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therealvinelle · 3 years

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Hi, love your metas and your fic. I think you mentioned somwhere that at the end of BD Aro was trying to prevent the fight. What were his motives? According to Edward, the Volturi are cowards, but I didn't get this feeling. Caius was begging for a battle, the guard vocally proclaimed willingness to die for the cause... hell, Jane had to be restrained from running to Bella and punching her in the throat. And I find it unlikely that their leader is less brave than them. Explain Aro's brain pls

Thank you so much! That’s really nice of you to say. And sorry for the late answer.

And explain Aro’s brain, whew. That is a very big question with a very long answer and this post will be a manifesto by the time I’m done. But you wanted Aro’s brain explained so manifesto it is.

So, before we go anywhere I have to make the distinction between Aro of the books and Aro of the movies. Those two are different people.

Starting with appearance, because casting does a lot for me and if a big deviation is made it better be like Ruth Wilson as Marisa Coulter, which is to say it better fit the character. Also, disclaimer, I think most of Twilight was miscast, and especially the Volturi. I’m forever dying at Caius looking like Lucius Malfoy. However, this is an Aro post, so we’re highlighting Aro.

Aro of the books is a twenty-something Greek with skin that has petrified and eyes covered in a milky sort of film, which totals to him looking perfect, as all vampires do, yet frail. When he walks it looks like he’s gliding. This is an otherworldly, ancient, inhuman being. He’s energetic and excitable, yes, but if anything that should add to how very other he is. Casting Michael Sheen is a clear signal that the movies were going in a completely different direction with Aro. Sheen is a great actor who played what he was given perfectly, but what he was given was a very different character.

In New Moon the book, Aro first rejects Edward request because this is Carlisle’s gifted son, and more, this is not what the Volturi do. They are not hitmen. It’s just a big no all around.

Bella enters, and the Aro she meets is a very polite and gracious man who’s delighted to see the human still alive, and pleased Carlisle’s son won’t be suicidal anymore. However, Edward fully intended to step into the sunlight in the middle of Volterra, specifically to provoke the Volturi, and he has broken the law with Bella. Further, Edward makes it clear that he fully intends to walk out of Volterra with his human still human, and that she’ll die of old age if he gets his way. Edward’s contempt of the law could not be more clear. However, Alice shows Aro that Bella’s fate is sealed, she turns or she dies. The law will be upheld. Aro is glad to hear it, and lets the Cullens all go home.

All in all, it’s a very tense occasion where Edward has put Aro in a difficult position, because he’s trying to force him to kill his best friend’s son, and Aro goes “YES THANK GOD” when Alice finally gives him an out.

New Moon of the movies was not this. Starting with the flashback (because I’m being thorough), Aro executes a lowly criminal himself. I object to that, I think that’s a menial task and Aro doing it himself made the Volturi look less regal, not more. Cut to the present day, Aro rejects Edward’s request because he doesn’t want to waste his gift. We get the whole meeting with Bella, and Aro… well I don’t know why he does any of the things he does. This guy never mentions his friendship to Carlisle, tries to kill our plucky heroes three times in the space of one minute (one, gives Felix the order to kill Bella, stopped by Edward. Two, moves to decapitate Edward, stopped by Bella. Three, he’s about to eat Bella, stopped by Alice), and when he lets them go it feels terribly convenient.

This was a guy written to be the villain of the series, and it showed.

Cut to Breaking Dawn part I’s ending scene, and while I love the song choice for the scene, and fully agree that Aro considers misspelling Carlisle’s name to be a capital offense, the scene itself… we are presented with a villainous, power-hungry megalomaniac who’s just waiting to strike against the Cullens.

We then get Breaking Dawn part II, and I haven’t seen that movie in years but I remember the fight scene well enough. Aro kills Carlisle with the biggest grin on his face, and gives the go-ahead to his Volturi to kill the surviving Cullens and their witnesses.

Contrast that with canon, where Aro’s first words to Carlisle are «Nothing would make me happier than preserving your life today». Now, he’s making it very clear that this meeting will most likely end with Carlisle’s death, but he’s not happy about it. He’s certainly not going to kill him with a smile on his face and laughter in his heart.

The movies needed a hammy villain, and that’s what Michael Sheen played. It is not who Aro is, at all. And he’s not the only character this happened to, but again, this is an Aro post so I’m not going to start raging like Don Corleone about what they did to my boys.

So, with the movies firmly expelled from the post, let’s look at the Twilight series from Aro’s point of view.

Or, rather, we’ll have to start earlier because Aro’s decisions throughout the series are pretty clearly motivated by Carlisle. And that means considering, “why is Carlisle so important, anyway?”

Consider these things: one, Aro is gifted with the power of knowing every single thought a person has ever had. He knows your soul. Two, Aro is the leader of the supernatural world, he has been for over a thousand years.

How many friends does a person with that power and in that position have?

Three, who does Aro even come into contact with?

Starting with number three, for Aro it’s going to be 1) criminals, 2) Volturi guard hopefuls, 3) Weirdos like Laurent who are wasting Aro’s time.

(“But what about the guard!” Well, while we observe close interpersonal relationships between Aro and Jane, and Aro and Renata, and one can assume Corin to be close to the wives, the distinction between Volturi coven and Volturi guard remains. The guards are servants, in some cases beloved servants, but servants nonetheless. It would be inappropriate and weird for Aro to start slumming it with Demetri and Felix)

So, Aro doesn’t get out much, which brings us to point two. The people he does meet, and who are willing to entertain a friendship with the Volturi leader, are going to be people who want something. And that might work for some rulers, Louis XIV built Versailles specifically to make his subjects do this for him, but he had something to gain politically from that. Aro does not, his power is supreme without a need to tolerate brown nosers. More, with his own and Marcus’ gifts, he’ll know right away that he’s being used for power. He would get nothing out of it.

Finally point one, Aro’s gift. Say that we have a vampire who’s not a weirdo and who thinks Aro’s a cool dude. Well, the question now is, who would ever want a person in their life who knows all there is to know about them? I wouldn't want anybody to know every thought I've ever had, I certainly would never seek out a person to know me that deeply when I could just go find normal people to be friends with instead. Not to mention how incredibly unequal such a friendship would be.

In short, I don’t think Aro has any friends.

Enter Carlisle a very amiable person who cherishes Aro for his personality, and doesn’t mind having his mind read. Aro just found a unicorn. Carlisle on his end likes Aro so much that he lives with him for decades. Even if you want to read their relationship as platonic, that’s still a very strong friendship.

Point being that Carlisle is unbelievably precious to Aro, and so very unique. Aro has lived for over three millennia, and never met anyone like this before. There won’t be another Carlisle.

This in turn makes him willing to stretch as far as he can to preserve that friendship and, as the plot thickens, keep Carlisle alive.

Fast forwards to 2006, and Aro is sitting in Volterra minding his own business when Carlisle’s son walks into town demanding his own execution. He has not committed any crimes. Not only is assisted suicide not something the Volturi even do, but this would ruin Aro’s friendship with Carlisle. Even if Carlisle was miraculously understanding of Aro killing his son (which I can’t imagine he would be), this would never leave the air between them. Carlisle could never be around him again after something like that.

So, Aro turns down Edward’s request. “Stupid Volturi man ruining my dramatic suicide, I’ll show him who’s boss!” Edward replies, and runs shirtless into the sunlight. I’m sure Aro was just dying, you had “The Sound of Silence” playing as he stared into nothingness because how is this happening to him. A whiplash of an hour later, Bella is alive again, Aro is happy, we can be done with this now, right? Right?!

No, Edward says, we cannot be done with this. He’s still refusing to turn Bella.

And so we get that whole New Moon exchange where Aro very tellingly shoves the part where Edward WALKED INTO THE SUNLIGHT IN VOLTERRA under the carpet and out of the conversation (for comparison: Irina is executed for false testimony and Bree for breaking a law she didn’t know existed), and he even allows Bella to leave human when he could easily have bitten her himself to keep the Cullens honest. This guy went out of his way to be lenient and show the Cullens good faith.

And then a few months later Irina walks into Volterra, bearing memories of what is unmistakably a Cullen immortal child.

Aro may care for Carlisle, but this is the guy who killed his baby sister so he’d still have Marcus’ gift. He will bend far, very far, for those he cares about, but he will not break. It’s duty above love, Volturi above Aro’s personal preferences. An immortal child is not an offense that can be tolerated, and so it’ll be Didyme 2: Aro Kills Someone He Loves Boogaloo.

By now I think it should be quite clear why I think Aro was trying to prevent the fight. Battle would have meant Carlisle’s certain death.

(And that’s even assuming the Volturi won the fight. With Bella there, there was a chance the Volturi wouldn’t prevail. But even before Bella started showing off, Aro was very much hoping this wouldn’t be another Didyme situation.)

#aro #volturi #carlisle cullen #twilight #twilight meta #twilight renaissance #the sad thing is that i have so much more to say about Aro #this is only the first of many posts #Anonymous #ask #i guess i also have to tag #aro/carlisle #sorry guys my terrible ship is leaking into my metas #but damnit IT'S A GOOD SHIP #long post

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skullchicken · 3 years

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On the 30.04.2021, Meinhart Bonifaz Brant, at that point an unassuming spindly 15-year old human reading Stanislaw Lem's "Star Diaries" on the living room couch, goblinized into a giant. About 50 years later, he would go on a few adventures under the street name "Alberich" (you see, it's very funny because he's not a dwarf).

In honor of goblinization-day, I'm compiling all of the art and (hopefully entertaining) stories I have of mah boi and the chicago shadowrun-group - so these are going to be some long posts. Everything under the cut so I don't clog up your dashboards and cut up into chunks. If you don't want to see it, blacklist "goblinization".

Part 1, the first mission:

So, why is Alberich? When I joined the shadowrun-group that would start my obsession, my english conversational skills weren't that great. Mostly trouble finding words and having a really thick german accent. Since I was a bit self-conscious about that, I decided to instead lean into it. Thus Alberich was a german-born ex-museum director turned shadowrunner since he did a Very Stupid Thing and had to leave the Allied German States for Chicago.

What did he do? He made a deal with a dragon. Specifically, he sold a forged piece of art to Lofwyr, CEO of Saeder-Krupp.

Alberich was introduced into the already formed group something like this: "At the entrance of the building, arriving punctually, you spot the biggest troll you've probably ever seen, looking very uncomfortable to be here and slinking as much as is even possible. All in all, he somehow doesn't look very threatening. In fact, he looks as if an art teacher had been stuffed with a 3 meter/10 feet tall horned giant. His face lights up as he sees you, though."

So the first thing he does is shake everyone's hand, politely assuring them that it's a pleasure to meet them and yes, he is Alberich, and who are you? Ah, yes, lovely names, very creative.

For reference, this is the average shadowrun-group:

Speaking of which, the gang's line-up did change a bit unfortunately, but the ones that stayed from beginning to end were:

Speedrun, street-samurai. An adrenaline-junkie who has styled himself after anime. Very much trying to be cool, to the point that he has adopted a deep-sounding voice that's rather obviously not his natural speaking voice. We pictured it as him talking with his head on his chin. Here he is, trying to impress the fighting adept shere khan:

Elf_Queen, decker and elf-poser. An elf-poser is someone who tries very hard to be elf-like - in her case, she wanted to actually *be* an elf. She ran away from home since her parents were metahuman-racists (Humanis policlub). Notably, her online and offline persona were very different. Online, she's very assertive and the guild leader of an mmorpg. Offline however, she's pretty much scared of anything. When Alberich joined the group, she hid behind Speedrun - you don't live with humanis for that long without picking up some xenophobia as well. And trolls aren't well-liked in the game world.

So the first mission: De-kidnap a kidnapped singer called Jericho. First we took a look at the bus-line she had last taken, a task for which Elf_Queen had to jack into said bus. Only three problems: A) She had to get behind a metal covering inside the bus B) her character sheet is min-maxed to hell and back, thus she has ONE measly point in strenght. Which wouldn't be a problem since she's in the presence of three pretty strong dudes if not for C) Massive Social Anxiety.

After looking around like a wet bunny for 5 minutes, Alberich (who has also cramped himself into the bus) finally catches on and goes "... can I help you, little lady?", pops the cover open and she can get deckin'. You might call this strike 1. You'll see why.

After visiting her appartment and some more investigation, we gather that Miss Jericho has been taken away into a bunraku (think brothel but with more brainwashing) to be re-programmed to the liking of her ex-boyfriend whose band she left to make it on her own (and quite successfully so). Which means we'll have to deal with Yakuza.

The bunraku turns out to be disguised as a night club. After I tried and failed to casually infiltrate the place (... I... er... wasn't a very good player at first?) we had to flee forwards, take out the guards at the door and make sure we get in and out of there as soon as possible.

In the club, almost before we made it backstage, Elf_Queen got held up by a guy bent on talking to her and froze up. Well, at least until Alberich very casually bent over the two of them and informed the guy that "she's with me". I tell you this, because this was strike 2.

Backstage, past a kitchen and into the cellar, we finally got into a room with two rows of plexi-glass cells - and in the middle, a bound spirit, a thing that feeds on negative emotions. Our muscle (Speedrun and Baba Yaga - yes, we had a John Wick in our midst. And yes, Alberich technically doesn't count as muscle, he's a mage. It's complicated) were outside, fighting off Yakuza. So it was up to EQ to hack Miss Jericho's cell open as quickly as possible and for me to make sure she wouldn't die while doing so.

After like three rounds of unsuccessful banishing (as I said... not a good player), the cell was open. But...

But.

There were the other victims.

What about the others?

Now, when I thought up Alberich, my core idea was "Daryl Whitefeather and Don Corleone having a mental fistfight". I tend to play good characters and this time around, to honor the setting I set out a morally grey character, someone who mostly looks out for himself and only indulges in kindness when he has the luxury to do so. Being kind and polite, if you think about it, is really just usually the easiest and most pleasant way to get people to do what you want. And if people are convinced you're scary by nature, seeming less so is just a smart survival strategy.

But then he looks at this little socially anxious nerd, who very much reminds him of himself, when he used to be a little socially anxious nerd, long, long ago and she says with big eyes "please! can you give me a bit more time? We need to save the others! We have to try!" and it's just... strike three. He's taken the little decker into his heart. So internally he goes "welp, I'm old anyways" and externally he shrugs his mana-burned shoulders, sighs "okay" and keeps trying to banish.

Unfortunately the spirit almost eats him alive. EQ fails to open any more gates, so they make it out once he as but 2 life points left, run into the elevator and evade the fast approaching small army of Yakuza on the way out.

Elf_Queen jumps into his arms, Alberich holds her like one might hold a chihuahua, Baba Yaga is trying to gauge their time and speedrun's reporting back from outside.

In the end, it was bittersweet. Because while we did save Miss Jericho, the brainwashing still took hold. Her last 1 1/2 years of life wiped away, she asked for her ex-boyfriend as soon as she woke up.

End of Part 1, thank you for reading this very self-indulgent text!

#shadowrun #goblinization #troll #mage #shaman #decker #baba yaga #john wick #cyberpunk #ttrpg

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clansayeed · 4 years

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Bound by Destiny II, part 1 ― Chapter 5: The Bloodkeeper

PAIRING: Kamilah Sayeed x MC (Nadya Al Jamil) RATING: Mature

⥼ MASTERLIST ⥽

⥼ Bound by Destiny II, part 1 ⥽

While struggling with nightmares of lives she’s never lived, a shadow from the past looming over her city, and the proposed idea that her life may just be a little bit too weird to handle alone, Nadya makes sure to tell herself that everything is perfect just the way it is. If only. When the self-proclaimed King of Vampires (and Maker of her sometimes-girlfriend and always-boss, can’t forget that little tidbit) Gaius Augustine returns intent on claiming Manhattan as the throne that was promised, she and her friends find themselves forced into the task of saving the world. But with millennia-old vampires and an Order of hunters on their heels as well as allies hiding catastrophic secrets at their backs… it won’t be an easy task. Too bad destiny didn’t exactly ask for her input.

Bound by Destiny II and the rest of the Oblivion Bound series is an ongoing dramatic retelling project of the Bloodbound series and spin-off, Nightbound. Find out more [HERE].

*Let me know if you would like to be added to the Destiny II tag list!

⥼ Chapter Summary ⥽

Gaius is free. Jameson is a traitor. Kamilah is vengeful. And Nadya is a Bloodkeeper.

[READ IT ON AO3]

“He’s back.”

Part of her is angry they don’t believe her at first. But when Nadya puts herself in their shoes — and she can now, like changing coats or doing something different with her hair, the ease of it frightens her — she isn’t entirely certain she wouldn’t react the same way. Which was easier to trust; the word of a fragile girl one loud noise away from a post-traumatic breakdown, or their own memories?

Only now they’re her memories, too.

So it makes sense when they go to check. Kamilah and Adrian leaving the penthouse so quickly they may as well have jumped from the roof. It’s hard but she tries not to take it personally. It’s not like they’re avoiding Nadya. This is important. This is life or death.

This is survival or slaughter.

They aren’t stupid enough to leave her on her own again, though. Nadya’s burned all those bridges — and herself in the process. Lily comforts her because she’s scared, because Lily knows she’s scared, but comfort, in this case, is another word for ‘keeps her under constant surveillance.’

“Did you know being unconscious isn’t the same as sleeping?”

Lily looks down at her strangely. But keeps Nadya close, tucked under her arm with a grip that’s meant to ground her but also makes her feel kind of grounded? “Weird talk to fill the silence.”

“The opposite, actually.”

“What d’you mean?”

What does she mean? Or how best can she describe the noise all around her; all the voices with their cheers and screams and laughter and weeping? Lily’s the vampire — she’s supposed to be the one with the super hearing.

Well… technically she is. Since all of the things Nadya hears aren’t really there. They already happened a long time ago.

She waits too long to respond, gets lost in her own (not really) thoughts. So Lily squeezes her arm — unknowingly right on top of a not-yet-bloomed bruise from her tussle with the Trinity. And the pain anchors her to the present. Careful, some part of her warns, don’t make a habit of it.

“Nadi’.”

“I think that’s been my problem, lately,” she continues; not like it explains anything, “I’ve spent too much time hoping to just… knock out, y’know?”

“No… I don’t.”

“How did I get here?”

Lily tenses with worry and holds Nadya back at arms’ length. She probably hopes that will keep her from knowing how truly and utterly freaked out her best friend is. It doesn’t.

“You’re scaring me, Nadya.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t — it’s not something to apologize for. But… can you just… try to explain?”

She nods. She tries.

“How did I get back to Kamilah’s?” Eyes quickly roaming over the familiar furniture, doorways, displayed antiques she’s come to know so well; “I don’t remember.”

Lily inhales deep; still doesn’t quite shake such human habits as breathing. “Adrian brought you here, sweetie. You don’t remember that?”

“Where did Adrian find me?”

“In his office…” And the silence is imploring, desperate despite the calmness of her. So Lily keeps going; “You were missing for three whole days. I couldn’t track your phone, you weren’t on any camera. We tore the city up and down trying to find you but it was like… like you’d vanished into thin air.

“Then you were just back. I pinged your phone at Raines Corp. and you were there sleeping on his couch like you’d pulled an all-nighter or something. None of it made sense — still doesn’t, mind you. But I’m the one who should be asking you about all this. Not the other way around.”

Nadya’s face scrunches up while she listens; and tries to remember. Anything; a drive, a train ride, walking on her own two feet. Only there’s nothing to remember because it’s gone; swept clean. Like someone took an eraser to the white board of her life and just wiped it carelessly across. Half-words and fractured sentences left in the wake.

Something falls into her eye and it stings — makes Nadya recoil and Lily hold her tighter because Kamilah probably warned her about Nadya being a danger to herself but when are they going to understand she’s a danger to everyone else, too?

It’s sweat, she realizes in the most anticlimactic fashion. A shower would be nice — but Nadya highly doubts she’s allowed to do such an ‘alone’ activity right now. As it is she practically has to pry her best friend’s hand away so she can give herself some space. One of them still needs breathing room, after all.

“Why aren’t you asking me, then? About… all this.”

The young vampire chews her bottom lip.

“Figured we should probably wait until Adrian and Kamilah get back. You remember where they went, right?”

Oh, she remembers. She remembers that particular change of atmosphere with a clarity as striking as it is opposite of the rest of her muddled thoughts.

“I just wanna sleep, Lil’.” Nadya sighs; and the fragility of it scares her. Forces her to face the reality that she didn’t know she could be so… broken.

“So sleep. They could be gone for hours.” Lily means well — Nadya knows that. But there’s absolutely no freakin’ way that’s happening.

Lily kicks off her boots and starts to stretch out along the length of the couch. Nadya’s body agrees; an instinct forged in friendship’s fire, and scoots herself down until they’re in an all-too-familiar position. Head-meets-toes. A little uneasy and a lot cramped, and it’s no sleeping bag slumber party. Yet somehow it’s the exact balance of physical comfort and personal space she needs. Even if Lily’s ankle bumps against her temple a few times.

They both close their eyes. Neither one sleeps.

Which is just as well, because when the Council members return to the penthouse they do so with voices raised and only rising higher.

The door slams shut with a THUD. Too loud for Nadya and Lily not to sit up far too alert to have been asleep. They know it — but don’t get the time to mention it before the fight is brought to them.

“He’s your Clan, Kamilah! You’re telling me you never suspected a thing?!”

“You were victim to Jameson’s psychic interference just as much as I!”

Adrian scoffs at the excuse. “Why didn’t you have any safeguards in place?”

“He was bound in blessed iron and witchfire! I seem to recall you agreeing with me that further measures were unnecessary!”

“You spent more time with him than anyone. You really didn’t consider he might have a way out?”

Kamilah rounds on Adrian in a whirl of dark hair and darker eyes. Her hand hovers just shy of his throat, nails like claws so familiar with that particular form of violence but not Adrian, never Adrian so she stays her wrath. For now.

“Watch what you find yourself implying, Adrian.” She snarls.

And he does — his frustration falters in the set of his brow before coming back in a different way. “You know I don’t mean that. I could never. I just…”

“Like I’ve been saying since we left —” Jax doesn’t have to shout to be heard over them; the growl deep-set in his curled upper lip is more than enough, “— neither of you are thinking straight. Yelling louder doesn’t make either one of you more right. On the contrary — you’re both very very much at fault.”

He stares them down; their bond, their years and experience trying to push him into submission but Jax doesn’t let it happen. He stands resolute and damn the rest.

“I take it the vampire Don Corleone wasn’t safe and sound where you left him last, huh?” asks Lily, and if she hoped to serve as a human (you get the point) crowbar intent on prying them apart… well its the thought that counts.

Even Adrian looks at her with a strangely scolding reproach. “I know you mean well, Lily, but if you fully understood the seriousness of the situation, you’d know now isn’t the time for jokes.”

“Yeah, well, maybe if you guys would share with the class instead of storming off I’d understand the seriousness of the situation.”

Nadya reaches out a hand to Lily’s arm; tries to stop her before she says something that actually does some damage. Her best friend gives her a look of “what, you know I’m right,” but it’s not about who is right and who is wrong.

Not against him.

She chances a look to Kamilah, oddly silent compared to moments ago. And just as she feared — Kamilah’s looking right back at her. Surveying her; trying to find something wrong with her. If only Nadya could express just how much of the woman’s self-doubt she feels as her own.

“He wasn’t there, was he. Gaius wasn’t in the Onyx Sarcophagus.” It’s not a question because she knows the answer. After all, it kidnapped her and fed her fancy wine and food and split her skull in two with a psychic jackhammer.

Kamilah purses her lips. “No. And you knew we would not find him.”

“I… yes. I knew.”

At Kamilah’s side, Adrian runs his hand over his face. Paler than she’s ever seen him, even when he was starving, beaten, and facing the executioner’s sword… or sunrise.

“How do you even know about him, Nadya,” desperation bleeding through his voice, “let alone where he… where we…”

All that he’s feeling and Nadya sees that he’s still holding himself back. Like if he feels it, or lets himself feel all of it, that makes everything worse. Somehow accepting those emotions makes everything Adrian’s fault.

But it’s not. It’s not your fault Adrian, it’s not.

“He showed me. He… he led me to it.”

“Who? Jameson?”

Kamilah scoffs. “Don’t be such a fool, Adrian. You know very well who.”

“But that shouldn’t have been possible.”

“What does that matter?” Jax kicks off from the wall and braces against the back of the couch. “It happened. Can’t change it. The only thing looking back at the past is good for is figuring out your mistakes so you don’t repeat them.”

“We didn’t make any mistakes.”

“Yes, we did.”

All eyes on Kamilah as she raises herself to a height Nadya didn’t know she was hiding. It’s a stature — a kind of weight on her shoulders she’s so far only seen worn by the Trinity. Two thousand years accepted and owned in one fluid motion.

She’s terrifying, and she’s beautiful, and she’s… she’s Kamilah.

“We underestimated him. I underestimated him. We allowed ourselves to believe Gaius could be chained and held prisoner. That he would accept the punishment we had agreed upon; that he should be forced to stare into the abyss of eternity alone, in the dark, and thought that he may face his actions and understand the consequences.”

She turns to Adrian vulnerable; raw in a way she can’t quite control. She carries the weight of her years but not without struggle. “Our mistakes were not physical, Adrian. But the day we took our victory and believed the matter put to rest with him was the day we blinded ourselves to the truth. Because… it was easier that way.

“We should have killed him.”

The look in his eyes — he agrees even if he won’t say it out loud. A gathering storm of guilt and responsibility and taking the consequences on his shoulders and seeing the both of them like that… it breaks her heart in a way Nadya didn’t even know could be felt. Until now.

“Fine,” he spits out the word in a bitter pill, “but none of that explains how Nadya is involved.”

Nadya hopes her smile is a reassuring one — but something tells her she’s too exhausted and it just looks weary. The way his face falls only hits it home. “I thought the same thing. Until he explained it to me.”

“He what?”

She can feel his panic itching under her skin like an ugly sweater she can’t pull over her head. Kamilah’s, too, though she hides it better and takes a knee in front of Nadya where she sits. She rests a cool palm on her thigh; tries and succeeds to keep the tsunami of emotions she’s feeling out of her face but Nadya doesn’t need to see them to feel them there.

“Nadya,” she rasps, “what did he explain?”

“My visions.”

“How did he know —” But the question dies on her lips; what’s the use in asking when they both know the answer?

He’s Gaius.

“Start from the beginning.”

It’s not a request.

LINEHERE

“You know, Bloodkeeper sounds like an epic R-P-G title.”

Though the moment she says it Lily looks over way out of the corner of her eye — like she isn’t sure if it’s okay to be making light of the whole business just yet.

Nadya’s smile is weak, but there. “I wish. Then I could return it and get my money back.”

“Store credit and you know it.”

She shrugs in a touché kind of way; looks back to Kamilah in hopes she might say something, anything — even if it’s just to scold them for not “taking things seriously.”

But the vampiress is as silent as she has been from the moment Nadya began recounting the events of… well, a couple nights ago now.

And saying nothing is sucky sure — but that Kamilah won’t even meet Nadya’s eyes is what really punches her in the gut.

Suddenly Adrian leans forward in his chair, elbows-on-knees, and buries his face in his hands.

“Adrian…?” She calls hesitantly — wanting so badly to go over there and comfort him. But if he rejected her now Nadya isn’t so sure she’d survive it. Not in one piece.

Kamilah distracts her with a touch. “Do you remember where you were taken?”

She has to dig… really deep and down and she has a feeling she shouldn’t remember where but it was too terrible a betrayal not to find the pain of it lingering in her chest.

“Marcel’s. I—I recognized the gardens. But I didn’t see him — maybe he…” And what kind of a world are they living in now where the idea of Marcel being held captive is a better one than him being complicit?

Any hope is dashed, though, when Kamilah shakes her head. “No; while I’m saddened to hear it I can’t say it surprises me. Marcel adored Gaius, and I think he held a soft spot for the boy as well. Enough that he valued Marcel’s innocence and kept him from knowing the more gruesome aspects of his plans. It took him many years to forgive Adrian and I for our turning against him.”

Jax’s face twists in disgust. “This kid, what, wanted Gaius’ crazy plan to happen?”

“He wished for a world where we no longer had to hide,” Kamilah replies in measure, “and I will not begrudge him that. But I have to hope the glamour of his return will soon fade and Marcel will… make the right choice.”

Glamour. Against her will, when Nadya inhales she smells death and rot. Behind her closed eyelids she can still see his opaque eyes…

“And you really believe all of this, Nadya?” asks Jax instead; he’s gotten good at changing the subject when they all know it’ll end in argument. Hanging her head counts as a nod, right?

“I do.”

“Even knowing how crazy manipulative this guy apparently is.”

“He could explain everything.”

Jax scoffs. “Yeah, and that’s wrapped up a little too neat and tidy for me.”

“While skepticism is a healthy trait to have when Gaius is involved, Matsuo, he gains nothing from lying.” Kamilah stands so suddenly Nadya gets secondhand vertigo. “As it is — I can confirm his claims.”

They all watch as she practically vanishes — gone in one blink and back in the next. She returns clutching a small book bound in old leather greyed and sagging with age. Nadya can see the echoes of its former splendor in her mind’s eye. Something from the library in her office, probably.

Kamilah flips hastily through the worn parchment pages; finds something near the end that makes her expression fall the barest flicker. “The myth of the Bloodkeeper.”

Part of Nadya wants to wrench the book from her hands. Another wants to chuck it from the building roof. “Please tell me that’s some kind of encyclopedia.”

“Nothing so concrete.”

Beside her, Lily’s practically jumping out of her own body. “Lore loot… that’s some high-level shit.”

“Lil’.”

“Actually, given I’m understanding the context correctly, she’s nearly accurate.” Which makes Lily pound her fist into the air and hold it out to Kamilah — but hell hasn’t frozen over just yet.

“For the first thousand years or so, Gaius kept me close at hand. Only once did I leave his side and it was at his own behest. He tasked me to find a book; a journal of some sort. With the scarcest of leads I scoured the vast city of Pataliputra for a decade. Until I found it coveted by an old madwoman.”

Nadya shivers against a breeze that isn’t there.

“And?”

“And she knew who I was. Never had we so much as toed the Empire’s borders and she knew me. My name, my birthplace, my deeds… ones no mortal could have shared — ones with no survivors.”

Kamilah goes eerily silent; lost in her own memory. God forbid Nadya be lost in it too. “Kamilah.”

Twice she blinks, lets her eyes lose their glaze of the past. “I told him I had found the book, and with a few pages to prove it’s existence. As well as a pile of ashes.”

Adrian snaps to attention and the movement makes Nadya jump. He’d been so quiet, so still… more a grave than a man.

“You lied to Gaius?”

“It was my small act of youthful rebellion.”

“I just can’t believe he bought it.”

“You’d be surprised just how much trust he had in me. Even in the beginning.”

Lily raises her hand but doesn’t wait to get called on. “Uhm, can we get back to the mad old lady trope?”

Only she doesn’t have to. Nadya reaches out for the journal and when Kamilah lays it gently in her open palm it feels… familiar. Like it’s been in her hand before — each word from her own thoughts onto the page.

“She was a Bloodkeeper.”

Kamilah nods. The hairs on the back of Nadya’s neck stand up; all four vampires watch her flip through thin pages with anticipation. Do they expect her to suddenly pull an Exorcist and start screaming memories in a demonic rage?

“The word is mentioned nearest the end. She describes a relief at naming herself; she feels unburdened by it. And the way she describes learning it is as though it came to her in a… a dream.”

She falters — Nadya doesn’t look away from the entries written in a language she can’t even read. She doesn’t have to.

Kamilah’s never sounded less certain of, well, anything in her life. “I see the signs, now. The mere potential of that knowledge was… I wanted to forget it, Nadya. I did — even in your hour of need.”

There’s not much use in trying to read it; when Nadya hands Kamilah back the book she makes a point of touching the back of her hand. “I believe you. You don’t need to be sorry.”

“I promised you I would find a way to ease your suffering.”

“And you did.” The journal falls abandoned on the rug between them, they might as well be completely alone. In fact Nadya would rather they were. “You did, Kamilah.”

“A-hem—” Coughs Jax into his fist with all the tact of, well, Nadya. “Let’s skip to the part where he let you go. Anyone else find that interesting?”

“He’s right,” Adrian agrees, “Gaius isn’t the type to let go of things—people—he claims belong to him.”

He is right. Nadya knows it too. But when she scrunches up her nose and thinks really really hard? It’s easier to remember her eighth birthday party.

“I can’t remember.”

“Well isn’t that ironic.” Lily teases dryly.

“More like convenient…” Adrian trails off — finds Jax giving him a hard eye.

“What did I say? Too neat and tidy.”

Kamilah reaches out to stroke her fingertips along Nadya’s arm; a caress even while literally holding herself at arms’ length. “Jameson’s doing, I’m sure.”

Jameson.

“Nadya?”

She looks down to see she’s gone rigid under the woman’s touch. Not that she relaxes. The Council members had been arguing about Jameson when they returned. And Valdas… hadn’t Valdas said he was the one who had messed with her head — influenced her, he’d called it.

“He took it.”

“Took what?”

Jameson who deceived them all. Jameson who forced her to take on memories she wasn’t ready for. Jameson who poured the wine and served the dinner and all the while loathed that he didn’t have a seat at the table.

“My head… he… he…”

Jameson who offered her water.

Before he took hold of her head and dug psychic spears into her mind over and over until he found what he was looking for.

What Gaius was looking for.

Nadya groans; knocks her glasses aside in her haste to somehow stop the pain. She presses the heels of her palms against her eyes and kind of hopes they’ll pop into her skull to dull the pain.

“Nadya!” comes Adrian’s voice, suddenly too close, and she throws out a hand to try and keep him at a distance. “What — what’s wrong?”

“Give her space, Adrian,” comes Kamilah’s voice, hypocritically closer but far less panicked; instead she’s a cool drink of water through the burning pain where Jameson had singed a hole into her memory.

“Keep going, Nadya. Whatever Jameson has taken is in your power to retrieve.”

Encouraging words from a woman not feeling like her head is a matchstick alight. “N-Not… it’s like a wound. It hurts…”

Lily squeezes her shoulder. “Come on, Nadi’. You’re literally the only one who can.”

Blindly Nadya reaches out over her shoulder, grasps at the void with uncertainty, but it doesn’t last long.

“I’m right here Nadya,” whispers Adrian in her ear, voice thick and unsure but none of that matters because his grip is the exact opposite, “we all are.”

“Even Jax,” Lily chimes in.

“I can support her without the group hug.”

It makes Nadya laugh; a spluttering thing wet with tears and spots in her eyes and everything sharp nipping at her head trying to take a chunk out of her. And somehow in the midst of it all… something snaps back into place.

“TheAmuletofNero!” The words tumble from Nadya and leave her heaving for breath. Adrian’s disembodied hand holds a glass of water in front of her and she doesn’t hesitate to gulp it down. Could give absolutely one hundred percent less of a care if she spills half of it down her chin — which she does.

She comes up from drowning in the cup, coughs on the water sloshing around in her lungs, and tries again.

“The… The Amulet of Nero. That’s what he wanted. He… he needed to remember where it was hidden.”

“Because he’s, what, going senile in his old age?” Lily asks, rightfully skeptical.

Gasp. “He —” —gulp, gasp— “— he didn’t hide it. Someoneelse… and he didn’tknow…” And just when she thinks she’s got only air in her lungs Nadya’s body throws her into another fit.

Adrian returns with a second glass; before she can take it he holds it out of reach with a warning, “slowly, this time,” and waits until she nods to give it to her. “‘The Amulet of Nero?’ I’ve never heard of it.”

Everyone looks at Kamilah for an answer, then. How is it possible that just when she’s certain the woman can’t possibly look any more worried, she manages all too well?

“That’s because Gaius had hidden it away long ago by then. And for good reason.”

Nadya sips her water — with every cool taste the psychic pain receding further and further into nothing. The sight makes Kamilah’s lips quirk upward and brings her hand to the human’s fevered brow. But her eyes are too sad for it to be a smile.

“If Gaius is looking for the Amulet then things are far worse than I imagined.”

#bloodbound #choices bb #bloodbound fanfiction #adrian raines #kamilah sayeed #jax matsuo #lily spencer #bloodbound mc #mc: nadya al jamil #fic: oblivion bound #oblv: bound by destiny ii #oblv: new chapter #; my fics

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theessayist · 4 years

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Movies that have made me cry like a baby

For a movie buff who’s more inclined to the gruesome thrill of horror flicks and the ingenious narration of crime films, I’m pretty in love with emotional movies. It takes a lot for this ENTJ to shed a tear; even on purpose; and in fact, I can only name a few titles that really got these eyeballs of mine watery.

I think a major part of the reason why I love emotional movies is that the way that I still get affected by them helps me determine if I still have a moral, empathetic anchor... You know... Somewhere deep down there. It gives me solace.

Moving on, knowing that I’m not an easy shell to break, I can guarantee that the films I’m about to mention will absolutely tear your heart apart.

S/N I haven’t watched Miracle in Cell No. 7 or any Frank Darabont masterpiece yet, so if they hit hard enough, I might make another list.

S/N #2 Animated films will be separated.

5. Marriage Story (2019) dir. Noah Baumbach

I’m a 17-year-old single girl living with my perfectly stable parents who love each other so much and I’m happy and eternally grateful for that; but why the hell am I crying?!

Starting off on our list is a movie that made me cry because of the immense confusion I felt as I watched two exhausted, beautiful humans go through a painful separation when they clearly still love one another.

I think the main reason why this film made a waterfall out of me is because I didn’t know how to feel. I didn’t know if I should side on Nicole, since she was the one who made more sacrifices and considerations; or Charlie- since he was the one who was suffering in the ugly end of the stick. It made me feel frustrated and angry in a way that I wanted to push them back together, and at the same time, pull them both apart.

I’d like to say more- but now I just want to credit Scarlett and Adam for the most heart-wrenching fight scene I have ever endured in all seventeen years of my life.

4. Train to Busan (2016) dir. Yeon Sang Ho

I watched this Korean zombie horror flick thinking it was going to quench my thirst for some brutal flesh-ripping, blood and gushing gore. I NEVER got tired of zombies- whether in movies, video games or soap operas, I eat that crap up. And so I dived in ravenous as hell, thinking I was gonna get purely that.

But instead I got a pretty, pregnant woman and her protective husband, an inadvertently neglectful dad and his adorable child, a hobo, and two teenagers my age who’re just as afraid as everyone else would be.

Oh, and a scumbag whose selfish deeds are so unspeakable I’d rather say ‘Voldemort’.

Seokwoo didn’t have to smile like that, you know. It’s little contrasting details like that that make emotional scenes so goddamn irresistible.

This movie got me by surprise- my unsuspecting self who did not expect any tear-jerker was cut up from behind with a father, and an almost-father, sacrificing for the love of their lives. Who doesn’t cry to that kinda stuff? Please cut their chests open and install a heart.

3. Titanic (1997) dir. James Cameron

Oh yes, the popular royal tear-jerker, sitting right next to the campus queen bees, The Notebook and A Walk to Remember (to which I didn’t cry, for what it’s worth). As much as I loved the romance that so beautifully blossomed between Jack and Rose, quite frankly I did not cry because the former died. Although that was really sad, too.

You know what gave me a stuffy nose and two red eyes for three days? The other passengers, for gosh’s sake.

The guy who got shot by the seaman. That seaman who shot himself afterwards. The band who played through the chaos. The maids that drowned in the ballroom trying to look after everyone else. The lone kid in the hallway who could’ve drowned. The mother tucking her children to bed. And most of all, the old couple cuddling each other as water rushed in their room!

I don’t think I’ve to explain why that subtly painful montage broke my gold-titanium alloy heart. It didn’t help that the lovable Captain Smith chose to sink with his ship, too.

2. Forrest Gump (1995) dir. Robert Zemeckis

Before I watched it, I didn’t know what to expect from this movie. But it had Tom Hanks (who, to me at that moment, was purely Sheriff Woody), and I knew it was iconic; so I sat through, thinking it was another one of those great films that was going to bore me. And boy, was I wrong!

So, unlike all the other films on this list, Forrest Gump actually made me cry in a heart-warming, happy, beautiful way. We watched this guy persevere through the challenges of his universe, we saw the way he rewrote history, we laughed at his utter stupidity, we lamented the come-and-go relationship with Jenny, we grew to love Colonel Dan; everything about it was amazing and touching and the end was just so incredibly satisfying, I didn’t know films could make me happy that much.

I was just really, really proud of our boy Forrest and how he lived, okay? Leave me alone.

1. Scent of a Woman (1992) dir. Martin Brest

So, I’m a really big fan of Al Pacino. Why? Because, like I said- crime is my #1 genre. Specifically, organized crime. And who’s the prince of the organized crime genre? You guessed it- this man. He was Jimmy Hoffa. He was Tony Montana. He was Michael Corleone, for crying out loud!

As a new, young fan, he has established in me the image of a tough, hard-wired man who would stop at absolutely nothing to achieve what he wants. Not morals, not friends, and definitely not family (F stands for Fredo). So what did I expect when he became the blind, eccentric, women-obsessed war veteran Lt. Col. Frank Slade? I had no idea.

That was why it got me so hard- because I was viewing Al play a largely different role. And what’s astonishing about it is that I didn’t see him as Al Pacino. Didn’t see him as a godfather, a union leader, or a drug lord. I saw him as that in-denial old man- washed up, empty, and feeling unwanted for the things he’d brought about in his life. For half the movie, I was admiring every nuance, the clever dialogue, the relationship-building, the philosophical aspects. The other half, I was crying profusely.

To be specific, I cried four separate times through the two-hour feature; especially during the Ferrari scene. It’s weird I know, but I cried there the most. The film was a very remarkable experience; and all these is why it is my number one pick for a film that will definitely gouge your eyes out.

I highly recommend all of these features for both lovers and non-lovers of the emotional aspects of film. Even I, as a crime and horror fan, could attest for the fact that these films are not a waste of your fast-paced time. You will be awed.

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cannoli-reader · 5 years

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A Thought or two on the race of the Wheel of Time casting.

So “The Wheel of Time” has cast a group of people to play the characters born to Two Rivers families, Nynaeve, Perrin, Egwene & Mat. And there have been concerns. And there have been people making knee-jerk assumptions that these concerns are entirely founded in racism. And hey, maybe there are some. But I don’t think all of them necessarily are.

First of all, some personal context. I am not really a SJW or much concerned about race issues in general. I am white, of entirely European ancestry, but I haven’t the slightest bit of “white guilt”. “Get Out” did not make me the least bit uncomfortable because I had absolutely no comprehension of the white characters. I understand that “representation matters” in media, but it matters to white people as well, which is why ‘Hollywood’ which is not a monlithic entity, mostly casts white people. I don’t care if there are not enough black people or too many white people in any given movie. We can have Scotsmen playing Lithuanian-Russians or try to pass off their burr as a brogue. We can have Terry Molloy, Stanley Kowalski and Vito Corleone, members of immigrant communities from very different parts of Europe, played by the same man.

That said, while I think adaptations have a degree of responsibility to be faithful to the original work or to the historical time period, I don’t care that Michael Jordan and Reg E Cathay and Jessica Alba were cast as members of a family that is white in the picture books in which the Fantastic Four originated or that black paratroopers were in “Overlord”. I would not approve of T’Challa being played by a white person, because that IS important to his character. And insisting on casting a woman of color as Cleopatra in the name of historical accuracy instantly destroys my respect for you.

What we know about the appearance of the Two Rivers people is that they seem to be about average height for their part of the world. Nynaeve & Egwene are short by modern standards (for a white or black North American), while Perrin is tall and Mat above average. They have somewhat darker complexions than the very Nordic-looking Aiel and possibly Andorans, but on the other hand, no character ever uses Two Rivers folk as a touchstone for dark skins, the way they do the Sea Folk or Tairens. Even Domani are often mentioned as having coppery colored skins, with Two Rivers people using the terminology the same as lighter-skinned people, suggesting that they too, are lighter-skinned than the Domani. When Elaida points out that Rand’s natural skin tone is unusually light for a Two Rivers native, she pushes up his sleeve to show the untanned skin, which to me suggests that Two Rivers people are not much, if at all, darker than a very pale person tans. So people do have a point that the actors for Perrin and Nynaeve, at least, if not also Egwene, are darker than they are portrayed in the books.

To which I say, “So what?” The important thing is that Rand is clearly different from the others. That is probably even easier to convey visually if they use actors from different races, so Rand clearly stands out. It might have been more interesting to make Rand the person of color, but then you’ll turn all the stuff into racial issues, and we don’t need that in discussions of the show. Seriously, that was one of the more tedious parts of reveling in all the on-line criticism of Season 8 of Game of Thrones, which I prefer to think of as HBO’s six-part documentary, alternatively titled “Cannoli Was Right All Along.” They didn’t kill off the Dothraki because they are racists, they killed off the Dothraki, to the extent that they did, because they long ago jettisoned everything else in service to spectacle. Which brings me to the point that TV writers can’t be trusted and there are lots of other concerns in what they are going to do, beyond letting some black folks get full of themselves because Nynaeve would make Captain Marvel, Wonder Woman and Rey hide under the bed when she’s annoyed at them.

One of the problems in “Game of Thrones” was that a lot of adaptational choices were not thought through, long term, nor were the implications. Like how Daenerys crowd-surfing on her freed slaves would look, compared to her riding her horse through a cheering crowd. Or how abandoning a lot of the world building meant some things made very little sense. If you read the books, between the lines, you know that the Dance of the Dragons (a war in-universe, not the book title) pretty much put paid to the idea of a woman inheriting the Iron Throne. But on the show, all we heard about that is that Stannis thinks the name is stupid. In the books, he has definite opinions, including that the losing female contender was a traitor for attempting to claim the crown over her younger half-brother. But this sort of world-building would justify the characters’ stated preference for Jon’s gender over Daenerys in Season 8. Going by the show alone, that makes no sense, because most of the nobles left at this point are women, and very few of the male lords would have reason to favor Jon over Dany, or else they were opponents of Dany for other reasons, like their die-hard support of Sansa, who was pro-Jon. The show’s worldbuilding undercut their own point of conflict, but they tried to fall back on book worldbuilding they had never serviced and made deliberate choices to omit characters or storypoints that would have supported that detail.

At this point I can’t see how the particulars of the Two Rivers’ ethnicity would affect the story, but I also thought cutting fAegon from “Game of Thrones” was a good idea when Season 5 rolled around. To the extent that it is an issue in the story, the Two Rivers district of western Andor was once the heartland of a legendary nation called Manetheren. When the nation was betrayed by their allies, the army fought alone to hold the ford of one of those eponymous rivers for far longer than anyone had thought possible, with civilians taking up arms to join them in hopes of preserving some fraction of the population. In the end they all died fighting, but the enemy force was wiped out as a result of their defense, and so the few survivors who had got out came back, rebuilt their homes and said “We’re only leaving this country feet first.” But they lacked the human capital or resources to rebuild the nation and have been reduced to a rural farming community centered around a trio of villages. There is a fourth village, called Taren Ferry, at the river crossing that is the only known way in or out of the Two Rivers, but they don’t have much to do with the rest of the area, and are looked at askance by the proper Two Rivers folk.

It is also established in the text that the Taren Ferry people are the only ones to interbreed with outsiders or to have much intercourse with them at all. The people living deeper in the Two Rivers are an isolated culture and breeding population. Itinerant enterainers, merchants buying their crops and peddlers selling goods they cannot make themselves are their only contact with the outside world, and at one point a character actually scoffs at the idea of marrying one of them. Rand is physically unique because his father, nearly equally uniquely, left the Two Rivers as a young man and came home with a wife from somewhere else and their baby.

Because the Two Rivers people have only been reproducing among themselves for two thousand years, certain characteristics are reinforced in their genetics. This is revealed when one of them, in a moment of stress, facing the same enemy that destroyed Manetheren, starts shouting in the language Manetheren spoke, using phrases specific to Manetheren. This is later diagnosed as a kind of racial memory emerging, and strongly suggests that the character is a descendant of strong geneological connections to the last king of Manetheren. A second character feels a sort of recognition, suggesting a lesser degree of this Old Blood as it is called in the books. The other two native Two Rivers people don’t feel it.

Now here’s the two fold problem with the casting. The problem is not Marcus Rutherford and Zoe Robins, it is Barney Harris. They should ALL be the same race. They’re isolated and have had very very few reproductive encounters with outsiders. Mat Cauthon should not be played by a clearly white actor if the rest of the Two Rivers is something else.

But the really funny bit comes with the implications of the casting with regard to the Old Blood.

Because these are the two people who are not the purest royal-blooded Two Rivers folk:

and

while this is the one with maybe a hint of the blood of the legendary hero-king:

and THIS is the pure-blooded descendant of ancient royalty:

Ooops. Gonna be fun when the people whose major problem with Missandei’s death is that a black woman didn’t have get to be in the last two episodes, watch the scene where Rosamund Pike tells THAT GUY, up there, how special his bloodline is.

But maybe they just rolled with the casting choices because they are going to skip the Old Blood issue. Okay. But like I said above, you never know what’s going to bite you in the butt seven or eight seasons down the road. But the cynical part of me is greatly amused at the implications of the apparent mixed race heritage of the Two River people, and what it suggests about who the nobles and who the commoners were in the glory days of Manetheren. On the other hand, you get the suggestion that the barriers between lords and commoners came down as they fought side by side to save their land and then worked side by side to make their community survive and we got people intermarrying without regard to the old social divisions.

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corleone-and-capone · 6 years

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what do you mean he slapped your ass? {sonny x francesca}

Young Francesca was very beatiful for her age, shining bright and earning whistles from the boys. She was very intelligent and had a humorous side, resembling her mother Sandra the most. That was exactly why her father, the infamous Santino Corleone, loved his little girl. She was exactly like his wife, everything he ever admired in her all in his daughter’s little face.

That afternoon, Francesca came home with Katherine looking very upset about something. Sonny, like Sandra, hadn’t a clue what’s going on. While launching with the family, he could clearly see an anger passing through his daughter’s face. And he was upset too. He was upset because his daughter wouldn’t tell him what happened, seemed to him like she didn’t trust him or even Sandra.

After launch, Sonny followed Sandra silently into the kitchen, leaving her to finish the dishes while he himself was eager to talk as soon as possible. Sandra turned to him immediately. She always valued a conversation with him, among other things as well...

“Come on, Sonny, tell me whatever you want before you blow your mind out. I’m listening” she smiled to him.

“It’s about Francesca” he said awkwardly.

“What’s the matter with her? I could see she was thinking about something.”

“For God’s sake, Sandra, that’s exactly what I’m saying! Could you explain to me what’s up with the kid? What if she is into some guy? Oh, I’m gonna kick that bastard’s ass if...”

“No, Sonny! You are not going to kick anybody’s ass before we figure out what’s on, alright? And seriously? A kid? What’s your problem? Don’t I fulfill my wifey duties?” she raised an eyebrow, joking.

“Oh, I wish you do every night but same thing comes up...”

“Right, that thing comes up!” she pointed to his pants.

“So what? Are we gonna talk about our sex life and my dick or try to find out what’s up with the girl like you suggested, ehh?”

“You’re right, I’m out of the talk. So, what are we gonna do?”

“Will you talk to her or something?”

“No, of course not!”

“Dammit, Sandra, what’s wrong with you? She will only talk to you, why talk to her man of a father?”

“Umm, because she actually adores you maybe?”

“Really?” Sonny’s time was up to raise his eyebrow.

“Yeah, really. Come on, I swear I’ll let you do whatever you want to me if she talks to you, okay? You can’t refuse that offer!” she said seeming upset as he laughed his heart out. He grabbed her waist and pulled her against him.

“I guess you are really making me an offer I can’t refuse, mio piccolo...” he whispered in her ear and slapped her ass laughing.

“I wish I’m not, Santino Corleone!” she pushed him off and gave him a slap on the chest.

“Okay, I’m gonna talk to her now but you come with me, alright?”

Sonny took off for Francesca’s bedroom and Sandra followed cursing herself for the deal she made with the devil himself. Sonny knocked gently on the door.

“Francesca? Can daddy come in?”

“Yeah, come in..” a muffled voice came from behind the door.

In that way, Sonny and Sandra found Francesca crying.

“Hey, hey! What’s the matter baby? What’s wrong?” Sonny sounded worried as he pulled her in for a hug.

“You didn’t tell me mummy’s here!”

“Shh shh, wherever daddy goes, mummy follows... Can you please tell me what is wrong? Please?” Sonny made a puppy face, trying to comfort her.

“A kid, a boy at school, Jimmy’s his name... He slapped me...”

Sonny suddenly froze.

“Wait, wait, wait, what do you mean he slapped you?”

“Not in the face, daddy...”

“No, no, no, just tell me where the fuck he slapped you, alright?”

“Sonny!” Sandra’s voice came as a reminder to his ears.

“I’m sorry. Can I at least know what really happened?”

“Well, he...”

“Yeahhh?” both Sandra and Sonny said.

“Well, he slapped my butt...”

Sonny reacted immediately, almost as if he didn’t hear what Francesca said. He hit his forehead with the palm of his hand, then breathed out heavily and through his hands in the air as he would always do when happy or upset, raising his eyebrows to Sandra. He then turned back to his daughter, not even noticing his wife’s bitting her lip.

“He slapped your fucking ass, uh?”

Francesca nodded. It was then that Sonny got up from his knees and walked out of the room in a strangely calm and cool pace, not saying a word. Sandra kissed Francesca and walked out too, closing the door as soon as she heard Sonny breaking something in the kitchen.

“Son of a bitch! SON OF A BITCH! DAMMIT, SANDRA, let go of me!” he said struggling to pull himself out of his wife’s grip.

“Sonny! Sonny, please calm down. CALM DOWN, SONNY!” she cupped his face in her hands while pleading him to stop. Suddenly he stopped knocking things out of place. His breath came out in a rapid pace.

“I’mma kill that fucking bastard right now, I’m gonna blow his brains out, I’m gonna kill him, I SWEAR IT!”

“You. Are. NOT. Going. To. Kill. Any. Ten years old. FUCKING. BOY!”

“Knock it off, Sandra, I’m a Sicilian, I can’t act like nothing happened!”

“So you are going to kill a boy because he slapped your daughter’s ass?”

“BLOODY HELL YES!” Sonny shouted.

“NO, YOU WON’T! I’m not gonna let you!”

“Oh, yeah?” he said and kissed her forcefully, with all his anger coming out. He let go of her a bit later.

“You still owe me something! Now, get off my way, I’m gonna find out the kid’s name.”

“Could you at least do it without breaking things and yelling?” she asked him as he walked away.

Sonny walked into his daughter’s room and knelt beside her.

“Honey, could you tell me that boy’s name?”

“Antonio Martinelli” said willingly Francesca.

“Antonio Martinelli” Sonny repeated and went to his bedroom, putting his coat on. He took off right away.

“Don’t do anything or else, I’ll divorce you, alright?” Sandra shouted to him.

“You won’t” Sonny smirked and walked his way out of the Corleone Compound. Arriving at Francesca’s school, he saw several kids playing football in the yard. He got out of his car and approached them all, whistling to get their attention. All heads turned around.

“Which one of you is Antonio Martinelli?” he asked calmly.

“I am the one you are looking for!” a proud voice came from the small crowd.

“Come with me, I need to talk to you” he said acting very very normally, as he took the boy’s hand and walked off with him. He backed him up on the car’s door.

“Listen now, Antonio right? My name is Santino Corleone, I’m Francesca’s father. I don’t know what you’ve heard of me, but I’m a very, very bad guy, a very tough guy and I don’t like little stupid boys with hard dicks slapping my daughter’s ass, alright? I am very unhappy with the news today, kid. You know, I’m a gangster so if you don’t want your fucking parents to find you with a black eye and that’s not gonna be from a fight with another boy, it’s gonna be made by a fucking crazy, mad man who can beat your crap out like BADA-BING - you better get your hands off my Francesca, or else... bada-beep, bada-boop, bada-bap, bada-beep, the whole New York City is gonna talk about how Antonio Martinelli got a black eye, okay kid? Understood?”

“Y-ye-yes, Mr Co-Corle-one..”

“Didn’t catch that?”

“Yes, Mr Corleone!”

“Good boy. Now go back to your friends and don’t say a fucking word because, BADA-BING! Get out of my sight, you son of a bitch, get outta here...” said Sonny as he slapped the back of his head a good one. The totally creeped out boy ran away and got lost as soon as possible. Sonny smiled to himself. He was still frightening.

As soon as he got home, he surprised Sandra with his calmness. They chatted a bit, Sandra always trying to change his mind about the night they were going to spend together. Sonny moved himself towards her and put his arms around her body.

“No, no, Sandra, you challenged me. You promised me. You owe me. You have to back off and accept the situation!” he laughed brightly as he dealt with her protests. He picked her up the bridal style and they kissed, Sandra finally ‘accepting the situation’ as he carried her up the stairs to their bedroom, not even daring to curse herself for the ‘wifey duties’ that were upon her...

#sonny corleone #Santino Corleone #sandra corleone #francesca corleone #the godfather trilogy #the godfather #the godfather imagines #the godfather fanfic #corleone family

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shahedam · 6 years

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Queen of the South episode 8 & my “Godfather” feels

Ok so I rewatched it today....Some interesting things. I have watched a lot of gangster movies/tv shows and one of my favorite gangster movies of all time is Francis Ford Coppola’s The Godfather. In no particular order.

1. James is always prepared. He had a fire extinguisher y’all. He is a very intelligent man. But James the next time you are trying to put out a fire you aim at the base of the fire. I loved that he is a mature guy. He showed us that a man can be a gangster and a gentle man. My heart almost burst when he had the finger on the trigger and she said no, we will kill them all when the time is right. Who the hell does the sound track the music just has me in a mood. Like yes. For James he gives me Young Vito Corleone (DeNiro) feels.

2. Sherriff Mayo is a sad man. Remember his conversation with Teresa. He was beaten and bullied so much that it changed him into a sadist psycho.

3. Pecas is not a bad guy. He is a boss. He is the biggest narco in La Comision. He is trying to protect his spot. He sided with Boaz who disappeared so that connection to the Colombians went to Camilla so now he is working with Camilla who is supplying him with coke. He never wanted Teresa in Arizona and he tells her that at the meeting. Teresa wants the throne so she is going to have to get on some murder mami shit so it is what it is.

4. Taza. I like Taza. He seems like a good dude. He wants to build schools and hospitals. Too bad they can’t get the casino up and running. Vegas is like 4/5 hours away from Phoenix so I don’t know why they can’t get it poppin but whatever. Those cars were awesome. I liked that him and Pote led them down Death Highway.

5. Pote. Pote. Pote, if that is not a ride or die I don’t know what he is. He is a soldado. He is loyalty at its finest. I love Pote. Teresa and Pote have both been through a lot together. The bond that they have is awesome. At first when I watched the episode I was like wait a second Pote you done gave the green light and then the red light but as I watched it again and from feedback from other QOTS Jeresa fans, I realize that Pote was giving her his blessing. I see now that he needed to know what was up because it is important. I also realized that he has never witnessed how the two of them get down for real. I think in Chicago he saw it a little but he was kinda giving them the side eye but Guero was there...Pote was at the crib in the kitchen in Dallas mostly when they was on their day to day Bonnie and Clyde thing and when they bounced to Malta James wasn’t with them. He doesn’t know that before the sex these two were always risking their lives for each other?*%! He would die for you was what Teresa needed to hear just like James needed to hear that she didn’t regret sleeping with him. He gives me Clemenza feels...

6. Teresa. I am a little torn about how I felt about Teresa. She showed her grown ass woman side, sweetly checking both Pote and James for locking her in the cellar. But, I didn’t like that she laid out the plan at the reservation after so many of them were against her plans which ultimately led to one of the tribe losing their life because he snitched the whole damn plan, she could have just left it at the I just want to let y’all know that we just gonna get this money and that’s all this is, we appreciate y’all help. Ok Taza, back to what you were saying. Feel me. She up there talking about transporting coke, just doing too much. Then ok just 48 hours prior Pecas sent a sicario to your place of business, said sicario killed your delivery driver on your property, you carve his tattoo from his arm and Fed Ex the skin tag to Pecas with a dove (I peeped you jumping Pecas when that bird flew out the box), that wasn’t a peace offering that was a message, you didn’t stop there you even put a little note up in there. So fast forward to 48 hours from that delivery time stamp you actually sent your people over to negotiate some El Santo coke, I wasn’t surprised that he killed Tonto (RIP Tonto fly with the other silent sicarios, I don’t think I ever heard him talk except for when he busted Teresa in the mouth with the gun or was that The Charger. My bad I digress) Anyway. Teresa you shouldn’t have sent them to do that. Lil T need to be in the ICU right now, no offense Taza. I feel for that young girl. When James said she knew the risk I felt like I felt when he asked Teresa did you see what Batman hit you with I need to get me one of those. Too soon babe. Teresa was dead ass wrong for doing that I could see if it had been a couple of weeks ok maybe after Pecas got him some sweets (he love to eat) but nope that young girl might die and if she doesnt she has a Return to Sender tattoo on her back and that sucks. Uh duh. Michael Corleone feels. Everything from the tragic death of her first love to her rise to become the Queen.

7. Camilla. I just have to give a hand clap to who ever dresses Camilla because I love her style. Classy and always on point. Loved that black kimono. But forget all that jumping right into it, Camilla knows who the General is, but allowing him to record her that was sloppy. Also the whole conversation with Pecas had me nodding my head because she wants her money. She basically told him bitch better have my money. Isabella was lying then coming and trying to ask for help but I thought you said that you ain’t seen Kique, he wasn’t taking your calls (meanwhile you in dusty ass garages running up on Kique talking about mi amour, go sit yo fast ass down somewhere don’t you got some homework to do. Damn Isabella gets on my nerves). I think that they should have just killed both the young lovers and put us out of our misery that is Isabella. Kique was sad but, damn it, you sitting in a car in a dark ass garage and you didn’t have enough sense to have the doors locked I mean to me you was asking for it. So stupid. Then if General Cortez wasn’t going to kill you hell you gave him the idea telling him that he could kill you but that will not take your love away from Isabella, you out here giving the killer ideas...and then what took the entire cake was you bringing up Camilla playing him out. Cortez is a horrible person and a straight pedophile. I don’t like him. He was always checking Isabella out. Remember when Epifanio had to tell him to chill talking about her at her party. While I might not like Camilla’s ways she is still a boss. She still runs the south and she is about to be dealing with her crazy ass daughter who I wish Manuel son had killed but then Teresa wouldn’t have gotten the 10 million from Camilla and she wouldn’t have been able to pay El Santo and the little angel would have came back with Thanos to kill Teresa ass, that’s not his name but he was scary. I’m excited to see how she gets out of this thing with Cortez and Isabella because he has definitely played his hands since he didn’t kill Isabella when he showed her Kique’s body. Camilla gives me Don Vito Corleone (Brando) feels, the end is near for her but she is still running everything.

8. King George. Ok I love James. I love Pote. I like Teresa (see above). But like I really ride for George, he is like all your day 1s he just has your back. Again, Teresa is being extra sloppy. You start a war and you got dough. You need to tighten up on security for your whole squad that’s what a boss does. Nobody ran up on none of them when they was with Camilla because like Camilla said it’s her job (The boss) to keep them safe. Teresa killed the governor of Sinaloa and knew it was gonna be retaliation, stole Rocco’s girls, put a hit on someone Sherriff Mayo who survived said hit and all I see is that same little ass squad (no offense James and Pote) but there has to be some number that you can call and get you some killers, like the Continental Hotel or something for the cartels...George and Bilal should have had a squad with them not no whack ass phone call talking about be safe. Now I know George got his own thing going on but I’m just saying they snatched him. I guess that’s the friend in the cage. He’s my Santino “Sonny” Corleone feels. That is not a parallel or foreshadow of how I believe that King George’s character will play out on the series. Because I loved Sonny’s character like I love George. He is a mess but a beautiful mess. Remember when George shot his shot at Teresa...You can be my Pocahontas or I can be your Pocahontas...I would make you my queen if Rico Suave didn’t already have dibs. He called James Ken Kardashian. I can’t. I am hoping George AND Bilal survive...Until next time kiddos. Bless

#spoilers #james valdez #team james #teresa mendoza #james and teresa #queen of the south #qots season 3 #qotsedit

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deansdirtylittlesecretsblog · 6 years

Text

Mimi’s RomCom Fluff Challenge Masterlist

Thank you to all the amazing authors who participated in my 16K RomCom Fluff Challenge. The challenge was to take a quote from a romantic comedy and write a fluffy piece using the quote as inspiration and in the fic. I’m excited to share these, they were awesome and a lot of fun to read!

10 Things I Hate About You:

Don’t let anyone ever make you feel like you don’t deserve what you want. - @torn-and-frayed (Dean) Faithfully

13 Going on 30:

We need to remember what used to be good. If we don't, we won't recognize it even if it hits us between the eyes. @emoryhemsworth w/Dean Simple Man

America’s Sweethearts:

Your pillow's better than mine. @klaineaholic w/Dean Takeoff

A Walk to Remember:

You have to promise not to fall in love with me. @mrs-squirrel-chester (Sam) Sam’s Magic Fingers

What's there to talk about? She's the best person I've ever known. @sis-tafics w/Dean Lucky Me

Breakfast at Tiffany’s:

A girl can't read that sort of thing without her lipstick. @supernaturalismalife Queen: Part 1-Mirakuru

I'll never get used to anything. Anybody that does, they might as well be dead. @winchesterswoonathon w/John I’ll Never Get Used to Anything...

Clueless:

Anything happens to my daughter, I got a .45 and a shovel, I doubt anybody would miss you. @roxyspearing w/ Dean Date Night

Anything you can do to draw attention to your mouth is good. @rizlowwritessortof w/Dean Friendly Advice

If I'm too good for him, then how come I'm not with him? @supernatural-jackles w/Dean Help Hotline

Crazy, Stupid Love:

Will you take off your shirt... fuck! Seriously? It's like you're Photoshopped! @pinknerdpanda w/Sam Blast From the Past

I will never stop trying. Because when you find the one... you never give up. @fireismysafety w/Dean

I'm wildly unhappy, and I'm trying to buy it, and it's not working. @deanssweetheart23 w/Dean Crazy, Stupid Love

Ever After:

She came to tell you the truth, and you fed her to the wolves! @plaidstiel-wormstache w/Dean To The Wolves

You have found my weakness but I have yet to learn yours. @bringmesomepie56 w/Dean Now Or Never

Besides, you claimed it was a matter of life and death. @waywardimpalawriter w/Dean Memory Lane

Are you putting me under house arrest? @katymacsupernatural w/Dean House Arrest

Failure to Launch:

And believe me, I did not want that because I had a good life before you. Well, not good... but... it was okay. Well, it... it was empty, actually, but at least I was blissfully unaware of how miserable I was. Whereas now... because of you... I am acutely aware of how completely and totally unhappy I am. Thank you for that. @salvachester (Dean) Living Conditions

Friends with Benefits:

Why do women think the only way to get a man to do what they want, is to manipulate them? @acreativelydifferentlove Not So Secret

If you tell anyone about this, I will rip your ears off and staple them to your neck. @wi-deangirl77 (Dean) A Different Side of You

It’s not you. Nothing is wrong with you. He’s a guy. You gave him a five date challenge, he got you and cut out. Forget the douche! He’s a dick. He’s a dick douche. @fuck-im-a-hipster (Dean) Shake It Off

Hope Floats:

Oh, I like all of God's creatures; I just like some of them better stuffed. And he's one of them. @idjitmonkey (Sam)

Why does everybody keep asking me if I've been drinking? What? Is there like a coaster stuck to my... butt or something? @september-daydream (Dean) Not So Drunken Babble

I would have stayed with you forever. I would have turned myself inside out for you. @kittenofdoomage (John) Make You Feel My Love

How To Lose a Guy in 10 Days:

You can't lose something you never had. @whatareyousearchingfordean (Dean) Bullshit

You see, the key to this game is being able to read people. @giftofdreams (Dean) The Perks of Reading People

Look, just give me back the necklace, then you guys can go on and kill each other. @rebelslicious w/Dean A Night in with Dean (bonus: Ode to Bobby Ewing)

Leap Year:

Why don't you stop trying to control everything in the known universe. It's dinner. Have a little faith that it will all work out. @mandilion76 (John) Flour Power

Well, when my 60 seconds came around, I realized I had everything I ever wanted, but nothing I really needed. And I think that what I need is here. And I came all this way to see if maybe you might think so too. @amanda-teaches (Dean) Better Than a Dream

Moulin Rouge:

You're going to be bad for business. I can tell. @thing-you-do-with-that-thing (Dean) Everything

The greatest thing you'll ever learn is just to love and be loved in return. @roxy-davenport (Crowley) For the Love of Horror

Never Been Kissed:

That thing, that moment, when you kiss someone and everything around becomes hazy and the only thing in focus is you and this person and you realize that that person is the only person that you're supposed to kiss for the rest of your life, and for one moment you get this amazing gift and you want to laugh and you want to cry because you feel so lucky that you found it and so scared that that it will go away all at the same time. @evansrogerskitten (Dean) Something Sweet

The right guy, he's out there. I'm just not gonna go kiss a whole bunch of losers to get to him. @abaddons.right.hand.queen (Sam) Right In Front (Sam Winchester)

Notting Hill:

I'm also just a girl, standing in front of a boy, asking him to love her. @castieldualangel (Dean) Tripping Over My Feelings

Oh God, this is one of those key moments in life, when it’s possible you can be really, genuinely cool - and I’m failing 100%. @deansdirtylittlesecretsblog (Dean) The Kiss

Say Anything:

She gave me a pen. I gave her my heart, she gave me a pen. @thranduilsperkybutt (Dean) Office Supplies and Love

One question: are you here because you need someone, or you need me? Forget it, I don’t care. @sammit-janet (Sam) Always

So I’m single now, and everything’s changed. I hate it. @sea040561 (Sam) Everything’s Changed

Sixteen Candles:

I can't believe this. They fucking forgot my birthday. @wvnchxstxr A Tradition to Share (sister!reader)

Would you guys please hurry up, I'm breaking like 30 major laws here. @nichelle-my-belle (Dean) The Memory Remains

Someone Like You:

Wow, there's the cynical bitch we know and love. @because-imma-lady-assface (Dean) Mel Brooks: Nightmare Cure

This is key to understanding the myth of male shyness. For while you think he is flattering you, he is actually flattering himself. Showing how open and honest and sensitive he is. @jessica-bones-winchester (Dean) The Myth of Male Shyness

Sweet Home Alabama:

I can't control her any more than I can control the weather. @ravengirl94 (Dean) Family of Strays

So I can kiss you anytime I want. @captainradicalpassion (Dean) Anytime He Wants

The girl I knew used to be fearless. @hannahindie (Dean) Fearless

The Notebook:

I want all of you, forever, everyday. You and me...everyday. @captainemwinchester w/Dean The Notebook

Stay with you? What for? Look at us, we're already fightin'. @jana-corleone w/John Team John

The Princess Bride:

There’s a shortage of perfect breasts in this world. It would be a pity to damage yours. @jayankles w/Dean These Bad Boys

No more rhymes now, I mean it! @kathaswings w/Dean Aftermath

You keep using that word, I don't think you know what it means. @emilywritesaboutdean w/Dean Everything You Need

That does put a damper on our relationship. @babblesoftheinsane w/Dean Untitled

This Means War:

Don't worry. If you're going to hell, I'll just come pick you up. @georgialouisea w/Dean Taxi Back From Hell

Don't choose the better man, choose the man who makes you a better woman. @wayward-marvel-sommer1196 w/Dean Crazy Stupid Love

When Harry Met Sally:

I'll have what she's having. @alleiradayne w/Dean Reprisal

When in Rome:

The whole point of love is to put someone else's needs above your own. @lovemesomepie85 w/Dean Always Love You

Now, you could get your heart broken or you could have the greatest love affair the world has ever known, but you're not going to know unless you try. @docharleythegeekqueen w/Dean Just Like the Movies

While You Were Sleeping:

$45 for a Christmas tree and they don't deliver? You order $10 worth of chow mein from Mr. Wong´s, they bring it to your door. @getmadandsmashstuff w/John Christmas in Connecticut: Or How John Learned to Love the Holidays

You’ve Got Mail:

You were spying on me, weren't you? @sofreddie w/Dean Avon Calling

#mimi's rom com fluff challenge #challenge master post

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ramrodd · 4 years

Photo

What do you think of the following statement: If Trump said chickens could plow they would be out in the field hitching them up?

COMMENTARY:

Of course, they’d hitch up the hens and put the rooster in the lead position and tell’em “Giddy-UP” and gee and haw their way around their trailer park flower beds until the chickens either learnet to enjoy plowing in trace or dropped dead.

You are dealing with really stupid people who have the right to vote because they have birth cirtificates that assures the republican authorities that they are eligible by species to vote. And the really clever pick of the litter in every generation Newt Gingrich has gone out of his way to recruit as glorified telemarketers elected to promote Steve Bannon’s Free Market Fascism and to blow up America like John Galt and/or Earl Turner. These are the same stupid people who put their hearts and souls into the southern rebellion led by the same greedy people who were making too much money from slavery to kick the habit. They are still running things in all the Red States as Jeff Davis in Richmond VA.

There is no question in my mind that Trump said exactly what he said about the military. He is typical of the Copperhead wing of the GOP. They really don’t belong to anybody except as honary members of Galt’s Gang, alleged libertarians who devise a personal system of values based on an infinitely small point of law or western ethics that justifiees their avarice, selfishness and, in the case of the Copperheads, political treachery. These are the people Newt Gingrich recruited as pawns in his political strategy to make him Speaker of the House and, currently, to re-elect Trump.

Every Republican but Mitt Romney in Congress falls into this category. Tim Scott is like J.C. Watts, Herman Caine, Ben Carson and Clarence Thomas, an equal opportunity bigot and actually belongs in the adult leadership of the GOP with Mitt Romney: they are authentic Conservatives in close to the Juan Williams mold of Conservative: Juan Williams has always been a BLM Conservative, which is why the Koch bothers threatened to withhold their grants to PBS unless Diane Rehm fired his ass from WAMU for being uppity.

In Indiana, when I was growing up, there were Lugar-Will Rogers Repubicans and Lee Hamilton-Walter Ruether Democrats and Dan Burton-Henry Cabot Lodge-KKK-Copperheads, the people who vetoed the League of Nations and largely had other priorites than military service during WWII, which might have been avoided if the League of Nations had been ratified. Dan Burton Copperheads are all in for the Military Industrial Complex and, like Marxist, consider lethal conflict to be a natural feature of capitalism. They all believe, like Trump, that people are suckers and losers to enlist in the US military and that a military career is like being a counselor in a summer camp that you do before you grow up and get a real job.

And that’s who Newty recruited to fill up the Republican Study Group and the House Freedom Caucus in order to advance his agenda of political treason and economic coup. Gingrich’s axiomatic discription of his political strategy, “Politics is the continuation of war” is Trotsky’s formular for violent revolution he, Trotsky, was teaching in Mexico when he was killed. Castro’s Cuba was one legacy of Trotsky’s evangelism and Newty has been using this formula to gain power since he went into poltics during the 70s.

Newty claims he adopted the political strategy of the anti-war movement, which is partially true, as the model for his political strategy. Newty and I are both Army brats and, at the time we were growing up, Counter-Insurgency was the sexy career path for West Point graduates, especially before JKF was killed. I had read Petreaus’s core bibliography for his CO-IN manual before I graduated from high school and I had a ring side seat to the cultural revolution on campus without belonging to either the liberal fascism of the anti-war draft dodgers or the conservative fascism of the pro-war draft dodgers (who were, essentially, the rising generation of Dan Burton Copperheads).

And they are all, basically, the paradox of the very clever and dumber than a box of rocks small town white businessman and/or politician. Like Mike Pence. People who avoided the draft during the 60s and were the corporate gate keepers when combat vets came looking for work after killing the Viet Cong for Christ.

Their attitude, the people Newty recurited, was that, if you were too stupid to avoid military service, it didn’t make much sense to put you on the pay roll unless you were a rabid ammosexual and/or a Tom Cotton wannabe (Tom Cotton isn’t anything new, either: I was scared out of a military career by a senior officer my dad’s age and rank with the same crypto-Nazi cognitive organization as Tom Cotton and Mike Pompeo and represent another catogory of Conservative Copperhead.

Trump is just like all these guys. As I say, they are a paradox: they usually have very strong practical talents in business and management and not necessarily authoritarian, but their horizons generally stop at the end of their peckers in predictable ways. Trump’s attitude about the military is one typical variation. They didn’t want to be held accountable by the League of Nations and they were perfectly happy becoming filthy rich and locally powerful from equiping the sacrifice of American citizen soldiers and feeling nobel in the process: the Arsenal of Democracy and all the rest. Trump really believes he’s a patriot in spite of the fact that he committed treason with his Moscow partners in the 2013 Miss Universe Pageant to get elected and hopes to do it again.

Putin has nothing to do with it. For Trump, business is business and treason is just another tool in his lie, cheat and steal “Art of the Deal” crime family business model. And, by and large, the Dan Burton Copperheads don’t have any problem with the practice: it’s nothing personal, Uncle Sam: it’s just business.

And all these Dan Burton Copperheads are the people who supply the harnesses for chicken plowing, partially because they don’t know any better, themselves, but recognize an emerging market when it surfaces.

For various reasons, the military has been content to allow themselves to be pulled around by their collective peckers by these people, the Dan Burton Copperheads, because they, the military, sustain the misapprehension that what “Honor” means to them means the same to crime family businessmen, like Don Corleone. And it doesn’t. And they, the active military, have been voting for Don Corleone “Honor” since at least the Democrats failed to finance the last death throes of the Republic of Vietnam on basically they same justification that Moscow Mitch is holding up Speaker Pelois’s $3.5 trillion capital budget for stopping COVID-19 in its tracks in 90 days and bringing the Green New Deal up to speed in 18 months.

Because, in the final analysis, as clever as the Dan Burton Copperheads like Moscow Mitch are in running a family bucket shop, they are dumber than dog shit when it comes to plowing with chickens.

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onceuponamirror · 7 years

Text

heart rise above

///// CHAPTER 11

summary: It wasn’t an experiment with freedom borne of some Americana fantasy; rather, a road trip of purely logistical intentions. The plan was simple. Drive from Boston to Chicago for his sister’s college graduation. That’s it.

Or, he drives a Ford Pickup Named Desire.

Mechanic!AU

fandom: riverdale ship: betty x jughead words: 58k chapters: 11/19

[read from the beginning] [read the latest]

I've looked at love from both sides now From give and take and still somehow It's love's illusions I recall

I really don't know love at all

He honestly thought he’d known insomnia well.

Sleep has always been the girl he loved from afar; pining, out of reach, that sort of sluggish mooning through the day that leads to a long night stretching his fingers across his pillows to catch something that isn’t there.

Usually, he manages to win over couple of solid hours, or at least enough energy to get him from one cup of coffee to the next.

But that, apparently, was until he met Betty, because he’s pretty sure he’s never going to sleep again.

After he climbs out of her car—which he’ll never be able to look at in the same way—and leans back through her driver’s window to kiss her goodnight, something so chaste and gentle that it’s almost laughable given what had just conspired between them, he climbs the stairs to his room, shoves open the door, and flops onto the bed on his stomach.

He lies there, facedown onto his pillow, for he has no idea how long, and completely unsure what he’s feeling, physically or otherwise. He’s still half-hard with the memory of her, but he doesn’t quite have the will to get up and take care of it because he’s too busy overanalyzing the massive downhill slope of the end of their date—so instead, he hits his head into the pillow a few times and mutters, “stupid, stupid, stupid,” to himself.

What had he been expecting? That they’d make out for all of eternity and never have to talk about emotions or feelings or all the thousand ways this was a slow motion car crash? He should’ve seen a talk coming a mile away, and definitely shouldn’t have been so utterly unprepared to hear the phrase “get it out of our systems” come out of her mouth, since she’d said the damn thing already, when editing his book.

“They have to act, even if they think it’s just something to get out of their systems. Let them enjoy what time they will have.”

They’d been using characters as shields, but she’d said that. Put it right out there. Warned him, way ahead of time. And somehow, he was still not ready to hear it without pretense.

But he’s not surprised. Frankly, if anything, he’s surprised that he’s not at all surprised. Because of course what was definitely a greatest-hits-moment was also going to be his one-hit-wonder. Because he always expected this would make him miserable in the end.

He kissed her because he hadn’t been able to think of much else all night. Or all day, really. Ever since waking early in the morning with a false memory of her on his lips, it’s been looming in the back of his thoughts, driving him up a wall and distracting him from an attempt at anything else. So he had to do it. Had to see how fantasy compared to reality.

The answer was obvious: if dream-Betty had merely kicked down his door, real-Betty burned his whole fucking house down. There was no comparison, really, now that he knows what she feels like under his hands and his mouth and has begun mapping the stars of her.

It terrifies him how satisfying it was, and yet completely, irrevocably—not enough.

Night rolls into dawn before he knows it, so he finds himself doing laundry in the flickering florescence of an eerily empty motel at five in the morning. That kills only about an hour, and he tries desperately to find a bit of sleep after. It humors him for a little while, and when he wakes, feeling groggy but frustratingly awake at the same time, he doesn’t fight it.

Instead, he goes off in search of deliverance.

It takes the form of a greasy diner breakfast.

“I thought I might find you here,” a melodic voice says over his shoulder an hour later, and before he can recognize that it does not belong to Betty and stamp out the hopeful crease in his heart, Veronica Lodge is sinking into the seat across from him.

“Okay, I gotta ask. Do you work here, or not?” He asks, squinting at her. “I still can’t figure that one out.”

“Not,” Veronica sighs. “Put in a few summers during my under-grad years, but it’s my mother with the steady employment here. I occasionally cover half a shift for her, as I was the night you two black hats rode into town.”

Jughead realizes this is why the one older waitress at Pop’s looks so familiar to him, and nods, absorbing this. But Veronica must mistake this for something else, because her expression knots. “I know I may not seem the small-town-waitress Kerouac would wax for, but Pop Tate has been good to my family when not many people were. I am more than happy to help out when I can.”

“I didn’t say any of that,” Jughead says slowly, wrinkling his brow. “I was just thinking about the poundage in pancakes I’ve made your mom carry and hoping that doesn’t come back to haunt me.”

“Oh.” Veronica looks confused for a moment, and then shuffles in her seat, raising her neck as if to look at him better.

There’s a long pause, and Jughead wonders what should happen next. He’s still working through why Veronica is at his table, early on a Saturday, when he’s pretty sure she and Archie have plans. “So...” he drawls, for lack of anything else.

“Right,” she says quickly, like she’s been pulled out of her thoughts. She crosses her legs and sits up straighter.

“So, I’ve observed something in you, Jughead Jones. That’s to say, a sharp wit mixing with a very blunt tact,” she says appraisingly, arching an already curved eyebrow. “An otherwise potentially fatal combination, but as fate would have it, just the kind I’m in the market for.”

“And I’ve been told I’m pithy,” Jughead mutters under his breath, but clearly not low enough for it to go unheard by her. The other eyebrow joins its mate. “How can I help you, Veronica?”

“It depends.” Veronica re-crosses her legs and tilts one shoulder towards him. “You see, I’ve been percolating on whether you might be more loyal than you are honest.”

Now it’s Jughead’s turn to raise his eyebrows, wondering how anyone gets this far through life being so cryptic. “Uh, I’d classify myself as the conscientious objector, if anything. But that would require context, of which you’ve provided none, so I can’t really answer that. But I can keep a secret, if that’s what you’re asking.”

“It’s not, so let me be more direct.” Veronica sighs, like she can’t decide if she is bored by this conversation or terrified of it. “I want to know Archie’s modus operandi when it comes to his relationships.”

“That is direct,” Jughead says. He finds a beat to gather his words. “Look, I’m not gonna slut shame my best friend. Archie is one of the good guys, but he’s also no milquetoast when it comes to his dating life. As in…he likes women, and women like him. Always have. Probably always will.”

She purses a pair of perfectly painted lips, and Jughead already can tell this has not been what she hoped to hear.

“Alright, listen, I really don’t want to be responsible for your relationship here. You asked me, and I told you, so don’t look at me like that. It’s just the fact of his history.” Jughead sighs wearily and leans in a bit closer over the table. “But, running the risk of sounding like this is at all any of my business, I should probably also tell you that he does really like you. Like, to the point where I have to hear about you constantly. And just so we’re clear, it’s fucking annoying.”

The look that appears next is soft and relieved and somehow also bordering on mischievous. “Thank you, Jughead. Now I can see why Betty likes you.”

“That makes one of us,” he mumbles, eyes flicking down to his breakfast. His stomach gives a little squeeze, but he forces himself through a stalling bite of bacon anyway. When he looks back up, Veronica’s head is tilted, studying him.

“You’re seeing her again tonight, aren’t you?” She points out, as this is the answer to his problems.

“Supposedly,” he sighs, as he hasn’t heard from Betty yet, but if Veronica’s bringing it up that might be a good sign the two discussed it. It also reminds him he has to go buy condoms after this. He still doesn’t want to have any assumptions about how tonight is going to go, but he’s definitely not going to be caught unprepared again. Then again, he still can’t believe—can’t even fathom—

“Do me a favor, Jughead.” He realizes he’s been staring at the ceiling, and meets her eye. “Tell me why you like her,” Veronica says, lacing her fingers together and twisting in the booth so that she’s fully facing him. Jughead gets the impression that the shift in body language was deliberate, because he now feels like he’s staring down the barrel of an interrogation.

“Don’t you have anywhere else to be? Anyone else to torture?” Jughead sighs. Discomfort is a word that doesn’t quite do justice to what he’s suddenly feeling.

She makes a noise that is too polite and poised to classify as a snort, but by any other name would smell as sweet. “Archie is at my apartment waiting for me to return with breakfast, and we both know he has no concept of time when there’s not a game of some kind afoot. So, no. Humor me.”

“How about I slip you a piece of paper to pass to Betty with the checked box for ‘yes’ on the question of whether I like her,” he offers instead.

“Betty values my opinion above nearly all else, Heathcliff. You wouldn’t want me coming back to her with a poor impression of you, would you?” She smiles, showing her teeth.

“Jesus, Donna Corleone. Fine, fine,” he growls. He’s gotten enough of a taste of Veronica to know that she’s not particular towards letting things go and probably would follow through on her threats, so he might as well just get this over with.

“Uh, she’s kind,” he starts. He squeezes his eyes shut, both because this is painfully embarrassing and because he’s a professional wordsmith and that’s the best he can come up with? She’s kind?

“She’s smart in a way that’s just a fact, whereas I sometimes think I drop big words just to prove that I can. It’s probably some leftover angst from trying to demonstrate I was every bit the teenage special snowflake I wanted everyone to think I was, but—” A smile tips at his cheeks at the memory of her excitement over editing his book and giving her notes.

“And she’s… I mean, she had maybe 4 hours, and solved almost all the problems in my book in three points or less. And because she’s kind and smart, she’s also understanding. It’s a gift.”

He pauses, realizing he’s still smiling, and now that he’s started thinking about this, it’s starting to scare him how many more reasons he has. She’s not just smart—brilliant, really—she gets his stupid references, and makes quite a lot of her own. She cares so deeply, even down to the tiniest detail. She takes a bit too much of that inward, bears the brunt for too many, but he knows it comes from a big heart and he has the sudden, unassailable desire to protect that.

But he doesn’t want to drop a three-foot long roll of parchment at Veronica’s feet, because that has a type of vulnerability to it he’s never quite known what to do with it, so he cuts off the tap of praise for Betty. Instead, he stares out the window, trying desperately to avoid meeting Veronica’s gaze. But, because he can’t help it, he adds, “And she’s beautiful. Obviously.”

He finally glances back over the table, and finds Veronica’s expression anything but the smug cheek he might’ve expected.

“You can’t hurt her,” Veronica says, her voice very still, but also with a clear warning. “She’s spent her whole life sacrificing herself for other people, and if she finally does something for herself and it’s you and you break her, she might never try it again. You know that, right, Jughead?”

He doesn’t know what to say. On the one hand, Veronica is right—at least about the part of Betty self-sacrificing her way through misery. On the other hand, the ball isn’t his court. She’s the one who asked for this to be just sex between them. He’s the one who’s already signed a death warrant for his own feelings.

“Jughead?” Veronica prompts, when the jukebox changes and he hasn’t yet replied.

“Yeah, I know, Veronica,” he says quietly, with something nearly a grimace.

She nods, once, and very slowly. And then seems to be waiting for something. Finally, “Well, aren’t you going to give me the same kind of speech about Archie?”

The question comes right as he’s taken a large bite of his breakfast, so much to Veronica’s displeasure, when he scoffs and says, “Uh, no,” it’s through a mouthful of waffles. He chews and swallows. “No. Definitely not.”

Her eyes narrow.

“Is this some sort of mano a mano duel for your masculinity, wherein you won’t admit to looking out for the emotional well-being of your best friend?” Veronica leans back into her seat, surveying him coolly, her fingers still laced and now settled over her knee. “Archie says you’re like his brother, but you don’t care to investigate whether or not I’m, say, the Succubus of de Balzac’s nightmares?”

He gives her points for the reference, but still shakes his head. “First of all, you’re Betty’s best friend, so I figure you must be alright. Probably not a Succubus, at least. Secondly, Archie is like…Play-Doh. You can hit it with a hammer and it’ll still fluff up to its original shape. So I never worry about him.”

She stares at him for a long moment, as if she can’t decide how she feels about that answer. Then she smirks, brushes off her skirt of nonexistent crumbs, and stands. “Alright. Well, this has been a pleasure, Jughead. Very informative.”

“Anytime,” he mumbles, taking another bite of his breakfast.

Veronica hesitates in front of his table. “But remember, if you do hurt her, I’m soon to leave the state and have seen every episode of How To Get Away With Murder.”

And then she’s gone, leaving Jughead with a whiff of jasmine perfume and the distinct feeling that she knows something he doesn’t.

After Veronica leaves, Jughead finds he doesn’t have much left of an appetite, so he requests a to-go box and gathers his things. He’d rather go to the store now and get the condoms earlier rather than later, just in case one of Betty’s other friends spots him in the busier afternoon. Getting through that conversation with Veronica was hard enough, but the idea of running into someone like Kevin whilst holding a box of condoms is enough to hasten his steps.

(For someone so glued to his smart phone, Kevin is somehow unnervingly easy to picture in a tweed newsboy cap shouting, “Extra, extra, read all about it!” to a bustling street and feels as though that says quite enough about how much he trusts that guy with information.)

Once at the grocery store, he beelines for the back, where he’d spotted the condoms last time when he’d been looking for toothpaste. There are a lot more options than he remembers, and casts a cursory sweep around to see no one is in the aisle with him before running his eyes over all the types.

Ribbed…sounds good on paper, which means it’s probably useless. He thinks he’s tried those before and not noticed a difference. Warming? That sounds like the one that could go very wrong, very fast. Twisted Pleasure? Was he buying a goddamn romance novel? Sighing, he grabs the box that seems the least gendered, deciding that if it’s not being overly marketed to men or women it should be good for both of them.

He shoves the box under his arm and weaves through the rest of the store, but pauses in front of the flower stand as a thought occurs to him. He can’t possibly buy the two things together, can he? That would just look—who is he, Reggie? But then his mind’s eye conjures the delighted, shy smile he craves so deeply from Betty, and he thinks flowers would be an appropriate substitute for bringing her food.

So he lingers, deciding if he can’t find a bouquet that reminds him of Betty, he won’t buy them. But then, much to his chagrin, he spots the little posy of white and blue flowers off to the side. They’re pretty, delicately lace-like and somehow completely wild all at once, seeming as if they’d look at most at home as spots of color on a grassy meadow. They definitely remind him of Betty. Damn.

Sighing, he reads the label, which informs him it’s a bundle made from something called baby’s-breath and, most ironically: forget-me-nots.

Of fucking course. He snorts at that, and begrudgingly bends over to pull them from their bucket. He can’t not get her them now, though can’t decide whether he wants her to recognize the little blue flowers by name or not.

He shuffles into the express lane, desperate to get this over with. But, once again, of fucking course, he recognizes the cashier as the pink-haired woman from before, the one who had teased Betty about Kevin finding out about their grocery run. He squints at her nametag, which reads Toni in crisp little letters.

Jughead attempts to hide the box of condoms under the flowers, which is ridiculously fruitless, considering she’s about to ring him up. At first, he’s not entirely sure she recognizes him, but as she lifts up the bouquet and sees what’s underneath, the look she passes him clearly states she does and even more clearly is knowingly amused.

“Big date, huh?” She says wryly, punching something into the register.

He attempts to mumble something in between “yeah, whatever” and “please shut up” but it just comes out as an incoherent garble of noise.

“What was that?” Toni asks, eyes dancing.

“How much?” He mutters, his voice gruff.

“$25.83,” Toni chirps, and Jughead practically throws a wad of bills at her. He sticks around just long enough to get his receipt and change and then quickly turns on his heel, his face hot.

He still can’t figure out why—he should be screaming from the rooftops that he’s got a solid shot at actually having sex in the near future, least of all with probably the most beautiful girl he’s ever known—not hastily shoving the box into his bag and blushing furiously.

This is the bowling alley all over again. Jughead knows that he’s not what one might call highly experienced, and nothing reveals that hand more than the lack of ability to even say the word sex out loud. So he’d just sat there, stammering like an idiot, unable to tell Betty point blank that he wasn’t a virgin and aggressively kicking himself for bringing it up at all.

It certainly doesn’t help that she had gone a bit tight-lipped after that, probably because she’s had solid relationships under her belt that involved regular sex and not a couple attempts at it scattered over the years. So. No pressure, right?

He tries to put it from his mind as he walks back to his motel. After throwing his bag onto the bed, he grabs the cheap, large ceramic mug next to the room’s Keurig, fills it with water, and deposits Betty’s flowers into it, to keep them fresh for later.

And then he sits on his bed, unsure what to do besides beg himself not to think about tonight. He definitely won’t be able to focus on writing. Archie is probably going to be occupied with Veronica and her jasmine perfume for the next 24 hours.

He almost wants to call Reggie, which sends a horrified shock to his system—but the fact of the matter is, Reggie is the only person Jughead knows with the particular skill of sleeping around without getting emotions in the way. He knows it’s probably already way too late for that, but he might still be able to stave off some of it.

If he’d ever be able to get past the shame of asking, he guesses Reggie probably wouldn’t judge him. Probably want to high-five him through the phone, if anything.

In the end, he never tries.

Are we still on for tonight?

A text from Betty stares at him, and he stares right back. A moment later, his phone pings with a little smiley face, also from her, and he sits up straighter, rubbing a hand up and down his face.

definitely. what were you thinking?

Pretty sure I still owe you a home-cooked meal! And we have HBO here!

He swallows. It seems a roundabout way of describing the concept of Netflix and Chill, but he has no complaints. Betty’s house is probably still empty of anyone else. A thrill runs down his spine. ok. sounds good. what time?

ok. see you then

A little ellipsis appears and disappears briefly before another text arrives. We could try something else if you don’t want to do that?

what? no, i like your idea

Juggie!! Then you can’t just type “ok”! You’re a writer, so you should know that makes you sound like you didn’t want to.

wtf, says who?

The ever-shifting dynamics of language, that’s who! Also, Buzzfeed.

She sends a link to an article about the type of person you are based on the way you say the word “okay” in texts, which he finds completely ridiculous but also thinks it’s the kind of thing his sister would find funny, so he screenshots it for her and asks Betty which she is.

(She’s, apparently, an “okay!” most of the time and it annoys him that it somehow makes sense.)

They exchange a few more texts, but after a few minutes Betty says she wants to go for a run and will talk to him later. She sends along another smiley face, which is a little funny considering her lecture on online etiquette and that Jughead was under the impression those were reserved for fuckboys—but then again, only Betty could get away with an utter lack of ironic emoticons.

He sends back simply “K”, because according to the article, that’s the one used by sociopaths, to which she replies with an eye roll emoji and I’m going now!

He catches himself staring at his phone and smiling, which won’t do, so he quickly shoots off the screenshot to JB and busies himself with cleaning his motel room a bit. He wants to shower as close to dinner as possible, in order to maximize the amount of time he has before the smell of soap wears off, so cleaning feels like the only option, even if there isn’t much of it to do.

Halfway through, his phone rings, which he answers without looking at, considering only three people ever call him: Archie, who only calls when Jug is not answering texts, his editor, who never calls without scheduling it, and JB, who calls him most of all. Unsurprisingly, it’s her.

“Oh my god, I love that,” she says, without preamble. She must be talking about the Buzzfeed article. “I knew you were socially inept. You always just write o-k.”

“So glad you’ve spent all those years studying psychology only to have your theories verified by the website made famous by videos of drunk people playing with puppies,” he drawls, putting her on speakerphone so that he can fold while he talks.

“Whatever,” she sighs. “I’m not the one who was reading it in my free time.”

He opens his mouth to defend himself, but that would require backstory. Which would lead them to Betty. Which would lead to JB eagerly trying to analyze his feelings. Which he’s not sure he’s ready to make real by announcing to his sister.

So instead he says, “Fair. So, what’s up? How’d your last final go?”

“Good! I think. I mean, everything just feels weird. I keep thinking I’ve forgotten to show up for one and I’m gonna get a letter in a month being like, ‘uh, you realize you didn’t actually graduate, right?’”

“I can only imagine,” he says, which is the exact truth. He can literally only imagine.

“Honestly, Mr. College-Dropout, you really dodged a bullet. These past few weeks have been hell. But, oh well. It’s over. And I inexplicably wanted that useless millennial degree.” She pauses. “Anyway, when do you think the truck will be fixed and you’ll be leaving Riverwater, or whatever that place is called?”

He’s holding his very wrinkled dress shirt up to the light and wondering if it’s worth ironing now, or if he should wait until he needs it for the graduation ceremony, so he’s a bit distracted when he replies, “Not sure yet, but I can ask tonight.”

“Dumbass, what do you think business hours are? Why would you wait until tonight?” JB snorts. When Jughead can’t come up with an excuse fast enough, she makes a suspicious sounding noise. “Wait, wait. Isn’t your mechanic a woman?”

“Uh, I don’t think I ever said that,” Jughead replies quickly. Too quickly, because he actually has no idea if he’s mentioned Betty’s gender before. Probably? No. Wait, yes, he did.

“Okay. You sound like you’re pooping an egg over there, which means I’m onto something,” JB says, with unnerving triumph. “Hold on.”

There’s a slight click, as her voice suddenly sounds farther away. “Did you just put me on speakerphone?”

“Yeah, so I can text Archie,” she says, casually, as if announcing the time of day. Jughead makes a stutteringly indignant noise, but JB shushes him. “Okay, he’s replying—oh my god, Jug! Her name is Betty? What the fuck, is she fifty?”

“No, she’s—she’s not fifty—and I’m not—Jesus, would you stop laughing?”

“I’m just picturing you, like, at some romantic candlelight dinner and holding hands with Betty White, is all,” JB says, coming down from her giggles. “I’m sorry—that’s so cool, Jug! What’s she like? I wanna know everything. Well, not everything. You know.”

“I’m gonna kill Archie. And I really don’t want to talk about this,” he mutters. “Especially not with you.”

“Why not with me? Everyone else in my major has their friends and families climbing over each other to get a free therapy session.”

“I don’t know, JB, are you sitting in an armchair already?”

“You know, I’m so ready for that joke to be over. Come June 1st, I’ll have an actual, bona-fide psychology degree and you won’t be able to pull this shit,” she huffs.

“—It’s okay, I’m just gonna buy you a nice big, cozy armchair for your birthday so you can diagnosis my bullshit from the comfort of your own home, and—”

“Quit trying to change the subject, Jug,” she says, sounding suddenly exasperated and perhaps a little offended. “Come on. Why didn’t you tell me about her?”

Jughead sighs and sits down next to his phone. “Because I already know it’s not going to end well and I didn’t really want to think about it,” he admits. “Sorry, I was going to tell you about her, just…not until I’d left town.”

“Why wouldn’t it end well?” JB says, sounding uncharacteristically measured. He wonders if this is his first peek into her therapist voice.

“I really don’t want to talk about this,” he insists, but knows it’s going to fall on deaf ears.

“Jughead, why won’t it end well?” She repeats after a moment, as he expected.

“Because it’s me?” He huffs. “Because I always find some way to destroy a good thing? Or, less apocalyptically: because she lives here and I live there? There’s just no happy endgame, JB.”

“You’re being really dramatic, as usual,” his sister says, halfway between amusement and sympathy. “So, you’ll try long distance. Big deal. It’s the digital age, old man. You can text and email and FaceTime to your heart’s content. And you can work from anywhere, right?”

He exhales noisily. As the thoughts come up, he realizes they’re true. “Yeah, I’d…well, I figure I’d be open to doing that. If we got to that point. But she told me she just wants to keep it—well, uh, physical.”

There’s a strangled coughing across the line, followed by, “La, la, la—I didn’t hear that!”

“There was a reason I didn’t want to talk to you about this.” He falls backwards onto the bed and stares up at his ceiling fan, which is moving in slow, rhythmic circles, almost like the hands of a clock. His room is hot with pre-summer humidity and his clothes are stuck to his skin with sweat.

It feels like rain again.

“So, that’s what she wants. So we’re gonna do it that way.”

“Wait, you’re not gonna tell her that you like her? You’re not gonna even try?”

“She knows I like her,” Jughead insists, though, to be fair, he’s never actually said it in such explicit terms. He’s just talked around it using veiled codas, half-haphazardly asked her on a double date set up by his best friend, and made out with her for half an hour. But, still. She must know.

“Does she know how much?” JB says softly, after a long pause.

“What? I never said—”

“You don’t have to.” She sounds almost sad for him, which he hates. He’s the one who is supposed to look out for her. “You’re my big brother. I know you. You wouldn’t be trying to hide her from me if you didn’t have Emotions-with-a-capital-E.”

JB’s voice bounces around menacingly in his thoughts.

Does she know how much?

How much is much, really? He thinks about his conversation with Veronica, and the very long list of pros in Betty’s column. He thinks about the flowers sitting in a mug in his bathroom. He thinks about the soft smile that he wears now, the one that immediately appeared on his face at the mere thought of her.

“Get out of your own head,” JB cuts through his thoughts. She sounds unusually serious. “You do this. You always do this. You’re so self-destructive because you don’t live in the moment, and you’re always thinking ten steps ahead. You know Jug, you’re a good writer because you’re observant, but you observe within your own life rather than live any of it.”

He inhales slowly, processing this. It twists at his gut, and knows she’s right, which only means he has nothing to say. But she also must know why he’s this way, and he waits for her to continue. But when she doesn’t, eventually, he ventures, “Come on, JB. What, I’m supposed to undo all those formative years of constantly worrying about Dad—in one night?”

“You have to start somewhere. You could at least try.”

“Sure, okay,” he scoffs. “All those years of worrying about how we’d get through the next month, or where’d we find him passed out next? Poof, gone, over it? Signing us up for SNAP in his name, or working all through high school to save up for something I half-expected to be his funeral? Fuck, do you even know how many times I expected the cops to show up at our door and tell us he was dead?”

“Yes,” she says, very quietly and after a palpable pause.

“No, Jellybean, you don’t,” he snaps, almost unaware he’s used her full nickname for the first time in years. “Because it was my job to keep you away from that shit. So, yeah, I think ahead. I like to know what I’m getting into and how I’m getting out of it. But I had to be this way. For you. But—thanks, thanks so much, for that gripping analysis of my childhood trauma.”

As soon as he says it, he regrets it. It comes out scalding and bitter and a voice that he hates so much, because it reminds him of his father in one of his drunken, angry stupors, yelling about how it wasn’t his fault he couldn’t hold job A, job B, or job C; how it wasn’t his fault his wife had left him, or how it wasn’t his fault he couldn’t be there for his kids.

His sister doesn’t say anything for a long time. “Okay,” she says finally, in a cracking voice. “You’re right. I don’t know what it was like for you. Dad…he and I always had a different relationship than you two, and I forget that sometimes.”

She sniffles, and he realizes she’s crying. Shit. “JB—”

“No, really. I get it,” she sniffs again, and god, he hates himself so much. How the fuck could he make his little sister cry like that?

“Fuck, I’m sorry,” he cuts in, half-choked. “Please, don’t cry—I’m just…feeling a lot right now and as you might now, I’m not super advanced when it comes to that. Emotional intimacy just freaks me out. I didn’t mean…”

“I know,” she replies, and he’s relieved to hear a bit of a smile in it. She takes a long breath, sniffling a little less. “Look, I poked you. You said you didn’t want to talk about Betty, and I just kept needling at you. I just did it because I want you to talk about things more, so they don’t build up so much. That’s all, you know?”

He sighs. “Yeah.”

“Okay,” she says, after another long moment. “I should go. Um…you’re gonna let me know when you’re on the road, right? Like, when you’re gonna be close to Chicago?”

“Yeah, of course. I said I would,” he reminds her, as she brought this up the last time they talked. “I love you. I’m sorry I snapped at you.”

“I love you too, Jug,” she says, and all he can see is his baby sister, curled up, asleep on a couch in 2005, looking so small, and completely unaware she’d seen her mother for the last time.

Her dark hair aglow with the light of a New Years Countdown on the TV, snow falling madly outside, his father gone for three days after, leaving him alone to the moment that he realized his childhood was over, and had been for a while.

He showers immediately after getting off the phone, desperate to get history off of him.

Jughead makes a lot of jokes about armchair psychology to his sister, but he’s too proud of how ridiculously right she is to really be upset with her. He’s glad she put her big brain to work the way that she did, because she’s definitely a little too on-the-nose about everything she said to him.

He does like Betty, and he knows there is a conversation looming about how much. He did keep her from his sister on purpose, probably because of that, because they don’t keep secrets. He does observe his life more than he lives it.

He stands under the spray, running that last thought over in his head. Don’t think, just do it, he tries to tell himself.

Maybe he should go buy some Nike’s for branded moral courage.

Betty doesn’t want anything more. And of course she doesn’t, she just got out of a long-term relationship a few months ago.

And maybe, he thinks, allowing a bitter shred of hope. Maybe, down the line…if they stay in contact…

He curses to himself, and cuts off the shower and the thought at the same time.

“Don’t think, just do,” he mutters aloud.

He rings the doorbell, bouncing on his feet. The concrete is still wet with the rain that broke the heat an hour before. The clout of humidity no longer sits on his skin, but now he’s got a couple of condoms in his pocket that weigh like a stone and the sweet-smelling flowers that waft distractingly underneath his nose, and he’s somehow far more nervous than he’d been last night.

But last night, he’d had a buffer. He’d had the mood-killing presence of Archie Andrews and the sharp cat-eye of Veronica Lodge to keep things light.

Betty answers the door looking brilliant in a simple white tank top and a denim blue skirt. Her hair is down for another night, and he hopes he gets to run his fingers through it again. And, fulfilling his wish, she flashes him his favorite smile when her eyes fall on the flowers. “Are those for me?”

“Nope, they’re for me. Just wanted you to see them,” he says, relieved his voice comes out the appropriate measure of dry. “Hold them for me, would you?”

“Happily,” she sighs, half-teasing, beckoning him into the house as she takes the flowers from him. She gives them a little sniff, looking at him from over the blooms from under her eyelashes like some sort of interlude of a fairytale.

He’s screwed.

The door shuts and locks gently, and Jughead gets as far as the foyer before he realizes Betty isn’t right behind him. She’s pressed up against the door, biting her lip and looking at him expectantly. “You’re not going to say hi to me?”

He’s so, so screwed.

Jughead crosses the room in about two steps, but slows right before he reaches her, because he wants to be sure what she means. She nods, almost imperceptibly, and so his hand sweeps out and cups her jaw, lifting her face up towards his so he can drop a light, greeting kiss on her lips. Or, at least, that’s what he means for it to be.

Her arms hook around his neck as she rises onto her toes in order to deepen the kiss. The flowers, still in her hands, tickle at his ear, and he opens his mouth to welcome her all the better.

She breaks for a bit of air and whispers, “Hi.”

“Hi,” he says back. He has the urge to add, I missed you, but it’s been less than 24 hours since he last saw her and that’s about the exact opposite of keeping things casual, so he bites it down.

Betty drops onto the balls of her feet and takes his hand, leading him through the house, which, now that he’s away from the flowers, realizes smells amazing. He gives a noticeable sniff of the air, and Betty beams at him over her shoulder. “I made salad, lasagna, and a blackberry pie. You seem like a chocolate cake kind of guy, so I was going to do that, but then I didn’t have time to go to the store and I had these frozen berries, so—”

“Betty,” he interrupts, grinning down at her. He’s glad he’s not the only one capable of rambling. “It’s okay, pie is great. I just…can’t believe how lucky I am to get a home cooked meal from the famous Betty Cooper kitchen.”

She flushes, mumbling something that sounds like oh good. “So, how was your day?” She asks, once they’re in the kitchen and has begun the hunt for a vase.

“Okay. Had a fun conversation about Archie with Veronica.” Betty pivots, raising an eyebrow, so he adds, “She cornered me at Pop’s and wanted to know his dating history.”

Betty doesn’t seem that surprised to hear this. “Of course she did,” she sighs, moving to the sink to fill the found vase with water. “Veronica is going to be a lawyer. She loves to do her research before holding court. So, does Archie have some sort of dark history a best friend should know about?”

“He’s had a drink or two thrown on him,” he admits, which is more than he would’ve said to Veronica. “The first time, he deserved it. The second time was a joke, because it was me, right after the first. He wasn’t too happy about that.”

“What did he do to deserve it?” Betty asks, looking mildly worried, and he realizes he’s undersold the sarcasm.

“Broke up with a girl the week before Valentine’s.” Betty cringes. “I told him that it was just a consumerist holiday made up to sell chocolate, but also that he should wait, because that’s the decent, capitalist thing to do. He agreed, but he’s impulsive, so then he did it anyway.”

She rolls her eyes, fluffing the flowers into their new home. She smiles approvingly down at them, and then back at Jughead. “So, I shouldn’t be worried about Archie for her sake?”

“Not likely,” he assures her. “I mean, I won’t lie, he usually gets rosy-eyed at this stage, but he’s definitely more smitten than usual. I think Veronica holds all the cards here.”

Betty makes a face, and he wonders if an edge of double meaning has reappeared. But it’s quickly gone, and before he knows it, she’s shooing him towards the dining table, where a steaming dinner awaits.

“I can’t believe you did all this,” he murmurs, piling lasagna onto a plate for her. “I’m definitely going to have to put out now.”

He means it to be a light joke, and Betty does smile, but it’s something more like a smirk, secretive and pleased. It’s a look he hasn’t quite seen so plainly on her before—hasn’t quite seen on many people, actually. He recognizes it, dimly, as desire.

She holds his gaze so long that he almost visibly shivers before she breaks away, reaching forward to take her plate from him. The moment passes, but he doesn’t forget it.

Afterwards, he rises to clear the plates, but Betty puts a hand on his arm. He pauses, looking over at her, and his heart gives a hefty slam as he realizes how closely she’s standing. “Leave it,” she says softly, and then wraps one finger around his own, leading him away from the table with only that little link between them.

“This is okay, right?” She asks, at the bottom of the stairs. He realizes where they’re going. “I just…we’re not taking it slow, right? So why bother with the pretense of a movie?”

It might be the moment that he should tell her this is probably the point of no return for him. He might not even have the scope of it until tomorrow morning. He might need to warn her that he’s got far too many feelings already, and this is only going to make it a lot harder for him to rumble away.

But when he pauses too long, and she drops his hand and his eyes, and she’s asking him if he’s changed his mind, he realizes that he can’t lose this moment.

Don’t think, do.

He’ll accept whatever comes after this.

So he kisses her with an answer to her question, and she giggles against his mouth, laces their fingers, and leads him upstairs. He can barely wait until they’ve reached the top of it for him to find her lips again, but this time, he hoists her into the air. She squeals in delight as he murmurs for her to tell him where to carry her, and she points over his shoulder to the room with the door left ajar.

He moves them through, into the pink room with the flowery wallpaper that seems so undeniably Betty and yet aggressively not, but right now he doesn’t care much for analyzing anything but the literal woman before him. He deposits her onto the bed, and it squeaks as he settles on top of her, his hands quickly finding something to study along the soft skin of her stomach.

“You’re so beautiful,” he tells her, for the first time, and thinks it could be the last words he’ll ever say.

Their breaths mingle in a familiarly frenzied kiss, which Jughead breaks in order to move to her neck. They might be skipping a few dates and steps, but he can still slow this down in the moment. He wants this to last.

He manages a solid scrape at languid kissing that could last five minutes or an hour and he’ll never know, but eventually, she starts to squirm beneath him, her hands becoming unruly with wanderlust. She moans as his teeth tug gently at the skin where her neck meets her shoulder, a noise he wants to hear again, and again, and again and it’s the moment that changes the scene.

Betty shifts beneath him, her hands moving to the hem of her shirt, and he sits up in order for her to have the room to pull it over her head. It’s barely off before she’s pushing at his own, and murmuring something teasing about forgoing his usual eight layers of protective clothing, and, god, he can’t take this.

He allows a moment to enjoy the view of her breasts against the triangular scraps of lacy blue fabric before dropping back down in kisses of worship while a spare hand finds it’s way under her skirt. He meets her eyes for permission, and she nods vigorously, so his fingers gently trace the slip of her underwear.

In all the moments before this, there’s been a staccato of a song in his chest every time he looks at her. Not always so loud, not always so tender, but constant, like the low plucking of a single, vibrating string. Call it nerves or call it something he cannot name, he realizes it was always there, because it is not here now.

Right now, he can only focus on the sounds of shallow breathing beneath him, growing more and more impatient and gasping as his fingers move further, deeper, circling her as she once did him in the bed of a river.

The look of elsewhere in her eyes when they lock on him burns into his skin, flushed with the realization he is pushing her there. One of her hands digs nails against his arm, the other overhead and gripping into a pillow as she comes open-mouthed, his name broken on her lips.

He meets her eyes in a question when she doesn’t say anything else. He thinks he’s done right by her, but there’s been so much silence that he’s starting to second-guess it, considering he’s only ever done that a handful of times. Her mouth opens and closes once before finding the word condom and hissing it madly.

He digs one out of his pants pocket and shucks them off in record time while she shimmies out of her skirt and underwear. He crawls back onto the bed to meet her, and the kiss she greets him with is different, as if she’s somehow kissing him with her whole body this time. Without breaking, she takes the condom from him, tears it open, and snakes a hand down to roll it on for him. She gives him a few light strokes as she does and his whole body shudders, but he’s fairly sure he won’t last long if she keeps going, so he gently moves her hand away as they line themselves up.

It feels simple, obvious, and right, like now that they’re here, he realizes this was always where she would lead him. It’s a hand he’s taken into something beyond them both and he wonders if he’ll be able to keep moving forward, or if this is perhaps what Orpheus felt like.

He shifts once to move inside her for the first time, and the world slows down, pulls back, drops in and repeats, like the curl and crest of the ocean wave he never quite understood the appeal of until now.

He moves as slowly as he can, savoring it, dragging along her, and thinking about only how beautiful she looks and whispering such thoughts feverishly against her skin, fumbling in the soft pink light of a warm evening. There’s no sound in the world but the stitch between breaths.

As his hips start stuttering, he knows he’s not got long left, so he dips a thumb between them where they’re joined, hoping it’ll be enough to carry her with him. He comes just before her, and then he feels her tighten around him, murmur a satisfied but completely incomprehensible word, and it’s done.

He collapses above her and they stay that way for a long, infinite moment. The late sky is just barely rosy beyond her window. His chest rises and falls with a shaky breath as her hands gently comb through the damp hair behind his ear.

The rhythm of her finger looping through a curl and then brushing faintly along the skin of his neck is what brings back that plucking in his heart. Only this time, it’s not so faint.

Finally, he pushes up on his elbows and meets her eyes. Neither know what to say.

#bughead #bughead fanfiction #betty x jughead #jughead jones #betty cooper #uh yeah so this happened #honestly i dont know what else to say except 'uh yeah this happened' like over and over and over again #hope y'all like long winded explorations of defense mechanisms before your smut #this chapter is 8 fucking thousand words long #i am reaching a critical mass

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thetravelingmama · 5 years

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100 Things about your Mom.

Hi Chi. I’m back! All better and cured. I’m feeling like my old self again, energy and everything back. Like my doctor said today: if it’s working, don’t change it. That being said, let’s do something fun! I saw this weird list of questions and said: Game on!

1: What random stranger has had the biggest impact on your life? A Dad at a beach playing with his son. He made us made the decision to start a family.

2: What achievement are you proud of but most people would consider silly or weird? I refuse to “act my age”.

3: What period in history had the best fashion? The 50’s!

4: What silly or funny thing makes you afraid or creeps you out? Clowns.

5: How quickly do you jump to conclusions about people? I try not to, but the reality is that I get “vibes” from people, instantly. I’m never wrong, as much opportunities I give.

6: How would the world change if super heroes and super villains actually existed? I think heroes and villains DO exist.

7: What would be your strategy for surviving an apocalyptic epidemic? I already hoard medicine, movies and booze.

8: What is the most important change that should be made to your country’s education system? Equality, Empathy, Values and Gender Perspective are things that need to be taught. I also believe that a University Diploma should be mandatory. No school? Jail.

9: What is something you think you will regret in the future not starting now and what is something you already regret not starting sooner? I regret not becoming a Mom sooner. I’ll regret it most in the future.

10: What part of your culture are you most and least proud of?

Proud of our strength of character. Least proud of living in a status quo.

11: What's the worst and best thing about being female? Best thing is having a baby, carrying it inside your body. That experience is wonderful. The worst is definitively the inequality, how people treat you different in many ways and what they expect on how you “should behave”. I also believe there are many double standards when it comes to us.

12: If you could put your brain in a robot and live indefinitely, would you? Not for a gazillion dollars.

13: If you could replace the handshake as a greeting, what interesting new greeting would you replace it with? High fives are awesome.

14: Who’s the worst guest you’ve had in your house and what did they do? I’m glad to report that I never let people that I don’t truly trust or know at my house.

15: When does time pass fastest for you and when does it pass the slowest? Fastest: when I have a lot of work and a close deadline. Slowest: when I had to come up with advertising campaigns. I HATED starting on a presentation with all the passion in the world until I had an idea that worked. Then, it just was a breeze. Until that jackpot happens, time is torture.

16: What always sounds like a good idea at the time but rarely is? Telling someone the truth. Sometimes it just turns out that they can’t handle or understand it. Another great one? Getting drunk and knowing that no one is going to take care of the baby next morning. Huge mistake.

17: Are humans fundamentally different than animals? If so, what makes us different? We’re very much alike, I realized it after I gave birth. I just think we have the burden of emotions and logic to deal with, that’s all. I envy them: I’d love to function just on instincts!

18: What pictures or paintings have had a big impact on you? Guernica inspired me to paint. The Marilyn Diptych inspired me to design. At the Moulin Rouge is one of my favorites, just because.

19: What movie or book character are you most similar to? That’s a tough one. I identify a lot (with absolutely no clue of why) with Mia Wallace’s lust for life and her disregard for rules; Marla Singer’s I don’t care attitude and confusion. I’m also a mix of Santino and Michael Corleone when I’m either strategizing or just extremely angry.

20: You can broadcast one sentence to every TV channel and radio in the world and have it translated to each country’s language. What sentence do you say? “What doesn’t offend you might offend someone else. Calm down and let people do and say what they want.”

21: What fact are you really surprised that more people don't know about? That research does not mean that you trust instantly whatever you find online. Reliable sources exist for a reason.

22: What are you completely over and done with? Putting the well-being of others before mine.

23: What memory do you just keep going back to?

It depends on the day.

24: What’s the most immature thing someone can do? I believe that making a scene in public is just sign that you are emotionally and socially immature. From treating strangers badly for a stupid reason to arguing with your significant other in front of anybody is just a sign that you’re the problem.

25: What are you most passionate about and what do you wish you were more passionate about? Reading and writing.

26: What’s the best comeback you’ve ever heard?

“I’m growing a human inside me, what’s your excuse?” I said that. :P

27: Who haven’t you seen or talked to in a long time and hope they are doing okay? With Facebook that stopped happening years ago. I actually miss that feeling of wondering how my friends are. Although, there is one friend from college that disappeared. I sometimes wonder what happened.

28: Where is the last place you would ever go? If by last this means “and then you can die”, Tibet. I can’t fathom thinking about a place in this world not worthy about visiting.

29: What’s something that you’ve never been able to do well? Math and control myself when I am beyond furious.

30: Who is the humblest person you know?

Any person who will do something for free just to help another human being.

31: What is the silliest reason someone you've known has completely lost it? The stuff people write online.

32: What is quite possibly the most annoying thing ever? People who judge others on based on what they wear, own, drive or live in. I also am starting to despise people who post every single goddamn second on social media. My social media algebra is simple: entertain, yes; Report, no.

33: What do you wish people would stop asking you? Can I have free tickets?

34: What is the most unusual fear you have? Frogs and Roller Coasters.

35: What is your favorite TV show? Right now it’s Better Call Saul.

36: What’s the most ridiculous argument you’ve had? If it’s ridiculous, I’m totally ignoring the idea of talking about it. Silence is golden.

37: What’s the biggest lesson life has taught you? My happiness is way more important than anything else in the world.

38: What is increasingly becoming socially acceptable? Telling others how to act, talk, behave, think, write... I remember the days when people judged you in silence or behind closed doors. Thanks a lot, internet.

39: What’s the weirdest tradition your family has? It’s not a tradition per se, we just talk really loud when we’re together, and all at the same time.

40: If you could choose anyone living or dead, who would you choose to lead our country? It would be a mix of Obama, Lady Gaga, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ed Snowden.

41: What app on your phone do you wish you used more? Tabata.

42: Who was the most power mad person you’ve met? Insert advertising client name here.

43: What world famous monument do you have no interest in visiting? The Tower of Pisa. Next.

44: What is something that you think people are only pretending to like or are deluding themselves into liking? Wine.

45: What joke went way too far? Anything that relates to a pregnancy announcement.

46: What are some of the telltale signs that a guy is creepy? If a man tries to control how I talk, behave, dress, manage a situation or just even decides something for me. If he thinks I need his approval for anything.

47: What is your very first memory? Walking around the beach.

48: What’s the most embarrassing thing you’ve said or done around someone you dated? It’s not embarrassing but it did catch me off guard: I made a point in my life to never say “I love you” to a man first until I was sure that it was going to mean something. One day, when I was starting to date your Dad, I just blurted it out. He laughed and said “You said it first!”

49: Who is your favorite actor or actress? Right now it’s Bryan Cranston.

50: What doesn’t exist but you desperately want / need it? A pill that eliminates sadness or anger instantly.

51: What are you most grateful for? My child.

52: If you could hear every time someone said something good about you or something negative about you, which would you choose? Neither. Not interested.

53: What do you wish you could re-live? Just for fun, my twenties. Had the best time.

54: What’s something that you recommend everyone trying at least once? Massages.

55: Do you prefer being warmed when you’re too cold or being cooled when you’re too hot? Warmed.

56: What sentence can you say that makes total sense now but would seem insane 20 years ago? “Do it, don’t wait.”

57: How decisive or indecisive are you? Extremely decisive. I’d rather go out in flames, always.

58: What’s something from your childhood that used to be common but now is pretty rare? I used to play outside unsupervised and came back home when I was supposed to. I also drove my grandpa’s car lots of times while sitting in his lap. Now he would get thrown in jail, I guess.

59: If you were an action figure, what accessories would you be sold with? A bottle of Vodka, books, beach items and lipstick.

60: What weird smell do you really enjoy? Gasoline and the streets of New York City.

61: What do you like that is traditionally considered masculine? Boxing, hard liquors, swearing, dark sense of humor.

62: What’s something you learned recently that you really should have already known? Expectations are resentments in the making.

63: What’s a simple mistake you made that had dramatic consequences? I should have been honest with someone without worrying about what could happen next.

64: What’s the best piece of advice someone has given you? You’re not responsible for how other people feel, it’s their problem to handle.

65: What do you think people automatically wrongly assume about you when they look at you? That I’m delicate, maybe?

66: Looking back on your life, what have you done that has given you the most satisfaction? Besides from being a Mom, having a successful company.

67: If everything was quantified, what life stats would like to see for yourself? The happy vs sad moments.

68: What do you really wish you knew when you were younger? That I am way more stronger than I thought.

69: When was the last time you laughed so hard you cried? I think it was watching Dave Chapelle or Joe Rogan on Netflix.

70: What do you wish you had more time for? Being with my child when she grows older. I hope to be alive when she gets married or has a kid.

71: When was the last time you had a gut feeling about something that turned out to be correct? How about a time your gut feeling was wrong? My gut feelings are 99% on point. Sometimes it takes a second, sometimes years. I always end up being right.

72: What’s your curiosity killed the cat story? Your Dad. I ended up married and having you!

73: What areas in your life do you have high hopes for and what are those high hopes? I hope that our child decides to run our company and makes it even more successful.

74: Who was the most spoiled person you personally have met? Met a few. No comment.

75: What makes you feel old? When people don’t know a certain band or piece of music.

76: What’s your favorite non-drug / non-alcohol high? Traveling.

77: What’s the worst thing you’ve heard one person say to another person? It’s a tie between, “Sorry, she doesn’t know what she’s talking about.” and “Shut up and listen”.

78: What do you love about yourself? I’m starting to love my new sense of self. It gives me meaning.

79: What gets progressively weirder the more you think about it? Society in general.

80: What have you gotten too old to put up with? Being obligated to do something.

81: What event would you like to know the whole and complete truth about? JFK’s death. I also would love to read Mueller’s unredacted report.

82: What have you recently become obsessed with? Home delivery. Hi Jeff Bezos, I paid for your electricity this month.

83: What’s the biggest waste of money you’ve seen? Anything related to spending a lot on cars or jewelry. I’d rather travel, sorry.

84: What’s surprising about you? Most people don’t know that I can’t stand chick films.

85: When you were a kid what silly thing were you deathly afraid of? Dracula. Frank Langella, you made my childhood miserable for months.

86: Besides a raise or more vacation time, what’s the best perk a company can offer employees? Time to relax and focus. In Advertising, we’re expected to produce an insane amount of creative pieces in little time. Creativity and pressure don’t go well. Also, a short amount of time during the month to do the things we can’t during the weekend.

87: Where do you like going for walks? Lower East Side or Montmartre.

88: If you found out you would inexplicably fall down dead in one year, what would you change about your life? I would travel non stop so that I could drop dead somewhere cool.

89: What movie have you seen more than seven times? It might be a tie between Pulp Fiction and the Godfather Series.

90: Most people want to be wealthy for one reason or another. Why do you would want to be wealthy? To travel.

91: What’s the best thing you could tell someone to cheer them up when they are feeling down? My grandmother used to say “Someday, when you look back at a bad moment in your life, you’re gonna laugh about it”. Wherever she is, I know she looks down and reminds me in my dreams from time to time.

92: When you were a kid, what movie did you watch over and over again? Mary Poppins... and The Godfather 1 when no one was watching.

93: What’s the worst trait a person can have? No empathy.

94: If you could know one truth about yourself, history, the world, or even the universe, what truth would you want to know? Is someone out there?

95: What’s your favorite souvenir that you have? Our cheesy “Oia” sign. It reminds me of the best honeymoon in the world.

96: What would you do if someone left a duffle bag filled with $2,000,000 on your back porch? Buy a small apartment in NYC, buy another near the beach in Rincón. Leave the rest for Mía.

97: If everything in your house had to be one color what color would you choose? Black.

98: What would your warning label say if every person was required to have one? Don’t get her angry. You wouldn’t like her when she’s angry.

99: What weird childhood fear do you still kind of hold on to? Big waves.

100: What’s the most polarizing question you could ask your group of friends? That’s the funny thing about us. There is not one polarizing thing we could ask each other. We talk and share EVERYTHING in our lives. The good, the bad, the disgusting, the inappropriate. Even the things we are ashamed to admit or share. That’s true friendship.

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filosofablogger · 5 years

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I stopped doing my Idiot of the Week feature around the end of 2017, for a few reasons. It was fun, but rather irrelevant. There were so many idiots that it was difficult to keep up. And a few people felt it was in poor taste, an insult to idiots everywhere. But I have to say that looking at the news every day, I’m thinking about starting it back up! They are everywhere you turn! Three in particular stand out today, and if I were still doing the IotW feature, these would be the first three I would choose.

Da Godfather wannabe?

It really does seem that Representative Matt Gaetz from Florida has a problem. I wrote about him just a few weeks ago (February 7th) for making an utter fool of himself at a House Judiciary Committee meeting on gun regulation whereby he piped up and said we need to build a wall. This left most of us scratching our heads. And now, he has opened himself to an investigation by the Florida State Bar Association. Is he begging for an Idiot of the Week award or what???

What did he do this time, you ask? He tweeted the following to Michael Cohen on the day before Mr. Cohen was scheduled to begin his testimony before Congress …

“Hey @MichaelCohen212 — Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison. She’s about to learn a lot.”

I’m beginning to think Mr. Gaetz works for Don Corleone! Sounds like “tough mob” talk, except from an amateur. His excuse was … wait for it … he was “witness testing”. Where I come from, it is called witness intimidation and witness tampering, both of which are quite illegal. But then, as I wrote earlier this month, Mr. Gaetz has, like his hero in the White House, never been particularly a fan of the law and follows it only when it suits him, hence the picture on the right (above) in prison orange!

Wah wah wah …

If Kellyanne whines as much at home as she does in the media, it’s a thousand wonders that George (Conway) hasn’t sent her packing already. All she ever does, it seems, is complain and point her knobby finger of blame … most always toward people who have a bit of good sense.

“There’s no question the Republican House failed, and they failed us in securing the border, but they also failed to make good on the promise to him that we would get that money for the wall They completely lied about that.”

Can’t you just hear that nasal whine in her voice?

No, Kellyanne, the republicans who did not support the building of Trump’s ego-wall, finally realized that for once they better listen to the people of this nation. The people of this nation … at least the large majority of the people in this nation, do not want a stupid wall on the southern border that would be inhumane and also interfere greatly with the economies of the border states. You, madam, need to study a bit and learn some facts before opening that mouth of yours! Ask your husband … he can enlighten you!

From bad to worse …

Earlier this week, in light of election fraud committed by a member of Mark Harris’ campaign staff who went about the ninth district of North Carolina collecting people’s absentee ballots, destroying the ones that weren’t for Mr. Harris, Mark Harris removed himself from the upcoming repeat election. At first, I was pleased by this, but then I started wondering who would replace him as the republican candidate.

Remember Georgia’s own idiot, Brian Kemp, who liked posing for campaign ads with a gun, and in one case with a rifle pointed at his daughter’s boyfriend? Well … I guess that in the South, every state, by law, must have at least one such idiot!

Meet Mr. Stony Rushing, the new republican candidate replacing Mark Harris …

Mr. Rushing is, as you might guess from the above campaign poster from when he was running for Country Commissioner, yet another gun nut. Even better, he has fashioned himself after Boss Hogg from that ol’ television show, The Dukes of Hazzard!

See the resemblance? Note the white costume and the cigar?

Rushing owns a gun store and shooting range, and is an advocate for keeping the Confederate flag flying. It is likely that ol’ Stony will have to share the stage with at least two other republican candidates, and let us hope that at least one of them is sane! Think about it … this guy could be sitting in the House of Representatives on Capitol Hill in just a month or two! {shudder}

Where do all these people come from? I’m not sure, but there is one common denominator, in case you haven’t picked up on it yet – they are all members of the Republican Party. Need I say more?

They Walk Among Us … I stopped doing my Idiot of the Week feature around the end of 2017, for a few reasons.

#Border wall #Boss Hogg #Brian Kemp #Dukes of Hazard #Kellyanne Conway #Mark Harris #Matt Gaetz #Stony Rushing

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fullspectrum-cbd-oil · 5 years

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CNN Host Cuomo Mocked After Claiming ‘Fredo’ Was the Equivalent of ‘the N-Word’ During Run in With Heckler

CNN host Chris Cuomo was mocked online after he claimed the name “Fredo” was the equivalent of “the N-Word” during a confrontation with a heckler.

The filmed run-in was posted to Twitter on Monday and went viral quickly, depicting Cuomo yelling angrily at a man after he had called him “Fredo” — a reference to Fredo Corleone, the weak brother of the Corleone crime family in “The Godfather.”

Cuomo claimed that using the name “Fredo” as an insult was “disparaging” to Italians and that the name was the equivalent of “the N-word” to African-Americans.

“Punk ass b*tches from the right call me ‘Fredo.’ My name is Chris Cuomo, I’m an anchor on CNN,” said the CNN host before threatening to throw the man “down these stairs like a f***ing punk” and that Cuomo would “f***ing wreck his s**t.”

Watch the video here:

A man in NY yesterday approached CNN's Chris Cuomo and called him "Fredo"

Cuomo: "You're going to have a problem"

Man: "What are you going to do about it?"

Cuomo: "I'll fuckin ruin your shit. I'll fucking throw you down these stairs"

Credit: "THAT'S THE POINT with Brandon" pic.twitter.com/4iWwzaSQpF

— Ryan Saavedra (@RealSaavedra) August 13, 2019

CNN executive Matt Dornic came to the defense of Cuomo, saying that the network “completely support[s] him” after the president’s eldest son — Donald Trump, Jr. — said that he “assum[ed]” that CNN was “not be available for comment.”

Chris Cuomo defended himself when he was verbally attacked with the use of an ethnic slur in an orchestrated setup. We completely support him.

— Matt Dornic (@mdornic) August 13, 2019

Dornic then took it a step further, attacking Trump, Jr. and his brother Eric Trump as “dumb brothers” in response to another tweet by the president’s eldest son.

Speaking of dumb brothers…. cc: @EricTrump

— Matt Dornic (@mdornic) August 13, 2019

Reactions to the video from other users were mixed.

Some users mocked Cuomo:

About an hour after the video’s posting, a user on Twitter pointed out that a guest on Cuomo’s show — commentator Ana Navarro — had described the president’s son as “Fredo” in the past while on-air.

Welp, this is awkward. Here's a clip of @ananavarro calling @DonaldJTrumpJr "fredo" on…Chris Cuomo's show. https://t.co/gUMoyWvvEQ

— James Hasson (@JamesHasson20) August 13, 2019

President Donald Trump gave his thoughts as well, saying “the truth hurts” and that he “thought Chris was Fredo also” in a tweet on Tuesday morning.

I thought Chris was Fredo also. The truth hurts. Totally lost it! Low ratings @CNN https://t.co/yBpGjt4N1T

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 13, 2019

Others did not hold back their thoughts, with one user calling Cuomo’s equivocation of “the N-word” and “Fredo” as “pure racism.”

Did @ChrisCuomo just say that “Fredo” is to Italians what the N word is to black people? Th N word is a dehumanizing word used against blacks who endured years of oppression. Fredo is a term from The Godfather, referring to the dumb brother. Equivocating the two is pure racism.

— Katrina Pierson (@KatrinaPierson) August 13, 2019

Does CNN’s head of PR still think “Fredo” is an ethnic slur after watching this? Because if it’s the N word for Italians like @ChrisCuomo says, I don’t understand why Chris seems so at ease with someone saying it here. An excuse just as fake as his news. #FredoCuomo https://t.co/8G8yuY80CK pic.twitter.com/1gwVyDVCob

— Donald Trump Jr. (@DonaldJTrumpJr) August 13, 2019

Fun fact about #FredoCuomo: Mario Cuomo used to refer to @ChrisCuomo as “the dumb one.” That’s why he doesn’t like being called Fredo.

— Arthur Schwartz (@ArthurSchwartz) August 13, 2019

So @ChrisCuomo says calling him "Fredo" is like the "N-word for us"

Weird, I don't recall him having an issue with Ana Navarro calling @DonaldJTrumpJr "Fredo" ON HIS SHOW ON CNN.

I also don't recall CNN having an issue with Rick Wilson calling Rep. Nunez "Fredo" on CNN.

Hmm… pic.twitter.com/cTdm9TdWMU

— Caleb Hull (@CalebJHull) August 13, 2019

As Oprah always reminds us, the n-word is the last thing black men heard before they were strung up from a tree or when black women were raped. Nothing is comparable to the n-word.

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) August 13, 2019

Remember when @ChrisCuomo said that Nick Sandmann was wrong for how he acted when Nathan Phillips was beating a drum in his face?

No bueno, Fredo! https://t.co/RDLGImuX0H pic.twitter.com/wI89SOyfUb

— Austen Fletcher (@fleccas) August 13, 2019

Hey, @NAACP, do you agree with @ChrisCuomo and @CNN that saying “Fredo” is the equivalent of the “N” word? #askingforafriend https://t.co/ojLF54X4uY

— Katrina Pierson (@KatrinaPierson) August 13, 2019

“Fredo” is not the “n-word for Italians.” It’s a movie reference invoked specifically to make fun of Chris Cuomo.

— Michael Knowles (@michaeljknowles) August 13, 2019

U want to know how culturally ignorant I am? I thought for several minutes that someone called @ChrisCuomo “Frodo,” and it just really pissed him off.

I’ll admit I had no idea “Fredo” was a thing.

— Jason Howerton (@jason_howerton) August 13, 2019

I think the guy was being a jerk to @chriscuomo, and I certainly understand Cuomo getting pissed, but there's just no way calling someone Fredo Corleone is like the n-word. There just isn't. That's plain nuts.

— Ben Shapiro (@benshapiro) August 13, 2019

So everyone must refer to @ChrisCuomo as Fredo from now on I see…

— Cassandra Fairbanks (@CassandraRules) August 13, 2019

So @ChrisCuomo says that “Fredo”— a character on The Godfather— is the same as the n-word? Equating the two is the very definition of white privilege and diminishes the generations of hate African Americans have had to endure. https://t.co/vbwIAran9S

— Steven Cheung (@CaliforniaPanda) August 13, 2019

Please, @NYGovCuomo, please tweet out: “@ChrisCuomo, you’re my brother, and I love you…”

— Michael Knowles (@michaeljknowles) August 13, 2019

Some defended Cuomo:

Fox News host Sean Hannity praised Cuomo, saying that he believes that the CNN host “has zero to apologize for” and was the one who “deserves the apology.”

I say good for @ChrisCuomo

He’s out with his 9 year old daughter, and his wife, and this guy is being a jackass in front of his family.

Imho Chris Cuomo has zero to apologize for. He deserves the apology. https://t.co/VnyMNgz14U

— Sean Hannity (@seanhannity) August 13, 2019

Former Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) proclaimed that Cuomo “had every right to defend himself” while disputing the claim that “Fredo” was equivalent to “the ‘n-word.'”

1. The guy is an ass who rudely got in the face of a public figure on vacation with his family.

2. @ChrisCuomo had every right to defend himself.

3. “Fredo” is not the “n-word.”

4. Now can we move on to stuff that matters like Trump’s stupid trade war killing American farmers?

— Joe Walsh (@WalshFreedom) August 13, 2019

Others came to Cuomo’s defense, as well.

I am not a fan of Chris Cuomo in the slightest but the guy insulted him and then sketchily recorded it. I don’t think that’s cool.

— Lisa Boothe (@LisaMarieBoothe) August 13, 2019

UNPOPULAR OPINION: Don’t approach a man in public and start chirping at him, film it, then whine when you get put in your place. @ChrisCuomo did nothing wrong here. Leave people alone and mind your own business. pic.twitter.com/yHTWXIwNoY

— Jesse Kelly (@JesseKellyDC) August 13, 2019

Good for @ChrisCuomo – standing up for himself (and his family) when harassed in an orchestrated setup

— Chris Cillizza (@CillizzaCNN) August 13, 2019

Although I disagree that calling #ChrisCuomo "Fredo" = calling a black person the n-word, I get his point and support his response to this rightwing loser who ambushed him. Some people think having a cell phone & You Tube channel makes them journalists. 11 yr olds have both, so..

— Tim Wise (@timjacobwise) August 13, 2019

Too many of us have seen this happen when we are out with out famIiies. If this continues someone is going to get hurt. Have some respect. @ChrisCuomo has every right to defend himself and his family. https://t.co/UD6g3hy9Mo

— Corey R. Lewandowski (@CLewandowski_) August 13, 2019

Additionally, former White House Communications Director Anthony Scaramucci tweeted out his support for Cuomo, agreeing that “Fredo” was a “slur” and that the confrontation was “quite racist.”

from IJR https://ift.tt/2KIJ5PV via IFTTT

#IFTTT #IJR

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spintrebuchet-blog · 7 years

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The Other Guys

In all of my previous posts, I may have been a little guilty of harping on the Big 4. But, in this piece, I will present you three of the most interesting characters on the pro-tour, outside of the quantum quartet.

Kei Nishikori

Naaaah. Just kidding!

Don’t get me wrong, I like Kei. Both as a human being and as a tennis player. But, man, he is boring.

If I had to compare tennis players to popular drinks, I’d say Federer was a glass of Pinot Noir, because of his grace, and Nadal would be a pitcher of lava, because of his intensity. Without any doubt in my mind, the drink that comes to mind when I think of Kei: soy milk.

Blandness personified. And, I should reiterate: he is a really good player, famous for upsetting the big kings in their guarded empires. He defeated Djokovic, who was the top seed, at the US Open in the 2014 semi-finals. He beat Andy Murray there in 2016 (also in the semi-finals). He came painfully close in beating Nadal in Madrid. The guy can play.

But, he’s just not blockbuster. Not to worry though! Kei, if you’re reading this, I have outlined six steps for you become interesting.

When you’re in Miami, give Nelly a ring and get a pair of iced out grillz. (Top and bottom).

Next time you hit an inside-out double handed backhand, scream out, “Kamehameha!”.

Dye your hair white and get pixelated highlights for the stark contrast. (Just try it out for me).

Fire Michael Chang (his current coach). Go solo for a while. Lone wolves are cool.

Make a few guest appearances on anime shows. (Seriously, man. You’re an icon in Japan. You’re almost as big as David Hasselhoff in Germany! How has that not already happened?).

Take your jaguar out for a spin in and burn some rubber on the streets of Tokyo, with some of the legendary drift kings. (Make sure you moon every single speed camera and get those photographs for your Twitter account).

There’s still time for the US Open. Almost six weeks. Once you have completed these steps, the crowds in Flushing Meadows are going to be calling you, ‘Bae Nishikori’. Until then, you have some work to do.

1. Gael Monfils

He made that jump on asphalt. That’s hard. A lot. I wouldn’t even attempt that unless it was on a giant bed.

But, that in an essence is Gael. He is widely considered to have been one of the most athletic players to have come into tennis. His fitness coach says that he nearly went became a track and field runner. Therefore he remains one of the biggest unfulfilled prospects this sport has seen. He almost 28, and he has never one a grand slam. Forget trophies, he’s never even made it to a semi-final.

Let me present him differently. Monfils would have been the cool kid in school. Naturally gifted who potentially could ace everything. Instead, he prefers the relaxed vibe of the school’s art department rather than the humdrum of studying.Perhaps knowing that he could never live up to the hype; he has made peace with this choice. He isn’t a bully. In fact, he’s a distinguished member of the student body. He does not get into any trouble. Reputation intact without any scandal. He simply prefers the path of creativity over the rush hour highway frequented by the Big 4. It’s all a matter of perspective.

youtube

Here’s La Monf, entertaining his home crowd in Paris during one of their many rain delays. This was back in 2014.

2. Fabio Fognini

I genuinely wonder if Fabio models himself after Sonny Corleone. This bombast from Sicily always brings in the show whenever he’s on court.

youtube

This compilation might be the best snippets you could find of him. (The second last one is probably the best. I love the whirlpool of melodrama that he flies into when a line-call goes against him.

Married to the 2015 US Open women’s champion, Flavia Panetta, he hoisted the trophy up proudly as if it were his own, back in 2015. He views himself as the kalamata olive in a mayo salad. He views it his critical duty to bring in the flavor.

Tennis is a popular sport in Italy. With an ATP Masters 1000 (in Rome), there are many fans waiting for the next homegrown grand slam winner. The last time was back in 1976, when Adriano Panatta won Roland Garros. I wonder if that pressure is one of the reasons as to why Fabio gets into so much trouble with umpires, linesmen, players, etc. (He once threatened Layani (an umpire). He almost came to blows against Rafa. And, he set fire to the Easter Bunny. Perhaps, I embellished one of them).

He’s that kid in high school who’s parents and grand parents were all distinguished scholars, and finds himself living under their daily shadow. I actually knew someone like that and he’d regular vent out that frustration by pulling the most extreme pranks on students and even teachers. And, just like him, Fabio’s a troublemaker.

As the song goes (by Olly Murs):

You're a troublemaker, you're a troublemaker

Trouble troublemaker, yeah, that's your middle name, oh oh oh..

I know you're no good but you're stuck in my brain

Don’t try to understand him. Revel in his madness.

3. John McEnroe

youtube

McEnroe. Winner of seven grand slams and one of the most prominent tennis commentators. However, as of late, he is gaining notoriety for making provocative statements.

Allow me to provide you with some of his finest hits:

He alluded that Djokovic might have had extramarital affairs, like Tiger Woods, which culminated in his performance drop. (Ridiculous. Based on nothing and with today’s paparazzi, we’d have known by now).

He said Serena Williams would be ranked #700 if she played on the men’s tour. (Asinine. She’d absolutely be in the top 5).

In his opinion, Andy Murray – current world number one, is a distant fourth among his peers in the Big 4. (True but unnecessary).

Keep in mind, these are just from the last two months.

He was notorious for his catchphrase: “You cannot be serious!”

This would be unleashed upon the referees who gave him bad calls.

It’s hard to think of another tennis player who had such a temper.

I am reminded by a quote by the great writer, Mark Twain.

“Anger is an acid that can do more harm to the vessel in which it is stored than to anything on which it is poured”.

In all fairness, Twain never played tennis.

1984 was his chance. The clay dominator of that time, Bjorn Borg wasn’t playing that year. McEnroe came in as the top seed. He was the favorite. He made history but not the way he wanted. He blew a two sets to love lead against Ivan Lendl in the French Open finals, back in 1984. This was the only time in the Open Era that anyone had lost with such a lead, in the finals of a Slam. It was the closest he ever came in winning that title. With just five points away from the finish line, he got mad at a bad call made by the linesman on his serve. He lost his composure and his momentum.

To his credit he has a good sense of humor about it. On his show on Eurosport, he interviewed a younger version of himself.

Old McEnroe: Let me give you one final piece of advice when you're playing this Czech guy in the 1984 French Open final. When you're 5 points away from winning the tournament - don't assume it's over!

Young McEnroe: You’re a joke. Do you think I'm stupid enough to the lose match from that position? You cannot be serious.

Old McEnroe turns to the camera, completely deadpan, and says, “I wish I wasn’t”.

#tennisedit

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qualitytimewithpeteanddeb-blog · 7 years

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Quality Time With Pete and Deb - Trump’s First Week

Peter Grosz and Debra Downing are alums of The Second City Theater, writers, actors and husband and wife, living in Brooklyn, NY. This piece was composed at home on their computer exactly as you see it. One person would write and the other would respond, essentially like an improvised written “conversation”. The content was not pre-planned. They only decided to talk about President Trump’s first week in office. They wrote on January 26th.

PETE: So it was a pretty uneventful first week. If you don’t count the controversy over crowd size, accusations of massive voter fraud, a GIANT protest march, executive orders undoing Obamacare, reinstating black sites and bringing back waterboarding, gag orders on federal agencies dealing with global warming, re-starting the Dakota and Keystone pipelines, proposing immigration bans from certain countries and giving Mexico the middle finger I’d say not much happened.

DEB: OH MY INDIGESTION! I didn’t mean to capitalize that but I think I will leave it. I have started taking a probiotic to help me with a condition I have called Trump Stomach. I got enough to last four years. Hopefully I won’t have to re-up. I think the inaugural speech was so insulting to the country and to the past Presidents who came to support the idea of the peaceful transfer of power. I wept as the gracious and elegant Obamas boarded that helicopter to leave the office. I’ve had a cold ever since that I can’t shake. But I have to say I was very encouraged by the attendance at all the marches. That is heartening don’t you think? By the way I’m sorry I gave you my cold.

PETE: Yeah, what the hell? Was that the message of the women’s march? That it’s OK to give your husband a cold? Not cool. I too was heartened by the turnout and enthusiasm, especially from little towns in the middle of Alabama or people who marched in freezing weather in Alaska. I was disheartened by stupid news reports that made fun of marchers or framed their coverage as, “What do these crazy women want, anyway? What the hell is going on here?” as if they were some unwashed mass of human garbage that was mysteriously swept onto The Mall by a gust of wind. I feel like there will be a real return to protest in the next four years and if he doesn’t do right by enough people the marches will only grow. I don’t want to root against him, I truly don’t, but it seems like the path he’s choosing is going to alienate more and more people as he goes.

DEB: It’s true. I think the fantasy that he would somehow change into a completely different person once he took the oath of office is over. He is who he is. I think there will be more and more protests as time goes on. There seems to be a realization that Democracy is fragile and so are your rights and you still have to fight for them or they could be taken away. By the way, don’t be surprised when people say negative things about a group of women getting together. Some people find it very unnerving because it threatens to upset the role of power in our society. To all those people I say, “Don’t worry bout a thing sweetie, we’re just having a Tupperware party! You know how important it is for we homemakers to organize! I mean to be organized. No, I mean to organize.”

PETE: Just reading that last part sent chills up my spine. All those women in one place… talking about God knows what… Someone told me that “Tupperware” is an anagram of “Topple The Patriarchy”. That’s true, right? I don’t want you going out of the house today. Or reading the newspaper. Or watching TV. Or talking to the cat. Or the dog. Or the appliances. Just sit in the corner and darn my socks.

DEB: At least the appliances are non political. All they want to talk about is Tesla and Edison. Umbierto is very concerned about the building of the Wall because he thinks he is from Mexico and the dog Frankie Five Angels thinks he is in protective custody until he testifies against the Mafia. I’ve got my hands full around here! PS .- throw out all your socks and underwear that have holes in them!

PETE: We should explain that we named our dog, Frankie, after Frank Pentangelis from Godfather 2, who’s nickname was Frankie Five Angels and who was in protective custody until he testified against Michael Corleone. And we should explain that we named our cat Umbierto for no good reason whatsoever. Back to Trump… Or rather, back to my underwear, which I’m apparently supposed to throw away just because it has massive holes in it. Ever heard of “breathability”? Or “exhibitionism”? This is ridiculous. You were never like this before Trump became president. What’s your deal?

DEB: I guess I just really feel empowered as a woman! I finally feel strong enough to say, “Hey- that’s gross! Buy new underwear and socks!” Wow, that felt good. I bet Eleanor Roosevelt had to say that to FDR all the time. I’m going to light a scented candle to celebrate! Then I’m gonna tell those appliances what I think of them!

PETE: I think we’ve gotten a little off track. That’s just what Trump wants. He wants us arguing about socks and underwear while he’s dismantling our liberties and environment and relationships with our neighbors. Don’t you just feel so on edge all the time? Like he could do something crazy at any minute? I honestly wonder what life is like for people who are excited for Trump. What’s it like to not watch the news peeking through your fingers like when you’re watching a scary scene in a horror movie?

DEB: Nobody wants to be wrong. I bet there are some people who are having buyer’s remorse but I’m sure they are not running to reporters to say, “Uh oh – this is bad.” I think his supporters are hoping there will be some job creation at least? I just hope these same people don’t lose their healthcare or fall deeper into financial crisis. I am rooting for these people to feel better about things, I just don’t think Trump is a real cure for what ails them.

PETE: I agree. As far as a Trump voter, or anyone, is hurting, they deserve relief. I know he’s certainly not the cure for what ails me and on some level I’m prepared to put up with disappointment for 4 years and resist what I can’t put up with. I also think it’s interesting that people are using the word “Resistance” so often in reference to standing up to Trump. I recall plenty of people being unhappy with Bush or Obama’s decisions but you didn’t hear the word “Resistance” that much. It makes Trump seem like a ruthless dictator or intergalactic overlord. I mean, the things he does also make him seem like a ruthless dictator or intergalactic overlord so I guess I get why people are using that word

DEB: Well now you’ve gone and made me like the term “intergalactic overlord”.

PETE: Oh great, now when we get invaded by an actual intergalactic overlord you’re gonna roll over. You’re such a sucker for a catchy job title. 9

DEB: Wait until you see the outfit The Intergalactic Overlord gets to wear! It’s kind of a combination between Liberace and Flava Flav. I have this all worked out. I’m gonna be the Kelly Ann Conway to this guy/girl/creature/plant/energy field. You see, it will come to take over the planet when major coastal cities are disappearing into the sea, drought, famine, super storms, war, nuclear winter… you know, all that jazz is happening. He’ll have a press conference where he chastises the humans for being so irresponsible with the planet –

WITH A GREAT CLAP OF THUNDER AND LIGHTING, A DARK FIGURE APPEARS IN A CLOUD OF FOG

A BOOMING VOICE IS HEARD.

BOOMING VOICE: Don’t put words in my mouth!

DEB: Please tell me you are The Intergalactic Overlord.

BOOMING VOICE: Actually I am the Press Secretary for the Intergalactic Overlord.

DEB: I was gonna say, you’re not wearing the right outfit.

BOOMING VOICE: Well, my good dark cloak is at the dry cleaners. I got a bunch of Argonfefutosol sauce on it and can’t get it out. You know how it is

DEB: What’s Argonfefutosol?

BOOMING VOICE: It’s like your Cholula but about twenty times spicier and made out Fefutosol.

DEB: What’s Fefutosol?

BOOMING VOICE: You don’t want to know

PETE: Um, my ears are bleeding from your booming voice, Mr. Press Secretary, can you please boom a little less?

BOOMING VOICE: Oh, you just assume I’m a man? How sexist.

PETE: I’m sorry, it’s just your voice. Mrs. Press Secretary

BOOMING VOICE: I’m not a woman either. I am a genderless Fog Figure.

PETE: Ok. I hope you don’t have to use any public bathrooms while you’re here. We’ve got a whole stupid thing going on with that.

BOOMING VOICE: Too late.

DEB: What does that mean?

BOOMING VOICE: Anyway, I am here to relay the message that you still have time to change Scrooge - I mean humans – sorry, I was just in a production of “A Christmas Carol” and I’ve got that in stuck in my brain. I received quite a few good notices for my performance. We are currently in rehearsals for “Oklahoma” in which I shall play Ado Annie.

PETE: Yeah, we’re not going to see that. Can you just tell us what you came to tell us?

BOOMING VOICE: Yes, sorry. Our ticket sales have just been abysmal so I’m trying to get anyone to come see it. You still have time to change, humans. You must not despair. You must stand up for what you believe in and not let your world be destroyed by a narcissistic egomaniac. (Whispering) Believe me, I know. My boss, the Intergalactic Overlord is such an intergalactic A-hole.

DEB: Well thanks for the positive encouragement. We’ll take it. I have so many questions about –

BOOMING VOICE: Where to get tickets for Oklahoma?

DEB: No… about the Universe.

BOOMING VOICE: I can only answer questions regarding tickets for the Intergalactic Community Players Productions. Sorry.

PETE: Well then maybe you can just go and we’ll figure things out for ourselves.

BOOMING VOICE: Agreed! You must be independent and brave. Much like Ado Annie who had to…

PETE: Get out of here!

WITH A GREAT CLAP OF THUNDER AND LIGHTING, THE DARK FIGURE DISAPPEARS AND THE FOG CLEARS.

PETE: I guess we’re lucky we’re not ruled by an actual intergalactic overlord. And that Sean Spicer isn’t trying to get everyone to see his play.

DEB: Well, it’s only the first week.

PETE: It’s gonna be a long four years…

#donald trump #comedy #satire

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