Saccharine had, like, two lines, and she's already fantastic.

This is such a strong opening chapter. From the inside of Sour Sweet's mind, I can see how having such rapid-fire changes in emotion/thought, with constant fears of abandonment and being hated running through them, would be downright exhausting. I don't blame her for lying in bed all weekend.

I second how great Saccharine is, with this exchange in particular just being gut-wrenching:

"O-oh. Okay." Saccharine said softly. "I know more things about bats—"

"I don't care about the bats, Saccharine," Sour Sweet snapped.

Just... damn.

Also, just wanted to note that I love your characterization of Cadance here. I don't think I've read many stories thatvactually use Dean Cadance as a character, but you pulled it off really well in this chapter.

Damn, gonna need a break after just the first chapter. The anxiety is extremely relatable. Every time you drop a story like this I end up questioning a lot about my pasty life and sometimes even current one.

I'm joining the Saccharine fan club here and god I hope Sour can eventually fully enjoy having such a wonderful sister.

That bit with Sour's PTSD of living with her mother was so well done. Both in writing and how you decided to show it in the page. Masterful.

Holy shit I had no idea this is what the thought process of a person with BPD is like.... Love the detail, seems so real

That's pretty painful to read. Poor Sour Sweet... Her mother's got a lot to answer for, it seems.

Wow. Poor Sour Sweet.

This is definitely a "one-chapter-at-a-time" level of rough story.

Sour Sweet's inner thought matches a lot with how I think about the world around me in my darkest and most cynical moments. Honestly part of the reason why I find it hard to befriend people

"HUGS YOU TIGHT"

Right from the very first line you make the story way too relatable. You perfectly encapsulate those dozens of spiralling thoughts that feed off one another, all stemming from a single innocent interaction. And how that taints the interaction going forward and makes Sour actually change her behaviour based on it. Just… ouch. It’s not a flashy or melodramatic introduction, but it’s no less hard-hitting.

There was no way the girls understood, not when her tone was all messed up. They probably thought she was being sarcastic

Ooh, now that’s a really interesting interpretation of Sour’s vocal tic, I don’t think I’ve come across that before.

Jesus, everything about the conversation with Cadance is so uncomfortably muddied and uncertain. And this is where you let the nature of an unreliable narrator flourish – between Sour’s illness and what seems like Cadance’s carefully-chosen words, I honestly can’t tell what is Sour’s BPD reading too far into Cadance’s words, and what actually is Cadance engaging counsellor/therapist white-lie mode.

Speaking of, I’d be remiss not to mention the way you write the flashback. While the usual choice of ‘italicise everything’ wouldn’t quite work since that’s used for Sour’s internal (and intrusive) voice, the partially-transparent quotes are both more evocative and more, well, fun. I’m always a fan of when people play around with the words on the page, and here it’s used to really evoke the feeling of scattershot memories, lodged deep down somewhere and repressed.

And, of course, Saccharine. A great character balance between not having as much life experience or emotional acuity as Sour, yet at the same time she’s clearly clever, and can pick up on people’s feelings. And of course she’s just a good bean.

"Not now, Sour Sweet." "I said not now ." "You think you're so much smarter than me, don't you?" "You eat like a pig." "No wonder you have no friends at school, if you act like this ." "Go to bed. No, I said go to bed, now." "God, you're so ungrateful!" "You are just too much, y'know that?" "You know, I didn't weigh that much when I was your age." "Brush your hair, it looks like a rat's nest." "Don't you ever use that tone with me again!" "'B-but! I-it's just! I didn't mean to!' I don't care. " "You don't get to speak to me that way, ever ." "Stop making excuses!" "Next time you use that tone with me, you can fix your own dinner for a week." "You're lucky I don't make you sleep outside!" "He was my husband, I'll talk about him however I want." "We only got divorced because of you ." "Aww, is she all angry? Grow up." "It's not your place to tell me how I can talk about my own ex." "I am done with this! I should've thrown you out on the street!" "No one will ever love you the way I do!"

FUCK YOU!!!!!!!!