RustedEagleWings

Two people do not decide that they are "courting". One person decides to "court" someone else. It's an action, not a stage in the relationship. A man decides to court a woman because he wants to encourage her to have romantic interest in him. He's trying to win her favor. It's not an exclusive relationship--a woman could be courted by multiple men at once. She'll spend time getting to know the guy who's interested in her, but they won't officially define their relationship as one where they only show romantic interest in each other. If they reach a point where they want it to be exclusive, that's when you propose.

bizarrely, America has in many ways gotten more conservative about dating since World War II.

Also, following this, I asked my mom what her thoughts were on the matter, and she said that while she “wouldn’t put it in those terms” she broadly agreed, and thought that anyone expecting any sort of exclusivity when a marriage proposal wasn’t at least on the very immanent horizon was “nuts, honestly.” I hesitantly asked if she was including relationships with premarital sexual activity in that, and her response was “Of course. I mean, gosh, you know your Aunt Terri used to have a guy for every day of the week before she finally settled down.”

And this was when I learned, to my shock, that the oft-repeated story of how “Aunt Terri used to have a guy for every day of the week” didn’t just mean “Aunt Terri had a full dance card” but rather meant that Aunt Terri had a period of her life where she literally dated exactly seven guys at once, all of whom she was sleeping with (or, my mom was quick to disclaim, “well, fooling around with, I don’t know how far she actually went with any of them, but they were definitely all fooling around behind closed doors”), on a literal weekly rotation. Like, they had a schedule. A schedule that all seven of the guys knew.

09/04/2026 • every time @softinvasions writes a villanelle about how sonnets suck i write another suckful sonnet*. metrical malpractice!

okay so. Shen Jiu is, officially, a normal teacher at a random college with two adoptive kids (Ming Fan and Ning Yingying) and one younger brother he’s extremely overprotective over.

Turns out he used to be an exorcist. Turns out he used to be a *vicious* one. Turns out some demon would like to get revenge. Turns out some demon is a prince.

Anyway, Luo Binghe waltzes up to that college like he owns the place, fully prepared to turn it into a battlefield and… what? His teacher’s nice? His teacher gave him a handshake? He calls him A-He now? “Please call me Yuan”? Apparently, the exorcist has a brother. A pretty one. And of course Lbh straightup jumps to seducing the pretty one. What better revenge on the guy you hate than to marry his brother?

Thing is, Ming Fan is immediately suspicious. Shen Jiu partially adopted him because he showed some talent in becoming an exorcist, even if he decided to retire and not tell his kids about his former job so his family could lead normal lives. And Both Ming Fan and Ning Yingying copied their A-die’s way of dealing with Uncle Yuan: extreme overprotectiveness and suspicion towards anything romance-shaped. Especially men. Especially men radiating evil red energy.

Shen Jiu’s currently on a trip or smth, maybe on honeymoon with Liu Qingge, anyway he’s not available and the kids think it’s their job to protect their uncle.

Ning Yingying is a lot more easy-going and a lot less suspicious of everyone and everything that moves, so it doesn’t take long for Lbh to convince her that he may be weirdly pretty and his existence gives people goosebumps but that’s normal! He’s just a chill guy! Ming Fan is harder to convince, but lbh is getting there. He remembers mf as the kid always trailing behind sj when sj was off-duty, but he doesn’t really care about him. So Mf is about to be convinced when he sees lbh kill someone without even moving his hands. Like, with a floating sword/shadow spear or something.

so of course he decides to pretend he’s not suspicious about the obviously suspicious and dangerous murder flirting with his uncle (who is by the way his age, so, he’s gross, and jail, jail for a thousand years, how dare he) and also investigate every single millimetre of his past. And thus begins a cat-and-mouse game where the cat is not aware that it is being chased by a mouse.

ming Fan, despite not knowing about the exorcist business, manages to uncover larger and larger parts of it and get closer to his answer. He also gets more and more convinced that lbh belongs in jail, not just for flirting with a man old enough to be his father, but also for, well, being a murderer.

he thinks lbh is part of some gangster family or mafia.

Meanwhile, lbh is too busy being a stupid teen in love (he’s 20+) to notice someone’s sticking his nose where it doesn’t belong. But his cousin/father does notice and starts trying to protect his cousin/son.

So ming fan and tlj meet. And it’s. Terrible. Terrifying. Ming Fan thinks tlj is a mind reader. Tlj thinks mf is just funny enough to not get murdered today. (It could be zzl but he wouldn’t spare mf so it’d turn into a whodunnit with nyy and sj as the leads)

so instead of killing the possible threat, he starts watching it. Everytime ming fan gets a new lead, that stupid old man’s there, sitting in front of him, smugly, being all “well? Found anything, detective?”

at the same time, ming fan IS finding something. He just doesn’t like what he’s finding. What started as a simple background check on a possible psychopath trying to seduce his uncle turned into a wild goose chase and he’s starting to realise that he’s in over his head. He needs an adult. An adulter adult that him. Except that the only currently available adults are a) being actively seduced by the problem or b) the problem’s insufferable father.

And he still doesn’t give up.

Ming Fan goes through all his memories involving Sj (which he found out has something to do with all this) and remembers that he used to always be complaining about this group named Huan Hua. Something about greedy old wretches and their grubby little hands. He’s desperate for any lead since his have been running into dead ends. So he starts digging. Apparently, it’s an exorcist union. Again, Ming Fan does not like the picture his investigation’s painting.

So he does the only sensible thing. He hacks into Huan Hua’s archives. which is something tlj has been trying for ages because of his traitor ex wife. At least he thinks she’s a traitor.

And then begins the craziest, most traumatic “what do you know that I don’t” Ming Fan has ever went through. They blackmail each other. Ming Fan finally knows the whole picture but he’s also sure Huan Hua erased parts of the history so he doesn’t actually have the whole picture. Tianlang-jun wants to know about Sxy. Ming Fan just wants to protect his family.

“Was there not another?” King Tirian asked, looking around at the vision of those who were friends of Narnia. “I recall hearing of a Queen Susan.”

The seven friends of Narnia exchanged glances.

“This book should be taken off of shelves for featuring–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative

“Schools shouldn’t teach this book in class because–” you are an anti-intellectual and functionally a conservative

“Nobody actually likes or wants to read classics because they’re–” you are an anti-intellectual and an idiot

Literally right after I saw this post, I saw another post in a discord chat for BOOK EDITORS in which an outspokenly liberal editor talked about how Nabokov should have never been published because he wrote about p*dophiles and described women's bodies in ways that made her uncomfortable. She described his writing as "objectively terrible" and said she wanted to burn his books. And other editors were bringing up classics they didn't like and talking about how they wanted to throw them in the trash. This wasn't like a light "unpopular opinion!" conversation. This was actual book editors talking about how books should be destroyed and censored.

There is something so scary and toxic in global culture right now. The revival of fascism is influencing everyone's mindset and approach to art, regardless of where they fall on the political spectrum.

I see far more books being censored today than when I was a kid. Librarians handed me The Catcher in the Rye, The Sexual Politics of Meat, and Animal Farm when I was literally 8-11. My mom would never have taken a book away from me. I read everything from the Tao Te Ching to the Qur'an to atheist texts under my desk at school. Teachers thought nothing of it or encouraged it. Books seemed universally acknowledged as sacrosanct to me.

Now I can't find any adults who don't hesitate or want to make exceptions when it comes to censorship. Even the most liberal social activist librarians I know go, "well except for book X..."

Actually, I did reports on book banning three separate times with three separate teachers, with three separate sets of parameters so I was able to write about the same topic in different ways, but this is specifically about the report I did in university. The actual specs for the report included that we were supposed to complete some kind of study or poll (this was not a science class). I put the questions out on a couple of forums I belonged to at the time and asked a few IRL friends as well. A lot of the questions were standard for this sort of thing, I think - were you ever assigned to read a banned book, did you ever read banned books on your own, did you read/were you assigned them BECAUSE they were banned or did you find out about them being banned later, what's your opinion on banning books, etc.

But there was one question I asked that ended up reshaping the entire thrust of my presentation: "Are there any books that you think SHOULD be banned, and if so, why?"

Here's the thing. Most of the forums I was posting on were fan spaces for a book series that, at the time, was one of the most banned/challenged books out there. It's a fandom that I have since entirely distanced myself from, that I one hundred percent do not recommend to anyone, that I will actively attempt to dissuade people from reading or talking about, and that I would like to not be popular anymore. I'm sure most of you reading this can guess which one I'm talking about (I won't name it or go into specifics because I don't want to trip any filters unnecessarily). But it was KNOWN that these books were banned in a lot of places. A lot of people wore the "I read banned books" badge with pride. I fully expected that the answer to that question would be a resounding "no" from the forums, and that I'd maybe get a few affirmative answers from one of the other spaces.

I was shocked. Not only did a lot of people come back with either "not exactly but I think we should keep [author] or [book] out of the hands of children" or "yes, [book]/anything by [author] should be banned because XYZPDQ", but not a single person who responded gave me the same answer. The only one I remember - keep in mind it's been almost twenty years - was that one person specifically said The Bone Collector, and for the "why do you think it should be banned" question, they only said, "No. I'm not explaining it. It's too horrible to even think about. Just believe me when I say nobody should ever be allowed to read this book."

I highlighted that last comment in my presentation, along with several other of my "favorite" official reasons for banning books - the Alabama school board that banned The Diary of Anne Frank in 1984 because it was "a real downer", the district that removed A Raisin in the Sun because it was "pornographic", the library that took Charlie and the Chocolate Factory out of circulation because it "might be hurtful to children without parents", and things of that nature - and pointed out that all of these were the same thing. This was somebody saying "I don't like this, therefore nobody should read it, and I shouldn't have to explain why." I also pointed out that if you can't give a good reason, the whole thing falls apart, and then I quoted "Smut" by Tom Lehrer:

All books can be indecent books, Though recent books are bolder, For filth, I'm glad to say, Is in the mind of the beholder. When correctly viewed, Everything is lewd. I can tell you things about Peter Pan And the Wizard of Oz - THERE'S a dirty old man...

Go back to that paragraph I mentioned earlier, about those books that I no longer recommend to anyone. Notice how I phrased that. I don't recommend them. I will tell you all the reasons why I don't think you should buy them. I will tell you all the problems with the author, with the franchise, with the writing. I wish they were out of print, I wish they were deeply unpopular, I wish nobody would ever read them again.

But I still won't advocate for banning them.

It's so easy to twist a justification. Look at what I quoted up there! A Raisin in the Sun was banned for being "pornographic". One of the websites I used as a source responded to that accusation with "Did they read the same play I did?" At the time, I thought the comment was funny. Now, twenty years later, I realize: It was a buzzword. It was a convenient label. At the time of the challenge, just saying "it's pornographic" was enough. Obviously you're not some kind of sicko who wants to hear about all the pornographic details, are you? Freak! That's pornography! And they're teaching it in schools! We should get rid of it!

A Raisin in the Sun, for anyone who didn't study it at any point or read it (or watch the movie, which was very good), is a play/movie about a black family in Chicago in the 1960s. The family matriarch has been in domestic service for years, but she's just received a very large insurance payment from her husband's death and is retiring. Wanting to give her family, especially her young grandson, a better life, she goes out and buys a house...in an otherwise exclusively white neighborhood. The head of the homeowner's association (essentially) comes to visit them and offers to pay them a substantial amount of money to not move into the neighborhood, because segregation isn't officially a thing and they can't legally stop them from moving in, but they don't want them there. There's a lot more that goes on in the play, and I highly recommend you go and read it, but the point is that there is nothing sexual or titillating in the entire thing. The closest we get is a scene where the daughter (Beneatha, a college student) is gifted a traditional African dress from her boyfriend, who's Nigerian, and he shows her how to put it on over the clothes she's already wearing, and maybe the scene where the daughter-in-law (Ruth, a laundress) accidentally reveals that, having found out she's pregnant, she's planning to have an abortion rather than bring another child into the world/have another mouth to feed.

It's not pornographic. But someone didn't want it taught in schools, so they called it that to get it banned.

It's so easy to twist labels. If you, a liberal, agree that books with X trait are okay to ban, the people who don't want books to exist will find a way to say they have X trait, and then what are you going to do, admit that you like that sort of thing? Sicko! Freak! Pervert!

kids tend to hypercorrect — this means that they tend to say things like “sleeped” instead of “slept,” “writed” instead of “wrote,” “goed” instead of “went,” etc

kids tend not to make errors such as omitting verbs (“i hungry”)

kids also tend not to make errors in the i/me, she/her department (“me am hungry”)

simplification of difficult sounds — consonant clusters especially, so things like st, sp, ps, etc., as well as f, v, th-sounds, ch-sounds, etc.

“babbling”-type utterances (“apwen” for “airplane,” using one babbly word for multiple objects, things like that) generally occur in children under the age of three and a half

say it with me: an eight-year-old child is not going to be saying “me hungwy”

do not confuse child speech with stereotypical learner english mistakes, that’s not only incorrect but also gross on the stereotypical learner english front (“me love you long time,” anybody?)

Past the age of about five or six years old, children can have deep, intellectual conversations about the most bizarre of things. I HAD A CONVERSATION LAST WEEK WITH FOUR THIRD GRADERS ABOUT THE GAS PRICES AND TAXES IN HAWAII.

Were they entirely correct in the facts they were giving? No, because it was all from what they had heard from parents or on the news. But that doesn’t take away from the fact that I was having a genuine conversation with four eight and nine year olds about taxes.

Just about the only speech problems most kids have, unless they have a speech impediment, is not being able to pronounce certain consonants (replacing ‘th’ with ‘fw,’ for example, and some letters are harder to form with your mouth than others) and doing exactly what the person above said: using the English language the way they know how, which isn’t always the way English works.

1) put that guy into situations

his clothes are dirty and torn and his hair is in tangles but she knows he must be someone important, perhaps the son of a noble family from one of the towns along the border with barizhan. She knows it from the way he speaks to the way he holds himself and right down to his soft, elegant fingers with their perfectly laquered nails.

And yet there's no arrogance in the way he begs her to help his two bodyguards. He promises he'll do anything to pay her back. He says that they had asked for help at the noble manor in the center of town and had been turned away.

She agrees to help him, ushers them up into one of their empty rooms, has one of her sons fetch an old sheet to rip up into bandages, and sends the other one running to fetch a cleric of csaivo.

He scribbles a hasty letter and sends it off with one of the couriers from town, and then all that's left is to wait. She agrees to let him help around the inn - not because she needs it, but because she knows he would otherwise spend his days pacing the small room he shares with his guards, worrying over their state.

It's a long two weeks that they wait, during which time his guards drift in and out of consciousness, spending their few waking moments fretting over their lordling and trying to drag themselves out of bed to carry out their duty of protecting him.

And then, on one quiet day while she and the young lord are working in companionable silence in the kitchen, they hear a great clamour from the entrance of the inn, and they go rushing out to see the source of the commotion.

Her heart jumps into her throat as she sees a group of guards come pouring into her inn, bristling with weapons and ready for a fight. They're dressed in the livery of the drazhada, and she doesn't even have time to wonder at their presence here before their eyes alight on the young lord at her side.

"Serenity!" shout several voices at once, and she stares in stunned silence as three figures break away from the group to come rushing up to the young lord.

One of them is a secretary, eyes wide and full of desperate relief as he reaches out to clasp his lord's, his emperor's, hands tightly in his own.

The other two, a soldier and a maza, must be his nohecharei. As are, she realizes with a start, the two men upstairs.

The maza looks her emperor over with a critical eye, and she remembers hearing somewhere that the woman was a cleric of csaivo.

"Our firsts?" asks the soldier once he gets the reassurance from his partner that their emperor is in good health.

"Upstairs," says the emperor. "They're safe."

There's several sighs of relief, not just from the two nohecharei, but also from the rest of the guards

The emperor turns to look at her then, and there's a heartstopping moment where she remembers that she had had him running errands for her these past two weeks, and she wonders if she will be executed for her sins.

Instead, the young emperor smiles gently at her, and pushes past his guards to stand in front of her.

you've grown to hate this place, this castle gifted to him for war victories. The halls are barren, the garden yet to bloom. The maids are pleasant, but they keep their distance, as if you'll strike. Maybe your husband is the kind to hit. You wouldn't know.

When he looks at you, it's only in short bursts, his eyes suddenly low. There's a long stretch of silence between you and you consider introducing yourself, but decide against it. He knows who you are.

"The maid is drawing me a bath," he says suddenly and a sick feeling pours over you. This day was always coming, but you aren't sure you're ready to lay under a stranger.

"Am I expected to join?" you ask and his nose crinkles.

"No." He steps back and away. His departure is brisk and driven. You retire for the night by yourself and awake alone. Your husband is set to leave again in a few hours; a few soldiers have already gathered in the front garden.

"Don't you wish to give your new wife a goodbye?" one asks, unaware of your open window. "One night and you've already had your fill? Or has she been filled too much?"

"I refuse to believe she is real!" says another. "What kind of woman has worn down our brute and turned him into a family man? Should we expect a gaggle of children in the upcoming year?"

Your husband growls. "You will leave the poor lamb alone. She suffers enough."

That softens you. Just a bit. You rise from you bed and go to the window, leaning out enough to catch the men's attention.

"Until next time."

He watches you, expression caught between more emotions that you can count, then turns his gaze back to his mount. The two men share a look, wide, wide grins on their faces.

(he must have lovers, you imagine. He hasn't touched you; he must be getting his fill with women in other cities, maybe women he actually loves. these are trinkets to keep his wife amused while she wastes away.)

none of the gifts come with a note.

one day a bolt of fabric arrives, yellow and ornate. It's only a small amount, not enough to make a dress, but enough for you to unravel and admire. It's beautiful and clearly expensive, golden threads woven into flowers and vines. Your father was a silk merchant; while you never wore the silks, you can recognize their quality.

the following week, the delicious man rides up on his steeds and presents a letter. The handwriting is rough. Knights that come from the lower class do not have the schooling of highborns; as fair as you know, your husband was born a street rat and worked his way theough the ranks to glory.

-I have been told by my secund that I did not send you enuf fabric for a gown. I do not no these things.

The spelling mistakes screw a smile out of you.

"Wait a moment." You stop the boy before he can leave. "I wish to send something back."

You take your time and use your finest calligraphy, tucking your note in with a handkerchief you had spent the week on. It's fine work-- one that would please even the hardest of hearts.

-Dearest husband,

Please take this handkerchief as a sign of my thoughts.

Your patient and thoughtful wife

A second letter arrives within the week.

-are you cros with me? A scrap of fabric for a scrap of fabric?

The response is what makes you cross. The poor messenger boy has to stay the night while you percolate over a response.

-Dearest, sweetest husband,

A handkerchief is a traditional gesture of affection. I have embroidered the edges by hand, with your family name and your roses, and it smells of my perfume. It is a piece of me for you to carry. If you do not appreciate my kindness or if you think it will turn away your lovers, you may return it. I do not wish it wasted on you.

Your less than patient and less than adoring wife

The poor boy scatters off in the morning and returns a few days later.

tortured wife,

I wil cherish it. I am sory, pour lam. I wil do better.