#except one scene but I think it probably occurs very early on

[try-set-me-on-fire]

What's the more depressed Buck fic have you posted snippets for it??

I haven’t, I’m not sure I’m ever going to fully write this one out because it might be dramatic to the point of trashiness hshsddhdh, but, yeah, what it says on the tin, Buck but with the depression sliders turned up, and flipping the ‘passively suicidal’ dial to occasionally active. Also he and Eddie are like even closer and more codependent and Buck sleeps in Eddie’s bed somewhat frequently and they kiss sometimes without even internally clocking that as something potentially romantic. Like they’ll be dating other people and still sleep next to each other and kiss sometimes and it doesn’t even occur to them that that might be not the best thing to do. They eventually get together actually at Hen and Karen’s wedding but even then don’t consider all the other sleeping together and kissing as part of that. It was just a thing they did, it’s fine.

I only have one half written scene for this, I’ll put it under a cut because it deals with self harm and past attempts, it takes place uhh I could never decide if it’s sometime in season two or after lawsuit arc (which I’m not sure would play out the same in this au, just like timeline wise). Sometime fairly early in their time together anyway.

Buck has a beer in his hand when Eddie notices, a detail that sticks in his head later.

“Shit!” He says it loud enough that Buck jumps a little, bottle almost sliding through his fingers. “Buck, is that- did you get hurt?”

“Huh?” He doesn’t think he did, they hadn’t been on any particularly strenuous or dangerous calls in the last shift, and it’s been a whole day since then so he thinks he would have felt it by now.

“You’re bleeding, man,” Eddie says with a worried frown, gesturing down at his leg.

Buck looks and he doesn’t realize what he’s going to find, what it means, until he sees red soaking through the right inner thigh of his sweatpants, and things would have gone easier, probably, Eddie would have to know if he’d said something like shit, that’s weird, I’ll go check it out. Except he doesn’t say that, he panics; he slaps a hand over the fuzzy line and snaps up to look at Eddie like he’s done something wrong. Eddie’s not an idiot. Buck sees the moment he puts two and two together, how wide his eyes get.

“I-“ Buck chokes, any and all excuses shriveling up before he can find them, so he says “I’ll just-“ and flees to the bathroom.

His leg is a bit of a mess. The fabric of the sweat pants peels away from his skin a little painfully with how much blood there is. Fuck. He hadn’t meant to cut this deep, it had just been awhile since he’d given in to the impulse and he tends to over do it after time spent holding back. He breaths steadily through his nose as he looks around the bathroom, hesitating over towels he doesn’t want to ruin.

There’s a knock. “Buck?” Eddie sounds kind of small and scared, and it makes Buck’s guts twist uncomfortably. Fuck. “Buck, I- Can I come in? I have the first aid kit, I just- I want to make sure you’re okay.”

[tender wound care, a little bit of talking about Buck’s self harm, Eddie very worried and mad as an extension of that worry and trying to hold all that in and Buck fucking guilty about making Eddie feel like this but just a little bit relieved that someone knows]

As Buck reaches for the ice pack the back of his hand drags across the outside of Eddie’s wrist, and though he’s seen the scar there a thousand times it’s the first time he’s felt the puckered skin. He can’t help the way his hand twists, fingers circling, holding, feeling. Eddie blinks at him, looks down at where they’re connected.

“It’s a bullet wound,” he says, voice sticking a little, rasping out of his mouth.

“I know,” Buck says quickly.

“Buck.” Eddie’s eyes dart back and forth between Buck’s own. “Buck, have you…”

He’s not sure if he should be truthful, he showed too much of the ugly underside of himself tonight already, but the moment's hesitation is long enough for Eddie to drag in a ragged inhale. Buck closes his eyes, drops his chin to his chest. “Twice.” It’s quiet enough in the bathroom that Buck thinks Eddie might be holding that inhale, trapping the air in his lungs. “Or… I don’t know, maybe three- I don’t know if the motorcycle counts.” He opens his eyes, laughing a little without much humor. “I guess if I don’t know if it counts, it probably counts, yeah?”

He is breathing, turns out. Buck can see Eddie’s chest move in and out, so he must be. His mouth is clamped shut and his eyes are frightened again and Buck feels a little sick because of it. “When?” It’s just a whisper, and then Eddie’s eyebrows come together. “I mean- you don’t have to- you don’t have to tell me, Buck, you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t…”

Buck raises an eyebrow, because he’s sitting on the man’s toilet with his boxers shoved into his groin so Eddie can clean the mess of his thigh. It’s a little late to be shy. He sighs, scrubs a hand over his eyes, and then turns that arm to show off the scar running away from his elbow, a story he’s laughed about before. “I didn’t fall from the balcony. I jumped off the roof.” Eddie’s eyes stutter shut, but Buck can’t stop now. “I looked up- I looked up how high you have to be. What’s fatal. Thought I had a good chance, and- and mom and dad weren’t there, figured even if I didn’t- even if it wasn’t immediate, I’d be… dead by the time they got home. But a neighbor saw me do it.”

[He left a note on the counter that he thinks his parent might have just thrown away, they certainly never brought it up, and kind of brushed the whole thing under the rug. They never took him to any suggested follow up therapy or anything. When he was roaming the world in his early twenties he’d sometimes get antidepressants off friends but like those don’t really work if you just take one every once in awhile. When he got the job at the fire station he finally had insurance and could get an actual prescription but the first kind he tried really didn’t agree with him and he ended up taking a bunch a once but he called Hen as he started feeling sick so she and Bobby came and found him in time (this is when Chimney is out from the rebar and after the disastrous therapy session and things are up and down with Abby so even aside from the chemical imbalance things are rough) and he has to stay in the psychiatric ward for a few days and he worried he wouldn’t have a job after but Bobby and Hen are there to pick him up and they take him out to breakfast and they care about him, Bobby lets him sleep on his couch for awhile, and things have been,like, okay since, he’s doing all right, he promises Eddie it’s not going to go that far again, that Hen and Bobby keep an eye on him and he guesses Eddie will now too. Eddie hugs him very tight and promises he will. He sleeps in Eddie’s bed for the first time that night.]

#asked and answered

[and-stir-the-stars]

You mentioned in a post that Saffron Evan eventually becomes somewhat protective of Mike. How would he respond if someone harmed Mike after that point?

(Obviously there might be a different response to different levels of assholery, so answer whatever type(s) interest(s) you.)

I think Evan’s overprotective phase happens relatively early in his and Mike's post-capture relationship; Evan generally acts very spiteful and hateful (partly to cover up the inherent fear of Mike he still has ingrained in him, but also because his whole world has been turned upside down and he's scared and has no one else but Mike around to blame) for six months at the very least. Evan finds Mike's old letters and his faith in William gets shattered, thus shattering Evan’s world once more; Evan is more angry and lost than ever before, and he doesn't know what to do with the hope that maybe Mike did-- does-- care about him after all. There's another month or two of Evan, like, equal parts lashing out AND reaching out to Mike through the trauma, before it suddenly occurs to Evan "hey, Mike knew that William was dangerous and would try to use me and just left me there anyway." Cue even more lashing out before Mike finally has his speech that makes Evan realize oh, Mike was just a scared kid back then and I didn't help matters very much; aka, the realization that Mike is just a person and not Big Brother Who Was Supposed to Care About Me and nothing else.

This realization is what sparks Evan’s overprotectiveness in the first place. It's, like, equal parts guilt over the hand he played in doing this to Mike and fear because Mike has finally started to care about him and care FOR him and he doesn't know what he'll do if something bad happens to Mike. And there's a big element of, like, Evan can tell now how badly Mike actually treats himself and Ev finds it unnerving.

Annnnnd, now for the purpose of that whole recap: Evan’s overprotective phase happens while he and Mike are still reclusive and very much isolated from society; Mike hasn't even met Jeremy yet at this point. So, there's not actually a lot of opportunity for Evan to catch someone doing something to hurt Mike. It would probably have to happen during a trip to the store or a fast food restaurant, or one of the times when Mike brings Ev to the parlor he's taking an apprenticeship at or to one of the side jobs he's working at.

So, now I'm imagining some absolute jerk going off at Mike when they're at a store or at one of Mikey’s jobs. It would probably be an adult going off at Mike, and adults still heavily trigger Evan’s anxiety and ptsd (both because William conditioned Evan to stay wary of adults-- little kid Evan can't let anything slip to an adult if he's too afraid to talk to them, right?-- and William just Being Abusive has made Evan wary of adults, especially adult men). Because of this, I doubt Evan would, like, directly go after the adult insulting/humiliating Mike; he's not going to say anything to the person, and definitely won't scream or try to physically overpower the adult. but I can see him doing something "pranky."

Except Evan would be awful at pranks. There's actually this one scene in Scrubs where a guy named JD pranks this girl by dumping a bucket of cold water while she's in the shower, and JD narrates that the girl isn't so good at pranks before the camera cuts to the girl obliviously throwing a raccoon in with JD while *he's* in the shower and he comes out with soooo many scratches, lmao. Anyway, I am now imagining that Evan has his raccoon with him in the store, maybe snuck in his jacket or a bag or smth, and Evan follows the jerk into the bathroom before shoving the raccoon under the stall with the person and listens happily to the person's screams of pain and terror :)

That's probably a bit extreme for Evan, though. I can see him stealing the person's shopping cart while they're distracted and rolling it away, maybe tipping it over or rolling it into some shelves. He tries hiding behind Mike when the person turns their anger on him, and Mike just grabs Evan and bolts out of there. He wants to be mad at Evan, especially because Evan is very specifically not supposed to be calling attention to himself or doing anything to trigger his ptsd, but like... that was pretty funny and he's kinda proud of his little bro.

If it's a younger teen or a little kid somehow insulting/hurting Mike, then Evan might try snapping at them or getting physical, but then again, Evan also has ptsd and trauma from all the kids he killed and let be killed when he was with William, so maybe Evan wouldn't try anything directly. Not really sure.

Anyway, like I said, Evan’s overprotectiveness is a result of that Realization about Mike being an Actual Person; it's a very intense and rather unhealthy overprotectiveness, and while it's good that Evan is starting to actually care about things outside of William again, his overprotectiveness is something he has to work on in his therapy sessions. He has to both get it down to healthy level and learn that the ways he's trying to protect Mike aren't altogether healthy on their own. Like, there doesn't actually need to be a whole story about someone being a jerk to Mike in the store to make Ev lash out; Evan will growl and try tugging Mike away if someone so much as says hello to Mike or tries asking what aisle the cereal is in.

Though, just because Evan works on the overprotectiveness in therapy doesn't mean it goes away entirely. It crops back up when Evan is stressed and when Ev can tell Mike is overly stressed, too. I'd imagine that if/when Henry comes back into the picture post-capture, Mike’s stress about the situation once again triggers Evan’s overprotectiveness.

#I'd go more into how henry affects things but i really don't know yet #Saffron pawn au #evan afton support center #evan afton #I am open to any thoughts you guys have on how henry might fit into the au btw

[nachosncheeze]

Fanfic Writer Ask Game

📚 & 🏷️

📚 Is there a fanfic or fanfic writer you recommend?

Definitely! It depends on what you are looking for, so here's a few of my faves in a couple different categories:

***Edit: I'm adding a cut bc it's just occurred to me to mention, anyone new who's not done the series but is seeing this - I do have a spoiler-safe fics list that Scotti and I were working on at one point, so if there's a specific season you're looking for, but not wanting to know what twists come after (or if you're looking for fic for a specific episode or event), feel free to inbox me and I'll send some links. :)

Below this cut there are descriptions that spoil all sorts of things, so.....***

For Jeller, everything by @indelibleevidence is outstanding. I'm gonna start out saying probably a majority of it has passages that are NSFW so if you're a minor or not into that, tread lightly. I'm currently revisiting Remember to Forgive, which has late-season 3 Weller suffering amnesia that takes him mentally back to early season 2; you know, when he couldn't stand to be in the same room as his wife. The angst! It's a fave and totally my jam, I could probably quote it. Torture Without You is... well. Read it. Amazing. I'm a big Remi fan, and here you will also find one of our two Reller champions: the Damaged Goods series is so dark (also very NSFW) but soooo good.

@idealisticrealism is another that everyone should definitely read, imo. The Fire is basically my favorite one-shot ever, and she's our other Reller champion - as complete AUs go I can not possibly overstate my love for From the Ashes and Into Flames. I could literally quote them both to you.

@gypsyscarfwoman is responsible for my other favorite one-shot, Nothing Can Come Between Us, which is Jeller after season 2, but from Sarah Weller's POV. It's just a tiny bit angsty but fluffy and sweet. I love the way she describes the interactions between Jeller as viewed by a concerned third party. There's also Shelter From Your Storm, which is another season 2 AU except that post compound raid there's legitimate concern Nas might throw Jane under the bus and let the CIA have her, so Weller fake marries her to legitimize and protect her.

@ladyriot recently did a lovely retelling of s2 but as a Jane/Patterson slow burn. The way they low key agonize over each other is tragic, but the ending is so sweet without being completely saccharine, and it's definitely worth a look.

I haven't read much Zapatterson but @narvaldetierra is actively writing them. I read Remembers from September and No Good Deed Goes Unpunished a while ago, and I'm excited to reread them soon and then keep working through this ship 😁

Dylan Cruca is worth checking out if you want a bit of season 2/3 Jeller canon divergence/extra scenes, or Jeller/Reller AUs - I thought their post-season 1 AU ended up being a particularly interesting twist - but they're not for everyone.

I could go on but I'll end with one that's basically the fic equivalent to a playlist of Sad Songs to Sob To: Silence Speaks by lochness20, in which Jane's black site escape attempt fails, and when they find her, she is in a REALLY bad state. Warning that it's pretty dark and brutal and tw for suicidal thoughts and an eventual very graphic murder.

🏷 Is there a tag you like to search for when looking for fanfics to read?

I don't really look for specific tags; it's not a huge fandom so there's not a ton of room to be choosy. I can say that straight whump isn't my thing, nor is pure domestic stuff, and I generally steer clear of pregnancy/kidfic unless there's some other compelling plot alongside the kids. I guess I basically love angst most of all 😍

Thank you for the ask!! :D It's always fun to revisit some faves. 💕

I'm trying to find my mojo and inspiration to start creating again, and I find these memes are a really good exercise to think critically about my ideas and hopefully get the juices flowing. If anyone else is curious, please check here and consider sending me an ask!

I've also recently done a WIP ask meme, which you can find here if you'd like a peek at what I've been working on before the words left me. :)

#blindspot #ask meme #writer ask meme #blindspot fanfic

[addoration]

thoughts on will parry's predicament in tsk (and bleeding into tas, so beware spoilers)

(forgive me for inaccuracies in this meta, i dont have my copies of hdm with me so im going on memory alone!)

so will parry, maybe 13 years old, has murdered a man. manslaughter, really, and was it even really his fault? the man shouldn't have been there in the first place.

he runs and runs and runs in fear, all the way from - what was it, winchester? - to oxford. he's physically running away, and while he would like to mentally run away too, he can't. he's gripped with fear and guilt and despair, and the only good emotion he's probably feeling is gladness that he had managed to get his mum out of there before that night.

he's too young and doesnt understand enough to realise that the dead man would never have been found. pullman does such a good job of making us get inside will's mind, see things from his childish perspective - we know, distantly, that these men must have been hired by someone else who's up to no good to go and break in to his house etc, and thus we might deduce that there would be some sort of "clean up" where the death of the man doesn't see the light of day.

in the show, we're shown this explicitly. it's almost too obvious? we know suddenly that it's boreal behind the invasions n stalking.

in the book, however, we're left as shocked and reeling as will is. like i said, distantly we know all those facts - but pullman manages to write in such a way that we see things simply from will's perspective, and we forget all logic. we're all scared little boys running from a bad deed.

and he meets lyra, and amongst the things he's thinking is probably "she doesn't know what ive done. i can still be a good person to her."

except of course, lyra pries and consults the alethiometer and she finds out exactly what will is. a murderer.

and well, anyone who has heard me speak abt it before knows that that scene where she finds out he's a murderer and is just like "awesome, he can keep us safe then" is one of my favourites. i think they did it dirty in the show. BUT regardless, i believe that this is both anticlimatic and also a climax at the same time.

anticlimatic because she finds out will's a murderer and she's actually put at ease. climactic because of the exact same reasons: its a pivotal moment in their relationship, even as early on as it is.

(actually can i say that as much as i adore the scene, i find it a bit..... wrong? it always rubbed me the wrong way that the altheiometer, a truth telling device, called will a murderer. it shouldnt, because that is ultimately what he is!!! he killed someone, intentional or not. but.

but.

will parry unintentionally and quite by accident killed that man. the word murderer just never sat right with me, despite it being true. i dont know if im alone in this - does anyone else feel this way??

anyway, moving on. the fact is, he seems to quickly forget about it. he's still on the look out for coppers when they cross back into his world, so of course it's not out of his mind completely! he's paranoid but not so paranoid as to be irrational.

but he goes the rest of the books without really thinking about it much more. remember when he draws the knife and intends to stand up to - who was it, the metatron? he does so without a thought.

which is partly on par for his character: he's a protector, he's a survivor. but i also feel like pullman forgets to give him any of the trauma that should come with accidentally killing someone.

even though kids are more resilient. even though its very much likely that he's pushed that into the mists of his mind simply because he has more pressing matters to attend to (finding lyra).

actually it's just occured to me; he doesn't have time to really grieve his father, either.

but anyway, back to the topic.

when the knife shatters, he's thinking of his mother. when he cant make another cut, he's thinking of his mother.

it's interesting that pullman chose love to be the driving force behind everything that will parry does. i actually really appreciate and adore that. i don't belive its ever explicitly said? but he is the bravest character in the trilogy. lyra endures a lot and is brave too, don't get me wrong, but there's something about will, seen consciously putting love first time and time again, that makes you remember that he, unlike lyra, did not choose this adventure, and so him standing in the face of it all and choosing to love anyway is a sign of his bravery.

i mean, thats not to mention the time he stands in front of iorek and says "fight me".

it's interesting to me. he is by far the kindest character in the series. even lyra, though never meaning ill, has her moments of small cruelty, though they taper out towards the end of the triology as she grows up and is also influenced by will.

i started this trying to gather a few thoughts on will being a murderer, and ive ended up concluding that will is the bravest and kindest character. do you think balthamos would have done what he did, sacrificing his life, if he had never been influenced by will?

and let me touch on one thing i said in passing: will did not choose this journey. men started stalking his mother and him, forcing him into the actions at the start of tsk; lyra, on the other hand, fought tooth and nail to go north and save roger, and then continued to chose to walk over the bridge between worlds that asriel created. you can say that it was fate and she was destined to do so, so she didn't have a choice either.... but its not true. she had a choice the same way eve had a choice.

well! ive said a lot and resolved none of the floating thoughts in my head. feel free to comment or add your thoughts to this, or come talk to me in the hdm server (msg me if you would like a link) about what ive said!! i just love will parry a lot.

#his dark materials #hdm #hdm tv #dove talks #long post #sorry mutuals who have no idea what im on about!!

[addictedtostorytelling]

Thanks again for your detailed analysis on CSI and its writing!! I have a question somewhat related to CSI - what other media would you recommend that emulates the storytelling of GSR and CSI? Specifically the character of Sara Sidle and the subtlety of the character development are facets that I really like, but I've struggled to find similar. I know that is a really broad ask, but I'm curious if there are other shows that capture that vibe that you would recommend!

hi, anon!

thank you for your kind words!

re: your question:

so if i were to list out some of the attributes that make csi, gsr, and sara sidle unique in terms of the storytelling and character development (imo), i'd probably include the way the show prioritizes depicting the characters' professional lives over their personal ones and, at least in the early seasons, is possessed of a literary quality; the way the ship is unbelievably slow-burn and for the most part occurs "between the lines;" and our girl's "jagged edges" are shown long before the reasons for them are unveiled, but once said reasons are unveiled, they make perfect sense in retrospect.

i can't think of one single show with one ship that involves one particular character that checks all of these boxes in the same way that csi does.

the best i can do is offer some shows/ships/characters that check at least some of the boxes (but not necessarily all of the others).

so with that caveat in mind:

the two shows i would recommend—probably to the surprise of no one—are the west wing and er.

more discussion after the “keep reading,” if you’re interested.

__

the west wing

ways in which tww is comparable to csi

while the profession being examined is incredibly different (a team of us presidential administration senior staffers vs. a team of crime scene investigators), the west wing is similar to csi in that it focuses heavily on the professional lives of a group of highly-intelligent, highly-flawed workaholic do-gooders all invested in a common cause, all of whom are married to their jobs in the extreme.

like csi, the narrative is situated almost entirely in the workplace, with very little play given to the "at home" stuff, except insofar as those two spheres naturally intersect.

if you like the "found (team) family" aspects of csi, then you'll probably enjoy that aspect of tww, too.

ditto for literary nature of the drama and the shakespearean overtones.

as for the ships: one of the more prominent ships on tww is josh lyman x donna moss. much like with gsr, they are a pairing comprised of an eccentric genius/social disaster and his incredibly loyal employee, who is also a genius in her own right, who, despite their mutual attraction from day #1, cannot be together due to their devotion to "the sacred profession™." if you enjoy the slow-burn of gsr and all of the pining/yearning of the early seasons, then j/d will probably scratch a similar itch for you.

while no one character on tww is a real sara analog, the characters in general are well-drawn, nuanced, and three-dimensional, and the characters of josh, toby, and leo are all ones that do have their traumatic backstories explored over the course of the series.

i will also say, independent of any comparison to csi, tww is definitely one of the best-written television programs i've ever watched, boasting several examples of episodes i would consider to be technically perfect.

while the subject matter may not appeal to everyone, if it does appeal to you, or at least could, i highly recommend you give it a chance just because the stories are so well-told and the characters are so engaging.

it's just really superlative television.

excellent all around.

bonus points: jorja fox has a recurring guest-star role on tww (as secret service agent gina toscano) during s1-s2.

ways in which tww is not comparable to csi

of course, all of the above said, tww and csi are (overall) incredibly tonally different, just by nature of their different subject matters, so if part of the appeal of csi for you is the darkness and morbidity, then the shiny, bright idealism of tww may not be for you.

also, just in general, tww is not a "procedural" in the same sense that csi is. it is much more highly serialized, to the point where missing a single episode can make the show incomprehensible going forward. it also doesn't adhere to the same kind of "we're introduced to a problem/case at the start of an episode, the characters work on/investigate the problem/case throughout the course of the episode, and by the end of the episode, said problem/case is almost always (re)solved" patterns that csi does. that so, if part your enjoyment of csi derives from that pattern or even from the general "neat and tidiness" of being told self-contained, forty-five minute episodic stories that generally are wrapped by the time the end credits show up on screen, then, again, tww may not be for you.

furthermore, with regards to j/d, they ultimately have a very, very different vibe from gsr, so don't expect the same kind of dynamic, even if the superficial trappings of "boss and employee extremely slow-burn forbidden romance" are the same. theirs is a much more “i’m going to tease and hassle you because i love you” kind of deal than anything we see from grissom and sara, for sure.

their storyline is also much more “mainline” than gsr’s ever is, particularly in the later seasons of the show.

as a general disclaimer, i will also throw out that, as is the case with csi, certain aspects of tww (which aired from 1999-2006) are now very dated, so you have to go into the show with a willingness to sit through some late 90s/early 00s shenanigans.

er

ways in which er is comparable to csi

on many levels, er paved the way for csi in terms of being a long-running procedural—both shows clock at in at fifteen seasons in total, all said and done—with cinematic aspirations.

as is the case with both csi and tww, er is another show that focuses on a group of highly-intelligent, highly-flawed workaholic do-gooders all invested in a common cause, all of whom are married to their jobs in the extreme. like csi and tww, it is also a show where the majority of the focus is on the characters' work lives, as opposed to their home ones, except insofar as there is natural overlap.

of course, more so than tww, er is a procedural, so while it is generally more serialized than csi, it is also very much the kind of show where most of the medical cases are ones that we follow and solve within an hour. that same familiar satisfaction one gets watching the "csi pattern" play out is present as the doctors cycle through their patients.

tonally, er is probably closer to csi than tww is, just by nature of featuring storylines that deal with life and death.

as for the ships: the ship that comes closest for me to gsr of any other ship on television (at least in terms of execution) is er’s flagship—doug ross x carol hathaway. hathaross is, like gsr, a ship where the characters have romantic history that predates the start of the show; they start out the pilot apart but then gradually over the course of several seasons come together in epic fashion. their love story is filled with yearning, drama, heartache, and transcendent, all-encompassing love. at its core, it is, like gsr, the story of a man who considers himself bad to the point of unlovability and the troubled girl he slowly learns to open himself to because he is pulled to her by a love that ultimately proves stronger than his not inconsiderable self-loathing and doubt.

as for characters: the character that i would say reads most similarly to sara for me of any other character on television also comes er—first nurse and later doctor abby lockhart, who features on the show from s6-s15 (and for her last several seasons on the show is ostensibly the closest thing er has to a “main character”). 

like sara, abby endured an incredibly traumatic childhood, the details of which are incrementally revealed over her first several seasons on the show and make total sense in retrospect, given her characterization. like sara, abby has a sardonic, wry, sometimes abrasive outer affect that she uses to mask how much she cares on the inside. like sara, abby is a messy, contradictory, flawed character who is allowed to make some fairly sizable mistakes and whose actions are not always “prettified” as is sometimes the case with other female leads. she is nuanced, realistic, and interesting, and the amount of growth she shows over her nine years on the show constitutes one of the best and most-rewarding character arcs i’ve ever had the pleasure to watch. her final episode on the show is one of the best sendoffs i’ve ever seen. so much of what happens with abby is very thematically similar to what happens with sara. it’s also just really, really good stuff by itself, even without the comparison.

not gonna lie: er is my favorite show of all time, and i wholeheartedly recommend it to anyone who is a fan of excellent tv. despite having debuted almost thirty years ago, it absolutely holds up, with wonderful characters, engaging storylines, and some of the hands-down best, most game-changing episodes of television in the history of primetime drama. 

bonus points: not only does jorja fox also have a fairly prominent recurring guest-role on er (as resident physician dr. maggie doyle) in s3-s5, but marg helgenberger, george eads, wally langham, liz vassey, and archie kao all also make guest appearances on the show, as well—to say nothing of the fact that many, many doctors and patients on er also show up as victims and criminals on csi.

pretty sure some of the folks who appear on both shows are jorja’s friends she’s gotten jobs for because she’s a peach like that.

ways in which er is not comparable to csi

because of the setting, subject matter, and temporality, er isn’t as literary as either csi or tww are in nature—and, in particular, it doesn’t tend to have the same kind of mythological underpinnings that the other two programs sometimes do—so if that aspect of csi is a big draw for you, then you might not be as satisfied with what er has to offer.

in later seasons, er also differs from either csi or tww in that it does start to explore more and more of its characters’ personal lives outside of the sphere of the workplace, and, at times, it does veer fairly heavily into the territory of relationship drama.

for as much as i love the show overall, there are some love triangles i find tedious.

as for the gsr to hathaross comparison, as is the case with j/d on tww, hathaross is a much more “main text” ship than gsr is by far, so if the subtext of gsr is something you really go for, just know there’s no real replication of that here.

likewise, with the sara and abby comparison, be aware that, at least personally, i don’t find abby’s romantic storyline at all as compelling as sara’s (and in fact i don’t really ship her endgame pairing at all), so if you’re like me, while you’ll enjoy her individual character development a lot, you might be lukewarm or even averse to what they do with her love story-wise.

as per the disclaimer with tww, be apprised that er is an older show (which aired from 1994-2009), so some of the storylines and concepts are dated.

though, honestly, overall, it’s held up really well and was remarkably progressive even during its early 90s seasons.

if neither one of these recs appeals to you, then other things you might check out:

while ted lasso is a comedy and doesn’t have much in common with csi otherwise, it does do an excellent job of exploring various characters’ trauma and unveiling what makes them tick in a way that might be something you like if you’re a fan of how sara’s trauma storyline is handled on csi.

the character of juliet burke from lost has a very different background than sara but is similar in that she is a brilliant, resourceful woman who starts out in “no one could ever love me because i’m a mess”-mode only to eventually find a transcendent, consciousness-altering love that teaches her otherwise. the execution is not the exact same as with sara/gsr, but the vibes are comparable.

anyway, like i said up top, there’s really nothing that i would consider to be a particularly close match to csi, gsr, and sara’s storyline on the whole, but hopefully something i’ve talked about here might be enjoyable to you.

thanks for the question! please feel welcome to send another any time.

#answered #anon #my recs

[h0riz0nstuff]

Non action shots of Aloy from the story trailer :D

#the shieldweaver seems the default for cutscenes now #except one scene but I think it probably occurs very early on #maybe #we'll see #hfw #horizon forbidden west #hzd #ps4 #guerrilla games #ps4 games #video games #beyond the horizon #ps5 #horizon forbidden west spoilers #hfw spoilers #horizon spoilers #spoilers

[thedreamermusing]

Harry identified with and reluctantly admired Snape even before ‘The Prince’s Tale’

So, 'Albus Severus' is admittedly is a controversial name in fandom due to Snape's own dubious morality. And people also think that Harry going from hatred to admiration of Snape so quickly is unrealistic. But, that's not true. There's no doubt that Harry hated Snape, but amid that hatred, there was also reluctant admiration and even identification with Snape. Let's see a few examples:

Harry did not speak; he felt that to say anything might be dangerous. He was sure he had just broken into Snape’s memories, that he had just seen scenes from Snape’s childhood, and it was unnerving to think that the crying little boy who had watched his parents shouting was actually standing in front of him with such loathing in his eyes. . . .

Probably the first time Harry is looking at Snape as anything more than his hated Potions professor. But it is still significant considering Harry's own abusive childhood.

His reaction to Snape's Worst Memory:

What was making Harry feel so horrified and unhappy was not being shouted at or having jars thrown at him — it was that he knew how it felt to be humiliated in the middle of a circle of onlookers, knew exactly how Snape had felt as his father had taunted him, and that judging from what he had just seen, his father had been every bit as arrogant as Snape had always told him.

His immediate reaction after watching Snape's memory is to empathise with Snape, because he knows what it's like to be bullied in front of a crowd.

We also get hints of how similar Snape and Harry are. Even Hermione comments on it:

Did you hear him talking about the Dark Arts? He loves them! All that unfixed, indestructible stuff —” “Well,” said Hermione, “I thought he sounded a bit like you.”

“Like me?”

“Yes, when you were telling us what it’s like to face Voldemort. You said it wasn’t just memorizing a bunch of spells, you said it was just you and your brains and your guts - well, wasn’t that what Snape was saying? That it really comes down to being brave and quick-thinking?”

Hermione comments on how they both sound similar. Snape and Harry do have a lot in common as we will find out later, but this is one of the first hints of another character noticing it.

But imo, the largest culmination of Harry's reluctant admiration is in the case Snape's old textbook, when he called himself the Half-blood Prince. This is teen Snape; Snape as Lily knew him, Snape without all the baggage that he has with Harry. And what is Harry's opinion of him?

Harry woke early on the morning of the trip, which was proving stormy, and whiled away the time until breakfast by reading his copy of Advanced Potion-Making. He did not usually lie in bed reading his textbooks; that sort of behavior, as Ron rightly said, was indecent in anybody except Hermione, who was simply weird that way. Harry felt, however, that the Half-Blood Princes copy of Advanced Potion-Making hardly qualified as a textbook. The more Harry pored over the book, the more he realized how much was in there, not only the handy hints and shortcuts on potions that was earning him such a glowing reputation with Slughorn, but also the imaginative little jinxes and hexes scribbled in the margins, which Harry was sure, judging by the crossings-out and revisions, that the Prince had invented himself.

Harry's admiration is practically dripping through the pages. He's staying up at night reading the book, admiring the boy who was so clever.

One of the most interesting lines is also this:

“My dad used this spell,” said Harry. “I — Lupin told me.” This last part was not true; in fact, Harry had seen his father use the spell on Snape, but he had never told Ron and Hermione about that particular excursion into the Pensieve. Now, however, a wonderful possibility occurred to him. Could the Half-Blood Prince possibly be —?

Harry is so attached to Snape's old textbook that he wishes it was his father. Harry is hungry for father figures and the fact that he elevates the Prince to this kind of figure from just his textbook is significant. It shows the lost potential between Harry and Snape. Who is the Prince but a younger Snape? It shows that had Snape been a little less bitter and damaged, he could have been a mentor figure for Harry.

These two have so much in common: their lives are defined by Voldemort and they're not truly free until he's dead, they're both half-bloods who grew up in the muggle world, they both suffered abusive childhoods, they were both bullied, they're both sarcastic and dry, they both can get very vicious (Snape more so obviously), they're both completely loyal to Dumbledore, they're both brave and stubborn as hell. I truly believe that had Snape not been so blind, he could have been a great father figure for Harry simply because of how similar they are and how much they could relate to each other.

He felt stunned; it was as though a beloved pet had turned suddenly savage; what had the Prince been thinking to copy such a spell into his book? And what would happen when Snape saw it? Would he tell Slughorn — Harry’s stomach churned — how Harry had been achieving such good results in Potions all year? Would he confiscate or destroy the book that had taught Harry so much…the book that had become a kind of guide and friend? Harry could not let it happen…He could not…

Harry thinks of the Prince as a friend and guide.

“Will you stop harping on about the book!” snapped Harry. “The Prince only copied it out! It’s not like he was advising anyone to use it! For all we know, he was making a note of something that had been used against him!”

“I don’t believe this,” said Hermione. “You’re actually defending —“

“I’m not defending what I did!” said Harry quickly. “I wish I hadn’t done it, and not just because I’ve got about a dozen detentions. You know I wouldn’t’ve used a spell like that, not even on Malfoy, but you can’t blame the Prince, he hadn’t written ‘try this out, it’s really good’ — he was just making notes for himself, wasn’t he, not for anyone else…”

Even after 'Sectumsempra', Harry defends the Prince like this. As a side note, I also think that Harry's relationship with the Prince somewhat mirrors Lily's relationship with Snape. They both admired and loved the boy who was so clever and imaginative and were willing to blind themselves as that boy went deeper into the dark side.

He broke off, looking out of the window. He could not stop himself dwelling upon Dumbledore’s inexcusable trust in Snape…but as Hermione had just inadvertently reminded him, he, Harry, had been taken in just the same…in spite of the increasing nastiness of those scribbled spells, he had refused to believe ill of the boy who had been so clever, who had helped him so much..

This is after Snape killed Dumbledore, and Harry's primary feeling about the Prince is one of betrayal. Ultimately, I believe Harry's relationship with the Prince is pivotal in his understanding of Snape, and I firmly believe that this also informed his decision to name his son after Snape. After watching Snape's dying memories, Harry's admiration of the Prince returned and merged with his feelings towards Snape. It is no coincidence that the chapter revealing Snape's true allegiance is called 'The Prince's Tale', telling us that Snape truly is the same Prince Harry admired and wished was his father.

Harry's feelings towards Snape after the Prince's tale is obvious. Throughout Snape's memories, he identifies with him, not James. He immediately notices that James has an air of being loved and adored while Snape conspicuously lacks it. He cannot bring himself to watch Snape's Worst Memory again. After watching the memories, he identifies with both Snape and Tom Riddle as 'the abandoned boys' who were outcasts and only found their home in Hogwarts.

In short, I believe Harry's admiration of Snape was not sudden or inexplicable but something he always reluctantly felt. He identified with Snape even when he hated him. Once he saw Snape's memories in his entirety, he understood and identified with them even more because Harry has been in Snape's shoes. He's been a dark-haired, abused, bullied, half-blood outcast. And he knows how hard it is to be brave in those circumstances. While the readers might have trouble understanding why Snape would have a child named after him, Harry doing so is not a surprise.

#severus snape #harry james potter #Albus Severus Potter #Harry Potter #harry potter meta #the half-blood prince #pro snape #name discourse again #harry's feelings towards snape are complicated #and profound #and anyone who paid attention should not be surprised by the name choice

[shining-magically]

so I’ve wondered this since the trailer came out years and years ago and Chloe defended the movie - was the red shoes teaser written by the same team that made the movie? were they forced to market it like that, was that based on an earlier draft, etc?? not sure if you know but you seem like the leading expert!

Sorry, this is gonna be an absolute novel because you know I’m an animation fan and the history and production of Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs is SO interesting and insane. Like, Tangled levels of insane. Thanks for calling me an expert, no one else was gonna do it so I just kind of took up the helm lol.

Here’s the low-down... The timeline of the movie’s production is an absolute mess and kind of an extremely wild ride. It was in production for ten years, went through a lot of different crew members, and went through at least two other major versions of the story before landing on the final version.

Since there’s not a ton of info on the movie’s production, a lot of this is pieced together from different interviews and context clues, and also a lot of what I’ve read and what I am quoting has been translated from Korean, sometimes pretty roughly. But yeah.

Here’s the story of why the Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs teasers and poster were so, so bad and fatshame-y and the actual movie was so, so good and body-positive. (With pictures and production artwork!)

(This is a beast of a post so I’m putting it under a cut.)

All right, so. After its conception originally as a short story by the South Korean studio Locus Creative in 2009-2010-ish, Red Shoes and the Seven Dwarfs was being worked on and was set to come out in Summer 2017, as evidenced by this poster at the 2015 Cannes Film Festival, featuring a different logo and very different character designs for most of the dwarfs.

In early-mid 2016, the first teaser (in which we see Snow White undress and then two dwarfs recoil in horror at her fatness when she takes her magic shoes off) was released, after the film had kind of been slowly chugging along for 6 or so years. (I am having such trouble pinpointing when the second teaser was released (in which one of the dwarfs basically attacks Snow while she is sleeping to steal her shoes), but I believe it was around the same time.) The teasers didn’t get that much traction because this was a small film from a small indie studio in South Korea.

None of the final actors had been cast yet. At this point in the production, the story was different, one of the many versions that the movie went through. As in the final movie, the dwarfs were actually cursed knights/princes and Snow White switched back and forth between two body types due to her magic shoes, but in this version, the dwarfs needed to steal the shoes from her in order to break their curse (rather than needing “a kiss from the most beautiful woman in the world” like in the final movie).

The weird thing is, I believe they had JUST changed the movie’s story when the teaser came out. I’m almost positive it was released more as a proof of concept than as an actual trailer for the movie. They had just recently combined two separate characters (seen above), a typical pretty, skinny princess character (Snow White) and a cute chubby girl character (’Bonnie’), into one single character that switches back and forth between the two appearances when she wears the magic shoes (also they had just dropped literally half of the movie taking place in the real world, with a magic mirror portal, it was a whole thing). 

They didn’t have the details of this aspect of the new story hammered out yet, and the first pass at presenting Snow’s magically changing body type, was, yeah, not good and super offensive. This was a really inexperienced indie studio making their first film on a low budget, so even the animation and voice acting wasn’t great. I think they just wanted to get SOMETHING out there because it had been 6 years and they wanted to have something to show for it.

But here’s the thing. Despite how the teasers make it seem, this was always supposed to be a movie about body positivity, letting go of appearance-based prejudices, and loving yourself and others for who you are and for who they are, which we see in the final film.

I like to think of our film as a kindhearted one. Our intentions are nice.

- Director Sung-ho Hong

It’s important to keep in mind that this movie was made in South Korea by a 99% Korean crew, and, as I understand it anyway, in Korean culture, ‘fatshaming’ is not really a thing that is seen as overtly offensive. Also, children’s media there seems to have more adult things in it than in the US, which probably accounts for the more risque parts of the teasers. That said, I really believe that at this point in the timeline, the movie was on-track to be bad (or at least not very good) when it was released, and it would have ended up bad IF a few key players hadn’t signed on (which I’ll get to in a moment).

Interestingly, the movie’s producer, Sujin Hwang, said in a 2017 interview:

“[Both teasers] were solely produced to induce curiosity. They’re completely irrelevant to the actual story.”

- Producer Sujin Hwang

I think what she was trying to convey was that neither one is a scene in the actual movie, because while the teasers didn’t reflect the revamped story as it existed in summer 2017 (the time of the interview), they DID reflect the earlier version of the story where the dwarfs wanted her shoes, which is what the story was at the time they were made.

Now that we’re in post-teaser 2016, HERE’S where things start to turn around. After the teasers were released, my guy Disney veteran and native Korean Jin Kim joined the project. He and Red Shoes director Sung-ho Hong had been buddies for about eight years and Sung-ho had been trying to get Jin to come to Seoul and work with him at Locus for a long time, and he finally succeeded.

Jin and his twenty years of Disney experience as an animator and senior designer on films like Tangled, Frozen, Big Hero 6, Zootopia, and Moana, had a HUGE HUGE HUGE influence on the movie. He redesigned almost all the characters, oversaw all the visual development from the moment he signed on, and heavily (HEAVILY) supervised the animation, literally going frame-by-frame through preliminary animations and drawing over them, teaching the inexperienced animators at Locus everything he knew. (Literally almost everyone except him either only had TV experience or had no professional experience because they just gotten out of school.)

From an outsider’s perspective, it really seems as though Jin joining the project (and his gargantuan effort) made the quality SKYROCKET. Not just in character design and animation, but also in things like effects animation, story, etc. After he joined, Locus really started pushing HARD to make a good, high-quality movie, and his influence and experience from being a prominent figure at Disney was absolutely key. The studio also began to really study Disney films and other well-made animated films from other studios to really try and pinpoint what the DNA of a good animated movie really is.

I don’t have any solid evidence, but I’m pretty sure that Tony Bancroft (an animator and the co-director of Mulan) then joined the project because he’s good friends with Jin Kim. He is only credited as the voice director (the movie was recorded in English and the characters were animated to the English dialogue), but I am SURE that he probably also had a pretty big influence on the movie, because like... How could he not? I really really think there was more to his role than his title would have you believe, even though there’s almost no info out there about it.

So now the movie goes through a gigantic metamorphosis. Character designs, visual development, and animation quality are all rapidly improving, the story is tightening, and the themes of the movie (which, again, were always the same and intended to be positive) are being presented in a more sincere way. The movie is becoming the sweet, self-love-encouraging and body-positive movie that was eventually released.

I’m putting a gif from the credits of the final movie here. As we move into 2017, when the giant eruption of backlash occurred, please keep in mind that the story was finalized at this point and that THIS was the movie people were so mad about:

Chloe Grace Moretz accepted the role of Snow White immediately after she read the script and she recorded her lines (I think) in early-ish 2017. Her co-star Sam Claflin also immediately accepted the role of the romantic interest, Merlin, after reading the script and recorded his lines in (I believe) July 2017.

In the summer of 2017, the story and script were more or less the same as in the final movie. Promotional images from that time show that most of dwarfs had been completely redesigned by this point and didn’t have their teaser designs anymore.

They also released a few screenshots that look exactly like the final film. The movie was advertised as coming out in ‘2018′ at this point. Here’s a promo image from 2017 that is MUCH more tactfully worded than the infamous Cannes poster:

So now we’re in summer 2017. The Cannes Film Festival. The movie’s script and story have been basically nailed down, animation is underway, and the Korean film company Finecut is beginning to market and sell the movie to worldwide audiences. They are planning on showing some footage to potential buyers at the festival, and they make a poster to advertise the film there.

Unfortunately, it’s THIS POSTER:

Now here’s where there are some unknowns. By this point, the movie is basically in its final form, which is an adorable, body-positive story about loving people for who they are, loving yourself for who YOU are, and that provides commentary on society’s standards of beauty and how they affect how people are treated/viewed. So why this poster??? All I can really tell is that someone (I think Finecut) really, REALLY messed up and either horribly mistranslated the tagline, or didn’t do enough research to know that this kind of thing is REALLY NOT OKAY in western culture.

The above picture is shared and the internet backlash begins, fueled by tweets from prominent body-positivity activists like Tess Holliday. Even Chloe Grace Moretz speaks out against it, because she of all people KNOWS that that’s not what the movie is about. The internet then finds the old teasers from before the movie was revamped and it makes things worse. Producer Sujin Hwang profusely apologizes and says that that is NOT the message of the movie. Locus pulls the advertising campaign, and takes down the two old teasers.

“Our film, a family comedy, carries a message designed to challenge social prejudices related to standards of physical beauty in society by emphasizing the importance of inner beauty.”

- Producer Sujin Hwang

Voice director Tony Bancroft also tried to explain the situation:

“The truth is the film has a body-positive message as its core theme–it’s the opposite of what reports are saying. The problem is one poorly translated movie poster that has been taken dramatically out of context.” 

- Voice Director Tony Bancroft

And then... There was nothing for a while. The movie didn’t come out in 2018 and was delayed. From what I can tell, I DON’T believe this delay was related to the Cannes backlash. I think it was mostly due to Locus’s limited budget and resources, because as we know, animation is difficult, time-consuming, expensive, and easy to do badly but hard to do well. Also, probably with Jin Kim and Tony Bancroft’s influence, they REALLY wanted to make sure to do a good job with the animation because they now had a great story and they really wanted the movie to be a quality, worldwide hit that would kind of put South Korean feature animation on the map. Just take a look at how nice the final animation was:

The movie was released in South Korea on July 25th, 2019. Unfortunately, the damage was done in the English-speaking markets and it was not released to an English-speaking audience until June 22, 2020, when it was released digitally in the UK. At the time of this post, there is no set US release date, but the distribution rights were recently bought by Lionsgate and the MPAA gave the film an official PG rating.

So who’s to blame? There’s no good answer. You could blame Locus for making those old teasers. You could blame Finecut for the competely tonedeaf Cannes poster. You could even blame cancel culture for raging against the movie based on one poster and two old teaser trailers without researching what the movie was actually about.

All I know is, it’s a damn shame.

#mooncactus #red shoes and the seven dwarfs #red shoes and the 7 dwarfs #animation #animation production #animation history #red shoes movie #redshoes #jin kim #tony bancroft

[labarch]

Witch Hats and Prejudice Part II

<-- Part I

Olruggio, my love, my man, I’m sorry your proposal to Qifrey in chapter 40 didn’t go as you hoped, let’s sit down and discuss your workaholism, temper issues and saviour complex, yes? Yes. It’s couple therapy time at last, we’ll have a look at Qifrey and Olruggio’s relationship and at chapter 40 in particular through the following points:

-Panelling in the Orufrey conversation in chapter 40

-Prejudice and power imbalance in Qifrey and Olruggio’s interactions

-Help as a collaboration between equals (spoiler: they haven’t made it to that stage yet)

-What Olruggio wants from Qifrey

 Panelling in the Orufrey conversation in chapter 40

The conversation in chapter 40 is never framed as a happy reunion. If we reuse the analysis of the panels from Coco and Qifrey’s conversation I made in my previous post, we find the same markers of unease between Olruggio and Qifrey. Most of the panels are narrow, and get darker and darker as night falls. Qifrey and Olruggio rarely share a panel, and even when they do, they rarely make direct eye contact: Qifrey looks down, or Olruggio walks away from him, or they are curled in on themselves or standing on a slope at different eye level. For a while Qifrey is up in the air and mostly talking to himself. Oh yeah, and there’s a hat that gets in the way at some point.

It gives the sense that they are having two separate conversations, and that they never truly achieve the connection that we saw between Qifrey and Coco. On top of that, while the conversation is supposed to be about comforting Qifrey and earning his trust, Olruggio never manages to get a smile out of him, except for wobbly, miserable little grimaces. So what’s going through both of their heads, and why are they failing to meet halfway?

The chapter has an outward pull to it. The scene takes place on a slope that leads away from the atelier. The chapter opens with a herd of dragons flying away and into the night. Then Qifrey takes flight to look into the distance, while giving a very contradictory speech about how fulfilling yet dull his life is here, how happy yet trapped in an illusion he feels. He has to hold on to his cape as it flaps in the wind. It brings those dragons back to mind, like they are a metaphor for the side of him that wishes to escape. Qifrey’s migration season is just starting folks, it’s a confusing time for him okay.

In contrast to Qifrey looking ahead into a dark wilderness, Olruggio in this chapter is almost always looking back. He walks away from Qifrey to talk to him over his shoulder, or he looks back towards the atelier. In the only scene where he faces Qifrey full-on, the past is so present on his mind that he de-ages them both. It’s interesting, because it adds a caveat to his pledge of listening to everything Qifrey has to say: he is not so much trying to adapt to Qifrey’s new situation as he is trying to bring them back to the childhood stage of their friendship, when they were always together and kept no secret.

This whole looking ahead / looking back dichotomy brings me back to the mentality of the Great Hall, a society obsessed with keeping itself in an insulated bubble, wrapping itself in good intentions and noble ideals, and ignoring its own inner darkness and complexity. Qifrey, because of his inability to be content and stay in place, threatens that delicate balance. That sends the other witches around him into such a state of panic and outrage that even those who genuinely love him end up lashing out at him with uncharacteristic brutality.

Prejudice and power imbalance in Qifrey and Olruggio’s interactions

I have described in my previous post how vicious and oddly personal Beldaruit got in his attacks against Qifrey in chapter 36, but you can make the same case for Olruggio, especially since the two scenes run in parallel. There is something excessive about the violence with which Olruggio confronts his friend. For one, he is choosing a hell of a time to do it: the girls are safe, there is no urgency to press Qifrey for answers right this instant – except if he is hoping to shock Qifrey into honesty while he’s disoriented. Qifrey has just woken up from a three-day coma; he is half-naked in a place Olruggio knows worsens his nightmares; his scar is exposed; he is half-blind because Olruggio has taken his glasses; Olruggio is literally an angry dark blob looming over him. I’ve often heard it say that Qifrey is manipulative towards Olruggio, but in return Olruggio isn’t above using intimidation tactics against him, consciously or not.

There is also the staggering lack of empathy of the approach: what started this whole thing is that Olruggio learnt about Qifrey’s impending blindness. And his knee-jerk reaction was to attack Qifrey about it. Like, um, my dude, your friend almost died, he is going to go blind and lose his job, you wanna try being sensitive about it? (Note that Qifrey running after the Brimhats didn’t trouble Olruggio that much at first: after his interview with the Knights Moralis he is mainly concerned with “getting his story straight with Qifrey”; it’s only later on, when we see him staring at the glasses he’s just repaired, that he starts voicing his doubts about Qifrey’s intentions). He may be right to suspect that Qifrey is hiding things from him, but there’s a pretty big leap between “you are keeping secrets” and “you are wilfully using your own child as bait”.

This whole suspicious climate, that makes Olruggio jump straight to the ugliest conclusion possible, is once again a feature of the Great Hall mentality. The mind of a person who has been in contact with forbidden magic is forever corrupt, and his actions are forever suspect. Had Qifrey been anyone else, he would probably have been given the benefit of the doubt for losing track of his students while he was, you know, extremely concussed and suffering from blood loss. Interestingly, Olruggio’s concern – whether, when faced with a chance to go after the Brimhats, Qifrey would choose his quest over his students’ safety – is addressed as early as chapter 22: after an instinctive movement to rush into danger, Qifrey pulls himself back and takes measures to keep Coco and Tetia safe, and even plans to call Olruggio and the Knights Moralis as reinforcements to help rescue the others. Then he gets hit in the head by a giant snake golem, and the rest is history.

In general, Beldaruit’s and Olruggio’s accusations that Qifrey is using Coco as bait without caring for her wellbeing just don’t hold up. First, all the attacks by the Brimhats so far have occurred in completely mundane, teaching-related settings with other adults present (at the stationary shop, or during an exam), so pushing blame onto Qifrey clearly comes from prejudice rather than evidence. Second, if Qifrey’s sole aim was to get clues on the Brimhats, he would pressure Coco into taking the Librarian test as early as possible, but we keep seeing the opposite: he encourages her to take breaks and to enjoy her training rather than be laser-focused on her goals. Hilariously, out of the two tests Coco passed so far, Qifrey gave his approval for none, thinking it was too early for her (extra-hilariously, Beldaruit is the one who speed-ran Coco through her second test). I’m just saying, if Olruggio hasn’t noticed any of this and can’t take it in consideration before bringing out the accusations and threats, maybe he’s not doing that good a job as a Watchful Eye.  

Another thing about this climate of suspicion, added to the power imbalance between Qifrey and Olruggio, is that it prevents them from having a healthy fight. Olruggio invokes his duties as Watchful Eye to berate Qifrey whenever he steps out of line, but when Olruggio lets his temper carry him too far and misuses his own power (when he drags Coco out to the Knights Moralis even though she had already been officially accepted as an apprentice in volume 2, or when he accuses Qifrey of using Coco as bait in volume 7 without proof), Qifrey never criticises him for doing so. It’s not that he is shy about speaking up to power – he is more than happy to yell at Beldaruit and Easthies when they mistreat his students. But when it comes to Olruggio, Qifrey is compelled to shoulder as much blame as he can, and seems almost afraid of saying anything negative to him.

It would have been justified for Qifrey to start chapter 40 by getting mad at Olruggio for his earlier accusations: Olruggio had been insensitive, unhelpful and completely out of line. But instead Qifrey pretty much encourages Olruggio to attack him again: from his “I thought you might be mad at me” to frantically denying that Olruggio might have ever done anything wrong. In return, there is something defensive in Olruggio’s delivery during the “I’m angry that I wasn’t someone you could trust” segment: he walks away from Qifrey as he gives the non-apology, and it comes out sandwiched between criticisms of Qifrey for being reckless and a long speech of Olruggio praising himself, and how everything would be alright if only Qifrey behaved himself and relied on him more. It’s an issue that this old distribution of roles is so well-entrenched between them, with Olruggio as the golden student and Qifrey as the eternal problem child.

Qifrey’s exaggerated gentleness and praise towards Olruggio participates in the feeling of wrongness that weighs on chapter 40. The memory erasure scene is framed like a kiss, and Qifrey keeps complimenting him even after sending him into an unnatural sleep. It would come across as condescending and manipulative, except for how fervently Qifrey seems to want to believe that Olruggio is perfect, and that any dysfunction in their relationship has to come from him.

Qifrey, focused as he is on his own dark secrets, is utterly unwilling to see any darkness in Olruggio. It makes sense when you consider that Qifrey has also been absorbing the prejudices of the Great Hall: he thinks very little of himself, and has probably been looking up to Olruggio as a moral compass ever since Olruggio took him under his wing as a child. He must also comfort himself with the thought that, when/if his quest drags him away from the atelier, Olruggio will be a perfect teacher for the girls. Having to come to terms with Olruggio’s flaws must be terrifying to him. But what about Olruggio’s perspective in all this?

Olruggio is an example of how even those who materially benefit from an elitist, close-minded society are damaged by it in some way. He grew up in the Great Hall as a bright-eyed, idealistic genius, and even as an adult he clings to the principles of that society like a mantra: “bring the blessings of magic to the people”. He is successful and respected by his peers, popular with the nobles and well-liked among the commoners. Yet somewhere along the way he became a ragged, workaholic hermit.

I have mentioned in previous posts that I suspect Olruggio of grappling with his own, deep-seated fear of being unwanted and left behind. He betrays that fear in the way he is attacking Qifrey: his concerns about Qifrey’s treatment of Coco aren’t based on evidence, and underneath that veneer he is mostly complaining that Qifrey is neglecting him. “Be straight with me”, “Don’t lie to me”, “You wouldn’t even tell me about it”, “You took her as a student without a word to me first”. There again, Olruggio is being a bit hazy on how far his influence goes as Watchful Eye: from what we know, Watchful Eyes are meant to ensure that students don’t get mistreated, but they don’t get a say in who teaches whom: it’s the disciples who choose their masters. Olruggio grumbling about Qifrey adopting more and more children behind his back is cute when we treat them as a couple. But from the perspective of their professional relationship, Olruggio is claiming the right to veto Qifrey’s students and take them away from him without any evidence of abuse.

The problem is that Olruggio is very bad at expressing his feelings without using his job, and therefore his authority, as a crutch. It’s endearing when he uses it to explain away his gifts to the girls (“I just want them to test a prototype”) or his marks of affection and care (“Drying your hair so you don’t catch a cold is part of my duties as Watchful Eye!”). However, it adds a layer of threat to his arguments with Qifrey, because he is constantly dangling that authority over his head, even when he is urging Qifrey to trust him. In his more agitated moments, it turns into a one-man good-cop / bad-cop performance (“Step out of line and I’ll report you” / “Why won’t you confide in me? I’m your best friend!”). Sure, he is willing to side with Qifrey against the Knights Moralis when he deems it appropriate, but here’s the catch: Olruggio gets to decide where the line in the sand lies, and that line seems to shift depending on how hot his temper is flaring at any given time.

It’s no wonder their conversation lends them in a dead-end when it is so one-sided. Thourghout the manga, and in volume 8 in particular, the author explores the idea that help should be a collaborative effort between equals, that encourages both parties to grow and learn more about themselves. Trying to unilaterally “save” someone is almost guaranteed to miss the mark and come across as condescending; it might even cause further harm.

Help as a collaboration between equals

Therefore, Qifrey and Olruggio can’t really come to any connection unless they make it clear that they are helping each other, not just endlessly acting out their roles as the golden student who knows all the right answers, and the problem child who must be saved from himself.

Aside from the framing, help as an equivalent exchange is the other key difference between chapter 40 and Qifrey and Coco’s dialogue earlier in the volume. In order to counter Coco’s doubts and growing self-hatred, Qifrey reinforces everything he admires about Coco: from her social skills and capacity for teamwork to her practical skills and her straight lines. He reminds her of all the things that she achieved so far. He also strongly hints that her fight is his fight, too, and that they should hold onto hope for each other’s sake. Finally, he makes a (pretty dramatic, unnecessarily literal and definitely unsafe, but still awesome) leap of faith by letting her decide what direction she wants to take next. His support isn’t conditional on Coco making the “right” choice, but freely offered. In return, Coco makes a display of saving Qifrey as well, saying she wants him right by her side while she figures out her path. The rescue itself is symbolic (it would actually have been safer for Qifrey to go back on his own), but Qifrey’s gratitude is genuine, because Coco made him feel valued, irreplaceable, just as Beldaruit and Olruggio were making him doubt his place as a teacher.

By contrast, Olruggio’s speech of friendship contains a grand total of ONE compliment, served in such a back-handed way that it sounds almost like a warning: “To Coco, you are a good teacher, so don’t betray that trust”. This is weighted against a slurry of criticisms about Qifrey’s recklessness, and heaps of self-praise. Olruggio is making a case for why Qifrey needs help and why Olruggio is best-qualified to deliver that help, like he is making a sales pitch to a client. It’s probably not a coincidence that Olruggio is remembering his successful bout of diplomacy in chapter 39 as he gears himself for his conversation with Qifrey. Olruggio, look, I get that you have more faith in your professional persona than in your regular self, but you can’t talk to your best friend like you are doing customer service, it just doesn’t work that way.

The help that Olruggio offers leaves no room for Qifrey’s input: once Qifrey has confided everything and laid himself bare, Olruggio will pick apart “where he needs the help” and “when he is about to do something stupid”, and either support or stop him as he judges appropriate. It reinforces Qifrey’s inferiority complex and interiorised guilt, by implying that his moral compass can’t be trusted. It also places the blame for Qifrey’s rash actions solely on his lack of judgement, rather than on having to grapple with complex, life-threatening situations and being caught in a pincer between a terrorist group and an oppressive system. There’s no mention that the definition of what’s “lawful” and “responsible” and “just” has gotten a bit messed up lately, and that Olruggio himself has had to compromise with his duties to cover for the kids. Olruggio fakes confidence in his capacity to fix everything, and pretends that things can go back to the way they were, but it would have been more honest of him to ask Qifrey to work with him so they can form a united front to face their new, complex reality.

Instead, by claiming that he is helping Qifrey out of a sense of duty, as Watchful Eye and as a friend, Olruggio reinforces the feeling that Qifrey is a burden to him. This gives Qifrey more incentive to keep his friend away from his investigations, and to see himself as expendable. In that light, since their friendship brings Olruggio so much trouble and so few benefits, betraying him and stealing the memories that relate to Qifrey’s secrets start to look like the lesser evil.

The only way that the conversation in chapter 40 could have gone well is if they both freely admitted to needing each other. However, it is too early in Olruggio’s character arc to be honest about his own feelings and worries. And it is too early in Qifrey’s character arc to see past his own self-loathing and recognize that his “perfect” friend also needs support and guidance. Yet, when they do, it is hinted that Olruggio can draw inspiration from Qifrey, and help Qifrey in a more meaningful way by highlighting how Qifrey matters to him, letting them reach this stage of true collaboration.

What Olruggio wants from Qifrey

I think Olruggio is repressing a sense of disillusionment about his work, the fairness of the system, and his usefulness as a witch. We see glimpses of his anxiety in chapter 39 notably. While he says that his true role is to help the commoners, circumstances keep reminding him that like it or not, his main function is decorative. He gets dragged in on short notice to be yanked around by petty nobles and arrange light shows at weddings; he has to act in secret to help the destitute, and even then can only do so much before the rules of magic society get in his way. So far he manages to keep his head above water, using his talent for diplomacy and showmanship to keep the nobles appeased, and finding small, creative ways to help commoners without breaking any law. But it leaves him with the feeling of being trapped in an increasingly constraining role, and is slowly pushing him towards a burn out.

He seems to feel a kinship with princess Mia, who like him is used as a tool in petty squabbles between nobles. He even metaphorically puts himself in her shoes: after likening her situation to being trapped in the spotlight in a dance she doesn’t want, he applies the same metaphor to himself and his inability to act outside the narrow constraints of witch rules, of being constantly watched and judged. And then, adorably enough, Olruggio actually brings Qifrey into the metaphor. He muses that Qifrey, who has gone against established rules before, might be the key to escaping that dance.

For all that the “problem child” / “star student” dichotomy has been weighing on Olruggio and Qifrey and warping their friendship, there is a flip side to it as well. As a prodigy who always pressures himself to perform perfectly (to the point where he will work himself to a zombie-like state and then hide behind a mask to look perfect and pristine in front of his clients at parties, Olruggio no), Qifrey provides a chance at escapism. For all that he berates him for causing trouble, Olruggio seems to fondly remember their old adventures. It’s possible that he valued the opportunity to do rebellious, forbidden things without having to jeopardise his reputation. His fear of being left behind by Qifrey is then also a fear of losing his hope that, when the pressure of being the perfect witch becomes too much to bear, Qifrey will be there to break him free.

In summary, Olruggio wants Qifrey to be his rebellious prince who breaks him free from the ballroom, and we respect him for it. Qifrey had his reasons for not being able to confide in him, and they both have a lot of character development to do before they can reach a stage of actual collaboration and trust. But I don’t dispute that taking his memories was a dick move. Thank you for coming to my ted talk.  

#witch hat atelier #witch hat meta #qifrey #orugio #olruggio #orufrey

[katerinabythesea95]

Scream rant

In the opening scene, i noticed that there are times when ghost faces tone changes, idk if anyone else hears it but i think it's cause bother Billy and Sty are taking at the same time not just one of them.

I think that Stu was the one who slices Steve and he hides behind the chair so Casey can't see him.

Also Casey has the same sweater as Stu, so maybe he was annoyed that he gave it to her and bought another one or there were two of them so that they could be twinsies when they were dating and Casey kept hers for some reason.

For those who don't know, the sheriff in Woodsburo is the same one in Nightmare on elm street. Which could mean that both movies occur in the same universe which in turn explains why when Dewey asks him if he thinks it was Billy who did killed Casey Steve and tried to kill Sydney, he replies: "20 years ago i would've said no, but kids nowadays..." Nightmare on Elm street came out 20 years prior to scream and also has the same director, Wes Craven.

Billy's motive is really clear when you pay attention to how he talks to Sydney. He sees her as merely a object for his own selfish needs, so yes he was upset about his mom leaving because of her mom, but he was really pissed about how Sydney changed, even though he tried to down play it.

You know the part where Sydney's in her house and Ghost face tried to attack Sydney? Well I always wanted to know why he waited so long to do so if he was already IN THE HOUSE AND SHE FELL ASLEEP. It would've been way too easy for him to kill but since he probably overheard Sydney talking to Tatum he thought it was best to play it safe just in case Tatum walked in and called 911 idk it's a loose reason but the best I can come up with RN.

I've watched some videos on details we've missed and along with the sheriff thing, i remember how they pointed out in a video that both cotton and billy lool similar especially from behind or sideways so it's easy to see why Sydney thought billy was cotton that night her mom was murdered.

There's a lot of forewarning in the scenes leading up to the big reveal of ghost face

you can see it in the first scene with Syd and Billy where a cover of don't fear the reaper plays in the background as they make out.

When ghost face chases Sydney up the stairs in the early scene, if you listen closely, you can hear him say, easy! Easy! Which is what Stu says to Tatum at school when she hits him with her lollipop

In that same scene, you can see Stu check his face for bruising from the night before when Sydney hit him

The two pranksters who dressed up as ghost face.

When Sydney asks how you cut someone open and Stu describes it graphically

The moment at the movie store, with billy Stu and Randy is a dead give away even if you haven't seen the movie before.

Billy's creepy stares lol

The whole EVERYONE'S A SUSPECT! is true. Cause i see all the characters and they each have a pretty plausible MO to be ghost face, not just Billy and Stu I'll dwell on that in a another post maybe.

When Billy tells Sydney that her mom was sleeping with his dad, Notice the look on Stu's face. You'd think he'd know this info because he's bff's with Billy but honestly his expression makes me think otherwise.

I WANT TO KNOW WHY RANDY WAS KILLED IN THE SECOND MOVIE. HE SHOULD'VE BEEN IN THE WHOLE FRANCHISE.

Im trying not to be disappointed if Stu isn't in the fifth instalment because I somehow have this idea in my head that he's still alive somehow and has passed down the ghost face mask onto the next generation.

I was looking at the cast for scream five and Randy's sister plus her kids are gonna be in it, so Im really intrigued cause she isn't talked about much or shown in the past movies except the second movie.

I think randy made more movies than the one we saw in scream 2, so maybe the Main characters find them and that's how they bring Jaime back. Also maybe there are videos he has with Billy and Stu in them at the very least.

Im trying not to expect too much for the movie but also i hope it doesn't disappoint too much

Maybe we'll get a backstory about how the gang met and maybe all the clues will point to Stu but if it's not his kid then maybe his ward. Or someone from his or Billy's family. Like for break it's not really that hard to come up with a good explanation to bring back Stu.

#scream 5 #stu macher for scream five #slashers #mathew lillard #billy loomis #stu macher #sydney prescott #dewey riley #randy meeks #gale weathers

[sunflowerdigs]

I think the issue with Malex rn is that the writers seem to see it primarily as fan service or something seperate from the narrative. Malex is used to get people to watch or to placate or bait fans. And because of that, it's operating independently of the narrative and nothing about it is particularly satisfying or meaningful.

It's like, Marvel movies aren't plotted out by writers, they're created in a boardroom by producers who want to maximize product placement or toy sales or whatever. So whether they make sense or tell an interesting story are secondary to their uses as money-makers.

My sense is that Hollier isn't saying "I want to tell a coherent story with Malex that helps drive the narrative". He's saying "I want to use Malex strategically to get another season and to tell the other stories that I am actually interested in telling". So the beats aren't happening naturally, the pacing is off, and Michael and Alex's feelings for each other have been completely seperated (and inevitably deprioritized) from their roles in the plot/narrative.

That's why, despite the fact that the first five episodes were about the characters coming together as a group and reaffirming the ways that they depend on each other and function in each other's lives, Malex was (nonsensically) completely absent. So, the sense we got (at the same time that Max and Liz were reminding us constantly that even if they aren't together they need to be in each other's lives on some level because they're, idk, cosmic soulmates) was that if Alex left and Michael never saw him again and no one ever mentioned him and Michael had zero idea how he was doing...he'd be fine. Like, it wouldn't occur to him to think of Alex at all. And same with Alex. They'd just lead their seperate lives and nothing would be missing. Michael didn't even mourn Alex coming back with someone else for longer than one scene, it was like he forgot about it immediately afterwards. It impacted none of his actions or feelings in the following episodes. Zip, zero, nada, none.

Oh, wait - but now that we're at episode 6, Michael suddenly can't stop thinking about Alex. Ok. Got it. Makes sense. Actually, no, it really doesn't make sense at all, but, who cares? All Malex fans care about is pictures of cute boys standing next to each other, right? It couldn't be that we're craving a meaningful story between two characters that we care about very much because we relate to them, just like Echo fans.

Bottom line, I think that Malex is just a tool for Hollier. That's why every time fans are upset, we get Vlamburn pics or why the actors are probably instructed to bring it up in promotional interviews even if they aren't a part of it. Did Tyler talk about Echo at all in his interview? Or Maria and Greg? No. But did we hear every actor's opinion on "omg are we gonna "get" 💞💋Malex🎉🎉?" (Not "this is what's interesting about how Michael and Alex are interacting this season" or "this is why their early interactions point to romance", just "get Malex") during the first five episodes where Malex was completely absent (except in promotional materials)? Yup.

And I think it's hard for fans to feel used in this way when we're not getting anything particularly positive out of it. Like, if we could see the strategy but it meant more Malex scenes or a plot that prioritized them, that would be one thing. It would still be fucked up but at least we'd also see Alex and Michael interacting like they actually matter to each other. But they're not and we're blatantly being toyed with, so. It kinda sucks. And I can see where people are just feeling done. Especially since this is the only queer relationship on the show, so on top of everything else, the deprioritization within the storyline just feels homophobic.

If I had any advice for fans I guess it would be to enjoy fanfic rn and just...let the show be a piece of Malex but not the extent of it. Because authors in this fandom are doing a terrific job of plugging in the gaps that the show has created. When straight, mainstream media doesn't take our stories seriously or tell them in meaningful ways, we still can.

As always, jmo, happy to be proven wrong.

#malex #roswell new mexico #as always just my take #i'm not saying you can't enjoy it or connect certain dots that make it meaningful #but it's not being told in that way #like it's really small simple things that they did beautifully with echo but didn't bother with for malex

[wolvesandpetals]

Postscript. Part 3 of 3.

Loki x Sylvie "Our divorce never went through" Modern AU. Angst, Rated T.

Masterlist of my Sylki fanfics here.

---

Exactly three weeks later, Sylvie walks into his bar. Her eyes drift immediately to the counter, where she spots him bartending, and she gives him a little wave.

[[MORE]]

He waves back, dumbfounded, having no idea how to react when a scene from his dreams becomes reality. She makes her way through the crowd, and takes a seat on a stool in front of him. "One whiskey please."

"With water or something else?" He asks, trying his best to recollect himself and act professional.

She shrugs. "You already know how I like it."

He returns a moment later with her whiskey on the rocks, and she takes a long sip. The bar is busy, and he has to quickly turn his attention to the other customers.

She sits there quietly for the next two hours, watching him work, sipping her drinks, before the crowd thins and he can return his attention to her. "Hello again", she says with a grin.

"Hi." He answers with a low, nervous laugh. "How did you find this place?"

She shrugs. "You know I was always a good stalker."

"That, you were." He says with a grin, remembering the days in the college when she used to grab his phone and go through people's profiles to figure out little things about them. Blackmail Fodder, she used to call it. "So what brings you to my little corner?"

Sylvie knows that if it wasn't for the alcohol in her system from the three neat drinks she has downed, she wouldn't have the courage to say what she's about to say. "I wanted to see you again."

He feels his heart skip a beat. That treacherous thing never listens to logic when it comes to her. "Why?"

"Do I need a reason?" She asks, and orders another drink. He cuts her off, deciding she's drunk enough. He announces last call, intending to lock up early- he has already messed up at least a dozen drinks, and really, how can he focus when she's here?- and she clings to the stool, watching him close up.

He tugs on an ear nervously when it's just the two of them left inside. He has not been alone with her in an extremely long time, and he can feel his body starting to betray him, as he starts noticing how incredible she looks in her skin tight jeans and top, the outfit clearly a deliberate decision on her part. "Let me call you a cab."

"No." She protests immediately, struggling to stand up. He rushes to her side and offers her support, and she steadies herself with a hand on his shoulder. "I'm okay, I'm okay."

"Yes, clearly." He says sarcastically. He reaches for the phone in his pocket, then wonders if it's safe to leave her alone in a cab in her current state.

A very bad idea occurs to him then, one that every single one of his friends and family would scold him for if they knew. "Come with me." He urges her gently, and she follows without a question.

He takes her to his apartment upstairs, and leads her to his room, the one place where nobody except him is allowed- not his family, or friends, or the rare dates he brings over.

She stumbles inside, and the first thing she notices is the photo on his nightstand.

"Shit." He realises his mistake too late.

Sylvie stills for a moment, before walking over unsteadily and taking the photo in her hands. It's one from their honeymoon. They couldn't afford a fancy place, and had decided to take a staycation instead. It's a picture of them in their old apartment, on their old couch, sipping on coffee in their old mugs. She runs her fingers over the glass and the wooden frame, searching for the warmth that resonated in her heart during those days. "Do you still have the mugs?"

"I did, for a while... But they eventually broke." He tells her guiltily.

She can picture him smashing them into pieces out of rage, and she can picture him accidentally dropping them on the floor and being anguished over it. She's not sure which one actually happened.

"You didn't ask for anything in the divorce." He points out. Then a dark thought occurs to him. "Do you want something now?"

She blinks. "I-" she sits down on the bed, placing the photo frame back, but upside down in her inebriated state, and she lets out a bitter laugh. "I don't even want a divorce.'

His heart skips another beat, now on the verge of feeling an emotion that is dangerously close to hope. Seeing her on his bed is not helping things either. "You should get some rest."

He proceeds to leave, but she tugs at his hand and stops him. "Stay with me."

"Sylvie." He scolds. His heart beats ridiculously, and he can't get his hand free from her.

"Please?" She pouts, and his eyes automatically drift to her lips. They are soft and inviting, and he really should leave swiftly.

He steps closer to her, and places a small kiss on her forehead. "Sleep well."

He turns out the light and closes the door shut on his way out, and spends the rest of the night tossing and turning on the couch, images of Sylvie on his bed burning brightly in his head.

---

Sleep does come, around dawn, and when he wakes up it's already past eleven.

Sylvie is in the kitchen in last night's clothes, and she's making pancakes for lunch, like she always did. This is how it was, when she was his.

She gives him a small smile. "Morning."

"Mmm", he hums, picking up the newspaper from the counter, reading the headlines but registering nothing. Words seem to lose all their meaning when he's with her. He watches her go about, her movements very familiar but a distant memory at the same time. Finally, he asks. "You still haven't told me why you're here."

Sylvie tries her best to appear confident and unfazed, when inside, she feels herself shaking. "I... I felt that we left some things unsaid."

Loki winces. "Please don't tell me you want us to scream at each other some more."

She laughs, trying to ease some of the tension. "No, that's not what I mean, at all." She turns the stove off, and finally gives him her full attention. "I know I have no right to say this, and I know I have no right to ask this, or anything of you, and I know you will probably say no, and I understand, but..." She finishes her rambling, and takes in a deep breathe. "I've been kicking myself for the last three weeks for not saying this. I need to say it."

"Okay." He says quietly, ready to hear her out.

"How do you think Thor feels when he meets Sif now?"

"That's an unusual question to keep you occupied for three whole weeks." Loki notes. When he notices her waiting for an answer, he shrugs. They work together, they meet every day. It's not a big deal. "Indifferent, I suppose. That's how people feel when they move on."

"Precisely." She toys with a stray strand of fibre in her jeans. "Do you feel that way when you look at me?"

He really shouldn't answer that. He really shouldn't open himself up to a world of hurt again.

But foolishness is in his blood, and his blood has been rushing to unexpected places when she stands so close that he can smell her intoxicating perfume. He can't help himself. "No."

Her face brightens visibly, and a smile spreads across her lips, a shadow of the woman she was when they first met. "Neither do I. When I look at you, I realise how much I've missed you. How much I... I still..." She can't finish the sentence, but she doesn't need to.

His hands are clenched into a fist next to him, and he's breathing heavily. "You could have called."

"How could I?" She asks, her voice sad once again. "I walked out on you. How could I ever expect you to take me back?"

He closes his eyes, trying to push the bitterness down. "I kept calling you. For months. You never returned my calls. Not once."

"I couldn't." She places a hand on his arm, willing him to look at her. Her eyes mirror his- fearful, hopeful, and tear-stained all at once. "I couldn't go back. I wasn't ready, back then. I needed time... And I... I'm ready now."

He shakes his head. "Wow. This is unexpected."

She takes in a shaky breathe. "Loki, I know you don't owe me anything. But all these years, something has been missing from my life. I always knew, but I didn't know at the same time, if that makes any sense. When you called, and when I saw you, it finally clicked. I... I know what I've been missing. I know what I want. I really do want to try again."

"And what happens if you decide to give up again?" He wonders aloud. "Where does that leave me?"

She closes her eyes, letting the tears fall. "I've spent countless nights awake, picturing you sleeping next to some nameless woman, kicking myself for giving up. I was young, and stupid. But I'm not any of those things anymore. I will fight for us this time, I promise you." She reaches for his hand, and his grip is tight, almost painful, but he doesn't speak. "Say something, please." She begs after a while.

"I don't want to get hurt again." He says, but he tugs her closer, until his arms are wrapped tightly around her and his face is buried in her chest. His voice comes out muffled. "And for the record, I've missed you too."

Her hand finds its way into his hair, and she inhales his scent, the familiarity of it bringing her comfort. When you have love, you only need one other thing- timing. This this time around, she has a feeling they have got that right.

She doesn't know what else to say, isn't sure where to start. But she'll figure it out.

They will figure it out. Together.

"When you're young, you just run, but you come back to what you need."

(The end.)

#fanfiction #sylki fanfic #sylki #pro sylki #sylvie x loki #loki disney+ #loki x sylvie #lovedaggers

[atlafan]

Office Neighbors - Part Eight

a/n: a very Andy heavy part, not proofread (reblogs and feedback are super helpful!)

warnings: slight angst, fluff, and smut

words: 15K

masterpost

“I’m not gonna let you talk to her until you both settle down!” Harry shouts at his mother and sister.

“We’re settled, just dial the number!” Anne shouts back.

“Yeah, the TV can only occupy all the kids for so long.” Gemma says. “She’s probably waiting as it is.”

Harry was ready to throw up. He couldn’t remember the last time he introduced a woman to his family, and it wouldn’t even be a proper introduction since it was over FaceTime.

“Okay, okay, Christ.” He swipes your contact. “Just let me say hi to her first before you two jump in.”

You answer after a moment, you were sitting up on your bed at Phil and Julian’s. You made sure your hair and makeup were done, and your headphones were in, just in case there were wandering ears.

“Hi, Y/N.” Harry smiles warmly.

“Hey! How’s everything going?”

“Good! Everyone’s good. We all decorated my sister’s tree last night.”

“Oh, fun! Phil made sweet potato pancakes they were so good.”

“That’s great.” He smiles.

“Yeah.” You smile.

You see a hand smack Harry’s shoulder and you suck your lips into your mouth to keep from laughing.

“Right, well, my mum and sister are here…” He side eyes Gemma. “Would you like to say hello?”

“I would.” You nod. It was the whole point of the FaceTime, but you thought it was sweet he was being so formal. Both Anne and Gemma come into view and smile. “Hello! It’s nice to sort of meet you both.” You chuckle.

“Same to you, dear!” Anne says brightly. “Oh, Harry, she’s lovely.” She whispers, but you hear her.

“Yeah, I know it’s not the same as in person, but this works.” Gemma says. “Hope we didn’t wake you up too early for this…”

“Not at all! I was up anyways getting some work done. How’s the weather over there? It flurried a bit, but it hasn’t been too bad.”

“Freezing rain here, I’m afraid.” Harry says.

“Is that Y/N? Hi, Y/N!” Andy says as he comes into the kitchen where the meeting was occurring.

“Andy.” Harry sighs. “You’re supposed to be-“

“Oh, just give the damn phone to me. You know her plenty, Mum and I don’t, so shoo!” Gemma snatches the phone from Harry, and Anne follows her into the adjacent room.

“Well…isn’t that just perfect.” Harry says to Andy.

“Auntie Gem told me to do it, sorry.” Andy giggles and runs out of the room while Harry chases him.

“Sorry about that, things can get a little hectic around here.” Anne laughs.

“Oh, it’s no problem.” You chuckle.

“So, where are you this week?” Gemma asks.

“I’m staying at my brother’s place in Boston. I’ll be here until the day after New Year’s. My friends and I usually get together for the fireworks and all that.”

“Oh, that sounds like fun!” Anne says. “I can’t remember the last time I actually stayed up late enough to watch the ball drop.” She laughs. “I’m usually home watching all the kids while Harry and Gemma go out.”

“Yeah, we have a couple of parties of our own to go to. Lots of friends for Harry to see. He’s quite popular amongst our group.”

“That’s nice, you share a lot of the same friends?”

“Oh, sure.” Gemma shrugs. “We’re only a couple of years apart in age, and we worked at the same bakery growing up, sort of attached at the hip.”

“You two were awfully cute. They’d even willingly wear matching Halloween costumes.” Anne says. “Remember the year you were Mario and he was Princess Peach?”

“Now that’s something I’d love to see.” You say.

“Okay!” Harry bolts into the room and snatches his phone. “Think you’ve all chatted long enough.”

“You got an entire meal with her family, I think it’s only fair-“

“Mum! Lizzy won’t stop touching me!”

“I’m not doing anything!”

“Seems like your kids need you.” Harry sneers.

“Wonderful, three brats.” She rolls her eyes. “It was nice chatting, Y/N.” Gemma says as she leaves the room the scope out the scene.

“I better go help her.” Anne chuckles as follows out as well.

“So…Princess Peach, huh? You don’t still happen to have that costume do you? I bet you look lovely in a dress.”

“I was five.” Harry rolls his eyes. “And you’re right, I look exceptional in a dress.”

“They’re very nice, your mum and sister. Um…is Gemma not married, or…?”

“She’s widowed, unfortunately.” Harry whispers. “That’s why my mum lives with her, she needed help with her kids and I obviously wasn’t around. It sucked, he had cancer.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry.”

“It’s been a few years, she’s doing much better, but she doesn’t date. She’s tried, but it’s too much.”

“I don’t blame her.”

“Did you have a nice Hanukkah with your family?”

“I did! I refereed a game of dreidel for my younger cousins, it was pretty funny.”

“You really like kids, don’t you?”

“I love kids.” You blush.

“Suppose that’s why you’re so good with them then, huh?” He was blushing too, but he was giving you that toothy smile you loved so much.

“I miss you, Harry.”

“I miss you too.”

“Dad…you better get in there…Lizzy and Ritchie have started to wrestle.”

“Better go pry them apart.” Harry chuckles. “I’ll talk to you soon, love you.”

“Love you too, bye Andy!”

You sigh as you hang up. You knew you’d physically get meet everyone someday so it would be less chaotic, but it was nice to meet them nonetheless.

//

On New Year’s Eve you throw on a black turtleneck bodysuit and a pair of jeans with some booties. You head out with Phil and Julian once they’re both home from work to meet your other friends at the bar. You send Harry a quick selfie, wanting to still look cute before you inevitably got sweaty and drunk. It was already the New Year in London, and Harry had sent you a selfie before he went out. It was sweet.

“Y/N!” Your best friend Nora squeals as soon as you see her.

“Hey!” You squeal back and hug her.

“It’s so good to see you, I’m so glad we could get together for this.”

“Same here, I know hard it is for you to get away…”

“Oh, don’t be silly. Wouldn’t miss a New Year’s in Boston. Hi Phil, hi, Julian.”

“Hi, Nora.” Phil smiles. “Y/N, we’re gonna go get a booth.”

“Okay, I think I’ll hang by the bar for bit with the crew.”

You say hello to your other friends: Claudia, Mark, and Darcy.

“Okay, so, where’s your man? We’ve been dying to meet him.” Mark says.

“He’s in London with his family.” You shrug. “You’ll meet him eventually, I promise.”

“Too bad, Nora says he’s quite the hunk.” Claudia says.

You side eye your friend as she laughs.

“You send me the best pictures, how could I not share?”

“His tattoos are really interesting.” Darcy says. “Never thought you’d be into a guy so inked up.”

“Neither did I, but I like them a lot.” You bite the rim of your cup and smile.

“I feel like it’s been forever since you’ve been serious with someone.” Mark says. “What’s it about this one?”

“Yeah, doesn’t he have a kid?” Claudia asks.

“He does…and I care a lot about him. His name is Andy, and he’ll be twelve in May.”

“Twelve?!” They all exclaim.

“How old is this guy?” Darcy asks.

“He’ll be thirty-three at the beginning of February. Would you all calm down? He had his son young, it is what it is.” You shrug.

“I knew you wanted to be a mom, but shit.” Nora laughs. “Whatever, you’re happy, right?”

“Very.”

“Then that’s all that matters. Now, I’m much more interested to hear how your love life is going, Mark.”

“Single and ready to find some New Year’s dick tonight.”

You all burst into laughter and clink your glasses. You all end up bar hopping a bit, saying goodbye to your brother and letting him know you’ll be back whenever, which he has no problem with. You get pretty sloshed with your friends, and you ended up at a dance club. You were having an incredible time. The club had plenty of TV’s going so a little before midnight, you all huddle together to watch the ball drop. You all kiss each other’s cheeks, it was cute. You feel your phone buzzing, and it’s a FaceTime request from Harry.

“Hello?!” You shout.

“Happy New Year!” He smiles. You nearly melt. He was still in bed, and he wasn’t wearing his glasses yet, and his hair was all floppy. “Where are you?”

“At a club, and-“

“Is that him?!” Nora shouts and goes behind your shoulder. “Oooo, look at him! Hiya hot stuff!”

“Isn’t it, like, really early in London?” Claudia slurs to Darcy.

“Yeah, babe, isn’t it, like, six in the morning?”

“Yeah.” He chuckles. “I was getting up anyways, and I wanted to call.”

“Aww.” You and your friends swoon.

“Well…I can see you’re busy, so I’ll let you go.”

“Okay! Happy New Year, love you!” You hang up before he can say it back.

“Damn, Y/N, he’s handsome.” Mark says.

“Mhm, and he’s allll mine.” You giggle with your friends.

//

“There’s my baby!” Paige exclaims as Andy gets off the plane. She throws her arms around him and kisses him. “Did you have a good time?”

“Yeah! Grammy and Auntie Gem say hi.” He holds her hand as they make their way to baggage.

“Oh, that’s nice of them. You had fin with Lizzy and Ritchie?”

“Yeah, we got to play the new game Y/N got me.”

“What game is that?”

“What Do You Meme, it’s a lot of fun.”

“Well, that was very nice of her to get that for you. Seemed like you got a lot of other nice gifts from when we spoke on Christmas.”

“Mhm, and Grammy got me a ton of new clothes. She got me those sneakers I’ve been wanting.”

“She sure has an eye for fashion, huh?” She chuckles. “So, we’re going to grab your bag and then Noah and Rachel are waiting in the car. Are you too tired for lunch?”

“No, I slept pretty well on the plane. One of the attendants sat with me and held my hand when we took off.”

“I love it when they do that for you, that’s so nice.”

“Gram’s not coming for lunch?”

“No, she ended up going to New York with Auntie Allie for New Year’s…she’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Alright, it’ll be nice then, just the four of us.”

“Yeah, it will. Everyone missed you, honey.”

Andy actually enjoys his lunch with everyone. He and Rachel talk about their new gifts. It warmed Paige’s heart to being having some real family time. The few days Andy is home is wonderful, and come Sunday, you show up to pick Andy up. You’d be having brunch with Paige before taking Andy back to Harry’s. You made sure to stock the fridge with all his favorites already. You take a deep breath, and ring the bell. After a couple of moment, Paige answers the door.

“Y/N!” She says brightly. “Come on in, you must be freezing.”

“Hi, thanks.” You smile and enter the home. She takes your coat and hangs it up. It was oddly quiet. “Where is everyone?”

“Oh, well, my sister came back with my mom late last night, so they’re out with Andy now having a brunch of their own, and Rachel has Hebrew school on Sunday mornings, and they usually get lunch together after that. So it’s just us two, I’ve got quite the spread for us, come into the kitchen.”

She really did have quite the spread. Bagels, cream cheese, eggs, juice, and fruit.

“Wow, you didn’t have to do all this…”

“Oh, sure I did. Would you like some coffee?”

“That’d be great, thank you.”

She nods and gestures for you to sit while she gets the coffee.

“I’m so glad we could finally get together to do this. I feel like I know you, but don’t at the same time.” She sips her coffee and makes up a plate, as do you. “Did you have a nice holiday?”

“I did, yeah, thank you. Did you?”

“As good as it could have been, I suppose.” She nods. “It was weird without my dad, but that’s life.” She shrugs.

“I’m so sorry, it must have been difficult.”

“It was weird, all of the fun helped distract us, but I know it was really hard for my mother. The first holidays without them are always the hardest.” You nod at her. “Anyways, I…oh, that’s a lovely necklace.” She points to your palm tree, and you clutch at it.

“Thank you, um, Harry got it for me.” You swallow.

“This doesn’t need to be weird, Y/N.” She smirks. “You’re in his life, which means you’re in my son’s life, and I just wanna know more about you, that’s all. This isn’t a one way street either, if there’s anything you’d like to know about me I’d be happy to answer.”

“I know…I have to admit, I was a little nervous to be one on one with you. I hope you know, I care a lot about Andy.”

“No need to be nervous. Harry trusts you, so I do too.” She shrugs. “He’s always been such a great judge in character.”

“Can I ask…how did you two meet?”

“Oh, god, years ago when we were in college. He came to our school when he was a sophomore, and joined our group. I was dating this other guy at the time, but we became fast friends. He was always so sweet. The other guy and I broke up eventually, and then I can’t quite recall what it was, but long story short Harry and I got together. I graduated a year ahead of him, but we made it work.”

“And Andy was an accident?”

“He certainly wasn’t planned.” She laughs. “I’ll spare you the details, but we were shocked to say the least when we found out. I was already working at the law office, thank god, so I had some decent benefits and maternity leave and all that.”

“Were you scared being so young?”

“A little…I was more so worried at the time about being so far away from Harry. I had started working in this area, so we were long distance. I was grateful he found a grad program in the area that worked for him. I sort of felt guilty for making him grow up so fast, but I got over it. He really stepped up.”

“He’s a great dad.”

“He really is! He was a natural right away.”

“And…it just didn’t work out between you two?”

“I was sort of stubborn, and a little resentful. He was getting to work on his career, and I felt like I was in a rut. My parents were getting to me…and…one morning I woke up and looked at him and realized I just wasn’t in love. When we were dating in school it was just fun, you know? I hadn’t really been given the chance to see if I wanted something future wise with him. For all I knew, he could have decided to go back to London, you know? It was awful because we were living together, and we had Andy, and I just couldn’t figure out how to end it, and then…well, he asked me to marry him, and that was when I knew it had to be over, so I told him no and we broke up. I felt sick over it because I knew I hurt him.”

You blink as you take all of the information in. Sometimes people just weren’t compatible, and that was okay, and maybe Harry had been looking at things with rose colored glasses.

“His parents were divorced growing up, so I think he thought getting married would make everything better. We fought a lot, things just stopped being fun.” She shrugs. “But that was all a long time ago, and we worked on things for Andy’s sake, and I’d like to think we’re doing right by him now. He raves about you, they both do, and it makes me so happy to hear it.”

“You really want what’s best for Harry, huh?”

“I do.” She nods. “And for my son, obviously. I know at times it may seem weird that Harry and I are sort of close…especially after my father died, but it’s really not always like that. It’s not like we text or talk every day. We only meet up when we absolutely have to. I think sometimes when we see each other more we fall into that old patter of friendship, but it doesn’t go further than that, I hope you can see that. I love Noah, I really feel like he’s the person I’m supposed to be with.”

“I…feel that way about Harry.” You mutter and sip your coffee, but you don’t miss her smile.

“That makes me so happy to hear, you have no idea.” She gives your hand a squeeze. “So, tell me, you’re working on your PhD, and then what?”

“Hopefully become a full professor at some point. I really like working at the university, so I won’t be going anywhere once I finish.”

“I just hope they give you a pay bump afterwards. Harry had to fight for his, he honestly almost left when they said no, but they didn’t want to lose him.”

“Right.”

“You’re just on a yearly contract, right?”

“Yeah, I can’t go for tenure until I have my doctorate.”

“Do you have anything planned for while you’re with Andy?”

“I have a couple of craft ideas, yeah. You’re not mad he wanted to stay with me?”

“No, I get it. He was so annoyed last year when he had to get up earlier for school and all that. Plus…right now he still enjoys seeing my mother, my biggest fear is that if he’s here a lot he may not like the visits as much. She’s sweet on him now, but she has this way of saying these little things that eventually just get under your skin.”

“God, I’m so sorry, that must be so difficult.”

“I’m just glad she has her own section of the house to putter around in.”

“Would she ever go back to living in a condo or anything? Maybe there’s some type of old folks community she could go to.”

“They were living in one before, but she really doesn’t want to live alone, and I don’t blame her. As shrill as she can be, I know she likes being around people.” She sighs. “Look, I guess I just wanted to say that I’m glad Harry has you, and I’m glad Andy has you too. Becoming a blended family isn’t easy, and I’m sure Harry having to watch me move on wasn’t easy either. He had started talking about you here and there, his new office neighbor, and how funny she was.” Paige grins. “I knew right away he had a little crush on you. I’d never seen him play it so cool because I’ve only ever known him as a flirt, but I know it’s different when you work with someone.”

“Andy told me something similar. God, how embarrassing for him to be gushing about me.” You chuckle.

“No, it was so sweet! I remember when he asked if he could bring a friend to Andy’s party, as if he needed my permission. We were very excited to meet you. I’m glad things have been going so well for you two.”

“Thanks, that means a lot.”

“You and I don’t need to be best friends or anything, but I definitely want us to be friendly, you know? I look at Noah and Harry, and I know there are times they have their own squabbles, but it’s nice they get along so well. I want you to feel comfortable here.”

“That’s very kind of you, thank you. I definitely don’t feel nervous around you anymore. Um, so, is there anything I should know about taking care of Andy for longer than just a few hours?”

“He’ll try to get more TV time, and he loves talking on the phone with his friends, if you don’t cap it at an hour, he’ll wrack up the phone bill. He won’t admit it, but he still likes the crust cut off his sandwiches. Oh! You’ll need to help him with his hair after he showers.”

“What does he need help with?”

“Well, there’s this special mousse he uses to help his curls really come out. Harry uses it, so he likes using it. You need to dry his hair with a t-shirt, and then comb through it. Then you have to get the mousse in your hands and run it through his hair. It’s best if he doesn’t shower right before bed because then you have to let it air dry.”

“Okay, very good to know. I don’t think I’ve been over when Harry’s helped him with that.”

“Other than that, it’s just helping him with homework and packing lunches. He’s not one of those kids that needs to sleep with you if he has a scary dream or anything like that. If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call me, alright?”

“Alright.” You smile at her and she smiles back. You’re able to finish the rest of your meal in peace.

A little while later Andy comes in with his Gram and Auntie Allie.

“Y/N!” He shoots over to you and gives you a hug.

“Hi, did you have a good flight and all that?”

“Yeah! I’ll go up and get my stuff.”

“Okay.” You chuckle as he races upstairs.

“You both remember Y/N from Andy’s birthday party, right?” Paige says to her sister and mother.

“Yes, hi.” Allie smiles and shakes your hand. “Good to see you again.”

“You too.” You smile. “Hello Lydia.” You shake her hand and you watch as she sizes you up.

“Hello, so, you’re taking my grandson from me?”

“Mom, please.” Paige says. “Andy wants to be able to stay at home easier with Harry gone.”

“This is home too.”

“It is, but he goes to school in another town, so it’ll be easier for him to stay with Y/N.”

“You’re always giving in so easily, Paige, you should have never let-“

“Pardon me, but what are you doing?” You say.

“Excuse me?” Lydia says.

“No, I don’t think I will. Were you seriously just about to start an argument with your daughter about her son in front me? What is wrong with you? She’s his mother, I think she knows what she’s doing. You may have zero clue about what it’s like to raise a child with someone you’re not with, but she’s doing her best. I think it takes a lot of strength and courage to change up a living arrangement the way she did. It may not be my place to say because I’m just the girlfriend of the guy who she used to be with, and I know you just lost your husband, but you need to check yourself lady.”

Allie sucks her lips in to keep from laughing, and Paige has to do the same. This was prime entertainment.

“Maybe she feels like she can’t stand up to you because she’s trying to keep the peace, but she shouldn’t have to do that in her own home. You should be grateful she didn’t ship you off to a retirement home. I’m sure you have a lot of things to be angry about, but let it go. Your daughter’s made a wonderful life for herself, and I think you should recognize that before it’s too late.”

Andy comes down with his things, and goes over to give everyone a hug.

“Thanks again for lunch Gram.”

“You’re, um, more than welcome sweetheart.” She was in shock.

“See on Friday, Mum.” Andy says as he hugs his mother. “Bye, Auntie Allie, love you.”

“Love you too.”

“It was nice seeing everyone. Thanks again for brunch, Paige, it was wonderful.” You and Andy head out and leave them all stunned.

“Oh, I like her.” Allie says with a laugh.

“Who speaks to a stranger that way?!” Lydia says.

“She had a point.” Paige says. “Who starts an argument in front of a stranger? And, fuck it, she’s not a stranger! She’s Harry’s girlfriend, his serious girlfriend, who I happen to like, and Andy adores her. She was right mom, you need to check yourself. Take some time to figure out your priorities because I can’t live like this! I’m walking on eggshells in my own home. My home, not yours.”

“Okay, can everyone just take a deep breath?” Allie says. “Let’s just sit down and have a conversation without this becoming a screaming match.”

//

As you drive Andy to Harry’s, you hear him trying to bite back a laugh.

“What’s so funny back there?”

“Nothing, it’s just…I’ve heard my dad raise his voice at Gram before, and hearing you do the same thing just proves you two are a good couple.”

“Oh god, you heard me?”

“Yeah, but it’s okay. Thanks for standing up for my mom.”

“Of course! She’s a really nice person, she doesn’t deserve to be talked down to in her own home like that. I couldn’t just stand there and let it happen.” You scoff. “Anyways, what do you say when we get back we get you unpacked and then we talk lunches for the week?”

“Sounds good to me. Thanks again for wanting to stay with me.”

“I’m happy to do it. It’ll be fun.”

“Do you think…um, if it goes well, that you’ll move in?”

Your eyes grow wide and your heart skips a beat.

“That’s a conversation I’d need to have with your dad, Andy. It’s sort of a big deal for two people to move in together. I’ll be honest with you, I don’t think I’m ready for that, but I really do enjoy staying over when I do.”

“Alright, I’ll take your word for it.” He shrugs.

You turn up the music and take a deep breath. Once you get Andy inside, and he unpacks his things you go into the kitchen with him to discuss lunches for the week.

“Just pb and j’s are fine, it doesn’t need to be fancy.”

“I know, but I wanna make sure you’re not hungry. I could cut up some carrots for you and put some chips in there too. Would you like that?”

“Yeah, whatever.” He shrugs. “Are you gonna make baked ziti tomorrow? Dad usually gets up early on Monday mornings to get it all together and then he just throws it in the oven when we get home.”

“Sure, I can make that. I don’t know if it’ll come out as good though.”

“I’ll get up early to help you, hold on a second.” Andy goes down to the basement where Harry has another freezer and comes back up with a container of sauce. “This needs to thaw overnight in the fridge.”

“Thank god you remembered, I wouldn’t have even thought about it. So it’s pretty much just boil the pasta and get it together with the sauce?”

“Mhm.”

“Alright, I shouldn’t need your help then. What time should I wake you up in the morning?”

“6:30.”

“Okay.” You nod. “Well, I know you had a big lunch, so just let me know when you feel hungry and I’ll whip up something for dinner.”

“Sounds good, I’m gonna go hang out in my room.”

“I’ll be up in the loft working if you need me.” You smile.

You: hey baby, I’m at your place with Andy. I’m gonna make him pb and j’s for lunch this week :)

Harry: that sounds great! Just make sure to cut the crust off, he won’t tell you to do it, but that’s how he likes it

You: so I’ve heard…I had a nice time with Paige today

Harry: not too awkward?

You: not really no, although, I did tell off her mom

Harry: you did?!

You: yeah, she was about to start some argument with Paige in front of me and I was like uhhh I think the fuck not!

Harry: lmao good for you, like I said, Lydia can be a bitch

You: for real

Harry: what are you up to now?

You: I’m gonna get some work done, wbu

Harry: just reading, the house is finally a little quieter…got my big meeting tomorrow

You: I know! I can’t wait to hear all about it

Harry: maybe we could FaceTime after??

You: definitely!

Harry: maybe we could plan it for when I’m getting ready for bed 😈 😈 😈

You: you’re an idiot

Harry: come on! Could be fun

You: normally I’d be game for phone sex, but at the time you’d be going to bed, I’d be eating dinner with your son, not exactly appropriate

Harry: maybe you could just send me a sexy pic then

You: a sexy pic?! How old are you???

Harry: 32, you’ve got a shit memory babe

You: you’re not helping your case

Harry: just teasing!

You: mhm, I’m going to do some work now

Harry: okay, okay I’m sorry

You: don’t be I just blah because I got my period this morning…so no sexy pics, but maybe when Andy goes back to Paige’s we could get a little frisky over the phone

Harry: sounds like an excellent compromise to me darling

//

You get up early the next morning to put the baked ziti together, and then you get Andy’s lunch box all set. You take a quick shower, and get dressed before going to wake up Andy. You gently open his door and peep your head in.

“Andy?” You coo. “It’s time to get up.” You hear him groan. “I’ve been told not to leave until you actually get up.”

“Ugh, fine.” He rips his blanket off and puts his feet on the floor. “Happy?”

“Very.” You smile. “Any requests for breakfast?”

“Oatmeal, please.” He yawns and you nod.

You drop Andy off at school on time, and wave to him as he walks inside. Morning one is done, you can do this.

Andy goes to his locker and puts what he doesn’t need away, and grabs his things for his first few classes.

“Andy!” Brandon exclaims and hugs him.

“Oof!” He giggles. “Almost knocked me over.”

“Sorry.” Brandon steps back and clears his throat. “How was London?”

“It was great, I had so much fun. How was your holiday?”

“It was good. Connecticut isn’t as exciting as London though.” He laughs and they both head to homeroom.

They sit in their seats and talk with their other friends. Their teacher comes in speaking with another student. Andy does a double take and his eyes grow wide. It was a girl with long, flowing brown hair. She had it up in a ponytail on the top of her head, held with a blue scrunchie.

“Hey, who’s that?” He asks his friends.

“Never seen her before.” Brandon says.

“Everyone!” The teacher says after the second bell rings. “Let’s settle down. I hope you all had a wonderful break. Today I’m excited to introduce a new student, Caroline Stearn, I hope you all will give her a warm welcome. Caroline, would you like to say a few things about yourself?”

“Um…sure? Hi, I’m Caroline, I just moved here from Maine…my mom just got a teaching job at the university down the road and my dad also just started working at the university, but he works in IT. I have three older sisters, they’re all in high school.”

“Thank you Caroline, why don’t you have a seat in front of Andy over there?”

She nods and does as told. She smiles at Andy and he smiles back. The teacher starts talking about whatever news the students need before homeroom is over.

“I’m Andy.” He whispers, and she turns around almost surprised.

“Nice to meet you.” She smiles.

“I was new here last year…but I came from a school a couple towns over.” He smirks. “You can sit with us at lunch if you want.”

“Really?” She sounds relieved. “That’d be great, thanks.”

He nods and she faces back front. He looks over at Brandon who was making a face at him. Andy mouths ‘what’ at him, and Brandon rolls his eyes. Andy felt nervous, but he wasn’t sure why.

//

“Carline, how’s your first day going so far?” Tyler asks her during lunch.

“It’s okay. “ She shrugs. “Everyone seems nice so far.”

“Do you miss living in Maine at all?” Andy asks. She was sitting next to him.

“Honestly, not really.” She giggles. “We were from a really small town with nothing to do.” Everyone at the table bursts out laughing. “What?” Her face was red now.

“And this town doesn’t scream small town to you?” Brandon says. “The closest arcade is thirty minutes away, same with the movie theater. There’s literally nothing to do.”

“My class sizes back home were ten people max. There’s like twenty of us here.” She says shyly and takes a bite of her sandwich. She sees Andy’s and smiles. “You don’t like the crust either?”

“No.” He smiles at her. “You know what’s funny? My dad’s girlfriend made this for me, and I didn’t even have to ask her to cut it off. She’s like, psychic or something.”

“Oh yeah, Y/N’s staying with you, right?” Brandon chimes in.

“Mhm, she told off my Gram yesterday. It was so funny. She’s so cool, I’m really glad my dad’s with her. He can be so lame sometimes.” He rolls his eyes, and then looks at Caroline. “Sorry, that must all sound confusing.”

“It’s okay. Maybe we could get together some time and you could explain it to me.”

Andy nearly chokes on his sandwich. He takes a sip of his water, and starts nodding.

“Yeah, um, we could definitely do that.”

“Cool.” She smiles.

“Cool.” He smiles back, and then look up at Brandon who just rolls his eyes.

//

Since you had time before classes started back up in a couple of more weeks, you decide to go to the library to get some work done, rather than go to your office. It would almost be too quiet. Normally you’d just sleep in, but it was almost good you needed to be up for Andy, it would keep you in a routine. Lisa was hoping to see a very rough draft of your work once the second semester started.

You get a fuck ton done before needing to pick Andy up at 2:30. You decide to stop off at Dunkin beforehand to surprise him with a hot chocolate as a treat. The first day back to school after a break always felt long as a kid, so you thought you’d do something to potentially perk him up. As you pull up you see Andy walking out with Brandon, but also with a young girl. He waves goodbye to Brandon and hangs back with the girl.

“Thanks for being so nice to me today.”

“It’s not like you made it hard…” He blushes. “Um, so, you were thinking maybe Thursday after school?”

“Yeah! It would have to be your house, though, we’re still unpacking.”

“I’ll ask my dad’s girlfriend, I’m sure she won’t mind.”

“Okay…I’m excited.”

“Me too.”

“Oh! There’s my mom’s car, I better go. Bye, Andy.”

“Bye, Caroline.”

Andy sees your car and races over, getting into the back seat.

“Hi, how was school?”

“It was…really great actually.”

“Oh, good. Here, I got you a hot chocolate.”

“You’re the best, Y/N! Thanks.”

“You’re welcome…um, who was that girl you were just talking to?” You ask as you start to drive away.

“Oh, that was Caroline. She’s new, I helped her out a little bit today. I was actually sort of hoping she could come over after school Thursday.” He mutters.

“I’ll have to ask your dad if girls are allowed over.” You smirk. “You might have to hang out in a more open area.”

“Brandon and I don’t have to do that…”

“Very true, but even still, you and Brandon don’t keep the door closed when he’s over.”

“You got me there.” He shrugs. “I’m sure Dad will say yes.”

“When do your basketball practices start?”

“Next Tuesday.”

“Do you have everything you need for that?”

“Yup, I got a ton of new stuff for Christmas.”

“Okay, cool, just wanted to make sure. So…Caroline’s nice?”

“Super nice, and…her smile is pretty, so are her eyes. They’re like…the prettiest brown eyes I’ve ever seen.”

“Oh!”

“She…she gave me the butterflies, Y/N.” He runs a hand through his hair.

“Already?”

“Yeah, and now I’m confused because I thought Brandon gave me butterflies.”

“Well…sometimes two people can give you butterflies, that’s okay.”

“But she’s a girl and he’s a boy…why am I so weird?” He groans.

“Oh, Andy, you’re not weird at all. A lot of people feel like you about boys and girls.”

“They do?”

“Sure! One of my really good friends Darcy likes boys and girls.”

“How does she decide which one she likes better?”

“Well, she doesn’t.” You shrug as you pull into the driveway. You both get into the house and sit on the couch to continue your conversation. Andy holds a throw pillow to his stomach. “I’ve been around her when she’s had a boyfriend, and when she’s had a girlfriend, both make her equally happy. I think for her, at the end of the day, she’s attracted to the type of person they are, so the gender doesn’t really matter.”

“My dad said something like that once, he says he just likes the person and the rest doesn’t really matter. And then I asked him if he liked boys like that and he said no, so I was just more confused.”

“Sexuality is an ever evolving thing, Andy. You may decide you like one thing now, but in a few years you could like something else. I know it all feels stressful and confusing, but remember you’re eleven. You have so much time to figure it all out.”

“So…you only like boys?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“How did you know?”

“I don’t know exactly. I’m just not attracted to women in a way that would make me want to date one.”

“Caroline is, like, really pretty. I’ve never really thought girls were pretty before.”

“Could just be a sign you’re growing up.” You give him a soft smile. “Can I ask…if you think Caroline is pretty, what do you think of Brandon?”

“Brandon’s…ugh, Brandon’s cute, Y/N.” Andy runs a hand over his face. “I like his smile too, and I mean, look the bracelet he made me. I made him one too, but he’s not as artsy as I am, and it’s literally perfect.” He holds his wrist out so you can get a better look at the bracelet.

“It’s a beautiful bracelet.”

“Can you do me a favor?”

“Of course.”

“When you ask my dad if Caroline can come over, can you please not mention anything else to him? I don’t want him to know about any of this.”

“Andy, he just wants to be there for you…”

“I know, but…he’ll just be so, like, after school special about it. Then he’ll tell my mom about it, and I really don’t want her knowing.”

“I don’t know if I can keep a secret from your dad, Andy.”

“You wouldn’t be! Please, Y/N?”

“Okay…I’ll keep this stuff between us.”

“Thank you.” He sighs with relief and leans forward to hug you.

//

After dinner you end up FaceTiming with Harry. He speaks with Andy for a bit first, and then it’s your turn. You take the phone into the bedroom for some privacy while Andy takes a shower.

“Hi.” You smile at him.

“Hey, baby.”

“How was your meeting?”

“Could not have gone better.”

“Really? That’s great!”

“They loved what I had, and signed me write another piece for the journal!”

“Harry, that’s incredible. I’m so proud of you.”

“Thanks. So, how was your first real day with him?”

“It was good.” You bite your bottom lip. “Can he have a friend over Thursday?”

“Sure, I don’t care if Brandon comes over.”

“It’s not Brandon…”

“Oh, Tyler then?”

“No, this is a new friend…a girl named Caroline.”

“A girl?! Wow, yeah, that’s fine. Did he tell you anything about her?”

“We actually had a long conversation about a lot of things today, but he asked me not to tell you and I don’t wanna betray his trust.”

“He…doesn’t want me to know something?”

“He doesn’t want an after school special lecture or whatever.”

“I do not do that.” He scoffs. “You really won’t tell me anything?”

“All I’m going to say is that he’s extremely confused, and I validated his feelings, and then he hugged me.”

“Does he like this girl?”

“He thinks she’s pretty.”

“And what about Brandon?”

“Can’t say.”

“Come on, Y/N.”

“Harry, I’m stuck here. I really wanna respect him. He’s not in any danger or anything so I think it’s okay that the conversation stayed between he and I.”

“I don’t like it.” He pouts.

“I’m sorry, baby doll.” You pout back.

“Y/N?! I need some help with my hair!”

“Welp, duty calls.” You giggle. “I love you.”

“I love you too. Thanks for being there for him. I’m happy he has you to talk to.”

“Me too.”

You end the call and meet Andy in the living room. He looked incredibly cute with the t-shirt wrapped around his head. He sits down on the floor in front of the couch and you sit down. You comb through his hair as carefully as you can, and then you apply the mousse. You hear him sigh and it makes you smile.

“Wanna watch TV before you go read?” You ask him when you’re done.

“Yeah, can I put my show on?”

“Of course.” You smile. He gets cozy next to you, and you smirk when you see he selects Family Guy. “Andy…are you old enough to be watching this?”

“Dad lets me watch this all the time, it’s funny.” He shrugs.

“Do you even get half of the jokes?”

“Not really, but it’s still funny.”

“Okay.” You shake your head.

“Would you play with my hair?”

“Sure, do you wanna rest your head on my lap?”

“Yeah.” He smiles and grabs a pillow to get comfortable. “Y/N?”

“Yes?”

“You’d make a good mom.” He says with a yawn as he keeps his eyes on the TV.

“Oh, um, thank you, Andy.”

//

When Thursday rolls around, you pick Andy up, and you’re also met with Caroline getting into the backseat of your car.

“Hello, you must be Caroline, it’s nice to meet you.” You smile.

“Nice to meet you too.” She smiles.

“I’m Andy’s dad’s girlfriend. I hear your mom works at the university? So do I.”

“Oh, really? She works in the Psychology department…my dad works there too, but he’s in IT.”

“Well, feel free to tell your mom to look out for me and Harry. We teach in the Communication department.”

“Okay.” Caroline smiles.

You get the two of them home and fix them with a snack. You tell them you’ll be up in the loft and you remind Andy to keep his door open.

“She’s really nice.” Caroline says as she sits down on Andy’s bed.

“Yeah, she’s the first girlfriend my dad’s had in a long time. I like her a lot.”

“How long have they been together for?”

“I don’t know…seven months I think.”

“Wow, that’s a long time!”

“Super long. They were friends for a while before they got together too, so they knew each other really well.”

“That’s so sweet! My parents met on a blind date.” She giggles. “How did your mom and dad meet?”

“In college I guess.” He shrugs. “She lives about thirty minutes from here, I see her every other weekend.”

“Does she date anyone?”

“She’s engaged actually. His name is Noah and he has a daughter, Rachel. She’s a year younger than us.”

“Wow, it’s like that movie Blended.”

“Yeah! They’re nice enough, and Noah makes my mum happy, so that’s all I care about.”

“That’s, like, really grown up of you.” Caroline was in awe of Andy. He blushes slightly and clears his throat.  

“Enough about me, what’s it like having three older sisters?”

“It can be fun and annoying. Like, they help me with my hair and clothes, but other times it feels like we’re always fighting. I feel bad for dad.”

“Why?”

“Because they all get their…monthly visits at the same time.”

“Oh! That video they showed us in health class was gross.”

“Did they show you the one about the girl who gets it for the first time, and then they talk about a girl’s insides?”

“Yeah! And then we had to watch the same one, but about boys, and then we had to watch a video about giving birth…”

“Ew, and they actually show the baby coming out, right?”

“Yeah…nasty.” They both shiver and then they both laugh.

“I know you guys said there wasn’t much to do around here, but what do you do for fun?”

“I play basketball with Brandon, his dad is our coach. Winter program on Fridays is fun. Do you ski?”

“I do! I can’t wait for tomorrow. Would you wanna sit with me on the bus?”

“Well…I would, but…I sit with Brandon.”

“Oh, that’s okay. I can just sit near you, maybe? Are you two best friends?”

“Yeah, we are.” Andy blushes. “And yeah, you can definitely sit near me.”

“Cool.” She smiles and grabs her books out of her bag, and Andy does the same. “You’d been so great to me all week. I’m really glad that seat was open in front of you in homeroom.”

“Me too.”

Later that night, after Caroline’s mom picked her up, you and Andy watch a little TV on couch. He had been quiet.

“So, do you have everything together for winter program tomorrow?”

“Yup, got my ski bag ready to go.”

“Make sure to pack what you need for your mum’s, she’s gonna get you after school tomorrow.”

“And then I’ll see you Monday after school, right?”

“That’s right.”

“I had a lot of fun with you this week. You make me not miss my dad as much.”

“Aw, that’s sweet. It’s okay to miss him, though, I miss him a lot too.”

“You forgot to say that you had a lot of fun with me too.” He rolls his eyes.

“Oh, did I?” Andy likes praise too, it seems. “Well, I had loads of fun with you this week, and we’ll have loads more next week.”

“I hope we get a snow day or something. Brandon’s dad usually takes us sledding.”

“Maybe you could bring Caroline with you too. She’s very nice.”

“Yeah, I like her a lot. She asked if she could sit with me tomorrow, but I had to tell her no because I sit on the bus with Brandon.”

“That’s good you didn’t flake on Brandon.”

“He’d kill me if I did, although, I feel like he’s getting a taste of his own medicine.”

“What do you mean?”

“Remember when he was with Molly? Everything was about her, now he knows how it feels.”

“Right, he’d talk about her a lot.”

“Mhm.”

“Do you talk about Caroline a lot?”

“Pretty much, it’s hard not to. She’s funny, and she always smells like cherries.” He swoons.

“And to think you’ve only known her for four days.” You chuckle.

“I wonder if she’ll go on the lift with me tomorrow, shoot, I should have asked her while she was here.”

“Do you have her number?”

“Yeah…”

“So text her and ask. Tell her you had a nice time hanging out, and then ask her if she’ll save a run for you tomorrow.”

“You’re brilliant, Y/N! I’m gonna go do that now and then get ready for bed. Goodnight!”

“Night.” You smile and watch him run off to his room.

//

You felt like a full on basketball-mom sitting at Andy’s practice. Watching all the boys was pretty fun, you never got to see Andy be sporty other than going on hikes. There were some other parents and older siblings in the gym watching as well. You got some funny looks from some, and others were quite friendly. You brought your laptop with you to get some work done, but you ended up taking pictures for Harry to see. You knew it killed him to miss Andy’s first week back in action.

Brandon’s dad had the boys running drills, back and forth, sprinting up and down the court. He had them all working on their dribbling, and at the end he had them scrimmage a bit. You noticed how when the boys had to stand and listen to directions that Brandon and Andy were often leaning on each other mindlessly, or touching in some fashion. When practice ends, Brandon chats with Andy quick.

“Did you wanna do homework over the phone later?” Brandon asks.

“I can’t. I need to shower and eat, and then I told Caroline I’d call her.”

“Oh…”

“Sorry, maybe tomorrow?”

“Sure, yeah, maybe you could just come over after school?”

“Well, Y/N is watching me for a reason, you know? You could come to place, though.”

“Yeah! I’ll ask my parents.”

“Great, well, I’ll see you tomorrow.” Andy comes over to you. “Hi, Y/N.”

“Hey, you looked great out there.”

“Thanks, can Brandon come over tomorrow?”

“Sure.” You shrug. “Come on, I ordered a pizza for dinner and I need to go pick it up. Thought it would be a nice break from my cooking.”

“I like the way you cook, but pizza sounds great.”

//

Brandon was fuming, and you could feel it. Andy had accidentally invited Caroline over too, and you were just trying to keep them all happy. They were all playing video games in the living room, and you popped them some popcorn. They had all done their homework together, but you could feel the tension when you gave them dinner. Luckily they’d be getting picked up soon so you could chat with Andy about it. Caroline’s phone goes off.

“Oh! My dad’s here.” Andy pauses the game to walk her to the door. “Thanks for having me.” She gives Andy a hug goodbye after she gets her coat on, and heads out.

“Isn’t she cool, B? She knows how to play Smash Brothers.” Andy says as he sits back down with Brandon.

“It’s not rocket science.” He mumbles.

“Are you okay? You were sort of quiet…”

“Well, I thought just you and I were hanging out today.”

“I told you at school, when she and talked last night I just sort of told her she could come by. I didn’t think it would be that big of a deal. You used to do it with Molly all the time.”

“Yeah, but Molly was my girlfriend, that’s different.”

“How is that any different?”

“Because she’d let me kiss her after. You wouldn’t say no to someone who lets them kiss you.”

“Maybe you should go back to kissing her then.” Andy rolls his eyes. “I like hanging out with Caroline…”

“More than me?”

“No…it’s just different.”

“Well, it sort of feels like you have a new best friend.”

“Don’t be like that, she’s not my new best friend, she’s just a new friend. She’s really pretty. Who knows, maybe I’ll kiss her.”

“You like her enough to kiss her?”

“Maybe.” He shrugs. “She’s really pretty, don’t you think?”

“She’s okay.” Brandon shrugs, and he sees his phone light up. “My mom’s here, I have to go.”

“Alright, see you tomorrow.”

“See you.” They both hug before Brandon leaves.

“Andy…um…”

“I don’t wanna talk about it.” He huffs and goes to his room. You follow after him and stand in his doorway.

“I was just going to ask if you wanted some ice cream.”

“No, thank you.” He sighs. “I feel Brandon was upset with me. I really didn’t think he’d mind it if she came.”

“Well, now you know. Maybe don’t make it a group thing.”

“He’s the only one of our friends that seems to mind her. I don’t get it.”

“Maybe he’s jealous that you’re suddenly not as available.”

“Then that makes him a hippo because he did the same thing with Molly.”

“I think you mean hypocrite.” You chuckle.

“Whatever it is, you know what I mean. This is so annoying, I acted supportive when he told me he was dating her.”

“Are you saying you want to date Caroline?”

“Maybe! It shouldn’t matter, he should be there for me. I should be able to talk about girls and stuff with him.”

“Andy did you ever stop to think that maybe Brandon is confused in the way that you’re confused?” His eyes widen at that.

“You mean…Brandon could think that I’m cute?”

“He could, yeah.”

“Oh my god.” He looks around like he’s searching for an answer. “But what if Caroline thinks I’m cute too?”

“Do you think that she thinks you’re cute?”

“There are rumors going around that she does!”

“Okay, so what do you want to do?!”

“I have no idea!” He flops onto his bed. He mumbles something into his pillow.

“What?!”

“I think I wanna ask her out!”

“Are you even allowed to date yet?!”

“I don’t know! I didn’t think I’d be feeling this way so soon so I haven’t asked!”

“Well, now I have to tell your dad what’s been going on!”

“No, you can’t!”

“I have to!”

“Okay, everybody just be cool.” Andy stands back up. “Screaming won’t get us anywhere.”

“Andy, you can’t ask her out unless your dad says it’s okay. I don’t know how he feels about you dating. You’re only eleven!”

“But I like her…”

“Then you need to wait until Harry gets home, and you need to talk to him about all of this. I won’t say a word, but you sure as hell will.” You cross your arms and so does he.

“I don’t wanna talk to him about this. He’s too romantic about everything, and then he’s gonna be like ‘my baby has a crush’.”

“Well, his baby does have a crush. It’s adorable when you think about it.”

“God, not you too.” He runs his hands over his face. “Fine, I’ll talk to him when he gets back and I won’t make a move beforehand.”

“Good.” You nod and stick your hand out for him to shake. “Pleasure doing business with you.”

You went to bed exhausted as fuck that night. You needed Harry home, now.

//

The next morning at school Andy takes a deep breath before going over to Brandon at his locker.

“Hi.” He says shyly.

“Morning.” Brandon says without looking at him.

“I’m sorry about yesterday.” Brandon closes his locker and looks at Andy. “I should have asked first before just inviting someone else over with us.”

“It’s okay.” Brandon sighs. “I get it.”

“You do?”

“Yeah, Caroline is really pretty. Do you, um, think you like like her?”

“I might…I think so, but I’m a little confused. It doesn’t matter anyways, she probably doesn’t like me like that.”

“Why wouldn’t she?” Brandon smirks and throws his arm around Andy’s shoulders as they walk to homeroom. “You’re a great catch.”

“Shut up.” Andy chuckles and nudges Brandon.

//

Things seemed fine between the boys as basketball practice. You could just tell by their body language. You and Andy share a dinner of pasta and veggies after he showers.

“Did you stay here all weekend while I was at my mum’s? I didn’t even think to ask.”

“No, I went back to my place. I’ll do the same when you go back on Friday. I had water my plants and all that.”

“What’s your place like?”

“It’s just a simple two bedroom.” You shrug. “I like it a lot cause it’s all mine. I love decorating and interior design, so I’ve had fun really making it my own.”

“If you could redecorate here, what do you think you’d change?”

“Hmm…” You look around. “First off, I’d paint…everywhere. It’s dark too dark in the living room. I’d paint it a light grey, and then find some curtains with some color to make it pop. I’d also get blinds for the sliding door, I hate that there’s nothing covering it. In here I’d probably get a round table to save some space. It’s a great size dining area and kitchen, but a round table would just make more sense, I think. I’d also put a glass coffee table in the living room to make it seem like there was more space, not that it’s cramped. It’s a wonderful sized home. More spacious than most ranches I’ve seen.”

“I literally agree with everything. Dad said we could do some painting over his spring break. I think he focused a lot on getting the outside to look nice.”

“Oh, you can tell he loves landscaping. This home has a beautiful curb appeal.”

“Do you think after dinner we could watch House Hunters together again? It was a lot of fun the other night.”

“Definitely!” You smile. “How were things with Brandon today?”

“Good, I apologized for just inviting Caroline over, and he said it was okay.”

“And how was Caroline today?”

“God she…she shared her cosmic brownie with me.” Andy rests his chin his palm and pouts. “I didn’t even ask, she just offered. She’s so nice, Y/N.”

“That was very nice of her.” You chuckle. “Those are the best brownies.”

“Dad never buys them because he says they’re overly processed, so we’ll make them here. It was a real treat.”

Andy helps you clean up dinner, and then you both get settled on the couch. He had gotten into a rhythm of resting his head on a pillow in your lap and wanting you to play with his hair. He had murmured that your nails felt nice like at the hairdresser. He loved listening to your commentary while watching the extremely staged show.

“Oh good, it’s House Hunters: Renovation! I love when they show what they did with the house after they bought it.” You say.

“Me too, I always like seeing if they make it worse or better.”

“I crack up when a lot of them try to do these intricate home projects by themselves. Hire someone for fuck’s sake.” You scoff and then blush. “Sorry.”

“Mum swears all the time.” Andy giggles. “If I tell her about someone that’s bother me, or something she just says fuck ‘em, it’s her…uh…what’s what word that starts with a ph?”

“Philosophy?”

“Yeah! It’s her philosophy.”

“Not a bad one to live by.” You smirk.

After two episodes, you send Andy off to bed, and get ready for bed yourself. You setting into one of Harry’s tee shirts, and decide to listen to one of those mediation bed time stories he’s always suggesting. You plug your headphones into your phone, turn the lights off and settle in. Just as you’re beginning to relax, the story stops, and Harry’s contact photo pops up on the screen, surprising you.

“Hello?” You whisper.

“Hi, baby.”

“Harry, it must be the middle of the night over there, why are you awake?”

“Couldn’t sleep.”

“Why not?”

“My body pillow just isn’t doing it for me tonight, I miss you.”

“Aw, babe, I miss you too…only a few more days. You’re back Saturday, yeah?”

“Mhm...are you gonna be at my place or yours?”

“I’ll probably be at mine since Andy will be at Paige’s. We’re having loads of fun. His basketball practices are going well. You got the pictures I sent?”

“I did, thank you for sending them along. Any other news to report, or are you still holding out on me?” You could practically hear the smirk that was sure to be on his face.

“All I can say is that Andy is going to have an important question to ask you when you get back.”

“Can you give me any hints?”

“He…may want to start dating…”

“Brandon?!”

“No, actually, someone else, but I’ve said too much already. I told him he had to ask you if he even was allowed to date.”

“Oh, it’s so meaningless at this age, I don’t care, but thanks for telling him that.”

“It’s not totally meaningless. There was a boy that asked me out when I was in seventh grade, and I said yes because I thought I had a crush on him, and then I realized I wasn’t ready to date, so the next day I told him I didn’t want to. It was so awkward.”

“And…you remember all this?”

“Of course, a girl never forgets.”

“Changing subject a bit…um…are you still, uh, on the rag?”

“On the rag?!” You nearly cackle. “No, you idiot.”

“I didn’t know how else to phrase it!”

“Just ask me if I’m on my period or not.”

“It’s an awkward question to ask.”

“You don’t seem to have a problem fucking me when I’m ‘on the rag’.”

“Not at all. Makes me a real man if I say so myself.” You hum your response, not having the energy to say something sarcastic. “Are you in bed already?”

“I am, I was even listening to one of those bed time stories you’re always talking about.”

“Is it alright that I’m interrupting?”

“Mhm.”

“What are you wearing, Y/N?”

“One of your shirts, your Rolling Stones tee.”

“Ah, that’s a good one.”

“What about you?”

“Just my boxers.”

Harry’s voice was low, and gravely. It was sort of nice listening to it with your headphones in. Heating him in surround sound was raising goosebumps on your body. If you closed your eyes it would be like he was there next to you, talking into your ear.

“Harry, did you call to have phone sex with me?”

“Would you me mad if I did?”

“No…just wish I had one of my items here to help me along.”

“Guess you’ll have to do it the old fashioned way and use your hand.”

“What are we in medieval times?”

“Alas, fair maiden, it seems we are.” You giggle softly at him. God, he was so cute. “So, you’re okay with this?”

“Very okay with it.” You bite your bottom lip.

“Are you biting your lip?”

“Yes.” You hear him hum in understanding.

“Wish it was me doing it. I’d bite your lip and then nip across your jaw to your neck.”

“Oh, I like it when you do that. I’d like you bite every inch of me.” You smile. “You know what else I really like?”

“Tell me.”

“I like when you kiss on my tits, and then when you blow on my nipples once they’re all wet.”

“Yeah? Gets your nipples pretty hard, huh?”

“Mhm.” You lift your shirt up over your chest so you could rub your palm over one of your breasts.

“Please tell me you’re touching them.”

“I am.”

“I love your tits, Y/N. Love touching and kneading.”

“I like feeling your big hands on them, and then I like when one of your hands slides between my legs while you’re still kissing on them.”

“And you’re always so wet for me once I get there.”

“M’wet now, Harry.”

“Fuck.”

“How hard his your dick right now?”

“Very, it’s throbbing for you.”

“Why don’t you lick your palm and wrap your hand around yourself like I would. Want you to touch yourself while I am.” You hear some rustling, and then a grunt from him. “Love when you listen to me.”

“Love when you tell me what to do.” He grunts again. “Tell me what you’re doing.”

“I’m just moving my fingers around myself, feeling myself get more wet.”

“Put a finger inside and then drag it up to your clit.” He hears a soft moan come from you. “Good girl.” He breathes.

Your eyes snap open. He had never said that to you before. You kind of liked it.

“What’s that? I’m your good girl?”

“My very good girl.”

“Christ, Harry.” You groan as your fingers press circles into your clit. “Fuck, I wish you were here, want your mouth on me.”

“Where?”

“Right on my clit so you can suck on it.”

Harry’s tip was leaking so much now that he was able to spread his precome all over his length. It felt incredible, but it was nowhere near as good as being squeezed by your walls.

“I’d do that, and slip my fingers inside, pet that special spot.”

“Oh my fucking god.” Your back arches slightly as you imagine it. “Harry.” You whine.

“That’s it baby, say my name while you make yourself come.”

“Want you to come too.”

“I will once you do. Gotta hear you do it first.”

“Fuck, Harry.” You groan as you rub yourself faster. You were so drenched you had to kick all of the blankets off yourself. You plant your feet into the bed as you bend your legs at the knee. Your arch your back up to get a better angle, and god does it feel good.

“Bet you’re squeezing around nothing, just wishing I was there.” All he could hear was you grunting and moaning.

“Harry.” You grit your teeth. “I, I’m, oh fuck!” You press your face into the pillow so you can moan out, but keep it muffled.

“God.” He breathes. “Blew my load just listening to you, Y/N.”

“Harry.” You whimper. “I’m a mess now and you’re not even here to clean it up.”

“I know, I’m sorry.” He chuckles slightly. “I’m a mess here too if that makes you feel better.”

“It does a little.” You giggle. “I really can’t wait to see you.”

“Me neither, my love.”

His words make you feel all warm and fuzzy.

“Well, unless you wanna listen to me pee, which I really hope you don’t because that’s just one kink I would have to shame you for, I think I should go.”

“Nope, no pee kink here, baby.” He laughs. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

“Sweet dreams.”

“Back at you.” You sigh and hang up the phone. There was something strangely erotic about getting yourself off alone in Harry’s bed. Calling you like that was sneaky, but you knew you’d sleep better, and he would too.

//

“Mm, hello?” You groan at 5AM when your phone goes off.

“Due to weather and road conditions, school is cancelled today.”

You sit up right away. You had no idea it was supposed to snow last night, and you also had no idea how to use Harry’s snow blower. You get up and throw your robe on, you needed to tell Andy there was no school. You quietly go into his room, and put your hand on his shoulder.

“Andy, sweetie, you have a snow day today.” You coo.

“M’kay.” He whispers sleepily.

You smile and leave his room so he can go back to sleep. You look outside and see it’s still dark. You figure you should go back to sleep as well. Yours and Harry’s cars were in the garage, so it wasn’t like you need to worry about digging them out. You could tackle the shoveling in a few hours.

You end up starting your day around eight, deciding that sweats would be most comfortable. You think Andy would enjoy some waffles for breakfast, so you get the batter going in the waffle maker. He appears from his room shortly after, the aroma being too intoxicating for him to stay in bed any longer.

“Morning.” He says, knuckling at his eyes.

“Morning, you hungry?”

“Mhm.” He smiles as she places a stack of waffles in front of him at the table. “Thank you.”

“You’re more than welcome.”

“What kind of snow is it?”

“The powdery kind. I need to get out there soon to clean up the driveway. You don’t happen to know how to use the snow blower do you?”

“No idea. I usually stick to shoveling the walkways and the stairs.”

“I’m sure I’ll be able to figure it out. How hard could it be?”

After twenty minutes of tinkering, you Googled how to start a snow blower, and found a video to watch. Once you got it going, it was pretty simple. You cleared the driveway of all the snow as Andy worked to clear the walkway to the front door.

“We make a pretty good team!” You say as you get the snow blower back in the garage.

“Yeah!”

You both head in through the garage and go into the basement to shed yourselves of your wet jackets, snow-pants, and boots.

Caroline: hey Andy! My sisters are taking me sledding since the roads aren’t too bad, do you wanna come?

Brandon: My dad’s gonna take me skiing today, do you wanna come?

“Shit.” Andy says to himself as he checks his phone.

“What’s up?” You ask him as you hand him a mug of hot chocolate.

“Both Caroline and Brandon invited me to do stuff with them…what should I do?”

“Who asked you first?”

“Caroline did…”

“Which activity would you rather do?”

“I’d rather go skiing, but I’d also like to hang out with Caroline…”

“Well, maybe you could go skiing with Brandon, and then meet up with Caroline later.” You shrug. “She could come over here and I could set a movie up for you in the living room, and I could sit up in the loft while you hang out.”

“Really?”

“Sure.”

“You don’t mind me being out all day with my friends?”

“Not at all, snow days are supposed to be fun, and the roads aren’t that bad right now.”

“You’re the best, Y/N!” Andy hugs you, and goes to text his friends.

Andy: Sure! I just need to a few minutes to get my gear together.

Brandon: Awesome! I’ll let my dad know, see you soon! Did Y/N want to come?

Andy: I’ll ask

“Y/N!”

“Yeah!”

“Did you want to come skiing?”

“Oh god.” You laugh. “No, I think I’ll save that for your dad, but thank you.”

Andy: she said thanks but no thanks lol

Brandon: okay lmao

Andy smiles and then goes to text Caroline.

Andy: Thanks for thinking of me, I’m actually going skiing with Brandon, but Y/N said you could come over for a movie later if you want???

Caroline: of course! Totally don’t blame you for wanting to go skiing. I’d love to come over later, I’ll ask my parents. Wanna just text me when you get home and we can figure it out from there?

Andy: sounds good to me ☺️

Caroline: ☺️☺️

“Okay, this should all work out.” Andy says to you. “I’m gonna get my stuff together.”

“Alright, will you just let me know once you’re there and all that. Text me updates so I know you didn’t split your head open. I don’t think your dad would like me very much anymore if that happened.”

“Yeah.” Andy laughs. “I think he’d take some brownie points away for sure.”

//

Andy was having a great time skiing with Brandon and his dad. After a couple of hours they all go into the lodge to get a quick lunch. Mr. Stewart goes up to order all the food while the boys sit at the table.

“Did you want to come back my house after? My mom’s making beef stew for dinner.”

“Aw man, I love your mom’s beef stew.” Andy pouts. “But I can’t, I have plans later.”

“Oh yeah? What are you up to?”

“Um…I invited Caroline over for a movie.”

“Oh.” Brandon’s face falls.

“But only because she invited me to go sledding today, and I said no I could ski with you.”

“Oh.” He perks back up. “What movie do you think you’ll watch?”

“I have no idea, I’ll probably let her decide. Any time me, my dad, and Y/N all watch a movie he always lets her decide.”

“Why?”

“Because it makes her happy.” He shrugs. “And then she’ll kiss him, and he likes that.”

“Right.” Brandon swallows. Before he can say anything else his dad comes over with the food.

//

You got a fuck ton of work done today, you were really proud of yourself. Harry’s loft was a perfect working space, even if you did miss your office at home. You hear Andy come in the door, and he shouts hello and that he’ll be in the shower. You chuckle to yourself and save what you’re working on for now.

Andy comes out a little while later just as you’re rifling through take out menus.

“I was thinking you could get something yummy for dinner. What do you think she’d like?”

“Pizza and mozzarella sticks sound safe.” He says.

“Alright, I’ll order it in a bit so it’s here when she is. I’m sure a lot of people are doing delivery tonight.”

“And you’ll just be upstairs?”

“Mhm, I don’t need to hover…just… you know, don’t sit on top of each other.”

He makes a face at you like he’s grossed out and then walks away from you. Not too long after the food arrives, so does Caroline.

“Thanks for getting all this, Y/N.” She says to you.

“Oh, you’re more than welcome. Did you two settle on a movie?”

“Cars.” Andy says. “Right, you wanna watch Cars?”

“Mhm.” She smiles.

“Okay, Cars it is.” You smile and set the movie up on Disney+. They both settle on the couch. “I’ll be right upstairs working if you need anything.”

“Thanks.” Andy says and watches you go upstairs. “I like this movie a lot, Brandon and I watch it all the time.”

“It’s one of my favorites. I don’t really like the sequels though.”

“Me either!”

“They suck.”

“Yeah.” Andy smiles.

“I really like Wall-E, too.”

“My dad and I watched that together for the first time a couple years ago and he cried.” Andy laughs.

“He did?!”

“Yeah! I have no idea why. He cries a lot when we watch movies, though.”

“He sounds funny, I can’t wait to meet him.” She smiles and turns her attention to the TV.

About halfway through the movie, once they were done eating, you noticed it had gotten a little quite, so you peer over the banister to see what was going on. They were simply entranced by the film, giggling occasionally. You smile and sit back down.

There was the part in the movie where the town comes back to life, and the cars all pair of to cruise together. Caroline sighs softly, and he hand brushes Andy’s. They both look down at their hands, and Andy makes a bold move in holding her, fingers intertwined and all. She smiles at him and blushes.

“Is this okay?” He asks.

“Yeah.” She nods with a brighter smile.

“Cool.” He sighs with relief, and they continue the movie like that, holding hands.

You stand in the kitchen while Caroline gets her coat on after the movie ended and her oldest sister was in the car outside.

“Thanks again for having me, it was fun.”

“Anytime.”

She throws her arms around his neck to give him a hug, and out the door she goes. Andy sighs contently and walks into the kitchen with a huge smile on his face. He gives you a surprising hug.

“What was that for?”

“For being so cool to let us chill alone. Knowing my dad, he would have walked by every two seconds, or if I were at Mum’s she would have had Rachel watch the movie with us. We…we held hands, Y/N.”

“Oh my.” You smile. “Big step.”

“No kidding.” He agrees. “I…I need to go call Brandon.” He races into his room and closes the door.

Andy was so innocently sweet, and it warmed your heart like nothing else ever could.

//

“He was a perfect angel, honestly.” You say over the phone to Janette as you stuff your face with the ice cream you had in your freezer. “He’s very popular, and is always busy. No wonder Harry didn’t make time to date before, I’m exhausted.”

“Doing it alone is tough, but now he’s got a great partner to help him out.”

“I love helping. He and I didn’t have one single disagreement, and he listened to me the whole time.”

“Well, of course he did. You’re his dad’s girlfriend.”

“True, but I was really expecting him to try to get away with something.”

“He probably knew he couldn’t test you. Smart kid.”

You chuckle and talk with her more about her break is going. You survived two weeks with Andy. You kept him alive and well.

Later on, you were snuggled up on your couch in some sweats of Harry’s, and a blanket, watching TV. Your heart skips a beat when you hear the jingle of keys and you front door unlocking. Harry said he’d text you when he landed, and he hadn’t. You stand up and shuffle around, grabbing a fry pan and getting into a batting stance.

“Baby?! I’m back!” He stops short when he sees you ready to attack and then he bursts out laughing.

“Stop it! I thought you were a burglar!”

“So you stood there frozen?!”

“You can go home if you want, I’m not longer happy to see you.” You pout and put the pan on the counter.

“Don’t be like that, I missed you so much, come here.”

Your smile slowly grows on your face, and you jump into his arms. He picks you up and you wrap your legs around him, tucking your face into his neck, getting a good whiff of his cologne.

“How was your flight?” You mumble into him as he holds you close.

“Little bit of turbulence, but it was good.” He says as he starts walking you into your bedroom. “Couldn’t wait to get home to you.”

“Aren’t you tired?”

“Slept plenty on the plane and bus.”

He gets you on the bed, and kicks his shoes off before getting on with you. You both lay on your sides facing each other. He grabs your leg and puts it over his hip so he can slot his leg between yours, and then he pulls you close so you’re chest to chest. He moves some hair behind your ear.

“Hi.” He says with a big smile.

“Hi.” You smile back. “I missed you.”

“I missed you too.”

He leans in and slots his mouth over yours, and your eyes flutter closed. You tug at his shirt to pull him even closer as you rock against the leg that’s between yours. His tongue drags along your bottom lip and you moan softly. He licks into your mouth and you’re met with his familiar minty taste. You tug him completely on top of you as you turn onto your back. You wanted his weight to just crush you.

“Baby.” He coos as he kisses from your jaw to your neck. He sucks on your soft skin and your hips buck up again. His leg moves further between yours and you gasp.

Your fingers lace through his hair and you tug as you grind against his thigh. You were feeling incredibly needy now that he was here with you, and not just a voice through the phone. You could feel him getting hard against her hip, so you reach into his joggers and start pumping him, getting a heft groan from him.

“Need you.” You breathe.

“Need to taste you first.” He says as shifts to tug your sweatpants off.

“No, please just fuck me, we can do all that afterwards.”

“I need to prep you first or it’ll hurt.”

“Harry, I’ve been fucking you for seven months, I’m perfectly adjusted.” He raises his eyebrows at you. “Okay, maybe not perfectly, but I’m feeling impatient so please.” She pouts at him and he physically can’t say no.

He doesn’t bother with your shirt, or his, he just gets his pants off, and you get yours off. He goes to get up in search for a condom, but you grab him and shake your head.

“Wanna feel you, just pull out.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yeah.”

His lips crash to yours as your legs open up for him. He lines himself up with you and rubs his tip along your clit. You were plenty wet for him. You both groan from the feeling. He slowly pushes inside you, and your head falls back from the stretch. Your mouth was hanging open trying to breathe to help yourself relax.

“Holy shit.” You say as he’s about halfway in.

“Three weeks in a long time, babe, let me take some time to just-“ He starts to pull out but your sink your nails into his ass.

“Just go for it.”

“Y/N, I don’t want to hurt you.”

“You won’t, it’ll feel good. Just give it one good thrust.”

He bites his bottom lip and does as you say, bottoming out immediately. You choke out a gasp. It hurt a little, but it quickly turned to pleasure as you felt full for the first time in weeks. You tighten around him and he grits his teeth.

“I’ll come if you do that.”

“Sorry, go ahead, move, fuck me, Harry.”

He rocks in and out of you, and you pull him closer so his head is buried in your neck. You wrap your legs around his lower back, and get your hands up under his shirt so you can scratch and squeeze at him.

“You feel so fucking good.” He growls into your ear, and it makes your eyes roll back.

“So, so do you, fuck.”

He sits up slightly to get a better angle. He pushes one of your legs back, and lets the other lay flat, and your mouth falls open as he thrusts in and out of you.

“Oh my god, Harry!”

“Hold your leg up f’me.”

You do as he says immediately and hook your arm under your leg as he continues to fuck in and out of you. He was hitting your g-spot perfectly. You reach to rub your clit in time with his thrusts.

“Oh my fucking god, Harry, don’t stop.” You were panting already. “Fuck, fuck, please, don’t stop.”

You knew he wouldn’t dare, but you couldn’t think of what else to say. Tears were starting to form in your eyes because it just felt so fucking good.

“Oh, oh! Fuck!” Your back arches as you come to your release. You squeeze impossibly tight around him.

“Shit, Y/N!” Harry pulls out of you just in time and comes on your stomach, getting a little on your shirt, but your head was so fuzzy you didn’t care.

“S-sorry, I didn’t mean to-oh!”

You look down and see Harry’s head between your legs. He really did want to taste you. He sucks on your clit and your hands go right back into his hair. You tug and squeeze with each stroke. He was moaning into you, and it was driving you crazy. You moan along with him as he gets both of your legs over his shoulders, your heels digging into his back.

“Harry.” You groan.

He was just focusing solely on your clit because he knew you’d be too sensitive for anything else, but he didn’t mind. You could tell he really just wanted to be close with you like this. The tip of his tongue makes circles on your clit and you feel like you go cross-eyed.

“That’s it, Harry, fuck, oh my god, that’s fucking it!” You cry out as you come and press his face further against you.

“Ride me.” He breathes. “Ride my face, I wanna keep going.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

You nod and wait for him to get adjusted. You rip your shirt off so you can be fully naked for him. You center yourself on him, and gasp when you feel his tongue on your again. His fingers sink into the plushy skin of your ass, and you essentially move so you’re twerking on him, which you know he loves. He loves when you really just use him, he was like your person scratching post.

He had you screaming again in no time, he was pretty proud of himself. You inch down his body, and get his shirt off so you can kiss down his chest. You suck marks into his skin, lower and lower, leaving a nasty trail of love bites behind. He was hard again, so you lick up and down his shaft before taking him into your mouth. You suckle his tip with vigor, making nasty noises that was music to his ears. One of your hands massages his balls while the other scratches up and down his stomach.

“Fuck.” He groans as you take him deep, bobbing up and down. You look up at him as best you can and he runs a caring hand through your hair. “Let me come on your tits, Y/N.”

You smirk with him still in your mouth and then you let him go with a pop. You get in a better position between his legs and pump his wet dick furiously.

“Jesus Christ! Just like that, baby. I’m gonna come, I’m gonna come!”

His come shoots in ribbons onto your chest, and you bask in the warmth it has at first. You kiss back up his body, smearing your chest onto his. You both giggle as your mouth reaches his again. He rolls you both back over so he’s on top again.

“Can’t get enough of you right now.” He says as he kisses the corner of your mouth. “Let me use one of your-“

“Harry, baby, I appreciate the enthusiasm, but let’s take a break, yeah?” You chuckle. “You’ve tuckered me out.”

“Mm, guess I’m a little tired too.” He kisses your cheek. “Could we go shower?”

“Yeah, that sounds like a good idea.” You nod with a sigh.

You wobbled into the bathroom with him, and he gets the water going. Once it’s warm enough you both stand under the water, just holding each other for a bit. He kisses your neck and shoulder occasionally, and you run your hands through his hair. You take turns washing each other up before you get out and towel off.

You cuddle up in bed with your head on his chest, just listening to his heart beat for bit with his fingers lightly stroking your back.  You prop yourself up on your elbow to look at him.

“Yes?”

“You sure got excited earlier, huh?”

“Couldn’t help it, just missed you so much. Do you feel okay? I didn’t hurt you?”

“I’m sure I’ll be a little sore, but it’s alright.” You smile. “Did you have a good time with your family?”

“I did, I feel really recharged. It’s always nice being home. Maybe, um, maybe next year you’d like to try coming with me?”

“Yeah, maybe.” You grin. He sit up a little and so do you. He puts his arm around you and kisses your temple.

“So, you really won’t tell me much about your two weeks with Andy?”

“I told you everything I could. What we ate for meals, how his basketball practices went…oh! We had a snow day and he went skiing with Brandon. I even used the snow blower.”

“You did?!”

“I did.”

“Bet you looked pretty hot.”

“Oh, stop.” You swat at his chest.

“But seriously…”

“You’ll have to talk with him tomorrow when you pick him up.” You bite your bottom lip. “He held hands with the girl, Caroline.”

“Wow.” He blinks a few times. “I wonder if he still might like Brandon.”

“He’s very confused, but I think it’s important to let him sort of test the waters. He said he never really thought girls were pretty before, but he thinks she’s really pretty.”

“God, I’m gonna have to have the talk with him.” He groans. “It was awkward enough when I got him that puberty book.”

“It’s not like you have to go in depth, you just need to remind him to be respectful.”

“You don’t understand…when boys start going through all this…things can get sticky.”

“Ew, enough said.” You both laugh. “I’m so glad you’re home.”

“Me too.”

//

Sunday morning, you drop Harry off at his place so he can unpack and get himself settled before going to pick Andy up. He exchanges pleasantries with Paige, and then on the road he goes.

“How come we’re taking the long way home?”

“Because we need to chat about some things.”

“What did Y/N tell you?” He rolls his eyes.

“Not much, honestly. Apparently you have a new friend, though.”

“Yeah, her name’s Caroline. She’s new to the school, her and her family just moved here from Maine. She came over to watch a movie the other day and we held hands…she even shared her cosmic brownie with me, Dad, I think we like each other, but…I feel guilty about Brandon.”

“Andy…how do you feel about Brandon, exactly?”

“I don’t know.” He mumbles. “It’s like…it’s like Brandon’s like an oo, and Caroline’s like an ah. I don’t know how else to explain it.”

“That actually makes a lot of sense.” He sighs.

“It does?”

“Yeah…so…you held hands with Caroline?”

“Yeah, it was really nice. Would it be alright if I asked her out?”

“Didn’t you already do that by asking her over for a movie?” Harry chuckles.

“No, I mean…I think I wanna date her. I wanna see if she’ll be my girlfriend.”

“Do you think you’re ready for a girlfriend? It’s a lot of responsibility.”

“It is?”

“Sure! Gotta treat whoever you date really nice, give them a lot of respect.”

“I do respect her. I asked her if it was okay while we were holding hands.”

“Thatta boy.” Harry says proudly. “Always ask before you touch, and if they say no, that means no.”

“I know, Dad.”

“Andy, that’s something I’m gonna say over and over to you for the rest of my life, so get used to it.”

“Did you date a lot of people when you were younger?”

“Um…not really. I mean, I had a couple of girlfriends in secondary school, and I dated a girl at uni in London before I came here and met Mum. So…you’d rather go for it with a girl you barely know rather than with Brandon?”

“I’m not entirely sure how I feel about Brandon, Dad…and I’m scared. Caroline doesn’t make me feel scared.”

“Well…if you’d really like to ask her out, I suppose it’s alright.”

“Really?!”

“Sure, we could go on a double date even. Ice skating, maybe?”

“Dad, you’re the coolest! I can’t wait to call her later.”

“You’re gonna ask her out over the phone? Don’t you wanna do it in person?”

“Get with it, Dad.” Andy scoffs. “Everything’s done over the phone now.”

“Well, excuse me.”

“I think you’ll like her, she’s so nice.”

“I’m sure she is.”

“She always smells like cherries too.” Andy sighs.

“You’ve got it bad for her, huh?”

“I’ve never felt this way about a girl before. I think I’m finally catching up with everyone.”

“It’s not a race, son.”

“Sometimes it feels like it is. Whatever, I just feel good about it, about her.”

“Alright.”

“I really liked staying with Y/N.”

“She said she had a great time with you.”

“Do you think you’ll ask her to move in with us?”

“Would like me to?”

“Yeah…I want her around more.”

“Me too.” Harry smiles. “I think I’ll ask her soon, maybe when the weather gets a little warmer.”

“She still needs to learn to ski. You should ask her to come with us to the cabin for February break.”

“I think Mum was hoping to do another family trip…”

“So, Y/N’s family now.”

“I’m happy you feel that way, but I don’t know how comfortable she’d feel doing something like that for an entire week.”

“You won’t know unless you ask.”

#harry styles #office neighbors #harry styles fic #harry styles fanfic #harry styles imagine #harry styles series #harry styles x reader #harry styles x y/n #harry styles y/n #harry styles smut #harry styles fluff #harry styles angst

[lloydskywalkers]

let me just start out by saying i love ever single one of your stories!!! i’m pretty new to the show and your works just add so much more feeling to everything and it’s sooo good!!! i don’t know if you ever do requests or not, so don’t bother with this if you’re busy!! but if you ever get a chance could you write smthg abt Jay and Kai? their friendship is so underrated but so good and i live for the moments in the show when Kai’s big brother instinct(tm) kicks in for him as well as Nya and Lloyd

aH thank you so much!! i’m so glad to hear that :D and this isn’t...exactly what you asked for, but Kai and Jay have this fun of dynamic that reminds me a lot of me and my brother, and i’ve been tossing around little bits of interaction between them for a while now, so i tried to make something coherent out of those :’D

Jay likes to think he’s pretty good at the whole compartmentalizing thing, for the most part. Mainly because he actually knows what it means, and it is not, for instance, locking your team up in a literal compartment while rushing off to fight the other compartment that is your resurrected homicidal father into submission.

“That was one time,” Lloyd will grumble, as if he’s only almost-died once. And then Jay will flinch, because that’s where his compartments come into play.

(Nadakhan gets one, Unagami gets another, the whole fun-times adoption reveal another, and everything else can get stuffed into the metaphorical attic since they won’t pay rent.)

Unfortunately, the attic is where the bad stuff lives.

Metaphorically.

If Jay had a nickel for every time he almost lost all of his friends, he’d have two nickels, plus another nickel for Cole falling into the fog, and another for Lloyd getting crushed by a roof, and another for Zane blowing up, and another for Nya in that awful dress with paling skin as her breathing stutters and the light in her eyes draining and —

And Jay is way, way too familiar with how it looks when his family dies, and all the nickels in the world won’t help that.

So while Jay likes to think he’s pretty good at compartmentalizing, he also thinks he’s got a valid excuse for the way he reacts when Lloyd goes down in the fight that afternoon. Sure, some vague part of his mind remembers that they’ve got a plan they’re running, and Lloyd should easily be able to handle a tiny little stumble — but Jay’s mind is stuck in glaring oranges and health bars, the unsteady gasping noise Lloyd had made before he went down, dissolving into digitized cubes just like everyone else, and Jay—

Jay can’t handle that, compartments or not, so he clears the space between them in a heartbeat just in time to take the bullet that comes hurtling Lloyd’s way.

It’d probably be a very noble and touching scene, if one) Jay didn’t make a hideous squeaking noise when it hit because bullets hurt, and two) the bullet would have missed Lloyd by a good two feet anyways.

Ah well, he thinks, as everything devolves into panicked yelling. It’s the thought that counts.

Except thoughts do not count when Kai is involved, apparently. Or any of the rest of the team, for that matter.

“What is wrong with you?” Kai hisses right in his face, eyes wild and sparking. “I was covering Lloyd, what were you doing?”

“Filling in for you, obviously,” Jay retorts. He has an excellent followup to that, real snappy and all, except that’s the moment Kai’s hand clamps down on the bullet wound in his arm to stop the bleeding, and Jay ends up stifling a shriek instead.

Great, he thinks, fighting back stinging tears of pain as he tries not to take Kai’s apparent wrath too personally. At least Cole looks worried, along the the rest of the team, who are dutifully concerned for his wellbeing like proper teammates should be.

“He’s going to need the hospital,” Zane informs them, his voice a lot steadier and calmer than his words make Jay feel. Zane’s eyebrows furrow as he studies his arm. “Stitches, probably.”

Jay swallows, trying not to curse. There’s a sharp scream as Nya finishes taking out another attacker just beyond them, and Jay figures that’s good enough.

“Okay,” Lloyd says, squeezing Jay’s wrist briefly. Either in comfort about the stitches or thanks for trying to cover him, Jay’s not sure. It’s a nice gesture, nonetheless. “Kai, Cole, can you get him there while we finish up? Sooner the better.”

Cole gives a sharp nod, and offers to take Jay from where Kai’s got him in a death grip. Kai shakes his head, and Jay’s stomach sinks. Sure enough, as soon as they’re clear of the scene, Kai starts going off.

“What did you mean, ‘filling in for me’,” he grinds through his teeth, clearly not about to let this go.

Jay bristles in response at his tone. “I meant,” he bites out, through a hot flare of pain in his arm. Kai’s always merciless with the bandages, even when he’s not in a mood. “That you weren’t there. So I covered.”

He should leave it at that, but Jay’s in a foul enough mood to finish with a condescending, “You’re welcome.”

Kai’s expression grows thunderous. “You didn’t need to. I was right there, you shouldn’t have — you weren’t needed, you should’ve held back.”

Jay feels his chest go tight. His head is clouding with anger, and the pain in his arm isn’t helping, but — ‘you weren’t needed’? Kai really didn’t skimp on the jerk juice this morning, did he.

“Oh, like you could’ve done so much better,” Jay glares. “Lloyd would’ve been toast by the time you got to him.”

“I could’ve made it!”

“Yeah right—”

“I would have, and I wouldn’t have gotten hit!” Kai snarls back. Something in Jay snaps. Or maybe it’s just the steadily increasing blood loss, but of all the nerve—

“Well you didn’t, ‘cause you weren’t there!” he snaps back. “You were too slow, which is real funny since your brain is too!”

It’s not his best comeback, he’ll admit, but Kai looks as if he’s about to light him on fire, if he weren’t stuck carrying Jay like the cover of some awful romance novel, blood getting all over his uniform as they both scream at each other. Maybe Jay will get lucky, and Kai will combust, and they’ll both go up in flames before they can remember that Cole is right there watching them.

“Cut it out, now!”

Oops, too late. For all the incensed authority in Cole’s voice, there’s still a traitorous falter that lets them both know they’ve screwed up. They fall silent, the atmosphere heavy with the lingering tension and new sense of guilt.

And the disgusting sound of Jay’s blood leaking through the makeshift bandage and hitting the ground, truly revolting, he hates blood.

“Just…no more. Please, shut up until we’re at the hospital.” Cole marches forward, snatches Jay from Kai’s arms, and proceeds to beat the fastest route to the hospital at a militant pace.

Jay still looks like some helpless romance cover heroine, dangling from Cole’s arms like he is. It occurs to him that he doesn’t even need to be carried — it’s his arm that’s hurt, he can still walk—

But any protests die rapidly at the look on Cole’s face. And at least this way, Jay thinks sullenly, he can fixedly ignore Kai.

Then again, Kai’s got a killer glare, and Jay’s always been garbage at ignoring people when his feelings are hurt.

* * * * * * * *

Despite the fuss everyone makes, Jay’s arm really isn’t that bad. They hook him up with some pretty sweet meds so he remembers zero of the actual arm-fixing, and he wakes up just in time to complain about being held in the hospital for ‘observation’ or whatever.

“It’s to make sure there’s no infection, or that you don’t rip your stitches out,” Nya tells him pointedly. Jay cringes under the look she gives him at that last part. Geez. You get kicked in the stitches one time after sneaking out early and suddenly no one’s got any faith in you. Typical.

“Why couldn’t we have just gone to medbay,” Jay grumbles. “Pixal gives way better stitches than this, anyways.”

“Gun wounds get hospitals,” Nya reminds him. “And it’s not fair to put that kind of pressure on Pix when we can avoid it.”

“It wasn’t that bad.”

Nya glares at him. “It most certainly was that bad.”

“Oh, so when you get your arm crushed by a car, it’s fine,” Jay glares back. “But when I get a tiny little bullet nick, it’s that bad.”

Nya rolls her eyes, ignoring him. “Just think of it this way,” she says. “Now you have a little more time before Lloyd starts weeping apologies all over you.”

“Aw, no,” Jay groans, leaning back in the hospital bed. “Tell me he’s not blaming himself, Nya.”

“I think we had a promise about not lying to each other, or something,” Nya says, sympathetically. She winces. “Pretty sure he made the connection, too.”

Jay frowns. “What connection?”

Nya shifts, her eyes darting from side to side. “The, uh, the whole…Prime Empire, thing.”

Jay stares at her for a beat, trying to reconcile his blatant shock with the roiling nausea at the mention in his stomach. Nya looking at him all kind and sympathetically isn’t helping, either, because she might have made it down to the final two, but she was never all alone, and the reminder that she’d have been fine if Jay hadn’t gotten her killed twice is—

Bad. Real bad, not good, zero out of ten stars. Maybe he can take a bullet for Nya, next, and that’ll — that’ll help things, maybe. Equivalent exchange? Restitution? Some kind of fancy word that means Jay swears he’s gonna make it up.

In the meantime, he smothers the rising sickness in his throat and sinks lower into the bed, sulking. “It’s too easy to recognize trauma in this team.”

“I hear you,” Nya sighs, wearily. She nudges his shoulder, rising from her seat near the bed. “Speaking of. Someone’s got something they want to say to you.”

It takes Jay a second, but his eyes widen as Nya heads for the door. “Wait, wait wait wait, don’t you dare—”

“Love you,” Nya says cheekily, before taking her merry leave of the room. There’s a brief scuffle from outside, and the sound of Kai yelping, before Nya shoves him through the door, slamming it shut behind him with a damning click.

For a second, Jay’s tempted to hit the ‘call nurse’ button as hard as he can, in some desperate attempt to escape. Then he gets a good look at Kai, who’s turned a pale, queasy color that frankly looks awful on him, which is saying a lot ‘cause there isn’t much that doesn’t look good on Kai, but the expression he has on now—

Aw, man, now Jay’s feeling guilty and it isn’t even his fault. Stupid moral conscience center, he curses himself.

“So, uh…” he begins, because far be it from him to let this kind of awkward silence stretch on any longer. “Nice, ah, weather we’re having?”

Kai doesn’t respond, staring fixedly at the floor, and Jay sizes up the ‘call nurse’ button again. Just for the both of their sakes, of course.

But then Kai takes a deep breath, blows it out, and rocks back on his heels, fiddling with his hands. “I, um. I’m sorry.”

Jay’s jaw drops open. Which is probably an overdramatic move, all things considered, but unless he’s suddenly lost the ability to understand words, Kai just apologized to him.

Kai apologized. To him.

It’s not that Kai apologizing is some great big deal — Kai might have his pride, but he’s also an intuitive and good-hearted person who knows when he’s messed up. But to him?

Jay knows how he and Kai work. Kai knows how he and Jay work, and he’s breaking the rules. Because Kai and Jay don’t apologize to each other. Unless it’s some awkward expression of sympathy, they’ve never needed to. They fight dirty, aim for each other’s kneecaps, swear eternal vengeance and hatred at each other before storming off, then an hour later Jay’s bounding into Kai’s room to show him dumb meme videos and neither of them even remember what they were fighting about.

Acknowledging said fight with something as gushy as apologizing is not only useless since they both forget what they’re apologizing for anyways, but also useless because it’ll take too much time, and counterproductive on top, because it’ll most likely end in another fight about who apologized better. So for Kai to walk in and say sorry—

“Oh no, who did you kill?” Jay says, paling.

Kai spears him with a look, but it’s so pathetically watered-down and miserable that Jay forgets to glare back.

“Sorry, sorry,” Jay mutters. “I just—”

“No, no, I’m the one who’s sorry,” Kai interrupts. He hesitates, then sighs. “But that’s fair. I — I was unfair. To you, back there. Like, really unfair, in a bad way, ‘cause you were shot and I know you meant well, but you—”

Kai gestures wildly with his hands, his stream of words cutting off. Jay is left to stare open-mouthed at him again. Babbling like this is Jay’s thing. Kai is breaking all the rules today, huh.

“I just…” Kai trails off, ducking his head. “I don’t like watching you guys get hurt. I don’t — I don’t like watching you get hurt. And I get scared, but it comes out angry, and then I make a mess of things so I’m — sorry. Really sorry, for biting your head off.”

He exhales, a little shaky, fingers balled up in tight fists as his head hangs low, refusing to meet Jay’s eyes. Something softens in Jay’s chest, like gooey melting butter or something else equally pathetic. But it’s rare that Kai vocalizes this stuff, despite the fact that Jay knows he cares, and it’s nice to hear it, so he figures he’s entitled to all the butter he wants.

Jay’s own gaze falters, and the something starts to twist. He bites his lip, tugging half-heartedly at the bandages around his arm.

“Well,” he pauses, thinking of the way his brain had shifted to autopilot when he’d watched Lloyd falter, the razor-sharp shard of terror that always splinters through him when any of their teammates come too close to the awful images of death left in his head. He swallows. “I guess I don’t really have any room to talk,” he murmurs. “Be pretty dumb if I blamed you for that.”

He’s preparing to sink back into his own well of self-pity and loathing, resigned to spending the next few hours until they check him out of the hospital replaying bad memories in his head, when Kai’s next to him all of the sudden, shoving him over on the hospital bed.

“Hey, hey, what’s the big idea—”

“Move, c’mon. You don’t need that much room, you’re a stick,” Kai grumbles, before grinning brightly in success as Jay makes him space. The contrast in expression is enough to startle Jay into silence, and Kai takes advantage. “I know that look. But you already got shot, so you gotta cheer up now.”

“So you’re forcing me into cheerfulness by stealing my hospital bed,” Jay scowls, but the sting is lost in the sudden surge of affection as Kai elbows his way on the bed with him, a steady warmth by his side.

“I’m gifting you my presence, you should be celebrating,” Kai huffs, as he pulls his phone out. “Now stop looking so sad and watch this video I got of a bunch’a geese chasing Zane at the park the other day.”

“You’re such a jerk,” Jay says, but he’s already snickering as he leans his head against Kai’s shoulder to get a better look.

He’s forgotten to tell Kai he forgives him, but like most things between them — Jay doesn’t really need to say it out loud.

#answered #ninjago #my fic #kai smith #jay walker #tumblr pls format right for once #Anonymous

[istanleyff7]

TOTP, Episode Aerith, Scenes 22-27

Final Fantasy VII Remake: Traces of Two Pasts Episode 2: Aerith Scenes 22-27 A Light Novel by Kazushige Nojima Translated by Stanley (@istanleyff7 on twitter) Scene 22

After Meguro and his children had left, Elmyra went out on her own. When she returned home after an hour or so, she updated what had happened while she was out. First, she went to the Sector 5 House to apologise for failing to watch over Marcellus and announced that Rona's real name was Aerith and that she would be keeping the alias. But Elmyra hopes they continue to have good relations with her and requests them not to talk about Aerith's name outside of the House.

"As much as possible, I wouldn't want to lie to them. I didn't tell the teachers our reasons, but they understood where I'm coming from. Moreover, Jean is an imaginative and clever boy. I'm sure he'll be able to keep the children in check. I've also gone on to explain the situation to my acquaintances living across the alley."

"Okay."

"Well, I've told them not to talk about it to anyone else, but I can't say just by doing that is enough. I've discussed with Butch, and he mentioned that the members from the third in charge would come over to the house and look after us. That's rather reassuring, isn't it?"

↞↠

Elmyra's plan may or may not have worked. The time had passed peacefully. Aerith became accustomed to being Aerith at home and being Rona while outside, and she was getting used to living in the slums. She was also used to having one of the third in charge and his subordinate in the house. Meguro came to visit a few times a month but never brought his children. Butch retired because of old age, and Carlo filled up the vacancy as a third in charge. February came, and Carlo planned a birthday party for Aerith’s 8th birthday, where the members would bring over their families to gather at the Gainsborough house and celebrate Aerith's birthday. When Aerith heard the plan, she was so delighted that she hugged Carlo. It was also decided that the children from the Sector 5 House were to be invited. Aerith did not want Marcellus and Rona to be invited, but Carlo did not allow her request. 

However, the party did not happen. The day before Aerith's birthday, Carlo brought his subordinates over to begin decorating the house for the party. Then Rodin appeared in a panic and reported that Meguro had a heart attack and collapsed. His life was also in danger. The actual head of the organisation had collapsed. For everyone involved, this was more important than a birthday party. Carlo flatly declared that the party was postponed. Aerith was stunned by this but was comforted that it was postponed instead of cancelled. However, the thought of the party being postponed on an ordinary day did not excite Aerith. The excitement and thrill had faded. While the adults were in disorder, Aerith shut herself in her room and cried. For one moment, Aerith's anger welled up towards Meguro for collapsing, and the next moment, she was tormented by guilt.

On the early morning of Aerith's birthday, Elmyra went out to visit Meguro. Someone from the House came over to invite her to play, but she ignored him. Elmyra came back home in the evening. 

"Meguro is fine. His condition is no longer life-threatening."

"I'm glad he's fine."

"If something were to happen to him, he'd ask me to take in his kids."

"What!?"

"It's an absurd request, isn't it? Shall we pray for Meguro's complete recovery from the bottom of our hearts?" 

Elmyra laughed, and Aerith could not help but laugh along with her.

"You finally laughed! Why don't we go somewhere more lively in the evening? Let's have something nice to eat."

"Okay, let's eat."

"We will. Actually, I've also hired a bodyguard. He should be here any moment."

"Who is he?"

Just then, the doorbell rang. A person's figure could be seen standing outside through the window of the door.

"Coming!" 

Aerith opened the door with great vigour. It was an unfamiliar face, but she recognised his suit. She had an encounter with Professor Hojo one day, was not there a man in a full black suit standing behind him? During the one time she had seen President Shinra, there was also a man in a full black suit standing in the corner of the room. The Shinra Company came at last.

"Aerith, so you're here after all. Everyone has been worrying about you," The man in the suit said in a friendly manner.

"No... Go away!"

Aerith backed away from the door and hid behind Elmyra. The man did not care, and he walked in on his own accord. Elmyra stopped him, but the man ignored her and continued talking.

"Aerith... You know you're not just any little girl. You're a descendant of the Ancients."

"Who the heck are you? This is my house. Don't you think what you're doing is rude?"

"My apologies. I'm a representative from the Shinra Company."

"You're surprisingly young. Are you a newcomer? You forgot to mention your name. Did you think you could scare me off by saying Shinra?"

The man lost the composure in his eyes.

"It's Tseng. I'm Tseng from Shinra Company's Investigation Sector of the General Affairs Department."

"And, what's your business here?"

"I'm here today to talk to Aerith."

"I don't want to talk. I don't want to!"

"You mentioned something about the Ancients. What the heck is that? You sure it isn't someone else?" Elmyra stood forward and said to him.

"They were the original stewards of the planet whose boundless knowledge and wisdom shall guide us to the Promised Land. Some believe the promised land to be a myth. Others, an allegory of sorts. But we take the words of the scriptures at face value and believe it to be quite real. Which is why Shinra would like very much for Aerith to help us—"

Aerith couldn't bear the thought of being separated from this house. She never wanted to go back to Shinra Building.

"You're wrong! I'm not an Ancient!"

"But Aerith... Even when you're all alone, don't you hear voices whispering secrets?"

"No, never!"

Aerith ran upstairs to escape. She crawled into bed and pulled the blanket over her. It was not cold, but her whole body was shivering.

She felt this one year would disappear like a dream. She shut her eyes tightly, trying to chase away the fear she has never felt before. All that came to her mind were negative possibilities. Eventually, she imagined Elmyra facing a terrible situation. What should she do? But she was afraid to go downstairs to see what's going on. No, what should she do if he comes upstairs?

"We came to an agreement," Aerith heard Elmyra's voice close by. 

Aerith looked up from my blanket and noticed there was no one else in the house. There was sympathy in Elmyra's eyes.

"You’ve been through lots of scary things, haven't you? Don't worry. He already left."

Elmyra sat down on the bed and held Aerith close to her.

"You're an Ancient?" 

That was so Elmyra, with a straightforward question.

"I'm actually called a 'Cetra'. My mother was a Cetra, and I'm only a half-Cetra."

Elmyra nodded again and again.

"That man...  from what Tseng mentioned, it seems that Shinra regretted not obtaining the information they wanted most because of the horrible things they did to your mother, Ifalna. It was regarding the Promised Land.  So it seems that they decided not to ask you for any other information except about the Promised Land."

It was not that she did not know about the Promised Land. She had heard of such a place from Ifalna. But what kind of place is it? Where is that? She did not know the information that Shinra wanted.

"I don't know. I don't know anything about that."

"That's what Tseng said. But he also mentioned things like, even if you don't know about it now, the day you may know it may come."

"I don't want to go anywhere. I like Elmyra, and I want to stay here."

"That's very nice of you to say, and I feel the same way too. That's why I suggested this to him. You'll live with me every day, and I'll observe you, and if I seem to see any sign from you, I will inform Shinra. Until then, Shinra is to absolutely not come near you. Tseng contacted his superior, and we had an agreement right away. I think he's a pretty good kid."

"So, can I still live here?"

"That's right. And too bad for Tseng, I'll probably only be observing my daughter's behaviour."

Elmyra let out a laugh.

Scene 23

"When Shinra found out about me, I no longer had a reason to hide my name. So I could be Aerith, not only in the house but also outside it. For a while, it was really peaceful. The Turks didn't really come, and Elmyra's business was going well. Of course, it wasn't all fun and games. There were times when I felt terrible and wanted to cry. But that's because we were living a normal life."

"That's nice," Tifa said empathetically.

"But then, another incident occurred. And it's because of Marcellus."

"Oh..."

Scene 24

Carlo came to visit. 

"Hey Aerith, are you well? Here's a gift for you."

He presented her with a bundle of sweets. It was a little childish for a ten-year-old girl. Elmyra thought that sweets were detrimental to the development of healthy teeth and made a glum face.

"I've got some business to attend to with Elmyra. May you take this and head upstairs?"

"Okay~"

This was a common occurrence when one of the in-charge came over. Elmyra, who used to tell her everything, was becoming more like a mother and distinguished what her daughter should and should not hear.  After entering her room on the second floor, she slammed her door shut with all her might. There was a loud bang. And immediately after, she quietly opened the door. She opened the door just enough for her body to slip through, and she concealed the sound of her footsteps and crept close to the stairs. The house was old, and the floor would creak when stepped on, but she already knew the safety zones where no noise would be made.

"It’s bad. It’s really bad."

Carlo could be heard saying that out loud.

"How much do you know about Meguro's illness?"

"His heart is fine, right?"

"Well, yeah. But the rest isn't so good. He has three diseases I can't even remember the name of. Since Rona was born, he has gained weight at an alarming rate, hasn't he? After his wife passed away, his life was a mess. He ate all kinds of goo and slop."

"I also tried to warn him, but I didn't know if I should have been harder on him."

"Well, he will either ignore you or flip you out. I wonder what he would do, though. And besides, Meguro also decided to move to the plate to facilitate his medical treatment. He's willing to manage the business from the plate, and it seems that he intends to bring a third in charge along with him to be his liaison officer. So what does that mean? From the way we see it, that guy is practically the second in charge. He didn't consult with you about such an important matter, did he? You're the same rank as him. He’s taking you lightly, isn’t he?"

"What a bother. I'm just only a representative, and I've been leaving everything up to Meguro up till now. I don't wish to get involved in all of this politics."

"You live with this job. How can you not be involved?"

Aerith could not hear Elmyra's voice, but she probably would let out a big sigh.

"Anyways, I didn't come over today to talk about the organisation. It's about Marcellus. That cocky shitty brat ran away from home. I only know this much but Meguro had ordered all the in-charge to search for him. He told me to pass it onto you, and so I did.

"Marcellus... I haven't seen him for two or three years. He's thirteen or fourteen now, isn't he?"

"Yeah. I ran away from my shitty home when I was twelve. I thought he merely just caused a big uproar by running away from home, but..."

"Did something happen?"

"Meguro's condition was leaked out to the public, and there seem to be people taking advantage of the situation. Such as Corneo from Sector 6, all the way to the Manson brothers. Meguro thinks that these people may have kidnapped Marcellus. What do you think?"

"If it was kidnapping, the kidnappers probably would say something?"

"Not yet, it seems. It's been three days since Marcellus disappeared. He most likely just probably ran away from home. But the worst case would be what I had just mentioned."

"Okay. I'll keep this in mind. Even so, I live on the wholesome side of the slums. I don't think I will be of much help though."

"We'll be the ones to find Marcellus. You keep Aerith safe. If Marcellus is kidnapped, there is a chance that Aerith will be kidnapped too. Regardless of what we regard you as, from the outside, you're the second in charge, Elmyra. Aerith is her daughter. If I had to use her as a bargaining chip, I'd choose her too. You'd rather give up your business for Aerith, wouldn't you?"

Aerith was astonished and took a step back. She stepped out of the safety zone, and the floor creaked.

"Aerith, are you there?" Elmyra called out sharply, "Come down here."

She had been caught, so it cannot be helped.

"Did you hear everything?" Carlo asked her the moment she got off the stairs. 

She had no choice but to admit it.

"Don't worry. Nothing will happen to you."

There was nervousness in Elmyra's voice when she said that.

"However, I think it's better if we take precautions. It's probably better to head out from here. There is someone in Kalm whom Gabriel used to take care of a long time ago. I think we can turn to him for help."

"If it's possible, that's probably better."

This saddened Aerith. She decided to raise Aerith on her own, and now Elmyra had to leave this house.

"Pack up your things tonight. I'll arrange for a car and a driver to Kalm. No, I'll drive. It's been a while since I drove, but I think I’ll manage. I'll pick you up before dawn tomorrow. You'll both have to walk to the gate, so wear comfortable clothes to move about in.

The conversation went on and on.

"Aerith, don't look like that... I’ll come pick you both up as soon as we solve this problem."

Carlo's chest tightened as Elmyra held Aerith's shoulders and pulled her close for an embrace.

↞↠

It was nighttime. Elmyra and Aerith stuffed their belongings into a small briefcase Elmyra and Clay used for their picnics and then went to bed. Aerith was so nervous she could hardly sleep. She wondered what Marcellus was doing. She had not thought about Marcellus in a long time. His voice suddenly came to her mind, as well as his malicious manner of speaking, the lemonade that he spilt on the table and the dirt that stained his pure white suit. However, she does not remember his face. She wondered what kind of face he had. His mouth leaked out blood. His nose. And then his eyes.

"Ahhh, that was it."

The moment she remembered how Marcellus looked, she felt goosebumps running down her body. Behind the shut curtains of the window, there came a flash of light. 

"What's that?..."

She got out of bed and opened the curtains slightly. She could see the garden. In the garden, she saw Marcellus, around the area where Jean had pinned him down that day.

"What?"

The next moment, Aerith was in the garden. Marcellus was lying on his feet, covered in blood.

"No!"

"Ugh..."

Marcellus moved his hand and felt the toes of Aerith's bare feet. She felt goosebumps throughout her body again. The scenery surrounding them changed in a split second.

"Ehh!?"

An unfamiliar landscape was spreading across. Walls. Wired fence. When she turned around, she saw Midgar, and it seems that beyond the wall was the wilderness.

"Help... me..."

A faint glow radiated from Marcellus' body. That was the form of life, and she felt as if she had known it all along. Now, at this moment, Marcellus was close to dying. 

"Where? Where is this?"

"Sector 6... gate..."

"Ehh? I don't know where we are, but wait for me!"

Aerith started to run in the opposite direction of the wall — towards what appears to be the slums. She intended to call for someone. However, the landscape disappeared. When she turned back, she could not even see Marcellus. She ｗas within a lukewarm, white blur, and she could not see anything anymore. Her body felt itchy, and she could feel the blood rushing through her body. It was an unpleasant sensation.

"No! No! Help me! Elmyra!"

She could hear her own voice in the distance, and it gradually became louder. And the scenery returned. Her eyes seemed to remember their function. She was in her room, somewhere she was familiar, and was lying by the window. She hurriedly got up and looked out of the window. It was still dark, but she knew that dawn was approaching. She noticed someone in the corridor. The door then opened, and Elmyra peered in.

"Ahh, you're awake. Carlo will be here any moment now, so hurry up and get ready."

"Marcellus, he's at the Sector Six gate. He has injuries and is covered in blood. He looks like he's in a lot of pain."

Elmyra's stare made her feel uneasy, but Aerith did not look away.

"Let's tell Carlo about this."

Soon after, Carlo came over and called for them. He urged them to leave in a hurry, but Elmyra held him back. 

"It seems that Marcellus is near the Sector Six gate, and he's injured. He appears to be in critical condition, so can you quickly go and save him?"

Carlo furrowed his eyebrows.

"Where did you get that information from?"

"Don't ask me anything, please. I owe you one."

Carlo first looked at Elmyra and then looked at Aerith's face. After that, he departed from the house.

Scene 25

"And then, Carlo found Marcellus collapsed near the Sector Six gate. He was in a critical condition, but I'm glad he somehow managed to survive."

"That's strange... Sorry, I'm repeating myself, but that's strange."

"I don't think it was just my powers, but I think the land had an influence too. It's because that area around my house was different from others."

"Such as the flowers being able to bloom?"

"Yup. I think that's the same way my mother, Ifalna, was able to come over to my room. But I can't even aim to try and do that. It's because I'm not a pure-blooded Cetra, and more importantly, I don't have the same state of mind as when I was a child. I think that's a huge factor. I can no longer tame that pure-like feeling similar to when I was a child. I wondered if I became insensitive once I grew up."

"Ahhh what a waste that you can’t have it anymore."

"Yea. Especially after starting this journey."

The two fell into silence. The definition of happiness changes from day to day.

"Oh," Tifa raised her voice.

"Did Marcellus run away from home after all?”

"Yup. It was just as Carlo thought. Marcellus didn't want to move to the plate, so he ran away. While he was aimlessly wandering around Wall Market, he got tangled up with Corneo's thugs, ran away, got lost, and lastly, he was attacked by a monster."

"Hey. Moreover, Carlo did a splendid job, didn't he?"

"Yeah, he did. He's a different person from the first time I saw him. He's like a dependable uncle. I used to think that he was an uncle, but clearly, he's like a brother."

"So, what’s he doing?"

Scene 26

Marcellus was brought under protection. However, the fact that the Corneo’s were involved, albeit they only had little influence, could not be overlooked. They cannot afford to stop being vigilant. The two young men under Carlo's care, Banquo and Zoot, were sent to the Gainsborough house to lodge for a while. They were still in their late teens. As they ate Elmyna's home-cooked food with relish, they seemed like children, and it felt that they could not be relied upon if a malicious enemy came over. Carlo, who paid a visit every other day, was seen to be very reliable compared to Banquo and Zoot.

One day, Carlo bothered Elmyra in an unusual way. He insisted that he wanted to eat deep-fried bread with meatballs. Elmyra refused, saying she did not have the ingredients. But Carlo was persistent, and in the end, Elmyra gave in. With Banquo and Zoot as bodyguards, they went out shopping.

"Hey, Aerith."

As soon as the both of them were alone, Carlo called out to her. He was very gentle in his voice.

"You know about how Elmyra told me where Marcellus was? How did Elmyra know about it?"

"Well, I don't know," Aerith responded bluntly.

She intended to pretend that she was calm, but she wasn't confident.

"I see. To tell you the truth, my colleagues suspect that someone was involved in the kidnapping. And in reality, it was Corneos' thugs who beat Marcellus up."

"Yup."

"And they believe Elmyra had something to do with it. Because she knew where he was, that's why she's a suspect and that her purpose was to warn the ones in command. Elmyra would be ready to make Meguro obey her. Something like that. Do you understand?" 

"They suspect Elmyra?"

"That's the case. And they suspect me too. You see, ever since Clay passed away, I've been coming here frequently. Now that they suspect that we’re a couple... Ah, sorry, excuse me... that both of us are planning to sell the organisation away and stuff like that. To be direct with you, we aren't in a good position. And as a matter of fact, Meguro suspects us too."

"What should we do?"

She thought of the time when Meguro was angry. It sent chills down her spine.

"I need to know why Elmyra knows where Marcellus was, and if it's a reason that everyone can understand, we can be justified. It's hard to clear our name once we're under suspicion, but if I know the truth, at least, I will feel different about it."

Carlo looked at her with downcast eyes.

"You know, Aerith. Elmyra is in a terrible situation. That's why Aerith. If you know anything, please tell me."

She knew what Carlo was saying very well. No, she understood the meaning of his expression. Carlo would not continue supporting them anymore if she did not say anything.

"About that."

Aerith's voice was trembling. In truth, Elmyra had told her not to reveal it at any cost.

"She heard it from me. I saw Marcellus in a dream. It actually wasn't a dream. It was something else. But that's the kind of feeling that I can only describe as a dream. In it, I met Marcellus, and he told me where he was."

Carlo nodded his head several times as he listened.

"You don't have to believe me, but it's the truth."

"I see. Aerith, does this happen often?"

"It doesn't happen often, but... It's not the first time."

"I see. That's why Elmyra believed you. Is that so?"

Carlo lifted his head and gave a sweet smile as he patted Aerith's head.

"Aerith, you really like Elmyra, don't you?"

She did not know what Carlo was thinking. She was not sure if he'll stay on their side or not. Or had she let him down?

"Carlo. What's going to happen? I'm scared."

"I'm scared too."

↞↠

Eventually, Elmyra and the others came back home from shopping. 

"Elmyra," Carlo called out for her, "The situation has changed. I'll have the deep-fried bread some other time."

"What the heck! I took the trouble to head out..." as Elmyra was saying that, it seemed that she noticed the unusual atmosphere in the room. "Did something happen?"

"Remember what I told you about going to Kalm? It turns out that it's probably better for you to go. If you don't wish to leave, then let Aerith go on her own."

"Are the Corneo's coming? Or is it Manson?"

"It's Meguro."

"What?"

"From the moment you knew where Marcellus was, he suspects you have connections to Corneo's. And they think I'm in on it too."

"Who's telling you that?

"Rodin, Marvin, Roger, Bowman, Louis and of course, Meguro himself."

"Isn't that all of them?"

Elmyra closed her eyes. Aerith wondered what she was thinking. Eventually, she opened them and stared at a point on the table. It was a picture of Clay and Gabriel.

Then, she transferred her gaze to Carlo and...

"Where's Meguro at?"

"He's at home. He has postponed the move and has been tirelessly working to solidify his security. Are you going to march into his place?"

"I just want to talk to him. I'm going to let go of the business and give up all my rights to Meguro."

"Woah woah woah woah! Are you serious?"

"I've thought about it several times, but to be honest, because when I thought about my livelihood, I couldn't follow through with the decision. Well, I guess this is the right time, isn't it?"

"Wait a minute. Even if you do that, that's not going to clear your name, isn't it? In fact, they might think that you're leaving us because you're going over to Corneo's. If you're not careful..." Carlo hesitated to say.

"I understand what you want to say, Carlo. But even so, I still have to go. Please take care of Aerith a little for me."

Carlo shrugged his shoulders.

"And Aerith?"

"No," a husky voice came out of Aerith.

Elmyra smiled and touched Aerith on the cheek.

"I may be back late, so go to bed. You can eat with Carlo and the others."

"No!"

Elmyra turned her back on her. Aerith tried to stop her, but Carlo grabbed her by the arm.

"Let go of me! Mummy, don't go!"

However, Elmyra went off. Banquo and Zoot looked at Carlo in disbelief.

"Banquo, Zoot, make us some food. Anything is fine."

"Carlo, I hate you."

Carlo had a sad look on his face. Moreover, he did not want to let go of Aerith's arm.

"Elmyra should clear up about this. We’ll be understood eventually."

↞↠

Aerith didn't have much appetite, so she caved herself in upstairs without touching Banquo's omelette at all. She was so worried about Elmyra that she could not concentrate on anything. She looked out of the window and peeped for signs of life downstairs numerous times. It was nearly midnight when the door opened.

"Elmyra!" Carlo called out in a lively voice.

"Let go of me!"

Aerith ran down the stairs and almost fell over. Carlo was scratching his head as though he was embarrassed, with Banquo and Zoot grinning at him.

"Mummy!"

Elmyra came over and squatted before Aerith's eyes.

"I'm home. You must have been worried."

Aerith could not resist it and gave Elmyra an embrace. Elmyra could not support the weight of her daughter and fell on her bottom.

"You've grown up, haven't you?"

"So, Elmyra. How did it go?" Carlo asked impatiently.

Elmyra helped Aerith to her feet and then took her time to stand up herself and fixed the wrinkles on her clothes.

"Meguro no longer thinks that Marcellus has been kidnapped, much less that you or I had anything to do with it. It didn't even cross his mind once."

"Eh? Is that so?"

"He said that you and I wouldn't go around doing that kind of stuff."

"Damn you, old man. You underestimate me!" Carlo tried to behave like a villain, but he couldn't hide his delight.

"So, what was with the talk that I heard about?"

"Who the heck did you hear that from?"

"Butch. I heard it from Butch. He retired, but he still meets Meguro often, so he knows what's happening inside pretty well."

Elmyra looked at Carlo in silence.

"Butch!? Butch set me up!? That old man!"

Carlo scratched his head off, swore, made his face funny, rubbed his eyes and paced around the room.

"Carlo, calm down. I'm not finished yet."

Carlo stared at Elmyra intensely. His breathing was still heavy.

"I have no idea how Butch was related to this, so let's put this talk behind us. I've brought something for you to keep from Meguro."

After saying that, Elmyra took a small box from her bag and presented it to Carlo.

"What is that..."

Carlo accepted the box and opened its lid. He was lost for words.

"It's Gabriel's ring. President Shinra also has the same ring. It was a token of their friendship. It was supposed to be Clay's, but that wasn't possible. So Meguro held onto it."

"In order words, that's..."

"It's to mark the first in charge, the head of the Gainsborough household. And this too."

Elmyra held out an envelope.

"Inside holds the title deed, a memo regarding Shinra's liaison officer to us, and the others are documents which you'll need for the job. It also has the blood-sealed certificates of the current in-charge of the household. I just did my blood-seal earlier too."

Elmyra then showed him the ring finger of her left hand. There was blood on the plaster.

"Big brother Carlo! Doesn't that mean you're the head of the household!?" Banquo excitedly exclaimed.

Elmyra looked at Carlo and gave him a big nod.

"Meguro has been sick and turned completely weak. He called upon all the other heads, and it looks like that was to prepare for his retirement. He intended to talk to you for the last time."

Carlo mumbled something in his mouth and went on to take the envelope. But then quickly withdrew his hand. 

"I'm scared. It's too sudden. What should I do?" ― Carlo was worrying about all these as his men, Elmyra and Aerith, observed him.

"You're amazing, Carlo," said Zoot, sniffing and rubbing his eyes.

It took Carlo three minutes to make up his mind. He took the envelope from Elmyra's hand, who had been patiently holding it, and put it in his black bag, which he always carries with him. He then took his gun from the bag and placed it on the table. A heavy thud sounded in the room.

 "I won't be coming here anymore, so I can't protect you both. You both have to do it yourselves."

"You won't be coming back?"

Aerith could not help but ask. Everything was settled, and things seemed to be going well, but Aerith could not wrap her head around why.

"I won't be."

Carlo suddenly made a weird looking face and looked as though he was on the verge of crying.

"If I keep coming and going to visit, won't nothing change? If members of other organisations know about this, you both will definitely become their target. It's not about the business anymore. Aerith, be a good girl, okay? Elmyra, continue being the great woman that you are."

After quickly saying those words, he left the house as though he was escaping. Banquo and Zoot hurriedly followed behind him. Right after that, the door opened once more, and Carlo came back alone. Once inside, he got close to Elmyra, and without looking aside, he embraced her tightly. He let out a deep sigh afterwards, lowered his shoulders and left the house.

He never came back.

↞↠

The days that followed were so peaceful that it was almost anti-climatic. Because nothing anxiety-inducing occurred, Elmyra put her gun in the attic after about half a year, when in the beginning, she would not even let go of her gun no matter where she went. Aerith wondered what Carlo and the others were doing. What happened with the hostile organisations afterwards? She wasn’t given any information. Elmyra probably knew something, but she did not say a word in the house. Elmyra is a workaholic and decided to earn her living by cleaning cafés, hospitals and orphanages in the neighbourhood. Elmyra told Aerith with surprise that she seemed to get a job no matter where she went in the slums. Even though she had enough on hand, she was often introduced to other customers, and there were people everywhere who cared enough to make sure that Elmyra and Aerith did not fall into poverty. Elmyra expectedly thought it was strange and asked them for their reasons, and they told her about the debt of gratitude that they and their families had for Gabriel Gainsborough. When Midgar only had its foundations, the wages paid to the workers were astonishingly measly. And a massive bunch of people who were neither from Shinra nor construction workers had money extracted from them in the form of referral fees, brokerage fees, and administration fees. It was Gabriel who reconfigured the structure and got rid of those who exploited the workers. There was lots of bloodshed, but workers' enemies were exterminated, and a large part of the wages paid by Shinra went to the workers since then. He also negotiated with Shinra and also won the workers an increase in remuneration. Many of them were able to open shops and start businesses because of Gabriel, and these people did not forget to pass on their gratitude to their children.

"I'm grateful for this."

Aerith heard Elmyra saying that numerous times.

↞↠

The children of the Sector 5 House would head out to work once they become thirteen years old. To mimic them, Aerith decided that she also wanted to work. However, Elmyra did not allow her.

"Why can't I?"

"It's not that I want to lock you up in the house, but I'm worried about you. You've been through a lot, haven't you?"

"I know, but for a long time, nothing has happened."

"That's true. But you know what? This is my problem, you know. Even up till now, this happens to me. Whenever I feel happy and secure, something happens. It's always been like that. I wonder if I had that kind of fate."

Elmyra let out a deep breath and shook her head.

"If I do that, I'd be restraining you as Shinra did. Alright, you may work. But, only around the neighbourhood, please."

"Thank you, Mummy."

Her mother's frank confession struck a chord in her heart. At the same time, she wondered about the possibility that she was one of the problems that she's holding onto.

Scene 27

"And my mother's fears were right on the mark."

"Ehhh?"

Aerith tiredly nodded to the surprised Tifa.

↞↠ You’re on page 119/142 of Aerith’s segment of the Light Novel Next Scenes: Scenes 28-35 Previous Scenes: Scenes 15-21 Back to Content Page (click/tap here) follow @istanleyff7​ on twitter for updates support the TOTP translation project financially here (click/tap here)

#ff7 ff7r ffvii ffviir ff7rln ffviirln aerith

[everythingsinred]

Let's Talk About NatsuMikan: The Anime (pt. 1)

I could go on and on about these two and I think I will, just because I don’t often see people talk about the analysis behind them. The meta I have seen about them has included a perspective that equaled the anime and the manga and I don’t think that’s an accurate way of viewing their relationship.

The anime is a different species than the manga, something that frequently happens during the adaptation from page to screen. Since they’re so different, I’ll analyze them separately.

There's going to be many parts to this so I'll keep a table of contents right here so people can more easily navigate (though you can also read through the "let's talk about natsumikan: the anime" tag on my blog):

Anime Analysis

Part 1: Exposition & Episode 7

Part 2: Episodes 8, 9, 10, & 11

Part 3: Episodes 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, & 17

Part 4: Episodes 18 & 19

Part 5: Episodes 20, 21, & 22

Part 6: Episodes 23, 24, 25, & 26 & Conclusion

The anime makes changes, as anime adaptations often do. The most outstanding changes are appearance related, as Natsume now has brown eyes instead of red, in addition to other characters who have hue-shifted eyes and hair. But there are also story changes, and I’ll be focusing on the changes that occur, specifically in regards to Natsume and Mikan and their relationship.

For one, their relationship starts evolving much earlier in the anime. I think it’s pretty undeniable that in the anime, Natsume started liking Mikan at the end of the dodgeball game. That scene never happened in the manga, but in the anime, it’s a crucial step in making sure nothing seems too sudden or forced.

The anime is 26 episodes long. If Natsume only starts liking Mikan after she saves him during the Reo Arc, then we’re already halfway through the show when positive feelings between the two appear. On the other hand, the feelings develop more slowly in the manga because there’s more time to properly develop the relationship in a more drawn out way.

My analysis will start with the anime, because it’s shorter and easier to discuss.

Exposition

It’s impossible to say that the anime was completely loyal to the manga. It very frequently couldn’t be, because it needed to fill in time in episodes or give closure early before the manga even addressed it (Natsume’s backstory in the anime, for instance, is vaguely referred to and implies deviation from the manga).

The most obvious difference between the manga and the anime from the get-go is visual. Not only do they have differing art styles (I don’t dislike the anime style but Higuchi Tachibana’s art style is so distinct and unmistakable while the anime’s isn’t so unique), but the setting is also different.

While the manga started in the depth of winter, the anime starts off in summer/fall. It always struck me as odd that while the first page of the manga has Mikan running after Hotaru in full winter-wear, the anime starts off warm and idyllic. You could almost think of that as a general warning for the difference between the anime and the manga. After all, while the anime has a reputation for being a cutesy and upbeat story about friendship and magical powers, the manga is much darker and discusses many morbid and depressing themes that can and WILL fuck you up. Warm vs. cold seems like an accurate difference, though I don’t think that was intentional.

We see way more of the village life in the anime, including Mikan’s efforts to keep the school from closing. This is a welcome change because Mikan’s passion to keep the school open is nothing compared to her friendship with Hotaru, and even after the school is saved, she runs away to see her friend, even if it means she goes to another school. The manga doesn’t imply that Mikan knew already about the school’s fate, and since she is always so preoccupied with Hotaru anyway, we don’t really get the impression that she cares very much. To Anime!Mikan, Hotaru is more important than saving the school, something she was so passionate about she rallied to get signatures. It’s an extra scene to prove just how much Hotaru matters to Mikan, and to show even more how selfless Hotaru was to go to Alice Academy, since she knew how much the school mattered to Mikan.

“Sign my petition to get a Gakuen Alice anime reboot!!!”

My boy Natsume is only introduced properly in the second episode, when we actually see his face and he speaks. His appearance is different from the manga’s too. I’m not sure if this was to appeal to a younger audience or what, but Natsume’s eyes are changed to brown instead of their iconic red, something that was always my biggest peeve about the anime adaptation. His hair is also somewhat purplish instead of entirely grey/black and, although this does bother me a lot less than the eyes, I wonder why they made this change when other characters have black hair. It might have been to differentiate him from Hotaru, another main character with black hair, though I’ve never had issue in the manga telling them apart.

His first interaction with Mikan is a lot more pleasant in the anime than in the manga, although that’s not really saying anything. Mikan’s skirt simply falls off and Natsume draws attention to it, rather than the unpleasant events that took place in the manga. This different event makes it a lot easier to support a relationship between the two of them right off the bat. They are still antagonistic but it’s not as terrible as it is in the manga. This makes it easier to establish romantic feelings earlier on, and might have been changed in order to achieve just that, or possibly also to appeal to a younger audience. Maybe both? Who knows.

“You can’t sit with us!”

With Natsume presented the way he is in the anime, it’s easier to make the claim that he’s simply a good guy who acts the way he does to protect people. And it’s true! He is! But he is also so much more. In the manga, he’s a more complicated character. Although he is a good person, he still requires character development, which is something he does go through, and something I’ll talk about more in his meta analysis later.

Most of the events at the beginning of the anime parallel the events of the manga. Mikan goes to Alice Academy at the same time of year, Natsume shows up with an explosion, Mikan has to go through the Northern Woods, she discovers her powers in her fight with Natsume, etc. Some of the continuation from episode to episode is different than the transitions between chapter to chapter, there’s extra scenes inserted to fill up time, and some of the exposition seems strangely presented (in the anime, Mikan finds out more about the school when she finds Narumi and Iinchou waiting for her at a tea party, which is…. Super weird…), but all in all the information and events are mainly the same. The big differences start with the dodgeball episode.

“Look how happy she is. Makes me wanna barf.”

Episode 7 vs. Chapter 9

I love the dodgeball episode. I feel like for the most part, the anime does deviation from the manga pretty well. With the last arc as an exception, I generally enjoy their changes and additions to the plot. The anime has to be different, has to progress at a different pace, has to introduce topics at different times. They have an episode to fill, and less time to build relationships. Natsume and Mikan are both different characters in the anime but it’s very subtle and has to happen due to the fact that the anime is shorter and seems more designed for younger audiences, in addition to wrapping up before the manga could explore more of the story.

Anyway, let’s talk about the dodgeball episode. AGAIN THIS DOES NOT HAPPEN IN THE MANGA THE SAME WAY so when discussing NatsuMikan as a concept, the anime events cannot be treated the same as the manga events. A lot of people maybe forget that the manga is very different than the anime when it comes to this episode. I see the two media conflated in plenty of fanfics, where seventeen year old NatsuMikan reflect on the dodgeball game from their youth that changed everything, and I get it because the anime version of the dodgeball game is cute! It's shippy! It's fun! But it doesn't happen in the manga the same way.

There's a similar trope with the sakura tree, which I can only remember from the anime, and yet it's such a fundamental aspect of NM fanfic it might as well have played a vital role in both anime and manga. Nothing wrong with any of this, of course. I'm just making it clear that my analysis will cover the two media as separate for the sake of a cohesive essay. Separating them in fanfic is far less important.

This look could probably kill someone. I’m surprised Mikan is still alive, TBH.

The chapter’s focus is Mikan starting to feel more at home in Class B, making friends with her once-hostile classmates, but the episode is more preoccupied with Natsume and Mikan’s perspectives on each other. While in the manga, the game ends with a tie and Mikan accidentally hits Hotaru in the face with the ball, the anime draws out the game to fill an episode and to introduce an evolution in the way Natsume sees Mikan. The first part of the anime episode is Mikan introducing her friends to her new senpai, Tsubasa. After she invites her friends, we see Natsume glowering at her and promptly ditching the next class, saying to Ruka that he can’t stand being in the same class as her. This addition to the plot already foreshadows that their relationship will change in some way by the end of the episode.

Tsubasa tells a frustrated Mikan that if she wants Natsume to be less unpleasant, he’d need to release some of his toxic energy. Thus, the sporty Mikan introduces the concept of dodgeball to the unwelcoming class. When they finally agree, Natsume gives one condition: that they play with the notorious Alice Ball, which is powered by the thrower’s alice (a detail absent from the manga). This Alice Ball is particularly terrifying with the threat of Natsume’s dangerous fire alice. Mikan also needs to get more people on her team, another aspect absent from the manga. While in the manga, Mikan only had her few friends on her team (including a wandering Ruka) and this ended up playing to her advantage, the anime has a humorous plot of Mikan tracking players down for her team, including a fake mustache she makes with her pigtails (she’s so cute, I love her), paying Hotaru to be on her team, and blackmailing Ruka to participate. This was mainly to fill time, but it makes the dodgeball game more important as well.

In the manga, we don’t see how the game ends, just that the teams tied and that everyone in class is having fun and bonding. In the anime, more emphasis is put on the “Mikan vs. Natsume” aspect, so a tie like the manga’s would be anticlimactic. Thus, the anime concludes the dodgeball game with Mikan and Natsume being the only kids left on the court, and Natsume not using his alice when he throws the Alice Ball. Even Hotaru leaving the game is something she does out of boredom instead of injury, further separating the other characters from the plot. It’s about Natsume and Mikan, and everyone else is mostly a side character. (Though Ruka also plays a vital role to this episode AND chapter, and it’s at this point that I think he started developing real feelings for Mikan as well. So when it comes to the anime, he and Natsume fall for Mikan around the same time, but in the manga, Ruka likes her first and the “he liked her first” argument for Natsume vanishes, though he never had that “advantage” to begin with.)

“Thank you!”

Natsume wins (something that shocked me at twelve years old) and is ready to walk away with his handy “tch” and all but Mikan thanks him for not using his alice and he goes off on her, demanding to know why she’s still smiling despite her loss. She says she’s happy that he had fun and was involved with the rest of class for once, and that in a way that means she wins. For Anime!Natsumikan, this is it. This is the turning point. “I just wanted you to be happy and have fun,” is what Mikan might as well be saying. “Really, this was all for you!” It’s sweet and it’s thoughtful and I don’t think Natsume ever imagined he’d be on the receiving end of her kindness, especially after all their beef. Manga!Mikan would probably not say these things to him, even if she meant them, for the sole reason that Mikan is stubborn and holds onto her pride, especially when it comes to her early relationship with Natsume, but Anime!Mikan is much more forgiving and much more willing to extend an olive branch, like in the dance episode. In any case, Natsume starts falling right then, and it’s obvious too, because he is pissed, and even more angry because he’s not even mad at her. He’s angry with himself for his change of opinion. This is the girl he was fully content to hate forever and yet here he was, starting to like her. Not ideal.

This scene, something so crucial to the development of Anime!Natsumikan, is completely absent from the manga. In the manga, Natsume still dislikes her by the end of the game although he does have fun.

He's not angry, just disappointed. In himself.

I’m not going to say one is better when it comes to starting up NatsuMikan because they’re very different creatures and I actually thoroughly enjoy both.

Anyway, the NatsuMikan after episode 7 is almost the same as in the manga, but the events carry a different weight since we know Natsume likes Mikan now (even if he would never admit it).

Summary

I hope this first part was interesting, and that it introduced the idea of Anime!NatsuMikan as being a little different from the manga's version. Yes, it is more or less the same story, but with so many thematic and plot changes, they take a different form as well, in a perhaps more subtle way, kind of like a slightly canon divergent fanfic. Fanfic where Natsume starts liking Mikan a bit earlier on in the story.

Next Part ->

#gakuen alice #alice academy #natsumikan #hyuuga natsume #natsume hyuuga #sakura mikan #mikan sakura #meta #my meta #ga #meta analysis #mine #ga meta #ga meta: anime nm #let's talk about natsumikan: anime #im trying to create a system from one post so let's see how it goes #ive never posted media analysis like this but im very excited to bc ive always wanted to analyze these kids <3 #unfortunately due to tumblrs image post limit of 10 i had to split this into MANY parts #im a visual person and i know others are too #if these images are not sufficient then i would rec maybe rewatching the eps after reading or maybe just skipping through the eps #u might some find some changes and themes of note as well to add and that would be super fun! #ga meta: nm #let's talk about natsumikan