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lucifer-is-a-bag-of-dicks · 3 years

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Grabbing Smoke

As much time as Sam spent with her best friends, sometimes she enjoyed a little bit of time alone.

Tucker was helping his mother bake cookies for some kind of fundraiser for the hospital, and Danny was busy visiting Pandora for fighting lessons. Apparently they were using swords today.

As fun as it sounded, Sam opted to stay behind, it had been a while since she'd been down to the park to feed the ducks. She didn't get quiet moments like that very often any more.

There was an uncharacteristic skip to her gait as she walked to the park, a canvas tote bag swinging from her arm.

Living in Amity Park, and especially hanging around with Danny, gave her an eerie sense to when something was amiss. Nothing quite like Danny's ghost sense, but she'd learned to detect a particular chill to the air, a prickling at the back of her neck. It could easily be mistaken for a chilly breeze, but Sam knew better. The crunch of gravel under Sam's boots was the only sound permeating the still air, not even the trees were rustling.

She continued her walk through the park, past the wishing fountain and through a trail where the trees grew slightly more dense.

The trail opened up to a large pond, it wasn't anything especially picturesque, the reeds were a little overgrown, the ground was muddy, but there were a few simple weather worn benches by the path that looped around the water.

Sam took a seat, pulling out a bag of frozen peas. She opened it, tipped a few into her hand and tossed them into the water.

The ducks immediately sped across the pond toward her, fighting for the peas that the turtles hadn't already gotten to.

Instead of grabbing another handful, she held the bag out to the empty seat to her left, waiting for a moment before shaking the bag impatiently.

A green hand slipped into the bag, pulling out a handful of peas before tossing them into the water.

"How'd you know I was here?" Kitty asked, now sitting visibly on the other end of the bench as Sam poured out more peas for both of them.

"I have my ways." Sam smirked. "What I want to know is why you've been following me all week."

"You knew for that long and you didn't say nothin'?" Kitty huffed. "Damn, I gotta up my game."

A duck waddled up and nibbled on her boot.

"Alright alright, ya hungry little doofus." Kitty lowered a hand full of peas and cooed as the duck happily ate from her palm. "Aww these guys aren't shy at all, do you come here a lot?"

"When I can." Sam tossed a few more peas into the water for the turtles. "So why are you following me?"

Kitty sat back and pressed her lips together, thinking.

"Look it's just... I don't remember much from when I was livin', you know? It's all sorta grey and fuzzy, I can't remember what anyone looked like, except Johnny." she tossed some peas to a smaller duck at the back of the group. "But as soon as I showed up here in town and I saw your face, I thought I felt... I dunno, somethin'. Like I'd seen you before, or maybe you just reminded me of someone, but I can't remember who, it's like grabbing smoke."

She lobbed a few peas a little harder than was necessary at the water. The turtles sucked them up greedily.

"So you've just been following me hoping you might remember something else?" Sam asked.

"Yeah," Kitty sighed. "But it's not working."

Sam swung her foot idly between a pair of scuffling ducks, splitting them up before tossing out some more peas.

"Maybe I'm related to someone you knew. Where did you grow up?"

Kitty frowned down at the water.

"I... I don't know." she said, deflating somewhat. "I didn't even realise I forgot that."

Sam couldn't help but feel for her, Danny had told her that ghosts would often forget things from their past, especially once they'd been dead for longer than they'd been alive. Somehow she had never really considered how terrifying that must be.

"You know..." Sam started carefully. "I could show you some old family photos. Maybe you'll recognise someone?"

Kitty looked up, eyes shining brightly.

"Really? You'd do that for me?"

"Why not?" Sam shrugged. "If you were here to cause trouble you would have done it by now."

"Aw, I never thought you'd wanna do something like that for me." said Kitty, smiling brightly. "You always seemed like such a bitch."

Sam laughed.

"If you'd spent a week being someone that wasn't Paulina, I would probably have seemed like less of a bitch."

"So you guys are big rivals or somethin'?" Kitty asked, grabbing some more peas and giggling as three ducks tried to eat from her hand at once.

"It's more that we have... conflicting ideologies. She thinks that appearances and reputation are the most important things in life, just like my parents." Sam lobbed some more peas into the water, they both watched them disappear as the turtles quickly snapped them up. "It's shallow and stupid, and I don't get why they have to push that shit on everyone. I don't care what people think, I just want to be whoever the hell I wanna be without having to fight for it all the time."

Kitty's face turned contemplative as she tapped her nails on the back of the bench.

"I think... I was like that." she said, slowly. "I wanted to feel fun and exciting, but my parents..."

She trailed off, frowning.

"My parents... I didn't like them. They didn't like me bein' the way I was, I can't really remember why."

Sam emptied out the last of the peas and scattered them over the ground, she scrunched up the empty packet and shoved it back into her tote bag.

"You know, if we went to school together we would probably have gotten along." said Sam as she stood up, gesturing toward the path. "Let's go check out those photos."

Instead of floating invisibly behind, Kitty walked by Sam's side as they headed back to her house. She idly waved at people as they drove past, grinning when someone stared a little too long and almost ran a red light.

"You know, it's nice bein' able to walk around in the day." Kitty said, skipping a little. "Wish I could do it more often."

"What's stopping you?"

"What do you think?" Kitty's lip pulled up in disgust. "Any time I show up your dumb friend sucks me up in his stupid thermos. Only reason I can walk around right now is because I got you as my get out of jail free card."

"Danny doesn't care if you just want to walk around." Sam scoffed. "He lets ghosts wander around town all the time, he only gets involved when you start breaking things."

"Uggghhh but just walking around is so boring." Kitty pouted. "I mean yeah it's nice and I like it but it gets old real quick."

"Then you'll have to get used to getting tossed back in the ghost zone. Do not pass go, do not collect $200."

"Don't you ever get sick of his goody goody attitude?" Kitty asked. "I mean you and I aren't so different right? You're all about the rebel gig, don't you ever feel like keyin' some asshole's car, or takin' a baseball bat to some mail boxes?"

"Only if they deserve it." said Sam with a smirk. "But I feel like you aren't especially picky about whose stuff you're breaking."

They approached the door to the Manson mansion, Sam hopped up the steps and stuck the key in the lock. She touched the mezuzah on the doorpost without a second thought before opening the door and standing aside to invite Kitty in.

The ghost stared up at her warily.

"I can't get past it."

"Past what?" Sam asked.

"The mezuzah, it keeps me out."

"What?" Sam frowned. "It hasn't stopped other ghosts from getting in."

"Well it stops me." Kitty insisted. "I think it's got somethin' to do with what we believed in when we were alive. I haven't got a problem with churches but when Johnny tried to ride his bike through one he couldn't get in. His mom raised him Catholic, he says he doesn't believe in any of that stuff, but I think he still does, deep down."

"So does that mean you were Jewish?" Sam asked, smiling curiously.

"I AM Jewish." Kitty crossed her arms. "Bein' a ghost hasn't changed that, it just... means that we got a few things a little wrong."

Sam thought about that for a moment, before stepping aside and gesturing toward the door again.

"Well, if you've been invited and you're not going to cause any trouble, then I don't see why you shouldn't be able to come in."

Kitty climbed the steps slowly, fingers reaching out and cautiously brushing over the mezuzah, she didn't feel anything unusual, no zap or burn or pain. She took a step through the doorway and passed the threshold without issue, no invisible force or barrier like the last time she tried to follow Sam inside.

"Well, what do you know." she said, grinning.

Sam lead her into a large, open planned kitchen and dining area, the tiles were bright white save for the specks of mud Sam's boots tracked through the room. The decor was minimalist, the atmosphere bland and sterile, she could smell some kind of citrus surface cleaner.

The back wall was all windows, leading to a patio surrounded by perfectly trimmed grass. As they approached, Sam turned, heading towards a door to their right.

The next room felt a lot more friendly, it was full of bookshelves and red tones. The lounges looked soft and inviting, a fireplace sat cold and empty against the back wall, but Kitty didn't have to try hard to imagine it roaring to life, filling the room with its warm glow.

"This is basically my Grandma's part of the house." Sam informed her, voice low. "Her bedroom is just through there, she's usually napping around this time of day so try not to make too much noise."

Kitty slipped off her jacket and laid it over the back of the lounge, already feeling at home in the cosy little room. She looked over the books as Sam fussed around some kind of large ornate chest.

"Here it is." She hefted a large photo album from the chest, carefully closing and latching it again. "Let's see if you recognise anyone in here."

Kitty sat down beside Sam as she opened up the pristine book, the outer cover was beige with the name Manson inscribed in golden cursive on the front. The first page was full of old faded photos, in greyscale or sepia tones.

"Ugh, I'm not that old." said Kitty, flicking ahead a few pages.

The pictures were colourful now, but still grainy, there was a young blonde boy in seventies style jeans leaning casually against a Chevrolet.

"Wait hold up," Kitty pointed at the boy. "Him, I feel like I've seen him before."

"That's my dad." said Sam, surprised. "His name is Jeremy, did you know him?"

Kitty hummed a little, gently tracing a finger over the picture.

"Jeremy... Jeremy, I'm not sure," she frowned. "But he definitely looks familiar."

They continued through the book, when suddenly Kitty slapped her hand down roughly on a photo of a pair of young women.

"Her! I know her! She was a mega bitch!"

"Shhh keep it down." Sam hissed.

"Sorry," Kitty pointed to the blonde girl in the photo. "That one! I don't know how I knew her, but I definitely knew her. She was a total brat."

Sam slipped the photo out of its sleeve and read the neat cursive on the back.

"This is... my Aunt Caroline, in 1985. She's my dad's sister." Sam looked up at Kitty, amused. "I can't believe you had beef with my family."

"Your family are snobs." Kitty sniffed. "Carrie was such a ditz, she thought she was sooo bitchin' because her daddy bought her a Mercedes."

"Yeah, that sounds about right." Sam grimaced. "Did you guys go to school together or something?"

"Maybe..." Kitty took the photo from Sam's hand, staring intently. "I'm pretty sure I skipped school a lot, I hated it there. It was a private school, we had to wear uniforms, barf."

"I would never have guessed you were a private school kid." Sam shook her head. "But most people would say that about me so it's not like I can judge."

"You went to private school?" Kitty asked, "How'd you end up in that Casper High dump?"

"Got myself expelled." said Sam, voice thick with pride. "Elementary, middle and high school, got kicked out of all three."

"Damn, you're good."

Sam grinned, slipping the photo back in its sleeve and continuing to the next page.

Kitty pointed to a few other photos, remarking on their familiarity, but not quite able to grasp how she knew them, the memories only flickered in her periphery.

"Wait," Kitty whispered, fingers brushing over a polaroid containing three people. "This is..."

The picture looked as though it were taken at some kind of party, a man and a woman faced the camera, each with a glass of champagne raised in their hands. The woman's other hand rested on the shoulder of a teenage girl with auburn hair, pulled into a tidy braid. She stared glumly at the camera.

"That's Katherine." Sam said, pointing to the girl. "She was my dad's cousin, but she got hit by a car when she was-"

Sam paused, looking over at Kitty's wide eyes and then back to the photo.

"Noooo way." Sam pulled the photo out of the sleeve. "Is this you?"

Kitty took the photo in trembling hands.

"I... I forgot I used to look like that." she fiddled with a lock of her green, teased hair. "I remember this party, I didn't want to go but mom and dad threatened to take away all my records and cassettes if I didn't."

Sam stared at Kitty, mouth agape.

"You're Car Crash Katherine?! My dad talks about you all the time! He always told me about the shit you used to get up to, he'd tell me that any kind of 'rebellious behaviour' was a slippery slope to 'dying on the back of some delinquent's motorcycle'." Sam put a hand on Kitty's shoulder. "You were my bad influence role model."

Kitty's red eyes shone with tears, photo still in hand, she wrapped her arms around Sam.

"This is majorly wicked! My legacy lives on! Corrupting the youth from beyond the grave!" Kitty laughed. "My parents would go totally mental."

She stopped laughing, her face turning forlorn as she drew back from Sam and stared down at the picture.

"Are they still alive?" she asked, a tremble in her voice.

"Yeah..." said Sam. "They live in a retirement home in Florida. They don't come around very often."

Kitty traced a finger over their faces.

"I wonder if they miss me." she said quietly. "Or if they were glad to be rid of the family embarrassment."

Sam didn't answer, she had wondered the same thing herself, if her parents would even care if she died. They hadn't given her a lot of reason to think they would.

She rested a sympathetic hand on Kitty's arm.

"Oh, you have a friend over bubbeleh?" a croaky voice spoke from the bedroom doorway.

Sam and Kitty both turned to see Ida Manson shuffling into the room, cleaning her glasses with her sleeve.

"Sorry Grandma, we didn't mean to be too loud." Sam apologised. "This is my... um, friend, Kitty. Kitty this is my Grandma Ida-"

"Ida?!" Kitty shot to her feet, staring in shock at the old woman. "Aunt Ida?!"

Ida squinted at Kitty, before quickly setting her glasses back on her face.

"Well as I live and breath, is that you Kathy?"

"Oh my god this is getting super weird." Sam whispered.

Kitty leapt over the ottoman to wrap Ida up in a tight hug, the old woman was surprised for a moment, but held her warmly in return.

"It's me Aunt Ida! Not really living or breathing but it's me!" Kitty laughed breathlessly.

"Oh my goodness, when all the ghosts started showing up all over town I wondered if I would ever see someone I knew." She rubbed comforting circles on Kitty's back as the ghost choked on a few sobs. "It's good to see you again Kathy."

Ida pulled away and wiped a tear from Kitty's face.

"And I'm so glad you aren't stuck wearing what your parents buried you in."

Kitty couldn't help but laugh through her tears.

"Let me guess, it was that putrid blue dress, wasn't it?"

"The dress wasn't nearly as bad as what they did to your hair." Ida snickered, patting Kitty's hand. "It had little ribbons in it and everything."

"I almost forgot you." Kitty placed her palm gently against Ida's face. "You were the only one in the family who ever loved me for being me, and I almost forgot you. I'm so sorry, I should have come to find you sooner but I just-"

"Shhhh, it's okay bubbeleh." Ida grasped her hand tight. "I think being dead is a pretty good excuse for forgetting a few things."

Sam stood beside the lounge, watching the two in shock, she wasn't entirely certain whether or not to intrude. Whatever she had been expecting to discover with Kitty today, it certainly hadn't been this.

Though in hindsight, it did explain Kitty's familiarity with Sam, people always said she had taken after her Grandma.

Ida let go of Kitty and hobbled over to the photo album still sitting on the lounge.

"Oh you don't want to look at that album." she said, as she shoved it onto the coffee table. She wandered to the other side of the room and began rummaging around in a small cupboard. "You want this one."

She pulled out a book with well worn, peeling edges. Pieces of the plastic sleeves had cracked off and crumbled away. It was old, and weatherbeaten, it was obvious that Ida had looked through it many many times.

"Here we go." she sat down in the middle of the lounge, gesturing for the two girls to come sit beside her. "These are the forbidden photos."

She opened the pages, the photos inside were entirely different from the 'official' album, there were no perfectly poised, prim and proper photos of people in nice, presentable clothes. They were all candid shots, people in the middle of eating or laughing, some were stumbling around blind drunk, a few were smoking joints. There were pictures from parties and protest rallies, in backyards and drive ins.

There was a picture of Jeremy as a young boy, grinning with one of his front teeth missing and grass in his hair.

"Only in this family would losing your baby teeth make a photo 'unsavoury'." Ida grizzled as she continued through the album. "I saved so many pictures that my husband would have thrown out otherwise."

"Ugh, Uncle Peter was such a prude, he wouldn't even let me in the house if I didn't have my shoulders covered up." Kitty rolled her eyes.

"He used to be so much more relaxed when we were young." Ida sighed. "He changed when he inherited his father's business, he forgot how to have fun."

A few pages later Kitty squealed in excitement.

"Oh my god! That's Frankie! She was my best friend, we used to do everything together!"

The Kitty in the photo looked far more like the Kitty Sam knew. Her hair was teased up, and she was wearing a crop top and a miniskirt. The other girl, Frankie, had short curled hair and a leather jacket. They each had an arm around the others' shoulder and grinned wildly.

"I love this one." Ida smiled as she pulled the picture out of the sleeve. "That was the night I gave you a lift to that concert."

"Oh that show was sooo good! I got my nose pierced there! It got so infected, Mom grounded me for a month." Kitty laughed.

"Man, and I thought I was cool for skipping school to go see Circus Gothica." Sam grinned. "I'm gonna have to come home with a tattoo next time."

"I can't believe I forgot about Frankie, I can't believe I forgot about all of this." Kitty held the photo close to her chest, a few tears running down her face. "I'm so glad it's not gone for good."

She kept the photo in hand as they looked through the rest of the album. There were many pictures of Ida, all of them with other people of all walks of life.

"Oh this was when you took us to that pride parade!" Kitty smiled. "You made Frankie so happy, and you knew a lot of the drag queens there, like a LOT."

"Grandma took me to a drag show when I was 10," said Sam. "Even took me backstage to meet them all, my parents thought we went to the theatre to see Romeo and Juliet."

"Oh I have photos from that." Ida flipped through the pages, getting closer to the end of the album. "Here we are, oh Evelyn just LOVED you."

Sam looked at the picture of Evelyn, frowning slightly.

"Oh weird, she kinda looks like Mr Lancer's sister, he keeps her photo on his desk..." Sam paused as she processed what she just said. "That's not his sister is it?"

"You probably shouldn't bring it up." said Ida gently. "Teachers can get in trouble for associating with this sort of thing."

"That's so bogus!" Kitty cried. "I really thought this kinda stuff would be better in the future!"

"It is," Ida assured her. "But we're a long way from perfect."

Ida flipped back through the album, searching for more pictures of Kitty and Frankie. There were a good few of them, each one Ida pulled out and passed over for Kitty to look at and hold onto.

"Oh woah, is that Johnny?" Sam pointed to a picture of Kitty sitting on the back of a motorcycle with a blonde boy. "He looks exactly the same, just a little less pale."

"Oh, did Johnny come back as a ghost too?" Ida asked.

"Yeah! We've been together all this time, in sickness and in death." Kitty beamed. "Mom and dad blamed him for everything I did, even if he wasn't around when I did it. They said him and Frankie were 'corrupting' me."

She rolled her eyes.

"I bet they blamed him for my death too. They'd be so mad if they knew we were still together."

"Just goes to show they had no chance of keeping you two apart." Ida said. "Not even death could do that."

Kitty held the photo tight in both hands, her shoulders began to shake slightly.

"It was my fault you know." she said with a trembling little giggle. "Funny huh? My parents always blamed him for everything, but in the end it was my fault we got hit. We were havin' a fight over somethin' stupid and I distracted him-"

Ida wrapped an arm around Kitty, patting her head comfortingly as she laid it against the old woman's shoulder.

"I think you're being too hard on yourself bubbeleh." Ida whispered gently into her hair. "It was raining, the truck that hit you was running a red light, the driver was charged for both your deaths. Even if you did distract him, you weren't the only card at play that night."

She gave Kitty a light shake.

"And don't think I didn't see the way Johnny used to drive that thing, he was reckless. I have no doubt that he wasn't paying as much attention as he should have been." She placed a kiss on the girl's forehead and squeezed her tight. "It's not fair to hold all of that responsibility on yourself, even if you both did everything right, that truck still would have run that red light, it still would have been raining. It was just pure rotten luck."

Sam had never heard a ghost talk about their death before, even Danny didn't like talking about his accident, and asking about it was incredibly taboo. Sam had been pushing her luck earlier just by mentioning the car crash.

It said a lot about Kitty's love for Ida that she chose to open up about it. Sam couldn't say she was surprised, her Grandma had always been like that. Never anything but an endless well of love and support, and the occasional kick in the pants if you needed it.

"Johnny's always had rotten luck." Kitty sniffed. "Follows him like a shadow."

"Literally." Sam snorted.

After a few more moments, Ida pulled herself away from Kitty, she got up and began rooting through the cupboards, muttering to herself.

"Aha, here it is."

She brought over an empty photo album, it was roughly the size of a small pocketbook, containing only one photo sleeve per page.

"I meant to fill this with photos for Sam to keep." Ida admitted as she shuffled back over to the girls. "But I don't think she'll mind donating it to a good cause."

She winked at Sam, who nodded back.

"Here," Ida pressed the little album into Kitty's hands. "Memories are a fickle thing, but photos are forever."

"I can't take these!" Kitty insisted, pushing the album back. "They're your memories too!"

"Oh my god you're both so old." Sam laughed, "Dad has a printer/scanner. I can make copies."

As Sam took the polaroids to her dad's office, Ida and Kitty pored over the rest of the album, Kitty picking out more photos to copy. She chose a few of Ida and Sam, and even one of Carrie.

"She was a total loser and I hated her but I don't hate remembering her, you know? I want to remember everything, even the bad stuff."

She took a photo of her parents, just one.

When Sam came back with the last batch of photos, Ida finished slipping them into the little album.

"There's still a few sleeves left." Sam pointed out, holding up her phone with a smile. "We've got room for a couple of family reunion pics."

The two girls squished up against Ida as Sam snapped as many shots as she could. Ones where they smiled, ones where they laughed, ones where they laid haphazardly across the lounge together.

Then Sam took a few candids of just Kitty and Ida, as they looked through the new album they'd just made together. Capturing Kitty laughing at something as Ida looked at her with a soft, loving smile.

Kitty clutched the album to her chest as she gave Ida a long, drawn out hug.

"Thank you so much." she said, her voice thick with gratitude. "It's like I can see my life in colour again."

She left the house with the assurance that she would always be welcome back, at any time, and a promise that she would always be looking out for her 'new favourite cousin'.

Sam flicked through the photos she took on her phone, she would have to make sure to have copies printed by the time Kitty returned to visit.

She knew Kitty coming over regularly was going to make things complicated, her apparent newfound protectiveness over Sam could potentially backfire in many spectacular ways, she was petty and troublesome when in the right mood.

But then again, so was Ida, and so was Sam.

At least she had better things to do now than beat up strangers' mail boxes, Danny was certainly going to be glad to hear that.

#lula's fanfics #danny phantom #danny phantom fanfiction #kitty #sam manson #ida manson

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idiopath-fic-smile · 4 years

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an In Defiance of all Geometry coda

another installment in the “donate at least $25 to a BLM-related cause and i’ll write at least 250 words of fic” series, which is still ongoing!

Somehow, even with all of their belongings packed into boxes, even after surviving the arduous project of putting said belongings into said boxes (how do people acquire so many things over the course of daily life? It’s hard to fathom) Combeferre can barely believe they’re moving out of Amis House.

“Well,” says Combeferre, swallowing past a lump in his throat.

“Well,” says Enjolras, placing a firm and reassuring hand on Combeferre’s shoulder.

“Uh hey, can I get through?” says Marius, and Combeferre moves away, feeling a pang of the usual guilt that manifests specially when he forgets about Enjolras’s roommate.

(Usually, this comes accompanied by white-hot embarrassment because usually it comes up when Combeferre fails to recall Marius’s presence for long enough to start getting physical with Enjolras, or occasionally Grantaire. There’s a reason Grantaire, Combeferre, and Enjolras spend so much of their time in Combeferre’s single, and it’s partly just so Combeferre has a place to let his blushes disperse. Marius is a nice enough person to never give Combeferre a difficult time about these little misadventures, but for one thing, it is humiliating to have to apologize to someone so repeatedly, disastrously wrong about the legacy of Ronald Reagan.)

(No, Combeferre is never letting that go. It’s Reagan.)

Grantaire appears in the doorway. “Bahorel’s truck is ready to go,” he announces. Bahorel has agreed to help the three of them move to their new two-bedroom in exchange for a loaf of homemade banana bread and “ten points.” Bahorel has absolutely refused to explain what the points are, or how or when they might be redeemed.

“Oh, you’ll know,” Bahorel had said, which might’ve sounded ominous, except there was a kitten in his shirt pocket at the time, specifically Jehan’s new all-black kitten which Jehan claimed off-handedly was “a down payment in future witchery” but whose name, as far as Combeferre could determine, was Semicolon, and Combeferre is struck anew by the force of how much he’ll miss living with nearly all his friends within arm’s reach.

“Oh hey, are there feelings happening in here?” Grantaire asks with a gentle smile, a smile that laughs with and not at. “Hey Marius.”

“Hey,” says Marius.

“We had so many good years in this place,” says Combeferre quietly.

“True,” says Grantaire, “and think of the better years to come.”

Enjolras shoots him an impressed look, and Combeferre can’t avoid a smile at that.

“Oh, to be clear, I’m not growing as a person,” says Grantaire, “I just like to practice a little something called reverse-nostalgia.”

“How does it work?” Comebeferre asks as the three of them make their first trip out to the truck.

“Easy,” Grantaire says, straining a little under the weight of his box but gallantly not letting it show. “You say, ‘How can we leave a place so full of good memories?’ and then I say, ‘Hey Combeferre, remember that time the heat broke in the dead of winter and we all had to cuddle together in the common room like a litter of orphaned puppies?’”

“Of course he remembers that night,” says Enjolras, voice a little rumbly and Combeferre ducks his head in a way that reminds Grantaire, oh right, that was when those two crazy kids got together.

“Okay,” Grantaire perseveres, dropping his box in Bahorel’s flatbed. “But do you remember when we had all those guest co-opers and that white dude with dreadlocks was a total asshole?”

“Undoubtedly Enjolras remembers,” says Combeferre, grinning, “because that was when he started to realize he had feelings for you.”

Grantaire is very glad he’s not still carrying a box because all those breakable valuables would be toast.

“What?”

“Have you never heard that story?” Combeferre asks. “We’ll have to fill you in sometime.”

“Reverse-nostalgia is harder than it sounds,” Enjolras observes, giving Grantaire a playful shove and Grantaire has to suppress a smile because he knows it’s a weird thing to be smiley about, but both of them being relaxed enough and confident enough to mess around is still a little new and exciting.

“Okay,” says Grantaire, “okay, but remember the gnarly ant infestation we had last spring? The new place looked promisingly bug-free.”

“Fair point,” says Enjolras as Combeferre shudders. “Reverse-nostaliga has its charms.”

The new place feels gigantic, even once all their possessions are moved in, even compared to the enormity of Amis House. It takes Enjolras a second to locate the emotion: it feels so expansive because it’s theirs. Just theirs. It feels like a betrayal of socialist principles, but Enjolras will not miss, for example, the prospect of Marius walking in at any time.

They all stand there a moment, in the middle of what will be the living room, just taking it in.

“Reverse-nostalgia,” says Combeferre. “Romanticize the future,” and Enjolras can tell by the set of Combeferre’s mouth that it’s a quote, although he’s unsure of the source. He agrees, at any rate.

“Shall we?” Enjolras says, and with that, they start unpacking.

They’ve been at it maybe five minutes when Enjolras finds a box labelled “ART SHIT” and dutifully starts to carry it to the room they’ve designated Grantaire’s studio. It’s not big, but Grantaire has made several approving comments about the light, and then hearteningly few self-deprecating jokes about being the kind of person who cares about the light.

“Hey,” says Grantaire, appearing at his elbow. “Are you sure?”

“Am I sure what?” says Enjolras.

“It wouldn’t be that hard to get a futon.” Grantaire’s chewing his lip a little.

Enjolras sets down the box. “Hey Combeferre!” he calls. “Grantaire’s doubting his place in the triad again!”

Combeferre walks into the room.

“He said he wants to sleep alone,” says Enjolras, and Combeferre makes the correct concerned face.

“No!” says Grantaire. “No, no, to be clear that is not what I’m doing.” He pauses. “I just, don’t you think, maybe it should look like two people here are dating and one person is the awkward third wheel, in case any relatives come to visit?”

“You’ve met my mom,” Combeferre says mildly. “You know that the day after your first gallery show she asked if it would be offensive to knit a Christmas stocking for a Jewish person. You’re in.”

Grantaire does that thing where he tries hard to pretend he isn’t glowing and turns to Enjolras. “You have relatives,” he says doggedly. “They don’t sound like they’d approve--”

“They probably wouldn’t,” says Enjolras. Then, “We talked about this. We have absolutely nothing to be ashamed of and that means we have nothing to hide. If anyone in my life can’t deal with me dating two people I love and who love me, then they’re cordially invited to exit my life.”

“Shit,” says Grantaire, “you’re glorious when you’re like this, you know that? And same, same, you put it well.”

“So then what’s the problem?” says Combeferre.

Grantaire hesitates. “Maybe I just, uh, needed a little reassurance?” he manages, and despite his protestations, he is clearly growing as a person.

Combeferre and Enjolras share a look, and then they’re on him, a tangle of frantically fond arms that resolves into a three-way hug. Combeferre has said before that the three-person hug is a great argument for their particular model of polyamory, and Enjolras has to agree.

“I’m so glad we’re doing this with you,” Enjolras murmurs into Grantaire’s hair. He feels Grantaire nod. “Also, we’re not letting you out until you accept that you will never, ever be the awkward third wheel of this equation.”

“Hey,” says Grantaire, laughing as Combeferre and Enjolras both hold firm, “you know it’s a process.”

“We know,” says Combeferre. “Thai for dinner tonight?”

“Sounds great,” says Grantaire, and Enjolras nods, ready to start goddamn romanticizing the future.

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andimack-crack · 3 years

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A christ-mack story: Andi Mack

[Description: It's December in this 5 part andi mack story Cyrus and T.J spend their first Hanukkah together Bex's past comes back too haunt her and the GHC find themselves trapped on Christmas eve]

Part 1: Old foes and Hanukkah woes

word count: 1060 words

Cyrus POV

Hanukkah. The holiday that comes right before Christmas meaning its overshadowed by that holiday however it's still important too me anyways. I was sat in the spoon waiting for T.J I wanted to invite him over to celebrate with me and my family it's a big step I'm not out to them but I would feel bad not inviting him I heard the ring of the door and turned round to see...oh Jonah.

"Hey Cy happy-" he started

"Jonah before you say Christmas please remember I'm Jewish" I said cutting him off slightly annoyed

"I was gonna say Hanukkah and give you this card but I don't think I will now" he said crossing his arms pouting.

"No no Jonah I'm sorry look I'm just a little on edge"

"You sound like my mom she's always stressed this time of year" he said laughing and handing over the card.

"You're telling me that you don't get stressed" I said raising an eyebrow at him.

"Touché"

I opened the card it had a dog with a Christmas hat with a menorah sticker Jonah must have put on there. Inside the card it had 'happy Christmas' printed on it Jonah crossed it out and wrote 'Hanukkah' I giggled closing it

"Thank you Jonah that's very sweet" he beamed at me with his smile that sets of his eyes and his dimples.

"Well T.J's on his way so in the nicest way possible if you don't mind could you go somewhere else I wanna ask him something important"

"It's cool I'll see you later" he said waving and walking out the door.

I started wondering if T.J remembered I don't celebrate Christmas I mean I have nothing against it I've been round to Andi and Buffy's houses before it's a really nice time of year I just hoped I could spend it with him or if he would want to spend it with me. The chime of the bell went off again and in walked my boyfriend I stood up to greet him.

"Hey muffin" he said happily hugging me

"Hi how are you?" I said going in for a quick kiss which he of course returned.

"I'm great I'm with you and It's the most beautiful time of the year I mean according to Justin Bebier thinking about it I high key had a crush on him when he was younger of course"

"Woah so I have competition?" I joked.

"No come on you're Cyrus I don't need anyone else" he smiled taking my hand.

"Yet you need me to do your laundry" Amber interrupted as she walked over.

"Dang it thought you weren't working today" he huffed

"So what part of 'Bye I'm going to work' did you not understand this morning?" She quizzed

"I tend to tune you out from time to time I'm the more interesting sibling" Amber rolled her eyes I grinned at them both.

"Cyrus what would you like to order?"

"Just a strawberry milkshake"

"We are having a special on Christmas flavours we have candy cane or gingerbread if those intrest you" she said

"Just a regular thanks"

"I'll have a candy cane milkshake" T.J said. Amber looked at him and turned back to me

"Be right back Cy" she left T.J rolled his eyes

"I wanted to ask you something actually" I started. My nerves growing a little.

"I'm all ears" He said paying attention to me like I was the only person there.

"Hanukkah is tommorow well the part where we invite family and eat all together and light the menorah is tommorrow and I was wondering if you'd like to-"

"Yes- I-i mean I would really lo-like to join you if that's what you we're going to say" T.J studdered

"Well yeah it was and that's great I'm glad you're so eager" I smiled feeling more relieved

"Well I'm guessing this means you are ready to come out?"

"Well that's the plan but I thought if you we're there it would be easier"

"Yeah I'll be there with you. Always" he said squeezing both my hands I smiled lovingly at him.

"Here Cyrus one strawberry milkshake" Amber smirked

"Where's my drink?" T.J asked

"You didn't use the magic word" Amber snapped

"Amber-"

"What's the magic word?" She said almost yelling

"No tip" he threatened Amber opened her mouth and closed it.

"That's two words but I'll except" she said quickly walking away

"Works every time" He smirked triumphantly

*********

Bowie's POV

I walked through my front door to find the house empty Bex and Andi must gone out christmas shopping setting my keys down and flicking through the mail I noticed a message had been left on the phone I pressed play.

"You have one new message: Hey Bex it's erm... Gabriel I wanted to say...well just call me when you get this. You have no more messages"

I frowned with confusion I never knew Bex had other friends she never told me about him. Just as I was about to pick up the phone and ring back myself Andi and Bex came in handling a bunch of bags.

"Hey dad" Andi said tiredly

"Hey kiddo how was Christmas shopping?"

"A lot harder than it looks you think you know a person but as soon as you have to buy them a present it feels like you're shopping for a stranger"

"First world problems I guess"

"We did get some good stuff though" Bex said happily

"You mean I did all you wanted to do was buy T-shirts" Andi corrected

"Hey can I talk to your mom for a second?"

"Yep I'll be in my room" she picked up all her things and lugged them off the her room Bex noticed my change in mood

"Okay what's up?" She asked concerned

"Bex um... who's Gabriel?"

A/N: Hey guys this fic will have 5 parts too it I hope you all enjoy :))

#andi mack #jonah beck #cyrus goodman #buffy driscoll #good hair crew #tyrus #tj kippen #amber andi mack #tyrus fanfic #fanfiction #christmas #hanukkah #andi mack fic #kippen siblings

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bushyhair · 4 years

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❝ then he said, leaning forward: ‘you’re strange animals, you women intellectuals. tell me: what’s it like to be a woman?’ i took my rifle from behind my chair and shot him dead. ‘it’s like that,’ i said. ❞ merlin’s beard, what is ( HERMIONE GRANGER ) doing out at this hour? for a ( MUGGLEBORN ) who is ( 47 ) years old, ( SHE ) really ought to know better. you know, i hear that they’re aligned with ( THE ORDER ), but that could be just a rumor. i do know that they’re a ( CIS WOMAN ) and a ( GRYFFINDOR ) alum who works as a ( POLITICAL ACTIVIST ) though. they’re very ( DAUNTLESS ) and ( ANALYTICAL ) but also quite ( VINDICTIVE ) and ( ACERBIC ), which could be why they remind of ( DESPERATELY SEARCHING FOR ANSWERS THE ONLY WAY YOU KNOW HOW – IN A DARK, MUSTY LIBRARY FILLED WITH ANCIENT TOMES WRITTEN IN LANGUAGES LONG DEAD TO MANKIND – BUT NOT TO YOU; A CEASELESS TUG-OF-WAR BETWEEN YOUR BRAIN AND YOUR HEART, BETWEEN RATIONALE AND COMPASSION; THE CELESTIAL HEAVENS THAT YOU CARRY ON YOUR SHOULDERS NOW THAT ATLAS IS NO LONGER AROUND TO BEAR THE BURDEN FOR YOU ). some people say they’re the spitting image of ( GUGU MBATHA RAW ), but i’ve never heard of them. word on the street is that they’re ( THE ERUDITE ) and their prophecy is ( PROPHECY 54 ), but only time will tell if that’s true or not. [ SARAH, 23, SHE/HER, PST ]

parallels: spencer hastings (pretty little liars), elphaba thropp (wicked), annabeth chase (percy jackson), amy santiago (brooklyn 99), sydney sage (bloodlines), beatrice (much ado about nothing), cristina yang (grey’s anatomy), monse finnie (on my block), jal fazer (skins), peggy carter (marvel cinematic universe)

hermione was something of a miracle baby (and a complete surprise). the couple found each other later in life than most, and they’d long since given up trying to conceive as her father was in his fifties and her mother was pushing forty. nevertheless, even though she was unexpected, her parents showered her with love and affection – they had always wanted a baby girl to call their own. hermione would be their one and only.

[ HOLOCAUST TW ] her parents named her hermione after the virtuous queen of sicily in shakespeare’s the winter’s tale and the only daughter of king menelaus and queen helen in greek mythology. her middle name is jean, which is a female variant of the name john, meaning “god is gracious”. i think hermione is, albeit probably unintentionally by jkr, coded as jewish (her appearance, how she faces oppression for her blood by the death eaters/voldemort which are analogies for the nazis/hitler/the holocaust, how she isn’t shown to have a particular attachment to christmas and rarely goes home for the holidays, etc.). thus, i’ve headcanoned that she comes from an interfaith family; her mom was christian and her dad was jewish, and they raised her with both religions with the intention of letting her pick when she grew older. while she is not spiritual and ultimately considers herself to be an atheist, she’s still very proud of her interfaith heritage. anyways, her parents didn’t actually name her jean because of its religious meaning; they named her after jean valjean from les misérables. much like her parents, hermione is also a fan of victor hugo’s work, and that was why she named one of her children hugo.

her father never spoke about how he was a victim of the holocaust, how he almost didn’t survive, how he lost his entire family to the war. sometimes hermione saw the number tattoo on his arm, and her own battle scars felt like they were on fire. her father was a survivor of the second world war, and she is a survivor of the second wizarding war. now more than ever, she understands the trauma, grief, and survivor’s guilt that he tried so desperately to shield her from. it is the same pain that she now carries. [ END TW ]

[ RACISM, BULLYING, AND ANTISEMITISM TW ] there were almost no black children in the posh neighborhood she was raised in, and hermione always felt out of place among her white classmates at the expensive primary school she attended. growing up, despite being upper middle class and an incredibly well-behaved child, she of course still experienced her fair share of racism due to her black and jewish heritage – dirty looks on the street by complete strangers, mean schoolchildren declaring her ugly for not meeting westernized beauty standards (especially when it came to her hair), shopkeepers keeping a watchful eye on her when she entered their stores, adults assuming she couldn’t possibly be as intelligent as her white peers. not only was it demoralizing to little hermione, it was enraging. she developed an overwhelming need to prove herself and her capabilities – she always had to work so much harder than white children to be properly recognized, but every year, she still outperformed everyone else. of course, young hermione was seen as rather swotty, condescending, and insufferable by her classmates, so she was incredibly unpopular. her only friends were her parents, and the one place where she actually felt like she belonged was the library. books were an escape, a refuge. they offered her some comfort in an otherwise comfortless world. little did she know that this world was not truly her world – that there was something else waiting for her.

hermione developed a strict adherence to following the rules and an unwavering respect for authority partly because of the prejudice she faced from an early age. as a young black girl, she knew that if she did not present herself to be well behaved, responsible, and mature – if she ever acted out in any way – there could be a high price to pay. black children were punished (or hurt – or even killed) for very, very little. while she eventually outgrew this behavior as she found her place in the wizarding world, it took her a little time to blossom into the revolutionist that she is today.

when she first came to the wizarding world, she noticed a stark contrast in how she was treated by most people upon first glance. after all, it wasn’t as though blood purists could tell that she was muggleborn simply by looking at her (even though she didn’t realize that was what it was initially). and because of the difference that she noticed, she had hope that maybe – just maybe – this was somehow a world free of prejudice and racism, a world in which she could finally find belonging in. but of course, the wizarding world was not quite as she first thought. there was still prejudice; it was merely towards a different group of people. mudblood. when draco malfoy first spat out that venomous word in reference to her, she didn’t immediately know just what it meant, but she understood well enough. she’d been called slurs before. hermione was once again rattled with that familiar fury. she was top of her year, with an extraordinary amount of power, but still she was viewed by many as inferior. she vowed to prove her worth and become an instrument of change. she would fight for herself, her friends, her parents, the enslaved house elves, and the other muggleborns. if this world tried to tell her she did not belong there either, she would show them all that she did. she would be the best and the brightest – better than draco, pansy, and anyone else who tried to diminish her. and that was just what she did. it wasn’t enough for her though. [ END TW ]

because while hermione might have been a know-it-all who seemed rather confident in her abilities, the truth was that she was deeply insecure and terrified of failure. identified as highly gifted from a young age, this unintentionally placed an insurmountable pressure on her to overachieve in order to measure up to those high standards – to confirm to everyone, including and especially herself, that she really was as intelligent as they all thought she was. and to make matters worse, whether she was in the muggle world or the wizarding world, she always had something to prove. (in fact, she was only able to attend her expensive private school because of the scholarship that was granted to her due to her high marks and test scores. because while she was upper middle class, her family still wasn’t wealthy enough to send her there otherwise.) she somewhat grew out of her insecurities as the years went by – she’s proud of who she is and knows that she’s capable – but some of her insecurities still linger to this day. that compulsive need to be perfect will never truly go away. it’s an innate part of her now.

[ PHYSICAL ASSAULT TW ] even though she is extremely socially conscious and compassionate, she is very much a paradox and can often be abrasive, insensitive, and overly blunt. she’s also far more ruthless than she appears to be at first glance – this is the girl who destroyed marietta edgecombe’s face when she dared to betray the d.a., erased her parents’ memories, set a professor on fire, imprisoned rita skeeter in a jar and blackmailed her, and left umbridge to the centaurs to rot. while she does have a rigid sense of morals, she’s vindictive and will ultimately do what is necessary to achieve the right outcome. she honestly does not regret any of these actions – the ends justified the means in hermione’s opinion. (aka draco malfoy should consider himself lucky she only slapped his sorry arse so hard that he bruised) [ END TW ]

[ DEMENTIA/ALZHEIMER’S AND PARENTAL DEATH TW ] once the dust settled after the battle of hogwarts, after the seemingly endless funerals and memorials, she left everyone behind for a few months to search for her parents in australia and bring them back home. tracking them down took several weeks in and of itself, but once she finally found them, she quickly realized that she had her work cut out for herself. memory magic is an incredibly intricate process because it involves reconstructing the brain, and without proper training, it can easily go awry. she spent many days working on properly restoring their memories, and even after she was sure that she had done it perfectly, something was still wrong. the doctors ended up diagnosing her father with early stage alzheimer’s. although her friends reassured her that it wasn’t her fault, she still blamed herself for this – her father was well past middle aged, but perhaps his mind would not have deteriorated so much if she hadn’t cast those memory charms. she began distancing herself from her parents early on in her school career, opting to spend her holidays with ron and harry instead of trying to fit into a magicless world she no longer belonged in, and she became wracked with guilt and regret for pushing her parents away even if it was partially for their safety and peace of mind. she thought she would have more time than this, years to make up for it all. there wasn’t. a few years down the line, her father finally succumbed to his dementia and passed away, her mother following very soon after. although she died of natural causes, it was almost as though she couldn’t bear being apart from the love of her life, to go on living in a world without him. [ END TW ]

[ PTSD, DEATH, PARENTAL DEATH, GRIEF, PHYSICAL ASSAULT, AND TORTURE TW ] at some point, she returned to hogwarts to complete her seventh year, determined to graduate with all o’s on her n.e.w.t.s, and of course she succeeded because she’s hermione and she buried herself in her schoolwork, very much as a distraction from her grief, her trauma, the diminishing health of her father, and her newfound fame. being a war hero thrust hermione into the spotlight, and at first, she didn’t know how to handle it in the slightest. through time, she came to use her celebrity status to become a voice for the oppressed – house elves, werewolves, other muggleborns – because again, she’s hermione and she wouldn’t be hermione without her vehemence for social justice.

upon graduation, she landed herself a job in the department for the control and regulation of magical creatures. she stayed there for a while before transferring to the department of magical law enforcement. she never considered herself going into magical law when she was younger, but she soon realized that it was the only way she would be able to bring lasting change to a long broken system. for several years, hermione immersed herself in her work as much as she could. it was absolutely a coping mechanism, especially after her parents passed. as always, she was constantly fretting over her loved ones, asking them multiple times a week if they were alright and reassuring them that she was always here if they need a shoulder to lean on, but she hadn’t quite dealt with the fact that she wasn’t alright, not by a long shot. in fact, she was barely holding it together. rather than living, she was merely surviving, and it wasn’t for herself. her work and her friends were the only real reasons she managed to drag herself out of bed every morning. she hadn’t properly grieved the people she lost, and she suffered from petrifying night terrors, and the worst ones were of bellatrix torturing her in malfoy manor. she tried everything to remove or cover her scars from the incident, but as they were magically carved into her by curses of bellatrix’s own creation, she wasn’t able to. eventually, she gave up, deciding she would wear them as signs of her courage and resilience. but there were still those nights where she woke up from a chilling nightmare, wailing and thrashing. she cast muffling charms on her room every night as a precaution. she couldn’t even bear to visit her parents’ graves, too overcome by guilt, knowing in her heart that their deaths were her fault. she didn’t know how to carry that pain.

eventually, she settled down with ron and had two children with him, and slowly, with her two best friends by her side, she started to heal from her war wounds. there was no orderly, linear process to follow, like the five stages of grief. it was messy, and it was hard, but she pushed through it. she sought therapy at the urging of her friends, learning how to better handle her emotions, especially the ones involving grief. it took time, but she learned to live to again. she was able to move on and finally forgive herself. she healed – only for that arduous work to be undone when the third wizarding war started and the world fell into shambles again.

hermione was angry. she was so angry at the world for putting them all through this again. so many people died to prevent another war from happening, and despite her best efforts to make their sacrifices count -- to make it all mean something -- it seemed like it was all for naught in the end. after all, here they were again -- the same fight. always the same fight, with most of the same people.

and then harry died. then harry, her best friend, died for the second time, and hermione’s world shattered into pieces. it was only her love for her family and her vehemence for justice that gave her the strength to move on--but only barely so. she knew that she would never completely heal from it all. the truth was that when harry died, a part of her died along with him. he was not only her first friend but her true best friend (because ron had always been something else, something much more complicated). she considered him to be a brother, and she always did everything she could to help and protect him. she loved him so much, and she would’ve died for him without a second thought. they all would have. his death -- along with her parents’ deaths -- will always be her biggest failures, and she will forever blame herself for them. what good is it – being so smart – if she couldn’t save the ones that she loved the most? once her boggart was failing her exams, but now it is harry and her parents telling her the truth that she already knows – that their deaths were her failure and her fault. of course, this boggart is as irrational as the one she had in her childhood. harry and her parents would never say such a thing. logically, hermione knows this, but she still blames herself all the same – even if they would never, even if it’s not truly her fault.

then, miraculously, harry evaded death once more, coming back to life like the messiah himself -- but at the price of the life of one of her dearest friends. she’s even more furious now, but that anger doesn’t have anywhere to go. ultimately, she knows that even though it was the foolhardy, reckless knights who performed the ritual, the blame rests on the order’s shoulders. they failed their children. they drove them to this. in a way, she truly understands why the knights did what they did because she missed harry with all her heart and would have given (almost) anything to see him one more time, but still, it horrifies her. she wanted him back -- she is so grateful to have him back -- but not like this. not at the price of neville longbottom’s life. this is beyond anything she could have ever conceived. this is an aberration. it should have been impossible. and yet, here her best friend is, alive and (almost) well. she never expected that she would ever have him back, but now when he looks at her without any recognition in his face, she cannot help but be reminded of her father’s death all over again.

in the end, she will keep going on, and she will fight until her last dying breath to protect her loved ones and the world, but she’s so tired. how many times will they all have to fight the same war? how many more people will have to die for them to finally end this – for good this time? will this ever truly be over, or is humanity doomed to make the same mistakes and fight the same wars forever? for the girl who’s supposed to have all of the answers, even she doesn’t know.

it should be noted that hermione has never believed in prophecies or even divination at all, and even now that harry is alive, she still doesn’t. ultimately, she would argue that the reason why harry came back to life isn’t because it was destined in any way but because the knights truly believed in the prophecy and thus made it happen, much like how voldemort marked harry as his equal out of his doing after he heard trelawney’s first prophecy. in a way, it was almost a self-fulfulling prophecy. in the end, hermione doesn’t believe in predestined fate, and she never will. instead, she intends to shape her own future.

edit: also! i forgot to mention that, before the ministry was taken over, hermione was head of the department of magical law enforcement, but when she was thrust out of her position, she made the decision to dedicate herself to the order fully. hermione has never been minister of magic in this verse. although the ministry was never perfect by any means, she was a strong supporter of minister shacklebolt and worked with him personally for many years. ultimately, she was fairly content where she was at before all of this, but who knows what could happen if and when the war ends. [ END TW ]

#rev intros #no graphic this time #i really just want to get this out #it's super rushed oops

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yonacausesproblems · 3 years

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icariahq task : 40 questions

Describe your character in a few words. People-pleaser, enthusiastic, fun-loving, vulnerable

What do you know about your character that they don’t know yet? Mmm, details about how she ended up in Icaria thanks to her mom’s brother and his wife.

What are your character’s major flaws? Callous, frequently bends the truth, is trying way too hard

What would your character give their life for? It can’t be anything too planned. Probably for someone that she was trying to impress

What is your character’s greatest asset? Part of me wants to say her pouty face. Uh.

What would completely break your character? Probably jail, honestly. She wouldn’t do well there. She’s bad with isolation

How does the image your character tries to project differ from the image they actually project? It’s a big part of her character that she doesn’t really indulge in vices as much as she pretends to.

What is your character afraid of? Abandonment, heights

Where would your character fall on a politeness/rudeness scale? Closer to rude. She’s endearing, but never really learned good manners.

If your character could choose a different identity, who would they pick? What’s coming to mind is Dua Lipa

In what or whom is your character’s greatest faith in? That people don’t stop surprising you.

What was the best thing in your character’s life? Like... she knows that she should say something like “getting out of foster care” or “making lifelong friends,” but Yona would probably say it was getting a decent taste in music.

What was the worst thing in your character’s life? When she was in her early teens, she got blackout drunk. It sucked, and it soured her enjoyment of being anything more than tipsy.

What is a favorite flavor or smell of your character? It’s actually not oregano! She loves citrus.

What seemingly insignificant memories stuck with your character? When she was maybe four, she broke a glass. Instead of getting mad, Yona’s mom pulled her daughter into a hug and told her that everyone makes mistakes even if we try to prevent them. And that it’s okay to mess up, but to try harder next time. Because when you continue to make mistakes, it hurts yourself too.

What is your character’s secret wish? Well, she’d love to be a movie star and travel the world to the delight of her adoring fans, but she doesn’t really think anyone’s going to suddenly discover her anytime soon. Which sucks.

What is your character’s greatest achievement? She graduated from high school despite some wavering temptation to... not do that.

What is your character’s deepest regret? She missed her dad’s birthday celebration once because she went out with her friends instead.

What is your character’s deepest disappointment? Growing older and coming to the conclusion that her aunt and uncle (on her birth mom’s side) were nice but self-interested people.

What is your character reluctant to tell people? Definitely that she’s not a big drinker. And if she has feelings for someone.

What is your character hiding from themselves? She’s a bad liar and isn’t good at getting over things that hurt.

What makes this character angry? What calms them? What makes her angry... people who make fun of her in a way that isn’t lighthearted. Yona’s sure she can tell when someone is just messing around vs being mean. She particular hates when people make fun of her name. What calms her down? Her dog, spending quality time with her family, and snacks. Give her like chips or something and sometimes she’ll get distracted.

List situations in which your character would not have control over themselves. If someone she really liked told something hurtful and she thought it was to make her feel bad. Getting rejected. Losing a family member (dog counts)

How strong is your character’s emotions? Controllable? Uncontrollable? They’re a little more controllable than she gives the impression of, but that’s not very impressive because she’s really emotional.

What wakes your character up in the middle of the night? Dog moves. Dog wants to be on top of Yona. Dog wants to go outside. So... her dog.

Describe a recurring dream and/or nightmare. She’s in a large hall with echoey acoustics, and she’s the only one in there. No matter how much she walks, the walls never get closer, and nobody comes when she calls out for help.

Describe your character’s family. Mom #1 (bio) = Arielle Greenspan, Dad #1 (bio) = Charon. Wine Uncle and Aunt Joey & Genevieve Greenspan. Adoptive mom#2 and dad #2. Her dad has something like 7 siblings (so her aunts and uncles) including Baz, and grandparents. Also she has a half-brother via Dad #1 named Romeo who seems lost.

Name your character’s favourite person and why. It’s kind of a fickle thing, honestly. Like she tries to impress someone and she would honestly say they’re the most important person to her, and then next week it will be someone completely different.

How many friends does your character have? She’s given up counting, which is exciting.

How many friends does your character want? More? Sure!

How would a friend or close relative describe your character? Sweet, bubbly, scattered, encouraging

Who depends on your character? Why? Err, maybe her family? But only because she works there and is loving.

Who does your character most want to please? Why? It changes, but it’s generally whoever she’s crushing on the most.

How does your character feel about sex? That it can either be really nice or absolutely harrowing. She’s attached to the idea that it’s better in theory with someone she really adores.

How does your character feel about romantic relationships? That she doesn’t really know what she’s doing yet. And she’s probably going to mess this up but! She! Really! Wants! A girlfriend!

If your character had to live in utter seclusion, what six items would they bring? Any items? She’d want Baymax, a tiny house, a shovel, a slinky, a mattress, and a massive blanket

What is your character’s most noticeable trait and most noticeable physical feature? Most noticeable trait is probably her special brand of enthusiasm. Most noticeable physical feature is difficult because hers are exaggerated overall. Maybe lips?

How does your character feel about work? Depends on the kind of work. She doesn’t really want to work on the farm forever, and she is sure she doesn’t want to sell fake weed for the rest of her life. If it pays well, is relatively interesting, and has okay work/life balance. She’s studying pharmacy because it pays well and sounds like it at least won’t get boring. It has only recently occurred to her that people might actually try to get her to supply real drugs illicitly.

Write one headcanon. Her birth mom was Conservative Jewish. Yona thinks it’s very Jewish of herself to identify as such when she’s literally a demigod and her entire existence is a puzzle of belief and the deep questions. She doesn’t talk about it a lot with other people on the isle because she doesn’t really see the point, but participates in some online communities.

Write one additional thing about your character. She has a Facebook fan page called “Animals of Icaria” where she pretends to interview random animals in the wild, at the zoo, or in someone’s house in the style of HONY.

#death mentions tw #icaria: task

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bourbonboredom · 4 years

Text

A Reason To Believe Chapter 10

Being an undercover officer is a perilous job and Flip Zimmerman knows this far too well. He keeps his romantic life limited to one-night stands, never letting anyone get too close. That all starts to change when he meets a vivacious Jewish woman named Elle just as he’s about to take on a seriously dangerous undercover job; infiltrating the KKK. Elle and his undercover work make him question things he’d never thought to before and challenge him to see the world, and himself, in a whole new light.

A Flip x OC Fic

Word Count: 3,859

Warnings: slurs

And if they stare

Just let them burn their eyes on you moving

And if they shout

Don't let it change a thing that you're doing

Hold your head up, woman

Hold your head high

(x)

Spending his Friday night in a backwoods bar with a bunch of racists wasn't Flip’s idea of a good time. The jukebox played the same ten songs in rotation, the lighting probably should have been replaced a good five years ago, and the pool tables were missing cue balls. At least the beer was cold.

He had grown used to the atmosphere at the bar, and the patrons. The smell of cigarette smoke fell heavily over everything, leaving a slight haze in the room. The bar was more populated than usual. A ladies night had been introduced into the roster, filling the usually testosterone-laden room with high heels and skirts.

The girls were pretty enough. Some looked like office-workers, secretaries and nurses. Some were definitely underage, leaving the detective in him rolling. They looked like they were having a good time, whispering among one another before one would wait for a man to approach her. They'd giggle and bat their eyes at anyone who caught their gaze. It was all so normal. It was hard to remember every single one of them was sympathetic to the aryan movement that this bar was home to.

A girl kept trying to catch his eye from across the room. She looked a little younger than him, but older than the underage girls. She wore a simple skirt and blouse with sensible heels. A work outfit, meaning she must have come straight from the office to the bar. Her hair was a dark brown that flowed down her back in soft waves. Her features were distinctly sharp, with high cheekbones and a thin nose. She would stare at him from across the room as he spoke to Walter, occasionally whispering to her friends and giggling.

"She seems sweet on you over there," Walter pointed out, amusement filling his voice.

"So I've noticed," He responded, keeping his answer as neutral as possible.

"She's a pretty one, would make a fine wife," He continued.

"I'm sure she would,"

It wasn't the first time being flirted with while undercover. He'd managed to keep a pretty clean record with undercover cases. But he'd been undercover at a few strip clubs early in his career, weeding out seedy club owners that allowed girls to perform favors in back rooms. Or drug gangs that hired women for company. There was one case where his target's wife got sweet on him and he spent weeks on end trying to politely rejecting her advances.

But he also wasn't dating anyone during those cases. He'd either purposely stop seeing anyone during those periods, or the girl he was seeing would get sick of him never being around and would leave. He made sure Elle aware that things like this might come up, but it didn't make him feel any less strange about it all. She understood he'd have to sometimes be around a certain kind of woman, and she was okay with that as long as he kept his hands to himself. He had no problem with that last part, especially when this woman would openly hate him if she knew his true ancestry.

'Weird how that works' He thought to himself. This woman is attracted to him, but if this were a different bar a different day, and he had his necklace on, she would be repulsed by him.

Elle's words echoed in his head; They don't care who you are as a person if you’re Jewish.

"Ask her to dance, she looks like she could use a partner," Walter suggested, eyebrows cocking up his forehead.

"Maybe later," He was avoiding committing to anything.

"Later? What's the wait?" A new voice came.

A few of the members approached them as they stood by a pool table. They had clearly just gotten to the bar, the cool outdoor air still clinging to their jackets as they formed a semi circle.

"Ron here is taking his sweet time waiting to talk to that sweet thing over there," Walter informed the newcomers, nudging his head in the direction of the girl at the bar.

"Are you stupid? If you aren't snatching that up, I am," One of the men said incredulously.

"By all means, go for it," He offered, putting up a hand in surrender.

"What are ya queer or somethin'?" Felix sneered.

"I ain't no queer," He defended. God, what was this guy's obsession with him? Everyone else accepted him but Felix was constantly badgering him.

"You're passing up on some good genes there," Walter said nonchalantly. "A pure wife is gettin' harder to come by,"

"Yeah, and finding a girl here guarantees her bloodline. Ain't nothin' in his bar that doesn't have Aryan blood runnin' through their veins," Felix grinned, but it came off as unsettling when matched with his words.

"I've done just fine in the past," Flip tried his best to wave them off. "I just got out of a relationship, she was a handful. I'm not in a rush to do that again,"

"All these modern women and their attitudes," Ivanhoe roared, his beer starting to affect his speech. "It's all this women's lib bullshit,"

"What happened to the good old days? When women knew their place was in the home? Now you got all these girls looking to go to college and have careers. Don't they know they aren't built for that?" Another brother bemoaned

"Built for babies an nothin’ else," Walter agreed.

"Hey, now that's not fair," Flip chided. Everyone turned to look at him, eyes wide in surprise anyone would challenge them.

"They're built for cookin' too, I'm not here to make my own damn sandwiches," He laughed, making the room laugh with him.

He knew Elle would kill him if he ever told her he said that. He sent a silent apology into the universe.

"Sorry I'm late," Another voice came, followed by the front door slamming shut. "Got tied up at the hospital,"

"Hey John, how's your mom doin'? I heard she fell pretty hard," Walter greeted the man as he grabbed a bottle of beer and joined the circle.

"She's okay, would be a lot better if the damn nurses would listen to her," John grumbled.

"Damn shame, they just don't listen to patients no more," Ivanhoe grumbled back.

"And she has this one nurse, uppity bitch. She goes around wearing pants like she's a man. It's plain disrespectful if you ask me,"

The group vocalized their dislike. Flip wondered to himself if there were any other nurses who took to Elle's habit of ditching the dress. He hoped it was someone else they were talking about.

"Oh, and if you think that's bad this nurse walks around wearing one of those Jew necklaces. That's right, our good Christian hospitals are hiring kikes,”

A pit grew in his stomach. It had to be Elle. Her coworker, the one supposed to be at Rosh Hashanah, worked in the maternity ward. He kept quiet and listened to what else John had to say, silently gripping his beer.

"No! The next thing you know they'll be hiring dogs off the street! How is the good lord supposed to protect patients at a Christian hospital if they're hiring nurses of a different faith?" Walter asked.

"Maybe we could pay her a visit like that black panther girl. Scare her off a little," Felix suggested, making flips blood run cold.

"She'll drop out in her own time I bet, she'll get she ain't welcome here," He heard himself say.

"She doesn't even have an easy to pronounce name, my mother doesn't know what to even call her. Those Hebrews and their weird names. Why can't they be more like us?" Flip didn't bother to point out John's name had Hebrew origins, he knew he'd be wasting his breath. And it had to be Elle, she used her full name on her name tag.

"Give her a number, I'm sure she'd respond to that. They sure used to," Felix laughed, causing everyone else to follow. Flip grinned but he felt sick as he twisted his face into a smile.

"Can she ask for a more suitable nurse?" He tried to switch the conversation to being less disgusting.

"According to the hospital, she's one of their best. The head nurse said she was 'one of the best they'd ever had' and my mother was 'lucky to have her looking after her'. Shows what they know," John rolled his eyes.

A little sense of pride swelled in Flip. He knew Elle was good at her job, but he was sure she'd be happy to hear how her bosses praise her.

"It's a shame, she's pretty for a Jew. And the pants do fill out in all the right ways," John chuckled.

"You could always shut her up with your dick," Ivanhoe offered. "Give her an uncut taste,"

He wanted to break cover right then. That was his girlfriend. His gorgeous, smart, fiery girlfriend they were talking about. Not some object for them to comment on. He took a few breaths through his nose to calm himself. The investigation was more important. He had a wire strapped to his chest that was recording all of this. This was evidence. He couldn't give up now.

"Let me know if you're willing to share," He managed to say, clinking bottles with John.

"I heard that girl who works down at the grocery store on 22nd is coming here tonight, if you're looking for something less kosher," Walter teased the young man.

"Oh don't mind if I do," John leered.

The conversation turned after that, much to his relief. They went back to their usual bemoaning of society these days instead of the targeted talk about Elle. He supposed he shouldn't be too worried if they couldn't even pronounce her full name, but the thought of anything happening to her made him slow to finish his beer at the risk of losing it.

He was able to start his goodbyes not too long after, saying he was looking to turn in early because he had a long week at work. He shrugged his shearling jacket over his shoulders and waved off any last attempts to set him up with a fine Aryan woman as he walked out of the bar, leaving the faint sounds of the jukebox in the distance.

He calmly got in his car and locked the doors, checking no one was wandering around outside for a smoke break. He began talking lowly into the microphone on his chest so that Ron could hear him.

"I'll meet you by the gas station in ten, park away from the lights," He said as he turned on his engine and drove out of the parking lot on to the poorly lit road.

He tried not to think too much about what was said as he drove. He pushed it to the back of his mind. Fear wasn't helpful right now. He needed to keep himself safe. He needed to keep her safe. But right now he needed to get this equipment to Ron so he could go home to her.

He finally managed to get off the uneven dirt roads hidden in the trees and onto the solid asphalt of the main roads. He noticed a pair of headlights behind him in the distance. In the rear view mirror he could see Ron’s car following him at a distance until they both pulled into the back lot of the small gas station on the way back to the city.

He gently but quickly pulled the wire from his undershirt, letting the tape remain in his haste. He pulled the transmitter from the front pocket of his jeans and turned the power off, winding the chord around the plastic frame. He got out of his car and opened the door to Ron's passenger side before sitting down.

"Were they talking about Elle?" He asked without a greeting. "That nurse they described sounded awfully familiar,"

"I think so. They said some stuff that'd be good in court, keep this tape safe," He responded, staring to get out of the car.

"That's your girl they were talking about, doesn't that make you angry?" Ron sounded upset at his perceived cavalier nature.

"You're right it is my girl. It makes me fuckin’ furious but I can’t blow my cover because of that. Now if you'll excuse me, I'm gonna make sure she's safe," He said curtly, slamming the door behind him.

He was out of the parking lot before Ron could even turn his lights back on. The drive from this bar back into the city was about fifteen minutes, with another couple to reach Elle's place. He was still cautious, driving roundabout routes and watching the cars around him to make sure he wasn't being followed. He couldn't throw caution to the wind just because he was angry.

His mind raced as he took the back streets to her apartment building. He had to make sure she was safe, that she was doing things to keep herself safe. A part of him still hoped they were talking about another Jewish nurse who wore pants and didn't take shit from patients. Unlikely, but it helped calm him down.

He swung into a spot outside her building, almost forgetting to turn his car off as he ran inside. He hurried up the stairs, not caring if his steps were too loud, and knocked on her door in a way one might mistake as pounding.

She swung the door open with a confused look on her face.

"Hey, I didn't expect to see you tonight," She greeted him.

"I just got off shift, wanted to come see you," He said, trying to stifle his heaving breathing from rushing.

"You look pale, is everything okay?" She asked, putting her wrist to his forehead.

"Yeah, I'm fine, come here," He mumbled, pulling her into a hug.

She squeaked in surprise as he swept her up in his arms, his body overtaking hers as he buried his face in the crook of her neck.

"You're gorgeous, you know that right? And the smartest person I know. You're perfect and anyone that says different is fucking blind," His voice was hoarse as his hands ran through her curls.

"Uh, thanks Flip. That's kind of out of nowhere, are you sure everything's okay?" She pushed him away gently before bringing her hands up to his jawline to get a better look at him.

"You know I can't really talk about work stuff, right? We talked about that," He says softly.

"Yeah, and that's okay," She matched his tone, running her thumb along his cheek in a soothing motion. "I get that it's gonna be that way,"

"But...something happened and it's making me concerned about you at work," He continued, looping his hands around her waist to pull her closer.

"Okay," She rested her head in his chest and waited for him to elaborate.

"Elle," He called softly. She looked up at him with her big brown eyes, full of empathy.

"I don't think you should be wearing your necklace at work," He said cautiously, watching for her response. "It's for your safety, I wouldn't be asking you otherwise,"

Her eyebrows knitted together, her nose scrunched the tiniest bit, narrowing her gaze as she looked up at him.

"No," Was all that came from her mouth.

“Elle—” He started, trying to find a way to tell her why this was important.

"I can't take this off, I've been wearing this since I was thirteen, it's important to me,"

"I understand that, and I said I wouldn't ask if it wasn't important," He tried to keep an even tone as her grew louder.

"Flip, I'm keeping it on," Her words were final, and she trekked out of the living room into her bedroom.

He stood there for a minute before following her. She was folding her clothes that had just been washed at the laundromat down the street. She was silent, but the way she snapped the folds and wrinkles from her clothes indicated she was angry.

He leaned against the doorway watching her. She clearly knew he was there but chose to ignore him, putting a freshly folded pile into a drawer.

"Elle, we have to talk about this,"

No response.

"Eliana, come on. You know this is serious, I've never asked you anything like this before,"

Another angry snap as she folded a pair of blue jeans.

"Elle, please. You're still Jewish if you take it off for a few hours a day, no one can take that from you—”

"You just don't get it, do you?" She whipped around, rage bubbling just below the surface.

"Obviously not," He shot back. "But I'm trying, so please explain to my why you can't take it off for work?"

“"t's a family heirloom, its non-negotiable,”

"What does that even have to—”

"It's a family heirloom Phillip! This was my grandmother’s. She didn’t make it to America like my parents. She stayed behind and was taken to the camps with the rest of my family. She hid it when everything else was taken from her! She sewed it into the lining of the clothes given to her. When she died at the camp from starvation my uncle had to sneak it into his possession before the guards could bury her with it. It would have been lost for forever in a mass grave otherwise. She wanted him to keep it safe, keep it in the family at all costs and out of the hands of the guards who'd melt it down for their own needs. He brought it to America after he was liberated and it was given to me after my bat mitzvah,"

The story rushed out of her mouth, her voice cracking and her hands curled into fists as if to anchor her to the moment.

"I was named after my grandmother. What would it mean if I took it off, Flip? She risked her life to keep this necklace, to keep her culture and her faith alive, I'm not taking it off," She covered it with her hand, as if to shield it from his view.

He was speechless. She'd mentioned it was a family heirloom, but it never occurred to him where it came from, or what it might have gone through.

The delicate star she wore around her neck was embedded with the history, the struggles, of her family. It had belonged to the person she was named for. Someone who died while keeping it safe. How many other family heirlooms were taken from people in those camps? Melted down or thrown away, as if they had no significance. An entire culture nearly wiped out and thirty years later still trying to recover and rebuild.

"I'm sorry, I didn't know," He apologized sincerely.

"It's not really a conversation I like bringing up," She said stiffly, her eyes tinged red as if she was holding back tears. "If you can't understand what this means to me…I don't know what to tell you. I've been wearing this for sixteen years, I can't just take it off,"

"I understand that now, it's just—” He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "Let's just say racists need medical attention too, and someone might've taken notice of you while you were working,"

She was quiet, chewing on her bottom lip as she thought through the patients she'd seen recently.

"And you can't tell me who, right?" She finally asked.

"I can't, I don't want you to accidentally act different around them. Do something that could alert them of what's going on,"

"But if I took my necklace off, wouldn't they still know I'm Jewish? Now that they've seen me?" She questioned.

"Maybe. Gotta be honest, some of these people aren't really Fullbright scholars. They think you 'look Jewish' but I don't think they'd be able to tell if you didn't have the necklace or your full name on your name tag,"

"What wrong with my name?" She asked indignantly.

"Nothing, it's beautiful," He rushed to her defense. "But they thought it was hard to pronounce when they saw your name tag,"

She scowled at the thought, eyes rolling before looking at him again.

"No one even uses my full name at work except for the head nurse. They all call me Elle,"

"I know. The guy who was saying all of this had a Hebrew name. Go figure,"

"Well they haven't figured you out yet, so I guess it's okay. They missed this schnoz somehow," she reached on her tip toes so she could touch her nose to his.

"Hey," He fake-protested. "You know you like it,"

"I do," She agreed, smiling for the first time that night.

She leaned up to kiss him, a peace offering he accepted openly.

"I am still Jewish even if I take it off," She conceded. "But this is important to me. It's my culture and my faith, not just some charm. It helps me feel closer to my family, especially when I'm thousands of miles from home,"

“I understand that now, I won't ask again,"

"And I'm safe at my job," She assured him. "I have a great staff, and they'll make sure nothing happens to me. And I'll start walking home with someone if it makes you feel better,"

"It would," He admitted. "Would you be okay if I let some of the guys at the station know about this? Just in case I can't be there?"

"You are not getting me special treatment," She said firmly. "The last thing I need is to be escorted around town by a bunch of cops,"

"Self defense training then. I can teach you some basics, stuff that can get you out in a pinch,"

"I have a little bit of training but I could probably need the practice,"

"How about on Sunday? You have that day off right? I'll take you to the station and you can throw me around,"

"Perfect," She grinned. "Can I put you in cuffs?"

"Can I put you in cuffs?" He asked back.

"Only if you're wearing that shoulder holster," She pointed her finger at him.

"Oh you liked that huh? Should I read you your Miranda Rights too?” He came up behind her, grabbing her by the waist and nuzzling her neck.

“You have the right to remain silent,” He used a gruff voice, letting his beard tickle her skin.

“You’re ridiculous,” She laughed.

“Anything you say can and will be held against you,” He accentuated the statement by grinding against her.

“Excuse me detective, this seems highly inappropriate,”

“You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be provided for you,”

“That’s not even sexy,”

He swept an arm under her leg, picking her up bridal style.

“Do you understand the rights I have just ready to you?”

“I believe so Detective Zimmerman. Now take me to bed you meshugah man,”

“I don’t know that one, but I’m gonna say its a compliment,” He said as he walked toward the bedroom.

“I’ll let you find out,”

----------------

NOTES

As I’m sure most people know at this point, many valuables and heirlooms were stolen during WWII by the Third Reich. Many families lost everything, some clung to smaller items in any way they could. There are literally hundreds of articles and sources about this looting, and if you’re in the mood to read something depressing, its a whole rabbit hole to go down!

Some history on the Miranda Rights

Taglist: @ladygrey03 @tinydancer40

#ARTB #ARTBmasterlist #flip zimmerman #flip zimmerman x reader #flip x reader #flip zimmerman x oc

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finnofamerica · 4 years

Text

Getting Stuck at the Mall - Oliver Wood x Reader

A/N: Okay so this is the first installment of 12DOC and oof, I smell a challenge.

|| Masterlist ||

You were overloaded with bags, each with the perfect gift for each of your siblings. And your parents. And Old Mr. Harris who lived down the street. And Jake who you used to babysit. You just wandered, or rather hunted, for your next gift. Cousin Mandy was always the hardest person in the world to shop for; especially with her ever-changing hyper fixations. There was one thing she’d never turn down, however. Comfort. Items. Blankets, pillows, stuffed animals; you name it!

It only made sense that you found yourself wandering into the Bed, Bath, & Beyond. Why this mall had one, you had no idea but considered yourself lucky all the same.

Christmas was your favorite time of year, commercialized or not. There was something about the warmth that clung to the air despite the intricate flakes of ice that decorated eyelashes and cheeks. It seemed like wherever you went, the warmth was always there, but only at Christmas.

In front of you, a little boy was struggling to reach a stuffed toy on the shelf. His mother, chattering away on the phone, didn’t seem to notice his plight.

“Do you need help?” You crouched to be eye level with the boy, giving him a soft smile.

“The dragon. I can’t reach.” He reached his arms out as if to prove his point. You held in a giggle, standing at full height to pluck the dragon off the shelf.

“Here you go, be extra nice to your mom, okay?”

“Okay miss.”

He smiled so big, showing the dragon to his mother. You walked away with a smile on your face.

Yes, Christmas was your favorite holiday. Not for the gifts you received, but the goodness you could give to others.

After hours of shopping, you felt the fatigue getting to you. Either that or you were finally crashing after three cups of coffee. Those display beds were looking real enticing after about 20 minutes of looking at pillows.

“What the hell,” You muttered to yourself with a shrug, telling yourself that a five-minute test wouldn’t hurt anything.

Big.

Mistake.

Tap. Tap. Tap.

You groaned, rolling over, the sound of paper rustling around you. You probably fell asleep wrapping gifts again.

“Oh wake up already!” A voice huffed will annoyance, giving you a rough shove on the shoulder. You rose up so fast that you knocked heads with the man in front of you, causing you both to wince at the sting.

“What’d you do that for?” You rubbed your forehead.

“Well maybe if you weren’t sleeping on the display beds like a homeless person!” He accused.

Right.

Ooops?

Your eyes finally adjusted so you could see him in the dim lights. He was handsome - in almost a boyish way if not for the scruff decorating his chin. Your throat felt thick and dry as you quickly diverted your eyes, focusing on the dark shadows of the shelves around you. To say you were embarrassed would be a gross understatement. You were mortified. You not only fell asleep in public, but you slept long enough for a guard to find you after hours.

“I’m sorry.” You scratched your neck awkwardly, collecting your bags. “I’ll, uh, I’ll find my way out.”

You furrowed your brows as you glanced around in the dark, wishing that the shadows hadn’t turned the aisles into mazes. Still, you stood as tall and proudly as you could manage - only barely tripping over the weight of your bags.

The guard left out a heavy sigh.

“Wait,” He pulled off his cap running his hands through a mess of hair, you couldn’t quite make out the color in the dark. “Look, I’ll walk ya out. We wouldn’t want ya setting off any alarms.”

You gave him a smile, though still uneasy.

“Thank you but I-”

“Can’t refuse otherwise you’ll set off the alarms. What side did you park on? I don’t want you walking around outside this late, less some shady stuff goes on in the parking lots.” He finally gave you a smile, trying to ease your worries, the lilt of his voice catching your attention.

“Thank you.”

It was silent between the two of you as he guided you through the mall, nothing but a few scattered Christmas decorations and his flashlight to light your way.

“Why were you sleeping on the display beds anyway?” He finally broke the silence.

“I was just giving them a test at first!” You defended, adding sheepishly, “I guess I’ve been working myself harder than I thought.”

He let out a little chuckle, deep in the back of his throat. “Workaholic. I know how that it.”

“Do they... Do they make you work through the Holidays?”

“Yeah, but I don’t mind. I don’t have much to spend it with anyways.”

“I’m Y/n.” You introduced yourself, “I would try to handshake you but..”

You gestured vaguely to the bags you were carrying.

“Oliver.” He held the entrance to the mall open for you. A cold breeze welcomed itself into the warmth of the building, bringing a faction of flurries along with it. The sudden change in temperature stung your nose, making it itch and itch until you let out a sneeze that echoed through the empty mall.

“Bless me,” You softly stated. God, this night was not going as planned and even worse you kept embarrassing yourself in front of the cute security guard.

“C’mon then, let’s get you to your car.” He grabbed your arm gently, guiding you out into the snow.

It was almost romantic if not for the context of the situation.

“Thank you,” You interrupted the silence. “I’m sorry for the inconvenience.”

“Made my night.” Oliver shrugged.

“Look, you said you didn’t have anyone to spend the holidays with, so um, let me give you my number and you can think about having dinner with my family on Christmas?”

“Yeah, I’ll, um, I’ll think about it.” He gave you a soft smile, taking the card you handed him.

“Nobody deserves to be alone on Christmas right?”

“What if I’m Jewish?”

“Then happy Hanukkah, tell me what you can’t eat.”

#hp 12 days of christmas #12 days of wizards #oliver wood x reader

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ladynestaarcheron · 5 years

Text

Hello hello hello! This is not chapter nine of Like Pristine Glass, I know, but that should be coming later this week! In the meantime, here's my submission for day three of the @acotarauweek, which you can check out and read lots of other new AU fics!

you can read this on ao3 as well!

Nesta's sisters are throwing a mandatory Hanukkah party, and she is dutifully (if begrudgingly) on her way when her car breaks down. Her sisters know Nesta can't be an in enclosed space with strangers, so an Uber or the subway is out of the question, so Feyre sends her friend Cassian to pick her up.

Nesta may be a grinch, but at least she's not an imp.

---

It is just her luck, Nesta thinks bitterly to herself, that the year Hanukkah falls neatly into the two-week Christmas break her firm has is also the year her sisters decide to gang up on her and host an extended family candlelighting night and the year her shitty 1973 Toyota finally decides to die.

On the side of some street in Brooklyn she’s never been to before. Of course.

It will be the very coldest day in New York City before Nesta Archeron takes the subway. She won’t. So instead she texts Feyre and Elain her situation and starts to look up the number for AAA before Feyre calls.

“Relax, I’ll get an Uber just as soon as AAA gets here,” she says in lieu of a greeting.

“No, no, you don’t have to!” Feyre says, voice loud over the chatter of their family at her and Elain’s shared apartment in Brooklyn. “I have a friend driving and he can pick you up!”

“I thought this was a family thing?”

“It’s a family and friends thing. It’s a togetherness holiday.”

“It is not.”

Nesta can hear Feyre smile. She groans inwardly, bracing herself for her least favorite joke of the season.

“Don’t be such a grinch, Nesta.”

“Don’t be such a grinch, Nesta!” Elain shouts in the background. She can hear laughter ringing, too.

“Who is this friend? When’s he going to be here?”

“I’ll text you his number. Send him your location. His name’s Cassian. He’s Rhys’ friend.”

Rhys, Feyre’s boyfriend of a few months whom Nesta has not yet met. “He has a car?” She sounds doubtful. She knows why she keeps a car in the city, but she still thinks it’s odd when she hears of other people who do. Especially men.

“Yes, and it’s a good one,” she teases. “Anyway. See you soon!” And she hangs up, before Nesta has a chance to shoot back at her for berating her car.

So instead Nesta texts the number Feyre has sent her her location, with a Hey, it’s Nesta, Feyre’s sister and calls AAA, who inform her that they will be there in about half an hour.

Nesta doesn’t want to wander around the street--she’s never been here before and it’s bitterly cold outside--so she sits in her broken-down car, drumming her fingers on the steering wheel, and waits for Feyre’s friend to text her back.

He doesn’t. Instead, he calls.

“Nesta?” he says, as soon as she answers. “It’s Cassian. Feyre’s friend. I’m right behind you.”

Nesta looks up and sees a car that has pulled up behind her in her rearview. “Hi,” she says.

“Hi,” he says. “Stay in your car. I’ll come out.” And he hangs up.

She is slightly miffed at being repeatedly hung up on, but she unlocks the car anyway to let Cassian in.

“Woah,” he says as he slides in her passenger side. “This is old. I didn’t believe Feyre. Hi,” he says, turning to face her with a crooked grin. He stretches out his arm. “I’m Cassian.”

“Nesta,” she says, decidedly less excited than he is. She takes his hand gingerly and she’s very grateful he doesn’t squeeze too hard and lets her go after a few seconds.

“So, how long have you had this piece of crap?” he asks cheerfully.

“It is not a piece of crap,” she snaps. It is, but she hates when anyone else says so.

“Right, except for breaking down,” he says, grinning wider.

Nesta’s mood sours even more. “It’s just the cold,” she says. And it’s not, but she doesn’t care. She loves this car.

He laughs. “Sure. So how long have you had it?”

“Three years,” she says.

“What year is it?”

“Seventy-three.”

He whistles low. “Well...I guess it lived a good life.”

“It’s not dead,” she says. “They’re going to fix it.”

He shrugs, the smile never leaving his face. “All right, then.”

Nesta looks at her window, drumming her fingers on the wheel again. AAA should be here soon, only seven minutes or so.

“So, how will you be getting back home? You live in Manhattan, right? Feyre said you never take the subway....”

“I don’t. Uber. Until this is fixed.”

His lips quirk upwards. “Well, I can drive you home.”

Nesta bites her lip. She has at least another twenty minutes with this man in a car, and then a few hours when she has to be under the same roof as him, and she’s already snapped at him once. “No thank you,”she says through gritted teeth.

Now his smile fades. “I just meant...I never like Ubers, and you wouldn’t have to pay me, so...” he trails off.

“Oh, they’re here,” she says, gesturing to the tow truck that has appeared in the rearview mirror. She leaps out of the car and rushes over to them and she can hear Cassian behind her following.

“Good evening,” she says to the man getting out of the car.

“Hi,” he says. “Which car is it?”

Nesta shows him her car and launches into an explanation of what happened. The man tells her where her car will be taken to and that they’ll contact her if she’ll be able to pick it up.

“What do you mean, if?”

He looks the car over doubtfully. “It’s...kind of standing on its last legs.”

“You haven’t even looked at it yet!”

“I mean, I’m seeing it in front of me....”

Nesta bites back what she wants to say. “You have my information?”

“Yeah, the company already has it.”

“Excellent. Good evening.” She turns on her heel and stomps to Cassian’s passenger side.

“Listen,” he says, sliding in next to her. “About earlier. I really didn’t mean...any harm. Just, like. If you want a ride. You’re my friend’s sister,” he adds.

“Yes, I know,” she says, snapping at him again. Then she stops herself and looks out the window. Now she feels too awkward; she shouldn’t have snapped at him but she doesn’t want to apologize, so she just presses herself into the back of her seat.

She hates this. Being locked away with people she doesn’t know well. She can barely stand being alone with people she loves, so this is a nightmare.

He notices. “Hey,” he says, looking over at her, real concern in his voice. “Are you okay?”

“Yes,” she says, pushing harder against the chair.

“You want me to pull over?”

“No. Thank you.”

He’s quiet for a moment. Then he says, “Are you sick?”

Of you, she thinks immediately, but bites her tongue. “No.” She’s firm enough that he’s quiet again.

“If you’re sure,” he finally says.

They’re quiet for about another minute. Then he says, “So, how come you don’t live with Feyre and Elain?”

Nesta opens her mouth to say None of your business, but for Feyre’s sake, she grits her teeth and says tightly, “I need my space.”

“Oh,” he says. He laughs, for the second time, and Nesta notes how his deep voice sounds a bit higher pitched when he does. “So am I infringing on your alone time in your car?” He laughs again, and Nesta thinks he’s mocking her, but then he winks.

“So, you’re a lawyer, right?”

So much for respecting her alone time. “Yes.”

“Criminal law, Feyre said?”

“Yes.”

“She said you’ve put a lot of bad people away.”

Well. She has.

“Don’t like to discuss work on the holidays?”

“It’s not the holidays,” Nesta says. “The only major holiday in December is Christmas.”

“It’s also Hanukkah,” he says.

Nesta rolls her eyes. “I know that,” she says. “But Hanukkah’s not a major holiday. It’s not even a holiday. It’s a festival.”

“Oh,” he says, looking over at her, surprised. “I didn’t realize there was a difference.”

“Well, there is.”

“What is it?”

“It’s,” Nesta says, and she struggles to find the right words in English. Not that she’s fluent in modern Hebrew, but discussing Jewish culture is normally something she’d do while throwing at least a bit of Yiddish around. “It’s mostly the prohibitions on work.”

“Oh. So you can discuss work on Hanukkah.”

Nesta rolls her eyes again and he laughs. “I’m kidding. So if Hanukkah’s not a big deal, why are your sisters throwing a party?”

“It’s not that it’s not a big deal. It’s just...not on par with Christmas in Christianity. We have holidays that justify month long vacations. This isn’t one of them. And anyway...it’s...fun.” She grimaces as she finishes.

He laughs at her again. “You seem very into fun.”

“It’s assimilation,” she grumbles. “There are Jewish ways to have fun.”

“I’m sure there are,” he says.

She turns to look at him. “What are you, anyway?” she asks. “Protestant?”

He glances sideways at her. “Why do you say that?”

“I don’t know. Aren’t most Americans Protestant?”

“About half, yeah.”

“Well. There you go. You’re not Jewish. Obviously.”

He laughs again and she’s not sure why. “You know, some might say that’s a bit rude.”

“Don’t be an idiot,” she says, snapping for what feels like the tenth time. “We’re going to my sisters’ Hanukkah party. I’m at perfect liberty to ask you your religion.”

He gives her another crooked grin. It’s lopsided and lazy and easy and she doesn’t like it. “Good point,” he says. “And I don’t know.”

“What don’t you know?”

“What religion I am,” he says. “I don’t really have one. I didn’t grow up with my parents. Rhys’ mom took me in. And she was just...festive. We had non-holiday holiday parties every few months.”

“Wait. You’re Feyre’s boyfriend’s brother?”

He shrugs. “Yeah. We’re here.”

He turns off the car and gets out, shutting the door behind him. She scrambles with her seatbelt and opens the heavy door, and he’s already on her side to offer her a hand down.

She blinks when she sees him. “How is he?”

“Who?”

“Feyre’s boyfriend.” She knows he can hear how impatient she is, but she wonders if he can detect her concern, her worry.

She thinks he can because his eyes soften a bit. “He’s a good person.”

She puts her hand in his. His skin is warm even through their gloves.

“Non-holiday holiday party?” she asks as they walk up to the door of the apartment building.

He laughs--he laughs so much, it’s ridiculous. “Yeah. Solstice times, equinox times.”

Equinox times? Who celebrates the equinox? What are they, Pagan?

He opens the door for her when they reach it.

“So,” he says. “I’ve never been to a Hanukkah party before. What can I expect?”

“What do you know about Hanukkah?”

“Oh, lots,” he says, following her into the elevator. “For starters, it’s widely misrepresented as a major Jewish holiday, when it’s actually a minor festival.” He shoots her a grin.

She rolls her eyes, but it’s more to hide her own slight smile than out of real disdain.

“And I know about the candles. And Feyre mentioned the foods.”

“There’s a story behind it,” she says. “But yes, here we’ll be lighting candles and eating fried foods. There are games. It’s...”

“Assimilated fun,” he says, winking.

She doesn’t do a very good job at hiding her short laugh. “Right.”

The elevator dings with Elain and Feyre’s floor, and Nesta doesn’t bother knocking at their entrance and just lets them both in.

The party’s already started. A gaggle of Elain’s friend Nesta vaguely recognizes, some of Feyre’s art schoolmates, some cousins (Nesta knows her father is here somewhere, as well), and four people she assumes are Feyre’s new...friends.

“Nesta!”

Nesta turns to the sound of her name automatically and is knocked backwards a few feet with the force of Elain’s hug.

“Hi, Elain,” she says, slightly muffled, trying to unhook herself.

“I’m so glad you made it! Are you okay! Is your car okay? Was the ride okay?” Elain’s eyes move over indiscreetly to Cassian, who is talking towards a blond woman Nesta does not know.

Nesta can feel a slight flush redden her cheeks. “It was fine.” Her sister’s sweet to care, but it was fine.

“I can take an Uber back with you.”

Cassian, more discreetly than Elain but not slick enough that Nesta doesn’t notice, cocks his head towards them.

“I...don’t know if I’ll take you up on that,” she says. She hates that she can’t be alone with strangers and she hates to ask it of her sister, but she might not need to. The ride with Cassian was...fine. And she trusts Feyre.

“Hey!” cries the sister in question, coming into the room. She stretches the syllable out. “Hey, Nesta, you made it! Hey, Cass.” She stops to give him a quick hug and then walks over to Nesta and squeezes her tightly. “Was the ride okay?” she says, lowering her voice.

She hates this. Hates it. “It was fine. Have you started cooking yet?”

“Oh. Yes! We have food and...Hanukkah drinks! Martinis!”

Nesta stops. “That’s the brilliant Hanukkah cocktail you came up with? Martinis?”

“They have olives in them,” Feyre says, defensive. “And we were supposed to have this gelt cocktail, but someone forgot to buy Goldschläger.”

“I thought you said you picked it up!”

“I have texts, Elain...”

Nesta relaxes a bit while listening to her sisters bicker. She’s missed them. She likes being around them. In small doses, maybe, but she does wish they had more frequent meetings.

“We should light soon,” she says to them, after listening to them chatter on about the lives for ten minutes or so.

“Daddy’s not here yet,” Elain says.

“And you haven’t met Rhys! Come, come.” Feyre grabs her right hand--her left is holding her oh-so-festive martini--and drags her back into the front room, where Cassian is sitting with the people she didn’t know from earlier.

“Everyone,” she announces, “this is my big sister Nesta. Nesta, this is Az and Mor and Amren and Rhys.” She looks back at Nesta, beaming.

Her heart cracks a little--she looks so proud, so happy, shining like the unlit chanukiyot are already blazing inside her--so she smiles and nods even though it feels so unnatural for her. “It’s nice to meet you,” she says.

Her eyes linger on Rhys.

She immediately doesn’t like him. He’s too tall. He has too many tattoos. He wears nice clothes but she doesn't trust how expensive they look.

She doesn’t know what Feyre has said about her, but she can tell Rhys doesn’t like her either, from the way he looks at her.

Whatever. She doesn’t need him to like her. She’s the sister, the constant. He’s the one who needs to prove himself to her. That’s just how it goes.

You’re off to a rough start, she thinks bitterly at him, and brings her martini to her lips.

“Did you all know,” Cassian says, throwing an arm back around the chair next to him. “That Hanukkah’s not actually a holiday?”

The one Feyre called Az turns to face him, but the small woman, Amren, scoffs and says, “That’s not exactly classified information, dimwit. It’s been a festival for two thousand years.”

Nesta likes her right away. She sits down at the table.

“Criminal law, right?” Amren says to her.

Nesta nods.

“Don’t ask her about work,” Cassian interjects. “She’s on vacation.”

“Private firm or for the DA or what?” Amren says, ignoring him.

But she doesn’t mind her questions so much, and she answers them. Amren tells her she works for Rhys--they all do, which she doesn’t like. It feels too much like a cult to her and she doesn’t want Feyre mixed up in that.

She hisses so to Elain, under her breath, and she laughs at her. “You’re being ridiculous,” she whispers. “They’re nice!”

“You think everyone’s nice.”

“It’s not a cult, it’s just having friends. You know? Friends?”

“Oh, hush. It’s time to light.”

“Daddy’s not here yet. We’re waiting for him.”

“Where is he?” Nesta leans back and crosses her arms. “Have you heard from him, Feyre?”

“Oh,” Feyre says, turning around and looking at the clock across from her. “Ten minutes, I think.”

“Why do you need to light the candles now?” Cassian asks her.

“We’re supposed to do it before eleven,” she replies.

“Hmm,” he says. Then he hesitates. He says to her, lowering his voice so only she can hear, “You...want me to drive you home after?”

Nesta bites her lower lip. She brings her glass to her mouth and takes a sip.

“Yes,” she says.

“Okay,” he says. He hesitates again. Then he reaches into his jacket and takes out something--a business card. “I...know you can’t take the subway or rides with people you don’t know,” he says, and Nesta can feel her throat grow tighter but he doesn’t take his eyes off her face. “I’m head of Rhys’ security. I can make sure you can get around safely. I can do it myself. If you ever need.”

Nesta takes the card from him and it’s so weird, because sometimes he’s teasing and sometimes he’s sincere and she doesn’t like when people are a mix of things. It makes everything harder.

But she appreciates it. A lot. So she nods slightly and slips the card into her own pocket.

“And you know,” he continues. “I can probably...help out. In that area.”

Nesta blinks. “What area?”

“You know. The...unsafe...area. With...whatever it is...whoever it was....” he trails off, but still, his eyes do not stray from hers.

Nesta blinks again. Is he...offering...to kill Tomas?

No. Because that would be insane.

So she just says, “Right.”

He nods and she doesn’t like the way he’s looking at her, like he’s studying her. But then he smiles and says, “So, are you going to come to our non-holiday holiday party next week?”

Nesta scoffs. “No.”

“Why not?”

Nesta rolls her eyes. “Because it’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard of.”

“I came to your Hanukkah party.”

“It’s not mine, and I didn’t invite you.”

“Well, I’m inviting you.”

Nesta grimaces. “One holiday party is enough for the season.”

“All right,” he says. “What about dinner?”

She raises an eyebrow. “Dinner?”

“Dinner,” he says, grinning. “You must like me enough for another car ride. You’re talking to me and none of your cousins. You like food. Dinner with me is a fantastic combination.”

Perhaps it’s the second martini. Or her sisters’ assimilated holiday cheer rubbing off on her. But she shrugs and says, “Maybe,” which, for her, is a ringing endorsement.

Cassian knows it, too, because he leans back and grins wider.

“All right, who’s up for some more latkes?” Elain says, coming in holding a platter.

“Now, really, Elain, you two said ten more minutes. Where is he?”

“Okay, you know what? I didn’t want to ruin the surprise, but since someone’s being such a grinch...he’s actually picking up the Goldschläger.”

“You’re such a grinch, Nesta!” Feyre says, cheering.

“You’re such a grinch, Nesta,” Cassian says, laughing along.

Nesta rubs the back of her neck. The one good thing about a non-holiday holiday party, she supposes, is that there can be no grinch.

Perhaps it’s not so ridiculous after all.

#lizo writes #acotar au week day 3 #day 3 christmas/holiday au #acotar au week #nessian #hope you guys like this!!#this was fun to write!!

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szopenhauer · 4 years

Text

What shirt you’re wearing now? my old Mickey tee Last video you watched on yt?

youtube

I’ve felt like on drugs watching it <3

Who is the tallest person you know and how tall are they? my ex classmate Z.B. is but no idea how tall exactly, I’ve been “dating” him in pre-school which is even more funny when you know that me and N.A. were the shortest kids (and still are petite adults) What are you listening to? Natural by Imagine dragons

How do you get songs out of your head? listen smth else or wait for it to pass? Have you seen all the High School Musicals? I don’t think so, I know I’ve watched at least one because my sister forced me to but I hate musicals and Zac buffoon is no good Do you dress appropriately for your age? no What song reminds you of summer? many Do you like your neighbors? nah Has a bird ever flown into your window? chimney, don’t worry, it survived Do you have nicknames that are longer than your actual name? sorta, could say so

What did you do today? visited gastrologist Do you like to sleep a lot? kinda, would say so Have you ever been in a class that you thought you were too smart for? oh well... Who was the last person you apologized to? my gf because I wasn’t able to write back as I wasn’t feeling well and was a little busy Would you ever get a pet tarantula? nope, I’m not scared of it but feeding spiders is gross and also my current partner has a phobia so no point of getting a pet like this Do you charge your cell phone every day? yeah Do you use tumblr? <I dislike ppl who say “what’s tumblr” as a response to questions like this because those surveys weren’t made in here so chill> Don’t you hate when people stare at you? ugh... Do you have a secret you’ve never told anyone? I do not Are you Jewish? I am not Does anyone copy the things you do? some ppl used to and yet been bullying me for what I was doing - stupid Is your dad still alive? luckily

Are you OCD about anything? you either have ocd or not, you can be obsessed about smth but then it’s not a disease, I might have this mental problem but it’s more likely just my BPD

What breed of dog are you the most similar to? pug? Is anyone madly in love with you? hmm...

Are you over-protective of anyone? possibly ^^” Would you say cancer rates are on the rise? it seems Do you have a good memory? it’s complicated How do you normally pose in photos? not... normally XD Are you looking forward to tomorrow? knowing that my sis won’t come? more than I did an hour before, sorry not sorry Will you hug anyone tomorrow? my parents obviously Could you name all 50 states off of the top of your head? no way When was the last time you were scared? always, more or less What’s your favorite song by Rihanna? Bitch better have my money - dunno why Do you have a pretty eye color? it’s fine in my opinion What’s your favorite Mel Gibson movie? despite him being an ass irl I was a huge fan of his old movies Do you ever put ketchup on your cereal? umm... what? hmm... Do you hate the person who last texted you? we’re in a relationship Do you ever wear plaid? at times Where are your parents at the moment? dad’s working and mom’s asleep Are you procrastinating as we speak? drying my hair, drinking water, responding to my father’s text and going to sleep Do people ever make you smile stupidly at the computer? yup Do you take painkillers? nope

Have you ever hugged someone you didn’t know? for example - there were those women in heart costumes on valentine’s day who were giving away lollipops and they hugged me Do you think God actually exists? I believe so Who did you last give a piggyback ride to? to J.N. and P.N. brother D.N. Did you know that a banana is actually a herb? wtf Do you like little random facts like that? love Who was your favorite Beatle? Paul What’s the ugliest trend you’ve ever seen? can’t choose only one

Do you say ‘legit’? nah

Have you ever solved a Rubik’s Cube? tried, failed, gave up

Who do you think is the easiest to talk to? my dad and @jonasz-cat Would you ever date a friend’s ex? hell no Do you think Ke$ha is good or no? I don’t listen to her music Are you talking to anyone right now? online

Where did your last hug take place? home

What did your last text message say? jest akuratny :)

which of these prints did you last wear: animal print, striped, checkered, plaid, floral print, polka-dotted, argyle, or houndstooth? floral print (and plaid)

out of you and your friends, who is the pickiest eater? ME

is your room cleaner now than it was a week ago? mhm :3

who was the last person you picked up at the airport? -

What’s your favorite color of shoe? it doesn’t matter much

Do you post music on your facebook? yup What do you think about people who don’t have facebook? they should unless they’re old Would you rather go to school or have a job? job gives money so... Take pics with phone or actual camera? depends If you could paint your bedroom walls any color what would it be? I wanna a vintage wallpaper tho Chocolate or vanilla ice cream? vanilla Camping or going to the mall? mall Swimming or Hiking? hiking Do you collect stickers? I got ‘em as gifts for my scrapbook and didn’t use Stuffed animal, flowers or chocolates? stuffed animal Pizza or pasta? pizza Italian or Mexican food? italian Do you walk around barefoot in your house? ewww, yuk Do you have a ring on your ring finger? not rn What band shirt would you wear? my fav bands of course What band shirt would you not wear? guess... What do you think about cigars? remind me of Aquarius from my book

Pencils; Mechanical or Traditional? traditional

Does it weird you out when people much younger than you, hit on you? creepy Is there anyone you know is into you right now? :D Do you tend to want what you can’t have? I want health What are you most confident about, physically? pfft What are you most self-conscious about, physically? my skin Have you ever felt trapped in a relationship? sigh...

Is it wicked hard for you to sleep when its hot in your room? it’s harder

Do you ever think people are just saying dramatic things to get attention? there are human beings who act this way

Are you easily offended? I’m sensitive but not the worst?

Is most of your email spam? D: 99,99%

Do you laugh at the expense of others? when they “deserve” it

do you have any bruises? on my knee which is weird as I barely ever get any and I didn’t hurt myself lately would you consider yourself a drama queen? to some extent when you were little did your mom ever sing to you? from what I remember ever feel like you don’t belong? because that’s true does your printer need ink? black

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twen-nee6 · 4 years

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How Trump Changed My Dad

tw: racism & all the prejudices

Last weekend, I saw my father, and, for the first time in my life, I heard him say racist things about Chinese people. In fact, this was the first time I heard him say anything this openly racist at all, except against “reptilians who call themselves Jewish.”

This isn’t some story about us uniting after a long period of time and him being a racist. My dad has always been in my life, and I love him very much. This is a story about how he has changed since Trump became president.

This is pretty long, so get the rest under the cut!

TL;DR: My dad has had his worldview skewed so radically due to conspiracy theories that he thinks that everything Trump says is true, and that has become a seed for racist remarks and ideas that are in direct opposition to viewpoints he had even last year.

It is interesting, and tragic, to reflect upon what Trump’s presidency has done to my family-- or, well, I suppose, my father. Before I really begin to get into this story, I am in no way condoning is point of view in any sort of way or trying to make excuses for him, because he is a grown adult who can make his own decisions. That said, he is also incredibly gullible under the correct circumstances. Unfortunately, Trump has kind of become those “correct circumstances.”

Before I get completely into this, I’d like to give some backstory on who my father is, because I think that’s important to realizing how absolutely floored my sister and I were to hear him say racist shit about Chinese people.

My dad grew up in a Jehovah's Witness family. If you’re unfamiliar with that sect of Christianity, they are a cult. My grandfather was excommunicated from the church when my father was young, and my dad (and all his siblings and my grandmother and my grandfather’s parents and brothers-- you get it: the whole family) was forbidden with interacting with him. To interact with my grandfather-- my dad’s dad --was to meet the same fate. No Jehovah's Witness is allowed to talk to someone who was excommunicated.

Despite this absolutely bizarre-ass rule, children are allowed to communicate with these people, so long as they’re not a full part of the church. My dad and his siblings were just not able to speak with my grandfather because my grandmother (and the rest of the family) were not allowed to interact, not because they were fully a part of the church. Thankfully, my father avoided the ceremony that would make him a true Jehovah's Witness throughout his life, so I have been able to correspond with my family who are still a part of the cult due to this loophole.

This loophole also made it possible for him to escape from an abusive situation with his step-father, and he moved in with my grandfather when he was thirteen.

I know this is exposition-heavy, but bear with me here. I want you guys to see the person I grew up with, not the guy that he is now, so you can understand why I am so confused and upset.

My dad is a fucking fantastic musician. He has so many good stories, but here are some highlights from his life:

* A close family friend who is a Native American taught him a lot about his culture. My dad likes to talk about how sacred nature is, and he also loves to talk about the very odd experience he had following the man’s meditation instructions. According to my father, he was teleported (in his mind) to a library where every book is the book of someone’s life. When the Librarian asked him if he wanted to read his book, he said no. This experience rattled him.

* He moved to the South Side of Chicago in the early 90s to chase his dream of music. He worked in a diner that was at an intersection where gang violence was common, and he lived even deeper south in the city than the diner. He recalls with horror what he saw, but he is quick to explain that there is a duality to people: people in gangs, he always likes to say, are just as human as the rest of us, and he always tells us he met “a kindness I never saw in anyone else,” in the people who came into his diner (especially the gang members).

* He also lived in Austin, Texas in the 90s, and played music with a band with an incredibly diverse background. He was on TV a few times (I imagine it was local, lol), and he loves to tell the story about the time that he ended up playing guitar at a Latinx club because he did a good job putting electricity into some guy’s house. He uses his story there to explain how to be humble-- he always tells us that everyone in the club was dancing to the salsa tune, then his dumbass had a guitar solo and he played the blues, which killed the vibe. “Always take in your surroundings.”

* When getting a tattoo, the tattoo artist mentioned in passing that a biker had paid her with his soul for a tattoo. My dad and his friend were drunk, and they bough the guy’s soul for $20 and planned to use it “to get big.” The next day, they were sitting at the table with this guy’s soul contract, and my dad said that something came over him-- “I knew that if I did what I wanted to do, I would get famous, but I also knew it wasn’t worth it.” He burned the contract. The karmatic repercussions of using some poor guy’s soul to become famous just isn’t worth it.

My father also taught me how to respect life. I lack empathy. I feel like I would have a much harder time with my life without my father’s patience in my earlier years. He taught me how to be socially appropriate in a way that wasn’t demeaning, unlike the rest of my family who berated me (and continue to do so) when I did something they viewed as wrong. One particular story sticks out:

When I was about nine or ten, we were camping with his side of the family. I caught a crawdad (crayfish for you non-Appalachian folk) out of the creek, and I was very curious what color it would turn if I boiled it. So, I did just that.

I’m definitely not proud of that.

My dad had always tried to explain to me the sanctity of life and how we shouldn’t just kill things prior to this, but that time he really seemed upset. He told me how disrespectful it was to the animal, and then told me to think about what it would be like to be boiled alive. He then told me I should at the very least eat the thing, which... I told my cousin to do because I am a picky eater.

That lesson definitely stuck with me more than, “Don’t kill spiders.” or, “Hunting for sport is wrong.”

Throughout my life, my father has been the level-headed one. He has been the one with useful life advice who actually knows how to have friends and talk to people. He has been the man I looked to to be socially appropriate and a “good person” because my mother has been chronically unable to keep any sort of friendly relationship for anyone longer than a year or two. She isn’t a very good social role model.

So, imagine my surprise last weekend hearing my dad talk about how much he hates the Chinese.

His basis? The time we went to California, and “they were way worse than the other drivers.”

I looked him dead in the eye and said, “Dad, everyone sucks at driving in California. It isn’t just Chinese people. White people can’t drive either.”

Now, I know he doesn’t hate Chinese people because of their driving. We went to California in 2004. He has never once mentioned a goddamn thing about Chinese people not being able to drive (or Chinese people in general regarding that trip), so it’s pretty fishy he would suddenly bring it up sixteen years later.

This is especially odd since I’ve only ever heard him sing words of praise for Chinese immigrants, or, honestly, immigrants in general-- up until about a year ago, but we’ll get to that in a minute.

When my parents split-- and I know this may seem like another unnecessary deviation, but hold with me here --my dad’s obsession began. He moved in with his father, my grandfather, the man who hadn’t seen any of his family aside from my father and me for thirty years. My grandfather was a doomsday prepper. He owned something like 300 acres of land in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains down in what is known as a “Holler” here-- a small community of people who are very close to each other, live on the same road and are usually pretty friendly toward each other.

My grandfather also deeply believed in the corruption of the government, and how that would inevitably be the downfall of everything. While he wasn’t spouting anything about Hollow Earth or the sky actually being a projection, the man was distrustful of all things establishment. This kind of thought process definitely didn’t help my dad when he was going through a divorce, and I remember he really got into learning more about the 2012 Doomsday at the time.

To back up a bit, my parents have always been conspiracy theorists. My mom claims to have prophetic visions and that she is in contact with a Gray alien, which, yes, is probably just the schizophrenia, but my dad never questioned her and honestly, believed her. He was all about aliens and Area 51 and “Bush did 9/11″ when my parents were still together. He only got worse when he moved away, taking up the Doomsday stuff and digging deeper into 9/11, and then kept falling down this fucking abyss of a rabbit hole when he moved from my grandfather’s place into an apartment in the suburbs.

There, he didn’t have things to do after work. He didn’t need to attend to the horses. He didn’t have the hills to walk through. He had himself and oh dear god, man

The release of the first Assassin’s Creed was where the decline became noticeable. We bought the game, and the next time I saw him, he was telling me about the Knight’s Templar. As the years wore on, he only got worse.

If you guys have seen the “Q Map,” that shit is all shit I can explain to you. Yes, I can tell you about the Draco-Reptilian Nazi Fleet, the Space War, and how Draco-Reptilian Nazis live in Hollow Earth. I can tell you how the Vatican relates back to the Knight’s Templar back to Moloch back to Egyptian Pharaohs back to Ishtar up to modern-day banks.

Look, I myself am gullible. I have the same kind of trait that makes me very paranoid and distrustful of people, especially authority.

My dad was spouting shit about “Kh****ian Jews” and how they were actually reptilian people (not real Jews!) who owned all the world’s banks and were trying to manipulate the populous into a One World Government, and, I’m sad to say, I believed it. Then, thank god I met my partner who shut down my bullshit really fast and has been a wonderful person to ground myself with.

(For those curious, my dad has asked for my partner’s bloodtype because they’re Jewish, and was visibly relieved when I told him it was B- instead of “an RH bloodtype” because that means that my partner is human... yeah.)

All that to say that I have an open mind. I’m willing to at least humor the idea of Nazis in Antarctica based on Admiral Byrd’s papers. Hell, I even humored my dad’s Flat Earth bullshit for a little bit, until I watched that Netflix documentary of Flat Earthers trying to prove the planet is flat, but only further proving it is round. I’m totally willing to listen to alternate ideas, and I definitely find a lot of merit in many conspiracies.

This isn’t about aliens visiting Egypt or civilizations predating Sumeria, though, this is about my dad tripping on conservative conspiracy theorists and falling into a tailspin down the wrong fork in the trail.

This started with him listening to what he describes as “an underground conservative news channel.” He originally began being wary of the Democrats because he believed Hillary Clinton was a reptilian, but he originally was like, “Yeah, all politicians are these reptilians.” I honestly have no idea when that changed. The man didn’t even care all that much about politics until around the time of the 2016 election.

I’m assuming this is because Clinton was running, and he felt invested in not letting a reptilian become president? I swear, this man has a whole section of his brain dedicated to “Why The Cintons Are Bad,” and that only got worse as the 2016 stuff ramped up.

He started watching Alex Jones. I lived with him during this time, but I was going to college so I wasn’t home with him very often. I’d come home to the TV on Alex Jones practically foaming at the mouth every night and my dad asleep on the couch. Around this time, he started talking down to Democrats, which, hey, that’s fine, both parties in this country suck, and he honestly was interested in Bernie as a candidate.

He does still like Bernie, for the record. He even said this year that he wouldn’t mind Bernie as president.

The election rolled around; Trump got elected. Then, a lot of stuff happened.

* My dad was working for my uncle (his brother-in-law) and also renting from him. My uncle was barely paying him enough to live, so he decided to take his old job back.

* Shortly thereafter, my uncle sold the house my dad was living in. He didn’t even offer it to my dad. He fucking sold it under his nose. Not to mention, my dad was the one who put in all the flooring, bathrooms, wallpaper, etc into the house.

* My dad moved into a small farmhouse in the middle of a corn field. His old house was in a town, so he at least had interaction with other humans outside work. There are so few houses on the road he lives on that it doesn’t even have the ability to buy internet if he wanted to.

Living very much alone in the middle of a goddamn field has really impacted him.

My dad surrounds himself with what he believes to be unbiased news, but outright says are “underground conservative news outlets.” I mean, the majority of his time is spent listening to this fucking bullshit, playing old video games and jamming on the guitar.

Since the election, my dad has come to view Trump as an absolute force of good. He does admit that he does not like Trump as a person, and that he thinks that he’s honestly pretty gross, but he has been more-or-less brainwashed to believe that Trump is going to “save this country.”

Why?

* Trump is weeding out “the people the Clintons put in.”

* Trump is ��going to make sure people who committed treason get what they deserve.” He points to John McCain and how Trump evidently tweeted something nine months before McCain died that eluded to the date?

* Those people who are committing treason are also part of a child trafficking ring and drink the blood of terrified children. I mean... maybe minus the blood drinking, but at least this one makes some sense, I guess.

* Trump is disbanding the Federal Reserve, which means that he is “taking the reptilians out of this country!” as well as putting the US dollar back onto the gold standard-- as if we have that much gold.

These were the original reasons why he liked Trump. He really thought, and continues to think, that the fucking orange in office has the best interest of America at heart just because he isn’t a politician. Anybody who ran for office who wasn’t a politician and got elected would have my dad’s praise, but it just happened to be Trump.

And what does that mean? It means my dad began by not agreeing with all Trump’s policies. It means my dad had a fucking brain, that he drew those conclusions himself with some aid of “”news”” (conspiracy) outlets.

But, because of the trust that he has put into this man, and the trust he has put into his “underground conservative news,” my father has allowed his perception of reality to become so incredibly skewed. For example:

* “Trump’s tweets are encoded by a quantum supercomputer to give news to the masses! Every misspelled word, random number and incorrectly capitalized letter means something, and it changes every time!”

* Dad says he doesn’t mind immigrants, but he constantly talks about how the people who want to get into America “aren’t actually struggling.” He pointed to something that happened in Mexico a little while ago and said that the people trying to get in weren’t starving, and he said that was all because they were a distraction hired by the Democrats to pull news from the trafficking of children over the border to contribute to the “adrenochrome market.” This is where some of his racist shit started.

* He believes all earthquakes in America in the last four years have been due to the Democrats “blowing up underground bunkers” to hide the fact that they are “conducing illegal human research.” He believes there is a whole world underground full of clones, and claims that ships docked on the West Coast exist there to help people that they take out of these underground cities. He also, of course, believes Trumpy-poo is the whole reason why “those poor people” are being liberated.

* According to him, there are Chinese tanks in the Amazon, and China is mounting an invasion on America. Believe it or not, this isn’t where he started talking shit about Chinese people.

* Trans* people do not exist. He also has become worryingly fixated on who he thinks is trans*? Literally any concert he sees on TV with a female lead singer becomes him pointing out “why that is actually a dude.” He’s also very fixated on “Michelle Obama is actually a man.” When we ask him why the hell that matters, he says it’s dishonest because “no man wants to be a woman.” Christ.

* On that note, he told me point-blank that women have more rights than men. I am AFAB. I fucking bluescreened.

* The BLM movement is just a way to deter from the election. The Democrats are busing in people to start riots and make cities shut down. “It isn’t a natural escalation of things to destroy your own neighborhood.” He also thinks the whole movement is shit beyond that because, “Everyone gets treated like shit by the police. I’ve been held down and beaten by a cop-- it’s just part of living in a city.” I... moving on

* “COVID-19 was created by the Chinese for the Democrats to skew the election.” He then points out all the sicknesses that broke out around other elections, like SARS and H1N1. This is where the sudden hatred of China comes from.

There is also just... so much more, but it is so incredibly tiring to try to think of all the things he tells me. Every time I look away to edit this anecdote, I remember more bullshit, so this is going to be the finalized list.

So, all-in-all, my dad went from being a very empathetic, compassionate man to having those traits used against him to believe that being racist is okay. My dad got sucked into politics because he was worried about the country being ran by reptilians, and now he believes that wearing a mask during a global pandemic is “unpatriotic” despite spending the majority of his life complaining about patriotism.

My sister and I try to set our dad straight. Any time he says something racist, we counter it the best we can, and it usually comes down to, “I’m not talking about all of them. I’m talking about the ones the Democrats paid off to do this stuff.” Unfortunately, there is no convincing him otherwise on that part, because if we try to show him anything regarding it, he deflects by saying that we got it from “a mainstream news source.”

I feel powerless as all hell because my dad has become something very distressing, and Trump / conspiracies are all he ever talks about. I can only hope that his absolute bullshit “underground conservative news outlets” either get shut down so he has to look elsewhere or that he somehow finds some news source that he trusts that isn’t sucking Trump’s dick. I don’t know.

#anecdote #personal #trump #xenophobia #racism #homophobia #prejudice #conspiracy #conspiracy theory #please keep an eye on your local conspiracy theorist lest they become like this #writing #article

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indigoire · 5 years

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It Read-through Chapter Three: “Six Phone Calls”

God. One hundred pages into IT and I only just got done with chapter three. This book can and will kill me.

Warning for racism, suicide, blood, gore, abuse, assault, misogyny, and Bill Denbrough’s shitty opinions.

Intro Chapters One and Two

Silly me thought, oh, twenty-four chapters, one thousand one hundred and thirty-eight pages, that’s about fifty pages per chapter, I can crank that out no problem. I was reading full novels over the course of a day when I was in school. Easy peasy.

Real whoppers like this chapter have me doubting myself. I’ll probably have days where I’ll break the chapter in half just so I’m not reading for three straight hours like I was tonight.

Anyways, on to the chapter itself. It’s really more like six chapters crammed into one, all introducing us to an individual Loser with the exception of Mike.

Let me sum up my reaction to these intros with my own tweet, having just finished Bev’s introduction:

And like, I’ve seen the movies, I’ve read the fanworks, I know a lot of the lore. I even read past chapter three as a kid, I remember Bill’s intro so clearly now. I feel like I have my own form of amnesia, but the shitty memories I’m uncovering are of reading this book. So believe me when I say I knew going in that the Losers would be an amalgamation of mommy and daddy issues or just plain issues, anti-Semitism, misogyny, repression, trauma, long-buried PTSD, abuse…like, there’s a reason they’re Losers.

But King feels like he needs to beat us over the head with this information.

For example, let’s start with Stanley. Good old Stanley. Hey, did you know Stan was Jewish??? A simple mention wouldn’t be enough though, let’s throw every anti-Semitic word at the wall, but it’s okay because it’s from the viewpoint of a Jewish character, his wife. The Jewish wife can call herself a kike all day long, why not, let’s just go ahead and do that.

Like. Come on Stephen. My notes say “at SOME point this just feels fuckin’ racist, dude.”

Stan himself is lovely. We get to see him from Patty’s point of view (and, point of order, I just realized that all of the Losers are introduced from the viewpoint of another character, with the exception of Richie and Eddie), and Stan is a level-headed, smart, steady man. He seems to be “preternaturally confident” about his life choices, whether that’s choosing where Patty should apply to for work or starting his own accounting firm, and he always seems to find success.

Stan also finds out about Bill and his books, but before the telephone call from Mike, before the Derry memories are supposed to rush in. Stan is reading Bill’s new book when he gets the call in fact.

He also makes an oblique reference to the Turtle around Patty, “the Turtle couldn’t help us”, and then seems to shake it off without going into it with her.

So. Either Stan remembered more than he let on, or something happened that made him aware. More aware than the rest of the Losers. Like, the Losers all seem to find wild success, supernatural success really, but to them it all seems to happen suddenly, at random. Not so with Stan. When Patty and Stan try to have children but can’t conceive, Stan says he knows the problem lies with him, he just doesn’t know why exactly. He then goes on to say that he’s in the eye of some storm, the calm between something terrible in his past and something terrible in his future.

Of course we soon learn what terrible something is lurking in Stan’s future. One evening he gets a call from Mike Hanlon, telling him to come back to Derry. Stan answers the call, responds to Mike’s questions, then tells Patty he’s going to take a bath. She ends up watching TV a little too long, then realizes something is Off. She finds him locked in the bathroom with slit wrists and the word IT written in his own blood on the wall.

The neighbors call the cops she screams so loud.

We then move from Stan to Richie, whose name I have never been more happy to see in my whole life. Finally, finally, one of my favorite characters. Richie answers Mike’s phone call with nary a hiccup. He puts on a Voice to answer, not something silly but a sort of adult “everything’s going to be okay” Voice. He then arranges things with his travel agent and somewhere along the way he has to go back to his normal voice. “Now he had to go back to being himself, and that was hard–it got harder to do that every year.” Richie is building walls around parts of himself with his Voices, avoiding the real him.

He does a couple of voices for the travel agent, she laughs hysterically, and he arranges his trip to Derry, and calls out of work. After it’s all taken care of, the memories start to rush back, the people, and he thinks of Georgie, with his arm ripped off, and then and only then does Richie vomit. He makes it to the toilet at least, but he empties himself entirely. He then removes his contacts.

A rather short intro, but to me a nice reprieve.

Ben’s intro is a lot better than I remember it being. I think I conflated it with his intro in the miniseries, where he brings home a girl and tells her about him being fat before they have sex. Here, not a whisper of that. There’s actually a bit where a woman asks Ben’s local bartender if Mister Hanscom is gay. “Mister Hanscom ain’t no sissy.” Cool. Thanks, Stephen.

Basically, Ben haunts this one tiny bar in Nebraska in this tiny podunk “town”, where he gets to know the bartender, a Ricky Lee, very well over the years. He comes every Friday and Saturday night, no matter where he is. When he’s working on the BBC Communications Tower in London he still flies back home every Saturday to get his drinks. He never takes anyone home from the bar and he consistently tips well. The bartender enjoys his company.

The night of the phone call, we see Ben head into the bar and there’s a terrible desolation hung over him. He tells Ricky there’s been bad news from home, and Ricky is sympathetic. He goes into some of the memories, of Bowers carving the H into his stomach, and shows Ricky the scar. He then orders a STEIN of whiskey, which Ricky, somewhat foolishly, gives to him, on the house.

Ben then, mentioning an anecdote about the natives in Peru, snorts straight lemon juice and then downs the whiskey like beer. He then gives Ricky Lee three pure silver dollars that his father gave to him before he died. He makes mention of a fourth one that he gave to Bill…and a mysterious reference that Bill or Bev somehow used that silver dollar to save his life at some point. Meanwhile, Ricky is horrified. He keeps thinking of a bar patron that once hung himself after coming to the bar, and how Ben has the same look about him. He’s suddenly struck that Ben is dead, a dead man walking.

But Ben walks out of the bar all the same, drives off, even while the waitress scolds Ricky for letting Ben drive, saying “he’ll kill himself”. And Ricky, who had thought the same thing not five minutes before says no he won’t.

It’s a common through-line, the Losers being dead men (and woman) walking, everyone comments how scared they seem to be, how overwhelmed by fear, with the exception of Richie, who has no one with him, but Richie notes that he’s a dead man walking all the same.

We move on to Eddie. In my notebook I wrote “EDDIE!!!” and immediately felt a renewed zeal to read.

Eddie is introduced not by physical description but by what we find in his medicine cabinet. I couldn’t tell you the purpose of half of the items listed, a lot of them no longer exist, and as much as I’ve been busting out google for this book I wasn’t keen on looking up an entire pharmacy. I did note that one, there’s a lot of products for, as the book puts it, “moving the mail” (I wrote down “get the feeling Eds gets constipated a lot, needs more fiber in his diet”), and then I noted that Eddie also has some serious painkillers, along with some uppers and serious downers. You know a book was written in the eighties when “Quaaludes” gets name-dropped.

I also wrote “Eddie is balding :C”, just so you know where my priorities lie.

Of course we wouldn’t be able to talk about Eddie without mentioning Myra. Right after Eddie basically empties his medicine cabinet into his bag, Myra comes thundering up the stairs. Oh yeah, chalk down some good ol’ fatphobia from King. Literally every shitty character is fat in this book.

Myra gets a bit of an interjection, though Eddie remains the central viewpoint for most of the chapter, and in her interjection she notes that she somewhat wants to trap Eddie (in the closet, jesus, very subtle) until “this madness had passed”.

Eddie presses Myra into taking over for him in his driving business, and she hasn’t driven in years so she’s terrified, all while half trapped in his memories. He remembers his mom laying into his gym teacher for making Eddie take Phys. Ed. with asthma, but the teacher notes there’s nothing physically wrong with him. All the same, Eddie goes for his aspirator, takes a deep puff of it.

He reflects that he knows how fucked up his marriage is, he knows he married his mother. Before he’d taken the plunge he’d placed a photo of Myra on the mantle next to his mother. He noted then that the two of them could be sisters. But he’d been weak and fallen into old habits. The jabs he could take, the jokes about Jack Sprat from his coworkers, but he really does seem ashamed of himself for taking the easier path, the one familiar to him.

He truly cares for Myra if nothing else. He doesn’t want to hurt her in any way. Even semi-harsh words make him feel guilty and remorseful. He contemplates telling her everything, but it would only make her anxiety and distress worse.

Also, two things of note: Eddie mentions that Myra “was really very sweet and had had even less experience with men than he’d had with women.” 👀 This and his pet-name for her, that makes her giggle to hear it, is “Marty.” I feel like this is far more telling of Eddie than the “marrying his mother” thing. He has affection for this woman, to be sure, but far more because she is safe, she doesn’t know much about men, she reminds him of familiar routines, she keeps him medicated and stable. He affectionately calls her a man’s name.

And she? She wants to lock him in a closet to keep him safe and docile to her.

As he leaves he briefly sees her transform (only for him, only mentally) into someone older, his mother back from the grave, “old and fat and crazy”, and a memory of his mother terrifying him in a shoe shop comes to mind. He shakes it off and asks her for a kiss, while saying to himself “if we were in water she’d drown us both.”

And then he flees to his taxi, on his way to the station and Derry.

The next introduction is terrible. It made me so mad to read, I remember it disgusting me when I was kid, but it just infuriates me now.

King’s only female protagonist, the only female in the Losers Club, Bev Marsh, is a walking punching bag.

This part is told from the viewpoint of Tom Rogan, Bev’s husband, and he talks about how he got her under his thumb, how he could sense her vulnerability. And one, it reads like how every man assumes female abuse victims work, secretly wanting the abuse and having the choice to leave at any time but unable to, and two, it is some highly toxic misogynistic shit. And obviously it’s told from the viewpoint of a highly misogynistic character, an abuser through and through (who, by the way, is also fat, so there’s that fatphobia popping up again).

But Tom knows that in times of extreme stress Bev is able to find her inner strength and push through. She becomes manic to do what she needs to do, and in those times Tom knows that his abuse wouldn’t be able to touch her.

I filled up a quarter of a page with the words “FUCK TOM >:C” just so you know where my head was at as I read about him “teaching Bev a lesson” and beating her until she “learned”. He even knows that when he beats her she regresses back to being a child. A *gag* sexy child at that. His disgusting words, not mine.

Of course Tom has parental issues of his own, of course! Match made in heaven. His mom beat him with a belt and he intends to do the same to Bev, put her in her place, give her a “whuppin’” as it’s phrased in the book. But Bev isn’t having any of that tonight. As Tom attempts to beat her for smoking and packing and daring to defy him, she fights back. She throws glass bottles at him and, as he gets more crazed, eventually tips the vanity on him. That isn’t even close to enough to keep him down though, so she snags the belt and whips him, first across the face, and then across the balls. Then and only then does he go down.

She flees, shoeless and penniless into the night, and laughs once she realizes she’s out and probably out for good. My notes read “Tom can and will rot in hell.”

Then my notes segue smoothly into “oh boy it’s Bill :|” and honestly, that could be the mood for the whole segment on Bill.

Bill…Bill is so obviously Stephen King. Any time there’s a writer in a Stephen King novel you can bet that the writer is a stand-in for Stephen King. This is why it was amusing to me to have his cameo in It: Chapter Two roast Bill, his self-insert. I also should note that in the last chapter Adrian is noted to have been working on a long-languishing novel, and being in Derry inspired him, and just reading that made me groan. Not because I have anything against writers, lord knows, but because I know King included that detail to tie Adrian to himself and to Bill. I know it will come up later. I know King has to make every character him before he can empathize with them.

Anyways, Bill gets the call from Mike all the way in England, where he’s staying in a cottage with his wife Audra. Beautiful, statuesque, red-haired Audra. “Why can’t you be the woman I want you to be” indeed. Not a line Bill says in the book by the way. At least not yet.

Audra wants to know why Bill is shaking and why he pours himself a stiff drink before breakfast, so Bill begins filling her in on the details. And as he does we’re treated to memories of Bill in college, in his creative writing class.

Now. Here is where I begin to lose patience with Bill and with King. King is clearly writing from experience. I know he had issues with his own college creative writing class.

Basically, the class is pretentious, concerned with inserting political opinions into everything they write, going on about how war is sold by sexist capitalists and so on and you can just TELL that King is projecting hard. Bill’s works, fun sci-fi stories and mysteries, are given fairly low scores by the professor.

Then one day in class, during a period when another student is talking about her work, filled to the brim with socio-political commentary, Bill stands up and basically says that he doesn’t get what they’re talking about and “can’t you guys just let a story be a story?”

Which like, dude, okay, I get it on some level, this shit sounds pretentious as hell. But it’s COLLEGE. If you can’t get a chance to be pretentious in college then when else can you be? Also, you know for a fact that King is twisting this story to make himself look favorable, because it is clearly a story from his own past. So obviously the students have to be talking about buzzwords that have no meaning, instead of, oh I don’t know, expressing their political beliefs? Everything has politics in it dude! Even your shitty ass story reflects the political landscape of America in the eighties for fuck’s sake!! It, the novel, would not be what it is if it weren’t mired in politics. It has a lot to say about race, gender, and class, and if the message is muddled and directionless it’s only because the author, Mister King, didn’t put any thought into what he was trying to say, but rather wrote a story that was meant to shock.

Anyways, Bill says the story thing, and it’s just the sort of malarky you would expect to see on the front page of r/braincels, with the top comment being “and then everyone clapped” because it is ridiculous. The teacher reprimands Bill, and Bill slinks out of class.

But OH BOY, Bill shows him! Because he writes his first horror story shortly after, and the story damn near pours out of him, and he brings it to class. The professor gives it an F and calls it pure pulp.

Bill sells it for two hundred bucks to a shitty magazine, drops the class, and with the drop out note, well. I’ll let King take over here:

“Bill Denbrough staples the drop card to the assistant fiction editor’s congratulatory note and tacks both to the bulletin board on the creative-writing instructor’s door. In the corner of the bulletin board he sees an anti-war cartoon. And suddenly, as if moving of its own accord, his fingers pluck his pen from his breast pocket and across the cartoon he writes this: If fiction and politics ever really do become interchangeable, I’m going to kill myself, because I won’t know what else to do. You see, politics always change. Stories never do.”

“Bill Denbrough,” my notes read, “kill yourself.”

The rest of the section continues with Bill falling into the lap of success with his stories, meeting Audra while working on a screen adaptation of his novel, the shoot going unnaturally well according to Audra, and his following years of success. He slowly fills Audra in on the blanks. His brother’s murder. His scars, from the Losers’ vow, which have suddenly reappeared on his hand after the phone call. How Stan was the one that cut their hands, before turning the glass on himself. How Stan at first mimes slashing his wrists, as a supposed goof, but Bill almost stops him all the same.

He then realizes he can’t tell Audra everything about what went down in Derry, but makes her promise not to come with him, to stay away from Derry. His stutter, which has slowly crept back in over the course of the conversation, scares her into promising

““And when do I see you again?” she asked softly. He put an arm around her and held her tightly, but he never answered her question.”

With that, thus ends chapter three.

This chapter took it out of me. It was all so familiar and yet all so new and horrible at the same time. I honestly can’t say I’m having a good time, but I’m certainly interested in what I’m reading. It’s like reading about a parasitic wasp, what it does to the host. It’s gruesome and disgusting, but you keep reading because you want to see the end result. But the fun’s only just beginning.

Catch you all tomorrow, bye for now.

#holy shit this was a long one #I spent three hours reading and two writing. So uh...yeah.#IT #Stephen King's IT #It (book)#It (novel)#Stephen King #IT Readthrough #Richie and Eddie are my only joys in reading this #I can't believe how much I hate Bill Denbrough

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nonasuch · 6 years

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My grandmother’s funeral was yesterday.

It was the first day of real fall weather we’ve had: blazingly sunny, but cool and dry and blustery. My grandmother had told my mom she wanted to be buried in the pink ballgown she wore to my mom’s wedding. My mom also gave the funeral home a sweater to put in the coffin with her, because she always brought a sweater with her everywhere she went.

I mostly held it together. I can still mostly hold it together as long as I talk about anything else. I’m going to work today, because we need to have the shop open on Saturdays, but I’m going to close a little early so I can get to my parents’ house to sit shiva tonight and tomorrow.

I’m not really talking about this anywhere else online, because most of the people who would see it on Facebook are people who know me IRL, and somehow that means it feels too personal to talk about. My grandmother didn’t want people to know she was sick, outside of her kids and grandkids, because she didn’t want people to make a fuss or spend a lot of time talking about being sick over and over. So I’ll talk about it here, where more people will see it but none of them are part of the massive family gossip network, as far as I know.

(I mean, some might be. We have a lot of cousins.)

I spoke at the service before the burial. This is what I said:

If there’s one thing anyone who has ever known her would say about my grandmother, it’s that she always, always wanted the people around her to have what they needed. Whether that was a second helping of dessert, or reassurance, or the phone number of every eligible Jewish bachelor in a thirty-mile radius. If she went out to dinner with a ninja, a Jedi, and the owner of the restaurant, she would still manage to pick up the check without any of them noticing. Even when we visited her in the hospital, she kept trying to offer us something to drink, something to eat-- did we need anything? Were we okay?

Nothing made her happier than ensuring the people around her were happy. It was so important to her that she cared for the people she loved, in whatever way she could.

And I think for a lot of us, that’s not an easy thing to do. I think most of us have to work at it. It’s hard to consider the needs of others, sometimes, to stop and ask if there is something we can do for someone else before we worry about what we need for ourselves. I know that’s something that doesn’t always come naturally to me. And if I were just to say that it came naturally to her, that would be selling her short.

Because caring is always work, even when you’re happy to do it. It is time and energy and thought that you might want to keep for yourself sometimes. It is work, hard work, to so consistently think of the needs of others, to so unfailingly offer whatever you can, whenever you can, and she did that work every day of her life without showing the slightest bit of hesitation. And I can’t think of anything harder or more worthwhile.

I always liked the idea of the tzadikim, the 36 righteous people whose goodness holds up the world. I can’t speak for the entire world, but I know a lot of us here today feel like our foundations aren’t as steady as they were, like the weight of the world is a little heavier. So I’m going to ask all of you to help each other to share that weight. To look for ways to show the people around us that we’re thinking of them, that we want them to have what they need. If we all do that -- if we all pick up a share of the work she was doing, the work of tikkun olam -- that would be the best legacy that I can think of.

We’re going to have to work out a new system for who picks up the check at restaurants, though. We can’t all do it every time, and nobody here is stealthy enough.

#personal

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allofthefeelings · 6 years

Text

Someone commented something on one of my Jewish MCU headcanon posts a few weeks ago, and I’ve been thinking about it and finally felt ready to reply, but I can’t find it now (or even which of the posts it was on), so it’s getting its own post.

Their comment was something about how maybe the character (I thought it was Peter Parker, but I may be misremembering- I have done a LOT of Jewish headcanon posts) isn’t Orthodox, so he wouldn’t celebrate Shabbat so he could still fight crime then.

And it tied in, in my head (although probably not that person’s intent!) to a lot of discussions I’ve seen on Jumblr the past few months, which equate how traditionally observant you are with how observant you are full stop. And as a Reform Jew, on the more secular side, these conversations have been hitting me harder than I’d expected.

I don’t do a lot of things that people consider “really Jewish.” I don’t follow rules of modesty, I rarely if ever go to synagogue (I technically don’t have one, because I quit my parents’ when the Rabbi made comments about Israel I disagreed with and haven’t yet found a new one), I don’t speak Hebrew and can only read it phonetically, I spend most of Friday night and Saturday screwing around on the internet or shopping for comics, and I enjoy a good meat lasagna sometimes.

But some other stuff about me: I went to a Jewish preschool, attended Hebrew school twice a week until I was in ninth grade, got Bat Mitzvahed and Confirmed. My mom was president of the Temple Sisterhood for years. I buy challah every week and keep Kosher for Passover and when I accidentally ate a bite of pork I was so horrified I made myself sick. My family’s important gatherings are Pesach and Rosh Hashanah. My grandma lived in a Jewish neighborhood (which I live in now) all her life, and interspersed Yiddish phrases into conversations that I didn’t realize weren’t “regular English” for years (but until the day she died she pronounced the holiday “Yum Kipper”). My dad’s program is at our local JCC. I have prayer books that I read when I need to re-center myself. I’ve gone to enthusiastic Torah study and felt incredibly myself in a room full of people passionately picking apart a story using their very selves as the tools to dig deeper. When things in my life got bad, I have talked to rabbis to get a deeper sense of how Judaism impacts my life in addition to talking to therapists. I use lights and electronics Friday evening into Saturday, and I’ll do fun stuff like attend comic cons and hard stuff like take care of my dad, but I try not to do work for my job because the idea of taking time to heal so you can fix the world the rest of the time is embedded in my bones. The way I was raised prioritized learning and asking questions and helping others in a way that my family never hesitated to tell me was rooted in our religion.

And even if none of these things were true, my Judaism would still matter to me and influence how I live my life.

Observance isn’t a switch you can flick on and off, or even a light with a dimmer. It’s not a question of being more or less Jewish. It’s an amalgamation of years of upbringing and education and history and belief and priorities. (I can’t think of a clearer way to say this, but I am emphatically not saying that Jews by choice are not observant; I am saying every Jewish person’s upbringing is part of what led them to the form of Judaism they choose to embrace.) Orthodox and Conservative and Reform and Reconstructionist Jews give different aspects of the religion different weights. That doesn’t make any more religious or more observant. That doesn’t make any belief less sincere or deeply-felt or likely to strongly influence behavior, whether that means giving to charities or going to protest marches or putting on a mask and fighting street-level supervillains.

So- back to the original question, which maybe wasn’t even a question; it could have just been a throwaway statement that I couldn’t get out of the back of my mind.

I welcome anyone who reads my headcanons to read Peter or Pepper or Natasha or Coulson or Jess or Bucky or ANY OTHER CHARACTER, any way you please. I’m Reform, and my understanding of Judaism is through that lens- including observing Shabbat and knowing Jewish holidays and attending youth group and keeping Kosher. I do some minimal Wikipedia-ing to make sure my memory’s accurate, but what you’re seeing is the result of a Reform Jewish education.

That said, if any of these characters being frum brings you joy, and what I wrote let you see that, by all means read them that way. They’re certainly not mine, and the MCU in particular is a pretty big sandbox for all of us. I’m not at all saying that, if these characters are Jewish, they’re Jewish exactly like me.

Just don’t assume that being actively, consciously Jewish means you can’t be Reform or Reconstructionist. I have many, many role models in my life who prove that is emphatically not the case.

#Jumblr #Jewish headcanons #Judaism #Reform Judaism #long post #I feel weird posting this but I feel even weirder not posting it?

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