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therealvalkyrie · 3 years

Text

Painter’s Hands and Guatemalan Coffee: Part 2

insomniac

Pairing/setting: Levi Ackerman x Female!Reader, modern!college!AU

Summary: When you catch your idiot boyfriend cheating, your grumpy roommate is there to pick up the pieces and watch your back as you toe a carefully drawn line in the metaphorical sand.

Word Count: 2.5k

Warnings: insomnia, nightmares, (remembering) death, panic attack, cuddling, fluff

AN: Here she is!! I’ve decided to give oc a little ~tragic backstory~ and I really hope it comes across like I’ve intended. I wouldn’t go so far as to call in angst, necessarily, but there’ll definitely be some in the future. Also, I know I’ve painted Annie and Reiner in a really bad light so far in this particular fic, but please know that’s not how I view them in canon at all - it’s simply because someone had to be the bad guy:( Anyways, I hope y’all enjoy and as always don’t hesitate to reach out via reblog/ask with any suggestions/feedback/questions!! ~valkyrie

(read Part 1.5 here)

Bodies jostle against you in the darkness to the beat of music you can’t hear. The buzzing gets louder, drowning out even your own screams for them to stop.

Stop. Stop. STOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOP!

“STOP IT!” You can hear yourself this time, your voice embarrassingly loud in the cramped room. You slap hands over your mouth but everyone’s already turned to look at you, disgusted at the display of emotion. Even they peel their faces apart to sneer down their noses.

“Why should we?” Annie’s voice rings with superiority, swirling around the space and nestling in the crook of your neck. You shudder away, but the faceless bodies shove you back.

“Don’t you know this is your fault, anyway? You weren’t enough for me.” Reiner jeers with a satisfied smirk. The whole room laughs, cackling and giggling spitefully. You can’t move, muscles frozen, as they turn back to each other and continue making out. His hand in her hair, her thigh hooked over his hip, obscenely wet noises from their joined mouths.

You scream and scream and scream, jaw wide and aching, and all of a sudden the scene shifts and you’re at your mother’s bedside. Your breath hitches and you’re screaming in a child’s voice this time.

“Mommy, Mommy, no, please, no, MOMMY, PLEASE--”

Your hand twitches towards her and its movement against soft sheets brings you back to consciousness.

You’re spread-eagled in bed, comforter kicked almost completely off, chest heaving.

“One. Two. Three. Four…” you count in a hoarse whisper to yourself, staring out the window at gently falling snow illuminated in yellow streetlights. It takes you to one hundred and twenty-seven before you’re calm enough to do anything productive.

You reach out a blind hand to find your phone on the nightstand and raise it up to check the time. 4:47 am. Nearly three hours of sleep.

Eh, good enough for jazz.

You heave a sigh, then push up to sit on the edge of your bed and flick on the lamp. The sudden bright light makes you squint against sharp pain behind your eyes and turn away in search of a sweatshirt. Some sifting through the ever-growing pile of laundry later, you settle on a green university hoodie and pull it on over your ratty tank top. Your toes and fingers always feel like icicles after waking up from a nightmare, so you find faux fur-lined slippers as well.

As you push past your bedroom door and into the living room, a figure in the comfy armchair catches the corner of your eye.

You nearly jump out of your skin before recognizing who it is. “Christ on a cracker, Levi! Nearly scared me half to death.”

“Sorry.” He doesn’t sound sorry as he marks the page in his book and sets it on the coffee table.

“What are you doing up?”

“I could ask you the same.”

“Well that’s not ominous or anything,” you mutter with an eye roll as you cross to the kitchen and set the kettle to boil for coffee.

Levi sighs and pinches the bridge of his elegant nose.

“Sorry. That’s not what I meant. It’s just… I noticed you haven’t been sleeping much lately and I’m worried.” He crosses to sit at the kitchen table and speaks to your back as you shuffle around the kitchen.

“What do you mean? Of course I’ve been sleeping. Whaddaya think I was just doing?”

“It’s five am, and you were still up when I went to sleep at twelve. Optimistically, that’s four hours of sleep. And yesterday you went to bed after one, but Hange said you were texting her at five-thirty, and--”

“Jeez, what, have you been stalking me or something?” you ask with an incredulous glance over your shoulder.

“We live together. It’s kind of hard not to notice.” Levi’s tone is the usual dry you’ve come to expect, but there’s an undercurrent that you’re too exhausted to pinpoint. “And Hange also told me she’s been worried.”

“What is this, an intervention? Just because I break up with someone I’m suddenly incapable of functioning?” Your voice (and headache) rises with each phrase, cracking on the morning dryness in the air, and you spin to face him.

“I didn’t say that, I--”

“Am I just supposed to wallow in misery for the rest of my life? No. I’m not doing that, Levi, I’m moving on. I-- I’m a busy woman, I’ve got finals and, and internship applications, and I happen to enjoy waking up early. I like watching the sunrise.” Though your words are rushed and you’re gesturing animatedly, uncertainty seeps through the stuttered phrases in your argument.

Levi lets you finish, then returns in a measured voice: “Why are you so defensive about this? I know you’re busy. So am I. But I manage to get more than four hours of sleep at night. I just want to help.”

His statement hangs in the air like dust mites, swirling around you and clinging to the sticky after-effects of the nightmare in your mind. You frown and drop your eyes to the linoleum, guilt settling into the stickiness.

“I know. I’m sorry.” Your voice is much softer. “I just--” A deep sigh. “I can’t sleep.”

“Why?”

The simple question makes your breath stutter and you scrub a hand down your face in an effort to ground your skin into reality.

“It’s so stupid.” It’s practically a whisper. “I have these nightmares. About my mom. I got them when I was younger, too, but eventually they just sort of… stopped. But now they’re back. And I can’t ever get back to sleep after, so I just stopped bothering to try.”

“You know, sometimes I get nightmares, too.”

The admission catches you off guard, your eyes widening. Levi always seems so… steady and sure, you wouldn’t have expected it.

“Really?”

He nods. “About my mom and the foster homes.”

“Oh, I didn’t know you…” Your heart sinks, and you don’t know how to say you’re sorry for the heartbreak he must’ve lived through with any semblance of tact.

“Yeah. It’s not something I talk about much.”

“Right.” You pause and chew on your tongue thoughtfully for a moment. “Do you have...strategies for when you can’t sleep because of them?”

“I have sleeping pills from my psychiatrist and some meditation practices that work for me. I can send you some resources, if you’d like.”

“Yeah, I’d really appreciate that if it’s not a bother.” You feel kind of sheepish now, for raising your voice, and so try to sound extra thankful for his help.

“It’s not.” He stands up and stretches both arms over his head, tipping his face up to the sky, lean body arching and twisting with the effort of it. “I’ll send them to you later today. I’m gonna go back to bed.”

“Okay. Thank you, Levi.”

He nods and yawns, nose scrunching adorably. “Night, kid.”

“Good night.”

As his bedroom door clicks shut, you sigh yet again and turn off the stove. The first thing to avoid is probably coffee.

Your fingers flick off last rivulets of water as you step out of the shower. A shiver rattles its way up your spine before you can grab a towel to dry off. Bless Levi, he had done laundry today and the towel is still dryer-warm, smelling of his favorite fabric softener.

As you go through your evening routine (tooth brushing, face washing, hair drying), you can feel a quiet tension set into your shoulders despite the humidity of the bathroom.

The day had gone okay. You managed to resist coffee until 8 am and cut yourself off at 3. A lecture and a studio in the morning left the afternoon for library studying and a trip to the grocery store.

You had actually seen Bertholdt there, in the cereal aisle. You hadn’t been too keen on having that particular conversation, but luckily he hadn’t seemed to be either. The pair of you exchanged sympathetically awkward smiles before turning back to the Cheerios.

The evening consisted of ordering chinese takeout while obsessing over your latest architecture design project, followed by convincing Hange over the phone not to sleep in the mouse lab for extra credit.

“But Bean will be lonely!” she insisted hysterically. “And Sonny wasn’t looking too hot in lab today, what if he needs his mommy and I’m not there?”

“You’re not their mommy,” you reminded her. “They have each other to keep them company, and if Sonny dies, won’t it support your hypothesis anyway?”

She had eventually acquiesced when you promised to help her plan a memorial should they pass in the night.

So now here you are, skin slowly drying, as you psych yourself up in the mirror to go to sleep.

“It won’t be bad. Just use the meditations Levi sent you.” You try to inject confidence into your voice, but you only end up grimacing at yourself in the mirror. “Ah, fuck it.”

You tuck your towel in firmly around your chest and double check to see your things are put away before going back to your room.

As you pass, you hesitate by Levi’s door for a moment. His normal studying music, Chopin, is on and light creeps out from underneath. Another moment of uncertainty, then you gently knock and poke your head in.

“Levi?” He raises his head from where he’s hunched over an easel, paint brush in hand. Brow furrowed and body tensed like a strung bow, he doesn’t look happy to be interrupted.

Fuck.

“I, uhm, just wanted to say good night.”

He grunts and turns back to the painting.

You take that as your cue to leave.

Back in the sanctuary of your own room, you curse again and kick your desk chair, sending it rolling a couple inches.

Why had you bothered him? To say good night?

“Stupid, stupid, UGH.” Your dramatic outburst ends in flopping face-first into bed. Just because he felt concerned enough to stage a fucking intervention doesn’t mean he’s your fucking nanny. Idiot.

Eventually, you roll over and get up to change into pajamas.

Settling into bed, you open your newly downloaded meditation app and start an audio.

“As you prepare for your meditation practice today, find a comfortable position sitting or lying down where you can fully relax….”

The cool female voice wraps your mind in a hazy blanket of fog and eventually coaxes your body into an achingly needed sleep.

This time the dream wakes you up whimpering into your pillow, arms flung above your head as though you’re skydiving. With a sucking breath, you lift your head to prevent imminent suffocation and instead settle on your side, staring unblinkingly into the darkness. Breath ragged in your chest, your mind can’t seem to move past the last image of your nightmare.

It’s burned into your retinas when you close your eyes and etched onto the moonlight-pale wall when they’re open: your mom’s pallid face staring up at the ceiling, hands resting on top of her blue embroidered duvet cover, chest still.

A sob escapes your unwilling throat and you’re scrambling to sit up and reach for the lamp. The lamplight suddenly reminds you of your own existence in the physical plane, thrusting all your senses into sharp contrast.

Her greying, thinning hair, the frailty in her fingers, the cracks in her lips, the cloying scent of death.

“Nonononononononono,” you moan, hunched over your knees, fingers tangled in your hair. Your stomach is hollow, chest tight, tears now flowing in earnest. It hasn’t been this bad in a long time, not since 7th grade at least.

Do something, do something, you stupid bitch, your mind is yelling at you, and so you force your body to move. Somewhere, anywhere other than here.

You practically fall out of bed and then lean heavily on your desk to compensate for shaking knees as you move to the door. Feet shuffle in the darkness and all of a sudden you’re sniffling outside Levi’s door, fingers in a deathgrip on your shirt. One, two breaths and you knock three hesitant raps.

Fuck. Shit. Instant regret bubbles up in your throat and you pivot away. Before you can get far, the door opens and you hear Levi’s sleep-ragged voice utter your name like a question. Damn.

You turn back sheepishly.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t’ve woken you up. Go back to bed.” Your voice is unnaturally breathy as Levi tries to make you out in the dim light of the moon filtering in through the living room window.

He reaches for your shoulder to gently pull you out of the shadows, and realization crosses his face as he registers the tear tracks and haunting terror in your eyes.

“It happened again,” he states.

You nod hesitantly and wipe at your cheeks with the back of one hand. You try again to tell him that no, really, you’re fine and he should go back to bed, but the words get lost in the tangle of truths between your brain and mouth.

Instead, what comes out is: “Can… can I sleep with you?” Your eyes finally flick to his before you quickly follow up. “It’s okay if you don’t want to, I just- it helps to have someone close….”

Levi watches you for a moment before sliding his hand from your shoulder to your hand and tugging gently.

“Come on.”

You follow him inside and fidget awkwardly at the side of his bed as he climbs in. His room is impeccably neat, not that you would expect anything different from the man who once gave you a five minute lecture about leaving dishes in the sink to soak. It was the most words you’d heard him string together at the time, and he only stopped when he realized you were laughing.

“You sound like my Great Aunt Cheryl,” you said between hiccups of mirth. “Insufferable woman.”

He had looked at you scathingly, then made you promise never to leave the dishes for later again on pain of changing the wifi password.

Once he’s settled, Levi turns back the covers on your side and looks at you expectantly. You falter a split second before climbing in next to him, the familiar smell of his laundry detergent clouding around you as you fall back into soft pillows. He throws the comforter over you, then settles down and opens his arms.

“C’mere, kid,” he says with a tenderness that makes a sniffle catch in the back of your throat.

You roll into his arms, resting your head in the curve of his shoulder and breathe the first easy breath since you woke up. An arm flung around his middle means your whole body is against his, warming you up like a midafternoon nap in August.

Levi settles his arm around your back after tucking in the blankets and holds you like you’ve always belonged there. He gradually, gradually feels you relax into him as your breathing begins to match his own.

After a while, your eyes droop closed and Levi allows himself the indulgence of tucking his nose into your hair. A bouquet of lavender shampoo and you accompanies him softly into his dreams.

(read part 3 here)

#attack on titan #shingeki no kyoujin #levi x reader #levi ackerman x reader #hange zoe #swearing #insomnia #nightmares #panic attack #painter's hands and guatemalan coffee #valkyrie writes

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lizardkingeliot · 3 years

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So, do those of you currently reading time cast a spell on you (but you won’t forget me) remember that scene in chapter 4 where Quentin shows up for his tutoring session and Eliot says he wants to go to the edge of the campus and manipulate the magic of the wards so they can fly? You know... this one:

Only they never end up making it there because they start bickering the second they leave the library? Well, in the rough draft of this chapter I initially had this scene... ending very differently. And they also weren’t going to fly, they were going to... well. I think I’ll just let y’all read it for yourselves lmao. I think I talked about this a bit on twitter when I was working on the chapter so if it sounds familiar that’s probably why. ANYWAY. I have a ton of deleted scenes from this fic, most of which will never see the light of day, but I woke up this morning with the urge to share at least part of this one so... I guess that’s what I’m going to do.

This is super rough and unedited and honestly not up to my usual standards, but... you know. Rough drafts tend to be that way. It’s also all over the place in terms of tone and where they were at this point in the fic lmao. This might be bordering on crack honestly. Which is why I just scrapped the whole thing and went a different route in the final draft. Anyway. Shutting up now. This is about 2k words so I’m putting most of it under a cut...

—

Trudging across campus two paces behind Eliot, Quentin was stricken by the overwhelming feeling that he was trapped inside a dream. The eerie, quiet campus, lit only by the waning moon and a few dots of light spilling from the various student houses. He looked back over his shoulder, spotting the Cottage in the distance, the dim orange glow of the front bay window swimming in his vision like a boat lost at sea.

As they approached the outer edge of the grounds, Quentin could feel the magic of the wards, buzzing on the air like insects. Bone-deep reverberations, strains of music swelling from within. He’d never been out this far before. The line where Brakebills ended and the real world began. Where there was nothing but the boat house and the wind. The hair on the back of his neck stood on end. He breathed in deep, the scent of the Hudson rushing nearby filling his senses as Eliot came to a sudden halt in the dark.

“Here,” Eliot said. Quentin could only just barely make out the shape of his elegant fingers pointing just ahead. “Can you feel the energy? I guess the Naturalists come out here sometimes and use it to light their bongs.” He laughed, a sound that warmed Quentin underneath his jacket at once. “And occasionally singe their own eyebrows off in the process.”

Quentin looked back. They’d come out to a place that the light from the Cottage couldn’t reach. Eliot formed an orb between his hands and pinned it overhead, a grapefruit sized pendant of magic swaying gently in the breeze. He stepped into Quentin’s personal space, giving him the once over. Head-to-toe and back again, settling at last on Quentin’s eyes.

“So,” he said with a smirk. “Cavaleri Animation. My memory of the First Year curriculum is a little hazy, but they’ve dazzled you all with that one already, yes? Turning your marbles into little glass animals, you know the one.”

Quentin nodded. “Yeah, um… but Alice was the only one who could actually get hers to work.”

Swift and warm as a pulse, Eliot’s hand curled around the nape of Quentin’s neck. Heat spreading down the column of his spine like a flame catching a wick. Thumb teasing over burning flesh. Eliot’s lips ghosted over his ear, not quite touching. Still, Quentin swore he could feel his smile. “Well,” he said, soft and dark, “I’m here now. And you’re going to do it. And it’s going to work.”

Quentin’s hand was bunching up the back of Eliot’s cardigan. He didn’t know when that had happened. The hum of the magic was making him dizzy. For a moment, it was impossible to breathe. His body a tight line of tension and desire. Eliot pulled away and Quentin released his hold, staggering a little as he tried to regain some semblance of control.

“Um, okay…” Quentin ran a hand through his hair in a half-hearted attempt at centering himself. “Why, uh—why do we have to do that here? We could have just done that spell in the library.”

“Because,” Eliot said with a tip of his head, “I have a theory.”

“A theory?” Quentin frowned. “You brought me out here for a theory?”

“More of a hypothesis really,” Eliot said with a wave of his hand. “But I think it’s going to work.”

“Great,” Quentin said with an exasperated sigh. “Dicking around with unstable magic in the middle of the night. What could possibly go wrong.”

“Look, it’s going to be fun,” Eliot said with that casual little air of his. “And we probably won’t explode even if I’m wrong. So we really don’t have very much to lose.”

“Okay, I’m—” Quentin threw his hands up. “For fuck’s sake, El, can you just tell me what we’re actually doing out here?”

“We,” Eliot said very slowly, reaching inside his cardigan, pulling a sliver of magenta colored glass out of the pocket of his vest, and looking through it, “are going to tap into all that crazy energy and make your little glass marble friend into a very big animal friend and take it for a spin.” He passed the sliver of glass over to Quentin. “Take a look.”

Quentin stared at Eliot for a very long time before relenting. “You’re actually a crazy person, you know that?”

“I think you mean certified sorcerer genius, but I’ll take it.” He gestured with a nod of his head. “Go on. It’s balls to the wall out here. So much energy we could power a fucking nuclear reactor and I doubt Henry would notice.”

Quentin looked through the glass, moving it from one eye over to the other. At first, it was impossible to make sense of what he was actually seeing. A latticework of stars. Billions of them it seemed, all bumping up against one another in a wild, cosmic dance. A galaxy of intersecting lines and patchwork patterns shimmering like the wings of a dragonfly. And every now and then, a spark. Popping off into the dark like fingers desperate for the night. Quentin handed the glass back to Eliot with a shake of his head.

“I don’t think this is a good idea.”

“Don’t be boring, Quentin,” Eliot said. It made Quentin’s chest ache with its normalcy. Like their past couldn’t touch them out here. Like out here with their bad ideas and their wild magic, maybe they could have some hope to start again. “But maybe… maybe don’t make anything that wants to bite our heads off.”

“Okay, so…” Quentin sighed with his whole chest. “To recap: you want to steal unstable magic from the wards of the school where we’re both currently students to make a giant glass animal that hopefully doesn’t swallow us whole so we can… take it for a ride?”

“Yes,” Eliot said, like it was the most obviously brilliant thing in the world. “Don’t make that face with your face. Tell me you’ve never wanted to ride a rhinoceros.”

“We are not riding a rhinoceros, Eliot. Absolutely not.”

“Well, okay…” Eliot’s hand on his nape again. Heat, fire, a five alarm blaze encircling his neck like a collar. “If you could ride on any animal, real or imaginary—”

“The Cozy Horse,” Quentin said without thinking, heart pounding like hoofbeats trapped inside his chest. “Um… it’s from the Fillory books, uh…”

Eliot laughed softly. “Okay.” His hand slid down to Quentin’s shoulder, gripping it possessively. “Tell me about... the Cozy Horse.”

“Um…” Quentin squeezed his eyes shut, took a breath, shook his head. Eliot’s hand was stroking up and down the expanse of his upper arm and shoulder, making everything go all fuzzy in his brain. “It’s just, uh… it’s this horse that Jane rode on. It’s, uh… really tall. Like a hundred feet. Like a clydesdale on steroids.”

“You won’t ride a rhinoceros but you’re perfectly fine with a horse that’s a hundred feet tall?”

Quentin turned his face upward, trapping himself in Eliot’s gaze. Sinking, flying, falling. Close enough to kiss if he only went up on his toes a little. Tucked inside the safety of his warmth. Quentin wanted to burn, to melt into a puddle at Eliot’s feet and slosh around like muck. “I…” Quentin swallowed. “I don’t think the Cozy Horse would hurt us. It’s basically a giant stuffed animal.”

Eliot grinned, gazing down at Quentin for a long beat before pulling away. “Okay then,” he said, taking a few steps down the path under their feet. “Show me Cozy Horse.”

Quentin reached into his pocket, knelt down, set the marble on the path. “I don’t understand how I’m supposed to… harness the magic of the wards.”

Eliot made a circle with his thumb and forefinger, peering through it with one eye. “Just leave that part to me,” he said absently. “Go on. Make your horse. And don’t say you can’t do it. We both know that you can.”

Quentin gazed up the long line of Eliot’s body. Eliot was fully focused on the wards. The sound of night, the crackle of magic. Quentin shivered under his jacket. His hands hovered over the marble, focusing his energy on prepping the glass for transformation with Dempsey's Silent Thermogenesis. Once molten, the marble could be manipulated into almost any shape he could imagine. For the Cozy Horse, Quentin didn’t have much to go on but the memory of a single illustration, and a few lines from The Wandering Dune, but he figured it would probably be simple enough. How hard could it be to imagine a draft horse the size of something straight out of the Cretaceous period?

Quentin twisted the glass under his fingers, so fully focused on his task he almost didn’t notice when Eliot began to move. When, suddenly, through the loop of Eliot’s fingers, a beam of sharp, frenzied magic began to focus on the animal he had half-formed with laser precision.

“You might wanna hurry,” Eliot said. “I don’t know how long I can hold this here.”

Quentin scowled in his direction, looping a bit of the molten glass into the shape of a tail. “You’re shit at communicating, you know that,” he spit, letting the gentle rage rising in his belly fuel his magic. “I thought cooperative magic was supposed to be, I don’t know… cooperative?”

Legs, hooves, the gentle slope of a hulking animal’s back. The wispy tendrils of a mane. Eliot was saying something that might have been a warning. Quentin was too focused on his creation to parse a single one of his words. The magic of the wards cracked like lightning. He could feel it in his hands. Quickly, almost as an afterthought, Quentin gave the beast that had come to life beneath his fingers a shimmering loop around the back of the neck that might have passed for reins if he squinted.

A single hoofbeat on the soft ground. The beam of magic stuttering through Eliot’s fingers died away, and he let out a tremendous sigh.

“Okay so... “ Quentin frowned, eyes flitting from the tiny glass horse up to Eliot’s face. “I don’t think this is going to—”

A flash, a pop, a tremendous wave of heat knocking the air from his lungs. Quentin shoved his body backward off the path and into the grass just as Eliot was running over. Kneeling down, using himself as a makeshift shield as he pushed Quentin further back away from the molten monstrosity shifting and morphing and doubling, tripling, quadrupling in size. A deep rumble, the tinkling of glass. Quentin peered over Eliot’s shoulder, his eyes moving up, up, up, trying to take in what it was he was actually seeing.

The glass horse shook out its mane, rearing up on its hind legs and down again with an earth-trembling thud. The distance from the ground to its shoulder must have been twenty feet. It had no eyes and no mouth, but Quentin swore he could feel its glassy stare boring into him. The light of the orb dangling overhead passed right through the center of its body. For a long moment, everything went perfectly still.

And then Eliot started to laugh. “Holy shit,” he said, his eyes wide as dinner plates when he turned his face to Quentin. “That is a big fucking horse.”

A laugh sputtered out from between Quentin’s lips. “Yeah, um… yeah. Fuck. It really is.”

Eliot’s body pressed right up against Quentin’s body when he turned, and leaned in, so close they were almost kissing. A pulse of heat passed between them. Quentin felt it in his chest like a second heart. “So,” Eliot said, a hand curling around Quentin’s cheek for a fleeting moment before pulling away. “You wanna take her for a spin?”

Quentin felt absolutely out of his mind. Hazy, his body a liminal space. “Yeah,” he said with a short, stuttering burst of laughter. “Yeah, why the fuck not.”

Unreality set in hard as they stood and cautiously approached. Up close, they might as well have been gazing upward at the hulking glass back of a dinosaur. The haphazard reins Quentin had created looped around the beast’s neck like a string of fairy lights.

“Um…” Quentin laughed, tucking a tuft of hair behind his ear. “How the fuck are we even going to get on this thing?”

Eliot took his hand suddenly, threading their blood-warm fingers together. “Oh, Q,” he said with a full-faced grin, “we’re gonna fucking fly.”

#the magicians #queliot #otp: proof of concept #myfic #*margo hanson voice* that's not tonally consistent with the fic

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tsukkisbean · 4 years

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Congratulations on 500! Can I get A3 with Kuroo, please?

beep beep...a3 detected...thunk!

your item has arrived, thank you for using tsukkibean’s vending machine! we hope to see you again in the future!

pairing: kuroo x gn!reader

genre: angst, rich kid!au

warnings: sad kuroo

word count:1181

prompt: a3. “i don’t need you to succeed”

a/n: (1) i’m sorry this was an angst please don’t hate me I FELT SO HORRIBLE AFTER YOU SENT AN ASK TELLING ME HOW YOU HOPED KUROO WASN’T ANGST 😭 (2) there’s a hamilton reference in there so if y’all catch that ily. (3) the hecatoncheires is a creature from greek mythology with 100 hands, don’t ask me how to pronounce it (4) THANK YOU KAT FOR BETA READING <3

kuroo wasn’t afraid of much, yet something about the dark chilled him to the bone. until now he’d been able to convince himself that his fears probably stemmed from some sort of childhood trauma. maybe it was because of that old oak tree outside his window that looked eerily similar to the hecatoncheires. or the fact that he’d watched one too many horror movies past sundown. though plausible options, both were very much incorrect.

blindly he searches for his phone hidden among the sea of pillows. once in his grasp, the sickeningly bright screen tells him it’s 2:30am. right on time.

today marks the 365th night in which his slumber had become plagued with nightmares. each dream was always different, yet they all ended the exact same way, waking him at the exact same time. it was the cruel way his mind reminded him of his past mistakes.

removing himself from the warmth of his blankets, he makes his way through the empty halls towards his study. it’s become a sort of routine for him, writing down each nightmare just as he remembered them. he hoped that maybe by compartmentalizing his feelings, he’d be able to understand what triggered the onset of nightmares.

but tonight he decides to try something different. once seated at his desk, pen in hand, his hand begins to race across the page.

to my dearest, y/n

did you notice where i placed the comma? i’m sure you would. after all, you were always the one that said the placement of a comma can change the entire meaning of a sentence.

it feels unsettling, writing to you like this. i guess it’s because i haven’t really gotten over the fact that you’re no longer with me. but if i remember correctly (who am i trying to kid, i would never forget this), you were always a sucker for these type of things - sappy love letters that is.

so that’s what this is i guess. my last love letter to you.

where do i begin? “from the beginning” you’d probably say. i miss your sarcasm.

if i’m being honest, i wasn’t too fond of the idea of meeting you, but i’m sure you felt the same. after all, who wants to get stuck in a business marriage, especially in this day and age? plus meeting your future partner in the spring, how cliché.

thank god my friends were at that dinner though, right? youth these days really know how to lighten up the atmosphere. at least them being there gave me the chance to tell you my nifty chemistry joke. do you remember how it went? i’ll tell you again anyways: why did carbon marry hydrogen? they bonded well from the minute they met. don’t think i didn’t see you try not to choke on your water.

i consider our second meeting our first date. i went in with the expectation that it would be purely business talk and it’d be over within the hour. but then you showed up all out of breath in a casual outfit, hair stuck to your sweaty forehead from the summer heat. from a ways away i could see your caretakers, in a panic trying to catch up to you. you pointed into the distance, trying to distract my bodyguard and despite being a trained professional, they fell for it. how thrilling it was to run through the busy streets of tokyo with you, escaping our obligations even if it was only for a few hours.

even to this day i’m not sure if you meant to drag me along because you didn’t want to hurt my feelings or because you wanted me by your side. whatever the reason, i’m glad you did because that was probably the most fun i had in awhile. i missed feeling like i had the freedom to do anything i wanted. it can get tiresome, you know? acting like the perfect child. who am i kidding, you know that better than anyone.

our relationship only spiraled from then on, and soon enough the leaves began to change colour. everyday you showed me a new way to live my life, and so it didn’t take me long to figure out that i’d fallen for you. i can’t tell you how happy i was when you agreed to marry me on your own accord. i’ll admit the way i asked you was kind of cheesy, but can you blame a guy? you were the hydrogen to my carbon. a relationship formed out of obligation, only to become something so much more meaningful. we were made to last.

you know, i’ve been having nightmares since you left. i’ve tried to tell myself it’s just a phase, that eventually things will go back to normal. but after 365 days i think i can finally admit that i hate the night not because i’m afraid of the dark but because it leaves me vulnerable and exposed to my own demons.

my nightmares start out different but they always end in the same way. all i can see is your figure, walking into the distance. no matter how hard i run, how loud i scream, you never look back. but today was different. i wanted to wake up so bad, i couldn’t live through this scene. not again.

this time you did turn back, the words you spoke held so much resentment and anger, “i don’t need you to succeed”. your eyes burned with so much hatred, it was probably enough to melt the snow. my heart is still aching as i write this. it was exactly like the day you left me.

i’m sorry i lashed out at you when you said you wanted to be a writer. you were always the more optimistic one between us, and i was always jealous of you for that. when you suggested we pack up and leave - that we start anew and do the things we really wanted to do, i wanted to. i swear.

you were right to call me a coward. i was scared of leaving the life that was so meticulously planned out for me. i thought i owed it to my parents to inherit their company, to carry on the family legacy. i thought i could provide you with the best life possible if i did everything they told me. i was afraid that if i took that leap of faith only to fall flat on my face, you’d leave me. funny how things work out. truth is, all i needed was you by my side.

you know i attended your book signing yesterday. you looked so happy, chatting with your fans about your newest release. i don’t think you saw me, and even if you did, you probably pretended not to recognize me. after seeing you yesterday, i realized something.

y/n, you were wrong to say you didn’t need me. i like to think that i created that fire within you by calling your dreams childish.

and it’s going to haunt me forever.

forever yours, kuroo

#haikyuu x reader #haikyuu scenarios #kuroo x reader #haikyuu angst #haikyuu x you #hq x you #hq angst #kuroo angst #kuroo testurou angst #kuroo tetsurou #haikyuu imagines #mystery bean 🔍

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aziraphales-library · 4 years

Note

Hey!!! I’m kinda new, and I’d like to know if you can recommend me some good GO fics? My only request it’s that they should mostly be Teen Up or Gen s fics... and maybe some good AUs (I’m in love with those)

Okay, here we go!! I went a little all out on this post because it’s more about personal preference, but I still stand by it :D

An Angel who did not so much Fall In Love as Settle Into It Gradually by TheLadyZephyr - 7.5k - Rated T

Crowley was standing in the middle of the room, hands in his pockets, looking a little lost. Aziraphale eyed the distance between them. Five steps. Five steps, and six thousand years, and a battlefield spanning an eternity.

The story of the little moments over the millennia that shape an angel’s regard for a demon, and the way he slowly, with great reluctance but inevitable surety, falls in love.

I simply adore this fic. It’s one of those fics that follows them through the ages and its just done so well. I don’t even know what else to say, just that you should go read it, and the fanart is also gorgeous!

Something So Magic by apliddell - 3.9k - Rated G

Crowley gets stuck in his serpent form, and Aziraphale tries his best to help.

This fic is simple, yet adorable, and I cannot get enough of it.

How Much To Give, How Much To Take by thechemicalgirl - 3k - Rated G

“It’s like…’ he paused, trying to calm down. ‘It’s like after I came back from Heaven and we switched our bodies back, something has happened. I can’t use my power anymore, not even to start the Bentley.”

Crowley loses his demonic abilities and Aziraphale tries to help him cope with it, but things get much more complicated than that.

Angsty, but also soft, and just a great execution of a favourite premise.

In Peace I Will Both Lie Down and Sleep by fizzybiscuits - 5.6k - Rated G

Aziraphale starts having nightmares. For some reason, he doesn’t talk to Crowley about this right away.

Title is from Psalms 4:8. “In peace I will both lie down and sleep; for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.”

This fic just has everything. It’s a stellar example of an established relationship fic and is cavity-inducingly fluffy.

Be All My Sins Remembered by CloversDreams - 43.4k - Rated T

“The trial,” Beelzebub continued loudly, “will consist of seven tests.”

“Seven…” Aziraphale muttered under his breath. He had a bad feeling about this and it showed. He twiddled his thumbs nervously as he waited for more details.

Crowley scrunched his face and shook his head. “Oh you don’t mean–”

“Correct. The Sins have been charged with the task,” Beelzebub interjected.

“Crap.” Crowley groaned. He slapped his hands onto his face and dragged them downward slowly. This was just what they didn’t need.

Gabriel nodded. He had a rather unpleasant grin on his face as he said, “Don’t know much about them, myself, but they can be a pretty gnarly group of high-class demons from what I’ve heard. On par with the archangels back home. Wouldn’t want to… what’s that delightful human phrase? Oh, right. Wouldn’t want to cock this up.”

Listen, in my opinion, this fic is massively underrated. I unintentionally binged it all in one go because it was so gripping. The angst in some chapters had me practically screaming, and the whole idea is a brilliant take on the seven deadly sins. The pining is magnificent, and I live for the Husbands drama.

Let Sleeping Snakes Lie by Blue_Sparkle - 2.6k - Rated G

Aziraphale confesses his love for Crowley when he can contain it no longer. Oh, not to the demon himself of course. To a sleeping snake.

Another fic featuring Snake!Crowley, this one is magnificently soft, and I adore the scene in Stardust it’s inspired by. Just can’t stop coming back to read, 10/10 recommend!

Serpent of Eden, Original Tempter by noodlefrog - 33.4k - Rated T

During Crowley’s trial, the agents of Hell present evidence that the demon has been fraternizing with the enemy. Careful to protect Crowley’s pride (and his own concealed feelings), Aziraphale turns on the saunter and leans into his friend’s reputation as a tempter to spin their relationship into something that looks more demonic than lunch dates and feeding the ducks.

This fic combines Pining, Misunderstandings, and a fantastic ‘what if?’ for the execution scenes, and I am here for it. The Original Characters are written fantastically well, and I loved the bonus chapter!

What They Say About Assumptions by DragonGirl - 7.9k - Rated T

While it’s true that God bestowed upon the angels the divine power to sense love of all kinds, that does not mean they were given the ability to sense exactly who or what that love is directed at. A minor design flaw that hasn’t been much of an issue. Until now.

Or:

Aziraphale has known that Crowley loved someone since the beginning. He’s also spent most of that time believing that someone was a demon.

Aziraphale’s obliviousness in this fic was so ridiculous it felt plausible. It was hilarious but also heartwarming, and has one of my fave love confessions. It was angsty as hell in the best way, and I just implore that you read it!

Futile Devices by ticketybye - 3.2k - Rated G

Crowley pretends to sleep. Aziraphale talks.

Just adorable. Cavity inducing fluff and love confessions are my favourite things and god does this deliver on that.

Foolish Principality by seashadows and WikdSushi - 6.6k - Rated M

Upon moving into a South Downs cottage, Crowley gets left alone while Aziraphale rushes to help the new proprietors of his bookshop. Thanks to a miracle gone wrong, Crowley discovers Aziraphale's greatest material secret, and a few things neither of them could ever fully face.

Is rated M but in my opinion there’s nothing too bad in here, though you should judge for yourself. The poetry is beautiful, horrifying masterpieces, and it is honestly fantastically funny and sweet.

——

Y’all know by now that I adore anything by Arinia, but this fic is one of my faves:

Just This Once by Arinia - 2.7k - Rated T

An idea came, slowly at first, before filling up his heart, setting every nerve alight. It might be another decade, another century even, before he saw Crowley again. No one had come to rescue him from Above. No one had chastised Crowley for wasting a miracle from Below. Perhaps, just this once…

The streets of Paris are soaked with blood, and Aziraphale realizes just how much he owes Crowley for saving his life.

It’s freaking adorable, the kissing is fantastic, and I have a secret love of the French Revolution that made me love the fic all the more. Read it, I beg you.

——

As for AUs, I don’t read loads, but I do have some faves!

Neighborly Affection by Thestarlitrose - 4.6k - Rated T - Human AU

Anthony J Crowley was four years old the first time he met the tiny Ezra A Fell; he wasn’t impressed.

He was forty-six when he found him again in a bookshop in Soho.

The Childhood Friends, Flower Shop, Christmas, Friends to Lovers fic nobody asked for in the middle of October.

This fic is a complete tangle of tropes, and it’s also incredibly sweet. Perfect for the fast approaching holiday season!

a book elegantly bound by AwkwardPotatoChild - 6.5k - Rated G - Library AU

Two idiots. One book series.

or alternatively, Aziraphale and Crowley are united over their common love of books and the scheming of one Miss Anathema Device

This fic manages to be both very funny and incredibly endearing at the same time. The book names were hilarious, and I adored Anathema’s matchmaking.

A Jaunt Or Two by sonicsora - 3.1k - Rated T - Human AU

They meet by happenstance twice over, only to end up quite woven into one anothers lives. It’s all quite accidental, but sticks.

Crowley realizes a bit belated he’s quite attached to this man who freely uses the word jaunt and wears cream-colored suits.

This fic is just adorable. It’s sweet, fluffy, and exactly my kind of thing. Also Gabriel’s a dick in the comedic way, which is fun to see.

Restoration by arealshitwizard (gaiusgallus) - 2.6k - Rated G - Human AU

Ok I had this idea in my head and it wouldn’t go away so here is Aziraphale as a painting restorer and Crowley as a flash stock broker… There’s just one chapter sorry for my sins

This is a really unique fic (I know I keep saying that, but it’s true!), and featured such fun interpretations of their characters!

——-

I’m aware that 90% of this list is very specific to my preferences, and that it got a little out of hand, but I hope y’all enjoy the recs anyway! XD

Does the blog have any favourites they’d like to share?

~ Mod B

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mcrmadness · 3 years

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Madness draws: Behind the Scenes of the latest Farin&Bela pencil drawing.

Aka the one that’s also my icon, even when that was a big risk to take because normally I start hating the photos I have once drawn, especially if I have failed miserably. This is how the drawing itself turned out:

ATTENTION: The original post about that drawing, with better image, behind this link.

This post is solely about the process itself with lots of pictures and also plenty of gifs, because I promised to do one if people would like to see that and I got some comments saying that they’re looking forward for that. So, here’s now that post!

For starters I have to apologize for the terrible quality that is the photos. I used my phone camera only and never thought about posting them, I just took them as a reference for myself and to show the progress to a friend and only after finishing the drawing I noticed that the angle of the camera causes a huge impact on the perspective of the drawing, so I sometimes might have done useless work when I thought some perspective was wrong when it was actually the photo that was wrong and not my work! I mean, take a look at these photos of the finished piece:

You see that? I realized this when I took maybe the second photo of the Farin sheet and looked at it and couldn’t believe my eyes because I didn’t remember drawing his torsto THAT small! And then I looked at the drawing and was like “wtf???” because it looked nothing like in the photo and then it hit me...

Also, another thing that I learn was that I might need to pay more attention to the perspective of the whole thing also because when I draw, I sit at the table so I am constantly seeing the drawing from my perspective instead of looking at it from above so that’s probably also going to affect the way I draw. I try to keep that in mind in the future so I can avoid redrawing things again and again just because my perspective is different than the reference photo’s.

Also the giant forehead of Farin’s in the photo on the right might have caused me to laugh a bit too much but anyway, let’s continue~ Or more like: let’s start for real this time.

Here’s the reference photo to y’all:

What I did in photoshop was to draw a line between them to see how I can divide the photo on two A4 papers. I had been thinking about this photo for some time already because it’s one of my favorites (but now I just feel cringy looking at it after I have drawn it... goddamnit!), and I got this idea that I could try drawing it on two papers in case I fuck up so I can start over or try again without having to do twice the work! Which was actually a good decision because this was the first version of Farin:

And it was awful. I also realized I had never drawn Farin’s face from he front. I have drawn him before from the side a few times but maybe once it came out actually good so that was why I decided to do the 2 paper method - because I knew it was not going to be an easy job! Bela is relatively easy to draw so I knew already that I would not have too many problems with that one.

I struggled with Farin’s eyes the most, at first.

It took me a while to figure out how to do that white line in his lower lid. Keep in mind that this was my first face portrait in over 10 years so I was very, very rusty and I just didn’t remember how to draw like anything anymore. (The photo is tilted because Bela’s face is a bit tilted and my hand can’t draw anything that is not straight [lol] so I have to rotate the photo in order to even draw the sketch of Bela’s eyes.)

So I took my sketchbook and tried to do some eyes...

I was still struggling so much here until I remembered about blending. And I didn’t have my hopes high but grabbed the eyeshadow applicators (my fave tool for blending) anyway, and switched to my other sketchbook in case the paper was the issue and:

Blending. It was all about blending! So with that in mind, I realized I can continue and I don’t need to do these in my old way, everything doesn’t have to have a lineart done but some of the job is done not with the pencils but with the eraser.

Anyhow, the previous Farin looked really bad and was too big as well so I just discarded that and started a new sheet because the old lines were not coming off properly anymore. I don’t remember if this is the old face or new but I think this might still be the old one:

Yes it definitely is the old because look at those lines! This is the new sheet:

And in the photo you can see one of my pencils - I use Derwent Graphic pencils, it’s a 12 pencil set with very soft pencils, starting with H, F and HB and ending to 9B. With this one I used F, HB, B, 2B, 5B, 7B and 9B. The white pencil is actually my new love aka the eraser pencil Koh-I-Noor Hardmuth. It’s amazing, I recommend! I just didn’t order 10 new ones this other day. I actually used about 1,5 full eraser pencils on this drawing alone so that’s why 10.

Here’s a “little” gif of the process on Farin:

I felt crazy when I went for the shirt, and I felt like I was going crazy MEANWHILE drawing it but in the end I did it and I’m super proud of it!

Below is the reference photo, it was pain in the ass to follow all those lines with my eyes and try to find what was I drawing and where was I but I think I did good. That was a fun challenge.

Okay so, when I was done with the new lineart, I decided to go for the shading and blending because that’s what really makes the drawings to pop. I started with the left (his right, my left) side of Farin’s face because I’m right-handed, and in the first photo I had done just the left (right) eye and mouth and nose, but in the second there’s also the other eye done already:

Keep in mind this was not the last time I drew the eyes. Not even close.

Something was off with the right (left) eye so I had to do that one again and I noticed that when you blend but haven’t erased and cleaned it yet, it looks like a black eye :DDD So here’s the before and after images of that cleaning. (Cleaning = I draw, blend, erase, draw and blend more when needed and then erase again, and repeat this as many times as I need until it starts to look ready to my eye.)

So here Farin was “finished” but if you still remember the final piece or compare it to it, you might notice it looks quite different. And you’re right. But more about that later, because at this point I started to work on Bela.

It actually started really well - I also had to do the whole lineart again because it did not match the size of “finished” Farin. I don’t remember if this is the first or second eye but when I had drawn his eye for the first time, I noticed it was not in line with Farin so I had to redraw it. A gif of the progress:

What’s that brown paper I’m using, you may ask? Well I noticed that people have some sort of paper on top of their art to keep it from smudging and I have no clue what that is so here’s my poor artist recommendation: baking paper! I tested it and it works (if you just remember to keep it under your hand, that is...) so that is, in fact, baking paper! :DD

I have drawn Bela’s face a few times before and he’s just so much easier to draw. In fact I used 4-5 days on Farin but I managed to start and finish (this version of) Bela just in one day. And that means that out of 12 hours (because I literally used the whole day for drawing) I used maybe like... 5h or something on Bela. That’s how much easier he really is to draw.

I don’t know wtf is wrong with Farin’s face but he’s extremely difficult to draw and I’m not the only one who has been saying this. I guess he just looks so regular but still unique enough to be difficult to draw. Bela then again has features that are very unique and very... caricature-like? I mean that just by drawing his nose or chin you can make a comic book Bela look exactly like himself, and with more realistic style his eyes already do a lot, but Farin’s really the opposite. My comic book version of Farin is literally the most basic version I can draw, it’s how I draw those characters and the only thing that makes him look himself is the hair, and his nose in a side profile. So I think that’s why it’s so difficult to draw him because he doesn’t look too regular but still regular enough to make is a very challenging task to do properly.

So yeah, the same day as I started working on Bela, I was also “finished” with the drawing:

Also look at how different it looks like from this perspective:

With the reference photo open in photoshop and I don’t understand how Bela looks more like himself in my drawing than in the photo. Also when I showed the WIP to my brother, he said that I somehow had succeeded at making Farin look more like Farin than what he does in the photo even. It’s weird.

But we were still far from finished. I was going to use the fixative on this soon but it just kept snowing the whole week so I couldn’t so every time I walked past the drawings, I stopped to fix this and that. For days I kept telling myself “I’m done, I can’t do more than this, I can’t do better than this.” and considered the drawing finished but still kept fixing things. Every time I was “done” with the other drawing, I saw something to fix in the other one and once that was done, I felt like the first one wasn’t as good and had to fix something from it too. And that led to a cycle where the other drawing was always better than the other and the worse one needed to be fixed. In the end I was hating the whole process and myself and my skills and I was already ready to abandon this whole thing and call it a day and never ever show it to anyone “because I cannot draw”. The photo above, here’s a list of things I redrew after that:

Bela’s eyes, the right (left) one at least twice.

Bela’s nose.

Bela’s mouth a couple of times.

Farin’s eyes x588045028520

And a list of things I kept fixing and fixing:

Bela’s chin.

Bela’s neck shadows.

Bela’s hairline.

Farin’s whole face was tilted so I tried to fix that.

Farin’s face was too wide, which meant also partially redrawing the ear.

Farin’s hair was too long and wide too.

Farin’s nose.

Farin’s mouth might be the only thing I drew only once and I’m actually still extremely proud of how it came to be. I did the lips solely with blending so that was super exciting to notice how I can use it for drawing and don’t need the pencils for everything!

During Bela’s eyes and nose and mouth especially I was hating myself so much and I felt like I was taking the risk of ruining the whole thing and a few times I was certain that was what I had just done too, until I somehow was able to save it again. But because of that, I wasn’t able to make Bela’s mouth any lighter anymore, the color wasn’t just coming off the paper so had to use what was there and make it look like it’s how it’s supposed to be, too.

Here’s a gif about those changes on Bela - the first one has the old eyes and nose, the others have minor changed on the nose and mouth:

(The blacks probably don’t get any blacker in reality, I did add more color to it all the time but mainly it’s just the lighting and my phone camera changing the brightness.)

I did the final details on his nose without even using the reference photo anymore. The photo didn’t seem to make any sense anymore at all so I was just using my mechanical pencil and the blending tool and eraser to make is look better. To my eye it looked more like a very flat nose with a big tip of the nose and he doesn’t have a flat nose and I tried to get rid of that illusion. I still feel like it makes him look bit weird but I’m not entirely sure how. Maybe it was because of my improvisation, idk...

So, Bela was then finally finished for the last time. In the Farin piece his left (right) eye had been bugging me the whole time and I didn’t want to touch it but still I felt like I have to do something about it because it was bugging me way too much. I then figured I could draw the eye line by line and take a photo of it each time to see if it looks right already or not, maybe I could then avoid doing all the phases before I was sure what to think about it. I mean, now the only way to see if it was correct was to draw e.g. an eye from start to finish, I couldn’t see from just the lineart or unblended eye if it was in the right spot etc. And here’s that progress on a gif:

The gif about only the eye would look so nice if Tumblr didn’t make the gifs so HUGE - this one is actually only 300px or 400px or something:

Apparently I also wasn’t happy with the other eye because:

But good thing is: I really enjoy drawing eyes. I love seeing them to “come alive”, my favorite part was to eraser a bit of the color on the iris to make them look like they are actually shiny! It feels like something so small to do and yet it makes a huge impact on the drawing!

And here’s yet another gif of the whole Farin sheet with all of the changes, including the last changes that made his head narrower, and less tilted and more in line. Look at the left side of his head especially to see that:

I can also see his nose changing between the first few photos. I keep forgetting about that but yeah, I also fixed that a little at some point.

And last but not least, the whole drawing in some sort of a timelapse gif:

Last two are the same but just a photo and the scan of the finished drawing. I still keep seeing things I would do differently but no can do, I already used fixative on it, also to keep myself from obsessing with it any more :D And to use it as a study of some sort. I have never been able to draw a perfect pencil drawing and this isn’t one either. I probably never can draw perfect drawings from references.

I do enjoy the whole shading and blending process, so much so that when I was editing these photos, I just wanted to start drawing something so bad but I also figured that I start to lose motivation when I get to the point where everything should be finished but I just can’t make it perfect. Like the current WIP I have, all I should do is to get the proportions and perspective and the lines of their faces correctly and I would be ready but it feels more like a superpower some people possess and I’m not one of those. I don’t know what is it but I just feel that I cannot see. I don’t know how to explain it, but I can’t see what I try to do and somehow keep drawing everything the wrong way. Just like in this post’s drawing too. There’s still things that are wrong and I know what it is but I don’t know how to solve it. My hands just don’t listen to me and they can’t do what I think they should. I also think the reason I cannot draw perfect copies of photos is because you can always see my “handprint” in them. If I copy a photo, it will look like a photo and not like a drawing made by me. So I believe that in my drawing there’s always a part of me visible and I’m not entirely sure if it’s a good thing or not. On bad days it’s not a good thing, obviously. On good days? Well I guess it’s good then because it just means I have my own style which I really should appreciate. But I wish I had my style only when I want it to be visible, but I can’t control it. Just like I cannot write text by hand that would look like it was written with a computer, so I guess I should just try to get used to it, no matter how much it’d bug me sometimes.

#mcrmadness draws #mcrmadness draws: behind the scenes #dä fanart #die ärzte

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bran-who-writes-theoretically · 4 years

Text

Julie and the Phantoms

~What I want~

-Y’all didn’t ask for this but guess what here are my thoughts anyway. They are based in nothing and are solely what I want. So here’s everything (I hope) in no particular order.

1. Let’s talk about Juke just to get it ~out of the way. TBH I cannot get around the age gap between Madison and Charlie. It’s so hard for me to see past it. I’m only a few months younger than Charlie and I literally could not imagine dating someone who was even in high school at all. I understand they wanted the guys to look the same age through the series so they had to cast older but.... eh. The only way I could really accept Juke would be if they kissed in the series finale just before the guys moved on. But really? I’d love to see them realize that they can’t be together because he’s dead. It would be SO interesting to see that, them having to stomp out the crush because it could only end in hurt for them both. I’d love to see them become super close/best friends. They have a connection, it just doesn’t have to be romantic. Also I’d really like to see her maybe end up with Flynn??? That would be so refreshing. You almost never see queer leads for kids shows and that would be awesome (P.S. even though it’s fine to ship Juke, even though I personally don’t, do NOTTTTTTTTT. I repeat NOT! Ship Madison and Charlie. I’ve seen other actors in older fandoms stop talking to each other because of fans shipping them. Please don’t do this to anyone. Remember he’s 21, and she’s 16).

2. Ghosts. They need to stay ghosts. Trust me, I want them to come back to life as much as y’all, but I don’t think there are any ways that they can bring them back that doesn’t feel like a cheat. Plus, I really really want the heartfelt goodbye from the guys in the last episode before they move on. What can I say? I love my bittersweet endings. Could you imagine the material they could give us? They could even bring Julies mom in to help the boys cross over.

3. I NEED to see more of the guys in the 90’s. I have a ton of questions. Some of which are: was Bobby always kinda to the side? How long was Luke gone? I want to see Reggie and Alex’s life. Who’s house was the studio at? (We can cross out Luke and Reggie, we’ve seen their houses/where they were.) but I have my own theory that it was Alex’s house before Julie’s family solely based on the reason that that’s why the guys were in there and why Alex lingers. But then that poses the reason why did his parents leave the house? Maybe because it was too hard to live there when they lived there with their son? But then that poses the question if they “forgave” him for being gay?

4. Reggie, I know he wasn’t intended to be, especially since I heard the “that was pretty hot!” scene was improvised, but I need him to be bi so bad. I am not sure I’m right, but I only have seen three (?) canonically bisexual characters on screen in my twenty years of life. And that’s Cheryl from Riverdale (😒) and my personal fav, Eleanor from The Good Place, and we also have a sprinkle of Korra in there. I literally cannot think of another. But lookie here! They’re all women, where are my bi guys (if you know any male bi characters? Send them my way👀). But seriously, Reggie has such potential to be great Bi rep! If I had seen a character like him I might have realized and accepted my sexuality way before I did. Because ironically I had a sexuality crisis at seventeen because a guy friend grabbed me by the shoulder and asked for my help not too different from Luke singing to Reggie lol!

5. Hollywood Ghost Club. I would really love to see more about it. I’m pretty sure I know what’s going on, Caleb most likely made a deal with the devil. But I’d love to see the guys and Julie help free all of the other trapped spirits he’s lured into the club. Also, on the topic of ghosts as a whole, I wonder if there’s any negative effects on a ghost staying non earth too long. It happens a lot in movies/books. They almost turn into a wraith, a darker version, only a shadow of themselves. I wonder if it applies here too.

6. Oh dang, CASPER. As per my previous posts as I was writing this, I was backhanded with memories of one of my favorite childhood movies, which I just recently watched again. Above I say maybe Julies mom could help them cross over. But remember how Luke promises to talk to Julies mom once they cross over? What if they do just that. A line that struck a chord while watching the movie was from the mother’s scene when she comes back: “let’s just say you know three crazy ghosts that kept their word.” And y’all, when she said that line not gonna lie I nearly cried thinking about that for the show. She also mentions that because her family loved her so much, she doesn’t have any unfinished business. I wouldn’t be surprised if she doesn’t have any unfinished business either. Casper came out in.... you guessed it.... 1995. So I wouldn’t be surprised if they got some inspiration from it. Not to mention that it’s also a kids movie that has some pretty serious moments that kinda shocked me with how sad they were rewatching as an adult. I guess that’s why I loved it so much.

7. Carrie. I really want to learn more about Carrie and Julies dynamic. We know they were friends (I’m assuming with Flynn too?) and had a falling out. But why? And in the last episode she’s clearly proud of Julie after the performance, so I really want them to make up and have her be part of the group again. And maybe learn the truth about the guys?

8. Willie and Alex, god I want them to be together so bad. Of course, Caleb owns willies soul, so that’s not great, so I’d definitely love that subplot of the group trying to free the ghosts of the HGC. We didn’t see Willie too much this season, so I hope we do get more time with him. Also, I absolutely need a big musical number like Perfect Harmony between Alex and Willie. The only time I’ve ever seen a scene like that between gay characters has been in Rock of Ages (an adult musical) with “can’t fight this feeling” and it was hilarious and I need something like it for this show because it would be super cute 🥺.

9. Not particularly a theory but I’m really wondering how long Caleb is going to be in Nick. Julie has already stated that she’s kinda over him, and that it would be unfair to lead him on... so what happens when he realizes she probably won’t take the bait. Other than that, I really hope Sasha has fun playing Caleb through Nick, it has the potential to be great.

10. I’m not exactly sure what their unfinished business is going to be, but I’m almost certain it has to deal with Julie somehow. But the ending absolutely has to be the guys moving on. The ending has to be big though. They have to play somewhere awesome and then they find out... they’re done here. I’d honestly like a whole episode just dedicated to their goodbye. The way I see it, the second to last episode can end with them smiling after the performance and then that smile fading just a little bit, because that was when they realized. Then the final episode will be then telling Julie (and anyone else who knows about them by then) and finally moving on. Here I’m torn. I’ve mentioned both above but let me get more in depth. Version one: the one I originally came up with. This dealt with when the guys are ready to move on, Julies mom would come and help guide them into crossing over. I really liked this idea for a while, until I watched Casper again. Version two: the one I now like better(?) is the guys moving on, and after they do, Julies mom comes back (where even Ray and Carlos can see her) because “let’s just say you know three crazy ghosts who kept their word.” Could you IMAGINE??? It would absolutely reduce me to bawling I want it right now. The reason I like this one a little more is because we can skip to a little while after everything, and she gets a sign from them (just like her mom sending her the flower in the S1 finale) to show that they are still watching over her. And then we fade to black.

So that’s most of my thoughts on this show, if there’s typos in this I absolutely don’t care at all I wrote this instead of doing college work.

#julie and the phantoms #julie and the himbos #julie molina #luke patterson #alex #reggie #sorry this is so long lol #I have a lot of thoughts and this was originally for myself but why not burden y’all with it

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backtothestart02 · 4 years

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Hot to the Touch - 4/? | westallen fanfiction

A/N: Y’all do not even know the pain and suffering I went through trying to get tumblr to cooperate with me and open a text post. Oy. Anyway, here’s my next commission made by @jennlee44 AND the next fic in my fics-for-icons arrangement with @izzyllewis. I hope you both - and everyone else! - enjoys this update. I had a lot of fun with it. :)

*Many thanks to @valeriemperez for beta’ing.

...

Chapter 4 -

She didn’t understand. It had been a long time since she’d had sex, sure, and this time had been good – really good. But not so good that she couldn’t get a hold of herself. Or maybe it was just the thrill of public sex and the discomfort that came from fucking somewhere other than a bed.

She cleared her throat and looked over at him when she felt put together enough to put some snap back into her voice.

“That was…uh…”

“Good?” he asked, a smirk she could only think to call aggravatingly adorable on his lips.

Really good, she thought again but decided not to give him too much of a boost to his ego.

“Yeah,” she said breathlessly, nodding and screwing up any chance of keeping him humble.

His smile was wide and smug and gorgeous, and she felt her cheeks heat up as she rolled her eyes, dipping her head down so their gaze didn’t meet. Her heart was bursting, and she was starting to smile too, and she couldn’t help but feel this very familiar crush-like feeling blossoming inside of her.

Stop it. It was just good sex. That’s all.

Really good.

Was it possible to be starstruck by really good sex?

“So…” She licked her lips, hesitant to look him in the eyes again lest she melt. “I should go.”

He looked at her curiously.

“I have a class,” she explained, glad that he didn’t know that said class was about to be let out in roughly five minutes.

He nodded once, still smiling, though now with closed lips, no brilliant teeth shining back at her. He didn’t ask any questions, and he let her skirt by him so she could get to the end of the aisle.

She paused briefly, then turned to look at him, feeling as flustered as he must have felt yesterday morning.

“Thanks,” she said lamely, lingering a second longer than necessary in case he said anything else.

His amused laugh was the sexiest thing she’d ever heard in her life.

“Any time, Iris.”

She swallowed her gasp with the smallest gulp she could manage and fled the scene, her heart still thudding away in her ears as she made her way down the back stairway and out the alley door. She was too embarrassed to look back and see if he was standing by the window watching her the way she had done the day before.

At least she wasn’t running like he had been; now she was more like power walking. She was power walking with purpose, and her arms definitely weren’t flailing about.

It wasn’t until after she turned the corner that she realized she wasn’t carrying any books or a backpack or even a purse. She’d gone to the bookstore solely with the purpose of getting herself off, so Barry probably knew by now that her excuse of going to class was complete bullshit and just used to get away from him.

Not that she wanted to get away from him. God, she wanted anything but.

She had to be careful though. All she’d wanted was a one-night stand, and that was definitely what she got. There was no need to even see him again. At least not for anything but sex.

Anything but sex…

She bit her bottom lip, imagining a ‘next time’ with Barry. She wasn’t sure, but she could’ve sworn her panties were getting wet again.

“God dammit,” she muttered under her breath. How could he have this effect on her?

She needed to talk to Linda, and she needed to do it fast. She had to figure out what her next move would be, because right now all she wanted to do was run back to that bookstore, hope Barry was still there, and jump his bones again. She wanted to spend the whole day doing nothing but having sex with him. It would be pure ecstasy, and she would relish in it.

But what kind of impression would that leave him with?

That she wanted to be with him? That she wanted to date him?

That was absolutely not something she wanted to ever do. At least not right now.

No. Never.

She was not going to date ever again, and if she did, it wasn’t going to be with this nerd she’d spontaneously hooked up with.

But why not?

She couldn’t answer that, so instead she trudged onward, back to hers and Linda’s tiny apartment. She put the key in the lock and opened the door, shutting it quickly behind her.

“Lin!” she called out. “Linda!”

No sound greeted her. She frowned and pulled out her phone. She saw she’d missed a call from Linda when she was… Well, when she was otherwise occupied. Heat rose in her cheeks again.

She put the phone to her ear and listened to the message.

“Hey, Iris, so I thought it might be fun if we stayed in my parents’ place all weekend! No more parties, I promise. Just us. I’m sure my folks won’t mind. Let me know what you think. I’ll be back at the apartment around noon. See you then!”

Iris lowered the phone from her ear and checked the time. 10 a.m.

Linda had an early morning Saturday class too, but hers started an hour later than Iris’ at nine, so she had no reason to be suspicious. Yet.

She didn’t know why Linda was going to take two more hours to get back to their place when her class would be over at 10:30, but Iris supposed it didn’t matter. Maybe she was running errands, maybe she was relaxing in the park, maybe she was settling in at her parents’ place after assuming she’d convince Iris to go with her. Regardless, she wasn’t home, and Iris was alone.

She kicked off her shoes, moved from the room to the even smaller room at the end of the short hall and fell back on her bed.

She sighed loudly and closed her eyes.

“I had sex with Barry Allen.”

…

Barry had watched Iris “power walk” away from the bookstore from the window where they’d fucked.

He’d stayed there a while too, smiling to himself, reliving the feel of his dream girl inside his mind over and over, wondering how she knew his name too, because he definitely hadn’t told her. Not that it mattered how she knew. All that mattered was she knew, and she’d cried it out as he thrust up into her, and wow, that sex had been good. It’d been a while for him, but he couldn’t remember sex being that good before.

After a good half hour, he left the bookstore the same way Iris had and grabbed himself a coffee at the local coffee shop before heading back to his and Cisco’s apartment.

He could not stop smiling.

The sex had been great, but what really made him beam was how easy it had been to convince her. Just cut her off and kiss her? Who would’ve thought? Caitlin was definitely right in that all he needed to do was keep pursuing her. In the back of his mind, he did worry if Iris would keep her distance now that they’d had sex once, but he hoped not. He hoped he could win her over again. He wanted to see her, be with her. He still wanted more than just sex, even though he hardly knew her.

But he knew her name, and he knew what her body wanted, and he knew where her secret hideaway was, and for right now that was all he needed to know.

The cry of “Damn it!” was heard just as he put the key into the lock of his and Cisco’s apartment door. The voice was most definitely Cisco’s, and the bleating that immediately followed definitely belonged to his goat.

Barry couldn’t help but chuckle before turning the knob and stepping inside.

“So, are you going to name it?” he asked, beaming as the baby goat trotted across the room, toilet paper dragging under one hoof, and Cisco sitting on the couch looking about ready to pull his hair out.

Cisco lifted his head up slowly and glared at his roommate.

“You left early,” he accused, his voice low and gravelly.

Barry shrugged nonchalantly, nothing able to get him into a bad mood this morning.

“I had somewhere I had to be.”

Cisco started walking towards him, daggers in his eyes, so Barry held up his hands in surrender.

“It was Caitlin’s idea,” he insisted.

Cisco paused, grimacing as he stepped into a tiny pile of goat poop. He was shoeless and sockless and looked about to scream.

“Here, okay, let’s just-”

Cisco’s groan turned high-pitched.

“This stupid goat!”

The bleating turned cheerful and then quieted as the goat turned to go into Cisco’s room.

“Oh, no you don’t! You don’t get to poop in my room, you little…shit!”

“Cisco!” Barry went after him with some paper towels, but Cisco just limped around, trying to ignore the squish of his foot every time he walked until he made it to the doorway of his room.

Cisco was fuming, his hands braced on each side of the doorway. Barry had to slowly unclench his hands and turn him aside as his gaze turned deadly. He handed him the paper towels for his foot and went into his room, fetching the goat who bleated happily again.

“I’ll put him in my room. If he poops, he poops.”

Cisco scoffed, wiping his foot clean and then hobbling back into the kitchen to disinfect it with soap and water and a real towel. He shuddered as he tossed the paper towels away and threw the towel into the laundry basket.

“You must be in a real good mood to be fine with a goat pooping in your room,” he said sarcastically as he made his way to the couch again and took a seat.

“Nothing a little disinfectant can’t fix. We just have to potty train him is all. I’ll pick up a litterbox when I’m out later today.”

Cisco stared up at him in disbelief, a million questions running through his head, but only one blatant fact emerged.

“We’re not keeping it!”

Barry’s grin faltered slightly.

“You better find out who it belongs to, then,” he teased, coming to sit beside him after wiping up the floor and washing his hands.

“I don’t understand,” Cisco whined. “Why are you in such a good mood?”

Barry shrugged. “Can’t I be in a good mood every once in a while?”

“You wouldn’t even speak to me when I came home last night.”

“That’s because it was three in the morning, and I’d been sleeping for four hours already.”

“Nah, there was more to it. Something happened at the party, didn’t it? Something bad. Something that upset you.” Barry was silent for a moment. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

He shook his head, then smiled cheerfully again.

“It doesn’t matter now. Everything is right in the world.”

“Everything is not right,” Cisco said. “That goat is out to get me.”

Barry chuckled. “Well, everything is right in my world at least.”

“And why is tha-” The dots fused together in his mind. “No.”

“Yep.”

“You. You and-”

“Uh huh.”

“But last night…?”

Barry sighed, realizing he’d have to tell the whole story.

“Last night, she jumped me in a bedroom at the party and I ruined it by not wanting a one-night stand.”

“Dude.”

“I know, I know.” He waved him off. “But I called Caitlin to drive me home, and she told me that Iris was probably just playing hard to get, and I should just keep pursuing her.”

“Hmm.”

“Turns out she was right!” He grinned gleefully. “I went to the bookstore this morning and turned the tables on her. She gave in instantly.”

“So, you had sex.”

“Well, yeah!”

“And…are you going out?”

Barry’s smile slipped.

“Well…no. I mean, we didn’t discuss that. She just…she said she had to leave to go to a class…”

“Oh, Barry.”

“She said the sex was great though!” More or less.

“That only makes it a one-night stand.”

Now Barry frowned.

“You gave her what she wanted, Barry. She’s not going to want anything to do with you now.”

His brows furrowed.

“Why do you have to be so negative? You don’t know that for sure.”

He shrugged in a ‘maybe I’m wrong’ way, but it didn’t make Barry feel any better.

“I’m going to take a nap,” Cisco said, heading for his room. “The goat’s doo-doo is on you.”

He closed the door behind him, and Barry sunk back into the couch, as his heart plummeted in his chest.

Had he really seen the last of Iris West?

…

At half-past one Iris decided Linda had to have gotten settled in at her parents’ place and headed over. It was a half hour walk, but she could use the additional time to try and sort her feelings out – as if she hadn’t already been doing that for the past two hours…

Regardless, the time was well spent, and when she knocked on the door to the mansion half an hour later and Linda appeared on the other side, she knew it was well worth the wait.

“I slept with Barry.”

Linda’s jaw dropped.

“Thanks for finding out his name at the party for me by the way,” she said, moving past her into the house. “It would’ve been awkward to cry out ‘book boy’ into his ear as he fucked me.”

“Well.” Linda shut the door and spun around. “You’ve had quite the morning.”

“Yeah…I skipped class, went to the bookstore, and…he showed up. Then, we-”

“I think I got it, Iris.” Linda grinned.

“I wanted to tell you right away, but you weren’t home. Then you weren’t at noon when you said you’d be, so I waited a little bit longer, and-”

“Yeah, sorry about that. Guess I caught up with stuff here. You good with staying here over the weekend? I called the folks. They’d love to have you staying here with me while they’re gone. In fact, they want us to stay to look over the house! Isn’t that great?”

“Fantastic,” she said on a sigh.

“Oh, what’s wrong, honey? You don’t want to stay?”

“No, it’s not that…” She shook her head. “It’ll be fun to stay here a few more days. I’d love to.”

“Then what?” She folded her arms.

“What do I do now?”

“What? With Barry?”

She nodded.

“Well, you got your one-night stand, didn’t you?”

“Yeah, I guess…”

“And that’s all you wanted, right?”

She was silent.

“Right?”

“Right,” Iris said, after hesitating a bit too long. “Of course. I don’t need any entanglements right now. I need to take care of me, and that means not jumping into a relationship. I mean, that scares me. I don’t want it. I don’t want to risk anything. I need to protect myself before I go thinking there’s a guy out there that could actually-”

“Hey, hey.” Linda closed the distance between them and grabbed Iris’ shoulders. “The choice is yours. No one is forcing you to do anything. Okay?”

Iris nodded slowly.

“I’m just not ready.”

“Then don’t jump into anything.”

“Okay.” She forced a smile. “Thanks, Lin.”

“Any time,” she said, reminding Iris of Barry’s last words to her. A chill ran down her spine. “How about I put a movie on and we just relax for a whi-”

“Actually-”

Linda frowned. “Yeah?”

“Could you get me Barry’s number?”

Linda blanched.

“You got me his name. Why can’t you get me his number?”

“Iris. You just said-”

“Every girl needs a booty call, right?” she said, avoiding her friend’s gaze.

Linda laughed. “Sure.” She shook her head. “Why don’t you get the movie set up, and I’ll do some digging.”

Iris couldn’t be 100% certain, but she was fairly sure she heard Linda mutter something on the way to another room, something about how good the sex must’ve been for her to want him as a booty call.

She probably should’ve kept the information to herself, but she couldn’t help it. How was she going to see Barry again? Just wait in the bookstore and hope he showed up?

Because yeah, she’d decided this was not going to be a one-time thing. Today had been euphoric, heavenly even. She’d felt alive in Barry Allen’s arms, as rough as that fuck had been. She missed his arms around her, his lips on hers, his tongue swirling her nipple, his hard cock thrusting up into her core, his hot breath in her ear. She missed it all.

And why should she be deprived of really good sex just because she wasn’t ready for a relationship? Why couldn’t this be just one really epic fling before she was ready for the real thing? It didn’t even have to mean the real thing would end up being with Barry. If she made the rules clear, and he agreed, then…well, she deserved this. After everything Eddie put her through, she deserved to feel alive every day. Multiple times a day. Multiple times an hour sometimes.

Her heart leapt into her throat at the thought of it.

She wanted to see him again. She wanted him to want her. She wanted to see his eyes roving over her body, taking her apart piece by piece. She wanted him inside her, all day, all night. She wanted to forget her fear of heartbreak and just enjoy the heat of his flesh against hers.

The very thought made her shiver.

“Okay, I texted you,” Linda said, re-entering the room.

Iris felt her phone vibrate in her pocket and quickly took it out to put Barry into her contacts.

“But Iris.” She put her hand over Iris’ phone to draw her attention back to her. “Be careful with this, okay? You don’t want to get caught up into something you can’t get out of. Sex is exhilarating, but it shouldn’t become an addiction.”

“Lin-”

“And it shouldn’t be used as coping mechanism to deal with heartbreak.”

Iris sighed, slightly aggravated.

“Just promise me you’ll be careful.”

“I promise,” she said sincerely, then threw all caution to the wind and excused herself to go to the bathroom…and text Barry Allen.

…

Late that night, after movies and dinner and painting nails and prank calls and gushing about the good ol’ days of high school gossip and homecoming after parties, Iris and Linda fell asleep on the couch in the huge living room in the center of the Park mansion.

Or at least, Linda did. Iris pretended to and then snuck out of the house where a cab was waiting for her. She had the driver let her off across the street from the bookstore, and then walked over to the back entrance in the alley, hoping her risqué suggestion wouldn’t be shot down at the last minute.

She needn’t have worried.

“You came,” she said, relieved when the tall shadow coming out of the alley was Barry and not some guy trying to kill or rob her.

“You asked me to,” he said easily.

She smiled brightly, then pulled a hair pin out of her pocket.

“C’mon.”

Once inside the rickety old door, Iris took Barry’s hand and led him up the stairwell in the dark. Moonlight shown through the windows on the second floor. It was deadly quiet, and the floor squeaked a little when they walked, but once they reached the center of the room and were in complete darkness again, Iris came to a stop, and so did Barry.

“You’re beautiful, Iris,” he said, smoothing some of her frizzed hair out of her face.

The compliment made her heart flutter and drop at the same time. It scared her and made her feel alive.

“Do you want me, Barry? Like you did this morning?”

His voice was rough when he answered.

“Yes.”

“I want you, too.”

“Iris.”

“This can be our spot, Barry. Every day…or a couple times a week…however often you want to do this.”

“Every day,” he said instantly, and her smile turned into a laugh.

“I missed you today,” she said, rising up on her tip toes to kiss him. “I missed your hands and your lips…” She pushed his jacket off his shoulders. “I missed your arms and your tongue.” She unbuttoned his shirt and spread her hands beneath his t-shirt. “I missed your breath in my ear and your eyes on my body.”

She met his eyes in the darkness.

“I missed you, too.” He gulped.

“But Barry?”

“Yeah?” he rasped.

“I’m not interested in a relationship. It’s just sex or nothing at all. That means no dates, no compliments – unless they’re sexual in nature, no being seen together. Hell, we have to keep us a secret just for good measure. Can you do that, Barry? Because if you can’t…”

He put a finger over her lips.

“I don’t like option two,” he said. “Anything is better than nothing at all.”

Happiness and heat exploded inside of her.

“I’m glad you think so.”

She dragged him down for a kiss, and he started to undress her. Moments later her clothes and his were piled into a heap, and Barry was lowering them down onto the soft carpet they’d stepped onto in the center of the room.

Iris sifted her fingers through his hair and drew her hands down his naked body. Her nailed traced the lines of his arms and face.

Feeling insecure in front of her perfection, Barry pinned Iris’ hands by her head, positioned himself at her core, using his knees to push her legs apart and leaned down to kiss her. Then he released her to slide on a condom and thrust into her soaking pussy.

She arched up and clung to him, digging her nails into his back as his teeth sucked on her neck. In and out he moved, his chest brushing her breasts and her mouth occupied, always occupied with his skin or his lips.

And so they moved in almost silence, exhilarated in the pleasure of their bodies winding around each other and writhing in the darkness, just shy of the moonlight seeping into the windows a few aisles away.

...

*Also posted on AO3 and FFnet.

#westallen #fanfiction #backtothestart02 fanfiction #hot to the touch #chapter 4 #fic commission #fics for icons #for jennlee44 #for izzyllewis #westallen fanfiction

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skysybil · 4 years

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Simulation Masterpost Time

Hi! I decided to make this ask reply its own post because it’s gonna be every haphazard detail I could think of that may or may not allude to it being a simulation--including things within the narrative and things that Sophie and Kevin have been up to.

@josephstern said: “if you guys ever want me to lay out every fucking tiny detail I’ve seen that I think points to it being a simulation, I’ll do that too” please god yes, your post explaining your rankings was super interesting but I’m not sure I’m 100% on board with the theory yet

So here I am! To be fair, I doubt it sometimes too! No theory is going to be totally untouchable and without holes. But I love going apeshit with Conspiracy Brain and exploring stuff like this, so here’s all the evidence I could think of as to why this might be a simulation. But remember it still might not be--I’m hoping everyone getting caught up in this simulation theory doesn’t mean people are going to be upset if it isn’t a simulation. Anyway, suspicious details below the cut!

How did everyone escape the crash (and being kidnapped by scary doppelganger robots) entirely unscathed? Peter’s injury didn’t even get worse in the crash, and they hit the planet’s surface hard. The ship was torn apart--why weren’t they?

Speaking of Peter’s injury, he gets up and walks to Rita’s computer cave despite the fact that he supposedly can’t even stand on his leg (transcript page 14). In my words in the Most Likely To Be An NPC post, “Sure, maybe Juno carried him, but I’d fully expect something like Juno picking him up to be a joke written into the script. I feel like it was deliberately left out.”

Also, the computer cave. Not only did the ship crash, but it crashed into the ocean. How are the computers even remotely functional?

Every character is acting oddly in different ways, but especially Juno. I’m just gonna refer everyone back to the Most Likely to be an NPC post here to cover individual character details. I will say, characters’ unusual behavior is the majority of the theory--Vespa is unusually aggressive, Juno acts vaguely like a golden retriever, Jet’s scene with the car is weird at best (here’s a fuck ton of Jet conversation because he seems to be under a good amount of debate in the theory), etc, so going through those posts is important!

See the Jet posts above for a lot of details about how weird the Ruby 7 scene is, but just in general--how did the Ruby survive the crash? It was bolted to the floor of the ship! I love the Ruby as much as anyone, but I’m just saying it’s weird that it’s not a warped ball of metal right now.

Also, along the lines of ernmark’s post on Rita’s role in the simulation, it’s very suspicious that they just happened to land on a perfectly serene island with everything they could ever need and no issues for food, water, shelter, or supplies.

Agent G refers to the place where the book is being kept as “Morpheus Maximum-Security Data” (transcript pg 35), and then sarcastically says “how imaginative”. Morpheus is the Greek god of dreams. Agent G is likely making a comment about how it’s a little too perfect for the scenario. This is 100% one of the most suspicious pieces of evidence in the bunch, in my opinion.

The general suspicious idea of a strange unknown figure dragging them all (and presumably whole chunks of the ship) from the water. What??

Before Rita has the chance to hack it, the security drone identifies Sneaky, the robot controlled by Peter, as an “unregistered male approximately six feet” (transcript pg 29). How does it know? That’s not information you can get from someone’s voice.

How did a thrown-together rocket made of thrown-together bots make it all the way to this incredibly difficult to reach and enter base (without being noticed at all) in a day? I mean, I love Rita and I think she can do anything if she puts her mind to it, but... really?

The most recent episode of “Writing Fiction Across the Void” with Sophie and Kevin was about writing satisfying endings and twists. They put a hell of a lot of emphasis on unreliable narrators, searching for inconsistencies, and not stopping yourself from making “it was all a dream” storylines if it has support. I feel like they’d enjoy holding that over our heads as a “we tried to warn you! we tried to train you!” thing. They specifically call out a way to signal that something is a dream as a place being “oddly idyllic”--see: why is the island just perfect to crash on?

Despite the fact that every character has a brief description of their entrance every time that they enter a scene in the transcripts, Juno does not have an entrance shown in the script at all when he enters Nureyev’s room acting suspiciously cheery. (Page 17, if you’re curious.) Plus, the transcript was posted late after the episode was dropped--it’s possible that suspicious descriptions like “too eager” had to be cut out of the script before posting it. However, I have not seen the production script for this episode yet, so if there’s something that alludes to this in the production script, feel free to call me out on it.

There’s all the details I can think of off the top of my head. Here’s some of my favorite speculation posts that elaborate on details and theories.

@jitterbug-juno ‘s post talking about some of the back and forth on Juno’s character activity -- the first person I’ve seen talking about how Juno might not be out of character at all!

This discussion from @jitterbug-juno and @iimpavidwrites was what got me hooked on the theory for the first time!

This discussion post from @darling-dearest-detective has some really harrowing ideas, especially regarding Sasha’s role in this and the significance of Peter’s depressing instrument!

And this post from @ernmark that I linked earlier in the post that talks about Rita’s role in this in particular, which is really good.

And here’s all my posts about the simulation theory so far: 1 2 3 4 5 I’m planning to put together another big post on the Juno issue and whether’s he’s in the simulation as an NPC or not, because I’m starting to see some stuff on both sides that fascinates me. So keep an eye out for that!

I hope this was a good collection of evidence for anyone who wanted it! If I missed anything I’ll reblog and add it on, as usual, feel free to ask me things and agree or challenge the points I brought up! I love the discussion and I love y’all. Have a good day!

#i know i'm missing some stuff so seriously send me messages or asks and i'll add stuff #tpp #the penumbra podcast #tpp s3 #tpp s3 spoilers #s3 spoilers #tpp spoilers #tpp junoverse #simulation theory

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anthonycrowleymoved · 5 years

Text

HAIR SURVEY RESULTS TWO: ELECTRIC BOOGALOO

i know this was a long time coming. without further ado, i’m going to show you the final scores. then, if you so choose, you can go in and see my ~further analysis and information~ as well as other details and a comparison of lev’s earlier survey.

SO. here’s how it worked. i had a total of 561 people rank 16 of crowley’s hairstyles. i wanted people to rank the hairstyles to see if the results differed from when people were asked what their favorite overall style was. each person who gave a hairstyle a ranking of 1 contributed 16 points towards that style, 2 contributed 15 points, and so on. this means the lowest possible score a Look™ can get is 561, and the highest is 8976 (16 x 561)

OFFICIAL RANKINGS:

1. 2012 BUN - 7965

2. GOLGOTHA - 7108

3. PRESENT DAY - 7060

4. 2007 HAIR - 6988

5. MESOPOTAMIA - 6820

6. EDEN - 5547

7. 1941 (CHURCH SCENE) - 5406

8. 1967 - 4644

9. 2012 NANNY - 4146

10. BOOK!CROWLEY - 3650

11. 1970s - 3408

12. 33 AD (ROME) - 3040

13. 1601 (SHAKESPEARE) - 2770

14. 541 AD (KNIGHTS) - 2751

15. 1862 - 2708

16. 1793 (FRENCH REVOLUTION) - 2477

DISCUSSION OF OVERALL RESULTS

graphic representation of all of the results, in descending order. as you can see, bun was the runaway lead, with the next four highest scoring looks™ pretty close together. similarly, the shakespeare look, knight look, and sideburn look are all similarly hated.

fig. 2: scores sorted by in-universe order of appearance. i think it’s interesting to look at this and see that there seems to be....sort of a trend. in general people seem to like the very early looks and the very modern looks, with the lowest scoring looks all clumped together.

INDIVIDUAL RESULTS

now, i’d like to discuss the individual breakdown of each look™, to determine how universally it was liked or disliked, or alternately the distribution of votes

eden

eden had an average score of 9.89. people seemed pretty middle of the road on this look, with the occasional person either loving it or hating it. it’s a lot more divisive than a lot of his hairstyles for sure. (me, i personally thought it verged a bit into ‘bad wig’ territory, and i did see a couple people thinking the same)

mesopotamia

i was kind of surprised by this one being as low as it was! obviously it was in that grouping of popular hairstyles, but i feel like the general consensus you read on here is that this is the fan favorite. apparently not so. the average score was 12.16, however, which, not bad. people in general did tend to like this look, obviously, with a few holdouts scattered about

golgotha

fun fact! this is my personal favorite because, the headscarf. my god. iconic. and apparently y’all agree! it eeked out second place with an average score of 12.67

rome

so this is the first. not great look. people don’t seem to be crazy about this one. it had an average score of 5.41

knight look

“oh maggie why is this even here we can’t see his hair” It’s My Survey And I Get To Choose The Looks. but anyway. no one liked this. seriously. this is the first one that didn’t get a single person to give it the top spot. average score was 4.903, which also isn’t great.

1601

look, i know you’re supposed to be unbiased or whatever, but this is a tumblr survey and none of this matters. i hate this look. i hate it so much i often forget it exists out of self preservation. even now as i type this i know if i scroll up i’ll see that terrible facial hair, and i saw it like a minute ago when i uploaded the picture, but i can’t for the life of me remember what it looks like because my brain has put up a protective barrier. you all seem to agree with me, as the average score of this is just 4.94. excellent taste all around

1793

LAST PLACE. i don’t completely. GET. the hatred of this one. i found it to be. very middle of the road. fine i suppose. but the people have spoken with an average score of just 4.42. so what do i know

1862

another one no one said was their favorite. i mean. fair. this one had an average of 4.83, and many people said this was his most heterosexual look, and i agree. bad.

1941

this one seemed to be a bit middle of the road for people, which is kind of understandable. it’s a great hat, but i get that people like the more dramatique™ looks better. had an average score of 9.64, so like. not bad

1967

now this one was ALLLLL over the place. people love it, people hate it, people are indifferent. average score was 8.28, which, again, shows how split this one was. i for one welcome john lennon and joyce byers’ demon lovechild.

1970s

i’m so mad. average score was 6.07. this is my second favorite hairstyle overall. yes, seriously. anyway you all are wrong and that’s all i have to say about that have a good night

1990s

people kept asking me why i included the illustration from the modern cover of the book, and the primary reason was because i thought it would be funny, which is why i do most things. i also was kind of wondering what people would do with it, and the answer is seemingly ‘question why it was there.’ i wish there was a way i could have included ‘your own personal headcanon for what he looked like while reading the book,’ but alas this is as close as i could get. average score was 6.51. the people who gave said this was their favorite are my heroes, and one person described him as looking like an insurance salesman, which like. thank you from the bottom of my heart

2007

yeah. okay. i nicknamed this one ‘cursed’ in my master list. i don’t get it. i’m so sorry. i am like, the singular holdout who just can’t stand this hair. but i am very much in the minority, everyone else seems to love it. average score was 12.46. good for you, 2007 crowley. i will never understand you

2012 (Nanny)

this is the last....not great look. again, a bit all over the place. average score was 7.39.

2012 (Bun)

i LOVE this hairstyle, but i was blown away by how high it was on lev’s poll and i’m blown away again with how high it is here. i just feel like we collectively never talk about how much we love the bun look, and then when we’re asked we go feral. this had an average score of 14.19. how. gender, indeed.

present

ahhh, the classic tennant hair. a solid look. no one really seems to dislike it, it’s just. not everyone’s top spot. there’s nothing offensive about it, clearly, but i don’t think it sets anyone off like some of the other top contenders. and i’m slightly surprised how little we talk about this hairstyle considering how popular it is (and i get it, he looks like every lesbian i’ve ever had a crush on who was painfully out of my league), but again, that might be because it’s Tennant Classic™. average score was 12.58.

LEV DYKEIEL’S RESULTS VERSUS MAGGIE ANTHONYCROWLEY’S RESULTS: A BRIEF ANALYSIS

the main reason i wanted to do this in the first place was to see if the results changed at all from lev’s survey when i asked people to rank their choices rather than just choose their favorite. the answer is actually like, kind of! not majorly, but a bit. the comparison as it stands without the entries that did not appear on both lists:

if you want to see the changes more easily, i’ve done some color coding here:

as you can see, there were definitely some shifts, but what i’d like to focus on is the change in rank of the golgotha hair, the two that came in last place, and the sixties and seventies looks. for the golgotha hair, i suspect that because it was so close to the mesopotamia hair, the vote may have been split a bit, whereas here you could have realistically given both a good score. lev also said that in their results, after the 2012 bun look, 2007, present, and mesopotamia were kind of always in a bit of a tie with each other, whereas this was the case with mine with the addition of the golgotha hair. taking that into consideration i think it’s interesting that that one ended up getting second place.

i also think it’s interesting that france wasn’t in last place on lev’s poll, because there’s such a huge difference in points between the sideburn look and the french revolution look according to my numbers. however, as i said before, no one actually picked sideburns as their favorite on this survey, but there were a couple of people who like, loved the revolution hair. i think that may have ended up giving lev and i slightly different results, as the revolution hair is like ‘you either really love it for some reason (rare) or despise it’ and the 1860s hair is like ‘you either hate it or you’re lukewarm about it’.

similarly, the shift in rank in both the sixties and seventies looks is also interesting, because they both moved kind of significantly. i think the 60s look changed because, as i said, it seemed to be a pretty divisive look. people don’t seem to be agreed on how much they like it, so there are people really Into It who voted it as their favorite on lev’s, but there are also people who HATE IT. i think something sort of similar happened with the 70s look in the opposite direction. i think not many people LOVE it, but a lot of people kind it not to be like, the worst one. as a result it went up a bit because, while few people consider it their favorite (can’t relate), a few people were like ‘okay it’s fun’ and ranked it semi-high, or at least there was more of a distribution than some of the more hated looks. also it’s almost 2 am i hope this analysis makes sense because words. the english language.

ANYWAY THOSE ARE MY RESULTS I KNOW I PROMISED TABLEAU GRAPHICS BUT I FORGOT I NO LONGER HAVE A LICENSE FOR THAT BECAUSE I GRADUATED AND ALSO IT LOOKS FINE WITH THE GOOGLE GRAPHICS AND I DON’T WANT TO MAKE MY LIFE HARDER COOL BYE!

#shut up maggie #text #CAN U SEE ??? WHY THIS TOOK SO LONG #good omens #go #long post #but there should be a read more

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infinitelytheheartexpands · 4 years

Note

as we are exchanging asks, something you asked me once: 10 favorite characters from 10 different operas and what you like about them?

an extremely delayed response, all apologies, and also it’s past midnight right now so perhaps I should be sleeping and I’ll try to keep this somewhat short (and probably fail), but anyway, to answer your question:

1. Don Carlo(s): I love just about everyone in this opera (except you, Grand Inquisitor. you can go die) but if I had to choose one, I’d go with the absolute icon that is Princess Éboli. The thing I love about her most, I think, is how wonderfully complicated and real she is. I mean, she loves life, she’s a fierce badass, she does some horrible things for...lots of different reasons, but she does her absolute best to set things right again. In short, an extremely relatable, amazing, gorgeous Disaster Bi. Also: Verdi mezzo, so epic-as-hell music.

2. La traviata: Violetta Valéry. She doesn’t have much in the way of competition within her opera, but I’m still putting her on here because she’s one of my favorite characters in anything ever, and one of the first fictional ladies on whom I developed a hardcore crush. Something people forget about courtesans is that they were more than just...sex objects. They were smart ladies who oftentimes set the pace for upper-class life even as they were privately scorned for their position. And Marie Duplessis (on whom Violetta is based) is pretty much your ultimate rags-to-riches story (although we know how it ultimately ends). So Violetta goes from having nothing to teaching herself the ways of the world, climbs to the top of Parisian society, then decides she wants to give it all up for true love and fulfillment. While she didn’t choose the right guy IMO, she’s incredibly brave and bold and sensitive and she cares so much about everyone and she gives up her happiness so many times and I can’t and I love her so much and also her music is amazing and excuse me while I go cry. Also I need to make these shorter.

3. Simon Boccanegra: There’s my boy, Simon! One: I am a sucker for Good Baritones. Two: I am particularly a sucker for Good or Good-at-Heart Tormented Verdi Baritones. Three: THIS GUY. All he wants is to have peace and be with his family. That’s it. He’s so good and kind and amazing but also he is taking exactly no one’s BS (just listen to that Council Chamber scene!). He takes a position he didn’t want in the hope that he’ll be able to win Maria, but then she dies, but then he still uses his position to try to reconcile the factions anyway (and surprisingly enough, he’s pretty successful?). And him as a dad MY HEART.

4. Falstaff: Alice Ford, aka area 15th-century mistress of the house who has the mind of a 21st-century woman and is absolutely iconic for it. She’s incredibly smart and funny and clever and such a sweet person and great mom. She takes no one’s crap whatsoever and she outsmarts both Ford and Falstaff at every turn. She’s the ultimate ‘girls supporting girls’ lady and she gives the middle finger to the concepts of women just being good for being men’s playthings and of arranged marriage. And she knows how to have fun with it all. My one complaint: VERDI WHAT WERE YOU THINKING NOT GIVING HER A BADASS ARIA. That’s all.

5. Carmen: Carmen, my first love...I fell in love with her Habañera and her sheer confidence when I was 7 (and not realizing what it was about, may or may not have attempted to sing it on the playground at school, much to everyone’s confusion, but that’s a story for another time) and I’ve loved her since. I love her freedom, her huge self-confidence, her devil-may-care attitude, and every last note of her music. I just love her as a person. And of course, the iconic ‘‘Free was I born, and free I will die!” That right there is a life motto.

6. Eugene Onegin: My fellow book-loving, perpetually-dreaming nerd Tatyana Larina. Of course, I love her because of how sheerly relatable she is but there are so many other reasons as well. Like her and her sister’s dynamic. And the way she grows up and matures. And the way she’s not afraid to set some damn boundaries with Onegin, indeed, tell him no. That’s a strong girl right there, and while I wish she’d been able to get Onegin and true happiness...I’m not sure a relationship with Onegin would’ve worked out, and I’m proud of her for realizing that such a relationship (and perpetually fantasizing about it) could be extremely unhealthy and moving on. And oh God, her music. Especially the letter scene, which is every writer on an inspiration binge. And the final scene. Anyway.

7. Guillaume Tell: This is another ‘I love just about all the characters in this opera but welp I have to choose just one’ opera, and my choice is Guillaume Tell himself. First off: see #4. Second off: He’s just??? such an incredible person in every way like how is it possible to be that great of a human being??? He’s brave, he sticks up for what he believes in, he’s always willing to give others a helping hand, he’s super-enthusiastic, he’s a great husband/dad/friend, he’ll do anything for the people he cares about, he will readily call those who need it out on their BS...anyway we STAN him on this blog. Also, Rossini. And that incredibly gorgeous aria ‘Sois immobile’. I die.

8. Les Huguenots: Yet another grand opéra where I love the vast majority of the characters, and while I am 99% sure you already know the answer to this, I’ll say it again: it’s the only, the only Valentine de Saint-Bris, who just so happens to be incredibly amazing. She’s so...real and expressive and she’s someone I just personally feel like I get, like I see a little (okay more than that) of myself in her because of how real and relatable she is (I wrote a few posts a while back about why I headcanon that she has a severe undiagnosed anxiety disorder, which was...a major part of the story of my life for a while and to a lesser extent still is, but I digress) and also how amazing of a person she is. She’s not willing to just sit idly by while the world around her falls apart and the people she loves turn on each other (and eventually her). She’s one of the few people on either side of the aisle who’s like ‘this whole religious war thing is stupid and y’all need to stop’ and when things go from bad to worse, she puts herself out there in the middle of it all to save the people she cares about most (oh, also, remember how she just. stormed into the royal palace, demanded an interview with the Queen Mother, got it, and then used said interview to get a way to save Raoul and Marcel? yeah me too), and then when that fails, she literally renounces her own faith rather than belong to a religion that is committing actual crimes against humanity. and while she still fights to the bitter end, she still believes there’s a way to redemption for everyone and forgives her dad and JUST...I die. Also her music’s great but like. I love her mostly for her story.

9. Benvenuto Cellini: I am falling in love with this opera and literally all of its characters more and more every day, but my favorite character is probably Benvenuto Cellini himself, who is a) one of the few Not-Dumb tenors in opera and b) is a (mostly) Good Tenor. He loves life, he loves his art, he loves Teresa, and there are so many times where he is just such a Mood (see pretty much his entire second-act aria). Also, dude is GUTSY as hell. I mean, he literally gets the Pope to give him...pretty much everything he wants in exchange for the statue. That right there is an iconic moment. I don’t have a whole lot else to say about the character because it’s still kind of a new opera to me, but anyway he’s super-cool and I love him.

10. Les contes d’Hoffmann: Nicklausse! (Also his incarnation as the Muse, but mostly Nicklausse) He gets some of the best music in the whole thing (the Violin Aria anyone? or the Barcarolle with Giulietta?) and also he’s one of my favorite trouser roles. He’s super-ambiguous— is he really Hoffmann’s buddy or is he actually secretly working for Lindorf or is he going back and forth or is he somehow trying to help Hoffmann through working with Lindorf??? But one thing’s for sure: he’s by turns funny, serious, caring, devious...and I love him all the time. And his Musely work...ugh, the Muse gets me every time. Also, I invariably picture Kate Lindsey in the Sher production and that is a LOOK.

That’s all, sorry about the wait, and here you go! ❤️

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cherishtaengs · 4 years

Text

I Hate That I... (pt. 3 - Y/N)

pt. 1 | pt. 2 | pt. 4 | pt. 5 |

Word Count: 3486

(This is so long because I’m trying my best to get my word count up for nanowrimo bc I am WAY behind the schedule I made for myself, but I hope y’all don’t mind skjdfhd)

You swept through the library doors, allowing yourself to quicken your pace into a brisk walk. For some reason, you couldn’t shake the feeling of Taeyang’s eyes staring after you, even though you knew you were safely far away from him. You also had a class to get to, but the little run in with the bane of your existence had left you dangerously close to being late.

You knew you shouldn’t have let him talk you into kissing him not just once, but twice- you knew there was nothing real in the way he practically begged for it. Not even the Devil himself could change overnight, and Yoo Taeyang was the next closest thing. But the only explanation you had to letting him sway you with a few words was that you wanted it. You wanted to kiss him again, just like you had at the party, and just the thought of that made your stomach flip. You shook your head, as if that would banish your thoughts from your mind for good. You didn’t know if you’d tell your roommate about the second and third kisses.

Thankfully, your class wasn’t too far, so you made it in right on time. Everyone else was already in their seats and looked up as you appeared at the door. Some hid their snide grins behind strategically placed hands, and others shared knowing glances with the people sitting next to them. To their credit, no one said a single word, so you took the walk of shame to your seat in silence. Your roommate and friend, Sammi, offered you a sympathetic smile. Somehow, that was worse than if someone had cracked a smart joke in your direction. You fully expected news of the little scene with Taeyang to have spread among friend groups by now. After all, there was no way that his incessant teasing and your passive aggressive response would only stay within the four walls of the library on such a small campus. Everybody knew everybody, and everybody talked, so you weren’t really surprised that you’d suddenly become a hot topic for conversations.

“You know what everyone’s talking about, right?” Sammi, leaned toward you. You shrugged a shoulder.

“Yeah,” You knew your classmates seated closest to the two of you had their attentions fully on you, but you didn’t exactly care. “I kind of expected this after the idiot made a totally unnecessary scene in the library yesterday.”

Okay, so you weren’t going to mention the second and third kisses just yet, at least not until you figured out what mess you and Taeyang had gotten yourselves into. In all honesty, you weren’t sure if you wanted to tell Sammi at all; the last thing you needed was for her to go crazy thinking the two of you were together or anything. Because that’s not at all what this was about, whatever this even was. This was about you beating Taeyang at all of his stupid little games and hearing him say sorry to you at least once for making your life unbearable whenever he was around.

“Are you gonna do anything about it?” your friend turned her attention back to her books as the professor walked in.

“What exactly am I supposed to do?” You asked, poking at your notebook with your pen. You definitely couldn’t mention wanting to get back at him. “I did what I did, he said what he said. People saw, people heard. That’s that.”

“But aren’t you going to, y’know,” she lowered her voice as the class began. “Get revenge?”

At this, you turned to stare at her. Sure Sammi had said a few questionable things about your hate-hate relationship with Taeyang before, but you didn’t think she’d actually support you getting even with him. “If you have anything in mind, let me know.”

The wicked grin on her face gave away that she did, in fact, have something in mind, and you juggled the thought of telling her your own plan.

Once class started, you couldn’t focus. The only thing going through your head was what happened in the library just a few minutes ago. You were always on high alert when you were near Taeyang, you never knew what he’d throw your way- even though mostly, it was just a snide comment here or there and nothing much more confrontational than that. But, you were always ready anyway. And yet, he’d still managed to corner you, literally and figuratively.

As images of all three kisses flashed through your mind, you felt the heat rise in your cheeks. You hated it. You absolutely despised how he’d left such an impression on you all three times. You felt it both at the party and at the library, the strange weightless feeling. Even though it was all you could think about, you didn’t quite understand. For so long, Taeyang had made you feel nothing but anger. Even if he wasn’t trying, he got on your nerves. And that insufferable grin he always put on when he realized just how annoyed you were- god, you hated it. But now, here you are, unable to focus in class because you couldn’t for the life of you stop thinking about kissing him.

And you hated the fact that you couldn’t understand what you were feeling more than the fact that it was him. Sure, fine, whatever, you kissed Taeyang. None of that meant anything in itself. Or, it wouldn’t have if you could just shake the strange feeling in the pit of your stomach. Whenever you wanted to get rid of the thought, your brain made sure you remembered every detail. From the way Taeyang’s hands had held you to how unbelievably good it had felt when he kissed you.

Well, of course Taeyang would be the perfect kisser- you knew he had plenty of experience in the field. And it wasn’t like he was your first kiss, either, but you couldn’t remember anyone having the same effect on you as he did. You were amazed at how easy it was to lose yourself in him, to momentarily forget about what was going on. The only thing on your mind was how he’d left you wanting more both times, and it made you want to scream.

“You okay?” Sammi nudged you with her elbow, bringing you back into the real world as class drew to an end. You realized that you’d spent the entire hour daydreaming instead of actually paying attention, and you felt another flush on your face.

“Yeah,” You gathered your things and stood, joining her as the flow of students moved toward the door. “Yeah, I’m fine. Just zoned out.”

“I can tell,” she had a smile on her face, and she looked you over once. “Will you tell me if I ask you why?”

You shrugged, avoiding eye contact with her as you both stepped out into the hall. “It’s nothing. I’m just tired.”

Your roommate offered you a knowing glance, which you did not need. “Were you up thinking about him all night?”

Before you could answer, Sammi pushed her shoulder against yours, turning you to the side. And, of course, just as your luck would have it, Taeyang was walking down the hall toward you. You quickly spun back to face your friend.

“No, I wasn’t,” You hissed as she barely hid her wide and mischievous grin. “I definitely don’t spend my time-”

“Thinking about me?”

You wondered if you’d get in trouble for punching an asshole in the face right then. And while it seemed like a good idea, you decided against it, instead turning around to look Taeyang in the eyes. He was standing an arm’s length away from you and you quickly saw that they weren’t the same soft eyes as before; they were back to being sharp and mocking.

“In your dreams,” you cross your arms and let a small smirk onto your lips, already deciding you’d get the last laugh. “You know what they say; when you can’t sleep, it’s because someone else is dreaming about you. I wonder if that’s why I was up all night.”

You heard Sammi draw in a sharp breath next to you. Taeyang’s grin only got wider, and his eyes narrowed, as if to acknowledge your taunt. Your heart was beating hard against your chest, and you hoped you looked as tough as you wanted to. “Then I guess I should thank you for making my dream come true. But, you had to break your promise to never kiss me again, didn’t you? Or was what happened today another mistake?”

You noticed that Sammi was very quiet and still beside you, obviously confused and unwilling to look away. You’d have to explain yourself later, exactly what you’d been wanting to avoid. But you’d handle that situation right after you finished this one.

“It wasn’t a mistake,” you shrugged, daring him to challenge you. “If I remember correctly, you were the one who begged for it.”

At that, Taeyang’s confident grin faltered a bit. It was almost imperceptible, but you caught it, the slightest twitch at the corner of his perfect mouth, and your heart jumped. There was nothing else he could say now; it was a clear blow to his ego, and Taeyang realized that you’d won this round.

“Now, if you’ll excuse us,” you continued before he can speak, momentarily basking in the victory before having to face your friend. “We have better things to be doing, and they don’t involve you.”

With that, you dismissed Taeyang and pulled Sammi along in the opposite direction. She still hadn’t said a word, and that bothered you more than if she was losing her mind. Which you knew she probably was, but was also still processing everything, because you kind of were too.

“Okay, listen,” you finally breathed out as you and your roommate were safely outside. “I’ll explain-”

“Damn right you will!” she crossed her arms, planting herself firmly in front of you. “Literally what was that?”

It was like your heart beat was amplified throughout your body, pounding against every part of you. There was no way you could prepare her for what you were about to admit, so you just blurted it out.

“Taeyang found me in the library and we kinda kissed twice there because he said he wanted to know if he felt something after the first kiss at the party but he needed to kiss me again to find out but it wasn’t the same so then we kissed again and he told me it was a bet and now we’re in this unspoken war kind of thing and yeah that’s what that was.”

You caught your breath, unsure of how Sammi would respond. She didn’t for a few moments, just stared at you blankly while the information settled in her brain. And when everything finally made sense to her, you saw the expression on her face change ever so slowly, comically shifting between confusion and disbelief before finally landing on excitement. She grabbed your hands in hers, a big smile splitting across her face.

“Taeyang is in love with you!”

You pulled away from her just as fast as the words left her mouth and shook your head. “No, that’s definitely not what it is. He doesn’t like me, he thinks he’s playing me. But he’s not, because I am. Playing him, that is. I’m playing him.”

You weren’t sure why your words were suddenly coming out all jumbled, but you guess it was because you were still a bit shaken.

“Oh my God,” your roommate clasped her hands together, gasping. “Then you’re in love with him!”

You run your hand through your hair, taking a deep breath. You should’ve just left her confused. “That is exactly the opposite of what I said. No one’s in love with anyone! We don’t even know each other like that.”

But of course Sammi wouldn’t let it go that easily. “Well, if you hate him so much without even knowing him, you can like him, too.”

“I can’t hate him and like him at the same time,” you rolled your eyes, knowing you wouldn’t get anywhere by arguing with her. “Pick a struggle.”

“Wait, wait,” she waved her hands and began the shower of questions that you’d expected as you started to your next class. “Tell me all about it. Is he that good of a kisser? Was there tongue? Actually, I don’t think he’d do that this early-”

Was beating Taeyang at his own game worth dealing with this?

- - -

The rest of your classes passed by similar to the first. All you could think of was Taeyang and his cocky smirk. You silently seethed, unnerved by the way he’d suddenly claimed the larger portion of your attention. That was way too much power, and you knew you shouldn’t allow him to have it.

But, as if the universe was apologizing for being so rude to you, the end of your day brought a pleasant distraction along with it.

“Y/N!”

You heard a vaguely familiar voice call you as you walked out of your last class. Sparing a glance over your shoulder, you caught sight of Inseong hurrying toward you. You immediately stopped in your tracks, clutching your book closer to you, and wondered why Inseong of all people would be looking for you.

“Y/N,” Inseong slowed down a few feet away from you, giving you enough personal space. You only noticed that because, conversely, Taeyang seemed to have no care for that concept at all. “I was hoping to run into you.”

As Inseong paused to catch his breath, you noticed that his cheeks looked slightly flushed and his hair was tousled from the wind. You hoped it wasn’t obvious, but his presence itself made your pulse flutter.

“I had classes all day today,” you smiled apologetically. “Just got out.”

“Really?” Inseong looked at you, eyes slightly wide as if he’d never heard of having a full schedule before. But you knew he was very familiar with heavy workloads; he was one of the smartest people you‘d ever come across. Nearly everyone worshipped Inseong and his brain. “It’s already past 6- you must be tired.”

You laughed nervously, hoping it came out more casual than anxious. “Yeah, I’m exhausted. Why were you looking for me?”

Inseong’s eyebrows bounced up quickly, remembering that there was an actual reason he’d stopped you. “I just... Wanted to apologize.”

“For what?”

Inseong lifted a hand to rub the back of his neck, dropping his eyes to the ground for a moment. When he looked back up, you noticed that they seemed to sparkle in the evening light. It wasn’t the right time, but you still felt your cheeks tingle with warmth. “For how Taeyang was acting yesterday. It was really uncalled for and he’s not... well, no, he is usually like that, but he’s nicer.”

You raised a skeptical eyebrow. There was no way you’d believe that until Taeyang himself proved it. Inseong rushed to continue.

“I know, you may not believe me,” he held his hands up, a sheepish smile lifting the corners of his lips. “But Taeyang’s not all asshole. Mostly, but not fully.”

You definitely didn’t believe Inseong, but you thought it was sweet of him to even try. Why couldn’t all of Taeyang’s friends be this nice? If they’d just learn some common manners from Inseong, maybe you’d tolerate them more. The older boy was looking down at you with expectant eyes, and you noticed the stark difference in auras between him and Taeyang. You hadn’t even been speaking to him for long, but he very clearly radiated a certain warmth that Taeyang was sorely missing.

“It’s really kind of you to try to clear his name,” you say softly, absently fidgeting with the strap of your bag. “But, that’s something Taeyang needs to do himself.”

Inseong blew out a breathy laugh, nodding his head. “I agree, believe me, I do. But knowing him, he doesn’t even realize he’s in the wrong. And I’ve, uh, heard people talking. Sorry about that, too.”

For some reason, it made you nervous that Inseong knew that things were spreading around campus, but you had also anticipated it to happen. Of course, you knew Inseong would have realized that gossip spreads like wildfire- you understood that was part of the reason he’d stepped in between you and Taeyang yesterday.

“It’s fine,” you shake your head, face quickly growing warmer. “I mean, there’s nothing going on between us, so I’m not worried about what people have to say about me.”

“That’s a relief,” you weren’t sure if there was a faint hesitation in his voice and you thought another expression flashed across his face for a moment, but he quickly replaced it with his usual bright smile. “And there’s one more thing-”

You watched as Inseong reached into his pocket and brought out a piece of paper that looked like it had been folded several times until it was a square almost the same size as his thumb. You felt a particularly hard thump against your chest as your fingers brushed his when you took the paper from him. When you unfolded it, you saw an address with a date, and right underneath that was a phone number. Could he see how your hands were shaking? You hoped not.

“Tell your friend about it, too,” your eyes followed Inseong’s hands as he ran his fingers through his hair and brushed a few strands behind his slightly pink ears. “Let me know if you’ll be there.”

You couldn’t find words for a moment. They seemed to have gotten lost somewhere in your head, mixed up with all the other things in there. It was almost a moment too late when you finally remembered that you should give him a response. And breathe.

“Yeah,” you nod a little harder than was normal. “Yeah, I’m sure she’d love to go.”

“What about you?” Inseong asked, lightly teasing. In just a second, you felt your ears burn and your cheeks tingled.

“Right!” you nod again, hair flying into your face as a crisp breeze picked up around you. “Yes, of course, yeah, I’ll... definitely be there.”

You didn’t know why it was so hard to form proper sentences all of a sudden, but maybe it had something to do with the really pretty smile Inseong was giving you. You wanted the ground to swallow you whole.

“Great,” Inseong said cheerfully. “Then I’ll see you there!”

He gave you a short wave and turned, walking away to do whatever it was that he had to do next, leaving you silently sucking as much air into your burning lungs as you could and blinking down at the paper in disbelief.

When you later told your roommate about the party Kim Inseong had invited you to himself, she had to lean against the wall for balance as she read the paper.

“And he wrote his number down?” Sammi’s eyes darted between you and the paper. “Okay, you can have Taeyang, let me-”

You snatch the paper back from her, shaking your head. “I don’t want Taeyang. I don’t want either of them.”

“Man, this really isn’t fair,” your roommate groaned, falling back onto her bed. “How are all the cute guys giving you attention when you don’t even appreciate it.”

You shrugged, carefully folding the paper and placing it in the drawer of your table. “Listen, I didn’t even ask for this. I’d gladly switch lives with you if it were possible.”

Sammi let out a loud sigh. “No, that’s fine. I’m already putting together what you’ll wear so I can live vicariously through you at the party.”

“What do you mean?” naturally, you were very wary of whatever it was that she had in mind. It definitely wouldn’t just be a night where you and her could have fun if she was already scheming.

Sammi pushed herself onto her elbows, eyes glinting mischievously. “Don’t worry, we’ll have fun. Maybe it’ll even help you win your little game or whatever. Trust me; I have an idea.”

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” you exhaled sharply, turning away from her. You definitely didn’t want her to go through with whatever she was planning, but you also knew that nothing could stop her if she was dead set on making it happen.

Sammi giggled with satisfaction. “It’ll be a good night. You can thank me later.”

You knew it was risky, but a part of you was also looking forward to the party. It was a few days away, but you already decided that you wouldn’t let it end the way the other one did. You wouldn’t let this one become an embarrassing mess.

For the sake of your own sanity, you couldn’t let that happen.

#fantasylibrary #sf9 #kpop #sf9 au #sf9 inseong #sf9 youngbin #sf9 jaeyoon #sf9 dawon #sf9 rowoon #sf9 juho #sf9 zuho #sf9 taeyang #sf9 hwiyoung #sf9 youngkyun #sf9 chani

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kateofthecanals · 5 years

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Okay let’s talk about The Scene™

So lemme preface this by saying that I know there are a lot of you out there who are just happy to have SOMETHING and would rather just take it for what it is, and that’s totally fine, I get it. Part of me would love to do the same, but.... if you’ve been following this blog for more than a millisecond, you already know that’s not how I roll. ;-)

I’m going to break down the scene moment by moment and give my thoughts along the way. Join me, won’t you?

For starters, let’s set the scene. It’s after the battle, winter is officially over, all the dead have been burned (you know, that famous Northern tradition...?). Sansa has a good sob over Theon’s corpse. Remember how I said a few days ago that they were just playing hot potato with Sansa at this point, passing her around all the eligible bachelors of Winterfell? WELL...

Next we cut to the Great Hall where things are kind of... awkward? Everyone’s just kinda sitting around, keeping to themselves... Jon is sitting between Sansa and Dany and staring at Dany with these dumb puppy eyes, which, lbr, sums up his whole character.

Now you know how Ghost feels, ya dick...

Sandor is doing what he does best -- sitting by himself, stuffing his face with booze and (presumably) chicken. Gendry asks him if he’s seen Arya, and apparently Sandor knows that they boned?? How?? Who the hell would have told him that? Melisandre? Anyway, Sandor throws him shade for wanting to get some puss so soon after the battle and it’s like... Bro, maybe YOU need to get laid too JUST SAYIN.

Dany decides to liven up the party by announcing that Gendry is now legitimized and the Lord of Storm’s End... thereby making him a contender for the Iron Throne lmao you dumbass. Everyone raises their goblets to Gendry Baratheon, and Sandor’s like “whatevs” and goes back to his chikin cuz he a rude boi boi.

Meanwhile, Sansa exchanges a pointed look with Tyrion and I have no idea what it was supposed to mean but I am sure there was like two paragraphs of “subtext” in D&D’s script about it that we were supposed to magically pick up on.

Tormund then raises his horn to the Dragon Queen, but Dany (rightly) counters by raising a toast to Arya, “the hero of Winterfell”. Sandor’s only slightly more impressed by this.

“Okay I’ll give ya that one--BUUURRRRRP.”

Sansa is all smiles but then she looks over at Dany and she stops smiling and gets up and leaves without explanation and inexplicably disappears UNTILLLLLL...

Tormund hits on Brienne but she swerves him, and Jaime gets up to follow her, and we all know they’re going to do it. Tormund is heartbroken, so naturally he pours his heart out to his BFF... Sandor. This is the second time tonight Sandor is listening to a guy lament about his sex life. Naturally Sandor is annoyed af.

He’s seriously considering jumping into the hearth rn...

Tormund gets over Brienne pretty quick, though, when a couple of Northern groupies approach the table and are like WILD THANG I THINK I LOVE YOU and he’s like SOLD!

Meanwhile, we finally see Sansa again, standing somewhere nearby watching all this like:

Again, I must reiterate that we haven’t seen Sansa since she randomly left the table after looking at Dany like 5 minutes ago. Is this where she’s been? Has she been discreetly watching Sandor this whole time??

Tormund’s like YOU COMIN’ CLEGANE? And Sandor like NOPE still got some drinking to do. So Tormund fucks off with his groupie and the other one pops a squat next to Sandor and proceeds to hit on him.

Gotta get dat Hounddong...

Sansa is still watching Sandor, looking at him like he’s GODDAMN SNACK

“Has he been here the whole time?? Weird...”

Groupie #2 tries to make a move but Sandor tells her to fuck off and she does. Sansa is like (Now I make my move...)

Sansa sits down across from Sandor and says “She could have made you happy. For a little while.” Sandor replies, “Only one thing could make me happy.” When she asks what, he says, “That’s my fucking business.”

Now, I know some of y’all are thinking this is a callback to Sandor telling Arya that fucking Sansa “bloody” would have been at least “one happy memory.” Buuuut I honestly think he was talking about Cleganebowl here. The implication is that not even the offer of free sex is enough to satisfy the Hound’s lusts. Which... sigh, okay, look, y’all know my stance on (book)Sandor’s sexual proclivities, so him blowing off a random groupie is NOT, imo, out of character for him. And if this were indeed the books, I definitely think his line about “one thing” that could make him happy, especially directed at Sansa, would indeed mean what I think y’all want it to mean. But this is GoT, so... no.

Now, him saying “That’s my fucking business” at first made me a little annoyed, but, hey, he’s always been rough-tongued with her. What really counted here, to me, is that she didn’t react to it. While she would have been justified in being like “don’t speak to me that way, asshole”, her face kinda said to me that she knows his gruff exterior is just that, and she knows better. And he knows she knows better. They have history. She’s seen him at his most vulnerable. She’s not gonna give him the satisfaction of reacting to his shittery.

At least, that’s my headcanon. In D&D’s head, she probably thinks his asshole ways are super Badass now or whatever...

Anyway, after a few seconds of eye-fucking, Sandor says that there was a time when she couldn’t look at him (which... wasn’t really a thing on the show?). She says she’s seen much worse than him since. He then proceeds to say that he “heard” about what happened to her (really? how? when? from who? Bran??) and that he heard she’d been “broken in rough”.... and.... just.... excuse me while I vomit??? Now we know that Sanford has no skills at speaking to rape victims, but this was just soooo unnecessarily vile. Especially considering this is the girl whom he had spent TWO SEASONS protecting, one of those incidents being an ATTEMPTED RAPE??? The Sandor I know, the Sandor who told Sansa “no one would ever hurt you again or I’d kill them”, would rip Ramsay’s dick off with his bare hands.

“I’m sorry that happened to you. I should have been there.” -- what Sandor SHOULD have fucking said.

But Sansa assures him that she took care of Ramsay himself. He asks how, and she says... “Hounds.” This makes him laugh, which... that’s nice? I guess?

I hope D&D don’t think they are gonna retcon Ramsay’s murder and claim that that was a direct reference to her connection with the Hound or anything because it totally fucking wasn’t.

But anyway, yay for Sansa making Sandor laugh and smile. He then says, “You’ve change, little bird.” She doesn’t respond. Then he goes and makes things worse by saying that none of that would have happened to her if she’d just come with him when he left King’s Landing.

Um, first of all, NOT TRUE AND YOU KNOW IT, and second, EXCUSE me, are you GUILT-TRIPPING A RAPE VICTIM?? Are you really “I told you so”ing her????? What the FUCK???

Oh but if you thought it couldn’t POSSIBLY get worse than that, then you don’t know D&D. Sansa then reassures him and the world that if she hadn’t gotten raped and abused and manipulated, she would have stayed a “little bird” forever. Yep, there it is -- Sansa NEEDED to be traumatized in the worst possibly ways in order to be strong. FUCK. THIS. SHOW.

This was all said during The Hand Touch. Complete with a little thumb rub. Yes, I flailed when that happened and scared my cats. I have been watching the gif of it over and over it again. But watching it again in context.... what was the point?? Are we supposed to infer that she’s assuring him that she made the right decision? Why? He doesn’t seem like he NEEDS that reassurance. The whole exchange just makes NO DAMN SENSE. I know we loathe the Sansa Apology Tour, but even her apologizing for not going with him when she had the chance would have been 18764% better than THIS.

So then some more eye-fucking ensues, Sansa slowly rises to her feet, complete with a subtle little lip lick, and slinks away in a very “come follow me” way.... but he doesn’t.

So again, I have to ask, WHAT WAS THE POINT? Sandor’s two previous conversations leading up to this revolved around sex, Sansa was pointedly watching him reject another girl’s advances... and now you’re still gonna give me blue balls??? The 2 people in Winterfell who could use a good, consenting lay the most, and they just... walk away?? Sandor is bouncing off to what is probably his death, he even said in Season 4 that banging Sansa would be his only happy memory, she’s RIGHT THERE caressing his hand and licking her lips... but he’s just gonna sit there drinking alone all night??

Like literally you don’t even have to show anything (even though the Jaime & Brienne scene is exactly how the Sandor & Sansa scene should have ended), just have her get up and then he sits there for a second before saying “ah what the fuck” and gets up to follow her... and that’s it! We’d get it! And then HOORAY for Sandor & Sansa getting laid finally! Would that have been so hard??

But nah. Tbh this scene seemed like a throwaway, in the same vein as the Ghost scene -- just get it out of the way as quickly as possible so we don’t have to deal with it ever again. It’s more than I expected, but it’s also just as bad as I expected.

I can’t believe I waited 5 years for a SanSan reunion and they just used it as another excuse to justify Sansa’s rape.

#sansan #got spoilers #got season 8 spoilers

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an-avid-reader · 4 years

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Opal (Lux #3) - Jennifer L. Armentrout

my rating: 3.5/5 stars

After losing her father, Katy and her mom move across the country to West Virginia. With her luck, Katy's new neighbour is pleasing to the eyes...maybe even abnormally so. But that's not all, this town has it's secrets--maybe that's just how small towns are. Little does Katy know that her new neighbours Daemon and Dee are more than they appear to be. As Katy is swept into Daemon and Dee’s lives, she quickly learns that they are aliens; as she spends more time with them, Katy has an aura which makes her a target to other aliens. Paradoxically, Katy must be protected by the twins while also losing the aura before she gets killed.

Note: this review is written after rereading the book

Link to Goodreads // book 1 / 2 // Spoilers in review!

Alright, where do we start--the I-told-you-sos or the this-needs-to-happen-but-morals-are-a-things ? Man, oh man, this book is literally chasing one goal: to get Bethany (and Chris *sigh*) out of the warehouse, but the obstacles and challenges?? What a ride.

I wanted to start off by talking about Armentrout’s writing and how I appreciate how it’s changed from book 1 onto this book (and undoubtedly changes with each book she publishes (or doesn’t)). I felt like while there wasn’t as much “action” happening in this part of the series, we got to delve into the characters’ relationship with on another--notably Dee and Katy’s relationship and how we can still build bridges after a fire *wipes single tear*. We obviously get to see Katy and Daemon’s relationship grow - which (assuming you’ve already read the book) damn some of those scenes are graphic ! But at the same time, it didn’t feel like it was overdone, if that makes sense. In terms of the plot, or the timeline rather, everything felt like it was happening naturally; we don’t just skip from one part to another without an explanation. Everything seemed to be meticulously planned out--some events having much more foreshadowing than others--and we never lost sight of the main goal of the book. I feel like sometimes we get sidetracked into smaller adventures, but in this case, everything that happened was done with the intention of rescuing Bethany and Chris, so it just reinforced the fact that the Luxen really care about them.

Alright, now onto other aspects of the novel--I will admit, when I started reading this book, I don’t actually remember what happened in book 3+4 of this series. It’s odd because I didn’t feel like this book was just filler (though it did feel more like a “bridge book” than Onyx. Nevertheless, we pick up on where we ended in book 2 (I’m telling you--you’ve got to binge these books!). We get to connect with Dawson and Katy-I found that their exchanges seemed natural, I’m not surprised that Dawson didn’t really feel like talking with his siblings. Katy was just there for him, she was willing to listen, and she didn’t push him into an interrogation session. She was just someone from the outside who he could talk to without feeling judged--that’s the type of person we all need in our lives to be honest.

I honestly felt a bit bad for Katy, or rather for her mom, because it was just...wrong...to keep her mom in the dark about the Luxen, but more importantly, about Will. Not to mention, it’s a huge risk as Katy’s mom would become a liability. I also think that Katy’s mom wouldn’t believe her--I imagine she’d say something like “oh Will isn’t trying to replace your dad” blah blah. But now Will isn’t a problem anymore...while these are fictional characters, we need to consider the morals of the situation. Of course Will was a piece of garbage (just like another character we all know…) so I guess his death was kind of his own doing, but then again a life is a life. Murder isn’t right, and it shouldn’t be justified unless it’s for self-defense, but even then things are a little hazy. I think what we can take away from this book is that it’s a good sign that Katy and Daemon understand the consequences of their actions, and they regularly check-in with one another to ensure that they don’t follow the same dark path that Will and Blake did.

So that’s about it for the morals, I guess, but, for the I-told-you-sos...well there’s Blake and the attitude/confidence that everyone had. I’ll start with the latter: I think the most obvious foreshadowing was that “everything will go fine” pep talk that the characters had with each other for BOTH times they were going to the warehouse. Sure we might not have known what nor the magnitude of what was going to happen, but the who or why was pretty obvious: Blake. I felt like these pep talks--while it’s key to have a positive mindset when you do something that’s scary, I felt like it also hindered their (Katy, Daemon, Dawson, etc.) ability to plan just in case something went wrong. And how do we know Blake would have his hand in this situation? Because it’s Blake. After the first betrayal from book 2, anything that comes out of that man’s mouth can be taken with a bucket-load of salt. Not to mention he literally blackmails Katy into his plan, so that’s another warning that he must have some personal gain. Double agent? Big yikes. Luc’s comment on trust? Another big hint. Can I also just say that Luc acts like a spoiled brat who needs to get off his high horse?? He’s trying to replace Matthew by giving some advice, but he’s a smol child. Y’all can’t beat Matthew, he’s still the most underrated character! ANYWAYS, needless to say, I felt like everyone was just walking into Blake’s trap again and their lack of judgement and overconfidence was the cause of their downfall.

Gosh, I have to hand it to Armentrout, Blake is such a good villain--I honestly despise his guts and he’s a fictional character. I think what makes him a good villain is because he acts like a Venus fly trap--what he has to offer seems almost too good to be true and BAM you get sucked in and there’s no escape because he’s also a snake. The airborne onyx, the opal?? “Oh yeah those are minor details” BRO. He’s so manipulative and I feel like he tells little white lies which is how he was able to get away with his crap (in addition to the blackmailing). I think the worst part is that there are some people who are trapped in a similar situation--not the alien thing, but the manipulation of a partner or a “friend”, which stems from the same ‘methods’, if that makes sense. I also just have a question about a small detail that never made sense to me. So upon Blake’s death, Nancy would get a letter and she finds out about everything--Katy, Dawson, etc. But...how would the letter be sent???? Blake’s dead so that’s not an option, his uncle is in the same situation...unless there’s an implant watching Blake or there’s some sort of sensor that acts as a trigger...I mean I guess Blake also plays a pretty big role with the DOD so I feel like his death would be learned about pretty quickly, but still...these small details are still details!!

I just remember about halfway through the book, I was like how did we get into this mess. You know when you’re watching a movie or tv series and the characters are in deep trouble and they’re kinda stuck or have only a few options? Yeah, trusting that one person who ends up betraying you will absolutely blow up in your face, and hitting the rewind button isn’t a thing, unfortunately. Anyways, that’s the feeling I had when everything was heading south, and then it just kept getting worse and worse--gaaaahhh. I guess the only thing that wasn’t terrible was Katy and Daemon’s relationship. As I’ve already mentioned, some of those scenes were super steamy, and I’m sure the last two books will be no different (spoiler--I already know something that happens within the next two books but I forget when it happens lmao). Their relationship went from 0-100 quickly, but also because it developed over the course of 2 books, the pacing seemed reasonable??

And finally, I wanted to briefly mention Matthew and how he’s still underrated. LISTEN. This man literally says stuff aloud that’s on everyone’s minds; “Ash, you need to learn a tad bit more sensitivity". Get W R E C K E D, Ashley (but for real, she’s developed a lot from book 1, and I think that has to do with maybe accepting that Daemon isn’t in love with her, as well as her brother’s death). Matthew is literally the glue that keeps the Luxen crew from falling apart, especially during those stressful times, such as the warehouse expeditions. He’s that wholesome but also high key broken character we need to appreciate a lil more.

So overall for me, this book felt slightly like a filler for what’s to come in the second half of this series, but with Armentrout’s writing changing from book one to book three, and the development of the characters and the timeline of the plot, I would say this installment falls between book one and two in terms of the rating. I sincerely hope that the characters continue to grow and develop some thinking skills, especially when it comes to trust and uhh...people whose names start with a B and end with a LAKE...You know the saying...seasons change but people don’t!! Ahhh something tells me Blake will still be in book 4 *sighs heavily*.

I’d love to know your thoughts on this book in the Lux series--how would you rate it compared to the other books in the series? Did you like it or nah? I’d love to know! =D

Thank you for reading my review, I hope you are having an outstanding day, wherever you are in the world!

- Cassandra / an-avid-reader

PS: Happy New Year everybody! I hope 2020 treats y’all well <3

#just one more ~ queue #book review #review #booklr #opal #jennifer l armentrout #lux consequences #lux #book series #mine #books #reading #paranormal #paranormal romance #spoilers

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jellybeanbeing · 5 years

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A Reaper at the Gates by Sabaa Tahir *UPDATED*

Synopsis:

Beyond the Empire and within it, the threat of war looms ever larger.

The Blood Shrike, Helene Aquilla, is assailed on all sides. Emperor Marcus, haunted by his past, grows increasingly unstable, while the Commandant capitalizes on his madness to bolster her own power. As Helene searches for a way to hold back the approaching darkness, her sister's life and the lives of all those in the Empire hang in the balance.

Far to the east, Laia of Serra knows the fate of the world lies not in the machinations of the Martial court, but in stopping the Nightbringer. But while hunting for a way to bring him down, Laia faces unexpected threats from those she hoped would aid her, and is drawn into a battle she never thought she'd have to fight.

And in the land between the living and the dead, Elias Veturius has given up his freedom to serve as Soul Catcher. But in doing so, he has vowed himself to an ancient power that will stop at nothing to ensure Elias's devotion--even at the cost of his humanity.

REVIEW WITH SPOILERS!

So I read A Reaper at the Gates again and I have new thoughts.

This re-read for me was surprisingly pleasant. I wasn’t planning on reading this but I had a sudden urge to read it so I just picked it up and it was really good. And don’t get me wrong, if you read my other review for this book, you will know that I loved it the first time around, but this time I just noticed a lot of different things that captured my attention and made the story even more complex and better. But I will be honest and say the true reason that I picked up this book again was because of Helene and Avitas. I just really love those two and their slow burn romance. I was really looking forward to it and it was just as I remembered if not, better. Anyways, onto the review!

Starting off with Elias, I know I said I didn’t like his chapters the first time around, but I’ve grown to really love them and appreciate them and his character. But his chapters still weren’t my favorite. Anyways, I found that his chapters were the most emotional and heart wrenching because Elias, this dude who loves so much, has to learn not to love anymore. We can see his slow progression into his detachment to the human world and it is so sad to read. I also really liked that with his chapters, we the readers got to see the true complexity that is this novel. The story is essential set up in the beginning as good vs evil, but with the stories of the jinn, we see that all sides have done their damage so the big question is put out there: who’s right and who’s wrong? And I absolutely love this because it strays away from the black and white of things and shows the true realities of war and the world.

Laia kind of annoyed me this time around. I love her with all of my heart but, she kept doing things she was told not to do, and it bothered me. I was so frustrated with her because I felt like she kept playing hero at the wrong times. She kept trying to save every one person she saw suffering, and I know her reasoning for it (because she wants to save just one life if she can or something like that) but THINK OF THE BIGGER PICTURE. Yeah, she can save that one child, but she can also save thousands of others if she just kept going instead of stopping for every one person. And don’t get me started with how easily this girl gets distracted. When she found out that Cook was her mom and they were reunited, she literally stopped and said that what happened between them was more important than their mission TO SAVE THE ENTIRE EMPIRE. HELLO? MORE IMPORTANT? *sighs heavily* I will say though, that I love that Laia makes mistakes. It makes sense for her character because all the others are more experienced than she is, with all the killing and other stuff. It also makes her more real.

Helene Aquilla is my girl. I love her so much. I just love seeing her growth, though it is heartbreaking. Her chapters were (again) my favorite, and I think that really has to do with the amount of different characters in her chapters. She is really the only character in this book who interacts with more than four people throughout the entire book. Through Helene’s chapters, we the readers can really grasp at how serious and more complex the war is. Also the “villains” were most present in Helene’s chapters and boy, are they written so well. I’ll get to that later. I guess all I really have to say for Helene though, is that I just loved her and her chapters. There’s nothing more to say.

Now for all three of these characters—Elias, Laia, and Helene—the one absolute thing that bothered me was that they didn’t seem to use their brains or common sense.

For Elias, he kept fucking around when Shaeva was trying to teach him his role as Soul Catcher and she even told him that she didn’t know if she would have enough time but still he kept skipping out and not learning. And what did that result in? Shaeva dying and then Elias barely having clue on how to pass on the ghosts all because he didn’t fucking listen.

For Laia, she kept passing over the minuscule details that later turned out to be crucial. In the beginning, she notices that the town where she’s trying to free Mamie, is empty and she’s like, that’s no concern of mine. WELL IT TURNS OUT THAT THAT WAS CRUCIAL BECAUSE YA GOT CAUGHT. She also kept assuming things that were later on not true, like when she thought she was the ghost and was so certain of it but it turned out that Cook was the ghost.

For Helene, she used her brains at bit more like with the figuring out the ships and what not, but she kept playing into the Commandant’s hands unintentionally, even when she was warned so many times not to. I think she just kept thinking about being one step ahead of Keris that she literally played into her hands and was like, ARE YOU SERIOUS? And let’s be honest, Avitas was a real big help in helping Helene try to take down Keris.

Now for the “villains” (The Commandant, The Nightbringer, and Marcus), I personally really liked how well they were written. The complexity and human qualities they have make them such interesting characters.

First off, Marcus: What he became at Blackcliff and after that was truly disgusting. He deserved to die, but I can’t help but feel sad for him. In Elias’s last chapter, there’s a line that explains this perfectly: “I take their darkness—that which Blackcliff found within them and nurtured—and Mauth consumes it...When I look back at the twins, they are boys once more, untainted by the world.” It’s so real and it’s sad. I will admit that I cried at his death scene and the last scene where he is with his brother. After Zak’s death, we see the more human side of him leaking through and it gave his character more complexity than just being this stagnant jackass.

For The Nightbringer, we see in his own two chapters why he wants to bring the jinn back. With his character’s POV and the jinn’s story, it really shifts the image of his character from being just evil into this morally grey character. He’s doing what he’s doing because he wants his family back and they were betrayed. He wants vengeance. I really love this because it gives reason behind his doings. It doesn’t make him out to be this bad guy, just to be the bad guy.

And for Keris, I am the most intrigued by her. I find the meaning behind her tattoo so fascinating and so well done. I read that part again and my jaw was completely dropped. Slowly, we’re uncovering the secrets of her past and it’s so good. I am wanting more, especially with that cliffhanger at the end where the Wisp is actually Keris’s mom. There are so many unanswered questions and I want them now. She did get on my nerves though. So much.

The romances in this book weren’t very heavy but it was a good amount. Laia and Elias’s relationship was meh, for me if I’m being honest here. The one thing loved though was how they kept referring to each other as friends or that they just really cared for each other. I was like, yeah, yeah, shut up, y’all love each other.

But Helene and Avitas? My favorite! Slow burn and hate to love romances are my absolute favorite tropes and that’s what this couple is. I love the slow build up of their attraction for each other and the subtle flirting that happens. It’s so darn cute and I’m shipping this so hard.

I cannot wait for when Elias finally tells Laia what he said in the caravan before he left: “You are temple, you are my priest, you are my prayer, you are my release.” I AM READY TO CRY WHEN IT HAPPENS.

Also, I cannot, I repeat, CANNOT wait for when Avitas finally says “Helene” instead of Blood Shrike. I WILL SCREAM FROM THE ROOFTOPS WHEN IT HAPPENS. He’s been so close to saying it and I just can’t wait. God, these romances kill me.

One last thing before I wrap everything up. The one thing that really had me thinking was, does Blackcliff Academy not train their students in things other than combat? Because Elias, top student of Blackcliff Academy, seemed to lack in skills like strategy and stuff like that. And whenever he mentioned about going into Mask-mode, it was to always fight and be emotionless. And if the answer is yes, Blackcliff does teach things other than combat, then why and how the hell did Elias become the top student? IT DOESNT MAKE SENSE. Also, does Laia have a last name? Where is Spiro Teluman? That man literally up and left. What are the rankings for the soldiers? (Auxes, centurions, masks, all that jazz). Okay, that’s it. 4/5 stars!

Definitely go check out my other Reaper review!

#an ember in the ashes #a torch against the night #a reaper at the gates #sabaa tahir #books #book review #book reviews #spoilers #book spoilers #elias veturius #laia of serra #helene aquilla

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callioope · 5 years

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Questions Meme!

Hello, yes, this HAS in fact been sitting in my drafts for ages and ages. Thank you to both @crazy-fruit and @ruby-red-inky-blue for tagging me and for waiting forever for me to answer (oops)! I’m sorry I took so long, but y’all ask really good questions and I had to think about some of them!

Question Set 1

1. How are you?

Oh, I’m doing alright! Thank you for asking. The earlier part of this year was rather rough, but therapy has been helping. I’ve been rather busy these past few weeks with traveling, and my schedule going forward is rather busy, too, so while I’m excited for those things, I’m also excited for the eventual moment I can just relax.

2. What would you say are your talents?

Writing. Making fancy color-coded spreadsheets. I’ve been told that my super power is getting random (annoying) songs stuck in other people’s heads. Does that count as a talent?

3. If you had the chance to start your life again, would you take it?

NOPE. No thanks. I like where I am at right now, and I would not want to relive my awkward years. Er, at least, my more awkward, younger years. Cuz I’m totally still awkward. Just less awkward. I hope?

4. Which language would you like to speak instantly?

HMM. ALL OF THEM. It’s really hard to choose!

Language fascinates me, and in another life I feel like I would have devoted a lot more time to learning more of them. Unfortunately, I really hated German class in high school because of the teacher’s tendency to put people on the spot -- I think that is sort of inherent in a language class, but I get anxiety speaking in public.

Anyways, I suppose I’ll answer Turkish to this question, since spouse and I keep saying we’re going to try to learn Turkish via Duolingo. For the record, my HS offered six languages, which was the most I’ve ever heard of an American school offering, and I was always quite happy with my choice of German. (The others were Spanish, French, Italian, Chinese, and Latin.) I do wish I had maintained my German better, and I that I had more time to learn Spanish.

5. Where would you like to be right now?

Honestly? I’m pretty happy when I’m at home. But if I had to answer where “else” would I like to be right now, out of the whole world? Being back on safari in Botswana is a top contender, as are a variety of places in Turkey, and also Munich.

6. What name would you give yourself?

I’ve always liked my actual name (Elizabeth). I know I go by Liz; one of my HS friends was quite stubborn and I’m a bit stuck with it now, but I don’t mind it. There are worse nicknames that come from Elizabeth. I used to go by Fiona online; I’ve always been fond of that one.

7. What is something you’re currently learning?

OOF, what a good question. I sorta blanked on this at first, and my first thought was uhhhh learning how to cope with my OCD??? I’m doing exposure therapy right now, ish. Emphasis on the ish. Also mindfulness. Does that really even count? I started a beginner’s knitting project several months ago that I never finished, does that count? (I just need to seam it, that’s what I’m putting off. I have knit plenty of scarves; however, this is my first hat.) I’m sort of teaching myself ukulele although I haven’t really learned any new chords or songs in awhile. I would very much like to take more photography classes with a focus on wildlife photography. That involves buying a new camera and... signing up for classes.

Question Set 2

1. What is a detail in a piece of art/a text that you like that you really admire?

This was very difficult, at first because it was like looking at a bin full of loose things and just seeing an assortment of color and being overwhelmed by it all, and then because once I did start digging around, I kept finding different ideas and it was too hard too choose.

Character-building: In the A Song of Ice and Fire series, when Arya starts working for the House of Black and White, Martin stops using the name “Arya” as she dons different identities. For example, he uses “Cat” for a bit, among other names. It shows she’s trying to be someone else, but the caveat is that there are still little mannerisms and such that show she hasn’t really left Arya behind (I think maybe she bites her lip or something? I don’t remember specific examples because it’s been over 5 years since I read these books, but I do remember really appreciating the general technique at the time).

Music: In The Beatles’ “I Want You (She’s So Heavy)” I love those repeated arpeggios, over and over, building, intensifying, as the white noise comes in and you can just feel the heaviness of desire, of want... (and then I love how it just breaks so suddenly! And I know it wouldn’t have been intended this way because that’s the end of side one, but since I listen to the whole album on spotify, then those bright chords of “Here Comes the Sun” come in and god Abbey Road is the best Beatles album)

Writing: the poetry of Florence + The Machine’s “All This and Heaven Too,” obviously, since literally the title of my blog comes from that. I’d quote that whole song honestly. There’s something that speaks to me about the incapability of language to fully encompass just... everything. I mean, love in specific here, but also just everything. Words are just these little boats we put meaning on and we hope they make it to the other side but everyone takes ‘em a little differently.

Like, look at this:

And the words are all escaping, and coming back all damaged And I would put them back in poetry if I only knew how

And this:

Words were never so useful So I was screaming out a language that I never knew existed before

Anyways, there’s also something just incredibly soothing about the music, too, and how she sings the song. There’s another line, from Sara Bareilles’ “Miss Simone” that goes “How does she know what a heart sounds like?” which pretty much sums up how I feel about “All This and Heaven Too” (and also many of Sara Bareilles’ song, especially that particular album, but I digress).

Anyways I did have some art examples, but I think I’ve rambled long enough.

2. Is there an idea that you really liked but had to discard because you couldn’t get it to work?

If I really like an idea, I don’t really “discard” it so much as put it on the shelf to attempt later. Out of recent fic ideas, I’ve really struggled with “How to Lose a Spy in 10 Days.” I first thought of this in late spring 2017, and for awhile I couldn’t stop thinking about it, but I was working on Whatever I Do at the time, and wanted to wait before starting another WIP. By the time I got to writing this, the inspiration well had sort of dried up.

I really like the idea of a fun cat-and-mouse rom-com idea where Jyn and Cassian keep outsmarting each other, with a whole lot of competency kink, some “oh shit we actually work well together!” and maybe some battle couple. And I was really looking forward to both the moment when they both finally let their guards down around each other and the big confrontation when they actually find out each other’s identities. But it involved more mission writing than I was prepared for, and I really struggled with it. I think I need to start over but that involves a lot of working, so it’s unfortunately shelved for now, and I’m working on a “You’ve Got Mail” concept instead.

3. Is there something fandom-related you would like to be able to do (i.e. I’d like to be able to make gif sets but can’t)?

Oh, yes, absolutely! Really anything that’s not writing related, lol. Gif sets, art, etc. But most of all, I have a music video idea for the song “So Close” from Enchanted--like I have a whole story board plotted out in a google doc. But I don’t have any video editing software, don’t even know how you get the scenes for a music video, etc. I have made videos before, but not since high school, and I don’t even have the cheap, basic video editing program I used back then. Sometimes I think I should just attempt make a gif set instead, but there are so many lyrics! and scenes that go with the lyrics! that I don’t know how to consolidate it into that format anyways.

4. What is a skill you’ve acquired through fandom work?

Hmm, this was tough. I’m going to say HTML. I’m not up-to-date on webdesign at all, but back in my early fandom days, I ran a few fansites. I still sometimes use HTML while leaving comments or to edit posts on dreamwidth or w/e. It’s super basic, but it has helped me at work at a variety of jobs. I take it for granted that people my age should know basic HTML, but a lot of them don’t, and then a lot of people I work with now are older and definitely not tech savvy.

5. Do you think anyone can learn to create great art, or does it take talent?

Well, I’m going to cheat a little. I do think think that anyone can learn to create great art, but I also think that everyone has a talent at something, and part of learning to create great art is recognizing your skill sets and honing those. If that makes sense? I’ve sort of seen both sides to this. I’ve seen naturally talented people create great things, but I also think that they’re probably cheating themselves if they’re not learning and honing their craft and trying to get better. But I’ve also seen people who started out making things that maybe you wouldn’t call great, but they worked hard over and over again, and looking at their work now, you’d say they were talented without ever knowing the difference. Great art = talent + learning + passion. Did that even answer the question? ...moving on

6. Do you prefer AUs or in-universe? Why?

I prefer to write in-universe, for sure. I find modern AUs more challenging, mostly because--and I feel kinda bad saying this--it’s very difficult for me to tap into Jyn and Cassian’s characters without some kind of tragic background. Their experiences and how they coped with them shape their personalities, and it’s really hard to separate them from those. My WWII was easier because, hey, it’s war, not so different from in-verse. But I initially tried to write Learning Curve in a modern AU and I was just totally bored. Putting it in universe made it more interesting to me, especially having to finagle a happier plot inverse. IDK, it might even be that I generally struggle to make up any conflict in modern AUs that feels interesting.

THAT SAID, lol, I definitely read either. So it’s probably strange for me to be hung up on it because I’ve read nice fluffy modern AUs and found them perfectly engaging.

Tagging: @theputterer, @magalis, @allatariel, @mythologicalmango, @threadsketchier MY USUAL DISCLAIMER APPLIES: no pressure if you just don’t wanna, AND if anyone sees this and was like “aw hey i wish she’d tagged ME” well guess what, I wish I did too! so go ahead and do it and let me know and then i’ll know to tag you next time, too :-)

Questions:

When you suffer a setback or a series of setbacks when creating (writing, drawing, knitting, any kind of crafty project thing you work on... even work), what are some strategies you use to cope with that stress and move forward?

What’s the hardest thing you’ve ever had to create/make and what did you learn from it?

What part of a bicycle would you be?

What’s a helpful writing (art/crafting/work) technique you’ve learned?

What’s a piece of art that made you see things differently?

You’re a new addition to the crayon box. What color would you be and why?

What was the last board game you played and what did you like or not like about it?

*sorry these came out rather writer heavy!

#about me #tag meme

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