Bette

And about the "straight coding"

and sexualisation of gay relationships: I literally just had a straight female friend say to me she is *obsessed* with jegulus but doesn't like wlw ships (in this case marylily) because she isn't attracted to women!

Though it never says so explicitly, it is definitely implied: Will would usually shave and not grow a beard. It’s why he’s described as having a baby face, with cute, round cheeks. A beard just doesn’t fit him. 

When, eventually, he does grow a beard, it’s understandable. Alyss, the love of his life, has just passed away. It doesn’t make sense. Nothing makes sense. Will stops caring. Stops taking care of himself. He doesn’t clean, doesn’t shave, doesn’t care. Of course he grows a beard. 

And not just because shaving costs a little too much energy, but also because Will grows to like the beard. He does. When he was still with Alyss - when she was still alive - he was himself. Without a beard. And now that she’s gone - well, he’s not the same person anymore, is he? And the beard symbolises that. 

So it makes sense. The beard. It’s okay. But-

Will’s doing better now. He is. He takes care of himself, for his friends, for Maddie, for himself. And no, he’s not the same person he was before Alyss died. He’ll never be. But he’s doing better. He’s smiling again, and laughing, and joking. There are even days that he’s happy. And yet the beard is still there. 

If the beard came into being because Will was depressed, wouldn’t its symbolism be even stronger if it disappeared when Will realises he’s no longer depressed? 

I know you addressed that Will is never going to be the same person again, but I think if he shaved his beard to symbolize that he’s doing better, that might undermine just how different he is now.

Will is nowhere near being the same bubbly, excited, curious person he was in the RA series. In fact, he’s so different from that that a common critique of TRR is ‘Will just became Halt’.

I’m going to change topic for a minute here but it’ll wrap back around so bear with me-

Throughout the series, Will rarely gives himself room to feel any uncomfortable emotions. The only times he does feel those emotions is when he is in the midst of a traumatic event, whether it be his kidnapping in books 2/3, losing tug in book 7, or Halt nearly dying in book 9. Outside of traumatic events, Will doesn’t process any emotions he deems as ‘bad’ or uncomfortable. One could write this off as Flanagan not exploring that side of him in the series (which isn’t inaccurate), but it could also be interpreted as Will having a tendency to bottle up his feelings.

One possible example of this is in the first book when Horace apologizes to him for being a bully. It would be perfectly natural, in fact very normal, for Will to be angry or sad or upset, but no. Will immediately forgives him. This could be interpreted as just being Will’s personality, but personally, I think he was scared of feeling any of those things. So, he skipped that step and went straight to being friends with Horace (which I’m not saying was a bad thing- I just think it would have been cool to see Will need some time before they became friends).

How does this all connect with Will’s beard?

Well, when Alyss died, Will couldn’t bottle up his feelings anymore. There was just to much there, so everything started pouring out. Although his breakdown was largely focused on her death, it wasn’t just about that. It was about every traumatic thing he had ever gone through. Like you said, he became deeply depressed and had a difficult time taking care of himself, if he even felt like he deserved that care.

I support the idea of his beard becoming a symbol of the pain, but slightly differently. I think of it like this instead-

In the first TRR, Will doesn’t take care of his beard. It’s gnarly and tattered and long. But, as he comes out of his depressive episode, instead of shaving it, he trims it- takes care of it. It no longer grows out of control like it used to.

Parallel that to uncomfortable emotions- in the first TRR, he’s engrossed in them. They became gnarly and overwhelming. But, over time, he starts taking care of them, treating them with the validation and respect they deserve. His emotions no longer overwhelm and attack him to the point of depression, but he also isn’t always happy and cheerful. No, he allows himself to be sad now, he allows himself to feel uncomfortable things.

Adding onto everything here, I also like to think of it as a sign of having to mature too fast too suddenly. Alyss was his soulmate yeah, but we also tend to ignore that Alyss had been in Will’s life since he could remember AND before it. Alyss was there with him throughout the entirety of his childhood, his teenage years and then his adult life.

Will wasn’t childish, but he was always an energetic person that liked to make jokes. The books described him as having a youthful personality plenty of times.

But Alyss’s death was sudden and unexpected. It was Will losing the love of his life that had been with him since he was a baby.It was him losing a plenty big part of his childhood as well. Of course he couldn’t be who he was anymore, the man pretty much aged 20 years just from the grief, and a beard is a pretty good way of symbolizing aging not only physically but mentally as well.

I wrote a whole essay on this last semester for one of my classes, discussing the relations between power, revenge, justice, and mourning, in TRR, but it plays into this as well. As far as we can tell, the very second Will learns of Alyss’ death - and more specifically, the who and why and how related to it - he becomes obsessed with revenge. He’s consumed by it. 

And he grows a beard. 

But here’s the thing: as a Ranger - one of the most notable ones, above that - Will has power. He has a power that not many citizens of Araluen have. Will has the power to look into Ruhl, to hunt him and his man, in the name of safety. When Gilan and Halt (and the others) discuss what to do about Will, his obsession with Ruhl comes up. They frown upon it - but not because Will’s doing something he doesn’t have the right to do. In fact, as a Ranger, if he plays the right chords and says the right words, Will can fully justify what he’s doing. No, Halt and Gilan mostly disapprove of the possibility of Will engaging in immoral ways of arrest and of him neglecting any other duties to the Ranger Corps. In other words: they don’t even consider this an abuse of power. This means that Will has even more power. 

So what if that’s the thing that the beard resembles? Power? It’s a power he uses - almost abuses. In fact, when Will’s assigned the mission of looking into Liam’s death, which ends up bringing him face to face with Ruhl, he has, again, even more power. Because this time it’s not just his regular duty as a Ranger, he was literally assigned to do this. 

Beard, according to the Cambridge Dictionary, means to face, meet, or deal with an unpleasant or frightening person in a brave or determined way. 

Look, I know it says that Will has a beard, but I think that’s just a nounification. You know how to run can become going on a run? And to shave can become having a shave? 

I WILL REPEAT.

HER NAME. IS EVELYN

feel free to use :)

one character trying to hold the others hand and failing miserably

so then they make a fool proof plan they think will work just to hold their love interests hand

the talk with their best friend like “should i just give up? at this point you’d have to be pretending not to know”

character b going in for a kiss and when they both accidentally bump heads character b can’t stop laughing at the insanity and character a is just confused because they genuinely didn’t know b was going in for a kiss

the stomach drop when your main character has to see their love interest w someone else or simply hear about them liking someone else

the spider-man meme where they’re all pointing at each other but it’s a conversation like “i said i didn’t like you like that because you said you didn’t like me” “but i said i didn’t like you because you were literally in love with someone else” then “i only said i was in love with them because you didn’t want me!”

one character being like “yeah im soooooo bored this weekend. when you are free. You know. i have NOTHING to do. oh what ever will i entertain myself with!!! WHOOeverrr should i entertain myself with.” and the other is just like “huh. yeah that’s pretty sad”

“i changed my schedule for you, you idiot.” “wait i don’t get it. why?”

one character going in to touch the other characters face and the other character freaking out like “WHAT????? IS THERE A BUG??? WAIT GET IT OFF”

^ but twist if they’re enemies and the other character thought they were gonna like throw a punch

your character being convinced they like everyone BUT them

“i can’t believe you didn’t know.” “YOU WANTED ME TO READ YOUR MIND??!!??!”

“marry me.” “what?” “what?”

OH OH BUT ALSO one character is asleep and the other whispers “i like you.” and they wake up like “what” and the response is, once again, “what”

“can i love you?”

“i told you i liked you!” “i thought you were joking!”

“but i don’t know how to love.” “me neither.” “okay. shall we figure it out together?”

“i like you.” “wait what? but i like you.” “HUH?????”

“i just don’t want you to hurt me. i don’t know how to do this, /name/.”

King,nodding: knife monopoly

The Collector:

-That’s all you can ever want in a story: intellectual, emotionally moving displays of cannibalism, and well-placed homoeroticism

-this piece didn’t disturb me nearly as much as it should have considering it ends with a man cutting his entrails out sitting at a dinner table with human-sized meat dolls

-you look like the kind of person who titles things in lowercase

-i can’t even world build our world, what makes you think I can write fantasy? 

-wait back up, your dad is a funeral director? 

Yeah. 

Okay. Go on. That’s… go on. 

-days since last mention of cannibalism in a workshop story: 0

-wouldn’t it be crazy if he was a child murderer though? 

-yeah, my older brother didn’t make the cut for this draft 

-vignettes in nonfiction are such a cop out for not writing transitions and I love that 

-well at least I don’t solely write sex scenes to cover up the fact that no one wants to fuck me in real life 

-i’m not used to writing in second person, so the fact that there are 40 “you’s” on one page is making me glitch 

-and then in the last chapter he dies, so there’s that thing, but also–

-you need that space thingie there at the beginning 

this one was requested to me… it was a little harder since enemies to lovers kisses are a little more plot specific but i did try! feel free to use <3

enemies to lovers post here.

“listen, let’s just forget about it.” “you mean forget about when we k—” “STOP.”

that split second before they kiss and they mentally ask themselves if this is about to happen but whoops their brain checked out hours ago and they’re about to kiss the person they hate more than anything

they haven’t talked about the first kiss they had— it was a small mistake, won’t happen again, the heat of the moment caught up to them and they still hate each other— but then suddenly there’s this moment for whatever [plot] reason and they’re gravitating towards one another and suddenly their lips are slipping over each others’

they’re teasing each other when one character goes “then kiss me” and is surprised that the other character actually does it

they’re playing a competitive game, whether it be a sport or for gym class or whatever, and while hiding, the sexual tension rises n boom they’re kissing

blurted confessions before the kiss

“yeah and it’s my fault for liking someone who—” cut off by a kiss

they’re alone in a room together in general because whew this makes for some incredible sexual tension

alternatively, they’re in a room full of people and somehow only register each other’s presence… one character sneaks away and the other follows and after a little banter they kiss in seclusion

“oh God.” “[name]…” “we just— kissed, oh God. i’m gonna be sick.”

“did you just…” “kiss my mortal enemy?… i think yes.”

“what are you thinking?” “i’m thinking i want to ask to kiss you. and i’m thinking i just did.”

ARGUING!!!!! then a heated “kiss me.” and suddenly their hands are all over each other

ALMOST KISSESSSSS!! its #that moment when they both know it’s about to happen, and God they don’t even care— but then they hear footsteps, or hear someone call them, or the phone buzzes, and the moment is gone like it never existed

“i… your lips.” “[unintelligible noises].”

that specific moment when they’re both stunned at the kiss, not only stunned that they let it happen but stunned that they don’t regret it at all

the aftermath. you as a writer need to decide if they’re going to acknowledge that it happened or going to pretend it didn’t and create more drama!!

tips

it doesn’t really matter the kiss as long as it shows not only their past and pent up anger but pent up sexual tension. it shouldn’t be something they’ve been thinking of outwardly, but something they’ve been actively trying not to think about, something they’ve been trying dearly to avoid. after all, they hate each other. so that moment when they first kiss should really solidify that “oh, i’m totally screwed” thought because they realize that the overwhelming urge to kiss their enemy didn’t just “come over” them, it was there all along.