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bakerstreet2014-04-15 12:48 pm
depletes) wrote in bakerstreet2014-04-15 12:48 pm
The Nonsexual But Still Romantic Intimacy Meme
The Nonsexual but Still Romantic Intimacy Meme
Intimacy is NOT necessarily about full sexual contact. Intimacy is all about two people forming a connection and bond between them. That involves becoming best friends, trusting each other, knowing each other, understanding each other. Intimacy is grown and developed, it can't be rushed.
Nonsexual forms of intimacy can add a great deal of depth and variety to fiction. On one end of the spectrum, they provide extra steps to support the journey from meeting a potential mate through romance, sex, and marriage. Sex is valuable, but it's not everything.
RULES
- Comment with your character. Be sure to include preferences
- Tag others!
PROMPTS
- Hair care. Brushing, braiding, washing, cutting -- all of these involve a lot of careful touching in ways that many people enjoy. Hair braiding is a bonding experience in some cultures. In fact, grooming is a bonding technique for social primates in general. People without close ties to others often treat themselves to regular salon visits as a socially acceptable way to meet the need for touch and interaction.
- Shaving. This involves an unusually high level of trust, especially if the person is using a straight-edge razor or something else with an exposed blade rather than just a buzzer. Although it can apply to women, shaving is one of the few forms of physical intimacy that is most closely associated with men due to their facial hair. Initiaton into shaving is a major milestone for becoming a man, not just for boys during puberty but also for transsexuals during transition.
- Bathing. This varies by culture; in America most people bathe alone but some other cultures practice communal bathing. A bath is usually more intimate than a shower, although a public bath can be non-intimate and small shower stall can be intimate. It's also different when two people wash each other (an exchange of intimacy and affection) than when one person washes someone else (more of a caretaking or protective gesture).
- Feeding. A classic romantic motif involves lovers feeding each other, but it works as a way of providing and caring for someone in any context. Like bathing, it can also clue whether both parties are participating equally or one is taking care of the other (temporarily or regularly). This one has an existential flavor since survival depends on food supply.
- Seeing someone without their adaptive equipment on. This includes glasses, dentalware, prosthetic limbs, a wheelchair, etc. Adaptive equipment is part of one's presentation to the everyday world, and taking it off can be as intimate as removing clothing, for many people in many contexts.
- Holding Hands: There can be many reasons for this gesture. Physical closeness, offering comfort, or staying together in a crowd, all may have you reaching for someone.
- Undressing someone. This can be kind of a one-way experience if the recipient isn't awake, and is often awkward for both people if they are awake. Sometimes it happens because hands are out of commission, but a more common example is someone passing out drunk. Overheating is another good reason. Different circumstances can imply different levels of intimacy.
- Sharing secrets. This especially applies to talking about personal issues that aren't widely known. An exchange of secrets is a common ritual between "best friends" among girls and women, but appears elsewhere as well. Some things are only discussed among people with a common reference; veterans may be more comfortable discussing war memories with each other than civilians.
- Ordering for someone in a restaurant. Acquiring food, without asking the other person what to get, shows a knowledge of their needs and desires. Providing food is also a gesture of support and sustenance.
- Providing moral support at a major event. Helping someone get through a funeral, a trial, or other intense but not crisis situation is usually performed by a very dear friend. This is a situation where lovers or family members may be too close to the matter to be much use.
- Crying on someone. When you cry, you tend to let your guard down. Most of the people close to you will see you cry at some point, so that can be a milestone in a relationship. Actually crying on someone, letting them hold you, is even more intimate.
- Serving in a primary role for someone during a wedding. This includes the best man or maid of honor at a wedding, or stand-in for absent parents, etc. as well as the traditional family roles. One aspect of intimacy is sharing each other's lives, including ceremonies and transitions.
- Comforting someone after a bad breakup. Moments of great vulnerability can bring people closer. While this role sometimes falls to family, breakup repair more often goes to a woman's female friends or a man's male friends.
- Listening to someone's heartbeat or breathing. Close body contact, enough to carry soft personal sounds, tends to be comforting as well as connecting, as it touches on positive childhood memories for most people. It is shared between parent and child, sometimes between siblings, and later between lovers. Tight nonsexual partners may also do this.
- Putting someone to bed. Interestingly, this activity can happen among people who are just getting to know each other -- most often if someone passes out drunk, but exhaustion can have a similar effect. It's a gesture of caring to put someone to bed rather than leave them where they drop. A milder version involves draping a blanket or coat over a person asleep on a couch or the like.
- Sleeping in the same bed. This is an act of shared vulnerability and intimacy. Lovers customarily do this; so do some siblings or friends, especially as children. People may also be driven to share a bed, sleeping bag, etc. for warmth or lack of other accommodations in challenging circumstances.
- Watching someone sleep. There is more vulnerability on the part of the sleeper, and more intimacy from the watcher, when only one person is asleep. Parents often watch their children sleep. Lovers sometimes do this with each other, which can be cute or creepy. It's also a guard position, useful for showing that one character seeks to protect another.
- Waking someone up from a nightmare. A subtler form of rescue than more physical actions, this is still a gesture of protection and caring. It often leads to comfort afterwards. A typical courtesy between parent and child, or lovers, this can also be an early threshold for characters thrust together unexpectedly if one of them has sturdy daytime walls and a lot of issues. It is common, but often unspoken, among war buddies or veterans, many of whom have nightmares.
- Sharing clothes, jewelry, other personal items. This is common between siblings or close female friends. Sometimes roommates do it too. Wearing someone else's shirt or bathrobe is typical in romantic relationships, so can suggest a similar level of intimacy even in the absence of sex.
- Cleaning someone else's living space. This shows care and knowledge on the part of the cleaner, and trust on the part of the recipient. You have to know what NOT to throw away or move. It's typical of family members and roommates. Coworkers may clean each other's desk, office space, etc.
- Living together. This is a big step, even if it's just for a little while. Housemates are in each other's pockets; it's hard to keep secrets. Family members and lovers often live together, but housemates who are family-of-choice form a category of their own. If you don't want a romantic partner, a permanent housemate is a good choice for someone to share your life with.
- Childbirth. Attending the blessed event entails providing a lot of moral support for hours under high stress. It can create a bond with the baby as well as with the mother. When planned, this opportunity is only offered to the closest family members or friends, barring professionals. But it can happen by surprise in very awkward circumstances, a popular motif in fiction.
- Saving someone's life. Quick action in a life-threatening situation demonstrates how much one person values another. This can create a strong sense of connection, and sometimes obligation. It often, though not always, entails personal risk for the rescuer. This is fairly typical for military buddies or police partners, etc.
- Risking your life for someone. Placing someone else ahead of your own life shows their importance to you unequivocally. This often, though not always, involves trying to save or protect another person. While it can create a sense of gratitude, it frequently causes anger as well -- someone who loves you will generally object to you endangering yourself, even to protect them. Military and police buddies protect each other regularly.
- Making emergency decisions for someone. This reveals both how well you know the person, and how much you care about them -- whether you know what they would want, and act on it even if it differs from your personal preference. Unlike some of the other options, in this one the initial action is often outweighed by the aftermath. Both characters have to deal with the results of the decisions, good or bad.
- Deathwatch. Dying can be as intimate as giving birth. Staying with someone while they pass is an act of love; so is providing moral support to someone sitting deathwatch for a family member or other person. Many soldiers and police have done this for someone.
(taken from here)
тнe wιnтer ѕoldιer • мcυ
this is an unholy mix of everything so.
Steve doesn't really expect to find him in some little dinner in the Midwest. He keeps thinking it will be a battle, a struggle, but instead it's Steve in sneakers and Bucky in a dirty hoodie with his head bowed over a sticky, condiment smudged table. He doesn't even have his shield with him and he thinks stupid, so stupid but there are new lines around Bucky's eyes and he doesn't stop really. ] Hey Buck. [ His voice is soft, sweet, a hand hovering just above his shoulder. ] You look beat.
[ It's almost like the old days, where Bucky'd fall asleep into his strawberry shake after a day's hard graft down at the docks, Steve coaxing him home with sweet nothings. Except it isn't, they can't be that again. He wonders what they'll be now. ]
it's beautiful and amazing. spoilers.
the more he walks around in this world he's barely been a part of, the more he remembers fragments of another one that he used to be in. he's pieced together more than he knew before the fall of HYDRA and SHIELD. he gets by on free internet at libraries, but he can't find more than what the smithsonian gave him on james buchanan barnes.
he's starting to wonder if the man ever existed, and if he did, if he ever will again.
he's been on the move so long, that even though he hears rogers' voice, he doesn't have it in him to bolt. he's been running off fear and adrenaline for too long, and the only result of the fight or flight response is to send a fine tremble through the whole of his body from utter exhaustion.
he only found himself in the diner because of the kindness of some older lady (who reminded him of someone he used to know, he thinks. "sorry, bucky, steve isn't feeling so well today. you can go to his room if you like."). she'd found him huddled on the street corner, and brought him in for a bowl of soup and a cup of coffee. she left a while ago, and he's started to drift as the warmth from the place seeped in and made him sluggish.
he tries to push himself up when he looks up and sees rogers, but even his metal arm groans in protest of the movement. he gives a sigh of resignation, and lets his head drop back down to his chest. his voice, still hoarse from barely being used, is soft as he finally speaks:]
Is that who I am?
[he thinks it would be better to be half of a person who elicits that sort of response and warmth out of rogers. better than the fearful eyes of old targets and ghosts that haunt him and keep him awake at night. guilt is what it is. it's new and alien and he hates it.
he deserves it though. he's caused so much pain over the years, even if he was just a blunt instrument to be used.]
no subject
[ It breaks his heart to see him this way, a puppet with its strings cut, worn down by everything that has happened to it. It makes him angry too, makes him want to hit out and fight back at the forces that have taken his best friend away from him.
He does none of that now, he can't and so he slides into the booth across from him and tries not to reach out and touch him. ] You don't need to run, okay? Not this time. It's just me.
[ He doesn't want to come across as a threat. He knows that won't work in his favour. ] When was the last time you slept, huh buddy?
no subject
[he hasn't been a person in so long that it's hard to think of himself like one. he's been a weapon. an instrument. a tool. never a person to his superiors.
he watches him with tired, wary eyes as he slides into the seat across from him. he won't admit that, realistically, he probably can't outrun rogers right now.]
Okay.
[he thinks about the question, really thinks about it. he realizes he doesn't know the answer. he's been on the move, never staying in any place longer than a few days.]
There---there wasn't anyone to put me back into cryo.
[when he went back. he did try, but it was abandoned. all gone.]
no subject
[ It's hard to be so careful, to be so slow. Steve's so used to the Bucky who would have spirited him up in the latest adventure. But he holds back, a pained look on his face as he sweeps his gaze over his bedraggled best friend. There are dark lines under his eyes and his hair is a mess. Steve would think he's been sleeping rough, but he knows he hasn't even be sleeping so --. ]
There's no one coming for you now, you're safe. You can choose when you want to do something, like sleeping, or eating.
no subject
[at least not outside of broken, disjointed fragments that make him twitch and snap out of a drift into sleep in a state of panic.
he raises his head, with some effort, a frown marring his exhausted features. no one coming for him? he's not sure if he's relieved or upset. he has no masters. he has no place. he's nothing.]
No one? [it's small, lost, like a child.] I don't---I can't---[he needs order. rules. instruction. all of this information is only serving to confuse him more. he's too exhausted to process it properly.]