modus operandi
(Written for @flashfictionfridayofficial's prompt: FFF218 How Do You Use It? This isn't related to anything I'm working on but enjoy!)
It wasn’t much, but it had been her mother’s.
Maybe that’s what made it hurt all the more.
She lets her face press to the cold stone of the bridge, trying to ease the ache of her heavy heart. It shouldn’t matter that she had hand sewn every one of the beads onto the bodice, that she had embroidered every stitch into the skirt by candlelight, that she had never worn it until today. She had stayed up late, squinting by the weak glow of the candlelight, eyes burning and fingers bleeding from where she had pricked them trembling with exhaustion, trying to finish the alterations in time.
All she had wanted was one night. One moment to remember what she had used to be, what her mother had wished for her.
The gash in the skirt bleeds where the ink pot was thrown at her. Where she rubs her fingers on it, they still come away black, instead of the blood red it looks under the moonlight. She feels the last sob escape her, bubbling through her throat.
She is no scholar to win her freedom by sneaking out to take the Civil Service exam as Shen Xiumin did. She has no skill for singing, unlike Huang Meilin, to run away to the stage and hide her face behind the face paint of the opera. She is no warrior to restore her family’s honour as Hua Chenyi did.
All she had were her hands. All she had were her eyes. The eyes that picked up the beads left behind where noblewomen dropped them from their hems, the calloused hands with unpainted nails that stitched them into the dress.
“Hush, child.” A voice emerges from behind her. “Why do you cry?”
She turns, bowing to the fox emerging from the undergrowth, her seven tails swishing. “Lady Fox.”
The fox’s fathomless eyes dart to the dress. “I see, the Prince will choose a bride tonight at the masquerade, won’t he? He will choose based on the dress.”
She could not admit that all she had wanted was a single night. She was no great beauty, but she had her skill.
“You have always been kind to the water spirits and the forest sprites. I will reward you now.”
The dress lifts into the air as she gazes upon it. The jacket lifts, the skirt puffs outwards before narrowing. When it descends, it is as soft as the mulberry silk only palace nobles could afford, the expensive deep green dye covered with intricate silver and gold where her own once laid.
And it looks nothing like her mother’s dress.
“Put it on. It will return to its former state by the hour of the tiger, but you should have time for a dance.”
But even as she takes it into her hands, she finds her head shaking. “Noble Lady Fox, I cannot accept your gift. For this was my mother’s and it would be a disservice to both of us to wear the dress as it is.” She swallows. “I am sorry, Noble Lady Fox, I am honoured but I still have my pride. I cannot accept this. I cannot wear it to the ball.”
The fox gazes at her, her dark eyes inscrutable. “Is that your final answer?”
She nods. “Then very well.”
The dress disappears from her hands altogether and when she looks up from the ground, the fox is gone too.
She swallows past the bitterness suddenly in her throat, for she knows better than to demand her dress back.
Days pass, and the prince announces his bride. She watches as the noblewoman steps up beside him, her hand dainty and soft, her nails painted elegantly, her face powdered and her lips as small and red as cherries. She moves on with her life, until one day, a courtier comes knocking at her door.
“Are you Xiu Yanli?” The courtier asks, her eyes squinting to read the characters. “Please come with me to the palace.”
She goes, even though the courtier doesn’t explain, not even when her stepmother demands to know where she’s going, demands that the walnuts will not shell themselves nor the tea steep itself in its pot. She goes, even though she knows she will never be able to come back after this.
All she had left that meant anything was the dress anyway, and that was taken from her too.
She stiffens as they reach the palace, but relaxes as they go around to the back. Then, she stiffens again, as she is led through a corridor opulent with gold dragons on the windows and through staircases with deep walnut wood engravings in them. Only the emperor is allowed gold dragons.
But she doesn’t say anything as she is led into a room. She sinks to her knees, bowing fully as the new empress-to-be stands before her.
When she raises her eyes though, she cannot help but gasp.
Her dress lies beautifully against her body, exactly as it looked that night, except the gash was now a silver and gold inlay that spiralled like a cobweb and the ink stain curved into beautiful delicate patterns like a painting of lotuses and bamboo on silk.
“I am told you are the seamstress who made this?” The empress-to-be’s voice is soft and high.
“I did the alterations, your Highness. It was originally my mother’s.”
“How did you make it do that with the beading?”
She explains but after, she forces herself to speak. “How did you get it?”
The empress purses her lips, and all of a sudden, she’s reminded that the empress is younger than her. “I’m new to the palace too. Another lady ruined my original dress and I was crying, except a fox came in and offered it to me, if I would recognise the seamstress later.”
She looks shyly at her. “Would you come and be a handmaiden for me? It’s just… I need a friend. You would stay here, of course, but you can return if you want. I’m not- I don’t mean to force you.”
She bowed. She bowed deeply and gratefully, before straightening up and smiling.
“Of course. But can I have my dress back? It isn’t much, but it was my mother’s.”
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·.⌇ 𝐒𝐘𝐍𝐎𝐏𝐒𝐈𝐒. height difference + jjk men — seeing you struggling to initiate a kiss, ft. gojo, nanami, toji, choso
note. super self indulgent once again woopsies
tags. jjk men x female reader (separately). fluff, suggestive themes. size difference obviously: reader is shorter than the characters. little hint of an age gap in toji’s part (you; early 20’s, he early 30’s). reader gets referred to as ‘small, short, adorable’. nicknames used ‘baby, sweetheart, princess, little girl, angel’. includes drabbles for each character.
𝐆𝐎𝐉𝐎 𝐒𝐀𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐔
“what’s the matter, baby?” satoru easily notices whenever you’re internally debating something. you’d fidget with your clothes, look around and nibble on your bottom lip.
even if you say that it’s nothing, your lover knows that you mean the exact opposite. he walks hand-in-hand with you out of the boutique where he had bought you a pretty dress. his thumb rubs your skin gently, hoping to comfort you with whatever you’re struggling to say.
“it’s uhm,” you finally speak up. satoru halts his steps and tilts his head with a curious pout on his lips. he doesn’t wish to pressure you into anything, so he keeps quiet.
his blue eyes follow your movements from behind his sunglasses. you step closer to him, your small hands travelling up to gently hold onto his jacket. you gulp before balancing your entire body on your toes—creasing your shoes a bit by doing so.
at this point, satoru knows what you’re trying to do. your actions are absolutely adorable and make the sorcerer giggle. he wants nothing more than to squish your cheeks together for being so cute. especially because you’re failing to reach his lips.
“oh, do y’need help maybe?” satoru asks with a smug grin. you frown and try to stand on the tips of your toes, though that didn’t seem enough. your lover needs to lower his head a tad more for you to kiss him.
satoru tilts his head backwards instead. he loves to see you pout and struggle to carry out such an affectionate act. he can’t help it—you’re so fun to tease, “c’mon, you can do it, baby!”
when you give up due to his constant teasing, the white-haired man gasps dramatically. you smack his bicep and turn around with a huff, “forget it.”
before you can take another step away from him—satoru’s hand reaches out to hold your wrist. he pulls you back against his chest, warm palm holding your cheek and tilting your head up so his glossy lips could meet yours.
“sorry,” satoru mutters against your mouth. his tongue sneakily swipes against yours which causes you to squirm. he gives your bottom lip a playful nibble in response, “couldn’t resist teasing you a little.”
𝐍𝐀𝐍𝐀𝐌𝐈 𝐊𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐎
“welcome home, dear!” you greet kento at the front door as per usual. he sighs in relief and smiles tiredly, appreciating your appearance before him. he seems utterly exhausted from his most recent mission.
“it’s good to see you, sweetheart,” kento shuts the door behind him. he takes off his shoes and places them where they belong before doing the same with his coat. he looks down at you as you help him tidy his belongings, “you’re looking beautiful tonight.”
to say you’re flustered is an understatement. kento always knows just how to get you shy and embarrassed from the casual way he compliments you. you’re in your pyjamas and apron—barefaced with nothing extra going on and yet your lover is completely engrossed by your looks.
“thank you,” you murmur back with a bright smile. kento smiles as well after seeing your happy expression. that’s what he does it for.
you hold kento’s hand and feel its warmth engulf your skin. his palms are a little rough; probably from the hard work he put into those recent missions he did. you look up at the blonde man in front of you and want nothing more than to kiss him—show your gratitude for everything he does for you.
thus, you lean in and stand on your toes, balancing on one foot whilst the other floats a few centimetres above the wooden floor. it’s hard to find a balance, though your attentive partner is quick to lend a hand.
“careful,” kento whispers, his voice so husky that you feel a shiver run down your spine. his big hands settle on your waist and he doesn’t waste a single second after that.
he leans in as well, head lowered to yours and your noses lightly brushing against each other. kento’s lips find your soft ones—interlocking them in a passion filled kiss. you can feel his entire body relax even more. as if he’s waited all day to be back home. to be back to you.
to kiss and hold you close.
𝐅𝐔𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐆𝐔𝐑𝐎 𝐓𝐎𝐉𝐈
“over here, princess,” toji calls you over with a subtle wave. he’s leaning against a brick wall, hands in the pockets of his black jacket. you walk over to him with an excited smile—happy to spend some quality time together with him today.
“hey, i missed you,” you comment and wrap your arms around his waist. you nuzzle your face against his chest to which toji reacts by giving you an awkward head pat.
the older man lifts your head up and away from his body by holding onto your chin. his eyes run over your face, letting out a short content hum. he’s missed you a lot too. not that he’d tell you that directly.
“how’s uni for ya?” toji asks. the pad of his thumb rubs your cheek and you lean into his touch. it brings a little smirk to his face—seeing how easily you become putty in his hands is rather amusing.
“been okay for most part,” you shrug and fail to maintain eye contact with your boyfriend. he probably doesn’t do it on purpose, but his half-lidded eyes makes your lower abdomen feel funny.
you’re still so nervous around him, though you’ve got the guts to at least kiss him first. you missed the feeling of his lips against you after all. the constant, soothing rubs of his thumb against your cheek only intensifies your desire.
you lift yourself up on the tips of your shoes. your cold hands cup toji’s face and he immediately gets what you’re trying to do. he snickers at the sight of you struggling to reach him and acts like he doesn’t know what you want.
. . until you whine about how you really want to kiss him. that man is sold the moment he hears your whiny voice.
“fuck. c’mere, little girl,” toji’s veiny hands go around your waist and move down to cup your ass, his lips crashing down onto yours with a desperation he’s never kissed you with before.
𝐊𝐀𝐌𝐎 𝐂𝐇𝐎𝐒𝐎
“do i need to add salt? she’s talking too fast,” choso ask whilst scratching his head. he’s watching a youtube video on his phone; specifically a cooking one. he’s attempting to copy a recipe in his kitchen and you’re helping him since he doesn’t know too much about phones. and cooking apparently.
you giggle and grab the phone from the counter. the lady’s words are incomprehensible due to the video being on two times the usual speed. you return the settings to normal with a light hearted chuckle, “yeah, because you’ve sped up the video, silly.”
“oh,” choso smiles sheepishly. he checks the stove and makes sure the food isn’t burning before turning towards you, “thank you. you’re a lifesaver, heh.”
you can’t help but admire the view of choso in front of you. he’s in an apron which is too small on him since it’s yours—his chiseled chest accentuated by the fabric. his black hair is up in a small ponytail and his cheeks are red. probably from embarrassment.
“you’re adorable,” you comment lovingly. choso’s cheeks turn even redder by your compliment and he sputters some words about how he ‘needs to focus on his cooking’.
you interrupt his stammers by getting closer. your lover stops and his lips are parted—giving you the perfect chance to capture them into a kiss. well, you try to at least
choso notices your silent struggles and blinks. it takes him a second to fully grasp the situation before he decides on helping you. he smiles warmly, his beefy arms effortlessly lifting you up to his height, encouraging you to wrap your legs around his waist.
one hand is on your thigh, the other holding the back of your head to deepen your shared kiss. choso pulls away and attaches his lips to your neck, settling you the counter, “want more, angel. you drive me crazy.”
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Another Update Regarding "No Fandom" tags
AO3 Tag Wranglers recently began testing processes for updating canonical tags (tags that appear in the autocomplete and the filters) that don’t belong to any particular fandom (commonly known as No Fandom tags). We have already begun implementing some of the decisions made during the earliest discussions.
By the time this post is published, you may have already noticed some changes we have made. Several canonical tags are slated to be created or renamed, and we will also be adjusting the subtag and metatag relationships between some tags to better aid Archive users in filtering. Please keep in mind that many of these changes are large and require a lot of work to identify and attach relevant tags, so it will likely take some time to complete. We ask that you please be patient with us while we work!
While we will not be detailing every change we make under the new process, we will be making periodic posts with updates on those changes we believe are most likely to prove helpful for users looking to tag or filter works with the new or revised tags and to avoid confusion as to why changes are being made.
New Canonicals!
1. COVID-19
Due to long-standing demand, we will be creating a number of new canonicals related to COVID-19. These canonicals include:
COVID-19
COVID-19 Pandemic, which will be subtagged to both COVID-19 and Pandemics
Alternate Universe - No COVID-19, which will be subtagged to Alternate Universe
Post-COVID-19 Pandemic
COVID-19 Lockdown
Created During COVID-19 Lockdown
How to Use These To Filter For/Filter Out Works Tagged as relating to COVID-19
❌ Filtering Out:
To filter out all works that use tags referring to COVID-19, the COVID-19 pandemic, or the COVID-19 Lockdown, add COVID-19 to the “Other tags to exclude” field in the works filter. This will also exclude works making use of the subtag COVID-19 Pandemic. If you’d also like to filter out COVID-19 Lockdown, you would need to exclude that tag as well.
☑️ Filtering For:
Add COVID-19 to the “Other tags to include” field in the works filter. This will also automatically include the works making use of the subtags COVID-19 Pandemic. If you wish to filter for only the pandemic or the lockdown, you can do so by including either COVID-19 Pandemic or COVID-19 Lockdown only.
2. Isekai and Transmigration
Given the similarities of the concepts, we will be creating a single canonical tag to cover both concepts to allow for easier filtering. Additionally, we will also be creating a canonical for the concept of Reverse Isekai and Reverse Transmigration. This tag will be subtagged to Isekai and Transmigration.
As with the COVID-19 canonicals above, you will be able to use these tags in the works filter to filter for or filter out these concepts. If you filter for/out Isekai and Transmigration it will filter for/out both Isekai and Transmigration as well as Reverse Isekai and Reverse Transmigration. If you would like to only filter for/out Reverse Isekai and Reverse Transmigration, you can just filter for that tag instead.
3. Mommy Kink
This oft-requested canonical will be canonized as Mommy Kink.
4. There Was Only One Bed
The ever-popular trope is now getting its very own canonical and all relevant synonym tags from Sharing a Bed will be moved over to this canonical, which will be canonized as: There Was Only One Bed.
Renaming Outdated Canonicals!
The Archive has been around for a long time, which means there are a lot of canonicals that make use of old and outdated terminology.
6. Asperger Syndrome
One of these canonicals is Asperger Syndrome, which is an outdated medical term which is no longer acceptable, and so will be de-canonized and made a synonym of Autism Spectrum.
7. Fantastic Racism
In the early days of the archive, the tag Fantastic Racism was canonized as a tag that was meant to represent Racism specifically concerning Fantasy or Science Fiction races (e.g. Elves, Orcs, Goblins, Vulcans, Phoenocats, etc.). To correct this particular issue, this tag will be renamed to Fantasy and Fictional Setting Racism to clarify the actual purpose of the tag and will remain subtagged to Racism.
Fantastic Racism in particular is a case of exceptionally poor choice of phrasing for what should have been a relatively straightforward concept. The tag wrangling committee is working hard to continue to develop a robust and sustainable collaborative discussion format for making decisions in regards to the canonization of canonicals which are not specific to any fandom in the hopes of avoiding such mistakes in the future.
Reorganization of the Gender Tree and Genderswap/Genderbend Freeform Canonicals!
We will also be re-organizing a number of tags related to the concept of Gender in the coming weeks. The early days of the Archive saw the canonization of a lot of similar concepts which makes searching and filtering for these concepts needlessly complicated and difficult to navigate.
To help eliminate one such complication, we will be merging Genderbending, Genderswap, Gender or Sex Swap, and Sexswap into a single canonical and renaming this new canonical to Changes to Gender or Sex.
Similarly, we will be making a number of other similar renames to bring related canonicals in line with this change:
Alternate Universe - Always a Different Sex will become Alternate Universe - Always a Different Gender or Sex.
Canon Genderbending will be renamed to Canon-Typical Changes to Gender or Sex
We will also create a new canonical for the concept of temporary gender or sex changes: Temporary Changes to Gender or Sex.
Other gender-related changes freeform tags we will be making in the next few weeks include:
Transgender, Transexual, and Alternate Universe - Trans will be de-canonized and made synonyms of the Trans canonical.
A canonical will be created for Medical Transition.
These are just some of the freeform tag changes being implemented. While we won’t be announcing every change, you can expect similar updates in the future as we continue to work toward improving the Archive experience. You can also check out some of the other recent changes we have made in our previous update on No Fandom tags. Feel free to follow us on Twitter @ao3_wranglers or keep an eye on this Tumblr for future announcements.
Thank you for your patience and understanding as we continue our work!
(From time to time, ao3org posts announcements of recent or upcoming wrangling changes on behalf of the Tag Wrangling Committee.)
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