I mean… you know I’m gonna ask about OMWF—fic of all time 🥺🤲
ah yes well... how about three things and a wee snippet for you, my darling.
Next chapter is Andrew POV
I've got it half finished...
I have FINALLY figured out how Kevin dies/d
and:
“Andrew, stop.” It’s Kevin, crouched at their side, jaw clenched, steel in his eyes. Someone is already finding their backbone, Andrew thinks hysterically. He blinks at Kevin, at the ghost they have chased into the past, and then he frees one hand from Neil and snakes it out to twist into Kevin’s collar, pulling him close.
Andrew breathes and breathes and breathes and then he says, “I would not hurt him.”
OKAY so, this one is a vamp!neil andreil I fully plotted out and started on a while ago, with berserker Neil and a whole household of found family vamps and humans but see... I like it so much I am thinking to make it a BOOK with OCs instead. One day. Maybe. If i can ever quit Nora's boys....
Explicit excerpt under the cut :)
Andrew woke up when the bed dipped and bounced and settled near his feet. He scootched up against the headboard, fighting a yawn and blinking reluctant eyes open. “You’re late,” he said.
“It’s fine,” Neil shrugged lightly. He was naked and sitting criss cross applesauce at the foot of the bed, dripping blood and grinning like a loon.
“Sun’s out,” Andrew said, cutting a glance at the thrice filtered light seeping in around their blackout curtains.
“Barely,” Neil said, but the slight tinge of sulfur in the air called him a liar, the burn of it warring with the metallic scent of blood in Andrew’s nostrils. Andrew reached out and rubbed the singed end of one of Neil’s curls and raised an eyebrow, but Neil’s grin just widened and he tilted forward onto hands and knees and stalked Andrew in the bed until Andrew dropped back on his pillow, until Neil was hovering over him, sharp teeth glistening. A drop of blood beaded in the hollow of Neil’s cheek, rolled down his chin, and plopped onto Andrew’s collar bone. He shivered when Neil dipped his head to lick it up with one long swipe of his clever tongue.
Neil nosed at Andrew’s neck. “Can I?” Andrew shivered again in anticipation and wrapped his arms around Neil, reeling him all the way in until Neil’s molten hot skin was pressed to him, his cock hard against Andrew’s thigh, his teeth two careful pin pricks at Andrew’s throat. The books and horror movies and fucking Twilight had it so so wrong. Vampires weren’t cold; they were liquid heat, particularly when they’d recently fed, and by the feel of him Andrew’d say Neil had just eaten a lot of people.
“Yes,” Andrew whispered in Neil’s ear, and Andrew held tight to Neil’s curls as he pushed his teeth slowly through Andrew’s skin, just how he knew Andrew liked it. Andrew arched up against him and Neil wrapped impossibly tighter around him and it was nothing but yes and always and the almost-too-much burn of shared blood lust rushing between them.
It felt like Neil wanted to crawl inside Andrew’s skin in these moments, on fire and feral and strong, so strong, the blood dripping from his hair and running down his neck, the same blood gushing through his veins, the lifeforce of the people he had killed, murdered, sucked dry in a messy berserker spree. Messy in a way that Neil never was with Andrew. Careless in a way that Neil never was with Andrew. This, now, was life - vital and real and so far from the death and destruction written all over Neil’s body for Andrew to read with fingertips and tongue.
Neil pulled back after an eternity, eyes shining and wild, but movements controlled, and it was with care that he tucked fingertips into the waistband of Andrew’s sweatpants, tugged oh so gently, tilted his head.
If Andrew said no, Neil would pull back, no questions, no proding, no expectation. He needed the release, sure, needed to ease the pressure valve after going berserk. But that was never Andrew’s problem, Neil made sure of it. If Andrew said no, Neil would jack off in the shower, and most likely promptly pass out against the tiles, running all the hot water out of the creaky old mansion to the annoyance of the humans.
But Andrew had known this was coming when Neil disappeared at sunset in a swirl of too big t-shirt and glinting steel blue eyes and Andrew had sat up waiting - fantasizing - until he’d been unable to keep his eyes open. Anticipation was a heady morphine of a drug, and the slow drip of it for the last twelve hours meant that every part of Anderw’s body was saying yes to this, right now, to Neil, to all of it.
Andrew shoved his pants down, surging up to kiss his vampire, to flip him in a show of strength that Neil allowed, that he relished, and proceeded to take him apart.
After, Neil promptly passed out. Andrew half sat up over him, considering a bridal carry to the shower to get the blood off of him, but he had other work to do and they could just wash the sheets later. It wasn’t like Andrew was going to get sleep for hours anyway. He brushed the singed curls away from Neil’s face, ran a fingertip down a scar on his cheek, and then heaved himself out of bed with a self indulgent sigh. He was going to need at least three shots of espresso this morning.
You found one that I can say, without caveat, that I do not ship!
I'm not a Thea hater ... I just don't like her for Kevin, nor do I like Kevin for her. In the few canon interactions we've had she is so harsh with him, and he is so kowtowed to her. I don't find the combo compelling.
Don't Ship It
Why don't you ship it? See above, but further, Kevin is my blorbo. I want joy and healing and softness for him. I want casual touch and affection for my touch starved boy. Not to say Thea cannot be written to be those things, but the canon fodder we have doesn't throw my mind in that direction. The two of them together makes me sad, and I still can't stop that little voice inside my head that Thea was just a throw away invention of a character to give Kevin someone when Nora scrapped the kandreil story line.
What would have made you like it? EH. I mean, I have written them together, as background characters. Maybe a more in depth character study of Thea? Maybe some insights into hidden softness in their relationship? I do not think all relationships need softness, but I do think Kevin needs it. I have no idea what Thea needs! There's not enough character on the page for me.
Despite not shipping it, do you have anything positive to say about it? I can see the potential for an Exy power couple, so that's kinda cool. I think Thea is incredibly strong - she had to be to survive the nest, particularly as a woman - and I think there could be a take on that which would work for me in a kevthea au.
Random personal side note: I was sent to a "therapeutic" reform school for almost 3 years. It was traumatizing. Personally, I could never, ever imagine being romantically involved with someone I was there at the same time with, particularly if we'd had a romantic/sexual relationship while there (not that we were allowed to). There was too much shit that went down, too much buying into cult thinking, too much trauma spewed out for everyone to see. Some people who graduated with me dated and then married people from the school. Almost none of them are still together. These are the things I think about when I think about kevthea together. Nora makes it clear that Kevin and Jean can't even play on the same team together. I understood that. I don't understand why what Kevin and Thea get is ... each other.
This is OF COURSE just my personal opinion, which is OF COURSE influenced by my personal experience and taste. Y'all know I go to war for anyone and everyone's right to ship any damn thing you so desire.
Oof. Okay. So. This one is making me realize just how hard this game is for a multishipper. I am sitting here unsure what set of questions to answer, because in theory I ship it - I've written it, and I write a lot of Kandreil. But in reality I don't gravitate to kandrew without neil there as well to ... balance them. @nanatsuyu says kandrew have ex-wife energy, and I couldn't say it better myself.
I'm going with ship it, because saying I don't ship it feels wrong:
What made you ship it? Again, this one probably came out of my self made kandreil pipeline. I first took on a kandrew fic as part of mixtape, thinking it would be easy since i ship kandreil (and at the time literally no one signed up to write kandrew), and it was actually SUPER hard for me to write. I had to totally re-align my stars to make them work (for me) without Neil there. After that it got easier, and I can say I have some affinity for just the two of them together, but usually in a very specific context.
What are your favorite things about the ship? I think the bittersweet intensity of them, and the fact that they have a bunch of shit to work through in most iterations, makes for good ship food and excellent fic. You also can't deny that chemistry!
Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship? I dunnnooooo what the opinions are. I'd say maybe that I believe the divorce rate is high with these two.
I literally screamed when I saw the notification in my inbox that OMWF had updated. Such a great chapter! The Nathaniel reveal was so gripping and I loved how it paralleled and diverged from the original reveal in the books. My question for you this time is how you plan to "save" Kevin. Because it still hasn't been revealed how he died in the future, nor the exact nature of Kandreil's relationship. Does it have to do with the Moriyamas? Does being in an established relationship with Kevin save him from his death? I'm excited either way, especially for the eventual confession (although do they even need to confess to each other at this point).
Yay thank you so much for your enthusiasm! I truly love this story, and agonize over every bit of it. There will be a wee bit of a time jump in the next chapter to get some plot moving.
Okay so, it's hard to answer your questions without spoilers, so I will put the (vague, still not super spoiler-y) answers under the cut ... read at your own risk!
Vague spoiler #1: I am not going to reveal exactly how Kevin died until we get to that part of the story, but the circumstances around it would have played out differently if Kandreil had gotten together earlier in their lifetime.
Vague spoiler #2: It does not have to do with the Moriyamas.
Vague spoiler #3: "Does being in an established relationship with Kevin save him from his death?" MAYBE!
Vague spoiler #4: They do not actually fully get together in the original timeline. Assume that most elements of the original timeline align with canon and Nora's extra content. Which means Kevin would have married Thea.
OOF okay @starsandgutters my darling don't come for me but ... i don't really ship it. that doesn't mean i don't enjoy reading it occasionally - particularly by aforementioned author - and i have even WRITTEN IT for shannen's birthday (and am writing another!) ... but imma go with the don't ship it questions:
Why don't you ship it? Okay I am now realizing what a hard question this is. I mean, I can theoretically ship anything. But this one doesn't pique my interest in a vacuum. I think the true-est answer is that I enjoy Aaron with Katelyn, and I also enjoy Aaron with Jean, and that's where I tend to put Aaron. Add that to the fact that I have so many other people I am more interested in pairing Kevin with than Aaron, and there we have it. I think they are fine together, I can even make an argument about them getting together, and I really love Shannen's kev/aaron (no seriously, if you haven't read it, it is delightful check out officialstarsandgutters on ao3), but aside from that I don't seek it out.
What would have made you like it? Well, shannen makes me like it lmao.
Despite not shipping it, do you have anything positive to say about it? OH totally! I think TBQH I can come around to see merits and interesting corners of almost any ship, depending on the take. My favorite mental version of them though, is kate/kev/aaron.
hello! i just wanted to say that i shared your fic with someone a while back and they finally read it and they just called me to say how much they're loving once more with feelings!! they're three chapters in as of now and they're already asking me for more recs from you and i have a list lockede and loaded
Ahhhh that’s so nice and makes me so happy! Thank you! I love OMWF and promise I am coming back to it… there will be much more! Just finishing up my very last owed thing (playing for keeps) and then all my attention will be on OMWF. It sucks having to work for a living instead of writing fanfic all day 😅
