Oh dude I SUCK

[lettered]

I broke the rules at H/D LDWS at slythindor100 by posting Sex, Lies, and Videotape. It's similar to the 250 word drabble, Honestly Ever After that I wrote for that competition, and you weren't supposed to post any alternate versions until after the competition was over.

All I can say is I'm sorry! I completely forgot! I forgot because it became a completely different story to me so I wasn't even thinking about Honestly Ever After by the time I got done. I've been trying to write a story with variations on this theme for four years, and it went through so many iterations I can't even keep track of them all. But I am sincerely sorry I posted one before getting to this one, and that now it's causing the mods grief.

What's sad is I was very obediently waiting to post my Unctious Unction one. But I didn't suddenly start to rewrite that one and get sucked into 18000 words of porn which can cause a person to forget you're supposed to OBEY THE RULES.

I'm sorry people, I'm sorry competitors, I'm sorry mods, I'm sorry fans, and . . . goodnight moon? In the future I'll be more law-abiding.

ETA: The story is now flocked, in order to adhere to the rules as much as possible after breaking them.

Comments

[synecdochic]

Personally, I think it's completely shitty of any challenge to restrict what you can write and post beyond "don't post the exact thing you wrote for this challenge until it's over". The two stories aren't anywhere near the same thing -- it's not like you took Honestly Ever After and expanded it.

[lettered]

Well, I agreed to the rules when I entered the competition.

The problem for me was that I've been wanting to write a fic wherein Draco asks Harry to be a complete slut under Veritaserum for four years. I have written at least 7 variations on that theme that are saved to my had drive, 5 of which are 5,000 words or longer--i.e., I've rewritten it MANY times in many different ways.

When I got the prompt for this competition, I thought, "Oh. Veritaserum. I can do another play on that idea I've always wanted to try, and have failed at over and over again." That was the drabble for which I got booted in the competition.

A while after writing it, I was still thinking about that idea, not that drabble. I finally realized what my problem had been all along: in every other variation, Draco tricks Harry into giving him Veritaserum, so that Harry feels that he's betrayed Draco. It was this angsty, somewhat upsetting thing where Harry already feels like a bastard, and Draco tells him he wants him to tell him he's worthless, and Harry can't handle it because he thinks he's going to be the next Voldemort, and dominating his boyfriend/husband just seems like another part of that, etc etc.

Anyway, when I realized I would be able to write it, and would be much happier, if I took all the angst out and instead wrote an essentially joyful story about a married couple learning to understand each other sexually, it became a completely different story for me. I rewrote it completely; I didn't use the drabble to write it *at all*; I didn't start from the drabble; I started from this idea I've been wanting to write for so long.

On top of that, I realized that this story was about me being honest with myself, and being able to talk in a relatively safe setting. I realize the internet isn't "safe", but most of the people who are going to look at this are fannish, which I *do* feel is a good environment for people--especially women--to admit to what turns them on, which many women feel they cannot elsewhere do. So having to flock it makes me feel . . . slightly less good about the whole thing.

But in the end, I did agree to the conditions. The mods of the competition said I could choose not to flock it, but would be banned in further competitions on the comm. I'm not interested in further competitions on the comm, but I don't want to annoy anyone. I've also had a hard time getting to know people in the Harry/Draco fandom, and don't want to establish a bad reputation. But in the end what it boils down to is that I agreed to some rules, which I can see why people think I broke. So I'm trying to deal with the consequences in the most graceful way possible.

And now I've babble to you for like half an hour. Sorry. This was surprisingly stressful; I guess since some people seem to like the fic.