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books · 9 months

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Writing Workshop Week 1: Show & Tell

Hello, writers of tumblr! It’s @bettsfic again with this week’s generative workshop.

Today we’re doing what might be my favorite class activity: Show & Tell.

You might be thinking, do you teach kindergarten or something? No, I teach college. But my students are often weary, downtrodden 20 year olds who are more than happy to go back to basics. Tumblr—being a website of people who care deeply about things and share that passion with others—seems like a great place to host Show & Tell.

Speaking of basics, let’s first talk a bit about…

The Writing Identity

The goal of many writers is to become better at writing. While I think this is an admirable goal it’s also a complicated one, because good writing is entirely subjective. Everyone has their own definition of what good writing looks like based on their knowledge base, history, and personal tastes. And so I often encourage my students, before they begin their journey of becoming a better writer, to step back and ask themselves, “What does good writing look like to me?”

And that’s the thing: you can’t really become a better writer. You can become a more patient writer, with the ability to write and revise multiple drafts of a work. You can become a more ambitious writer, with the ability to write longer stories and deeper themes. You can become a more detailed writer, with the ability to render images and the small details of living that maybe other people don’t notice. Writing is a skill that requires practice, but it also requires joy. You have to enjoy the work more than you fear the potential for failure. And to enjoy the work, you need to honor yourself, your interests, and your ideals. In other words, to become a better writer, you have to become more you.

I remember when I first started writing, I frantically sought out writing advice. I clung to simple adages and rules: active verbs are stronger than passive verbs; remove words like “think” and “realize” and other indicators of your characters’ interior experiences; take out adjectives and adverbs. If you were to adhere to all this advice, your writing wouldn’t become stronger, it would become colder. You would write like Hemingway. There’s nothing wrong with Hemingway, but Hemingway already did Hemingway, and that means you’re free not to be Hemingway.

Don’t we read to feel closer to people, to experience that which we couldn’t otherwise experience? The beautiful thing about prose is that it’s the only medium that conveys consciousness, because language is the way we contain our thoughts, and writing them down offers others the chance to understand them. E.M. Forster in his book Aspects of the Novel says that the only difference between a character and a person is that a character’s secret inner life can be known, but a person’s can only be understood in observed behavior. Novels are stories of consciousness; biographies are stories of deeds.

In my early days as a writer, those inane adages of “good writing” began to weigh on me, and I found myself frequently opening a blank document and telling myself, “I’m just going to write something for fun, for me, and so I don’t have to follow any rules.” Every time, that lawless thing I wrote would become better than anything I’d written when I followed the rules. And in this case, “better” means I was proud of it; in writing as close to myself as I could, I was able to help my technical skill reach the level of my personal taste.

Good writing advice doesn’t spout shallow adages of what should be, it tells you all the things that could be; it opens your mind to possibilities and techniques. “Should” restrains creativity; the entire point of writing is to be creative. To be creative means to make something that has never existed before. And so one of the first things I tell my students is: You already know everything you need to know about your own writing. You already have good and important stories in you. You just have to sit down and write them.

“Show, Don’t Tell”

One such adage that still really gets to me is “show, don’t tell,” which a lot of writers believe. Many people take it to mean that you should describe the exterior circumstances of your narrator in order to allow the reader to interpret meaning. Instead of describing how your narrator feels, these people would rather have you describe their facial expression. But if you’re so interested in rendering the exterior rather than the interior, you’re better off becoming a director.

Others take it less literally: you show your story instead of tell your story, which, sure, is a valid personal belief for your own work but it’s ambiguous and impractical, and also denies the nature of people to tell stories. Fairy tales and fables are stories that are told. Telling stories came long before showing them.

In some ways, “show, don’t tell,” can be useful. If you spend a thousand words of character A lovingly and carefully describing every detail of character B, you don’t then need to say something like, “She was pining for him,” because you’ve allowed your description to do that work for you. So no, you don’t need to say it, but maybe you want to. Maybe you want to make it inarguable that character A is pining for character B; you don’t want a reader to say, “I think she’s paying that much attention because she wants to kill him and she’s looking for his weak points.”

And so that’s what it comes down to—choice. Ultimately, writing is about making decisions, and those decisions are stronger when you understand all your options.

Behind the adage is a more difficult truth to swallow: prose is both infinite in its potential and also frustratingly limited, because you have no control over your audience. You can lovingly describe every snowflake that falls in a blizzard, and your reader will be taking their own meaning from it—for people who can mentally visualize things, it’s the images their mind conjures; for those who can’t, it’s a mass of facts. And there are also those who are sleepy and missing details, or who are skimming to get to the bits they’re most interested in, or who accidentally dropped their book in the bath and now the bottom half of every page is warped and unreadable.

Or you can say, “It snowed.”

No matter what your beliefs are on “show, don’t tell,” the truth is that it’s a false dichotomy. The very nature of prose is to navigate this divide. Some stories call for more showing, for example when your narrator is at a distance, when we don’t have much access to their thoughts or feelings. Other stories will ask you to tell, especially if we’re deep in your narrator’s head and they’re giving us everything. Showing lends itself to setting, imagery, and plot. Telling lends itself to character, voice, and style. One is not inherently better than the other, in the same way that a screwdriver isn’t better than a hammer—the tool you use depends on the task at hand.

Any time you encounter a trite rule in writing, it’s usually pointing to something much greater and more fun to think about. In this case, showing and telling are two integral tools in meaning-making. For this week’s activity, we’re going to use both show and tell to make meaning.

Prompt time!

In Donald Barthelme's essay “Not-Knowing,” he calls objects magical. “What is magical about the object is that it at once invites and resists interpretation. Its artistic worth is measurable by the degree to which it remains, after interpretation, vital.”

So what does that mean? Although this essay is a hot mess (lovingly), part of its intended work is to be a mess. In fact Barthelme describes the mess of his desk and allows it to define him. It’s covered in coffee cups, cigarette ash, unpaid bills, and unwritten novels. In reality, those objects are just objects, but when rendered in prose, they give us an impression of this particular world and the character within it. The writer renders; the reader interprets. The things we own, that mean something to us, are also things that can define us. Who is the person who carries a leather wallet embossed with their initials, with the inside holding credit cards and a stack of neat bills? Who is the person who carries a canvas wallet with a faded Punisher logo on it, attached to a chain, and the only thing inside it is a Subway rewards card?

Objects are important. Especially in this world we live in where so many things have become virtual, tangibility will always be integral to us. We are a species that reaches out and touches. We like to hold things in our hands. We love things which cannot love us back.

For this week’s prompt fill, I want you to find a magical object for Show & Tell. Ideally, it’s something with a long personal history that’s important to you. Maybe it’s the object you would save in the event of a fire, or maybe it’s something you lost long ago.

First, I’d like you to show us the object by describing it. Then, tell us the story of it.

You can write about how you acquired it and the memories it conjures. Allow yourself to link and associate memories and feelings. Don’t box yourself in too much—just see where it takes you.

But you can also put a spin on it. Here are some ways you can do that:

If you want to try fiction, you can write the same story about your favorite character’s beloved object, or you could completely make up an object and its history.

If you want to try something experimental, you can write a story from the perspective of the object, and maybe its beloved thing is you.

If you want to try poetry, write a poem of your object. This is a separate lesson, but T.S. Eliot’s concept of an objective correlative may be illuminating to consider.

The purpose of this activity is to dig through your memories and/or observations, connect them, and use something external to conjure meaning from them. You begin with what your object is and it will eventually lead you to what it means.

Questions? Ask ‘em here before EOD Tuesday so @bettsfic can answer them on Wednesday. And remember to tag your work #tumblr writing workshop with betts if you want her to read your work and possibly feature it on Friday!

And, for those just joining us: @bettsfic is running a writing workshop on @books this month. Want to know more? Start here.

#tumblr writing workshop with betts #writers’ room #writeblr #writing advice #show and tell #long post #long text post

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evolutionsbedingt · 10 months

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15 Questions 15 Minutes

Thank you for the tag @shakespearerants! What an excellent way to take a break from reading a complicated linguistics paper!

1. Are you named after anyone?

Alas, I'm not. Thinking about stealing my dad's nickname though.

2. When was the last time you cried?

Yesterday around noon, grief comes out of nowhere sometimes

3. Do you have kids?

Nope.

4. Do you use sarcasm a lot?

Whatever made you think that.

5. What sports do you play/have played?

None, to the aggravation of my poor constitution. I should probably get into something....

6. What's the first thing you notice about someone?

Clothing style and body language, usually gives me a pretty good guess of their personality too.

7. Eye colour?

Greenish - brownish.

8. Scary movies or happy endings? (also, had to hunt down this question from the prev-prev-tagging person)

Oh, definitely happy endings. I don't do scary films on principle.

9. Special talents?

Eh - does being a jack of all trades count as a special talent? It's damn unlikely that I'll master anything but I pick basics of languages up really easily, taught myself basic sewing, knitting, crocheting and embroidering, can make up simple meals from scratch and bake decently along to recipes (though pies are my declared enemies).

So yeah, give me ten to fifteen minutes and I'll learn the basics, but I'll never master it (ADHD sucks)

10. Where were you born?

In my hometown :P

11. What are your hobbies?

Writing, reading, watching series (and accidentally picking up bits of languages), baking, sewing, sending care packages to friends and occasionally remembering that I have an affinity for musical instruments.

12. Do you have pets?

I technically own a cat but she lives with my mum. I still consider her mine though <3

13. How tall are you?

Not tall enough

14. Favourite subject in school?

I almost never have a singular favourite of anything. I liked languages and art subjects, but also history and biochemistry. Would have loved the natural sciences more if I wasn't so bloody atrocious at maths.

15. Dream job?

At this point? Hell if I know. I love researching, but I'm not sure whether my brain is up to a life in academia. I love working with my hands but my body isn't exactly getting better so... We'll see. Let's survive this Master's degree first.

Tagging: @rowanofferelden and @colubrina, if you're feeling up for it! :)

#tag games #ask games

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snow-and-saltea · 5 months

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About your personal post - people without depression can say weird and disheartening things about it because they don't understand, so when I was at my worst, I ended up talking instead to people I didn't know (like free helplines) because then if they said something unhelpful/upsetting, I didn't take it so personally and it didn't undermine a relationship. I could get the stuff off my chest, then when I felt a bit better, could then go back to communicating with people I actually knew. I don't know if this might be helpful but it definitely was to me, because people can accidentally be so awful without meaning to. That said, please do reach out for help in some form - things will improve even if it doesn't feel like it now. Sending you all the best <3

(i privated the personal vent post so this looks out of context but)

thank you for this really sincere and kind response anon :'))

mhmm. i think what helped ground me now, i guess, was the reminder that they're still trying to help me and their perspective is no more or less important than my own. and that they're not an evil or bad person (hence they aren't setting out to hurt me on purpose) and neither am i for disagreeing. if we have the same goal of helping me, the power to redirect or reroute advice is as much as in my hands as it with the other person. i think i made myself too passive of an object (something being done to me, as opposed to a subject, doing something in the world) and i was too caught up in the quagmire of my own mind about how i feel about being an object, the emotional politics of things and their role in this mental warfare ive somehow concocted, rather than if i had just switched gears to become a subject. is this explanation easy to follow? hopefully it does!! sjdhskdhskfjdkfk the way my mind works is not very easy to explain or understand because i am constantly very meta about my thoughts and it creates complications that i have to take time to unravel, so i decided to go for levity (kinda, i can never be quite as concise as normal people).

with that outta the way though, what you said did give me pause and i thought was really insightful, thank you! i think one of the reasons i found it difficult to disagree with them is because we have a history or connection of some kind that allows for misunderstanding to flower really easily, and because humans personalise everything, its not easy to be a detached, easy going person who is both balancing taking me seriously + being kind and understanding with no serious lines about where it should end bc of nebulosity (and that leads to feeling impatient and exhausted acting against your natural disposition or instinct. which is what i also felt i was the victim of, so to subject someone else to that situation would be hypocritical of me and so i know its not the right perspective i should latch to).

that kinda went into multiple strands of thoughts ajdhskdj but the bottom line is, yeah! i agree with your advice, its very helpful. i often feel fearful of going to talk to people who i know will agree and or understand my stance, because i am always very wary of behaviours that lead to false honesty for myself. false honesty as in... i can say whatever i want and it'll technically be the truth, but its not an accurate summation of reality or what actually happened, and so i always feel wary about confiding in people with just my side of the story because i worry about my influence on other people's biases that would lead them to agree with me, and i don't like being right on the sole fact that i was convincing enough (simply by virtue of being confident or emotionally charged and firm in my interpretation of reality / the situation). i think ill have to strike a balance between finding the appropriate and relevant amount of context to solicit advice, but also not too much perspective that i get muddled with ideas that are not my own and get confused on what are my feelings and what aren't. and also!! i guess!! i just need to have (temporary, but fruitful) trust in whoever im talking to that they are a person with their own life experiences that inform their judgement, and not everything hinges on me being completely unbiased (bc its an impossible bar to reach even at the best of times) and that they have their own reasonings that remain unaffected by how i speak. if there's a gap in information, they can ask it, and i can volunteer it, and there doesn't need to be me overexplaining everything at the same time with multiple parantheses and caveats jwhksjdkd its something im prone to doing.

now that im more clear-headed, i can see how both ways of asking advice can have pros and cons. asking advice from someone i don't know relies on the universality of "common sense" and social instincts/principles of what is appropriate and inappropriate and it can help to simplify the matter to the essential thing at the center most point, and it can help me figure out if i'm overcomplicating things by thinking too much about accommodating personality quirks and letting the wrong thing slide / personalising it too much w my own perspective. it risks oversimplifying a lot of things, but it also can be grounding with reminding me if a situation can / SHOULD be as straightforward as it looks, and all that.

whereas asking advice from someone i do know, its a lot more personal because that person probably knows things about me i don't or they know things about me that i overlook or disown / dismiss that they think are noteworthy. whether or not they're valid points of concern is another topic, but the point is, contextualising things and advice so that it is something that i will most likely follow / need to hear for me specifically is important because it gives more basis as to where they're coming from, bc they're not saying stuff blindly. although, yeah, they can be pretty hurtful when they come from or are delivered badly because i feel like. "why are you saying this to me knowingly!! why are you hurting my feelings on purpose!! don't you know i don't like that!!" and there's a higher standard i have for people i know / have a close connection to because its tangled in a lot of history. the same goes the other way around, i also find it difficult to disagree on a purely logical perspective of "i don't agree with what you're saying about this" and its hard for them to not feel like they're being dismissed or to not take it personally, especially if they were passionate about being helpful.

i guess it's just the balancing act we have to do, so there's no other way to do it than to do it, even if badly. its ... tiring and daunting realising the potential each individual has to cause hurt, but i just have to trust that the world will spin as it always does, and i have to spin along with it, albeit imperfectly and clumsily.

once again, thank you for going out of your way to send a kind message when i was in the Depths of it, i truly appreciate it. seeing your message in my inbox made me weepy when i saw it, i felt very touched. squeezes you, i hope you have a wonderful week ahead of you, friend 💛🐢

#yuu rambles #anon #augh. my thoughts are a bit scrambled here but i think i put this as coherently as i can manage #i hope it's understandable to you anon!! thank you again for being kind!!#therapy stuff #this ended up being longer than i expected.... in my head it was elaborate but easy to digest so i hope that came across

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mydaroga · 5 months

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Hiii, I really like your blog. I don’t know if you reply to your asks, and im sorry if im bothering you. You seem very knowledgeable about the beatles, so I wanted to ask if you know whether Paul was a bit of a possessive jealous type of boyfriend. Because most of the things I’ve read only paint him in a good light, it almost seems pr-ey lmao. Thanks so much and sorry! (I know im a bit nosy sorry again)

Hullo anon! Thank you! I'm flattered you'd ask me, thanks for thinking I have something to say on the subject. I'm a little curious why you're asking, but I will try to answer as best I can. This is NOT meant as a slam on McCartney though it may not be flattering; I was asked, and I'm trying to answer with the knowledge I have.

There are some caveats, though. I think it's dangerous to make broad statements about a real person's private behavior. I also don't know any more than I've read, and don't have any special insight. I also think people are complicated and even what's reported isn't going to give a full picture. So the following isn't meant to be a full portrait, or an indictment. It's just what comes to mind on this topic. Also keep in mind that Paul is an 81 year old man who has a dating/marriage history of like 65+ years at this point. People do change.

What we can pull together, in my opinion, paints Paul as someone I wouldn't necessarily want to date, though he's hardly the worst. For example, his steady Liverpool girlfriend, Dot Rhone, has some things to say that may be alarming. In Dot's telling (with some of this confirmed by himself) he could be controlling of her appearance and what she did and who she interacted with. Then again, it was the 50s and he was basically a teenager, so I don't think it's entirely fair to pin one's entire character reading on that.

We also know that while dating Jane Asher for six years, he continued to see many other women on both a casual and ongoing basis. However, while we know he did get jealous at least once of her other romances, we actually have no idea what, if any, arrangement was between them or whether that incident indicates he didn't like her seeing other men, or just, that one got too serious. Asher has never broken her silence about her relationship with Paul, after announcing their split on live television, which is a baller move.

We know that while Linda Eastman was very interested in Paul, she wasn't initially jazzed about marrying anyone again, and had a career as a photographer and was living a single life. This isn't strictly to your question of jealousy, but it's complicated and up in the air whether Linda would have, in another relationship, chosen to keep working or fulfill her own creative ambitions rather than raising a family and joining Paul's band, by most accounts with some initial reluctance. I'm by no means saying Paul 'forced' her into marriage, Wings, or being at home with him every evening, but I am saying that knowing what Paul was looking for, she chose to marry someone who was definitely looking for those things. And there are accounts from people like Peter Cox who claims Paul could be very controlling (wanting her to himself, making sure she was home every evening, needing to be the center of attention, etc); I won't link it here because I have no idea how much he's to be trusted, but it should be easy to google.

But I also think that the good parts of Paul's relationships are also real, so for my money, the picture I get is of someone who is fairly controlling, wants a "traditional" type of marriage for someone raised in the 50s, and also genuinely loves his family. He's also one of the most powerful people in the world, and that is inherently going to warp the power dynamics around him. He's also been able to, at least in some quarters, curate his image and possibly create a more idyllic picture than you'd see if you were there. In fact, many journalists in the 70s took potshots at his "perfect marriage" image, though I think a lot of that is their problem. So your sense that there's some PR around him I think is valid. But there's also accounts you can find (Francie Schwartz, Dot Rhone, Peter Cox, to name a few) to get another side. Both are biased, but put together I think a reasonable person can draw some conclusions.

#paul mccartney #kris talks a lot #anon ask

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howevillumsen4 · 2 years

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Kick These 5 Senior Feline Health Problems to the Aesthetic

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If you assume your seniors cat is enduring, tend not to postpone-- routine a consultation together with your animal medical practitioner and share your observations. Blood panels and several other analysis tools can figure out the issue, perhaps result in a good early medical diagnosis of age-related disease and get as a result of the essential corporation of coping with and controlling it for the feline pal's health and fitness. Shared inflammation support Attempt they to take care of as well as deal with your own personal cat's arthritis: Nonsteroidal potent drugs for problems Acupuncture treatment Weight control Sensible carefully checked out exercise Products with crucial fatty stomach acids to help in reducing swelling, and glucosamine as well as chondroitin to assist replace cartilage material Gentle therapeutic massage therapy Scrubbing locations the fact that might be difficult to the cat to reach Secure blankets and a welcoming bed to help relieve tight articulations Easy option of the litter box and food together with also water bowls Prescription medications, including steroidal drugs for puffiness as well as disease-modifying osteoarthritis medications

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kateis-cakeis · 3 years

Text

Alivebur Has A Crush Analysis

Alivebur is a character who has been through the highs and lows of life. We have seen him lead, we have seen him fall, and we have seen him come back and try his best. What we have not previously seen, however, is Alivebur in love. In the last few streams from his POV, his interactions with Quackity have stepped into the realm of possibility that to Alivebur, this is more than a simple rivalry. Therefore, this analysis will explore Alivebur's possible crush on Quackity by going through the streams to show development, and looking in depth at expressions.

The Book

When Alivebur takes the Project Nevadas book from the chest, he regards it and Quackity's name softly, sounding emotional, almost like he's on the verge of tears - especially as he says 'my kinsman':

“Quackity… My, my old rival! My… my kinsman. We’ve been through a lot, we went through a lot together. And I- And I-” - (Wilbur’s resurrected gentleman of L'manburg: 1:02:11, 5th May)

It's a very emotional line, and truly the first time during the 5th May stream that Alivebur seems genuinely comfortable, suggesting that this is the first time he realises that Quackity is the only one (from his perspective) who isn't afraid of who he was before he died.

Furthermore, it suggests this is where he first gets the hope that Quackity sees him as human.

He even reads the book with a gentle tone, suggesting that he thinks Quackity wrote it with a softness.

In the 31st May stream, Alivebur still has the book on him, and keeps the contents to himself, at first, stopping midsentence as he begins to read it to Tommy.

“Let me read you the book, let me read you the book. ‘My dearest friend, Wilbur’. Uh. And then there’s just some other stuff.” – (Wilbur’s A Deck of Cards with a Green Smile on them: 14:53, 31st May)

Due to him having no idea he was going to be up against Quackity yet, it is likely he kept it to himself because it was too personal to share - only later showing it to Tommy as a plea to why he shouldn't join Quackity.

In between reading the first part and uttering 'uh', Alivebur opens his mouth to say more, but no words come out. As if he couldn't physically read it.

Then he goes on to 'read' Tommy the book, except he makes up the contents. What is interesting here, is how he seems to slip:

“It says: ‘My dearest friend, Wilbur. I’ve really missed seeing you. Come to Project Nevadas. Your best friend, Quackity.’ He’s not my best friend, Tommy, don’t worry, that would be you.” – (Wilbur’s A Deck of Cards with a Green Smile on them: 16:28, 31st May)

Tommy has pushed him for what's inside the book, so Alivebur 'gives in' and starts to read it, coming up with what he's saying on the fly. The slip? 'Your best friend', we know in the 25th July stream that one of Alivebur's goals seems to be Quackity being his friend, making this line all the more obvious that this is something Alivebur wants, to be Quackity's friend, and to be on his side.

When he gets rejected from Las Nevadas, he opens up the book like he's trying to make sense of it:

Because Alivebur took it as a call, took it as an invitation to join Quackity and be on his side - something that Alivebur seems to want. Perhaps because it would be a place to belong, a side to stand with, someone to stand alongside who isn't afraid of him.

Hence why he was petty and challenged Quackity, because he was rejected by the only person who Alivebur thinks regards him as a human.

Alivebur keeps the book on him in the following stream, Healthy Competition. Where, in the middle of talking to Phil, while looking in his inventory, he gets distracted by the book, losing track of what he was saying as he looks at it:

This suggests that Alivebur is keeping the book on him because it's precious, and because he's yearning. It isn't something he's keeping safe in an Ender chest like he used to do with history books, but rather something he's keeping on him, almost like he's keeping it close to his heart.

It's personal, enough to distract him in the middle of a conversation in a way we haven't seen from Alivebur before.

When he's making plans, he doesn't get distracted easily, usually sticking to the point, but here, he trails off in the middle of a sentence, pulls the book into his hand, struggles to open it, and looks for just a second before putting it away.

It's definitely not something that Alivebur would do at all, and is certainly new. Which, in turn, heavily suggests a crush because it is something we've never seen before.

Later in the stream, as Alivebur tosses the named steaks over to Ranboo, Alivebur pulls the book into his hand again. His expression drops almost, he stops in a sense, eyes dipping down. There's a sadness this time:

Like a sad longing. Perhaps the book is a reminder too, of what he truly wants, to be alongside Quackity, to be his dearest friend like it says.

While Alivebur doesn't look at the book in the 3rd and 4th Aug streams, he does still have it on him, showing that he does indeed keep it on him at all times. Evidently, the book is very important to him.

Therefore, due to all this, it can be heavily suggested from the book alone that Alivebur has a crush. Keeping it on him at all times, regarding it softly, being unable to share the contents at first, looking at it with a longing or a sad yeaning, all show that the book is precious to him in a way that proves feelings.

The Crush Question

More under the cut

When Alivebur talks about how Quackity challenged him, calling the look in his eyes cool - before then admitting that he almost called it hot, Tommy proceeds to ask if Alivebur has a crush, to which Alivebur says:

“I have a complicated relationship with Big Q, but I don’t think it’s at that level yet.” – (Wilbur’s A Deck of Cards with a Green Smile on them: 44:55, 31st May)

There is a lot to this line, for example, 'complicated relationship' suggests, within this context, that he's referring to their very colourful past, where they were political rivals, allies, perhaps friends, and also almost lovers.

Considering that Alivebur says he doesn't think it's at the level of a crush yet does indeed suggest that he is aware of his attraction and/or feelings for Quackity.

We know from Niki's birthday party that Alivebur had feelings for Quackity then:

“Sometimes, uh, you know, my, my, my feelings towards some people... in this room get the better of me.” - (Karl's Dream SMP with Niki: 1:46:37, 2nd Nov)

During that pause, that ellipsis, Alivebur looks straight at Quackity before continuing. It is clear that at this point he did have feelings, hence why he kissed Quackity, and why later in that stream he sang songs of love and hate to him. Complicated relationship indeed.

So, 'complicated relationship' possibly does refer to all their past, to everything they've been, or almost been. That paired with him thinking his feelings aren't at the level of a crush yet - at this point - does heavily suggest that this is something that is progressing.

Either he will later realise his feelings have gotten to the level of a crush, or that it's been a crush for a while, but the important part here, is the use of 'yet', he's expecting it.

In turn, Alivebur's answer to Tommy's question does suggest the existence of feelings already, as well as Alivebur acknowledging it can become a crush.

Crush Behaviour

In recent streams it has become increasingly evident that Alivebur is behaving like he has a crush already. Even in the first stream where this becomes evident - the 31st May one - he displays signs of a crush.

To begin, one of the most evident signs of a crush from the 31st May stream are the longing sighs:

It's the way he sighs with his whole chest. The way he's trying to speak but sighs instead, as if that's all he can say, as if it conveys everything he feels.

The lines the sighs coincide with are interesting to note too:

“He’s, he’s um, he’s, I guess my, my yang. He’s the yang.” – (Wilbur’s A Deck of Cards with a Green Smile on them: 47:56, 31st May)

The first sigh takes place between 'he's um' and 'he's', and only then gets out what he wants to say, that Quackity's his yang. Which, from that, it can be suggested that the sigh comes from thinking about Quackity as his light, his other half, as something he can't exist without, something like a soulmate. Because that's what 'his yang' suggests on its own, but paired with the sigh, it shows how he's thinking about it, and from the tone, he's also longing for it.

And then there's the line for the second sigh:

“Because when you’ve got people like Quackity over there, who are just- You know, he said it best, I’m not gonna talk shit about him behind his back.” – (Wilbur’s A Deck of Cards with a Green Smile on them: 1:10:00, 31st May)

Here the sigh takes place when Alivebur cuts himself off after the 'just'. It's more of a breathed sigh, and it has a 'aw' sound to it. There is a feeling of more attraction here than longing. He's thinking about Quackity again and then sighs like this, almost in a happy way. It's almost got an amazed feel to it, as if that's how he feels when thinking of Quackity here.

Then he goes on to say he's not gonna talk shit about him behind his back, which also indicates a crush type behaviour, because while he's setting himself up to be Quackity's rival, he stops himself from doing what most would when they're against someone.

The sighs aren't the only part of the 31st May stream that have a crush behaviour feeling to them. This is also clear when Tommy asks if Alivebur and Quackity were kissing.

He nervously laughs after Tommy asks, and stares at Quackity, with his hand over his mouth. The nervous laugh suggests that Alivebur does feel something towards this question, something positive but guarded, hence his hand over his mouth, and why he stares at Quackity.

And then he deflects. He doesn't answer Tommy's question, he just changes the subject. It's clear from this that he's hiding his true feelings here.

“No, I don’t think I wanna kiss him. It’s um…” – (Wilbur’s A Deck of Cards with a Green Smile on them: 50:29, 31st May)

This is backed up by him saying he doesn't think he wants to kiss Quackity. He clearly has some complicated feelings about it, hence the use of 'think' instead of just leaving it as no.

Evidentially, there is some guarded part of Alivebur that isn't sure what to feel about kissing Quackity, but judging by the use of 'think', and nervously laughing while staring at Quackity after being asked if they were kissing, it seems like he's thought about it.

The next blatant crush behaviour happens in the 25th July stream as Alivebur is talking about how he met up with Quackity:

The body language here, the way he seems to fiddle with his arms, it's a very nervous thing to do, and since he's talking to Phil here, it suggests he's nervously talking about his crush to his dad.

The full line shows this even more:

“Yeah! I met up with him, and I hadn’t seen him in ages. It was, I’m gonna say it, it was nice. It was a nice time. I- I- It felt good, it felt, uh, you know, he didn’t, he didn’t seem afraid of me, which is cool.” - (Wilbur’s Healthy Competition: 7:38, 25th July)

He begins with that he hadn't seen him in ages, which is especially interesting because this is true of everyone, it's been 13 years for Alivebur, but the way he says it here makes it sound so casual, like it had just been a little while. Perhaps it suggests how human and alive he feels around Quackity.

He goes on to say it was nice, that it felt good, and how it's cool Quackity didn't seem afraid of him. Which suggests even more so of just how human and alive Quackity makes him feel, that he simply had a nice time. Especially with him saying it felt good, which shows how this isn't just an intense rivalry for Alivebur, it's something that makes him feel more positive emotions.

The most damning evidence for Alivebur's crush behaviour, however, comes from when he's waiting for Quackity on the 4th Aug stream.

“Wait here, look, I promise you, just you wait. Just you wait. Ready? Ready? Are you ready? Are- Are you- Are you ready? Um… Uh…” - (Wilbur’s Unhealthy Competition: 11:06, 4th Aug)

He expects Quackity to be there as soon as he is, but when he's not there, Alivebur begins to get nervous, um-ing and uh-ing. After two minutes of waiting around, Alivebur then proceeds to proclaim that he thinks he understands Quackity, and how his brain works, only for him to prove he doesn't give a shit:

“This guy. Ranboo, I swear to god, like I, I feel like I understand him, I feel like I know how his brain works, you know, how his- how the- how the cogs in his mind go. And then he just, and then he just goes and proves that he doesn’t give a shit.” - (Wilbur’s Unhealthy Competition: 12:56, 4th Aug)

The reason this is evident crush behaviour is because Alivebur starts getting self-conscious about how Quackity feels about him after waiting two minutes. He assumes that as soon as he arrives on the border, Quackity will be there instantly.

It's very reminiscent of real life, where some people may get self-conscious if their crush doesn't text them back immediately. Except with Alivebur, instead of a text, he turns up on Las Nevadas's doorstep and expects Quackity to drop anything he's doing to tell him to fuck off.

However, the most blatant part of this piece of evidence is when Quackity asks if they've been waiting long, to which Alivebur replies with:

“Uh, I’ve just arrived, you know, I just arri- I, I haven’t been long for you. I, I wouldn’t- Quackity, you think, you think I’d wait for you?” - (Wilbur’s Unhealthy Competition: 14:35, 4th Aug)

He pretends he's just arrived, trying to act suave, that he wouldn't wait for Quackity, just like how Quackity didn't instantly greet him the minute he turned up. He's brushing it off here, but even he himself knows that he isn't acting as smooth as he would like:

He glances away as he drinks from the bottle, then closes his eyes, scrunching up his face. It's an embarrassed 'oh god did I really just say that?' type expression. It's the type of expression you would expect to see from someone who feels like they've just embarrassed themself in front of their crush.

That's what is evident here when everything from this scene is put together, that Alivebur is acting like he has a crush.

Finally, the last bit of evidence we have right now that indicates Alivebur is expressing crush behaviour is when he says he feels alive after interacting with Quackity:

“I feel alive, Ranboo, I feel alive. Someone’s looking at me and talking to me! I’m alive, I’m alive! This is great.” - (Wilbur’s Unhealthy Competition: 27:22, 4th Aug)

You may notice here that the 'someone's looking at me' is similar to what cc!Wilbur said from Alivebur's perspective in the recent reddit comment about him (here), that 'no-one even looked at him' before he died. Alivebur is excited, even seeming to be happy, that someone is actually paying attention to him, looking at him, even if it's in a rivalry sense.

And it's only Quackity that makes him feel this way, despite Ranboo being there, talking to him. It suggests that what Alivebur is feeling with Quackity is unique, and makes him feel more than the friendship he has with Ranboo.

Most of all, the excited and stressed 'I feel alive' and 'I'm alive!' not only suggests that just talking to Quackity makes him feel alive, but that it could be making his heart beat faster every time he sees him and interacts with him.

This is implied through the line because to feel alive in this excited sense induces a reaction, and that probable reaction of feeling alive - being excited, suggests his heart is beating faster. This links back to Alivebur having a crush because when a person is around someone they have feelings for, their heart beats faster.

Lastly, in the latter half of the quote, when he says 'I'm alive!', he looks towards Las Nevadas, and sighs in what sounds like a happy tone. This shows that it is indeed Quackity that is making him feel this way.

All in all, everything from the sighs to the way Quackity makes him feel alive, does indeed suggest that Alivebur is displaying crush behaviour towards Quackity, and therefore, indicates that he has a crush.

Homoerotic Tension

Another factor that ties into the evidence that Alivebur has a crush, is the homoerotic tension he has towards and with Quackity.

The most obvious occurrence of this is when Alivebur bites his lip at the idea that Quackity won't like the burger van:

“So he didn’t like it? He didn’t like you setting up the cookie stand? … Okay. Okay. No, no, no, that’s good.” - (Wilbur’s Healthy Competition: 21:33, 25th July)

As soon as Ranboo says Quackity didn't like it, Alivebur smiles, licks his lips, and then bites his lip.

In this context, there's no anxiousness here, so the only reason he could be biting his lip is because of his attraction to Quackity. A lip bite in this sense means that Alivebur is restraining himself, as well as experiencing desire.

It's a very clear attraction to Quackity, which further shows that he is attracted to him in all senses. This is also a foundation for where his feelings are coming from, and because we know Alivebur's type (he likes a challenge and thought the look in Quackity's eyes was hot when he challenged him), it becomes evident that the lip bite is a reaction to the idea of Quackity being angry at him.

And in the 4th Aug stream, this is explicitly said:

“When you smashed the window and blew up the wall? I’d be pissed, and I bet he is, dude.” - (Wilbur’s Unhealthy Competition: 7:20, 4th Aug)

“Ohh boy! Ha ha ha ha, ha! Oh, this is good, this is- this is exactly what I want. Did you see how- Dude, dude, Ranboo, he was trying act like I didn’t get to him.” - (Wilbur’s Unhealthy Competition: 26:47, 4th Aug)

Therefore, due to Alivebur expecting Quackity to be pissed, and him saying it's exactly what he wants after interacting with him, it's clear that him smiling and biting his lip after hearing that Quackity didn't like the cookie stand, comes from wanting Quackity to be angry with him, and so, links into his type, proving his attraction to him.

This links back to his possible crush because a lip bite like this definitely isn't an expression someone would make about a friend or just a rival. Which means it's explicitly attraction to Quackity, and further suggests that him having a crush on him is very possible.

Another notable moment that shows tension in this sense is when Alivebur says Quackity is a hard man to refuse.

“But I get it, I get it, you know, Quackity… He’s a, he’s a hard man to refuse.” - (Wilbur’s Unhealthy Competition: 24:09, 4th Aug)

The reason this suggests homoerotic tension and attraction is because of what 'he's a hard man to refuse' suggests. It's as if Alivebur is saying to Quackity that he can't say no to him, which shows how he is drawn to him. It also suggests that if Quackity were to ask something of Alivebur, he would do it, as he can't refuse him easily/can't say no.

The most interesting part about this is how Alivebur has never been manipulated or persuaded by Quackity, and therefore, in Alivebur's case, this sentiment is coming from their history, and possibly refers to the rivalry they have always had. Alivebur didn't refuse Quackity from running against him during the election era, and he eagerly gunned for a rivalry once he was rejected from Las Nevadas.

All of this indicates that Alivebur saying Quackity is a hard man to refuse has romantic connotations to it and suggests attraction to him.

Overall, the homoerotic tension, and Alivebur's attraction shows how it's very likely a crush has built off this foundation, and suggests why Alivebur is so drawn to Quackity.

Conclusion

In conclusion, Alivebur has a crush due to the way he talks about and interacts with Quackity. It is clear in the way he holds the book close and regards it softly and with a longing, and how he doesn't think his feelings are at the level of a crush yet, as if he fully expects it to happen. Additionally, his yearning sighs, the way he nervously laughs as Tommy asks if they kissed, his body language when he talks to Phil about him, and how he attempts to act smooth in front of Quackity only to be embarrassed by what he said, all suggest he's behaving like he has a crush. Furthermore, biting his lip when thinking of Quackity and saying he's a hard man to refuse show his attraction, and therefore, his likely crush. Overall, Alivebur has a crush due to all these factors.

#dream smp #alivebur #wilbur soot #quackbur #tntduo #dream smp analysis #i could have added more evidence but that would have easily made this over 4000 words #it's 3700 words but still #it's definitely long enough to show enough proof i think

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qqueenofhades · 3 years

Note

Hi. You made a post a couple of days ago about how queer historical fiction doesnt need to be defined only by homophobia. Can you expand on that a bit maybe? Because it seems interesting and important, but I'm a little confused as to whether that is responsible to the past and showing how things have changed over time. Anyway this probably isn't very clear, but I hope its not insulting. Have a good day :)

Hiya. I assume you're referring to this post, yes? I think the main parameters of my argument were set out pretty clearly there, but sure, I'm happy to expand on it. Because I'm a little curious as to why you think that writing a queer narrative (especially a queer fictional narrative) that doesn't make much reference to or even incorporate explicit homophobia is (implicitly) not being "responsible to the past." I've certainly made several posts on this topic before, but as ever, my thoughts and research materials change over time. So, okay.

(Note: I am a professional historian with a PhD, a book contract for an academic monograph on medieval/early modern queer history, and soon-to-be-several peer-reviewed publications on medieval queer history. In other words, I'm not just talking out of my ass here.)

As I noted in that post, first of all, the growing emphasis on "accuracy" in historical fiction and historically based media is... a mixed bag. Not least because it only seems to be applied in the Game of Thrones fashion, where the only "accurate" history is that which is misogynistic, bloody, filthy, rampantly intolerant of competing beliefs, and has no room for women, people of color, sexual minorities, or anyone else who has become subject to hot-button social discourse today. (I wrote a critical post awhile ago about the Netflix show Cursed, ripping into it for even trying to pretend that a show based on the Arthurian legends was "historically accurate" and for doing so in the most simplistic and reductive way possible.) This says far more about our own ideas of the past, rather than what it was actually like, but oh boy will you get pushback if you try to question that basic premise. As other people have noted, you can mix up the archaeological/social/linguistic/cultural/material stuff all you like, but the instant you challenge the ingrained social ideas about The Bad Medieval Era, cue the screaming.

I've been a longtime ASOIAF fan, but I do genuinely deplore the effect that it (and the show, which was by far the worst offender) has had on popular culture and widespread perceptions of medieval history. When it comes to queer history specifically, we actually do not know that much, either positive or negative, about how ordinary medieval people regarded these individuals, proto-communities, and practices. Where we do have evidence that isn't just clerical moralists fulminating against sodomy (and trying to extrapolate a society-wide attitude toward homosexuality from those sources is exactly like reading extreme right-wing anti-gay preachers today and basing your conclusions about queer life in 2021 only on those), it is genuinely mixed and contradictory. See this discussion post I likewise wrote a while ago. Queerness, queer behavior, queer-behaving individuals have always existed in history, and labeling them "queer" is only an analytical conceit that represents their strangeness to us here in the 21st century, when these categories of exclusion and difference have been stringently constructed and applied, in a way that is very far from what supposedly "always" existed in the past.

Basically, we need to get rid of the idea that there was only one empirical and factual past, and that historians are "rewriting" or "changing" or "misrepresenting" it when they produce narratives that challenge hegemonic perspectives. This is why producing good historical analysis is a skill that takes genuine training (and why it's so undervalued in a late-capitalist society that would prefer you did anything but reflect on the past). As I also said in the post to which you refer, "homophobia" as a structural conceit can't exist prior to its invention as an analytical term, if we're treating queerness as some kind of modern aberration that can't be reliably talked about until "homosexual" gained currency in the late 19th century. If there's no pre-19th century "homosexuality," then ipso facto, there can be no pre-19th-century "homophobia" either. Which one is it? Spoiler alert: there are still both things, because people are people, but just as the behavior itself is complicated in the premodern past, so too is the reaction to it, and it is certainly not automatic rejection at all times.

Hence when it comes to fiction, queer authors have no responsibility (and in my case, certainly no desire) to uncritically replicate (demonstrably false!) narratives insisting that we were always miserable, oppressed, ostracised, murdered, or simply forgotten about in the premodern world. Queer characters, especially historical queer characters, do not have to constantly function as a political mouthpiece for us to claim that things are so much better today (true in some cases, not at all in the others) and that modernity "automatically" evolved to a more "enlightened" stance (definitely not true). As we have seen with the recent resurgence of fascism, authoritarianism, nationalism, and xenophobia around the world, along with the desperate battle by the right wing to re-litigate abortion, gay rights, etc., social attitudes do not form in a vacuum and do not just automatically become more progressive. They move backward, forward, and side to side, depending on the needs of the societies that produce them, and periods of instability, violence, sickness, and poverty lead to more regressive and hardline attitudes, as people act out of fear and insularity. It is a bad human habit that we have not been able to break over thousands of years, but "[social] things in the past were Bad but now have become Good" just... isn't true.

After all, nobody feels the need to constantly add subtextual disclaimers or "don't worry, I personally don't support this attitude/action" implied authorial notes in modern romances, despite the cornucopia of social problems we have today, and despite the complicated attitude of the modern world toward LGBTQ people. If an author's only reason for including "period typical homophobia" (and as we've discussed, there's no such thing before the 19th century) is that they think it should be there, that is an attitude that needs to be challenged and examined more closely. We are not obliged to only produce works that represent a downtrodden past, even if the end message is triumphal. It's the same way we got so tired of rape scenes being used to make a female character "stronger." Just because those things existed (and do exist!), doesn't mean you have to submit every single character to those humiliations in some twisted name of accuracy.

Yes, as I have always said, prejudices have existed throughout history, sometimes violently so. But that is not the whole story, and writing things that center only on the imagined or perceived oppression is not, at this point, accurate OR helpful. Once again, I note that this is specifically talking about fiction. If real-life queer people are writing about their own experiences, which are oftentimes complex, that's not a question of "representation," it's a question of factual memoir and personal history. You can't attack someone for being "problematic" when they are writing about their own lived experience, which is something a younger generation of queer people doesn't really seem to get. They also often don't realise how drastically things have changed even in my own lifetime, per the tags on my reblog about Brokeback Mountain, and especially in media/TV.

However, if you are writing fiction about queer people, especially pre-20th century queer people, and you feel like you have to make them miserable just to be "responsible to the past," I would kindly suggest that is not actually true at all, and feeds into a dangerous narrative that suggests everything "back then" was bad and now it's fine. There are more stories to tell than just suffering, queer characters do not have to exist solely as a corollary for (inaccurate) political/social commentary on the premodern past, and they can and should be depicted as living their lives relatively how they wanted to, despite the expected difficulties and roadblocks. That is just as accurate, if sometimes not more so, than "they suffered, the end," and it's something that we all need to be more willing to embrace.

#history #medieval history #queer history #meta #long post #anonymous #ask

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who-is-page · 3 years

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We sort of started this discussion at Chimeras' Othercon panel, but I wanted to keep it going so I figured I would send an ask. What do you think it would mean for our community to drop the focus on voluntary and involuntary identities? I agree that we fundamentally should, but a bunch of things immediately jump to mind.

Our community has spent years leaning heavily into the lines between voluntary and involuntary identities and taken special care to make massive distinctions between them, leaving little to no room for grey area. It's no bit surprise that alterhuman spaces have had actual, legitimate, longstanding issues of grilling and gatekeeping. Nonhumans with nuanced and complicated identities are forced to shove themselves into a box to fit into the community, and the ideas we have about certain identities needing to be involuntary are absolutely baked into many aspects of our community and its history.

At the same time, we have used this unjustified gatekeeping in part to protect the community from genuine threats and appropriation of our terminology. The way we have limited our concepts of who is allowed to identify in what ways is generally wrong and has no doubt harmed a subset of kin, but at the same time is understandable in the sense that it has a cause. Yes, this was an issue even before KFF, but KFF certainly don't make it easy to create space for genuine voluntary kin and other voluntary alterhumans.

How do we create the space for nuance and fluidity and complexity in these terms and identities after we have spent so long defensively creating rigid boundaries and restrictions regarding the ways people are allowed to identify? How do we address community gatekeeping while also protecting our community from the people who use our identities and terminology in bad faith?

I have a lot of ideas, but this is obviously a very complex topic that we can't just solve in a day. I was just curious to hear your thoughts, if you had any. Hopefully once our personal website is up one of our first essays will be about this issue. (Also, how is Page? /hj)

So I know we’ve been sitting on this ask for... -checks watch- ...almost two weeks now, but it’s genuinely because I just wasn’t sure how to answer it for a good long while, and I didn’t just want to throw out some haphazard, half-hearted answer to such important questions. So here’s our thoughts on the debacle.

Voluntary and involuntary is a focus I doubt we’ll ever see any of the alterhuman communities permanently drop, for several reasons.

The first and foremost being that, by the definition of the term “alterhuman,” defined here as “a subjective identity which is beyond the scope of what is traditionally considered ‘being human’,” both experiences at their most extremes technically fall underneath the label, rendering the distinction (to some) vitally important to helping understand and define their identity/identity labels. The difference between KFF as an alterhuman identity and forms of otherkinity as an alterhuman identity, for instance, as you mention.

And then there’s the societal factors to consider. People like nice, neat little boxes: people like to be able to compartmentalize their communities, with no overlap, with no spillage, with no complications or grey areas or nuance. It’s a fact of life that people often instinctively want to water down labels and identities into more easily digestible formations, though there are arguments around why people precisely do it. And, as you point out, that often means alterhumans and nonhumans with more complex or nuanced identities typically get shoved into one box or another that they may not perfectly fit into.

When we zero in on specifically the otherkin community, this becomes even more complicated given the community’s rife history: abusive p-shifter groups, the appropriation of language by roleplayers and fiction writers, zoophiles attempting to forcibly associate otherkinity with pro-bestiality movements, and the blatant general misinformation spread by laymen and academics alike, just to name a few relevant problems the community has faced and continues to face. The community is stubborn to a fault, largely because it’s had to be in order to survive. It holds to its preconceived notions and rigid boundaries like a dog with toy aggression to their favorite plush stegosaurus. Fittingly so, really.

So how do we take that stubbornness and change it to be more inclusive to our own? How could we, while still surviving all that onslaught and more? That’s the big question.

In regards to the larger alterhuman community, we’re blessed in the fact that it’s still such a young concept: it hasn’t quite yet had to face the “pathological anger” Religious Studies professor Joseph Laycock has described otherkin as bearing the brunt of. It’s still a community figuring itself out, with much of the anger you find related to it aimed at specific subsets of community within it, rather than at alterhumanity as a whole. And I think the fact that the alterhuman community is still metaphorically air-drying on a table means we have the opportunity to prevent anti-nuance and anti-complexity attitudes from taking hold in it. How we do that is another battle in itself-- I feel like the encouragement of inclusive dialogue, of open discussion intermingled with considerate or civil attitudes, within alterhuman-marketed spaces is a good starting point. I also think that the encouragement and legitimization of “alterhuman” as its own standalone term would be a positive force, where it functions as a broad, diverse identity label in addition to being an overarching, joining umbrella label. A label where someone doesn’t have to give details away of their identity if they don’t feel comfortable doing so, or shove themself into a box they may or may not actually feel they fit into. Something functionally similar to how many people use “queer,” if you will.

But that still leaves aside the issue of identity and terminological misuse, I am aware. And that is...an abstract thing to ward against, at absolute best. I think that the defining of our own spaces not only through our words but also through our actions would perhaps be the best thing we could do, realistically. The cultivation of websites, of group projects--books, zines, comics, pictures, forums, anything!--, of community-led conventions and meet-ups and howls and gatherings. Things which foster and build a community identity of sorts is the best defense against those who would try and distort that which makes us, us.

Zooming back in on the otherkin community, these answers change slightly, because--going back to the clay metaphor--the otherkin community has already metaphorically been glazed and baked (in the fires of hell). That history is cemented, the ways people have wronged it and continue to try and wrong it is cemented, the assumptions and attitudes are cemented.

With the otherkin community, I think that the burden of changing minds and pervasive attitudes falls a bit more onto the shoulders of “community leadership,” because of how the community functions and values both community experience and articulation. There’s a reason we don’t have a term comparable to “greymuzzle” in any of the other alterhuman communities, after all-- it’s a well-known and often aggravating quirk of the otherkin community, to hold certain individuals in such high esteem and put them on a pedestal because of their longevity and the things they’ve done and said. I hate to say that they have to set an example, but in the otherkin community that really is one of the best ways to advocate for change, or to push against those gatekeeping and grilling attitudes--by those who are largely well-respected putting forward ideas that have previously been mocked or disavowed, pushing debates on their legitimacy into community consciousness until it eventually trickles into community normalcy and foundation.

(This is, as you can imagine, a double-edged sword depending on how it’s used. But that’s a discussion for another day.)

That’s not to say that the ideas of creation and creativity with the goal of cultivating an inclusive community identity, like I suggested for the alterhuman community, is inapplicable to the otherkin community: but the otherkin community already has a long-term community identity, so it’d moreso be creation and creativity for the sake of formative inclusion. “History is always written by the winners” is a very, very literal phrase in its application to the otherkin community. Our community memory, for lack of a better way to put it, sucks from individual-to-individual. The future of the otherkin community, its eventual-history, is determined by its historians and creators of today: day-to-day arguments and discussions, unless deemed historically relevant by one archivist or another, disappear to the sands of time, and much more long-term recordings such as essays, websites, comics, etc., often go far beyond just its creators hands and get passed around and down for years, potentially. If you want a more nuanced and inclusive community, you have to dig up the clay for it, shovel by shovel, and bake it yourself, brick by brick, and eventually, with luck, or enough backing prestige, or just because those bricks are so astoundingly solid people can’t resist taking some to build their own foundations to nonhumanity, things will change. It will take time above all else, but once it’s there it will be impossible to remove, because people will just assume those bricks have always been there given enough years.

But those are just some of my thoughts and opinions on it. It’s an issue with so many layers of complexity to it, that there’s really no perfect answer out there that I can offer, and I know even what I’ve shared here has its flaws and drawbacks. I’m sure plenty of my followers also have additional thoughts on the subject, and I’d love to hear from other people what they think in the replies and reblogs.

(Also, Page is a very tired boi.)

#long post #otherkin #alterhuman

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firelxdykatara · 3 years

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You’re doing a LoK rewrite, correct? Would be really interested in hearing how you plan on fixing Suyin’s character and the Lin-Suyin conflict because……. oh boy. Man there’s a lot to unpack there. This is what happens when we don’t let Toph just raise her fucking kids for the sake of pushing a stupid as hell narrative about working women and single motherhood.

I am indeed!

In... you know, the way I'm doing most of my big potential projects, in that I have a folder with some documents that have plot notes and... some day I may actually get full, finished fics out of them (h2o AU is in there, as is my voltron!atla fusion AU, and uhhhh my book 3 atla rewrite, and a few other things), so... but I will say that the docs I have for my LoK rewrite so far amount to roughly 4.2k words of just Plot and Character Notes, which may some day turn into words of Story, hopefully.

ANYWAY, POINT IS: yes, this exists, and I have Many Many Thoughts.

Including how the Gaang kids would shake out! Cause I know I'm doing Zutara, and maybe Tokka???? Although I don't wanna just leave Suki out either... maybe a throuple??? Or Sukka having an amicable breakup before Sokka and Toph get together--maybe she already has Lin by then, and Sokka helps support her through the grief of losing Kanto???? Idk honestly, I haven't actually figured any of that out definitively yet except that Aang was perfectly happy to settle down with an Air Acolyte from one of the rebuilt temples because he grew up and out of his crush on Katara pretty easily once he hit puberty and matured a bit.

UHHH none of which is actually an answer to your question, because it's a valid one! Which is why I've been sitting on this a while (10 days I'm so sorry) bc I haven't made any solid decisions but I've been letting it percolate around my head a bit. And the more I think about it, the more I really like the Sukka -> Tokka idea (and I don't want to kill off Suki since the kids all deserve their awesome Kyoshi warrior auntie in their lives, and also I want a Sukka kid to be besties with Iara [zuko and katara's youngest] so maybe she gets with someone else after she and Sokka split? I could be talked into Ty Lee/Suki actually, the more I think about it....), but obviously having a stable father figure and a Toph who is... not what LoK made her out to be will dramatically change the Beifong family dynamic.

That said, I think I actually have a solution. (I'm so sorry for what I'm about to do.) Toph has Lin with Kanto--and he passes away when Lin is two or three, which is why she has very few memories of her father. (Although none of this 'she doesn't even know his name until she's 50+ cause Toph didn't tell her daughters about their fathers' bullshit.) Sokka is there for her through it all (all of the gaang is, of course, but you know that it sometimes just hits different when it's someone you're also starting to fall in love with, especially when there are older and much more deeply buried feelings there that are now resurfacing, because at least in my version Toph was deeply in love with Sokka when they were teenagers, but he was in love with Suki and she also loved Suki so she didn't want to mess up anything about their family or the group dynamics by making her feelings anyone else's problem), they fall in love, get married and have Suyin.

(Sokka may jokingly refer to it as a shotgun wedding, but the truth is he wanted to propose well before he found out she was pregnant, his attempts just kept getting messed up in increasingly comedic fashion.)

Throughout all of this, Republic City has been established, Sokka is Chancellor, Toph is something of a defacto police chief--mostly because, at the time, no one else was willing to volunteer, and she jokingly offered to whip the law enforcement, but unfortunately everyone else at the meeting took her seriously. However, she is also the founder of the probending league, and basically her feelings about law enforcement are complicated and she actively discouraged her kids from joining the force which is part of why Lin did. How else do you have a teen rebel phase with a parent like Toph? (Which, in this instance, means tough and firm but fair, with a 'you break it, it's up to you to fix it' attitude and very little desire to actually control her daughters and their behavior.)

Ah, but here's the rub.

Suyin is ten years old when Sokka dies, and Lin is sixteen. I'm not sure how he's killed--maybe by Yakone, to tie it into my plans for Amon and book 1. (Note that I'm not sure when the Yakone bloodbending trial happened in canon, but it doesn't matter. The timeline I'm gonna build will be completely different post-comet, and I'll eventually write it all down so that I can keep things straight.) Which would incidentally provide excellent means of having Katara have a very personal stake in the Amon conflict, and perhaps color the fight between him and Iara, but I'm getting off track. And I think Sokka being killed by Yakone, and Toph being unable to protect or save him, or deliver her own brand of justice to avenge him (because Aang is there to stop her and.... shit probably got ugly, I suspect she didn't talk to Aang for at least twenty years after Sokka's death--and this isn't to say I think Toph is particularly violent or murderous, but in that moment, she absolutely wanted to kill the man with her bare hands, and however much she may have regretted it afterwards, she took a very long time to forgive Aang for stopping her in the first place), is what results in Toph stepping down as police chief.

She didn't withdraw from her daughters or fuck off into the swamp or anything (words cannot express how much I hate that part of her canon history), but she did grieve for a very long time. Lin, meanwhile, felt like it was up to her to keep her family together, while also feeling a desperate need to... prove herself, I think. And because her mother was so adamant that she not join the police force, that's exactly what she does. I think Lin completely misread Toph's intentions, too, and believed that the discouragement was because her mother didn't think she had what it takes, when in reality I think Toph was scared of Lin losing herself in the job like she herself had begun to, and eventually coming up on something she couldn't change or fix and making the same mistakes she had.

(I think Toph and Lin have communication issues largely because they are both headstrong and willful, but where Toph thought she was giving her daughters the room they would need to make their own way, what Lin desperately craved was direction and she felt like that was something her mother simply couldn't understand.)

Suyin, on the other hand, fell in with a bad crowd like in canon. I think that what she desperately needed was attention, similar to Lin craving direction, and Toph was trying so hard not to be her own parents that she went a little too far in the other direction and Suyin began to feel like it didn't matter what she did, her mom wouldn't care, or get angry, or discipline her, or anything. Lin and Suyin butted heads a lot growing up, too, especially after Sokka's death, because Lin tried to rein in her sister's behavior and this was met with resistance and derision because Suyin felt like Lin was trying to be both mom and dad and she was neither but her big sister would never admit to being just as lost as she was and it made her furious.

So when Suyin is sixteen, and Lin is twenty-two and new to the force, The Big Rift happens. Lin catches Suyin and her gang, tries to apprehend her, gets a scar on her face in the ensuing conflict. But instead of abusing her power and sending her problem child off to her mother before fucking off to the swamp to avoid the consequences of her actions, Toph tries to actually fix things. Suyin cools her heels in prison for a while, because she was paralyzed by guilt at the time when she hurt her sister (a few inches lower and she could have slit her throat), and was still there when Lin's backup arrived.

Uhhhhhhhhhhh..... I'm so sorry I rambled for so long, BUT THE UPSHOT IS: I think Suyin learned a bit about culpability and taking responsibility for her own actions, Toph realized that her daughters had different needs than she did at their age (and I think a lot of the problem was that grief clouded her own ability to connect with her daughters, and in trying to not be her own parents she lost sight of how to be the parent her own daughters needed), and Lin, I think, had to realize that she had never fully processed the loss of not one but two fathers and had turned to her job in order to avoid actually confronting the grief that had overshadowed her childhood.

However, she did not forgive Suyin, at least not right away--and she wasn't forced or expected to. Suyin understood that she crossed a serious line, she took her lumps and did her time, and no one shamed Lin for her anger. I think, as a result, she had less reason to hold onto that bitterness, and perhaps by the time the story actually begins, she and Suyin are on much better terms, though I haven't worked it out exactly yet.

UHHH yeah I went on for days lmao. All of this is subject to change, too, depending on the needs of the story whenever I get around to actually writing it all down, BUT these are my initial thoughts, at least.

#atla #lin beifong #toph beifong #suyin beifong #tokka #lok rewrite #lok rewrite notes #precious-metal-girl #asked

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aelaer · 3 years

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Hi friend! You seem vast in your knowledge of Stephen and willing to share so please enlighten me as I don’t read the comics but I do watch the mcu movies, and do love Stephen.

I know he’s erratic and impulsive and reckless sometimes but didnt we already complete this arc in his first movie? Especially since we’ve watched him deal with the consequences of his actions for the entirety of the film and end of the movie Stephen was a different Stephen from the beginning of the movie.

IW Stephen seemed like a more mature version of the man we’ve met at the end of his first movie, a linear progression of the character, more responsible.

The spider man trailer is just a few minutes so I’ll further reserve judgment till I see the film, but he seems.. silly almost? I’m aware he has his funny moments but I’m just nervous they’re gonna make him the joke instead of having him make the jokes.

Do you notice anything weird about how the adults act in these newer marvel projects.? (I’m thinking of loki specifically) they all have a silly undertone to them? I cant put my finger on it but it’s definitely new and ..off

Is this a constant characterization for Stephen in the comics? Is this what he’s like all the time?

Regardless, thank you for your time if you see this xx

Oh yeah, Stephen's my favorite subject at the moment so I'm happy to give my thoughts!

Note that my answers apply to MCU!Stephen and what we've seen in the four films he's been in.

In my experience of just living, there are personality quirks that can be tempered out and made better, but not entirely eliminated, even if it's undesirable. In my opinion, Stephen's need to push himself and prove that he can Do A Thing is a trait that won't ever go away--especially as that trait has helped him more than hindered him. Examples would include the more mundane such as getting through a combined MD/PhD program and inventing surgical procedures at what is still a really young age for a neurosurgeon. We don't have a canonical age for Stephen, but Benedict was 40 when Doctor Strange was filmed and released; even if he's canonically in his mid-40s, that's still very young for him to be at his caliber after the necessary years of med school and residency in the United States. He's young and nowhere near the end of his career when he gets in the car crash. So with that information in mind, we know that he's very ambitious and throws himself into doing difficult work with gusto. That doesn't even go into everything he did as a sorcerer.

Why get into all of this? Because while we, the viewer who has seen the multiverse open at... some point (possibly, in a rewritten timeline, it's always been open now with what happened in Loki!), we have seen just how nuts it gets. We have seen the consequences. Stephen's smart, but I don't think it's a matter of strictly recklessness and more a combination of ignorance on this specific subject (erasing memories across the world or slightly rewriting time-- we don't know how he's doing it, but a memory spell makes more sense to me), hubris (of course), and the real desire to help Peter out. The latter two traits combined in intelligent people have proven bad in both fiction and reality.

The reason I don't think it's pure impulsiveness is because in the trailer, we see Stephen doing some meditation type thing in the underground area before the spell. He's also always doing research and as he tells Peter he'll help him, he clearly knows of a spell already and has some working knowledge of how it works. The conversation with Wong wouldn't have happened otherwise. But I personally get the vibe off him that he'd not do it without being very confident that he can do it -- and his history in the films has shown 0 failures in any of his spells once he's past novice-level, so in that aspect, his confidence makes sense. If he *should* do the spell due to the risks of failure, and lack of practicing precaution in the face of his confidence, is where his flaws lie, IMO. And in that sense people could say he was reckless for deciding to perform a complicated, dangerous spell, but that follows his M.O. completely -- he performed a very complicated, dangerous spell consistently with the Time Stone again and again, from how the sorcerers spoke about the Infinity Stone (and he casually just... throws himself into a time loop, then to look through time. He takes calculated risks, but they are very much risks).

One last thought on this statement - the biggest, biggest lesson that Stephen learned in his first film was that it was not about him. There was more to the world than his glory and his brilliance and even his happiness. He started doing things for the greater good rather than himself. And he started doing things for others -- fighting for the Sanctum in his own film, and protecting the Earth. Serving something greater than himself. But that doesn't make him suddenly humble, and it doesn't suddenly take away his strange (hah) sense of humor.

IW Stephen seemed like a more mature version of the man we’ve met at the end of his first movie, a linear progression of the character, more responsible.

He was more serious in that film. So was Tony. They still had some quips and arguments, but they were very serious. And it makes sense as to why -- it was the end of the world. So the mood of the setting would change anyone's demeanour. But he had very little chance to unwind in that film, considering that he was trying to protect one of six items that would destroy the universe, and also got freaking tortured in the middle of the film with little time to recover. But nearly every Avenger was super serious in that film, and for good reason.

It's a completely different setting from what is now Stephen's life which, from what little we've seen in the trailer, is weird enough that he got a magical snowstorm in the Sanctum. It's safe enough that Wong's off on vacation. It's been nearly a year since he returned from the dead. He's either figured out how to move on in the last year or, as some prefer, has gotten good enough to put on a facade and bury the trauma so far down that he's putting on a normal act - but that's up to debate until MoM. And we have no idea if old traumas are going to be brought up there or if it's just the new things.

I think the point is that it's possible to be both a responsible person and also to make colossal mistakes due to either emotional connections or hubris (or both - we don't know which way the film will go, if they'll explain it at all). They're not mutually exclusive. He can be protecting reality fantastically, while also believing that he's skilled enough to pull off the ability to pull off a dangerous spell which he did in his own film and in IW. He's guided the timeline down a specific path in IW/Endgame, after all - what's a little identity item compared to the fate of the universe, after all? Removing the Spider-Man/Peter association is, in comparison, child's play I imagine to a man like Stephen.

He was definitely silly in his own film. He was constantly trying to get Wong to laugh and there was a banter between Stephen and Christine after he gets stabbed. He's always been a bit awkward and a bit jokey--I think Thor showed that combination of humorous snark and good research rather well, though he was flippant in a way that didn't get to show his kinder side that is better established in his film. And now we get to see that sympathy in his agreement to help Peter (at least, in my opinion).

Because he was doing an amazing awesome spell not once, not twice, but *three* times in the trailer alone, I am not worried about Stephen just being a joke. He seems just as powerful as he was in IW and Endgame. The rest of the world is just getting reminded that he's definitely a bit of a socially awkward duck at times (or, if you prefer, Putting On a "I'm Fine" Front And It's Coming Across As Weird). So him being a big joke is not something I am personally worried about.

Situational humor has been a staple of Marvel films since Iron Man. I watched the films casually before 2016 when I fell head deep into Stephen Strange (or well, 2018/9 is more accurate as that's when I *really* went nuts), and my viewings before that time and after that time was a lot more analytical. And it's very easy to see where the silliness started, all the way back when Tony crashed into his own car and Dum-E sprayed him with a fire extinguisher. Thor was the butt of the joke in the "fish out of water" scene in a good, good chunk of the film. Even Captain America had some situational humor. And remember that Guardians of the Galaxy was back in 2014, which was halfway through the MCU's time thus far. The stars of these films are almost always the butt of some joke a couple times and do things that could be viewed as childish.

I don't know your age at all, but if you were born after 1990, what might be happening, rather, is that they are not getting sillier, but that you may be getting older. I was an adult (legally, at least) in 2008, but the way I view the adults of the films throughout the early 2010s as compared to now is night and day. It's just come with my own life experience, and wider understanding to media tropes. The jump is even more significant if you were younger in Iron Man/Avengers days and are an adult now. If you're an older adult than me, then I'd argue it's the matter of life experience adding to your overall knowledge of media plus, potentially, rose-tinted glasses giving you a better vision of the older movies while forgetting that the older movies had plenty of their own flaws (and silliness). Could be a lot of things- it's too individual to really say why your perspective has changed. But I don't think the MCU's largely changed their comedy formula since 2012/2013.

Is this a constant characterization for Stephen in the comics? Is this what he’s like all the time?

Oh the comics are a mess of characterizations. It's very difficult to find full consistency across writers, and some writers did him much better than others. At the moment, Jason Aaron's 2015 run is viewed as very good by a large amount of fans, while Waid's 2018 run is viewed with mixed reviews. It's largely a matter of preference as you'll see traits that are just so uncharacteristic in an arc and then it never happens again. He takes on secret identities, he kills billions to save trillions (along with the other Avengers!), he sells his soul, he's in a steady relationship for 30 years, then he's sleeping with a new woman every arc he co-stars in-- it's just so dependent on the writer over the decades. What Marvel thinks will sell. Right now Marvel thinks his death is gonna sell issues, so yeah :P You pick and choose with the comics and build a personality from there.

Thank you for the thoughtful ask. I hope this wasn't too much of a drag to read through; I get rambly on my favorite subjects. Or anything, really.

#stephen strange #doctor strange #spiderman no way home #spoilers #meta #mcu #i did a long ramble #i love stephen #i hope this was somewhat enlightening nonny #anonymous #ask #answered #long post

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btsficsforthehumble · 3 years

Text

adj.: 1. Modern, unfamiliar, or different

2. Not based on or conforming to what is generally done or believed

pairing: reader x ot7

genre: college au; angst, fluff, smut, poly, ot7

Summary: You begin your first year at a prestigious university, set out on achieving your academic goals when a series of men step into your life that change the way you view the definition of love.

Part Six

Warnings: none

Word count: 2.3k

The next day, you purposely run a little later than you normally would. You don’t know if you could endure another session of Taehyung being an actual menace at 9 o’clock in the morning. So, you take extra time to add some light makeup and pick out a pink checkered dress with a cream cardigan, and step out feeling cute, caffeinated, thanks to your morning coffee, and ready to tackle Calculus.

As you walk into the mostly full classroom, you naturally head to the spot you’ve stayed the last couple classes. This time however, you keep an eye out for Seokjin. Spotting him on the far side of the room, you send him a quick smile. Once he sees, he’s quick to send you one back with a nod.

He seems like a bit of a loner, you notice, with all of the other students engaged in hushed conversations around him, but with him seemingly content to lean on his head on his hand and stare off until class starts. He is strikingly handsome in a classical way that’s impossible to deny, which you suppose is intimidating. Coupled with him also being an older student in the class, it seems he creates a bubble around him that he himself is oblivious to.

You make eye contact with Hoseok as you head to your seat, to which he gives you a large toothy smile and a cute wave. You couldn’t hold the smile off of your own face if you tried, so you gave him a beaming grin with your own wave to accompany it.

Two seats behind Hoseok was the before-mentioned menace. His smile towards you was significantly less innocent. He was leaning back in his chair, legs stretched out far enough to be underneath your own seat, with his arms crossed. He seemed to be saying, “I’m too cool to be here.” After doing a judgmental scan of his posture, you raise an eyebrow and take your seat, and set your back firmly to him in hopes he’d get the message you didn’t want to be messed with today.

By some stroke of luck, your professor walks in almost immediately after your butt hits the seat. Pulling out your notebook, you steel yourself for the next hour of lecture in which you were refusing to let yourself get distracted. Even if Hoseok offered to study with you, you didn’t want to embarrass yourself in front of him by being clueless and then being a complete dead weight.

----

After another grueling class, you have to admit your fears about being dead weight feel closer to reality than what you’d want. In hindsight, you were really glad you took Hoseok’s offer to study. Well, if you were being honest with yourself, there was no way you’d turn that down even if you were a complete master at calculus. Hoseok is so bright and charming, and you feel drawn to him in the way flowers face the sun. He had such a happy and kind energy, that you have no doubt makes people from all walks of life love him.

Regardless of the boy’s personality, you are thankful for the fact that you had someone willing to help you with your least favorite subject. You need it.

You stand, and Hoseok soon follows. He turns to both you and Taehyung, “Are you both still good to study tonight? I know I need a review!” He lets out a laugh.

Taehyung answers before you get the chance. “Yeah, me too. Cafe Persona, right?”

You were a little surprised at his serious attitude. You hadn’t seen him act like he cared about anything, including his calculus grade, in the short time you’ve known him.

“Yep! Does that work? Y/n, are you still free tonight?” Hoseok answers, now looking at you expectantly.

“Oh! Uh, yeah, that works!”

“Great! Does seven sound okay?” Hoseok looks between you and Taehyung, causing you to glance at the other boy too. Taehyung was leaning with his hip to the edge of the chair, and ankles crossed with a straight look on his face. He balances relaxed and focused, and you can’t help but be intrigued by his attitude shift. He almost seemed like a different person from yesterday.

“Yep!”

“That works.”

You and Taehyung answer at the same time, causing Hoseok to grin at both of you. “Great! See you guys then!” Hoseok waves at you both before making his way out of the classroom, leaving you and Taehyung alone.

You give him an apprehensive look, waiting for him to say something flirty. Seeing the look, he gives you an understanding smile, seemingly not in the mood to mess with you. Slightly relieved, but honestly a little worried for him, you grab your back and go to leave. You pause, and look over your shoulder.

“Hey, are you okay?” You surprise yourself as you speak. He has managed to worm himself into your heart at least slightly, it appears.

He looks up from his bent over position and gives you a small look of surprise, apparently just as bewildered by your words as you. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just didn’t sleep well after working on a project last night,” he explains.

You tilt your head to the side, now curious. You’ve never really thought about his life --- his major, year, anything. “What is the project for?” you ask.

“A sculpture class. It fulfills a requirement for art history majors.”

You aren’t going to lie, him being artistic and into history made you more attracted to him. That major fit him well, from what you have seen. He dresses in baggy clothes, usually in neutral palettes, and instead of him looking messy, he makes everything he wears look sophisticated in a way that not many people are able to do.

You say with complete honesty, “That’s actually really cool. It makes sense for you.”

Now standing, he gives you a genuine smile. “Thanks, I really enjoy it. What about you, then?”

You divert your eyes, not wanting to admit you hadn’t chosen yet. “I actually am undecided…” you admit.

“Ah, well, life is long. You’ll figure it out. You’re smart.” His eyes hold yours as you speak, shining with sincerity.

You couldn’t help the blood rushing to your cheeks. You could tell that he really meant what he had said, not just saying it to be polite.

“Thank you, Taehyung… I hope you're right.” You glance down to your phone, breaking eye contact. It was a bit too intense for you. When you saw the time, you nearly jumped. You were close to being late for your next class.

“I’m running late, I’ll see you later!” you call over your shoulder, already hustling to leave the room. You hear him call out a bye as you leave, and feel his eyes following you until you get out of sight. He definitely left you with more complicated feelings towards him than what you had anticipated. But, that’s to think about another time --- you need to haul ass to get to Intro to Comp.

You make your way across campus surprisingly fast, dodging dozens of students who seemed to be less rushed than you. Nearly winded, you arrive just as the clock reaches the hour and the professor seems ready to begin. Embarrassed at the eyes on you as you walk in, you make your way to Jimin who you see sitting near the back as fast as you can without looking strange. You knew your face was red from the exertion and the embarrassment.

He laughed at your predicament as soon as you got close, and cleared the stuff of the seat he was saving for you.

“Shut up!” you whisper yell at him, but a smile breaks out on your face at his wide smile that showcased a just slightly crooked tooth. His eyes disappeared into crescent shapes at the force of his full cheeks lifting.

Once he calms down, and the lecture begins in relative peace, he leans over to you to speak without being overheard. “The LA was staring at you when you walked in, you know? His eyes never left you until you sat down.” He gives a conspiratorial grin.

“What? No way.” You give him an incredulous look. The LA seemed broadly disinterested --- disinterested in the class, disinterested in people, disinterested in you.

“I only noticed because I was watching him before you walked in,” Jimin admits with a giggle.

“He probably was just looking at me since I came in late, that’s all,” you justified.

Jimin raises a brow at you. “I guess we’ll see then, won’t we.” His eyes travel down the length of your torso and back up again, before giving you a smirk.

“Oh God. Whatever you are thinking, please don’t,” you whine.

He just widens his grin in response. Between Taehyung and Jimin, you felt that you’ve reached your mischief quota for the year already. You let your eyes slide shut and groan quietly.

----

“Come on y/n, don’t worry. I just have to ask him a question!” Jimin giggles, failing to hide his evil intentions. He wants to drag you up to have a quick chat with your broody LA, currently standing idle at the front of the room, watching the students filter out of the lecture hall.

“Sunbae if you do something embarrassing you owe me a drink,” you groan out. “Please, please be normal.”

“Don’t worry,” he draws out with a smile. A villainous smile, may you add. And with that, he drags you down the rows of chairs to the front of the room, stopping just short of Yoongi.

You hover slightly behind Jimin’s shoulder, wanting to leave but not wanting to abandon your friend. Yoongi looks back and forth between you and Jimin, and settles back on you, making you bristle slightly. It didn’t help that he had a delicate frown marring his features.

Jimin’s cheery voice quickly penetrates the awkward silence. “Hi, Yoongi right? My name’s Jimin! I was wondering if for the first project, we had to have a bridge structure? Or if we could use a double chorus maybe? Doctor Choi didn’t specify in class today.”

Yoongi narrowed his eyes at Jimin. “For the first project, use the traditional structure. Choi will grade you harsher if he thinks you’re a try-hard,” he gruffly answers.

“Hm, I see. I can be a bit overzealous at times, when I’m interested in something,” Jimin replies, this time in a much lower pitch. You watch his eyes roam Yoongi’s figure as he speaks, not bothering to disguise his interest.

“Can’t we all.” Yoongi’s voice is somehow even gruffer than before. And this time, he is staring straight at you as he replies.

Jimin notices, and gives a knowing smirk your direction. “Thanks Yoongi, see you next class!” Jimin sing-songs with a smile. He grabs your wrist, leading you out of the auditorium.

It’s a good thing he does, because your brain was short-circuiting after that interaction. You feel like a deer in the headlights, and nearly stumble as you try to keep pace with Jimin.

As soon as you walk out of the building, Jimin lets out a cackle, bending over from it’s force. “I told you! He definitely thinks you're hot, I mean, did you see the way he was looking at you? He looked like he wanted to eat you right there and then!” He lets out another loud laugh at his words.

You could feel your cheeks flaming. “Ugh, what the hell was that! Why’d you even say that to him! YOU were the one trying to eat HIM!” you yell slightly, waving your arms like a crazy person.

His laughter only gets louder at your response. “I wanted to test a theory! While I wish I was wrong and he wanted a piece of me, he only had eyes for you, darling.” His laughter died down slightly. “You look really pretty today, I don’t blame him,” he adds. His gaze turns slightly wistful, but it only lasts a second before he skips over to you and links your arms.

“That’s no reason to do all of that! You’re so embarrassing, sunbae!” You look up at him, giving him your best pout.

He pulls you closer, forcing your face to rest against his shoulder slightly. “Ah, the hot LA thinks you're cute! This is a win, my dear.” He gives a smirk down at you.

“I don’t know if that’s it. He seems kind of mean… maybe he’s just socially awkward or something,” you guess.

Jimin tilts his head, and says, “Maybe. Either way I know I had fun, your blush is too cute.” He gives you another mischievous grin.

You roll your eyes, and reach in your bag to check your phone. You needed to get some work done before your meeting with Hoseok and Taehyung.

Seeing the time, you quickly unlink your arms from Jimin’s and go to say goodbye. You want to have enough time to run though some practice problems before you go later, and you knew it was going to take you a while. It seems the time was causing you to have to cut all your conversations short today, unfortunately.

“Bye sunbae, I have to go. Oh, and you owe me a drink!” you declare.

He gives you a pout of his own at your leaving, but is quick to transform into a wide grin at your reminder.

“This weekend!” he calls as you start backing up. You roll your eyes in response, and turn around to walk in the direction of your apartment. It was time to grind out some work, and not think of the weird interactions with boys that had happened today.

#BTS #ot7 #ot7 x reader #poly ot7 #houseofddaeng

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aro-comics · 3 years

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Fashion Analysis (Part 2: Outside of Amatonormativity Alone)

[Note: This post is a part of a series analyzing self-expression, fashion, aromanticism, and how they interact with other parts of identity. For full context please read the whole thing!]

Outside of Amatonormativity Alone: Sexism, Homophobia (and/or Transphobia), Racism, Ableism, and Other Factors That can Impact Self Expression

My comic was originally meant to be a light hearted joke. I’d always been told I’d want to dress up one day, be pretty and feminine once I fell in love with a boy (BLEGH). I was so certain that I would never do that, and now … here we are. I put lots of effort into my appearance, present feminine, all in the hopes I’ll impress a very special someone - a potential employer at a networking event. I think there’s a certain irony to all of this, and I do find it funny that I managed to both be wrong and completely subvert amatonormative stereotypes!

But having the chance to think about the whole situation, I realize now that my changes in presentation reflect far more. The pressure I felt to dress differently are still influenced by fundamental forms of discrimination in society, and I would be remiss to not address these inherent factors that were tied with my experiences alongside my aromanticism. So in this section, I will briefly cover some of these factors and summarize how they can influence people’s self expression as a whole, before discussing my own experiences and how these factors all intersect.

Sexism

The pressure on women In This Society to uphold arbitrary norms is ever present and often harmful, and while I wish I had the time to discuss the impacts of every influence the patriarchy has on personal expression, to even try to cover a fraction of it would be impractical at best for this essay. Instead, since the original comic focuses on professionalism and presentation, this is what I will talk about here.

Beauty standards are a specific manifestation of sexism that have a deep impact on how people perceive women. It’s a complicated subject that’s also tied with factors like capitalism, white supremacy, classism, and more, but to summarize the main sentiment: Women are expected to be beautiful. Or at least, conform to the expectations of “feminine” “beauty” as ascribed by the culture at large.

They also tend to be considered exclusively as this idea that "women need to be beautiful to secure their romantic prospects, which subsequently determines their worth as human beings. The problematic implications of this sentiment have been called out time and time again (and rightfully so), however there is an often overlooked second problematic element to beauty standards, as stated in the quote below:

“Beauty standards are the individual qualifications women are expected to meet in order to embody the “feminine beauty ideal” and thus, succeed personally and professionally”

- Jessica DeFino. (Source 1)

… To succeed personally, and professionally.

The “Ugly Duckling Transformation” by Mina Le (Source 2) is a great video essay that covers the topic of conforming to beauty standards through the common “glow up” trope present in many (female focused) films from the early 2000s.

“In most of these movies, the [main character] is a nice person, but is bullied or ignored because of her looks.”

Mina Le, (timestamp 4:02-4:06)

Generally, by whatever plot device necessary, the ugly duckling will adopt a new “improved” presentation that includes makeup, a new haircut, and a new wardrobe. While it is not inherently problematic for a woman to be shown changing to embrace more feminine traits, there are a few problems with how the outcomes of these transformations are always depicted and what they imply. For starters, this transformation is shown to be the key that grants the protagonist her wishes and gives her confidence and better treatment by her peers. What this is essentially saying is that women are also expected to follow beauty standards to be treated well in general, not only in a romantic context, and deviation from these norms leads to the consequences of being ostracized.

The other problematic element of how these transformations are portrayed are the fact that generally the ONLY kind of change that is depicted in popular media is one in the more feminine direction. Shanspeare, another video essayist on YouTube, investigates this phenomenon in more detail in “the tomboy figure, gender expression, and the media that portrays them” (Source 4). In this video, Shaniya explains that “tomboy” characters are only ever portrayed as children - which doesn’t make any sense at face value, considering that there ARE plenty of masculine adult women in real life. But through the course of the video (and I would highly recommend giving it a watch! It is very good), it becomes evident that the “maturity” aspect of coming of age movies inherently tie the idea of growth with “learning” to become more feminine. Because of the prevalence of these storylines (as few mainstream plots will celebrate a woman becoming more masculine and embracing gender nonconformity) it becomes clear that femininity is fundamentally associated with maturity. It also implies that masculinity in women is not only not preferred, it is unacceptable to be considered mature. Both of these sentiments are ones that should be questioned, too.

Overall, I think it is clear that these physical presentation expectations, even if not as restrictive as historical dress codes for women have been, are still inherently sexist (not to mention harmful by also influencing people to have poor self image and subsequent mental health disorders). Nobody should have to dress in conformity with gender norms to be considered “acceptable”, not only desirable, which leads us to the second part of this section.

Homophobia (and/or Transphobia)

So what happens when women don’t adhere to social expectations of femininity? (Or in general, someone chooses to present in a way that challenges the gender binary and their AGAB, but for the sake of simplicity I will discuss it from my particular lens as a cis woman who is pansexual).

There are a lot of nuances, of course, to whether it’s right that straying from femininity as a woman (or someone assumed to be a woman) will automatically get read a certain way by society. But like it or not, right or not, if you look butch many people WILL see you as either gay, (or trans-masculine, which either way is not a cishet woman). This is tied to the fact that masculinity is something historically associated with being WLW (something we will discuss later).

This association of breaking gender norms in methods of dress with being perceived as a member of the LGBTQ+ community has an influence on how people may choose to express themselves, because LGBTQ+ discrimination is very real, and it can be very dangerous in many parts of the world.

I think it’s very easy to write off claims in particular that women are pressured into dressing femininely when it is safer to do so in your area; but I really want to remind everyone that not everyone has the luxury of presenting in a gender non-conforming way. This pressure to conform does exist in many parts of the world, and can be lethal when challenged.

And even if you’re not in an extremely anti-LGBTQ+ environment/places that are considered “progressive” (like Canada), there are still numerous microagressions/non-lethal forms of discrimination that are just as widespread. According to Statistics Canada in 2019:

Close to half (47%) of students at Canadian postsecondary institutions witnessed or experienced discrimination on the basis of gender, gender identity or sexual orientation (including actual or perceived gender, gender identity or sexual orientation).

(Source 3)

Fundamentally this additional pressure that exists when one chooses to deviate from gender norms is one that can not be ignored in the conversation when it comes to how people may choose to express themselves visually, and I believe the impacts that this factor has and how it interacts with the other factors discussed should be considered.

Neurodivergence (In general):

In general, beauty standards/expectations for how a “mature” adult should dress can often include clothing that creates sensory issues for many autistic people. A thread on the National Austistic Forum (Source 6) contains a discussion where different austistic people describe their struggles with formal dress codes and the discomfort of being forced to wear stiff/restrictive clothing, especially when these dress codes have no practical purpose for the work they perform. If you’re interested in learning more on this subject, the Autisticats also has a thread on how school dress codes specifically can be harmful to Autistic people (Source 7).

In addition to potentially dressing differently (which as we have already covered can be a point of contention in one’s perception and reception by society as a whole), neurodivergence is another layer of identity that tends to be infantilized. Eden from the Autsticats has detailed their experiences with this in source 5.

Both of these factors can provide a degree of influence on how people choose to express themselves and/or how they may be perceived by society, and are important facets of a diverse and thoughtful exploration of the ways self-expression can be impacted by identity.

Also, while on this topic, I just want to take a chance to highlight the fact that we should question what is considered “appropriate”, especially “professionally appropriate”, because the “traditional” definitions of these have historically been used to discriminate against minorities. Much of what gets defined as “unprofessional” or otherwise “inappropriate” has racist implications - as an example, there is a history of black hairstyles being subjected to discriminatory regulation. Other sources I have provided at the end of this document (8 and 9) list examples of these instances.

Racism (being Chinese, specifically in this case):

For this section, I won’t be going into much depth at all, because I actually have a more detailed comic on this subject lined up.

So basically, if you were not aware, East Asian (EA) people tend to be infantilized and viewed as more childish (Source 10). In particular, unless an EA woman is super outgoing and promiscuous (the “Asian Bad Girl” stereotype, see Source 10), IN MY OPINION AND EXPERIENCE it’s easy to be type casted as the other end of the spectrum: the quiet, boring nerd. On top of this too, I’ve had experiences with talking to other EA/SEA people - where they themselves would repeatedly tell me that “Asians are just less mature”, something about it being a “cultural thing” (Yeah … I don’t know either. Maybe it’s internalized racism?).

Either way, being so easily perceived as immature (considering everything discussed so far) is also tied to conformity to beauty standards and other factors such as sexism and homophobia, which I believe makes for a complex intersection of identity.

[Note from Author: For Part 3, click here!]

#NotAComic #Fashion #FashionAnalysis

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scathecraw · 3 years

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BBRae Week 2021 - Day 3: Into The Woods

“Summer camp has been so much fun, Rachel. Teether hasn’t cried once since the day after you dropped us off, and Tommy got first place in the obstacle course. You were right, we should have done a camp last year, too.” Melvin chattered excitedly on the office phone while Rachel listened patiently. “They’ve made a bunch of arts and crafts, and the woods here are so cool. They’re really old, and Gar knows so muchabout all the trees and animals and bugs.”

“And who is this Gar, Melvin? A new friendof yours?” Rachel’s emphasis was obvious, and Melvin’s blush was practically audible.

“NO! He’s a counselor. He’s really nice, but he’s really old. Like, 50 or something. You’ll meet him on parent’s day next week.”

Rachel didn’t remember anyone older than the director, a middle aged woman she had spoken to when getting them enrolled and again during drop-off. She suspected Melvin was fibbing to cover her embarrassment, but she brought it on herself by teasing the preteen. “I’m sure I will. Does this mean that you’re going to drag me out into the forest when I come? I thought it was going to be an afternoon of arts and crafts and then some campfire songs, not a forced march.”

“Duh. Arts and crafts are lame. Gar said that next year he’d show us how to whittle, which sounds better than making lanyards.” There was muffled adolescent shouting, and Melvin covered the receiver and yelled back. “I gotta go. We’re going swimming. I’ll call you on Friday. Love you, bye.” She hung up before anything could be said back, and Rachel was left with dead air while Melvin sprinted after her friends, untied shoelaces flailing behind her.

Arriving at the aforementioned “Parent’s Day”, Rachel wasn’t quite sure what to expect. The camp had at first seemed like a good way to get the three adopted children outside instead of rotting their brains, but the sheer noise of a few dozen milling, clamoring kids and groups of socializing parents made her wonder what she had subjected them, and by extension, herself, to. She was late, which probably didn’t help the situation, but she looked around the chaos in an effort to find her own three chaos engines. Instead, she was spotted.

A wild, dirty missile made a high-volume impact with her legs, nearly toppling her and babblingso fast that even Rachel’s practiced ear couldn’t discern what he was saying. She was wobbling and about to fall over when a firm hand caught her upper back and helped her regain her balance. “Teether, dude! I said you could go get her, not try to body slam her.”

Rachel finally planted her feet, acknowledged Teether with a gentle hand on his head, and looked up. And up. They both froze for an instant, but the tanned, blond man recovered first. His slack jaw snapped into a smile, and he said “Hi. You must be Rachel. I’m Gar, one of the counselors here.”

His hand was still on her back and heat radiated from it like afternoon sun. Her face had never fallen into the silly expression his had, but unconscious thought raced before she could regain her composure. ‘Definitely not fifty,’ she thought. “Hello. Yes, I’m Rachel, Teether’s mother.” She peeled Teether from her leg with practiced ease, and he sprang off of her and ran.

Gar realized that his hand still rested behind her, almost possessively, and retreated to a more respectable distance. He chuckled, nervously. “Heh. Um, Melvin and Tommy are with their friends, still, but we should probably get them. Ms. Waller asked me to show you around – she said you had just moved to the area?” It wasn’t a question, but he phrased it like it was. They began walking back towards the milling crowd of parents, children, and quite possibly enough noise to drown out a jet engine.

“Yes, it’s our first summer here. She mentioned that most of the kids made this an annual activity, but I didn’t think we’d be so strange as to warrant a personal detail.”

“Oh it’s nothing like that, it’s just that there’s not really many other summer camps around, and ‘cause we go from K-12, we get pretty much everyone. A lot of the other parents already know everybody. You’re not strange, just… new.” His eyes never left her, even as they began walking.

Back with the crowds, Melvin and a gaggle of similarly aged girls watch the two of them. One of them nodded decisively and turned to Melvin. “Okay. They’re too cute together. Look at how awkward they’re being.”

Anotherhuffed a little. “They’re just staring at each other. They should be holding hands or something, right?”

Melvin’s eyes narrowed critically. “It’s been like 10 minutes and they aren’t kissing yet. Gar’s probably too much of a nerd to do anything. We need to do something to make sure they know how perfect for each other they are.”

“Like what? They aren’t going to start making out in the middle of the crowd.”

An evil smirk crept across Melvin’s face. “Maybe not in the middle of the crowd, but what if they were all alone in the woods? Then they’d have no excuse not to!”

A look of awe crossed her companions’ faces. “That’s evil. I love it.”

But the smirk fell, half-formed plot evaporating. “But how could we get them out there alone? It can’t be anything serious, or else Rachel will ground me forever, and I bet she won’t even go unless we can trick her into it.”

“Could you just tell her you feel sick?”

“No.” Melvin shook her head slowly. “Then she’d either stay with me or just take me home early.”

One, heretofore silent, chimed in. “I think I know what we can do. But Mel, you’re going to have to make a lanyard.” She giggled at the disgusted look, and said “C’mon, we only have like 15 minutes before they start wondering where we are.”

Across the crowd and a million miles away, Garfield and Rachel were, in fact, being tremendously awkward as they watched the kids run and play. Gar fumbled his words and couldn’t decide to stare at her eyes, the curve of her neck, or decidedly anywhere except her. Rachel was the opposite. She answered in short, monosyllabic whispers and swallowed, trying to ease her desperately dry throat.

“So, uh, you said you just moved here! Do you have a job, er, of course you do, unless you don’t! That’s fine, too! Nothing wrong with… that. Yeah.” He trailed off, before gamely trying again. “So what do you do when you’re not, y’know, coming to summer camps?”

Rachel took a deep breath and centered herself. Gar started. “I’m not, like, annoying you, am I? I’m sorry, I tend to blabber -”

“No. I’m just… a little off-kilter. I’m a curator of antiquities at the museum.”

“That is so cool. Gar’s eyes were like dinner plates. “I love the museum! I always wanted to volunteer there, but I never feel like I have time between summers here and planning classes during the year.”

“Oh, you’re a teacher? Grade school or high school?”

“High school and occasionally some classes at the community college. I figured I was already teaching AP and college bio isn’t much different. I’m sure the kids get tired of me after the sixth year, though, heh.” He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly, uncomfortably warm even for a summer afternoon.

“I suppose they wouldn’t let you teach so many years if you weren’t good at the job. Not that biology is my area of expertise.” She clarified, hearing his unspoken question. “I studied history and preservation, so a natural history museum is certainly a big change.”

“Wow, I bet. Still, nobody does what they expected to when they were in college. I got a bachelor’s in Environmental Science, but it turns out most of those jobs are just telling corporations what they want to hear.”

Rachel leveled him with a newly assessing gaze. “Believe it or not, so are quite a few jobs in archaeology. It’s what put me off of the field.”

“But hey, teaching led me to Jump and to Lake Titan Camp, so I can’t complain.”

While the two nominal adults conversed, a far more intricate conversation was happening in the craft cabin. Kole, a pink haired co-conspirator of Melvin’s, was creating a half finished lanyard in pink and purple while the rest strategized. “Okay, so I need to throw her off so she’ll agree. The pink and purple color scheme is good – pink for me, purple for her, but I need something to knock her off her game.”

“You could tell her something that surprised her, maybe. But what?”

Realization dawned. “Okay. This is a little mean, maybe, but I was planning on talking to her about it anyway. I know just what to say. Kole, how’s the lanyard coming?”

“I’ve got it to the perfect length. Just long enough that you might ‘Need a little while to finish it, pretty please.’” She held up the dangling lengths of string. “Everything ready? We’re running out of time.”

“Now or never. Let’s go.” Melvin took a deep breath and led them to the doorway.

Garfield and Rachel were deep in conversation. The initial awkwardness had faded, and while there were still sparks flying whenever they made eye contact, it was more a static buzz than the almost painful live wire sensation of their first glances. At some point they had migrated closer to where Teether and Tommy’s two groups had merged into a supercrowd of children all making noise, forcing them to stand closer to one another to be heard. They were in this huddle, all focus on each other except for both of their frequent check-in glances to the children. Rachel had dipped her toe into a hint of vulnerability to test the waters, quietly and without fanfare explaining that she had adopted all three of them from the same orphanage she had found herself aging out of.

Gar reciprocated. “That’s really incredible. I was adopted pretty young by some family friends. I know how complicated that sort of relationship can be, but it’s doing something amazing for all three of them.”

Melvin, seeing their closeness, hesitated, just a bit. She was messing with fate, a little. But she was certain it was for a good cause. And it was now or never, they were already cutting it close to “Shared Activity Time” for her age group. “Umm. Rachel.”

“Yes, Melvin?” Rachel saw that Mel was nervous. Melvin was never nervous.

“I want to finish a project for you, but won’t have time later. So, uh, I need you to find something else to do. During the Activity Time, I mean. I just want to finish making this. Please, M-mom?”

Time stopped for Rachel. She had adopted them six years ago, and there had never been a time when Melvin had consciously called her “Mom”. Forms asking for “Mother’s Name”, sure. Mother’s day celebrations, absolutely. Even a few mostly-asleep, teary pleas, but never, never while Melvin was in control of her faculties.

But while time had stopped for Rachel, it marched onward for everyone else. Melvin held her breath and waited for long, tense seconds, but Rachel didn’t seem to be coming back to her senses, so she hurriedly spat out “Okayloveyouseeyousoon,” and fled back to the safety of her friends.

Gar, too, was frozen. Not to the same degree, nor for the same reasons, but he felt like he had intruded on something intimate that he had no business being a part of. He looked around, helplessly as Rachel gaped. After several seconds of silence, he couldn’t not do something. “Uhh. Rachel? You… okay?” More frozen immobility. He waved a hand in front of her face. “Rae? You there? Do I need to get a doctor?”

She seized his hand. “Did… did she just call me “Mom”? Or did I have a stroke?”

“Yeah, ouch. She did. I’m guessing this was new?”

“I… Yes. She’s never… What… what do I do? Was she angry I didn’t answer? Where did she go?” Rachel began looking around for her.

“Whoa, slow down. She’s with her friends. She wasn’t mad, it seemed like she was nervous, but not scared. And what you do is let her come to you and talk to her like you always do, and just make sure she knows you’re okay with it. As long as you are okay with it, right?”

“Of course. I just thought...” Rachel trailed off.

“Then there’s nothing to worry about! She loves you and just told you how she feels. That’s a good thing. Let’s give her a chance to do whatever she’s doing. The rest of the kids are about to go do an activity, so we have time.”

“I think I need to get away from the crowd for a minute. I can’t believe I’m asking this, but is it alright if we just go for a walk?”

“Of course.” Gar’s grip had at some point shifted to be holding her hand back, and he led her down a dirt path towards a grove of trees. “This path is quiet and not too hard.” Her sudden harsh look had him follow up. “You’re not really wearing the shoes for hiking, Rae.”

“Hmf. And since when did I say you could call me Rae, Garfield?”

He looked stricken. “I am so sorry. I dunno what I was thinking, Ra-chel. Rachel.”

She narrowed an eye. “Rae is… acceptable, as far as diminutives go. Just don’t make a habit of it in public.”

“Cross my heart. Hey, at least being a little mad at me put your mind off of Melvin, right?”

“And now it’s right back. So very helpful,” she deadpanned.

“Easy come, easy go, right?” His smile grew a little. “I don’t wanna pry or anything, but is it really that surprising? She said you were her mom like, a dozen times during camp.”

“I suppose not. It caught me very off-guard, though. Teether and Tommy sort of switch between Rachel and Mom, but Melvin’s never really seemed like she even wanted that sort of, I don’t know, ‘Official’ title for me.”

“Listen, the whole ‘mom’ thing isn’t as scary as you’re making it out to be. You’re already giving her the kind of love a mom is supposed to, and she loves you. She talks about all the time with stars in her eyes. Being adopted doesn’t make her less your daughter. Rita Farr isn’t any less my mom for taking me in when I was eight, and Marie Logan isn’t any more or less important to me just because she’s not around.”

Rachel took a breath and sighed it out. “Thank you. That does make it easier.” They walked in silence for a short time. “Wait, Rita Farr, as in the movie star? As in, the philanthropist and art collector, married to Steve Dayton?”

He blushed a little. “Whoops, probably shouldn’ta dropped that so casually, I guess. Yeah. Steve and Rita adopted me when my parents died. It’s not always easy, but I love ‘em.” He watched her reaction carefully, hoping she wouldn’t suddenly start treating him differently for having such well-known parents.

Rachel schooled her face after having that bombshell dropped on her. “Well, if we ever meet we’ll be able to talk about some historic pieces she has that I wrote papers on.”

A beat passed, then Gar’s loud laugh broke relative silence of the forest. “Aw man, she is gonna love you.”

And just like that, the tension was broken. All the concern, the lack of balance, everything fell away, and the static buzz of easy conversation punctuated by something just a little too close to intimate for an average friendship was back.

They wandered together down the shady paths, miles away and only a few trees distant from the campground. Rachel didn’t notice the distance she had walked on the formerly dreaded forest hike, and Garfield forgot to try quite so hard with his jokes and wise cracks. They walked, hand in hand and only somewhat realizing how close they were to one another, shoulders nearly touching.

The spell was eventually broken, as they always are. They rounded a final bend, seeing in the distance the campground they had left, what, less than an hour ago? And the reality that they had left behind when they entered the sun-shafted canopies woke them up, and they found that really, their hands were quite slick. Had they been clasped together the whole time? And Rachel, especially, was starting to sweat from the heat and the walk. Garfield was suddenly nervous, after all, he never talked this much, not without making a fool of himself.

But even after emerging from that hazy dream, they held on, gently rising out of the fog and into the real world so no sudden movements could disrupt the memory, the closeness that two almost strangers that fit together like complementary puzzle pieces had shared.

It wasn’t even fully dispelled when their hands slipped apart to be wiped on cargo shorts or dark jeans, though the almost hidden flight from behind a few low-branched trees of blonde hair and untied shoelaces and quiet giggle quickly sobered them.

Garfield turned. “Was that -?”

“Melvin. Oh, that little brat, she is too damn smart for her own good. I would put money on her scheming to get us alone.” Rachel fumed and her face tightened into a mask of cold anger. “I can’t believe that she would manipulate me like this! How could she – How could she finally call me -” and the mask broke, shifting from anger to near tears in seconds.

Gar panicked. “Whoa, hold on, no. She’s not that cruel, I know it and so do you. We’re probably missing something. You just said you can’t believe she would do this – she probably didn’t. Rae I promise you, there’s got to be an explanation that makes sense.”

Rachel took a deep breath, followed by another, centering herself. “I am going to get to the bottom of this. Where would she be doing this “project” she made up?”

“The craft cabin. I’ll take you there, but I guarantee you it’s not as bad as it might sound.”

It was like the crowd parted for them without even reacting. No one looked at the worried counselor or at the steely featured parent, but nonetheless they found their path almost unimpeded. Gar held up a hand just outside the door. “Let me get you two some privacy. Please.”

“Fine. Do it.” Terse and unhappy, Rachel’s displeasure was apparent in her voice, and it made Garfield wince.

He opened the door to see five preteen girls, huddled and tittering. At least until they saw him and his serious frown. Then their eyes went wide, and they looked to Melvin in a panic. “Out, girls. Clear the room. Not you, Melvin.” He stopped her when she tried to take shelter in the middle of the pack. He turned to follow them, and glanced back almost pityingly, then shook his head and exited.

The girls all ducked their heads when they saw Rachel just outside the cabin and hurried off, racing to be the first around the corner and away from the ticking time bomb.

Garfield simply nodded, and left her to it. Rachel entered the cabin and saw Melvin almost trembling, and it broke her heart. She had worked up a head of steam on the walk and the wait, but seeing her precious daughter actually afraid stopped any real anger and left only a bitter emptiness.

Rachel wasn’t quite sure what to do with her hands. She settled on a vague, open armed shrug gesture. “Why, Mel? Was it just a prank? Just a way to manipulate me?”

Tears brimmed in Melvin’s eyes. “No, I just wanted to give you guys a chance to talk alone. I’m sorry I lied, I really did try on the lanyard, but I’m just bad at them so I had Kole do it. I’m sorry, I am.”

“What? What lanyard? Melvin, I don’t care if you had a friend help with a lanyard! I just can’t believe that you would call me your mom, just to trick me into talking to someone. I can’t tell you how badly that hurts me. I… I love you too much for that.”

“What!No, nononono, Mom, I promise that wasn’t a trick. I promise. I was gonna talk to you about it, but I just – I thought that if I – I thought that maybe if I just did it you’d just let me and maybe you’d talk to him and then it everything would be perfect. I promise. I love you, Mom. I do. And I was just trying to maybe make you not spend all your time watching me and talk to him. He’s really cool, and I could tell you like him, and he’s completely in love with you, and you’re perfect for each other. I was just trying to help you be happy!” She sobbed, breathless.

Rachel froze, then instinctively wrapped her daughter in her arms and let her cry. “Mel, you don’t need to worry about me. I am happy, I promise. I don’t need you to try to trick me into being happy. Hey, it’s okay. I’m not going to say I’m not mad, but I get it. You don’t have to trick me into talking to, what did you call him, “really old, like 50 years old” guys? If we talk, we talk. That’s how adults work.”

“No, it’s not! I’ve never seen you go on a date, and you just ignore people when they try to talk to you. I know it was dumb, but I had to try something ‘cause otherwise you’d just give him that serious face until he ran away, and he’s perfect for you if you’d just give him a chance!”

“Mel. Mel, okay. I promise. I will give him a chance. But you don’t need to be worried about me. I don’t need a twelve year old playing matchmaker. You should be doing kid things, not bad romcom plots.”

“*SNRK*. They’re not bad. They’re sweet. And you like them, otherwise you wouldn’t have so many of them.” She wiped her nose with the back of her hand and glowered.

Rachel internally cursed Kori. “If you say so. Now let’s sit here for a minute, then we can go wash your face and you can go hand out with your friends. And I will have a talk with Garfield, and you will not stick your nose into my dating life. Understand?”

“Yes, mom.”

It still startled Rachel to hear that coming from Melvin, but it also warmed her heart. She hadn’t even known she wanted it until it happened, but it was like a spoken guarantee that she really was doing things right, and her little family really was working.

They sat together and Melvin showed her the lanyard that she had made via Kole. Rachel put it on the silver chain she wore around her neck and let it rest beside her heart promising mostly to herself that it would be kept safe at home. Then, when Mel had calmed down, they headed to the bathroom where Mel cleaned the tear tracks from her dirt-smudged face and rinsed her red rimmed eyes. Rachel gave her a final kiss on the forehead, and sent her off.

Gar found her standing there, staring off into space against the wall of the concrete shack. He leaned against it and slid down to sit around the corner and next to her. “So.”

“So,” she said back.

“Not saying it just to confuse you?” He glanced at her, gauging her reaction.

“No. But she wasn’t against confusing me.”

His eyebrow cocked. “Not mad?”

“Still mad. Still going to be grounded, probably. But she did it out of love.”

“Y’know, I don’t want to say I told you so, but...”

“But you totally want to say ‘I told you so,’” she finished for him.

“Yep. So what now?”

“Now, I guess I do what I was going to do before we had all this to deal with,” she said, the soul of nonchalance.

“What’s that?” he said, and when she didn’t respond, he stood up and looked around the corner. “Rae?”

“This.” with only his head around the corner, she turned and kissed him, gentle and sweet, and far too short for either of them. “I’d like to go out sometime. I want to take you to a behind the scenes at the museum, and I’ll let you choose the restaurant.”

His head spun and his eyes were out of focus. His thoughts were like molasses and he could barely get out the word “Okay.” before she was gone, a little bounce in her step.

AO3 FF.net

#bbraeweek21 #bbrae #fic

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brw · 3 years

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i see people hating on hank pym nd then i see your blog. what's his deal?

hello anon!

his "deal" is uh! with any comic character his age (turning 60 next year!), really fucking complicated! if you're looking for an explanation on the "trail of yellowjacket" storyline which shows the infamous panel (you know the one i'm talking about), here is another long discussion i did on that specific moment and arc and the stuff leading up to it and the aftermath.

but for his general deal, outside of that moment & era and more generally? like i said, complex, but definitely worthy of discussion i think. anyway here's a cut because whenever i talk about henry pym i go a little overboard.

hank like most characters of his time is very much so influenced by the style and biases of his era. some of these have mostly been retconned or ignored; for example hank was initially supposed to be around his early to mid 30s as a hero, and janet was supposed to be in her early 20s; there's multiple times in the old tales to astonish comics where hank comments on janet's youth. however, due to the sliding timescale and other complications hank is now in his early 20s when he begins superheroing, and was probably 25 at most when he met jan. like most comic characters, the misogyny and ableism that was very prominent in his character have either been erased, "addressed" and then readdressed and ignored and then readdressed again, or retconned, etc.

sometimes these retcons and readdressings are good; age of ultron #10 remains my favourite standalone hank pym comic ever, and avengers a.i was the comic that retconned hank's previous neurodiversity & mental instability (in the 1970s when he first had his mental breakdown which is a very complicated subject that i won't spend too much time on unless asked he was said to be schizophrenic) from a very vague nonspecific mental illness into him being diagnosed with bipolar disorder, which while not perfect was definitely handled much more respectfully than anything in hank’s history up til then. sometimes they aren’t so good; in the late 2000s/early 2010s following the death of janet van dyne hank takes on the mantle of wasp, becomes the scientist supreme (don’t worry about that too much) and opens a domestic abuse center for women. i personally didn’t hate everything about this line but it left a bad taste in many people’s mouths and i can’t say i blame them for that.

he’s very easy to handle poorly, probably because historically he's been handled very poorly. it's not impossible to write him well, as mark waid, kurt busiek, sam humphries and many other writers have proved, but it requires a certain amount of sympathy and a lot of writers (sort of understandably) don't have that. so there's a lot of back and forth with hank. it doesn't help that we also have alternate universe imprints (namely the infamous ultimates universe) that potray him as just a complete and utter irredeemable monster of a person. but 616 hank pym, with his vast legacy of different writers, is not so simply one way or another. can he be read as an abusive piece of shit? sure. but he can also easily be read as a struggling scientist who really just wants to help other people in unusual ways but keeps fucking it up for himself. there's always going to be people who hate hank and want to write him as an iredeemable monster, but there's also always going to be people (like me) who sympathise and see him simply as a complicated hero.

anyway. i’ll say one more thing, because i’ve already gone on a lot and i’m aware this is rather incoherent, but comic characters being…. like That isn’t anything new. i mean, wolverine is one of marvel’s most famous characters, and has literally murdered his own children on more than one occasion. everyone loves deadpool, the man who locked a blind woman in a wardrobe full of knives to punish her, where she tearfully said this was where he’d put her when she misbehaved, as if it was something that happened on multiple occasions. peter parker once hit a pregnant mj across a room, daredevil hit black widow across the face, etc. abusive behaviour in comic characters is nothing new, but most of the time it is understood that this is a problem with the writer, the era, etc, nothing to do with a 60 year old character. but hank pym remains a character most plagued by bad writing, despite it being unfortunately incredibly widespread in marvel comics, and comics in general. I mean, how many panels are out there of batman hitting a robin? batman is still probably the most popular hero ever despite that. this isn’t unique to ant-man, but he’s the only one that continues by and large to be defined by it by both writers & fans.

#hope this helped in some way anon! i got a lil incoherent i do apologise #asks #anonymous #hank pym

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fanfickittycat · 3 years

Text

Pay Attention to Me

TITLE: Pay Attention to Me

CHAPTER NUMBER/ONE SHOT: One Shot

AUTHOR: fanfickittycat

FANDOM: Haikyuu!!

CHARACTERS/PAIRING: Suna Rintaro x Reader

GENRE: Smut

FIC SUMMARY: After seeking advice from everyone about what to do when your boyfriend Suna won’t pay attention to you, you decide to take matters into your own hands

RATING: M

AUTHORS NOTES/WARNINGS: Unedited because that’s sexy right? Atsumu being a huge himbo. Read it on AO3 here

“Rin?” No response. You knew it was useless, but you couldn’t help but try to get your boyfriend’s attention. He was right next to you and he still wouldn’t respond, despite the way you’d call his name in the sweetest voice you could muster. You sighed, turning back to your maths homework that Suna had abandoned twenty minutes ago with no progress beyond the first set of sums. He always suggested study dates, but really it was just the chance to be near you without interacting.

“Talking isn’t necessarily communicating” he said once “I just like to be near you.”

At the time, it had made your heart melt that he was so satisfied and comfortable with just your presence, but lately it felt like a slap of indifference across your face. It was almost as if he thought of you as a pet, or a casual acquaintance instead of as his girlfriend. You looked at him, regarding his green eyes that looked at his phone with more interest than they looked at you. His thumb lazily scrolled down the screen as the clock ticked behind him. You could leave and he probably wouldn’t notice, but you were too shy, too nervous to make such a bold move. You finished up your homework glumly instead, packing away your things when it started to get dark.

“Done already?” Suna asked, speaking for the first time in two hours. You felt your heart sink into your stomach.

“Yeah” you looked away and nodded, pretending to be distracted by the inside of your school bag. It offered no comfort.

“Time flies” he hummed, stretching his arms up as though he had done anything more than be on Twitter. You swallowed thickly and stood up, feeling awkward when he didn’t follow suit.

“Well, I’ll get going then” you said. It prompted him to stand, which was encouraging, and he pressed a quick kiss onto your cheek before bidding you goodbye, but it didn’t calm the anxiety churning in your stomach. You were thankful you lived close by, only a couple of streets away at most, but it would have been nice if he had walked you. A cool spring breeze made a flurry of petals swirl around your ankles, and you breathed out shakily. Strings of gut-wrenching questions began to spin like threads in your mind. Was this it? Was this what you had to look forward to? Silence and your words hanging in the air, ignored? A lame kiss on the cheek as your only crumb of attention?

You contemplated your relationship when lying in bed that night. Suna had caught your eye, as he had many girls’. Tall, lean, athletic; his fox eyes had been subject to many a giggly conversation in the girls’ bathroom. You had thought him attractive, but what really captured your heart was how deceptively smart he was. You could see how intelligent he was. When he was picked on by the teacher in class, he always managed to have the answer, even though his tone was bored, and he didn’t look at all like he was paying attention. In the few volleyball games, you had attended with your friends, you observed how he calculated his chances with keen interest. He was more times than not on his phone, but you had seen him reading classic, dog eared paperbacks too as he waited for the twins to come out of class. It was how you had met.

“Vonnegut?” he noted, making you jump. You looked up to see him standing in front of you, hands in his pockets casually as he regarded you.

“Yeah” you cleared your throat, feeling your cheeks flush at the unexpected attention “I read Slaughterhouse Five last week and I liked it so…” You trailed off, feeling self-conscious. You had never spoken to him and vice versa. In fact, you were surprised that he even acknowledged you, even though it was a little pathetic to admit.

He nodded “I noticed.”

“You… noticed?” you frowned as you considered his words “do you make a habit of watching girls read?”

His lip quirked upwards “no. Only you.”

The chaotic sound of Miya Atsumu interrupted anything more being said, and you both looked towards the school as Atsumu held up a paper with a 32 written on it in red and circled. The blonde boy started raving to Suna, even at a distance, about how he had to do a make-up test and how badly he needed his help.

“God, he’s so loud” Suna mused, turning to walk away from you and towards his friend. You opened your mouth to say something but snapped it shut instead, not wanting to ruin whatever just happened.

“Tell me what you think when you finish” he said over his shoulder at you, nodding to the copy of Breakfast of Champions “I think you’ll like it.”

That had been it. From then on, you’d speak more and more to each other, straying off the topic of literature soon after. Then, when asked to pick partners for a history project, your friends had stared at you in open mouth shock when he walked across the class to claim you as his. His confession to you had only been a natural progression and you’d been together ever since.

So, what had changed? You knew that Nationals were coming up and he had been training more and more in preparation, but he had always carved out time for you, even in the summer when he’d go away to training camps. Was he tired of you? Bored even? You had to admit, that when gossip began to flutter around school about the two of you dating, you were really the one who was most surprised by the news. You were by no definition, popular, instead keeping a small group of friends and interacting with others easily with little to no friction. When you had asked Suna about it, trying to sound as nonchalant as possible, he had laughed.

“You think nobody sees you, but I do” he said, leaning his chin on his hand “the way you told the substitute teacher last month that you enjoyed her lecture, or the books you read in the courtyard, or the confident way you talk in class. I see it. I like it. I like you.” He said it like it was the simplest, easiest thing in the world. Now however it felt complicated. You didn’t feel seen or even liked anymore.

You groaned and turned over to bury your face in your pillow. A soft thud prompted you to reach over the side of your bed and retrieve the fox plushie that Suna had won for you at the summer festival last year. He had looked so beautiful in the light of the lanterns, and happy to consume all the misshapen onigiri that Osamu couldn’t sell that night. Atsumu had practically inhaled the meat buns, and it rendered him full and groaning on the ground. The memories filled your mind, calming your racing heart. It had cemented itself as your favourite memory. Aran physically stopping the twins from arguing who could catch the most goldfish; Kita coming in a navy yukata with his grandmother; Suna kissing you when the fireworks filled the sky. The images played themselves in your mind like a slideshow, lulling you to sleep.

The next morning followed without major incident. You woke up earlier than usual to see Suna had sent you at least eight different TikToks. Something that he did often. You had texted him to say you were going to school early, not that you expected a response. You ended up forgetting your headphones and it rendered your walk to school monotonous.

“Good morning” you turned to see Kita and Aran smile gently at you. You had never interacted much with the two third years, but they were always kind to you, whether it be thanking you for coming to their games or reassuring you that they’d take care of Suna during training camps.

“You’re up early” Aran noted “did Suna keep you up? He keeps sending TikToks in the volleyball group chat at like, three am.”

“He’ll need to stop that soon. He needs all the rest he can get before Nationals.” Kita added. You smiled at their concern, but it faltered as you thought about the wall between you and your boyfriend.

“Is… Is he okay?” You asked, “he seems distracted these days.”

“He seems normal to me” Aran said, shrugging. Kita took time to consider his answer, but he didn’t have anything to add, which only made you sigh.

“Never mind” you said hurriedly, shaking your head “I’m sure he’s just occupied with Nationals.” It seemed stupid suddenly, but your heart still ached at the lack of an answer.

“Suna is talented” Kita said after a pause “and when he applies himself, he shines but he’s also lazy. He lacks the discipline to keep himself motivated when things become too comfortable.”

“What should I do?” You asked, cringing at the way desperation snuck itself into your tone.

“Tell him how you feel” Aran said, “he’s sure to listen.”

You shook your head “that’s the problem. He’s not listening.”

Aran scoffed “I can talk to him if you like. He’ll listen to me.”

“No” you sighed “it’s my problem, I should deal with it.”

“Be direct with him” Kita said, “confront him with his behaviour.” You thanked them for their help, leaving them to go sit in the courtyard. Your book was open, but you weren’t reading it. You mulled over the advice you were given instead. Of course, it would be best to just say it plainly, but the thought made you recoil. You were never one for confrontation. You didn’t have Kita’s ability to be cold and logical; nor Aran’s willingness to start difficult conversations. You tried to picture yourself challenging Suna but whenever you looked up at him, you’d register his height and his pretty eyes, and your brain would glitch for a full two seconds. How he still managed to have that effect on you was nothing short of witchcraft.

You ended up closing your book and abandoning the chance to read and instead wander aimlessly through campus. It was a stupid way to kill time, but you couldn’t sit still anymore. The sound of sneakers scuffling distracted you, leading you to the gym where the basketball team were practising.

“Those sneaky bastards” you heard, prompting you to look to your right where an angry Atsumu stood with his hands on his hips.

“They know Thursday is our day.”

“Atsumu” his brother said in between bites of onigiri “today is Friday.”

“Oh.” Atsumu raked a hand through his blonde hair, hiding his obvious embarrassed flush “don’t say anythin’ ‘Samu, I don’t wanna hear it.”

“Eh? I’m jus’ tryin’ to eat” Osamu mumbled, mouth full of rice. He noticed you looking at him and raised a hand in greeting.

“Is Suna ‘ere too?” Osamu asked, making Atsumu look away from the basketball team and at you instead.

You shook your head “no, I got here early. Um…” You hesitated, unsure whether or not you should ask “about Rintaro… How do I...” you struggled to describe the situation “how do I get him to pay attention to me?”

“Aren’t you his girl?” Atsumu asked, cocking his head to the side.

“Idiot. She means he’s bein’ negligent.”

“Don’t call me an idiot, yer the one who forgot to buy milk yesterday!”

“You forgot too!” “Quiet dumbass, we’re s’pposed to be helpin” Osamu snapped, looking back at you.

“Oh yea” Atsumu laughed, the fight already forgotten in his mind “hmmm… Suna likes lace.” You blinked at him and Osamu smacked the back of his head.

“Ignore him. Bake him somethin’. Or go out an’ eat. Or-“

“Not everyone thinks with their stomachs” Atsumu retaliated, smacking his brother on the back of the head too. They started to squabble again, and you watched, wondering whether you should walk away or film them.

“This has to be a new record” you felt yourself flinch at the sound of Suna’s voice “it’s not even nine.”

“Rin“ you murmured his name as his lips ghosted your temple, you felt the words in your throat but before you could even form the letters on your lips, he had whipped out his phone to film the twins. They were on the floor at this point, and you sighed, watching your boyfriend kneel down to get a better shot. You turn to go to class, in dismay about what to do.

You had to push yourself to focus on class that day, conscious of the fact that Suna was sitting at the opposite side of the classroom, towards the back, making it too hard to turn and look at him subtly. You were driving yourself crazy thinking about it. When it came to your turn to read aloud in class, you were uncharacteristically shaky and even the teacher seemed concerned. She asked you quietly before lunch if you were feeling okay, and you flushed and quickly reassured her that you were fine.

Your friends however were not so easily duped. You sat on the roof of the school with them, dodging questions and shrugging when they asked.

“Is it Suna?” Misa asked, frowning “is he treating you right?”

“He’s not treating me wrong” you mumbled, stirring your chopsticks into the cold udon.

“I knew it. I’m going to beat him up after class” Misa said, aggressively stabbing her omelette, making Ami pinch the skin between her eyebrows.

“I don’t think you need to go that far” Ami said, turning to you “you know you can tell us anything.”

Your heart warmed “Rintaro is just… I feel like I’m boring him.”

Misa made a sound of disagreement “his personality is being hot and sending memes. You’re way better.” It was funny to hear her speak like that considering how much fangirling she did when you two started dating.

“He’s always been withdrawn” Ami said, “even in elementary school and middle school he was disinterested.” Ami had been surprised when you and Suna became an item; she had known him since first grade and always knew him to be reserved.

You sighed, closing your eyes to concentrate on the slight breeze and the warmth of the sunlight. No one seemed to be offering the same opinions except that Suna was just like that, and you should’ve known better. It made you upset that everyone thought so little of him.

“He’s a good boyfriend” you insisted lamely “he’s thoughtful and considerate and I like him a lot.”

“He doesn’t sound like it” Misa scoffed, earning a sharp nudge from Ami.

“Well, he is” you snapped, immediately feeling guilty “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be like that.” To your surprise Misa laughed.

“Maybe you ought to be more like that” she said, eating another bite thoughtfully “you’re never aggressive or argumentative. Maybe you should raise some hell.”

“Yeah, that sounds mature” Ami said, pushing up her glasses “but maybe being a little more assertive would be beneficial.”

The mix of opinions and advice stayed with you that afternoon. Perhaps you should insist more. You knew Suna had practise that afternoon, and though you’d usually insist on waiting for him, you decided to leave instead and figure out what you needed to do. Tomorrow, he had promised that you two could hang out. It would probably just be watching a movie in his room, or at the very most, going out for pizza. Your fist clenched. You knew what you had to do.

As you predicted, Suna asked you over to watch a really bad movie he had found online that promised bad CGI aliens and not a trace of coherent storytelling. You entered his room, taking care to keep your composure as he accepted the Tupperware box of cookies you baked for the occasion.

“Chocolate chip” he hummed “don’t tell Kita that I’m indulging like this.”

“I’m not making any promises” you said, earning a raised eyebrow from him in response but he said nothing. You bit the inside of your cheek, hesitating before shrugging off your jacket and sitting next to him on his bed. He played the movie on his laptop, putting one arm around you casually.

“You feel stiff” he commented, and you relaxed your muscles, telling yourself to calm down.

“I’m just really tense about these aliens” you said, nodding at the screen where a squadron of lanky green creatures discussed their plan to blow up the Earth. Out the corner of your eye you saw him smile and held your breath when he pressed his cheek against the top of your head. Already your resolve was melting. Maybe you had been exaggerating his lack of attention? Maybe he had snapped out of it? You snuggled into his chest, feeling happier already.

Then he reached for his phone.

You snuck a glance up at him, wanting to gauge how distracted he was. His face was impassive as his thumb scrolled down his twitter feed. He stopped to read something before continuing.

“Rin” you said softly. He did nothing. “Rintaro.” Nothing again. You nudged your foot down onto the spacebar of his laptop to pause the film. He didn’t notice. You bit your lip. It was now or never.

“Suna Rintaro” you said in a clipped tone, swinging your leg over so you were straddling him. He dropped his phone and it bounced off the bed and onto the floor.

“What… What are you doing?” You grasped his chin, bringing it up so that he had no choice but to look at you.

“Pay attention to me” you said with a frown “you’re always on your phone when we’re together and you act like I’m not even here.” You felt yourself swallow nervously and your face flush with heat, but you pushed yourself to keep it up.

“Am I boring you?”

He blinked at you “no.”

Unsatisfied you clicked your tongue “do you still like me?”

“Yes.”

“Then why don’t you look at me instead? Or respond when I call you? It’s not nice of you.” He opened his mouth and then closed it again, considering his words.

“I’m sorry, angel” he said, using the pet name that he only brought out on rare occasions “I didn’t mean to ignore you. You’re right it wasn’t fair of me. Can you forgive me?” You could feel your heart hammer in your chest as he glanced up at you, loosening your grip on his chin with his hand and then pressing a kiss to it. His expression was so tender; something you’d seldom see unless you were in the midst of passion.

You pressed your lips together for a moment and said “no.”

“No?” He repeated, furrowing his brow in confusion.

“No” you said firmer, fisting the material of his t-shirt. Your knuckles brushed against the milky white of his skin.

“Your actions have consequences, Rintaro” you said, “I will not be ignored.”

“Oh?” he murmured, his hands lingered on the backs of your thighs and inched their way up your skirt.

“R-Rin” you struggled to maintain your demeanour “I’m serious.”

“I know but you’re so cute when you’re serious” he cooed, squeezing your flesh and smiling when you bit your lip “hmm these feel different.” He let go of your ass and brought his hands around to the front of your skirt, lifting it and whistling at your new purchase.

“They’re a new set” you mumbled.

“Pretty” his eyes darkened as he took in the vision of you in black lace “is this why Atsumu was talking about lace?”

You spluttered “w-what? How do you know about that?” He shrugged playfully, letting your skirt fall back down in exchange for undoing the buttons of your blouse.

“Everyone knows Atsumu can’t keep a secret” he hummed in pleasure at the sight of the matching bra “all this for me?”

“I have to get your attention somehow” you muttered, looking away from him.

“Angel” he called “I am sorry about that. Let me make it up to you.” He leaned forward to press a kiss onto your sternum. He continued to pepper your heated skin with kisses to get you to look at him again.

You sighed “you’re hard to be mad at.”

He smiled triumphantly “does that mean I’m forgiven?”

“No.”

“You’re a tough cookie” he said, “I guess I’ll have to try harder.” One arm curled around your waist, pushing you closer to him so he was able to capture your lips. He smiled when he elicited a soft gasp from you as his free hand gripped your thigh. He kneaded the flesh, making you tremble in anticipation as his lips continued to kiss your own. He hissed when you bit down on his bottom lip, making you feel bolder. You kissed down the column of his neck, pulling his shirt and prompting him to take it off. Before the shirt could hit the ground you latched your mouth onto his shoulder, biting down onto his skin and making him curse under his breath. You pulled away to lick the tender skin, leaning back to survey your work.

“You are being punished for your crimes” you said, “bad Rintaro.” You crawled off him, shutting his laptop gently and placing it on the ground. You expected him to wait; after all, your streak of confidence had rendered him speechless. You forgot however, that just as he was on the court, he adapted easily to new situations. He grabbed you from behind, making you squeak in surprise at how swift he was. His arms were wrapped tightly around you, preventing you from moving despite your struggles. His chin rested on your shoulder and you could hear his breath on the shell of your ear.

“Just when I think I have you all figured out, you throw something like that on me.” He licked a stripe up the pillar of your neck, chuckling when you shuddered in pleasure. To be honest, even you were surprised by his actions. Usually sex was a soft experience, with him being gentle and slow as he coaxed orgasms out of you. This time he was rougher; no longer wanting to be lazy and indulgent.

“Rin” you whined when he began kissing the spot near the base of your neck that he knew made you weak “you’re meant to be facing punishment for your behaviour.”

“Aw, am I still not forgiven yet?” he nuzzled into your neck “hmmm I suppose I deserve it. How could I neglect my angel like that?” He loosened his grip on you, letting you wiggle out of his grasp. You turned, feeling a heady mixture of intoxicated by his presence and nervous as you tried to anticipate what to do next. A certain idea had been playing on your mind for a while, but you lacked the conviction to undertake it. You pressed your lips against him hard instead, wanting to build up a little more courage. He was more than happy to accommodate, kissing you back with equal vigour.

“Fuck” he mumbled under his breath when you kissed his jaw, allowing your hand to traverse down to the planes of his stomach. You stroked his skin softly, enjoying the soft trail of hair that led you down to the waistband of his sweats. His breath hitched, and you felt empowered by your ability to make his brain glitch. You leaned back, biting your lip as you palmed the outline of his dick. His eyes fluttered shut, and he began breathing harder when you shed the layers of fabric and touched him. You stroked up and down his shaft a few times, wetting your lips as you watched him groan softly. You swallowed your nerves and leaned your head down to kitten lick the head of his dick.

“Is this okay?” you gazed up at him through your lashes as you continued to lavish your tongue over his flesh. This was a first for you.

“Y-you. Uh, yes but you don’t ha- fuck” he struggled to say anything coherent when you took him in your mouth. His hand petted your hair at first, encouraging you to continue, and you experimentally took more of him into your mouth. The sensation was foreign, and you felt your throat protest against the invasion.

“Don’t push yourself, angel” Rin panted, and you pulled back a bit, using your hand to help where your mouth struggled to reach. You tussled at first to find a comfortable rhythm, but Suna’s soft, sinful sounds pushed you to try. You let him poke into the flesh of the inside of your cheek, trying to find what would feel best for him.

“Good girl” he mumbled, holding your hair like a makeshift ponytail. The words immediately made a rush of heated lust swell inside of you, increasing your speed. Suna’s words began to sound less intelligible as you continued, and you were surprised that his thighs were beginning to quake. You pulled away, watching him whine from the loss of your warm, wet mouth. It ached a little, you realised, touching your jaw lightly.

“You’re such a fuckin tease” Rin huffed, and you couldn’t help but laugh at his pouty face.

“You brought this on yourself” you said, sticking out your tongue “but I think you’ve learnt your lesson now.”

“Finally,” he groaned, pushing you down so your back was flat against the mattress. He positioned himself so he was pressing against you “now let me pay some attention to you.”

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