a passing thought

[kindkit]

I've just read a very good fic that demonstrates (among other things) that consent and good communication can be extremely sexy indeed.

But (and this is not a criticism of that fic, to be clear), it occurs to me that in every fic I've seen do that, the communication is always ultimately yes, and the consent is always ultimately given. Maybe there are issues, maybe someone's traumatized about something or just plain nervous, and overcoming that to get to a place of joyous consent and pleasure is the point.

What I don't think I've ever seen--and I admit I haven't been looking for it, or indeed reading much fic at all for a long time--is a fic that's focused on communication and consent, but where the communication is no. No, I don't want to do this specific act. No I don't want this, I don't enjoy this. And (this is the key part) where the result is still good joyous loving consensual sex. (NB I'm not talking about fic where a character is asexual and doesn't want to have sex at all. That's its own category; I mean characters who want to have sex together but where certain things are off-limits.)

No doubt it exists, because everything exists somewhere in fanfic. But I'll bet it isn't nearly as common as the other kind.


By the way, the very good fic in question is this one. It takes a premise I absolutely do not believe, that I think is implicitly but strongly contradicted by canon (Stede as sexually experienced with men) and makes it work. (The fic is from Ed's POV; it would have been a lot harder to make it work in Stede's POV, I think. But Mia_ugly writes Ed amazingly well, and I can believe inexperienced Ed from her even though my read of Ed in canon is very much the opposite.)


Buttercup (13819 words) by mia_ugly
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Our Flag Means Death (TV)
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Blackbeard | Edward Teach/Stede Bonnet
Characters: Blackbeard | Edward Teach, Stede Bonnet
Additional Tags: Porn with Feelings, Mutual Pining, Bad Sex, But Then Better Sex!, First Time, Inexperienced Ed, Experienced Stede, how the turntables, Pirate-typical violence, Blackbeard-Typical Angst, post-reunion, terms of endearment, Happy Ending
Summary: The thing is, when you’re Blackbeard you’ve got kind of a reputation to uphold. When you captain a ship, when you lead a crew, when people look up to you, tell stories, build a legend – parts of that legend are always more accurate than others.

And maybe you just let it slide, some of the things people say. Some of the things they assume. Maybe you swagger around and wear black leather and are a handsy bastard and let the stories tell themselves.

Maybe you don't want to talk about it.

Comments

[sovay]

No, I don't want to do this specific act. No I don't want this, I don't enjoy this.

If it survives into the finished novel, I have read a quite good sex scene with explicit off-limits (and not traumatically so), but the novel in question is still in progress and therefore I can't point anyone to it. I agree with you that it seems less common to me than the alternative, because so much of the pattern is the assumption that with the right person, everyone wants everything.

[kindkit]

the assumption that with the right person, everyone wants everything

Yes, exactly. And I do see the appeal of that as a trope--it's very romantic. But I'd also like to see fics take on the romance of accepting and respecting a no.

Part of me also thinks it would be interesting to see fics where things are dealbreakers. Sometimes people are just sexually incompatible, even if they love each other, and I've never seen a fanfic touch on that, as far as I remember. (Actually I've just remembered one, sort of. A m/m fic where the two men really love each other, but they're genuinely both straight and when they try to have sex together it fails miserably. They end up stuck in a kind of limbo, where they love each other too much to break up, but every time one of them has sex with a woman, the other is jealous and miserable. It's not a happy story.)

Mind you, I'm not saying I'd enjoy reading that for any pairing I ship. I want my happy ending at least as much as the next fan.

[sovay]

But I'd also like to see fics take on the romance of accepting and respecting a no.

Agreed. It's an important part of a relationship that works. And also it's normal for people not to want to do everything even with the right person, which means statistically it is owed better representation in fiction.

Sometimes people are just sexually incompatible, even if they love each other, and I've never seen a fanfic touch on that, as far as I remember.

I don't think I have, either, although I have certainly seen it nonfictionally.

A m/m fic where the two men really love each other, but they're genuinely both straight and when they try to have sex together it fails miserably. They end up stuck in a kind of limbo, where they love each other too much to break up, but every time one of them has sex with a woman, the other is jealous and miserable.

(What was this, the Mary Renault Memorial Platonic Disaster?)

Mind you, I'm not saying I'd enjoy reading that for any pairing I ship. I want my happy ending at least as much as the next fan.

Happy endings don't have to be perfect bang out of the gate, though, and romance conventions dictate so much that they should be, anything that acknowledges the complications of reality is interesting. There's a kind of soft, blameless angst that a lot of romances throw in the way of the relationship that isn't like the problems that real people have, either.

[kindkit]

the Mary Renault Memorial Platonic Disaster

*snickers* It was a due South fic. A good one that made me very sad and that I never want to read again. I can't remember the title or anything, but I think the author might have been Cherryice, who (at least in dS fandom) specialized in stories where the main pairing broke up or was unhappy.

Happy endings don't have to be perfect bang out of the gate

Exactly. I said below to rydra_wong that my biggest fic complaint is when every problem is solved by half a conversation and a sex scene. I really like problems that get better but are still ongoing, conversations that have to happen more than once, happy endings that aren't 100% perfect. I admit that I do like my fic to be easier and happier than real life--I don't want to read about people who start out adoring each other and ten years later they're fighting bitterly over whose turn it is to take out the trash and who never stacks the dishwasher properly--but I like a little salt in the sugar, I guess.