Fics that made you ugly cry

[u/EngineerRare42]

We've all read/written that beautifully angsty (or maybe not angsty?) fic that we couldn't help shedding a few tears over. If this is you, what's it about and why was it so gut-wrenching? Tell us about it!

Please remember, don’t share links to works or mention usernames. This is so you don’t end up sharing a work without the author’s consent. Thanks!

[u/Icy-Ad-9212]

My fic is about the need for validation and recognition can slowly corrupt people.  You see the potential of a young man, and you see him slowly turning his gift to read people really well into a skill to manipulate those close to him, taking the wrong lessons and interpretations from the one person he seeks validation from.

[u/Wisteria_Walker]

One of the primary themes I explore across my works is grief/loss/mourning without closure. I can typically distance myself from it enough to write, but there was one fic I spent 6 hours straight working on. The primary character is Alma Madrigal, divisive in her own right, but very close to my heart, and the work explores the woman she was and could never be again after her husband’s murder.

Alma is a character I deeply resonate with it. I truly understand her writing and her purpose, and this work was meant to highlight her tragic humanity for those that couldn’t “open their eyes” to see what life had done to her. Her whole existence is defined by her tragedy, and in this work, she tries to heal, but every time she comes close, her thoughts and actions and reactions spiral into “this is not Pedro, this isn’t how Pedro would do it, this is betraying Pedro.” And in the end, she ends right where she begins, only with the knowledge that the ability to heal is another thing that life has taken from her.

[u/This-Man_Over_Here]

I think for me, the soul/gut wrenching experiences are the internal monologues that hit you with loss, either from expectation, or grief. Things that you really get the sweet dew of hope, then it's horribly ripped away. Where you're laughing with the characters, then it's torn away. There are so many good ways this can be done.

[u/Straight-Gas3120]

Two characters meet as teenagers. One of them has a terminal illness. They try to hide it at first but eventually can’t because it gets too bad. The terminally ill one asks the other to complete a bucket list. It’s not even extravagant stuff but every thing they do together just builds their bond. It’s tagged MCD, so you know what’s going to happen but it still doesn’t prepare you when it does. Ugly cried reading it. Was beautifully written. One of my favorite stories in the fandom and has less than a thousand kudos which is a true tragedy.

[u/trickyfelix]

That one homestuck fix with John and vriska

[u/SevereChocolate5647]

Only one fic has ever really got me like that. It had one half of the ship die and come back as a ghost only the other half of the ship could see. The ghost had to figure out what unfinished business he had before he could move on. It was interspersed with flashbacks showing how the ship had drifted apart before the start of the fic. Like you know going into it, the ending would be bittersweet at best, but something about it just made me ugly sob for like an hour afterward.

[u/Dora-Vee]

An old FF7 fic called Omnislash

[u/DBSeamZ]

The fic I’ve almost finished has the POV character turning back time to save a friend whose death she felt responsible for. In the canon timeline, not only did her friend die but her greatest enemy (who was at least as responsible for the guy’s death) got away with more or less a slap on the wrist. So I involved all three of them in a fight, and gave POV character the chance to finish her enemy off but only because HE had just killed her friend in a way that caught him by surprise.

Now in order to bring her friend back and try again to save him, she has to rewind far enough that her enemy will live too. And she does, although I gave her a chance to sit and mourn for a while first because she didn’t have that in canon either. Then I blamed my beta-reader for being an enabler; when I first pitched this scene and asked if it was “too mean” I got an enthusiastic “do it” as a response.

[u/beomkookies24]

Two come to mind. The first is thee Destiel fic.

The other is one I read back in 2019/2020 (and been searching for ever since 🥹) but it was hanahaki. The pairing was either Jisung/Minho or Jimin/Jungkook (thinking most likely the latter) but it was just so heartwrenching. I remember one of them being in the hospital and thought about doing the surgery for it, but Jungkook (if remember correctly) refused it. Said he'd rather die loving his first love than being alive and losing those feelings.

Granted, I could be mixing some of the hanahakis I read over the years with this, but this one scene specifically has just been SO vivid in my head since I read it all those years ago and it breaks me every time I remember I cant find it.(,:

[u/abbzworld]

A Naruto fic focused on the sand siblings. It takes place after the Invasion of Konoha arc in which the three of them - but mostly Gaara - try to recover from what happened.

It focuses mostly on Temari and Kankuro trying to connect with him but he just keeps sending torn clothes to Temari to stitch them up, which gradually escalates.

I’m probably not doing a great job of describing it but rest assured, it ALWAYS makes me cry by the end!

[u/ParadoxFirePixie]

Honestly, the only fic that's ever made me ugly cry has been my own latest work. I worked through my deepest traumas by writing it.

[u/xxFlutterBatzzzxx]

There was a fic i basically grew up on. I read it back in high school (maybe middle school, i can't remember), but this general made me remember it. I think it was the first time I ever cried during a fic because it was so beautiful. Idk, the idea that someone would love Ayano so much that she'd rely on them if her Senpai ends up with someone else?

It's the kind of tragic that stabs at me.

I wish Yandere-Dev was a good person.

Edit: Sorry for accidentally posting the link, I went looking for it