#seymour needs to belong somewhere

[blood-orange-juice]

There's something to be said about how we never find Mary-Ann, only other people's dreams of her. Fragments.

Both Rene and Ann muse that maybe Mary-Ann never existed, and in a sense it's true. There obviously was a girl once, but that girl is not what any of them are searching for, not really.

#narcissenkreuz #everything is mary-ann #everyone has their own idea of mary-ann #and maybe that's why her absence is louder than anything alain ever built #objet petit a #(ok. I'll shut up) #I am not normal about them #seymour needs to belong somewhere #cater needs to feel useful #lyris wants the old halcyon days back #ann needs to find who she is #no idea what alain wanted but maybe we'll find out when we know more about sandrone #none of these have anything to do with the real mary-ann #they just look mary-ann-shaped if you squint

[eijispumpkin]

On Allegory, Imperfection, and Inadvertent Subversion: A small essay about Akimi Yoshida’s Banana Fish and Salinger’s “A Perfect Day For Bananafish”.

In the story of Banana Fish, Yoshida references Salinger’s short story “A Perfect Day For Bananafish” (which henceforth shall be addressed as “Perfect Day” simply for ease of reading) several different ways, both in-universe and out. It is exceedingly evident that the character of Ash Lynx is heavily based on Seymour Glass, and one might surmise that Banana Fish is an allegorical retelling of “Perfect Day”, especially given that in the original story, Ash Lynx dies of what is arguably a “passive suicide” – that is, when faced with an injury that isn’t immediately fatal, he chooses to bleed out rather than seek help, which when framed as a suicide, parallels the much more violent and sudden suicide of Seymour Glass.

However, this surface-level allegorical reading ignores a very important variable in the story of Banana Fish, namely the counterpart to Ash’s Seymour: Eiji’s Sybil. While Ash and Seymour share many similarities (both are traumatized, troubled geniuses with partly-Irish roots who grew up in New York City), the similarities between Eiji and Sybil are very few. Eiji does symbolize a world of innocence to contrast with Ash’s world of horrors, but unlike Sybil, Eiji is an adult with agency of his own, and though he retains some of Sybil’s childlike innocence and is able to connect deeply with Ash as a result of it, Eiji’s agency and decisions ultimately change the narrative and its meaning.

That is to say, by introducing Eiji as an imperfect Sybil, one who has agency and can actually provide Ash with understanding and support of the kind that Seymour never got from Muriel or others around him (and which Sybil, being three years old, was in no way equipped to provide), Banana Fish directly subverts “Perfect Day”’s original message of cynicism in the face of a material world unconcerned with the horror of lost innocence and its resulting isolation.

To understand what this means, it’s important to first understand the meaning and context of “Perfect Day” and the circumstances in which it was written. “Perfect Day” is a story written first and foremost as a critique of American materialism in the wake of WWII; Salinger echoes the concerns of the Lost Generation before him, in a way, by really driving home the alienation from modern adult life felt by those who were exposed to the horrors and traumas of the battlefields in wartorn Europe, only to return home and find a culture completely removed from it all. Seymour Glass is a stand-in for Salinger himself—Kenneth Slawenski, in his 2010 biography of Salinger, notes that on returning from the European theater, Salinger “found it impossible to fit into a society that ignored the truth that he now knew.”

If that sounds familiar, good, because it should! This is precisely the motif of “Perfect Day” (as well as some of Salinger’s other work featuring members of the Glass family, such as Seymour’s younger brother Buddy, which, as an aside, is a name that might stick out to Banana Fish fans. Whether this is an intentional reference or a coincidence, I can’t say for certain, but given the depth of other references within this allegory, I’m inclined to think it’s intentional).

As a quick summary for those who may need a refresher, “Perfect Day” is a story about a deeply traumatized man who feels isolated from the rest of society because of the weight of the horrors he has been exposed to. Muriel Glass, Seymour’s wife, is the epitome of this: she represents the materialistic culture that Seymour feels so alienated from, always talking about brand-name things and luxuries and upward mobility. Seymour rejects her company in favor of playing the piano for children and spending time on the beach, where he tells three-year-old Sybil Carpenter a story about bananafish, fish that gorge themselves on bananas in holes under the sea until they’re too fat to escape the entrances to these little banana dens, and then they die. Instead of dismissing this story as something bizarre, Sybil claims she sees a bananafish in the water, which endears her to Seymour, until she leaves, at which point he returns to his hotel room and shoots himself in the head.

In “Perfect Day”, this interaction (between Sybil and Seymour) is the center of a set of dualities. Sybil represents the state of childlike innocence that Seymour longs to return to, and because of her innocence, she can “understand” him in ways that the material adults like her mother or Muriel do not. Seymour’s isolation is a product of his society and the lack of support and understanding for traumatized veterans returning from war, and it shows in the way that adults his age cannot connect with him, and he cannot connect with them. This disconnect between worlds is what eventually results in Seymour’s suicide—he can fit neither in the world in which he wishes to be, nor in the one in which he must reside, and it ends in his death.

The question is, then, how does this relate to Banana Fish?

As mentioned previously, Ash Lynx is a very clear parallel to Seymour Glass. He’s a young man faced with immeasurable trauma from which he believes he can never recover, and there is a clear motif of duality in his entire character arc: his world (one of violence and trauma) versus the “normal” world (where innocent people who have “regular” lives may reside). Like Seymour, Ash feels trapped in a world he can’t escape, knowing “the truth” that he knows, about the horrors that people are capable of.

It follows, then, that Eiji Okumura is a parallel to Sybil Carpenter, who represents childlike innocence and a world that Ash longs to be part of but can’t reach. And to an extent, this is true: Eiji is sheltered and innocent, comparing real-life to TV shows and being completely unexposed to kidnappings, drugs, guns, and violence. However, there is a sharp contrast between Eiji and Sybil, one that fundamentally changes the relationship between Eiji and Ash and makes it radically different from that between Sybil and Seymour:

Eiji is an adult, and as such, he has agency of his own.

Unlike Sybil with Seymour, Eiji can make his own choices and face Ash as an equal. Where Sybil is a child who runs back to her mother after playing with Seymour at the beach, Eiji actively and consistently chooses to stay with Ash, over and over. He even explicitly tells Ash “you are not alone”, which is a huge and direct contrast to the message of inevitable, devastating isolation from “Perfect Day”. Whereas Sybil’s innocence serves as a reminder to Seymour of what he’s lost and cannot regain, Eiji’s innocence is a beacon of comfort and companionship to Ash. Eiji is someone with whom Ash can relax and be playful like a boy his own age, as noted by Max and Ibe watching them interact.

This communication and connection are present between Sybil and Seymour, but in a very different way. Seymour prefers to play make-believe and tell silly stories to kids, because he went from being a wide-eyed innocent to being traumatized and longing for a place to belong, and Sybil as a child represents what he wishes he had, while the adults around him (most notably Muriel, his wife) are a world he doesn’t understand that feels false.

This is not the dichotomy of worlds that Ash faces. Ash faces a world of trauma and suffering that he sees himself as trapped in, and a world of peace and security that he thinks is beyond his reach. Where Seymour yearns for a return to innocence, Ash yearns to escape his pain, and the combination of this subtle difference with the effect of Eiji’s agency and the narrative structure of Banana Fish results in a subversion of the themes in “Perfect Day”.

Banana Fish is a long-form narrative, while “Perfect Day” is a short story. Part of the inherent structure of a long-form narrative is character growth and development, which for obvious reasons is much less prominent in short stories. As a result, Eiji’s impact on Ash is clearly visible over the course of the narrative, and it becomes impossible to declare that Ash is firmly rooted in the world he sees himself as trapped in. By the end of the story, even Ash wavers on this assertion; although he ultimately succumbs to suicide, a narrative choice that been criticized ever since its publication, in the moments leading up to his stabbing, he does believe that Eiji is right, or at least right enough that he wants to see him one last time (this is ambiguous and open to interpretation, of course).

Why did this narrative choice spark so much controversy and outcry from fans? Not every story that ends in tragedy is criticized as poorly written for it; examples range from Shakespearean tragedies to “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story”, a film in which the entire cast dies in the climax. Yet just about all fans agree that it fit the narrative. Clearly, then, it is possible to craft a story that ends in death and tragedy but still feels well-written. What makes Banana Fish different?

I would argue that the answer lies in this imperfect allegory. By creating a Sybil-esque character that can interact with the Seymour-esque character as equals, can stay with him, and can listen to him and support him through his grief and pain, Akimi Yoshida inadvertently turned “Perfect Day”’s message on its head. The tragedy of “Perfect Day” is Seymour’s isolation. By giving Ash a warm, compassionate relationship in which he is assured over and over that he is not alone, Yoshida upturns this entirely.

Ash is led to believe in this dichotomy mostly by his isolation. He believes that since Eiji is in mortal danger as a result of being special to him, he needs to send Eiji to safety, i.e. somewhere far from him and far from the reach of those who would hurt them both. This isn’t a miscommunication issue or anything of the sort; this is Ash being afraid for Eiji’s life; Eiji isn’t averse to returning to Japan itself. Eiji is averse to returning to Japan without Ash, as he mentions when he talks about how Ash could be a model, and tells him about kami. In establishing this as a consistent tenet of Eiji’s character, Yoshida ensures that Ash is not isolated in the same way that Seymour was.

In addition, Eiji can move freely between both worlds set up in Ash’s perceived dichotomy, a motif made explicitly clear when Eiji leaps the wall to freedom and light at the beginning, leaving Ash (and Skipper) behind in captivity in the dark. Despite this escape from the world of violence and crime, Eiji returns of his own volition and stays with Ash, experiences his own fair share of horrific traumas, and still leaves in the end to return to his world. This makes it clear that the dichotomy is less stark than Ash is led to believe, unlike the repeated validation of his isolation that Seymour receives, and is another reason that the ending of “Perfect Day” is inconsistent with the ending of Banana Fish

A quick sidebar: Banana Fish has no real Muriel, but if pressed, I would posit that the closest parallel to Muriel that exists is Blanca, whose main purpose in the narrative seems to be to reinforce to Ash that he can’t escape the world he feels trapped in and longs to leave. But where in “Perfect Day” Muriel symbolized the materialism of American society after WWII, Blanca has no real established reason to be so invested in keeping Ash down, and in conjunction with the fact that despite his own traumas, he can retire peacefully to the Caribbean, his role in the story falls to pieces entirely. Where Muriel represented a lifestyle that Seymour fundamentally could not reach, thereby reinforcing his isolation, Blanca is supposed to parallel Ash to a degree, but his words to Ash do not match his actions whatsoever.

Therefore, if anything, Blanca’s assertions serve only to strike a contrast with Eiji’s (and Max’s, to an extent, since Max and Eiji both agree that Ash can escape this and they want him to heal). Moreover, Blanca’s relationship with Ash is that of a mentor and a student, a relationship that is shown to be fundamentally unhealthy, given that Blanca willingly worked for Ash’s abuser, a mafia don who he knew trafficked children. Some argue that Blanca was blackmailed into this service, but given that Blanca chose to betray Golzine at the end and work with Ash with seemingly no real provocation or change in his relationship with Golzine, this supposition seems flawed. Blanca’s assertions about Ash and his ability to forge bonds and leave his world the way Eiji does, and indeed the way Blanca himself does, are simply incorrect, and the narrative itself provides us all the tools we need to realize that Blanca is wrong, even without the extended context of a parallel to Muriel Glass.

Returning to the main issue at hand, i.e. that of the imperfect allegorical connections between Sybil and Eiji, and the dichotomy between worlds that Ash perceives, it’s clear that in creating a positive, nurturing relationship between Ash and Eiji rather than a one-off encounter, Yoshida inadvertently created a story about connections rather than isolation. Ash’s attempts to keep Eiji safe from harm by sending him home are countered by Eiji’s assertion that he only wants to go to Japan if Ash comes with him, which is a kind of selfless devotion that reaches through Ash’s isolation until he decides that he won’t try and separate himself from Eiji anymore, which is a massive blow to the dichotomy of his supposed two worlds. This is the narrative acknowledging that both worlds can coexist.

Not only this, but also Eiji, who has his own trauma—he’s kidnapped several times, shot at, drugged, sexually assaulted, attacked with a knife by a drugged friend, exposed to several deaths, shot at people in fights himself, and ultimately nearly killed by a gunshot wound—despite all of this, Eiji is still allowed to exist in the world of peace and regularity. Eiji’s innocence is sharply tempered by traumatic experiences, and he can still walk between worlds. If Eiji, Max, Ibe, Jessica, Sing, Cain, and Blanca can all experience traumas, why is Ash the only one who cannot escape? Is there some kind of magical bar of “too much” trauma, like an event horizon on a black hole?

Obviously, no.

So it comes to this: Essentially, the reason that the ending is so controversial, and why I personally believe that the open ending of the anime is an improvement to the original story, is that the allegory between Banana Fish and “Perfect Day” falls apart because of Eiji’s agency. Ash wants to protect Eiji, and to protect Eiji’s innocence and light, because he feels that it’s beyond his own reach, but Eiji forges a bond with him that is rooted in mutual respect and care, and in doing so, undoes the devastating, painful isolation that led to Seymour’s suicide. This is why Ash’s death can feel so hollow—it doesn’t follow the pattern of “Perfect Day”; after the entire story is about Ash’s bonds and those who love him unconditionally, it feels almost like a shock-value plot twist tacked on, rather than a tragic inevitability.

I don’t believe that Yoshida intended Banana Fish to be a subversion of “Perfect Day”. I believe she meant it as a one-to-one allegory, and this is why she kept the ending as Ash choosing death. However, due to the changes in themes because of the characters and their relationships, Ash is not isolated in the profound way Seymour was, and his death is therefore not nearly as impactful.

#this is 2600 words i am so fucking sorry but also im not sorry im just verbose #banana fish #banana fish meta #asheiji #ash lynx #eiji okumura

[azure-firecracker]

First Six fanfic! Yay!

Summary: Anne gets sick and one of the other queens has to look after her. Thanks to @the-final-wife for the prompt.

PSA: My phone is in French so sometimes it’ll add accents to words, and also the quotation marks sometimes look like this: « Anne Boleyn »

Anne woke up at 3 am, sweating buckets and trembling from head to toe. This was something she actually experienced pretty frequently, due to her nightmares, but this was different. This wasn’t a nightmare.

Anne was absolutely FREEZING. Despite the fact that she had her usual four or so blankets on her bed, she felt like she was sleeping in a freezer. She thought some fresh air might do her good, but when she tried to go outside, she found that her entire body felt sore and exhausted. She had a fever, she figured, but she didn’t really know what to do about it. She really didn’t want to bother any of the other queens, seeing as they were still mad at her for breaking the window last week.

After what felt like ten years, she managed to drag her sick body towards the door, and put onto the balcony. She groaned as the wind it her face. It certainly didn’t make her any warmer, and to make matters worse, her brain was starting to feel fuzzy. She was pretty sure she was becoming delirious. Wonderful. She was about to turn and go back inside when she felt her legs give out under her, and she fell onto the balcony, sinking into a deep sleep.

Sometime later, Anne became conscious. She was in a freezing, sore, exhausted, delirious haze, and didn’t want to open her eyes. She heard voices. The voices sounded familiar, but in her confused state, she couldn’t tell who they belonged to.

“...told you a million times, Jane! I don’t know how she got here! I just found her.” This voice was smooth, like rippling water.

“Water,” mumbled Anne, suddenly realizing she was incredibly thirsty. The voices paused.

“Did she say something?” asked the water voice. Anne tried to speak, but no sound came out of her throat.

“Dunno, love,” said a different voice, soothing, like the water voice, but softer, more like a bunny rabbit.

“Bunnies,” mumbled Anne, just trying to say what she was thinking. Then, “water.”

“Wait!” said a third voice, high-pitched and musical this time. “I think she said ‘water!’”

“And ‘bunnies,’” said the water voice, amused.

“Kitty’s right,” said the soft voice. “Cathy, run and get her some water.”

Cathy’s footsteps sounded like cannonballs in Anne’s throbbing head. She put her hand over her ears, wincing.

“Poor thing,” the soft voice said, the sounds significantly muffled to Anne’s ears, “looks like she has a headache, too.”

“We should check her temperature,” said a fourth voice, this one deep and hypnotic, like cello music.

“Cellos,” muttered Anne, happy to be able to speak at all.

“First,” said a fifth voice, this one bossy and not soothing at all, “we should get her inside. It’s freezing out here.”

Anne felt someone scoop her up into their arms. She felt herself being carried. That was all she processed before she felt a burn in her forehead and lapses into unconsciousness once more.

When she woke up, Anne noticed a change. She was still freezing and exhausted, but she was now able to recognize everything around her. That was progress.

She was lying under a lightweight fuzzy blanket on the leather couch in their den. Soft music was playing in the background. There was also a flamingo...wait, that was wrong. Anne blinked, and it was gone. Shivering, she reached to grab another blanket.

“Don’t!” barked a voice. Startled, Anne whipped around (well, as fast as her sick body could “whip”) to see Catherine of Aragon glaring at her. “You have a fever,” said Catherine in a monotone, “don’t be an idiot, or you’ll overheat.” With that, she turned on her heel and left the room.

Hurt and bewildered, Anne flopped around on the couch until she was lying down again. To her surprise, she started crying. Being this sick was terrifying. She felt weak and vulnerable, like bad things could just creep into the room and do whatever they wanted to her.

Now, if anything else had happened next, Anne never would’ve called Catherine. Even in her feverish state, she could tell that the Spanish queen wanted to be left alone. But what happened did happen. Anne blinked wearily, but snapped out of her haze when she saw him standing over her.

Henry. More enormous than she remembered, with a gleam of revenge in his eye, and radiating sheer power. Anne screamed as loudly as she could. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she expected him to do something, but he just stood there, and what she blinked, he was gone. Footsteps came rushing down the stairs, and Catherine of Aragon was standing at the door again.

“What?” she snapped.

Anne whimpered. “Henry was here. I saw him, right in front of me.”

Catherine sighed. “Don’t be stupid, Anne. Your crazy fever is making you hallucinate. Now will you leave me alone?”

Anne would’ve done just that, left her alone. Under any other circumstance, she would’ve buried her feelings and let Catherine go on with her day. But she was too exhausted to even gather up the energy it took to hide her emotions.

“Catherine, wait,” Anne’s voice came out as barely a whisper. “I’m scared.”

Catherine regarded the sick girl with a calculated stare. It was almost too calculated, as if she was hiding something. Then, sighing, she plopped down on the couch, right at Anne’s feet.

“Come on then. We need to get you distracted. I’ll even watch one of those stupid television programs you like.” Was Anne imagining the soft edge in the older queen’s voice? She was about to say something when Catherine, seeing her open her mouth, shot her what could only be described as a death glare. Startled, Anne curled up in a ball and turned her gaze to the TV.

It came when Anne had gotten attached to a contestant on a reality show. One of the other contestants had snapped at her, and now she was crying. When Anne reached up to see how hot her face was, she was surprised to find tears there, too. As the show went on, she got worse and worse. By the end, she was completely bawling. Catherine eyed her warily.

“What is it?” she asked in a tired tone.

Anne couldn’t help it. All of her feelings came spilling out before she could make them stop.

“ I don’t understand why you’re being so mean to me! I know you hate me for what happened the last time, and any other day, I’d be fine with this, but today I’m really sick, and I need you. You don’t even have to be nice, I’m not asking for that.” Anne took a deep breath. “I’m just asking you to treat me okay and help me. Just for one day.”

There was silence. Even the TV seemed like it had gotten quieter. Anne looked over at the othe queen. She was curled up at the end of the couch, just so that Anne couldn’t see her face. A little annoyed, Anne reached out and tapped her shoulder.

“Look,” said Anne, “just tell me why you’re mad. I’m tired of all this aggressiveness, or whatever the fuck people call it!”

Catherine whirled around. To Anne’s surprise, her eyes were full of tears.

“ Goddammit, Anne,” she said, her voice breaking as she spoke, “ I was worried about you!

“What?”

“I’ve only known you in this century for a few months, and sometimes I really do hate your little French ass, but the truth is, I don’t know what I’d do without you! You remember what it was like before. Just a little cold could mean death, and I know it’s different now, but I’m still getting used to it, and high fevers like yours...well...” the Spanish queen looked even more uncertain, “what I’m trying to say, Anne, is that I love you. I love you a lot, and I don’t want to lose you.”

Silence filled the room again. Anne stared at Catherine, shocked. She wasn’t sure what she’d expected to hear, but this definitely was not it.

Anne wasn’t sure what she would’ve done next in a difficult circumstance, but it was at that moment that her fever broke. Sweat started pouring out of every inch of her body, and she was relieved to find that her energy was coming back. She even managed to sit up and smirk at the shocked Catherine, who was staring at her, openmouthed.

“Bet you wouldn’t give me that speech now that I’m covered in sweat.” There was pause, an Anne felt her grin fade a little. “Well, I didn’t really mean that, but if it’s true...”

Catherine stopped the sassy queen by pulling her into a tight hug. Anne gasped in surprise, but after a few seconds, she tentatively put her arms around Catherine’s much taller body.

And that was the position Jane Seymour found the two queens in when she got home that afternoon.

#six musical #six the musical fanfic #catherine of aragon #anne boleyn #@the-final-wife #short six fics by theatergirl06

[janeyseymour]

Escape- pt 5

pt 1. pt 2. pt 3. pt 4.

Jane Seymour has stayed with Henry long enough. Cue Catherine of Aragon and the rest of the girls to save her.

Jane and Catherine figure out what they're going to do about Henry.

When Catherine woke up for the first time that day, she heard a soft moan. Slowly walking to Jane’s room, she confirmed the sound belonged to Jane.

“You okay love?”

“No,” a small voice answered. “Please come sit with me.” She quickly opened the door and sat by her side.

Wrapping an arm around the blonde, Catherine spoke, “Do you want to talk about it?” Her question was answered with the shake of the head. “Okay. Just relax. I’ve got you.”

She sat with her until she was sure that Jane was asleep. The hispanic laid her back down before walking back to the couch and glancing at the clock: 3:30 AM it read.

“Oh God. You’ve gotta be kidding me,” she sighed, laying back down and promptly letting the darkness take her away.

When Jane woke up, she knew she had to convince Catherine to leave. Shyly, she walked into the living room praying that her friend wasn’t there. Unfortunately for her, John and Catherine were mid-conversation.

“Good morning Daddy,” she made her presence known. “Good morning Lina.”

“Morning my beautiful daughter,” John got up to greet his daughter and get her some coffee while Catherine opted to nod at her with a crooked smile.

“Lina, we need to talk,” she began to nervously play with the skin where her ring used to sit. She had taken it off the night before and left it on the bedside table before promising herself she would never put it back on again.

“Of course.” The two women silently made their way to the back porch.

As soon as they were out of earshot, Jane blurted out, “You need to go.”

Catherine was stunned and could only stammer, “W-What? Why?”

“You need to leave. I don't know where Henry is, and it’s only a matter of time before he comes here. If he knew you were here too, I’m honestly not sure what would happen. I don’t want to know what would happen. It wouldn’t be good.”

“That’s the issue Janey. You don’t know where he is. You need to go to the police so they can find him before he finds you. I don't really want to know what would happen if he found you.”

“You know I can’t do that. I’ve been with him for so long, and, as crappy as it is, I really don’t want him to go to jail. I still love him.”

“The longer he’s out there, the closer he is to killing you, and the more people he’s going to end up hurting in the process of trying to find you. Do you really want that?”

“Of course I don't want that Catherine,” Jane’s voice went stone cold. “Who do you think I am? A monster?”

“No. But right now, you’re being stupid. You’re risking not just your life, but others’ too. You’re putting other innocent people in harm’s way too! What about your parents?” She raised her voice slightly.

“You know I’m just trying to protect you Lina,” Jane got quiet again.

“And you know I’m trying to protect you,” Catherine sighed heavily. Jane sunk.

“Cat,” her voice broke. “This is hard. It’s so fucking hard.” She choked out a sob.

“I know.” The hispanic engulfed the blonde in a hug. “But if you want it to get easier, I really do think you’re going to have to go to the police.

“Fine,” she whispered. “Let’s get this over with.” She untangled herself from the warm arms that held her and dried her river of tears.

As they headed in, not twenty yards away behind a bush, Henry muttered, “Fucking shit.” He had originally come here to try to apologize to the woman he loved and take her back home, but it wasn’t looking like it was going to be that easy. He ran.

“Daddy?” Jane yelled as she wandered back into the house.

“Dad’s in the shower dear,” Margaret called from the kitchen.

“Oh, okay. Uh, Lina and I will be back a little later.”

“Where are you going? Is it safe for you to go out right now?”

“We’re just going to the police station Mom. It’s going to be fine.”

“If you say so. Please be careful.”

Jane wandered back outside to the front porch and waited for Catherine to make the first move.

“I can drive.” Catherine ran to the car and opened the door, helping her in.

The drive was quick, but the wait for the meeting seemed as though it dragged on forever. The two were in the middle of an intense game of solitaire on Jane’s phone when a short lady in a business suit came out of an office.

“Seymour, let’s go. Why are you here today?” the woman said rather flatly.

“I need to file a report... to report Henry Tudor, my ex.”

“Fill out these forms, and then we’ll need to talk to you if that’s okay. If the case holds up, we’ll take care of it from there.”

Hours later, Jane and Catherine left the station after meeting with Officer Beale and a few others who informed them that the case would be held up and followed through with. He had informed them they were to relocate while they searched for Henry.

“Where am I going to go?” It’s not like I can really afford anything right now!”

“Jane-”

“No! I can’t just-”

“Jane,” she tried again.

“No, let me finish!” She raised her voice at her friend now that they were safe in the car again.

“Just listen real quick. My younger cousin has a house a little ways away from here. We, or you, can go there. It’s safe. She lives with a few other girls, but I’m positive there’s enough space for us.You’re more than welcome to stay there as long as you need. I already spoke to her this morning before you woke up. There’s not much around the house, but it’s somewhere relatively safe and quiet.”

“Will you come with me?” She asked shyly, afraid Catherine would say no.

“You know I will if you want me to.”

After a long discussion about where they would be going, the two women were on their way to their retreat.

“Just let me go to the bathroom, and then we can take off?” Jane looked at her friend for permission.

“You don’t need my permission to go to the bathroom.”

“I just-” Jane’s shoulders sank. “Sometimes it annoyed Henry if we were about to leave. Something about ‘Why didn’t you go before? Now we’re going to be late. Come on Jane.’ Most times he said no. I would just have to hold it until we got to our destination.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about that now. You’re your own person. You don't need permission to relieve yourself.” Jane sped off towards the bathroom.

“Cath, you listen to me,” John said seriously as soon as he knew his daughter couldn’t hear them. “You better take care of her. You hurt her, I destroy you... like I’m going to destroy that shithead Henry.” His tone got angrier as he continued thinking about the man that had broken his daughter.

“Of course sir. You know how I feel.” She shook the older man’s hand.

“Yes I do,” he whispered lightheartedly.

“What?” Margaret seemingly appeared out of nowhere. “What haven’t you told me?” She smacked her husband’s arm.

“Ow woman! Calm down! I’ll tell you when they leave. I’m just trying to have a moment with one of the few people Jane brings around that I don't utterly hate.”

“You’ll find out soon enough Marge. I’m sure of it.” Catherine winked at Margaret.

“Alright, I’m ready!” Jane’s voice rang throughout the house before she appeared at the bottom of the steps.

“Bye Mom.” She hugged Margaret as tightly as she could without feeling any pain in her ribs.

“Stay safe babe.” Margaret shed a single tear before releasing her daughter.

“Bye Daddy. Love you.” She nearly fell into her father’s arms.

“See you later princess. I love you. Be safe.” He jokingly nudged her into Catherine. “Off you two go! We’ll see you lovebirds soon!”

“Dad!” Jane laughed nervously. She missed Catherine’s face flush red before quickly composing herself.

“I’m just joking around babe.” John winked. “Bye now!” He pushed the two out of the door.

Jane and Catherine walked to the car as Catalina started, “Let’s get this show on the road. We’ve got about 5 hours ahead of us. We’ll be lucky if we get there by nine tonight.” She opened the car door for Jane and began to drive.

A little ways down the road, Henry was screaming, “What the fuck? They’re gonna call the cops?” He had been pacing around for the last three hours, unaware that Jane was already out of town and on her way to hiding. He drunkenly grabbed his phone from his pocket.

“Thomas? I need your help. Call me back,” he sneered into the phone and angrily hung up. “Fucking hell. What am I going to-” his phone rang.

“Asshole, why didn’t you answer like thirty seconds ago?”

“I was helping my mom. What do you need?” Thomas asked his friend, clearly annoyed.

“I need to find Jane. She’s with that bitch Catherine Aragon.”

“Jesus Christ. What did you do to that poor sweet girl?” Thomas Culpepper had always known Henry to be a rowdy drunk and wished he could save Jane and have her to himself. Jane Culpepper had a nice ring to it.

“Nothing you fucker. She just left me.”

“Sure.” Thomas didn’t believe his friend. “Come to my house. I’ll be expecting you in five.”

“I’m by her parents’ house. I’ll come tomorrow. I have things to do.” Henry’s mind was racing.

“Bye,” Thomas hung up. Henry ran to the nearest store to gather the things he would need for this journey he was about to go on.

#six the musical #six musical #six the musical fanfic #six the musical fanfiction #six musical fanfic #six fanfiction #six fanfic #aramour

[rumours-spiral]

for five more minutes

part 1- we’re six

note: this is part one of a multi-part series detailing the lives of the queens in their second lives. we’re not really given much information about their reincarnation, or of the ladies in waiting, so my adaptations may differ to yours. i will be updating as regularly as possible. i don’t love this part- it’s mainly just to set the world up, so the chapters should be getting more interesting soon. please feel free to give feedback!

word count: 3373

warnings: there’s a sort of panic attack, but it doesn’t go into much detail. please be safe <3

Catherine of Aragon woke with a gasp.

Her hand flew to her chest, above her heart. It ached faintly.

The room she was in was dark, save for a low-burning candle behind what appeared to be a pillar. She frowned. She didn’t know where she was. She didn’t know how long she had been asleep for. And she didn’t know who the uncovered black mass of hair on the floor (and indeed the head to which it was attached) belonged to. Apprehension flared in her stomach for a moment before she chided herself for being childish, reminding herself of who she was. She cleared her throat.

“Who are you?” The question came out shakier than she had intended, and her voice was gravelly, as though she hadn’t used it in a while. She frowned harder at that, wondering once again how long she had been asleep for.

“Excuse me?” She called out again, and she flinched when the sleeping girl shot up suddenly into a sitting position. Her head snapped towards Catherine, and a beaming smile lit up her face. “My lady!” She breathed, and it was in Spanish, and Catherine had only a minute to consider this response before she was being wrapped in a hug.

“Maria?” She whispered, disbelief colouring her voice. It sounded like Maria, certainly- the accent, the tone, the cadence of her voice. But the woman currently in her arms looked nothing like her. The hair was black and curly where it should have been brunette and straight, and her skin was of a dark brown.

“Yes, yes, my lady, it’s me,” she confirmed as she pulled away from her mistress and stared into her eyes. Catherine stared back and- by God, she found the same gleam of happiness, the same look of adoration. Tears welled in her own eyes and she brought her old friend into a bone crushing hug despite the awkward angle, laughing in something nearing hysteria as she did. “Oh, I’ve missed you, dear Catherine.”

The aforementioned woman’s happiness was dampened at that, and confusion took up its place. She parted from her friend after a moment, and looked down at the raised (was that stone?) platform she was still sitting on. She appeared to be in a chapel. Though it appeared to be dilapidated, the knowledge comforted her slightly.

“Maria, what do you mean?” Maria’s own smile slipped off her face at the question, and a sadness Catherine didn’t like at all welled in her eyes. “Maria? I don’t understand.” She sat up straighter and took the standing girl’s hand. A tear rolled down Maria’s cheek.

“You don’t remember, my lady?” She asked quietly. She sighed at the answer she already knew Catherine would give, and she sat on the same platform as her friend. “You died.”

Catherine stopped breathing at that. And then it all came flooding back too quickly- the weeks of a constant pain in her heart, the friend that sat beside her now rushing into her bedchambers and locking the door. The two days they spent there, and at the end Catherine’s eyes closing for the last time in her arms. Tears she didn’t even know she was crying dripped onto her lap, and she looked up at her lady in waiting again. She opened her mouth to say something, but whatever she was going to say was forgotten immediately at what Maria was wearing. Catherine felt the incredible urge to laugh; Maria was wearing an ill-fitting, black- well, piece of fabric on her torso, and on her legs were trousers.

“What on earth are you wearing?”

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

Anne Boleyn woke silently.

Her lips were still moving in the Lord’s Prayer, but no sound came out, and she opened her eyes in confusion when she noticed what she was doing. And that confusion only grew when she took in her surroundings.

The curtains on the other side of the room were merely folds of fabric, minimalistic in material quality and the strangest shade of purple she had ever seen. They appeared to be thin, doing very little to halt the sunlight streaming in. The bed she was in was minimalistic, also- it had no drapes and no supports that reached several feet in the air. Its sheets were thin and plainly coloured, and the pillows beneath her head and the duvet resting on top of her weren’t stuffed with feathers. There were no wooden beams or stone bricks to be seen anywhere, and the walls were light pink, of all colours! There was no fireplace, no table where one could take their breakfast. Only a long desk made of a material that didn’t seem to be wood, a bookcase filled with odd-looking books, and a black rectangle on the wall. Was that to be some type of painting? And where were the candles? How was one to see at night? She frowned and moved to sit up. And she almost passed out.

A white-hot pain lashed across her neck and her entire torso ached, and she fell back to the bed immediately. Tears gathered in her eyes at the pain, and they flowed at the memory of the day that came rushing back- of the sheer blindfold, the rough wood beneath her cheek. She lied there, paralysed by pain and utter confusion. What was going on? Was this heaven?

It wasn’t God who walked through the door, but a woman with mid-length blonde hair. Anne wanted to scramble back, to move, but couldn’t for risk of blacking out. The woman was wearing the strangest clothes she had ever seen, and her hair was uncovered, and Anne’s confusion and fear was building so heavily that she could hardly breathe. 

The woman paused instantly when she saw Anne staring at her. A small, cautious smile spread across her face, but her eyes lit up in a way that Anne would have recognised if she were more stable. She cleared her throat softly, stepping into the room fully and closing the door behind her. “My lady?” she asked.

Anne didn’t want to speak. She was sure it would hurt her throat even more, and she wasn’t even certain if she was still on Earth. The woman seemed to realise her reluctance, as she approached the bed slowly and stopped a couple metres away from its foot. “I’ve waited days for you to wake, Anne,” the blonde continued. She looked as though she wanted to come so much closer, but she stayed a distance from Anne. She found herself grateful.

“I’m Margaret Lee. Maggie.” Anne’s eyes widened even more at that, recognition flooding her face; a heavy distrust replaced it after a second as she took in ‘Maggie’ again. Maggie had brown hair. She had brown eyes. This wasn’t Maggie.

Where was Maggie? Her friend had been with her there on that scaffold, had listened to her final words. Her eyes flicked about the room as if she would find her hiding somewhere, but she didn’t. The woman who claimed to be her stepped forward even slower than she had approached earlier. “Truly, Anne. I received your prayer book,” she said, and she latched onto the hope that sparked in Anne’s eyes. It had been Anne’s final gift to her. She still looked distrustful, however, and Maggie recalled easily the words she had read every night for the rest of her life. She could even recall Anne’s regal handwriting, how she had dotted her I’s and looped her letters.

“’Remember me when you do pray, that hope doth lead from day to day.’”

Tears sprang into Anne’s eyes again at the words, and she opened her mouth as though to speak. She couldn’t bear to, but Maggie saw her own name mouthed and Anne’s hand twitch toward her, and she ran to her lady’s side. She knelt at next to her, reaching a hand to cover hers.

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

Jane Seymour woke numb.

She hadn’t realised she was awake, honestly.

The last two weeks of her life had been so hazy and painful, each day melting into the next, and ultimately welding into her own private version of hell. In fact, she had only noticed her consciousness because of the absence of pain. That was odd.

Where was Henry? Did he know she was healed? She felt exhausted and still fairly poorly, but it was so much better than before. Perhaps the fever had broken. Her next thought was of her son. Her son! Edward! Oh, did she miss him. She craved him more than she had craved anything else, and that primal need is why she opened her eyes.

The room she was in was… strange.

It was so different to anything she had ever seen. But it didn’t matter. What mattered was her son, and her Henry. And where were her ladies? Her physicians? She hadn’t even any guards, and she didn’t recognise wherever she was. She frowned, ignoring the deep pain that resonated in her stomach as she sat up in the covers. It worsened when she stood from the bed. Upon reflection, she would realise that the haze of the illness was very much still there. She had discarded every sign screaming at her that this was wrong too easily, that this wasn’t her world. That the weakness and grief deep in her bones meant that something was very wrong.

She almost collapsed when she stood on shaky legs, but she had to find Edward. She hadn’t even held him yet- she should like to feed him herself, the wet nurses be damned. The bed had no posts or drapes, so she leaned on a tiny dresser that stood beside it. Henry would be so pleased with her, his only wife to provide an heir! Her vision went black in the corners, and she almost didn’t notice someone enter her chambers. Whatever the person was holding was promptly dropped, as they rushed to Jane, supporting her and lowering her back onto the bed. Jane hadn’t the strength to refuse, and her past mission was forgotten instantly. She lied down passively, but in the illness that had blurred her sight, she recognised the spun gold of the hair (albeit much shorter than it should have been) that belonged to the person. She smiled up at the figure.

Jane reached a hand up to cup her lady’s cheek, and she stopped instantly in her efforts to tuck her back in.

“Joan,” she breathed, before the exhaustion pulled down her eyelids, and she fell back to sleep.

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

Anna of Cleves woke peacefully.

Her eyes drifted open slowly. She took in her surroundings with a mild surprise, but was mostly shocked to still be alive. The sharp pain in her abdomen had grown so painful, and the physicians all said she was to die. She had even written her will- maybe this was the afterlife. If it was, whoever governed it certainly had odd taste in furnishings. Tired of the sublime, she sat up cautiously, weary still of that pain and its dull presence.

“Excuse me?” she called out. She wasn’t sure who she would end up summoning, but the silence bored her already. There wasn’t even a book beside her. Within seconds, a woman with a peculiar complexion ran into the room, wearing even stranger clothes.

Her skin and eyes were of a dark brown, and her hair was the purest black she had ever seen. She was pretty though, and she had an excitement in her eyes that made Anna like her instantly. She gave her a kind smile, next asking her who she was.

“I’m Bessie,” she said simply. “Elizabeth Blount?” Anna’s smile loosened slightly as she cocked her head at the woman. She had opened her mouth to speak, but something glinted in the corner of her eye; upon turning her head, she found that it was a mirror. The clearest, largest mirror she had ever seen. And in the middle of it, sat up in a mess of blankets and pillows, was a woman with an even darker complexion, and black hair that stuck up at all angles.  That wasn’t Anna.

Her mouth was still open, and Bessie let out a snort. “I pulled about the same face when I saw myself,” she said as she walked over to Anna, as if this were a perfectly normal thing. As if they both weren’t completely different to how they should have been. Anna still stared at herself, and raised a hand to touch her face, to see if the woman was truly her. The reflection moved in synch.

“What?” was all she could say in reply. She ripped her gaze away from the mirror to look at the other woman, who had a grin on her face. That was definitely Bessie- a woman of no help at all. Another snort escaped Bessie, ending their impromptu staring competition, and she looked at them both in the mirror.

“To be frank? You died,” she said bluntly, and Anna wasn’t really surprised. She was more anxious to know why she was here, and why she was in the body of a completely different person. She rolled her eyes at Bessie, and at the statement. Bessie mockingly rolled her eyes in retort and turned to look at Anna directly. “Someone brought us all back. A man and a woman- Lucy and Toby.” Anna’s stare sobered at that.

“Back? What do you mean, back? And who is ‘us’?” Panic edged into her voice the longer her sentence grew, and Bessie had to place a hand on her arm to ground her.

“Calm down, Anna,” she said, not unkindly. “Me and three other ladies in waiting- Maria, Maggie, and Joan. We all live together, in this flat.” Anna looked at her as though she were mad, and she almost definitely didn’t know who most of those women were, but Bessie persisted.

“We were brought back a couple years ago. Lucy and Toby help us out, but they don’t live here. And, um,” and now Bessie hesitated. How on earth was she meant to word this?

“They… brought all of Henry’s wives back.”

Anna almost laughed, but the look of complete sincerity on Bessie’s face made her pause. “You- you’re joking, surely?”

A serious look was her only reply.

“Boleyn? Seymour? Parr?” She asked with growing disbelief. “Back?”

The look remained on Bessie’s face, and Anna stared down at her lap. “All of you,” she clarified. “I don’t know how Toby and Lucy did it. I don’t even think they know how they did it. But we’re here.”

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

Katherine Howard woke crying.

She felt the wetness on her cheeks, and wiped it away without much thought in her sleep-drunk mind. She wondered what time it was, mostly. It was odd that a servant hadn’t been in to rouse her- sunlight could be seen even from behind her eyelids, and since it was the dead of winter, it must have been late. Her brow furrowed when she didn’t feel Henry beside her. Had they woken him but left her? It seemed that they had left breakfast for her, however, as she smelt something warm from across the room. She opened her eyes only to see that these were not her apartments. And there was a woman sitting across the small room, hunched over a foreign object with a steaming bowl on her lap.

Katherine moved to stand immediately, upset that she had been so vulnerable before someone who didn’t even look familiar, but a razor-sharp pain left her falling backwards to slam her back into the bed’s headboard. She didn’t see the woman’s head snap up to look at her, too consumed in her agony to even open her eyes. But she flinched violently when she felt a hand on her arm- she didn’t know who was touching her, she didn’t recognise the woman, she didn’t recognise this place-

The hand was retracted immediately, though Katherine’s fear persisted. Her breathing was quickening, and she felt an awful lot as though she were being choked. That scared her even more- was there someone else in the room? Who was touching her? The panic-fuelled adrenaline coursing through her had begun to numb most of the pain she had felt upon moving the first time, and she found the strength to open her eyes. No one was touching her, she discovered, though the closeness of the woman made her inch back on the bed. The brunette watched her tremble with a growing worry, and slid onto her knees on the floor when she realised Katherine’s retreat.

“Hey,” she said softly, although even that made Katherine flinch. “I’m Lucy. You’re safe.”

She wasn’t surprised to see very little change in Katherine at the sentence, knowing even herself that it was stupid. But as no one had taught her how to deal with a 500-year-dead Tudor queen, she decided to cut herself a little slack. She maintained the friendly smile on her face, wondering what the hell she and Toby had done now.

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

Catherine Parr woke with a groan.

Cramps squeezed her lower abdomen and she twisted in the bed slightly. She was so cold. Why was she cold? Wouldn’t the cold be bad for Mary?

The sound of someone moving in the room made her eyes open minutely. It was a man- probably her physician. She tried to look closer, but the light gave her a headache, and she didn’t really understand what he was doing, anyway. He appeared to be putting something in- a wall? Surely that wasn’t right. But she wanted Mary more than she cared for what he was doing, honestly. She cleared her throat softly in preparation to speak, and the man’s head whipped towards her.

“Where’s Mary?” Her throat hurt, and the complete dryness of her mouth told her she needed water, but Mary was more important. She had only seen her daughter a couple times, and she was feeling much better now. The man continued to look at her and a look of pity she did not like at all replaced the original disbelief that had been there. He set down whatever he had been doing and sat on the chair that was a couple feet away from her bed. Odd. This wasn’t her room. Had they moved her to a nursery?

The man avoided her question, asking one of his own. “How do you feel? Would you like me to get you anything?” Catherine frowned at that.

“Only something to drink. But where’s Mary?”

The look on his face deepened, but he only twisted round in his seat to reach for something. He passed her a very strange container. It looked like glass, but contorted and made a rather obnoxious sound when she squeezed it. It held water, but she wasn’t thrilled to drink out of it. She looked up at the man questioningly.

“It’s, um- it’s a water bottle,” he outstretched his hand and took the bottle from her hand slowly. He untwisted its cap and gave it back, watching Catherine take a cautious sip. Knowing she wouldn’t get an answer to her original question, she thought of another while she drank.

“Where am I?” She asked instead. This question made the man pause, but not in the way her inquiries of her daughter did.

“You’re in the 21st century, Catherine.”

She stared at him. He blinked back.

She was about to argue with him, to be angry, before she realised the rest of her surroundings. Nothing looked like it should. Not the walls, not the windows, not the floor, the bed, the chairs, the books, the door- not even the clothes he was wearing looked normal. And all the physicians had said death was unavoidable, that she had grown too sick. It made too much sense, but it made absolutely none at all at the same time.

 “What?” The question felt childish, but she didn’t really care. His look of pity somehow intensified and she had to take a deep breath to keep from getting angry at it. She didn’t want pity, she wanted answers. “Who are you?” She asked next. He seemed relieved at this question.

“I’m Toby Marlow.”

#six the musical fanfic #anne boleyn #catherine of aragon #catherine parr #katherine howard #jane seymour #anna of cleves #fanfic #for five more minutes #six the musical

[the-quiet-winds]

Take My Whole Life Too

“If you don’t hug me right now, I think I might fall apart.”

Jane just stares blankly ahead.

“Mama, please,” Katherine whimpers.

Still, nothing. Like Jane isn’t even there. 

Probably, Katherine would later realize, because she had just been woken up.

But in the heat of the moment, Katherine just sees the tears welling in her eyes and the vacantness in Jane’s face.

So, instead of initiating the hug she so desperately needs, Katherine jumps off the bed and sprints out of the bedroom, down the stairs, and out the front door.

It’s the slamming of the door that snaps Jane out of her sleep-haze, the last remnants of the dreams lingering in her subconscious clearing to nothing. 

And in that exact moment, Jane realizes how she majorly she messed up. She thrashes the covers off and shoves her feet into her boots, grabs a jacket, and heads downstairs. 

She steals a heavy blanket off the couch, knowing Katherine wouldn’t have taken anything to keep warm when she ran off, and leaves the house.

Under the heavy warmth of the streetlights, Jane stands on the sidewalk, squinting into the distance for any sign of her daughter. Her baby girl, who Jane was too sleep-deprived to comfort when she needed it most.

She sees nothing but more streetlights painting the snow-covered world orange. She looks left, right, left, right, then, on an impulse, walks left. 

The world is dead around her. Unmoving, the only sound the snow beneath her boots. It’s eerie, and it scares Jane far more than she’d ever admit. 

Just because she didn’t see anyone around, didn’t mean there wasn’t anyone around. And if someone had found Katherine first-

Jane scolds herself for such thoughts and searches with twice the intensity for any sign of life. Even the slightest movement or flash of light could help her. Katherine couldn’t have gotten far - she barely had a thirty second headstart on Jane and probably couldn’t run fast without proper shoes, since it wouldn’t be surprising if, during her frantic and likely nightmare-induced fleeing, she forgot to cover her feet.

By the edge of the park pond, she sees something. 

Without even thinking twice, she is sprinting to the pond, softly calling Katherine’s name.

But there is no Katherine after all, just a very confused duck.

It quacks at her furiously for disrupting its nap, ruffling its feathers as it screams in a language Jane doesn’t understand.

With a sigh, orange-tinted breath curling in front of her eyes, Jane turns back towards the sidewalk. Again, she stands, looking both ways up and down the boulevard, tears of desperacity festering in her eyes as she searches desperately for her daughter. 

Just as she is turning to head back towards home, she spots, far off on the other side of the pond, a body.

Oh, God.

Jane is sprinting again after that, nearly tripping over that still very angry duck, around the edge of the pond to where, as she nearly screams upon seeing, is Katherine. She’s shivering, half-lidded eyes staring listlessly at the frozen pond, broken mumbles falling from cracked, bluish lips. 

Jane pulls Katherine into her lap, wrapping the heavy blanket around her, lightly patting at her cheeks to get her to come to. “Come on, Kitty-Kat,” she pleads softly, “talk to me, love.”

After a few moments of fruitless attempts, Jane realizes what she must do. Securely wrapping Katherine in the blanket, she lifts her up in her arms, ignoring how they shake under the weight. Katherine isn’t heavy at all, but her height combined with the fact Jane isn’t exactly used to this forms a challenge.

As Jane starts to make her way back, she feels Katherine’s head roll to rest against her chest, lips still moving to mumble words into her coat. “Leave me alone,” reaches Jane’s ears, “‘I’m innocent,” and, perhaps the most heartbreaking, “mama, don’t leave.”

“I’m here now,” Jane promises, although Katheirne can’t hear her and nothing can repair what she had already done. “I’m never leaving you.”

Despite being somewhere between awake and not, Jane swears she can feel Katherine latch to those words and lean more into her.

The trek back to the house is long and hard, but Jane makes it as smooth and swift as she can, hoping to get Katherine back in a warm bed, in her mother’s arms, as quick as possible.

Once she makes it back to the house, she’s honestly surprised to see the living room and kitchen empty. She was sure at least one of them would have woken up to the sound of pounding footsteps and slamming doors from earlier. 

Maybe they’ll just have to talk about it in the morning.

For now, Jane manages to wiggle her feet out of her boots and carry Katherine up the stairs and right into Jane’s own room, not even unwrapping her from the blanket until she could be warmly found in Jane’s comforter. Once she is, Jane strips off her coat and falls beside her.

The sudden weight brings Katherine more back to the present.

“M-mama?” She stammers out of chattering teeth.

“I’m here, love,” Jane promises, pulling the covers tighter around them both before opening her arms.

Katherine, despite the nag at the back of her mind about the events of earlier, lunges to cling to Jane’s waist. Jane gladly accepts.

“Sleep now,” she murmurs into Katherine’s hair, placing a kiss there, “mama’s got you. You’re safe now.”

Those words, spoken so warmly and softly, are enough to lull Katherine into a slightly-fitful sleep.

Jane, on the other hand, knows there will be conversations to be had come morning. Between her not fully waking up and Katherine running off, they will both have apologies to give.

But for now, Jane has her baby girl safe in her arms, back where her daughter always belongs.

And that, she decides, is enough.

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

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#six the musical #jane seymour #katherine howard #julie writes #take my whole life too

[elizabeth-234]

The Supplejack

Previous Chapter Eleven: Welcome to Oscorp

Hi all! I'm sorry this is so long coming! Thank you to everyone who has read or commented! I appreciate it so much.

Chapter Twelve: The End

His legs rested between the metal banisters of the fire escape and dangled off uninhibited into the air. Peter pressed the crown of his head between the bars so the two twisted rods squeezed the sides of his head. He focused on the sensation, the cold soothed his headache while the pressure dulled everything to the two points on his temples. The burning in the back of his throat weakened and his eyes, weighed down by tears he gave up trying to stop, were free to fall onto his lap.  

How had it all come to this?

His voice had been so broken and distanced, but now through the haze of memory it was clear as a chime and full of disappointment.

The air swept up the alley causing goosebumps to rise on his exposed skin. The sky darkened and the stars were exposed but Peter was too lost in himself. He couldn’t see how the lights shined down on the Earth, lighting the city and making it more beautiful. He couldn’t see anything with his sight blurred by his tears.

He wished he was up there. Maybe if he was a part of the stars everything in his life would seem small and insignificant. Next to those burning gases he could stop being Peter. Even if he was alone like he deserved, he could belong somewhere at last.

The window squeaked and May climbed through the opening. He could hear her mumbling about sore joints and catching colds but the complaints didn’t stop her from sitting down next to him, cross-legged instead of sitting with her legs through the slots. She bumped shoulders with him when he offered no greeting.

“Do you want to tell me why you came running in the apartment without giving me a hug and slamming your door?” She said with a small laugh.

Peter looked at his knees until her hand came under his chin and guided his head up. Her eyes widened at the sight of him. She wiped her thumbs under his eyes, then brushed his hair back.  

“Oh, Sweetheart. I’m only joking. What happened?”

Peter whimpered and wrapped his arms around May. Like always her own arms reciprocated, firm and strong. She rubbed her hand down his back while whispering words of comfort. She held him until he couldn’t cry anymore though his heart was left aching from the battles of the day and the absences that were just beginning to form.

“I lost it, May. I lost him.”

Her hand stopped for a moment but she pulled him closer to her hugging him with everything she had.

“It will be okay,” she said.

Peter inhaled the vanilla and reminders of his childhood from her hair as they sat on the fire escape ignoring the wind and stars, but even wrapped up in May’s arms he wasn’t sure anything would be okay again.

-

Earlier

He braced his head between his knees and stared at the tips of Julia’s oxfords. Flash was pacing while the others watched.

“What the hell was that?” Flash said. “What in the actual hell was that.”

“What happened?” Frank said sitting beside Peter with a hand on his shoulder. The other group had found them dazed and escorted by Mr. Osborn. His words offered congratulations to their group and farewell but his curled smile spoke differently.

Monica and Estee said a quick goodbye after exchanging numbers and they all walked out of the building in quick strides. No one talked until they were outside and once there, Flash exploded with a barrage of curses. Frank couldn’t stop asking questions while Monica was on the phone with someone, her parents he thought, but her shrill tone wasn’t helping anyone calm down.

The nausea wasn’t going away and Peter kept his head down. Cement, people, and buildings surrounded him but Peter was floating with no tether to the earth. Not even his breathing or the sounds of his group was keeping him there. He couldn’t stop thinking about and suspended in the memories of the blood dripping onto the white lab floors or the cries of the rabbit. Its small paws tensing and scrambling to get away from the robotic arms restraining it.

Julia stood in front of him, guarding him like before and handed him her water bottle.

“Thank you,” He said, voice cracking.

“Peter, I know Seymour was weird when we were… well, friends, I guess, but this was something else. Did you see how he smiled?”

“Smiled at what?” Frank said.

“And that was your final entry? I mean, Jesus, that was smart but why did they have it?” Flash said ignoring Frank who had turned away from Peter and was looking at Flash for more answers since he was the most vocal out of their group.

“Stop, Flash. Can’t you see he’s not feeling good.” Julia said not turning from her spot.

“I don’t think any of us are. I feel sick now like a ate a bad Subway tuna footlong.”

He continued his pacing and Peter waited for the churning feeling to pass. Julia handed him the water again before moving to sit beside him and he sipped on it trying not to listen to Frank and Flash argue about what happened.

She placed a hand on his shoulder. Her fingers were small but the light pressure seeped into his coat and he was back on solid ground again.  

“Peter?” she said softly. “How did he get The Weaver formulation?”

Peter shook his head.

“Does… Well, does Mr. Stark know?” He winced, “You’ve been working with him, right?”

He turned to look at her and noticed the pallor of her skin and the way her hand not resting on his back was fisted on her lap.

“I don’t know.” He said.

“I’m sure he doesn’t” She added, “But that just adds the question of how he stole it.”

He looked toward the Oscorp building. The black panes of glass casted a shadow over them still.

Peter shivered and Julia moved her arm with caution around his shoulder and pulled him closer to her. He continued staring up at Oscorp but rested his head against her shoulder. His neck stiffened and Peter tried not to put too much weight on her.

Flash stepped forward so he was in front of them and they both turned to look at him.

“Look man I’m sorry, but we need to report this or something.”

The nausea threatened to rise up again but Peter swallowed it down. He didn’t think anyone would believe them and if they did, nothing could happen. It was five high school students against a wealthy man who had connections all throughout the city. Asking his groupmates to get involved would get them in trouble. Peter could figure it out on his own.

“I can talk to Mr. Stark. I have a meeting with him already today.”

Flash looked ready to go on another rampage but a look from Julia silenced him. More questions circled around but when no answers were reached, one by one the group disbanded. Monica was the first to leave, not hanging up on the phone as she waved goodbye. Her brows furrowed as she looked at the four of them.

Frank was next as he had practice. He insisted they all text him when they got home. Flash, after more words on the subject, promised to text Julia and slipped away with a glance at Peter.

Julia sat next to him, worrying the strap of her backpack back and forth.

“Are you okay?” He knew she must blame him for everything. It was his idea to go and Seymour targeted him as well. Julia smiled and asked him the same question back, pressing the water bottle into his hands.  

“Are you okay, Peter?”  

A million thoughts raged out of control in his mind and he shook his head.

“I don’t even care they have it, but what are they going to do with it?”

Julia screwed the cap on and weighed her words before voicing her thoughts.

“We need to fight this. There has to be some way…”


“No,” Peter said without waiting and Julia sighed. “I just don’t want to cause a fuss.”

“It’s yours Peter. You’re not making a fuss and what if they are hurting more animals?”


He was the one who sighed this time.

“You’re right but I’m scared. I was scared in that room and you stepped in front of Seymour and yelled at him while I did nothing. It was so badass.” He smiled with closed lips at her.

“It will be okay, Peter. We’ll figure out what to do. We’re a team after all.”

Peter nodded but after they parted as he walked to his next destination, the remnants warm feeling of Julia’s fingers around his, he couldn’t stop the cold pit in his stomach from seeding and he wondered, not for the first time that day if he should have just stayed at home and slept.

-

He exited the elevator on weak knees. The journey from Oscorp to Stark Tower hadn’t been the calming walk he needed. Instead, the consequences of their outing and all sorts of different scenarios kept creeping over him. The next one progressively getting worse.

There was a voicemail from May and texts in the group chat kept chiming so he flipped his phone shut and turned it off.

Friday was quiet today only offering a small hello as he walked down the hall. He didn’t have the energy to talk so he was grateful for their silence.The hallway was empty as well and for a moment Peter thought there was time to turn around and go home. He could call and cancel the meeting with Mr. Stark.

Peter turned down the hall and stopped short. Blood dripped down the window and Peter reared back. He blinked and it was gone with nothing but silver and white walls. Peter backed to the other side of the hallway and waited until his breaths evened out, not looking away from the spot on the wall.

We have an understanding with Stark Industries.

Mr. Osborn’s voice coiled itself around Peter’s thoughts, slick with oil and venom.

Was it true?

His stomach churned as the doors to lab two slid open. He peered in from the hallway but the room was empty again. Like every other day Peter walked into the lab but unlike those days he kept his coat and backpack on. The room settled as he sat down. It was quiet, too quiet.

He laid his head on top of his crossed arms on the table and scrunched his eyes shut. His work stayed in the drawers of the desk and documents in the computer. The images Oscorp hung just behind the lids and the rabbit’s cries echoed behind Mr. Osborn’s words like a warped movie soundtrack.

He squeezed his eyes tighter until black spots burned through the memories.

It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be.

After months of working with Mr. Stark he had to believe it wasn’t true. There was no way Mr. Stark knew Oscorp had his project. The worked together every week! The man knew his favorite Thai order and Peter had begun to open up to him. He had begun to share himself in a way he almost never did.

What would he do if Mr. Stark gave The Weaver to someone like Norman Osborn?

Peter heard the footsteps before he saw him and sat up.

The doors automatically opened and Mr. Stark burst into the room. His normal, cocky smile was gone and was replaced with tight, pale lips. His cheeks were flushed and topped with a grimace that deepened when he saw Peter.

Peter’s heart pulsed and he pushed himself to the back of his chair. The footsteps echoed in the otherwise silent room and Mr. Stark marched toward Peter.

“What were you thinking?” He said with eyes narrowed on Peter.

Peter stood up to get out of the way, the chair clattering behind him.

“Mr.- Mr. Stark?” He said.

“What the fuck where you thinking?”

His was so loud and unlike anything Peter had ever heard come from him that when the man continued forward, Peter backed away. Mr. Stark didn’t stop until he stood in front of him, chest heaving. Peter felt small standing against the wall, like he was three years old again being chastised for something by May or Ben.

This was worse. He wasn’t three years old and he didn’t know what he did wrong.

“Do you know who I just got off the phone with? Do you?”

Peter shook his head and flushed. Mr. Stark was already talking before he could open his mouth to explain.

“Norman fucking Osborn and do you know what he had to say? No, don’t even answer that. He said you and your little friends were there at Oscorp. He said you were getting a tour and that you were interested in the place. You even knew someone who worked there.”

Peter flinched back and the blood drained from his face. It sounded like he was the one betraying Mr. Stark, that he was looking at Oscorp for fun. 


“No…No, Mr. Stark it-it wasn’t like that. I swear.”


“It could have been anyone but Oscorp…” Peter shivered at the tone in his voice.

Mr. Stark saw his movement and grimaced again, turning away and pacing until he stopped at the desk. Peter watched as he bent over, hands braced on either side of him. His back rose and fell in rapid bursts.

Peter’s mind spun. Mr. Stark was yelling. He was blaming Peter.

He remembered the first night he stayed after one of their lab days. They ate pizza together and Mr. Stark insisted on taking him home until Peter declined and went on his way belly full. He remembered walking home and wondering why this legend, why Tony Stark had invited him to stay. He wondered why Mr. Stark was even investing an interest in him at all.

He froze at that particular thought and a filter lifted from his eyes. Peter began to inspect their interactions from the moment they met. How there always seemed to be so many questions and how Seymour and Oscorp got ahold of The Weaver.

He was just an investment.  

The special meeting where Mr. Stark already knew everything about him, working together on their side project, and all the dinners and movies. Every single interaction was just to get close to Peter; to use him.

It was like Sam Carlson over again and waking up in the hospital to find May gone, to find any hope faded and realize it was fake to begin with.

Peter swallowed and stepped forward. He kept his voice low and beseeched the anguish in his chest, the itching in the back of his throat, silent.

“What do you want from me?”

Mr. Stark’s back stiffened and he turned around with fists clenched at his side. Hard eyes stared at him and Peter stared back, steeling his resolve and readying to hear the bad news.

“They know what they are doing. You shouldn’t mess around there. It’s dangerous.” He said and Peter continued staring, waiting for the rest.

Mr. Stark ran a hand through his hair and instead of looking strong, his back hunched under an invisible weight. Peter thought he saw a flicker of darkness in his eyes but it was gone before he could focus on it.

“I can’t work on the project anymore, Peter.” He said in the end. It was the use of his name and not his nickname, kid, which he’d grown to love that took his breath away. Peter’s heart stopped and he took another step back, his head shaking back in forth slowly.

So, it was true.

He should have known from the beginning working with Mr. Stark was too good to be true. He had let his hopes get away from him and now it was too late.

Mr. Stark turned away and Peter couldn’t help the sniffle that escaped him.

A small part of him urged him to explain and tell Mr. Stark what happened, but the larger part, the self that was bleeding and wounded wouldn’t let him. It wouldn’t matter either way. Mr. Stark had made his choice and he was just Peter. He couldn’t do anything about it.

If there was anything he was good at it was leaving when someone didn’t want him. He walked around Mr. Stark, hoping the man would stop him but he made it free to the door.

Peter stopped on the brink of the hallway and turned his head back making out the edge Mr. Stark’s head, facing the window out.

“Thank you, Mr. Stark.” He said and walked out of the lab, running down the stairs, out of the building and Mr. Stark’s life.

*hides away* I'm so sorry.

Thank you for reading!

Taglist: @demi-starzak @whatisthou @warmwithafewfrostymoments

Next Chapter Thirteen: A New Normal

#my writing #the supplejack #peter parker #shy peter parker #irondad #spiderson #fanfiction #marvel fanfiction #peter parker fanfiction #ao3 #angsty fanfiction #eliza writes #tony stark

[the-botanist-and-the-borrower]

To be fair, Seymour hadn’t wanted to ride the bicycle all the way uptown. The thing was rickety, practically a tetanus shot in the making, not to mention, the back tire had a flat. The handlebars were rusted beyond recognition, and that was before he took into consideration that the thing had no seat on it, and he’d have to carry… how many flowers again?

Three orders for bouquets, along with a rather hefty pot of begonias.

Great.

Maybe if he’d slept in a little later, Mushnik wouldn’t have bullied him into doing it by holding his job over his head, but… 

Well, he’d gotten up, nice and early, ready to face the day and--

--been tossed onto a deathtrap with wheels. 

Doesn’t matter.

True, he’d dropped a few of the stray buds here and there, and true, he hadn’t ridden a bicycle since he was… nine, but with a pot balanced between the handlebars and a few bouquets tucked neatly under his arms, he’d pedaled his way uptown, only stopping to retrieve a few of the stray blossoms he’d unwittingly dropped along the way.

And by a few, well… the bouquets had definitely suffered a bit of collateral damage in the form of lost petals and scuff marks, which had earned him quite the stern talking to from Mushnik, not to mention, a reduction in price for those who’d ordered them. 

Which had come out of his paycheck.

It’s fine, really.

Sighing heavily and scrubbing a hand over his face, Seymour was more than ready to spend the rest of the day in the basement, tending to his own little jungle. 

Did I water this morning?

Frowning and adjusting his glasses, the botanist squinted suspiciously at the nearest plant: a little fern. 

Maybe…

The dirt did look damp, a little darker than normal, which was interesting. 

Huh.

Well, he was forgetting things all the time, so he must’ve slipped it a bit of a drink earlier. Which probably meant he’d watered the others, right?

One more worry off the list.

Sighing and sitting on the edge of his weatherbeaten mattress, Seymour let his eyes slide closed for a moment. The day had been a disaster. His hands were caked in grit, not to mention, a little bloodied from falling off the bicycle.

“Should probably take care of that.” He remarked to the air, as he found himself doing more and more often. Somewhere he’d read it had something to do with being lonely, which was… probably true. 

Pushing those thoughts away, the young man leaned to reach his bedside table, snatching a battered first aid kit from the mess of his belongings and setting to work. 

Just a simple disinfectant and a few bandages were all he needed, really. It’d take awhile, sure, but as Seymour settled down to patch himself up, he knew he’d be fine. 

Wasn’t like he had anything else to do.

#lsoh #little shop of horrors #seymour krelborn #audrey fulquard #story #little ship

[missingpersonscasesnetwork]

The Cedu School 3 | California Missing Children From Cedu Boarding Schoo...

Another possible Serial Killer I have uncovered doing the #StateByState there is no way this is a coincidence. All Missing from Running Springs, CA.

I have taken the liberty to coin these 3, "The Cedu 3"

California Case #15

#1 Daniel Ted Yuen, 16 #DanielYuen

Daniel was reported missing in Running Springs, California on February 8, 2004. He left his school in the vicinity of the 3400 block of Seymour Road at 10:45 a.m., saying he was going to buy a pack of cigarettes, and never returned. He took no belongings or identification with him when he left.

Daniel is originally from Edison, New Jersey. His parents sent him to the Cedu School, a therapeutic boarding school for troubled youths, ten days before he disappeared. They decided to do so after he stopped going to his home high school in his sophomore year in December 2003, following a breakup with his girlfriend. His parents took him to multiple psychiatrists, who thought he suffered from depression. One of them recommended the Cedu School.

Daniel told his parents that he was unhappy at the Cedu School and afraid of the other students, and that he planned to run away. He has a history of running away from his home in New Jersey.

The Cedu School had a private investigator, Keith Raymond, search for Daniel; Raymond had experience finding Cedu students, who frequently ran away. There were possible sightings of Daniel in the Hilltop Community Park in San Diego, California a month after his disappearance; witnesses reported he was panhandling there. Raymond brought scent dogs to the park, and the dogs indicated Daniel's scent was present there, but a search of the area turned up no sign of him.

The Cedu School declared bankruptcy and closed all of its seven campuses in the spring of 2005; its financial insolvency came about in part because of lawsuits filed against them by families unhappy with the way their children were treated at the school. While many people have praised the school for providing valuable help to troubled children, there have also been allegations that Cedu students were abused. Daniel's family was one of those that filed a lawsuit.

Curiously, Daniel is not the only Cedu student to have vanished without a trace; Blake Pursley disappeared from the Cedu campus in 1994 and John Inman in 1993. Neither of the boys has been found.

In December 2018, Raymond got a voicemail from an unknown person who spoke about Daniel. The caller said, "Daniel Yuen is fine, Daniel Yuen is still in the same area where you originally searched. He doesn't want to be found, he doesn't want you or his parents looking for him." Raymond then went back to San Diego, to the same park he'd searched before, and showed an age-progression picture of Daniel to employees at the park office. One employee thought she recognized Daniel.

The park employee stated Daniel had been in the park the same day Raymond arrived, and that he had a Caucasian woman and a baby girl with him. When the employee spoke to the man and asked what neighborhood he lived in, he acted nervous and left with the baby. Raymond spoke to more witnesses in the vicinity who recognized the couple and baby described by the park employee.

Daniel's parents have emphasized their son is not in any trouble with them or with the police, and that they only want to verify his well-being. His sister, who was twelve when he disappeared, is also eager for answers in Daniel's case. His disappearance remains unsolved.

#2 Blake Wade Pursley, 13

Blake was living at a special needs boarding school, the Cedu School, in Running Springs, California at the time of his disappearance. He had been enrolled in the school only since June 1, and had told his mother he was homesick and wanted to leave.

He was last seen at 8:00 p.m. on June 26, 1994 as he walked to a barn on the property to check on the animals. A staff member saw a light go on in the barn shortly afterwards. Blake did not return to his dormitory by the 10:00 p.m. curfew and and has not been seen again. Searchers tracked him to a nearby highway, but no further.

There were numerous reported sightings of Blake in California and Utah in 1994 and 1995, but none of them have been confirmed. He is from Flagler, Colorado and may be somewhere in that state.

Many agencies classify Blake's disappearance as a runaway. The school officials believe he ran away, but his family thinks he may have been abducted or lured from the school grounds.

Curiously, Blake is not the only student to have disappeared from the Cedu School and never been found; John Inman disappeared from the school in 1993 and Daniel Yuen in 2004. The Cedu School filed for bankruptcy and closed in 2005.

No suspects have been identified in Blake's disappearance and his case remains unsolved.

#3 John Inman, 17

John was last seen in Running Springs, California on January 16, 1993. Authorities believe he left of his own accord. He may be in Los Angeles, California.

John was a student at the Cedu School, a therapeutic boarding school for troubled teens, in 1993. Curiously, he isn't the only Cedu student to have disappeared; Blake Pursley went missing from there in 1994 and Daniel Yuen ran away from the Cedu campus in 2004. The Cedu School filed for bankruptcy and closed in 2005. John's disappearance remains unsolved.

#Missing #Missing Persons #MPCN #Missing Persons cases Network #The Cedu School #The Cedu three #SerialMolester

[futurelivinginspiration]

Where Tiny Houses and Big Dreams Grow

A tech entrepreneur and his friends make a weekend community in the woods.

BARRYVILLE, N.Y. — Five years ago, Zach Klein, a successful tech entrepreneur then in his late 20s, was living in New York City but dreaming of the wilderness. A former Eagle scout, partner atCollegeHumor, and founder of Vimeo, the elegant online video platform, he was in between ventures, teaching entrepreneurship at the School of Visual Arts and spinning cycles, as he put it, while looking for land to buy — a lot of land — upon which he hoped to spend time building things and reconnecting to the scouting skills of his childhood.

Most urgently, he hoped he could persuade his friends to come along for the ride.

Mr. Klein got lucky in Sullivan County, N.Y., where he found 50 acres of forest with an understory of ferns and mossy boulders, lightly accessorized with a rough-hewed, one-room shack free from plumbing and electricity and a separate sleeping porch perched on a steep hill overlooking a rushing stream called Beaver Brook.

The property belonged to Scott Newkirk, a New York designer, and much of its appeal lay in Mr. Newkirk’s aesthetic: His shack and porch were lovely enough to have been featured in New York magazine. After 10 years there, Mr. Newkirk was ready to move on, and for about $280,000, Mr. Klein had found his utopia.

Beaver Brook, as he named it, inhabits a nexus of themes: a millennial’s version of the Adirondack camps of the robber barons, the back-to-the-land movements and intentional communities of the 1950s and ’60s, and a combination folk school/artists’ residency.

While hedge funders tend to express themselves in ever-bigger shingled simulacrums of early 20th century waterfront estates, those in the tech world who’ve enjoyed similar success may be more interested in experience, community and relationships, as Lane Becker, a founder of digital start-ups and the author of “Get Lucky,” a tech business primer on serendipity, pointed out.

“To the extent they want to spend their money, it’s on stuff like that,” he said. Mr. Becker and his wife, Courtney Skott, a furniture maker, were in Denver last weekend for a wedding, staying with a couple — a start-up entrepreneur and a television producer — who had rehabbed a Masonic Lodge. “They Airbnb some of the rooms out,” Mr. Becker said, “less because they need the money but because they’d like to get know different people. That’s sort of the model of what Zach’s doing. Some might see a sort of hipster-twee affectation, but I think there’s a more genuine impulse at work.”

Mr. Klein’s inspirations are familiar: the writings of Stewart Brand, the ’60s era eco guru and editor of the Whole Earth Catalogue; and John Seymour, the author of “The Self-Sufficient Life and How to Live it, ” along with the architectural ideals of Christopher Alexander. Other touchstones included a maple sugar shanty he once visited as a child, a community of Hobbitlike tiny houses called Trout Gulch built by some tech friends in Santa Cruz, Calif., and a yurt village built by a family in the Adirondacks.

But his pitch was pretty simple, said Courtney Klein, a digital strategist and entrepreneur, who married Mr. Klein at Beaver Brook in 2012. “It was, ‘Let’s get a piece of land and we could bring all our friends together and have a good time.’ ”

And so it began. In August 2010, the couple hosted a weekend of “bonfires, contemplation and wood chopping,” among other activities. They cooked stew in the shack, now called Scott’s Cabin, for Mr. Newkirk, and which Mr. Newkirk had outfitted with a propane stove, and washed up by hauling five-gallon containers from the brook.

Some guests bunked in the shack and sleeping porch; others pitched tents among the ferns. The experience was the model for what would be a kind of weekend commune, an experiment in episodic off-the-grid-living with a core of eight friends that has grown to about 20, including five children (Nell Klein arrived just over a year ago. )

There was Brian Jacobs, a sound designer and composer and Mr. Klein’s former roommate in New York City. He had been a junior Maine guide and his proficiency with an ax served the group well. There was Jace Cooke, a founder of the tech start-up Giphy, and other young creatives — animators, app designers, musicians and filmmakers.

Mr. Jacobs brought Grace Kapin, who worked in fashion, one weekend; having survived that, they are now married and building a cabin there. Before long, everyone became handy with chain saws and other power tools; they brought in more experienced builders to oversee large projects and teach the group carpentry skills.

There were rookie mistakes. An early project, a barrel-shaped tub, floated away one spring when the snow melted and the brook rose. Composting drew bears. (Ms. Kapin named their ursine visitors: Alan Ginzbear, Stephen Colbear, Marion Beary.)

The group made art on their camping weekends, including a winsomeshort film about building a stool from an oak tree, and took enticing photographs that looked like they had been art-directed by the editors of Kinfolk magazine. Since 2009, Mr. Klein had been collecting images of sheds, shacks, cabins and huts into a Tumblr blog he called, cunningly, Cabin Porn, and he also posted Beaver Brook’s embellishments, captured in those photographs, there.

When the blog, an enchanting rabbit hole of tiny handmade houses, quickly went viral, his private utopia became public record, and book publishers came courting, seeing in Cabin Porn the architectural equivalent of Brandon Stanton’s Humans of New York. The result, “Cabin Porn: Inspiration for Your Quiet Place Somewhere,” is out this week from Little, Brown.

Three years ago, Mr. Klein began inviting artisans like Tom Bonamici, a product designer with an expertise in woodworking and timber framing, to hold annual weeklong workshops at Beaver Brook for paying students to learn building skills. Mr. Klein, whose latest endeavor is DIY, an online “maker” site for children, is keenly interested in turning Beaver Brook into both a folk school and an artists’ residency.

After his first workshop, and at Mr. Klein’s urging, Mr. Bonamici, a gentle Oregonian with a passion for traditional Japanese timber framing, became a Beaver Brook resident.

Like all utopias, this one changed as it grew. It was three years ago that the Bunkhouse was built, on a piece of land across the brook with road frontage, electricity and a well. Camping in Scott’s Cabin or in tents strewn about the hill had lost its luster, Mr. Klein said, “People got slower and slower about volunteering to do the dishes on cold nights.” And without power, Beaver Brook’s season was contained to the warmer months.

Yet there is some nostalgia for the time “before,” when there was no cellphone coverage, Wi-Fi or hot water. This year’s Beaver Brook workshop project was timber framing, the foundation for an outdoor kitchen the residents hope will bring some of the action back to the Arcadian side of the brook. Six students paid $500 for Mr. Bonamici’s tutelage; the fee covered a week’s worth of chef-cooked meals and groceries (Mr. Klein and Ms. Klein paid for materials and Mr. Bonamici’s stipend).

On the last night of the workshop, students and residents ate by candlelight among the sturdy framework they’d built. “It was like old times,” Mr. Klein said.

The Bunkhouse, Mr. Klein said, was also bait for a plan he was hatching to draw Ms. Klein, Mr. Jacobs and Ms. Kapin into full-time residency at Beaver Brook. The four discussed buying a local market, perhaps putting a bar in its basement until Ms. Klein put the kibosh on the plan.

While Beaver Brook, she said, “did snowball pretty quickly from something that had more meaning than a weekend house,” it was not her life plan to settle permanently in rural Sullivan County.

“Courtney was the voice of reason,” Ms. Kapin said.

The Kleins have since moved to San Francisco, where DIY is based. Ms. Klein and Ms. Kapin, who still lives in Brooklyn, are partners inStorq, a line of maternity clothes that Ms. Klein founded.

Mr. Klein and Ms. Klein are Beaver Brook’s owners, and they pay taxes and insurance on the properties. Beaver Brook residents are divided by their dues into two categories: Bunkers pay $150 a month for a guaranteed bed in the Bunkhouse. Campers pay $75 a month for a spot across the brook.

Bedrooms at the Bunkhouse, an airy open-plan house designed around the frame of a 19th-century barn, are first come first served. It’s the most practical system, Mr. Klein said.

Last year, 100 people, give or take, spent at least one night in the house. Over Labor Day, he and Ms. Klein and Nell were sleeping in a first-floor bedroom that has been outfitted with a crib, one of three separate bedrooms.

Most of the sleeping options are communal: In an open loft space upstairs, there are two double beds; the Bunkroom, which is also upstairs, has eight futons on its wide-planked yellow pine floor. It’s Mr. Klein’s favorite place to sleep. “I love being up here with eight snoring buddies,” he said.

As for projects, there is one simple rule, Mr. Klein said: “As long as the thing you want to do doesn’t cause irreversible change, just go for it.” Idan Cohen, an amateur chef, organized the building of a cob oven one work weekend this summer. As it happens, Ms. Kapin’s and Mr. Jacobs’s stunning wedge of a cabin, dubbed Clydeshead for their dog, Clyde, was Mr. Klein’s idea.

“It’s his special skill to talk people into doing something ambitious,” Ms. Kapin said. (Given Mr. Klein’s hope to anchor his friends more permanently to Beaver Brook, one suspects in this instance a deeper motive.)

With a budget of $10,000, Mr. Jacobs’s and Ms. Kapin’s original vision of a cube tucked into the hill receded pretty quickly. “Once we talked to people who knew what they were doing,” Mr. Jacobs said, “we realized we’d have to build a retaining wall, there’d be backhoes involved...”

Mr. Jacobs’s brother, Mike, is an architect, and he designed a refined 350-foot rectangle cantilevered out over the hill that uses the surrounding trees as supports. That particular innovation depends on treehouse technology, an anchor bolt known as a Garnier Limb. (Michael Garnier, an Oregon based treehouse builder — and treehouse dweller — is sometimes known as the father of the modern treehouse movement.)

There are Beaver Brook rituals, like the annual talent show, held New Year’s Eve in the Bunkhouse. Newbies earn a nickname after their third night on the property, and following a requisite post-sauna plunge in the brook after dark. (Mr. Klein’s is Zubaz, for the virulently patterned pants that he and other Buffalo Bills fans like to wear. Ms. Kapin’s is Guns, for the Linda Hamilton-like biceps she developed building her cabin.)

On work weekends, newcomers might be assigned grunt work chores like path maintenance. “It is much, much harder than you’d imagine,” Ms. Kapin said with a slight shudder.

There’s an email chain, for planning projects and working out domestic issues. Laundry has been particularly thorny. With so many beds and no assigned rooms, the residents were struggling until it was suggested they bring their own sheets and towels. One resident offered to cross-stitch everyone’s names on their linens.

Beekeeping has been broached as a project for next summer (Mr. Klein has a hankering for mead). In August, Mr. Klein sent around a Beaver Brook logo he and Mr. Cooke designed as a book stamp for their growing Bunkhouse library.

Unlike the vicious, trollish tenor of, say, the internal communiqués of Manhattan co-ops, Beaver Brook residents write with civility and a regular refrain of “awesome!”

“I think this is an important step,” Mr. Klein wrote, weighing in on the recent laundry discussion, “towards delegating the responsibilities for making BB work, creating a more camp-like culture, and raising the bar of participation to be more intentional. Cheers or jeers?”

Back home in San Francisco, the email chain is Mr. Klein’s primary online community, as he pines for his East Coast retreat.

Sunday nights are rough, he added. “It’s when everyone is driving back to the city from Beaver Brook,” he said, “and I get a flurry of photos of the meals they’ve made, or of building the cob oven, and I feel on some level I’m missing out on the life I made.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/24/fashion/the-cabin-porn-commune.html

[vestedbeauty]

Crepe Erase Review On Day 21

New Post has been published on https://vestedbeauty.com/crepe-erase/

Crepe Erase Review On Day 21

When I saw an ad for Crepe Erase on my Facebook newsfeed, I was intrigued.

I mean, Crepe Erase has Dorothy Hamill as a spokesperson, for Pete’s sake! Hey, I wore her hairstyle from about fifth-grade until eighth, and I know Dorothy wouldn’t lie, right?

Plus, the other spokesperson is Jane Seymour, the eternally ethereal beauty from Somewhere In Time. No way would she travel through time and leave young Christopher Reeves behind just to BS me about skin care.

See how scientific I am?

Girl, you don’t know the half of how easy a sell I am. This is nothing. When I do copywriting for clients, half the time I have to practically lock my wallet in the safe to keep myself from whipping out a credit card. It’s ridiculous. But while I usually cruise right past ads on Facebook, this one grabbed my attention long enough for me to watch their whole video.

I won’t lie… I’ve been extraordinarily blessed in the genes department. My mother turns 72 this month and she is GORGEOUS. People are shocked when they find out how old she is. The same thing happens when people find out that I turned 50 last year. In fact, I’ve had complete strangers guess my age at a decade or more younger than I am, which usually prompts a mini happy dance on my part. Now that I’m letting my gray hair stay gray, I don’t get carded much anymore, but when I was coloring it, it happened almost all the time. It probably helps that I was an avid reader as a kid, and after getting a horrible sunburn on a family beach vacation (the kind of sunburn that leaves you nauseous, shivering, and crying because your bedsheets hurt)… I typically don’t go out much during prime sunburn times.

That Crepey Skin on My Neck, Though…

When I DO go out in the sun, whoever’s with me usually starts our outing by rubbing my sunscreen in better. Globs here or there, you know the look. I can honestly say I’ve taken the “wear sunscreen” advice given in commencement addresses to heart. Except maybe… possibly… I just might have forgotten my neck and decolletage now and then. Okay, maybe more frequently than that.

I’ve got to tell you, it was a bit of a shock when I moved into my current home and the master bath’s vanity mirror was tipped just so at an angle that nearly made me jump out of my crepey skin like there was someone else in the mirror! I started moisturizing like a fiend but it didn’t really do any good. As I’m not a fan of crewneck or scoop neck collars (who likes getting choked by their own shirt?!), my v-neck-filled wardrobe was a pretty good reason to look for a solution.

Enter Dorothy and Jane.

Gotta Say, Crepe Erase Looks Scammy

Hey, even marketers have standards. Thank goodness I’m a bit of a minimalist and I don’t watch television, or else the highly suggestible part of my brain would bankrupt me. Usually, if I watch an ad, I’m dissecting it to pull out the copywriting bits. Headline and hook, benefits and bullet points, objections, call to action, all that. They sell on a subscription model, which can be scammy. If you ever belonged to the Columbia Record Club and tried to cancel your membership, you’ve probably been likewise schooled on the dangers of getting roped into an inescapable subscription plan. I made sure to jot down the cancellation phone number… just in case.

Watching that ad, though, my skeptical self was spellbound. Those before and after shots got me good. Having pared my makeup bag down to just seven products, using a Rodan + Fields system on my face, and indulging in some Posh bath and body products that I buy from a fellow writer, there was a little bit of wiggle room in my skin care budget. So, I took the plunge, knowing I could return it if it was worthless. I bought the Crepe Erase Essentials System. It includes:

1 full-size Exfoliating Body Polish

1 full-size Intensive Body Repair Treatment

And a free gift (the redundancy of that term bugs the stew out of me!)

My gift with purchase was a small jar of eye creme-filled ampules. They feel nice, but I don’t know that I’d order them because there’s no apparent improvement.

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Unboxing Day Was a Good Start

  Everything was packed carefully. Nothing exploded in transit. The usage instructions were clear.

Each morning, you dampen your neck and chest and then apply the Exfoliating Body Polish and rub it in. I do my face scrub (I buy Rodan + Fields from my friend Megan) at the same time, and then hop into the shower to rinse it and do normal shower stuff. When you get out, you rub a pea-sized amount of the Intensive Body Repair Treatment onto your neck and chest for about a minute. That’s it.

Some details that might matter to you:

Not tested on animals

No parabens or phthalates

Not fragrance-free – it’s got a very light citrus scent

Okay, Okay, I’ll Show You How Crepe Erase Works!

You’ve been so patient. But I know that what you really want to know is… Does It Work?????? 

On the left is my “before” picture. On the right is a photo taken 21 days later. I tried to get the same lighting, angle, all that – more just so I could see for myself whether Crepe Erase was making a difference, but also so I could give you a picture that was worth looking at.

Honestly, I was pretty shocked that there was such a difference!

I’ve barely put a dent in the products so far. I can tell that I’ll run out of Body Polish long before I run out of the Body Repair Treatment.

The BEST Way to Buy Crepe Erase… Is Not from CrepeErase.com

If you buy from the site, you CAN get a nice rebate with Ebates, which is great. In fact, if you buy stuff online on a regular basis, you should definitely register with Ebates to get cash back on purchase you’d make anyway. Expect to pay about $39.95 for your first shipment, plus tax, if you get the package I got. They have others. The second shipment in your subscription will be more like $59.95 plus shipping, and no gift with purchase.

But… if you have Amazon Prime (you do, don’t you? Try Amazon Prime 30-Day Free Trial), you can get the same package for $50 and free shipping. PLUS, no subscription, so you can just order when you want to rather than getting a surprise bill and shipment when you’ve still got half a jar of the creme. My plan is to cancel with CrepeErase.com and just buy what I need with Amazon going forward.

OK, I’ve got to tell you, all this talk about Crepe-anything now has me kind of craving a Nutella-filled crepe! Not the same at all, but there’s that power of suggestion thing working again!

Anyhow, if you click on the links in this post and buy anything, someone somewhere will send me a few bucks, which I will likely blow on bacon or a nice single-malt scotch, depending. Hope this was helpful!

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#Crepe Erase

[francescareiszlittlesoh-blog]

The History and Journey of Little Shop of Horrors

Howard Elliot Ashman -  (May 17 1950 - March 14 1991) - lyricist and script writer.

Alan Menken - (July 22, 1949) - composer.

Howard Ashman and Alan Menken have worked together multiple times; mainly for animated Disney Films such as “Beauty and the Beast”, “Aladdin”, “Lion King” and “The Little Mermaid”.

Menken and Ashman's Off-Broadway musical was based on the low-budget 1960 film The Little Shop of Horrors, directed by Roger Corman. 

The musical did its world premiere Off-Off-Broadway May 6, 1982 and ran until June 6, 1982 at the Workshop of the Players’ Art Theatre. It then proceeded to open Off-Broadway at the Orpheum Theatre in Manhattan's East Village on July 27, 1982 and ran for 5 years. This production was directed by Ashman and the musical staging by Edie Cowan. It won several awards such as the 1982–1983 New York Drama Critics Circle Award for Best Musical, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Musical, and the Outer Critics Circle Award. It was also critically acclaimed. It closed November 1, 1987 and after 2,209 performances  it was the third-longest running musical and the highest-grossing production in Off-Broadway history. Though a Broadway transfer had been proposed for the production, writer Howard Ashman declined this offer as he felt the show belonged where it was. Seeing as it was not produced on Broadway, the original production was ineligible for the 1982 Tony Awards. An original cast recording, released in 1982, omitted the songs "Call Back in the Morning", and "Somewhere That's Green" (reprise), and had abridged versions of "Now (It's Just the Gas)," "Mushnik and Son," and "The Meek Shall Inherit." It also shifted the location of the song "Closed for Renovation," appearing in the show after "Somewhere That's Green" while appearing on the cast album after "Now (It's Just the Gas)" to serve as an upbeat bridge from Orin's death to the Act II love ballad, "Suddenly, Seymour".The recording features Leilani Jones, who replaced Marlene Danielle as Chiffon two weeks after the musical opened.

Original Off-Broadway cast:

• Seymour Krelborn – Lee Wilkof

 • Audrey – Ellen Greene

• Mr. Mushnik – Hy Anzell

• Chiffon – Marlene Danielle (replaced after two weeks by Leilani Jones)

• Crystal – Jennifer Leigh Warren

• Ronette – Sheila Kay Davis

• Audrey II (voice) – Ron Taylor

• Audrey II (manipulation) – Martin P. Robinson

• Orin Scrivello,– Franc Luz

Frank Oz 1986 film: 

The film was released December 19, 1986 and directed by Frank Oz. The 1986 film stars Rick Moranis, Ellen Greene, Vincent Gardenia, Steve Martin, and Levi Stubbs as the voice of Audrey II. Ellen Greene proceeded to play Audrey in multiple productions after the film was released. The film also featured special appearances by James Belushi, John Candy, Christopher Guest, and Bill Murray. It was produced by David Geffen through “The Geffen Company” and released by Warner Brothers.

The film was produced on a budget of $25 million whereas the original 1960 film only cost $30,000.

The film was some what modernised. The director clearly felt that some things needed to be changed so his audience would find the film entertaining. When a musical is originally written for the theatre, it is very common that songs are made more up-beat and have more of a POP undertone to it when re-created as a film.

The first link is the original Off-Broadway recording of the song “Ya Never Know” and the second link is the film version of it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-T3E1RF9OlE

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXnVnSXofDY