#and sophie's like well i don't know fitz! how the FUCK is it fair that you're the one that gets to have a finish line? how the HELL am i

[synonymroll648]

absolutely evil fic idea! sophitz soulmates au where post-war they reconcile but also find out that fitz won't make it to 100 due to the severity of his shadowflux echoes and the reason sophie kept surviving seemingly impossible odds was because the black swan 'accidentally' made her immortal.

to make things extra cruel: consider how fitz canonically counts on having thousands of years ahead of him to build himself a future he enjoys, and how sophie canonically struggles w/ the idea of living forever due to her human upbringing (plus the canon-compliant possibility of her hearing ten bajillion tales growing up of how immortality is a curse) :D

#i love love love soulmate au's. usually for the fluff. but this. this... #this intrigues me conceptually so much that i think exploring it would be worth the pain #i have way too many wips rn to write this. but #that doesn't mean i can't share it w/ you guys :) #i just keep thinking of how the tables of 'fitz comforting sophie about living forever because he'll be there' will flip #and it could flip in SO many ways #it could be sophie comforting fitz about death being inevitable because she grew up around death #and knows that death can be a well deserved (fairly) happy ending if fate is kind enough and you play your cards right #but it could also be them being so so so openly envious of each other's lifespans #like we could have a screaming match in the dead of night where fitz is like #how the FUCK is it fair that we both have echoes but I'M the only one that's doomed to die young because of them? how the HELL do you have #ANY right to speak on this? on how i should deal w/ having THOUSANDS OF YEARS RIPPED OUT OF MY HANDS? #and sophie's like well i don't know fitz! how the FUCK is it fair that you're the one that gets to have a finish line? how the HELL am i #supposed to be happy about NEVER getting to stop? about ALWAYS having to be the moonlark? about INEVITABLY LOSING EVERYONE I LOVE BECAUSE #THEY'LL BE DEAD? #honestly you could have both. you SHOULD have both. imo. hurt/comfort babyyyyy #also. if you want. you can have this be a thing where the immortal falls in love w/ the same soul again #but fitz never comes back as an elf. always something mortal #also when fitz dies. having a throwback to the search and having one of them go 'fuck time. fuck death. i'll find you again and again' #less 'death cannot do us apart' and more 'death can only separate us temporarily' #also. sophie having to watch fitz deteriorate from the golden boy she knew to barely hanging on to life. and fitz having to deal w/ #sophie never changing in any physical way #don't you love feeling sad guys? angsty if you will? /t #sophitz #sophie foster #fitz vacker #kotlc #keeper of the lost cities #kotlc fic idea #sophitz fic idea

[bookwyrminspiration]

I'm still wondering why tf Sophie kissed someone that she knew liked her as a way to say "See? Friends" like that must've been so heart breaking for Dex omfg

Also, Sophie just really comes off as attention seeking to me. I can't pin point it but she seems like a real big attention seeker

My theories are that it was:

1. to prove to herself that it wasn't what she wanted, as she's accommodating enough when it comes to her friends that if she didn't have said proof she always would've felt bad and "what if..." so it was just as much to see for herself as it was for Dex

2. to take away the power of the kiss from Keefe or Fitz and cause love triangle drama later, instead attempting to give Dex his "fair share" (I don't know how to word it bear with me) as a legitimate love interest while also dismissing said status

3. because it's got a big of dramatic flare and books love that!

The thing is, I don't think she went into the kiss with 100% certainty with how it would end. She was hesitant to go that direction with Dex and felt weird about it, but Dex explained his perspective a little, how no one would think it was weird because they're aren't biologically related. So that was Sophie challenging her own hesitation based on her human upbringing and her relationship with Dex and trying it out. Seeing how it will feel to give him the fairest assessment she could. Why a kiss? Because it's quick, immediate, and makes for a more interesting story than the two of them having a long thought out conversation (though they had part of one afterwards, which I think was good and appropriate). I think that was her genuinely making an effort, not just a way of dismissing Dex like "see how that didn't feel right? we shouldn't date."

That being said, it definitely was an unpleasant and embarrassing situation for Dex, hence the time the two spent apart as he thought about things and got through it. It was heart breaking! He'd liked her forever (his words not mine), and it just wasn't going to happen.

Would I suggest this course of action, kissing your homie to see if you're a good fit for each other, in real life? Not in the slightest! Relationships take work and communication and effort, and kisses aren't a good judge of chemistry. I know my partner and I fit together well because we're both autistic (if you're autistic I highly recommend dating another autistic person it's fucking amazing), we both communicate in similar ways and we use that to talk about our boundaries, to ask each other things, to have those serious conversations. We share our interests and listen to each other and help each other work through meltdowns when we can. We're conscious of each other's likes and dislikes, our sensory issues (I don't eat peanut butter before I see them because they hate it, they take note of if I have socks and if there's carpet, etc).

If I evaluated my partner based purely on kissing, I'd be making an entirely inaccurate judgement of our compatibility. But in the context of a novel? These aren't real people, and so we can do more fun things like kissing for the intrigue, and then follow it up with some conversation for the maturity. It's a different balance

I don't want this post to get too long so I'm only going to briefly comment on the attention seeking, but we can talk about it more separately! Could it be the times where she's talking about how she's the moonlark so she should be involved in more things? Or her feeling bad when she's excluded (like when wearing the circlet)? Or her desire to know everything that's going on? Or how she seeks out others to help her all the time to serve her own interests (like going to Oralie to get a meeting with Gethen when Mr. Forkle told her not to)?

Those are a few possible attention seeking behaviors that could give that vibe. It's an unexpected (at least to me, and it's not a bad thing) quality to attribute to her, so I'd be curious to look at it more!!

#kotlc #keeper of the lost cities #kotlc character analysis #quil's queries #kotlc ships #nonsie #sophie foster #dex dizznee #hang on I'm mentally high fiving myself right now for the brevity of those last two paragraphs #I fully expected myself to be like 'i don't wanna make this long' and then go on for several paragraphs #but I didn't!! #so I consider that a victory #but seriously I'd love to talk about it more if you want #it's interesting!! #long post

[gay-otlc]

Can we talk about how Sophie has trichotillomania?

Because I've been involved in KOTLC fandoms for over two years and I've heard it mentioned exactly once.

Trichotillomania is a disorder characterized by uncontrollable, repetitive pulling of hair. This can be scalp hair, eyebrows, arm hair, leg hair, eyelashes, really any type of hair. Even though the person knows they aren't supposed to enjoy pulling, they get a weird sense of pleasure or calm from it, and it's difficult to stop. Pulling is frequently done in stressful situations.

Does that sound familiar to anyone? Ring any bells?

Yeah, it sounds like Sophie Foster.

In the books, it's played off as sort of just another nervous habit, a weird quirk of Sophie's. It's mentioned a few times by other friends/adult figures as they ask whether it hurts, but when she says no, they don't tell her to stop. She's often described as "pulling on an itchy eyelash," but it seems to be more of a stress response than something causing her stress.

I thought it was just another weird quirk of hers until I started pulling out my hair. I would pull it most when I was stressed, and it always felt "itchy" just before I did.

It was horrible. Trichotillomania is fucking destructive. At my worst point, I had a huge, gaping bald spot. I didn't talk to people because I was ashamed of my hair. I missed class once because I couldn't tear myself away from the mirror and stop pulling. I spent hours in front of the mirror each day, checking and checking to make sure no one would know anything was weird if they looked at me.

It was so hard. And I felt so alone.

Now, as I said before, I read KOTLC nearly three years ago and have been making fan content for over two. Suffice it to say that series means a lot to me. How do you think it would have felt, if the protagonist of this huge part of my life, was just like me, struggled like me, and it turned out okay for her? I would have had so much hope that it could get better instead of climbing and clawing for every shred of progress.

Now, how do you think it felt to see that protagonist go through something similar, but it didn't matter much to her? It made me feel like some whiny bitch for being this upset about my hair. If Sophie Foster could have trich and go through life functioning fine (well, not really, but the trich doesn't make anything worse for her is my point), why couldn't I? Pathetic.

Like most days, today is a good day to get pissed at L*ura, so I'm going to use her art as an example. This is a close up screenshot of Sophie's eye (please ignore the cursor in the middle, my computer hates me).

[Image ID: A close up picture of an brown eye. It has long, dark eyelashes surrounding it and a cursor covering the pupil.]

(Please tell me if my image ID is shit idk how to write these.)

As we can clearly see, Sophie has long, dark eyelashes. The top eyelashes are most obvious, but there's a fair amount on the bottom as well. It's been a while since I've read the books, but Sophie doesn't wear makeup much, if I recall correctly. So she probably wouldn't be wearing mascara.

Then why the fuckity fuck do her eyelashes look so, for lack of a better word, normal, when she pulls them every three paragraphs?

People with trichotillomania look like they have trichotillomania. I have a bald spot. When I did all my research on trich in an OCD spiral, one writer said she had to wear wigs. Another said she had zero eyelashes for years. Someone on here (not saying who just in case they don't want me to) said their left eyebrow was nearly gone.

I hated how I looked in the worst of my trichotillomania days. It's less noticeable now, but I still hate it. I feel like a freak, to not have hair like a 'normal' person.

Now, Sophie Foster is described as beautiful. She has all the boys and the girls after her. She's an elf, all elves are beautiful. But she pulls out her eyelashes, and she pulls out her eyelashes so often, that unless elf hair grows at really different speeds (which I doubt it would, considering that would have been very noticeable when Sophie lived with humans), she would have no or very few eyelashes.

And yet, that was erased in her official art. Why? Because apparently, people can't look like they have trich and still be beautiful.

But that's bullshit. People with trich are beautiful. I am looking in mirrors and trying to tell myself I look beautiful instead of crying. Bald spots are beautiful. Eyes without eyelashes are beautiful. Brow ridges without eyebrows are beautiful.

People with trich are beautiful, dammit!

So give us that, Shannon. Give that to your readers who don't have trich, so they understand it, and your readers who do, so they see themselves for the first time and don't feel alone.

Give us Sophie Foster thinking she's ugly and a freak because she doesn't have eyelashes, and give us Keefe or Fitz or Biana or whoever telling her she still is.

Give us Sophie Foster trying to sit on her hands, telling herself not to pull, doing it anyway, and hating herself.

Give us Sophie Foster standing in front of the mirror and crying because she can't stop, she can't stop.

Give us Sophie Foster seeking help and trying to get better, trying to heal.

Give us Sophie Foster trying and relapsing and trying and relapsing and trying and relapsing and trying.

If you're going to give us Sophie Foster with trichotillomania, give us a character with trichotillomania.

#trichotillomania #trichotillomania tw #trich #bfrb #bfrb tw #sophie foster #kotlc #smh do better shannon #fuck l*ura #cursing tw #ocd tw #shai is sO oCd #this was really hard to write but i think it's important #f u c k my head is so itchy now #just one hair... #fuck #anyway #ask to tag #rant tw #kotlc discourse #sophie foster trichotillomania