.”

“Of course we’ll be friends.” Colin says. That hadn’t even occurred to him, that they wouldn’t be. “But the friendship bracelets sound nice, if it wouldn’t be intruding on you and Mac’s thing.”

“He might want the friendship bracelets all to himself,” Tyson admits. “Maybe we can do friendship anklets? Or one of those necklaces shit, I should have told Nate we could have those. How ape shit do you think Toronto would go if we took a second on the ice to match those up?”

Colin’s not an idiot. He knows when Tyson’s talking to talk. “I can’t imagine they’d be happy,” he agrees, anyway. Then, “Are you okay?” He asks. He gets up from his seat. His phone’s still buzzing constantly from the group chat, but that’s easily ignorable. The sand is outside, and the ocean. Colin’s not even certain where Tyson is right now—he’d mentioned going to see Nate, but if they were on the phone, he must not have.

“I just spent like an hour talking Nate down from going and giving Sakic an ultimatum, so. You should be glad, I saved you guys from losing your star.” Colin can hear the long breath. “He’s not doing great. I don’t think he’s ever really had a trade like this. I eventually had to text Sid to go talk to him because at least he’s there.”

“Crosby’ll take care of Nate,” Colin agrees. “ But are you okay?”

“I’ve been talking with Kerfy too. He’s doing okay, it’s not like he didn’t know it might happen, but you should check in with Josty and Comph, they—“

“Tys,” Colin cuts him off. He’d usually let Tyson talk as long as he wanted, but not when he uses it to avoid his feelings, which he’s wont to do.

He hears Tyson’s sigh, into the phone, something that’s almost, painfully, a laugh. “How do you think? It sucks. I’m—but it’s not like I didn’t know this might happen. I’d have gone to Seattle anyway. And like…it’s easier for me than Nate, I think. Seven year’s longer than my dad ever got, then I ever got growing up. It’s what hockey is.” It’s not wrong, any of it, and Colin gets it—he was a hockey brat too—but it’s still in that tight voice, like he’s trying to make light of it. “But I’ll be sorry I won’t be there with you next year. I know you may want to rethink signing now to come with me to Toronto, but like I told Nate, that’s not how things are done, and we’ll find a way to get you through it. I can—”

It’s—Colin knows what Tyson’s doing, because it’s what Tyson does a lot, how he makes sure everyone around him is okay. That’s something the locker room’s going to miss, how Tyson, despite what he might say about himself, has always looked to the other guys first to make sure they were okay.

Colin’s suddenly, viscerally angry at it. That Tyson was probably on the phone talking his dad down before this, and he was checking in with Kerf, and then he probably spent the last hour making sure Nate was okay, and Colin’s not saying anything about their friendship or whatever, but—he doesn’t want to be that person. He wants to be the person Tyson doesn’t have to be okay with. Who makes sure Tyson’s okay.

Or maybe it’s not so sudden. Maybe that’s why Colin had to wait before he called, so that he could keep the anger under control. Maybe he is so fucking pissed that he’d signed to stay in Denver with Tyson and now Tyson was gone, and no one was there to be there for Tyson.

“I’m not Nate,” He snaps, and Tyson’s mouth clicks shut.

“I noticed. I can actually tell you guys apart.” He pauses, then, “Huh, I’m going to have to get used to having teammates who aren’t blond now. I don’t know how to deal with that. Think Matthews would dye his hair if I asked really nicely?”

“That’s not—“ Colin takes a breath. “You don’t have to be careful with me. I know how being traded feels, and I’m can handle it when you’re not okay. I’m not going to run to Sakic.”

“I don’t think he was ever actually going to—“

“Tyson,” Colin interrupts again, then slowly curls and uncurls his fists. This isn’t his to be angry about. If he was there, with Tyson, he’d—hug him, or start him baking something, or do one of the many thing he’s learned to do when Tyson’s strung out like this. (So maybe, yeah. Maybe none of this is new.). “Tyson,” he says again. “I’m not—you don’t have to, or anything. But if you need me to listen, and not judge or handle it badly, I can.”

“I can’t.” Tyson says it sharply, quickly. No more laughter. “I’m not thinking about it now, because I have too much shit to do. If I think about it, I—I really fucking wanted to stay, okay? I wanted to—at my house, with Nate, and Gabe, and everyone, and I thought maybe, after the draft, I was okay, and—” His words are getting faster now, starting to trip over themselves. “And you were staying, I was getting another year with you, I was so happy about that for like an hour, and I know this is how it works, but it’s…”

“Yeah,” Colin agrees, when Tyson appears to have run out of things to say. He remembers that, from a few years ago. The echo of it hurts less than the sound of Tyson’s harsh breath on the phone, then Tyson with all his laughter gone.

“I don’t want to move to fucking Toronto,” Tyson mutters. “I like my home.”

Colin doesn’t give him the platitudes, the ‘you’ll like Toronto too’ and all that shit. Tyson knows it. Colin’s sure Tyson heard it plenty. It’s not going to help. Nothing’s going to help, not right now. He wants to—wants to see Tyson. Wants to make sure he really is handling it, wants to make sure he doesn’t OD on ice cream and remembers that no matter what, his friends love him. Wants to see Tyson again, before it’s across the ice, really.

“I could—do you want me to come?” Colin asks, instead of all that.

Colin knows Tyson’s not okay, because he doesn’t even make the dirty joke out of that. Instead, there’s a sharp intake of breath. “Do you even know where I am?”

“No.” Colin’s not reckless, not off the ice, but this—this isn’t reckless, he thinks. This is necessary. This is all that anger coalescing and taking shape. “I can go wherever.”

“You don’t have to, I can—”

“If you want me there, I want to be there,” Colin informs him. It rings truer than Colin meant it, maybe—truer than he thought when he was resigning. He doesn’t regret that resigning, it’s not like Tyson was the only reason, but…he meant what he said.

“I...” He can hear Tyson hesitate, then, “Yeah. I’d like that.”

“Okay. Just send me the info and I’ll be there.”

“I—thanks,” Tyson mutters. Then adds, with determined lightness, “I mean, there’s a good possibility Nate will already be here and like, chaining himself to me, which should be kinkier than it is, so I can’t guarantee it’ll be fun.”

“I’m not coming for fun,” Colin replies. He knows why Tyson’s joking, but it still—itches at him. Tyson’s gone, after this. No more lunches after practice or cooking weird recipes Tyson found online or hanging out at the bars together or any of the things that have made Colorado a home for Colin. “I just want—whatever you need.”

It’s not like it comes out differently than Colin meant it, though he’s not sure he would have said it so bluntly, if he’d thought longer. If he’d realized how much he meant it, before today.

But he know Tyson gets it, because Tyson generally gets Colin. And also because it gets him quiet for a moment, too. “This is kind of shitty timing, Willy,” he says at last. “I’ve got—a lot of shit, right now.”

“It doesn’t have to be timing. Just—it’s there. If it helps.” Colin looks out at the sand again. His heart’s louder in his ears than he’d expected. He should have taken more time, processed this more fully, but—there isn’t time, he supposes. That’s the problem. If he could have, this would have unfolded slowly, easily, slotting into place between them like it was already on its way to doing. But now they have to do this like this.

“It kinda does,” Tyson admits, and Colin smiles despite himself. “I mean, it’s just—everything’s a lot, and I want to, but I’ve got move and I’ve still got a list of people to talk to and I guess they want me in Toronto sometime for like, promo or to meet the guys or whatever and—“

“I know,” Colin tells him. He remembers. He just— “I can help.”

“You generally do,” Tyson admits, and sounds almost like he’s actually smiling. “Okay, yeah. I’ll send you the info, then.”

“Good.” Colin takes a beat, then. “Think we can make friendship bracelets, though?”

“Nate will actually cut yours off, so only at your own risk,” Tyson replies, but he’s laughing now, and it’s almost real, and Colin—fuck, he’s going to miss this.

Change is good, and healthy, he reminds himself. Evolution is a part of life.

With Tyson snickering on the phone, he can almost remember that.

#colin wilson/tyson barrie #avs tumblr fic #leafs tumblr fic #i suppose :( :( :(#i thought i had feelings about Nate and Tyson #(And I'm pretty sure I do they're just too raw)#and about GAbe and Tyson #but it turns out that Colin and Tyson were what I needed to write to get out my feelings right now #who knew?#i don't know what this is it's just...emotions #and me processing #so #enjoy #my fic

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robinruns · 4 years

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Long, increasingly incoherent rambling under the cut. Sorry if the cut doesn’t work for mobile users and you have to see this brain dump

So when I was leaving work, I dunno if I looked like shit or something, but Jennifer asked if I was tired. Like I had mentioned that I got less than 6 hours of sleep last night so maybe she was just wondering. I said no, because I’ve been tireder, but meh. I mentioned that debate I was having about doing that two miles and neither option sounded good. She suggested I just don’t do it. What is 2 more miles at this point when the race is this weekend? And the more I thought about it as I left, I was like she’s right. I’ve pushed myself hard so far this week. I technically did 3 workouts on Monday. I ran and strength trained on Tuesday. I was on my feet, moving, jumping around for HOURS yesterday. What good is 2 more miles gonna do me when I’m not even trying to PR? Like who cares?

And that’s whats shitty. And what I talked about a therapy today. Like from when I started trying to lose weight and I told myself I’d run a marathon before I turned 30 I worked hard and hit milestone after milestone after milestone, and then I ran a marathon! And then I decided I wanted to run a half marathon under 2 hours and I had to work like a year and half or so at that, and I had some big failures along the way, and like last year I said I wanna PR every distance and I wanna place in my age group at every race and it was like these BIG ASS GOALS and like I didn’t hit them all but it was like... whatever, keep going, keep running, you still got that 2 hour goal, keep working.

And like I did. I kept running and grinding and I stuck to the plan and I did so well because I hit that goal, I ran a half marathon under 2 hours a year ago. And then it was like... I GOTTA GO BIGGER and I went back to the marathon and I feel like that I have to do better, and while I did, it also really knocked me back and I lost all my speed and that just fucking sucks so hard.

And like it kinda really sucks that like other than people on here, because this is a fitness related community (sorry bandom followers) I feel bad talking about what I accomplished because it’s like no one cares about running unless you’re a runner and I know so few runners.

Like at therapy we spent SO MUCH TIME talking about running and like... how I feel when I accomplish goals but like part of it really is that I’m sad that no one comes to my races. Like no one I know in person really cares it feels like so I don’t talk about it and its like it’s to the point where running a half marathon doesn’t even feel like a big deal and so I don’t even talk about it like I’m accomplishing something and then it doesn't’ feel like I’ve accomplished anything and it’s this vicious cycle and like I don’t even know what this means.

I just don’t know. I guess I like running because I can do it alone, I’m not dependent on anyone else, there’s no team element. But I wish I felt like my parents or Kyle wanted to celebrate with me. Like it feels like they only care because its like oh she likes it so we’ll pretend like we care about it. My shitass brain literally can’t comprehend that may, just maybe they genuinely care about my running. Fuck I was even thinking while sitting in the session today that my therapist probably even hates talking about running this much but she fucking HAS TO CARE because I’m paying her to care. Like this is the only way I can get someone to listen to me talk about running for an hour. Fuck I’m annoying.

I don’t know it’s stupid. Depression is stupid. I guess I didn’t realize how much and for how long I’ve been looking at... everything through this prism. Like I’ve been relying on self deprecating humor since I was like 7 years old. Kids didn’t like me. I was fucking weird. I hung out alone and PLAYED WITH THE CASPER THE FRIENDLY GHOST NECKLACE I GOT AFTER I SAW THE MOVIE. Like... I look back on so much of my life and my heart breaks for who I was and what I went through. Like I wanted to hang out with people but no one wanted me around and then when I was a little older and found friends, I was so worried about what others would think about me because I’d get teased and like I found me old online journals and I was so sad as a teenager as well but no one noticed and like fuck. Why did it have to be that way? Why did I have to be so alone for so long? Why did no one want to be my friend? Why am I still not over it like all this time later? Why am I fucking crying about this now and why didn’t I back then? I just want to go back in time and tell her that she’s doing ok, to be weird and obsessive and to ignore what other people think.

Which is bullshit because I still care what people think. Like a lot. I’m painfully conscious of how awkward and annoying I am and how weird I am and how I like like 3 things and have trouble talking about much else and like I’m never gonna be who I really want to be because my brain gets in the fucking way and

I just want to be happy and set my goals for next year but I don’t even know what I’m going to want to go after. I know I need to just be patient and let the meds start to work so I can think clearly again, but it’s hard to wait. It’s not in my nature.

I don’t know. I think that’s all I have for now. This is like supplemental to my therapy session today. I can’t even remember what she wanted me to work on other than to confirm that he wants to hear how my running goes and like think about goals for next year, but its hard to know what I want at this point

#personal

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secret-diary-of-an-fa · 4 years

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Hollywood DIDN’T Fuck Up? Tell Me More!

NOTE 1: When I refer to “Hollywood” in this blog, I mean the mainstream film and telly in general, not just films and shows produced specifically in and around the small part of LA known as Hollywood. It’s just really convenient cultural short-hand, okay?

NOTE 2: To provide context for those of you who aren’t familiar with my work, I’m a socialist and generally progressive. When I complain about gender-flipping and other virtue-signalling bullshit, it’s because its cheap and usually serves to alienate a show’s most dedicated core audience, NOT because of the political ethos it purports to be in aid of.

Way back in the Dark Times of 2016, the world was ‘treated’ (if that’s the right word) to the worst thing that had ever happened to pop culture up to that point: a shitty, gender-flipped reboot of Ghostbusters with one-note characters that shat all over the legacy of the original, beloved film while trying to replace it. Naturally, when I noticed that a new Ghostbusters film was set to come out later this year, my initial reaction was an even mix of anger, sadness and disappointment with the world in which I am forced to live. Then I got online and found the official trailer for the upcoming Ghostbusters: Afterlife and found myself overwhelmed with a sense of joy, triumph and- above all- catharsis. They haven’t fucked it up! For once, the mainstream film industry has done something right! Oh, how I’ve missed feeling unambiguously positive about a pop-cultural touchstone!

You see, Ghostbusters: Afterlife isn’t a continuation of 2016 timeline, nor is at a fresh attempt at rebooting the justly-venerated classic: it’s a thirty-years-later sequel that pays homage to the original without trying to ape it. Instead of being inadequate stand-ins for the original cast, the new protagonists are clearly their own, separate thing with their own, distinct identities. Instead of trying to copy the completely-impossible-to-replicate tone of the original, it seems to have opted for a more contemplative atmosphere with low-key humour that can stand on its own without forcing an unfavourable comparison to the original. Instead of being gender-flipped (like the 2016 debacle), it opts to utilise a mixed-gender central cast that feels appropriate and well-suited to modern audiences.

Will it be as good as the original? Almost certainly not, but because it’s not trying to symbolically replace it it doesn’t have to be. It seems to offer a sweet, touchingly crafted coda to the original while also seeking to create an identity that isn’t wholly reliant on it. And if it turns out to be shit? Well, it doesn’t matter, because (again) unlike the 2016 edition, it’s not trying to unseat or replace its forebear, meaning that it can’t retroactively taint past culture with its shitiness. That said, I don’t think that’s going to be an issue, because against all odds, this one actually looks good.

However, I’m not just happy that a good film is coming out: I said I felt triumphant and cathartic. That’s because of one very important line from the trailer: “there hasn’t been a ghost sighting in thirty years”. And just like, Ghostbusters 2016 has been ret-conned out of existence: it no longer has any validity anywhere on any GB timeline. The erasure that it tried to enact against the original has bounced back on it and cancelled it out. It’s rare for a movie studio to admit that it was wrong- either directly, or through dialogue in a later film- but that’s unequivocally what’s happened here. They might as well have put up a big, white-on-black screen simply stating “WE’RE SORRY FOR 2016. WE PROMISE IT WON’T HAPPEN AGAIN.” Of course, I’m under no illusions: Sony (the studio in question) aren’t doing this because its a good and noble thing to do: they’re doing it because its profitable. They’ve figured out that if they make a Ghostbusters film that pays proper respect the original, they’ll pack out cinemas with people who are in desperate need of psychological healing after the last fucking attempt to squeeze money out of the franchise (myself amongst those people). But you know what? I’m taking the win. For a film studio to show any interest in making amends for its past mistakes is almost unheard of, even when doing so would be good business-sense. The massive, bloated egos of the people involved usually get in the way. So fuck it: I’m just going to be grateful for the combination of rare good sense and self-deprecation it must have taken to make this film happen.

In related news, I’ve also started seeing adverts for a new show in the Star Trek timeline, simply entitled Star Trek: Picard. Sadly, this one isn’t going erase ongoing farce that is discovery, but it does feel like a tacit admission that iteration of the show wasn’t worth of the pixels it was printed on. Star Trek: Discovery, you might recall, abandoned previous Treks’ use of an ensemble cast to focus almost exclusively on a single, unlikeable character. Why? Because it was the only way the creators could gender-flip a series that had never actually catered to one specific gender before, and you can’t properly peacock yo woke credentials without a pointless, self-righteous gender-flip. Going back to established character like Picard (who is, very visibly, an older male archetype) seems a lot like an apology for this particular dick move. Of course, Star Trek had more of a right to the gender-flipping nonsense than any other series, purely because it was always admirably forward-looking and you can’t blame it for being a bit overenthusiastic about that sometimes, but its still nice to see a Trek show that rocks up with the intention of catering to the actual fanbase rather than an imagined audience of self-consciously fauxgressive hipster arseholes.

The point is, I’m happy. I am experiencing uncomplicated happiness about the state of pop culture for the first time in a very long time. There’s no telling what shape the next decade of culture is going to take, but it’s not even February and 2020 is already sending some pretty unambiguous signals. On the one hand, we have Star Trek finally crawling back to its original, predominantly male fanbase. On the other, we have films like Birds of Prey and upcoming aqua-sci-fi Underwater bringing superhero and sci-fi fiction to a more female-predominant audience in a way that seems original and doesn’t force anyone else out of the picture. And the new Ghostbusters just seems to be for everyone. We’ve been through a long period of artificial strife with film-and-telly producers creating contrived divides along gender-lines in order to sell sub-par products to idiots who are stupid enough to believe that they’re scoring a political win by buying a fucking cinema ticket. But it might finally be coming to an end, as all pigshit-thick cinematic and televised trends inevitably must. There’s no substitute for just making good films and shows. If early indicators are reliable, we might actually be entering one of those rare, gleaming golden periods when Hollywood actually remembers that.

#Secret Diary of a Fat Admirer #movies #Ghostbusters: Afterlife #Star Trek: Picard

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violetsystems · 4 years

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#personal

The biggest edition to my footwear collection is still the cat sleeping at my feet as I type this. She doesn’t use the other litter box at all which is understandable. That’s my default these days. Whether things are understandable or not. Or maybe whether I really deeply care or not. I was riding the train home during rush hour yesterday and somebody was playing trap out of a chik-fil-a backpack. I was done with everything at that point I just muttered “Fuck Chik-Fil-A” loud enough to hear. It didn’t help the dude’s backpack was in my face. His friend picked up on it and understandably I got off the train at the next stop. There’s been a lot of people following me around these days and making me feel unsafe. Unfortunately nobody will listen to me about it so I just end up understanding the situation. My understanding lately has been to keep myself safe by walking away from everything. Like somebody assaulting me and my mom on her birthday wasn’t enough evidence that I’m being targeted. That’s crazy talk to people out here. Are you sure you aren’t just imagining things? I ended up taking the Ashland bus home again which ironically is a far rougher neighborhood. I honestly don’t think anybody with a Chik-Fil-A bag is going to understand the finer nuances of why I’m offended. I honestly don’t want to have a conversation with that type of person. I don’t have time to be the steward and sheppard of the lost flock everywhere I go. And yet people have these societal expectations of me that never seem to deliver. They walk all over me without my consent and I just have to nod. I have existed within this hidden framework of rules for years bumping up against the fence over and over again. No matter what I do somebody seems to jump in and assume control over what I’m trying to do with my life. Like I never asked. Literally nobody gives me a chance to speak other than on Tumblr on the weekends. I’ve described the kinds of behavior I’ve been subjected to for years. For years people told other people behind my back that I was crazy, antisocial and worse. But they never understood until recently that I actually had a very dangerous point. This is traditional gaslighting and in America I think it’s the norm. I was reading how the American economy is literally financed by debt fueled by overconsumption whereas in China it’s fueled by debt driven investment. I have as many bills to pay as the next person. I spend a little time every day to manage a spreadsheet like a journal in regards to how much money I spend. I’ve done this for years by myself just like I’ve worked out my feelings in real time on the internet. There’s no shortage of people trying to get you to spend more money. It seems that people only value you in America based on how much money you are able to spend. I bought a pair of Gore-Tex converse for seventy dollars. They’re literally the illest shoe in context of people’s understanding of how I wear clothes. I don’t sit here and spend hours talking about the clothes I wear. Nobody cares. I’ve been invisible for years or worse. I’ve been a wink or an inside joke that people abuse to sell their products, images, and manifestos. When I make a valid point it is met with laughter behind my back and mined for intel and dirt in secret. Laughter and comedy in America is rooted is some deprecating humor. It makes sense when you tie this into bullying. People want you to feel bad about yourself for a lot of reasons. It’s mostly an act of devaluing your self esteem. That you aren’t enough. So you’ll spend more or try harder for people who wouldn’t do the same for you. It’s a pyramid scheme staring you in the face on a dollar bill. And then there’s the things that money can’t buy. That some people care about and other people just overlook time and time again. Self respect at the end of the day or the beginning of a new one is hard to come by. It’s understandable why I keep to myself in that respect.

I can’t change how shitty I’ve been treated. I live with years of it. I thought it might get better clearing it up in a journal. Writing about how I feel about this or that is about as close to a vibe check as any. And still people try to play these games with me in real life. The games prove nothing. It’s just an excuse to pit people against each other and tear down power. Like you are cordially invited to the wood chipper or meat grinder. Your opinion matters. Except when it doesn’t. After all these years feeling lost and alone is still my problem. I recently have come to embrace this. Who wouldn’t want to get lost and alone with me? There’s people I don’t want to be lost or alone with. Because I’ve been there facing myself in the mirror. We can talk for hours about all the good we are doing and there’s no record of any work or activity to show for it. When I was on Facebook I used to relentlessly post my miles I tracked in my running app. They’d go ignored for years. I’d check into the gym and it would echo in the digital staleness of the platform. Really nobody cared or understood what these things meant to me. The minute I would share something that inspired me I would be talked over or the conversation would shift to another person. I just basically defaulted to thinking nobody cared about me. I didn’t want to burden the world with how that made me feel. But I wrote about it here week after week. And I never lied when I sat down to sketch it out. It’s just that nobody really understood how bad everything had gotten for me. I have lived a literal fucking nightmare for the last two or three years. Ironically I quit drinking around the same time. That part was me understanding I wasn’t doing anything positive for myself with that habit. People asked in a hushed whisper online if I “got help.” I just fucking quit. Like I quit huge portions of my life that were complete bullshit. I’m constantly reminded how I don’t fit into those parts of my life when they return to haunt me. Ignore my pain for years and then suddenly show up again to try the same old socialite bullshit. We’re all in this together. Except when people alienated me for years. This isn’t something new or shocking for me. I understand other people are coming to the very same realization. People in America use the English language like a bulldozer. They talk emphatically with a concerned tone about how much they care. They never give you a chance to question why. They’re always doing the questioning. They always have the right answers tied to the right texts that nobody has ever really heard of. I get these emails about how my name was mentioned in this or that academic paper. I have to pay a fee to sign in to find out which. So literally I have to pay a fee to figure out who is plagiarizing and conceptualizing my life. Just like I bought all this street wear gear to be noticed and just ended up victimized and shunned. There’s a wall out there for sure you can’t pass. It’s a fence that has no logic other than rich people who don’t think you’ve paid enough to be human. And these are numbers that don’t really work well with a nonprofit salary. And yet I still do what I can with it and hold my ground. Because this shitty behavior is not sustainable. And the real vibe check is that I am done with everything and beyond anger and frustration. Sadly I’m the one with the answers to my problems. And the only answer I’ve found is staying away from the disrespect. That and saying what I feel whenever I feet like it. Because nobody cares anyway. They’ll applaud how brave I am then figure out a new way to poke me with a stick.

I’ve always thought the best I could be was being a good person. I’ve made a lot of sacrifices nobody understood to be that person. People distrusted me for years. I only recently began to realize that this was not my fault. I can’t possibly do anything else in my life to get people to trust me. People have dug down so far deep into my life it is insulting. If you bring it up to anyone the first thing they’ll do is doubt you. Typical stage one gaslighting. “How can you be sure?” in a concerned tone is really just “Why are you rocking the boat?” in America. I can be sure enough that most people out here don’t value the sacrifices I’ve made. They can’t fathom them because they don’t pay attention. They say they know me behind my back. How that one time they saw me out of context. People for the record haven’t hung out with me for months if not years. I used to play magic down the street and then people got cocky. Now I play Hearthstone online and developers still get cocky but it’s far different. There’s an actual community there with complex thoughts on everything. Some of them I agree with. Other things like Hong Kong I feel are none of my fucking business at this point. I don’t think anybody cares about the nuances of how unhappy I am with politics these days. I keep out of discussions now because they go nowhere. Americans want you to say things out loud so they can put you on record. Somewhere they can either use your opinion to sell a product or a service. Maybe even a patriotic ideology. I write enough reviews on Amazon to know the functionality of that. Somebody asked the other day if an acrylic paint I reviewed could be used on silk fans. I answered the question as non-biased and informative as I could for a white guy and moved on. For a person who drinks as much coffee as I am nobody understands that I have a subscription. I spent seventy dollars a month for a month’s supply of single origin coffee. Meanwhile people at work are always trying to sell me on something else. How my coffee habits are meaningless unless I spend money into this or that pool. How Blizzard is evil and doesn’t deserve my support. How I need to convince people my view on Hong Kong is correct when they’ve never even been there. There’s times when my opinion is valued and I share it. And then there’s times when people don’t listen to a word I say. They have absolutely no understanding of why I live and breathe let alone choose to support. They show no care. They simply target, bully and neutralize. If they fail they deal with the awkwardness of their assault by pretending I don’t exist. That’s the real wall. How you will never be good enough in some people’s eyes. Because you might just realize your value and leave all together. Take your money, your care, and your attention elsewhere. Maybe even to another country where the debt is driven by investment instead of hyper conspicuous consumption. Really after all these years of suffering in America I feel like I have no value to this country. I’ve been raked under the coals so much and scrutinized for no reason. If people really were watching and paying attention they’d know how much hurt I’ve been through. I’ve stayed accountable for my actions so I could live in a space where I could love myself. Which makes it highly understandable why I keep to myself and stay out of the public eye these days. It is not safe for me and has not been for a very long time. You can only be brave for so long until somebody finds a way to make you a martyr. In that respect I’ve carried enough crosses to know you’ll never cross that line with me. Especially if you eat at Chik-Fil-A in 2019. Eat a real fucking chicken sandwich you dumb fuck. <3 Tim

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coup-de-maine · 5 years

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How to enter a fandom - RPC

Hey guys, time for a friendly PSA from yours truely~

So I’ve been in and out of a lot of fandoms, made friends, enemies, frenemies, grave mistakes and happy accidents. I also see a lot of people come in other fandoms. Most of yall do great but I see some people carry in this weird sort of self deprecating attitude that can immediately turn rpers away from them, which results in; more of that self deprecation. So Im here to hopefully help out with the best ways to enter a fandom or an rpc, make your presence known and make lots of wonderful friends.

Now the first, and most important thing, and I notice a ton of people struggle with it is:

General attitude.

Let me give two examples of some first time posts.

“Hey! I’m new to the fandom. I know my bio and my theme sucks but would anyone like to rp? Maybe?”

VS.

“Hey! I’m new to the fandom. My bio and rules are located here, though they’re still under construction I’m really eager to develop them with interactions!”

Now I know the first one is tempting for a lot of reasons. You might not even feel like its all that bad, but up next to the second one it actually sounds a little...depressing, monotone, dry. Even though they start the same, one ends with me feeling like: this person really doesn’t put effort into things, they dont even really want to be here. All my threads with them are going to be lazily written or probably written with half baked enthusiasm.

The second person is happy to be here, eager to interact, admits��that since they’re a new blog not everything is perfect. Yet, they don’t talk down on themselves or make it seem like anyone who talks to them will only be taking pity on them.

This is actually a big problem I see in the rpc. Making people take pity on you for interactions and the rule with that is simple:

don’t make people feel like they have to take pity on you.

It’s a knee jerk reaction, I know. We’re all awkward humans on the internet who want to play up our faults. Who wants to say “My stuff is SO awesome! It’s the best”???

Well. You do. You’re new to a fandom. People already have established relationships, character arks, possibly with another version of the muse youre playing. Backstories so detailed it’ll make your head spin. You are literally selling yourself to these other rpers. Don’t sell them “A vacuum cleaner that sucks. No, not sucks up the dirt, it just sucks. Like me, Im trash and dont even have a working vacuum” No one wants to buy a vacuum cleaner that sucks.

Hate to break it to you, but when you say you suck, or your stuff sucks; people are gunna believe you. Or they’re just gunna pity you. And thats not great either.

Heck you might think; why not? So long as they rp with me, whats wrong with that?

Well... lots of things but mostly; pity isn’t a good feeling. Nobody wants to feel guilted into rping with you. Imagine seeing someone on your dash constantly posting about how no one likes them, their character or interacting with them. How they wanna die because they never get asks, no one likes their starters. (Sound extreme? I’ve seen it.) It makes you feel bad right? It makes you wanna like them but like- where do you even start??? They don’t even like them?? What common ground do you have?? “Hey, I see you hate yourself... uh... I hate you too?” Not great. Actually bad. You don’t know how to approach this person without becoming an emotional crutch, and you know they’ll latch on to you and suck every positive emotion out of your body so how do you win?

So lesson one is; People don’t want to be forced to feel so bad that they rp with you, they want to feel inspired to. Inspire some dudes! (or non-dude identifying people)

Presentation!

This is everything. Present yourself. You don’t need flashy icons or a cool promo- let me tell you, I’ve made some shitty promos in my life. See Here

That was my promo for a long as time. Until it was THIS that a friend made for me (A friend that I made. Through how awesome I presented myself. Thanks Vee, if you see this I still love you)

I can’t stress enough how important attitude is because I’ve had both a shitty attitude and a great one in the RPC and let me tell you, nothing kills a blog faster than a shitty attitude. Wanna make a self deprecating posts about that meme that you got 0 asks for? NUH UH. Think again. PITY = BAD, SHORT LASTING FRIENDSHIPS. INSPIRED = SUPER AWESOME HAPPY FUN TIMES FOREVER.

Yo, present yourself in a way that makes people wanna approach you. Get them interested, say something wacky or edgy or if your character is self deprecating then self deprecate through them but DO IT IN A FUN WAY. The people who care about icons and fancy promos usually aren’t worth lasting friendships either. Sometimes they literally spend more time formatting than writings something worth while for you. (some of you really balance it and just love formatting but u know im not talking about u Im talking about those that literally wont talk to us that dont)

So present yourself well and be genuine.

--- WAIT WAIT WAIT- be genuine?? What if my genuine self is self deprecating and negative?

[JOHNNY TEST NOISE]

HELL NO shut the what up I know you’re not, I know that’s a reflex to cover up how insecure you are, I know you hate how pathetic and small you feel so you point out all the things wrong with you before someone else can. That’s not you, and you are capable of more than that.

Dude. (and non-dude identifying peeps) I’m gunna say it again. I’m gunna say it a million times; one day it will sink in. Everybody feels that way.

What?? Octo ur so cool and confident tho

You know how you never noticed?? CANT SEE MY HANDS SHAKE THROUGH THE COMPUTER.

DONT KNOW HOW LONG I HESITATED BEFORE SENDING THAT ASK MEME TO YA.

The internet is a playground because you can trick people into believing whatever you want about yourself. YEP even good things!!! You don’t have to wear your flaws on your sleeve, and you certainly don’t have to wear them like a full body cast that prevents you from doing anything fun in your life.

Take the cast off, take a risk. You literally have nothing to lose. Especially if no one interacts with you as is anyways.

Be mindful

This is more of a trick I use to make myself feel better. I don’t follow a lot of people so my dash is pretty slow. It’s fairly easy to tell when people are and aren’t active/online so I literally have to trick myself sometimes but;

If you reblog a meme and get nothing, step back and ask yourself; am I sure anyone even saw it? and are the people who did maybe to shy to send anything? Or maybe nothing in that meme applies to their character.

As a mute character I am VERY restricted to what memes I reply to. As a character who speaks VERY LITTLE I am VERY restricted to what dialogues I can send at all. This means I’m required to edit memes a little (this is allowed by most meme creators btw) or I need a very good relationship with a character in order to say/sign that many words at them.

And worse case scenario, queue it and reblog it again/later. Its no biggie, some memes don’t make it.

Self reflect

Check out people on the dash. Do they have interactions? What are they like? Is their character more welcoming? Maybe you’re character is more intimidating. You might need to actually seek out interaction.

Tumblr has this huge enigma where everyone wants asks but no one wants to send them. Curious anons come from someone, magic anons come from your peers, followers, friends. Some of them are pretty obvious. Want asks? Send them. We really need to get the ball rolling with this because its honestly a problem. Show some initiative and reach out. It actually feels pretty good seeing someone react to your outrageous anon. And its a lot of stress relief if you play an otherwise very serious character to get to branch out and be silly.

So you send asks, you like starter calls- why isn’t it working?

Well, a stranger knocks on your door and tries to get to know you. Its a little awkward- it can work sure in some cases. But in most you’ll probably close the door and phone the police.

The RPC isn’t as strange as that but what’s easier? Talking to a muse you’ve never met from a blog you’ve never seen before? Or writing a thread with your best bud, throwing in inside jokes and references to your favourite shows- teasing each other about that one embarrassing thing that happened to your muse- yeah. Yeah you get it.

If you have history or at least an idea what someone is like, you will want to interact with them more. I don’t know if you’re some mean... meanie pants whos gunna smack my muse because he offered you a cookie. And maybe you are, but if I don’t know you, or know that your muse is deeply traumatized by cookies, I might take that as you saying “Ew no get away I never wanna rp with you”.

It sounds harsh, but I KNOW it happens. It STILL happens to me, even with people I’m friends with. Even if someone has multiple blogs and I get on fine with one muse, if the other hates me I might get uneasy about sending in asks cause I feel like I’m directly bothering the mun (who I love on this blog but WHAT IF THEY START HATING ME THERE TOO???)

Separation is tricky. We all get jealous or feel neglected when our partners focus on another thread/ship or send mean angsty replies which is why its important to check yourself remind yourself you have value, mun =/= muse and that it’s all in good fun.

Have Rules

UGH no!!! Not rules I hate rules, I dont want to restrict anyone!

Listen. I get it. I was a rule-less blog for a long time. But you know what? You need them. Not just for you, but for the people who wanna interact. I still feel the need to ask people who have rules what they are and aren’t comfortable with. You might not realize it but shit can go down in rps especially in certain fandoms. Even if its just the basics. Write them. They matter.

Unless you’re fine with someone literally controlling your character, or a blog you dont even follow who RPs David Letterman tags you in a smutty thread where your muse and him are married and he’s heavily pregnant with 4 narwal baby’s I- I think you can see where I’m going.

If its just the basics, thats fine, everyone loves seeing that. No god modding, not forced shipping, ect- great. Less for me to remember. Add to it if you need to. Everyone experiences rp different. Make your experience a comfortable one.

(And stay tf away from me Preggo-letterman)

Step away.

If you’re feeling negative, just step away. Do not make a big post about it alerting everyone who follows you because they might not all respond well. If you have close friends in then fandom you can go to, talk to them, vent a little, or just remove yourself and get those feelings out. But remember that no one here is equipped to be your therapist, and we cant all be expected to take the burden from you. It is up to you to regulate your emotions. Use coping skills but please don’t make the fandom or your blog a toxic place to be.

You don’t feel good, and no one reading your posts feels good, and building friendships on not feeling good is just... completely not good.

Im not saying you must be sunshine and rainbows all the time, but feeling bad feels bad and even though rping is just a hobby and a past time you are still reaching into other peoples lives. Leave a good impact, try to be someone you would want to meet in the rpc. Make it a better place.

Tips and Tricks

If you leave with nothing else, please take these:

Send Messages.

IM people, send them asks, get to know them before RPing.

Be kind.

Be generous.

Be enthusiastic.

Be happy.

#PSA!!!#Im so so so SO sorry its so long #I tried really hard to make it entertaining #anyways I just get a lot of people asking me how to enter the RPC and...#I wish I had heard this shit when I started lmao #rp #tumblr rp #roleplay

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unapologeticallybella · 4 years

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I Don’t Look Like J-Lo but Someone is Gonna Love Me Anyway

TW: Body Dysmorphia/ E.D

I’m going to go ahead and say, I am so happy I am not a notably attractive person. I’m not saying I’m ugly in the slightest but you know what I’m talking about. Those people where their attractiveness is one of their defining traits. Like you mention their name and almost always someone responds with, “Oh, the pretty one.” Yeah that’s not my story and that probably won’t ever be me. What I’ve noticed about those kinds of people is that almost always their personality suffers in some way shape or form. I’m not saying notably pretty people can’t have a good personality but basically yes, it’s rare. So when you don’t get to lean into your beauty, you tend to lean on other things like humor, kindness, intelligence; Oh, did I mention humor? One of my earliest memories is being around six years old, waking up in the middle of the night in a god damn panic. I ran to my mom hysterically crying. I said, “I don’t wanna be ugly.” I couldn’t really tell you what she said because I genuinely don’t remember. Obviously it didn’t make me feel better because here we are sixteen years later and I still wake up with that panic from time to time, only now I just don’t wake anyone up to hear me cry about it (that sounds a lot darker than I intended for it to.) Anyway, what I’m saying here is that I’ve always struggled with the way I look.

We all have that voice in our head that tells us we look like shit, that we shouldn’t post certain pictures, and that everyone else sees what we see; I swear sometimes I’d just rather stay home. I know everyone looks back at their old pictures and thinks “Wow, why was I so insecure, I looked fucking amazing.” It’s a pretty common thing, I know. For some of us that voice inside our head is a bit louder and a lot more persistent, mine was very cruel and eventually it just kind of took me over. I’ve never really talked about what I dealt with because I did it so privately; partly out of guilt because I knew I was harming myself and secondly because it was something for me to control and I didn’t want to lose that. I think I was eleven when someone else commented on my weight for the first time, I was 115 pounds. That’s when it started. I would go through these spells of not eating, restrictive diets, the obsessive calorie counting; no one noticed. This continued on and off for years, I love food so fucking much that it eventually turned into bingeing and then starving myself for the day, then bingeing again. Eventually I gained weight because my hunger would just build up, my cravings would just get stronger and I would lose every time; I’d binge. I would eat so fucking much. I could eat entire pizzas within 15 minutes, boxes of Oreos, bowls of cereal, tubs of ice cream, blocks of cheese; it’s absurd how fast I could eat it all. I was obsessed with diets, skinny detox teas, meal replacements were my favorite, and I loved watching my fitness pal tell me how much I could lose if I maintained the low calorie intake. My junior year, I tried making myself throw up for the first time. It was such an easy way to get rid of the guilt I felt for eating that much food, it helped me maintain the weight for a while. I really wasn’t under the impression that it was a problem because I wouldn’t do it often, only when I lost control and ate enough for me to feel fucking disgusting.

You could say it might be emotional eating but what I’ve come to learn is that sadness absorbs my ability to feel hunger; it’s kinda great if you have a fucking problem like mine. My first breakup, I couldn’t eat solid foods for a few weeks; I genuinely only ate a cup of yogurt a day and Cheez-its when I felt like passing out. I lost weight immediately. It made me feel so powerful; I loved the feeling of hearing that I looked good. What’s crazy is that the power only lasts so long before that voice inside tells you still look like a troll. I look back at these pictures where I clearly look small and tiny but in that moment I promise you; I didn’t see that in the slightest, I couldn’t. My senior year, I got better for a while. I was the biggest I had ever been, and I felt like everyone could notice; I thought my curves looked weird and the way my body just held fat in the worst places made me want to die sometimes. I did crash diets on and off that year; I was extremely self conscious and hated the way I looked. I moved to New York, and I had started taking Ritalin (prescribed okay kids.) Three weeks in, I forgot to eat for a little over two days. I genuinely did not feel hunger in my body. I was outside a hotel during fashion week, waiting for Kylie Jenner to show up when I had a full blown paranoid delusion. I called my mom thinking a bomb was going off. “Mom, I’m looking right at this cop and he looks fucking worried, Mom. Get me on a plane I need to come home right now. Something is happening, there are loud noises.” Then she tried to calm me down, she asked when the last time I ate was and when I tried to think back I was like, “Oh shit that bagel I had was literally two full days ago.” Yeah, so I stopped taking Ritalin, I think that would have been a dangerous combo for me.

I struggle to call it an eating disorder because I never looked sick; it didn’t ruin my life; it didn’t hurt me (I don’t think) but I definitely wasn’t healthy. I think that was my turning point; I was tired of feeling weak all the time; I was tired of obsessing; I was so burnt out from all of it and I decided I wanted to stop it all completely. I eventually gained over sixty pounds over two years, it’s been a fucking nightmare let me tell you. Every day, I struggle with my body and what goes on inside my head. I tell myself awful things; I know that it’s not good, but it doesn’t really go away. I fight so hard to not fall down that path because I don’t want that for me; I don’t know how bad I could get and that scares me. I went out of my way for the past two years to prove to myself that I didn’t have a problem anymore by constantly treating myself with food. It’s like every time I ate a shit ton and I didn’t throw up was a success but then at the same time it wasn’t. Turns out that guilt manifests in different ways and it’ll find its way to you. I’ve gotten to the point where I know the weight gain is noticeable, I feel like people think the awful things I do; So I did the only thing I knew how, laugh it off. Humor baby! Self deprecation is my middle name, sweetie.

I know I joke a lot about the way I look and the weight I’ve gained, it’s all light-hearted, but it actually gets pretty dark in this neck of the woods. Body dysmorphia is a mean bitch; She didn’t even allow me to enjoy my skinny days, talk about a shitty time. I used to do this thing where I would wash my hands on the right side of the sink just to avoid being in front of a mirror; “I just don’t wanna ruin my day, ” I’d always say. Anyone who knows me knows I’ve always used the same 2 inch mirror when doing my makeup because “looking at my whole face all at once is overwhelming.” You did not want to be around me when I couldn’t find that mirror, now that was a full-blown panic attack. I’m trying to be kinder to myself, now that doesn’t mean I won’t still make self-deprecating jokes but I’m trying to unlearn that shit. I go through body positive phases where I force myself to look at myself and find things I like. I unfollow Instagram models sometimes but it doesn’t matter; pretty people are everywhere baby. Every day is a god damn battle with myself; I can look at in the mirror and say “Hey you look good today” out loud but that bitch inside my head is screaming “You look like Shrek dumbass.” Having a past where men weren’t all that nice to me; I have an inherent feeling that if I was prettier, a lot of the things that happened to me maybe wouldn’t have (Come to find out even the hottest people get cheated on too, sick world we live in.) You know I’ve spent so many years comparing myself to other women because of something some asshole did to make me feel insecure; I always fall short so I’m done doing that now. Sometimes I worry that even if I lose the weight or if I cosmetically change the things I don’t like, that voice still won’t go away. Then what? What if I’m never happy with myself regardless of the ways I can change my appearance, I mean there’s a pretty good chance that could happen. So I’ve decided that I need to find a way to fall in love with myself the way I am right now.

People always preach “love yourself” and all that shit, but it’s so hard when it’s just you alone with your thoughts. Feeling love for yourself is arguably one of the most difficult things you’ll ever learn to do, it takes a kind of strength I’m trying to find. I will say, I do think the way I feel about myself has projected itself onto my relationships and in-turn sabotaged them. I have always required a certain amount of reassurance and affection from my partners which I’m sure can be draining but I forgive myself for that now. I have so much love for others that it just pours out of me uncontrollably and somehow I can’t find a way to feel that love for myself; it’s quite the problem to hauve. I’m learning to protect myself from that voice inside of me; I avoid things that I know will trigger me and cause me to spiral. I’ve been trying to lose the weight I gained these past two years, but for the first time I’m addressing the inner work. I acknowledge my weaknesses, I know my vices, I know myself better than ever now and that makes all the difference. Last December I forced myself to pick a form of exercise and like it, so I picked cycling. The first time I took a class, I actually catapulted out of the bike. I felt like the biggest idiot, but I tricked myself into enjoying the class. I just told myself that I would feel like one of those people who thinks spin is equivalent to a morning cup of coffee and eventually that’s how I genuinely felt. Now it’s been almost a year since I made that choice and I’m so happy I forced myself out of bed. After the breakup, my mom really wanted me to start yoga to “soothe my anxiety” and it did surprisingly. It’s amazing what you can do for your body by just taking time to just sit there in silence and think about nothing. Sometimes when it’s that quiet, feelings come up and before you know it you’re on the beach on a yoga mat crying in the arms of your yoga instructor. These past six months, I have healed things inside of myself that I genuinely didn’t know where there. It’s been a mixture of therapy, cycling, yoga, listening to my body, forgiving myself, forgiving others and learning to love the parts of me that I don’t (oh and just not eating Chick-fil-a so fucking much.) This picture is me in my favorite pair of jeans, I bought them almost exactly a year ago and when I bought them they were snug and now this is what I’m working with. Is it sad that my favorite pair of jeans don’t fit me anymore? Hell yeah but I can finally say I can feel and see a difference in my body now.

So no, I probably won’t ever look like J-Lo and that’s okay. I’m probably always going to struggle with these issues and I will probably have that voice inside of me forever. But someone is gonna look at me and feel so fucking lucky; and it won’t just be because of the way I look. It’s going to be because of the way I make them laugh and the way love just pours out of me uncontrollably. Most importantly, when that love pours, it will be for me too.

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