Chapter 4 Commentary (Read chapter on AO3)

Clef hadn't had the houjicha Umi had brought him yet, and the beginning of this chapter seemed like a good opportunity for him to enjoy his souvenirs. But given I'd left his tea in his study, I needed to make a couple adjustments to make it work.

I did do some adjustments to Umi and Clef's conversation about bringing Umi home to meet his family, and ended up adding to and rewriting a whole chunk of the conversations they have. As well as shifting the details of how their relationship has gone up until this point, because I'd never sat down to lay it out, so several comments through the fic were contradicting each other. 

Clef implementing a rule of only meeting in public spaces after Umi refused to let him ignore her does seem the most likely, so I've gone with that. And it also works very well for explaining why their relationship looks very different from an outside perspective.

I also added a little bit more background to Umi's masturbation scene, because I don't think I was as clear with the fact Umi had never done it in Cephiro before, so it was all very new while tensions were high. And I also made it more clear what Clef was noticing when he realised what she was doing when he stopped intending to apologise for letting things go too far.

And the biggest change to this chapter is Clef starting a contraceptive regimen. Given how far things go, it made so much more sense for him to decide to start something after all of that than to wait until after the ball.  Which does mean a few comments need shifting later on.

Chapter 3 Commentary (Read chapter on AO3)

I made two very noticeable changes to this chapter: Umi does not eat the cake now, and Clef also gets a reaction scene following the events in the library.

The more times I've reread this story, the more Umi eating the cake Clef made makes less sense. She doesn't like sweet things. Why would he go to all the trouble of learning how to make a cake like the ones she makes only to change the recipe to one she would eat when that's not the point. The point is that he's been trying to work out how she could continue her hobby if she moved to Cephiro.

If she moved to be with him.

So that's a change that felt like it was needed.

And then Clef having a reaction to the library scene also felt like it needed to be there. I wanted to highlight how he was feeling about everything that had happened, and how he was starting the realise that maybe he should rethink that whole idea that he wouldn't sleep with Umi this week.

Also we just get more of Kalos and Brisa teasing him. And make it very obvious that this is absolutely normal behaviour on their part.

This is also where I started exploring just how domestic Clef could be as a character. I kind of love the idea of him enjoying cooking as kind of the opposite to Umi's inability to cook. That's obviously something that I have had fun exploring in other things, particularly my Guru to House Husband series, which does spawn from many little things mentioned in Sanctuary that I don't explore here. But Clef cooking was something I really wanted as part of this whole first part where he's properly bringing Umi into his personal space, and letting her into his life in the way he's wanted to for months.

I might also just be sappy and having fun giving a peek into what their future could look like very early on with Umi chopping vegetables with him. They've been married in my mind for decades at this point. There is no escape.

As part of the whole Umi no longer eats the cake in the cake scene, I loved the idea of Kalos and Brisa being annoyed with Clef about that.

I did also change the conversation with Aveo probably a bit more than just a little tweak. Adding in comments about a morning after potion. And Umi now takes her first dose this chapter.  Because, if anyone was counting, it's a bit unclear whether or not she actually takes the fifth dose on the day after Honda falls off. Also, it makes more sense to start taking it after the events of library, and would also explain her lack of hesitation later that night.

Chapter 2 Commentary (Read Chapter on AO3)

I didn't change anything too major in this chapter. I just made some adjustments to Umi's motivations for poking around on Clef's desk. Less trying to "help", so much as just being nosey while wishing she could help him with his research.

I think I also made a few minor changes to the walk through the gardens, but nothing major.

In the very early version of the story, Getz and Aygo were simply more staff of Clef's house, the gardener and his nephew. But then I realised it worked better for Getz to actually be a healer given where I was taking the plot. I'd already decided when I started to rewrite of the 2012 version in 2017 that I wanted to have the new sections of Cephiro supported by some sort of circle of magic users, so it made sense to add him to that list. 

Umi waking up to find her curtains had been opened and breakfast on the table is also a hold-over from the 2012 version where Clef only had household staff, but I have kept it because I am too amused by the idea of someone coming up with breakfast for Umi as a pretence for actually checking up on if they had gone to bed separately or not, because everyone had absolutely started making wagers before Umi even arrived. I don't know who might have bet on the first night (any thoughts?).

Getz is named for the Hyundai Getz which is related to the Hyundai Accent, which is the last car I had before I moved from the USA to the UK, and Aygo is named after the the Toyota Aygo, which is the car my wife had when I moved over to the UK, and was still the car we had when I posted this chapter in 2017.

Chapter 1 Commentary (Read chapter on AO3)

This chapter was still clinging too much to my original 2012 draft, and too much of the plot had changed later for that to make sense. While I kept many elements and many sections are recognisable, if different now, I consider this  chapter a complete rewrite. I consider everything having been changed.

One of the big changes I've made is the conversation that leads to Umi going to stay with Clef. Umi makes the claim later that she invited herself to stay with Clef with the intention of seducing him. So I made some tweaks to her confidence to match it with later chapters. She wavered so much in the first few chapters because the plot was originally the two of them discovering their feelings and the application of alcohol leading to poor choices over the course of the week. But, honestly, I prefer the idea that both of them are absolutely aware that that they both are interested in a sexual relationship with one another and have been for months, which is how I have written the later parts, and some of the prequel stuff. So this chapter ought to match.

Also, it was just funnier to add in the invitation conversation and make it obvious they both knew the expectations that came along with the invitation -- even if Clef doesn't necessarily want to admit to himself that that's exactly what he'd agreed to when he let Umi come stay.

A lot of the changes are likely to include things I think are the funnier option that still works with the plot.

I did consider aging Umi up just a little in the rewrite, but I still think the complicated emotions of transitioning out of high school and into the adult world faster than expected work really well with the plot. Especially with the idea of Umi rushing this relationship out of the fear that something could happen to Clef or her and she would miss her chance with him.

I had originally planned for her to be 18, but I am terrible at math and didn't realise that she would only be seventeen until the very last month of her last year of school.

It didn't make sense to switch it to her going into her first year of university, especially since this Umi had already decided she wanted to move to Cephiro after school, forgoing university.

And I like the timeframe of Clef's repeals against the timing of everything. Though, I guess I could have moved everything up a year. But that wouldn't entirely work with Umi's decision that if 16 was old enough for marriage in Japan, it was obviously old enough to be counted as an adult in Cephiro, therefore she could claim to be a full adult at 17. And if she was an adult at 17, why would she try to wait until she was 18?

But I have added in an unquantified amount of time for the first two trips to Cephiro that does mean she's dubiously 18 at the start of the story anyway.

It could be interesting to write a version of this where Umi's a legal adult in Japan at 20 when they start a sexual relationship in Cephiro, and how that changes things. I think she would probably have had sex with someone else in that span of time, just to satiate some level of curiosity. Which would be an interesting change in the dynamic of their first time. But that's a different topic, lol

I thought it would make sense for Umi to mention the budget that had been mentioned in the final scene when Umi meets Aveo for the first time. Because Umi has no real filter between her thoughts and her speech sometimes. I felt Umi should also do a bit more exploring, even if she still gets bored because all the other rooms seem the same.

And also, it seemed silly to not show Umi's first visit to the kitchen. I shuffled a few conversations around because of that, like Umi asking about the clothes.

I made it more obvious that Aveo has a more familiar relationship with Clef now. Originally she was written as more of a head housekeeper/butler type character. But it is a lot more fun, and sillier to have her be not only a work colleague, but also a distant relation to Clef, so he is literally bringing Umi home to meet his family.

Aveo is named after my favourite car that I have ever owned. I adore Aveo my character, and I loved that car. I am so sad that I lost the car to a terrible hail storm.

Aveo would definitely know about the repeal vote, even if she doesn't mention anything to Umi about it.

Coming back to things I think are funny, I was amused by the idea of Clef refusing to say anything to Umi about the repeal because he'd decided that he was going to have self-control and not have sex with her during this visit, even is she asked. Mostly because he knew that if she knew that he'd spent the last however many weeks fighting to make it legal for them to have sex she would definitely insist they do it to celebrate the repeal.

I also realised in editing this chapter that Umi would absolutely bring Clef a gift of some sort when coming to stay with him. Not just a host gift, but a souvenir from her holiday the week before, as well.  It makes me wonder what other things she's brought him after various holidays with her parents, and if there might be a gift she brought him after the Festival celebration that basically ignited their sexual tension.

In trying to come up with something, I remembered all the sponsor reads for boxes like Sakura Co, and went to see what Kyoto specific stuff they were selling, and when I saw the houjicha brownies, I decided those were prefect, especially if she got him some houjicha to go with it.  I must admit that houjicha is one of my favourite types tea. It's been roasted and because of that puts me in mind of a cross between coffee and tea. I wonder if Cephiro has any roasted type drinks at all.

While working toward finishing my longest Rayearth fanfic, Sanctuary, I have been going back through the earlier chapters to fix things that bugged me about them, and to also get them to vibe correctly with the later chapters, since I didn't know the whole plot when I first started writing and it is very obvious on a reread right now. 

I will be adding some notes to chapters with big changes as I update them, but I also thought it would be fun to do a more detailed post with what I've changed and why, as well as my thoughts about the chapter. I miss the old trend of author commentary from the LJ days. Why not use this space to do that for my fanfic.

If you are coming over here from AO3 and would like to chat in this thread as I post updates and commentary, you are more than welcome to join the forum to do so. Registration is open, but it has to be manually approved before you can start posting, so it may be a wait of a day or two for me to log in to see the notification for approval unless you shoot an email to the forum email account or my personal one on AO3 to let me know you need in. It's a spam measure, sorry for the inconvenience.

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Maybe she likes a nice red bean or green tea flavor? Those aren't quite as sweet (still sweet, but not like some chocolate marshmallow cookie dough monstrosity)

Guess I have to decide Ascot's. I'm gonna go with a nice cookie dough for him. (That was my fave when I was younger, now I enjoy more of the less sweet ones myself, oh, and salted caramel)

At the beginning of the manga, Umi wails about Cephiro's lack of Haagen Daz, which feels slightly incongruous with her dislike of sweets, but I suppose not all ice cream is particularly sweet.

What sort of ice cream flavours do you think she likes best?

On the topic of ice cream, what sort of flavours do you imagine the other characters might enjoy?

Do you think any character in particular might be too lactose intolerant to enjoy ice cream?

Our washing machine caught fire last week, and choosing a new one is so annoying!

this is still the mood.