four months into getting to know each other, shouto finds him by touya-nii's shrine. his little brother gently sits down beside him and offers a small prayer.
"yumi-nee-san," natsuo wonders if his little brother will ever drop the second honorific, "said you were the closest to him," shouto says quietly.
after all these years and the use of past tense still makes his heart break. 'you are the closest to him' he wants to correct but that wouldn't make sense anymore. touya-nii hasn't been talked about in the present tense since before middle school. does shouto even remember a time before nii-san's dea-, disappearance?
"yeah, i was," he says, eyes never leaving the photo. it's the one nii-san took for sixth-grade picture day. kaa-san had got him all dressed up and he had hated it. somedays he thinks if he looks close enough, he'll see the displeased pout on nii-san face. "why?"
his little brother says nothing for a long time, back ramrod straight. natsuo has no idea what's going on in that head of his. shouto has so few tells that he's practically a blank slate. natsuo hates his father.
then slowly and so quietly, he has to strain his ears to catch it, shouto stammers out, "do-, do you think he would have liked me?"
natsuo's immediate reaction is to say 'yes'. yes, of course, touya-nii would've loved you. yes, of course, touya-nii would've crossed the heavens for you. yes, of course, he would've loved you shouto; you're his precious younger brother.
but he remembers the way nii-san used to spit out shouto's name when he was a kid. the way his brother's mouth wrapped around it, the face he made, like he had just eaten something disgusting. he remembers the way touya-nii had become almost crazed by the end, hellbent on proving himself the rightful heir to their shitty father's legacy. he remembers the way touya-nii had said, "i just need to prove that i'm better than him,"; the 'him' said with such bitterness and contempt.
he knows instantly that touya-nii would not have liked shouto. that this house and his father would have twisted any ounce of love, nii-san would've held towards shouto, into jealousy and hatred.
(this house may have ruined all of them but it only ever broke two of them.)
natsuo can't say any of that to shouto. his kind little brother who forgave him for not being there. his amazing little brother who falls in love with every cat he sees. his wonderful little brother who has a wickedly dry sense of humor. his soft baby brother who loves him and yumi-nee with a passion. his tender-hearted baby brother who still worries if his long-gone older brother would've liked him.
no, natsuo can't tell shouto that nii-san wouldn't have like him. shouto will internalize it like he does with everything else that hurts him. and there is already so much that hurts shouto, he will not add to that list. his baby brother smiles these days, nothing big like his green-haired friend, but quiet, lovely, ones all the same. shouto talks more these days. they have dinner together when natsuo is home. his baby brother laughs now. it's a miracle like nothing else in this world.
shouto is the best thing to come out of their house and natsuo will die before he ever hurts his little brother. so instead, he curls an arm around shouto's shoulders and pulls him into a loose side-hug.
"of course!" he lies cheerfully, ignoring the ache in his chest, "touya-nii would've loved you. you're his — and our —precious little brother after all. there is no universe in which he wouldn't have loved you."
the tips of his baby brother's ears go red and his pleased little answering smile makes the ache of lie go away. natsuo will tell a thousand more lies if it means shouto never stops smiling like that.
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thinking about this discussion I had before FVR even came out, thinking about blends, thinking about "give me dong or give me death", about how it's both. thinking about both mac and dennis getting exactly what they want (mac's fantasy in saves the day, for mac to go away from dennis) but with a TWIST (for mac to realize there's nothing on the other side, for dennis to realize he needs mac). thinking about the pulse checking, thinking about the flatline.
thinking about my meta that I wrote before s15 even came out, about how we've been witnessing an impossible choice that's splitting dennis in two, thinking about "<3 or die" being the name of the salon in chop (and off with the head / just start over meta...), thinking about new beginnings, and meet cutes. thinking about rebirth, and baptisms.
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Fabric softener is for the weak, the ones who can't handle life's little discomforts. You know who uses fabric softener? People who can't face reality. Real men and women don't need their clothes to smell like a field of daisies. We don't need our towels to feel like a baby's bottom. We face challenges head-on, unafraid of a little roughness.
Fabric softener is a scam, a marketing ploy designed to make you believe your life will be better if your clothes are softer. But guess what? Life isn't soft. Life is hard, it's tough, and it's unforgiving. If you can't handle the rough texture of your jeans, how are you going to handle this cutthroat world?
And let's talk about the environmental impact. Fabric softeners are loaded with chemicals that pollute our waterways, harm marine life, and contribute to the destruction of our planet. Is your soft towel worth destroying the environment? I don't think so.
Real success doesn't come from a bottle of fabric softener. It comes from hard work, determination, and a willingness to face challenges without needing everything to be soft and easy. So put down that fabric softener, embrace the rough edges of life, and start living like a real champion.
... I wasn't using fabric softener... The blankets come sold that way. I'm making tie-blankets for the humane society...
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one day i will properly compare dee made a smut film and ptsdee and the differences in the way they handle their very similar subject material but i have shit to do early tomorrow morning so. for now.
do you ever think about how RCG-written episodes, no matter how bad (both character morality-wise and writing-wise) they get, will always have a degree of humanity to them. like. 11x04 has dee doing something that is So incredibly wrong and horrible to dennis. but the reactions to it don't match its intensity. 12x07 again has dee doing something absolutely fucking deranged, and the gang tells her how fucked up it was. there's actually an acknowledgement both from her and from the others that what she did was awful, but her motivation, charlie, dennis, frank and mac's motivations throughout the episode make sense. dee's insecurity is the root of it, she can't handle being someone's "rock bottom", and she needs to prove that it can get worse. 11x04 dee just decides she's going to be a bastard and tell everyone that dennis was raped at 14. we don't know why she does this, and she really has no reason to, other than to be an asshole.
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