#cddm

OHHHHH WAIT I LOVE THIS

so, as of right now in the fic, davey is only fixated on anastasia- and for good reason, too, since he's. y'know. a lead in the show- BUT i can honestly see this happening??

i'm a huge advocate for davey having ADHD so can you just. imagine him showing up to school one day looking really tired and exhausted but ALSO hyper and excited and he looks like he's about to burst and when someone asks him he just,, "i listened to waitress last night"

and tbh idk if he'd get hyperfixated on One Specific Musical at a time or if he'd speedrun musicals until his playlist rivals katherine's playlist, but within a month, he's able to talk about SO MUCH theatre shit

I HAVE SO MANY OTHER ASKS TO ANSWER BUT I SAW THIS ONE AND CAME RUNNING

OK SO:

i'm gonna answer the last part first, and then go into headcanons!

so, my fave scene so far HAS to be the audition scene. i just,, i love it so much, and i feel like it's some of my best writing!

however, my OTHER favorite is the scene where jack comes out to kath, just for the Emotions. i'm not ecstatic about the final product and the way i worded the scene, but i feel like it's really authentic emotionally ?? and i just !! AUGH i live for jack kelly angst

MOVING ON TO HEADCANONS !! im not gonna talk about davey, jack, kath, sarah, or charlie, but they are Here In Spirit

Antonio 'Racetrack' Higgins:

pronouns: he/him ; sexuality: gay

so we know that he's dating Spot !! they've been together for a while now, at least 6 months, and they just,, click

but more onto Race by himself !! he's playing vlad, obviously, and is amazing at playing comic relief characters. it's what he Does; he loves it, and loves making people laugh !!

he's also a dancer; i imagine that he's been dancing since he was about,, five years old. used to be on competition teams, but traded the competitive dance for theatre once he got into high school

he actually met albert in dance !!

he and jack also go way back!! not that jack was in dance or anything, but Medda would often go to the dance recitals and bring Jack and Charlie (because some of her theatre kids were also in the recitals). so, jack and race met through that, and have been besties ever since !!

Sean 'Spot' Conlon:

pronouns: he/him ; sexuality: bisexual

dating race !! he's very much the Strong and Silent Type in the the relationship, but thats ok because he'd gladly let race talk for HOURS just to listen to him.

he started theatre when he was fairly young; he's been in more productions than Katherine, actually, but a lot of those were just small roles in local productions.

pretty good dancer; not the best, but he's getting there

he's very protective of his friends, which is also why he takes such a liking to davey. i feel like they'd have a solid friendship- they're both on the quieter side at first, but if given the chance to talk and develop that friendship, they'd be SO close

he sees medda as a second mother and also just like. shows up for dinner sometimes, so his relationship with jack is more like "bickering brothers who also sometimes get dairy queen together" instead of friends

Albert "Red" DaSilva:

pronouns: he/him ; sexuality: pansexual

besties with race !!

he's not an actor, though; he helps with choreography, and also works tech! it's very hectic but him and race are both medda's right hands when it comes to choreo

he's dating Smalls (sam), and their relationship is pretty new !! he's really happy with them

in his free time hes rlly into engineering (which is why he's so into tech work with the theatre), and also works on cars a lot

he just really likes getting his hands dirty !!

also he's kind of shy but he's also a HUGE flirt, which is very uh. interesting for him to deal with, but he makes do

OTHERS:

Sam "Smalls" O'Brien - she/they, bisexual, dating albert. they like skating, and play Lily in the show!

Specs (they/them, bi) and Romeo (he/him, gay) - both a package deal. best friends, both freshmen in the ensemble!

JoJo de la Guerra - he/him, straight, freshman like Specs and Romeo!! also besties with them !!

okay so !! the thing with cddm davey is: he's not a theatre kid.

like, the only shows he's seen are the ones that the school has put on in the past, which he's only seen because his parents drag him and les out to support sarah, and aside from that, he's kind of clueless.

i feel like he wouldn't have a CLUE about Les Mis as a show- he's probably struggled through read the book though- and he only ever listens to it because Katherine plays the cast album in her car.

A/N: hi besties guess what i’m working on <3 y’all should send me CDDM asks!!

Read Courage, Don’t Desert Me on AO3! (Chapters 1-7)

***

He pushes that thought out of his head as he jumps offstage, landing on his feet with a soft grunt. He gets about five steps in before he hears a voice behind him say, “Y’know, they built those steps there for a reason.”

David turns, brow raised, though he grins when he sees Jack standing just a few feet away. David walks closer, shrugging. “What can I say? I like living life on the edge.”

“Jumping down four feet is ‘living on the edge’ to you?” Jack asks, laughing softly. Jack takes a few more steps, meeting David in the middle. There’s just about a foot of space between each other, not much at all, but then Jack is looking up at him and smiling and, wow, even a foot is too much distance for David. “You need to get out, man. Climb a building, sneak onto the subway, maybe dine-and-dash from an expensive restaurant… the possibilities are endless.”

“I don’t even know how to begin doing something like that,” David admits with a chuckle. “I’m not… yeah. I don’t do stuff like that.”

Jack considers this for a moment, then smiles. “I’ll teach ya. Just stick with me.”

David gulps, feeling his face heat up, and he nods. “Yeah, I-- Yeah. Okay.”

“Yeah?” Jack asks with a smirk, one that makes David’s mouth go dry.

OOOOOH okay so:

i really feel like davey would be into ,, any and all kinds of musicals, bc he's so new and he hasn't really been indoctrinated into thinking a certain way about them?

like he's not really critical of them

like yknow how there are people who say that older musicals are better than newer musicals, or that jukebox musicals don't deserve the hype, or that comedic musicals are inherently "worse" than serious ones?

yeah davey doesn't think any of that stuff !! he just. likes what he likes

i DO feel like, aside from Anastasia, his favorites would be Les Mis, Phantom, and Hadestown !! and i feel like he would like hamilton but he wouldn't LIKE hamilton if you get what i'm saying

also mean girls. this is not up for debate

MOVING ON:

his favorite thing about theater, i think, would be... the community

especially in CDDM, bc davey doesn't have very many friends at all in this au?

so idk if you meant Davey or Jack, bc they're both very different, but im gonna take this opportunity to like !! explain a bit about both!

so, starting with davey.

i'm not gonna explain too much about him, bc there's uh !! a big plot device that revolved around his relationship with his sexuality, but the thing you need to know is:

davey is EXTREMELY open about being gay.

he came out during the summer before freshman year, and, at the time, was one of the only out people in school. obviously more and more people come out as the years go on, but davey is honestly one of the first in their grade to do so.

he just doesn't see a point in hiding it.

meanwhile... jack.

jack has a lot of internalized biphobia.

it's cddm canon that jack kinda ,, gets around? he's probably had a string of flings and failed relationships following him since middle school. he's had a bunch of 'girlfriends', he makes out with girls at parties, he's just your average hormonal teenage boy.

but, as he expresses in chapter 4, he's scared that- because he's already had experience with girls without ever trying anything with guys- people won't take him seriously.

jack likes attention, but not for the wrong things, and if he feels like everyone thinks he's coming out for attention... it isn't going to end well.

we don't get a coming out scene with Charlie, but i imagine that the whole "coming out" thing happens to Jack about a week and a half before senior year starts. he only tells Charlie, because Charlie has been through everything with him and has never judged him. he's been there through every court date, every visitation with his dad, every less-than-ideal afternoon, every bad day. Charlie has been through it all.

when Jack comes out to Charlie he's definitely borderline having a panic attack because he's nervous and scared for Charlie's reaction

all in all jack is just,, hhhh

he internalizes a lot of his issues and makes them so much bigger than they ever would have been if he just. didn't worry about them

long story short:

davey is very out because he doesn't care what others think about him in *that* way, and