#riverbed au

[malt-rants-and-stuff]

An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works

Summary:

“Five bucks says he won't come.” Ogasawara starts, pulling the cooler full of ice behind him. “Seven bucks says he shows up right before it ends,” Sasaki replies distractedly. Or; A drabble of sorts, centered around Oga and Sasaki on a walk for party snacks.

Finally finished this thing after getting distracted trying to tie it into other stuff, decided to gift it to you @dirtbra1n. Happy birthday to you again even though its the next day now!!

[malt-rants-and-stuff]

ask game Wow shirahama how come you get TWO miscommunications in one fic . title or whatever it was specifically. :]

HAHA OH NOOO. well more like oh yes but oh no for shirahama. this is what I like to call the "shirahama interlude" and I have one snippet from my outline for you that sums up the entire plot

i would say I feel sorry for him but I really don't. I need to keep putting this boy in situations.

okay for real though, this is the shirahama fic for my lovely riverbed au which I care for like my own thousands of words long child. very dear to me.

the basic idea of this fic is that in a world where sasaki never met miyano (at least not when he did in canon), shirahama for some reason Keeps meeting miyano. over and over again. not that miyano realizes this, since they meet randomly at very spaced out points in time.

the miscommunications mentioned in the doc name are very miserable times for everyone, one taking place before graduation and the other after it. shirahama will be the one to let both of these miscommunications go without trying to fix them. this is good for me and bad for him because I love a long game.

something to note here, shirahama and miyano become friends in a similar way to canon sasamiya becoming friends. except they're so much more embarrassing about it (in their own opinions) because the effects of two different but similar kinds of nerds becoming closer friends due to their interests meshing well can be catastrophic for their very repressed minds.

as in "devastating: the one person that gets me is making me question myself". and of course being romance lovers they both have their fair share of trope knowledge that logically should save them from miscommunication (<-it makes it 10x worse). surely the consequences of their actions won't lead to more problems. Definitely.

this fic is also the one that I had fun leaving little easter eggs in the other parts of the series for too. icey incidents had one, not sure if anyone spotted it though since it was a small moment and I doubt anyone would've thought to look out for it haha.

being the shirahama interlude, it's also the mid point of the series (at least as of now), so it really pulls tight on all the different plot threads left from the stories before it.

with a more meta angle, this fic made me draw on the different feelings that can come from growing up ignoring a truth deep inside of you. one you've grown comfortable letting ache and dig into the darkest corners of yourself in hopes that you'll be able to forget about it completely. but one day you grow too much, there isn't anywhere left to hide. one day you're all long limbs and silver hair shading your eyes, and you're forced to stand in the light.

[malt-rants-and-stuff]

malt I’m serious why do you have so many interesting wips do you understand how hard it was for me to pick just one. going with casual notes but genuinely Holy shit. I love you malt……

first of all thanks so much ahhajs I blame my notes app for being free and easy for me to access when I get an idea

second, that's so funny bc kiri also asked about this au, I talked alot in that response so if you want a little more insight about this au I'll point you there but. yes. casual notes. my dearly deranged.

this is my hanzawa and tashiro focused fic for the riverbed au! and the one that started me with the au as a whole, though not the first chronologically. if you've seen me explain before you'll know but I'll explain the au again. it's basically a what if everyone met at different times or never met at all au. very exciting stuff. with these two they end up meeting later, and most importantly: tashiro never joins the ping pong club. in my reply to kiri I explained what their dynamic is sort of, but I want to tell you about the fun thing that drives their narrative here: prev pres.

thats right!! even without the club, tashiro can't escape him. prev pres is friends with tashiro because of something really silly. hanzawa is friends with prev pres and is his vice captain. prev pres looks at them and goes "you know what would be fun?" and shoves them all into an enclosed space to hang out. it is a disaster on all fronts. the timeline for this fic is my usual style of time-jumpy nonsense, but it generally takes place over the course of their entire high-school career into tashiro's first year of college. a whole lot changes. have some snippets from said college year:

that second one is from my outline so apologies for the no names and just dialogue lol

the driving force for this au for me is really just "how much do these characters really, truly change each other throughout this series. what if we take that away. how much is left." how much of sasaki is left without miyano, how much hanzawa without tashiro, how much kagiura without hirano, how much how much how much

I'm not sure if I've found the answer yet. but it's been very enjoyable analyzing these guys and deciding what parts of them I can surgically remove without their entire identity as a character bleeding out of them.

[malt-rants-and-stuff]

typecasting myself and asking abt “casual notes [hanzawa I'm gonna lose my SHIT]”

lmao yeah this is on brand, and with one that I love lots too!

okay so this is for the riverbed au, my little spot of obsession. I’ve been in pits that i dug for myself. casual notes was the start of this whole idea. Idk if I’ve explained it for you before, it’s my “what if some people met at different times or never met at all” au basically. this one is my tashiro and hanzawa fic, which centers around them having met a little later. More importantly: tashiro never joins the ping pong club here. Why? Shirahama shenanigans in this au means that he never had the idea to join or invite tashiro to join with him.

have a snippet:

there are sort of two sides to this story. on one side we have tashiro, who is have A Time let me tell you. very much drifting through life in a way that he thinks he's at peace with. on the other side we have hanzawa who is about the same as he is in canon, mr. runs around at a million miles an hour keeping himself busy. Just. a little different. the lack of tashiro-isms in his life shows.

the fun bit about this fic is the fact that when they finally do meet they kind of? don't like each other? for reasons I'm elaborating on in my reply to db (edit: no I didn't. I forgot to.) since you both asked about this wip lol. and due to this dislike, they're sort of weirdly dancing around each other for ages. they don't have any Real interactions until tashiro is a second year and by the time hanzawa has graduated they still aren't sure what to think of each other. very much a "I'm not sure why but I don't know how to interact with you" type of deal. College aged hanzawa though? he is much more open to the idea of them hanging out. due to Reasons. and they do. to tashiro's detriment. it's a lovely time all around.

haunting one another is a must for these two. strangers to haters to "I think we watched the world end together, want to get a coffee?" to friends(?). they're fun.

[malt-rants-and-stuff]

I fucking love writing so muchhhh

16 pages of just ideas and notes and concepts for my au. so much good stuff. and it's just what I wrote in the last hour. for just one out of like 5 fics. I have so much I can do!! I love it here!!!!