#YES i deleted the other post because i realised this was better
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#tbh#tbh creature#autism creature#machine girl#yipee#YES i deleted the other post because i realised this was better#fsorry for the watermark i didnt wanna open an actual editing program LMAO#maya haunts the dash
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Wasting Beats In This Heart Of Mine - how it would have ended
Hello, folks! As some of you already know or have heard me mention previously, my TLH fanfic WBITHOM is coming to an end. I am no longer comfortable with it being in the public eye since it involves a lot of personal stuff for me, and so I have decided to delete the fic entirely on every platform it's been published on (that's Quotev, AO3, and Wattpad) rather than rewrite the entire thing. This will also finally give me the chance to focus on other written works. Maybe I'll return to fandom with a rewrite one day for anyone interested, but for now, the future is dedicated to other things. The fic will be deleted in 48 hours, so readers on Quotev and AO3 have a chance to download the unfinished fic if they so desire before then or just have one last read. I ask that no one rewrites or adds an ending to my fic and publishes it anywhere without my knowledge and permission. Never put an author's work through AI either. I still have several copies of my fanfic and its outline, so I will always have evidence of where the story comes from.
WBITHOM is a monster, with the master document coming to well over 150,000 words and the fic so far being ~146,000 words (the entire outline and all my notes makes up over 4,000 words, yes). I predict that, had I finished the fic, it would come close to 188,000 words (so, there was a decent ways to go still). It's the biggest thing I've attempted, but because of that, it is also the most time-consuming (it's been almost a year and a half of writing, and each chapter either takes two full days to write or weeks) and it takes up the most space in my head, not really leaving room for the other ideas I want to explore.
So, as someone suggested, I thought I'd give readers who were hoping to see the fic to its proper end some closure. That's what this post is for: how it would have ended. Along the way, I'll explain some things too about recurring themes and motifs and all manner of behind the scenes and thoughts behind my ideas.
Character Arc Summaries
As readers know, this story follows the characters of Lila Raftis, James Herondale, Cordelia Carstairs, and Matthew Fairchild. They're all the most significant figures, though we do see other perspectives and side characters too. Essentially, Lila Raftis struggles with loneliness due to a myriad of other issues she has to work through, and James Herondale's arc starts with his depression and turns into a journey to authenticity where he feels like his own person and not just what he has been written or expected to be. Cordelia Carstairs' physical state of being lost extends to how lost she is within, and she ends realising that she has been continuously defining herself through other people. I see her as leaving London and the love triangle with James and (unconfessed) Matthew (and Lila) to deconstruct a lot of the ideals she was trying to live up to and why. As for Matthew Fairchild, I made the deliberate decision for him to turn into a werewolf and have that separation from Shadowhunter society so that he could pursue the arts and build a better life that he would find more satisfaction with, also eventually becoming sober. I took inspiration from his time at the academy, particularly when he turns to Lila in one of the earlier acts and asks if it's so bad to not be a Shadowhunter. At first, he regrets turning, but I planned for him to wind up relieved.
Honestly, while this work is very self-insert (and that's not a bad thing generally, but I've been finding it uncomfortable as time goes on, so that's why I prefer to take it down and keep it to myself), it was also my way of going How It Should Have Ended for the TLH series as a whole. I started it before ChoT, yes, but that book only led to minor changes and alternate paths taken -- I was already using ChoI as a base to steer these characters in the directions I thought they should go.
The Rest Of Act Three
The rest of Act Three of the fanfic is summarised below (...at length. It's a lengthy summary).
We ended the fanfic on the chapter where James and Lila returned to London, 1903 of his dimension. He was gravely wounded in his left arm, which ends up being amputated despite the efforts of Lila and Lucie (and Gus' help too). This is, of course, a reference to the recent fan art of James where a headcanon went around that the reason we couldn't see his other arm was because it just didn't exist. I took it and ran, which was not planned. I knew I wanted James injured so that Lila could return the care he once had shown her when she was wounded badly, but it wasn't going to be as severe as it ended up being. This is how we ended up at the Institute instead of 48 Curzon Street as I had previously planned for the chapter. James was going to be fine, but Cordelia had decided to confront Lila about several things, and they'd end the night having kissed -- which in turn leads Lila to going for a walk to clear her head and her subsequently getting kidnapped by Jonathan Bell (the Other James from another dimension). Anyway, the change did make some of these plot points awkward (😭) hence why I spent ages editing the make out between Lila and Cordelia because I could not decide how it should start and end. It was a nightmare. As Silver pointed out, it didn't make a whole lot of sense in the order of events (Cordelia should have gone to see James first), but I was in a mad rush to finally release the update since I knew people were waiting. The kidnapping also was not quite as dramatic as I envisioned it, but oh well. I'm actually quite happy with the rest of the chapter though.
From there comes the rest of the fic that readers probably will not get to experience, so that's why I'm writing this out, so you at least know the mysteries that I won't get to reveal and how we get to the end.
Jonathan Bell kidnaps Lila and, through the use of shadow, they end up in Paris, France. This is where Matthew also fled after his mother released him from the Silent City cells after he persuaded her into it. Lila ending up there and being away from both James and Cordelia, and spending more one-on-one time with our antagonist and Matthew since the earlier parts of the book was always intended.
Jonathan is revealed to have possession of another silver pen, which is a reference to a previous fanfic I wrote (also deleted) called Chain of Lies, where the pen could literally rewrite reality if you used your own blood for ink. In Jonathan's dimension, Lila ended up staying in his world and marrying him, but she also dies of a mysterious sickness during their honeymoon, so he uses the pen to go back in time and cancel their honeymoon, under the impression she would not get sick. Instead, she was hit by a car several days earlier, and died in the accident. Jonathan goes back again to stop that from happening, but Lila ends up dying again anyway, over and over again in different ways, every time Jonathan reverses time to prevent each event from occurring. Eventually, he goes so far back in their timeline together that he's reliving the December when they met, and that's how he knows how to divert the accidents in WBITHOM that threaten harm to this other dimension's Lila (are you still with me?). But before that, he created a time loop in that December of his dimension just trying to keep Lila alive for two years of his life whereas everyone else remained the same, but stuck in time. It's supposed to be very angsty and tragic, and it's a demonstration of one of James Herondale's core traits eventually twisting horribly wrong: how he would do anything for those he loves, whether that be family, friends, or lovers.
This character flaw/strength is something I reference lightly a few times throughout the fanfic, mostly in the ways he is concerned about the safety of his family and friends which he tries to find out from Lila, who has read Chain of Iron and knows what the future is supposed to be, and then how he reflects on how he does not know what he would do when someone he loves dies. Honestly, the issue is that he cares too much about people, which is both a good thing and a bad thing, depending on how far it goes. Jonathan is the literal embodiment of what would happen if James' care went too far, if it bordered on obsession, if he wanted to keep someone from dying so bad that he would sacrifice everything else, even the universe.
So, Jonathan finally confesses to the time-loop and explains that as a drastic measure, he tried finding Lila in another dimension to see if he could save her there, but this tearing of the time-loop to escape it worsened a tear that Cordelia had already created in her fight with Belial and the Mandikhor to such a point that it started growing and expanding and destroying the fabric of time and space between dimensions and the universe as a whole. You know, wibbly-wobbly, timey-wimey... stuff (Doctor Who reference for those who get it). The thing he did not realise though is that in this timeline, Lila is not meant to die, so long as she goes back home instead of staying in 1903 (he still doesn't know this, it's just a fact I would have explained to the readers when we meet Circe, the employer of Poppy Morad (P.M.) and Saint Nicholas). This is supposed to leave Lila conflicted, because as much as she wants to hate his guts for being the reason for her family disappearing and the worlds ending, even this Other James is a reflection of her own nature, which is another thing that's been lingering beneath the surface for the duration as the fic: while James has a doppelganger that demonstrates who he might become if he cannot accept loss, he and Lila have similarities boiling beneath the surface that go unnoticed until an outburst we saw Lila have where she basically accuses James of being just like her (not complimentary at the time).
Lila as a character is someone who cares deeply, but is willing to sacrifice herself and others to protect what or who she cares deeply about (yet we also see her choose self-preservation over self-sacrifice a few times before she truly starts acting in service of others). Her circle of people she cares about is more limited than James', but the shared sentiments still stand. Plus, the way Jonathan has acted this entire time has always bordered on unnerving or odd -- I did that on purpose. He's been driven to obsession, where he's basically an extreme of what James and Lila believe in. And he is both James and not James in this way, if that makes sense. We see in one of Lila's nightmares earlier in the book Jonathan saying it does not matter which version of him he is or which version of her she is -- they belong together. Fully delusional at this point, but it's meant to be scary. I'm kind of obsessed that Jonathan is also a mirror for Lila to see how she might look to her James: someone who knows you way too well, but you've also never met nor know much about at all (she might know James but she does not know this one), who's inexplicably fixated on you (granted, James did not even begin to guess Lila's feelings, and hers were rather superficial in a way until they spent more time together).
Anyway, basically, the start of this rewrite of Chain of Lies pretty much began with these dynamics between the two Jameses and Lila. It was a whole thing with diagrams and late night ranting to my poor sister and everything.
So, of course, Lila is conflicted and she also does not know how she's supposed to get Jonathan to reverse the problem he has created -- whether he's also supposed to go back to his dimension and whether that will be enough to repair the tear. Most of this happens in the Notre Dame cathedral because I said so (I like cathedrals as settings, sue me if you dare).
Meanwhile, Matthew has been in Paris and totally avoiding Charles, so he also hears nothing of Will and Tessa being notified about James' injury in London and leaving by portal. But he does hear some French Shadowhunter gossip about the Consul's werewolf son's disappearance when he discovers Lila being taken to the cathedral by a masked man. Then ensues a solo rescue operation. Honestly, I always have a lot of fun writing Matthew, it's hard not to include him more. Anyway, the rescue is successful, and he takes Lila back to his hotel room to lay low for the night before he gets her back to London with the others (since he recognises that they must have no idea where she is, what happened, and she's an integral part of solving this whole mess, as people are still disappearing in this world).
I had a really nice scene planned that I'd been waiting the entire book to write, but basically Lila and Matthew spend a sober night together (as opposed to their time in the Silent City together) where they talk about all their woes, including their love lives, and eventually they get on to the topic of how they could have smoothed over both their dilemmas if they just had each other as lovers, if only their similarities were not such that would probably be self-destructive at this point in their lives. Because we've seen often in the book other characters compare these two, but it's these two themselves who recognise that, yes, they are alike in some ways, but not the ways it counts in order to have a healthy romantic relationship. They settle on being good friends. Matthew also takes her measurements so they can pick up some quick changes of clothes since Lila's still wearing her grimy outfit she wore during the explosion. And she also brings up that she knows he's an artist, but asks that she have the chance to sketch him, and he offers to do so in return, so they spend the rest of the night drawing, which I just find so sweet. There's not much significance in that at face value, it's just cute, but I also see Matthew embracing an old hobby as one of the first steps he takes in moving on from all his pain and finding better outlets for it.
Also, the platonic nature between Lila and Matthew, the complicated romance with James and Cordelia, and then all the familial themes and side-plots going on are all part of an idea I had going into this that I wanted to demonstrate many facets of love and the importance of each in their individual right. If anything, given the extreme slowburn I've come at James/Lila/Cordelia with particularly, I want to end this book purposefully with none of them winding up together because so many other things mattered more than their romance, and even the kind of loves they have for each other are a reason they don't end up staying because they would all rather see each other safe and not see each other at all than know they might cause other problems by being in the wrong dimensions.
Anyway, because I do multiple perspectives for everything, while Matthew and Lila and Jonathan have their bit going on in Paris, back in London we see James coming to terms with his disability and in all his rumination over what's happened and Lila being missing but him being unable to go out and find her, James finally (FINALLY!) realises his romantic feelings for Lila. This also leads to a scene between him and Cordelia where they both discuss Lila and their feelings for her. Cordelia also confesses how she has felt for James for a long time, but she also explains that she wants nothing to come of it anymore because she does not see herself settling down with him like she previously thought. James is a bit stung by this (I mean, my guy had no idea about Cordelia's true feelings until now and then she also springs a rejection on him at the same time when he's just begun to realise some of his own feelings around her) but is ultimately relieved since he feels he needs more time to figure out who he is and the life he wants without the bracelet numbing him.
We also would have seen Poppy Morad and Saint Nicholas again and their increasing distress and alarm with how difficult Jonathan Bell has been to track and control since he's hared of to Paris with Lila.
When Jonathan finds out Lila's gone, he feels betrayed and frustrated by his failure. Because while he feels he has saved her, she's refusing to be his as she once was in his dimension (also why he was confused and then against her leaving and going home earlier in the story). The world is breaking down around him (we start to see parts of Paris going up in flames, not unlike London 2021 of Lila's dimension) and he's about to go track Lila down again (but now he's going a bit more heavily into Villain Mode).
We also see Poppy Morad closing in on Jonathan as he returns to London when she's defecting orders from Circe, her higher up, to take him down instead of corralling Lila's effects on the timeline.
Lila and Matthew return to London on Christmas Eve just hours before the end of the world properly starts in 1903. This is also when she and James interact for the first time since he passed out on the bridge several days ago. I was a bit undecided on how I wanted this scene to look, other than I needed them to finally confess their feelings for each other in the rain like a cliche after they have an argument where Lila says that James has everything she wants (and this is where we realise the root of her problem in this whole book is not simply loneliness, but a dissatisfaction with herself and her life, which has lent itself to the more superficial issues she's been having) but that ultimately she also just wanted him though she knows she cannot be with him without risking everything. So, when James confesses his side, they decide to spend what little time they have left with each other as best as they can. (And this where I as an author push them together like Barbie dolls and go "now kiss").
Have I mentioned this story has too many layers and plot points and it's been driving me mad this entire time I've been writing it? Anyway.
They quickly determine with The Gang™️ that "Belial" and "Lilith" are not who they seem to be anymore, because while Alastair just got arrested for the murder of Lilian Highsmith (oh yeah, that happens while Lila and Matthew are in Paris, because I wanted a reversal where it's Thomas who stands up for Alastair when he's accused of murder, just for funsies) everything else that has happened seems to be related to whoever this P.M. (remember when Cordelia was also accused of murder because Filomena thought she saw Cordelia when she was attacked?) and Matthew body double is (spoiler: Poppy Morad and Saint Nicholas are codenames for other versions of Cordelia Carstairs and Matthew Fairchild in another timeline, I'll explain more about this later, but what you can probably surmise already is that this alternate Cordelia has taken the place of Belial within this dimension and is the one murdering all the victims (including her father. That was a difficult point, because we see in a PM and Saint Nick scene that he's concerned about whether she can go through with it) and Matthew has taken Lilith's place in some minor ways (like hiding and then handing back Cortana at the right moments)).
Anyway, because Lila's kind of behind on some events, she goes to confess to Cordelia (but explain how she also feels about James), when Cordelia says there's a lot more she wants out of life before she pursues romance again. That she's been so consumed by it, by finding love, by getting married, she's lost who she is beneath it all. (Have you noticed the theme for every character in this fic is basically authenticity and finding oneself despite whatever circumstances they find themselves in?)
Then, we also would have seen Lila dedicate herself to taking down Jonathan herself since he's the main problem that's tearing things apart and perhaps if he's killed then he can no longer influence time and reality.
Vaguely, I had planned that James and Lila would have what my outline says is "an emotional night together" because it could mean literally anything and I wasn't totally sure where I wanted it to go. So. Interpret that one how you will with whatever you prefer, honestly. Anyway, while that's happening, we see Matthew go home to his mother who is, understandably, worried sick and mad because he never wrote to her like he was supposed to and Charles return without him. We see Matthew collapse into her arms and just sob. That was the plan. It's important to me that he's actually vulnerable with her for once and that he, a young man too big to be in his mother's arms, lets himself be held anyway. There was also supposed to be a wholesome Thomastair moment that I hadn't really planned, though I knew Alastair would go home with Cordelia afterwards and she would start her journey to forgiving him. We also would have seen her kneel in front of Sona to confess A Whole Lot Of Things about what's been happening in her life, from as early as the marriage blanc and the Blackthorn Manor incident. Basically, everything is supposed to be hopeful even if it hurts just a bit and feels a little bittersweet. Because then in the chapter this all would have taken place in, we'd end with Saint Nicholas and Poppy Morad collecting the pithos from Christopher who picked it up in the background of everything (basically, all the Belial storyline has still been operating as it should, except it's being orchestrated by PM instead of Belial), when Jonathan sneaks up on them and fatally wounds (he had the intent to kill) Saint Nicholas, who he is shocked to find out in that moment is an alternate Matthew.
AND THEN, next chapter we would have had at the tolling of midnight, signaling Christmas day, PM the alternate Cordelia (whose character is the way it is because she's been hardened by some long and traumatic years -- she and alternate Matthew have a tragic backstory that I've been keeping in my back pocket that wasn't really necessary to be explained in the story, but if you want to know more, just ask) drags a dying alternate Matthew back to their tent where Circe, their mysterious employer, is torn away from her work elsewhere to start enacting emergency world-fixing in this timeline. This is also when we find out Circe's identity: she is Cassandra Clare, once again (if you read Chain of Lies) who's codename was derived from the common shortened CC she's referred to in fandom, who has universal powers and basically controls (to an extent) a good portion of the universe. Like a god. But also not. It's a whole mysterious thing that I never intended to explain because I think some things are better unexplained.
THEN, Jonathan shows up to 48 Curzon Street, covered in blood and calling for Lila. A fight between him and James (and sort of Lila who's attacking Jonathan though he refuses to attack her) ensues before he ends it all by taking out a silver pen (The Silver Pen) where we see 'Nikoletta' engraved on it, and writes a time-loop which snaps the final threads keeping all the timelines and dimensions in order.
Act Four Explained Slightly More Briefly
This is the final act of the book and also the shortest. It was planned to only be about six chapters long. Now, I was most excited about this part of the book because I had ✨visions✨. No, literally, the entire inspiration of this entire fanfic came from a dream I had about James Herondale as Spider-Man, me impersonating Cordelia Carstairs and not knowing how to do Shadowhunter things, Santa Claus as Father Time, and the end of the universe, and this is where we would have finally get to see it all come together.
We kick it off with an entire chapter dedicated to a lot of scenes similar to what I've written earlier in the book with Lila and James' nightmares, where nothing makes complete sense and yet the reader is meant to feel on the cusp of understanding something alongside the characters before the dreams usually end. Only they don't here. The dreams are reality, but reality is broken, and there is no waking up because there is also no sleeping and there is no normal but faint memories of what came before. So not only is the environment ever-shifting (think of it almost like a kaleidoscope and you have maybe a quarter of my vision here), but the people also keep "glitching" between different versions of themselves at different points in time and in different realities even (sometimes the doubles join and then they split apart, it's a weird nightmareish sort of thing in my mind), and so they also have different memories and levels of knowledge about things that have happened and what's going on. We see it mostly through Lila and James' perspectives. There's supposed to be a lot of angst and a feel like everything is a fever dream.
In the next chapter, things only start to get slightly ordered when Jonathan Bell finds Lila and says he'll rewrite the universe she wants so that it's perfect for her, and can have it be anything she wants, so long as they are together (major creep vibes though, honestly, as sweet as this might sound to some). This is also me addressing a problem from my original fanfic before this one, Chain of Lies, where I basically gave that silver pen waaay too much power, and now I'm demonstrating what it can do and so, like the one ring to rule them all, it must be destroyed (once Lila or someone else gets a hold of it to rewrite and fix the fabric of everything). Alastair saves Lila from Jonathan this time (he's still a bit prickly, but we see he still cares about Lila anyway), and demands she go find Cordelia to end Jonathan (Cordelia has Cortana which can cut through anything, which is important). Then we also would have seen that James is stranded somewhere with a fluctuating Matthew (the vision is that he keeps changing states from a werewolf to a living corpse to himself at various ages) and they are attempting to find PM, the alternate Cordelia, who knows Circe who should be able to fix everything as PM explains (she got separated from Circe and Saint Nicholas when the world went crazy). She leads them partway before she's taken by the collapsing world (she disappears basically, because that can still happen to people). When Lila finds her Cordelia, she's in the Paladin state (imagine glowing eyes and a vague aura of scariness with a glowing sword and you've got it) and it takes a bit to get through to her so they can make a plan to take down Jonathan.
Chapter after that, we have Cordelia distracting Jonathan so Lila can steal the pen, but she realises she does not know how to write an ending that does not kill all the Jameses since, as Jonathan once put it in her nightmares, "it does not matter which version of him I am... we are the same". This hesitance gets Cordelia fatally wounded, though she's not quite dead yet, but it's the final push Lila needs to kill Jonathan with Cortana (as also seen in a dream she had ages ago without realising it), and Circe finally manages to pull enough worldly strings in this chaos to pause time long enough for James and Lila to reunite to do the re-writing with her.
From there, we have two alternate paths. I called these basically "the happy ending that could have been" and "the bittersweet ending that was", which I was inspired to write by The Umbrella Academy (if you know, you know, I won't spoil it for anyone else who doesn't).
In the happy ending that could have been, we see the characters a couple years down the line. We also find out that Lila would not have died like she did in the other universe. She and James are together and they end up planning to propose to each other on the same day, which is the day after Lila successfully ascends. Then we see Cordelia and Matthew travelling together across the world as friends. After that, we would have seen Thomas and Alastair having dinner at the Lightwoods'. Finally, the Raftis family believe Lila is missing, presumed dead, but after a couple years they are finally moving on.
The bittersweet ending that was though is where Lila goes home. The friends she's made in London 1903 see her off before James takes her back to her dimension where they'd have one final goodbye on Blackfriars Bridge. That night, Cordelia gets on a train to set off and travel on her own. We also see Matthew, who has already picked up Oscar a couple days earlier, going to Gus' flat to complain that Oscar misses Gus and would not stop whining until they came by. We see Matthew finally tentatively suggest a first date, and Gus would accept. We close this part of the ending much like we started the book, with James walking alone in the night, just as he was when he left the Devil Tavern and his story took a different direction to canon when he found himself outside Cornwall Gardens where he met with Alastair. This time, James is alone, and he's feeling a little hopeful about the future ahead.
We get one final chapter before the epilogue where it's mostly Lila's perspective as she finally gets to experience Christmas with her family in 2021 and I planned for the beginning of some family healing and bonding to occur. Then we would have seen future James once more, who it turns out is now tasked by Circe (CC) with maintaining the space between dimensions, but this means he can't be in any one for very long since it's a lot of work that takes up time.
And now we get to the epilogue. Every time I imagine this, I get a little emotional. The epilogue would have began several years in the future with Lila dropping a bi-annual letter into the Thames, which I liken to the River Styx, in that it's where all lost things end up. We see, rather comedically, that she has moved out with the money she gained from some things she "stole" from Curzon Street, as well as her mysterious finding of the adamas, which scientists in her world are still amazed by. We are surprised to see though that when she goes home, she's living with the version of Matthew who nearly died in his previous role as Saint Nicholas, because CC gave him a chance to live out a new life elsewhere, in a dimension where there was not another version of himself. He and Lila seem to be doing well.
We cut to James of around December 1905 who has gone to visit his family at the Institute, where Lucie and Jesse are pouring over Cordelia's latest letter from abroad. James says he was just at Matthew's flat, and Gus was telling him about theories of time travel that the mundanes at the university Gus attends were discussing. We also find out that James himself has written a book, a science fiction piece with a ridiculously long title, about different worlds and the doubles of people that exist. After the dinner, he goes to Blackfriars Bridge and produces several of Lila's letters out of a pocket before stowing them away and shadow travelling to her dimension to leave a letter for her.
The fanfic would have ended on James' letter, which mentions briefly that he is having nightmares again of Belial's return since they have heard nothing have what happened with CC. Aside from that, the letter is rather sweet. But we see that Lila never gets a chance to read it, because CC collects it first and burns it with a lighter while humming "it's beginning to look a lot like Christmas".
Concluding Words
And that, ladies, gents, and fair folk, was how Wasting Beats In This Heart Of Mine would have ended. It has potential for a sequel. One I never want to write except in my head because, man, I am so exhausted by this fanfic alone after I already did it as a rewrite of Chain of Lies. If anything, this is the sequel to Chain of Lies and the next potential story would be the third book. It's been a long few years, I'll tell you that.
Some final things:
If you're wondering about that green coat I was always mentioning: it was supposed to be my tell, along with the gold-ringed eyes, for Saint Nicholas being an alternate Matthew, who is also the leader of the SoHo wolf pack in his origin universe. For Poppy Morad as the alternate Cordelia, who worked as Matthew's partner in time shenanigans, it was the fact that people forgot her face once they saw it because of a facial rune she applies (one that does not exist but she has courtesy of working for The CC). That's why people often knew they saw Cordelia, but could not remember the details of that meeting, if they managed to remember her at all.
The reason Lila has essentially what I call "a death aura" is because of her alternate selves, many of whom die, and it's something that leaks between worlds as the walls steadily break down.
At some point in Le Grand Reveal Of The Time-loop, Lila realises that the detailing on Jonathan's mask matches the floral detail on the back of The Joker card she's been carrying around with her sister's initials this whole time, which hints at just how significant some of the objects in this story are and the meanings they can give (The Fool and The Master being other common names for the card, related to its unpredictability and capability of being anything).
Jonathan wears, obviously, his crimson cape, but his clothes are a deep navy blue and this is part of my reference to Spider-Man and the original dream that inspired all of this.
Future James does indeed have diamond stud earrings. I said so.
At the end of the book, CC would have reinstated Lilith and Belial (whom she removed for previously causing problems in other dimensions where they became too aware of alternate timelines) with altered memories, so the stories can generally continue where they left off (some a couple years later, which has some interesting effects if I wrote the next book, in theory).
And I think that's all I have. But if anyone has any questions at all, feel free to reply to the post to ask, message me, or put it straight into the ask box, I'm more than happy to answer since I'm already depriving you of a properly written-out neat ending to everything. Reminder that I am deleting the fanfic WBITHOM in roughly 48 hours from the time of this post, so after that it will not be available on any public platforms for reading. I am not taking down any of my other fanfics (except for the few that I already have some weeks ago).
Thank you to the readers who have supported me on this longass journey. You were often the reason I kept going when I wanted to give up on writing fanfic, especially writing this one, which has been a very trying process (I mean, it took me half a day just to explain the last approximate third of the damn book, for crying out loud). I appreciate the kudos, the comments, and all the enthusiasm. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
Take care now, and I'll see you in the updates of other works in the future.
-- streettealee
P.S. special thank you to @thevagabondexpress who endured many hours of me blabbering way too much about this fic and these characters, who I pestered to give me feedback as I fretted over whether I was doing everything right (spoiler: there's no right way, just better ways), and who cared about this when I struggled to. You suggested I might find a way to give readers some closure. And so I also give thanks to @faithfromanewperspective, who went nuts for an Australian OC (understandably, as I would too) and blazed through my entire fic and encouraged me inadvertently to start updating again after a long dry spell. You still absolutely get to see my drafts and outline next time we catch up in person, but I hope for now that this is a good description of the rest of what the book would have been and it gives you some closure, as well as for the other readers. Thank you also to @quantummeep for reading and commenting! I can never get out of my head how even early on in your reading you recognised all the plot threads that I had been weaving together, and it meant so much to me that you appreciated the level of detail I tried to work with.
Thank you all and to the other readers who also supported me 💛
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A Fine Line Bonus 1
The first A Fine Line bonus chapter!!!!
Pairing: Namjoon x reader
Genre: just fluff, love that for them
Word count: 6.4k
Content: no real warnings for this one. A mention of cum and a penis, that's basically it.
A/N: FFS I have written this post out twice and then accidentally deleted it all so I fucking give up lol it's here and it's unbeta'd and I hope I'm back, baby!!!
Epilogue 4 | Masterlist | Bonus Chapter 2
Bonus Chapter 1 - Fear and the First Date
“Does this mean I can ask you out now?” he asked as his hand trailed lightly up and down your back. It had barely been five minutes. You were still sitting on him, soft and sticky and sated.
You lifted your head from his chest and looked at him, perplexed.
“What do you mean?”
“On a date,” he said, as though it were obvious.
“A date?”
“Yes, a date.” Slower now, like you were stupid. “Like dinner and a film, or we can go to a museum, or I don’t know, fucking bowling or something. You know, a date.”
You did know. You knew what a date was. You just didn’t know you were going to go on them. You’d sort of already skipped that part, you thought. Weren’t you past the dating part now? You couldn’t picture it: sitting across the table from him, in some restaurant, some expensive, pretentious restaurant he would take you to. Just you and him, looking at each other, saying what? It wasn’t as if you hadn’t had conversations with him. But a date? Were you going to go on a first date with a man who already knew what you looked like naked, how you sounded when you writhed underneath him? A man whose soft cock was still inside you, whose cum was drying down his length? A man you’d been living with for the better part of a year? Did that make sense?
“Just so you know, you have to say yes.”
You pressed your face into the crook of his neck. Half of you felt that fluttery kind of excitement that you supposed you should feel when asked out on a date. The other half of you felt blind panic. It wasn’t so much about whether or not you wanted to, but whether or not you thought you even could.
Namjoon prodded you lightly in the side with a finger.
“Look, I get it.” His voice was soft and quiet. “I’m not going to force you to do anything you don’t want. But you picked this, right? You want this? I said this—this-”he gestured to the two of you there, naked, entangled, “this matters to me. It means something to me. You said it did to you, too. I get it if you feel like running away. But... You can’t actually run away.”
He sounded calm; he spoke evenly, slowly, but you could feel his heart in his chest, could feel him heat, flush, could feel him swallow when he’d finished talking.
You hadn’t forgotten what you’d said. It did mean something to you. Too much. You had made the decision and you had thought that was the hard part. They said it would be easy; you just did it; you just let someone into your life and that was that. You had believed them. You had said yes. But now you were here, having to say it again. The alarm bells ringing in your head telling you to evacuate, to cut and run, to quit while you were ahead, to not expose yourself to that kind of hurt.
The kind of hurt that Namjoon was exposing himself to. Had repeatedly exposed himself to. For you. Because he wanted to be with you.
It hit you again, the realisation that he has feelings. He was nervous. Nervously kind of joking about you running away, bailing on him. Nervously kind of not joking, reminding you of your words, holding you to them. You were awash with guilt and shame because you had to realise this, again, that he had feelings, too. You were so wrapped up in yourself that you had to be reminded of it. It made you wonder why he wanted you. It made you think about him saying he had terrible taste in women. It made you feel, in a small, quiet way, that he still did, that you would be another of his mistakes. You decided then and there not to be.
“I’m not running away,” you replied quietly. “It does matter to me.”
It wasn’t easy. You had to accept that maybe it wasn’t going to be easy, at least not yet. But you had to try. You owed it to yourself. You owed it to him.
“Good.”
He turned his face into yours, nudged your nose, and made you look at him.
“It’s ok, you know,” he whispered, his lips brushing yours as he spoke. “It’s going to be ok.”
“How do you know?”
He kissed you then, cupped the back of your head to bring you closer, to press his lips to yours.
“I don’t know.”
“Then how can you say that?”
“Not everything has to end in disaster. Even if it has every single time you’ve tried before. Maybe this time, it will go right.”
“That sounds like the definition of insanity.”
He huffed a small laugh, a little exhale blown over your face.
“Well maybe you make me crazy, huh?”
*
“You’re nervous!”
“Yes! Of course, I’m nervous! You don’t have to sound so fucking happy about it!”
“But it’s sweet! It shows you care; it’s nice.”
“No, it’s not!” you cried down the phone. “It’s horrible and I hate it and I don’t know what to do! Honestly, it makes me want to take everything back and just run away.”
“You’re not going to do that,” Lina replied and you thought you heard a hint of a warning tone in her voice. You tried not to let it get your back up.
“Obviously I’m not! God, I’m fucking trying, ok? But this is stressful! How, how do people do it? Date? DATE?! I mean... We haven’t even-” You paused in your pacing, mid-step, mouth open. “We haven’t- we literally have not spent any time together outside the four walls of this apartment.”
Lina was quiet on the other end, as if running through her own memories to confirm.
“There’s a first time for everything.”
“YES, and it’s weird! And scary! And like- god, is dating always this stressful?”
“You’re talking to a woman who met her husband at 18. I have no idea.”
“Fair point.”
“Also, your situation isn’t exactly normal-”
“Which makes it worse! How do you go on a first date with someone you live with? When you’ve already fucked them a million times?!”
“You may be overthinking it.”
Of course, you were overthinking it. You had gone from trying not to think about Namjoon at all to thinking of nothing else. But not like before, when you thought about him fucking you, thought about unravelling—you and him alike—thought about all the things he’d done to you and the things he would do again. Now it was just him. His hands. His dimples. The softness in his gaze when he looked at you sometimes.
It was terrifying. The idea of him, of you, of the two of you. There were parts of you resisting, still; you were aware of them all the time. They made you want to flinch when he reached over to tuck your hair behind your ear. They made you stew in your bed at night, unable to sleep, telling yourself that it was never going to work out, that it was time to cut your losses, to get out while the getting was good. It had been only days since he asked you out, since you had finally said yes to this, but they had somehow stretched into lifetimes, each lasting longer than the previous and every hour more stressful than the last. You should have been eagerly anticipating this date. You were dreading it.
But there you were, dressed and sweaty and panicking, waiting for him to pick you up, convinced it wouldn’t work out, he wouldn’t want you, the world would see you together and utter a swift, definite ‘no’.
“He’s coming to pick me up; did I tell you that? What’s he going to do, buzz at the door as if he doesn’t know the codes? Pretend it’s not his apartment he’s coming to?”
You swore you heard Lina sigh dreamily.
“He’s romantic.”
“You know how long it’s been since I’ve been romanced? I don’t know how to do this.”
“You’ll learn. Just let it happen. Stop resisting it.”
“I’ve been resisting for so lon-”
“Exactly. Stop. Follow his lead. Trust him.”
“You say that like it’s so easy.”
“It’s not easy, but it’s necessary if you want to-”
“I know, I know. I don’t need a lecture.”
“Sorry.”
You sighed this time.
“No, sorry, I’m just-”
You heard the doorbell ring and froze. He was here. Fuck.
“He’s at the door. He’s standing outside the door of his own apartment, waiting for me to open it. “
“Well don’t leave him waiting! Go on! Have fun! Make good choices!”
You rang off and smoothed down your dress—or wiped your sweaty palms all over it, one or the other. You walked slowly to the door and slipped your shoes on before opening it.
You hadn’t stopped being bowled over by the fact of him, the physical reality of his being. That he was so tall and so handsome in his crisp, white shirt with his too-short hair and his eyes that always saw right through you. The power of him hadn’t diminished at all: the way he made your heart flutter, and your pulse race. It was, in fact, stronger now than ever. You were going down so, so badly.
His cheeks dimpled as a smile spread across his face when he saw you.
“Hello, beautiful.”
You blushed, tight-lipped, and tried to accept the compliment graciously. It was still new to you.
“I’m ready to go,” you said and he nodded back at you with a scrunched-nose smile.
“Tell me,” he began as you shut the door and walked together down the hall. “Do you hold hands on a first date?”
You looked at him, shy and embarrassed all over, and he looked a little the same.
“I, uh, I don’t know?” You laughed awkwardly. “I haven’t been on a first date for... a while, a long while... Do you?”
There was a pause that went on a little too long and felt a little too strained. You couldn’t believe you might have already put your foot in it; you’d only been on the date twenty seconds! Then he said,
“What about Hoseok?”
You almost stopped in your tracks, your steps falling out of rhythm with his, and when you looked at him, he only glanced over and then away again.
“Uh, well, I... It wasn’t really, we didn’t. It wasn’t like, dating. We weren’t dating. We didn’t- it wasn’t. We didn’t do... dates.”
“Oh. Right.”
You didn’t know if it was the wrong answer or the right one. It was the honest one.
“Well,” he said, taking your hand in his. “I do hold hands on a first date.”
He grabbed your hand and gave it a squeeze and you felt your knees tremble.
*
Namjoon was good at this. Dating. Sitting across from you in a restaurant, eating, drinking, talking, smiling at you and joking with you and being so unutterably charming, you almost couldn’t believe it was the same man who had routinely pinned you up against a wall and fucked you so hard you couldn’t breathe.
You had sat down, stiff and self-conscious, all too aware of the tables on either side of you, the couples sitting there, over-hearing you—listening to you? It didn’t matter if they did; you wouldn’t be saying anything salacious, but you felt so exposed, sitting there so publicly, announcing to the world that you were trying to get this man to like you, a man so much better than you were on every measure. You assumed everyone could see right through you, see who and what you were, see that he would be better off without you.
It made you stupid. You felt embarrassed and conspicuous and it was so distracting that you kept forgetting to listen to Namjoon when he spoke. Your leg bounced under the table incessantly; your eyes were darting about, scanning the restaurant behind him, looking for people looking at you, talking about you. As if you had never been out in public before now. As if there was something so strange and unusual about a woman being on a date with a man.
Though it was strange and unusual for you. Was it strange and unusual for Namjoon, too?
He wasn’t acting like it. He was talking to you as if you were the only person in the restaurant. He didn’t notice when the woman next to him almost spilt her glass of red wine on herself. He was sitting with his back to the restaurant so he didn’t see every person, couple, and group come and go. He just kept his focus on you. Always looking at you, seeing through you. You had no idea what he saw.
“Are you listening?” he asked.
“Oh yes! Sorry, no, what did you say?”
He laughed and turned to glance over his shoulder.
“Looking for better options?”
“No! No, of course not. Sorry, I just...”
How could he understand? Sitting there so comfortably, so confident, so at ease in himself. You couldn’t sit there and tell him you were nervous, that you were so nervous, you couldn’t concentrate. You thought of all the differences between you, wondered how this could ever work. He was ready to receive the world and you had nothing to give.
He interrupted your thoughts with a hand over yours.
“You’re not having fun.”
He wasn’t asking.
“No, I am! I...”
“It’s ok.”
You caught the guarded disappointment in his eyes and wanted the ground to swallow you whole. Then he stood and offered you a tight smile before walking towards a waiter. He gestured to your table as he spoke and, when the waiter moved off, he didn’t come back to, but went to the counter. He took out his wallet and paid for the dinner you had only just started.
Was it over?
A different waiter approached the table and took your almost-full plates away and you were trying not to cry when Namjoon returned.
“Here-” he shared the last of the wine from the bottle between your two glasses. “Drink up!”
You took the glass on autopilot and gulped at the wine. You didn’t want to ask what was happening. You would put this off as long as you could. If it was over already, if you’d messed it up before it had even had a chance to begin, you were going to make him do it. End it. Dump you? Does it even count as dumping if it’s only your first date? And where would you live? Where would you go? What would you do? It would be the final nail, the last straw. You would ship yourself off to the outback and live alone where no one else could be hurt by you, where you couldn’t get anything wrong.
A waiter approached with a bag of packaged-up food and Namjoon stood again, extending his hand to you. You took it and he led you out of the restaurant. You had somehow missed the moment he ordered the taxi, but it was there, just outside, waiting for you; Namjoon opened the door for you to slide in.
“Where are we going?” you asked, quietly, when he sat down beside you.
“Home.”
“Oh.”
With the bag of food wedged securely on the floor between his feet, he took your hand and placed a kiss on the back of it. You didn’t know what that meant. Maybe he was just waiting until you were back in the privacy of your home. The backseat of a taxi was no place for it and he was a considerate guy, after all.
He kept hold of your hand the whole way home. He also kept quiet. So did you. As you slipped your shoes off in the hallway, he gently told you to go and sit at the table. You followed the direction without protest. You took your phone with you and furiously tapped out message after message to Lina, filling her in and pleading for help.
You: what does this mean?
You: I don’t know what he’s doing.
You: should I ask?
You: do I help? I can’t even bring myself to look!
You: what do I say to him? How do I know what to do?
You: tell me what to do!! I’ll actually do it!
Namjoon was clattering about in the kitchen; you were doing your best to ignore him. You had buried your head in the sand and ignored the truth for long enough; you’d had the practice; you’d wait for him to break through, pull you out, then maybe kick you out.
Lina was not replying.
“Here.”
Namjoon placed a steaming plate of pasta in front of you—the very one you had ordered at the restaurant—and he placed his own dish opposite you. He returned to the kitchen and opened the fridge.
“Ok, well,” he called, “there’s half a bottle of white-” he grabbed it and then opened a cupboard to the left “-and a whole bottle of red, but I’m pretty sure this is the red Taehyung got me and it’s completely undrinkable. What do you reckon?”
“Uh... I guess... both?”
He laughed—it was almost a cackle—and brought them both over to the table with a pair of glasses. He poured the white wine out, two big glasses, emptying the bottle, and lifted his, gently clinking it against yours.
“To Date One version 2.0.”
“Oh,” you replied. “So... we’re still on a date?”
“Yeah!”
“But here?”
“Yeah!”
Namjoon hesitated then put down his wine glass with a quiet thunk. He tapped his fingers lightly on the table for a second and then spoke.
“Look... I want you to enjoy this date. You were not enjoying it at the restaurant. And I’m trying not to take it really personally that you don’t want to be seen with m-”
“No!” You flung a hand out to grab his; his fingers, still dancing on the tabletop, stilled. “I don’t... I don’t want you to be seen with me.” You had to pause, take a deep breath. You owed him what you were feeling because you had made him feel bad. He was, as ever, being honest with you and letting you in and you had said you were going to try. You had said you were going to do this. Practice makes perfect. No time like the present.
“I felt so embarrassed because it felt like everyone was looking at me, or us, looking at you and wondering what the hell you were doing with me... Because I still don’t... I don’t get it. I feel like a mistake.”
“You feel like a mistake?”
“Yes, I feel like I’m going to be a mistake for you. Another one.”
Namjoon almost chuckled but only almost.
“Because I have terrible taste in women.”
“Yes.”
He sighed and nodded.
“Yeah, I guess it was my fault for saying that. Maybe I should have said I had terrible taste in women... Do you want to get into it?”
He looked like he didn’t.
“No, not if you don’t want to. I’m sorry for ruining our date.” He didn’t want to get into his but that didn’t mean you couldn’t get into yours a little. “I was—am—nervous. I was so nervous I forgot to be excited, which I am! I am excited about this, but I still find it so hard to believe. I- I said to you before that I’m not a person yet and I’m not. I don’t feel like I can give you what you deserve.”
Namjoon straightened up in his chair and folded his hands across one another.
“Didn’t we decide that I get to be the judge of that?”
You shrugged. You knew the logic was on his side but you couldn’t accept it.
“Well, then, unless I say otherwise, you are welcome—encouraged—to assume that you’re giving me everything I want.”
You couldn’t quite bring yourself to believe that and it must have shown on your face.
“How about this,” he suggested. “An agreement, a deal: if I want something from you, I will ask. If you want something from me, you will ask. Straight up.”
The fact that he believed you were capable of being that upfront about your needs, wants or desires almost made you choke on your wine. Half the reason (or even the whole reason) you had got into this mess together was because you weren’t capable, not even of being honest with yourself.
“Just like that?”
“Just like that.”
“What makes you think I can do that?”
“Sometimes I think I know you better than you do, y’know? You don’t see yourself like I see you at all. I do think you can do it.”
It didn’t seem like you were going to get out of this one. So you nodded, hesitantly at first and then more surely. You could try, at least.
“Good. So now you have to trust that I will ask you when I want something. Maybe like right now.”
“Right now?”
“Yes. I want something from you right now. I want you to enjoy this date, please.”
You giggled, relieved.
“Ok.”
“Think you can?”
“Yes, I think so.”
He smiled and nodded and picked up his fork.
*
Namjoon was good at dating. And it turned out, when you let yourself relax, you were good at it, too. The laughing and joking and flirting did come easily; the other stuff might not but you had this at least.
“I’m your equal,” you said suddenly, not knowing it was true until you said it out loud.
Namjoon’s eyes raised high on his forehead.
“Uh, yeah?”
“I mean, you think I’m your equal.”
“Yeah... Should I... not?”
You felt like you were beneath him, were convinced of it, but he never acted like he thought that. He never treated you like that. He treated you like an equal. He gave to you and he asked you to give back. He wanted this to be equal between you. As if you were equals. As if you—
“We’re in this together.”
A second passed and he blinked. Another second passed and his face softened, then relaxed into smile.
“Yes. We are equal. We are in this together.”
That was new for you.
“You like me.”
He laughed.
“Yes, I do. And you don’t believe me when I say it.”
“It’s not—well, I suppose... I don’t know. It feels hard to believe. Sort of. One the one hand, I believe it, because we’re here; you’re here and we’re having fun and you- you asked for this, you wanted it. You want it. So, I believe it. But, at the same time... Dating has not been a part of my life for a long time. Being wanted hasn’t been part of my life for a long time so it feels—I guess I thought I was over it? That part of life? I guess I thought that was it, y’know? I couldn’t leave and my husband didn’t like me or love me or maybe he did but not how I wanted it, not how he used to, not—I don’t know. That makes it hard to believe.”
You paused and sighed, inwardly rolling your eyes at yourself. Because you were making this all about you. You could hear yourself doing it now.
“Sorry,” you continued. “I keep- it's not- I-… I know I keep bringing it up, making excuses or something. I’m just always dragging my baggage into everything-”
Namjoon shook his head and you paused long enough for him to speak.
“You can’t let go of your baggage; it’s your past and it’s part of you and you’re talking about it like it’s ancient history but it’s been less than a year. Things take time. And, you know... You won’t ever be able to put the baggage down, but there are things you can do to make it easier to carry.”
“Like what?”
“Therapy?”
“Can’t afford it.”
“I can pa-”
“No.”
“Why n-”
“No. I said no.”
He rolled his eyes playfully.
“Ok, well have you ever considered talking about your feelings?”
“Hey! I’m trying!”
“And I’m teasing.”
And he was. Because he could. Because he knew you well enough both to make the joke and to know that he could. He knew you. And he was sitting here across from you teasing you about it. Teasing you about your shit as if it were endearing. As if he liked it.
Because he did.
*
“Ok, then, Namjoon,” you swivelled your now-empty wine glass in his direction, “tell me this: do you kiss on a first date?”
He leant back and tapped his hands on his stomach, tipping his head side to side as he looked at you.
“Well, that depends.”
“On?”
“How well the date has gone.”
“And how well has it gone?”
His eyebrows raised.
“Oh, is this date over?”
You gestured to the empty plates in front of you, the wine bottles emptied, too. He leant forward then, elbows on the table, chin resting on his hands.
“You mean you don’t want dessert?”
A shiver ran through you, part-delight, part-relief. This was the part you could do. Sex was… It was easy. You were well-practised now. Namjoon was familiar. You fit. You were comfortable. It was so much easier to physically expose yourself to him than it was to be emotionally exposed. And it was a relief that he still wanted it, too.
“Well,” you said, leaning in to mirror his pose, “I didn’t say that exactly. What dessert do you have in mind?”
He held your gaze for a second, maybe two, then he scooted his chair back across the tile floor with a screech and walked over to the freezer. You snorted with laughter when he started digging through it.
“Hm, we’ve got… one frozen hotteok and… most of a tub of mint choc chip which must be yours and, honestly, is kind if making me re-think this whole thi-“
“I am not having this argument with you again. You have known this about me for long enough now. Either accept it or kick me out.”
He looked over at you as if he were considering it, kicking you out, as if he were considering making the joke, pretending to kick you out. He put both options back in the freezer and kicked the drawer shut.
“I think I’ll keep you around a little longer.”
“Is that right?”
You stood and carried the empty plates over to the sink, placing them down gently before slotting yourself between Namjoon’s legs as he leant against the fridge.
“So… Dessert?”
“Oh, you actually want the mint ice-cream? I c-“
He was half-turning, as if to re-open the freezer and you pushed his shoulder back into place.
“No.” Moving even closer to him, close enough to smell him, close enough to have to tip your head up to see his face. “I was thinking… something else.”
You lifted onto your tip toes and he bent his head to bring you almost nose-to-nose.
“If you kiss me right now, that means it’s a good date, right?” you asked, whispering into his mouth.
His only reply was to do just that, kissing you gently, his hands resting light on your hips. But it didn’t stay gentle, didn’t stay light. Because it had actually been days since you’d been this close to him; not since he’d asked you on this date had you tasted him. You slid your hands up his arms and linked them behind his neck; you let your balance fall forward into him so he was more lifting you than you were standing, the tips of your toes just grazing the ground now. His hold on you was tight, secure, like it always was, like he didn’t want to let you go.
Until he did. He broke from you and lowered you to the ground once more. Your brain whirred in a series of question marks as he straightened up, the distance from your mouth to his bigger and bigger.
“To be clear-“ his voice was lower now, a little strained. He cleared his throat. “I want to be clear: I don’t fuck on the first date.”
You tilted your head to one side, mouth still hanging open.
“Uh, you… don’t? I mean- we’re not… We aren’t going to have sex?”
He shook his head, eyebrows pulling down over his eyes.
“Is that a problem?”
“No! No, of course not. It’s fine. I just… I’m just… surprised, I guess.”
Surprised and disappointed. Surprised, disappointed, and confused. Because it was entirely reasonable for him to not want to have sex on a first date, or even a second, or a third, or any time, but… this wasn’t really a first date. You’d had sex before, plenty of it. Just days ago, even. Had something changed? You weren’t sure what. You didn’t know how to do this, after all.
“Ok, no sex on the first date. How many dates does it take?”
You needed a number to shoot for; you needed to know when it might end, the not having of him, the nerves, this anxiety and vague discomfort unsettling you.
“How many?”
“Yeah, if you don’t have sex on the first date, which? Second? Third?”
“You sound like you just want to get in my pants.”
“Well, yeah, I know what’s in them.”
It was a joke. You had thought it was a joke. You expected him to laugh, or grin at least. Smile a little.
The joke fell a little flat and silence fell between you for a beat too long.
“Is it that important to you? The sex?”
You’d mis-stepped. You’d got it wrong but couldn’t work out why. The sex always worked between you. This was the part that was supposed to be easy. Did dating really have to complicate everything?
“I don’t know what you mean… Isn’t it important?“
There was a pause before Namjoon replied.
“You remember before I went away, when I told you I didn’t want to sleep with you anymore?”
“Yeah.”
“Because I wanted to get to know you?”
“Yes.”
“That still applies.” He shrugged. “We’re dating now, right? I want to date you. I want to get to know-“
“You do know! You do! You said yourself you think you know me better than I do!”
“But there’s still so much I don’t know! The dating stuff: where did you grow up and what is your family like and all of that stuff. I don’t know any of that… Look, I’m not saying I never want to have sex, obviously, and I’m not trying to… hold it ransom or something I just…”
He trailed off and you didn’t try to fill the gap for him. You couldn’t. He just what? He just what?
He shuffled and averted his gaze, staring down at his fingers tapping on the counter.
“I just don’t want it to be the only thing you want from me.”
It hit you like a ton of bricks. The only thing? But you wanted everything.
“I know you’ve said you want this,” he continued, turning back to look at you, his eyes inscrutable and his courage in being able to look at you unfathomable. “I know that. And like I said, I’m trying not to take any of it personally because I know this is hard for you and I know you’re trying and I don’t want to make you feel bad—I’m really not trying to do that—but I just… when I have doubts, I doubt that you really want all of me.”
You blinked. You could’ve been knocked down with a feather. HE doubted? HE doubted that you wanted him? Before you could reply, a little voice piped up in your head:
‘Well, can you blame him?’
No. No, you couldn’t.
So much time passed in your surprise that Namjoon sighed and moved past you, reaching for the tap and sponge. He turned on the water and started to wash up while you still stood, unmoving, struck dumb by the revelation that… he felt the same way as you. That… he knew how you felt. That he could understand.
It began to dawn on you that maybe this was what sharing feelings was all about. Maybe this was what it got you: understanding. Maybe if you had shared your feelings before now—long before now—so much of your trouble and strife might have been avoided.
You didn’t share feelings. You didn’t grow up in a family that shared feelings. And you grew averse to it, cautious of it, sceptical of it. Then you grew scared of it. Scared of all the secrets you were keeping. Scared of letting them out. You were so scared of your feelings that you had let the fear of them control you. Maybe sharing them wasn’t weakness after all.
“I don’t think you want all of me.” It wasn’t a radical statement coming from you; you’d basically said as much before, but it felt different now that you were echoing him.
He paused and you realised he was waiting for you to continue.
“I- I don’t just want sex. I do want it but I don’t only want it but I-”
Fuck, you could feel your skin prickling knowing what was coming. You could feel sweat begin to gather in your palms. You couldn’t look at him as you said it. You weren’t as brave as he was. You took a deep breath and looked at his feet.
“I feel like it’s the only thing I have to offer you.”
He opened his mouth as if to protest but you didn’t let him interrupt.
“I told you before I’m not a person yet. I don’t have things to give. I’m… I’m blank. My life is blank but you, being with you, sex is… You make it-”
You squirmed, uncomfortable, horrified by your own act of disclosure. You looked pointedly away from him, reducing him to a blur in your peripheral vision, the only way you felt you could continue.
“… Colourful.”
It was mumbled, barely audible.
“Huh?” Namjoon asked and you groaned.
“You make my life feel… not blank.”
“Hm? Are you sure that’s what you said?”
A flash of frustration burst in you and you turned to glare at him, only to see him grinning, almost laughing, at you.
“Namjoon!”
Your hands balled into fists and you couldn’t stop your left foot stomping the floor.
“Say it. I’m going to make you say it.”
“I don’t want to!”
“You have to!”
You cried out to the ceiling and continued staring at it as you said it, a little too loud and a little too aggressive.
“You make my life feel colourful! You bring colour to my world! And I hate you!”
You heard him laugh and then you felt his arms around you and his lips on your cheek.
“You’re cute.”
You made a show of trying to push him away.
“Shut up. I don’t like you anymore.”
“Hey, you’re supposed to be honest with me.”
You sighed and leant into him.
“It’s not just about sex,” you said, muffled against his shirt. “It’s just that sex is the only time I feel… It’s the only time I don’t feel this gulf between us.”
“There’s no gulf.”
“Yes, there is.”
“You think there is but there isn’t.”
You looked up at him, pouting, stubborn. He rolled his eyes playfully.
“Ok, fine, let’s say there is a gulf. You know what also exists? Bridges. Transport. A gulf is not uncrossable.”
“I know it’s not, because it’s not there when we have sex.”
“I’m not going to sleep with you tonight-“
“I know! I’m not- sorry! No, I know. I’m not trying to pressure you, sorry. Sorry. I-“
“It’s ok, just making sure we’re clear.”
“We are.”
He stepped backwards and took your face in his hands. He kissed you, just a little, just enough to make the noise in your head turn down, to make a soft hum start up where the anxiety had been.
“Doesn’t mean I don’t want to,” he said quietly, his face still close to yours. “I do. But we’ve done this all in the wrong order and I want to…” He moved back and you didn’t flinch this time when he tucked your hair behind your ear. “I want to do things right. For you.”
You broke the eye contact first, swallowing hard as you willed the moisture in your eyes to disappear. You nodded.
“But—” Namjoon lifted your chin and tilted your face to his—“We can kiss as much you like, what do you say?”
“Yes please.”
*
It was late now. Make-up off, pyjamas on kind of late. You were lying in bed, all too awake because you could feel Namjoon next door, knew he was there, and felt his absence in your bed like a new kind of presence. It was keeping you up.
So you did the only thing that made sense to you. You got out of bed and knocked on his bedroom door. He came to it, blinking and dishevelled.
“I know we can’t sleep together but… can we sleep together?”
He frowned, confusion written large across his sleepy face. You walked past him and climbed into his bed.
“Like, sleep. As in, actual sleeping. Just sleeping,” you called across the room as you shuffled down and pulled the covers up.
You saw him shrug as he shut the door and made his way back to you.
“I’m not sure this is very first date behaviour,” he mumbled, his voice low and groggy.
He nevertheless wrapped his arms around you and pulled you close against him.
“We’re not on the date anymore,” you replied. “This doesn’t count.”
He kissed your shoulder.
“Is that right?”
“Yeah.”
Silence followed his responding hum and you felt sleep tugging at you quickly, surrendering yourself to it more easily than you had managed just five minutes ago.
“Besides,” you whispered, your words slow and thick and fighting against sleep, “I always sleep better with you.”
“Mm, me too.”
You weren’t sure if he was really awake; in the morning, you didn’t even remember the exchange. But you did sleep better next to him and you woke, happy in his arms.
Epilogue 4 | Masterlist | Bonus Chapter 2
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Hello Internet!
I like tumblr because it feels safe and more nice. It’s a weird day because I thought I got cancelled because I liked the colours Blue and Green 🤣🤣 … never thought I’d ever say that…
Weird right? I also keep seeing words like “antis” “solos” and I really don’t know/want to know what it means but now I feel bad because lots of people think I’m not ok. I’m fine! I’m actually laughing now 😂. I just had a FT with my friend Mae and then remembered the internet is not real life (lol)
This all started because I wanted a blue and Green penguin toy instead of a bush baby toy called Linus (we like Linus now)
I guess I just initially panicked because even when people are interacting (but aren’t mentioning me directly) I was still tagged… so I was flooded with….”you’re a freak” “ew” “no” “delete this” and someone actually said “k*ll yourself” and it just felt like it was all directed straight at me and i literally had no clue what went on. I usually post them close things because comments make me feel anxious but recently I’ve been trying to be more interactive. It’s 7am and I just spent the last few mins just reading through (I can’t sleep lol) and realised it was a lot of peoples other conversations, not necessarily directed at me but to do with some sort of fictional story? (I’m not going to look into it, I just want ppl to like my music and make friends)
Yes, I feel better that it wasn’t directly at me however I think human beings should try and speak to each other nicely especially if they’re strangers on the internet. Luckily (minus the horrible ones) , a lot of the tweets made me giggle but I’ll refrain from mentioning colours and mammals. I was also warned to not bring up homes and pregnancy which I do not wish to try and understand but I won’t be mentioning that either. I’ll stick to posting hot pictures of myself and music promo and maybe just try and keep interactions to my hand written letters hehe. I love my darlings but me and the darlings were … VERY confused…
Btw this isn’t some sort of official statement (it’s not that deep lol), I just like using tumblr like an online journal and I do vlogs here which I like and sometimes do long posts like this! I just need to get back to bed so started writing this and I’m now sleepy again.
I love you all
Ps: get off the internet please haha 😂 ❤️
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SOCIAL JUNGLE!
And I disappeared two and a half years ago from social media I was active on, posting, liking, and sharing memes. At first, I started using less social media, and one day, I woke up and deleted all my accounts on social media. You might say that you use Tumblr, and I would say Tumblr is more media than social. I use it to read poetry and share my writings. Around two and a half years ago, I deleted all my social media without telling my friends and acquaintances. My phone was active initially for the first couple of months, and after that, I stopped using my phone; I use it sometimes, but I rarely switch on my phone.
Initially, it was tough without a phone and social media as I always had the urge to go back, but I controlled myself. I always wondered, do my friends think where I went? But the surprising thing was only three of so many people I know tried to contact me, and all those I thought were my friends don't give a shit whether I am alive or not! Some think I deleted social media because my life is horrible, but the truth is that I deleted it to feel peace, and now my life is happier without living in a social jungle. The amount of peace I have felt in all these years is unbeatable. There is no drama, political agendas, and awful people. Life is good here.
I always thought I might be left alone without any friends, but I have realized I never actually had friends; those people with whom I used to hang out were not my friends; they were just people, they were the strangers I knew, and I learned that I was alone with them. Real friendship and authentic relationships are where two people choose each other and stay with each other without any conditions. All these years, I have realized so many things. I have built a strong relationship with myself. I have learned many new things about myself. My strengths, my weaknesses, and my triggers, and I have learned to listen to my soul` this all was not easy if I see I have changed a lot in the past years, and yes, I have also failed myself so many times, but I refused to give up on myself.
I am not the person I was two and a half years ago, and I am not the same person I was six months ago as I have been realising a lot lately. I have learned to differentiate between right and wrong. My mind feels so light all the time. I don't think I will ever go back to the social jungle again, and I am so proud of myself for not giving up on myself and for always acknowledging where I am wrong and right. I have learned to accept myself.
There is a lot I need to improve in myself. I am working towards it with a healthy spirit. The social jungle is not my place. Life is better without fake people. Social jungle apps control our minds without us knowing what they are sinking deep into our subconscious minds. The change I have noticed in my perspective toward life and society after getting off social media is positive and immense. Social media is using human minds like a trash can, and from where these big companies are making a good amount of money. Staying away from fake people is so peaceful. I have fewer people in my life, but I know they are the real ones.
Now I read more. I learn more, and I understand my world even more. I feel freedom.
@scribblersobia
#social media#life without social media#social jungle#poeticstories#writerscreed#poeticstateofmind#writerscribbles#algorithms#so proud of myself#life is happy#gratitude#scribblersobia
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did you delete your shinran future post? i liked it so i could read it later and now i can't find it anymore
hey!! yes I did -- for reasons that end up boiling down to not liking how I worded things and making it all seem much more uhhhh negative then I intended to. Sorry about that!
I've been thinking these past few days and if you still wanna know what I WANTED to say but hopefully better worded here you go. Also sorry for any spelling/typos I'm actually on my computer for once so I dont have autocorrect to save my ass. <- can never remember how to do the cut thing on mobile
I think in real life ShinRan would not work out. I want to emphasize in real life, because ShinRan is my favourite ship (despite my occasional dabbeling in Heijshin) and I love them and I want them to work out and this is, at the end of a day, a story about them and their life and how much Shinichi loves her. I do actually consider the manga a lovestory first and foremost, because Shinichis main motivation is to return to Ran and to live a happy normal life with her -- normal crossed out because I doubt they'd ever be able to live a normal life, but you get what I mean.
In univerese I imagine they'd work out similarly to Yusako and Yukiko, where yeah there's a case every other day, but they still get to spend enough time together to make up for Shinichi having to get up during dinner to safe the day or whatever. Shinichi actually returning to his life as Shinichi and a potential reveal where Ran realises that huh he never actually did leave her alone and had good, legitimate reasons for his "absence" -- that would probably really work in their favour. If he actually gets his shit together and works with her/lets her tag along (in case he ends up being a detective like her dad) that'd be a hugeee plus (bodyguard ran :sideeye:).
If he ends up going the police route with a semi regular (???) work schedule and a DUTY to leave, even during, perhaps, dates or whatever, I think Ran could cope with that as well, knowing how her dad used to have to leave her mum and her admiration (?) for the policemen/women in her life (<- so long he doesnt go down the Furuya route and/or joins one of the many, many organisations that would probably beg him for help once the BO is taken down. Like I think Ran would probably be over the whole spy/really dangerous people are after my life all the time thing and straight up beat him up if he tried to.)
In real life though I only see too real possibilties: either Ran gets tired of having to wait for him all the time, before the reveal even happens, (which has,,,sorta?? happened in canon already?? like its a joke at this point, and she does have the patience of a saint but lets be real) -- a girl can only take so much, and having to watch her sit around and wait for him all the time hurts even as a fan. Like at some point she'd be fed up with his shit or, if she somehow managed to hang on, Sonoko'd be fed up with his shit.
Like someone in her life would go: you know what? screw this and make her move on and they'd be right to do it too. Again, love Shinichi, like that's my special guy and whatever, but I don't think Ran, or anyone for that matter, could be happy in a relationship like that. Option two is...well...unlikely to say the least becuase, lets say the reveal does happen before she calls it quits and the BO gets taken down and Shinichi gets the therapy he needs -- unless he stops working as a detective, I honestly don't see them working out.
Finding out that your childhood best friend and boyfriend almost died, multiple times all while trying to protect you and lying to your face over and over again to do that is STILL putting himself in danger again and again??? I don't think Ran would like realistically be able to sleep every time he'd be out solving cases or whatever. And I dont think Shinichi would let her come along either because his main motivation is to protect her and she's already gotten in danger during "normal" cases before. AND SHE WOULDNT WANT TO KEEP WAITING.
So. Either he quits (which I don't see happening, not for lack of trying on his part but rather his ability to attract danger and also his sense of justice wouldn't let him I think) or they call it quits for their own sakes.
But this isn't real life so idc shinran on top lmao in my head they get married and live happily ever after
#THIS IS PURELY MY OPINION PLEASE DONT BE MEAN TO ME I DONT WANT TO ARGUE NOOOOO#I DO NOT SHIT HIM W FURUYA BTW FURUYA ROUTE AS IN WORKING LIKE FURUYA FOR THE PSB#detco#case closed#meta?#shinran#shinichi kudo#thanks for the ask!#asks
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I know you and other accounts on Twitter fight a lot to expose Effie, but I think it’s better to just ignore her. Don’t take this the wrong way, I am actually all for exposing who she is, she does harm people. But her endgame is to tie herself to him and his children forever (as she confirmed it), which means even when they will be adults. She is posting all kinds of wrong every day, hoping people will repost and tweet her nonsense. It’s giving her attention. Notice how nobody comments her posts? She doesn’t have any engagements, but then when Armie’s fans repost what she has said and done, they are giving her the engagement she craves and that proof will stay on the internet. This is why she always deletes her crap minutes after tweeting. Not because she doesn’t want to get reported (she will never be reported by twitter), but because she waits for his fans to repost her fanfictions involving his children or whatever SS she crafted. We all should ignore her, whatever she posts. He’s been cleared, we should focus on that and not give her any attention, and she will wither away, this is the worst thing that would happen to her. There is a reason why he isn’t interacting with her, why he’s ignoring her, why he doesn’t block her. Ignoring her is why he is free of her power now. Elizabeth should be exposed yes, but I think we should all stop giving attention to Effie. Just wait and see what will happen if we do. Once again, this is just an advice and I know we all want her to get her comeuppance, but this isn’t the way. We should celebrate Armie instead.
As a general rule I prefer to do both.
I can and will celebrate Armie whilst ridiculing her utter bullshit, and throw it in the face of those still stupid enough to try and defend her.
The problem is (and I don't know if this is common knowledge) but it's not just Armie she's victimised. She has an entire 'support group' she's created for genuine victims, created solely to gather abuse stories she can either steal for her own, or use to get her knickers wet.
So yes, while I wish we could just ignore her, this is bigger than Armie and Lying Lizzie, and the more she runs her mouth because Armie is ignoring her, the more people realise what she's truly about.
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not to martian this but i was gonna be like "2010 seb pavloving mark so badly with his long pullable hair he still gets a reaction 12 years later!!" delighted in correcting myself: mark is pavloved simply by seb's proximity. but anyway um yes please elaborate on ur thoughts why would u threaten to delete the gospel truth
PLEASE you are so right about it just being Seb's proximity. I am never EVER getting over any interview of them over the last few years but especially Silverstone 2017 Channel 4 interview where Mark is all gooey eyed touchy. See Seb -> Brain Function Re-Diverted immediately kinda deal (mood). Bless you for seeing this vision immediately as Martian because.,,, YEAH me too ;-; & THANK You for allowing me to talk about this some more 🙏
seemore-ing this simply because I am 300% certain I'm going to go off on several! tangents. sebmark ramble ft. pink hair bobbles below the cut (. ❛ ᴗ ❛.)
weeeee i am not good at collecting my thoughts into coherent writing unless I spend several hours plotting beforehand ALAS this needs to be said from my desk whilst I should be working;;
Something something exactly Mark being absolutely feral for Seb's long curls in 2010. there's just so much to grab there y'know !!! So much availability to shove his fingers through it and pull. Not just when Seb is expecting it too? He's just easy to tug around by his hair a bit :( It's easy to make Seb look at him if there's a fluffy mop of curls right there to grab at and yank :( And there’s this one time that 2010 Sebi GIGGLES and ties his hair up and it’s just a joke that he ties it up because it’s not really quite long enough for that and he ties it a little too high, so it sticks up at an odd angle like Sebastian was expecting when he did it - but then he’s sat between Mark’s thighs and the joke isn’t really funny anymore. (And then he does it a few more times for good measure. Because it makes cleanup easier if they’re on a schedule and Seb doesn’t really have the spare time to be washing Mark out of his hair before he goes out in public. Because Sebastian actually sort of likes it, grows his hair out even more just to be able to tie it better. And now every time Mark sees that little hot pink hair bobble Sebastian's suddenly got dozens of in his vicinity, even just on his wrist, or when he’s fiddling with it in his fingers in a press conference or debrief, or he inevitably finds one hiding in his own pile of laundry, he twitches and sighs and zones out.)
And now cut to 2022 when Mark gets to watch Sebastian's hair start to slowly grow out through the season, at first sure that eventually he's going to show up one day after not seeing Seb for a week or two or more - both caught up in their own lives with work, on different time-zones and they get that, it's part of the business - and he's going to see him again in photographers Instagram posts, or discussion with other people, or grabbing some spare time with Seb, or upon arriving at the paddock himself that Sebastian has cut his hair and it's shorter again. But that day just never comes? His hair just gets longer and longer every time Mark sees him!!! And Mark just doesn't say anything. Because it's whatever, and he absolutely definitely isn't thinking about it every free moment (and NOT free moment) he gets.
Sebastian's hair keeps getting longer and now Mark's fingers are twitching every single time he's in close proximity to Sebastian. They do a lot anyway, an itch to touch, to close any space between them, but this is different. His fingers start to curl a bit at his own thighs rather than just twitching fingertips, he absentmindedly threads a hand into his own hair like he's just slicking his hair back but he tugs a little on the way, and that only ever leaves him feeling... unsatisfied and a little hollow and not realising the correlation.
Sebastian's curls start to fall over his forehead, down the back of his neck, and get in his eyes. Mark's fingers twitch all the more, even seeing Sebastian on the big screens when he's working distracts him. and he still hasn't put two and two together? that oh- moment hasn't arrived!
Sebastian shows up with a headband, eventually, and Mark misses the curls that had started straying over Seb's forehead. Especially misses watching Sebastian pushing his hair back behind his ears, a move that always looks bashful to Mark even when it's not. Mark decides quietly to himself that he does not like the headband.
It’s when Mark sees Sebastian brush his hair back with both hands as though he’s about to tie it up in a little ponytail that he gets his aforementioned oh moment. Except it’s sort of more of an oh shit moment because he feels like the bottom of his stomach drops through the floor in that moment that he’s convinced Sebastian is about to have a little pullable ponytail and Mark is almost certain he’s about to see Sebastian fish a little pink hair tie out of his pocket. The headband comes back out again instead though, and Mark isn’t sure if he’s more devastated or relieved.
AND HONESTLY this is where my plot making skills fall apart because I write all the pining and then inevitably fall apart at the final hurdle. But perhaps Mark shows up one day and it’s after a comfortable slow build up where Sebastian just about has him out of his jeans, that Mark stops him and takes the same coloured hair tie out of his pocket that Sebastian used to use religiously, drops it into Sebastian’s open palm, and asks him if he would, just for old times sake? Just for him?
YEAH. JUST. Sebastian in hair bobbles :( Mark LIKING Sebastian with his hair tied up and not realising how much he’d missed it :( 2022 Mark at the place where instead of ruminating on it alone he just. Asks Sebastian :(
#soph.answers#SORRY this sat in my inbox for a while because i had to immediately turn my pc on to type a landslide of words#i don't write anything publicly like. ever. so this is. this#also ames if u want me to answer this priv rather than public lemme know!!!!#AM I SUPPOSED TO COMMUNITY LABEL THIS? WHO KNOWS NOT ME#userxoames
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The amount of times I go to make a post and then delete everything before/during/after I start writing because I realise what I'm writing is stupid or I worked out the answer or I talk myself out of it without actually saying anything
Anyway, since I'm here now I'll just say I figured as long as I keep the name consistent throughout the whole fic then it should be okay. I'm going to change it so that it doesn't always keep switching between the two names because that's confusing and even if people know who I'm talking about well you can see why I delete everything before I post because I go on a tangent (if you can call this a tangent) about something trivial such as names and other names people go by in fiction
This led me to reading and looking at fics and I didn't go through many but general consensus is that it's to stick to one name and one name only unless someone's calling them by their nickname and I think going with "Evan" instead of "Vanoss" is more appropriate however, "Delirious" instead of "Jonathan" is better since it's like saying "Nogla" instead of "David" and you know, that's just how it is, isn't it?
I'm speaking nonsense kinda well it makes sense to me anyway I'm going to make these changes now and then maybe post the prologue I really want to post it I'm going to post it and expect hate because yes :) weird writing lol
#squir spiels#I don't mean that last part negatively although maybe it is kinda negative#I don't know what to expect from this but oh well#it'll be interesting since I never really delved into this kind of writing before#and I want to keep it up too#I put effort into those text messages so I have to!#they're not featured in the prologue and I don't know how long this fic will go for so yeah T-T#need to keep writing in order to reach those texts
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10, 18 and 21 for Fanfic Ask
Thank you so much for asking!
10. Is there a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?
I'm sometimes surprised how deeply Once More,With Feeling resonated with some readers. It is my first published fic and the one I sometimes think I could have written better now than I was able then. But then I get reviews which say it's someone's favourite and feel very positively surprised.
18. What’s one of your favorite lines you’ve written in a fic?
I don't really have a favourite line, but I have favourite chapters and scenes. In OMWF it's Mary and Matthew's engagement and the way she is telling him about her relationship with the other version of him, and Mary realising that Tom is also a time traveller and she is not alone.
In ITFT it is the chapter where Matthew learns the truth about Pamuk.
In The Heiress, it's Mary's confrontation with Vera, the letters between her and Matthew when they confess their feelings for the first time and Matthew's first day of leave in the spring. Also some of the scenes in the honeymoon chapter I am working on right now.
For The Bet it would be Mary and Matthew climbing the tree, their kiss on the road from the train station, Matthew working through his feelings with Jack and then Mary's confession.
Ambulance Driver: Matthew and Mary in the cottage during the battle, their conversation after Mary shoots that German, the dugout collapse, honeymoon, when she sees him in a wheelchair for the first time, the first time they are intimate after his injury.
21. Have you ever deleted an entire scene after spending hours laboring over it? If so, why?
Yes, several times.
In Ambulance Driver practically the whole chapter with Patrick Gordon. I've written this story out of order and by the time I've reached that point in the plot, Matthew was emotionally in a completely different place than I initially envisioned and so was Mary. I did regret it a bit because I really liked some of the scenes, but they didn't fit in anymore at all.
The other big one was in not yet published part Time Traveller's War. I had great dramatic plot with Matthew, Mary and Richard, but then I decided to change the course of the story and it didn't fit anymore. I scrapped it with big regret and am still considering whether not to post it as a one shot AU at some point.
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Do you think something is going on with Jimin ? He looks so sad over all. And today he was literally hiding under his mask and hat, clinging to Tae and Jhope throughout. This is really worrying. Taking a break from sm often is understandable but completely quitting it ? I hope he connects with us once in a while. Other members regularly updates and I'm not expecting him to do so. Some smarties here will say I'm entitled. If you think so then yes, I want to know whether a person I adore so much is happy... just posting a pic or a message in weverse once in a while is enough for me. I hope nothing negative is going on in his life. He usually post this ' we will come back safely message but he didn't do it this time '. We all miss you Jiminie
I understand that we care about the members, that we want them to always be well and I understand that we care about Jimin because of the shit that stupid people say about him on social media but what we shouldn't do is assume that there is always something wrong with him based on one gesture or one action. You in this post have associated Jimin being down with things he has always done.
He was hiding under his mask and hat: Are you serious? Jimin has ALWAYS done that when he wants to. In fact he, Yoongi and Jungkook are all experts at wearing masks and hats that practically cover their entire faces. That's not an indication that he's not feeling well or that something is wrong.
Clinging to Tae and Jhope: You've never paid attention to Jimin's relationship with the two of them? That was the most normal thing in the world. Maybe it's not something we usually see in airports but it's normal.
Many of you seem to forget important details when they don't fit into your narrative but BTS went to the airport in the morning and they've already said more than once that they're not used to that. Jimin has said more than once that he goes to bed super late so he was probably tired and didn't sleep much or at all. Jin said in one of his posts that he had played video games until 8am and was therefore going to sleep through the whole flight.
"Giving up social media: Is it so hard to believe that a person doesn't like to be on social media all the time even if that person is famous? Jimin hasn't given up social media, he just doesn't post as much as others but he does occasionally. I don't see anything wrong with that and I don't understand how that translates into something being wrong. Now if he does it because he realised the shit they say about him on social media I'm glad! It makes me happy that he prioritizes his mental and emotional health over his fans wanting to see a picture of him.
Anon, with all due respect, just because a person posts something on social media doesn't mean everything was fine with them. Or that they are fine.
I was depressed and having suicidal thoughts a while back, and I still posted pictures and even motivational messages.
You are not only entitled, but you are also selfish because you want Jimin to post something for YOUR satisfaction, regardless of whether he wants to or not. Don't you think we'd be better fans if we respected the fact that he doesn't seem to want to do it? And that regardless of the reasons why he doesn't do it should be respected?
You guys need to stop associating with Jimin that something bad is happening because he stopped doing something he used to do. People change. He has done so in many ways and that should be respected. That's what a good fan would do.
I've received several asks with this same narrative and I've deleted them all, this is the only one I'll post. I know that many of you don't give a shit about what I say about my blog, but know that if you send me any more of these, I will delete them.
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I have some things I've been thinking about when it comes to the hybrid AU and I wanted to hear your thoughts if you are open to it. But please please feel free to immediately delete this if you don't want to read it. I'm going to say Trigger Warning for SA just to make sure I don't hurt you or anyone else.
Basically ever since you started posting content with a puppy!hybrid reader I've realised how fucked up some things could be in that world when it comes to hybrids and essentially owning people. Because obviously there are no laws against having a relationship or sex with hybrids. So I'm like shit... how many of these poor buggers are "adopted" to essentially become someone's sex slave. Even if they're into it because they love their owner and the owner isn't downright cruel to them. Kind of like a weird Stockholm Syndrome. I feel like it would happen more to the poor females than the males. I'm wondering if maybe shelters have rules or do thorough background checks so people can adopt the female hybrids.
I started thinking about it when you said about puppy!reader kissing all over Eddie I was like damn the Eddie I write would be hard immediately and want to fuck her so bad. 😂 But he didn't adopt her to buy himself a girlfriend, he wanted a companion. A pet. I have no doubt Eddie would be down for a relationship if she wanted one. But also, how can you tell what's real when they're going to love you to the moon and back just for saving them.
Anyway do you have any thoughts on that? It's kind of like an ethical dilemma.
Also, since I've already added the trigger warning I've been wanting to ask more about puppy!hybrids going into heat or I think you called it a rut for the males? You wrote about puppy!steddie helping each other out during a rut. Do you think they would do the same thing with a female puppy!hybrid reader? Can you get your hybrids desexed? Can you force them on birth control? Do you have to teach them about protection so they don't run around getting each other pregnant? I have so many questions I'm so sorry. I need to know because damn, what I wouldn't give to be Eddie's puppy!hybrid. 🥵
tw for SA as mentioned above // also don't apologize, hybrid aus are something i know a lot about, so feel free to ask anything!
hybrid aus are magical realism, they plop a magical concept into a realistic society. my hybrid au tends to ignore the terrible parts of society that would run even deeper if hybrids were integrated into it, but a lot of people don't, and i'll answer your questions using hybrid au lore that i've come to know over years of reading a lot of different fics.
yes, there is a lot of implied sex slavery within the more developed, realistic systems of hybrid aus, so it's difficult to police sexual attraction from hybrids as it might not always be genuine. and no, a lot of shelters that are portrayed in fics don't do background checks, because they're not pro-hybrid. they abuse their hybrids just as much as the general population does, and it's usually the one nice character that stars in the fic that gives them a better life. i suppose my hybrid au is supposed to be a perfect world, where people aren't that vile. in reality, i know that they would be abused and exploited and assaulted, i just don't like thinking about that (i'm not angry that you asked me, i'm fine to share my knowledge i just don't like writing it into my fics), so i don't write about it either. but in a more developed hybrid au, i would most likely include hesitation surrounding sexual or romantic feelings because of that. i've definitely written longer and more developed hybrid aus for different fandoms, so i'd suggest if you wanted to get a better understanding of the au, you should go to AO3 and look up whatever fandoms you're into!! a lot of creators have a lot of fantastic work there that goes way more into depth than my little word vomits do.
so again in more developed hybrid aus there's lots of explanation around that (maybe i'll write one for steddie, who knows), but basically the general consensus is that there's heat/rut suppressants, that can mask the symptoms of a hybrid's heat/rut. but in most of the fics that include them, they negatively affect the hybrid, with side effects of nausea/vomiting, emotional numbness, decreased appetite, basically it destroys their personality and leaves them a shell of a person. so the mc's choice is then, do i want to harm this hybrid by masking their heat/rut, or do i want to be fucked into oblivion? and in fanfictions, i'm sure you can guess which one is decided upon. and i think in fanfiction protection is just ignored because no one wants to write about condoms, but yes you could put your hybrids on the pill or give them a rubber, it's really up to the author.
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i was tagged by frank @soupstiel thank you wormstie <3
rules: answer 30 questions and tag 20 blogs you are contractually obligated to get to know better.
name: rain
star sign: taurus
height: 5'4 / 1.64 m
time: 1:45 am
birthday: may 10th we had a party
favourite bands/artists: see the thing about me is that i don’t feel shame. taylor swift, louis tomlinson, 5sos, luke hemmings, hozier. glee cast.
last movie: dancing queens, it’s a swedish movie about a girl who introduces herself as a boy to be able to dance with a group of drag queens. the dancing wasn’t amazing but the gay people were. leave it to scandinavian movies to give you actually realistic queer characters (or like, characters in general tbh).
last show: currently watching good witch, and i liked the gilmore girls vibes at first but now i’m halfway through and i’m kinda bored tbh. cassie is my ideal woman though.
when did i create this blog: september 2021 but i’ve had my main for 10 years
what i post: here u go
last thing i googled: “rrr movie” because that’s what frank said he watched and i thought he was talking about the french movie by that name but his description of it didn’t match so i looked it up and apparently it’s a different movie. the french movie is called rrrrrrr. hilarious movie if you understand french.
other blogs: my main is @ghost-roads and i have lots of old side-blogs for old hyperfixations that i don’t use anymore but haven’t deleted bc i’m a hoarder
do i get asks?: sometimes. not enough :( i wanna hear from u guys!
following: 1010 apparently. that’s too many. in my defense i do have several blogs. but i might need to do a bit of a cleanse bc the dash has become A Lot
average hours of sleep: 6 which is soooo not enough for me
instruments: um. a lot. my main instrument is the viol (or viola da gamba) but i also play the recorder, guitar, piano, harpsichord, and then i can find my way around a cello, a double bass, most percussion instruments, and i just bought a violin so i’m gonna try to learn that next. oh and voice.
what im wearing: a floor length flowery dress hashtag summer
dream job: tbh, what i already do (music teacher) but like. less underpaid.
dream trip: not much of a traveller, but i would like to visit more european countries, but not by myself. i need a travel companion otherwise i won’t enjoy myself
nationality: no comment
favourite songs: that’s difficult because when i like an artist i’m usually obsessed with their entire discography and it’s hard to pick favourites. so here are some songs that are iconic to me personally, but that isn’t to say i don’t also like other songs just as much. would you come home by tyler blackburn. long live by taylor swift. the night we met by lord huron. starting line by luke hemmings. movement by hozier.
last book i’ve read: good thing i know no shame. new moon from the twilight saga, which i finished almost a year ago and had been reading for the past three years. yeah
top 3 fictional universes i’d like to live in: stars hollow from gilmore girls. middleton from good witch. and the shire from lotr. i realise those are places inside the universes in question but i mean if i were to live in those universes i’d have to pick a place and well i pick those places specifically. also yes i do just wanna live in a small town where everyone is friends and nothing bad happens.
i’m pretty sure that wasn’t 30 questions lol. i’m not gonna tag 20 people either so i guess fuck the rules.
tagging the besties, sorry if you’re already been tagged, and of course there’s no pressure to actually do this <3
@sarcasmisalifechoice @roublardise @knifelesbianjo @girlbossdean @lesbianjoannaharvelle @charlie-bradbury @supersapphical @michaelcoded @dylfnatural @angelsdean @freakwiththeknifecollection
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I'm interested in 4, 5 and 9, in case those are still up for asking? :D
Thank you for the ask!
4. Which comment has had the most impact on your writing?
5. Have you had a writer you admire comment on your fic? What was that like?
9. What inspired you to write your first fic?
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4. Which comment has had the most impact on your writing?
Probably one I got on my first fic that assumed it knew the direction my story was going, and it was true; following what I (mis)understood to be the conventions of fanfic then, the antagonist would've undergone some severe retributive whump. It was a whump fic.
The plot wasn't set in stone, though, so I changed the outcome of the events that were to affect him, and I think it worked and was better.
I've posted a little more quickly than before in some cases (especially with whump), because comments indicated that the salve needed to be applied to the wound pronto!
Supportive comments. I might not have continued if a friend from AO3 (now on tumblr), on ffn (now on AO3 and tumblr), and one from reddit had not started up communication with me. I'd deleted all my work at one point on AO3, because the main story was dark, and I felt it didn't contribute much. Possibly if I hadn't had these interactions, especially in the case of the first friend, Repossession (dark fic), and a few others, might not have been reuploaded to AO3, and I mightn't have continued wth writing fanfic in general.
I really didn't know how fanfic or fandom worked when I first started posting. It takes some time to build a base.
5. Have you had a writer you admire comment on your fic? What was that like?
Yes, quite a number of times, and it's lovely. All times are special, but
the first few times were especially encouraging, because I'm a niche writer and (as with most writers), radio silence is more the norm than feedback, so it was validating that these writers that I admired commented, but it was also an exchange of ideas and craft.
I was a mess when I first started posting, not realising how much fandom just doesn't care about rare pairs, which is logical, but I wasn't aware. Intrinsic motivation is the better drug, folks.
9. What inspired you to write your first fic?
I was writing purely for myself. Hit and run grabs of stuff that I wrote anyway, but not for any particular fandom. My main impetus was giving Law a bit of relief from the situations he found himself in in a number of hurt/comfort fics I'd read where it didn't seem that he had any relief/a form of victory at the end of trauma.
I meant to not put him through more, but I didn't succeed. Ahhh. But, in the longer fics he did end up having some respite, some dignity restored. A writer I'd been chatting with in PMs on FFN stated that I should go for it. I mean, I didn't grow up on OP or fanfic, so it really was a matter of throwing things at the wall and seeing what stuck. I intended to write that first story (and it did numbers on FFN! And AO3. It made me so nervous I took it down a few times before it found its permanent space) and nothing else.
Also, lots of things in fics didn't necessarily gel with me, so I wanted to put across my ideas and experiences of both more equal relationships and the effects of trauma—particularly longer-lasting effects. Of course, those ideas, in turn, probably don't gel with a lot of people.
I have a writing background. So story is something I've always done.
***
The ask box is still open if you're curious. Numbers 2, 4, 7, 9 , 11, & 13 are answered.
#The happy fic writer ask game#trafalgar law#one piece fanfic meta#chromasks#aibhilin atibeka#chromalami#long post
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i was thinking for a long while about whether there would be any purpose to me making a "goodbye" post here, considering i barely talk to anyone here anymore nor have i really had anyone i used to talk to reach out to me
but. i kinda want to. just to use tumblr to talk about myself for one last time. and say that final goodbye. except not final lmao
its been 6 months since the last time i reblogged a post. which is weird to think about. its been longer since i was actually active here. its been longer since i last talked to a mutual. oops. i still definitely value the people ive met here, but... i just stopped using this site. its hard to talk to people if you arent using the same platforms for communication
to a big block of text that may actually comment on things:
im doing a lot better now.
across a lot of my time on tumblr, i think ive come across as an often vitriolic person. i most likely was a vitriolic person. i spent ALL of my teenage years on this site, and my teenage years were some of my outright worst. i used tumblr as an escape from that, but i allowed my emotions to spill across. i talked negatively about things often (because i couldnt vent to people in real life). i often outright criticised things i knew my mutuals liked. i would be dismissive and negative about topics for the sole reason of hoping that it would be enough to make a mutual unfollow me. i gained some sort of sick validation from that feeling. its weird to think about. its weird to know how much i cared about these interactions with people i barely knew
lately, ive moved away from online spaces. a bit. ive probably spent way too much of my time on youtube watching study content and fucking discrete mathematics guides lmao. but ive done less doom scrolling. i dont really know what shows are popular anymore, and im fine with that
the biggest change that helped me, i think, was finding other queer people. my university has a queer collective. ive never been more blessed to know such people
i also met my beautiful boyfriend there.
university has treated me kindly. now that were back in-person, ive been thriving. my current units are... something, but i find computer science as a whole thrilling. ive had the opportunity to interview for some related roles (mainly lvl 1 helpdesk lmao) and its been an overall fascinating experience (yes im still a first year shhhh)
with the assistance of a friend, ive found a nearby clinic that does hrt currently accepting new patients. if you know the state of trans healthcare within australia, finding a place accepting new patients is HARD. i am endlessly grateful to my friend for informing me of the clinics status. ideally, ill be starting hrt soon
but. mostly, ive come so much further than i thought i ever could. im out in a small community, and im going by my chosen name in many circles. ive cut my hair off. i have a boyfriend who is part of the queer community himself (though cis) who accepts me. i NEVER thought i would have this opportunity pre-transition.
and my queer friends i have found in life. there is beauty in community. i care so much about all of them. i didnt realise how lonely and isolated i was, as a trans person not knowing any other queer people.
my life has changed for the better. this post exists solely so i can ramble about that.
im probably not going to delete my tumblr. its still too useful for when i need to find certain things from my past. but i wont post regularly ever again.
maybe ill do another long ramble-post if something important happens in the future.
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hello hello!! i've been a reader of your works since about 2020, when you were posting a bit abt haikyuu, and i reread your fics as a treat since your writing is special to me. there was always this certain feeling to your works that i could never pin down, and i finally realised what it was. it was kinda like the acknowledgement and romanticisation of the mundane that is always present in hayao miyazaki's studio ghlibi films, yknow? you always let your stories breathe, which is something that tends to be sorely lacking in even a lot of critically acclaimed stories and media nowadays. your stories are probably why i like character studies so much, ahaha, since you explore whatever character you write as much as possible. i gotta say though, i did trawl your feed a little and was wanting to ask if luffy inspires in you what hinata does, and if you were going to write about him. knowing now that you hate the process of writing and only really do it if your love for a character is sufficient made me see your fics in a new light, because they were labours of love. i'll have to print out your fics for safekeeping at some point though, even if i am scared to death of people stumbling onto my fandom tendencies, ahaha. seeya!
HELLO TO YOU TOO omg pleasure to meet you, anon! And *sobs* 2020 really was that year, yeah? So happy to hear that my fics made you feel better in that sucky year ;-; I can relate in a way; I honestly don't think I would've made it out sane without writing to keep the unpleasant thougths at bay. I guess that's why my earlier works for the Haikyuu!! fandom had a lot of, uh, "ghibli-esque" vibes, as you described. So yeah, you finding that I "always let [my] stories breathe"? *tears up* honestly one of the biggest compliments I've ever received, considering I've always feared I complicate things too much in my works, thank you so much!!!
Oh man, you mentioned Luffy---please know that you will never have a comprehensible, succinct conversation with me once you bring up Luffy, but I will try to truncate myself since this isn't really the appropriate place to ramble :DDD BUT YES, I'm actually dying to write about him!!! I do have a simple thing in mind, something about Luffy and two other Strawhats who I'd like to explore more, but it's probably going to take me some time... real life, god, such a pain. It's going to be a challenge writing in Luffy's POV though *crying* it's so strange how foreign his mind can be to me even though we've known him for 1000+ chapters already.
Oh and *sobs* sorry, I did have this super ugly habit of purging my fics, but I think I've gotten better in resisting that urge over the years! I've seen the discourse around it and I've learned a lot; I'll try not to spread my misery by deleting works I no longer wanted to be associated with but might've meant something to somebody. So please don't fret about my current hq!! works going poof anytime soon! Like, you don't have to print them out; it must be expensive, and I can totally imagine how it'd feel if someone were to find printed fics in my sock drawer ;-; Alsoooo I'm not stepping away from the hq!! fandom any time soon, I'm actually writing a Yachi & Yamaguchi fic (I hope it's okay to soft launch here :DDDD I really want to publish it soon and I want to hold myself accountable). It's absolutely criminal that I don't have a story for them yet when I adore these besties so much ;-; I think it's time to change that this year!!!
So sorry for the super long response, I hope that didn't bore you ;-; Thanks for stopping by!!!
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