claricechiarasorcha replied to your post “4,6,9!”
It's actually kind of neat -- and kind of scary -- when people see things in your writing you weren't even aware of, ha ha.
It is! But sometimes it’s really cool, and makes me think about my own stuff a little differently!
@saltandlimes, I hope you don’t mind me using your comment as an example, but it really made me rethink some of Ren’s motivations in Princess.
In the beginning of Princess, there’s this exchange between Hux and Ren:
“Plenty of time,” [Ren] says to Hux’s questioning look, brakes for a red light. “You have French club after school; [Brendol] is not expecting you until four.”
“That’s tomorrow,” Hux says, staring at Ren’s big hand on the gearshift, meticulously filed nails, the white shirt cuff peeking out from underneath the dark navy of his silk-wool suit sleeve.
“Tomorrow, too,” Ren says, not missing a beat. “Model UN Wednesday. Undo your belt.”
In my mind, Ren had offhandedly lied to Brendol, and Brendol hadn’t really noticed/cared. In his conversation with Brendol, Ren could have named the wrong afterschool activity for a number of reasons: gauging Brendol’s awareness of Hux’s schedule, and his interest in Hux’s comings and goings; trying to muddle the general perception of “when did this happen” (they’re already super busy with the merger, Brendol’s about to go out of town, if he has an imperfect memory of how often exactly Hux has been in Ren’s company -- oh, on French Club day, whenever that was -- that can only be good for Ren); hell, he could have just been lying for the sake of lying -- he’s not exactly a paragon of good behavior.
However, in @saltandlimes comment on the fic, she said it really had gotten/disturbed her that Ren hadn’t even remembered which afterschool activity Hux had that day: “He knew enough to know that Hux was skipping out enough on something, but had to be reminded of what it was”. Which makes Ren a different kind of awful. This Ren -- who knows that Hux has stuff he does after school -- doesn’t really care all that much what that stuff is. Which then begs the question of whether the caring behavior he exhibits later (helping Hux learn about the business, reminding him to take care of his ankle) is really just part of the scene for him as much as having spanked Hux had been. If he just gets off on all of it. If it’s just this persona he puts on for Hux, rather than actual care. And you know, I hadn’t intended Ren to be like this -- in my mind, he really does care about Hux, and when he is acting like he gives a shit, he really does; he may be awful, but he’s genuine. But I like being able to imagine the other possibility, because hey -- I may not have quite realized it, but it was there to be imagined, clearly.
