Madeline: Helen, I know you want to do that thing where we're arguing and fighting, but then suddenly it's like "Whoa, this is hot," and we start making out. Dream on!
i love the concept of time lord dazai who strictly lives by one specific rule: he never allows himself to get closer to the people he encounters on his journey because while they are mortals, he isn't. they can spend the rest of their lives with him, but he will never grow old with them.
no matter how much he time-travels across the universe, that consuming loneliness that punches the oxygen out of his lungs is always going to be there.
that is, until a certain hot-headed ginger enters the equation as the most unpredictable of all variables.
chuuya is fierce, stubborn, loud, passionate, spiteful, loyal to the point it might get him killed.
letting him go will be the hardest thing dazai has ever done.
I was watching someone's soundtrack reaction to the Wicked movie when Defying Gravity popped up and they said this:
"From Glinda's perspective she's like 'Why would you not just put on a face? Do you have to say everything you feel, and do everything you stand by?'"
And I was just like: There! There! You broke Glinda down to her bare bones! Everything about her is a performance meant to make the majority of people adore her! She's a bubbly blonde with a pretty face. No one expects her to be anything else. Despite this though, Glinda is honestly the more strategic and less impulsive of the two. Elphaba constantly has so much passion just bursting forth. She's reactionary. And the hard part about Defying Gravity is that for a moment Glinda gets swept up in that passion. She cares for Elphie so much and of course she would love to go with her, look out for her, because Elphie's right about a lot of things, and they would be an unbeatable team.
But once Glinda stops to think, once she's able to truly grasp the severity of what Elphie's suggesting, all she can see is two young women going up against someone who controls perception throughout the whole country. She sees that they don't have a plan. They don't have anywhere to go. She sees them both having to run and run and run. She can't be as impulsive as Elphie. She can't even be as passionate. Because Glinda has buried so much of herself behind a facade that to be truly exposed for what she really is feels like it would be a death sentence for her.
Glinda is a coward in all the ways that truly matter.
And that's before we even get into Act 2, where the woman is truly just a person shaped by every regret and repressed feeling she's ever had hiding behind a pearly white smile and a dulcet giggle. She's the new puppet on a string, the new plaything for the propaganda machine and she couldn't be happier, couldn't be lovelier.
And when she does see Elphie again, she feels everything. She's so happy to see her alive, she's so mad at her for leaving, she's so defensive because she's ashamed of the part she's played in it all, of being encouraging to the people of Oz.
She hates her role. She hates the people eating up lies about her Elphie. She hates herself for letting her need to be admired and adored, her fear of losing all of that, keep her from the one person she truly ever loved with all her heart.
it's not often, really, it's not, but cyrus has a venomous side to him. everyone knows how passionate he can get - what happens when there is hatred and spite in that passion?
sometimes you watch a video of James Vowles calling Alex special and your mind goes blank and three weeks later you have 6k
everlasting thanks to @latecomersprivilege for cheerleading, proofreading, and encouraging my crimes
don't like a gold rush
Rated Explicit
Fandom F1 RPF
Pairing Alexander Albon/George Russell
5,951 words
In which Alex having a good boss for once drives George absolutely mad.
First part below:
James Vowles is the best thing that could have happened for Williams. Well, the best in 2023, second overall - second to signing Alex. George truly believes that, has said it often, loudly, to anyone unfortunate enough to be nearby with a microphone. Even as the spectre of getting caught in the Albon DRS train gets ever closer, even as the W14 lets him down at every turn, he’s still got a massive soft spot for his old team. He wants the best for them. He wants the best for Alex.
And James as a boss is everything Horner wasn’t, as far as George can tell. Even-tempered. Even-handed. Kind. George has been in the Mercedes orbit long enough to see that. James wasn’t the type to talk down to a fourteen-year-old touring a garage with eyes like saucers. Instead he offered a steadiness even Toto couldn’t match. His good opinion had been worth having, and George had fought to get it.
He likes James, for Christsakes.
So, it’s something of a surprise to find himself grinding his teeth as Alex gets second-beer tipsy and starts waxing poetic about what a difference he’s made to the team.
They’ve got a small table at the back of a footie pub in London, where not a single regular is under 60 and clearly no one gives two shits about Formula One. It’s not built for tall men; their knees jam up against each other. George is slightly too warm in his jumper and coat, prickles of heat across the back of his shoulders. And his molars ache as Alex keeps going on about bloody James Vowles.
“Some of it’s the car, obviously, and the calendar,” Alex is saying, too media-trained to not add context and caveats in any declaration, “but James is just- like, no offence to Jost, but- he gets it. It’s like we’re all going in the same direction. Points aren’t a fucking miracle anymore, it’s expected, but not in a bad way, you know?”
“Don’t rule out the driver,” George adds, because he’s pathetic, really, weak for the indulgent eyeroll and grin Alex throws him to hide the genuine pleased flush of a compliment. And, because, well. It can’t all be James.
He’s not blind to the fact Alex has dragged Williams higher than he ever managed. And yes, it’s a different car, a different set up, but Alex is fucking quick, and it’s about time someone else noticed.
“No, but really, it’s- Look, I’m not saying it’s perfect, I’m sure Logan has something to say about his contract renewal, but I’ve never had a boss who takes care of the team like he does. It’s nice,” Alex finishes, with that half-shrug he adopts to couch his opinions in nonchalance. George knows him too well to fall for it.
Something hot and slick and sour coats the inside of his chest cavity, roiling up from his belly. He necks the rest of his pint before it can escape over his tongue. “He takes care of you?” he manages, and it almost sounds normal, squeezed out of his throat like that, everything else trapped behind his teeth.
A glint comes into Alex’s eye. “I’m sure it’s not the full Toto Wolff experience-”
“Piss off.”
“-holidaying together, sharing a crossword, father-son fishing trips-”
“Piss off!”
“But, yeah. Logan more, obviously, he needs it more. But- you know after Silverstone, after you pointed out the shoulder thing, he had them look at the seat again? That kind of thing.”
Of course George remembers Silverstone. He’d joked about it, under the watchful eyes of the press and a Williams PR woman who knew him far too well, because Alex hated when George made a sincere fuss, but he could just about get away with taking the piss.
It’s good, he reminds himself, that James doesn’t want the car to shake his drivers to pieces. But that doesn’t stop the sudden blinding vision of James pressing a bandage against Alex’s skin.
George had done it, back in the summer, when Alex had tripped on their run and the jerk of the fall had reopened the scar from the seat. George had only had these stupid Superdrug plasters, all too small, so he’d had to line three up, carefully overlap them and smooth them down so they wouldn’t ruck up into a mess when Alex rolled his shoulders. Alex had said he was making too much of a fuss then as well, but he’d shivered as George ran a thumb around the edge of each plaster to check the seal.
It hadn’t been normal for George, obviously, having his best mate half-naked in his bathroom, the mirror too big for comfort, all of his face there to be seen as he touched Alex’s skin. But. But the thought of James doing the same makes George’s fingers tighten on his glass. And he knows, logically, that it didn’t happen; that Williams has a medic, that Alex has a trainer, that there’s half a dozen people on the team who take care of Alex. Who have that in their job descriptions.
He just- Christ. He wants it to be him.
“I’m glad, mate,” he lies. Swallows. Makes himself hold Alex’s gaze when he responds with his ducked-head smile. But he nudges the conversation on so he doesn’t have to keep lying, swaps the wildest rumours he can with Alex’s - Charles to Red Bull, Lewis to Ferrari, Fernando collecting a seat on every team like he’s filling out a Pokedex. The caustic burn lingers in the back of his throat, despite four pints and a packet of crisps.
Read the rest on AO3
