𝐓𝐡𝐞 𝐏𝐫𝐞𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐞𝐫

“jamie. my heart. my parabatai.” always gets me

okay okay okay…….

kevin day is 100% one of the loneliest people in the entire world. this is pretty much accepted. he grew up in an abusive household, the property of a family of monsters that didn’t bother to teach him how to be compassionate. the only affection or tenderness he likely received was from jean, who only gave it when kevin had been physically harmed, so there’s a good chance kevin equated kindness with pain. kindness with a punishment, whether psychological or physical. whether his pain or someone else’s.

oh? they’re joking around with me? this equals pain, yes? riko will make sure this equals pain.

so, let’s say he goes out of his way to avoid interactions with his new teammates, because with those interactions comes pain. 

dan grins at him, asks him if he wants to go for lunch, but there’s the sharp slap of riko’s open palm against his cheek. renee smiles softly at him but all he can see his jean’s blood smeared across his fingers. matt nudges him with his elbow, asks him if he wants to play some video game, but there’s the heavy boot of riko’s heel on the back of his neck. allison isn’t so much kind as ‘your cheekbones could cut glass and your ass is the 8th wonder of the world’, but there’s the excruciating pain of every bone in his hand shattering.

then some fucko comes along, who grew up with the same lessons, the same punishments, the same strange vein of compassion and empathy. and suddenly, it’s all different. because he’s accepted, he’s a part of them. his past hasn’t made him unlovable, what he’s done hasn’t made him impossible to care about.

maybe - maybe. maybe kevin can have that too. kevin can have love, can have friends, can have a family. kevin can have kindness (or whatever andrew’s version of kindness is) and not have it be synonymous with pain.

🐕🐕🐕💞

fandom talks a lot about kevin being a cult survivor and that shaping his personality & world view but a lot of the time the fact that he was also an abuse survivor on a personal level out of the conversation like even before riko broke his hand, he was very much abusing kevin, maybe not as blatantly and visibly as he was abusing jean, but it was still happening. that kind of persistent emotional and verbal abuse is so so damaging, and it can be even more insidious when it's coming from a "loved one." remember that at one point, kevin and riko considered each other family. they were children together, they loved each other. kevin loved and trusted riko as a brother, so when the abuse began mounting and mounting, it wasn't just coming from a teammate or coach, it was coming from someone he loves

i think sometimes people judge him way too harshly for his fear and coping mechanisms and attitude, but like. you can't ask someone who has suffered like that to be well-adjusted

Heart eyes

I am obsessed with the MoTM Silas epilogue. Like. What Was That. He happily thinks about how he created problems on purpose (the main plot of this book!!) to get the two teenagers he takes care of to progress their relationship. Literally a kid making his dolls kiss. He thinks about planning their wedding in the same breath with reminiscing about how he kidnapped tortured and murdered a man!! And then he summons the fucking void garbage disposal to shred a a dress he thinks is ugly. The garbage disposal tells him all the other demons want to kill him and his response is "lol". The most character ever

we are NOT gonna move on from Steven

NEVER

Okay okay but that scene with Kevin and Jean in the kitchen really got me.

The "I can still hear him. Can't you?" and "best not to think at all" And then also the whole just casual use of alcohol as preemptive coping mechanism.

Like we see Kevin's breakdowns through Neil's eyes, his fear, his famous declaration after getting his tattoo covered in a drunken stupor. But from Neil's perspective, it's almost distant - if that makes sense? What we glean from Neil is only what can be physically observed and Kevin is reluctant to discuss anything that is not immediately necessary for Neil's safety or the success of the team.

But with Jean it feels so intimate and very humanizing. Jean has sunk so much of his trust and his life into Kevin, and to see Kevin fail to live up to those expectations is jarring through Jean's pov.

Even with all the panic and the drinking etc, Kevin is still idealized in Neil's perspective. He is Kevin Day, he is the queen of the court, Riko's number two. He may be a mess the minute he gets off court, but that hardly matter in the face who he is on court.

But for Jean, Kevin is just Kevin and everything else comes after. He is supposed to be "stronger than Jean" not because he is the number two or the son of exy or whatever, but because he is Kevin as Jean has known him since he was 14. He is Kevin who withstood Riko's abuse long before Jean got there and long after. Kevin who allowed a little sliver of softness to sneak through by asking jean to teach him his first language. Kevin who seems to slip into casual physical intimacy with Jean like it's nothing, grabbing coffee mugs and allowing Jean's knuckles to press against his palms. It is not the perception of Kevin as an exy player who is failing but it is Kevin himself, a very human self, that is failing.

I've always kinda felt as someone who adores Kevin, we never really got a conclusion to Kevin's whole arc. Like yes, he played against Riko and yes, he covered up his tattoo, but it's so clear that Kevin is still not entirely coping. There are so many loose ends left with his character at the end of the first trilogy.

We get to see Neil fumbling his way to a semblance of self-acceptance and hopefully we get to witness Jean slowly healing, but I don't think we're gonna get that with Kevin in a way that I personally would find satisfactory. Such is the plight of being a non-pov character I suppose. That is to say that I need all the crumbs I can get.

I'm on Words of Radiance right now and I gotta say,

I just love Kaladin, like he has a mysterious past that he isn't interested in talking about, and he has like no respect for anyone who hasn't personally earned it, and clearly wants to be left alone forever. But he sucks at getting people to ignore him.

Like first of all, he looks everyone in the eyes, even people so far above his station. He has an impeccable posture and presence at all times, even without considering the whole stormlight thing which apparently can make you look prettier/more saturated in the world. He has slave scars marking him as dangerous and just pretends that he's basically of a station to light-eyes. And he barely even remembers to call the King 'your majesty', it's an afterthought at best and if the King believed that he actually had authority Kaladin would probably be dead. (Of course if the King was a stronger personality than maybe Kaladin would have shown him respect).

He wants to be left alone to die but has such strong sense of honor and empathy that he ends up caring about anyone that ends up in his vicinity for more than 5 min if they need help in anyway. He adopts Renarin grudgingly likes/respects Adolin even when Adolin drives him absolutely insane. He does his absolute best at any job he is given no matter how hard it makes his life or how many toes he steps on.

And he cannot hide his skills to save his life. So far, about half way through the book he's not terrible at hiding the stormlight, except that he is and the people around him just have more to worry about (like dying) when he has to use it.

He's a very very good surgeon even though he didn't actually have the chance to formally study, and when literally anyone calls him on it, he's just like 'I learned field medicine' - sir, you think field medicine is a good excuse for knowing more about epilepsy than the light-eyed noble that HAS the epilepsy??? Really?? Like are you even trying anymore? You're using words that no one else has ever heard of and you are teaching everyone around you field medicine.

He will literally never be able to blend in ever in his life.

I love him.

Shadow and Bone season 2 doodles ✨

One of my most favorite moments is when Inej appears and Jesper gets scared to death 😭