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.
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.