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(This might make a duplicate, in which case I apologize, but I think I accidentally deleted the original trying to edit it to get a tag right. XP)

My main character makes a lot of bad choices as part of her arc (negative and then recovering from that negative arc) and I have two themes that I want to emphasize: 1) People need people. 2) Bad decisions result in negative consequences.
One of my character’s bad choices involves a guy, and I’m not quite sure how to handle it, because their relationship is an important thing for her arc and the themes and it’s intentionally a bad relationship, but it’s gotten a tad graphic. Not too bad (and I have tight standards on physical romance), but enough that it has me second-guessing myself. I don’t want to tone it down for risk of losing a key part of their relationship and emphasis on how negative it is and contrast between this guy and a friend of hers who actually legitimately cares about her; at the same time, I want to have a reputation for writing clean YA fantasy (something I wish I saw more of myself) and I don’t want to ruin that before it really begins, as this is part of the first series I’d like to publish (with the prequel in the works editing).

Is it better to tone it down and risk compromising the themes or should I continue, making sure it doesn’t get any worse, and fix it in edits if I need to? :/

@hope-ann @daeus-lamb @ethryndal @consciousdreamer @aster @snapper @kate @morreafirebird