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one-ishmael · 5 years

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Chapter 10: A Bosom Friend

Now that we’ve got church out of the way, it’s time to get real chummy with some dudes just bein’ bros. Just a real couple o’ old pals, pallin’ around! That’s it and that’s all, certainly no subtext here, no sirree.

These next few chapters make an interesting counterpoint to the harsh, literally sermonizing tone of the last little run. It’s a nice change of pace.

SUMMARY: Ishmael gets back to the Spouter-Inn, and finds Queequeg examining a book at the dining room table, counting its pages in awe. Ishmael decides to become friends with Queequeg, and strikes up a conversation. Queequeg is very receptive, and quickly declares them married, and after a while they go on up to their room. Queequeg divides his money evenly, giving half to Ishmael, they then get in bed together and share their deepest secrets with one another, as married couples are wont to do.

So, I mentioned before, back in The Counterpane, that there are a few parts in Moby-Dick; or, the Whale that could be construed, by modern readers, as a bit homoerotic. Queequeg sleeping with his arm around Ishmael, sure, that’s a little gay, but this chapter, hoo boy, there’s really no other way to read it than a budding romance.

I mean, let’s take it point by point. First, Ishmael finds himself merely interested in this strange “savage” who he was forced to sleep with the night before. But as he gazes at him, he takes note of his handsomeness, the fine shape of his head. He delves into phrenology and says that “Queequeg was George Washington cannibalistically developed.“

Phrenology is a pseudoscientific theory from the 19th century that posited that the shape of the head indicated the shape of the brain, which, naturally, determined your personality. You could use some calipers to measure the lumps on a skull and tell if someone was a criminal, by the size of their Crime Organ. It’s pretty interesting, and all obvious hogwash, perfect material for the Sawbones podcast, one of my favorites, who have of course done an episode on it.

Let’s not beat around the bush, Ishmael is secretly checking out Queequeg while pretending to watch the storm outside, “Whilst I was thus closely scanning him, half-pretending meanwhile to be looking out at the storm from the casement.” He is enamored with the stoic personality of his bedfellow, the way he goes through life perfectly self-aware and ease with his own existence, warts and all. Even so very far from his homeland, among these people who must seem so strange to him, Queequeg never falters!

Also this passage, which I take as a personal attack on myself:

Surely this was a touch of fine philosophy; though no doubt he had never heard there was such a thing as that. But, perhaps, to be true philosophers, we mortals should not be conscious of so living or so striving. So soon as I hear that such or such a man gives himself out for a philosopher, I conclude that, like the dyspeptic old woman, he must have “broken his digester.”

And then, and he continues to stare longingly, we get this line

I began to be sensible of strange feelings. I felt a melting in me. No more my splintered heart and maddened hand were turned against the wolfish world.

Ishmael is just falling head over heels in love with Queequeg. He’s got a crush. There is simply no other way to read it, I’m sorry. Ishmael throws away all doubts relating to Queequeg’s origins, decides that since he hasn’t found any true kindness among his fellow christians, he’ll try being friends with a pagan.

There have been some hints and indications of it, but Ishmael is remarkably open-minded and tolerant for a man in the early 19th century. Indeed, after he finally works up the courage to start chatting with Queequeg and they share a smoke, get hitched, and go back to their room, Ishmael has no problem literally worshiping an idol with his best pal.

I really love the logic he uses for it:

I was a good Christian; born and bred in the bosom of the infallible Presbyterian Church. How then could I unite with this wild idolator in worshipping his piece of wood? But what is worship? thought I. Do you suppose now, Ishmael, that the magnanimous God of heaven and earth—pagans and all included—can possibly be jealous of an insignificant bit of black wood? Impossible! But what is worship?—to do the will of God—that is worship. And what is the will of God?—to do to my fellow man what I would have my fellow man to do to me—that is the will of God. Now, Queequeg is my fellow man. And what do I wish that this Queequeg would do to me? Why, unite with me in my particular Presbyterian form of worship. Consequently, I must then unite with him in his; ergo, I must turn idolator.

It’s hard to argue, frankly. A lot of the logic of religion is rooted in more ancient practices that are based in more polytheistic understandings of the world. You’re only supposed to worship your god because you’re on their team, essentially. But if you really believe that your god is the only real one, and all powerful, and all knowing, then why should they be so jealous of your worship? Would they really be so petty as to punish you for being kind to a friend?

Now, as the new married couple settle in to bed for the next chapter, I will entertain some argument about their status as clear and obvious homosexual lovers. There’s nothing explicit here, of course, and I hear you saying that friendship was different in those days.

Long, long ago, before modern society, there was a strange place called The Past, and they have strange habits and customs that look odd to our modern eyes. We may see some men hugging each other, being physically intimate, and think “goodness, how homoerotic!” But, in that time, it was simply more acceptable for men to express physical affection for one another with no sexual subtext whatsoever. They were, in fact, just dudes bein’ bros. Or companions being bosom chums, whatever the 19th century equivalent phrase is.

So what I am reading as something more than friendship was actually just that, and would have been understood to be that at the time.

But I say to you: Yes, things were different in the past, but that cuts both ways! You simply could not speak openly about these things, which were especially common among sailors. There is a famous saying, that the traditions of the Royal Navy amount to “rum, buggery, and the lash” (or something like that). Men cooped up together on a ship for months and months, it’s no surprise, frankly. And there’s no way that Melville, who was a sailor for his entire youth (even if he only went on one whaling voyage) would be naive to these facts.

The language employed in this chapter, I posit, frames this more as a crush and budding romance than anything else. If Melville intended a mere close friendship, he could have written it differently, and who cares what he intended anyway, he’s not around to argue. Interpretation is creative! I say: they’re gay, and make a good couple.

Ah, if this were a serious bit of writing, I would go track down some more sources to cite and whatnot, really develop a strong argument. But hey, I’m just havin’ fun here, not doin’ this for a grade. So you’ll just have to take my word for it.

Up next, The Nightgown, in which we get an intimate portrait of the young lovers in bed, and one of the most #relatable bits in the whole book!

Until next time, shipmates!

Image Credits:

First four from this article, last two from this one. All anonymous photos.

#Moby-Dick; or The Whale #moby dick #ishmael #queequeg #herman melville #gay #19th century photography

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dominodebt · 7 years

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ring, rang, rung

It’s McCree’s fault, honestly—but then what isn’t his fault?

He’s sitting on the edge of Reyes’ desk—Blackwatch’s Commander keeps glancing over to make sure he isn’t defacing it with slurs against Morrison or phallic imagery, both things he’s been wont to do on many occasions—toying with something in his brown hands.

Reyes leaves him to it, deciding to be thankful the whatever it is in the gunslinger’s grip isn’t a weapon for once—or at least not something that can be obviously identified as a weapon—when it catches the light filtering in from the slanted blinds, and Reyes blinks at the sudden flash of gold light that flares in the boy’s hands.

McCree seems delighted at the discovery, and Reyes watches as he lays the object flat on his palm, turning it this way and that and watching it sparkle in the light.

“It’s a ring,” the Commander observes, and it’s a testament to how enraptured McCree is by said ring that he doesn’t flick his buckshot eyes up to brightly and sarcastically congratulate Reyes on his mighty fine detective skills.

McCree just nods, transfixed by the piece of jewelry. It’s a simple golden band, as far as Reyes can see. Slightly tarnished, but still glittering brightly in the sun.

Reyes lifts his eyes from the ring back to McCree, noting his look of clear fascination. He pushes the report aside.

“Who’s was it?” he asks. People don’t handle the belongings of strangers with the delicacy and respect McCree’s showing this ring. He didn’t know the scruffy ex-con was capable of such reverence.

“My mama’s,” McCree answers, and Reyes’ eyes widen. His mother’s?

A sly smile curves the gunslinger’s lips as he slides his gaze over to Reyes. “Well, maybe my mama’s. Could be wrong, but, there’s a non-zero chance of it not bein’ hers.”

The phrase non-zero chance immediately alerts Reyes to the fact that Angela Ziegler had some hand in this situation, and he settles back in his chair, watching McCree watch the ring, wondering how he feels about that.

Saying that something has a non-zero chance is her favorite phrase—well, one of her favorites. She has a lot of memorized quotes and lines she likes to whisper to him in native tongues and dead languages that make his pulse spike and breath catch.

Only when she’s done riling him up—when their fire has cooled and they’re laying in the calm stillness—will she translate them. Her pale, calloused fingers walking over the broad expanse of his chest as her bangs tickle his ear, a smile in her voice as she recites the words of philosophers, poets, writers, and doctors.

��Ange was doin’ some diggin’.” McCree’s knowing grin lets Reyes know that he knows exactly where his mind had drifted off to, and Reyes gives him a warning look as he glances back at him.

“Digging where?” Reyes asks, idly wondering how many pet projects and side ventures she’s working on in addition to the mountain of duties Overwatch tasked her with. He makes a mental note to bully her into eating something from one of the basic fucking food groups and see if there’s anything he can help her with.

McCree shrugs. “Not sure, honestly.” He’s gone back to staring at the ring. “We just kinda got started talkin’ about family one day—I think it was her dad’s birthday? Or what would’ve been, I guess.” He glances up at Reyes, a little helplessly. “Y’know how she can get.”

Reyes nods, thinking of all the times he’s seen those impossibly blue eyes spark with something—intuition, anger, knowledge, fear—and then watched her turn away from the middle of a conversation to lock herself in her lab.

What she does is anyone’s guess, but she’ll stay in until she’s done what she set out to do or the next fucking Ice Age rolls in—whichever comes first.

McCree balances the ring on his thumb and flips it like a coin. Reyes’ tracks its brief trip up, watches it wink in the light, before it falls back down into the gunslinger’s waiting palm. He curls his fingers over it protectively.

“Came outta her safe deposit box,” he explains. “My mom’s, I mean. Ange ran a bunch of tests on it, checkin’ fer DNA an’ all that.” He shrugs, and Reyes watches as he pockets the ring before lifting his gaze. “She said it’s so old ‘n tampered with she didn’ feel right givin’ me a hundred percent, but half-best from Angela Ziegler is better than a lot of folks’ best efforts, y’know?”

Reyes nods again. He does know.

Silence settles between them, but Reyes knows McCree has more to say. The air’s too heavy, his gaze too serious. The Commander cocks a questioning brow, meeting the gunslinger’s eyes.

McCree doesn’t disappoint.

“Y’all ever gonna get over yerselves ‘n get married er what?”

Reyes stares back at him evenly, chin resting on his folded fingers, privately deciding that while that’s not the most unexpected thing to come out of Jesse McCree’s mouth, it definitely charts.

“I beg your fucking pardon.”

“C’mon.” McCree slips backwards off the desk, placing his hands on the dark wood as he appeals to Reyes. “Don’t get all huffy. Y’all have been datin’ fer years now—”

“We aren’t dating, Jesse, for god’s sake, this is a military operation—”

“It’s a goddamn, shambly mess of a family is what it is—”

“That is not an improvement.”

Reyes just sighs. He should never have asked. He hasn’t even had fucking coffee yet—what was he thinking letting the living headache that is Jesse McCree into his office at all?

He mops his face with his hands, already planning his trip to Angela’s lab so McCree won’t have a chance to run this shit past her before Reyes can warn her.

It’s half for her sake—she doesn’t need the headache—but mostly for McCree’s. He has no idea what her response would be, but there is a definite non-zero chance of it involving violence.

“C’mon, Gabe,” McCree says again, all wide-eyed and earnest imploring like he’s begging for permission to go on a mission with Genji to Hanamura that definitely doesn’t involve hunting down members of the Shimada Clan (it does) and not proposing that Reyes pop the fucking question to Angela goddamn Ziegler.

Reyes drops his hands, looking up to give—as Angela so brightly coined—his shitty cowboy son a look of flat annoyance.

“How long have you been sitting on this?” he asks.

McCree rocks back on his heels, and Reyes arches an eyebrow.

“Jesse—?”

“Since King’s Row.”

Reyes kicks himself. He should have known not to use up all his shock on McCree’s first absurd statement—of course there’d be more, absurder statements to follow, because it’s Jesse fucking McCree and he’s a bottomless pit of absurdity. A goddamn matryoshka doll of stupid.

“Since King’s Row? Jesse, that was years ago—we weren’t even—we’d hardly—”

McCree smirks as Reyes struggles to avoid putting a timestamp on his relationship with Angela.

“Yes?” he prompts, smugly, because he’s an asshole.

“Shitty cowboy son,” Angela’s voice singsongs in Reyes’ subconscious.

Reyes flings the boy a look of warning as he pushes himself away from his desk. “You can shove that smirk straight up your ass, Jesse,” he says. “And if you bother Angela with this, I’ll shove it for you, and maybe a couple of limbs for good measure.”

McCree steps back as Reyes gathers his documents. “Don’cha wanna know why I’ve thought this since King’s Row?” he drawls, completely disregarding Reyes’ only half-insincere threat.

Yes. “No,” he remarks stiffly, moving to grab his hoodie. Ange always keeps her lab so fucking cold for absolutely no reason.

“’Cause that’s when she hacked into like, three security systems without the help of a tech, practically resurrected Lena while under fire, and fuckin’ pistol whipped an OR15.” He pauses, before adding. “Oh yeah, ‘n she told Morrison to fuck off in front of a buncha people.”

Reyes sighs as he dons the hoodie. “If there’s a point to this, get there now,” he says, though he does appreciate the reminder of Dr. Ziegler—Overwatch’s legendary Mercy—telling Overwatch’s Strike Commander he could rot in hell for an eternity when he suggested she be sidelined for the remaining mission, as he didn’t want to exhaust her.

Morrison hadn’t meant it as an insult, but really. He should have known better. Reyes and Ana had picked the exchange up over the comms and Ana had almost fallen out of her chair she was laughing so hard, while Reyes just stared at the pale slip of a genius, like he’d just now really seen her properly for the first time.

And as charming as the memory is—and as correct as McCree is in guessing the origins of his affection for the doctor—he’s very curious as to how he came across such information, given he’d been three countries over, hot on Widowmaker’s trail at the time.

He considers asking McCree as much, when the answer occurs to him—Ana fucking Amari.

McCree grins like he can read his thoughts—it’s a possibility Reyes hasn’t totally ruled out—and the Commander glares back at him.

“Don’t go running your mouth about this,” Reyes warns him, pointing a finger. “If I hear anyone else talking about this, I’ll ship your ass out to Ecopoint: Antarctica.”

McCree replies with a flat look because no, Reyes, you won’t do that, because underneath it all you’re a huge sofite and you’d never ship your shitty cowboy son anywhere.

“Sure, Commander,” McCree drawls back, snapping a sarcastic salute. “Whatever you say.”

Reyes gives him a look that lets him know he’ll pay for that sarcasm later before he pulls from the room.

-0-

She doesn’t answer at his knock, which he takes as an invitation.

Her back’s to the door, and he pauses to take in the scene before him.

“Your son,” Angela begins, and Reyes cocks an eyebrow as he leans against the doorframe, watching her struggle for a bottle of all-purpose cleaner that’s been stashed on top of the actual cupboard, a good foot and a half above Angela’s searching hand. “Is gonna get his kneecaps broken if he doesn’t stop rearranging my supplies.”

Reyes can’t stop a smirk that twists his lips. “Genji?” he asks, feigning sincerity. “I’m appalled.”

He dons his poker face forcefully as she turns her head to assess him over her shoulder with the flattest look of unamusement he’s ever seen.

“I will feed his hat to my incinerator, Gabriel, so help me.”

Reyes finally cracks a grin, and she offers him a sly, half-smirk in reply as he enters her lab and walks towards her, idly kicking the door shut behind him.

“You have an incinerator?” he asks, drawing nearer and watching as she turns to meet him, fists propped on her hips.

She scoffs. “Of course I have an incinerator.”

The moment is so wholly and singularly Angela—arms akimbo, hair a fluffy mess, expression indignant like she’s offended he ever doubted her possession of a fucking incinerator—that he can’t stop the smile that warms his face.

God, he loves her.

The thought—just as true as it’s been every other time he’s thought it—draws him up short, and he goes still for a moment, mind wildly reeling back to his conversation with McCree, the glint of the wedding ring—

He stuffs it behind a neutral expression as he finally settles before her, and she tips her head back to meet his gaze.

One of her eyebrows twitch upwards—both an unasked question and a reminder that yes, she fucking saw that—and he just waves her off as he circles his arms around her waist, pulling her flush against him.

She huffs a sigh as he draws her up to him—contended and tired—as she melts into him, every part of her body liquefying to fill his spaces as she turns her head to rest it against his chest, listening to the sturdy rhythm of his heartbeat

“What’re you thinking about?” he murmurs after a beat, pressing his cheek against her hair.

She hums thoughtfully. He can feel the noise in their closeness.

“How I can steal Jesse’s hat and replace it with a pile of ashes.”

He closes his eyes. “Ange.”

“I won’t really burn in. Just make him sweat for a few hours.” He can feel her smirk against his chest. “I bet if I asked Genji he’d steal it for me.”

Reyes snorts. There’s a pretty high probability of Genji stealing the hat without being asked, just to be an ass.

Silence lulls over them again—warm and comfortable—and Reyes is just gathering the nerve to tell her why he’d come when she interrupts.

“This is lovely and all, but I really do need that cleaner,” she tells him lightly, pulling back to gesture with her chin at the bottle McCree had hidden away out of reach.

Reyes just huffs out a laugh as he stoops down to gather her legs in his arms before hoisting her up.

“Lift with your legs, Commander,” she reminds him, patting his shoulder with a smirk.

He rolls his eyes. “I could bench press, like, eight of you.”

“Mm-hm,” she hums back, distracted as Reyes straightens back up, their semi-combined height allowing her to pluck the cleaner off its unintended perch. “Of course you could, sweetheart.”

“You only use terms of endearment when you’re being a shit,” Reyes points out, smirking back.

Angela gives a false gasp at the accusation, splaying the fingers of her free hand over her theatrically dropped jaw.

“Me?” she asks, eyes going wide. “Oh, my love, my darling, my sugar-coated dish of key lime pie à la mode—”

“I will drop you,” Reyes threatens.

She snorts and waves his warning off and he in turn gently lowers her back to the ground.

He watches her idly as she tugs down her sweatshirt where it’d bunched up under his arms, throwing her ponytail over her shoulder with a mindless flick of her wrist. For a brief moment, he sees the phantom flash of a ring accompany the moment, and grits his teeth as his eyes dart away.

Goddammit, Jesse.

Feeling her gaze, Reyes glances back. She tilts her head, forcing an errant blonde curl to fall away as she squints up into his face, searching his expression.

“What’s up?” she asks, gaze flittering about his form like she’d missed some kind of gaping wound before drifting back to his eyes. “You seem off.”

McCree asked me when we’re getting married and I haven’t stopped thinking about it since.

He has to bite his tongue against blurting it out as she turns away to begin cleaning. He wonders if he can read the truth in his eyes. He wouldn’t be surprised.

“McCree showed me his mom’s ring,” he says instead, waiting until she’s done spraying down her side of the counter before taking the bottle from her to spray his.

“What could be his mother’s ring,” she corrects him—automatically, a reflex. One of the hardest things new recruits have to weather is Dr. Ziegler’s inherent need to right wrong information. She means nothing by it—it’s just her body’s visceral response to hearing lies and half-truths, no matter how serious or benign.

“Wise shall be the bearers of light,” she’d murmured to him once in the darkness of his quarters.

“What could be his mother’s ring,” he allows, as she begins working a towel over the counter. He pauses. “It was nice of you to do that.”

She puffs up her cheek with a large breath, then blows it out slowly, hands on her hips as she surveys her side of the counter.

“It was the least I could do,” she murmurs. “Besides—the boy could use a good heirloom.”

Reyes snorts at that as she throws the towel his way. “Do heirlooms build character now?” he asks, automatically tensing when she punches his shoulder.

“He needed something to ground himself with,” she replies. “He’s not a drifting, wandering outlaw anymore. I hoped I could find something to remind him of that.”

Reyes nods, sobering. He can understand that.

He personally doesn’t have any such heirloom, but he knows she does. An elegant ring—stunning in its simplicity, radiating a quiet beauty. It had belonged to her mother and never leaves her bedroom.

She’d shown it to him, once. It had dazzled under the soft glow of her bedside lamp, and Reyes had traced the intricacy of the band as she chattered quietly about her mother, her father, her childhood. A legacy she’d built for herself from the ashes of what she’d lost.

Neither of them had even considered the marital part of the ring—it was early days, yet, and they were still caught up in the whirling storm that was them being together to think of anything else.

Now, though, it’s all he can see.

He curses McCree again. Maybe he will help Angela burn that hat.

Angela arches an eyebrow as she watches him, and he realizes he has no idea what his face has been doing for the past thirty seconds.

“You sure McCree didn’t say anything else?” she asks calmly. “You’re definitely bothered by something.”

He doesn’t understand why he can’t tell her. Isn’t that the whole reason he came here? The words are stuck in his throat, struggling for a handhold on his tongue.

He skirts her gaze. “Just typical shitty cowboy nonsense,” he answers.

Her eyes linger on him for a moment before she seems to accept it—or at least decides not to push anymore—and moves across her lab, shedding her sweatshirt as she does.

“I’ve got a meeting with Morrison and Lena—I think he’s still worried about that sprain, even though I’ve cleared her a dozen times.” She rolls her eyes as she shrugs on her lab coat and pulls her hair out of its ponytail, letting it tumble around her shoulders.

Reyes watches her from the same spot, lifting an eyebrow. “You know how Morrison can be,” he offers.

Angela makes a face and he chuckles before she’s gathered her papers and files and is passing him to leave.

She stills—he knew she would—and slots her hip against his, leaning against him as she lifts her eyes to his.

“Ana’s in the training facility,” she tells him quietly, lifting an eyebrow. She nudges him gently, and he curls a hand around her waist in response, fingers splaying out over her ribs and curling just slightly.

“Talk to her,” she insists. “I just—something’s clearly got you distracted.”

“It’s you,” he tells her honestly.

Her soft, warm expression sours as she shoots him a sardonic look, and he chuckles, pressing a kiss into her hair.

“You are such a shit,” she tells him, but there’s no heat to her words.

He grins, pulling back and dropping his arm.

“What happened to sugar-coated dish of key lime pie—?”

Angela huffs, moving past him towards the door and shouldering it open with a roll of her eyes. “Goodbye, Gabriel.”

He watches her go for a beat—it’s always strange, being alone in her lab. He doesn’t like it. His gaze plays over the lab, and as he steps towards the door, a sudden flash catches snags his peripheral, and he turns to see his shift in angle allowed him to see light of the sun catch on one of her beakers, making it shine.

He stares at it for a moment.

Then he heads for the training facility.

wow what's up I still remember how to write.

It's been a while since I've posted anything, and I still haven't really been feeling much motivation to write, and then out of nowhere at 3am I literally jolted awake and was like "what if McCree brought up marriage and hilarity ensued?"and here we are. I wrote this in A Day. Less than

please keep all of that in mind when reading this lmao

I think I'm going to make this a small series because I had so much fun writing this and want to include the other characters. Plus Ange and Gabe ain't gonna decide to get married in barely three thousand words okay like that's just not happening. Also: this is for fun. I know a lot of the stuff I write has very specific canon perimeters but this is just a dumb fun thing. Don't overthink it guys.

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#Overwatch #Gabriel Reyes #Angela Ziegler #Jesse McCree #mercykill #Not My Circus Not My Monkeys

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