#and she wanted us to stand while working the whole time bc tradition i guess? | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

therealvinelle · 3 years

Note

I agree that Aro definitely is not straight, but if he is gay and not bi, why window shop for a wife? If he wanted a partner for some reason, why not find a male one? It was a different era, yes, but are vampires really homophobic?

So, for this meta, we’ll have to get historical. Before we do, keep in mind that while I know Ancient Greece better than most, having studied it (introductory level classes only, mind), I don’t know it well enough to be any kind of authority on the matter. History, more than any other discipline I can think of, is not respected as an academic field, and people with poor to no understanding of historical hermeneutics will make very bold assumptions that they then have too poor understanding of history to realize are bullshit. This is a disclaimer because I don’t want to join in on the chorus of authoritative-sounding people on the internet with no verifiable credentials who spout things about history that are then taken to be gospel truth by readers because the author made it sound good.

More, I say this because your question is asking me to explain the morality and social norms surrounding a character from 14th century BC Greece. And this man would not, for the record have been Ancient Greek, he would have been Mycenaean Greek. Very quick history lesson: Mycenaean Greece was a flourishing society that suffered a downfall, Greek civilization fell into its very own dark ages, until around 800 BC when Greeks began forming what would become the Ancient Greece we know and love. This in turn means that I can’t very well read up on the marital and sexual norms of Ancient Greece when I’m researching for Aro, because he was five hundred years old already when Ancient Greece became a thing.

And your question concerns cultural history. And for that we’re going to have to look at how we know the things we know about history. How history is studied.

Historians have two kinds of sources: archeological findings and written records. (I’m aware that oral tradition, like the one carried by the Aborigine people, isn’t technically one of these, but to my understanding it’ll be treated to similar analysis as written records, which leaves us with the two types of sources standing strong.) These sources are analyzed, and we apply various theories and models onto them to make sense of the context they were written in. The more sources we have, the more we can refine or eliminate these theories or models.

More, history is an ever evolving field. There are movements and schools of thought that influence how history is written (marxism in history, that is, history as a class struggle, was heavy in the 60′s and I think until the 80′s), which means that how a certain culture will be perceived today is not the way it was perceived a few decades ago, nor will it be perceived the same way a few decades in the future.

You see why I am daunted by you asking me to give you an answer about sexual and marital norms for a guy who lived 3000 years ago, and I hope you’ll understand why I feel this word vomit is necessary.

Now, the danger with Mycenaean Greece is that it’s a society it’s easy to feel we know a lot about, because it was the precursor to Ancient Greece, and we know a lot about the latter. But, first of, the reason why we know as much as we do about the Ancient Greeks is the Romans. The Greeks wrote about their history, their philosophy, their government, and they wrote plays and told stories. However, that was two thousand years ago and their writings would have been lost to the sands of time if the Romans hadn’t idolized and sought to emulate their society. This meant preserving their written records. This tradition was carried on by the Christians, in part because Hellenistic philosophy was incorporated into Christian philosophy. We have neo-platonism to thank for Christian asceticism, the “mind over matter” cornerstone.

What I’m getting at with all of this is that we know the insane amount about Ancient Greece that we do because of some very unique circumstances, and so we can make very sophisticated theories about what the Hellenistic world was like. It’s still detective work, but not Pepe Silvia type of detective work. This is not the case for Mycenaean Greece. We know a comparative lot about Mycenaean Greece, considering how long ago it was, but there is very much we don’t know.

With Mycenaean Greece, we are dealing with a lot more uncertainty. We haven’t deciphered one of their two writing styles, and a lot of the text we do have is very fragmentary. Coming up with detailed societal models for Mycenaean Greece, and for the 14th century BC specifically, is... well I don’t know enough about what this society left behind to know what historians have to work with, but I imagine they have their work cut out.

More, I haven’t studied this at all, which means that any attempt on my end to research this would be stumbling around in the dark.

One example: the Illiad and the Odyssey, while composed around the 8th century BC, were set in the early 12th century BC, which is nearly Aro’s time period. The Illiad depicts a homoerotic relationship between Patroclus and Achilles, and both works depict a lot of matrimonies, so I wish I could use it as a source. However, not only would this time gap alone make these sources questionable, but there’s also the matter of the Illiad and the Odyssey being transmitted orally, from bard to bard. Changes were made over the years. For example, the technology described in the Illiad is from several eras, as the warriors will be using bronze weaponry in one book and then switch to iron in the next. This game of telephone is what happens when a story is transmitted orally from person to person. So, while it’s tempting to use these works as a sort of reference point, the possibility, likelihood even, that the bards made adjustments to keep the old story entertaining for their contemporary audience is strong.

For this reason, I can’t give you any kind of historically correct analysis on what the marital or sexual mores would have been like in Aro’s time. Even if the knowledge is out there, I don’t have it.

But I can say this, spouses have for the longest time been partners. Men and women got married, even in the gay, gay, Ancient Greece, not just to have children but because they complemented each other, they were partners. Men needs wives, and women needs husbands. And a partner was canonically exactly what Aro was looking for, feelings had nothing to do with it:

After Caius and Marcus had found their romantic attachments, Aro decided to find his own, although rather than finding his other half in another vampire Aro decided to create his own instead. Aro had a certain type of woman in mind and he found what he was looking for in Sulpicia. He successfully courted her and she came to fall in love with him.

As for vampires being homophobic, I think that is for another post about what culture they bring with them into their new life. But to be brief I’ll say that while the individual vampire can be homophobic, there can be no homophobia at an institutional level because vampires have no institutions. And it’s the institutional homophobia that gets ya. It’s what the whole fight for gay rights has been about: secure legislation against discrimination and that protects gay people. (The right to marry and protection from employees firing LGBT employees comes to mind as examples of this.)

So, no one could force Aro to marry a woman.

And I’d go into a rant here about how the prospect of gay marriage, of even identifying as homosexual (the labels homosexual, bisexual, and heterosexual are very new and, to my recollection, were born off of the Western psychiatric discipline as men who slept with other men were diagnosed with homosexuality. I imagine a man from the Antiquity would be confused at the notion that just because he likes to sleep with dudes he shouldn’t get married to a woman), was unthinkable up until very recently, but I just made this obscenely long rant about how I can’t really make these kinds of guesses, so I’m not gonna.

I think being married to a woman and then banging hot dudes who came along suited Aro just fine.

Also, I can’t believe I’m doing this, but - I’m going to encourage history asks. Because this fandom has a bit of a history problem, as a lot of the characters are from different time periods and many feel unsatisfied with the way Meyer handled that. I am by no means a historian, but I know several of the historical periods the characters of Twilight are from well enough to make educated guesses.

So, hit me with your worst.

#WHEW #aro #sulpicia #aro/sulpicia #history #twilight renaissance #twilight meta #twilight #this is very long and I'm tired so I didn't proofread #GERONIMO as they say #hope there are no embarrassing mistakes #also yes I know I just made a pretentious ass of myself #but i'm writing twilight meta on tumblr so i left my dignity behind long ago #doktrajediscovery #ask

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extremelyblackandwhite · 3 years

Text

august

pairing: sheriff lee bodecker x younger! reader

warnings: cheating, age gap

a/n: i wanted to write this chapter to show how y/n’s and lee’s affair began and to show how y/n shaped lee or his point of view. this song is mostly based off august from taylor swift (bc we all know at this point that i’ll just write fanfics based of any folklore/evermore songs) and war of hearts from ruelle. this one is not smut, the next one (illicit affairs) is gonna be. additionally, i’ve come to the conclusion that knockemstiff y/n dressed like betty draper and after-knockemstiff y/n dresses likes meg draper and that is canon. btw if you’re interested in what she’s wearing in this chapter here [x] p.s.: lee’s not captain yet in this chapter

> ILLICIT AFFAIRS

Salt air and the rust on your door, I never needed anything more. Whispers of are you sure? Never have I ever before. But I can see us lost in the memory, August slipped away into a moment in time ‘cause it was never mine

August was an odd month this year; the godless and sunless town was going through the biggest heatwave anyone could remember. Most habitants were in the parks and outside their homes in plastic chairs enjoying the heat, however, in Y/N’s house, they were baking apple pies with the apples leftover from the little apple tree farm they had a bit south from the town centre. Y/N had suggested they just gave away the apples but her grandmother, ever the traditional woman, believed the best way to show appreciation would be to bake something. “It shows you care, Y/N” as if she cared about anyone in this god forbidden town. She couldn’t wait to pack her bags and go to the big city where she can be something other than a trophy wife. Besides, it wasn’t like there were any available suitable husband options around.

She wiped the flour out of her forehead as she placed the last pie in the oven. 24 pies, surely that would account for a high electricity bill at the end of the month. Not that it mattered anyway, her grandmother could more than afford it after all she was the woman right now sat at the kitchen table, giving out plates as if they cost nothing.

- Y/N, sweetheart, can you go and deliver the pie on the living room. It’s already cold and I don’t want it to go stale.

- Yeah, sure.

- To Captain Bodecker’s house. Promised Jane I’d send her one.

- Captain Bodecker’s? But that’s in town. - she scratched her elbows. She’d rather not go to Captain Bodecker’s house yet again he probably wasn’t even around, always busy in the station. - Can I take the car?

- It’s a 20 minute walk, it’s sunny outside and you’re young. Save on gas.

- But ...

- Y/N, you better be outside with that pie in 5 seconds or we’ll have a problem. - she interrupted.

Y/N sighed, unlacing the back of her apron and placing it on the hook. Just great, that’s all she needed today, to walk to the town centre to deliver one of the pies she had just spent the whole morning preparing. She guessed it could’ve been worse, she could’ve had to go deliver it to the police station then Captain Bodecker would’ve definitely been there. It wasn’t that she disliked him, quite the opposite. Back when she volunteered at the precinct he was the only one who was nice to her or at least the only one who wouldn’t try to put his hand under her skirt. He’d even memorised her name which not even the Sheriff who had hired her knew, to this day whenever he saw her he still called her Bella. He was nice to her and she couldn’t say she hadn’t developed a little school girl crush on him, despite the fact he was married. He’d even stood up for her when her manager started screaming at her. Nevertheless, she couldn’t stand being in his presence, feeling like whatever she said would get her in trouble. His wife wasn’t someone she enjoyed either; Jane Bodecker was known for having quite the sharp gossiping tongue. Most of her friends commented their “men friends” would comment how she used to have quite the reputation while at high school and whenever she saw her at the shop, she’d always call her Little Miss Perfect or make some side comment about how she was occupying a job that someone else needed. Still, Y/N could deal with Jane, a little smile, a nod and she was ready to deal with the devil.

The sun scorched her skin as she walked her last minutes til the Bodecker residence. It was a nice home, recently painted with some nice flowers in the front garden yet there were rumours of Captain Bodecker wanting to move to Brewer Heights. Y/N didn’t know how she’d react if during her morning walks she passed by him, so she counted it only as rumours. Standing in front of the red door, she held the pie in one hand and knocked against it with the other one. She stood there waiting for someone to come in until footsteps made her wake up from her dream-like state and prepare to deal with Jane. However, as the door open, a familiar silhouette had her heart racing.

- Y/N, what brings you here? - she watched him dressed in casual clothing, something she barely saw if she had ever seen; jeans and a white t-shirt.

- Captain Bodecker ... I ... I was looking for your wife. My grandmother sent this. - she held up the pie in front of her. - She said Mrs. Bodecker wanted one.

- Jane’s ... out. Come in. - he opened the door wider for her but she remained in the same place like a statue. - Come on, it’s too hot out. Don’t want no fainting lass complains on my day off. ‘Sides, don’t you want a slice of pie?

- I really shouldn’t.

- You can say no if you want to. No need to be afraid of me, Y/N. - he leaned against the doorframe. - Thank you for the pie, though.

- I guess I can stay a bit. - she tucked a bit of hair behind her ear. Lee couldn’t help but shamelessly check her out as she walked inside his home. It was no secret she was a beautiful woman, heck, Lee thought her to be the prettiest little thing to ever arrive into town, with her sunny smile and pretty dresses. This one was no different, lavender which complimented her so well with a little white rope tied around her waist into a bow, like a little present. Nevertheless, he kept it under wraps he was a married man besides every man in town shamelessly harassed her, despite the side eye he gave them.

He watched as the fabric of her dress swung with the movement of her hips. Lee surely didn’t expect such a pretty girl to walk into his home, had he known he would’ve made an effort to fix the mess that was his house. Normally Jane tended to keep that sorted as he usually spent the day and night at work, but with her staying with her mother after their last fight. It wasn’t anything new, she always did that whenever they fought and then would return after Lee made a fool of himself by begging her to return and that he was wrong during the fight. Still, she placed the pie on his kitchen table with a gentleness and posture which mirrored her privileged upbringing. He couldn’t lie and say his mind hadn’t wandered around how she would look when she eventually got married, after all that was the future of all Knockemstiff women. He also couldn’t lie and say he hadn’t wondered how she would look as his wife. She was sweet, with a sharp mind which definitely had not been appreciated in the precinct. Despite this, productivity seemed to raise whenever she called out any officers who had their feet on top of their desks instead of doing paperwork. He still remembered having to always keep an eye on her, were any officers to get too rowdy with her. Yet, she didn’t care and she held herself and believed herself to deserve the same respect as every working man in Knockemstiff. Although he imagined how she would be as a wife, he had to admit he couldn’t see her ever being some Knockemstiff’s man’s wife and with the example from her grandmother, she was surely on the path to be a rebellion starter.

- Big fan of apple pie, Y/N?

- My grandmother refuses to sell the apples so instead I woke up at 6AM and have been baking apple pies nonstop. She says it shows I care.

- Never thought you to be found of Knockemstiff residents.

- And I am not. - she spoke as if the mere thought of it offended her. - She said she promised Jane one.

- Don’t think Jane will be back for a while. - he leaned against the kitchen door, watching her place the pie onto his kitchen table. - You can take half that pie, if you want.

- Trust me, I have my share of apple pie at home. - she folded her hands on top of her stomach. - Uhm ... Do you want me to cut you a slice of pie? I normally take mine with a bit of vanilla ice cream on top. It’s gorgeous, the warmth of the pie and the cold of the ice cream. You should try it?

- You’re just full of ideas, aren’t ya? - he sat on the wooden chair as she sliced the pie to the best of her abilities. - Shouldn’t you be at university, or someth’ng?

- Well, grandma had the stroke and she’s not as motile as she used to be. I’ve been taking some classes at Ohio University but it’s not the same, it’s ...

- It’s not the big city, ain’t it? - he added.

- It’s not that I dislike Knockemstiff, Captain ...

- Yeah you do. - he interrupted her. - Just don’t let the Sheriff hear it. He already ain’t too found of ya.

- Nobody in that precinct liked me. - she rolled her eyes. - Well, they did but I did not like them in that way.

- I liked ya. Whenever you screamed at Leroy it always made my day.

- Leroy’s the most incompetent person I know. All he does is pimp girls out as if he discovered prostitution. I feel sorry for the girls.

- He does a good service.

- Of course you’d know. - she pushed her hair away from her shoulders, feeling the sweat roll down her neck. God it was, too hot. Lee furrowed his brown, laying the fork onto the porcelain plate. She caught his look, brow raising over in a playful, smug kind of way, before she laid her hands on the table. - I’ve seen it before.

- You’ve seen it before?

- Don’t worry, I didn’t see IT, but I saw Jenny get in the car with you just after graduation. I know what she does, she would call me all the time whenever Leroy was being an ass.

- Oh ...

- Don’t worry, I’m not gonna say anything. Everyone in this town cheats, mostly because everyone in this town marries someone just because they think that will save them from Hell. No one is saved if they’re born in Knockemstiff, not even me.

- You mean to tell me you’ve done bad things, Y/N? ‘Cause I don’t believe it.

- I’ve never done it but I’ve thought bad things. All the time. - her gaze lowered from his face to his waist before returning back to his eyes. It was a millisecond gaze, something she herself knew but he didn’t notice, no matter how observant he was. There were no perfect men in Knockemstiff, but in Y/N’s mind he was her perfect man. After all, there are no perfect men anywhere, even Saints sin and then die heroically to get into heaven. Y/N would rather sin than die for people who would’ve had her accidentally killed many times if it weren’t for her grandmother’s name and status in town. What’s the fun in being good? Every time she was good she got yelled at, someone put her hand under her skirt or tried to pin her against a wall. She was good, she would just rather sin so people wouldn’t taint her goodness. It’s a question of self preservation, at least that’s what she told herself.

- That doesn’t make you bad. If so there wouldn’t be good people.

- There are no good people. - she added, ever the negative person she was, something she had inherited from her mother and which everyone who knew her could trace back to. - All people are born so they could be buried. Everything you do ... in a 100 years they won’t remember everything and all that be left of you is your burial site. That’s your legacy.

- Such negative views for someone who wants out of Knockemstiff. I thought you’d have a better outlook on things.

- I’m never getting out of here. - she sighed, almost used to the idea that she was going to stay no matter how long she fought it. - I’m gonna die here.

- Dying ain’t so bad. - he leaned against his chair. Y/N smiled at him, looking around his home. It was messy yes but it was still a good home yet that wasn’t what she noticed. Looking out the window, she saw a built in pool. She didn’t remember hearing the Captain had a pool. Sure, he had a the better salary compared to everyone else in town except for the Sheriff, Mayor, and her grandmother. Yet she had never heard of him having a pool, not even she had one.

- You have a pool?

- Yeah, built it back when Sandy used to come over to wind up from the dinner job. She’s married now so I don’t think she wants a pool at her big brother’s home anymore.

- I don’t think anyone in town has a pool. - she rose from her chair and walked to the window in a lavender rush. - It’s gorgeous.

- You can come over whenever you want, Y/N.

- Can I go now? - she looked over her shoulder to him. The idea of being able to swim while the boiling august heat continued to shine down onto the hellish town. Somehow it made sense yet it didn’t. Lee cocked his head to the side, wondering if he’d misheard her words or if she was really considering swimming into his pool. Unwanted feeling stirred south of him and he punished himself mentally for imagining the lavender flower girl in such ways.

- Well, uh ... you don’t have a swimming costume. - he babbled like a confused, stunned child.

- I can swim on my undergarments. It’s pretty much a lace embroidered swimming costume. - Lee merely nodded, not knowing exactly what to do but knowing he was flirting with sin, looking at an abysses and seeming not to fear that he was going straight into it.

Y/N walked from the window up to the kitchen door which led over to the garden. The once white door had withered with time, turning slightly yellowish with rust on the borders, the glass of the small see through windows cracked yet remaining its shape. The door seemed to be a small reminder of what was still wrong in the Captain’s life but she chose not to dwell over it, no to think about it. She felt the cobblestones against her feet covered by an old pair of white ballerina slips as her mirrored image became clear in the crystalline pool water.

Lee on the other hand watched like a hawk, from the rusted door he’d broken so many bottles of liquor against, as her lavender fabric fell to the dirty cobblestones. The contrast of the prim expensive dress against the cobblestones which had aged as badly as he had done was telling. At least it was telling enough for him and he wondered if this was a gift from God or if the devil was toying with him. The devil is in the details, his mother used to say, yet as she emerged from the water, hands pulling down her hair, he was almost entirely sure the devil was the girl in his pool, the same girl who had worn white dresses until her 18th birthday. Yet again, the devil was once an angel and to him, she was closer to becoming a fallen one than continuing to wear shades of white.

- You don’t swim, captain? - she asked as she swam to the border of the pool.

- I don’t enjoy doing it. - he stayed glued to the door, a good distance from her to ensure he didn’t get tempted. - You gonna just swim around like a mermaid, huh?

- It’s better in the water than on the cobblestones, I tell ya. - she dipped into the water once again only to return to the surface, water droplets rolling down from her plump skin. - Come on, captain. You’re gonna leave me swimming by my lonesome? During the hottest day in Knockemstiff?

- You’re a trouble stirrer.

- Maybe I’m just bored. - she smiled at him. He knew she wasn’t tempting him, he knew Y/N. She liked to tease around, she enjoyed the freedoms which she imposed onto herself and as such she was much different from the women he knew. Not that he knew any women outside of Knockemstiff. He’d been born and raised here and all the women he saw from out of Knockemstiff were on his television screen. - Come on, Captain. It’s your pool.

- I don’t want you to see my belly.

- I don’t care, besides, if it’s that bad then come into your clothing. - her arms rested upon the pool border, wondering eyes tempting even the saint of all saints. Lee looked at the cold water reflecting the afternoon sunlight beams, trying to avoid the thoughts that crossed his mind before turning around. He let his jean trousers pool to the ground along with his shoes before entering the water using the ladder. He was almost sure he’d make her laugh if he were to jump into the water.

The water was cold and dripped from his skin in crystal like drops. Y/N offered him a playful smile, swimming close to him with that wide eye child naughty fun look only she managed to still hold intact. She held her hands slightly back before pushing the water towards him.

- You tellin’ me you invited me in for a water fight? - he chuckled at her actions.

- Afraid I’ll win?

- Kid, you’re much too tiny to win against me.

- Wanna bet? - she threw water again at him, swimming closer and closer to him before anchoring herself against him, hands on his shoulders. - I bet you as many apple pies as you want.

- Yeah, I’m trying not to gain any more weight, kid.

- You have beautiful eyes, I’ve never noticed. - she made eye contact with him, seeing her own reflection in his light blue eyes. Maybe she’d never notice because the uniform was so dark blue his eyes reflected it like mirrors, yet they were light. - They’re gorgeous.

- Trying to make me blush, kid?

- Just never noticed.

- Well huh ... - he could listen to his heart beating and drumming against his chest along with the soft movement of the water. All his eyes could see was her, her hands holding onto his shoulders and her angelic face looking at him. - Thanks, you have nice eyes too.

- You can’t take a compliment, Captain. - she teased.

- I don’t think I’m deserving of any, specially coming from you, kid.

- What is that supposed to mean?

- You know what the men say in town. They think you’re the prettiest thing in a skirt to ever pace around here. Pretty sure they’ll kill each other trying to get your favour.

- My favour? Is that what you think I’m good for?

- No ... I ... That’s not what I meant. - his face creased. - I’m just telling you what I hear.

- You seem to know a lot of gossip about me, captain. If I didn’t know better, I’d think you’ve been asking around.

- What if I have? - Lee watched for the first time her mouth shut close. She didn’t know what to say next, eyebrows furrowed together as she inspected his face, slow blinking. Her eyes left his to look at the water back at him. - Just looking out for you ... not a lot of people like you ‘round town.

He hands gripped his shoulder as she swam closer to him. Her intention was to hug him thank you. Of course she didn’t expect no one to look out for her, she didn’t care about what a bunch of housewives and hopeless alcoholics thought of her. She knew he didn’t inspire adoration in them other. As she got closed to him, he leaned down, capturing her lips into his. Her hands slide from her shoulders to his chest, almost as if she wanted to be the good one and push him away. He was married after all. However, as his lips moved against hers she found herself incapable of pushing him away, hands relaxing just resting against his chest as she found herself acting on her sinful thoughts for the first time.

So much for summer love, for saying us, ‘cause you weren’t mine to lose.

taglist: @lookiamtrying

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jonahlovescoffee · 3 years

Text

Mistletoe | J.M.

a/n: i suck at writing. the only thing im good at is procrastinating my procrastination so send help pls :/ this fic was supposed to be up before Christmas but i just finished writing it today and i’m not even proud of it :’) anyways, happy reading and be sure to tell me what you think in the end <3

summary: all you wanted to do was kiss your boyfriend under the mistletoe, but things didn’t work out as planned.

warning: secondhand embarrassment, fluff & some mildly suggestive themes in the end bc i couldn’t help it lmao

word count: 2407

“And that’s what I call a perfect plan,” Emily threw her arms up in the air excitedly, thankfully not getting the attention of anyone else in the cafe. She had just finished explaining the details of her stupid plan to make your boyfriend finally kiss you that was admittedly not so stupid after you ran through the whole thing once again in your head. What’s the worst possible outcome of her plan? Him hating you forevermore? You highly doubt that’d happen so maybe this plan was actually worth a try after all.

“Do you think this is a good idea though, I mean I don’t wanna come off as too needy or anything...” you rambled on nervously, your hands fidgeting with the hem of the beige sweater you were wearing.

“You always overthink everything,” Emily landed a firm reassuring pat on your shoulder. “Don’t worry. It’ll be completely fine. Couples kiss each other all the time! And it’s about time for that dip to do the same to you too.”

You and Jonah had been dating for quite a while now — nearly a month and a half to be exact — but you both had never kissed. His previous girlfriend had left him heavily scarred and this was your first romantic relationship with anyone, meaning that you were too inexperienced in this relationship department to know how it works, so of course both of you had agreed to take it slow. Don’t get you wrong, he did shower you with affection all the time through other methods, mainly through intimate gestures but he didn’t make a move to take it any further and you being the useless coward you were, you didn’t even dare to initiate it either even though you’d gotten comfortable enough with Jonah to the point where you do want to kiss him. Very badly.

Now, you knew that each and every relationship was different and there was nothing wrong with not choosing to express one’s love through something as absurd as kisses, but after Daniel accidentally let the fact that Jonah actually kissed his ex on their first date slip during one of your conversations with him, you started to wonder whether you were the problem. Were you not pretty enough? Not capable enough?

Your worsened insecurities didn’t go unnoticed by your best friend, which was exactly why she dragged you out to a cafe that late autumn day to offer you her so-called ‘foolproof’ plan that couldn’t go wrong.

So when winter rolled around and it was time to put up Christmas decorations around your house, maybe it was because of the indescribable Christmas magic in the air, or maybe it was because of the delightful festive cheer, you eventually decided to follow her advice and hung a mistletoe above the door. Now all there’s left was for you to greet him at the door, inconspicuously gaze at the mistletoe above you, say something along the lines of, “Wow, I wonder how that mistletoe got there!”, and then hope he’d get the hint and was ready for a cute Christmas kiss — If he did go along with the plan, that is.

Which explained why here you were right now leaning against a wall of your living room, shifting your weight from one foot to another repeatedly while biting your nails as you stare intensely at the clock, trying your best to soothe the nerves in your stomach. You had just invited him over for dinner like usual and was now waiting for his arrival anxiously like something big was about to happen although you knew very well that a kiss was hardly considered that big of a deal.

The loud chime of the doorbell that sounded moments later disrupted your train of thought, startling you a little. You hurriedly smoothed your attire and took a deep breath to calm yourself down before making your way to answer the door. You flung open the front door with a cheeky smile plastered on your face.

“Hey, ba....Corbyn?! What are you doing here?” Your voice raised a pitch in the end of your sentence from how shocked you were when you were greeted with the sight of Corbyn standing on your doorstep instead of your boyfriend whom you were expecting, your eyes widening in disbelief so much that you swore they almost popped out of your sockets.

“Just here to pass your present before I return to my hometown tomorrow for Christmas,” he answered, passing you the rectangular shaped present that was beautifully wrapped with vibrant Christmas-themed wrapping paper. Under normal circumstances, you would’ve thanked him profusely and proceed with guessing excitedly about what he might’ve gotten you (because he is an amazing gift-giver) but this time was different. You had a mistletoe dangling from the ceiling above your head and your friend was not supposed to be here now. Out of all the times he could’ve passed you your present, he had chosen today to do it. Great.

“But isn’t that Jonah’s car?” You asked, pointing at the black Audi that was parked in your driveway, completely ignoring the present that was now in your hand.

Please don’t see the mistletoe. Please don’t see the mistletoe....

“Not even a thank you?” Corbyn cocked a brow but sighed and gave you a reply to your question when he realised you were scowling at him. “Yeah, I caught a ride with him since we’re heading to the same place and he wants me to wash his car afterwards. This dumbass is too lazy to do anything by himself,” he explained and rolled his eyes.

“He’s in the car now talking on the phone with our manager, so yeah,” he added, still not noticing the mistletoe, even when he looked up a little and scratched the back of his head. Luck was definitely on your side today.

“And I bet you have tons to pack for your trip tomorrow, don’t you? So you better hurry home and get ready,” this was the best excuse you had to get him to leave before things got awkward.

“Hello? It’s me you’re talking about,” Corbyn ruffled your hair with his hand. “My stuff is all packed and ready a week ago.”

“But I guess I should get going anyway,” he said, clapping his hands. Jonah can be seen walking towards you both. “The last thing I want is to third wheel your date so see ya’ soon,” he bid his goodbye and you felt a weight lifted from your chest when he still paid no attention to the stupid plant.

But someone else sure did. You watched as a smirk grew on Jonah’s face when his gaze lifted higher to see the mistletoe above you. He was about to walk away when Jonah stopped him by putting an arm over his shoulder.

“Hey, Corbyn, don’t you think it’s extremely rude to leave a girl standing under a mistletoe without a kiss?” His simple question had you internally cursing him with a long string of profanities as embarrassment flooded your veins instantly, heat spreading from the tips of your ears to all over your face.

“Oh,” He dragged out the one syllable word when he finally took notice of the mistletoe as realization hit him. “No wonder you were acting all weird just now! Because you wanted a kiss from me but you didn’t have the guts to say it, huh?”

“No, I absolutely don’t want anything from you!” You waved your hands frantically in front of you in denial.

“Including your present? So give it back to me,” Corbyn instructed, wiggling his eyebrows playfully, in which you responded with another deep scowl.

“No, the present is mine now so you can’t take it back!” You practically screamed at him as you tightened your hands around the said object protectively. You friendly banter went on for a while more, with Corbyn teasing you and you shooting your crafty retorts back at him.

Jonah watched the exchange between you and his best friend silently with an amused smile and couldn’t help but burst into laughter when Corbyn suddenly said “you’re so annoying! It makes me want to kiss you to shut you up” in the midst of your playful bickering, making your cheeks redden even more and from the way you open and close your mouth without any words coming out of it, it was evident that you were at a loss of words too.

“Then kiss her, bro,” Jonah urged him with a nudge of his shoulder. “But not on the lips. Those are mine,” he said in a serious tone, the former cheekiness all gone. It was merely a simple sentence but little did he know butterflies erupted in your stomach just from hearing it.

“As much as I’d not want to kiss you, this is tradition and we can’t break it,” with a hopeless sigh, Corbyn scrunched up his nose in disgust but proceeded to lean in and give you a brief kiss on your cheek before pulling away almost immediately. “There, that’s settled. Hang your mistletoe elsewhere next time. The last thing I want is to fucking kiss my best friend again,” he left with a wave of his hand at you and Jonah.

“I guess it’s just the two of us now,” Jonah stated the obvious as his car pulled out of the driveway a moment later by Corbyn.

“Shut up and get lost, I don’t wanna talk to you,” you crossed your arms in front of your chest, looking away from him, still mad that he made your friend kiss you. It was nothing more than a kiss on the cheek but that didn’t mean that it wasn’t awkward.

“But why are you still standing here then? Right under the mistletoe,” he moved closer and wrapped his strong arms around your waist, kicking the door shut behind him. You were engulfed in his uplifting and clean scent of autumn that you loved so dearly, considering that autumn is your utmost favourite season of all. “Wonder how did that get here. I don’t remember seeing the mistletoe the last time I visited.”

“Fuck you, Jonah.”

“Here? Against the wall? Damn, darling, you sure are one kinky girl,” he joked, earning a playful smack from you.

“Stop,” you whined and buried your face in his chest to hide your blushing face that was already as red as a tomato or even redder at this point. He chuckled, his hand moving to cradle your face and pushed it backwards gently before tilting it upwards.

“Sometimes I forget how delicate and innocent you actually are,” he breathed and you could feel heart doing jumping jacks when your gaze met with his intense one. Your mind went totally haywire when he started to lean in, your breaths mingling with each other’s. “And you have no idea how much I’ve thought about doing this.”

When your lips connected at long last, the wonderful sensation was like nothing you had experienced before. The kiss was soft and moist and hot and breathy, not trying to win a battle but seeking union and closeness and the sharing of one breath, one sensation, one timeless and passionate moment. You yearned for more — you wanted so badly to feel so, so much more of him — so you didn’t hesitate to comply to his wish when he bit your lip lightly for permission for his tongue to slip into your mouth.

The heat rose in your cheeks as your tongues entwined, quick and electric and delicious, then firmer, more determined, more curious about the heat that lay within, seeking to chase down that elusive liquid lightning that reached through both of you. Instinctively, you grabbed fistfuls of the soft material at the front of his coat to pull him closer and deepen the kiss. He groaned when you bucked your hips against his as his grip on your waist tightened to prevent you from repeating the same action because his self-control was reaching its limit. One more time and he might not be able to restrain himself from pinning you against the wall and ripping off your clothes to devour you.

Plus, he knew that you weren’t ready for that either.

“That was amazing,” you said in awe when you finally pulled apart to catch your breath, breathless from the heated kiss-turned-makeout session with your boyfriend. “If I can get kissed like that everytime I stand under a mistletoe, I think I might go against Corbyn’s advice and hang more of those around my house.”

“You don’t need a stupid mistletoe to kiss me, idiot. You can do it whenever you like,” he replied, his thumb caressing your cheek gently, as if you were his most prized possession that he was more than reluctant to let go of (which you were).

“But why haven’t you done that before?” You asked, staring quizzically into his hazel eyes that were the softest brown infused with green, as if he held the new spring growth inside.

“I wanted your first kiss to be special,” he tucked a loose strand of hair behind your ear. “There’re a lot of things that I want to do with you and do to you that I haven’t done yet, love, so you gotta be patient,” he promised and took your hands in his, squeezing them once.

“But what if I want you to show me what you want to do to me now?” You wanted to take the question back right after you said it out loud. His lips curled into a smirk which made you even more embarrassed than you already were, not saying a word. “No, I mean what am I even talking about...” you trailed off, pulling your lower lip between your teeth tentatively, not on purpose but because that was what you did everytime you were nervous, only to find his jaw slightly clenched as you did so before using his thumb to softly pull your lip back out.

“Desperate now, are we?” He teased, holding your hand as he led you towards the dining room where the various dishes you had prepared for dinner sat on the table. “Maybe I would, but let’s have dinner first, okay? Dessert will come later.”

It took you a moment to understand what he meant and when you finally did, your face turned red all over again.

#corbyn besson #daniel seavey #jack avery #jonah marais #wdw #why dont we #why don’t we #zach herron #wdw imagines #jonah marais imagines

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bittywitches · 3 years

Note

I’m obsessed with the college roommates concept— maybe you’re feelings lonely and kinda sad abt ur love life one night and Grayson offers to take you on a date just for fun as friends but then ~feelings~ happen ☺️

Umm do you mean that one episode in season 8 of friends where Joey takes out pregnant Rachel and gets his crush on her??? Bc yes :))

It’s probably just been one of those weeks, you know? An assload of assignments, tests and exams every other day, most of which you’d completely bombed and were feeling shitty about. You hadn’t had more than 5 hours of sleep a day in like a month, you’d been living off of microwavables and instant noodles, you couldn’t remember the last time you’d had a sip of water since all your energy has been from coffee. And the kids in all your group projects this semester? Idiots. Selfish pricks. Every single one of them.

So it was needless to say that you were just in one of those moods. It was a Friday night, so things had slowed down enough, finally, but it also finally gave you some time to let yourself think, and god it was not great when you had to think.

It had started as just one of those basic thoughts; “What am doing? Where is this going?” which lead to “Why am I even in college in the first place?” Ending with “Oh my god I’m wasting my life and I’m gonna be alone forever”.

By the time Grayson had made it home that night, you were huddled up in the living room sofa under a blanket, your laptop open in your lap and snacks all over the table a couch while “Isn’t she lovely” by Stevie Wonder played on your phone as you tried your best not to burst into tears at the thought of never finding a boyfriend.

“Whoa, I don’t remember getting my invite to this slumber party.” He laughed, kicking his shoes off and throwing his bag onto the single sofa next to yours.

You slumped your shoulders. “It’s not a slumber party, it’s a pity party.”

“Oh?” He sat himself down on the sofa. “Who for?”

“Me, who else?” You wallowed, stuffing some more popcorn into your mouth.

“Why, did you get marks back?” He asked, leaning forward with his elbows on his knees, a bit concerned at the volume of popcorn you were putting into your mouth with each bite.

“No, but what’s the point? I already know I’m doing bad.” You slumped backwards into the couch, just wishing you could be swallowed by the pillows and cushions.

“Hey,” He placed a hand on your knee, looking at you seriously now. He knew you. Your general melt downs he was used to, but this was different. He could tell something was wrong. “You okay?”

You sighed, grabbing your phone off the counter and pausing the song so you could think straight. “You don’t wanna hear about it.”

“I wouldn’t have asked if I didn’t.”

You sighed, slipping your legs out from under you and dangling them off the couch. “Okay, um..” Grayson’s hand had fallen away, and you suddenly felt like rubbing the spot on your leg where it had been. “I don’t know. I guess I’ve just been so busy lately, and it’s just gotten me thinking about my life in general. And how I haven’t gone out on a date in like…” You had to stop and think, and started laughing after a few seconds. “In so long I can’t even remember. Wow, god.” You sunk back into the couch. “I miss dating.”

He quirked an eyebrow at you. “Yea?”

“Yeah, you know,” You waved your hands around vaguely. “The whole excitement of it. Getting to dress up and look all nice. Feeling all pretty.” He tilted his head at you, and you shook your head and laughed. “But you know, not that I need the reminder. I’m obviously hot as fuck.” You gestured to yourself, highlighting your nest of hair and your stained sweatshirt. You waited for him to laugh, but he just continued to look at you with that weirdly deep expression.

“What?”

“How about I take you on a date?”

You blinked at him, then started to chuckle, confused. “Huh?”

“You know, as friends. But I’ll give you like, the whole experience.”

You almost spit at that. “The ‘whole experience’?”

He rolled his eyes. “You know what I mean. We’ll get all dressed up, go out to a nice place for dinner or something.”

You sat up now, your eyes narrowed at him. “Why?”

“Why not? It’s a friday. If you have stuff to do you can always do it later.”

“You know where that mindset gets me, Dolan.”

“Come on, it’ll be fun.” He smiled. “Plus, you deserve a fun night.”

You scoffed. “Yea, but not with a boyfriend or anything. With my roommate.”

“You think you could do better?”

“Incredibly.”

“God just shut up and go change.”

You laughed. “I— You know what? What the heck.” You got up, and he did with you. “Ah, okay!” You gave him a quick squeeze before running to your room, and his eyes followed after you, a gentle smile on his lips.

…

He’d done the whole shebang. He got dressed in a nice dress shirt and clean black jeans, something you’d actually never seen him wear before. He’d somehow gotten you a bouquet of flowers, which, you weren’t even sure where or how he’d gotten them, because you couldn’t have taken more than twenty minutes to get ready. Nonetheless, he truly was the gentleman you had never expected. This was Grayson, the guy you watched old disney movies with and cried with during finals. He was the one you’d eat whole pints of ice cream with and play The Last of Us with and helped you master. He certainly wasn’t the one who was supposed to be complimenting you on your dress and taking you out to nice dinners. But here he was, doing just that.

He’d parked his car and was now escorting you inside this tiny but upscale italian restaurant, simple but elegant. As you entered through the glass door, the dazzling chandelier above the waiting area along with the gorgeous red sconces blew you away.

“Grayson how did you get a place like this on such short notice?” You whispered to him, gripping his arm, a bit intimidated by all the fancy folk waiting inside.

“I know some people.” He responded, a small smile on his lips.

You slapped his arm. “As if, you don’t even know the name of the Starbucks barista on campus.”

He rolled his eyes. “Can’t you let me be cool?” You stared at him waiting for the response, and he sighed. “This place is fairly new. Not that many people know about it yet, so it’s pretty easy to get a reservation.”

“How’d you know about it then?”

“Found it when I was looking for a place to take Sarah to.”

“Oh my god that girl from your Kinesiology class?” You looked at him with wide eyes and a grin on your face. “No way! I didn’t think you’d grow the balls to ask her out.”

“Hey,” He said, but you laughed. “Well, I haven’t exactly asked her yet. I was just checking it out.”

“Well either way, she’s going to love this place, it’s so extravagant.” You made it to the front and Grayson informed the woman standing there of his reservation. She escorted you both inside and brought you to a table next to one of the windows. She’d dropped off two glasses of water and menus for you both to look at in the meantime. You peaked at the one in front of you, and your eyes grew again.

“Gray, did you happen to look at the prices before coming here?”

“Don’t worry, I’m buying.” He flipped through his casually, as if he wasn’t exasperated at the large numbers printed on the cards.

“Are you serious? What are you, made of money?”

“Hey, I promised you a fun night, right? I can make a few sacrifices.”

A young man came up to your table, and you both gave him your order. You ended up choosing the cheapest thing on the menu, because a) you didn’t want to be too much of a burden on Grayson, but also b) you barely knew what any of it was anyways. He left, you both chatted for a bit, and he returned with your meals, both of them being some sort of pasta that you were a bit embarrassed about not knowing the differences between.

Grayson didn’t really know that much either, to be quite honest, but for some reason he felt the need to impress you with this place. And he was pretty giddy about the fact that it was working.

But throughout this, you had kept staring at him, frankly a bit shocked at the whole situation you both were in. You had to shake your head to get your thoughts straight, but ended up giggling. “So, you always this sweet with the girls you take out on dates?”

He bit his cheek, but decided to play along, lowering his fork and leaning in towards you to hear you over the chatter in the restaurant. “Why, you interested?”

“No, just curious what it is that Grayson Dolan pulls to get a girl.” You crossed your arms on the table, on elbow propped up with your chin resting on your hand. “Tell me, you have any moves?”

He laughed. “What, that I just use with every girl?”

“Don’t act so modest. There’s gotta be something. What gets them drooling?” You asked a playful smile on your lips.

He rolled his eyes, taking a bite of his food. “Okay fine, um.” He cleared his throat. “It usually starts out the same, I ask them about themself. Where they’re from, what they do— like, okay. What do you like to do in your spare time?”

You snorted. “Are we doing this? Are we playing this out?”

“Yesss, go with it.”

You laughed. “Okay, uh well. I like to paint sometimes.”

“Yea? What kind of stuff?”

“Well I used to do more traditional stuff, my parents were really into those pretty realism paintings. I’d do flowers and fruits and whatever, but every since, I guess junior year of high school, I’ve been doing more pop art pieces? And a lot more self-indulgent stuff. And I…” You trailed off, realizing you were rambling, but also realizing that Grayson had his soft eyes fixed on yours.

“What?”

His eyes widened a little, as if you’d shook him out of a daze, and he chuckled. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to stare. It’s just, uh... “ He smiled. “Your eyes are really pretty.”

Your face flushed a little bit, and you looked away from him, taking a sip of water to use it as your excuse. “Ah, thank you.”

He shook his head. “Anyways, so do you still do pop art now? Or has it changed since you’ve started college?”

You blinked at him, then covered your mouth as you opened it in slight shock. “Wow, that was really good.”

He laughed. “Yea?”

“The eye thing was good on it’s own but to know you were actually listening to me? I’m impressed.” You nodded in approval.

He tilted his head, chuckling. “Thank you, thank you.” He took another bite of food before continuing. “So what about you? You have any moves?”

You snorted again. “Gray, I barely go out on enough dates in the first place, much less enough to establish any moves.”

“Why are you always so modest? You can tell me you know.”

You laughed. “Yeah duh I know, but I’m genuinely serious this time. I don’t get asked out all that often.” You shrugged. “It’s why I get excited when I do get to go on dates. It’s fun.”

Grayson was the one who couldn’t help but stare now. He blinked at you, unable to really comprehend what you were saying to him. How could people not want to ask you out? You were incredible. Looking at you now, your hair up in a dainty bun, a few curls falling down the sides of your face; your pretty off the shoulder dress that matched your deep magenta-maroon lipstick. And he wasn’t lying about your eyes, they really were so pretty. They sparkled, even more so when you were laughing. Which was usually accompanied by your scrunched up nose, making you look like a cute little bunny. He smiled at the thought, as he loved seeing that expression on your face.

“Huh.” he said out loud then, not realizing when it was he had starting noticing your small actions like that so much.

“What?” You asked, looking up at him, and suddenly, seeing those same eyes he always saw staring at him, he felt almost light headed. His face felt warm, seeing you look at him like that. He was almost afraid that you could see what he was thinking. But why would that be a problem unless…

Grayson slowly widened his eyes. Did he seriously have feelings for Y/N?

“Nothing, sorry.” He said with a smile, looking back down at his food. Sure, he’d always thought you were amazing. You were gorgeous, sure, and you made him laugh. And yea he loved hanging out with you, watching movies and playing video games, and he adored being your roommate, having late night conversations and spending all your free time together…

He wanted to mentally smack himself in the face. Shit, he had feelings for you.

This was going to be a long night.

#not me getting ~carried away~ as usual #grayson dolan #grayson dolan imagine #grayson dolan concept #grayson dolan blurb #grayson dolan x reader #dolan twins #ask #anon

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yunsoh · 3 years

Note

could u rank aaaall the characters u can think of from fave to least fave?

i won’t do every single one because there’s literally too many characters in this series but i’ll rank the ones that i have opinions about;

1. yuki -- a shocker i know but it cannot be helped. he’s been my favorite since day one. hands down my favorite character arc in the story, i think it’s just so impactful not just for a romance series but for a story so focused on cyclical trauma. he’s a cryptic little weirdo but he’s also just like..... achingly normal and relatable. (i mean........ isn’t that just his whole character development......). big romantic, so kind and genuinely good but also he’s a big bastard and i love that for him. his and tohru’s relationship? his development surrounding it?? the best of the best. just standout to me. mwah. absolutely iconic.

2. kakeru -- for a character i didn’t even remember when i went back to reread the series a few years ago he is like....... quite literally on the brain all the time now lmfao. technical-wise i think he stands as a really interesting juxtaposition to our main trio in the sense that he has the qualities they initially lack, but he struggles with and has to actively work on aspects that are very inherent to all three of them. he just holds a unique perspective that i appreciate, esp since it’s so critical to challenging yuki’s. vibes-wise i think he’s both interestingly complicated and a fucking fool. absolutely lame and refuses to acknowledge it. love him.

3. machi -- the ways in which my opinion about her character have changed over the past year....... okay so if we’re talking like, strictly canon machi i don’t think she would be this high up (still top 10 probably) but considering the mental energy i’ve put into reconsidering her character & story and just like.... the fact that i think about her as much as i do..... i kind of can’t not have her up here lmfao. idk i think she had a lot of potential that got dropped in canon which is a shame, but i think i’ve talked that point to death so. anyways. i do just love her. she just has those vibes you know. no bullshit, secretly rabid, depressed & doing her best. yeah. takaya nerfed her because she realized she would just end up giving her the same gay subtext she gave yuki and u know how she feels about that.

4. haru -- god what is there not to love abt him. i think he makes me laugh the most throughout the series but he’s also sooo fucking intense at times it’s sick. especially since he usually stands as a chill and grounded point while everyone else is going crazy..... again just immaculate vibes. just so much love in his heart. like he genuinely just wants people to be happy and having a good time. i do also wish his character/issues were explored a little more (maybe in lieu of characters who like.... didn’t really need a character arc lmao) but it’s not a dealbreaker. boy rlly almost exposed the sohmas to the whole school though huh.

5. kyo -- he’s actually somewhat tied with tohru but i think he has just an edge above her for me because he’s such a grouch LMAO. idk there’s just something about how he’s very prickly but suuuch a softie and romantic under it all that just gets me. in a weird way though, he ticks a lot of my boxes but isn’t exactly a character that i’m strongly drawn to? i like him, but i don’t really reread his chapters/rewatch his eps. something about him doesn’t click exactly right for me..... maybe bc his story is strictly romance-focused (and honestly tends towards the melodramatic that i’m a bit ‘hm’ about). that said he lucked out with getting a satisfying ending to his arc and he’s made me cry at least once so gg.

6. tohru -- every time i think about her i’m just like. can we pleeeeease get this girl a therapist. yes they all need therapy but like..... hello can someone help..... anyways she’s just so lovingly made and i think her progression is super super well done. how her issues and grief manifest and really take form in the series over time is just...... oog...... it’s just perfect. i really appreciate that we get to see a character who is stereotypically feminine and mother-like actually struggle under those traits, but doesn’t abandon them once she overcomes her issues. she’s not a go-to character for me like, personality-wise ig (again.... melodrama....) but i do love her. icon.

7. uo -- back in middle school i think she was actually my favorite character after yuki.... and tbh is it such a coincidence that i couldn’t remember the second half of the series when i visited it again in my 20s lmaoooo. first-half series uo is just so fresh. i love that people find her threatening and yet she’s just this chill harsh-mouth who’s also incredibly tender-hearted and vulnerable. just genuinely funny and insightful every time she’s on the page. her friendship with kyo is also pretty standout to me it makes me laugh every time, and ofc her love for tohru... well u know. meanwhile second-half series uo um.... who’s that lol..... she only takes a place above hana here because i have really affectionate memories about just loving & admiring her when i was younger.

8. hana -- more or less tied with uo. she’s a constant mood and i love her for it. i guess i could say “second-half hana idk her” here too, but that’s just more because she just literally drops off the face of the earth after a certain point. but whatever, i love that she walks around with psychic powers and everyone knows it but it’s never questioned because everyone is just so fuckin weird it doesn’t matter. takes no shit, could kill you without leaving evidence. vibes. i also think her backstory is really beautiful and her relationship with tohru is just gorgeous. just a perfect support character.

9. shigure -- okay he actually also used to be a fave back in the day. i think he’s just fun to think about...... his perspective and his purpose in the story is pretty fascinating and i think it’s one that you gain new insight on with each reread. he just stews in this incredibly morally grey area and that’s where he stays. truly a character that you either love or you loathe. i mean at the heart of things he’s a conniving bastard who has fuckin problems LMAO but he’s also just so.... aggravatingly lackadaisical when he’s not actively being a shit-stirrer.... just “cause problems on purpose & chill” energy. ends justify the means to the bitter core. problematique. his story w akito is fucking batshit and the series wouldn’t be the same without it, the energy of that with the rest of the story?? what the fuck dude. meanwhile i do love his relationships with the main trio & the other sohma kids.

10. ayame -- king.... he’s just 110% all the time and i think that his existence is just the most exquisite dunk on his family’s rigid upholding of conservatism and tradition it’s truly sexy of him. he does what he wants and tbh, it’s worked in his favor for the most part. when he’s on screen you know some stupid shit is about to go down. and of course i really love his and yuki’s relationship and how it impacts them both over the series...... good shit rlly. a fabulous menace.

11. kimi -- she’s literally just up here because she’s goddamn funny and i love her relationships with kakeru and yuki. no deep traumatic lore just a girl owning the fact that she’s cute smart as hell and knows how to get what she wants. a brat to the core. idk she’s just pure fun and i think that’s necessary in a story where even the designated clown characters (kakeru, ayame) have fairly dark moments. also i think about the “his wallet 💖” moment too often.

12. komaki -- okay. so. she is not this high up on the list because of who she is in canon. she’s this high up purely because of how i’ve recreated her in my brain lmfao. i think she’s borderline unnecessary in canon (i like that we see the other side of the accident, but the execution of it is just. not it.), but my extensive daydream universe where i just overload her with headcanons to give her any sort of character beyond “kakeru’s cute girlfriend” lands her up here. i also just think of her too much as an extension of thinking about kakeru too much. sue me.

13. momiji -- honestly i’m having kind of a hard time placing him because i do like him, i think he’s funny and sweet and of course has his own brand of issues going on, but...... i don’t think i have any strong feelings about his story? i think he brings a necessary lightness to the cast, but when it comes down to some individual aspects of his narrative (involving his mom/momo, his unrequited crush on tohru) ...hm.... i think his complicated feelings about the curse are really poignant though and that part of his story especially slaps for me.

14. akito -- hmm... hm.... i like how akito stands as tohru’s narrative foil and i think the parallels between the two are pretty rich...... but i really struggle with just how fucking exhausting she is lmfao. the lengths of her derangement are just 2 much for me personally, and i feel like the ending really failed her as far as her personal growth goes (which? i think is super fucking detrimental considering how takaya tries to portray her as like, “reformed” or something along those lines.... i just don’t buy it. her having a normal functioning relationship with SHIGURE??? lmaoooooo. please). i do appreciate the level of darkness she brings to the story, and how her behaviors form and completely fuck the family over, but...... i don’t necessarily enjoy her........ tiring queen.

15. rin -- ah... tragic, vitriolic goth.... i do like her, and i think i could place her above akito depending on the day, but her story doesn’t really stand out to me. like, it’s obviously incredibly sad, but it’s really unfortunate that we don’t see her develop in a way that actually..... you know.... develops her character.... idk it sucks that she’s written in a way where she’s fruitlessly sacrificing herself mentally and physically for haru and there’s never really a point where it feels like she can just relax and consider herself and her own needs (or even like. like herself). she starts and ends the story feeling completely broken from trauma and i just think there should have been more of an intervening point somewhere in there, which i think could have been achieved with more time between her and tohru. as is she’s just kind of all-around tragic which :’/ bummer. she deserved more growth.

16. mayu -- honestly i still don’t really get why she of all of the characters has a backstory chapter. i think her friendship with kana is pretty heartbreaking but it also doesn’t... do much for me.... after the fact... so i don’t know what to think about it. her crush on hatori is kind of weird and i don’t fully understand it in canon. but you know what. she’s funny and i like her attitude. for the most part, i like when she’s on-screen. i think she has a really funny relationship with her students and is this chill no-bullshit kind of figure. her friendship with the mabudachi boys is nice even though i think it’s delivered a little weird at times (which is more or less because it can be easy to forget that she. knows them lmfao). yeah. i like her but takaya really made some decisions with her huh. also i originally didn’t add her to this list but i’m just sticking her in here last second so yes there’s a note in hatori’s bit that doesn’t make sense now but it’s staying.

17. kyoko -- so i kind of have some blasé feelings about kyoko, except when it comes to her backstory, in which case i am just... upset lmfao..... the adult version we see of kyoko is sweet and at times like, pretty funny in just how blunt/harsh she can come across as, but in general my feelings about the parents in furuba are just like.... oh you’re a nice parent.... oh you’re a fucking horrible parent..... etc. you know? it’s usually pretty one or the other (some parents are a little more complicated than others -- tbh kakeru’s mom comes to mind), and she’s obviously portrayed as a good parent, esp since we see her primarily through memory. anyways, her backstory is just tragic. she went from one abusive situation to the next and was then left to be a single mom at like, 19/20, traumatized and with just about no support system, and while i understand that she was able to become the kyoko we see in the present because of tohru.... idk i think i still feel a kind of unresolved dissonance between backstory kyoko and the kyoko we see later on. and i think that largely has to do with the fact that we (purposefully) don’t see the parent’s perspectives -- so she ends up in this transitory stage. i have no idea how this would be resolved lmao i think it just is what it is.

18. hatori -- i’m also struggling to place him because i think he’s sooo so poignant in the beginning of the story but i don’t really pay much attention to him later on. which is a shame considering his introduction is to me the first real punch to the gut regarding just how deep the issues go with the sohmas. i don’t feel inclined to really think of him very often, but i just think there could have been more done for him. i think trying to tie up his issues with a romance just doesn’t really work and is also irrelevant to his? actual problems? (also sorry i’m just remembering that this is another symptom of takaya pulling another wacky coincidence maam they don’t all have to know each other i repeat they don’t all have to fucking know each other--) anyways i feel like his resolution wrt his issues with his family/the curse is kinda.... glossed over..... unless i’m just completely forgetting something.

19. hiro -- i used to hate this kid. straight up. now i think he’s just like.... a typical smart-mouth 12 year old...... so he’s alright lmfao. i think his relationship with rin is interesting but it’s pretty forgettable. i don’t really care about his relationship with kisa or the parallel it makes with kyoru, but i do like the scene where he tells her about his curse breaking. he does mature in a nice way over the series. oh and the panel of him holding his sister makes me cry idk dudes. alright maybe i’ll place him above kagura just on that right alone.

20. kagura -- do i feel justified putting her this far down on the list? i dunno. her relationship with kyo isn’t my favorite (i just find it obnoxious) but i think she’s pretty funny and cute otherwise..... thing is kyo takes up like 95% of her story so there isn’t much otherwise 2 speak of. really wish her relationship with rin could have been explored more tbh i think that could have had potential. honestly my feelings about her change with the phases of the moon so while i don’t care much about her right now two weeks from now i’ll probably feel more inclined to bump her up to the momiji-rin range. which i feel like says enough about her character for me lmfao.

21. kisa -- she’s alright? i think she’s cute but she doesn’t really do much for me after her intro chapters (which. i only like so much bc they’re a big part of yuki’s narrative tbh). yeah. honestly not much to say about her :(

22. ritsu -- sighs.... man...... ritsu could have just been so much more but canon doesn’t give us much and i really don’t think about them otherwise. like truly they just completely disappear for the whole meat of the story LMAO...... what the fuck.....

23. nao -- he’s not so far down at the bottom because i hate him, he only has this placement because you could literally take him out of the story and i wouldn’t fucking notice lmao. i never think about him and i don’t rlly want to. next.

24. kureno -- uuuugh uuuughhhhhhh. the wasted potential of this fucking guy. would it have been so hard to drop the creepy romance plotline and just put more effort into his story regarding his place in the family....... his symbolism...... fuck even just giving him a personality. ugh. honestly i think we could have benefitted from a pov chapter from him to get a better sense of all of this instead of just extrapolating but. alas. looking at him gives me the residual taste of cardboard and regret. i had actually originally placed him above both nao and ritsu because at least he gives me something to think about, but it didn’t feel right. i actively dislike seeing this dude because i just know that his storyline is fucked from start to finish -- not in a narrative way like akito or rin, but in a way that just gives me the impression that his character was never 100% there. all this drama over a man who only wears button-ups and khakis. despicable.

25. katsuya -- yeah i know boring typical answer and surprise to no one but there is just nothing redeemable about this dude to me. i won’t lie, i think i would consider his character differently if the narrative had any intention whatsoever to condemn him, but obviously that doesn’t happen so here we are. anyways tohru baby you were right to dislike him just like...... lean a little more into it yknow........ yeah. i considered maybe not putting him on here because of my general attitude about the furuba parents but the fact that the story tries to paint him in a positive light just makes kyoko’s backstory borderline unbearable to read. bad.

#'i won't do all of them' lists 25 fucking characters. actually why are there so many gd characters in this story.#yes i know technically a few of these i don't really have opinions on but i needed to complete the zodiac & stuco lists 😔✌#fruits basket #fruits basket spoilers #answered #Anonymous

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prosopopeya · 3 years

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New Year’s Meme

this survey has been a tradition among my friend group for YEARS, but i haven’t filled it out since 2015 apparently. i’m not entirely sure why except 2016 was the year a lot of stuff changed for me, namely in that i finally got out of school in some form and started a new job, but i also had a few health problems that kept plaguing me (thyroid medicine being off, vitamin d) and my anxiety was all over the place. so here we go i’m doing it again and feel free to do it too if you want!!

1. What did you do in 2020 that you’d never done before? tried on wedding dresses. taught virtually. dealt (poorly) with drunk teenagers. performed in a pep rally. wore face masks all the time. i’m going to lump in living with someone. jon moved in october 2019, but i don’t think i did this quiz last year so. taught ap.

2. Did you keep your New Years’ resolutions and will you make more for next year? i don’t really like resolutions. they put too much pressure on me and i am a fragile person when it comes to setting expectations and living up to them. i did want to try to read more this year, and i maintained that until the pandemic, and then just kind of gave up requiring myself to do anything but live.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth? i don’t think so. a coworker did.

4. Did anyone close to you die? jon’s cousin committed suicide in march or april. the circumstances were pretty upsetting. um. andy died in february, very suddenly. andy was my high school boyfriend for four years with whom i had a very... he scarred me in a lot of ways when it comes to sex and consent. it’s taken me a long time to unpack all of that. and i struggle with how much any of that was his fault or just bc he was a stupid kid too. our mutual friends had nothing but nice things to say about him on fb. anyway. he would guilt me into saying he’d kill himself if we broke up, and jon’s cousin killed himself over his girlfriend. so that was a complex part of the year.

5. What countries did you visit? none. literally the week before the quarantine, we went to asheville to visit jon’s cousin.

6. What would you like to have in 2021 that you lacked in 2020? maybe a different job? or at least some peace at doing mine.

7. What date from 2020 will remain etched upon your memory, and why? march 13 we cancelled classes and had a technology training day; the 15th we had another one, and then we were virtual the rest of the term. it was such a sudden shift and while i so loved working from home tbh, it was such a relief after a supremely shitty january/february work-wise, i still had a lot of keyed-up, stressful days centered around transitioning to being the senior upper school spanish teacher. i hate it!

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year? writing 50k in the month of november. i have literally never done that before and actively reject nano as being typically unhealthy for how my mind works, so it was nice to do it entirely by accident.

9. What was your biggest failure? mishandling the drunken teenagers on that field trip in january.

10. Did you suffer illness or injury? i sit crosslegged in my virtual teaching chair and i did it so much that my ankle hurt for the entire summer.

11. What was the best thing you bought? we put a deposit on our elopement in ireland. jon’s wedding ring. (i didn’t buy my wedding dress.)

12. Whose behavior merited celebration? my best friend at work who keeps me sane and is represented by benny in my au, which other than the fact that he is not my sidepiece, is perfect he is crucial to my survival at work and i love him so much. (also he is gay and the french teacher so the benny parallels just keep coming). everyone who tore down a statue in virginia (and other places, but especially monument avenue). everyone putting their lives on the line during this pandemic.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed? guess! but aside from all the obvious, i found out a friend of mine at work voted for trump. my work bff and i had been trying for years to sway his politics, but that had us both deciding to give up on him.

14. Where did most of your money go? food, ALCOHOL. god., our savings account. i did a pretty excellent job saving this year, though a good deal of that is because jon moved in and makes more money than me, and also we split all the bills.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about? my wedding dress but strangely only when i went to try it on after it came in bc after the purchase i was so sure i’d made every mistake possible. my wedding band. wellbutrin changing my whole life. and, last but certainly not least, the gay angel and the bi(lingual) hunter. i wouldn’t have survived nov-dec in school without that distraction. the election.

16. What song(s) will always remind you of 2020? the entirety of taylor swift’s oeuvre this year, maybe specifically “this is me trying”

17. Compared to this time last year, are you: i. Happier or sadder? happier, i suppose, perhaps contrary to what should be the case, but wellbutrin is a hell of a drug. ii. Older or wiser? wiser. ii. Richer or poorer? richer.

18. What do you wish you’d done more of? reading. cleaning. exercising.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of? stressing. chaperoning.

20. How will you be spending Christmas? so, an update; last year was the first year i didn’t go to my mom’s for christmas. i was supposed to see her for thanksgiving last year, but she basically told us not to come bc she wasn’t feeling up to it (cool!), and we went to jon’s for christmas and my mom’s for new year’s.

this year, obviously we couldn’t go to my mom’s. instead, we rented a little cabin by the lake. it was perfect; it was really really nice inside, the beds were SO SOFT, the pillows were the best things i have ever laid my head on, like i took off the pillowcases to try to find the brand. we had a little tiny christmas tree with tiny ornaments from walmart that we decorated. the 23rd, we went and picked up our wedding bands. we slept two nights in the (cold) back bedroom so i could wake up and look out at the lake. it snowed for christmas. :)

we opened presents on christmas eve, per jon’s family’s tradition. on christmas eve, we also went to his family farm and sat outside and hung out a little. every year his family does like a secret santa sort of thing and i got my first present in that exchange, which is notable bc jon and i are not yet officially married. i got a remote control car -- jon’s idea bc i couldn’t think of anything, and he was so delighted to hear that i loved playing with rc cars when we went to the beach as a kid.

christmas morning we facetimed my parents and opened some presents together. then jon and i marathoned mandalorian (after spending the previous few days watching several die hard movies), and then we watched wonder woman 1984 which was a bad movie.

21. How will you be spending New Year’s Eve? ok LAST year for new year’s, we were in a hotel room, so that was nice, bc it meant minimal stress with my parents. i had always wanted to go to this restaurant near us that has a special new year’s menu, so we did that. the night before or after i think we went to cheesecake factory, which was also amazing.

this year currently i’m tumbling and he’s playing pokemon, and in a bit we’ll try to time it so we finish schitt’s creek in time for the new year.

22. Did you fall in love in 2020? i re-fell in love with supernatural so that was nice.

23. How many one-night stands? 0. i submit we should randomly change question 23 each year to something more relevant to any of our life experiences.

24. What was your favorite TV program? what did i even watch this year. schitt’s creek. mandalorian. i mean obviously we know supernatural. the circle. are you the one (the queer season). pose. unsolved mysteries. we’re here! perry mason. watchmen. oh maybe that mcdonald’s monopoly fraud documentary. avenue 5. i’ll be gone in the dark. of those i think my favorite maybe is... pose or we’re here.

OKAY UM. on my 2014 version of this there were a bunch of questions about tv shows that i’m putting back in if only for the memories:

25. Which TV shows did you start watching in 2020? the haunting of bly manor, which we still need to finish. derry girls.

26. Which TV shows did you let go of in 2020? HERE’S WHY I WANTED TO RESURRECT THESE. here was my answer in 2015: “supernatural. goodbye, my sweet prince.” CAN YOU EVEN FUCKING BELIEVE

27. Which TV shows did you mean to get into but didn’t in 2020? Why? so far, queen’s gambit and that one on hulu with catherine the great. EVENTUALLY. 28. Which TV shows do you intend on checking out in 2020? fleabag. queen’s gambit. 29. Which TV show do you think you might let go of in 2020 unless things significantly improve? idk i drop things pretty regularly if they don’t entertain me 30. Which TV show impressed you least in 2020? GUYS HERE’S MY ORIGINAL 2015 ANSWER: “supernatural. :(”

anyway back to the rest of the quiz:

25. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year? every person who refuses to listen to facts and information.

26. What was the best book you read? killers of the flower moon: the osage murders and the birth of the fbi, or the his dark materials series.

27. What was your greatest musical discovery? well i knew about tswift so i’m not going to count her albums. i will count this song that jon played for me once in the car that got stuck in my head for two weeks straight and led me down into a great related-songs spotify playlist: through the roof ‘n underground.

28. What did you want and get? a wedding dress and a very specific kind of wedding band. a gay angel. a christmas getaway. animal crossing.

29. What was your favorite film of this year? idk i don’t know how many films i saw this year. maybe mucho mucho amor: the legend of walter mercado

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you? i was 32. we went to an escape room with a BUNCH of people -- work bff, my old work bff and his wife (old bc he quit and we’ve fallen out of touch :(), the cool new physics teacher and his fiancee, and the aforementioned trump voter and his wife, before we knew... we went out for brunch/lunch after. it was pretty great!

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying? not having to chaperone that school trip in january. dean being bi in english as well as spanish. cas just ilke, appearing in 15x20. not having to physically go back to work this fall.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2020? no! real! pants!

34. What kept you sane? jon. supernatural (in a way?). animal crossing for a while. wellbutrin! i haven’t really been able to detail this yet, but finally i did something about tumblr and my therapist making me think about adhd. my doctor gave me wellbutrin (bc i lack any official diagnosis and was on anxiety meds anyway, and he was like let’s try this!) and it’s fucking. it’s a fucking godsend. surprisingly enough, my students. trying to provide them a safe space has been a calming thing for me.

35. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most? jensen ackles’ silence. misha collins again, i guess.

36. What political issue stirred you the most? the summer was so fucking intense. i guess though it was me trying to exert my influence in a responsible way with my students without trying to try to make them feel uncomfortable but then one kid was a vocally upset trump supporter after the election and i had to try to defuse that situation.

37. Who did you miss? my old work bff. several old friends that i’ve fallen out of touch with bc i have no object permanence.

38. Who was the best new person you met? people i met through the spn resurgence!

39. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2020: if you manifest it in an au, it will come. no really though. maybe that expectations are only as important as i make them out to be.

40. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year: usually i have a hard time coming up with anything for this and i default to looking at my most played songs of the year. my most played song of the year received each and every one of its plays within the month of november and you can guess why. anyway see if this works

I had all and then most of you Some and now none of you Take me back to the night we met I don't know what I'm supposed to do Haunted by the ghost of you Take me back to the night we met - the night we met, lord huron

#happy new year #annual meme

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tutselutse · 4 years

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A Little Push

Sooo.... I’m obsessed witht the idea of Emma and Zoey as friends who won’t admit it, and, well, after writing many bants for them, this suddenly had to happen. You can blame @bi-gstupid and @nocoffeeforoldmen for enabling me.

Content: Zoey/Emma, drinking, casual hook up, mild sexual content, hints of Paulkins in the end bc they are soulmates ok? ----

Thinking back on it, Emma should have known they were heading towards this. However, it still took her by complete surprise when it happened. She glanced to her left, where Zoey was dozing off, with her hair splayed out over all the many pillows, under the sheet that didn’t fully cover her breasts. Huh.

They had been out drinking. A tradition they had developed over the last month and a half. Nora had broken her ankle and while she stayed at home, she had left Zoey in charge. On paper that sounded horrible, but since Zoey now was the boss, she had no one to suck up to, and that made her a lot more tolerable. Emma almost even enjoyed their shifts together. Not fully though, since Zoey and her friends were doing a production of Les Mis and Zoey would sing the Fantine songs over and over. But Zoey was a good drinking buddy. Hot enough to get free drinks and not selfish enough to abandon Emma for just anybody. She held her liquor well and talked shit about the other people in the bar.

Today they had been drinking beers mostly and having a laugh over that customer guy who was interested in Emma and not very subtle about it, but never got the nerve to do more than polite small talk. It was somewhat endearing, and it wasn’t like he was unattractive. Emma kind of enjoyed the polite small talk. He usually let her vent a little over whatever annoyed her that day. Zoey kept insisting she should date him. Or, in her words, totally bone him.

“I’m not gonna bone him,” Emma insisted.

“You’re so boring,” Zoey said and emptied the beer glass in front of her. Then she wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Classy. “He really looks like he could use a good roll in the hay.”

“And therefore, I should do it?” Emma asked, eyebrow raised. She lifted her own glass and took a sip.

“You also need a good roll in the hay,” Zoey said with a sly grin. “Finish your beer, old lady. I’m getting us another round.” Then she stood up and left Emma to fume over being called an old lady. The other round turned out to be drinks this time. Then another beer. Another drink.

And suddenly it was the middle of the night and Emma was feeling perfectly drunk and ready to lie down. They emptied their glasses and got up, gathering their things. Outside a light drizzle was in the air. It felt nice and cool on Emma’s face and she stood for a moment with her eyes closed and enjoyed the sensation on her skin. A cool breeze brought out goosebumps on her arms and legs. She felt less tired now.

She opened her eyes and looked up at Zoey. “Wanna split a cab?” she asked.

Zoey looked at her for a moment, an expression in her eyes Emma couldn’t read. Her gaze travelled up and down Emma’s body and she bit her lip. And then, instead of answering, she had stepped forward, leaned down and kissed her.

What the fuck?

Emma froze, taken by surprise by the softness of Zoey’s lips. Zoey pulled back and gave her a questioning look. Almost defiantly asking Emma what she was going to do now. Emma stared at her, lips parted and heart pounding. Then she placed her hand on Zoey’s neck and pulled her into another kiss.

Zoey didn’t hesitate and immediately wrapped an arm around Emma’s waist, while deepening the kiss. She tasted like her last drink – rum and coke – and she smelled nice. Her body was soft and curvy against Emma’s, but there was nothing soft about the way she kissed. It was needy and hungry, with tongue and a hint of teeth. After several minutes of kissing and hands that got more and more curious, Zoey pulled back and with heavy breathing said, ‘I would like to split a cab.”

And that was how Emma found herself in Zoey’s apartment, making out against a hallway closet. It had been ages since she last hooked up with a girl, let alone someone she knew already, but Zoey’s feverish kisses, and hands under her shirt were causing her blood to boil and her body to yearn for more.

They were both still in their Beanies uniforms and Emma started to undo Zoey’s buttons fast and pushing the shirt off her shoulders, exposing creamy skin and a thin lacey bra. She trailed her fingers down the exposed chest, ghosting past the nipples and continuing down her stomach.

Zoey was undeniably hot. Pretty face, and annoying and distracting mouth and nice legs. Her eyelids fluttered as Emma touched her and it was incredibly satisfying to look at. Zoey kissed her again, more urgently, shoving her hand into Emma’s shorts, not even bothering to open them.

They stumbled backwards through the apartment, until Zoey opened what Emma assumed was the bedroom door. Zoey didn’t hesitate, shoving Emma unto the bed and straddling her, sending her a victorious eyebrow waggle.

They ended up having sex for what felt like hours. Whenever one of them was done, the other one took over. It was practically a competition to see who could give the other the most and the best orgasms. Finally, they both rolled away and caught their breaths.

“Sex with women is so fun,” Zoey grinned, lifting her head and resting on her elbow. “I’ve always wondered what sleeping with an older woman was like.”

Emma crossed her arms and frowned. “I’m not that much older than you.”

Zoey just giggled. “You take everything so seriously.” Then she stretched out on her back and closed her eyes. “Goodnight, Emma.”

Well, that was that Emma supposed. She just fucked Zoey from work. Zoey, who was rude and lazy and flirted with customers to get more tips and always sang some new musical theater song or practiced scales. Zoey, who was the only person she knew, who matched her level of shit-giving, who was really hot and a good kisser. Emma hadn’t thought of their bickering as flirting, but maybe it had been. There was some tension between them and now they had acted on it.

She fell asleep after turning around a few times to get comfortable, and woke up to sunlight and an arm stretched out over her. She turned her head and groaned at the sight of Zoey behind her.

“Move,” she said, lifting her arm off.

“Sorry,” Zoey mumbled and rolled away, “I’m used to spooning my boyfriend.”

“Your boyfriend?” Emma asked.

“Sam is kind of my boyfriend. I don’t know. We’re not exclusive, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Zoey answered, sitting up and rubbing her eyes. “He gives good dick. But you were much better at oral,” she winked. Emma rolled her eyes.

“Oh really? The gross cop dude isn’t good at going down on women? I’m shocked,” Emma said sarcastically.

“Was that your way of saying thank you Zoey, you were good too?”

“Thank you, Zooeeeey, you were good too,” Emma mocked. Zoey threw one of her many pillows after her.

“Anyway, I’m glad it’s not weird. You’re an asshole, but I really wanted to fuck you,” Zoey said, standing up and walking naked around her room, picking up discarded clothes. There were a few marks on her from last night.

“Likewise, I guess?” Emma shrugged, “we agree this was just fun, right? Not a big deal?”

“Of course,” Zoey grinned, “sex is no big. Speaking off, you really should fuck the guy from Beanies.”

“But now I have gotten that roll in the hay,” Emma said with a smirk, “so now there is no reason.”

“Babe, there is always a reason,” Zoey winked, pulling on clean underwear. “I just got your machine started again. You’ll wanna get laid again in no time.”

Emma bit her lip as she thought it over. What the fuck was she talking about? “Did you-“

“Oh, fuck you, you gave me hickeys,” Zoey said, inspecting herself in the mirror. Emma smirked.

“And you fucking liked it,” she responded, climbing out of the bed. Zoey had been whimpering and begging for more when she gave them. From the look in Zoey’s eyes, she remembered as well. Emma went searching for her clothes and got dressed quietly. She really needed to brush her teeth. Zoey walked her out, still only dressed in underwear.

“See you at work,” she said, and Emma did finger guns back at her.

“See you,” she replied.

She spent the day sleeping eating greasy carbs and then more sleeping. She woke up to her Monday shift. It was one of the long days and she wasn’t looking forward to it. Zoey was in the break room, grinning when she saw her arrive. She hadn’t buttoned her shirt yet and the hickey was visible. Emma got images of her mouth against Zoey’s skin and her hand between her legs. She exhaled and fought the sudden arousal at the thought.

The customers kept coming, everyone else was clearly as tired and in need of coffee this Monday as she was. Emma noticed several cute girls, with pretty eyes and full lips, in dresses that hugged their curves. She noticed a few men, with sharp cheekbones or nice shoulders. Zoey was right, her machinery had started back up. A customer spilled a little as he took his frappe, and Emma wiped the table down.

“Hi,” a nervous voice said, and she looked up into remarkably blue eyes, “I’ve got an easy one for you. Just a cup of black coffee.”

Emma smiled at him, and it made his whole face light up. She poured him the coffee, keeping an eye on him at the same time. He was tall and cute. She accepted the payment, noticing his impressive full lips and that he had broad shoulders underneath the suit jacket. When she handed him the coffee, his fingers brushed against hers and she felt tingles run from her fingertips up to her elbow.

Maybe Zoey was right?

“I see you in here all the time, don’t I?” she asked, “what’s your name?”

“Paul,” he answered, offering her a small and sweet smile.

“Hi Paul,” she said, “I’m Emma.”

#tgwdlm #starkid #emma perkins #zoey and emma are good friends and neither of them will admit it #zoey x emma #paulkins #paul matthews #zoey from beanies

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thepeanutbutterwizard · 4 years

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Ninjago/Avatar au Pt 4

Basically just Book 1 (and I agonize over ships. Help)

(Also I finally finished watching A:TLA)

(Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 5)

Recap time:

So, we’ve got Maya, Garm, Lloyd, Kai, and Nya flying on Ultra and trying to get to the North Pole. Morro and Wu are pursuing them, as is Clouse, (who will be taking Zhao’s place) and, y’know, the entire Fire Nation. Koko has been abroad for about three years, looking for any information on the Avatar she can. Ray went off to fight with the other men from the Southern Water Tribe.

They have a lot of similar adventures to cannon: they go to the Southern Air Temple to see if that can jog any memories from Lloyds past lives. It doesn’t work, Lloyd just gets ahold of a glider (there are a lot of shenanigans with him learning how to use that) and adopts a Flying Lemur (give Lloyd all of the pets pls) who is just as mischievous as Lloyd. They take a detour to Kyoshi Island, and get a letter that Koko had left for them, saying that she was going to look for a mysterious library (wink). They also befriend one of the prominent members of the village, Cyrus Borg, and his daughter Pixal (she’s human), the leader of the Kyoshi Warriors (I know Cyrus would make a great Mechanist, but the idea of Kyoshi Warrior Pixal was too good and I fell in love with it. Also Samuraishipping is fantastic.)

They fight pirates, there are Spirit World shenanigans (btw the last fully realized Avatar before Lloyd, and his spirit guide is a human version of Firstborn.) and there might be a Jet stand-in if I can figure out a good character for that role. There’s a running gag of people automatically assuming that Maya and Garm are married, to their combined amusement and annoyance, until one of the kids will call one of them their parent, and the other one aunt or uncle (they’re family in this au. Fight me). Eventually they just start automatically answering anything that implies they’re a couple with ‘We’re siblings’.

Wu and Morro have been chasing them the whole way. Wu has been conflicted this whole time; he just found out that his brother is actually alive, and has been hiding for years, with the Avatar no less. And now he’s having to hunt both of them down (as well as his brothers wife and kids? Maybe?) when all he wants to do is, like, talk? Have a cup of tea and catch up maybe? Meanwhile Garm is thinking that Wu is completely on their father’s side, and that he won’t show them any mercy if he catches them.

Eventually they make it to the Northern Water Tribe. The chief is the former elemental master of ice. I shall call him Ice, bc I dont think he has an actual name. He’s a waterbender. And now we finally meet Zane, the white haired (human) wonder! (Heh, you all can probably guess where I’m going with this. Pls don’t kill me.) His unnamed mother died giving birth to his younger brother, Echo, when Zane was about two, and their father died a few years after that, and they were taken in by Ice, who was a close friend of their parent.

I don’t think I’ll make Zane a bender bc of the whole ‘moon spirit saved my life as a baby’ thing, but Echo is (purely for angst reasons. You’ll see what I mean in a bit). But this is the part where we get some sweet sweet Oppositeshipping! Zane isn’t betrothed to anyone, but even though he likes Kai, he’s constantly worried about his tribes safety and worried about what will happen when the Fire Nation shows up (he’s smart enough to know that they will show up eventually) and he’s scared of letting everyone down, and there are just a lot of issues there holding him back from being in a relationship with Kai.

Now, even though everyone knows that Lloyds the Avatar, they’ve kept it secret that Kai and Garm are firebenders (and Garms whole backstory) for obvious reasons. But you guys know that date that Zuko went on in Ba Sing Se? Pretend that they have that lantern thing in the Northern Water Tribe. Kai and Zane have that cute date and Kai lights the lanterns and its adorable.

But I bet you’re wondering who takes the place of krusty old Pakku? Krux of course! Who better to be the traditionalist old jerk waterbender teacher than the traditionalist old jerk boomer? (Acronix is there too. He’s not a bender. If I could find a way to work Futureshipping into this au, I totally would. I am still trying to figure out how to organically work it in) So Lloyd, Nya, and Maya are ready to learn some traditional waterbending (bc even though Maya is a really good waterbender, she literally just made up her own style. It would be like someone trained in acrobatics and dance, turning it into a form of combat, and entering a mixed martial arts tournament. She’s always wanted to learn some traditional waterbending) but Krux does the whole ‘boys do combat, girls do healing’ speech.

None of them like it much, but they go along with it and try to pull the whole ‘I’ll just show you what he showed me!’ thing and get caught. Krux demands an apology, and Maya is trying to keep Lloyd and Nya from blowing up at Krux, and she’s also trying to keep from blowing up herself (I hc that Kai gets his temper from Maya). Krux says something about how even if he wanted to teach them, clearly Maya, and Nya especially, don’t have what it takes to be real waterbenders, and Maya fucking snaps. She goes off on Krux, says some things about how she’s spent her whole life living in fear, and how she worked her ass off to hone her bending, and then she challenges him to go outside and she’ll show him what a ‘real’ waterbender can do.

Lloyd, Kai, and Nya are all a little shocked. It’s the first time they’ve seen Maya get so mad. Garm, who has known Maya for years, had been trying to subtly tell Krux to shut up (even though Krux was really pissing him off too, but someone needed to be the adult). Since Maya isn’t about to let Krux get away without a fight, Garm is just thinking ‘hoo boy, here we go’.

Krux tries to walk away from Maya, and then promptly gets his ass handed to him on a silver platter. He begrudgingly admits that, while Maya’s bending is chaotic and wild and sloppy, it is very powerful. But just bc she was able to beat him in one fight doesn’t mean that he has to teach any of them any waterbending. Maya says ‘fine! We just thought it would be a good idea for the damn Avatar to learn traditional waterbending, but I guess I’ll just go ahead and teach him more of my ‘wild, chaotic, sloppy’ waterbending style! And, I’ll teach anyone in this tribe who wants to learn from me, no matter who they are! And besides, it’s not like you can stop me.’

And so she did! Maya spends the next little while teaching not only Lloyd and Nya everything she’s come up with, but a bunch of the young waterbenders in the tribe learn from her too, as well as some older benders. Krux is less than pleased, but he isn’t looking for Round 2, so he keeps his mouth shut. Garm has been trying to lay low through all this. As low as possible for the father of the Avatar at least.

Meanwhile, Wu and Morro have been tracking them down diligently. At least, Morro is being diligent. Wu has been a little shit and trying to slow them down on purpose, and anytime they have to fight team Avatar, he keeps trying to use that to get his brother alone and get him to talk shit out dammit brother, where have you been and who are these people do I have niblings? cause you do and he’s a good kid even though hes trying to kill you right now explain that he is really, truly glad that he’s alive and well, and that no, he doesn’t actually want to catch him.

There wasn’t any type of assassination attempt on Morros life like there was Zuko, he either faked an injury so he could go on his secret ‘capture the Avatar’ mission during the siege on the Northern Water Tribe, or he wasn’t allowed to go and snuck away (with a little help from Wu either way). He does the same thing Zuko did with the underwater tunnel, but Morro doesn’t have firebending to break the ice. He has airbending (bet no-one saw that coming). I debated with myself for a long, long time if I should make Morro an airbender (they were nomads, and bending is inherited. It’s not that hard to believe that a few airbenders survived that way. I also love the airbender Ty Lee theory)

Wu figured it out when Morro was pretty young, and did everything in his power to both teach Morro, and keep his bending a secret. This played a big part in contributing to Morro’s need to be seen as worthy and deserving.

So anyways, the siege. It’s happening. Kai is being a bit of a grumpy angst lord (bc he wants to hold hands with a pretty boy) but gets assigned by Ice to guard Zane and Echo. Lloyd enters the Spirit World, Morro fights Nya and only wins bc he pulled out his secret airbending when she had her back turned. Meanwhile, Maya and Garm are helping fight of the Fire Nation (Maya with her waterbending, Garm with hand-to-hand combat) when Garm see’s Clouse going off to kill the Moon Spirit and follows him. Wu also follows them and gives Clouse the whole ‘we need the moon too’ speech.

Garm watches from the shadows as that confrontation takes place, but jumps in to fight the Fire Nation soldiers who came with Clouse at the same time that Wu does when he kills the Moon Spirit, and not only does he all-out firebend for the first time in a while (once he and Ray became more trusted by the Southern Water Tribe the blanket ban on their firebending was lifted, but it’s kind of a bad idea to excessively play with fire in a village that’s made almost entirely of ice and snow) he reveals his identity to everyone. He’s actually a little surprised that Clouse is surprised that he’s alive. He figured that Wu would have told everyone about his death being greatly exaggurated.

Clouse books it, Lloyd fuses with the Ocean Spirit to go wreck the Fire Nation, things are a teensy bit more awkward in the spirit-cave-pond-area-place with Garm and Wu being there together, but its overall just a somber moment.

And then, Zane becomes the new Moon Spirit. But not only do we have a sad Oppositeshipping good-bye kiss, we have a sad last hug ever between Zane and Echo. I made Echo a waterbender solely so it could be a terribly sad thing where anytime Echo bends he can feel his brother with him. It’s sad. There are tears (including from myself as I type this). Kai is comforted by Garm, which is basically confirms Wu’s incorrect suspicions that Kai and Nya and Maya are Garms kids and wife, and that they’re helping the Avatar (look, this gag is just too funny to me and I will keep it going as long as I can.)

When they leave the spirit pond, Wu tries to pull Garm aside to talk to him, but Garm still has no idea if he can trust Wu, and that means that the kids are super wary of him (they know that Wu and Garm are brothers) so all that really accomplishes is getting Kai to firebend at Wu’s face (btw, Kai firebending is a big deal. When he was a fairly little kid he accidentally firebended [firebent?] and Maya got burned. For Kai, firebending is the last thing he uses, not the first) and then grabbing Garm and Nya (whos giving an inconsolable Echo a piggy-back ride as he is still sobbing) and booking it. But not before Wu was able to slip a letter into Garm’s parka.

While all this is going down, Morro and Clouse had their little scuffle, but Morro has to airbend at one point to save his own skin, and not only does Clouse see, but quite a few mid-retreat Fire Nation soldiers see as well. Then Clouse gets killed by the Ocean Spirit.

Morro and Wu steal a raft and book it, since now one of them is a traitor and the other was just outed as an airbender. Krux and a group of people, both benders and non-benders, head to the South Pole to help them out. Echo is a part of this group; it’s what he knows Zane would have wanted to do. Team Avatar head out to find Lloyd an earthbending teacher, and Garm finds the letter from Wu. He’s scared to open it, and doesn’t for a while.

And now, it’s time to introduce a new character! See, back in the Fire Nation, the Firelord had been growing displeased with his son. Despite Wu’s best efforts, dear old dad had caught on to how much Wu disliked the war, and he figured it would only be a matter of time before something tipped Wu over the edge and he turned full traitor. That would leave him as a ruler with no heirs, and that wouldn’t do. So he secretly was searching for a good candidate to take the throne, preferably an orphan, who showed proficiency in firebending and could be moulded into a cut-throat living weapon.

He found what he was looking for in a young girl named Harumi. A firebending prodigy whose parents had both died in the war. And now that the Firelord learned that, not only did his younger son turn traitor in the North Pole and run off with his airbender adopted son, but his disgraced fool of an older son is alive and actively helping the Avatar, well, it’s high time the world saw just what his hand-picked heir can do.

#ninjago #ninjago au #ninjago avatar au

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annavolovodov · 5 years

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ya girl saw the downton movie and has some Thoughts

if you followed me at all from 2011-2015 then you'll know i am firmly Team Downstairs and did not want this movie to happen, just so you all know what position i'm coming from here.

everything below is gonna be spoilery af. if you haven't seen it yet and want info just hmu. if you have seen it and want to talk about it please message me bc i’m always up for chatting about Downton.

okay but the title sequence with the music building and cresting as we come up over the hills and get our first shot of downton... goosebumps. tbh i don't know shit about film making but i can't fault the technical aspects (costumes, music, cinematography). the impact of the increased budget was felt from the very first second.

for the plot i’m gonna split things by character to make it easier. i’ll probably go to see it again and maybe after that i’ll have some deeper Thoughts but i missed being able to liveblog during the film so enjoy my rambling first reactions.

upstairs peeps

everything with violet was iconic. i'm glad that they didn't neglect her relationship with isobel and ofc maggie and imelda played fantastically off each other. pretty much everyone has already highlighted the scene with violet and mary at the end and it tied things up perfectly between them. violet and mary are so so similar and violet has been pushing for her to inherit since before S1. the movie showed us that mary is basically running the estate even if she doesn't get the the title and i can totally see why violet is confident in the future of downton now. that being said, i don't think violet will actually die. maggie has been talking about leaving since 2012 and fellowes obviously put this in as a get-out clause for her should she want to go, but i reckon they’ll convince her to do more. if carson's palsy can be mysteriously cured, so can violet's conveniently vague illness.

i already knew that robert and cora weren't gonna be in it much, but i wish we could've seen cora finding out what was happening with edith and helping her out. it wouldn't surprise me if there was a deleted scene there cause that whole storyline felt a little disjointed. i completely forgot that cora knew about the pregnancy and was so confused at how the queen foud out about it all. i don't think we got anything in robert and cora's bedroom, or anything with cora/baxter and robert/bates, which would've also been very welcome but i guess they can only fit in so much.

onto mary: this may be an unpopular opinion but god i miss her long hair. yeah i know it wasn't the style of the time but her wig in this one was tragic and they need to fix it. i absolutely love that t*lbot didn't exist for a solid 95% of this movie and mary got her rightful place ruling downton. i wouldn't say i’m the biggest mary fan but her arc felt like one of the more satisfying ones of the movie imo.

as someone who has been firmly #teamedith from day one i am delighted to see my girl happy and successful. literally all her outfits were A+ and not to be gay on main but those scenes of her in her nightclothes getting ready for bed gave me my rights. i’m sad that she seems like she's either given up her magazine or has less of a role in it now based on what they said outside???? she did seem unsatisfied with aspects of her position so hopefully she'll go back to doing some writing and publishing cause that was a good fit for her, and if edith and bertie are “modern” enough to travel without servants surely edith moving away from traditional grand lady duties and back to her magazine that wouldn't be an issue.

the mention of sybil being gone seven years? yeah. thanks for the pain. tom accidentally saving the monarchy on no less than two occasions is the ultimate "congratulations you played yourself" moment but the fact he thought the army had sent someone to check up on him is the level of republican i'm trying to be on. i'm a bit ehhhh on his relationship with lucy, mainly cause i'd rather the screentime given to the newbies had went to established characters. but like sybil/tom was a wholeass epic romantic slowburn spanning several years through a war and across class divisions n shit and meanwhile lucy/tom have known each other for forty eight hours and had three conversations in a hallway so like obviously that’s just gonna pale in comparison????? like it just is???? i guess i don't hate it but it just was a bit unnecessary and the time coulda been spent on better things.

isobel didn't have all that much to do on her own but i appreciated her scenes with violet and i love that she was the one to figure out that lucy was lady whatever's daughter. penelope wilton's facial expressions during some of the exchanges with violet were great. i see lord merton has also undergone a miraculous recovery from his apparently serious anaemia but he also didn't appear much which was a big win for me!

team downstairs aka the ones i turned up to see

as a downstairs supremacist who has watched the screentime distribution in previous fifty two eps of the show, it’s fair to say i had low expectations going in. i expected a grand total of 10 minutes for the servants combined and i think that's why i was unexpectedly happy with what we got. ideally we would've ditched the subplots involving the personal lives of the royals and all the stuff w imelda staunton and her maid but oh well it could’ve been worse and i'll take any breadcrumbs i can get. anyway i'm eagerly awaiting the team downstairs cut of the film one of yall will hopefully make when the dvd comes out. the only part that was far, FAR too upstairs heavy for me was the last sequence of the film after the royals left and i think we would've benefitted from rounding things off with team downstairs after the ball.

so i guess retirement magically cured the palsy carson had, but i guess after matthew’s miraculous recovery anything can happen at downton when it comes to health. Fellowes is getting a free pass for retconning this one cause i cba with more death/loss. mary going to carson for help and him immediately coming to her aid was very sweet. kinda wish we'd find out what he was up to post-Downton (except for his gardening) tho.

i was expected zero carson/hughes content in this movie and yet !!!! and yet!!!!!! we were somewhat well-fed. like carson (incorrectly) thinking he can control the other servants and mrs hughes' "oh that went well charlie, start as you mean to go on" hdjksjs i love them. and the lil scene in their cottage ugh. also we got more of them using their first names and yeah i guess that makes sense given they've been married for a while now but as i said, i had low expectations.

mrs hughes is still like the best person ever but wbk. her vs. the royal housekeeper = iconic. i kinda felt bad for royal whatsherface in some ways because she clearly didn't know who she was up against THE elsie hughes who has vanquished much scarier foes in her time. the other servants were never gonna win that battle.

the 0.5 seconds of baby bates *chef's kiss* perfection. god i am slightly bitter it was only 0.5 seconds given the fuckin multiseason journey leading up to his birth. tbh we should've ditched everything involving the personal lives of the rando new characters and let baby bates have some of that time but fellowes loves upstairs too much to let that happen. the small interaction was adorable though and i'm glad the mention of his name was subtle enough that we can retcon it cause i truly believe anna and bates would've came up with a more creative choice than that. genuinely i'm so curious about their whole living situation and how they cope with a smol child while working full time but i doubt fellowes even considered that so y’know. what can we do. i enjoyed the breadcrumbs but i wanted more.

i did go into this film with the mindset of "something awful will probably happen to anna or bates," cause that's what usually happens in these things but plot twist!!!! we saw them smile on multiple occassions!!!! what a nice change for us all! i swear every time anna bates smiles an angel gains their wings. her scenes with mary were good and i'm happy their friendship made it into the film. you know what else i was happy to see? the EXTREMELY UNDERRATED brotp between anna and baxter. there was a couple of moments with them standing next to each other or talking to each other and it warmed my heart. like yass two of my fave people are friends. it's a big win for me.

i'm sure i read something about brendan being involved in another project which meant he couldn't film too much (i'm curious to whether this impacted the lack of baby bates scenes?) and while it's true that bates didn't have a ton of scenes, i didn't feel like he was absent which was good.

thomas had the best storyline imo. i don't blame him for being angry that mary brought in carson and it was actually very iconic of him to go off in the library like that. i found it hilarious that while everyone else was panicking at downton he went off on gay adventures. i really wish we'd gotten this "thomas makes a gay friend then discovers the village's underground gay scene THEN gets a boyfriend" in the show cause that would've been SO MUCH BETTER than some of the other stuff that got stretched out across the last couple series (like the love quadrangle with daisy/ivy/alfred/jimmy). like, imagine thomas’ movie plot as a series-long arc. the impact. i liked the guy that was his maybe-boyfriend and i hope any continuation keeps that relationship going.

mrs p and daisy continue to be the mother-daughter duo of the century. i thought both of them were supposed to be moving to the farm post-S6 but i suppose that would've meant they wouldn't be in the film hence why it didn't come to fruition. i guess they could all move once daisy and andy get married. mrs patmore didn't get a great deal to do but i still feel like i saw her a fair amount. comrade daisy was awesome and is definitely me when i see any monarchy-related stuff. somewhere over the last few seasons she's developed into one of the most interesting characters in downton and we don't talk about that enough. andy trashing the boiler was immature af but at the same time i feel like it completely makes sense for daisy to take that as a compliment. it’s just such a daisy thing to do?????

now, there is one thing i kinda fucked up here. while i went into the film with low expectations for everyone else, i fully expected baxley to be A Thing because how could i not and boy did i come out looking like boo boo the fool. i guess baxter and molesley have continued the tradition of Agonisingly Long Downstairs Slowburns which would be okay if we were still getting one season per year but is quite frankly rude when we're on rationed content like this. the first half of the film i thought it was gonna be revealed that they were together or something but then that scene at the end implied they're dancing around each other and my god is it frustrating. i would give so much to trade tom and lucy's romantic subplot for a baxter/molesley one but once again i know that's an unrealistic dream.

definitely not enough baxter in general but that one shot of her, anna and mrs hughes standing in the same frame was worth the price of my cinema ticket. still love molesley even tho he's a monarchist.

in terms of the overall downstairs stuff, i'm euphoric at seeing all these people interact with each other again. as we all know, found family is the best trope and since the servants are literally the epitome of that every moment focussed on them is like chicken soup for my weary soul. was the revolution against the royal servants realistic? no. was it realistic for the two people who came up with most of the plot to be the ones who went to jail for doing literally nothing wrong and would therefore want to avoid stuff that could get them in trouble with an all-powerful family? also no! however, seeing downstairs all working together for a common goal is content that appeals directly to me and i am thankful.

shoutout to the last scene which is the best way the movie could've ended it for me. use of first names AND walking home together? thank u fellowes.

tldr; team downstairs fan who was strongly anti-movie, went in with low expectations, was pleasantly surprised. there are a shit ton of things i’d change but i just really loved seeing these characters who all mean so much to me again. obviously the only reason this film happened was for financial reasons rather than a desire to continue the storyline (cause the finale tied things up perfectly imo) but i wish they'd done a two-part miniseries instead to ensure everyone gets some screentime. two ninety minute specials every few years would work much better if everyone wants to keep downton going but i guess that doesn't bring the cash in like a movie does.

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lady-feste-pendragon · 5 years

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OPTION TWO: KING OF ATTOLIA: THE HIT BROADWAY MUSICAL (and this idea is mine so it’s a looooooong one warning you now)

WE OPEN with a huge ensemble cast song of heckin course in which all of Attolia COMPLAINS about this HUGE PAIN in their COLLECTIVE BUTTS, telling the story of how the thief of eddis DECEITFULLY and WRONGLY kidNAPPED their prECIOUS QUEEN who may have been bloodthirsty and barbaric but who careS she was ouR queen and she’s beAUTIFUL and we loVE her and we hATE the king who forCED her to marry him bOO to the king doWN with the king we hATE him he’s TERRIBLE and the song ends with Aris comes sprinting on stage, disrupting all the singers and sending the song to a skittering halt bc guys!!!!

Costis punched the king!!!

To which there is suddenly a lot of Whispered Talking about oh nO costis is so niCE and now he’s gonna diE bc he punCHED the kinG also what did the king do this time--inSULTed teleus no heckin wonDER costis punched him but still v tragic cut to scene 2 Costis in his cell, pacing, sitting, standing, pacing again, and there’s a knock at the door. It’s the king of attolia, approaching from Stage Right, a bottle of wine tucked under his arm and two cups in his one visible hand. Costis lets him in. The king sets the wine on the table. He lifts his right hand--no. It’s a hook, the audience can see for the first time. The King of Attolia is missing his right hand.

The song neglected to mention that. There’s lots these songs neglect to mention plot twist Nobody talks about How the King lost that Hand it is a Forbidden Topic

There is no song when the king tells costis he’s being promoted, only a stuff uncomfortable silence whenever the king is not speaking. Toward the end of the scene in strides Attolia asking if Attolis has decided whether to hang costis or behead him. Attolis answers neither, costis will be promoted, and Attolia makes a noise of disgust and leaves.

A few songs follow as Costis settles into his new position and since this whole narrative is filtered through his eyes, the audience is lead to believe all the things about attolis from the first song are true. He dresses like a peacock, he has no dignity, he’s spiteful with his servants, he makes costis do stupid things. The queen pulls Costis aside and asks him to Keep an Eye on the King for her, to report back to her occasionally. He assumes the queen will one day do away with this idiot king and he is surprisingly conflicted about that. He gets his I Want song, which is mostly just “I Want This Stupid King To Leave Me Alone” lol.

Another important note: One of the songs is a council song that’s v political and it’s mainly during this song that we learn 1) the king is a v good singer so what was the deal with people complaining about his voice/speech/accent in that first song, and 2) Oh, that’s it, the king can’t rhyme. Attolian formal speech (sung, in this case bc Holy Musical Batman) is traditional broadway style meter and end rhyme. Eddisian formal speech has internal rhyme, has specific meters and important in-meter repetition, but no end rhyme. When Attolis sings, he Never rhymes, although you can see him Trying, actively trying so hard and only getting as far as slant rhyme which makes everyone involved Wince terribly bc Ugh That Accent, This Stupid Backward Eddisian Goat. Attolis and Attolia as of yet have no duet, but they meet in hallways sometimes and greet each other in song and it’s awkward and weighted and Short. Attolis has a lovely I Want song in which he locks all of his attendants out of his room and sings to himself (while costis is Right There, Sir) how homesick he is, and how much he misses Eddis and his freedom. It’s v sad. Attolia also has a solo during the council scene, which is also short, her time is coming i swear

THE KING’S WEDDING NIGHT is a bawdy awful song and an Absolute Bop and dite is terribly proud of himself and everyone’s humming it on and off for the rest of the act. It makes gen horrifically mopey which makes costis’ head hurt but the king is starting to grow on him. like a fungus. after all he sang that really sad song about how much This Sucks and yeah, fair, everybody’s putting stuff in his food and bed and crap and Maybe if we were Nicer to him he wouldn’t seem so Awful (all of the guards make fun of him for this). There is a short “lilies i rule, heads you do” scene that takes place during another short council scene right before The Dinner of the Fateful Dance, and during that council scene Attolis doesn’t even Try to Rhyme and people keep interrupting the council song to hum The King’s Wedding Night and he gets visibly more and more agitated as the coin keeps flipping and the song keeps playing and he leaves in a huff. Attolia tells him as he stalks off that he Has to attend dinner and during dinner he Forces (!!!) the queen to dance with him to a lovely instrumental song, which seems to play first in slow motion while Phriesine sings of Attolia’s backstory, of her first marriage, of the importance of the king’s humor when the queen offers him her wine. Suddenly the song speeds up, and the queen’s hair tumbles past her shoulders, and she’s smiling, why is she smiling? Costis blinks as the king gives her back her hair pins. That was certainly telling, but only if you’re paying attention.

Act One ends with Costis on his day off with a sense of unease, until he passes some guards who are struggling to put away the dogs and suddenly he knows! and he takes off running!!! bc where is the king!!!!!

Act Two opens with Costis desperately singing a prayer (Ten Golden Cups) as he runs and arriving in the garden just in time to see the king easily dispatch the second to last assassin. The third is apprehended as the rest of the court arrives, assuming Costis has done the deed. The assassin is questioned furiously with the king leaning against costis and he spits furious vitriol about the king, the same things everyone was singing about at the beginning but with more bitterness, and ends with “The queen should have kILLED you when she cUT OFF YOUR HAND!!!!” and if there are enough nonfans in the audience and if the actors are doing their job right it should feel like all the air has been sucked out of the room bc you don’t taLK about that!!! the queen arrives then and attolis kisses her and presses his forehead to her shoulder and suddenly everyone is rhyming as the royals are rushed up to the queen’s chambers. The king is put on a bed, spewing blood. The queen faints, the king is Distraught, everyone is shoved out of the room. Attolia is left alone with Costis outside the room and she Sings. It’s a short song, and mostly is Extremely Angery about the assassination attempt in her Own Garden in her Own Court to her Own King. When they’re let back in in the next scene it’s Duet Time Babey!!!!! Attolis and Attolia sing together about their relationship and their Love and their past and their present and how they’ve learned to step past it all and costis watches, feeling like an outsider but also So Stunned. He tells the king about the cups and the king swears they will be there

From here things start happening Very Quickly, It Seems. The king is ill. The queen is singing more often. The queen of eddis comes to visit, not just the king’s cousins as in the book. Unfortunately we have to cut out the part where sophos goes missing bc sophos can’t exist in this universe he adds too many variables we get one (1) storyline and we can’t mess this up. The king speaks with Relius and that’s Scary. There’s another ensemble song during which Costis is the only one to defend the king and he is Uncomfortable when the king’s wedding night motif plays again. And Then the king Destroys the house of Erondites and the queen has relius thrown in jail (also during that time the queen has a vicious, terrifying, short solo that’s more like a temper tantrum and a panic attack rolled into one and the king Soothes her) When the king is Destroying that baron’s house??

he rhymes.

Perfectly, flawlessly, he rhymes. He matches Attolian cadence note for note, word for word, and then he folds Eddisian repetition and internal rhyme into the mix. Attolia joins in, her own musical style rising up to meet his. The exchange lines, ending each other’s rhymes, Attolia ends up using more Eddisian themes than even he does. He proves he could do it all along, he just didn’t want to, and now he proves he doesn’t have to by ending that proclamation in a purely Eddisian way. And the next scene? Relius. Attolis. The dungeon. The King’s Wedding Night: Reprise. Perhaps the most terrifying reprise ever written. And in the end, he lets him go. And Relius returns to Attolia and once again begs her forgiveness and Attolia gets her own terrifying, heartbreaking solo, and in this one? she uses Eddisian cant and Attolis isn’t even in the room. She forgives him in a blend of Eddisian and Attolian that becomes it’s own musical language, and the only one used by the royals for the rest of the show.

Does that sound like the end? because it’s noT guess who haven’t had a duet yet!!!! it’s Attolis and Costis time!!!!! the attendants wake costis bc the king is drunk on a rooftop and he is supposed to Fetch the king. Costis learns to speak the language the king and queen have already been speaking to each other, and the king declares he has work for costis to do. And yeS the king slips, and tumbles, and falls--until it’s clear he can’t catch himself, his foot is off the parapet--and he flails and Something catches him, and pushes him gently back up, and a gentle rich chuckle fills the stage as the voice of a god says “go to bed, Eugenides.” Eugenides and Costis stare at each other, wide eyed, terrified. “The gods really do speak to you,” Costis whispers and Attolis confirms it and a Vow is made, “will you serve me and my gods for all your days?” In the end Costis agrees and asks him to come to sword practice tomorrow.

The final scene is fairly short, Attolis’ defeat of the guard and of Teleus and his being named Annux, and Attolia is there, and i actually am not sold on that as the actual ending, this scene could be moved before the rooftop or could be deleted altogether except we Need the annux line and i want attolia to be there ugh problems problems but either way the curtain closing song is an invocation of hephestia which, invocations should also feature bc i heckin love me an invocation song but that’s it that’s the play can u imagine these idiots singing in front of a live studio audience boy i die!!!!

#the queen's thief #king of attolia #now this one should def go under a read more it's at LEast a mile long #still not doing it #also if u want hit me up for lyrics i've been toying with them for Months but barely wrote them down so good luck if i remember them lol

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rivalsforlife · 5 years

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rank the prosecutor themes!!!

Okay!! I’ll do you one better and do all the main rival themes (meaning: I’m including Shi-Long Lang and Justine Courtney in here too. despite Lang probably being very displeased at being grouped in with prosecutors. sorry.) uuunfortunately I am going to get into spoilery territory with this one, but I’ll do this in reverse order, so you can skip the spoiler parts because they’re my favourite ones haha, and I will warn for them.

First, a disclaimer: All the prosecutor themes are fantastic. that is all.

12 - Great Revival - Franziska von Karma: I adore Franziska, but she needs her own leitmotif. This one is basically the same as Miles’ Great Revival, except higher and with a different intro, from what I could tell. and I’m not even sure if the sound gets revamped for the Investigation games…? I can’t quite remember. ANYWAYS, what really made this the lowest of the prosecutor themes for me is that they also use this theme for MANFRED VON KARMA in AAI2, because I guess they didn’t want to create a whole new theme for him when he only shows up for part of a flashback case. So they borrowed his daughter’s. This is a DISGRACE, because Miles Franziska and Manfred are all very different characters and deserve to have distinct leitmotifs. Especially since the whole idea of the Great Revival is that it’s them coming out from underneath Manfred’s shadow/unlearning his techniques, since this plays when Franziska comes in with the evidence to save everyone in Farewell, my Turnabout, I think. So having Manfred have the anti-MVK song is not good.

11- Zacharias Barnham - The Sword of Labyrinthia: things get difficult now because all the songs are good. I’m putting this one here for a couple of reasons, namely because I first listened to this song while going through PLvsAA on 2x speed on youtube because otherwise it would take too long, so I heard this song at 2x speed and now it just feels too slow to me. I said these rankings were going to be very subjective, right…? also it would have been great if they actually finished Barnham’s character arc, you know. Darklaw doesn’t really have a leitmotif so she’ll be missing from this list, by the way, I didn’t just forget that she existed.

10 - Nahyuta Sahdmadhi - The Last Rites Prosecutor: it’s a pretty song. I like how it actually uses what sounds like a human chorus in there, which is distinct from pretty much all AA music? I especially like the part near the end of the loop where it gets all kind of suspended in a sort of “floating in the void”-like feeling, at least to me. It’s down here though because I… don’t really get an “opponent” vibe from him. I don’t listen to this and think to myself “oh, this is the guy I’m going to fight”, you know what I mean?

9 - Barok van Zieks - Grim Reaper of the Old Bailey: I like how ominous and haunting this song is, pretty fitting for a “Grim Reaper”. It’s nice to listen to, too. It just didn’t really stand out for me above all the rest, so it’s here.

8 - Simon Blackquill - Distorted Swordsmanship: similarly to van Zieks’ theme, this has a very ominous vibe to it. It’s pretty subtle for a lot of it, and it’s way less “in-your-face” than a lot of the other prosecutor themes. It suggests an opponent that isn’t going to face you head on but kind of work in the shadows and take you down without you even realizing it… which is fitting, considering Blackquill’s whole “twisted samurai” motif and the idea of psychological manipulation being his main thing. I like this one, like all of the prosecutor themes, and it’s only here because I… liked others more.

7- Miles Edgeworth - Great Revival: “Grace why did you say both Great Revivals are practically the same thing but put Miles five places above Franziska” OKAY LISTEN. There is only one “Franziska von Karma- Great Revival”. There are multiple “Miles Edgeworth - Great Revival”s, and this is about where I’d average them out. Great Revival 2002 would be ranked about the same as Franziska’s because, yeah, they’re practically the same thing. Great Revival 2013, however, has an even prettier intro, is more orchestral and therefore sounds even more regal and fitting for DD-era Miles. I am seriously considering making this my alarm to wake up to in the mornings because… it’s so pretty?

BUT I have to mention the actual orchestral versions of Great Revival, because they are phenomenal. There’s one for every Gyakuten Saiban Orchestra. The 2016 one is the first one I listened to, but it was tragically taken down… so listen to the 2019 one. All the orchestral editions are pretty much the same… but the orchestral Great Revivals have a new part around 1:30 that is just GOREGOUS. I ADORE it. That would probably shoot this one up a few rankings if they were in the games. I gasped out loud in a dead silent library upon first hearing it, it was very embarrassing. Great Revival imo sounds much prettier the more genuinely an orchestra it is. I love this song? … moving on.

6 - Shi Long Lang- Speak up, Pup: I said that Blackquill’s theme was very subtle – this is the opposite, this is about as “in-your-face” as it gets. It also sounds very cool. It has a sort of… I’m hesitant to use this term, because of how people abused it when I was in junior high, but it definitely has a sort of swagger to it. It pretty well encapsulates Lang’s character and him just… barging onto the crime scene with all his people and making hasty arrests and taking bullets, like, all that stuff I can see coming from a person with this as their leitmotif. But I just like listening to it, it’s one of those songs that has a similar effect to caffeine on my brain. It’s just very loud and cool and I enjoy it.

5 - Justine Courtney - Goddess of Law: I also really love listening to this song. It’s very regal. This song is very good in contrast with Sebastian’s First Class Farewell… like, Sebastian spends most of the time as a bit of a joke, with his light and airy theme… and then Justine comes in with this theme and you kind of feel like “oh, crap, now things are serious.” I like the use of the organ, obviously, giving it kind of a churchy feel which makes sense as she is referring to and worshipping the Goddess of Law, but I also love the faster parts of it too. It shows off her quick wit and intelligence that makes her a pretty formidable opponent for Miles in AAI2. It’s the song of someone you definitely would not want to cross… and is very pretty.

4 - Godot - The Fragrance of Dark Coffee: my feelings about Godot are… complicated and not entirely positive… but I adore his theme. He’s the first prosecutor to really have a proper leitmotif that’s all his own… and even though it’s not a “I’m so ready to fight this person” leitmotif or even a “this person’s particularly intimidating” leitmotif, it’s very laidback and relaxed. Honestly what gets this one so many points is, guess what, once again, the orchestral songs! Part of this is a lot of bias, because they replace the piano parts with the flute in the orchestral editions of this song and I played the flute for six years so I am partial towards it. But also it just… sounds extremely pretty? It’s very relaxing and… it just sounds gorgeous in the orchestra editions. I haven’t listened to the jazz version yet but I bet that would be gorgeous as well. Here’s the most recent 2019 orchestra version of this song, but the 2008 and 2016 ones are good too (my favourite being the 2016 one, which again got taken down bc copyright :( rip)

3 - Klavier Gavin - Guilty Love: out of the mainline games, AA4 has the best soundtrack imo, which is justifiable considering who the prosecutor is. Okay, this one is a huge contrast from Godot’s theme… it’s actually a huge contrast from all the prosecutor themes. The only one who comes close to this level of Rock is Lang’s theme. It’s fun, it’s upbeat, it’s soooo much fun to listen to. It really does set Klavier apart from all the other prosecutors - this isn’t the song of your enemy, this is a song of a person who’s here to find the truth and have a good time doing it. You go into the courtroom getting ready to face off against the dreaded Second Case Prosecutor, the most insufferable version of every prosecutor until now, and you get ROCK MUSIC. … literally, he apparently actually plays it in the game. which, pun intended, rocks.

This gets bonus points, of course, for being made into an actual song with lyrics that you could hypothetically sing, made by Shu Takumi. If you haven’t listened to this one yet you totally should, it’s a good time. listen to Klavier Gavin ditch his date to go to court. PARTICULARLY for the parts where Apollo’s theme gets in there. like, uh, Klavier. pining much?

– OKAY NOW SPOILER WARNING. I’m going to go into a bit of AAI2 spoilers here, nothing too major like the mastermind or anything, but if you don’t know what the deal is with Sebastian then I’d just recommend avoiding this for now. And then after that are major DGS2 spoilers, so if you haven’t played either of those games and don’t even want to look at anything remotely spoilery you can probably just skip out on the rest of this post.

2 - Sebastian Debeste’s Themes: okay, so. First Class Reasoning is just such a… light, airy, bouncy song. It sounds kind of absent, like it’s running off chasing butterflies instead of investigating a crime scene. It’s not the song of a formidable opponent (which makes the contrast with Justine Courtney’s leitmotif much better). This plays pretty notably in the one argument you have with him that’s so nonsensical it doesn’t even justify the traditional confrontation music, you have this instead.

And then in the final case you get First Class Farewell.

This sounds infinitely more mature than First Class Reasoning. The two instruments kind of do a… back and forth with each other. I think I read somewhere it’s like a tango? Whatever it is, it is something where you need to keep up with the argument and the logic, something Sebastian hasn’t been able to do… until now. It has him standing up to his father, standing on his own, and showing that he truly has the potential to be a great prosecutor. If we ever somehow see Sebastian as a prosecutor in future games, I want this to be his leitmotif. Individually these two songs wouldn’t take this spot, but put together and showcasing Sebastian’s character growth – and that First Class Farewell plays in one of the most emotional AAI2 scenes – is what brings it up here. It’s a really good use of leitmotifs.

Speaking of great use of leitmotifs…

1 - The Masked Disciple’s Leitmotif. I… cannot say anymore than this without spoiling the entirety of DGS2, so I’m actually going to put the rest under a “keep reading” if you’ve finished DGS2. So, uh, if you haven’t, just… when DGS2 is translated, play it, it’s really good. And this leitmotif might actually be my favourite song in the entire series, for reasons that are under the cut. I… really hope this works, if it doesn’t, scroll as fast as you can and don’t look back.

…

…….. so. Asougi, huh.

The Revived Prosecutor is! INCREDIBLE. At the time I’m writing this, the only way to really experience DGS2 as someone who does not know Japanese and only knows English is by watching these twitch streams, and you might notice that when this first starts playing the streamer actually pauses so we can listen to it. it’s that good.

It starts off as such an intimidating, imposing song. It’s a song of your enemy. It’s so strange, so different from the Asougi we’re used to, and you’ve really got to wonder if he’s the same person.

AND THEN SAMURAI WITH A MISSION KICKS IN. It felt like an actual, physical gut punch.

It has lacks that familiar, Japanese-y kind of feel to it, though. It’s Asougi, but it’s different. Asougi is the Samurai With A Mission, and he’s fulfilling his very murdery prosecute-y destructive mission, which is so different from the Asougi that Ryuunosuke idolized in DGS… and even though this person is so different from the Asougi we knew, it still is Asougi. It also has a few hints of the Professor’s Theme in there, which is also incredibly good considering… well.

Honestly, one of the reasons I’d want a remake of the original trilogy – like a full-on remake – is so that they’d do something like this with Miles’ themes. His “Great Revival” is good… but it doesn’t suit AA1 Miles. If we had an actual “Demon Prosecutor” theme, which was mostly replaced by DL-6 when talking about Miles’ trauma, and then get to something like Great Revival for his… well, Great Revival, that would be fantastic. That’s the one regret, that Miles came too early for ace attorney to get around to making proper leitmotifs like this.

Also again this song is just really fun to listen to. And that’s probably what’s most important here, right?

#asks #soundtrack rankings #prosecutor leitmotifs #(a separate tag so I can advertise it without adding the spoiler)#ace attorney

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ghostmaggie · 5 years

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hey so in your MKAT post (which you’re 100% correct about) you also mention you’ve had some issues with RT in the past. i’m fairly new in the fandom and also watch his other show iZombie, but i wanted to ask what issues they were?? i like to be informed about the media i consume lmao

Oof okay so I'm on mobile and therefore this will probably be more rant-y and opinion-based than you might be looking for, so I invite anyone with opinions or sources or thoughts or contradictions to reply or shoot me asks and I'll share them (plus I'm curious of other thoughts) but,,

Idk if this was clear in my original post, but my issues are mainly contained within the actual show as opposed to things about him irl, because idk that much outside of secondhand info, so take it with a grain of salt I guess, lol

Also, I feel like I need to say that this is really negative about vmars--which, to be clear, is a show I love dearly--and I know sometimes I like to avoid negative commentary on things I enjoy because it gets stuck in my head and ruins my enjoyment. So if that's you, feel free to skip this! I wont be offended and you shouldn't feel bad about it! It's also just one person's opinion, and I'm most definitely not always right :)

So mostly setting aside the brand new season because I have no clue how to talk around spoilers effectively, in short (with spoilers up through the movie and maybe some spoilers for the books and new season, I cant really tell at this point):

(Editor's note post finishing writing: it's not even all my thoughts, but it's not short. Sorry.)

RT shares in the grand tradition of showrunners I do not care for along with Steven Moffat and Jason Rothenberg, for many parallel reasons. Moffat thinks hes cleverer than he really is, jroth is a douche about romance and character motivation, and both are smug jerks who drove me away from shows I used to love, so.

So number one I guess would just be the sense that he really fucking does not care about the fans. It's especially egregious, as I've seen others point out, when he literally would never have gotten his show back (after driving it to the ground) without the LITERAL MONEY donated by devoted fans. I'm not saying you have to do things just because fans want them, but to go out of your way to do things you know fans will hate just to be contrary is,, yeah.

He thinks he's so very smart, and yet his plots are riddled with holes and inconsistencies (hello, Moffat). It speaks, to me, of a lack of respect for everyone involved--fans, writers, actors, crew, critics, just everyone. Write down a timeline. Something. Try.

One of my bigger issues, though, is that the misogyny in vmars is just...beyond appalling. Not just narratively--i understand representing the flaws in society, I guess, but veronica is honestly one of the most misogynistic parts of the show, and she is never ever ever held accountable for it. Ever. The show never sends the message that she's wrong for the atrocious way she treats, to name a few, Madison, Kendall, Gia, and even Carrie during the s1 plot with Adam Scott. The carrie thing is especially fucked up bc iirc the narrative only condemns her for guessing the victim wrong. (As another note, her treatment of other marginalized groups or basically anyone she ever treats badly--logan, Keith, Wallace, weevil, the list goes on--is rarely or never narratively critiqued. Veronica mars can do no wrong, apparently, even when she's obviously wrong.)

She's far from the only example of misyogny, of course--duncan's s2 dream about madonna/whore meg/veronica comes to mind in screaming color, yet donut is somehow treated like a prince forever and ever and v's lost true love even though he's basically the scum of the earth (pardon, my true feelings are coming out a little here).

Somewhat connected is, of course, the show's treatment of rape in general (hi, season 3), but especially Duncan's rape of veronica. I'm still not over the way they walked it back to "not a rape" and took back holding him accountable. I live for all the fanfiction that addresses it, because at least there people remember that, whether he "thought she could consent" or not, he literally thought she was his sister and didnt know. That's uninformed consent at best, babe!

And if that wasn't bad enough, to "resolve" that plotline and then come back at the end of season 2 to be all, "jk! You WERE raped, by SOMEONE ELSE [too]! Enjoy that reenabled trauma, and some chlamidya to boot!"

Speaking of retconned instances of sex, how about that piz/veronica tape that suddenly became full on sex in the movie? Fun times.

My favorite bout of misogynistic writing, you ask? That would have to be "narratively-enforced nicest girl in school who stands by her friends and is sweet and loyal becomes a raging hell bitch yet also the representation of misogynistic virginal innocence because she was knocked up and abandoned by Mr. Narratively-Claimed-to-be-Perfect-but-Actually-the-Worst and completely undergoes a 180 personality change then dies for plot reasons" because holy fucking shit.

Okay sorry I got way more into that than I meant to. I'll try to wrap up.

RT does a very jroth job of treating fans like shit for giving a shit about a romantic relationship he created. He acts like fans are a bunch of stupid girls for caring about romance, but then pushed it at every level of promo to reel us back in. Make up your mind, asshole. It's desperately unfair to bait fans with romantic promo (even in the form of an inane and ooc love triangle) and then snap back with "oooh it's noir, shut up about the romance!"

If that's how you feel, stop making every other plot point and promo about the fucking romance.

RT seems to want to be making a show that he isnt. He wants to be grimdark and angsty and awful, I guess, and while there have been elements of effective darkness throughout vmars, they have been tempered by the show as a whole. That made it (mostly palatable) for people like me. To flip the script now does a disservice to long term fans and does nothing to attract new viewers. If you want to make a different show, make a different show. Don't drive beloved characters into the ground because you're bitter about how your work is perceived post-death of the author.

To wrap up--he hates character growth. He must really hate it. This is dipping a little into the new season, but he just. Won't let anyone develop. Well. Maybe some people. A very few. But not veronica. Never veronica. Because heaven forbid your main character, the person we've followed for 15 years, be anything other than she was at 16. Her personality, her approach to the world, none of it has changed. Which begs the question: what has been the fucking point?

Sorry this is so long. I'm not sure I even answered your question, so feel free to ask me to try again 😂

#post #vmars #vmars spoilers #maybe #thanks for asking

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living-dead-parker · 5 years

Text

Hallmark, Hot Chocolate, and Halls - P.P

Summary: Y/N is sick, Tony’s tired. Good thing there’s Peter.

Warnings: idk if there’s cussing, there might be. This is really a call out post about me bc this is 100% me last night and today bc im sick. Also probably some mistakes.

On and unrelated note, I voted for the first time today which was cool

Word Count: 1.3k

(Not my gif)

"Mr. Star-"

"Get over here, kid. Now, please." Tony cuts off Peter as the younger man rounds the corner into the living room of the Avengers Tower. Peter notices a frazzled Tony attempting to stand up and a sickly looking Y/N attached to the man, not letting go. Her arms are wrapped around his waist as she holds onto him, clinging for dear life. Peter's eyes go wide, brows furrowed in pure confusion. "Help me." Tony begs, finally standing up, taking Y/N with him.

"W-What happened?" Peter asks as he steps closer. Peter notices the Hallmark channel playing on TV, tons of tissue littering the coffee table and the couch, the bottles of DayQuil and NyQuil. He also notices the mass of blankets and pillows, the movie DVD boxes, bottles of water and juices. The living room looks a mess and Tony does too.

"Y/N is sick." Tony responds in a smartass tone. Peter rolls his eyes.

"Yeah, I know, but...what is all of this, why isn't she letting you go?" Peter asks as he steps closer, picking up some of the mess with a clean napkin on the table. Tony sighs, prying the young woman's arms off of him.

"Y/N doesn't get sick often, so when she does, it's bad," Tony begins, pointing to the young woman who lies in a fetal position on the couch. Peter giggles, looking over at his girlfriend. She sits up, looking over at Peter with her puppy dog eyes. "I have some stuff I need to take care of today, so can you stay with her for today? I took care of her all last night, so I need to spend some time making myself look presentable." Tony says, earning a nod from Peter. Tony rests a hand on Peter's shoulder, giving the young man a sympathetic look. "Good luck."

As Tony walks away, Peter turns and notices the small bucket by the couch, a small jar of VapoRub, some TheraFlu packets and a few other medicinal items. Turning back around, he sees Y/N throwing her arms up for a hug, and how could Peter say no? Sitting down, he pulls the young woman in closer to his side, moving to press a kiss on her cheek. However, he feels a soft and extremely warm hand move in front of his face to stop him.

"Peter, don't kiss me, okay. I don't wanna get you sick." Y/N warns. Peter shakes his head, leaving a chaste peck on his cheek. Turning in his seat, he looks over at you and smiles down at you.

"Are you comfortable? Do you need anything?" Peter asks. Y/N shakes her head, wrapping her arms around the young man's waist. Peter's hands go down to her hair, messing with the h/c strands of hair that messily lay atop her head.

For the rest of the day, the two just sat down watching crappy Hallmark movies while Tony went out for meetings. Pepper was away at meetings with Tony as well. Every once in a while, Bucky or Sam would come out to pick on the two teens, earning glares and sass from the sick girl. It wasn't until Y/N threatened to throw them off a cliff once she's better that they finally stopped. However, Nat and Wanda would come out to do the same, teasing the couple relentlessly. If Y/N had her strength at the moment, she'd be threatening the two women, but she knows with them it's on-sight so there's no point until she's better. Peter would occasionally get a call from his two best friends, Ned and Michelle.

Eventually, Tony did come back and Pepper decided to stay and help him take care of Y/N. Peter decided to stay as well as he hasn't been able to see you for a whole week. Peter had already called May to ask for permission to spend the night, to which she agreed, saying she'd be working a night shift anyways. Now, Peter sits on the big couch with you while Tony and Pepper cuddle up on one of the other couches.

"She didn't give you too much trouble now, did she?" Tony asks, looking over at Peter.

"No, we stayed like this all day. Only moving to use the restroom, but besides that we've been in this same position." Peter states, looking over at the man. Tony chuckles, looking over at you in an unbelieving way.

"She wasn't emotional? Didn't throw up? No laugh crying? Begging for some 'hot choccy milk'? Whatever that is." Tony asks, looking between Peter and his daughter.

"What? No." Peter responds, not sure what he's going on about.

"Last night, I took her to a Walgreens to buy items for her flu. Cough drops, pills, teas, and so on. On the way to the store, she was playing that one Ariana Grande song, I guess it's a new one and she just started crying,"

"Dad, I don't know why I'm crying." you cry as you wipe the tears away. You begin to giggle a little, embarrassed that you're actually crying. It's really a mix of emotions. From being upset that you're sick, to feeling vulnerable because you're sick, to the line where Ariana Grande sings about loving herself.

"Are you really crying?" he asks, briefly turning and noticing your puffy eyes and the tears falling past your cheeks.

You begin to laugh as you cry, singing along. "Thank you, next. Thank you, next. I'm so fucking thankful for my ex."

On the way back, you were in charge of music again. Tony started the drive back home, just wanting to get you comfortable and warm. Suddenly, the sound of Some Velvet Morning by Nancy Sinatra and Lee Hazlewood. As the song reaches Nancy Sinatra's line, the tone shifts and once more, you're crying.

"This song is so beautiful, god I blame you for making me emotional, father." you cry once again. Tony sighs quietly to himself as he sees you crying again. He rests a hand on your, lightly squeezing it reassuringly. He sings along to the song with you, holding in his laughter.

Upon arriving back home to the Avengers Tower, Tony set you up in the living room per your request. At the store, he bought you DVDs; How the Grinch Stole Christmas, Polar Express, Elf, and the Nightmare Before Christmas. He set the movies up, also setting out your water and your juice, as well as some Halls cough drops. He made you eat a cough drop while he went to make you some TheraFlu tea.

"I want some choccy milk." you whine.

"You're 18, Y/N. Please act like one." Tony whines as he hands you a cap full of NyQuill.

"It tastes gross, dad." you whine, scrunching your face in disgust.

"Either way you can't drink milk. It'll make the phlegm worst. Just take the NyQuill, chug some water, and then drink your tea. Please." Tony whines.

You had spent a majority of the night awake, either in a coughing fit, throwing up, or being unable to breathe in general. Tony stayed awake with you the whole time, deciding he'd rather make sure you;re okay than let you stay up alone and sick.

"Geez, that sound bad." Peter sympathizes, holding Y/N closer to him. Tony shrugs, leaning back in his seat and watching the movie on TV. "Why Hallmark?" Peter asks after a few minutes of watching the movie in silence.

"Y/N and I have made it tradition that we watch shitty Hallmark movies and only that throughout the months of November and December. The only exception is the news. Besides that, this is all we watch."

"Yeah, and usually we drink some hot choccy milk, but all I have is this stupid TheraFlu tea in my hands." Y/N complains, sending Tony a glare. Tony shrugs, standing up and walking out of the room. The only sound in the room is the sound of some terrible Hallmark movie, that Y/N seems to genuinely like watching. After a few minutes, Tony walks back in with three mugs, offering one to Peter.

"Hot choccy milk, Peter?" Tony asks as Peter takes the mug. He offers one to Pepper as well before taking a sip of his own drink. Y/N glares as she angrily sips on her tea, popping another Halls cough drop into her mouth, crossing her arms across her chest and watching the movie again.

Please leave me asks/requests. I’m always a slut for new friends

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yunsoh · 4 years

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can you do hc: furuba characters and their star signs?

i unfortunately am insufferable about astrology so this turned into. a whole thing. but here goes.

i’m only focusing on the main four (tohru, kyo, yuki, shigure) and then also kakeru and machi because i have thought about their charts to a degree where i might as well just lay them out here. i’m going to try and keep the descriptions brief (oh my god. never mind. this didn’t happen at all**), but ofc if you want more info/have questions you can shoot me an ask abt it.

**i ended up saying too much so. tohru, kyo, and shigure’s will be in this post, and then i’m just gonna. do a separate post/reply to this one with yuki, kakeru, and machi’s lmfao. just to be considerate of people, you know, maybe not wanting to read the biggest wall of text in the world.

i guess just some baseline things:

- i won’t be going into every single planet/house placement/aspect because that’s 2 much man, but i’ll talk about the parts i think are most immediately interesting.

- i decided to challenge myself a little and look up actual charts rather than just making up my own. which means i went ahead and took a sick guesstimate about their “actual birthdays” based on the years they were born and then the sun/moon/rising combinations that i figured fit them best. yes this is a ridiculous thing to do for fictional characters. yes i now have fictional characters charts sitting in my list on astro.com. but also yes i had fun doing it so it’s w/e. (and yes i know takaya specifically said that they don’t have birthdays but literally when have i ever listened to her abt anything. my city now.)

- birth years i based on the manga since that’s their like, real core characters. they’re 80s kids and shigure is a 70s dad it’s just how it is.

- take all this with a whole salt mine. like actually. but also my apologies if this is at all confusing, bc i know it’s a lot of like....... more intermediate astrology stuff. hopefully it’s at all comprehensible.

- i’ll also add the disclaimer that if you personally have literally any of these placements please god do not take what i say as like, word of god or whatever. it’s all dependent. i’m also reading them for fictional characters with like... established characterizations..... so use ur best judgement.

this is incredibly long so it’s going under a cut.

tohru

taurus sun, cancer moon, pisces rising; taurus mercury, pisces venus, libra mars (retrograde).

part of me hates how predictable this is but if it works it works lmfao.

pisces rising & pisces venus in the 1st house are the things that are probably most immediately apparent about tohru to her peers -- pisces brings with it a receptive quality, in that it almost acts as an open channel in the world. it doesn’t really have any defenses up, and in that sense is prone to getting hit by. absolutely everything. depending on what the rest of the chart entails, this can be completely crushing and overwhelming, or it can be handled with some grace. or both, which is the case with tohru. important too is to consider the chart ruler (the rising sign’s ruling planet), which is jupiter under traditional rulerships, and neptune under modern -- personally, i prefer traditional rulerships, so i’m going with jupiter lmao. jupiter here is in the 8th house, which is indicative of being rather open about areas that are typically seen as taboo or not socially spoken of, specifically concerning other people’s matters (rather than the self). jupiter in 8th is also indicative of luck when it comes to other people’s resources, as it’s a house of merging with another.

because pisces is such a receptive source, other people are both comforted and taken aback by it. pisces risings are often considered a little weird (or a lot), and frequently view the world on a baseline of emotion -- they’re keenly aware of the energy in the room, and have a tendency to carry other people’s emotions with them. at the same time, they can have trouble discerning their own emotions -- everything is just kind of a big swirl of feeling. but, we do see tohru frequently step herself away from that overwhelm, or be guided out of it, through more grounded and physical acts of service, rather than emotional. taurus sun and mercury lends some reprieve for her here; when she starts to feel overwhelmed, she is often guided back to her self-determination, in which she quiets her thoughts by getting herself back into the work grind, or reminds herself of what her root motivations are, either within the given moment or in the long-term.

taurus is a bit of a double-edged sword for her, because while it’s a grounding force, it also leaves her with putting up walls around herself in order to avoid help from other people. taurus is heavily self-reliant, and proud of what they can do for themselves and others -- but when it comes to actually needing help, and needing to ask for help, their first instinct is to refuse. it’s basically like pulling teeth. in the 2nd house, this is especially poignant -- her pride (sun) is rooted in the realm of work ethic, finances, routines. that self-reliance always comes up in the form of knowing she’ll have to provide for herself after graduation, and sees going at things alone as a sort of “training” in a sense, even when it harms her or puts her in harm’s way (this is also evident by aries being the 2nd house cusp, in that she takes this area of life as a challenge and is particularly energized by it, even if it’s to the point of burnout).

cancer moon also has a hand in this, as far as being slow to open up emotionally goes -- while she’s someone who has her heart on her sleeve (very much due to pisces venus in 1st), this doesn’t mean that she’s actually vulnerable about her emotions. cancer moons often find their strength in providing for others, and find emotional comfort in giving other people a place to feel safe, most stereotypically through physical comforts like food and gentle/welcoming environments. they also tend to operate in self-care in this way, by making themselves physically comfortable. this self-care can often come up due to just the sheer exhaustion of feeling and accepting emotions quite easily, but not feeling comfortable fully expressing them. she isn’t completely repressed -- again, she emotes very easily (a combination of venus in 1st and moon in 5th; moon in 5th allows for a freer self-expression, to the point of being over the top at times) -- but she shields herself from opening up fully, until it really just completely overwhelms her and she ends up more or less exploding to let everything out. cancer moon is also highly, highly bonded to their emotional memory! their memories are their well of emotion.

i want to touch on what’s going on with the 7th house, because i think it looks a little scary at first glance. 7th house rules our one-on-one partnerships, including (but not limited to) long-term romances and friendships. pluto and saturn are intense and challenging energies respectively -- pluto asks for transformation and rebirth, saturn stands for personal challenges that have to be deliberately overcome. mars is a planet of drive and ambition, but also a place of conflict. it’s a lot of difficult energy to consider, but i think it fits her quite well, especially considering her issues of letting her guard down and being emotionally vulnerable. her personal struggle (saturn) is about really, honestly letting people into her life, without feeling inadequate or unworthy. understanding that she’s worthy of the love she receives is something she struggles to fully comprehend up to the end because of a low self-esteem (which is somewhat tied to pisces venus -- pisces venus tends to surrender themselves quite a bit, which doesn’t always mark a low-self esteem [as we’ll see....in a later chart], but can absolutely err that way if there aren’t other parts of the chart to ground it or overpower it with more self-affirming placements, such as a developed taurus placement. pisces venus can feel a little lost in themselves and instead rely on the emotions of the room to determine where their confidence is -- if emotions are good, they’re good. if not, they’re not.)

mars in 7th is indicative of feeling revitalized and driven by these close relationships, but also overflows to the point of arguing -- in which she’s usually arguing because she’s fighting for them and not with them. mars is in retrograde here, which follows the general theme of internalizing issues rather than externalizing them (in 7th house, this often comes up as her getting frustrated with the situations her friends are in and carries it by herself, and is driven to then handle these issues even if her friends are completely unaware. uo and kyo come to mind specifically). mars being in libra, she especially feels inclined towards a sense of doing right for and by the people she loves, even if she does it in ways that can be more than a little intense at times. also struggles a little with being alone! plays off of other people’s energy constantly.

pluto in 7th i think is like........ kind of poetic for her lmao....... especially as it deals with finding transformation/rebirth through these committed, personal relationships. her whole arc involves her feeling an immense guilt over not only feeling as though she’s losing her mom as time passes, but then also “replacing” her in her heart as she falls in love with kyo. and it’s with kyo that she finds strength to grow into and understand herself in ways she hadn’t before. but it’s also a markedly intense transformation for her, and one that repeatedly breaks her heart because it’s a difficult change (saturn being conjunct pluto here absolutely doesn’t soften the matter oml). but she comes out the other side a stronger and more confident person.

one last note, because i just remembered someone asked me ages ago about this: north node! north node is indicative of the path we’re asked to take during this lifetime (versus the south node, which is indicative of what we are already comfortable with; regarding karma, it’s the path we’ve become familiarized with through past lives). north node here is in cancer in the 5th house, almost directly conjunct the moon. a cancer north node is indicative of needing to move away from issues of detachment, competitiveness, workaholic tendencies, elitism, mommy issues (capricorn issues; the south node is always exactly opposite the north), and instead moving towards compassion, self-care, inclusivity, maternal energy. some of these are already present in tohru via other aspects of her chart (compassion and inclusivity, maternal energy), but there are some that are more. difficult things she has to move on from lmao..... being conjunct moon, this is an especially emotional and sensitive part of the journey. 5th house north node is indicative of needing to work towards expressing the self in a way that is purely for the self, rather than for others -- there’s already a comfort in being able to provide for the collective other, but shifting the focus to more “selfish” expression is grounds for discomfort. a journey towards being able to be more unapologetically self-expressive and self-loving. the fun thing about north node is that for the most part, the chart will always be indicative of the issues that need to be considered and overcome in order to face it, so i feel like at this point it all speaks for itself lmao.

(a note; the nodes take about a year and a half to change signs, so everyone within this cohort is going to have the same north node in cancer. which comes up in different ways for each considering house placement & aspects but still. kids the mommy issues.... the superiority/inferiority complexes..... kids......

also i’ll add that in Real Life north node is usually a lifelong struggle to fully realize/accomplish, but ofc. this is fiction. character arcs and speedrunning personal development and the like.)

there’s more to talk about here but like. i’ve already said too much omfg. moving on.

kyo

capricorn sun, aries moon, aries rising; capricorn mercury, capricorn venus, aquarius mars.

yes. the poetic cinema of him and tohru both having a saturn-pluto conjunction in the 7th house. i see it. i am perceiving it.

but before that, some talk about the aries and capricorn of it all. aries and capricorn are both so inherently driven to just do. aries is the initial spark and the short-term determination, the immediate reaction to things, while capricorn is the more plodding slow-burn and considers time and longevity. they’re similar in determination, but clash because of the fight between impatience and time, and reacting immediately versus careful consideration. these more patient traits are present in him, but for a while they’re buried under his inclination to react to things. aries rising views the world as something of a personal challenge, and can put a lot of pressure on themselves in order to overcome these matters. but, they come at it with a borderline unwavering determination; they fall down a lot and are quick to get back up again. other people can find them pushy or cocky, or just too “in your face” about like..... everything lmao...... because they’re just blunt. they see the world honestly (or, so they think) and react to it honestly. this ties too to aries moon, in which the emotional reaction to things is very much a quick, bursting reaction, and then it fizzling out not long after. emotions tend to zip by very quickly -- they’re felt for a moment, and then it’s passed.

moon in 12th, though, makes these emotions a bit more ambiguous to understand -- fire moons feel intensely and suddenly, but a layer of ambiguity that the 12th house provides can make it feel as though emotions are being muddied, and not seen clearly. what we see then with kyo is having these intense reactions to things, but being off-base with consciously understanding why he’s feeling that way. for him, it’s also in part a purposeful shielding and misdirect; he knows subconsciously what the root of these issues actually are, but in the heat of the moment, it’s misdirected to what’s exactly in front of him. it’s a mode of self-protection. this struggle is also present in this sun square moon situation -- sun square moon offers the challenge of the head and heart not working together, and often having conflicting desires (individualizing vs emotional security). capricorn sun in particular is a fairly grounded and practical placement, so up against the wiles of aries moon in 12th, there’s a deep struggle to actually feel grounded. it also presents an issue of feeling as though there’s something to prove in themselves to others, especially regarding self-worth, which is exacerbated by capricorn’s ambitions and moon in 12th’s difficulty with truly seeing themselves; they tend to take things too personally lmao. on the flipside, moon in 12th is actually quite in tune with other people’s emotions, even when they can’t fully comprehend their own. when he lets himself open up a little, he’s shown to be quite understanding of tohru’s emotions in particular, even when she’s not being forthcoming.

lot of mars energy and aspects going on here that also push against capricorn’s groundedness & practicality -- aside from the aries rising & mars chart ruler, the moon is in an easy, sextile relationship with mars (in which mars’ reactions flows easily into the moon reacting), mars itself is in an easy, flowing relationship with uranus (planet of very sudden change; mars sextile uranus asks for high energy levels and a need for something to be going on) and a difficult, square aspect with saturn, which causes a repression and frustration/inhibition for mars. the mars energy here is just one frustration after another. aries rising at least grants him the wherewithal to channel that energy somewhere productive, so when it’s not channeled into his self-loathing, it’s channeled into athletics. he’s trying.

speaking of, aquarius mars being the chart ruler is a little interesting to parse, if only because it does sit so strongly against all of the capricorn energy. aquarius mars is like......... kind of a freak LMAO. in a good way. in some charts it sits as something that’s more blatantly against the social norm, and in others it sits more as a quiet but consistent rebellion. the latter i think is the case here, if only because of that tough square with saturn and all that capricorn energy erring on the side of conformity. i think it’s interesting to take the cat lore into this, considering that the cat’s “downfall” in the story was that it was the only one, among god and all the other animals, to go against the wish for an eternal banquet -- its lack of conformity ended up in the cat being seen from there on out as an enemy. there’s something just inherently nonconforming about the cat, but it becomes a repressed and self-hated thing within kyo because it’s so incredibly alienating in the scope of his immediate family. at the same time, there’s something also inherently rebellious in the ways he seeks out to be the first cat to ever be included within the inner family, even if it all ends up for naught (mars’ contact with moon in 12th i think comes into play here, if only that his motivations are so heavily skewed; he becomes intensely avoidant when he’s asked to face his real issues surrounding the matter). aquarius mars is also very much about being driven for overall social change and reform, which, again, stands at an odds with capricorn’s more staunch viewpoints (he’s not exactly the most accepting of people who step out of the social norm, but this i equate more to capricorn venus in 10th -- traditionalist views regarding personal aesthetics, in a house regarding one’s reputation; also is incredibly self-critical and can project that onto others), but he does in the end fight against the system that his family has put in place for him and is, eventually, a major part of the catalyst for the curse’s downfall. pretty sick shit.

on a less ‘large scale’ level, aquarius mars affects his social sphere -- the 11th house rules the realm of friendships, teams, groups, anything having to do with a collective, as well as hopes and aspirations. mars here is both invigorated by (and invigorating to) social groups, and can find itself being challenged by them. kyo’s self esteem regarding his social skills can be attributed to the fact that he does feel like an outsider, but he’s actually pretty socially attuned once he settles in. aquarius tends to struggle with needing its alone time, alongside feeling like it doesn’t quite fit in, but at its core it’s a social sign -- there’s a required balance between being alone and needing to be with others. it can take aquarius a while to really find comfort in social settings, i think, so i think it’s fitting that this is an area that kyo struggles with for a time.

okay. god i already wrote so much. and yet...... okay. capricorn sun, mercury, and venus -- sun in 9th does seek a basic desire to be able to expand its worldview outside of the confines of home, and this runs along the theme of kyo’s being caged in a major way. sun conjunct neptune here is also indicative of how easily he gives up on that desire and submits to powers above him; neptune acts as a shroud, and can be a challenge for the sun’s ego to work with, especially in the case of the ego being harmed in any way (such as through abuse). it’s imperative that there’s someone who is able to guide the sun back to its goals, especially in the case of a capricorn sun, which can really suffer under the feeling that they aren’t actively doing or achieving, or can otherwise be prone to melancholy in self-perceived defeat. also concurs with the themes of sun square moon in 12th. capricorn mercury and venus in 10th, a focus on getting shit done lmfao. mercury here tends to be a problem-solver, but can also err towards thinking they’re the smartest person in the room or use otherwise demeaning vocab (kyo........ yeah). venus here typically tends towards wanting to be in a place of getting attention, but square that moon in 12th this is something. highly inhibited lmfao. but venus in 10th also tends to be seen as highly attractive by others, in looks and personality, which i think is a) true because sohma and b) fucking hilarious because he gets his own little fanclub from the. middle school girl gang or w/e. god.

and then yes, the saturn-pluto conjunction in 7th. saturn: similar to tohru in struggling to let people into his life in full, and not believing he’s worthy of that love as he is (esp regarding kazuma and tohru). pluto: similar again to tohru in that he experiences something highly transformative in his person once he actually accepts the love of other people, and allows himself to be transformed by love. it asks him to let go of his self-hatred, which in turn asks him to let go of a lot of other things that held him back from growth. and he comes out the other side of that experience with a hell of a lot more self-confidence. the fact that he and tohru are these transformative experiences for each other.... fucking poetry. yeah.

north node note: north node is in cancer in the 3rd house; for him, it’s asking him to move away from being defined only by achievement, mommy issues, competition, & complexes around inferiority, and embrace being more emotionally sensitive and inclusive of others and the self, and especially being able to find comfort within the self. north node in the 3rd asks for a journey of being able to express the self in a way where the thoughts are purely individual, rather than coming from certain shared ideologies or other higher influences. this i feel is especially poignant for him as he struggles to really move on from certain beliefs planted in him by his family situation -- beliefs that he’s inherently worthless, that yuki is to blame for his struggles (due to zodiac lore) rather than seeing the situation for what it is (abuse from akito and his father), that his future is set in stone because it’s family tradition. the north node here sits opposite the sun, which is indicative of a struggle between a distinct drive towards personal development and an inclination to stick to what was learned in childhood; a battle against the ego for personal development. north node trine saturn is i think indicative of being self-accountable and having a lot of determination, and tending towards a mature outlook on things. square moon is indicative that this personal growth journey is especially spurred on and nurtured by significant relationships with women, though they tend to be challenging........ yeah..........

MOVING ON..............

shigure

scorpio sun, scorpio moon, taurus rising; sagittarius mercury, libra venus, libra mars.

shigure just exudes fuckboy venusian energy, and that is on that.

taurus rising colors the chart in a way that brings focus on self-reliability, prioritizing personal wants & comforts, and in general not being rushed or bothered unless it’s on their own terms. for all his slipperiness, shigure’s actually pretty lax and slow-going, and looks at the world in a way where he first and foremost considers what is useful to him, in the moment. self-indulgence king. there’s also a considerable focus on loyalty and honesty. under this is the influence of the chart ruler, libra venus; taurus alone tends towards being more reserved (which, shigure really doesn’t seem to mind just chilling by himself in the middle of the woods tbqh), but libra tends to get agitated when they’re alone for too long -- as an air sign, they thrive in the realm of mentality, and libra in particular thrives in this arena when it comes to social connections. they’re simultaneously flighty and committed; libra venus perfects the art of being huge romantics while also coming across as emotionally detached.

but ofc shigure does have a considerable amount of passion when it comes to his love life, more than erring on the side of possessiveness, and that comes in with the double scorpio sun/moon in 7th, as well as venus conjunct pluto (pluto bears an intense, transformative energy; it kind of sits there like “i refuse to make anything easy, or take anything easily” lmfao). 7th house is all about long-term partnership, as well as considers the energy you’re drawn to (and simultaneously have issues with seeing in yourself, since it sits opposite the rising). scorpio on the descendant tends towards being selective towards people, and while shigure is pretty sociable, he only has a handful of truly close relationships, all of which have been long-standing since he was a child. sun & moon being conjunct one another indicates a conscious expression of emotion (rather than, if the moon were unaspected, emotions can be more free-falling and come and go unconsciously/subconsciously). shigure tends to be deliberate in how he shows himself and what he expresses, and taking scorpio into consideration, there’s a considerable intuitiveness he has that he uses specifically to dig into people’s observed sensitivities (sagittarius mercury in 8th also affects this; 8th house handles matters including other people’s psychology, and sagittarius mercury can tend towards being rather open-faced and blunt about what they think and say).

when it comes to akito, though, there is that push and pull of “belonging” to her, and also pulling away from her -- moon in 7th does find emotional stability in being someone’s person, and sun in 7th also finds a base importance in being part of a partnership, romantic or otherwise; but that pulling back can be attributed to a mix of taurus’ mode of self-reliance and at times cold detachment, libra’s general emotional detachment, and also scorpio moon’s tendency towards vindictiveness (or otherwise a high emotional response) when it’s hurt. paired with a libra mars, which can be a majorly provoking force in terms of shit-stirring, there ends up being this concoction of “i’m hurt, i’m going to hurt you back in a way that makes you feel exactly how hurt i am, and i’m also going to avoid saying things outright because i want you to figure out why i did it” (sagittarius mercury and its tendency towards “i’ll say and think what i want and if other people can’t keep up, that’s not entirely my problem” plays into that as well). shigure doesn’t come off as a sensitive sort, but it’s more that he both manages to keep his hurt rather private, and also genuinely only gets bothered when it comes to his most important relationship. libra’s “eye for an eye” and matters of balance really especially come into play for him in terms of him feeling hurt by akito -- like. he literally fucked ren in revenge for akito sleeping with kureno lmao. that’s beyond being hurt, that’s a perceived betrayal. scorpio antics. libra mars conjunct uranus also is big “suddenly, i have decided that i will cause problems on purpose" eye-for-an-eye energy.

beyond his penchant for. revenge fucking. he’s also notably charming and funny! the charm is itself the overall venusian energy between taurus and libra, but it’s also found with that venus square jupiter -- squares are typically energies in conflict with one another, but venus and jupiter are both benefic planets; the worst that this square brings really is that they can tend to be lazy and unmotivated, and that people might think they have loose morals lmfao. and considering this square occurs with the 6th and 9th houses, it’s a marked laziness with daily routines and things concerning travel, higher learning, and publishing. long-suffering mitsuru and tohru kind of deal with the brunt of this. jupiter in 9th in general also grants some good fortune regarding travel/higher learning/publishing/the like, which i just think is like. a funny little thing considering he’s an achieved author at 25 under multiple pseudonyms. also the libra influence on that in that he’s a romance writer, mercury conjunct neptune heavily influencing creative thought, and the saturn in 2nd indicating a more serious motivation when it comes to career (+ the saturn trine mars in 6th giving him like, actual dedication in the realm of his career and his success -- mars in 6th is more about the determination to do things well, especially in terms of daily tasks).... yeah! like he does what he wants but he’s also obviously dedicated to his craft lmao.

i guess another thing to mention is all this 6th house energy -- 6th house handles personal health, daily routines, service given to others within the physical world. which with shigure, it’s very much a part of his character that he’s kind of trash at keeping physical care of himself (shit eating habits, absolutely fucked up sleeping schedule), and that he veers pretty heavily on the side of being self-serving. uranus, pluto, and mars don’t bode very well in this house. they just don’t like it -- uranus either figures out ways to adapt or detaches from these chores entirely, mars can be an energizing source here with the right willpower (such as regarding his job, though writing is in itself a self-serving profession), but would rather be served than serve others, and pluto can tend towards harboring power struggles with others because they want to do things on their terms only. venus is really the only one sitting in this house having a good time, if only that venus brings pleasure wherever it goes -- for shigure, that’s maximized in making sure he’s able to do things his way so that there’s as little struggle as possible. he’s content letting his house and habits go to hell, and he’s just as content with shunting off the housework to someone else. he just can’t be bothered to do things he doesn’t want to. (also, again, venus square jupiter. the laziness but also the charm that has people put up with him without much fight or consequence.) i will say though that he does provide a physical service by housing three literal teenagers, but ofc there’s an undercurrent of an ulterior motive in doing so. so.

and then mars conjunct uranus + sag mercury is just big fucking clown energy.

some north node notes: his north node sits opposite the kids’, which i think is an interesting little thing. north node in capricorn is indicative of needing to move away from codependency, an overindulgence in self-soothing/self-care, and passivity, and asks to move towards being a more proactive presence, someone who leads, and someone who empowers people rather than enables them. so. i think in general this is interesting to coincide with his character arc, in the sense that he doesn’t exactly have one lmao? he’s very much a stable force throughout the story; he doesn’t really undergo any massive personal changes like a lot of the other characters do. he’s a character who is very much comfortable admitting that he does things for himself, and that he is shown time and again that, for all of his self-serving nature, he’s still very much committed to this relationship with akito that he’s harbored since he was a literal child, no matter how volatile and skewed it became as they got older. i think the one matter of the north node that he actually fulfills is being someone who tends to challenge other characters’ personal viewpoints and asks them (though indirectly) to consider changing how they think in order to facilitate their growth. but, he’s not exactly a proactive force here; he nudges, but he doesn’t fight.

north node in 9th also takes this into consideration, as it asks to expand outside of what is already known, to learn and grow outside of where they grew up, and to be able to teach from that learned wisdom. which, again, isn’t fully realized in him, as he chooses to dedicate himself to akito and in turn return to living within the sohma estate, which also includes him giving up his job as a novelist..... in its way it’s sort of like expanding these horizons vicariously through akito, who is literally taking her first step into being anything like a normal functioning human being outside of the curse. idk about that. but he does think outside of the curse’s constraints and looks beyond it, rather than feeling particularly held back by it, and in that sense is able to offer some wisdom and nudge other people towards the thought of freedom. it’s a mixed bag.

(i’ll slap a link here when i make a new post for yuki, kakeru, and machi’s reads!)

#fruits basket #tohru honda #kyo sohma #shigure sohma #this is the true testament for just doing things purely for yourself. holy shit.#i literally made this post for me and like five other people #anyways sorry if this is like. incomprehensible. i had a lot 2 say apparently.#i'll try to get the disaster trio's shit done within the next few days lmfao but in the meantime..... just take this #Anonymous #yunsoh astrology #fruits basket spoilers

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marvmacdonald · 5 years

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“she's fucking impetuous and daring, a little too bold and way too fucking fearless.”

MARY MACDONALD is 21 years old and works as an JUNIOR AUROR and is loyal to THE OOTP they were an GRYFFINDOR and are a MUGGLEBORN. SHE look like CHRISTIAN SERRATOS.

CHARACTER PARALLELS: jessica jones ( jessica jones ), leia organa ( star wars ), arya stark ( asoiaf ), johanna mason ( the hunger games ), nancy wheeler ( stranger things ), rosa diaz ( b99 ), ellie ( the last of us ), raven reyes ( the 100 ), kat edison ( the bold type ), nina zenik ( six of crows ) AESTHETIC: red lipstick stains on drained cups of tea, leather jackets, cigarette bums crushed under doc martens, sitting down in the shower and letting time pass by, always wearing your gold cross necklace, messy ponytails, beer burps, laughter that’s filled with desperation, jean dungarees, screaming in your pillow, mud stained clothes, denim on denim on denim. LINKS: stats. pinboard. character tag. playlist.

history

mary had a little lamb? WRONG. mary had a little calf. because she was born on a dairy farm in the highlands of scotland ( laugh at my joke pls i worked hard on it ). she was born third to two muggles – a scottish father and a mexican mother, who loved each other deeply – and would eventually become their middle child. she could have become overlooked, but mary never felt discounted at home: while her parents were very often busy with the cows, their love ran deep.

her youth consisted of this: running through fields of grass, attending a muggle elementary where people sang songs at her ( old macdonald had a farm and mary had a little lamb, the former of which was, of course, accurate ), playing with the animals, building tree houses with her brothers and sister and playing football every spare moment she got. it was good and simple and wholesome.

of course, strange things happened, as they tend to with muggleborns: she’d explode her brother’s toy when she got angry, or let things fly around the room when she was laughing. when she found out she was a witch at age eleven, things fell in its place. and the macdonalds, while traditional catholics, accepted mary, which is the most important thing of it all. her parents were shocked, yes, but they squeezed her shoulder and promised to discover this all together.

which?? very much influenced mary greatly? because it went against a lot of things they – and she, too – believed in. magic was deemed evil by the church they attended. everything about this was supposed to be wrong, but her parents shifted their views because their love for their daughter was greater than their desire to cling to all the rules the church laid down for them, this has allowed her to have a faith in people, and while she may be cynical and bitter at times, that faith is still there.

i mean --- her parents accepted her, they were capable of openmindedness despite being traditional people in most other situations. other people can too.

hogwarts was as chaotic as home, and mary settled in quite nicely. sorted into gryffindor ( she guessed it was for her rambunctious nature, but who knew ), she found herself a second home and loved it. as it turned out, she was rather good with a wand as well – she didn’t do so good at essays, though – and genuinely liked learning ( except for history of magic. fuck that. ).

being a muggleborn had its downsides, of course, but mary never really allowed herself to feel discouraged. hurt? yes, definitely, but never discouraged. she wasn’t going to let it get to her, she told herself, but it did, especially when the harsh words turned into something more. it was during her confrontation with mulciber that mary felt true, harsh fear for the first time. she felt shut down, paralysed, depressed —– but then, after a while, she got up and took some important steps. she reported mulciber, which led to nothing, which caused her to feel angry, which in turn caused her to feel determination. if the system wasn’t going to be on her side, she’d just have to fucking change it, right? mary started throwing herself in her schoolwork, determined to join the dmle – hopefully as an auror, but any position would do. she suppressed her fear and the trauma that was there, and kept her head straight.

this entire situation is up for change and stuff when/if we get a mulciber!

graduation rolled around and mary got the five required NEWTs to even apply. it was a nervewracking process, but once she got into auror training, she cried. like. for a full ass day. she was so proud of herself and she felt so determined and !! man. it was such a good, defining moment. around the same time, mary joined the order; she knew the ministry was corrupt, and that it’d not allow her to do everything she wanted to, when the order DID. mary had too much anger, too much determination to fight this bullshit to just stick with the ministry, and so the order seemed like the right place.

it’s only recently that mary graduated from her training and became a junior auror. it’s ... infuriating, at times, but also amazing. she hates the ministry and most of the people in it, feels paranoid in those walls, but knows that there are good people, too. people who want to better that place, like she does.

kaz brekker voice: brick by brick, i will destroy you.

also --- mary is ... very quite involved in the war. her time is divided between the order and work, and her dog. she’s determined to get this war to end. she doesn’t even care if she destroys herself in the process --- what does her life mean, if she could help save numerous people?

so right now, she’s fighting. she’s gritting her teeth and keeping her goals in the back in her mind and is focusing. and she does not always feel brave or confident or self assured, but that does not matter: mary macdonald always gets the fuck back up, and that’s what she will keep doing until she’s completely knocked down.

personality & tidbits.

mary is a human espresso. she’s so. damn. bitter?? despite the fact that she keeps on going and that she’s fighting her ass off, she’s tired and angry that things don’t seem to be moving in the right direction, she’s feeling bitter about the fact that this kind of discrimination is happening right in front of her eyes and that she does not have enough power to stop it. she feels powerless, which makes her feel bitter, which makes her cynical.

still! mary is not necessarily a debbie downer to be around. she keeps her bitterness ( and hopelessness, even ) carefully hidden in boxes in her mind. on the outside, she’s filled with quips and smiles and quick comments! just a sociable bean, but just a bitter one.

is a dog person and will fight anyone who prefers cats. has a cairn terrier called bowie. she loves him more than anyone.

obsessed with tea, tbh. her ma always said that ‘there’s nothing a cuppa can’t fix’ and mary definitely agrees with this statement.

though is also a ‘whiskey in a teacup’ kinda gal

can be spotted wearing either a rly nice ass blazer or a jean jacket, no inbetween. either office-fancy or farmer-chique

fucking loves muggle culture and loves fellow muggleborns and !!!!!! she loves it!!!

very much in a take-no-prisoners mindset at this point re: death eaters. it kind of scares her, tbh, but mary is very much capable of murdering a death eater, even if she could stun them — she’s just done. she’s very. done. with them. and this whole shbang? will only feed into this.

mary is ruthless, that’s what it boils down to. she’s a lot more than that, of course, but she’s ruthless — in small things ( football matches & boardgames ) but also in bigger ones, and of course the war is the main way it shows. mary is so angry. she’s so angry and scared and tired of feeling that way and tired of being scared to lose people and herself and of death and she’s so angry that people really are this way and that they really do these things — she wants it to stop. she wants the world to be right. and sometimes she thinks the ends do justify the means.

this is why she’s chaotic neutral and not chaotic good.

like ive had her turned to dark arts before just bc she’s so desperate to. fucking win. tbh i’m sure she has a growing interest rn. stop it mary :(

and she’s also like — mary doesnt care if she ruins herself? if she becomes a bad person who’s unable to live with the shit she’s done? as long as the world is better for it, as long as kids can go to hogwarts and feel safe and the world is a safe place for everyone. what does her soul matter in the grand scheme of things? she’d burn in hell forever if it meant the rest of the world changed for the better.

emotionally driven mess of a being

is catholic but struggles a lot with religion and feeling faithful, but she does still identify is a catholic, it’s just? complicated. it’s rly complicated and she hates it.

is a bit flighty when it comes to romance, def has a lot of one night stands/fwb situations though??? she’s just like??? i dont have time for romance its a WAR

has been trying to stop smoking for five years, but alas

a proud scot. a proud latina. proud proud proud. such a fucking lionness.

mary was a beater during her time at hogwarts and was Highly competitive. threw herself into the sport tbh after the mulciber incident. she still thinks football is superior, but you know, it isnt in the air.

she’s pan and out of the closet --- something that did put a strain on her relationship with her family. ( the fact that they could accept her magic but not her sexuality ... baffles mary, but bigots have never been very reasonable. ) she’s not very open about it at home, but otherwise ... she’s out here lovin everyone.

plot ideas!

roomies —– so mary is not Earning A Whole Lot Right Now but does not want to live at home any more because 1. its in the middle of nowhere and 2. most importantly, she’s afraid of endangering her family. she needs roomies! i’d love for her to live in glasgow/edinburgh/london/idk a city!!!

hook ups/fwb’s/etc —– mary is what the old ppl call promiscuous and she sleeps around. so ! let’s talk! former hook ups! booty calls! friends with benefits! etc etc etc!

party pals —- mary likes going to pubs and clubs in the muggle part of town bc it is a LIT way to escape the reality of the wizarding world and also, muggle clubs have better music. come party w her!!!!

in the dragon’s den together —- fellow ministry employees who side eye the ministry and whom mary can sip tea and judge their colleagues with

mudbloods club —- mary loves her fellow muggleborns and i would love some muggleborn friends that she can be buds with. ranting about dumb pureblood names and traditions and the fact that wizards dont have movies

general friendship ideas —- im just going to a bunch of ideas here: hogwarts friends, ride or dies, order pals, friendly exes, fellow tea drinkers that she can go on coffee/tea dates with, friends who are growing apart bc of the war (my fave), etc.

etc —- some other ideas i want to spitball: purists who h8 on mary’s life, fellow diagon alley employees, fellow order members, Annoyances, there is solidarity in being scottish, ministry connections, etc etc etc HIT ME UP

#maraudrs:intro

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