I am genuinely worried about James, was it another concussion? How is Chaser handling this? I know you won’t give spoilers but can you at least tell people that concerns over James’ time on IR are unfounded?
This is as spoiler free as possible, but discussing events further down the line is inherently spoiler-y, so. Cut for spoilers.
Being very vague intentionally, I do want to confirm that James doesn't have a concussion and isn't seriously injured (100%, Finn would not be hosting a dinner party if his BFF had just received that news, Holden would have to ask him to leave (and he so wouldn't, he'd just vent text at Fiona from another room while she mocked him for being a jealous bitch every time James paid attention to someone that wasn't him.)
elliott is an 11 year old autistic boy. he is french-british and is an ESTP. he was born on july 16th and is estimated to have died on october 2nd. he is gay and asexual and has a crush on james erickson. he was born without his left hand and forearm. elliott lives with his father, gregory marshall and step mother, kathrine marshall. he has an older step sister named ruth. his biological mother, allison marshall, had died in childbirth. he likes talking about his special interests, especially frogs and poetry. he enjoys singing and wants to be in the choir. he is also mentioned loving the ocean and swimming in general. he is often annoyed by having only 1/2 of an arm and being cold. he is noted to strongly dislike roger due to his attitude and rude nature. elliott is an avid banana hater for some unknown reason and dislikes arguing or needing help. he tragically passed from drowning. he wanted to pursue poetry and other art forms, and is known as a positive force on the island.
For the prompt: Please, we need Finn’s POV of James and Holden!
This is 99% a loving but honest treatise about Finn's Bestest Friend, because Finn Schneider, everybody.
James has always been someone who keeps things close to the vest. Some of their teammates have referred to James as secretive, and every time Finn’s overheard them he’s corrected them.
Private, he says. James is private.
But honestly, Finn doesn’t actually disagree with them.
James is private, Finn means that, but it isn’t just privacy. Privacy is a preference. Secrecy is something else. Finn doesn’t know how to explain the difference, but he thinks most people would agree there is one, and most people who’ve met James would agree that James is the latter.
Finn is private. James is something else entirely.
Finn had known James for almost a year before he learned he had a brother. Even though James had met all his siblings by that point, Finn had only heard about Chelsea, and he probably only knew about her because, besides his parents, she was the only person who ever called James. Or, Finn supposes, not necessarily the only ones who called, but they were the only ones whose calls James actually picked up.
It took Finn five years, give or take, before he knew, really knew, that James was gay, and even then, it wasn’t because James told him. And maybe he isn’t gay, maybe he’d prefer Finn use another word entirely, but it’s not like Finn can ask him, considering if James does know Finn’s aware, he’s doing a very good job of pretending not to. Or maybe he’s just trying not to think about it. He does that sometimes.
Five years. Finn’s not saying that he didn’t suspect before that, but —
He doesn’t like that word, ‘suspect’. It makes it sound like James has done something unethical, illegal. Or alternately, that Finn spends all his time gathering intel about people, putting together data like pieces of a puzzle — adding up a glance, an awkward pause, a smirk, forming a clear picture out of signals that most people don’t even know they’ve been making.
Maybe the second one’s a little too close to the truth for his liking. It’s not that he does it on purpose, exactly — he doesn’t want to be nosy, or overstep, and he thinks he mostly manages to avoid that.
But he can’t keep his brain from cataloguing all those pieces of information, can’t keep it from noticing which ones might fit together, even if he never confronts someone with the information, never mentions it to anyone else, never lets it change the way he treats them.
Giving someone clues, often unknowingly, isn’t the same as telling them something, and in his experience, people don’t appreciate you knowing things they haven’t told you. They certainly don’t like knowing you can predict their behaviour — people really hate thinking they're predictable — so Finn’s learned to keep his mouth shut, let them think that they aren’t.
But he still knows all those things about them. He can't help that.
Five years, it took. At least four of them as James’ best friend. Because that's what he is, he knows that even though James doesn't say it. He’s the only person James can still tolerate by the end of a long road trip, the first person James would call if he needed a hand, an ear, a guide. On most things, at least, and he’s thankful James can go to his sister or his mom for all the stuff Finn's just as hopeless with. The first person James would call in an emergency — after 911, obviously, if it was that kind.
It’s not like that doesn’t go both ways — he’s Finn’s best friend too. Finn probably wouldn’t call him in an emergency, but that’s because James usually has his phone on silent, and he probably wouldn’t pick up. Also, Finn loves him, but with the exception of a couple very specific scenarios Finn can see James being extremely helpful for, most of them hockey related, his particular skillset doesn’t exactly match the ones needed during most emergencies.
Finn had a flat last month. Not a real emergency, honestly, but close enough for the purposes of illustration. The first call he made was to AAA, and the second one was to Georgie, who lived nearby, and came to pick him up so he didn’t have to catch a ride with the tow truck.
If Georgie hadn’t answered Finn probably would have called Logan, though he’s almost as bad at picking up as James is, then maybe Greg, who also lived around there, or his right-side neighbours, who are the genuinely neighbourly kind, and wouldn’t be going out of their way on the ride back home, at least.
He texted James while he waited for G, though. James replied three hours later with You have AAA right?
Finn doesn’t mean to make James sound like a bad friend, because he isn’t one. He’s kind, and hard-working, and brilliant about the game. He has high standards, but he holds himself to even higher ones. He can miss the obvious sometimes, but he's uncannily observant about other things — he probably knows more about Finn's preferences than he does, and notices before anyone, even the coaching staff, what isn't working with a drill.
He makes Finn laugh too — sometimes it's unintentional, but it usually isn't. James is funny, though Finn knows nobody believes him, because James doesn't tell jokes, he mumbles them, and he only does it with a few select people, Finn luckily among them. And the comments he mutters to Finn under his breath are usually snarky enough to make Finn struggle to keep a straight face, things that Finn would never say, or even mutter, but does sometimes find himself thinking.
And he’s — he’s comfortable. Or more, Finn’s comfortable around him, the way he hasn’t felt with anyone but family before, not even G.
Around James, everything is just a little bit easier. It’s easier to step up, easier to speak out, easier to know what to do, to trust the decisions he makes.
It probably helps that James always looks like Finn’s saved his ass by ordering his drink while he’s in the bathroom, grabbing him OJ across the street because the hotel ran out and James isn’t nearly awake enough yet to go himself, checking in after James notices a call-up has been putting it back after games. Like Finn’s some kind of really boring superhero. Super Schneids, saving the day one glass of orange juice and possible intervention at a time.
Finn didn’t tell James, because it wouldn’t have helped anything, but he wasn’t any more enthusiastic about Holden joining the team than James was. It’s taken years for their team to grow up, grow closer, for the room to gel. It's their team — all of theirs, of course, but it’s James' and Finn’s and G’s. Like some sort of Charlie’s Angels, where G’s got the good looks and charm, James is the strategic genius, and Finn’s — well, Finn knows how to talk to people.
Adding anyone to the room can change the dynamic, no matter who they are, and Holden Chase wasn’t just anyone. He had a history with half the roster, some of it pretty ugly, and James didn’t hide the fact he detested him. Detested him a way Finn hadn’t seen him act with any other opponent before, though James has nursed more than a few quiet vendettas, ones Finn’s probably the only one aware of, because, well, James is private. But everybody on the roster knew how he felt about Holden Chase well before he got here.
It makes Finn wonder if this was something — inevitable, maybe. That line about a thin line between love and hate. James doesn’t pay much attention to anyone unless they impress him, but he paid a lot of attention to Holden, even as he claimed he wasn’t impressed at all.
Inevitable, though Finn doesn’t know what started it, can’t quite peg the moment, though he bets it wasn't when James was clenching his jaw the second Chaser walked in the room, certainly after he lost his composure in practice for only the second time Finn’s ever seen, and more...spectacularly than anyone would have expected, Finn included, and Finn’s pretty sure he knows James better than anyone.
But still not well enough, apparently. Not well enough to know what changed, or more, how it did — when it was, who made the first move — though he assumes it had to have been Holden. He knows James at least that well.
But he doesn't know exactly what it is, or more, how James would describe it. Beyond ‘someone special’, at least, though those are the words from Finn’s mom, not him, he just acknowledged there was someone. The first time he said it, Finn assumes to anyone.
A confession he followed up with an uncomfortable, roundabout series of questions that Finn was pretty sure boiled down to ‘do you know it’s Chase? Please don’t actually confirm that, I’ve already dealt with enough tonight’, judging by his visible relief when the subject was dropped. Right before he lit up at the suggestion of going to meet up with the team, even though a year ago he would have made a face at Finn for the question, like ‘obviously not, who do you think I am?’.
But then, a year ago, Finn wouldn’t have asked him that question, because he does know James. Not perfectly, or even as well as he wants to, because James shrinks back from interest like a turtle hiding in its shell, but as well as James allows.
And, as well as he knows James, he still finds it all a little — inexplicable, maybe. Or not, maybe it isn’t, but nobody’s explaining it, certainly not to him. But Finn keeps his mouth shut, keeps his eyes forward, the first rules of the locker room, probably even more important than ‘don’t suck’. If James wants to explain it, Finn’s happy to listen, but in the meantime, he picks up the pieces, fits them together the best he can, and hopes like hell this all won’t blow up.
Look, couldn't explain why but I low-key have a feeling Holden and Ethan would get on. Or at least, the interaction woild be entertaining? Despite knowing almost nothing about Ethan lol
Ethan: My brother threw a punch at you? James?
Holden: uh, yeah, but I ducked, and obviously we're more than cool now, and that was ancient--
Ethan: Tell me what you said to him.
Holden: It's really nice you're protective of him but -- is that a notebook?
So, after the general info on masking, here's how it specifically looks like and impacts some of the 'verse's characters.
I think I kind of need to preface this with the fact that a lot of my characters have neurodivergent traits because, well. I do. I don't know how a neurotypical person thinks, the same way a neurotypical person doesn't know how a neurodivergent person thinks. You can read about the experience, and, despite shitty stereotypes to the contrary, you can empathize with it, but the wiring of the brain is literally different.
So when I'm listing characters here as neurodivergent, I either a) set out to write them that way or b) in hindsight can't deny that their experiences are written through a very specifically neurodivergent lens. Someone not being explicitly labelled as ND doesn't necessarily mean they aren't, I just..really don't want to go back through my entire 'verse applying diagnoses the same way I happily slap an MBTI or enneagram or kindergarten teacher/assassin label on them, because that feels wrong.
But if you're neurodivergent and see something in a particular character that makes you feel seen, I'm not going to tell you 'nah man, they're actually neurotypical'. Especially because literally every single one of them was written by someone neurodivergent.
Anyway! Canonically ND characters and their masks:
David: masks extensively. Generally does his best for 'unobtrusive, pay no attention', unsure why it doesn't seem to work (mostly because he's talented and beautiful, so it seems less 'unobtrusive' and more 'I think I'm better than you', which isn't helped by the fact that often when the mask does slip, it's to show frustration, contempt, or disdain -- think at the All-Star Game his rookie year, or several points early on with Jake. Also does not help that he often does think he's better than people.)
Bryce: Still laughing at 'straightsona' used to describe Bryce out with his teammates, because it's perfect. His 'I don't care, I'm hot as shit, bitches love me' dickhead behaviour was him picking up those behaviours from popular peers and teammates over the years, partly mistaking that for the reason they were popular (rather than being seen as boy kings making them callous or arrogant), and partly viewing them as the exemplar of someone no one would predict was gay. Jared's worst enemy.
Speaking of, honourable mention to Raf Sanchez AND Julius Halla here, Jared's going around collecting neurodivergent loved ones all through IJ(aoe).
James: 'unobtrusive, pay no attention', much more successfully than David, partly because he has a mouthpiece in the form of Finn. His crashing after road trips is partly extended overstimulation and change, but it's also having to wear the mask more extensively, because he has much less time to himself, especially when he shared a room. (He's mostly unmasked with Finn, that's why Finn is his exception to a lot of No People things, but he wasn't at the beginning).
Holden: Also kind of 'I don't care, I'm hot as shit, bitches love me', but...ironically? He doesn't mask as much as the others, and because of that, he frequently drives away people who originally seem to like him and wonders why. Has been described as 'a lot'.
Fiona: Literally will not leave the house without a full face of makeup and a pair of heels or she'll feel exposed and vulnerable, and putting her make up on is how she prepares to be Outside Fiona. She's very perky and friendly at work. The second she gets home it's an 'uggggh' moment and straight into the shower to decompress/literally unmask. She's more aware than any of the guys that she's putting on a performance, partly because she grew up with all those 'girls are expected to be...' followed by a list of things she definitively wasn't. Has also been described as 'a lot'.
Finn: And How May I Be of Service To You Today?
Now this is where it gets kind of interesting because like -- people often have facades. That's not a neurodivergent only thing. People can be fake, or posture, or pretend to be something they're not. Mike, for example, will lean into the big macho asshole when he's put on the defensive, Willy is Always Performing, Thomas is sunshine even when he doesn't really feel like being that, Robbie will play the buffoon to make people laugh if he thinks they need it, half of Joey's rants are playing to the cheap seats.
Like, there's a difference between pretending you're somebody else sometimes, or behaving inauthentically, and full on 'yeah, they're masking'.
But Georgie is masking. Georgie is, at all times, evaluating his surroundings, monitoring people's emotions and reactions (especially to him), and behaving in the manner he thinks is most likely to lead to his being liked. And he was already doing that when Robbie met him, but it's intensified significantly since.
I think that's where the biggest difference lies between some of the above ND characters and Georgie? David, for example, doesn't care if he's liked (like, yes he does, but also...no). The mask is for safety/to minimize vulnerability. David's in particular was tweaked to get praise and avoid criticism from his parents (didn't work), teachers, and coaches (worked much better), not so much for his peers.
But Georgie's isn't for safety. Georgie doesn't manage his behaviour to avoid harm, Georgie wants people to like him. And he's discovered that people don't seem to like him when he does certain things, or acts certain ways, or needs things from them, so he just...doesn't do those things.
Finn's interesting because he has both forms. Please like him it'll break his heart if you don't.
