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crimeronan · 11 months

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i've seen a couple people in the notes of this very good post about fictional polyamory by @thebibliosphere say things along the lines of "oh, i've been doing it wrong :(" or "how do i know if i did this right??" or "i should probably give up and start over, i wrote this badly :(" and. no!!!!

(i AM seeing far MORE people say "oh, this clarified and helped me so much, i think i know how to fix issues i've been having with my own story" which. YES!!!!)

listen. if you're a monogamous person who's writing a polyamorous relationship, and you've been focusing mainly on The Triad and All Three Together All The Time as the endgame, that's literally fine. that's a perfectly acceptable and strong starting point for your plotting, imo. you do not need to give up on a story that you've started like this.

but the things discussed in the post Can and Should improve your execution!

you can keep the same plot beats and overall relationship arc 100%. polyamorous relationships are infinite in their formations, every one is unique. "basically a monogamous romance but with three people" Does exist, as a relationship type. you're not hashtag Misrepresenting (TM) poly people with it

BUT i do think it will help to read up on some poly people talking about how their relationships Differ from monogamous ones.

so i have outlined some basic important concepts about polyamory.

MORE IMPORTANTLY though, i've broken down some questions that you can answer throughout the writing process to strengthen your individual dyad relationships, your individual characterization, & your characters' individual feelings/experiences. this is a writing resource have fun

future kitkat butting in to say i spent over two hours writing this and it definitely needs a readmore. it is also NOT comprehensive. but everything should be pretty simple to follow! feel free to reblog if you find it helpful yourself or just want to reward me for how gotdan long this took KSLDKFJKDL.

i've grabbed quick links for a couple of the important concepts, some have SEO pitches in them but the info largely seems to be good. (if i missed anything Egregiously Gross on these sites i should be able to update the links with better ones later, since they're under the readmore.)

sidenote: this is NOT meant to be overwhelming, despite the length. if you can't read all of this, that's Okay. you do not need to give up on your writing.

here we go:

compersion!

compersion is a BIG thing in a lot of polyamorous relationships. it's joy derived from seeing two (or more) of your partners happy together, or joy derived from seeing your partner happy with someone else.

compersion is really important as a concept because it highlights that every individual relationship within a polycule is different -- and that that's a GOOD thing. it's sort of the inverse of jealousy.

by the "inverse of jealousy," i mean that instead of feeling left out and upset and possessive, you feel happy/joyous/content.

i can use personal experience as an example: it's a Relief for me when my partners receive joy/support/sex/romance/etc that i can't (or prefer not to) give them. and i love seeing my partners make each other laugh and be silly together.

it's 100% okay for a poly triad not to be together 100% of the time, it doesn't mean that the third member is being left out or not treated equally when two people do things alone together.

(i have individual dates with my partners all the time! PLUS larger 3-and-4-person date nights.)

if the third member DOES feel jealous or left out, then the polycule can have a conversation to figure out what needs/wants aren't being met, and solve that. this happens semi-regularly in my polycule, as it will happen in any relationship (including monogamous ones)! it's just part of being an adult, sometimes you have to talk about feelings.

metamours!

a metamour is someone who is dating your partner, but ISN'T dating you. this may not be relevant for people writing closed three-person romantic sexual triads, but it's a super helpful term to know.

the linked article also lists different types of metamour relationships with some fun phrasing i hadn't heard before. the tl;dr is: sometimes you'll be domestic cohabitation friends, sometimes you'll be buddies with your own friendship, sometimes you might not interact much outside of parties, every relationship is different.

there's no one-size-fits-all requirement for metamour relationships. sometimes polyamorous people will end up dating their metamour after a while (has happened to me), sometimes polyamorous people will break up with one partner for normal life reasons, but remain friendly metamours.

the goal of polyamory is NOT for EVERYONE to fall in love. it is 100% okay if this happens in your story, it happens in real life too! but it is also 100% okay for characters to be metamours without ever becoming "more than friends."

(sidenote: try to kill any internalized "more than" that you have when it comes to friendship. friends are just as important and special and vital as partners.)

of course there are a million ways for messiness to occur with metamours within a complex polycule, exactly like with close-knit platonic friend groups. however this post is not about that! there's enough "here's how polyamory can go wrong" stuff out there already, so i'm focusing on the positives here :)

open versus closed polyamorous relationships!

i'm struggling to find an online article that reflects my experience without directly contradicting at least SOME stuff. so i'll give a quick rundown

google has a bunch of conflicting definitions of open relationships and whether open relationships are different from polyamory. the general consensus seems to be that an open relationship prioritizes one partnership (often a marriage), but that each partner can have extraneous flings or long-term commitments (most often sexual in nature).

this is not typically how i use the term wrt polyamory. the poly concept is pretty simple. a closed polyamorous relationship is one with boundaries like a monogamous one. there are multiple partners in the polycule, but they are not interested in having anybody new join said polycule.

an open polyamorous relationship tends to be more flexible -- it just means that IF someone in the polycule develops mutual feelings for a new person, it's fine for them to become part of said polycule if they want to! the relationship/person is open to newcomers.

some groups will need to negotiate this all together, others will just go "haha, you kids have fun." just depends on the individuals!

with open AND closed polyamorous relationships, the most important thing is making sure that there's respectful communication and that everyone is on the same page. but there's no one-size-fits-all way to do that.

i wish i could give you guys a prescriptive "You Must Do It This Way" guide, but that's.... basically the opposite of what polyamory is about, HAHA.

feelings for multiple people!

i was gonna tack this on to the previous section but decided it warranted its own lil bit.

a defining feature (....i'm told?) of monogamous relationships is that a monogamous person only has feelings for One individual at a time. they only want a relationship with one individual at a time. or, if they DO have feelings for multiple people simultaneously, they're still only comfortable dating one person at a time & being exclusive with that one person.

this is perfectly fine!

the poly experience is generally different from this. but once again..... polyamorous people all have different individual perspectives on this.

for me, i have never been able to draw hard boxes around romantic vs sexual vs platonic relationships, & i love many people at once. my personal polycule lacks many strict definitions beyond "these are my chosen people, i want to forge a life with them indefinitely, whatever shape that life takes"

some poly people feel explicit romantic or sexual attraction to multiple people at once, some poly people feel almost no romantic or sexual attraction at all. i'd say that MOST poly people feel different things for different partners, which is not a bad thing!

some poly people are even monogamous-leaning -- they have just chosen one romantic partner who is themselves part of a larger polycule. (so this monogamous-leaning person has at least one metamour!)

or alternatively, they might have one romantic partner AND a qpr, or other ways of defining relationships. (this is a factor in my own polycule!)

i made this its own point because if you're writing a straightforward triad, this is unlikely to come up in the story itself -- but it's worth thinking about how your characters develop/handle feelings outside of their partnerships.

like, is this sort of a soulmateship, 'these are the only ones for me' type deal? in which they won't fall in love with anyone else, and can be fairly certain of that?

that's pretty close to typical monogamous standards but you Can make it work. just be thoughtful with it

alternatively, can you see any of these characters falling in love Again after the happily-ever-after? and how would the triad approach it, if so? what would they all need to talk about beforehand, and what feelings would everybody have about the situation?

it's worth considering these questions even if the hypothetical will never feature in your actual canon, because knowing the answers to these questions will help you understand all of the individuals & their relationship(s) MUCH better.

i've been typing this for nearly two hours and there's a lot more i COULD say because... there's just a lot to say. i'll close out with some quick questions that you can ask yourself when developing the dyad dynamics within your triad

first, take a page and create a separate section for each individual dyad. then answer these questions for every pair:

how does each pair act when alone?

how do they act differently alone compared to when they're with their third partner?

are there any elements of this dyad (romantic, sexual, financial, domestic, etc) that these two people DON'T have with the third partner?

if so, what are they?

are there any boundaries or hard limits within this dyad that aren't shared with the third partner?

if so, what are they?

partner 3 goes out of town alone for a few weeks. what are the remaining two doing in their absence?

(doesn't have to be anything special, it's just to get a sense of how the two interact on a day-by-day basis without the third there)

what is something that each partner in the dyad admires about the other -- that they DON'T necessarily see in the third partner?

what problem do These Two Specifically need to solve in the story before their relationship will work?

how is that problem DIFFERENT from the problems being solved within the other two dyads?

doing this for ALL THREE dyads is VITAL imo. that way, you develop complex and nuanced and different relationships that all have unique dynamics.

those questions should be enough to get you started, i hope

then After you've charted the differences in relationships, you can start to jot down similarities in the overarching triad. what does one person admire in Both of their partners? what are activities that all three like to do together? what are boundaries or discussions that all three share?

but the main goal is to figure out how to Differentiate each relationship!

a polycule is only as strong as the individual relationships within it. if two people are struggling with their own relationship, adding a third person won't fix that.

(UNLESS the third person is the catalyst for those two to, like, Actually Communicate And Work Their Shit Out. i just mean that the old adage of "maybe if we just add a third-" works about as well to fix a miserable non-communicative marriage as, uh, "maybe if we have a baby-")

AND FINALLY.

if you're not sure whether your poly romance reads organically to poly people, you can hire a sensitivity reader with poly experience. if you can't afford that, you can read up on polyamorous resources like a glossary of terms & articles actually written by poly people. (and stories written by poly people!)

you can also just.... ask poly people questions, if they're open to it. i like talking about polyamory and my own relationships so you're welcome to send asks if u want, i just can't guarantee i'll answer bc my energy levels fluctuate a lot and i don't always have time.

polyamorous people are in an uphill battle for positive representation right now & so the LAST thing i want to see is authors giving up on their stories bc they're worried about getting things Wrong. well-meaning and positive stories that treat this kind of love as normal, healthy, & aspirational are So So So Needed. even if you guys end up with some funky-feeling details.

seriously, if you're monogamous then you probably don't have a full idea of Just How Nasty a lot of people can get about polyamory. i wish it DIDN'T mean so much for you guys to want to write nice stories about us, but it does mean a lot. and it means a lot that you want to do it WELL.

in conclusion. this is not a prescriptive guide, it's just a way to raise questions. and also, you all are doing FINE.

#thebibliosphere i apologize for tagging u when we don't know each other at all i just want u to get credit for the initial discussion #given that it is so much more thoughtful and clear than anything i'd think to write.#i did NOT mean to spend multiple hours on this but once i started writing i was like #oh god i actually do have like a lot i can tell monogamous people about writing poly people & the poly perspective #anyway. i mention it in the post but people can send me (respectful. obviously) asks if they have questions #i cant promise to answer all of them bc i am bad at this. but if i'm well enough then i'll try #polyamory #non-monogamy #ethical non-monogamy #writing #my writing #writing advice #relationships

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mikavlcs · 1 year

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Shade Astray

Pairing: Ghostface!Tara Carpenter x fem!reader

Summary: Never in her life had Tara met anyone that made her feel like you did. She would make you hers, no matter what it took.

Warnings: graphic violence(!!!), murder, mentions of drugs and suicide, tara’s like genuinely terrifying here (tarafying? sorry), relatively bad pacing, overuse of the word anger and its various synonyms

Word count: 6.1k (sorry)

Notes: ...sorry about this, i just needed to get it out of my system. not proofread bc i was tired of looking at this story lol, but i’ll be back to my regularly scheduled wednesday stories in a few days<3

Masterlist | Part 2 | Part 3

For as long as Tara could remember, she had always struggled with her anger.

It was an issue during her early days. She of course didn’t remember, but her father would always humorously recall how she would scream absolute bloody murder as a baby if she wasn’t fed or if they took her toys from her.

Her patience did grow over time, but her possessiveness only ever got worse.

She treasured the things that she designated as “hers”, always treated them with the utmost care and she hated when others tried to take them from her.

Her family learned very quickly to not touch her stuff without asking. Only a few incidents were needed for them to understand how to respect her things.

Her older sister, Sam, seemed to understand better than her parents, but they learned, nonetheless.

And when she started going to school, it was the same.

Only once did someone make the mistake of taking something of hers. It was first grade. They were out for recess and one of her classmates, Alex, wanted to play with the stuffed animal she brought for show and tell. She said no, but he didn’t listen and snatched it right out of Tara’s hands.

In retaliation, she snapped the action figure he brought clean in half and threw the halves across different ends of the playground.

Alex wailed; she just snatched her plushie back and went back to her spot on top of the slide.

Her teacher was worried by the display, but her parents wrote it off, saying she would grow out of it. If only she were so lucky.

Over the years, her anger ebbed and flowed and changed as she did, but it never left.

Hundreds of pencils and toys suffered at the hands of her rage, but never another person. That simply felt like a line Tara couldn’t cross.

And she did not cross that line.

Not when her father suddenly left. Not when Sam abandoned her for no reason. Not when her mother started drinking and leaving the house for days at a time.

She stayed firmly on the “right” side of the line, but the anger still persisted, strengthening with each person she watched walk out the door and never return.

It was almost funny how the emotion that haunted Tara was more present in her life than her actual family.

At some point, it became a comfort of sorts. Even on Tara’s worst days, days when she couldn’t feel much of anything, she could still feel that simmering anger within her. It grounded her in a way she knew it shouldn’t.

Years began to go by and neither her father nor Sam came back. Her mother’s alcoholism waxed and waned. Eventually, she began to go to rehab, but Tara didn’t really notice anymore. Even when she was sober, she wasn’t really present anyways.

What she did know was that through everything, her anger never faltered. It simply persisted, festering in silence, and at some point, Tara welcomed it.

As she entered middle school, Tara found herself migrating into a group of friends. The group was on the smaller side, consisting of five other members besides Tara herself.

There was Amber, a rebellious self-described “wild card” who loved parties. Wes, a shy, soft-spoken nerd that crushed on every girl he saw. Mindy, a slightly obnoxious film buff that would talk your ears off about her favorite franchises. Chad, a dumb jock with a heart of (mostly) gold. And Liv, a pretty girl with a startling lack of individual personality.

Tara adopted the role of the good, responsible girl. The one that reminded everyone about homework and urged them to study for tests. It was an easy enough persona to maintain.

They weren’t perfect, but they were more tolerable than the rest of Woodsboro and they were fiercely loyal. And weekly group hangouts were much better than just sitting in an empty house.

But these new friends did complicate Tara’s life a bit. When there was no one else around, there was no need for her to try and hide her anger.

Now, she needed to be cautious around others, to make sure the carefully crafted mask she wore around them never slipped. It was hard at first, but she got used to it with time.

The discovery of the Stab franchise changed her.

It was movie night at Amber’s house, the group favorite since her house was huge and her parents were virtually nonexistent. Amber insisted on them binging the Stab movies because she was obsessed and after enough “my house, my rules”, they obliged.

The group watched, Mindy and Wes pointing out every little thing they deemed ridiculous, but Tara was completely engrossed.

She had known about the movies and how they were based on the various real-life Ghostface killings across Woodsboro, but actually sitting down and watching them was riveting.

The movies themselves were fine, all overplayed tropes and cheesy one-liners, but the kills were another thing entirely.

Something about the brutality of them excited her, a mixture of anger and excitement creating a dangerous high that she was already addicted to.

Tara was immediately obsessed.

Immediately when she got home, she watched them all again. Within weeks, she had read every book and article she could find about the murders, absorbing it all like a sponge. She even joined the stupid Stab subreddits.

Her dreams became riddled with blood and gore and her behind that iconic mask. And from her dreams, it permeated her thoughts during the day. She daydreamed about it during class and when something inevitably angered her, it was the first thing she thought of.

The Line, as she had come to call it, could not be crossed in real life, but there were no boundaries she couldn’t cross in her mind.

If someone stirred that anger within her, she simply imagined herself donning the Ghostface mask and carving out their insides with one of her kitchen knives.

For a few years, that was sufficient, just thinking about the awful things she would do was enough to satiate the darkness within her.

Then you arrived.

You moved to Woodsboro a few weeks before the start of junior year. Tara heard about the new town residents, nothing stays secret for long in a small town, but she didn’t actually see you until the first day of school.

She and her friends were sitting at their usual table outside the school. Mindy and Amber were debating about some horror movie they saw, and Tara had checked out about five minutes ago when something out of the corner of her eye caught her attention.

A car pulled up to the school, grey and sleek and entirely unfamiliar to her. Her interest piqued, she watched on as two figures in the front seats talked. The passenger seat opened, and out of it came someone she’d never seen before.

You.

All it took was one look and her world stopped. When it started again, it no longer revolved around the sun, but you.

You waved goodbye to whom she assumed to be your father and scanned your surroundings, hesitance apparent in your mannerisms. She intently watched you nervously thumb the strap of your bookbag, a plan to make you hers already formulating.

It began with something innocuous. Throughout the day, she found that your schedule was similar to hers, and in all the classes you two shared, the seat next to hers just happened to be the only one open.

Tara took the opportunity to introduce herself. You introduced yourself, voice soft and melodious, and already, she wanted to hear it again. She offered to show you around, which you shyly accepted. Before she could say anything else, the bell rang, lapsing the class into silence as the teacher began speaking.

Throughout class, she couldn’t keep her eyes off of you. You were everything she could ever want, and she knew then and there that she would stop at nothing to make you hers.

Within a week, Tara being by your side at school became normal. What was once a mere convenience became routine, and your place in class became rightfully next to her. Somewhat awkward small talk became friendly banter. And Tara finally got you comfortable enough to accept her invitation to sit with her at lunch.

Unfortunately, her friends were also there, but meeting them was an inevitability, and you ended up getting along with them pretty well. A bit too well in some ways.

Wes, of course, took an immediate liking to you. His light blush and stuttered words gave him away instantly, and as much as it annoyed Tara, that wasn’t what worried her.

What worried her was Amber’s behavior toward you. She was always talking to you, always grinning with her arm over your shoulders or a hand on your arm. A look in her eyes that Tara couldn’t—or more accurately, didn’t want to—place.

So Tara took a different approach. She started taking pens and pencils so you would ask to borrow hers, and she happily obliged. Then your class notes started going missing, textbooks disappearing between classes, but Tara always let you use hers.

She began inviting you over to her place under the guise of studying, but inevitably you ended up just hanging out. With some gentle coaxing, she got you to open up a bit.

You ranted about anything and everything, she listened, and you thanked her afterward.

She kept doing that until it became a habit. Until you began seeking out Tara to talk about something that was bothering you, which made her happy.

Tara slowly positioned herself to be the person you could rely on most, the one you could go to about anything.

And for a fleeting moment of time, that was enough—to know that you trusted her more than anyone else in the entirety of Woodsboro.

But, of course, it didn’t last. (It never did.)

You had an odd effect on Tara. You were the first person she had ever met that could calm her deep-seated rage. Any fury she felt at an incompetent classmate was washed away by the mere touch of your hand to hers.

But you also exponentially worsened it. Because even if she hadn’t made an official claim on you yet, you were hers. And she began to notice just how many people had their eyes on you.

The boys she caught leering at you in the halls, the jocks she heard having vulgar conversations about you—hell, even the occasional person that asked you for a pen in class. They all awoke an unprecedented amount of ire within her.

Every time Tara saw someone staring at you during lunch, she wanted nothing more than hit them until the skin on all of her knuckles was split and bleeding. Whenever she heard anyone talking about you, she wanted to reach into their throat and tear their vocal cords out.

She never did, she never once laid her hands on any of those people. But she wanted to. Oh, how she wanted to.

Tara quickly found herself inching closer and closer to The Line, using all of her remaining control to stop from crossing it.

All of her remaining self-control and morality went out the window when someone finally asked you out.

Tara was the first person you told. And she didn’t know what angered her more—the fact that someone had the gall to try and take what was hers or the fact that the person that asked you out was Amber.

Boiling hot anger bloomed in her chest and spread through her veins.

Tara’s relationship with Amber Freeman was complicated.

In some ways, Amber was Tara’s closest friend. The whole group shared a love for horror films, it was what initially brought them together, but Amber was the only one whose love for the Stab movies rivaled hers. She had even introduced Tara to the franchise. But that wasn’t what made Tara’s relationship with her so different from the others.

Her bond with Amber was special because Amber was the only person Tara had ever met that was like her.

She saw it most in the way Amber looked when she watched the murders in the films. Sure, Amber always loved the gory kills in slasher movies, but something about the Ghostface kills made her more intense. And it only took one glance for Tara to know why.

The acute passion and almost primitive desire she saw reflected in Amber’s eyes when Ghostface slaughtered someone was something she was entirely familiar with.

In that moment, Tara knew that Amber was capable of the same terrible things that she was. And she knew Amber knew it as well.

They never talked about it, just let it linger in the air between them, open and free. Their special connection brought Tara closer to her than any of the others.

But that also made Amber Tara’s biggest threat. The horrifying potential within her made her unpredictable, and while that had yet to actively oppose Tara’s own wants, it was beginning to become a nuisance now.

Because she had seen the way Amber looked at you, knew what that desire in her eyes meant. She was taken with you the same way Tara was.

And she couldn’t accept that.

She wasn’t able to sleep that night. Her anger was so potent that it felt like it had swallowed her whole. Her fists shook violently, a scream she had been holding back for hours bubbled up again and Tara could only curl into herself and swallow it back down.

It was too hot, sweat coated her skin and soaked her clothes. Her fury was burning her alive from the inside out and she ached for something to take it out on, needed anything—even if it was painful to drown the fire inside of her.

More than anything, she yearned to get rid of Amber. Permanently.

She knew she shouldn’t, but once she thought of it, she couldn’t stop. It would be so simple, to just sneak into Amber’s house and gut her. Hell, she even had a costume, nearly forgotten in the back of her closet from Halloween a few years prior.

And if she didn’t do this, there was a chance that she would lose you.

With that realization, the dam broke, her moral walls crumbling under the weight of her need for you.

The Line was the last thing on her mind that night and before she knew it, her plan was fully formed.

Exactly one week before she planned to kill Amber, Tara invited her over for a Stab marathon. Likely around the twentieth one they’d had over the years, but this one was different.

Watching these movies never got old for Tara, and they were always made better by another person that shared her love for them.

But even with that, it was still less passionate, less enthusiastic than those other times. A melancholy had settled in the air. There was a new finality to the rolling credits, and Tara would be lying if she said it didn’t get to her.

She wondered if Amber could feel it too.

On the walk home, Tara was somewhat conflicted. But then she reminded herself that Amber was trying to take you away from her and that was enough to have her seeing red.

Without anymore hesitation, she took a step over The Line, crossing into that horrifyingly seductive forbidden territory, and firmly planted her feet there.

You were Tara’s and she wasn’t going to let anyone get away with trying to take you from her, not even a friend.

The kill itself was easy enough to pull off.

The Freemans were almost never home, leaving Amber to roam the house by herself most nights and she was never the best at remembering to lock the windows. She relied mostly on their cameras to alert her of anything, but even those were easy to avoid if you knew where they were.

She slipped in through a window around the back, swift and silent as she made her way through the house, mindful to avoid the inside cameras when she could.

Amber was in the living room, watching some show Tara didn’t recognize. Her phone sat on the couch beside her, and the sight of it nearly made her sigh. She had debated doing the phone call, but she didn’t have the iconic voice changer and thus, was forced to do without it.

She knew that Amber would be turning in for the night soon, so she waited, lingering in the darkness of the attached kitchen for her moment to strike.

That moment came mere minutes later. Amber turned the tv off and stood, stretching for a moment before heading toward the stairs. Tara gripped the hilt of her knife and quietly walked out. Her heartbeat quickened, perfectly matching her footfalls as she came up behind Amber.

One of her last strides had a bit too much weight behind it, causing one of the floorboards to creak. Amber whirled around and only had time to blink before Tara struck.

She buried the knife right between Amber’s ribs then twisted it sharply, finding a sick satisfaction in the way she felt something crack. Her heart raced as she pushed Amber to the ground, settling on top of her as she yanked the knife out and plunged it back into her, slightly lower this time.

Then she did it again and again and again. Tara would admit that she lost herself a bit, the adrenaline pumping throughout her pushing her into almost a frenzied state as she brought the knife down then back up.

Amber, to her credit, didn’t scream. The only sounds that filled the air were the sounds of the knife piercing flesh and Tara’s labored breaths under her mask.

When she finally snapped out of it, all she could see was red. It was everywhere—on her knife, the carpet, the surrounding furniture. Some had even managed to splatter onto the ceiling. It was oddly beautiful.

Knowing her time was limited, she turned her attention back to her victim. Amber remained silent, only the occasional bloody cough escaping her as she stared at Tara above her.

Tara reached into Amber’s pocket and pulled out her phone, holding it briefly in front of her face to unlock it. Once inside, she opened the security app and remotely shut off all of the cameras in the house. She waited for a moment, ensuring they were off before reaching up to pull her mask off.

Amber’s eyes widened slightly when their eyes met but she didn’t look surprised. If it were the other way around, Tara supposed she wouldn’t be either.

In a way, they both knew this would only ever end one of two ways.

They would either wreak havoc on the town of Woodsboro together, or one of them would eliminate the other. And unfortunately, it had to be the latter.

Tara adjusted her grip on the knife handle, careful not to move the weapon as she held her dying friend’s gaze. Neither of them said anything, they just let everything sit in the air around them until, finally, Amber stopped moving altogether.

Once the warmth left Amber’s body, Tara stood and pulled the knife out of her one last time, cleaning the blood off of it with a quick swipe of her hand per tradition.

She stayed there for another minute then left, making sure to lock the window on her way out.

Later that night, as she waited for sleep to take hold of her, she wondered if she regretted what she did, finally crossing that line after all these years of holding herself back. It took only a few moments for her to find that her answer was a firm and resounding no.

She would mourn the loss of a friend but never regret her decision. Tara was going to make you hers, and she was going to make sure that no one stood in her way.

It took three days for the body to be found.

Considering Amber’s parents were probably somewhere in Europe, they took no notice of their daughter’s sudden silence, but the rest of the group did. They had been on edge since the end of the first day and by the third, you wanted to go over and check on Amber.

Tara stopped you immediately, not wanting you to see what waited in that house, and suggested calling the police to perform a wellness check because “what if it’s something serious?”

Amber’s face was plastered all over the local news within hours. Along with the news that her killer was another Ghostface.

For public safety reasons, the security camera footage was released and immediately caused an uproar. The idiots in the Stab subreddits were clamoring, new theories being posted every hour. Tara ignored them.

Her entire focus after Amber’s death was made public was you.

The entire group was upended by Amber’s passing, but you were distraught. Even if you didn’t return her feelings, Amber was still your friend and her death hit you hard.

She took every opportunity to be there for you. She hung out with you after school when you didn’t want to be alone, invited you over on the weekends when you needed a shoulder to cry on.

In your eyes, the two of you were grieving together, and in some ways that was true.

When you cried, she would always hold you and cry with you. Sometimes her tears were real, sometimes they were fake, but her concern for you was always sincere. And the way you held onto her like a lifeline made her sure that what she did was more than worth it.

Aside from your sorrow, everything was going relatively well. The fraudulent mask of sadness she needed to sustain almost everywhere she went was exhausting but necessary.

She knew she would have to grieve with the pack, and she did it masterfully while also paying special attention to you and your mental health.

Her ever-present anger had also been noticeably dull. It was always tempered when you were around, but even when you weren’t present it was still anemic.

It was actually somewhat peaceful, and she expected it to remain like that for a while.

What she didn’t expect was her sister to suddenly return to Woodsboro.

Tara swore she had never been more surprised when she answered the door, expecting it to be the police, and saw instead her sister standing there. She was taller, a bit rougher around the edges, but she was still the Sam that Tara tried to forget about over the years.

She let Sam in more out of curiosity than anything. Tara wanted—no, needed to know why her own sister had to abandon her for years without even attempting to contact her.

And, admittedly, the explanation was worth her time.

Turned out that her sister was actually her half-sister. They had the same mother but different fathers. Sam’s father was Billy Loomis, one of the original Ghostface killers. Sam ran away because she was scared that she would end up like her father, that she would somehow hurt Tara if she stayed.

So she left and ended up getting mixed up in all kinds of bad shit. (She didn’t specify, but the track marks on her arms told Tara everything she needed to know.) But she heard about the rise of another Ghostface and that convinced her to finally return, for good.

Throughout Sam’s explanation, Tara bit her cheek until she bled and gripped her chair until her knuckles were white.

It was all she could do to not laugh in her sister’s face.

The “darkness” inside of her that she was so afraid of amused her because she knew it didn’t exist. She couldn’t see the potential that either she or Amber held in her sister’s eyes, and that made the entire situation laughable.

Tara couldn’t help but wonder how frightened Sam would be if she found out about what she did, how terrified she’d be if she knew about the things that Tara thought about doing.

Part of her was jealous, to come from such a profoundly blood-stained family legacy sounded incredible, but she knew it was for the best that it was Sam and not her. It would only make her a prime suspect.

So she flooded her eyes with tears and feigned understanding, allowing her sister to hug her for the first time in years.

The words “I forgive you” tasted like ash in her mouth, but the act needed to be upheld.

Sam expressed her want to move back into the house, something Tara was immediately against. But as she thought about it more, she found herself allowing it.

For insurance mostly. If there were more victims, Sam would be able to back up Tara’s alibis about being at home. She would also serve as her backup plan in case things went south.

After all, if the police were to ever suspect her, it would be so easy to implicate the ex-addict daughter of Billy Loomis in her place.

The following months were an adjustment period.

Tara having to relearn how to cohabitate in her house with her sister, the group learning to function without Amber, and the town having to deal with the fact that there was another Ghostface on the loose all at once proved to be…a lot. For everyone involved.

Naturally, Tara managed just fine. She dealt with the hurdles that came with her sister’s constant presence as they appeared and found a rhythm to fall into relatively quickly.

Things with her friends were similar. With more practice, her persona got easier to maintain and as the group began to accept and move past Amber’s death, it became effortless.

You had grown much closer to Tara over the past months. It was obvious that her insistence to be there for you when needed had paid off. You naturally gravitated toward each other, spending nearly every moment together at school.

You were also doing much better, smiling and laughing again like you did before. The effervescence you usually exuded was back and Tara couldn’t be happier.

There was just one problem.

Amongst the chaos, Tara found that the calm that settled in after Amber’s death slowly faded, her anger returning to her with a fiery vengeance.

But her rage was never more apparent than when she was with you at school.

Those guys that ogled you in the halls didn’t simply disappear (as much Tara wished they did). If anything, they only got bolder without Amber’s presence. Some of the stares she saw them giving you were downright disturbing.

And that wasn’t even mentioning the vulgar conversations she overheard about you.

Every disgusting word she overheard in class or in passing while she searched for you in the halls made her fingers twitch toward her side, looking for a weapon she didn’t have.

It was like before, but now that she had crossed The Line it was so much worse.

Now she didn’t simply want them to hurt, she wanted them to die by her hand, slowly and painfully. She wanted to watch the life slowly drain out of their eyes, for them to die with the knowledge that you would never be anyone else’s but hers.

Tara could only hold back for so long, especially when it came to you.

She gave in four months after Amber’s death, almost to the day.

Her second victim was Daniel Holmes, a lanky art club snob that had a crush on you. During Calculus, Tara would see him drawing pictures of you in his notebook.

His older brother found him on his bed with 11 stab wounds and no fingers. He would never draw you again.

Her third victim was Rowan Morlow, your tall and endlessly arrogant chemistry partner who took every opportunity to make you uncomfortable. He flirted with you relentlessly, ended up giving you a stupid poem about how you were “his sun” that always managed to light his world up.

Tara burnt him alive. The police could only identify him through his dental records.

Her fourth, and (for now) final victim was Jason Lowry, a linebacker for the school’s football team. Tara hated him. He was a repeat offender, ogling you in the halls, saying disgusting things about you in class, and always trying to get your attention. He was always on her list, but the others distracted her from dealing with him.

She finally snapped when she overheard him talking to his friends about wanting to drug you at a party you planned to go to that week.

That same night, she stabbed him 43 times and then slit his throat with so much force that she nearly decapitated him.

(Later that week, she convinced you to not go to the party and stay with her for a movie night. Just in case.)

After Jason’s murder, she had to take a step back from Ghostface and lay low for a bit. The media coverage was picking up and the sheriff was getting more and more intense about finding the killer. Especially after Jason’s (deservingly) brutal death.

The police were really starting to crack down, patrol cars were on nearly every street and Tara couldn’t afford to take any chances.

So, begrudgingly, she locked her Ghostface costume away and took a break from the killings.

Her hands still itched for the hilt of her knife when she saw someone’s eyes on you, but you made it manageable. And now that she wasn’t planning murders, she had more time to spend with you.

You seemed just as eager to see her, which pleased Tara. Biweekly hangouts became you coming over nearly every day to watch movies and just spend time together.

You admitted how terrified you were about the Ghostface killer running around Woodsboro and she nearly said that “she would never hurt you” before she caught herself.

It was the truth. Tara would kill herself before she laid a hand (or knife) on you. But she couldn’t say that outright.

Instead, she offered to drive you home after school every day.

And that’s where she was now.

Classes for the day had ended only twenty minutes ago, so there were still tons of students there waiting for buses and parents. She sat in the parking lot, blaring music in her car while she watched for you to appear at the entrance.

Two songs later, you finally walked out the doors. She perked up, about to get out the car to wave you down, but stopped when she saw who walked out with you.

Wes.

He was matching your strides, pulling you to a stop before you could look out to find Tara in the lot.

Leaning forward, she watched him step close, much too close for her liking, and ghost a hand over your arm. Every time you went to look away, to look for her, he pulled your attention back to him.

It made her want to tear his insides out, but she held herself back. So far, the killings had been deemed random. Two murders within the same friend group would look suspicious. Not to mention the fact that Wes was the sheriff’s son. If she killed him, there would be a manhunt.

Before her thoughts could go forward, you looked over and saw her. The way your expression brightened almost made her forget about Wes, but he remained there. Even after you started making your way to Tara, Wes stood and watched you go.

Tara’s palms itched.

The passenger seat door opening brought her back to the present. She turned to see you already looking at her with a beautifully bright smile that she couldn’t help but return.

Momentarily forgetting about Wes, she put the car in reverse then paused. “Mine or yours?”

“Yours.”

Tara nodded. It was the same answer you always gave, and she forced herself to swallow the lingering question of why.

She turned the music down and handed you the aux before she sped off toward her house. The drive was spent with Tara listening to you ramble about your day, your music playing softly in the background.

But even the melodic sound of your voice couldn’t distract her from the nagging thought of Wes and his stupid crush.

She lasted a few more hours before she finally cracked.

The two of you were in the living room lounging on the couch in front of the tv. Sam was out, thankfully, so Tara didn’t need to keep you holed up in her room to avoid her.

Some movie Mindy recommended was playing on the tv, but Tara had long since stopped paying attention, instead focusing on the feeling of your head on her shoulder.

But again, Wes and his stupid blonde hair invaded her thoughts. He was so close, looked so hopeful about whatever he was talking about. She couldn’t help herself.

“So, what was Wes talking to you about earlier?” She tried for a casual delivery and given the way you answered without hesitation, she succeeded.

“Oh, he just wanted to know if we could study for the chem test together. I told him I’d have to check my schedule,” you said, and she could hear the smile you inevitably had in your voice.

A growl bubbled up in her throat, but she forced it out as a breathy laugh. “He totally likes you, you know.”

You only hummed in response. Tara didn’t like that. She needed a definitive answer to how you felt. So she took a more direct approach.

“Do you like him?”

This time, you sat up straight, putting a bit of distance between you to her displeasure. She tried to meet your eyes, but you stayed quiet, not quite looking at Tara. She clenched her fist, nails digging into her palms so hard they nearly drew blood.

“Because if you do, you could always go hang out with him. I wouldn’t mind,” she lied, unable to keep a touch of bitterness out of her voice.

She absolutely would mind. If you left her for him, she wasn’t sure if she’d be able to stop herself from slitting his throat—sheriff’s son or not.

You looked at her then, eyes wide, “No, I don’t want to leave. I’d rather be here, with you. I feel safe with you.”

Tara’s fists relaxed, pride swelling in her chest at your admission.

“Besides, I like someone else.”

Surprised, Tara froze. Her anger flared again but she tempered it immediately. She knew she shouldn’t ask, that hearing you say anyone’s name but hers would send her on a rampage, but she couldn’t help herself.

“Who?”

You glanced away, lips pursing as you fiddled with your finger. She couldn’t be upset with you for your lack of answer when she saw the subtle shaking of your hands.

“I can’t say,” you eventually said.

Tara’s jaw clenched, but she kept her voice soft. “Why not?”

You brought your eyes up, not making eye contact but close enough, and bit your lip. Tara could barely tear her attention away from it to hear you whisper, “Because it would ruin things.”

“What?” Tara asked, confusion drawing her brows together. What did that mean? What exactly would you ruin?

Again, you stayed quiet, but a deep blush was rising on your cheeks. Your eyes traveled the length of her face as you stuttered something too soft for her to hear.

Finally, you looked up and met Tara’s gaze and she understood.

“It’s me?” she whispered, her disbelief more than apparent in her tone.

A sharp inhale, then you nodded, slow and shy. That was all she needed.

Without another word, Tara surged forward and crashed her lips into yours, kissing you fiercely. You were surprised at first, but you reciprocated with the same urgency, hands rising to her face. At the feeling of your hands

Tara lifted you onto her lap, slowly running her hands from your thighs up to your hips, slipping her fingers beneath the fabric of your shirt to graze your bare skin. A soft yelp escaped you, but you only moved closer, both of you losing yourselves in each other.

You stayed pressed against her until long after the movie ended.

That night you fell asleep in Tara’s arms. She laid awake, barely able to close her eyes with the overwhelming amount of emotion running through her. You had always heightened her emotions, but now that she’d kissed you, claimed you it was different. More intense. A type of euphoria she’d never been privy to.

But the anger still remained, still thrummed at the very thought of someone else touching you now. Unconsciously, her arms tightened around you.

You were finally hers.

And if needed, she would kill every single person in that godforsaken town to make sure it stayed that way.

#this is bad sorry #tara carpenter #tara carpenter x reader #ghostface!tara #scream #scream vi #jenna ortega #idk what tags to use #pls heed the warnings #like it gets kinda concerning #i promise i'm normal

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