Song of the Day: December 13

"Blue Healer" by Birdtalker

Hello random stranger I don’t even follow! I grew up on Lake Erie and we have a storm hag and I am so excited to talk about her! Mostly she’s from like the war of 1812 and partially forgotten about, but she’s said to cause storms that take down ships so she can feast on sailor flesh. She has a spooky little theme song but by the time you hear it it’s too late and she’s already next to your ship about to pull you under. Which like, you’d think then that we wouldn’t know the song but it’s:

Come into the water, love, dance beneath the waves

Where dwell the bones of sailor lads inside my mossy cave

She’s said to live in a cave under presque isle, which does not make sense because it’s a sand bar full of swampy lagoons, but also there’s a rip current medium often on the beach side so arguably she’s still out there sucking down souls. I’m just saying there’s bluffs on the other side of the bay that seem more reasonable as a place to find caves. But like also historically during the war of 1812 (but really 1813) Oliver hazard Perry’s fleet spent the winter in misery bay, which is sort of toward the end of presque isle, and they were very cold and hungry. I do also like to think that the people that fall through the ice dunes and die in winter are her victims. Maybe also the people that snowmobile on the ice too far into spring and go under. Then again she probably can’t be blamed for every kind of stupid death that happens.

Anyway apparently her name is Jenny Greenteeth, which makes it pretty clear that she’s an English import at least in name, but I love her.

Also, in case you don’t already know, Lake Erie is shallow which makes the currents weird and there’s like, so many shipwrecks. It’s warmer than the deeper lakes so they aren’t as well preserved as the ones in Lake Superior or anything, but there are genuinely a nuts number of them. Also there’s at least one ghost ship, the dean richmond. There’s this whole area called the Lake Erie quadrangle that they’re thinking about protecting federally because there’s so many shipwrecks? Like, beyond a Bermuda Triangle amount. But on the bright side, it doesn’t have as much of a plane crash history as the Lake Michigan triangle!

Also there are some giant goddamned sturgeon in that lake, and if you feel the need to go mermaid tail/person body with the mermaid thing I recommend a long twisty sturgeon tail and body! I forgot what this was for in my excitement to tell someone about my girl Jenny Greenteeth, but have so much fun!

THIS is what I'm talking about!

Who says we have to let it go? (a season 4 reflection)

As promised, I finished rewatching the show in full one more time, so now I will finally put my S4 thoughts to paper (or screen). Coincidentally, this is also the day that the series finale would've dropped if S4 was released weekly, so it feels fitting to write this today, anyway.

Even after the initial Rina fog has lifted and excitement has died down, season 4 still remains my favorite season. While it has plenty of issues with plotting (certainly more than s3 or s1), it absolutely nails it thematically. The season explores the importance and consequences of vulnerability, and the power of seeing others as they truly are (as I mentioned in an older post, it's all about vulnerability and authenticity), and every main character's storyline so beautifully contributes to those themes in unique ways. There's also a really interesting dynamic between looking to the future and holding onto the present being explored this season, and I think the glamor of HSM4 (a hollywood movie) and the humility of HSM3 (a high school play) are symbolic of each respective idea. There's actually a lot I want to discuss about each character's relationship with both HSM4 and HSM3, and how it succinctly shows their internal feelings about their futures, but maybe that's for another time. Anyway, Tim has said his intention for the show's thesis is to find people who see and accept you for who you are, but this last season goes so much deeper with that concept, emphasizing the necessity of letting yourself be seen and known, too. This can be through letting your walls down, letting your flaws and struggles be seen, choosing to forgive those you love and take a second chance, or boldly speaking what's in your heart. Nearly every original song this season touched on this theme in some way, which really emphasizes the thematic cohesion of this season.

This leads me to the music, which is the best it's ever been in the show. Every single one of the originals is so good, and I love that there was also (finally) a showtune in a traditional musical theater style ("Over Again")! However, the score is what really stuck out to me this season (HUGE shoutout to Gabriel Mann, the scorer of the show). I do think the scoring of S3 really started to assist with telling the story by including more recurring leitmotifs (I think the return of the Rina cue helped), but the score of S4 really leans into this aspect of storytelling, especially in the final 2 episodes. There's leitmotifs to represent Shallow Lake, a magical motif from "Dreams Don't Die" to represent the magical and fleeting nature of high school theater, countless variations of the Rina cue, and I'm pretty sure there's even a recurring leitmotif established for Kourtney (I have to go back and listen for if it's used beyond her scenes).

Another thing that really stuck out to me was how well each episode was written. I think overall, there are leaps between some episodes that don't feel natural, but the story of each episode is well constructed and executed. There's genuinely not a single episode this season that I would say is boring or pointless... certainly some plotlines throughout the season turn out to be, but the episodes themselves are solid. Unfortunately, some of the plotlines this season feel like they end really abruptly, which did feel jarring on a first (and second) watch. I do believe Bart Johnson when he said some stuff for HSM4 was cut, because I was surprised at how little the OGs were in this season. Same can be said for Dani's storyline, which really felt superfluous in the end result. I hope that there's a showrunner's/extended cut released of this show someday, because that would probably fix those issues.

Overall, with this being the last season, it had the most important job of closing the show out in a truly complete way. I really believe it competently did that job, and I think how it finished the growth of the lead characters is what makes it conclusion so poignant. Everyone will have their opinions on how the show handled certain characters, but how Ricky and Gina (and even EJ, to a lesser extent) were handled in this last season absolutely tells me these writers knew what they were doing with these characters. The last series finale I watched that concluded character arcs so resolutely, with such tremendous humanity and truth, was Lost (Jack Shephard's arc is one of the most complete and profound I've ever seen). Gina Porter has always been a character I related to deeply, and that final season really made my connection with her even more personal and heartfelt. I actually have experienced healing of some wounds of my younger self witnessing her story, and I see how much more growing and healing I still have left.

So, what's the sum of my thoughts on season 4? I wouldn't change a thing! Ok, that's not necessarily true, but I still love it as it is. It was the funniest season (seriously, every single joke was hilarious), it was the most heartfelt, it was thematically rich, and it helped me say goodbye to the wildcats, while still holding onto hope for a bit more.

Yes, it's 2021, but I'm still not over the dark irony of Kilgharrah's final words, so I am going to analyse it, even though precisely nobody asked.

Firstly, Kilgharrah tells Merlin after his admission of failure that "all that [he has] dreamt of has come to pass". Now, obviously there is the irony of the fact that Arthur is dead, something that Merlin has been trying to prevent for the whole five seasons, yet the battle was victorious, people have seen magic as a force for good and Merlin can now be open about his gifts with his friends. However, there is an even deeper irony here that is rarely addressed, and this lies in the word "all". The problem is, that while Emrys is the entity that strives for magical inclusion and the one that fufils the prophecy. Destiny is not conscious: it doesn't understand life or death beyond the shallow ties of balance and mathematics. Yet Emrys may be a concept, and concepts need someone- or something- to take root in, and that someone happened to be Merlin.

Fundamentally, Merlin is not a bad person, but regardless of his power, his empathy, his loyalty, he is still unequivocally human. He has flaws, he has guilt, and no matter how dedicated he is to his destiny, there will always be other variables that come into play, and there is therefore no doubt that Merlin would have had other thoughts, no matter how insignificant, that lay opposed to his destiny.

Take when Freya died: Merlin was heartbroken, and in those seconds of emotion before reason took a hold once again, he may have wished, just for a moment, that Arthur and Freya's fates were reversed. And even after that, he would have hoped that one day, Arthur and Freya could live in a world where the other's existence is not a violation onto the other. And what place exists where harmony must ensue outside of the dead?

Then moving on to Balinor's death and Merlin's anguish in its aftermath: yes, he gained his powers as a dragonlord, but at the expense of a father he should have had a right to know. In that light, there is the inevitability of resentment for his gifts. Merlin would never have wanted the powers he attained had he known the price for them. And yet again, those tiny thoughts would have crept in: the wish that things could go differently, the wish that the business of dragons was not his to oversee, even at the time when his gifts were needed most. So the sick twist there is that when Merlin needed Kilgharrah, the only person who ever truly understood him despite their differences, left him alone, that wish came true.

There are hundreds of instances where Merlin's humanity prevented the prophecy from taking a favourable turn, and that, I think is what makes Merlin less a drama than a tragedy: there's the hope for a better ending combined with the constant prescence of an ending you don't want to believe. There's the fall at the ending and the warped sense of catharsis that comes with knowing that the end did come, even if it wasn't what you expected.

Following that, there is a pause in the conversation, as both characters take a second to mourn in silence, the absence of what united them showing them no longer as allies, but as friends.

Then: "no man, no matter how great, can know his destiny." This isn't so much something for Merlin to understand, but more something for the audience to hear: it's an echo of the first words we hear, and therefore a reminder that it is Kilgharrah who tells the story. Now this is an interesting narrative device in itself: why have him narrate rather than Arthur? Why Kilgharrah over Merlin or Gwen or Morgana? Take a second to imagine what it would have been like for the story to start with their voices, even if the words were the same. Especially when we know their endings, it gives the story a different tone and alludes to each of their fates in a different way. Though here is that terrible truth that the narrative comes back to every time if you analyse it far enough: each of the core four has a story, yet because of the way they were used, it will never be their story to tell. But Kilgharrah... He was just as important as the rest of them, but while the others were pawns, he was sat watching the game with a reluctant but omniescent eye, and that's what make that line hit so hard for us (aside from the fact that it is a taunting echo of the hope we had at the start). The story, while timeless, is dead, and we are all helpless spectators, hoping against hope that we are wrong about how it ends.

Furthermore, there is the fact that it is a repeat of the first words we hear when we still hold a little hope. It is that reiteration of the fact that the story will be told and retold, rewritten and loved but doomed to end in tragedy. It's an indication of the timelessness of certain tales and the permenence of endings no matter how much we want them to change, and it hits the mark every time.

Then, if it wasn't sad enough already, there is the final utterence of the phrase "once and future king". Kilgharrah says these words in hope, trusting Merlin to take it as a promise, but retrospectively there is the darkness of that line that Merlin probably knew all along, even if he didn't let himself believe it. In saying "once" rather than "now" right from the get-go, there was that quiet acknowledgement of an ending, even if it was followed by a beginning: it is yet another reminder to Merlin that he should have known, and that bittersweet reassurance that wherever he may have done, it would always have ended in disaster. Even if they both made all the right choices, the gods would have found another way to turn it down.

Okay, next let's look at "when Albion's need is greatest, Arthur will rise again". This, in all.effect, is a reiteration of the last phrase, made clearer for an audience who may need or desire reinforcement here so I'm not going to go too deep. But the thing is, Merlin already knows, at least in his heart, that it is Arthur's destiny to rise again and be the greatest king Albion has ever known. So when Kilgharrah says this, it is not a warning or a piece of advice, for perhaps the first time, it is a kindness. Merlin has been wrecked by his actions and those of all the others caught in the imperfect web spun and left to decay by the idea of Albion. It is a gentle reminder not to forget the reason for all that they have lost, and an olive branch of freedom for one who was so long enslaved.

And there again is that irony and cruel truth that while Merlin is the crucible in which that dream will be forged and has a certain autonomy over its nature, he is not a part of that dream himself, and maybe he never will be. Not unless someone lets him in, and all the people who would ever have done so are a breath too close to death for it to really count.

(I said I wasn't going to go too deep but I got carried away)(this is why my lit teacher is fed up with me)

And finally, the last line Kilgharrah says to us, perhaps the most powerful of them all: "the story that we have been a part of will live long in the minds of men". To analyse the words in this individually would be a rare insult to its complexity, but as a phrase, it evokes such an emotive response that it alone finally cements that finality in our minds. It's the cyclical acknowledgement of the audience's role in the narrative, simultaneously retracting and strengthening our suspension of belief. The one word I have used more than any other in this essay is "story" and this is why: the people who hear a tale such as this become just as important as the characters, because we are united by hope for the final chord but dreading it, because that means that the song will finally be over. Is it better for the embers to glow with tragedy or be extinguished by a deeper catharsis?

In summary, it is obvious to the naked eye that the Great Dragon's last words are loaded with meaning far beyond their initial appearance, and when you dive deeper, the web of connotations is so vast that this essay has barely scratched the surface. But the informal and perhaps most accurate theme that wa can draw from this is that none of us are over this show, no matter what we claim, because that ending really flippin' hurt, okay!?

it will come back [pt. 1] /// Yandere Shigaraki x f!Reader

Summary: You have a bad habit of picking up strays, and the half-dead villain you find bleeding out in a dumpster is no exception. [Part 2] [Part 3]

A/N: Low budget yandere for my greasy king. This concept has definitely been done before, but I couldn’t resist. This is my first non-smut on this acct and I’ll be so sad if it bombs 😭

Title from the Hozier song: “don’t let it in with no intention to keep it / jesus christ, don’t be kind to it / oh honey don’t feed it / it will come back.”

Tags/warnings: light yandere, minor injury, angst, Shiggy likes you, reader needs a friend and a good night’s sleep. [In later parts but not in this one: violence, sex, more yandere, 18+]

You’ve always had a soft spot for strays. Maybe that’s why you became an ER nurse—from the first abandoned puppy you brought home as a kid to the patients you refuse to give up on even when it looks hopeless, you’ve never been able to turn a blind eye when something needs your help. Sometimes (times like this) you wish you knew better. It’s hard enough to take care of yourself these days.

Today’s shift was…what, 16 hours? 17? The 20-minute walk from the bus stop to your apartment building feels like it takes twice that long in the rain. God, you need a shower. And a decent night’s sleep, preferably for at least 12 hours. Tomorrow’s your day off, and you’re ready to take advantage of it the best way you know how: Netflix, soju, and your favorite vibrator. But tonight? As soon as you’re clean, you’re going to pig out on leftovers and collapse into the bed that’s the only halfway nice piece of furniture in your shithole apartment. You really do deserve a break; you’ve earned it.

Unfortunately, as usual, the universe has other plans.

You hear him before you see him: wheezing, choked breaths, like someone’s trying to breathe with an anvil on their chest. You’re not quite out of nurse mode so your mind starts trying to diagnose the issue before you even register what you’re hearing. Fluid in the lungs, possibly blood. That hacking isn’t good. Broken ribs? Definitely bruised. But probably not a puncture…

The breathing is coming from down an alley next to your building. It’s dark enough that you can’t see from the street what’s making the noise. And you’re not a fool, you know it’s a bad idea to walk down pitch-black alleys late at night, especially in this area—a neighborhood you’re living in by necessity, because it’s the only place cheap enough for you to get by. But the coughing…it just sounds so awful. It sounds like it hurts.

Your phone’s already in your hand with 119 dialed and ready to call (standard practice when you’re walking home by yourself), but you turn the flashlight on and shine it down the alleyway. “Hello? Anyone there?”

Nothing responds, but you can still hear the breathing. You step in a little deeper, swinging your light from side to side and looking over the heaps of trash bags overflowing from the dumpster. The raindrops make clicking sounds as they hit the plastic, and you can hear gurgling from a rain spout down the side of the building, but the wheezing doesn’t stop.

One more step. And then one more. You wish there was something you could do to make the splash of your rain boots in the puddles a little less loud. Something about this situation—the rain, the dark, the flat grey light from your cellphone, and that horrible hacking breath—it makes you feel like you’re walking into a horror movie. But you don’t stop walking.

The hacking is coming from a man propped up on the wall between a few XL bags of trash. The black outfit he’s wearing almost blends into the bags, but a mop of grey-blue hair gives him away. His head is slumped onto his chest, and if he’s conscious he doesn’t show it. “Hello?” you ask again, even less confident that you’re going to get a response.

No answer.

The smell of garbage is…ugh…hard to ignore, but on top of it is an oppressive stench of copper coming from the man passed out in the trash. You kneel down to get a better look and yep, he’s covered in blood. It’s hard to make out in the low light, but there’s a trio of long gashes in the man’s abdomen, cutting apart the skin and flesh so deep you can see traces of a slim layer of yellow fat between all the inky clotted blood. It looks like he was attacked by an animal. Or someone with an animal quirk. There are a lot of villains in this neighborhood.

And the coughing...definitely internal injuries. Whoever this guy is, he needs treatment. You hold up your phone to hit the call button on your pre-dialed 119—

“Don’t.” The voice is a growl, low and surprisingly firm despite the scratchiness. You jerk back and clutch your phone to your chest, caught off guard not just by the interruption but by the intensity of the face glaring up at yours.

His eyes are red. “You need an ambulance,” you tell him in your calmest nurse voice.

“If you try to call the police, I’ll—kill you,” the man says, but the threat is a little less threatening when he has to stop in the middle to retch blood onto his own chin.

You glare back at him but don’t call the emergency number. There are a lot of of reasons why he wouldn’t want to go to the hospital, but the most obvious one is probably true. “You’re a criminal. A villain?”

He doesn’t respond, choosing instead to keep glaring at you like you’ve committed some mortal sin against his ancestors by having the nerve to check on him and try to help him. Somehow it pisses you off. When you were getting your ADN, you once took a temp job doing health screenings at a local middle school and you would always get so annoyed at the kids. Didn’t they see you were just doing your job? Why is it so hard to understand that what you’re doing is for their own good?

Stupid kids. Stupid villain. “You’d rather bleed out and die?”

The man bares his teeth at you, and it’s a pretty disturbing scene considering how they’re covered in scarlet. “You think they’re going to save me? Think I’ll go to the hospital and get all my HP restored?”

He’s mocking you now. You only have a second to move out of the way before he spits off to the side. “I mean…that’s how a hospital works.”

“If you think I would—make it out of that ambulance alive, you’re—dumber than you look.” His voice is interspersed with coughs.

“Well, you’re not going to live if I leave you here.” You hold up your phone, ready to call the ambulance, but in a shocking display of agility the man lunges forward and grabs it out of your hand. “Hey, wait! Give that…back…”

Your voice trails off as your phone crumbles—literally crumbles to dust in the man’s fingers. Once he’s satisfied that there’s no way for you to call the cops, he slumps back onto the trash bags and closes his eyes, apparently exhausted from the effort.

Goddamnit…! For a second, you can only stare blankly at the pile of dust that used to be your $300 smartphone. And then you’re seized by something, maybe not hatred but an annoyance so strong you can feel it in your throat, and you decide right then and there that this villain is not going to die. You’re going to save him. Out of spite.

You’re not sure how you manage to half-carry him from the alley to your apartment, but you do. You’re lucky it’s ass-o-clock at night and no one’s in the lobby or the elevator, or you’d definitely be getting some looks trying to lug a maimed body around. What would you say if someone did call the cops? Don’t worry, don’t worry about it officer, it’s just my friend drank a little too much, oh those wounds? We were at a costume party, haha…

But no one sees you, and no one calls the cops. The man is unconscious the whole time you’re carrying him, and by the time you have him laid out on a shower curtain on your living room floor his breathing is a little bit shallower than it was before. You’ve got your tools—nothing fancy, just some gauze and closures and antiseptic from your personal first aid kit. It’s not much, but it’ll have to be enough.

“Let’s get to work, asshole,” you tell the unconscious body in front of you, and you crack your knuckles.

///

The day after you pick the villain out of the garbage, your body decides that it’s not going to let you sleep in no matter how much you need it. You can tell because the huge windows in your bedroom—the only saving grace of this apartment, honestly—are depositing golden-pink sunrise light over everything you see when you open your eyes, including the villain’s face. Which is about six inches away from yours.

“You smell like death,” you tell him sleepily. He doesn’t move.

He’s…probably in his early twenties, you think, but it’s hard to tell because of all the wrinkles. His hair is on the longer side, and it’s striped with rusty brown smears from his blood. Again, you notice how red his irises are. Have you ever seen someone with eyes that color before? You’re pretty sure you haven’t.

“You slept for a long time,” the villain says, finally moving back so he’s not breathing into your mouth.

“Yeah, I was tired. From saving your life.” You sit up and rub your temples. “I’m thirsty…”

Before you can finish your complaint, the villain is holding a glass of water out to you in an awkward 4-fingered grip.

“Um, thanks, I guess.” You suck down the water and immediately feel better, enough that you realize how wrong it is that he’s up and moving around and probably undoing all your hard work. “You should be lying down.”

“The floor hurt, and I was bored.”

“Lie on the couch then. You can watch TV. But first—“ He’s sitting on the edge of your bed next to you, and you make him lie down flat so you can look at the injuries. They’re not nearly as bad as they looked last night—no walk in the park, but at least you won’t have a corpse in your apartment in a few hours.

When you’re done inspecting him, he sits up and asks you for a shirt. You had to cut his off, not that it was any great loss. The thing was shredded. Him pointing it out is the only thing that makes you really realize he’s shirtless, so you give him an oversized pajama shirt of yours. It has the name and motto of your old high school on it, and the villain reads it out in a half-mocking tone when you hand it to him.

“Beggars shouldn’t be choosers,” you snap. “You should be grateful.”

“I am grateful,” he says, putting the shirt on. “But I don’t understand.”

“I mean, you need a shirt, right? It’s cold—“

“No. Not that.” He’s staring at you again, and you find it difficult to maintain eye contact. “Why you didn’t leave me where you found me last night.”

There’s a lot you could tell him, all of it a little bit true. You were curious. You believed him when he said he wouldn’t make it out of the hospital alive. You couldn’t leave him alone the same way you can’t leave abandoned puppies alone. You wanted to prove to him that you were right, and that being stubborn wouldn’t get him what he wanted. But you don’t say that. “You killed my phone, so you owe me a new one. And I can’t get that back if you bleed out.”

He’s looking at you like he doesn’t believe you, and you fidget under his gaze until he sighs and says, “Whatever.”

You have to let him lean on your shoulder when he walks back to the living room to lie down on your couch. How the hell did he even get to your bedroom by himself? You really didn’t think this through—what are you supposed to do with an infirm possible villain who can barely walk unsupported without opening his injuries back up?

But that’s a problem for tomorrow you to deal with. Today, you’re content to set your laptop up on the coffee table so the two of you can watch TV in…oddly companionable (if you’re not imagining it) silence. It’s almost the lazy day off you were daydreaming about before you got yourself into this mess, and the atmosphere is so relaxed that before you can really decide whether to force the man to go to the hospital or turn him out on the street (or…?) you’re dozing off on your couch like there isn’t a potentially dangerous stranger lying beside you with his head just a few inches from your lap.

When you wake up, your problem is solved for you. He’s gone, and it’s like he was never there—except you’re down a cellphone and a pajama shirt, and your shower curtain is drenched with blood. You wrap it up with the rest of the soiled medical supplies and toss all of it in a dumpster a mile away from your building without knowing exactly why.

///

It’s not the last you see of him, but somehow you had a feeling that was going to be the case.

He scares the shit out of you the first time he visits (over time, that’s how you’ll start to think of his little unannounced drop-ins: visits. Like you’re being visited by a ghost or something). You’re coming back from another grueling shift in the ER, so tired you think you might be sleepwalking, and what do you find when you come in your apartment but a strange white-haired man sitting on your couch eating dry cereal out of the box and flipping through one of your books?

You nearly piss yourself.

He doesn’t seem surprised, which makes sense, considering he’s a villain and he’s probably used to pulling this dramatic entrance thing on people. He certainly doesn’t seem the least bit threatened when you brandish the mini canister of pepper spray on your keychain and demand that he tell you how he got in if he wants to retain the power of eyesight.

“It was unlocked,” he says.

“It was not unlocked,” you reply, rolling your eyes. You may be sleep deprived, but you’re not careless. Never careless.

“Whatever. Calm down. You’re not going to use that on me.”

He’s right, but you don’t want to admit it. If he wanted to do something to hurt you, he could’ve done it that first night. And you’re too tired to really put up a fight, so you just put the cap back on the pepper spray and flop down next to him on the couch. “What the hell are you doing here?”

He looks at you curiously from between his shaggy bangs, like you’re the one intruding in his home and not the other way around, then reaches out to hand something to you. “Here, payback.”

It’s a cell phone—not a smartphone like the one he destroyed, but a flip phone circa the 2000s, the kind that forces you to press “9” four times to get the letter “F”. You stare at it for a second, then look back at the villain. “Are you kidding? Did you get this from a museum?”

“Take it or leave it.” His feet are propped up on your coffee table, but you can’t make yourself care. Actually, it looks nice…him stretched out with an odd look of comfort on his lanky form.

You lean back on the couch and kick up your feet next to his. “Fine. Thanks, I guess.”

He shrugs.

“How are your wounds healing?” Why are you trying to make conversation with this guy? He’s…a villain, right? Not that you’ve ever received affirmative confirmation of that fact, but the hesitance to call the police and the breaking and entering are pretty good tells. But…it might be weird, but since you picked him up that day, you’ve felt a kind of kinship with him.

Alone. Abandoned. No place to go. No one to save him. It’s not a pretty comparison, but you can’t deny it rings true.

Maybe that’s why you pick up strays.

“They’re fine,” he tells you after so long a pause that you’ve almost forgotten your question. “Doesn’t even hurt anymore.”

You take a long look at him, at his posture—he’s relaxed, but his abdomen is crunched a little bit, curled in on himself so subtly that even you wouldn’t have noticed it if you weren’t looking. It’s not your problem. He’s an adult, and you’re sure he could be seeking real medical attention if he really needed it. You’re in no way obligated to perform some kind of checkup on this arrogant dick who literally broke into your apartment to give you a shitty phone and eat your cereal. The sensible thing to do is to tell him to forget that you live here and hopefully never see him again.

His head tips back to rest on the top of the couch, and he holds your book up to read. At this angle his long hair is out of the way of his face, and you notice among the deep-set creases in his skin a pair of wide scars across his right eye and on the corner of his lips. They’re pale and faded—old, then—but they look off to you, and after a while of snatching glances at his face you realize it’s because they’re healed badly, extraordinarily badly, the kind of healing that you don’t see very often because it only occurs when a stubborn patient tries to let a particularly nasty injury heal on its own. The part of you that isn’t sensible wonders how old he was when he got those scars.

Has he learned his lesson?

You doubt it.

“Lie down,” you sigh. “Let me see the cuts.”

Which is how you find yourself examining this annoying villain again, checking on his injuries and giving him recommendations for care like you’re his personal nurse or something. It’s not a role you enjoy playing, but at least he takes it without complaint, and you start to wonder if maybe this is why he broke into your apartment in the first place. If anything, he looks calmer when you’ve flipped up his shirt and prodded at his wounds, his eyes closing slowly and freeing you of that scarlet-red gaze.

He’s like a cat, you think, and then you shake your head and remind yourself that it’s a terrible idea to think of this man—this grown man who is probably a great danger to you and others—as a wild animal you’re trying to domesticate.

When he finally leaves (only after you drop a couple dozen unsubtle hints about how long you’ve been at work and how exhausted you are), you take a moment before you sink into bed to look at the flip phone. It’s no nicer than your original impression, but as you scroll through the screens you notice that it’s factory-new, except for one thing: there’s a contact programmed in, a phone number with an area code you don’t recognize listed under “T”. And you don’t want to be curious…

…but you are. Shocking.

Down the rabbit hole it is, you decide. So you text him.

///

[You: 12:03 AM] > Hey it’s (Y/N) > (the girl whose apartment you broke into) > What does T stand for? [T: 12:07 AM] > What do u think [You: 12:09 AM] > ?? [T: 12:09 AM] > My name > Dont you know who i am [You: 12:10 AM] > Are you famous? [T: 12:10 AM] > You dont watch the news do u [You: 12:11 AM] > Not really > What’s your name then [T: 12:12 AM] > … > Didnt u say u had to sleep [You: 12:15 AM] > Oh yeah > Whatever I guess > Good night

[T: 2:34 AM] > Its Tomura > Dont look it up

[You: 8:02 AM] > Ok > I won’t > Tomura

➠ [Part 2]

BLOOD BOUNDARIES - Enhypen OT7 Fanfic (ch.6)

[CH.1] [CH.2] [CH.3] [CH.4] [CH.5] previous chapters

[CH.7] next chapter (unavailable, check back or follow for updates!)

genre: vampire au, romance, drama, mystery, thriller

note: written inspired by enhypen's storyline, given-taken lyrics & teasers. please keep in mind all members are apart of this fanfic and the main theme is mystery/drama!

*P.S swear words are used (i try not to use them often lol but i feel they added to the emotion in the dialogue) the beginning lowkey not proofread sorry happy readings!

"I sensed you were here." He commented sternly as he stood up from the piano bench.

You stepped back, "Y-you just play really well... Didn't mean to be a creep." You get shy with shivers after realizing he knew you were around. From what you recall, you were absolutely silent.

His wordless response was a cold signal to leave. And so you did. Whipping your head back behind you to see people begin to exit their rehearsal rooms. You left Jay alone as he probably wished, mindlessly waiting for your roommates to storm out. The doors along the hall were now wide open so that you could search the rooms. Like a scavenger hunt, you went in and out of each music room, clueless as to which one you would find your friends in.

"Y/N?" You hear Hyesun before you could even step foot into one of the larger sized rooms along the hall. You slung your head up in surprise to see your roommates chatting with faces you were tired of seeing.

"Long time no see." Heeseung visibly bit down on the tip of his tongue causing your emotions to run wild. You were irked to see Nana, Hyesun and Dahee (in case you forgot these are the names of y/n's dormmates) with Jaeyun, Heeseung and Sunghoon.

"Haha..." You laugh uncomfortably at the overwhelming mixture of people.

"We were just thinking about having a party before the upcoming long weekend," Sunghoon plastered a dark smile that you found strangely annoying. He had some corrupt aura and every bit of your gut felt alarmed by him.

"Jungwon is in the next room over, you should ask him to come here," Dahee said calmly and reassuringly. If anything all of your roommates looked unexpectedly comfortable and relaxed in the presence of some of the school's hottest boys. You imagined your friends to be flustered since they had secretly fangirled to you about them during late-night girl talks. It seemed they had become genuine friends instead of fangirls. It made you question your intuition and trust issues. Maybe it was just you overreacting and these boys were friends, not threats.

Nodding your head, you run off to where Dahee had mentioned Jungwon was. Chasing until you met a closed door with a dim light shining through its' crystallized glass. Listening close you could hear Jungwon sing softly through the door, making your heart rate rise a bit. Like a fool, your heart was going in circles. You focus your eyes through the bits of glass that didn't distort your vision to see Jungwon in pure grace.

"He sings pretty well doesn't he?" You felt a whisper brush the conch of your ear. Not even bothering to see who the whisper belonged to, you agreed.

"Yeah... I've never heard him sing before." You blush at yourself, finally taking a look to see who you were even talking to.

Your gaze met a pair of sharp cut out eyes, "If I heard a person sing like that, I'd be convinced I'm in love with them." Kim Sunoo taunted, trying to make it obvious that your feelings of interest were on full display, even to a stranger. "You might get hurt though, being in love with Jungwon." His voice was a deep frequency that hummed in the bloodstream of your ears.

"Why would it hurt?" Your curiosity getting the best of you.

"He's capable of things you don't want to imagine," Sunoo fakely sighed, his breath hitting the side of your neck. "Jungwon's truly a bad boy. Playing around such a delicate flower." And with that said, Sunoo swung the door right open.

Jungwon abruptly stopped mid sentence, startlement creating a pale cast over his face, "Y/N? What are you doing here?" Jungwon laughed a bit to himself, a little embarrassed after the fact you had probably heard him sing.

"She was standing outside since the beginning of the song." Sunoo smiled smugly before walking out, leaving you in the icy room alone with Jungwon.

"I didn't want to interrupt... That's not even the point... I came to tell you that my dormmates are in the other room talking with the guys."

"The guys?"

"You know... Sunghoon and them... I-I'd really appreciate if you were just there Jungwon." You were sincere because, for some reason, he looked lonely. You would also really feel more at ease with Jungwon around and you hoped your sincerity reached him.

Jungwon had put on a concerned face before dropping it, realizing he was overreacting."Oh. Alright... I'll be there in a few minutes." Jungwon got up, shuffling his sheet music stand into a neat stack that hid in the corner. He had responded in a way that was much calmer than you expected. Perhaps you were expecting him to lash out about being around his friends?

"But Jungwon I want to ask you something..." You hated the secrets between the two of you, it was a mystery game you didn't want to play anymore, "Can you just explain what your relationship with Sunoo... Not even Sunoo, the rest of the guys."

He stopped in his tracks, knowing you were tired of his lies. "We're all orphans from the same orphanage. We just never got adopted." He spoke bluntly in a cold and rushed tone. His answer was enough to have you not ask any more questions about their relationship as it seemed too personal and insensitive of you to keep asking. "Since we were all too old to stay at the orphanage, some social workers came and took us to live in a house together. The house is just on the outskirts of the school but we only go there for long weekends and breaks when there is nobody on campus..." The realization of when Jungwon had said Heeseung was his dormmate came back to you. "They're like my brothers. But, some bad things happened to them in an incident we had a couple of years back at this carnival.. We were never the same after that." Jungwon had gotten somewhat emotional blurting it all out. He had choked up as you heard his words full of frustration built up in his throat. When you looked deeper into him, you found your heartache as his eyes glittered with tears.

"I-I trust you Jungwon. I'm so sorry I must've put you in an uncomfortable situation." You felt like an awful human being hearing his story.

"No, I'm sorry. I'm being too protective with you over those guys. I'm sorry about that. I just see you and get worried. They've become bad people..." He slid his fingertips from his forehead up until they tangled with the roots of his hair, closing his eyes to conceal his emotions.

You could've just hugged him right then seeing him in the midst of crying but your mind was a haze, foggy with not wanting to cross the unspoken boundaries between the two of you. The skinship of hugging was still considered too much for your friendship and you weren't openly ready to have the feelings of endearment that come with carrying out such an intimate gesture. You knew by being in such close distance with him would make you a fool for love.

"I think we should go to the others." You darted with a sudden wall forming between the both of you. You shuddered in pain with your cold remark after Jungwon had just revealed something so deep and vulnerable to you. Even if Jungwon had just told you an intimate part of his identity it was like he became more of a stranger to you. It seemed everything Jungwon was saying was quite true but still Sunoo's words had scarred your subconscious of falling in love with him or even merely liking him. Jungwon had said the boys were bad people but what excluded him from them?

You made your way back, leaving Jungwon to be alone and cool down from whatever you had just made him think of. Every second, regretting you didn't just wrap your arms around him and comfort him. Had it not been for Sunoo, maybe you would've trusted there was nothing more to what Jungwon than what he had just said.

"Did you find Jungwon?" Dahee lifted her eyes off of Sunghoon to yours. You got deja vu when you saw Sunghoon staring at Dahee with the same eyes he used during the commotion at the library.

"Yeah, I think he's just packing up his stuff right now..." You gulp awkwardly as everyone had settled into smaller groups. You think your eyes were deceiving you when you noticed Sunoo now in the room, being quick to withdraw from the conversation he was having with Hyesun and Nana to approach you.

"You don't look well. Something happen between you and Jungwon?" A wicked bubble of laughter rising in his chest.

"Not at all..." It was half true half not. Nothing had really happened mentally or physically but emotionally, there was something.

"Interesting because I was just asking those two girls about you and Jungwon. It seems you two are a lot closer than I anticipated."

"We're just friends, we're just getting closer these days."

"Sweetheart, he's not really trying to be your friend, right? He's just using you like how these boys are doing with your girl friends right now."

"Using us? Using me? Our relationship isn't that shallow. Maybe your dimwit friends would do that but I know Jungwon." You were offended by his assumption, who was Sunoo to claim such an idea?

"What makes you think you know him?" Sunoo laughed gravely at your statement. "I've heard a lot about you from Heeseung and Jaeyun, Y/N." Sunoo used your name. It seemed you both knew each other's names without having to directly say it or formally introduce yourselves.

"I'm flattered I'm that pretty enough to them that they would talk about me, Kim Sunoo." You used his name in the same power he had used yours in a sentence.

"More than just pretty, you should watch yourself. The pretty girls of this school don't last very long in this school."

"And why is that?"

"I think you'll find out soon enough." Sunoo snickered while swaying himself up and away after looking at the doorway.

"It looks like a party in here." Jay had entered with an arm hanging around Jungwon. You hadn't realized how packed the room was until Jay mentioned it.

"Yeah and we're planning one right now." Heeseung spat in a jokingly annoyed tone at Jay.

"A party???" He laughed, "If the school finds girls with us outside school grounds or even near the dorm we'll all be fucking expelled." Jay raised his scratched brow in interest as to Heeseung's response.

"Yeah as if the teachers are even awake super late at night. Literally, no one monitors the halls at night." Heeseung let out an airy scoff from across the room. You and your roommates were all flustered at the plan of a party so late at night. You were embarrassed your mind was even in that direction. "Our place is not far from here Jay, calm the fuck down."

"H-hey I think us girls will head off to eat, we'll settle the plans another time." Nana made eye contact with all the girls as a signal to exit. It seemed the mood took a bitter turn when Jay had entered.

It was an awkward scurry out the door as Nana pulled Hyesun with her. You shortly followed, looking behind you to see Jungwon give a lifeless stare at the ground. Your eyes focusing in on Sunghoon who whispers ever-so closely to Dahee. Whatever he told her, it tinted her face a plush pink.

"Dahee let's go." You glared at Sunghoon before putting on a sweet smile toward Dahee. You couldn't just watch Sunghoon act like such a flirt to Dahee, not when you knew something was also going on between him and Kyungeun.

...

Dahee hums beside you as Nana and Hyesun walk in front. The four of you were quiet, not one of you bringing up the encounter with the boys.

"Do you guys actually want to have a party with them?" You interrupt the silence.

"Y/N they are the hottest guys at our school, do you think we're going to pass on the opportunity?" Hyesun answers.

"Jaeyun told me he and Heeseung could get a couple of drinks from the town over the weekend." Nana added.

"Drinks?! How? Were literally all minors?!" You freaked out like a child.

"Not sure... I do admit though... I'm scared we'll get caught." Nana admitted making you feel reassured knowing she was leaning more toward not having a party.

"What else did you guys already discuss about the party?" You asked, hungry for the details.

"Apparently they've got a place really close by to here. I guess they live together?" The thought of what Jungwon had said to you earlier about the boys all being orphans came back to you.

"Where exactly is there place?"

"Somewhere in the woods of school." _________ author here lol just want to check in and make sure everyone remembers everything from the very first chapter :-) i told you guys that stuff mentioned in early chapters have big significance in the later chapters! Also feel so bad there are so many characters to keep track of LOL I will make a profile of all the characters once everyone is introduced.

Please leave feedback if you have any and thank you for being patient!

Barchie 5x06 Review.

So I usually just do one reivew for an episode but I have so many thoughts on this episode that I decided to split it in two otherwise it’ll be way too long, I figured two smaller reviews will be easier for people to read than one novel of a review. So in this part I am just going to be talking about the Barchie content. Then I’ll post a second half covering the rest of the episode later on today. As always these are just my own interpretations and opinions and naturally there are spoilers. So if you want to know my thoughts on Barchie this episode read on.

The Teacher’s Lounge

The first scene we get of Barchie is the one where they are in the teacher’s lounge. Now I have seen some people who are disappointed or using the argument that Barchie have become only sex and that they never talk. To me though I don’t think that is true at all and this scene is proof of that. When Archie first approaches Betty they are talking about the Polly situation. Betty is confiding in her friend about what is going on in her life and is sharing her worries with him. In return he tries to reassure her and comfort her when he reminds her that Alice had said Polly would disappear for days at time before showing up again. Another thing I’ve seen some people worry about is that Barchie are just using each other as a distraction. Again I totally understand why some shippers might be worred about that. But to me I’m kinda like well yeah they are. I mean maybe I misinterpreted the situation but I kind of thought that’s what their whole friends with benefits arrangement was about. It’s a friend that you can use to help you work out your frustrations and to be a distraction for a little while. Also this idea of using sex as a distraction and coping technique is hardly a new thing to riverdale both v*rchie and b*ghead have used sex in the past to distract themselves from their problems and they were both long term established relationships, them using sex that way didn’t negate from their very real feelings for each other. So I don’t think that just because Barchie are sleeping together in an attempt to escape for a moment, that means they are doomed or that their relationship is shallow and only about sex. If anything its a good thing because it shows that when they are feeling stressed and worried its each other that they choose to turn to. I think we often get so distracted by the sex part of the arrangement that its easy to forget about the friends part of friends with benefits. 

What I did love about this scene was how cute it was. Like when he calls her Ms Cooper and just the fact that he came to check up on how her day was going in the first place was adorable. And of course I loved that little hand touch it was just so soft. I also thought their smiles and that playful look Betty gets when she’s thinking about a plan for where they can hook up was really funny.

The Titanic Sails Again.

Growing up Titanic was my favourite movie and in my young mind it was the most romantic of movies, so naturally I was thrilled about that iconic titanic moment being recreated for Barchie. At the same time I couldn’t help but laugh a little at it too. That being said there is no denying that the scene was on fire.I mean I don’t know if its just Barchie and their chemistry or if its because they’re depicting adults now or a combination of both but is it me or do these sex scenes seem so much more explicit than they used to be? I mean holy firecracker.

 I also thought the song choice was perfect. I’ll be honest I had never heard it before but I do think the lyrics and also what the song is about is significant. I talked about songs a bit before and how in tv shows the lyrics can often hold significance because the producers have to shorten the song to fit the scene, therefore they have to chose not just a song that will fit the scene but which lyrics specifically work for the scene. Obviously it was a sexy scene so they wanted a sexy song to go with it. But the song, by the writers own admittion, is a love song. Bazzi said this about the song and I just think it is so in line with Barchie at the moment  "It became more than just a love song to a girl I was with…Lyrics were just flowing out, because I had felt this certain love and acceptance from this girl, and I wanted to take that and on a bigger scale give that back to people." This is exactly how I see Barchie’s relationship, its about love and acceptance. They have always loved each other, whether that’s romantically or as best friends or both. Also they have always been supportive and accepting of each other. 

So what about the lyrics that are actually in the scene. Well like I said some of them I just think are because they go with the whole sex of the scene. I mean lyrics like ‘hit it from the back and drive you wild’ and ‘hands on your body.’ Those don’t really need much analysis, pretty damn obvious why those lyrics were chosen. I mean you can look at it as simply its a song about sex and they are having sex, its not that deep. But I actually think there are some lyrics that could indicate that there’s something deeper to Barchie. The lyrics ‘girl I lose myself up in those eyes’ for example is actually a rather romantic line about how he is enamoured with the girl and I do feel like that’s how Archie feels about Betty and always has. Also the line ‘I just had to let you know you’re mine.’ Again this to me seems deeper than just sex. I do wonder if on a subconcious level they both see each other as theirs but that they aren’t willing to admit to themselves or each other. My favourite lyrics though are ‘feels like forever even if forever’s tonight.’ To me this makes me think that when they are together they let themselves feel all of those feelings they have for each other. Just for those moments they aren’t hiding, they just feeling it all and it feels like something that can last, it feels like forever. But neither one of them is ready to confront that so instead they just settle for tonight, they are willing to take what they can for now. 

I also feel like when they choose a song they probably do so knowing that either the audience have heard it before or that they will go and listen to it in full. So maybe there are some more clues as to where Barchie are heading in the rest of the song? (Probably not, its probably me just over analysing everything as per usual but hey let me live in my land of denial a little longer, its fun here.) In the full version of the song it starts out with a speaking part where the guy announces that he’s had a bit too much to drink and now he needs to tell her how he feels. I do wonder if this will be how Archie ends up confessing how he feels, like he has a bit too much to drink maybe at this point Glen has shown up and he’s feeling some jealousy and so he just goes to her and admits to how he’s feeling? Anyway back to the song, he then goes on to talk about how much he loves her smile and how he gets lost in her eyes. Again really romantic notions that we often associate with being in love. Later in the song there’s another similar lyric ‘Even when it's rainy, all you ever do is shine.’ Again this idea of someone being the sunshine in the rain is a very romantic notion and again I do feel like this is how Barchie feel about each other and kind of ties into what I was saying above about how when things are bad they turn to each other. I mean those scenes when they are together they look happy, they are both each others sunshine when things are getting stormy. 

Throughout the song there is also alot of the idea of belonging with the other person and this idea of a long term relationship. Outside of the obvious ‘you’re mine’ lyrics and the title of the song itself. I talked a little about the feeling like forever lyrics too but there are some other lyrics that I think are important. For example ‘Man, this feel incredible, I'll turn you into a bride, you're mine.’ Again this lyric isn’t about sex its goes deeper than that this is talking about being together forever not just a fling. But I think another even more interesting lyric in the song is ‘Swear to God, I'm down if you're down, all you gotta say is right.’ I’ve said before that I think that Archie is the one that is more willing to explore a relationship than Betty right now. I do feel like this line reflects how Archie is feeling like all Betty would have to do is say the word and I think he would be all in. Now I am fully aware that I could be reading way too much into this but I just find it interesting that they chose a song for a Barchie scene that is talking about how in love a guy is with the girl he’s with and how that guy is longing for more. 

So like I said earlier there is no denying that this scene was all kinds of hot so naturally I was very amused when the fire alarm started to go off. I don’t know I just found that really funny, like a literal fire broke out whilst they were doing it. Of course this is because some Stonewall Prep footballers set a fire in the school. One thing worth noting though is that obviously those two guys saw both Archie and Betty there at the school I can’t help but wonder if they’ll go back and tell Reggie this. I mean I don’t think they will but its possible they could do some scenario where Reggie tells Hiram and considering how Archie later tells everyone that he was alone and out running when he discovered the fire, Hiram is going to know that Betty and Archie are wanting to keep things quiet and maybe he or Reggie will use it to try and blackmail Archie. Like stop what you’re doing or we’ll tell everyone about you and Betty. I mean Betty didn’t do her blouse up all the way when they came out so I think the students probably would be able to guess what they had been doing. I’m not entirely convinced on this theory but the thought did cross my mind. Speaking of Betty’s state of dress, that leather skirt and the heels with the blouse, our girl came all dressed up for Archie and I loved that outfit. Also I really loved the scene where Archie was trying to explain why he was at the school in the middle of the night to see the fire. I mean Archie does go night jogging, he has in the past at least so the excuse was a believable one but his delivery was far from smooth.

On a less fun note I have seen some people comparing the Barchie car scene with the one with Miss Grundy and that’s just not ok. They are very different situations one scene is between two consenting adults and the other was a person of authority and an adult manipulating a teenager into having sex with them. The fact that people are using that scene as a way to prop up their own ship or to try and say its evidence that Barchie are wrong is quite frankly disgusting and disturbing so please just stop.  

The Shallows.

So this was on the surface such a small scene but in truth I actually think in terms of Barchie’s relationship it was one that held the most significance. Whilst Veronica sings the lines ‘Tell me something boy, aren’t you tired of trying to fill that void.’ It zooms in on Archie’s face and you can see he is feeling some things. He is clearly got some things on his mind that have been stirred up by those particular lyrics. I said before the episode aired when I saw the clip of them in the teacher’s lounge in the promo that I wondered if Archie was already beginning to get tired of sneaking around and after seeing this episode I do think that’s the case. I think Betty and Archie have been in love with each other since the pilot, maybe even before, but they’ve spent so long pushing down those feelings and ignoring them that I’m not sure they know how to do anything else. But as a result, I think not acting on these feeling has left a void in their lives/ hearts. Now they’ve reunited and they are both single and they’ve realised those feeling are still there, but like I said, I think they spent so long denying their feelings its become second nature to them. I think they both fear losing the other if they take it to the next step and it doesn’t work out, then they’ve lost their best friend. But I also think this void they’ve created is becoming too much so they instead try to fill it by sleeping together hoping that it might be enough to make them feel more complete.

When Veronica sings the next line ‘Or do you need more?’ this time it zooms in on Betty who you see gets a little sad and looks down at the ground, like Archie those lyrics have got her thinking and feeling things. Again these lyrics are so significant and I think the mesage is pretty clear. Barchie want more with each other, as much as they are enjoying the whole FWB thing they’ve got going on they’re realising that its not enough. They are also probably feeling a lot of fear and uncertainty around that revelation. The next line Veronica sings is also very meaningful. ‘Is there something else you are searching for?” What’s really interesting to me is obviously I think this lyric is suppose to indicate that yes Barchie are searching for something other than the FWB deal they’ve got going on. But I actually think the writers show us exactly what it is Barchie are looking for. At this moment they zoom in on Kangs. I think its important that at this moment they show us a happy, stable couple, who have a deep relationship and who fell in love when they were in high school and who still had those feelings for each other all these years later. This is what Barchie want with each other.

Also the song talks about the shallows. Shallow water is indicative of safety as oppose to being in the deep end which makes you think of being out of your element or in danger. Barchie has always been associated with safety, Betty on several occasions has talked about how they feel safest with each other. I also feel like they feel safe with the whole FWB arrangement. The song continues to go on to say that they are ‘far from the shallows now’ and talking about ‘I’m in the deep end, watch as I dive in.’ This line is talking about willingly throwing yourself into the deep end, to embracing the unknown and just going for it. I do think this is suppose to tell us that this is what Barchie will do. That eventually they’ll take that leap of faith for each other and just dive in. A large part of the reason why I think this song is about Barchie despite it being sung by Veronica and Chad (well truthfully I think it had signifcance for a few couples but I’ll cover that in the other half of the review) is because one the fact that they zoomed in on them both. But two because right when the song finishes Archie immediately turns to look at Betty and she flicks her eyes to his. I think this shows that they were thinking about each other during that song. 

The Porch

Ok so now I want to talk about the scene that seems to have caused some differing opinions within the fandom. A lot of shippers are saying that the scene where Betty comes to the door and they kiss, that Archie had a strange look on his face as he closed the door after she suggested they go upstairs. Now I agree there was a strange look on his face. I did see a lot of people speculating that this was because Archie was jealous over Veronica and Chad and was distracted by that so wasn’t really that enthusiastic about hooking up with Betty at that moment. Respectfully I am going to completely disagree with that reasoning. I was actually kind of surprised when I saw so much speculation that Archie was jealous of Chad, particularly over on twitter because me personally I didn’t see any indication that Archie was jealous. He was definitely wary and suspicious of Chad and obviously still protective of Veronica but I don’t think that situation was the reason for the conflict Archie seemed to be feeling. However whilst I don’t think that Archie was jealous I do think that at some point some element of V*rchie is going to come back into play and that was being set up in this episode. One thing I noticed as I’m sure many others have is that so far the time jump has had a lot of parallels and throwbacks to season 1. But the interesting thing about these parallels is that they each have different outcomes then the original parallel. For example the scene in 5x04/05 when the core four reunite at Pop’s. This scene parallels the one, I think is in 1x02, where the core four sit together for the first time, the one where Betty and Veronica are there and then Juggie and Arch come in and Betty offers for them to join them. Both scenes are very similar but the outcomes are different, in the original scene the four of them are relaxed and laughing together, in the season 5 scene they are a little tense and its awkward. Well I think the V*rchie and Barchie storyline is going to parallel the one in season 1. I think Betty will once again feel jelaous of Veronica and Archie. I could also see Archie get confused about whether his concern for Veronica is old feelings returning or just a friendly kind of concern and whether or not what he feels for Betty is deeper or just an attraction. Basically Archie is going to find himself in the same situation he was in in season 1 but in reverse. In season one he was confused about whether what he felt for Betty was just a friend thing and whether what he felt for Veronica was something deeper or just attraction. Now I think it’ll be the other way around. Back in season 1 ultimately Archie chooses Veronica, sort of, especially after Betty shuts him down during his ‘a part of me always thought’ speech. What else I find interesting is there is another kind of role reversal here between Betty and Archie. In season 1 it was Betty who had feelings for Archie and believed he didn’t have feelings for her. I think in season 5 its Archie that has feelings for Betty but believes she doesn’t have feelings for him. I think they’ll hint at V*rchie but I don’t actually think they will put them back together. I think how it will go is Glen will show up and Archie will feel jealous when he realises that there was something between Glen and Betty. As a result he’ll start spending more time with Veronica which in turn will make Betty jealous. Evenutally in 5x10 it’ll come to a head and Archie having one too many will show up at Betty’s door and declare his feelings. But I don’t think anything will happen right there. I think Betty will just look after drunk Archie and it’ll be the next day that they’ll talk about their feelings and then get together because this time Archie will choose Betty. 

Speaking of parallels that brings me back to this porch scene. Obviously I feel like this porch scene is a parallel to the porch scene in the pilot where one has shown up at the others door. Last time it ended in rejection but this time they kiss and sleep together. Also I couldn’t help but notice that during this scene and the one where they a laying in bed together the theme playing is the same one that was played during that first porch scene, which can’t be a coincidence. Ok so what about that strange look? If its not about Veronica then what was it about. Well I think it was because Archie wants more with Betty but feels like she just sees him as a hookup. 

There was another parallel between this scene and the one earlier in the episode in the teacher’s lounge. In both scenes it starts out with Betty talking about how she is worried about Polly. Again this is showing that friends element of their relationship and how they still go to each other for comfort when things are troubling them. Archie in turn confesses that he himself was feeling crazy and frustrated and whilst I do think some of that relates back to Veronica and Chad, I mean Chad had been a huge dick to him right before this, some of it also probably had to do with Reggie and that situation, but I also think some of it is that he is frustrated about where his and Betty’s relationship is, which was brought on by him hearing Veronica sing shallow. Another parallel between the two scenes is in both it is mentioned that Jughead is out and at work. In the first scene Betty says its too risky for them to be together at Archie’s even if Jughead is out. But this time she doesn’t seem worried about it. I think she just wants to be with Archie and so just doesn’t care what the risk is. I do think this is a small indication that things are changing between them. There are more little hints in this scene too. For example unlike after the scene in the teacher’s lounge where we next see them going at it in the car, in this scene they don’t show them in the act. Instead they show them after. I actually really loved this scene, even more than the car scene. Because here they were just cuddling together, it wasn’t about sex in this moment, they just wanted to be near each other and were taking comfort in each other. I am going to come back to this moment in a bit but first I want to go back to the porch and talk some more about that. 

After talking about how he is feeling frustrated, Archie and Betty kiss. But this kiss to me seems different from the others they’ve had post time jump. For one the others were during their hookups and so were passionate and urgent. This kiss however was just so soft. I also think its worth noting that when I first saw the scene I thought it was Betty that initiated it but I actually think it was Archie. Archie takes a small step towards Betty but also as Betty moves forward you can see Archie’s shoulders move almost like he is pulling her too him. Now I feel like if it was a case of he was distracted by Veronica and wasn’t that into being with Betty he wouldn’t be the one pulling her too him for a kiss. Also Archie is the one that deepens the kiss too. Another thing worth noting is that despite Betty’s concerns about the risk and that they up until now have been very careful about not getting caught. Well they kissed each other on his porch with the door wide open. Literally anyone could have seen them. But again in that moment I don’t think they cared, I think they just wanted to be together. Also despite Betty aksing to go upstairs after I don’t feel like that kiss was meant as a prelude to sex, or that it has anything to do with sex. The kiss wasn’t passionate or heated. It was a much more romantic kiss and maybe I’m projecting but to me it seemed to be more fuelled by their real feelings for each other than by desire or lust. And this is exactly why I think Archie had that look on his face as he closed the door. I think he poured his feelings into that kiss hoping she would know and to me the look on his face was one of frustration and I think its because when she wanted to go upstairs he felt like it was a case of her only seeing him as a hookup option. However I think judging from the look on her face as she looks at him after they kiss I don’t think that is true. Again I could be projecting but to me she just looked so in love with him. 

Ok so going back to the scene where they are cuddling in bed together. Like I said they both have pensieve looks on their faces but the really sweet thing is that Archie is stroking Betty’s shoulder and Betty is stroking Archie’s side and I don’t know why but those little details made me feel all soft and gooey inside. When Betty’s phone goes off Archie is just staring at her the whole time with such a loving look, he looks completely besotted by her. Also there is that moment when Betty says that she has to go and then says ‘but this... was really nice.’ That hesitation before she says really nice, to me, showed that Betty was trying to think what ‘this’ was exactly and it seemed like she couldn’t quite find the right words to define it. Again they both just looked so in love when she was saying it. Also as a FWB type arrangement I’m not sure it was necessary for her to kiss him goodbye like that. Like the kiss on the porch it wasn’t a heated or lust fuelled kiss it was soft and tender, again as if there were real feelings behind it. Also as she goes to leave you can see Archie almost reach out to stop her and say something. It’s pretty obvious in this moment that Archie doesn’t want Betty to go and wants to say something, maybe about his feelings for her, but he changes his mind and again looks deep in thought. 

Overall I thought this was a really good episode for Barchie and I do think that they are moving more towards becoming something more than just friends with benefits. I know that there is a possibilty they might go back to the original couples but as of right now I don’t see that happening anytime soon. I do feel like as a fandom us Barchies have been let down so many times that we just expect to be disappointed but for now I’m staying optimistic and I’m just going to enjoy speculating and enjoy any scenes we get.      

Unspoken: Chapter One - Oikawa Tooru x f!reader

Oikawa has been in love with you since you became a manager for the university’s volleyball team, but keeps it to himself in fear of what his fan club might do to you if they found out

genre(s): college!au, mutual pining (mostly Oikawa), friends to lovers, angst, eventual smut  words: 3k+

a/n: don’t worry folks, i just got carried away with this fic and felt it would be better to split it up. chapter 2 is complete and will be up tomorrow 💖 with a bonus smut ending if you are a heathen like me. enjoy ~ J ✨ i am also sorry i made the fan club so bitchy

taglist: @takingyouruwus @kurosarium @apollochjld @afterglowkuroo  (lmk if you’d like to be added to my general or a specific taglist!)

Chapter 2 

The Oikawa fan club is definitely not a fan of you, and you certainly aren’t of them. Not because you have a crush on him too but because they’re obnoxious and take the best seats at volleyball games. It also doesn’t help that they outright despise you. They don’t even try to hide it. Snickering in the hallways at school or passing quick remarks whispered amongst them at games. You really aren’t a fan of that. You don’t care, you don’t care, you don’t care—you chant to yourself to keep your tongue locked behind your teeth. It isn’t worth your time or the effort.

Not until you hear one of them hiss today at the game, “What is she even doing up here? I thought she’s the manager,” a scoff. “Guess the team likes Miko better.”

Your fists ball instinctively. You can’t sit down there, as much as you’d like to. If they knew anything deeper about volleyball beyond Oikawa’s killer serve and being obsessed with his ‘pretty hair’ they’d know that you might be a manager but there is a senior manager who outranks you and only one is allowed on the bench down on the court.  

Though you have to admit, sitting up here in the bleachers with the Oikawa ogling brigade in front of you—the manager—fawning over his every move is degrading. You don’t necessarily have to sit directly behind them, but god dammit you want to see the game too and are willing to grin and bear it for the sake of the team. You can’t sit in the normal cheering section crowded with students either since you arrive late and would have to sit at the back of the stands. So, this is the better of two options, even if today the fan club is being particularly petty.

“Or maybe she’s just a wannabe,” another snickers, loud enough that you know she is intending you to hear it.

That pushes you over the edge, making you abruptly stand up. You’re wearing a university volleyball club jacket for fucks sake! Are they really so shallow as to start slinging rumors like that around? They jolt at your sudden movement, glaring back at you, clearly with no intention of apologizing. They so obviously just want you to leave.

You want to watch the game, support the boys you watch work so hard and work hard for yourself, but you don’t want to be around for this bullshit. You know shouldn’t care, but you do, and it fucking ruins the game for you.

Instead of giving them some mean remark like you’re itching to throw at them, you just turn on a heel and go. You stride up the steps and towards the exit right as you hear the crowd gear up for Oikawa’s serve. You stop once you reach the doorway, fists clenched and trembling with anger, furious at yourself for letting them get under your skin. Exactly like they wanted to. You should have stayed as a silent ‘fuck you’ to them, but you can’t stomach going back either. Not like they even care anyways, probably too wrapped up in Oikawa’s serve. Now a sigh escapes you; forcing your hands to unfurl and stretch the ache that formed from how tightly you had them clenched.

You need to take a breath and move on. You have nothing to prove to them, all the matters is that you know where you stand. It also makes you feel better that the team actually knows you, they can pretend it isn’t true all they want but that doesn’t change that you get to spend time with the team, and inevitably, Oikawa. A fact they loathe.

You end up lingering in the hallway near the entrance to the gym, waiting for the game to finish. Usually you can be a part of the between game meetings if you want to, sometimes you can’t get down there fast enough but sitting here in the hallway, you’ll make it today. While you wait, you slide down the wall to sit, leaning against it and pulling your legs close to rest your chin on.

You like to think that you have tough skin and their words can’t hurt you, but they do. And while you may not put the same about of blood, sweat, and tears the boys do into the sport—you put in your fair share for them, and it’s hard to be met with scoffs and sideways glances purely because of jealousy. You’re appreciated enough by those who matter, so why are you so bothered by the fan club?  Shaking your head at the fleeting thought that it has anything to do with Oikawa, you convince yourself it’s just annoyance that you can’t enjoy games like you’d like to.

Interrupting your thoughts, the whistle blows to signal the end of the game and you perk your head up. You’re grateful for the distraction, not really wanting to delve deeper into your thoughts about Oikawa, and peek into the gym. Miko notices your head in the doorway and waves you in to join the huddle.

Ha, take that fan club. Wannabe my ass.

Miko’s movement catches Oikawa’s attention. He looks to where her attention is drawn and watches you beam before throwing the door wide and joining the huddle by Miko’s side. He wonders what you were doing waiting by the door, normally you wait until the last possible moment before bolting from your seat in the bleachers to join the huddle. You never want to miss a single second of the game, which he finds rather endearing. And he can’t remember the last time you skipped out on a game early.

He stares at you, trying to get your attention, but you’re fixated on the coach, no doubt trying to soak up as much information as possible. It makes his mouth curve ever so slightly at how eagerly you listen during these huddles. When you do briefly slide your gaze over to him, he gives you a questioning look to which you just shake your head at and point discretely at the coach.

Ah. Your way of saying, ‘shut up and listen’.

He supposes he likes that about you. Your bluntness.

So, with an eyeroll, he fixes his eyes on the coach, fully intending on pestering you later about it. He tries to grab you before the next game, but you hurry away as soon as the whistle is blown, and his fingers grasp empty air.

The team wins the next set, winning the match without going to the 3rd set. As customary, he lines up with the team to thank the spectators and Oikawa gets the chance to pick you out in the crowd. He spots you off to the side, and he’s noted since meeting you that you don’t sit with the cheering crowd, but rather on your own. It’s never too hard to find you, your face split in two by a smile as you clap for them. It’s then that he notices who is sitting directly in front of you.

He fights the urge to frown. He likes to think he’s a polite guy, having always given attention to his so called ‘fan club’. He got used to it in high school, the constant barrage of placating a group of fans, but had been secretly looking forward to hopefully leaving it behind. Only to have a new one re-emerge within the first few months of school. The other guys on the team weren’t too keen about him for a while after that. It took him forever to convince them to tolerate him again.

And he hates that they give you trouble. Ever since they discovered you interact with him outside of school, it seems they deemed you an enemy. He tries to stay away from you during regular school hours, keeping it limited to volleyball only, but lately the two have started bleeding together. He simply can’t help himself, however selfish that may be. Gathering his things, he wonders if they’re the cause for your weird behavior earlier.

He glances at you helping Miko put away the chairs, a tight feeling constricting his chest. God—if he ever told you how he actually feels about you, what would his fan club do then? How miserable would they make you? But damn him to hell, he’s selfish, and it doesn’t stop him from striding over to you cooing your name.

Without hesitation you reply, “Oikawa-san~,” in the same sing-song voice he uses for you. You don’t even bother to look over your shoulder at him, continuing your task.

“What was with the little peeping tom imitation earlier?”

You’re glad to be facing away from him, your skin prickling with the thought of having to explain to him that his fan club was pissing you off. Surely earning yourself a more prying follow-up question that you definitely do not want to answer. So instead you shrug, brushing off his question, “You guys were so far ahead, and I was sure your serves would end it, so I figured I’d actually be a part of the entire huddle.”

He squints, finding that to be rather out of character for you. “You missed my serves though!” He pouts, deciding it’s better for him to let you off the hook than continue to pry. He doesn’t think you’d tell him anyways, no matter how much he pesters you.

“Oh, big baby. I missed what? Two?”

“What if they were my best yet!” He protests, leaning around you so you can see his impressive pout. It delights him that he elicits a smile from you, peering at him from the corner of your eye, clearly finding his antics amusing. “Guess you’ll have to help me with serving practice to make up for it.”

You stick your tongue out at him, which he hates to admit he watches very closely as you answer, “Fine.” Though, truthfully, he’s not really pulling your leg too much. You like helping him practice.

He can’t help how his mouth turns downward into a frown as another member of the team, a bold freshman, butts into the conversation. “Need any help?”

Though he does find immense delight at the way your face falls to a neutral expression, giving him a curt, “I’m alright, thank you.” You don’t even turn to him, instead tilting your head to look at Oikawa continuing, “Oikawa-san is more than enough help here. Why don’t you see if they need help putting away the net?”

The freshman slinks away and Oikawa has to physically restrain himself from doing a victory lap as you shove a chair into his hands grumbling to yourself. The muttering continues as you move to put away more chairs, loud enough that he catches you say, “Is he ever going to get the hint?”

“What?”

You almost drop the chair you’re holding, turning wide-eyed at Oikawa, not realizing you’d been talking out loud to yourself. “It’s nothing.”

He frowns. “Is he bothering you?”

God he’s talking so loudly, making you nervous that the underclassman might hear him. “Can you talk any louder?” You hiss. Oikawa’s expression doesn’t change, however, and you groan really not wanting to get into this right now. “He’s been at it for a couple weeks now,” you say, trying to play off the situation as best you can. You’ve never had someone as persistent in pursuing you as he is, or someone as oblivious to your subtle rejections either.

You vaguely wonder if this is how Oikawa feels all the time with his fan club.

“Wanna pretend to date for a while?” He suggests harmlessly in your opinion, but very selfishly in his. And while he knows he isn’t joking in the slightest—you certainly think he is and bark out a laugh at the idea of fake dating him to get the underclassman off your back. “What?” He pouts. “Is it so crazy of an idea?”

You’re laughing even harder now, enough that people are beginning to look your way, so you swallow you remaining laughter and wipe your eyes dramatically. “It just don’t want to be murdered in the dead of night by your fan club, that’s all.”

You go back to collapsing chairs and don’t notice Oikawa stiffen. He doesn’t like being reminded that his fan club will literally rip apart any girl he is even remotely interested in. And he isn’t just interested in you. He likes you. A lot.

Clearly not thinking anything of this conversation, you say over your shoulder, “What are all those muscles for if you’re not going to carry more chairs than me?” He blinks back to reality and makes a show of picking up way more chairs than you and putting them away faster too. That only earns him a scowl in response, but he knows it’s only for show.

~

“Oh, pleeeeeease?” Oikawa almost gets on his knees begging you. Practice is done but he wants to stay late and hammer in more serves before the night is over. And sue him if he thinks it’s way more enjoyable if you stay to help him. “You promised last week!” You groan, scrunching your eyes tight, not wanting to look at his stupidly adorable pouting face that usually breaks you. It doesn’t help that you can feel he is standing very close to you. “You’re going to have to open your eyes sometime.”

“Nope, I’ll walk all the way home like this.”

He pleads your name again. “You’re going to miss the rare sight of Oikawa Tooru on his knees for you!”

You don’t budge. “Nice try.”

“I’m serious!” Now he really does get on his knees, dramatically putting his hands together to beg you. “This is a once in a lifetime chance!”

He keeps it to himself that you could definitely get him on his knees for many different reasons.

He’s sure that he’s broken you when you groan loudly and peek an eye open at him. Upon seeing that he is being serious, both of your eyes widen, and you have the audacity to start giggling at him. “I should take a picture.”

That makes him scramble to his feet, sticking his tongue out at you. “You better not.” It just makes you grin and his heart soars at the sight. He can’t help that your smile makes his stomach do somersaults. He takes you by the arm and drags you further into the gym before jogging over to the other side of the court and grabbing a ball from the cart.

He loves that he doesn’t have to tell you what to do. You’re already digging through your bag to find objects to place around the opposite side of the net for him to aim for. He notices that you’ve placed some of them very meanly—some sitting just barely on the outside line, others in spots that he has a record of having trouble hitting. And while it makes his chest swell with pride you even notice his performance, the scowl across his face betrays his annoyance that you aren’t making this easy.

If you’re going to help him—he’s going to have to work for it.

And hell, if that doesn’t drive him wild.

“Those good?” You ask, stepping off to the side, a smug smirk splayed across your lips.

You know exactly what you’re doing.

He levels a look at you that you return with a sickeningly sweet yet utterly terrifying smile. “You’re going to have to do better than that, I’m afraid.”

Your smile transforms into something that makes his stupid fucking shorts tighten, holding his gaze steadily as you challenge, “We’ll see.” Then you tear your eyes from his and he feels like you’ve ripped his chest out with it and like he can barely get enough air into his lungs. He knows the challenge is to drive him to do better, to perform the best of his ability, but damn—he’ll give 110% for the rest of his life if you ask him to.

You will never admit how much you love watching Oikawa play volleyball. Watching him shift from his teasing, easy-going smile, to this intensely serious and calculating gaze that while foreign to you—is also so strangely familiar. You feel lucky to be able to watch him up close, someone who has honed their craft, yet is ever looking to be better. When it comes down to it, you truly admire Oikawa and want to be there to watch him grow and see where he goes. Because to you, the sky’s the limit for him.

Where the hell are those thoughts coming from?

The sound of a volleyball slamming onto the court, sending the notebook you placed on the line skittering across the floor, startles you. “Hey! Pay attention!” Oikawa scolds. You quickly apologize, knowing full well how much a stray volleyball can hurt. “And make sure you’re watching! I’m going to hit every single one of those first try.”

You nod, a bit blankly, still reeling from the thoughts tumbling through your head. He tosses another ball up, his powerful thighs straining as he thrusts his body upwards, hand meeting the ball at the perfect point—the sound of his hand cracking against it almost as loud as the sound that reverberates around the gym when it connects with the floor. It all happens in the blink of an eye, but you feel like you’re watching it in slow motion until his feet touch the floor and you’re jolted back to reality.

God, what the fuck is going on with you tonight?

Oikawa isn’t blind. He knows you’re watching him. And it sends such a thrill down his spine he doesn’t know what to do with himself besides channel as his energy into his serves. Otherwise he’s going to do something very stupid tonight.

You’re uncannily quiet for the remainder of the night. Just watching him serve over and over again, and when he’s finished, helping him pick up the balls and set up the targets so he can start again. He is desperate to know what’s going through your head, but he lets you stew, just as interested in what conclusion you might be coming to on your own.

It’s not his fault that his imagination runs absolutely fucking wild that night. He can’t sleep, theorizing what changed today—if anything did. What were you thinking about as you watched him so intently? What flipped the switch? Are you thinking about him right now, lying awake in bed like he is? It torments him even in his dreams.

~

He does keep you awake that night. You can’t get the image of him out of your head. His voice either. It’s infuriating. You try to convince yourself he’s just a friend. That all those late nights in the gym, all the times he’s walked you home, all the bus rides you’ve fallen asleep on his shoulder, are harmless. He hasn’t wormed his way into your heart, he hasn’t made you fall in love with him slowly and quietly and its only now hitting you like a tidal wave—has he?

Fuck. Has he?

You’re grateful your roommates’ room is down the hall, giving you the freedom to scream into your pillow.

Are you a fucking Oikawa fan girl now?

You don’t know the difference between you and them is that he’s been in love with you a lot longer than you can even imagine.

mirrorball | a. matthews

a/n: first in a series of sixteen fics based off taylor swift’s new album, folklore. full list here.

You sighed as the front door closed behind you. It had been a long day; weddings always were. Being a wedding guest was usually just a series of slightly uncomfortable, awkward experiences back to back to the point where you became as numb to them as your feet were from your heels due to general exhaustion and open bars and all you would have to say about the evening when your co-workers asked you about it on Monday was that it was fine. You had made it through the day, thanks to champagne and your boyfriend. He intercepted some of the worst potential interactions for you, even taking on your great aunt’s cheek pats that verged on slaps for you. He had been a champion today, according to your mom, and you couldn’t agree more. 

“That was exhausting,” Auston sighed as he shuffled past you into the kitchen. “Remind me get a restraining order against your great aunt. I think she basically slapped me.” 

You laughed at his words, letting your feet carry you into the living room as you tried to will your exhausted, running mind to rest for a moment. Tonight, despite it’s obvious down being that it was a wedding and you were close enough to the age where it was considered acceptable to be getting engaged, you had a good day. Any day you could spend with Auston without the noise of his job and the world’s thoughts about the two of you was a good day. Sure, everyone at the wedding had opinions, but theirs were within scope, within the socially allowed levels of casual judgment. What you and Auston usually dealt with was out of scope, and it wore on you heavily. 

You wanted nothing more than to make everyone else happy. It was one of your best qualities, but also the one that brought you the most pain. There was only so much broken glass a person could pick up when trying to make the world a better place before their palms became bloody and scarred and parts of you started to break off in an effort to make yourself easier to tolerate, easily palatable to everyone. The parts of you that broke off, some of them broken forcibly by yourself kicking and screaming, in an effort to be adored by the masses were blending with the broken parts of the world you saw and you didn’t know what to pick up anymore. 

You felt like you were on a tightrope, balancing the person you knew you were and the person everyone wanted you to be, the person everyone would like, as you tried to walk across it. The two identities were entirely different weights. The person you were was heavy. She was real and strong and powerful, a three-dimensional human being incapable of being liked by everyone simply because she had opinions. The person everyone would like was a shallow grave, void of personality or content, waiting for the real you to fall into it and swallow you whole. You wanted so badly to be able to shed yourself of that two-dimensional false personality, but the real you was too much, too raw, too real to risk in front of the world. You chose instead to try to use it sparingly. Each time you did, it turned you into a mirrorball, reflecting and almost magnifying the best qualities of the people around you, spinning at a fast pace in an effort to provide that reflection and amplification to as many people as possible. There wasn’t space for you in it and the spinning made you constantly dizzy. Mirrors didn’t shine themselves; they simply reflected whatever was turned to them.

The killer part of it all was from your tightrope you couldn’t even see the platform you left to start your journey, nor could you see the platform you were theoretically walking it, which made you question what you were even doing on the tightrope in the first place. Was there even a platform on the other side?

Auston wasn’t like you. There were multiple parts to him, but they made up one whole human being. He brought out different parts of his personality around different people, in different environments, but he owned every single part equally; none had more weight than the other. He was solid, firm, complete. You were fractured and unbalanced, a house of torn and taped together playing cards desperately hoping a breeze didn’t come by and topple you. 

Auston didn’t really understand why you cried sometimes when everything became too much. He held you while you cried and rubbed your back gently. He didn’t understand because that desperate personality never came out to face him. You were always yourself with him. It’s why you, despite multiple failed relationships and countless almosts that led to real heartbreaks, were still here. He was different. You tried with him, because relationships take effort, but the you that tried was real and imperfect and good and he loved that you. The him that tried with you was the same one everyone else got, you just got every single piece, sometimes all at once, and you thanked your lucky stars he was easier to love than you were.

Your feet were still sort of numb thanks to your heels that you refused to take off. Auston had tried to get you to bring flats for the reception, but you’d waved him off because they didn’t go with the dress. Maybe you should’ve just swallowed the aesthetics for comfort, but you did love those heels. You sighed as you let your feet slowly start to carry you in a circle, your body swaying as you hummed one of the songs from the wedding softly to yourself. You closed your eyes and focused on your movements in an effort to clear your mind. 

When you opened your eyes, you saw Auston standing in the doorway between the living room and the kitchen. His tall frame was leaned against it. His suit jacket was off and his sleeves were rolled up to his elbows. His tie was loose around his neck and his hair that had been perfectly in place when you left that morning was drooping onto his forehead untamed. He had a soft, kind smile on his face that carried into his eyes and somehow deeper into him. His dark eyes were watching you sway, his smile growing as he watched and let out a soft laugh. 

“What?” you asked him, tilting your head to the side and raising an eyebrow at him. 

He laughed a little louder before pushing off the doorframe. He crossed the room until he reached you. His large hands reached for you, finding purchase on your hips. You smiled up at him as you let your arms climb up to fall over his shoulders. You kept humming along and let Auston start to sway you slowly to the tempo of the song you were humming. 

“Thank you for coming,” you told him, foregoing your humming in favor of speaking to him now. 

“Of course,” he nodded softly. “Boyfriend duty, right?” 

You laughed, making him laugh, one thing you were really good at and always wanted to be good at. He pulled you closer into his chest and continued to dance with you, slowly working you in a circle with him as you swayed to music that wasn’t playing.

“Boyfriend duty,” you agreed softly. 

“I think I did alright,” Auston told you. 

"You did great,” you replied, your voice quieter than before. “Better than I would have done if roles were reversed, but I’d give it my all.” 

Auston sighed, his head rolling back a little. His hands fidgeted with the material of your dress as he thought. You weren’t sure exactly what was going through his mind, but you could see the pained expression on his face as he debated whether or not to tell you what he was thinking. 

“You know you’re beyond good enough, right?” Auston told you as he lifted his head back so he could meet your eyes with his. “You don’t need this act you do. I like you, for you. So will everyone else.”

But they won’t. They’ll only like parts of me, the parts of me that make them feel good about themselves, but they won’t like all of me. If they don’t like all of me, what’s the point?

“Not everyone on the planet is meant to like you, you know?” 

You hadn’t realized those thoughts came out of your mouth, that they hadn’t just been in your head, until Auston replied to them. You bit your lip and dropped your eyes to the floor, staring at Auston’s dark dress shoes and your heels instead of his face. 

“And that’s a good thing. If everyone liked you, I probably wouldn’t. You’re not for everyone, baby, and that’s a good thing. I love you, the real you, the one that’s here right now. You don’t have to pretend to be this sort of personality-free robot all the time. Less people might like you, but the people who like you will like you for real things, like I do.” 

“It’s not that easy, Aus,” you sighed as you let your eyelids drop closed. You picked up your head, but kept your eyes closed. The possibility tears would fall down your cheeks when you opened your eyes was too high to risk it. Auston couldn’t handle seeing you cry. “It’s just not that simple.” 

“But it is.” Auston cut you off before you could finish. “I know it would be a change and change is scary, but you’ll be happy. You won’t cry so much.” 

You shook your head as a pathetic, sad smile fell over your face. It was a hopeless smile, full of pain from the pulling inside of you between one side that desperately wanting to do what Auston was offering and the realistic part of you that knew it would never work. 

“Auston, it’s like I’m on a trapeze. I’m swinging back and forth, but never landing somewhere fully. I’m just swinging, performing stunts at high levels of personal risk, so other people have a good time. I’m swinging back and forth between myself and the person people actually like. There’s no net. There’s no where to go. The just have to keep swinging. I can’t reach a platform.”

You opened your eyes to see Auston’s brow furrowed down and he had started shaking his head softly. He lifted one of his hands up from your hip to cup the side of you face, his thumb rubbing the few tears that had slid out away. 

“I’m the net, baby,” Auston told you. “Choose to fall. Choose to fall right now. No more swinging. Just be you, the real you, all of the time. I’ll catch you. I promise, I’ll catch you.” 

You shook your head, causing his other hand to come up to the other side of his face and hold your head in place for a moment. You had no choice but to look at him as a few tears spilled down your cheeks even though you wanted nothing more than for that not to be occurring right now. Auston pulled his lips in between his teeth as he looked at you. 

“Yes, you can,” he assured you. His voice was steady and firm, void of any doubt. He was solid and sure, a rock that had battered storm after storm and never moved an inch. This storm couldn’t hurt him and he knew it. He was tired of standing on the sidelines, watching it hurt the person he loved. “Let go. I’ll catch you. I know it’s a process, but we’ll work on it together. Just try, not for me, but for yourself. Try.”

You closed your eyes and took in a deep breath. You trusted Auston. You trusted him more than anyone else you knew. If you didn’t trust him enough to catch you, to finally stop the spinning, the breaking, the constant unbalanced sensation you carried, then this feeling would be permanent. It couldn’t be permanent. You didn’t want to feel like this anymore. You took a deep breath again. You needed to fall, you just didn’t know how. The look in Austin’s dark eyes told you he was going to be standing there, waiting for you, no matter how messy it was, that he was going to be right there while you figured out how to shed the fake skin you wore and found your footing at yourself. You didn’t know exactly how it was going to work, but the steadiness of his hands and the feeling in your chest told you this was worth the risk.

“Okay, catch me.”

Ranking Lady Gaga's albums, from worst to best

Being a Lady Gaga fan can be an exercise in frustration.

Gaga is far more ambitious than most popstars — I doubt we’ll ever see Ariana Grande or Ed Sheeran make an album as left-field as Born This Way or ARTPOP. But she's also far less consistent, with numerous misbegotten projects.

Gaga's undeniably successful, with five #1 hits, an Oscar and multiple iconic music videos to her name. But her messy album rollouts and tradition of underperforming lead singles make her feel like an underdog compared to the more polished, precise careers of her contemporaries like Taylor Swift, Beyoncé or Bruno Mars.

Gaga is kind of a mess. But she's our mess. This album ranking will cover some records I can't stand — albums that make me constantly hit the fast-forward button, or albums I ignore altogether. But there isn't a single record on here that wasn't a bold move. Even the "back to basics" albums made strong aesthetic choices.

So let's dive into the career of the most fascinating Millennial popstar.

#8: Cheek To Cheek (2014)

This really shouldn't count. It's a Lady Gaga album in name only. But, technically it's a Gaga album, so here we are.

I've got nothing against Gaga having fun playing Rat Pack-era dress-up with Tony Bennett. She's a theatre kid at heart, and I'm sure every theatre kid would kill to make a Great American Songbook covers record like this. It sounds like she and Tony enjoyed themselves, so I'm happy for them!

...but I'm sorry. I can't be objective about Cheek To Cheek, it's the opposite of my taste. There's only so many bland lounge ballads I can take.

BEST SONGS: I have to pick one? "Anything Goes" is cute, I guess.

WORST SONG: "Sophisticated Lady"

#7: A Star Is Born (2018)

Let me first make this clear — A Star Is Born, the movie starring Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga? It's a masterpiece. It's electrifying and tragic and I'm still upset it didn't sweep the Oscars that year. There's even a cute dog! You won't hear me say a bad word about it.

But A Star Is Born, the accompanying soundtrack? It's extremely hit-and-miss.

Yes, it includes arguably Gaga's best-ever song and one of the greatest movie hits ever written, "Shallow." And there's plenty of other great tunes in the tracklist too — "Always Remember Us This Way," "I'll Never Love Again," the "La Vie En Rose" cover.

Even the country-rock songs from Bradley Cooper (who, reminder, is not a professional singer) are mostly good! "Black Eyes" RIPS, and "Maybe It's Time" feels like a long-lost classic.

But sadly, there are so many mediocre filler tracks on this thing. The second half of A Star Is Born's hour-plus runtime (Gaga's longest!) is padded with generic songs like "Look What I've Found," "Heal Me" and "I Don't Know What Love Is." The only good one out of the bunch is the silly, intentionally-bad "Why Did You Do That?"

In the movie, these filler tracks serve a point – they're meant to show Gaga's character selling out. They work in the movie when you hear them for a few seconds and see Cooper make a drunkly disappointed scowl. But I don't want to listen to them, and sadly, they make up half the album.

In other words — A Star Is Born would've made an incredible six or seven-song EP. But as an 63-minute-long record? It's a slog.

BEST SONGS: "Shallow", "Always Remember Us This Way," "Maybe It's Time"

WORST SONG: "Heal Me"

#6: Joanne (2016)

After Born This Way and ARTPOP, I get why Gaga needed to make a more lowkey, back-to-basics album. I also understand that many of these songs have extremely personal lyrics for her.

But is a down-to-earth album what I really want from our most outré popstar? Not really.

Luckily, Joanne is better than that description suggests. Yes, there are some bland acoustic ballads and awkward hippie-era throwbacks (two styles that are really not in Gaga's wheelhouse), but there's also some Springsteen-style heartland rockers! And those go hard in the paint.

Joanne works best when Gaga works the record's dusty aesthetics into her brand of weirdo pop, like on the sizzling "John Wayne," the winking "A-YO" or the delightfully extra Florence Welch duet "Hey Girl."

The record also has "Perfect Illusion" — a glorious red herring of a lead single that sounds nothing like anything else on Joanne. It's a roided-up mixture of woozy Tame Impala production and hair metal histrionics, and it rules. It might be Gaga's best-ever lead single! (at the very least, it's her most underrated.)

And there is one slow tune that's unambiguously great: "Million Reasons," another solid Gaga lighters-in-the-air power ballad pastiche.

Despite what some Little Monsters may tell you, Joanne isn't a disaster. There's some great stuff in there, and even the worst songs are just forgettable. But it's still far from her best.

BEST SONGS: "Perfect Illusion," "Diamond Heart," "Million Reasons"

WORST SONG: "Come To Mama"

#5: Chromatica (2020)

When Chromatica was released near the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, it had been seven years since Gaga had released music in her classic gonzo-synthpop vein. I can easily picture the record serving as an "ugh fine, I'll give you what you want" response to the many Little Monsters annoyed with Gaga's half-decade of folksy ballads and Julie Andrews cosplay.

I'll say this about Chromatica — outside of The Fame Monster, it's her most consistent record. There's not a single track that's a glaring mistake. And the three singles — "Stupid Love," "911" and the triumphant Ariana Grande duet "Rain On Me" — easily stand among her best tracks.

But although "all bangers, no ballads" album sounds rad in theory, it doesn't really succeed in practice. Chromatica is solid, but it's also a very same-y record. It feels like Gaga had one really great idea for the album ('90s club music with super-depressing lyrics) and repeated it over and over and over again to diminishing results.

There are some songs that are able to separate themselves: the three singles, of course, as well as the goofy "Babylon" and "Sine From Above," the Elton John duet that's the closest Chromatica gets to a ballad. But by the end of the album, you feel more worn out than electrified.

Also — and this is probably unfair, but still — Chromatica came out just a couple months after another retro-dance blockbuster pop album: Dua Lipa's magnum opus, Future Nostalgia. That's not a flattering comparison.

BEST SONGS: "Rain On Me," "Stupid Love," "911"

WORST SONG: "1000 Doves"

#4: The Fame (2008)

Out of all of Gaga's records, The Fame is most like a time capsule. It REEKS of late '00s/early '10s pop — which isn't an entirely fair criticism, seeing as Gaga popularized that era's sleazy, synthy aesthetic. It's also not a bad thing! I don't mind a little nostalgia!

As you already know, The Fame's singles are masterworks. "Just Dance," "Poker Face," "Paparazzi" — these tracks have titanic legacies for good reason. And although it's probably the least-beloved of this album's hits, despite being a total banger, "LoveGame" should still be commended for having arguably the most Gaga lyric ever (you know, the "disco stick" line).

And even though those tracks are front-loaded on The Fame, there are some gems deeper in the tracklist. "Summerboy" is basically Gwen Stefani covering The Strokes (so obviously, it's great). "Eh, Eh" is adorable. "Starstruck" is the most 2008 song ever recorded, with aggressive Auto-Tune and Flo Rida showing up to make Starbucks jokes.

Sadly, The Fame still feels like Gaga before she became fully-formed at certain points. The back half has a number of songs that feel like generic club tracks forced by the label, and "Paper Gangsta" is one of the clunkiest songs in Gaga's catalogue.

But at the very least, the bad songs on The Fame at least serve as little nostalgia bombs for that era of pop. And the best songs are untouchable classics.

BEST SONGS: "Paparazzi," "Just Dance," "Summerboy"

WORST SONG: "Paper Gangsta"

#3: ARTPOP (2013)

For much of Gaga's career, she's been ahead of the curve. She tries something, and a year or a few years later, other popstars try something similar to diminishing results.

That doesn't just apply to the successful stuff, like Gaga's extravagant music videos inspiring many copycats from 2010-2013. It also applies to the mid-late '10s trend of legacy popstars making a controversial record with risky aesthetic or lyrical choices that backfired: reputation. Witness. Man of The Woods.

Gaga did this first, with ARTPOP — arguably the most abrasive, and bizzare major label album released by a major modern popstar. And she did it better, because unlike Swift, Perry and Timberlake, Gaga's weirdness was for real. And it was in service of some prime, hyper-aggressive bangers.

ARTPOP isn't Gaga's best work — some of her experiments on it are major misfires, from the obnoxious "Mary Jane Holland" to the bland Born This Way leftover (and Romani slur-utilizing) "Gypsy."

But when ARTPOP is on, it's ON. The opening stretch in particular, from "Aura" to "Venus" to "G.U.Y." to "Sexxx Dreams," is chaotic synthpop at its finest. Those songs took Gaga's classic sound to an apocalyptic, demented extreme, and they're fantastic.

"MANiCURE" is a great glam-rock banger, "Dope" is another classic Gaga piano ballad, the title track is some sikly-smooth dreampop; even the misguided, clunky trap anthem "Jewels N' Drugs" is bad in a hilarious, charming way!

Trust me: ARTPOP will go down in history not as a flop, but as a gutsy, underrated record from a legend. Less Witness, more In Utero.

BEST SONGS: "G.U.Y.," "Venus," "Sexxx Dreams"

WORST SONG: "Gypsy"

#2: The Fame Monster (2009)

Objectively speaking, this is probably the best Gaga album.

It's her one record with no fluff, no filler — only 34 minutes and 8 tracks, all of them stellar.

It's the record that took Gaga from "wow, this new woman is a fresh new face in pop!" to "this woman IS pop."

It's the record with her signature track, "Bad Romance," which was accompanied by arguably the greatest music video of the 21st Century. (It also has my absolute favorite Gaga track, the relentlessly catchy "Telephone.")

I don't think I need to explain what makes mega-smashes "Bad Romance" and "Telephone" and "Alejandro" great, nor the accompanying legendary deep cuts "Speechless" and "Dance In The Dark." They speak for themselves.

However — the sleek, calculated perfection of The Fame Monster, while incredible, isn't something I return to often. It's just not the side of Gaga that's my favorite. That honor would have to go to...

BEST SONGS: "Telephone," "Dance In The Dark," "Bad Romance"

WORST SONG: "So Happy I Could Die" (but it's still pretty solid)

#1: Born This Way (2011)

One of my favorite podcasts is Blank Check. The concept of the show is to analyze each movie by a famous director — in particular, those who had big success early on and then got a blank check to make whatever crazy passion project they wanted. Here's a great example: because Batman was a massive hit, Tim Burton got to make whatever Hot Topic-core movies he wanted to for decades, from Edward Scissorhands to a creepy Willy Wonka remake.

That long-winded tangent is just to say: Born This Way was Lady Gaga's blank check. By early 2011, she had conquered the pop universe, notching hit after hit after hit. Every other pop star was copying her quirky music videos. So the label let Gaga do whatever she wanted — and she didn't waste that opportunity.

Born This Way is wildly overproduced. It's both extremely trend-chasing (those synths were cutting edge at the time but charmingly dated now), but also deeply uncaring about what the teens want (I don't think Springsteen and Queen homages were big at the time). And I love every messy, overblown second of it.

From the hair-metal/synthpop hybrid opener "Marry The Night" to the majestic '80s power ballad "The Edge of Glory," Born This Way starts at an 11. And Gaga never takes her foot off the pedal for the album's entire hour-plus run time. Clanging electric guitars, thunderous synths and Clarence Clemons (!!!) sax solos collide into each other as Gaga champions every misfit and loser in the world. It's gloriously corny in the best way possible.

Born This Way is also the perfect middle ground of pop-savvy Gaga and gonzo Gaga. It doesn't go quite as hard as ARTPOP, but the hooks are stronger. And the oddball moments are tons of fun, from the sci-fi biker anthem "Highway Unicorn" to the goofy presidential-sex banger "Government Hooker" ("Put your hands on me/John F. Kennedy" might be the greatest line in pop history).

Born This Way will always be my favorite Gaga album. It's armed with nuclear-grade hooks, slamming beats, and soaring anthems. Although it's not as untouchably pristine as the Mt. Rushmore of '10s pop classics (for the record, that's 1989, EMOTION, Lemonade and, of course, Melodrama), Gaga isn't best served by meticulousness. She's proudly tacky and histrionic, and so that's what makes Born This Way an utter joy.

BEST SONGS: "The Edge of Glory," "You and I," "Marry The Night"

WORST SONG: "Bloody Mary"

Would ya look at that! Another Alchemy Brothers oneshot! (Yes, the title is inspired by that JerJor song 😅)

Here For You

Warnings: Nightmares, Lots of emotional angst, Villain Varian (he definitely needs a warning)

“Hugo...”

The chilling voice sounded familiar. Too familiar. The blond alchemist shook his head and adjusted to his surroundings. He seemed to be in his and Varian’s lab, but the atmosphere was...different. The dingy space was covered floor to ceiling with increasingly noticeable dust. Not one surface or piece of equipment was spared from the filth, and the sight made Hugo’s skin crawl.

“Hugo...”

There was that voice again. The echoey nature of it made it hard to pin-point who’s it was, but Hugo was almost positive he knew; and that realization only deepened the pit forming in his stomach.

“Var-Varian?” He asked, timidly into the darkness.

The sardonic laughter that rang out into the emptiness couldn’t have been anyone else’s. Hugo staggered backward, but suddenly, a silhouette of the boy flashed in front of him. Hugo blinked once, and there Varian was standing directly in in his view, a twisted and sadistic smile resting on his face.

“You know, I’m not sure what’s more pathetic,” Varian echoed. “You...or the ridiculous idea that you think that someone could actually care about you.”

Hugo’s breath got caught in his throat. He couldn’t speak; couldn’t move; he was simply frozen.

Varian walked around the lab slowly, tipping over various flasks and beakers as he went.

“Face it, Hugo. You’ll never truly fit in here. Me, dad...we’re a family.”

He walked back over to Hugo, staring him down.

“And you were brought in solely out of pity.”

The solutions spilled onto the floor and fused together, morphing into a solid, rusty orange hue. The amber grew and spiked out all around Hugo, until it reached its peak, dividing the room and separating himself from Varian.

The deadly substance tore through a sleeve of Hugo’s clothes, making him reel back in surprise and pain. The cut was deeper than he expected, and it made his entire left arm sore. The pain traveled to his head as he collapsed on the ground He was still too shocked to cry, but his eyes burned almost as much as his head.

The image of Varian slowly faded into the darkness, but the amber continued to grow.

“He’s not coming back, Hugo.”

This time it was a different voice he heard; even more familiar than Varian’s. His head shot up, and suddenly he was face to face with...himself. Hugo scooted back to the wall as another shard of amber shot out and cut his other sleeve. He winced and grabbed his right arm, the room seeming to close in on him.

The phantom version of himself loomed over him, straight faced without a hint of emotion.

“You might as well give up while you still have the chance.”

The boy’s head started spinning as the pain became more severe, the words lingering in his mind...

———

Hugo’s eyes shot open, and he sat up in his bed, taking slow, shallow breaths. The tears came, as they always did, and they wet the sheets around him. He checked his arms for the cuts, but they were completely unharmed. It was just a dream.

“A nightmare,” Hugo corrected between his sobs. He hugged himself, slowly rocking back and forth, causing the bed to creak.

The sound traveled over to Varian’s side of the room, causing the boy to stir. His eyes fluttered slightly and he rolled over on his side. He saw a very distraught looking Hugo, curled into a ball on his bed and obviously crying. Varian immediately stood up and walked over to him, his feet making the floorboards creak.

Hugo heard him coming and tensed, having to remind himself again that it was just a nightmare. He scooted over to make room for Varian who promptly sat down next to him.

“Another nightmare?” Varian asked in a hushed tone.

Hugo could only nod miserably before laying his head on his knees.

Varian’s face fell; he hated seeing Hugo like this. Mostly because there was nothing he could really do to fix it.

...But he could still try.

Varian gingerly placed a hand on Hugo’s shoulder.

“Do you...want to talk about it?”

Hugo perked up slightly to look at Varian. This was his brother. His brother who did care about him. He could never act like...that.

Hugo closed his eyes and took a deep, slow breath, trying to shake the images in his mind. But they just kept coming back. Maybe talking about it would do him some good.

“I...I was in our lab,” Hugo started in a voice barely above a whisper. “And I saw...you.”

Varian quickly retracted his hand as his stomach dropped. Hugo had a nightmare about...him?

Hugo noticed Varian’s tenseness and quickly backtracked.

“But it wasn’t you, of course. I know you’d never hurt me like that.”

Varian’s eyes widened and he backed up further.

“I hurt you?”

“No, no, it was just...what you said,” Hugo recovered. “In my dream, I mean.”

“Oh...”

Varian moved closer to him again and lowered his voice. “What-what was that?”

Hugo’s face darkened as he stared at the floor.

“That...you didn’t actually care. And that dad only adopted me out of-“

Hugo’s eyes filled with tears again as he tried to get the words out.

“Out-out of...pity.” He laid his head on his knees again, continuing to rock back and forth.

Varian drew in a sharp breath and tried to find the words to comfort Hugo. His brother’s nightmares were always so...real.

“Hugo...you know that’s not true,” Varian began, urging his brother to look up at him.

“I’m your brother. And it’s not because of pity; it’s because I care about you. I care about you more than I’ve cared about anyone, and-and dad does too.”

Hugo managed to look up at Varian, his eyes still bloodshot with tears.

“I mean it, Hugo,” Varian went on in a serious tone. “I-I don’t know what I’d do if you weren’t here, heh.”

A genuine smile played at the corners of Hugo’s mouth. “You’d probably drive yourself crazy with your nerd facts instead of me,” Hugo joked under his breath, chuckling a little.

“Hey, I heard that!” Varian laughed along. The lightheartedness only lasted for a measly moment, however, before the mood shifted downward again.

“Whatever you saw in that dream...it wasn’t true,” Varian continued. “And it can never be true because whatever happens-“

He moved his hand to Hugo’s shoulder again in a comforting manner.

“I’ll always be here for you.”

Hugo’s tears started to come back, but this time they were happier. That was really all he needed to hear right now. Just that his brother was truly there. He stopped hugging himself to let Varian in. He knew he could always go to him for comfort. Hugo scooted closer to his brother and wrapped him in a hug.

“Thanks, Hairstripe,” he whispered.

Varian was startled at first; up until this point he had usually been the one to initiate affection when it came to Hugo, but this was a very welcome change. He was relieved that he was able to help, and he gratefully hugged his brother back.

“Heh, anytime.”

———

The memories hit Hugo like a brick.

How could everything suddenly be so different in the span of one year? That was back when he still had a family, and when his brother still cared. Now, the terrifying nightmare seems closer to reality than the heartwarming moment that came after it.

Hugo sits in the same curled up position, rocking back and forth. But this time...he’s alone. No one is there to comfort him even though the person who used to be there is in clear view. Hugo doesn’t look up, but he can sense that Varian is practically glaring at him. In the span of a single year they had gone from brothers...to enemies.

The blond shivers and backs up further onto his bed, hitting the wall of his cell. It all happened so fast; the amber, Varian’s turn, and now prison where he’s been for three months. The only things keeping him going are the memories. The memories of how things used to be. The joy that they both felt before everything started spiraling, and especially the care that they had for each other. It was all real, and he knew for a fact that those feelings couldn’t just go away overnight. Varian’s heart is hardened for the time being, but Hugo keeps the hope that deep down, his brother is still in there.

Hugo props his head up and regrettably looks in the direction of Varian’s cell, quoting to himself what his brother had said to him a year ago.

“I’ll always be here for you.”

———

The young convict is also leaning against the wall of his cell, unable to sleep. Along with Hugo, Varian’s mind is being plagued with memories which he tries to push away, but for the first time something is actually stronger than his anger. He holds his head and groans. He doesn’t want to remember the meaningful moments he shared with Hugo. Mostly because he knows that he does still care about him. Even after everything, he’d still be devastated if something happened to his brother...

But he doesn’t want to care either. It just gets in the way of what he wants most: revenge. He tries to think of new plots to break out of jail, schemes to attack Corona, anything but those dreaded memories, but they refuse to leave.

Varian shifts his position as his mood grows somber. He doesn’t really want revenge. He just wants his dad back; he wants Hugo back. As much as he tries to deny it, he misses his brother. But he’s gone too far to turn back now.

The sadness passes and his eyebrows furrow again. He needs to stick to his goal: break out of jail with Andrew, enact his vengeance plot on Corona...and somehow ignore Hugo the entire time.

Varian turns around to face Andrew’s cell, forgetting that it’s also Hugo’s. For a brief second he locks eyes with his brother, but he quickly turns away. Whatever happened a year ago is completely over. Hugo basically betrayed his trust just like everyone else, and that is something he wouldn’t forgive. There’s no way that their bond could ever go back to what it was.

Hugo sighs sadly after seeing Varian turn away so abruptly and turns around himself. The glimmer of hope he still has is starting to fade. It was a disheartening feeling; knowing that Varian wanted nothing to do with him anymore.

Hugo subconsciously rolls up his sleeves and looks at his arms. They were still unharmed, but this time the pain is real.

A new quote comes to Hugo’s mind as he pushes his sleeves back down. It was something distantly familiar, almost as if he had heard it in a dream. He grits his teeth and hangs his head, whispering to himself, “Maybe I should just give up while I still have the chance.”

Sense and Sensibility Readthrough Part 7.5

Or, where I was gonna start chapter 11, but needed to talk about why I thought Willoughby's observation was wrong.

And then, of course, I turned it into something really long, so that's taken up my reading session today. (I still haven't finished writing my thoughts on Narrative Voice either, because it has gotten loooong.)

Anyway.

"Brandon is just the kind of man," said Willoughby one day, when they were talking of him together, "whom everybody speaks well of, and nobody cares about; whom all are delighted to see, and nobody remembers to talk to."

Elinor is right, here, that Willoughby is demonstrably wrong in his assessment of Colonel Brandon's social activity. It's not merely the fact that Elinor herself has taken an interest in Brandon enough, but simply the fact that Willoughby's claim that nobody remembers to talk to Brandon, is predicated on Willoughby himself dismissing the existence/value of the Middletons in general. It's not true that Brandon is not spoken to, it's that he's not spoken to by an arbitrary class of people whom Willoughby thinks matters, such as Willoughby, Marianne and Elinor, which he himself is a part of.

> "That he is patronised by you," replied Willoughby, "is certainly in his favour; but as for the esteem of the others, it is a reproach in itself. Who would submit to the indignity of being approved by such a woman as Lady Middleton and Mrs. Jennings, that could command the indifference of anybody else?"

We know the Middletons speak to him, because Willoughby himself admits it, but we also know from his own words that they don't count, only Elinor does. In fact, he considers them a negative. Social noise. Detractors by association even, a bad or shallow crowd. I wouldn't be surprised is he considers servants here also. After all, Marianne has already said as much in her statements around being 27, and we're lead to believe they share perspective on most things. Were it to be that Colonel Brandon was comfortable and sociable with the Middletons' maids and butlers, I think Willoughby would still consider him an unfortunate case.

And importantly, we know that the Middletons don't restrict themselves to just speaking with him, they also do care about him and his problems. Elinor has referenced that Sir Middleton clearly knows about whatever has troubled his history, and does have an investment in seeing the man socialise. Mrs. Jennings, for all her misplaced enthusiasm, does have an interest in his romantic life or woes as it may be. Just because these cares are aligned with their own interests of socialising and matchmaking, doesn't invalidate them. (Can't say much for Lady Middleton but the narrative has ventured that Lady Middleton specifically is a little cold outside the topic of her own children.) And, you know, who knows what other friends Brandon may have. We aren't him. He was even a Colonel, he must at least have military mates.

We see the Middletons as very flawed individuals because the narrative has framed them this way. Sir Middleton is ignorant, Lady Middleton is self-absorbed and Mrs. Jennings is shallow; on this line we're also expected to dismiss their value as individuals and friends at least slightly, the same way Willoughby and Marianne do.

But really, we can turn that assessment straight around, on Marianne in particular. She can be considered narrow-minded and dismissive. Arrogant perhaps, maybe even cold to people who are unfamiliar to her. As self-absorbed as Lady Middleton, perhaps, or as shallow as Mrs. Jennings. She's not so different, but she gets a pass inside the story for being young and pretty, and out of story for being the protagonist. It's easier to dismiss her flaws because they are presented, but not highlighted. But, again, we can turn that back around for the Middletons! If perhaps Brandon were the protagonist, would Mrs. Jennings have the same cheerful warmth as Mama Middleton? Maybe Lady M does care, but is simply detached like Elinor? There is certainly nobody in the story as genuinely generous and well-meaningly sociable as Sir M.

How might the Dashwoods appear then? Elinor might be cold, disinteresting, even if she shows some care. Marianne, pretty but vain and shallow; friendly, but mayhap just as likely to ask somebody to sing a song she just heard, or to bulldoze somebody with her opinions. Mama Dashwood might even appear as self-absorbed in her own family as Lady M; she made a point not to socialise beyond walking distance.

Either way, my point being, they are not so different. Watch Willoughby or anyone, including herself, give Marianne the time of day if she were older or dumpier! Or a servant! Is my statement here to mean that noone will give her attention? No, actually. Plenty of nice, genuine, and flawed people will anyway. Just that Willoughby and Marianne themselves, and anybody with that particular flaw of pride, would not.

So, yeah! Willoughby's observation was incorrect, and very myopic really. Such is youth, except come on man, Marianne is 17 but you're my age. You should know better! Man's definitely coasted on some social privilege his whole life and it shows.

"I do not dislike him. I consider him, on the contrary, as a very respectable man, who has everybody's good word, and nobody's notice; who, has more money than he can spend, more time than he knows how to employ, and two new coats every year."

I think Willoughby genuinely considers himself to not dislike Brandon. After all, he doesn't hate him, and he knows he has no reason to dislike him. I think Willoughby is the type of person who genuinely considers themselves to not dislike anyone, because, again, he has no reason to. They don't matter to him in that way.

But I think his general attitude speaks for itself. After all, he does find Lady Middleton and Mrs. Jennings thoroughly disrespectable, even by association. He considers Brandon a respectable man, but only in the ways in which he considers Brandon to have potential to be amongst people like himself and Marianne. He otherwise has everything callous to say about the aspects of Brandon's personality and circumstance that keep him from joining what he perceives as a more lively and acceptable strata of sociability. He certainly takes no issue with Marianne's actual open dislike of the man. (Though, come to think of it, that may be at least in part Mrs. Jenning's fault for setting her on him through thoroughly inappropriate real-person-shipping.)

I do think Willoughby has a great, mostly unvoiced disdain for Brandon's crowd, and I think that disdain extends to Brandon himself for having just enough potential to escape it, but not doing so. I get flashbacks to cases like in To Kill a Mockingbird (and uh, real life...) where people don't think they're racist, but also quite obviously don't think anything of the black community, and also look down on anyone who associates with them, like the guy has to always pretend he's drunk, and Atticus Finch himself. Disliking other people is a bad thing that other people do! This case is probably nowhere near as serious, but it comes from similar places on basic levels. Exclusivity, tribalism, elitism, prejudice, ostracisation, from where deeper, deeper problems take root.

STATUS! That's a word that could have been useful to me but I haven't used.

Anyway, I take this perspective because it's not as though I wasn't there too at one point, though absolutely nowhere near the extent of Marianne or Willoughby. I certainly didn't hold those conscious opinions, but I still felt the pressure to define the boundaries of people I should befriend, and I did unjustifiably dismiss people who I thought were dismissable by arbitrary social standards I didn't even understand. And for what? After all, I was exactly the same type of arbitrarily dismissable person! I was a weird kid! Weird kids are not socially prestigious material!

It's strange how easily ingrained that arbitrary-social-boundary-drawing is. Seriously, where exactly are children getting it from? Answer’s probably obvious but I’m already going too long.

I think, it's a very important thing to unlearn. If not least because it's a source of very deep societal problems, it can also potentially be another thing that leads somebody into a situation of, "everybody speaks well of, and nobody cares about; whom all are delighted to see, and nobody remembers to talk to." Not because noone cares or wants to speak to them, but because they've arbitrarily blinded themselves to people who do! There will of course be Willoughbys and Mariannes who don't care about you and think little of you, but at the end of the day they're a minority, and in terms of social interaction they're really no different from every other Middleton who might genuinely care.

It's ironically a fate that will most likely to hit hardest a Marianne or Willoughby who falls from social grace. After all, if they lose whatever privilege of personality or appearance, wealth or youth that keeps them afloat, they'd have noone to care about them or to talk to! Just lots and lots of Middletons, or probably worse. And befriending those people would involve, gasp, lowering your social standards! Descending to the level of people whom you have implicitly thought to have been beneath you this whole time! And now you've become a Brandon, who is old, and most unfortunately boring, and who only interacts with the Middletons, who don't count.

What a terrible fate!

Final Thoughts: So yeah, I think Willoughby was wrong, and also I think he's more than a little disdainful. He's definitely the kind of guy who has always had the luxury of arbitrarily making his choice of social affiliation, and has never had to challenge his prejudices. If he thinks nobody wants to talk to Brandon, well, on top of not being correct, he's also quite satisfied to play his own role in Brandon's perceived ostracisation. Not saying you are obligated to socialise with people whom you don’t have any interest in, but man, there’s no reason to do ‘em like that.

Wait, I've definitely used both the words pride and prejudice in this tangent. Hmm.

Anyway, making friends, and especially connecting with them, can be hard, but Brandon at least seems to be doing fine. The kids just have a superiority complex.

ZEP: S1 - CLARKEMAN ENDGAME

This is part of my ZEP: S1 Thoughts Master Post

Here’s the new & updated long analysis post for ZEP S1. This one features the whole season, all 12 episodes.

Just me...dissecting & analyzing the storyline...with focus on Zoey & Team Max. But since the stories are so intertwined, there’s Zoey/dad & Zoey/Simon talk, too. Among other things...relevant to it all...

ZEP: MAX & ZOEY -  THOUGHTS 1 [LINK HERE]  

WHY TEAM MAX IS ENDGAME

THE LOVE TRIANGLE

I hear the showrunner & the characters talk about a “love triangle”, yet I don’t see one (just confused, grieving people). I hear them talk about a deep emotional bond between Z&S, and yet I don’t see it on screen. I see a pretty shallow connection due to their dads - “grief bond” with no actual deeper connection. And though I personally don’t “feel” that they actually feel attraction to the other, I’m willing to admit that perhaps each truly thinks they do…and actually find the other attractive. But nonetheless the story, to me, has clearly been told in a way that showcases the differences of the two men in her life.

One thing that kinda supports my theories is that while we & Zoey have heard Max sing her actual “love songs” (revealing that the connection they have is love, friendship, romance), then Simon’s “heart songs” have been mostly related to his grief (”Should I stay or should I go” is kinda an exception here). Meaning their connection is based on that, and his grief is what she’s supposed to help him with. All S’s songs have been about his inability to deal with the loss of his dad, and the problems in his life & relationship that have come from this. Which is why I’m still a bit confused why the show is calling it a love triangle, when it doesn’t really seem to be.

Since they all sing their innermost thoughts, and the songs are related to the feelings they have, and connected to the “problem” Zoey is supposed to help them with, then for Simon that seems to be “everything grief related” (he’s still not dealing with the loss, and it affected his relationship with Jessica..etc)…and I don’t understand why Zoey isn’t more actively helping him with that…instead focusing on “do I possibly have romantic feelings for the man?”, when she & Mo established that if she doesn’t help the person who she hears sing with their problem… that’s not good. I think THIS is the thing that has “confused” me. (but we all know network shows love their love triangles and such drama, so they have to play it like that..). So I really hope that in the coming eps we will see Z. help S. deal with his grief (she has her family, Mo & Max…who help her, but S. doesn’t seem to have any support system…) and “fix him”.

Good news for one team, perhaps not so good for the other team.

Based on everything we’ve seen on the show (the storytelling, the promotional materials, the spoilers)… everything points to Max/Zoey being the endgame. I’ve seen many fans (both those who support Team M & those who support Team S), say that they get the same message from the storytelling. It does seem to be the clear message from the show…no matter how they get there..or when…

The “proof”:

First: The actor who portrayes Max is billed higher (probably mostly cause he’s done more well-known musical projects before than the other actor), and he’s featured in much more promotional materials (promo pics, posters, promo videos…) and in more central role, than the other actor. The promotion is vastly focused on M/Z. They use those characters & actors… a lot…for promotion. That suggests only one thing.

Second: They told us the premise of Zoey’s future relationships in the Pilot already via this Max/Zoey conversation:

Zoey: I have a long history of — what do you call my past relationships again? –

Max: – “Unnecessarily complicated, exhausting for everybody, the opposite of good”?

Zoey: Yeah. Those things. Which is why this time I’m just gonna take things slow, and wait for the right “in”

And with Zoey/Simon thing has been just a repeat of her past experiences which she claims she doesn’t want to re-live again, and this show is all about her growth as a character/person, this cannot be the endgame. Even if they’d reveal that S/J have broken up… all that’s already happened has followed this exact description (see Max’s quote)

Third: While Zoey sang her heart song to Max and they had a moment for themselves (though..let’s be honest…they get interrupted so much that others in the office must’ve overheard a lot by now…), the heartsong to Simon seemed to be more like a setup for having Max see it. And while both songs are about her deepest, secret feelings/desires… and there’s truth in both, then the way the scenes were set up makes it seem like she sang to her best friend to make him aware of how she really feels (what he said in the previous ep: he needs to know/get a respose from her…and this gave him that). But the other song was meant to be overheard by her best friend…and that was the goal of the song/scene (not the song itself, but that he saw). Again pointing to the show going for Max as the endgame.

Fourth: The triangle is as follows: Both Max & Simon like Zoey, but she only really likes one of them. Both men sang heart songs to her (Max = I think I love you, Sucker, If I can’t have you, 500 miles), and she sang to both…but different songs. Simon sang “If you say that you are mine, I’ll be here ‘til the end of time” in 1x05, so it’s coming from his side. Zoey in 1x08 sang “I’m Yours” to Max (that her heart is his), but she sang “I want you to want me” to Simon (not that she wants him, but she wants him to want her). As her best friend explained it - one is about love, the other physical attraction. But… if you listen to the lyrics more closely then based on them she’s singing about how she saw S. crying & all alone (1x01) and how that affected her, compared to singing to M. how she’s “caught feelings”. So she’s only actually interested in Max, as her feelings for Simon are not mutual (beyond the grief bond). One is one-sided and more “superficial”, the other is mutual and more “serious”.

Fifth: While we’ve seen that Zoey thinks she’s caught feelings for Simon (what she told her mom at the engagement party), and she hasn’t really admitted this to anyone besides her mom, she seems to not see it as a good thing. She also claims to both Max & Simon that she doesn’t really have feelings for Simon/wasn’t aware of her feelings and/or that she’s basically over it… so kinda “little white lies”. She seems to think they have a sort of connection and/or she seems to find him attractive…despite realizing that it cannot happen because he’s engaged. (and before Simon went and took the wrong step, he said the right thing - they leaned too much on each other about their grief, and they should just go back to co-workers, and that’s all. Sadly…that was changed because of the “glitch” that mislead…people). But… we also saw that she is fighting against having feelings for the morally questionable engaged man, cause she probably realizes it’s a bad idea.

Sixth: All this time, but especially in the last episode, the show has tried to show the two men in her life differently, and show the differences in their “relationships” with Zoey. It’s a very classic “fairytale story” that follows often-used “clichees”. They’ve shown how the two are different, and how the connection between both “ships” is different. And everything points to them starting to make the difference even more clear. By now they all are aware of each others feelings…to some point… and both men are aware that they’re both competing for her interest.

And she’s aware that she is interested in both… but in different ways, and for different reasons. And again they used Max to vocalize the choice before her - will she choose physical attraction without deeper connection or love and deeper emotional connection…AKA “new attractive co-worker who went through what shes going through VS her best friend, who is always there for her…no matter what. The options were made clear, now it’s her decision. And it’ll depend a lot on how each man will act from now on…at the most difficult time in her life (she’s now really going to lose her dad).

If Simon will try to make advances based on the heart song she sang, which gave outmixed signals AND at the same time Max will continue being a good friend (as we saw in 1x08…despite their dispute) then that’ll make Z/S grow furher apart and Z/M grow closer. And since it’s all become too complicated and messy for everyone… then it’s very possible all this will get to Jessica, and break those two apart. But… that’s IMO gonna be the opposite from making the path clear for S/Z. To have Simon as a character grow they need to have him deal with his grief, and all that. The Simon vs Max thing is a lot like Leif/Tobin thing… where the peer reviews made one become sketchy and start playing games, and the other start working on bettering themselves. I expect similar differences of paths taken for S & M. Especially because we’ve not only seen Tobin 2.0, but also Max 2.0 (and we’ll see more of that..in coming eps)

Seventh: We ve heard spoilers than in the S1 finale there will be a “heart song” for/from/with one of the two and Zoey. From how the scene is decribed it sound more like something fitting to Max (Max/Zoey). Which fits with how the season and story has been built so far. That seems to also confirm where they’re taking it. Cause…they’ve established that just like on most shows the main character HAS TO have a love interest, and so far they’ve only introduced two  options.

Other reasons why Zoey will most likely choose “love” over “physical attraction” (in the end, even if she’ll choose differently for now):

We saw Zoey’s reaction when she found out that S. had a SO/was engaged - she ran. And though she might find him attractive (physically)…as she found out via her heart song in 1x08, and she might feel a connection to him (because of the heart song she heard him sing in 1x01), she hasn’t shown interest in actually being with him… because she knows he’s taken. And also because she’s not really in the right place to start a relationship. She/They may not realize it, but they don’t have much more in common than grief - that’s the center of their bond (for now). Despite her interest/attraction to him & her thinking she “likes” him…

This is also why it’s easier for her to admit she has/had feelings for Simon, but she’s having trouble admitting…to herself (and Mo) & to Max that she may have feelings for her best friend. There’s nothing to lose with the first, but a lot to lose with the second. She’s afraid (and she varbalized it at the end of 1x07) that something could not go well… etc

While Max was not at all ready to meet his dates (Autumn) parents, because it’s a huge step and he just wan’t ready for it, he has met his best friends parents, and is welcome at their home. And there’s no feelings of meeting the parents being such “next level step”. We saw this when he brough her dad pudding to eat & when he helped carry the bed downstairs. It was also mentioned that he’s been part of the extended family for a while - welcome to family events (Christmas, barbeques..). Zoey’s father - the most important person in her life until now - is definitely on the man’s side, who brings him pudding (cause he’s paid attention that he can only eat soft food) and visits him & helps out. And her dad’s opinion is very important to Zoey, so…

She is completely at easy with Max seeing her with a facemask on, eating take-out, alone, at home, but she hides it (the true self) from Simon. She wears “a mask” with Simon, but doesn’t with Max. Same with how she didn’t tell Simon about her dad in 1x08 (brushing it off: hospital = lollipop), while telling Max that her dad had an apointment that morning. And though it did take her time to find the courage to tell him about it all in detail, she did..in the end. But from the start she shared the main info even if she didn’t tell what exactly happened and how she feels about it. She didn’t completely brush it off with him…even if the news made her unable to process and share it…right away.

We saw how she resisted her personal heart songs to Leif/Joan & to Simon, while being completely at ease with singing them to her best friend (Max) and her dad (Mitch). Cause if we leave out the big dance numbers (Crazy, Pressure), then she tried stopping herself  from singing the others…the personal songs… and/or apologized for what’s to come…with Simon, too. But with Max (and her dad) the song just came to her…without the need to apologize or resist it. And afterwards she just tried to claim it didn’t mean as much, because she’s just in denial (and not really ready to start a relationship…because right now she is going through stages of grief). There’s a huge difference in both the heart songs she sang & HOW she sang them.

And we’ve seen that she really appreciates him as a friend, and as she told him - she can’t lose him as a friend…she needs him in her life. She cares about his feelings. She is afraid she gave him the wrong impression, she runs after him to explain things to him, because she knows that he got hurt. She actually cares about him…and is feelings (as a friend). And they’ve not shown the same reaction with Simon. And though the friends to one-sided to more-than-friends trope is “an overused clichee”, it isn’t necessarily bad. It can work well. Examples: Mondler on Friends, Peraltiago on B99…

Max may have the advantage of having known her longer, and knowing her better (because they’ve been friends for 5 years), and hence she’s more comfortable around him. And…that’s the reason why she let him in on her superpower secret, and why she tells him about…things. But… that’s precisely why she should and will choose Max over Simon. (He’s been there for her…always…and he continues to be there for her…through this hard time in her life.)

We saw how even though he was upset with her (for keeping secrets from him, from setting him up with someone  else when she knew about his feelings for her…just because she didn’t dare to be honest with him & communicate…and hearing her sing to another person, too…) he was still there for her. A shoulder to lean on…literally and figuratively. He came to her rescue when she put her job at risk (singing Pressure), he gave her her mom’s message and supportive advice regarding her dad… And though there’s a hint of competitiveness that he seems to feel after the 1x07 elevator end scene (where we saw that both men seem to think they’ll be the end choice), and him wanting some kind of response from her, the 1x07 end scene and other moments have shown us that he’s willing to wait til she’s ready.

Especially…since in 1x07 he felt like it’s unfair that she can see into his heart and knows how he feels about her, he doesn’t. But in 1x08 he got to see into her heart (because even though she’d promised to always be honest with him from now on… she wasn’t fully… for a bit… and the “glitch” made her break her promise…til the evening), and it’s more “fair”. He now isn’t as in the dark, and less uncertain. I think the glitch was good for him, because he now knows how she really feels. All he wanted was an honest answer. And though it’s undertandable that he’s a bit hurt by what he’s heard & seen lately… but in the end it was beneficial. As Mo put it… he deserves an answer…no matter what it is…

I get the feeling that by now Zoey’s actually aware that she has feelings for her best friend. She might’ve not been aware of it all until he sang the first heart song to her, but after that we’ve clearly seen that she has either started to realize she actually has feelings for him or that she’s started to have feelings for him. She showed signs of jealousy when he was with Autumn (seeing them talking at the coffee shop, dancing at the club…). She couldn’t stop staring at him when she walked in during the Mo’ Makeover…indicating clearly that she finds him also physically attractive. Not to mention the emotional connection, and friendship. All the looks she gives him, her song & dance during “I’m Yours”… all for him…

And she cares about his feelings & not hurting him (running after him when he sees her heart song to Simon…) The look she has, when he brings her dad pudding & when she sees him with her dad or when  she hears him sing “500 miles”, or the looks and giggles when she sings her heart song to him…. While she’s in no place in a relationship at this time, I think she’s realized that despite her grief and emotional state she’s developing feelings for her best friend. And that… just like what’s going on with her dad, seems to scare her.

Survey #329

“i keep it all inside because i know that man is everything but kind”

What is the best thing about your life right now? Uhhhhh... I guess from a realistic standpoint, my partial hospitalization program. I'm learning very important coping skills and have some social interaction almost every day. How was your second serious relationship different from your first? Did you approach relationships differently with some experience under your belt? My first serious relationship was made deeper than what was safe because I was 100% obsessed with him; meanwhile, with Sara, I feel I loved her in a wiser way and with a sense of self still present. I was definitely more hesitant to "let" myself fall in love again, though, and was very insecure at the start. Whose death affected you the most? My dog's, Teddy. What was the best time you’ve had with a complete stranger? I don't exactly make a habit of hanging out with complete strangers... Who has seen you at your absolute worst? How did your relationship change afterwards? Mom, Jason, Girt, and Colleen, probably. Girt showed up at the ER after my overdose (I was a dramatic fuck and wrote a suicide note on Facebook so I didn't just... go without telling some people things I definitely wanted to), and that's when my crush on him really kicked into gear again. He was and is just always there for me through everything. For Jason, I am quiiiiiiiite sure seeing me have an absolute catatonic breakdown the night of the breakup just pushed him away more. I probably looked crazy. Colleen also showed up at the ER after my suicide attempt, and it brought us closer. Then there's Mom, who's, you know, my mom, and my darkest times have always grown our incredible bond, too, because she would never fail to be there for me. What’s your favorite planet? Saturn is dope. What’s your favorite pasta dish? Just spaghetti with tomato sauce and meatballs. What color do you really want to dye your hair? My top three are pastel pink, light/creamsicle orange, and silver, but there are more. What’s your favorite eye color? Sapphire blue or emerald green. What’s the weirdest place you’ve ever broken into? Um, I don't break into places. What’s something really cute that one of your friends does and is totally endearing? Sara gets super squeaky, bouncy, and just in general wordlessly excited at reptile shows. Going with her to one is one of my favorite memories, mostly just by watching her. Tell us a story of something that happened to you after 3AM when you were with friends. Have I ever been (awake) with friends past 3AM...? Idk. Do you have a favorite coffee shop? Describe it! Not a coffee gal. Who was the last person you gazed at the stars with? Sara. (: When was the last time you remember feeling completely serene and at peace with everything? Now THERE'S a fuckin question. I don't have the slightest idea. What was your biggest fear as a kid? Is it the same today? Thunderstorms; definitely not. Have you ever been to a Pride festival? No, but I'd love to. How open are you with your parents? I don't tell everything to my dad (though I know I could), but I'm an open book with Mom. Is there anything you’re more open about on the internet (such as on LiveJournal) than you would be in “real life”? I guess my sexual history. I'm just in general pretty open online. What is the most petty thing you’ve ever done? Oh, I'm CERTAIN it involves Jason after the breakup, but I don't know the "most"... What is the longest you’d be willing to wait to have sex in a new relationship? I myself don't want to until we're clearly serious and long-term by that point, and I know for a fact they're in love with me like I am them. I don't care how long they want to wait, though. I said in a previous survey that sex just... isn't that important to me. It's not my most cherished form of intimacy. Who has had the most positive effect on your life? My mama. Are there any relatives that you are not on speaking terms with? What happened? Most of the family doesn't talk to my aunt's literally psychotic, manipulative fuck of an ex-husband. I don't feel like it's my business to share exactly what happened, but yeah, fuck him with a chainsaw. :^) Who was the last person to ask you to hang out? Did you agree to hang out with them? It was more like an open invitation to all of her friends, but I guess you could say Summer. I did. I honestly wanna hang out again. Have you ever had to take a stool or urine test? Why did you have to do this? Urine ones, yes: to 1.) test for UTIs and 2.) ensure I wasn't pregnant before surgery. Is there a food that you eat basically every day? What food is that? Not every day, no. Can you remember the first video game you ever played? What about your first video gaming system? I don't. It was probably something with few controls, like this Barbie horse riding game my sisters and I loved, or an Elmo game that we had on a demo disc. I think you had to follow a path on a pogo stick picking up letters? We had a PS1 when I was born, so that was my first. The last video game you played - did you play alone or with someone else? By "video," I'm going to assume you're not including the computer, in which case I think it was The Legend of Spyro: Dawn of the Dragon, which I was playing alone. It does have a two-player option though that I wanna do one day. The controls are definitely meant for two people. If there is a disc in your computer, what disc is it? There is no disc. Do you shut down your computer every time after you use it, or do you leave it on? I always leave it on... Do you know anyone who has ever been in a movie? Who and what movie were they in? What was their part? Hm, I don't believe so. Describe the last shirt you saw that you really liked. Where did you see it? It was definitely some sort of graphic tee on Facebook, I'm sure. It was something with an opossum design and a short phrase. When was the last time you brought a pet to the vet? What was wrong with it? The most recent vet visit was when we got Roman neutered. Do you have any bug bites on you right now? If so, where? No. When you go fishing, do you make someone else get the fish off the hook? When I DID fish, yeah. Not because I was afraid to touch the fish, but because I was afraid of nicking myself with the inevitably dirty hook. Did you go to daycare when you were little? Only very briefly; my incredible separation anxiety from my mom made it extremely difficult. She very quickly chose our neighbors as my and my sisters' babysitters. I could handle that because I loved "Uncle Donny," the granddad of the family, and I could see my house from their front door. He was/is (idk if he's still alive) a wonderful man. Do you know what you’d have been named had you been born the opposite sex? No. Would you ever visit a nude beach? NOOOOOOOO THANK YOU. Who was the last person you dreamt about? I don't remember. Where is your favorite place to be kissed other than the usual place? Don't touch my neck if you don't have free time lmaooo. What is your favorite memory with one of your grandparents? I'm going to be completely honest: I have none that are exceptionally important to me. I only knew one grandmother most of my life, and we had a turbulent relationship. Would you date someone who has cheated in their previous relationships? Naaaaah son. What was the most drastic change you made to your appearance? Chopping 8+ inches of hair off. Is there anything you hope your significant other/future significant other never finds out about you? No. I don't want to keep secrets from them above all others. What are most of your Facebook posts about? If you're talking things I actually compose myself and not share, probably pictures of my pets, haha. Or small statements regarding political issues or mental health. What’s your favorite part of the song that you’re listening to? The beat. Who was the last person you got into a small argument with? Probably my mom, idk. How warm do you like your showers/baths to be? Pretty hot. In the past year, have you lost weight or gained weight? How much? Gained... and I'd rather not share. What year was the last car you rode in/drove? I have zero clue, but it's old. What’s your worst/funniest experience with one of your neighbors? The neighbors at my childhood home had two wonderful rottweilers, but one day they got loose and killed at least one of our kittens. It died in my hands. Mom was fucking livid and sobbing. Besides this occasion though, we got along with them. How much alone time is too much for you before you start going crazy and want to be around people? It depends on the day, really, and how entertained I am in my alone time. Generally, one day of total isolation (from people, anyway) is enough for me to want my mom's company at least or to be texting Sara. The last time you burned your tongue or mouth, what were you eating? A pizza roll burned my tongue just a tad. Honestly, are you shallow? Not at all. Besides clothes, shoes, and accessories, what’s your favorite thing to shop for? S N A K E S ! ! ! I could LIVE on the Morph Market website and "window shop." I love planning out the next morph I'm most interested in adopting. If you have/had any facial piercings, what side are they on? Any reason you chose that side? If you don’t have any, if you had to get a facial piercing what would it be and what side would it be on? I have a vertical labret on my lower lip that goes directly down the center of my face. I chose it because I love the symmetry. I've had my right nostril pierced twice, just because I preferred that side for whatever reason. What, would you say, is your sexiest/most provocative article of clothing? I don't own anything like that. I have zero interest in showing off my body. Do/did you have attendance problems in school? I was notoriously tardy for the first class of the day a lot because I was an absolute beast to drag out of bed all the way up to college. Does/did your parents ever go through your computer or cell phone? Mom did. What song reminds you the most of a particular day in your life? Why is that? "Where the Wild Wolves Have Gone" by Powerwolf is a strong one. I played it again and again the day Teddy was put down, even before we went to go euthanize him. It was my inspiration to one day spread his ashes at Yellowstone in wolf territory. As much as I'd love to keep his ashes forever, like, what happens after I die? And my sisters? Eventually, that container will lose meaning and probably be discarded, so I want to return him to nature. Do you have any close friends that were adopted? No close ones. Who, in your opinion, is the best thriller writer? Idk. Does your Mom eat meat? Yeah. Do you prefer thick or thin crusted pizza? THICK. Thin crust is an utter disappointment. Do you have any friends with the same name as you? No. Who has the prettiest middle name you know? Ha, I mention Alon a lot when it comes to beauty... I can't remember what it is, but I do know hers wins. Do you prefer it when it gets darker earlier? No. It makes me go to bed earlier. Can you touch​ your nose with your tongue?​​ No. Is there a particular sport you follow on a regular basis? No. Are there any shows that your friends seem to be obsessed with, but that you just don’t get? Oh, loads. How old was the last child that you spoke to? She's six. What’s a song that makes you feel happy? "Pretty Woman" by Van Halen, for one. How far in advance do you prefer to plan? It depends, but generally kinda far. Do you always smile for pictures? With other people, yes. Some selfies, no, but usually. What are you most excited about right now? my MOTHERFUCKIN tattoo appointment in MAY!!!!!!!!!!! Do you prefer the aisle, middle, or window seat on a plane? Window seat, zero doubts. Where would you like to volunteer? I wanna help at an animal rehab. What was the last thing you ate? A strawberry and grain granola bar thing. How do you find new music? Usually YouTube recommendations. What’s your favorite city? I don't have one. What makes your bedroom special to you and what is your favorite part about it? It's a total nests of my various interests. My favorite part is my meerkat collection. Have you ever had a crush on someone “too young” for you? No. Do you shave your legs more than once a week? God no. I haven't shaved my legs since October lmao. Would you get married if you could right now? Definitely not right now. I don't have a job or my own place. What is your favorite type of jewelry (i.e. bracelets, necklaces, etc.)? Chokers. Do you regret losing your virginity to who you lost it to? No. I was wholeheartedly in love with him. What was the shittiest hotel you’ve ever stayed at and why? I've never stayed in a bad one, to my recollection. Have you ever gone on a boat and been sick the whole time? No. Have you ever kept something from the wild as a pet? A turtle for a little while, yes. Don't do that. Ever win first place for something? Yeah, a few things. What was the last thing you fell off of? Idk. Do you have a favorite local band? Who are they? No. What’s the most confusing book you ever read? The style in which Johnny Got His Gun is written is very confusing, but you adapt to understand it. Jumping back and forth from the past to the present can give ya some metaphorical whiplash. Do you have a funny last name? Does anyone make fun of it? No. Has anyone ever called your personality dull? Do you agree with them? No. Have you ever personally witnessed a drug deal before? Possibly. Ever have an ultrasound performed on you? What was it for? Yes, for my liver. I can't remember what they were checking for, but I was fine. Have you ever been kicked out of somewhere? Colleen's house, yes. Have you seen all the Lord of the Rings movies? Nope; got no interest. Would you ever consider getting a piercing in your septum? Nah, not for me. Do you enjoy being outdoors? Only if it's cool out, in which case yeah. Do you enjoy watching fireworks on the 4th of July? Not anymore. I just think about the terrified animals (wild and pets alike) and traumatized veterans. Do you enjoy tanning? Not at all. Which of the seven deadly sins do you commit the most? Sloth. Did you have a Furby when you were younger? Yeah. Creepy fuckers. How long was your first relationship? I actually don't remember how long Aaron and I were together... other than it was just a few months. Who was the first person to break your heart? My dad, generally speaking. Romantically, Jason. What’s the biggest lie you’ve told someone? I don’t know. Has anyone ever drawn a picture of you? Yeah. What did the last key you used go to? The car's trunk. Is there anything, any event, you wish you could remember more clearly? I honestly do wish I remembered my "first time" because that's a pretty big deal to me. What’s your biggest priority right now? My mental health. If you’ve stayed overnight in a hospital, how did you entertain yourself? I've done that numerous times, and given there was nothing good on the TV ever, I just slept time away or read. Since every time I was suicidal, there were very, very few things you were allowed to have. Have you ever rubbed anyone’s feet? EW no. Are your hands unsteady? Yes; I have what's called an essential tremor in both. Are your legs long or short? They're proportional to my body. Is there a bookshelf in your room? No. Do you own a robe? What color is it? No. Who’s the last person you smoked weed with? I've never done it. Ever had a person who was obsessed with you so much that it scared you? No. Has anyone ever mistaken you for someone else? Yeah, my sisters in the past. Is there anything you need to talk about with someone? No. Who was the last person who cried around you? My mom. Who’s the last guy to give you roses? Tyler. What band was on the last band t-shirt you wore? Korn. What piercing do you like most on the opposite sex? Maybe snakebites. Do you stick your tongue out often in pictures? Nah. I only ever really did once or twice when I had snake eyes. Honestly, have you ever purchased something, worn it, and then returned it? Possibly? If you could have your own house anywhere in the world, where would it be? In the mountains in a nicely wooded area with a waterfall close by. It'd be nice to have a small stream or pond too to sit or swim in. If you could create a holiday - what would it be? I wish the legalization of gay marriage in America was a legitimate holiday. Are you shy about singing in front of people? OHHHHH YES. Do you own a robe? Do you sleep with a sleep mask? No.

Little Wonders Ch. 2

Chapter 2: Twists and Turns of Fate

Summary: Logan felt something he’d never felt before: blind, brain numbing fear. His whole body had tense up like a wound-up clock. He could speak, he couldn’t scream. Regrettably he couldn’t even think.

Chapters: 1, 2

Logan felt something he’d never felt before: blind, brain numbing fear. His whole body had tense up like a wound-up clock. He could speak, he couldn’t scream. Regrettably he couldn’t even think.

Chance of Death: 100%

The logical Side was trying to think of anything but his brain was only coming up with reasons he was going to die instead of looking for a useful solution. He could barely even wiggle to attempt to free himself. The door sounded heavy. No one knew where he was. The Host had warned him before this even started that he would be unable to help Logan.

“Don’t leave evidence,” Bim mocked Dark’s tone of voice. “Fucking asshole, who does he think I am? I don’t leave fucking evidence.”

A dull thud from Bim’s elbow hitting the table startled Logan. “So, what’d you do?”

Logan’s throat seized up with fear, rendering him literally speechless.

“Bet it was pretty bad for the Old Man to deal with you,” Bim leaned over the table and gave his newest victim a wide toothy smile. “You’re working with the heroes aren’t you?”

“Confessions given during coercion are unreliable and untrustworthy,” Logan refused, once he could calm himself enough to speak. He desperately wanted Patton or Roman, he felt alone and terrified.

The young villain scoffed, and Logan startled when he felt something sharp cut into his previously unmarred cheek, giving out a choked gasp. “I’ve heard people say and promise a lot of things you know? I can see why the Old Man drags out his kills, but you know, I don’t think I can do that tonight. I’m just so fucking hungry!”

With no warning to Logan, Bim punctuated his statement by stabbing Logan right next to the lung, Bim’s hunger making him sloppy. Logan screamed out, pain piercing his body as he instinctively tried to get away but the cuffs kept him from doing so.

“But,” Bim grabbed Logan by the cheek and forced him to look in his direction, his fingers digging into the cuts and scratches, “I think I can drag this out long enough to be fun.”

A bang came at the door, startling both Bim and Logan. Logan went very still, and Bim angrily hissed and turned to the door.

“I hate being interrupted during dinner,” Bim growled, his voice starting to get farther away.

Logan’s racing heart wasn’t helping.

“Yeah what do you want Old—” Bim hissed before everything went quiet.

There was a muted scream, then Logan was left with footfall running towards him.

“Shit,” someone cursed.

“A little help here!” Someone else called out.

“I’m a bit busy here,” the first voice called out.

Logan felt a bit disoriented, a still functioning part of his pain told him he was most likely going into shock, which would be fatal for his condition. His wrists and ankles, along with all of his body felt considerably lighter. Not helped by his inability to see.

“Let’s go, before Dark shows back up,” the first voice was becoming increasingly familiar.

Finally Logan felt like he was being moved, which snapped his brain almost into hyper awareness as he was moved. At the moment he could be sure if it was a good thing or not, but he couldn’t hear Bim anymore.

After about two minutes they stopped.

“You think he can find us?”

Virgil?

“Yes, hand me your watch, I’ll call the heroes.” Logan vaguely recognized Deceit’s voice. “Do not remove that knife yet.”

“I,” Virgil already sounded like he was panicking. “Hurry, he’s dying.”

“Compress the wound,” Janus ordered. “Stay quiet.”

“Shit,” Virgil sobbed. “Shit.”

“How bad is it?” Logan asked.

“It looks like he got you in the lungs,” Virgil answered.

Logan took a shallow breath, “I do not feel like I have a punctured lung.”

“Okay, okay, that’s good,” Virgil said in hysterics.

“Virgil, I need you to remain calm,” Logan ordered.

“How can I remain calm when you were stabbed in the chest,” Virgil told him. “You’re not Remus or Ro, you’re gonna die. How are you not freaking out.”

“My survival right now hinges upon me being calm until help arrives,” Logan reminded sharply. “Now that I am away from Bim I can not afford to panic. I need you to calm down.”

“If I hadn’t dragged my feet we could have gotten to you before you got stabbed. I saw Dark dragging you along and I froze up,” Virgil sounded like he was sobbing.

“Virgil,” Logan tried to cut in, trying to think of what Patton would do.

Scream, a part of his brain reminded, to which Logan sharply reminded himself was unhelpful.

“You’re going to die and it’s going to be my fault,” Virgil panicked.

“Let it go,” Logan told Virgil, his tone had a slight lilt to it from the song, but Logan couldn’t sing ballades too well and he’d been stabbed so it would have been asking too much from his already taxed system. “Let it roll right off your shoulders.”

Virgil snuffled a little bit as Logan kept going, “Don’t you know? The hardest part is over?”

“Let it in,” Logan pleaded as Virgil silently came back to Logan’s side, pressure finally being out onto his stab wound. To carefully stop the bleeding while not jostling the scalpel. “Let your clarity define you.”

“In the end,” Logan grimaced in pain, “we will only just remember how it feels.”

“Our lives are made,” Logan’s hand scooted over to touch Virgil’s fingers, the ones still on his chest, regretful of the fact he couldn’t see him. “In these small hours, these little wonders, these twists and turns of fate.”

Virgil managed a smile as Logan sang, touching his free hand to Logan’s face and carding it through his hair.

“Time falls away, but these small hours,” Logan grimaced back. “These small hours still remain.”

Despite the pain he tried to reach up to touch Virgil’s face, so happy he was with him. But the logical Side was stopped immediately by the shooting pain through his body. He screamed out.

Desperate, Virgil carefully moved Logan into his lap, urging him to stop.

“Let it slide,” Virgil picked up, trying to keep the bubble of calm going, if only for his own sake to keep him from screaming and panicking. He knew he was a bit pitchy and probably singing a bit deeper than it was normally sung. “Let your troubles fa~all behind you, let it shine.”

Logan, however, didn't seem to mind, just watching Virgil sing, “Til you feel it all around you.”

“And I don’t mind,” Virgil told Logan. “If it’s me you ne~ed to turn to, we’ll get by.”

“It’s the heart,” Virgil began on his own before Logan regain enough strength to continue along with him. “That really matters in the end.”

Virgil was too worried about Logan, to realize that the logical Side’s eyes had turned to a deep, dark shade of blue. Logan’s glasses were destroyed so he couldn’t make out the subtle glow of Virgil’s deep, dark purple eyes in the darkness.

“Our lives are made,” Logan sang with Virgil, feeling his body get charged a bit with some kind of energy. “In these small hours.”

“These little wonders,” their singing had become a little quieter, to preserve as much of Logan’s strength as they could. “These twists and turns of fate.”

“Time falls away,” Virgil carded his free hand through Logan’s hair again. “But these small hours, these small hours, still remain.”

Janus was creeping back to their hiding spot, hearing their voices before he could see them and was about to chew them both out. He knew leaving Virgil alone with Logan hadn’t been the best idea, but it was their only option, but it wouldn’t do them any good if Janus went to the trouble of disgusting and redirecting Logan’s and their trails if someone heard them singing in the tunnels.

Then he stopped when he saw the glow of purple eyes.

“All of my regret,” Virgil kept softly singing with Logan, feeling his body charging with energy, knowing what it meant, but wanting to hold Logan even closer. “Will wash away somehow.”

“But I cannot forget,” Logan agreed as Virgil realized that Janus was there and silently begged for help. “The way I feel right now.”

Janus carefully moved over, trying to disrupt the torn magic trying to knit itself back together. He carefully but quickly pulled the scalpel, using the magic he could conjure up to make it relatively painless. They’d both tried fusing with Remus when he’d been stabbed, and the result was the Dragon Witch having a knife sticking out of him, and a healed wound around the blade. Logan did cry out but Virgil stroked his face, their eyes still glowing different colors.

Virgil held Logan close, putting as much pressure on the wound as he could.

“In these small hours,” they both tried to sing, but Logan’s much more pained. They let out a soft glow, and the words became a bit stronger as one person sat in their place, “these little wonders.”

Janus backed up with the scalpel, making it disappear up his sleeve as he gave the new fusion its space. The fusions’s arms around his body as if the two halves were still trying to hold onto each other.

“These little wonders,” the fusion sang, “these twist and turns of fate.”

“Yeah, these twists and turns of fate,” the fusion kept going, his grip on himself slightly less desperate and tight,” Time falls away. Yeah, but these small hours, and these small hours.”

The magic in the air began to slowly dissipate, which revealed Janus because they were less likely to be caught. “Still reman, yeah~yeah, oh, they still remain.”

“These little wonders,” the fusion continued. Janus quiet went back to check the mouth of their tunnel, braced to see Dark or one of his cronies. “Oh these these twists and turns of fate.”

“Time falls away,” the fusion slowly opened his eyes, “but these small hours. These little wonders.”

“Still remain,” he trailed off softly, letting go of himself to look at his hands and the now magically closed up stab wound of his chest. Even Logan’s shirt and vest had been magically repaired as if nothing had happened.

But everything had happened.

Virgil’s thoughts were churning as Logan grabbed the reins of their fusion. In place of Logan’s suit coat and Virgil’s cloak was a long dark blue cape, the shading so dark that it was almost black, the inside of the cape was an equally dark purple color. The cloak was a bit shorter than Virgil’s cloak, and lacked a hood.

“Hello,” Janus greeted softly, trying not to startle the new fusion. One he’d never thought he’d get to see with Virgil insistence on never fusing again when he’d joined the Light Sides.

“Jan?” The fusion still sat kneeling, the Logan in him paused at the name. Janus? Deceit was Janus?

Janus smiled in the dark tunnel, unsure if this fusion took after Virgil’s night vision. “Yes, do you have a name?”

The fusion thought for a couple seconds, “Brain, my name is Brain.”

Smiling a bit more softly, Janus held out his hands and Brain took them, standing up on shaky legs. “So, Brain, where to now?”

“The base, I have to let the heroes know that Logan is okay,” Brain decided. “Do you know where we are?”

“An abandoned railway station fifty miles out of town,” Janus motioned and Brain began to follow him. “Virgil and I have been looking for a way to reverse his curse, and there was supposed to be some kind of witch in the area. Before we could find her, Virgil spotted Logan and almost got his head taken off by Dark.”

“I should be lucky you two were in the area,” Brain began to whisper, the two of them tiptoeing through the tunnels. He grabbed Janus to pull him closer, looking nervous, “I can’t see far away.”

Janus offered his hand, “Come on, then.”

They walked in silence for a couple seconds, Brain pausing to look at some of the graffiti on the walls a couple times in distraction. Then Janus paused them.

“What do you mean you can’t find them!” Dark boomed, Brain tensing up.

“Boss, we looked everywhere,” one of Dark’s network nervously answered.

Brain could almost smell the fear in the air from Virgil and heard a wet, squelching sound — the sound of the man’s head being ripped from his neck — along with the rip of a hole in the Void.

“Clean everyone out,” Dark ordered. “Once Bim has had his fill, I’ll smoke them out.”

Janus tugged on Brain’s arm and Brain stayed quiet, trying not to draw attention to either of them.

Dark’s voice began to get farther away and the tunnel started getting a bit brighter.

“Hey!” Someone called out behind them.

Brain, with Virgil’s reaction time and forethought, screamed and threw up a fear wave, willingly shaping it to look like Dark. The guy screamed and Janus grabbed Brian, the two running into the woods.

“Heroes, some help would be appreciated,” Janus ordered into Virgil’s communicator as he took off in a random direction with Brain.

Thankfully that was when Jackie came in and, at Janus’s immediate insistence to take Brain first, scooped Brain up and ran back towards the base, leaving him in the garage to go back for Deceit who was probably at Dark’s non-existent mercy.

However now Brain was now left in the garage with Patton and Roman looked different levels of confused. Marvin and Iplier were them, feeding off of their unease. Being left alone with the three heroes left Brain and his two halves just as uneasy.

“Where’s Logan?” Iplier asked.

“He’s a Side,” Patton commented. “But you’re not Orange.”

“No,” Brain took a deep breath, thankful that Logan was part of his make up. “I am Brain, I am a fusion between Logan and Virgil.”

“What?!” Roman shouted.

Patton let out an excited screech, clapping his hands to his face, “Ahhhhhhh! Virgil’s first fusion.”

“Virgil has fused with Dee and the Duke to make the Dragon Witch multiple times,” Brain corrected.

“Hi Lo,” Patton waved at Brain. “Having fun in there with Virge?”

“How do we know it’s really this Brain fellow and not that snake in Side’s clothing?” Roman demanded.

“You tried to swipe Virgil’s Nightmare Before Christmas posters, and then almost got your head caved in with Logan’s clipboard when you stole all the Crofters in the fridge and then lied about it.”

Roman crown, sheathing his sword, frowning and looking at Marvin and Iplier, “Okay unless they told that slimy snake, it’s them.”

“Yah sure?” Marvin asked incredulously.

“Yes, they’re Logan and Virgil fused,” Roman looked unhappy. “I take it you two, for whatever reason, fused in the heart of Dark’s territory. I’d be more upset if that wasn’t so romantic.”

“Well,” Brain became acutely aware that Jackie was back with Janus, and both of them looked none the worse for wear. Jackie walked over and gave Brain the watch. “Oh thank you, Logan was stabbed by Bim and in trying to calm each other down they fused.”

“He was stabbed then?” Iplier shouted. “Are you still bleeding?”

“Fusing and unfusing resets our forms, so as fun as a visit would be, Doc, I’m good, although I do need to yell at your boyfriend,” Brain said.

Iplier rolled his eyes, “Sure, what’s he do this time?”

“Brain is referring to the Host’s actions regarding both Anxiety and Logic,” the Host suddenly appeared behind Iplier, leaning his head on his doctor’s shoulder.

Iplier jumped a bit, “Host, don’t do that?”

The Host looked pleased by the reaction he had cause. He leaned away, stepping from around Iplier.

Janus let out a low snake-like hiss when he realized the Host was there, his serpentine pupil narrowing. “You!”

“Now,” the Host smiled. “The Host regrets to inform the Sides, that he does not have anything to say that would make him look any better.”

“You obviously hate us,” Brain blurted out.

“Brain is very much incorrect,” the Host corrected. “The Host had to determine what timeline he existed in, which he was thankful to have Virgil’s help for, and Logan would be ineffective as a spy if he believed he was constantly watched. He would be unable to discern the Host from the Entity. Anxiety would not have fused with Logan, even to spare the other Side’s life if he felt pressured to do so. The ensuing loss would have been incalculable.”

“Why gamble with their lives at all?” Janus demanded angrily.

The Host looked offended by that, “Gambling implies there was a likelihood of the Sides losing, which the Host did not allow for by ensuring that Anxiety was not in the base you the time Dark became suspicious, and that word of a forest witch reached Deceit. Therefore the heroes are still able to have the best possible ending when the Actor arrives.”

“Are yeh playin’ wit’ our lives like a video game, yeh right bastard?” Marvin demanded.

“The Host doesn’t prefer to think of it that way, but if that is the easiest to understand then the Host will argue that he is looking for the best possible future and nudging various individuals — villains, heroes, and civilians alike — into positions they need to be in. The Host was unsure which timelines were possible or what would have been the best until Anxiety refused to fuse with anyone post-joining the heroes, which would have broken the curse immediately since Virgil now doesn’t technically exist, Brain does.”

“It was that simple?” Janus demanded. “We could have been done with that ages ago if I had known that!”

“Ah, but Virgil would not have been by the train station, if Deceit had known, the Host reminded proudly. “Logan would have been disbelieving of a threat under the Sides’s noses, and the Coalition and police would not have gotten concrete evidence against Bim.”

“So we’re on the Good End route?” Roman asked.

Host sighed, “Sure. The heroes can go with that, if it helps them.”

“Good, because I need a nap,” Brain decided, already heading into the base. “Out.”

Janus left the base with a curt goodbye, making sure Brain was actually okay before he took off.

For the first day Brain stayed in the base, dragging Virgil’s stereo system into Logan’s workshop and starting to work on some small projects when he could hold his own attention. Logan was going to have to deal with a lot of half-finished projects when Brain separated.

One day turned into two. Then three.

Brain managed to finish one of his projects, giddily excited in pride and accomplishment, walking around Logan’s office in a black t-shirt and jeans. Patton often sat with him, asking what he was doing, Roman was quietly supportive as he ranted about his newest role in a play. They weren’t exactly pushy but after four days it had been the longest the Sides had ever stayed fused and Brain could tell Roman was either jealous or worried . . . and being a fusion with Virgil meant that Brain’s anxiety hiked through the roof. An anxiety that was calmed during a movie night at the Light Sides’ apartment.

The trio were watching some movie and Brain was starting to doze off, head leaned back against the couch.

Then, as gently as they had fused, the fusion was suddenly Virgil with his head leaned back against the pillow, Logan sitting in his lap, sleeping against him.

Patton smiled and let out a silent scream as he took out his phone to start taking pictures. “So cute,” he cooed in awe.

“Quiet,” Roman hissed, smiling, “you’ll wake them up.”

Virgil grumbled and held Logan a little closer, making Patton more excited as he took more pictures. The four Core Sides reunited once again.

Love Bytes 02 | Firewall Breach | KNJ (M)

Last time on LB01: You find yourself at Tae & Kookie’s place for your Saturday night hangout. Some teasing and drinks are had, and you’re waiting outside for your ride with the boys while mindlessly swiping on Tinder. Hoseok catches a glimpse of the steamy image on your screen.

Rating: M (18+)

Word Count: 7.4K

Series: Love Bytes (2/?)

Genre: F2L, Fluff, Bestfriends!au, CollegeProjessor!Namjoon,  friendship feels, slow burn, fluff, sexual tension, humor, pining, embarrassingReader, light Jimin smut (tempting me)

CW: grinding, teasing, pining

Pairings: Namjoon x Reader, brot7

masterlist // previous chapter // next chapter 

Do not repost.

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Hoseok sits with his chin resting on a palm, staring down at the same image with a concentrated gaze. For a moment only your eyes move, now acutely aware of the man to your left. You’re frozen in place, hoping the shame will kill you instantly so you don’t have to face the subsequent humiliation.

You sit motionless, like maybe if you’re still enough, he’ll forget you’re there. You pray his perception is based on movement as your teeth sink deeper into the flesh of your knuckle, letting only shallow breaths escape. But as the seconds pass, they grow increasingly unbearable. You turn your head, ever so slightly, immediately locking eyes with Hoseok. The crooked smile on his face speaks volumes louder than the whisper that follows.

“Such a dirty girl.”

You blink a few times and guiltily drop your hand to cover the screen. A nervous laugh escapes your throat. “What do you mean?”

You squirm as you stretch your legs out and press your thighs together, trying to pretend he didn’t just catch you in the act. His eyebrows raise and you feel like prey as he tilts his head towards you, husky voice chastising you with your own name.

"You know what I mean."

You sit in stunned silence, wishing Hoseok would let you transform into a statue and become one with the stairway. It seems fate has other plans as a car rolls up to the curb.

“Show me your profile."

The tone of his voice tells you it's not a question, and the hand snaking around your back tells you there's no escape. Hoseok springs to his feet, dragging your stumbling form towards the car. You feel him prying the phone from your clammy fingers.

“You’re paying for my fucking drinks,” you counter, deathgrip on the case.

“Deal!” He’s shaking your hand and the phone fervently as you both shuffle down the final step.

To prove his merit, he presents you with a credit card, knowing full well you’ll beat him to the bar. You eagerly snatch it before he changes his mind. When keeps his palm extended and snaps his fingers a few times, you know he wants far more than just a peek at the profile. With a low groan, you surrender the device, hoping that by some miracle he’ll be merciful.

“Please don’t tell them, Hobi,” you quietly beg, swallowing hard. He’s already hungrily scanning through and you're desperate to limit the damage of whatever he's so eager to see.

You lock eyes with Jimin just as he finishes climbing into the back seat. He sends you a smile that threatens to make your knees buckle. You panic for a moment at the thought of being forced to sit next to him, but the alcohol is catching up to you and the growing heat between your legs nearly cancels out the butterflies in your stomach.

Hoseok hums, reaching for Namjoon, whom is already palming the handle on the front passenger door. "Nah nah nah nah nah. Let Y/N sit up front. I gotta show you something.”

Namjoon furrows his brow as Hoseok ushers you into the front seat. You stumble with one hand around the door frame, glaring daggers at him, which does not go unnoticed by your best friend.

Hoseok waves your phone up in the air and wiggles his eyebrows at you before taking his seat. “She needs our help.”

Namjoon shakes his head and speaks in a low tone, almost as if he’s talking to himself, “Man, she’s really pissed. I’m almost afraid to see.”

“Hobi, you’re such a dick,” you whine. God, if only you were a little more drunk, maybe you wouldn’t feel so mortified.

Hoseok is sandwiched between Namjoon and Jimin, giving a content sigh as he buckles himself in, unbothered by his knees jutting up on either side of the armrest. You’re about to fasten your own seatbelt when you feel pressure on the back of your seat. Namjoon loudly clears his throat, as if you couldn’t tell his gangly kneecaps were the culprit. You roll your eyes hard, making sure he sees the reaction in the side mirror before you comply. He presses his lips together in a thin line, and even in the dim light you can see the dimples forming.

The car takes off and you’re grateful the radio is on loud enough so you don’t have to hear what the men are saying. The driver has the rearview mirror angled off so you can’t use it to spy on the interaction. You’re not sure if that’s better or worse than being able to witness it. You attempt to distract yourself by looking out the window, but you can see Namjoon’s profile in the side mirror and your eyes are glued to him, looking for any sign of the judgement you know is coming. His lips are still pressed together, but you can’t make out any additional details as the street lights outside become sparse.

Hobi stone cold fucking betrayed you and you knew you should have expected it, but still. What the fuck did he mean you needed their help? You were doing fine! You wrote an intro with a few witty lines and a bullet list of interests. You admit they’re probably kind of niche, but similar interests make for good relationships, right? Compatibility is a standard for those kinds of things. After all, if you have an Intel CPU, you can’t be trying to install a motherboard built for an AMD processor; it just doesn’t work that way. People are kind of like that too, except with more variables. You’ve told yourself this countless times and yet now your resolve falters, knowing your marketing strategy is falling under heavy scrutiny.

Your pictures weren’t anything fancy --three selfies you had taken in the last couple months. Definitely nothing you would call “sexy,” but it was hard enough to write a profile that felt like “you,” nevermind taking photos for it.

The first was a smiling headshot on a day when your hair was cooperating and your skin wasn’t on a moody breakout rampage. The next was more cringeworthy, not because it was a bad photo --on the contrary, you looked pretty cute leaning casually against a wall, and for once your trademark sweatshirt wasn’t covering up the natural curves of your body. But you know the painstaking effort that went into taking it, and how many times you had to run back and forth from the camera to the wall before auto-timer went off. How many terrible body selfies did you take in order to get the one? Too fucking many. You involuntarily crinkle your nose, remembering some of the particularly unflattering ones. You silently bless your past self for deleting those ahead of time.

The last was an angled selfie of you in the lab, elbow deep in repairs, completely taken on a whim while you were working late. I mean, it is your life after all: fixing shit and looking like a hot mess, pretty much 24/7. Might as well be honest about it.

You spare a peek back. The phone screen illuminates Namjoon’s glasses and you can see your first profile picture reflected there. Jimin leans in, resting his chin on Hoseok’s shoulder; you know your profile has his full attention. He’s pointing and saying something, but you can’t make it out. Your cheeks flare with heat; there’s no way your pictures would be up to his standards.

Jimin touches the screen and the reflection in Joon’s eyes changes. You’re suddenly positive all three photos are way shittier than you remember. You lean out further from behind the seat, eyes wide with drunken curiosity at the reaction. It’s like a fucking trainwreck and as bad as the damage is, you want to see it. You fucking have to.

You don’t need much light to notice the way Hoseok is positively beaming; at least he’s enjoying this. Fucker. Jimin darts his tongue out and you’re so focused on the path it traces around his mouth that you miss the way Namjoon sucks in a shallow breath and bites down. It’s only when you notice the absence of the reflection in his glasses with the tilt of his head, that you realize Joon is reacting at all. He leans down to get a better look, slowly letting his lip drag across his teeth. You freeze, shocked at the salacious response to whatever caught his eye. What the fuck? No way was that in response to anything you have up there. You swear to god if they got distracted and are using your phone to look at porn, you’re going to be pissed.

All three men have their fingers on the phone now, talking amongst themselves and leaning in towards the screen. You’re ready to fucking explode with curiosity. You face forward in a huff, knowing you can’t hear them right now, no matter how hard you try. As you turn towards the window, you drum your fingertips on your thighs to the rhythm of pop song on the radio, aching to end the boredom.

Again, your eyes lock onto Namjoon’s silhouette, desperate to glean some information from him. You take note of the swoop in his hair, how it falls over his eye and brushes against his cheek; despite how unkempt it is today, it still looks good, and you kind of hate him for it. When was the last time he cut his hair anyway? He usually didn’t allow it to grow this long. You pat your pockets in search of your phone, meaning to text him a snarky reminder when you realize it’s still in the boys’ possession. Ugh. The dissonance of the trio’s laughter is the one thing that carries clearly through the car. You slink down into your seat, waiting to arrive so you can get drunk enough to ignore the world.

Thankfully, the car pulls up before much longer and you desperately scramble out and beeline for the doors of the club, ignoring the way Namjoon is calling your name. Whatever he has to say can wait until you have a drink in your hand. The bouncer sizes you up as you present ID, and you offer a dorky smile as he stamps your hand; despite being in your mid 20s, you still never feel like you’re old enough to go to these places.

It doesn’t take long for you to circumvent the crowd to an empty seat at the bar. You slide the bartender Hoseok’s card, asking him to start a tab before ordering your usual. Resting your elbows on the bar allows you to prop your chin on the back of your hands as your eyes drift across the room.

You don’t see the others, but you know they’re definitely here. You can feel Kim Seokjin’s drunk hoe energy sparking throughout the club. Out of all the drunk hoes in the room, he was probably the drunkest--and at this point, the sluttiest. That was part of the beauty of Jin, though. He was always so considerate, so ready to help at the drop of a hat, even when there was no way he possibly could. But he was also the same broad-shouldered hunk that accidentally flashed his dick to everyone in the room while attempting a handstand the week after you met him. That was when you learned to love basketball shorts.

At first you thought him to be soft spoken and meek, but that wasn’t really his persona. He did his best not to be imposing or threatening; he wanted to be someone whom could earn your trust, someone you could come to for any problem whatsoever, and he definitely was. So level headed, so genuinely kind, he could heal any wound with his dumb jokes and affectionate hugs. You loved him for it. But as with any of the friends you cared for so greatly, there were layers to him. And one of those layers was being the biggest pervert and party boy you have ever met in your goddamn life. When the alcohol came out, the floodgates opened, and the pants came off. Maybe someday if you were brave enough to break the firewall, you could take advantage of that opportunity. Fat chance though; you were fully aware of your cowardice.

The Tequila Sunrise slides its way over to you and you grant the bartender a nod of approval as you take that first delicious sip. Gentle fingers sweep against the nape of your neck. Ready to kill, you round on the offender to find no one. Quickly turning to the other side, Namjoon is already sitting in the seat next to you, resting his cheek on his knuckles with a grin. Your eyes narrow before he says a word. He presents your phone and your greedy fingers snatch it up, spinning back to face your drink.

He leans in close and you find your shoulder and neck craning together to combat the hot breath that tickles your ear. “How come you didn’t tell me you were on Tinder?”

It’s hard to detect the nature of his tone over the thrum of a heavy bassline, and it’s dangerous to assume anything about Namjoon. You’d learned that his profession had given him a great amount of practice keeping himself composed in front of others if he chose to do so.

You quaff the beverage in response, keeping your eyes fixed on his. Your cheeks pucker in around the straw and the liquid quickly disappears.

He watches you expectantly, blinking a few times and raising his eyebrows. When he realizes you’re downing the whole thing to avoid the question, he leans in close enough to be sure you’ll hear the deep sigh that follows, “Ooh yeah. Suck it up baby. Suck it all up.”

You almost choke on the liquid and cough around the straw briefly before smacking your hand against the bar and continuing to drain the cup.

“Oh? Are you choking? Is it too much? Oh, that’s it, use your hand. Mmm. I love it when you choke, baby.” The way he tilts his head towards his shoulder as he provokes you sends a jolt of electricity through your spine.

Christ, Joon.

You loudly smack your lips as you finish the drink. Namjoon steals the cherry sitting on a mountain of ice and pops it into his mouth, letting the stem dangle out from between his lips. “Attagirl.”

“Nothing that a good suck can’t distract you from, huh?” Your lips curl into a smile as you notice the bartender making his way back over and you motion for another as you starting flipping your phone around in your hands.

“You gonna actually talk to me about it? Or would you rather me just... sex you up some more?” He wiggles his eyebrows at you and you can’t help but laugh. He has the strangest way of making you feel at ease, even when you’re ready to burst from anxiety.

You place your phone on the bar and blink at him a few times, noticing the stem still hanging from his mouth. “Hey, I was gonna eat that!”

“Your own cherry?” He winks, giving you a playful nudge with his elbow. “Impressive.”

You swirl the straw around the ice in the empty glass a few times. “I didn’t want you judging me for using a dating app.”

He sits back and crosses his arms. “Judging? I’m not judging.”

You spare a glance, catching a hint of the dark smugness there. “I see you with your judgy eyes! You’re doing it right now!”

He snorts and rests his elbows on the bar. “I’m not."

"Yeah, okay," you sneer, rolling your eyes. You flash a grin at the bartender as before taking a short sip.

"I just… want you to be safe." His muffled voice dies against his hands, completely lost to your ears in the music. He orders a shot of tequila before he turns his head towards you. "Hey, we worry about you is all."

"I can take care of myself," you challenge, eyes narrowed.

Namjoon is eying the cherry nested on the rim of the new glass. You're quick to suck it up before he can take a swipe at it, gasping as the fruit lodges itself in the back of your throat. You choke out a few coughs and fish for the stem, pulling it from your mouth entirely.

He's got an eyebrow raised as his shot is set before him. "And you wonder why we worry."

"Fuck off," you manage to sputter, eyes watering.

You drag the spit covered cherry back into your mouth, separating the stem with your teeth. Namjoon’s eyes drag over you in revulsion before turning his attention to the shot before him. He downs it with a quick shake of his head and snatches the orange slice from your glass to act as a chaser. Instinctually, you crinkle your nose at him and continue to siphon alcohol through your straw, placing the cherry stem on the napkin below your drink.

“Wait, where’s your stem?”

Namjoon’s jaw snaps shut and he raises his eyebrows. “Mmm?”

“The cherry stem,” you continue, a laugh bubbling in your throat. Namjoon shifts in his seat and you can’t help the cackle that escapes you. “You fucking ate it?”

He expels a puff of air as he tosses the rind on the bar, leftover juices making a small puddle on the countertop. “You know, guys aren’t gonna like it when you laugh like a witch. Might wanna stop that shit.”

“I’m not about to take advice from someone who doesn’t know how to clean up after himself. Case and point.” You pick up the orange peel and drop it on the napkin, wiping the area around your drink.

He blinks at you indignantly, “Wow.”

“Yeah, I call it like I see ‘em.”

You sip on the fruity beverage, focusing your attention to the phone on the bar for the first time since Namjoon had returned it to you. You swipe at the screen and are surprised to see everything is as you left it. There’s a red notification bubble on your messaging app and you’re drunkenly tonguing the straw as you open it, trying to remember why you’d leave it unread.

Joonie: DIRTY GIRL???? 😂

Ugh. Now you remembered. You’re not sure if it’s the alcohol or the fact that you know he’s reading his own words over your shoulder, but your face is burning. “You know I was hoping that text would just disappear if I ignored it, but the notification was bothering me.”

He lets out an amused hum and cocks his head to the side, watching you swirl your tongue across the straw between sips. He slides you a glass of water that definitely wasn’t there before you started looking at your phone. “You’re gonna get sick if you keep drinking this fast.”

He’s right.

“Don’t tell me what to do,” you spit, using your finger to push the water back towards him and start sucking on the straw with renewed vigor.

“Then don’t be dumb,” he answers simply. You can tell he’s annoyed by the way he pokes his tongue out over his top lip as he carefully glides the cup over to you.

When you tilt your head back to give him that incredulous look he hates so much, you feel the world spin a moment, causing you to blink a few times. As you look at the counter again, you realize the second tequila sunrise is half gone. You know he has a point, but your pride has already taken enough of a beating tonight that you’re not willing to concede.

Namjoon sighs as you sit there with your bottom lip protruding in a pout. He takes the straw from the alcoholic beverage and sets it in the water. You’re about to protest when an arm drapes around your shoulder and a familiar voice steals your attention.

“Ma’am is this man bothering you?”

You turn to see Seokjin wearing aviator sunglasses, two leis draped around his neck. You strain to keep your posture as Jin pulls you both close to his chest. What once resembled a hug had now become a sort of chokehold, pressing your cheeks partially against each other and partially into his sweat-soaked shirt.

“Yeah, officer, take him away,” you mumble, giving Jin two playful smacks on his jaw.

“Can’t you let me off with a warning?” Namjoon pleads, playing into it.

Jin loosens his grip, allowing you both to escape. He tilts his head forward, which pushes the glasses down the bridge of his nose. “Okay, but I hope you learned your lesson.”

Namjoon bows his head slightly. “Of course! Of course! Sorry, officer.”

You smirk at the display, absentmindedly sipping water through your straw.

Jin turns his attention towards you, a dark and wicked grin on his features. “Do you want to get laid, Y/N?”

The water nearly shoots out of your nose as you choke out a response, “J-Jin?”

You can see Namjoon snickering behind his hands. “Oh, she definitely does.”

Jin takes the pink chain of flowers from around his neck and drapes it over you with a nod of approval. “Ah! There! You are now,” he hiccups mid-word, “leid!”

You can’t help but laugh at his stupid joke. “I can always count on you, Jin.”

“Count on me? One, two, three. One, two, three.”

Confused, you watch him for a moment as he does a waltz by himself, which contrasts the heavy baseline of the current song.

“Join me, Y/N!” he calls, motioning for you to go to him with wide gestures. He begins to disappear into the crowd, accidentally smacking a few people as he goes.

You take the straw from the water and drop it back into the alcoholic beverage, rising from your seat, immediately wobbling. Namjoon’s arm is already out, looped around your waist in support before you fall. “I gotcha.”

The contact of his hand causes you to shiver, despite feeling incredibly warm. Your chin comes to rest on his shoulder as you exhale softly against his ear. The slurred pout that escapes you is dripping with sweetness. “Finish my drink for me, Joonie?”

He sighs loudly. “God, you’re gonna be so sick later, aren’t you?” He pauses to inspect you. “You good?” As you nod, you’re puffing your cheeks out like a child. He murmurs under his breath, “Okay, I’m not babysitting you this time. I’m not.”

The way his fingers slowly trail up your side and drift across your back cause your eyelids to flutter a moment. Not allowing yourself to linger on the sensation, you grab the glass of water and chug it down as fast as you possibly can. Water comes dribbling down from the rim onto your chest before you slam the empty glass down on the counter and tuck your phone into the top of your shirt, securing it beneath your bra.

Namjoon laughs, taking the straw out of the tequila sunrise before gulping it down. “You’re such a fuckin’ mess.”

You wipe a sleeve across your mouth, a wide grin left behind. “Takes one to know one.”

He shakes his head as you disappear into the crowd in search of Seokjin.

____

Hours had passed and you find yourself in the thrall of alcohol, dancing like an idiot with Jin for a good portion of it. He was just so goofy and fun; it was hard not to jump around with him, especially since he had gotten you leid. He had this weird way of making you forget about all the shitty parts of the week. You bobbed your heads together and threw your arms around one another, dancing ridiculously around a swarm of sweaty bodies.

Taehyung and Jungkook had been competing for the same girl’s attention, trying to outdo each other all night. Currently, they were sandwiching her between their pelvises, and it was obvious she was LIVING for it, milking the competition for all it was worth. You couldn’t help the envy coursing through your veins as you watched them grind her like coffee beans.

Yoongi had been busy drinking, disappearing upstairs with a couple of girls last you saw him. The few times you made your way back to the bar, Namjoon was nowhere to be found. That was fine by you, since you didn’t feel like getting yelled at for drinking more anyway. Hoseok was the life of the party, dancing his way around the club, a drink almost always in his hand. You haven't seen Jimin since the ride over, slightly disappointed by the lack of juicy booty in your life.

Your body is overheating and you wrench yourself away from your smiling friend, heading towards the doors for some air. You can’t pull the hoodie off your body fast enough as you reach the exit, tying it around your waist and letting your hair down. You sit alongside the curb, reveling in the temperature of the concrete.

“Fancy seeing you out here.” Your head snaps toward the voice to see the familiar blonde hair of Jimin in the moonlight. He grins as his dark eyes run across your now exposed torso. “Cooling off?”

You nod enthusiastically, exposing your neck to the brisk night air. You arch your back, chest rising higher than normal in an exaggerated stretch for his benefit. Alcohol had made you brave. Stupid, but brave nonetheless.

You hum in acknowledgement, your lips curling into a smile as you note the angle of his gaze. “Did you see what Tae and Kookie were doing to that girl?” You tug on your top, excessively fanning the air along the inside of the fabric, allowing a playful glimpse of the dark lace underneath. “Whew, way too hot for me. Got me a little dizzy.”

“Oh?” His body floats gracefully down, coming to rest beside you. The warmth radiating from his core immediately causes sweat to trail down the back of your neck. “You did have a lot to drink. Do you need some help standing? Do you want me to get you a ride?”

Yeah, get me a ride on that dick.

You feel yourself clench around nothing, despite knowing he’s being kind and trying to take care of you. You inhale deeply and shake your head, willing the thought away before giving it a chance to pass your lips. Letting the bravery take control for the short amount of time it’s available, you lean in and link arms, lightly tracing the denim with your other hand. “Mmm, I’m okay. I think I might just need a breather before going back in. The air feels so good right now.”

Jimin smiles softly and tilts his head down at you. “Any luck with tinder so far?”

You scoff, eyes scanning the cityscape for something else to focus on. “I’d be more successful finding a guy to grind on and take home with me tonight.”

He laughs. “I guess that’s true. Though I’m not surprised. Your photos suck.”

Your eyes snap to his face, immediately allowing the shame and disappointment course through your knotted brows and slack jaw. Fighting the surge of tears, your hands retract to hug your knees and find a building to focus on in the distance. “Not all of us can be models,” you huff, unable to hide the defensive nature of your tone.

He chokes out a laugh. “No no no no no, not like that. It’s so mean like that. I’m sorry. Hey, look at me.”

You chew on your bottom lip and do your best to keep your attention elsewhere. It’s not until a small, soft hand is tapping your shoulder that you turn back, eyes threatening to spill out at any moment.

“I meant to say… You're a lot prettier in real life,” he mumbles, the tinge of pink in his cheeks apparent even in such low light. “Your photos don’t show it well enough.”

You're not sure if you're hearing him correctly as your chest tightens and the blood rushes to your ears. But the shy smile growing across his face has you questioning your judgement. You wipe your eyes as tears inadvertently fall, unknowingly smearing the eyeliner and mascara across your face. “You think I’m pretty?”

“Of course I do. Ah?” He pauses a moment, registering the sight before him. “Oh nooooo. I made you cry?” It’s then that his eyes also begin to water. “I’m so sorry. You know I don’t like,” he can’t fight the sob that interrupts him, “to see you cry, Y/N.”

“Don’t you start crying, Jimin! You’re gonna make me...” The words are almost indiscernible as your voice raises two octaves. “...cry more...”

It’s too late; the tears are flowing freely down his cheeks and you can’t fight the way your eyes are stinging as your makeup runs into them. The alcohol has an iron-clad grip on both of you.  He turns towards you, arms sloppily finding their way around your shoulders and knotting around your neck. You lean in towards him, pressing your forehead into his. Being this close and seeing how swollen and red his face is, you can’t help the wet snort that bubbles in your throat, allowing a giggle to escape.The more you try to stop, the more they keep coming.

He scoffs desperately as he looks at you through puffy, squinted eyes. “Why are you laughing at me? You’re being so mean!”

“I’m sorry! You’re just so drunk! It’s cute,” you try to explain between wheezes, tears still dribbling down your cheeks and across your nose.

“You’re more drunk than me!” he protests, unable to stop his own giggle as he runs his eyes across your bloated, streaky face.

“Now who’s the mean one?” you sniff and wipe at your face with the back of your hands, unable to ignore the black smears left behind. “Oh god. I’m a fuckin’ mess.”

You pull back from Jimin, eager to go find a mirror to fix your face. His arms, however, remain locked around your neck. Seeing you shift uncomfortably, he drops his hold on you. “You’re not a mess,” he whispers, tracing a thumb around your face and resting it on your chin. “You’re pretty.”

Your heart aches, body set ablaze and yearning to go in further, but you’re frozen in awe and fear of his beauty. The swelling in his face has already faded, the frown replaced with high cheekbones and a warm smile. Joon was supposed to help stop you from getting into situations like this, but right now you can’t tell if you’re upset or relieved he’s not here this time. Entranced by Jimin’s ethereal gaze, he draws you in --guiding you towards him with his thumb. You’re not sure if he’s pulling you or if you’re leaning into it; either way you’re fucking hammered and far beyond making sense of it. You close your eyes pause as your lips lightly brush his, feeling his hot breath mingling with yours, and again you find yourself stuck, trying to will your mouth forward just a bit more.

You both hold there, breathing, skimming your lips across one another without pressure, aching for him to just fucking do it already. You steal a glance through half-lidded eyes and see a cheshire grin overtake his features. He’s watching you, waiting for you to react. Mother. Fucking. Tease.

“Want to dance?” he asks, letting his lips graze yours ever so slightly, knowing full well his provocation is having the desired effect. The game of chicken will continue, even though you know you’re far too drunk to not cross the line.

You drop your face into the crook of his neck and groan. “Fuck you.”

“Careful, Y/N. It’s not nice to tease,” he laughs, patting the back of your head.

“Who says I’m teasing?” you challenge, pausing to purse your lips and read the reaction.

His eyebrows raise, a look of incredulity spreading across his features as he tilts his head back. “Aren’t you?”

Your fingers drift along his hair, lightly brushing his skin with the back of your palm. His tongue briefly darts out to wet his lips, curious about what you’re about to do. He sucks on the inside of his cheek, causing his mouth to bend into a lopsided smile. Letting yourself gravitate towards him, you stop just shy of his lips --a reciprocating action of what he had done to you earlier. “Let’s dance.”

__

Your sweaty bodies writhe in time with the rhythm of the base. You buck your hips against his pelvis and grind your ass back into him, intoxicated by the way he groans into the back of your neck. It’s hard not to notice the length pressing into your backside with each thrust and body roll. Every slight movement causes more and more heat to pool between your legs, craving a deeper grind, deeper satisfaction from the movements. Under normal circumstances, you would have been down-right embarrassed at the state of your panties, twisted up and soaked inside your jeans. But alcohol had given you stupidity and courage, and at least the temporary effect of not giving a flying fuck about how desperately you wanted to fuck Park Jimin tonight.

His hands roam across the curve of your torso, tracing the outer edge of your breasts before grasping your hips and pressing you further back towards him. You’re unsure whether this is torture of ecstasy for the both of you. Lost in the sway of his hips, you allow him to lead your motions, rolling your head back and seizing the side of his face with a curled palm. Before your brain can register what’s happening, Jimin drags his tongue across your neck, tracing a line around your jaw before returning to the crook and lightly dragging the flesh through his teeth. Your pussy clenches around nothing as he latches onto your neck, tonguing and sucking the sensitive skin while relentlessly grinding into you from behind. You let out a loud moan that gets lost in the sound of music.

The reward of a needy purr from Jimin vibrates through your neck and raises goosebumps across your chest; despite the heat radiating from your body and the disgusting amount of sweat coating your skin, he has a way of bringing that electric chill through you. A playful bite on your earlobe has you weak, his heavy breaths the only sound you can focus on as he lingers there. You want to turn your face to his, to taste those delicious, plump lips. But the sound of him desperately panting into your ear has you hypnotized, with your dripping pussy aching to grip the cock at your backside. You’re so caught up in each other that the music might as well be white noise, the other patrons merely shadows moving too fast to perceive.

You clutch at his thighs and your back arches up, leaning on him for support as you roll your body in time with his. He releases a sigh against you --and with it a distraught curse that’s so soft you almost miss it. “...fuck…” You’re in disbelief at the sound, and panting like a bitch in heat to match his frenzied breaths. His arms trace up your body again and latch around you possessively, as if to pull you impossibly closer.

He claps one hand to your hip while the other is splayed across your chest, heaving with the movement of your bodies. Before you have a chance to mentally quell the new tidal wave forming in your panties, Jimin dips his hand beneath the fabric of your shirt, allowing it to roam freely across your abdomen; the skin-on-skin contact is enough to make sure that later on when you’re peeling away your sticky panties and throwing them out, you have to throw away the jeans too.

You want to stop yourself, but your starved pussy advises otherwise. You look back to meet his gaze, breathless smile matching your own. You knot your fingers in his hair before closing in on his lips. Fingernails dig into your belly as the greedy kiss consumes your air. Sloppy tongues roam over each other and you turn back towards him, allowing yourself to drag his lower lip through your teeth and slowly let it snap back to him. He doesn’t hesitate to quickly relieve the space between you again, hungrily chasing your lips when you attempt to tease him.

While you feel up his chest with impatient hands, he wastes no time in wedging a thigh between your legs and grinding up into your crotch, causing a fevered moan to escape between parted lips for a fraction of a second before your mouths are crashing down once again. You’re in a state of euphoria as you roll your hips down, grinding your clit into his thigh and drinking in a slew of wet kisses.

You have to take a moment to allow oxygen to fill your burning lungs, but you use the opportunity to lathe your tongue along his jawline, wanting to taste all of him. All you can taste is salty sweat. You don’t know what you expected.

___

Namjoon had been watching from across the bar for some time. He kept telling himself it was creepy to just keep staring like this --and that he should stop-- but he couldn’t seem to focus on anything else. He kept telling himself this was fine; it was what you had said you wanted after all. Firewalls be damned. You wanted him to let you break the rules: you had always joked about it, but he knew you were one hundred percent serious if he’d never stop you.

After seeing your prospects and dating profile… well maybe you could use someone who could make you feel good. And who was he to keep stopping you? Granted, you had asked Namjoon to step in and stop you from breaking the group dynamic, but this was different, wasn’t it? You needed to get laid, and you already liked him. Jimin was perfect. He could give you the raw emotion you needed to see in someone else. He would laugh at your stupid jokes and tell you how impressive you were for doing your job. He could give you the fulfilling sex it was obvious you were craving. He would talk you up and treat you the way you deserved, inside and out. He’d regard you as a princess and fall head over heels for you. You’d be so happy.

As your best friend, Namjoon wanted you to be happy. So why did it feel so bad to see finally unfolding like this?

“Wow, they’re really going at it huh?”

Namjoon jumps back a bit in surprise. He was so busy doing the spying that he never thought someone would be paying much attention to him. Hoseok stands a few feet away, leaning against the bar and sipping on a drink as his eyes fix on the way you and Jimin seemed to become one blurry form, chests rising and falling together.

“Who?” Namjoon pretends to squint into the crowd, as if his eyes weren’t glued to your form for the better part of an hour.

Hoseok sets his drink down on the bar, giving Namjoon a stern look. “Really?”

Namjoon returns the stare, blinking a few times and pursing his lips innocently.

“You know, you could just tell her.” Hoseok rolls his eyes hard and starts cleaning underneath one of his fingernails.

“Tell? Tell who? What’s there to tell?” Suddenly Namjoon is as cool as can be, hiding behind a stoic mask.

Hoseok finds Namjoon’s shoulders, gripping them tightly. “You go up to her just like this and you say ‘Y/N, I need to talk to you about something.’”

Namjoon scoffs. “Come on, man. Don’t be weird.”

“Okay, okay. I’ll let you be you. Pretend I am her. Come on.” Hoseok clears his throat before getting as high pitched as he can. “J-joonie, why do you need to talk to me?”

Namjoon lets out a soft chuckle as he keeps his eyes trained on the dance floor to make sure you’re still there, even though each touch you share with Jimin causes a pang of hurt to run deep through his belly. “Because… I need you to know I care about you.”

Hoseok drops to his normal tone. “Oh shit. Okay direct. I like it. Oh? So why do you send me to Jimin’s arms?”

“Because he can be better for you than I can,” he responds absentmindedly as he watches you crane your neck towards the ceiling, exposing the skin for Jimin to pepper kisses along, to which he readily obliges.

Hoseok gives a slap to Namjoon’s face, causing the man to rub his cheek in disbelief and regain his attention. “No! You stop that. You’re perfect!” He clears his throat and goes high pitched again.“You could be my tall man, Joonie.”

Namjoon can’t help but laugh. “Why the hell am I playing along with this?”

“Because you looooove me. Say it.” Hoseok raises his eyebrows, shit-eating grin strewn across his face, which causes Namjoon to pause.

“I don’t ...Ah…” he starts, eyes drifting back to Jimin pulling the hair from your face. He tugs at the lei around your neck, bringing you down low enough to meet his lips. Again the bite of jealousy stings Namjoon, posture stiffening and voice firm. “It’s not like that.”

Hoseok drops the charade and allows his drink to dribble back into his glass in order to interrupt. “Like hell it ain’t! Don’t even play, Joon. You can’t even keep your eyes on me when I’m pretending to be her, not when you know she’s over there with her tongue down Jimin’s throat.”

Namjoon’s eyes dart back to Hoseok, defense faltering with the crack in his voice. “I don’t love her.”

“Yeah, okay. And I don’t love pussy,” he mumbles; the caustic statement deafened by the liquid hitting his tongue.

Namjoon clears his throat, gesturing towards the dancefloor. “Don’t you think she looks happy?”

“I think she looks drunk,” he answers with a shrug, cocking his head to the side when he sees the way you’re sliding your hand along Jimin’s pants. “...And horny! Whew! You sure it was a good idea to let them go at it? I can cockblock if you want.”

A conflicted groan lingers in Namjoon’s throat as he shakes his head. “...No. I just need to not be bothered by this whole Tinder thing. She wants to get laid. Let her get laid by someone we trust.”

Hoseok opens his mouth, but promptly shuts it before taking another sip from his drink. “It’s been over a year and you still haven’t done anything about how you feel. Of course it’s going to bother you.” He whistles, watching you and Jimin both teasingly tug on each other’s shirts. “Especially since they’re not going to make it back to his apartment at this rate.”

Namjoon knows he’s right as he watches you claw Jimin’s bare shoulder in response to the blonde burying his face in your chest. He also knows that very drunk you is about to make the mistake of fucking a very drunk Jimin in the bathroom and you’re both probably going to be crying about it later. Jimin would cry because he wouldn’t have been able to give you his best, questioning whether you actually enjoyed it or not-- that and not being able to see your tits because he’d undoubtedly be fucking you from behind-- and Joon would have to hear all about it. You’d be crying because you’d fucked Park Jimin in a bathroom stall like a cheap whore instead of fucking Park Jimin in his bed like a reasonably-priced whore. And again, Joon would have to hear all about it.

Or worse. You’d be going down on him, and gag all over his dick. With how much you’d been drinking, it seemed plausible. You both would cry to him for sure. But what if both of these drunken messes somehow had the most mind-blowing sex and wouldn’t fucking shut up about it? Or worse, they’d do it again and again, leaving his mind to constantly think about how Jimin would make love to you in ways that Namjoon had been aching to for ages. He hadn’t thought it through. It was going to drive him crazy no matter the direction the night took.

Hoseok must have been watching the mental gymnastics going on, because he pounds the rest of his drink and rubs his hands together. “Showtime.”