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the-witch-of-one-piece · 6 months

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Control 18+ Ft: Shuji Hanma, Taiju Shiba, & Ran Haitani WC:1400+ Resident: @enchantedforest-network Synopsis: You belong to them and they have to remind you that when you start to act out. They will put you in your place and you won't fight them doing so. (I wouldn't fight them not one bit 💀) TW: Masturbation (F! reader receiving), Morally Grey Men, Possessive Behavior, Choking, fingering, finger sucking, pet names (baby girl, brat), slight stalking, degrading names (slut), calling them daddy, strong language, dominating trait from the three men, jealousy, you belong to them.

Hanma

“Tsk tsk like I told you to keep your legs open for me.” Hanma cooed in your ear. Your back pressed against his chest.

Your panties were tossed on the floor. Your legs spread slightly open. The way his fingers brush between your slits causes you to squirm uncontrollably. Hanma leaned over your shoulder, his golden eyes gazing at his tattooed hand between your legs. “Just the slightest touch is making you quiver this much?” the cocky tone left his devilish lips as he could feel your juices on the tips of his fingers.

The way he did it was always a teasing matter, he knew it drove you crazy. “Stop teasing me so much.” biting back the moans as your eyes closed savoring this sinful touch his fingers could do to you. It was hard to separate yourself from him, he came and went when he felt like it. The consistency was never there when you really needed him. You said to yourself you were finally done putting up with his bullshit and mind games. You even questioned your own sanity wondering if he even loved you? If he did… he had a strange way of showing it to you. When you decided to go out with someone different you wouldn’t have guessed he followed you and your company the entire evening.

Your company wouldn’t even make it into your apartment when Hanma finally had enough of what he liked to call the ‘little game’ you were playing. The poor guy didn’t know what hit him (literally). Hanma with a look in his eyes you could describe them as dangerous and yet sexy, almost making you want to get on your knees in front of him ready to take your punishment.

You were putty in the palm of Hanma’s hands and you hated how vulnerable he could make you feel and yet you wanted him to touch you more. Just like a drug, you couldn’t get enough.

“Just remember I’m the only one that can make you feel this good.” his fingers pushing more between your slits “Your pretty little cunt is mines and mines only. You thought I was kidding when I said no one else could touch you?” his long slender fingers sliding into your moisten cunt feeling the warmth of your walls. “See I can’t leave you alone for a few days without you acting like such a little slut….You disappointed me.”

“I’m-I’m sorry.” you whimpered as his fingers were pumping in and out of you. His fingers are getting nice and coated with your sweet nectar. “Oh fuck please don’t stop.”

“And if I do? How badly do you want it, my little slut?”

“Bad Shuji baby~~” you whimpered.

“Tell me who you belong to?” The possessive tone was making its appearance in his voice. He added another finger into your warm little cunt.

“Shuji Hanma~~~” tossing your head back slightly against the lanky man.

Taiju

“Look at me when I’m talking to you.” Taiju watched you avoid direct eye contact. “We are not done talking.”

“I’m done talking.” You shot him a quick look and began walking to the shared room. You began undoing the expensive dress he bought you just a few days ago for this special event. Where he was sitting, he clicked his tongue and began rolling up his sleeves getting up from his seat following you to the bedroom.

‘god damn brat.’ Taiju being the observant man a few hours prior the dress looked great on you but he noticed some more unwanted looks. Even Taiju overheard a conversation about you and your dress with a few men he knew. He fucking hated how they were speaking about you. He just wanted to rip their throats out. It took every inch of him to control himself and not make a spectator of himself just like he did when he was younger. You were enjoying yourself but it was being cut short by him. When you asked him he didn’t give you an answer but simply moved you towards the exit. It frustrated you because he wouldn’t even tell you the reason and that's when you became more sassy with him. You weren’t going to look at him.

It wouldn’t take long for you to hear his footsteps enter your bedroom. The dress slides down your frame as you reach for your silk robe placing it on. “Like I said we are not done talking you damn brat.”

“And I say we are.” you picked up the dress and placed it on the back of the chair.

It was driving him crazy that you wouldn’t look at him. The large structure man walks towards you. In a quick motion, you were pinned between him and the wall. His large hand pinning both of your hands above your head. Still avoiding to look at him “Even pinning your hands above your head you still can’t look at me.” his large hand was around your neck applying enough pressure to get your attention. “Apparently, I need to wrap my hand around that pretty neck of yours to have you look at me like a good girl.” Taiju's eyes focused on yours as they traveled to his hand around your neck. He felt his growing bulge forming in his pants. “Look what you do to me. Getting me all worked up..” his voice was low raspy the hint of his bourbon mixed with the cigarette he was smoking lingered on his breath.

“Now… Are you going to listen to me when I tell you to do something?” he asked you. You didn’t argue as you nodded. “I can't hear you.” the slightly taunting in his voice.

“Yes daddy.” your eyes are still on his.

“Good girl… Now get on your knees for me and show Daddy how much you love him.”

Ran

Sitting on his lap, it was becoming more apparent he was looking at your left hand more. His fingers seem to play with the ringless ring finger. Ran began picturing what kind of ring he was planning on placing on your finger. “Something on your mind Ran?” Looking at the violet eye lover. His eyes drifted from your ring finger to your doe-eyed expression. “Thinking about what kind of ring will look good on your finger baby girl. I think it’s been long overdue and I want to get it now.”

You cocked your brow at him “Really now?” with a playful smirk “What makes you think I will wear it now?”

“As my future wife, it will be suitable. You would want to wear the ring your future husband bought now wouldn’t you?” Your fingers combed through his soft smooth short hair. “If I don't?”

“You will, I will make sure of it.” He reached for your fingers intertwining them with his. Sliding you off his lap onto the couch, his hand still intertwined with yours. You were sliding lower onto the couch as he was hovering over you. “You and I both know well if I place a collar around your neck you wouldn’t remove it or just like when you ride my face until you cum. No one is capable of taking you from me either.”

He had you right there. No doubt in his mind and he was right you wouldn’t decline anything he wanted to do. He would be able to convince you to walk down the street in lingerie if he wanted to. He had this sort of power over you and it always made you cave in. “I get it, Ran. You know I’m teasing Ran.” you playfully said, “I’m yours.”

Other than the three words he loved hearing, he also loved those two words “Say it again baby girl.” Lowering his head lower towards your lips lightly brushing against yours. The light touch of his light sent a tingling sensation throughout your body.

“I’m yours.” You lifted your head slightly as your lips pressed against his.

“That’s my girl~” Ran smoothly said to you. Ran freed his hand from yours, his index finger brushing against your bottom lip. The tip of your tongue lightly brushes against the tip of his finger. With no asking from him, your lips began sucking on his finger. “I bet you would be sucking me off so good just like always a baby girl. Seeing those pouty lips around my cock how you take me inch by inch.” he continued to watch you suck on his finger.

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Tagging: @the-haitani-baton, @satanlovesusall666, @galactict3a, @ratlovecat, @niko-ash, @iluv-ace, @captainmycaptainn, @strawberrychrome, @missgab, @anxious-chick, @livefromraleigh, @kei-b-gurlll, @spookiisopium, @bontensbabygirl, @txna04, @intheafterall, @stygianoir, @kira-rrh, @intheafterall, @staygoldsquatchling02, @nightqueensk, @alexanderlightwoodii, , @sintyu, @missgab, @elmakimaki_ , @hana-patata, @ancient-vivarium @livefromnc , @mdibby @chronic-claire-universe @cxrxx @drakensdarling, @stephisokay, @lunatical, @q-the-rockaholic, @istanstraykids, @opchara, @twistedw0nd3rland3acc, @galliardsmaniac, @villsophie, @carixes

#the witch of one piece #tokyo revengers #tokyo revengers x reader #hanma shuji #hanma x reader #taiju shiba #taiju x reader #ran haitani #ran x reader #val's writing #morally grey men #tokrev #tokyo revenger smut

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bro-atz · 3 months

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don't cross that line

in which: once you cross that line, there's no going back, and you just happened to cross that line with your best friend, choi jongho.

pair: uni student!jongho/uni student!afab!reader

word count: 7.3k

content: light fluff?, smut, friends to lovers au, suuuuuuper plot heavy, drunken kisses, sober sex, bedroom sex, completely consensual!

rated: R | nsfw — minors do not interact

author's note: for the lovely @yourlocaljonghoe who asked for a jongho friends to lovers au and bada bing bada boom here it is mwah also may or may not be based off true events also i desperately wanted to include a cuddle scene because of this so you're welcome...? AND HUGE THANKS TO @yunhoszn FOR BETA-ING FOR ME YOU'RE A DOLL BABES MWAH

network: @cromernet

taglist: @k-hotchoisan @eyeryis @sinnarols @aaasia111 @sunshineangel-reads @hwallazia @dazzlingstarrs @dutchessskarma @/yourlocaljonghoe @st4rhwa @frobin4ever @sanhwajjong @certifiedmoa @therealcuppicake @yuyubeans @hyunukitty @startlinglyoongi @hyukssunflower @chewyhotteoks @alexwritesfics apply for the permanent taglist here!

“Listen, all I can really say is that if she wanted to do well on the project, she would’ve pulled her weight,” Jongho grumbled.

You and Jongho were getting lunch in between classes. The two of you usually talked about classes during your break, and that day, you decided to bring up the last group project that you worked on. Jongho had to carry his team while you ended up having a blast with your own, making him all the more salty.

“Yeah, but that’s no reason to make her cry,” you pointed out.

“It’s her fault for not doing the work.”

“Jongho, she was your girlfriend. You didn’t have to be so mean.”

“Was, thank God,” Jongho let out a sigh of relief. “Honestly this whole dating thing is such bullshit— I just want to get my degree and get out of here.”

“Wow. How romantic,” you said sarcastically and rolled your eyes.

“Shut up,” Jongho retorted while throwing a fry at your face. “It’s your fault I was dating her in the first place.”

“I said go on one date with her. No one told you to ask her to be your girlfriend.”

“Yeah, well… Shut up.”

You shrugged, a smug smile appearing on your face as you realized that you won that argument. Jongho took a bite of his burger, annoyance written all over his face as you rubbed your smug smile. Jongho chose to fully ignore you at that point, making you turn to your phone to see that you were going to be late for your next class if you didn’t haul your ass out of there.

“Hey, I gotta go. I’ll see you tonight?” you asked him.

“Yeah. See ya,” Jongho responded with a nod and a light wave.

There was a Tuesday night tradition you, Jongho, and a couple other friends from school had— Trivia Night. One of your other friends worked at the bar that hosted the trivia, which is how you came to know of it in the first place.

That being said, even though you went for trivia, you guys never actually played. It was more of an excuse to go drinking in the middle of the week than anything, which meant every Tuesday, you and your friends were drinking way too much and screwing yourselves over for classes the next day.

“Hey, Joong!” you said, your words staring to slur together. “Let’s do a shot together.”

“Yeah! All of us!” your friend, Mingi, added as he hugged you from behind.

“Fine, last round, and then I’m sending you home,” Hongjoong replied while rolling his eyes, a playful smile on his face.

“Good idea. Y/N’s been getting a little handsy with me,” another friend, Yunho, said as he brushed your straying hand off his thigh— you couldn’t help it; you were an affectionate drunk.

The five of you clinked glasses and took your shots, Yunho and Jongho doing it with ease while you and Mingi made faces as the liquor burned your throats.

“Hey, so did you guys look into your classes for next semester?” Jongho asked.

“Not yet,” Yunho shook his head. “I’m guessing you have?”

“Yeah. We have to take the senior colloquium, so why don’t we all try for the same time and recitation? Keep us sane in our last semester of college.”

“Alright, that sounds good,” you giggled and hugged Jongho. “It’ll be fun to have a final class together.”

Mingi settled for nodding while also giggling. Jongho wanted to talk about the matter further, but you and Mingi were just far too gone to have a proper conversation at that point, so he just settled for talking to the group about it when you all were sober.

You were still clinging to Jongho as he sat quietly and thought about classes while sipping his beer, your head on his shoulder, your arms wrapped tightly around his waist. You couldn’t help but stare at him as he was lost deep in thought, and your drunk self thought it was the perfect time to nuzzle your nose in his neck.

“Alright, we’re going home,” Jongho immediately declared.

“What? Why?” you complained as Jongho got out of your embrace and grabbed your arm to put over his shoulder.

“Because you’re done.”

“How do you figure?”

“Because I know. Let’s go home before you yak on the bar again,” Jongho shut you down and started dragging you out of the bar. “Yunho, let me know how much we owe you after you close the tab.”

“Will do!” Yunho responded cheerfully as he watched Jongho drag you away.

“Bye Yuyu, Mango, Joong!” you managed to say before leaving the establishment.

The walk home was atrocious for Jongho. You refused to walk in a straight line and kept trying to pull him towards any bar that you passed, and at some point, Jongho had enough and made you get on his back so he could piggyback you back to your apartment. His patience was wearing thinner as you started playing with his hair and tickling his neck, but you were his best friend, and you were drunk out of your fucking mind, so he was going to be there for you.

By the time Jongho got you home, you were practically falling asleep on his back— he had a very comfy back, not going to lie. He put you down right in front of your door, but instead of reaching for your keys, you slumped onto him, his chest catching you before you went tumbling down.

And then, you blacked out.

You woke up the next morning with a horrible hangover and absolutely no memory of how you got back from the bar in the first place— you remembered Jongho walking you home, but how you ended up in your bed was a complete mystery to you. There was a nagging feeling in the back of your mind, that you did something you shouldn’t have, but you couldn’t for the life of you figure out what it was, nor did you have the time to ponder it because you had to get your ass out of bed and onto campus.

Your first class was absolute torture, your headache intensifying as the lecture went on and on, and by the time the class was over, you were ready to fall over. You trudged out of the classroom to see your friends waiting for you— they usually waited for you after your Wednesday morning class so that all four of you could grab lunch— Yunho immediately pulling you in for a hug.

“You look like shit,” he commented while hugging you.

“Wow, really? I had no idea,” you responded with heavy sarcasm.

“What the fuck happened to you last night for you to look like this?” Mingi asked.

“I have no fucking clue,” you groaned. “All I remember is leaving the bar…”

But, your statement was drowned out by Mingi as he dramatically grabbed his chest and gasped, “Did you and Jongho go and drink more without us?!”

“Yeah, no. Y/N was too wasted for that,” Jongho shook his head. “I took her home directly.”

“I guess the hangover is only hitting so hard because I’m not as young as I used to be,” you sighed loudly.

“…We’re all in our early twenties. Shut up,” Yunho said while rolling his eyes.

“I dunno man, Jongho acts like an old man a lot,” Mingi said with a slight giggle. “I think he’s in his eighties.”

As the three boys bickered, your mind lingered on Jongho’s words. He took you home directly, and you remembered that, but… How the hell did you get into your apartment? And why was the weird feeling still lingering?

“Hey,” you pulled Jongho out of the argument and to the side, the two tall men still walking without realizing you and Jongho were no longer walking with them. “Can we talk?”

“Sure,” Jongho agreed, the two of you moving to the side of the hallway.

“Did… Did something happen last night?” you asked. “Because I have this nagging feeling that I did something, but I… I don’t know what.”

“Don’t worry about it, and just sleep it off,” Jongho replied. “Look, I gotta get to class. I’ll talk to you later, okay?”

“Right, yeah, okay…” you trailed off as Jongho left you standing there more confused than ever.

Because what did he mean by “don’t worry about it”? What the fuck did you do last night?

You decided to take matters into your own hands. After you were done with classes for the day, you went straight to the bar because, Goddammit, you needed answers or at least some clarity.

“Joong!” you called loudly the second you got into the bar. “I have a question for you!”

You plopped yourself down on one of the bar stools and looked at the bartender, a determined glint in your eye, but a heavy sigh on your lips.

“Geez, you look like shit,” Hongjoong commented on your appearance the second he stood in front of you.

“That seems to be the general consensus today… Ugh, anyway. Did I do something wrong last night?”

“What?” Hongjoong’s face twisted in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“Like… Okay, I feel like I did something I shouldn’t have done last night,” you explained. “And I’m trying to figure it out.”

“You were fine here— well, you were shit-faced, and Jongho took you home, and that’s about it,” the bartender recollected. “You didn’t do anything outta pocket.”

“Okay… I still feel like… I’m missing something,” you grumbled to yourself, but the man could still hear you.

“Why don’t you ask Jongho since he walked you home last night?”

“See, I tried doing that, but he told me “don’t worry about it”,” you said, exasperated, while using air quotes. “What the fuck does that mean— What should I not worry about?!”

“I don’t know!” Hongjoong held his arms up as if you were holding him at gunpoint and demanding answers. “The only thing I can say is ask him again, or maybe sleep on it, and it’ll come to you.”

“So helpful,” you couldn’t help but be sarcastic. “Fine, I’ll sleep on it. Thanks for the help, Joong.”

You got off the stool and were about to head for the exit when the bartender asked, “So you’re not going to get a drink?”

“Are you fucking kidding— No! Bye, Joong!”

“Hey, Jongho?”

The two of you were sitting on your couch— Jongho came over after he finished his classes for the day.

“What’s up?”

“Are you sure I didn’t do anything that night?” you asked him, your voice slightly wavering.

“I told you not to worry about it,” he responded with a sigh.

“No, but I’m going to worry about it because I want to know!” you exclaimed. “You being all vague and shit about it just makes me more concerned, and I just need you to tell me for my own sanity.”

Jongho let out yet another sigh. He looked straight at you, his eyes meeting yours. You never realized how pretty his eyes were until you made proper eye contact, and the bigger his eyes got, the prettier they became. Then, you realized that his eyes were not getting bigger, but he was moving closer to you. You leaned backwards, your back hitting the arm rest as he pinned you against it, his light exhale flitting past your cheek.

“You really want to know?” he asked, his voice lower and softer than usual.

“I… I do. I do want to know.”

Shocks ran through your body when he caressed your face lightly, his dainty fingertips rubbing lightly against your ear. He leaned in closer to you, making you squeeze your eyes shut since you assumed that he was going to kiss you. Instead, he whispered in your ear, “You told me you loved me.”

He leaned away, allowing you to look at him with complete and utter shock. You tried to brush off the tension building in the room and between your legs as you responded as light-heartedly as you could, “But I always tell you that I love you.”

“Yes, but…” Jongho placed his hand on your thigh and slowly moved it upwards, his voice dropping even lower. “Last night, you told me that you meant it, that you were in love with me.”

Your jaw dropped. Your eyes darted back and forth, and your heart rate picked up as you tried to make sense of the situation— his words, his actions, and your body’s reactions.

“I— I did?” you whispered.

“Yes, and then,” Jongho’s voice also hushed to a whisper as he leaned close to you once more, his hand going further along your thigh, nearing your crotch. “You kissed me.”

“I… I— I,” you stammered, not a single coherent thought left in your brain.

Your brain only got emptier when you felt his soft lips against yours, your body immediately melting into his comfortable touch. You reciprocated his kiss, your hands unconsciously moving from his shoulders to his neck, bringing you closer to him. Your body lurched towards his when you felt his hand move around to your ass, the man firmly cupping it while his other hand slipped under your shirt and traced the curve of your waist, a soft moan playing on your lips.

“Just admit it,” he said softly with his lips still pressed against yours. “You love me, and I love you, too.”

His teeth got a hold of your lower lip and tugged it upwards as his hand started kneading your breast, making you gasp. Then, his patience started wearing thin. He lifted your shirt and moved your bra up to reveal your breasts, his mouth immediately going right for your nipple, and as he sucked, his hands pulled your pants down to reveal your soaking cunt. You were moaning loudly at that point, Jongho’s name barely rolling off your tongue.

When Jongho slipped his slender fingers into you, your entire body reacted. Your back arched, your toes curled, and your hands ran through his hair and gripped it tightly, his fingers pleasuring you greatly. He kept curling them inside you, searching for your G-spot, and once he found it, you cried loudly and sat up in bed.

In bed?

You looked around. Jongho was nowhere to be found, and you were in bed, awake. What the fuck… was that? You blinked the sleep out of your eyes and shifted in bed, only to feel something wet between your legs. You lifted your duvet to see that you were sitting on clean sheets, but soaking up your panties was your arousal.

Did you seriously just have a sex dream about your best friend?

You were mortified with yourself. For the rest of that week, you avoided Jongho like the plague because every single time you saw him, guilt pricked at your skin, brain, and heart. How could you dream of your best friend like that and then see him in the same way ever again? How were you supposed to act normal around him?

And so, you avoided the shit out of him. Seriously. You made sure to use the other exit from your classroom so that you wouldn’t have to deal with the group walking with you, and you ditched all of your regular spots because, fuck, you had no idea how you were going to be normal around him when you couldn’t even be normal with yourself before sleeping.

Because, truth is, that dream did something to you. Any time Jongho popped into your mind, your cunt would clench, and your body would rush with heat; and if you thought about him at night, you desperately had to do something about it. So, basically, every night, you were touching yourself while thinking about your friend— your best friend. What the fuck was wrong with you?

You were forced to meet with the group on Tuesday— Yunho left you a very long, very angry, very drunk voicemail telling you that if you didn’t show up on Tuesday, he was going to murder you. You doubted him, but when you heard Jongho and Mingi try to hold him back in the voicemail, you decided it wasn’t worth risking it.

You and Mingi were the first ones there, the two of you sitting in awkward silence as Hongjoong served you your drinks.

“Okay, um, what the fuck is wrong with you?” Mingi asked after taking a solid sip of his beer.

“W-What do you mean?”

“You’ve been avoiding us all fucking week! Did we do something wrong, or like, do you hate us or—”

“Oh my God, Mingi, no,” you immediately assured the guy. “I wasn’t trying to avoid all of you! Just…”

“Just what?”

“I was avoiding Jongho…”

“What the fuck? Why?” Mingi’s tone went from accusatory to worried and sympathetic, making you relax a little bit.

“Okay, so, uh… The other night… I… I may or may not have had a sex dream about Jongho… And when I woke up, I just… I got super turned on.”

“Wait, was it a wet dream?”

“I don’t know… Can girls even have wet dreams?”

“Well… Sounds like a wet dream to me,” Mingi answered after pondering the idea for a little.

“Great. Either way, I can’t even look at him the same way anymore. Fucking kill me,” you groaned as you laid your head on the bar top.

“Wait, so why’d you even dream about it?”

“I don’t know, man! I’ve been friends with the guy for fucking years, and this is the first time I’ve ever dreamt about him like that— and what’s worse is that he was so fucking good in my dream! Ugh, I wanna die!”

Mingi, who found the whole ideal hysterical, was laughing his ass off as he watched you get more and more mortified by the second.

“Did you ever figure out what happened that night, Y/N?” Hongjoong entered the conversation, making Mingi’s laughter die down a little.

“No,” you sulked. “I never got the chance to ask him again… I asked him in that dream, though.”

That made Mingi laugh all over again. He was clutching his stomach and laughing until he started crying, and he continued to laugh his ass off even when Yunho arrived. Well, he was still laughing, but he was able to wheeze to Yunho, “Dude, listen to this—”

“Mango, shut the fuck up!” you kicked Mingi in the shin, although that did nothing to the guy.

“Y/N had a random sex dream about Jongho!” Mingi barely said before laughing all over again.

“Really?” Yunho asked— he didn’t seem surprised, though.

“Yeah,” you said sadly.

“Well, I guess it makes sense that you’d have a sex dream about him considering what you did,” Yunho pondered out loud.

Mingi stopped laughing, and you, Hongjoong, and Mingi all stared at the tall man, Hongjoong asking, “What the fuck did she do?”

“She kissed him.”

The three of you stared at Yunho with wide eyes and dropped jaws.

“What?!”

“Yeah, Jongho told me about it.”

Your brain, at that point, was erroring out as it tried to recollect the events of that night while Mingi, on the other hand, was so insulted.

“You knew about this and didn’t tell me?!” he asked, feigning injury.

“I thought he told you! What do you want me to do about it?”

“Just check in with me next time! We should share everything with each other, Yunho.”

Yunho and Mingi continued to bicker in the background as you finally, finally, remembered what happened that night.

“Y/N, you’re home,” he said quietly while standing you upright. “Where are your keys?”

“In my pocket," you said with a slight giggle— the jeans you had on actually had front pockets, so you usually stashed your keys in there so you wouldn’t have to wear a purse when you had those jeans on.

With a sigh, Jongho carefully dug into your pocket, his fingers lightly grazing your upper thigh. You couldn’t help but let out a little moan; his action was so minimal and unintentional, but it still felt fucking good. God, you were definitely wasted.

Then, a crazy thought entered your drunken brain. You realized that you needed to thank Jongho for getting you home safe. Granted, it was his job as your best friend (not really, but what are friends for?) to make sure you made it home, but you still had to thank him, right? So, right after Jongho unlocked your door and opened it for you, you grabbed him by the collar, and you thanked him by kissing him.

To be honest, it was the world’s most anti-climactic kiss. Your lips just pressed against his, and that was it. When you moved away, you could see that Jongho was in complete shock, his jaw dropped slightly. His eyes were darting back and forth as he tried to decipher what the fuck you just did. His hands, which were previously on your shoulders, dropped to the side, limp.

That’s when you made the situation worse. You pulled him towards you again and kissed him properly. It was a gentle kiss, your lips enveloping his upper lip, your hand moving from his collar to his neck to make the kiss the slightest bit more sensual. And, to your surprise, you felt his hands on your waist. He reciprocated the kiss, bringing his body closer to yours as he kissed you more passionately. You were practically melting in his arms the longer he kissed you, your brain officially erroring out as you lost yourself in him.

When the chain of kisses ended, you found yourself dazed. You truly didn’t know what to say or do, so you just patted his chest and whispered, “I… Uh… Good night, Jongho…”

Jongho seemed unfazed, as if he wasn’t just making out with you seconds prior. He nodded and patted your head while responding, “Good night, Y/N. Sleep well.”

“Yeah, you too…”

Brain fuzzy, you crashed in your bed, your face still rosy and your lips slightly sore from kissing your best friend. Your best fucking friend.

You buried your face in your hands when you realized what you did, your mind chanting “what the fuck?” over and over again. You felt someone’s hand on your shoulder, but there was no way you were going to be consoled so easily.

“Y/N, don’t worry about it. It was a tiny mistake,” Hongjoong said softly. “We all know that you’re not usually like that.”

“I’m sick and tired of people telling me not to worry about it,” you groaned. “And being drunk is not an excuse… I… What do I do?”

The four of you were silent until Yunho said quietly, “I think you should just talk to him.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah, just talk it through. You guys are best friends, and I don’t like seeing the two of you avoiding each other.”

“Wait,” your head snapped up. “What do you mean each other? I thought I was avoiding him…”

“Why do you think he’s not here right now?” Yunho pointed out.

You gaped. Trivia was about to start soon, and Jongho was nowhere in sight.

“Where is he?”

All you did was kiss the guy, but you felt the guilt weighing on your shoulders not just because of the kiss but because of everything else you did following the kiss. The guy was your best friend for crying out loud. If it was just the kiss, you would’ve apologized immediately, and all would’ve been well, but the dreams just made it so much harder for you to do anything— even knocking on his apartment door was fucking difficult.

You somehow mustered the courage to do it, and after a couple of seconds, Jongho answered the door. He was wearing his standard class outfit: jeans, a hoodie, and a jean jacket; but he looked so fucking hot, so boyfriend material in them, that your heart actually skipped a beat or two.

“Hey,” Jongho spoke first, pulling you out of your head before you could spiral into a dizzy daydream.

“H-Hey, uh… Can I come in?”

Holding the door open, Jongho invited you in. You walked in hesitantly, awkwardly. You’d been in his apartment so many Goddamn times, so you shouldn’t have been so timid, but your anxiety truly got the better of you.

The two of you ended up taking a seat at his tiny dining table, the man sitting across from you. You fidgeted with the hem of your shirt as you looked down and tried to spit out something, anything.

“So…” you finally uttered. “I wanted to apologize.”

“For what?” Jongho genuinely sounded confused.

“I got really drunk the other night—”

“Y/N, it’s fine. I told you not to worry about it.”

“No! It’s not fine, Jongho,” you shook your head. “I— I came onto you, which was totally not cool of me, and I’m really sorry for that. I don’t like that you’re uncomfortable around me, which is totally valid considering what I did, but like… You’re my best friend, and it’s so weird that we’re avoiding each other like this…”

“Wait… Huh?”

“What?”

“I didn’t think you remembered, which is why I told you to not worry about it,” Jongho explained.

“I mean, I didn’t at first, but then it came rushing back to me like just now at the bar after Yunho told me what I did, and God, I feel awful for doing that to you,” you rambled.

“Why do you feel awful?”

“Because I kissed you without consent…? Isn’t that why you were avoiding me?”

“That… That wasn’t nonconsensual, Y/N…” Jongho started mumbling as the tips of his ears turned red.

“What… Um, what do you mean, Jongho?” you asked in a small voice.

“I mean…”

Jongho pressed his lips together and looked away, his ears turning redder as he ran his fingers through his hair. The guy was embarrassed as fuck, but he still managed to look so attractive that it made your heart, and your cunt, clench hard. He left his hand on the back of his head as he brought his gaze back to you.

“I kissed you back…”

Your jaw dropped slightly. Stammering, you asked, “S-So… What, uh.. What does that mean?”

“That I kissed you because I wanted to. Because I like you. And I was avoiding you because… Well, I didn’t want you to know that I, uh, had feelings… For you…”

Your face erupted into flames. You looked straight down at your lap, your eyes darting back and forth as you tried to make sense of the situation. The two of you were absolutely silent as clouds of embarrassment and slight tension filled the room.

“Wait…” Jongho broke the silence. “So, if you just remembered, then why were you avoiding me?”

“O-Oh… Because…” you forced yourself to get the words out— knowing him, he wouldn’t let you go without a proper explanation, and there was no way you were going to be able to lie to him at that point. Plus, even if you didn’t tell him, Mingi was going to, and it was definitely better that you told him than your dumbass friend.

“Spit it out, Y/N,” Jongho said, his voice breaking you out of your trance.

“Right.. Because I, uh… I had a sex dream about you… And now I can’t… Not see you… In… That… Way…”

And with that, you buried your face in your hands, trying to extinguish the red on your face; you could practically feel steam leaving your ears because of how embarrassed you were.

Jongho, meanwhile, was completely taken aback, but in the best way possible. If you were dreaming about him in that sense, did that mean you liked him back? That the feelings were mutual? That the kiss actually meant something whether you realized it or not?

While you were dying of embarrassment, Jongho hugged you— he thought he was reassuring you, but it only made you more shy and a little turned on feeling the way he hugged you securely to his surprisingly firm yet soft chest (you hugged him all the fucking time, so why you were only noticing it now was a mystery to you). You were so ready to let out a squeal— more like a dying dolphin noise— of embarrassment when you felt him choke down a chuckle and start petting your hair. Goddammit, was he trying to drive you insane?

Luckily, Jongho didn’t push the topic further (yet). The embarrassment slowly died down, and when you felt your heart unclench, you timidly hugged him back, and once you calmed down enough, he let go of you. Then, he fucking made your heart skip a million beats when he brushed your hair out of your face and looked at you with the softest eyes you had ever seen on him. You had seen him with plenty of girlfriends in the past, but this was the first time you had ever seen him display so much affection— and for you, of all people.

At some point, the two of you migrated to his sofa where you were sipping on water on one end of the long sofa and he was sitting in the arm chair next to the sofa like a fucking king. You had to keep your eyes on your water because if you got even the tiniest glimpse of his thighs and the way he was manspreading, you would fully combust.

“Y/N,” Jongho asked, his voice softer than ever.

“Yes!” you sat up attentively. “I-I mean, yeah…?”

You for sure thought Jongho was going to laugh at your actions, but he didn’t. He looked like everything was normal, but his ears were bright red once again.

“So…” he started. “In this dream… What happened?”

You choked on your water. You knew he was going to ask at some point, but you didn’t think he would actually ask you. You set the cup of water down on the coffee table in front of you and sighed softly before explaining the dream to him.

And as you explained your dream to him, Jongho’s face didn’t change in the slightest. He took all of your words in and just kept nodding, making it a little easier for you to tell him. Finally, after you finished retelling your dream— you only told him the dream that started all because God forbid he ever found out about you touching yourself while thinking about him in your dreams— he nodded and said, “Oh, wow… Hopefully, I live up to the way you dream made me out to be… Well, only if you’re okay with that.”

You blinked and froze, the words slowly starting to sink in. Was he asking for consent? Oh my God, did he want to fuck you?!

Without realizing it, you nodded slowly, your body taking over your mind. Then, you whispered, “I’d… I’d like to experience it for real…” giving him the verbal consent that he wanted.

Jongho held out his hand, willing you to hold it. He tugged your hand to make you get up and stand before him, and before you knew it, you were straddling him, your ass pressing against his knees. He was looking up at you with the softest, sparkliest eyes that you’d ever seen on him, making your heart skip a beat but in a way that was different from the way your wet dream version of him did.

With one hand on your back and the other weaving his fingers through your hair, Jongho led your head to meet his, his lips pressing against yours softly. He kissed you slowly, passionately. You were holding onto his shoulders at first, only for you to move your hand to his face and cup his cheek, the kisses deepening, your tongue slipping into his mouth as you felt your body slowly start to heat up.

His hands moved from your hair and back to your thighs, the palms of his hands rubbing against your clothed thighs so slowly and sensually that electricity zapped through all of your nerves. He let out little gasps and groans in between your kisses, his fingers pressing into your thighs when you tugged upwards on his lower lip.

Jongho was a lot more calculative with his actions in real life than in your dreams. His hands trailed from your thighs to around your butt, only to rest on the small of your back, his fingers teasing you by tugging at the waistband of your pants but not actually moving them down. You whined lightly against his lips, your hands gripping the collar of his jean jacket to get him to stop teasing you and start stripping both you and him down.

What sold him on moving faster was not the threat of your grip, but the way you were rolling your hips into him, the slightest movement making the bulge in his pants grow bigger and tighter; and it certainly did not help when you ran your fingers along his neck, one finger lingering on the little mole on his neck.

His intensity increased immediately. His hands went under your thighs and shifted you so that you were straddling only one of his thighs. He pushed down on your waist so that you were fully sitting on his thigh before running his hands up your shirt, his fingers brushing along the sensitive spots on your back.

The two of you only stopped kissing when you forced him to take off his jacket and when he helped you get out of your shirt, his eyes scanning your body as you tossed the shirt to the side.

“W-What? What is it?” you whispered, suddenly self-conscious and slightly reluctant to take your bra off.

“You’re stunning, Y/N,” he breathed out, his hands tracing the curve of your waist.

The compliment made you all sorts of shy all over again, making you bury your face in the nook of his neck. Jongho used that opportunity to unhook your bra, the straps slipping off your shoulders the second the band released. You ended up slipping the bra off, leaving your entire torso exposed. You felt the blush on your face get more intense when his hands and lips roamed your body, the man’s eyelashes fluttering as he left tiny, soft kisses along your skin.

Your hips resumed rolling, your clothed cunt rubbing along his thigh as his hands cupped and clutched your breasts. His hands kneaded your breasts continuously as he left little pink marks along your collarbone, chest, cleavage; and finally, when his mouth found your nipples, his hands moved back to your ass and held the underside of your ass securely as he sucked and nibbled on your tit.

“Jongho!” you cried as you flung your head back. “I— Angh— I—!”

You couldn’t form a single thought the second he started moving the waistband of your pants down. The only thing you could do was forcibly move his head up so that he was forced to look into your eyes, his dark hair covering his sparkling eyes slightly.

“I want you to fuck me already,” you whispered— more like whimpered— while grasping the collar of his shirt.

Wordlessly and effortlessly, Jongho stood up with you in his arms, your legs automatically wrapping around him as he carried you to his bedroom. He laid you down on his bed gently before starting to slowly remove his own clothes.

It was dark in his room, but thanks to the moonlight and the lights from the city, you were able to see his muscles and toned body reveal themselves as the clothes came off, and when he took off his pants, you saw that his cock, his girthy cock, was impatient and ready to go— you couldn’t even imagine the amount of self-restraint he was using if his cock was that red and angry.

Jongho turned to his nightstand and produced a condom. He tore the packet open and tossed it somewhere before rolling the condom on and getting on the bed next to you.

“C’mere,” he whispered as he laid down.

Soon, you were straddling him once more, your wet cunt hovering above his erect cock. At first, you thought he was going to ask you to ride him, but instead, he pulled your arms down so that you were essentially pinning him down, his lips making contact with yours as your chest pressed against his. His fingers ran through your hair and held the back of your head as he pushed your face closer to his, allowing his tongue to slip into your mouth.

You were so distracted by his tongue dancing with yours that you didn’t even realize his hands moved to your ass and his cock, lining up your entrance with the tip before pushing you down slowly, the girth of his cock spreading you so wide that you thought you were going to tear.

You cried against his mouth as he filled you up, your ass pressing against his thighs as he remained still inside you. Your walls clenched tightly around his fat cock, making him sharply inhale in between kisses, a little grunt escaping him shortly thereafter.

After a couple of seconds, you were able to relax your pussy just enough to start moving comfortably, your ass slapping his waist lightly as you moved your waist up and down. You moved slowly and gently at first as you moaned against Jongho’s lips, your chest rubbing against his, your nipples getting more sore by the second.

But, you were going a little too slow for the man underneath you. His hands, still on your ass, held onto you tightly as his waist jerked upwards. Your ass slapped against his waist so hard that the sound echoed in the room, and it felt so fucking good that your lips left Jongho’s so you could cry out in pleasure.

Jongho wanted to hear those cries more, so he continued to ram his waist upwards, and as he did so, he moved your ass so that he was continuously rubbing against your G-spot, making your orgasm arrive way sooner than you expected. You moaned loudly and dropped your head into the nook of his neck as you came, your cunt creaming around his dick.

You were panting heavily as Jongho sat up, his cock still deep inside you. Yet, he didn’t move. You remained seated on his lap as he gave you a second to recover and blink the stars out of your eyes as he moved his lips to your neck, peppering small kisses along your soft skin. His arms wrapped around you, his fingers pressing lightly into your waist and back, his nails tickling you ever so slightly. You rested your arms on his shoulders and let out euphoric sighs as he kissed you all over, leaving the occasional pink mark on your skin as he worked his way around the blank canvas of your body.

He started leaning into you the more he kissed you until he had you pinned to the bed. He was hovering above you when your back settled into the mattress, his hands laid flat right above your shoulders. The two of you just stared at each other, your mouths slightly open as you breathed in unison. Jongho’s hair was covering his eyes slightly, but you could still see them sparkle as he gazed into your eyes. His soft touch brushed against your temple as he moved your hair out of your face and tucked it behind your ear before cupping your face and kissing your lips lightly, a small smile appearing on his face.

You wrapped your arms around his shoulders and brought him closer to you, your lips yearning for him to kiss you more deeply, more passionately; and your waist shifted slightly and impatiently as you waited for him to fuck you. The second he locked lips with you again, his hips gyrated into yours, the light slaps of your waist meeting his filling the room.

Jongho’s pace slowly started speeding up, and the intensity of his thrusts increased exponentially as your cunt started taking the shape of his cock. Your insides started heating up to the point where you thought the friction was going to start a fire within you, and every time his waist rammed into yours with a satisfying slap, you let out a gasp mixed with a moan, your head pushing back further into the mattress.

Your legs wrapped around his waist completely, allowing him to thrust even faster into you. Jongho kept gasping your name softly as his orgasm neared, the melodic sound of your name leaving his lips making your body tingle all over and your toes curl. You hugged him even closer to you so that his chest was against yours and his nose was rubbing against the crook of your neck, his hot breath tickling your skin.

“You’re close, aren’t you?” Jongho gasped as you clenched around him.

You bit your lower lip and nodded, stars reappearing in your vision. Just seeing you bite your lower lip was enough for him. Jongho snapped his hips into yours with such force that made you cum hard, your walls fluttering as your arousal squirted out. Jongho, meanwhile, also came, his cock twitching as his cum filled the condom.

As you recovered from your high, Jongho pulled out and removed the condom before stroking himself a couple more times, ropes of cum decorating your torso as he finished completely on you, a groan of pleasure and relief rumbling in his chest. Then, wordlessly, he got off the bed and disappeared into his apartment.

You were able to push yourself up by the time Jongho returned with towels and water. He handed you the glass, and you took tiny sips of the water as you watched him wipe you down.

“Tell me something,” he said to you. “Was that as good as your dream?”

Jongho looked up at you as he waited for you to respond. So, you cupped his face and led him towards you to leave a lingering kiss on his lips.

“No, it was better.”

You thought you would be waking up from another dream, but no. This time, when you woke up, you woke up to see your best friend’s sleeping face right in front of yours, his soft features relaxed and beautiful. He looked so peaceful, so pretty while sleeping that it kind of made you jealous that he could look like fucking Sleeping Beauty.

You shifted slightly, immediately making the sleeping man hug you closer to his bare chest, his soft skin making you shiver slightly. And when you felt his gentle exhale flit past your ear before he buried his nose in your hair, every single nerve in your body tingled happily.

As Jongho continued to sleep, you observed him, your eyes landing on the little freckle on his neck. You absentmindedly traced your nail along it lightly, tickling him and subsequently waking him up.

“Mmm, good morning,” he uttered, his low morning voice echoing in your ear.

You’d had many sleepovers with him in the past, and you’d heard his morning voice many, many times in the past, but having him talk right into your ear like that was too sexy, too stimulating for you that early in the morning, your heart and cunt fluttering.

“Good morning, Jongho,” you whispered back.

Hugging you even closer, Jongho let out a happy exhale before leaving the faintest of kisses on your temple, making your heart skip and making you realize that you were falling for him.

But he didn’t need to know that. Not yet, anyway.

#broatz #cromernet #ateez #choi jongho #jongho smut #jongho x reader #reader x jongho #ateez jongho #choi jongho ateez #jongho ateez #choi jongho smut #ateez choi jongho

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swampstew · 10 months

Note

Can I request Buggy with Fluff N3 for the event? Thank you!! ❤️❤️❤️

Hello anon❤️ Thank you for your submission and patience! I hope you get a chance to read this :) You requested fluff, subtle intimacy, and I give you: [ Simple Touches ] Bandaging/stitching up an injury

Oh Captain, My Captain Buggy

Warnings: None. Fluff and cute stuffs. Ended up sorta sweet n' romantic in a way I wasn't anticipating but Buggy deserves it tbh, cutie but wet n' pathetic King of the Pirates❤️ Word count: 1.1K

“OOOOOWWWWW!”

You push through the pained howls of your Captain as you stitch up his latest injuries. For a man who had eaten the chop-chop fruit, he sure got brutally chopped up by other people more than he should reasonably be.

To be fair, his latest network of contacts involved some intense and no-nonsense individuals. Two in particular who seem to have a rather tight hold on his gorgeous blue head as he did their bidding and processed their contracts.

“DAMNIT Y/N that HURTS!” Buggy hollers at you, tears spilling down his face in pure agony. It makes your heart break. Still you push on.

“It will hurt more if it festers and worsens. Then we’d have to seriously chop pieces off you,” you chide him gently, done with pushing the needle through the tail end of the long gash on his chest. “This is going to sting a bit but I’ll count down from 3. 3—” you tightened the sutures securely before he could hold his breath.

“YYYYEEEEOOOOOWWWW!!!!” his head flew from his neck, as did his hands and feet from his body. “GRR!! YOU ENJOYED THAT TOO MUCH!” he spit at you.

You give him an unimpressed look, “You know that that’s not true. Now get back here. You have some wounds on your face and right hand that need to be disinfected and bandaged. If you can make it through without any complaints, I’ll give you a treat. Sound good?”

His head reattaches to his head but his hand floats down to grip his chin, “A treat? What kind of treat?”

“A nice one. We got a deal?”

With a nod, Buggy reassembles himself and sits still as you inspect each cut and bruise. Washing away the dirt and dried blood, applying a salve on the wounds, and wrapping each one in a bandage or long, woven cotton wrap to soak up any leaking from the cuts. A hushed song brews in your throat and without realizing it, you start to emit the tune from your lips as you patch him up.

Buggy watches you closely as you lightly hum to yourself while you work. Normally, he would literally talk his ass off about anything and everything – but watching you treat him so tenderly has his mouth dry and his mind quiet. Trying to understand the feelings in his chest that you cause him to have with your firm but kind personality. Not understanding why you treat him with such dignity and warmth despite his antics; you’re one of the few people who sees through his bullshit but you also accept it, encourage it even. In his brain playing back all his interactions with you over the last year that you’ve been on his crew to better understand what your deal is.

His eyes bug out of his head for a moment, a memory unearthing itself. With Alvida.

“I think the new doc likes you, Bugs,” she tilted her cowboy covered head at Buggy. When he gave her a confused look, she scoffed and used her head to gesture at you sitting at the bar with his most trusted men. “You’re telling me that you’ve NEVER noticed how much time they manage to spend with you, or how they always talk you up? That they know almost everything about you that not even your own crew knows about?” Buggy scoffed, “Most of my crew are idiots, why would I tell those morons anything?” Alvida gave him a bewildered look, “Then why do you share anything with the doc?” “I don’t share EVERYTHING!” “Oh no? So you haven’t spilled to them how Emperor Shanks is the only man you can respect as the next King of the Pirates?” His hands flew to her face and smothered her speech, “QUIET YOU DAMN WOMAN!”

Buggy felt like an idiot.

That was maybe three months ago.

“All done. You should heal up in no time but if you feel worse, you know where to find me.”

Buggy brought his hand to the back of his neck, “Yeah. Sure.” He wasn’t sure how to pivot from being a crybaby patient to a flashy guy with rizz when he suddenly felt…overly aware of how he acts around you. To be perceived by you and now knowing that you were perceiving him.

“Wh-where’s my treat?”

“Oh that’s right I do owe you a nice one. Wait right here.”

His mind is racing a mile a minute, trying to plan, trying to scheme a charming personality in 2-seconds flat as he watches you go to your desk and pull out a dark bottle. Buggy didn’t notice how attractive your face is as he did just now. He always thought you were the most attractive in the crew in general, but now he was seeing your face. And he found that…he actually quite liked it.

Your step falters are you become aware of his intense stare. You feel…insecure suddenly. Is there something gross on your face or scrubs? Does he not like liquor suddenly? Oh no, is your hair messy?? With a trembling hand you tuck some loose hair behind your ear and lightly touch your scrub as you present the bottle.

“An aged rum that I nicked from our last raid. I hear it’s a grossly expensive brand.”

Buggy took the bottle and rolls it in his hands quietly, not saying anything at all. You watch him nervously, anxiety eating at your gut, a hot flush spreading behind your ears and the back of your neck. You know for a fact that Buggy likes expensive things, no matter what it is. Even if he hates what it actually is, like that time he tried bull fighting fish caviar. He was laid up in your office for a week after that one. He still keeps a preserved jar around, just so he can say he has it on hand.

“I hear it goes well with steak, or something,” you mumble, confidence draining away slowly.

He perks up to that, “Steak? Oh yeah, yes that does sound like a good pairing.” He stands up from the cot and shifts on his feet.

Buggy the Star Clown is shooting his shot.

“If I make Cabaji cook up a few steaks, would you…be interested in joining me for dinner? A flashily impromptu date?”

Your eyes nearly bug out of your head, that being the last thing you expect to hear from him. You had been certain that you would have to ask him out yourself with all the hints and nudges you gave him in the past seemed to go, well, right over his head.

“Oh! Y-yes that sounds nice!”

Smiling, Buggy turns to exit. Passing through the threshold he turns back to add, “I’ll pick you up at your cabin later. Escort you to the dining hall and all that jazz.” He ducks out of the room.

You’re glad he isn’t there anymore because your knees weaken and you grab the cot in support. Thrilled, you look at your schedule and decide to close up early. The injured would have to stay injured on their time, you had an important date tonight.

#buggy the clown #buggy x reader #oh captain my captain mini event #eustasscaptainkid #swampstew bedtime stories #swampstew #swampstew stories #anon asks #buggy the star clown #captain buggy

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hermannsthumb · 18 days

Note

Hey hey could you write something about newt confronting his middle school bully a la this post: https://10001gecs.tumblr.com/post/729455540321779712/my-high-school-bully-reached-out-to-me-and-asked

(post) hmm i wonder who sent this in after we talked about it in discord 7 months ago... allusions to non sfw behavior at the end !! (edit also literally seconds after i posted this i realized this ask says middle school and not high school like i wrote. sigh.)

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

“Oh, shit,” Newton says. “Hermann, do you see that guy?”

He’s doing some strange, jerking head motion over the ambiguous vicinity of Hermann’s left shoulder, and it takes Hermann a good few seconds to realize Newton wants him to turn around and look at the fellow in question. He puts down his sandwich with a small sigh: he waited two hours for Newton to wrap up his work so he would have company in the mess hall for lunch, lunch which will continue to evade him, he supposes.

But Newton kicks his shin under the table as he cranes his neck around. “Newton,” he snaps with a startle. It wasn’t hard enough to hurt, but—offended at the mere principle of it—he hits Newton’s own shin back with the end of his cane. Newton is too preoccupied with attempting to hide the entire upper half of his body beneath their table to put up a fuss.

“Don’t be so obvious about it,” he says to Hermann. “Be subtle, subtle. Yeah, perfect.”

There’s no one exceptionally exciting over Hermann’s shoulder when he turns back about painfully slowly, or at the very least no one he can see causing Newton to get as worked up as he is. It’s the usual gaggle of personnel they see wandering about the Shatterdome with them. “Ugly blue shirt,” Newton whispers, “and a stupid beard.”

Hermann spots him after another glance through the food line—a stocky, unassuming man waiting with a tray in his hands, though admittedly Hermann can’t find anything particularly offensive about his shirt or his facial hair, not even by Newton’s standards. “What of him?” Hermann says.

He doesn’t recognize the man, but that’s hardly surprising. There’s been plenty of new faces about the base recently after the latest round of Shatterdomes shuttered their operations and sent their skeleton crews to Hong Kong as a last resort. Hermann expects he might be one of the transferred ranger recruits. He lacks the, ah, soft disposition of Newton and Hermann and their more technologically-inclined ilk, and is certainly built large enough to hold his own in a jaeger.

“I think I know him,” Newton says.

This is not that surprising either. Newton has a curiously long list of ex-partners spread throughout the various networks of the PPDC, partially because the instability of their employment at any given base up until recently (or, indeed, the instability of their expected lifespan) is not conducive to long-term relationships, and partially because Newton’s personality is not conducive to it either. Hermann envies the people who have had the means to escape Newton: he himself has had no such luck. “Another poor soul you’ve scared off?” he says, and takes a bite out of his sandwich more aggressively than he intended.

“Ew, man, gross.” Newton makes a face at him. “No way. He’s a total asshole. He used to make my life hell.”

Hermann swallows his mouthful of sandwich. This admission, on the other hand, is surprising. Newton doesn’t usually make his dislike of people unknown, especially not to Hermann, and Hermann had been under the assumption he was familiar with the full roster of Newton’s ‘enemies’—most of whom are academic rivals of some kind (though certainly none surpass Hermann’s high ranking in that particular category), and all of whom Hermann had Googled obsessively after being made aware of their existence. “Sounds a bit like the whole 'taste of your own medicine' cliche,” Hermann says.

“No, come on, I'm serious, I mean actual hell, just ‘cause I was out about being into dudes,” Newton says. “Whatever bullshit you can think of—stole my shit, made fun of my glasses, pushed me around, called me lots of really creative and exciting slurs. Really original content. He flushed one of my notebooks down a toilet one time and I got in trouble for it. Just—you know, stupid, immature, homophobic jock-vs-nerd bullshit.”

More than slightly alarmed, Hermann shoots another glance over his shoulder. The fellow with the beard has moved ahead in the line and Hermann has a much clearer view of him now. He’s most certainly at least twice Newton’s size, if not larger, and Hermann doesn’t like the idea of him treating Newton in such a physically aggressive manner by any means (to say nothing of the other half of the harassment he received). “When on Earth did that happen?” he says. “The Jaeger Academy? You reported him to—someone, anyone, I hope.” And if not Hermann is more than happy to do so now.

“Oh, no,” Newton says. “It was back when I was in high school for a year. Before I skipped twenty grades, I mean.”

Hermann relaxes his shoulders, which had grown quite tense. “Ah,” he says. As a child he was unfortunately quite familiar with schoolyard bullies himself.

“His name is something stupid, like Chad or Chet or something. Not actually, but you know what I mean. I used to stalk him on Facebook when I was in grad school to make sure his life still sucked shit. He got divorced the same month I got my fourth doctorate. Really poetic. Oh, fuck.”

He ducks back beneath the table. Evidently he isn’t fast enough, because when Hermann turns, Chad-Chet-something is staring intently at the empty space Newton inhabited seconds prior. If the wide-eyed surprise that flashes across his face is any indication, he has recognized Newton in return.

“He’s coming this way,” Hermann says to the rustling somewhere in the vicinity of his ankles. It must be filthy down there. He hears Newton curse, though given the alarming way the entire table wobbles, it may be because he’s just hit his head on something. “Would you like me to make up a lie and say you’ve gone off somewhere? Or I can stall for a bit, and you can—I don’t know—crawl off.”

“Newt?” Newton’s former classmate says.

Newton rises back up slowly, his hair in significant disarray. Hermann fantasizes briefly—not for the first time—about going at it with a comb. “Heyyyyy, man,” Newton says. “What’s up?”

Newton’s classmate had been squinting at him with a small frown, but (to Hermann’s immense surprise) he begins to smile. “It is you, that’s wild! I don’t know if you remember, but we went to school together—like, fifteen, twenty years ago. We were in the same homeroom.”

“Oh, totally,” Newton says. “Bradley?”

“Seth.”

“What’s, uh, what’s brought you to Hong Kong?” Newton says.

Seth looks down pointedly at the empty chair positioned between Newton and Hermann. “Mind if I sit here?” he says, and though neither of them respond, he drops his tray down with a small clatter and follows suit. “I joined on with the PPDC last year, and I was stationed in Seattle up until a couple weeks ago,” he continues, confirming Hermann’s earlier suspicions. “I’m still getting used to everything. I heard there was a Dr. Geiszler working at one of the labs here somewhere, but I had no idea that was you. Did they just throw you over here too?”

Newton has gone a little red in the face, as if he’s bottling up a great deal of shouting, cursing, and possibly crying, and Hermann is somewhat impressed at his restraint in not making a scene. He feels a small surge of protectiveness for Newton (despite everything) and steps in not-very-smoothly to help him. “Newton—Dr. Geiszler I have been stationed here since 2020,” he says. “I’m Dr. Hermann Gottlieb.”

“Hermann’s my lab partner,” Newton manages to say. “We get along really awesomely. We’re, like, pretty close. Seth and I went to high school together, Hermann.”

“Mm,” Hermann sniffs. “So you’ve mentioned.”

He does not bother hiding his disdain, and Seth is astute enough to notice and jump to the logical conclusion of precisely the conversation he’d interrupted: he gives them a small, embarrassed grin, and an exaggerated shrug of his shoulders. “Yeah, I was kind of an asshole back then,” he says, “but you know how teenagers are.” He picks up his tray and stands. “Anyway, I’ll leave you guys alone. We’ll have to catch up later, Newt? Maybe dinner?”

“Totally,” Newton says.

“I should hire someone to kick his ass,” he says to Hermann as they watch Seth find a seat with some fellow rangers—similarly fresh faces, Hermann presumes them to be his crowd from Seattle—across the mess hall. “I bet I could bribe another ranger into it, just go a littttle too hard in on a sparring match. Maybe knock out a few of his teeth. Ugh. Like I’d ever get dinner with that dick.”

“I got dinner with Seth,” Newton announces in the laboratory a week later.

“I wondered where you were last night,” Hermann says, feigning disinterest as he squints at his computer screen. In truth he’s rather peeved at Newton over it; they’ve had a long-standing arrangement as dinner companions for several years at this point, and he’d waited for Newton at their table in the back of the mess hall for an hour before he finally realized he was being stood up and stormed off to his quarters. He’d debated tossing out the extra chocolate pudding cup he had stolen as dessert for Newton but decided to eat it instead, imagining with relish the whole time how upset Newton would be if he found out. It made him feel a little bit better.

“Oh, yeah, sorry I ditched you, I kinda forgot,” Newton says. “I was on my way to the mess and he kinda accosted me out of nowhere and offered to buy me noodles downtown, as an 'apology'. Not gonna turn that down. I made sure to run up a bill. But, dude, you’ll never believe this.”

“Mm,” Hermann says.

He hears Newton made an impatient little shuffling noise behind him. Then Newton is stomping over and grabbing onto the back of Hermann’s desk chair to spin Hermann around to face him. He boxes Hermann in, one hand on each armrest, and (with nowhere else to go) Hermann folds his arms across his chest and scowls up at him. “Fine. Go on.”

“So,” Newton begins gleefully, “it turns out he’s also gay now. Or I guess he always was, which explains the divorce thing, but you know what I mean. He said the reason he treated me like shit was because he was jealous of me for being out, and also because he thought I was infecting him with my gay cooties or whatever since he wanted me soooo bad. What a jerk.” He drops his arms away from Hermann’s chair. “Anyway, we boned.”

Hermann sits up quickly and nearly collides with Newton's abdomen. “What?”

“Eh, don’t worry,” Newton says, “it’s not like I’m into him or anything. I’m gonna hold that grudge forever, sorry, he’s not hot enough to make me forget all that, even if he isn't an asshole anymore. I know what I’m doing. It’s all part of my awesome revenge plan: I’m gonna string him along and then dump him hard after he gets a taste of what it's like to date someone as cool as me.”

Hermann is of two minds: the first is that Newton’s plan is abysmally stupid, and the second, that he can’t help but be relieved that Newton is not earnestly subjecting himself to a relationship with a man whom he’s professed to hate. Loathe as he is to admit it, Newton deserves—Hermann grits his teeth—better. “How exactly do you intend to ‘string him along’?” Hermann says. “And why would you even want to? He hardly seems worth the effort.”

“Number one, by being hot and charming as usual,” Newton says, and rolls his eyes at Hermann’s loud scoff. “Shut up. I’m irresistible. He’s already trying to get me to go out for coffee with him today. Can you believe how clingy he is? So desperate. Ugh. And number two—” He shrugs, and something uncomfortable simmers within Hermann’s chest at the sight of the light blush rising to his cheeks. “I meeean, I don’t know, dude. The hate sex was kinda doing it for me. I guess technically I was the only one doing the hating there, because I’m irresistible, but it was still pretty hot.”

Being treated to details of Newton’s sexual proclivities is not a new experience for Hermann, as Newton seems to think it both constitutes daily small talk in the laboratory when their work gets slow and something Hermann genuinely cares to hear about, but Hermann finds himself bristling at it now. He wasn’t aware such an, er, act, spurned on by hatred, was even a possibility with Newton—that Newton would enjoy it. Could they have been finding more constructive outlets for their mutual dislike throughout all these years? Simply embraced the fiery passion of it all? Certainly Hermann has crafted list after list of increasingly erotic ways he could shut Newton up, but it is the first time he begins to wonder if Newton might not have done the same.

He forcefully turns his chair back around to hide his face from Newton. He is flushing, his skin hot beneath his collar. His computer screen swims in front of him. “That’s lovely to hear,” he says, after far too long of a silence. “I’m glad you—enjoyed yourself. Best of luck with it all.”

“Right,” Newton says, after too long of a silence of his own. “Uh, I’ll be back in an hour-ish.” He adds, mockingly, “We’re getting coffee. I’ll bring you back a muffin and tea or something.”

Once Newton has gone, Hermann drops his head into his hands with a small groan.

#newmann #maria's fanfiction tag #eh i don't think this is my best but i'm trying to get myself back into the writing groove

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fanficfanattic · 6 months

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I think the thing with Jamie is that he didn’t particularly have any role models of how to go from ‘bad’ to ‘good’. His mum wasn’t perfect, but she didn’t pretend to be. I bet she said sorry when she upset him. Most of the team was good from the start so never fucked with him really. And I love them, but Isaac and Colin didn’t really do a redemption arc. They stopped being little shits and that was apparently enough.

But that isn’t what I really mean. No one who has particularly hurt Jamie has ever made amends. (Dad and probably his dad’s mates.)(To some degree, Roy and possibly Ted). Plus when the type of being hurt you’re used to is an extreme one, it can skew your perspective of even what counts as hurtful. So I don’t think Jamie would have thought of himself as bad as his dad. Not in a million years.

Even though what he said to Sam made Sam lose confidence in himself. The way Jamie’s dad’s bullshit made him lose his own confidence. None of Jamie’s peers could make him feel that way, so it must have seemed absurd that he could to them. And if he’d thought of it that way, he’d have probably thought they were babies if that was enough.

Which is compounded by the fact that thinking that way probably meant he was grateful to his dad. Believed he’d needed his dad doing that to him so he could be strong and tough and become a premier league footballer. Ted reinforced that idea at least twice.

But Sam’s strength came from the foundation of his father’s love. Jamie became truly strong when he got the support of his team. Roy got (more) out of his own goddamn way once he let Jamie in as a part of his support network.

Jamie had to see people taking steps to be the best version of themselves to start that journey for himself. And part of that meant getting out from under his father’s thumb and away from his fists.

#jamie tartt #roy kent #ted lasso #jamie’s mum georgie #georgie ted lasso #james tartt sr #colin hughes #isaac mcadoo #sam obisanya #ola obisanya

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canonmisogynyvictimstournament · 8 months

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PROPAGANDA

NATASHA ROMANOFF (Marvel Cinematic Universe) (CW: Forced Sterilization)

1.) Was reduced to “chick who fights” and wasn’t given any characterization at all outside of that up until Winter Soldier, the third movie in which she played a major role. Her sideplot in Age of Ultron revolved around dating Bruce, whom she apparently related to because she felt like a monster for not being able to have children (we’re never shown why she actually wants them, it was the first time she’d ever mentioned it), she was the only original Avenger to die before the final battle in Avengers: Endgame and her death was mostly used to give the other male Avengers a reason to fight on. Most of the movies she was in, she spent in a cat suit that was halfway unzipped. I think there are maybe four movies in the entire MCU where she interacts with another named female character. In general, she’s a super interesting character who was super underdeveloped despite being in a ton of movies.

2.) Due to being forcibly sterilized and not having a family of her own, she concludes that when someone has to sacrifice their life For The Greater Good^tm, it should be her (who has spent the past few years as a –if not The– leader managing the security of a superpowered, post-disaster Earth), instead of her guy friend (who has spent the past few years committing war crimes while hiding from his entire support network) because he had a family (that disappeared due to Magical Scifi Bullshit and Might come back if they succeed on their quest) that has been fully capable of supporting themselves while he’s been away secret agent-ing in the past and aware that he might not come back one day from his dangerous job.

Out of universe, there was very little merchandise of her (even in group shots) and it took ages for her to get her own movie in the Everyone Has Their Own Movie Or Three franchise.

3.) She was fridged to upset all the men in endgame and didn’t have a word spoken of her after her death unlike Tony who got a whole funeral.

CORDELIA CHASE (BUFFY THE VAMPIRE SLAYER/ANGEL THE SERIES) (CW: Pregnancy)

1.) (downs an entire bottle of vodka and slams it back on the table) SO. CORDY. Cordy started off as a supporting character in Buffy the Vampire Slayer. At the start she was your typical high school mean girl character, but as the show went on we got to see more depth to her character: her insecurities, her courage, her capacity for incredible acts of kindness. Then after the third season she moved into the show’s spin off, Angel, where from the beginning she was basically the show’s secondary protagonist. Her and Angel were the two mainstays of the show’s main cast, she gets the most episodes centered on her out of all the characters aside from Angel (and yes, I’ve checked), and we really got to see her grow from a very shallow and self-centered and kind of mean person to a true hero who was prepared to give up any chance at a normal life to fight the good fight while still never losing the basic core of her character. There were some… questionable moments like the episode where she gets mystically pregnant with demon babies and things got a bit iffy like halfway through season 3 where the writers seemed to run out of ideas for what to do with her outside of sticking her in this romance drama/love triangle situation with the main character but overall, pretty good stuff right? THEN SEASON 4 HAPPENED. In season 4 she gets stripped of literally all agency and spends pretty much the entire season possessed by an evil higher power, and while possessed she sleeps with Angel’s teenage son (who BY THE WAY she had helped raise as a baby before he got speed-grown-up into a teenager it was a whole thing don’t worry about it) and gets pregnant with like. the physical manifestation of the higher power that’s possessing her. it’s about as bad and stupid as it sounds and also is like the third time cordy’s got mystically pregnant in this show and like the fourth mystical pregnancy storyline overall (you will be hearing more on that note in other submissions I’m so sorry). after giving birth she goes into a coma, in which she remains for the rest of season 4 and the first half of season 5. SPEAKING OF WHICH DON’T THINK SEASON 5 IS GETTING OFF SCOT FREE HERE. yeah so in season 5 the show just FULLY starts trying to erase cordy’s existence. she gets mentioned ONCE in the first episode and then never again until halfway through the season where she wakes up, helps out Angel for a bit and encourages him in his fight against evil, and then goes quietly into that good night and dies so it can be all sad and tragic. I’d call it the worst fridging of all time but even THAT feels generous because the whole point of fridging is killing off a female character so a man can be sad, and after Cordy dies basically no one’s even sad about it because the show immediately goes back to pretending she never existed. she is not mentioned ONCE in the two episodes after she dies. in the whole stretch of time between her death and the end of the season she gets mentioned exactly four times. again, I counted. anyway the fun twist to all of this is that all of this happened because the actress who played cordy got pregnant before season 4 and joss whedon was so pissed off about this affecting his plans for the show that he decided to completely fuck over her character and then fire her and write her out of the show. so cordy’s a victim of both writing AND real life misogyny!! good times!!

2.) OH SO MANY THINGS they menaced by giving her terrible hair cuts, making her seem like she’d get together with the guy she loves (and who loves her back) but instead she was killed and when she was brought back, she got possessed by an evil entity who used her body to give birth to itself. afterwards she was in a long coma and died. her character was so throughoutly assassinated

3.) She got demonically pregnant TWICE - there was this real sense of a womb/ability to get pregnant as like, a place for evil to get in. She got positioned as femme fatale and evil mother. The actress basically got fired for being pregnant, and when she agreed to come back for a single final episode she specifically said they could do anything but kill off the character. Guess what happened

#polls #round 3 #week 6 #new #cw forced sterilization #cw pregnancy

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sldlovescartoons · 3 months

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One of the bigger crimes of the bulk of The Mighty Nein being kind of stupid, and the giant blind spot Caleb’s Intelligence and Wisdom Scores have towards his trauma is that nobody is there to really logic shit out when it pops up. Like when they first go to Nott’s home town, there’s honestly a lot more clear evidence that Yeza was working with the Assembly and got snatched by Kyrn. The village was recently attacked by Kyrn. Even the letter refers to Trent’s research as separate. Also all the torture was specifically a Trent Scourger Special. The assumption that the Assembly snatched and was torturing Yeza came from a real animal fear place. But Caleb is too zonked on trauma juice to shuffle things out and way too ready to place more suffering at his own feet. And none of the others have the kinds of smarts to be like “Okay, but that was that Trent guy, right? This letter talks like their stuff is separate. I don’t see why they would take him unless he’d done something bad- maybe the simple answer is right one here?” Along those lines. But that one is really minor and understandable because there was a lot going on-

The time where this was the biggest crime was after the dinner with Trent. Because that shit Trent said about sending the woman to heal Caleb is so obviously bullshit if you really scrutinize it at all. Like I didn’t need Matt to say in the wrap up it was bullshit because I knees immediately it was bullshit because it doesn’t make any goddamned sense. Broken Scourgers are held in the Sanatorium for a reason. They are really dangerous to Trent and his operation because not only do they risk leaking his methods to the public, but because if one dies in fact get better, or rather get magical cleric healing, they will definitely want to kill Trent in the aftermath. The built in risk with an operation like his is that he’s also training up his future executioners if any of them turn on him. You know, like they were? As it was, Astrid was going to take his ass out in good time and she’s fully drunk the koolaid, you don’t need a pissed prodigy on your heals too. Trent’s stated reason for freeing Caleb is fucking nonsense, it’s stupid, but none of the Nein have the sort of Wisdom and Smarts to be like “that doesn’t make any sense, though? If he wanted to free you to make you reach your potential, why did he wait so long? It makes more sense to do it sooner. Also, if he has ready access to clerics with magic like that, why doesn’t he just use them to fix all broken scourgers right away? It would increase the number of spies in his network, so either there’s a good reason he doesn’t heal them, or he doesn’t have open access to clerics that powerful and he’s bluffing. This doesn’t make a lot of sense.” And so on. Also just their dumbassery (said with all the affection in the world, I love the Nein. To bits.) they never really get how and why Trent is so scary and dangerous. Not fully. And are thus woefully unprepared to help Caleb with his problems like Caleb helps them with theirs. And it’s not their fault, they are angels and they are doing their best, but boy does it do a number of Caleb not having sort of support. The closest is Beau, and I love her, she’s like my third favorite behind Caleb and Jester, but- Yikes. Just Yikes.

#critical role #c2 #the mighty nein #caleb widogast #ramble #meta

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lou-struck · 10 months

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When You're With Me

Tooru Oikawa x Reader

~Tooru has just gotten back from a long trip abroad and is ready to get home.

WC:1.6k

This is my Submission for @mrskenmakozume Home Collab which can be found HERE

Tagging: @enchantedforest-network

Rain pummels your windshield as you creep through your lane at a snail’s pace as yet another driver cuts you off clearly, not paying attention to where they are going.

You glance at your dashboard clock and see the blinking green numbers glaring back at you.

03:24 am and let loose a dramatic sigh as the car that cut in front of you merges poorly again, this time nearly hitting a group of businessmen who were making their way across the crosswalk.

It’s far too early to deal with this bullshit.

But people always do crazy things when they are in love

Even if it’s something like picking their boyfriend up from the airport at three in the morning

Tooru Oikawa has been away for two months traveling the globe with his professional volleyball team. Of course, he has had tons of away trips before; none have ever lasted this long.

It’s strange, but without him, the new house the two of you moved into doesn’t feel like home.

The rapidly changing time zones and your schedules have made communicating nearly impossible. Whenever you have a free moment, he is out with his teammates or is in a dead zone, and whenever he’s free, it’s at some ungodly hour when you are trying to sleep.

You have missed him terribly.

Watching your boyfriend’s volleyball matches on the television did little to lighten the load you have placed on your heart.

“To keep up with this heavy volume of traffic, please use the front two lanes solely for unloading passengers and luggage. Violators will be towed at the owner’s expense.” The automated speaker repeats for the third time since you have been waiting in the arrivals drop-off lane at the airport.

If it weren’t so early, you would feel a bit guilty picking up your boyfriend in your pajamas and fuzzy slippers, but you don’t have the energy to care, not when you are only a few meters away from finally getting to see him up close.

And that you do.

Clad in his team’s warm-up sweats and jacket, Tooru stands on the edge of the sidewalk looking out at the passing cars trying to spot yours. When he sees you approaching, his features light up boyishly, and he starts to walk toward you. He makes it halfway until he looks behind him, where his luggage sits untouched by everything except for the rain.

He doesn’t have the time to look embarrassed as he grabs them and weaves through the crowd of travelers. When he gets to the car, he impatiently tosses both bags into the back seat with a tired grunt.

He slams the door shut a bit louder than he intended to do, but it doesn’t slow him down at all. In a flash, the passenger door swings open, and he lunges over the center console with a squeal. “Baby, you’re here. I have missed you so much. Did you miss me?”

His long, lean arms wrap around you, and he holds you as close to his body as he can.

His normally pristine-looking hair is drenched with rainwater, and the droplets soak through the sleep shirt you have on. But it doesn’t bother you. “Of course I have.”

Despite the annoyed honking of the cars around you itching for your spot, you continue to hold him. The heavy weight of loneliness that has been resting over your heart disappears as you listen to the familiar rhythm of his heartbeat.

“I’ve missed you so much,” he repeats, mumbling into your shoulder. “I’m sorry it took so long.”

“You sure took your time.” you sniffle, “We should’ve done this hours ago.”

He snorts amusedly and gives you a playful squeeze, “Next time, I’ll just fly the plane myself through the damn thunderstorm; I’m sure I could.”

“I don’t think it’s that easy,” you giggle, pulling back to get a good look at his face. As much as he tries to hide with playful winks and looks of adoration, he looks utterly exhausted; his skin has an unnatural paleness to it that accentuates the dark bags that rest under his bright brown eyes. You know he can’t sleep on airplanes, so he must be running on fumes by now.

“Can we go home?” he mumbles, tiredly gripping your hand. “I want nothing more than to just fall asleep in our bed, in our room with you.”

“Absolutely,” you respond, intertwining your fingers with his, “I think we both deserve a good night’s sleep.” Driving with one hand is considerably difficult, but you don’t want to let go of Tooru’s hand for even a moment.

He is abnormally quiet for the majority of the car ride home as he stares down at your hand, occasionally running his thumb over the back of your hand.

“Did you watch me?” he murmurs softly, breaking the comfortable silence. “In my games?”

“Every game, but you know that already.” you tease, a pleasant smile on your lips from his question. You know what’s coming next.

He smirks and raises your hand to his lips in a teasing kiss. “But did you really watch me? That one serve I did was incredible, wasn’t it?”

“Tooru, you broke the poor guy’s nose.” you giggle. “I don’t know if I’d call that incredible.”

“Nope, I did him a favor~” he yawns, looking just a bit sinister; you don’t know all the details, but the player he nailed with that wicked serve of his was known to be quite the instigator in the Volleyball League. “He didn’t know how to shut up, so I gave him a distraction.”

“Just as petty as ever,” you giggle as you turn down your street. Tiredness makes the trip go by much faster.

“I think you meant to say pretty.” he grins as you pull into your driveway. The neighborhood is quiet as your car comes to a stop. It’s not even four in the morning, so the two of you have plenty of time to catch up on some rest. Especially since you both have the day off.

“Should we get your bags out of the back?” you ask, sliding out of the driver’s seat.

“Leave them; I have more important things to bring in with me.” he coos, stepping out the door and scooping you up. You cover your mouth to muffle your squeal and look around. Your neighbors may be suckers for Tooru’s charm, but you don’t think you have the same effect on them.

After spending the day traveling, you wonder how he still has the strength to carry you; the stamina of professional athletes never ceases to amaze you.

“Ahh, home sweet home.” he sighs dreamily, unlocking the door and carrying you through the threshold as if you are newlyweds. He locks the door behind him with a click and reluctantly sets you down carefully with the last of his energy; whatever else he was going to say was cut up by a deep yawn.

“Woah, big yawn. I think we should get some rest,” you grin, thinking about how wonderful it will feel to finally get to rest in your boyfriend’s arms. You’ve missed his sleep-talking and long limbs more than you would ever tell him; he can be such a tease about these kinds of things.

His shoulders slump as he smiles goofily, “Sleep is good.”

You flick off your slippers and watch as they hit the wall with a little thud.

“Hey, that’s not nice.” he sighs, wrapping his arms around you and resting the majority of his weight on your shoulders. “This is our home; we should love it, not hit it with bunny slippers.”

“Sorry, wall,” you apologize with mock sincerity and try to drag both you and Tooru to the bedroom. Your side of the bed is a mess of sheets and pillows while Tooru’s is still partially made; you haven’t had the heart to move anything since he left, replacing his form with body pillows and heated blankets that don’t do him justice.

You both flop down onto the firm mattress, too tired to do anything else. Sleep is on the menu tonight, and you are starved.

Burrowing into the sheets, you enjoy the cold sensation of silk against your skin. “Feel’s good,” he murmurs into the pillow holding out his arms for you to join him.

“You’ve missed it that much?” you ask. “We have only lived here for a few months; does it already feel like home?”

“Not it’s you.” his breath is hot against your neck. “When you are with me, anywhere can feel like home. You know, it’s funny, but I haven’t had a good night’s sleep since I left.”

“Me too,” you admit, enjoying the sensation of being used as his personal body pillow. “It’s not the same without you.” You twist around to start getting into your favorite sleeping position.

Now facing him, you see his eyelids beginning to droop; keeping them open must be so difficult for him. “Promise me that if I have to go away for that long, you’ll come with me.”

“I promise,” you mumble, ignoring your pillow entirely and resting your head on his chest.

“I love you so much,” he breathes, reaching up to kiss the top of your head, “Thank you for being my home.”

#tooru oikawa x reader #oikawa tooru #tooru oikawa #oikawa x reader #hq x reader #oikawa fluff #haikyuu x reader #oikawa tooru x reader #hq fluff #haikyuu!!#Haikyuu x reader #🏠.if walls could talk

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hetr0ph0bic · 1 year

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Okay so this is a half baked shuriri request but what about a multi part of them trying to woo a bossed up powerhouse y/n who’s supposed to be doing business with them (maybe PR for a new invention they’ve created)? Could be v spicy, esp if the y/n is bratty/dom herself

GIVE IT UP

tag: shuriri x blk fem reader

a/n: this is 3 parts yall! no smut in this one, but its sweet im super excited for this 😎😎😎. remember like in stuff if u enjoyed thank yall love yall!

your phone shakes with a green and red button on the screen

“hello” you answer in a drawn out voice.

“yes y/n i see you’re on madison ave, why?”

you roll your eyes at her energy filled tone, “well this is the way to the hotel is it not”

“y/n! i told you, you had to go network at the casino business party” she yells

“ im not fucking doing that” you say in a monotone voice.

“wait please” you can just imagine your assistant pleading eyes

“no, look ive been working since 6am… im going to the hotel”

“please just 15 minutes in and out! plus, it could open many doors” damn, she does have a point but, no.

“no im not even dressed for that” you look down at your ripped dirty blue jeans

“you’re going to be fine, im turning the car around”

“what-”

“it goes with your brand ‘young/ reckless/ genius’ plus the shirt and shoes you have on pulls it together, you're going to be fine!” hasani chirps through the phone

the car then comes to an abrupt stop. you look out the window, now seeing your front of some building. ‘casino parties llc’. stepping out of the black escalade and brown boy with a simple tux greets you with a smile.

“miss y/n of ‘real tech’! right this way”.

the boy ushers you through the casino. scattered loud conversations and music fill the spacious building. red and gold carpet flooring and walls all over, it seems like a business party. suits and dresses all over, old people talking about bullshit. with a sigh, you begin to join them, shuffling through bodies. time slowly passes as you network around the room. a fake smile plastered on your face, and light wine in your right hand. at last, all the pointless congratulations and empty promises stop. looking down at your phone, about ten minutes have passed, you turn to the backdoor about to leave. seeing something glisten in your peripheral view, you turn to the source.

hand in hand, there they are. looking down on the floor from the balcony.

the old friend. riri williams. the girl who helped push your creative mindset and motivation in college. on her arm is a known face, shuri udaku, black panther, and ruler of wakanda.

from above, shuri leans into riri’s side

“woah, that’s y/n from real tech” shuri smiles bright

“ yeah that’s y/n from my 12pm bioengineering class” riri kisses shuri’s cheek with a smile

“ huh… did she always look like that”

“ nah that’s something new to me. don’t get me wrong, she was always good looking but-”

“she’s grew into herself” shuri finishes the sentence

riri then leans over the railing, locking her eyes with yours. with her hand she waves lightly, grabbing shuri’s, they make their way down the stairs. the two sport similar blazer outfits. riri's has slacks and a vest, revealing more skin than the other. shuri has the same all-black outfit but with a heavy blazer coat. silver and gold jewelry paints their bodies, mixing beautifully. the couple complement each other so well, clothes and body's. as the two make their way towards you, bodies naturally part, making room for them. after a sometime, they reach you.

“hm funny seeing you here” riri crosses her arms in front of you.

“and why is what?”

“well it isn't mr. roger's stupid class now is it”

“haha thank GAWD it isnt, i hated him” you cover your mouth giggling from the joke

“whaaa i think he for real had it out for us, but it’s good to see you” you both reach out closing the space between the two of you. riri looks to her side looking at shuri

“this is my wife shur-”

“yes, yes ms.udaku, panther pleasure to meet you” you reach your hand out shaking hers

“yes same here, how’s the party treating you?” shuri asks with a smile

“honestly? okay i guess i was only sticking around for 15 minutes then leaving”

“what why” the couple's face full of confusion

“i’ve been up since 6am ri. and talking with old people who think you're disrespectful to their dumbass traditions isn’t really my fav pass time” you wave a waiter hand off your cup of wine to them.

“well, seems like we are not the only ones” shuri states looking down at riri.

“i had to drag her over here, literally” riri bumps her body against shuri. the other bashfully smiling.

“how about this we leave here and just get some food and drinks?” riri offers

“ yeah, but only if you are up for it” shuri gives a unsure look at you

“nah its okay i know a diner close by”

you find yourself in the front side of the royal's car, directing shuri where to go

“yeah turn here on 47th- yeah right here”

‘carve unique sandwiches’ the old sign reads

the three of you shuffle inside the small shop. yall take to order food, a big pizza being the main corse. after paying, the three of you find seats close to the cashier. riri passes out paper plates on the wooden table.

“so what happened, after school. in life and appearance wise” she ask while stuffing a pizza in her mouth

“ yeah? apparently you didn’t use to look like this?” shuri chimes in.

“yeah bruh i don’t even know man. now started working for real on my engineering projects after graduation. now i did stop letting people walk over me which was a process and hell on its own. as for my body…. im still eating the same doing the same stuff, so that's truly a mystery.” you grab the pizza and ranch drizzling it on top, and taking a big bite.

“you look good” shuri comments

the compliment take you by surprise, making to choke. clearing your throat, you try to find your balance again

“umm thanks thanks” you look down at the table, pizza, people walking outside. anywhere but them.

“yeah and we are in wakanda, but you’ve made a whole name for yourself with real tech”. riri says while sipping on a sprite.

“ speaking of that, would you like to work together on a project. i have a new idea for my soldiers and others”.

“what absolutely, how are we gonna make it work tho? when do yall head back to wakanda?”

“ well im free tomorrow i just gotta move stuff around, can we come to lab in the morning?”

“yeah i get up a 6am so be there by then” you pull out for phone putting in their numbers and calling your car. after a bit all the food is finished.

“so ill see yall in the morning?”

“ see you in the morning, y/n!”

you and the couple part, heading to their homes and beds. you quickly take a shower, anticipating the next morning. the couple does the same, the water turns on. steam filling up the walk in shower.

“ so you like her?” riri rubs the soapy rag against shuri’s back

“so do you” shuri shoots back defensively

“ yeah do, stop being so defensive” riri smack her back lightly

“anyone with eyes would want her” riri finishes the thought. shuri turns to face her again, looking into her eyes.

“ no matter what, shuri you have to keep your cool and take it slow”

“i know of course, but we are only here for two more days” shuri whines

the couple finishes up, bodies melting into the soft bed.

pt2

tags @karimwillia @shurismainbxtch @shuriszn @widowmakker @letitias-fav @rxcently @acommonwhor3 @garbagesleepschedule @nightlife-things @sweetalittleselfish-honey @louderfortheback @heartsforjojo

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csuitebitches · 2 years

Text

On Being Resilient

It’s very important that you know and understand the importance of being resilient. It’s easy to say you’re strong when you’re obviously not.

I feel that sometimes the whole “fake it till you make it” culture has some clear problems with it.

The problem with culture like that is that your external doesn’t match the internal. So even if you look confident, you won’t feel it, and you won’t exude real confidence. While such a tactic is a great short term method, it’s not healthy for the long term - you are going to have to address those issues.

When you look up online on how to build resilience, you’ll see a flux of similar things. Positive thinking. Positive friends. Relax. Breathe.

I’m sorry if I disrespect any of those authors - but quite frankly, I find it a little bullshit-y.

So let me share with you things I’ve actually learned, tried and tested on my path to being resilient. That doesn’t mean that I’m 100% resilient.

But bear in mind that I was an overly sensitive child, very emotional teenager - and now in my 20s, I don’t get affected by situations to that extent. And I’ve stopped victimising myself, another plus.

As usual. If this doesn’t work for you, I’m sorry. This is not a cookie-cut template. It’s better for you to be inspired by this and recreate your own rather than follow it exactly so. But do what you feel is best.

•••

1. I started by creating a SWOT analysis of myself.

- S- Strengths: skills, values you have, good habits, what you can offer to people in terms of skills (both corporate life and personal life). Examples: honesty, problem solver, marketing, drawing, Excel, etc.

- W- weaknesses: things you know you’re not good at, both private life and corporate life. Examples: impatient, temper issues, programming (I hate it lol), paying attention for a long time, bad relationships etc.

- O- opportunities: what are incoming opportunities? Club memberships, conferences, job offers, career changes, online courses, etc. if you don’t have any, CREATE them. Go online and look for networking events. Go on coursera/ EdX and find a course you want to actually do.

- T- Threats: What obstacles are coming your way? For instance, your plate may be full. Or you have to compete for a job. Examples : being obtrusive, having competition, being a perfectionist, etc.

•••

2. Next, I took a couple of days to really go over the SWOT. You have to be honest with yourself. Fully. No one else will see it but you. You could even go around and ask your closest friends and family what they think are your best and worst qualities.

•••

3. Next, I took a mental resilience test online, because I realised that I wanted to quantify my data. It’s easier to improve when there’s a number visible to you. I used this: click here.

They score you on four factors:

* Motivation

* Concentration

* Coping With Pressure

* Confidence

•••

4. After seeing my score and analysing it properly, I decided to etch out a game plan for each factor. Here’s a sample:

- Motivation:

* setting smaller goals in order to succeed

* Accepting failure and moving on fast

* Asking for feedback on performance (work, school, organisations)

* Working on things that give me satisfaction

- concentration:

* using brain games such as Elevate and Mental Math to improve focus

* Reading more

* Trying different things at work/ school to remain focused (some people work best around other people. Some people work best alone. Some prefer noise, white noise or silence. Figuring this out really helps).

- Coping with pressure

* making quicker decisions (I used to take forever to make decisions because my emotions would come in the way. Now I stick to a simple pros and cons list and it helps me a lot).

* Being able to deal with adversity. Two things come in play here - a) learning from other people’s mistakes (ted talks, videos, your boss, parents, friends etc) b) learning from your own mistakes. Put yourself in micro situations - such as choosing where to eat with your friends or partner (not always, mind you - but stop being indecisive when they are too!), take on responsibility at work, etc.

- Confidence

* You need to believe that you will succeed.

* For me, setting mini goals a week is the most effective. Areas: Home (laundry, cleaning, etc), Self (homework, exercise, meditation, habits, learning new things), Environment (social life, work life, friends, family).

* I use a free habit tracker “Habit” (pink icon in the App Store) to track my 6 daily habits.

•••

4. Resilience comes with progress. It comes slowly. There will be setbacks. There will be issues. There are often times when, in a fit of emotion, we forget about resilience and get carried away in our situation. You need to realise this. You need to remind yourself to be resilient every single day. Say it out loud or write it down or set a reminder, I don’t care. But you need it at the back of your brain.

You’ll face all sorts of situations to show your resilience. Maybe a team member isn’t doing their part in a project. Maybe a friend of yours is adamant in you doing a certain thing with them. Maybe your family has some expectation of you that you’re not interested in achieving.

Resilience doesn’t mean aggression. It doesn’t mean anger. It means being tactful, calm, level headed but firm. It means that you don’t fake-compliment to make someone feel nice (occasionally it’s necessary if a friend or something is really down). It means you convey your genuine opinions about something and not necessarily agree with the majority.

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aerodaltonimperial · 4 months

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I did promise that I would try to explain how horrible (soul-crushing) the publishing world is, so at least people understood that I’m standing on the wreckage of all my self-confidence, so here’s the super abridged version. I suspect most people don’t know what it takes to be trad published—for our purposes here, trad published is going to be published by a major publisher with distribution. Normally this is the Big 5 but some of the smaller houses would still count here. We are not counting indie pubs here, because they have no distribution (meaning they are not in libraries or book stores), and I have already had experience with them and it was horrifically disappointing.

So you’ve written a book. That’s great. Now you have to try and find a literary agent, because you can’t submit to any of the Big 5 (normally) without an agent doing it for you, so you have to embark into the query trenches. Querying is where you spend a shit-ton of time researching lit agents (and weeding out the schmagents and the agencies with bad reps by trolling forums and somehow tapping into a whisper network; yeah, good luck with that if you aren’t in the biz already) and then you send them a little letter about your book and anywhere from 5 to 25 pages of the manuscript itself (depending on what they ask for, and every agent is different). The opening pages, so you’ve hopefully spent three weeks constantly tearing those pages apart and re-writing them, because you have approximately 3 seconds to be AMAZINGLY GOOD and catch their eye.

Agents all rep different age categories and genres. You have to filter through them to find the ones that rep what you write, and are open to queries (many are NEVER open, or open only to referrals from existing clients, or open only to expensive conference live-pitches, so again, good luck!) Some of them will throw up MSWLs (manuscript wish lists) and then you might find one that is asking for something very similar to what you wrote, and can toss it their way. Depending on what you write, you might have 30 agents to query (niche genres) or 100 agents to query (romance, women’s fiction, thrillers).

Agents are extremely busy. On average, the response time can be anywhere from 10 minutes to 2 years (no, I’m not kidding). Most of the lit agencies have a rule where you can’t submit to more than one agent at a time, so you are stuck waiting for the first rejection before you can query another agent there, and in at least a third of the situations, you will simply never get it. You’ll have to mark it as “closed, no response” after about 120 days and assume it’s a no. Some agencies STILL run by the “no from one is a no from all” which is BULLSHIT so you have to REALLY HOPE the one agent in the agency you picked to query will like your shit cause you can’t query anyone else.

And then you wait for the responses to roll in. Most will be form rejections. A few might be requests for more (partial or full manuscripts). And like I said, probably a third or higher will simply never get back to you. Ever. Generally, after about 6 months, you are probably done querying, with some outliers who will take a year to get back to you if they do at all.

If you get LUCKY and one of them requests your full manuscript, hooray! Now you get to wait even longer while they read it. If you are VERY VERY lucky, that agent might offer representation on it. They have to really love it. They will ask you for a call (these are all done via Zoom or the like, nowadays). Sometimes, you might get an R&R—or, a revise & resubmit, where the agent asks for changes. There is no guarantee that doing them will please them enough to get an offer on it. General consensus is that R&Rs only slightly raise your odds for getting an offer, and about 70% of them will still result in a rejection.

Fun thing about getting an offer of rep: industry standard is that you ask for 2 weeks to contact all the OTHER agents who still have your query and/or materials so you can let them know that you have an offer. And this is where my LEAST FAVORITE FUCKING PART of this industry comes in. It’s practically the tenet that publishing was built on—people only want shit that someone else already wants. Any outstanding queries, you “nudge” to let them know you have an offer and your timeline. Any outstanding submissions, you let them know they gotta read fast. You WILL get a shit ton of agents asking for your manuscript here, because SUDDENLY SOMEONE ELSE WANTS IT so it must be great. (On my only successful manuscript, my request rate for materials was 8% pre-offer. After my offer, it shot up to 60%. I will die furious about this.)

You may, if you are super duper lucky, even get multiple offers, and then you have to decide which agent you are going to choose.

So if you get this far, GOOD JOB. You have beaten 95% of the other writers out there. You are still doing all of this for free. And you still have more to go through! From here on out, now that you are with an agent, you get to go on “submission,” where your agent sends your book out to editors that they have (hopefully) matched up genres/likes with. And it’s just like querying, only your agent does it instead of you, and you sit at home and wait EVEN MORE TIME for overworked, underpaid editors to somehow fall in love with your book.

Maybe one of them does! Then you get to go to something called “second reads.” This is where the whole TEAM at the publishing house reads it and most of the time, they all have to agree. Then you have to go to ACQUISITIONS, which is a meeting at the publishing house where the editor has to pitch your book and ask the rich CEOs for money to offer on it. Your book can die at any one of these milestones: it can be rejected by editors, it can be rejected at second reads, and it can be refused at acquisitions. This process takes anywhere from 1 day (if you are super lucky and probably shit gold) to 2 years, and when all the editors are exhausted, your book is officially dead on sub.

If you DO HAPPEN TO GET THROUGH THIS and get an ACTUAL BOOK DEAL, you are the lucky 1%. And you might finally, FINALLY, get paid for the work you have done. (In installments, spread out over years, depending on how much of an advance you get.)

Or, like a whooooole bunch of us, you end up figuring out that your agent, for whatever reason, isn’t working for you. Maybe you want to write a genre next that they don’t rep. Maybe they leave the industry for whatever reason. Maybe you have a mismatch of communication/expectations/needs. Maybe they suck at being an agent and stop doing what they are supposed to do (like mine). And then you end up either leaving your agent or getting dropped by your agent, and you are back to square one all over again.

Remember that every time you have to query again, or go on submission again, you have to have a new book ready. The people who succeed at this industry have time, money, and luck; the more of those you have, the better you will do. A LARGE number of writers are bankrolled by a partner and/or parent and/or generational wealth who pays the bills for them, because otherwise, it’s pretty damn hard to find enough time to write as much as you need to.

And every single one of those rejections is going to eat away at you, inch by inch by inch, until you’ve amassed more than 150 of them representing all the times you just weren’t fucking good enough. Then you have to decide: do I keep doing this? It’s been years. It’s been double digit books. How much of my life and time am I going to waste on this fruitless quest? And I guess that’s the question you gotta answer lol.

#don't reblog this we do not need this bullshit connected to me

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eisforeidolon · 1 year

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https://at.tumblr.com/eisforeidolon/i-dont-understand-the-reason-of-jareds-fans-to/rwjk3tut446w

The issue with people upset by the prequel is that it’s basically a wound that keeps getting picked at every time another OG Cast member joins the show and Jared is still not there. I have to be honest, I don’t like Jensen as quite as much as I did before the prequel situation, BUT I still enjoy seeing him in stuff. Honestly, I don’t see how the finale made the situation any worse. No one truly thought Jared would be in it. Sam was the reason for Dean turning up again at the end. It could have been worse. I think people are allowed to be upset about the show, but Jensen didn’t newly kick their puppies.

I get that to some it feels like a slap or a throw away line about Sam, but it would have been worse if he wasn’t mentioned at all. Jensen could have asked Jared to make a cameo and maybe he said no. I don’t really think that happened, but I can’t, and don’t want to, waste any more energy being upset by a show , or the behind the scenes of a show, when I’ll never be able to know the full true story anyway.

I think Jensen truly has made a mistake in how he handled the not-really-a prequel, and I don’t think he came off looking great from a personal or professional POV. But, he’s also gotten more visibility with The Boys and an ABC show. So, it’s not like he’s destitute now or something. I don’t think he’s in any danger of not working.

People have lost the art of seeing nuance in people and situations. It’s all black and white. Jared is a monster. Jensen is the devil. Jared is my sweet meow meow. Jensen is perfect. Most people aren’t all good or all bad, and sometimes they can do crappy things while still being a decent person at their core.

Can people just chill the F out?

I wish, but I don't expect it to happen.

I have no interest in defending the prequel generally, not least because I don't understand basically ... any ... of the decisions made in doing it. Like my reaction to nearly all of it has been, "But why, though?". So someone not liking Jensen anymore or liking him less than before over it? Eh, fair enough.

However, still going on about how Jensen is an evil backstabber trying to "erase" Sam literal years later when he sorted it out with Jared in a day is just ... something else. Including acting offended all anew because there really wasn't - IMO - an obviously better way to bring Sam into that finale without a Jared appearance he may not have wanted or been able to do for any number of reasons. As much as certain Jensen stans and hellers are trying to deny it, the underlying motivation for Dean was explicitly said to be protecting Sam. Like I see no real difference between acting like it's some pointed insult Dean went on an adventure without Sam and acting like it was some pointed insult Sam lived longer than Dean in the finale.

Likewise trying to insist all Jensen's other projects are laughable failures and he's clearly desperate for work because ... obviously nobody would choose to do more than one thing after doing the same show for 15 years! There are plenty of other actors both more and less successful than Jared and Jensen, so the obsession with continuing to pit them against each other when they clearly aren't following the same path anymore is just ... silly stan bullshit.

Yes, being the lead of a weekly show and an EP of that show and another is impressive on any network. Yes, The Boys is a buzzy streaming show and even a supporting role on ABC means new audience and networking opportunities. Sneering at either is ridiculous. Both of these guys could probably retire tomorrow if they wanted off SPN money, but lucky for us? They're still creating things for their fans to enjoy - but for stans, that's not good enough. One of them has to be crushing the other because their not!fave is an unforgivable terrible horrible no good very bad person that will get his just desserts if they just talk enough shit. 🙄

#askboxery #anonymous #anti actor stans

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girl4music · 2 months

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youtube

SHELBIE: “We also actually have seen a difference in characters. So there are 80 less characters last year, queer characters, like WLW characters. There are 80 less WLW characters in the last TV season than the year before so it’s kind of like-“

EMILY ANDRAS: “Where’d they all go?”

SHELBIE: “ABC lost 18. Netflix lost 22.”

VALERIE: “Just walked into the parking lot and disappeared.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Yeah, exactly. Or they all got on the wrong bus to the greatest party that we can go to.”

NOELLE: “Oh that’s much better!”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Yeah, I wish that was true. I wish that was true.”

SHELBIE: “From an industry perspective do you think that there’s - because of the backlash of 2016 - there was an uptick in like ‘Oh, we have to do rep” and kind of now, everybody’s a little afraid of how to tell those stories. Do you think maybe that’s what’s happening?”

EMILY ANDRAS:

*to Noelle*

“That’s such a good question and I’m looking at you.”

NOELLE: “Yeah, I mean, I would say anytime you get a finger pointed at you and someone telling you you’re not doing a good job - especially like from a network perspective where those optics are really important. In the US, they seem to care more than they do here. I would say, not to be cynical but I would say, yeah, that is probably why there were more. But that doesn’t mean that those stories, clearly, were being told more responsibly or in a better way or that those characters were three-dimensional characters who were fully fleshed. I think if you can lose that many, they probably weren’t integral enough to your show to begin with.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Yeah, that’s my fear a little bit. It’s almost like this cute trend for some people and I’m like ‘It’s not a trend. These are real people and this is real representation and this needs to be what it is going forward’. So I think there was a little bit of a sense from some networks - One Day At A Time - that maybe it was like, ‘Well we gave you some candy and then you are the candy and now there’s no more candy left’. And I’m like ‘It’s not candy’ and they’re like ‘We love candy. How dare you!’. Um… I think it’s both things. I think it’s both like ‘Well, we can just throw in a bunch of LGBTQ characters and like that’ll feed the masses’. But also the other fear is that I do think there is a little bit of a resistance particularly, potentially from writers who are older or more established that they’re like ‘Well, I’m so terrified to wade in here and tell these stories that I’m just not going to tell these stories or include these characters at all’. But that’s just bullshit. You just have to learn to be better maybe and try harder.”

SHELBIE: “Be more creative.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Yeah, be more creative.”

NOELLE; “Retire!”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Yes, retire. Yeah, exactly.”

*crowd laughs and applauds*

SHELBIE: “Do you think there’s a way that we can use Wynonna Earp as a little bit of kind of like a flagship saying ‘Listen, you can tell queer stories and you tell them with drama’. What I hear a lot, I feel like from writers is ‘Well, I mean you don’t want to be bad rep, so then we can’t tell any stories because we can’t have any bad storylines’. But Wynonna Earp kind of - you guys have been proving that you can have the drama and you can tell the stories and then still treat your characters with respect. So do you have any idea how we could get that information in to like a more of a way where it could be digestible by executives or showrunners or other writers?”

NOELLE: “Yeah, I mean I think just tell everybody to watch the show. I mean like, come on.”

EMILY: “Everybody.”

NOELLE: “Everybody, tell your everybody. Um… I mean for me it comes back to making sure that your queer characters aren’t secondary or tertiary to the main characters. Like I think the fact that when Emily built this world, you know, um, the queer characters became-“

EMILY ANDRAS: “Team effort.”

NOELLE: “Yes, team effort. Whatever. I wasn’t even here…. Um the fact that you can, you know, have - you can have an episode where, you know, where Wynonna’s sister’s girlfriend can be in the entire A-story with her, like is a testament to the fact that though, you know, Nicole, or if you have a story with, you know, with um, with Doc and Jeremy, like those characters are fundamental to the lifeblood of the series. They’re not just somebody you go out to for kissing scenes so you can tick the box and say, you know, ‘We did our rep. We did a good job’, you know, and pat ourselves on the back. I think if more shows did that then you,… the drama would be inherent. Like if when you created those characters you thought how they related to everybody on your show, not just the person they were sleeping with or smooching with, then I think that would just give yourself more opportunity for drama because, um,… because those characters are real and they matter to more people than just their partner.”

VALERIE: “And then your only options for drama aren’t relationship drama because you have so many other relationships and you can tell so many other sides of the story and it’s a lot more exciting that way.”

SHELBIE: “If they’re actual characters, yeah. If they’re only the ‘gay character’ then you have no other story to tell than their drama I guess. Their relationship drama.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Their sexuality can’t just be their story. It has to be intrinsic to their character - but their whole story can’t just be ‘I’m gay’ all the time, although that’s not the worst.”

NOELLE: “I would also say that I think as writers and, you know, producers and people in the industry, we are conditioned because it’s the way we came up. Because it’s what TV has always been. That the thing that’s the most dramatic is loss and tragedy. And I think we undervalue how much emotion and how much drama a queer audience can get out of a happy ending because it isn’t the standard. You know?

*crowd applauds*

I think we need to put more value in happy endings for queer characters and not just go ‘Well, you know, for straight characters a happy ending - like who cares? We should probably kill somebody’. Like maybe we could have a happy ending every once in awhile.”

VALERIE:

*to Shelbie*

“And to sort of go back to what you’re saying about like Wynonna Earp being a flagship. It’s why like sometimes the running joke on the Autostraddle TV team is like ‘I bet Valerie is going to bring up Wynonna Earp on this roundtable again’”

EMILY ANDRAS: “‘How dare you!.’”

VALERIE: “Because it’s true… yes, I’m definitely biased because I love the show, but it’s also true that there are so many things that you can point to. It’s like ‘Well, okay this show failed us, but look how Wynonna Earp did a similar thing and succeeded at it.’ So it’s like it’s kind of always pointing those things out to hopefully get future TV writers, future people who are reading TV critic recaps, and things now, that will go on to create, like have it kind of in the back of their mind.”

NOELLE: “I hope so.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “I am impatient though, like the one thing I want, which we’re not quite there yet is like, it would be good to have a world where you can also have like queer villains, you know what I mean? Like I want to get to the point where we have our heroes, so then we’re going to have awesome LGBTQ-like villains and complicated people and it’s… we just need more of everything. Do you know what I mean? And then it’s going to be more fully rounded. But I’m not completely sure we’re there yet.”

SHELBIE: “I think Gentleman Jack is making at least a little bit of a stride.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “It is. It sure is.”

SHELBIE: “Because as much as we all want to love her… she’s not exactly the greatest person in the world.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “She’s complicated. Exactly.”

VALERIE: “Villanelle.”

SHELBIE: “Oh, yeah, that’s a good one.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Villanelle. Yup. Fine. I’ll write a gay villain. Okay?”

NOELLE: “But then you get…”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Friends to enemies, enemies to friends.”

NOELLE: “Then you get into the situation though where you’re like, ‘We have this amazing part… and it would be great to cast this character or to write this character as a queer character’, but ultimately the bad guys die, generally, and so you’re like well… so if we’re a show that has really good rep, is it okay if we kill the… if we write this amazing part for an amazing queer character, but then at the end they have to die. So then that’s an added level of, you know, if we had made real sustainable progress since 2016, maybe, but the fact that we haven’t means I don’t know that… I mean it’s-“

EMILY ANDRAS: “Difficult.”

VALERIE: “As of right now there’s still a very fine line between like a queer villain and villainizing queerness.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “That’s so true.”

SHELBIE: “That’s a good way to put that. I think though that there’s, from like a straight statistics point of view - somebody’s going to be crazy, somebody’s going to die, somebody’s all those things. So if you have enough to balance it. I think that’s how you do that. So if you have 4 gay characters and you kill one from like our, you know, objective scoring system, you’d still have a really positive score because you’d have enough positive to balance out… the thing that you’re doing.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Right.”

NOELLE: “It’s still scary as hell though. It still would give me hives.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Yeah, I don’t know. We have a super hero that shoots people in the face. So I just like, do not think that’s a good plan at this stage. Like, no, I just like honestly, I just like think about it all the time. It’s like, I just wanted to move faster. Do you feel like that for diversity in general? I’m just like if it was faster, then there’s going to be more times for people who are queer too. Do you know what I mean? Like that’s the other truth. Like the actors I know who are LGBTQ are like ‘I just want to do everything’ right? Like ‘I want to play Bobo Del Rey. I want to play everything’.”

SHELBIE: “It’s an interesting argument ‘cause we want queer people playing queer roles and queer writers writing queer stories. But at the end of the day you want queer actors to be able to just play anything right? The same way that we wouldn’t want anyone else to get boxed in. So that’s kind of a… it’s an interesting argument I feel like that’s happening right now in the industry.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “It is, but at least we’re having it. At least we’re talking about it.”

SHELBIE: “We’re having the discussion.”

EMILY ANDRAS: “Yeah, exactly.”

NOELLE: “And you can’t really ask like, you know? I was just on a show where I was like, it would be great to get like a queer actor to play this role, but you can’t ask so unless you know, and you don’t always know, like… how do you do that?”

SHELBIE: “Yeah ‘cause you can’t not hire them because they’re not queer or hire them. Yeah, that’s tough.”

I had to transcribe this entire question and answer segment from this EH Con Canada 2019 panel because it’s such an important conversation to have and set of questions to address regarding LGBTQ representation in TV art/entertainment. What they talk about is what I’ve been writing about frequently and recently about how to provide better and more positive LGBTQ representation - particularly surrounding WLW characters - and the representation anxiety and cancellation anxiety that so many TV show creators feel over potentially accidentally perpetuating the harmful trope of Bury your Gays and being mistakenly accused of queerbaiting through main characters that can be perceived as gay or queer when they’re not canon gay or queer main characters.

They specifically talk about how to go about telling stories with and about gay or queer main characters that are the same or similar stories that we see with straight, cis and white male characters all the time because there is much less controversy over it when it’s a straight, cis white male main character because those main characters are everywhere and their stories - both positive and negative - in TV art/entertainment are everywhere because they get to be all different types of negative and complicated characters like villains that are abusive and destructive people that do deserve death or other forms of punishment and there’s no resistance against that by the general public because it’s not ever marginalizing or villainizing a specific group or community of people that need representation.

I would recommend you to watch the whole video because it’s all important but I specifically think this part of the panel is the most important and I am so proud of Emily Andras, her entire Wynonna Earp team, and the Earper fandom for spearheading this incredibly necessary initiative in addressing LGBTQ representation in the TV art/entertainment industry. This is a conversation that everybody that cares to talk about this subject needs to have to make a real difference in achieving better and more positive representation for gay or queer characters that aren’t or won’t always be the greatest people and telling their stories where they have a negative or darker character arc than other characters that are also gay or queer that have a positive and lighter character arc.

How do we do this? We need to have the in-depth conversations in addressing this subject together as a LGTBQ+POC community before we go asking for and pitching it to TV showmaking networks that have a sincere interest in providing better and more positive LGBTQ+POC representation but are afraid to because of representation anxiety and cancellation anxiety.

This video is long but it’s well worth the watch. If you don’t want to or don’t have the time to watch it, at least read the little segment that I have transcribed and if you feel like you want to talk about it - I’m here.

Let’s have the conversation. It’s incredibly important.

I will link you to where I’ve written about this before if you don’t understand and want to know more: https://www.tumblr.com/girl4music/743149350219333632

#wynonna earp #eh con canada 2019 #lgbtq representation panel #emily andras #shelbie cohen #noelle carbone #valerie anne #emily gutierrez #representation anxiety #cancellation anxiety

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ritchiepage2001newaccount · 1 year

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WHY UNIVERSAL BACKGROUND CHECKS ARE JUST AS UNLIKELY AS EVER, UNFORTUNATELY

I'm a leftist (Libertarian-Socialist), who votes progressive, because I live under an "elected" government, and I had thought I had purged the MSNBC/CNN Nation from my friends list, but apparently not, as my timeline is just chock-full of media-driven hysteria over current events, so here's a primer:

"Liberals" who think their arguments are clever or relevant to the Second Amendment are exhausting.

They are not the left; they are just one half of the good cop/bad cop act of the corporate owned fire-hose of bullshit that is the corporate media, and corporate America's governing criminal cartel/duopoly.

Both cults "I like simple and ineffectual 'solutions', because they make me feel like I'm doing something, and I'm just stinky with fear."

There are over a hundred million legal gun owners, who some want to punish for somebody else's crime.

Well, there are some things to consider.

We've been a heavily armed country since 1621, and yet the epidemic of daily mass-shootings didn't begin until 20 April 1999 (Columbine), at a time when gun ownership was at an all-time low, and five years after Clinton's assault-weapons ban, so maybe guns aren't the variable.

Maybe, just maybe, dead school-children are the price of the neoliberalism practiced under the "Washington Consensus" of BOTH right-wing authoritarian parties since the 1980's? When your country offers you no prospects, and you become terrified of the future, what then? Fear can make unstable people do desperate things. Add to that a culture of celebrity, and what could possibly go wrong?

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/aug/18/neoliberalism-the-idea-that-changed-the-world

Another factor that goes completely unexamined, is the way Ronald Reagan and Tip O'Neill emptied our state hospitals onto our streets, and onto families ill-equipped to deal with the sometimes violent mentally ill.

https://apps.bostonglobe.com/spotlight/the-desperate-and-the-dead/series/community-care/

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/opinion/commentary/story/2023-04-24/opinion-impact-of-deinstitutionalization-on-homelessness-reagan-mental-health-hospitals-san-diego

https://calmatters.org/commentary/2019/03/hard-truths-about-deinstitutionalization-then-and-now/

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/10/04/opinion/us-mental-health-community-centers.html

Thank God, the "solution" is so simple...

Also, 84% of NRA members support universal background checks. The problem is, every time a bill comes up for a vote, Democrats add poison pill amendments guaranteeing defeat in the legislature (and the courts), and then they proceed to tell the TV cameras that "once again the GOP and the gun lobby have voted down background checks and defied the will of the people", or some such nonsense.

If you want to watch Dems sabotage universal background checks (while Republicans roll their eyes and face-palm) in real time, go here:

https://www.c-span.org/networks/

P.S. You can probably guess which one of these three groups I belong to (Hint: It's the one that's growing and actually decides elections):

https://content.gallup.com/origin/gallupinc/GallupSpaces/Production/Cms/POLL/bk82tkyic0sqaulbp34asq.png

https://cdn.vox-cdn.com/thumbor/vxWG3CrKYLkPwpJHj9BD7ou5DR0=/1400x0/filters:no_upscale()/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/22430597/bbc_k5onqe6g_al6vtvcqg.png

#LaborPartyNow!!!

P S The line, "You don't need 30 rounds to shoot a deer!" is not clever.

The Second Amendment has nothing to do with hunting tools, toys for hobbyists (target shooting), or even weapons for self-defense.

It's about ARMS!!!

It's about the individual citizen's right to arms, so they'll be prepared to join a militia, not the other way around. ‘Well regulated’ at that time, simply meant, ‘efficient.’ In other words, in order for a muster to be efficient, civilians needed to be already armed.

So the "collective rights" argument has a couple of problems that make it quite unhinged from history and reality.

1) As I've mentioned above, Americans have always been relatively heavily armed. How did that happen in a collective rights paradigm?

2) Contrary to what you were probably taught in school, by the time of the Confederate artillery barrage on Fort Sumter, the war over slavery had already been going on for over six years, and was fought entirely by independent volunteer militia's. Fort Sumter was just the beginning of official involvement by government troops. How did that happen in a collective rights paradigm?

3) In what universe do government forces need to have their right to arms protected?

4) Since when do National Guard members keep National Guard arms (Hint: they're kept at the armory, and have been since colonial times)?

5) Obviously, "Liberals" are stupid.

Again: #LaborPartyNow!!!

P P S That was ENTIRELY the point of the first fruits of dissent, the 10 Amendments we've come to call the BILL OF RIGHTS (which have become a beacon to aspiring democrats all over the world), to protect INDIVIDUALS from the government they had just created. #TrueStory

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tyforthevnm · 2 years

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MCR Interview - April 9, 2002

Source: wertica_ on LiveJournal

This was MCR's first EVER interview, it was for Snagglezine - a New Jersey fanzine run by two Eyeball Records interns (Kim and Chris). I think this was done April 9th 2002 after a show in Garfield, NJ.

M: I'm Michael Way, I play the bass guitar. G: I'm Gerard Way, I'm the singer. K: You're biggest influences? G: Iron Maiden. M: The Smiths. G: At the Gates, Brit pop, Blur, Morrisey, shit like that. Like metal, like melodic metal. We're all about it, like Helloween, big influences. M: Oh yeah. Keeper of the Seven Keys. G: You can't hear any of our influences in our music though but it's there. M: It's subconsciously in the music, but nobody else can pick it up unless you're looking for it, you can't really pick on what's there. K: We hear that you just signed to Eyeball (Records). How's it feel to be signed to such a great label? G: We're fucking really excited. M: It's so excellent. G: I've know Alex for a while, I probably shouldn't say that, Alex is fucking great. M: ..and an amazing human being. We've known him and he took care of fucking Thursday and we were psyched about that, but not only that, we were really psyched to be with Pencey Prep because those kids fuckin helped us out right from the start. They gave us their tour van when we needed it, they gave us their fuckin tour van! Hambone gave us the tour van and fuckin cause they're getting a new one and they gave us a spot in their practice studio that we share with them, so we share a practice studio with them. C: Yeah Alex got us our first interview, Thursday. M: Yeah I remember, I was right there. No, but it's great cause it's like a family, we all hang out all the time, it's amazing. G: We can't hang out with Thursday as much as we'd like to cause they're always on tour which is gonna happen to all our bands now. K: Favorite bands to play with and favorite venue? G: Pencey (Prep). M: So far it's just Pencey (Prep) but the Loop (Lounge) was hot. G: But the Loop, even though they don't let kids in which sucks, I don't like that 21 and over stuff, but it had great sound. M: Yeah, there's like a professional sound guy. G: But this place (Garfield American Legion) had great sound. C: CBGB'S had good sound for Thursday. M: Oh the Piebald one? C: Yeah. G: Oh I want to play there. C: It's good. M: So far we only played about 5 shows, out of 5 shows, the Loop was the best. G: And we got an encore there. M: Yeah people were calling for an encore. K: That's awesome, we've never been there. Have you guys played in any bands before? G: Me and Mikey had this band called Raygun Jones and we were like, you know, really young and he was the bass player back then too. We had a female bass player and she just dropped out so we just put a bass on Mikey pretty much the same way we did this time. We put a bass on him and said play. We trained him. M: Yeah exactly. It's like I normally play guitar but like my brother came up to me with the material and I was just so blown away that I had to join. I was like, "I don't care what I play" and "I have to be in this somehow". G: He really filled out our band. We had a good vibe going anyway but then when he was in it, it clicked. And that's why, the way you saw us play out there today, we weren't playing like that until Mikey was playing tight with us and joining. K: How long have you guys been established and what was your reason for starting a band? G: The band, uh, me and Otter really got together in November, I believe, and the real reason we established it was because it has a lot to do with the September 11th attack. I was on my way to get ready for a Cartoon Network meeting because I do cartoons and stuff and he had that option. We saw the plane hit right from the train and when we got there we were all just standing on the pier in Hoboken like right on the edge. There's like 300 people that were friend and family and we all saw it go down. That's when I realized that doing this cartoon was bullshit, I love to draw and make art but it was so commercial, it was just that I felt like having meetings with people in suits, it just made me realize what the hell I'm doing with my life. That's what our 1st song that we always open with "Skylines and Turnstyles" is about. It's about the Trade Center. C: Although I'm a big fan of the Cartoon Network and like 3 in the afternoon in your pajamas... G: Yeah but dealing with them is not fun. That actually got it and everyone like came together through the music. It's like therapy. K: How did you get the name and does it imply that you guys are quite the partiers? M & G: Hahaha Oh!!! G: We used to call Mike "Mikey Party" but now he's "Mikey Romance". K: That's how we met you! M: Yeah it was at a party. G: It's like 11 different meanings for the band. You can take them anywhere. On a personal level, for me, it's about anti-depressants. I was like so depressed about a year ago and I just wanted to cut my fuckin face off. It's also like a reference to Irvine Welsh and his books. M: All his books are like classified as Chemical Romances. It's like love stories where there's like drugs involved. C: Yeah, I went to google to see if you guys had a site and all his stuff came up. M: Yup yup, Irvine Welsh. Now there's only 2 people so far that picked up on that. Two people were like "Whoa, you mean like Irvine Welsh?". But it's a personal level, like we took the name and we brought it to a personal level. G: Yeah it really means for me anti-depressants. Like we drink beer and shit... M: We like to party. K & C: Hell yeah. G: We drink and party, we rock and roll man. K: Yeah, the most "un-edge" name, right? G: We don't like do drugs though. C: You're not my friend then. (haha, he's kidding). M: Yeah we don't need drugs to have a good time. :: Gerard announces slumber party and that guitar player takes guitar to a whole new level because he has a gash and is bleeding:: K: One more serious one, what do you guys think of the sudden outburst of bands on indie labels such as Thursday, Phantom Planet, Hot Water Music, and Rival Schools being played on MTV2 and MTVX? G: I think, I always thought this because I've been an artist with comics from that whole scene too. Anything from the underground eventually makes its way up. It's like something underground, it's new and fresh and it's eventually gonna make its way up to the tv. It's bound to happen, it happens with everything. Nirvana is the best example of it and I think that's what's gonna happen with Jersey and I think it's gonna be great. M: I think it's like survival of the fittest cause like whoever's doing it for the right reasons is gonna survive and whoever's doing it for the wrong reasons is gonna get chopped and fried and we all know who's doing it for the right reasons. C: Yeah we know. Do you guys like Dragon Tales? G: We're Lord of the Rings fans. M: No, he's talking about the cartoon. C: ...on PBS. G: The only exposure I have with Dragon Tales is that little kids come in and ask for the cd @ B & N. C: Best Valentine's gift you ever got? G: I'm about to get one right now but I haven't seen it yet. Shit. I haven't really gotten any. I got roses, I love roses so a girl got me roses. That was pretty cool. M: You know what, I can't even remember getting one because there hasn't been a powerful female outlet in my life to give me a Valentine's day gift. So there's no Valentine's day gift I can remember. C: No little candy hearts from grandma or mom or anything like I usually get? M: No way! K: You got frogs this year. M: You're lucky dude. C: Yeah I got frogs from her. Disney character that most represents you? M: Donald Duck. G: Yeah Mike dressed up like Donald Duck in 2nd grade. M: It was a fuckin rad costume, my grandma made it. G: It was fuckin hot and then the next year he dressed up as a stay puff marshmallow. M: And it was also really hot. G: Mr. Toad. C: Would you guys ever cover "The Lady Is A Tramp" by Frank Sinatra? M: It could be done. G: Could we do that? M: It could totally be done. G: Yeah I could see us doing that. M: Cause Frankie's awesome. G: What about doing a Dean Martin or a Sammy? M: Those guys knew how to party man. C: The Rat Pack. G: The Sans Crew. Vegas man. We want to bring Hambone with us cause he always wins on slots. M: He's the King of Slots. ::tangent on Hambone:: Other members not in interview: Otter (Matt)->drums Ray Toro->guitar, phenomenal Thanks to Mike and Gerard, we love you guys, you rock!

#mikey way #gerard way #interview #rica.archive #april 9 2002 #april 2002 #2002 #eyeball records #bullets era

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