Hello Sib! A: How did you come up with the title to Double Take? and Aa: Since it is a wip and has developed themes or focuses more on them in ways you didn't anticipate would you give it a different title now? : )
Double Take was born entirely from my love of puns.
The working title was Double Identity, which was... serviceable... but lacked a certain humour that I thought was essential. So I wrote out a bunch of titles - just throwing words onto a page, seeking out any and all terms that were even remotely related to twins, doppelgangers, identity, seeing, or seeing double (to give you an idea of how low my bar was, Seeing Double was a potential title, agh).
After that, I went through and culled, narrowing it down to the titles that best encapsulated what I thought the story was about (at the time, it was something like: lollll, Arthur and Jon are cousins, but they have these dated/frozen-in-time mental images of who the other is, and Eames has a TOTALLY WRONG impression of Arthur. Also, mistaken identity hijinks.)
Of the shortlist, Double Take stood out. It worked on so many levels! Double, meaning two! Double take, describing everyone's reaction to Jon! SO MUCH WIN!
Since the shift in themes/shift in focus, I actually think Double Take is even more fitting. To do a double take - to look at something that is surprising or unusual a second time... man, it’s such an apt description of how Arthur and Eames (and Arthur and Jon, and Jon and Eames, and Jon and his family) are reassessing their relationships and knowledge of one another. It’s even better than I hoped for/intended.
Taking the ask meme as a reason and telling you once more how much I love your writing. When I first read Double Take I somehow thought it was finished after the first or first two chapters and it was such a great surprise to one time revisit and discover it was a wip. I had fallen in love with your Jon anyhow but then I got very intrigued with/by(?) the relationships. Best Wishes! Ingwer
Thank you so much!
I’m glad you love Jon and find all the relationships intriguing because, despite my original lighthearted cracky intentions, that is what the story transformed into: an exploration of relationships - romantic, familial, platonic - and what it takes to form genuine connections, as told by… Jon Martello, hahaha. The progression of the relationship between Jon and Eames, especially, is one that took me by surprise.
(Honestly, if I’d known the theme of relationships/connection was going to be a central one, I would’ve sowed the seeds from the earliest chapters, but I had no idea. One of the pitfalls (and joys) of WIP posting, I suppose. Double Take is definitely a tale that grew in the telling.)
Thank you again for reading, and for all the lovely, thoughtful feedback you’ve left on the story!
youcantsaymylastname replied to your post “Fanfic Year in Review: 2016”
Your moobs Bane story was one of my favourites this year. You had John POV spot on with his can do personality, his inability to stop saying what's on his mind and Bane's confusion about the whole situation but wanting to try something for John.
Aaaahhhh, thank you so much! I do adore John and his bluntness (which cooler heads might interpret as hotheaded ;)), and examining Bane, that human bundle of contradictions, through John’s detective eyes is always fun.
amazinmango replied to your post “Fanfic Year in Review: 2016”
MOTHER OF CHEESE YOU ARE BEYOND AMAZE
also Bane moobs omg i need to get on that
Everyone needs to get onto Bane’s moobs. There’s ample space, after all ;D
fruityshirts replied to your post “hi, sib. i just read your fic persistence, and it was so beautifully...”
Such good advice!
Thanks! I mean, again, there’s no guarantee it’ll work, and it looks like such a small step, it’s tempting to ignore. But in my experience, perfectionism is so, so insidious (even without including the various mental disorders it generally goes hand-in-hand with), intertwined with so much of one’s brain, you sometimes have to go full inception and introduce the simplest version of an idea - in this case, the small shift that your goal is just words, not good words - to even start effecting change in one’s self.
Hi! We don't know each other but I sometimes look at your fob posts. I saw your tag about being sad reading the article about Joe's book. As I said, I don't know you, but I listened to the podcast from which Joe is quoted and he sounds a lot more positive there. He talks differentiated, self depricating (as always) and with warmth about his experiences as a musician, about fall out boy and more. Since it was your post that I even found the podcast I wanted to tell you this. Best Wishes Ingwer
hey, thank you for telling me! i haven't had a chance to listen to the podcast, but i have heard from posts on here that the article doesn't have much of the context and took some pretty bad pull quotes. it's unfortunate because i've seen people on twitter and places use it as an excuse to hate mania or make out there's a rift between joe and pete and patrick, which obviously isn't true.
i'm still sad they don't seem to be working on an album for release any time soon, but i'm very glad they're still always writing and all four of them are clearly still best buds.
I like the scene between Morgana and Arthur in the car driving at the beginning of It's agood refrain. It's the scene that makes me want to reread the story because of the cosy and siblingsy (there is sisterly and brotherly but nothing for siblings? in German there is) athmosphere and because it stands for the whole story that is so much about Arthur and his different relationships and how much they all care for him. So. I hope I got the ask meme right, I didn't check it again. Cheers Ingwer
I love writing siblings so much! And Arthur and Morgana are such fun siblings to write. (You're right, though, English really needs a word that means siblingy.) And I'm so glad that it set up the whole fic for you, that's wonderful to hear.
Ted Lasso is great! I am watching it after having it seen on your blog. I couldn't get into series for a while but this one is so funny, heartfelt and still a little bit mean that it just suits me. And Anthony Head is so awful just like he was as Uther when he was just great being awful as well. But ugh he is awful I hope she kicks him in the balls befor this gala is over. So back to it. Best Wishes Ingwer!
Oh man, I hope you enjoy as you continue! It's really just such a good kind show. (Other than Anthony Head, who is delectably despicable.) I'm also having some trouble getting into shows, but this is one of a very few this year that just felt good to watch and that I didn't get bogged down in or procrastinate on finishing!
Nell, I am so glad you recommended (or just said you liked ...?) Julie and the Phantoms. It is so wonderful - music, nice relationships, taking the ghost thing seriously, fun (fun!), all of them their own kind of dorky. Have a good day! Ingwer
Isn’t it just so charming? I am beyond delighted that I saw enough rumblings about it on my dash that I decided to watch it, and pleased that I’m passing on the joy as well! I am just crossing absolutely everything that it gets renewed and that they figure out a way to resurrect ghosts because I read Meg Cabot’s Mediator series at a formative age okay.
Hm, Ficlet Time ... MorganaxGwen (gen or ship) - not villified "old magic" or/and balancing jobs and relationships and me time/things that matter to oneself - or another ship to the last trope Best Wishes ingwer, i hope you are well!
(My Merlin agenda, this many years on, is apparently justice for Morgana and magic reveals for EVERYONE.)
Almost as soon as she learns how to do anything on purpose, Morgana wants to show it to Gwen.
She ought to have expected it. Ever since Morgana picked her out of a line of chambermaids when Uther finally let her choose her own staff, Gwen has been her closest companion. She sees Morgana's gowns, her letters, her new sword tricks. Everything she is, Gwen knows, and she doesn't pretend it's only the good or easy things. Gwen knows her nightmares too, after all.
She just doesn't know that they're magic. That Morgana sees the future, and that her nightmares have always been that. She thinks Gaius's tonics are to help her, and not to suppress it.
Morgana must keep this secret from Uther, if she wants to live. She has to keep it from Arthur, because she's not sure she trusts where his loyalties are. Merlin knows, but Merlin knows too much and tells her none of it, and she's not sure how much she can trust him either. But Gwen—Gwen deserves to know. She won't betray Morgana, and if she's disgusted, if it all reminds her too much of her father, she'll just leave. It will break Morgana's heart, but it will leave her alive.
So, when she learns how to light candles with precision, correctly and every time, when she's practiced it in a mirror enough to see that eerie ring of gold in her eyes when she does, she waits for an evening when Gwen is helping her undress and turns to catch her hands. “I want to show you something.”
Gwen smiles at her, confused but trusting. “What is it?”
“Sit down, please.” Gwen does, more confused than smiling now, but she doesn't look frightened, either. Morgana memorizes her face, in case it does become fear, in case Gwen decides she's a monster now. “I want you to know something about me. I've only known it a few months.” Gwen's breath catches, her eyes get wider, and Morgana wonders, puzzled, what she thinks she knows, what confession she thinks is coming. It's clear there's one in her mind. “It's easier to show you than to tell you, Gwen, but … just know that you have no reason to be frightened. I wouldn't ever hurt you.”
“I know that,” says Gwen, and her voice is trembling a little, but not with fright. With anticipation, with whatever it is she thinks Morgana is about to do.
Maybe, Morgana assures herself, Gwen has guessed. Gwen is smart, and has watched her nightmares for years. She can put pieces together. Maybe she knows it's magic, and Morgana will say it, and there will be no shock, just a gentle “I know” and an appreciation of what she's learned. It's a beautiful fantasy. She can ask Gwen, after, what she thinks Morgana was going to do, and they can talk about that too. Secrets can only hurt them, and Morgana needs someone who knows her secrets, someone whose secrets she knows. “My dreams,” she says, and Gwen flinches, blinks, tilts her head. This isn't the conversation she was expecting, then. “They're of the future.”
“I know you dream of things that could happen. It's the worst kind of dream,” says Gwen, unsure, but from her knit brows, she already knows that's not what Morgana means.
“There's a certain kind of dream where if I dream it, it happens. No matter if I try to stop it or ignore it, it happens. And that means … I have magic. The dreams I can't choose, they're part of me, but other magic, that I'm choosing, and learning. I can do this.” And Morgana says the words that make her eyes glow, and the beeswax taper in the silver candlestick between them lights.
Gwen doesn't jump, or yelp, or back away from her. She doesn't scream. She just inhales sharply, watching Morgana's face instead of the candle, and after a tense second, lets her air out again, slow and shaky. “I don't know what to say,” she finally says.
“I don't know either,” Morgana admits. “I want to ask if you hate me, but it seems terribly selfish.”
“My lady—Morgana, I couldn't. But I'm terrified for you. What if Uther finds out?”
Uther has never seen her clearly. It's why he's always so unpleasantly surprised when she fights him. “I don't know. But that's why I'm trying to control it. Otherwise, I fear it will leap out of me, and I won't be able to choose the time or the place.”
“Then of course you must practice. Who else knows?”
“Merlin. And probably Gaius, though he likes to use Merlin as his messenger and pretend he doesn't.”
There's a flash of hurt there at Merlin knowing and Gwen not, and sometime Morgana will have to explain the murky nightmares she has about Merlin that could be the future and could be some mistrust from her waking life. Maybe they're the future far enough away that they could still be changed. It's a comforting thought, that all of Morgana's life isn't laid out in front of her unchanging. But Gwen, good Gwen, always better than Morgana deserves, shoves that hurt away in favor of a tremulous smile. “Very well. That makes it easier to practice. And explains why Arthur asked me if Merlin is pining after you, I suppose.” She clasps her hands in her lap and looks down at the candle. “What else can you do?”
Morgana could cry with relief. Instead, she sits down across the table from Gwen. “I'll show you.”
