Waiting (on You) - Commentary - Ch. 13-14 (Patreon)
Content
Welcome back! I’m writing this commentary way early because the next few weeks are going to be crazy. That’s the holidays in a nutshell, isn’t it? I’ll be traveling to see family, traveling for work, going to office parties and movies and petsitting for my sister…pretty much the works. In the few days remaining before that gauntlet begins, I’m trying to get as much of my writing stuff set up and ready to go. Getting this commentary wrapped up is step one of that process!
As a writing update - I’ve still been working on my cops and robbers AU. It’s just under 40k words now which, now that I think about it, is pretty good progress! It’s nowhere near done, of course, but it’s coming together in terms of plot and outline. I’m even seaming some of the parts together now, which helps me generate new ideas in the process.
It’s still a long way from complete, but it feels nice to be writing something new. Whenever I get stuck in one phase of the writing process for a while, I feel like I’ve forgotten how to do the other parts. For instance, since I spent so long editing Queens of Remnant (far longer than I had intended), I felt like I couldn't actually write a story anymore. I could only edit.
Fortunately, that’s not true! At least, it doesn’t feel true. And that’s what matters.
But, without further ado, let’s get into our two most recent chapters of Waiting (on You). Chapter 12 ended with a bang (probably more like a crunch, actually…), so Chapter 13 picks up once Yang’s been taken to the hospital.
I want to say that most people probably expected Yang to get into an accident at some point in the story. I put in a lot of side references to Yang’s motorcycle just to keep it top of mind for that sole purpose! Either Blake was commenting on how Yang doesn’t wear a helmet, or Ruby says that Yang drives too fast, or Yang insists that motorcycles are awesome and there’s nothing bad about them at all.
Except the tiny detail that Blake pointed out in Chapter 3:
“You could get tapped on that thing and end up in the hospital.”
Does that count as foreshadowing? I don’t even know. I should probably know this…I guess I imagine foreshadowing to be more subtle. That wasn’t subtle at all. The only thing subtle about it is that there’s no context to suggest it will ever actually happen. Just that it could happen.
Well, it happened. Yang got tapped and ended up in the hospital. I tried to keep it as minor of an incident as possible while also making it serious enough that she is taken to the hospital. Basically, my goal was to get her to the hospital somehow so that two things could happen:
- Blake shows up to take care of her
- We gain more backstory via Yang’s reaction (read: fear) of hospitals
Poor Yang…I just put her through the wringer in the interest of plot progression…
Totally worth it though! But first, I needed to remove Avery from the picture.
I didn’t want Avery to come across as a horrible human being, so she goes to the hospital with Yang. Can you imagine if she didn’t? She goes on a date with this girl she likes. That girl is probably not going to call her back, which she’s disappointed about, but then that girl gets tossed over a car and taken to the hospital. “Oh well. She didn’t want to date me anyway,” Avery thinks while making her merry way home.
I’m giving Yang the benefit of the doubt in picking reasonable people to date (except Mel with her ‘aggressively easygoing’ self). Also, Avery sticking around let me show the readers something very important, and very amusing (to me, at least) - what Blake really thinks about the string of random girls Yang goes on dates with.
That answer is…not much.
Under ordinary circumstances, Blake would be polite and would probably try to figure out ‘why them?’ - i.e. what do they offer Yang that she doesn’t. But when worried for Yang’s wellbeing…she only acknowledges Avery’s existence long enough to learn what happened.
At least Avery isn’t as dense as Yang is! Imagine the night from her POV. First, Yang’s late meeting her at the bar. Then Yang takes a phone call during their date, from a ‘friend’ who’s not an ex-girlfriend, which requires Yang sneaking off to the restroom to have a private conversation. Then Yang comes back all ecstatic from the call but is unwilling to engage in any flirty behavior, thereby coming off as uninterested. So Avery says she should get going, and Yang jumps on the opportunity to leave rather than ask for more time together. Then Yang ends up in the hospital, but she keeps asking for Blake, and to call Blake. And then another girl shows up who’s a bit more concerned than ‘a friend,’ and Yang’s relieved as if her savior just arrived.
When Avery tells this story in the future, it’ll begin with, “Remember that time I went on a date with a girl who got hit by a car, then her girlfriend showed up at the hospital?” Fortunately (again, because I like Avery), she takes it pretty well. Originally, she was going to throw a tantrum. YES. I swear to you, I was going to do it. I was going to put Yang into the hospital and then force her to deal with a pouting girlfriend - kind of like Chapter 1. And then Yang was going to respond with something along the lines of, “Ok, thanks, bye, don’t bother calling.”
I guess that just seemed a little too dramatic. So Avery’s cool about it instead, and she’s even willing to be Yang’s friend so they can hang out again. I like to imagine that they do hang out again. Well, I suppose since I’m the writer that I can just say that it does happen! They work in a similar industry, after all, and they get along well. So, once everything settles down, Avery gets in touch and they hang out again. It’ll be much less awkward this time, and they’ll become good friends.
I’m sure we’re all glad that Blake showed up to save the day because Yang was on the verge of a panic attack for a little while. I’m sure everyone could infer why Yang doesn’t like hospitals - she spent too much time in them as a child when her mom was sick. (I decided to give Summer an illness versus whatever happened to her in the show…which I’m guessing was probably violent??)
This chapter gives Blake a chance to show that she is as capable as Yang boasts about her being. She checks on Yang, talks to the doctor, gets all of the medicine and paperwork sorted out (off screen), and gets Yang home and to sleep. All while she’s stressed out of her mind, of course. She doesn’t let Yang see that though, so Yang doesn’t worry in the slightest.
Once they get to Blake’s apartment is when things get interesting (or fun, in my book). Yang’s slightly out of it, so she can unwittingly make things very difficult on her BFF/the girl who is overwhelmingly in love with her and trying so hard not to show it.
First, Yang offers for them to share a bed. Which, I like to believe that Blake argued back and forth with herself on that one. Of course they could share a bed - they were friends and friends could do that. On the other hand, Blake didn’t want the first time they shared a bed to be a time like this. On the other other hand, she probably kicked herself for declining after she left. Nothing had to happen. And staying there would have meant that she could have kept a closer eye on Yang.
So they didn’t sleep together, but Blake does help Yang change. I actually think that was better than them sharing a bed. I adore Blake’s hesitation during this scene though. She wants to help, but she also doesn’t want to cross any boundaries. Internally, she’s just dying a little from the whole circumstance. This definitely wasn’t the way she imagined undressing Yang for the first time!
She probably hadn’t imagined their first kiss like that either.
There’s no way Blake slept that night. She probably just laid on the sofa, staring at the ceiling while her mind raced through everything that happened. Yang kissed her. Yang kissed her? Yang kissed her. Yang kissed her. (You get the idea!)
I bet a lot of people thought that Yang wouldn't remember the kiss the next morning. Well, that almost happened! The idea drew me in…mostly for the added angst potential. But…I realized that it could be played another way, and this other way got me a second kiss in two chapters. You’re welcome!
I also just didn’t want Yang to forget such a pivotal point in their relationship. I also didn’t want to cheapen the emotions that led her to kiss Blake in the first place. She wasn’t blackout drunk or something. She was woozy, but she was still aware and thinking (relatively) clearly. It wasn’t a ‘I’m so drunk I have no idea what I’m doing’ kiss. It was a ‘you mean so much to me’ kiss.
So she doesn’t forget! But she does, possibly rightfully so, feel bad that she just up and kissed Blake out of the blue.
Did you notice that Blake was the one avoiding the subject the next morning? She’d probably convinced herself that Yang would forget or that it meant nothing - or was worried that it meant nothing - so avoided it like the plague. Yang, in a joyous moment of personal growth, is the one who broaches the potentially awkward subject.
When she apologizes for making Blake ‘uncomfortable or upset or something,’ Blake is probably thinking, “...are you kidding me? I’ve only wanted to kiss you for years now.”
And then Blake got to fulfill that dream by kissing Yang right there in her living room.
Wasn’t that so much better than Yang forgetting?? We got two kisses out of it instead. And the second one gets Yang thinking, ‘uh, hello? Blake’s an incredible kisser??’
Almost as good as getting another kiss is seeing some of Blake’s sass rear its head. Yang probably just shouldn’t bring up jealousy ever. I mean…Blake is jealous, I’m sure. She’d have to be. These other girls, who Yang admits to not even liking that much, get something that she wants. But then Yang treats her like the most precious thing in the world and she knows that she’s special, somehow, even if it’s not in the way she wants.
I think when she tells Yang that, “They have something I refuse to give you,” she meant that she refuses to be a casual partner or one-off date. Like, if she’d wanted to hook up with Yang, I’m sure she already could have by now. But she wants something serious, and a romantic relationship with Yang will only be an option when Yang is ready to work on her commitment issues.
Imagine her surprise (and consternation) when Yang admits that she’s trying to fix her commitment issues…by going on a date with someone else. Blake honestly just can’t catch a break.
Weiss also found herself in a rough spot even though she didn’t even appear in the last few chapters! There she is, minding her own business off screen, celebrating the fact that she and Ruby just confessed that they love each other, and Yang gets hit by a car? Honestly…all she wanted to do was celebrate properly with Ruby. Instead, they’re rushing to the hospital and she’s comforting Ruby instead.
The evening isn’t a failure though. She’s never been in the position where she’s had to comfort Ruby before, but she discovers that she’s remarkably good at it. This only confirms what she already suspected - that the two of them were destined to be together and she should start ring shopping pronto. (Or something along those lines…)
Blake also snatched victory from the jaws of defeat (I just wanted to use that phrase). While Yang might’ve gotten hurt while on a date trying to fix her commitment problems by committing to another girl, Blake finally gets it through Yang’s thick skull that she’s not busy all the time so pick up the damn phone and call her. I’m just emphasizing what everyone’s already thinking by now, especially Blake.
They end the chapter snuggled on the sofa together, cute as can be. Where they go next, nobody knows! What we do know is that something has to change. Perhaps that drunk driver finally knocked a few screws loose?
Guess we’ll find out in the next chapter!
Until next time,
Miko