#I even put in the effort to get the right font

[blazingjackdaw]

I missed doing meme redraws <:

#faith the unholy trinity #faith game #john ward #amy martin #blaze draws #shenanigans #first thing I draw in weeks and it's a meme #of course #I even put in the effort to get the right font #go me!

[skzdarlings]

the same but different | the threesome series ; skz ; han/reader/felix

masterlist.

threesome series part 3/4.

You grew up with Felix and Jisung.  Your definition of normal has always been unique, considering Felix is a faerie and magically connected to Jisung.  So even though you are dating Jisung, when Felix tells you he needs to marry to keep up appearences in the faerie court, you see no reason to say no…

pairing: han jisung/reader/lee felix content info: sexual content. threesome. faerie au. this is an almost 16k word read. one day i will meet my maker and have to atone for that. warning for some ambiguous motivations plus general freaky faerie and supernatural stuff. felix and jisung have a magical connection, reader does not know the details but it seems they can physically feel each other's reactions and urges and they do a lot of the same things in an uncanny way. there is a 'consummation ritual' that involves being watched but reader is clever about it.

:)

-

Autumnal flurries follow Han Jisung everywhere, little tornadoes of red-and-gold kicking up an elemental fuss wherever he steps. It might be a remnant of his time with the faerie folk, or maybe a coincidence, or maybe he is such a blustery font of chaos that he is simply kicking up wind storms on his own. 

He totters into the café with his usual trail of leaves, much to the displeasure of the bus boy who follows with a broom.  The wind gets restless at the window.  It throws itself against the pane with a heavy, reverberating thunder as if nature is knocking in pursuit of Jisung’s attention.  You watch a few pine cones hurl themselves at the glass before everything settles down on its own. 

Jisung pays it no mind.  He slides into the booth across from you, heaving a big dramatic breath. 

“Good afternoon,” you say, amused with your boyfriend’s theatrics.  They are as constant as his flurries.   

“Yo, is it, ‘cause ah, HAHA—I’ve been having a day.”  He thunks his head on the back of the booth and pretends to fall asleep.  His round glasses skew with the loll of his head.

Jisung dressed up for today’s date.  He is wearing a beige coat that flatters his warm complexion plus that cute checkered scarf you gave him last winter.   You don’t mind his usual hoodies and caps as it always puts a swagger in his step, but you appreciate his effort even if it is a little random. 

He lifts his head with another musical sigh, golden blonde hair fluttering from his breath.  His big glasses make his dark eyes even bigger and you smile again.

“Hi,” you say sweetly.

He whimpers with more theatrical misery. 

“You’re so beautiful,” he says like it is the most painful fact in the world.  “Why are you so beautiful?  And funny, and smart, and mine.  If you weren’t gonna be ugly and horrible, the least you could have done is reject me.  It wouldn’t have been so bad.  I could have been a lonely suffering artist, hidden away in a basement, composing symphonies for the beautiful woman out of my league.”

“I think you just described the Phantom of the Opera,” you say.

“Even better.”  Jisung sighs wistfully.  “He lived in an underground sex dungeon, right?  I don’t think he even paid rent.”   

You laugh into your hot chocolate. 

“What’s gotten into you?” you say.  It’s a rhetorical question.  Jisung is always a little silly. 

Your playful boyfriend thumps his hands on the table and glares past you, out the window. 

“Faeries,” he says brusquely.  “And their stupid faerie bullshit. My life is a nightmare and an arthouse horror movie and no one has ever suffered more than me—oooh, is that a chocolate croissant?”

You slap his hand when he reaches for your pastry.   He yelps like you chopped it off. 

“Jisungie,” you say, lifting an eyebrow, “what do you mean faerie bullshit?” 

He pouts spectacularly while unknotting his scarf.  He speaks in a watery, despondent voice, very contrary to his usual goofiness, “What do you think I mean?”

This, it seems, is also rhetorical as you have no opportunity to answer.  The bell jingles above the door and a little shiver moves down your spine. 

Unlike Jisung, you have never been to the faerie realm, but you have a gift for recognizing a supernatural presence.  Everything catches your eye as if they are sparkling fireflies, no matter their efforts to hide. 

The courtly fae, the ones that look human, have a tendency to cast enchantments both literal and metaphorical, their impossible beauty captivating to any human eye.  You are not immune to their gravitas, the way space seems to warp around them like earth is little more than gelatinous mire, but you can sense their other-worldliness before seeing them.   This is most likely due to exposure.  You did, after all, grow up with a faerie. 

You look to the doorway.  

Ah.  Speaking of. 

“Oh my god,” Jisung whines.  “He said he’d give me time to tell you.” He steals your hot chocolate and takes a swig like it’s hard vodka. 

“Tell me,” you repeat.  “Tell me what?” 

Though you are talking to Jisung, you cannot help but look over at his… his…

His Felix. 

Felix smiles when he sees you.  He scrunches his nose cutely and it makes his constellation of dark freckles dance on his sunny face. 

The freckles have always been an intriguing part of his glamour – for his human-like appearance is a mask shrouding his true faerie form – because faeries typically regard such things as imperfections.   Perhaps the freckles are residual from his time in the human realm, as Jisung’s flurries are the opposite. 

Felix is unbelievably beautiful.  He is wearing mortal clothes but he does not look truly human.  There’s something in his movements, fluid and dance-like, sometimes too swift to perceive.  His blonde hair catches the light with a perfect glow at every angle, his slender frame flawlessly draped in a black long-coat and a flattering black sweater.  His lovely ringed fingers part the air with his little wave and his perfectly pink mouth curls up in a sweet smile.  His dark eyes seem to sparkle.  

He crosses the restaurant in a few strides, quicker than a human would.  He smiles the whole time. 

“Hello,” he says, his deep voice smooth as butter.  Or maybe you’re the butter, his voice the knife, gliding right down the centre of you and settling low in your belly.  It has always had that effect. 

“Felix, hello,” you say in that quivery way you always greet him.   You grew up with both Jisung and Felix but Felix flits off to the faerie world when it suits him, and every time he returns you find yourself awestruck by him, as if you had never truly seen him before. 

Jisung smacks his head down on the surface of the table.  You and Felix look at him, you with considerable more concern.  Felix just draws his mouth into a flat line, neither smiling nor frowning, more like he anticipated his… his… his Jisung would behave this way. 

“Is it okay if I sit?”  Felix asks, pointing to the spot beside Jisung.  Jisung is somewhat sprawled in the booth but this doesn’t seem to concern Felix.  When you nod, he smiles, smooths out his coat, and simply bumps Jisung with his hip to squish himself into the booth. 

Jisung whimpers again, resting his head on the wall and pouting at it. 

“So,” Felix says.  He folds his hands on the table and tips his head, looking at you.  “How are you doing these days, hmm?” 

Faeries are known for their decorum.  It can turn sour very quickly, but it is imperative to adhere to rules of hospitality and general politeness.  

It is still strange and unnerving to have a faerie prince plunk himself into your booth and smile at you so politely.  Especially when you haven’t seen Felix in more than a year.   A year and fifteen days, to be specific, because Jisung has counted them all.  Jisung complains endlessly when Felix visits but he complains even more when he’s gone for too long. 

You think Felix must have returned to the human realm a while ago.  Jisung is usually friendly when he firsts sees him, but right now he is glaring. 

“What?”  Felix looks at Jisung.  They cock their heads at each other, the same angle, same time. 

It is always funny seeing them side-by-side.  Singularly, they look nothing alike, perhaps because Felix has intentionally deviated his glamour from being identical.  Jisung has a round face, cartoonishly cute at times, his build bulkier from his somewhat erratic workout schedule.   Felix is all sharp lines with a pointed elegance to his features, though his presence fills what space his slender body does not.  Their only similarity is their hair, similarly bouncy, alike in length, and identically shaded.  Right now it is a matching blonde. 

Despite their ample differences, there is an uncanny sameness to them.  They move the same way, tip their heads at the same time, roll their eyes in tandem.  They even take a breath at the same time.  You are certain if you pressed a hand to each of their chests, you would find their hearts beating to the same steady cadence.   

Felix was once a changeling.  Faeries sometimes swap their infants for human ones, occasionally for fun, oftentimes when their offspring is sickly or malformed.  Once a changeling swap has occurred, the faerie and human are inexorably linked to one another.  If the human parents try to kill the faerie or let it die, it will also kill their child, so it is in their best interest to nurse the sickly baby and hope the faeries swap them back. 

Felix was born too soon, a shrivelled little creature, third son of the autumn high prince’s third wife.  His mother swapped him for Jisung, stealing the little mortal away in his infancy.  Jisung’s mother was not a bewildered, simpering mortal, however.  Her resilience and intelligence was part of the family’s initial allure, but it was also the downfall of the changeling operation.  She ventured into the faerie realm and won back her son, plus the right to see the lonely faerie prince that had been so unceremoniously abandoned by his unloving family. 

She returned to the mortal world with Jisung and Felix.  The changeling prince spent his childhood bouncing between the human realm and the world of faerie.   You grew up next door to Jisung and the three of you have been a tight-knit trio since before you can remember. 

You love Felix just as much as you love Jisung, it’s just that… the faerie-ness complicates things.  You aren’t sure Felix really loves you or Jisung in a way you understand.  Even now, his enquiry after your well-being seems more like a necessary script than genuine question.  He will be uneasy until you complete your side of the exchange. 

“I’m good, Felix,” you say.  “How are you?”

He smiles, freckles dancing.  “Good,” he says.  “Thank you.”  

Felix cracks his neck and Jisung is compelled to do the same, though he looks irritated about it.  The depth of their connection has always been ambiguous to you, but sometimes Jisung feels phantom aches and pains, urges that come out of nowhere and pester him like an itch until he satisfies them.  

He seems impatient today, his glare not subsiding for a second.  

“You said I could have time to tell her,” Jisung says. 

“I gave you time,” Felix replies calmly. 

“You gave me like five minutes, man!”

“It doesn’t take more than five minutes,” Felix  says.  He seems genuinely perplexed that Jisung would believe otherwise.  He looks at Jisung with a head tilt that Jisung mirrors, then they both look at you.  “Hi,” Felix says.  “Will you marry me?  See.  That was less than five minutes.  It was five syllables, actually.  Well, I guess if you had asked it, you would have said, ‘Will you marry Felix,’ so it would have been six syllables, but that’s still less than five minutes, even if you streeeeetch it ouuuut—”

“I’m gonna stretch you out,” Jisung says, then plants his forehead in his palm.  “That came out wrong.” 

Felix does not plant his forehead in his palm but he does rest his chin in his hand. 

“So,” he says to you, smiling. “Will you?  Two syllables, by the way.”

“Shut up about the syllables, dude.” 

“Wait,” you say, interrupting their inane blabber.  If you leave them to it, Jisung and Felix will dance in verbal circles for hours and still not clarify anything.  “Marry you?  Why would I— Felix, you know Jisung and I— I don’t understand what’s—”

You love Jisung and Felix.  You find them equally attractive, in their own way and as a complimentary pair.  As much as you adore Jisung, you feel bereft when Felix is gone for a long time.  Your crush on Felix was as inevitable as your romance with Jisung.  Only where that relationship has long since solidified into a stable love, you and Felix have never done much more than hug. 

Jisung and Felix, on the other hand, have shared their own intimacies.  You caught them kissing back when you were teenagers.  You got pouty rather than angry, viciously jealous of both of them at once.  Jisung was too flustered to speak, mostly chirping like a frightened bird, while Felix just smiled and cheerily said, “Jisungie says we’re practicing.”

“Practicing?” you asked, hands on hips.  “Practicing for what exactly?”

Felix frowned, looking confused, like it had never occurred to him to follow that line of questioning. 

“For girls!”  Jisung exclaimed. 

Felix snapped his fingers and nodded.  “Right,” he said.  “Girls. That was it.  Wait.”  He looked confused again and pointed to you. “Isn’t she a girl?” 

“She doesn’t count,” Jisung said, getting redder by the second.  You threw a shoe at him and stormed out of the house. 

That was a long time ago.  That momentary flicker of suggestion was the only time Felix brought up potentially kissing you.  Even then, it seemed less desirous than pragmatic.  

And now, for some reason, he is asking you to marry him. 

“Oh my god, man, maybe if you used more than five syllables, she would get what’s going on,” Jisung says.  His gaze softens when he looks at you.  He reaches across the table to take your hand, though it takes you a second to respond.  Your fingers are frozen stiff around your mug.  “Baby,” he says in a soft, apologetic voice, “I know it sounds a bit strange, but I promise I can explain.” 

“I have to get married,” Felix interrupts, ignoring when Jisung scowls at him.  “I think it’s just for, uhhh, appearances, basically.  My brother Chan just became high prince and I’m the only one of my mum’s kids who isn’t married and she thinks it makes her look bad because all my dad’s other kids have their lives together… anyway, she said either I find a bride for myself or she was going to give me one.  And, uh, she’s not very, hmm, generous, is she?”

Definitely a rhetorical question.  You do not need to have met the faerie princess to know of her predilection for malice.  Felix would most likely be saddled with some Shakespearean donkey-headed monstrosity for all his days.  Felix, being Felix, would smile blithely and accept his awful fate, saying little on the matter when prompted. 

Felix is like that.  He shows neither amity nor animosity to much.  His emotions, whatever they are, manifest unpredictably.  He smiles a lot of blank smiles.  Occasionally he bursts into random tears that flood out of him with terrifying distress.  It comes upon him unexpectedly, so big that it is almost theatrical.  You think he might be mimicking expressions of human pain to convey whatever interior hurt he is feeling, however severe or benign, then it just stops until next time.  

He is not the sort to wail and harass you.  Even if he was desperate, he would not force you to marry him.  Looking into his dark eyes, you know that much.  There are plenty of stories the world over where supernatural princes steal mortal girls from their beds, where they compel them to dance until their feet bleed, where they fill their heads with songs that play until the human goes mad and dies in some anguished pit in their own mind. 

There are not many stories where they propose in a café.

“Felix, you idiot!”  Jisung smacks Felix on the arm.  “You didn’t even tell her the important part.” 

“Oh yeaaah,” Felix says. 

Jisung scoffs and looks at you, his expression soft again.  He squeezes your hand.

“Baby,” he says, “you know how Felix and I have a special, um, connection?” 

You know he means the changeling magic but you think about them kissing.  You push the image aside, as well as the lingering jealously, and nod. 

“Right,” Jisung says.  “We’re like… tied together and shit, right?  Like if I got hit by a bus, Felix would also go splat.”

“Faeries don’t splat,” Felix says, bristled. 

“Splat,” Jisung says sweetly, “like a big stupid faerie pancake.” 

“Jisung,” you say, “are you going to make a point?” 

“The point,” Jisung says, “is Felix is gonna live a long time, if he doesn’t go splat.  So that means… I’m gonna live a long time too.”

“If,” Felix interrupts, “he comes with me to live among the folk.” 

The fair folk.  Another name for the courtly fae.  Divided into seasonal realms, the four courts host a variety of faerie life.  Felix is from the autumn court and Jisung was spirited to it as baby.  You have never crossed from this world into the faerie world.  You know the stories better than anyone, almost more familiar with the foreign realm than the world around you, but its reality has only ever been a distant dream. 

This seems like the world’s strangest break-up: your boyfriend leaving you for his changeling faerie to live an immortal life in the faerie realm.

Except it’s not a break-up.  It’s a proposal. 

“I have no idea what’s happening right now,” you say, juggling feelings of confusion and jealousy and desire.  “What does that have to me with me?  And getting married?” 

“It will bond us together too,” Felix says, smiling again.  “Do you understand?  Isn’t that wonderful?  The three of us can be together for always.  I think you’ll really like it.”  He looks sideways at Jisung and adds, “And you’re smarter than him when it comes to the fair folk.  I would feel better if Jisung had your company.”

“What?” Jisung slaps the table.  “What are you talking about?  I’m the one who’s been there!  I am so totally super smart about faeries all the time!” 

“You once ate a magic apple and grew a tail,” Felix says.   

“You know I get snacky after my naps.  Besides, I got better.  Suck on some salty iron and boom, no tail.” 

Felix sighs, exasperated, and Jisung sighs, even more exasperated. 

“Please marry me,” Felix says imploringly.  “For all of us.” 

Felix cannot lie.  Faerie magic ranges from miniscule to immense, but lying is an impossibility regardless of rank. 

An inability to lie does not guarantee honesty. The truth can be obfuscated.  Faeries are clever with words, cleverer still what they reveal at all.  

Felix has not lied.  He needs to marry.  It would bond you.  You are smarter than Jisung when it comes to the fair folk.

Felix has not told the whole truth.  He does not need to marry you specifically.  He would be happy with just Jisung, you think.  They have something special, something you have always watched from the outside.  You know a lot about faeries but you do not belong to their world.  Felix could keep Jisung safe.  You are a spare. 

Despite the loving stare of your two oldest friends, you feel woefully insecure.  You take your hands back and rest them in your lap, staring morosely into your cooling hot chocolate. 

“Baby?” Jisung says gently.

You look up.  They look equally concerned.  They reach for you at the same time then look at each other.  They mutely come to an accord and Felix takes your hand.  You shiver immediately. 

“Sweetheart,” Felix says.  “It’s just me.  I won’t… I won’t make you do something you don’t want to do, but I… I want to know… I mean, do you not…”

“You don’t want to come with us?”  Jisung asks, his bottom lip wobbling.  Tears spill over his cheeks seconds later.  “I-I-I know it’s a bit weird.  But you’ve always talked about wanting to see it anyway.   And you don’t have any family here anymore.  Are you worried about the royal court thing?  Because I’m gonna be there and Felix says we’ll spend most of our time at his bower anyway and okay I don’t even know what that means and I didn’t wanna seem stupid so I didn’t ask—”

“It’s just my tree-house, Jisung,” Felix says.

“It’s just his tree-house,” Jisung sobs. 

“It isn’t that,” you say.  You reach for Jisung so you are holding both their hands.  You give them a squeeze.  “I love you both.  So much.  It hurts a little sometimes because of how much.  And I’m scared… I’m scared of being left behind.” 

They both pause.  Felix looks more bewildered than any supernatural creature in history, you are sure.  They are inviting you to come along and you express fear of the opposite.  It must be incomprehensible to his mind. 

Apparently it also confuses Jisung because he softly whispers, “What the fuck.”

You bring their hands together and withdraw your own touch. 

“I just mean…”  You are too embarrassed to vocalize it. 

Recognition lights their eyes at the same time.  Jisung rips his hand away. 

“I can’t be alone with Felix forever!”  Jisung cries.  “Are you crazy?  We need you!  Without you it’s just… just… just us.  It’s nothing, it’s empty.  You… you’re our person.  If you’re not there too… then… then… then I’m not going either.  I’d rather get old and die with you than live forever without you.” 

Felix’s mouth opens and closes with a storm of unspoken thoughts.  He has sobbed spectacularly at birthday cards and scraped knees, but he doesn’t cry now. 

Jisung’s exclamation rattles you.  It was such a genuine burst of emotion, so rich with devotion that you feel silly for ever doubting either of them.  Empty, he said.  You never considered what kind of echo might exist between them, how your presence filled it and made it better, not worse. 

You intend to remedy your blunder, an apology on your lips, but then Felix finds his words.

“I’ll tell you my name,” he says.  “My true name.  Will that be enough to convince you?”

Enough?

Enough?

You and Jisung stare at Felix with your jaws dropped.  Felix clenches his jaw, staring back at you. 

Faeries go by many names in their long lifetimes.  Felix was the name Jisung’s mother gave him, but it is not his true faerie name.  Names are powerful things.  If a mortal has a faerie’s true name, they can ensorcell and compel that faerie to do their bidding.  It essentially enslaves them. 

Faeries do not freely reveal their true names, not to other faeries and certainly not to mortals.  Tricky mortals have uncovered faerie names, stories of humans triumphing over wicked creatures, but you cannot think of a single story where the faerie got down on one knee and willingly offered it.

Because that’s what Felix does.  He gets out of the booth and gets down on one knee in front of you, then looks up at you with dark, desperate eyes. 

“I’ll tell you right now if that’s what it takes,” he says.  His hands are shaking.  The wind starts knocking at the window again, harder than before.  Leaves form columns of colour, shooting up to the sky, scattering in every direction. 

“Don’t,” you say.  “Don’t.”  The trust this requires is extraordinarily substantial.  It means more than any simple I love you.  Maybe Felix feels human love or maybe he feels something different.  Maybe losing you is not like losing a person, but like losing a limb or something equally vital.  It must be, for him to offer up his entire being in a word. 

The gesture means more than you can say.  The best way to reciprocate it is by refusing it. 

“It’s enough,” you say, choked up.  “It’s enough that you would offer.” 

“I’ll tell you,” he says, like he thinks you don’t believe him.  But of course you believe him.  He can’t lie. 

“I know,” you say.  “I’m sorry I doubted you.  Come here please.” 

Felix sits beside you and lets you wrap your arms around his neck.  He is tentative at first but then he looks at Jisung and holds you tighter.   The world outside settles once more. 

“Wow, that was intense,” Jisung says.  He grabs a napkin and blows his nose.  “Wheeew.  Wednesdays, am I right?”  

Felix pulls back, just enough so he can see your face.  You feel shy under his rapt attention, flush with warmth when his fingertips sweep from your temple to your jaw.  He holds your chin and tilts your face up.  He seems to be studying you.  This close, you can see all the shades of brown in his eyes, even flecks of dark, dark green and threads of gold.  There is a shimmer to the black of his iris.  If he turned a certain way, you think his glamour would disappear.  You think he would be beautiful anyway. 

He exhales.  His breath flutters over your lips. 

“Will you come with us?” he asks, his deep voice rumbling so soft and low.  “Will you marry me?”

You look at Jisung.  You cannot imagine any circumstance in which a man would look so eager for his girlfriend to accept another man’s proposal, yet this feels completely normal. 

Normal.  The three of you have always had your own definition of that word, haven’t you? 

You look at Felix, at the shimmer of his bold gaze.  

“Yes,” you say.  “Yes, I will.” 

Felix smiles and Jisung lets out a whoop!  You laugh, turning aside to wipe an unbidden tear from your eye.  Felix touches your cheek.  He looks more entranced than anything, blinking long and slow like a content cat. 

Jisung is still celebrating.  He shoves half your croissant in his mouth while you are distracted.  Then, with his cheeks stuffed full of pastry, his eyes get wide. 

“Ohyeah, weforgotsumffing!” he says around a mouthful of food.  He coughs, swallowing too quickly.  Felix clears his throat and passes Jisung your mug.  Jisung gulps it down while you and Felix exchange an affectionate glance.  

Then Jisung clinks the cup on the table and looks at you, sheepish. 

“Haha,” he says.  “By the way, you have to fuck Felix.” 

-

There are entrances to faerie in the deepest part of the woods.  Doorways are found in unlikely patterns that most humans will declare peculiar but innocuous: rings of spotted mushrooms, circular patches of darkening grass, shadows that arch with a perfect curve beneath a canopy of leaves.   

You have known this all your life, but you also knew to never go looking.  Not on your own.  A mortal wandering into faerie is not so different from a lamb wandering into a wolf den.  

Even with a wolf escort, you feel like that vulnerable lamb.  You hold hands with Jisung the entire trek, trailing behind Felix who hums as he lightly dances his way through even the harshest terrain.  Finally you come across two branches, twining up and up until they tangle like two hands clasping across a chasm.  

Winded from the exertion of the hike, you and Jisung come to a slow stop to catch your breaths.  Felix hurries ahead, his face brightening as he approaches the archway. 

“You ready?”  Jisung asks, squeezing your hand.

“Yeah,” you say.  “You?”

“Oh, hell yeah, baby,” he says with a laugh.  You look at him only to find his gaze turned on the archway, faraway with reminiscence.  “I remember it, you know,” he says.

“What?” you ask.  Jisung has never mentioned this before. “But you were just a baby.���

He looks at you with surprise, like he didn’t expect an answer.  Maybe he didn’t mean to say it out loud.  He laughs, deflecting the tension, and rubs the back of his neck. 

“Yeah, I know,” he says.  “Magic I guess, or something.  I dunno.  I just know I remember it.  There’s stuff that happened last week I can’t remember.  In a year, or fifty, or a hundred, I don’t know what I’ll remember from here.  But I remember this place like I never left.” 

You squeeze his hand again.  He looks at you and smiles, squeezing back. 

“Come on!”  Felix calls.  He is standing at the archway, waving to you.  He is wearing jeans and a t-shirt, a leather satchel slung across his chest.  The mundanity of his clothing looks unnatural.  If he looked inhuman in that café, he looks even less human now.  His glamour is in tact, his freckles pronounced, but there is a quality to him that defies logic.  He looks like he could take off flying and it would not be unusual. 

You and Jisung exchange a final glance then approach.  Felix smiles and walks backwards through the archway.  You can see him clearly as if he merely took another step in the woods.  He holds out his hands, you and Jisung taking one each, then you step through as well. 

Oh.

October orange sunlight pours through the trees, the early sunset colour of a clear autumn day at its close.  The woods are a mosaic of colour: green, orange, yellow, red, brown, little swirls of leaves flying from branch to branch, gathering in piles and scattering again.  You watch leaves settle over a pile of bones only for the whole apparatus to knit itself together.  You stumble to a surprised stop as a cat made of bones and leaves unfurls before your eyes.  It scampers up to Felix, rattling like an ivory windchime and somehow still purring.  Felix scratches behind its leafy ears, smiling and greeting the kitty affectionately. 

“Come on,” Felix says, not noticing the way you and Jisung are completely arrested by the sight of the cat.  “It’s not far from here.” 

It is the domicile of the autumn court.   It is built into the woods, or swallowed by it, grand structures built within and around trees, some abodes very high in the sunlit branches, some disappearing into the ground.  They are decorated with garlands of dried flowers, gardens of gourds and harvest fruit weaving around the lower rooms.  You jump, startled, when a pile of nearby leaves rises up, revealing itself to be a deer, presumably also made of bones beneath its leafy surface. 

“Whoa,” Jisung says, an apt summary.   The leaf animals have no eyes, the faces uncanny.  The deer turns its neck with a click of bone, dipping its head in a respectful bow to Felix as he passes. 

Felix doesn’t notice.  He is watching you and Jisung now, smiling with so much mirth you think he might start glowing. 

“Do you like it?” he asks, looking directly at you.  Maybe he knows what Jisung is feeling without asking.  You try to school your expression to show more than just awe. 

“It’s beautiful,” you say.  You can see how a mortal could be a swept away by the beauty of the faerie court.  Between the glitter of crunchy leaves and the wafts of cinnamon and spice, it fantastically overwhelms the senses.  You can also see how quickly this dream could turn into a nightmare, if the sun was eclipsed and the undead creatures of the earth turned their vacant eyes on you.

You do not convey the complexity of your thoughts.  Felix takes for granted that you always tell the truth, even though he knows you can lie.  You think he sometimes forgets.   His whole face crinkles up with a smile now, maybe too severely, but you appreciate his attempt to render delight for you. 

“A little further to the palace,” Felix says. 

“Palaaace,” Jisung says in a sing-song, squeezing your hand.  He almost knocks you over when a bird swoops by his head.  This raven is real, not made of leaves, and it perches on Felix’s shoulder.  “Birds,” Jisung says woefully.  “There’s always a freaky-ass bird.” 

“This is one of mine,” Felix says, scratching its head.  “I think my brother sent it.”

You watch as the bird leans in, eerily person-like in how it seems to whisper in his ear before fluttering off.   Felix neither smiles nor frowns, his mouth drawing into a thin line as he comes to a halt.

“What is it?”  Jisung asks.  His startled tone reveals that Felix might be perturbed. 

“They’re expecting us,” Felix says, gazing ahead as if he can see your destination through all the foliage.  “They’re already preparing our wedding.”

“What?” you and Jisung say at the same time.  You look at each other then you ask, “Did you tell them already?”  Felix only proposed yesterday and he has not returned to the faerie realm, unless he snuck away overnight, but you don’t think so.  He spent the night with you and Jisung, Jisung insisting on being the little spoon between two big spoons.  Felix had his arm around Jisung and his hand in yours all night. 

“No,” Felix answers.  “I didn’t say anything yet.”

“This feels spoooooky,” Jisung sings, then laughs nervously. 

“Maybe,” Felix says with a casual shrug of his shoulders.  “Maybe not.  Let’s go.” 

You and Jisung exchange another look, but you have gone too far to turn around, so you follow Felix.  He leads you to a red-bricked path that thickens with moss the further you walk.    When you reach the base of a hill, Felix stops to hold your hand. 

“Don’t look back until I say,” he says.  “You could fall.  Keep your eyes on me or the cat.  She knows the way too.” 

The cat is running around your feet, mewling, though the clack of its jaws is louder than its airy voice.  You decide to look at Felix instead.  Apparently Jisung picks the cat because he coos, “Aww, she’s kinda cute in a freaky way.  What’s her name?” 

“Babyeater,” Felix says. 

“Oh nooo,” Jisung replies.

You follow Felix and the cat up an incline that grows so steep that at one point you are walking perpendicular to the forest below.   You look at Felix the whole time, squeezing his hand tightly.   His returned squeeze is reassuring.  You remind yourself this is Felix, the same boy who kissed your scraped knees better, who sat through all your childhood tea parties even though he never really understood the concept of playing pretend, the same boy who has dutifully and lovingly obliged your every whim, however much he failed to understand its human purpose.  For Felix, it was always enough if it made you happy. 

He leads you safely over the crest of the hill, then it’s just a few more steps through a darker patch of woods before you are stepping into a huge clearing, bright and orange and gold.   Three massive, broad trees stand in the distance, an elaborate stone citadel built around the trunks.   There are faeries and other supernatural entities wandering around an autumnal garden, some scurrying with bundles of lights and candles and drapery.   The clearing and castle have been beautifully and frightfully decorated with pumpkins and dried flowers and bones. 

“Is this for us?”  Jisung asks.  “Uh, I mean, for you?”

“It looks like it,” Felix says uncertainly.  “I don’t know how they—”

Jisung screams, a proper shrill yell right in your ear, when something bursts out of some shrubbery and blocks his path.  You stumble back with wide-eyed surprise and Jisung instinctively shields you even in his terror.  Felix is not scared, his face neutral as ever, but his connection to Jisung has him reacting similarly, guarding you with his body. 

An eyeless husk straightens itself, bony limbs stretching for the sky.  You hear the crack of a neck-bone and the flutter of leaves, then all at a once a glamour settles over the faerie, revealing a handsome young man with short brown hair and dark eyes. 

“He’s still loud,” the faerie says.  “You were loud as a baby too.  Wahhh-wahhhh-wahhhhhh—” 

“Seungmin,” Felix says, nonplussed.  “Thank you for the raven.” 

Felix bows and the faerie, Seungmin, who must be the aforementioned brother, bows back as per the dictation of decorum. 

“Chan is mad he had to find out the news from Hyunjin,” Seungmin says, his mouth quirked in a smirky little half-smile.  “You better to be ready to grovel.”   

“Ah,” Felix says.   He looks over at you and Jisung who are clinging to each other, still wide-eyed with surprise.  “Hyunjin is a prince from the spring court,” Felix says.  “He can see the future.”

“Oh,” Jisung says.  “Yeah, sure, makes sense.”  He looks at you with a face that says, it definitely does not make sense. 

“Spring court,” Seungmin says with a little eye-roll.  “They burst in here with a dramatic fuss like always.  It’s embarrassing that the high prince of autumn learned about his favourite little brother’s engagement from a different court...”

“I can’t help that Hyunjin sees the future,” Felix says, more disgruntled than you have ever heard him.  It occurs to you, as you look between him and Seungmin, that Felix stands out here just as much as he did in the human world.  It is different, as here it is the little cracks of humanity that fracture his faerie face.  Not just the glamour, the freckles or his clothes, but some intrinsic bearing.   Maybe it is the sameness to Jisung, the way they block you with the same stance, the way they shuffle on the same foot.  Maybe it’s something else, but it is suddenly pronounced. 

Seungmin does not appear to notice Felix’s tone.  He just gives another bow which Felix is forced to return.  You see Jisung twitching and you squeeze his hand. 

“You don’t have to bow,” you whisper.    

“I know,” he says, then bobs twice in an aborted half-bow. 

You sigh.  You jump when Jisung shrieks again, startled by a little leaf-dog that comes running out of the shrubbery.  It is being pursued by some frantic sprites.  They yammer at the puppy in a faerie tongue as it starts to chase the cat.  All their bones are clattering as they run around, cat then dog then sprites.  Seungmin blinks at the fiasco then looks at Felix. 

“Let’s go,” Seungmin says.  He turns and gives you a bow, as is polite, then looks at Jisung and says, “Boo!” 

Jisung jumps and Seungmin cackles, bowing. 

Felix gives Seungmin a little shove, his mouth a grim line again. 

You follow Seungmin further into the garden, coming upon a feast that seems to be currently underway even while servants continue to set the party around the guests.   Food appears and disappears off the table, some faeries eating and some of them throwing food at the servants.   You have heard stories of ensorcelled human servants being trapped in places like this, but you only see faeries so far.  It doesn’t put you at ease exactly, but you don’t feel quite as frightened. 

Then all the faerie guests at the grand table stop and look at you.   Then you are frightened. 

“Hi,” Jisung squeaks. 

It is nervously and thoughtlessly blurted, but it would be impolite to ignore it, so a chorus of “hi” and “hello” circles the table in return. 

Most of them have a glamour of some kind.  A stockier, handsome faerie with bright orange hair stands.   He is on the other side of the long banquet table but manifests in front of you in mere seconds.  You are very alarmed to find him wearing bandages under a black army coat, the white wraps stained with blood.  It is very at odds with his deeply dimpled smile. 

“Hi there,” he says, looking past Jisung and straight at you.  “Wow, Felix really did it.  Welcome.  Call me Chan.  Sorry for the, ah, blood, I think it upsets humans?”  This apology seems sincere enough, accompanied with a tilt of the head, but he offers no further explanation.  He pulls you into an embrace, tucking you into the fold of one muscular arm, and laughing with an unexpectedly adorable giggliness.  “We have a human little sister.  That’s fun, yeah?”  He looks at the table and everyone nods and claps, only a few characters mutely unresponsive. 

You smile, maybe.  It feels a bit boxy.  Your brain is fitting all the pieces together, recalling that Seungmin referred to Chan as the high prince of autumn.   Chan is thus the highest font of power in this faerie court and he is hugging you. 

The hug pulls you away from Jisung who moves closer to Felix.  You look at them, watching as they hold hands, trying to convey with your eyes that you would rather be with them.

There is no time for any extraction attempt because a fuss stirs at one end of the table.  A pink-haired faerie bursts out of his seat.  He is long-limbed, tall and spindly, and he runs around the huge table at a fairly human speed.  He is wearing a billowy green jacket and a long string of pearls, his pastel appearance at some odds to the deepness of the autumn court. 

“Hey Fee-lix! Heeey!” he says, very literally bouncing when he reaches Felix.   

“Aha, hi, Hyunjin,” Felix says.   

“You brought humans!”  Hyunjin says, sweeping down to look at Jisung, then turning his dark-eyed stare to you.  His glamour is astonishingly beautiful, as bright as his pearls, a face like a handsome marble statue and a supermodel’s stature.  But he slinks like a ferret, as smirky as a fox.   “The bride,” he says with something of a wistful sigh.  His dark eyes are sparkling.  “A faerie and a human.  How romantic.  I love romance.” 

Then you are freed from hugging Chan, but only because Hyunjin cups your face in both hands and kisses you.  Not a greeting kiss either, but a deep kiss.  You sputter when he licks you. 

“Um,” Jisung squeaks. 

“This is High Prince Hyunjin.  Of the spring court, of course,” Chan says amiably, not doing anything to stop the high prince of the spring court from sucking face with his brother’s bride. 

Hyunjin stops on his own, smiling at you fondly.  “Pretty girl,” he says, stroking his whole hand over your face.  “I wish I could marry you.”  This is spoken without much longing, but it must be true or he couldn’t say it.   

He turns his sights on Jisung next.  Jisung straightens, eyes darting around for an escape. 

“The changeling baby,” Hyunjin says.  “He’s so cute now.  Can I marry this one, Felix?” 

Jisung’s eyes widen, looking at Felix, then at you. 

Felix looks unamused.  “No,” he says simply. 

Hyunjin pouts, slinking up to Jisung.  He grabs his face, long fingers grasping him tight.  Jisung’s lips part with surprise, his cheeks puffing when Hyunjin shakes his head around. 

“That’s not fair,” Hyunjin says.  “You already have one.” 

“I said no,” Felix repeats. 

Hyunjin just sighs.  “I knew you’d say that,” he says.  “Oh well.”  Then he kisses Jisung full on the mouth too, Jisung squeaking through the very wet onslaught.  Hyunjin just smiles and strokes his face, then goes back to the table. 

Hyunjin’s self-introduction triggers a similar desire in the remaining guests.  Soon they are swarming you, forced into the vaguest semblance of a queue when Chan waves a demanding hand.  You meet Felix’s mother, who smiles and coos at you like she didn’t mandate a wife in the first place.  You meet Changbin, another half-brother of Felix, who thankfully follows the example set by Chan and not Hyunjin and simply hugs you.  He is so burly and strong that it lifts you off your feet, but he has enough restraint not to crush you, so that’s something.  

There are clusters of other faeries, all noisy, all dipping in bows or trying to kiss you, and all of them from the spring or autumn court.   A hush falls over the garden when the remaining guests approach for an introduction.  Felix finally appears at your side, Jisung too, standing on either side of you and holding your hands. 

“Winter and Summer,” Felix whispers as two courtly fae and their retinues step forward. 

You know very well why Felix deigns to warn you.  The autumn court and spring court, as per their seasonal equivalents, are shifting and transitory in many ways; they grow and they learn, and they often host humans, be it in a generous or malicious capacity.  The winter and summer courts are hostile to change, and both have little to do with humans at all.  Whatever human encounters have transpired in those courts have left few survivors to speak of it. 

Their glamours fit them strangely, like new clothes not yet broken in.   The first prince wears his glamour like a boy forced into dress clothes by a parent, walking with a stiff sort of discomfort.  His robes are coloured blue and yellow, long and loose, his blonde hair turning dark blue at the root.  His dimples are deep and cheekbones very sharp, and when he smiles he reveals a whole row of long, piercing teeth that he forgot to glamour altogether. 

You jump, staring aghast as the otherwise too-pretty prince sweeps into a bow.  He looks at Chan, sees him smiling, and copies the expression with a frightful brightness. 

“Prince Jeongin,” Felix says.  He squeezes your hand, reminding you to bow back. You do so swiftly.  “Summer.” 

“High Prince,” Jeongin says, laughing for some reason, a wheezing sound. 

“You have fourteen older brothers,” Felix says. 

“Had.”  Jeongin smiles again, his dimples deepening, his teeth glittering.  “I ate them.” 

“Oh,” Felix says. There is a pause as he looks at you then looks at Jeongin.  Your face reveals terror, you are certain, but Jeongin is waiting expectantly.  Felix weighs his words and says, “Uh.  You must be happy to be congratulated.” 

You wonder how you ever thought Felix was strange.  He seems so normal suddenly, the only one who finds something wrong with a person eating fourteen brothers.  If he did approve, he would not have to word his congratulations so strangely to avoid a lie. 

Unless he just did that to appease you, a small voice says in the back of your head. A different truth is not a lie.

You wish you were not such an overthinker.  This is Felix.   Your Felix.  Yours, yours.   As much yours as Jisung, who is breathing a little heavier, so it makes Felix breathe heavier, and their combined strain has you close to panting as well. 

You are thus all breathless when you meet the final prince, introduced as High Prince Minho of the winter court.  He is wearing dark clothes, apparently sans his usual furry winter accoutrements, and his glamour is a barely-there mask that vanishes when the light hits him at certain angles.  He wears it like a loosely tied scarf, grudgingly donned.  He has not glamoured his eyes, mismatched and vibrant and vacant of all human emotion.  He does not smile when he bows.   Like Jeongin, he does not hug or kiss you. 

He looks you over, his stare raking, then he does the same to Jisung.  Whatever he sees makes him laugh, though it is a derisive sound.   Then he looks at Felix and says, “They’re fragile.  Be careful, changeling.” 

When he leaves, Jisung whispers, “Honestly, that last one got me kinda hard.”

“Yeah,” Felix says, unhappily, “I know.”   

And just like that, you are trying very hard not to laugh. 

You look at Felix and find his returned gaze to be very affectionate.  You always thought his regards looked a little too precise, like he was concentrating on forming the appropriate expression, but compared to certain toothy grins and cold laughs, Felix looks positively alight with sentiment.   He still looks strange in his t-shirt and jeans, but you think he might look strange anyway. 

It never occurred to you before that Felix’s changeling life might have made him an oddity on both sides of the veil. 

You feel a pang of sympathy, suddenly. 

Felix looks down at where you are holding his hand.  You see his gaze flit across to where you hold Jisung’s hand as well.  It exacerbates that pang in your chest, recalling your own jealousy when you found them kissing, plus all the years spent wishing you shared their magical connection.  It never occurred to you that Felix might feel some type of way about you dating Jisung, about you and Jisung both being human.  Maybe it reminded he was an outcast wherever he went.  Always very close to being part of something, never quite belonging. 

Funny enough, Jisung has always been significantly more blasé.   He sets his sights on what he wants and it never occurs to him that he will not have it.  He has Felix, he dates you, you marry Felix, he lives forever.  You look at your human boyfriend, at the way his dark eyes seem to sparkle as he looks around the garden.  You think somehow, despite his occasional shrieks and frights, he looks more home here than Felix. 

“Right then!”  Chan suddenly claps in your face, startling you.  “It’s wedding time, yeah?  We’ve never had a human wedding here before but Hyunjin is an expert so he helped us out…” 

Two faerie servants rip you away from Felix and Jisung.  Hyunjin follows you, looking very keen, his hands clasped behind his back but his whole face lit up brightly.  His eagerness does not put you at ease, nor are you reassured by his seemingly “expert” advice.  Seeing as he thought it was appropriate to introduce himself by making out with you, you sincerely doubt he is the human expert he has proclaimed himself to be.  

Sure enough, the slapdash preparations are very random.  You are shoved into a very pretty dress, but then Hyunjin attempts to adorn you with both a veil and a headpiece, and you can see an array of other accessories from international wedding regalia.  Being as polite as possible, you decline the offer to any headpiece at all.   

“Wow,” Hyunjin says, cupping your face.  “You are so humble.  Humans are so amazing, the way they just let themselves be ugly.  Wow.  Wow.  I won’t interfere with your hideous but humble head.  Should we kiss again?”        

“I think it’s better we don’t,” you say.  “It might wrinkle the dress?”

He nods sagely.  “That would be bad,” he agrees.  “Especially because your head is so bare and horrible.  The dress is doing all the work.  Can I put flowers in your hair or do you really prefer to be ugly?” 

“Uh, flowers, yeah, sure,” you say.  He says everything so frankly that you somehow can’t feel offended.  A compliment would feel just as meaningless. 

“I’ve always wanted to attend a human wedding,” Hyunjin says.  “You know, spring is a very popular time for human weddings.  But humans are always dying so fast after, so it makes me sad to watch them properly.” 

“You feel sadness?” you ask.  Though Hyunjin and Felix seem quite different, perhaps you can glean an answer to the depth of faerie emotions.  Especially considering this marriage business feels like an entirely different beast now that you are in a wedding dress with an entire congregation of faeries sitting in a garden waiting for you.  It seemed like a simpler affair when it was just Felix and Jisung in a café booth.     

“Oh, of course,” Hyunjin says.  “I feel sad all the time.  I feel sad right now because you aren’t marrying me.”  He says this with a great deal of joviality, smiling at you like he’s proud of his supposed sadness.  

You decide not to ask more questions on that front, because you doubt his answers will be very helpful.  You do enquire after the wedding festivities.  You try not to frown at the very random assemblage of traditions he has baked into a single ceremony.  It sounds like a tedious affair but you decide to brace it, supposing it could be worse. 

“Then we all watch the royal consummation,” Hyunjin says casually, adding another flower to your hair. 

You grab his wrist without thinking, stopping him.

“Did I stab you?” he asks, blowing on your head to check for blood.  “Sorry.  I keep forgetting pins in heads kill humans.”  He says this with a lot of exasperation, like it’s a personal inconvenience to him that humans die so easily. 

“No, it’s not that,” you say.  He pops another peony on your head, manifesting the little buds out of thin air.  “What do you mean ‘we all watch the royal consummation?’  Who is ‘we’?”  

“The high princes, obviously,” he says, tucking a rose behind your ear. 

You stare ahead, mouth hanging open. 

Yesterday seems so long ago now, but Jisung and Felix did explain to you that the autumn court required an act of consummation to legitimize the marriage.  Apparently it has nothing to do with virginity or rearing heirs, mostly functioning as a ritual for the sake of itself.  Once faeries decide something is a rule they must follow it. 

You were very hot in the face the entire conversation.  Jisung seemed content to describe the way you need would have sex with his changeling faerie, but you were too embarrassed to meet either gaze. 

Maybe it would have been easier if you did not want to sleep with Felix. If it was just a necessity, it would be meaningless.

But you very much do desire Felix, even if he only smiled blithely during the discussion.  He seemed unaffected while you were very flustered. 

This is a very different type of flustered. 

“I was not told there would be an audience,” you finally say.

“There isn’t usually,” Hyunjin says.  “But that’s how human princes do it, if I remember.  A whole council watches.  Felix doesn’t have a council, though, so we’ll have to do it.  It would be very rude not to indulge your human traditions.  There!  All done.”

He steps back to admire your appearance.  You are still frazzled from the conversation, from the strong floral scent that is now wrapped around you, from everything. 

“You look—”  Hyunjin pauses, then, “—not horrible at all!  I did a very good job.  Now the wedding can start.  I’ll tell Chan to start killing the sacrificial wedding goats.   We only have one and it’s made of leaves and bones but I assumed that would be okay with you.  This way we can just keep killing the same one over and over again.  I’ll be right back.” 

“Can I—”  You feel panicked.  You need to see Jisung.  Hyunjin has you sequestered in some little golden alcove.  You do not want to be hunted down if you just flee, so you ask, “Can I go look at myself in a mirror?” 

“You’re testing me,” Hyunjin says, his long fingers covering his mouth with a surprised gasp.  Then he giggles.  “I passed!  I know you can’t look at the bride before the wedding.  Wait here!”  Then he disappears out the gate and around the corner. 

You sit down in a huff and close your eyes.  You try counting backwards from one hundred to calm yourself, but you reach the low twenties and still feel tense.   

Then you hear the patter of human footsteps.  You know it is a human because faeries scarcely disturb the ground where they walk.  You hear the crunch of leaves and lift your head, feeling a rush of relief with Jisung pokes his head into the alcove. 

“There you are,” he says.  “Felix is – uh – they’re getting him – dressed – and I wanted –  wanted you—” 

You stand as he talks, as his voice drifts, as his breath catches.  He looks down the length of your dress then back up, his dark eyes watery as he exhales with a gut-punching whoosh. 

“You look so beautiful, baby,” he says.  “This – this feels weird.  I know it’s – weird.  But it’s not – it’s not wrong, right?  It’s just weird.  But weird isn’t bad.   It’s just—”

“Weird,” you say, with a little laugh.  “Yeah.  I know.” 

He smiles softly.  He wore his glasses here but he has since put in contacts.  His hair is neatly styled and he changed into slightly nicer clothes, still human world, but very handsome in his black pants and black shirt.  He is so handsome that for a moment you forget about all your worries, taking a step towards him with your hand extended.  He catches that hand, bringing it to his shoulder.  He sweeps you into a kiss that banishes all your bad thoughts, the familiar taste and feel of him engulfing you.   You sink your fingers in his hair, parting your lips under the press of his mouth. 

It's him who ends the kiss, breathlessly, stuttering, “S-sorry, wait.  I came here to tell – to tell you – the consummation – that pink guy—”

“I know,” you say with a cringe.  You bury your face in his neck.  “Ugh, a bunch of faeries are gonna watch me have sex.” 

“Faeries and me!” he says with a nervous laugh. 

“Huh!”

“I tried to stop it, but no one would really listen to me,” he says.  “Someone only listened when I said it was weird for a guy to watch his little brother have sex, and some people agreed, so Prince Chan said I should take his place, since there were no faeries of equal rank to him and at least I was human.”  He slaps a hand to his forehead.  “Sorry.  I tried.” 

“Oh, Jisung,” you say, giggling a little helplessly at your morose boyfriend.  “How do you get yourself into these situations?” 

“You’re wearing a wedding dress!” he replies. 

“That’s only because I know you!” 

“Your life would have been very boring without me,” Jisung says, smiling. 

“I know,” you say.  “It would have been awful.” 

Because for as strange as all this faerie nonsense is, you cannot imagine a world where you never knew Jisung, where you never knew Felix, where you never had this love in your life, as messy and jealous and complicated as it has been at times. 

You tip your head, gazing into Jisung’s eyes.  He shivers when you twirl a bit of his hair around your finger. 

“Jisungie,” you say, thinking of your own jealousy, of Felix’s confounding glances.  “Do you ever feel jealous at all?”

“Of what?” he asks, totally innocent.

“I don’t know,” you say.  You are not sure how to explain it without seeming ridiculous, which puts it into some perspective.  “I mean, me and Felix are about to… you know.”

“Uh, yeah.  That’s okay.  I don’t want to have sex in front of the cannibal faerie,” Jisung says, making you laugh.  “Not a joke!” 

“I know, I know.”  You kiss his cheek. 

“I couldn’t be jealous of you two,” he says, looking contemplative, as if this has never really occurred to him before.  Then he looks at you a bit sheepishly, his gaze skittish in how it darts around. 

“What?” you ask, recognizing his shy mischief. 

“I think it’s… uh… kinda hot?”  He rubs the back of his neck.  “I love you and I guess I also love that stupid faerie boy.  And… maybe… I kinda wanna see…”

You feel very hot again. 

“You, um, want to watch Felix fuck me?” you ask, frankly as you can. 

“Yes.”  He stares straight up, his ears gone completely red and his cheeks turning pink.  “I think you’ll look hot together.  I was kinda hoping we’d do something like this one day.  I mean, the cannibal faerie is a surprise, but other than that…”

You kiss him.  His arms circle your waist and he tugs you close, the kiss deepening naturally.  You let all your flustered embarrassment fizzle away, thinking about Felix, thinking about Jisung.  You get a bit handsy, squeezing Jisung’s biceps then resting your hands on his chest.  He makes a little sound into the kiss, one of his needy whimpers.  It never fails to light you up. 

“I’m nervous,” you say, speaking low, against his lips.  “Thinking about so many of them watching me and Felix…”

It is clear by his gulp and frantic nod that Jisung finds the scenario sexier than he should.   “Yeah, baby,” he says.  “What can I do?” 

You know the faeries will be occupied with Hyunjin’s myriad of rituals for a while, so you peck his lips and ask, “Get me ready?”

“Ready,” he repeats.  His gaze jumps up to the flowers in your hair.  “You are ready.” 

“Not like that,” you say.  

Jisung really does his best to be appropriate, but he gets pussy-drunk faster than any man you have ever known.  A suggestion is all it takes.  You tap his shoulder and he obediently drops to his knees. 

“Baby,” he says in a reverent whisper, sighing, eyes closing when you run your fingers through his hair. 

Heavy-lidded and so seemingly submissive to your desire, Jisung looks up at you.  Then he reaches past you, grabs the chair by the leg, and yanks.  He is not too gentle, spilling you onto it with a forceful nudge. 

You know Jisung does nothing by halves.  He is singular in his passions.   You ask him to kneel, so he kneels, so he closes his eyes, so he opens his mouth.  He pushes your dress out of his way and licks through your panties until the fabric is sticky and you are so so wet that it clings to you.  Your thighs tremble and he whimpers softly, high and light in the back of his throat. 

“Jisungie…”

“Shh, shh, shh,” he says in a raspy voice, drawing the fabric aside.  “It’s okay.  Don’t cry.  I’ve got you, baby.” 

He speaks so sweetly, like he is incapable of being mean, even while he torments you with long, twisting strokes of his tongue, never committing to a single pattern.  It is a storm of sensation, rolling through you over and over again.  You are so sensitive that slightest nudge feels like a miniature orgasm all on its own.  You gasp and whine, trying and failing to close your legs around his head. 

“Jisuuung,” you say, your voice rough. “We don’t have much time, I need to come…”

He moans when he buries his tongue in you, when he licks messily up past your clit and back down again.  You grab his hair and tug, though it does nothing to deter him. 

“Your husband can make you come later,” he says, giggling an inch from your pussy.  “I’m just warming you up…”  

“Please,” you say, “please, please, please.”

“Hmm?” is his reply, then he sighs and dives back. 

Your eyes close, brow furrowing in concentration.  You rock your hips against his mouth as he finally starts circling your clit with a single-minded resolve.  You feel flushed and shaky, pleasure and heat coursing through you, and you know you must look as ravaged as you feel.   

You open your eyes and see Felix standing in the entryway.  He looks astonishingly beautiful, his long blonde hair neatly styled back, his freckles pronounced and eyes so dark.  Long earrings made of sparkling orange gems dangle from his ears, looking at once like rippling flames and water running over bronze.  He is dressed in an approximation of a tuxedo, except the pants are leather and the shirt and blazer are cropped too short. 

He tips his head, his eyes on Jisung for a moment.  Then he holds your gaze unflinchingly, maybe daringly.  His smile appears slowly.  It is too gentle to be lecherous, tender despite the fact his gloved hand runs over his belt and tugs.  His tongue touches his bottom lip and he tips his head the other way. 

His presence startles you for a moment.  You should feel caught, or embarrassed, or something.  But the initial surprise fades and you just stare back at him.  You dig your fingers into Jisung’s hair and breathe harder as he strokes and strokes and strokes you with his tongue. 

Felix exhales.  His smile is still soft.  He lifts a darkly gloved hand and gestures to you, curling two fingers, a suggestive come here. 

Then Jisung’s hand goes from your thigh to your pussy, two fingers curling inside you without any resistance.  Felix’s smile curves into a pleased, satisfied smirk.  He nods. 

You come, holding Jisung’s face against your pussy, letting him moan and whimper with his own pleasure as you roughly fuck his mouth.  When he lifts his head, his mouth is so obscenely wet that you throb with a renewed ache of desire. 

“I think you’re ready now,” Jisung says.  He lowers your legs and slowly slides his fingers out of you.  Your breath catches, swallowing up a sound of a surprise when he uses both thumbs to spread your pussy open to his gaze – his and Felix.  Your head feels fuzzy and not with faerie magic. 

“I think so,” Felix says. 

Jisung does not seem surprised by his voice. He lets you go, your dress falling back over your lap.  He wipes his mouth on the back of his hand and looks over his shoulder at Felix.  Felix approaches, his steps silent despite his big black boots.

You watch.  Jisung’s bottom lip twitches.  He looks up at Felix with the same hazy intoxication he looked at you.  Felix bites the tip of a glove, pulling the fabric off with his teeth, then he swipes his thumb across Jisung’s glistening mouth.  Felix brings that thumb to his own bottom lip, his tongue only just swiping the tip of it. 

Then Hyunjin struts into the alcove and slaps a shocked hand over his mouth. 

“What are you doing?” he demands.  You think he is going to remark on the man kneeling at your feet, not to mention your sexually dishevelled appearance, but then he says, “Felix.  You’re supposed to have a hat.” 

“I don’t need a hat, Hyunjin,” Felix says with a sigh.  “I would like to talk to my bride for a minute.” 

“That is impossible,” Hyunjin says.  “You need a hat.  Come with me.”

It occurs to you that you are watching the two most emotional faeries in their courts, even if those emotions are aimed in strange directions, like hats.  Because Hyunjin is very adamant and Felix is very annoyed.  You are more than a little concerned that if things come to a head, it will turn horrifying without much effort.

Then Jisung leaps to his feet and puts himself between the two faerie princes.  It surprises everyone to silence.  Even Hyunjin stumbles to a stop.  He cocks his head like a predator regards a measly scrap of prey, eyes flashing as he takes a menacing step forward.  

Felix has no time to react.  You have no chance to scream. 

Jisung is a step ahead of everyone.

He bows.  Hyunjin stumbles to a stop for a second time.  It takes him a second to realize what has happened but when he does his eye twitches.  He bows back, then straightens with a huff.

Jisung bows again.  You slap a hand over your mouth to hide your surprised laugh.  Hyunjin looks far less amused.  Glaring, he bows too, as per the rules of politeness. 

Jisung leaps to the side and bows again, forcing Hyunjin to follow him.  He does this twice more, leading Hyunjin to the exit, bowing back and forth the whole time. 

“Make him stop!”  Hyunjin shrieks.

“Okay, okay!” Jisung says, hands raised in surrender.   He bows one more time, swooping low, then he turns and runs as fast as he can.

Hyunjin, obliged to return the bow, goes chasing after him with a frantic yelp. 

“Is he gonna be okay?” you ask, springing to your feet.  You dress falls neatly down. 

“Yes,” Felix says.  “Hyunjin won’t hurt humans.  He likes them too much.”  He turns to you then, his expression returned to a more passive neutrality, though you do not miss the way he looks you over.  “Will you be okay?” he asks.  “I’m sorry.  I thought we would have more time when we got here.  I didn’t know they would do this.” 

“It’s okay,” you say, too shy for a conversation after he very much watched you orgasm.  “Um.  Might as well, I guess… get it out of the way.” 

“Yes.”  He frowns at this, turning aside.  “You want to… get it out of the way.  I understand.  I’m sorry it had to be this way.  You don’t want to marry me.” 

He says it so plainly and without any hesitation.  He must believe it is the absolute truth.  For a moment, you can only stare at him, his handsome profile, the tendrils of sadness that tug at his features.  How did you never see it before?

“Felix,” you say gently.  He does not look at you.  You touch his arm and he looks at your hand.  “Felix, I am happy to marry you.  I love you.”  He looks up at that, his brow furrowed.  “And Jisung,” you add.  “I’m… I’m glad it happened this way.  So that you and I—”   He turns to you and your heart skips a few beats, affected by the warmth of his steady gaze.  “So that you and I could come together as well.  And now the three of us—” 

“Can I kiss you?” he asks, then looks aside.  “I’m sorry.  That was forward, yeah?  I just… don’t want the first time to be out there.  Is that strange?  To be honest, sometimes I don’t know what’s strange or what isn’t.  The rules are different everywhere, you know?  I don’t think I’m doing a good job of this.  I’m sorry.  We don’t have to—”

You cup his face and kiss him.  It is very stiff for a moment, because you are both surprised by your brazen action.  He somehow grounds himself first, a careful hand curling around your hip to guide you a little closer.  A breath passes between you then he kisses you back. 

You touch his chest, making a sweet small sound into the kiss when his lips slide so softly against yours.  You are about to deepen it when Jisung interrupts with, “Aww, you’re kissing!  So cute!” 

You and Felix look over at him.  His hands are clasped and he is gushing as only Jisung can. 

“I thought you were running,” Felix says, with a hint of amusement. 

“Stupid labyrinth led me back here,” Jisung says.  He mimes zipping his lips shut and gestures to you.  “Keep kissing.  Pretend I’m not here.” 

“I wouldn’t want to pretend that,” Felix says, so sincerely that Jisung’s eyes widen.  They look at each other for a long moment, then Felix looks at you.  He cups your face. 

Then Hyunjin comes running in.  He swings his arms in a dramatic flail and flower petals fly everywhere.  The leaf dog comes running in and starts nipping at the air, trying to catch the petals.  In the midst of this chaos, Hyunjin storms up to Jisung and promptly bows.  Then he shoves him to the side and grabs Felix by the arm.

“Hat!” he shouts.  “Now!” 

-

It is a twenty-six hour wedding ceremony.  You and Jisung fall asleep halfway through festivity number twelve, curled up under a furry blanket near a fire pit.  You wake when Felix lifts your head into his lap.  Jisung is already curled up with his head on your belly, so you smile and snuggle into Felix.  He cups your face and strokes your cheek, the flickering firelight casting shadows on his face, making his smile seem bigger than usual. 

The consummation ritual is last.  It takes place inside the castle, in a beautiful room that appears to have been designed for this express purpose.  The mossy stone walls are decorated with dried flowers, the plush bed laden with thick red throws and burgundy cushions.   Despite the tall open windows, there is no autumn chill, a lit fireplace cozying the room with its warmth.

It would be a lovely chamber if not for the translucent curtain with a literal audience behind it.  The winter and summer princes sit ramrod straight, so uninterested in their surroundings that it actually puts you at ease.  Hyunjin looks… a little too eager to be honest, but you aren’t convinced he understands this ritual anymore than anything else today. 

Jisung is side-eying Jeongin, who is sitting beside him because Hyunjin refused to sit by ‘the annoying changeling brat’.  Minho is sitting between Jeongin and Hyunjin, casting the occasional side-eye to the spring prince.  Despite his stoic countenance, his displeasure with the company is clear. 

Honestly, the whole tableau is quite comedic.  You find yourself trying to stifle laughter when Felix finally arrives.  You were sent to separate rooms to undress and change into robes, but you arrived here first.   Felix looks at you curiously, clearly perplexed by your laughter. 

“You’re not nervous anymore,” he observes. 

“No,” you say.  “I’ve just been thinking like a faerie.” 

He tilts his head at that.  You smile and kiss him, a chaste kiss that makes his lashes flutter.  The little reaction tickles a flurry of butterflies in your belly.  You hold his hand and lead him to the bed where you sit down.  His eyes shift with a nervous scuttle, but he follows the direction of your hand when you gesture to him. 

You keep your eyes on his, intensely locked as you lift his hand and take two fingers in your mouth.  When you close your lips around his fingers and gently suck, his breath catches.  It echoes in Jisung. 

Then Jeongin whispers loudly, “Is she going to eat him?”  He sounds moderately intrigued. 

“Be quiet,” Hyunjin replies. 

“I think it’s over,” Minho says, catching onto your ruse before anyone else.  

You smile and open your eyes.  You separate from Felix and turn your head to the silhouettes beyond the curtain. 

“A penetrative performance,” you state.   “I believe that was the requirement.  And I believe that should qualify.” 

You are stretching the meaning of those words and you know it, but that’s what faeries do.  His fingers ‘penetrated’ the breach of your mouth, so it should count on the most technical level. 

“All done,” you say with a smile and wave. 

“So you’re not eating him?”  Jeongin says, frowning. 

Minho is the first one to stand.  He flicks Jeongin’s forehead as he passes, but otherwise says nothing before fleeing the room.  Jeongin follows with a slightly disgruntled shuffle, then Hyunjin stomps his foot. 

“Humans,” he says, marching past Jisung. 

The door closes behind Hyunjin.  Jisung claps a hand over his mouth and laughs into it, so hard he has to put a hand over his stomach as he doubles over.   Felix laughs too, a pleasantly low rumble that he tries to stifle with a cough.  You smile up at him, leaning back on your palms and admiring him in the warm orange light.  He tucks some hair behind his ear, regarding you with a very tender gaze when he nods his head in a curt little bow. 

“All done,” he says.  It makes your brow furrow: the little shift in tone, the tension that still draws his shoulders back.  You realize that even after everything, he is still uncertain about his place.  Even Jisung knows where he belongs, not for a moment thinking he should leave the room, but Felix takes a step away from the bed like he intends to do just that.

You grab his hand, drawing his attention back to you.  Blonde hair falls around his face, shadowing it.  He doesn’t quite meet your eyes, gaze somewhere on your chin. 

“Felix,” you say.  His fingers tighten around yours and it feels like a question.  You answer by tugging that hand, drawing him closer.  His eyes flash gold when you drop his hand to open your robe.  This time you can hear Jisung’s sharp breath too, all laughter subsiding as you let the robe fall off your shoulders, laying yourself bare before Felix. 

He looks awed but stricken.  You can see when he swallows.  He looks at Jisung then back at you, his brow furrowing.  His lips twitch in a bid to speak but no words come.   

It would be funny, this supernatural being somehow struck dumb by you in your most vulnerable state, but your smile is more affectionate than amused.

“Felix,” you say again.  “Have you ever done something like this before?” 

He shakes his head frantically, his eyes still running up and down your body. 

“No,” he says.  “Uh, no.  No.  I can – feel something when Jisung – when you – I mean—”  He chokes on an awkward laugh, turning away for a second. 

“I fucking knew it!”  Jisung says, poking his head between the folds of the curtain.  “Bro, you’re such a liar.  I asked if you could feel when we fuck and you said no!”

“I can’t lie,” Felix replies, turning to Jisung.  He forgets to be embarrassed while arguing, very plainly and patiently stating his case.  “I told you most faeries don’t think about sex like humans and that I couldn’t be certain what you were doing, yeah?  And I can’t.  And I would have told you more but you only asked the first time and I didn’t know you were going to keep… being with her.  And I – I didn’t want to make things awkward… for you… okay?  By thinking of me every time… so I just… What are you smiling at?”  His deep voice breaks, pitching comically higher for a second. 

Jisung is smirking and nodding, just a floating head with a vague silhouetted body behind the curtain. 

“Man,” Jisung says, “you’ve been acting like a monk but secretly jacking it while we get freaky in the other room… That’s naughty.”

Felix draws his mouth into a flat line then looks at you for help.  You are trying to hold in your giggles, lips pressed tight together.  When he looks at you, you exhale, waving at Jisung to back down for a second.  He ducks behind the curtain again, giggling to himself like the menace he is. 

Fortunately, Felix is easy to distract.  All it takes is opening your legs for his all his attention to zero in there.  He swallows again. 

“Sounds like we’ve been teasing you too long,” you say, your voice drawing his eyes back up to your face.  You smile and beckon him forward.  “Come on.  Let me make it up to you.” 

He looks like he is going to deflect politely, either because he is a faerie or because he is Felix, but then you grab his robe and yank him closer.  He stumbles up to you, his fingers fluttering at his sides and his shoulders still tense.  You take one of his hands and place it on the side of your face, soothing him with another gentle smile as you unknot his robe.

He is already very hard and this seems to fluster him, but he points to the curtain and sputters, “He’s – touching—“ 

“Fuck yeah I am,” Jisung says. 

“Jisung, shh,” you say, trying not to giggle again.  “And slow down.  You’re always so impatient.” 

“Am not,” Jisung says, but you can see him lean back, folding his hands behind his head. 

You look up at Felix, holding his gaze the way you did when you sucked his fingers.  You like the way he twitches and breathes harder, the way his eyes flash, the way his jaw clenches.  His thumb curls under your jaw when your mouth slides over him.  You can’t help but moan when his whole face contorts with more natural emotion than you have ever seen from him.  His breath stutters and stops and starts, his sounds so low and guttural that you feel them inside you. 

“Oh, fuck, dude,” Jisung says, rasping.  You pull back just a little, drooling and stroking with your hand, and glancing at Jisung out of the corner of your eye.  He lifts his hips and squeezes himself over his pants.  “We were fucking torturing you, holy fuck.”   

“Mmmmrrgh,” is the approximate sound Felix makes.  His eyes are partially-lidded, his expression one of immense concentration.  He pulls your face back to him with a flick of his wrist.  Appetent and quite demanding, he leads your mouth back onto him and holds you in place to shallowly and gently fuck your mouth.  He makes a pleased sound, one of deep relief, his head lolling back and the tension leaving his shoulders.   

You let him set the pace, matching the animal instinct that overcomes him.  He stops himself when he’s close, breathing hard and stepping back.  You want to ask if he is okay, but you have to flex your jaw and your voice is momentarily shot.  Before you can find that voice, he turns to the curtain and says, “Show me what you did earlier.  I want – I want to do that too.” 

There is a quiet moment, Jisung maybe surprised at the sudden attention, but then the curtain parts and Jisung steps all the way through.  He has unbuttoned his shirt to the navel, his partially unzipped pants doing nothing to hide the bulge behind his fly.  The sight of him sets off more sparks, especially when he winks at you with all his cheeky wantonness.

Felix gives Jisung a once-over too, pushing a hand through his hair and steadying his breathing.  His features look sharper than ever, darkened with a determined resolve.  He says nothing when Jisung sweeps behind him.  Jisung wiggles his eyebrows at you while he gathers Felix’s robe and slides it off his shoulders. 

“She likes your freckles,” Jisung offers by way of explanation, smooching Felix’s freckled shoulder with a playful little mwah. 

Felix tilts his head and looks at you.  “Really?” he asks.  “I can’t fully scrub them off the glamour. I think it’s somehow your fault.”  This is aimed at Jisung.

“Everything’s my fault!” Jisung says with a great deal of pride. 

“Why would you want to get rid of them?” you blurt, showing just as much as horror as you did when meeting the cannibal faerie.   Felix without his freckles is equally abhorrent.

Felix looks at you, thoughtfully.  Firelight is flickering over the room but you do not think it is a trick of shadow when his freckles seem to darken everywhere. 

“Aw,” Jisung says.  “He’s flirting.” 

Felix looks at him with a certain degree of exasperation.  “Show me what I asked,” he says. 

“Oh, wow, okay, geez, pushy,” Jisung says, circling so he standing beside Felix.  Felix drops the rest of the robe, evidently not the slightest bit shy to be standing there naked.  Now your gaze is the roving one, jumping between them, darting upward when Jisung cups Felix’s face and turns it to him. 

“You need to turn her on first, man,” Jisung says, swaying to the playful rhythm of his own voice.  Felix follows, but his eyes narrow into judgemental slits.  Jisung seems unbothered by this, standing still, tucking some hair behind Felix’s ear.  “C’mooon,” he says, with an impatient little shoulder wiggle and a laugh.  “She likes you… she likes me… as they say… badda bing badda boom…”

“I don’t think they say that during sex,” Felix says, frowning. 

“He’s right,” you say, giggling. 

Jisung sighs and looks at you.  “No audience participation,” he says, miming a zip across his lips.  “Just sit there and look pretty, baby.  We’ll get to you.” 

Felix looks at you.  Jisung leans close to whisper in his ear.  You try to decipher what he is saying based on Felix, but all Felix does is furrow his eyebrows then look sideways at Jisung.  There is a moment of quiet, then they smile at the same time.

Felix delicately cups Jisung’s chin.

The last time you caught them kissing, it spurred only jealousy.  But that was different.  That was your childish reaction to exclusion, your own anxieties speaking over everything else.  This time, you are not outside of their connection.  You even swear you can feel the faintest tingling on your own lips when they gently come together in a feather-light kiss.   

Their hands trace similar paths, Felix’s slipping into Jisung’s pants and Jisung touching him back.  The kiss deepens until their tongues touch, then Jisung giggles while Felix grins.  They look at you at the same time.

“Go,” Jisung says, nudging Felix forward. 

They let go of each other and Felix climbs up on the bed, guiding you backwards until your head is on a pillow.  Long tendrils of blonde hair brush your cheeks. He lays over you and kisses you, pressing your head into the cushion.  Even lost in his kiss, you can sense Jisung with a fuzzy awareness.  You recognize the familiar touch of his palm, his hand gliding up your inner thigh.  Felix makes room, joining Jisung at your thighs.  You twitch with an instinctive little jerk, pushing yourself up on your elbows to look at them.  Jisung puts a finger over his lips and shushes you, smiling. 

“We got it, we got it…” he says.  He cups the back of Felix’s head and pushes his head down to your pussy. 

Felix glances up at you, then him, then down.  His eyes close and he sticks out his tongue, his expression one of the sweetest pleasure when he puts his mouth on you.   What he lacks in skill, he compensates with eagerness, messily diving in with an open mouth, licking and kissing and making a mess of himself.  Jisung threads his fingers into his hair and tugs, laughing a little. 

“Easy, easy,” he says.  He and Felix look at each other as Jisung lowers his own face.  When he puts his expert mouth on you, your head falls back, thighs parting further.  You throw your arms over your head and dig your fingers into the cushions.  You chase the rhythm of his tongue, looking down when it stops, when Felix replaces him. 

“See, look at her,” Jisung says.  Felix looks up at you.  “Just like that.” 

Then Jisung joins him.  They torturously alternate whose mouth is on you.  Jisung dives at Felix, licking across his wet lips and kissing him before returning to you.  You can hardly tell one mouth from the next, gasping under two tongues as they stroke you and each other, matching blonde heads bobbing in perfect coordination between your thighs.  It is inhumanly perfect, so harmonious that it almost agonizing.  This is how mortals lose their minds here, you think.

Eventually you are so wound up that you can’t help but cry out. 

“Oh noo,” Jisung says, very unrepentant as lays beside you.  “I think we were teasing her… That’s so mean of us, isn’t it, baby?  Huh?”  He pinches your face in his hand, cooing at you while you playfully glare.  He giggles and kisses you, your own wet desire smeared across his lips.  “You’re so wet, baby,” he says, sliding his hand down your body and over your pussy, easing his fingers through the wetness there.  When you whimper, he whimpers back in faux sympathy, pouting and nodding.  “I know, poor baby,” he says, curling his fingers inside you.

Felix’s eyes light up, watching.  He props himself up on one hand and touches you with the other.  You make a sound against Jisung’s mouth, a breathy moan as Felix slides his fingers in too.  It’s thick, that many fingers at once and so suddenly.  Your thighs jerk and you whine into Jisung’s mouth.  You see stars when you close your eyes, their fingers moving at the same time inside you.  They share a heartbeat, a rhythm, not faulting in the slightest.

For a moment, you just lay there and dizzily take it, stretched around their fingers, wet and silky hot and so turned on that you feel like you’re floating. 

“Jisung,” Felix says in his rough, deep voice.

“I know,” Jisung replies, just as hoarse.    

Their fingers leave you and Jisung grabs your throat with that same hand, slick fingers nudging your chin to look at him.  Your breath catches and you think Felix’s breath catches too. 

“That’s my girl,” Jisung says, reaching down at the same Felix reaches up, a hand on each breast, teasing the pebbled peaks.  You squirm and Jisung returns his hand to your throat, smiling at you so innocently, scrunching up his eyes with delight.  “Good girl,” he says, squeezing.  Felix gasps then moans, sucking kisses wherever his mouth lazily roams.  Jisung places those same hot kisses on your neck, each kiss landing one after the other, lighting every nerve.  Teeth and tongue lave at your skin, no doubt bruising it with each little love bite. 

“That’s it,” Jisung says, and you really start to think your human boyfriend is made of more magic than autumnal flurries.  His dark eyes sparkle in the light, his mischievous smirk lighting up his handsome face.  He is so giggly and sweet despite the dastardly torture of his hands and mouth. 

You find yourself sinking into the sensations, eyes closed, body running on instinct. 

“Felix,” Jisung says.  His hand leaves your throat, sliding down your body.  You realize he is spreading your pussy lips again, teasing as Felix pushes inside you.  It is easy now that you have taken so many fingers, but the knowledge of what is happening, of who is fucking you, makes your breath stutter and eyes open. 

“Ohh,” is the only sound you can make, watery eyes on where Felix is moving slowly in and out of you.  His brow is furrowed again, that look of concentration, then he groans and all but sprawls on top of you, fucking you with messy abandon.   Jisung thumps his head heavily onto the cushion, panting heavily, as if he was fucking you. 

“Felix, you gotta—”  Jisung says, his own face twisted up with a tortured sort of pleasure.   Felix does not listen to him, still rocking his hips with a frantic unevenness.  It feels good and crazy and wild, your head lolling to the side, a hum in your throat. 

Jisung finds the resolve to push himself up, groaning with the effort.  You watch him roughly manhandle Felix, yanking his head up to get him to concentrate.  Felix’s eyes flash gold then go dark.  His mouth is hanging open and his cheeks are flushed.  He never stops moving. 

“And you said I was impatient,” Jisung murmurs, grabbing Felix’s hips and evening out his rhythm.  You suppose it stands to reason that if Jisung is the most pussy-drunk man you have ever known, than Felix would be too.  Except Felix actually is magic, and everything about Jisung seems to multiply in Felix.  He looks completely overcome.  Then Jisung suddenly asks, “Good tears or bad?”

“Good,” Felix rasps. 

“So you wanna keep going?”

“Ye-es,” Felix hiccups, then suddenly starts crying, all the messy human-ness mixing with his confusing faerie-ness, coming together in an explosive physical and emotional mania that has him burying his face in your neck and fucking you so deep and hard that your own sniffles start. 

“Yes,” you say at the same time as him, wrapping your arms around his neck.  Jisung touches your hand, his other still guiding Felix’s hips.  Felix moans in your throat then marginally turns his head. 

“Jisung,” he says.  “I can’t—unless you—”      

Jisung very unceremoniously shoves a hand down his pants, then looks up at you and smiles. 

“Okay,” Jisung says.  He moves and Felix sinks back inside you, moaning deeply, clutching you possessively.  You hold him back as fiercely, blinking up at Jisung when kneels near your face.  “Come on, baby,” Jisung says, his thumb tugging at your bottom lip. 

“Yes,” Felix says, nodding at him and at you. 

You open your mouth, nodding at Jisung.  His pants get tossed somewhere and he removes his shirt at the same time his dick pushes past your lips.  They really do fuck with an extraordinary identicalness, perfectly matched without a word.  It is easy to fall into their rhythm, not even straining.  You feel like you were born to be here, between them, sharing them, sharing yourself with them. 

They come at the same time, Felix with his cheek pressed to yours, Jisung with his head thrown back.  They lay down on either side of you, flopping back at the same time. Felix has a completely dazed look on his face, his breath stuttering when you tuck some of his sweaty hair back.  He looks at you like he is seeing you for the first time all over again. 

All three of you exhale at once.  The resulting giggle comes in three-way unison too. 

“Wow,” Felix finally says.  “It’s much more fun like this.”

“Hell yeah,” Jisung says, holding out his fist for a bump.  You swat it down before Felix can return it.  Jisung just laughs, snuggling up to you. 

Felix also rolls onto his side. He tucks one hand under his head and touches your face with the other.  You and Jisung both look at him, his faraway stare, the way a small smile unfurls on his face.

“You’re mine now,” he says.  “Forever.  Yeah?”  It’s posed like a question but evidently it is already fact to him, or he could not say it. 

“Forever and ever,” Jisung says easily, stretching out on the royal bedsheets like he has always belonged there. 

Felix looks at you for an answer too, still smiling.  You are not as easy as Jisung, but you try hard not to overthink. 

But you remember so many stories of humans wandering in the faerie world, never seen or heard from again, the tales of their disappearances ranging from beautiful to horrifying.  You think it would be impudent to think yourself different or better than them.  They thought they were safe too. 

The question tumbles past your lips before you can think twice: 

“Your true name,” you say.  “Would you still give it to me if I asked?” 

He clearly does not expect the question.  He blinks quickly, then his gaze darts to the side.  You look there to see Jisung nodding off, already half-asleep on your shoulder.  Felix is not sleeping.  You look at him, wondering still about the sometimes contradictory depth of their connection. 

“Aren’t you tired too?” you ask. 

“A little,” he says. 

You realize he didn’t answer your other question and you open your mouth to ask again.  He kisses you, cupping your face, making a happy sound when you kiss him back.  Jisung makes his own little happy sound, sighing on your shoulder. 

“I love you,” Felix says, speaking soft and low against your lips.  He strokes the side of your face.  “I want you to stay with me forever.” 

“You’d really tell me your true name?” you ask. 

“I’d do anything for you,” he says.  “I love you.” 

“I love you too, Felix,” you say, about to say more when he kisses you again.  He smiles so big and bright, it crinkles the corner of his eyes.  

“You do,” he says.  “That’s the truth.  You love me like you love him.” 

“It’s the same but different,” you say.   “Like how you love both me and Jisung.”

He is still smiling.  He kisses the corner of your mouth sweetly.  “The same but different,” he says.  “Yes.  I understand.” 

He draws you into his arms and kisses the crown of your head, sighing a happy sigh.  Jisung curls up behind you, already fast asleep while Felix murmurs sweet love confessions at you until you fall asleep too, nestled tightly and safely in his arms.

#skz smut #stray kids smut #lee felix x reader #han jisung x reader #lee felix smut #han jisung smut #skz x reader #stray kids x reader #faerie au

[ambassadorarlert]

toxic!armin head canons

author’s note: this fr has been a long time coming. it took a while to gather my thoughts lmao. he can’t be sweet all the time, right??😭

warning: modern au. toxic characteristics — obsession, jealousy, possessiveness. gaslighting.

18+ ONLY MINORS DO NOT INTERACT

we're not gonna look away from armin's whole underlying character trait of being a known manipulator. he is going to gaslight you.

armin starts his mind games as a last resort. when he's desperate to have his way. when he's being back into a corner, and you're holding your ground in an argument or disagreement. when you're winning and he's losing. he'll play into his unfortunate-baby face-sweet-boy persona and say, "i'm only telling you/doing this because i love you!" armin slaps, "I don't know what you want me to do." at the end of most arguments because he knows it will make you quit arguing out of pure frustration.

we can all agree armin goes through your phone

he immediately clicks on iMessage to see who you’ve been texting. snoops through everything. pictures, contacts, notes. all of it. armin goes all up in your private dm’s, discord, looks through your snapchats. who you’ve been sending tiktoks to. he’s so extra, he even scrolls on your social media timelines. your dash. your fyp. just to see what you’re always looking and giggling at bc who is making you laugh if it’s not him ? arminknows he won’t find anything and that you would never do anything behind his back. but he looks anyway and holds his breath just in case. and, if he does find something he doesn’t like, he will confront you about it and not even address the bigger question

major attachment issues. in bold, italics and regular size font.

the root cause being his parents died when he was really young and was only raised by his grandpa who worked all the time. /: armin definitely has mommy issues. he's very anxious to pleasure you and do everything you want him to bc a.) he's hopelessly devoted to you b.) for some reason he think it'll make you love him more. armin will get really attached to you after the first date, and everything in your relationship moves quickly. he says i love you first. 3 months into the relationship you’re moving in together. engaged after 1 year, married 6 months later. he’s sensitive and in tune with everything you’re doing and feeling and saying. the slightest change in your voice, oh you must be mad at him. when you're literally just tired and have 0 energy, he must be annoying you. armin needs regular reassurance and validation. he will straight up ask “do you still love me?” at least once a day.

armin gets jealous so. so easily.

armin thinks he's not good enough for you and that you deserve someone who can do the things he can't, while simultaneously not being able to bear the thought of you being with another man. he views other guys as a threat and is off-putting on purpose. he goes through your followers and interactions daily and reports guys who leave compliments and thirsts. he gives guys dirty looks when he see's them obviously looking at you. will ask trap questions like "would you still be with me if you could start your life over?" armin is well liked among your girlfriends but makes no effort with your guy friends, and has succeeded in distancing you from a few of them. he disguises ultimatums as open communication. armin's jealousy is a delicate spectrum.

he's very possessive of you.

you're his everything and he wants everyone to know that. you're so gorgeous, he's not gonna hide you away. armin recognizes that you're your own person, and you can show off however you'd like. as long as he's somewhere in the background. he encourages that you tag him in all your posts. he fights for his life trying to convince you to let him come with you while you go out with your friends and he wins most of the time. but when he has to stay home, he stays up and waits for you, he double/triple texts and asks when you'll be home even though you made a point to give him a timeframe. and don't even be 5 minutes late because armin already has seventy-five questions lined up. if he's feeling extra silly, he'll start a fight over text. 🤪

2023. do not copy or repost any work by arlertwitch on any other platform. violators will be prosecuted. 🪼 — @artsyblkblocked / @sleazymac-n-cheesy / @arlerts-angel / @chiinni / @aegonslawyer / @stoned-eren /

#its not even his fault fr. #he’s just protective that’s all. #he’s been through a lot and he can’t always help it ok #my writing #armin arlert #armin imagine #armin headcanons #toxic!armin #armin drabble #armin one shot #armin x reader #armin x y/n #armin x you #armin x black reader #armin x fem reader #armin x black y/n

[janmisali]

FAQ

Q: wow, you're on tumblr?

A: that's not a question, but yeah, this is the Official blog of youtuber jan Misali. I also have my main blog @hbmmaster where I reblog stuff and make more low-effort text posts.

Q: wait, you're on youtube?

A: yeah, I make videos. for new viewers I recommend checking out the best of jan Misali playlist. for people who already watch and enjoy my videos I recommend watching my inspiration playlist, which is a curated selection of videos I personally keep finding myself coming back to.

Q: can you put your name and pronouns in this FAQ?

A: you can call me Mitch, jan Misali, or Misali. "jan" works too, just make sure not to capitalize it. I use he/they pronouns, with no strong preference between the two sets.

Q: when is [video you've announced] coming?

A: by asking this, you have delayed it by another month. sorry!

Q: when is [series that hasn't had a new installment in a while] returning?

A: when I want to go back to working on it, and no sooner

Q: are you going to make a video about [thing you mentioned in a post]?

A: no. some things are just posts

Q: I want to make something based on something you made. is that okay?

A: I'm not a cop. I broadly approve of any stuff people make that's derivative of my own work, as long as I'm given the appropriate amount of credit for it and you tell me about it once it's posted somewhere so I can see it. the only exceptions to this are if you're like just fully reuploading something I made (not cool!) or if it's something I'd disapprove of even if it wasn't derivative of my work (do not write fanfiction with me in it, or like, south park character AI covers of song translations I've made).

Q: you're into languages, right? how many languages do you speak?

A: none

Q: what font do you use in your videos?

A: Noto Serif

Q: what software do you use to make videos?

A: Google Slides and Audacity

Q: can you reblog the scoobypost again?

A: only if you ask nicely.

questions about "the /hj tone indicator is worse than useless" (March 2023)

Q: I think what /hj (half-joking) is supposed to mean is...

A: the reason I find /hj confusing is not, in fact, that not enough people have told me their own personal definitions of what they think it means. I do not need or want to hear any more, thank you.

Q: I think I get what the /oj anon was saying, it's something like...

A: I am not exaggerating by saying that I spent years coming up with interpretations of what the /oj anon could have meant. there is a 0% chance that I haven't at some point considered the exact interpretation you're suggesting. if you want to share your interpretation with someone, find a different person who thinks they understand it and tell them instead of me.

questions about "how many Super Mario games are there NOW?" (May 2024)

Q: will you release the full survey data?

A: no. the full survey data includes the anonymous comments of 5500 random people on the internet who didn't sign up for that.

Q: will you release an edited simplified version of the survey results?

A: I already did! it was in the form of a video called "how many Super Mario games are there NOW?"

Q: will you release the full survey data, but without the open answer sections?

A: no. the raw numbers are not in a comprehensible format, and it would take about as much work as it took to make the video itself to get them into a comprehensible format. I'm not doing that myself, and I'm certainly not going to allow other people to do that on their own just so they can find out what I decided wouldn't be worth mentioning in the two-hour video. if you have a specific question about the results, ask that question instead.

[erosuguru]

No title sorry bout that lol Satoru Gojo x Reader, mainly fluff, reader lovingly bullies gojo, gojo is whipped, 800+ Words

CW: none, fluff head to toe, can't spell 'Satoru' without 'Sato' (sugar) gehehehehehehehe dies, little proof reading

Notes: I had a long day and I was book shopping and I realised "ah, gojo would buy shit for his gf just because he remembered her" so here we are, I'm not good at writing fluff plz bare wit me, I'm trying out a new divider plz tell me if it looks good or bad :')

A book slid across the soft surface of the table to you, you put down your mug and examined the cover then looked up towards your white haired boyfriend who's face looked like he was expecting you to jump into his arms and express gratitude.

"What's this?" Satoru's expression fell at your words. He sat up and gestured to the book as if that would make you understand. "The book you were talking about, remember? When we had coffee in that new place?"

Wow, he remembered? You couldn't help but smile, that conversation was weeks ago and he still remembered, during then you passively mentioned the book's title, you merely brought it up saying your friends were all reading it and talking about it but you weren't going to pick it up anytime soon (for the sake of your TBR list, you can't..)

"And you waited until now because...?" You picked up the book as you spoke, fingers flipping through the freshly printed pages and examining the font size and spacing of the words. Satoru snorted, "waited? I've been looking for it everywhere!" He folded his arms over his chest as irritation took over his features."Everywhere I checked, it was sold out!"

"Seriously? You ran around stores for me?" You teased, and he pouted, scooting his chair closer to you. "Of course~ when my love asks for something, I race to get it!"

"Satoru, that's nice, but.." You set the book down. "I didn't ask for–"

"Shhhh, you can show me your devoted thanks later." He cut you off with a finger to your lips, acting as if he was saving your breath from praising him and his valiant efforts (of purchasing a popular book).

Continuing this would just prove to be useless, although it was a nice gesture, even if you couldn't read it now– he listened, he knew you were interested and he made the effort to purchase something with you in mind.

To say Satoru was an impulsive buyer was an understatement. He's smart with his money, and yet moments where he loses all rationality in a transaction have been frequent after establishing a relationship with you. If Satoru sees anything in a store that briefly reminds him of you, he's taking it home to you.

The best part of the whole process is seeing your reaction, even if you told him he didn't need to waste his money on you– he could see the smile twitch at the corner of your lips as you grew flushed; almost as if shy that satoru thinks of you so fondly outside of your daily interactions.

His surprises could be anything, ranging from a mug that was the right shade of your favorite color to a necklace he thought would look good on you, it makes him even happier when he sees you use said gift in any mundane activity.

"This is really sweet of you, baby, thank you." You replied and kissed his cheek, Satoru hummed through a smile happily, accepting your affections. You reached for your mug– the mug he bought you because he knew you'd love the cartoon cat on it.

"So where'd you find it?" He waved off your question."It doesn't matter. What matters is that I got it before anyone else could, and capitalism loses!"

"Capitalism actually won because they got your money, so.." You quietly drank from your mug as you watched his face contort to disappointment. You restrained yourself from laughing at his pouting. How dare you belittle his victory?

"You're so mean to me! And here I bought 2 copies so we can read it together!" He announced as he showed his copy, the same book with the same cover. You set down your mug and cooed at him. "Satoru! You didn't have to do that. Honestly, are you obsessed with me?"

You uttered that sentence in a clear joking tone, but his expression hadn't changed. "Of course I am! I thought I made it pretty clear! You're literally all I think about!" Satoru proudly proclaimed and grew red in the face when you burst out laughing, your features growing flushed as well at his declaration.

"You're so lame, Satoru!" You wiped the tear away from your eye as you came down from your little giggle fit. He pouted at you once more. "What? Am I the only obsessed one here?"

"Maybe, I'm not the one who ran store to store looking for 2 copies of the same book?" His pout persisted at your retort, laying his head on your shoulder he stared up at you with a pitiful yet loving gaze, one that he would give you whenever you were being 'mean' to him.

"Okay, okay.." You turned to him and cupped both his cheeks in your hands, kissing his forehead, Satoru indulged in the closeness, feeling your scent envelope him as you leaned closely to him. He stopped you from moving your hands away just as you began doing so, keeping them on his cheeks.

"... Satoru?" You waited for him to answer but he only tipped his face towards you, you rolled your eyes unable to fight the smile off your lips as you kissed his cheeks, the tip of his nose and finally right on his soft lips. "Was that good enough compensation?"

His face reddened, and he nodded once. "Mhmm, thank you, pookie~"

#satoru gojo x you #satoru gojo x reader #gojo satoru x you #gojo satoru x reader #gojou satoru x reader #gojou satoru x you #jjk x reader #jjk x you #jjk x y/n #jjk fluff

[genericpuff]

This is stupid, but you know those new LO hoodies the Webtoon shop has? I know the font they're using. It's Eckmannpsych which is an Adobe font.

That's not the stupid part though. The dumb part is the capital H and G in the Eckmannpsych font do not match what is on the hoodies, which would obviously be on the hoodies that have Hera or Goddess on them. So, Rachel looks to have taken the time to hand draw her own H and G to match the font style for those hoodies but did not take any time to make new, better art for the merch, but instead reused ugly panels from the comic. Talk about a strange look into her priorities. She doesn't like how the G and H look on a font? She will remake those to fit what she wants. Rachel when the assignment gives her the chance to make specialized, better designs for those same merch? She can't be bothered to even try. WTF!

for the love of god-

I'm assuming and hoping they had the commercial rights to that font LMAOO But it did kind of make me go 🤨 because while I didn't know the font EXACTLY off the top of my head it still felt... weirdly out of place for something like LO? Why are these hoodies being stylized like they're from Austin Powers LOL

On another note tho, the LO merch is just like... disappointing in how bad it is for what's supposed to be WT's #1 series, which is, btw, a series with so much unique stylization that it shouldn't even be this hard to make merch for it! it just feels very "first attempt at redbubble merch", but unlike genuine first attempts at making merch (which is obviously a learning curve that I wouldn't judge anyone for being new to) this is a company that's sunk shitloads of money into LO so I don't know why they can't get better merch made?? so much of it is just the default drawings taken and slapped onto a tote bag or t-shirt, which like, yeah cool fine you're using art that's recognizable and considering the art is already made, it stands to reason that they should use it for more than just the comic. It's just disappointing to see how lazy it often is and how little effort is put into translating it onto a t-shirt/tote bag/etc. like we can't even have ONE exclusive t-shirt with a unique design that isn't just poorly copy pasted from the comic?

Case in point, those t-shirts that Rachel was advertising a while ago that were actually straight up falsely advertised. I can't find the post about it on my Tumblr (I'm pretty sure I talked about it here) so here's the IG story rundown I did on it ages ago:

Again I'd really like to have benefit of the doubt here that Rachel isn't the one making these designs, usually that's not how the merchandising process goes in these types of deals, so I'm not gonna point the finger at her. But it's just so odd to me that it happened in the first place. And this goes for a lot of LO's merch, so much of it feels cheaply made and rushed off a conveyor belt for the point of making money without much expense. Which yeah, that's a business model for sure, the goal is to profit, but like this?

You can't even argue that it's like people criticizing LO the comic because like, as much as I'll justify what I spend my time doing here in my free time, it's true that at the end of the day I don't have to pay for LO, so really the only thing I'm doing is inflicting psychic damage to myself, it's not like my actual money is on the line LMAO That's why I stopped paying for LO ages ago and only do it when I have a specific episode I need to review (such as the midseason hiatus review series I did). At the very least, if I really want to keep reading LO but don't want to pay for it, I can just avoid FastPassing it and read it for free so I can save the coins for other series I'd rather read. The Webtoons' FP system is very fair that way.

But this is merch explicitly made to generate revenue. It is a product, front to back. You can vote with your money by not buying the thing you don't like, absolutely, but the fact that it's this poorly to begin with is just so indicative of Webtoons' business practices and so shitty for the people who genuinely enjoy this comic and are being advertised and sold shoddy merchandise that doesn't even come looking the same way it's advertised. It's really not a good look for Webtoons, Rachel, or LO that this is what they're selling to people.

Especially for what they're charging, good lord-

Like, okay, they're hoodies and they're gonna be expensive to print and ship so the higher overhead cost makes sense, but jesus christ, with the kind of merch Webtoons has already given the stamp of approval on, would it even show up in decent condition? How bright are those colors gonna be? Are they gonna strip off as soon as I throw it in the wash? I'm half-tempted to buy a hoodie for myself just to do a review on it but I can't justify dropping $75 CAD on a hoodie that only has art on the back. Maybe it's just me living in the hellish lands of Canada where we play with toy money that's the problem, but it's just not a gamble I wanna take LOL If I bought one it would probably be the Hecate or Hermes ones because they're the only ones that are at least somewhat legible and have decent character art that isn't a character looking like they need to poop LMAO

(these are literally the two worst drawings they could have chosen of these two i stg lol the only thing that would have made this worse/funnier is if it was Handsome Hades and Persephone Kidnapping a Baby LMAO)

It has me worried about what the LO figures are gonna look like when they release. Are they gonna have some creative liberty with making them chibi-fied (like a Nendoroid?) or are they gonna try and replicate the art style exactly and wind up making literal blow-up sex doll Persephone? 😭

NGL, if the figures are done well enough and don't cost an arm and a leg, I might consider buying one just for the shelf collection, but again, it depends. If Webtoons released a tarot deck with really good panels from LO (like the Tower 4 scene or Persephone sitting on the rooftop with her comb or Eros flying down into the Mortal Realm) I would buy the shit out of that. I would even just take the Major Arcana if 78 cards was too much to ask :'0 I'm not against Webtoons/Rachel trying to profit off LO merch at all, I just wish it was BETTER- (╥﹏╥)

#lore olympus critical #lo critical #anti lore olympus #ask me anything #ama #anon ama #anon ask me anything

[joyce-stick]

The Beef Stroganoff Song! (arbitrary subtitle discourse edition)

So, you may have noticed here that the subtitles in this clip (from Symphogear GX episode 3) are fairly different from what you're used to seeing when people post this video, and the phrasing in the subtitles is fairly different from what the associated memes often say

For those who don't know, Symphogear got itself released on blu-ray by Discotek, and with that came with a new translation authored by Noelle (@ulsairi on twitter ) who is notable for being the only trans lesbian anime translator I know of off the top of my head.

Her translation appears, in my opinion, really rather polished and very good, and I strongly appreciate the way it's written and how much character it adds to the dialogue by giving everyone distinct voices and adapting things into more natural English. It's also a fair bit gayer. I haven't encountered many people who've seen these subs, but I think most fans of the series would consider these a net positive change. There are some people who are mad about these subtitles, and they can die mad.

Anyway, let's talk about the different phrasing of the beef stroganoff song. I'm mostly going to compare to Crunchyroll's subtitles for reference since that seems to be what most others go off of. Here's a link to that version.

So right off the bat we can see here that while CR's translation appears to be a lot more, for lack of a better word, functional, Noelle's translation tries to apply more dialectal force "it's beef stroganoff/Yes! It's THAT beef stroganoff!" And generally communicate through the tone how excited the girls are to get started. Additionally you'll see throughout that the latter is a fair bit more lyrical, there's a lot more punctuation and verbal tics and filler phrases written into the dialogue to express that they are singing, which makes sense since Japanese tends to omit a lot of the sorts of prepositions that Noelle threw in here,

Like, Yumi (yes I went and looked up her name on the wiki) just says "beef stroganoffu" because it's obvious from context that it is beef stroganoff, she doesn't need to spell it out, at least, not in Japanese

(We know like maybe ten hiragana and 1 kanji do not trust us on Japanese this is all just basic shit we learned from online guides)

So this probably leads to a rushed translator from Crunchyroll (they are notoriously crunched for time) who's just trying to Get It Done probably not really bothering to throw in extra additional connecting letters to express the tone of the character, only doing so when it's required to make basic grammatical sense in the target language. So they likely didn't think to make the subtitles have flourishes like this that aren't explicitly in the original Japanese. Noelle meanwhile had the time to consider things like this and take such liberties in order to attempt to convey the same tone that was arguably implied by the Japanese, even if not explicitly put forth

And that's about all the things I should not repeat I guess, TL;DR, these subtitles are more fun to read because the translator had more time to think about the best way to make them more fun while still being accurate to the spirit of the original dialogue, who'd have thought!

(In case you're wondering, the Commie subtitles say kind of the same thing here, and y'know, it doesn't seem like a wrong translation, but also I really dislike this subtitle styling, orange on pink with that font and that drop shadow is just kinda bad. I appreciate the effort but like. Come on. Please fansubbers, please think about if the font and colors you chose actually work with the image you're putting them on)

Moving on!

horizontal and middle rhyme with each other so you can almost actually sing this, actually let me take a moment to try it right now- never mind, I can't sing. Hahaha. I don't actually think it lines up that well with the melody But I thought it did! Didn't I? That's significant, that this actually reads like plausible lyrics to a silly song someone made up instead of a literal translation of a Japanese song

Anyway, here comes the first major difference!

So in the Crunchyroll subtitles, Yumi says "it doesn't have to be beef" which in English (in my estimation) sounds a tad scatterbrained, like, "oh yeah sure beef but whatever really it doesn't actually matter," while Noelle's subtitles rather say "Got no beef? Don't you worry!" Which implies something different.

"It is recommended to use beef, but you may substitute something else if you are sorely lacking in beef" as opposed to "Oh the beef doesn't actually matter, zoinks lol!" CR's translation is kind of a bit funnier in how it sorta comes from nowhere without this qualification, which probably lead to this phrase's memeticness, but Noelle's translation seems more reasonable to me so yeah again, tada, yay for sensicalness.

Now here's another interesting change:

Again, the flat manner in which the CR subtitles say "finish with salt" with rendezvous only being included because that's literally what they said, is sort of absent any stronger emotional implication,

Noelle's translation meanwhile going with "don't forget them, they need it" imparts personhood upon the salt and pepper. The implication being that the girls are saying, "the salt and pepper are in love, please reunite them, they must be in gay love together." Or maybe you think the salt and pepper cannot be forgotten and must be reunited because they are Only Friends.

Whether you choose to believe that this is the salt and pepper getting married, or merely subtext, or an interpretation, or salt and pepper shipping bait, this is a deeply important tonal indicator because it reminds you that these girls are ultimately playing with their food!

"And there, now you're in for a treat!" I don't think I need to explain this one.

Now, here's an interesting one!

In the Crunchyroll subtitles, it just says the memetic "boys don't know this." With no context, no elaboration, no clarity, no qualifiers. Boys don't know. Did the boys magically get their brains wiped? Are the boys biologically incapable? Who knows. Nothing is said but that.

Noelle's subtitles, on the other hand, qualify this statement by saying "Boys aren't taught to cook, so they may not know" (And note again how, it says "kno-ow" to emphasize, once more, that they're singing, and also this lines up with the long "ooooo" sound they make at the end of this lyric, so cool)

There is now context! Boys aren't taught to cook! Anime and Japan's culture in general still pigeonholes people into gender roles! And an anime translator just wrote you a hidden translation note about it! You might be a boy, you might know how to cook, but certain boys in another part of the world aren't traditionally taught cooking, so they may not know

They may not, but they could!

Trust a trans person to express gender facts with subtle nuances like this in anime translations.

And with that lovely bit of good translation and good writing and good localization of a thing to make it make sense to people

Mew!

#symphogear #symphogear gx #beef stroganoff #translation discourse #boys dont know this #(or rather THEY MAY not) #(but could if they were told how!) #you know it from anime and manga #audrey (of the joystick system) posts

[screechingsandwichtriumph]

The hellfire club x reader

Includes: Mike wheeler , Lucas sinclair , Eddie Munson, Dustin Henderson ( I know there are some others , but I don't know them , so we will stick to our main characters<3)( Also I am sorry this took so long , but I am writing so many exams I'm gonna die and also I procrastinated as much as possible)

Warnings: yandere things, stalking, obsessive behavior , bullying, I hate this and really struggled with it even though I loved the idea

Summary: you defend Dustin once and not it's over for them. They need you

Thank you to @saturnsbabe69 for helping me figure out how to write this<3 (and sorry I was so late)

The hellfire club was known around school as a group of losers who enjoyed playing board games in all of their free time, hence a lot of people made fun of them

You on the other hand weren't exactly font of them , but you should never tolerate people making fun of others. So when you saw a boy knocking down a boy's- Dustin was it?- tray down in lunch and calling him a 'careless loser' you decided to do something small for it

Now , you weren't exactly willing to end up in detention for an unknown kid and his friends , but you could be really discreet when needed

You passed by the by Dustin and his friends who were currently cussing out tha boy and gave them a reassuring smile

Reaching Brad , the boy that had knocked Dustin's tray you stuck your foot out causing him to fall on the ground, head first

"oops , Brad are you ok? Maybe you shouldn't have been such a careless loser"

That's the same exact way those boys fell for you

After that expect them to be following you around

Lucas and Dustin , can and WILL stalk you , following you home , knowing your program and all that. And let me tell you, Dustin will look through your garbage

Mike will stare a t you from afar , collecting information but not obsessively stalking you. He will however try and discreetely get close to you , throu a class or even by accidentally bumping into you

Eddie was definitely the first one to approach(let's assume he is only like two years older) and in a non discreet way.

He will call out your name on the hallways asking you if you wanna go with them on the movies or something

Embarrassed you decline

All the other boys facepalmed but at least now it was out and they could actually be more open about you

Dustin would find you in the halls to talk to you about class , Lucas would play basketball and yell "this shot is for you" (and then most likely lose), and Eddie would just talk to you non stop asking you out once a week

Mike I think would be tha least annoying but don't expect him to not be obsessed. My boy would upgrade his stalking and he would totally threaten anyone that speaks to you

You become kind of their friend and you talk to them , but rejecting them anytime they ask you out

In the beginning they didn't mind much , convinced you'd come around and actually fall for them eventually

When sometime had passed and you seemed to remain immune to their efforts to woo you , they decided that needed to get more serious

They even scolded themselves, because what were they thinking , you are so delicate and perfect , so how could you fall for their distasteful attempts right?

They put on a nice dinner , maybe even a picnic in one of the most picturesque places in town

They make sandwiches and all , Eddie even learns some romantic songs to play to you, while Dustin prepares the food and Lucas carried it. Mike makes sure everything is perfect , collecting flowers and orchestrating tha whole thing

They take you there , in a blindfold that they really struggled to concise you to wear and they confess their feelings in depth

You end up not saying no to their advances not long after

#x reader #fanfic #yandere #yandere stranger things #yandere eddie #yandere mike #yander Dustin #yandere lucas #gn reader #stranger things #stranger things x reader #yamdere eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #mike wheeler #mike wheeler x reader #lucas sinclair #lucas sinclair x reader #dustin henderson

[chrollohearttags]

I promise idc abt silly stan wars or who ppl think is better when in my most un humble opinion, all of the female rappers are miles ahead of any of the mainstream males right now. All them girls been stepping when it comes to visuals, sounds, versatility and everything. What’s so funny to me, the goal post just keeps moving. The same people who were screaming that they’re tired of the pussy rap and that Sexxy Red is bad rep are the same ones calling Doja a weirdo and saying she’s trying too hard to be different. People said they’re sick of Nicki is ‘too old’ to rap the way she does so she puts out a new song (which was cute as hell btw) and everybody says it’s trash. Meg and Cardi rap on a Brazilian funk beat, which is so unique and bc it wasn’t WAP 2.0, despite them saying it wouldn’t be anything like it, people are mad. And please don’t get me started on Monaleo and Flo Milli dropping two of, if not the best and most versatile albums to come out this year and being paid dust. Not to mention it’s always, ‘there’s no unity in female rap’ and Glorilla, Gloss Up, K Carbon, etc all have a whole ass group. It’s so fucking stupid. I’m tired of women having to put in 5x the effort and these raggedy ass, yuck mouth men get to skate by on mediocrity and their namesake. Drake’s diet light, syrupy misogynistic ass releases the same song in different fonts every year and ppl eat it up. He’s on every radio and you can’t escape him even if you throw the shit out the window. He’s on every new girl’s dick until they turn him down and then he goes and shades them in another trash ass song, rapping about some shit he’s never lived. A whole cornball. DaBaby should be stoned for that bullshit he put out recently. I can’t remember the last time I was impressed by a man’s work that wasn’t an underground/independent rapper bc they seem to be the only ones who with a morsel of talent. The girls can’t ever catch a break and it’s exhausting seeing them have to tip toe around and make sure everything is perfect, they can’t have fun, they can’t experiment or even make a bad song to grow as an artist bc they’re all under a microscope. Anyways, we support all female rap over here and I’m tired of them having to be perfect and still never good enough.

#cherry chats 🍒 #sorry I’m a lil heated abt this #I’m sick of Drake getting away with his crimes but my girls gotta be perfect #fuck y’all and these stupid ass takes #female rappers #my whole page is a misandrist account minus the fictional men #sometimes

[lauvwar-r]

07 from the start ⸝⸝ cold drinks and cowardice

"oh? we're not going to the library this time?"

it must be a sign, you think, holding a paper bag in your right hand and his hand in your left. it was late enough into the cold winter season for frosty breath and signature hot chocolate but warm dandelion rays seemed to follow you two and frame the campus perfectly.

"nah," you shrug, "pela said that the council agreed that the stage would be put in the middle of the campus uh- garden? lawn? grass area thingy- you know what i mean…"

"yeah! we thought the area would bring the most traction." you're not even looking at him: your nervous eyes glued to your surroundings with false confidence, but you know he's giving you that look. that sickening soft one that you often mistake for adoration.

it's… fond??

and it makes your heart race — just for a second, before remembering what he said before.

"not a date huh…" you mutter dejectedly.

truthfully, it kinda sorta hurt when you found out he said that. whilst not fully demolishing your ego and porcelain heart, it did pinch at you — like soft rope burn for your self-esteem.

but what hurt a little more was the fact that he never told you. never told you about his private account that is.

i mean yeah… i have one too, but that's because i talk about how much i like him on there, you reason with yourself. and i get privacy and everything. but, bronya? you thought him and bronya were just school friends. were you… even his best friend?

"hm?" a hum interrupts your spiralling thoughts.

"anyway! i thought we could like, survey the area. see how and should things be set out and work from there." you say with faux enthusiasm, "we can work on your quote-on-quote poster on a bench nearby too."

"...it's not that bad."

"uh huh," you tease, raising an eyebrow. whatever. who geppie lets follow his private doesn't mean anything.

eventually, you two end up sitting on a bench together that faces the lawn.

"oh come on! look," gepard laughs as he pulls out his laptop, already logged in and displaying a somewhat improved version of his last poster. the changes are minor, like font changes and whatnot. but you can tell just how much effort he put into it. effort he put into everything and anything he did. a quality of his that you love. "i got rid of some of the uglier images," he pointed out excitedly, shuffling closer to you so you could get a closer look, "just like you told me to." the last part, a whisper similar to the sweetness of vows.

"it's good…" you mumble, too busy clinging onto his words and soothing a racing heart.

"really?"

"really." you reply earnestly, hooded eyes studying yours.

you wanted to lean in. to tread past the tightrope of a line preventing you and gepard from being more than just friends; to finally speak your mind on what you've been feeling for the past few years.

but…

"ah!" you explain, pretending to remember something by suddenly grabbing your paper bag from before.

…you're a coward.

inside are two beverages and a warm pastry carefully wrapped in tissue. "my favourite…" gepard mutters, surprised, "you remembered."

"iced coffee. you always preferred things cold. and a pastry too! it's a thank you for yesterday and-"

his ears turn redder than the normal red-on-a-windy-day red. and you almost — almost considered this a win: a step over that line, before…

"ha. you really are my best friend."

ouch.

MASTERLIST ⸝⸝ previous! ⸝⸝ next!

𑁤 sypnosis. despite claiming to be 'rizz master 3000' name has failed to ask out their crush and childhood best friend, gepard, for a few years (L). with this new wave of courage, will this lovestruck idiot be able to confess before gepard buys a house and adopts 3 cats and a bunny with someone else? (this is a joke. geppie will not be adopting 3 cats and a bunny).

notes. . . omgg this is like my 6th time ive tried to post 😭 ( so sorry for the like 3week hiatus LMAO) anyways ive been trying to get into a law school for next year so college has been biting me in the ass lately. sending love to all yall tho <3

. . . tags @520cafe , @kitsuxiv , @91ed0 , @iridescentsunsetwaters, @yevene , @lunavixia , @vilthenothing , @ryuryuryuyurboat

#💐 ⸝⸝from the start𓂃⸼ #gepard landau #gepard x reader #hsr smau #hsr x reader #gepard smau #gepard x gender neutral reader #gepard x gn reader #gepard x you #honkai star rail #honkai star rail x reader #hsr x gn reader #hsr x you #hsr gepard #hsr #hsr x gender neutral reader #honkai gepard #honkai star rail x gender neutral reader #honkai star rail smau #honkai star rail x you

[astermath]

hey aster, happy 1k!!! love your work and you fully deserve all the love💗💗

so i’m sending in a prompt from idiots to lovers (“you’re so cute.” “what did you just say?” “i said you look like a boot.”) for robin buckley because this literally SCREAMS her

aww tysm that’s so sweet, hope you enjoy and ty for sending in a request! <3

♡ aster's 1K celebration ♡

wc: 0.9K

tags: lovestruck robin, crushing, fem!reader (duh), just some pining lol, not rlly proofread! normal sized font below

Robin is a girl that tends to fall hopelessly in love. She can’t simply have a crush, or think someone is cute, no, she always falls head over heels, straight into a vat of hearts and sappy confessions.

And usually that’s fine, that works for her. Her crushes give her a reason to go to school, to get stuff done, to put extra effort into her appearance. But she tends to admire from a distance. She knows how much she talks, and how hard it is to stop talking too.

That’s why she usually just sticks to looking at you from a distance, cheek leaning against the palm of her hand as she daydreams about the dates you could go on. In the timeline where she musters up the courage to talk to you.

But it seems that the universe has other plans. The universe being your English teacher, and the plans being a duo project about a country of your choosing.

You couldn’t choose your groups, which you didn’t mind, you could work with just about anyone. You’re smart, you could probably do this whole thing by yourself.

But to Robin, this was a huge deal. She’d never even talked to you before, besides the one time she had to apologise for bumping into you in the hallway. She still dreams about that interaction.

And now she’s gone for embarrassingly daydreaming about you to sitting in your room, surrounded by books about Italy, writing down interesting facts and discussing the order of the presentation.

But her mind is only halfway there. It’s hard to focus on wine, Rome, and pasta when you’re sitting right in front of her like this. The sunlight coming through the window is hitting your skin just right, she can smell your perfume, and your PJ shorts are the cutest she’s ever seen.

“So, do you have anything to add, or can I start writing out my part of the presentation already?”

“You look so cute.” The words leave her lips before they can even register in her own brain. It’s like her body has decided it needs to tell you how adorable you look, without her mind being able to pull the brakes at all.

You look up, quirking an eyebrow, clearly confused by what you’ve heard. “Sorry, what did you just say?”

“Ah! I, uh—“ She sits up straighter, her eyes averting to the papers scattered in front of her, cheeks tinging pink from embarrassment. She’s not great at coming up with excuses, but she doesn’t exactly have a choice right now.

“I said you uh… You look like a boot.”

Shit.

She could have slapped herself right then and there.

'Seriously, Buckley? A boot? That’s the best thing you could come up with? Not fruit, or something else nice?'

“Oh,” You look up, scratching the back of your neck for a moment. “Well, like a nice boot?”

“What qualifies as a nice boot?”

“I don’t know,” you smile, leaning backwards onto your hands. “I like cowboy boots. And gogo boots are cute too.”

“Huh. I see.” She tries not to make it seem like a big deal, but she enjoys learning small things like this about you.

A few moments pass, and she’s already got her nose shoved back into a book while you try to write down a good introduction.

“Did you actually have something to add though?” You ask, looking up from your paper.

“To the presentation?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh, I don‘t know.” She puts the book down, thinking it over for a moment. “Maybe that the word America comes from the Italian language?”

"Huh, seriously? That's really cool." You smile, and it makes the blood rush straight to her cheeks again. You're already noting it down under the 'fun facts' section of the presentation, your pen scribbling away as Robin tries to compose herself.

"Yeah, uh, Vespucci came up with it. Italian explorer." She fiddles with the bit of frayed fabric at the hem of her shirt to keep her hands busy.

"You're really smart, aren't you?" You flash her another smile, and she thinks it actually might kill her this time. There's no way someone could look this pretty.

"Oh, uhm... I-- I guess." She chuckles bashfully. "You're pretty smart too, though. You always know the answers to like, every question in class. Even though you never raise your hand."

You grin, knowing damn well that's out of pure laziness and not shyness at all. "Yeah, I guess so. 'M glad I got stuck with you on this assignment though. You're full of interesting facts, Buckley."

She smiles, averting her eyes in hopes of not looking like the complete lovestruck fool she is. "Yeah, well, maybe I'll teach you some Italian here and there too."

"Wait-- you speak Italian?" You sit up straight, eyes practically sparkling after finding out this new juicy bit of information.

"Well, only halfway so, but I like learning languages. Keeps the brain juicy, you know?"

You chuckle at that, leaning your elbows onto your knees and letting your cheeks rest on your palms. "You're somethin' else, you know that Buckley?"

"You're one to talk."

"Well, you did say I looked like a boot. I guess that counts as 'something else'."

The both of you start laughing, and suddenly she doesn't feel so bad about her slipup from earlier anymore. Or this project. Bless the universe for putting her in your room that day.

-

-

-

#robinmath #aster writes stranger things #robin buckley x reader #robin buckley x fem!reader #robin buckley blurb #robin buckley imagine #robin buckley #robin buckley stranger things #robin buckley fic #robin buckley oneshot #aster's 1K celebration!

[aro-comics]

Growth (Part 2)

Growth, Part 2/3 – ITS REALLY NOT THAT HARD!! 😭😭 Lol sorry but the last panel is absolutely me when I think about amatonormativity as a whole, it’s really silly the more you think about it and I can’t believe that it’s so deeply engrained in most of the world. 

I think I should mention I don’t have any specific narratives to reference for the tropes described in this comic, as much as I would like to, as I started panelling this a year ago and past me GOOFED and didn’t leave many notes on what examples she was specifically think of. Again, feel free to let me know any examples you can think of in the comments or via DM! I’ll pin them if they’re in the comments and I might make a follow up Tumblr post listing examples 😊

Also, while I was researching this general topic I did go through TV Tropes “The Singles” (as a character type? Category) page, and I found something very interesting. There’s a literally a section describing the tropes that “explain” why a character was not in a romantic relationship … and literally they have ever “Excuse” for why a character might be single except for. Maybe literally they’re aromantic 😭 The closest is “Allergic to Love” (which like, relatable. But also not inherently an orientation).

Just like …. OH MY GOD. People sometimes try to act like we’re being dramatic about leting people know being Aromantic is possible but STRAIGHT UP. IN POPULAR CULTURE (and often OUR WHOLE LIVES BEFORE WE DISCOVER THE TERM, AND ACCEPT OUR IDENTITES) THE IDEA OF BEING AROMANTIC IS JUST NON-EXISTENT, WRITTEN AROUND WITH EVERY OTHER POSSIBLE “EXCUSE” OR “EXPLANATION” Because apparently the idea that someone could just not feel romantic attraction is too much for this world 😫

I don’t have too much else to say, other than I hope you’re all holding up okay and taking care of yourselves.

Image Description:

Slide 1: Celia holds her hand up to her chin, contemplating. “The whole idea of growth being tied to romance is reflected in other tropes too –”

Slide 2: A split panel is illustrated. A south asian girl is shown crying as she types on her phone. She mutters to herself “Ugh, I’m SO done with dating. I’m putting myself first for once.”

On the other side of the panel, she is shown to have gone through a *transformation* (a la early 2000s makeover), and bumping into her destined love interest.      

“The character’s efforts to “work on themselves” and “get away from romance”, are ironically what lead them to finding their “happy ending”.

Slide 3: Alternatively, a character finally accepting that they are happy single is seen as a “stepping stone” to being “ready” for a relationship.

In this scene, a brunette wearing a yellow shirt and dark skirt proclaims “I can be happy as a single woman”. In the background a spotlight flicks on as her “right” love interest appears. “Achievement unlocked: True Love interest” is overlaid in a font reminiscent of classic video games.

Slide 4: Celia speaks to the viewer. “Again, there’s nothing inherently wrong about either of these stories. It’s amazing if someone who gave up on love due to frustration, not a lack of desire, finds it again through pure fate and luck.”

Slide 5: Celia gestures now as she tries to explain, “But the problem is that these moments are framed as more of a “gotcha”, where this idea of pursuing growth purely for oneself, or holding any disdain of a romantic relationship in this process, is inherently wrong. In the end, even growing for yourself is really about growing for a romantic relationship.”

Slide 6: Celia rubs her hands through her hair in frustration. “Like … not everything is about being in a relationship! It’s not that hard.”

#regularcomic #GrowthComic

[coldhndss]

──★ ˙ ̟ !! Blue Lock Matchup No.1 @mimomis

Hello!! Thank you so so much for being my first matchup! For me, I decide characters based off who is most similar to you, then reversing the role and going for the exact opposite + making sure that it matches your personality based on the information I’ve been given. Also, thank you so much for basically matching the exact format I was looking for in a matchup <3

So, with that, I matched you with Rin Itoshi!

What did it for me, was the second part you sent in where you described yourself as ‘childish when you want to be, and that it’s terribly easy to make you smile or laugh’. I feel like Rin is easily misconstrued as a rude and unlikable person, but he wasn’t always like that; and I like to think that once he gets over this whole rivalry, he’ll most likely soften up again.

 ―୨୧⋆ ˚ “I like to read and watch documentaries in my free time.”

I think you and Rin would definitely bond over these types of things. The two of you would suggest things to each other and watch them in your spare time, or together. You’d tell him about a new film of sorts that is coming out, and he’ll tell you he somehow already has free  tickets to go see it. He comes off as the sort of person who doesn’t really care much for others, but still puts effort into the things he notices you enjoy. 

―୨୧⋆ ˚ “..come off as guarded and that glacier blue best represents me as a colour.”

Adding a colour that best represents you was super useful, as I think people can easily be matched to colours based off their personalities, and in this case, I think Rin would also be matched to the same kind of colour. This kind of colour can signify clarity, and open expression of your feelings. Although you and Rin may come off as guarded, I think he’d see parts of himself in someone like you, and it may help him strive for a change. Funnily enough it’s kind of poetic.

Your old-type interests and reserved nature (correct me if I’m wrong) would add to the maturity in a person that I personally think Rin likes to see. You two would really get along as your personalities don’t clash but are not the exact same in that regard. Rin would tell you about his worries and vent to you about things that he wouldn’t feel comfortable telling anyone else. In terms of a school setting, the two of you would walk to and home from school, stopping on the way to sit at a café and work on homework, or at a mini shop selling pricey stationery trinkets, books, pens, markers, journals and the like. Something would catch your eye, but you’d decide against it because you can’t afford to splurge right now. 

The next day you’d walk into school and find it in your locker, covered in baby blue gift wrapping and tied together with a shiny black bow. A tag hangs off the edge of the bow with his name written in a pretty font.

―୨୧⋆ ˚  “I also tend to oscillate between intentionally talking nonsensically and analysing/overthinking everything.”

Just as I think he would vent to you; he’d also be there for your little analyses sessions. He’d maybe even agree with some of the things you say and tell you not to worry about bothering him with your talks. He’d listen to you speak and nod or murmur in agreeance here or there, opting to stay silent and only listen to you speak over talking himself.

Rin would value you as a reliable person who’s feelings he could never bring himself to hurt. Even if he’s cold at times, and seemingly wouldn’t want to talk to anybody at all, he keeps it at bay when it comes to you as he wouldn’t even want to imagine hurting your feelings. You’ve been there for him when he really needed it, and he wants to do the same for you.

#coldhandsss #writing #blue lock #fluff #rin itoshi #blue lock x reader #bllk #blue lock matchups #blue lock boys #anime #manga

[vickyvicarious]

I remember when Jonathan first talked about his nocturnal existence causing him to have fragile nerves -or something of the sort- and being startled at his own shadow, he stopped reporting how bad his nerves are from it. Despite having to spend hours with Dracula every night unless told otherwise. Mina after the first few times she woke up for Lucy, she reported the same toll on her health from being awakened and then unable to go back to sleep, but she's not talking about how tired she is anymore. Despite having to be up for Lucy's sleepwalking every night unless told otherwise. She keeps track of Lucy's health, not her own.

Yeah! They both leave out these kinds of ongoing stressors for themselves. We have to look for clues and read between the lines to realize that, hey, Dracula is still keeping Jonathan up for long chats throughout basically the entire stay, or wow Mina must be beat.

And it makes sense in a way. They both have higher priorities. Jonathan has limited freedom to write and paper to write on, and is focused on talking about Dracula's inhumanity and his own efforts to escape. Mina uses her diary to talk a lot about her worries and fears but she is mainly focused on Lucy. Her journal reflects her desire to meet the responsibility for Lucy's care that she's been given, and her own state isn't as important compared to that.

At least to her. I care a lot about it, and the way both of them just don't talk about how badly they're doing - or try to downplay it when they do - hurts to think about. At least we know they love one another so much that they will absolutely look after each other's health and wellbeing assiduously. But they've got a tendency to push themselves really hard and just act like it's nothing. A part of me wonders if it stems (partially, I think it's definitely personality too) from their orphan backgrounds - they're used to having to work hard and to perhaps not being given the space or importance to linger on their own upsets or ailments. They are practiced at focusing on what needs to get done instead.

...anyways, you know what I love to imagine? How their respective journals look over time. They both start out written neatly, with precise lines and perhaps a fair bit of effort put in to getting the shorthand right. Jonathan's gets messy first: writing entries on a bumpy carriage ride will do that to you. Mina has to practice writing really quickly when interviewing Mr. Swales, and her handwriting takes on more of a slant... Jonathan's gets smaller over time, both to reflect his more secretive mindset and also how he's trying to preserve all the space he can. Sometimes his hand shakes so much that the shorthand is hard to read, maybe a page is even torn a little. Mina's writing gets larger when she's exhausted, sometimes her pen lingers long enough to almost blot or trails off. Some of her entries might be pen, some pencil. Jonathan's all pencil, and you can see when he needed to resharpen it. I doubt either are probably writing on any kind of lined paper and their ability to write in a straight line suffers over time. Both of them have pages that are stained by tears...

I can't read shorthand so obviously I'd need the proper English version to be able to read it, but I would love a version of Dracula that incorporates all those elements into "photograph of diary pages" type formatting. It would have typewriting for those portions, maybe different fonts depending on the typewriter. Unique handwriting for everyone. Maybe even a sketch in the corner where appropriate. Basically, what re: Dracula has done with the audio, but in visual format.

#dracula daily #mina murray #jonathan harker #anonymous #replies

[lets-make-a-conlang]

Hi conlang person (unsure what to call you)

How long do you think it will take to design the language? There are so many words, or rather things that need to have words. Do you anticipate this being a project that lasts months or years, or do you have a secret cheat code I haven't thought of?

Also, will the conlang feature loan words from other languages? How about exceptions to grammar rules? Will we be creating a new alphabet?

If you can't already tell I'm very excited about this project and appreciate the effort you put into setting it up!

Hello!! 🤝

I haven't actually posted a name on here haha 😂 I guess you guys can call me Blue, cause that's my favorite color 💙

❝How long do you think it will take to design the language? There are so many words, or rather things that need to have words.❝

Being a bit nitpicky here, I'm the one who thinks of the polls and writes them out. So of course it can't be helped that some things can't be voted on. 🧠

Other than that, some words I will choose to be in the language, but for the majority you guys have control over the project. We post, you vote.

I do have a plan for creating word posts/polls (sort of?). I'll let you guys know pretty soon when we get there. A lot of the plans I have are very open to change, depending on the results of the polls.

❝Do you anticipate this being a project that lasts months or years, or do you have a secret cheat code I haven't thought of?❝

No, I don't have cheat code. 😆 Being a bit new to conlanging, I actually don't know how long this will take. With 1-2 polls every day, this might take about 6 months to a year to make a usable conlang (this is a guesstimate!). Maybe even shorter?

From there, it can be further expounded upon by the community. If enough people are interested, I might use other services like Reddit, Youtube/Rumble videos, Memrise, etc to continue this project later on.

If people from different/foreign language backgrounds like this idea, we could make a pictures-only Memrise course and a Discord to communicate with each other? Just throwing things out there. 🤔

Language evolves over time, and I want to emulate that with these styles of posting.

❝will the conlang feature loan words from other languages?❝

❝How about exceptions to grammar rules?❝

Grammar rules will be decided upon by polls later on. 📜🖊️

❝Will we be creating a new alphabet?❝

Not necessarily an alphabet, but yes. The choice of "using an existing system" vs "creating our own system" will not be voted upon. I prefer we have our own writing system-- in my opinion it makes it feel more like its our own thing, yknow?

However, that doesn't disallow it from looking similar to existing writing systems. For typing on computer, alphabets can be done with a custom downloadable font file. Or if it is an abugida, logographic, featural etc., we can use English letters while typing to Anglicize the writing, and then use our own writing system in drawings/pictures. It sounds complicated right now, but that's because lots is open to change while this project is just starting.

I hope I've answered all of your questions!! It's awesome to see feedback and excitement about this too, makes me so happy! 🥰

#lets make a conlang #asks #text post #1 day poll #tumblr poll #conlang #writing #questions

[there-was-a-hole-here-itsgonenow]

Always #1 at Bradley… family?

NOTES FOR BELOW: I thought the sign said Always #1 at family, but it might actually be #1 at Bradley’s. This is relevant to the post because I focused on the word family. A lot of it hinges on the word family. @howtobecomeadragon has an excellent perspective about this, how Bradley’s Big Buy is written like this outside:

(A yellow sun/star, Bradley’s in blue, and BIG BUY surrounded by red also — our primary colors. Blue in the middle of yellow and red, with yellow placed above and red below. )

And yet the apostrophe s is left off on the sign inside the store (see below). Not to mention, it looks like an ‘i’ is there. Howtobecomeadragon, just like me, always assumed it said family. It likely says Bradley. But at a distance and with it’s presented angle (I don’t think it appears any other time other than this scene), it seems ambiguous. Maybe set design wants you to think it says family?

The 1 is directly above Will’s head, foreshadowing who exactly is looming over Will—who is tied to Will. Mike is rooted to Will’s side here and so, by association with Will, One is looming over Mike as well. I said in my original post that Mike is rooted to Will’s side here like he is through s4 and will be in s5. Mike is a positive tie to Will, opposing Henry’s tie to Will. Henry wants to sever the bond between Will and Mike.

Additionally though, I thought about the color choices of the neon here: Always #1 at family. One is associated with red; plain answer there. ‘Family’ is also highlighted in red. ‘Always’ is blue. ‘At’ is blue as well, and that is the word directly in-between Mike’s and Will’s heads. The starting and ending letters of ‘family’ (the tail of ‘y’ trailing under the ‘f’) are directly over Mike’s head.

What does the blue-highlighted ‘at’ directly above and perfectly in-between Will and Mike mean for them—for Mike especially, given that color is linked to him? And what does the red-highlighted ‘family’ mean for Mike? Red represents One; the neon 1 represents One and it is above Will, signaling a clear correlation, but the word family itself is hanging over Mike.

Blue (Mike) and red (One) are used in alternative fashion to color this sentence. Automatically I think of the parallels between the Creel and Wheeler families. Both families are pictured as ideal on the outside—THE picture of normalcy even. But the Wheeler and Creel families are riddled with lies and underlying facades.

Mike and Will are positioned side by side underneath this sentence, right in the middle of it and simultaneously under the blue ‘at’—‘at’ as a word itself here emphasizing the action toward the object (family) and expressing the relationship between the implied subject (Mike) and skill/capability (Always #1). ‘Always’ and ‘at’ are blue. Is Mike not in a position (in the above s3 scene especially) where he feels like he has to present a certain way? Is he not trying to emulate his family/the norm? Through similar parental-inspired clothing choices, him giving up on games he loves, and who he’s really in love with and attracted to in order to ‘grow up’/be as he knows he’s expected to be? Mike has feelings for Will, a truth that does not fit within the normal/conventional family picture. Under that ‘at,’ where he and Will sit together, doesn’t meet the expectation of an idealized family. It would break the normal path Mike is trying to stay on.

The fact this sign is in a grocery store, a place where people go to replenish what they need to live and get through their days, may also suggest that the norm/expectation is what’s required for the ‘family’ to live. Family, in this case, becomes a trap, a trap that extends from society-implemented normalcies that affect families. In addition, there is extra ‘effort’ put into the font choice for ‘family’ as opposed to the rest of the sentence. It’s all in print until it becomes cursive, a style of writing that has been expected of adolescents in order to uphold the standard of cursive penmanship that many adults were once/still can be held to (In American education systems, as far as I’m aware, this has been the case. U.S. students, as part of their curriculum, needed to be proficient in cursive. As of 2010, this is no longer a curricular requirement). I don’t think it’s a coincidence that ‘family’ is all of a sudden in cursive, highlighted in danger-coded red, and is above Mike’s head particularly as a representation for these symbolic notions. Metaphorically, the standard Mike is well-aware of is hanging over him. It can be dangerous to not uphold it and keep his family going as they are, right? Yet it’s a danger—a trap—for his own life.

Henry knows this. Henry knows from his own experiences what Mike’s deal is regarding expectation and family. Once again, “eat, sleep, reproduce, and die” is strongly relevant when considering the basic, normal functions that are required to live—with ‘reproduce’ being a social standard of function for life.

I believe it was @wibble-wobbegong who prompted Petergate, in which Henry was in love with another boy in his childhood: Peter Owens, Sam Owens’ son (a ton of evidence is there to back it up, including relevant connections to Petey Mchew in Robin’s story and St. Peter imagery; a definite must-read that is well-worth your time to sift through if you haven’t). In short, aside from many facades their families project (@aemiron-main has a great many posts discussing the Wheelers and Creels), there is Mike’s connection to Henry: their love for other boys that don’t uphold the family standard.

The fact that Henry knows, very likely directly understands, what is going on within Mike is what will make Mike vulnerable to Henry.

#byler #mike wheeler