Ode to Optophobia (4A)

[veryspecial0ne]

Title: Ode to Optophobia, or: Ten Men That Loved Annie Edison (7/19)
Author: veryspecial0ne
Rating: R for the whole series, to be safe.
Word count: ~2400 for this installment, ~20,300 for the series thus far.
Disclaimer: I have now been tweeted by both Dan Harmon and Alison Brie. I'm pretty sure that's the closest I'll ever come to having

Comments

[columbuscrab]

This kills me. This absolutely kills me.

First off, apologies for lurking so long without reviewing. I am lazy.

But seriously, this series is so good. SO good. I love the insight we get to Annie's past through other characters, and how those loose ends are resolved later on with Jeff. I'm seriously waiting on baited breath for this next chapter.

[veryspecial0ne]

Well, I'm grateful you got around to reviewing, even if it took horrific amounts of angst to spur you into it, haha.

[stephanierb]

Wow. That was so intense, but so good. We knowing nothing, really, about Annie's parents and you managed to explain her father's absence in a way that made him sympathetic and Annie's estrangement understandable.

I am VERY much looking forward to her father meeting Jeff. I can only imagine his reaction to his daughter marrying an older man.

[veryspecial0ne]

I'm glad you were able to find him sympathetic. I was really worried about that, actually, especially with the end when he just goes back to work the next day. I was racking my brain for a softer way to end this installment, but nothing I did worked because I had to keep in mind that this man did, for a while, raise Annie, who started getting stress headaches when she was four, and that for reasons mostly unexplained he is no longer part of Annie's life. Really, what we do know is that it's Annie's mother who cut her off but that she doesn't speak to either of her parents, which until I'm proven otherwise says to me that he wasn't even in enough contact to be part of that decision.

Plus, I adore Annie and her relationship with Jeff (OBVIOUSLY) and hate to taint it with something so cliched, but come on. Look at the last couple of guys Annie has been interested in. The girl has daddy issues falling out of her butt.

[na_thalia]

I discovered a new chapter in the morning, before I went to work, last week. And today, I came home to a new chapter. I'm not sure which is better!

It's always interesting to see Annie's parents since we don't know a whole lot about them except that they're divorced and Annie doesn't have contact with them post-rehab...

I admit to being disappointed (not in you!) at the final chapter involving Mr. Harding - I love professor mentors and it made me so sad to see him being unsupportive but... Realistically, that might well be the case if you met up with them years later. *sigh*

I have no ability whatsoever to predict who you're going to write about next so I'm super curious to see what'll happen!

[veryspecial0ne]

Haha, I'm trying not to always post at two or three in the morning anymore for the well-being of everyone involved. Then again, I actually did finish this chapter at two in the morning. I just didn't post it to M/M for another twelve hours. So my experiment seems to be failing.

I totally meant for Harding to be supportive in the second half of his chapter when I conceived the story. Honestly I did. The situation sort of morphed on its own. I ended up pretty satisfied with that because I think it led to some good growth and a touch of resolution between Jeff and Annie, which is really what's important here, so I'm glad it wasn't me you were disappointed with. :-P

Oh, and see my reply to stephanierb above for my slightly extended thoughts on Annie's parents if you're interested.

[wallows]

It's really a testament to Annie's strength that she is able to rise above this less than stellar situation she had to grow up in. You're also able to show the very relationship structures between families which is like negotiating a field with landmines.

[veryspecial0ne]

The best part, of course, is that I didn't make up any of the strongest stuff about Annie. We know for a fact that at the age of seventeen or eighteen, her determination for achievement was so strong that she actually lost everything -- her chance at a high school diploma, her Ivy League dreams, and all her ties to her family -- and she's not only surviving but is still impossibly positive, optimistic, and of course, irony-free.

[veryspecial0ne]

Thank you! Sorry I took so long to answer this, I usually like to do it as soon as possible but I had a surprise guest followed by a day-and-a-half power outage. I'm about to post the second half, so be sure to check it out!