#fic: unsustainable

[teejaystumbles]

Well, since the idea of it is what got me to go watch Hannibal...Do tell about Unsustainable (Dreamling Hannibal AU)!!! :D

(I think you probably know all there is to know already 😅 because sadly I didn't work on it one bit since its inception... I know, I'm sorry. The Hannibal mood is a hard one to achieve and stay in for long enough. But I still love it and hope I'll write more for it someday. I think it can only profit from me gaining more writing experience in the meantime!)

Unsustainable is a Dreamling AU with the premise that Dream comes out of the fishbowl broken, and with a grudge. Here's a good summary I wrote a long while back:

Hob doesn’t know Dream personally. He got his immortality from Death, he has a standing appointment with her, not Dream. Dream has only watched those meetings but always declined his sister’s invitation to join them and get to know Hob. He has started to watch him and his dreams more closely though after 1689, has sent him appropriate nightmares after 1789, has in fact indulged more and more in watching him. So much, that he is focused on Hob alone as a possible ally after his escape. His imprisonment has made Dream cruel, almost feral, but his exemplary control allows him to hide that dark side rising inside him. He approaches Hob and finds it not hard at all to convince him to help him get revenge after a few meetings. Dream becomes more and more obsessed with Hob, he wants him to be the mongoose under the house when the snakes slither by. He also wants him in every other conceivable way. Hob is not averse, not at all, he’s head over heels for this beautiful brother of his stranger, he has finally found someone who knows him, needs him, can be there forever if he doesn’t chase him away, so he’s careful and kind. He soon realises that Dream does not want him to be kind, though, does in fact seem to revel in it when Hob loses his temper. The things Dream asks him to do are nothing to an ex-soldier and he believes he is giving bad people their just desserts. The weird behaviour of some of them, as if they are dreaming, makes him wonder, though.

It features a lot of dark themes - revenge; murder and violence; Hob being into near-death experiences; Morpheus praising the Corinthian instead of atomising him; mind fuckery and gaslighting-

it's a heavy one and I honestly don't know if I can ever pull it off, it's a bit different from the things I usually write. But I might just be in the mood to explore it again one day :3 until then, have a bit of what I've already written (I've forgotten if I've already shared it, sorry):

The King of Dreams! What a wonder! Hob loves this. "Pleasure to meet you, Morpheus. Your majesty. What do you prefer? But I warn you, I am not a fan of monarchy and a peasant at heart. So forgive me if I, ah, behave like a boor." He winks cheekily at the other and sees his nostrils flare in irritation. He does not seem angry, though. He looks... curious. "Morpheus is fine. I will not stand on ceremony with one I...would like to call... friend. Hob Gadling." He leans back in his chair and tilts his head back a fraction, looking at Hob down his perfect long nose. He gives a miniscule smirk and adds: “I also believe you to be perfectly capable of quite a number of things. Including courtly manners. Do not sell yourself short… Sir Robert Gadlen.” Hob sucks in a breath and twitches his fingers restlessly. He can barely refrain from jiggling his leg, so thrilled is he. This man, this…being, knows him! Knows him like Death knows him! He grins and leans back to hide his twitching fingers under the table and grip his trouser leg instead. “So tell me, brother of Death. Why did you decide to meet me? I believe she has invited you to join us a number of times. You never came. Why now?” The red pinpricks of light in the Dreamking’s eyes flicker. His smile grows for a moment before his face becomes deadly serious. “My sister has praised you, Hob Gadling. You are. A good friend to her. She believes you can be a good friend to me as well.” He leans forward and puts his hands on the table between them, palms up like an offering, an invitation, a question. “I am in need. Of a friend. Someone who will help me. Retrieve what was stolen from me.” Morpheus’ blue eyes are boring holes into Hob’s and Hob shivers and blinks. He licks his lips again and then, cautiously, reaches out for one of the bone white hands on the table. The moment he comes into touching distance Morpheus pulls his hands back, eyes wide. He flicks his gaze down and away and then up again to meet Hob’s once more and Hob feels like he has just stuck his hand into the cage of a tiger. Morpheus’ eyes burn with a fiery red light. He swallows and Hob tracks the movement of his Adam's apple, feeling his own throat go dry. He clears it awkwardly and puts his hand palm down on the table. Clearly touching doesn’t seem to be a good idea just yet. “If you are in trouble, I am happy to help”, he says, smiling gently at the other who still looks like a spooked animal ready to attack. At Hob’s quiet words the man blinks and, in a second, regains his composure, his face giving nothing of the obvious discomfort he just felt away. Hob breathes an inconspicuous sigh of relief, feeling like he just avoided getting his throat ripped out by a feral beast.“I would. Very much appreciate that.” Death’s brother says in his deep rumble of a voice and Hob signals the waiter for another pint. “Then let’s talk.”

#dreamling #the sandman fanfiction #asks #fic: unsustainable #dark!Dream #dreamling hannibal au #teejay writes

[thebluestbluewords]

re-reading Mal’s Spellbook

Evie should be meaner, actually??? But also, a) Jay has totally fine handwriting in the spellbook, the font they chose for his writing is way more legible than the one they chose for Mal, and b) is this what the kids are mean about these days???

#me writing a silly little fic where Jay has genuinely awful handwriting due to like. undiagnosed dyslexia. #which is important for his school character arc because he genuinely believes that he’s bad at school #and also relies almost completely on his verbal memory of whatever they went over in class #he can debate just fine!! His logic is sound #he’s just #really slow at reading and his handwriting is genuinely atrocious #he dictates essays to the school laptop they ‘stole’ from the library #the others read assignments out loud for their shared classes #and like. He’s not stupid. He can cover for it. But the thing about being in school full time and covering for a learning disability #is that it’s exhausting and unsustainable #and going to lead to a breakdown eventually #even if that’s just failing a test #and being found out #anyway if anybody is still reading my older fic this is why Jay’s in the offset testing blocks in my ongoing cinderellaverse #he gets extra time on tests because of the dyslexia #he probably also uses a red filter over the page when he reads because that’s the breakthrough that helped my irl dyslexic sister #anyway someday I’ll actually write all of my school thoughts into a real fic

[seiya-starsniper]

.

#reminder to myself that not reading other people's fic in a timely manner does not makes me a bad friend or a bad mutual #my brain is just wired for audio lately when it comes to long things and it's fine #also my idea of a timely manner is a little unsustainable anyways #still...the pile is very large lol #and I've started plenty of fics that are WIPs and then not gone back and continued aoidjaosiasoi #it feels especially bad because I'm writing when I could be reading instead and that's just head demons I know #the guilt is irrational but it's there all the same #seiya talks #seiya rants

[cryptocism]

As someone who currently has their sneakers duct taped together I hope Thad has been maintaining that tape can't imagine superspeed makes it wear out any slower

his shoes are doing about as well as he is tbh

#asks #anonymous #held together with duct tape and a dream #watch as i write an essay about my own fic analyzing the significance of duct tape shoes and how they represent thads emotional state #ive also had shoes that were held together with tape... only briefly but #it truly is unsustainable

[dufrau]

(questions post)

5. What’s a fic idea you’ve had that you will never write?

Me and @hellmo invented an AU where Nancy's hair is a portal to a Narnia like dimension where they worship her hand as a god because she keeps putting things like pencils etc in her hair and they land in Narnia and it all seems very magical to the creatures that live there. I think it turns out Karen had an affair with a faun or something and thats why Nancy is half Narnia? I think at some point Robin falls into Narnia through Nancy's hair somehow??? I will never write it because I don't fully understand it even though I invented a lot of it.

20. What’s a favorite title for a fic you’ve written?

Um. tits out for annie oakley. up until the morning of the day i posted this the doc was titled "The World On Its Side", like a very dreamy serious kind of title. But I was like... I think it needs to be lighter than that? But I couldn't think of a good title. And instead I thought of a terrible title and was just like... well now I have to call it that.

15. How do you come up with titles for your fics/chapters?

Usually songs. Sometimes I just roll the themes around in my brain and think about songs that fit. Sometimes nonsense titles like the one above. Sometimes phrases that just feel right. Somebody on here a couple days ago mentioned pulling a line from the actual fic and I was like 🤯 because I have literally never considered that but I might try it at some point.

29. Share a bit from a fic you’ll never post OR from a scene that was cut from an already posted fic.

Okay so I dont have any ronance that I dont plan on posting at some point eventually? But can I interest you in some terrible unfinished never posted clexa written in an absolutely batshit style that reading back has me like ??? Im just gonna post the whole thing under a cut its like 1200 words feel free to not read it lol but this is apparently how my mind was working circa january 2016

The fact was that it was a big world indeed. A person could get lost in it for as long as she might like room and time to think, and a person did just that.

The more pressing facts, multiple, were as such: that a person had killed, and killed again, and killed, again, and at the end, had killed some more, and had saved some. The math of the thing was almost rudimentary, but the broader truth, clearly or not, a thing to worry on.

And a person did worry, but she did so entirely within the boundaries of her sanity, and her regrets were measurable to everybody but her. 

Losses and gains. Arithmetic.

But more than that, a problem perhaps beyond math, or, more likely, just beyond the math needed knowing for children meant to sweep the same dust their own grandparents had sneezed in, was the matter of things, which was at present: We are here. How do we stay?

Clarke Griffin knew the laws. Physics and morality. But she fell and she fell, and a person does have a limit.

So she left and she walked and she walked until she stopped, in a place that was nowhere. It was not the scene of a great battle (a great victory, however fleeting). It was not the scene of a great loss (betrayal, truly, but again, a victory in kind). 

No.

But she stopped. By water, by land. She stopped, and she took what she would. And she was never hidden, as she knew she would never again be hidden on this Earth. And she never hid, as it was no longer, if it had truly ever been, in her nature. She stayed until she went, and if she feared anything, the scouts didn’t say so.

And Lexa heard it all, as a Commander must, in clumsy words, but true enough to tell the bones of it, which were: Clarke of the Sky People yet lives, her people live also, and though the winter threatens, that is all that weighs upon them now. The mountain is fallen.

The winter was a concern, always, but at present it was perhaps the lightest of weights upon Lexa's shoulders. 

Always, this weighed: To be invincible was a trying thing. To be thought invincible, perhaps, was better or worse. Her people were, as a rule, practical in their admirations, but some thought her nevertheless the stuff of stardust. If none had bested her, and if she was impressive in the ways some might see fit to measure, then she was also lucky, and, often, she was right. The fact, singular, was that she won. Always, she did that. 

A Commander, if she were in the habit of telling anybody anything, might tell them this: She was not at all invincible. Her armor was earned, and it was only ever as true as her reflexes made it. She held no claim to Godhood. She was young and slippery and wiser than many, but she was a girl and she was nothing more. A fool might mark it otherwise, and foolishness might have its uses, but she did not pretend. 

If she was a legend, she didn't believe in it. 

But if a Commander was truly just a girl, she was certainly a mindful girl. The weight of her burdens was familiar, and she carried it carefully, and everything had a place. Her lands, her laws, and, the root of all things, her people. She carried it all, and she was comforted by it. 

She was grounded, until she was not. 

Lexa had carried all people, always. But now, in the wake of a great victory (not hers, surely, but her people's, if only by default), she found her equilibrium all wrong, because she did not carry A Person, and in fact she never had. 

And so it was that a Commander sent a message, through a messenger to another messenger, and to another after that, to a place that was nowhere, to a person who knew she'd be found, who was only ever pretending at being lost. And the words, by design, were clumsy, but true enough to show the bones of it, which were: The Commander rides for Camp Jaha, and a person would do well to be there when she arrives. 

Camp Jaha, probably, had been nowhere very recently. Both the this and the that of it. An open plain, a speck in the darkness. Now, though, it was aggressively somewhere. The this had become the same as the that, all at once, and the visual of the thing was appropriately sudden.

Clarke had known the that, if only from the inside out. It was the this, to her, that was new, but, on approach, it was now the that that was the thing. 

Metal, gleaming and bent. Earth, torn and burnt. 

There was a place, everywhere and nowhere, where everything felt like guilt. Where a person looked, at everything and nothing, and wondered what they might have done. In this place, right now, Clarke Griffin knew a new thing, which was: This had been a war even before she knew what war was. 

Mind, even from a distance (close enough. too close), it was clear: Her people survived. Fully, and actively, they were surviving. But, the that, the Ark, life itself for all of all time, sunken, stabbed, buried (a sword, a spear, a bullet most like), in the this, the Earth, life actually, since before even all time, and it was, frankly, a little on the nose.

A person might laugh, but this person, this time, she walked.

Now, another fact, always true, but for Clarke Griffin, newly known: A civilization, which is to say, people, going about the basic business of living, was a noisy, close thing. Moving, and building, and being, and speaking and speaking and speaking. And now, asking, and hugging, and crying, and looking and looking and looking.

Bellamy was the first to see her, or at least the first to see her, and he shouted and he waved, and he ran in and he ran out. And when he met her, he stopped, and he would have asked, but her mother was next, and she did not stop. And she did ask. And Clarke answered, and she noticed, as she grew again accustomed to the voice that had gotten her exactly everywhere, that Octavia came only as far as the gates, and Lincoln  stayed beside her. Raven was last, but she did come, if only just as Clarke ran out of words to say. To her credit, there were, in fact, not many words at all; Clarke had been gone, and now she was back, and, as ever, war was coming. 

Days followed, and nights as well, predictably, and once again the math of things demanded attention. Mouths needed meals, meals came from stores and from crops and from ever smaller projections of both. Conceptually, there was winter. Really, a person could only guess. 

An estimate, on a particular day, was that for every mouth, there were two eyes, and those eyes were pointing up. Snow. Water plus cold. A miracle plus a miracle. Even so, a person might find her eyes straying to the fields, counting what might yet be saved. A person might also catch her eyes straying to the gates, counting what might yet need saving from. 

#eskavibes?!? #fic ask post #clexa #i never actually posted any clexa fic #i think this is the longest chunk i even wrote #and it is unsustainable #like i cannot imagine trying to write an entire story in this style i dont know where it came from or what i was thinking #anyway im hopefully a better writer now???

[hella1975]

Did Chenas newborn childs name start with L?

I THINK MAYBE YEAH ACTUALLY 😭

#i never named her in-fic (if I did then this is so embarrassing for me) #but there’s like. ‘fanon’ names and i KNOW luka is one of them #this is so funny we can’t keep doing this it’s unsustainable #ask #taob asks

[demonicimagery]

i’m not yet fully sure how to annunciate this but satine kyrze in clone wars is written in such a way that the writers misogyny is inextricable from her character for me and it’s very hard to like her or hate her or really cohere what she could have been. like the relationship that damara has to hussie’s racism in homestuck but without the handmaid. maybe it’s my own thing but all portrayal of her positive or negative falls flat to me bc it’s so removed from what her character is or it’s too fucking sexist to stomach

#satine kryze #it’s hard to explain but like: #they’ve basically made “oh this ideology sounds good on paper but is unsustainable” #into a character #they do this by oversimplifying an ideology #not thinking particularly hard about the ramifications of her actions #making her set dressing for obi wan every time she’s on screen #then when she’s captured she’s portrayed as almost naive? despite her age and experience? #like as if women being overly idealistic and irresponsible rulers wasn’t loaded #it’s not like they set her up as an individually flawed person #because they barely set her up as a person at all! #and then she’s fridged for obi wan #then people are like “hey her ideals are a bit fucked” #which makes sense! #but then they’re like “because she’s trying to do a cultural genocide of mandalore or she’s too stupid to understand the consequences” #”of her own actions” #which also suck and are almost always sexist #i’ve seen fic that basically says “shut up the men are talking” #uncritically #this isn’t super well phrased bc it’s like 1am but i was trying to look through bo katan’s tag and was so fed up by the misogyny #also i hope the damara comparison makes sense #me tag #star wars

[dark-side-blog3]

La squadra Childhood friends au pt 5

These songs are what inspired the au https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pcHHyi9Wdts and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyE9x5HETkY

Everything has changed: It's most of their childhood, how happy la squadra was back then with Darling in their life cause they made an effort to be with them, then it leads up to the present. Though held captive, they're happy to see them hitmen team

The Joker and the Queen: Darling begins to succumb to them, it's a slow process but they begin to return their feelings.

Blep cat

I can see the darling listening to while they sit on the couch and look out the window, the base briefly empty from the other nine inhabitants, and they imagine how the lyrics reflect their relationships with all their friends. Disregarding the fact that it's a relationship they can't leave if they want to. That doesn't fit the romantic aspect. So darling shoves it away, and listens to a playlist to sink into a mindset where they're happy with this.

It's cute, in the same way, that it's tragic; the reader has lost the will to fight.

#blep cat anon #blep cat #childhood friends au! #submission #not mine! #it reminds me of crazy ex girlfriend when rebbeca has her reprise where she'll never have problems again. that's the sad tone i the reader #get from the main character finding it easier to succumb to escapism fantasy #which is ironic because I LOVE escapism fantasy #but it's sad when the fantasy character that's a self insert engages in escapism because they could have a happier life and not need escapi #m the same way we might. And its like-- I don't know I am rambling-- but its like even our fantasy versions of people seek a level of satis #satisfaction and contentment that is unsustainable-- not unobtainable. Its just unsustainable. Its not permanent. Which of course its not. #this especially-- its a horror genre. Misery of some level is common place #ah I completely derailed the fic-- at least its mostly in the tags and its not attached to your work #great job blep cat!!!! #poly yandere la squadra #yandere la squadra

[scionshtola]

ffxiv is hard to take a day off from bc not only is there so much to do but also all my friends are there 🥺

#unsustainable though i am so sleepy and i have so much fic to write agshsjd #it’s easier with other games bc it’s just me by myself! #but also i went to bad last night like okay. back to regularly scheduled business. and then was like bht i need more gc seals agshsjsj #PROBLEMATIQUE. #i need a text post tag

[teejaystumbles]

I feel the skin that separates us, start to fade And when I lie on top of you, I'm afraid I can see right through myself, crystal clear I am disassembling I could disappear, disappear There is a voice inside of me, I don't know And all his words keep echoing trim and low I've been waiting for a sign to appear He has a message waiting for me But I don't wanna hear I promise, I swear, I can not keep it together I can not keep it together [x]

"Whenever he's mentioned in The Iliad, Patroclus seems to be defined by his empathy." "He became Achilles on the field of war. He died for him there, wearing his armor." "He did. Hiding and revealing identity is a constant theme throughout the Greek epics." "As are battle-tested friendships." "Achilles wished all Greeks would die, so that he and Patroclus could conquer Troy alone. Took divine intervention to bring them down." "... This isn't sustainable. We're going to get caught."

#yes hannibal au no one stop me #dreamling #own art #the sandman fanart #hannibal tome wan transcript #fic tag: unsustainable #teejaystumbles

[thebluestbluewords]

"Stoppit. I'm not going in the piss pool." 

"You know you want to," Mal drawls, scooping up a handful of water. "It'll feel good once you're in it. Aren't you like, dying in that?" 

Carlos tugs the hood of his sweatshirt up over his head. "No. It's not that hot." 

"With the amount of chlorine in public pools, the percentage of actual piss to water is probably very low," Evie says helpfully. "Probably less than 1%, if we assume that the maximum number of children based on occupancy and general health data, say about thirty kids, are constantly pissing in the water in very small amounts." 

Carlos shudders. "You're really not helping." 

Oh, right. He’s got a selective thing about germs, courtesy of growing up around her hellish wickedness, the master of animal-related health code violations. Mal’s pretty sure that Cruella never did horrible things with animal piss, but she’s not willing to swear on it. The taxidermy eyeball hat she caught a glimpse of the one time she ended up inside Hell Hall while Carlos’s mother was in still haunts her nightmares sometimes.

"I'm not baking myself like a potato either," Evie points out. "If you're having a germ freakout, you can go stand under the sprinkler by the gift shops instead. I can't see where it's drawing water from, so it's probably not coming from the kiddie pools."  Huh. It would be weird if every attraction in the park drew water from the kiddie pools, but considering the wild shit they've seen in Auradon thus far, not actually that weird. They've seen cows with shoes on, and a giant metal crab left out on the side of the road, and more weird-ass grocery stores than they'd ever dreamed of back on the isle, including the one that sold bubble gum powder by the jug, so like, piss fountains? Totally a possibility. 

“Piss fountains,” Mal says out loud, just to try out the sound of it. “Auradonian piss fountains doesn’t sound very magical.”

“They banned magic.” Carlos says. His voice is so flat that it might as well be made of the gum Mal found on her shoes last night. “So like, if you’re trying to help, you’re fucking failing at it.”

“I wasn’t.”

#don’t mind me just thinking about waterparks #my fic #anyway did I tell yall about the time my family went to an indoor waterpark and got pink eye? #because. yeah. #I don’t think any of the isle kids are germaphobes in the traditional sense #because that feels deeply unsustainable for kids who grew up on a trash island #but I do think that being raised by obsessive parents does lead to some weird hang ups about stuff #and body fluids feels like a reasonable one for the son of the fur-obsessed puppy murderer #when you’re murdering animals and keeping the house spotless #you get a little hung up about what bodily fluids are going where

[boundinparchment]

Disappearing for a while, per usual, before I throw my emotions into the void again.

#am fine i woke up this morning and just hated everything #whatever i've gotten myself into with fic is genuinely unsustainable but idk what to do about it #have lost a lot of passion and idk if I'll get it back #idk what I need but it’s not this place atm

[reitziluz]

feels disgusting to me to be up this late but i must make it known that i accidentally slammed out a full 4K in one sitting and this draft is now done.

next up i'm going over the whole thing, checking the flow and if there's any rough spots to tinker with. then it's time to submit it to a beta reader, and then...

i'm going to get started with ch3 early

#yea fic talk #will publish the chapters on the last day of each month #can't get hasty because that would create an unsustainable schedule #and it'd then become a slow schedule

[mikkaeus]

so I haven’t caught up on kp bc I’m not home yet so I decided to catch up on ITT anon’s iconic starker selfcest fic instead (read: rereading from the beginning) and I’m missed this so much, holy shit. both ITT anon and reading long fics in general — I have not read anything over 50k since my starker phase bc thai BLs barely have any long fics (not that I don’t also love the short ones!) and it feels like getting into a spa in winter

#ramblings #starker #so glad ITT anon is still updating #I need to get i fo OFMD or SVSSS or something this is unsustainable #to get into*** #tony is so fucking terrible I’ve missed this 😂 #never understood the appeal of selfcest until this #that post about how you’re only a few fics away from discovering something about yourself is so true #I love ITT anon

[bonjourxrenae]

Y’know when I started this Utena AU fanfic I hadn’t considered the symbolic implications of replacing “princes” with “heirs” and “kings” but HEYYYY LET’S GO

#Renae rants #fanfic rambles #Dust and Gold #D&G #the prince is a misogynistic heterosexual archetype and an unsustainable standard for purity and virtue #a king can be this PLUS there’s now a layer about POWER and RULING and BIRTHRIGHT #and - ESPECIALLY RELEVANT - the Hubris of it: Kings being Living Gods #and with my chosen protag as an Heir to a Kingship #while also citing his empathy mercy and kindness as virtues #REJECTING the title #it’s a big middle finger to Sins of the Father stuff #there is also more or less the genderfuckery of it all that is prevalent in Utena but I feel like that is ANOTHER RANT for ANOTHER DAY #gotta love how vague I am about all this #don't worry about it #once I get a good title for this fic I'll retag but ehhhhh

[bysaber]

Breaking up ft. Satoru Gojo

Day 13 of 31 Days of Ficmas!

summary — you break up with your partner a few weeks prior christmas.

word count — 1.2k

content — hurt/comfort, gojo is emotionally constipated but he’s trying ok, lowercase intended

notes — today was supposed to be obito’s fic but i wrote this one first because im kinda… going thru the same thing lol. enjoy <3

everything feels out of place as you lay in bed trying to place together pieces of an unfinished puzzle.

two weeks have passed since the last time you and gojo spoke to each other. two weeks since you broke up with him, leaving a part of your heart behind.

you know you have to move on, but it’s hard when you have years of friendship and a one-year-long relationship weighing on your back. you look back to all the efforts you put into it and, foremost, you can’t completely let him go.

you always knew about gojo’s personality, in fact, you fell in love with it. but it became unsustainable when you were the one doing everything while he sat back and watched.

you used to say to him, “you are a good person. you are the best person I’ve fallen for, like a window of light in the dark.” and never once you regretted those words. you made sure to repeat them to him during the breakup.

you truly believe satoru’s a good person, and he never intended to hurt you. what defined the fate of your relationship was his inconstancy, his fear of emotions.

gojo could shower you with kisses and “i love you”s for days, but they were always half-hearted and, whenever the conversation between the two of you took a deeper turn, he would instantly shut down.

become cold, even.

he also didn’t care much about life in general, talking about several topics and simply forgetting to ask simple questions like “how was your day?”

you knew he cared, but it didn’t feel like he did.

it killed you every time he’d disappear for an entire day, especially on days you weren’t okay, not even bothering to reply to your texts, and then replying with a mere “i was busy” – you knew it already, but a text would be nice.

and to match his emotionless self, you were the embodiment of intensity.

you tried to crack up his shell, always paying attention to what he said and remembering it. you dove head first into every interest he had, and supported him in every choice he made.

you cared, you asked and, mostly, you talked.

multiple times, you tried to express how you felt, how you wish he could open up more and maybe just regard you a little more – a few texts not to worry you wouldn’t hurt. gojo said he was like that, but that he would try to be better.

what mined your relationship was that lie.

because he never even tried.

and after another month of dealing with all of that, with not feeling wanted enough, cared enough, you decided to end everything.

you can’t lie a little part of you hoped he would fight for you, ask for you to stay. but as you watched distress filling his eyes, all he could muster was, “i’m really sorry i couldn’t be better.”

and you lost everything you thought you had.

you blink away your tears, trying to escape from your painful thoughts, and get up from the bed – it’s past seven now and you need to start getting ready for a christmas party at one of your friends’ house.

you need to move on.

after taking a quick shower, you put on the red dress you’ve decided to wear – a dress that gojo bought for you months before – before starting to do your makeup.

this is when your doorbell rings.

you frown, “who is it?” you yell as you make your way toward the door, but there’s no time for an answer before you open it.

you almost close it again when you see your ex-boyfriend standing there, but you don’t. you know you need to be mature about this situation, even if seeing him makes all the walls you’ve been building crumble down.

it hurts.

“gojo.”

you don’t look him in the eye, focusing on his christmas sweater instead. funnily, the one you gave him a year ago.

“can i come in? it’s freezing outside.”

if you looked into his eyes, though, you would see the big blue bag under them. you would see how faded his blue irises are, and how fucking anxious satoru is.

you don’t ask further questions, letting him into the house he knows all too well before you close the door. he follows you like a lost puppy, and keeps standing when you sit on the couch.

“you look gorgeous,” he compliments meekly.

“thank you. what do you want?” it takes all of you to not start crying right then and there, but you know you have to be firm.

“i want you back.”

satoru doesn’t beat around the bush, and the silence that follows is so loud it can be heard. you feel your heart beating in an insane rhythm, and your head spins.

“gojo, you can’t–”

“you were right. you are right. about everything,” he interrupts you. “i was a boy, and for that i’m sorry. i acted like you had to keep up with my shit, like you would always be there, and i’m sorry for that too,” gojo speaks so fast you can barely keep up with him, like he’s going to die if he doesn’t say those words. “i thought i couldn’t change, i thought i didn’t have to. because it is easier to live the way i live, but… it is much harder to live without you.”

“gojo–”

again, he doesn’t let you speak, “don’t call me that. please, don’t call me that,” gojo drops on his knees in front of you and grabs your hand. “call me satoru, toru, baby, love for all i care. just not gojo. i’ve been miserable without you, i never thought a person could get so miserable,” his voice cracks, pulling your hand towards his face in a desperate attempt to be comforted. “i promise you i will do better, i will pay attention, text you all the time, tell you all about my past and what made me who i am, scream through my pain for what’s worth. just take me back, please.”

you are so deeply in shock that it takes you a while to register the tears falling down his face, his eyes closed as he expects the worst.

all it takes is for your thumb to caress his cheek softly, and satoru sobs. you grab his face with both of your hands, cleaning his teardrops as your own fall, and you gently kiss his forehead.

it kills you to see him like that, but at the same time it gives you a reason to live to know that he’s willing to try. for you.

you kiss his nose, his cheeks, and then his lips.

satoru whimpers, pulling you into an embrace so strong you’re afraid he’ll never let go.

“toru,” you say when you part your lips and bury your face in his neck, feeling his scent. “everything’s okay now. i’m here, i’ll take care of you.”

“missed you so much, i’m so sorry,” he whispers.

“i missed you, too,” you confess, finally looking into his eyes and frowning when you notice he hasn't slept. “what’s past is past, we’ll be okay. but i guess we should just sleep a bit, hm? it was one hell of a ride.”

“sleep together, right?”

he sounds so clingy, you chuckle lightly.

“yes, toru. together.”

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