It’s a love affair that started when I was at the tender age of 12. I started writing fanfiction of the series that meant a lot to me as a way to escape my tenuous reality and to further interact with the shows I had nearly encyclopedic knowledge of even at a young age. For the uninitiated, fanfic or fanfiction are works of fiction written by fans based on a popular series like a manga/anime, TV show or book series. You can write fanfic to anything and trust me, there is fanfic of it even if you think whatever show or series you’re into isn’t popular. For many, fanfic is a way to either self-insert into a narrative or right the wrongs established by canon. For many writers, writing fanfic can become a way to explore kink, sexuality and even gender; I know it did for me. I was able to self-insert and live out fantasies beyond my wildest dreams even if it was something outlandish as dating the main fictional character or having my own power fantasy. It was a love affair I kept up through high school even doing commissions for friends and patrons to make their favorite ships and scenarios happen. If you wanted a lemon slash fic with your OC and an MC: I was your smut peddler. I loved sharing with the audience I had, the friends I had and I loved reading other fanfic of pairings I liked. I cannot impress upon you enough how social early fanfic was back in the day. It was all about sharing, commenting and more.
Fanfic was and still is an important part of building your fanon and defending your ship in the fan world and being able to bolster your fic with canon and headcanons became a currency to fans. While many were worried about building shipping manifestos, others were more focused on just indulging in a world entirely built on making their dreams come true through fiction. I don’t really remember what it was that got me to stop publishing fanfic. Maybe it was the sites I used to love going down or just gaining a different friend group but steadily one day I just stopped sharing the fic I worked on. But the funny thing was that college and sites going down didn’t stop me from writing fanfic. I continued on, just not really sharing my work with anyone. Even after graduation and moving into my own place I kept on writing fanfic; sharing with at the time a very eager audience of one: my then girlfriend. She was a huge source of inspiration to keep writing, to keep going, to keep creating and even though I was sure that the works I was making would never see other eyes: each chapter I finished was another little love token I could give her and I was content to continue to share. When she broke up with me, for a while, I lost my reason to write. It took a year or two after the breakup to keep going but I did and I went back to writing in solitude, mostly out of spite. I finished a work I started in high school only to continue on writing in the same universe and I was able to indulge every desire I ever had for that work and in my life.
I kept my ability to create OCs and write both the vanilla and smutty arts: it truly is a skill that needs to be honed. All the while I roleplayed and edited and continued to work in fiction and toting my ability to write fiction but still was afraid to show all the years of work that I had hoarded away like a dragon protecting its gold.
As sensibility changed I got scared of publishing because indeed the times are no longer what they were. In the early days of fanfic the word “problematic” didn’t exist and we reveled in just how much we could push the envelope or shock a reader with smut, filth, or just obscenity. It was rarely ever gratuitous: it always did serve the narrative but we cared very little for trigger or content warnings or for protecting readers from things that may be shocking or unsettling. The newer crowd is sensitive to those things and while I can empathize with wanting to be warned for things that could offend certain sensibilities I was worried that maybe, just maybe I should just go off into that good night; keep my work to myself and age out of fandom like all the new kids on the block assume I should.
To be honest, I wasn’t sure what possessed me to publish again. Maybe it was the influx of fanfic I’ve been reading as a means to pass the time during the pandemic. Maybe it was just the desire to share this part of myself again. Maybe, just maybe it was a desire for feedback and praise. I don’t know what it was that got me to do it: but I did it. And so far, I have no regrets. It’s wonderful getting comments on my work again, being seen again, and being out there again. Each new moment of praise spurs me on to keep going and while it is a little daunting to potentially have a fanfic schedule again as I did in my youth I am also excited to have a burgeoning little audience that seems to like my work. It’s like exercising a muscle that I had let atrophy and writing fiction once more has become social rather than selfish. I haven’t had to sacrifice anything that I want, I get to be myself and share what I’m passionate about with other people that are passionate about the same thing.
That inherent social nature of fanfic is what drew me into this world decades ago and I didn’t realize how much I missed it when I took my years away to find myself. But the fanfic community has once more welcomed me back like an old friend and damn, it feels good to be home.
Amanda.Actually 