Cherry Bomb Time

my partner was a TA for an intro-to-subject course in grad school. finals week rolls around and the students are required to submit this big module assignment they've had like a month to do for a decent chunk of their grade. if you've submitted everything, you'll see a summary screen with a star beside each module name showing it's been completed.

an hour before the assignment deadline, he receives an email from a student claiming they completed the assignment, but the system is not allowing them to submit. there's an image attached to the email. partner goes to open what he assumes is a screenshot of that summary page.

instead, he sees that the student has taken a photo of their laptop from about 2 feet away, with that page open. strange, but it wouldn't be the first time a college freshman has lacked the tech literacy to take a screenshot. he almost doesn't look twice at it, but he realizes something about it just feels a little bit...off. so he zooms in.

the student had CUT STARS OUT OF CONSTRUCTION PAPER and TAPED THEM TO THEIR LAPTOP SCREEN BESIDE EACH MODULE NAME. you could see where they actually had completed the first couple of modules, but the stars for all the subsequent ones were like, double the size of the first two and exactly as uneven/irregular as you'd expect if you were freehanding them with scissors.

comradeship we need to

start the month off on.

It’s always him acting as this flawless, dom caretaker who effortlessly manages his partner's freakouts

And it’s for a very obvious reason: people project themselves onto Shane so they can play out a fantasy of being a visibly vulnerable person who gets saved from their own emotions, spoon fed how to deal with minor issues, and excused from doing any emotional labor whatsoever.

But like.… this is not how their dynamic works at all. Canon Ilya is deeply depressed incredibly vulnerable and can’t even manage his own emotions half the time. Expecting him to perfectly carry the burden of someone else's entire emotional well being is hilarious when the poor man is barely holding himself together.

There is absolutely nothing wrong with wanting to read or write a self-indulgent hurt/comfort tropeJust stop acting like this fanon version of these characters is the absolute truth

everyone always seems so surprised when shane is funny or makes a joke, and i don't think it's meant to be mean, but like? yeah shane is funny. he's always been funny. he's picky about his audience (because he has his image to think about and also because he's just naturally reserved), but he is snarky and quick with it. you know who has ALWAYS found him funny, though?

and on ilya's part, he chirps partially (i think) strategically to have the other team playing annoyed because that's not going to have them on their a-game, but also?? it's for fun. he is puppy nipping and going "play??? play back??? play??" and with almost everyone (because of the reputation he's been branded under), the response he gets is fuck off and a refusal to engage, like we saw with scott hunter. you know who's always understood that this is supposed to be for fun, though?

If anything Troy Barret is the one that shows more angst and insecurity of the type fanon Shane displays. I would Ryan Price, but the truth is Ryan is barely functioning in his book because his anxiety is so bad and so global (bless him for getting his happy ending).

Yes, and if I say this also extends to how people see Shane in bed...but I shan't speak more on this

But yeah no Shane has active anxiety, not paralyzing anxiety. His anxiety drives him to do things--like pursue a restricted diet, or buy the sex condo--not sit around and whimper.

He's really a very strong and very active character. It's a popular headcanon that Shane gets overwhelmed by decision making and needs Ilya to take over for him but like....there is zero indication of that anywhere in the text. He's fairly decisive and not shy sexually. Shane's the kind of guy to see a hot picture of Ilya on Instagram and get so horny he books a private charter flight to go fuck his boyfriend.