#you can call walker gay as in 'that guy's pretty queer'

[dreamings-free]

How Harry Styles Became A Modern Style Icon

by Phoe­be Luck­hurst - Evening Standard 15/11/19

A man wrought in the fires of teenage boy­band hy­per-stardom is not afraid of a lit­tle commotion. Still when Harry Styles — the One Di­rec­tion mat­inée idol turned lan­guid Gen Z icon — tweeted, at 1.01 pm GMT on Wed­nes­day af­ter­noon, that he would be tak­ing his up­com­ing album Fine Line on tour, you could, if at­tuned to the cor­rect de­mo­graphic fre­quency, hear the howl echo around the in­ter­net: gut­tural, hun­gry, ul­u­lat­ing. This was a pseudo-re­li­gious experience: one vi­ral meme de­picted the Pope hold­ing a copy of his al­bum aloft. The announce­ment has been retweeted al­most 70,000 times.

The 25-year old is a tour vet­eran — he spent five years and five al­bums strapped to the thunder­ing 1D jug­ger­naut — but this new tour is his first as a bona fide solo brand. The al­bum, his first in two years, is synth-soaked and soul­ful, the al­bum’s aes­thetic fever­-dreamy. Granted, he’s not the first per­son to go to So­Cal, try a few magic mush­rooms and de­clare him­self radically trans­formed, but the re­sults are be­guil­ing — and cer­tainly a world away from his years as a Simon Cow­ell Ken doll. Since his last record, he has co- hosted t he Met Gala and been reborn as an Alessan­dro Michele muse. This is your Styles crib sheet.

Melody maker

Styles’s new al­bum — writ­ten un­der a tie-dye mist af­ter tak­ing the afore­men­tioned psychedelics, which also re­sulted in a mishap in which he bit off the tip of his tongue — is “all about hav­ing sex and feel­ing sad”, which, granted, as a topline, does not wildly dif­fer­en­ti­ate the record from the genre of “al l other mu­sic ever”. Still, the early signs for Fine Line are encouraging. Its first sin­gle, Lights Up—which has been streamed al­most 100 mil­lion times on Spo­tify —is­ synth-y, soul­ful, un­der­stat­edly an­themic, very dif­fer­ent to, and bet­ter than, the lead sin­gle on his last solo record, the Seven­ties, soft-rock Sign of the Times( it still, of course, hit No 1), and very, very dif­fer­ent from any­thing he did with 1D. Many thou­sands of words have been writ­ten about whether there is a bi­sex­ual sub­text to Lights Up. It has been noted that the song was re­leased on Na­tional Com­ing Out Day, that Styles’s sex­u­al­ity has been sub­ject to fren­zied specu­la­tion be­fore, the video fea­tures an oiled-up, top­less Styles gy­rat­ing around men and women, and that the lyrics (“Shine, I’m not ever go­ing back/ Shine, step into the light”) could be in­ter­preted as a mean­ing­ful rev­e­la­tion of sorts. Cer­tainly, he has be­come a queer icon — especially with Gen Z — who are thrilled by his se­lec­tion of gen­derqueer singer-song­writer King Princess as his sup­port act for the Euro­pean part of his tour. Speak­ing of col­lab­o­ra­tors, Styles worked on the al­bum with pro­duc­ers Tyler John­son, who has worked with Tay­lor Swift, Mi­ley Cyrus and Ed Sheeran, and Jeff Bhasker, who has collabo­rated wit h Mark Ron­son and Kanye West, and his friend, Tom Hull, aka Kid Har­poon, who co-wrote Shake It Out for Florence + The Ma­chine. He has also been granted a fairy god­mother: Ste­vie Nicks, who called him her “lit­tle muse” at Fleetwood Mac’s hyped Wembley head­line gig i n J une. “S he’s a l ways there for you,” Styles has said in the past. “She knows what you need: ad­vice, a lit­tle wis­dom, a blouse, a shawl.” Sure.

Got Styles

Any young man raised in the white heat of a boy­band spot­light must be granted the space to find his fash­ion path; Styles has done so with no mis­steps and ex­u­ber­ant plea­sure. Once upon a time, he would sem­a­phore his in­di­vid­u­al­ity with a ban­dana; now, he turns up to a cover interview with Rolling Stone in a white floppy hat, blue denim bell-bot­toms and Gucci shades, his nails coloured pink and green. His favourite trousers, un­til he lost them on the beach, were a pair of mus­tard cor­duroy flares; this week, he wore a Lan­vin sweater vest with a sheep de­sign that sent a co­terie of Lon­don menswear stylists into throes of ec­stasy. He wears flo­ral suits and Cuban heels, ruf­fled, New Ro­man­tic shirts, Charles Jef­frey jump­suits and pussy- bow blouses. It is flam­boy­ant, self-con­sciously Bowie/Jag­ger, and in Gen Z par­lance, “very ex­tra”. His stylist Harry Lam­bert is par­tial to an ex­trav­a­gant col­lar, dra­matic neck­line and a vo­lu­mi­nous trouser.

Be­sides Lam­bert, an­other part of this evo­lu­tion has been his re­la­tion­ship with Gucci’s cre­ative di­rec­tor Michele, who has turned the Ital­ian her­itage brand into the ul­ti­mate post-gen­der lux­ury fash­ion la­bel, the first to merge their menswear and wom­enswear, and dis­patch male mod­els down the cat­walk in dresses and women in suits. A good look for a Gen Z idol.

With the brand

Notably, the brand­ing on this al­bum and its tour art­work is con­sis­tent with this new look Styles. The al­bum cover fea­tures Styles i n white cus­tom- made Gucci bell bot­toms and a Pep­to Bismol-pink shirt, open al­most to the waist, shot by mod-goth Tim Walker with a fish­eye lens (it is Walker’s hand in that S&M glove you can see in the left-hand cor­ner). In the dreamy video for Lights Up he wears a glit­tery suit and sus­penders, in a sort of hal­lu­ci­na­tory ver­sion of Satur­day Night Fever. Into it.

Stand up

Then there’s his voice — not the mu­sic, but the ac­tivism. Even as one-fifth of a boy­band manufac­tured by Cow­ell’s al­go­rithm, he was quick, quippy and itch­ing to go off-mes­sage; but now that he con­trols his own, he is am­pli­fy­ing causes such as Black Lives Mat­ter and End Gun Violence. He wore stick­ers for both on his gui­tar on his last tour, which might sound small, except that photographs of Styles gal­lop around the dig­i­tal world at hy­per­speed. At con­certs, he has waved pride, bi and trans flags, and a Black Lives Mat­ter flag. He once bor­rowed a flag from an au­di­ence mem­ber at a show in Philadel­phia that read, “Make Amer­ica Gay Again”. At a show on his last tour, he de­clared: “If you are black, if you are white, if you are gay, if you are straight, if you are trans­gen­der — who­ever you are, who­ever you want to be, I sup­port you.”

A vo­cal, en­gaged fan­dom of teenage girls minted his mul­ti­mil­lion-pound for­tune; he is loyal and ad­mir­ing of their zeal. “They’re the most hon­est — es­pe­cially if you’re talk­ing about teenage girls, but older as well,” he told Rolling Stone this sum­mer. “They have that bull­shit de­tec­tor. We’re so past that dumb out­dated nar­ra­tive of ‘Oh, these peo­ple are girls, so they don’t know what they’re talk­ing about.’ They’re the ones who know what they’re talk­ing about. They’re the peo­ple who lis­ten ob­ses­sively. They f***ing own this shit. They’re run­ning it.” Ob­vi­ously, he’s a fem­i­nist. “Of course men and women should be equal. I don’t want credit for be­ing a fem­i­nist. I think the ideals of fem­i­nism are pretty straight­for­ward.” An icon is born.

#harry styles #evening standard #15.11.19 #article #stylesupdated #hlsource #hs2 promo #harry #mine

[carrionxcamille]

Ribs of Friendship | Cam, Adam, Cece, & Winn

Timing: Happy hour, June 1st Location: Dell’s Tavern Parties: Camille, Adam- @https://walker-journal.tumblr.com/, Cece- https://thebickedwitchoftherest.tumblr.com/, Winn- https://packsbeforesnacks.tumblr.com/ Summary: An unlikely group get absolutely blasted! At the Sports Bar and get to know eachother over crude jokes and ribs. Just another Totally Normal day in White Crest.

Camille pretty much had a job, finally. Which meant she’d be able to start saving up for a deposit on a flat and could get out of the shitty motel with the vampire neighbors. A reliable supply of hot water, a proper kitchen, her own bedsheets. It was going to be amazing. First, though, she was going to do something spiteful and petty. Jace was going to rot in a prison cell for the rest of his life. There was a Sox game showing this afternoon at a place called Dell’s Tavern — they were baseball, that was all she knew — Camille was going to drink beer, eat ribs, and watch the game. Even though Jace didn’t even know she was alive and would have no idea she was spending her afternoon doing three of his favorite things, it was going to be very satisfying.

She’d been so excited she had even straightened her hair and put on a little makeup for the occasion. Sitting at a stool on the bar with a cool bottle of their cheapest beer waiting for her ribs, Camille was as happy as she’d been in weeks.

“Hey there.” 

Adam sidled into a chair next to Camille. A Sox baseball cap was perched precariously on a mop of the unruly brown hair. Wearing a sleeveless t-shirt with a suggestively shaped pair of baseballs under the phrase, “I’d Hit That,” and a much loved pair of worn jeans, the young man fit in well with the crowd. A lazily jocular edge to his smile hinted that Adam might’ve been pre-gaming well before the first pitch had actually been thrown.  “Enjoying the game?” Adam asked, despite his brown eyes following the soft lines of Camille’s oval face down past her lithe shoulderline, far more intently then anything having to do with baseball. 

Sports bars had to be one of Cece’s favorite places. Not because she enjoyed sports, but because she enjoyed the environment inside of them. The camaraderie, the excessive drinking, the excited energy of the place. Hell, Cece even enjoyed a good bar fight every now and again. She had convinced Winn to go out with her for the night, ensuring him that it was totally his responsibility to pay for the drinks. 

They met up outside of Dell’s. “Looking good, Runaway. I think ditching town gave you some street cred. You’re really nailing that Ponyboy look.” She patted his shoulder endearingly and opened the door into the bar. “How many drinks do you need to tell me about that whole shitshow?”

The only use Winn had for baseball was for metaphors, and even then, they were all played out. But everyone up north crowded around for Sox games, and Winn felt an obligation to go out and mingle (though, really, Cece didn’t have to convince him to drink). Ponyboy? “Took you more for a cowboy gal, Cec. But we’ll find you a nice ponyboy. Ain’t gonna be me, but don’t you worry.” It occurred to Winn, belatedly, she might not be referring to that kind of ponyboy, but he’d take the L. She might get a laugh out of it.

As they walked into Dell’s — where Winn was half-sure he was gaining regular status despite his relative sobriety compared to the rest of the barflys — Winn caught sight of Adam in his element: flirting with a woman who was older than him. (Though, even queer as a three dollar bill as Winn was, he could admit Adam had taste.) “I can tell you ‘bout part of the shitshow,” he said to Cece, “but I think it’ll be much more fun to push ourselves into that shitshow.” Was he about to badly wingman a straight Hunter for a laugh? Absolutely. If Adam couldn’t stick a landing, he didn’t get to stick it in. “C’mon,” he said, hand pushing on Cece’s back as he guided them to the disaster-waiting-to-happen.

It was a long time since Camille had gotten much male attention. Being married to a guy like Jace didn’t exactly do wonders for your self esteem — she knew she wasn’t ugly, but feeling attractive and wanted was markedly different from just acknowledging that you had a pretty face. This kid who sidled up to her at the bar — and wasted absolutely no time letting his eyes wander from her face to her breasts — was what, mid twenties? Sharp jaw, muscular arms. The crude t-shirt was enough of a shock to her system to get her mouth working — almost. “Uh—” Eloquent. “Me? Yeah. I mean, I don’t— y’know, I don’t really follow baseball but it’s— Yeah. It’s good.”

Christ, thankgod his face was nothing like Jace’s, or she might have some heartbreaking flashback to their younger years. His smile had always taken up practically his whole face back then. Camille sipped her beer, trying to process what was happening — what, was he just overly friendly? There were plenty of hot young girls around to chat up. In fact another one just walked in. What was happening? “What about you?” 

Broad shoulders shrugged at the question as Adam’s face beamed in a faintly flushed sunbeam smile. “Happy, Horny, Healthy, the usual,” he assured Camile, before putting one arm on the bar and leaning forward toward her a little. “Hey… so babe,” the young man’s smile and tone softened into a manner of conspiratorial intimacy. Adam’s bottom lip brushed against his upper teeth speculatively as his dark jasper eyes submerged below Camile’s neckline before eventually raising to meet her gaze again. “Maybe you’d be up for…”

“Yo Winn! Oui disaster nipples! Over here! 

The moment was broken instantly as Adam caught sight of someone he knew from the crowd, the footballer’s free arm waving insistently to catch the newcomers attention across the crowd.

“First off, I don’t think you and I are on the same page about Ponyboy at all.” Cece squinted, not sure she even wanted to know at this point. Not until she had more alcohol in her. “Second, I’m equal opportunity. People are lining the streets to get to me. I’m just disinterested.” With a shrug, she eyed the pair across the bar that she assumed Winn was pointing too. “You’re totally changing the subject. But why is Prom King flirting with that grown-ass woman? I’m guessing you know one of them?” As if on cue, the boy started waving his arms in their direction. Bingo. Of course Winn knew the hot jock. 

Cece pushed through the crowd to get to the two, eyeing the both of them suspiciously as she got up to them. She had no idea who either of them were, but was trying to assess the situation here. Did the woman need an out or was she welcoming of the company sidled up next to her? Cece offered a knowing smile to the woman before turning towards the guy. “Excuse me, sir. Don’t you have a science lab or high school playoffs coming up? Can I see some ID?”

“Yeah, I know him. But ixnay on the eavinglay ‘round him, alright? Promise I’ll tell you later,” Winn said. Given Adam’s attempted distance, Winn was almost surprised to see the other man wave. Delighted, but surprised. He sidled in next the other man, wrapping a loose arm around Adam’s shoulder and giving him a shake. Winn spoke loudly, turning the charm and cheese up to their maximum. “Aw, c’mon, Cece. Can’t you see he knows what he’s doin’? He’s shootin’ his shot! And who knows, maybe this lovely lady across from me digs the,” he snorted, remembering Adam’s own term for him that first night, “fuckable boybander vibe.” 

“Winn Woods,” he said, reaching around and in front of Adam to the woman to offer his hand for a shake. “I’m Adam’s gay best,” werewolf, “friend. I can tell you all sorts of,” fake, “secrets about the guy, before you make your decision. And if you pour your drink in his lap, I’ll be there like a real bro to towel him off.” He smirked, winking from behind Adam’s sight at Cece and the other woman. “And Cece, babe, I know you don’t know sports, but playoffs would’ve been, like, a month ago or more.” 

Oh god, that smile. That was Jace all over. The sight of it had made Camille melt, once upon a time. Admittedly it was not ineffective now, she felt her own lips curling up at the corners in a reciprocal smile. She blinked, surprised by the statement — he was… horny? Did people just admit to that these days? What was she meant to say? Luckily, there wasn’t much time for her to worry about what kind of response to offer because he barrelled forward, and she didn’t lean back when he leaned forward.

Would it be so terrible? To flirt a little with some handsome fool at a bar? Now that would really piss Jace off. She wanted to know what she might be up for. Again, though, her chances were dashed when he noticed a couple of friends. Camille shot the woman a wide eyed but bemused glance, trying and failing to stifle a laugh at her quip. He was young, of course, though to Camille the girl did not look much older, and neither did the other man. “Fuckable boybander vibe,” she repeated as she shook Winn’s hand, amused by how accurate of a descriptor it was. 

Very quickly she had all their names — how useful — and almost entirely forgot to introduce herself, lost in trying to keep up with everything Winn was saying. “Camilla W— uh—” Actually, yeah, she didn’t want to stick with Watkins. “Dugar.” Better. She could say Watkins had been her married name, if pressed. “Nice to meet you. All. Not the worst vibe, for the record.” She shot Adam a quick grin, really having no idea what else to do — very out of practice with the flirting. “I can — sorry, if you guys came to hang out I can go sit somewhere else, I don’t want to be in your way.”

“Sure.” Adam made reaching around behind to his back pocket into an excuse to brush an arm close to Camille. He retrieved his wallet and held it out for Cece’s pursal, the contents indicating that he’d turned twenty two on this past January 14th. “I’m legal,” he said absently while leaning forward with his I.D into a none-too-subtle pretense to give the blonde bombshell a once over...and then a second over...and around the third over seeming to remember that evolved homo-sapiens engaged in conversation sometimes. “But if you still want to drag me outta here, rough me up a bit…” He looked up into Cece’s green eyes with a submissive puppyish expression. “Definitely wouldn’t complain.” 

The hunter let out a long whistle at Winn’s statements, the bird-song lilt hinting at a life spent outdoors. “Towelin’ me off...” Adam replied in a thickly affected Tennessee drawl, “when y’ talk all hot and purty like that Mr. Lee,” he continued with a soft playful punch at the man-hip now blocking his way to the ladies. “... why, it nearly flips me ass-up.” 

However Camile’s protestation snapped Adam out of the banter. “Woah, woah Camilla.” He leaned back with both elbows behind him on the bar, craning his neck past Winn. “You’re the star of this party. You been in White Crest long?” 

Ah, the elusive bromance. A tale as old as time and a relationship with weirdly sexual undertones. Cece loved a good bromance. Winn cozied up in the chair next to Adam while Cece still stood between Camille and Adam’s seats. She had to admit, Adam at least had the charming thing going for him. Cece couldn’t decide between rolling her eyes at the dude or flirting with him. “You’re cute.” Cece reached out to pat him on the shoulder. “Make sure to treat me right in your dreams.” 

Apparently, Camille got the wrong idea that the three of them had come to hang out. “I agree with Troy Bolton here. We’re all in this together now. It wouldn’t be any fun without you.” She assured Camille that Adam was right and she should stay with the group. 

Confident that he was alright, Cece found the stool next to Camille and flagged down the bartender. She ordered beer for herself, pointing at the others. “Put in your orders. First round’s on pretty boy over there. Well, the farthest pretty boy,” she said, pointing past Adam at Winn. 

“Mmm, awright, sweetheart,” Winn grumbled, jokingly, into Adam’s ear, letting out an exaggerated groan when the other man ‘punched’ him. He had to admit he was mildly impressed at Adam’s quick turn from joking to… well, about as genuine as Winn was sure the boy could be in public. As Adam tipped his head back, Winn plucked the hat off of his head, throwing it, backwards, onto his own sweep of hair, ruffling Adam’s affectionately. Gotta give the boy a little more tousle if he was hopin’ to impress two women in front of him.

“They’re right,” he said, evenly. “We didn’t come here for this mess,” meaning Adam, “we came here for this mess.” He threw a thumb back at the taps. “And as my darling Cece has pointed out, I’m buyin’. Owe her, taken some of Adam’s for free… and haven’t seen you ‘round these parts, so I figure I’m payin’ it forward.” 

When Cece got the bartender, Winn rolled his eyes. “Beer, Cec? And here I thought you were a classy woman.” Then again, Winn told the bartender to get him ‘whatever,’ so he wasn’t picky or nothin’. Turning his attention to Camille, he smiled, “Picked a wild time to come into town, if you’re new here. I’d promise that the ocean wasn’t always black, but… that would imply that somethin’ wasn’t usually going down. And that,” he said, laughing, “would be the biggest lie I ever told.”

Camille was really having to focus to keep up. Three people was not really a crowd but it felt like it to her, especially with them all chattering away and asking questions. The way they all bounced off each-other made her miss her old friends. By the time she’d died Camille hadn’t really been close with anyone- trying to keep your crumbling marriage a secret could have that effect- but there were a few people from work she’d had this kind of easy back and forth with. She was unsurprised when Adam blatantly checked out the other girl of the group- that was young guys for you, attention span of a goldfish- and she was sure whatever appeal she might’ve held moments ago was now forgotten.

Still if they wanted here to stay… Well, there was no harm right? They were young and loud and here to drink and probably weren’t going to ask anything too invasive. She’d come here to have fun, a group would probably help with that. And more beer definitely would. Camille shuddered at the mention of the black ocean, “um, I’ll just have another one of these.” She told the bartender, lifting up her near empty bottle and draining the last of it. “Got here just over a month ago actually, in the midst of all that mad stuff with the, uh, mimes.” 

God this place was fucking nuts. “Grew up in Bangor though, so I was always hearing crazy stories.” Now she was one of them, she supposed. “Didn’t expect eyeballs out of my damn taps though, I gotta say that one really threw me.” 

“Yeah, fish eyes are used as bait a lot,” Adam said in an amiable baritone that could convey steady normalcy even if a very building they sat in was engulfed in flame. “They do it all the time in Cook’s Bay,” he claimed while making an order of his own. “Fucking crazy that a bunch of bait would get yeeted into the harbor same time as the big oil spill, its friggen Deep Water Horizon all over again. Hope all the fishing crews get compensated once a lawsuit gets through y’know?” 

Like many Hunters, Adam was charged with the preservation of the supernatural world’s secrecy, a delicate balance between making sure that humans were safe from supernatural threats and ensuring that paranormal communities were safe from the witch hunts and hysteria of ages past. A lifetime of assuring people that everything was perfectly normal even as Spawn rampaged through graveyards, churning rips in space-time disgorged eldritch horrors, and children went ‘missing’ in Trow dens had cultivated a warm soothing mien that invited everyone else around him to buy into the banal lie. 

Everything was fine. What a terrible oil spill. Wolves can’t be people. That’s crazy! 

“What made you decide to come to White Crest, Camilla?” 

Either Adam was crazy off his ass or he was purposefully moving away from the conversation of the eyeballs. With Camille’s back turned to her, Cece shot Winn a suspicious glance as if to convery, Who is this dude? He did a pretty good job trying to normalize the whole eyeballs coming out of water pipes though, so if nothing else he was either good at making up falsehoods or way too invested in explaining the supernatural away. 

“How does anyone end up in White Crest?” Cece interjected, accepting her drink from the bartender and taking a gulp of it before continuing, “A bit of bad luck and a dash of poor decision making.” Cece flipped Winn off, “For the record this beer was on special tonight. That’s hella classy.”

“You’d have to be on somethin’ to take that case,” Winn grumbled, and then, because it probably was a smart idea to lie to Camille, “I’m sure the fishers will fight the town for lettin’ off-shore drilling go on like that.” Winn reached around Adam as Camille’s eyes were on the game for a moment and twirled his finger at Cece, an implicit Just go with it. Regardless of the hard-to-explainability of White Crest this week, they couldn’t really lead with “Hi, we’re a witch, a werewolf, and a Hunter, how’re you today?”

“Don’t have to go on the cheap just ‘cause I’m paying, y’all, by all means break the bank.” There was a part of Winn that hated flashing money around, but that part was easily combated by the part of him that hated drinking cheap shit. And the beer on special was cheap shit. He tilted his head at Cece for a moment, considering, and ordered her another drink, something nicer (and, frankly, more alcoholic).

Fish eyes. Right. Camille sighed, aiming an annoyed glance at the sigil on the back of her hand. There was a time when she’d have rationalized it away like that, too. But then she’d come back from the dead and it was hard to ignore that the world was full of strange and terrifying things like re-animated corpses and whatever problem had eyeballs coming out of taps. Maybe their cluelessness was a good thing, she needed some normal in her life. “Right, fish eyes. No wonder it stinks so bad, crazy.”

She nearly choked on the first sip of her new drink when Cece made her comment, grabbing for a napkin to cover her mouth while she cleared her throat and recovered. “I hope not too much poor decision making. I—suddenly needed a new place, but I didn’t want it to be in Bangor because that felt like a step back.” Camille twisted the napkin up in her hands, but despite the tension to her body there was a smile on her face, “I just left my husband.” It was the first time she’d said that out loud, and even if the way they’d take the statement—a divorce—wasn’t totally right, it was close enough. 

A plate of ribs was set down in-front of her and she laughed a little, remembering why she’d come here in the first place. “Ribs, beer, and sports were three of his favorite things. I saw that this place was showing the game and figured I’d come here to spite him.”

“So you're free...niiiice,” was apparently Adam’s sole take away from Camille’s confession. His dark eyes followed the banter between Cece and Winn, letting the resident werewolf dude reach around him to make some random gesture. Winn made a twirling motion at Cece, which Adam didn’t understand the context of. 

Nevertheless, while Winn was doing that, Adam made his own addendum of sticking a finger in his mouth in slow suggestive rhythms for Cece’s edification, before gesturing with his head towards Winn and Camille before making the fingers of one hand frantically hump the other fist. This was concluded with the footballer making a heart to Cece, followed by two thumbs up. 

Confident that this pantomimed proposal of a foursome definitely helped whatever Winn had been trying to say, Adam turned his attention back to Camille as her food arrived. 

“I dunno, poor decisions can be... fun sometimes,” assured Adam with an innocent choirboy smile as he made progress on the drink that’d arrived for him. 

Clearly, Winn wanted Cece to roll with the mundane excuse. She wasn’t going to fight it. She had moved here for a regular life after all. That had all gone to hell in a prada purse about a month into it, but the idea had really been pure. She didn’t plan on ruining that for anyone else. Especially someone as seemingly innocent as Camille. The poor girl had no idea what she had gotten wrapped up in. Winn, Cece, and assumingly Adam weren’t crazy in the supernatural sense, but in a bar? Havoc could ensue. And Camille seemed to not only be caught in the middle of it, but had the spotlight shown down on her. 

Cece stared back at Adam as he… what the hell was he doing? Fingering his mouth? Cece held a confused look on her face before returning the gesture, using her middle finger in its place. He finished off with suggesting a foursome between the group. Admittedly, the company around was pretty attractive. Cece wasn’t denying Adam’s looks, the dude was hella hot. She was even starting to warm up to the guy. Definitely didn’t mean she planned on sleeping with him. “I think I like you Adam, just haven’t decided why yet.”

“Leaving your husband is just about the smartest reason I’ve ever heard someone move to White Crest for and I will drink to that.” The bartender dropped off the second drink that Winn had ordered for her and she winked over at Winn in appreciation, “Thanks babe! In fact, I'll double drink to that.” She raised both glasses and took turns taking a large drink from each. “Well, we need the ribs, then. If we’re going to do this right and really stick it to him.”

Winn listened with a counselor’s patience to Camille’s reasons for moving to White Crest. Something, maybe the way Camille was holding herself, made Winn cock his head. Her heart wasn’t beating faster — at least, not more than could be explained by proximity to Adam’s… everything. And speaking of Adam…

What was he doing? Winn wouldn’t deny mild interest in the way Adam’s mouth wrapped around a finger, and Winn wasn’t… opposed to sleeping outside of his usual range? So long as someone was fucking him with something, he could get off to a blank piece of paper if he tried hard enough. He smirked, rolling his eyes in Cece’s direction as she flipped him off. Good for her. Adam could use the blow to his ego, even if Winn was still half-sure part of his bravado was fake as hell.

But back to the more important company, “I agree with Cece. You’ve got a head start on us, Cam — is it alright if I call you Cam? Before you make any poor decisions, you’ve got to let us help you make a poor decision!” Wait, no. Adam would get the wrong idea. “Buyin’ you a lot of ribs, I mean.”

There was, admittedly, something almost attractive about the crude gestures Adam was making. In a college frat boy sense. He was hot enough to get away with doing stupid stuff. Camille exchanged glances with Winn and Cece. “I know I’ve been out of the loop for a while, but am I supposed to understand what he’s trying to say with all the-” She imitated one ofthe gestures poorly, and that was enough to snap the pieces together in her head. “Oh! Oh- yeah. No, yeah. I get it now. Wow- that’s- hm.”  She shook her head, dispelling the notion entirely. She hadn’t had sex in years, and it’d certainly never been that freaky. “I think I need to warm up a bit before making a decision that poor.”

She slid the plate of ribs a little ways along the bar so the others could grab one if they wanted, “uh- yeah. Cam is fine.” It was closer to her own name, in fairness. She laughed, raising a rib in a mock cheers, “well then, to my ex husband being miserable forever, and making poor decisions.” She gulped down a little beer then took a bite from the rib, grinning.

Adam raised his glass high and let out a loud woop that drew a few glances before the gaming-watching bustle returned to its collective inertia. “To Cam! May her ex get ulcers that make him piss blood in loneliness and may she forget his prick-ass forever!” With that merry invocation of divine justice, Adam added yet more alcohol to his system. 

“So,” Adam pointed to Cece and Winn with his free-hand, purposefully choosing to spare Cam the spotlight for a little bit. “What’ve you crazy hot kids been up to?” 

Cece liked this group, and it totally wasn’t just because of the beer and ribs. Well, it totally wasn’t any more than like half because of the beer and ribs. Camille led the charge, stealing Cece’s heart with an impromptu cheers using her ribs. Damn, Cece loved a good emotional cheers. Adam chimed in with his own addition to the roasting of Camille’s douche of an ex. “Dark, dude. I can drink to that.” Cece grinned, raising one of her glasses and finishing off the beer. She slid the empty glass across the bar and found the drink Winn had ordered for her as a chaser. “Get too into defamation and we may end up hexing the dude.” And if Camille gave Cece anymore reason to, then those hexes may just end up ringing true. 

“Winn here was just taking me out for a night on the town. He owes me.” The two hadn’t really discussed how Winn owed her exactly. The conversation about her tracking his whereabouts hadn’t naturally come up in conversation. “I make him pay a membership fee for my friendship.”

Winn nearly choked on his drink at Adam’s toast, masking his laughter by raising his glass to the rest of the group’s. “Hear, ah, hear?” he tried, voice coming out hoarse from the liquor burning at his throat. He shot Cece a glance that he hoped communicated ‘Don’t hex anybody without Cam’s permission.’ Though, given she was already on her second drink, he figured it would be forgotten by the time it came to actually hex the prick. (If hexes were, like, a real thing?)

“I definitely owe her,” he agreed, rolling his eyes at Adam’s ‘crazy hot kids’ comment. They were both older than him. Like, definitely more emotionally evolved. No matter Winn’s suspicions about Adam’s whole… deal. “I’m truly lucky for her friendship. I need the good karma that pickin’ her drunk ass off the floor nets me.” He gulped down more of his drink, winking across at Cece. “And don’t y’all have, like, a giant television at the house?” he said, nudging Adam. “Your moose brothers not want to watch the Sox? Too busy puttin’ up their socks on doorknobs?” This time, his wink was directed at Cam.

Though it was again a little more crude than the sort of company Camille was used to, she had to say she did not take any issue with Adam’s toast, going as far as to clink her own beer bottle against his before taking a swig. If only she could forget him, wouldn’t that be nice. Her gaze shot to Cece when she mentioned hexing, wondering if she actually meant it, if Cam wasn’t the only one here who knew about the weird supernatural side to White Crest. She even opened her mouth to ask, and then realized they were probably in mixed company and she didn’t want to come off as crazy, so just took another bite out of the rib in her hand.

Perhaps if she got the girl alone some time she could ask about it. In the bathroom or something, girls went to the bathroom in groups right? Yeah. “Oh god, socks on doorknobs?” Camille laughed, shaking her head. “People still really do that? I miss college.” Jace had done the whole frat thing of course, and she’d been in a sorority too, she could remember how damn near impossible it was to get time alone together. “That’s why you came here all on your lonesome, huh?” She teased, nudging Adam’s arm, “got something to prove to your frat pals.” 

“Yes we still do that,” assured the guy who lived in a house where socks and kinds of things were put on various types of knobs. “And I’m with a client actually,” Adam protested at Winn and Camille’s insinuations of being a randy stag goodnaturedly. “I’m here if they needs me,” 

Adam nodded to a figure seated directly across the bar from him on a couch. The ‘client’ was dressed in a full jacket with gloves, hood, hat, and sunglasses despite the heat, no skin showing. Gloved fingers, six on each hand, drummed absently on the client’s knees as their gaze drifted across the crowd in the manner of someone overwhelmed but nevertheless content to observe the jovial chaos in silence. 

“But at sundown I can be with whoever wants me,” Adam noted with a smirk to Camille before purposefully diverting the conversation away from his client. “So, you’re here now. Found work yet?” 

Two drinks in and Cece wasn’t mad about the company she had found herself in tonight. She wanted to argue Winn’s point about her drunk ass, but considering they met when he helped get her drunk ass home one night, she decided against it. Clearly he wasn’t letting her live that one down anytime soon. At least until Cece returned the favor. Problem was, she never turned down a drink. She may not leave the place stumbling off her ass but she was rarely sober enough to be the responsible one in a group. 

Adam had clients, huh? Cece could only assume it was a sex thing. At least until Adam pointed the client out and Cece shot them a strange look, “Hmm. That’s a weird kink.” She muttered. She caught that bartender’s attention and tapped at her empty glass, smiling when he nodded his confirmation that he had received the message. “I dig the whole serial killer vibes they put off. Very Jack the Ripper.” Cece took a drink from her new glass and listened as Cam dished more details about her life.

Client? Winn looked at the figure Adam had nodded to, considering the other man’s word choice. Sundown. In the loud thrum of the bar, it was hard to hear whether or not the client had a heartbeat, if Adam was helping out someone in the way he’d helped Lucas. For all the younger man talked about conflicts of interest, he had… far more supernatural friends than particular enemies, Winn felt. But now wasn’t the time to argue with Adam over his calling in life — especially not in public. Adam hadn’t talked to Cam for any reason other than his babe senses, Winn was sure. Otherwise, why would he have attempted to cover up the town’s… weirdness.

Cece was already on her third drink, so Winn felt he had to up the ante. Neither of them were driving home, right? Unlike the night they’d met, Winn could, you know, call a damn Uber. He motioned the bartender as he came back with Cece’s next drink, mumbling “Strong.” with a wink to the, admittedly pretty, man. Was Winn (probably) hanging out with a bunch of straight folks? Yes. Did that mean he couldn’t distract himself from the whole… Noah situation? Absolutely not.

Okay, Camille had a hell of a lot of questions about that client. Not that she had any right to ask them, or really any desire to know the answers — there was probably nothing good to be said about a guy dressed like that. Who kept their gloves on inside? Well, people who wanted to hide their hands. She tugged at the sleeve of her shirt to tug it down over that ugly sigil, and wondered if she should become a gloves person too. She hadn’t been here long, so it wouldn't be hard to establish them as part of her style. Cam forgot about the guy happily enough when Adam diverted attention back to her. “So the spell is broken at midnight? Would that make you Cinderella or the fairy godmother?” she teased, taking a drink. “Day manager at that theme park. Cryptic— no, Cryptid Corner.” Cam shrugged. “Not exactly the dream, but it pays better than being a shop assistant or something. I mean I just got it and I’m still on, like, a trial period, but I’m sure I’ll be fine. What about you two?” She gestured towards Cece and Winn. “Now that we know Adam works as a full time weirdo watcher.”

“They’re from outta town,” was the only detail Adam supplied in explanation of his client’s nature to those gathered. He definitely wasn’t inclined to explain just how much of an understatement that was. But thus far the “guest” to this dimension had abided by the deal to not absorb anyone’s biomass, which was mean that Adam could spend his evening flirting and generally get his boorish man-child act on instead of lowering White Crest’s tourist cred by filling a sightseer full of holes. 

“I mean… I can put on slippers and wings if that’s what you’re into,” he assured Camille with an easy smile. “Cryptid Corner… Is that the one with the mothman and all that?” he asked before the questions turned to Cece and Winn.

“I’d actually be quite interested in you in slippers and wings.” Cece shrugged, taking a drink from her ridiculously strong drink. She knew she had Winn to blame for that. But as long as she didn’t have to drive home tonight, she didn’t really care how much she drank. “Yeah, I think so. Supposed to have all those weird attractions. I think I talked to the owner of that place once.” Cece remembered chatting about the amusement park. It seemed like her scene, terrifying and exhilarating. Though she hadn’t had the chance to get out there yet. “Guess I’ll really have to check it out now that I have a friend that works there.”

“I work for the Medical Examiner’s office.” Cece explained, “I’m a toxicologist. Which is just a fancy word to say that I test urine and blood I collect from dead people.” Cece joked. She turned to Winn, suddenly realizing that she didn’t actually know what the hell he did. Aside from modeling in a past life.  

“There’s an amusement park in town?” Winn said, wondering aloud. “Jeez, for Smalltown, USA, this place sure does have everythin’.” Weird attractions? Weird for White Crest? Christ, what kind of horror show was Cam working at?

“Oh, me?” Well, this was awkward. What did he do? Oh Christ, did Winn have hobbies? Friends that weren’t werewolves or… well, Hunters? “Um, it’s the off-season, but I coach the high school team. For hockey.” He scrambled through his brain, searching for something, anything. “I modeled?” Wait, shit, not that. “Um, in Europe mostly.” Worse, somehow. Winn could almost feel the smirks building on Adam and Cece’s faces. “I got kicked out of school today, so I’m, uh, a bit… loose, with the job-slash-life-thing, right now.” He downed his entire drink in one gulp, gesturing to the bartender to get him another drink, now. Please.

“Only if you can actually wave a magic wand and change my life.” Camille muttered in response to Adam’s quip, swivelling a little on her stool to order another beer. She should be careful really, because she didn’t know this guy and her tolerance wasn’t what it had been in college. But screw it. If anyone could go through what she had and not crave being a little bit drunk, then they were probably nuts to begin with. “Yeah.” She perked up again with a new bottle in her hand. “Yeah, mothman and all that shit, terrible uniforms. Don’t get too hyped up about visiting, it’s nothing special.”

Dead people? Ah, shit. “So do you, uh— do you know Regan?” She toyed nervously with a lock of hair, hoping to god this wasn’t some strange set up because the doctor had spilled her secrets. She didn’t seem like the gossip type, but still. “I— met her. While I was out for a walk a few days ago.” That was fine, this was a small town, people were friendly enough to introduce themselves. Kicked out of school? Camille’s concerned teacher instinct kicked in, and she leaned across a little to get a better look at Winn. He didn’t seem lazy or like a troublemaker or anything — true her expertise was in much younger kids, but there might still be something she could do. “What happened? Did they give you a fair chance before kicking you out? Temporary expulsions? Reports, guidance counselor?” 

Resisting the urge to answer Camile’s quip with the insistence that his ‘wand’ was indeed magic and could change lives, Adam continued drinking but briefly frowned in thought at the mentions of a Medical Examiner led on into Regan being brought up. While it was always possible that this was a completely different ME office with a different Regan, Adam had a suspicion that this Dr. Regan Kavanagh, the world’s most confusing hunter-dating Banshee materialist.

Winn dropped the fact that he was a male model in Europe, causing Adam to decide that he wasn’t nearly intoxicated enough and order another drink. Sex-canyon V-line wolfmen coaching high school hockey like it was one of those sappy sports movies wasn’t something he wanted to process sober. 

Cece’s eyes narrowed towards Winn. He hadn’t mentioned anything about the college to her yet. Not enough alcohol yet, clearly. Luckily, Cam seemed to have asked the questions for the group. Not that Cece thought it was her business to get involved in Winn’s personal life. But she was a big fan of a little chaos every now and again. She could storm the campus and make a few heads spin. For funsies. 

“Oh, you met my boss then.” Cece smirked, rolling her eyes and shaking her head. “Bucket of fun isn’t she?” From the looks of it, more people knew about the Doc than Cece thought. Apparently, despite Cece’s assumptions, the woman was pretty popular in town. But if Regan referred to any of these people as a friend before breaking down and accepting Cece’s friendship Cece wears going to dive off a bridge. “I love that girl to death, but she takes life a bit too seriously for my tastes.” Cece followed suit with Winn, downing her new drink in one gulp and raising the empty glass towards him in triumph. “Hell yeah! That’s the kind of energy I’m looking for tonight! Guys, I think we’re going to have some fun.”

“I am not drunk enough to talk about Regan Kavanagh nor my educational drama,” Winn said in his smoothest, most honeyed voice. “And we’ve got all the time in the world for me to come clean. So long as you don’t clean out my wallet.” He winked, slapping Adam on the back again. “I’m sure the golden boy and I can show y’all ladies a nice time. Though not that nice, eh Adam?” He elbowed the other man, trying to direct the conversation off of him — and Regan for that matter.R

After all, he hadn’t spoken to Regan since they’d sent that CVS on 3rd to a hell dimension. The less Winn thought about that, the better. Oh yeah, he was going to get blasted tonight. He deserved it. No one was driving home, they were pissing off an Uber driver with four different locations, loud chatter, and absolutely no filter like God and Stonewall intended. He may be the only queer person here, tonight, but it was Pride Month and he knew how to work a party, even in the straightest possible place. First thing? “Bartender!” he called, loud and long and stupid, “I need, uhhhhh, a drink for every percentage point you want me to tip you.” Hell yeah. Time to get stupid.

#chatzy #adam cece winn #adam #cece #winn

[anarcoqueer1994]

Andi Mack but absolutely no one is both cis and het

So I loved this idea but got overwhelmed trying to think about squeezing in all the headcannon ideas I have for each character and their gender and sexuality and having it flow well in a single story. So these are a list of my headcannons for each character. I pretty much already picture ever character as either not cis or not straight, or both. Every once in a while Buffy gets straight, cis rights but not often. Anyways, if there is anything particularly interesting I may expand it into a story. I know alot is pretty well established but I needed to collect my thoughts into one list.

Please ignore typos, I'm running on stress and sleep deprivation.

Andi

• Pansexual/pan-romantic, cis girl, she/her

• She and Buffy got that serious pan/bi solidarity. (More on that later)

• In love with her amazing girlfriend, Amber. But both Amber and Buffy were ready to fight anyone who tries to erase her pan identity just bc her SO is a girl.

• Literally Amber almost got into a fist fight with a girl who was insisting Andi was a lesbian even when she was corrected.

• Reminds people constantly that Pan and Bi are not always interchangeable and you should always respect the labels a person asks for.

• She, Libby, and Walker did everyone's makeup and/or face paint for their first PRIDE.

Buffy

• Demi-Bisexual/bi-romantic, cis girl, she/her

• Literally the reason she fell for Marty started with the fact that he was such a good friend. Also she thought he was really cute but will never admit it

• Is tired of trolls online belittling bi-girls validity, especially bi girls in relationships with men.

• Has a shirt that says "My sexuality is not your fetish."

• Loves Marty so much but is tired of justifying her bisexuality to both straight people and gay people.

Cyrus

• Homosexual/Homo-romantic, Cis Guy, He/him

• Definitely a theater gay. Like you can't tell me that he did not listen to "I'm not that Girl" from Wicked constantly when he thought TJ and Kira were dating.

• Literally makes gay puns constantly.

• He and Amber founded Grant's Queer Alliance. Straight, cis folks could be in it but didnt want them in the name like GSAs because straight people don't needed to be centered to be an ally

• Accidentally chaotic

• Ships Ryan and Chad

• Is a Tumblr gay

Jonah

• Heterosexual/Aromantic, Cis-Guy, he/him

• He loves making out but is not a fan of the whole heavy romance emotions

• People tell him constantly that he will feel those feelings someday when he meets the "right person".

• He disagrees.

• "Why can't it just be fun?" He has literally no interest at all in being in a romantic relationship.

• Like at all.

• He is happy with and values his platonic relationships and does not want more than that.

TJ

• Homosexual/Homo-romantic, Trans-Guy, He/him

• He was so stressed out when he realized that not only was he trans, but he is also gay.

• Built up emotional wall and mean persona to let everyone know that he was definitely a super masculine guy.

• He told Amber he was a boy when he was 5 years old, so she at 7 years old, snuck the scissors from their parents' room and chopped off his hair.

• His whole family has been so supportive.

• Cyrus was the 2nd non-Kippen to know he was trans, after Reed.

• Reed was his first crush because in kindergarten Reed kissed TJ on the cheek. That was his "first kiss." The crush eventually went away when he realized he just really wanted Reed as his best friend.

• TJ's mom helped him pick out safe binding options once puberty started. His mom also got him hormone therapy starting pretty early in his teen years to minimize the effects of puberty. He is super grateful.

• Always chaotic.

• Uses "I'm gay" as an excuse for anything.

• Made out with Cyrus in front of some shitty evangelical preacher protesting at PRIDE.

• Cant even picture ever dating a girl and has no idea how Cyrus ever thought he was straight.

Amber

• Homosexual/Homo-romantic, Cis Girl, She/her

• Sapphic queen

• Is overwhelmed by how pretty girls are

• Loves Britney Spears

• Probably too good for you.

• Is ready to ruin anyone's life if they say anything homophobic or transphobic to her girlfriend(Andi), Best Friends(Cyrus and Iris) or her little brother. (TJ)

Marty

• Heterosexual/Hetero-romantic, Trans Guy, He/him

• Runs fast to outrun that dysphoria.

• His family was not supportive like TJ's but TJ and his family have his back.

• Unsafe binding methods until TJ forced him to be safer

• Big dumb boy energy

• Is so proud of his girlfriend all the time.

• At a track meet, some asshole guy from another school kept telling Marty to go run with the girls because there is no way he can keep up with "real" guys.

• Marty beat every guys time and won in both events he participated in: Sprinting and Long Distance.

• He still can't believe how lucky he is to have Buffy as a girlfriend.

Libby

• Pansexual/pan-romantic, cis girl, she/her

• Attracted more towards fem folx but she has dated both fems and mascs.

• Polyamorous

• She and Walker are currently dating and are the cutest SAVA couple.

• Her other partner is Iris. They met through Andi and Amber. At Andi's 16th birthday, both Iris and Libby were there and they clicked right away.

• She was very open to Walker about this and they were so supportive.

• Best aesthetic

Walker

• Pansexual/pan-romantic, non-binary, they/them

• Polyamorous

• Obviously with Libby

• Recently broke up with their other partner so only dating Libby right now.

• Loves to wear androgynous, slightly more masc. clothing. As they gets older, they are getting more daring in their feminine clothing elements though

• They can't picture just feeling like one set in stone gender.

• Has days where they gets a little dysphoric about their body but has other

• If one more boomer says "They" is plural, so help me god.

Iris

• Homosexual/Homo-romantic, trans Girl, She/her

• She and Amber became friends in the third grade when a mean guy called her freak for wearing a dress to school. The guy said "Boys don't wear dresses." And she started crying and saying she was a girl. Amber saw him laughing at her so she kicked him in the not so nice parts and She and Iris have been friends ever since.

• She finally feel right when she is with Libby. She, herself is not polyamorous but is fine with Libby having other partners.

• Realized she was a lesbian about a day into dating Cyrus but wanted to try to be straight.

• Did not work.

• Literally the sweetest.

• She and Walker actually love playing video games together even when Libby is not around.

Reed

• Bisexual/Bi-romantic, cis boy, he/him

• Loves to flirt... with everyone

• Used to have a crush on TJ

• Even though he and TJ aren't friends anymore, he would never out TJ as trans bc that crosses a line.

• Has dated like half the school

• Will ruin your life and not give a fuck

• He made out with this cheerleader behind the bleachers and literally an hour later made out with her "straight" boyfriend

• Literally loves chaos

Gus

• Asexual/aromantic, genderqueer, he/him/she/her/they/them

• Really only wants friendships

• Pronouns dont matter to him but will alway respect yours

• Doesn't like to be touched at all.

#andi mack #tj trans #buffy #marty trans #bi buffy #cyrus goodman #jonah back #gus #walker #iris #libby

[thenightling]

The Dodged Bullet

Warning: This is deliberately bad!

The dodged bullet:  

The following is the horrific notion of what would have happened if The CW, Fox, or Syfy adapted Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman instead of Netflix.   This is going to poke fun of common tropes of Fox and CW shows.  See if you can spot them all.

I am going to deliberately write this very, very badly.

             The generically attractive young man in his early-twenties walked toward the crime scene.  He wore a long leather jacket, designer sneakers, expensive brand-name jeans, and a stylish and perfectly fitted black polo style shirt under the jacket. It was rumpled but just so as to hint at what a great body he had under it.  He had thick, dark brown hair.  Brown eyes, a smoldering gaze and a dazzling smile.  He’s Caucasian and generically attractive.  He’s thin but not rake thin, more like sexy male model thin.   He’s got muscle tone.  

           At the moment he looked stoic, hands resting in his pockets.  He crosses the yellow crime scene tape without anyone stopping him.  No one questions his presence but he is not invisible. This is “grounded” in reality, folks.  

           The Sandman solves crimes!  The Sandman is a private investigator with a secret. He is a real Sandman!  Hidden in his jacket is a leather pouch which will probably get used maybe once or twice an episode (budgetary reasons).   And he gets confused by certain social cues and pop culture references but otherwise he’s just a generic hot guy.

           He’s probably portrayed by a Tom Mison type. He might be American. There’s an English accent but it’s so slight (so hidden by Americanisms) that it’s almost undetectable.   He approaches the pretty, ninety-pound, college age female detective with perfect, blond hair.   She looks up at him.  

           “Hey, Murphy.” She says in a friendly tone.  Yes, Murphy is his alias. She thinks he’s just eccentric and thinks he’s The Sandman but he gets results!  

           “Detective Walker.” He smiled with obvious affection. He crushes on her, pines for her. But she mustn’t ever know the truth. It is forbidden for one of his kind to be with a mortal.  Even if she is a Vortex.  And her great power may one day destroy the world…  or save it!  That’s the real reason he was here, to watch her. He had never expected to fall in love with her…

The show has almost no scenes in The Dreaming and when there are it’s about 90% CG over green screen, like the Enchanted Forest sets of Once Upon a Time, or the under-whelming Hell of Lucifer.  There’s probably a throne room with a starry night sky behind it, and an under-whelming “vast” library on par with Belle’s library in Once Upon a Time that will be shown very rarely.

           “We’ve got another one.”  She said gravely.  “Eyes torn out.  Pretty girl. Whoever this creep is- this predator must be stopped!”   The implication here is the victims are all damsels who have been targeted by an evil man targeting them for misogynistic reasons.  But don’t worry!  The show is totally not sexist!   Detective Rose Walker kicks ass!   And in season four she’ll be raising her own long-lost little brother!  Even though it’ll take her at least five seasons to learn Murphy’s secret (if she ever does).  

           “I thought the ‘me too’ movement would have at least reduced some of this.” She said with a shake of her head in disappointment at the world.

           The line of dialogue doesn’t actually really make sense under easy scrutiny.  Why would “Me too” actually make a serial killer reconsider his life choices?  Oh, well, the audience doesn’t have enough time to question it.

           “Me too?”  The adorable, awkward, pretty “Murphy” questions.

           “Boy!  Where have you been?  In a cave?”            “Actually I was trapped inside a prison cell for a hundred and five years and before that I resided in another dimension.”

           She rolls her eyes.  “Not this again.   Tell me you can at least figure something out with your ‘Dream powers’” she said cynically.   He might have been insane and socially inept but he got results!

           Morpheus knelt down next to the body and placed his hands on the corpse. There isn’t even any SFX for this. He’s just sensing something.  He grunts in a sexy portrayal of sexy CW level pain.  

           “What? What is it?”

           “I think I know who did this…”

           “Who?”

           “Corinthian…”

             (Opening credits here.  Maybe the opening riff of Enter Sandman by Metallica.  No, wait, Fox and CW can’t afford that.   It’s Mr. Sandman by the Charlottes!  It kills the mood but everyone knows the song.  You’ll be sick of it by episode five if you weren’t already.  And it will get a LOT of use since the song is cheap / practically public domain.)

           The next scene is not present day.  It’s a flashback.  And by flashback I mean a hastily put together set in Vancouver Canada.  It’s probably someone’s private stables being passed off as a medieval village.  No, wait. Its eighteenth century.  There’s a sexy other character wearing slightly anachronistic style sunglasses hiding his eyes (No CG here, the production team figures the glasses are enough).  In fact his eyes might not even be weird at all. He just likes sunglasses!  There, that’s better, no wasted money here.   He’s wearing a badly fitted white wig over white hair.  

           “My king,” the sunglassed man says with a bow. We have to be blunt for our easily distracted audience, so there’s the reminder that this is the dream king. “Thank you for letting me accompany you to the waking world.  There are such delicious things here.”

           “Yes, the food is rather pleasant.” Morpheus replies. His costume is decently fitted but obviously borrowed from another show, possibly a left over from Buffy The Vampire Slayer.  Those props and some period costumes still get use.  Isn’t Morpheus adorably oblivious, though?

           Morpheus is wearing a dark blue frock coat and lace. His trousers are exceptionally tight to show off the actor’s perfect ass.

           The Corinthian’s costume is cream colored. There was a behind the scenes fight and as small victory for the one crew member who actually read Neil Gaiman’s The Sandman in getting the cream outfit.  Others working on the show wanted the costume to be black to make it more obvious he was the bad guy.        

           An attractive, tall, black man (probably American), under the age of thirty, is behind Morpheus.   This is his loyal manservant, Lucien.  But it’s totally not racist making the dreaming librarian / butler black when the show hasn’t had any black characters yet.  No, it’s inclusive!  

           The attractive black man speaks.  “My Lord, I think he intends to do harm to the mortals here.”

           “Nonsense, Lucien. I’m certain it’s fine.”

           The Corinthian wandered away from his master and he soon drags off attractive young female into an alley, hand over her mouth.   No, The Corinthian isn’t gay anymore in this version.   But it’s okay.  Hob Gadling, Morpheus’ immortal friend (who now runs a bar for some reason) is gay!  He’s very gay.  In fact that’s the extent of his entire personality.  But isn’t this diverse and inclusive?!   And there’s no more problematic gay nightmare, even though in the original comics The Corinthian gets uncreated and the second Corinthian is a relatively decent guy for a nightmare.  

           After some persuasion Morpheus finally listens to Lucien and walks down into the alley.   He stops in his tracks when he sees The Corinthian has killed the girl and his licking his fingers, having obviously already eaten her eyeballs (gotta keep that TV-14 rating!)   He lets out a gasp.  “Corinthian, what have you done?”

           We cut back to present day and “Murphy” is walking into the bar owned by his friend, Hob Gadling . Hob sees him and smiles. “Murph, oh, honey, you look like Hell! Come sit down and tell me all about it.   You know I love juicy gossip.” He says in a naisly, lisping voice.

Imagine this scene was written by some very straight guy whose only exposure to gay people were 1990s Will and Grace reruns.  

           Hob places a shot glass in front of Morpheus and Morpheus downs it quickly. “Have you seen Matthew?”

           Matthew was Morpheus’ straight human friend and roommate.  He had learned Morpheus’ secret in the pilot episode when Morpheus rescued him from a car accident using his dream magick.   Ha!  And you thought we’d have talking birds in this thing. Lol!  No!  Grounded, remember?

           “Matt?  Oh, sweetie, you can do better than him.  I keep telling you, he’s just not your type.”

           Morpheus raises an eyebrow but says nothing about the implication about his sexual identity.  There will be a LOT of queer baiting on this show without confirmation in regard to his sexuality.  

             “I need to talk to him.   One of my nightmares is loose in the city.”  You can tell this was written by a New Yorker because they take for granted “The City” to mean New York.  

           “One of your Nightmares?   Why couldn’t it be one of those sexy wet dreams?”  Get it?  Because if the character’s gay he has to always be horny!!!  Ha-freakin’ –ha.  

(Please know I don’t actually feel this way. I’m mocking bad TV writing.  This whole thing is a spoof.)    

           There’s an awkward pause intended for the viewers to laugh.

           “I don’t believe any water nymphs have escaped The Dream dimension.” Morpheus replied in confusion.

He calls it The Dream Dimension in the show because “The Dreaming” didn’t sound hip enough according to some executive.

“I’m afraid it’s The Corinthian.  So now I have two problems.”

Hob nodded sympathetically.  “The detective you might have to kill…”

“And now this.”   This is an idiot proofed recap for people turning on the show late or just watching it in passing while doing other things or playing on their phone.  CW does this sort of in-story forced, shoe-horned exposition all the time.

The episode plays out a little bit like an episode of Lucifer mashed into an episode of True Blood.

While they’re trying to find the killer, Detective Rose Walker meets Murphy’s roommate, Matthew, and the two hit it off while chatting about Murphy’s weirdness.  They decide to start to date.   As Morpheus has feelings for Rose that he won’t admit to this causes a strain between him and Matthew Raven (There’s that bird reference!  What?  That should be Lucien’s last name?  Naw!)  And between him and Rose Walker.  

Morpheus lashes out rather than admit to what he is truly angry at and he and Matthew argue over something petty and this leads to recovering alcoholic Matthew to start drinking again as sad music begins to play.  

Morpheus eventually finds The Corinthian and is forced to destroy him.  He had to kill his own creation so he is kneeling in angst crying prettily while the sand left over from the uncreation slides through his fingers.  Some new female cover of Queen’s Who Wants to live Forever? Is playing in the background.  The original version is “too old” and too expensive for use. So here’s a very generic sounding cover done in a style that makes it blend in with every other pop song played during the forty five minute mark of a CW show’s run time (including commercial breaks).  

           The song plays as we cut to Matthew drinking alone sexily in an alley.  He’s sweaty and wet, but he just looks like a wet fashion model.   Morpheus is sexy crying over the sand that was the Corinthian, and Rose going to sleep prettily in her bed, no bed head here.  Oh, and she sleeps in perfect makeup!  There’s no scene where she even remotely looks like she’s out of makeup.

 She’s having strange dreams but they look pretty mundane.  Like real-world mundane.  It’s her living room set that we probably saw a few minutes ago, just dimmer lighting and some haze to make it clear this is a dream.  Because even with a show about The Dream Lord, dreams have to have an old fashioned camera fringe haze.  Murphy is there with his back to her.  He looks sad.  He turns to look at her and she gasps.   She sees a star (lense flare) from Murphy’s eyes in the dream as he looks at her in surprise like he wasn’t expecting her to see him.  She wakes up with a gasp, and everyone in her apartment building also wakes up at the same time, signifying that their dreams were connected.

And so ends what was probably the third episode of CW (or Fox’s) The Sandman.  

And that is pretty much how CW or Fox would have done The Sandman.

#The Sandman fan fiction #The Dodged Bullet

[boonitx]

okay, I’m just gonna say this because I can’t believe the level of FAKE going on.

1. blaming tyrus stans for the friendom not being as “peaceful” as it was at first when the only reason there’s discourse is because jyrus stans insist on treating them like they’re at fault for everything wrong ever on AM? 

2. saying  there was “no build up” to Cyrus crush on Jonah fading or that it was “out of nowhere” when there had been lots of posts about how “it’s like Cyrus doesn’t even like Jonah anymore!” for WEEKS before. like really, I wish they had done things differently but if Cyrus really doesn’t like Jonah anymore, can you blame him? homeboy hasn’t really been spending as much time with him as he did in season 1 and he has seen him pretty much beg Andi to stay with him, and even if we all see how messy jandi is imagine being Cyrus and realizing that even with all the messiness going on Jonah would rather be with Andi than him anyway? yikes 

3. this thing about suddenly calling TJ “some guy who came out of nowhere” now that it’s more likely HE becomes Cyrus love interest and endgame relationship and that this is enough reason for said relationship and by result Cyrus’s storyline losing importance when TJ has pretty much the same screentime if not more than Walker but somehow, wandi is way better and makes more sense than jandi. Walker, a supportive character. Who just now appeared and hasn’t had that much screentime. Is better for Andi than Jonah and Andi should drop Jonah immediatly even tho she liked Jonah way before Cyrus did. But TJ? he’s an extra who appeared 3 seconds in the whole season so he doesn’t matter. a relationship with him would drag Cyrus and his storyline to oblivion. 

4. everyone treating Joshua, a 16 year old actor like he was in the first march for queer rights but now that Cyrus doesn’t like Jonah, he’s some kind of judas and sold out the lgbt community to the devil ??? leave him the fuck alone. he didn’t lead you on, he literally tried his hardest to stay neutral and say nothing but you guys insisted on asking time and time again about jyrus/walrus/tyrus, don’t make it his fault because it isn’t. it’s even worse if you’re older than him and trying to take it out in a child you should know better.

5. acting like Cyrus’s storyline is about his crush on Jonah? it isn’t btw. just because he doesn’t like Jonah anymore doesn’t mean his character is done for, he’s more than that and more more than his sexuality too. he hasn’t had that much of an actual plot but we can hope and wait, maybe this sets up for more personal growth on his part. and he’s still pretty much gay and he still gets a endgame boyfriend, nobody is queerbaiting, people can like more than 1 person in their life, they’re in middle school, 13 years old, jandi isn’t even endgame either since the series is still going.

6. just because Cyrus said he doesn’t like Jonah anymore doesn’t mean nothing can happen? Andi said the same like 3 times or more, even to Jonah’s face and guess who still likes Jonah. spoiler alert: Andi. MAYBE he thinks he’s over Jonah, MAYBE he’s trying to lie to himself because he thinks it’s hopeless. (even worse now that it seems Buffy likes Jonah too) and maybe when time passes they end up together at the end, it’s a cliche move and we all seen it, people who liked or dated at the beginning of a series, broke up or moved on but ended up together anyway? ie jake saying he moved on from his crush and going out with another girl but still marrying amy at the end in b99. ross and rachel breaking up and getting together several times until staying together for real in friends. it happens a lot.

7. again about the building up on Cyrus not liking Jonah (in case he really doesn’t anymore) just because you see Cyrus interactions with TJ as platonic doesn’t mean they are. They could be. Or they could not. They could be what made Cyrus realize some stuff about his feelings for Jonah. just because you don’t like certain developments doesn’t erase them or takes out their importance. if you care about Cyrus storyline you should be paying attention to everything he does because it is part of his character and story.

8. if you don’t want to watch AM after all this, it’s totally your call, you literally owe shit to the show, nobody is keeping you here and if they try to guilty trip you don’t listen, everyone watches the show for their own reasons and if yours aren’t there anymore then say no more and just drop it, but be aware that this doesn’t give YOU the right to shit on Joshua, Terri, and other fans. you are responsible for your actions regadless of your feelings.

9. even if Cyrus doesn’t like Jonah anymore. even if Cyrus does end up getting together with TJ. it doesn’t mean anything ? you can still ship jyrus there’s literally nothing stopping you, fandoms exist for that, make your fanart, write your fanfics. i get how it feels, i’m still bitter about sasuke and naruto and it has been YEARS. tyrus stans had been shipping them even tho lots of them were sure jyrus would be the endgame. there’s people who still ship ambi or muffy. you do you. 

#andi mack #cyrus goodman #jonah beck #tj kippen #buffy driscoll #just my opinion #i ship tyrus but really nothing is keeping you from shipping jyrus regardless of what happened

[bonkybornes]

The Road So Far: Phantom Traveler Pt.2

"Thank you for taking our survey." Sam said, "And if you do plan to fly, please remember your friends at United Brittania Airlines. Thanks." He hung up the phone with a sigh. "That takes care of Blaine Sanderson and Dennis Holloway, they're not flying any time soon." Working Man played in the background as the two spoke, Dean keeping his eyes on the road.

"So our only wild card is Amanda Walker, the flight attendant." Dean stated, praying to whatever God may exist that they wouldn't have to get on a plane.

"Right, her sister said that Amanda's plane leaves at eight tonight, it's her first night back on the job." Dean internally groaned, he was completely screwed.

"Just our luck. Call Amanda again, see if we can catch her." He told his brother, gripping the wheel nervously.

"I've tried like four times, I left voicemails but she's not responding. Dean, this is a five hour drive, even with you behind the wheel." He pointed out.

"We'll make it." Dean insisted, pressing down on the gas pedal.

~

Sam frantically looks around as they enter the airport, hoping to find some information on the flight, "There! It's boarding in thirty minutes." The fear grew quickly in Dean's chest.

"Alright, we still have some cards to play. Where's a phone?" He muttered, spotting one a few feet away. He picked up the receiver and talked to the secretary, "Hi, gate thirteen? I'm trying to contact Amanda Walker on flight 424, she's a flight attendant." Sam desperately hoped this would work, he never liked lying to get things, even when it was necessary. "Hi this is Doctor James Hetfield from St. Francis Memorial Hospital, we have a Karen Walker here?" Dean covered his face with his hand, a headache forming.

"Karen?" Amanda wondered.

"Yes, she got in a minor car accident. No serious injuries but-"

"Wait, that's- that's impossible!" She exclaimed, "I just got off the phone with her." Shit. Dean thought.

"W-What?"

"Five minutes ago, she was at home cramming for a final. Who is this?" She said suspiciously.

"Uh, well there must be some mistake." He tried his best to keep his composure, failing miserably.

"And how would you even know I'm here?" The gears turned in her head. Sam snuck around to the other side of Dean to listen, "Is this one of Vince's friends?" Dean licked his lipe, getting into character.

"Guilty as charged." He lied easily.

"Unbelievable."

"He's really sorry." At this point Dean was just pulling things out of his ass and hoping he wouldn't have to go any higher than the ground.

"Well tell him to mind his own business and stay out of my life." She gritted her teeth.

"Wait! Come on, you gotta see the guy! Really, he's a mess. It's- It's pathetic." He bullshitted.

"Really?"

"Yeah, totally." His face was screwed up in concentration. Amanda sighed on the other side of the phone.

"Just, tell him to call me when I land. I have to go." She softened. Panic took over his voice, but she was already hanging up the phone.

"Dammit! So close." Dean exclaimed. Sam sighed shortly.

"Alright, time for plan B." He declared, "We're getting on that plane." Dean widened his eyes, the panic showing clearly now.

"Woah, wait! Just hang on a second. There's gotta be another way!" A nervous laugh left his lips.

"Dean, if we're right, that plane is gonna crash. It's got over a hundred passengers on it!" Sam argued.

"You're right."

"Okay, I'll go get tickets, you get stuff out of the trunk, whatever will make it through airport security." Dean looked to the side nervously, "You okay?"

"Not really." He admitted.

"What is it?" Sam rushed, they didn't have time for this.

"I kind of have this problem with-" Dean trailed off.

"With flying?"

"Yeah." Sam gave him a bitch face.

"You're not serious?"

"Well it's never been an issue until now! Why do you think I drive everywhere?" Dean asked him, nerves taking over.

"Fine," Sam sighed at his brother's fear, "I'll do this one on my own."

"No!" He exclaimed.

"Well we don't have another option, Dean!" Their speech was getting faster, either from nerves or lack of time.

"Come on!" Dean shouted. He was going to have to get on this plane.

~

"Are you humming Metallica?" Sam asked. They had taken their seats on the plane and Dean was near a panic attack, his breathing heavy.

"Calms me down." He rushed, trying to picture himself anywhere but there. When that doesn't work he picks up the pamphlet on how to stay safe if the plane crashes, if anything happened he needed to be prepared.

"Just try to relax." Sam advised, pissing his brother off.

"Just try to shut up!" He shot back childishly. Sam took a deep breath, preparing himself for what would surely be a stupid conversation.

"Look, I know you're nervous, but you've got to stay focused." He told his brother calmly.

"Okay."

"We've got thirty two minutes and counting to stop this thing or the plane goes down." Sam reminded him.

"Yeah, on a crowded plane. That'll be easy." Sarcasm shot out of Dean's mouth like spit, covering the sentence with a snarky tone.

"Let's just take it one step at a time. Who's it possessing?" Sam tried his best to guide him trough the panic and into the case. Dean swallowed thickly.

"It's usually gonna be someone with a chink in the armor, something the demon can worm through, someone with an addiction or some type of emotional distress." Dean rambled, sounding like a page out of their dad's notebook.

"Well, this is Amanda's first flight after the crash, if I was her I'd be pretty messed up." He suggested, an idea popping into his head, "Why don't you go check on her, see what you can find out?"

"What if she's already possessed?"

"There's ways to test that." Sam offered, "If she's possessed, she'll flinch at the name of God."

"Oh, nice." Dean nodded, standing gingerly to head towards the flight attendant.

"Dean!" Sam whisper yelled, "Say it in Latin!"

"I know that!"

The younger Winchester sat in his seat as Dean headed off. He wondered why Jay had to go, why it had to be him. It's almost like he was cursed or something. Everyone around him keeps dying. He continued on this train of thought until Dean reappeared beside him.

"Okay, she's gotta be the most well adjusted person on the planet."

"You said Christo?" Sam asked.

"Yeah. There's no demon in her, there's no demon getting in her." The plane hit a patch of turbulence, shaking Dean to his soul, "Come on, that can't be normal!" His anxiety was through the roof.

"Hey, it's just a little bit of turbulence." Although Sam was scared by it too, he was able to keep his fear under control, mostly.

"Sam this plane is going to crash okay? Stop treating me like i'm friggin four!" Dean's knuckles were white from clutching the armrests, his body was pressed to it like he was trying to glue himself to the seat.

"You need to calm down."

"Well, I'm sorry, I can't."

"Yes, you can."

"Dude, stop with the touchy-feely, self-help, yoga crap. It's not helping." Sam resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

"Listen, if you're panicked you're wide open to demonic possession. So you need to calm yourself down. Right now." The older Winchester blew air out of his mouth slowly, trying with everything in him to relax his body. "Good, now I found an exorcism in here that might work." He angled the book so Dean could see it. "The Rituale Romanum."

"What do we have to do?"

~

Lights are flaring from all over the plane, Dean pressed himself against the wall as the nose of the plane dipped down towards the ground. If it was possible, his eyes were wider than before, almost popping out of his head. Sam took charge of the situation, searching under every seat for John's notebook. The demon had kicked it away in it's struggle to escape. Aha, He picked up the book and started reading again. Still sprawled out on the floor, he manages to finish the exorcism and send the demon back to Hell. Dean slumps to the ground as the floor levels.

"You okay?" Amanda asks him. Dean nods, his breathing getting closer to even.

~ "Nice work back there Sammy." Sam and Dean were in the Impala, driving away from the airport. They had given some crap statement to the police, they'd never figure it out anyways. Sam scoffed and put his head down a bit.

"Yeah, just another day at work." This sent a chuckle flying out of their mouths.

"I'm serious! You did a hell of a job back there. when did you learn Latin?" Sam fished a beer out of the cooler by his feet and opened it, shrugging.

"I didn't? I totally bullshitted all of that pronunciation." He said through laughter. They sat in silence for a minute, maybe more. The rumble of Baby's engine, and the soft rock coming from the radio was their only company.

"So theres this thing in L.A., June I think." Dean started, "It's called a- A pride parade." A smile broke out on Sam's face. "What's that all about?" Dean cleared his throat after he spoke.

Sam turned to his brother with an amused smile on his face. "Dean, you dont have to do this."

"What!" Dean lifted one of his hands off of the wheel, "I- I really want to know more!" Sam laughed at his brother's awkward state.

"Alright, if you really want me to I'll tell you. It's a celebration, kind of. Everyone in the LGBTQ+ community gets together and marches. They march for freedom, rights, to be proud of who they are." He trailed off with a fond smile.

"The LGBTQ+ community, that's-"

"Lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, and every other sexuality and identity there is." Dean nodded, not fully understanding but trying to, for the sake of his brother.

"Sounds fun. We should go." Sam damn near spilled his beer all over himself.

"What?"

"Yeah! Why not?" Sam scoffed a bit.

"I don't know, I guess I just thought you wouldn't be that into it." Their faces fell a bit as they remembered the day Sam left.

"Sam, I'm- I'm sorry." Sam's head perked up at his brother's voice, "I should've stuck up for you, should've said something. Dad was a dick, to say the least."

"No, there's not a ton you could've done, he did what he did. Nothing can change his mind, you know that." Sam kept his eyes trained on his lap.

"Yeah, but I could've at least said something."

"Dude, it's fine. I'm not gonna hold a grudge." They both stared at the long road ahead of them.

"Alright, bitch." The two grew smiles on their faces.

"Jerk."

#supernatural #Supernatural fanfic #destiel #sabriel #dean #sam #winchester #lgbtq #gay!sam #bisexual!dean #the road so far

[bifaq]

Bisexual Media Masterpost

Someone sent us a message asking whether we know any media containing bi characters and I thought “hoo boy time for another masterpost.” So here it is. Add your rec + at least one sentence describing it in the reblogs or responses and I’ll update the post to include them! [these titles] are ones that don’t actually label characters as bi but where a character has relationships with people of more than one gender and isn’t really labelled otherwise. These are ones that have been suggested by our followers. 

TV Shows and Webseries

Brooklyn Nine-Nine - Police squad turned chosen family fighting crime and occasionally each other (in ridiculous bets). 

The 100 - Post-apocalyptic space society decides that for some reason, a bunch of teen delinquents are the best people to repopulate the earth. Except earth already has inhabitants. (cn: bury your gays, tragedy porn)

Black Mirror, specifically the episode San Junipero - Shy awkward gay lady meets bubbly bi lady for dancing, sex and technology-based hide-and-seek.

Orange is the New Black - BamBi discovers that being rich doesn’t (reliably) keep you from going to prison and that other people have real problems. 

How to get away with murder - Black bi law professor cannot believe what her students get themselves into. 

Orphan Black - Clones try to find out how many fucking roles Tatiana Maslany is capable of playing within the same plot. 

Lip Service - Scottish The L Word, which reminds me

The L Word - I really don’t know how to adequately describe this if you’ve never heard of it, please google it. 

Dear White People: A bunch of black college students have very different ideas about how to deal with on-campus racism.

Crazy Ex Girlfriend: Woman thinks moving to a new town to be close to her ex-boyfriend will cure depression, surprisingly finds that this is not the case. 

Couple-ish: Nonbinary bi artist and their lesbian (?) roommate have to fake a relationship for visa purposes. 

Greys Anatomy has a strong female bisexual main character called Callie Torres who is AMAZING but there is a lot of seasons of it

The O.C. - During the second season of this teen drama about a boy from a poor, troubled family being taken in by a wealthy family with problems of their own, a bisexual recurring character is introduced as a love interest for one of the main characters. [The Legend of Korra - Sequel to Avatar: The Last Airbender, follows teenage Avatar Korra as she tries to keep the world and herself in balance with some help from her friends and mentors. (Although the label bi is not used in the show, the creators released a statement explicitly using the word right after the finale aired and it may be in the sequel comics.)]

Shadowhunters - 18 year old girl finds out about her destiny of being a demon-fighting Shadowhunter and goes on a journey to find herself and defeat evil

Movies

[Cloudburst (2011) - adorable old sapphic ladies take a roadtrip to Canada so they can get married before their grandkid can put one of them in a home and split them up.]

[Margarita with a straw (2014) - Talented writer with cerebral palsy discovers that she deserves to be more than people’s token disabled girl, leaves behind unsatisfying boy crushes and (temporarily) her family to go to college in the states and fall in love with a blind lady.]

Brokeback Mountain (2005) - Bisexual shepherds get mistaken for gay cowboys. 

Appropriate Behavior (2014) - Confused twenty-something tries to reconcile being a model Iranian daughter with being a bisexual woman with a live-in girlfriend. (I’m pretty sure there’s some transphobic language, but unfortunately can’t recall the details.)

[When Night is Falling (1995): College professor is torn between boyfriend/colleague and local mysterious circus lady.]

3 (2010) - Midlife-crisis-y couple begins separate affairs with the same guy. (I’m not totally sure if this film is available in English, it’s originally German. It might be my favorite movie ever, though, and I strongly recommend you watch it if you ever have the chance.)

[Frida (2002) - A visually stunning biopic on bisexual painter Frida Kahlo. I recently learned that Salma Hayek was pressured by Harvey Weinstein to include a sex scene with another woman, and honestly don’t know how I feel about that. Not wanting to include a scene that confirms a historical figure’s bisexuality seems not super great, but forcing women to perform sex scenes for the voyeuristic enjoyment of gross dudes in power positions is super disgusting, so.]

RENT (2005) - Struggling artists do their best to (not) pay rent. Instead, they sing a lot (like people in musicals tend to do.)

Books (fiction)

The Second Mango (plus sequels), by @shiraglassman: Lesbian jewish Disney princess goes on magic quests, finds bi working class girlfriend and (platonic) bi royal consort/baby daddy along the way. Includes many more queer characters as well.

Rewriting the Ending, by hp tune: Sapphic broke-writer-meets-rich-heiress fluff. (cn: some unaddressed bi erasure on the part of one protagonist.)

Ex-wives of Dracula by Georgette Kaplan: Cheerleader and dorky girl-next-door develop a thirst for blood and for each other. (cn: grown man trying to hook up with high school girls.)

The Color Purple by Alice Walker: Woman gets mistreated by all the men in her life, realizes her husband’s mistress is the best thing in her life. (cn: domestic abuse & rape)

The Light of the World by Ellen Simpson: Local bi woman cannot believe that her grandmother was gay for another lady, enlists help of her friendly neighborhood historian to find out more. 

Orlando by Virginia Woolf: immortal person finds life is too long to settle for one gender (both identity- and attraction-wise).

[Temple of My Familiar by Alice Walker: A non-linear journey through the lives and thoughts and memories of several connected characters, includes a section featuring the women from The Color Purple.] [Otherbound by Corinne Duyvis: A fantasy in which a boy in our world can for unknown reasons see through the eyes of a bisexual, servant girl in other world every time he closes he eyes.] [Some Girls by Kristin McCloy - a woman in her twenties moves cross country to make a life for herself in NYC despite the wishes of her loved ones.]

The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo 

Books (nonfiction)

When we rise: My life in the movement by Cleve Jones - A personal memoir of an activist of the Gay Liberation movement. Not focussed on bisexuality in any way, but good context I think for debates with people who think it makes sense to define our community by “who originally started it.” Spoiler alert: There was no one person or group and also language and identity evolve over time. 

Sapphistries: A global history of love between women by Leila J. Rupp - It’s an ambitious project to cover all of human history on the entire planet, but this is a pretty good attempt. Deals a lot with evolving identities and the difficulty of pinning labels on historical figures. 

Bi: Notes for a Bisexual Revolution by Shiri Eisner -  A radical look at bisexuality - its history, its power, and the responses it provokes in the world. Blessed Bi Spirit: Bisexual People of Faith edited by Debra Kolodny - A multifaith collection of essays by bisexual people of faith. Published in the 90s, so some of the language is dated but it still is very relevant to today. Some of Us Did Not Die: New and Selected Essays of June Jordan  -  A collection of new and selected essays spanning the entire career of bisexual activist and author, June Jordan. She writes on issues of gender, race, sexuality, violence, writing, politics, etc.

Podcasts

Queery: Cameron Esposito talks to queer people about their identities, feeling ok in your own skin, coming out, and more. (I especially loved the episode where she chats with Stephanie Beatriz who, you guessed it, is bi. There’s also one with Evan Rachel Wood Bisexual.)

The Bright Sessions: Therapy sessions for people with supernatural abilities. What could possibly go wrong?

Love

mod platypus

#bi charaters #bisexual characters #bisexual media #bisexuality in media #bi representation #bisexual representation #media recs

[rotten-zucchinis]

Reflections on (my) embodied queerness-- Part 3: People reading me unpredictably... or as Shaggy from Scooby Doo

This is part 3 of a 3-part reflection about some aspects of my own embodied queerness. It’s about some of the various ways people seem to “read me” in terms of gender and sexual orientation (mostly), and some of the factors that seem to matter, like context and whom I’m with at the time.

Part 1: Homophobia doesn’t care about “identity” or “attraction” [here]

Part 2: Mis/understandings with some queer family members [here]

I never know how people are going to read me. It really depends on the context, who I’m with, and who they are. For example, it’s next to impossible to be read as “non-binary” by cis folks-- the options are usually “woman”, “man” and “indeterminate freak who is invariably either a woman or a man even if I can’t tell which right now”. Typically I’m read as a woman, albeit never a straight woman. On rare occasions, I’m very briefly read as a man, until I open my mouth and the judgement jumps to “woman”. 

It doesn’t really have much to do with “outedness” for me or how open I am about various identity labels. There are a few contexts where I’m not out as a non-binary person. I’m not hiding anything and if people know what to look for it’s pretty clear. But often, people don’t know what they’re looking at. Mostly, other non-binary people recognise me as presenting fairly “non-binary” (even if it isn’t one of the non-binary archetypes). But cis people don’t.

And while I’m about as out as humanly possible about being ace, it’s not necessarily something people can typically (at this point in time) be read as by strangers, barring any explicit declarations via clothing or buttons, etc. Nevertheless it’s something that often comes up pretty quickly even with casual acquaintances, largely because I spend so much time doing ace stuff and live in an ace space with ace roommates. It’s pretty much something I’m comfortable talking about at any point in time, with anyone. I do a lot of educational work in educational contexts and elsewhere too-- like when strangers in places like grocery stores see a button or patch I have on me and ask. So it doesn’t take much for people to learn I come with an “asexual” label and therefore to apply it (if they believe in such things... or defiantly classify me otherwise if they don’t). Still, that doesn’t usually happen with strangers on sight. 

I’m not usually read on site by strangers as a “queer, non-binary aroace”. I’m usually read on site by strangers as some kind of queer freak-- usually of the dyke variety-- sometimes trans. What kind of trans? That depends and/or who even knows?

I can’t separate the various aspects of my identity that might be informing people reading me dyke-wise-- is it my non-binariness? my aceness? my aroness? my aroaceness? my queerness? some permutation of those? all of them together? There’s no way to know. And occasionally and unpredictably, I’m read as a young (gay and/or trans) boy by women for no clear reason (though almost never read as a man by men). 

What I do know is that heterosexism and sexism are the main regulatory forces I encounter in the world. The gender-policing I encounter is typically from those blunt instruments and generally not from any explicit transphobic targeting of my transness. While someone might ask me “what” I am (re: gender), I won’t get beat up for “being trans”. I might get harassed for “being a dyke” or possibly (though not likely) for “being a fag”. 

Having said that, how people read me is often informed by those around me. When I’m out with my sister, people tend to read me as a butch (lesbian), even though I’m not especially masculine. Often people seem to read us as a couple (which is uncomfortable). Occasionally people read me as her tomboy little sister (which is really weird because I’m the older one... and also *well* beyond my teen years). But age is tricky-- and there's trans age magic!

In particular, when I’m out with my “unspecified vegetable” (i.e., UV)[1], heteronormativity encourages people to read one of us as a dude, even if we won’t read “straight” when we’re mapped onto a pairing of bodies gendered differently. And amatonormativity encourages people to read us as a couple, especially since so many of the places we frequent are places where people are assumed to have an intimate or family relationship when they’re there together- medical offices, pharmacies, grocery stores, etc. 

Pharmacies and doctor’s offices are where I’m most likely to be read as a guy (albeit a gay trans guy accompanying my boyfriend?) At one particular doctor’s office *some* staff read us *both* as men-- I think they think we’re a gay couple-- but confusion always ensues because someone else there also thinks I’m also the “female friend”. (This is particularly amusing because neither of us is a man.)

But generally, it’s hit and miss. Are we a couple of gay dudes? Are we a lesbian couple? Are we just an ambiguous cloud of “together trans-GAY”? (That’s certainly what we seemed to be back when my UV was less disabled, less fat, had a beard and wore much more flamboyant clothing and make-up.) 

How my UV is read usually depends at least somewhat on how they are presenting-- their clothing and hair, the visible shape of their chest, whether they’ve recently shaved or are wearing any makeup, etc. But people gender them all over the place with no apparent rhyme or reason, sometimes in the most contradictory and humorous ways. Other complicating factors have to do with social readings of disabled, fat bodies-- which is often “no gender” (and no personhood for that matter).

Sometimes people think I’m my UV’s caregiver, in which case, I’m a “woman” and they’re a non-gendered non-person. I’m not sure exactly what leads to the assessment that my UV must be needing a care-giver in those moments. Maybe it’s something to do with how, not only can disabled people not use money [explanation] but visibly disabled people using walkers (or wheelchairs!) can’t have friends or partners or people generally choosing to associate with them (at least not while they’re actually using their walkers or wheelchairs). //sarcasm//

Sometimes though, how people read me is a little surreal:

dude-seeming person calling me from across a parking lot: “Hey, you look like Shaggy[2] from Scooby Doo!”

me [is neither tall nor thin; is wearing a plaid shirt, baggy plaid 3/4 length pants and a plaid hat]: “...”

dude-seeming person again calling me from across a parking lot: “Hey, over here! You look like Shaggy from Scooby Doo!”

me [is unsure how to respond]: “Fair enough”

dude-seeming person still calling me from across a parking lot: “Is it fair enough? Do you agree?”

me: “I'm not wearing a green shirt.”

dude-seeming person still calling me from across a parking lot: “It's fucked up that you're a girl. But you look like Shaggy.”

me: “...” [shrugs... and leaves]  

{During that interaction, I was engaged in the familiar act of trying to put a walker that I’m not really strong enough to lift into a car without resting it on my bad knee. I left as soon as I could. And throughout the interaction, the person calling at me never acknowledged the presence of my UV.}

Maybe that just says it all: it’s fucked up that I’m a girl and simultaneously Shaggy from Scooby Doo.

[1]  “Zucchini” refers to a counterpart in a QP relationship (i.e., a relationship that isn’t a romantic relationship but that also isn’t adequately or properly described as a “friendship”). It’s not uncommon for people to use other vegetables, especially in or near the squash or eggplant family. I used to refer to my relationship mate(s) as an acorn squash but circumstances have changed somewhat and we still haven’t settled on a new vegetable to reflect that. But since they’re not comfortable with the specific word “queerplatonic”, I don’t want to use “QPP” here.

[2] The character of Shaggy from Scooby-Doo [ explanation ] is a tall and lanky stoner-dude cartoon character who hangs out with his large dog ( Scooby-Doo ) and solves cartoon-mysteries with his human-friends. He always wears the same clothes. And he looks nothing like me, except a mild similarity between my hair and the hair of Matthew Lillard when he portrayed Shaggy in the live-action movie [ image ].

#queer #ace #aroace #non-binary #arospec #amatonormativity #homophobia mention cw #embodiment #how people read me #ableism mention cw #heterosexism discussion cw #my ramblings #I actually don't think I look anything like Shaggy from Scooby Doo #And I'm certainly nothing like the character in terms of personality #queued

[roidespd-blog]

Chapter Twenty : B IS FOR BI

“… But it ain’t no lie, Baby Bi Bi Bi (Bi Bi)” N’Sync, 2000

Prior to the redaction of this article, I asked a very close friend of mine, who happens to identify as bisexual/pansexual (more on that later) one simple question — a way for me to see if I was heading in the right direction and be sure to do justice to this part of our community. What do you think the biggest obstacle for bisexuals is in 2019 ? “Invisibility. The lack of representation of bisexuality as a legitimate identity. The more you are out there, the more everything is normalized, and there’s so much talk about the G in LGBT, Gay men, and next to nothing when it comes to Bisexuals.”

Communities tend to make the same mistakes as societies, as we are born in the same environments and are influenced by the same principles. When it comes to the Queer Community, patriarchy wins. In the L G B T Q I +, the G is omnipresent (because they represent the MAN, usually white), the L takes a little place on the side, T is the most persecuted, I is invisible. But it’s the B that keeps being so fascinating to me. B is the most under appreciated, denied and dismissed of them all.

WHAT IS AND WHAT IS DEFINITELY NOT

Bisexuality : romantic or sexual attraction to both males and females, or to put more in a 2019 kind-of-term, to more than one sex or gender. Bisexuality is part of the three main classifications of sexual orientation alongside heterosexuality and homosexuality, but we’ve already talked about this. This is bullshit and it doesn’t matter. These are just principles that the world kept cramming into our faces when they didn’t know any better. Not anymore. Just like its three other “main” terms, Bisexuality was coined in the 19th century, and its history is as old as the rest of them.

Ancient Greeks (at least 550 BC) incorporated bisexual relationships into their practices, but not exactly in a sexual way. Men with wisdom and experience would often pass along their knowledge or strength (if you were a soldier) to the younger generation through the act of sodomy. Once the young would reach maturity, the relationship became non-sexual — supposedly. It did interesting to point out that stigmas were present when the sexual relationship continued after the boy’s adulthood. A preview of things to come, in terms of bigotry.

Another interesting detail into History, it is never mentioned that women could have sex with other women as well. Sure, Sappho wrote about the female beauty, but this was just poetry. History itself only mentions the Men, as only them could dominate and be part of the wisdom. In Ancient Rome, it was acceptable for a man to have sex with other men outside of marriage, as long as they were younger, not another man’s son (so, slaves) and if the man would be the one to penetrate. Patriarchy, La-dee-da, La-dee-da.

In our modern society, what is REALLY interesting to point out though, is that when it comes to bisexuality, it is not easily owned by the person who could represent him/her/themself as bisexual. Terms like queer, polysexual, heterofexible, homoflexible, MSM or FSM are thrown around as alternatives to bisexuality. Hmm.

Bisexual activist Robyn Ochs defines bisexuality as “the POTENTIAL to be attracted — romantically and/or sexually — to people of more than one sex and/or gender, not necessarily at the same TIME, not necessarily in the same WAY and not necessarily to the same DEGREE” which is going into more detail than the human heteronormative brain might comprehend at the moment, but pretty accurate to my knowledge.

What bisexuality is not, though, is what some papers found smart to call a transitional period. A study ‘found evidence of both considerable consistency and change in LGB sexual identity over time’ (there it is again, the confusion between orientation and identity. See my article from June 9th). Apparently, youth under that study who had identified only as bisexual at earlier assessments would then assume the gay/lesbian “identity” over time by 30 to 40%. I feel the need to clarify the situation ONE. MORE. TIME. Sexual orientation and identity are two separate things. Yes, scientists substitute those terms as easily as you might replace regular mayo with non-fat mayo, and it would be correct. But it creates way too much confusion. Sexual orientation is who you are attracted to. Identity is who you are, and it includes but not limited to sexual orientation. You can’t define yourself by your sexuality only. What the study is trying to explain (I hope) in a very broad and clumsy way is that sometimes, social circumstances prevent you from assuming and owing your real sexual orientation, whether it is straight or gay or whatever your orientation is. So a nice teenage cover up is the use of the term “bisexual” as a transitional period of time. I get it. I’ve done it. I made myself believe it for a long while. But that doesn’t make us bisexuals for a while THEN something else. I was always a homosexual. My non-nurturing environment didn’t give me the tools to put my dick on the table and say “I’m gay, bitches”. But to keep going back to that stereotype of the half closeted homosexual when it comes to have a general image of bisexuality is just so fucking wrong. A cliché, my dear. And now that I’ve mentioned it.

COMMON UNREAL NOTIONS

A person can be smart. People are dumb. So when it comes to understanding someone that you are not, crowds tend to go to the silliest questions. Like :

“So… Is there a percentage of how gay you were and how straight you can be?” Nop. Maybe someone can put a number on it, but it seems quite unrealistic to say “I’m like 40/60”. Sexuality is not be quantifiable.

“Do you think you’ll ever make a choice ?” There is no choice to make. Bisexuality is a definitive (though somehow less finite exploration of the human form) sexuality and thinking it has to evolve is offensive. Like saying that a gay man will get over it and go back to women eventually.

“But if you had to choose ?” You’re dumb. Your mother definitely fucked your uncle nine months before your birth.

“So you are dating someone of the opposite gender. Are you straight now ?” Fuck no. The gender of the person that I’m dating does not tilt the needle of the fucking outdated Kinsey scale.

“You are probably confused” You are probably ready to go fuck your mother’s pussy with a rake. And that was not a question.

“I could never date a bisexual. I would never be sure if he/she’s not looking at another guy/girl” So ? Your straight/gay boyfriend/girlfriend can still look around no matter what. If he/she’s a horn-dog, you should be worried. Bisexuals do not have more sexual desires because they can be attracted to multiple genders. Still not a question, dumbass.

“You’re so lucky, you have twice the chances to find someone, right ?” You failed math and it shows. AGAIN, being bisexual does not mean that romantic and sexual feelings are constant towards all genders all the time. They have the same troubles with human connexions as everyone because people are dumb, remember ?

“But you can’t actually know for sure until you’ve tried it both, don’t you think ?” I don’t know, did you try humping your uncle/father before you realized you were incestuous and you liked it ? Sorry, I meant to say sexual orientation does not need a try run to be real. You are what you are no matter what. You may sometimes ignore it for a while but it’s mostly because society never showed you it could exist.

“Do you believe that everyone is bisexual ?” No, I’m not Freud. I’m a grown man perfectly capable of understanding that bisexuality is not an umbrella-term for ALL sexuality.

“Don’t you think Bisexuality is a myth ?” This whole conversation is a myth. Gurl, Bi.

And that’s just the tip of the crushingly big iceberg. Bisexuals are constantly under the microscope of the rest of the world for existing outside the binary system of human recognition. You are a woman or a man. You like women or men. Simple. It never was. But the public (whether LGBTQ+ or not) insist on pushing the idea of bisexuality to the side and ignoring its legitimacy.

OSTRACISM

Worst than the usual queer rejection from society, bisexuals have it both ways by being denied true existence by society AND by the Queer community. Just look at their flag. The purple is crushed between the blue and pink, ready to disappear, not taking much space. You queers who are reading this article, don’t try to cop out and say “but I have no problems with bisexual people”. Fuck the fuck off. You fall into the same trap as heterosexuals. You fear someone who isn’t exactly like you. And do you actually date a lot a bisexual people ? Because last time I checked, bisexuals weren’t really talkative about their sexuality since it’s welcomed with such cold shoulders the white walkers are asking if they put on a nice little sweater. I keep coming back to a conversation I had a few weeks ago with a lesbian woman I know who said she could never date a bisexual woman as she would never be sure if she would stay gay for her and that she liked girls who knew what they wanted. Bisexuals know what they want. It may change from Monday to Tuesday (matter of speech) but I do believe the sexual attraction does not come from a switch inside them with two modes (either gay or straight) but from the individuals, whether closer to masculine or feminine traits, they might encounter that day. Again, that’s prejudicial and it makes you kind of a bigot but whatever.

Still on the subject of rejection, it’s not just romantic or sexual. If you go on the internet, there are countless examples of bisexual men or women who, after they came out as WHO THEY FUCKING ARE, had to face a change in the way people would treat them and act around them. A straight girl who couldn’t sit too close to her bisexual female friend because she could have a crush on her. A straight man who stopped giving hugs to his close bisexual male friend in case he would get the wrong ideas. OR a gay man or woman who would just end a relationship when they found out about their partner’s sexuality. Yep, I went back to sexual. Sue me.

Let’s put this out there : bisexual people are just as capable to commit to a monogamous relationship. It’s not because you fell in love with someone with a V that you’re gonna suddenly get hungry for the P. Don’t be a child.

Now, being rejected by society is one thing. We are queer, that’s our song, we twerk to it with vigorous enthusiasm. But the treatment of bisexuals in the Queer community is plainly unacceptable.

In France, when the Mariage pour Tous (fuck, I promised myself I wouldn’t use France again. Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. Whatever.) succeeded after months of lobbying and manifestations from all sexual orientations, this was considered a victory for the LBGTQ+ community as a whole. But really, it was a success for Gay men and Lesbian women, as Bisexuals are not viewed as a consequential orientation. They are not visually recognizable to gay, lesbian or straight people, they don’t have the same historic tragedies that the general public know about and their sexuality has been used and abused as a motor for heterosexual male fantasies in pornographic movies and myths, thus keeping it from becoming a reality in people’s minds. It then becomes a vicious circle where the moral is low and the activism is nowhere to be found, so nothing changes. Bisexuals stay in the darkness (until they make a fucking choice, right ?). By the way, the term biphobia is never uttered but it’s real and it happens constantly.

WHAM, BAM, THANK YOU PAN ?

Something I haven’t totally mentioned yet is the term Pansexual. It’s actually the part of the article I was the most apprehensive about as if uninformed, is quite difficult to distinguish with Bisexual. Bisexuality is the romantic or sexual attraction to more than one gender. Well, Pansexuality is the romantic or sexual attraction to all genders, outside of the binary scope of what gender is, I guess ? That’s when things get complicated because people are really attach to the label “Bi” would argue that it does not limit them to only boys and girls but other genders. And then those really attach to the label “Pan” could argue that their term is more inclusive to transgender people, who are men and women but also non-binary individuals who do not identify with male and female identities’ basic definitions. Then I would say that to me, bisexuality is the more known and comprehensive umbrella term for what this romantic or sexual orientation is and that pansexual is a more recent word and kinda beyond the scope of bisexuality (in a good way). And then someone would tell me I have it all wrong and then I would shut the fuck up. Definite differentiation between bisexuality and pansexuality is a mindfuck for the ages, as is the term “feminism” to some these days. By the way, “Pan” means “All” in ancient greek and a synonym to Pansexual can be Omnisexual (“omni” is latin for “All”). But I don’t want to get too much into that, I don’t feel like I have the energy.

DOUBLE JEOPARDY

As I kept my searches broad for this article, I ran into a term that was used by SOS Homophobie to talk about discrimination of bisexual people. Double Jeopardy. We talked a lot about ways that straight folks can discriminate against bisexual people and a little bit about biphobia inside the Queer community but I would like to come back to the latter. I do write these articles for everyone but I seem to keep repeating myself quite a lot at the end of each of them, only because the problem seems to always be the same : as long as we are tearing each other apart, we won’t advance as one. Live together, Die alone, that sort of thing (Damn, I really do repeat myself).

To my queer peeps, do not fear the sexual preferences of your partner as your relationship do not depend on what gay or straight orientation she/he/they is/are gonna have that day. Do not make the mistake to judge them by their supposedly easy-way-out heterosexuality as they are not straight. They don’t hold more privileges than you in this world, as they might flip flop at convenience from one side to the other. A bisexual woman who falls in love with a man is still a Queer woman. It’s not your queer experience, but it is one and you need to embrace it. Do not put them down for it because they are already being put there by straight people on a daily basis.

All of this is based only on your own insecurities which have been fed by your minority status, your heteronormative education, your own ostracism from said heteronormative society and possibly your capabilities as a lover (ndlr : your fear of being dumped).

But most of all, do not ignore them. Those are your people. They hurt just as much as you (but between us, you can’t rank genders but in the prejudice scale, I’d say it comes at a close number 2. Think about it.) and they need your support, as you needed theirs when it was time to get that Mariage Pour Tous — damn, last time, I promise. Remember that this MPT was also for them. Every action you take as a community is an action to benefit them as well. As they are the B in LGBTQ+. Say it out loud. See how weird it sounds without the B.

Mic dropped.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YUDab9piv_U