#they’re not fun to me i don’t want to explore them or project onto them etc etc
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hey Sky community, you have a racism problem
look at this
these are officially released promo art depicting the in-game spirits.
I am also going to gesture at a few stills from the animations.
not even touching on that the spirits in-game are all various shades of blue, but yknow what, I will touch on it. they’re blue. the ancestors spirits are all various shades of dark blue, sometimes with darker brown wisps of skin or explicitly dark brown when portrayed as alive. likewise the skykids are various shades of brown or darker colors. I know y’all can see that.
so with that out of the way
why the fuck would you draw them white?
see, this has always bothered me for the year I’ve been playing Sky and interacting with its online fandom – seen it speckled in Skyblr, in the art channels of Skycord, throughout Twitter, disconcertingly prominent on Instagram – but given how immaturely the Sky community handles confronting any amount of discourse, I never wanted to say anything publicly cos I didn’t want to be on the receiving end of a deluge of harassment this oh so positive and kind playerbase is known for.
then TGC Twitter retweeted a piece of art that whitewashes the ancestor spirits.
deep breath.
I don’t want any of you racist shits to take this as confirmation that it’s somehow acceptable to make the ancestors and skykids white. sure, TGC says a lot of things in this game are “up to interpretation,” but it strikes me so strange that some of y’all look at these darker-skinned characters and immediately go against canon to give them light pink or paper white skin. why is it so hard to draw these darker-skinned characters with the dark skin they have both in game and as how TGC officially depicts them?
I’ve seen several excuses for this:
“I’m humanizing them.” okay and why does this humanization necessitate making them white? why do you have to make these nonhuman characters human? why does your brain immediately go to “white” when considering “human” and not any other palette for the many people of color who make up the majority of the human population?
“I’m projecting onto them.” you can’t project onto characters with dark skin? you don’t find characters with dark skin relatable? that’s quite racist. I, as a black child, often projected or saw myself in pale-skinned characters that dominate the entertainment media I watched growing up. surely it shouldn’t be that hard for white people to see themselves in non-white characters. surely.
“it doesn’t fit my artstyle / I’m not used to drawing POC.” then you are a terrible artist unwilling to challenge yourself or your own biases, unwilling to improve your skills or explore other palettes you may find favorable and attract a larger diverse audience. drawing with another color is not that difficult. if you do find it hard, there are a monumental amount of tutorials on illustrating people of color and darker skin tones out there online for free. you can even color pick from your reference! the only thing stopping you is your racism.
"they’re not human so it can’t be whitewashing.” true, the characters of Sky are not human, they likely don’t have human conceptions of race to them. I’ve been asked before “why are you bringing race into this?” as if I’m the one racializing non-raced characters. look, I wasn’t the one who drew them white. believe it or not, white is a race – it isn’t the “default,” it isn’t a non-race, white is a race. making these non-raced characters white is racializing them, putting race upon them that they do not have. it’s weird. for all you complain about “making everything about race these days,” why go out of your way to portray these humanoid characters with dark skin as white? fun fact: it’s still whitewashing even if the character is not a human being, especially if said character resembles humans of color.
however, I will add that is particularly insulting to see characters with explicitly black hairstyles drawn white. if I see another ancestor or skykid with an afro, afro poof(s), or dreadlocks with pale skin, I am going to bite someone. likewise, the Enchantment spirits take inspiration from Arabic cultures, Flight crew have influence from Inuit and other Northern American indigenous cultures. no, I am not invoking cultural appropriation to condemn your skykids with Lively Navigator’s hair or Cheerful Spectator’s afro or Fire Prophet’s short dreads or Indifferent Alchemist’s turban – that is perfectly okay. it’s the far too many Sky fanartists whitewashing skykids and these ancestors that is the problem.
I’m not demanding you to be canon compliant, I’m asking you to stop whitewashing, to stop erasing the little representation the players of color have overall. we do not often see people who resemble us in Western media very often, especially as the majority of the characters. it’s the same for those who ascribe gender onto these canonically agender characters, contributing to nonbinary erasure, though that is a story for another time.
and this doesn’t even touch on the afro chibi trend (how come this black hairstyle is only ever “cute” when it’s on an infantilized character? and for fucks sake do not call it clown hair or broccoli or, god forbid, cotton) or how Vault Elder’s headscarf is used to make “eggs” or “chickens.” why can’t you appreciate our hair and our headcoverings as just as fashionable as uncovered white hairstyles? why do y’all keep calling POC hair fucking food? if you do it as a joke, it’s still a racist joke. do you know how hard it is for me to exist without white people nonsense as a Black person with an afro irl? don’t get me started on the bullshit hijabi Muslims have to deal with. the best you could do is not mock their appearance.
now there are those of you who have been doing these racist things without really thinking about it. you just drew the ancestors with pale skin cos that’s where your mind goes or you’ve been a silly afro chibi for a while or you drew your white self as a white skykid. reading this, you’re doubling down now cos you don’t think you’re racist, you’re not a raging bigot, you can’t be a *gasp* bad person!
and, yknow what, I don’t think you’re a bad person either. I condemn the actions, not the person (unless you’re an asshole). like you, I grew up in a white supremacist society participating in racist institutions down to the micro level, not questioning what I was taught or socialized even if I was often on the receiving end of microaggressions. but I learned to confront the prejudices that have been socialized in me because they maintain an unjust world that hurts people unnecessarily. even now I am still confronting prejudices that have been ingrained in me because I understand the harm they cause and the oppression they perpetuate, how bullshit have and continue to make the world a hostile place for people of color like myself. I stop doing bigoted things. it’s the least I can do.
surely, you can too.
and for those blokes who are aware of how racist you are and continue to do this shit anyways? fuck you.
sincerely,
a Black Sky player
#sky: children of the light#sky children of the light#that sky game#thatskygame#sky: cotl#me speaking#tw racism
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my question with a lot of the takes that i’ve seen where they want to draw a line somewhere, whether that be at fantasizing or specificity or the takes being boring is like,, do they not read smut? ik some people don’t and that’s obviously fine like don’t read something if you don’t want to read it. but i feel like ive seen a lot of people say “stop having weird boring takes and actually write a fic instead of just fantasizing about it” and i think that’s such a strange take because something tells me not one of those people would be happier having more explicit fics saturate ao3. to me a lot of this feels like people are personally uncomfy with more nsfw content (which again is Obviously fine everyone has their own limits which should be respected and i don’t think anyone who just is saying nah it’s not for me and not making it a moral issue should be called puritans especially cuz sex can be a really sensitive topic for some people and i think those people generally understand the nuances a lot better than others who are throwing out allegations) and want their discomfort validated or maybe just want to understand it more themselves so they jump to one of these limitations. they don’t want to say they’re completely uncomfortable with sex because they’re probably not!! there’s just something that specifically seems to irk them about this situation and they want to publicize that in a way that makes them and anyone else who sees their take feel like they are objectively right and not being mean or against sex. i bet some of them have read smut (for other fandoms or even for byler) and maybe even enjoyed it but maybe felt icky or guilty and they want to justify that and not feel like they’re the weird ones or too sensitive or like kink shaming. i also bet some of them haven’t read any smut and don’t understand that it’s not all self insert (not that there’s anything wrong with that but tbh ive seen none of that on ao3 for byler and ive seen a lot of takes saying people want to have sec with teens and are making self insert fantasies about it when ive seen actually zero evidence of anyone doing that) and that it’s mostly using these characters who we love and project onto as vessels to explore different scenarios (emotional and physical) in a safe place that anyone who knows what they don’t like and knows how to read tags on ao3 won’t be negatively affected by.
(i also just want to say that the take that it’s boring and lazy content is so silly considering head cannons are literally the backbone of any fandom like we are all here to put them in situations we don’t already see them in in canon and “fantasize” about how they would react (except for people might use the word “think” or “speculate” when referring to non explicit head cannons) and also the fact that there’s a non explicit polls account that doesn’t get any flack for posting polls with the same level of frivolousness (not a bad thing, i like them too) and those are allowed to be just good old fun but once you add sex to the mix suddenly everyone only wants content that is serious and exclusively canon relevant)
yes!!!! being uncomfy with smut is fine!!!! but moralizing it and shaming people who do like smut is not fine!!!! all we are asking is for people to mind their own business and take control of curating their online experiences instead of taking it out on people for making content they don't like!!!
and yes!!! why are headcanons considered gross sexualized fantasies? like to me so much of sex is psychological so when i'm talking about kinks or who likes x thing more or what their sexual dynamic is like.... to me that's just another level of analysis and examining the character.
nothing further to add because i 100000000% agree to all of the above. thank you for the message!
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22nd March ‘24 - [arch] Mad About Munch, Warm-up sketches and daaarknesss???
Good evening, Shri! I forgot that it is Friday, but at the beginning of writing this, I have an hour and 27 minutes until Friday is over, so I WILL be on time!
Wow, like a lot has happened? But I also don’t have tons to show for it. (it’s because I’m working on cool secret project that I’m not allowed to talk about which is fun!)
Stuff i have been doing
Museums :0!!!! I have been travelling and in my old age apparently, I like old art now???
Gathering a lot of reference images - photos, but also general inspiration
Finally organising my digital space a bit! I backed up like 3 years' worth of Procreate images and cleared out half my iPad
Getting some of my sketchbooks, especially comic development, digitised and onto Google Slides! I follow a similar process to when I was at uni still, with a huge PowerPoint for a project that contains reference images, inspiration, plot bullet points, and links to google docs where I write the scripts, development sketches and finals. It makes it super easy to go back to important parts of the development and be reminded of things I might have lost in the development process
Warm-up sketches because you bullied me into it (affectionate)
Continuing to explore colour
2 things I would like to tell you more about:
1) Edvard Munch!!!!!!
If you ever get the chance to visit the Munch Museum in Oslo, do it!! I hadn’t seen a whole museum dedicated to one guy before, but seeing so much of his work in one place, in person really helped me understand it better. They also had a fantastic audio tour to rent that made it super accessible. I had just come from thinking about colour last week and becoming more comfortable with darker colours, and I had been thinking about personality and narrative in settings and backgrounds - both of which he does really well. In particular, The Sick Child, Eye in Eye, and The Sun stood out to me.
2) Play. AGAIN!!!!!
I feel like I’m constantly having to fight myself, reminding myself to let go, play around, and explore without the expectation of a final outcome. You told me to try some 20 min warm-up and cool-down sketches - which I’ve been doing and has been going great! They’re not all perfect and aren’t supposed to be, but I’ve also had some really fun outcomes that wouldn’t have happened otherwise. I also feel like I’m getting more of a grip on colour :0
Plus, I’ve found that I haven’t wanted to post my terrible sketches or even my better ones?? Which has been nice to make without the need for sharing. However, I have found myself craving a final image to share with all of Tumblr and Instagram, thinking of possible images that would do well on those platforms. I think there is a small part of me that wants to create those because it would be fun, but I think it’s mostly to fix the number-shaped hole :/ Hank Green made a good video which mentioned the fact that platforms are EXTRA BAD with teaching creators to be addicted to them, even more so than consumers. Video here. It’s good.
I was listening to the Imp and Skizz podcast earlier (Episode - Rendog pt 1), it’s a great podcast, they chat about Hermitcraft a bit but mostly about what being alive is like and being a creator, I really recommend them too. Anyway, Skizz said he was once told to ‘create videos that he wanted to watch.’ And I think it’s a good approach to have when creating. What do I wanna see/ read?
I would love to chat to you about the balance between dark tones and silliness in storytelling too, but it is 11pm and I do have to get up early tomorrow. Plus, I’m not sure I have enough thoughts yet. But for now, it’s left me thinking: what do I want to make? Am I campable of silliness in stories? I want to tell stories with an undertone of darkness, that discusses difficult themes, but how to we do that while keeping it entertaining and not just Too Much(™)?
I dunno, just thoughts I’ve been having. I wanna get them down, even if I don’t have any solutions yet. In the meantime, please accept these sketchbook pages in lieu of philosophical answers.
Thank you for listening to my rambles once again!
Love <3 Archie
Ps. I saw Frozen the musical and it was Very Sibling, and I cried. It made me think of you and I think you would like it (it’s only a bit different to the film but it makes such a difference omg)
#archillustrates#arch is learning#project development#art#art process#art resource#process#artists on tumblr#illustration#small art blog#art blog#illustration blog#queer artists on tumblr#illustrator#book illustrator#queer illustrator#comic artist#comic art#female artists on instagram#artists on instagram#procreate#digital artwork#digital artist#artist blog#artist on tumblr#tumblr art blog#art on tumblr
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what do you like most about writing each south park character?
Oh MAN I love this question! I’ve only ever written from the perspectives of Stan, Kyle, Kenny, Cartman, Butters/Marjorine, Craig, and Tweek, so I’ll be focusing on those seven!
Stan I adore making him a massive simp like ohhhh my god Stanley Down Bad Marsh my son hes kind of a loser sometimes and we love him for it! He’s definitely one of my favorites to write and I project onto him a good deal and have a few running gags with him, like a lot of the time I put him in clothes that I actually wear, have him reference media I enjoy, make him vegetarian every single time, just… Stan. What an icon. I love when he’s just so Done with the shenanigans around him too lmao
Kyle is my other favorite, easy, like he lends himself out so well to serve as the voice of reason and there’s so much to do with his character over every au! The majority of my Kyles are very empathetic to a fault, mostly idealistic in their worldview, very introspective, which is super fun to explore! It’s also fun to delve into his hypercritical side, when he portrays a false confidence that he doesn’t feel, when he’s everyone’s go-to. I really enjoy writing style because like yeah they’re in love, but they’re best friends at the root of that, and it’s important to me that their relationship is built off that bond.
Kenny! Dude Kenny is such an inherently complex character, whether you factor in the immortality or not, but he’s so interesting because he’s kind of a comic relief character on the surface, but holds this deep melancholy. He’s another favorite of mine to write and I have so many headcanons for him, like how he’s incredibly good at reading people, super good at making friends and cheering people up. Also I LOVE making Kenny unhinged as shit, like he is my vessel for inappropriate jokes and out of pocket comments, just so much eccentricity because he deserves it damnit! King shit. Or princess shit, perhaps ;)
Ok Cartman, I had SO many hang ups writing Cartman when I first started. I had absolutely no clue how to tackle him, because I don’t really like writing truly evil characters, and when I was super new to sp fanfiction I thought that was the only way I could really do him, that or leave him out. But YALL!!!!!! Once I realized I could write him as actually caring for his friends but just being an abrasive fuckwad for the hell of it, everything changed!!! He is SO GODDAMN FUN TO WRITE like the Cartmanisms are delightful to come up with and he is EASILY one of my favorite characters to include now! His commentary is fucking hilarious and he will deadass just say anything, I can’t BELIEVE I spent so long avoiding writing him bc he’s a blast and the most unserious guy you will ever meet also he absolutely reads fanfiction that guy is devouring dead doves. One of these days I’ll make a list of my favorite cartmanisms I’ve written.
Butters/Marj, so I don’t necessarily have more of an attachment to either version, but I think my favorite thing about writing them is the speech pattern! Butters has more of a hesitant way of talking and that’s honestly super fun to translate into writing. I like making them a really nurturing character, like as the station medic in ATLCTS, but also pretty gullible to shit like pyramid schemes like in the OrangeJuiceVerse. Another character that I hesitated to write from for a hot minute because I wasn’t sure how I wanted to go about it, but Butters/Marjorine is really fun to switch up the rhythm of the prose!
BY FAR my favorite thing about writing Craig is giving him pointless beef with Stan, like when this mf does not care about shit except his bf and stripe it’s so fucking funny to me. In In The Truly Gruesome I had SUCH a blast making him so quick with the comebacks and the nonchalance like bruh he is so damn funny for no reason that’s probably one of my favorite Craigs I’ve written. His relationships with people in his life are really cool to explore too, like in the later OJV he’s really good friends with Kyle, and their differences in personality that au are super cool to work with!
Similar to Butters, Tweek is fun to write because of the distinct speech and thinking pattern! His prose, the slight stutter and hesitation, like you can tell when it’s Tweek talking. That’s part of the reason I alternated chapters in Broken Bottles From Apartment 2 between him and Kyle, because of the juxtaposition of their ways of thinking and talking. Whereas Kyle is concise and deliberate, Tweek is more scattered and sporadic, which is an interesting contrast!
Aight man that’s it for this ask, I hope I made some semblance of sense, thank u for asking about this!!!
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First of all, congrats on destroying the BIG TOP! So to speak. (I'd ask if you could give it to me but they haven't invented that technology yet). Secondly, since you asked for Asks, what got you so into Norma as a character? I wanna compare and contrast. :V
hahaha THANK YOU! some day modern medicine will unlock the secret to equivalent exchange… some day
anyway, great ask because i Always have stuff to say about Norma. putting it under the cut for length (although to be fair, if you don’t want to see lengthy impassioned essays about Norma i’m not really sure why you’re following me in the first place)
first of all: i unapologetically like women who kinda suck. listen, okay, listen, i absolutely understand that the line between “fun to dislike” and “just obnoxious” is different for everyone but Norma falls entirely on the fun side for me. from her very first appearance, she’s so unnecessarily petty and snarky and competitive with this ten-year-old she literally just met, and i can’t lie i just find it incredibly entertaining. and also, y’know, i think she sucks but in a way that’s ultimately harmless and also so believable. she’s not a terrible person, she’s just a shitty teenager. i’m a Norma apologist, not in the “she did nothing wrong <3” way but the “yeah she’s mean but that’s what’s interesting about her” way. give me more female characters who are complicated and unlikable and make bad decisions!
secondly: she’s a shitty obnoxious know-it-all teenager, and boy, do i relate! maybe part of this is filling in the gaps and part of it is projection, but i look at her and i see someone with the compulsive need to “win” every conversation and prove they’re the smartest person in the room; someone who clings to their model student status because deep down they’re afraid it’s the only worthwhile trait they have, the single thing that makes them anything more than a useless waste of space with no friends and no redeeming qualities. characters who are jerks or bullies are really interesting to dive into for me, because there’s always something underneath that. Norma’s combination of annoying pretentiousness and deep insecurity is really compelling to me, and a lot of it is because i see my younger self in her. i feel like i really grok her as a character, and because of that i find her interesting to explore and write for!
thirdly, the big thing that drew me to her the same as it did the other interns was, ironically, their lack of screentime. PN2 has one too many ensemble casts, and individual development for some of the characters feels rushed, and i am first in line saying i wish we’d gotten more intern content. but what we did get was just enough to pull me in and hook me on the characters. the game left me wanting more, and honestly that’s what drove me to write so much fic of the intern cast in the first few months after release. they were so charming and felt so underutilised and i was desperate for more from them – and at the same time, because they had fairly little screentime they made a great starting point to develop further with headcanons and filling in the blanks and just turning them over in my head and imagining what could have been. what really gets my creative juices flowing is taking something from canon and building on it with my own stuff (which is also why i’ve gotten so invested in the future AU!), and the interns all have such strong concepts and starting points while also giving a lot of freedom to develop them and flex my own creative muscles.
like, i was thinking about why i never really got into the psychic 7 in the same way, and i think it does just come down to them being more fleshed-out characters in comparison. which feels so funny to say, haha – i love the old people’s club, they’re great, but i never latched onto them like i did the interns, and i think it’s because they don’t have the same fill-in-the-blanks potential. we get to learn about their backstories in pretty great detail, we get to explore 6/7 of their minds, and they all feel very succinctly developed but in a way that ties a bow pretty neatly on most of their characters. we learn so much less about any of the interns in comparison, but those unanswered questions just end up tickling my creative brain that much more. there’s a theory that people engage in transformative fanwork to give them the kind of engagement they didn’t get from the canon, and i think that’s definitely true here! maybe there’s an alternative universe out there where we got way more intern content and i never ended up writing any fics with them in, hahaha
#honestly? i don't even know if she's my /favourite/ intern#that would probably be adam#but she's definitely the one i find most interesting and most fun to write for#also i totally get why people dislike her but when i see people posting norma hate it's a straight-up instablock#like sorry you don't understand or appreciate flawed female characters. seems like a you problem#i should really draw her again. it's been too long. i miss my horrible swagless daughter#ask
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devlog 17: things my therapist told me
the script for TSTW is still coming along. the first couple of scenes are the most sensitive ones because they effectively have to hook the reader when little has happened in the story, so I can confidently say that those 8 scenes have been polished enough that I don’t have to worry about them anymore. Now, the main plot begins.
here’s the soundtrack for the rest of this devlog:
youtube
I don’t think there could ever be a fully professional way to talk about the things that heavily affected you as a kid. As an adult, I had to wrestle with the fact that there’s never really a good time to talk about feelings and be happy. There’s always someone in the world suffering more than you, someone dying and something terrible happening to the children of a country being genocided by zionism (free palestine).
Today I’m going to talk about the themes at play in “The criminal mastermind’s pocket diary”, the project I’m working on while writing the script for my other comic, which is coming along well. While a lot of what I’m going to talk about will pale in comparison to the suffering of others in the world, I find it valuable to remember that in order to fight the dragons that plague the world we must confront and quell the evil within each and every one of us.
With that in mind, one thing I haven’t mentioned about the central point of killouette is that in more than one way, her experience is very much my own. Growing up in Beyrouth it seemed like there was one of three options: you’re either born with money in which case your safety can be bought via being in safer areas and schools, or you’re in a middle/lower class area where you’re stuck with the other two choices. One is to pass the time on the street and acquire the culture thereof, the other is to be an indoor kid. My parents, who had good intentions, decided that the best course of action to not have me become a thug was to never let me leave the house except to go to school or family outings. Combine that with a poor financial situation and a tiny house, it meant that growing up I didn’t have the internet, and could rarely take up the space required to do activities. Doing something as simple as reading a book was complicated because most of our books were stored in the sofas which were designed to maximize what we could do in our tiny house. It doesn’t end there, you see my mother has always been a clean freak, so she valued tidiness over most other things. Now imagine all that for a second. An understimulated child, often told they’re “gifted” who could never explore the world or do many things inside either. you can see how that’s a recipe for someone with the personality of a blank sheet of printer paper.
It’s not all doom and gloom though. I still had some fun because I, in addition to being cursed with the gifted label, had an overactive imagination. So the underside of beds became forts, and broken appliances became experiments. The few friends I had at school became a window into the outside… I eventually became a normal human being but there’s something about that entire period in my life that made me feel very bitter towards my parents. Why were you throwing your anxieties onto me? Why couldn’t I just join the scouts? Why couldn’t I stay over at a friend’s house for longer than two hours? Looking back at all of that having gone to therapy I’m thankful for it. I don’t think I would have fallen madly in love with the craft of comics had it not been for me overcompensating for all those missed years. Part of me really wants to heal that inner kid in my head who still wishes for some adventure though. That’s killouette.
Killouette’s parents are much like mine. Not evil, just a little overprotective. Projecting just enough that it’ll seep into killouette’s behavior as an adult. But now, as a kid, I’m giving her something that I wished I had when I was a child: privacy and space. Killouette has her own room and her parents don’t feel the need to constantly police her as long as she’s in there. That might not seem like much, but I think that would be enough for a smart kid to do some pretty amazing things.
you may have also noticed that Killouette doesn’t have any noteworthy character flaws, and it should be obvious at this point that the goal of me making this is in part to empower her. With that being said I am fully aware that while my experience is relatively common, it’s far from universal. This is why the cast is so varied: each child represents to some extent a different way of growing up. I can’t do them all sadly, but I think the grounds will be covered pretty well with what we have.
there’s also other kids to consider, so I have some things I want to explore with them as well. I don’t want to spoil too much but here’s a quick fire round: Talbas has anger issues because of neglect and video games. bata has well meaning parents but the constant taunting and threats of being sent to far away places cause anxiety in the way she acts. motsik has the most ass, dogshit parents. 0/10 not having a good time. abuse central, destination anywhere else. falefil is spoiled and his parents haven’t taught him certain things about respect and money. that tends to influence his behavior. zmik is the closest to killouette, except he is a version of her closer to me allowed to leave the house. he’s included in the cast partially as a way for me to extent empathy to a younger me, but also for anyone who might be going through something similar to what i did as a kid. lastly there’s claude. claude is for all intents and purposes, if we were to put her in a realistic framework, some weird mish mash of immigrant and orphan child genius. i imagine claude would experience some alienation from some people, but i’m not worried about the story getting sidetracked since her friends have her back and the adults in the story are losers anyways.
On a more general note, I’ve been noticing how my approach to writing has been evolving to suit whatever project I'm currently working on. It was weird at first cause I thought a writing technique is something that you’re just stuck with. With prior comics for example the main concern was always “how do I portray what’s happening in the most raw way possible” whereas with TSTW it’s more “let’s try to be more efficient with the framing of the ideas, as long as it feels right”. With Killouette, it’s not about showing things in the most realistic way possible because if that was the case, for starters this amount of genius kids would not be two buildings apart in some suburb in beyrouth and killouette would not be able to hide the amount of things she does. but that’s not the point. a bunch of what happens in the story could happen with real kids in real life, and the point of the book is to capture a young sense of ambition and wonder. the type of mischief that leaves you laughing and being impressed instead of wondering what’s happening in the world. I’m not here to tell you about kids committing actual awful actions, I'm here to show you kids having a good time despite it all. that nothing can stop life and the desire for it.
If the kids of Palestine can still find it in them to laugh and have fun, the least I can do is have some imaginary abused kids triumph over their circumstances.
next week, we’ll be improvising some doodads and seeing how we can recycle previous unused work.
devlog updates on Tuesdays.
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i would honestly love to hear you talk more about fukuzawa and moris relationship. i don’t know if you have any particular thoughts about their dynamic, but if you do, i would love to hear it!
Their relationship is really interesting. I think about them a lot actually, but I’m not quite sure I can properly articulate my thoughts. I’m always kind of thinking about Mori, though, he’s such an interesting character.
Ah, I need to re-read the manga and finish reading the Untold Origins of the Armed Detective Agency, because some of my memory of them is kind of vague and my opinions kind of undefined, but yeah.
I wonder if they actually were friends? Because if I remember correctly, Yosano said they were but she changed that, but their relationship was always vaguely hostile. But it was a lot friendlier before the Yosano incident. Now I think Fukuzawa hates Mori, and Mori’s still bitter about the whole thing with her.
Something I want to know more about is each of their relationships with Natsume and how it relates to the tripartite pact. Because how do they know him? It seems like an important and personal relationship for both of them, so how exactly did they meet this guy? I’m reading The Untold Origins of The Armed Detective Agency right now, so I might get some answers on Fukuzawa’s relationship with Natsume there, (might be a while until I finish it tho, I take forever to read books I’m actually interested in bc I stop every five minutes to pace around my room and think about it), so I won’t speculate too hard on him for now. But I think Mori’s relationship with Natsume is where the real interesting implications lie.
I don’t think I’m the first one to have said this, but part of me believes Natsume pressured Mori into leading the mafia. Because like, why was Mori so adamant that he needed to take over now? Like maybe it was for personal gain, but that doesn’t really fit into Mori’s whole “I’m doing this for the city” thing. Also Natsume is the Mori and Dazai of the first iteration of soukoku, of course he was pulling some strings there.
Cursed thought, but do you think Mori and Fukuzawa were both trying to recreate their dynamic in some way? Like Mori with soukoku and Fukuzawa subconsciously with Dazai and Kunikida? Sometimes I think so. Because I do think Dazai reminds Fukuzawa of Mori to some extent. And Chuuya reminds Mori of Fukuzawa apparently. And Mori projects onto Dazai. So intensely. (Which is one of the main reasons I feel like Mori probably has his own tragic backstory and trauma to deal with. Also Because most characters in bsd do.) But Fukuzawa doing it isn’t that likely I guess.
Their place as seemingly the original soukoku is really interesting in general. And all the parallels there are so fun.
Also I think there’s some parallels between Fukuzawa’s relationship with Ranpo and Mori’s relationship with Dazai that I find fascinating.
Just whole tangled web that Natsume set up with them and the tripartite pact is so… I love it and I hope it’s explored more one day. (Also Taneda!)
Oh! Also I think they might team up again soon. Against Fukuchi. Because damn, Fukuzawa has never had a decent friendship in his life apparently.
This prompt led me onto several mental tangents that I made into other posts because they don’t really make sense to put here, but I have more thought but they’re all vaguely related.
#thanks for the ask!#this is disorganized bc I wrote it in like five different sittings#and I certainly didn’t write this in order#bsd mori ougai#bsd fukuzawa#bsd natsume#bsd dazai osamu#bsd kunikida doppo#bsd port mafia#bsd yosano#bsd chuuya
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Invisibill bingo? Invisibingo?
INVISIBILL !!!!!!!
They are SO COOL LOOKING!! -
INVISIBILL’S SENSE OF STYLE IS SO COOL!!! He has such transmasc swag and it oozes from every inch of him like he’s a blueberry jelly donut. There is something about the way he dresses and inspired his sense of style on the Victorian era that SCREAMS gay trans man and it is SO fucking cool. His sense of style is UNMATCHED bro. All that time in the closet DID GOOD FOR HIM, he didn’t waste a MOMENT of time in there. Fashion icon.
Everyone is wrong about them but me -
I didn’t mark this one off because it doesn’t apply, but I wanted to talk about it because I LOVE seeing people who have a bunch of invisibill thoughts and headcanons !!! It’s so interesting for me; I’ve voluntarily chosen to digest his character through the lens of other people and their perceptions of Bill because, to me, it’s most fun to get to know him that way!! (I do have a couple HCS though; most of these are not only commonly held by other people but they’re practically already canon in the show anyway; he is a gay, trans man with ADHD ok I love him a lot)
Wasted Potential -
WE DIDNT GET ENOUGH OF INVISIBILL!!! The show wasted him; not in a bad way, but in the unintentional way where he was underutilized. He’s extremely interesting character-wise and extremely interesting ability-wise!! He should’ve been a more prominent villain I think.
They’re like a blorbo to me -
HIM. He. I don’t know what else to say but he is so round and soft and I want to hug him and also help comfort and assist him on the long, difficult road get an ADHD diagnosis because he means so much to me.
They’re deeper than they seem -
invisibill’s behavior and demeanor hints at there being something bigger going on under the surface. We don’t know anything about his childhood or his family (as far as I know I’m the show’s canon anyway), and the way he reacts to things, his personality, his flaws and his actions hint very heavily at there being something in his adolescence or previous experiences that influenced the way he is. I want to know more about it! A lot of the time these insecurities are played for a bit, which can be funny but ultimately undermines his character. I want to explore him more and know more about him so bad!!!!
I like them enough to project my own issues onto them -
I don’t know if it counts as projecting because it’s practically canon at this point, but a lot of the neurodivergent traits he exhibits in the show are things that resonate heavily with me !! There are also a lot of headcanons developed by the fanbase that match my own experiences, and so I’ve begun assigning those to him as well!!
They got done dirty by the fans -
ok, part of me agrees with this because I do believe that invisibill is severely underrated and underutilized by both the fanbase and the show; but another part of me really only marked this bingo square off because I wanted to talk about something in a similar vein. I feel like a large piece of who invisibill is was curated by the fanbase, actually!! There’s a kind-of niche part of the fanbase that creates content for him, and though I wish it was larger (hence the “got done dirty by fans” bit), a lot of the character as I know him was created by that group! So honestly, even though I agree with him being “done dirty” with how under-appreciated I sometimes feel he is, I would also argue that he was developed amazingly and well loved by fans! It can apply both ways, I think.
Didn’t get enough screen time -
Bill absolutely did NOT get enough screen time, and was underutilized in the plot (in my opinion). He can turn invisible!!! He has an interesting personal life!! His demeanor is captivating and his character is extremely lovable!! He absolutely should’ve gotten more screen time and attention in the show itself. (I feel like I could say that about a lot of the characters in WG, which I guess is probably due to the fact that there’s such a vast array of interesting, engaging characters!! I long for almost each and every single character to have been given more time to be fleshed out on-screen; but I feel that, even if wordgirl wasn’t cancelled prematurely, and no matter how long the show would have ran, I would still feel this way! I just can’t get enough of these characters; and even if Wordgirl was 100+ seasons long, I bet that I would still long for these characters to have more time on-screen.)
I want to carry them in a handbag like a tiny dog -
I think invisibill would have a blast being carried around like that in a little bag. I also think it would be fun to hear him blurt out random little things he would see as we went places.
Why do they look like that -
(/affectionate, /pos) HE. I’ve already talked about bill’s transmasc swagger previously in this post, but I’m going to continue to talk about it because his appearance absolutely warrants it. There are so many tiny things about him, excluding his overall theme and aesthetic, contributing to his character and his look that I just love. I adore how dinky his hair is, his dorky little middle part, and the way that the lines of his hair swoop to form it’s overall shape. I like how the shade of his hair is light brown verging on blonde, and how it matches the brown of his vest and compliments the red of his necktie (they’re all brown, so they’re all similar hues forming a common color theme in his design; but the color of his hair and his vest are more yellow-toned, unlike the necktie which is more red-toned. It makes his design cohesive as well as diverse!!). I like how the outline of his torso shares a similar swoop as his hair does, and that it’s wider on top than it is at his stomach and waist. I like how his face is slightly longer and bigger in comparison to his body and neck than it would be if it was proportionate, and how his thin, rounded nose shares a similar length in comparison to the rest of his face—I think that both of these traits contribute greatly to how he’s characterized; the uneven shape communicating his clumsiness. His torso being wider at the top and his head being a bit too big for his neck gives him a sense of imbalance, like he could tip over at any moment.—I like how his arms are rubbery, soft, and look a bit limp, and how they sometimes flail about in a way that shows his uncoordinated, all-over-the-place personality. He’s really well designed and it makes me so happy!
Im mentally ill about them -
I am sitting here writing an entire essay-length post on TUMBLR MOTHERFUCKING DOT COM about this gay little cartoon character; I think that’s enough evidence in favor of my brainrot for him. If that’s not enough, though, I spent most of one of my drivers ed classes doodling him and sneaking glances at my phone to look at a reference photo. I am very much mentally ill over this little dude.
They work best as part of a dynamic -
I crossed out the best because I didn’t want to undermine his individual character. Invisibill works just as well in a dynamic as his own individual character. Watching him in a group, a pair, and on his own is always entertaining! I also feel like his relationship and dynamic with BLHG showcases Bill and his personality just as much as the times he’s presented on his own!
They’ve never done anything wrong in their entire life -
look at him. Do you really think this man could do anything wrong? Ever?? Really?? He literally looks like how eating cookie crunch for the first time as a child feels.
Anyway sorry this took so long for me to reply to, I wanted to use this question as a prompt to doodle him a bit lol :)) here he is!! I doodled these silly little fucks in drivers Ed this week and it was SO fuckin fun :)
#wordgirl#wordgirl fandom#wordgirl pbs#invisibill#wordgirl invisibill#invisibill wordgirl#wordgirl blhg#blhg#big left hand guy
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Heyyy 👋🏼 If you feel like talking about it, im wondering what your thoughts are on the mash timeloop fan theory/lens of viewing the show? Assuming youve heard of it around mashblr, if not i'll comment again to explain.
Thanks for asking!
Honestly lol my answer might be kind of boring because I'm not really all that into it?
I'm not completely sure why actually. I totally get where it comes from - Mash has a completely nonsensical timeline and there are some meta jokes about it and references to the war going on forever etc. It's an easy lens to jump to.
I guess maybe I don't really get into it because it takes something that I prefer to see as like, some cutesy references to the fact that the show lasted longer than the actual war, as well as a minor thematically appropriate addition to the "war is hell" theme through suggesting that it feels drawn out and that they're stuck there forever, and gives it centre stage by turning it into a full-blown tangible allegory.
And idk, the subjective experience of time is just not the aspect of the war trauma theme that I find the most interesting, and not the one I'd pick as a big significant metaphor. It just doesn’t compel me.
There’s also an aspect to the fanon that I think is kind of rooted in like... taking incidental aspects of a narrative and projecting them onto the text in a meta sense? Like all those ‘these characters were always dead, you can’t escape the narrative, every story is a ghost story’ vibes, where the inherent functions of narrative are given meaning. And unless the text is already quite meta - moreso than Mash, which is not notably meta imo especially compared to a lot of sitcoms - that whole way of looking at fiction also kinda leaves me cold. So taking the way the show ran 11 years and has continuity issues and the characters have no agency bc they’re fictional and giving that significance within the context of the story just isn’t really my thing. This is a bit more broad than just the time loop lens but I’ve definitely seen time loop takes with this kind of vibe so I think it’s related at least.
It's funny because I'm actually a big fan of groundhog day fics as a trope, but I'm not really that into them in Mash fandom. Maybe... well I like groundhog day fics because they're fun, they're a good way to explore a character and a relationship, and I enjoy fics where a ridiculous premise is taken seriously, which groundhog day fics tend to be. A mundane canon with a magical fic premise that just rolls with it and only concerns itself with how the characters realistically react to it is my jam.
But the whole timeloop Mash fanon is more about an allegory for trauma and... I guess I'm just not that interested in that vibe lol. It doesn't have the fun stuff I want from groundhog day fics ime, and it's not my preferred way of delving into the trauma theme, I suppose.
This is of course just my own personal taste. A lot of people really get something out of the time loop metaphor and I think that's awesome. I definitely don’t want to knock anyone who’s into it, I think it’s a totally legit and pretty creative and cool way of reinterpreting the story and exploring some of its themes. It just doesn't really land with me and my preferences wrt fiction and analysis, at least from what I’ve seen in the fandom so far.
What do you think of it?
#btw i'm kinda sitting on a bj's narrative arc post until i finish watching season 11 which i need to get back to#but it's on my mind and will happen eventually#marley on mash#mash gen#text post#also lol i say i'm not sure why and then write a bunch of paragraphs#but i was navelgazing in real time while writing this
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Oh you know I'll take the opportunity to ask about vampires!! Can you tell me a little bit about the worldbuilding when it comes to vampire powers, weaknesses, and origins?
I would absolutely love to!! Also thank u for asking you know I love u @antique-symbolism I hope you’re having a FANTASTIC day 💖
So this project actually started as a bit (I never once intended for it to be my thesis but here we are, oops) when my fiancée and I were watching Lost Boys because she had never seen it (I’ve loved the movie for a while bc you can pry any non-twilight vampire media out of my cold dead hands)
That being said, a lot of the lore is very similar to Lost Boys! I’ve removed the idea of half-vampires and head vampires because that’s too complicated for this little novella, but essentially: sunlight=bad, sleep during the day (maybe they hang upside down like bats, just for fun), and to become one, not only do you have to be bitten, but you have to drink some of their blood as well. Very different from the Fool of Death Vampires, hahahahahahah
As far as powers go, they’re incredibly wildly strong, have WICKED GOOD eyesight/hearing/smell (the whole first scene involves them being Too Good at Carrie’s balloon popping carnival game) and as long as it’s night outside, they’re able to turn into bats and fly around. Also: they’re able to eat and enjoy regular human food, it just doesn’t give them any sort of nourishment, they simply must drink blood to live (that being said though, if they starve themselves they won’t DIE, they’ll just go starvation-crazy and end up probably murdering a bunch of people.) And we know I’m weak for a “these vampires are too sexy for their own good” moment, so they are obviously incredibly attractive (for whatever 1980’s standard they need to be at the time lmao)
Now, origins: Delilah is the oldest one out of the group, and she was turned in the early/mid 1800’s by her older sister, Leah. Leah kinda manipulated her into it, we don’t really get into it in the actual story (might write a short story based around it, tbh) but Delilah (being incredibly pissed off that her sister tricked her into this) killed Leah and decided to go and create her own family, because obviously her old family wasn’t one she could trust. Hence the arrival of the other girls, Judith being the youngest having only been turned in about 1945. They’re all in love and incredibly happy, even if they argue sometimes. They balance each other out.
Also, a fun tidbit: their names weren’t originally Delilah, Esther, Rebekah, Maggie, and Judith. They decided together as a group to all change their names, and they picked names for each other and all went biblical to be dramatic!!
The story doesn’t have much to do with killing them at all, it’s mainly an exploration of their humanity, however if you DID want to, decapitation is the way to do it! Not much else will work on these hardy motherfuckers
Thank you for letting me brain-dump onto your ask!! I hope this answered your questions and of course I loved getting the chance to talk about them ❤️🩸
#about the author#writeblr#my writing#my wips#lost boys wip#ask the author#antique-symbolism-main#writing#writing community#thesis#my ocs
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@called-kept I deleted your ask from forever ago before I decided to answer it... *pensiverat* but I think you asked 9, 10, 11!
9. Do you project onto characters in your work?
Project? I’m not sure what this means, honestly. I do get invested in their stories, and I’m emotionally attached to them. I do, I admit, use the drama of their stories to work through my own emotions, especially when I’m in the low points of my mental up-and-down. And I tend to put a lot of my own personality into main characters. But they’re their own people. They have their own backgrounds, their own motivations. Thaddeus is the closest to me, personality-wise, but even he makes choices I would never make, and not just because he’s more courageous. And some of my characters, like Toad, are VERY unlike me.
I do my best to honor my characters’ stories, not just make them puppets. Here is something important about my writing process: if I start thinking of a character as a tool, a symbol, or a puppet, the story falls apart. I just can’t do it. I can’t write allegorically. I NEED to think of the characters as real. I cannot force myself to care about a character who I can’t believe has a whole entire life enough to write about them. I can’t do it.
(I don’t enjoy reading allegories, usually. The Man Who Was Thursday is the one exception, and I still find it grating that it’s somewhat allegorical. I think that’s not bad, just the way God made me. God’s thought is exceedingly broad, as Kaylie would say. Or, it takes all kinds to make a world, as mom might say. I can appreciate allegories intellectually, but I just don’t enjoy it.)
10. What’s something you’d like to explore in your writing but haven’t had the chance yet?
Nonhuman characters. I want to get deeper into fantasy than I have yet. The Strange Redemption and Toad Story are fabulous, but I would like to get deeper into the fantasy genre, if you know what I mean. I adore things like six-legged alien biology and intricate sci-fi android mechanics and sentient spaceships and dragons and sentient mushroom caverns and so on. What does it mean to be an embodied being? How do our bodies affect how we think? And inter-species relationships (NOT IN A WEIRD WAY UGH) are a lot of fun.
11. What’s one of the best pieces of writing advice you’ve ever received (or had to learn on your own?)
To complete a writing project requires many, many factors to be correct, not all of them in your control. If you don’t have a story idea AND writing skill AND time to write AND desire to write AND something that I call “brainspace”, no amount of force of will can make you pump out a novel in a year.
I felt pretty bad about not writing a novel by the time I was seventeen. And then I took a look at my life and realized: I had an idea, I had writing skill, I had time (debatably), I had desire, but I was living a stressful life and I did not have brainspace. I had to have space to heal and get some emptiness in my brain before I could write. All of what I did then built up the compost pile I draw from in writing; the reading, the bits of writing I did, the living, walking, cooking, researching psychology... I just needed to be in a healthier moment in my life to finish a project.
Have compassion with yourself.
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Week in Review
11/19/2023 – 11/25/2023
Sunday
It’s great to see a more light-hearted/silly arc in Undead Unluck after Rip’s action-heavy one. And I’m soooo happy to see the little Agoo bunny girl again…and now I want ramen.
AGHHHH WOW CIPHER ACADEMY’S ANNIVERSARY COLOR PAGE IS SO COOL Some of the hair color choices are a little…but I’m just so happy to see Cipher Academy’s continued success. Here’s to many more years! Also wow Iwasaki’s such an incredible artist…not only is the cover page a big spread with a lot of characters, we’re also getting this army of Dekiai-chans in the chapter itself. I also love all the variations in Dekiai-chan designs, especially the Judge Dekiai-chan with her twintail scales. Super cute. The little Tayutan moments were also super cute. And the Toshusai backstory!!! Agh!!!! And the foreshadowing to Iroha having to face his own past!! AGHH!!!!
I do wonder about how long Cipher Academy will end up being. Since the beginning of its serialization, I’ve been scared about it getting an early cancellation because of its niche premise, but I’ve held onto hope that Nisioisin’s name being attached to the project would lend it some credence…and now that it’s survived a year and getting color pages and merchandise, I’m more at ease about it. But even then, I don’t think it’ll necessarily last a super super long time – they’re already on their way to the 50 billion morg that was laid out at the very beginning of the series, and we’re finally getting some insight and backstories for characters who have previously alluded our understanding. I can totally see Iroha facing some sort of final boss and maybe a twist or two before obtaining the morg in the digital Cipher Academy and save the battlefield dancer before the series just comes to a natural end. (And selfishly, if Cipher Academy ended up being like a 10 volume series, it’d be more appealing for VIZ to print physically and then I could collect the whole thing…). But on the other hand, there’s definitely room for expansion beyond the actual Cipher Academy (perhaps even to actual wars), so who knows. For now, I’m grateful for what we’ve gotten, and I just hope that Nisioisin and Iwasaki can create the story to their satisfaction.
Perhaps this week will be a record for the shortest Manga Sunday ever…
Monday
Watched the new episode of Make Some Noise and it was pretty fun but generally unmemorable. This group of comedians just maybe didn’t have the right synergy for me.
Tuesday
I read the first two chapters of At Summer’s End because they just got added to the Manga Plus app and the art style looked intriguing. It’s definitely of those quiet and subtle mangas, and the tone is refreshing, but the story itself didn’t really grab me so I don’t think I’ll continue.
I’m glad to get more insight into Nayuta and her motivations in the new Chainsaw Man chapter. It seems that being reborn didn’t necessarily curb her instinct to hold power over those she doesn’t care about – loving her is fine and good, but Denji really needs to teach this kid some empathy.
House M.D. Party time: the first episode was bad and unmemorable, the second episode was kind of bad but at least in an interesting way. First of all, I don’t care about Chase/Cameron so their scenes meant nothing to me. Second, I liked Thirteen and Wilson interacting but I didn’t like her convincing him to go date a woman. What happened to wlw/mlm solidarity, Thirteen!! Third, I hated the Foreman and Taub scenes because I feel like they had no idea what kind of dynamic or conversation they would have so they made them take drugs and do goofy stuff and I hate it! It felt so out of character…and it could’ve been a great opportunity to actually explore this dynamic but they just tossed it away. Fourth, the House scenes were okay. Fifth, the kid brother is right about naming the baby Toadette. It’s a better name than Walker, in any case. And also it’s kind of hilarious how the baby plot basically had no real culprit behind it (the nurse having seizures is a blameless culprit) or anything that would’ve made the incident interesting, so it was purely there to facilitate the bottle episode, huh? At least they took this opportunity to be more artsy with their shot compositions – lots of blocking and framing things in specific ways. Also Thirteen speed-flashing Taub was very funny; I like their dynamic the most in the group because they’re both a little cunty and fun.
Wednesday
More House. There are so many patients with relationship issues this season, I suppose to parallel the relationship issues going on with House and co., but I don’t like it! I wish we had domestic Hilson moments for at least two seasons without Wilson or House trying to get a girlfriend again. I also don’t like Taub going back to cheating – I want to just erase of all of this from the canon in my mind. At least we got the hilarious “I’m as straight as any of you! [Looks at the two bisexual people in the room]” scene and the “We just started milking him last night” line but other than that the episodes were unmemorable.
A pretty fanservicey chapter of the Kusuriya manga…and not one that I particularly liked… I don’t like when a manga introduces triplet (or triplet-esque) characters because it feels like they just want to fill out the roster without actually designing a bunch of different characters…and I mean design both in the visual way and in the character writing way, because they always play up the sameness as a defining character trait. It just feels like they’re redundantly taking up space in the cast…I would’ve much preferred three new character designs so that each of them could get a chance for their personalities to breathe. Also, small nitpick, but Chinese people (especially in historical China) generally wouldn’t wear something white in their hair casually because it’s associated with funeral rites. It’s kind of bad luck/vibes. Also also, I think I’m going crazy a little bit, but the art in this chapter was wonkier than in other chapters…maybe because we just got through an important and action-packed arc and this one was more lighthearted, so the artist loosened up a little… But man. I’m also tired of ghost stories – I prefer the medical mysteries, as you may be able to surmise from all the House I’ve been watching, but maybe all this ghost business is going somewhere (hopefully). Ahh with the serviceable anime and this middling chapter, I’m feeling my passion for Kusuriya slightly wane. I wonder if it’s still a 10/10 for me…well, the anime will take ages and the manga will take literal decades, so maybe once I read all of the light novels I’ll reassess how I feel about it.
Thursday
House: That was a pretty good season finale. It’s not as good as season 4’s, but it’s second best for sure. I really enjoyed the framing narrative of the penultimate episode, it let me imagine Dr. Nolan actually joining House’s team and being around to be his friend and allow him to be more open with people (not to mention how their dynamic in itself is pretty fun, what with Dr. Nolan being quietly insistent on not taking any of House’s bullshit). The end to Hilson’s domestic bliss makes me miserable, though. And then the season finale was also great – I love when there’s a big disaster in medical dramas because the sense of urgency and challenge is gripping and all sorts of things can go wrong in interesting ways. Seeing House genuinely connect with his patient and be so vulnerable was amazing, and it made the ending all the more tragic and heartrending… And then the Huddy happened and we skipped past it because we despise Huddy lmao. That one thing stopped it from being a perfect season finale for me, as petty as that is. But I have to be true to my Hilson bias.
Friday
A huge project landed on my lap so I had no time to do anything else in my frenzy, whoops.
Saturday
I watched the new SpyFam episode while I ate dinner and it was great! The action scene was as fluid as I’d hoped it would be, and it was even funny and beautiful at times (the fireworks lighting was amazing). I really enjoyed the editing for the comedic moments in particular, like Yor ploughing through a bunch of wacky assassins without even letting them introduce themselves and the dutiful Chief cleaning up after her. The serious part of the fight was also great, and helped elevate Yor’s internal emotional arc. I’m looking forward to seeing the arc conclude next week.
Undead Unluck: I’m afraid…it’s Fuukover……………………………………………..no actually I’ll bring out the visuals for the first time on this blog because after I saw this I had to pause the episode and sit in silence for twenty minutes because WHAT ON EARTH IS THISSSSSSSSSSS
WHAT DID THEY DO TO MY BOY AGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH
This is extremely petty of me to complain about but it made me genuinely upset… The curvature of the smile is all wrong, and the overly full bottom lip makes him look like a creepy Chad meme AGH and the pronounced wrinkles under his eyes and on his neck just give off an entirely different connotation from the manga… Manga Shen looks sly and unsettling, almost otherworldly, while Anime Shen looks like a wojack I’m going to CRYYYYYYYYYY
It’s so sad looking at the past two weeks of me being like “I can’t wait to see my boy Shen be unsettling!” only for THIS to happen…even the usual slick graphic for the Negators was weaker in this episode…what happened…
After last week’s episode and now this one, I fear the production is slipping away from them a little… There was a lot of recapping and weird editing last week, and here there were…an unusually high amount of still frames, and they weren’t even used that artistically to hide the obvious shortcuts they’re taking. I really wanted to keep my hopes high for Undead Unluck after its amazing start, but now the cracks are really starting to show and the things that I’ve tried to graciously ignore are now rearing their heads… The ugly 3D zombie models, the weird pacing, the mangaka’s weak monster designs (sorry buddy, but you do make up for it in the human designs/writing)… Unfortunately, butchering Shen’s smile alone is enough to make it impossible for the Undead Unluck anime to be a 10/10 for me (and I was really hoping for it to be one. Because it’s fun to add new titles to my little awards page).
At least there was a lot of Chinese in this episode, and most of it was passable…even if I’m still a little bitter about Mui’s casting. But I don’t know, I feel like I’m seeing Undead Unluck slipping from me in real time and it sucks. This used to be the highlight of my week, but now I’m just dreading it…if it continues to be like this, I’ll eventually accept that that’s just the way things are (like I did with Kusuriya), but right now it stings.
Speaking of Kusuriya, wow that was a great episode this week. It’s on par with the Lihua episode for me, maybe even a bit higher because there wasn’t any janky animation. The pace kicks off quickly right away to highlight the urgency of the situation, and I can see that a lot of care has been put into portraying Maomao’s emergency medical skills. I like seeing the dynamic between Maomao and her dad, too – I feel like it’s a pretty unique anime parent-child dynamic (but of course, a lot of things about Kusuriya’s writing is unique). Maomao quietly solving the mystery was also fun, and it didn’t feel like a drag like last week’s did. What I like about Kusuriya’s mysteries is that there’s not always anything to really do about them once they’ve been solved (ie. no criminal to catch/prosecute), it’s more about the joy of solving the mystery itself. But this allows the situations surrounding the mysteries to be more fluid and ambiguous – they’re often not a specific moral judgement on the culprit but just an exploration of the setting or a philosophy. I also liked the conversation between Maomao and Meimei in the bath, and that shot of Maomao in the annex was amazing foreshadowing. Also, getting ponytail Maomao was such a treat. And then! The return to the rear palace! Everything about the conversion between Maomao and Jinshi was just perfect, the little animations of Jinshi tapping on his leg or the cup to show his irritation, the pacing and performance of the voice lines, Jinshi’s various expressions, it all culminated into such a pitch perfect comedic scene that closed out the episode nicely. I’m glad I’m ending this Week in Review on a high note.
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if I’m being honest, EJ and Gina's relationship never convinced me specially with the fact that we know Ej is going to college, now he is a counselor/director so there’s a lot of power imbalance in there and them adding the "father figure" line didn’t help their case because it means they are very aware of the difference in life stages which is why the easiest way to just end that thing is by making Ej realize he needs to go to college and a relationship with Gina isn’t possible. Gina potentially being the female lead now I just don’t see them giving them a "distance relationship" basically off screen specially when they have Rina both in high school to explore for season 4.
hi anon, thanks for the ask! talking about this show today has been kinda fun, especially with press happening rn and such.
—
i’ll note quickly that i think the anon is talking about when jamie says ej’s a “big brother figure”, not a father figure.
—
honestly i never was super invested in it either (as i’ve said)… and the life stages difference they’re heading into is the main thing that puts me off. that’s mostly for personal reasons, like i won’t judge them for it bc the show doesn’t seem to have an issue with it, but for me… it bugs me a bit, so i get that. like i’ve been saying since we heard camp was season 3 that if they made ej a counselor it was going to bug me… and that if they wanted me to support this relationship they shouldn’t do that… and now he’s not only a counselor, but he’s her DIRECTOR? yeah that’s a bit of a power dynamic now in two ways at this summer camp. so… not exactly sitting super well with me.
—
but yeah idk how they plan on handling ej’s college thing truly… there are ways in which they can execute keeping ej and gina together despite ej starting this new stage of his life, but it also comes down to what’s best for these characters, as individuals. because frankly while relationships don’t (and shouldn’t) have to come at the expense of individual development, the relationship is less important at this stage in their lives than them getting the opportunity to grow and thrive as individuals. it also depends on to what extent they want to / plan to keep ej in the show, lbr.
i think if they maintain the relationship through season 3 and do long distance in season 4 (whatever distance that is), a turkey drop type of situation isn’t out of the question, but probably on gina’s end rather than his… bc she’s the one with the instinct to cut ties in a new place… and she might project that onto him. i think i’ve said in the past that might be a potential breakup scenario for them- gina cuts the cord bc she wants him to be able to get the full college experience and such… bc she’s personally so used to the cut and run thing. whether that breakup would last or not is another question, because ej could in theory go back to her and be like no you don’t get to decide that for me, i’m not missing out on anything, i want this, i really like you, etc… but who even knows.
that being said- the long distance plot being shown almost entirely from gina’s pov would get tiring real quickly i’m sure- and if they’re having ej’s college be at a distance, they’re going to reduce his status, and so it would all be from her pov… plus maybe some tidbits about ej’s college stuff from ashlyn as well. gina dealing with that would likely eventually start to get draining, and while yeah, they showed the taxing effects of an ldr with rini, and they wouldn’t have to do it the same way for another ship, i think it’s even harder to make it seem great when it’s mostly through the eyes of one character, even if she is the female lead.
—
tbh with nini out of the question, and lily leaving in theory as well after this season given ork’s other commitments (so the character cannot be developed into an actual option, rn she isn’t one), i think unless they introduce a legitimate brand new love interest for ricky, rina happening at some point is highly likely. the storyline has to be closed off in some way shape or form- whether they’re the series endgame or not. that doesn’t mean they inherently have to date, but this show thrives on relationship drama, so i for sure don’t think anyone should be ruling it out.
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#222: Passion and Grind
When you love what you do, you will never have to work a day in your life, right? Well, things are usually a lot more complicated than that.
Different people enjoy different things, but many parts of the process suck for everyone. Like getting rejections — who likes getting rejected? And yet, successful writers accumulate hundreds of rejection slips. It's one of the not-so-fun things that you have to put up with so that you can enjoy the things you love.
What do you love about writing?
Are you intrigued by telling good stories? Maybe you like words and finding cool things to do with language? You might be passionate about a particular cause or message that you wish to convey. Perhaps your dream is to see your book on the shelf in a bookshop one day.
What makes writing appealing to you? Take a moment to think about it.
I love making things. I'm always working on something. I can't handle spending a day chilling at the beach, doing nothing. It's a blessing and a curse.
For me, writing a story means making up this giant world and squeezing it onto a handful of pages for others to explore. I'm also interested in words and language, albeit not nearly as much as others.
Set up systems and turn your brain off
What I'm not as good as is finishing things. I have loads of ideas. I'm easily excited to start new projects, but I struggle to finish them sometimes.
I'm also a pretty slow writer. I can't write 5,000 words in a day.
To prevent these things from holding me back, I put systems in place that help me keep going when I'm not feeling like it.
I learned this through running. Sometimes, I'm in the middle of a run, and I'm just not feeling up for it. When that happens, I narrow my focus on the movements I'm making. My only job is to keep making the same movements that I'm already making to keep moving forward. The same thing, over and over again, as if my body was an engine.
If I start thinking about things, I’m just going to quit and not finish the run. Ruminating about something that you don’t feel like doing won’t help you do it. You will find as many excuses as you need to quit. They’re everywhere.
The best way to overcome this is to set up a system. Set some ground rules and power through.
If I could write many thousands words in a day, perhaps I wouldn’t need a writing routine. But I can’t, and so I have one. I do a little bit every day without thinking about it.
To stop me from dropping everything to chase every random idea I have, I don't allow myself to start new projects until I've finished what I'm working on at the time. If the idea is good, it might go to the beginning of my queue, but I’m not allowed to drop the current project as a rule. If I allowed myself to think about it, of course I would find reasons why the current project sucks and will never go anywhere, and why the new, shiny one needs all my attention urgently.
Final thoughts
What you love about writing is, ultimately, what will carry you through that inevitable grind. The more passion that you have for specific parts of the process, the higher the chance is that you'll persevere for long enough to make it.
Doing what you love is an endless dance between passion and grind.
About the Author
Hi, I’m Radek 👋. I’m a writer, software engineer and the founder of Writing Analytics — an editor and writing tracker designed to help you beat writer’s block and create a sustainable writing routine.
I publish a post like this every week. Want to know when the next one comes out? Sign up for my email list below to get it right in your inbox.
SUBSCRIBE
(I won’t spam you or pass your email to a third party. You can unsubscribe at any time.)
Past Editions
#221: Going From Zero to One, November 2021
#220: How to Make Your Writing Compound, November 2021
#219: 7 Benefits of Doing NaNoWriMo Even If You Don’t Win, October 2021
#218: The Best Writing App for NaNoWriMo, October 2021
#217: Don’t Save Your Best Ideas for Later, October 2021
#writing#writers#write#writing tips#writing advice#amwriting#writing life#writeblr#writing update#personal update#me
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A Favor: Part Seventeen
Nessian Modern AU
Masterlist
a/n: 70% of this fic is written on my phone lying on my side in bed while using swipe typing bc im too lazy to type out words and it shows
TW: discussion of SA
***
Nesta has an easier time adjusting to a third person in the cabin than she thought she would. Maybe it’s because Azriel indeed minds his business, and half the time Nesta isn’t aware he’s there at all.
Cassian seems to be more irritated by it than anyone else—not his brother, of course, but the fact that he and Nesta no longer exist in their own little bubble. Which is how he ends up at Nesta’s apartment with an overnight bag, sprawled out stomach-down on her mattress while she gets ready for bed.
“TV show or movie?” he asks, clicking through her laptop. Shows are Nesta’s thing and movies are Cassian’s; she feels generous enough tonight to say, “Movie.”
“Thank god,” he mutters, typing something on the laptop. “There’s a Turkish horror flick that I was saving for you.”
“Where do you even find these films?” Grabbing her hairbrush, she flops onto the bed beside him and starts brushing out her brassy locks. Before he can answer, Nesta’s phone buzzes from the stool she uses as a bedside table. Feyre’s name flashes on the screen.
Nesta frowns, but picks up without a second thought. “What is it?”
“Nothing serious,” her sister replies. “Just checking in.”
Before Cassian, Nesta didn’t very much understand the purpose of “checking in” without reason. Now she empathizes with Feyre a little. “I’m fine,” she says.
Deciding she can do better than that, she adds, “Cassian and I are about to start a movie.”
“Is it his choice? I’m so sorry for you.”
Nesta peeks over to where Cassian is still intently searching for his obscure movie and smiles a little. “I like Turkish horror,” she replies.
Cassian overhears and grins approvingly.
“Well, I’m looking at wedding dresses with Rhys so he can prepare for when he inevitably proposes,” Feyre says. “In case you wanted to know.”
Nesta did not particularly want to know, but she doesn’t say this. “Sounds fun. Is that it?”
“For what?”
“This conversation.”
Feyre sighs over the line. “Yes, I’ll let you go now. Thanks for picking up.”
The bar is in hell, Nesta thinks. Mostly because she put it there, but she still feels embarrassed to be congratulated over such small things. “Thanks for keeping it short.”
She’s about to hang up when she hears a male voice speak up in the background, and Feyre interrupts, “Wait—before you go, can you tell Cassian to call Rhys back? He wants Cass’s help picking a new team leader for the Italy project.”
Nesta has no idea what that is, but she says, “Sure, fine.” They say their goodbyes and hang up.
“What’d she want?” Cassian says without looking over at her.
“She said Rhys wants you to call him about the Italy project.”
Cassian turns toward her, half sitting up. “Really? What for?”
“Something about picking a team leader.” She returns to brushing her hair. “Why? What’s the Italy project?”
“Something I thought we put aside for good,” he grumbles. “It’s a year-long overseas project in Milan. Rhys thinks it’s gonna bring in a shit ton of money.”
“Sounds big. What do you have to do with it, though?” She’s never heard of Cassian being involved in Night Court’s international operations, even though he takes on more work than the usual employee.
Cassian shrugs, going back to movie searching. “He wanted me to be the one leading the team, and I guess he still feels petty about me turning him down. Honestly, choosing team leaders outside of my department isn’t even part of my jurisdiction.”
Nesta hesitates. “He offered you the job? When?” She didn’t know this.
“On New Year’s.”
“And you turned it down?”
“Yeah.” Cassian clicks on a link that looks like it’ll plant fifteen different viruses in Nesta’s laptop. “Found the movie,” he says.
“Why would you do that?” Nesta demands.
“The movie?”
“The job offer! Why would you turn down such a big opportunity without even telling me?”
Cassian laughs in confusion. “Are you angry right now?”
She’s astonished at his nonchalance. “Cassian,” she says. “It’s Italy.”
Italy with the art and history and seaside beauty—it’s on their top five places to see before they die.
“It’s Milan,” he says like there’s a difference, “and it’s an entire year away from you.” He shakes his head, sitting up to face her. “Are you out of your mind?”
She goes still. “Don’t tell me you said no because of me.”
“Of course I said no because of you.”
“It’s your dream job!” she bursts. “Traveling, exploring, being on your own—”
“Those are our dreams. I made those plans with you. The hell am I supposed to do all the way in Italy without you?”
“You sound codependent,” she retorts.
He narrows his brows. “Like you wouldn’t do the same thing in my position?”
He’s right, of course. Nesta would do the exact same thing for him. But Nesta and Cassian are not the same, and they both know it. “You can’t make that comparison,” she sighs.
“Why not?” he demands.
“Because—” She struggles to put it into words. “I would give up a long distance job for you because it would be worth it. You’re worth it. It doesn’t work the other way around.”
“Again: why the fuck not?”
So he’s really going to make her spell it out. “Because you’re a good boyfriend. You’re affectionate and caring, you always go the extra mile for those you love, and you come with all these free perks. It’s a great deal. And I’m not anything terrible, but I’m the bare minimum compared to you. Why would you give up Italy for the bare minimum?”
Cassian looks at her in disbelief. “I don’t even know how you can say so many wrong things in a row.”
“He’s blinded by love,” Nesta mutters to herself.
“First of all,” he holds up a finger, “I don’t know where you learned to compare yourself to me, but I don’t like it. You make it sound like I need to be paid back for every half-decent thing I do, and that is not the case at all.”
“Of course you think that,” she says. “You wouldn’t be a good person if you didn’t.”
“Then let me be a blunt person.” He puts a hand on her knee and looks her in the eye. “You will never be like me. Very few people are; you can’t take it personally.”
“Oh my god.” Her eyes might roll out of her head.
“But you’re not the bare minimum. Not even close.” He states it like an undeniable fact.
“How so?” she challenges.
“Like how Elain told me about this boy who broke her heart in her high school, and how the next day he walked into class in a leg cast. And how she just knew you had something to do with it, and you two had a huge fight about it that lasted a week.”
Nesta does not enjoy that memory being brought up. Elain called her a psychopath for the incident, and to save her feelings, Nesta (rather unconvincingly) said it had been an accident.
“I didn’t push anybody into a creek,” she maintains the lie. “Sometimes people just fall down there.”
“To be fair, you’re a lot more stable now than you were then. Now when people hurt those you care about, you find sneakier ways to hurt them back. Don’t you?”
“I do not,” Nesta defends.
“Really? Because Eris texted me earlier saying you’ve been ignoring him since New Year’s, and he’s starting to get worried that you have something heinous planned for him. I asked him why he would ever think such a thing of you.” Cassian leans forward and rests his chin on her shoulder. “Why would he think such a thing of you, Nesta?”
Cassian looks pretty well off from here, doesn’t he? She remembers Eris’s smug face. Did you know Rhysand’s parents found him sleeping in the streets?
“Because he said a bad thing,” Nesta says, looking down at her fingernails. “And I have an unfortunate reputation at school for getting back at people who say bad things.” Like the time Brian O’Connell made jokes about a rape trial the class was studying, and then couldn’t find an internship at a single firm the following summer.
“And what did he say? Because I can’t imagine he would directly insult you. He actually likes you, ass that he is.” His face is warm so close to her neck.
She looks away. “I won’t repeat it.”
That seems to be all Cassian needs to get an idea of what Eris said. “And how long are you planning on holding it against him?”
“Forever.”
“That’s what I thought.”
Nesta meets the eyes that haven’t left her face this entire time and snorts. “What’s your point?” Seriously, she’s starting to redden at how close he is.
He buries his face in her neck, his stubble rasping against the sensitive skin there. “The point is that you also do a lot for the people you love. Just in a different way.” He pulls away to look her in the eye. “Don’t do anything to Eris, though,” he says. “Not that I care for him or his shit opinions, but whatever you have planned isn’t worth it.”
Nesta wants to scoff in disbelief at the sincerity on Cassian’s face. He’s always choosing kindness, even at the worst moments. “So that’s your argument?” she says. “You won’t go to Italy because your girlfriend has a bad temper and a taste for revenge?”
“That’s my final argument, Your Honor.” He takes her hand. “Forget Milan, will you? One day I’ll take you to Portofino.”
The longer Nesta knows Cassian, the more she finds it useless to hide from him. Which is why she lets him watch the thoughts flit across her face as she considers his words, deciding whether she believes him. Deciding whether he’s right to give her so much devotion.
“Fine,” she finally says. “You’re right.”
A slow smile spreads across his face as he realizes he won. Wrapping his arms around Nesta’s waist and legs, he hauls her into his lap and shifts around until they’re both comfortable. The movie is forgotten for now.
“Out of curiosity…” He noses at the nape of her neck. “What did Eris say about me to make you so angry?”
When Nesta doesn’t answer, he says, “I’ve already heard everything that could possibly be said. The shit that used to get me when I was eighteen doesn’t have the same hold on me a decade later.”
She lets herself relax into his hold. “It was about the time you spent as an orphan.” Technically, he’s still an orphan, but it was different back then. “I didn’t like the tone of his voice.”
Cassian’s answering hum is a low rumble against her shirt. “Did you know my biological father was from Italy?”
Nesta perks up at that. “No.” She assumed he was entirely Algerian, even though he and Azriel probably look ethnically ambiguous to most. “Isn’t that all the more reason to see Italy someday?”
“Not at all,” he says. “If I could pretend that half of me didn’t exist, I would.”
She can’t think of a response that doesn’t involve a question, so she doesn’t reply. She waits for Cassian to speak on his own terms.
“I went to Italy once,” he admits. “For less than a day while my brothers were partying in Monte Carlo. I was young and stupid, and thought I would never be complete if I didn’t know who my father was.”
“Who was he?” She doesn’t know why she’s whispering.
“No one worth remembering,” Cassian says, his arms unconsciously tightening around her. “I put some dots together and realized how he and my mother must have met, how he must’ve—forced himself on her, and I decided that I didn’t care about bloodlines at all. I never returned to Italy after that.”
Nesta’s hands want to reach out and touch him, soothe him. But her muscles are suddenly very cold, and she can only stiffen. “And what about now? Do you… not want to go back?”
“It’s just a place to me,” he says. “Nothing special, nothing terrible. But I like the way it sounds when you talk about it.” His eyes sparkle. “I’d like to pretend it’s my first time going with you.”
“Alright, then.” She nods. “One day, we’ll go together. It’ll be our first time.”
***
Cassian refuses to let Nesta leave bed the next morning, dragging his heavy mouth across her body whenever she tries to get up. She’s about to surrender to him altogether when her phone starts vibrating loudly, insistently.
Breaking away from Cassian’s attempt at cuddling, she answers without checking the caller ID. “Yes?” she croaks sleepily.
“Where the hell have you been?” Emerie demands.
Nesta shoves Cassian away despite his protests, untangling her legs from the sheets. “At home,” she says, getting out of bed and heading for the bathroom. “Am I supposed to be somewhere else?”
“We haven’t seen you in two weeks,” Emerie says. “Gwyn thought your boyfriend’s weird family killed you.”
“That’s not what happened,” Nesta assures, pulling her shorts down and sitting on the toilet. “I just needed some alone time.” People are all around her these days, it seems. Her body still can’t quite adjust to it.
“Well, have you had enough—are you peeing?”
“Yeah.” She wipes and flushes the toilet.
“Well, clear your day and kick your sorry boyfriend out of your place. I can’t remember the last time I went out.”
“Why does everybody always want to go out?” Nesta says as she washes her hands. “What’s wrong with staying in, being safe, never leaving the house?” She dries her hands on a towel and returns to the bedroom, where Cassian is now sitting up and checking his emails.
“You’re preaching to the choir, but this actually wasn’t my idea,” Emerie says.
Nesta and Cassian alert at the sound of a knock from the front door. Nesta never has uninvited guests.
“Hold on a second, Em,” she says, jogging up the short set of steps to the door. She opens it to the sight of an exasperated-looking Gwyn.
“Jeez, next time send a text that you’re alive, will you?” Gwyn says, shoving past Nesta to enter the apartment. “Do you know how worried I’ve been—” She halts midsentence, one foot hovering above a step as she realizes that Nesta isn’t alone. As she sees Cassian in her bed, bare-chested and highly amused.
“Hey.” He raises a hand in greeting.
Gwyn pales.
“Hello?” Emerie calls over the line.
“You girls both share the same brain,” Nesta sighs. “Let me call you back, Emerie.”
Gwyn whirls around just as Nesta hangs up. “That won’t be necessary,” she says quickly, looking embarrassed. “I’ll be outside. I’m sorry.”
She hurries out of the apartment even faster than she came in, ducking her head to hide her face.
Nesta tosses her arms up in the air. “Great,” she says to Cassian. “Your abs scared her away.”
“But I didn’t do anything—”
She shuts the door behind her as she follows Gwyn outside, barefoot and all. She barely notices the freezing cold air or the awful press of damp grass beneath her feet as she catches up to Gwyn and grabs her elbow. “Hey, what’s wrong?”
Gwyn jerks suddenly, yanking out of Nesta’s hold. Her breathing seems a little shallow, and she looks even more embarrassed for it. “It’s nothing. I just didn’t know you had someone over.”
“Cassian? He’s cool, you don’t need to be weird about him,” she tries to reassure Gwyn. “Though I did use to tell him that not everybody wants to see him shirtless all the time.”
“It’s not that,” Gwyn says, waving her off.
Nesta gestures to the apartment. “Do you want to come back inside, then? I’m sure he has clothes on by now.”
Gwyn clears her throat uncomfortably and looks down. “I’d rather not. I’m—I don’t like being around men.”
Nesta pauses, not sure if she heard right. “Like, in a ‘check the backseat of your car before getting in’ way, or…?”
“No, like I can’t be alone in a room with a man without feeling sick. It activates my fight or flight, it’s weird.” She’s carefully stiff, like she’s ready to be met with humiliation.
Nesta remembers that Gwyn has never told her about her therapy sessions before, but she knows they’re more intensive than her own weekly conversations with Lana.
“Not that I think your boyfriend is a bad person,” Gwyn adds when Nesta doesn’t respond. “He looks really nice. He sounds nice, too.”
But Nesta doesn’t care about any of that. Unsure of what to do next, she reaches out and awkwardly pats Gwyn on the arm. “Good thing you’ve never been to the cabin, then. Cassian’s brother is staying…” She trails off when she realizes none of this is relevant. “Why are you here so early?” she asks instead.
Gwyn eases up a little at the change in subject. “I missed you. We’ve barely talked since Christmas.”
Nesta didn’t realize people would take such notice to her absence. “Yeah.” She flushes. “I do that sometimes. I’ll send a message next time I go into hibernation, though.”
“You’re freezing,” Gwyn suddenly scolds, noticing how Nesta’s goosebumped arms are wrapped tightly around herself. She unzips her red hoodie and shrugs it off. “Go back inside and get dressed.” She flings the hoodie around Nesta’s shoulders before Nesta can protest. “Meet me at my car. We’re hanging out.”
Nesta knows that a last minute change of events is not the end of the world, even if it sometimes feels like it. For Gwyn and Emerie, she can bear the discomfort of unexpected plans, same as she does for Cassian. But she at least has to know: “How long will we be out?”
“You can come home after lunch.” At Nesta’s face, Gwyn adds, “Lunch will be at two and shouldn’t take more than an hour.”
Looking her friend up and down, someone who has such an easy time understanding her, Nesta nods in satisfaction. She turns around to go back inside.
***
They end up at the library where Gwyn works, in the stacks of the long-abandoned encyclopedia section.
Emerie takes a loud sip from the huge McDonald’s soda she snuck in. “So all this show was because Gwyn didn’t want to work her shift alone?”
“I just have some last minute cleanup to do,” she hisses for the third time, shoving an old book back where it belongs. “Go to the porn section if you’re so bored here.”
“Oh, I definitely will,” Emerie says. “But I’m glad that we’re congregating now, even if it’s in the most depressing part of the library. I have a present for you girls.” She hands Nesta her drink so she can dig around in her purse.
Nesta personally has no complaints. The library is quiet, it smells of paper and old ink, and it holds all her favorite books. It’s almost better than staying in.
Emerie successfully pulls out a handful of folded and wrinkled papers from her bag, smoothing them out as best she can. “One for each of us,” she says, passing the papers around.
Nesta takes her paper and stares at the header. Gwyn is the first to speak. “Pole dancing classes?”
“Why?” Nesta says.
“Well, I originally offered them to Justinian and Isaac but they said no—”
“It’s really not for me,” Gwyn interrupts, trying to pass the registration form back to Emerie. “Sorry.”
Nesta doesn’t give her form back.
“Look,” Emerie says. “I get the hesitation. We’re a handful of boring bitches who hate having fun. But don’t you think that has to change at some point?”
“I’ve known you guys a month,” Gwyn retorts. “We’ve only been boring bitches for a month. This is too much.” She turns to Nesta for help.
Nesta is still staring at the paper. Dancing—on a pole, yes, but it’s still dancing. “I’ll do it,” she says.
Gwyn looks betrayed and Emerie looks elated. “Really?” She hops up and down. “That’s two against one, Gwyn. You have to do it, too.”
Gwyn’s cheeks are turning red in frustration. “You can’t just force this on me—”
“Gwyneth,” a sharp voice interrupts their conversation. Nesta spins around to find a young woman with dark skin and bleached white curls heading in their direction, a stack of books in her arms.
She halts before Nesta and glares. “No food or drink in the library.” She looks pointedly at the 32-ounce in her hand.
“It’s not mine.” Nesta shoves the drink back to Emerie.
But the librarian has turned to Gwyn, who hides the dance class form behind her back. “And what are you doing here?” she demands.
“Just putting up a few books, Merrill,” Gwyn answers quickly.
“While socializing?” the woman named Merrill sneers.
“We were just asking for help finding the romance section. Is that a problem?” Emerie crosses her arms and steps forward, letting a little of her beautiful deadliness slip into her stance. It’s the deadliness of someone at the top of her law class, someone who will graduate in a few months with all the power she could want in the palm of her hand. Nesta gets a rush from playing the lawyer game, too, but she’s never had the kind of ambition that Emerie has. Emerie is a shark sitting around in a small pond.
Merrill is not impressed. She snatches the styrofoam cup dangling from Emerie’s hand and tosses it in the nearby trash can. She turns back to Gwyn. “Hand your badge over and clock out.”
“But I’m not done yet—”
“Now.”
“Okay,” she squeaks. She pulls her ID badge off her neck and hands it to Merrill.
Nesta gapes in disbelief. Before she can speak up, Merrill says, “No loitering in the library. If you don’t have anything you need to check out, leave.” With one final judgmental look, she turns down an aisle of dusty books and disappears.
Gwyn makes a face at her back.
“That woman is not old enough to be acting that misanthropic,” Emerie says after Merrill is gone.
“Whatever,” Gwyn mutters. The registration form is still in her hand. She crumples it into a ball and throws it into the trash. “Let’s get out of here.”
Nesta stares at the trash as Gwyn turns to leave. “Coward,” she says.
Gwyn’s head snaps toward Nesta, her auburn hair swinging. “Excuse me?”
She shrugs. “You heard me.” Emerie’s eyes bounce back and forth between the girls.
“I did,” Gwyn says. “I was just making sure this wasn’t coming from the woman who would sooner bite someone’s head off than do something she doesn’t want to.”
“Girls,” Emerie snaps before Nesta can bite back. “It’s just a stupid dance class. I thought it would be fun to do together, but it doesn’t matter anymore.” Taking Gwyn by one arm and Nesta by the other, she starts steering them out of the stacks like a stern mother. “Now let’s go eat. I’m fucking hungry.”
Gwyn’s mood from the library doesn’t recover, even as they sit down for lunch at the local diner. Nesta thinks Gwyn might actually be sick when the male waiter winks at her while taking her order, and it’s not until long after he’s gone that color returns to her face. When their food arrives, Gwyn only picks at her plate.
“What’s wrong?” Nesta finally has to ask bluntly. “You look pukey.” Did the coward comment affect Gwyn more than she let on, or was it Merrill’s attitude that threw her off?
At Nesta’s words, Gwyn becomes even more pallid. “I just don’t feel great today,” she murmurs, looking around like she’s seeking a way out of the diner. “Sorry guys, I didn’t mean to be such a buzzkill. Maybe I should go home early.”
“Absolutely not,” Emerie says. “If you’re going home, we’re going home with you.”
Gwyn bites her lip, trying to decide if she wants that or not. But something about her antsy demeanor is too familiar to Nesta, because she says, “If you really want to be alone, do you mind driving me home first? Emerie’s car is a mess.”
“You just need to move around a few papers,” Emerie protests.
But Gwyn nods distractedly, already gathering her things. “Sure, no problem.” They pay the bill and go their separate ways.
During the ride home, the sky that’s been gray all day finally breaks open, unleashing a spattering of rain over the town. Nesta watches it sprinkle while Gwyn drives in silence.
“Why are you scared of Merrill?” she eventually asks. “She doesn’t look much older than you.”
Gwyn snorts, but there isn’t much heart to it. “Merrill is my superior, but I can handle her on most days.”
“Just not today?”
Gwyn eyes Nesta warily from the corner of her eye. “No, not today. Or this week.”
Nesta chooses not to push. The dull metal of the cars surrounding them glints under the rain, and they arrive at a red light.
After a minute, she takes a breath and blurts, “I’m not always like that around guys, you know.”
Nesta watches her closely, remembering how ghostly she seemed around Cassian, then the waiter. “Keep going.”
Gwyn stares straight at the traffic ahead, her fingers turning bone white on the steering wheel. “I’m just going through a hard period. Everything upsets me and I don’t know how to think straight. It’s like my brain accidentally traveled to the past and now it’s stuck there.” She sounds shaky, breathless, and it makes Nesta wonder what exactly her mind is experiencing.
Nesta knows what it’s like to be unable to move on. Her own brain has only recently started looking toward the future. “Where are you stuck, specifically?” she asks hesitantly. Maybe she can help Gwyn navigate her way out.
Gwyn’s chin quivers. “In a dark room.” Her lips form a tight line. “Being held down. I’m outnumbered.”
Nesta’s stomach turns. “How far back is it?”
“Two years,” Gwyn whispers. “Lately I can’t even look at anything without—remembering it. Thinking about it. Every time I feel like I’m moving past it, I end up being wrong.”
The light turns green, and Nesta puts a hand on Gwyn’s knee in an attempt to ground her. “Drive,” she commands softly.
Gwyn presses down on the accelerator, but Nesta can feel her leg trembling beneath her hand. She squeezes her knee hard. Even with the dark parts of her own past, Nesta has never felt what Gwyn is feeling right now. So she tries to stick to what she knows.
“It’s like you said,” she says carefully. “You’re going through a period where your brain isn’t being friendly to you. It’s horrible, but you can live with the knowledge that it’ll be over eventually.”
Gwyn shakes her head, holding back tears. “It doesn’t work like that. Once it goes away, it’ll just come back again. And it’ll be like that for the rest of my life.”
“You’re right.” Nesta doesn’t have a solution for that, and she hates it. “You’ll never forget. You can be at the peak of your life and still remember all of it. But,” she says slowly, “whether you reach a point where it barely fazes you, or if you keep crippling under the weight of it decades later, you’ll still be normal. You’ll be a perfectly normal human.”
Gwyn lets out a tearful laugh at that. “What does that even mean?”
Shit. “It means…” Nesta tries to explain herself better. “In case you’re worried that there’s something very wrong with you, I’m here telling you that there’s not. There will never be anything wrong with you.”
Gwyn eyes her skeptically as they turn onto a residential road. “Even if I never get past one nightmare I lived years ago? Even if that nightmare defines me until the day I die?”
“That won’t happen.” Nesta’s tone is simple, factual. “But yes, even then.”
“Really? You’re not gonna tell me to live for the better days or whatever?”
“Does that sound like something that would help you? Because I can say it if it does.”
Gwyn snorts. “No.” But her limbs are steady and her eyes are clear on the road. She clears her throat. “Thank you for listening. I think I might feel a little better now.”
“Was it because of what I said?” Nesta tries not to be too hopeful.
“I wouldn’t give you that much credit,” Gwyn says, crushing her hope. “But I’m glad I told you. It makes things…a lot easier for me.” She exhales deeply.
“You know my plate is mostly empty these days.” Nesta pats her knee. “That means I’ll always have room to help carry your shit.”
They pull up to Nesta’s apartment, and Gwyn parks at the curb. “Give me your dance class thing,” she says suddenly.
Frowning, Nesta pulls the wrinkled paper out of her purse and hands it to Gwyn.
Gwyn smooths it out on the steering wheel and grabs a pen from a cupholder, clicking it. “If you’re going to help carry my shit, I guess I have time for pole dancing now.”
“But that’s mine,” Nesta protests as Gwyn starts filling out the form.
“It can be both of ours,” she says, writing Nesta’s name under hers.
“Really?” Nesta grins with an excitement that she doesn’t easily feel. “You’re going to do it with us?”
“Why would I let you do it without me? So I can become the third wheel in our girl group?” She gives Nesta a look that says No way in hell.
Nesta rolls her eyes. “That would never happen to you.”
“Sure,” Gwyn drawls. She finishes the form and folds it in half before pocketing it. “I’ll give this to Emerie as a gift.” She leans over to peck Nesta on the cheek. “Now get home. Love you.”
Nesta turns red at the words and coughs. “Thanks for the ride,” she responds, getting out of the car.
“Say it back!” Gwyn calls after her. But Nesta shuts the door in her face and waves, pretending she can’t hear her. Gwyn mock-scowls at her through the window, but lets her off easy and drives away.
That’s enough feelings for today, Nesta decides. Even if her chest is swelling with emotion for her friend. It’s a sweet hurt that lingers long after she returns to her empty apartment.
***
a/n: i’m back in my no plot, just vibes era
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