#jerlena

The antis found me you guys 🙏

You’re good! What am I going to do—complain that someone is enjoying the content I put time into making? I actually think people should take more time out of their schedule to appreciate me and the things I create. (And you definitely didn’t spam me—I have pretty a extensive masterlist system, so I’m used to it when someone cracks those open and I get a rain of notifications.)

Jelena consistently ranks as my favorite non-Mikaelson dynamic (and beats out most of those as well)—and I’m certainly not anti-incest in my media, so I fuck with it platonically and romantically/sexually. I probably should talk about it more considering how much I love it, but I get sidetracked on my silly little side quests.

But you truly can’t beat the dynamic—what if I loved you so much that if it came between you and the deaths of thousands (or hundreds of thousands, we do not know how large Kol's sireline was), I would always choose you? What if it was never even a choice? What if I loved you so acutely that I held back an ancient evil for long enough for you to kill him (and if you also love Keremy like I do, this becomes extra tasty)? What if you went to the ends of the Earth in a desperate bid to save your brother from a centuries old curse? What if you betrayed yourself for nothing because he died in that cave? What if your last true anchor to humanity was murdered by a girl wearing your face and a boy wearing the face of your implied soulmate—and you brought him home and you burned down your family home with his body inside? Insane. Delicious. They need to bottle what it does to my brain and force people to drink it. (Kol actively dreams of having a sibling who might love him like Elena loves Jeremy.)

As for general Jelena content, I have them topping the charts of two of my ranking posts: [x] [x]. I have a webweaving post for them that I made recently. I also drew them.

I have an Eurydice/Orpheus oneshot in the works for them. If you decide to stick around, you’ll realize I’m a big OC person—huge fan of them, really—but I do have an obligatory Gilbert sister. Her story gets deep into the Gilberts. (And my favorite pairing for her is Elena/Jeremy, though her storyline drags her kicking and screaming away from them—but it’s funnier that way imo.)

As for Gilbert-specific hot takes:

I once talked briefly about how I would improve Jeremy’s storyline through the use of historical parallels with his ancestors (specifically Jonathan/Emily and Abby/Miranda). I have a larger post in the works where I give more of my thoughts on his canon plotline and what tweaks I would have made—though in general, I tend to fall on the side of working with what canon gave us and exploring what already exists rather than changing entire swathes of it.

I also have a lot of my metas on this masterlist, which includes some Grayson stuff (I love the previous generation of the MFG and have a lot of thoughts on them)

As for takes I’ve never posted before… hmm.

I think people who say the Gilbert family had no characterization are just… not reading into what’s actually present. We get quite a bit of it filtered secondhand, and anyone with experience with fandom archaeology should be able to extrapolate from there. (Though, as a caveat: I think it’s fine to wish we’d gotten more—I certainly do—but I don’t think it’s a sign of poor writing. There is a lot going on in TVD, so I don’t blame them for not giving us a lot of content related to them. Where would they fit it in?)

I love Jenny Nicholson’s TVD video, but I think her take that The Departed validated Elena’s survivor’s guilt and that the narrative was saying she was meant to die on that bridge is wrong. Her video is so fun, but she strikes me as the kind of person who isn’t particularly interested in analysis of the non-literal sense, which is fine, but it isn’t something I’m particularly interested in taking as gospel.

“Angel, saint, Devil's spawn, good or evil, you've got me pinned to the wall and labeled as yours until the day I die. And if you die first, then it won't be long before I follow.” ― V.C. Andrews, Petals on the Wind

01. and if i only could, i'd make a deal with god, and i'd get him to swap our places / 02. at school they taught me how to be; so pure in thought and word and deed, they didn't quite succeed / 03. all we do is think about the feelings that we hide; all we do is sit in silence waiting for a sign, sick and full of pride / 04. the only heaven i'll be sent to is when I'm alone with you; i was born sick, but I love it, command me to be well / 05. i cannot stop this sickness taking over, it takes control and drags me into nowhere; i need your help, i can't fight this forever / 06. you wonder why i hit myself; i'm trying to kill the worst of me, to be the best for you / 07. and judgment taught us that our hearts were wrong, but they're the ones that we'll look down upon / 08. unchain me, sister; love is with your brother / 09. in our bed; it’s sacrilege, sacrilege, sacrilege, you say? / 10. my sister, there is a sadness on your face; you're like a motherless child who's longing for comfort; what's running through your veins that's causing you such pain? / 11. there's a light on the road and I think you know; morning is coming and i have to go / 12. sister, bring it hither, push it down below; catch yourself a looker, let him go, go, go / 13. oh, how i long for you, i long for you; quiet now, oh, we must not tell a single soul about this tale; to the grave, no one will know

8tracks | youtube

For the headcanon meme:

Headcanon A: what I think realistically

Elena stops taking her pain medication about as soon as they stop reminding her. By the time her birthday rolls around even the lingering headaches have largely gone, but her birthday may just be the most painful thing since those first few days after the accident when it sunk in that her parents weren’t ever coming back.

They try, her friends, they really do, and part of Elena is so so grateful for the way Caroline presents the cake and Bonnie whispers they even got booze but they’ll have to wait for a moment to sneak away while the (responsible) adults aren’t looking.

Matt stops by and it’s awkward, but he doesn’t push, even though he looks like he wants to. Elena doesn’t know how to tell him that “I need some time,” was already turning into “it’s over” the moment she said it. It wasn’t a total lie though. With all that’s happened, she can’t even imagine trying to deal with Matt and their relationship too.

Jeremy comes back in while her friends are already there, along with aunt Jenna and uncle John. His eyes are red, as if he’d been crying. He stands at the doorway for a long moment, staring at nothing in particular, or perhaps at the nothing where there would have been someone just a summer ago. Then, he turns abruptly and rushes up the stairs. They can hear the slam of his door even from the living room. There is an awkward moment where no one seems to know how to respond until Elena pastes a fake smile on her face and suggests they cut the cake.

Jeremy does not come downstairs again that night, not even for dinner, but when she goes to bed later she finds something on her pillow. It’s a pen, a fancy one, like the one her Mom had given her when she was eight to write stories with. It comes with a small card, which simply reads: Sorry. Happy birthday.

She fills nearly her entire journal with that pen before the summer is out.