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lovelyney · 1 year

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───────𝐆𝐋𝐀𝐒𝐒 𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐓, 𝐆𝐋𝐀𝐒𝐒 𝐁𝐎𝐃𝐘──────

DESC: When your intrusive thoughts win you over, you start withdrawing from everyone, thinking that no one will notice. However, that is far from the truth.

PAIRINGS: Tighnari x (GN!) Reader

SCENT: hurt/comfort

WARNINGS: self-harm, intrusive and suicidal thoughts, mental breakdowns, mentions of hallucinations, blood mentions

FLORIST’S NOTE: each and every flower has its own growing conditions; people are the same when it comes to healing from trauma or mental illness. do not rush yourself. you will bloom, i promise. give. yourself. time.

SONG: Fallen Down ― VGR, CG5

⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯⎯2023 !! #©LOVELYNEY

YOU FLINCHED BITTERLY as you finished off your last Withering Zone for the day—one of the disciples of dismay hitting your upper arm before it fully deteriorated. And since you were dealing with this one by yourself, you’d have to wait until you got back to Gandhara ville to treat it. Wincing in pain, you pressed your hand against the wound and hoped you’d be able to hide until you (semi) safely returned to your house in the ville. The farthest thing you wanted to do at the time was alert Collei and Tighnari, not with how fatigued you were.

As you reached the village, you exhaled a sigh of relief—the sounds of laughter dampening your already bitter mood. Typically, you wouldn’t complain about such a positive thing, but as of late, your mental energy has drained unusually fast, and seeing people live so carelessly when you can’t is a very bittersweet thing.

“(NAME)! You’re back!” Collei hollered and ran over to you, a soft smile gracing her lips as you came in her line of sight. “How’d everything go? You didn’t get hurt, right?”

You pressed your palm harder against your arm, hoping the blood that threatened to seep out wasn’t noticeable. “I’m fine, Collei. Everything went well! I’m just a little tired. . .” You assured, your voice breaking from your exhaustion.

Her eyes softened. “I—I see! I’m glad to hear that. Go ahead and get some rest; I—I’ll tell master Tighnari you’ve returned.”

You smiled feebly, “thanks so much, Collei. I appreciate it.” Bidding the girl a quick goodbye, you strode into your small house, your body about ready to collapse.

You walked into the bathroom and grabbed the necessary supplies to care for the laceration. Your medical knowledge was limited, but luckily, Tighnari gave you an entire lecture on how to cater to different kinds of wounds when you had gotten yourself injured in the forest alone. Gingerly pulling your sleeves up, you tried to tear your eyes away from all the scars that littered your skin. Whenever you looked at your self-injuries, they reminded you how terrible you felt about yourself. People always say scars are evidence that you’re strong, but all yours did was make you feel weak. You wanted to confidently say that you’re passed that part of your life, but truthfully, you started to feel yourself slip back into it. You haven’t mentioned it to anyone, fearing they’re going to label you as “crazy” or simply just water down your feelings to “being dramatic.”

A familiar voice rang out and dragged you back to reality; “(NAME)? Are you in here? Collei told me you weren’t feeling well, so I came to personally see how you’re doing.”

You hurriedly finished up the bandages on your arm. “Coming!” you replied, leaving the bathroom and almost stumbling over your feet from how fast you moved. “H—hi, Tighnari! I’m alright, really. I’m just really tired,” you greeted, your shoulders tense from the ranger’s sudden visit.

Tighnari’s ears and nose twitched as he surveyed your expression. “I smell rubbing alcohol. You’re injured, aren’t you?” He asked curtly, his eyebrows furrowing.

You swallowed thickly, knowing it was far from possible to hide anything from Tighnari. You faltered, “[sighs]. Y—yes. . . But it’s nothing, really! One of the dismays just hit me before the zone fully dispersed.” Hearing your voice out loud made you want to shrink and hide.

Shaking his head dismissively, he stepped closer to you. “(NAME), I’m not worried about how well you performed I’m worried about you. Let me see the—”

“Nono! That—that won’t be necessary. I, um, already treated it. S—so, it’s fine now!” You blurted, your face burning with fear. You hadn’t shown anyone your self-harm scars, and you feared what he’d think of you if he did see them. You swallowed the lump in your throat and continued talking. “Y—you don’t have to worry about me. I’m fine, really. . .”

Tighnari’s ears lowered as he stared you down with a melancholy gaze. The biting fear in your (COLOR) eyes and voice had nearly caused his heart to jump out of his ribcage. He could clearly tell something was wrong, but he didn’t want to push his luck.

“[sighs]. Alright, I’ll trust your word. . . But if anything’s bothering you, physically or mentally, please don’t hesitate to come find me, alright? I really don’t mind taking care of you, (NAME).” Confided the ranger, softening his voice to ease a little of your apprehension.

Letting out a quiet breath of relief, you flopped down on your bed, your mattress bringing you some much-needed comfort. “Mhm. Thanks, Tighnari. . .” you muttered, your voice monotonous from your lack of energy.

He sighed and ran his fingers through his hair. It felt wrong to leave you alone when you clearly weren’t well, but maybe all you needed was some quality sleep. “Alright, I’ll leave you to rest. Sleep well, rosebud.” He spoke before leaving quietly, making sure to close the door behind him.

Through your bitter emotions, you brightened up a little at the nickname he’d given you. “Rosebud, huh. . .” you thought and closed your eyes, mind weighing heavy with uneasiness for an unknown cause.

“Will I ever have a chance to fully blossom?”

You hugged your pillow tighter against your body as sunlight enveloped your room through your flowered curtains. It seemed your hypothesis from yesterday was correct; you were spiraling downwards back into your depression, judging by your lack of unwillingness to get up despite sleeping like a log the entire night.

Fluttering open your (COLOR) eyes, you peered up at your ceiling with a distant look. You doubted anyone came in to check on you; you didn’t consider yourself to be of significance to them. So it was natural they didn’t care, right?

Being alone with your intrusive thoughts with nothing else but the sound of the wind was excruciating—torture even. Whereas no matter what you did to try and move, the shackles that restrained you didn’t budge. Though you remembered how careless you’ve been with the withering zones and thought you maybe deserved to be alone—to feel the crushing weight of everything you thought you did wrong.

Tears clouded in your eyes and fell down as the thoughts multiplied. And with each one, the light in your eyes that once rivaled the sun dulled to rival the twilight that washed over teyvat during the night.

KNOCK. KNOCK

“(NAME). . .? Are—are you feeling alright? You haven’t left your room at all today. . .” Collei’s warm voice asked on the other side of the door.

You jolted up and frantically rubbed your eyes, hoping to rid the evidence that showed you’d been crying. “Y—yeah, I’m in here! Sorry, I ended up oversleeping. . . Do you need me for something?” You answered and tossed your legs over the side of your bed.

She shook her head, “no no! Um, Tighnari specifically told me that you should spend today getting all the rest you need. So you oversleeping is not an issue at all!” Her eyes followed down to your injury. “H—how’s your arm feeling?”

You winced as you remembered yesterday’s events. You murmured, “ah, an—about that. . . I’m sorry for hiding it from you. I—I didn’t want you to worry.”

Collei offered you an apologetic smile. “Please don’t apologize! I—I’m just glad you treated it. . .” she reassured. Her smile fell when she regarded your puffy eyes and wet cheeks. “(NAME). . . Are—are you sure you’re feeling okay? You look so drained. . . You know you can always come to master Tighnari or me if anything’s bothering you, r—right?” Worried the trainee.

“She’s lying to make you feel better. Nobody actually cares about you.”

“All you do is make things worse. You’re nothing but a burden to everyone around you.”

Biting back another tsunami of tears, you cleared your throat and compelled a weak smile. “I appreciate that, Collei. But I promise I’m alright! I just, um, need to lay down for a bit more. . .” you said feebly. “Way to go; you made it sound like you’re trying to get rid of her. Now she’s sure to hate you.”

She nodded understandingly, her expression warm and gentle. She insisted, “t—that’s perfectly fine, (NAME)! I’ll leave so you can rest, b—but please come get someone if you feel the need to!”

You watched her leave with a sigh, your gaze lingering on your bedside drawer. “I should at least change clothes. . .” You uttered and picked out some comfier-looking clothes to throw on. As you dressed, your eyes continued to fixate on one of your drawers. “Well, what’re you waiting for? Go on, do it.” You fell on your bed and tightly shut your eyes, mustering up all your strength to ignore your thoughts.

Meanwhile, Collei strutted up to Tighnari and tapped his shoulder, the nervous feeling in her stomach increasing. “H—hey master Tighnari. . . Are you busy right now? T—there’s something I want to talk to you about.” She hesitated, her eyes fleeting back to your house every now and then.

The fennec’s ears wiggled as he turned around, immediately noticing her anxious countenance. “No, I’m not. What’s wrong? Is it about (NAME)?” He inquired. He wasn’t certain why you were the first thing that came to mind; maybe because he was already so worried about you. Seing her nod, Tighnari’s stomach flipped upside down. “They’re. . . they’re not doing well, are they?”

Collei’s eyes glossed over with tears as she shook her head. “I’m worried about them, Master. . . Like really worried. They kept pressing they were okay, but the look in their eyes felt so. . . numb and impassive,” she explained.

Tighnari stressfully sighed as he tried to think of the best way to confront the situation without hurting you. He didn’t want to press you to say anything you weren��t comfortable with, but he also didn’t want you going through this alone. “Alright. Collei, could you take my place in this week’s outings? Normally I would have you watch over them, but I’d rather take care of them myself in this particular case. . .” Requested the boy, his ears drooping as his heart hammered against his chest. Her statement about you having a numb look in your eyes gravely worried him.

“Of course! Do you want me to go tell the others?”

He nodded, “that’d be great. . . Thanks a lot, Collei.”

Your back pushed against the wall as your head dropped further into your hands. You don’t know why you thought sleeping would magically fix everything. It didn’t help that you felt incredibly abandoned, despite being surrounded by people. People who, deep down inside, you knew cared and would help you without a doubt if you were to just ask. But each time you even considered asking for help, a mocking voice would belittle you for even thinking someone loved you. After hearing it so many times, you think you’d be able to successfully ignore it, but no. Instead, it dragged you farther down inside the grave you put yourself in. And the worse part was that there was no one around to help pull you back up, making the desire to give up increasingly stronger.

“Then why don’t you do it? It’s not like anyone here would care anyways.” A distorted, yet incredibly familiar, voice whispered in your ear.

Lifting your head up to look up, your entire body stiffened as you saw what looked like a hazy deformity of Tighnari. Even though you knew it wasn’t actually him, your mentality was shattered, and so was your sense of reality, so it got into your head with a snap of a finger; what worsened it was that it sounded exactly like him. You closed your eyes and covered your ears, striving to slow your rapid heart rate and clear your mind. “Go away. . .” you thought, fingernails digging into your skin.

“Why don’t you give up and make everyone’s job easier? You know you aren’t wanted here. Your only chance at being useful is to just rid yourself, so you’re not in everybody’s way.”

Shakily forcing yourself up, you staggered into the kitchen—feeling like the only way to quiet your thoughts was to harm yourself. You promised yourself you wouldn’t put yourself through this again, but you’d instead do that than cave into your thoughts.

Somehow, you clung to the last drop of hope that lingered inside your head—the hope that desperately called, “hang on just a little longer, and I promise everything’s going to be okay; YOU’RE going to be okay.”

Tighnari ambled to your front door, ears pressed tightly against his head as he knocked. “(NAME)? Can I come in? If you’re feeling well enough to talk, there’s something I’d like to ask. . .” He called gently. His ears flicked up and picked up the sound of your crying. Throat tightening, he knocked again, this time more urgently, hating every second wasted by not being with you. “(NAME), if you don’t open this door, I will find another way in! Let me help you, please!” Shouted the ranger, trying desperately to turn the doorknob. “Fuck this. No way in hell am I leaving them alone in there.” he thought before lock-picking your window and sliding inside.

“(NAME)!” he yelled as he raced inside the kitchen, finding you with a kitchen knife in your hands—blood dripping down your arms and covering the tip of the blade. It felt like a life or death situation as he stepped closer, never once taking his eyes off you. You looked so fragile as if you could completely break at one wrong action or word. “(NAME). . . Please, put—put the knife down.” Tighnari pleaded and bit his lip, trying his best to keep it together for your sake. “I’m here now. You don’t have to bear through this alone any longer. . .”

Your head suddenly fell silent at the sound of his concerned and hopeless tone—a prominent distinction from the one your hallucination had given him. Your strength left your body, and you dropped the knife, tears flooding your (COLOR) eyes and falling down endlessly.

The second the knife hit the floor, Tighnari rushed to your side and dragged you into an embrace, letting you cry into his shoulder. His hand firmly held the back of your head as he rocked you back and forth, terrified you’d drop dead at any moment. He murmured, “it’s okay, rosebud. . . I’m here now. Nothing can hurt you. . .” His turquoise eyes fell to the floor, giving the knife a sharp kick, sending it skating across the floor. Feeling you latch onto his hoodie, he pulled you tighter against him, careful not to hit your bloodied arms.

Every bottled-up emotion you had exploded just like that—each and every self-destructive thought twisted into a heavy sob. And with each one, your knees caved further and further in til’ you couldn’t stand upright.

Tighnari was quick to catch you before your body hit the floor, his arms soon finding their way around you again. He stayed quiet, however, pressing small pecks to your forehead to show you that he was there—that he cared. He hadn’t heard such gut-wrenching sobs in all his life, and to hear it from you, his favorite person, made him want to cry.

After a few minutes, your cries quieted to sniffles, and eventually, you had utterly enfeebled yourself. Tighnari showed a faint smile, “alright, rosebud. I’m going to carry you to my house so I can properly care for your wounds. Close your eyes and rest for a while, okay? I can see how tired you are. . . I’ll be right with you when you first wake, I promise.”

You gave a weak nod and leaned your head against his chest, finally deciding to give your mind and body a proper rest.

You stirred awake, head throbbing and memories blurred, to the sensation of someone gently patting your face with a cold washcloth. “Hmmn. . .” you muttered groggily, your eyes refusing to open.

“You’re awake. . . How’re you feeling?” Tighnari asked from beside you and set the cloth down, his gaze now fully fixed on you. “Do you need/want anything?”

Your breath hitched as you recalled what happened. Looking down, you noticed your arms, both sore, were neatly swathed in bandages. “I—I feel so numb. I’m—I’m so sorry, Tighnari. . .”

He shook his head and handed you a cup of a calming tea he had put together. “Rosebud, please. You have no reason to apologize. I should be the one saying sorry. I felt something was off with you and brushed it off.” He lamented, carefully caressing your cheek and brushing away the tears in your eyes. “You don’t have to tell me anything you don’t want to, okay? Just know that you’re safe here—both from the outside and yourself. Nothing’s happening to you under my watch.”

You took a trembling breath as you sipped the tea. The intensity of his love made you feel small as he stared at you. “I’m sorry I never told you of my past with this. . . I promised myself I wouldn’t do it again, but everything got so loud—my thoughts, the world, everything. It hurt so much, Tighnari. . . So much that it manifested a hallucination of you. I—I was so scared and so alone. I tried so hard to cry for help, but it was like I lost my ability to talk. . .” You described.

Tighnari’s large ears twitched slightly as he carefully listened to every word you expressed, ensuring he understood everything before offering input. As he pondered what to say, his eyes dropped to your bandaged arms. The idea you’ve already gone through this process alone made him sick.

He mused, “(NAME) it’s your story to tell, not mine. In no way am I mad at you for not telling me of this sooner. . . I’m proud of you for speaking about it even now, given it’s something you’d rather not reminisce about. . .”

“I can tell by looking at you that you’ve been through so much. I know you might think otherwise, but you’re so strong. Despite going through hell and back, you remain incredibly empathetic and caring. Do you know how impressive that is?

“I can guarantee you that whatever bullshit your mind fed these last three days is only food for your depression; that’s it. I can’t stress enough how much everyone here adores you—including me. rosebud, you’re so incredibly beautiful, from the inside and out. The way you flourish and flower is something I wish I could see every day. The thought of you wilting, let alone by your own hands, terrifies me. Archons, (NAME), you might not see it, but you’re perfect in every way.”

Tighnari finished and kissed the pads of your fingers, watching as your eyes glazed over with tears.

Each word echoed in your head until your mentality began to heal. You hadn’t realized how badly you needed to feel someone’s arms around you until he pulled you in his and kissed away the tears that fell from your (COLOR) eyes.

You rested your head against his chest, racking through your brain to try and think of something to say. “What—what did you mean when you said you adored me. . .?” You mumbled. “Really (NAME)? That’s what you come up with?”

Tighnari laughed warmly as his fingers smoothed your (COLOR) hair. “Is that what’s gotten you so quiet? Well, rosebud, I mean exactly what I say. I adore you. Collei always tells me how obvious my feelings for you are, but I didn’t want to rush anything between us, especially with how you’re feeling now. But I have an inkling that the reason why your depression chose me to manifest is because you feel the same. . .” He cooed.

You fell silent as thoughts swarmed your mind, none of which proved helpful in your situation. “Come on, (NAME)! Say something!” you thought and bit your lip. “Y—you might be right. . .” you replied quietly, slipping your fingers into his.

Tighnari smiled and pressed his lips to the back of your hand. “That so? Good, because I took the rest of the week off to look after you, and you’re going to stay at my house for that time.”

“That’s fine with me, but where am I going to sleep? I—I don’t want to kick you off your bed. . .” You wondered.

He chuckled, tail wrapping around your waist comfortably. “You’re sleeping with me, silly. That way, I can keep an eye on you and make sure you’re sleeping alright. Judging by the circles under your eyes, you’ve been struggling. . .” He hummed and started to rub circles on your side. “I already moved most of your things here while you slept; do you have anything that helps you sleep better at night? I’m going to have you drink a calming tea beforehand, but do you have a certain routine you need to do?”

You smiled a genuine smile, his calming and caring demeanor soothing your doubts. “No. . . I think having you by my side will be enough. . . Thank you, Tighnari. I—I appreciate it so much.”

“Oh, (NAME). . . You don’t have to thank me in the slightest. I’d do this 10 times over if you asked. I’d do just about anything for you. . .”

#|✿| — 𝐅𝐀𝐖𝐍’𝐒 𝐅𝐋𝐎𝐖𝐄𝐑𝐒 #|✿| — 𝐏𝐀𝐃𝐈𝐒𝐀𝐑𝐀𝐇𝐒 #|✿| — 𝐅𝐑𝐀𝐆𝐈𝐋𝐄 #genshin impact x you #genshin impact #genshin impact x y/n #genshin impact x reader #tighnari #tighnari oneshot #tighnari x y/n #tighnari x reader #tighnari x you #hurt/comfort #tighnari comfort

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her-power · 4 months

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The End of All Things (Part Four: e.m. x fem reader)

TRIGGER WARNING & C/W: 18++++ MDNI!!! Sweet! Eddie, hurt/comfort, grief, talk of grief, fluff, heavy drug use, suicidal thoughts, talk of death/dying, lots of crying, lots of swearing, some smut, unprotected p+v, trauma

Part One: Denial Part Two: Anger Part Three: Bargaining

Summary: Relationships are tested, choices are made, words hurt, and you might end up kicking Eddie Munson's ass. Full plot summary is on part one of this series.

Word Count: 8.6k

A/N: I also submitted an original sketch in this part. It's been years since I have drawn something so it's not great and I fucking forgot how hard it is to draw hands and draw a person lmao but I wanted to give you guys a little added bonus to this series.

A/N #2: This part was a bit rough for me to write, but also super healing in a way. I felt like I was looking into the eyes of all of my friends as I was writing this and just remembering things after so many years since losing my mom. Part Five will be released after the holidays, I need a bit of a break to be with my family and be prepared for the griefy feels. I love you all, thank you for giving me a platform to be creative and to heal. <3

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Eddie was pacing in the break room of the record store; inhaling deeply on his cigarette as he tried to gather his thoughts. The trip back home was uneventful, you had stayed at the Inn in Philadelphia for a night again. He had noticed a change in you after the cemetery. It was subtle changes; you would be unusually quiet, but then you would snap out of it and that big, beautiful smile he loved so much would appear. You were tired a lot; Eddie had noticed the bags under your eyes as the weeks went by. He knew you weren’t sleeping. Even when he would stay in the same bed as you, he knew you only pretended to be asleep. When you thought he was asleep, he would hear you rummage around in the kitchen, or go sit out on the porch, smoking a joint.

Then it hit the two-month mark, and you were starting to terrify him. Summer was almost over, you had lost interest in things you loved to do, like painting, singing, reading. You would go to work, come home, stay awake, sleep, and then go to work again.

Eddie would try to get you to talk to him, but you would shut down, blocking out anything and everything around you.

He plops on the chair, his leg bobbing nervously, cigarette dangling out of his mouth. He stood up and started pacing again, he couldn’t sit.

Eddie had called the realtor two weeks ago; she had a kind voice and gave him useful information and advice when it came to potentially buying a house. He was also curious why there weren’t any hits on the house, it had been on the market for a while and parts of it had been redone but no one was interested in buying it. She told him it was a mystery to her as well, there was nothing aesthetically wrong with the house, the foundation was perfect, the roof was brand new, but no one seemed to care for it. The owners had lowered their price five thousand dollars under the asking price, and there was still no jump.

He had been saving money here and there for a couple years; he would call it his emergency fund. But when he had saw how you looked at your childhood home, how your eyes lit up with nostalgia and joy, he knew what he had to do.

He was doing everything in his power to get enough money for the down payment on the house; he had mentioned the plan to your father. Eddie had thought he would think he was crazy, that neither one of you could afford to live in a house, let alone a mortgage. Instead, he asked Eddie how much he needed. Eddie didn’t want anything, he told him, just support. Your father then said something to him that he will never forget.

“I have two loves in my life: my wife, and my daughter. Some people aren’t lucky enough to have that happen to them. Some dad’s leave, some do stupid shit and some die. I love my daughter with all my heart, but I don’t want her to feel stuck here. I don’t want her to worry about me or worry about what my future holds. I don’t want her to stop her life because her mother died. I’m gonna be okay. I’m going through it, and I’m always going to, but I’m okay. I’m practically an old man, I lived my life, and it was beautiful. It’s still beautiful, but I’m not gonna fully rest until I know that my daughter will be okay. And if she stays here, she won’t be.” He swallows, taking off his glasses to clean the lenses. “Now, I’m asking you how much you need not as a charity. But as a man, looking at a kid I watched grow up to become a man and fall in love with my daughter, who has been by her side through all of this. Wiped her tears, fed her, laugh with her. My daughter loved that house, and the fact that you didn’t even hesitate to call the realtor speaks volumes just what kind of man you are. You want to see her happy, and you are a big part of her happiness. I couldn’t have asked for a better man to love my daughter. I know her mother would agree. So, you’re gonna tell me a number, and I’m gonna do my best to give it to you. Don’t fight me on this.”

Eddie had almost sobbed right there; it was one of the nicest things anyone has ever said to him. He told him a number, and your father said to give him two weeks. Part of him still didn’t want to take it, but he knew if he didn’t, your father would give the whole thing to the realtor.

He had lit up another cigarette and blew his bangs out of his face. He had called you a few hours ago; you had the day off and planned on taking a nap. Eddie had told you he had found this certain type of acrylic paint you had needed and asked if he wanted to pick it up for you. You had thanked him but said no, and the rest of the phone call was uncomfortable silence.

“Munson!” Sully’s booming voice comes echoing into the break room.

Eddie sighs. “What?”

Sully peeks his head in, his large frame would intimidate most people, especially since he had an enormous throat tattoo, but Sully was a big teddy bear. He was a businessman second, and a father to two beautiful little girls first. “You good, kid?”

“Yeah, I’m fine.” He inhales on his cigarette and puts it out in the ashtray.

“Any word from her?” Sully was asking about you, and Eddie had told him he spoke to you a while ago. “How’s the money saving going?”

Eddie had told Sully about his plans, and he was more than onboard with it. He said he was close to the owner of the record store on Newbury St in Boston, that he had put in a good word for him, and the owner was more than happy to welcome him into the store when he was ready. The record store in Boston was two floors, both floors had rows of records, and the bottom floor had a little sound stage where locals would perform for a monthly open mic night.

Eddie had gone back on the floor with a tote of jazz vinyls, he sat in the aisle and organized the records by artist. Robin had come to visit, had sat on the floor with him, passing him each artist he asked for.

“I’m worried about her.” Robin says suddenly, looking up to meet Eddie’s eyes. Eddie glances at her and goes back to moving around the vinyls, swallowing hard.

“Me too.” Eddie says softly.

“Has she said anything? When I saw her at the Hideout last week, she looked like a walking zombie for Pete’s sake.” Robin looks up at him, he shook his head, staring at his hands, the skull ring on his middle finger. He fingers it gently. “Are you alright, man?”

“Not really.” He laughs tiredly and looks at her. “She won’t talk to me about how she’s feeling. She’ll talk to me about everything else but that.”

“What happened at the cemetery?” She asked gently.

Eddie shakes his head, running his hands over his face. “A breaking point, I think.”

“Jesus.” She mutters. “What do we do? Intervention? Get a priest? I don’t know how this shit works; I’ve never had someone close to me die before. Is there a rule book? Do we just not say anything and let her be stubborn and just slowly disappear until she’s whittled down to nothing, and we just glue her back together and tell her we love her but what if at that point it’s too late and we can’t—"

Eddie kneels in front of Robin, gently holding her face. “Hey, breathe, dude. Deep breaths.”

“I don’t want anything to happen to her.” Robin tells him quietly, her eyes filling with tears as she looks at her friend. “Why did this have to happen?”

Eddie caresses her head, gently patting her and pulls her in for a hug. “I don’t know.” He mutters. He was so tired of saying it, tired of saying he didn’t know, because it sounded so fucking simple, but it wasn’t.

“Why doesn’t she want to talk to us? We’re her friends, she shouldn’t have to suffer alone.” Robin looks up at him and he sighs, gently knocking her chin.

“I’m going over there after work. I don’t care if she hates me, I need to at least get an idea of what’s going on.” He leans back against the shelves, leaning his arms on his bent knees and Robin wipes her face.

“How are you holding up?” Eddie looks at her. “With all of this? Losing her too?”

Eddie gives her a sad smile. “Would you believe if I told you I was fine?”

“No.” She smirks at him.

“It’s a surreal feeling honestly.” He realizes he hasn’t spoken about this with anyone, even you. “The only time I ever experienced some sort of loss was when my dad went to prison, but fuck him, he can rot there for all I care. But he’s still alive, she’s not. I’m still trying to process how someone can be here one minute, living, breathing, and then just be…dead.” He shrugs, realizing he’s crying and quickly wipes his tears away, he almost laughs. “See? I don’t even notice I’m crying, it’s stupid.”

“No, it’s not.” Robin says, reaching over to squeeze his knee. “You’re going through it too.”

“Yeah, but I feel like I shouldn’t.” He sniffles, wiping his nose with the back of his hand. “She wasn’t my mother.”

Robin gives him a sweet smile. “No, but she was the next best thing to you.”

He sighs, shaking his head, another tear falls down his cheek. “There’s just so much pain in her. I can feel it.”

He points to his heart, “I see how much pain she’s in and I want to take all of it, so she doesn’t have to, I’d rather suffer with it for the rest of my life, then watch someone like her go through that when she didn’t deserve it. Her mother didn’t deserve to die. I guess no one does, even the shitty ones.”

“Nah, the shitty ones deserve it.” Robin laughs and Eddie chuckles. “You really love her, huh?”

Eddie nods and he sighs, looking into her eyes. “I have to tell you something.”

Eddie tells her his entire plan, about the house, about your father helping him with some of the down payment. He told her about going to see your childhood home, how it’s been on the market since June, and no one is interested. He told her that if his plan works, he’s gonna ask you to marry him the first night you sleep in the house, and that was the first time he has said it out loud. Robin cried happy tears, followed by punching him in the arm.

“You guys are leaving me!”

“Ow!” Eddie laughs, rubbing his arm. “It’s not even set in stone yet.”

“Dude, you know it’s gonna be!” Robin smiles, pulling him in for a hug. “I’m happy for you, but I’m gonna fucking miss you, man.”

Eddie kisses the top of her head, rubbing her shoulder. “Yeah, I’ll miss you too.”

“Steve is gonna be devastated.”

“Nah he’ll be fine.” Eddie jokes. “Yeah, I know. His little boy is growing up.”

“That sounds so gross when you say it like that.”

***

Eddie had driven to your house after closing the store; your car was still in the driveway and the outside lights were on. Your father had gone to Jimmy’s for the weekend, and he had called Eddie at the store to make sure he planned on going over there. Your father didn’t say it, but he was worried about you too.

Eddie walks into the house, hearing the television playing in the living room. He peeks his head into the living and sees your form curled up on the couch, a knitted blanket over you with your hood over your head. It was freezing in the house, Eddie had saw you set the air conditioner to 60 degrees. The only source of light was from the television, it was nick at nite and I Love Lucy was playing. Eddie notices the three empty beer bottles on the coffee table, a half smoked joint, and a bottle of aspirin. He quietly clears the table, dumping out the remaining beer from the bottles in the sink and tossing them in the recycling. He washes his hands and heads back to the living room; he squats on the side of the couch where you were laying, leaning forward to kiss your cheeks softly and caress your head. You stir, opening your eyes, meeting Eddie’s and you smile softly.

“Hey baby.” Eddie says sweetly to you, rubbing your cheek.

“Hey.” Your voice is groggy, and you sit up a little, stretching. “What time is it?” You pull your hood down, rubbing the sleep from your eyes.

“A little after ten. Go back to sleep, I just wanted you to know I was here.” He kisses the top of your hand, and you lean into him to kiss his lips.

“No, it’s okay, I feel like I haven’t seen you.” You lay back on the couch pillow, reaching out your hand to cup his cheek. Eddie put his hand over yours, and scans your face, he hated how tired you looked. Your hair was in a messy braid over your shoulder, you looked like you had been crying for hours before he got there.

And your eyes.

Eddie inhales a shaky breath as he looks in your eyes and sees that the light that was once there, was gone. You notice his staring.

“What?” You ask with a smile.

“Nothing.” He shakes his head, getting up and sitting next to you, lifting your legs to drape them over his lap. “I just missed you today.”

You smile, reaching over to entwine your fingers. Eddie leans his head back on the couch, gently rubbing massaging circles around your thighs as you both stare at the television.

Eddie feels you shudder under his touch, so he stops.

Apparently, you didn’t want him to stop, because the next thing that happens is you straddling him, pressing your lips to his in a passionate kiss. He holds your waist tightly and groans when you grind yourself against his jeans. You pull off your hoodie, wearing only a lace bra and you deepen the kiss again.

Talk to her, idiot! Eddie is saying to himself, and he moans in response when your teeth graze his throat. She knows exactly what she’s doing, she’s avoiding, she knows how she looks, stop kissing her and talk to her!

Eddie’s conscious screams at him but he continues to kiss you, continues to touch your skin. His skin prickles with goosebumps when your hand touches his stomach above his jeans. Your hand slides down into his pants, grasping his hard length in your hand and Eddie moans loudly.

You’re a stupid fuck! Snap out of it, dummy!

“Wait, wait, wait.” Eddie finally says breathlessly against your lips. “Stop, stop.”

You pull away from him, removing your hand as if it burned. You stare at him with confusion and concern that you may have hurt him. Eddie runs his hands over his face, leaning forward on his knees. “We need to talk.”

“Don’t like that.” You say softly, laughing a little, your heart was racing.

“No, it’s not that kind of talk.” Eddie gives you a sad smile, taking your hand in his and rubbing his thumb over your skin. “You’re starting to scare me.”

You pause, staring at his face. “What? What do you mean?”

Eddie looks at you, really looks at you. “You know what I mean.”

You pull your hand away from his and he sighs, he can already feel you pulling away, he can see it in your eyes too. “Eddie, I’m fine.”

Frustration rose in his chest, and he wants to laugh but he doesn’t, he scoffs instead. “Is that a lie you’re telling me or telling yourself? Do you really think you’re fine?”

She blinks, her eyes already widening with tears. “I’m not lying, Eddie.”

“When was the last time you ate? When was the last time you did something you actually enjoyed? Because for two months, you have been disappearing in front of my eyes.” His own tears were filling his eyes, and he blinks them away. “You need to talk to me.”

“And say what? What do you want me to say, Eddie?” You raise your voice.

“Fucking anything!” He gets up from the couch and paces. You watch him with sad eyes. “Jesus Christ; I know you’re hurting; I know you’re in pain, I can clearly see that but all I’m asking is for you to talk to me. I told you I’m here for you, but instead you’re pushing me away!”

“Okay. You want me to talk? Let’s talk.” Your bottom lip trembles as you look up at him and toss your hoodie back over your body. “Every single damn day I am praying that I don’t wake up in this life, and I wake up in the next because I am tired. I am so tired, Eddie. When I sleep, I don’t feel this fucking throbbing pain in my chest like I feel right now. When I sleep, I have dreams instead of nightmares now and I see her. I see her and she’s alive and I want to stay there. I physically cannot stand to look at myself in the mirror because of how fucked up I look. I don’t tell you these things because it’s not your fucking job to heal me, it’s no one’s job.”

Eddie stands there stunned, his fingers clench around his chest, a lump forms in his throat, and a breath escapes him. “You’re telling me, that every day you pray you don’t wake up? How the fuck do you think that makes me feel?!”

“You wanted to talk!” You snap at him. “You wanted the truth so I’m telling you!”

Tears form in his eyes as he stares at you. “Do you have any idea what that would do to me if I lost you? I mean, fuck, I feel like I’m almost there just by how you’ve been lately. It would destroy me if something happened to you. It would kill me. And you pray for that every day?”

You stand up from the couch, grabbing the joint from the table and lighting it quickly; you inhale and let the smoke billow from your nostrils. “I don’t want to die Eddie.”

“Then what the fuck are you saying to me?!” He yells, tears spilling from his eyes.

“I’m saying I don’t want to feel this pain anymore! If I could cut it out of me without bleeding out I would do it! If I could swallow a bunch of pills just to get rid of it and be okay, I would do it! I don’t want to die; I want to kill this part of me that feels all this pain and guilt and fucking grief and just be done with it!” You yell at him, hot tears stream down your face. “So yeah, I pray for it.”

Eddie runs his hands over his mouth, a small sob escaping him as he stares at you. “Why haven’t you told me this?” His voice is so full of pain, it kills you.

“Because it’s not your job to heal me.”

“It is if I want to spend the rest of my life with you!” He cries and your breath hitches. “Fuck! I want it all with you. I want you; I want the marriage, I want those babies with you, I want a fucking house in the suburbs with a damn dog! Hell, maybe even a cat. But I meant it when I said that when I look to the future, you’re in it. And right now; I feel like you’re telling me you don’t want any of that.”

“Of course, I do.” You say quietly, averting your eyes, wiping away your tears.

“I don’t think you do.” Eddie’s hand goes over his heart again, feeling it slowly break.

“You’re not inside my head, okay?” You snap at him and point to your temple. “It’s a fucking mess in here. Why would you want to be with someone for the rest of your life who can’t even take a shower? Who has a devil and angel on her shoulder, one telling her it’s okay to feel all this pain and the other telling her, grab those drugs from a few months ago! You won’t feel a goddamn thing!”

“Hold on a minute, you told me you didn’t have any left.” He was big mad; you could see it in his eyes.

“I lied.” You meet his eyes, and he lets out a laugh.

“I know exactly what you’re trying to do and hate to break it to you, sweetheart. It’s not gonna work.” He wipes his eyes and his nose. “Did you do it?”

“No.” You whisper.

“Go get it then.” Eddie sneers and you look at him like he slapped you. “If you want to do it, numb your pain that way, fucking doit. I’ll do it with you. It will be a Kodak fucking moment.”

“No. Eddie what the fu—"

“Why? You want to kill that part of yourself, right? Why don’t you kill it slowly with the drugs? Better yet, I’ll go find the guy that supplied the shit that I had, and I’ll go on a fucking ride.” He heads towards the door, tears still running down his face, his eyes wild. You follow him and grab his arm.

“Eddie, stop it! That could fucking kill you!”

“Just a small part of me.” Eddie says, his tone cold.

You let go of his arm, eyes narrowing. “Oh, fuck you!”

“Stings, doesn’t it?”

“What are you doing!? Why are you acting like this?!” You yell through your tears.

“Because you’re not the only one who lost her!” It’s out of his mouth before he could stop himself. Your eyes are wide, glistening with tears. He stares at you, rubbing his palm over his lips. “I cannot imagine the pain you feel right now. But I look at you and I can feel it radiate it from you, every single day. The light in your eyes is gone. And it’s because you choose to suffer with this grief alone.”

You step back from him, shaking your head as you stare at him. “You know what? You need to go. Get out.”

“You think I’m gonna leave after what you just told me? You’re out of your mind.” He crosses his arms over his chest.

“You are a fucking asshole!” Your eyes are wide, wild. You open the front door. “I don’t care if you sleep outside in your van, you need to get away from me!” Tears are pouring down your cheeks as you throw open the front door, you look up at him. “You promised me you wouldn’t push. You promised.”

“I guess we’re both liars then.” His big brown eyes match your same wild ones, and you squeeze your eyes shut.

“Please. Just go. Go away.”

“I’m not leaving you.” Eddie says through his gritted teeth.

“I want you to! I don’t want to see you! I don’t want to be in the same room as you! Get the fuck out of my house! Get out or I’m calling the fucking cops!”

He stares at you hard. “You wouldn’t do that.”

“I wouldn’t? I’ll just say the magic words, town freak, right?”

His breath hitches and he felt his heart snap in two. Those words have haunted him for five years, and you used it as ammunition, you aimed, and fired. He looks out to his van and then back at you, his face turns from sadness to full on anger. “Fine. Go ahead and suffer alone.”

He walks away from you, you slam the door shut, and slide down to the floor. Your breathing accelerates and you sob into your hands. You did it, you actually did it. You just took the last ten years, wrapped it up in a ball and threw it in the dumpster.

Eddie hops into his van, not even bothering to put his seat belt on and peels out of your driveway. He doesn’t even know where he’s going, he just drives. His heart was pounding, behind his eyes stung, he felt like he had his entire body was vibrating. He passes the Leaving Hawkins sign and keeps driving until he’s on a dark stretch of road; he pulls over to the side and turns the car off. He leans his forehead against the steering wheel, his breathing picking up, his hands grip the wheel in a white-knuckle grip. He leans back, punching his dashboard not once, not twice, but three times, and he screams, the sound so guttural, so full of pain, full of anger. “Fuuuuuuck!!!!!!!”

He sobs, hard. His body trembling as every single emotion that he had bottled up these last few months finally made its way to the surface. He shouldn’t have pushed, he knows that, but he’s glad he did. If he didn’t, he wouldn’t have known how bad you were hurting, but it didn’t matter now. You told him to go, so he did. He takes a cigarette out, lights it and inhales, his breath trembling as the smoke comes out. He didn’t want to feel like this anymore, he needed to feel something else other than this pain, and he felt like a goddamn hypocrite when he turns on the van, driving to Indianapolis to a spot where he knew he’d be able to get rid of his pain. It didn’t matter now, none of it mattered, he was just pulling the strings to his own destruction.

He completely disassociated on the ride to the city; he doesn’t even remember putting on music. He goes down a side street, trying to remember if he’s in the right spot, and when he sees the neon BEER sign, he knew he reached his destination. He only knew about this place because of his dad, he had brought him here when he was last out of prison. In every corner of the bar, someone was snorting something, drinking something, smoking something. He parks the van and gets out; as soon as he opens the door to the bar he is hit with aromas of weed, cigarette smoke, and stale beer. It wasn’t that crowded, and Eddie was glad. He sits on the stool at the bar, the bartender was an older woman, maybe in her late fifties, with kind eyes and a sweet smile.

“What can I get you, honey?” She asks sweetly, placing a napkin in front of him.

“Whiskey, please, straight.” He hands her a twenty-dollar bill, which she hesitates to take, but does anyway.

She places the glass in front of him, and he brings the rim of the glass to his lips, knocking the whole thing back. He winces at the bitter taste and twirls his finger around asking for another. She refills his glass, and he nurses this one.

“You look like you’ve been trekking through a war zone there, sweetheart.” She tells him gently, leaning against the bar, shining a glass.

Eddie meets her eyes. “I don’t want to talk about it.”

“I’m not gonna pry, I’m just not sure if you’ve come to the wrong place or the right place.” She gently pats his hand and goes down to the other side of the bar to talk to the other patrons. Eddie glances around the bar, and his eyes fix on a booth in the corner. There’s a man speaking to a woman with their heads bowed, she couldn’t have been much younger than Eddie, she was strikingly beautiful, but had very sad eyes, he notices the exchange. The man had put something in her hand, and she walks away from him, leaving the bar. The man notices Eddie staring and nods at him with a smile, Eddie nods back, looking away from him. He stares at his glass, twirling it in his fingers, the brown liquid moves side to side as he stares at the glass. He turns his head to look over his shoulder, the man was still there, quietly sipping his beer, looking up at the television that had some sort of sports game on.

Eddie knocks the rest of his second drink back and gets up from the stool. He feels the hair prickle on the back of his neck as he walks towards the man. The man looks at him and smiles, leaning back in his seat. He looked like a washed-up version of Robert DeNiro, a little intimidating, otherwise he seemed nice.

Eddie takes out his hand and the man takes it. “Hi, I’m Eddie.”

“Leon.” He sounded southern, Eddie thought. “What can I do for you?”

“I don’t know, what do you got?” Eddie asks, already feeling the effects of the drugs that he didn’t even take yet. That’s how much he loved it the first time he tried it, and that was by accident. Again, it didn’t matter anymore.

Puppet.

“Uppers, downers, china white—"

Pulling the strings.

“How much for the China white?”

Destruction.

Eddie had driven back to the county line outside of Hawkins and had parked in an abandoned fishing spot. The only source of light was from the moon reflecting off the pond, and he opens the square. Leon had told him that if he wasn’t going to shoot it, he’d have to go slow, a small bump. Eddie hated needles, despite having all his tattoos, he couldn’t understand how someone could willingly stick a needle in their arm.

You’re about to snort it, you stupid fuck. What’s the difference? It’s still heroin.

Eddie takes a cassette from under his seat, he didn’t even bother to look at who the artist was, he was gonna throw it out anyway. He sprinkles a little bit of powder on it, no bigger than his fingernail and takes a rolled-up dollar bill. With no hesitation, he’s snorting it into his air ways. He grunts, his nostrils stinging, and a wave of nausea hits him. The cassette tape falls out of his hands, and he feels the vomit hit the back of his throat. He pushes his door open with his shoulder, vomiting all over the ground. He leans his body onto the door panel, wiping his mouth, coughing a little and that’s when he feels it. His eyes flutter close, and he feels a smile grace his lips.

“Oh shit.” He whispers, feeling the euphoria coursing through his blood stream, his nervous system, everywhere. He tries to think of something, think of you, think of her, and he felt nothing. Puppet. Strings. Destruction. He practically drags himself into his driver seat and slams his door. He reaches for the bag of powder, blindly finds the dollar bill and snorts again. He laughs when he lifts his head up, it falls back onto the headrest. Before he knew it, it was all gone and he was smoking a cigarette, his eyes half lidded, his head nodding to the side. He would jump awake, inhale on the cigarette and nod out again. He was just resting his eyes, he told himself.

When he opens his eyes again, he’s in your driveway. He sits up straighter, seeing that it was still dark outside. How the fuck did I get here? He pushes the front door open and practically falls out. He holds his head, the sudden pressure from getting up too fast making him dizzy as he stumbles onto your front porch, pushing your door open. He calls your name, but you don’t answer. He notices the stillness as he stood there, noticing all the lights were off, there was no sound. He suddenly felt sober, and his feet take him to the center of your living room. The light from the bathroom came through the door that was ajar, and all he hears is the sound of his own breathing and his footfalls.

He pushes the door open slowly with his palm, the hinges squeaking, and he sees you lying there. You’re on your back, your head tilted to one side, arms splayed out, unmoving.

A groan escapes him, a sound that started from the very depths of his soul. His body falls against the door, and he falls to his knees. His body felt stiff as he crawled to you, hot, angry tears were pooling from his eyes.

“Nooo…” He groans, his hand shaking as he turns your face, your eyes in a fixed stare. He inhales deeply, cupping your face. You just have to kiss her, and she’ll wake up. That’s all, like Snow White and Sleeping Beauty.

Eddie kisses your lips gently, his tears falling to your cheeks, and he lifts his head. You still lay there unmoving, no breath from your lips. His mouth falls open in a gasp as he looks at you, and his body shakes with sobs. He stares at your face, he couldn’t understand what was happening, why this was happening.

“Please come back to me, please. I’m sorry. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean anything I said, please.” He cups your face, smoothing back your hair; you were so cold. “Just wake up now, and we can start over, that’s all. Just wake up…please!!!” He cries and cradles your limp body to him, trying to figure out something, anything that will get you to wake up. He kisses your cheeks, your hair, your forehead.

His head falls back, and a loud, guttural wail escapes his lungs. “Nooooooo!!!”

“Nooooo!” Eddie screams himself awake. The sun was beating down on him in the van as he catches his breath, looking around, panic and fright in his wide brown eyes. He was still parked at the pond. He feels bile rise in his throat and barely gets the door open before he’s violently vomiting on the ground. His vomit from the night before inches from where he stood. He wipes his mouth, his skin sweaty, damp. He squints in the sunlight and holds his stomach. He was still high, but functional, his logical part of his brain working faster than it did last night.

“Fucking idiot, Munson.” He says to himself, and then he remembers his dream. A breath is caught in his throat, and he scrambles himself back in the van, he starts it up, throwing it into reverse and speeds out of there. He was dry heaving on the way to your house, having to stop only once to pull over and vomit again.

He almost forgets to put the van into park when he screeches into your driveway. He almost falls out and scrambles up the steps, your door was unlocked. He doesn’t bother closing it when he runs in and shouts your name. His blood ran cold when he didn’t get a response from you, and he screams your name again. He runs into the living room, his breath caught when he sees that the bathroom door is ajar like in his dream. His heart pounded and he felt his hands shake: it was just a dream, it wasn’t real. Just a dream.

The door squeaks open, and you walk out, towel drying your hair from taking a long hot shower. A whimper escapes his lungs, and he startles you.

The towel falls from your hands as you stare at him and he stares at you, he’s looking at you like he’s seeing a ghost. You immediately notice his features, his pale face, his eyes wide with panic, almost black. He was sweaty, and your hand goes to your mouth to hold back your cry, you knew immediately what he had done and part of you felt responsible.

There was desperation on both of your faces, and the two of you crash into each other, sobbing and holding each other. Eddie holds your face in his hands, kissing you over and over, his tears mixing with yours.

“You’re here.” He kept saying and you weren’t sure why. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.” He cries holding your face and you shake your head, sputtering, you can feel your face flush as you caress his face, his hair, staring into his eyes.

“No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have had you leave. I didn’t do the rest of the drugs, I got rid of them, I flushed them. I didn’t do them, I swear.” Panic is in your voice, and he holds onto your waist tightly as you keep touching him, keeping him upright.

Eddie feels his heart split in two and feels the guilt bubbling up in his chest as his head falls to your shoulder and he sobs. You hold him there, rubbing the back of his head as you both sobbed. “I fucked up last night, I’m so sorry. But I needed to not feel anything. I thought it didn’t matter, I thought I lost you forever and I couldn’t…couldn’t handle losing another person, I couldn’t handle that pain. There’s so much of it and I don’t know what the fuck I’m doing.”

You pull away and hold his face, shaking your head as you give him a small smile. “We have to feel it, I realized that after you left last night. That’s one of the only ways that lets us know that she was real, that the pain is real; that our love is real.”

“How do you not hate me?” His lip trembles. “After everything I said, after what I did.”

“Because I love you. No matter what and that’s a hard fucking pill to swallow when you realize how much you love a person, even when you’re so fucking angry at them.”

You run your thumb along his lips, and he smiles softly. “When you left last night, I wanted to die. I was awful to you, I pushed you away because I thought your life would be a lot less chaotic without me in it. And then…” You inhale deeply, your voice shaking. “Then I felt her. I felt this warmth, this blanket of pure comfort and I just let it consume me. Everything poured out, I thought my guts were gonna shut down and I would be stuck in a loop of constant tears forever, but I let her in, and she stayed awhile.”

Eddie laughs a little as tears continue to fall from his eyes, he caresses your face, your hair and kisses you softly. “I love you.” He whispers to you.

“I know.” You smirk up at him, wiping away his tears.

He kisses you again, wrapping his arms around your shoulders, letting out a sigh of relief. You hold him tight, rubbing his back and arms.

He takes a shower soon afterwards; scrubbing the last night away until his skin felt raw, and he swore he rubbed off most of his chest tattoos. He finds you in your room, and he walks in with no shirt, and just his jeans. His wet curly hair stuck to his chest. You’re sitting upright, sketching in what looks like your mother's sketch pad.

He sits on the edge of your bed, glancing down at the book. “You’re sketching?”

You look up at him and smile; you were just doodling. Some wildflowers, eye shapes, your hands. You didn’t feel ready to paint yet, and you forgot how much you loved to sketch. You couldn’t force yourself to be happy, but you could try to be a bit more human.

You feel his eyes on you and look up again. He’s smiling that sweet smile, his dimples large. He still looked a little high, but he was less sweaty, less jumpy. He wasn’t entirely sure how he was going to feel once it was completely out of his system. Would it hurt? He wondered. But he realized he didn’t care if it did, he deserved to feel that pain.

You close the sketch pad and put it on your nightstand, you scoot closer to him, you drape your legs on either side of him while he kneeled. His hand reaches up to caress your face, your lips, and you pull his mouth towards yours in a sweet kiss. You lay back, taking him with you, he cups your face, his other hand going to your leg to hook around his waist, the kiss deepening. His lips travel to your throat, leaving a soft trail of kisses there and to the center of your chest. You sigh lovingly at his touch, and he lifts up your shirt, leaving soft kisses on your tummy, around your navel and ribs. He feels you shudder at his touch, and he pulls you up, peeling your shirt over your head. You were naked underneath, and he kisses you again. The tips of his fingers glide up your arm, leaving goosebumps to prickle on your skin. You grip his forearm, and gently move your fingers up and down as he kisses your neck, slowly moving down, leaving soft kisses around your breasts, and taking your nipple into his mouth, gently sucking. Your back arches and you moan; he goes to your other breast, gently kissing and sucking. His hand travels down your belly while he teases your nipples, and he snaps the button of your jeans. He meets your lips passionately again, grunting softly as his hand slides down over your sex and fingers your clit generously. You arch your hips, and he pulls off your jeans and underwear. He hovers above you after taking off his own jeans and rubs your face. He leans down to kiss you, his lips soft. You let out a moan and he grunts when you feel him push himself inside you, your back arches at the feeling, a loving sigh escaping your lips. His mouth stays hovered above yours as he thrusts, and you look into his eyes. His fingertips dig gently into your thighs and a throaty moan escapes his lips. He caresses your face, kissing your lips softly, burying his face in your chest, licking around your nipple again. You grip his shoulders, moaning loud, the sensation of his gentleness, the grinding of his hips, was enough to get you to scream. Your orgasm was building in your lower belly, but you didn’t want this feeling to end. You held onto it, and flipped him onto his back, riding him gently, your palms on his chest. Your clit rubs against his pelvis, and your head falls back in a whimper. He holds your hips, his head arching back against the pillow. He sits up, holding him to you in the butterfly position, his arms tightly around your middle, his lips against your breast. The tingles in your belly grow, and you clench around him, your head falls back as you cry out in pleasure, your orgasm causing every part of your body to tremble, and tears spring to your eyes. He groans against you as he orgasms soon after you, he holds you to him, still catching up on your breathing and you look into his eyes. His hand caresses your cheek, and he kisses you gently. You push yourself off him so you’re sitting more in his lap, pressing your forehead against his and he hugs your waist.

Staring into his big brown eyes, you give him a soft smile, gently petting his face. “From now on, we need to be honest with each other. No more secrets.”

He shakes his head, smiling at you. “No more secrets.”

“I’m not okay, Eddie.” You tell him quietly, your eyes filling up with tears, he tightens his hold. “And I won’t be for a long time. When she died…I think, I think a part of me did too. That’s where that pain is.” You press your hand over your heart, and he gently kisses the center of your chest. “They say there’s stages of this grief, but I think they’re full of shit. I think you go through each stage, over and over and over again. It’s constant, like a running stream. And I know you’re not okay, either. You were right when you said that I’m not the only one who lost her—”

“Sweetheart, that was—”

“Let me finish.” You smile at him, kissing his nose and he stares into your eyes. “I’m not the only one that lost her. Yeah, I lost the bond that we formed as soon as I was born, I lost the late-night talks and getting my tears wiped away because she was my mother. You lost someone very special to you, someone who showed you love and comfort and a bond that can be so rare to find. I will never take that away from you. Your grief is your grief, not mine. But we can heal together. It's not gonna be easy, it’s gonna be really fucking hard but I plan on doing this with you for the rest of my life. I plan on feeling every single emotion that God or whoever the fuck throws at me, at us. I plan on you being by my side until we’re old, watching our grandchildren grow up, yelling at each other on how to figure out technology because let’s face it, this world is going to be run by machines soon. You are the best thing, the craziest thing, that has ever happened to me, and I’m gonna hold onto that until I can’t anymore.”

His eyes are filled with tears, and he smiles large, kissing you passionately. You hug him tightly, kissing his cheek before getting off his lap. He lights up a cigarette, inhaling it deeply and stretches. He looks at you with his arm draped over his shoulder, just watching you. He stands up to get dressed but you stop him.

“Wait.” You tell him, grabbing your sketch book. “Stay like that."

"What? Why?” He laughs.

“Shut up, don’t move.”

He smiles at you and stays still, and you begin to sketch out his form. Eddie suddenly felt shy as he hears your pencil hit the paper, this was such an intimate moment, and he didn’t want to mess it up. You concentrated so hard on what you were doing, and he felt his heart skip a few beats as he watches you, both nude, just the sounds of the creativity coming out of your brain.

You smiled when you were finished, and Eddie was able to move his limbs, feeling stiff all over. You wipe off the pencil dust and hand it to him. He smiles large, you had captured him so beautifully and he realizes it was true, you saw him for who he truly was.

Just Eddie.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

Autumn had come out of nowhere, and you wrap your sweater tighter around you as another wave of nausea hits you. You had left work early; it seemed like every twenty minutes you were running to the bathroom to puke your guts out. You tried to think about what you had eaten the night before; was it the chicken? Was it the leftover meatloaf you had made for your father’s birthday? Eddie had been very cryptic lately, and it was starting to piss you off. He would ask you questions about what color paint you’d use to paint a kitchen, hardwood or carpet; you would overhear him talking to your father about stuff that had to do with finances, and your father had a glint in his eyes, and you tried to think of anything that could possibly make sense. The nausea hits you again and you run to the bathroom and vomit hard. You swore there was nothing left in your system to vomit but your body had other plans. You lean against the tub, the coolness of the porcelain an odd comfort against your skin.

Your eyes land on an unopened box of tampons, and a sudden thought occurred to you. Closing your eyes, you think back to when you last had your period; trying to figure out the math was like trying to figure out a formula with Einstein. Your eyes snap open; it had been over a month since your last period.

A month.

Nausea hits you again and you grip the porcelain, preparing for the worst but nothing comes. “There’s no way.” You say to yourself and lift yourself up on shaky legs.

Grabbing your keys, you rush out the door to your car, and go into a local pharmacy. You take the first test you see, and don’t make eye contact with the cashier as she rings you up. When you arrived home, you were grateful Eddie was still at work, and your father was finishing up a construction job in Ohio. You rip open the test, reading the directions.

“Pee on it? How the fuck…” Your eyes squint as you look at the small diagram drawing of how to get coat the test in urine. Groaning, you pull down your pants, and do your business, yelling comedically as you get urine all over your hand trying to match the test up with the stream. The directions said you had to wait three minutes for the results, and you sit on the toilet lid, your leg bopping up and down anxiously as you wait.

Once the three minutes was up, you don’t look right away. Your arm reaches the sink counter, and you take it, looking down at the tiny window. There were two lines, and you suddenly forgot what that meant. You scramble to dig the directions out of the trash, scanning the black ink until you reach the result section.

One line meant it was negative.

Two lines meant…

Your hands shake as you stare at the test in your hand, like it was a rare piece of art, and you were trying desperately to see if the picture would move.

No matter how you look at it, the result is gonna stay the same.

A smile creeps up on your lips, tears well in your eyes and you cover your mouth with your hand.

Something happens to you just now; it felt like the Earth shifted right at your feet. Before there was a constant tilt for so many months, now suddenly it was upright. Everything seemed brighter, you felt a dull ache in your chest, but it wasn’t pain, no, it was something different.

Something warm.

There was a human being growing inside you. Yours and Eddie’s baby. Your father’s grandchild, your mother’s grandchild. Yours. A being that had a part of you and a part of the man you loved. Your best friend, your lover, your confidant.

You were going to be parents.

You were going to be a mother.

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson x smut #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson x fluff #stranger things #stranger things fanfiction #eddie munson fem!reader

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longing-for-rain · 15 days

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What incident are you talking about that makes zk mad and have personal beef with you?

Actually now that I’ve done some investigating it’s unclear exactly who is mad at me because there are two cliques mad at me for opposite reasons.

Basically, I hold what I used to think was a very simple and uncontroversial opinion, which is that fiction is a great way to explore dark themes and topics, but at the same time, can spread harmful and insulting messages if these topics aren’t treated respectfully. Too much nuance for tumblr, apparently. Some people called me a terf for saying rape is bad and some people called me a pedo for so much as mentioning sexual themes in my writing. So we’ve got polar opposites here.

As for “incidents” I’ll give a brief overview under a cut because (warning) it involves sexual abuse and suicidal ideation.

To summarize:

I became active in the Zutara fandom during mid-late 2020 as a result of being online due to the pandemic. Just before the pandemic, I suffered a sexual assault and Zutara (ship and community) became a source of escapism and comfort for me

Shortly after becoming active on tumblr, I joined a fandom event and was paired up with a beta reader. This person proceeded to groom and sexually abuse me over the course of about a year. To put it in perspective, this occurred during the height of the pandemic and we were often on discord calls for hours every day. It was a very involved and predatory “friendship”. And I want to make this extremely clear—do not try to find this person. I’ll only answer questions about this in DMs if you legitimately have personal safety concerns. I don’t think they’re even active anymore and I’ve made peace with the fact I’ll never get proper closure or justice and any attempt will only result in more victim blaming and abuse. So please don’t bother. I’ve been over it

I didn’t realize what was happening to me was sexual abuse at the time, only that it hurt and that something was wrong. Due to the sort of culture I’d been sucked into, I wasn’t allowed to properly express my discomfort and had difficulty articulating what was wrong (being autistic doesn’t help there either). So every time I tried voicing discomfort, I was shamed into silence until it reached a breaking point

As I gradually started waking up to the fact I was being abused, I also, as a result, started unpacking some of the harmful ideas that were directly enabling my abuse and questioning them. This made my abuser angry; they felt their control slipping I imagine. I started exploring these ideas through my writing and asking questions about things. That made people angry

My abuser knew what they were doing. They were a self proclaimed “fandom old” and knew how these communities operate much better than I did at the time. So they got a notoriously loud and stupid Zutara stan angry with me, who proceeded to (predictably) write a bunch of unhinged tumblr rants and dogpile on me over discord. As a result, everyone in her clique also decided I was evil and scapegoated some other bullshit (at this point I don’t even remember everything I’ve been accused of) onto me. She also used sexually degrading language (I don’t think she knew this but it was word-for-word things that had been said to me by men who abused me in real life) and this resulted in me being triggered, suicidal, and it was a whole mess. Lots of people were fighting and there was even a rumor (I have no way of confirming this) that anti-Zutara people got in the mix because they enjoyed watching the infighting

I actually did attempt suicide once, and seriously considered it on a few other occasions. These people only used this as further evidence that I was crazy and couldn’t be trusted or believed

Then, as I stated increasingly using writing to vent about what I experienced, people got mad at me for that too. Even called me a pedo. I think that’s the worst part—that the message from all this is that women’s sexual assault and torture is meant for titillation and entertainment, but serious and meaningful exploration of it is forbidden

Currently, people still share out of context pieces of this story and act like I’m some horrible prude and/or pervert. People who don’t even know me spread rumors without asking me a single thing. They’re spineless and believe whatever their respective clique does. So that’s where I’m at

At this point I more or less keep to myself and focus on writing. I do really love writing and Zutara, and despite everything, it still did/does bring me comfort while dealing with the worst few years of my life. I also have received so much positive feedback about my writing—people telling me it helped them, it resonated, it made them see things in a new light. That’s meaningful to me so I continue doing it.

And I try not to take what happened too personally either. Over time I realized I’m not the first person they treated like this and I won’t be the last. That’s just how cliques work, and how people who are different are treated. Tale as old as time: once they’ve decided you’re a witch, they’ll burn you no matter what you say.

#tw sa #tw suicide mention #fandom drama #I guess #ask #anon

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megatrons-husband · 6 months

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Hello, I just saw this in the tags and wanted to add my own input. I am an abuse survivor and also a megastar shipper. Megastar is one of my tops, and that’s because they are both abuse victims and I see myself through both of them. When I ship them, I generally ship them as healing past the abuse and trauma they’ve both been through and make them happy, and able to heal and grow together, I always felt that if I was able to see those two heal and be happy, and being victims of abuse (megatron abused thru slavery, starscream abused thru megatron) then I would be able to heal myself. Being able to portray megatron and starscream break the cycle of abuse makes me happy in a way and even tho we don’t get it canonically, I try and portray it with what I write.

I do agree a lot of depictions of megastar are extremely abusive, esp tfp depictions. I myself don’t really interact with fandom content that makes them out to be abusive. I do admit that there are a lot of people who glorify the abuse in the ship and that was a reason I just, didn’t interact with the fan version of it. At the end of the day, each to their own but I resonate with this answer.

I agree with everything you said and I think you offered a very kind and nuanced answer.

That said, at the end of the day I think that most all transformers ships have the ability to be priorship or abusive and it always irks me or at least, saddens me when people just go after megastar shippers. I mean, despite being an abuse survivor myself and going out of my way to portray the ship in a unique way to me, Ive had people tell me to kill myself. I remember there was a megastar story board artist who worked on Earthspark, and people were telling her to kill herself and to get hit by a bus. Ive realized that in the tf fandom it’s like ‘okay’ to harass megastar shippers even this elf us who don’t ship the ship in an abusive way, but other shippers tend to be exempt from this,.

lIKE I also like MegaOP, but MegaOp also has incredibly abusive foundations too. Especially TFP MegaOP, where Megatron quite literally took advantage of Optimus when he had no memories and just in general, some of the things he’s done to Optimus, short of torturing him and even killing and hurting his friends just o hurt him, are abusive and reminds me of things that happened to me. And people tend to romanticize that, and call them like ‘crazy husbands’ or exes or something like that, and I realize that it’s so common to romanticize the abuse in MegaOP, just like proshippers do, but its’ almost never called out the same way megastar is. Hell, some of the people bashing Megastar are the same people who think it’s romantic when Optimus is gettin beat and nearly killed by Megatron, or when Megatron kills and hurts those close to Optimus.

I don’t mean to rant to you, I just noticed how ship hate and suicide baiting is so acceptable to do to megastar shippers. It’s so common, even if we *don’t* ship the ship in an abusive way. And there aren’t that many megastar shippers compared to others. It’s a very isolating experience because I realize this fandom is ‘friendly’ until people have double standards over a ship you like. Like i said, I'm an actual abuse survivor, and in a place where I still have to live with my abuser, so writing megatron and starscream working thru their own traumas and loving one another is kinda healing to me. BUT being told to kill myself over it, sometimes by popular bloggers in the TF fandom, and then seeing them glorify abuse in other ships is not fun.

SORRY i just wanted to send this to you because i agree with your ask. originally i was gonna respond to your post but i was anxious

Ok first i would like to say your absolutely AMAZING. You are a poet becuse this is the most accurate opinion of transformers ships ive seen in awhile, twitter users a shakering is there boots right know!! And your view of megastar is perfect and the way you described your writings of them sounds amasing and a great and healthy way to potray them, also i very glad that it helps you. : ] And just puting this out there as a abuse survivor to i get you. Id like to touch on megop to since you mentioned it! Iam not going hate anyone fore it because once again to each there own, but i hate the double stander for megstar shipers, when megop is just as bad! People really need to understand that both have the opportunity to be awful horribly portrayed ships, or beautiful heartfelt relationship with great story telling! And one last thing that i would like to add is when you said that ever transformers ship has the opportunity to be proship, and yes i agree strongly with this. the transformers fandom has a very bad problem of fetishizing relationship and just around makeing really bad and gross ships. But something id like to say is some ships will never be heathy, and cant be. There are some ships that are just gross and overall cant be labled as anything other than proship. For instance, somthing that makes me absolutely sick is people who ship overlord and Fortress Maximus, specifically there idw/mtmte portrayals. A little background if some have never read the comics, Fortress Maximus was a warden at this prison basically and overlord came a over ran the place, killing tons of bot and taking many captive. Maximus was one of said bots and overlord wanted some information that only Maximus had and for 3 and a half years torture, abused, and lobotomized him. The amont of trama that Maximus gained from that, form overlord, alone should show how awful of a ship it is to began with. There is no way that it could be written to be heathy for either bot because its shown alot just how much Maximus HATES Overlords guts. But iam a stop there, or iam a write a hole essay. Thank you for shareing your opinion on the matter! It was really well written!! Hope you have a good day or night! :]

#transformers #megatron #megaop #megastar #hate proshipers #anti proshitter #fuck proshitters #proshitters dni #starscream #Fortress Maximus #overlord

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zirawrites · 1 year

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Been thinking about an AU with this premise so, how would the companions react to the SoSu explaining that they aren’t actually Shaun’s parent?

Cait: “Well then why the hell have we spent so much time lookn’ for him?” Cait cared less about Sole’s relationship with Shaun and more about whether Sole was trying to find the lost baby on some crazy suicide mission. That was one shitshow she had no interest getting involved with.

Codsworth: “But you brought him home from the hospital?” Codsworth’s sentence came out more like a befuddled question than recollection of that memory. “I don’t understand. Did Nate/Nora... stray? Oh goodness, that was so presumptuous of me. My apologies, sir/mum. It’s none of my business.”

Curie: “And yet you risk so much for him?” Curie placed her hands tenderly across her heart. “That is so kind of you, Sole. I’m sure when we find him he will be oh so grateful towards you.”

Danse: “Family runs deeper than blood relations.” Danse was closer to soldiers in the Brotherhood than his own relatives. It wasn’t difficult for him to sense Sole’s love for Shaun, regardless if they were his biological parent. “I completely understand where you’re coming from.”

Deacon: “And next you’ll tell me Codsworth isn’t really your second-cousin.” Deacon hesitated when Sole didn’t break into the smile they always did when he caught them lying. “Wait, you’re serious? Then who are you to him?” Deacon didn’t see that coming... and he hated being left out of the loop.

Hancock: “Sometimes we find our real family after we leave home.” Hancock had found his people in Goodneighbor. There was nothing -- and no one -- left in Diamond City who gave a rat’s ass about his wellbeing. “Shaun’s lucky to have someone like you sticking out their neck for him.”

MacCready: “After all you’ve done for Duncan, it’s no surprise you’re trying to help another kid fallen victim to the Wastes.” MacCready only found Sole more admirable after their confession. He was a family-man at heart.

Preston: “The whole Commonwealth is lucky to have you. Shaun included.” Preston wasn’t sure why Sole was always looking out for the little guy, but he hoped their altruism rubbed off on his own good deeds.

Piper: “Does that mean if Nat was taken you’d find her, too?” Piper had always feared losing her only family to the Institute. She hoped sticking around Sole would help train her for the worst outcome.

Nick: “I’ve made a career out of finding other people’s kin. You and I aren’t so different after all.” Nick never doubted Sole would help someone outside of their family. They’d been helping settlers since they thawed from the vault.

X6-88: “I’m not sure if the Institute was aware of that.” Someone was getting fired when X6 turned in his next report.

#fallout 4 #fallout 4 reactions #i was going to write a little story on how sole knew shaun but i'll leave it up to imagination #i just ate some expired ice cream so im in no state to be creative ngl #deacon #danse #preston garvey #maccready #fallout curie #fallout cait #nick valentine #hancock #codsworth #x688 #fallout piper

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theculturedmarxist · 4 months

Text

These days I mostly avoid being around art spaces and the dwindling population of people that frequent them. This is for the same reason you might duck an old friend who’s been transformed by time and circumstance into a thing that you scarcely recognize. Sometimes it’s better to remember them as they were.

I broke my rule the other night to attend the closing of a theater I built long ago, and it was every bit as sad and disappointing as I would have expected. Hardly anyone came to send her off, and the ones that did could muster nothing better than a couple of beers and off to bed. The whole thing was over by 11.

“Who are you voting for,” a pudgy, bearded, graying Xer, asked me before I left. He was wearing a kind of middle-aged bohemian get-up, right down to the hipster hat, that made him look like he’d just stepped out of a commercial for a new Type II diabetes drug. I’m down to talk my doctor about . . .

“I’m writing in Dave Chappelle,” I said.

He opened and closed his mouth a few times, trying to find the part of his brain that knew how to process a dissenting opinion. Not finding one he sputtered, “But you’re not for Trump.”

“No.”

Then a skinny, wan, pale guy with sunken eyes, and long, greasy black hair, sober as a judge, like someone who’d acquired all the physical attributes of heroin addiction, without ever having had any of the fun, said, “Then you have to vote for Biden, or Trump wins.”

“So what,” I said.

And that was when they both shit themselves and I had to do the whole red-pill/blue-pill thing. By the time that was over, everyone else had gone and I followed suit. Leaving the building for the last time, I thought of livelier days when the whole place, the whole block, the whole city, was full of life and crazy energy.

How did this happen? How did we get here?

This is an article I’ve started, abandoned, and started again a few times over the years. That’s partly because I still had some hope when I began that I might one day be able to return to my craft as a theater director without revealing my opinions. But that was before Due Dissidence had a YouTube show. Now I very visibly express ideas 3-4 times a week that would get me professionally and socially cancelled in about 5 minutes as soon as anyone from that crowd took the time to check out the channel, which of course they would.

Another thing that’s kept this one at the bottom of the digital drawer is lingering affection for a lot of people who are still making the music, lighting the lights, and all that. I have dear friends in the arts and this is going to hurt some of their feelings. Except for the ones who regularly DM to thank me for saying what they can’t without risking career suicide. Those will be greatly cheered by this piece, in the way of a bullied child watching their tormentor take a hard fist to the nose, so I guess in the end that part’s a wash. Here goes.

In the 8 years since the election of doom that transformed me from the kind of guy who wanted to have a beer with Rachael Maddow, to the kind of guy who would protest her book reading, I’ve had lots of debates with lots of people. Enough to notice a distinct pattern

Conservatives will generally keep it on the issues; they may not agree with you, but as a rule they aren’t going to go right to ad hominem attacks on your character. Liberals can go either way: they may debate the issues with you, but they’re just as likely to attack you personally as a closet Republican, a Russian plant, or if you happen to be a white man, that’s kind of their go-to. But the absolute worst people you can find yourself engaging with are members of the arts community. I know this because I’ve been a member of it since at the tender age of 19, I bullshitted my way into a directing gig at the still extant 13th Street Repertory Theater.

The artists I worked with then as a kid from Queens dazzled by the bohemian world I had infiltrated wouldn’t recognize the artists of today, and I suspect they wouldn’t like them all that much. Heirs to a 60’s counter-culture ethos of distrust for authority and institutions, and to an older tradition of the artist-intellectual, they generally thought of all politicians as dishonest psychopaths, and spent more time discussing Kafka than the evils of Soviet Russia, which occupied the same position of public enemy #1 that its successor state does today. And lest the wokeratti immediately jump to its aforementioned go-to, the scene was far more substantively diverse than what you might find at a theater or a gallery today. They were gay and straight, old and young, black and white and brown, and in a major departure from the current moment, both penniless and well to do. There were artists living rent free in the loft above the theater, others renting $250 apartments in pre-hipster Williamsburg who had to walk across the bridge to get to rehearsals for lack of train fare, and still others living comfortably on the Upper West Side. If there was a failing it was in a tendency towards pretentiousness: when a middle-aged woman pronounced confidently at a post-rehearsal dinner that the principal crisis of the modern age was the “post-Nietzschean vacuum,” I almost laughed in her face. No one had that problem in my native Flushing, and I suspected that was true most places. But the problem wasn’t racism, sexism, or homophobia-expressing those sorts of views would have been just about the only thing that could have gotten you ejected in an atmosphere where pretty much anything went, and it was that way in the arts community for as long as I was a part of it.

Generally, I like to heavily source everything I write, ‘cause when you’re offering controversial opinions, you had better cross all your t’s and such. But because the arts are such a distinct subculture and the kinds of institutions that have the means to conduct a wide survey on questions like: what class background do artists usually come from, or, when did artists start to favor censorship, never would, I must of necessity rely on my personal observations and speculations. Which makes this, by definition, a personal essay, so take it as you will.

I’m starting from the premise that something has gone very wrong when you have an American arts community that tends to be politically conservative in the sense of being to the right of general sentiment in the Western world on class and economics; that mindlessly supports politicians like Joe Biden and Hillary Clinton who’s records are at odds with even the identitarian issues that they claim to care about, and that sees de-platforming and cancelling figures like Joe Rogan as a legitimate tactic, never considering the idea that once you let that genie out of the bottle, no one will be more vulnerable to having it turned against them than artists. I’ve given a lot of thought to how a bohemian scene of intellectuals and misfits turned into something resembling a PTA meeting in Scarsdale. This is what I came up with:

I will concede this to the painfully woke white people that dominate the arts even as they lately denounce their own position: rich white people are the crux of the problem, with the emphasis being on “rich” rather than “white,” as some would have it. The low to no pay circumstances of most creatives are beside the point, even though many of them will point to this as evidence of their moral authority to speak on matters of poverty and marginalization. If “artist” isn’t a Professional Managerial Class job, what is it? It sure ain’t factory work. The pretense of artists to social disenfranchisement calls to mind John Goodman’s line in Barton Fink, where his serial killing salesman tells John Turturro’s slumming writer, “You’re just a tourist with a typewriter, Barton. I live here.”

Most of these folks are just playing dress up for a while before they pack it in for Grad School and take up residence in the same sedate suburban enclaves from whence they came. Just as in every other sphere of American society, the arts are, and always have been, dominated by these kinds of middle and upper-middle class, mostly white people, whose sensibilities reflect that reality. The higher up the food chain you go, the more evident that becomes. The same exact advantages of money and connections that favor people in every other industry, favor those who attempt a career in the arts. Perhaps even more so because the standards are so nebulous. If you’re a doctor, or an attorney, you either do your job well, or you don’t. If you’re an artist, the quality of your work is subjective which leaves a lot of room for just hooking up the people you relate to, which in the arts is going to mean a lot of rich white people, hooking up other rich white people. The net effect of that is, if a lot of bad ideas are coming out of the suburbs, that’s going to be reflected in the work.

When the PMC’s were more rooted in the New Deal, with its focus on class and economics, as was the case when I first entered the scene, so were the arts. Now that they’ve turned to neoliberalism in their economics, and the post-modern turn has unmoored their social activism from observable reality, we have an arts community that has nothing to say about the current moment that strays an inch from what you might hear on MSNBC. This is why, as just one example, in a moment of social strife and economic dislocation, the Artistic Director of Connecticut’s Long Wharf Theater recently seized on the idea of a Black Trans Women at the Center festival as the best use of his platform and resources. The company lost their home of 55 years shortly thereafter.

Whereas in the 30’s a good many artists responded to the Depression by adopting a Marxist-Leninist posture and playwrights like Clifford Odets, (the writer being satirized by the Cohens in Barton Fink), and later Arthur Miller and Rod Serling, began writing plays for the first time that placed working class people “at the center,” this generation of artists greets the moment with only contempt for the struggles of working people, seeing them as reactionary Trumpers who sadly lack the education and sophistication to realize that the economy is great, incremental change is the best we can hope for, and getting all bent out of shape about books full of graphic cocksucking in your child’s middle-school library is totally uncool. Rather than to represent the struggles of average people, these artists offer them nothing but derision and when they do bother to acknowledge them, it is only to portray them as wrong-think culture war enemies.

Adding to the problem, poor people who manage to get to college usually don’t decide to major in something that’s going to almost guarantee that they end up poor. Being an artist is a luxury most people from economically disadvantaged environments just don’t think they can afford. You’re a lot more likely to choose it if you have a trust fund to fall back on. So, essentially you end up with a scene dominated by trust fund babies, no matter what identity group they align with. Their politics proceed from there. All these artists going on about white privilege is partly a case of, to use a phrase with which any theater aficionado will be familiar, “Methinks thou dost protest too much.” And as with Diversity Equity and Inclusion efforts in other sectors, this results in pretenses at promoting “representation” amounting to nothing more than trying to find more black and brown people from similar backgrounds to the whites that are already there, and who consequently share the same attitudes. Barracks and Michelles are always welcome, but the Hueys and Assatas make these folks deeply uncomfortable. The theater party I walked into last week, was no more racially diverse than the scene I knew in the 80’s (perhaps a bit less), but it was palpably less wide-ranging in class perspectives.

Another reason the censorious Victorian lady in high dudgeon pose that has become the liberal class default setting over the past 10 years or so, has had so much appeal to this group in particular, probably has to do with the psychological afflictions common to artists, combined with the insecurities inherent in the profession. This is something else I’d love to see a study on: common psychological illnesses in artists, but lacking such a study, I can only tell you what I’ve observed. Most people don’t choose a career in the arts because they’re very secure, contented and happy sorts. The level of personal psychological torment that’s driven them to such an irrational career choice varies, but deep neurosis, emotional neediness, and pervasive self-doubt are kind of a base line. I do not except myself from this analysis: my head is the kind of snake pit that Indiana Jones has nightmares about. Proceeding from there, you’ll find a fair amount of narcissism, borderline personality disorder, manic-depression, and just plain old depression-depression. These qualities are not at all ameliorated by constant rejection and criticism, which is kind of the nature of the beast. In some ways the people who are attracted to the arts are the least capable of enduring its vicissitudes without severe psychological damage. So, you have a bunch of deeply insecure, neurotic people, trying to make their way in a profession where the rules are vague and the agreed upon standards of successful work are non-existent, and then you hand them a secular religion that gives them not only rules and standards, but a weapon with which to bludgeon their critics as -ists, phobes, and reactionary heathens. That’s like throwing crackers at a starving man. Naturally they jumped on it en masse, without ever thinking through the consequences. Critical Social Justice gave artists something they haven’t had since Duchamp signed a urinal and called it a sculpture: certainty. And this group is far too ignorant of the past to know why their forbears rejected the kind of formalism that these standards impose, and what the price paid in quality, creativity and individual expression will be in the long run. Insofar as they embrace Duchamp’s lesson, it is only in using the precedent set by his famous prank to avoid being interrogated on the basis of quality, talent and craftsmanship.

Which brings us to my final observation.

I’m going to let you in on a secret, although if you’ve ever been dragged to a “new interpretation” of Hamlet on the Lower East Side, back when we still did that sort of thing, you probably already know: talent is rare. That’s why we call it talent. If it was common, we’d call it something else. I’ll give you a breakdown from something I have a fair amount of expertise in-auditioning actors. If you audition 100 actors, it’s going to go something like this: about 10% will be so God-awful you have to wonder where they got the encouragement; around 60% will be passable in the way of people who have had a lot of training; 20% will be very good; 8% will be excellent; a final 2% will be exceptional-in other words, talented. So, based on my admittedly subjective observations, only about 30% of the people who call themselves “artists” have any business pursuing it. And only 2% of those are really gifted. So, the scene is, and always has been, mostly populated by hangers-on who are only one 30th Birthday away from packing it in and getting a Masters in Social Work. The appeal of a set of standards that remove the basis of evaluating work from its quality to its adherence to a set of clearly defined political beliefs is obvious. If you can’t out-talent people, you can at least out-woke them.

None of this is to say that representation in the arts isn’t a problem or wasn’t a problem until these meddling kids started performing their virtue for likes and clicks. It’s always been a problem, particularly at the level of management and project leadership, in the arts as in every other sector of society. I would posit that DEI efforts are a solution in search of a problem, only in that part of the reason for that lack of representation, has always been a lack of artists of color walking in the door, which in turn has to do with the economic realities I’ve mentioned. There aren’t a lot of poor white people walking in the door either; I’ve owned 5 theaters in NYC across three decades, and I never met another theater owner or director, who grew up on welfare. In my experience, that lack of representation never had to do with virulent racism in the arts community. It always had to do with class realities and broader issues of structural racism society-wide that stop POC from ever making it to the door to be considered. If you were paying any kind of attention, that lack of diversity was always an embarrassment, but you can’t work with people who simply aren’t there because of societal problems that reach far beyond the arts. If we really want to do something about this, we need to go out into impoverished and marginalized communities, provide training and encouragement to young people in particular, then offer them jobs in our theaters and galleries, instead of only looking for POC from similar backgrounds to the people who are already there in order to assuage their white guilt. Until we see arts institutions doing that, we will know DEI efforts in the arts for what they are: one more example of rich white people protecting the privileges of their class, even if they have to outwardly denounce them in order to do it.

In the end, the arts scene as it exists today and the institutions that support it may have simply become too sclerotic, out of touch, and irrelevant for saving. The future is with activist-artists grown naturally from their communities, using new technologies and platforms to draw attention to concerns and realities that no gatekeeping clique of PMC’s will ever understand or think to explore. As our self-appointed creators of culture have abandoned us, it may be time that we abandon them in turn, leaving their venues to close as they should, leaving their 501c’s to go bankrupt, as they are doing, and taking the space their collapse opens up to create something new of our own.

#class war #class politics #art #professional managerial class #diversity

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brenninthetaylorverse · 4 months

Text

I know most of you probably forgot about it but I haven't and I want to keep my promises so guess what! I'm bearing my soul to you people and today I'll finally be giving all the details of my album, melodramatic.

@dandelions-fly-in-summer-skies I'm gonna @ you in some more of my music like new songs because this is not my best work lol

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album cover:

*the original image isn't mine, I literally got it off the internet and I never plan on releasing this, making an album cover and all of this is for fun*

tracklist:

1. the movement

2. crying in my bed at 3 am on a rainy tuesday

3. gospel

4. places i’ve seen before

5. people lie.

6. take another breath

7. long pause

8. my dreams aren’t real but my demons are

9. honey take your meds

10. is my family ashamed of me?

11. drama queen

the three songs (I had a few that has the same number so I get to choose on those lol PLEASE DO NOT JUDGE MY WRITING)

1. my dreams aren't real but my demons are

Sitting in my room on a regular day, wasting my life away. I think blue light is seeping into my brain. I don’t do anything anymore. I don’t even see my friends. And my room is dirty, I wish my Mom was here to bug me to clean it. And he said “You’ll be fine on your own.” Oh, but he was so wrong.

My dreams aren’t real. Sitting here wishing I had some kinda physical appeal, even looking in the mirror hurts. What can you do when you're stuck in a body that doesn’t even love you? How did the brain name itself and why is the brain so mean? And why is there a man dressed in all black outside my window, but only on Thursday nights? Because my dreams aren’t real, but my demons are. Getting into college, becoming famous, that’ll never happen but I can count on my sleep paralysis demon to be there when I need him. And it’s so sad because I’ve never hated myself more than I do now and they don’t care.

I can’t help but mope around, waiting for some big circus to roll into town. Maybe then I wouldn’t be the only clown. I get up on big stages, hoping every time will be different, but instead I get booed off. I’m not proud of my past and I hope this version of me doesn’t last. They say all I do is sing about the negative but what do they want me to do? Sing about rainbows and unicorns? I never will because I sing about what I feel.

Cause man, my dreams aren’t real. I can wish all I want for a big fancy house but come on, that’ll never happen. Cleverly hidden lyrics on the back of a cereal box. Whenever I’m at the doctor's office for the 7th time this month, all I do is stare at the clocks. I take 20 medicines a day and nothing can keep my demons away.

2. is my family ashamed of me (I am not suicidal I just want to preface)

They used to call me the good kid. They said to make sure I remember them when I get famous. They wanted some of my success. They wanted me to be somebody. And I can’t imagine dying without being famous. I want people other than my hometown to know my name. I want to be someone. Make a name. Get out of this town. And yet I’d be leaving behind everything I’ve ever known, till eventually I drown. In other words, in the fight for the crown. I’d come back and leave, do it all again and still not know where I want to be. 36, a crazy woman with a broken dream. Do I want that to describe me?

What happens when you give all the time and never get anything back? Do you run out of gifts? Of things to give? All the birthdays, all the christmases. All the lost time yet I was there. Do they hear the whispers about me? The grocery store, the gas station, in the eyes of the people who saw me grow up. I was gonna do great things but sitting here, I got one question. Is my family ashamed of me?

Would all the problems be fixed if I wasn’t born. If I never existed. Would they be happier, nicer, richer? What would it be? Give me a genie and I’ll waste my wishes and give me all the money in the world and I’ll be gone. Is my family ashamed of me? And it’s not my fault, I’ve been thinking ‘bout death. Can’t help but question this whole big thing, said no when you proposed with your dollar tree ring. I can never ask for help, I’m embarrassed when I see someone I know in public. And I hate driving slow, but I love having somewhere to go.

3. drama queen (this song has a few taylor references, whoever can point them all out gets a cookie)

I wish that you could go and unsay all those things you said that day. I wish I could undo all my actions and the reckless driving I did on the way. I know I’m partly to blame, I know that you always curse when you say my name. I think I know everything, but I’m just a dumb teenage girl trying to make her way. Do you think when I showed up to your party that was when I ruined everything? Do you think that my Mom is too pushy and she needs to stay in her lane? And why did you run away when I said those three words? All you had to do was stay.

I know you say I’m a drama queen. I know you say I think I know everything. But I thought you cared. I thought you liked it when I did that dare. I thought you were gonna comfort me when I cried, but you left me. If I died, would you attend my wake? Would you care if I threw it all away for the sake of our relationship? What if your future was in the bend, would you leave me then? Are you waiting for the moment to strike when it hurts the worst then leave my life speeding, while I’m forced to slowly follow the hearse?

I convinced myself that you were a brick wall and I was the sledgehammer. Breaking you down and fixing you back up but like usual, I was wrong. You are my David, I am Michelangelo. You wanted the world and I wanted you, we are not equal. I wanted you so bad that suddenly, I didn’t want you at all. What happens when you’ve been fighting for years but suddenly you lose sight of what you’re fighting for?

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so that's that. also I put most of my lyrics in paragraphs so if you don't read it all, I don't mind lol. enjoy my friends.

#music #new music #musician #songs #music lyrics #fyp tumblr #lyrics #album #songwriting #song lyrics #fypage

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souryogurt64 · 9 months

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Hi I apologize if this is an odd question but a few months ago you mentioned a journal entry Pete had made about death/dying and I was wondering if it’s the one where he’s in the hospital?

its pete wentz so he talks about death and dying a lot but there is an early draft of the suicide scene from the book in his journals, this is probably based on the real thing

This is where the story begins, not linearly but more like this is where it stalled out. Like “back after the commercial” pause that never ends or the humming with the “be patient. We’re having technical difficulties” sign. St. Valentine’s Day massacre of the brain cells. 8 blue ones will do that, anyone in a white coat will tell you. You’re in your sister’s car on the phone with managers, psychiatrists, and your mom. You love to hate attention. You hate to love attention. They’re telling you to drive to the emergency room. It’s so predictable. ‘I am only telling you this to set the scene’. The cold February air is sobering but unforgiving. It feels like there are insects buzzing through your veins. It’s funny the way the black night sky into the double—doored white—lit corridor of northwestern hospital is like heaven, in the movies. The only thing missing is overweight baby angels and some harps. They are unfortunately on back order.

“You know what the Midwest is? Young and restless” is playing on the speakers at the door. Your mom laughs nervously in the waiting room— the thing inside your head bothers her far more than it bothers you. There is a fish tank on the right side of the room, over there, just between the bleeders. The fish in the tank are all a brilliant blue. They are the first thing you circle in a “what does not belong in this picture” quiz. You are mesmerized. An old woman with a bandage wrapped around her head, you know like from the old days, stands right in front of you obscuring your view. She needs them more than you do. They call your name and take you into the next room. The security guard looks at you in a “the fuck are you gonna do” kind of way but then settles into boredom. You almost feel like you owe him a tantrum or some kind of psychotic episode. They say undress and put on the gown. You want to call her up because she knows just how to get you out of your clothes. “You can’t have those in here,” the guard says pointing at your shoes. "The laces are considered a suicide risk. The lights are bright and the door is open— nothing is going on here. You aren’t getting away with anything. You ask them for a pen and paper to write down all the details. They are also considered a suicide risk too and are denied. You tell them in that case it won’t be your fault when your memory is blurry and you don’t get any of this right. ‘I am only telling you this because it’s possible that none of this is right’.

They make everything the whitest white in the hospital. The lights are so white they burn your skin or maybe you are just imagining things. It makes you feel more alone than you ever have before. You are lying on a gurney that hundreds of people have died on before. You lift yourself off of it quickly so none of their memories seep into you. You look around to make sure that no one saw you do this, no one saw you acting “crazy”. The security guard is staring at you with the “just give me a fucking reason” look but settles back into the monotony. You cough but you’re feeling down and kind of light and get worried you might blow yourself away— you hold on tight to the rails. The crisis counselor comes into the room and shuts the door but she asks the guard to open the blinds and watch through the window. Now you are the brilliant blue fish in the tank with him watching. Swimming, not quite as brilliant, just as blue. A nurse comes in to draw your blood. She puts the needle in and you get kind of nervous that she is gonna pull “the boy” out of you. ‘Yes I did just drop that reference. I’m okay like that’. The crisis counselor is a fucking amateur. If she had her shit together you suppose that she would be in some nice building in the suburbs with a receptionist— make 200 for 45—minute sessions. She’s fucking farm club not even minor league ball. You on the other hand have read The Pill Book from front to back. You could talk your way out of anything.

But you’re too busy swimming for the guard. She says she won’t admit you to the hospital if you’ll sign a contract saying you won’t hurt yourself. You actually laugh out loud at the thought of anyone depressed enough to kill themselves being stopped by a piece of paper. It’s like slitting your wrists over a sink so you won’t make a mess. You joke her “imp gonna have to go over this with my lawyer. And send back some markups”. She’s not impressed. Crisis counselor A is followed by B and so forth— it’s getting hard for you to keep your story straight. You feel yourself bending it just to keep it interesting, adding minute details, waiting for compliments on your storytelling ability. I'm only writing this because I shouldn’t’. You call the one person who matters from the gurney and say, “the Capulets and Montagues don’t have shit on me and you”. You are pretty sure you got her voicemail. You call back and apologize for leaving the first message. You are talking into a phone that doesn’t exist to a girl that doesn’t matter anymore.

But who are you kidding; it takes a bit of time to get in or out of your system, the same as any drug. You fall asleep in the room. Your dreams are sterile and uninfected. Wake up; the thought of having a conversation with another human being makes you throw up. You are noticing the way everyone is talking about you— not in a conspiring against you kind of way— and again not in a “the world revolves around you” kind of way— but more the way a doctor and family member would have a conversation over the bed of someone in a coma. “I hope it’s not serious. Is he going to be the same? Will he wake up?”.

You understand why there aren’t mirrors in places like this. No one wants to see their cried out eyes or stitched up faces. Every time you look in a mirror you remember you are always one second away from crying or getting it right. It’s fucking pathetic. You pitch and turn. You can’t control your head right now on the inside, there’s no way of describing it. The closest you can come is the movie where the paralyzed man drowns in the bottom of a swimming pool. Your head is that scene. You shut your eyes and disappear off of the face of the planet but only for a second so no one notices. ‘Im only telling you this so you know things could have turned out so much differently’. You are a set of circumstances, nothing more, variables. The only important part of this from the start was: you in your sister’s car in the past tense, YOU in the past tense, almost but not quite.

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glacierreblogs · 1 year

Text

I, Remus Coriander

Kind of a vent fic, a lot of this is how I was feeling before I was on meds. So I'm not gonna tag anyone in this, but I will be sharing it.

CWs: hallucinations, manic episodes mentioned, depressive episodes mentioned, sort of suicidal ideation(like it's not quite there yet, but not far off),

Words: 461

I’m going crazy, that’s the only explanation, I’m going crazy. I, Remus Coriander, am going crazy. There are people there and then there aren’t. There are shapes floating in the sky. Something’s crawling on me, but nothing is there. Where can those conversations even be happening! I, Remus Coriander, can’t tell fiction from reality sometimes. Most times now actually. Do dragons exist? I swear I heard one the other day. Can animals talk? That racoon was speaking just fine. Heard it actually say human words. Do fairies exist, I saw a few the other day, one was dead. It kind of looked like me. Should I ask for help? Maybe. But I’d rather die than be put in a psych ward. Plus, I know of no one else who goes through this. Some days the emotions are high, other days I’m depressed, and then come most days. Where I’m fucking normal, which makes me feel like I’m making this up. My family doesn’t see anything wrong with me. Sure, I haven’t told them a fucking thing, but if they don’t see my mood swings as these terrible, awful things, then surely everyone has them. How else do I explain what’s going on. I mean, Roman is hyper all the fucking time. Maybe he gets depressed just as often too. Maybe he’s just better at hiding it than I, Remus Coriander, am.

It’s been a fucking week. And I, Remus Coriander, have only gotten worse. What the fuck is going on. I know it’s not normal, I see the weird glances when I look at something that’s not there. The hallucinations, because apparently that’s what they’re called, seem real enough for me to touch. Like I can see the whiskers on that cat, that’s not even there. Because I’m inside the house and we don’t own a cat, do we? Do we? I’ll have to remember to ask again later. Actually maybe not, cause I don’t want to be sent away if we don’t own a cat. I can’t handle being alone with my mind right now. But also, my hallucinations are translucent enough for me to slightly see through them. Can I see through this cat? Yeah I can, and oh, it’s gone.

Y’know what I hate more than anything. It’s people who say stuff or do stuff and pretend that they didn’t. Or when they don’t say or do stuff and pretend that they did. I’m supposed to be in on the joke too apparently. Do you know how hard that is for someone who woke up that day thinking that zombies exist. Do you know how hard that is for someone who’s brain says that something’s there when there’s not. Do you know how hard it is to live…

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theconstantsidekick · 2 years

Text

Captain America: Civil War ft. Static (5)

Pairings: Steve Rogers x Stark!Reader, Tony Stark x Stark!Reader (siblings), Bucky Barnes x Stark!Reader (future)

Genre: Angsty with a hint of Fluff?

Summary: Fighting off the Winter Soldier and having a kind conversation with Bucky Barnes, Y/n didn’t think both of those things could happen all in one day. And yet…

(These scenes incorporate y/n, codename—Static, into the pre-existing story as a character without making drastic changes to the plot or mythos. All the major plot points from the MCU remain in place with the addition of the reader as Static, who is not only a Stark but also enhanced. Whatever events from the canon aren’t mentioned, take place without much change.)

Warnings: Swearing, Mentions of Past Trauma, Mentions of Torture, Mentions of Alcoholism, Suicidal Ideations.

a/n: if any of you have watched the show I'm referencing, you fucking hit me up, you hear me? YOU HIT ME UP!

Y/n figures it out moments before the sirens are sounded.

After the verbal showdown with her brother and her boyfriend, she needed to blow off some steam.. Or well, just blow off some smoke. The cigarette was burning past the filter when the pieces clicked together, about why Sergeant Barnes was framed as the culprit of the attack.

But the loud sirens and the entire control room filled with agents rushing around meant she was a little too late.

As she enters, she takes a moment to spot Natasha and Tony making their way toward the exit.

“Please tell me you brought a suit,” Natasha says to Tony.

“Sure did,” Tony replies, buttoning his blazer and breaking into a jog alongside Nat. “It's a lovely Tom Ford, three-piece, two-button. I'm an active-duty non-combatant.”

“If you don’t have a suit, we gotta call in Y/n,” Nat states gravely.

“Don’t you think I know that?” Tony bites back.

“We cannot let her get anywhere near this,” Nat reminds him.

“Anywhere near what?” She asks casually, sneaking up behind them.

“For fuck’s sake. You can’t sneak up on people like that under high-stress situations like these,” Tony scolds her.

She just chuckles in response, jogging along with them.

“Y/n,” Nat tries but Y/n shuts her down.

“Come on! I’ll be fine.” She insists jovially.

Nat stops to fix her with one of her serious this-is-so-not-funny looks.

“What?” Y/n asks petulantly.

“You know what,” Nat replies.

“We don’t have time to waste. So I’ll cut to the chase. I won’t lose control and do something crazy, okay?”

But then it’s 10 minutes later and Barnes just threw her brother, her Tony across the fucking room and if there were ever any circumstance that would make Y/n extremely prone to violence, y’all have been reading this shit long enough to know, it’s this. “Yeah, Nat, remember what I said about the whole not losing control and going crazy thing?” She asks calmly, straightening up.

“Yea…” Natasha replies, apprehension clear in her tone.

“I lied.” She jumps over the railing from the floor above and lands right in front of Barnes. When she faces him, looks him in the eyes, she realises, this really isn’t Barnes at all. It’s her dearest, oldest friend.

“Soldat.”

There is a beat, a hint of a hint of recognition. And then he charges at her with her metal arm. But unlike all the times she had previously fought the Winter Soldier, this time, she is not afraid.

He hurt Tony.

This time she is just fucking angry.

She dodges easily, by stepping out of the way.

He turns to land another blow, she sidesteps that too.

She smirks, “Sie sind eingerostet.” You’re rusty.

That seems to piss him off. He punches her straight in the gut, throwing her back.

Skidding onto her knees, she looks up, gut sore, eyes watering. She isn’t losing to him this time. Not again. Never again.

Standing up straight, she lets out a short breath and motions him to come at her. He takes the bait. Running up to her, he throws his metal arm aiming for a mean left hook but it clashes, letting out a loud clang.

The metal banging against metal rings out loud enough to halt the commotion around them.

Well, that and the fact that Y/n just brandished a fucking sword out of fucking nothing. Yeah, shit like that usually catches attention, she reckons.

She hasn’t used the damn thing in… give or take two decades? And god! It feels damn fucking good. It’s exhilarating, to say the least. The dark metal of the sword shines pink as it reflects the light. It’s a soft glow, ever so delicate. But it still manages to bathe the Soldier’s pale metal hand in pink. It makes her smile.

The Soldier, however, doesn’t seem to find it even remotely charming.

His face twists in confusion. Only a beat passes before he strikes again.

She blocks again.

Another beat.

They both assess each other.

For the first time in all the thousands of times, they have faced off against each other, the Soldier seems confounded.

But the moment doesn’t last for too long. Pushing himself back, he runs up to her, gaining momentum and attacking again.

Dodging out of the way, she circles around and counters on his right side.

His reaction is a second too late and she slashes him. It’s a small cut, a scratch at best. But it draws blood.

She smiles.

Losing his temper, he charges. He strikes, she blocks. He strikes again, she dodges easily, moving around to kick his legs, causing him to loose balance.

It’s a delicate dance, as most fights are. But this one’s different. It used to be a routine for her—fighting the Winter Soldier. Day in, day out, they fought. A dance of fists and limbs, gutwrenching and unending. But this is so fucking different.

For once, she’s not scared.

She doesn’t have to fight to survive, she doesn’t have to hide a part of herself as she does. She doesn’t have to worry about making it out alive. Her brother is right behind her. Natasha is too. Steve’s a few moments away. Though she doesn’t need them to win this time around, it’s fucking comforting knowing that there is no version of this fight that ends with her dead. And maybe that’s what she needed? Because for the first time in her life, she is kicking the Winter Soldier’s ass.

For every hit he lands, she gets him back two times over.

In all honesty, she feels fucking cocky.

She smiles.

Her sword is an inch away from his throat, and there is an eerie silence hanging around them.

“Sie können nicht mehr gewinnen.” You don’t get to win anymore.

But before she can strike the final blow, her arm is pulled away as she’s pushed out of the way.

Sharon is on him in an instant, fighting with all her might the best she can. It’s not enough though. She’s a good fighter but you have to be better than good to take on the Winter Soldier.

Y/n raises her sword, ready to fight again but there’s a tug on her shoulder, pulling her back.

When she turns to look at the offender, “Barnes is still in there,” is all that Natasha says before she jumps in to help Sharon.

And fuck if that doesn’t hit where it hurts.

Barnes is still in there.

She forgot about him.

She forgot about Bucky Barnes.

In her rage and vengeance, she forgot about the man behind the mask. She made him the monster again, she forgot the man beneath, again.

Fuck.

Unfortunately, the downside of having a heartbreaking epiphany (of the fact that you’re a shit person) during a goddamn superhero fight is that you don’t have the correct tools or the required time to deal with said epiphany. Because Barnes is already in motion, T’Challa hot on his trail and Natasha is gasping for breath, having been choked by a metal hand.

It’s not until much later when she’s sitting in an abandoned warehouse with a semi-conscious Barnes coming to with his metallic arm clamped under a huge hunk of metal that she tries to come to terms with her murderous rage.

As Barnes mumbles himself awake, Sam calls Steve into the room.

“Steve,” Barnes mumbles.

“Which Bucky am I talking to?” Steve asks.

“Your mom’s name was Sarah,” he says before a painfully soft smile breaks onto his face. It reminds her of something but she can’t put her finger on it. It’s so gentle, it confuses her. The dichotomy of the rugged, broken warehouse and the reminiscing smile on his face almost breaks her. “You used to wear newspaper in your shoes.”

Steve smiles too then. He looks at her once, where she stands leaning against the wall on his right. “Can’t read that in a museum.”

“Just like that, we’re supposed to be cool?” Sam asks, frustrated. Which, yeah fair question.

“What did I do?” Barnes asks.

“Enough,” Steve tells him.

“Oh, God,” Barnes laments, anguish clear on every inch of his face. “I knew this would happen. Everything HYDRA put inside me is still there. All he had to do was say the goddamn words.”

“Who was he?” Steve asks.

“I don’t know.”

“People are dead,” Steve’s not pulling his punches. “The bombing, the setup. The doctor did all that just to get 10 minutes with you. I need you to do better than ‘I don’t know’.”

Barnes thinks for a second, “He wanted to know about Siberia,” he says, eyes flinting around in recollection but never too far, never to her. “Where I was kept,” a beat. “He wanted to know exactly where.”

“Why would he need to know that?” Steve inquires.

And then for the first time since he came to, Barnes looks at her. There is a hesitance in his look too. As if he’s afraid to even look at her—like he’s not supposed to.

When his eyes fly away, looking down with shame, it clicks.

He’s afraid to mention it in front of her, ashamed even.

And fuck if that doesn’t hurt her worse.

God, I suck, she thinks.

So she does him this little kindness. Stepping up, she replies, “Because he’s not the only Winter Soldier.”

Hesitantly Barnes tells them about the rest of the Soldiers, how they were trained, how they were made… and that story… She can’t really say why but it feels familiar somehow. She doesn’t have the time to assess that thought.

“Who were they?” Steve asks.

“Their most elite death squad. More kills than anyone in HYDRA history. Except—” his eyes flicker over to her once again.

“Except me,” she supplies for him, another act of kindness.

Nodding shyly, he continues. “And all that was before the serum.”

“They all turn out like you?” Sam asks him. His tone is a little too accusatory but again, she gets it.

“Worse.”

“The doctor,” Steve chimes in, “could he control them?”

“Enough.”

“Said he wanted to see an empire fall,” Steve remarks, addressing Sam.

“With these guys, he could do it,” Barnes informs them. “They speak 30 languages, can hide in plain sight, infiltrate, assassinate, destabilize. They can take a whole country down in one night. You’d never see them coming.”

Stepping up to Steve, Sam speaks in a hushed voice, “This would have been a lot easier a week ago.”

“If we call Tony—” Steve tries.

“No.” Sam cuts him off. “He won’t believe us.”

“He’ll believe her,” Steve counters, nodding at her.

Sam looks at her and relents. “Even if he did, who knows if the Accords would let him help.”

Steve looks at her then, there’s concern on his face. It’s almost sweet. The chaos around them just fades away when he looks at her like that—eyes all soft, hints of an annoyingly cute frown forming on his forehead. He looks so beautiful, always beautiful.

“What do you think?” He asks, stepping up to her.

She takes a moment. She needs a lot more than that but a moment is all she can afford. Exhaling audibly she says, “I think there’s something more.” Her words make his frown prominent. “I think there’s something we’re missing.”

“Like what?” Sam asks.

“Like why now? I know the timing of the bombing seems… opportunistic, but it feels like there’s more to it somehow. There’s a huge piece of the puzzle that we’re missing and I think the answer lies somewhere in who the fuck that fake ass doctor was,” she tells them.

“You want to figure out who he is?” Sam offers.

She shakes her head from side to side, “Yeah but we can’t let him beat us to Siberia. We need to find those Soldiers before he does.”

“And if Tony tries to stop us?” Steve asks.

“You’re on your own on that one.” She is not going to fight her brother. “I came because it was you and because—” she looks over at Barnes for a second before shaking her head. “Actually it doesn’t fucking matter why I came. If Tony’s on the other side, you’d be a bunch of dumbfucks to count on me.”

Steve, with his kindest blue eyes, just nods. He gets it.

Tony is her person. That one person for whom she’d burn the world down. He was there for her when no one else was. There aren’t words to describe the devotion she has to him, she doesn’t think there ever will be.

Steve gets it.

And why wouldn’t he?

His person is the one who got them all into this mess.

“We’re on our own,” Steve tells Sam.

But then Sam shrugs, “Maybe not. I know a guy.”

The three of them begin prepping. They make a few calls, and gather their resources, before Sam and Steve head out to grab something for them to eat and steal themselves a ride.

With as much gentleness as he can muster, Steve asks her to watch over Barnes. And she agrees with a curt nod.

After taking a few moments to gather her courage, she walks back into the room. “So,” she begins as she brings herself to rest against the wall in front of him, “The red book, huh?”

The icebreaker seems to work as she intended.

Slowly looking up at her, he asks hesitantly, “You know about it?”

Instead of a reply, there is just silence. It’s so unexpected especially when matched with the look of shock she’s wearing that it makes Barnes frown.

“Fuck sorry,” she blurts out, shaking her head. “For a second there I completely forgot that you talk now.” When Barnes just looks at her with a flat face, she adds, “What? In half the century that I’ve ‘known’ you, you’ve spoken like 17 sentences—And I think just TWO of them were to me. I’m allowed to forget that you talk.” Barnes just rolls his eyes. She smiles then, “But yeah.” She shrugs jovially. “I read about it in some old files after Peggy got me out. They obviously didn’t use it on me…” She looks at him with a challenge in her eyes. “But you knew that.”

There is a beat of silence.

And then—

“I’m so—

“I’m sor—”

That shuts both of them up.

The silence seems palpable.

“You go ahead,” Barnes breaks it.

“I just—” She hesitates for a second. Gathering up her courage, she begins again, “I just wanted to say I’m sorry.”

But apparently, that isn’t what the man wanted to hear. “What?” He throws back, shocked.

She shifts her weight from one foot to another. “I’m sorry,” she repeats.

“What for?” He scoffs almost as if the entire notion is completely stupid.

“For almost killing you—well not you, him but… You were in there, you always were and I just didn’t—I never…” She shakes her head, trying to shake away all the overthought thoughts from her head. “I shouldn’t have done that. Back at the base. I shouldn’t have gone as hard as I did.”

“I would’ve hurt a lot more people if you hadn’t,” he counters.

“Maybe,” she offers. “But I could’ve kept you busy without murdering you. Waited for Steve to get there. Knocked you unconscious—I don’t know. There were a million different options apart from straight-up murder. I shouldn’t have gone as hard as I did.”

“I deserved it.”

“I could’ve killed you,” she argues.

“I would’ve deserved that too,” he replies slowly, head hanging low, looking too small for a man as big as he is.

She understands the sentiment. She doesn’t agree with it, but she can relate to it. She has been exactly where he is. She wishes to expedite the processes for him… another small kindness.

She clicks her tongue. “I don’t agree.” His face contorts into something akin to disagreement, but before he can voice it, she adds, “Despite our… colorful past, I assure you, you do not deserve that.”

As expected, her words don’t carry the weight that is necessary to make a man as reverently known as James Bucky Barnes feel any less guilty.

So she tries again.

“You remember what I told you?” Her question makes him look up. She takes that as yes. “I’ll tell you again, just cause I feel like you need to hear it. We are not what they made us into, Sergeant. We are not monsters. The only way to prove them wrong is to be better.”

The James Barnes she had heard tall tales about seemed a relentlessly charming flirt, who was a little cocky but in that endearing kind of way which made you fall in love with him. But the James Barnes in front of her has this silence to him that could only be explained by years of trauma. He’s not cocky or flirty but she can still see the hints of an endearing man. So much so that when he speaks next, she wants to listen as keenly as possible.

With short, stiff movements while his hand stays stuck underneath the hunk of metal, he says in a low, unsure voice, “It might be true for you… But it doesn’t—I’m not… I haven’t done anything to be better. I haven’t even begun to make up for all the horrible things I did.” There is venom in his voice as he speaks. “I am still the monster they made me.” He looks at her, “You saw today who I am—WHAT I—”

“I’m gonna cut you off there Sarge.” She takes a step forward. “Do you really believe there is something you can do to make up for all the shit you did? Because newsflash partner, there really isn’t. There isn’t some grand equation where you save 4 people for every 1 person you killed.” She needs him to understand this, right here, right now. It’s fucking important. “There is no way to ‘make up’ for our sins, Sergeant. We did what we did. We cannot undo any of it. No matter how badly we want to.”

He looks absolutely lost as he asks, “So I shouldn’t even try?”

She relaxes again, “Now, when did I say that?”

“So, you’re saying I should try but expect to fail?” He asks, almost confounded.

Y/n smiles then, “Well, I’m not trying to say that either.” She’s met with scrunched-up brows and a scowl worthy of an award of some sort. She can’t help it, she lets out a chuckle. Taking a few steps closer, she sits down on the floor. Her knees are still up cause she refuses to ruin her beautiful oxfords, while she’s manspreading cause she likes it.

He stares at her as she tries to make herself comfortable in her (once) impeccable suit.

“You know what I love about the way the world changed throughout the years?” The question is purely rhetorical, so instead of waiting for what would obviously be an annoyed zinger, she continues, “I got to watch them develop technology, language, food, social constructs, yadda, yadda, yadda. But my favorite part, the fucking best part was Media. Watching people understand the power of the media they produce was so fucking fun.” She’s wearing a huge grin on her face. “And that—” she laughs a little, manically almost. “That led to some quality fucking television! I mean top-fucking-notch, alright?”

He’s looking at her like she’s lost her mind.

“Now, why am I going on this random unrelated tangent, you ask.”

“I didn’t,” he replies with a straight face, the cheeky bastard.

She waves him off. “Because it’s not unrelated at all. Back in the late nineties, early naughties, there was this show called ‘Buffy The Vampire Slayer’, which as the name suggests was about a teenage girl named Buffy—which yes, is a very peculiar name—who used to slay vampires which were like soul-less undead and unfeeling evil little dipshits. It was a great show. It was a spec-fucking-tacular show. Peak television and don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.

“But we aren’t talking about that today.” She shifts a little closer. “Buffy The Vampire Slayer had this spin-off show—which essentially is another show set in the same universe as the first, usually staring a side character from the original story as the main character in this one.” Waving her hands around, she continues, “Anyway, so Buffy The Vampire Slayer had a spin-off called Angel, which followed a dude named Angel—obviously—who used to be a vampire long before either of the shows started, and did like a bunch of crazy homicidal maniac shit but then got cursed with having his soul back.”

“That doesn’t sound like a curse,” Barnes interjects, almost shocking her.

“Doesn’t it though?” she counters. “After wreaking havoc, killing innocents, creating chaos everywhere you went, with no regard for the consequences—and doing so for like a century… you wake up the next day having to feel the guilt for all of it?” Cocking her brow she asks, “Is that not the worst punishment one could possibly get?”

Barnes’ eyes shy away.

“I thought you said this was relevant,” he contends half-heartedly.

She smiles again. “It is. Will you just give me a second?” When all he does is exhale audibly in patient annoyance, she continues, “So, as I was saying; Angel leaves the setting of the previous show and moves to L.A. where his show begins. Fights two or three bad guys, meets a few old friends, has a couple of revelations where he comes to realize that the only way to move forward is to help people, to be better. And so he decides to start an investigation agency to ‘help the helpless’.” He looks at her with a discernable look in his eyes.

“The reason I’m telling you all this is because, there comes a point in the show where someone like you, asks him why he does it. If he knows that his actions don’t matter, the greater scheme, the big picture. If there is no grand plan, no big win… If none of it changes because of what he does, then why do it? Why even try to be good? Why help people who if given the chance might not help him?” She smiles reminiscing. “And he says—and I remember it like it was yesterday cause that is how spectacular this show was—he says to the woman, ‘If nothing we do matters, then all that matters is what we do… cause that’s all there is.’.

And there it is…

There is the moment.

Not too long, not too short.

Just a moment.

And then she says, “It’s a great fucking show… I mean it has 5 seasons, three of which are almost unwatchable but it’s still a great fucking show. And I do not say that lightly, I mean—it’s so simple yet poignant, right? Redemption isn’t something you do for a certain period and then you’re done. The show—and this is another reason why I say it is a fucking genius piece of television—but yeah, the show equates Angel’s search for redemption and struggles with being a vampire to alcoholism. His thirst for blood is quite similar to an alcoholic’s thirst for booze and sobriety is a cruel bitch. You don’t become sober by not drinking alcohol for a set number of days. It’s something you practice every single day. You wake up in the morning and choose to be sober till you go to bed. And then you wake up the next day to make that choice all over again.”

She exhales loudly.

She’s been talking too fast.

Tony keeps telling her she talks too much about shows or films she likes.

“All that was just a long-winded way of saying that we cannot make up for what we did. But trying regardless of that? Now that—” she clicks her fingers, “That is what proves them wrong… it’s what makes us good people,” she tells him.

A hint of a smile glints across his face.

Then he asks, “Is that why you do this?”

With furrowed brows, she asks, “You mean this superhero shit?” When he nods, “God no! The hero gig is the most selfish thing I’ve ever done. I do it just for Tony, so there is someone to watch his back when he’s out there because I know for a fact the kid isn’t capable of doing it for himself.” She smiles at the thought of her brother. Shaking her head, she adds, “I—I’m a lawyer. That’s how I decided to help the helpless.”

“It’s kind of funny I suppose.” Slowly she gets up, standing up on her feet. “If there were an actual scale I’d be a lot more fucked in trying to balance things than you are.”

“Why would you say that?” He asks, confused.

As if the answer isn’t fucking obvious. “You were violated, controlled into doing what you did. I on the other hand had a choice—fuck! I was probably the only person in that goddamn place who did!”

“A choice between what? Doing what they told you, or dying at my hands?” He counters, incredulous. His voice rising for the first time.

In the distance, she can hear Steve and Sam parking whatever car they had jacked.

“Just because it wasn’t a good choice, doesn’t mean it wasn’t a choice.”

He doesn’t understand. He can’t.

What he went through was beyond horrible. But it wasn’t like that for her. Every single step of the way, and every single time she chose the easy way out. She chose self-preservation over what was the right thing to do. She was selfish, dangerously so.

Therefore it’s only fair that the price for her freedom should be higher.

How can he not see that?

His jaw clenches at her words, “You’re a hypocrite.”

As Sam and Steve make their way inside the warehouse, she puts her hands inside her pocket turning away from him, she smiles, “33 sentences in half a century, Sergeant.” She turns her head to look at him again, “You do not know me.”

And just like that, the unspoken truce they’d agreed upon has been violated.

When Sam and Steve enter the room, the tension is so palpable Sam asks cautiously, “I feel like we’re interrupting something. Should we step out?”

“Nah, we’re done here.” With that, she turns around and walks out.

Read next part here. Find the series masterlist here. Find other Static Verse works here.

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