Starting off with a reference in the title that so many people will get.
I’ve been gloomy lately. Melancholy. a sad, Victorian orph-
But seriously? I think I’m lonely.
Autumn makes me lonely in general. Probably because it’s when I really enjoy the weather and I want to go places and do things, but that’s only fun with other people and I’m such a shit friend who never goes anywhere and never does things that people have stopped asking. Sure I can go places alone. I can and do. But my fun is being aware of the other person/people I’m with having fun.
I am such a good sidekick! I’d be a great wingman! If it’s a group of friends, I can be the comedy relief! Or the grouchy one! Or the obviously unmedicated ADHD (or possibly just stoned) one that needs looking after! I can wait in the van and honk if I see the cops coming, too. I’m multifaceted!
(I spelled multifaceted right the first time and I needed to call that out because it’ll probably never happen again)
I don’t know if my current state of “would like a human live-in nap buddy” has anything to do with the fact that I’m suddenly inspired to write fanfic for a show that’s been over for ten, maybe closer to fifteen years, or if the urge to write fanfic for my favorite characters in my favorite type of relationship is some sort of substitute for actually having that relationship.
It’s the standard “Odd Couple” duo with a lot of “will they won’t they” without the sex. I mean at all, not even in a “fade to black” way. Nap buddies. Total “I love you and am in love with you and you are my best friend and I hate you because you’re so stupid and so smart and I really like sleeping next to you but not in a sexytimes way” (Except maybe once in a while I’ll read the explicit ones. But not often. But like if the plot is really compelling, or the writing’s exceptionally good… ).
This is the part where I really hope my mom doesn’t know I’m updating this because … I don’t know why really, because it’s weird to be “Hey! Here’s the two action figures I’ve been smashing together in my head!” to my mother, but totally not weird at all to tell strangers. Maybe it’s because I wouldn’t have to sit across the table at the diner with any of the rest of you. Unless, of course… in which case… sorry about the TMI? I mean obviously sorry everyone about the TMI to everyone, but especially to the people I avoid eye contact with on the few times I do go to a place and do a thing.
Although she does know I write fanfic (and what name it would be under, because obvs), and she’s well acquainted with shipping and slash and I tend to hyperfocus on one show at a time, and I talk to her a lot so she probably unwillingly knows more than she wants to about the shows at whatever time I’m into them (there’s a cycle). Like I’m sure she’d like me to shut up about The Wild Wild West” which has been The Thing of the Week for a few weeks running. She’s smart. She knows which action figures I’m smashing together.
And “The Wild Wild West” is what triggered the loneliness and/or the fic, because Jim West and Artemus Gordon came out of the same template as John Sheppard and Rodney McKay on Stargate Atlantis. And then I was thinking “John and Rodney probably love The Wild Wild West and totally see themselves in Jim and Artie and would not notice how gay the show was coded.” And that’s how the fanfic drive kicked in, only once I got out onto the streets I accidentally got onto the highway and now I have to go the long way back. And THAT (a fic that was supposed to be about them getting high and watching The Wild Wild West) is how I started writing again for a show that was over before most teenagers were even born, while dealing with feeling the need for my own Nap Buddy (Human).
While I was writing dialogue, I thought about how I missed writing dialogue. Then I thought about how I missed having dialogue like the stuff I was writing.
What came first: the feeling or the fic?
Doesn’t matter. Hopefully I can keep writing. Maybe even try watching something made after 1980 and find a new Odd Couple to smash together in my head, and deploy the witty banter that rambles through my brain to a place someone else might see it and appreciate it and tell me it’s funny (I don’t really care how else the fic made you feel. I want to know if the jokes landed) because aside from a Nap Buddy I also miss having a Banana to be Second to. The High Energy to my Low Energy. Maybe I can avoid having to get the dopamine from a human if I can get it through clicks. I also have a pillow nest that’s honestly probably a lot safer for everyone involved.