[commentary] whale fall

[shyshyshiloh]

Before they started playing, they huddled briefly, slapping each other’s hands. It felt, more than anything, an acknowledging of no hard feelings. Or, an acknowledgement of that which we all spend a lifetime searching for: the permission to come home again, after forgetting that there are still people who will show up to love you, no matter how long you’ve been away. No matter how obsessed you’ve been with your own vanishing, there will always be someone who still wants you whole.

— Hanif Abdurraqib, “Fall Out Boy Forever”

when i write, the title usually comes after everything else.

i get ideas and put them on the page and then if i’m lucky and/or diligent enough, at the end of it all there’s a story. and when you spend so much time with your own story and know not only how the sausage gets made but also exactly what is (or isn’t) in it, it becomes hard to take that all and boil it down into a name.

on october 13, 2025, a friend texted me to watch the nmixx comeback. i was at work, so i pulled up the music video during my lunch break, and i didn’t expect much.

by the time the video was coming to a close, i was watching nmixx dance in the ribcage of a sunken skeleton and thinking to myself, with an urgency that i hadn’t felt in months, i want to write an nmixx fic. and — i want that fic to be called “whale fall”.

i had been struggling to write my fandom trumps hate piece for, essentially, the entirety of the year. structurally, there were no problems: my bidder (hi julien 🙈) and i had already settled on a direction + theme, i was going to write for a group and pairing that i love (fromis harom), and a few months of unemployment meant that i should have had all the time in the world to write it. hell, writing it should have been the easiest thing i’ve ever done.

i usually start with a story and name it at the end. i usually thrive on guidelines, a schedule, a deadline, a goal.

three false starts and a growing sense of panic later, it was becoming clear that my “usual” did not apply. and with or without my enthusiasm, something would have to change. “blue valentine” arrived at just the right time for me to recognize, in it, the chance to break out and try again, and with julien’s blessing i started over, one more time.

the actual physical writing of this fic is possibly the least interesting part about it. i typed it out, at least 300 words a day, five days a week. i didn’t particularly push myself or stay up late for it. i’m trying to learn my lessons when it comes to that.

but as for the inspirations that went into it (and, while i think the degree to which they’re present or even really noticeable varies), those are things that this fic couldn’t have existed without. i look upon these very fondly and i think they made the writing experience that much more special. in no real order, they are:

• whale falls, of course. and where whales are significant to nmixx, i thought about whale falls as a symbolic death, and as an unmaking (where destruction/decay of the original form are inherent and necessary) that doesn’t lead to rebirth, but instead to something that is better by way of being different
• the entire blue valentine album, and especially the manifesto, “love is blue”
• the phan reveal (yes, really)
• fall out boy, their history + their relationship with their fans and each other, and the wonderful essay ”fall out boy forever” by hanif abdurraqib
• the fic playlist

disorganized notes on said playlist

(link) themes of movement + direction + car rides. searching. the ocean. a relationship with fame. a relationship you want so much it hurts. going home and what that means when home isn’t a place, but a person

1. Only Ones Who Know - Arctic Monkeys
   • they made it far too easy to believe / that true romance can’t be achieved these days
2. Supercut - Lorde
   • from lily to haewon “how i see the members through music” playlist
   • editorializing memory in the name of convincing yourself against what you already know
3. Puppet Show - UmYull
   • umyull music as haewon-coded
   • how many songs must i create / and tell to you all / to finally be free from the heart that binds me? (x)
4. Satellite - Gyubin
   • revolving + gravitational orbits as a metaphor for faith and longing
   • you’re my lighthouse
5. Booster Seat (triple j Like A Version) - Asha Jeffries
   • weightier and more desperate and the incandescent nighttime to the original’s late afternoon
6. Alone Together - Fall Out Boy
   • fall out boy, of course and always — and fall out boy forever
   • the save rock and roll album as a return and as an acknowledgement
7. Ocean Dream - Bearings
   • i don’t think it’s wrong to want something a little strange
   • what’s going on in that head now? / i wanna know
8. Don’t Delete The Kisses - Wolf Alice
   • progression from what if it’s not meant for me? -> me and you were meant to be
9. Going Home - The Aces
   • understanding and devotion and forgiveness
   • whale song-esque samples throughout (ex: at 1:09)
10. Shape of Love - NMIXX
    • finale of blue valentine + finale of the playlist. an ending made by overcoming

i think there is nothing more romantic than patience. i think sometimes, no matter how hard it is, we have to dismantle what we know so that something else can grow in its place.

thank you, of course, to lara and roy for beta reading for me. thank you to You, whoever you are, for reading-reading.

and thank you to julien, for not only putting money down on this crazy ride but sticking with it until barely over a week before the deadline. you’re a real one.