don't really have anything to add besides i agree with nearly all of these and i also appreciate the specific nuances u point out within these tropes that make them so good... emotional distance vs physical proximity is one of my fav things and also the whole 'u know them kinda but u feel like u should know them better' is so excellent and truly underrated. also idk how adjacent of a topic this is and i also don't know how u feel about these things but /i/ personally am a fan of things like sex pollen/fuck or die when its like... mutual unwillingness... or maybe one of them's been secretly carrying a torch for the other but the other's not into it... or whatever as long as it makes it terribly awkward afterwards like i think it's boring when the fucking is what makes them realize their feelings like it should COMPLICATE things not RESOLVE them. anyways that was certainly a tangent but i feel like we have similar feelings on how unwillingness makes things interesting? like i'm no 1 proponent of relationships that are formed out of circumstance/necessity... my favorite thing ever is guys who wouldn't even be friends if they weren't situationally forced together for whatever reason

"because like the most embarrassing thing ever is to talk about your feelings and people should just not do that and instead stew in their unresolved feelings while the other person does the same beside them" SO TRUE like people just don't write about REPRESSION in a way that hits anymore

wrt hs/uni aus i have nothing to add here except that u are so correct and im personally a huge fan of sportsfic-adjacent academic club competition arcs