At the beginning of COVID, I started writing fanfiction. Before this, I never pictured myself as someone who would be interested in creative writing. I wrote essays for school, and that was the extent of my writing.
Then one day, I went onto AO3 to search for fanfiction of a show that I had been watching and as I was searching around, I was disappointed to find that no one had written any asexual fanfiction about this show. This is not an uncommon problem for the ace community. Many people find asexual stories to be boring, and since the ace community is small, there is an even smaller number of people who write fanfiction inside of it.
That is when I realized something that would inspire me. I enjoyed writing, so why not try this out? After all, the quarantine left me with more free time than I knew what to do with. There’s no better time to try something new.
I ended up writing a short story about the series that I had been watching and reimagined one of the characters as asexual. When I posted it, I was instantly nervous. I had never posted my own work before, and now people around the world could read what I had written. It was intimidating, and I was positive that it would get very little views.
Later that day, I was shocked to find multiple messages in my email thanking me for writing that story. As I read through each of the comments, I was stunned by how many asexual people had reached out to tell me that they were so excited to see asexual representation and that my writing had made them feel seen. The story was met with so much love and acceptance that I wanted to keep writing them. A year has gone by, and I still write these stories every week.
Reading the messages that my readers send me is one of the best parts of my day and they motivate me to keep writing. I understand how important asexual representation is, especially since there is so little, and I am thrilled to be able to add some ace material to the world. Asexual stories and voices deserve to be heard, so that is what I will continue to do.
One comment on “Telling Our Stories”
I love this so much ! I’ve only published on AO3 a few times, but the comments really are a nice warm motivation ! Especially when you’re not expecting any or you’re worried !
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