October Writing & November Goals

[osprey_archer]

This month one of my coworkers tested positive for Covid (she’s fine now, btw) so I spent two weeks in quarantine (I’m fine too) and during that time I accidentally a book. (I finished the draft yesterday and am giving myself the rest of October as a writing holiday, hence the fact that I am posting this monthly writing update early.)

Well, it took longer than the two weeks of quarantine, and obviously at some point the accident became quite purposeful. Really the only part of this that is an accident is that the story was meant to be just a few scenes of h/c drawerfic, and I resisted it becoming more than that because I knew I’d need to do some real research if it turned into a real book... but I crammed in so many aspects that I liked that I ended up writing the darn thing.

The main characters were friends at an English boarding school, and after they are wounded in World War I they are reunited at an English country house that has been converted into a convalescent home for amputees. They sit in the library and talk about Robert Louis Stevenson (specifically, they make up The Further Adventures of Alan Breck Stewart and Davie Balfour), and then a year later Robert goes to visit David in a cottage by the sea in Cornwall and… there is cuddling. And PTSD. And sex. And more cuddling. Look, it’s been a hard year, I get to write as many cuddling scenes as I want.

So it’s going to go in a drawer after all for a year or two as I get “research World War I amputees” sorted. I’ve got E. R. Mayhew’s Wounded: A New History of the Western Front in World War I to begin with. 2022 me can decide whether the cuddling is excessive.

***

As for November writing plans... um, I guess I’ll just hold off and see if there’s an insurrection on November 4?

So I don’t have a specific word count or drafting goal for this month, but I would like to get some writing done. My plan is to work on the m/m Sleeping Beauty I posted about the other day, although I have no idea how to end it and am waffling about whether the fairy folk ought to make another appearance at some point in the story, rather than laying a curse on a baby in 1844 Wisconsin and then fucking off forever. Possibly in connection with Russell finally receiving a true love’s kiss, 102 years after it would have done any good, but better late than never?

Although I’m not sure what would take a kiss over the top to a true love’s kiss if the first sex scene is not enough to do it, which it can’t be, because that’s the scene where CaelanColinAndrew tries to explain homosexuality and Russell is like “...is this why you guys don’t do friendship? Because I’ve noticed that men in 1964 do not share their feelings or touch each other and it’s SUPER weird,” and adding in fairyland at that moment would be Too Much.

(Side note! If anyone with access to JSTOR could get me a copy of E. Anthony Rotundo’s “Romantic Friendship: Male Intimacy and Middle-Class Youth in the Northern United States, 1800-1900,” I feel it would be useful for this book. ETA: A kindly angel has gotten me the article! Thank you, kindly angel!!!!!)

Maybe the true love comes in when Russell is crying because he’s sick of living in the friendship-less hellhole that is 1964 and CaelanColinAndrew kisses him and tells him, in all sincerity although possibly with his heart breaking, “I would send you back to your own time if I could.”

Comments

[kore]

So it’s going to go in a drawer after all for a year or two

[osprey_archer]

It's for the best! You don't want to read subpar amputee fic, do you?

[kore]

//looks at osprey_archer

//looks at AO3 history

//looks back at osprey_archer


(I swear "subpar amputee" fic could be a tag on Stucky fandom all by itself)

[osprey_archer]

To be fair Bucky Barnes is a very unusual amputee, with a super special supersoldier prosthetic arm that can punch through walls and is literally attached to his body, so there's no expectation of historical accuracy in representing the World War II amputee experience. Very rarely were World War II amputees brainwashed into supersoldierdom! Bucky Barnes may in fact be sui generis.

Also as I recall Bucky Barnes in Reciprocity displays an adamantine opposition to discussing His Feelings about Amputation with Steve, so it's not like it's something the story digs into.

[kore]

(OMG I never meant to sound like I was throwing shade on your fic, I loved it! //mortified)

Bucky Barnes in Reciprocity displays an adamantine opposition to discussing His Feelings about Amputation with Steve

YES he did (atho maybe he would have told a Funny Story about it happening to Steve. Those funny stories that made Steve kinda sick were hilarious).

[osprey_archer]

Haha, no worries. I mean, I think it's a fair cop that the amputee stuff is not what I'm focusing on in Reciprocity, but there's so much going on in that story! no one could reasonably expect me to deal with amputation stuff too! everyone is there for the psychological trauma anyway.

(And that's actually true in this story I just finished, too. It's just that in historical fiction I can't straight up invent the details about the prosthetics they're using the way I could about Bucky's super powered metal death arm.)

You know, I don't think Bucky ever tells Steve a funny amputation story? He definitely makes jokes about the missing arm, but not the amputation itself. Maybe it was too traumatizing for him to turn into a funny story. Or maybe it's part of his more general reluctance, especially early on, to talk about his days with the Soviets.

...or maybe his arm got ripped off during the fall and even during his meanest moments Bucky realizes that Steve might actually break if Bucky makes jokes about falling off the train.

[kore]

(STILL EMBARRASSED. OMG. Mostly because I hate making that kind of faux pas and oh look! I think I forgot my fucking medz)

(Altho I DID just find out Bucky finally told Steve a funny orphanage story! And ....poor Steve was too messed up to appreciate it. Oh Steve. Also the director is totally Coulson.)

...or maybe his arm got ripped off during the fall and even during his meanest moments Bucky realizes that Steve might actually break if Bucky makes jokes about falling off the train.

OH MY GOD poor Steve. Reciprocity Steve is so fragile.

Also I wish I had not missed your ACLU donation period because I totally would have tried to commission a Nat fic.

[osprey_archer]

Is this the time Steve & Bucky are on the Bus and Bucky bullies Steve into eating breakfast and tells him a story about watching a squirrel wreak havoc on the board of director's meeting? Steve ought to recognize that story is a GIFT and instead he's just like WHAT'S THE SECRET MESSAGE HERE.

Reciprocity Steve would DEEPLY RESENT being called fragile (not quite as deeply as Reciprocity Bucky would, but pretty close!) but it's so true though.

...Also depending on the nature of your Nat fic dreams, the ACLU donation period might still be open. The ACLU donation period may, in fact, be open forever, on account of... everything that the world is right now.

[kore]

YES IT WAS I JUST NOW READ IT and it was adorable! Bucky was being so sweet! and Steve is just like but I thought I cracked the code >:-( and I'm just like, OH, STEPHEN.

...Also depending on the nature of your Nat fic dreams, the ACLU donation period might still be open. The ACLU donation period may, in fact, be open forever, on account of... everything that the world is right now.

WOW REALLY I love your Nat fics and I love the ACLU! (I first donated when I was a teenager so I could say I was an actual card-carrying member of the ACLU, lol.) What would you like writing? I loved the Red Room stuff -- the ice skating, her and Bucky at the morgue, the one with Dottie, all those. The steakout one was great too.

....altho omfg, can't we just have a nice quiet election that gets decided by 9 PM PST on November 3 and then everyone takes a three-month nap.

[osprey_archer]

Steve thought he'd finally figured out the orphanage code, when really the orphanage was never a code, it was a state of mind... and he's finally in the state of mind where he could totally get it if he weren't so convinced it was a code. Bucky must be exasperated. They could have been such buddies now if only Steve weren't falling apart under the strain. :(

I will probably have to get back to you about Nat stories after the election because right now my brain is mush.

[kore]

It was so heartbreaking when Bucky talked about his dead asshole handler being in the orphanage! And the parallels were great with the two of them, and Steve and Rumlow. (Bucky is hilarious. "Why not give him back to Coulson? What are they going to do, brainwash him again?")

OMG, no worries on the story front. They're saying "get ready for election week," Jesus.

[osprey_archer]

Steve is all "Sending Rumlow back to Coulson would traumatize him! AGAIN!" and Bucky is like "Do I LOOK like a care??"

Other Nat thoughts: I've always meant to write a Nat/Bucky/Steve fic. (I think it would start out BuckyNat and add Steve in. Bucky's like "Did you and Steve ever...?" and Nat's like "OH GOD NO he's so needy. Did YOU and Steve ever?" and Bucky's like "OH GOD NO he's such a Boy Scout, he would never.") Obvs this could fit a lot of Red Room memories - Nat thinking about how the Red Room has shaped her understanding of How to Human, Nat and Bucky reminiscing about the bad old days in Brainwashing Central, Nat musing to Steve that probably she felt so at home with SHIELD because it was just like the Red Room in that outwardly they had such high ideals and they were just trying to help people but inwardly it was all rotten...

[kore]

I never replied to this, like a dolt, but I love all of it!

Nat musing to Steve that probably she felt so at home with SHIELD because it was just like the Red Room in that outwardly they had such high ideals and they were just trying to help people but inwardly it was all rotten...

OH MAN. //heart crashes onto floor

[osprey_archer]

I've always felt that it was an under-explored vein of angst that Steve's work for SHIELD was always really, secretly, work for Hydra; he's fought for Hydra just as much as Bucky has, and he wasn't even brainwashed (although obviously he was comprehensively lied to, like all the other loyal SHIELD agents, Natasha included). I've always thought Steve might have trouble forgiving himself for that - far more trouble than he has forgiving Bucky.

Do you have my email? If you're going ahead with an ACLU-donation-for-fic, email might be a better place to discuss it at length.

[kore]

I swear I have not forgotten about this and it sounds amazing! altho right now I am in the throes of reading the instructions for a meal kit turkey dinner (cheating I know, LOL) and I'm already in trouble. "Let the turkey marinate overnight in a large airtight container on the bottom shelf." There is NO ROOM there, meal kit people! It is all occupied by all the rest of the stuff that was in the meal kit box! I guess they were not writing for people with "urban apartment-sized refrigerators."

[asakiyume]

Wohoo, way to go--best way to use a quarantine period ever!

I have started a letter to you...

[osprey_archer]

LETTER LETTER LETTER LETTER.

I mean, obviously whenever you get around to it...

It was a very well-timed quarantine period! I definitely didn't manage to get much of anything done in lockdown back in April.