Latest Posts by twirlingflurry - Page 4

nicky buys andrew rainbow socks at pride one year as a joke and also as a futile attempt to bond. he forgets about them, but andrew often wears them under his black boots (especially when they go to eden’s) and no one knows about it. years later, at psu, nicky walks in on neil and andrew asleep on the couch. and there, peeking out from under blankets and neil’s legs, are the rainbow socks on andrew’s feet. nicky doesn’t take a picture because it feels too personal, but his heart soars at the sight and he cherishes this small victory

kevin day is the type of person to unironically quote memes that are just. so out of date

seth gordon spent all his college athlete years believing his team was worthless and would never amount to anything and he died with those same beliefs and i will never get over it

i honestly cannot stop picturing him as coach hedge from pjo and i'm not even sorry

So I know Coach Wymack is meant to be all big and buff and super badass with lots of tattoos but since Day 1 of reading AFTG I have only been able to picture one person as Wymack and that is this motherfucker from Teen Wolf

it’s really trippy to search for allison reynolds, expecting the blonde defensive dealer and absolute goddess allison jamaica reynolds, just for the search to give you allison reynolds, the basket case emo girl from an 80s movie

allison and renee bc i love these women and i love renison <3 feel free to repost WITH CREDIT!! (tap for better quality xoxo)

here to prompt that 'other time', thoughts on allison? headcanons, character study etc?

thank you for giving me free reign to ramble about this absolute goddess

the short version of this post: allison reynolds is such a underrated character whose trauma is too often overlooked 

the long version:

one of the most common criticisms about allison is that she’s too cold/uncaring. i don’t want to make this a whole post about sexism, but i will say this: it’s shitty to hate a female character for the same reasons you love male characters in the same series. this happens too often in literature (not just aftg) and it’s exhausting. you can obviously have preferences and favourites, but loving andrew for his apathy and hating allison for hers isn’t the vibe. there are valid arguments that people can use to defend their favourites without being hypocritical and sexist

on that note! allison’s apathy isn’t just because she wants to be bitchy - it’s absolutely something that she learned while living with her parents. she would’ve gone to social gatherings where masking your actual emotions is essential and expected, and then she’d have gone home and have her dreams and aspirations bashed and ridiculed by her parents. it’s only natural that she would hide behind that icy persona in order to guard herself. i’m willing to bet that she pretended not to care when her parents disowned her, and only let herself fall apart when she was completely alone. it would have taken her a long time to be vulnerable in front of others

allison’s just become a really great actress who doesn’t let people get close enough to actually see her. it’s a coping mechanism and it’s how she protects herself from hurting more than she already is

and somewhere (i can’t for the life of me remember if this is in the books or the ec, but anyway), it’s mentioned that allison doesn’t get presents from randy. partly because anything that she can afford anything she wants, but also because she doesn’t have a parent figure to talk to, and randy subs in as a mother figure for her. remember that scene where nicky asked neil to convince andrew to go to thanksgiving in columbia, and remember how heartbreaking it was when he said he missed his mom? allison feels the same thing. (some key differences in the actual situations, but the gist of it? she misses her mom so desperately that she clings to any sort of motherly affection she can get)

okay anyway, that’s enough rambling about allison for today. i’m hoping to start posting more allison content, because even though it doesn’t do as well, i love her sm

basically? more allison appreciation pls and thanks xoxo

also!! @codename-adler wrote a foxes + onesies post (well 9 posts, 1 for each fox) and the portrayal of allison is 10/10, i highly recommend checking out their tumblr :)

no fucking wonder mary never let neil make any friends on the run. for someone whose survival depended on anonymity and being anyone but himself, he was absolutely horrible at hiding any aspect of his personality for longer than 2 seconds of actual human interaction

neil actually cleaned out his cuts and burns after lola tortured him??? while he still thought he was going to die???? like i cannot emphasize enough how much that hurts. i literally had a blister that rubbed off on my foot and cried for days afterwards whenever i tried to clean it out with water, and here neil is even using s o a p?????? it paid off bc he lived and his wounds didn’t get infected but ow

it’s the way that the foxes didn’t stay anywhere overnight all year and instead drove home in the middle of the night every single time to avoid being stuck somewhere unfamiliar, but they willingly stayed at a hotel when neil was taken and would’ve been fine with booking a second night when he came back to them if that’s what he wanted. like andrew would’ve stabbed them if they even thought about leaving, but the best part is that he didn’t even have to. i’m sorry i’m just crying

so you're telling me that nicky, a bad gay driver, was driven around by andrew, a bad gay driver, and he still... didn't realize that andrew was gay af?? nicky c'mon

i have so many emotions about One Riko Moriyama, because on one hand i hate him so much but in the other hand, every single time he appeared in the book i just...loved it. cause he added this tension and always progressed the plot. it was just so good yknow? like he’s a little bastard and if he were real i’d hate his guts on i instinct but as a character/ piece of fiction, i find him really interesting to think about. anyways:your thoughts? not just on this but like, riko in general?

(sorry for such a long ask ┌（-.-)┐)

riko moriyama is a little bitch and i hate him, but i absolutely agree with that. he’s a terrible person and i was almost as excited as neil when he died, but i also absolutely loved the almost feral side of neil he brought out. riko prompted so many iconic lines, and i was genuinely excited when i got to scenes that had him in them. that could be because i’m a sucker for angst

overall, i hate riko in terms of actual qualities. he wasn’t even a villain i could sympathize with, because he just genuinely enjoyed causing pain and terror for no other reason than that it was fun. but i loved the added angst and drama he brought to the series, it definitely enhanced some of aftg’s best qualities and made it that much more interesting

i don’t think neil ever really let himself fully come to terms with and grieve for his mother’s death. he just kept running and couldn’t stop, and he didn’t really have time to think about it with everything that went on during his freshman year. plus like... he was constantly casually looking for blood under his nails?? like this boy needs some serious help oh man

nicky: damn neil nice legs

neil: well every day is leg day when you’re running from your problems

nicky:

erik: what does ‘take out’ mean?

nicky: dating :)

kevin and aaron: food

neil: murder

andrew: all three, if you’re not a fucking coward

neil violently disliked his mother for half his life, but she was still his entire world. and like... no wonder he didn’t know how to navigate friendship and kindness when he showed up at the foxhole court. the foxes showed neil how to thrive where mary taught him to survive. and even though they’re a fractured mess most of the time, they’re exactly what neil needed to become whole. to become a real person for once. to finally be able to stand his ground and have something worth fighting for

how terrifying do you think it was for kevin to get a phone call from riko during christmas break while neil was at evermore? do you think his heart skipped a beat when he saw the caller ID? do you think he stared in shock and tried to fight off a panic attack while his mind spiralled to worst-case scenarios? what do you think kevin thought riko was calling for? to bring kevin back? to tell him that he took things with neil too far? to say that neil signed the contract and wouldn’t be coming back? or that he passed him off to nathan and neil was gone forever?

how do you think he reacted when riko told him that he’d inked neil? that he hadn’t passed neil off to nathan, but he might as well have? that he was practically painting a target directly onto him and begging someone to take aim? how worried do you think he was? how relieved when neil came back, harmed but alive? 

and most of all, how hard do you think it was for him to try and keep it together when he knew how it would eventually end for his smart-mouthed, runaway recruit with worlds of potential?

popping back in to ask: what are your fave fic tropes? do you have any fave fics to recommend that follow those tropes?

i KNEW that my notes document filled with fics i’ve read would come in handy someday! i’m a sucker for hurt/comfort and angst, those are always tags in my ao3 searches :) here are a few of my favourite aftg ones:

say something by Willow_bird - my most reread fic. andreil learn ASL bc neil goes mute sometimes. lots of content, awesome writing, fluffy but also angsty and lots of hurt/comfort

this is what hollows by constellationqueen - raven!neil, great writing, LOTS of angst, true to characters, in progress (i’m subscribed!)

heaven can’t help me now by history11huh - kevaaron fic (didn’t love the ship before reading this but obsessed now), love-hate relationship, definitely angsty, in progress (subscribed!)

a switchblade is my preferred weapon by badacts - raven!neil, diff povs, overall great, love it

staring at the sun by TheirHighestMajesty - jerejean fic! jean adjusting to the trojans. tons of angst and hurt/comfort. i vibe more with the first half of it and am not subscribed anymore, but i think it’s still in progress! highly recommend. (fair warning, the slowburn is... very slow)

the unkindness of ravens by crazy_like_a - raven!neil, first fic i ever bookmarked, wonderful writing, obsessed with this one. in progress, subscribed :)

be sure to read the TWs for these, especially the raven!neil ones, bc some parts are pretty dark

also most of these are pretty long LMAO i’m sorry, i like getting invested in fics. i also tend to skim filler chapters etc

can we agree that neil absolutely flexed when he dragged andrew’s hand under his shirt? and can we also agree that while andrew was definitely interested in the scars, he also 100% let his hand linger on neil’s flexed abs? ok thanks

hola me amiga, back again to ask: tilda minyard and her relationship to both of the twins. thoughts?

hello again! 

(cw: abusive parent-child relationship, tilda, twinyards’ pasts)

oh boy. tilda. she is one character that i just. hate. i don’t hate her for putting the twinyards into foster care. i don’t even hate her for only taking aaron back, bc while it’s heartbreaking all around... she couldn’t handle two kids, which is devastating but fair. not telling aaron about andrew was pretty shitty, but again, she couldn’t handle two and aaron would’ve wanted to reunite, so keeping him a secret was maybe what she thought was the least painful.

but god. i hate her so much. 

she was neglectful of aaron his whole childhood and made him feel like a burden. he still loved her, bc kids want to love their parents so desperately. and in return he was met with snarls and insults and silent hatred. the kind where a person can channel their hate as they’re washing dishes roughly or clenching they’re jaw while watching tv. the kind that festers around you and makes the entire environment stifling and toxic. 

and then andrew. i don’t think andrew had it in him any more to care that he was abandoned. the fact that tilda abandoned him and kept aaron may have stung slightly, but ultimately, he would’ve shoved that down as just another shitty thing in his shitty life and moved on. 

however. 

tilda started to become violent when higgins told them about andrew. she’d been abusive the whole time, but now it was physical as well. and there’s no way aaron didn’t associate that negativity with andrew, even only subconsciously, before he even met him. 

and then andrew was reunited, which tilda had tried to avoid all along. and andrew saw how abusive she was and told aaron he could take care of it, and he did. and aaron despised him for it. because he still loved his mom. because he was still so desperate for the love that came out in fractured fractions from time to time. 

tilda is, ultimately, why the twinyards have such a shitty relationship. she’s the reason aaron had such a shitty childhood. (i don’t think it’s 100% fair to blame all of andrew’s on her, because while she is why he’s there, she wasn’t the actual abuser for him. she doesn’t haunt his nightmares). 

tilda shattered the twinyards and did nothing to put them back together. and i will never forgive her for it. 

bc i’m just a really great person all-around, obviously: unpacking the truth

mines is “this is a safe place bc i know harries would murder me: a true crime series”

i love that andreil didn’t try to hide their (“not-”)relationship from anyone, they just didn’t bother telling people. they didn’t try to deny their attraction or the fact that they’d been hooking up, and they didn’t panic when they were outed. their reaction was basically “yeah, and?”, and they they just went on with their lives and nothing changed. they’re so perfect for each other and it’s so pure and i can go on about this forever but

back on my bullshit

n e ways

do you want have headcannon for the foxes cursing habits/how they curse/ everyone’s fave curse word (this totally includes abbie and dadmack too btw)

ilysm, thank you for another ask!

ooo this is fun! (it got very long very fast hahah sorryyy). here’s what i’ve got for you:

(coarse language ahead, obviously)

dan mostly swears at people. by this, i mean she doesn’t usually swear if she stubs her toe or is running late, only if someone pisses her off

her favourite ones are asshole and motherfucker, but she’s also fond of dick

kevin isn’t picky with his swear words - he’ll use whatever gets the point across

however, he loves swearing in french, and his fave french curse is “putain à la merde”, which loosely translates to fucking shit

andrew opts for fuck and fuck you most of the time. in english, because he usually wants everyone to understand him if he swears

that said, he doesn’t often have to swear - his stare says it well enough

matt curses not only when he’s mad, but also when he gets excited (so basically, he swears a lot)

his faves are holy hell/fucking hell and frick frack crack-a-lack (bc of the looks the foxes give him when he says it)

aaron’s favourite english swear words are bullshit and moron, but he especially enjoys the casual german curse word “scheiße” and uses it very often

seth goes right for the throat. he’s not afraid to use the f slur or c*nt, especially around the foxes (two swear words that i’m nervous to even type out LMAO) 

in more public settings, he opts for jesus christ and shit

allison loves saying bitch/son of a bitch (bc people call her a bitch all the time so she just turns it around)

worth noting that she swears at inanimate objects more than at people - her curling iron when it burns her, her phone when she drops it, anything she bumps into, etc

nicky, like aaron, is fond of german curse words. his are generally more colourful though, since he learned more german slang and bc swear words are the first thing he got erik to teach him

in english, nicky likes kiss my ass and damn. he also enjoys making up random insults sometimes, like calling someone an untied shoelace or a stale piece of bread. medicated andrew found this very entertaining

renee doesn’t swear - she destroys people with condescension and passive-agressiveness

before she was born-again, she was fond of using fuck (twinning w andrew xoxo)

neil will use literally anything, in any language. typically he morphs his curses to fit whatever culture he’s currently immersed in. some examples:

america: fuck/fucker

britain: wanker and prick

france: merde, salope, and va te faire enculé (shit, bitch, and go fuck yourself)

germany: flachwischer and du fickfehler (~fuckiwit/motherfucker and you mistake*)

wymack always mixes it up. flying fuck, pain in my ass, what the absolute shit, goddamnit, etc. he doesn’t have a favourite; he likes them all

abby’s pretty tame, usually. her most frequently used are crap, what the hell, and christ. if she stubs her toe, she normally says frick. wymack thinks it’s adorable

*i don’t actually speak german, besides very basic beginner duolingo stuff, so those translations are just what i found on random websites

you said i could send more asks (and i just thought of this so) what do you think of the extra content? ive seen a lot of mixed views but everyone mostly disregards it so i was just wondering what parts you liked and what parts you didnt

sorry for two asks in a row but xfjrsfbjgrukgv i’m curious

 yeah, seriously send them whenever! they always make me happy :)

as a general rule, i accept the things that are set pre-canon and most canon-timeline stuff (why andrew’s afraid of heights, that kevin noticed andreil first, renee’s past, etc). the stuff that i don’t love (mostly post-canon), i tend to view as headcanons rather than stuff that would happen in the canon universe. like the no renison, no jerejean, twinyards growing apart - i don’t vibe with those, but i respect that other people might

some of the post-canon stuff that i do like is the cats, robin, how andreil navigates intimacy (besides the no hugging), and andrew sleeping w his back to the wall, among others. i also don’t actually mind the no marriage thing for them, and i’m passive about the no “i love you”s

idk! i’m pretty indifferent about most of it. i was just excited to have more content from the author! i pick and choose what i want to consider canon, and i just disregard the rest :) 

do you have any headcannons (andreil or otherwise) that are unpopular within the aftg fandom? and by unpopular i mean you haven’t seen them done/mentioned by anyone yet.

(also your posts are rlly cool, glad i stumbled upon your blog!!)

oh man, i love hc asks! i appreciate you giving me permission to let my mind run wild. and tysm, that’s really sweet!! 

(these are in no particular order. i haven’t seen any of them done before, but i also haven’t read all of the aftg hcs, so i apologize if there are any that you’ve already seen! CW: scars, bad family relationships... i think that’s it?)

kevin dog ears the pages of his books 

(he didn’t have any actual bookmarks at the nest and would rather just fold the pages than use a random scrap of paper)

in france, they greet by kissing each other on the cheeks (1-4 times, depending on the area). so, i propose that jeremy does his research and decides to greet jean at the airport with 2 “bises” (as is custom in marseilles). it’s second nature to jean, and he returns it without thinking. eventually that’s how all the trojans greet each other

bonus: the trojans greet the foxes like that at a match. most are confused, andrew stands off to the side and (understandably) refuses, nicky’s enthusiastic, and neil and allison reciprocate perfectly

the foxes write letters to each other when they no longer share dorms! especially neil, since he’s the worst at answering via technology

the letters include little doodles in the margins, pictures in the envelopes (mostly from dan), and other little things that can fit

all of the foxes have created spots designated for the letters

allison commissions a set of 10 custom garden gnomes that look like each teammate for all of the (og) foxes’ houses (and also wymack). while the reactions vary, everyone keeps them (some display them in their yards and some do not)

renee journals and presses flowers

allison reads classic poetry and novels

matt and dan get neil to paint lil fox paws around their house, wherever he wants to. they always smile when they see them

wymack has scars similar to andrew’s. he used to always wear long sleeves bc of it, but he covered them up with the flame tattoos and proudly displays his arms now

the foxes as a whole tend not to like rainy or snowy days bc bad weather = staying inside, which isn’t ideal when you have a horrible home environment (and for neil it meant running was harder)

they generally all end up in the same room on bad weather days, without planning it. no ones mentions the reason, but everyone feels a bit calmer with their found family around

neil and andrew start up a collection of black glass figurines in their home (like bee’s but opposite)

the foxes have a way easier time buying gifts for andreil once this collection is started, and it grows exponentially

neil doesn’t love ice cream but he has taken a liking for froyo

he doesn’t really care what he eats, but andrew notices that neil eats a lot more of it a lot faster, and fruit-flavoured froyo becomes neil’s usual frozen treat 

it’s also what caused him to experience his first brain freeze bc he’d never consumed a frozen food so fast before

i’m so sorry to any mobile users who have just gotten a wall of text

i hope this is sort of what you were looking for! aftg is on my mind 24/7 and this all flooded out LMAO

feel free to send me asks anytime! :)

FBI: *gives strict instructions*

Neil: *removes one earbud* what

i really wish we’d had more hernandez content, because he was obviously important to neil. like neil didn’t flinch at all when hernandez reached to help him up after andrew slammed him w the racquet, he clearly cared for neil and wanted to see him succeed, he was probably the person neil most trusted (although still warily) in millport. like i bet he puts up all the newspaper clippings about neil that he can find, and i bet he follows neil’s life through the news (and is shocked when the truth about his past comes out). i hope that neil gives him a ticket to watch him at the olympics. anyway, i want more hernandez content 

matt: self-defence is not some fun boxing match, okay? it’s about escaping with your life. so, strike, scream, and run. alright, lets try it

neil: *smacks kevin on the back of the head, screams, books it*

matt:

kevin: >:o

matt: that may have been my fault

i hit a follower benchmark the other day and i know that follower counts don’t matter in the slightest on tumblr, but it makes me so happy that people actually stick around for my random aftg thoughts! every note makes me smile, and i always go through every reblog to look at the tags bc you lovelies are honestly hilarious. thank you for following! love you all <3

andrew, after his car is destroyed by ravens fans: in terms of money... we have no money

neil, with a quarter of a million bucks: *hands over his binder*