do you know what I've learned? Readers are smart but they're not mean.
You don't have to spell everything out. They're going to get it. When you're so deep inside your oblivious unreliable narrator's skull that you worry no one will see what's really happening, all the little details and hints you're giving, the reader will see. They will understand. They will notice every scrap and crumb you give them and they will build it into delicious feasts, and they will appreciate that you left something for them to do instead of spoon feeding or shoving it down their throats. They're smart.
But they're not mean. When your plot is a little blobby and your sentences are not perfect, you worry that all these smart readers will see how you could've trimmed everything up and been a better writer, but that's not how it works. They bring their brains to read your story so that they can enjoy it, not pick it apart. Fanfic--honestly, most of literature--is a party, and people at a party don't spend their time criticizing everything and focusing on all the things that are subpar (unless they're English majors, who are the worst). They focus on enjoying themselves, looking for the good time they came to have. If they don't like the people at the party or the music is bad, they might just quietly leave, but they're not going to nope out just because there are a few too many bags of chips. What's truly wild is, shockingly, people have different tastes, so some people might even like your blobby plot and subpar sentences. Turns out smart people looove chips who knew
