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we go without saying (commentary)
hello i wrote we go without saying for the gmmtv exchange and the feedback on it was so nice that i felt compelled to talk about it.
ok i started writing this commentary on the flight home from thanksgiving at 9 pm after a long day so i am putting the bit that isn't actually relevant to this fic but just Thoughts on BL RPF behind a cut:
i think it occurred to me when i was thinking about the two thai bl rpf fics i've posted anonymously. neither were particularly difficult to write, but that's because they were both written with a characterization i would describe as more taynew the ship than how i actually perceive taynew. there are certainly company assigned ships in kpop and fanservice that plays into existing dynamics, but the shipping/koojin culture of thai bl is so strong. being in fandom means that you, at least to some extent, accept the collective delusion. fourth insists that it's possible he could fall for gemini and you, if you are not actually unhinged, pretend to accept that as truth. (speaking of the collective delusion, y'all i cannot convey how quickly the polca fangirl spirit entered my body when i saw taynew irl. they casually brushed against each other and i was going OUUUIIII before i even realized i was doing it.) anyway it's not unique to thai bl to have difficulty separating the job from what's genuine, but in thai bl, shipping is the thing you're selling. your future success is dependent on your ability to sell the collective delusion.
i think (in my mind, that is, because i am not actually writing any joylada gang rpf just having elaborate before bedtime daydreams) it's harder for me to conceive of OGTN than it is more recent gmmtv ships because there's more history. but also because somehow, by virtue of being less organic (paired together for the express purpose of becoming a branded ship), somehow these ships end up feeling more organic. this is not to say they aren't engaging in intentional fanservice or that their interactions are more earnest, but it's more like...there's an acknowledgement of coworkerism that isn't necessarily there in OGTN because of how they became a branded ship. i think offgun is better (as a ship to consider and explore) if we acknowledge that they aren't soulmates or close friends or even two people who would interact outside of these specific circumstances but what if i want to remove them from those circumstances and still retain some of that "true" characterization while also getting them to kiss kiss fall in love? IT'S HARD i'm telling you.
my recipient asked for any variation of offguntaynew and left their prompts pretty open. i knew that i had some scraps of offguntay floating around in my notes, which gave my brain a starting point. i had a few sentences of a college au where off and gun were together and tay/gun made out for 7 minutes in heaven. i've also long wanted to write a fic where tay is pining over off (given that tay has always been single and i feel like he's usually characterized as the piner in taynew, what if he was pining for someone other than new?) so i ran with both of these vibes.
it took me weeks to get over the hump of the first scene, but i feel like it establishes a few key aspects of tay's personality—friends with everyone, clumsy, likely to end up talking for minutes straight about whales at a party. i know i just complained about it being difficult to write tay but it was easy enough to weave his hobbies (cameras, badminton) and core traits (losing shit, bickering with new) into the fic. the real hard part was figuring out his voice. like the end of the first scene, (And it's stupid, and vulgar in a way that Tay would never normally think about a stranger, but as he looks between Off and Gun, that half-cup of punch threatening to come back up his throat, Tay thinks, Yeah, he looks like he has a certain skill set.), i went back and forth on these lines multiple times because it didn't feel like something tay would actually think but also you know. he has eyes. and yes, i threw in that bit about tay thinking it was out of character himself to justify it. when writing tay, i had to remember that when he was in his early 20s he described himself as insecure and very self-doubting, that he had not yet grown into the confidence we see today. i got some very kind feedback on tay's characterization in particular so i'm glad my stress was worth it.
in terms of the offtay dynamic, i wanted to write pining tay but i needed some kind of barrier to them getting together. i'm a big fan of the trope where someone perceived as straight reveals queer inclinations and it sends another character into a tailspin, but also if the barrier of straightness is removed, what is then the barrier for tay? i never really expanded on why tay felt like it was impossible for off to like him because at this point in his pining, the specific reasons don't matter, just that it is impossible. it's already the story he's told himself. He wants to believe Gun, but this isn't the story he's been telling himself for so long. There is no fork in the road of this neural pathway, no part of him allowed to hold onto any hope. the story that off was telling himself, conversely, was that tay couldn't be interested in him because he's 1. not interested in anyone and 2. would've shown some kind of interest by now if that wasn't the case.
enter gun into the picture. he was probably harder to characterize than tay because i feel like my mental perception of gun is either just funky little gay or Whore, which are both fair but also there is more to him!! i wanted him to be playful and flirty (see: the close friends list, which is something a + r + i made extensive jokes about in the past) but also perceptive and blunt in a way that would spur off and tay into action. there isn't as much offgun in this because they're already fucking and in my mind they had already settled into a comfortable fwb relationship but i loved writing gun draping himself over tay :") i imagine that after this fic ends, the three of them will have to have a longer conversation at some point but for now, there's enough intuition and mutual understanding to get them started. off will probably still continue to ship taynew because once a polca, always a polca.
some other stray thoughts:
- his attraction to other people has always been a rare, sporadic thing. i wrote this single line in one of my notes and then tried really hard to fit it into a scene. i really felt compelled to establish tay as both a person who fucks and a person with infrequent sexual attraction because that's how i see him and how i wanted off to not see him.
- i know my recipient asked for any combination of OGTN so i didn't actually need to include any new but as a polca i had to lovingly include some taynew friendship <3
- He can't be sure; his feelings were like a bruise he couldn't remember getting. Suddenly there, tender and blooming red. shout out to all my girls who bruise easily!!
- Off gives him that pleased grin he gets whenever he makes fun of Tay, the one that shows that they're both in on the joke, and Tay feels suddenly fond. Fond of their effortless dynamic, their shared daydream of buying land together when they've made lots of money at their real, adult jobs. for research i watched the friend drive offtaygun episode several times and when i wrote this bit i was thinking about the way offtay were teasing each other with silly wordplay while shopping for ingredients and their easy dynamic. i treasure offtay so much because you can just feel how much they enjoy each other's company.
- the title comes from SOMOH's "anything". i thought the lyrics were kind of a perfect fit with the idea of unspoken feelings—You're the mistake I've never made / And while I am scared to fall into your arms / You feel the same, but we go without saying / Anything— but i also liked "we go without saying" as a phrase, as offtay's feelings for each other were obvious to gun.
- i know the ending is rushed because it's not a staygame fic if there isn't a rushed ending but i am still super happy with how this turned out.
ok i started writing this commentary on the flight home from thanksgiving at 9 pm after a long day so i am putting the bit that isn't actually relevant to this fic but just Thoughts on BL RPF behind a cut:
literally spouting nonsense
despite being in thai bl fandom for four years now, i've only written three (well now four) rpf fics compared to more than a dozen fics for various dramas. i've always wondered why i struggle with writing thai bl rpf, beyond the fact that, as compared to writing fic for the dramas, there is more necessary legwork than writing a pwp that acts essentially as a deleted scene from the series. i probably "know" tay tawan as well as any idol i've ever stanned. there are years of interviews, the variety shows, the ig lives that are done without a manager standing off-camera to course correct if needed. tay especially is both an open book and someone who's been described extremely consistently by everyone he meets. so why was writing him so hard???i think it occurred to me when i was thinking about the two thai bl rpf fics i've posted anonymously. neither were particularly difficult to write, but that's because they were both written with a characterization i would describe as more taynew the ship than how i actually perceive taynew. there are certainly company assigned ships in kpop and fanservice that plays into existing dynamics, but the shipping/koojin culture of thai bl is so strong. being in fandom means that you, at least to some extent, accept the collective delusion. fourth insists that it's possible he could fall for gemini and you, if you are not actually unhinged, pretend to accept that as truth. (speaking of the collective delusion, y'all i cannot convey how quickly the polca fangirl spirit entered my body when i saw taynew irl. they casually brushed against each other and i was going OUUUIIII before i even realized i was doing it.) anyway it's not unique to thai bl to have difficulty separating the job from what's genuine, but in thai bl, shipping is the thing you're selling. your future success is dependent on your ability to sell the collective delusion.
i think (in my mind, that is, because i am not actually writing any joylada gang rpf just having elaborate before bedtime daydreams) it's harder for me to conceive of OGTN than it is more recent gmmtv ships because there's more history. but also because somehow, by virtue of being less organic (paired together for the express purpose of becoming a branded ship), somehow these ships end up feeling more organic. this is not to say they aren't engaging in intentional fanservice or that their interactions are more earnest, but it's more like...there's an acknowledgement of coworkerism that isn't necessarily there in OGTN because of how they became a branded ship. i think offgun is better (as a ship to consider and explore) if we acknowledge that they aren't soulmates or close friends or even two people who would interact outside of these specific circumstances but what if i want to remove them from those circumstances and still retain some of that "true" characterization while also getting them to kiss kiss fall in love? IT'S HARD i'm telling you.
my recipient asked for any variation of offguntaynew and left their prompts pretty open. i knew that i had some scraps of offguntay floating around in my notes, which gave my brain a starting point. i had a few sentences of a college au where off and gun were together and tay/gun made out for 7 minutes in heaven. i've also long wanted to write a fic where tay is pining over off (given that tay has always been single and i feel like he's usually characterized as the piner in taynew, what if he was pining for someone other than new?) so i ran with both of these vibes.
it took me weeks to get over the hump of the first scene, but i feel like it establishes a few key aspects of tay's personality—friends with everyone, clumsy, likely to end up talking for minutes straight about whales at a party. i know i just complained about it being difficult to write tay but it was easy enough to weave his hobbies (cameras, badminton) and core traits (losing shit, bickering with new) into the fic. the real hard part was figuring out his voice. like the end of the first scene, (And it's stupid, and vulgar in a way that Tay would never normally think about a stranger, but as he looks between Off and Gun, that half-cup of punch threatening to come back up his throat, Tay thinks, Yeah, he looks like he has a certain skill set.), i went back and forth on these lines multiple times because it didn't feel like something tay would actually think but also you know. he has eyes. and yes, i threw in that bit about tay thinking it was out of character himself to justify it. when writing tay, i had to remember that when he was in his early 20s he described himself as insecure and very self-doubting, that he had not yet grown into the confidence we see today. i got some very kind feedback on tay's characterization in particular so i'm glad my stress was worth it.
in terms of the offtay dynamic, i wanted to write pining tay but i needed some kind of barrier to them getting together. i'm a big fan of the trope where someone perceived as straight reveals queer inclinations and it sends another character into a tailspin, but also if the barrier of straightness is removed, what is then the barrier for tay? i never really expanded on why tay felt like it was impossible for off to like him because at this point in his pining, the specific reasons don't matter, just that it is impossible. it's already the story he's told himself. He wants to believe Gun, but this isn't the story he's been telling himself for so long. There is no fork in the road of this neural pathway, no part of him allowed to hold onto any hope. the story that off was telling himself, conversely, was that tay couldn't be interested in him because he's 1. not interested in anyone and 2. would've shown some kind of interest by now if that wasn't the case.
enter gun into the picture. he was probably harder to characterize than tay because i feel like my mental perception of gun is either just funky little gay or Whore, which are both fair but also there is more to him!! i wanted him to be playful and flirty (see: the close friends list, which is something a + r + i made extensive jokes about in the past) but also perceptive and blunt in a way that would spur off and tay into action. there isn't as much offgun in this because they're already fucking and in my mind they had already settled into a comfortable fwb relationship but i loved writing gun draping himself over tay :") i imagine that after this fic ends, the three of them will have to have a longer conversation at some point but for now, there's enough intuition and mutual understanding to get them started. off will probably still continue to ship taynew because once a polca, always a polca.
some other stray thoughts:
- his attraction to other people has always been a rare, sporadic thing. i wrote this single line in one of my notes and then tried really hard to fit it into a scene. i really felt compelled to establish tay as both a person who fucks and a person with infrequent sexual attraction because that's how i see him and how i wanted off to not see him.
- i know my recipient asked for any combination of OGTN so i didn't actually need to include any new but as a polca i had to lovingly include some taynew friendship <3
- He can't be sure; his feelings were like a bruise he couldn't remember getting. Suddenly there, tender and blooming red. shout out to all my girls who bruise easily!!
- Off gives him that pleased grin he gets whenever he makes fun of Tay, the one that shows that they're both in on the joke, and Tay feels suddenly fond. Fond of their effortless dynamic, their shared daydream of buying land together when they've made lots of money at their real, adult jobs. for research i watched the friend drive offtaygun episode several times and when i wrote this bit i was thinking about the way offtay were teasing each other with silly wordplay while shopping for ingredients and their easy dynamic. i treasure offtay so much because you can just feel how much they enjoy each other's company.
- the title comes from SOMOH's "anything". i thought the lyrics were kind of a perfect fit with the idea of unspoken feelings—You're the mistake I've never made / And while I am scared to fall into your arms / You feel the same, but we go without saying / Anything— but i also liked "we go without saying" as a phrase, as offtay's feelings for each other were obvious to gun.
- i know the ending is rushed because it's not a staygame fic if there isn't a rushed ending but i am still super happy with how this turned out.