off-point lotus / bonus features
Jan. 23rd, 2023 06:56 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
yallabites this reikao.
i'd had this one in the works since june of last year? something like that. i had originally wanted to get it done by early november in time for their birthdays but heh. that did not happen! but it's finished now and i'm kinda proud of myself for getting something done by the first month of this new year...! setting precedents for the rest of it, i hope.
i'm not a reikaoist at heart. you know how it goes: some men are born yaoipilled, some achieve yaoipilling, and some have yaoi pills thrust upon 'em. i'm obviously in the final category... but i do think reikao are sooo narratively intriguing. and they certainly have themes. and i promised to write at least one reikao in my life <3 so it culminated in this. something a little about faith and belief, and a little about love... the title comes from this poem bc i was looking for lotus imagery inspiration bc lotus eaters > to dream, to forget > what is the reality of things/is that truly any better than the supposed false.. isms. in the end i didn't really lean into it bc 1) kaoru's understanding of odyssean myth is probably far more cursory than mine ishafjhd and i wouldn't expect him to lean on lotus imagery in the first place 2) it was too floral and meandering etc etc. but here's a note i made to myself early on in the process just to keep myself on task wrt the Narrative:
so most of the writing process was about kaoru's confusion about rei, the realization that he wants to Understand rei, and the subsequent realization that understanding/knowing the reality is not necessary for love/belief. there's some boy band mythos there too that i kinda dropped in (koga's belief, adonis's trust, undead as more than just undead/as some sort of culmination and marriage of four high school boys' dreams etc etc) but i don't really expect anyone else to care about it. it's just how i read the text so it's how i approached the fic!! because i think a lot of undead's dynamics center around What You Believe About Rei Sakuma... and a lot of reikao specifically is built off this belief (and previous lack thereof) that kaoru holds toward rei... all this is deeply romantic to me but in retrospect this fic is barely shippy like damn they didn't even kiss... it may not show but i'm actually a firm believer in the Anywhere But The Lips trope bc i feel like kissing is such a cop-out for getting intimacy/romance across in a work but i know that a lot of ppl abide by the big damn kiss.. ah well. there are other, more romantic reikaos
going off my thing about romance and pda and whatever i rlly did want this to be more of a study and way for me to cut my teeth on the reikao dynamic... notes from the biting scene:
LIKE actually even with arakao it's barely even romantic. my bad.. also going off the mentioned light/dark thing i actually have notes on thatfbahbdhsf on one hand kaoru's desire for light is because darkness feels too intimate (illicit activities as well as intimate ones are associated with darkness) and it's unknowable in the same way that rei sakuma is unknowable, but it's also because he wants to see rei. rei's thing about the darkness is that he doesn't have to be anything and no one has to perceive him bc he has hangups about that kind of thing... #girl. so he calls kaoru out on flicking light switches on and in the bite scene he's the one who orchestrates it so they can do the deed in the dark. the point is that they both want different things at that moment in time - kaoru is looking to Get rei and rei is looking to keep kaoru in the dark (figuratively and literally) as he's always been. funny thing is that kaoru figures out how to work with it even if he doesn't really Know what's happening necessarily which is about BELIEF and CHOOSING TO TRUST. which is the epigraph!!!! love is choosing the kingdom of god is within you because you ate it.. etc etc.
favorite scene
i liked writing this and i think it illustrates best the #dynamix at play. neither of us are who we once were... i wasn't ready then but i'm ready now. i see you and i'm not going anywhere... that kind of thing.
deleted scene
only one deleted scene bc i don't actually have that many LMAO.. this is a good thing for me bc it means i got most of the prose out with minimal change on the first go!! iirc this part was from a veryyy early draft where it was more about parasocial relationships and kaoru believing the myth till he learns otherwise + that coinciding with him realizing that rei is not the myth either. but i think i got most of that down in drift in so i scrapped it ^^b
here's what i was working with tho. bc i loveeee seeing writing processes
like i said, i didn't actually have to do too much in the way of editing because it flowed pretty easily.. tbh the hardest part was just finding the chance to write at all, which is sooo unlike what i dealt with while writing drift in (had plenty of time but the writing was like pulling teeth). i think i had been aiming for around 5k the entire writing process (according to what i can recall in my brain and my other dw posts) so i'm pretty happy about the word count TT a part of me wishes i could give them 10k but i know that with the vision i had for this particular piece it would quickly become excessive. i will say that i have plans for a light 2-3k sequel but i think it would only really appeal to me LMFAO. pacifica taco bell......
overall i think that this is like. pretty decent as a piece of writing and i would like to believe it's decent as a piece of reikao writing as well!! i hope i can keep this pace up throughout the year ^-^b
i'd had this one in the works since june of last year? something like that. i had originally wanted to get it done by early november in time for their birthdays but heh. that did not happen! but it's finished now and i'm kinda proud of myself for getting something done by the first month of this new year...! setting precedents for the rest of it, i hope.
i'm not a reikaoist at heart. you know how it goes: some men are born yaoipilled, some achieve yaoipilling, and some have yaoi pills thrust upon 'em. i'm obviously in the final category... but i do think reikao are sooo narratively intriguing. and they certainly have themes. and i promised to write at least one reikao in my life <3 so it culminated in this. something a little about faith and belief, and a little about love... the title comes from this poem bc i was looking for lotus imagery inspiration bc lotus eaters > to dream, to forget > what is the reality of things/is that truly any better than the supposed false.. isms. in the end i didn't really lean into it bc 1) kaoru's understanding of odyssean myth is probably far more cursory than mine ishafjhd and i wouldn't expect him to lean on lotus imagery in the first place 2) it was too floral and meandering etc etc. but here's a note i made to myself early on in the process just to keep myself on task wrt the Narrative:
lotus has as much to do with choice as it does truth. you choose what you desire more and that seals your fate—is it better for you to believe that there is light at the end of the tunnel, something worth your journey, or for you to eat and sleep and be merry in a place where you no longer have to toil? (obviously on a personal level the lotus-eating may come to the same result as anything else but on a larger scale this affects the people around you more than it affects yourself. like it might be the same result for You personally but what about odysseus’s journey? you just fucked him over!!!! but i don’t want to navel gaze in this one.) anyway All this to say that at its core this one is about belief. a declaration of faith and all that….. rei’s family has believed the vampire myth for so long that it has become real to them + adokoga believe the myth of undead + rei believes a lot of things about himself even as he attempts to debunk them—sometimes it’s like he’s asking kaoru to tell him what’s real and what isn’t. so it’s mainly about kaoru choosing to believe that undead is special or love is real or that he genuinely cares for rei. and all that
so most of the writing process was about kaoru's confusion about rei, the realization that he wants to Understand rei, and the subsequent realization that understanding/knowing the reality is not necessary for love/belief. there's some boy band mythos there too that i kinda dropped in (koga's belief, adonis's trust, undead as more than just undead/as some sort of culmination and marriage of four high school boys' dreams etc etc) but i don't really expect anyone else to care about it. it's just how i read the text so it's how i approached the fic!! because i think a lot of undead's dynamics center around What You Believe About Rei Sakuma... and a lot of reikao specifically is built off this belief (and previous lack thereof) that kaoru holds toward rei... all this is deeply romantic to me but in retrospect this fic is barely shippy like damn they didn't even kiss... it may not show but i'm actually a firm believer in the Anywhere But The Lips trope bc i feel like kissing is such a cop-out for getting intimacy/romance across in a work but i know that a lot of ppl abide by the big damn kiss.. ah well. there are other, more romantic reikaos
going off my thing about romance and pda and whatever i rlly did want this to be more of a study and way for me to cut my teeth on the reikao dynamic... notes from the biting scene:
it doesn’t have to be a love confession or whatever i just want it to be like. Are you serious > i’m always serious. In ressun kaoru is scared of rei and worried about the blood thing and embarrassed but this time he willingly Offers himself to rei and it’s that same vulnerability thing like one of us has to give first. In this case it’s kaoru and so rei has to give something back. funnily enough rei is the one chasing the darkness. Like i’ve always been serious about all of it - but It in this case doesn’t pertain to vampirism, and instead refers to chasing after kaoru. Like it was serious to Rei it was just that he figured it would never be reciprocated bc kaoru was like that so now that it’s finally becoming Real - what happens next?
LIKE actually even with arakao it's barely even romantic. my bad.. also going off the mentioned light/dark thing i actually have notes on thatfbahbdhsf on one hand kaoru's desire for light is because darkness feels too intimate (illicit activities as well as intimate ones are associated with darkness) and it's unknowable in the same way that rei sakuma is unknowable, but it's also because he wants to see rei. rei's thing about the darkness is that he doesn't have to be anything and no one has to perceive him bc he has hangups about that kind of thing... #girl. so he calls kaoru out on flicking light switches on and in the bite scene he's the one who orchestrates it so they can do the deed in the dark. the point is that they both want different things at that moment in time - kaoru is looking to Get rei and rei is looking to keep kaoru in the dark (figuratively and literally) as he's always been. funny thing is that kaoru figures out how to work with it even if he doesn't really Know what's happening necessarily which is about BELIEF and CHOOSING TO TRUST. which is the epigraph!!!! love is choosing the kingdom of god is within you because you ate it.. etc etc.
favorite scene
“What do you want to say?” Kaoru asks, and there. Rei drops his eyes, seeming to take pause. He drums his long fingers on one bony knee to a familiar beat—one of their older songs, though Kaoru can’t say which one. Old enough that it doesn’t seem to matter anymore—though it’s not like anything stops mattering just because it isn’t in direct view. Kaoru knows that. He’s not the same person he was in second year, and neither is Rei, but it still matters, who they used to be. You build off them, the old things, the history buried deep down. There will always be residuals, like how Rei looks to Kaoru for his own reflection, how Kaoru’s heart races when he does.
Rei clears his throat and stands, his gaze leveling. Kaoru follows suit. “Undead will continue, and while the children finish up their studies, my plans involve a bit of travel. Europe, America, anywhere. Everywhere. It’s lonely without a partner, and if, as you say, you’re indeed willing to throw yourself whole-heartedly into idol work—then…”
“Then I’ll go with you,” Kaoru says, thinking of all the times too little and too late, how many times he’s allowed Rei to slip through his fingers like fistfuls and fistfuls of dry sand. Building off of who he used to be, jumping off a ledge that he never would have even approached in second year. He’s not letting Rei get away from him again. And, because it’s the only way he knows how to close a deal, Kaoru holds out his hand.
Rei takes it, places his other hand over them. He leans in close to Kaoru’s ear and whispers, “Thank you,” in a small voice uncharacteristic of who he’s supposed to be.
i liked writing this and i think it illustrates best the #dynamix at play. neither of us are who we once were... i wasn't ready then but i'm ready now. i see you and i'm not going anywhere... that kind of thing.
deleted scene
“We deal in love, yes?” The statement sounded much too strong, even then, but Kaoru only pursed his lips and nodded. “So what does one do when that love is no longer desired, when they don’t need us anymore?”
Kaoru found the mental fortitude to look Rei in the eyes, that deep scarlet like blood. “Then, we make them want it.” We make them want us, is what he might have meant.
only one deleted scene bc i don't actually have that many LMAO.. this is a good thing for me bc it means i got most of the prose out with minimal change on the first go!! iirc this part was from a veryyy early draft where it was more about parasocial relationships and kaoru believing the myth till he learns otherwise + that coinciding with him realizing that rei is not the myth either. but i think i got most of that down in drift in so i scrapped it ^^b
here's what i was working with tho. bc i loveeee seeing writing processes
like i said, i didn't actually have to do too much in the way of editing because it flowed pretty easily.. tbh the hardest part was just finding the chance to write at all, which is sooo unlike what i dealt with while writing drift in (had plenty of time but the writing was like pulling teeth). i think i had been aiming for around 5k the entire writing process (according to what i can recall in my brain and my other dw posts) so i'm pretty happy about the word count TT a part of me wishes i could give them 10k but i know that with the vision i had for this particular piece it would quickly become excessive. i will say that i have plans for a light 2-3k sequel but i think it would only really appeal to me LMFAO. pacifica taco bell......
overall i think that this is like. pretty decent as a piece of writing and i would like to believe it's decent as a piece of reikao writing as well!! i hope i can keep this pace up throughout the year ^-^b
