Neil Was Ready To Die. He Had Accepted That He Wasn’t Going To Live Past 19, That He Would Be Killed,

in aftg, words often go “in one ear and out the other” when neil’s listening to others, but never with andrew. he clings to andrews words, absorbs them, hoards them like the upperclassmen hoard neil’s breadcrumb truths. he listens and he cares, he read between the lines and fills in the blanks, and that’s exactly what andrew needs

this idea just randomly came to me and i can’t get it out of my head so: the foxes as texters (we already vaguely know some info but i have stuff i want to add on)

neil is just the worst texter ever. like... one word answers, bland messages, leaves you on read 99% of the time. normally reads the texts at least, but he doesn’t text first unless he needs something, and he doesn’t make an effort to keep the convo going. phone is always on silent but with vibrations - he hasn’t figured out how to turn it off vibrate, and he doesn’t care enough to ask for help (esp since his phone is normally dead anyway). he gets better at checking his phone and answering calls when andrew leaves psu though

andrew either answers within 2 seconds or never answers at all. autocap is off and he never uses punctuation (not even for questions). messages are usually short and to the point, but he’s fun to text if he actually deigns to answer. mix of dry humour, heavy sarcasm, and obscure messages that you can only understand by remembering 6 throwaway comments 

nicky is very enthusiastic!! lots of emojis, instant replies for all, only punctuation he uses are exclamation points and question marks. isn’t deterred by bland texters (re: neil) and will spam you with no regrets. also sends lots of pictures! and he never says “already seen it” when you send a meme that he’s seen before - he’s just happy when someone thinks of him

dan usually replies within a few hours. uses excessive amounts of question marks, and her texts are filled with abbreviations. autocap and autocorrect are off. sends memes constantly, never afraid to ask someone to meet up or to start a convo w someone she hasn’t talked to in a long time. sends a ton of short messages in a row rather than one big one. only uses periods if she’s mad or it’s important

matt’s texts have a ton of typos, even though autocap and autocorrect are both on - he mostly texts w capslock bc he gets easily excited. uses punctuation, but not at the end of texts. gets back as soon as he sees your message, but it could be a while, bc he always puts his phone on silent during practice and classes. uses cute emojis all the time

renee has autocap off but autocorrect on, and she uses proper punctuation. many :) type of emojis but rarely the actual face ones. takes a bit longer to answer bc she wants to formulate the right response, but she’s very quick to reply if it’s an emergency

allison doesn’t answer for hours, unless she actually likes you. always has a ton of unopened messages, and says she’ll get around to them eventually. texting style morphs from person to person - perfect punctuation w neil, no autocap or autocorrect w dan, enthusiactic w nicky, etc. won’t text first unless she likes you or has something important to say or ask for

kevin’s texts are very demanding. def has autocap and autocorrect on. not afraid to spam until you answer him. he’ll send a massive text and then a ton of short angry ones. texts people when he’s bored and drunk texts constantly (you could be getting a play-by-play of his fav exy moments, or an in-depth analysis of an important historical figure, or be completely roasted). he has french, english, and japanese keyboards, so sometimes his autocorrect gives you a multilingual message. sends memes to anyone that they remind him of or that he thinks will enjoy them, but hardly ever answers any memes or posts sent his way

aaron is the sweetest texter ever with katelyn, all cute emojis and smiley faces, but he’s pretty dry w basically anyone else. has fun texting w the monsters though, and he’ll never admit it, but he loves getting spam from nicky and memes from kevin. the only people he sends memes to are nicky and katelyn. the messages between him and andrew could all but be in a different language (and sometimes actually are in german) for how chaotic and obscure they are. he’s the type of person to open your message and then forget about it for a week before answering

seth is direct with his messages and you never know if he’s being sarcastic or just really mean. sends posts to allison all the time when they’re on, ghosts her when they’re off. short messages, but happy to help keep the conversation going if he likes you. no qualms about spamming you if you don’t answer. sappy drunk texts

if you made it through that... good job, this is just a dumping ground for my random thoughts lmaoo

Since my recent post about demi Neil erasure has gotten much more traction than I thought it would, here's a small post about how it feels and felt to realize I was demi because of Neil and then subsequently see tons of people disregard it.

(this isn't a call out or discourse post, just some personal stuff I'm airing out to hopefully help this stop happening)

It was kind of a big moment for me when I realized that like, Neil's thoughts on romance/relationships throughout the books wasn't just someone finally getting it right but someone writing from an ace spec perspective.

So seeing people (and literal friends of mine) say, "Well he is basically gay because he's dating Andrew," or any similar phrase hurts. On top of all the internalized shit I still have to work through seeing that sets me back so far. There is literally no justification for it. He is demi, it is not just a widely accepted headcanon. It's a confirmed canon fact, and he and very importantly every demi and ace spec person in this fandom deserve to have it treated as such. It erases such an important part of his character and the plot of the books. It erases his emotional bond with Andrew.

We rarely get ace spec rep in novels, and to finally have a demi character and see it taken away by people in this fandom because it's 'just easier to call him gay' really fucking sucks.

TL;DR: Neil is demi, he isn't 'basically gay'. It isn't 'easier' to call him gay either. If you want to get into semantics it's one extra letter to type. Calling him anything but demi hurts demi fans more than you may realize, and I hope this helped at least one person understand that.

Guys this isn’t an aftg account BUT I can perfectly sum up Andrew and Neil in two quotes from my kids at work

Andrew: “Congratulations, you’re a liar. “

Neil: “My favourite colour is none of your business.”

i feel like we all just forgot that kevin’s on nicky’s List™?? okay a) this is further proof that kevin’s hot af b) does kevin know??? that nicky wants to bang him???? and c) nicky what a waste of a choice, kevin would never

okay hear me out:

mary and neil always had tea on hand

yes, i know they only packed the essentials 

tea is essential

they would cram it into their duffle bags wherever it fit, and made sure to never run out

the only mugs they used were travel mugs, because regular ones would break too easily

tea became neil’s comfort drink over the years

it was something constant in his life, something that was always there for him after a long day or sleepless night

he guzzled tea after he’d been shot

his mom made it better than he did

their travel mugs were warm and full in the cup holders when mary was bleeding out

neil had to reach over them to shake her shoulders, trying to keep her awake when her eyes so desperately wanted to flutter closed

he tried to pass mary her mug to keep her conscious, tried to get her to drink just a sip mom, please, you can do it

the mug slipped out of her hands, covered in blood

neil let it burn in the flames of the car

he doesn’t drink tea anymore

but it doesn’t matter. he has a new comfort drink. andrew makes the coffee every morning

andrew makes it better than he does

the binghampton bearcats are such assholes ??? i haven’t really seen this brought up before (i feel like they’re just overshadowed by the ravens lol), but they’re genuinely horrible people. neil was kidnapped and tortured after a riot broke out after their game at their court, and they then proceeded to face the foxes again and played horribly dirty just to try to red card one of the remaining foxes to put them at a further disadvantage ???? like what the actual fuck

neil: i hate it when people say “so, tell me about yourself”

neil: what do you want to know? my trauma or my favourite colour?

neil: because i’m telling you neither. fuck off.

i just need to reread all for the game

you know what’s painful? before the final match against the ravens when neil says that he can see how much matt loves his mom and that “sometimes he was still surprised at how blatantly that love was returned” 

like?? 

mary did her best to keep neil alive and they had a complicated relationship but, ultimately, neil loved her

this quote hurts though, because neil obviously didn’t really get that love reciprocated - yes, in her own way, mary loved him and tried to keep him safe and as happy as possible given the circumstances, but overall his life on the run was full of pain and fear and his mom added to that

so of course it’s weird for him to see randy love matt so fiercely and so openly, but my heart still aches for him