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twilghtkoo · 10 months

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ride: first date [part one] jjk

“you nervous?” “yeah.”

summary. you’re first date with jungkook and he’s picking you up on his motorcycle

pairings. biker!jungkook x reader (f)

genres/au. fluff, strangers to lovers, friends to lovers, college au

warnings. flirty jungkook, oc and jk touch each other (not sexual), poor attempt at motorcycle knowledge (my fault) T__T, if i missed anything pls lmk!!

word count. 1.6k

notes. first part!! and the beginning of a new series but with jungkook o.o i rly liked this one hehe, pls like and reblog if u enjoyed this !! also did y’all see jungkook’s promotion schedule photo bc W T F

[ series masterpost | masterlist | taglist ]

—

you’re the girl he’s had a crush on since he saw you for the first time in the library on campus. you were wearing grey sweatpants and a random hoodie with your hair tied up in a low ponytail, your glasses framing your face in the most prettiest way. you were frantically typing and writing stuff down on your laptop, and when he had walked over to take a seat next to you— after the pep talk he had with himself— your notes still looked neat and colorful despite your distressed scribbling.

after he had the courage to tap you on the shoulder and start a conversation, you’ve both quickly became friends. it was surprising to see how well you both bonded together. and you’re not usually someone who makes friends so easily, it having to do with your shyness and social anxiety. but jungkook had a charm and such an easy-going personality that drew you in.

you’ve mostly hung out on campus, both of your schedules not aligning in your favors due to exam season. so your hangouts were located in the library most of the time. opting to studying together and just being satisfied basking in each others presence.

around the tenth hangout, jungkook asked you out on a date. you were working on a quiz and he was writing an essay when he slid a piece of paper over to you before he went back to typing on his laptop.

will you go out on a date with me this saturday?

check ☐ yes or ☐ yes :)

you would’ve said yes even if he gave you a ‘no’ option.

a couple days later, before the weekend, he had walked you to the campus’s bus stop and waited with you. you had an evening class and it ended around eight, the blue sky now turning a shade darker as the minutes pass and it made you frown.

“how do you get home? you said you park in parking garage b and that’s across campus. you didn’t have to walk me here, although i really appreciate it.” you said, worried. from the eyes of others, jungkook looks tough, if his tattoos, piercings, fit figure had anything to go by. but you cared about him and it’s natural for you to be worried. anything could happen.

your concerns make him grin, he shoves his hands into the front pockets of his jeans.

“i’m okay, promise. and i ride my bike to get places.” he assures you.

you tilt your head, staring at him with curious eyes. “like a motorcycle?”

he nods, holding his small grin when he watches your eyes grow bigger.

you gasp, “really? you own a motorcycle?”

“yup, she’s my baby. got her when i turned 20. she’s precious to me.” he tells you before leaning down next to your ear. “but don’t worry you’re more precious.”

you didn’t have time to respond because your transportation pulls up and jungkook grabs your hand to walk you to the entrance of the bus.

jungkook arrived at your place a bit early but he couldn’t help it. he was excited. he had texted you he was here but told you not to rush.

he’s has never been this nervous in his life since having to tell his mom he wanted to major in computer science and not med school like she wanted. he’s nervous because he’s going on a date with you.

and you’re in your bedroom trying to gather your necessities into your shoulder bag, deciding to take a peek through your window that shows the front of your building and you’re able to see jungkook next to his bike.

he’s not sure how to stand when you walk out your door. should he lean against his bike with his arms crossed? he almost decided to just sit on it but why if he’s going to get off anyways to greet you. should he pretend he’s on his phone until he sees you?

“kook!”

he is shaken out of his internal turmoil when he spots you lightly jogging up to him, a radiant smile lighting up your entire face with warmth and joy.

“sorry, did i make you wait?” she brushes a few strands of hair out of her face, peering up at him with guilt and curiosity with the shiny black bike next to him.

he quickly shakes his head. “no, i wasn’t waiting long. don’t worry.” he assured you.

“you look pretty.” jungkook compliments you, scanning your features with the same grin he had when he had asked you out on a date.

you blush, “thank you, you too. i mean, you look really really handsome.”

his eyes crinkled at the edges and the corners of his lips turned upwards. his lip piercings shining and glaring from the sunlight, almost blinding you.

he notices you staring at his bike with interest.

“you nervous?”

“yeah.” you admit, sheepishly smiling.

you watch as jungkook unzips his leather jacket and sliding it off before he makes his way to you. he helps you slide off your bag before helping you slide your arms in the sleeves. his smell and the soft scent of his cologne makes you feel giddy inside and makes your heart hammer.

“i’ll ride slow, i have precious cargo today.” he responds, zipping the jacket up and grabbing all your hair from out the jacket. an action that makes your heart beat louder out of your chest.

you slide your bag back over your head to rest on your shoulder as you watch jungkook grab the helmet that rested on the back of his bike.

“did the bike come with an extra helmet?” you question, genuinely curious.

he’s careful to not mess up your hair as he slides the helmet over your head, and strapping it on.

he hums before he responds. “no, i bought it yesterday.” he tightens a strap, then asking if it was too tight, you said no.

“you bought it for me?”

“i told you, i have precious cargo. can’t have nothing happen to you.” he finishes making sure your helmet was secured, lightly patting the top of it before he slid his on.

watching jungkook do his thing and putting on his gloves was kind of hot…okay, really hot.

jungkook gets on first, kicking the kick stand off the ground and holds out his gloved hand for you to take. giving your hand a squeeze as he notices your small steps before you climb on behind him. instantly wrapping your arms around his tiny waist, when you tightened your grasp you were able to feel the sculpted muscles underneath his t-shirt. only making you intrigued on what’s hiding beneath the thin cotton fabric.

“hold on to me okay, squeeze me if anything.” he tells you softly, but you know he’s serious.

the sound of his motorcycle coming to life was like a breath of fresh air. in fact, his frequent gentle touches at stop lights were everything calming and you appreciated it.

the light just turned red and jungkook slows down to a stop. your knees rested against his hips as your arms circled his waist, both your hands linked together. he frees his hands from the handle bars to rest on your hands, giving them a squeeze.

and god, you’re very thankful for this helmet that’s hiding your red face and your embarrassingly huge smile.

his hands then roam to your knees then down your shins, patting a rhythm and then running over your denim covered leg soothingly.

is he doing this to make you go crazy? cause it’s working.

you’re not sure if it was the coffee you had this morning or his touches that boosted this sudden confidence but your hands loosened around his hips and gripped them. squeezing where his bare skin ends and you feel the hem of his black jeans.

jungkook places a hand over yours, not letting your hands move anywhere else. he wants yours to stay where it’s at for the moment.

he tilts his head back. “you doing okay?”

you nod, “yeah, you’re a safe driver. five stars.” you joke.

he chuckles at that and the light turns green.

he took you to a dog cafe. not just any dog cafe, but a corgi cafe. you didn’t even know this cafe existed. oh but through the big window in the front of the building, seeing the few corgis you could see, you wanted to burst with excitement.

“you like corgis?” he asks, pointing to the pen that’s in your hand with an acrylic artwork of a corgi at the end. you had bought it at a stationery store a few weeks ago.

your lips curve upward into a small but genuine smile. “yeah, they’re my favorite dogs.”

he smiles with you, mentally storing that information into his brain.

“you haven’t been here before have you?” he asks nervously, helping you off the bike and unstrapping your helmet. he helps you fix your hair and brushes back a few strands.

you shake your head. “no, i didn’t even know a corgi cafe existed here.”

“good, i was worried you’ve already been here.” he holds his hand out for you to take, in which you did.

you’re swaying on your feet unconsciously, switching gazes from the nervous boy and the sight of a freaking corgi cafe in front of you.

but jungkook notices you.

he hums out, “come on pretty, don’t wanna keep you out too late.”

#yeow6n #ride: jungkook series #ride: to first date #jungkook fluff #jungkook scenarios #bts #bts fluff #bts drabble #jungkook drabble series #jungkook drabble #jungkook x reader #jeon jungkook #bts jungkook #bts scenarios #bts x reader #jungkook

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olderthannetfic · 3 months

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Genuine question: what's the point of writing fanfic? As in, what's the purpose? No one in the fandom I'm in comments on fics and I even got told off by one person for doing so, as it "encourages bad writers and makes them think they're good". So it seems that it's a lot like book writing, where people work hard and are creative, but instead of getting paid and getting comments on the work, you just sit there silently hoping someone will press the kudos button and make a number go up. I feel like that time and work could be better spent on making something you might get some kind of profit off of. Don't get me wrong, I love doodling fanart, but I don't post it, as I'm aware that there's no point to doing so, and while it's a nice way to fill the time on a commute, it's not something that takes me as much time and effort as fanfic does. So... why do people bother? Sometimes I describe ideas I have and people I know in my fandom will tell me I should write it, but I don't see why. I get more interaction from just saying "imagine if [thing here]" than I would by sitting down, writing for hours, editing and posting [thing here], so what would the point be? I'm not punching down or going "haha women and their fanfic lol!", I genuinely do not get what the point is and this blog feels like it might have someone reading who knows the answer.

Do you make art for profit? Genuine question.

There's nothing inherently wrong with being motivated primarily by external factors, but it's not actually why a lot of people create things, whether it's books or recipes or doodles in a notepad.

I enjoy the actual process of writing.

I think many people lose sight of that aspect in an era where tons of <500-word fics that are mostly outlines and "Imagine if..." posts get disproportionate attention for being easy to consume. But the satisfaction of doing a bigger art piece and doing it right is real and motivates a hell of a lot of creation.

I suppose you might be thinking "Okay, but why not just write it alone and never post?", but I like sharing. Showing off my finished creation is part of the joy, and sharing with other people like me is too. But those aren't quite the same thing as worrying about kudos. It's like dressing nicely when you leave the house because you feel great when you know you look good vs. needing another person to tell you you look good.

To be honest, though, this type of feeling has grown in me the better I've gotten at a craft. The closer my finished projects get to the vision in my head, the easier it is to find them fulfilling and to be excited to share them. When I fall short of my own ambitions, it's discouraging no matter how much attention I might get from others.

I feel like it's time for my regular reblog of Adam Westbrook's video essay series The Long Game.

vimeo

youtube

The third and least known in the series is all about this idea of who you're making art for if you're not getting material rewards in the short term. It talks a lot about autotelicity—being internally driven instead of externally.

But if you really just want clicks, anon, start a blog that accepts anon asks and posts about wanky stuff. Actually tag things, unlike me, so people can find you.

No, writing for attention isn't worth it.

The time investment is too great and your brain will always fixate on the times people didn't respond instead of the times they did.

But that's not actually why most people write.

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azrielgreen · 3 months

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There's a reason I always moderate comments but i approved this one so people can see how truly vile it gets sometimes. I'm not arrogant. I don't think the way I write is better at all. Exploring them on an authentic level means exploring this, or any, version of them with wholehearted passion, not that this is the authentic interpretation of them. Writing intense stuff isn't a brag, it's a warning so people can be prepared for stuff like arguments and confrontations. I always over-warn for CW stuff so that, again, people are prepared. I never once have asked people to read it. It's just there and I've tried my best to a) write something i loved and b) thoroughly warn those who might read it. Any interpretation of the characters is valid and worth exploring. It's so sad to see a reeled off list of all the way Steve "should be" and the implication that nothing but strict canon adherence could ever be a passionate, worthy exploration. It's... only fanfic? It's not real. They're not real. Nothing is real and everything is possible and that's supposed to be what's fun about it.

I write the characters very intensely, so yes, they are often out of character, sorry for... warning about that? I write different backgrounds for them and play with the negative space of possibilities and potential and i do this with authentic curiosity and passion because I love doing it and i get very into it. Sorry for warning about that too, I guess? When I first started writing in this fandom, some people pointed out to me that I could CW warn for them being OOC and that was new to me, i didn't think I had to warn for that. I thought people would read the tags, like in other fandoms, and understand that the story would do different things with the characters but it became clear that this was actually solid advice as this was a fandom obsessed with "canon adherence" and policing. So I thought I would CW as thoroughly as I could so no one would be shocked or disappointed and then maybe they wouldn't leave an essay of hate in the comments.

But ultimately, people like this would only be satisfied if I deleted everything and stopped writing. I barely participate in this fandom as it is beyond answering asks and writing. I don't rec my own work. The thing i don't ever want, and this is why it was worrying seeing something like YD becoming "popular", is for people to feel like they *should* read my work without having gone and looked for it via the tags. Without having found it naturally, just by browsing and thinking "that's definitely for me". I've only ever posted for small rarepairs in the past so a couple of comments on a fic always made me so happy. I write for myself and the few others in the world who might like it. I have never written for an audience. If you don't like something I wrote, it's not for you. Genuinely. Move along to the next, no? That's what I would do.

This was so spiteful and targeted. YD is so old at this point, I just don't understand people who do shit like this. I don't bother anyone and I try to be here for anyone who needs me. I CW as thoroughly as I can. I don't think I'm better than anyone. I think every single iteration of these characters is worthy and valid and what matters is how fun they were to write, for the author. I had so much fucking fun with these stories that seeing this miserable little rant seems pointless to me. I don't care if you didn't like it. I don't care if it wasn't to your taste. Writing it was what I wanted. Sharing it is secondary, always. It's fanfiction, written for free in my spare time. I didn't take up space, I didn't trample anyone. There is no reason for this beyond spite.

I am sorry about the vest/jacket mixup, however. Truly, genuinely from the bottom of my heart devastatingly sorry about that. I know it'll take time for people to forgive me and maybe no one ever will, I have to make my peace with that.

Anyway, thanks for loudly projecting your feelings onto me and my work.

💜💜💜

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williamrikers · 11 months

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On the subject of consent in recent BLs

In this analysis, I will take a look at several love scenes in recent Thai BLs, how they frame consent and the sexual agency of the characters, and why those matter.

(KinnPorsche deserves its own post: I’m sure people have already written in detail about how much emphasis is placed on issues of consent/non-consent throughout the show and how fundamental consent is to the relationship arcs of both KinnPorsche and VegasPete, and I won’t belabor the point here. Also, special shout-out to The Warp Effect for what it brought to the conversation about gay sex, but TWE isn’t technically a BL so I decided not to include it in this analysis.)

I am going to take a closer look at the following shows in this essay: Not Me, The Eclipse, A Boss And A Babe, Step By Step, and La Pluie.

Not Me and The Eclipse predate the other shows by two years/one year respectively, but I feel it is valuable to include them here because both show very explicit negotiations of consent that I feel are spiritual successors to the wonderful scenes we’ve been getting in the other three shows.

Why am I even writing this? There used to be an unfortunate tendency in the genre to have a power imbalance between the “seme” and the “uke” character, which translated into the seme deciding when to have sex and what kind of sex to have—and even though recently, several shows have done good work in dismantling the seme/uke dynamic and questioning the associated stereotypes, it cannot be denied that the archetypes are still an important part of most BLs, and even in cases where the tropes are played with and questioned, understanding those subversions still requires a knowledge of and familiarity with the original tropes on the part of the audience.

However, gone are the days of Until We Meet Again and Dean’s “I’ve waited long enough, make sure you’re ready.” (I enjoyed UWMA a lot but that was. Yeah. Not Great.) Now, we see characters actually talking about and negotiating their limits, and doing what feels good to them.

Let’s start from the very beginning. Not Me was an absolute trailblazer in this regard, and not mentioning it here would be a gross oversight. The first time Sean and White have sex, it happens in their version of the beach episode. (Which, in Not Me, is the two characters briefly living in a tent inside an abandoned building. This show is the best.) Sean and White are removed from their usual environment and protected from the outside world by two barriers: the walls of the old house and the tent that’s literally enveloping them and giving them a space that is unequivocally theirs, shared, in which neither one of the characters has any sort of power over the other. And what happens in that space when they’re about to have sex is extremely interesting: the first thing Sean asks is whether White is afraid of him, which White denies. The following exchange goes like this: White: "So, what are we doing?" Sean: "What should I do to you?" White: "That’s up to you." (Watch the whole scene here.)

I find this exchange incredibly meaningful because this already turns the seme/uke dynamic that can be found in a lot of other shows on its head. OffGun as a branded pair can easily be stereotyped into the seme/uke dynamic just because of their physical appearances, and clearly spelling out that both characters have agency in this scene is incredibly important.

And then it gets better! Sean assumes that White is sexually inexperienced (which is not true but the fact that White was actually in a relationship with a woman back in Russia never comes up again after the pilot episode, so maybe the show expects us to assume this, too), and suggests they try different things and White can tell him what he likes and doesn’t like. Compared to the stuff we’re getting now, this scene isn’t very high heat at all, but it’s one of my favorite intimate scenes ever because them asking each other “Do you like this?” after every kiss, every touch, is so incredibly unique and transports a wonderful sense of figuring out sexual pleasure together, as a couple.

Sex in Not Me is not something one character does to another, it is something that is discovered and shared together, and we even get an afterglow scene in which they gently tease each other about their fast beating hearts. (And don’t get me started on the importance of White choosing to ask Sean whether Sean is okay with White not being like Black in that moment right before they have sex, because he doesn’t actually want to have sex with Sean as Black! He wants to discover and share intimacy with Sean as White, as himself, not as his brother! The layers!)

Anyway, I think that scene paved the way for a lot of the conversations around consent we’re now getting in BL, just because it is so explicitly, unashamedly putting forward a definition of sexuality that has nothing to do with one character actively giving and the other passively receiving, but frames intimacy as something that is built together. (More on giving and receiving later!)

Now, moving on to The Eclipse. I decided to include the first time Akk and Aye have sex for a different reason: while we don’t really see them actually talking about consent, we see them practicing non-verbal consent. Let me explain. Akk’s and Aye’s whole thing is teasing each other. At first, Aye is usually the one doing the teasing, but Akk gets the hang of it towards the end of the show and teases his boyfriend right back. When they’re in Akk’s childhood bedroom together, Aye clearly alludes to the fact that he thought they might use this opportunity to have sex for the first time, which Akk pretends not to understand, all while alluding to it himself. I love this guy. (Watch the whole scene here.) Anyway, Akk says he wants to sleep, lies down and once again, tells Aye jokingly he just wants to sleep, clearly expecting Aye to do what other BL protagonists do at that point and not take no for an answer (sidenote: I HATE the “saying no as foreplay” trope with a passion and as far as I’m concerned it should die already).

However, Aye is not like other BL love interests, and he backs off. He stops touching Akk, lies down with his back to Akk, showing Akk that he takes him by his word: if Akk says he wants to sleep, Aye is going to let him do just that. So now, it’s on Akk to say that, no, that’s not what he meant, can Aye please come back to cuddle. And then Akk is the one to escalate from cuddling to kissing, which is extremely important: we know that Aye has been ready to have sex with Akk since forever, it’s Akk who’s been having hangups about intimacy this whole time.

They don’t put consent into so many words on this show, but Aye shows Akk that he respects his limits and that Akk only has to tell him he doesn’t want to do something and Aye will take him at his word.

So, these are, to me, two foundational scenes of establishing consent: one that shows consent as something that is established verbally, as an ongoing conversation, and one that shows consent as something that is established physically, by showing your partner that you respect their choices and limits by way of simply acting accordingly.

Now, let’s get into the fun part: scenes we got so far in 2023. I’m writing this post on the 13th of June, and I’m sure this year still has some great things in store for us, especially because Step By Step and La Pluie are both ongoing and neither of the main couples are actually together yet at time of writing. However, they’ve both already given us AMAZING scenes on the topic of consent, so I feel it is worthwhile to write about those already.

I want to start off by talking about A Boss And A Babe.

Let me just preface this by saying that the intimate scenes in ABAAB are some of my all time favorites in BL ever, because in them, sex is something that is just so normal. When Gun and Cher have sex, we don’t see them very passionate, excited, reluctant or wide-eyed innocent (which are some of the emotions traditionally associated with sex in BL). On the contrary, in every single scene that shows them being intimate, both characters are incredibly calm. They’re certainly happy to be with each other, but in a subdued way. Someone described their second intimate scene as them seeming like they’ve been married for a few years. They’re both just… incredibly normal about having sex with each other. It’s simply something they like to do together. It’s a part of their romance but it’s not more or less important than any other aspects of their lives.

And consent is at the very heart of it.

When Gun and Cher have their first time, we see Gun explicitly asking for consent two times: first, “Can I kiss you?”, then, “Can I do more?” The second one even comes with the promise that if Cher says no, Gun will immediately go to sleep without mentioning it again. And then it is on Cher to say yes, to pull Gun close and kiss him to show him that he is comfortable with taking things further. (In the show, these two questions were shown apart from each other, I cut together a version of the whole First Time Scene in its entirety, watch it here.)

Now, things get more interesting: the second intimate scene shows Cher initiating the encounter (watch the whole scene here). Cher pretty consistently falls into the uke category, both physically and as far as characterization is concerned, but he’s certainly not shy in the bedroom. And this time, he’s the one who asks for consent from Gun: Gun asks “You’re starting it?” and Cher’s response is “Can I?” Despite him being framed physically lower than Gun, basically at Gun’s mercy, he still seeks confirmation that Gun is okay with the way things are going. Not to overstate it, but to me, this feels revolutionary. Once again, we’re being shown that sex is something two people do together, as a shared activity, and that the “seme” character isn’t expected to just be up for it. He, too, has the right to say no.

On this show, sexual agency is taken extremely seriously, and it is clear that both Gun and Cher give each other space to decide what they’re comfortable doing. This is shown in non-intimate scenes as well: there are so many moments on ABAAB in which the characters negotiate physical touch and closeness, asking each other for hugs before actually hugging each other, Cher leaning on Gun’s shoulder in the car but not allowing Gun to touch him because that’s not what he’s comfortable with in that moment, and so on. (The only exception to this otherwise pretty consistent rule is the kiss in the car scene, which I’m still extremely confused about because it seems to go completely against Gun’s character. Who knows what happened there.)

Of course, the fact that so much emphasis is placed on negotiation and consent isn’t surprising on a show that has such obvious kink undertones and whose Our Skyy 2 entry basically consisted entirely of Dom/sub roleplay at work—I’m just saying, I think someone on the writing team is way into BDSM and knows all about the importance of enthusiastic consent from all parties involved, and I would like to send them flowers.

Step By Step hasn’t really reached the point where we can analyse the dynamic between the main couple (although we can take some educated guesses based on the interactions we’ve seen so far). However, last week’s episode had an extremely important scene between Pat and Put: Pat wanting to have sex with Put, then changing his mind mid make-out (watch the whole scene here). I really like the way this scene was done. No matter how shitty Put treats Pat at times, in this instance, he immediately understood and respected Pat’s change of mind without Pat even saying or explaining anything—at the end of the episode, Put says to Pat that Pat should tell Put when he feels ready to have sex. (We already know this will never happen because of course, Pat and Put are not endgame, but I do appreciate the sentiment.)

BLs rarely include a whole storyline in which the protagonist is in an actual, serious romantic relationship with someone other than his endgame love interest (hi Moonlight Chicken!), or if they do then just to up the angst factor. In this case, however, I feel that this scene raises our expectations for Jeng even further: if the guy who is definitely not a romantic match for Pat treats Pat with this much respect in the bedroom, then Jeng has to do at least that and then some. I do feel confident that Jeng won’t disappoint in this regard, but it’s fascinating to see a show frame this kind of respect as the absolute baseline minimum, with the endgame love interest expected to do even better.

Now, the one you’ve all been waiting for. The one that made me write this whole essay in the first place: La Pluie.

Oh boy. Where to start.

A week ago, we got an incredible make-out scene on Saengtai’s floor, which ended in Patts stopping the encounter because he could tell Tai wasn’t really comfortable taking things further—@bengiyo talked about that scene in detail here. And then, three days ago, La Pluie gave us the most unique, trope-defying, timeline-changing blowjob scene of all time, and I want to talk about it.

Tai and Patts are making out on their bed, Tai is not ready to go “all the way” and stops Patts from undressing him. We see a very realistic frustrated reaction from Patts, who nevertheless immediately stops and accepts Tai’s wishes—it is clear that Patts does not expect things to go any further at this point, and that he won’t pressure Tai into anything.

And then, Tai offers to blow him.

(Unfortunately, this show is only on iQiyi so I can't link to it, but you can get a good impression of the scene here.)

I mentioned the concepts of giving and receiving earlier: other people have said this more eloquently than me, but there is a tendency not only in BL but also in wider society to view sex in terms of giving and receiving, with a lot of expectations and stereotypes attached to the roles during different sexual acts. On other shows, that blowjob might be framed as a consolidation or an apology, something that the giver does out of a sense of obligation without enjoying it much. Not so on La Pluie! Tai is shown incredibly happy and satisfied afterwards, both when they’re sleeping next to each other, as well as on the morning after (see also @ginnymoonbeam's post about that here). Tai offered to blow Patts because he simply wanted to, not motivated by guilt or anything of that sort. And he genuinely enjoyed it! In the post I linked above, @bengiyo points out that La Pluie consistently centers queer desire, or more specifically in this case, male desire for a male body; much in the same way that the camera fucking loves Force’s body on ABAAB: the sensuality of the skin, the hands, the abs, the flat chests, the broad backs and shoulders of these men is explicitly emphasized, and Tai’s desire for a dick in his mouth is made absolutely crystal-clear. Of course, since this is a TV show and not a porno, we only see Patts’s thumb in Tai’s mouth instead of his dick, but the imagery, the implications, are clear as day.

And it is such a gentle framing, too: Patts caresses Tai’s lip lovingly, Tai opens his mouth slowly, seductively, then faces Patts’s crotch with a soft look on his face. We do get a clear sense of this encounter as tender, and gentle, and most of all, desired. Tai’s queer desire is at the heart of this scene, and at the heart of the afterglow scene as well. He wanted this man’s dick in his mouth, openly suggested it, showed Patts he was sure about his decision after Patts asked him whether he was, and ended up clearly happy and satisfied with the sex they had. This post, also by @bengiyo, goes into more detail on that.

This, once again, shows us sex as a conversation rather than a series of predetermined acts, shows us sex as a shared activity, as something that can be wonderful and intimate and make people happy without following what society views as “the correct steps”. I think this is extremely important because one part of queer identity is figuring out one’s own relationship to sexuality, one’s own desires and needs, and BLs that ignore this aspect fall a little short in my opinion. Sure, those men are kissing, but do they experience queer desire? Do they experience joy in their queer desire?

For me personally, a show that does not shy away from these questions is a lot more meaningful than a show that does, and consent is at the heart of it all. By framing sex as a conversation, as something that is built and shared together, the shows I looked at here are actively positioning themselves against the idea that there should be predetermined roles for partners during sex, and instead suggest that queer joy can be found in communication and consent. Understanding sex and intimacy as something that is built together, with both partners as equals in conversation, is just as radically queer as a man waking up with a smile on his face after giving his soulmate a blowjob the previous night.

And quite honestly, a male character who clearly, passionately, unquestioningly communicates that he wants a dick inside of him—that is incredibly sexy. But maybe that’s just me.

#*mine #not me the series #the eclipse #the eclipse the series #a boss and a babe #step by step #step by step the series #la pluie #la pluie the series #i said ''is anyone going to write a 3k meta analysis on this topic'' then didn't wait for an answer

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darcydoesfuckall · 1 month

Text

Why you should write that AO3 comment:

Hello! I am an AO3 author and professional fandom dipshit. This is an "essay" on why you should leave that comment on the fanfic you just read.

Table of Contents:

"Commenting is too much effort!"

"I don't know what to write!"

Do you want more fanfic?

Fan creators are human beings, not AI content generators.

You can count it as charity work on your metaphysical taxes.

"Commenting is too much effort!"

Yes, writing a comment takes energy. I'm an introvert, I get that. I have two counter arguments to this point.

AO3 comments are not the SAT:

This is a comment from my latest fic, Quantum Entangled.

Three words and a heart. It requires zero consideration, it isn't specific to the fic, it's something you could copy-paste, even. A comment like this is better than nothing. I'll let my reply from AO3 explain why:

"You know what, I appreciate this way more than you'd probably expect. The temptation to lurk is a strong one, both for social anxiety reasons and internet content-consumption culture reasons. But when people lurk, I can't tell that they've enjoyed the story. The more people that lurk instead of interacting, the more I assume that my work wasn't good enough, irrespective of the reader's actual feelings. So this was a very welcome comment to read. Thank you for indicating your enjoyment. I will endeavour to write more stuff for you to lurk on in the future. :)"

A comment like this, one that is as thoughtless and low effort as possible, is still a comment. Something that denotes a reader's interest. Because, and I can't be clear enough about this, I HAVE NO OTHER WAY OF KNOWING THAT YOU LIKED IT. Kudos and comments are my only window into the reader's experience.

Sure, I'd love more detailed and thorough comments on my work, but, if that expectation is the thing that's going to stop you from commenting at all, I'd prefer the bland copy-paste appreciation.

Onto my second argument.

Do you know what also takes effort? WRITING THE DAMN FIC:

You do not get to complain about being forced to type a congratulatory handful of words after reading that 200k slow-burn fantasy au. Do you know how many hours went into that thing? Do you? Because I can guarantee that it was A LOT. All that writers are asking for is a single emoji. A kudos, at the very least. Consider the effort that went into the creation that you've just experienced and give just a thimble full of it back.

Authors lay out a feast for you to devour. They're only requesting a "thank you".

"I don't know what to write!"

Like in the previous example, an AO3 comment can be as simple as three words saying that you appreciated it. Just an acknowledgement that you were there. It doesn't have to be fancy.

But if you want fancy...?

Here's one of my comments, from Tishae's Better Together.

Let me break it down for you.

"Stunning. This au is so well developed. I love how you managed to maintain tension after the point that they discover that their feelings are requited. This was brilliantly paced, and the action (esp the ending) was so engaging."

The comment opens with appreciation. (Think of it as a sandwich with love as the bread. It starts and ends with my enjoyment.)

There are specific details about what I liked.

"If I may ask, what was the crime that the Metatron committed? Maybe I'm bad at reading between the lines or maybe I missed something, but I'm really curious as to what dirt they have on him. Victimless? Bad enough for imprisonment, but not so morally reprehensible as to make Anathema reveal it? Did he embezzle? That's all I can really think of."

Continues with a specific question about the story and plot.

Shows that I was critically engaged and actively considering the story.

You don't have to have questions about every fic that you read, but don't be afraid to ask them if you do. I love it when people ask me about my work.

"Thank you for the delicious food. I honestly thought that you were going to have Crowley's final look be something in grey (black and white being the theme of the show, metaphorically representing separation/binary, so Aziraphale was uncomfortable with it due to the implications. Grey, symbolising unity/shades of grey as an idiom, would then be the biggest middle finger to the Metatron) but I do really like what you came up with."

Gratitude.

Thoughts about how I read the plot. (This is something I particularly love to read as an author. Please tell me what's going on in that funky lil' brain of yours!!)

"I'm hoping this comment provides plenty of dopamine. If the task activation and instant gratification parts of your brain light up, you might be more likely to write GO content again. Love your work, thanks for sharing it. I hope you gain 3 inches of metaphorical dick length. Please keep writing."

Encouragement to keep writing. (This is the best way to ensure that creators remain in the fandom)

A funny comment to sign off.

Now that you know what to comment, let's start on the real reasons why you should.

Do you want more fanfic?

Fun fact! Fanfictious Authoria are a species that sustain themselves entirely on a diet of brain worms, unfinished WIPs, and kudos. As one of the three fundamental food groups, removing kudos from the fandom ecosystem causes a complete collapse of the natural order. In times of unprecedented scarcity, entire populations of Fanfictious Authoria can die out completely. This means that the production of fanfiction, in that particular region of fandom, stops entirely, often causing major ecological damage, and the subsequent deaths of fan species in the same genus. (Like the Fanfictious Artia, or the Fanfictious Editour, both of which subsist on fanfiction based diets to survive.)

In conservation efforts, experts are imploring readers to donate kudos and comments toward any fandom region that they want to stay alive.

But I digress.

When I want more content, I tell the author. Ask and you shall receive; it's the best way to convince an author/artist to make more.

My comment on @mrghostrat's And They Were Streamers

You liked it? Then COMMENT! Not for the author's sake, but for your own. You want to see the ending of a WIP? Well, it'd be a terrible shame if the author gave up on it because they thought no one was reading... They don't know that you enjoy their work until you TELL THEM. They're not psychic, you have to help them hear you. Commenting on the things you like influences the creators of said things to attribute the act of making content (and, notably, making the type of content that specifically appeals to you) with the dopamine hit of reading your reaction. Treat them like Pavlov's dogs. Ring the kudos-bell.

Fan creators are human beings, not AI content generators.

They have real human feelings and real human egos. The contemporary attitude towards media engagement is skewed towards algorithmic, instant, and uncritical consumption. This is pumping straight gasoline into the beautiful lakes of our fandom ecosystem. Fandom cannot afford to treat its creators like mechanical text generators. We are not an unfeeling assembly line, only there to produce content. We are enthusiasts, engaging in our hobby. No fan creator has to show you anything. They are fully within their rights to keep their works hidden in their computer files, never to see the light of day. Every fanfic on AO3 is only there because someone had the grace to share it with you. You are not entitled to an author's work, just as they are not entitled to your kudos. We have a mutually beneficial arrangement. Do not forget your part in this symbiosis.

It's a problem that extends beyond AO3. Tumblr is a less enthusiastic place than it used to be. Fandom as a whole is drifting towards a consumption mindset. I, for one, am sick of it. Reblog things, like them, share them. Make fanart of fanart. Who gives a shit? Do the cringy thing. You don't have to cultivate your blog aesthetic. Be who you are, like what you like, and have enthusiasm about all of it. Fandom should be an expression of radical self acceptance. Embrace it. Leave essays about fics that you liked. Reblog the essays of other's when you see them. Exist in the mutual joy of seeing and being seen. You are not just an external observer, absorbing content from a distance. You are here too. Wave back at us. Say 'hi.'

You can count it as charity work on your metaphysical taxes.

My final appeal is a moral one.

Commenting on AO3 is just a kind thing to do.

You are your actions. Are you the kind of person who does the kind thing when no one is watching? When no one will care?

Fanfiction is a hobby, and I'm not here to guilt you about how you spend your leisure time. I'm only here to say that there is a kindness you could be giving the world.

If you are one of the people that performs this kindness, I thank you.

#ao3 #fanfiction #fanfic #GO fandom I'm looking at you #good omens #ineffable husbands #crowley #aziraphale #ineffable wives #ineffable husbands fic rec #ineffable idiots #ineffable partners #ineffable spouses

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yrluvjane · 2 years

Text

| ʜᴇʀ ɢᴏʟᴅᴇɴ ɢʟᴏᴡ |

[Harry Potter x fem!reader] [Warning: most annoying ending ever.]

"I never promised Hermione anything, I mean, all right, I was going to go to Slughorn's Christmas party with her, but she never said . . . just as friends . . . I'm a free agent. . . ." Harry mocked Ron voice as he sat with Y/n in the back of the library, filling her on the Ron's latest speech about his freedom. "That book please." Said Y/n mindlessly pointing towards a heavy-paged blue book titled Transfiguration of sentient beings.

"We're taking this in two weeks! Why in Merlin's name are you doing it now?" He asked flipping through the book but shut when he saw an entire 13-paged chapter on transfiguration of garden animals. "I like to be ready, and Hermione isn't being any better really."

"He's at perfect liberty to kiss whomever he likes, I really couldn't care less." Said Y/n making a face which Harry believed had to be Hermione's. She raised her quill and dotted an i so ferociously that she punctured a hole in her parchment.

"You should really start studying." Said Y/n without looking up. He bent a little lower over Advanced Potion-Making and continued to make notes on Everlasting Elixirs, occasionally pausing to decipher the Prince's useful additions to Libatius Borage's text.

"And incidentally," said Y/n, after a quite a while, "you need to be careful."

"For the last time," said Harry, speaking in a slightly hoarse whisper after three-quarters of an hour of silence, "I am not giving back this book, I've learned more from the Half-Blood Prince than Snape or Slughorn have taught me in - and I thought you were on my side -"

"I'm not talking about your stupid so-called Prince," said Y/n, giving his book a nasty look as though it had been rude to her. "I'm talking about earlier. I went into the girls' bathroom just before I came in here and there were about a dozen girls in there, including that Romilda Vane, trying to decide how to slip you a love potion. They're all hoping they're going to get you to take them to Slughorn's party, and they all seem to have bought Fred and George's love potions, which I'm afraid to say probably work -"

"Why didn't you tell on them then?" demanded Harry. "They didn't have the potions with them in the bathroom," said Y/n scornfully. "They were just discussing tactics. As I doubt whether even the Half-Blood Prince" - she gave the book a suspicious look - "could dream up an antidote for a dozen different love potions at once, I'd just invite someone to go with you, that'll stop all the others thinking they've still got a chance. It's tomorrow night, they're getting desperate."

"There isn't anyone I want to invite," mumbled Harry, who was still trying not to think about how Y/n would certainly go with Hinderson, a Ravenclaw prefect, any more than he could help, despite the fact that she kept cropping up in his dreams in ways that made him devoutly thankful that she could not perform Legilimency.

"Well, just be careful what you drink, because Romilda Vane looked like she meant business," said Y/n grimly. She hitched up the long roll of parchment on which she was writing her Transfiguration essay and continued to scratch away with her quill. Harry watched her with his mind a long way away. "Hang on a moment," he said slowly. "I thought Filch had banned anything bought at Weasleys' Wizard Wheezes?"

"And when has anyone ever paid attention to what Filch has banned?" asked Y/n, still concentrating on her essay. "But I thought all the owls were being searched. So how come these girls are able to bring love potions into school?"

"Fred and George send them disguised as perfumes and cough potions," said Y/n. "It's part of their Owl Order Service. A Hufflepuff kept showing it off in the common room."

"Yeah, well, never mind that," said Harry quickly. "The point is, Filch is being fooled, isn't he? These girls are getting stuff into the school disguised as something else! So why couldn't Malfoy have brought the necklace into the school - ?"

"Oh, Harry . . . not that again . . ."

"Come on, why not?" demanded Harry.

"Look," sighed Y/n, "Secrecy Sensors detect jinxes, curses, and concealment charms, don't they? They're used to find Dark Magic and Dark objects. They'd have picked up a powerful curse, like the one on that necklace, within seconds. But something that's just been put in the wrong bottle wouldn't register - and anyway, love potions aren't Dark or dangerous -"

"You broke into a gate that was bewitched by Dumbledore!" Whisper-shouted Harry as Y/n hit him with a parchment roll on the head before shushing him. "And if I didn't, you would've been dead due to frostbite." Said Y/n with a glare and slamming her book shut signaling this discussion is over.

True to her words, Romilda Vane had cornered him the moment he had climbed through the portrait hole. "Hi, Harry!" said Romilda, "Fancy a gillywater?" He could imagine Y/n giving him a "what-did-I-tell-you?" look over her shoulder. "No thanks," said Harry quickly supressing a snort. "I don't like it much."

"Well, take these anyway," said Romilda, thrusting a box into his hands. "Chocolate Cauldrons, they've got firewhisky in them. My gran sent them to me, but I don't like them."

"Oh - right - thanks a lot," said Harry, who could not think what else to say. "Er - I'm just going over here with . . ." He hurried off, his voice tailing away feebly.

When he arrived in the entrance hall at eight o'clock that night, he found an unusually large number of girls lurking there, all of whom seemed to be staring at him resentfully as he approached Luna. She was wearing a set of spangled silver robes that were attracting a certain amount of giggles from the onlookers, but otherwise she looked quite nice.

Harry was glad, in any case, that she had left off her radish earrings, her butterbeer cork necklace, and her Spectrespecs. "Hi," he said. "Shall we get going then?" "Oh yes," she said happily. "Where is the party?" "Slughorn's office," said Harry, leading her up the marble staircase away from all the staring and muttering. "Did you hear, there's supposed to be a vampire coming?" "Rufus Scrimgeour?" asked Luna.

"I - what?" said Harry, disconcerted. "You mean the Minister of Magic?" "Yes, he's a vampire," said Luna matter-of-factly. "Father wrote a very long article about it when Scrimgeour first took over from Cornelius Fudge, but he was forced not to publish by somebody from the Ministry. Obviously, they didn't want the truth to get out!" Harry, who thought it most unlikely that Rufus Scrimgeour was a vampire, but who was used to Luna repeating her father's bizarre views as though they were fact, did not reply.

Whether it had been built that way, or because he had used magical trickery to make it so, Slughorn's office was much larger than the usual teacher's study. The ceiling and walls had been draped with emerald, crimson, and gold hangings, so that it looked as though they were all inside a vast tent. The room was crowded and stuffy and bathed in the red light cast by an ornate golden lamp dangling from the center of the ceiling in which real fairies were fluttering, each a brilliant speck of light.

"Harry, I'd like you to meet Eldred Worple, an old student of mine, author of Blood Brothers: My Life Amongst the Vampires - and, of course, his friend Sanguini." Worple, who was a small, stout, bespectacled man, grabbed Harry's hand and shook it enthusiastically; the vampire Sanguini, who was tall and emaciated with dark shadows under his eyes, merely nodded. He looked rather bored.

A gaggle of girls was standing close to him, looking curious and excited. "Harry Potter, I am simply delighted!" said Worple, peering shortsightedly up into Harry's face. "I was saying to Professor Slughorn only the other day, 'Where is the biography of Harry Potter for which we have all been waiting?' " "Er," said Harry, "were you?" "Just as modest as Horace described!" said Worple.

"Here, have a pasty," said Worple, seizing one from a passing elf and stuffing it into Sanguini's hand before turning his attention back to Harry. "My dear boy, the gold you could make, you have no idea -"

"I'm definitely not interested," said Harry firmly, "and I've just seen a friend of mine, sorry."

He pulled Luna after him into the crowd; he had indeed just seen a long mane of brown hair disappear between what looked like two members of the Weird Sisters. "Hermione! Hermione!"

"Harry! There you are, thank goodness! Hi, Luna!"

"What's happened to you?" asked Harry, for Hermione looked distinctly disheveled, rather as though she had just fought her way out of a thicket of Devil's Snare. "Oh, I've just escaped - I mean, I've just left Cormac," she said.

"Under the mistletoe," she added in explanation, as Harry continued to look questioningly at her. "Serves you right for coming with him," he told her severely. "I thought he'd annoy Ron most," said Hermione dispassionately.

"I debated for a while about Zacharias Smith, but I thought, on the whole -"

"You considered Smith?" said Harry, revolted. "Yes, I did, and I'm starting to wish I'd chosen him, McLaggen makes Grawp look a gentleman. Let's go this way, we'll be able to see him coming, he's so tall. . ."

The three of them made their way over to the other side of the room, scooping up goblets of mead on the way, "Who are we hiding from?" whispered a voice from behind them as Hermione shreiked.

"Y/n! Oh thank merlin!" Said Hermione placing her hand on her chest as if she just had a heart attack. Y/n chuckled, "Sorry?"

She looked beautiful.

Harry's breath hitched and caught in his throat as he raked her up and down with his eyes. She was dressed in a stunning, glittering gold dress that pushed off her shoulders and slitted up her thighs leaving others imaginations go wild, especially Harry's.

She had her hair tied up in a low bun, decorated with pearls. Her gold heels reflected the light. Her middle finger had a gorgeous wildly sparkling gem on but what caught Harry's eyes wasn't the expensive rock.

It was the large bruise forming on her knuckles, staining her skin with blueish purple marks.

Harry's hand immediately grabbed hers in worry, his mind racing with what could have caused it.

"Y/n! What happened?!" He asked, the monster crawling inside him was both in rage and worry. It was as if it wanted to climb out and tear everyone apart and push Y/n behind it, protecting her.

"Oh, it's nothing." She said as she pulled back her hand a dismissively waved it.

"Y/n punched one of Williams friend's in the face after he said something bad about you, Ron and Hermione." Luna said in her dream-like voice as if she was retelling a story.

"What?!"

"Why?"

Both Harry and Hermione asked at the same time though Harry felt the monster calm down and he had to hide the grin that was about to litter his face.

She defended him. She had punched someone for him.

Well technically she punched someone for you, Ron and 'Mione ... A voice in his said but he pushed it away. Harry felt special.

"He just said something unacceptable." She replied just as Luna interupted

"He said Harry is bias and an attention seeking freak, Hermione was disgusting for dating Weasley, Krum and Cormac and that Ron was a patheticly poor excuse of a wizard." Luna said expressionless as Y/n tried to send her 'Cut it' signals with her hand but the Ravenclaw ignored her.

"Y/n then punched his face in front of the Ravenclaw common room, breaking his nose. Then she told William she couldn't date someone who had friends that shamelessly talked in such vulgar ways and she'd rather date a Slytherin. And made sure to remind us that Hermione here is the smartest in our year, Ron saved every single throw at the match and Harry was more braver and selfless than all of us combined. That's why he isn't here, he was escorted to the infirmary."

Hermione seemed both shocked and grateful as she lunged herself at the Hufflepuff and started muttering nonsense of how she shouldn't have done that and how she'd get in trouble and how she's grateful for her words.

Harry on the other hand was a grinning freak inside. She thought he was brave. He felt the urge to giggle and held it in. Sure he was pissed off with what Hinderson's friend had to say but she stood up for him ( them ) but who cares.

She said he was braver and selfless then all of them combined. But before he could let the butterflies in his stomach get the best of him, he needed to make sure.

"So you and Hinderson are over?" He asked as Y/n nodded. "Did I go to far?" She guilty asked her friend but Harry answered and answered too fast.

"No!" He had shouted gathering some of the surrounding people's attention causing the three girls to look at him either in shock or curiosity. Hermione squinted her eyes at him and raised her brow.

He felt his face flush as he stumbled for words. "Sometimes they're just not meant to be." Grimcing as he remembered his epic failure of a date with Cho last year.

"Yea, so? I don't have a date and Hermione is hiding from her date. . . May I have this dance, Miss Granger?" Y/n asked in a deep posh accent that made Hermione giggle and blush.

"No, yo-" Hermione began but squealed when Y/n pushed her onto the dance floor. Y/n placed a hand on Hermione's waist and grabbed her other hand in hers as Hermione placed her hand on Y/n's shoulder, laughing as the latter lead them across the dance floor in quick, funny strides.

"You like her." Luna's voice came.

"Yea, I do." He said. He's face morphed into a soft lazy smile as he watched the Hufflepuff twirl them in circles making Hermione laugh as she tried to slow the badger down.

"I'm sorry Luna, I didn't mean to ruin your night." He said but the blonde waved her hand and smiled at him warmly.

"Your my friend Harry, I'm happy if your happy." She said, Harry stared at her with a friendly smile before bowing down slightly and placing his hand out.

"Miss Lovegood, may have your hand for this dance?" He asked as the Ravenclaw smiled before pulling a chuckling Harry onto the dance floor.

An hour later, Harry sat with his drink on a couch alone while Luna spoke with a friend on the other side of the room. He looked around staring at the dancing figures as they twirled and swayed under the light.

His eyes caught Y/n' figure. It wasn't that hard, she was glittering like a disco ball, her sweet laugh filling the room, making Harry smile.

He watched her dress flow every time she twirled.

How the strand, that fell from her elegant hairdo, swayed every time she laughed, throwing her head back.

He watched how she tapped her, done white nails, on the glass of her drink, into a rhythmical sound.

He watched how she twirled Hermione and complemented her in a deep voice mimicking a man, making the bushy-haired girl swat her arm playfully and covered her mouth as she laughed.

He sat mesmerised by the ethereal beauty that filled his mind, painting his every nerve and cell in a glowing haze.

His thought we're cut off when he felt the couch dip next to him. Hermione had just flopped down next to him, out of breath sporting a happy smile.

"Oh, I don't think I've ever danced so much. Should've gone to the Yule ball with her, boy can she keep going." Hermione said as she turned and faced her friend, who was staring at the said girl.

"Go, go ask her to dance!" Hermione encouraged as Harry shook his head bringing his glass to his lips.

"C'mon Harry, you can go dance with her and grow this relationship into something more or you can spend the rest of your life regretting it for being a coward." Hermione said as Harry kept quiet for a moment, downing the rest of his drink.

Hermione was about say something else when Harry jumped up and placed his empty glass on a passing tray. "You're right, 'Mione." He said.

He walked over to where Y/n was speaking to Zabini, his chest tightened at the sight wanting nothing more than to hex the Slytherin into the next century.

As Harry aproached them, he caught Zabini's eye, who looked at him in disgust before saying a few words to the Hufflepuff and leaving.

"Hey." Harry said softly as Y/n made a surprised sound before chuckling and facing him with a tired smile.

"Hey, well don't you look ravishing?" She teased as Harry felt a shiver run down his spine, the words making more problems then it should.

He swallowed before putting on a similar tone. "Isn't that my line?"

"You wish, Potter. We both know I'm much more of a gentleman." She said. Harry's eyes locked on her lips as she raised her glass and drank it.

"Dance with me." He said abruptly. She raised her brow and put down the now empty glass at a nearby table.

"Are you asking or demanding, Mr. Potter?"

"Will you give me the honour and pleasure of having this dance with you?" He asked putting his hand out, every fiber in his body begging for her to say yes.

"The pleasure is all mine." She said as she slipped her hand into his.

He slid them to the middle of the room as he placed a hand on her waist and held her other hand in his.

"You look gorgeous." He said filled with seriousness. He watched as she blushed, chuckled, looked down then up again at him.

"I'm not the one who's got the eye of everyone in the room." She said.

"You're mistaken, you're the most beautiful one here. They're blind if they think otherwise." He said, he felt her grip on his shoulder tighten.

"Didn't know your the charmer type, Harry."

Harry.

The sound of his name on her lips made his heart beat like never before. He let go of her waist and twirled her around, bringing her closer to him.

Her hand rested on his chest as his slipped slightly lower than it was before. "Maybe there are things about me you've yet to see." He whispered.

"Maybe there is." She mumbled as she drummed her pointer finger against his chest. Harry pulled her out before twirling her out and pulling her in, wrapping his arms around her waist as her back flushed with his chest.

"Harry." She whispered as he twirled her out. There it was again, his name. His clothes felt to tight. The air felt too hot.

When she came back this time her hand was on the side of his neck wrapping around it as she brushed his jaw with her thumb. He's hand dropped to her hips, brushing his thumb up and down.

"Y/n." He whispered so softly he barely heard it. It came out as a warning, as he shut his eyes.

She was close, too close.

"Yes?" She asked as she ran her hand down his shoulder and to his chest, the hand that held hers tightened it's grip.

"Yo-" He was about to say something when the perfect moment was cut off by Hermione's shouting.

"Get off me!" She shouted, both and almost everyone in the room faced the commotion.

Both Harry and Y/n rushed over, apart of both their minds annoyed and slightly pissed off.

"You don't have to make a scene. Let's just dance." Cormac said.

"I said I don't want to." Hermione said as she stepped back from him. Y/n stepped in front of her pushing her back, behind her.

"This is none of your business, L/n. C'mon Hermione, if it was anyone else they'd beg for me to dance with them let alone date them."

"Shove off, Cormac. Hermione values those with brains and character." Y/n said as Cormac scoffed, pushed Y/n and reached to grab Hermione's wrist.

Harry was already on his way to punch the bastard when, Hermione raised her fist and punched right in the jaw.

Before anything else could happened, Y/n kneed him where the sun doesn't shine.

"Nice form, 'Mione." Y/n praised as people turned their heads to see Cormac rolling on the floor. Hermione on the other hand stared at her fist as if it punched Cormac with it's own mind.

"Next time she says 'No' you get the hint and piss off," Y/n commented as she kicked him with her heel. People began to rush over and crowd the boy.

"Y/n!" Hermione yelled horrified.

"I've got detention anyway, may as well stretch it to it's limits." She joked just as she got pulled by Professor Slughorn. Harry stared at Cormac with undisguised disgust before grabbing Hermione and rushing her out after saying goodbye to Luna and Y/n.

That night, Harry stayed wondering at all the possibilities that could've happened if Cormac wasn't being a pain, which made the Potter hate the boy even more.

#harry potter x reader #harry james potter #harry james potter x reader #harry potter #harry potter x fem!reader #harry james potter x y/n #golden trio era

1K notes · View notes

hazbin-but-good · 23 days

Text

another hazbin hotel rewrite/redesign?

yup! and i'm so serious about it that i made a whole blog for it. i'm a white queer ex-cath tran doing this as an art and writing exercise, so feedback from other creatives + jewish and/or racialized folks is especially welcome.

i'm putting this post and only this post in the main tags for visibility. also, not gonna link my main, but i do make my own original stuff, and i encourage fans and haters alike to do the same.

anyway, here's a mostly good-faith 1.7k-word essay on the original. i think it's pretty funny and brings up some less talked-about points. correct me on the facts, disagree with my opinions, and ask clarifying questions, but don't come at me with any piss-poor reading comprehension.

the hellaverse is garbage, and here's why

cw: strong language, stronger opinions, intersectional feminist critical discourse analysis

1. vivienne medrano, the person

medrano was born as a well-off white-passing latina (salvadoran-american) in bougieass frederick, maryland. while attending new york's top art school, she got popular on deviantart-tumblr-twitter by being a prolific multifandom fujoshi furry who's more into ornamental character design than storytelling. upon graduation, she leveraged her fanbase and industry connections to make the hazbin and helluva boss pilots, get helluva made for youtube, and get hazbin made for amazon prime.

like every woman online, she gets harassed for no good reason, and as a certified autist, i will defend her right to be dumb, weird, annoying, and bad with words. however, there are legit reasons to criticize her:

racism, misogyny, homophobia, fatphobia, some antisemitism, past transphobia, past ableism

shitty boss, bad friend

cowardly, vindictive, manipulative, thoughtless behavior

skeevy friends

sucks at taking criticism

in short, i think she desperately needs a PR person and someone to clean up her digital footprint.

2. medrano's art

incurious

inauthentic

noncommittal

creatively stagnant

overindulgent, and the indulgence isn't even fun

shallow and childish framed as complex and mature

bland and boring framed as shocking and subversive

to be clear, i'm at peace with the existence of suckass art like this; i just think the money, attention, and praise it gets are unearned and should go to more interesting works, of which there are infinite.

medrano's had the time, money, and social cache to grow as an artist, learn from the best, and take creative risks, but she hasn't. if she truly has nothing more to offer, she should let her collaborators take the wheel, but she doesn't do that either. instead, she keeps getting more and more resources to make the same baby bullshit, and that pisses me off. she could be the nicest person ever, and this fundamental arrogance would still make her art blow.

stop with the pointless guilt: liking medrano's work does not make you stupid or evil. however, if you stay in the kiddie pool of culture, if you refuse to engage with a diversity of art, if the hellaverse is your point of reference for anything media-related, you can't expect to have your opinions on art, media, or culture taken seriously. you have not earned a seat at the table. you gotta hit the books first.

i cannot emphasize enough how much incredible stuff is out there if you're willing to look further than what social media and streaming services put right in front of you. if you come away from this blog having learned about just one new artist or piece of art, i'll be a happy camper.

3. the hellaverse

a. empty and confused

hazbin and helluva's content and marketing has no clear target audience. the subjects are inappropiate for teens, but the execution is too childish for adults, and lemme tell you what i don't mean by that, first.

not inherently inappropriate for teens:

sex and sexuality

violence, including when it intersects with the above

politics and religion

not inherently childish:

animation (any style)

comedy

episodic writing and/or loose continuity

young characters

fun, happiness, optimism, the power of friendship, cuteness, tenderness, sincerity, etc.

what i mean is that these shows are literally about adult characters who fuck, smoke, drink, do drugs, go clubbing, work full-time, manage their own finances, and deal with stuff like bureaucracy, sexual violence, domestic abuse, marriage, divorce, late adoption, and family estrangement.

however, none of these "adult" things are given enough specificity to create drama or comedy. it's all too stock, vague, flat, weirdly sanitized, and thus utterly banal—pure aesthetics on top of bad saturday morning cartoons. it's exactly what i'd expect from a sheltered disney kid who needs to log off and get into their local gay scene ASAP so their only contact with things like poverty, policing, addiction, and sex work stops being facile movies and TV.

if the shows were aware of this and played with it, that could be amazing, but they're not. they give you the mickey mouse version of the world with a straight face and then play looney tunes sound effects to try to make you laugh and sad_violin.mp3 to try to make you cry. now that's funny.

b. old and tired

let's make like americans and pretend that the rest of the world doesn't exist. even within the confines of the USA, home of the hays code, the red scare, and reaganite propaganda, this neopuritan fascist state ruled by 1000 megachurches in a trenchcoat, the indie/underground animation scene has been doing crazier shit for decades. anti-war films in the 60's, bakshi movies in the 70's, the simpsons shorts and r-rated movies in the 80's, adult swim and MTV in the 90's, flash/newgrounds/youtube in the 00's, streaming in the 2010's—so what are we doing in the 2020's with this wet white rice drowned in expired ketchup? i feel crazy making this point because it's obvious if you've watched these things, but if you haven't, you're gonna be like "well, there's gotta be something new here". no! there isn't! in the words of jimmy "the scot" jordan, nothing, nothing, NOTHING!

c. ideological purgatory

actually, there is one thing in these shows i've never seen before: the presbysterianism. shout out some interesting or at least intentional presbysterian art in the comments, because the way these ideas are presented here is not compelling. it just makes the rainbow neoliberalism even more confusing and contradictory.

i guess the big presbysterian things are protestanism, calvinism, and, uh, big church government? presbysterians, get your shit together. get your brand down. catholics have BDSM and vampires, evangelicals have TV and corporatism; what do you have? celtic crosses? no wonder medrano has such uninspired ideas on divinity.

d. queer deficiency

when i look at a piece of art, i ask myself: "what does this give me that i can't get from the hunchback of notre dame (1996)?" if the answer is as limp as "uhh, gay people, i guess", i can probably look for my gay shit elsewhere and rewatch the hunchback of notre dame (1996) in the meantime.

but let's say that you have no standards. you've been waiting for ages for a show about gays by the gays for the gays, and by god you're gonna get it. this is it! here we go! time for some

generic twink obliteration

male sexuality as aggression and dominance displays

WLW (sex and chemistry not included)

a couple straight femdoms

and the stalest sex jokes known to man

...yeah, it's not very queer. and by "queer", i mean "questioning or subverting gender norms (including sexual roles) within a given cultural context regardless of creator identity and intent". i'm not a queer studies scholar so LMK if there's a more specific term for this, but whatever you call it, it's not in the hellaverse much.

there's not even any transness, literal or metaphorical, just ancient drag jokes. i guess the writers thought we would've been too controversial. so much for an indie animation studio that prides itself in the diversity of its staff both above and below the line, bakshi-style. i wonder how medrano, a bisexual woman, would've felt if told that a lesbian main couple in hazbin would be "too controversial".

4. spindlehorse and the vivziepop brand

spindlehorse toons underpays its overworked staff and keeps outsourcing more and more labor to even more overworked freelancers overseas to cut costs. a rainbow sweatshop is still a sweatshop, and just because these practices may be "industry standard" doesn't make them any more ethical.

the studio has also been repeatedly accused by current and former employees and contractors of creating a hostile and abusive workplace. AFAIK, it still has no dedicated HR person, and victims are too afraid of retaliation like blacklisting and online harassment to speak out.

this is exactly the stuff that unions exist to prevent. as i'm writing this, the IATSE (the parent union of TAG, which is the parent union of all US animation unions) is negotiating with entertainment industry executives for better working conditions, and if the execs fuck around like last year, it's strike time again. so watch this space, voice your support, and don't cross any picket lines.

i hope spindlehorse unionizes, but until then and for these reasons, i don't think you should give money to the company.

first of all, all content on amazon-owned platforms is ok to pirate, and all youtube ads are ok to block. everyone involved in making the episodes has (or should have) been paid upfront, so you're not taking the bread out of anyone's mouth.

next, let's look at the succulent offerings of the official vivziepop merch shop:

$10 pins and keychains

$15 sticker packs

$20 mugs and acrylic cutouts

$25 shirts

$30 metal cards (not even tarot)

$40 lounge pants

$50 mini backpacks

random $80 skateboard deck

forgive my latin americanness, but this is all stuff you can get made by a local metalsmith, print/sublimation shop, or just crafty people in your life. it's cheaper, customizable, and better for the environment to skip all the shipping and packaging. also, not painting your own skateboard is poser shit.

the hazbin website also has $15 pins, one $20 keychain, and $6 trading card packs. people are weird about trading cards, so if for some reason you wanna gamble for a mass-produced bit of cardboard, plastic, and tinfoil, at least bulk-order for all the vivziepoppers in your area so it's less of a huge waste. better yet, trace the designs and make infinite bootlegs.

at the end of the day, buying merch is not activism. your bulk order of trading cards will not save any wage slaves from getting evicted from their overpriced studio apartments. however, the shop links you to all the credited artists/designers, and more of your bucks will actually reach them if you buy their designs directly, then turn them into body pillows or life-sized bronze statues or whatever the fuck.

go through the credits of any episode of helluva or hazbin, and you'll find even more creatives you might wanna support. get jinkx monsoon's albums on CD. subscribe to actually good artist, animator, and composer gooseworx. lots of voice actors now have patreon, cameo, or self-hosted pages where you can write better lines for their characters and have them read it. these things may not look as shiny as Official Merch™, but we all need less plastic shit and more culture anyway.

#spindlehorse #vivziepop #hellaverse #hazbin hotel #helluva boss #spindlehorse critical #vivziepop critical #hazbin hotel critical #helluva boss critical #hazbin hotel rewrite #hazbin hotel redesign #helluva boss redesign #communism #degrowth

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autistic-katara · 10 months

Text

ok i might get blocked by a couple ppl for saying this but the Jackson’s Diary fandom is seriously making me wanna become a proshipper out of spite (read the post before blocking me or whatever please)

like idk if u guys have checked the fandom tag on ao3 recently but theres been a bit of drama surrounding the fact that someone posted a smut-fic of Exer (an 18yo) and David (an almost 18yo, who was aged up A FEW MONTHS for the fic) and they were harassed into taking it down and making a fucking apology post ON AO3, THE PROBLEMATIC FANWORKS WEBSITE.

and this fic was tagged 100% correctly like it was very explicitly tagged as smut n stuff yet there were still a bunch of comments being like “uhm what did i just read 🤨” and when i made a comment defending the authors right to yk, not be harassed for making not even rlly problematic content someone who clearly would suffer withdrawal symptoms if they turned twitter off for too long started arguing with me abt how “erm ackhtually we should be allowed to comment harassment under ppls harmless and explicitly tagged fics cause theres no smut in this fandom and it shocked us” and u could just rlly tell they felt they were more righteous than God in their opinions and yeah so cut to tonight when i’m scrolling through the tag and i see a post titled “i’m so sorry” in which the author made a post basically being like “i’m so sorry for posting that ik it was disgusting it has been permanently deleted” which in the comments a few ppl were telling them that what happened sucked n stuff (myself included // judging by their reply they only did this to stop the harassment which yk, completely fair) and i went back to scrolling since i wanted an actual fic not fandom drama but like 2 posts down there was another post titled “please stop” or smthn like that where someone else made a post basically being like “guyssss can we please not write smut of these characters this fandom is so wholesome i dont wanna ruin it 🥺 anyways sorry this isnt a fic this just needed to be said lol” and like dude, my guy, WHAT THE FUCK?!

this is AO3, this is a fanwork archive that as far as i know was created (at least partially) due to the fact that ppl kept getting their “problematic” works taken down from other sites and the creators wanted to yk archive all fanworks. this is NOT a social media site where u can make callout posts abt how what someone else posted disturbed ur pure wholesome chaste scrolling by daring to uploaded something with *gasp* consensual sex between 2 consenting adults?! (or canonically 1 consenting adult and 1 consenting gonna-be-an-adult-in-a-few-months-but-isnt-much-younger-than-the-first-guy but u get the idea)

like guys, ao3 is not twitter. it is not tiktok, it is not tumblr, its not youtube, its not even wattpad. it is not a social media platform, it is a fanwork archive, specifically one that lets u post whatever kinda content u want (yes, even smthn depicting 2 consenting adult/almost adult participates that are in no way related having sex, ik its crazy what they allow online these days).

and look honestly the callout post wouldn’tve annoyed me this much if it was posted on yk an actual social media. like if it was posted on twitter or tiktok or on youtube as a video essay or even on here, like sure if i saw it id be annoyed that this fandom cant handle the tiniest bit of non-puritanicalism and fuck, maybe if it was on here id even drag myself into a pointless days-long argument that causes me suicidal levels of stress but on archive of our fucking own itself?! for the millionth time, IT IS NOT A SOCIAL MEDIA! u dont make posts like that that u want the rest of the fandom to read or whatever on there because its not that kinda website!

anyways yeah i hope i explained the situation ok, u might be able to check it out urself if u feel like it and yeah idk this whole thing just kinda felt like a wake-up call for me like yes i find incest and pedophilia disgusting OBVIOUSLY and i dont like ppl romanticising it in fiction but idk i’ve seen ppl talk abt toxic antis before and show screenshots of conversations where theyve acted super shitty but idk seeing this all unfold in person and having to argue with these hardcore antis just- i dont wanna be associated with these ppl, if these are what alotta antis r like i dont want anyone to assume i agree with them like at all, whether its other antis, proshippers, or ppl like me who have a super complicated opinion on it. like they harassed a person into taking down their smut and made call-out posts on ARCHIVE OF OUR OWN abt how they dont want their wholesome pure fandom corrupted by gross dirty irredeemable sex. and just yeah hope no mutuals i seriously care abt unmoot or even block me over this since ik a few of u r antis but yeah srry for this i just kinda seriously hate this fandom right now :)

also incase anyone is typing out a “kill yourself pedo” reply/rb rn; i turn 15 on Friday, i am 2+ years younger than ur innocent bb minor boy David and his definitely not already a legal adult boyfriend Exer so yk

#jackson’s diary #jacksons diary #ao3 #proshipping #dexer #fandom discourse #will probably regret making this post by tmrw morning but yk thats future me’s problem #again hopefully i explained this ok i’m pretty sure it was quite rambly

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bestanimatedmovie · 1 year

Text

Choose your favorite!

Time to fly!

Vote in the other polls!

What fans say:

How To Train Your Dragon:

The message was just nice. I have a lot of nostalgia for it. I used to be a huge dragon nerd as a kid and dragons just weren't that prevalent in media here, especially not as friendly figures. I still love HTTYD and it's sequels nowadays.

It was one of my favorite movies as a kid and one of the few movies I watched that wasn't a barbie movie, it's just really cool.

Best movie featuring dragons period. The pure wish fulfillment fantasy of having a highly intelligent fantasy creature companion that can fly and doesn’t mind being ridden like a horse, therefore also the best execution of the dragon rider trope in all of fiction. Extremely funny, adding to the comedy is the fact that only adults have Scottish accents and all the teens have an American accent. So good that even its tv show follow up was decent by extension. The bit where Hiccup is trying to earn Toothless' trust and they start to work together changed me on a fundamental level.

I LOVE IT SO MUCHSHJKBSKHGDK I have a bone dysplasia which causes some bones to be a little bit more hollow and whenever I would feel a pain in my top back, 8 year old me was like ''woah I'm growing wings its my time to fly like toothless'' lol and it was always a dream of mine to fly. Weirdly enough I could relate to toothless because the "not being able to fly but you should be" felt like an allegory to a lot of my life! It gave me hope when he WAS able to after the help of others + the care he always needed + that mechanic wing thing made me feel like with the right ''recipe'' could help me get better too. My favourite scene is the first flight!! I love the animation for it, it makes me feel like im flying through the clouds too! The soundtrack is amazing too, I still cry to the songs.

I could write an entire essay about how much I love this movie, it truly is one of the best films ever made to me. Utterly flawless on both a technical level and a story-telling level. Not to mention the score oh my GOD the score of this movie changed my life. There are too many scenes that are so impactful, but the Forbidden Friendship scene has to be one of the best. Test Drive too.

This is literally my favorite movie of all time. This movie got me through the worst times in my life. It’s about love and friendship and all that lovely goopy stuff and it’s also fucking gorgeous.

THE cinematic masterpiece of our generation. On god.

This movie is an absolute masterpiece, the animation is pretty, the score is perfect, the relationship between Toothless and Hiccup is so sweet, Toothless is absolutely adorable. Definitely one of DreamWork's best films.

It's a beautifully animated movie about an unconventional viking boy named Hiccup finding his place in a world where dragons and vikings are constantly at odds, and how he changes the world around him. The dragon designs are unique and beautiful, and the vikings are larger than life and match the exaggerated setting.

Who on Tumblr DOESN'T want a dragon best friend I ask you. I would kill to have what Hiccup & Toothless have.

It does a brilliant job balancing tropes in a way that subverts and plays into them. There is so much in it for both adults and kids, it doesn't look like other animated films, it feels more grounded and in that realism it becomes so beautiful. The friendship in the film feels very real despite one of the characters being unable to talk! Forbidden Friendship scene is, in my opinion, the greatest scene in the history of cinema. The music, the lighting, the cinematography, the pacing, the emotions, it is practically perfect in every way. I could go on but I think ya get it.

God this movie defined my childhood and it's still so good when I rewatch it now. I'm guessing you'll have had this submitted a good few times bc it goddamn deserves it but. Hiccup is so relatable and !! dragons !! big cute dragons whose animation models are based on cats!! based fr

I have many fond childhood memories of this movie and in particular I loved how my cousin would "talk" for Toothless (cousin was babysitting us when we first watched the movie). Another thing is The SCORE. The music is iconic and awe inspiring to this day. That first time when Hiccup and Toothless fly together and it Works and the score absolutely goes HARD, I loose my breath every time. It's great. Also have you seen Toothless he's an adorable dragon and a badass, what's not to love?

Makes me cry every time because Hiccup and Toothless are such good friends and they love each other and end up as two halves of a boy dragon soulmate sandwich also the music is extremely good who doesn’t like dragons anyway.

It's the story of a beautiful friendship forming between a boy who doesn't fit in and a dragon who is the last of his kind. It's so cute. And it shows positive representation of disability, Hiccup and Toothless become disabled in ways that meaningfully parallel each other. Hiccup makes a prosthetic tail fin! And Toothless is just so cute!

The sound track is amazing

Honestly everything is phenomenal. It has a good use of comedy and an excellent story and character development. There are also countless beautiful and awe-inspiring scenes supported by an amazing score.

Up:

It is a very emotional movie about an old man learning to still enjoy life even though his wife died.

Such a beautiful film about loss

#How To Train Your Dragon #Up #best animated movie #round 2 #tournament poll #tumblr's favorite

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bohobooks · 7 months

Note

Hi me again (I just love all the stuff you write I can't get enough 😅)

Could I request one where the reader is ominis little sister (specifically a year younger) and she has the biggest crush on sebastian but yea ominis is a very protective older brother so she secretly leaves sebastian love notes and someone he figured out it was her and he feels the same way.

A/N: you absolutely made my day. Thank you so much, love!

Forbidden or Not (Sebastian x Gaunt!reader)

Request: Could I request one where the reader is Ominis's little sister (specifically a year younger) and she has the biggest crush on Sebastian but yea ominis is a very protective older brother so she secretly leaves sebastian love notes and somehow he figured out it was her and he feels the same way.

♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♥︎

"Absolutely not. I am not having this discussion with you. You're too young for him anyway." Ominis rubbed the bridge of his nose, clearly annoyed.

The slender frame of his sister sits on the cushions beside him in the Undercroft, "Omi. I only asked if Sebastian was dating Samantha. Besides, I'm literally 11 months younger than you, you can't sit here and tell me I'm too young." She whines.

"You asked that question because you fancy him, and it is not happening. Ever."

A mischievous smirk appears on the girls face, and even though he can't see it he clearly senses the shift in her demeanor. "I don't know Ominis, I think forbidden love is even kinkier..."

Ominis groans and gagged dramatically, "Y/n you disgust me. Mother and Father should have put you down the second you were born." Ominis continues to fake throwing up.

The enterance to the undercroft whirls mechanically, revealing Sebastian. His eyes immediately take in the scene before him- Ominis dramatically gagging, and Y/n sitting there as proud as a peacock about something.

A dark eyebrow raises above his hazel eyes as he looks at the girl, "Do I even want to know what you said?"

Y/n laughs as Sebastian sits next to her, "Well, I asked him a question that he was too stubborn to answer. So I basically said-"

"Absolutely not! You are not repeating that filth to Sebastian!" Ominis suddenly chides, causing Y/n to laugh even harder. She leans over, gently sitting her head on Sebastians shoulder as she continues her fit of giggles.

He tenses up for a split second at the contact, but quickly wills his body to relax. It's just Y/n, he thought to himself, You've known her forever.

Suddenly, and all to soon, Y/n stands. "Well, I'm off to work on my potions essay. Since somebody won't be helpful." Her tone was playfully accusatory as she bent down to poke her brother in the chest.

As she turned the exit, Ominis clears his throat, "Y/n, the answer is no. And for you to not even THINK about it."

"It just gets hotter the more you forbid it, Omi." She pauses, turning to look at Sebastian who seemed genuinely gobsmacked at the language that just left her mouth. "Good night, Sebastian. Have fun dealing with the prude."

♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎

After leaving the undercroft, Y/n made her way into the Slytherin common room. Try as she might, the first half hour passed with her getting only an inch further on the parchment. The only thing she could focus on was Sebastian. Of course, her feelings were nothing new. Since Ominis first introduced the pair, she was head over heels for the freckled boy. She knew nothing would ever become of her feelings, even though they grew infinitely stronger with each year. Sebastian would never see her as anything other than his best friends sister. And even if by some Merlin born miracle he did, Ominis would never allow it.

Y/n groaned, slamming closed her potions book and subsequently dropping her head onto it.

"Whats wrong, baby Gaunt?" A teasing voice rang from her left. Violently flinging her head up, she meets eyes with Imelda. The two were friends, Imelda surprising everyone when she quickly took to the younger Gaunt sibling.

Y/n groans, slamming her head back I the book, "There's a boy I can't get out of my head. Trivial, I know. It's just that I've fancied him for so long, and I know he'll never feel the same."

Imelda pulled out a chair from the table, sliding it lower to Y/n, "It's not trivial, I actually understand. Say, why don't you write this mystery man a letter. You don't have to sign it, obviously. Just tell him how you feel."

Y/n raised her head, surprised, "That's actually a good idea, Mel. I never pegged you as the romantic type."

Imelda scoffed, standing, "Because I am absolutely NOT! Anyways, let me know how it goes Baby Gaunt."

My eyes follow Imelda as she makes her way to the dorms, and I pull out a clean piece of parchment and begin to write.

♡♡♥︎♡♡♥︎♡♡♥︎♡♡♥︎♡♡♥︎♡♡♥︎♡♡♥︎♡♡♥︎

The boys sneak into their dormitory well past curfew. Sebastian immediately scanned the Common Room for Y/n, heart sinking a bit when he realized she must have gone to bed already.

He and Ominis make their way to their dorm, quickly changing into their pajamas. Sebastian sits at his desk, attempting to write in his journal. The only thing that comes to his mind is her. Really, it's been that way for a while now. He had realized roughly a year ago that he had fallen for the girl. Eventually, the sound of Ominis's snores stir him out of his thoughts. He sighs, closing the journal and heading to his bed.

Pulling back the emerald covers, he's surprised to find a small piece of parchment folded neatly tucked under the blanket.

He reached down, gently unfolding it. As he reads, he gently sits on the edge of the bed, careful to not make enough noise to wake Ominis.

Sebastian,

"It was many and many a year ago,

In a kingdom by the sea,

That a maiden there lived whom you may know

By the name of Annabel Lee;

And this maiden she lived with no other thought

Than to love and be loved by me.

I was a child and she was a child,

In this kingdom by the sea,

But we loved with a love that was more than love—

I and my Annabel Lee—

With a love that the wingèd seraphs of Heaven

Coveted her and me."

As I sit and attempt to work, I find myself thinking of you. Honestly, as of this point, you are all I can think about. I found myself reading this muggle poem, by Edgar Allen Poe, and once again thinking of you. You'll never know its me who looks at you everyday with such love and adoration, but please know there is someone out there who thinks the world of you.

Sincerely,

Your Annabel Lee"

Sebastian's heart raced. Who had sent him this? A warm feeling spread in his chest, and he smiled. Carefully tucking the note into his journal, he lay down to sleep.

The next morning, Sebastian practically skipped to the breakfast table, sliding into the seat beside Ominis.

Ominis immediately grew suspicious about his friends overly chipper attitude. "Uh, good morning Sebastian."

Sebastian patted his friend on the back, "Indeed it is, mate. Say, have any of you ever heard of a muggle poet named Edgar Allen Poe?"

Ominis's eyebrows furrowed as he shook his head, but to Sebastians surprise Imelda spoke up, "Isn't that the fellow that wrote the book you've been toting around Y/N?"

Sebastians eyes flicked hopefully over to her, watching as she grew a slight shade of red, "Uh, yeah. Actually."

The girl rifled around her bag, pulling out a leather bound novel. Sebastians face broke into a smile, "Spectacular! Do you mind if I borrowed it for a bit, Y/n?"

Y/n looked at it uneasily, "I suppose not, but I have to warn you it's heavily annotated and-"

The boy excitedly leaned across the table, taking the book, "Thank you! I promise I'll take care of it."

Without eating or saying as much as a goodbye, Sebastian bounded out of the Great Hall to spend his Saturday morning reading away in the common room.

♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎

Sebastian spent the next couple of hours pouring over the tattered and worn book. Y/n had indeed annotated it, filling the margins with elegant cursive. Finally, Sebastian got to the poem from the letter. He read the poem intently, and went back over her scribbling on the edges of the poem. It was clearly the most loved prose in the book, seeing as the margins were filled to the brim with writing. Sebastians eyes fell to the line

"And this maiden she lived with no other thought

Than to love and be loved by me."

Around these words, Y/n had drawn hearts and a single word, "Him." All at once, things clicked into place. Sebastian ran into his dorm, removing the letter from his journal, and placed it beside the book.

He realized with shock, and slight embarrassment that it took this long for him to notice, that the handwriting was the same. Y/n had written the note. His mind spun into action, coming up with an idea.

♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎♡♡♡♥︎

Sebastian found the Gaunt siblings in the Undercroft, sitting in quiet comfort while they read.

Y/n's eyes flicked up from her book immediately as the undercroft gate whirred mechanically to announce Sebastian's enterance. She smiled at the boy, hiding how nervous she was. Had he put two and two together? Damn Imelda, if she would have just kept her mouth shut...

Sebastian smiles at her, arm extending out to hand her the book, "Thank you for letting me borrow this, Y/n/n. Someone had reccomended it to me. I actually really found myself enjoying the poem 'To Frances S. Osgood.' "

She smiled up at him, "That is a good one." He smiled down at her, and walked across the room to where Ominis sat. The two boys began a quiet conversation, but Sebastians eyes kept finding themselves on the girl.

As he had hoped, she opened the book to the poem he had mentioned- finding within the pages, a note.

Thy grace, thy more than beauty, Shall be an endless theme of praise, And love—a simple duty.

I admit, my darling, it took me embarrassingly long to realize the wonderful letter was from you. I know your brother may not approve, but know my feelings are the same. For years I found myself falling for you, but never spoke of it- I was afraid you'd only see me as a monster. But know this, Y/n Gaunt: I love you with a love that is more than love and, if you will have me, nothing will keep us apart.

Her eyes widen, flicking up from the page to look at Sebastian. He glanced at her from the corner of his eye, a smirk finding its way onto his face as he spoke to the clueless Ominis.

As she clutched the note to her chest, she couldn't help but smile back.

#hogwarts legacy #ominis gaunt #gaunt!reader #hogwarts legacy sebastian #sebastian sallow #sebastian sallow x reader #hogwarts legacy oneshot #hogwarts legacy imagine #hogwarts legacy ominis #wizarding world #wizarding world oneshot #hogwarts legacy imagines

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centrally-unplanned · 1 year

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I always find the 'semiotics' or symbolic language of media interesting from an evolutionary perspective. Recently online there was a bit of a discussion about run cycles in animation; a guide to running written by Hayao Miyazaki from back in 1980 for which we had the text due to its inclusion in collected-writings book Starting Point has been missing its original accompanying visuals for all this time. Someone (Rebekah Machemer) found and scanned those drawings so now we have the complete work:

Very cool stuff, and really great to recover any lost production media like this. In the essay itself Miyazaki gets a bit philosophical - why care about running animation at all?

Above all what is most important is what one wants to express through the act of running…Men of strong resolve, who are wearing heavy armor and carrying swords, should run in a way that weak extras cannot. The running of surging masses on fire with anger, the running of a child doing his best to hold back tears until he reaches his house, the running of a heroine who has forsaken everything but the desire to flee—being able to show wonderful ways of running, running that expresses the very act of living, the pulse of life, across the screen would give me enormous delight. I dream of someday coming across a work that requires that kind of running.

On the one hand this all resonates; make the character visual, express their identity through motion, etc. On the other hand...girl who runs like this? I don't run, like, at all! It's not a common occurence in my everyday life to see a single person running, and if I do it is 99% of the time someone working out. I am pretty sure when I do run its way less an expression of my Forsaken Herione vibes and instead an expression of my 12-hours-a-day-on-a-computer workout routine.

-How you think you look running

-How you actually look running

What I am not saying here is that Miyazaki is wrong or anything to care about running. Instead I am saying that when he discusses how beautiful the act-of-running is, that is only partially coming from observing reality; it primarily comes from animation as a medium. Animation's value-add is the art-in-motion, you want the screen to be expressing itself to the audience through movement. You as an audience member want to see the animator themselves express their own aesthetic to you through that movement. There are a million ways to make that happen but running is one of the strongest; its character focused, universally applicable, common *enough* that you know what it looks like, you can make it diegetic to a climax if the plot demands it, etc. It makes sense for animation to utilize it, and it does - more than just animation, film all over does! It's a universally common symbol in the language of film with decades of meaning built into it.

But that meaning does not first come from real life, it comes from those demands of film-as-a-medium. In all likelihood no one has ever emoted a climactic meaning to you while running, or after running, you don't have a frame of reference for that. When you, as a viewer, are emotionally moved by the act of running, you feel that because film as a medium taught you to feel that. Compare it to how animation/film often focuses on the eyes and mouth for expressing emotion - that is not an invention of film, that is how real human beings communicate, when talking to a person you focus primarily on their eyes and mouth. The semiotics of film's language around eyes is built primarily from real life, which is much less true for running.

What is cool is how much of a semiotics of running animation has been built up given its origin within the demands of the medium. Miyazaki had a hot take and a desire to see artists push the craft as early as 1980; since then I can think of hundreds of running cycles artists have put their own touch on. I think of these as real Artist moments - it is something that the craft leads you to that you become obsessed with perfecting, existing for its own sake, something that interplays between observation and pure creativity. I can see these scenes now outside their own story, as the use and evolution of language. Which is neat!

#animation media theory

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munson-blurbs · 1 year

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For your 2k celebration: Eddie/Lover's Lake/book 🌼

Big, gigantic thanks to @trashmouth-richie for helping me with this one!

Warnings: attempted drug deal, mention of drug use

WC: 899

Mud squelches under your trainers as you make your way towards the lake. It’s a familiar destination; your favorite place to write. But today, you have other plans.

Eddie’s already there, waiting for you. He’s sitting on a stone wall, idly tapping his ringed fingers against his tin box. Your stomach flip-flops at the thought of what’s inside.

Come on. Don’t be such a coward.

“Um, h-hi,” you stutter, mentally kicking yourself for letting your anxiety seep into your voice. “Thanks for meeting me here.”

“Yeah, no sweat,” Eddie says, patting the empty spot beside him and popping open the box lid. You oblige, bringing your backpack onto your lap. “All right, I can do $15 for half an ounce.” He takes out a crinkled plastic baggie, frowning as you inspect it critically. “I really can’t go any lower; you’re already robbing me blind here.”

“No, no,” you shake your head, “‘s not that. Um, I was wondering if you had any, like, magic mushrooms?” Your face burns as you say it.

Eddie’s eyes widen. “Never took you for a psychedelics kinda girl,” he laughs incredulously, “but, yeah, I should have some.” He digs through his stash, tongue poking out of the corner of his mouth in concentration. “So, what’s the occasion?”

“Huh?”

“The shrooms. You going to a party, or…”

“Oh.” You wipe your palms on your jeans. “I, um, I’ve been having bad writer’s block, and I heard that drugs can help…unblock things? I smoked weed with my friend, but it didn’t do anything.”

“Oh, yeah?” Eddie asks, not breaking his focus. “What are you trying to write? Essays and school shit?”

You shake your head. “I’m working on a novel, actually,” you admit. It sounds silly when you say it aloud. “It’s like a horror-mystery hybrid? I don’t know,” you finish lamely, hoping he finds the shrooms soon.

But you’ve captured his attention, and his chocolate brown eyes light up as they meet yours. “No way!” he exclaims. “I love scary stories. I swear, I’ve read everything Stephen King’s written.” He crosses his heart for emphasis. “Can I get a sneak peek of your book?” He pouts adorably, melting your heart and easing your nerves.

“It’s just some chapter outlines so far,” you explain, tugging your notebook out of your backpack. It’s an assuming marble composition notebook, but it holds all of your hard work. “And I haven’t written anything in weeks, hence the…” you gesture to his lunchbox of drugs in lieu of completing the sentence.

Eddie raises his eyebrows as he scans your writing. “This is…really fucking good,” he muses, flipping the page and continuing to read. “How do you come up with this stuff? Puts my Hellfire campaigns to shame.”

You laugh bashfully. “Sometimes, inspiration just strikes, y’know?” Your smile falters when he skips to the rough sketches you have for your characters. You’re not an artist, not by a long shot, but you know he’ll be able to recognize who you’ve modeled a protagonist after. “Okay, give it back,” you blurt out, attempting to grab it from his hands, but his grip is too tight.

“What, you got some naughty drawings in here?” He waggles his eyebrows, making you giggle despite your embarrassment. “Don’t worry; I won’t judge.” Before you can protest further, he finds the one picture you were hoping he’d somehow skip over. It’s a tall, lanky guy with curly brown hair that touches his shoulders. He’s wearing a concert t-shirt with the sleeves cut off, displaying his tattoos, and ripped black jeans. “Whoa,” Eddie breathes, and you’re praying to be swallowed up by a black hole. “This dude is totally metal.”

“Wh-What?” Did he really not know who it was supposed to be?

“The guy,” he says, pointing to the drawing, “he looks so badass.” He closes the notebook but doesn’t hand it back. “Could I hang onto this? I wanna read more, but I gotta get going. Promised my uncle I’d make dinner tonight, and he’ll kill me if I say that and then order pizza one more time. Actually,” he pauses, a mischievous glimmer in his eyes, “do you wanna help me cook? And stay for dinner, obviously. You could maybe tell me more about your story. Might help get those creative juices flowing or something.” He shrugs like he didn’t just use all of his courage to ask you.

“Sure,” you smile, hopping down from the wall and brushing off your pants. “And you can tell me about your…campaigns?” You furrow your brows, unsure if you used the correct terminology.

Eddie narrows his eyes. “I don’t know…how can I trust that you’re not working as an enemy spy?”

You gasp, startling him. “Sorry,” you apologize sheepishly, “but that just gave me a great idea. Maybe Kal–that’s the totally metal dude–used to be allegiant to the enemy, but is trying to redeem himself!” You pluck the notebook from him, flip to where a pen serves as a bookmark, and jot down your thought before you forget it.

“You’re welcome, by the way,” Eddie teases, taking the book back and tucking it under his arm for safekeeping. “You’d better mention me in the acknowledgments. Better yet–dedicate the whole book to me.”

“I can see it now: ‘For Eddie Munson: thanks for the idea and for not selling me shrooms,’” you joke back, walking in tandem with him.

“Perfect.”

#bug's 2k celebration #eddie x reader #eddie stranger things #eddie munson fluff #eddie x you #eddie munson #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson x f!reader #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x reader #eddie x y/n #eddie munson fanfic #stranger things fanfic #fanfic #eddie munson stranger things #stranger things

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anarchycox · 10 months

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So, I'm not sure if you've touched on it in a post before or not, but as a person who posts fanfic to AO3, what kind of comments do you prefer? The ones that are a simple this is really great/love this, or the ones that might be closer to a review/essay on the work, or a happy medium?

Or do all positive comments have equal weight, in your opinion?

Thank you so much for such a great question. Thinking about it, it has two answers really.

The first is this: legit every single comment (that isn't hate or just offering 'constructive criticism' because that's a whole other issue we aren't talking about here, this is preference) brings me joy.

I mean it. If you leave me a heart or a keysmash I love it. You use the extra kudos script, I love it. A short "this was great" I love it. Full paragraphs about what you loved - I love it.

People should not worry about 'getting an A' in comment leaving. Simple but sincere is the stuff that is amazing.

"This made me happy" "I was a wreck reading this chapter" "What the fuck what the what the fuck!" "Well that was hot as hell"

Anything along those lines is wonderful and amazing, but I do cherish even just getting a heart.

So I prefer any comment no matter how small to no comment at all.

But I do have an inspiration board where I write with some of my favourite comments I've gotten written on it to keep me going when a story is getting little to no response.

They aren't elaborate comments, just ones phrased in ways that really made me feel like my writing matters to someone. A couple on the board are:

I quite like your reckless approach to absurdity.

Completely unhinged (compliment).

The patented "chaos but sweet".

You write many good words in many good order. Top Thumbs.

It was worth every second of my life I spent reading this.

Bylaw got called on me I was laughing so much.

I want to grind this up and drink it like soup.

These weren't part of larger comments or if they were there was a sentence or two more but not much more than that. Heartfelt, unique, but not shooting for here is a first year essay about why your fic is the best ever.

Every comment means something to writers, even just saying extra kudos. But if you are looking to know what lingers in our minds that we want to roll around in and fucking eat?

Let us know it emotionally mattered to you.

#ao3 #commenting #fandom #we live for comments no matter how small #but the ones that live rent free #are the ones that let us know you were impacted #even in just a sentence #let writers know their work made your day better #or it impacted you in some way

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snugglesquiggle · 3 months

Text

right, pinned posts

i have a website which is probably the best place to see all of my stuff:

but to get a taste of what you can find on that site, keep reading

most people are probably following me for my murder drones stuff.

i write the critically acclaimed J/Uzi fic, Hostile Takeover

it's a novel length enemies to lovers slowburn, and distinguishes itself by pulling it all off without heavy alteration to canon characterization.

most people are probably put off by the ship, but i've received numerous comments to the effect of "i never liked this ship" or "i didn't think it could be done" followed by "but you somehow pulled it off".

give it a shot!

besides that, i've read a lot of murder drones fanfic, and maintain a page on my website dedicated to indexing and reviewing fics that i'd recommend

several of the people following me are writers, who may be interested in know that i've written several essays on the craft of writing. people tend to find them pretty insightful!

i've written many stories other than Hostile Takeover. you can find them on my site; there's too many to list, but in general, i write nonhuman character near-exclusively. (my friends were only so surprised when i became obsessed with murder drones)

still, HT is my best work, and i'm not certain fans of that will enjoy my earlier writing, and i have reservations about recommending most of them. A Chimerical Hope is still cool, i think.

the majority of my site is dedicated Black Nerve, a dark fantasy setting of my creation about giant sapient insect ninjas and corrupting fungus and gruesome mutagenic blood magic. there's so much going on there that i just cant get into all of it here. not even sure where you should begin reading

lore posts like "In Dialogue With Plagues", or "Lardsuckers and (What Were) Grubsuckers" give you a taste of just how freaky the setting is, and i think "The Duality of Mantis" is a great look at the weird psychology of the dominant species. but there's so many loreposts i can't list them all

writing is probably what i've done the most of, but i have other skills :3

i've released three albums of electronic music on bandcamp:

although i think my best music is the stuff i made for looptober 2023, which though not "officially" released (i'm debating whether i should spend time polishing them), you can still listen to it on itch.io or my site!

and there's more!

i'm sometimes an artist, and there's gallery on my site with over three hundred pieces i've drawn over the years. i mostly draw these weird alien dudes i invented, plus a bunch of praying mantises and dragons and pokemon. quality varies a lot and i'm bad about staying in practice, but here are some pieces i think turned out rather well

ok, now is that it?

well, mostly. i have some poetry that's alright, a game demo that's kinda neat, but nothing i'd seriously promote.

if you read through all of that, i love you. thank you for your time and i hope there's something here you appreciated

#my squiggles

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theresawritesstuff · 10 months

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12. It was perfectly normal to discuss a book they see at the bookstore with their friends, but it's definitely not normal to suddenly be interrupted by the author of said book

New York, 1973

"Okay girls, we've hit the modern stuff. Go nuts! Books are on me," Midge told the band of teenagers.

"Thanks for taking us shopping, Mama," Esther said, browsing through the biographies.

"Of course, sweetie! Always happy to help. Especially when it means dishing on backstage gossip in the name of academics."

"I still don't see why we can't do our report on you, Ms. Weissman," Audrey sighed.

Midge bit back a smile as Esther rolled her eyes. "Sorry, hun. I've been banned from any school related interviews. Esther and Ethan both agreed. I'm happy to pull favors with anyone I know who you might be interested in writing about though."

She heard her daughter make a sound of disgust as she pulled a book from the shelf. "Why did someone let Gordon Ford write a book? He doesn't even write his own show."

"He doesn't?" her friend Vivian wondered through her bubblegum.

"Most of these celebrity authors have ghost writers helping them," Midge informed her gently.

Vivian clicked her gum disapprovingly. "Well that's bogus."

"Yeah. If I have to write my own essays, so should they," Audrey agreed. "They're even getting paid for it!"

Midge chuckled. "That's the business kid."

"Here's someone who we know actually did the work at least."

Esther picked up a copy of a new book from the display table bearing a familiar face.

Vivian let out a giggle. "Oh my mom has the biggest crush on him!"

"Really?" Audrey wondered incredulously.

"What? He's cute in an older guy kind of way. Don't you think he's cute Ms Weissman?"

"I'd also be curious to hear the answer to that question."

They all turned to stare at the man in question smirking behind them as he leaned against a bookshelf.

"Not as cute as he thinks he is, but sure," Midge replied.

Lenny chuckled, coving his mouth with his hand just like he was always wont to do. "I'll take it."

*Hi Lenny."

"Hey Midge."

It had been so long since they'd last spoken, yet seeing him like this again made it feel like it had been no time at all.

Her heart certainly flipped just the same.

"You look good," she commented casually.

He certainly looked healthier. Steadier. His eyes were brighter. Like a light that had been going out had been reignited.

He looked more like the Lenny she knew. The Lenny that lived in her memories.

It was a good look.

Lenny shrugged. "For an older guy."

"Oh my god," Vivian gawped, realizing who had overheard their conversation.

Esther looked between the two adults and began to steer her starstruck friends away, giving them some space to talk. "Hey let's go check the science fiction section and see if they've got any Ray Bradbury books on sale."

"Why?" Vivian wondered.

Audrey, catching the vibe, gave her a pointed look.

"Oh. Oooohhhh. Right."

Esther handed the copy of his memoir to her mother as they passed. "We'll just be back there, Mama. Nice seeing you, Lenny."

"You too, Esther," Lenny murmured, giving her a little wave.

With the teenage trio gone, the tension between them grew palpable, hanging in the silence.

"It is a nice picture," Midge said, noting the author's photo.

Lenny smiled softly. "Thanks. Kitty actually took it."

"She's got a gift."

"I certainly think so. Given what she had to work with."

Midge didn't take the bait to compliment him further.

"Esther's grown a lot since I've seen her last," He commented softly, sounding a bit melancholy.

She nodded in agreement.

"She really shot up last summer. Growing like a weed, that one."

"They always do, don't they?"

The conversation lulled again, but they held the other's gaze intently, that unspoken electricity still sparking between them.

Some things never change…

"How are you?" she asked genuinely after a moment.

He nodded, stuffing his hands in his pockers. "Good. I'm good. Doing a lot better. Here for a book tour."

"Oh well in that case, would you sign mine?" she teased lightly.

"Love to."

He stepped in closer to take the book from her hand, his fingers brushing hers on the pass.

"So, Ms Weissman…" he drawled, clicking his pen to scribble that illegible signature he was so proud of. "You didn't take the new husband's name? I saw the announcement you were engaged in the tabloids a while back."

Midge bit her lip, avoiding his eyes.

"Yeah I um… didn't go through with it after all."

"Why's that?" he asked, handing the book back but still hovering in her atmosphere.

"I just realized he didn't make me laugh as much as I would have liked," she answered.

"Hm."

She cleared her throat, brightening her expression. "Thanks. For the book. Can't wait to read it."

"Sure."

"Nice seeing you, Lenny."

"You too."

She turned to leave but heard him say

"Are you doing anything later?"

She turned back, tilting her head coyly.

"Maybe. What did you have in mind?"

He gave her a hesitant shrug. "Just thought we could catch up a bit."

A part of her wanted to run. To hide from the pain of the past and let things be behind them.

But that part wasn't nearly as strong as the parts of her that missed him.

"I'd like that…"

#midge x lenny #Midgelenny #tmmm fanfic #Prompt fill

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