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ringneckedpheasant · 3 years

Note

u got any trans anders headcanons? 👀

OH BOY DO I EVER.... i also just have a lot of thoughts abt medical transition in thedas.... please forgive me for turning this into an absolute essay lmao

i think it’s reasonable to think that even if they’re not commonplace, some form of hormonal treatments would be available—naturally derived estrogen has been used for quite literally thousands of years, and would at least be available for trans women like Maevaris. i haven’t been able to find much on the history of testosterone usage before like the 1800s, but i don’t think it’s that far-fetched to think that that’s a development that could’ve happened within anders’ lifetime or even before, especially since we’re talking about a world where like. magic is a thing and herbalism is widely practiced. Krem seems to indicate that there are magical methods of transition, though iirc it was implied to be through blood magic (that, or Krem has an aversion to any kind of magic being used on him)

as far as surgical procedures go i don’t think there would be much available? at least not for trans men, which is part of the reason i drew anders as not having had top surgery, but looking like he’d been on t. which i think he would be, though i don’t think he would’ve started until late into adulthood.

my thoughts abt like. the timeline of his life are always kind of nebulous and subject to change but i’ve been thinking a lot lately about the subject of his name. i don’t envision his parents as being particularly accepting, at least not his father. maybe part of the reason he never disclosed his name when sent to the circle was in the hopes that no one would find out what it was—even being called Anders, as weird and dehumanizing as it would’ve been, might’ve been preferable to being called his dead name. i think a lot about the way that Anders’ name changed when everything else in his life did, and that both of those things happened as a direct result of being rejected by his family.

when he was sent to the circle at 12 i think he could’ve reasonably passed as a boy without much effort, though it would’ve gotten harder as he got older if he didn’t have access to hormones. i think it’s safe to assume based on interactions with Krem that knowledge of trans people, and respect towards them, isn’t something that’s commonly found outside the Qun (and perhaps Rivain or Antiva—but certainly not in Fereldan, or Orlais, or the Free Marches. yes i am still mad about Sera’s transphobic dialogue if you bring her to the winter palace). Anders’ absolutely miserable transition to living in the circle probably would’ve been made worse by adults in charge not understanding or respecting him.

I like the idea of Karl being the first person to accept Anders without question, to try to help him find information about other people like him with the limited resources they would have in the circle. there’s not a lot of canon information about Karl’s life, but 1) i think he and Anders met fairly young, maybe as soon as Anders got to the circle and 2) maybe by chance, Karl knew someone else like Anders—a sibling, a friend, maybe an aunt or an uncle.

his time in the wardens may have been better than his time in the circle, wrt gender. my HoF is a mage, and i imagine that even if he didn’t remember anders particularly clearly, he would’ve been Aware of him—people gossip, especially, i imagine, when confined like that. my surana is a nice boy however and would’ve tried to ensure that no one in the wardens gave Anders any shit over being trans.

by the time he ends up in Kirkwall, i think he would pass fairly well. and while he is absolutely dirt poor, i think by this time he would’ve found the resources to start some kind of hrt. he probably wouldn’t have regular access to it, and just going off my own experiences, this would’ve been something that made transition a slow process. it’s filled with constantly feeling like he’s taking a step back whenever he goes off it, when his progress halts, when his period starts up again, when he’s subject to awful mood swings from unstable levels of hormones (i also think Anders is bipolar, and i imagine some aspects of that would be exacerbated by being Hormonal)

by the time he meets Hawke and the rest of them, i think he would’ve sort of plateaued—after years of HRT, even inconsistently, he would be able to pass as a man without much difficulty. some things, like facial hair, simply do not go away even if you stop taking t.

i Do, however, think that Fenris would clock him. in an ideal world this would be because he is t4t and like recognizes like, but even if that weren’t the case, I think Fenris would be the most likely out of any of them to know about trans people—I may be mistaken about the timeline here but I *think* that Maevaris would’ve come out before Fenris left Tevinter? Fenris likely had at least passing knowledge of her, maybe even met her while accompanying Danarius if she had assumed her father’s position as a magister. my understanding is that Mae is literally the first trans woman ever to have a seat in the magisterium, and that it was a Big Fucking Deal to a lot of people. it would make sense for Fenris to know about her. also!! fenris spent time on Seheron with the fog warriors and it seems extremely likely that he would’ve met people who were aqun-athlok while there.

my point with all of this is that 1) Fenris would likely know Anders was trans even if he himself wasn’t and 2) as much as they hate each other, I think there’s no way that Fenris would out him. he refuses to hand Anders over to the templars, and I think he would know how dangerous being outed to the wrong people would be. (my thoughts are of course heading in a fenders direction, and I’m thinking about Fenris disclosing to Anders that he knows, and their shared transness being the first step in realizing that they have more in common than they would otherwise think.... in learning to understand and empathize with one another... g-d.)

that is the extent of my serious thoughts about this for now, it took me a half an hour to type this up on my phone and i hope at least one person finds reading it worthwhile lmao

(less serious thought: Anders and Fenris should have t4t sex in the back of Anders’ clinic <3)

#long post #long fucking post lmao #anders #fenris #da2 #marc.txt #anon #answered #trans anders #trans fenris #dragon age

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memelzebub · 3 years

Text

[waddles by] pardon me vent post coming through...

formality and the ability to fake maturity don't mean shit when it comes to treating people you consider friends with respect and kindess 😑 if you don't want to cradle your ego tight while shedding tears and repeating to yourself (AND THE PEOPLE YOU HURT???) that you're a good person to get through the days, just try being nice?? I promise it feels really good to be nice to people and make them smile, and it feels really good to not force yourself to be around people you "project your insecurities" onto. 😑😑😑 oh but i guess it WOULD hurt you since you knee jerkingly say such hurtful things. I saw you were thrown for a loop when I unironically told you I already knew I was stupid when you just took a joke I made about myself and crushed the insecurity under your foot by saying "that's called being stupid" you better be getting your fucking mean habits in check, and I KNOW being around that entire family that is just so inconsiderate, imbalanced and downright emotionally abusive to eachother isnt gonna make that easy!!

I remember you telling Sam she'd be an ugly girl. Fuck you. I remember someone else never saw me and Sam as the genders we identified as! And she STILL DOES, I KNOW she still does! and you're staying friends with her despite being part of the LGBT club and all this other stuff like why did you even bring her back into this when we were leaving you because this is a whole other issue????? She doesnt believe in lesbians. SHE DOESNT BELIEVE LESBIANS EXIST SHE THINKS LESBIANS ARE DELUSIONAL AND DOESNT BELIEVE NONBINARY IS AN ACTUAL GENDER IDENTITY AND YOU THINK ITS OKAY TO LET US KNOW YOURE STAYING FRIENDS WITH HER WHEN YOURE TELLING US YOURE NOT TRANSPHOBIC ANYMORE IN THIS STUPID ASS GOOGLE DOC ABOUT HOW MUCH BETTER A PERSON YOU ARE?? Remember when you said you were trying to "protect me" from her and all this shit about how she made homophobic jokes about dating me?? What the hell is wrong with you?????? You are not respectful to Sam and I!!! You treated me like I was this emotional soft boy and you treated Sam like she was this gross person who was "too fat" for you and you were ashamed of dating like why didn't you tell me you and her were dating in the beginning?? Why did I have to find out through context clues that you two were dating?? Why was Sam the only person I ever saw initiate pda with you?? Why did Sam tell me about this time you two were at the store and you made a scene that "made people think you were abusing her" MAYBE ITS BECAUSE YOU WERE ABUSING HER!!!!!!!

And why? Why did I ever think you were better than that? You "accepted" me, but not Sam! My fucking sister.

And why did you have to take my own emotional blockages and shortcomings so personally? You never truly understood or cared for what I was going through, huh? That's fine, not everyone is going to, and I know you have it rough, too. I lost nights of sleep worried about you and I wanted to be there for you so bad when shit hit the fan before. But I thought that, before shit started getting weird, that we were super close and I could trust you and you'd understand me. But you took the emotional distance I developed when highschool hit way too personally. And you never understood Sam who is my sister and just someone that I highly relate to emotionally and mentally. And now I have to undo that emotional distance somehow without sabotaging myself over these self villifying messages I told myself that I somehow happened to read word for word in these dms you had with someone else that you chose to snapshot and put in the stupid fucking google doc you shared with Sam and I!!!

You should know better than to tell someone to their face that they're like their parents. And you do know better which is the worst part, you just think you can do it anyway for whatever sick reason hiding under all that woke and inclusive language you picked up on over time. And you think it doesn't count because it's in a snapshot from a dm from a few years ago, well you snapshotting it and posting it for me to read in the present is essentially renewing the statement you fucking jerk. And I know I rubbed that other person "the wrong way." She really hated it when I criticized Bayonetta's oversexualized design one time, I'm certain I did other things that made her uncomfortable like be afab and be more interested in women and femme presenting people and also not shill idiotic white cis men that hide behind large words because theyre so obsessed with being right and sounding intelligent like she does. And it probably rubbed her the wrong way pretty hard when I dropped her for making me feel like she saw me as a delusional, brainless lesbian who only thinks they're a lesbian and will realise they like men just like She does in time. She made me feel like that when I was around her when I'm literally gnc nonbinary and pansexual. Like, I was guilty at first but it was because I couldn't accept I'd dropped her for a reason all my own, and it was always because she made me feel more and more dysphoric and unintelligent the more i interacted with her. Just like you did.

Ugh. Im so fucking mad and ashamed of myself.

#personal

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kob131 · 4 years

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Hey remember when Soku said he was gonna stop talking about RWBY?

Guess who got caught lying?

https://sokumotanaka.tumblr.com/post/184748210112/phazonfire-the-rwde-tag-is-so-fucking

I don’t know what tag you’re looking through about the homophobia thing considering the majority of the people seem to be gay and would probably call you out if they saw this.

I don’t remember you guys ever calling anyone out for calling Illa a ‘psycho lesbian’ because villain + gay = psycho lesbian apparently.

Oh wait, which tag is it that says that? hm...

Look people doing rewrites on the series is a non problem, and the dumbest gripe.

so is 99% of what you fuckers pull. Like bitching that a catgirl was put into a catsuit.

But rwby isn’t well written some is allowed to watch it to fix it to reconstruct or deconstruct it there is no harm to this and the series could benefit from a rewrite.

Too bad you assholes break the show EVEN FURTHER when you do rewrite shit *cough* RE:RWBY *cough*.

If you don’t like it don’t go through the constructive criticism tag just to cry cause someone doesn’t wanna kiss rwby’s butt like you do.

Last time constructive criticism existed in the RWDE tag: 900 BC.

Yeah sure.

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https://sokumotanaka.tumblr.com/post/612590859661295616/your-idea-of-nit-picking-is-not-the-correct-use-of

I don't know how to tell some of ya'll that just because you constantly argue against criticism and the other person gets tried to talking to a brick wall doesn't mean you win.

This ain't your preschool, this requires critical thinking skills which some of ya'll clearly lack.

And just because you reject facts and demand that your delusions are true doesn’t make the other person a brick wall. You just don’t understand how to debate.

Your idea of nit picking is not the correct use of the term. Nor do whoever you are know what is and isn’t criticism on a subject.

Nit picking. Noun. “looking for small or unimportant errors or faults, especially in order to criticize unnecessarily.“

Literally all you do.

Also I’m only an asshole to people who are assholes back. So don’t pretend like you know me and mind your own? Deal? Deal.

Sorry Soku, that makes you a sexist, racist, transphobic Nazi. You know, since that’s MY Modius Operandi.

Also your blog is FILLED with bad political takes so you’re the LAST person I wanna hear tall about “not picking”

“Can white people approiate basic human decency?”

Remember that take on your old blog?

Now what were you saying about politics...

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https://sokumotanaka.tumblr.com/post/611875463897497600/i-didnt-watch-vol-7-thank-god-but-a-friend-of

I didn’t watch vol 7 thank god,-

So you have no idea what you’re about to say? Got it.

but a friend of mine on my discord mentioned flynt and neon returning (with Ik finally) and boy they really gave the catgirl a hoodie with cat ears on it? And Blake has a catsuit? Miles, Kerry, Shane and Monty always talked about how “subtle” they are with things like scenes and designs and they put both the catgirls in outfits that are so on the nose it might as well be a part of your skin.

Where was that said again?

Also that;s not were the term catsuits come from. It comes from cat burglars using them.

Isn’t that like going “Hey black guy put these big lips on over your other lips? Or the black guy having a fucking basketball printed on their jacket?” Good lord, in a world where people can be born with cat ears, and tails don’t you think it’s kinda freaking disgusting that these exist where humans can wear them?

And before you say that’s the point, in a world where none of the faunus get to say how they feel about these things and don’t have real life minority reactions to things like white dudes walking around with grills and fros and crap it kinda isn’t when the faunus girl wears a hoodie depicting one of the features of her own race that they were hunted down and slaughtered for.

Considering that it’d be no different than a white person getting cornrows-

Also it kind of is since black people walk around emphasizing their DARK SKIN, which is the basis of their discrimination.

You’re just race obsessed.

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https://sokumotanaka.tumblr.com/post/611637391064694784/hmm-funny-that-the-rich-white-girl-who-was-racist

Hmm funny that the rich white girl who was racist gets an overpowered semblance that shares alot of feats like her team like being able to make runes that increase speed, Platforms, Remove gravity, shoot projectiles, Make people stick to them etc etc. Oh and she has the ability to summon monsters that show feats of strength that rivals one of her partners.

Meanwhile the minority character is shown to fuck up alot, gets treated like shit and never gets an apology from said racist, get nerfed constantly, have her weapon poorly sautared back together while the rest of her team gets upgrades and has the weakest semblance of the three.

Seems alittle off white writers.

And who has the better fight record than the other?

... The minority?

Hm, seems off black complainer.

Oh did that sound racist? Hm, dunno why it sound considering you said the SAME THING

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https://sokumotanaka.tumblr.com/post/611636922643857408/so-let-me-get-this-straight-vol-7-has-ended-and

So Let me get this straight, vol 7 has ended and apparently they lost the one relic they had, still haven’t found the newer one or did but still have to deal with Ironwood and several others. Cinder is still alive, Neo is siding with her out of fear? When she wanted vengeance and could team up with rwby.

this is volume 7 of supposedly 10 so three more seasons and they still haven’t sat down and talked about what they’re supposed to to against the immortal grimm lady, they don’t know where the relic at beacon is and ozpin’s still ghosting them, and they’re foolishly gathering them all in one spot instead of taking the maiden and the relic and putting both of them on the farest corners of the planet? I thought they were going to atlas to meet with someone Weiss knew as the Anton Sokolov Play dishonored! of their world to build a rocket and send at least one rocket into a black hole and never have an issue with Salem again.

three more seasons and a plan hasn’t even been formed to deal with her or the relics, Emerald and Mercury are doing nothing, Cinder has no goal except to be the new adam and chase the heros and get her ass kicked, Hazel’s doing nothing, The comms are down and we haven’t heard a peep from whoever runs Vacuo, Blake and Ruby have still had barely any interaction, Weiss hasn’t apologized for her racism, We never addressed how and why did Raven appear in Yang’s dreams, Why did ren from shields over his hands and show off feats of strength that rival yangs or his weird ability to sense tyrian? Neo’s eyes changed color when she saw Raven and her teleport ability. Lore Like how semblance, Lien (the money that looks like credit cards but has zero numbers on it work) The examples of agriculture, Flora and Fauna, dust and so on.

A. Haven’t they said it’s more like twelve?

B. Nope, Ozpin’s back. But hey, who needs to actually KNOW what you’re talking about?

C. Can’t do that, don’t know where the Spring Maiden is. Would have known this if you watched Volume 6.

D. They never said that and expressly said they were meeting with Ironwood to get the relic somewhere secure. Gee, that’s the THIRD thing you’ve gotten wrong. Hm...

E.So Soku, how does Quirks affect agiculture? What were the original Quirks like? Who had the first Quirk? What was life like for people when Quirks were uncommon? Hm? Nothing is said?

MHA is shit, SOku said so.

But sure, three more seasons to cram that all in AND a plan and character interaction/Growth and so on, this is a lovely mess of a show.

And as you have shown, you paid attention to 0% of it so how would you know?

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So how’s that tar and feather treatment treating you Soku? Because I have so many more ways of humiliating you, happy showcase them as long as you open that bitchy little mouth of yours.

So go ahead and keep posting. It just lets me indulge my sadism without remorse.

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anarkhebringer · 4 years

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You can pick if you wanna do art or headcanons, but something for Serenite, and/or Reaper and Daisy? Know I Love And Care You Always Friend

Floops you’re always there for me I love you

Anyways, headcanons, headcanons galore... How about the lesbians? I always love thinking about Reaper and Daisy.

As always, under a cut due to length.

- Reaper saved Daisy from a group of thieves that jumped her while on a mission a while back, and for some reason, something about Daisy stuck out to her, and she agreed when Daisy offered getting to know each other and friendship after healing her as thanks for the rescue. After that, Reaper knew she made the right choice, because Daisy is the kind of soft person that quiets her mind and puts her at ease.

- Reaper actually met Daisy before she transitioned, and was the one to help her realize that her feelings about herself weren’t weird at all despite what her family said to her, and are perfectly natural, while encouraging Daisy to begin her transition once she realized she was trans and expressed wanting to do so.

- One of Reaper’s main types of targets is transphobes, and this was far before meeting Daisy (SHII is nonbinary so she’s extra protective of GNC people in general, even more than she already would be even if he was cis), so it’s nothing new for her when searching for pests to exterminate for targeting Daisy. Oh, Reaper also has a huge collection of teeth from transphobes that she’s knocked out, and made into jewelry like necklaces to wear as a disturbing trophy of sorts (even SHII thought it’s a tad “different” when first learning of it, even if he’s equally morbid and warmed up to the idea immediately)

- Even before Daisy transitioned, and they became much closer than friends, Reaper was extremely gentle and calm with her, and protected her whenever she needed it. Daisy’s been her best friend ever since they met, pretty much.

- When Daisy first decided to transition, she worried that things would get awkward between the two of them, until Reaper assured her with “Your identity is yours, not mine. If you thought you were a man before, I respected that and saw you as that. It’s what you said you were. You find out you’re actually a woman? Great, you’re a woman. Women are nice. Nothing awkward about that. Shit changes sometimes. Learning new things and adapting isn’t bad, people are just stupid and pathetically clingy to what they’ve always known. Even if it’s obviously wrong.” It was the best assurance Reaper could’ve given her in that moment, since she knows how Reaper is by now, and knows the blunt and lowkey aggressive statements are just how she talks in general. She knew what Reaper meant by it, and it made her happy.

- Eventually, in the offshoot portrayals where they get together, Daisy gets to see an even more gentle side of Reaper that she never thought possible. She thought she was easily flustered when Reaper was gentle to her before? This is a whole new level that’ll sometimes leave her wheezing and unable to speak, and only able to mimic a tomato with how hard she’s blushing. Emoting is beyond difficult for Reaper in general, but the fact that it comes so easily now, and in ways that have her smiling? And having eyeshine? At the same time? Yeah, Daisy’s gonna sound like a teapot that needs to be taken off of the stove burner immediately.

- Daisy loves hugs, both giving them and getting them, so that’s the most common way that she expresses her love with Reaper physically, since she knows Reaper doesn’t like too much up close interaction that has her being touched, unless she herself initiates. Reaper can usually manage to give Daisy at least a quick little squeeze with a pat or little rub on the back and handle it, so she does it. In her eyes, it’s what Daisy deserves for what all she does for Reaper, so Reaper is more than fine with giving this much to her when she can’t handle much else.

- Reaper isn’t at all the lovey-dovey type, but something about Daisy makes her feel softer. So, she shows that by not stopping herself when the sudden urges arise to tell Daisy she’s loved, and give her hugs and kisses. Daisy’s always beyond overjoyed and absolutely thrives when Reaper initiates, and it’s obvious, which makes Reaper feel at ease and even happy to witness.

- Reaper’s no cuddler by any means, but she makes exceptions for Daisy, since it makes her feel like she’s protecting Daisy by holding her close as they sleep, which makes it far more comfortable, and easy to endure if she starts to get uncomfortable from the physical contact as time passes. Reaper’s usually the big spoon.

- Daisy’s personally not bothered by her voice (a little bit of trivia, I have Patrick Seitz as her “last resort” voice claim, AKA the voice claim I’ll go with if I don’t find a softer-spoken deep voice for her, cuz we need more big and snuggly muscular trans girls with deep voices that aren’t turned into all brawn and made into transphobic comedy relief...), but was a little worried at times that Reaper would be bothered by it. Of course, to her relief, Reaper doesn’t mind it at all, and fully supports Daisy with whatever she chooses to do with that part of her transition, or if she’ll even mess with her voice at all. So far, she’s decided to leave her voice alone.

- Daisy’s got a love of softer pastel colors, so Reaper likes to gift her little things here and there in her very favorite pastel purples, and Daisy treasures every gift as if it’s the most valuable possession to have.

- Reaper sometimes does Daisy’s makeup, and never fails to make her feel beautiful when she sees the end result. It makes Reaper’s chest feel all warm and fuzzy when she watches Daisy get so openly bubbly over it as she happily thanks Reaper and admires her work.

#floople-doople #asks #long post #OCs #original character #OC info #OC headcanons #OC: Koro-SHII #OC: Daisy #trans girl #trans OC

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fluidityandgiggles · 5 years

Text

Sleep Is For The Weak - Chapter 16

Previous Chapters: Prologue, Chapter 1, Chapter 5, Chapter 10, Last Chapter

Writing Masterlist - for previous chapters not otherwise linked, Read on AO3

Notes (I guess): I realize it took me way too long to do this, but I can explain. Uhh...

So for those of you who don’t know, I haven’t been home since September, and I won’t be home for another... two weeks, more or less? I’ve been to places where I couldn’t know if I’d have working wifi or any wifi at all so updating this fic has been a mission. So I do whatever I can to update at reasonable times.

With that being said, I finished this chapter way back last month while on a two week long trek in Nepal and haven’t had the opportunity to upload it, so I’m grateful I can now. Because this one... was a hell of an exposition ride for a lot of shit I planned a long long time ago.

Quick disclaimer - some bits of this chapter deal with the definition of transgender, and a specific learning disorder. The definition of transgender mentioned in this chapter has been taken from the DSM-IV-TR, which is a defunct edition of the DSM that came out in the year 2000 and has been replaced by the DSM-5 in 2013. The definition has since been changed and separated, and I believe it is now called gender dysphoria, though I’m not quite sure. But it does not reflect my opinions on how dysphoria is related to being trans, I do believe (and have several sources to back me up, including the DSM-5) that you don’t have to be dysphoric to be trans. The same goes for this learning disorder, what is said in this chapter reflects only the way the characters think of it - and it will change later on, I can assure you - and not at all what I would think or say about it.

As is tradition, thanks to @whatwashernameagain for KHS and for all her patience with me and my shenanigans (and not getting frustrated with my stupid ideas) and to @broadwaytheanimatedseries for the original idea and for giving me the best commentary for my screenshots when I send them. And also to @winglessnymph , @asleepybisexual and @anony-phangirl , who have fallen out of the loop but are still there. I know I haven’t sent you anything much in recent days, but... still.

Tag list (sort of): @bunny222, @ab-artist, @sweet-and-sour-shadowling, @ilovemygaydad, @your-username-is-unavailable, @virgilcrofters, @violetblossem, @maybe-i-like-the-misery, @book-of-charlie, @thatsanswitch, @thatrandomautist, @thebiggestgaypirate, @marshmallow-the-panda

(Wanna be tagged? Lemme know!)

Trigger warning: period appropriate transphobia (the early 00s were not exactly trans-friendly). This chapter also includes (rather controversial) opinions/ideas about the definition of transgender (as mentioned in a now-defunct, but then the most recent, edition of the DSM), discussion of abortion, mentions of past self-harm, discussion of personality disorders and hospitalization, panic attacks, and description of rejection sensitive dysphoria. I’m pretty sure I forgot something though, so let me know if I have so I can add it.

—————

Friday, May 30th, 2003

"...your valedictorian, Jenna Miranda Wheeler."

"Class of 2003…"

New York was beautiful in May.

Sadly, that was not where Remy was heading today.

According to Linda, Stephen was going to go on a business trip for at least two weeks in June, starting late May. So Remy was invited over for the summer. Not his first choice, but Leah begged him to come and Emile said that it might be a good idea. But…

Spending more than a day at Linda's, combined with the knowledge that Jenna and India have graduated just a few days ago and Chris hasn't, was a good enough reason for Remy to feel shitty. And he did.

The main upside was that Georgia was beautiful in May too.

He managed to cheer himself up somewhat by thinking of the good things that happened this month - Emile's TOVA results (9/9 inattentive symptoms, 4/9 hyperactive-impulsive, definitely has inattentive type ADHD), India's name being called at graduation instead of her deadname, Jenna graduating valedictorian, his friends moving to Virginia and so on - by the time the taxi from the airport pulled up in front of the, by now, rather familiar house.

And then his stomach dropped.

Stephen was still there.

"Do you need help with those bags, Rebecca?" He asked, eyeing the massive, neon pink duffel bag and the incredibly heavy purple backpack that sat on the sidewalk near Remy as he tapped his foot nervously.

"Not from you I don't. Thanks for the offer, but… no thanks."

He was too proud to admit that the duffel was too heavy for him to lift and he could barely drag it, but he packed most of his clothes and books in it. Some were mailed home. But not most.

"That shit gotta be heavy as fuck—"

"I said, no thank you. Now, move out of my fucking way."

Leah was napping by the time he finally dragged everything inside, but Rachel was doodling in the living room, smiling brightly when she saw him come through the door. She abandoned her crayons and waddled all the way to hug him.

As much as he barely knew her, Remy definitely loved Rachel too.

"I'm going to daycare," she mumbled somewhat, trying to use words she didn't quite know yet. "You have to come!"

"You're such a big girl!" He ruffled her pigtails, picking her up. She was so light for a two-year old. "Going to daycare already?"

"Mmhm."

"I'm so proud of you!"

She just hugged his neck and babbled on about her friends and daycare, her hand flying and her almost falling from his hold. This was another happy thing to add to the list.

He wasn't happy. But this was happy. For now.

—————

Stephen left on his business trip at around seven thirty, and Remy took a huge sigh of relief. Leah also woke up from her nap a few hours earlier, all grumpy and upset for some reason, and Remy tried talking her into telling him why she was so upset.

Linda said it was because of the nap. Leah only got even more upset.

"Why am I here?" Remy asked during dinner, while Leah entertained herself (and he was sure she didn't notice much) and Rachel was almost dozing off. "We haven't had a single good interaction since I was five years old, Linda."

"Am I no longer allowed to want to be around my son, Remy?" She stung back, looking anything but as aggressive as she just sounded.

"I'll be honest with you, kid. I know you don't like me. I can understand why. But what I don't understand is why you're bringing this up in front of your younger sisters. They're too young for this to—"

"I saw a movie about penguins on TV," Leah started rambling. "They're really weird…"

The argument stopped just as quickly as it started, and Leah was allowed to go on and on about penguins bringing rocks to each other. So he proceeded to just glare at Linda, who helped Rachel eat her pasta. This was awful, this was absolutely the worst situation he could've found himself in, and… he just wanted out.

And he kept wanting out even as Rachel already went to sleep, Leah was busy doing her homework last minute, and Linda asked Remy to help her clean up.

"I'm only here because Leah asked me to," he almost hissed as he was tasked with packing the leftovers in incredibly familiar tupperware containers.

"I want to spend more time with you, Remy. I'm still your mother—"

"Well, you haven't acted like it, like, ever!"

Linda sighed, putting the plate she was holding in the dishwasher. "I don't want to sound like I'm making any excuses—"

"So don't make any."

"—but I was barely your age when I had you. This is no excuse, I'm not trying to say that I had no idea what I was doing because of that, but I sacrificed so much of my life to raise you!"

"You could've aborted me! You could've been smart and used protection in the first place!"

"Condoms aren't a fail-proof—"

"Face it, Linda. You never wanted me. You're not homophobic or transphobic for the sake of it, it's clear you have at least some level of respect to queer people. You just never wanted me in the first place."

The next plate she was holding broke in the sink. "How fucking dare you say that?!"

"I'm just saying—"

"I have never wanted something in my life more than I wanted you!" Her screams hurt Remy's ears, going as far as to make Leah cry in the other room. Linda immediately lowered her voice. "I know I've been a bad mother to you. I regret every decision I've ever made while I was married to your father, except being married to him and having you. And I've spent every day since leaving you and your father regretting my decisions, and wanting to make it up to you, but you kept pushing me away. How do you think that makes me feel, huh? Do you still think you're the only one who's been robbed of something in this relationship?"

"...you had Leah while you were still married to Dad" was all he could say. And he hoped he'd have the last word. "Was she a mistake too?"

Sadly, you can't always get what you want.

"Leah… is problematic. But she wasn't a mistake either. None of you are, and you can stop saying that. Whatever is wrong with her does not make her a mistake. Just as your gender identity disorder does not make you a mistake."

"No, you're right. It doesn't. It makes me transgender. A female-to-male man. You know those terms? Female to male, transgender? It's what people call it nowadays."

There was another long moment of silence as Linda cleaned up the broken plate and Remy finished packing up the leftovers, and Leah stopped crying.

It was a stressful silence. Very typical of home life with Linda Brigham-Hollander.

"...you may not have come at a time I liked," she sighed after everything, falling into a chair. Remy was ready to leave the kitchen, but this wouldn't let him. "I know we could've… waited a few more years. But you came when you did, and I don't regret that. You were never a mistake. I may have a hard time understanding… what… your identity. I'm trying my best to educate myself now, you know—"

"That's almost five years too late."

"I don't know what Leah told you about her school life, but whatever hardships she got understanding stuff—"

"She has no trouble understanding stuff as far as I can see—"

"Educational stuff. School material. She got that from me. Education comes harder for me, you may not know that. I was never the brightest student and I only completed my high school diploma when you were three years old. Don't get me wrong, this has nothing to do with you. But I couldn't learn when you asked me to. It felt like—"

"Linda, it didn't take Dad five years to be able to call me by my name and use the correct pronouns. Even if you don't mean it this way, this is bullshit to me. And I hope you get it."

And then he got up and left, leaving her to her own. If she cried, well… that's none of his business.

—————

Sunday, June 8th, 2003

Nathalie and Emile were getting ready for the Tony awards when Emile had a panic attack.

No, that's not true. Emile has been having panic attacks all week long for some weird reason he couldn't explain, most likely not being able to talk to Remy all week long since his phone died and he couldn't get a new one just yet. But today was the worst one. So Julie lent him her phone for a call, to explain himself so he won't panic so much, but…

But Remy wouldn't understand. He'd be mad if Emile tried to call him from Julie's phone because of some panic attacks… and then he'd hate him, and then… and then…

Then he wouldn't have a best friend anymore…

What was India's phone number again…?

She picked up on the fourth ring. "India McGinty—"

"It's Emile," he almost sobbed the second she picked up. "I… I have a question…"

"Oh, honey, of course. What is it?"

"Do you think Remy would hate me…? My phone died and I can't get another one until next week and—"

"Emile, are you… are you crying right now?"

"No… I did before, I just…"

She sighed before clearing her throat. That's it, she hates him too—

"Do you mind if I pass you over to Jenna? She's better at this than me."

"...okay…"

"...Emile?" Jenna's voice was softer than India's somehow. She'd never raise her voice, but Emile was scared of the people who'd be there when she does once she becomes a lawyer. "Can you please explain what's going on?"

"Well… my phone died, and I can't tell Remy because he's with his mom and I don't wanna call him while he's with his mom, so I'm scared that if I don't talk to him all summer he'll hate me and then he won't talk to me anymore and I can't—"

"Let's slow down, you're only upsetting yourself. Remy is your best friend, right?"

"Yeah… I mean, I like him a bit more but, but it's not like I can just tell him that, and…"

"That's fine, we're not gonna focus on this for now. That's for another time. But he's your best friend, right?"

"Yeah, I just told you!"

"So why would he hate you for something like that? He's going to understand, I'm sure."

"I don't… know… it just feels like he might…"

"I know. This feeling fucking sucks, doesn't it?" She chuckled. Emile couldn't answer to that. He just… he couldn't. "But it's not healthy to dwell on this feeling. It might become a self-fulfilling prophecy if you fret about it so much."

"What do you mean…?"

"...have I ever told you that I was institutionalized until my second year of college?"

He couldn't stop his jaw from dropping. "No…"

"Okay. So I'll tell you now. I… how squeamish are you? I don't want to… trigger anything…"

"I don't know… I don't… I don't think I really mind much…?"

"Okay, I… I'll censor it anyway. Is that okay with you?"

"Yeah."

"So when I was fourteen, I started harming myself. It's not… it was what you'd think, but not for the most part. I didn't cut really. But my parents knew, and they gave a ton of fucks and not just because they had a reputation to uphold like I thought they did back then. They just… they gave all the fucks."

"Okay… I'm sorry, I didn't—"

"Don't apologize, you had no part in this. And you never will. I promise."

"Okay."

"Two years after I started, my parents sent me to a psych ward. At that time they thought I was depressed, it was too early to diagnose me properly, so… I've lived for three years on doses of antidepressants that didn't do a whole lot, because nobody knew. I was finally diagnosed with borderline personality disorder when I was nineteen, my medication prescription was fixed and I was let out of there when they decided I'm doing well enough to be able to live on my own again. I spent my first year of law school with a nurse attached to my hip, can you imagine?" She laughed, and Emile struggled to hold back a smile.

"Actually yeah… my sister is narcoleptic…"

"Oh shoot, sorry… didn't mean that. Anyway… back to the topic at hand, yeah? I was… infatuated, for a lack of a better word, with this guy. His name was David. I thought I was in love with him, but it turned out I idolized him to a point where he became my favorite person, and that was an incredibly toxic experience. He was like… like Angelina Jolie in Girl, Interrupted. But dialed up to eleven. He was a fucking asshole and I haven't seen him in years… he was transferred to another place after an incident that involved one of my friends, she ended up almost killing herself because of this guy. And my anxiety over being perfect for him, over making him like me and making sure that he keeps liking me, made me extremely unhealthy in the long run."

There was a pause, possibly for Emile to process. Most likely. This wasn't fair… this was totally not fair! Why did good people have to go through shitty things?

"My next favorite person after him was a girl I dated for a couple months before India." Jenna sounded kind of breathless at that, as if she was crying herself. "And… she made me talk to her. She asked me questions for clarification all the time and helped me with my anxiety, especially when I felt like this. I was tiring, but… it's the effort she put into this that counted. Emile… you gotta talk to Remy."

"But… but I can't…"

"Who said? Communication is key. I know it might be really hard, especially for you, but… call him. It's his birthday soon, right? In July?"

"Yeah…"

"Call him. Write down everything you want to tell him and tell him then. I promise it'll make your anxiety a lot easier to manage."

————

"Remy," Linda called from the living room as he was heading to bed. This was becoming ridiculous…

"I told you, I'm not talking to you for the rest of this—"

"I can't read a single word in this cursed book of yours."

"...what book?"

"This DSM thing. Remy, darling, why do you need this book? It's so difficult to understand, couldn't they have written better books about this?"

He ended up not going to bed after all, instead resorting to making himself tea and going to sit on the couch next to her.

"Mom, that's… that's the diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders, mom. It's existed since the fifties. This is the revised version. They can't make it simpler to understand, I don't think."

"Well, your grandma's always said that if a child can't understand what's written, it's because the writer is bad at what they're doing."

"And so have a lot of my professors, but sadly this is what we have to work with. What's so confusing anyway?"

"I was trying to read about your… your thing, the gender identity disorder thing…" she turned the book to him. The passages in this section have been highlighted the day he bought the book and he knew them by heart. Well, for the most part. "I'm sorry, but the words are just… long and confusing."

"...that's fine… it's totally fine, I can… I can simplify it for you…"

"I don't need you to simplify it for me, I know English. I just… I can't read this! Big and confusing academic paper words."

Oh fuck…

"I'm a painter, not an academic, Remy. I can't read. You know this. You've known this forever."

"I forgot you're dyslexic…"

"And what does forgetting that help you?"

"Nothing… let's… let's go over this together, okay? The sections that apply to me." He waited for Linda to nod, rather reluctantly, before putting on his own pair of reading glasses.

"So, to diagnose someone with gender identity disorder there are two criteria, identifying with the opposite gender and feeling dysphoria. In order to meet those criteria, you gotta not be intersex, which I think is pretty stupid, and also it has to affect your daily life."

"Yeah, I know that. Your shrink told us that when you were fourteen. Let's move on, okay?"

"...okay. In boys, aka trans girls, this doesn't apply to me… okay. Girls with GID, aka trans boys, display a intense negative reactions to parental expectations, blah blah blah, you never had any expectations of me so this doesn't apply…"

"No no no no no, you will read this out. No skipping."

"Okay, fine! Girls with GID display intense negative reactions to parental expectations or attempts to have them wear dresses or other feminine attire. Some may refuse to attend school or social events where such clothes may be required... They prefer boy's clothing and short hair, are often misidentified by strangers as boys, and may ask to be called a boy's name. Reminds you of something?"

"...go on."

"Their fantasy heroes, yeah no, I never had fantasy heroes…"

"You had She-Ra."

"Yeah, but she made me gay, not trans, mom. Prefer boys as playmates, contact sports… yeah, none of that either…"

"You used to play soccer as a kid. Your dad has a lot of pictures of that, you know."

"I… didn't actually know that… huh."

"You didn't learn to kick a ball from your father, though. I'll tell you that."

It took a bit of time for Remy to stop himself from giggling, deciding to sip his tea instead. It didn't work very well.

"Yeah… well… moving on, ‘they show little interest in dolls or any form of feminine dress up or role-play activity. A girl with this disorder may occasionally refuse to urinate in a sitting position. She may claim that she has or will grow a penis and may not want to grow breasts or menstruate. She may assert that she will grow up to be a man. Such girls typically reveal marked cross-gender identification in role-play, dreams and fantasies.' Does any of this sound familiar, mom? Because I don't… I don't actually know."

"Until now… yeah. All of that sounds incredibly familiar. Look, I…"

"I know what's you're gonna say, and please don't. It's fine. I know you panicked, I know you said things you didn't mean to, but… can we leave that for now? That's a bridge we're gonna deal with later. Now, adults with GID…"

They ended up staying up for far longer than either of them wanted to, but it was alright. Linda wanted to learn. Remy was willing to teach her.

They only barely made it to bed at three in the morning, the page bookmarked for tomorrow, when they'll continue reading.

#kylo cant write #sanders sides #remy/sleep #emile picani #keep him safe #sleep is for the weak #the remy centric prequel #tw: period appropriate transphobia #tw: mental health discussion #tw: invalid/defunct definition of transgender #tw: discussion of abortion #tw: mentions of self-harm #tw: personality disorders #tw: hospitalization #tw: panic attacks #tw: rejection sensitive dysphoria #wow this is a long one

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dannimogen · 5 years

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Blatant misinformation is being spread around and i have to say I’m curious as to why no one’s even bothered to do any research to see if it’s true. For instance, some of the people accused of being biphobic are bi themselves. There’s also been claims that the server only had one “non-white” person in it, when around 50% of the discord consisted of people of color.

No one was being malicious with their intentions either. At the time this screenshots were taken, none of us knew their sexualities (which still doesn’t make it right, and we’ve all apologized for that). But we never sat down and were like “lol these bi women are straight” bc we didn’t know! And as soon as it was pointed out, we made sure to apologize and to learn from our mistakes (which we did). The only time it was ever brought up again was Friday night, where it was IMMEDIATELY shut down. No one on the server even entertained the message.

The brynlee thing is also frustrating bc the people who posted the screenshots literally told us that they thought it was a harmless troll blog. They didn’t care, and they didn’t think that brynlee “perpetuated homophobia” or anything like that. They only included the brynlee stuff to stir up more drama. Also, brynlee wasn’t created to mock straight people. People made her bc we wanted to make a sort of blocklist of homophobic people in the community. It then devolved into an inside joke, but as soon as we realized “oh shit people are being friendly and interacting with brynlee” we deleted her blog. Also, I’d be willing to bet most of the people who are outraged over brynlee don’t even remember what she posted or any details about the blog at all.

The server had dozens and dozens of active members and had been going on since January. The screenshots referenced two instances, neither of which were repeated. Contrary to popular belief, we didn’t just sit around all day gossiping about people in the fandom or hating on bi women. Around half of the server was made up of bi/pan women. We had a channel that we mostly kept to when talking about our disdain for male li’s, and there was a rule that we needed to tag the male li hate if they were in general channels (which I’ll admit, wasn’t always followed. but to my knowledge, no one expressed discomfort over it—if someone had, the rule would have been much more strictly enforced.)

Oh, and another thing—everyone in the discord shared extremely personal information, including but not limited to sensitive details about their mental health, pictures/names of children we’re related too and children we babysit, and some of us shared our full names and even the towns where we lived. Knowing that people were lurking and taking screenshots for months, pretty much spying on us, was extremely distressing to me and many others who were part of the server. Not because we were “upset about being caught,” but because we felt that our privacy was violated with regards to extremely personal information.

I’ll admit that we made mistakes when we assumed some people were straight—that was wrong of us and I’d like to sincerely apologize to people that we’ve hurt. I can promise that we all learned from that mistake and felt genuine remorse and guilt that we had unknowingly invalidated a persons sexuality. I know that as soon as the person pointed out what we were doing, I never made that mistake again, and was very mindful about making sure others didn’t either.

Oh, and please stop sending hate to my friends. If you must send hate to someone, direct it towards me because I can handle it. But they’ve received horrible anon hate, and even death threats, and that is absolutely not okay. People are also being transphobic and have misgendered people from the discord.

This is the first and last post I will make about this. I’m not hoping to change anyone’s minds, but I am hoping that maybe more people will do some research before immediately taking something as fact. The people I met in the discord were genuinely some of the kindest, supportive, and accepting people I’ve met in my entire life. Seeing all of this misinformation and even blatant lies floating around about them hurts my heart.

Nobody is perfect, but what truly matters is that we learned from the mistakes we made and will never repeat them again. From those of you who know me, you know that the last thing I would ever want to do is hurt someone—if I have hurt you in any way, please know that I am genuinely sorry, and if you’re comfortable with it, please message me so I can apologize personally. I won’t be answering asks about this either—in fact, I won’t be acknowledging it after this post. I know what really happened, but if people want to continue spreading misinformation and lies, there’s nothing I can do about it.

#choices discourse #women hating women #typing that last tag was physically painful #but yeah this is all i have to say

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northernlightsclans · 5 years

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Re: ongoing harassment from ex-coi members

[this post was made on february 26th, 2019]

@bayheart @wendips i doubt these mentions will work but we are all well aware that you stalk me/this blog at this point so.

leave me alone. fawn, we had two conversations, months apart, over a year ago. you ship a pairing involving a character who by her own admission thinks the kid she met when he was 12 is too young for her with said 12 year old, who only later turns 13. this makes me uncomfortable. they are not a sophomore and a freshman in high school, they met outside of a school context and dipper is likely an 8th grader while wendy is likely a sophomore.

youve willfully misgendered my friend and youve spread lies about me, including accusing me of harassing you, being interested in the sex lives of children, and sending you suicide bait. this all was after we hadnt spoken at all for over 3 months. i want nothing to do with you. this is my first point of direct contact with you in over a year now (and no, a post i made telling you to leave me alone after you made the coirp blog does not count).

two conversations does not constitute harassment. smear campaigns and slander do.

bay, you are a racist. you are. below is only one example of the times you made multiple members of color uncomfortable.

and i kicked you from my server for supporting a smear campaign against me that you admitted in your own words you knew had no grounds.

and instead of leaving me alone, over a YEAR LATER, you choose to dm people who dare to interact with me to give them the weakest callouts ive ever seen.

[link to screenshots of my entire convo with fawn, disproving this bullshit]

some extras: -im not native, you racist idiot -i dont lie about you to anyone -ive never harassed any of you. -im ace myself and have ided that way since i was 16. -you admit in your own words that i never kicked anyone for being cishet. why is this included at all. because i talk about it when people are racist? homophobic? transphobic? ive stated multiple times that i accept people regardless of identity to this server specifically because i want everyone who needs it to have a community. -i do want to be done. i never know anything about anything you people are saying about me until people come to my dms, either threatening me on your behalf or asking why people are talking shit about me in servers ive never been in.

leave me alone.

-maria.

EDIT: Update as of 4/21/2019

As it turns out, Bay took on a new identity to come into my server during our last application period, from November 30th to December 4th. She pretended to be “spark-lex” and was a member of the server from December 2nd to February 26th, at which point she was kicked for inactivity after attempts to reach her had been made and left unanswered for weeks.

Today, still pretending to be Lex, she attempted to regain access to the server to continue spying on us. Below are screenshots.

#bayheart #wendips #fawn #bee #bay

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enthuzimuzzywrites · 6 years

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I think tumblrs spoiled me. Everyone on here (that I interact with that is) is so loving and supportive that sometimes I forget that ordinary people can be so ignorant.

One of my best friends (my BEST FRIENDS) just said the ugliest shit about this super sweet non binary friend of mine. And he prefaced it with “I know you’re gonna hate me for this but it’s so good hahahahahah”—NO. It’s not good. It’s not fucking funny. It’s ugly and gross and YOU DONT GET TO CHOOSE. You can’t sit there and make jokes all the time about how you’re “literally such a librard haha I’m like so liberal it’s freaking crazy” and mean it?? and then turn around and say the most disrespectful shit.

No, honey, I’m not gonna hate you. But I feel really fucking bad now. Bad for you, living your life an ignorant prick who thinks shit like that’s funny, and for the fact that you are now one of those that we’re waiting to change or die our so that human beings get treated with a little bit of decency, bad for them, who, by the way, is kind, caring, nerdy, sweet, and broken, like all of us (except for you, at least. Side note: he is fucking PROUD *CONSTANTLY* of the fact that he’s not depressed and I am. Of the fact that he’s okay with himself and I’m not. He makes jokes about it. That makes me feel great, buddy boy. Keep that up.), and doesn’t deserve to be talked about that way or disrespected. They are smart, and capable, and logical, and able to do things I can’t even comprehend. And you decide to throw that shit away for one fucking joke and the fact that since you (and I quote), “Don’t respect that whole thing [they have] going on and shit.”

What the fuck. I thought the gay jokes and shit when I came out to you (the first fucking person I ever trusted with that by the way) was fine or whatever, like your way of accepting it. And yeah, I can take it. I mean, I’m pretty damn gay. But it’s too far to go after them. They are a good fucking person and hey guess what *you can be transphobic without labeling yourself that way*. Mind blowing, right?

That joke was pretty fucking transphobic, dude. And you fucking knew it too! You knew it. So fuck off. I’m gonna go stress eat chocolate and send them dad jokes to try to make them smile. Bye.

#gay shit #transphobia #personal #not dnp #hey man if youre reading this #yeah. thats what I meant by my scared silence #im not gonna fucking apologize

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fairiencarnate · 6 years

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Honestly as much of a shit show as this website is, Tumblr has taught me so much about the world around me. My mindset and ideas now are nothing like they were before I found this site. I used to be a homophobic, transphobic, stereotype enforcing, judgmental, small-minded, conservative little christian girl and Tumblr has turned me from that into somebody I can be proud of.

I've found so much joy in bettering myself and doing my best to be kind and compassionate whenever possible. I've developed such a huge passion for human and animal rights, as well as politics and environmental issues. Tumblr introduced me to gardening and the outdoors, things that have become a big part of who I am, and got me through the hardest parts of my recovery from severe mental illness.

I finally came to terms with my sexuality, something I've felt guilty about my entire life. Since I was a child I believed my attraction to women made me a terrible disgusting sinner, something that I should suppress and unlearn. Then when I got older I struggled a lot with my fluctuating levels of sex repulsion (I've always only been sexually attracted to people I've developed a connection with, but this turned into sex repulsion after an incident with an abusive friend. I remained repulsed by sex for about a year. It wasn't until I met my current boyfriend that it changed again. I still experience sex repulsion sometimes but it isn't a regular thing anymore). I truly thought there was something wrong with me and I'd never be loved because of it. It was here I made the first friends I could be open with about the way I am. All the beautiful humans of the LGBT+ community here have taught me that my sexuality isn't just something I have to accept, but something I can celebrate. Though I don't imagine I'll ever come out to my family, I no longer feel the deep hatred for myself I once did. My sexuality has become one of my favourite aspects of myself and I'm proud as fuck to be demi - pansexual (though I still find myself sometimes wishing I felt comfortable identifying as bi, since pansexuality is a little harder to explain and ace/demi's get a lot of shit by members of the LGBT+ community).

TLDR; I started Tumblr as a hateful closed-minded individual who thought she knew everything, and the influence of everyone here has simultaneously humbled me and healed me.

So yeah, shout out to Tumblr and everybody I've ever interacted with on here. Y'all changed my life in more ways than I can count.

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asreoninfusion · 7 years

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1-4,7,10, 11,13,14,16, 19-21, 25,26,30,34, 39,52,54,55, 61,62,65,67 also 69 - (b) - How mature do you think i am on a scale of 1 to 10 giggity giggity!

That’s a lotta questions! :o I’mma put this one under a cut, lol.

01: Do you have a good relationship with your parents?

Yeah, my mum especially. To the point where we’ve been discussing buying a plot of land for my hobbit house and splitting the payments and I’d be 100% fine with doing that and trusting there to be no issues with the money and also we’d probably build the house together. She’s on board with my hobbit house plans.

02: Who did you last say “I love you” to?

Uuuuuumm, I don’t think I’ve said it for a long time, I can’t remember. I imagine it probably would have been my mum, but more likely in writing that in person ‘cause I’ve been away at uni and haven’t seen any of the family in a few months now.

03: Do you regret anything?

Many stupid small things and instances where I’ve embarrassed myself by being socially awkward. Nothing major though.

04: Are you insecure?

Depends on what about. I am content about some things, like being able to achieve things independently and get by on my own and also I’m generally perfectly happy with how I look, except for in photos which pisses me off because I know I look better than I do in photos and it annoys me that they make look bad. Fuck photos.

But then I am hideously insecure when it comes to dealing with other people like ahahahaha I am so bad it’s embarrassing. I need to go back to self-isolating I can handle that so much better. Every time I try to interact with people I end up fucking up somehow and hating myself.

07: What did you last eat?

I still haven’t eaten today, so it would have been dinner last night. I tried some of Domino’s new meatball things at a society/social thing last night, they weren’t that great.

10: When was your last physical fight?

Uhhh. Do sword fights count? Cause I imagine it would have been when I was taking the sword fighting lessons. That was like three years ago now.

11: Do you like someone?

Presuming this means like like as in crush-type like, no.

13: Do you hate anyone at the moment?

Nn, hate is a bit strong. There’s a few people in the aforementioned society that I am wary of, because they’ve made comments that are kind of racist or transphobic or otherwise Not Cool, but I’m too fucking weak-ass to call them out on it.

14: Do you miss someone?

Not really. It’s kind of weird, like, I say I’m close to my family but at the same time long periods of separation seem totally normal and I don’t miss them much at all idk.

16: How exactly are you feeling at the moment?

I... am still not entirely okay about last night’s society thing and the guy who was making transphobic comments. Like, if there’s one thing I really fucking hate, it’s people who spout opinions - usually opinions that are shitting on other people’s existences - when they clearly know fuck-all about what they’re talking about. Making judgements without knowing the full situation kind of thing.

But I don’t feel like I know enough either to really stand my ground, so I say nothing because, as I mentioned before, I am fucking disgustingly weak. Like, evil flourishes if good people stand by and do nothing and all that jazz.

So, I feel gross about the comments, and I feel gross for not saying anything, and I just want to barricade myself off from the world because I can’t fucking handle anything, and then I feel gross about that too because ahahaha that is not how to respond to conflict.

(The amount of weakness + running away from my problems has gotten so bad I can’t even project onto Cloud anymore, even though he used to be my go-to identifier for that kind of shit. orz)

19: Would you go back in time if you were given the chance?

Mmm, I don’t know, that could end badly. I don’t think there’s anywhen I’d want to go to enough to risk it. I’d rather just go somewhere else geographically in the current time.

20: Where was the last place you snogged someone?

I have not snogged anyone at any point ever.

21: What are your plans for this weekend?

Too much plans, I wanna sleep. But I want to get the tables and graphs done for one lab report and do a decent chunk of the research for the case study thing I have to do for next week. Then I’m gonna hang out with a friend this evening. Tomorrow there are mentions of a group of friends going to the Chinese supermarket and getting together and cooking stuff?? (We’ve done that before but there has been very little in the way of organisation/confirmation of anything this time round so idk.) And there’s the social for the BDSM club people tomorrow evening as well.

This is too much people I’m gonna burn out by the end of the weekend aaaaaahh. DX

Also I needed to try a wash my hair at some point, because we do not talk about how horrifically bad that situation is. (I look at those posts that occassionally crop up with neurotypical people horrified that someone with a mental illness might not shower for two or three days because spoons and I die imaging the reaction if they knew how godawful I am with that shit.)

25: Do you miss anyone from your past?

Nah. I’ve moved countries enough that I am very good at forgetting people and moving on, I’ve had a lot of practice. That’s probably not entirely a good thing, but.

26: What are you craving right now?

Breakfast.

30: What’s irritating you right now?

I think I already gave a far too detailed answer for that in question 16. >>

34: Who/what was your last dream about?

Oooooh. I did have quite an involved dream, but I can’t remember it all that well now. I think the vine guy was there briefly for some reason.

39: How old were you when you had your first kiss?

I have not yet had a first kiss.

52: Do you believe everything happens for a reason?

Nah, sometimes shit just happens because people are assholes. Most times there will be a way to rebuild and make something better out of whatever situation, but I wouldn’t say it ‘happens for a reason’ as if people were meant to suffer however they have.

54: Is cheating ever okay?

No. I mean, I don’t understand it anyway because being ace I’m just here like ‘wtf??? is it really that damn hard to keep it in your pants???’ lol. But if you are interested in having more than one partner, good communication and polyamorous type arrangements are a much better way to go if everyone’s on board with that.

55: Are you mean?

Never intentionally, though I imagine my awkwardness sometimes can be interpreted as rudeness.

61: Is it cute when a boy/girl calls you baby?

It would depend on the person saying it. I used to have a friend a very long time ago who called me and our other friend ‘babe’, that was cute. If I trusted the person and it was done in a joking but affectionate kind of manner within a friendship/queerplatonic relationship I’d be fine with it. If it was someone I didn’t know so well and, like, if they’re trying to be sexy with it like a ‘hey baby’ kind of thing, that would be weird and creepy ‘cause no thank you.

62: What makes you happy?

Long hikes in lots of nature when the weather is nice, people saying nice things about fic or that thing that happens where we all bounce ideas off each other and end up with fic of art and art of fic, uni work that is actually fun to do and I feel accomplished when I make something I’m proud of, randomly having a gigglefit over recalling stupid funny things (mostly dumb vines or Markiplier, lol), when my voice cooperates and I can sing well.

65: Your best friend of the opposite sex likes you, what do you do?

That is awkward as hell because I can guarantee I won’t feel the same way about them, soooo. If it was my best friend of the same sex that has more potential, since I would consider a queerplatonic kind of relationship with someone I was really close friends with and trusted a lot, but I’d be 100 times more comfortable with it if that person was female as well. (Or nonbinary, or trans, actually... now I think about, it’s only cis males that make me really nervous about being liked by. A generalisation, I know, but if any demographic is going to feel entitled to more than I’m comfortable with, it’d be them.)

67: Who was the last person of the opposite sex you talked to?

Probably someone at the uni society thing yesterday, I guess.

69: Do you believe in soulmates?

No, certainly not as a universal thing. Like, it’s sweet to some people click so well it feels like they’re soulmates, but I don’t think that can be expected for everyone.

#ask meme #memery #antarcticanammonite

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mintypothos · 7 years

Text

Convince Me

@raythrill @hubris-but-no-writing @holdthesewords remember this post?

Here’s half of a fic because why not

It started off as a simple thought.

Burr frequently allowed himself to be dragged to their various gatherings. For a long time, Lafayette wondered why Burr bothered to come, or why Alexander kept inviting him. Hercules was with Lafayette in their confusion, but didn't care either way, personally. Laurens was actually on Alexander's side, and not just because he liked backing Alexander up.

“Hey, shut up!” Laurens hissed once, when Lafayette voiced their objections, forgetting Burr was still there- and what? He was as quiet as a mouse! “Don't be an asshole when you don't even know him, man. Aaron's actually a cool guy.”

With Laurens apparently glowing endorsement, Lafayette knew they had to investigate. They started by trying to draw Burr into a conversation.

“Ah, Aaron Burr! You look lonely!” The teasing was uninspired and almost automatic, so it wasn't entirely surprising when Burr looked in their direction with a raised brow, but failed to react to the taunt. “Tell me, are you a cat or dog person? We need a tiebreaker.” Technically, they did, since Laurens and Alexander were arguing dogs, and Hercules with Lafayette were arguing cats. In reality, Lafayette liked both about the same amount, but making the tie was a good excuse to pull Burr in.

Burr took a long moment to reply, as if something important depended on his answer. “I like both equally,” he said smoothly. Lafayette's nose practically wrinkled at the bland, nothing answer. Why couldn't Burr say what he really thought?

“Man, people weren't kidding when they said you had no opinions.” Hercules laughed.

Lafayette could have sworn a tiny frown flashed across Burr's face, but maybe they'd been looking too closely. “That really depends on what 'people' have been talking about me.”

“You are the worst, Burr.” Lafayette drawled at the plain answer. Something curious wiggled in them, though. Lafayette wondered what Burr's actual opinions were.

When Lafayette was curious about a person, they flirted. It was their thing. First, it was an easy way to out transphobes, but second, it was plain fun. Lafayette liked getting under people's skin and enjoyed the ego boost of causing someone to flush or stutter.

Which was why, when Lafayette decided to try flirting with Burr, they were surprised and a little bit bothered to find failure.

“Hey, Burr, how has your day been?” Lafayette winked and flashed a flirtatious smile. With most people, it would be the lamest trick in the book, but Lafayette was confident and charming and had a winning smile, they knew it worked coming from them.

Burr blinked and returned a customer-service smile, boring and fake. “It's been alright. Yours?” Lafayette rolled with it, because not everyone reacted the same, and really, Burr was probably also wondering why they just started talking to him.

But after a few weeks of light probing, there was still nothing. Fluttering their eyelashes in a certain way usually caught anyone's attention for at least a moment, but Burr's expression never wavered. Just polite, clean small talk all around.

It became something of a challenge. Lafayette didn't mind, challenges were fun.

“Laf, why are you going after Aaron?” Alexander accused one night, when it was just them alone. One couldn't expect five people to always have matching schedules, after all- especially when Laurens and Hercules were in school.

“I'm curious, are you not? He is always hanging around, but never sharing anything of himself.”

Alexander huffed, a surprised, amused sound. “So you just want to know what he stands for? I guess I can't complain, it used to really bother me when we first met.”

“Yes, it constantly confuses me why you continue to like Burr,” Lafayette shot Alexander a teasing look. “Unless you just enjoy having someone nearby who will never contradict your arguments? You do like winning unopposed.”

Instead of snapping back or even scowling, Alexander broke into laughter. “Are you kidding me? Aaron doesn't let me get away with shit. He's almost as good a debater as I am, even if he plays full defense far too often.”

“You're lying.” Lafayette blurted, surprised. At Alexander's raised brows, they were forced to consider the point. “This is Burr you're talking about? Mr. Aaron Never-shares-his-opinion Burr? Little Burr who would rather talk charming circles around a point than ever actually get to it?”

Alexander snorted. “You think he's charming?” He held up a hand before Lafayette could object, “And yes. That Burr. He actually has plenty of opinions, when you get to know him. John likes him too, and even Hercules is warming up to him.”

“Hercules warms up to everybody,” Lafayette pointed out. “Liking everyone is his thing. And Laurens likes Burr because you do.”

Alexander shook his head. “Dude. How about you actually just talk to him, instead of whatever you're trying to accomplish. Aaron's not awful, I promise.”

'Not awful' was far from high praise. But it did come from Alexander, the man frequently incapable of polite social interaction. Lafayette vowed to give it a try.

The problem was, 'actually just talking' to Burr posed a dilemma. On the one hand, it gave Lafayette more chances to put his flirt on and make a real effort, while simultaneously actually listening to Burr instead of looking for reactions.

On the other hand, Burr was an interesting person, under all the blandness. He was also completely immune to Lafayette's efforts.

“You should come over,” Lafayette encouraged, when Burr once again refused the Sunday dinner they hosted. “It's not even just Alexander, Herc, and Laurens. The Schuylers and Thomas and James come, also.” Lafayette knew Burr was friendly with those last two by now, not that he ever mentioned them. “It would mean a lot to me if you came,” Lafayette leaned into Burr's personal space. Nothing.

“Do you really want to know why I don't like going to dinners?” Burr shared a soft quirk of a smile, just a tad self deprecating. It was a sign Lafayette was beginning to recognize as Burr preparing to be honest. Maybe it wasn't nothing. Lafayette nodded quickly for him to continue.

Burr shifted, looking around like someone could be listening in. Alexander was occupied by Laurens, deep into some animated conversation, and Hercules was off on some clothing-related subject with Peggy. Peggy didn't usually have the time to hang out with the group, and was actually as into fashion design as Hercules, so Lafayette couldn't exactly blame him.

“I have misophonia.” Burr said in a hushed, but not quite whispering voice. It was not what Lafayette expected. At their blank look, Burr pushed forward. “It's okay if you haven't heard of it. Basically I get a strong reaction when I hear certain sounds, like eating noises. It makes dinners with people hell, unless I can distract myself well enough.”

“I know what misophonia is,” Lafayette answers, too surprised to even make a joke. “Alexander never said anything.” Alexander was terrible at keeping such things quiet.

Burr nodded, understanding the statement for what it was. “I never told him. Or anyone, really.”

This gave Lafayette pause. Burr was clearly in a deeper friendship with Alexander than he was with them. “Why are you telling me this?” It made no sense. Something small and warm brushed their heart, touched at being confided in. Lafayette wasn't usually the friend people vented to- that was Hercules if one wanted comfort, Alexander if one wanted someone to be angry with. Lafayette was the fun friend, the friend one went to when they wanted to forget things, not confide about them.

“Well, you said it would mean a lot to you,” Burr shrugged, but there was something warm in his eyes. Lafayette felt butterflies. “Contrary to popular belief, I don't actually want everyone to think I'm heartless.” A few weeks ago, Lafayette would have, and probably did, make jokes about just that. But here and now, they were drowning in the definitive proof that Burr was anything but heartless.

There was a beat, Burr's expression turning confused, before Lafayette realized they needed to respond. “You should come anyways,” Lafayette said impulsively, when they couldn't think of anything else to respond with. “I promise to be plenty distracting,” they hastily tacked on, with a confident smirk that belied the sudden fluttering in their chest.

Burr's eyes widened a bit, before his lips tipped into a genuinely amused smile and then, wonder of wonders, a tiny but real chuckle. “It doesn't work that way. You said you knew how it worked.” Burr wasn't even trying to be playful; Lafayette had seen his 'charm' before. This right here was all natural, and maybe that's why Lafayette felt like they were floating.

“It was worth a shot,” If Lafayette's laugh was a bit too quick or a bit too high, Burr didn't notice. “But really, everyone talks the whole way through, loudly too. If that's not enough, I could play some music.” Most of Lafayette's initial motivation in inviting Burr had been to pick his brain. They weren't sure when it became more about actually wanting to spend time with Burr.

This earned a happy little grin, the expression reaching Burr's eyes with a friendly glint. “You don't need to go out of your way for me. Your dinners sound like enough trouble as it is.”

“It's not trouble!” Lafayette almost rushed to respond. “How about, if you come, you're allowed to throw a shoe at anyone who tries chewing with their mouth open?”

Burr chuckled again. The sound was very nice. Lafayette wished to hear more of it. “Only if that privilege extends indefinitely. Alexander loves to talk while he eats, I literally can not be in the same room as him like that.” Burr leaned forward with that statement, actually entering Lafayette's space in an attempt to be conspiratorial.

“It's a deal.” Lafayette was gone.

Burr did show up at the dinner, and Lafayette did make sure music was on, even though everyone kept asking them why. When Alexander tried launching into a story with a mouth full of food, Lafayette called him out. Everyone gave them a bewildered look, except for Burr, who gifted them a soft smile. Already, that made it worthwhile.

Flirting still didn't work, even now that it was as much about actually getting closer to Burr as it was about the challenge of it all. Eventually, Lafayette had to call for backup.

“He's not straight, is he?” Lafayette whined to Laurens, busy studying for his med school classes. The sight reminded them of how nice it was to not be in school anymore.

Laurens only raised an eyebrow, flipping a few pages of his textbook. “He's bi. You can't tell?”

Lafayette loosed a long, breathy groan. “I don't know anymore, he hardly responds at all, and I know he's single. Straight people are the only single people I can't even pull a bit.” Even that wasn't exactly true, they were occasionally approached by straight women thanks to their slightly more masculine gender expression, but a mention of pronouns usually sent them packing.

Laurens made a long, considering hum. “And this actually bothers you? I thought you were just flirting to get under his skin. Also, you're succeeding more than you think you are.”

“At first, but I don't know, Burr's actually...” Lafayette stopped. “Wait, what do you mean, I'm succeeding?”

Laurens actually closed his textbook, smirking at Lafayette like he knew something. “Why do you want to know?”

Lafayette huffed, crossing their arms. “Don't try to be coy, Laurens. It doesn't suit you.”

“Fine. Aaron thinks you're cute.”

Laurens already had Lafayette's focus, but with that, they were riveted. “He does?” Then, realizing the sentence, “Hey, I'm not cute, I'm elegant.”

Laurens snorted, and then snickered, and then full out laughed. “Laf, you've got a crush!”

“Crush sounds so juvenile.” Lafayette sniffed. It wasn't worth denying. “How do you know, anyways?”

“He doesn't complain at your little nicknames. 'Our Burr', 'little Burr', and all that. He nearly kicked Alex in the face, the last time he tried to call him 'little'.”

Maybe crush was the right word, because it was also very juvenile how that statement made Lafayette's heart float. “Well, in that case,” Lafayette said, their words soft and airy like the feeling in their head. “I'm definitely getting at least one date.”

That caused another snort. “A little ambitious, there.”

“What?” Lafayette's forehead creased. “You just said-”

“I said he thinks your cute. He still doesn't know you're flirting with him. I'm pretty sure half of the time, Aaron's convinced you're trying to make fun of him.”

Lafayette's mood dropped. “I'll tell him, then.”

Laurens shrugged. “If you can. When's the last time you actually, genuinely asked someone out? You always just ramp the flirt up until they ask.”

Damn. Laurens was right. “It can't be that hard.” Lafayette wasn't a shy person, after all.

“Oh, you have much to learn.” Laurens gave Lafayette a condescending pat on the head, somewhat ruined by the fact that he had to stretch to reach.

“Okay, you know what,” Lafayette, frustrated and a little bit egged on by the obvious challenge, made a mistake. “I bet you 50$ I can get a date with Burr by the end of the week.”

It was an easy bet- It was early in the week, Lafayette was good at dating, good at charming despite the recent difficulties, and now they knew for sure Burr was interested. “You're on,” Laurens took it anyways.

The next day, Hercules and Alexander and even Peggy immediately added their stakes to the bet. Peggy was on their side, bless her, and everyone else against.

The stakes only made Lafayette more determined, but they should have realized it was a terrible idea.

Aaron Burr was in a conundrum. He often was, but this one was considerably worse than the usual fare.

Lafayette happily existed in an entirely different world from Aaron, despite them often being in the same social space. It was clear that Lafayette was both mystified and vaguely disapproving of Aaron's presence, they never tried to hide it. Aaron was fine with that. Despite what everyone said, Aaron knew he couldn't please everyone, and was perfectly content to stay distantly polite as long as Lafayette wasn't actively mean about it- which they never were.

But then, Lafayette started talking to Aaron. First, with a few words, a half assed invitation to debate. Then it became more, and more, until Lafayette started seeking Aaron out first, before their friends.

It shouldn't have been a problem at all, never mind a conundrum. Except for the fact that Lafayette was very beautiful, and actually very interesting to talk to. Once one got past their constant teasing and dramatic flair, they were every facet of Aaron's stereotypical romantic fantasy. Tall, dashing, with great hair and sparkling, smiling eyes. Whip-smart, but not academics obsessed. Outgoing enough to pull Aaron into conversations a bit outside his usual comfort zone, but attentive enough to back off when Aaron needed. They were also funny, very positive, and wasn't put off even by Aaron's driest remarks.

“But there's no way they'd be interested,” Aaron sighed over the face-to-face messenger. Maria laughed from the other end. “Can you stop enjoying my pain?”

“Not until you stop being terrible at everything.” Aaron rolled his eyes fondly at the comment. Aaron's frequent social mishaps were a common thread between them. “Why do you think they aren't interested? You said they talk to you a lot?”

Aaron considered the question. “They're one of those popular, confident types. I'm pretty sure Lafayette has never once been hesitant about the people they're into. I figure if they were interested, they'd have done something by now.”

Maria hummed. “And what if they have done something, but you're too dense to figure it out?”

“Don't be ridiculous, I'm not an idiot.”

The resulting laugh came out somewhat static-y from Maria's low quality mic, but the light derision was still obvious. “Do you not remember when we were kids and I thought I was straight?”

The memory was very old, but still somehow very clear. “Shut up!” Aaron huffed. “You promised never to talk about that.” Given that it was Maria who had been trying to express her mistaken crush, and gotten considerably more desperate, she should have been the embarrassed one, not Aaron. Unfortunately, Maria was one of those few people completely capable of reviewing past embarrassing memories with no shame. “Also, I was a lot younger then, so that's not even applicable.”

“Aaron, honey, you haven't changed that much.”

“Oh, shut up.” Aaron shot back again. “You're no help.”

That was a lie, Maria was always a lot of help, even if it never seemed that way at the time. Judging by her smug smile, Maria knew this as well. “Look, I'll put it simply, for you. Would you want to smooch them?”

“What?”

“Answer the question!”

“Okay, maybe. Yes.” Aaron averted his eyes. “You're being childish.”

“Shut up,” Maria returned Aaron's words. “ I'm not even going to tell you to ask them out, since I know you'll never work up the guts,” Aaron didn't respond- she was right on that. “How about this, if they ask you out, would you say yes?”

“What is this, highschool?” Aaron sniped, and then relented under Maria's glare. “I don't think it will happen, and if it did happen it would probably be as a joke, but if they seriously asked, then yes.”

“Well then, there you go. You've decided what you're going to do, crisis averted.”

The crisis didn't feel averted at all, but Aaron let it go. There were other, less confusing subjects to talk about.

The talk with Maria did actually help. Aaron was able to relax a bit, enjoying his conversations with Lafayette, and occasionally even instigating himself. Even when he did occasionally say something awkward, something that slipped through his usually perfect mental filter, it felt okay. He was getting comfortable around Lafayette.

Until, Lafayette started acting weird. More weird than usual. They greeted Aaron, but jumped when he responded. They started talking about unusual topics, like favourite restaurants, fun places nearby, or activities they both enjoyed. And while Lafayette would share their own thoughts, they kept pressing back to Aaron's opinions, and what he liked. It sounded almost like they were scoping out date ideas, but there was no way. If that was what Lafayette wanted to do, surely they would have a more graceful way to do it.

“Are you okay?” Aaron finally snapped, when Lafayette refused to meet Aaron's eyes after asking him some strange question about food preference.

Lafayette was visibly taken aback. “What do you mean?”

Aaron bit back a dry response that wouldn't help the situation. “You're acting strange, this past week.”

Lafayette opened their mouth, denial on their lips clear as day, but then froze, and wilted. “So even you've noticed now. I'm a mess.”

It was Aaron's turn to be taken aback. “You've never been anything less than fully put together from the day I met you,” Aaron admitted. “But if you're going to tell me what's up, I'm not complaining.”

“You think I'm put together?” Their recovery was quick enough to cause whiplash. “Why Burr, I had no idea you thought so highly of me.” Their smirk was wide and mischievous. And Aaron knew it was full of shit.

“Let me rephrase. If you don't tell me what's up, I am complaining.” Aaron put his hands on his hips. Lafayette pouted. Burr held steady, even if the sight was cuter than it had any right to be, coming from a grown person who was a full head taller than him

They stared at each other, until Lafayette crumbled, glancing away. Aaron allowed a tiny smile of victory. He could blankly out-stare anyone. Lafayette shifted their weight, clearly weighing their options.

“I have a question, but I don't think you want to hear it.” Lafayette finally admitted.

Aaron raised a brow. It was a strange thing to occupy someone, especially Lafayette. “Let me be the judge of that, then.”

“Okay,” Lafayette took a breath, crossing their arms over their chest defensively. “Do you want to go out sometime? Like to a dinner with ambiance, or a movie, or something?”

“What?” Aaron was baffled. “Who's all coming, and why would that bother me?”

Lafayette let out a long, frustrated sigh, scrunching their hair with one hand. “No one would be coming. I'm asking you out, Burr.”

“Oh.” Oh. Aaron considered the idea that Maria was right, about everything, all the time. “Like for real?”

“What do you mean, for real?” Lafayette's brows furrowed.

“Like, if you're joking right now, I will kick you in the shins.” Aaron said blankly, still in shock from the revelation.

It took Lafayette a moment, but then they almost jumped forward. “No, oh my god, it's not a joke! I wouldn't do that!” Lafayette looked honest, and for a moment Aaron's heart skipped.

“Are... you sure?” Aaron finally asked, when it was clear he should be responding.

Lafayette huffed, sharp and loud and almost a laugh but not quite. “Stop torturing me Burr, please. I would like to take you out. Yes or no?”

“Um,” Aaron stalled, trying to process past his surprise. “Okay.”

It wasn't particularly smooth, for either of them. But it didn't need to be.

The actual date wasn't anything fancy, but Aaron was glad for it. Lafayette greeted him at the coffee shop with a chaste peck on each cheek, that they dramatically stooped down for. “It's custom in France, you know,” they said in way of explanation, eyes dancing in laughter.

“Um,” Aaron said, overwhelmed. Lafayette chuckled and laced a hand in his, gently towing him to the counter.

Aaron and Lafayette chatted, drank the whip cream from their fancy coffees, went for a scenic walk, and chatted some more. Aaron found himself smiling more than he had in a long time, since moving across the city for work. Lafayette even laughed in turn at Aaron's sarcastic comments. Real laughter too, not the light forced chuckles of a person trying to impress, something which Aaron had plenty of experience with. Most people tended to misunderstand Aaron's tone. It was nice.

Aaron kept Lafayette's warm grip in one hand, the half finished coffee in the other. The coffee of course was a lost cause when Aaron lurched over an uneven patch of sidewalk. The coffee went arcing through the air, Aaron not far behind- until Lafayette's hold wrenched him back, their other arm reaching up quickly to settle him.

“Are you alright, little Burr?” Aaron almost flushed between his clumsiness and the pet name. Then, he noticed his nice burgundy jacket was soaked in coffee, and Aaron did flush.

“I'm the worst,” Aaron groaned, vainly trying to wipe off what he could.

Lafayette giggled, light and pure and unguarded, opposite from the mocking notes Aaron half expected. “You are the worst, Burr,” They teased, easing their own jacket off and offering it to Aaron with a flourish. “But only because you tempt me into making the cheesiest of gestures.”

The jacket was going to be stupidly huge on him. And it was, in fact, an incredibly cheesy gesture, but the chill of wind against wet clothing was already starting to make him shiver. “You don't need my help for that, you're cheesy all on your own,” Aaron joked to distract from the red likely staining his cheeks. He shrugged Lafayette's very warm, very large jacket on, folding his own over one arm. As expected, the jacket nearly reached Aaron's knees.

Lafayette plucked Aaron's free hand again, leaning down towards him with a silly grin and crinkled eyes. “You look adorable. May I kiss you?”

“Only if you never call me adorable again,” Despite the words, Aaron leaned closer, caught up in the moment, cozy warm from both the coat and his own fast-beating heart.

“I make no such promise.” Lafayette leaned closer still. This close to their face, Aaron could see that he wasn't the only one affected. Aaron wondered how Lafayette ever managed to look smooth- they were actually a dork. A very charming dork.

Aaron took a rare moment of initiative, and leaned up. With Lafayette already in his space, he didn't need to reach very far to meet their lips. It was light, it was sweet, and it was short. But Aaron saw stars anyways.

The date came to a close, after that. Even if they pretended otherwise, Lafayette quickly became cold, New York winters being nothing to joke about. Still, they insisted Aaron wear their jacket for the trip home.

“You're being ridiculous,” Aaron complained.

“Ah, but am I?” Lafayette swung their joined hands. “If you have my jacket, then you must meet me to return it again. It is the perfect opening to request another date.” Lafayette stopped then, dropping his tone into something uncharacteristically nervous. “If you'd like?”

“What?” Aaron realized he spent far too much time being either confused or surprised. “You want another date? I just proved I'm a walking disaster.”

Lafayette gripped Aaron's hand tighter. “You're perfect!” They blurted, then considered their words. “I mean, if you really are a walking disaster, at least I get to rescue you.” Sheepishly, they scratched their neck.

Aaron's head spun. Obviously, he wasn't perfect. But to hear it come out so impulsively in his defense felt... nice. But Aaron knew he didn't want to make that decision, as high on giddy, puppy-love feelings as he was now.

“I'll get back to you?” To Lafayette's credit, they only drooped a bit at Aaron's uncertain words.

“Well, you do have to return my jacket.” Lafayette repeated. “Which you still look adorable in.”

“Don't call me adorable,” Aaron grinned through his own admonishment. It was a good night.

Aaron woke up happy. He bought himself fast-food breakfast and got to work on time, instead of his usual earliness. Everyone started giving him strange looks. Aaron wasn't surprised- he was on cloud nine, and though he wasn't the most expressive of people, it probably showed.

“Are you constipated?” Thomas rudely snapped when Aaron went to ask him for a document. Aaron hummed, ignoring him.

After work, he dropped by Laurens' place to help him colour code and organize his study notes, as previously promised- Aaron was a long time study expert, even if he had no clue about the subjects Laurens was taking.

“You seem happy.” Laurens commented, always blunt.

“Yeah,” Aaron sighed, pulling out the pink high-lighter. Laurens rolled his eyes with an exasperated puff, but let it be.

After a quick trip home and a nervous meal, Aaron knew it was time to return the jacket. Feeling silly, Aaron put it on once more. The cut was flattering on Lafayette, but made Aaron look almost childlike. It smelled like vanilla spice. Aaron laughed at his own absurdity and bundled the fabric up in a bag, shrugging his own, freshly cleaned jacket on.

Aaron considered texting first, but it was Monday evening, which meant Lafayette would be at Alexander's, likely also with Laurens and Hercules unless either of them had assignments due. It would be easier just to head over.

Aaron tried not to think about the likely teasing he would get, returning the jacket in front of their mutual friends. Alexander certainly wouldn't let it go without at least one lewd comment. The others would probably snicker or cajole and act like children in general.

The door was unlocked, and Aaron didn't bother knocking. That was his first mistake. The second mistake was being quiet enough in doing so that the loud conversation inside was not interrupted as he approached the kitchen.

“No one made you wager money, Alexander,” Lafayette's voice was smug and teasing. “Or any of you. I want to see those bills.”

“Oh come on, I don't just have 50$ in cash lying around!” Alexander complained. Aaron wondered what stupid bet Alexander lost this time. They all seemed to like the occasional wager, but Aaron always turned them down because betting was stupid. It wasn't surprising or even disappointing that no one invited him to get in on whatever it was.

Of course, Aaron's benign mood towards the bet went out the window when the subject revealed itself. “How was I supposed to know you'd actually convince Aaron to go on a date with you? You, of all people!”

“Yes, me of all peop-” Lafayette's voice cut off when Aaron dropped his bundle with a soft but audible thump against the ground. Everyone's face whipped immediately to the source of the noise. “Aaron..” Lafayette's voice was surprised, uncertain. They were holding an incriminating fistful of bills.

Aaron felt numb, and slightly dizzy. The high he was riding through the entire day crashed, compressing into a strange hollowness in his chest. “Enjoy your winnings,” He said, not sure if it was a whisper, a shout, or even his normal tone.

“Aaron, wait!” Lafayette scrambled to their feet, long limbs working against them. Aaron was already at the apartment door, nearly slamming it behind him. He took to the stairs at a firm speed-walk. Halfway down, the stairwell door banged open again, multiple voices now shouting for Aaron to stop, to wait, to listen. He walked faster, clearing the building and crossing the street before any of them could see where he was going.

Aaron wasn't interested in explanations. The truth stood out for itself well enough.

#fic #burrlaf #please suffer with me #if at least one person who reads this goes from #oh hey burrlaf sounds kinda cute #to yep i ship that shit now #i will have succeeded #nonbinary lafayette

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Meet Trans Comedian Making Fart Jokes an Act of Resistance

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Meet Trans Comedian Making Fart Jokes an Act of Resistance

“I love to create very dumb and stupid shit,” says comedian Patti Harrison. Jessica Lehrman for RollingStone.com

Patti Harrison is seated onstage at an ACLU fundraiser in the dimly lit backroom of a Brooklyn bar. It’s a comedy show, but the room is somber – it’s been mere days since Donald Trump was elected president. Despite the upsetting turn of events, Harrison appears overwhelmingly put together. She has the alert, composed posture of an honor student on the first day of school. When she speaks, her tone is measured and polite, as if she is selecting each word carefully from a basket of perfectly ripened apples.

She tells the audience how deeply upsetting the election has been for her, a trans woman of color. She has also just landed her dream job as a comedy writer, and she is rattled by feeling so high and so low so swiftly. She proceeds to quietly read the pitches she had to bring into work the day following the election and the room fills with ripples of laughter that escalate into shrieks and roars. One is a show called “Son Boss” – a father promotes his son too many times until he realizes his son is now the boss. Harrison punctuates the premise with a deadpan, “Uh oh, Son Boss.” The audience wails.

Eight months later, Harrison found herself in front of an audience of millions. President Trump had tweeted that he would ban transgender people from the military and The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon invited the 26-year-old Ohio native to share her thoughts on the proposed ban. Harrison was polished and charming as ever as she chided the president, saying, “Donald, you are so stupid, you are sooo stupid. You’re lucky you’re so hot.” The appearance was a hit – earning nearly 400,000 views on YouTube, thousands of retweets on Twitter and a headline in The New York Times. It was a surreal moment for Harrison who, in the face of the current political climate, speaks with as much reverence for the power of fart jokes as she does the importance of trans rights.

“I love to create very dumb and stupid shit,” says Harrison, “And that’s the funny thing – when people seek me out as this like political comedian, I literally just want to joke about IBS and farting.”

Harrison still performs in the basements and backrooms that make up New York City’s alt-comedy scene, but she is poised to become the most visible working trans comedian in America. You may recognize her from her comedic videos about queer and trans identities. Or perhaps you’ve seen “Patti Reviews Animals,” where she serenaded a squirrel monkey, delivered heartbreaking news about Steve Irwin to an alligator and confused a Patagonian cavy, a South American rodent, with Sofia Vergara. If you haven’t seen Harrison yet, chances are you will soon. With a recurring role on season two of TBS’s Search Party, a guest role in the current season of Broad City and a small part in Paul Feig’s upcoming film, A Simple Favor, Harrison is suddenly everywhere. But perhaps the biggest role Harrison has been asked to play is that of mouthpiece for the trans community. Harrison’s identity as a trans woman of color, paired with her general charm and poise, make her a perfect go-to for witty commentary on trans rights – even if her humor is rarely overtly political.

Jo Firestone, who writes for The Tonight Show and has produced many live shows featuring Harrison, adores her absurdist, gross-out wit. She recalls a card Harrison made for her. “[It] had a goofy cartoon character on the front … a cute little poodle – and then on the inside, the doodle-poodle had developed breasts and a penis and balls and was bleeding from the mouth and screaming out, ‘My body is a cage!'”

Harrison is like this on stage, too. Her tone is polite, composed and inviting. When paired with her pointedly stupid jokes or characters – which alternate between sweetly wholesome and ultra vulgar – the effect is disarming. It’s like watching a cashmere sweater unravel and reveal hundreds of blood-thirsty baby spiders – horrific and captivating.

“She has a warmth about her that is very exciting,” says Firestone. “She just has ideas that nobody else has and her overall demeanor is so interesting. She’s so calm on stage and so in control but also so strange.”

Although Harrison’s live act isn’t improv, it retains the off-the-cuff energy of her improvisational roots. She often dips into characters who are both endearing and repulsive. She loves, for example, to play old people who are horny. And she adores the opportunity to sing a silly song doing an impeccable Stevie Nicks impression. In a recent “bats and rats”-themed comedy show in New York City, Harrison asserted that she definitely knew what bats and rats were before she crooned, “I’ve seen the love on a child’s face know, yeah I know that love always wins. But I never learned this one thing.” She pauses dramatically before bursting into the chorus: “I don’t know what a bat is / I don’t know what a rat is, too / I don’t know what those things are / Is it like a shoe?”

Harrison says much of her humor is inspired by growing up in Orient, Ohio, a rural town where she was often the only person of color in an almost exclusively white community. The daughter of a Vietnamese immigrant mother and a father with roots in Detroit and Tennessee, Harrison quickly learned that, in order to survive, she had to sympathize with those who openly mocked her. “I think a lot of me trying to blend in was me co-opting the racism that was used against me in a way – being OK with it. Like, ‘Yeah they’re calling me chink but they mean it in a nice way. They’re not racist, they hang out with me every day! Sure, they make jokes about me eating rice all the time, but they invite me to the movies sometimes!'”

“She just has ideas that nobody else has and her overall demeanor is so interesting. She’s so calm on stage and so in control but also so strange,” Jo Firestone says of Patti Harrison. Jessica Lehrman for RollingStone.com

Harrison, the youngest of four sisters, credits her siblings for helping her to see that she didn’t have to accept other people’s biased behavior. “My sisters were really smart,” she says. “And they sort of planted that seed in me that I actually don’t have to put up with this if I don’t want to.”

Growing up, Harrison also loved MadTV, especially its female performers and their unabashed wildness. “People like to shit on MadTV,” she says. “But it was this hub of female excellence and female character comedians like Debra Wilson, Nicole Sullivan, Mo Collins, Stephanie Weir – all of these people that are just like powerhouse performers.”

But it wasn’t until college, when a friend invited her to an improv show, that it occurred to her to perform on stage. She was immediately smitten with the form and auditioned for the improv team at Ohio University. She was elated when she got in. “That was the defining moment in my college career. I felt like, ‘Wow, I’ve accomplished something.”

When Harrison finished her fourth year of college, she came out as trans. Her family was supportive but coming out wasn’t without its uncomfortable conversations. Having switched majors, she still had credits to complete for her degree, but she ultimately decided not to return to school. Instead, she moved to New York to earn her living as a famous improvisor. “I thought that was a thing you could do,” she laughs.

Performing after she came out as trans was markedly different from her college stage experience. “My command changed,” she says. “Before I transitioned, I felt like I could walk on stage and just, like, say anything and people would just laugh. And that’s kind of a privilege that I just lost through the layers of social context and me being visibly a political object in a lot of people’s brains.”

Like all comedians, Harrison must face the challenges of connecting with an audience, but being trans often adds an additional layer of division between herself and the people from whom she’s hoping to elicit laughs. “It’s like, ‘Oh that’s a trans person.’ And that’s the conversation they’re having in their head throughout my set,” she explains.

Harrison still vividly remembers the cutting feeling of her first brush with transphobia as a performer. “One of the first shows I did in New York, I got on stage and this person in the front at normal speaking level was just like, ‘Oh that’s a guy. That’s a dude,'” she says. “And I had to keep going. And I bombed. Because I felt so disarmed in a bad way. It immediately got me in my own head.”

Harrison says she now feels mostly at home in the spaces where she performs, especially in Brooklyn where she knows she has allies. “I perform in spaces that are very inclusive and protective,” she says. “I feel more comfortable knowing that there are people around [who are] progressively minded who will have my back.” But there are still moments that give her pause, particularly when friends introduce her to people who turn out to be transphobic. “People are like, ‘Oh this is bla bla bla, he’s so nice, he’s great!'” she says. “And then it’s like, oh I have to stand with this guy who won’t look at me.” Harrison also has had the feeling she’s been booked for shows by men who are eager to identify as allies, but who are clearly uncomfortable interacting with her. “It’s like, ‘I’ll put you on the show, but oh do I have to touch you? Do I have to hand you the drink ticket?'”

Following her appearance on Fallon, Harrison was briefly flooded with requests for interviews. While it was an opportunity both for visibility as a performer, and visibility for the trans community, Harrison noticed an upsetting pattern in the questions she was sometimes asked by her interviewers. “I think it’s important for people to know [that I’m trans],” she says. “For the most part, there’s not a ton of out and working trans comedians, or people who are visible. [But] sometimes those questions [about being trans] have been a gateway to more invasive questions.”

Those questions are invariably about the intimate details of Harrison’s transition. She’s been asked various times whether she’s had surgery. “It’s always about sexualizing you,” she says. “It’s always about ‘Can I fuck you?’ and ‘How can I fuck you?'”

Dylan Marron, a writer and performer who got to know Harrison while working with her at comedy site Seriously.tv says he was instantly impressed with Harrison’s writing and her sensibilities as a performer. “I think what makes Patti so brilliant – in terms of needing more representation in media – is that Patti is just so fully herself,” he says.

Marron recalls a video Harrison made in 2016 after Brooklyn Magazine released their 50 Funniest People in Brooklyn list. The video was captioned, “To congratulate everyone whose name made it on.” In the video, Harrison gazes forlornly offscreen, scanning for her own name. She realizes she hasn’t been included, turns to the camera and asks theatrically, her voice strained, “Where’s my name?” She sobs, rises and exits dramatically, on rollerblades.

“Queer art is all about subverting further levels than you ever thought possible,” he says. “I think that’s what Patti does so beautifully.”

The daughter of a Vietnamese immigrant mother, Patti Harrison says much of her humor is inspired by growing up in Orient, Ohio, a rural town where she was often the only person of color in an almost exclusively white community. Jessica Lehrman for RollingStone.com

While she recognizes the value of representation, Harrison also says there’s something affirming about getting cast in parts on Broad City and Search Party, neither of which were written with a focus on the characters being trans. “It’s a good sign when we can have a marginalized person on screen – any person of color or LGBTQIA person – and there’s no shoehorn explanation as to why they are there,” she says. “They can just be on screen and their character motivations are what they are and they’re not like ‘Oh this is my maid. She’s trans, but she’s also a flute player.'”

“I think in some places it’s like, yeah someone in the midwest needs to see that I’m a trans character and I’m a person,” she says. “But for me it is very rewarding to get to just act and not have to think about my otherness for a few hours.”

In the same regard, Harrison often feels that speaking about the silly and mundane sometimes feels like its own political statement. “I’m learning now that just being a visibly marginalized person and not addressing it in an artistic space is almost more political than for me to be on stage talking about it,” she says. “It’s fully a privilege to be an artist and not have to talk about your oppression in your art. If you don’t have that challenge – you get to make art about a hoverboard!”

As for the dismal political landscape, Harrison says it’s only driven her to keep creating the stupidest jokes possible. “I think in the way that a lot of people’s bodies release tears when they’re stressed or sad, my body releases horrible, horrible jokes about bird assholes and the dumbest things I can think of, because – even if it’s just for a second – it [provides] relief. I guess the equivalent of taking a deep calming breath for me is like farting in a beautiful musical tone,” she says, adding, “Or farting with a dear friend! If you’re doing it with a friend you can harmonize a chord.”

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