The Insanely Long Fanfiction Meme - with bonus LFN fic bit?
The Insanely Long Fanfiction Meme
Wow, seriously long meme. But I've been sick for the last few days and mostly have just been lying in bed hoping to die pass out from exhaustion because sleep has been difficult for the last twenty-four hours or so, and so instead of just moping and hating everything my current circumstances, I did a meme!
1. What fandoms have you written in?
Chronologically: Harry Potter, Mina de Malfois, The Devil Wears Prada, La Femme Nikita, Firefly, Tin Man, Dollhouse, Alice in Wonderland, The Stand (crossover), and half-written bits of 28 Days Later, Doubt, and Battlestar Galactica. Wow. *is a fandom whore*
2. Pairings?
Um, a lot-which is weird, because I consider myself more of a gen girl than anything. But it turns out there are more than I can really list here-especially in HP fandom-so I'll list my faves to write in each fandom, skipping over the fandoms where I've only written Genfic, and leave it at that.
Harry Potter: Severus/Hermione
Mina de Malfois: Arc/Mina. Or Arc/Xena. How about Arc/Xena/Mina? :D OT3 FTW!
Devil Wears Prada: Miranda/Andy
La Femme Nikita: Madeline/Operations
Firefly: Inara/Kaylee. I think I'd prefer to write Jayne/River (yeah, I don't know either), but I can't seem to make it happen. Lol.
3. Any fandoms you would like to write in?
I want to actually finish something in BSG, but after season four, I can't seem to manage it. My head was swimming with fic until mid-season-three. Ugh. I should have listened to y'all and stopped there, 'cause seriously, wtf. I also really want to write Doubt Sister Aloysius/Sister James fic (nunslash ftw? No?), but my raised-Catholic brain can't seem to get past the fact that I'd be, um, writing nunslash. I can't help it; Meryl Streep makes me want to write femslash about her in EVERY MOVIE OMG it's not my fault. I wish I could write West Wing, but don't feel like I (a) am intelligent enough to pull it off, or (b) know enough about the political system in my own country. I fail. I would also love to write Deadwood, but I doubt my ability to get the voices right, and seeing as how I blush when I write the word 'fuck' into a story one time, I don't think I'd get past, um, paragraph two.
4. Do reviews affect how you write in any way?
Kind of? I mean, they don't really influence what I write, or how I write the characters, or where my plots go. All of that's pretty much set before I ever post word one. But some reviews have a negative effect on the muse-and not even just the bad reviews, either. Sometimes it's just the fear that the reviewer is expecting an ending way better than the one I've got planned that makes my muse hide her head in the sand. Lol. I know the solution to this is to just stop writing WIPs, but but but… sigh. I never learn.
5. Do you use a beta? Sometimes. I usually do in HP fandom, and pretty much never do in the others. I think because the pool of potential readers of my fic is so small in the other fandoms that I feel like if I use a beta, I'm cutting down my posted-story-readership by a third. Also, I only know, um, maybe seven? people total in all the other fandoms combined. In HP, there are at least seven people I know actually online at any given moment. Usually twice that.
6. What ratings do you read/write?
All of them! :D I write more toward the G end of the spectrum, but will read anything and everything.
7. What warnings have you used on your fiction?
I use my warnings section for labeling than actual warnings, because that's how I read them on other people's fics-what kink am I perusing today, vs what should I avoid. Lol. So while I warn for the usual things to save people's sanity and all (non-con, dub-con, character deaths), I've also warned for things like adultery, voyeurism, incest, language, mpreg, violence & torture, brain-breaking weirdness, odd scenarios, fisting (what?), etc.
8. Do you have any squicks?
Not really. Like I said, I'll read anything and everything. There've only been a few fics to really squick me out, all of them sent to me by one of my lovely, helpful friends after I said somewhere else that I don't have any squicks, but it wasn't the theme/warnings/etc that squicked me, so much as the way they were written, if that makes sense.
9. Do you Role-play online? If so, what?
Nope.
10. Favorite fandom to write/read?
This is kind of a tie between HP and LFN. Usually I pick up a new fandom, am fascinated with it for a few months, and then it falls to the wayside and is overshadowed by the giant that is HP fandom, but LFN's hanging in there and receiving most of my writing attention these days, a year and a half after my first fic in that fandom posted, so… it might have pulled into the lead as 'favorite'.
11. Favorite pairing?
Again, this was SS/HG in HP fandom, but I think it's been overtaken by Madeline/Operations in LFN. Omg I love them. Especially Madeline. Lol.
12. Do you write/read drabbles?
Yes! :D A lot of them, actually.
13. Forget other people, what is the fanfic you’ve written you’re most proud of?
For the 2010 meme, I totally put To Make an End, but if we're talking 'most proud of ever', I think I'd have to say Filling in the Spaces. It was the fic I'd wanted to write for two years, and the OWL House Cup finally convinced me to give it a shot. I haven't updated it in a long, long while, but it's probably been my favorite story to work on ever. Although randomly, my favorite character to write hasn't been Petunia, as some might think, but Hestia-trying to turn her from the throw-away practically-name-only character she is in canon, into a fully formed person with a personality and hopes and fears and issues all her own. I <3 writing Hestia, for serious. Also <3 writing Petunia, I always have, but Hestia is the reason I know I'll finish that fic someday-because even though it's really Petunia's tale, it's telling Hestia's story, too.
14. Do you find writing easy? Hard? What are the most difficult aspects of writing you struggle with?
It depends what sort of day month quarter year I'm having. There are periods of time (i.e. the second half of 2009) when there just aren't enough hours in the day for all of the writing I want to do. I write on lunch breaks; I write while I should be working; I write when I should be sleeping. I write page after page of writing, churn out one-shots and the beginnings of WIPs and drabbles like mad… and then there are periods of time (i.e. the last seven months of 2010) when I can't write a damn thing to save my life. I can't write a grocery list, for all the focus I have. I want to write, but nothing sounds right, and the words won't put themselves together properly, and nothing works. It's insanely frustrating.
15. Write a few sentences or so (or, you know, two pages) of your favorite pairing or character.
She once went six years without having sex with him.
'She went' versus 'they went' because Paul really had nothing to do with it-he'd have had her back in his bed (or her bed, or bent over a desk, or some other entirely unacceptable situation) within two days if she'd let him-and 'sex with him' instead of 'sex, period' because celibacy has… well, never really been her forte. Besides, it was never the sex that was the problem when it came to her and Paul, but rather all the other issues that cropped up whenever their relationship strayed too far from the strictly professional end of the spectrum.
It had been a decision made out of necessity; neither of them particularly needed the distraction, and Paul tended to lose perspective and objectivity when things were let to go on for too long, and besides, relationships of any sort inside Section were usually a mistake.
It hadn't been the first time she'd made that particular decision. Rather, it had been the third. But Paul's wheedling and complaining and downright orneriness when she insisted on a more platonic (if what they had could ever be truly called platonic) relationship had worn her down after only ten months the first time, and six weeks the second. She wasn't particularly proud of that, but as was her habit when it came to parts of herself that she didn't approve of, she'd simply focused her attention on destroying it and rebuilding with something more acceptable. She'd rebuffed all of his hopeful advances with icy scorn, heartlessly returning gifts and avoiding at all costs the grand gestures he was prone to on holidays she didn't even celebrate… but while he'd relent for a time, there would always come a moment when he again decided that he actually had a chance at changing her mind, and the whole cycle would start over.
And then George had become a problem. She and Paul had pieced together a plan, and she couldn't even blame him for bringing an end to her six years of steadfast refusal because it had, technically, been her idea. And it had been a good idea, too good to discard simply because neither of them could afford Paul's emotional entanglements.
(She blatantly refused to acknowledge the part of herself that created situations that enabled her to justify doing what she wanted by making it seem like the most logical course of action; while that was yet another part of her own personality that she was less than proud of, she'd never quite managed to excise it-and, if she were being honest with herself, she wasn't sure she really wanted to, as it usually ended with things going exactly the way she wanted them to go.)
So she slept with him-just once, because that was what their carefully-constructed profile called for. Well, it was supposed to be once. That one time opened a sort of floodgate, and everything had all gone downhill from there.
It should have ended with the utter failure of their plans, though. They were both angry and frustrated and disappointed and just generally bitter enough afterward that ending things would have been almost effortless; after all, it had all been, ultimately, part of the profile. Everything could have gone back to normal, whatever that was, and that would have been it.
Except their version of normal had always ended with them being partners in every aspect, and bringing it all to yet another end was easier said that done. Now, three months later, she finds herself wondering how she let herself fall back into this same routine of hurried encounters in far-off corners of Section, darkened windows in the Perch, answering the door at three a.m. despite knowing she shouldn't, and waking up with Paul curled around her hours after she told him he should go home but hadn't actually made him leave.
More worrying than those things, though, is how comfortable that routine has become.
She should put a stop to it, she knows that. It'd be better for both of them, better for Section, just… better. It's what she should do, and Madeline has always been willing, if sometimes reluctantly so, to take on the task of what must be done, no matter how distasteful or how much she'd, truth be told, rather not.
But part of her wonders if there'd really be a point to ending this ridiculous, self-indulgent cycle of not-romance. It'd only repeat itself; experience has repeatedly taught her as much. Paul would be impossible to deal with for weeks, and irritating to deal with for months, and she'd only end up giving in anyway because eventually she'd want to, which would make the whole ordeal pointless.
…aaaand I have no idea where I was going with this.
16. What was the first fandom you wrote for? Do you still like/participate in it?
Harry Potter-and yes! :D
17. What would you call your writing “style”?
Typical Jackie fic: written in present tense, third person, too many adverbs and adjectives, severe abuse of italics throughout, very few uses of proper nouns outside of dialogue-heavy fic-and speaking of which, not a lot of dialogue. Tons of one-shots and drabbles, not so many chaptered fics. Lots and lots of genfic and femslash, unless you read my LFN stuff, in which case it's mostly TR fic. In HP fandom, lots of fic about random minor characters.
18. Name one thing you’d LOVE to write, but have been too afraid or shy to do.
I'd love to write darkfic. Like, really, really dark. I started a few for the hp_darkfest a couple years ago, which are now lingering in the Dead Files, but can't seem to bring myself to write even those to be quite as dark as they started in my head. I also can't write a proper NC-17 scene. My pr0n is mostly implied. Lol.
19. When you write, is there anything that helps? Music? Quiet room?
Lots of room for pacing-most of my writing is done in my head first, then jotted down quickly once I have the scene figured out, and the 'figuring out' bit mostly involves a lot of pacing back and forth across my house, the same path over and over, talking out the dialogue aloud and trying to describe facial expressions by looking at myself in mirrors as I pass, and blocking out people's positions in scenes by walking all over the room, turning this way and that, until it makes sense in my head and I can practically see and hear the scene happening. Then I write. I sometimes do the subdued, more stationary version of this in the car, which probably makes passersby think I'm insane.
20. What inspires you?
Everything? Random quotes. Bad movies. Great songs. RL situations. Things that make me angry. Things that make me go, "Awww…." People I know. People I don't know, but wish I did. People I know, but wish I didn't. Random ringtones I hear on people's phones. Old photo albums. Quotes that pop up on my gmail news feed in the Quote of the Day section. Dreams. Odd turns of phrase. So yeah, pretty much everything.
21. Now, regarding your fics… which is your favorite?
My favorite is probably Thought But Never Said. It was a writing style I'd never tried before, and was my first LFN fic, and… yeah, probably my favorite, though To Make an End is a close second.
22. What is your most popular fanfic and why do you think people like it so much?
Probably All Those Empty Spaces-it's received a ton of reviews (outside of House Cup, that is; during the Cup, everything received a ton of reviews), has been recced all over the place, has been a featured fic on just about all the archives to which it's been posted, and won a few awards-all of which surprised the hell out of me, because I'd never have imagined that a random one-shot I wrote twenty minutes after finishing DH, written about one of the most hated characters in the HP series, would be my most popular fic. *shrugs* Weird, but I'm not complaining. I think people like it because it makes them think; it's about a usually-hated character, but it makes people question some of the reasons they hate her. It doesn't make excuses for her actions, but gives them a reason all the same, and turns a cookie-cutter villain into a person with hopes and disappointments and old heartaches held too closely for too long to really be let go. And yeah, mostly it just makes people think. Lol.
23. Which is your worst-received fic?
Ummmm… I guess This is How. But then, it's femslashy incest fingernail-kink fic. It was written for a prompt, and the recipient enjoyed it, but I'm not surprised most other people didn't really find it to their liking. It was definitely for a very specific audience. Lol.
24. Which is your angsty-est fic?
I guess this would probably be The Ties That Bind. Angst, angst everywhere. Death and family issues and more death. Yay, Andromeda's life.
25. Which is your funniest fic?
I don't really do funny all that often. I mean, some of my writing has a sarcastic or funny twist; Off-Label Uses for the Gelman Process had some amusing moments and fun turns of phrase weaved into what was, ultimately, an otherwise plotty fic with a kind of screwed-up, violent, slightly-tragic ending. But I guess of the few written with the intention of actually being funny, I'd say Glowing Orbs and Other Things, which was mpreg crackfic, but fun to write all the same.
26. Smuttiest?
Definitely In the Engine Room. Yay, fisting porn.
What? That was the prompt. :p *shifty eyes*
27. Fluffiest?
I don't really write much fluff. I'm more of an angst kind of girl. I guess Bedtime, which wasn't so much a story, as a 250-word drabble response to the 'A' prompt on the ABCs of DWP challenge. It does involve cuddling in bed and a teddy bear, though, so that probably makes it fluff.
28. Have you ever made someone cry with a fic?
Supposedly. I mean, I wasn't there to verify or anything. Lol. But supposedly An Unsurpassable Distance, Filling in the Spaces, Hoping for Normal, Snapshots, The Ties that Bind and The Endlessness That You Fear have all made people cry at one point or another.
29. Which fic frustrates you the most?
I'm going to say The Endlessness That You Fear. I started writing it in 2007. Then DH came out, and it entirely changed my view of Snape. After that, I just… stopped. I've only updated it a few times since, the last time being November of 2009. I can't see Snape as the person I was writing anymore, and so writing the fic at all is proving very, very difficult. It's kind of maddening. Sometimes I really, desperately wish I had one person entirely willing to be spoiled on the endings of all of my WIPs and willing to let me spill the whole thing out, then take the time to help me piece together the bits that I can't figure out. Lol. A cheerleader without an aversion to spoilers, I needs one.
30. Which fic was the most fun to write?
Uhhmmm… probably the Twenty Random Facts series. They are, as the title implies, incredibly random, and were written without much thought or seriousness, even though they did, for the most part, end up pretty serious in terms of subject matter.
31. Who is your favorite OC you've ever created?
I'm going to have to say Gordon from Off-Label Uses for the Gelman Process. He keeps threatening to sneak into To the Black, and I have this random urge to write Gordon & Madeline genfic set pre-series. Maybe one day. Lol.
32. Are you better at one-shots or multipart fics?
One-shots. My chaptered fics are okay, but they generally, as a rule, remain unfinished for a long, long time. Like, forever. I've finished, um, four? and still have six to go. Seriously, if I ever even joke about posting another WIP, someone just slap me, okay?
33. What character do you think you're the best at portraying?
Petunia Dursley, hands down. Lol. I get her on some level, and writing her comes kind of easily.
34. What character is the most difficult to portray?
Dudley Dursley. I know, right? I can write his mum, why not him? But he's really, really hard for me. I finally tried my hand at it recently, but I'm still not sure I'm happy with the results. *shrugs* I have trouble with most male characters, actually; I have a hard time figuring out what's going on in their heads-which is probably why I write almost exclusively from female characters' POV. Seriously-only 19 of the 95(!) drabbles and fics I've posted have been even partially written from the POV of a male character. *is lame* There are a lot of men in my stories, they just generally aren't the ones telling the story. Lol.
And stealing some from daybreak777.... 35. Favorite Opening Line(s)
(From Off-Label Uses for the Gelman Process)
Madeline hates this restaurant.
The staff are, without exception, entirely incompetent. The food is terrible. If she were one given to imagination or had a flair for the dramatic, she'd be swearing that she could feel the grime of the floor right through the soles of her shoes.
36. Favorite Closing Line(s)
(From Mina de Malfois and the Present Crisis)
I nodded and stood, unable to hold back a grin as I fell into step beside her. "Arc?" She unlocked the library door and then paused, waiting for me to continue. Feeling silly and ridiculous, but not really caring, I said, "Merry Christmas."
Arc's smile crept all the way up to her eyes as she turned to open the door, and a wave of warmth washed over me that I wasn't sure could be entirely attributed to the library's heating system. "Merry Christmas, Mina," she said softly. "Now come inside. It's freezing out here."
37. Favorite Line from any of my stories
(From Finding Quiet)
Serenity groans and moans through the black, only-mildly-important parts falling off outside, dangling inside, still broken. The ship is broken, the family you've found here is broken, and even though you're more at peace now than you have been in years, sometimes the echoes ("Hey, small crazy person," whispered from the bridge, words left behind) (a Reaver touched this wall, fingerprints that can't be washed away) make you feel like you'll drown.
36. Favorite Title
My titles are usually fairly boring. We'll go with Some Things You Lose (and Some Things You Just Give Away. That's probably cheating because that one technically came from song lyrics and wasn't my creation at all, but... well, that can be said for most of my decent titles. Lol. Song lyrics or poetry. If that one doesn't count, I'll say Spoon Handle Wands.
37. Favorite Scene
This scene from Part Two of To the Black:
With a few minutes to spare, Madeline hesitates for only the briefest of seconds before tapping into the security feed of the Perch. The room is dark and empty. Of course it is; it's two a.m. on Paquin. Paul is probably sleeping right now, as well he should be. Really, so should she.
Skipping past the security feeds from a series of empty hallways, she pauses at Comm for a second, then continues on, stopping when she gets to her office. Mild annoyance races through her at the sight of all of the fluorescent lights still shining brightly-the last thing on her mind when she'd left had been her plants, after all, and she'd realized, on some level, that they'd all die or be thrown away long before she could ever consider returning, but the waste of years' worth of work is frustrating nonetheless-but that irritation is forgotten in an instant at the sight of a lone figure sitting on the floor.
Paul. Of course. Who, it appears, isn't even close to being asleep right now.
She stares for a moment, unable to make herself move on to the next screen. He's just… sitting there, leaning against the wall opposite the glaring lights, and the picture isn't the clearest in the 'verse, but if she had to guess, she'd say that despite the display in front of him, he isn't seeing bonsai and orchids at all. He lets his head drop back against the wall, opting to stare at the ceiling instead, and he looks so very… defeated.
Madeline remembers a time, years ago, when he'd been shot, and she'd leaned over his bed in Medical, his cheek cool beneath her fingertips as she'd ordered him to live, willing him to hear her and obey. For the briefest of seconds she wishes, irrationally, that she could do that same thing right now-and just as quickly she rolls her eyes at herself in disgust and snatches her hand away from the monitor, clicking out the commands to cut off the connection to Section and wipe away all evidence of her having been poking around in the first place.
38. Tag some friends!
Um, no. Lol. I love you guys too much. But if you want to give it a shot, go for it! Just set aside an hour or two to write up all of these answers, 'cause seriously…
Wow, seriously long meme. But I've been sick for the last few days and mostly have just been lying in bed hoping to die pass out from exhaustion because sleep has been difficult for the last twenty-four hours or so, and so instead of just moping and hating everything my current circumstances, I did a meme!
1. What fandoms have you written in?
Chronologically: Harry Potter, Mina de Malfois, The Devil Wears Prada, La Femme Nikita, Firefly, Tin Man, Dollhouse, Alice in Wonderland, The Stand (crossover), and half-written bits of 28 Days Later, Doubt, and Battlestar Galactica. Wow. *is a fandom whore*
2. Pairings?
Um, a lot-which is weird, because I consider myself more of a gen girl than anything. But it turns out there are more than I can really list here-especially in HP fandom-so I'll list my faves to write in each fandom, skipping over the fandoms where I've only written Genfic, and leave it at that.
Harry Potter: Severus/Hermione
Mina de Malfois: Arc/Mina. Or Arc/Xena. How about Arc/Xena/Mina? :D OT3 FTW!
Devil Wears Prada: Miranda/Andy
La Femme Nikita: Madeline/Operations
Firefly: Inara/Kaylee. I think I'd prefer to write Jayne/River (yeah, I don't know either), but I can't seem to make it happen. Lol.
3. Any fandoms you would like to write in?
I want to actually finish something in BSG, but after season four, I can't seem to manage it. My head was swimming with fic until mid-season-three. Ugh. I should have listened to y'all and stopped there, 'cause seriously, wtf. I also really want to write Doubt Sister Aloysius/Sister James fic (nunslash ftw? No?), but my raised-Catholic brain can't seem to get past the fact that I'd be, um, writing nunslash. I can't help it; Meryl Streep makes me want to write femslash about her in EVERY MOVIE OMG it's not my fault. I wish I could write West Wing, but don't feel like I (a) am intelligent enough to pull it off, or (b) know enough about the political system in my own country. I fail. I would also love to write Deadwood, but I doubt my ability to get the voices right, and seeing as how I blush when I write the word 'fuck' into a story one time, I don't think I'd get past, um, paragraph two.
4. Do reviews affect how you write in any way?
Kind of? I mean, they don't really influence what I write, or how I write the characters, or where my plots go. All of that's pretty much set before I ever post word one. But some reviews have a negative effect on the muse-and not even just the bad reviews, either. Sometimes it's just the fear that the reviewer is expecting an ending way better than the one I've got planned that makes my muse hide her head in the sand. Lol. I know the solution to this is to just stop writing WIPs, but but but… sigh. I never learn.
5. Do you use a beta? Sometimes. I usually do in HP fandom, and pretty much never do in the others. I think because the pool of potential readers of my fic is so small in the other fandoms that I feel like if I use a beta, I'm cutting down my posted-story-readership by a third. Also, I only know, um, maybe seven? people total in all the other fandoms combined. In HP, there are at least seven people I know actually online at any given moment. Usually twice that.
6. What ratings do you read/write?
All of them! :D I write more toward the G end of the spectrum, but will read anything and everything.
7. What warnings have you used on your fiction?
I use my warnings section for labeling than actual warnings, because that's how I read them on other people's fics-what kink am I perusing today, vs what should I avoid. Lol. So while I warn for the usual things to save people's sanity and all (non-con, dub-con, character deaths), I've also warned for things like adultery, voyeurism, incest, language, mpreg, violence & torture, brain-breaking weirdness, odd scenarios, fisting (what?), etc.
8. Do you have any squicks?
Not really. Like I said, I'll read anything and everything. There've only been a few fics to really squick me out, all of them sent to me by one of my lovely, helpful friends after I said somewhere else that I don't have any squicks, but it wasn't the theme/warnings/etc that squicked me, so much as the way they were written, if that makes sense.
9. Do you Role-play online? If so, what?
Nope.
10. Favorite fandom to write/read?
This is kind of a tie between HP and LFN. Usually I pick up a new fandom, am fascinated with it for a few months, and then it falls to the wayside and is overshadowed by the giant that is HP fandom, but LFN's hanging in there and receiving most of my writing attention these days, a year and a half after my first fic in that fandom posted, so… it might have pulled into the lead as 'favorite'.
11. Favorite pairing?
Again, this was SS/HG in HP fandom, but I think it's been overtaken by Madeline/Operations in LFN. Omg I love them. Especially Madeline. Lol.
12. Do you write/read drabbles?
Yes! :D A lot of them, actually.
13. Forget other people, what is the fanfic you’ve written you’re most proud of?
For the 2010 meme, I totally put To Make an End, but if we're talking 'most proud of ever', I think I'd have to say Filling in the Spaces. It was the fic I'd wanted to write for two years, and the OWL House Cup finally convinced me to give it a shot. I haven't updated it in a long, long while, but it's probably been my favorite story to work on ever. Although randomly, my favorite character to write hasn't been Petunia, as some might think, but Hestia-trying to turn her from the throw-away practically-name-only character she is in canon, into a fully formed person with a personality and hopes and fears and issues all her own. I <3 writing Hestia, for serious. Also <3 writing Petunia, I always have, but Hestia is the reason I know I'll finish that fic someday-because even though it's really Petunia's tale, it's telling Hestia's story, too.
14. Do you find writing easy? Hard? What are the most difficult aspects of writing you struggle with?
It depends what sort of day month quarter year I'm having. There are periods of time (i.e. the second half of 2009) when there just aren't enough hours in the day for all of the writing I want to do. I write on lunch breaks; I write while I should be working; I write when I should be sleeping. I write page after page of writing, churn out one-shots and the beginnings of WIPs and drabbles like mad… and then there are periods of time (i.e. the last seven months of 2010) when I can't write a damn thing to save my life. I can't write a grocery list, for all the focus I have. I want to write, but nothing sounds right, and the words won't put themselves together properly, and nothing works. It's insanely frustrating.
15. Write a few sentences or so (or, you know, two pages) of your favorite pairing or character.
She once went six years without having sex with him.
'She went' versus 'they went' because Paul really had nothing to do with it-he'd have had her back in his bed (or her bed, or bent over a desk, or some other entirely unacceptable situation) within two days if she'd let him-and 'sex with him' instead of 'sex, period' because celibacy has… well, never really been her forte. Besides, it was never the sex that was the problem when it came to her and Paul, but rather all the other issues that cropped up whenever their relationship strayed too far from the strictly professional end of the spectrum.
It had been a decision made out of necessity; neither of them particularly needed the distraction, and Paul tended to lose perspective and objectivity when things were let to go on for too long, and besides, relationships of any sort inside Section were usually a mistake.
It hadn't been the first time she'd made that particular decision. Rather, it had been the third. But Paul's wheedling and complaining and downright orneriness when she insisted on a more platonic (if what they had could ever be truly called platonic) relationship had worn her down after only ten months the first time, and six weeks the second. She wasn't particularly proud of that, but as was her habit when it came to parts of herself that she didn't approve of, she'd simply focused her attention on destroying it and rebuilding with something more acceptable. She'd rebuffed all of his hopeful advances with icy scorn, heartlessly returning gifts and avoiding at all costs the grand gestures he was prone to on holidays she didn't even celebrate… but while he'd relent for a time, there would always come a moment when he again decided that he actually had a chance at changing her mind, and the whole cycle would start over.
And then George had become a problem. She and Paul had pieced together a plan, and she couldn't even blame him for bringing an end to her six years of steadfast refusal because it had, technically, been her idea. And it had been a good idea, too good to discard simply because neither of them could afford Paul's emotional entanglements.
(She blatantly refused to acknowledge the part of herself that created situations that enabled her to justify doing what she wanted by making it seem like the most logical course of action; while that was yet another part of her own personality that she was less than proud of, she'd never quite managed to excise it-and, if she were being honest with herself, she wasn't sure she really wanted to, as it usually ended with things going exactly the way she wanted them to go.)
So she slept with him-just once, because that was what their carefully-constructed profile called for. Well, it was supposed to be once. That one time opened a sort of floodgate, and everything had all gone downhill from there.
It should have ended with the utter failure of their plans, though. They were both angry and frustrated and disappointed and just generally bitter enough afterward that ending things would have been almost effortless; after all, it had all been, ultimately, part of the profile. Everything could have gone back to normal, whatever that was, and that would have been it.
Except their version of normal had always ended with them being partners in every aspect, and bringing it all to yet another end was easier said that done. Now, three months later, she finds herself wondering how she let herself fall back into this same routine of hurried encounters in far-off corners of Section, darkened windows in the Perch, answering the door at three a.m. despite knowing she shouldn't, and waking up with Paul curled around her hours after she told him he should go home but hadn't actually made him leave.
More worrying than those things, though, is how comfortable that routine has become.
She should put a stop to it, she knows that. It'd be better for both of them, better for Section, just… better. It's what she should do, and Madeline has always been willing, if sometimes reluctantly so, to take on the task of what must be done, no matter how distasteful or how much she'd, truth be told, rather not.
But part of her wonders if there'd really be a point to ending this ridiculous, self-indulgent cycle of not-romance. It'd only repeat itself; experience has repeatedly taught her as much. Paul would be impossible to deal with for weeks, and irritating to deal with for months, and she'd only end up giving in anyway because eventually she'd want to, which would make the whole ordeal pointless.
…aaaand I have no idea where I was going with this.
16. What was the first fandom you wrote for? Do you still like/participate in it?
Harry Potter-and yes! :D
17. What would you call your writing “style”?
Typical Jackie fic: written in present tense, third person, too many adverbs and adjectives, severe abuse of italics throughout, very few uses of proper nouns outside of dialogue-heavy fic-and speaking of which, not a lot of dialogue. Tons of one-shots and drabbles, not so many chaptered fics. Lots and lots of genfic and femslash, unless you read my LFN stuff, in which case it's mostly TR fic. In HP fandom, lots of fic about random minor characters.
18. Name one thing you’d LOVE to write, but have been too afraid or shy to do.
I'd love to write darkfic. Like, really, really dark. I started a few for the hp_darkfest a couple years ago, which are now lingering in the Dead Files, but can't seem to bring myself to write even those to be quite as dark as they started in my head. I also can't write a proper NC-17 scene. My pr0n is mostly implied. Lol.
19. When you write, is there anything that helps? Music? Quiet room?
Lots of room for pacing-most of my writing is done in my head first, then jotted down quickly once I have the scene figured out, and the 'figuring out' bit mostly involves a lot of pacing back and forth across my house, the same path over and over, talking out the dialogue aloud and trying to describe facial expressions by looking at myself in mirrors as I pass, and blocking out people's positions in scenes by walking all over the room, turning this way and that, until it makes sense in my head and I can practically see and hear the scene happening. Then I write. I sometimes do the subdued, more stationary version of this in the car, which probably makes passersby think I'm insane.
20. What inspires you?
Everything? Random quotes. Bad movies. Great songs. RL situations. Things that make me angry. Things that make me go, "Awww…." People I know. People I don't know, but wish I did. People I know, but wish I didn't. Random ringtones I hear on people's phones. Old photo albums. Quotes that pop up on my gmail news feed in the Quote of the Day section. Dreams. Odd turns of phrase. So yeah, pretty much everything.
21. Now, regarding your fics… which is your favorite?
My favorite is probably Thought But Never Said. It was a writing style I'd never tried before, and was my first LFN fic, and… yeah, probably my favorite, though To Make an End is a close second.
22. What is your most popular fanfic and why do you think people like it so much?
Probably All Those Empty Spaces-it's received a ton of reviews (outside of House Cup, that is; during the Cup, everything received a ton of reviews), has been recced all over the place, has been a featured fic on just about all the archives to which it's been posted, and won a few awards-all of which surprised the hell out of me, because I'd never have imagined that a random one-shot I wrote twenty minutes after finishing DH, written about one of the most hated characters in the HP series, would be my most popular fic. *shrugs* Weird, but I'm not complaining. I think people like it because it makes them think; it's about a usually-hated character, but it makes people question some of the reasons they hate her. It doesn't make excuses for her actions, but gives them a reason all the same, and turns a cookie-cutter villain into a person with hopes and disappointments and old heartaches held too closely for too long to really be let go. And yeah, mostly it just makes people think. Lol.
23. Which is your worst-received fic?
Ummmm… I guess This is How. But then, it's femslashy incest fingernail-kink fic. It was written for a prompt, and the recipient enjoyed it, but I'm not surprised most other people didn't really find it to their liking. It was definitely for a very specific audience. Lol.
24. Which is your angsty-est fic?
I guess this would probably be The Ties That Bind. Angst, angst everywhere. Death and family issues and more death. Yay, Andromeda's life.
25. Which is your funniest fic?
I don't really do funny all that often. I mean, some of my writing has a sarcastic or funny twist; Off-Label Uses for the Gelman Process had some amusing moments and fun turns of phrase weaved into what was, ultimately, an otherwise plotty fic with a kind of screwed-up, violent, slightly-tragic ending. But I guess of the few written with the intention of actually being funny, I'd say Glowing Orbs and Other Things, which was mpreg crackfic, but fun to write all the same.
26. Smuttiest?
Definitely In the Engine Room. Yay, fisting porn.
What? That was the prompt. :p *shifty eyes*
27. Fluffiest?
I don't really write much fluff. I'm more of an angst kind of girl. I guess Bedtime, which wasn't so much a story, as a 250-word drabble response to the 'A' prompt on the ABCs of DWP challenge. It does involve cuddling in bed and a teddy bear, though, so that probably makes it fluff.
28. Have you ever made someone cry with a fic?
Supposedly. I mean, I wasn't there to verify or anything. Lol. But supposedly An Unsurpassable Distance, Filling in the Spaces, Hoping for Normal, Snapshots, The Ties that Bind and The Endlessness That You Fear have all made people cry at one point or another.
29. Which fic frustrates you the most?
I'm going to say The Endlessness That You Fear. I started writing it in 2007. Then DH came out, and it entirely changed my view of Snape. After that, I just… stopped. I've only updated it a few times since, the last time being November of 2009. I can't see Snape as the person I was writing anymore, and so writing the fic at all is proving very, very difficult. It's kind of maddening. Sometimes I really, desperately wish I had one person entirely willing to be spoiled on the endings of all of my WIPs and willing to let me spill the whole thing out, then take the time to help me piece together the bits that I can't figure out. Lol. A cheerleader without an aversion to spoilers, I needs one.
30. Which fic was the most fun to write?
Uhhmmm… probably the Twenty Random Facts series. They are, as the title implies, incredibly random, and were written without much thought or seriousness, even though they did, for the most part, end up pretty serious in terms of subject matter.
31. Who is your favorite OC you've ever created?
I'm going to have to say Gordon from Off-Label Uses for the Gelman Process. He keeps threatening to sneak into To the Black, and I have this random urge to write Gordon & Madeline genfic set pre-series. Maybe one day. Lol.
32. Are you better at one-shots or multipart fics?
One-shots. My chaptered fics are okay, but they generally, as a rule, remain unfinished for a long, long time. Like, forever. I've finished, um, four? and still have six to go. Seriously, if I ever even joke about posting another WIP, someone just slap me, okay?
33. What character do you think you're the best at portraying?
Petunia Dursley, hands down. Lol. I get her on some level, and writing her comes kind of easily.
34. What character is the most difficult to portray?
Dudley Dursley. I know, right? I can write his mum, why not him? But he's really, really hard for me. I finally tried my hand at it recently, but I'm still not sure I'm happy with the results. *shrugs* I have trouble with most male characters, actually; I have a hard time figuring out what's going on in their heads-which is probably why I write almost exclusively from female characters' POV. Seriously-only 19 of the 95(!) drabbles and fics I've posted have been even partially written from the POV of a male character. *is lame* There are a lot of men in my stories, they just generally aren't the ones telling the story. Lol.
And stealing some from daybreak777.... 35. Favorite Opening Line(s)
(From Off-Label Uses for the Gelman Process)
Madeline hates this restaurant.
The staff are, without exception, entirely incompetent. The food is terrible. If she were one given to imagination or had a flair for the dramatic, she'd be swearing that she could feel the grime of the floor right through the soles of her shoes.
36. Favorite Closing Line(s)
(From Mina de Malfois and the Present Crisis)
I nodded and stood, unable to hold back a grin as I fell into step beside her. "Arc?" She unlocked the library door and then paused, waiting for me to continue. Feeling silly and ridiculous, but not really caring, I said, "Merry Christmas."
Arc's smile crept all the way up to her eyes as she turned to open the door, and a wave of warmth washed over me that I wasn't sure could be entirely attributed to the library's heating system. "Merry Christmas, Mina," she said softly. "Now come inside. It's freezing out here."
37. Favorite Line from any of my stories
(From Finding Quiet)
Serenity groans and moans through the black, only-mildly-important parts falling off outside, dangling inside, still broken. The ship is broken, the family you've found here is broken, and even though you're more at peace now than you have been in years, sometimes the echoes ("Hey, small crazy person," whispered from the bridge, words left behind) (a Reaver touched this wall, fingerprints that can't be washed away) make you feel like you'll drown.
36. Favorite Title
My titles are usually fairly boring. We'll go with Some Things You Lose (and Some Things You Just Give Away. That's probably cheating because that one technically came from song lyrics and wasn't my creation at all, but... well, that can be said for most of my decent titles. Lol. Song lyrics or poetry. If that one doesn't count, I'll say Spoon Handle Wands.
37. Favorite Scene
This scene from Part Two of To the Black:
With a few minutes to spare, Madeline hesitates for only the briefest of seconds before tapping into the security feed of the Perch. The room is dark and empty. Of course it is; it's two a.m. on Paquin. Paul is probably sleeping right now, as well he should be. Really, so should she.
Skipping past the security feeds from a series of empty hallways, she pauses at Comm for a second, then continues on, stopping when she gets to her office. Mild annoyance races through her at the sight of all of the fluorescent lights still shining brightly-the last thing on her mind when she'd left had been her plants, after all, and she'd realized, on some level, that they'd all die or be thrown away long before she could ever consider returning, but the waste of years' worth of work is frustrating nonetheless-but that irritation is forgotten in an instant at the sight of a lone figure sitting on the floor.
Paul. Of course. Who, it appears, isn't even close to being asleep right now.
She stares for a moment, unable to make herself move on to the next screen. He's just… sitting there, leaning against the wall opposite the glaring lights, and the picture isn't the clearest in the 'verse, but if she had to guess, she'd say that despite the display in front of him, he isn't seeing bonsai and orchids at all. He lets his head drop back against the wall, opting to stare at the ceiling instead, and he looks so very… defeated.
Madeline remembers a time, years ago, when he'd been shot, and she'd leaned over his bed in Medical, his cheek cool beneath her fingertips as she'd ordered him to live, willing him to hear her and obey. For the briefest of seconds she wishes, irrationally, that she could do that same thing right now-and just as quickly she rolls her eyes at herself in disgust and snatches her hand away from the monitor, clicking out the commands to cut off the connection to Section and wipe away all evidence of her having been poking around in the first place.
38. Tag some friends!
Um, no. Lol. I love you guys too much. But if you want to give it a shot, go for it! Just set aside an hour or two to write up all of these answers, 'cause seriously…