It's extremely funny that there have been multiple writers in multiple mediums who've been allowed to write Wolverine from the X-men who clearly had no idea what a wolverine is and assumed it was a fancy word for "wolf", and at no point did any of the literally dozens of other people involved in bringing their writing to life see fit to challenge this assumption.
Sometimes the rest of the team gets handed a once in a lifetime opportunity to do the funniest thing, and all they have to do is keep their mouths shut long enough for it to go to print.
One of the classic Magic: the Gathering arts is that of Hyalopterous Lemure, where the artist mistook 'lemure' (a type of malignant spirit) for 'lemur' (a small fuzzy primate), but manage to *nail* 'hyalopterous'
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Ok, what if when two soulmates happen to be in front of a mirror at the same time they can see each other? It starts almost immediately so Shane at three or four is sitting on his parents' bed watching his mother get ready and instead of himself he sees another little boy with a halo of curls. They stare at each other. Shane, confused, waves. His wrong reflection does not wave with him. The other boy tilts his head and blinks in confusion. His mother doesn't notice. After a beat, the other boy pulls a face at him and sticks out his tongue. Purely on instinct, Shane sticks his tongue back out at him. They both laugh and then the other little boy freezes and runs off. Shane's reflection returns.
"What's funny, baby?" his mother asks.
"Nothing." Shane says because he has no idea what that was.
It takes awhile for happenstance to strike again, and even then it's only glimpses for awhile. Then at ten, they move and Shane has his own bathroom with a big mirror. Sometimes when he's getting ready for school in the morning, brushing his teeth, the other boy is there instead, but he's dressed like he's going to bed. By now, Shane has heard about soulmates, he wonders if the other boy has too. So Shane mouths 'hi'. The other boy frowns and mouths back something else entirely. When Shane shakes his head, the boy wrinkles his nose. It takes a few tries before Shane painstakingly writes a message out backwards and show it to the mirror 'My name is Shane. I speak English. You?'
The other boy stares at the words, frowns and then runs off. Shane waits and even though he winds up almost missing the bus it's worth it because the other boy holds up a sign with weird lettering, but he's patient enough to hold it until Shane can take a picture with his Polaroid. It takes weeks of looking in the library (Shane doesn't ask his teachers much of anything usually and anyway, he doesn't ever know what to do with himself during library time, so it gives him a project). He determines the other boy is using Cyrillic. This explains less than he'd like. The school library doesn't have any books about Cyrillic. Defeated, he finally caves and tells his parents "I see a boy in the mirror, he uses this alphabet, can I get a book?" His mother hugs him very hard. Soulmates, he learns, are rare and precious. He also learns that maybe his parents were worried about him in ways that don't entirely make sense, but okay. Fine. Glad we squared that away. Can I have a dictionary now?
If it had been two years later, he might not have asked. He would have been too afraid of what it might mean to have a male soulmate. Lucky they moved. Lucky that they brush their teeth and the same time.
Shaky-handed characters and pantomime get them to 'Ilya' and 'Shane'. A lucky glimpse in a locker room bathroom gets them to 'hockey'. They start to use clocks to make sure they don't miss each other. When Ilya misses one of their schedule times, Shane can barely think about anything else all day. He knows they won't have a chance again until tomorrow, but when he goes to pee before dinner, he finds Ilya in the mirror, his eyes red-rimmed. For the first time, Ilya seems way too far away. Shane put his hand to the mirror and when Ilya put his hand up too and it's shaking, Shane wants desperately to be closer. That's how his mom finds him on top of the vanity which is not doing well with the weight of a preadolescent hockey player with his whole torso pressed to the glass. She doesn't make him get down. Maybe because he's crying too without any idea what they're both sobbing about. He won't for years.
It goes and goes. Shane interrupts Ilya getting ready to go out, finds him styling his hair. Shane mimics him with a smile and Ilya wrinkles his nose at him. Ilya watches Shane floss in bafflement, but takes up the habit too, seemingly so he can make fun of the faces Shane makes. When they happen to catch each other in hockey gear, they use their fingers to signal goals and assists. Shane keeps track in a little book that holds a lot of things. No one else can see Ilya, anymore than any one can see Shane on Ilya's side, but they learn to be careful in public restrooms, coming up with a clear subtle signal for 'not home' since they can't see the others location. They watch each other grow up. They learn how to write in each other's languages and backwards at that.
And finally, finally, comes the sentence that makes Shane's heart skip a beat. In Ilya's pretty handwriting (good even in his second language and backwards which makes Shane unbearably jealous and proud):
I will see you soon.
They meet at four sitting on their mother's beds across the world from each other. They meet at twelve, sharing a pain that doesn't need words to be clear. They meet at fourteen, Shane fresh out of the shower and Ilya shirtless, things wakening in Shane that he thought he would never understand. They meet at sixteen, hands pressed to the place on Shane's mirror that is always marred with fingerprints.
They meet at seventeen. Shane sees him across the parking lot and tries to stay cool, walking instead of running. He watches Ilya try to light his cigarette and gets there before flame touches it.
"You're not kissing me for the first time tasting like cigarette smoke, asshole."
"This is not romantic," Ilya protested. "This is not first time I hear your voice."
"I love you," Shane said irritably, "do not light that thing or I'll throw up."
Ilya's breath caught. "You do not know me. You do not love me yet."
"I do," Shane said stubbornly. Then he stuck out his hand, "I'm Shane Hollander."
With a smirk, Ilya took his hand. "Ilya Rozanov."
Shane didn't let his hand go. He held firm and Ilya didn't try to pull away.
"There, now we know each other. I love you. Kiss me."
"Shane. I have to go back. It is no good there if we..."
"I know. Mom read me a bunch of articles," Shane said with a shrug. "But there's no one else out here. Kiss here. Everything else later. Okay?"
"Okay," Ilya said.
They kissed in that terrible parking lot and Shane never wanted it to end. He pulled away with a soft sigh.
"Wow."
"Wow," Ilya repeated teasingly. "You will say this when we beat you too."
"Not happening," Shane laughed. He was still holding Ilya's hand, a circuit completed.
When Shane got back in the car, his mother asks, "How did it go?"
Shane has a number in his pocket and a promise for a mirror meeting tonight once Ilya's roommate goes to sleep that makes his ears burn.
"He's kind of an asshole," Shane said, delighted.
"Okay," his mother laughed. "I can't wait to meet him."
And it's not that it's easy. Ilya goes to Boston and Shane goes to Montreal. They will have years before they see each other more in person than through reflections. But when Ilya gets ready for game 7 of the Cup, he does it with Shane smoldering with lusty jealousy from twelve inches away. And when it's Shane's turn, Ilya wears his jersey alone in the privacy of his house so Shane can see it before he heads off to victory.
Even years later, when they're married and more often before a mirror together than trying to communicate through them, sometimes they do it anyway. If Shane is washing his hands, ready to go back out to a photoshoot, he'll look up to find Ilya flirting with him or holding up Anya to make her wave at him.
There is always a handprint on their mirrors.
Sometimes they are apart, but they are rarely alone.
You have just lost use of this random kitchen item/ implement how screwed are you in terms of cooking?
https://wheelofnames.com/ry4-3s4
The wheel is completed but if you the mod want to change it at all feel free and I couldn't figure out how to get the link to work properly even un-anoned.
Thanks, have a nice day and drink some water
You have just lost use of this random kitchen item/implement!
attaching something to an email is so scary. what if i accidentally put hard-core porn in there. i don't think i have any downloaded but what if i do and i attached it to the email. what then.
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I think a lot of people misunderstand why enemies to lovers is so popular. It’s quickly become one of the most pervasive tropes in many novels. Is it the banter, the tension? That’s definitely part of it. But if that were true, then friends-to-lovers and literally any romance with good dialogue and characterization would scratch the same itch. For some, it does, but for many…enemies-to-lovers just hits different.
My theory is that it isn’t actually about love, not really. I think it fulfils a fantasy that no other trope can provide: the fantasy of being seen as an equal.
Think about what specifically makes someone an enemy in fiction. It’s not just someone the MC dislikes, it’s someone who can affect them in tangible ways, maybe even have the power to ruin them, challenge their worldview, expose their weaknesses, etc. The relationship begins with conflict because the characters are fundamentally opposed in some way. It doesn’t matter why, but they’re fighting. There is a struggle for dominance.
I would argue that the most impactful enemies-to-lovers moments are never the romantic moments, they’re the scenes where power shifts. They BOTH lose: they’re forced into a position that would have horrified them at the beginning of the story. They end up needing (or wanting) each other.
That’s why I think people are often disappointed when a supposed enemies-to-lovers story turns out to be a milquetoast attempt where they’re just kinda mean to each other for a few pages, and then immediately start making out. Where’s the risk, the actual threat? If the characters aren’t capable of genuinely affecting one another, then the relationship isn’t actually transforming in a satisfying way. The appeal is in the fact that they have power over each other, because the eventual trust they build requires real surrender.
Because here’s the thing about enemies; they pay attention, and usually more attention than anyone else. They notice weaknesses because they’re actively looking for them, they notice strengths because they need to account for them. They notice habits, blind spots, ambitions, fears.
They study the MC with a level of scrutiny that borders (and later crosses) intimate, but unlike friends (or supporting characters in the MC’s corner) they’re not willing to give them the benefit of the doubt, they don’t overlook flaws out of affection. Which is exactly what makes the eventual romance so satisfying. It feels earned.
It’s easy to imagine being loved by someone who sees the best version of you, but it’s an entirely different thing to be loved by someone who has seen you at your worst. That’s why this dynamic often feels more convincing than romances where the characters are immediately into each other.
I imagine there are many who go through life feeling misunderstood, or worse, that the people who love them only love the polished, perfect version they present to the world, almost like impostor syndrome. But what if there was someone who couldn’t be fooled by this carefully constructed image?
When someone more powerful chooses someone, maybe the fantasy is protection. When it’s someone less powerful, the fantasy might be admiration. But if there’s someone intelligent and observant enough to see the MC as an equal, the fantasy there is the most intense and honest validation.
Which means enemies to lovers was never about turning hate/annoyance into love, it was about turning power into vulnerability – which is a terrifying loss of power, which THEN leads to intimacy.
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buzz aldrin and neil armstrong liked to do a thing where they’d tell unfunny jokes at parties about being on the moon and when people were confused they’d go “guess you had to have been there”
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