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[esurialis]

Angela Sarafyan in We Are Boats (2019)

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the warm welcome of this reunion was both expected and unexpected, yet no amount of preparation would help her steel herself, and the wind is near knocked out of her chest with the sheer force that aziraphale wraps her in a hug with.  she just manage to let out another laugh, breathlessly, as she returns the gesture, arms squeezing 'round him, a little tighter than even she had even expected (millennia come and go and very, very few faces manage to remain near constantly throughout them, so eve suspects that is where such an excess of sentimentality stems from.)

her hands linger by his shoulders for just a moment after he pulls back, as though wanting to reassure herself that he was here, in front of her, tangible and corporeal and real.  no sooner than her own hands drop do his raise to follow suit, and it brings a fond smile to her face.  if she had to try and explain it ... well, eve supposes there aren't many she has come across that she has not felt responsible for, quite literally in many cases.

it comes with the territory, some might say.  first woman, second human, the mother of humanity.  she's gained a good few monikers over the years, some far less complimentary than others, but she wears those with a certain delighted pride–– the point of the matter being that eve often falls into the role of custodian, caregiver, mother.  it is a rarity indeed that she meets someone who she feels she can eschew that responsibility with, and it quite literally feels like the weight of the world is lifted from her slender shoulders.

❛❛ some tea would be wonderful. ❜❜  a beat, then, as she casts that ever-curious gaze of hers at the shelves upon shelves that make up the bookshop around them, and she's left a little in awe.  ❛❛ i'm sorry it's been so long. ❜❜  it feels totally inadequate, the understatement of a lifetime or two or several, but it's all that she can think to say.

my lungs were burning , it only took my vision popping with color to force me to realize i'd been holding my breath , expelling a shuddering exhale through my teeth as i took several quick strides forward , brazenly avoiding the pleasantries to drag her into a hug. i couldn't even begin to explain how good it was to see her ; 6000 years , & i thought i'd seen the last of her , disappearing over the ridges of those sand dunes with adam , 7 days after the garden was created. strange , i'd only known her for 7 days , yet i'd grown so painfully attached to her , to both of them , that it had been like a punch to the gut , watching them leave.

i'd blamed myself for ages , blamed crowley , hell , heaven , all of it. i know them moving on from eden had been the catalyst of everything humanity had grown into , but i still missed the simplicity. harmony among fresh wild flowers , innocence , love. i'd been the only angel to really give them any attention once they'd been created. gabriel had watched eve's birth , but that was the extent of his meddling. now , it was my job to protect them. how was she here ? how was she alive ? all those questions died on my tongue as i leaned back from the hug , my cheeks aching from how wide i was smiling , raising a hand to brush away the faint beginnings of tears that stung at the edges of my gaze , waving my hands flamboyantly as i inhaled another shuddering breath.

                   ❛            oh ! oh good heavens , look at you ! oh , i cannot believe you are here , i am so happy to see you !            ❜                    oh , crowley would be happy to see her too , i just knew it. while i didn't necessarily agree with what he'd convinced her to do in the garden , i couldn't change any of it now , only embrace seeing her again. hands moved to cradle her shoulders , giving her a quick glance over as i beamed at her , offering a tiny shake of my head as i stepped back , pride surging through me like some delighted parent.                    ❛            i'm so sorry , look at me ! all teary already , please sit , i'll .. i'll make us some tea. do you like tea ? i could make us some cocoa instead if you don't.            ❜

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a laborious sigh spills from her lips, then, tugging the corners of her mouth down with it, a frown marring the first daughter's expression for the second time this fateful day.  ❛❛ well, it's not as if i'm not making very bright decisions as of late, is it? ❜❜  what is the difference between good and evil, though?  who gets to decide which is which, where the line is drawn?  is there no room for interpretation, for shades of grey, for nuance?  just knowing of these things does little to help one understand them; the tree of the knowledge of good and evil doesn't grant an all-knowing moral compass with its sinful damnation, eve has learned.  certainly, her head is jam-packed with thoughts and opinions, leagues more chaotic than it was before she ate the damned fruit.

yet, trust that she would not change the story if given a chance; when presented with a tree bearing mouth-watering fruit and simply told not to eat of it, she will disobey every time.

❛❛ it all seems a bit ... cruel, to me. ❜❜  is she allowed to criticise her creator?  she's doing it, so obviously it's possible, but eve gets the sense it's something that will be frowned upon.  maybe not by present company, given who they are and who they work for (with?) but in general, she wonders if critiquing the almighty is the wisest of choices.

then again, it's not as if she can really make her current situation much worse.  that's not what she's finding fault with, anyway; not entirely.  ❛❛ to abandon us just as we could do with some guidance. ❜❜  eve suspects she'll figure it out all the same, find her own answers to her own questions, but there's still that voice in the back of her mind which laments the apparent callousness of one who is meant to care so deeply about all creation.  one might imagine that should even include the sinners, the disobedient woman and her insouciant husband, but apparently not.

𝐄𝐗𝐏𝐑𝐄𝐒𝐒𝐈𝐎𝐍 𝐃𝐈𝐒𝐓𝐎𝐑𝐓𝐒 𝐈𝐍𝐓𝐎 𝐀 𝐒𝐎𝐑𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐓𝐑𝐈𝐂𝐀𝐋 type of grimace, to reiterate the aforementioned point ( at the very least. ) ❛   ────probably not the brightest idea, really. ❜ none of mankind's earliest ideas had been overly bright, though not necessarily to any fault of their own. ❛   demon of hell and all that .. y'know. "evil incarnate", "abomination of sin", "wily old serpent", all that yammer. my lot can get in a heap of trouble, doing the so-called right thing. ❜ veil of thought is drawn somewhat over his eyes as his wandering gaze is coaxed back to her again. he finds himself asking similar questions.

what was the point exactly of all that is decidedly good and all that is decidedly evil? and why try an untried creature in this celestial game of morals without even bothering to spell out the rules? WHAT WERE THE RULES? he's begun to wonder if the almighty was just making it all up as they went along... it's certainly not a comforting notion, by any means.

to the maiden's barrage of questions, crowley merely blinks ( at first. ) ❛   er- well ... ❜ WHAT WOULD YOU DO, FIEND? .. WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?

you disobeyed. you were shaved and tarred for asking questions of your god; struck aflame, and abandoned.

❛   look, you don't want to do as i would. probably. me? heaven, hell [ ... ] right, wrong, bla-bla-bla-bla. between us, i tend to go along with things as far as i can. afraid it rather leads to a great deal more questions than it does answers. anyway─ ❜ he shrugs, marigold eyes falling away from @esurialis, ❛   maybe .. try not asking other people what to do. or god, or whoever, and ask yourself instead. ❜

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eve is so explicitly afforded no agency throughout time. she's evil, but she didn't choose to be; it's a result of her disobedience. for thousands of years, it was utterly terrifying for theologians (who were overwhelmingly male) to think that eve chose to be "evil" of her own volition, chose to gain knowledge, to escape paradise, to evade blind obedience to a higher power. so no. no, instead, she is tempted. her lack of control over her own urges and desires (innately female features, we're repeatedly told throughout time) are what lead to her demise. her tempter becomes s/atan, who in turn becomes l/ucifer. l/ucifer, a male figure of deliberate resistance and rebellion; eve is presented as doing precisely that, but her sin is portrayed as something accidental. it's the fault of a silly little woman, not an angel fighting a perceived injustice. and we see this then reflected against women in history and in mythos alike––women commit disobedience by mistake, by foolishness, by clumsiness. like eve, like pandora. it is only men that can disobey heroically, intelligently, or with authentic and valid motivation and reasoning. like prometheus, like faust.

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Sylvia Plath, The Unabridged Journals of Sylvia Plath

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❛❛ hello, angel. ❜❜  the warmest kind of fondness spreads and spills, through her chest and from her lips, dimples indented in the sun-kissed skin of her cheeks, rosy from the chill that lingers in the air outside the door.  which, she's still holding open, she realises; an escape route, should she have chosen to chicken out at the last minute, or if some divine power struck her down on the spot for entering a celestial property, or whatever.  even after all these years, eve isn't entirely sure how their lot works––either of their lots, or however many there are.  she's far from the type to back out of a plan, no matter how poorly planned or impulsive it may be, so she lets the door fall shut behind her, never letting her gaze stray from the fine a.z. fell.

far be it from her to claim that she had enacted some grand master plan to find one of her oldest (and perhaps, very first) friends and reunite with them.  if she had, soho would not have been anywhere on her list of places to start.  but it was bound to happen by happenstance eventually, wasn't it?  eve has travelled the globe ten times over at least in her life thus far, seen all the wonders of the world: if anything, it's shocking that it's taken this long for their paths to cross once more.

vibrant laughter, full to the brim with vim and vigor, rings out from her, and she takes a few steps forward from her place by the doorway.  for a moment, it's only the swishing of her skirt and the clinking of fine metal bracelets that fills the silence; and then,  ❛❛ long time no see, hm? ❜❜

aziraphale , angel of the eastern gate , protector of the garden of eden ; all those titles meant nothing if i swallowed my pride & realized i failed them. i had , hadn't i ? it was my job to keep them safe , innocent , happy. to be tempted into eating forbidden fruit under my watchful eye had been a huge blow to my confidence , though i'd more than willingly given them my sword. a flaming , holy relic like that hadn't meant to fall into human hands , in truth i didn't really know what the two would do with it , just that it could very well be the thing that kept them safe out in the world.

protect yourselves now , i've done a piss poor job , you two are all you have.

they'd made me love humanity , even though i'd already grown attached to the concept of them during the creation of everything. eve had been so outspoken & vibrant , my heart had swelled with such fondness , i'd ached to see them leave , praying to the almighty to keep them safe , even if they were still angry. that had been ages ago , of course , though the memories still burned with a sickening brightness that made me reel. i guess guilt would do that to you. the bell to my shop rang , shattering me from my dull reflection of past haunts , tearing my gaze from my book to peer at the customer over the spectacles resting atop my nose.

i froze , sucking in a sharp breath which hung in my throat as i fixed my gaze on the woman who entered , rising to my feet instantly & ushering the glasses from my face to clutch them in shaky fingers , brows knitting a faint crease as i took a wary step toward the figure , as if she might disappear.                    ❛            you - i'm so sorry .. eve ?            ❜

@esurialis / closed starter !

[esurialis]

𝐄𝐌𝐁𝐎𝐃𝐈𝐌𝐄𝐍𝐓 𝐎𝐅 𝐓𝐄𝐌𝐏𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍 𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐅𝐓𝐒 𝐇𝐈𝐒 𝐆𝐀𝐙𝐄, 𝐔𝐍𝐓𝐈𝐋 𝐇𝐄 𝐈𝐒 𝐎𝐆𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐆 at the almighty’s prodigal daughter through irises of saffron yellow ( and slit pupils. ) his eyes slither over every inch of whatever expression she offers unto him like charting a map [ … ] studying for direction. pointed chin tilts ever so slightly to the side. it’s a balancing act: tiptoeing along a thin line drawn in sand, separating all that he should say, and all he should not. godless, he’s never necessarily been one for rules .. then again, perhaps he hadn’t much regard for them even in his faith ( being cast out was never a choice; it sort of just happened that way. ) nevertheless, in @n1atruc's experience, a bit of heresy tended to simplify things in situations like this one. ❛   ────are you asking me which one i think is right, and which is wrong? ❜ he begins, without leaving her much room to respond before continuing. ❛ .. ‘fraid i’m not much help in that regard, it’s sort of policy for me to be inclined toward the latter. ❜ yet still, he studies her intently. ( try not to take it to heart; for despite your sin, it is you the creator has blessed with a soul. ) curiosity is but an instinct.

❛ maybe you ought to go for an equal mixture of both, for good measure. up to you though, in the end. ❜

❛❛ hm.  i suppose i am. ❜❜  she frowns, then, and though curiosity (that which had begot all this trouble in the first place!) begs for her to push for an answer even still, some part of eve thinks that it would be unwise: and yet, how much more trouble can she get into, really?  what greater punishment can there be than to be banished from the only place she's ever known, abandoned by her creator?  in truth, eve does not know that it is the penalty She had intended it to be.  could it not be that an apple, rotten as it may be, and a world, barren as it may be, could taste better on her lips than forever wondering?  perhaps paradise has simply been outgrown, as opposed to lost––the omens of perfection shed, and the blessings of knowledge gained.

❛❛ what would you do, then?  how would you feel? ❜❜  it comes out a little more interrogatory than she had intended it to, but she trusts that he won't take it personally.  seems like it might be an occupational hazard for someone in his line of work, after all, and there are a few too many things racing through eve's mind as of late for her to be able to worry about hurting the feelings of the garden's other beings.  he's to blame for that, now that she thinks of it, but it's hard to try and assign blame to one who merely encouraged her; it was her hand that plucked the apple from the teeth, her teeth that sank into its juicy flesh, her mouth that seemed to cleave the garden in two.  ❛❛ what options are there? ❜❜

[esurialis]

the eve/pandora and eve/prometheus parallels r some of my favourite, ever

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Maeve is not for sale, and neither am I. Angela Sarafyan as Clementine Pennyfeather in Westworld S03E07

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i’ve said this before to mel but my heart really does ache for eve sometimes (a lot of the times). how do you mother your children when you’ve never had a mother yourself? how do you advise them on the adventures and failures of childhood when you were never a child yourself? how do you fit your grief inside your chest when your first son murders your second? how is there not a word for a parent who outlives a child when such is the case for one of the very first parents ever to exist?

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i will forever have so many thoughts and feelings and no ability whatsoever to convey them—

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Dream Girl Evil, Florence + the Machine // Details from The Fall, Hugo van der Goes

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why do you love yourself so much?

have you seen me

[esurialis]

❛❛ or, perhaps, you're far too humble. ❜❜  she counters almost immediately, albeit with a silent postscript: for an angel, that is.  a finger pokes and prods at his shoulder to further emphasise her point, manicured nail digging into the material of his shirt for a moment.  what might be called hubris for a human such as herself may well be the base level of confidence for divine beings like henry, even if eve does take umbrage at the idea of such differing standards; for she knows that, even among her fellow humans, the boundaries between confidence and hubris vary on how a society perceives you.

some may well blame that entirely on eve––she who caused the fall, the bad influence, the deceived fool––but it strikes her as being something remniscient of her rather disaffected husband than of herself, in all honesty.  funny how it all works out, isn't it?  how none seem to remember who the father-of-it-all is, yet eve has never once gotten to shed the motherly mantle which has been attributed to her time and time again, be it fondly or less than.

her face remains smooth and furtive, though there is a smug sense of pride stirring away in her stomach, and eve finds herself a little bit glad to see him struggle on tenterhooks for his earlier little blunder.  ❛❛ belgium. ❜❜  no more than a word that escapes with an exhale as arms lift and shift, loosely encircling his shoulders, her fingers interlocking with each other just so at the nape of his neck.  ❛❛ i was there for only a couple of days, though.  it was switzerland for a month before that. ❜❜  swaying on the spot a little to and fro, the kiss he presses to the edge of her mouth serves as the epicentre of fondest little smile––yet still she plays it all very coolly.  eve knows that to do so is to cut off her own nose to spite her face, but she's nothing if not determined to prove a point, and stubborn to a damned fault.  ❛❛ i skiied while i was there, would you believe? ❜❜

❛❛     perhaps,  you give me far too much credit than i deserve,  my love.     ❜❜     a moment of modesty.     to shed ego was to be vulnerable.     however,  it's an act that only occurs due to the woman before him.     carefully,  henry's head cranes to the side,     ❛❛     only when i choose to be,     ❜❜     he teases back.     ❛❛     though i'm sure you're quite aware of that already.     ❜❜     (you and only you could ever know me better than i ever knew myself.)     early hints of a smile twitch at the corners of his lips.     she had always been good at this—never biting her tongue—allowing her outspoken nature to take charge (always a woman searching for more).

was this her curse ?     to devour and be devoured.     to remain perpetually dissatisfied with her hunger.     only a fate so cruel for deceiving the almighty.     and what a woman she was to spit in the face of god.     all-mother who ventured only where one other dared to go.     (how could you ask for more,  eve ?     how could you defy with such ease ?     how could you—)     if only it were as simple as asking such questions.     henry knew to exist in paradise was to sacrifice,  whether it was your happiness or independence (sometimes both all at once).     and for eve ?     the choice was never her's to have.     she was a woman forced into anguish—created from the rib of a man who could never understand her.     perhaps,  that was why she deified the odds.     even she knew she deserved more than a caged existence.     to continue life,  staining her holy digits and lips with pure,  unabashed desire.     no longer would she be god's caged bird—she would spread her wings—and soar into the air far out of everyone's (henry's included) reach.

when her gaze narrows,  a sharp chill crawls down henry's spine.     (i have now,  suddenly,  entered the metaphorical doghouse.)     a large clear of his throat as his eyes cut downward,     ❛❛     forgive me,  hmm ?     ❜❜     henry lifts a brow.     a careful humming is the only response he receives.     (you've dug yourself quite the hole.  tread lightly.)     his head tilts down at her  ;  eyes watch as her digits absentmindedly trace shapes along his arm.     ❛❛     surprise you,  huh ?     ❜❜     lips pull back to reveal a pearly white grin.     his left-hand presses into the curve of her back,  guiding her closer to his chest.     a need to be as close to her as physically possible.     ❛❛     i can do surprises.     so long as you,     ❜❜     he pauses to kiss the corner of her lips.     ❛❛     —can be my sous chef and tell me about your trip ?     where did you visit this time ?     ❜❜    

[esurialis]

Q: WHAT ARE YOUR PRIMARY ARCHETYPES?

A: BELOW.

50% EXPLORER.

›  the explorer is drawn to the unknown, whether that’s a himalayan peak or the road not taken, and have a thirst for adventure.  they take journeys, not vacations.

28% INTELLECTUAL.

›  the intellectual is the ultimate dinner-party guest.  engaging questions and thoughtful debate are their trademarks.

22% SPIRITUAL.

›  the spiritual seeks a deeper meaning.  for them, the journey of faith is never-ending.  thoughtful and compassionate, they have a strong sense of moral obligation.

TAGGED BY: the loml @promachoi <3 TAGGING: whoever is reading this ...

[esurialis]

“heathens” - aurora