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aswallowssong · 3 years

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OWP (but make it December?) Day 12 - My BFF

These are back too! I forgot I had already written this one (bless) so I guess the one that’s basically just silliness will have to wait until tomorrow... oops?

Read on AO3

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JJ had brought the game under the guise that they could only play so much poker in a five hour flight.

Kit knew that it was really because Hotch would never let them play five hours of poker on the jet. Someone would come away wounded.

She also knew it was for her benefit. She’d been working between sites for two months, and she didn’t know much about anyone on the team, save for Morgan. Even with their morning workouts, they were surface level friends at best.

Somehow she thought that it might have been Hotch behind it, but she couldn’t be sure, and she wasn’t going to ask. While still holding fast to the mantra that she wasn’t a part of the BAU team, the more they made an attempt to include her, the more she wished it were true.

“Okay, this one says, who’s your best friend?”

“Lame,” Elle said, her small grin full of mirth. Morgan nodded, “Yeah, that’s a boring one. Why do you always pick the most mellow cards, Jayje?”

JJ pouted momentarily. “You have to pick off the top, Morgan. What was I supposed to do, look through the cards until I found one I liked? That’s cheating.”

“Actually, I don’t think you can cheat in games like this, because there isn’t a point system. No winner, or loser, would be affected by the cards chosen.”

“This isn’t a game you can win,” Kit said, “If there isn’t a point system, how would you win at all?”

Reid thought for a moment with his eyebrows pulled together before he looked over at JJ and said simply. “This isn’t a game.”

“I didn’t say it was a game,” JJ said evenly, though the annoyance radiating off of her was entirely palpable. Elle shrugged as she and Morgan shared a look, but Spencer wasn’t done. “Actually, you said ‘Okay everyone, we aren’t playing cards for five hours, we’re playing a game that’-”

“Who’s your best friend, Reid?” Elle said, effectively both cutting off his verbatim quote of JJ from an hour before, and his impending death-by-Kit-glare if he continued. She hated when he quoted someone back to themselves. It felt like Reid trying to show off, and she hated a show off.

Reid was clearly caught off guard, though he was the one next to JJ. The rule was that everyone had to answer but the person holding the card, and Reid was seated on JJ’s other side. “Oh, um. I don’t know. Morgan?”

“Aw, thanks Pretty Boy,” Morgan said, heckling from across the table. “I’ll say you, but just because you said me, and you make the coffee in the breakroom almost good compared to the way Elle makes it.”

Elle, who was next to Morgan, rolled her eyes and shoved at him. “Listen, that coffee sucks without my help.”

“Who’s your best friend, Elle?” JJ asked, she and Kit sharing the same laugh as they watched the two bicker back and forth. Elle thought for a second before she said, “I guess Liza. She and I went through the academy together, and then we were both in Seattle. We get together when she’s in town and try to talk, but…” She trailed off and gestured vaguely, but they all knew. Kit nodded along with the others. She felt like she barely ever talked to her siblings anymore, especially the ones she didn’t live with. The BAU was running them all ragged, one day at a time.

Elle looked up at Kit, nodded at her. “Alright, Lep. You’re last, go ahead.”

“Hotch and Gideon didn’t go,” Kit said, nodding towards the men on the other side of the jet. They both insisted they were not playing, but they’d still been asked every question, and both had answered with little to no interest.

“Haley,” Hotch said easily, without even looking up from his file.

“David Rossi,” Gideon said, barely glancing up from his book before looking back down.

The group of five around the table were silent for a second before Elle nodded, looking over at Kit and saying, “Okay, there you go. Haley and David Rossi.”

“Who’s yours?” JJ said, giving Kit a small, encouraging smile.

Kit took a breath and tilted her head. “Um. Oh, okay. Monty, easily.”

“Monty isn’t your best friend,” Morgan said, and Kit raised an eyebrow at him.

“Oh, no?”

“No, she’s your identical twin sister who you work and live with. That’s not friendship, that’s codependency.”

Kit raised an eyebrow at him, eyes going hard and defensive. She knew he was joking, but that didn’t make it hurt any less. “Okay, so, Ari then?”

“Don’t you all live together?” Reid asked, tactlessly. “That would make Morgan’s reasoning sound for both your… twins? Siblings? How are you supposed to phrase that?”

“Cúpla,” she said easily, “Ari and I aren’t identical twins.”

“You’re in a set of triplets,” Elle pointed out. “I think that counts.”

These fucking people.

“Okay, well, then…” Kit trailed off, ears burning as she realized she didn’t really have any friends that weren’t Ari or Monty. They spent their time together on Sundays, the only day they all had off, and Kit saw Ari in the evenings and Monty leaving work. All her other time was spent in the clinic, or at the BAU.

“Then?” JJ prompted, and Kit sighed and looked away from their group. “Then I guess I don’t have one.”

“You don’t talk with any of the girls from the clinic?” Morgan asked, and Kit shook her head.

Elle prompted further, “What about your academy roommate?”

“Monty,” she said quietly, one hand coming up to tug at her left braid while the other slid along the leg of her pants.

Morgan spoke again, gently throwing an elbow in her direction, “No secret boyfriend?”

She knew he was teasing. He was trying to bring the mood back up; the mood she’d clearly just crushed by admitting that she didn’t have any friends at all. “I don’t have time for a secret boyfriend, even if I wanted one,” Kit said, rolling her eyes and swatting at his shoulder.

Reid looked confused at the other end of the table, next to Elle. “We have a two day weekend every week. Surely if you wanted to go out, you could go on either Friday or Saturday night without seeing sleep repercussions?”

Kit shook her head. This conversation was very quickly going from sort of sad to super depressing. “I work Saturdays in the clinic. My only day off during the week is Sunday, and if we’re on a case, I don’t get a day off at all.”

“You work six days a week?” JJ asked, clearly unaware. Kit didn’t care, she’d never told them, and hadn’t anticipated it coming up. She didn’t really care. Why would she?

She was sort of glad the conversation was scooting away from her lack of any conceivable friendship.

“Yeah,” she said with a shrug, “I have to keep my hours balanced. Three days with you, three days with them.”

“That doesn’t leave you a lot of personal time for friends.” Elle crossed one leg over the other, actively wrangling the conversation back into the super depressing. Kit wished she would have left it alone, but she knew it was strange. What twenty five year old had literally no friends?

They were quiet again for far too long. Kit refused to look up, or around, or at anything at all. She focused on the dryness of her hands, constantly chapped and raw from washing and washing in the clinic. She was startled when, out of anyone sitting there, Reid spoke up.

“You talk to us,” he said simply.

The other three nodded immediately, words tumbling and spilling as if they’d all been wanting to speak up, and now the floodgate was open for them.

“You came to my apartment when I got strep,” JJ said. “I wouldn’t have called anyone but a friend for that.”

“And I’ve never had a better training partner,” Morgan said, “No one else is competitive enough.”

“I didn’t think anyone else would share the same taste in music as I do, but then we caught you at the bar, and I knew you were cool before, but that really sold it.”

Kit looked around at them before feeling a small smile tug at the corners of her mouth. She knew what they were doing, of course, but the feelings coming off of them were genuine. They meant what they said, and she was incredibly grateful. She didn’t let the tears that threatened to prick get any further than a threat, but she had to physically swallow and clear her throat before she could speak.

“Thank you. All of you. I guess… I guess you guys are my best friends.”

Morgan scoffed, giving her a smirk and nodding towards Reid. “You may have to fight Pretty Ricky over there for it,” he said, watching for Reid’s reaction, which was exactly what they all expected it to be.

“‘Best’' is a qualifier of relative quality, which means that its place as a superlative adjective makes it of a singular quantity. Superlative adjectives are used to show-”

“You can have more than one best friend, Spence,” JJ said, cutting him off and nodding toward Kit, who’s cheeks lit a similar color to her hair. He seemed to realize and read the situation, though he’d already shoved his foot in his mouth, and instead of continuing just said quietly, “Right. Yeah, obviously. The world isn’t a thesis.”

“The world isn’t a thesis,” Elle echoed before nudging the deck of questions towards him. “Your turn, Doctor Reid.”

He fidgeted with his fingers before pulling the top card from the deck, reading aloud, “What is your favorite color?”

“No!”

“Throw the whole game away!”

“It’s not a game! We’ve established that this does not meet the qualities that allow something to be a game!”

“Shut up, Reid!”

Kit watched as the jet settled, all of the attention being pulled away from her as a warm presence settled in her chest.

Yes. These people, who drive me crazy, and have no concept of personal care of any kind. These people are my best friends.

#Brenna writes things #or at least she tries #October Writing Prompts #OWP #day 12 #My BFF #Criminal Minds #SCRC #Kit needs some friends

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prophezeiung · 4 years

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ways of realizing that you’re falling in love with your best friend pt. 1: the murdering of his girlfriend a holden vaisey x pollux parkinson drabble @vorhersage

A young woman had been killed, murdered in cold blood, the papers said. Whatever noteworthy family members she had left behind were not only, understandably, in mourning, but also desperate to find whoever was responsible for this tragedy and hold them accountable. Among them were her sister, Ophelia, who some people claimed had gone a little insane over this loss; and her boyfriend, Pollux, who wore the darkest shades of black and the hardest facial expressions in the weeks after her death. Among them was her killer. Holden Vaisey, this killer's best friend, had watched the events unfold like the one-man audience at the enactment of a drama. He had missed most of the lead-up to this breaking point, by his own volition, but he had been there when she had died. He had seen the desperation creep into her eyes the moment she realized that she had put her trust in the wrong person, and the gravity of this mistake. He had seen it leave her eyes as well, along with every last glimmer of life at one stroke of his best friend's hand. The months that had led up to this moment had been agonizing to watch, but now his front row seat was paying off. He supported Pollux fully in this decision, not only because their relation had become more than a nuisance to Holden, but because he thought it better for Pollux to rid himself of this unsustainable foolery. He surely would have helped out, had Pollux himself not come to the conclusion that entertaining a charade like this was anything but beneficial to him. Taking matters into his own hands had proven to Holden that Pollux, when it came down to it, was still the man he took him for. They had not talked about it, Holden hadn't known the plan or if there even was one, but he had sensed it, the stern determination and the cool composure that had taken over his friend, and he had felt at ease, just as much as if he had taken this life himself.

Somebody who did not know Holden Vaisey might see this: A deeply disturbed man reenacting the traumas of his youth. An affinity for the violent things in life born from the foreignness of affection and devaluation of empathy. An untrue self-image through distorted reflection. The physical denial of feeling — quite literally the drowning of emotions to the brink of extinction, self-torture under the pretense of betterment. Somebody who did not know Holden Vaisey might also see this: A love, like a flame, obsessive, hungry, scorching and selfish to the core, yet oxymoronically sacrificial. The sickening satisfaction over the misery of somebody else, only unusual and therefore more twisted in the context of their mutual and exclusive love. The routined incomprehension and denial of either.

Holden Vaisey himself was happy. Not the pure, unadulterated form of happiness, the innocent joy that grows rarer with wisdom, nor the twisted schadenfreude, the malicious pleasure at others' despair. He was simply and wantlessly content. It did not matter that someone had died and that consequentially something had to die. Things were like they were before, or soon they would be. He had not cared at all for this phase, this short-lived phenomenon that had been his best friend's relationship, and so it was good that it was over.

He didn't know how it had started, and he wanted and didn't want to understand it in equal measures. The less he knew the better, it should seem, but the material with which his mind filled in the gaps was at times just as unsavory as the sting of the truth, if not worse. He caught himself asking Pollux to decide in his favor time and time again, a little private experiment conducted in order to measure how invested in their friendship he should remain: "Stay a little longer?", "Are you coming?", "Any plans for tonight?"

The girl — rather than a woman, because they too barely were men — was secondary to Holden. They had met before, of course they had, whoever met Pollux would subsequently meet Holden as well, but she had instantly fallen in the same category that Holden filed most acquaintances in: Useless, uninteresting, unimportant. She was but background noise to him. The more surprised he was when Pollux began to seek her favor. She was not plain aesthetically, but she lacked even a spark of charm to Holden, and beyond that, she represented the class of leeches and lowlives that neither of them had ever paid much mind to, as well as political opinions that should alert even Pollux' sense of self-preservation. She was not only their inferior, she was their opposite. And yet Pollux spent every moment he could afford by her side — time that had previously been reserved for Holden, because of course they spent every spare minute of their life together. It was elemental to their bond. It was all they knew.

Someone who wasn't Holden Vaisey might have seen this: Jealousy.

Pollux Parkinson had withdrawn his attention slowly but noticeably, and even someone like Holden, who took the only meaningful bond he had for granted — because since he was born until now, it always had been granted —, noticed. When the unthinkable suddenly becomes reality, the first natural reaction is apprehension. When the only stability suddenly becomes unreliable, the first natural reaction is wariness. When the source of mutual trust is suddenly opened to a stranger, the first natural reaction is reticence. So Holden had just flashed his bloodhound growl grin and let Pollux believe that nothing had changed. He didn't let him know how unbalanced he became when Pollux went to spend time with his lover, he didn't show his disdain for his new strange lifestyle, he didn't express his doubts over how this choice would affect either of them. They barely spoke about her or Pollux' feelings, and Holden was quite happy with that.

He did not understand what they meant, anyway. The love that he had seen was this: A thoughtless devotion that made you blind and deaf to the world. The sacrifice of freedom and rationality. Bitter disappointment and lifelong aching for a never-real fantasy. It was this: Weakness. He didn't claim to know it, neither to want it, nor to understand it. But what he had seen of it did not match what he knew to be true about his best friend. The Pollux that he knew was clever, alert, rational. He was strong. To Holden's mind, it was easier to believe that what Pollux claimed to be love was false than to believe that his view of him was. The possibility that there were things that transcended previous beliefs and devotions lay so far outside of his reach that it wasn't even within sight. Any dark inkling that the person he'd known his entire life and was confident he knew by heart had a side that to him that was unknown and incomprehensible was buried as quickly as the victims of the manhunts that Holden conducted with increasing frequency. With or without Pollux, though more and more without.

Finally Pollux had seen how vulnerable he had made himself, how he had lost control, and so he had taken it back by force. Given her what she deserved. To Holden's eyes, it had been long overdue. The only consequence of Pollux' decision to kill this alleged love of his that Holden cared for, then, was the relief he felt at the prospects of things going back to how they were. Pollux had, to him, changed beyond recognition, but not beyond reversal. Whatever this girl had done to him, he had shaken it off, and even though Holden presumed that some of it might preoccupy him for another while — Pollux had always been the quieter of the two, and neither of them had a habit of prying innermost thoughts from the other —, nonetheless this choice must surely mean that he had found closure, or was confident that he would.

Someone who knew Pollux and the thing most important to him might see this: Two lovers, heartbroken, torn apart by the expanding gap between their two worlds. Doubt, rearing its ugly head for the last time, so strongly this once that the bond that had always managed to squash it before now snapped under its heel like a twig. The admittance of a true nature, supposedly, against all previous efforts of salvation, and the destruction of any proof that there had ever been such.

Nobody, not even those who knew Pollux and the thing most important to him, would see this: Two lovers, oblivious, each breaking their own heart and turning away from help and each other. Love masked as habit, desire masked as codependency. Knowledge of one another, so intimate it might predict actions even before they are initialized, yet an intentional blindness towards the most basic psychological processes, their own and the other's.

That Pollux was keeping his distance even after the deed was done and the circumstances had shifted back to something familiar was always part of the equation. Holden knew his friend, and he was patient with him. Not the calculating patience he had for everyone else, people that he expected to gain something from and would therefore suffer through their antics if the price was right — no, for Pollux he would wait, however long and for whatever reason. In this case he knew what he would win from it, and it made him display an almost childlike anticipation that grew with every day, but it made no difference. Holden was certain that, sooner or later, Pollux would return to his old self, return to him.

Because in turn, nobody knew what Pollux Parkinson meant to Holden, not even Pollux himself. It was this: Glue that held together something irreparable. A silver lining for someone irredeemable. An extension of himself, as irreplaceable as a limb and as vital as an organ. A mirror, and at the same time, guidance. The promise of safety, taken for granted and the only reason why his world didn't collapse daily.

Had he been provided with this clear-cut definition, cold as steel, and asked, was it love? The answer would undoubtedly be yes. But a man who let a sick mind decide over a healthy heart would never consider that it was able to love when he had decided long ago that he didn't subscribe to this strange concept. No, the admission to anything but self-sufficiency would certainly crumble the so carefully constructed self-image.

For a person so keen on controlling every single aspect of their presence, Holden paid very little mind to the routines pertaining to his best friend. Whatever he felt like doing, he just did; Pollux understood, he was the same. There was no reason to overcomplicate matters that so smoothly ran on their own. If a future without the other was impossible, why bother trying to live any other life?

#death /#murder /#long post /#( in case the read more fails pray for me )#( n e ways i wrote this a while ago but it's time to put it on here )#( ft. nici's ophelia whom we love )#vorhersage #wahrsagung #𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐝𝐞𝐧 𝐯𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐞𝐲 › general › the murderer #𝐡𝐨𝐥𝐝𝐞𝐧 𝐯𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐞𝐲 › ship: pollden › fuel the pyre of your enemies #𝐫𝐩. › drabble › the things we invent when we are scared

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mermaidsirennikita · 5 years

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January 2019 Book Roundup

New year, new reading challenge, etc. After a decidedly bad start, I found 1) a very fun, very Gothic thriller 2) a sad but well-written YA contemporary about toxic friendships and 3) a fun Holly Black sequel. Not a total loss, then! My favorite book of the month, all things considered, was really probably Holly Black’s The Wicked King--if largely because the ending was exactly what it should have been. On to February! I’ll try to read a bit more romance that month, juuust to rub my own single-ness in a bit more.

Lie to Me by J.T. Ellison. 1/5. Ethan and Sutton seem like they have it all--he’s a famous author, even if he has been struggling with writer’s block for years; she’s a successful romance novelist, though her recent run-in with a nasty reviewer online has tarnished her reputation. Though they were shaken by the loss of their baby, they seem to be getting it together. Until Sutton goes missing, with a note to Ethan warning him to avoid looking for her. I won’t say much more, because you can probably guess the plot here, save for some twists that weren’t really twists because they were only there to shock and made very little sense. This book ripped off Gone Girl to a degree that wasn’t so much capitalizing on the domestic thriller craze as it was literally ripping off Gone Girl. This was just kind of stupid.

Luna and the Lie by Mariana Zapata. 2/5. Luna works at an auto shop, and has for years, while supporting her younger sisters. One of her bosses has become a father figure to her; the other, Ripley (or “Rip”) is the bane of her existence. However, when Luna is invited to her grandmother’s funeral, she is concerned about coming into contact with her estranged family again. In a bid to stay protected, she asks Rip to accompany her--which leads to her keeping a secret for him. Honestly, I don’t even feel like I can properly give this a review because it just kind of bounced off of me. I don’t mind a simple, even kind of dumb plot as long as I’m enjoying myself, and I just wasn’t here. But someone else might! A Zapata book’s enjoyability, I’ve learned, lives and dies on whether or not you’re into the male lead. Rip was like...................... the opposite of my type. So it didn’t work for me.

The Au Pair by Emma Rous. 4/5. On the day that Seraphine and her twin brother, Danny, were born, their mother Ruth flung herself from the cliffs outside their ancestral home of Summerbourne. Shortly after the death of their father twenty-five years later, Seraphine discovers a photo taken on the day of her birth, before Ruth died--but in it, Ruth is holding only one baby. Increasingly obsessed with the truth behind her past, Seraphine seeks out Laura, the au pair employed by her parents before the twins were born. But the more Laura avoids her, the clearer it becomes that what happened that day at Summerbourne may be worse than Seraphine imagined. This book is ALL about the atmosphere. It’s got a Gothic vibe, with the characters’ obsession with family and Summerbourne adding this super creepy edge to everything. I can’t say that the plot is especially fantastic--I did see the ending coming, and I can’t say that much here was super revolutionary. But the tone? A+.

The Wicked King by Holly Black. 4/5. In the sequel to The Cruel Prince, Jude has now had control of Cardan, the new High King, for five months. This makes her the true power behind the throne--but her relationship with Cardan is not an easy alliance. Struggling with her attraction to Cardan, Jude is warned that someone close to her is a traitor; and in order to keep her power, she must uncover that person’s identity as soon as possible. This book was so dependent on the love-hate dynamic between Jude and Cardan working. And oh, it does. The tension between them simmers. Their dynamic is easily the most compelling part of the book. And the rest is good, too--I’m not one of those people that thinks Black has reinvented the wheel regarding the fairy thing in YA... because she hasn’t. But this was *fun*, and I enjoyed it. I could do without some of the cringey aspects of Black’s fairies (I refuse to call them faeries). Overall, however, I’m really excited for the next book--the ending really sealed this one.

White Stag by Kara Barbieri. 2/5. Janneke has lived in servitude to the goblin Soren for nearly a century, given to him by his wicked uncle, Lydian. Just as she realizes that her humanity is slowly eroding, the Erlking dies, leaving a power vacuum. Determined to keep Lydian from ascending to the throne, Janneke joins Soren in the hunt for the White Stag--the future king’s source of power--and along the way struggles with coming to terms with both her past trauma and her uncertain future. This book has a great premise, but is bogged down by a lack of worldbuilding and slow pacing. It just couldn’t keep my attention, despite the fact that I am an admitted sucker for sexy goblin books (HOW COULD THIS HAPPEN TO MEEEEEE). Furthermore, although I appreciated Janneke’s trauma and the fact that she still hadn’t come to terms with it, something about the way it was handled felt rather clumsy? Well-intended and not exploitative, but... yes, clumsy. I wouldn’t be against trying something else by Barbieri as I think she has potential, but the pacing ultimately killed a lot of my interest in this one.

Our Year of Maybe by Rachel Lynn Solomon. 4/5. Sophie and Peter have been best friends since childhood; and Peter has been sick the whole time. Now that she’s turned eighteen, Sophie is donating her kidney to Peter; and she secretly hopes that this will be the catalyst for the change in their relationship that she’s long wanted. But after the transplant, Peter is different--he’s free for the first time in his life. Free to pursue new interests, a life separate from Sophie--and Chase, a boy he likes. As Sophie and Peter grow apart--both struggling with guilt and gratitude--they find themselves forced to define a relationship that may be growing toxic. First off, I love the way that Solomon writes her characters. They’re so real and flawed and sometime straight-up assholes. I also love that Peter is bi and this is just kind of a part of him--but a part he’s never really been able to explore, due to his illness. There’s a lot at play here, and neither Sophie nor Peter get a villain edit, which is refreshing. They just... are incredibly codependent. And there is a good deal of attraction going on there, which adds to the complexity of what they’re dealing with. And really, neither of them have ever had anyone else to lean on outside of family. This book is basically just digging in to Sophie and Peter’s relationship; outside of that, there isn’t too much plot. But that? Is really good. Is it quite as good as Solomon’s debut, “You’ll Miss Me When I’m Gone”? Not really. But God, she’s a breath of fresh air in YA contemporary.

Echo North by Joanna Ruth Meyer. 3/5. After hardship debilitates his family, Echo’s father journeys out to sell his wares. Echo finds him lost in the woods, at the mercy of the very same wolf that scarred her years before. The wolf gives Echo an offer: if she spends a year in his home, her father will be set free. Taking the deal, Echo finds herself in an ever-changing house full of living books and secret rooms, with the wolf as her constant companion. He sleeps in her room at night, with only one rule: she must never light the candle to look at him in the dark. As you can imagine, this is an “East of the Sun, West of the Moon” retelling. And there were so many things I loved about it. The writing style is super pretty, exactly what you’d want from a fairy tale. Furthermore, Meyer plays with some really interesting concepts that I hadn’t seen before. But... I never was as emotionally attached as I wanted to be. Nothing really surprised me. I’d like to see what she does next, but I do think she needs to work a bit on character development and emotional intensity.

#book roundup #reading roundup #books #book recs

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stephhannes · 5 years

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it’s november!

which means that october has passed, and now we’re rolling headfirst into the holiday season. thanksgiving used to be my favorite holiday, but after my dad died, it felt weird. the first year after my dad died, back in 2015, i went back home to do Family Thanksgiving and i hated it (although for some reason even though nathan and i weren’t together at this point yet, i actually ended up seeing him on this thanksgiving- it was the first time i’d seen him in 8 months and also the first time since my dad had died so it was all around A Strange Time) the second year, i think i’ve blacked out from my memory because i can’t remember anything about it. but the third year, last year, i was living in new york and actually had a lot of fun, since nathan’s family had come into town and i got to go out in public and be with people and do activities, etc. this year will be my first thanksgiving without both my dad and my fiancé and i’m dreading it.

october was a rollercoaster of a month. i’m pretty sure i slept away the first half of the month. there were a large handful of days where i’d sleep for 22 hours, and the days that i didn’t, i at least was asleep for all daylight hours, only awake between 7pm and 8am. i feel incredibly lonely here in abilene, since i have no friends here anymore so a lot of the time i go days without talking to another human face-to-face. i guess to cope with the whole ‘i dont know anyone here and i dont have anything to do here’ thing, i just sleep a lot. i mean, that and the depression are probably why i slept so much, but whatever. there were a lot of days where i felt so overwhelmed by the concept of having to rebuild my life. even if i manage to move somewhere, get a job and go through the motions of moving on, i know that nothing will ever make me as happy as nathan did. there is literally nothing that could compare to the inexplicable joy i felt every morning i woke up with nathan next to me. when my dad died, i felt this intense sense of loss when i realized that he wouldn’t be around to see me graduate, or see me get married. and now i feel an even greater sense of loss realizing that i don’t even get to marry nathan anymore.

two months ago, i was just generally sad, just always a little weepy. but now, as some time has passed, i’ve starting finding very specific things that make me sad:

-i guess that october is a hot month for engagement/getting married because i’ve seen so many announcements on facebook lately and every time i see someone in a wedding dress i get so overwhelmed with sadness. also, for some reason i still get SO many ads on facebook for engagement rings, and wedding planning and whatever, and like, look mark zuckerberg, i’d love to pick out a venue but i can’t so can you leave me alone?? thanks.

-the other day i opened netflix for the first time since nathan died and i got sad because i saw all of the shows he had started but hadn’t finished watching yet

-i went to a movie and got sad because i realized nathan and i had somehow never gone to a movie together

-on the topic of holidays, the other day i realized that nathan and i will never get to spend a christmas together. he hated holidays to begin with so it’s not necessarily like we would have done anything, but still. the first year that we were together, we were living apart, so we didn’t see each other for christmas that year. the second year we were together, he went on vacation for like three weeks without me during christmas and that was a total disaster. i was so upset because it was my first year far away from home, from all of my friends and family. i couldn’t afford to go back to texas for christmas, so i was incredibly lonely. i felt so isolated and terrible, and i remember crying at night leading up to him leaving because the thought of having to sit at the apartment alone for both christmas and new years was a lot for me to handle. then, after work on christmas eve i got super drunk with a coworker and somehow ended up on a train with her to pennsylvania to spend christmas with her family. so i guess it worked out in the end, i was still alone on new years' though and that was really sad. anyways, the moral of that story is that when nathan was alive we never got to spend christmas together and now he’s dead so we will never get to ever and that makes me sad.

-every time a new album comes out, or movie or something hot in pop culture, or news story or whatever, my first reaction is always “oh! i wonder what nathan’s thoughts on this are” because he was always the first person i’d talk to about things when they happened, since we were always together, and now i feel this weird void when i realize that i don’t have anyone to immediately bounce ideas off of.

-i took out my old pillowcases from our apartment and i wasn’t expecting them to smell like him but they did. i still haven’t unpacked my suitcase of clothes from the apartment, but when i go in to take out an article of clothing, they all still smell like the apartment itself. that’s what i expected from the pillowcases, but instead they smelled exactly like nathan.

-i don’t care about basketball, but for some reason, not hearing about it 24/7 has been really weird. nathan would constantly tell me all the hot new basketball gossip and even though i don’t care about the sport, i somehow got into hearing about it all the time and now i’m back to being completely in the dark and it’s weird.

+++

the latter half of october has been better. i still get periodically sad most days, but i’m finally not weeping through the entire night any more. there was a small stretch of time where i was inconsolable, just constantly crying. now i can eat lunch without tears in my eyes, which is cool. i started reading again and read like 5 books in a week (which is a strange change of pace from who i’ve been since i graduated from college. literally the day that nathan died, i was reading a book and he straight up was like ‘wow, i could have sworn you were illiterate because i think this is the first time i’ve ever seen you read something’). the other day, i finally read ‘the year of magical thinking’ by joan didion which actually ruined my life. it felt like i was watching a tape of my own life the entire time i was reading it, because so many of her experiences were eerily similar to my own throughout this entire situation the last few months.

the biggest thing i did, however, was finally clean my bedroom. when i graduated from high school and went to college, my parents finally bought a house. since i was away at college, they just moved everything from my old bedroom into my room at the new house, so it started off just as a time capsule of everything i owned from high school. then as i’d move back home each summer between years at college, i’d bring home more garbage that would just accumulate in the room. my junior year of college, i moved to an apartment and i took my mattress from home. when i left that apartment to move to nyc, i threw the mattress away. so my bedroom at home was literally just a storage room for trash, old clothes, old furniture and knickknacks, and it had no bed. when i moved back to abilene, i spent the first two months sleeping on the couch in the living room because the thought of trying to put together a new room was exhausting and i had other things to expend my energy on, like sobbing for 5 hours straight. but finally, i did it. i spent a day throwing away all of my awards and papers and scripts and notes from high school. i threw away notes from freshman year of college, and put away boxes of novels i had accumulated as an english major. i bagged up all of my clothes that i hadn’t worn since i was 13. i ordered a mattress. i ordered the same mattress that nathan and i had at our apartment, which was a bold move on my part, but honestly it was comfortable and relatively cheap so whatever. it’s weird because now, sitting in a full sized bed i keep thinking “wow how did nathan and i share one of these, it seems so small” but then i remembered that we used to share a twin sized bed that didn’t even have a box spring so this is luxury in comparison. i love decorating and buying furniture and setting up rooms. and i was so excited for nathan and i to kind of settle so i could do that in philly. when we lived in new york, all the furniture we had was stuff we found on the streets basically, because we knew we’d only keep it for a year. but when we were in philly, we were able to actually buy stuff and set up a real living space. giving all of that away was really hard for me, not only throwing away everything we had built, but also throwing away some of my own independence of having my own space. so rebuilding a room in abilene was nice, and i feel a lot better about being back at home now.

the last couple of days of october have been hard for me for some reason. i spent two days going through all my old texts with nathan from the year that we lived apart and it’s left me in such a weird headspace. i think it’s hard to see how much we struggled to be apart back then, when it was something that was impermanent, and we were still able to actually talk to each other every day, and compare that to now, where i’ll never get to talk to him again. we were codependent as hell, but in like….a healthy way, yknow? i just constantly get so sad for all of the things we’ll never get a chance to do, and i get sad for all of the days that i won’t have him by my side, and i get sad for all of the nights that i won’t get to sleep next to him. and i’m sad that unlike the last time we were apart, this doesn’t end after one year. this is just what i have to deal with forever and i’m sad and i’m mad and i miss my fiancé a lot. one of the conversations i keep coming back to is when one time nathan was like “i don’t want to do another year like this without you” and i was like “you’ll never have to” and i’m emotional because it was true, but now i’m out here having to do every year without him. the other conversation i keep coming back to is one time when i was like “i really can’t imagine what it would be like to not have you in my life” and he was like “you’ll never have to deal with that.”

also, while re-reading, i came across a stretch of a few days where i was having a particularly hard time. i was stressed because of school and moving, and was just generally very depressed and nathan reminded me of the one thing that i need to keep reminding myself now- “please don’t try to deal with everything on your own.” when nathan and i were together, sometimes i would forget that, i would let myself get so overwhelmed with things before i would come to him and ask for help. and OF COURSE i’d feel a million times better every time i let him help me, but it always took me so long to let him help. that’s something i need to remember especially now- i need to let people help me. i need to ask people to help me.

my favorite part of reading through the old texts was from march 2017 where he sent me 5 texts in a row that said “don’t read our texts and get sad.” it’s almost like this is something that i do all of the time and have always done….weird…

i’ve come a long way from constantly googling “can you actually die from a broken heart,” but i’m still not doin so hot.

anyways, that’s the end of my october. on november 6th, i’m going back to new york for a little bit and i’m excited to see my friends and actually be present in the city. i went back pretty shortly after nathan died, and i was still in such a daze that i didn’t get to enjoy my time there, so it’ll be nice to be back with a clearer head and more ability to be social. it’s been nice traveling around and seeing friends and being in different places, it gets lonely being in abilene honestly. like, i get that i can text people but i’m constantly just dying for face-to-face interaction with people that know me well, and also getting to interact with people in a space that’s not just me locked in my bedroom. i do appreciate everyone that’s reached out to me lately though, it never hurts to get a text every once and awhile from people i dont necessarily talk to on a daily basis- sometimes it’s just nice to know i’m not out here totally by myself all the time.

now that it’s november, in the spirit of thanksgiving, i spent some time reflecting on every time i was thankful to have nathan in my life. over the years that we were together, i sent him a ton of letters, and most of them had at least one paragraph where i’d list off some random list of things that i was thankful for. i always made it a habit to make it abundantly clear how much i appreciated him. here are some of those paragraphs:

the first is from august 2016, about 4 months after we had started dating. i sent this first letter to him the day i left to go back to college, right before he moved to new york to start grad school.

Thank you for being the best. Thank you for always being there for me, even when I’m in a dumb garbage mood and I’m not the easiest to deal with. Thank you for always being so patient with me. I know it’s frustrating sometimes when I won’t talk about things, but you are always so understanding. In the past, it’s been so hard for me to talk about my dumb human emotions, but you’ve always been so good at listening and not making me feel like I’m being ridiculous when I actually take the time to talk about them with you. Thank you for always asking how I’m doing. Thank you for always offering to get me ice cream when I complain about not having any at my house. Thank you for spending so much time with me this summer, even if it was at weird hours. Thank you for letting me yell all my stories at you. Thank you for always making me feel appreciated and valued. Thank you for always texting me good morning and goodnight. Thank you for buying me in n out every day for like a week when I had no money while you were in Austin. Thank you for always offering to do my laundry (I swear to god I’ll do it myself…eventually…maybe.) Thank you for living with me for those two weeks in Austin.Thank you for always letting me fall asleep on you. Thank you for being so easy to be with. Thank you for always supporting me and believing in me. Thank you for always making me laugh. Thank you for loving me. Thank you for being mine.

the next comes from december 2016. i sent this on christmas eve, after we had been living long-distance for four months.

When you moved away, I was so afraid that we were going to grow apart, I am so incredibly thankful that that hasn’t been the case at all. Despite being so far apart for so long, somehow I’ve managed to fall even more in love with you. You really are so incredible. Every day that I wake up and I’m yours, I genuinely feel like the luckiest person in the world. I’m constantly thankful for your support. I’m thankful for the way that you always make me feel appreciated. I’m thankful for the way that you always compliment me when I send you snaps. I’m thankful for the way that you constantly text me every day. I’m thankful that you always tell me that I’m going to be a great wife. I’m thankful for the way that you’re always there for me when I’m having a rough day, or when I’m sick, or when I’m stressed out. I’m thankful for the way that you always tell me you love me. I’m thankful for how you put up with me even when I’m being difficult. I’m thankful for all the times you stayed up late and talked to me on the phone for like six hours straight until way too early in the morning even though we both had things to do. I’m thankful for the way that you always remind me about things that I know I’ll forget to do. I’m thankful for the way you call me to make sure I wake up from my nap and don’t completely ruin my sleep schedule. These last few months have been hard, but the way that you do all of these little things made it a million times easier. Thank you for your dedication to me. I really don’t have the words to express how thankful and happy I am about all of the things you do for me. You’re my best friend, and I can’t imagine having a more perfect person by my side.

this letter was from june 2017, right before i moved to nyc.

this year hasn’t been easy but it has been so worth it. thank you for doing everything you could to make it as painless as possible. thank you for making time to call me most nights, and thank you for answering my calls when it was 4am and i couldn’t stop crying because i missed you. thank you for growing with me this year, for continually being better at loving me and helping me be better at loving you. thank you for doing this with me even though it wasn’t either of our first choice of how to spend the first year of our relationship. thank you for flying me to new york back in april, and showing me around before i moved. thank you for getting our apartment set up. thank you for being mine, and for wanting to marry me and for being such a god damn dream to be with. i’ll see you in a few days, i love you and we never have to be apart again.

the next letter is from october 2017. we had been living together in nyc for about four months at this point, i sent it on our 1.5 year anniversary. this letter was always really special to me, because i spent so much time reflecting on the new life we had started together.

thanks for having my back when i was stressed and unemployed by constantly reminding me that things would be fine and that we’re a team. thanks for making me shower every time i get too drunk and start throwing up. thanks for helping me get my life together that one night that i lost my phone. thanks for surprising me with your extensive knowledge of the musical stylings of both r. kelly and shania twain. thank you for making time for me even when you’re busy with school. also thanks for continuing to make sure that i don’t ruin my life by excessively napping and also forcing me to go to the grocery store even when i reeeeeeally don’t want to. i’m sorry that i steal all the sheets and take up the whole bed- i’d promise to get better about that but i try not to make promises i won’t keep. you’re the best and i’m really thankful of how patient you are with me- even when i’m a nightmare on my bad days. thanks for dragging me to new york, coming here is something i never would have done on my own accord and i’m actually kinda liking it a little maybe.

this one is from may 2018. the day after we got engaged.

hey b, thank you for asking me to marry you. i feel so incredibly lucky that you picked me, that i get to spend the rest of my life with you. thank you for deciding to break your whole ‘no marriage rule’ thing for me, i appreciate it. being your wife is gonna be my favorite thing, thank you for letting me do that.

this is from a month later, when we’d just moved to philly.

thank you for everything you’ve done this last week with moving us here and helping me get the apartment together. you’re the best. also you’re lucky i like you bc there is no one else that i would have driven 16 hours in one day for. thanks for still loving me when i get grumpy and thank you for taking care of me in all of the ways you always do. you’re my favorite and i’m really really glad that you’re mine

and finally, this is from october 2018. two months after nathan died. i still text him periodically, like he’s still alive. to catch him up on what’s going on. at like 6am the other night, i just sent-

thank you for being mine for as long as you were.

(also just as a ps, i’m so excited because i used to have this huge collection of pictures of nathan asleep on me because every time he’d fall asleep on me i’d take a bunch of pictures because it was so precious and i lost most of them when i lost my phone on an A train last year, but i found a couple of them when i was going through our texts on my macbook, so i’ll leave this post with that because it’s my favorite thing and i miss having to listen to him snore directly in my face every night)

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