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penny00dreadful · 11 months

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So does anyone remember that post that was like "Robin and Eddie meet when she does that thing that's like 'hello, please pretend you know me so I can get away from this person' then Steddie happens?" Because I do. I cannot for the life of me find it. If anyone knows the post I'm talking about please let me know so I can link it, this is very much not my idea, it's that persons idea but the brain worms got me so here we are. 🤷‍♀️

We found it! It's this post by @wynnyfryd Thank you Anon! Obviously I went in a different direction with it but this post was 100% my inspiration so thank you for helping me find it!

AO3 link for those asking! 🖤

Robin should be royally pissed off with herself right now. She would be if she wasn’t so damn scared.

That guy was still trailing behind her, no matter the twists and turns she’d taken down different streets trying to lose him and the only thing she’d gained from it was to get totally and completely lost. It could be something completely innocent, the guy might be coincidentally going in the same direction as her but she wasn’t willing to give him the benefit of the doubt if it meant keeping herself alive.

The distance between the two of them was slowly closing as she was followed through the dark and empty streets of the city, hoping, praying for some kind of shop or restaurant or something to make an appearance so she could hide inside but apparently Robin was able to find the one street in this city where everything was either closed for the night or boarded up.

Her heart was pounding in her ears and the beginnings of tears were starting to sting her eyes and all she could think of was how sick with worry Steve was going to be in the morning when he woke up to no missed calls, no missed texts and no Robin. She’d scoffed at him hours earlier when he’d offered to go to the ‘work thing’ with her but she'd told him she was a big girl and she could look after herself and not to be such a worrywart mom.

And now she had no idea where her phone had gone, if she'd left it behind or dropped it somewhere, no idea where she was and no idea of what she was going to do.

If she’d been a bit more present in her head she probably would have noticed the loud, braying, male laughter coming from just ahead of her and crossed the street to avoid them before it was obvious she was avoiding them. But as it was she could barely see straight through her tears and panicked tunnel vision while simultaneously trying to keep an eye on the slowly encroaching guy behind her. She was practically already in the group’s space and one of them had definitely already seen her though he didn’t pay her any attention.

But even through her blurred vision and panic, she finally registered what exactly she was looking at. Four men standing around the entrance to what looked like the diviest of empty dive bars, chain smoking and being as loud as humanly possible, but that’s not what caught her eye.

Long hair, chains, leather, denim, tartan, rings, tattoos, subculture. If Robin had to choose a group of men to approach, any kind of subculture would be the best option. They knew what it was like to be other. There was no guarantee these guys were safe, but they were probably safer than a group of frat boys.

The next thing that caught her eye that nearly made her cry in relief as she got closer were the patches and pins.

A rainbow ‘A’ against a black and white striped background pinned on one guys collar, a yellow-white-purple-black patch on another's arm, a pink-yellow-blue patch over the third guys heart and a progress pride flag pinned to the largest guys pocket.

Her people.

Without a second's hesitation she made a bee-line for them, planting herself firmly next to yellow-white-purple-black patch person who had a mess of thick light brown curls that reminded her of Steve’s hair. They fell painfully silent at her arrival.

The four of them blinked down at her, with her tearfilled eyes and wild aura of panic around her they were probably, understandably freaked out.

“Hi guys!” She called out to them, probably a little too loud, hoping her voice carried back to the fucker following her, tensing as she could actually hear his footsteps approaching now.

The guy with the longest hair and the pink-yellow-blue patch standing directly in front of her glanced quickly over her shoulder before returning his gaze to her. His face split into a wide warm grin, tapping her shoulder lightly.

“Hey girlie. We thought you weren’t coming, we’ve been waiting.”

The footsteps behind her audibly slowed down. Robin laughed, a little maniacally, keeping her frantic gaze on him, not daring to turn around. “Yeah, I uh- g- got sidetracked.”

“Eddie, what-”

Pink-yellow-blue patch guy, Eddie she supposed, slapped ‘A’ patch guy lightly on the stomach with the back of his hand, shutting him up as her pursuer passed them by, giving the group a wide berth.

“Hey, no worries. You’re here now, right?”

Pride patch guy kept his eyes on the guy who’d been following her the whole time, only looking away when he eventually turned the corner, disappearing into the night.

Robin immediately felt her posture slacken now that he was finally gone, the full weight of everything coming down on her. Her tears began to spill over and her whole body shook as hysterical sobs started to pour out of her body.

“I’m sorry. I’m- I’m sorry. I didn’t know what else to do. I think I left my phone behind and I don’t know where I am. We only moved here a couple of weeks ago and I got lost trying to get away and- and-”

“Hey, hey. It’s okay.” Yellow-white-purple-black patch person squeezed her shoulder lightly, keeping their distance. “You’re okay. Don’t worry about it.”

“We can call someone for you, if you want?” Eddie asked, crossing his arms tight like he was trying not to reach out to her, probably worried it would freak her out more. “Boyfriend or girlfriend-”

“Or romantic partner.” The person with their hand on her shoulder interjected lightly.

“Alright Baron from the Baronies.” Eddie snorted. “But fair point, Gareth. Romantic partner or friend or whatever?”

“Um,” Robin’s voice was still shaking. “I don’t… I’ve never been good at memorising numbers…”

“Me too, terrible at them.” Eddie smiled again, pulling his phone from his pocket. Robin’s fear and panic was almost entirely gone now even though she was still hiccuping and sniffling underneath their concerned gazes. They were all firmly keeping their distance, keeping any touches short and fleeting, not moving too suddenly, trying their best to make sure she knew they weren’t a threat and it was really helping her to start feeling safe again. “But we could try to find them online? Instagram or something?”

“Yeah. Yeah we could try that.” She wiped her eyes roughly against her sleeve as she shuffled over to Eddie’s side. “My best friend, Steve, he uh- he’s probably asleep and I don’t think you can call him if you don’t have him added…”

“You can send him a message.” Eddie replied easily, handing his phone over. “And if he doesn’t wake up, we’ll try something else.”

“Don’t worry we’ll get you home.” ‘A’ patch guy smiled down at her while pride patch guy nodded along.

Robin sniffed again. “Thanks.” She was able to conjure up a small watery smile as she opened the app and found Steve’s profile, shooting off a quick message begging him not to freak out and explaining the situation as concisely as she could.

“Here.” She handed Eddie back his phone who glanced down at it for just a second before his eyes widened slightly as he scrolled through Steve’s profile.

“Oh shit. This is your friend?”

Robin nodded. “Mm-hmm.”

“He’s… he’s really pretty.”

That managed to pull a startled laugh from her. “Oh god, don’t tell him that, you’ll give him a big head.”

“Let me see?” Gareth asked, whistling low when Eddie turned his phone around showing a photo of Steve and Robin at their last pride parade cheering with the crowd, Steve with the pink-purple-blue of the bi flag smeared across each cheek and Robin with the pinks, oranges and white of the lesbian flag draped around her shoulders. “He is really pretty.”

Eddie snatched the phone back, cradling it to his chest. “Fuck off, Gare. I saw him first.”

Robin smiled again. “Any response from him?”

“Hm?” Eddie asked distractedly, scrolling through Steve’s photos before pride flag guy punched him in the shoulder. “Ow! Wh- oh, sorry!” Eddie frantically scrolled back up before clicking into his messages again and shaking his head. “Nothing yet.” He held the phone out to show her.

“Okay.”

“What’s your address? If he doesn’t respond, we'll find a way to get you there.”

“Uh…” Robin was drawing a complete blank, only able to remember her parents home address hundreds of miles away.

“Or tell us something nearby.” Eddie added, not missing a beat, clearly picking up on Robin’s lack of an answer. “What’s on your street?”

“Um,” she closed her eyes, trying to picture it in her head, “there’s a couple of Chinese take outs, Asian food store, paint store… there’s… I think it’s a tattoo parlour? There’s designs painted on the window, a tower on either side. I think they’re from Lord of the Rings?”

“Inklings? Is that the place?”

Robin opened her eyes. Eddie was grinning at her conspiratorially. “That’s it. You know it?”

“Would you believe me if I told you I work there?”

“No way.”

“Way.”

Hope was starting to grow feathers inside Robin’s chest. She could go home, she didn’t have to stay out all night waiting for Steve to wake up and never let her out of his sight again, she could hug her best friend and drink coffee out of her favourite mug and curse at their finicky fridge and steal his hair products again. She could go home.

“Is it far?”

“Nah, only a few streets away. Ten minute walk, tops.”

“D’you- I mean… do you think you could-” Could she really ask them to walk her home after they’d already done so much for her? Would she be asking too much? Could she be putting herself in more danger?

“I can take you there if you want? Let you get back to your… Steve.” There was a slight blush dusting over Eddie’s cheeks. Maybe he did have an ulterior motive, but it wasn’t an ulterior motive involving her. If she wasn’t so wrung out and aching to crawl into her own bed she’d be thinking up teasing material to lambaste Steve with. But as it was, she was desperate to get home.

“Would that be okay?”

“Yeah.” Eddie replied, bright and easy. “It would just be me and you though,” he held his hands up in surrender, “and you can totally say no, like if you're uncomfortable or whatever. Gareth is Grant and Jeff’s ride home and you’re still on the clock, right?” He turned to Gareth towards the end of his sentence.

“Yeah, but I get off shift in about an hour so could come in if you wanted, wait around in the back room until then if you wanna go as a group?” They answered.

“I think… I think I just want to get home.”

“Okay, cool. No worries I’ll get you there safe and sound. Here,” Eddie pulled his phone out again, “I’m gonna message Steve to let him know we’re on the way in case he wakes up,” he showed her the short message only sending it off when she gave a nod, “and I’ll get you to navigate just so we don’t get lost.”

He handed his phone to her with the maps app open, directing them towards Inklings tattoo parlour. He was playing it off like an easy joke, instead of another way to assure her she was safe. He was making sure she knew exactly where he was taking her at all times, he was making sure she had the ability to call the police or whatever if he turned on her, he was making sure she knew he didn’t need or want her address if she didn’t want to give it.

This fucking guy.

He definitely wouldn’t be the worst choice Steve had ever made if it did go that way.

“I don’t know how to thank all of you, seriously. I don’t know what I would have done if I hadn’t run into you.”

“Don’t worry about it.” Grant smiled at her before hesitating. “Uh, I just realised we don’t have your name.”

“Oh!” She laughed at herself, feeling lighter. “I’m Robin.”

“Pleasure to meet you, Robin.” Grant held his hand out, shaking hers once she took it.

“Likewise.”

“And don’t worry about thanking us, just pay it forward, yeah?” Jeff said.

“Plus.” Gareth took on a nonchalant tone even though they had a smirk plastered over their face. “We’ll see you again at Steve and Eddie’s wedding.”

“Shut up!” Eddie scowled but didn’t hold onto it for long in the wake of Robin’s giggles.

She sighed once the giggles subsided, a weight lifted off her shoulders. “I look forward to it.” She raised her hand in salute as the three of them headed back inside, turning to Eddie as he held his elbow out.

“Shall we?”

Robin tried to suppress her smile but took Eddie’s arm anyway. They only made it down one street and around one corner, Robin clutching tight to Eddie’s phone before he finally asked.

"So."

"Best friend Steve." Eddie twirled his rings around his fingers. "Is he…"

“He’s single.” She answered lightly. “But you might be arriving into his life at the wrong time. He’s recently sworn off men.”

“Well we’ve all sworn off men once or twice. Men are terrible.”

“Agreed.”

“Is it because of a bad ex?”

Robin threw her head back with a groan remembering the giant breakdown that had finally finally ended it. “Tommy was the worst. He’s the reason we even moved out here, there’s nowhere to get away from an ex in a small town, you know? They’re everywhere. I’m not going to go into what happened, it’s not my business to say but it was bad.”

Eddie nodded, his eyes down on the ground, running through everything in his head.

Robin could see the tattoo parlour up ahead, the glorious sight of their apartment building just a few buildings away.

“Do you think… with time… he could open himself up to men again?”

Eddie had such a tentative hope in his eyes, it was adorable really. Looking over him, she thought about the type of people Steve would constantly thirst over, blip in the matrix Tommy Hagan notwithstanding.

Lithe bodies with full lips and giant eyes, hair he could run his fingers through and something unusual about them. Something odd.

He’d never explicitly gone for someone so heavily into a subculture before but he’d never turned them down either. And based on Eddie’s job at the tattoo parlour and the way he was dressed, he almost definitely had some ink on him. That alone would be enough to make Steve swoon.

“I think he might. Will you walk me up?” Robin asked, holding the door to the building open, offering Eddie the same kindness under the guise of doing a favour that he had offered her so many times tonight.

“Yeah, sure.”

They’d managed to make it up to the third floor, walking down her hallway before Eddie’s phone started to ping incessantly.

She turned the phone over in her hand, looking at the screen. “He’s awake.”

Robin, where are you?

Are you okay?

I’m on the way.

Please be okay.

Their apartment door was flung open just as they reached it. Steve was standing there panting and terrified, his hair a mess, his glasses askew, his jacket and shoes thrown haphazardly over his pyjamas.

“Robbie.”

Steve slammed into her, holding her tight before immediately letting go to inspect her face and running his hands over her body, checking to see if anything was wrong.

“Are you okay? Are you hurt? What happened? What do you need?”

“Steve.” Robin caught his fluttering hands in hers and squeezed, nearly crying out in relief just to have him with her again. “I’m okay. Eddie and his friends helped me.”

“Eddie-” Steve looked to the side, noticing her saviour for the first time. “You’re Eddie.”

“I’m Eddie.” Eddie gave him a short little wave and a dazzling smile that quickly dropped in shock as Steve pulled him into a crushing hug, his blush returning with full force.

“Thank you, thank you so much. I don’t know what I would’ve-” Steve took a big breath in and loosened his arms from around Eddie’s shoulders. Robin saw his eyes slowly trail over his face before very briefly flicking down to the pink-yellow-blue patch then back up. “Come inside, the two of you. Can I get you anything? Tea? Decaf coffee? A glass of water? Like, literally anything to say thank you.” He asked, ushering the two of them into the apartment.

Steve caught Robin’s eye behind Eddie’s back and mouthed ‘oh my god he’s fucking gorgeous!’

Robin snorted and thought to herself ‘sworn off men, my ass.’

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am-i-the-asshole-official · 3 months

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AITA for bitching about fics I dislike on my blog?

as a foreword, this is kind of a non-issue and no one's ever told me to stop, but I'm curious what other people think of fandom etiquette.

the fandom: a fairly small one. 2.4k fics on ao3 small. I recognize most people posting in its tumblr tag small. if I tell you the name of the source you'd almost definitely be able to find me small.

the source: pornographic, which means everyone involved is or should be an adult. it's BL with a switch MC, but the fandom overwhelmingly prefers bottom MC/top LIs (love interests), to the point where I've had people be astonishingly rude to me because my favorite character is a bottom LI and some of my friends have been outright harassed for the same. I used to not care about sex positions in the slightest, but now when I see bottom MC fanworks I can't help but remember how poorly I was treated.

the fics: wildly and inexplicably popular, even though they are, frankly, poorly written. it's eternal bottom MC turned up to 11, complete with copious amounts of OOCness in order to turn every ship into the worst ye olde yaoi gender roles dynamic you can imagine. it's things like MC, canonically a 23yo plank of a dudeguy, being written as a big titted milf in his 40s (which is made more confusing by the fact that one of the LIs is already a big titted milf). it's also things like the MC being written as disliking sex and having to be coerced into it when one of the most charming things about him is that he's a hilarious sex pest, or writing the LIs sexually harassing the MC when they really would never do that. I've likened it to replacing the characters with OCs that share the same name and my friends have agreed with me. I'm honestly convinced that the author and his readers don't actually like any of the characters if they feel the need to change everyone so thoroughly.

why I might be an asshole: it's assholish to hate on free fanworks, and I've bitched about these fics on my public tumblr blog. the fandom is small enough that there's a non-zero chance of it getting back to the author and a reasonable chance that fans of the fics have seen my bitching. I'm probably projecting the hostility I've received onto someone who's done absolutely nothing to me, and I am absolutely just straight up jealous that their fics get better stats than mine. I may also be being an asshole to myself, because being critical of other people's fics has made my hypercritical of my own.

why I don't think I'm an asshole: I think everyone has the right to be bad at things, but I also think everyone has the right to be a little hater. I don't put the fandom tag on these posts; they stay on my blog and my blog alone, and if later on I feel like I was unfairly vitriolic I'll delete the posts. I only post on tumblr because I'm certain the author in question only uses twitter, which dramatically lowers the odds of him stumbling across my posts. the fics are so popular that it's definitely possible that their fans would see my posts, but I think it's unlikely that they'd bother looking at my blog because 99% of my posts are about one of the bottom LIs. I have never and would never leave comments on the fics themselves, and I generally try to keep the bitchy posts to a minimum; it's far from a constant thing.

tl;dr - I publicly bitch about fics that (in my opinion) are poorly written and extremely OOC, under the assumption that it's unlikely the author would ever see it. AITA?

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

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colubrina · 3 months

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idk if you have a TikTok or if you keep up with the HP fandom over there; but apparently manacled by SenLinYu was posted on Amazon for purchase (not by the author). It’s since been removed but was up for more than a couple days. And there were individuals on TikTok that just didnt understand why others were getting so upset. Like let’s disregard the fact that someone other than the original author profiting off this work, but I actually saw people that were very firm in the belief that they could sell fanfic. Whether that be through book binds, cases like this, or commissions/Patreon. I’m an elder gen Z, and I remember coming into the fanfiction spaces pretty early on maybe like 07-08?? I think I was 9-10 reading HP fics on fanfiction.net and very vividly remember everyone being super specific about “this is not my sandbox, I’m just playing around” or “If you recognize anything, it doesn’t belong to me”. So I’m always surprised by people that really don’t see a problem with it. I’ve even seen people claim that it will either fall within the limits of fair use or that it would be a PR nightmare for someone to go after someone. I guess I was 1.) just wanting to rant about how shortsighted I think it was to someone that was around in fanfic space before 2015 and 2.) get thoughts from an author that I feel like has had several popular/successful fics in the fandom.

Yeah, I've got a TikTok. I never post anything, but I try to share anything people make that's nice about my old fics. I always have this half-assed feeling like I should make things but I don't. (https://www.tiktok.com/@colubrina_)

2. Congrats to Senlinyu on her book deal - very cool!

3. And yeah, I saw that people were doing that, and I wish I was surprised but I'm not. There's always been a not-insignificant part of the dramione fandom that sees the fics as 'belonging to the fandom.' They will post them on sites where the author doesn't want them. They will host PDFs online even when you directly ask them not to. They will rehost fics authors have taken down, orphaning them on AO3 so they can't be stopped. They don't see it as stealing because they see the fics as public property. It was probably just a matter of time before they started trying to host them on Amazon. It's frustrating for sure, but it does feel a bit like 'here we go again.' It certainly doesn't fall under fair use, and I think Manacled might be one of the very few fics that will have a legal department eager to keep it offline so the publisher can make their money from it, but other people will be less fortunate. Fic has become enough of a part of the ecosystem it's not at any kind of risk as an artform. But, yeah, it sucks. Be nice to your authors. Respect their wishes. Don't do this shit.

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anantaru · 4 months

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You think rape is funny? Maybe once you fucking experience it you won’t. Fucking cunt.

hello. so I'll just jump right into this. tw. discourse tw. mentioning r*pe.

@saetoru made this claim about me:

saetoru, could you add proof at least? i can not remember a time where i would repost a joke like that so i'd love for you to show me proof please, this is all I'm asking.

also how was it on your dash, on your own dash and @dottores dash, when you have never followed me? + but maybe it was the for you feature that was the same for the both of you.

accusing someone without proof is not okay, again, i can not remember doing this so if you have a screenshot add it so i can remember and apologize, but i can't do anything because i don't remember saying a joke with SA in mind.

before that i just want to mention: i don't think r*pe is funny, i'm not a dark content blog either so i do not really reblog dark content things because i'm sure most of my readers don't want that + I'm just not into that as well. the only joke i was "called out" for once is when i used a "i want xyz character to smack their laptop on my face or tits" which i got from an andrew garfield interview where he read his thirst tweets out loud, at that time i just deleted it because it's alright.

dottores, your mutuals, two of them to be exact, have sent me multiple of your personal blog hate posts about me and not once, have you made one where you talked about me saying an SA joke. you have only claimed that i am a cunt and that i am a gatekeeping bitch hence why i believed this must be the reason why you would suddenly hate me despite the fact we never interacted.

now, I want to address this next, this is from @dottores post which when i got it sent to me, i would've wished she just tagged me right away and said it with her chest, more so not let saetoru talk about her experience but just handle this with me.

^ this is cat @dottores saying i got it wrong.

^ this is why i believed she meant it just like i said it, why do you go through blogs that grow really fast's notes in the first place? where do you take the right to police other blogs like that when i'm sure your blogs aren't empty of blank blogs either. it is hard to get rid of all of them but i'm sure we all try at least, we don't need you to make us feel bad or come off as belittling, if you have found out a way to get rid of every blank blog, do enlighten us please.

+ at that time of this reblog icks?? post that saetoru added, my blog was blowing up so when a moot of mine (which was also theirs at a time) saw this, they had sent it to me.

"creators that grow really fast" and nowhere has she mentioned she only went through only her own moots notes, aside from that apologies but i still find this weird, i don't think you should invest so much time in other people's blog but this is my opinion.

this is the next thing she said:

i don't know if dottores meant me there but i have never once harassed you nor sent you hate anywhere, again you cannot just accuse me of stuff like that when you have also never reached out to me. The things i claimed about you guys in your callout, i have text messages of the person (your moot) who sent it to me.

but back again, the only thing i did do was block dottores on tumblr and then later ao3 when i saw you in tags, which you made fun of me for later:

also i got this ask that time:

"who blocks on ao3?" i do, ao3 is the platform i use the most so why is it funny when i use the block button? + i just like to point something out here, "they must've clicked to read and realize it was me" you can think that if you want i don't mind, but let me ask you this: i have seen you in tags hence why i was able to block you, but how did you notice i did? you can't see me in tags so surely you didnt click on my work, so you must've searched up my user for whatever reason?

and i know this is about me because she added the "this person called me chronically online" i couldn't find the post but what she was talking about is me calling other writers who reblogged that one "ick post" with not needed things such as "when writers cant characterize a character" or "when they only write headcanons", i have plenty of screenshots of that post but since i don't want to use up all my space here, i don't see why i should show their reblogs from this.

there were plenty of people like that, which reblogged horrible things there so i called everyone under that post chronically online, not just you dottores.

yeah :) like people making fun of someone for blocking them for their own comfort. i just don't want to see you, that's all, but i have never send you hate asks nor harassed you, the only thing i did was block the blogs your own mutuals exposed to me.

^ this is after i felt bad for you after the callout.

this is coming from your own mutuals, i have never alone claimed you guys are jealous of me nor is there anything to be jealous about. i am just a blog, this here is not being popular, no one knows who i am and i do not need to pride myself in having a big blog on tumblr.com, and my readers know that. we are all the same here.

i didn't mean you here saetoru but i understand that it sounded that way, the phrasing was a little off, for that i apologise that i made you upset with this, english is not my first language, i'm french, and when it comes to this callout post i was so fed up with it that i just posted it without looking for grammar mistakes etc. + this is about one of your friends who deleted their personal the second i announced i got their user, that was something with kaeya, when they sent me a hate ask. i won't expose it here but that person was also the one who blacklisted a friend of mine for liking itto.

i think there is a lot more but i will stop it there, this could've ended differently and i'm sad that it ended this way. I wish you all the best and i mean it, i hope we all can learn from this and move on, write on tumblr for our favorite characters because it's fun and stay away from drama. If you made it this far thank you 💓 — yoru

#tw discourse #tw rape

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try-set-me-on-fire · 11 months

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Ooh how abut number '11. toothpaste kisses' for soft prompts! Love your writing

Send me soft prompts! Ao3 collection post here!

Eddie is going to make everyone late.

Look: he really thinks most of it isn't his fault. He'd covered for somebody on B shift Tuesday, so he'd only had 24 hours off and he'd had to sleep through a good chunk of it, so laundry went a little by the wayside, leading to him tossing a frantic load into the washer at 5 am when he realized he had no clean work clothes. And, again, he’d covered that Tuesday shift after a 12 hour on Monday, so it’s reasonable that he forgot how dire the toothpaste situation was. The look Chris had given him when he said they needed to run to the store right now at bright and early 6 am would have withered a lesser soul, so at 6:04 Eddie, still in sweatpants and wearing ratty old slides is running down the block solo to grab whatever they have at the nearest corner store. He winces as he grabs the baking soda kind (Chris hates it) and books it back to the house, trying to breathe through the waves of oh god I’m a terrible father who left my kid alone and forgot about dental hygiene.

The house is considerably more crowded when he gets back to it. First, Chimney is lugging a dresser up the front stairs.

“What- hey- what-“ Eddie grabs the bottom of the thing, hastily shoving the toothpaste in his pocket. “What’s this?”

Chim tilts his head at him. “We were getting rid of it and you said you could use a new dresser, remember? I texted you I was coming to drop it off.”

Eddie’s phone is probably dinging away uselessly on his bedside table. “Right, yeah, sorry. There was a toothpaste emergency. Uh, thank you, we can just-“

Before he can come up with some way to finish that sentence, Carla opens the door. He hadn’t even seen her car, shit, he hopes there’s no calls right away when they get to work because he’s clearly not slept enough and should lay down again as soon as possible.

“Oh!” She says, surprised and cheerful. “Why don’t you bring that into the living room. I put your clothes in the dryer, Eddie, I figured if you were running the wash this early it was an emergency.”

Well thank god somebody has a plan and knows whats happening. He and Chim set the dresser next to a wall someplace as out of the way as they can get, and then Eddie points at Carla. “Thank you,” he says, trying to put as much sincerity into the words as possible, before pivoting to head down the hall to find Chris. Its not a long journey, the kid standing right around the corner. Eddie hands him the toothpaste. “There you go.”

Chris scrunches his nose. “Baking soda kind. Gross. And I don’t need it, Dad, Buck brought the good stuff.”

“Buck?”

“Hey.”

Eddie pivots again to look in the kitchen, where the man himself is leaning against the counter drinking a cup of coffee out of his current favorite mug, the one with the squiggly little drawing of a frog and a chicken dancing together. “Hi.” Eddie supposes he isn’t exactly surprised he’s here, Buck is a feature of their household as much as the mug he’s holding is, but he is a little concerned about the amount of people popping out of the woodwork without him noticing. “Anybody else here? Why’d you bring toothpaste?”

Buck grins. “I think you’ve seen everybody now. And you were running out when I was here last, you’ve been busy, figured it might be helpful.”

Eddie nods, a little… wordless, maybe, a little bowled over. “I’m gonna…” he gestures towards the bathroom and limply leaves the conversation. By the time he’s brushed his teeth (it is the good stuff, the pricier name brand arctic fresh, Eddie usually goes for generic spearmint) Chris and Carla are ready to head out the door. Eddie is glancing at the clock and nervously calculating exactly how wet the clothes he’s about to put on are going to be as he says goodbye, leaning to kiss Carla, Chris, and Chim’s cheeks. “Ok, thank you, have a great day at school, I’ll see you tomorrow.”

It takes a few seconds of staring at Chimney’s trying not to laugh face, and listening to Chris’s not-trying-not-to-laugh-at-all guffaws before his brain catches up to his actions. “Oh my god.”

Chimney grins and Eddie shakes his head futilely against the oncoming barrage. "I always knew I was your favorite." He smacks a hand to his cheek and swoons, and Eddie rolls his eyes. "Everyone said it was Buck, but I knew the Han-Diaz love connection was just waiting to happen."

Buck is laughing somewhere behind him, and Eddie wants to see what look is on his face, but instead he rolls his eyes again, harder, and says "I'm going to check on the laundry," and shoos his son out the door before fleeing to the dryer.

Of course it's all still fucking damp. They're already pushing it on time though (maybe if all three of them are late they can unionize against Bobby?) so he shucks his sweats and shimmies his way into the unpleasant cool of his pants. When he emerges from his shirt, wincing, he finds Buck in the hallway with him.

“Chimney says we’re running late and if you don’t hurry up he’s leaving you for dead, no matter your new found love.”

“I know, I know, I just need to find my shoes-“

“I put ‘em by the door,” Buck smiles, and then the smile becomes a grin. “Hey, Eddie.”

“Yeah?” Eddie says with the right amount of apprehension for the situation.

“No goodbye kiss for me?” He tilts his head, grin thoroughly classifiable as shit-eating.

“We’re going to the same place, Buck. I’m probably gonna ride in your car.” He’s absolutely going to ride in his car, they both know it.

“Ah, so is Chimney, he got one.”

And Eddie could defend himself with the reasonable explanation that he just happened to be standing in a row next to the people he’d meant to press his affection onto, or the less reasonable explanation that he only gives goodbye kisses to people whose names start with a C, but instead he says “You want a kiss, Buck?”

And he’s moving before he loses nerve, and Buck is also moving, laughing at him, so again Eddie feels like it’s not entirely his fault when his kiss lands sort of on his cheek but mostly- it’s mostly on his mouth, which is soft and exhaling a little surprised sound against Eddie. They both pull back but maybe not as far as they probably should, if they weren’t them, if Eddie hadn’t spent the last few weeks or maybe years wondering how he could ask Buck to live on the shelf with all the mugs he’s cycled through as favorites. Then Buck darts his head forward, pecking another little kiss to his mouth, and Eddie chases him for a third, and Buck’s hand tangles in his shirt and he says “Oh” into Eddie’s mouth because the fabric is wet under his touch.

“Buckley, Diaz, I’m getting in my car, and I’m not going to defend you to Cap!”

Even at Chimney’s words they don’t entirely jump apart, just slide back a little, stand more firmly facing each other as the front door distantly opens and shuts.

“We’re gonna be late,” Buck says, an awed little smile pulling at his face.

“Yeah,” Eddie says, a little breathless. Maybe he can blame that on the cold clothes. “We should probably get going.”

Buck nods, and barely finishes the motion before Eddie puts his hands on his face and pulls him in for another minty kiss, firm, a promise. Buck is grinning when he backs off and Eddie is sure his face is a mirror image as he ducks around him to go find his shoes.

They’re late. But as Buck settles next to him on the couch, all pressed along his side despite the still damp clothes, Eddie thinks it was worth the wait.

#buddie #eddie diaz #evan buckley #911 fox #my writing #911 abc

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softshrimpy · 6 months

Text

How To Woo A Hot Principal

Step 16: Vulnerability

Summary: Working at the Weathervane was exactly what you needed. The routine, the people, your co-workers. It certainly helped that a certain tall, blonde, fucking gorgeous woman happened to frequent the cafe. Now some may call hopelessly flirting with your customers inappropriate behavior.

But truly, when it came to Larissa Weems, who could blame you?

It's been a rough two weeks and I craved Larissa comfort. So enjoy! 🦐✨

Tags: @variant-2402 @the-bagel24 @autumn-leaves-chasing-breeze @kimiinou @muffintopxs @h-doodles @bbykens @lilfartbox1 @bigolgay @winterfireblond @gela123 @i-like-reading @hopelessly-sapphic @alder-saan @im-a-carnivorous-plant @weemssapphic @barbarasstar

(pls let me know if you want to be tagged/ I missed you!)

Chapter 15

Cross Posted on AO3 Here

HWTAHP Masterlist

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

Larissa was busy. Which was fine! And understandable considering all the antics Wednesday has been up to recently. Her dedication to finding the monster that had attacked you was sweet, a little insane, but sweet. However, the way in which she was trying to find it was…unorthodox to say the least.

She had asked you almost a hundred different questions about the night you were attacked, not that you remembered much of use anyway. All you could remember was that you were in the woods (how far from the school you didn’t know), you had been crying so hard you hadn’t heard anything and that Marilyn had showed up very shortly after you were attacked…

Which was bothering you for two reasons. One was that if she had been close enough to be there right after you were attacked, why didn’t the monster attack her? Wednesday had hypothesized(her term not yours) that the monster had probably gotten spooked by a second person. It still didn’t sit right with you though.

And the second reason was that you had barely seen Marilyn since you were brought back to Nevermore. She had popped in briefly when you were unpacking to say hi and say she was glad you were doing better and then all but disappeared off the face of the planet. You know the two of you weren’t all that close but you honestly thought you’d at least see her around a bit.

You knew her and Larissa were close, she had told you about the long chats over many glasses of wine and their morning coffees together. And the two of them hadn’t stopped hanging out, not until Larissa went into full crisis(Wednesday) management mode. And it’s not like you spent all your time holes up in your room (anymore, not that Vlad allowed it in the first place). And with all the fucking walking around the Nevermore campus you were doing you really did not understand why you hadn’t seen her at least once.

So you decided you would try and find her today. Partially because, yes, you were lonely. But also because you wanted to thank her properly for saving your life. So you set out to find the funky lil redhead, vowing to yourself that you would find her before the end of the day.

Surprisingly she was in the first place you checked; the greenhouse. This did make you wonder if you were imagining her avoiding you. She was on the phone when you entered. She seemed to be in the middle of a heated argument with someone, hand gesturing wildly as she whisper-yelled at whoever it was she was speaking with. You stood awkwardly at the door, trying to figure out if you should stay or go.

Before you can make a decision the phone call is over and she's angrily sighing and shaking her head. You knock on the closed door behind you, hoping to announce your presence properly before stepping further into the greenhouse. At the sound she turns, rather swiftly. The look on her face goes from proper anger to shock, then to something you can’t name before swinging back around to anger again. You don’t even have a moment to open your mouth before she storms over to you, poking your chest with her finger.

“You! You just- you had to- and now I- UGH!” She groans, tears gathering in her eyes.

“Marilyn…?” You mumble, staring at her, confused as fuck.

“I-I’m sorry I don’t know why I-“ she tries, stopping when her voice cracks.

She looks moments away from bursting into full-blown sobs. Her eyes are wet with unshed tears and her lower lip is trembling. She opens her mouth to speak again but you wrap your arms around her, enveloping the small woman in a hug. She does burst into tears then, hugging you back while burying her face in your neck. You pat her back, doing your best to soothe her.

She calms eventually, her cries dissolving into the occasional hiccup. She takes a step back from you, wiping at her eyes and letting out a shaky breath.

“Sorry..” she smiles, “I don’t-you shouldn’t have had to deal with that I’m sorry…”

“It’s okay. Are you okay though?” You ask.

She nods and sniffs, shooting you what you assume is meant to be a reassuring smile. You smile back at her, squeezing her shoulders.

“I’m fine, I mean I will be fine. Sorry. Is there- can I do anything for you?” She offers.

“I actually just uh wanted to chat to you. And thank you properly for you know saving my life and all.”

“Really you shouldn’t thank me. It was the least I could do…” her face falls for a second before she smiles, “Is there anything else? Sorry, I’ve got uhm-I have to head into town to pick up a plant delivery.”

“Oh…oh no. It’s- no it’s cool! I’ll just- I’ll leave you to it then,” you murmur.

You say your goodbyes, feeling a bit better when Marilyn suggests you get coffee sometime. When you leave the greenhouse you stand dumbly for a bit, trying to figure out what to do now. You figure it would be best to go back to your room. Your mood can’t get that much worse just by vibing in your room.

———

Apparently, it could get worse. Much worse.

As it turns out dissociating in your room actually made you feel so much worse. You had ended up staring blankly at the really nice window you had while thinking back on all the ways life had gotten so fucked in the last few weeks. And then you ended up thinking about how your life had been fucked up the whole time. Which was a super fun little exercise to be doing before a physio session with Vlad.

And really Vlad was so sweet, really. So kind. However you felt like utter shit and he was making you do all these stupid, painful stretches that were making your scars and body ache. Which when combined with your already shit mental state leads to a rather terrible outburst.

“Come on kiddo just a few more of these,” he encourages you.

“I can’t.” You huff, wincing at the pain in your stomach.

“Sure you can kiddo. It’s just three more you got this-“

“No I fucking don’t! So can you just fucking let me breathe?!” You yell.

“Alright, let’s take a breath then-“

“No that’s not going to fucking help! Nothing is going to fucking help because things are just fucking fucked!” You end up kicking the nearest thing which just so happens to be a wall.

Which is how you end up sitting in the infirmary with a fucked foot and a dent in the wall you had taken your frustration out on. Turns out the vampire strength did not save your bones from being obliterated by concrete. The nurse had been very sweet, wrapping your foot and sending you on your way. Vlad had helped you back to your room, not asking any questions and leaving you with a simple ‘call if you need anything.’

And so you lay on your bed, frustrated and angry and hurt. You feel tears welling up in your eyes and get even more frustrated if that’s even possible. Part of you knows you’re just having a bad day, that these feelings will pass and you’ll be okay. But another, louder part of you says this is how things will always be.

That’s how Larissa finds you, laying on your back on your bed, foot wrapped in a lovely bandage, crying your eyes out. She silently takes off her heels, padding over to your bed and sitting herself next to you. She brushes some hair out of your face, smiling down at you.

“I hear you’re going around destroying property.” She hums.

“I’m sorry, I can- I can get it fixed and pay for the damage I-“

“Darling, I’m certain your toe suffered more damage than the wall. And even if you destroyed a wall you would never have to pay for it.” She reassured you, brushing the tears from your cheeks gently. “How’s your foot?”

“It’s fine, I was being ridiculous.” You grumble.

“I’m sure that’s not true,” she frowns, “do you want to talk about it?”

You sigh, squeezing your eyes shut in an attempt to keep the tears from falling. You shrug, biting your lip as you sniffle.

“It’s fine I’m-I’ll be fine,” you croak.

“Talk to me darling,” she murmurs.

“I…” you try, not really sure where to start, “I don’t know I’m just…I just feel like- I just- everything is so overwhelming at the moment. I just- I feel like I’m drowning.”

Larissa taps your arm, gesturing for you to sit up. You do, a bit confused. You feel your heart melt when she shuffles behind you, pulling you to lie back against her. She wraps her arms around your stomach, squeezing you gently and pressing a kiss to the back of your head.

“Go on sweetheart,” she murmurs.

“I just-my whole life has been like flipped upside down. I mean I-I almost fucking died and-and then oh no wait I didn’t because it turns out I’m a vampire! Which is- I mean it’s really cool! And I’m not- I’m not upset or anything but…but my parents hid it from me my- my whole life and I-how am I supposed to feel about that? And my father is all high and mighty about it, pulling the ‘I was doing what was best for the family’ crap. And I can’t even fucking ask my mom about it because she’s-“

Your crying restarts in earnest then. You hide your face in your hands. Larissa holds you tighter, whispering soothing gentle words into your hair. She doesn’t ask any questions, simply holds you as you cry and reassures you that everything will be alright. It’s nice that you can just be with her, that she doesn’t expect anything from you. When you’ve calmed enough to speak again you continue.

“I can’t ask her about it because she’s dead. And she’s been dead for years and it still. I mean I went to therapy for it at the time. And I-it helped. But I-I keep wondering if- if she knew? If she- I mean she probably helped keep it a secret from me but…did she feel the way my dad does? Did she hate who I am too? Would she think I’m a monster?”

You sink further into Larissa’s embrace, grasping her hands with with of yours as you breathe shakily. She shuffles a bit, squeezing you again before she speaks.

“Your father is an idiot and a bastard for the way he treated you,” she whispers, “and I never knew your mother, so I won’t claim to know how she would feel. However, I do know you. And you are one of the kindest, most accepting, most lovely people I’ve ever met in my life. You’re always looking out for others, you’re always trying to help people. There’s nothing even remotely monstrous about you, my love.”

“You thought I was a monster though…” you mumble, bracing yourself for anger.

“I did,” she sighs shakily, resting her chin on your head, “and I-I can’t apologize enough for that. I need you to know that what I said, had nothing to do with who you are. I was-I took out my anger and fear on you. You’re not-there is absolutely nothing monstrous about you darling. And I will spend every moment of every day for the rest of my life trying to show you that.”

Your breath hitches at the sincerity in her voice. You awkwardly manoeuvre yourself to sit sideways between her legs, your foot preventing you from turning around completely. You stare up at her from where your head is resting against her arm, pouting and probably looking like a mess. But Larissa just smiles down at you, her face filled with so much love and adoration you feel the weight on your chest ease a little.

“I’m sorry-“ you start only to be interrupted when Larissa presses a finger to your lips.

“None of that now,” she chides, “you don’t need to apologize for feeling things. I’m so- I cannot express how much it means to me that you shared that with me. I know that one conversation isn’t going to solve your problems, but I promise I’ll be here for you whenever you need me. You know you can call me whenever you need alright?”

“But what if you’re busy I don’t want to bother you…”

“Nothing is more important than you darling.”

She says it with so much authority and sincerity that you genuinely forget how to breathe for a moment. She brushes a few more tears from your cheeks before kissing your forehead. It’s a bit awkward with the way you’re positioned. She chuckles at the noise of protest you let out when she adjusts the way she’s sitting.

“How about we go back to my quarters, get changed into more comfortable clothes and order some takeout? How does that sound darling?” She suggests.

“I-you don’t have to go through so much trouble for me Rissa.”

“I know I don’t. How about you let me anyway?” She grins.

Honestly, you don’t know what to say to that, and her cute grin makes your brain malfunction. So you nod up at her, your face flushing as she escorts you to her room.

And as you sit cuddled up to her later that evening, with her tracing abstract shapes on your arms, you truly feel like everything will be okay.

#htwahp #principal weems #larissa weems #larissa weems x reader #wednesday #larissa x reader #principal weems x reader

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teaberrii · 4 months

Text

Chapter 12: Eyes Everywhere

After ending a five-year relationship, you pour all your energy into work. Your latest assignment? Staying at a popular bed-and-breakfast to gather information. It should be a piece of cake... If only the owner isn't the man you scolded on the street.

Jing Yuan/You

Notes:

Cross-posted on Ao3

Female reader

Chapter index at the end of chapter one

You’re spending the rest of the afternoon doing research in the city. You manage to score an interview with some businessmen, and the responses of one of them have you see a silver lining.

“There are a lot of great business opportunities here besides hospitality. I mean… it truly is a great place if people here can get it up and running. It may be small, but they should take advantage of the island's natural resources. That can seriously boost its economy! I already know people who want to get factories up and running… but they’ve been and still are facing a lot of obstacles.

"Take this off the record, but I think the people here are too protective of themselves. Maybe it’s because of what happened to that owner that everyone sees outside influences as a threat.”

“Owner?” you ask.

“Yeah. Caelus… I think that was his name. He owned a boutique hotel”—the man points somewhere in the distance—” somewhere in that area on the next street over. I kind of knew his old man as my wife and I stayed there when it was just getting off the ground. It’s quite a shame. Their ideas were very unique, and I heard they were doing well before the awful news…”

“Have they said anything about their business running into some sort of trouble?”

“God, it was so long ago… but I remember a fight. Don’t know the man who was arguing with them but my wife was a local here. She’d never seen him before either, so it might’ve been an irritated customer since it was pretty clear he wanted to make a scene.”

You show him a picture of Caelus’s uncle. “Was this him?”

“Yeah! Pretty sure.”

So, that meant Caelus’s uncle mainly or had always stayed in the city. Was he already trying to sabotage the hotel before the Star Rails project with Jing Yuan's ex? Did the resentment go that far?

You thank the man for his time. Then, as he walks away, you quickly turn around. Perhaps you’re paranoid, but you swear you sense someone looking at you. But all you see are people and tourists walking around. Nothing out of the ordinary.

“Well, well, if it isn’t everyone’s favourite mother.”

You recognize that voice anywhere. You turn around, and your guess is right. “Didn’t think I’d see our athlete superstar walking the streets alone.”

“Yeah, well, not everyone gets the special opportunity to spend time with the one and only,” Dan Feng says with an amused grin. “You’re lucky.” You give him a deadpan look but start walking with him nonetheless. “So, how was the date? Did Jing Yuan treat you like the queen you are?”

“Flattery will get you nowhere, son.”

“Oof. You got me.”

“But, since you asked... I had a lot of fun. It was wonderful."

“Wonderful? Really? You’re too young to be sounding so old, Mom.” You raise a fist, and Dan Feng quickly raises the bag of groceries he’s holding to protect himself. “Just kidding!” You face forward just as he asks, “So, are you two official?”

You don’t know what to tell him. The less people know, the better. However, Jing Yuan already messaged you about Yanqing's mistake. And there’s also the project. You may be digging up dirt on Star Rails, but you’re still partly responsible for this project's success. Perhaps it’s best to wait until this is all over to announce the news.

“All right, I get it,” Dan Feng says. “I think I know why you want to keep it hush-hush for now.” He winks at you. “I’ll keep your secret, Mom. Don’t worry. But… Did you know his ex is back?”

“Who did you hear that from?”

“No one. I saw her myself. If I were to take an educated guess, she was going to pick up Yanqing.”

“Have you met her before?”

“Twice. Once when she and Jing Yuan were dating. The next was on their wedding day.”

“...Ah.”

Dan Feng gently nudges you. “Hey, don’t be getting jealous. They’re done for.”

You want to say you’re not jealous. It doesn’t bother you at all. And, maybe you’d really feel that way if you’d never seen her. But now that you’ve seen and met her in person… it feels more real.

You clear your throat. “Where’s your brother?”

“He’s been worried about Jingliu, so they’re out on a little date. I wanted to go, but he insisted on going alone.”

“Someone sure sounds disappointed.”

“Just between you and me, I think he has a thing for her.”

“Don’t tell me you’re jealous.”

“Me?” Dan Feng scoffs. “Oh, please. It’s Jingliu. It’d take someone really special to sweep her off her feet.”

“You don’t think Dan Heng meets those standards?”

“Do you think he does?”

“Sir, why are you asking me?”

“Well, you and Jingliu are kind of alike… You’re both women.”

“Very well spotted, thanks.”

“Honestly, I don’t think there’s a man or woman who exists that can match Jingliu. She’s unmatched.”

You and Dan Feng are almost at the bed and breakfast when the conversation turns to his training for the Global Games next year.

“It’ll probably be my last competition.”

“...Are you thinking about retiring?”

Dan Feng smiles, but it doesn’t quite reach his eyes. “Yeah. I don’t think I have much of a choice.”

There’s more to the story, but you don’t get to ask when you reach the stone villa. You see March and Welt sitting on the couch inside, and Pom is anxiously looking upstairs. Knowing exactly where it leads, you glance up. You hear faint conversation but not enough to know what’s going on, but you’re sure that the voices belong to Jing Yuan and his ex.

“What’s going on?” Dan Feng asks, pushing open the door. “Why are you all just sitting here?”

March sighs. “Because there’s a war going on upstairs.”

“Where’s Yanqing?” you ask.

“Upstairs with Jing Yuan and… his ex,” Welt says.

Pom puts some glasses on the table. “Let’s calm down, everyone.”

You take out your phone and see the last text from Jing Yuan.

She found out through Yanqing.

You’re sitting next to Welt when Pom puts a glass of water in front of you. “Everything will be okay,” he reassures.

“Why is Yanqing up there?” Dan Feng asks. “Why are they up there, anyway?”

“She wanted a place ‘to talk’,” Pom says. “Neither of them wanted to go to his place."

“Wait. How do you know this?”

“I… sorta overheard a little bit of their conversation when they got back. They came in, and Jing Yuan said they’ll be using the balcony upstairs.”

March leans back. “God, why’d she have to show up?”

You don’t know if you’ll get a response, but you text Jing Yuan anyway.

I’m downstairs. Is everything okay?

Just then, everyone hears footsteps, and the first person to appear is Jing Yuan. He’s carrying Yanqing who's resting his head on Jing Yuan’s shoulder. The poor kid looks exhausted. Behind Jing Yuan is his ex.

When Yanqing sees you, he lifts his head, and Jing Yuan puts him down. You stand and meet them halfway. Yanqing hugs your knees, and you affectionately pat his head.

“Is he okay?” you ask Jing Yuan.

There's a tired but stern look in Jing Yuan’s eyes. “He’s fine."

Then, his ex walks up to you, ignoring the stares of the others. “Let’s have dinner together.” She crosses her arms. “I have the information that you want, and I’ll give it to you on one condition.” Where is she getting this confidence from? “So, since we’re both here, let’s use the time to get to know each other. Just the two—”

“Enough.” Jing Yuan’s interruption makes the room go completely silent. Then, he shoots his ex a cold look. “Yanqing gave you his answer.”

“This is between me and her.”

“No, it’s not. You’re using other ways to try to get what you want without any consideration for your son.”

“Stop.” Yanqing’s muffled voice sounds desperate. “Stop fighting… Please…”

His ex turns to you, looking a little rattled. “So, we’ll have dinner tonight. Just me and you.”

You clench your fists, but you hold your tongue for Yanqing’s sake. As soon as she walks out the door, March lets out a breath. You still have a comforting hand around Yanqing’s head when she walks over.

“Geezus, what happened up—”

Dan Feng’s nudge makes her stop. He nods at Yanqing who’s still hugging your legs.

“I wanna go home,” Yanqing says, his voice still muffled.

You crouch and put your hands on his cheeks. “Then, let’s go home.”

The car ride back to Jing Yuan’s house is a quiet one. Before you get there, Jing Yuan reaches over and gives your hand a little squeeze. You turn to him, and you can see it in his eyes. He’ll tell you what happened but not with Yanqing in the car.

A short while later, Jing Yuan is making Yanqing a snack in the kitchen. You and Yanqing are in the living room, playing a game of chess, but you can tell from the tired and sad look in his eyes that he’s focused on something else.

“...I made a mistake.” At first, you think he’s talking about the game. “When Dad was driving me to school, he told me beforehand that I shouldn’t call you Mom while she’s here. I forgot, and…”

“Hey…” You sit next to him. “Don’t tell me you’re blaming yourself.”

“Maybe if I didn’t make that mistake, they wouldn’t have fought and…”

Jing Yuan puts a plate of healthy, homemade snacks on the table, and you and Yanqing look up at him. Then, Jing Yuan crouches and puts a hand around his son’s head. “It’s not your fault, Yanqing.”

“But… She got so mad.”

Jing Yuan glances at you. “Do you think calling her Mom is something you shouldn’t do?”

Yanqing looks at you. “Well, if she doesn’t mind…”

You kiss his head. “Of course I don’t.”

Jing Yuan affectionately ruffles his son's hair. "That means it's okay, and you didn't do anything wrong." Yanqing manages a small smile and Jing Yuan affectionately ruffles his hair. “Why don’t you take your snacks and watch some TV while Mom and I have a little talk?”

Yanqing looks from Jing Yuan to you and back to Jing Yuan. Then, he picks up his plate and walks over to the couch. You and Jing Yuan end up in the kitchen where he also prepared you a little something. But food is the last thing on your mind.

“I’ve never seen him so quiet,” you say. “What in the world happened?”

Jing Yuan sighs. “She wants you to leave Yanqing alone. If you do, she'll tell you what you want to know."

It takes a moment for his words to sink in.

“Yanqing never said you were seeing anyone,” his ex said, glaring at Jing Yuan.

"It's not something he should have to tell you."

“I don’t care what kind of relationship she has with you, but she’s not taking Yanqing away from me.” Then, she crouched and put her hand on Yanqing's shoulders. He was sitting on the couch, trying to disassociate from all of this negativity. Jing Yuan never wanted him here, but his ex refused to let him leave as she also wanted to set things straight with him. “Yanqing, Mom will give you a much better life in the city. We recently moved into a bigger house, and a new private school just opened—”

“...I don’t want to go.”

“Why? You can still see your dad, and—”

“It’s not just because of Dad,” Yanqing interrupted quietly. “I like it here, and it’s not like Dad isn't letting me see you. I still visit, but I don’t want to stay there… forever.”

“Yanqing, you’re still too young to understand, but—”

“You say he’s too young," Jing Yuan interrupted, "but at least he knows what he wants." She stood upright, and Yanqing ran over to Jing Yuan. "That might change when he gets older, but stop pressuring him into doing something he doesn’t want.”

“Pressuring him? I’m not! I’m reasoning with him.” His ex scoffed and crossed her arms. “It’s also because of her, isn’t it?”

"Stop saying it's because of her." Jing Yuan glared at her. "Because it's not. You're not respecting him."

She walked up until she was close enough to lower her voice so Yanqing couldn't hear. "I know she's looking for some information. She wouldn't come to me if it was easy to get." She returned his glare with one of her down. "I want her out of Yanqing's life."

“I’m not going to let Yanqing see her anymore." Jing Yuan puts his hands on the counter behind him. "Not alone, at least.”

You scoff. “I’m also not going to give her what she wants.”

A short silence passes where both of you are mulling over your thoughts about what to do with this crazy woman until…

“...But I'll still have dinner with her.” Jing Yuan looks up and sees you leaning against the wall. “She knows that you’ll definitely tell me what happened on the balcony. And, knowing that, I’m not going to run away.”

“If you made up your mind, I have an idea.”

“I’m all ears, General.”

◆◆◆

Jing Yuan drops you off at a nearby restaurant later that evening. As soon as you enter, you see his ex already at a table near the window. Taking a small breath, you walk over. You know she sees you but she’s still looking out the window. You slip off your coat and drape it over the back of the chair. Then, you casually put your phone face down on the table. When you sit down, she finally acknowledges you.

“How long have you been seeing Jing Yuan?”

“I thought we were here to talk about your deal, not my relationship with Jing Yuan.”

She pours herself some wine. “It’s related.”

“What’s your condition?”

She scoffs. “I feel like I’m looking into a mirror.”

You force a smile. "Let's not waste time.”

“Didn’t Jing Yuan tell you? I want you out of Yanqing’s life.”

“That’s impossible.”

“Then, no deal.”

You cross one leg over the other. “Regardless of who Jing Yuan dates, that person will be part of Yanqing’s life. Are you going to refuse whoever comes into their lives? Or, is it because it’s me, someone who happens to work at Star Rails?” A pause as you pour yourself some wine. “I also have other ways of getting what I need.”

“Are you threatening me?”

“Of course not. What would I gain from doing that?” You calmly look her in the eyes. “I’m giving you a chance to clear your name. Everyone thinks Star Rails has something to do with Caelus’s death. You were part of that project. It’s natural that people suspect you.”

“A chance to clear my name? Don’t make me laugh. I don’t have anything to hide.”

“Caelus’s uncle was a stakeholder in that project. You handled everything. It’s impossible not to have met him at least once. That time, you and Jing Yuan were still together and you knew that Caelus was his friend.”

“...What are you getting at?”

"Caelus and his uncle didn't have a good relationship. He even caused a scene at his hotel before meeting you. He must have known long before that Caelus wouldn't accept the offer from Star Rails. So, to succeed, you tried convincing Jing Yuan to convince Caelus to go through with the project. But, that failed. And somehow Caelus ends up dead."

“I didn’t have anything to do with that!” The sudden outburst turns a few heads. Then, she exhales sharply. “Why would his uncle want him to partner with Star Rails in the first place?”

Do you have the right answer? You have no idea. But the one you can think of is the only one that makes the most sense.

“Money. Caelus’s uncle wasn’t happy that his brother left Caelus with everything, including the hotel. Partnering with Star Rails is one way for him to get some kind of control over the hotel. There’d also be potential money under the table.”

“And what would I gain from that, hm? Yes, I wanted the project to succeed, but why would I help him?”

“He knew a guy.”

“I was talking to one of my business partners today, and… he mentioned Caelus’s uncle,” Jing Yuan said. “Not knowing that I know him.”

“What did they say?”

“He was recommending him as a potential partner as he’s supposedly a great businessman and friend. And he also has connections.”

“Wait a minute… Don’t tell me…”

Jing Yuan nodded. “He said Caelus’s uncle has been on good terms with senior management at Star Rails for a long time.”

“Senior management, huh?”

“He could put in a good word for you and help you climb the ranks,” you say.

“That doesn't guarantee I'll get anything. You’re going to have to try harder than that, Honey.”

"Then, why didn't you file the project reports? There wasn't anything suspicious about it other than Caelus's uncle being listed as a stakeholder. If you really don't have anything to hide, why don't you give a clear explanation?"

She’s looking off to the side when she says, “I just forgot.”

You almost scoff, but you don’t hide the disappointment on your face. You thought she would’ve come up with a better excuse than that.

“I have proof that you didn’t just forget.”

You think she’d ask for it, but instead, there's a pause before she says, “...He approached me first.”

Jing Yuan’s ex walked into a restaurant that evening. A stakeholder had invited her to a business dinner, and she'd thought others involved in the project would attend. But when she arrived, there was only one person. He was still dressed in the same outfit from the meeting earlier today.

“Ah, you’re here.”

She sat across from him, thinking whether she should stay or make an excuse to leave. “I thought there would be others joining us.”

He filled his glass and then hers with wine. “Let’s get right to it, shall we?” He picked up his glass and gestured for her to pick up hers. She reluctantly did so.

Clink!

“I’ve heard a lot of great things about your performance," he said, "and this project is apparently a make or break for a big promotion.”

“...Um, yes. That’s right. Does this have anything to do with—”

“My nephew is the owner of the boutique hotel.”

It took a moment for those words to sink in. She shouldn’t be so surprised as they have the same last name, but it was so common that she didn’t think twice.

“Let me tell you now that you won’t have any luck trying to convince him. This project is just an idea… a vision of what could happen. But, it’s not going to work.”

“If you have such strong concerns about it, why didn’t you raise them during the meeting?”

He extends his arms to the side. “Because if I did, the project wouldn’t be a success.”

“What… What are you saying?”

“My nephew won’t partner with Star Rails because our vision doesn’t align with his. Regardless of what happens, he wants to remain independent, and he won’t change his mind. Unless…”

“Are we ready to order?”

You almost frown when you hear the young waiter interrupt Jing Yuan’s ex. When you look at him, his innocent smile almost makes you sigh. After the waiter leaves, you turn back and see Jing Yuan’s ex calmly sipping her wine.

“...You were saying?” you ask.

She puts her wine glass on the table. “There’s nothing else to say.”

There is. You can feel it.

“...Did he have something to do with Caelus’s death?”

“You’re asking the wrong person.”

Are you, really?

“But, I had nothing to do with it."

After a brief silence, you say, “...You asked how long I was seeing Jing Yuan. What about you and your fiancé? How did you two meet?”

She slightly narrows her eyes. “Why are you asking?”

“He told me today that I had no idea what you went through. It just made me curious is all.”

“...Why would he tell you that?”

You look her in the eyes. “You tell me. It sounded like it had something to do with Caelus.”

“Let’s not get off topic. I told you what you wanted to know. Now, it’s my turn. Stay away from Yanqing.”

“This isn’t about me. Have you considered what he wants?”

“He’s too young to understand.”

“About what? You say he’s too young, but even I don’t understand why you want him to stay away from me."

"I don't need another person to be a bad influence on him. I'm already trying to get him out of this godforsaken town." She gives you a cold look. "Convincing Jing Yuan is hard enough. I don't need another person in my way."

"Godforsaken town? Why do you hate this place so much?"

She scoffs. "You haven't noticed? They aren't exactly the friendliest people to outsiders who want to do business here. They're too narrow-minded. I only want what's best for my son."

“Having me stay away from him isn’t going to help your case. It’s a short-term solution to a long-term problem. He may be young, but you should at least respect him.”

“Sorry for the wait!”

You don’t bother looking at the waiter as he sets your food in front of you. You give a nod of thanks just before he leaves. When you turn back, Jing Yuan’s ex is looking at you with a composed expression unlike before.

She looks as if she has something to say, but her phone goes off. After a glance, she says, “So, I take you aren’t going to do it.”

Perhaps you're paranoid, but you turn around. You sense you're being watched. But nothing seems out of the ordinary.

When you turn back, Jing Yuan's ex is already standing and putting on her coat. "Then, we have nothing else to discuss." She calls the waiter over, and there's confusion on his face but he does as he's told. He walks over, glances at you, and packs away her food.

You watch as they walk away. When you glance out the window, you see her cross the street and get into a car. You pick up your phone and turn off the recording that's been going on ever since you sat down. After texting Jing Yuan and knowing he’s on his way, you go to pay for your food. You step out into the cold, scrolling through your phone as you think about what you’ve learned.

You're sure Caelus's uncle has something to do with Caelus's death, and you also have a hunch that Jing Yuan's ex knows something about it if her fiancé's words are anything to go by. Was it the guilt of knowing and not doing anything? Or was it guilt—

Your eyes widen when a hand swiftly covers your nose and mouth. Your phone drops to the ground. Your hands are in a bind behind you. Despite your struggles, your attacker drags you into an alleyway, leaving your phone with an incoming call from Jing Yuan on the cold cement.

Chapter 13

Tag list: @suoshiii @lordbugs @lxry-chxn @seirenspinel @immahuman @queencybow @nqctre @grimreapersscythe @winterpein @asakenajustexistshere

#jing yuan x reader #jing yuan x y/n #jingyuan x you #jingyuan x reader #jing yuan x you #honkai jing yuan #hsr jing yuan

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kedreeva · 1 year

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#wow now i hate nancy even more like what an overly critical bitch#it's not even bad jfc#wtf was her point other than stomping down on steve and constantly saying how stupid he is#god i hate that cheating bitch who thinks she's so much better and smarter than everyone#stranger things (via @captaincoffeegirl515)

So I get you're mad, but also, this isn't cool. Hating on characters in tags of posts that you didn't make isn't cool. Hating on Nancy isn't cool, either. Fandom isn't and shouldn't be about hate. If fandom is making you angry enough to spew vitriol like this, you may need to step back and take a breather.

If you actually watch the scene this is about, she isn't calling Steve stupid. She doesn't make fun of him, she doesn't even tell him it's bad. He assumes, from her face as she reads, that she thinks it's bad, that she thinks he's bad at writing. Even if he was (which that essay argues he isn't, and I don't think he is), and even if she did (which I don't think she does), she does not say so. In fact she's only encouraging wrt to the paper itself.

Before Nancy even says anything at all, Steve says "It's crap, I know" and Nancy's immediate reaction is to say "No, it's not crap!" Steve then insists "It's not good," and Nancy's response is an affectionate smile and "It's going to be! It just needs some reorganizing." She's not even talking about editing the writing itself or the concepts! She gently asks if she can mark on his paper - respecting that he might not want her to help that directly even after he's clearly asked her to look at it, which is loads better than some commenters I've seen on AO3 these days - and he agrees.

And the thing is? She's being kind about the editing she does do! Literally the first thing she does is tell him she sees the metaphor he's using (acknowledging that she knows he understands metaphor enough to create his own from scratch) and tells him it's a great metaphor. When she does point out something that needs addressing, she doesn't tell him "you did this wrong" she tells him "I don't see how they're connected." Do you know what that is? That's straight up gentle help. That's "you have connected these, I am not saying they are not connected, I am just saying I don't see the connection." I don't do a lot of editing but I've had a lot of editing done at me, and this language is so kind. It does not invalidate the thing the writer is trying to do, it just tells them that if they want to make that point, they have to elaborate to make it clearer to people who aren't inside their head with them. That's a perfectly valid critique and she is giving it to him very softly.

He then explains the point and she turns back to the paper to start rereading when he interrupts to ask if he should start from scratch and she immediately tells him no. She asks about the deadline, he tells her it's tomorrow (for early acceptance, which means Steve is trying to get this in early but also that he's waited until the last second for that), and then he asks if she can come over and help him with it (which a) is him forgetting they already have plans and b) is asking her to give up her plans to do work with him on short notice when he probably had time before this he could have asked. I say this to make it clear that her reaction isn't out of the blue or unjustified).

Nancy, who is still torn up over her best friend being brutally murdered on her watch while she was right there after brushing Barb off, and who still feels horribly guilty about having to lie to Barb's parents about it all, says no, remember they have dinner with Barb's parents that they already bailed on last week- ie, Nancy doesn't want to brush off Barb's parents again when brushing off Barb is what got Barb killed. She even tells Steve "You don't have to go" and suggests he work on the paper instead, giving him an easy out. And he grabs the paper and crumples it and does the thing that raises my hackles saying what's the point and acting like trying won't matter and he may as well give up on it because it wasn't instantly perfect the first time.

The point of contention in this scene is NOT that Nancy is telling him he's stupid, it's NOT that she thinks his paper is crap. The point of contention is that Steve desperately wants life to move forward away from the terrible thing that happened to them, and Nancy cannot walk away from the past that left her so damaged. He wants to focus on a paper to get him into a college (I like to think it's the one she wants to go to, so they can stay together, but that's just a theory), and she wants to go wallow in a sad dinner with the grieving parents of her dead best friend. That is the argument. It has nothing to do with his paper except that the paper is a device to show he's trying to move forward and the dinner is showing that she's stuck in the past.

This also isn't Nancy thinking she's better or smarter than anyone. This is Steve being faced with having to care about schoolwork because for maybe the first time in his life the result of his written work matters to him and he's very easily frustrated by not being immediately successful, and Nancy being so wrecked by the trauma she went through that she's barely keeping her own head above water, such that she cannot help him the way he needs despite wanting to. This isn't anyone treating anyone badly out of malice or being a bad person; this is incompatibility rearing its head and getting ready to bare its teeth. This is their trauma responses butting heads. This is the first whisper of how much they don't and can't fit right now. It is the first sign that they aren't going to stay together.

I don't doubt that they love each other. It's not even a question to me. But despite the idea sold to so many people in story and song, love isn't enough. It can't be the only thing. You can love someone to the moon and back but if you don't fit, you don't fit- and trying to carve yourself into the right shape will do far more harm than good. And that's what we'll see them realize, later, and that's why they split apart. Not malice, not meanness, not even apathy. They care so much in opposite directions that they're liable to tear each other apart trying to stay together, and instead of forcing it to break them the way he did in season 1, Steve will end up letting go this time. And personally, I think that's an awesome display of character growth.

#stranger things #nancy wheeler #steve harrington #wank for ts #stranger things meta #and I just want to say that like #if you think you love steve but you hate nancy this much #you don't love steve #I absolutely don't want them to get together for a lot of reasons #but he loves her still #and she loves him still #and that should matter #it should matter as much as steve and robin's love matters #because there's something deep there #and romance isn't the only outlet #I would take the intimate knowledge that someone would kill for me #over romance any day #anyway we don't hate on nancy in this house #I don't want hate anywhere near me #they're traumatized teenagers dealing with things no one should ever have to deal with #and also they are characters victim to plot devices #and we're gonna respect both #also adding this: carving themselves into shape is bad #growing to fit together... that's the good shit #especially if how they fit later isn't how they expected #but is even better

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mrsriddles-blog · 2 months

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I actually find it quite rude that you do this weekly rec thing ? It's disrespectful to other writers who also write great stuff ..... Maybe you should just stop it or if you love it so much maybe in a month or something? When did you start this stuff anyway ? As a writer I feel like you should be more considerate towards other writers feelings . And no this is not out of jealousy , my work has been on your list and that's how I found out about this . In no way am i putting you down , I just wanted to get this out in a way that didn't seem rude

I started the weekly read thing to mainly keep track of everything I read during the week. It’s literally everything I’ve read so far this year. I love it and I do think it gives authors the spotlight during the week. I try to get new authors included every week if possible, but I genuinely just go through a read what I have in my likes posts and keep track of it.

I never meant to offend anyone and make anyone think it’s rude. It wasn’t my intention. I did consider once a month, but I prefer the weekly reads simply because I do read a lot on Tumblr and it’s hard enough to keep track of it all in my notes app where I compile the list.

I started at the beginning of the year as a new way to track what I was reading, but as an author myself I wanted to be able to recommend other works from other authors. It can be challenging to find these amazing works, especially when tags are misused constantly. So, as a reader it’s nice to be able to help other readers/authors who may struggle with finding new fics for their favorite characters.

If there are truly more than just you out there who don’t like that I do this and whatnot, feel free to reach out. If you don’t want to be on the list, you can tell me and I’ll make a list of those who want no part of the list. But, I’m sorry you find it disrespectful and rude. I never intended for that. I had done it in the beginning to help me keep track of what I was reading as I love to read a lot on here (I have OCD and really bad ADHD, so it’s a nice little thing I’ve done to keep me organized, but to help me remember) , Ao3, and Wattpad. It’s easy for me to keep track of all that I read—and there are some fics I find myself going back to because I loved them so much—so this was not to gain any sort of limelight on myself for doing or to shade other authors or whatnot. If anything, I mean the best and I know I try to include some writers who have just started on the Tumblr platform as it can be hard to find your audience.

Again, I never meant to offend anyone or to make it seem as if I were being rude. If anyone truly feels that way, feel free to message me or comment below. I won’t be offended! But, if there’s truly a lot of people out there who fill this way, maybe I will stop doing the posts and find another way to keep track of the reads. Again, I didn’t mean to offend anyone. Or I can continue, but if you’ve been on the list and don’t want to be on it, message me. I’ll be sure not to put you on the list in the future if it makes you uncomfortable or if you simply don’t like it.

I’m sorry to anyone who has been on the list and if I’ve offended you. I hadn’t seen anything negative, so I assumed that everyone was enjoying it as much as I.

#masterlist #week reads #weekly reading #slytherin boys #sturniolo triplets #coriolanus snow

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boomstab-papa · 2 months

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Tae's guide to Pillowfort

So you fucking hate what tumblr is doing, you're fed up, but you don't know where else to go / what to do when you get there

Here's a guide what I've been up to over on Pillowfort:

For starters, new users need to either get an invite code (message me if you want one, because I literally always have some!) or donate to Pillowfort's operating costs to get started. I recommend getting a code first, and then donating later if you decide you like Pillowfort.

Recognize that Pillowfort has no ads and does not sell user data, so you are not the product. You are the customer. Pillowfort lives because users give their money to the webisite directly, just like how ArchiveOfOurOwn.org operates. If you give Pillowfort a try... and you want to see it keep growing... and you have a couple bucks to throw their way... please consider donating!

On your new account, you'll set up your blog. User icon, description, settings, etc. You get one blog per account. Consider making this your "everything" blog, where you make your original posts AND reblog things.

Consider making a Community that will serve the same purpose as a tumblr sideblog. For example, I made my main blog ceylon-tae and then made the Community "ceylon-tae-art". Just make the Community for now.

Did you set your NSFW and blacklist preferences? You should. Filters & Blacklist have their own link in the sidebar, so you don't have to go into your Settings every time you want to blacklist something. Easy!

Join some more Communities! Think of joining a [Fandom] Community like following the [Fandom] tag on tumblr. Posts from that Community will show up on your feed now! Here is a list of the currently-most-active communities.

Follow some people! You might have seen some of your comrades on tumblr posting their Pillowfort accounts, or maybe you really liked someone's post in a Community and you decide you'd like to follow them! Go follow them! Their posts will show up on your feed now!

Make a post! Remember to add any relevant tags to the post, especially if your post is NSFW, and don't cen/s0r your tags. Your post will now show up on your blog, and you can control who can see it, reblog it, or comment to it. You can make text, image, video, or link posts.

Now you can reblog that post you made to your Community that you made! Or to another Community someone else made! Some Communities review submitted reblogs before posting them, others do not. Remember to add the relevant tags to your reblog here as well.

Reblog posts you enjoyed, so you can show it to your followers!

If you have something to say about the post, Pillowfort has a nested comments section! Livejournal / Dreamwidth / Reddit users will find this familiar. Newbies will hopefully find it easy to learn: make your own comment, reply to the comments other people have made, talk to people in a space that's made for talking and replying.

You can make your own hush-hush commentary in your tags when you reblog a post to your blog, but these tags are not visible anywhere else. So Pillowfort is not gonna rat you out to OP when you make weird tags on your reblog. But also there is no bulit-in way to read everyone's tags in one long list.

You cannot make addendums to posts when you reblog them. If you want to add something, make a comment! Or make your own post and include link to the original post.

Seriously. Comments section. Good stuff. If you enjoy a post, check out its comment section. For comparison, tumblr discussions lived in reblogs, but comments on AO3 fics are what makes an author's world go 'round. Comments are where discussion lives on Pillowfort. So comment on the post if you have something to say! You can have real discussions again! GO. BE FREE. You can also do a Kung Pow Penis in nested comments if you want to. Nested comments are good.

Likes just tell OP you liked the post. That's it. It's just like how kudos works on AO3.

Remember, there's no algorithm, so Likes don't boost any post's visibility, and if you want other people to see a post, you reblog it. If you want to see posts, you follow people and communities, or you dive into the tags for yourself.

There's more details and things to know, but I think these are some good basics for "how the fuck do I even get started"

More how-to-pillowfort guides: https://www.pillowfort.social/posts/3459763 by DoktorHobo https://www.pillowfort.social/posts/4099124 by rah https://www.pillowfort.social/posts/4404622 by killerandhealerqueen

In summary:

Make a blog. Make posts. Make a niche-interest Community or three. Follow people and Communities. Reblog other people's posts to your blog. Reblog posts to your niche-interest Communities. Make comments. Reply to comments. Love the comments. The comments are a fertile land and we will thrive. And we will call it... Pillowfort!

#pillowfort #talking #still figuring out cohost but i do like what people post there too

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numbuh-7-knd · 6 months

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Inspired by this post, where I was trying to come up with non-whump/angsty scenarios for

Character A holds Character B in their arms while kicking open a door.

Which quickly turned into Desert Duo/Mumscarian fluff which then transitioned into general hermitshipping fluff. feel free to elaborate on any of this if you feel like it, I'm probably not going to do much more than maybe upload this to AO3 as is.

Scar grabbing Grian (or Mumbo, or both) to watch disney movies. they're hanging out at Scarland and Scar talks about something he's building in Scarland and how it was inspired by such and such movie (maybe it's something for the adventure area of the park, inspired by a disney attraction that was inspired by Peter Pan) and Grian says he's never seen that one.

Scar gasps dramatically, before picking Grian up and flying to the Scarland Theatre, slamming the door open only to remember that it's only a facade, probably flying into something, rushes to the castle, he doesn't have a bedroom or sitting area, and then rushing them to Grian's base looking for a spot to watch a movie, only Grian doesn't have one either, rushes to Mumbo's.

He startles Mumbo, and Either Mumbo's vault is good enough for movie watching or they involve the rest of the hermits until they find a sufficiently comfy place for movie watching, all the while refusing to put Grian down.

Maybe for added hilarity he hands Grian to mumbo for a bit so he can get Jelly or snacks, or both.

Mumbo going along with it and Grian complaining about it while not actually fighting them on it, like my cat does when I hold her sometimes and she wants to pretend she's not a cuddle bug and verbally complains the whole time while snuggling and staying put in my arms even though we both know if she really wanted to get down she'd jump out of my arms or bite and scratch me.

Scar claiming it's "soulmate privilege" when Grian complains, and Mumbo jumping on that claiming "Soul Sharing" privilage. The other hermits jump on that with those amounts them with soulmates (the ones who participated in double life) joining with their soulmates while the ones who's soulmates aren't hermits complain and those without soulmates pout about it, until someone agrees to be "honorary soulmates" with them. Grian and Scar agree that Mumbo's a part of their soulmate trio no questions asked. Cleo offers to be Joe's honorary soulmate, saying that what's one more when she already has Scott, and Joe accepts but also wants Ollie as an honorary soulmate.

Impulse and Bdubs hang out, making Etho jealous, while Tango longs for Jimmy and Zedaph feels left out. Maybe Skizz can be his honorary soulmate.

Etho misses Joel at least a little bit, but he also does not like seeing Bdubs cuddling with Impulse. Does he wish he was cuddling with Bdubs instead? Yes No, he's just... bothered by them cuddling, for some reason. It's weird! double life was months ago now! they've completed a whole 'nother season of the life series and started another one! and besides look at Zed! look how sad he is! *Camera panes to Zed, busy trying to complete Zedvancements* Impulse and Tango should be doing stuff with him not worrying about something as silly as soulmates!

Gem offers to be Pearl's "honorary soulmate" since Scott didn't want her.

Maybe BigB visits for Ren, or maybe Ren spends it with Doc, who has to be talked out of having the entire Sci-craft server over.

The Hermits end up arranging a big sleepover/movie night to invite their various soulmates or soulmate adjacent people over to the server to hang out. They build a "drive in" movie theatre in the shopping district.

halfway through the "movie night" they have to move indoors because the area wasn't spawn proofed enough. They end up in someone's base or shop with lots of pillows and blankets on the floor. maybe they go to scar's bed shop, or they make a pillow fort in the iBuy lobby.

#hermitcraft #hermit shipping #trafficshipping #desert duo #double life #mumscarian #goodtimeswithscar #Grian #Mumbo Jumbo #trafficblr #my writing

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hunterssm00n · 5 months

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Hello, From the Other Side

Lex reflects back on her experience under the ice in the Pyramid, and remembers the one reason she made it out alive. Set one year after the events that occurred on Bouvetoya Island. | Lex/Scar |

part 1 of 2

my Scar & Lex series on ao3: here

*cw psychological trauma*

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧‎♡‧₊˚

It was quiet.

Not the deadly kind of quiet that precedes an earth-shaking storm, nor the kind that you note in horror movies, where it always seems to be followed by the killer making his next bloody score. This was a peaceful quiet.

However serene this type of silence was, there was always that little voice in Lex's head now that whispered for her to be alert. Ever since the incident ("accident", as the news reports had deemed it) on Bouvetoya Island, this little voice had been constant. It spoke to her in the most un-assuming of times, always reminding her to watch herself. It was rather embaressing at times; especially in front of other people. Going all Amazon-warrior-lady, her eyes scanning every surface, her spine going rigid... It was definitely a way to leave an impression, though not necesarrily one that she would've preferred. She knew it wasn't schizophrenia; she didn't need a doctor to tell her that. Rather, it was a form of post-traumatic stress disorder - a constant survival instinct that, one year later, she still couldn't seem to shake. But then again, the news reports hadn't known the full extent of what had happened, hadn't seen the things she saw. What had occured on Bouvetoya Island was no mere accident.

Who could blame her for being paranoid? She had every right, as the therapist had told her, to feel the way she did. She didn't want this right. She wanted to feel normal again. Wanted to worry about paying her electric bill on time, about what she was going to wear on a date, about what she was going to have for dinner. Not about whether or not there would be a monster lurking around the corner in the hallway of her house, waiting to drag her off into the darkness.

Lex Woods crunched through the snow up the walkway of her little cubby in the forest. The heavy grocery bag in her right hand was nearly weighing her down, as her left hand searched for her house key in her coat pocket. Her fingers found the familiar ridges of a Pepsi-Cola bottlecap, and she knew the key would come out with the cap should she pull the string. She had turned the bottlecap necklace into a makeshift keychain, and it served its purpose as both a practical asset and a memoir.

She inserted the key into the lock on her front door, giving a small smile at the thought of her friend, Sebastian. In the few hours they'd been friends, they'd come to know each other better than she knew most of her female friends she'd been in the company of for years. In an instinctive, survival situation though, it was easy to get to know someone on a deeper level; whether they were a runner or a fighter, how well they did under pressure, how deeply they let their fear affect them.

Stepping inside her house, Lex stomped the snow off of her boots, and gently pushed the door shut. All of the main lights were on in her house, creating a bright, warm atmosphere. Since the incident, Lex had a hard time walking into a completely dark room. She'd taken to leaving lights on even when she wasn't home, just in case she came back after dark, so she wouldn't have to step into the shadows to try and find the lightswitch. She hadn't been kidding about wanting to worry about paying her electric bill - it was more often then not a little outrageous for someone who lived by themself.

Hanging up the bottle cap on the key hook next to her door, she took a moment to study the familiar logo etched on the surface of the cap. Remembering the sardonic way Sebastian had explained how he found it, she gave another small smile. That was a good sign. It had taken her a long time to think about him without crying.

Lex toed her boots off, nudging them with a sock-clad foot over onto the floor mat so they could dry. Heaving the bag of groceries up, she carried it over towards the brightly lit kitchen area while stripping off her winter skins with her free hand. She left her coat on the back of an armchair, along with her hat, scarf, and gloves. Before Bouvetoya, she never would have left it laying around. She was a meticulous person - especially about her space. She kept things very tidy and neat. While her home was still clean, even now, she had stopped caring about little things such as leaving her coat on a chair. Things like that didn't really phase her now, it seemed.

During the process of unloading her groceries, a sudden thundering on her roof nearly had her jumping out of her skin, and she gasped as the blood zapped through her veins like an electric shock. Dropping the bag of apples in her hand, the paper bag practically exploding on impact with the floor, the hand that had been holding them immediately clenched into a fist.

The rumbling seemed to roll down the slope of her roof before thumping to the ground with enough impact to rattle her kitchen window.

She was in front of the window before she even knew what she was doing, and tore back the curtain to reveal whatever was making the noise. An avalanche of snow was seen pouring off the roof onto the ground, then it slowed to a stop with the last pitter patters of the packing, wet substance hitting the ground. Snow. It had been snow. It hadn't been the first time snow had come rocketing down from one of the trees over her house, but she was shaking like it was nothing she'd ever experienced. No. Like it was something she had experienced, and never wanted to go through again.

To make doubly sure, she took a moment to listen for... She didn't know exactly what. For something, anything out of the ordinary. That same, peaceful silence met her ears, her fridge humming being the only other sound besides her pounding heart.

Satisfied that she wasn't in danger, she let the curtain drop to cover the window, and turned back to face the warm, light room. Leaning back against the counter, she tried to calm herself. Placing a hand over her heart, she knelt to sit on the floor, trying in vain to breathe steadily through her nose. The familiar signs of a panic attack flooded to the surface of her mind, and she was just grounded enough to roll her eyes. She was actually having an anxiety attack over snow.

She breathed in through her nose, letting it out through her mouth, leaning her head back against the cupboard to open her windpipe so she could suck in more oxygen. Staring at the cieling, she laid both hands flat on the floor, extending her legs out in front of her. You're fine, you're fine.

And then she thought of him.

He was always in the back of her mind, and who could blame her for keeping his memory alive? He had been her warrior partner through the crucial climactic point of their survival journey under (and later, above) the ice. She had saved his life, and he had saved hers. Back to back, together they had fought their way out of the maze of the Pyramid. He was a prescence in her mind, and at times like this, he pushed to the front of her brain like an emergency responder, trying to revive her. Physically, he was not there, but he lived on in her memory. During her "moments" like this, the thought of him always either made her feel better, or worse.

Better, because he had essentially saved her life. She liked to think she would have survived without him, but in reality, she knew she would not have. Her savior had protected her, helped her back onto her feet when she had been knocked down, had done the impossible and ensured her survival. And that was usually where the 'worse' feelings began - the fact that she had been the lone survivor.

It was a psychological thing, she knew. She longed for him to once again help her through her fear, to stand her up and brush her off. She ached for it, sometimes. He had been there, experienced this horror with her. He had made her feel safe - not in the lovey-dovey, soap opera, romance novel kind of way, but literally. She had felt the reassurance of safety, being with someone who could face those monsters, and was more than capable of destroying them. She'd seen him do it. The thought of him was the only thing that made her feel safe anymore. And he was gone.

During her panicked moments, she held onto the thought of him like a lifeline, and it made her ache to think that that was all he would every be; a thought. A distant memory of someone she had only known for a few hours, but had left more of an imprint on her mind than anyone she'd ever known. Sebastian had been a handsome, charming, wonderful person, and Lex could definitely have seen herself remaining his close friend, had he survived Bouvetoya.

But it was not Sebastian she thought of when she awoke from her nightmares.

Lex had one hand on her heart as it started to calm, and the other moved to cover her forehead as fresh tears rolled down her cheeks. The way the mind worked under moments that relied only on instinct, the things people never realized about themselves until they were placed under that pressure... Lex had realized that she, like him, was a warrior. He wouldn't have marked her cheek with his barbaric, warrior symbol had she not been. But since they had been through such an intense situation together, and he had been the only one to make it to the surface with her, she now had a terrible time dealing with any thought of Bouvetoya without his memory. It was crazy, and silly, she knew. But she missed him. That was probably, she thought bitterly, another side-effect of her post-traumatic, whatever. Placing all of her emotions and distress onto him, putting all of her faith into him, trusting him to keep her safe, even now, when he wasn't here.

She didn't even know his real name (only her nickname for him, based on the mark he had given both of them once they reached the surface), but she knew his prescence. It was unforgettable. She pined for that prescence in her moments of fear.

A small noise escaped her throat, and she let out a shakey breath. "I'm sorry," she whispered, another whimper following her words, "I'm so, so sorry." Sorry that she hadn't been strong enough to protect him, as he had done for her.

After a few more minutes of steady breathing, Lex finally dried her eyes, and picked herself up off the ground.

"This can't be healthy, missing a dead alien from another freakin' galaxy," she muttered, trying to lighten her mood. "Not good for someone's health, at all."

Lex bent to pick up one of the many apples scattered across her kitchen floor, when another crashing noise came from her roof. She jumped, then shook her head, "Snow, you idiot, it's snow."

Then, what sounded like something crawling, on hands and feet, scaling the slope of her roof. Lex frowned. It was snow, right?

Holding her breath, she heard the steady thump, bump reach the edge of her roof, and then came to a THUD right outside the front of her house. She would've ran and hid, or even fainted in terror, had she not heard a familiar chittering, clicking noise coming from outside.

It can't be. She had heard that noise enough to know what it meant; it was something she could never forget. Lex walked slowly towards the door, one foot in front of the other, but she didn't even make it there before the damn thing was kicked open, slamming against the wall with enough force to rattle the windows, yet again.

She shrieked, jumping back a few feet, putting the kitchen island between her and whatever was about to come through the door. In no time at all, as though she was in danger and it was coming to her aid, a massive, hulking figure flew through the doorway, nearly smashing both walls down in it's haste. It was a blur, until it landed steadily on the floor a few feet away from the wide open entrance to her house. Then, only then, was she able to comfirm her suspicion.

It was a - well, whatever her companion had been. She noted the smooth, black dreadlocks that adorned it's head, as well as it's massive size, even crouched down, like it was now. Then the creature lifted it's head to look at her, and rose to it's full height. She gasped, unable to stop the noise even if she'd been in the right frame of mind to do so. Her heart pounded still, but in a completely different way, this time. Not out of fear, but out of disbelief; out of, dare she think it, excitement.

"Scar?"

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧‎♡‧₊˚

AN: I do not own the Alien vs Predator franchise or any of it's characters. I also do not own the song 'Hello' by Adele.

part two

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miraculousmultifan · 3 months

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Taylor Swift prompt fest!

Steve / Eddie Shake It Off Season 02 AU - the Halloween Party The most Steve-coded of these Steve-coded lyrics: I go on too many dates But I can't make 'em stay But I keep cruisin' Can't stop, won't stop movin' It's like I got this music in my mind Sayin' it's gonna be alright

My ex-man brought his new girlfriend She's like, "Oh my God!" but I'm just gonna shake And to the fella over there with the hella good hair Won't you come on over, baby? We can shake, shake, shake (yeah)

hiii!! thank you so much for the prompt! i hope you enjoy the fic :D

as a reminder, this is part of my event: stranger things (taylor's version), and you can find the prompt list HERE

i'm also cross-posting this fic (and every other fic from this event) to my ao3, so if you'd prefer to read it there, HERE IS THE LINK

Shake It Off

When Steve stepped out of the bathroom, leaving Nancy to… freshen up, he hadn’t wanted to see Jonathan Byers right after. But nothing ever seemed to go his way after that slimy monster attacked them, did it?

It doesn’t matter. Just shake it off, man.

“Hey, Steve,” Jonathan called to him meekly. “Have you seen Nancy? She invited me, but I haven’t seen her since I got here.”

It’s probably not what you think, Steve. Shake it off.

“She’s in the bathroom by the kitchen. She’s gotten pretty drunk so you should probably drive her home,” Steve replied, deadpan, trying to keep his voice even to avoid making a scene.

Jonathan cocked his head. “You aren’t taking her?”

Trying to think of any other excuse that wasn’t ‘we had a fight and the sight of her right now makes me want to scream,’ Steve replied, “I’ve been drinking too, man. Don’t wanna get a DUI.”

Without another word, they parted ways. As Steve was walking away, he heard Nancy delightedly exclaim, “Jonathan!” His chest clenched, and he attempted to stop the scowl from darkening his face.

Shake. It. Off. Steve!

Although he hadn’t realized he was doing it, Steve made his way to the kitchen to grab another drink. Beer wasn’t really cutting it anymore, but he remembered seeing someone dump vodka into the fruit punch, so he poured himself a hefty cup of the stuff. If he was going to stick around this party, Steve certainly wasn’t going to do it without adding a little artificial fun.

Once he had started feeling the buzz of the alcohol fogging up his brain pleasantly, Steve joined the thrum of people in the living room dancing. The current song was one that Steve couldn’t remember the name of, but he knew that he loved it!

While the kind of dancing everyone else was doing seemed to revolve around nodding their heads, tapping their feet, and just generally trying to look cool, Steve let himself loosen up. It was like he became the center of attention, feeling the music move through him as he matched the beat with his body.

And it was fun! Way more fun than if he decided to go straight home and mope around in his empty house because Nancy didn’t love him.

The thought of Nancy sobered him up a little, though. Now he was at the point where he could hear conversations happening around him.

“I saw Nancy Wheeler leave the party with that loner, Byers. Harrington really can’t make them stay. Imagine losing your girlfriend to the same guy twice.”

“You’d think after dating half of the female student body he’d figure out how to get a girl to like him for more than just a quick fuck.”

Steve tried to lose himself in the music again.

“Harrington really fell off, huh. That weird fucking dance makes him look like a barfing cat.”

“Literally! I can’t believe we all thought he was cool. This is so lame it’s sad.”

For some reason, Steve found himself sinking back into the feeling from before. He was having fun. He was making his own dance up, and it felt great!

Soon, though, the song switched to something with a different beat, and Steve had to find the rhythm again. When he opened his eyes to get a better grip on his bearings though, he was looking directly at Eddie Munson standing in the corner.

He looked unimpressed and generally disinterested, and Steve frowned. It was a really bad look to have someone unhappy at your party. Sure, technically it wasn’t Steve’s party, but as the proclaimed “King of Parties,” he was basically his duty to right this infraction.

Before Steve even realized he was walking, his feet led him straight to Munson, stopping him too close for the average person’s comfort. He started drafting what he was going to say, trying to find the right combination of words that would get Munson to have fun, but instead…

“If you’re here for weed, your Majesty, I’m afraid I’m fresh out of stock for the night,” Munson drawled, watching Steve with guarded eyes.

“What?” Steve blinked once. Then twice. Oh… “Ah, right. Weed.” Ever eloquent, that was where Steve’s mouth decided to shut off.

Munson raised an eyebrow at Steve suspiciously. “If you weren’t looking for weed, why are you standing here?”

“You’re not having fun,” Steve stated. Come on, get to the point, Steve!

Putting on a theatrical face, Munson sing-songed, “What an astute observation, my Lord! Though, I do regret to inform you that this is strictly a business venture. Nobody has fun when they’re conducting business, my Liege.”

All of Munson’s fancy words were kind of fucking up Steve’s ability to get the words he wanted to say out of his brain and into his mouth. “Huh?”

Munson sighed, obviously becoming fed up with Steve's conversation skills. “Did this conversation have a point, or did the braincells I lost while standing here just die for nothing?”

“Come dance with me!” Steve finally suggested.

“I beg your everloving fuck?” Munson answered, his face twisted in several different complicated expressions.

Steve grinned. “You’re not having fun, so come dance with me! I wasn’t having fun a couple minutes ago, and now I feel great!” He paused for a moment and frowned. “Though I guess that could’ve been the vodka…”

Munson pinched the bridge of his nose and grumbled under his breath, seeming just to himself, “Why are you even entertaining this, Eddie? Get a grip!” Then he relaxed his shoulders and looked up, staring at Steve calculatingly as he said, “So let me make sure I got this right. You, Steve Harrington, are inviting me, Eddie Munson, to dance with you in this crowded room full of practically every popular kid in our high school.”

“You know, you have really nice hair,” Steve replied instead. “What conditioner do you use? It looks so soft.”

Squinting at him like he had two heads, Munson finally relented and snarked, “It seems like someone should be chaperoning you right now, so… I guess I can rise to the occasion for once.”

Steve beamed at Eddie and led him deeper into the mass of people so they could be closer to the music. Once he found what he deemed to be the perfect spot, Steve let himself feel the music once again. He wanted to get rid of all that other shit.

The gossipmongers at Hawkins High always start shit at every opportunity. Sometimes the most basic things get circulated through every rumor mill, and Steve had given up trying to plaster on a fake smile and put on a show.

Suddenly, Steve turned to Eddie and said, “Hey, you’re against all that conformist shit, right? Like doing your own thing or something?”

“Yeah, man… I am,” Eddie replied carefully.

Steve smiled, hoping he figured out how to get Eddie to really join him. “That’s what this is. Dancing like an idiot because it’s lame and so fun and I don’t have to worry about anyone else’s… bullshit.”

Eddie hummed, watching Steve appraisingly before his lips quirked up into something a couple of degrees off of affection. “Alright, I think I can get behind that. Wanna pretend like we’re the lead singers of this band performing a sold-out show?”

Brightening considerably, Steve pumped his fist. “Hell yeah!”

Once Steve gave his approval, Eddie whipped out an air guitar and started strumming viciously, his motions not at all synced up to “Girls Just Want to Have Fun.” Steve grinned and picked up his own fake microphone, tilting the stand around like he was Elvis Presley while he headbanged aggressively. Cyndi Lauper was not an artist people would usually headbang to, but it was fun, so Steve was doing it.

Naturally, people started to stand and gawk at their display, but their confused and disgusted looks only seemed to fuel Eddie’s energy. Hey, that’s what Steve had been trying to do! Getting Eddie to join him was definitely the right choice.

Matching Eddie’s enthusiasm, Steve leaned in closer to him to share the microphone as if they were singing a duet. Eddie snorted out a surprised laugh at Steve’s antics, but he still joined in with the charade.

Even when people started whispering around them, Steve didn’t care anymore. Their words slid off of him like water off his back. Plus, Eddie looked like he was having fun too.

Steve was starting to forget why he had been so upset before… Eh, it was probably just some stupid bullshit anyway.

#mira writes #stranger things (taylor's version)#stranger things #taylor swift #steddie #steve harrington/eddie munson #stranger things season 2

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