#clevver now

[thesiltverses]

I don’t know who types up the ask answers on this blog but to whoever’s reading this: how do you all feel about being alive and sentient? What keeps you going, what purpose propels you through this chaotic void? What do you think (or hope) waits for you after your inevitable end? What do you think constitutes a life well lived?

I'm going to answer this in the most wayward and stupidly overlong manner possible, because the previous ask had me thinking about puppets, and I was already mid-way through writing up a book recommendation that's semi-relevant to your questions.

Everyone (but especially people who've enjoyed The Silt Verses and all the folks on Tumblr who loved Piranesi by Susanna Clarke) ought to seek out Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban.

Riddley Walker is a wild and woolly story set in post-apocalyptic Kent, where human society has (d)evolved into a Bronze Age collective of hunter-gatherer settlements. Dogs, apparently blaming us for our crimes against the world, have become our predators, hunting us through the trees. Labourers kill themselves unearthing ancient machinery that they cannot possibly understand.

A travelling crowd of thugs led by a Pry Mincer collect taxes and attempt to impose themselves upon those around them with a puppet-show - the closest possible approximation of a TV show - that tells a mangled story of the world's destruction, featuring a Prometheus-esque hero called Eusa who is tempted by the Clevver One into creating the atomic bomb.

Riddley himself, a twelve-year-old folk hero in-the-making surrounded by strange portents, ends up sowing the seeds of rebellion and change by becoming a conduit for the anti-tutelary anarchic madness (one apparently buried in our collective unconscious) of Punch 'n' Judy.

It's a book in love with twisted reinterpretation, the subjectivity of interpretation, buried or forbidden truths coming back to light (the opening quote is a curious allegory about reinvention and cyclical change from the extra-canonical Gospel of Thomas, which is a good joke and mission statement on a couple levels at once) and human beings somehow stumbling into forms of wisdom or insight through clumsy and nonsensical attempts to make sense of a world that is simply beyond them.

It rocks.

The book starts like this:

On my naming day when I come 12 I gone front spear and kilt a wyld boar he parbly the las wyld pig on the Bundel Downs any how there hadnt ben none for a long time befor him nor I aint looking to see none agen. He dint make the groun shake nor nothing like that when he come on to my spear he wernt all that big plus he lookit poorly. He done the reqwyrt he ternt and stood and clattert his teef and made his rush and there we wer then. Him on 1 end of the spear kicking his life out and me on the other end watching him dy. I said, 'Your tern now my tern later.'

Riddley's devolved language - a trick which has been nicked/homaged by many other works, most notably Cloud Atlas and Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome - is a masterwork choice which may seem offputting or overwhelming at first, but which has its own brutal poetry and cadence to it, and ultimately which makes us slow down as readers and unpick the wit, puns, double-meanings and playful themes buried in line after line.

(Even those first five sentences get us thinking about cyclical change, ritual and myth in opposition to the dissatisfactions of reality, and 'tern' to paradoxically indicate a rebellious change in direction but also an obedient acceptance of inevitable death.)

In one of my favourite passages in literature and a statement of thought that means a lot to me, Riddley has been smoking post-coital weed with Lorna, a 'tel-woman', who unexpectedly declares her belief in a kind of irrational, monstrous Logos that lives in us, wears us like clothes, and drives us onwards for its own purpose:

'You know Riddley theres some thing in us it dont have no name.' I said, 'What thing is that?' She said, 'Its some kynd of thing it aint us but yet its in us. Its lookin out thru our eye hoals...it aint you nor it dont even know your name. Its in us lorn and loan and shelterin how it can.' 'Tremmering it is and feart. It puts us on like we put on our cloes. Some times we dont fit. Some times it cant fynd the arm hoals and it tears us a part. I dont think I took all that much noatis of it when I ben yung. Now Im old I noatise it mor. It dont realy like to put me on no mor. Every morning I can feal how its tiret of me and readying to throw me a way. Iwl tel you some thing Riddley and keap this in memberment. What ever it is we dont come naturel to it.' I said, 'Lorna I dont know what you mean.' She said, 'We aint a naturel part of it. We dint begin when it begun we dint begin where it begun. It ben here befor us nor I dont know what we are to it. May be weare jus only sickness and a feaver to it or boyls on the arse of it I dont know. Now lissen what Im going to tel you Riddley. It thinks us but it dont think like us. It dont think the way we think. Plus like I said befor its afeart.' I said, 'Whats it afeart of?' She said, 'Its afeart of being beartht.'

While Hoban is, I think, deeply humanistic to his bones and even something of a wayward optimist, the notion of human beings as helpless and ignorant vessels, individual carriers - puppets, if you like - for an unknowable and awful inhuman power-in-potentia and life-drive that lacks a true shape or intent beyond its own continued survival (even when that means destroying us or visiting us with agonising atrophy in the process) conjures up the pessimism of Thomas Ligotti, another big influence on our work and a dude who was really into his marionettes-as-metaphor.

Let's go to him now for his opinion on the thing that lives beneath our skin. Thomas?

Through the prophylactic of self-deception, we keep hidden what we do not want to let into our heads, as if we will betray to ourselves a secret too terrible to know… …(that the universe is) a play with no plot and no players that were anything more than portions of a master drive of purposeless self-mutilation. Everything tears away at everything else forever. Nothing knows of its embroilment in a festival of massacres… Nothing can know what is going on.

Curiously, both Ligotti and Riddley Walker have appeared in the music of dark folk band Current 93, whose track In The Heart Of The Wood And What I Found There directly homages the novel and ends with the repeated words,

"All shall be well," she said But not for me

These words, in turn, hearken back to Kafka's* famous reported conversation with Max Brod:

'We are,' he said, 'nihilistic thoughts, suicidal thoughts that rise in God's head.' This reminded me of the worldview of the gnostic: God as an evil demiurge, the world as his original sin. 'Oh no', he said, 'our world is only a bad, fretful whim of God, a bad day.' 'So was there - outside of this world that we know - hope?' He smiled: 'Oh, hope - there is plenty. Infinite hope, just not for us."

So, we walk on.

We carry this thing that's riding on our backs, endlessly bonded to it, feeling its weight more and more with every passing day, unable to turn to look at it. Buried truths come briefly to life, and are hidden from us again. Perhaps they weren't truths at all. We couldn't stand to look the truth directly in the eyes in any case.

If there is hope, it's for the thing that looks out from our eyeholes, which thinks us but cannot think like us. We'll never get to where we're going, and the thing will never be born. There's no hope for it. Perhaps we don't want it to win anyway. It's nothing, and the key to everything.

The Jesus from the Gospel of Thomas says:

'When you see your own likeness, you rejoice. But when you see the visions that formed you and existed before you, which do not perish and which do not become visible - how much then will you be able to bear?'

Kafka, writing to his father, begins by expressing the inexpressibility of his own divine terror:

You asked me why I am afraid of you. I did not know how to answer - partly because of my fear, partly because an explanation would require more than I could make coherent in speech…even in writing, the magnitude of the causes exceeds my memory and my understanding.

Kafka concludes that while he cannot ever truly explain himself, and that the accusations in his letter are neat subjectivities that fail to account for the messiness of reality, perhaps 'something that in my opinion so closely resembles the truth…might comfort us both a little and make it easier for us to live and die.'**

It doesn't bring comfort to Kafka, whose diarised remarks both before and after the 1919 letter make it clear that he views his relationship with the things (people) that birthed him as an endless entrapment that prevents him from attaining any kind of self-actualisation or even comfort, since he cannot escape their influence or remember a time before them:

I was defeated by Father as a small boy and have been prevented since by pride from leaving the battleground, despite enduring defeat over and over again.

It's as if I wasn't fully born yet...as if I was dissolubly bound to these repulsive things (my parents).*** The bond is still attached to my feet, preventing them from walking, from escaping the original formless mush. That's how it is sometimes.

Samuel Beckett returns again and again (aptly) to this pursuit of a state of true humanity and final understanding that is at once fled and unrecoverable, yet to be born, never to be born, never-existed, endlessly to be pursued, pointless to pursue. From the astonishing end sequence of The Unnameable:

alone alone, the others are gone, they have been stilled, their voices stilled, their listening stilled, one by one, at each new-com- ing, another will come, I won’t be the last. I’ll be with the others. I’ll be as gone, in the silence, it won’t be I, it’s not I, I’m not there yet. I’ll go there now. I’ll try and go there now, no use trying, I wait for my turn, my turn to go there, my turn to talk there, my turn to listen there, my turn to wait there for my turn to go, to be as gone, it’s unending, it will be unending, gone where,where do you go from there, you must go somewhere else, wait somewhere else, for your turn to go again

I’m not the first, I won’t be the first, it will best me in the end, it has bested better than me, it will tell me what to do, in order to rise, move, act like a body endowed with despair, that’s how I reason, that’s how I hear myself reasoning, all lies, it’s not me they’re calling, not me they’re talking about, it’s not yet my turn, it’s someone else’s turn, that’s why I can’t stir, that’s why I don’t feel a body on me, I’m not suffering enough yet, it’s not yet my turn, not suffering enough to be able to stir, to have a body, complete with head, to be able to understand, to have eyes to light the way

From Thomas' Jesus:

When you make the two one, and you make the inside as the outside and the outside as the inside and the above as the below, and if male and female become a single unity which lacks 'masculine' and 'feminine' action, when you grow eyes where eyes should be and hands where hands should be and feet where feet should stand and the true image in its proper place, then shall you enter heaven.

Tom's Jesus makes a particularly Gnostic habit of both insisting that the hidden will be revealed and demonstrating the impossibility of attaining a state where the hidden ever can be revealed. Contrary to C.S. Lewis, we will never have faces with which to gaze upon the lost divine and the mysteries that shaped us, and crucially, as Christ puts it, we would not be able to bear the sight of ourselves if we did.

We will never become the thing that's riding on our backs.

Jesus again:

The disciples ask Jesus, 'Tell us how our end shall be.' Jesus says, 'Have you found the beginning yet, you who ask after the end? For at the place where the beginning is, there shall be the end.'

The Unnameable:

I’ll recognise it, in the end I’ll recognise it, the story of the silence that he never left, that I should never have left, that I may never find again, that I may find again, then it will be he, it will be I, it will be the place, the silence, the end, the beginning, the beginning again, how can I say it, that’s all words, they’re all I have, and not many of them, the words fail, the voice fails, so be it

The final passage of The Unnameable, which often is hilariously shorn and misinterpreted as an inspirational quote about how if you don't succeed, try again:

all words, there’s nothing else, you must go on, that’s all I know, they’re going to stop, I know that well, I can feel it, they’re going to abandon me, it will be the silence, for a moment, a good few moments, or it will be mine, the lasting one, that didn’t last, that still lasts, it will be I, you must go on, I can't go on, you must go on. I’ll go on, you must say words, as long as there are any, until they find me, until they say me, strange pain, strange sin, you must go on, perhaps it’s done already, perhaps they have said me already, perhaps they have carried me to the threshold of my story, before the door that opens on my story, that would surprise me, if it opens, it will be I, it will be the silence, where I am, I don’t know. I’ll never know, in the silence you don’t know, you must go on, I can’t go on. I’ll go on. †

We bear this thing that's riding on our backs. We'll never get to where we're going, and the thing will never be born. If it was born, it'd be too terrible for us to bear. There's nothing riding on our backs.

It will never speak us into being.

We keep on calling out into the silence, we keep trying to explain or understand the thing that's riding on our backs, searching for a way to birth it before we die. Our words about the thing are crucial, and they're meaningless, and they're all we have, and they're nothing at all. We cannot name it and we cannot express it, but we cannot stop trying, and we will keep turning back to our words about the thing, obsessing over them, tearing them to pieces, putting them back together.

I'm fumbling at something I can't think or say, but fumbling is all we're capable of. There could be beauty and meaning and comfort in the fumbling, but it's also vain, and foolish, and pointless, and we're lying to ourselves about the beauty and the meaning and the comfort, and we're indulging ourselves pointlessly by going on and on about the pointlessness of it. Nothing can know what's going on. We will never get close enough to understand without being destroyed.

Thomas' Jesus again, warning those who seek to reveal what's hidden:

He who is near me is near the fire.

Riddley Walker, reflecting on the Punch puppet's inexplicable desire to cook and eat his own child:

Whyis Punch crookit? Why wil he al ways kill the baby if he can? Parbly I wont ever know its jus on me to think on it.

If you got to the end of this, congratulations: but the above is honestly the most appropriate patchwork of what I believe, what propels me, what I feel.

As for what comes after life, I think it's fairly straightforwardly a nothingness we are tragically incapable of fully knowing or accepting - it's Beckett's unimaginable and unattainable silence, a silence that his characters' voices keep on shattering even as they cry out for it.

-Jon‡

*I can't remember if Kafka makes prominent reference to Czech puppets in his work, which is interesting in its own right given the thematic relevance (the protagonist in The Hunger Artist is perhaps a kind of self-directing puppet show?).

However, Gustav Meyrink - who some unsourced Google quotes suggest was pals with Czech puppeteer Richard Teschner - did write a strange little story, The Man On The Bottle, about an audience watching a 'marionette show' who are too wrapped up in performances and masks to interpret the reality that they're actually watching a human being suffocate to death.

**Thomas Ligotti: "Something had happened. They did not know what it was, but they did know it as that which should not be.

Something would have to be done if they were to live with that which should not be.

This would not (be enough); it would only be the best they could do."

***Beckett's Malone Dies actually kicks off with a related sentiment:" I am in my mother’s room. It’s I who live there now. I don’t know how I got there...In any case I have her room. I sleep in her bed. I piss and shit in her pot. I have taken her place. I must resemble her more and more."

† I don't necessarily align myself in humour with Ligotti on a lot of this stuff but I imagine he would recognise both Beckett's writing and Kafka's frustrations re explaining the causes of his hatred for his father as sublimation: finding artistic and philosophical ways of sketching the inexpressible horror and uncertainty of our existence in order to reckon with it at a remove without destroying ourselves. A higher form of self-deception, but self-deception nevertheless.

‡Muna's more of an anarcho-nihilist, I think.

#long fucking post just to say 'i don't know'

[mossolantern]

CA: Wwhat the fuck did you just fucking say about me, you little bitch? I'll havve you know I graduated top of my class in the Navvy Seals, and I'vve been involved in numerous secret culls on Al-Quaeda, and I havve over 300 confirmed kills. I am trained in gorilla wwarfare and I'm the top sniper in the entire alternian navvy. You are nothing to me but just another target. I wwill wwipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of wwhich has nevver been seen before in this empire, mark my fucking wwords. You think you can get awway with saying that shit to me over the Internet? Think again, fucker. As wwe speak I am contacting my secret network of spies across alternia and your IP is being traced right now so you better prepare for the storm, maggot. The storm that wwipes out the pathetic little thing you call your life. You're fucking dead, kid. I can be anywwhere, anytime, and I can kill you in over sevven hundred wways, and that's just wwith my bare hands. Not only am I extensivvely trained in unarmed combat, but I havve access to the entire arsenal of the Fleet of dualscar and I wwill use it to its full extent to wwipe your miserable ass off the face of the planet, you little shit. If only you could havve knowwn wwhat unholy retribution your little "clevver" comment wwas about to bring dowwn upon you, maybe you wwould havve held your fucking tongue. But you couldn't, you didn't, and noww you're paying the price, you goddamn idiot. I will shit fury all ovver you and you wwill drowwn in it. You're fucking dead, kiddo.

HELP IM LOSING IT BAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

#ASK

[jovenshires]

ive just gone down a rabbit hole of old clevver vids with spencer in them and the girls on that show were the original spencer girlies omg

i havent watched them but now i feel like i should

#spirlies gotta stick together ! #spencer #clevver #ask #asks #anon #anonymous

[agnewbones]

the fucking clevver beauty vids with spencer...... now THAT'S cinema

#mine*

[getitchlo]

Chloe and Christi Lukasiak visiting Access Hollywood, E News, Instant, and Clevver studios today in LA (Aug 14)

#chloe lukasiak #christi lukasiak #dance moms #interviews #clevver #clevver now #clevver news #instantdotme #instant #e news #access hollywood #corepr

[chakytron]

Zendaya Gets CANDID About How Disney Has Affected Her Entire Career!

Zendaya Gets CANDID About How Disney Has Affected Her Entire Career!

Zendaya Gets CANDID About How Disney Has Affected Her Entire Career! Category Main Description: Zendaya is getting candid about being labeled a “Disney kid” and she’s reflecting on how that image has affected her entire career. Watch the latest Clevver … TopTrengingTV Hunting the most trend video of the moment, every hour every day 24/7. Youtube Video Data Published At: 2021-01-27T19:30:04Z…

View On WordPress

#Bella Thorne #celeb news #celebrity news #clevver #clevver news #disney channel #Disney channel child stars #Disney then and now #entertainment news #main #news feed #shake it up #toptrendingtv #trend hunter #trend video #trending youtube videos #VIDEOS #youtube videos #zendaya #Zendaya 2021 #Zendaya Bella Thorne #Zendaya Disney #Zendaya Disney channel #Zendaya Disney secrets #Zendaya euphoria #Zendaya Gets CANDID About How Disney Has Affected Her Entire Career! #Zendaya gossip #Zendaya instagram #Zendaya interview #Zendaya new interview

[xfilesgirl]

mamma mia is really out here sponsoring everything lol

#they sponsored a clevver video and now this.. #bb20

[herheroics]

@clevvered​ xoxo

           IT WOULD be safe to assume that since Potter and his crew had left, the halls at Hogwarts have since.. changed. Sure, there’s a new evil every now and then but not every couple of months. It was refreshing. And with being Head Mistress now. Well...More things fell onto her shoulders. It’s not like she didn’t see them after all. Every now and then they had family dinner but it wasn’t like they were in her halls. Hearing a knock on her door, the headmistress looks up, peering at the face that looks around the corner. “Hermoine dear, come on in! Care to join me for a spot OF TEA?”.

#clevvered #( she is the one that can transform into a cat just to watch you ; minerva mcgonagall )

[think-of-wonderland]

So is no one gonna talk about how if you put taylor rapping in ready for it over Jay z's raapping in empire state of mind it fits perfectly? and if it was intentional or not?? could this be a really deep way of making a dig at kanye.. sampling his former best friend/ collaborater who he alledgedly fell out with because of beyonce not liking kim??? is taylor a genius or is she driving me insane????

#taylor swift #taylor #swift #reputation #look what you made me do #ready for it #1989 #fearless #kanye west #jay z #speak now #clevver #buzzfeed #theory #conspiracy #conspiracy theory #taylor rapping #abigails wedding #snake

[ditzydursley]

                          “ Just One Of The Many Outcasts In Little Whinging,                                     A Bit Cliche Now If You Think About It. ”                                                                            ( @ditzydursley​,  ANTI JKR,  promo credits to the lovely @clevvered​ )

#***self promo #hp roleplay #hp rp #hp oc #hp promo

[its-chelisey-stuff]

She decides to end her unrequited love of a decade by kissing him, but what she does is to pass the curse to him! Muahahahaha!

On another note, I wasn’t aware of how much I was enjoying this drama and this particular ep till I saw my drafts full of posts of this drama lol I guess you could say I’m more proactive on the weekends lol but also, I really really like this drama.

“Let’s say goodbye here and let’s never meet again”

He drops her hand and tells her “You keep telling me to go whenever you feel like it” Uh... boy, she has been trying to get rid of you since you saw each other again, for the past 24 hours! You just wouldn’t let her. You even made her go into your room at night to “help you” sleep.

“I don’t know whether you’re a prince or a wicked witch, but you keep holding me back like a curse. It’s too hard for me. I really want to stop that now.” 

Oh, Lee Soo. Objectively speaking, you’re right. But you become part of the problem when you don’t let her go and don’t respect her wishes. She really wants to get away from you and is bad that you don’t want to understand.

But of course, she has the upper hand in this, when she throws at him the argument he’s been insisting her on since high school: “Take care of yourself first.” And that, Lee Soo, is exactly what she is trying to do. It’s called self preservation.

“The curse, me, everything.“ Hold on tight, cocky bastard! ily SeongWu You’re about to find out.

HAHAHAHAHA HIS FACE!!

“The curse is broken now” Oh no, girl, I don’t think so.

I can’t get over his expression. Even when she leaves he just stays there, frozen. This makes me think that he never knew he liked her. He obviously did, but never realized it. Only in dramaland. It’s hilarious because five minutes ago he thought he had all the clevver arguments and witty words and now LeeSoo.exe has stopped working.

Looking forward to his development and coming to terms with his feelings. Also, he is obviously staying in Korea, no way he’ll return to the U.S. after this.

#more than friends #the probability of going from friends to lovers #number of cases #jtbc #shin ye eun #ong seongwu #kdrama #ep 2

[unelectedofficial]

      𝘏𝘈𝘋𝘕'𝘛  𝘛𝘏𝘌𝘠   done  enough  work  for  the  night  ?  nessarose  was  too  nervous  to  say  something  to  the  other  girl  ,  for  fear  of  not  looking  intelligent  enough  ,  but  it  was  becoming  awfully  hard  to  stay  focused  on  their  work  (  and  becoming  increasingly  difficult  to  keep  her  eyes  open  )  .       ❛  do  you  think  we  should  take  a  break  ?  ❜  she  asks  ,  finally  putting  her  quill  down  in  frustration  .  they  had  been  working  for  hours  ,  their  work  now  only  illuminated  by  the  ornate  oil  lamps  that  sat  upon  the  library  tables  .  ❛  i’ve  heard  that  it’s  easier  to  learn  more  if  you  study  with  breaks  .  we  can’t  all  be  as  persistent  as  you  .  ❜

      ✧･ﾟ  @clevvered​  liked  for  a  tarot - based  starter  --  the  moon  !

#clevvered #✧･ﾟ → INTERACTION / ❛ 𝘭𝘦𝘵'𝘴 𝘥𝘢𝘯𝘤𝘦 ❜ #✧･ﾟ → VERSE 07 / ❛ 𝘭𝘰𝘰𝘬 𝘸𝘩𝘰'𝘴 𝘨𝘰𝘵 𝘩𝘦𝘳 𝘰𝘸𝘯 𝘵𝘳𝘪𝘤𝘬𝘴 ❜ #i need to write up my hp verse aaaah

[getitchlo]

Chloe Lukasiak on Clevver Now (Oct 5 2016)

#chloe lukasiak #clevver #clevvernow #clevver now #youtube #get it chlo

[sabraenas-a]

“  i  have...  so  many  questions.  ”

             a  knowing  smile  builds  upon  ruby  lips,  a  small  nod  sent  in  hermione’s  direction.  it  wasn’t  easy  to  understand  everything  ---  especially  in  times  like  these.  the  war  was  over  but  sabrina  wanted  to  lift  everyone’s  spirits,  lord  knows  they  needed  it.  she  had  been  somewhat  of  a  recluse  in  the  past  few  months,  but  now  she  understood  that  it  was  only  right  to  show  her  face  again.   “   i  know,  i’m  sorry.  it’s  been  forever.   ”    /  @clevvered​.

#*ﾟ･✧♕ you hear me roar . › writings . #verse / harry potter. #clevvered. #i hope u don't mind i just ran with this !

[fightforbetter-a]

@clevvered​ asked for  「   🌪️  -  a  starter  where  our  muses  are  trapped  together  during  a  storm ?  」 from send an emoji for a starter  (accepting)

          If  there  was  one  person  Hayley  would  rather  not  be  with  right  now,  it  was  Hermione.  Actually,  no,  scratch  that —  the  Dark  Lord  would  take  top  spot.  That  might  be  a  possibility  though,  she  couldn’t  help  but  worry  fearfully,  eying  the  rumbling  clouds  that  overtook  what  had  been  a  lovely  blue  sky  mere  minutes  ago  when  she  and  Hermione  were  hashing  out  their  differences —  attempting  to,  at  least,  because  it  felt like  the  entire  world  was  between  them  now.  Almost  literally,  it  was.  She  had  blood on  her  hands  from the  orders  of  a  wizard  Hermione  was  determined  to  fight  against.  They  were  from  two  opposite  worlds,  ideologies  clashing  even  more  than  they  had  at  Hogwarts.  Not  that  she  believed  in  the  Dark  Lord’s  cause,  not  really,  but  —  well,  what  was  she  good  for, if  not  putting  her  monstrous nature  curse  to  use ?  At  least  now  her  family  look  at  her  again.  She  might  be  a  monster,  but  she  was  a  monster  they  could  live  with,  now  she  was  helping  the  Dark  Lord.  Now  that  the  Dark  Lord  had  seen  value  in  her.  Or  he  had,  right  up  until  he  surely  discovered  her  betrayal  in  not  turning  over  one  of  Potter’s  mates. 

❝ That  isn’t  natural. ❞  Hayley  kept  her eyes  on  the  sky  as  it  began  to  pelt  down,  fierce  enough  that  the  rain  would  cut  skin  if  one  was  caught  in  it.  A  flash  highlighted  the  room  in  white  light  for  a  brief  moment,  enough  for  her  to  see  Hermione’s  features  in  sharp  contrast  when  she  turned  to  stare  at  her.  ❝ You  have  to  get  away  from  here,  now,  because  if  this  is  who  I  think  it  is  then  we’re  both  dead. ❞

#interaction || hermione granger #clevvered || interaction 001 #clevvered #☾ — i won’t lie to her || answered asks #[ hope this is okay!!

[waitimcomingtoo]

I Keep On Missing You - Tom

First Part

Pairing: Tom Holland x Reader

Authors note: The songs didn’t come out in that order in real life by any means.

Masterlist

Tom tracked your relationship with Brad with The Vamps music. Every time he heard Brads voice on the radio, he gave it a good old fashioned rage-listen.

“Oh how I wish that you could say you feel the same way.” Brad sang and Tom groaned loudly.

“She doesn’t!” He huffed and quickly changed the channel.

“I’d risk it all. I’d rather crash, I’d rather crawl than never have your love at all. With only bricks to break my fall, I’d risk it all.” Came on another time.

“Shut up!” Tom shrieked.

“We will dream a dream for us that no one else can touch. My dear, I’m here, so wake up.” Brad seemed to follow him wherever he went.

“Go back to sleep, and starve!” Tom grumbled. 

Despite his hatred towards them, all those songs told Tom you guys were in the talking stage.

High Hopes came out a few weeks later and told Tom you were together. Lyrics like “I could move in with you and we could get married too.” cut Tom like a knife. He winced every time it played on the radio.

Worry told Tom you and Brad were fighting and falling apart, and he tended to leave that song on a little longer.

Finally, Million Words. A breakup song.

Tom wasn’t very experienced in love, but he wasn’t an idiot. He wasn’t gonna be that guy that tried to win a girl back right after a breakup. He gave you space but when he refreshed your Instagram one day and saw all traces of Brad had been deleted, he decided to reach out.

“Hey.” He wrote.

“hi.” You answered a few seconds later.

“How are you doing?” He sent.

“so you heard?” You replied and Tom let out a little laugh.

“Everyone hears everything in Hollywood, but that’s not what I’m here for.” He wrote.

“then what are you here for?” You wrote back.

“You. I’m here for you.” Tom sent.

“That was lame.” You replied after a minute, and Tom blew breath out of his nostrils.

“If I recall correctly, my lameness was one of the things you loved about me.” Tom messaged. He waited anxiously for a response.

“ew why’d you put “love” in past tense?” You finally answered, and Toms heart skipped a beat.

“Idk we’re broken up I didn’t want to assume.” He texted back.

“never mind. forget I said anything.” you sent.

“Okay. How are you feeling?” He asked.

“better. brad and I have been broken up five months now so I’ve healed.” You replied and Tom smiled to himself.

“I’m glad you’re okay.” Tom sent, then typed out “I miss you”, but he deleted it.

“i’m kinda glad you reached out. i miss you.” You went and Tom nearly threw his phone.

“You do?” He asked.

“we were best friends before we started dating and I thought we always would be. it’s been super weird without you this past year.” You sent. Tom didn’t know how to respond. His thumbs danced over his keyboard until you sent a follow up text. “i don’t like it.”

“Tom, you’re wanted on set.” Someone knocked are his trailer door.

“Listen, I’m on set right now and gotta go but I’m gonna text you later okay?” He sent. “I want to finish this conversation.

“okay” you wrote back, and Tom smiled.

“And btw, I’ve hated every second we’ve been apart.” He sent quickly and left to go on set.

Later that night, Tom got a text.

“are you there?” You sent.

“Always.” He replied.

“can you come over?” You asked, and Tom looked up to Heaven with a smile.

“I’ll be there in ten :)” He sent and quickly put on his shoes. He pulled into your driveway in no time and walked into your house with his spare key.

“Hey.” You came out of the living room in sleep shorts and an old T-shirt. You looked timid and a little worn down.

“Hey.” Tom said back and gave you a gentle smile, which you returned.

“How have you been?” You asked as you took a step closer to him. You rubbed your arms from the cold and Tom wished he was still the one who warmed you up.

“Do you want an honest answer?” Tom laughed halfheartedly.

“Yeah.” You nodded.

“Terrible.” He said, and heard you sigh.

“Why?” You asked lamely. You knew why.

“Because I just had to drive ten minutes to see the love of my life when I used to be able to roll over and see her asleep next to me.” Tom shrugged sadly. He looked small all of the sudden, and your heart began to break as tears stung your eyes.

“What happened to us?” You croaked.

“He did, love.” Tom whispered.

“He didn’t do anything to us. He just magnified problems we were already having.” You said and Tom knew you were right.

“I shouldn’t have gotten jealous or tried to control you. That’s toxic behavior and I know that now. I have no excuse for it.” Tom apologized for the first time and a weight came off his shoulders. All his guilt was coming to light.

“No, you shouldn’t have.” You agreed. But I should have talked to you first before making plans with Brad. I knew it made you uncomfortable but I did it anyway, and I’m sorry for that.”

“I’m sorry too.” Tom sniffled.

“Where do we go from here?” You asked.

“I just want you to come home.” Tom pleaded.

And so you did.

But the songs didn’t stop after you got back with Tom.

The Vamps released Same To You a week after you posted a picture of Tom kissing your cheek on your Instagram, a song asking if the love from your new boyfriend felt the same to you as Brads love did.

The Missing You EP was full of songs about losing your girlfriend and regretting it, making Tom wonder what actually happened between you and Brad. Lyrics like “maybe I should’ve loved harder, checked if you were all right” and “I’m a fool. I let you down, I messed around, I made waves. I’m ashamed.” made it seem like Brad seriously messed up and broke your heart. As much as he wanted to know, he didn’t dare ask. It wasn’t his place. He didn’t need to know how Brad Simpson had broken your heart.

Then, Stay dropped.

It was another song about begging a certain someone to come back and how sorry he was for his mistakes. Tom couldn’t help but notice how longingly you looked at the radio when it played and wondered if Brads songs were the only apology he’d ever given you. Tom felt his chest tighten at the lyrics, “darling, won’t you stay here? I promise I can change” ,and wondered if you had told Brad about the fight you’d had with Tom in the dressing room of the Graham Norton show all those months ago.

Tom never thought too deeply into the song until he saw his name and Brads name in a headline on Clevver News. A picture of you and Tom was in the thumbnail, as well as a picture of you and Brad. He looked around to see if you could hear and clicked the video.

“Watch Brad Simpson change the lyrics to “Stay” to diss Tom Holland in an attempt to win back Y/n L/N.” A perky “news” reporter said at the start of the video. Tom bounced his leg as the video played. He saw a sweaty Brad sitting on a stool with his guitar in his arms.

“And darling if you stay here, it won’t be a mistake. We can hide under the duvet, and Tom will have to wait.” Brad sang and let out a laugh. The audience laughed as well and Brad kept singing.

“Now, if you didn’t catch it, Brad clearly said “Tom will have to wait” instead of “time will have to wait”. Fans were quick to notice this little dig at Tom Holland while other fans denied Brad saying it. What do you think? “Did Brad change the words? Is he still trying to win Y/n back?” The news reported asked. Tom junked when he heard you enter the room.

“What are you watching?” You wrapped your arms around Toms neck from behind and kissed his cheek.

“He’s still singing about you.” Tom grumbled as you rubbed his shoulders, showing you the headline on his phone.

“Let him sing.” You shrugged as you sat in Toms lap, giving him a kiss on the cheek. “I’m right where I’m supposed to be.”

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