Strangers | ✔️

a/n

author's note.

Hello everyone! Thank you for reading my story and sticking with me for so far :) I appreciate you.

Feel free to skip to the end if you don't want to read my rant. 

I started this story in hopes of somehow twisting the inescapable WP cliche because I was tired of reading long, winding stories about players, love triangles, cheaters, unrealistic insecurities and expectations, or any of the sort. At times, I do enjoy these cliches very much, yes, but many a time, paired with average writing and too many chapters, they were too much.

There were a few things (re: cliches and issues with society) I wanted to "address" (or correct!) in this very compressed short story, and I just wanted to share with my readers (as few as you may be):

- Stereotypes of masculinity/toxic masculinity: I wanted to explore this idea through Damien, who struggles with apologizing, and/or not being a bystander to his friends' almost macho actions (bullying). Toxic masculinity sucks (and the idea is that Damien went through that, where he was brought up in an environment that fostered this.) This leads us to our next point–

- Romanticizing  bullying: When I wanted Damien to be involved in some sort of perpetration of bullying in this story, my first thought was that he has to apologize. Bullying with no consequences should really not be romantized, and it's scary how this stereotype spreads itself on WP. (Abuse is not romantic!) I tried to portray bullying in this book in a very simple way, and I'm sorry if my exploration of bullying is too vague or inaccurate, I feel like I could have done better, but I'm not sure how.

- Unrealistic portrayals of sex: First times are often bad. I've seen so many "amazing first times" in WP stories, and it often makes me want to roll my eyes. Some people even bleed during first timers; it's slightly odd to throw that part of the story out of the window, no?

Now, obviously, I know this book is far from perfect, and probably ironically adheres to some cliches too (oh no! "past bully x mc"? So original.) I actually considered making Damien an absolute jerk/bad guy just to spite this cliche, but I think our Slytherin boy deserves better.

I am not 100% satisfied with my writing quality in this book either, and I would say it's quite bad at times. But I'm simply glad I finished it, and perhaps I will edit it in the future if I do feel like it.

Another thing that I wanted you to notice is...

Yes! The protagonist doesn't have a name. Perhaps I wanted to express the idea of "no matter who you are" with this character and their anonymity, and I  felt they were often times more a narrator instead of the MC. That might just also be because they're an absolute introvert, though. 

Towards the end, I tried to make them more gender fluid as well to support that idea, though I think she came off as more a female, so I might just roll with that. Either way, I love my MC a lot.

(This idea of an nameless MC was also inspired by the amazing Turnpike by /simonesaidwhat. She's an amazing writer.)

And, some head canons I have (which is just canon I guess):

- Raegan and Allie often come off as a couple/to-be-couple in my head, so surely that ship has sailed already.

- And... Leith x Parris? Does anyone else see it?

In the end, this little book is just love story between two dummy introverts. I love them. I hope you do too. 

'thank you's

I want to thank some specific people here:

Firstly, a user-not-found that commented when I was on hiatus. You deleted your account, and I never got to know who you are, but thank you so much. You made my day a long time after you commented on March 6, 2021.

Secondly, wynnwinn, for giving me motivation to write since 2020, even just by DMs that spaced, like, months apart. (I can't seem to tag you but ill check back!!)

Lastly (definitely not least)!! isntitluvly, for commenting so much, all the time. You made my days!! Honest. I really hope you liked the story.

And of course, you. Thank you for reading. See you later :)

april 1st, 2022