there's glass between us

So... I made something. It's my first time making a fanart in this fandom (usually just posted fics), but it didn't go as smoothly as I thought it'd be.

Halfway through making this, my drawing pad got baptized in coffee and immediately malfunctioned, so the foresty background had to be frankensteined together from stock photos and Photoshop magic 😭🌲 If you can't already tell how it's such a pretty background contrasting to the rigid lines of both sterek and the car lmao (don't come for me).

It’s not exactly how I imagined it, but it's the closest it could get. And with Christmas coming up (and my pad not coming back from the dead anytime this year), I really wanted to post this anyway. This is the banner/poster for my upcoming Sterek Christmas fic, which I’ll be posting on AO3 around mid-December once I finish proofreading ✨❤️

You know that thing where a story is written in tight third person limited — we’re meant to be inside someone’s head, seeing the world through their thoughts — and then suddenly the narration says “the blond frowned” or “the shorter woman sighed” about a person the POV character knows really well?

That’s called antonomasia — using a descriptive label instead of a name. And it’s fine when we’re talking about strangers: “the cashier handed her the receipt,” “the tall guy blocked the door.” The POV character doesn’t know their names, and we just need a quick way to tell people apart.

But the moment it’s used for someone the POV character already knows, it breaks immersion. Because that’s not how our minds work. We don’t think “the older man smiled at me.” We think “Mark smiled.” Or maybe “my boss” if that relationship matters in the moment.

Third person limited means the narration sits inside someone’s perception. Their inner monologue is the story’s voice. So when you switch from “Mark smiled” to “the blond smiled,” you’ve pulled the camera away from their mind and turned it into an outside shot.

If you want to create distance or irritation, you can do it on purpose —

“The idiot from accounting emailed again.”

That’s character voice. That’s judgment. That works.

But otherwise?

As soon as your POV character knows someone’s name, use it. While we do tend to worry about repetitions, names rarely register as such to the readers.

If you need variety for rhythm, use relational or emotional identifiers that make sense in their head: her friend, his partner, their teacher, the person they loved.

Because inside someone’s thoughts, there are no “blonds” or “brunettes.”

After a while of talking about how Anya acts the trainer says there’s nothing to worry about, Anya likes Shane just fine, it’s just that she sees him as the boss and is acting accordingly

And Ilya is like. But. I’m the one who adopted her? And raised her before Shane got here?? And the trainer is just like yeah well she sees you more like an equal. And Ilya is like WAIT she thinks Shane is in charge of both of us?? And the trainer is just like well do you interact in a way that would make her think that?

Ilya’s life flashes before his eyes as he thinks of all the times Shane has come over with a snack for Ilya and a treat for Anya, or all the times Shane has announced they’re all going for an after dinner walk, or pets Ilya’s hair and tells him he did a good job at practice, or the fact that he uses the same warning tone with Anya when she misbehaves as he does with Ilya when he’s causing problems on purpose