#corie replies

[drwcn]

I have a question about the Imperial concubine system. Where did they all *live*? In cdramas the consorts are always depicted as masters of their own palaces (at least in the ones I've seen), but not *every* concubine would merit such a thing, nor could there be enough space, so where did they live? Did lower-ranked concubines live in the same palace as a high-ranked one? Did they live together in one palace and only supervise their own apartments?

Hi friend,

Hmm, the answer is they all lived in the Forbidden City (for the Qing and Ming dynasty). I think people underestimate just how big the Forbidden City actually is. I remember when my granddad took me there as a teenager, it took me 3 hours to walk through it from north to south, and I only briefly glimpsed about 40% of the palace because at least half of it was under repair/maintenance and also used as government/military offices now.

There's a saying in Chinese: 后宫佳丽三千, which roughly translated to the harem has three THOUSAND beauties. This is of course an exaggeration, but the palace is designed to house A LOT of people. I think if you watch Empress in the Palace, you'll notice not every concubine has their own "court", aka an enclosed property contained within a courtyard, as part of the over all palace. This "court" could called a "gong" 宫, a "yuan" 苑, a "ge" 阁 etc, determined mostly based on their size and who lives in it.

An empress or a consort of high station will live within a "gong". Now the gong is not one singular building. As you propably have seen in harem dramas, particularly of the Qing or Ming dynasty, Chinese "houses" are not very big, in and of itself, but what makes a court big is that it has a lot of houses that make up one court. Typically, a gong is headed up by a consort of a certain station. Concubines of lesser stations may not have their own own court but live within the court of a higher consort. The main consort of each court will live within the main building of the court, and if she had lower concubines living under her juridiction, they will occupy a smaller side building.

The buildings you see in dramas like Story of Kunning Palace, Story of Yanxi Palace, Empresses in the Palace, are all in the design of the Forbidden City in Beijing, which served as the royal palace for the majority of the Ming dynasty, and all of the Qing dynasty until the early 20th century when the Qing dynasty dissolved. It is not actually filmed in the Forbidden City. Most shows are shot in man-made film cities built for the tv and movie purposes. These are replica buildings designed to look almost identical to the layman's eye to the actual thing.

I highly encourage people to actually visit it; it is very cool. Although..I will warn you that the "south front" of the Forbidden City, which is also its grand main entrance, opens up to... Tianmen Square.

#cdrama #corie replies

[scionshtola]

looks better with the same hair but. not a lot. to me.

#they look like. idk. they were put through a generic barbie pretty face filter. their original face is so cute and now they kinda look like #they are holding water in their mouth. and also their eyes are not as downturned. the nose looks better in this one tho #it looked smaller yesterday which i didnt like. i know it's wip but. idk #they look better in the trailer but if this is what their face looks like wandering around... #the most i can muster is that's cori. i guess. #i need a text post tag #okay sorry i wont post about it again unless its to share nice pictures from the trailer #also pls do not reply to me to tell me they look the same or its just pixels or to post on the forum just leave me to my wallowing #its commiseration hours ONLY #also i guess its annoying to me bc i LIKE the stylizing they have in place currently

[offyoupop-easypeasy]

#boy meets world #shory #shawn x cory #cory x shawn #bmwedit #it's about time #an affair to forget #watching the wedding ep with shawn reluctantly giving away cory and was reminded of that scene from an affair to forget #when corys like 'what do you want me to do?' #and shawns like 'i dont know' #when cory asks 'youre giving me your blessing?' #and shawn replies 'yeah well we gotta grow up sometime.' #smfh #corys vows when he says 'thats all ive ever known...and thats enough' haaa ok not getting into that one #82 percent of the shit cory says to shawn is more romantic than his vows #boy meets heteronormativity #mine

[felinemotif]

i read 'a mother holds her knife by the blade' essay and. dear god.

i got chills from: "She has since, never ceased to remind me: 'I felt nothing, I pushed too hard, you only hurt afterwards.'" what a sentence im sobbing dry heaving some writers are just so <333

for anyone who would like to read the essay

short, but a heavy hitter. it's one of the first essays i read this year (though it was originally published a little while back) and i've reread it a handful of times since.

mélissa laveaux has a very straightforward, no nonsense writing style that perfectly suits the topic of her essay. very much 'these are the facts, take it how it is.' there's no looking away from or dressing up her truth.

[She has since, never ceased to remind me: “I felt nothing, I pushed too hard, you only hurt afterwards.]

the first and second time i read this, i teared up.

i ended up getting into her music after reading her essay, which was an added bonus because i doubt i would have found her otherwise.

anyway in the spirit of continuing to throw my reading, past and present, at you i'd like to suggest that you read this ask and answer from ask polly, by heather havrilesky.

it's about aging and feeling like the path you're on will only lead to doom. it's about how to combat those fears, while accepting that it's normal to feel that way. it's about not being alone in your fear of the future. it's not all downhill from here.

here are a few snippets from it that i particularly enjoyed to hopefully entice you into reading it <3:

'Your stress and dread and storytelling about the future are a much bigger problem right now than the actual future is.'

'Our culture encourages us to translate every disappointment into a very personal moral failure. So I want you to deconstruct your guiding assumptions about what you “should” be.'

'Having a nice cocktail and chatting about dread is one of my favorite things. I’m not kidding. Don’t stay isolated. Reach out, and reach in. Stay connected.'

ALSO the entire last paragraph but i don't want to copy and paste it bc that closing line is meant to be read at the end of the piece it truly wouldn't hit as hard if i were to spoil it for you but yes this!! highly recommend giving it a read if anything from the above speaks to you

#i don't know how to sum up my reading tastes other than: all of it. every word available to me. #sososo heartened to hear that you enjoyed mélissa's essay god but that woman can write #waffleinator-inator #replies #cory talks words #<<<< so i can keep track of recs and the such

[elysiumxii]

yet more for @temporalobjects ft cory & iwai cont from here 

Cory draws back a little as Iwai turns towards him, finally settling some attention on him, though true to form it was only to lightly scold him with a disapproving look and request he wait, as always, for work to finish. “Oh..” he mutters softly, but Iwai’s focus had already returned to the screen. Well he should know he wouldn’t come before old things that were owned by dead people and no one wanted any more... silly him. 

Cory does find Iwai’s shop fascinating and even he likes to poke around and look at all the old things, but it was the man himself that he came over to see, rushing over after his shift finished, but he shouldn’t be surprised to see Iwai still hard at it. As he settles into the seat beside him, the blonde courier’s eyes do glance over the older man’s side profile as he works. Cory admires everything that Iwai has made out of himself. His shop, running everything on his own and doing so well, his worth ethic... but it wasn’t like he had much of a social life. Beside him, who does the guy even have? Cory hasn’t met any friends, nor has he really heard mention of any. His poor, lonely boyfriend. 

“Lets make something delicious” he whispers softly before sitting forward a little towards him and rests his temple on Iwai’s shoulder, head tilting to watch the screen he was so absorbed with. Maybe Cory should help set him up with some friends... fellow geeky friends, who like old things. 

Funny thing was, he didn’t even come here to be fed. He rather wanted kisses...

#replies;cory #temporalobjects

[original-missif]

OH!

Okay, so during their little Family Reunion on Cebu, I think Rita (the little girl, daughter of Ernesto's friend from ep 2) would wander right up to Eliot thinking he's Alex and just start talking his ear off and Eliot would immediately take a liking to this spunky little girl and happily listens to her go on and on until she takes a pause like "you're acting weird, Alex" and he just kinda smiles "that's because I'm not Alex. I'm his brother. My name's Eliot."

And then he helps her go around causing mischief and annoying Alex

10000% because Eliot is amazing with kids and is also a little shit disturber when he wants to be. I'm biased for Oldest Sibling Eliot, so it's his God Given Right to annoy his younger brothers as much as he wants (tho not to the point where Alex's bp is a danger).

so when Alex returns to the gift shop and finds everything's been moved around - there are amethyst crystals everywhere on every counter and shelf - and despite immediately knowing who is responsible ("damn it Rita I just finished organizing the inventory!") he's uncertain how she got in the shop ("I locked the doors how the heck did she get in??") and who helped her do it

#it could have been anyone #kai might have done it just to annoy him #or cory help because he's late on rent again #jacob couldn't have done it because he's a goody-two shoes... unless #he just found out eliot has secretly been a criminal for 20 years so he'd probably know how to pick locks but he's not that childish?right? #anon #reply #almost paradise #alex walker #jacob stone #eliot spencer #oldest daughter eliot spencer deserves the chance to bother his brothers without consequences

[tabbyrp]

Medieval AU

A lost meme from the inbox – something something AU.

Behold first an AI monstrosity to set the mood.

A medieval AU sound, to be honest, absolutely fantastic. Pure crack-nip. As long as it’s one of those quasi-fantasy ones where plague isn’t a common issue and people have decent hygiene habits.

It’s also one of those settings which feels ripe for all the raccoons-in-a-trench-coat to inhabit. Corinne is the local baker, a semi-recent arrival in the village who carries her own secrets. Brian as the county sheriff, or one of his men, appointed by the king to deal with unruly criminals. Raylan stops by on frequent occasions, hunting for the worst in the land, and often finding them already waiting for him in the local jail cell.  

Beth and Riley, the local nobles, one a noble knight and the other prone to appearing in the village to aid those inflicted with ailments. There is rumor of another sibling, a whisper of a name of Billy, but none have seen him. The villagers do know Jayden, a fellow noble, choosing to reside with the Riley’s instead of in her own castle, and a lady not to mess with.

While every land has the nobles, it also has those of less courtly aspirations. Ron, the owner of the local tavern, and the one who keeps many ruffians from swindling the town. Luka, who the children call the wolf of the woods, only comes into the village when he must. Aspen, an unruly waif with an uncanny ability to know all the secrets the town folk would rather stay hidden.

And amid the other souls who have been carelessly overlooked, there is Tabby, still serving drinks as everyone’s favorite tavern wench.

#corinnebaileyrp #meme reply #thanks cory! #cross all the streams! #honorable mention everyone

[dazai-on-my-mind]

Hate that I can't interact with my mutuals like normal. No I won't send in an ask but I will leave the longest and most unhinged tags for you to read and spam reblog your entire page.

#but if you wanna send in an ask 👉🏾👈🏾 #its gonna be an awkward reply but a reply nonetheless #cory talks aloud

[spinejackel]

i could have sworn i had a picture of him, but that sounds a lot like my sister liz’s cat juniper, but slimmer like this guy

havana browns are so pretty. honored by the comparison 💕

i’m crying at cuddly russian blue because i used to have the sweetest cuddliest russian blue when i was a kid😭 i know my mom has a picture of AJ somewhere

#reply #cory core #monsterfolkandfiction #grand maul seizure #pocketchina

[nightmarecountry-a]

❝ Don’t touch me ever again. ❞ - dream

The nightmare has no words for the emotion that a mortal might call shame: it only knows that a white-hot, searing feeling of discomfort of some kind seems to inflame its entire being when its creator looks at it like this. Nightmares like the Corinth/ian are made to force others to self-reflect, after all--not to do so themselves.

Lack of experience makes him attribute the feeling to anger instead: easy to stomach and to reckon with; a feeling he can understand.

"My apologies, lord," say two mouths out of three; the eyes, talking while the Corin/thian's jaw feels wired shut with what he thinks is rage. "I intended no disrespect."

He glances to his creator's arm, the one he'd so foolishly grabbed mere moments ago to stop him from simply walking away instead of hearing his nightmare out. Already it seems an impossible thing to have done.

The feeling he thinks is rage seems to shift a little. His eyes feel uncomfortable, their teeth clenched tight while he wrestles with some nameless, unclear feeling of dread.

"Won't you hear me out?"

#asks #ic. #v: the original #mythboundmuses #mythboundmuses: dream #[ this entire reply is just cori/nthian having no idea that what he's feeling is shame. #and intense rejection/failure.] #[ i feel like he was probably trying to make an argument for being allowed to roam the waking world and dream just started to LEAVE LMAO]

[drwcn]

Hello! Quick question: JC-antis will prove their (insane) arguments about him by citing how the "real" JC is described in MXTX's text. I know a lot of the story revolves around the danger of rumor and hearsay, but in my English translation, the story seems to be written in 3rd person omniscient, which unfortunately seems to give their argument some weight. Could you lend me some insight regarding the original Chinese or any cultural elements that might help me defend my Fave? Thanks! <3

i mean Jiang Cheng is very much a little shit face, but is he a bad person? Hmmm no.

as far as i'm concerned, antis can say whatever they want and i just...block ppl LOL

it's hard to give really concrete evidence without digging up the real text and MDZS is....VERY LONG. And i just can't...be...bothered.

But I will say one thing about Chinese as a language. Sometimes I found that translation often made what is just "casual speech" very abrasive and aggressive and rude sounding in English.

Even just the most basic example from the show: when that dude from episode 2 fainted in the Fairy Temple, Sizhui is translated to say: hey what's wrong with you? Or something to that effect. (the only reason i can pull this up as an example is bc i recently started watching it again with a new friend who i've infected. i'm like patient 0 in this untamed epidemic that's going around in my friend circles).

Which honestly, if a person fell down in front of you and your automatic response is what's wrong with you? People would be like wtf, why are you so rude? But in Chinese, it's....not a rude thing to say. In fact that is exactly what Sizhui says: what's wrong with you/what's going on with you?

And this is Sizhui we're talking about. Like the Angelic Boy of the mdzs universe no matter which iteration.

So naturally you can see how that plus a shitty temper would make Jiang Cheng seem like an irredemable asshole.

Not to mention all the misreading into the cultural dynamic, trope dynamic that people seem to be doing left right and center. Completely heedless of the myriad of people telling them bruv, you're reading the book wrong please calm down.

It's like whenever i read a good fanfic and i see the words "Madam Yu abused Wei Wuxian" - I click (x), right away. I'm too old and too tired to deal with this kind of shit in my life.

Also the absolute projection I see in some people's analysis/fic/headcanon. Bruh....

But who am I to tell people how to live their lives? If they get more out of mdzs/cql than is intended by the author or production team, well that's none of my business. I can have selective blindness.

and do i feel show jc is a bit watered down than book jc? hmmm yeah, to an extent. but also i feel that's the thing with books right? when i read it i imagine one thing, but when i see it as a visual in the show, that's both the director's interpretation of the character as well as the actor's interpretation of the character. and i decided that it's canon enough that it's not ooc, and i actually like the show's interpretation so that's what i'm gonna stick with.

#corie replies #cql #the untamed

[mostlysignssomeportents]

“If buying isn’t owning, piracy isn’t stealing”

20 years ago, I got in a (friendly) public spat with Chris Anderson, who was then the editor in chief of Wired. I'd publicly noted my disappointment with glowing Wired reviews of DRM-encumbered digital devices, prompting Anderson to call me unrealistic for expecting the magazine to condemn gadgets for their DRM:

https://longtail.typepad.com/the_long_tail/2004/12/is_drm_evil.html

I replied in public, telling him that he'd misunderstood. This wasn't an issue of ideological purity – it was about good reviewing practice. Wired was telling readers to buy a product because it had features x, y and z, but at any time in the future, without warning, without recourse, the vendor could switch off any of those features:

https://memex.craphound.com/2004/12/29/cory-responds-to-wired-editor-on-drm/

I proposed that all Wired endorsements for DRM-encumbered products should come with this disclaimer:

WARNING: THIS DEVICE’S FEATURES ARE SUBJECT TO REVOCATION WITHOUT NOTICE, ACCORDING TO TERMS SET OUT IN SECRET NEGOTIATIONS. YOUR INVESTMENT IS CONTINGENT ON THE GOODWILL OF THE WORLD’S MOST PARANOID, TECHNOPHOBIC ENTERTAINMENT EXECS. THIS DEVICE AND DEVICES LIKE IT ARE TYPICALLY USED TO CHARGE YOU FOR THINGS YOU USED TO GET FOR FREE — BE SURE TO FACTOR IN THE PRICE OF BUYING ALL YOUR MEDIA OVER AND OVER AGAIN. AT NO TIME IN HISTORY HAS ANY ENTERTAINMENT COMPANY GOTTEN A SWEET DEAL LIKE THIS FROM THE ELECTRONICS PEOPLE, BUT THIS TIME THEY’RE GETTING A TOTAL WALK. HERE, PUT THIS IN YOUR MOUTH, IT’LL MUFFLE YOUR WHIMPERS.

Wired didn't take me up on this suggestion.

But I was right. The ability to change features, prices, and availability of things you've already paid for is a powerful temptation to corporations. Inkjet printers were always a sleazy business, but once these printers got directly connected to the internet, companies like HP started pushing out "security updates" that modified your printer to make it reject the third-party ink you'd paid for:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2020/11/ink-stained-wretches-battle-soul-digital-freedom-taking-place-inside-your-printer

Now, this scam wouldn't work if you could just put things back the way they were before the "update," which is where the DRM comes in. A thicket of IP laws make reverse-engineering DRM-encumbered products into a felony. Combine always-on network access with indiscriminate criminalization of user modification, and the enshittification will follow, as surely as night follows day.

This is the root of all the right to repair shenanigans. Sure, companies withhold access to diagnostic codes and parts, but codes can be extracted and parts can be cloned. The real teeth in blocking repair comes from the law, not the tech. The company that makes McDonald's wildly unreliable McFlurry machines makes a fortune charging franchisees to fix these eternally broken appliances. When a third party threatened this racket by reverse-engineering the DRM that blocked independent repair, they got buried in legal threats:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/04/20/euthanize-rentier-enablers/#cold-war

Everybody loves this racket. In Poland, a team of security researchers at the OhMyHack conference just presented their teardown of the anti-repair features in NEWAG Impuls locomotives. NEWAG boobytrapped their trains to try and detect if they've been independently serviced, and to respond to any unauthorized repairs by bricking themselves:

https://mamot.fr/@[email protected]/111528162905209453

Poland is part of the EU, meaning that they are required to uphold the provisions of the 2001 EU Copyright Directive, including Article 6, which bans this kind of reverse-engineering. The researchers are planning to present their work again at the Chaos Communications Congress in Hamburg this month – Germany is also a party to the EUCD. The threat to researchers from presenting this work is real – but so is the threat to conferences that host them:

https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/researchers-face-legal-threats-over-sdmi-hack/

20 years ago, Chris Anderson told me that it was unrealistic to expect tech companies to refuse demands for DRM from the entertainment companies whose media they hoped to play. My argument – then and now – was that any tech company that sells you a gadget that can have its features revoked is defrauding you. You're paying for x, y and z – and if they are contractually required to remove x and y on demand, they are selling you something that you can't rely on, without making that clear to you.

But it's worse than that. When a tech company designs a device for remote, irreversible, nonconsensual downgrades, they invite both external and internal parties to demand those downgrades. Like Pavel Chekov says, a phaser on the bridge in Act I is going to go off by Act III. Selling a product that can be remotely, irreversibly, nonconsensually downgraded inevitably results in the worst person at the product-planning meeting proposing to do so. The fact that there are no penalties for doing so makes it impossible for the better people in that meeting to win the ensuing argument, leading to the moral injury of seeing a product you care about reduced to a pile of shit:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/25/moral-injury/#enshittification

But even if everyone at that table is a swell egg who wouldn't dream of enshittifying the product, the existence of a remote, irreversible, nonconsensual downgrade feature makes the product vulnerable to external actors who will demand that it be used. Back in 2022, Adobe informed its customers that it had lost its deal to include Pantone colors in Photoshop, Illustrator and other "software as a service" packages. As a result, users would now have to start paying a monthly fee to see their own, completed images. Fail to pay the fee and all the Pantone-coded pixels in your artwork would just show up as black:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/28/fade-to-black/#trust-the-process

Adobe blamed this on Pantone, and there was lots of speculation about what had happened. Had Pantone jacked up its price to Adobe, so Adobe passed the price on to its users in the hopes of embarrassing Pantone? Who knows? Who can know? That's the point: you invested in Photoshop, you spent money and time creating images with it, but you have no way to know whether or how you'll be able to access those images in the future. Those terms can change at any time, and if you don't like it, you can go fuck yourself.

These companies are all run by CEOs who got their MBAs at Darth Vader University, where the first lesson is "I have altered the deal, pray I don't alter it further." Adobe chose to design its software so it would be vulnerable to this kind of demand, and then its customers paid for that choice. Sure, Pantone are dicks, but this is Adobe's fault. They stuck a KICK ME sign to your back, and Pantone obliged.

This keeps happening and it's gonna keep happening. Last week, Playstation owners who'd bought (or "bought") Warner TV shows got messages telling them that Warner had walked away from its deal to sell videos through the Playstation store, and so all the videos they'd paid for were going to be deleted forever. They wouldn't even get refunds (to be clear, refunds would also be bullshit – when I was a bookseller, I didn't get to break into your house and steal the books I'd sold you, not even if I left some cash on your kitchen table).

Sure, Warner is an unbelievably shitty company run by the single most guillotineable executive in all of Southern California, the loathsome David Zaslav, who oversaw the merger of Warner with Discovery. Zaslav is the creep who figured out that he could make more money cancelling completed movies and TV shows and taking a tax writeoff than he stood to make by releasing them:

https://aftermath.site/there-is-no-piracy-without-ownership

Imagine putting years of your life into making a program – showing up on set at 5AM and leaving your kids to get their own breakfast, performing stunts that could maim or kill you, working 16-hour days during the acute phase of the covid pandemic and driving home in the night, only to have this absolute turd of a man delete the program before anyone could see it, forever, to get a minor tax advantage. Talk about moral injury!

But without Sony's complicity in designing a remote, irreversible, nonconsensual downgrade feature into the Playstation, Zaslav's war on art and creative workers would be limited to material that hadn't been released yet. Thanks to Sony's awful choices, David Zaslav can break into your house, steal your movies – and he doesn't even have to leave a twenty on your kitchen table.

The point here – the point I made 20 years ago to Chris Anderson – is that this is the foreseeable, inevitable result of designing devices for remote, irreversible, nonconsensual downgrades. Anyone who was paying attention should have figured that out in the GW Bush administration. Anyone who does this today? Absolute flaming garbage.

Sure, Zaslav deserves to be staked out over an anthill and slathered in high-fructose corn syrup. But save the next anthill for the Sony exec who shipped a product that would let Zaslav come into your home and rob you. That piece of shit knew what they were doing and they did it anyway. Fuck them. Sideways. With a brick.

Meanwhile, the studios keep making the case for stealing movies rather than paying for them. As Tyler James Hill wrote: "If buying isn't owning, piracy isn't stealing":

https://bsky.app/profile/tylerjameshill.bsky.social/post/3kflw2lvam42n

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/12/08/playstationed/#tyler-james-hill

Image: Alan Levine (modified) https://pxhere.com/en/photo/218986

CC BY 2.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/

#pluralistic #playstation #sony #copyright #copyfight #drm #monopoly #enshittification #batgirl #road runner #financiazation #the end of ownership #ip

[luveline]

could i request spencer x bombshell!reader where maybe spencer and the team meet reader’s ex boyfriend / a guy she used to be interested in and he’s sooo different from spencer so he assumes her flirting is a joke but really she never had a type until she met spencer n now she’s only into nerdy, sweater-vest wearing sweethearts <3

love ur work sm i only read spencer fics but i read all your characters bc the writing is so intoxicating !!

thank you for your request angel! <3 1k, fem

Spencer looks adorable today. You’re not sure if he knows, but that can be easily rectified. 

“Spencer Reid,” you say sternly. 

He’s immediately wide-eyed and sorry. “What?” he asks, pouting. 

“You have some explaining to do.” You glare, taking your compact from your pocket. You open it, check your appearance, fighting a huge smile as you flick the mirror on him accusingly. “So, what do you have to say for yourself?” 

“I don’t get it.” His eyes jump between the mirror and you. “Sorry?” 

“You should be sorry. Do you see how nice you look today?” He rolls his eyes. “Hey, don’t act like you don’t know what I mean.”

You and Spencer have known each other for years now, and you love him. You’d die for him easily in the field, and out of it too, but you’re not together and he’s bad at accepting compliments, so he shrugs you off like you’re only teasing him. 

“My handsome partner,” you say. Even if he isn’t your boyfriend, that’s your loophole. You and Spencer get paired for everything these days, because you’re best friends and Hotch has given up on separating you (though professionally there’s no need). “I could eat you.” 

“Still mildly threatening, then,” a voice says. 

You spin in your chair, shocked and a little horrified to find the last person you wanted to see here in Connecticut. “Cory!” you say, knowing he’ll believe you’re enthusiasm if nobody else. 

“Hi, beautiful. You weren’t gonna call me?” 

Your lips pop as you reply, “I was definitely going to, just as soon as we weren’t on the clock. How are you?” you ask, standing to receive the hug you know he’s going to give. 

Cory is… well, he’s gorgeous, though that hadn’t been why you had fun with him when you were here last. He’d seemed nice enough and plainly interested in you at the time, and you’d been sort of lonely, so really he was a necessity of the soul rather than a want. Plus, he was very rich. 

Gorgeous he may be, but Spencer Reid he is not. You don’t deny it to yourself —the genius behind you has completely changed your type, the kind of man you vy after, and if you’re honest, he’s the one for you. So hugging Cory and pretending you’re going to call him for drinks after the case is over isn’t easy. You lie rather than reject him.

“He seemed nice,” Spencer says in the awkward silence Cory leaves behind. 

“Sure!” you say, blowing out a hot breath. “Was I embarrassing myself? I didn’t expect to see him.” 

“You were the same as usual.” 

You tilt your head back as the door opens again, worried it’ll be Cory back for a last word. Emily smiles at you knowingly, a bag of takeout in hand. “God, did you see that?” she asks, eyebrows rising. “He was perfect.” 

“If you like the Greek god motif,” you joke. 

Spencer’s frowning at his files when you turn back to him. “Spence, what’s wrong?” you ask. 

“Mm? Nothing.”

“You sure?” you ask. 

He maintains that he’s okay as the rest of the team flood in for lunch. You pretend to believe him, not sure what you’ve done to upset him but willing to figure it out. You unwrap his food for him and place his plastic cutlery on a napkin as you know he prefers, sorting through the cup drinks to find his diet lemonade. “Here, handsome,” you say, touching his shoulder gently as you sit down next to him. 

He bristles. 

“Spencer?” you ask. 

He looks around the table. Hotch and Rossi are talking about something with shared smiles, while JJ and Morgan debate the case. Emily’s on her phone with a straw between her lips. They aren’t listening, and so he says, “It’s not a fitting nickname.” 

“What, handsome? That’s not a nickname, it’s a pet name, and it’s true. You’re one of the most handsome guys I’ve ever seen,” —you laugh and grab his elbow when he shakes his head— “are you kidding? Spencer, you could be a model. I’ve told you this a hundred times. You have amazing cheekbones, just dreamy, and your lips–”

“Oh, god, please don’t start,” he says, covering his face with both hands. He sounds like he’s smiling. “I shouldn’t have said anything.” 

Hotch shoots you a don’t tease look. You send him a vehement I’m not back, waiting for him to look away before you prod Spencer again. “You’re so cute, Spencer, you don’t get it.” 

“I don’t wanna be cute, cute isn’t your type–”

Your eyes flare. “What would you know about my type, Spencer? Is this– is this about Cory?” 

“Of course it is,” he says, face pink as he drops his hands. 

“Spencer, he is not my type.” 

“But you dated.”

“One date. And that was before I realised I liked dorks in sweater vests,” you say. You’re both acting like this is half a joke, a skit, in case you’re overheard, but you’re also both well aware that it’s serious and vulnerable and flustering to confess certain things right here and now. Too bad it has to be done. “I miss your glasses, babe, they really added to your charm.” 

Spencer shakes his head, picking up his styrofoam boxed lunch to ignore you. 

You sidle close to him, your pinky finger rubbing the slightest hint of his bare wrist. “Wanna get drinks with me tonight? I need a cover story in case Grecian Cory tracks me down. And, you know you get that really cute blush when you drink. What do you say?” 

“No,” he says with a smile, which means yes in this instance.

You kiss his cheek, giggling at the lipgloss left behind. “You’re my type, handsome.”

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x you #spencer reid x y/n #spencer reid x fem!reader #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid fluff #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid oneshot #spencer reid scenario #spencer reid drabble #spencer reid fic #spencer reid fanfiction

[felinemotif]

i finished it. i'll need 2-3 business days to like. recover.

but it was. definitely a favorite!! there's just things about her writing style that just suit the narrative so well, and she has such a way with words, and her story is also just so? idk the word for it but it's such a memoir (compliment). truly one of the best books i've read and thank you very much for recommending it <333

AHHH i'm so glad that you loved it. in the dream house has been my favorite memoir for a while now, and i don't see that changing anytime soon.

carmen has such an evocative and mesmerizing writing style that just sucks you right in. and the comparisons & explanations she gives often feel so? backwards, almost, in the sense that you would have never thought to word it like that, but it always makes perfect sense in the end. it's incredibly unique to her. i just finished another work by her the other day, her body and other parties [a collection of short stories], and even though it wasn't told in the same perspective as her memoir, it was still undeniably written by her.

she's one of those authors where you can just tell when it's her name on the cover.

i'm looking forward to any future work carmen puts out. i could read ten more books by her and still not be satisfied.

but again!! i truly am so happy that you enjoyed it!! i was having so much fun reading your posts about it as you read.

#i am such a fan of memoirs atp it's hard to say how many i've read/own #but i highly doubt i'll ever find one that speaks to me the same way in the dream house does #waffleinator-inator #replies #cory talks words

[elysiumxii]

🎃halloween | au!cory & au!iwai - alien @temporalobjects​

Cory winces as he hears the clattering of pans, the metal banging as it falls from where they were stacked feet high and clamours down onto the tiled kitchen floor with it’s dirty grout. Quickly his arms lift, readying himself for the boot that usually comes next. “Damn...! Clumsy rat!” Standing easily 3/4 of a meter taller than him the bar owner yells as he bears down on the shorter, younger and fairer alien. 

Cory’s species, known for their soft skin with pretty markings were not often seen in this part of the quadrant - it had cost a pretty penny to buy him from the smugglers that roared through this outpost over a moon cycle ago, and sometimes the bar owner wonders why he bothered. A female probably would have garnered more attention, not to mention they might have been more useful than this kid. Who seemed good at nothing but making a mess and being in the way! He was shit behind the bar and very rarely returned a happy customer when he was picked to go upstairs - too awkward! With those big, wounded eyes that just seemed to put good paying customers off! 

“This smugglers come through again, I’ve a right mind to sell you back to them!” He yells, the man a 7ft humanoid with a drooping snout that crinkled at the end. The top of his head almost completely bald, but for some sun spots and a few sprouting white hairs. As the kick comes Cory lets out a pained yelp, falling forward a little and clutching at the leg of a high table, before looking back with wide, pained, emerald green eyes that seemed to swirl with more intense colour. This is exactly what he means! No one would want to get frisky with that! Even with skin softly sun kissed from the desert planet’s hot atmosphere, orange markings like pretty splotches having darkened against somewhat squishy cheeks and his temple - nestled up into strawberry blonde hair in fluffy curls - he wasn’t going to get any business looking like that! 

It didn’t help that Cory’s people were almost natural telepaths. With one simple touch of skin on skin Cory could tell someone their greatest fear or true thoughts... the type of clientele they see really don’t want to hear that when they want to get freaky! 

“You can’t serve without making a mess, you can’t wash without breaking things and no one has hired you in a week because you look like you want to cry not give a man his greatest night! I might as well just cut my losses and feed you to the bazors!” He yells again, this time raising a fist like he’s going for a hit, leaving Cory to yelp as he curls up and cowers. 

#replies;cory #temporalobjects #/ ALIIEENNSS #au!cory

[wildcatofgreen]

"But they're jus' 'lil animal things right--like I see people call cats an' dogs their furbabies all the time."

#carol's cruisings #blue-rphub #shermphibia #noncanon stuff #cory: sis theyre beatin yo ass in the replies