For Narnia & Beyond

✮ Standing slightly in front of whoever they love in a crowd without noticing they do it

✮ The threat assessment that runs automatically in every new room they enter

✮ Learning everyone's allergies preferences fears exits on the first meeting just in case

✮ The voice that goes very quiet and very calm when something is actually wrong

✮ Absorbing conflict before it reaches the people they've decided to shield

✮ The violence they are capable of living quietly beside the gentleness they choose

✮ Remembering every person who ever hurt someone they loved with a precision that never fades

✮ Saying I'm fine through injuries that are not fine because worrying people feels worse than pain

✮ The tenderness that exists beneath the armor that only specific people ever get to see

✮ Being the person who stays sober at the party without being asked because someone should

✮ Noticing the shift in someone's energy before they've said a single word about what's wrong

✮ The apology they give for being overprotective that doesn't fully reach the eyes

✮ Carrying the weight of keeping everyone safe and never naming it as a weight

✮ The flaw of loving people in ways that leave no room for them to need anything from anyone else

✮ Fighting for everyone else's right to be soft while never allowing it in themselves

✮ The exhaustion visible only in private when the door is finally closed and no one needs anything

✮ Needing to be needed in a way that is both a gift and a wound

✮ The person who finally protects them back and the way that completely undoes them

✮ Having kept everyone safe for so long they don't know who they are when there's nothing to protect against

so then, when el sacrifices herself at the end of s1, mike should ostensibly have no reason to believe she's alive. all he has to go off of is that he thinks he maaaybe saw her standing outside the window and the fact that, well. it happened before didn't it? will came back. and again, he was right. el was alive.

so both times mike's loved ones ever approached death, both people came back to him as it magically resurrected from the dead. so, of course mike would think el is alive. why wouldn't he? if he's been proven right both times before? and of course, this final time, el really is dead. at the very least, functionally. because mike is never going to see her again, and he's never actually going to find out her true fate, so that's as good as dead.

Season 5 should've focused on the actual main characters, not a bunch of new ones

Season 5 should've had the apocalyptic theme they left off season 4 in, not just covering the upside down with metal bars and call it a day

Season 5 should've had the core four be together, not being seperated again

Season 5 should've given Jane independence, not making her entirely dependant on men like she had always been and not even making her last moments about herself.

Season 5 should've developed Steve and Nancys platonic bond, not forcing Steves romantic feelings again

Season 5 should've either bought Will and Mike together or fixed Mike and Jane, not just ignoring their problems and leaving it ambigious if they were dating to queerbait us

Season 5 should've given Will a love interest, not an imaginary epilogue boyfriend

Season 5 should've focused on Mike and Nancy, not Holly

Season 5 should've created new iconic moments, not try to recreate prior seasons iconic moments (and fail)

Season 5 should've given Lucas his own arc, not just make him Max' boyfriend

Season 5 should've made Erica a main character, not sideline her give her a total of 15 minutes screentime

Season 5 should've made the painting pay off, not just abandoning it yet still putting it in the epilogue

Season 5 should've focused on being its own thing, not just nostalgiabait

or we could be really really mean and horrible and we could say will has to find out that chester died shortly after will disappeared because the grief was just too much

Please tell me that Will eventually found out that this fierce “not possible” was Mike’s initial reaction to Eddie’s invitation to Hellfire Club.