#^ said by someone who had never made a video essay before and does not ever want to become an online content creator
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Fighting back the urge to make a video essay on Super Dark Times
#^ said by someone who had never made a video essay before and does not ever want to become an online content creator#but man. so many people don’t get this movie and don’t appreciate it’s subtleties I really want to explain them all#and also to get people to shut up about the allison theory like hello that goes against the entire point of the film#anyway#super dark times
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5 and 8 for Jason, and 19 and 21 for Tim?
Hello laufire :D I've seen you around in my notes a fair few times, thank you for the ask!
Jason first bc I am predictable 😌
5. First song that comes to mind for this character?
Dana Dan by Bloodywood! I had it as his theme song long before I started headcanoning him as religiously Hindu and the music video feels all the more appropriate now that I do!
youtube
There are a LOT of runners up, sixteen in specific I could name off the top of my head bc I made a whole character playlist for him and I listen to it every time I drive (burned CD in my car :3)
8. What's something the fandom does when it comes to this character that you despise?
Hoo boy, that competition is FIERCE lol I try my best not to talk about it in terms of complaints though. That's just not the energy I wanna have most of the time. That being said, since you asked for some salt ye shall receive hehehe!
I think the through line of the most annoying stuff is that people will point at something Jason did in his villain era and twist it wildly out of proportion into something unequivocally EVIL and then everyone else will (incorrectly imo!!!) claim that it's out of character and due to writers that hated him and we should throw it out.
The worst example of this by far is his fight with Mia Dearden
First of all, it was written by JUDD FUCKING WINICK so yeah this was not a matter of an unfavorable writer!! Second of all, I think it's a goddamned masterpiece of a comic, and THE successor to UtRH
So like you have the second Robin, born into grinding poverty, having to commit crime to survive, joining up with a vigilante mentor, and killing someone for the greater good, and then being utterly destroyed... and then you have the second Speedy, born into grinding poverty, having to commit crime to survive, joining up with a vigilante mentor, and killing someone for the greater good, and then growing from that to become a fully fledged hero in her own right! So similar and yet their paths have been so different with Mia healing and becoming even stronger and Jason having been isolated and pushed to villainous extremes.
Then during that confrontation each of them know about the other through hearsay and research, but have never met before. Each make their own assumptions and then prove that they are more than what was assumed of them! Jason makes a deeply flawed but earnest attempt to try and connect with Mia and she rejects it because she has the support he never did and therefore has already long ago grown passed what has destroyed and consumed him!!
And some people REDUCE their fight to just "evil scawy Jason trying to hurt poor widdwe Mia"???????????????????????????? Might I challenge those responsible to a duel of paintball rifles at dawn?!?!?!?
Kinda the entire fucking point of an antagonist is to let the complexities and nuances of the characters shine, and that's doubly true of antagonists that used to be protagonists! Mia and Jason are such amazing narrative foils for each other, and tbh, Jason himself is an extremely good foil in general! On top of that the Arrows have long been foils of the Bats, so Bruce and Ollie also foil each other in the background brilliantly as Jason runs rings around them both!!!!
I would need to start pulling up pictures of comic pages and write a full length essay to get into proper depth with it (And I do intend to eventually!!) but the way they each interact with that fight and with their own histories going into it is great for both characters and it's just... gah... basically my favorite comic ever and it's stuck in this meaningless tug of war over "characterization" from two sides who both mostly haven't read the damned thing, let alone properly dug into the analysis of why Jason did any of that or what it might mean to Mia beyond just being unpleasant...
I would KILL to get DC to let me write a Mia and Jason comic. There's so much fun shit that they could do together, no matter if they were allied or enemies, I'm gonna have to write it as fanfiction tbh, but the fact that Green Arrow (2001) #69 - #72 is completely ignored until someone wants to use it as flat proof of 'Jason bad and ur bad for liking him' is just...
Le sigh...
Anyway what the fuck was I doing? Answering an ask lol??
Okay here we go: Timmy Time!
19. A relationship in canon that you don't like?
Its gotta be Steph simply due to how badly it was mishandled. As usual with female characters, I feel like Steph's nuance and strength as a character was in direct conflict with how the authors implemented her narrative role as a love interest. The fact that Tim was flat out casually misogynistic to her for her whole introduction and it wasn't treated properly as a flaw is a deal-breaker for me. The amount of Steph's Wikipedia biography that's Tim's love life makes me want to commit arson. The ship itself in isolation from much of the canon may have potential, and the canon material itself isn't all bad by any means, but to me the relationship still feels like a net loss.
21. I do indeed write, uh, a considerable amount of fanfiction about this dude, so: What's your favorite thing to do in fics when it comes to this character? Something that you don't like?
I like making him more unhinged. Or rather, I interpret his early actions as having been spectacularly unhinged, and like to imagine he kept that energy up into later years. I'm so not interested in Tim being a well adjusted person tbh I want him in my wonderful little Freak 4 Freak ship being spectacularly messed up and incredibly weird with nonsensical ideas about how boundaries work
For what I don't like... Hmmmm, this one's a little hard to answer because most of that falls into the neutral category of stuff I have no interest in writing at all, and so I just don't lol
I suppose I don't like to do apologies, though I have written one. I like to get down into the messy depths of sympathy and resentment by having him talk about those conflicts with the allies that have hurt him. However, I think the direct contrition and simplicity of apologies has less and less appeal to me the more I develop as a writer. Apologies retroactively cement an idea of fault and blame. I think there's more room for exploration in having the characters talk through all of the components of the issue without ever having that particular kind of confrontation.
Thank you very much again for the ask!!! I hope this was a fun read :3
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I enjoyed your essays and i feel that they were things you should be proud of having made
Ok yes I am proud of the essays.
However, at this point, I have said basically everything I wanted to say in them and I don’t really know if I want to write any more of them.
I also intended to become a music journalist someday when I started the zine. I don’t really want to become a music journalist anymore because it seems like it actually sucks.
I also know I will never be able to achieve that, because I was recruited to market AI before ChatGPT was a thing and the overall public developed a very deep hatred for AI and anyone associated with it.
While this comes with its own challenges, I thrive in tech startup environments and the career I have achieved is incredible and more than I could have ever hoped for considering my age and educational background.
However, the main issue is that very frequently, I get plagiarized, or people take an incredibly inappropriate amount of credit for things I have worked hard to achieve, in order to very successfully further their own endeavors.
I have not been really good at turning the essays into some kind of huge success for myself, and that’s what I want. I deliberately do a lot of things to keep the essays contained to a certain degree. I have known multiple people personally who achieved a high level of indie success, and I have seen the horrible stuff they went through because of it, and I do not want that kind of circus in my life, especially considering the fact that I am happy with where I am professionally.
However, it is still incredibly hurtful and upsetting to be taken advantage of like this over and over when so much time and love goes into these essays.
For example, someone on Tumblr who does not like me plagiarized my first Panic essay, inserted a bunch of mean digs at me being crazy in it, posted it on Reddit, and got more upvotes than I got views.
A famous YouTuber with over 500K subscribers based a video around my essays, inserted a dig at me into the video, and then got 155K views on this video. A real journalist that was interviewed for the emo history book commented on this video saying how amazing and well-researched it was.
A girl who ran a podcast interviewed my favorite writer, very obviously implied to him during the interview she found all his old articles and all this lore about him on her own and had been a fan of his since the 2000s, and then advertised this podcast in my ask box. The guy who wrote the aforementioned book also interviewed him and like I can’t prove these people read my essays but the timing is certainly, well, suspicious. I know I do not own or invent this information but given how obscure it is and the fact she was probably advertising herself in my asks it is pretty obvious what happened here. These essays aren’t just one google search that anybody could have found, putting all of that together and finding all of those sources was a ton of work.
Finally, I don’t want to give a lot of details about this out of respect, but someone I used to be friends with heavily used the zine to get a job in music and meet a member of MCR. I personally felt like during our involvement, which ended about a year before this happened and because of the following, she intentionally misrepresented the percentage of labor she was actually doing, pushed a lot of “dirty work” like transcription onto me in order to obtain all the benefits of networking with publicists and musicians without doing the work, and sabotaged the most important interview I ever did with this specific goal in mind.
Everybody seems to think this kind of thing is completely OK and it’s OK to treat me this way because like just a crazy juvenile fangirl that needs mental help so I don’t matter and I didn’t do any real work, whereas they’re LEGITIMATE and SERIOUS and COOL so it’s okay to steal my ideas and my research to further their own shit. I am getting really sick of it and it hurts my feelings.
I also had a lot of bad and stressful things happen to me recently (grandma dying unexpectedly, dumb injury, best friend at my job getting laid off, little brother needing emergency surgery essentially on my birthday, cat shelter being closed) and privating the essays is something pointless I can control to make myself feel better.
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Let’s deconstruct this…
Ok, so at this point I’ve seen a great many things written on Who Ed is with a capital W, and even I’ve thrown bits and pieces of my hat in the ring. But there is one particular thing I have a burning desire to express, and that is, respectfully, Edward’s softness is his own damnit.
There’s a pretty popular notion gaining traction in the fandom that Ed’s softness is just as much a performance as Blackbeard. That him embracing it fully in those brief moments of episode 10 before “the kraken” was unhealthy actually, and he wasn’t being true to himself. In summary: Ed requires Blackbeard to be whole. And my question is: why do people find Ed an unreliable narrator in his softness, or more specifically, why do people think he lacks autonomy of it?
It bothers me when people say that Ed is trying to be like Stede to gain approval in these moments, because the only major similarity I see is aesthetic. Guys a huge theme of the show is older queer men finally finding ways to escape varying forms of toxic masculinity, and understanding that their queerness does not exclude them from manhood. Homogenizing two effeminate gay men and implying that one is “losing himself” to the idiosyncrasies of the other goes directly against this goal. In fact it actually perpetuates negative gay stereotypes, but I’ve made a video essay where I discuss that at length.
Edward writes and performs a song on deck when he wants to process and share his feelings openly. Not only is this waaay more emotional honesty than we ever see Stede express (on purpose at least), but this is a creative outlet unique to Ed. Theatrical story telling is an established motif in Ed’s character the same way literary storytelling is for Stede’s. Edward’s not only dealing with his hurt in a way Stede definitely wouldn’t (he didn’t, Stede went out of his way pretend everything was fine in episode 8), he’s also doing so through an established passion of his.
The Swede wasn’t full of shit when he said that performance can simply be an expression of you. This is not Ed trying to put on a new mask when the old one proved ineffective. This is him finding comfort and even joy in finally using performance to reveal himself instead of hide. I don’t understand why the credit for this beautiful moment of self discovery must be ripped from Ed and used to accuse Stede.
It’s the same with the “SiLk GoWn”. This is the same person who lovingly touches every piece of nice fabric he lays eyes on, and lit up like a fucking Christmas tree the second someone said the word “fashion.” Ed has had a deep love and longing for such a soft pretty thing since day 1. These were ingrained and suppressed in Ed all long before Stede came on the scene. That robe may literally belong to Stede, but just as he wore it as a sign of his newfound boldness under the safety of someone loving him for who he is, Ed’s choice to wear it symbolizes the blossoming autonomy of his own identity. To continue enjoying the things Stede made him feel safe enjoying even without his presence.
Now let’s move on (or backwards I guess?) to the academy. Something I’ve seen a lot is people decrying that Ed is sacrificing his authenticity to play a housewife for Stede. Guys… he just folded some socks, calm tf down. Saying something like this about a gay man just trying to do something small and sweet for someone he loves, again, really seems to perpetuate the toxic masculinity this show hauls ass to deconstruct. Yes the answer to toxic masculinity isn’t just “effeminacy is perfect and good”. But Ed can be genuinely content with finally being able to partake in the domesticity he never got to experience without perpetuating that.
And you know what, he can be unsure of the best way to fulfill that desire and change his mind. I don’t quite like the disregard for Ed’s autonomy when people say his decision to stay at the academy or find an escape is driven only by whatever he thinks Stede wants. He is taking Stede’s feelings into consideration because that is perfectly healthy when you love someone and want a life with them, but his choices are still absolutely driven by his own needs moment by moment too.
I think people really take Ed understandably not wanting to be subjugated by the British and run with it. Like yes he is visibly uncomfortable with the soldiers treating him like an exotic animal they’ve tamed because no shit. But I don’t know how many times Ed has to blatantly state he does not want to be a pirate anymore for it to be believed.
Edward is not an exception to this. Even if he managed to thrive emotionally in this line of work once upon a time and there are aspects of it he enjoys, Ed still became a pirate out of desperation. He didn’t choose it any more than Oluwande and Jim did, he was fleeing poverty and abuse.
It’s not that piracy is a net bad and that Ed should want to distance himself from it. It’s that he assumed piracy is the only option he’s ever had in life even when it hurts him, and the realization that he has the freedom to choose differently is empowering and a net good. Him wanting to run to China with Stede, or take the crew’s funky acts on the road, whether they’re practical or not (especially in this show) is beside the point. The point is Ed’s absolute unbridled joy in their possibilities, the pure delight in discovering that you are not chained to a series of decisions you made under extreme duress 30 years ago.
No, Ed is not doing a complete 180 of his personality during his NoBeard era. He’s been forced to sacrifice his personhood for decades, and is now finally wrestling it out the grasp of thousands of people… at the age of 50 and during two of his darkest moments no less. How absolutely amazing.
#this is probably gonna flop cause it’s a mile long but I’m passionate about this damnit#it’s about autonomy over one’s own identity babes#ESPECIALLY in the context of queerness#biceratops meta#ofmd#meta#our flag means death#analysis#Edward teach#Blackbeard#Stede bonnet#blackbonnet#gentlebeard#1x09#1x10
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i swear to fucking god im not a hater but if i see another fucking badly-made thumbnail boring neurotypical straight guy with lame monotone voice talking over buncha mfb clips video of the worst metal fight beyblade takes ive ever seen with the unfunniest jokes im gonna rearrange the DNA sequence of the closest person to me to that of a Doto greenamyeri nudibranch because i swear to god just shut the fuck up.
how the fuck do you meatheads base how much you like a character over powerscaling and win ratio. would you prefer a wild bear over your own mother because the bear is stronger than her? thats how you fuckin sound like. i gotta rant this shit out because i had enough if i hear another fucking "ryūga da goat🥶🐐" "beyblade really is that serious🤣" "This show is so acoustic😵" "did you know that moses split the sea with a be-" WE FUCKING KNOW THE WHOLE WORLD KNOWS AT THIS POINT. ALSO IF YOU DEADASS USE AUTISM AS AN INSULT LET ALONE USE THE WORD ACOUSTIC OR ARTISTIC FOR IT STAY 7 KILOMETERS AWAY FROM ME AND ALSO DONT WATCH METAL FIGHT BEYBLADE EVERYONE IS GAY AND AUTISTIC YOU KNOW WHY⁉️ which cishet neurotypical out there makin spinning tops fight with neon green or blue whateverthefuck hair half the cast looks like they been hiding in closet before their debut episode.
PRIME example of these bad takes is , because of powerscaling again the hate on masamune ? i thought people hated him because they thought he was annoying (like how i did when i first watched it when i was little) (FOUR YRS OLD) and like id get that as in he talks alot or whatever but people hate him because. fucking. "he has a low win ratio and claims to be the number one blader" BITCH THATS A 15 YR OLD. or like around that age somewhere you get the point. so what if the taco doritos colour palette guy a little confident in himself bitch you hate fun you hate sillyness. people also use him as like a tool to praise kenta? constantly i see takes like "kenta is like masamune if masamune didnt suck" or something as in they both try to rise to the top and get stronger but one of them doesnt talk shit like did you know you can praise a character without putting down the other one motherfucker. another one is "masamune isnt a legendary blader because he talks shit but cant actually back it up" Hey my brother in Allah lets play a little game. which one of the fucking legendary bladers talks big about himself. you have ten seconds. 10...9...8....KING. KING IS RIGHT THERE .
also saw someone say damian shouldve been a legendary blader⁉️⁉️mf that boy was on rearrangement stereoids the effects of that wouldve already worn off by the time of metal fury how does that even WORKK😭😭 he was probably off with 3 big fucking pet dogs to eat custard pudding or sumn idk .Ryūga dickriding has been a thing for for ever but right now for some reason people decided they didnt talk about that guy enough. theres so many videos on him guys there are other characters to talk about i can write a three billion word essay on damian but i dont think i can say anything about ryūga that hasnt been said at this point. also the people who claim hes alive BECAUSE hes alive in the manga is crazy like yall cant see those as two different universes? im not saying wether if i think hes alive or not this isnt about that dont miss the point. i wanted to make text posts about mfb for forever but i was embarrased for god knows why so i just posted my mfb fanart on my main but i cant take it anymore (eatina burger with no honey mustard) must speak this time im afraid
also sorry if this is hard to read im not good at ending sentences where i should punctuation jumpscare. powerscaling mfs will hear u say u like a character like for example tsubasa or sumn and immediately bring up ryūga like shut the fuck up this shit happened on twitter i dont even use twitter i opened the app for 000.1 seconds. you just jelaous ryūga will never serve like did mf also im not a ryūga hater anyways i reached the character limit fuck
#rant post#Sorry i had to . FUCK.#mfb#beyblade#beyblade metal saga#metal fight beyblade#beyblade metal fight#beyblade metal fury#ryuuga#Ryūga#masamune kadoya#me if i was written by vivziepop
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Loser Round 7: Ken Amada (Persona) vs. Mabel Pines (Gravity Falls)
Propaganda below the cut
Ken Amada (11):
y'all are all for "murder and revenge plots" until is a 10 y/o boy who watched his mother die and started to become conflicted after realizing his moms killer is a secretly kind traumatized teenager to the point where the 10 y/o boy attempts to kill himself by giving himself up to assassins.
bro he's 10.
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ken amada is such an interesting character with the unfortunate circumstances of having little screentime and atlus deciding to ruin his reputation forever by giving him a romance choice in the fem protag route. ken is a child who lost his mother at NINE. nobody ever believed him when he said that she was murdered, and that he saw who killed her. hes miserable, and all everyone around him does is give him sympathy while hes suffering and was forced to grow up before even going into middle school. hes angry and determined to get revenge on the person who killed his mother, and he doesnt even see the own value in living anymore beyond getting that revenge. hes more mature than most of his peers, and is desperate to be seen as an adult.but at the same time, he is still a child who likes superhero shows.
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OH GOD WHERE DO I START
First there's the normal "The fandom hates kids" complaints of "He's so whiny" "he's so annoying" "oh my god kid just SHUT UP" y'know, the typical fandom stuff that makes you wonder if these people have ever talked to a child in their life
Second, there's (spoilers)...
October 4th, and the ENTIRE FANDOM is calling this kid a murderer.
For context, the moment in question doesn't necessarily paint him in the best light but its still understandable. Your team is going on a mission while Ken and another character named Shinjiro are away. In an alleyway, they have a talk where it is revealed that on that night a year priar to the game, Kens mom was killed in that allleyway by Shinjiro's Persona (Which, by the Rules of the Game Lore, basically means By Shinjiro). Ken tried to tell the authorities, the authorities didn't believe him because Magic Reasons and the death was ruled an accident.
Of course Ken is Fucking Pissed and wants revenge
However, because of Talk, he ACTIVELY CALMS DOWN, and realises "Hey, I probably shouldn't kill someone. Despite them, y'know, killing my mom"
HOWEVER REVOLVER JESUS COMES IN AND RUINS EVERYTHING BY SHOOTING SHINJIRO. AND LIKE, IF YOU PLAY P3P YOU CAN /AVOID THE DEATH THING/
AND EVERYONE BLAMES /KEN/. AND ONLY KEN.
And third (yes, there's a THIRD) IS THE FUCKING FEMC ROMANCE THING. WHICH JUST...SHOULDN'T HAVE EXISTED IN THE FIRST PLACE. BUT NOW HE'S "SHOTA BAIT" BECAUSE WE HAVE TO BLAME THE CHILD FOR THE AUTHORITY FIGURE COMING ONTO THEM 😒
Mabel Pines (12):
I literally saw a tiktok today about how Mabel is a bad person. She’s 12! Like yes, she has made some mistakes and bad choices, but so has everyone else. And I never see any of the other characters in the show criticized the way she is. Everyone in the show has made mistakes (Grunkle Stan commits crimes practically every episode ffs) but because Mabel is a 12 year old girl and acts like it, she gets the most hate. Mabel deserves to be loved 🩷
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girl gets so much flack for being... immature and kind of selfish at age 12? like she had whole video essays made on why she is a horrible person who deserves punishment. god forbid girls be silly
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!!! Spoilers for Gravity Falls last 5 episodes !!!
This has gone down a lot but when the Weirdmaggedon arc was happening, the finale of the series, a big part of the fandom started hating Mabel because she accidentally caused the Weirdmaggedon (basically an apocalypse + bizarre shit like the water tower becoming an eight-legged monster with a giant mouth).
For context, in the episode that starts this arc, "Dipper and Mabel vs The Future", Mabel is really excited to the end of their summer vacation at Grunkle Stan's house, since it will be her and Dipper's 13th birthday and they will enter high school (her idea of high school of course coming from teen movies). But then this whole idea starts to shatter when Wendy tells her that high school isn't like a Disney musical, but it's okay, she will get through this since she will be with Dipper, her twin brother...
Except, that Dipper receives an invitation by Grunkle Stan's scientist brother Ford to become his apprentice after summer ends, staying in Gravity Falls, without Mabel. When she discovers it, she gets really mad at him and in a fit of rage, she accidentally picks Dipper's bag instead of hers and runs off to the woods.
When she gets there, Blendin, a time-travelling friend of theirs finds her and tells her that he has a way of making her brother stay with her, and make the summer take a little more to end, and that he just needed a little thing that Dipper has in his bag. That thing is a dimensional rift that Dipper and Ford contained to not cause the Weirdmaggedon, but Mabel didn't knew about that and gives it to Blendin. Blendin then breaks it and it's revealed that Bill Cipher was controlling Blendin to get the rift and release the Weirdmaggedon. He then traps Mabel in a bubble, starting the final arc of the series.
So, a few episodes later, that bubble she's in is revealed to be a world of fantasy that she controls, and that she didn't want to leave that world, as she was scared of growing up etc.
Context given, A LOT OF PEOPLE HATED HER FOR THIS. Suddenly people started seeing Mabel as just a selfish girl who wanted things only her way, when she was only a 12-year-old scared of growing up without her twin brother (they do end up going back together at the end but still).
The worst part is that apparently the people behind it took note of this, and on the comics that where released after the finale, she is a selfish spoiled brat. I haven't read the comics though so I'm going off what some people said about it.
#yall hate kids tourney#loser round 7#persona#persona 3#persona 3 fes#persona 3 portable#persona 3 reload#p3#p3fes#p3p#p3reload#ken amada#amada ken#gravity falls#mabel pines#cw suicide#cw child death#cw age gap
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Hello sex witch! Long time listener, first time caller, love how you do the teaching you do 😄
I was having a chat with my (college age) sibling, and I found she might have some... skewed views on the morality of being sexual. Think along the lines of purity culture, with a sprinkling of religious teaching, and a dash of how legality/morality must be intertwined. I know that sort of thing can lead to some unhealthy thinking, and honestly, I'm a little worried!
This is just background for context, I'm not asking you to solve or even unpack all that lol. But I really vibe with your stance on sex-neutrality, and it seems like a good concept to introduce her too. Like, a lil'nudge.
My personal sex-neutality mindset was gained over years of life experience and internet osmosis, which is really difficult to condense into a "quick-start guide," given I've never really had to educate on it before. I mean, I'll start with the definition, but she would probably prefer having sources other than just me talking for hours lol.
So. TL;DR. As an educator, do you happen to have any resources you could point me towards on sex-neuteality? Books, websites, podcasts, previous posts..? Things I could pass along?
Thank you so much sorry for the length
hey anon,
this is a tricky one because, as you said, sex neutrality is something that comes about from a lifetime of nurturing influences. adopting a totally new mindset is rarely something that can be adopted by one book or video essay, no matter how good they are. this is especially true in the face of religious influence, which can be very difficult to tactfully circumvent without making someone feel as if they're being criticized for being religious at all.
just having a figure in their life (that's you!) who's willing to start and engage with non-judgmental discussions about sexuality can be really helpful for people unlearning sexual stigma, so congrats to you for doing the hardest work just by being present!
having said that, you can't do everything and a recommended media list never hurts. there isn't a lot of work (that I'm familiar with, at least) that just sit you right down and say "hey. here's why sex neutrality good," so I'm going to drop work where that's sort of a powerful background radiation.
Emily Nagoski's book Come As Your Are is a pretty great guide for cis women learning to get comfortable with their bodies and sexualities and, more importantly, the possibilities of communication to find a relationship and sexual style that works for them! I really like the way Nagoski normalizes such a wide range of different needs and desires while assuring readers that there's no "wrong" approach; it's very comforting! if your sister is a podcast person, Nagoski also has an eight part podcast series of the same name where she debunks myths and answers more questions about sexuality.
actually hi as long as we're talking about podcasts Kate Lister, a historian who specializes in historical records of sex work, has a terribly fun podcast called Betwixt the Sheets that's nothing but sex friendly fun. it's got enough interesting historical meat to it that it's not even obvious sex neutral propaganda on the surface; some of my favorite episodes have Lister interviewing other academics about Queen Victoria's dietary habits and Hollywood portrayals of vodun.
if we want to talk about the 101 of getting comfortable with one's own genitalia and reproductive health, I must point to Dr. Jennifer Gunter's Vagina Bible. Dr. Gunter has made a whole career out of debunking medical misinformation, wellness scams, and Goop over on twitter. I think she should be allowed to attack Gwyneth Paltrow with a sword but I can't make that happen so I can at least promote her book.
if your sister starts feeling adventurous, Dr. Lindsey Doe's youtube channel Sexplanations has been a formative influence on me and has years worth of videos covering tons of topics in quick, unabashedly enthusiastic bursts of information. this video where Dr. Doe talks about her own instances of internalized sex negativity could be an excellent starting point, especially if you want to discuss it together like a lil youtube bookclub.
for a longer youtube dive, Khadija Mbowe's ruminations on sex positive feminism, its shortcomings, and which parts they see as worth preserving could also be a great point of conversation, especially for someone whose coming into the conversation not identifying with sex positivity. caveat that they do link to Christine Emba's book Rethinking Sex in the video description and I cannot in good conscience recommend or fuck with that at all, sorry.
Angela Chen's book Ace, about asexuality, is genuinely so so wonderful, and I think required reading for anyone trying to make sense of any kind of sexuality.
Meg-John Barker's book Rewriting the Rules is a maybe a more expansive version of Nagoski's book, less focused on sex and much more interested in expanding ideas of what relationships can look like and encouraging personal expression within them. honestly I think that's a really important part of embracing sex negativity - more compassion and less judgment for yourself can lead to more compassion and less judgment for others, right? right, hopefully.
Jaclyn Friedman's book Unscrewed is a delight, and does something similar to Mbowe's video linked above by highlighting ways in which commercialized #girlboss "sex positivty" is useless and then providing instances of real people doing actual, tangibly useful and positive work. Friedman highlights everything from queer youth shelters to orgs run by and for trans sex workers of color to reproductive justice organizations; it's a great dip into a lot of different radical causes without (hopefully) being too overwhelming.
I hope this serves as a good starting place for a lot of positive conversations with your sibling! good luck, friend xoxo
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hi scoopsogie, the post you rebloged about media creators expecting their audience to be different than it actually is and then putting their rage onto said media, made me think about Dream. because so far he was a creator who actually embraced the big part of his audience that is women and queer people. and he always has been supportive. but. and please correct me or reassure me if I'm being unreasonable. when he said in the video that a big part of his fans are actually collage guys and people into competitive gaming and with his request to be normal and tone down the activities that mostly women and queer people do in the fandom, i got scared that twitter's behaviour made him a bit apprehensive towards this side of fandom. that he doesn't like us like he used to and maybe he wishes his fan were mostly gamer guys...
Hi friend!
I like that post, it's very informative and sheds light on an issue in main stream media. For television shows, like they're mostly talking about here, there are a number of people behind the scenes making decisions and leading where the next season or arc is going. The showrunner, the network, individual writers (very rarely the actors). In between seasons, these people have time to discover *who* is watching their shows and being the loudest about it, engaging with it. It's not that NO men are watching those shows, they just aren't as loud and interested and locked in. I've read theories before about why men aren't as engaged in shows like woman as far as transformative work goes (art, fic) and a big one that I put my horse behind is that these shows are made *for* men. They see themselves as the heroes, the characters, and so they don't need to turn to fanfic to "fix" anything or to imagine it differently. I dunno, that's another essay for a different time.
For Dream and other streamers/real people fandoms (even musicians to a degree) they see their fandoms in real time. Musicians, definitely, because when they're touring you visibly see the audience coming to the show. For streamers it's a tad different, because names in chat are just names, but creators are usually way more involved in twitter where they see the bios and stuff.
I think Dream meant that his fanbase (which our reputation online has been we are all 14 year old girls) - *does* have college age people+ in it and men (who, let's be real, with *our* reputation online, is it any wonder they aren't as vocal as the die hard fans?). When your youtube subscribers alone are 30 million, you wouldn't expect all 30 million to be 14 year olds. I think Dream is very aware that his audience in primary female leaning queer people and POC. Especially compared to other gaming creators and a big part of why we are all here is because he makes us comfortable following him. I don't care how good a youtuber someone is, if they're shitty to their female and queer fans and constantly making gay jokes, I'd bounce. A huge part of why I even got into this fandom was the fanfiction. I had never played minecraft before in my life.
But also remember just who this video is intended for. It's not really for us. It's not intended for the fans who already saw the holes in these allegations and chose to believe Dream. It's for people looking to crucify him. It's *those people* he is showing himself to. It's *those people* he is saying 'I have boundaries and I don't condone everything my fanbase does willy nilly.' This shouldn't be a surprise to us, as Dream has always said he doesn't support doxxing and he doesn't support using his name to harass anyone. He's gone out of his way to be an example and be kind to people who have been mean and cruel to him (tommy, quackity). We've seen him reach out privately and resolve issues before (that guy Henry or whoever ((he's irrelevant imo)) who said Dream provided alcohol to an 18 year old in his hotel room which turned out not to be true).
I don't think he suddenly hates art or fanfiction. This is the man who not only has written fanfiction before (Percy Jackson) but hosted a fanfiction writing contest for his own fandom. I think what he doesn't want is for antis or whoever to go into the #dreamfanart tag and see explicit fic of him naked and/or having sex. Because minors CAN see that in the tag, it reaches a wider audience. Randos who only see that tag will think he condones that. So, he's simply stating he doesn't want that where majority of people will see it. At least, that's my interpretation.
It really sucks, but I think that really means no explicit art on twitter at all (though i think there's a gray area of having a private acct and only sharing with people who are over 18 and have to request to follow -- but that's been a practice already). Additionally, I'm not sure where his line is and where it crosses into explicit. Is kissing okay? He put a hard case out there for not truthing, which I'm glad he said, people shouldn't be scrutinizing his close friendships to the point where they're trying to see if they have separate hotel rooms (this is an example, i actually haven't heard of people doing that). Don't make DNF being real your entire personality.
I really don't think he suddenly wants an entirely gamer-boy audience. I think courting that side of his fandom helps with the harassment overall, though. Having men in the fandom gives the entire fandom more validity -> which, this actually makes me really angry and I hate it but (circling back to the post you mentioned) people have always struggled to respect majority female and queer fandoms.
I'm definitely rambling and trying to make sure I'm answering all the parts of your ask. This is not coherent and not all of my thoughts at all but it's already disgustingly long. So,
TLDR: Dream still loves us, still likes art and fanfiction, and isn't trying to replace us with dude bros.
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Project “Let’s watch every single Fast & Furious movie”
The series is still finding its feet and not entirely sure what it wants to be. It has however decided that this one should contain a truly incredible amount of homoerotic subtext.
2 Fast 2 Furious (2003)
We check back in with Brian, who is street racing for a living in Miami now that he is no longer a cop. Ludacris, is here, for some reason. The FBI show up and put our boy over a barrel until he helps them investigate another crime ring, with his car.
The cinematography and general visual language is much more mature, they've figured out how to shoot cars driving and in particular races in a way that better conveys relative position, advantage, and speed. No more undercranked footage, much more medium to wide shots of cars weaving past each other, as well as some complicated composited motion shots.
If you look for this movie on Tumblr you mostly find gifs of Devon Aoki in her girlboss pink Honda S2000. And yeah, I get it, this look kicks ass. The leather skirt and thigh highs with garters or whatever that is really screams 2003.
Right, the plot. Even more so than last time, the core plot is extremely mid. Brian is over a barrel, and needs to help the FBI investigate a drug lord, in exchange for them forgetting about him. He doesn't trust a cop to partner with him so he gets them to offer a deal to his old boyfriend Roman, with whom he had a falling out many years ago. The two of them go undercover smuggling money for the drug lord and eventually work through their differences and get the guy. Big whoop.
Far more interesting is how the interpersonal relationship of Brian and Roman is handled. These two feel like a couple who dated all through high school and broke up over a nasty disagreement when they were 19 and never really got over each other. The first time they meet they physically throw down and it looks like this.
Just straight guy things. I made a crack about 2 bi 2 curious in the last post and I was like "someone has to have made this joke before" and a) not really it looks like only a couple tweets but b) it led me to this short video essay on a bisexual reading of 2 Fast 2 Furious. I don't agree with all its finer points and I think the author completely misread some sections of the movie but you'll find far more agreement than disagreement from me with this one.
youtube
Carrying on, there's a lot of the awkward "I want to trust you, and I know I should be able to trust you, but I don't trust you" between these two. It's great, if you want to watch two very pretty guys go insane over each other for an hour and a half, this is a movie for you. I'm going to reiterate a lot of what's said in this video because it's all very obvious.
Before we continue, I need to note that what you don't see, oddly, is really any kind of coherent heterosexual romantic subplot. Like, there's one there, they do parts of it, but it's almost homeopathic. It's purely there to check the box. Monica is an undercover cop who's been with the drug lord for like a year and, in theory, Brian is attracted to her. There's discussion of this, he checks her out, they make bedroom eyes at each other, the drug lord gets jealous, it's a whole thing, but mostly you see that Roman is worried that Brian is going to do something stupid because he's attracted to her.
In the above video the author misinterprets one scene as Brian sleeping with Monica but they do not actually fuck! She shows up in the early morning to tell Brian that he's going to be betrayed but they do not, in fact, fuck! This is important to me because man, there's so little of that subplot going on. This subplot barely develops at all, they don't talk to each other much, and when they do it's only the barest flirting.
At one point Brian does a driving stunt to impress Monica and when he's done, Roman pulls up and goes "oh, he did that stunt? He learned that one from me." which. Come on there's no way to read that that doesn't at least suggest that maybe Roman did it to hit on Brian when they were younger.
Speaking of car stunts, those are used to convey character a lot better in this movie. Dishonorable side characters drive in annoying ways in races to make themselves hard to pass, Brian and Roman do a whole elaborate game of one-upsmanship during their driving audition for the drug lord, and a doubles drag race with high stakes serves as a major bonding moment where they learn to trust each other. There's much, much less plot and character going on explicitly but I think the photography and the storytelling are working together more closely in this movie.
The movie seems to care less about the cars themselves though. The Lancer and Eclipse they drive for much of the movie are not particularly attractive nor particularly powerful cars, and the Challenger and Camaro they pick up later are more plot device than eye candy, unless you're really into American Muscle I guess. The initial race includes Suki's S2000 and Brian's Skyline that both very quickly end up sidelined, you don't see much of them again. There is much less time spent in garages and at races here, which is part of why the core plot feels like a lot of other action movies where the protagonist is a criminal helping the cops. I wonder if some of this is down to appealing to a wider audience who may just not give a shit about the finer distinctions between the Honda Civic EF and EX hatch.
There's a beautiful sunset scene where Brian and Roman just talk it out for a few minutes and settle their differences, come to terms, and finally trust each other again. I know I'm pretty much only talking about this one relationship but it's pretty much the only part of the movie with any depth, and the other parts only gain value in their proximity to it.
The final sequence is a huge endurance run across Florida that is a lot of fun to watch and includes a very funny scene where they scramble like, a hundred cars as a distraction to throw the police off. If you watch you can see that they really just grabbed whatever cars they could find to pad out the shot, there's like three or four PT Cruisers hidden in here.
The final run is mostly a show of the reformed trust between these two, it's great, it's a decent culmination of what's been building up through the whole show, they get their freedom, together, and resolve to move on together.
The whole movie really hangs on this relationship, it elevates it from a solid 5/10 "absolutely mid action movie" to a 7/10 "compelling characters you will think about later" type deal.
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The Unsleeping City Chapter Two and Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto
Ally Beardsley said, "I get her Kitchen, that really old book" and I perked up a little bit because I know a book called Kitchen, a niche one that I have analytical thoughts about and love as a piece of art and have never heard anyone mention outside of the class wherein I read it. And then they said "it has this really cool trans character in it," and I had to pause the video to scream about this, because the book I know does in fact have a cool trans woman in it. Her name is Eriko. When I had calmed down enough, I pressed play again and Ally Beardsley said "It's by this writer Banana Yoshimoto" and that is as far as I am into that episode because at that confirmation I had to stop and scream again.
Kitchen, the novella, is made of two different pieces: "Kitchen," about short-novel length by itself, and "Moonlight Shadow," a much shorter story. Both stories are about grief, isolation, connection, and food. Notably, both stories start with the main characters already in mourning, their loved ones already dead. We enter their world as one that is notably empty. This parallels the setting of season two, which opens with introductory scenes that still keenly feel Kugrash's absence.
I have been thinking about Kitchen through this entire season, which is part of why I got so excited when Ally Beardsley mentioned it. Kitchen is a book about grief and grieving and relying on others in your time of need to help you and care for you and give you food. Yoshimoto uses light and dark imagery not as symbols of good and evil, but rather of isolation and connection. Multiple times, she brings us the image of distinct points being connected by light in a dark void, including the main character looking up at the moon in a dark sky and, in one of the closing images of "Kitchen," a lighthouse tracing a road of light across black waves. When our narrator meets one of the people who will become her new household, she sees "in the black gloom before my eyes...a straight road leading from me to him" (Yoshimoto 6-7) (I don't have my book with me but I did find one of my old essays about it :) ). The darkness in these images is that which is not known, that which the characters cannot see through, which is why it represents isolation. They do not have knowledge or connection to that place, even though they may in the future. That way, the imagery is also connected to agency and the act of exploring and reaching out to one's world. Kitchen portrays characters in grief and dangerously deep in self-isolation, and the events and relationships that help them deal with that and figure out how they are going to live now. Yoshimoto characterizes the universe not as malicious but uncaring, and proposes that the response to this is to look for meaning instead in each other and the world we make. Which is exactly the struggle our characters are embarking on against NULL! Meaning, value, the things we personally hold dear; and it doesn't matter if they're "cosmically insignificant" or doomed or can be corrupted or whatever because they exist while they exist and they matter while they're there. Aaaaaaaaaa!!!
I've just remembered that one of the characters in "Kitchen" climbs up on someone's roof in the middle of the night to eat katsudon with them. They were not invited there! It was not katsudon that was in the hotel room! They bought the katsudon in the middle of the night and put it in their backpack and climbed up onto the roof and tapped at the window and said "Hello I brought katsudon"! I love this. It's so good. It's also Kugrash behavior.
Victoria Brown also persistently cares for people by providing them food, which is just to say that these two stories are both thinking about the comforting and communal power of cooking for people and eating together.
If I had a nickel for each time a mysterious, apparently-human but probably supernatural figure connected to a liminal location appeared to a character in need and offered them specifically tea in the Unsleeping City and Kitchen, I would have at least three nickels. Also the liminal location in "Moonlight Shadow" is a bridge over a river, which is traditionally a powerful symbol and also something that holds significance in Unsleeping City geography and lore.
In "Moonlight Shadow," a young man in mourning for his girlfriend wears her clothes every day after her death. I'd like to show Ricky Matsui this bit and hear his thoughts on it because of how he has taken on some of Kugrash's role. Ricky feels pressure from other parties as well, the Questing Blade and the Peasant's Sword, to carry on a legacy (that is symbolized by something one wears or carries).
I think that's all the thoughts I have about it for now, except that I seem to remember a line in "Moonlight Shadow" about a cloudy sky hanging heavy like stone, which might characterize the emotional state of New York in Chapter Two as well.
I'd like to know Pete's (and Ally Beardsley's) thoughts on Eriko as a character, and also if they talked to any of the other people in the season's production about the similarity of themes between the book and the series. If anyone has thoughts they'd like to share about this or about Kitchen in general, please do let me know! I vibrate whenever I get to discuss parallels between different media I'm into.
#pete conlan#the unsleeping city#the unsleeping city season 2#the unsleeping city season 2 spoilers#moonlight shadow spoilers#kitchen by banana yoshimoto spoilers#kitchen by banana yoshimoto#Sakurai Mikage#Tanabe Yuichi#Tanabe Eriko#Kitchen by Banana Yoshimoto#Victoria Brown#Kugrash#Sofia Lee#Ricky Matsui#Hiirage Moonlight Shadow#Satsuki Moonlight Shadow#Urara Moonlight Shadow#interliterary analysis!#literary analysis!#screaming (positive)#dimension 20#The unsleeping city spoilers
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And we’re back folks, if not a few days late. Sorry about that, I had to write a classics essay, of all things, so that held me up a tad. Despite that, here are my live thoughts and reactions for the new (and final :( ) Heartless video. Enjoy!
Alastor
“Curse of the hollow” is a vibe of a name, also I giving me Molly flashbacks
Ah yes, Genshin, something that I definitely know about (sarcastic)
Mythology vibes? We Stan
I love the attitude of, even if it gets scrapped or the comic never gets made, its fine, its fun to make. It’s a great philosopher towards creation
Yeah, he do be a vampire
Black hole/void magic is so cool. The audio it brings to mind is stunning
I love a spooky arm
The stars are plot significant
You can tell that I love the spooky arm thing, cause it is the main aesthetic of one of my D&D characters lol
Lorelei
I hate spelling her name, brain says no
I know that poster girl is a very common phrase, but for Lorelei specifically, it gives such a strong image. Those huge theatre posters that can’t fit on your wall, yeah that
Shoutout to all the people who did the black swan fanart
(Notes app tried to correct ‘fanart’ to ‘canary’ apple explain)
Ah yes, bird
Lorelei’s outfit being even slightly based on a wrestler is such a vibe. I don’t know what that vibe is, but it is indeed a vibe
Star placement is once again iconic. I feel like I’ll be saying that a lot tonight
The idea of the Lorelei fandom that almost certain exists in the Heartless universe having wild conspiricy theories about her tattoos gives me life, cause you know they would.
Diana
Cool cowboy + spy is a stunning aesthetic. That post about stealth vs. Russian stealth is strong with this one
The Eye!
As someone going through a Sandman phase, the ideas that come to mind at Diana being based on the Fates are numerous
The wld west vibes + the snakes are stunning.
So many references I don’t understand lol. Is this how my friends feel every time I speak?
Taking the two ‘heavy hitter’ characters and giving them the most ‘big brain strats’ fighting dynamic would make for such fun fights. Especially compared to other random fights that may happen in the series
Lance
The bastard boi!
Yes Alex, make it gayer. As God intended
My screen is small so I cannot see the face. Very sad
Alastor makes Lance captain for one day. He thinks, the guys literally a knight, how bad could it be? Next day Alastor revokes Lance’s position as captain
Alastor walking into a cell block, pointing at Lance and saying that one before walking out as the guards release Lance.
I don’t know why Lance is giving me the strong fan fiction ideas but here we are
He would call his sword teeth
He do be Erza
I actually did watch the video after he mentioned it in the last video. If you haven’t I highly recommend. Stunt people are icons. And nerds apparently
Eira knowing the ex-owners of Lance’s swords is great angst material.
Part of me says ‘armour cool’ Gremlin brain says ‘armour go clang when he walk’
I have not yet mentioned how much I love this specific art style from these videos so I will say so now.
Scales look amazing. That’s the comment
Shiny orange on the armour giving me NRG from ben 10 vibes
Scales on the sword handle. I love the attention to detail
Bandy
My beloved
He do be giving Mr Compress Vibes since day 1
Swap
The personality swap fits are great guys, never stop
(There’s a character in the current fairy tail manga who does something like this in a really fun way. Not relevant just came to mind)
The line between cliche and aesthetic is very thin
When he said, ‘not just normally playing cards’, my brain went straight to the idea of him having an absurd amalgamation of different card sets. Like he has a few Pokemon cards, a yugioh card, maybe something from magic the gathering. Black cards makes a lot more sense
Swap
Contract demons. terrifying
Pretty hair!
Puff go the sleeves
(Good lord my gremlin brain is taking over these comments)
I think I would prefer the banter rather than miming, but that’s just me.
I love this pose
Dock
Dock is probably the character I’ve seen the most fanart of
Right there! Love that he labeled it
Gross and scary and kind of decomposing. Now more people are going to have a crush on him
OMG, he’s an empath
Goop
We love a creepy cleric
“Pause for ADHD moment”
Another creepy arm!
Can’t wait to see this coloured (specifically talking about creepy hand)
“And also, pretty hot” - I have no words. I love
Alex paying specific mention to Dock showing his arm gives me the same vibe as that Tumblr post about the Mandelorians wrist
Love the Disney villain green on this guy
I was right, the creepy arm looked great in colour.
Final thoughts-
This new style continues to impress me. I don’t know enough about art to say what’s change, but I absolutely adore it. The way it makes things glow especially sparks joy.
The curse names give me such strong DND vibes, specifically subclasses. But that may just be that bloodhunter subclasses are all order and they use curses.
No more Heartless videos makes me sad, I hope that we get more content in the future. It may take some time for me to get excited at the idea of a new concept corner, but I know I will and I know I’ll love it. Heartless has been, and probably will continue to be my comfort YouTube series.
#abd illustrates#abd heartless#heartless#content#live reaction#alastor creed#diana shikari#lorelei#lance lothaire#dock heartless#bandy bellamis#shadow makes content
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So after skimming through the Magic Trick theory last night, and having had experiences reading/watching Neil Gaiman's other works, I've come to the conclusion that Neil is a highly intelligent/highly talented author.
And I know this goes against the new brand of philosophy I've been learning but... I'm kind of left feeling jealous and inadequate at times. And stupid. I'm a mathematics major eagerly awaiting to go back to school, but after seeing someone come up with the Magic Trick theory, I am left feeling like I can't even logic myself out of a box. It's one of those things that gives me imposter syndrome. Like I have no business participating in college level mathematics and someone will found me out eventually. Or like I'm being ridiculous, spending my free time watching videos on philosophy, AI, neuroscience, psychology, space, and physics because people will find it pretentious and will never believe I can understand even a smidgen of it.
As for the writing; I am left feeling so blown away by what I've just witnessed and what all of this possibly entails that it leaves me feeling very dim and primitive as an author. Because I seriously doubt I could ever come up with something so creative and genius. A plot so complex that people write essays about it and spend hours upon hours dissecting it. Right now, I'm feeling a lot like a novice. As though there is nothing special about my works and the growth I've seen over the years is hardly noteworthy.
And you see, it's ridiculous to feel that way. Because comparing yourself to others is unhealthy and kind of toxic. It's hurtful to yourself, and, well, I feel like it also implies that if someone else does good work, they shouldn't have because it left you feeling small. And that is not at all what I believe. I think people should be allowed to be passionate, talented, and skilled at things. I think they should be allowed to feel pride over what they've created. Quite frankly, I hate when people grow resentful of those who have something they don't (unless it's, say, a billionaire raping the Earth of its natural resources and causing great harm and deprivation for everyone else). I've dealt with that before, as someone who naturally happens to have a pretty decent physique and, well, who ig could be considered attractive (even though I don't consider myself such). I've dealt with people comparing their own appearance to me and feeling terrible as a result, and then later proceeding to neg the fuck out of me and/or act incredibly bitter and hostile if I talked about ANYTHING nice going on in my life. It made me feel awkward and guilty. In a way, I felt like I was responsible for their unhappiness, or like the negative things they said about me were true and I'm being narcissistic for seeing any good in myself. I do NOT want to be like those people!
Also, I think passion is far more important than being good at something. Seriously, I hate this idea that people's worth is directly correlated with what they have going for them. How skilled or talented they are, how smart they are, how pretty they are, how much money they make, etc. It's pretty disgusting. To me, it feels like we treat people like a commodity when we reduce them to what they have to offer. And also, I find it sick how we tend to shame those who have passions that are a little more "absurd." I feel very awkward talking about my interest in subjects such as math, for instance, because it comes with this expectation that I must be highly intelligent. And if I'm not, then I'm a fraud. But would I really be hurting anyone by having an interest in something and never being good at it? What's wrong with just enjoying something?
And look, I think working on improving yourself and reaching your full potential can be a fun journey in and of itself. But it should ONLY be done for your own sake. It shouldn't be about trying to stand out or whatever. You're going to end up killing your passion if you get caught up in feelings of inadequacy. Speaking from experience, life sucks when you're always comparing yourself to others and feeling inferior.
So... it really shouldn't matter to me if people like Neil Gaiman are out there making masterpieces. They exist only for the sake of being enjoyed, at the end of the day. Seriously, it isn't that deep. I'm just writing as a hobby. No one cares if I churn out a masterpiece. In fact, the stakes are much higher for Neil because this work is supposed to be the legacy of a dead friend, and he already has such high expectations put on him because he's a famous author who's produced many iconic works in the past. Think of it this way: authors like me actually have the FREEDOM to suck at what we do and make tons of mistakes. BECAUSE NO ONE CARES! That gives us a lot of creative leeway. We can experiment around with various plots and styles to our heart's content because we aren't concerned with hoping a book or show will make enough money so that we can continue it. I remember seeing Neil himself admit that he kind of misses the days when he was less of a well-known name. Because things were more simple then. I guess this is something that has failed to occur to me for the longest time because I've never been so good at something that people expect so much from me, but it sounds stressful.
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I watched James Somerton's video essay about Young Royals after seeing Lisa's insta story. I've watched his videos from way back, so I was glad when I found out that he'd done a review of a show that I've come to really love.
The analysis was...interesting. I don't know if that's the right word, but it'll do. It was well structured and immersive, as his videos often tended to be, but while I did enjoy listening to it, this is one of the rare times where I found myself disagreeing with most of the points being made. Don't get me wrong, he made a lot of good points. I don't want it to get twisted and make it seem like I'm against the issues presented here because I'm most definitely not— but we'll get to that later.
Point is, I thought the review was rather reductive in a sense that it took one aspect of the show and decided to look at it through a narrow lens. It discussed the show in its most basic sense, presenting YR's world as this black-and-white setting. It was also rather biased towards its view of Wilhelm, while also completely reducing Simon's character into—using his own words—an "emotional support poor" when he's clearly more than that.
So let's get down to business, shall we? (Note: I'm writing this while at work and on the spot, so bear with me if it's kind of all over the place.)
The forbidden romance brought about by class divide is a trope that's been used a million times. Believe me, I'd know. I came from a country where all of the shows on TV had a plot revolving around a wealthy guy falling in love with a poor girl that his mother and another rich girl (that's always evil) may or may not torment. It's nothing new. It's been overused, done before. YR falls into the same trope, with Wilhelm being the wealthy guy and Simon the impoverished love interest in this scenario. But Wilhelm isn't just some random rich kid—he's also Sweden's crown prince. And that, I think, made the difference (which the review decided not to incorporate.)
While I do agree that media almost always portrayed wealthy characters as emotionally stunted due to cold detached parents and the poor characters as those with higher EQs caused by warm loving families (something that is not at all the case irl), the main root of Wilhelm's problem isn't wealth, but status. His gilded cage isn't made up of money, but of duty: as a royal, a crown prince, and most importantly and what I think is most damning, a public figure.
It would be easy to dismiss Wilhelm's problems as inconsequential, especially since we as viewers could never relate to being a royal, but that would be unfair to his character's purpose and journey. YR never tried to hide the fact that Wilhelm is privileged in every way, as it's reflected in both his words and actions.
Example: when he told Simon about the private tutoring lessons, he said it in an almost conspiratorial way, just some topic to get to talk to him. He had good intentions, but it was still upsetting to hear for someone like Simon who could not afford to pay for those (unfair) lessons. To Wilhelm, such a thing was normal, while for Simon, whose grades were directly tied to his opportunities, it was a punch to the gut. This disconnect was most evident during their fight at the Music Room, when Wilhelm was quick to scoff at Simon's drug dealing when he himself was guilty of using them. Although he said he did not want to put the blame on Simon, as was suggested by his peers (also note that Wilhelm aligned himself with them by saying "...and the guys think we should let you take the fall"), he did heavily imply that he was to be removed from this, that the situation was riskier for him because it would damage his reputation, family, and image.
Does that excuse his actions? No, but it does put it into perspective. Privilege had always been in Wilhelm's life, so the only way of living he's ever known is one that moves according to its hold. He does this unknowingly, sure, yet all the same it's there. It controls him the same way the institution that bestowed it upon him does. Fvck the monarchy
And that had always been the issue, wasn't it? Wilhelm's life was never his own. He won't get to live as a 'normal' person. The people would always be interested in his affairs and he'll always have to give a piece of himself to them. That's the price he had to pay for all the privilege that came with his title.
Wilhelm could never be himself—I don't think he even knows who he is, really—because one wrong move could trigger a chain reaction of negative press, only contributing more to his anxiety. Is this a "first-world problem", as the internet liked to jokingly call it nowadays? Yes, but not quite. While this type of dilemma is unique to persons with Wilhelm's status, the themes of societal and familial pressure, grief, and being lost and confused in your teen years, are universal. There's no set guidelines for what situations can be considered deserving of our empathy or not; we don't get to judge people on what makes them sad.
When I was a kid, I couldn't help but resent well-off friends of mine who got depressed, because as someone whose parents had to work over more than 12 hours every day just to make ends meet, I thought, "how could you, whose life never seemed to lack for anything, dare feel down?" But as I grew up, I learned that it wasn't a choice, that sadness and grief and paranoia didn't discriminate with its victims. Everyone's feelings are valid.
It's easy to get lost in the resentment and to be dismissive of someone else's trauma, but tragedy isn't a competition. There's no point in comparing baggage because everyone has different circumstances, and at the end there are no winners here.
Wilhelm's entire character arc was leading to his realization that the institution he'd chosen over someone he loves doesn't care about him, and it's time for him to take command of his own life. The thing is, up until that point, Wilhelm never had a say in his life, contrary to Simon's accusation that everything was on his terms. Wilhelm was moving in a limited capacity, trying to find compromises where he could, and even that's a hard task to do. Him wanting to continue the relationship even in secret (which was completely unfair to Simon and he was right to reject) was him trying to reconcile what he wanted vs what the monarchy would tolerate. But then again, even if Simon did agree, would that truly make them happy? Simon was right when he said that Wilhelm had to figure out what he wants, like what he really wants. Because while Wilhelm can't see it yet, a relationship with Simon is just one aspect of the thing he's truly craving for: a life where he can act, speak, and love freely.
Which led me to my next point: Simon is, and never was, Wilhelm's emotional crutch. While Simon does help a lot in regard to Wilhelm's anxiety and overall mental health, he never thought of him as the solution, nor expected him to be the one-all fix to his problems. One of the things I loved the most about their relationship was the amount of communication between them. Sure, they fight and walk out and may be prone to petty remarks as teenagers often are, but they make sure to address their issues right away and give constant updates. No one's kept in the dark when it came to matters concerning them both.
Their social standing is something they both can't ignore, but when they interact it barely matters. When Simon stands his ground, as seen in the Music Room Fight and the Break Up Scene that hurt me a lot, Wilhelm doesn't force him to stay or demand anything, because he's under no delusion about his title. He knows Simon doesn't give two shits about him being prince.
I agree that YR is a modern retelling of the classic prince/princess x pauper story, but only to a certain extent. Something like YR, which presents a narrative that is pretty simple and straightforward, could have easily been a mediocre piece of media if handled incorrectly. However, the creators of the show does a good job of taking common tropes and cliches then completely turning them around their heads. It isn't ambitious, but it is genuine in its delivery. It cares about its characters and manages to make them fleshed out enough—a feat for a series that only consists of six episodes—for us to stay with them.
Simon is no exception. He's written like the typical fairy tale love interest: he's poor, loves and takes care of his family, smart, and dreams of going beyond the confines of his town. But he's also outspoken and sassy, can lose his temper and resort to violence, makes stupid decisions that land him on hot water. It's those things and the little details they add, like always eating clementines and having close childhood friends, that makes him feel real and a person that exists outside of Wilhelm's character.
He has an entire storyline of his own that doesn't intersect with Wilhelm's. His interactions with his father are some of my favorite scenes in the series. I wish we could have seen more of Simon's story, but I suppose it would be difficult to fit in everything in six episodes, and Wilhelm is the main protagonist. Still, from what we've seen so far, you could tell that Simon has mix feelings of anger, shame, and resentment towards his father. He's not a bleeding heart, and he doesn't have to be. He's very much flawed, but that's what makes him a compelling character in his own right.
I could see why they'd think Simon was perfectly shaped to fit the poor-love-interest character type, one that showed, to quote, "emptier bank accounts, fuller hearts", but that was because Simon was never ashamed of their social standing unlike his sister Sara.
Sara's character and storyline was the antithesis to this idea. Her insecurities stems from being poor. The emptiness in her could only be satisfied by climbing the social ladder; her actions were slowly building up to this and culminated in her betraying her own brother for a chance to be a boarder at Hillerska.
The scenes with Simon's family are uncomfortable to watch sometimes, because I've been there. I know the feeling of not being able to afford a more expensive, better quality brand like Sara had wanted with her jodhpur, of feeling inferior in a school that caters to rich children (I studied at a private school on scholarship I am Simon) and feeling like a desperate person when asking after someone you know is at a better place than you.
I disagree that YR romanticizes poverty and forces us to empathize with the wealthy. I think it's because Simon's life, where he's living in a somewhat nice house and a present single mother, isn't the picture of poverty we have in mind, so we never really gave much thought to how his social class impacts his daily life. I've done some research and while Sweden is not perfect, their services is leagues above my country where there's not even something you can officially call middle class because there's such a huge disparity between the rich and poor. But the experiences are something that we collectively share, and I do think that YR did a good job showing the problems brought about by Simon and Wilhelm's social standings.
(Omg I didn't think it would be this long. If you read it until the end, THANK YOU. This is just me being really bored at work and deciding to write this down rather than actually checking my emails. Sorry for this and when will we get some yr content, I'm starving. Lisa, give Omar his phone 😭.)
#young royals#prince wilhelm#simon young royals#wilhelm x simon#sorry for the rant#is this a rant?#Analysis sounds formal I'm no professional#I'm just a fan with opinions
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right place, wrong time
— a someway, somehow jungkook drabble
summary Home was Jungkook, it had always been Jungkook… but it wasn’t this Jungkook.
warnings angst, heart ache, its actually kinda sad :/ lmfao, jk is a little... uh... como se dice.... jerk without realizing it.... justice for oc.... also there’s a scene where oc throws up so !!
rating m
wc 1.5k
notes THIS TAKES PLACE 5 YEARS BEFORE SWSH ITSELF ! OK ! enjoy <3 i wanted to try writing angst again <3 also i have no self control i said i would post this in 7 hrs yet here i am. and its not proofread <_<
When you were kids, the fact Jungkook’s birthday fell early on into the school year was a huge deal; everyone in your class was invited, both new and returning students, and the event itself was practically the opening scene to the school year itself. As you got older and he began to move away from colorfully decorated parties, his early birthday still earned him a lot of attention, had everyone at your high school congratulating him from the moment the first bell rang until the last. There weren’t any grand birthday bashes during high school, but the Jeons were a loving family, party or no party, and always got him a cake to celebrate each new year.
Up until you left for college, you had never missed Jungkook blowing out the candles for his birthday. Be it a backyard party bustling with kids or a smaller affair at his favorite restaurant, you had always been invited, always cheered for him with each new year of life he welcomed.
As a kid, you had always been adamant on getting the spot closest to him as you sang happy birthday, beaming at your best friend like he was your entire world. His childhood photo albums had been proof of that, filled with a chronological sequencing of every birthday he’s had with you at his side, your smiles changing with the times— from missing teeth to full of braces, you had always been at Jungkook’s side.
As a young-adult, you had to bite down your pride and watch Sojin fulfill that spot.
You had missed his last two birthdays since entering college. Your first year away from home, everyone you knew warned you about not going home too early into the year, something about how it would solidify your homesickness and you’d never be able to assimilate afterwards. So you had congratulated Jungkook from Taehyung’s phone screen, greatly appreciating the way Taehyung angled the phone away from Sojin as best he could. Then your second year, you had been drowning in that first wave of projects and essays, and simply couldn’t squeeze a five hour drive there and back into your schedule. Jungkook understood; there was no party this year, just a simple family dinner. The video call ended soon after you congratulated him, his attention drawn away by the voice of another woman you knew all too well.
For his twenty-first birthday, Jungkook was adamant that you attend. He had told you about it before you had left for the new semester, bent over by the front wheels of your car, making sure everything was in tip-top shape before you went off again. His t-shirt was drenched in sweat, trails running down his hairline, over the prominent veins of his neck.“I want you there,” Jungkook had said, taking your offered hand as he stood back up. He must have miscalculated— or maybe it was on purpose —his step, because when he stepped forward, he was all too close. He didn’t let go of your hand. “Please?”
Your eyes flickered over his chest, to his neck. He smelled like home, or at least the image of it you had created in your mind during your last two years away. Home was lavender fabric softener billowing over you in waves, the faint traces of this morning’s cologne, the subtle scent of his metallic work tools. It was his chocolate curls tickling his eyebrows, his easygoing smile, the way he pulled you closer, made the scents wash over you all over again.
It was Jungkook. It was Jungkook. It was Jungkook and his warm touch. It was Jungkook and his softened gaze. Home was Jungkook, it had always been Jungkook… but it wasn’t this Jungkook. It wasn’t this Jungkook and the hickey on his neck.
The sight made your stomach recoil, eyes quickly averted from the site of the crime. He had gotten here later than usual, said something about having to take Sojin somewhere first. So that’s what that meant. Jungkook, unaware of the fact the collar of his t-shirt has let you in on his private life, squeezes your hand. “You’ll come, won’t you?”
And you were stupid and you were in love, so of course you said yes.
It’s a cookout this year, his backyard filled to the brim with relatives and friends and so many cans of beer you don’t know what to do. His parents are ecstatic for your return, babbling on and on about how much he missed you for the last two birthdays. You take it in stride, and maybe in a different timeline you would have believed it, but not this one. Aside from greeting you at the door and taking your keys off your hands, you had barely seen the birthday boy all day. You mingle with old friends, his relatives, tentatively sip at your can of soda. You’re tired, the long drive having sapped the majority of your energy for the day.
Sometime around sunset, you meet eyes with him across the yard. Jungkook smiles, he always smiles. You okay? he mimes with a thumbs-up, and you want to say yes, but Sojin is sitting on his lap, an obnoxiously loud display, and when he puts his hand back down, it immediately finds its home on her thigh. You send him a half-hearted shrug, play it off like you're still a little carsick from the long drive here.
(Truthfully, you are sick, but you’re not sure it’s from the drive.)
Even at twenty-one, his family maintains their tradition and sings him happy birthday. With your return, his mother delegates you to cake cutting duties again, so you’re on standby for the song, at his side with the cake cutter in hand. Jungkook is grinning from ear to ear, Sojin attached to his hip, his arm sling around her shoulders. His family sings and sings, and Jungkook is happy. His eyes jump around the table, taking in the sight before him the way he does every year. And when they reach you at his side, Jungkook beams, reaches for your hand beneath the table and squeezes, all the while keeping his girlfriend closely hugged to his other side.
You cut the cake. Sojin gets her slice and promptly whisks Jungkook away.
By ten pm, you find yourself in his upstairs bathroom puking your guts out. It’s the carsickness, you tell yourself, or maybe the cake frosting, throat gagging around nothing, tears clinging to your lash line. But is it really?
“__?” someone says, and you make a weak attempt to turn towards the door. You don’t know what you expected— had you actually wanted Jungkook to find you in this sorry state? —but it isn’t Jungkook. “Shit, what happened?” Taehyung worries, hurrying to your aid. And you’re grateful that there’s someone here to help you, to save you from yourself and your stupid, heartbroken thoughts. But it’s not the man you want it to be, and that has you squeezing your eyes shut tightly, until the mascara on your lashes imprints itself against your under eyes instead.
The man you want bumps into you downstairs, catches Taehyung helping you into the spare bedroom to lie down. “__?” Jungkook calls out, eyes big and scared. “Where— what’s going on?” he asks, thrusting his plate into Sojin’s hands before rushing to your side. He grabs your forearm, and the touch burns, so you yank yourself away.
Faintly, you hear Taehyung explain. “She’s sick,” he says, pulling you closer. “She’s been out of it since she first got here. I think it was the long drive.” Yes, it was the long drive, you agree.
Jungkook, unfazed by your first recoil, reaches for your arm again. “I’ve got her,” he tells Taehyung, underestimating his strength when he tugs you closer, has you stumbling into his chest. His rough handling makes your stomach tighten, your head feel dizzy.
“Jungkook,” you gasp, hand on his chest. “Wait— I’m—“ And he’s trying to move you back up the stairs, probably into his bedroom to lie down. But the sight of the stairs and his overwhelming scent and the hickey on his neck, the hickey Sojin left on his neck, makes you nauseous all over again.
Taehyung yelps in your defense. “Jungkook,” he scolds, carefully maneuvering you out of Jungkook’s harm’s way. “You’re making it worse.”
From a few feet away, Sojin calls out his name. “Jungkook?” she says and her voice is so sweet, yet so sticky; it makes you gag. “Baby, they’re calling for you outside.”
And everyone is saying his name, so he doesn’t know where to look, doesn’t know who to prioritize, not when everyone wants his attention. He looks at you, and your heart soars for a millisecond. Then it plummets when he settles on Sojin instead. “I— you’re right, Tae,” he sighs, backing off, letting go. “You got __, right?” Taehyung nods. “Call me if anything happens.”
And he leaves, slips his hand around Sojin’s waist and guides her out the door. He doesn’t look back, doesn’t even tell you to get better soon. He just leaves.
Taehyung lays you down, doesn’t say a word when you start crying because he probably thinks it’s about your stomach and the vomiting. “It’s okay,” he soothes, helping you out of your shoes. “Does it hurt?”
Yes, you sob. It hurts very badly.
Copyright © 2021, 1kook on tumblr. absolutely NO reposts allowed.
#networkbangtan#jungkook#jungkook fic#jeon jungkook fic#jungkook x reader#jeon jungkook x reader#bts fic#jjk#bts x reader#swshd#mine
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favorite crime - na jaemin
favorite crime - na jaemin
this is the second installment for my SOUR series! you can read jeno’s one here!
a little bad boy!jaemin x troubled (?) but still a ‘goodie goodie’ reader // strangers to friends to partner in crime to strangers again :/
word count: 7.2k
summary: “It's bittersweet to think about the damage that we'd do
'Cause I was goin' down, but I was doin' it with you”
who would have ever thought that, jaemin, the quiet boy you met in detention, would become your first love? getting involved with his shenanigans was probably the worst thing you could have done in your life. you were lucky enough to love someone like him, someone who excited you, scared you, and most of all, loved you back. but what happens when his actions suddenly have consequences?
a/n: this summary sucks but i liked writing this alot,, explains why it took me so long to write it oops.
tagging the bestie: @skrtbabe
//
Know that I loved you so bad
I let you treat me like that
I was your willing accomplice, honey
//
as you walked into the near-empty classroom, you made a beeline for the closest seat to the window. if you were going to be stuck in detention for two hours, you might as well have a nice view. you let out a short sigh to yourself, one hour and fifty eight minutes to go. the supervising teacher was lazily marking her class’ essays, completely choosing to ignore the entrance of na jaemin. he gave her a subtle scoff before stumbling past the desk, making his way to sit behind you. you heard him roughly place his bag onto the surface of his desk. you’d be lying if you said you didn’t want to look back and see what he was up to. jaemin was always a mystery to you, and to everyone else in the school. despite keeping himself away from the majority, people had quite a lot to say about the boy. you heard rumours that he got stabbed (which you didn’t believe at all) but your classmate, haechan, insists he had video evidence. if anything, you don’t think you had ever spoken to jaemin in your entire life, but that was all about to change.
thirty minutes into detention and you were beyond bored. everybody was either catching up on school work or trying their best to not be caught on their phones. you opted to staring out the window, eyes following the movements of a particular butterfly. eventually, the butterfly decided it was time to leave your line of sight, causing you to let out a short huff. you heard a soft chuckle, belonging to the previously silent boy behind you. you slowly turned to face him, his eyes immediately latching to meet yours. he had his chin perched on top of his right palm, a cunning grin on his face. you gave him a glare,
“what are you laughing at?” you faintly whisper to him. this caught him off guard, he didn’t expect you to sound so stern.
“an explosion is about to happen” you grew to be more confused, what is he talking about?
“wha-“
“i’ll be right back! s-stay where you are!” your teacher suddenly blurts out, rushing out of her room as fast as she could. the rest of the students all looked over at eachother, some even opting to leave detention entirely.
you turned back to the snickering boy, who clearly had something to do with it.
“what the hell did you do?”
“put laxatives in her coffee” your jaw dropped, how the hell did he manage to do that?
“w-what’s wrong with you?”
“what’s wrong with you? learn to live a little” he suddenly stood up, slinging his bag across his body. his eyes still stayed on you, silently asking for you to follow him. this was one hell of a first impression. you weren’t sure what took over you in that moment, but you found yourself trailing behind na jaemin like a lost puppy as he led you both out of the school gates. he didn’t speak much to you, aimlessly walking to wherever the hell he needed to be.
“so what did you get into detention for?” he suddenly asked you, causing you to stiffen. you weren’t a stranger to getting into trouble, your short temper often being the root of your issues. but you weren’t exactly the most comfortable talking to new people.
“ah you’re a bit shy? i’ll start then, i stole lee haechan’s clothes after gym practice” he smirked to himself, feeling some sense of pride.
“that was you? he was running around school butt naked because of you” you couldn’t help but chuckle at the memory of seeing two full ass cheeks after your history class.
“that’s what he gets for claiming that he has proof i got stabbed? which is ridiculous by the way” jaemin shakes his head before coming to a complete stop. you slightly bump into his right shoulder, quickly stabilising yourself before looking at the quiet cafe infront of you.
“hungry?” you nodded in response, following him into the cafe. he seemed to have known some of the workers, earning you a free croissant and hot chocolate.
“so, i told you why i got into detention, now it’s your turn” he chimed, clearly entertained by having you as company.
“i punched kim yuna in the face” you slightly cringed at your own words. you weren’t the one to be physical in your confrontations, but this girl really struck a nerve.
“sheesh, i saw her earlier, you gave her nose a good bruising, i must say” he couldn’t help but find the entire thing entertaining. this was so odd to you, every person that had witnessed it, thought you went crazy. but here jaemin was, laughing at the situation.
“you think this is funny?” you asked curiously, rather than in a judgemental manner.
“well yeah, i don’t know why you did it, but she probably deserved it” he shrugged, taking a bite of his own pastry. you felt your shoulders begin to relax, infact your entire demeanour had changed. jaemin was the only person that didn’t push you to admit your faults and apologise. he didn’t need to know the whole story, he just took your words for what they were.
the next hour consisted of you and jaemin, sharing stories on some of the mischievous things you had gotten up to in the past. from small things like setting off stink bombs during an exam, to running from the mall cops after stealing a pair of pants from a store. jaemin liked your reactions to his stories, at first your face would be full of shock, then turn into some sort of enlightenment. he found it quite endearing to watch. he wasn’t too bad on the eyes either.
“need me to walk you home?”
“i don’t need you to do anything for me” jaemin just smirked at your response,
“but i wouldn’t mind if you did”
“ah i see how it’s going to be”
“what do you mean?”
“our relationship, it’s going to be very push and pull” what on earth was he on about?
“you got that from just spending a few hours with me?” jaemin nodded, shoving his hands into his jacket pockets.
“i think we’ll be spending a lot of time together” was all he said back. if you had told yourself earlier that day, that you’d become na jaemin’s partner in crime, you’d punch yourself in the face. but this was only the beginning.
//
from that day onwards, you would purposely seek out jaemin’s presence. whether it be you walking to the most isolated parts of school, or simply trying to get into detention in the case he was there again. as a result of the laxative prank, jaemin had earned a two week long suspension. you had caught wind of this information from the school’s chatterbox, haechan. you’d think after being humiliated by jaemin, he’d keep his name out of his mouth.
you decided to visit the same cafe you accompanied jaemin to, incase he was hanging out there. you weren’t sure why you wanted to be around him so much. if anything, you were more at risk of getting another detention, or becoming a social outcast. but you were going to take those chances.
as you entered the cafe, your eyes scanned near and far for any sight of the black haired boy. you were about to give up, when you heard a voice,
“stalking me now?” you immediately froze, too nervous to turn back. you felt jaemin’s hand on your shoulder, slowly turning your around to face him.
“i-i no it’s not what it looks like-“
“it’s fine, you must have missed me, no?” he let a cocky grin land on his face. you just rolled your eyes, ready to walk right back out that door.
“let’s get up to some trouble today” he gripped your wrist gently, dragging you out of the cafe. he didn’t let go of you, once again, you were aimlessly following him. why did you let him do this to you?
jaemin wasn’t too much of a talker, he tended to try and speak with his eyes. you found it interesting, the way he expected you to know exactly what was on his mind. he eventually stopped walking after reaching an abandoned building. you were beginning to feel slightly anxious, noticing that the sun was slowly setting and the breeze was getting cooler. jaemin plopped his carry bag on the concrete floor, you heard clinking sounds erupt from the bag. he moved to pull out a few spray cans.
“ever graffitied?” you shook your head,
“not spray painting, but i’ve drawn some not so pleasant pictures in the bathroom stalls” you shrug as he handed you a can of bright yellow spray paint. he slightly chuckled at your anecdote, which made you look down at the ground.
“well you won’t get in trouble for messing up this place”
“what is this place anyway?” you start to shake the can, watching as jaemin started spraying onto the blank wall.
“somewhere i come when i don’t feel like going home” you weren’t sure if you wanted to press him to elaborate, so you just nodded, beginning to spray a random design of your own.
jaemin found hanging around you quite amusing. you were always up for anything he wanted to do. you seemed so cheerful about the simplest things, and never pushed him to explain the questionable things about himself. you were a lot different than the people he would usually surround himself with. but like many things in na jaemin’s life, they often went sour very quickly.
//
And I watched as you fled the scene
Doe-eyed as you buried me
One heart broke, four hands bloody
//
jaemin had asked you to accompany him to the abandoned building one night. you were half asleep and freezing to death as you approached his car. it was quite beat up, making you worried,
“is this thing even safe to be driving?” you groan as you wrap yourself in your large puffer jacket. jaemin had previously insisted you bring a sleeping bag and pillow. you chose not to question it, too tired to argue back with him.
“don’t disrespect my sweet ride! be grateful i didn’t make you walk in the cold” he scoffed before starting the engine. the car ride was fairly quiet, you were drifting in and out of sleep, in which jaemin noticed. he thought you looked so peaceful, so he tried his best not to make any sharp turns or run over many speed bumps. in a matter of time, he parked the car, gently wiggling your shoulder. you woke up instantly, feeling his cold hand on your cheek. you furrowed your eyebrows before following him out of the car. he led you to the same wall you both had graffitied on before, but this time, it seemed to have become a complete picture.
“i wanted to show you this! isn’t it cool?” he gleamed, pulling you to his side, slightly rubbing your shoulder to warm you up. you quickly ignored his touch, focusing back on the wall. it was a mirage of different doodles and words that must have meant something to jaemin.
“this is amazing, you did this all by yourself?”
“yeah, i really wanted to see your reaction”
“what does it all mean?”
“it’s kind of a representation of what goes on in my mind? i’m not the best with expressing my feelings with words, so i decided to let it out on this wall” jaemin spoke with such ease, his voice filling your ears with warmth. he pulled you closer to him when he saw you shiver,
“care to share?” you slightly joked. jaemin never got too deep with you, so you assumed he would brush the comment off. but he just stares back at you, his eyes piercing into your own. you held your breath as he leaned in closer to you.
“sure thing” he slowly leads you back to the car, turning on the heater as you both wrapped yourselves in sleeping bags. you were huddled up in the back seat, your head leaning on his shoulder as he played with his fingers.
“i never had an outlet for my imagination. my parents weren’t the most warm or loving people in the world. i barely remember anything from my childhood, except for the unpleasant memories. when i started hanging out with some of the older kids, they showed me the ropes of their crew. they taught me how to graffiti, how to carve things with a pocket knife, you know, basic seventh grade stuff” he let out a soft chuckle, but you didn’t laugh. instead you placed your hand over his, feeling the coldness shoot through your body.
“i-i don’t like showing how i feel. because i think it makes me weak, or pitiful. that’s a bad way of thinking, but i can’t help it. so i let out my frustrations here, by either spray painting or smashing random things. it’s nice to get it all out” he stops speaking, his posture suddenly stiffening. you lifted your head from his shoulder, forcing him to look over at you.
“i’m here to listen to you. you don’t have to result to destroying things in order to reveal your feelings. you can just talk to me next time, okay?” you assured him, tightening your grip on his hand. jaemin just nodded, his eyes faltering from yours. why were you so considerate towards him?
“wanna know why i punched yuna in the face?” you saw jaemin crack a smile, nodding frantically.
“she said some things about my family, how they only took me in because they felt sorry for me. see, i’m actually a foster kid, my real parents weren’t in the ‘right state of mind’ to take care of me. well, in the eyes of the law atleast” jaemin didn’t know how to respond, opting to pulling your head back into his shoulder.
“i know she was just trying to rile me up, my foster parents aren’t terrible. but hearing those words just struck a nerve. how can people be so judgmental?”
“that’s just life, love. everyone will always have their own opinions, but it’s up to you, on how to respond. or you can simply choose to ignore them, it’s always worked for me” jaemin started tracing small patterns on the back of your hand, feeling his eyes become drowsy.
“but i don’t want to always ignore my problems. i want to be able to face them, how else will i grow as a person?” you sighed,
“we grow each and every day, most of the time we don’t notice. you’re doing better than you think. sure, you’ll grow up soon enough, you’ll develop your own identity, but for now, enjoy the moment. don’t care too much about what others think, this is your life to lead” jaemin looked down at you, feeling a warm sensation reach his heart.
“for someone who doesn’t like speaking his mind, you sure give some great advice. promise we’ll be there for eachother?” you pull out your pinky finger from his grip, watching as he blinks for a few seconds. you sensed some hesitation, but blamed it on him being tired. eventually, jaemin linked his pink with yours, sealing it with a gentle press of his lips. you couldn’t hide how flustered you had gotten, burying your head in his chest as he started stroking your hair.
“thankyou for being with me tonight” he mumbled as he felt himself fall asleep,
“anytime”
//
sometimes jaemin would leave you hanging for days on end. at first you would get concerned, mainly for his own safety. you were never sure what he got up to in his spare time, and to be honest, you didn’t want to know. but after a certain amount of days, he would pop back into your life that nothing happened, as if no time had passed. today was one of those days. he was sitting on your bedroom floor, flicking through your history notes. you couldn’t pry your eyes away from him, he looked so peaceful.
“you’re so much smarter than me” he huffs, scratching his head as he closed your notebook.
“no way, i’m pretty average. you’re more street smart than i am” jaemin perks up at your words,
“i guess i am huh” he smirks to himself, making you slightly smile.
“i can help you study if you want, you need a pass, right?” you scooted over to him, sitting so that your shoulders brushed against eachother.
“well yes, technically. but passing doesn’t secure i’ll get into college. not that i can even go” he shrugs, eyes focused on his rings, beginning to fiddle with them.
“what do you mean?”
“i don’t have the grades, my parents barely have any money saved for my college fund. i don’t have a job, you see the issue here?” you sensed him stiffen up next to you, this topic clearly striking a nerve within him. you placed a hand on his shoulder, gently squeezing it,
“you know college isn’t for everyone. i’m sure you will be able to live a good life” jaemin knew you were trying your best to cheer him up. but these were constant thoughts and struggles he had been dealing with for what seemed like a lifetime. he knew you would never fully understand, and he couldn’t be mad at you for that.
“y-yeah, i’ll be fine” he sighs, linking is fingers with yours. you worried about jaemin so much, it slowly began to take over your mind. you caught yourself thinking about him more often, how you wanted to be there for him during his dark times. but jaemin always shoved off the idea of getting too deep with his emotions. sure, he trusted you with most things, but there was always a thought in the back of his mind. you were way too good for him.
//
“what is this?” you smiled brightly at the boy standing across from you. he was leant up against your locker, gift bag in his hands, shoving it towards you.
“a token of my appreciation for our growing friendship” you chose to ignore the last word, your feelings towards jaemin still being undecided.
you slowly open the bag, your eyes landing on a small box. you furrowed your eyebrows, before opening it.
“t-this is beautiful, jaemin. how did you afford this?” you gasped, pulling out the shiny necklace from the delicate box. it was a silver chain, that sparkled under the light at just the right angle. there was a small pendent latched onto it, a butterfly.
“don’t worry about that, do you like it?” he grinned at you, taking in your ecstatic reaction,
“of course! i cant thank you enough!”
you pull him into a warm hug, arms tightening around his torso. jaemin chuckled softly, bringing his arms to wrap around your frame, slowly swaying you side to side.
“being there for me is enough, i promise”
//
The things I did
Just so I could call you mine
The things you did
Well, I hope I was your favorite crime
//
the following few days, jaemin went MIA again. you were beginning to become annoyed by his lack of communication. you wanted to believe he was gone for good reason, but something in your gut sensed something worse was happening. that’s when you decided to go to the abandoned building, remembering he often went there when he wanted to be alone. not having a car of your own caused many issues in your life. like right now, you were huffing and puffing once you hopped off your bicycle. you quickly set it aside, making your way to the building. before you turned to the main corridor that you met jaemin in many times before, you heard hushed voices, one belonging to the boy in question.
“we need this deal done asap. no excuses” a deep voice echoes through the building. you couldn’t get a good look at them without being caught, so you remained hidden behind a huge slab of concrete.
“b-but what if they think i’m scamming them because i’m new?” jaemin squeaked. you had never heard him so worried before.
“well you better think of some way to get them to buy, we can’t risk anymore losses. take this as initiation into the big boys club” what the hell was going on?
soon enough, the small group of men had left the building, walking past the concrete slab you were hiding behind. you let out a sigh of relief before rushing to jaemin. his eyes widened at the sight of you, part of him wanting to yell at you for being so stupid.
“what are you doing here?!” he was mad.
“i could ask you the same thing” you scoffed. jaemin suddenly became quiet, eyes avoiding yours.
“what’s going on? and i want the truth. the whole truth” he just sighed, dragging you back to his car. you folded your arms, in disbelief from what you had heard prior.
“i-i’m helping them with some deals okay? it’s just a side hustle to get some cash, i want to get out of this town. this is the only way”
“what are you dealing? drugs?” you gasped, watching as jaemin snapped his neck to face you.
“yes, it’s not as bad as you think-“
“not as bad? they’re literally part of a gang. do you know what happens to people who don’t seal these deals?” you couldn’t believe what you were hearing.
“i know the risks. but i’m desperate. i just need enough to buy an apartment in another city and finally start my life” jaemin doesn’t know why he’s bothering trying to explain this to you. he brushed his fingers through his hair roughly, letting out a groan as he did so.
“when i said there are ways for you to live a good life, i didn’t mean deal drugs. i meant get an apprenticeship or something! literally anything but this”
“there’s nothing you can do to change my mind. i already swore i’d do this deal. i need the money. you wouldn’t understand” jaemin struck back, feeling attacked by your words.
“what the hell is that supposed to mean? i-i can’t do this. come back to me when you’ve come to your senses. this is stupid and you know it” you rush out of his car, causing jaemin to trail behind you as you stumbled to find your bike.
“come with me” you stopped in your tracks.
“pardon?”
“come with me to the deal. i-i don’t want to go alone” he says barely above a whisper,
“you’re crazy if you think i’ll follow you like a lost pup-“ jaemin pressed his lips on yours, hands stuck to your waist, gently rubbing your sides as he deepened the kiss. your words became jumbled as he continued to kiss you. as much as you wanted to argue back with him, feeling his lips on yours was only something you had experienced in your dreams.
“please” he whispered, pulling away from you momentarily.
“o-okay” you whispered back, hands now on his shoulders. jaemin smirked with pride before pulling you in once again. he led you back to his car, dragging you into the backseat. he began trailing kisses down your neck, erupting a pleased sigh from you. and just like that, you were wrapped around his silly little finger.
//
you were now seated in the passenger seat of jaemin’s busted ass car. your nerves were off the charts, and so were his. you had never seen him so anxious before, he was breathing in quick successions and couldn’t stop shaking.
“just get it over and done with...okay? get in and get out” you try your best to ease his nerves but how much could you really say? you were encouraging him to commit to a drug deal, this was not how you expected your friday night to go.
jaemin just nodded, clutching onto something in his jacket pocket. he pressed a soft kiss to your forehead, gently stroking your hair as he did so.
“thankyou for coming with me” he mumbled. you just nodded, trying to ignore your intense gut feeling that something was going to go wrong. he led you by your waist into the noisy bar. you kept your head down, allowing jaemin to gain sight of the clients. he didn’t let you approach the group of men, so you tried to distract yourself with a random fruity cocktail from the bar. it wasn’t enough to push aside your worries.
after what seemed like hours, you caught sight of jaemin, who seemed like he was in a rush. he quickly scooped you away from your seat, swiftly leading you out of the bar. before you could even open your mouth, he interjects,
“no time for questions, get in the car now” he harshly shoved you into the passenger seat. now you were more worried than before.
“what the fuck is going on?!” jaemin didn’t answer you, starting the engine of the car. before you could press him any further, the same group of men rushed out of the bar, eyes scanning for the boy next to you. this wasn’t good.
“may or may not have given them the wrong amount...nothing a little hide and seek can’t fix!” jaemin tried to laugh it off, but you knew he was equally as scared. his dingy car wouldn’t start, adding to the panic in the atmosphere. the group of men were already in their own vehicle, approaching jaemin’s car rather quickly.
“fuck fuck fuck” he began shouting, slamming his foot on the accelerator as the car hurled forward. in a matter of time, he was speeding down the street. he probably ran a couple red lights and a few stop signs, but he wasn’t fazed. you on the other hand, were about to throw up. jaemin kept taking sharp turns to throw off the car chasing you, he barely looked back. you were terrified in this moment. anything could go wrong, one wrong turn, and it could all be over. soon enough, he stopped right outside the all too familiar abandoned building. he was out of breath, the adrenaline still present in his system. you were completely frozen, still in shock at what had occurred.
“wasn’t that riveting?” he smirked. he fucking smirked?
“are you kidding me? that was fucking insane. d-don’t do this again. i don’t want any part of this anymore” you began tearing up, feeling your heart pump out of your chest. jaemin’s face dropped as he tried to hold your hand, in which you pulled away immediately.
“t-take me home. please.” he didn’t say anything back to you. he respected your wishes and took you home safely. you didn’t even want to think about the punishment he would receive from the gang for messing up the deal. the only thought of your mind was your own safety. jaemin risked your safety this time around. you would have done anything for him, but in this moment, you were beginning to regret it. na jaemin was trouble. and you needed to stay away from trouble.
//
staying away from na jaemin was harder than you thought. subtle glances from across the classroom or school courtyard wasn’t doing you any good. so you sought refuge in the library. somehow he managed to find you there too.
“y/n, please, talk to me” you continued to read the novel you weren’t interested in, trying your best to remain angry. he sat across from you, pulling down the book from your face, eyes begging to meet yours.
“there’s nothing left to say” he just sighs, never seeing you be so stubborn.
“i know what i did was wrong, i shouldn’t have put you in that posit-“
“can we please not discuss this here? where anyone can hear us?” you quickly interrupt him, pulling him to the school parking lot. out of habit, jaemin led you to his car, opening the passenger side door for you. you got chills as you sat in the seat once again, the memories flooding back.
“i-i’m sorry. i shouldn’t have brought you into it. i just didn’t want to be alone...you’re the only person who doesn’t make me feel alone.” jaemin could barely look at you, too embarrassed of being vulnerable.
“you know how i’m against what you’re doing. and i know i can’t change your mind. i just can’t keep worrying about your safety. it hurts me knowing that you could get hurt one day” you began sniffling, which made jaemin’s heart ache. he pulled your face to meet his own, staring at your soft features. he slowly guided his fingers to wipe away your tears.
“don’t worry too much about me, love. i’ll be just fine” he pressed a soft kiss to your lips, and just like that, you were dragged right back into his arms.
“be careful” you whispered against his lips,
“always”
//
You used me as an alibi
I crossed my heart as you crossed the line
And I defended you to all my friends
//
jaemin wasn’t careful. not in the slightest. he showed up at your window, hands clutching to his lower torso area as he stumbled into your room. you hushed him to be as quiet as he could but you immediately knew something was wrong. he practically fell to his knees, soft whimpers and sighs leaving his mouth. you quickly moved to turn on your lights, taking a better look at the boy in pain. your eyes travelled along his face, covered in scratches and bruises.
“you good with playing medic tonight?” he joked, trying to relieve the tension. but you were not having any of it. you pulled him into your bed, allowing him to lay on his back. he had an array of cuts over his body, including a large gash on his lower lip. you swiftly rushed to the bathroom, grabbing your not so impressive first aid kit, but it would have to do for now. you tried your best to disinfect what you cold, until you reached his torso. you saw there were specks of blood leaking onto his t shirt, which made you more worried than you were initially. jaemin just sighed, lifting up his shirt slowly. your eyes were glued on the painful wound plastered on the right side of his body.
“d-did someone stab you?!” you felt tears prickle the side of your eyes. how could he be so stupid?
“n-no, its just a cut, it’s not even that deep” he tried to play it off, but the moment you pressed the cleansing wipe onto the wound, he winced.
“stop playing the tough guy. i hate when you play tough guy” you groan, trying your best to tend to his wound. jaemin watched as your expression changed from one of concern, to annoyance.
“hey, don’t be mad at me, okay?” he brought his hand to hover over your thigh, gently stroking his fingers on the surface.
“i’m sorry” he whispered, trying his best to sit up, but you immediately pushed him back down. you moved to lay next to him, allowing yourself to finally look him in the eyes.
“i can’t always be here to take care of you like this, jaemin. as much as i want to, there are going to be times where i just can’t. you have to understand that”
“of course, i didn’t expect you to be my personal nurse or anything. i just don’t want you to leave” his words sank deeply into your thoughts.
“i-i won’t leave”
“thankyou. i promise i will take you out and we will have fun. like old times. we can go on a road trip, or even that stupid homecoming dance you keep talking about. i’ll do anything to make it up to you because i ca-“ he immediately stopped himself, clutching his side.
“just get some rest, we can continue this discussion another day. goodnight jaem” you just sighed, turning on your back to face him. jaemin didn’t know why he couldn’t finish his sentence. he does care about you. more than anyone else in the world. but why couldn’t he just say it?
you on the other hand, were too busy imagining your future with jaemin. would he be there as your partner in crime for life? or was he just someone passing by to teach you a lesson? you weren’t too sure you wanted to find out.
//
“y/n, principal lee wants to see you in his office” your economics teacher informed you during class, eyes of classmates following you as you left the room. you swore you hadn’t done anything remotely mischievous lately, besides snatching a cheat sheet for the upcoming final.
“ah yes y/n, please take a seat” principal lee invited you into his office. you tried your best to stay focused on the stubby man in front of you but you couldn’t ignore the two police officers standing to the side.
“you wanted to see me, sir?”
“yes, these officers are here to ask you some questions. don’t worry, you aren’t in trouble. they just need some information for their investigation” he explains as best he could, shifting the conversation over to the two officers.
“as principal lee mentioned, we just need information. are you comfortable with us asking you a few questions?” you slowly nodded, hands beginning to clam up.
“we have reason to believe your friend, na jaemin, has been involved in an incident that occurred last thursday. he claims he was present with you that night. can you confirm this?” you immediately froze. you swore you didn’t even blink. that was the night he came to your window, all banged up a bruised. but you couldn’t tell them that part. so you went with a variation of the truth,
“yes, he was with me, we often study together and watch movies on thursdays.” you tried your best to maintain eye contact, not wanting to draw any more attention.
“have you noticed anything odd in his behaviour lately?” you knew they were just following protocol, but you weren’t prepared for any of this.
“not really. he is quite reserved naturally, but there hasn’t been anything too alarming, in my opinion” the officers just nodded, scribbling down your words.
“thankyou for your time, if we were to need any more statements from you, would you be okay with that?” you simply nodded, wanting nothing more than to get back to class.
“great, we’ll be heading off now, thankyou principal lee, and y/n” you let out a breath you didn’t know you were holding in. what in god’s name happened that night?
“why were the cops coming out of the office? did you do something?” your friend, jimin asked you as she rushed to your side.
“n-no, they were asking about jaemin” you sighed. you didn’t want to tell her much, knowing she wasn’t his biggest fan.
“y/n, you have to stop hanging out with him so much. he’s bad news. i mean, he’s got the cops questioning you? is that someone you really want to be with?” you knew she had your best interest at heart, but she didn’t know jaemin like you did. no one did.
“don’t talk about him like he’s some pest in my life. he makes me happy, okay? i’d do pretty much anything for him” you huff, beginning to walk away.
“but would he do anything for you?” her words made you stop in your tracks. she was right to question that. god, even you questioned it sometimes. would he?
//
And now every time a siren sounds
I wondеr if you're around
'Cause you know that I'd do it all again
//
jaemin insisted he take you to the homecoming dance — he even pinky promised you.
“jaemin! i’m so excited for tonight, what time are you coming by?” you excitedly squeal into the phone, making jaemin slightly chuckle.
“uh love, i-i don’t think i can make it tonight” you felt your heart drop.
“what? why?”
“i have some business to take care of. i promise you i’ll take you out soo-“
“i think you should stop making promises you can’t keep. hope you have fun doing whatever you’re doing” you immediately hung up, wiping the stray tears from your face. you quickly pulled yourself together. showing up alone to the homecoming dance after you told your friends you were going with jaemin, was probably one of the most embarrassing things you had ever experienced. they all felt pity for you, dragging you to dance, trying to get you to forget about jaemin. but nothing was working. you were beyond disappointed, partially in yourself, for believing he could actually keep his promise.
the moment you got home, you saw someone sitting on the steps just outside your front door. you let out a loud sigh, hoping he heard everything. you wanted to push right past him and go to bed, but jaemin trapped you in his arms. you felt something was off about him. he was stiff as a board, he didn’t say anything to you. you finally got a glimpse of his face, his right eye was swollen and there was a slight gash on his cheek. you immediately gasped, all your anger towards him had fizzled away.
“w-what happened?” you barely whispered, bringing your hand to the side of his face. jaemin winced as he felt the touch, quickly pulling away.
“finally got what was coming” he tried to laugh it off, but he knew you weren’t going to laugh back. instead, you allowed him to follow you to your room, hoping your parents were fast sleep.
jaemin slowly made his way to sit on your bed. you felt like he had something else he was hiding from you, but your main focus was yet again, tending to his wounds.
“i’m getting some real déjà vu right now” you sighed, cleaning his face. jaemin tried his best to not move, but everything stung. he really got it bad this time.
“i’m sorry for breaking my promise. i know how much the dance meant to you” he softly muttered, eyes avoiding yours.
“i-it’s okay”
“no it’s not! you do so much for me, and i couldn’t even do this one thing for you. i feel so shitty. why do you even keep me around? i’m deadweight and that’s trouble for someone with wings” he scoffs, replaying harsh words he had heard from others in the past. you slowly plucked away the medical kit, turning to face him properly. (a/n: not me using a quote from the show ‘panic’)
“you’re not deadweight...you’re a good person, jaem. you’re good to me, that’s what matters” you gently push away the stray strands of hair that covered his forehead. he smiled at your touch, leaning into your palm as you brought it to cup his cheek.
“i love you”
you almost choked on your own saliva...he loves you?
“w-what?”
“yikes, not the response i was hoping for” he yet again, tried to relieve the tension with a joke. but you weren’t having any of it.
“can you be serious for one minute in your life? you can’t just say something like that and not expect me to freak out! i mean, do i love you too? of course i do! i would be stupid not to, but jaemin, you cant just spit that out of nowhere!” you began pacing around your room, which made jaemin smile even wider.
“well i just did. and i mean it” he stood to meet you, standing in the middle of your room as he held your shoulders in place.
“s-so what happens now?” jaemin hesitated for a moment, did he just ruin everything?
“we can’t be together”
“pardon?”
“i-i can’t do that to you. i can’t let you be with someone like me. i’m constant danger. the cops are going to get me one day, and i don’t want you to see it happen” he started rambling, you were barely understanding anything.
“this makes no sense. you’re telling me that you love me but you can’t be with me? why would you do this to me?” you started sobbing,
“i-i don’t expect you to understand. i just needed to tell you before...” he paused, pulling you closer to him. but you pushed yourself away. you didn’t want to hear anymore but forced yourself to listen. you needed answers.
“before what?” you gritted through your teeth,
“before i leave” your eyes widened, tears stopped flowing for a moment. you couldn’t make out any words, allowing jaemin to explain,
“i cant stay here, not in this town. i need to go somewhere else. somewhere they won’t find me. somewhere i can start over” he sighed, sitting back down on your bed.
“take me with you! we can go tonight, i don’t care where i am, as long as you’re with me i’ll be okay!” you begged, pulling out your duffel bag from under your bed. but jaemin quickly gripped your wrists, pulling you to sit with him on the bed.
“y-you can’t come with me. it’s not fair on you, or me. i want you to have a better life, a life with no regrets. you have so many goals, i can’t hold you back from them. i won’t” he insisted, holding your hands in his as he pleaded you with his eyes. you weren’t thinking straight, everything became so overwhelming.
“why are you doing this to me? i cant do this without you! i cant get through all of this without you. please don’t leave” your hands began to shake. jaemin brought them to his lips, placing soft pecks on each knuckle in an attempt to calm you down.
“you can. i know you can. because you’re you. an incredibly loyal, intelligent and courageous person. you don’t need me. if anything, i need you more” he smirked at the last part. you kept shaking your head, not believing anything he was saying.
“just promise me one thing?” he whispered, leaning in closer to you so that your foreheads touched.
“don’t forget me. don’t forget all the things we got up to. i had so much fun with you, more fun than i’ve had in my entire life. i can’t thank you enough for everything you’ve done for me. i love you, okay? i’ll always love you” finally, he kissed you. his hands dragged to your waist, rubbing over the soft skin. you shined into the kiss, partially still upset with his departure.
“can we just have one last night together?” you pulled away, wiping away the rest of your tears. jaemin softly nodded, pulling you down onto the bed, wrapping his arms around you.
“thankyou for being my partner in crime. i’ll miss you” he sighed, gently scribbling random doodles on your arm with his fingers.
“i miss you already. maybe one day, we’ll meet again? i don’t know, am i being silly?” you didn’t want him to answer, afraid he’d break another promise.
“you’re not silly at all. we’ll see what life has planned for us” he responded. that was enough for you. you’ll leave it up to fate. you were just happy you were spending one last night with the boy you loved so dearly.
//
It's bittersweet to think about the damage that we'd do
'Cause I was goin' down, but I was doin' it with you
Yeah, everything we broke and all the trouble that we made
But I say that I hate you with a smile on my face
Oh, look what we became
//
you awoke the very next morning in an empty bed. your heart sunk, knowing jaemin was gone had finally hit you. your eyes drifted to where he once was, landing on a piece of paper.
‘go to the building for one last goodbye. i hope you like it.
- jaem <3 ‘
you quickly got changed and rushed there as fast as you could. would he be there to bid you farewell? you weren’t betting on it, but was still curious as to what he had to show you. you made your way into the building, your eyes cascading over all the graffiti. finally, you saw exactly what he left for you. he painted over the mural you both worked on. it had been replaced with a painting of a butterfly. its wings were all different colours, you could tell he spent ages on it. you finally reached the bottom of the artwork, a small inscription was engraved,
‘for the one with the wings, keep on soaring’
“so cheesy, i hate it” you joke to yourself, smiling at his words. this was his final gift for you. as you admired the painting once again, memories of all your little adventures came rushing back. everything you did together seemed like an eternity ago. although you wished you had confessed to him sooner, or kissed him harder, you knew that he was gone for good. jaemin wasn’t the time to keep many promises, so you’ve learnt. you started to put your faith in the universe. if you were meant to be, then you would meet again. but for now, you were content with everything you had gone through together. you were grateful to have known someone as amazing as jaemin, and you would never take that for granted. you only hoped he would do the same, no matter where you both were in life. you hoped you could both grow wings and soar through life without any regrets.
#na jaemin#na jaemin imagine#jaemin imagine#jaemin fic#nct dream imagine#nct dream fic#nct fic#nct jaemin imagine#nct series#nct au#nct jaemin au#jaemin fluff#jaemin angst#nct dream fluff#jisungsmochi masterlist#jisungsmochiimagines
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detention, retention, and draco malfoy being a little shit
masterlist
request guidelines
pairing: draco x reader
request: no not really
summary: golden trio friend y/n y/l/n tries to extract information out of draco malfoy after being placed in detention together.
warnings: swearing, panic attack kinda stuff, just the dark war things that would come w having the task that draco does
a/n: ayo so i started this as a fic i was originally planning on writing in a week. i discontinued it bc i didn’t think anyone was that interested, but i’ve written for it on and off. it’s about 16k words right now standing, but i’m reposting this as a 2 part series. here are the first ~12k words....enjoy :) IMPORTANT: if you’re like “hey i started reading this in october why tf are you reposting the first two parts” just keep reading ok lmao i promise there’s more there’s about through part 6 in here hehe. i just wanted new readers to be able to pick up on it without being turned off by the fact that it was part 3. this will b e 2 parts and at least 20k words
word count: 11.6k
taglist: @gruffle1 @missmultifandommess @cleopatera @hahaboop @accio-rogers @geeksareunique @eltanin-malfoy @war-sword @cams-lynn @itsivyberry @ayo-cowbelly @nerd-domland @yesnerdsblog @shizarianathania @evanstanfanatic @strawberriesonsummer @hariosborn @night-ving @straightzoinked @imintoodeeptostop @naiomimoonshard @jejegu @ophelia-enthusiast @alwaysbeanunknownfan @nearly-memories @litty-dumb @callieclearwater @malfoy-wife15 @charlenasaxen @belladaises @fiantomartell
happy reading y’all
For legal purposes, the york pudding she lobbed at Pansy Parkinson’s head on Monday evening was simply meant to be a joke. She didn’t know that her aim was bad enough that it was going to get in Snape’s hair instead--honestly, it wasn’t even supposed to get past the Ravenclaw table, much less veer to the left to make a beeline for the professors--but no matter how much she tried to explain this to McGonagall, her sentence remained the same: detention every Friday. For two months.
Her life was ending for sure.
“I honestly don’t know what you were expecting,” Hermione told her as she gently wiped off the nib of her quill later that night in the common room. “Even if you had hit your mark, that’s still technically assault.”
“Did you even hear what she said to me? She told me that I looked like the type of kid that bit people in primary school,” complained Y/N. “I didn’t even think she knew what primary school was!”
Hermione snorted. “How long ago?”
“Two days. I’ve been waiting until there was something throwable on the dinner table.”
“How very analytic of you.”
“I’m going to hit you.”
“And you wonder why you’ve got detention.” Hermione tsk-ed at her, her face stone serious but her tone light hearted. “Maybe take this as an opportunity to, I don’t know, do your homework for once? So you won’t have to have a breakdown over the next Potion’s essay and beg me to write it for you?”
“I’m going to go to sleep and think terribly mean thoughts about you.”
“Have fun.”
~
Detention.
Something that Y/N wasn’t completely unfamiliar with--she’d done her time organizing Snape’s cabinets, just like every other Gryffindor--but it was different when it came to McGonagall. An impressive old lady, she thought that McGonagall saw something in her. She was always the first to chuckle at Y/N’s jokes and hesitated to reprimand her stupid behavior. And she never gave Y/N detention.
Until now, she supposed. 6th year was changing a lot of things--even their Potions professor--so McGonagall turning a new stone shouldn’t have been anything shocking.
At least, not as shocking as the first thing Y/N saw as she walked into her house head’s office.
“Malfoy?” she spat.
The platinum blonde didn’t even bother to look up from his desk.
“Miss Y/L/N,” Professor McGonagall chided. “I think we would all prefer if you restrained yourself from getting into any more physical altercations with Slytherins.”
She huffed, plopping down in the chair furthest away from that foul git and reaching for her satchel.
“I’ll be back in two hours,” said the elderly professor. “If I hear anything, and I mean anything, other than the sound of studying, consider your sentence doubled.”
With a swish of her robes, McGonagall was gone, leaving her with Malfoy.
“So what’d you do to get in here, huh? Did the administration finally get a hold of that video of you licking Voldemort’s toes?”
“What the fuck does that mean?!” he snapped, whipping around to glare at her.
“‘s just a joke,” said Y/N. “Like--how everyone says your family houses him and everything--but whatever. I can tell it’s a sore spot.”
His gaze, never withering in intensity, remained trained on her face. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Apparently so. What’re you here for?”
He exhaled sharply. “If I tell you, will you shut up and let me think?”
“No promises, but maybe.”
“Late work. I forgot to turn in the Transfiguration exam last week.”
She made a tutting sound as she lazily shuffled through the crumpled parchment in her satchel. “I expected more from you. Aren’t you gonna ask me how I wound up here?”
“No. I am going to ask you to stop talking now, though.”
~
“That’s terribly unfortunate,” Hermione said over breakfast the next morning. Ron and Harry were nervously chit chatting at the other side of the table over the Saturday Quidditch game against Hufflepuff--supposedly it was supposed to be quite a high stakes match. Not like Y/N cared much, though.
“Yeah! And the worst part was that he won’t even tease anymore. Like, he just sits there all broody and woe is me. We’re all witnessing our nation’s descent into war--he’s not special!”
“Who are you talking about?” asked Harry.
“Oh, just Malfoy,” said Y/N. “We have detention together with McGonagall. He’s such a nasty little greaseball, don’t you think? I mean, look at him right now, glowering over his cereal.”
“Wait! That’s it!”
“What’s it, Harry?” Hermione asked.
“It’s genius, really,” he said. “Y/N has to spend time with him alone every week, and we know that something is up with him. Malfoy is absolutely a Death Eater and has connections to You-Know-Who, but I just need to find a way to prove it.”
“I vaguely forecast where this is going, and I hate it already.”
“Listen, Y/N. It’s not for that long, and it’s for the health of the wizarding world. If you just get to know him--”
“Ick!”
“If you just get to know him, maybe get him to trust you and find out his secrets...we’d finally have enough to turn him in and throw him out of Hogwarts for good.”
“Is that really necessary, Harry?” Ginny butted in from her seat further down next to Dean. “Malfoy’s probably just exhausted like the rest of you. 6th year is difficult, and we have no solid evidence that he’s a Death Eater. I’m sure being stuck in a room with him for 2 hours is hard enough without pretending to be nice to him.”
“But what if Harry’s right?” said Y/N. “What if he is actually a Death Eater? What if he’s an active danger to the student body?”
“Exactly!” The joy written across Harry’s face at the prospect of someone else finally agreeing was infectious. “So will you?”
“Er…” She dragged her spoon across the top layer of her porridge. “In theory, sure. In actuality, I’m not sure how I could do it. Malfoy doesn’t want anything to do with me, either.”
“Love potion?” offered Ron.
“I don’t care how much of a prat he is, I’m not roofying him.”
“I rarely agree with you, Y/N, but I think you’re right. If you want to do this, you need to get him to trust you for real.”
“Your back-handed compliment skills never disappoint, Hermione. Do you think you could help me out with a plan?”
A slow smile spread across the girl’s face as she nodded. “That’s my strong suit.”
The plan they laid out over the remainder of the day was ambitious but at least do-able. Each week was split into different subtasks, the end goal being a somewhat tentative friendship between the two.
“If you can flirt with him and get him to have a crush on you without scaring him off, you’d be in the best possible position,” Hermione told her as they walked back from the Quidditch pitch among the screaming Gryffindor fans. They’d won--yet again. “Obviously I don’t foresee that being likely, but if you pull it off somehow he’d probably be willing to tell you anything. The fact that you’re a pureblood is going to carry you through this whole ordeal. He’ll at least be accepting of your existence in the wizarding community.”
The bitter edge in Hermione’s tone made Y/N’s blood boil. There was no reason for Malfoy to be as prejudiced as he was--he’d spent his adolescence in Hermione’s academic dust. She was obviously smarter than him.
“You got it, ‘Mione,” she said. Her voice barely carried over the cheers of her peers as they ascended the steps to the common room. “We’ll take this little ferret down. I can’t wait.”
“Don’t get too cocky, now.”
The Gryffindor after-party was crazy...per usual. The charmed self-filling goblets, the blasted playlist of Wizpop pumping through the air, and the buzzing energy of the room was giving Y/N a giant headache. She stood with Hermione and Harry by the edge of the crowd, watching Ron get hoisted up on the shoulders of the chasers.
“No wonder the Slytherins think we’re Neanderthals,” Y/N mused. For once, Hermione didn’t respond. “Hermione? Is everything okay?”
The second she turned away to look at her best friend, gasps and whistles filled the room. She whipped back just in time to see Lavender Brown, a sweet but slightly ditzy girl in their year, pull away from a kiss with Ron.
“Oh shi--Hermione!”
Harry and Y/N shared a glance before darting after the witch--who had impressively already made it to the door.
“Hermione, wait!” Y/N called as they jogged after her, throwing open the common room entrance and finding her sat by the tapestry on the other side of the hall, knees to her chest.
“‘Mione, what’s wrong?” asked Harry.
“Don’t be daft, Harry,” said Y/N. “You saw exactly what the rest of us did.”
“I don’t understa--”
“Harry.” Her voice was taut. “I know you’re just trying to help, but I think that it might be best if you let us be. Go back and enjoy the party.”
He gave her a tight, grateful smile before darting back through the door. Y/N wasted no more time in walking over to Hermione and throwing her arms around her shoulders.
“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, hugging her tight. Hermione made no move to detach them, so she continued. “Ron is an idiot. You deserve so much better--your first kiss was Viktor fucking Krum, after all. You’re hot stuff and this place is just unfortunately running dry of men who are impressive enough for you. Once you’re out of here and working in the Ministry, you’re gonna have the time of your life with men actually in your league.”
Hermione managed a sniffly laugh as she wiped her eyes with her sleeve. “It’s just so fucking embarrassing, you know. Like, I have a crush on him because I think he understands me and I smelled him in my Amortentia and I thought he’d like me back, but…” She hiccuped. “Then he goes off and kisses Lavender Brown, of all people. There’s nothing particularly wrong with her or anything, but she’s so different...I’m so bookish, and she’s so girly and everything I’m not…”
Y/N took the opportunity to tuck a lock of Hermione’s hair behind her ear as she listened.
“And it can’t help but make me think--was I ever anything to him but a friend? If the girl he ends up choosing is the opposite of me?”
“Girly, don’t think like that,” murmured Y/N. “He’s a teenage boy. They don’t think of love the way that we do--to them it’s a game of availability, not of choice. At least for Ronald. You intimidate him, and by extension, you’re not available.”
“That shouldn’t matter!”
“You’re right. It shouldn’t.” Y/N drew a long breath. “So you should find someone who always has you as their first choice--someone who isn’t intimidated by your intellect. They’re out there. I promise.”
Hermione managed a shaky smile. “Thanks, Y/N. I mean it. Do you mind if I have some alone time? I don’t think I’m ready to go back to the party but I just want some quiet.”
“Of course. Let me know if you need me,” she said, brushing herself off and making to walk down the hall.
“You’re not going back to the party?”
“Nah. It hurts my head and I want fresh air. If I’m not back here in a half hour, assume that I’ve been kidnapped.”
With that, she started her walk. She wasn’t planning on going on a long stroll--there was a small balcony that she often went to when she needed to clear her head. It was beautiful, especially on a snowy night like this.
But the walk was creepy.
There was only one way in and out--a narrow, damp hallway that had absolutely no light fixtures. If Y/N really wanted to, she could cast a quick lumos, but she wasn’t sure if she wanted to see what lived on the walls. The stairs were steep, too, but she managed to bound up all 40 of them in record time.
“Who’s there?”
The sudden voice ripped a scream out of Y/N’s throat as she reached the top, catching a glimpse of the shadowy figure at the edge of the balcony that spoke. She clasped her hand over her mouth and she crept forward to the opening, getting a better look at the person that was in her secret spot.
The clouds shifted in the sky to allow more moonlight to cast a soft glow on Malfoy’s face, hardened with irritation.
“Malfoy?” Y/N asked, rather dumbly.
“What stellar observational skills,” he drawled.
She felt her cheeks grow hot. “What are you doing here? This is part of the Gryffindor tower. Shouldn’t you be...I don’t know...playing hide and seek with the sewer rats in the dungeons?”
“Very funny.” His flat tone exposed the fact that he did not, in fact, find it very funny. “There’s no rule barring me from coming up here.”
“But why? This is my spot!”
“Because I wanted to get out. Now, I was here first, so unless you want your detention extended, I suggest you leave.”
Y/N bit the fiery comebacks on the tip of her tongue as the memories of her plan with Hermione began floating back to her.
Week 1 -- Hold one neutral, civil conversation with Malfoy.
“I’ll be quiet. You won’t even know I’m here,” Y/N decided upon. leaning up against the balcony. The rogue snowflakes that made it past the overhanging roof melted on her cheeks.
“That isn’t a suggestion,” said Malfoy. “I’m demanding you leave.”
“Beautiful night, isn’t it?” Y/N asked, pointedly ignoring his words. “I’ve always loved the snow. It’s so quiet.”
“And it would be even quieter if you left.”
“Aren’t you the conversationalist?” said Y/N.
“If you don’t leave, I will hex you,” Malfoy told her through gritted teeth.
“I just love how the moonlight reflects off of the snow,” continued Y/N. “It’s so...pure.”
“Please leave.”
On her walk back down the dank stairwell, she allowed herself a little smile.
Task 1? Technically done.
~
The first week went largely as planned. Malfoy was cold and certainly suspicious of her, but he wasn’t completely venomous when Y/N asked where he got his quill from in Potions. It was silver, charmed to shimmer with flecks of forest green. He told her Barnaby’s in France, and that was that. She walked away from his table with all of her limbs attached. Perhaps that was all the progress she was going to make in the next few weeks, but the task at hand certainly made the prospect of her lost Friday afternoons more bearable.
Harry was going completely batty, rambling on about how Malfoy was behind the mysterious cursed objects that had been floating about the castle without explanation.
“And why would Malfoy bring cursed objects to Hogwarts if he has aspirations other than being expelled?” Hermione would ask over their books.
“You don’t understand, Hermione! You girls need to be careful walking around at night--especially you, Y/N. I don’t want you going missing after detention because of that slimeball.”
Y/N always gave him a laugh, berating him for his slight misogynistic commentary and turning back to whatever her task was, but the truth was that she was worried for him. The mental weight of the impending war and the fact that he couldn’t do anything about it was certainly getting too difficult for him to bear. It was heartbreaking to see the vivacious boy she’d grown up with crumble under the responsibilities of something he should never have to worry about in the first place.
Friday came much sooner than expected, and Y/N reluctantly left her friends in the common room to trek to McGonagall’s office. The walk was frigid and the wind bit at her cheeks as she rounded the last outdoor hall.
Why was this castle so dark?
A thump behind her made her jump, and Harry’s words came floating back to her.
Remember all those cursed objects? What if there’s someone just...stalking the school grounds, waiting for someone like me to snatch?
She shivered, throwing herself at the office door and slamming it behind her.
“Miss Y/L/N,” Professor McGonagall greeted, her eyebrows raised in amusement. “Something giving you trouble?”
“No, Professor,” she answered, setting her bag down on the desk next to Malfoy. He sent her a curious look as well. “It’s just cold outside.”
She chuckled. “I need to go speak to Headmaster Dumbledore. I expect that, upon my return, you both are in one piece and alive.”
“I’m not sure if I’m the one who needs to be given that speech,” said Y/N, bored and testing the waters.
“She’s right, Professor,” added Malfoy. “There’s no projectiles here.”
McGonagall exhaled a long, shaky breath before brushing herself off. “Please. Behave yourselves.”
“You got it, boss,” she said as she watched her Professor walk out the door. “So, Malfoy. How was your week?”
“I don’t know what you’re up to, but I’d way prefer if you didn’t speak to me,” he said, refusing to make eye contact.
“I’m not up to anything! We’re in detention together and, I dunno, since I see you sometimes at balls, I thought it’d be nice to be on good terms.”
“Good terms?” He scoffed. “You’re a Gryffindor. I’d rather you be a bloody Hufflepuff.”
“How about neutral terms?”
Even though he wasn’t looking at her, she could catch a glimpse of him rolling his eyes. “If neutral terms mean you being quiet, then, yes. Please.”
“I’ll be plenty quiet. After I hear about your opinion on what happened in Potions today with Brown and Weasley. When Snape yelled at them for holding hands.”
He let out a sharp sigh. “Believe it or not, I actually have better things to do than keep up with whatever stuff your house does.”
“But…?” Y/N pressed. She may not’ve spent her time at Hogwarts as Malfoy’s best friend, but she had grown up with the boy, and she could tell when he was holding back.
He stared blankly at her.
“Come on. I’m literally the only person in my house who’ll openly admit that they’re disgusted by that dynamic. I’m begging you.”
She wasn’t sure if she was imagining it, but she thought she saw a flicker of amusement dance across his face for a moment. “Your house sounds more like a cult than a student group.”
“Oh, says the one from Slytherin,” said Y/N.
“We only act like that because our families are close. What’s your excuse? Hormones and Quidditch culture?”
“Touché.” As much as she wanted to fight back, she bit her tongue. Whatever she was doing was making progress, and quicker progress than she was expecting. Her next task was to make him laugh, and she was emboldened by the fact that she could potentially be able to kill two birds with one stone.
They sat in silence for a little bit, but this time, it was a comfortable silence. Malfoy wasn’t staring at the clock on the wall or rolling his eyes at her every move, so she had time to plot.
On one hand, she could make a fool of herself--drop her inkwell, say something stupid in class, fall down the stairs--but she had a sneaking suspicion that her sorry attempts at slapstick humor wouldn’t land well with Draco anymore. He’d become so serious lately, so solemn. This was the most light hearted she’d seen him, even compared with how he acted with the rest of his Slytherin lackeys.
On the other, she could try to sell out her friends. She could confide in him how “big” Hermione’s teeth were (they weren’t even big) or tell him that Ron smelled of eggs (true, but that was a low blow). Something told her that this would be much more successful, but she wasn’t willing to turn to that so quickly--she was already a week ahead as it was.
“What is it?”
Malfoy’s bored drawl cut through her flurried thoughts. Her cheeks turned pink as she blinked, noticing that she’d been staring at him for far too long. “Nothing. Sorry. I just spaced out.”
“Sure,” he mumbled, giving her another suspicious look before turning back to his work. “Can you maybe space out somewhere other than my face?”
“Where’s your vanity, Malfoy?” she pressed as she leaned back in her chair, hair swinging over the back.
“Shut up,” he snapped. She could tell that whatever connection they’d had in the fleeting moments beforehand was being burnt by the second, but her embarrassment and pride drove her forward.
“Merlin, what’s got you so wound up?” she prompted, noting how deliciously unraveled he looked at this. “Where’s my cool, collected Slytherin?”
He slammed hands on his desk at this, whipping around to glare at her. “What’s your angle, Y/L/N?”
“What?”
“Why are you bothering me?”
“Because I want to.” She beamed.
Malfoy ran his fingers through his hair, mussing up the usual neat manner in which it normally laid on his head. “Compelling. What do you want from me?”
“What do I want…?” She tilted her head at him, narrowing her eyes. “What?”
“You never talk to me,” he explained. “Obviously, I prefer it like that. I can’t help but wonder why suddenly you want to be making small talk. So, what is it you want from me?”
“Malfoy,” she said. “I think you’re a spoiled prick who thinks far too highly of himself and drives me insane. But I also think that you’re funnier than what my friends give you credit for. Granted, you’ve always been annoying, but I don’t want anything from you. I just want to, I dunno, make these next few months less insufferable.” Somehow the lie slipped through her teeth easier than any of her previous bluffs.
He frowned, his mouth opening once before firmly screwing shut into a scowl. “Oh.”
“No offense, Malfoy, but what else can you offer me other than your dazzling personality?” she teased. “You know my family. I don’t need to blackmail you to pay for jewelry I’ve had my eye on or anything.”
He scoffed. “As if I’d say yes.”
“Exactly my point. It’d be fucking weird. Merlin, I’m not trying to butter you up to buy out Borgin & Burkes for me. Do I give off gold-digger vibes? Is that what this is about?”
“Fucking hell.” Malfoy turned to her in disbelief. “Do you ever shut up?”
“Answer my question. Or better yet, pull out your wallet. Wait, did I say that out loud?” She mimed surprise and covered her mouth. “Oh no! What will my mother say now that I’ve squandered my last chance of hitching you? There’s no way I can go home for Christmas break now.”
He rolled his eyes so hard she found herself worried for a moment that they were going to just permanently get stuck in the back of his head. “Hate to break it to you, but you didn’t really have a shot to begin with.”
Ouch.
She huffed and dramatically flopped over the back of her chair, hoping he couldn’t see that she’d flinched. “So you don’t think I’m pretty??”
“Y/L/N,” he snapped, his voice a low warning. “Can I please just work? What is with you today?”
Y/N sent him a sour look before giving her Charms work another look. Malfoy was awfully quiet, and when she snuck any glances at him later on, he was angled to face away from her.
Why did she feel like such shit all of a sudden? She cataloged the past events, trying to pinpoint the exact moment that her stomach dropped. It all made sense when the words “You didn’t really have a shot to begin with” echoed around her head once again. She’d failed Harry. She’d failed Hermione. There was no way that she was going to be able to get him to reveal his secrets now--it’s not like he was confiding in even his closest friends as Harry made apparent when he explained how vague his statements were to his fellow Slytherins on the train. Her only chance would’ve been to somehow get him to fall for her, and that wasn’t going...great. And it had been a pipedream to begin with.
When McGonagall swished back into the classroom to dismiss them, Y/N shot out of there without even looking at Malfoy again. It felt like something was lodged in her throat and she was not going to cry in front of him. No, no. She had to make it to Hermione to tell her what was going on.
“Y/L/N?”
Malfoy’s voice made her pause in her flee as she nearly rounded the corner in front of her, but she refused to look back. It was far enough away that it was possible she didn’t hear him.
“Wait!”
She was up the stairs and speed walking as fast as her legs could carry her to the Gryffindor tower before he even saw which way she went.
~
“I don’t think you understand,” Y/N wailed by the fire as Hermione rubbed her shoulders and Harry sat awkwardly perched on the couch. “I can’t do this. The only way this was going to work was if he had a crush on me, and I don’t think he ever will. I fucked it up! The one time you guys need me, I fuck it up! I let you down!”
Hermione’s left hand stopped its rubbing to rest firmly on her shoulder. “Please don’t be upset. You didn’t let us down. Plus, you’re only, what...two weeks in? You don’t need him to like you to make it work. Just getting him to trust you will be enough, and you’re good at that.”
“I don’t think so,” continued Y/N. “Harry said that he wasn’t even that open on the train when he overheard him talking to all of his friends. And those are purebloods that he likes! That he’s trusted and known for years and years! I’m a friend of you guys, and he knows it. I think he’d figure it out quick.”
“We should take every chance we can get,” said Harry from his spot a few feet away, his eyes lazy and unfocused on the fire crackling in front of them. “You won’t let us down if you can’t get anything, Y/N, you know that! But if you got anything from him, it’d be incredible. It’s a win-win. I don’t understand why you’re so upset.”
“I’m not upset,” she said, her tone becoming defensive. “I just...don’t want to mess this up. I know how much it’d mean if I succeeded.”
“So just try!” Hermione said. “There’s nothing wrong with it. I’m sorry he was kind of mean to you today, but I don’t think that should bother you too much. He should be more afraid of what you’d say if you didn’t care about being a good person.”
“Fucking right on there,” she said, wiping away the frustrated tears. “If I was honest with him, he’d leave crying. He should be grateful that I’m taking this bet so I actually have to be nice to him.”
“That’s the spirit.” Harry leaned over to smack her back like he did his Quidditch teammates after a winning match.
After they’d parted their ways with Harry, Hermione and Y/N made their way slowly up the stairwell to the girls’ dorms.
“Y/N?” Hermione asked, breaking the silence.
“Yeah?”
“Do you think, er…” She paused. “Do you think you were really upset about failing us today? Or was it something else?”
“What do you mean?” Y/N furrowed her eyebrows. “I don’t see what else it would be.”
“I’m sorry,” responded the bright witch. “Forget I ever asked. It was a stupid thing to wonder about.”
“Weirdo,” she teased as she waved her a goodnight and made her way to her dorm.
The next morning, Y/N busied herself with revising her Charms essay over her breakfast--a cup of tea and a half-buttered piece of toast--while Hermione leaned over her shoulder, nodding or grimacing at the corrections she made.
“Did you work during detention? Like, at all?”
“‘Mione,” moaned Y/N. “It’s too early for this. I don’t want a lecture. I just couldn’t focus.”
Her warm brown eyes narrowed as they bore into Y/N’s face. “Why were you distracted?”
“Oh, I, uh…” She stumbled over her words as Hermione drew closer. “Merlin, Hermione. I told you last night. I just felt like I was letting you all down.”
“Mhm,” was all she got in response before her best friend tilted her head back down to the parchment in front of her.
Y/N sat, completely puzzled. What was Hermione on about? She’d been straightforward with what was hurting her--she didn’t want to mess up the only task the Golden Trio had ever given her--and, even if she hadn’t been, Hermione was smart enough to deduce things for herself. So what was she thinking about?
Her eyes drifted over to the Slytherin table where the usual 6th year pureblood gang loitered about, drinking black coffee and sulking--but Malfoy was not to be seen. She jumped when her eyes met Parkinson, her dark eyes burning into her soul as a deep scowl was written across her face.
“Malfoy, what the fuck do you want?” Ron’s voice pulled her back to reality to see him glaring somewhere behind her.
“I wasn’t here to talk to you,” a familiar voice drawled.
She turned to see Malfoy standing behind her, a sneer written all across his stupidly pretty face.
“Miss me already?” asked Y/N as she raised an eyebrow and cocked her head to the side.
“For fuck’s sake, stop doing that,” he mumbled, reaching into his pocket and throwing a box at her. “You forgot your quill. I took the liberty of properly storing it, because it seems like you lot like to just throw them in your bag. Makes me physically ill to watch.”
“Oh.” Y/N studied the intricate box in her hands before tucking it away in her knapsack. “Thanks? I guess?”
He nodded curtly, contorting his face into one last scowl to send to Ron before turning and leaving,
“So,” Hermione began, cutting her omelet at a much brisker pace, “I think we need to have a little chat. About...all of this.”
“Why?”
“Not right now,” she said, her voice low and her eyes flicking at Ron and Harry sitting across from them. “I don’t think it’d benefit us for them to hear.”
“Ok?” She cautiously took a bite out of her toast and continued staring Hermione down. “You’re scaring me.”
“It’s...I don’t know. I thought I was crazy for thinking this, but it seems like we need to talk about it anyways. For this little mission of yours to work, we need to be totally open and honest with each other.”
“Sure.” Y/N took another bite. “I honestly have no clue what’s got you so on edge, though.”
“Who’s on edge?” Harry asked, leaning over the table and stealing the croissant on Y/N’s plate.
“Hey!” she exclaimed. “Do you not see the entire plate of them over there?”
He laughed, sending her an easy grin and dunking a piece into the hot chocolate in his mug.
“Finders keepers. Say, Y/N, are you busy next weekend? Ron and Lavender are going to Madame Puddingfoot’s together, and I know Hermione isn’t going to want to take a weekend off studying to go to Hogsmeade, so I thought that maybe we could go cause some trouble at the Cauldron.”
“If you stop stealing my food we can talk about it,” replied Y/N, the corners of her lips tugging up into a grin.
“Deal.”
Hermione tugged at her arm. “I just realized I need to get something out of my room before we watch the Quidditch game. Will you come with me, Y/N?”
“Sure!” said Y/N. “Gee, I’m rolling in invitations today.”
Once they exited the dining hall, though, it immediately became evident that they were not actually heading up to the dorms. Hermione dragged her into the nearest bathroom before casting a quick silencing charm.
“Myrtle! Are you in here?” Only when she was sure silence was the only response to her question, she seemed satisfied to turn to Y/N and begin talking. “When were you going to tell me that you have a thing for Malfoy?”
“I’m sorry, what?” Y/N felt the heat that had risen to her cheeks from the last quill-encounter re-emerge.
“You know exactly what I’m talking about,” said Hermione. “Are you seriously going to expect me to believe that you nearly sobbed over some random pureblood git telling you you never had a chance with him because it might slow down your progress with helping us? Actually? I’ve seen you look more ecstatic about hearing that your dear granny passed away.”
“To be fair, she had really good life insurance,” Y/N cut in. “And she was an old hag. Never had a nice thing to say to me.”
“Life insurance or no life insurance...you can’t seriously expect me to believe that you were just upset about not being able to help us as much. That was ridiculous. I don’t buy it. And the way you blushed like crazy when he came over to talk to you--the way you try and pretend like you can flirt...please. Y/N, it’s clear as day. I know you, and I know you have a crush on him.”
“Hermione!” hissed Y/N. “You have no clue what you’re talking about!”
“Yes, I think I do,” she pushed. “And you need to be honest with me if you want to be of any help right now.”
Her bossiness lit a fire of rage in Y/N’s chest, but she sucked in a deep breath, shutting her eyes before releasing it. “Believe me when I say I haven’t ever acknowledged any feelings I may or may not have towards him.”
“Ok.” Her face softened. “I know it might take time, but I honestly do think I’m right. Please just...be careful. This is a really odd situation to get caught up in if you actually have feelings for the other person. You’re trying to manipulate him, for Merlin’s sake.”
“And if I have these feelings for him, I’ve done a pretty damn good job of suppressing them for however long they’ve been here.”
Hermione sighed. “That’s true. I’m just saying that spending this much time with him is probably only going to make things worse. Will you please tell me if anything changes between the two of you?”
“Anything changes?” Y/N’s voice was dripping in disbelief. “You’re joking. Even if I was obsessed with him I don’t think there’s ever a chance of hell in anything ‘changing’ between us. He said it himself.”
“You know what I mean, Y/N,” responded Hermione. “Just promise me, ok?”
“Ok,” said Y/N. “I promise.”
That seemed to satiate Hermione as she nodded approvingly at her friend. “I think it goes without saying that Ron and Harry shouldn’t hear about this.”
“There’s nothing to hear about, but yes.” She shuffled her feet before meeting Hermione’s eyes again. “Er, I’m sorry for this being a weird question, but would you mind coming along with me and Harry to Hogsmeade? I don’t really see him like...that...and I don’t want to read into it too much and reject him if he is doing it just platonically, but just in case. Y’know.”
“Sure,” said Hermione, even though her face took on that curious expression yet again. “Anyways, you actually did forget something--you’re not wearing a single piece of Gryffindor colors for our game today. You should probably run back to your dorm before Harry and Ron notice.”
After they said their goodbyes, Y/N found herself turning over the things Hermione had said to her in her head. Did she like Malfoy? No, no fucking way. But a part of her really did think he was funny. And of course it was natural to feel rejected when anyone insinuates that they’d never consider you as a romantic interest without jest.
Once she’d made it up to her room and grabbed a few scarves, Y/N made to put her red cloak into her satchel. Her fingers ghosted over the box that Malfoy had given her and scoffed once she saw the Malfoy crest engraved into the rich wood.
Narcissistic snot.
Her curiosity got the better of her as she reached over to open up the elaborately decorated box. What met her was not just one quill but two--one of which was most certainly not her own.
She took them both out, tossing the old one in a pile with her other trusty familiar white feather quills and picked up the other one. It looked familiar--identical to the quill that she’d complimented Malfoy on in Potions about a week ago. Butterflies began to flutter like crazy in her stomach as she turned it over in her hand, watching the gray and green glitter together and the magic sparkles cast a gentle light over her bed. She generally avoided dipping into her family’s pockets to get school supplies any more than she had to--it’s not like it made her friends feel good about themselves when they were reminded how rich her family was--but this might be what she could consider to be an exception. She hadn’t even liked his quill all that much when she first saw it in Potions--but it was one of those things that was so noticeable that it made sense to compliment him.
She gave it one last look before tucking it back away into the elaborately decorated box. Perhaps she had spoken too soon when she’d told Hermione all hope was lost.
~
When Monday morning Potions class with the Slytherins rolled around, Y/N wasted no time. Malfoy was alone--even his Slytherin lackeys seemed to know not to bother him. Just what she needed.
“Malfoy,” she greeted, setting her bag down on his table and looking him dead on. He raised to meet her eyes, his eyebrow raised.
“Can I help you?”
“I just wanted you to know that I also really like your immense fortune,” she said. “And your manor.”
“Well, a lot of people do,” he mumbled as he looked away to dig through something in his bag. If she didn’t know any better, she would’ve thought he was blushing.
“I’m just letting you know,” she continued. “In case you were wanting to give them away. It worked for the quill, so I thought, well, why not?”
He exhaled, a deep and annoyed sound escaping his lips as he rolled his eyes up to the ceiling. “I knew I shouldn’t have done that.”
“You really didn’t have to.”
“I was getting sick of it,” he told her. “I never can stick with one quill for too long, and I thought it’d be a shame to toss it. I thought it’d be better to be charitable--it’s not like your family could get an appointment at Barnaby’s if they tried.”
“Hey!” Y/N said indignantly. “You don’t know that!”
“I’ve heard your parents try to speak French,” he said. “If you’re anything like them, you'll be barred from ever entering the country.”
“Malfoy!”
His lips turned up into a smile, a soft laugh escaping his lips. Y/N suppressed the urge to grin in return. Task 3? Done. “What?”
“I can’t even argue with you,” she said. “It’s tragic.”
She stared at the empty stool next to him, wondering if she should just take the leap and sit with him. Malfoy seemed unbothered by her presence as he opened up his Potions book and set it next to his cauldron. “Do you want a partner?” The words left her lips before she could stop them.
He cast her a curious look before glancing at the empty stool. “It depends. Are you going to be annoying?”
She gasped in faux-offense. “What makes you think I could ever be annoying?”
“On that note, I think you better get back to Potter.” He motioned with his head towards the side of the room where most of her Gryffindor friends were chatting. Harry was staring at her, his fists clenched by his side.
Y/N smirked and sent him a wink.
“On that note,” she said, careful to imitate Malfoy’s drawl and sending him a smug grin, “Maybe I better sit here.”
“Hm.” He awarded her one more uninterested look before rolling up his sleeves and setting out the ingredients for the potion they were brewing--Amortentia.
She tried not to make it too obvious that she was staring at his left arm, but there was nothing on it like Harry had told her. It was just pure, unblemished pale skin that shimmered under the light. Before he could catch her looking, she quickly sat down and started pulling out her own things. After a short pause, she decided to take out the silver quill. She’d left his box back in her room--she wouldn’t be caught dead with something that had the Malfoy crest on it--but she’d wrapped it in a pouch with her own family’s emblem on the front, shimmering in gold and red.
“Why don’t you just buy your own charmed quills?” asked Malfoy after they had chopped all of the gillweed.
“You already know. We’re an abomination to the French. We aren’t allowed entry.”
“That’s not what I mean.” His tone was meant to read as exasperated, but his words still seemed good-natured.
“I...well.” She frowned. She’d never confessed this to anyone, but she supposed that Malfoy wasn’t going to find a way to use it against her. “I don’t like to flaunt my family wealth. I think it makes people, at least in Gryffindor, like me less. I learned that pretty early on.”
He hummed something in response before sliding all the gillweed into the cauldron, turning the clear liquid into a bubbling forest green.
“Why are you being so nice to me all of a sudden?” she asked.
He took his time finishing the note he was jotting down before he answered. “I’m not being nice. It’s just called being civil. You said it yourself, we see each other at balls sometimes.”
“We probably won’t anymore, though,” she mused.
Malfoy’s eyebrows shot up, but his voice remained low and steady. “No. I suppose that we probably won’t. Is your family part of the Order?”
“Hm. Are you a Death Eater?” she asked brazenly. He had no business asking her something like that, and he knew it. Especially not with his family connections.
“What do you think?” he drawled, waving his bared left arm in front of her face.
“Bullshit. That doesn’t mean anything after we learned Glamour spells last year.”
“Guess you’ll just have to trust me, then,” he responded, focusing intently on the bubbling liquid in front of him instead of her face.
“I guess so,” she replied. The weight of her Glamour comment began to sink in--she was right, after all. How had she not thought of it before?
But he was right when he told her she just had to trust him. Could she? Y/N rested her chin in the palm of her propped hand as she watched him work. A piece of disobedient moonbeam blonde hair dangled over his forehead as he diced up the unicorn tail, his eyebrows furrowed in focus.
“Is this why you want to be my partner?” he finally asked after a few moments of silence. “So you can just stare at me while I do all the work?”
“There’s the vain Draco I know,” she said, grinning as she leaned over to punch his shoulder.
He rolled his eyes again, scooting out of arm's reach before flipping back to Amortentia in his book. “You’re insufferable. And it’s Malfoy to you.”
“Fine, fine, Malfoy,” said Y/N. “What do you want me to do, then?”
He shoved his cutting board towards her, the half-diced unicorn tail staring up at her. “Finish dicing this and then stir it in. 9 times clockwise. I did almost all of the work, but it should be finished after that.”
Y/N sent him another glare before doing as he said. The glittering quill kept catching her attention from the corner of her eye, and she couldn’t help but notice that Malfoy was writing with just a plain white quill for the time being. HE really did just give it to me.
After the final ingredients were diced, she began to stir, each rotation around the cauldron turning the potion to a different color. It began as the bubbling green, then a deep sea blue, then a royal purple, a crimson blood red, a glimmering gold--before settling into a pale silver.
“Wow. It’s beautiful,” she breathed. “It’s like...liquid starlight.”
“All thanks to me,” said Malfoy. “You didn’t even have to crush the Mandrake root.”
“You’re such a gentleman, Malfoy.” Her voice dripped in fake sincerity. “So, what do you smell?”
Y/N was expecting him to scowl at her and tell her that it wasn’t any of her business, but he actually leaned over the cauldron and shut his eyes.
“I’ve never been good at explaining what things smell like.”
“Fair.”
Once he leaned back, she took his place, shutting her eyes and breathing in a tendril of the beautiful potion. “Whoa.”
“What’s it for you?”
“I don’t...know,” she admitted. “It’s not something I can describe note by note. It kind of reminds me of something, though.”
“Something with Potter, I presume?” he said, casually twirling his generic white quill around his fingers.
“No,” she answered, surprised at how honest she was being. “It’s…I’m trying to think. Er, it’s very lavish. It reminds me of when I was younger and my parents would drag me to galas and balls and whatnot.”
He stared at her in silence.
“What about you? Does it remind you of anything?”
“Yeah.” Malfoy reached forward to put a lid on the cauldron, effectively shutting out the steam from reaching either of them.
“Ooh, have you figured it out yet?” she teased, crossing her legs and turning to face him head on. “Let me guess. Is it someone like…”
She paused, a wicked smile stretching across her face. “Oh my god, is it Hermione? Or Luna? Or...help me out here!”
“No.” His voice was sour.
“Ah, it’s Parkinson then, isn’t it? Tell her I’m sorry for throwing food at her if you ever have the chance. Make sure to add the part where I’m more sorry that I missed.”
“Y/L/N!”
“It’s okay. I’d be a little let down, too.”
“Can you please just…” He rubbed the bridge of his nose. “Please just stop. I haven’t figured it out. Okay? Happy now?”
“I’ll leave you alone,” said Y/N. “Under one condition. You give me a hint. I’ve given you everything I know! This isn’t fair.”
“This doesn’t have to be fair,” he hissed.
Y/N kept the easy smile plastered on her face while she waited, her eyebrows raised in anticipation.
“You’re not going to let up until I tell you, are you?”
“You’d be right on that,” she said, sugary sweet.
“Fine. It’s something kind of floral.”
“How descriptive,” she snorted as she slumped back in her stool, thinking hard. Where had she smelled it before? Y/N shut her eyes, leaning her head back and trying to immerse herself into the memory that had surfaced. It smelled like grandeur, like an open ballroom full of guests wearing expensive perfumes. She could feel spinning, spinning like she was with a dance partner. Who was it? She couldn’t quite remember--the last ball she’d been to had been years ago--but after she leaned forward and smelled the Amortentia once more time, she came to a conclusion.
“I had to have danced with him at a gala before,” she announced to Malfoy, who was looking quite unimpressed. “So I know it’s no one from Gryffindor.”
“Interesting,” was all he said before turning to his parchment and jotting something down.
Late that night, while Y/N was settling into bed, a strange idea struck her. Sure that the thought that was nagging her was completely fruitless, she had no trouble with reaching into her desk and pulling out the Malfoy box. She just had to check if she wanted to sleep well.
Here goes.
She closed her eyes, imagining the expensive scent of her Amortentia. Then she opened it, stuck her nose into the fabric, and breathed in.
Well, fuck.
~
The internal debate going through Y/N the next day at the breakfast table was intense. On one hand, she really, really wanted to just tell Hermione that Malfoy had been in her Amortentia and she was completely fucked, but on the other…
She glanced at the witch next to her as she methodically sliced her toast into perfect, equivalent squares before dunking them in jam. Y/N liking Malfoy was not going to fit into her toast cubes. If she said anything, she would lose her excuse to talk to her about him. And her excuse to try and get close with him.
Perhaps I can figure it out tomorrow.
When tomorrow came, she still hadn’t made progress. Y/N was beginning to think that her so called “revelation” after they brewed Amortentia was truly just complete and utter bullshit. So what that his quill box smelled like it--all rich people kind of smelled the same at some points, and so did their houses. There was a reason why she couldn’t immediately pin the scent to anything--it wasn’t like she even knew what Malfoy smelled like.
But the truth remained that she was still attracted to someone who happened to be a rich Slytherin--so naturally, her mind began to wander. There’s no way it was Zabini--his mother owned a fragrance line, and she would’ve instantly recognized the cologne that she knew Mrs. Zabini made him wear--and there was absolutely no way that it was Crabbe or Goyle, so the only other Slytherin it left was...Nott? But that didn’t make sense either--she’d never spoken to him before in her life, even less than Malfoy. So perhaps it would be better if she didn’t think on it.
The next day of potion brewing came on a stormy Wednesday. Malfoy and Y/N worked silently together to brew a Draught of Dreamless Sleep. She was surprised to see how practiced his movements were--he didn’t even have to reference the book to recite the exact measurements and directions.
“Do you have bad dreams or something?” she asked, mostly as a joke. He didn’t seem to pick up on the light-heartedness and stiffened up.
“No?”
“Gee, you’re talkative today,” Y/N said, trying to ignore how her hand brushed his by accident when she added the scoop of anjelica.
“Excuse me for not entertaining you,” he drawled. “I wasn’t expecting to have such a needy potions partner today.”
“I am not needy!” she gasped, smacking his arm. “I’ve sat in silence for a full hour!”
He rolled his eyes (he was always rolling his eyes) and gave the potion one more final stir before setting the lid on the cauldron. “Think you can do that again? It needs to simmer for that long.”
“Just because you’re so sweet to me,” crooned Y/N before pulling out a heavy book from her satchel. Her Charms exam was tomorrow, and, naturally, she had decided to save all of her revising work until the night before. The textbook stared back at her as she jotted a few notes onto a previously blank sheet of parchment. The quill in her hands was light and glided across the paper like the tears of Merlin, something that she had forgotten quills could do. All of her familiar basic quills were okay, but they were prone to skidding and breaking. This nib hadn’t worn down in the slightest, still at a smooth and defined peak.
Y/N couldn’t believe that, out of all people, the person to give her such a thoughtful gift was Draco Malfoy. She tried to sneak a glance at him then, moving her curtain of hair away from her face. It took all she had in her to not be startled at the fact that he was already looking back, a slightly concerned expression etched into his face.
“Is something wrong?”
He snapped out of it the moment the words left her lips, his face hardening. “No.”
“Forget I ever asked,” she responded, turning away from him for good and focusing on her textbook. No, there was no way he could be what she smelled in her Amortentia. She liked to think that her subconscious wasn’t secretly a masochist.
~
Friday evening swung around again, much to Y/N’s dismay. She’d had a talk with Hermione later on in the week, confirming that no, she did not smell Malfoy in her Amortentia, and that yes, she was still abiding by the plan that Hermione had so carefully laid out for her. It did bother her a bit that she could be lying to her on both fronts--but at the end of the day, she was going to get the answers that Harry wanted, no matter what.
She just had to get through the scary ass castle first. She’d forgotten how spooky Hogwarts was after her previous sprint to the door, and this time she was positively trembling by the time she turned another dark corner on her way to McGonagall’s office. Yet another cursed item had been found in the girl’s lavatory on the 3rd floor, right by some of the classes that she had taken earlier in the week. The fact that whoever was out there was capable of dark magic and actively wanted to hurt people terrified her, all that Gryffindor bravery be damned.
So when she heard footsteps suddenly right beside her, it was no wonder that she jumped feet in the air.
“Fuck!” she sputtered, turning to see a very familiar blonde in Slytherin robes. He was frozen in place, curiously looking her up and down.
“Am I interrupting something?”
“Malfoy,” Y/N said, resisting the urge to melt into a puddle of relief at the sight. This wasn’t right--wasn’t he a suspected Death Eater? “You scared me.”
He scoffed, digging his hands into his pockets. “You’re supposed to be the brave ones, right?”
“Huh?”
Malfoy motioned to her Gryffindor jumper.
“Oh.” Heat rushed to her cheeks as she realized what he meant. “I dunno. I just get jumpy around the castle at night.”
“No shit.” They’d begun to walk now, side by side. Y/N couldn’t remember ever walking with him before--she’d always been late. “Do you think I forgot the way you screamed when you saw me at the tower?”
“Shut up,” she grumbled, reaching over and giving him a healthy shove.
They walked in silence together. Malfoy moved noticeably slower than he normally did so he wouldn’t leave Y/N’s shorter legs in tow. McGonagall seemed pleasantly surprised to see Malfoy hold the door open for her.
“I’m glad to see you two getting along,” she said, giving Y/N a hesitant nod before grabbing the stack of papers on her desk. “I’ll be back momentarily.”
After she exited the room with a swish of her deep maroon robes, Malfoy turned to her. “Are you scared of the dark or something?”
She turned, ready to send a biting retort his way, before she noticed how gray his pallor looked...and how big the circles under his eyes were. “You look like shit, Malfoy. Is everything okay?”
He rolled his eyes. “Don’t change the subject.”
“Oh. Um…” Y/N pause before deciding that the little tidbit of information she was about to reveal wasn’t that important anyways. “I’m just on edge at night at Hogwarts is all. Especially with all that weird shit going on with all the cursed objects. So I kind of hate walking to and from detention.”
Malfoy let out something that sounded like a strained laugh.
“You didn’t answer my question. Is everything okay?”
“None of your business,” he snipped. “I just had a bad night.”
“Do you have trouble sleeping?” she asked, unable to keep herself from prying.
“Something like that.”
“Have you tried lavender?”
“I’m sorry?” He frowned.
“Lavender. Like the essential oil. It’s nothing magical,” she explained. “I just like to spray it in my bed sometimes before I sleep. Or I’ll use a few drops in a diffuser. I have trouble sleeping too, all the time, actually.” She shut her mouth before she had any chance to ramble further.
“It sounds a bit too floral for my taste.”
“Here.” Y/N dug around in her satchel, searching for the tiny spray bottle she kept with her at all times. “Borrow this and spritz your pillow with it before you sleep, and then tell me it’s too floral. I promise it helps.”
He glared at her. She extended her hand with the white bottle that was covered in purple decor, raising her eyebrows expectantly. “I won’t tell anyone that you have it if that’s what you’re worried about or whatever.”
“Fine,” he snapped, snatching it from her hand and dragging his fingers over her palm for just a second. “Don’t expect me to actually try it, though.”
“Just give it a sniff.”
He huffed, but to her surprise, he actually uncapped the top and held the spray hole up to his nose, inhaling in once.
The effect was immediate. Malfoy’s face completely drained of color, becoming even grayer than he’d been when she first saw him under the light. The briefest expression of surprise fleeted over his face before he wiped it off, replacing it with something unreadable and tossing it back at her. “I’m not using this.”
“Why not?”
“Not quite my taste,” he spat.
Y/N was shocked by the sudden outburst, watching as he continued to glower at his desk. “I don’t understand. It really does help you sleep. I know it seems stupid, but I...really think you should try it. Just once, if anything.”
“Why does it matter so much to you?”
“Because I--” Y/N stopped herself before she let her mouth run without check. “I know what it’s like is all. I feel like shit if I don’t sleep. Plus, I have to spend time with you every Friday. I imagine that you’ll be slightly more tolerable if you sleep more.”
“Hm.” He sent her a particularly venomous glare. “Thanks for your concern. Consider me uninterested, though.”
“You break my heart,” she teased, pulling back her hand and placing the bottle on the corner of her desk. An idea struck her.
“And just what are you smiling about?” Draco said. His lips were turned into a sour frown.
“Nothing, nothing,” she responded, her voice adopting a sing-song quality. All she had to do now was wait.
He exhaled, a deep and exasperated sound. Then he turned back to whatever was in front of him.
McGonagall entered the room a few minutes later, nodding cordially at the comfortable silence the two students were in. What she didn’t know was that Y/N was waiting, just waiting for Malfoy to dig through his satchel and stop paying attention to his quill.
She got her opportunity a few minutes later, when McGonagall called him up to look over his latest Transfiguration homework.
“Mr. Malfoy, I’m happy to see that you’re taking more initiative in getting your assignments done...I have to say that you had me a bit concerned…”
While her professor kept Malfoy occupied, Y/N darted over and grabbed his quill.
Ha.
Malfoy frowned down at his desk when he returned, giving Y/N a suspicious look.
“What is it, Malfoy?” she said, hoping her voice conveyed nothing that might hint that she took something of his.
“Nothing.”
“Hm.”
The rest of detention passed without any more discussion. Y/N was eager to run up to her dorm and set up her plan to be carried out the next morning, but she calmed her bouncing leg and forced herself to keep a straight face when McGonagall dismissed them.
“Got somewhere to be, Y/L/N?” Malfoy’s voice called after her as she sped down the hall towards the Gryffindor tower.
“What’s it to you?” she fired back.
He didn’t respond. Instead, he picked up his pace until he was walking next to her.
“Aren’t the Slytherin dorms the other direction?” she asked.
“I don’t know. Are they?”
She allowed herself to be amused by the way words flowed out of his mouth when he was slightly out of breath. “Why are you walking with me?”
“You said it yourself.” He kept his eyes cast on the cobblestones below them. “You don’t like walking alone at night.”
“Uh...oh.” Against her will, her feet froze and she was glued to the ground. “You’re joking, right?”
If the lighting wasn’t so dim, Y/N would have good reason to believe he was blushing with how intently he was studying his fingernails. “By all means, I can be.”
“No! No, I didn’t mean it like that,” she said, the words tumbling out of her mouth. “Er...I’d like you to. If you want to, that is.”
He shrugged, an elfish expression spreading across his face as he took in how nervous she was. “Well, come to think of it, you didn’t ask me to. I suppose I better get back to the Slytherin dorms anyways. I wouldn’t want to be anywhere near the Gryffindor Tower right now.”
“Why?” she squeaked.
“Oh, you know, I don’t think it’s a coincidence that most of the cursed things showed up on your side of the castle, yeah?”
She gulped.
“I gotta get going. Don’t want to stand around here too long. This place gives me the creeps.” With that, he turned and began walking away.
“Malfoy?” She hated how timid her voice sounded. “Consider this me asking you to walk with me.”
He slowly faced her, a sly grin plastered all over his face. “Oh? Did I hear that correctly? Do you want me to?”
“I’m only going to say this once,” she said, putting her hands on her hips and trying her best to look intimidating. “Walk with me. Please.”
“I guess I’ll take it.” Malfoy glided down the hallway to her in just a couple steps, sending her yet another smug look.
“You made up that whole ordeal about Gryffindor Tower being targeted, didn’t you?” asked Y/N as they rounded the corner to reach the staircase leading up to the common room.
“You bought it, didn’t you?”
“Who says I didn’t just want you to walk with me?” pushed Y/N. This was as close to flirting as it would ever get for her--but it looked like, somehow, things were falling into place. The heat in her cheeks must’ve been from the excitement of making progress.
Malfoy’s toe caught on the first stair and, if it weren’t for Y/N’s steady grip on his arm, would’ve made him go sprawling across the stone steps.
“Merlin, Malfoy,” she said, immediately dropping her grip from his shoulder. “What’s gotten into you?”
He responded with an unceremonial snort and a withering glare. The rest of the walk was done in silence, and Y/N noted how careful his footwork became around the Gryffindor steps.
“This is me,” she finally said once they reached the tapestry for the Gryffindor dorms. He seemed surprised, and only then did it strike her that he’d probably never seen the entrance himself before. “Thanks for being such a gentleman.”
“I live to serve,” he drawled.
And just like that, he was gone.
~
Her plan was simple. She had located an extra monogrammed pouch in her cabinet, a rich mahogany color with her family crest in a vivid gold, and placed both his quill and the lavender bottle. She would corner him after breakfast or follow him out of the Great Hall and show him then.
However, it was becoming increasingly obvious that Malfoy was not coming to Saturday morning breakfast. Many people didn’t, but Y/N had never known him to miss it. His normal spot was vacant, and it certainly wasn’t a house-made decision as all of his Slytherin friends were present and accounted for. Y/N couldn’t say for sure, but she could see Parkinson turning her head to the entrance every time the doors thudded open before glancing back to Malfoy’s empty seat when it turned out to be someone else.
Where was that loser?
“Excuse me,” she said to the trio as she stood up and brushed off her skirt. “I think I’m going to go get some fresh air. I have a bitch of a headache.”
Hermione and Harry expressed their sympathies while Ron gave her a characteristic mumble through his mouthful of bread, and she was off with the pouch secured in her cloak pocket.
It was a clear November morning, clearly Mother Nature’s attempt to slowly move the world from the crisp autumn to a cold winter. The sky was clear and the sun’s rays warmed her skin at a slanted angle, casting weak shadows across the courtyard.
If I were Malfoy, where would I go to sulk?
The obvious answer was either the Slytherin common room or his own dorm, but that was without a doubt out of question for her. She wasn’t even sure if she possessed the knowledge to guess which corridor the entrance was in, much less work out the password herself. Beyond that, just getting into the common room and waiting would be...She shivered. It would be a terrible idea while she was clearly wearing a cloak in Gryffindor red and gold trim.
As she continued her aimless wander around the castle, she heard the slightest sound from the girl’s bathroom on the second floor. It wasn’t ever really in use--no one came in there to actually use the loo unless they wanted Myrtle to materialize and tell them her supernatural troubles while they were in the middle of their personal business--but it was often the source of strange happenings.
Like the cursed objects she thought to herself, her nails digging into her palms. But did she care about that right now? Surely cursed objects seemed somewhat...suspicious. Dark magic was difficult to hide, and to a pureblood eye that grew up around magical objects, cursed things shouldn’t be impossible to spot.
And, plus, it was Malfoy she was looking for. None of the students had died from the curses so far, and if she was able to break through and learn something, or at the very least gain his trust, the reward to the Order would be more than worth it.
She stepped in, expecting to see an entirely empty bathroom with perhaps a ghost rattling around at the sink. Instead, a different sight awaited her.
Draco Malfoy was clutching the edge of the cracked sink basin in front of him, rocking himself back and forth and shaking. From her vantage point, she could see that he was dressed in his normal garb--a black ensemble--but his hair was unruly and messy, sticking up in the back like he’d hurriedly tugged something over his head.
A strangled gasp grounded her and halted her curious observations. Malfoy began to make these awful sobbing sounds, like he could barely manage to breathe.
Y/N was frozen in place as she surveyed her options. If she stayed and tried to talk to him, he might react in anger or hurt her. But if she just left him, like this, all alone...She swallowed once before stepping forward.
“Malfoy? Are you okay?” Obviously he’s not, you bint said a voice deep in her brain. She pushed it aside as he swung around, his wand raised and his eyes blazing. “Whoa! I’m not going to...Put your wand down!”
He stared at her, his eyes wide with horror as he continued to shake, so much so that his wand slipped out of his hand and clattered to the floor. Without thinking, Y/N reached into her pocket and flung her wand away, holding her hands up.
“I’m not going to try anything. I promise.”
As she drew closer, she could see the remnants of tears on his wet cheeks and the way that his silver eyes were rimmed with a bloodshot red.
“You shouldn’t be here,” he hissed, his voice weak and cracking.
“Neither should you. This is the girl’s bathroom.”
final a/n: ok so lmk if you guys wants me to continue. i really did not edit the last half fjkdsal;f also kinda made this an au where malfoy tried to assassinate dumbledore. with more than one cursed object but dw it’ll all make sense ill clear that up 😭
#draco malfoy#draco x reader#draco malfoy x reader#draco imagine#draco malfoy imagine#draco x you#draco#draco malfoy x you#draco x y/n#draco malfoy x y/n#draco x oc#draco malfoy x oc
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