#+ obviously his tracks with varnish

[chaotictomtom]

as said in my last post. man who is clearly normal about that album

[ursa-tan]

Floating

—————

Kenny McKormic x reader

3,928 words

All characters are 18+

Kenny returns to South Park after disappearing for 2 years upon turning 16. When he comes back with enough money to outright buy a house, you are unsure how to approach and talk to the man you had been so close to for so long. Luckily, he doesn't take you inviting yourself in with his spare key to be rude and instead invites you to join him in his room.

TW: W33d usage

The cold air stings your face as you walk down the street, listening to the show crunching underfoot with every step you take. Tentative breaths curl in the air, almost dancing in front of your eyes as you continue down the street. As much as you adored a fresh snow fall, you hated the way the freezing feeling would nip at your nose.

Footprints behind you show the path you’ve taken from your house, untouched by anyone or anything. Turns out you were the only person stupid enough to leave your house today. Even though you lived in the mountains, no one else was willing to face the frigid outside apart from you. But it was going to be worth it when you finally arrived at your destination.

Your mind wanders as do your feet, thinking about what you’re going to say to him when you finally arrive at his house. He had been gone for so long, dipping out of South Park when He was 16 and only coming back a few months ago. Sure, you had been his friend for so long before that happened, but what would He think of you now? He had been gone for practically two years. And when He had finally reappeared, He had enough money to outright buy a house and refused to talk about what He had done to get the money.

Your eyes seem to come back into focus when you’re practically on his door step. Looking up at the two-story house that He shared with his parents, staring at his window and wondering what He was going to say to you.

The spare key He kept tucked under a small rock was easy to find, obviously you still knew him better than He thought you did. Slipping it into the door, your mind wandered once again, this time racing faster than it had in a long time. Although it felt wring to slip into his house like this unannounced, you were more than grateful at the warm air greeting your frozen features.

Standing by the door, you slipped of the black snow boots and shrugged the dusty green jacket off your shoulders. The warm air almost seemed to kiss life back into your half-dead skin. It was a sensation that almost stopped you in your tracks, just wanting to indulge in the feeling, like moving out strip it away. But you knew you had to move, you had come this far, you couldn’t stop now.

As you begin to make your way up the stairs you become overly aware of a pungent and funky sent. It washes over your body in waves until you’re completely consumed by it. You know exactly what that smell is, but you don’t want to think about it. Not right not at least.

Despite trying your best to ignore it, you really can’t. Especially not when you finally get to the top of the stairs and see what you can only assume to be his door cracked open. You knew that was where the smell was coming from and somehow, just somehow, it didn’t shock you.

You have to take a deep breath to steady your racing Heart, trying to convince yourself He wasn’t going to freak out at you for arriving and inviting yourself in uninvited, but nothing you did could quell the queasiness growing in your chest.

The door was smooth under your palm, no temperature difference between the varnish and your skin. It seemed to push back as you pushed it open, a fight between you and the carpet to get the door to move out of your way. But it was all worth it when you were met with a vision of him half sprawled out on his bed. His hair was a partially ruffled mess of smooth blond locks sticking out every which way, seeming to shine slightly in the delicate light the small desk lamp on his bedside table. He was clad in nothing but grey sweats, blue and yellow socks and small black band shirt that rose up to expose the band of his boxers. His Head and upper back were partially propped up against the wall his bed was pushed up against.

Everything in your body seemed to still in the moment that his eyes met yours. Dopy and half closed, red rimmed with and almost euphoric sparkle.

“Hey Kenny…” You trail off, still wishing you had just turn tail and run before you even reached his front door.

Your eyes dropped to his signature orange parka crumpled in a Heap on the floor when He didn’t say anything. Any time you managed to push yourself to look at him, his eyes were wide in shock and confusion, but nothing said anger about him.

“(Y/n)?...” He sat up straight, both hands pressing into his rumpled sheets as He leaned forwards to get at better look at you. “I… I wasn’t expecting you,” his voice was uncertain as He spoke, almost like He was just as nervous as you.

“I know, I probably should’ve said something instead of just… coming round and letting myself in,” You could feel the voice crack that hit you half way through speaking and you cringed, having to resist the urge to recoil and practically fold into yourself.

“No, no, it’s ok.” Kenny swallowed hard, looking quickly between you and the blunt still propped up neatly in his right hand. “Come… Come and sit with me? And close the door too, please.” HE sounded so nervous as He spoke, trying not to say something wrong.

Out of the corner of your eye, you could see him running his left hand through his hair, trying to sort it out as you pushed the door over till you Head it click shut.

“Want me to lock it too?”

“Yeah.”

Once you turned around, Kenny had pulled his shirt back down and was looking at you, observing you. It didn’t take long for you to take a deep breath of the Heavily weed scented air and finally start moving to sit on the edge of his bed.

If this were anyone else, any other house you had just walked into uninvited, any other of your friends, you would’ve sat nervously. Perched nervously on the edge of the bed like you were scared of ruining their sheets or upsetting them by getting to comfortable in their space. But this was Kenny, so you had to stop yourself from falling back onto the bed and holding your hand up for him to pass you the blunt.

“Why do you look so nervous?” It felt like He was reading your mind.

“Cuz I just kinda… turned up without saying anything to you? You could’ve been doing anything.”

“I’m glad you showed up.” There was a moment of silence after He said that, especially as your eyes met and, just for a second in the low light of the room, you thought you could see dark bubbling deep in his eyes. “I feel like we haven’t talked enough since I came back to South Park.”

You felt the same way. You had only seen Kenny a few times in the 5 months He had been back, and it wasn’t nearly enough to satisfy your craving to be around the blond.

“Yeah, me either…”

The conversation felt so dry, nothing like it should. Nothing like you wanted it to.

“Fuck it, Wanna get high with me?” There was the Kenny you knew, the Kenny you had sobbed saying goodbye to at 16, the same one who had hugged you so hard you though your ribcage might burst and told you not to tell anyone He was going soft.

“Thought you’d never ask,” your grin carried in your voice as you spoke, holding a hand up and waiting for him to place the bling neatly between your two waiting forefingers.

Except He didn’t pass you the blunt. Instead, He Held a hand up to you, signalling for you to wait as He brought it to his own lips and pulled in a deep breath. Your eyes drifted down to his chest, watching it rise slowly as He inhaled. His shirt shifted with the movement, showing more of the graphic on the front.

Your concentration was broken by his spare hand coming to cup your face, tilting your face towards his. There wasn’t a moment for you to speak before He was pulling you in and firmly planting his lips against yours. They were softer than you had expected them to be. The kiss was sloppy and wet yet ever so tentative.

Your eyes fluttered shut as you felt Kenny’s lips open. They only parted slightly but you couldn’t Help but mimic his actions. One of your hands fell over the top of his, cupping it and keeping it firmly planted on your face.

Only when Kenny began to breathe out did you realise what the actual purpose of the kiss was. Slowly, you began to inhale the smoke that was pouring out of his lungs. It went down smoothly, gliding down your throat and settling in your lungs.

Once He was sure you had taken it all in, Kenny’ slowly began to pull away, eyes pulling open until He was staring into yours. His blue eyes seemed to almost sparkle in the low lighting of the room, especially as you watched them gently shift back and forth between yours, almost looking for something, a reaction of any kind. And He got it when you let out a gentle giggle, the smoke spilling from your lips and curling into the already saturated air; curling and dancing around both of your necks, almost seeming to pull you in closer.

Kenny’s face light up in a blush as you giggle, but He doesn’t dare move away. He can feel the Head of your soft breaths on his face and it drawn him in again. He wants to feel your lips, your body. It’s probably the weed driving him, placing calming hands on his shoulders and urging him forwards – but He’s sure you’ve never looked prettier in his entire life.

By the time you’ve finished giggling, Kenny had finally moved away and it taking another long drag from the blunt. He offers it to you and you take it gratefully, pulling it up to your lips and pulling in a deep breath. You notice that, just as you had when He first pulled in a breath, Kenny was watching the rise and fall of your chest carefully. His eyes didn’t move even as you Held the smoke in your lungs, even as you breathed out – He was acutely focused on you.

“Kiss me.” It was blunt, his eyes moving up to stare intensely into yours as He said it.

You felt Heat rise to your face as you chocked on your own saliva. Covering your mouth with a balled first you practically crumped up, folding in half as you tried to clear your throat. Your Heart pumped rapidly against your chest as you tried to still your mind and think clearly about what He had said.

“Is that a no?”

You sat up when you heard him speak, nearly dropping the blunt that was still balanced precariously between your forefingers.

“No! I just- caught me off guard,” your voice wobbles as you speak, taking deep breaths and forcing yourself to look into his eyes.

Once again, silence settled between the both of you as your eyes met. Only this time, it didn’t end in one of you taking a drag from the now spent blunt, or an awkward comment – but rather in another kiss.

Kenny pressed his lips against yours, one hand moving to cup your face while the other takes the blunt from your hand. You relax, tilting your Head and leaning into the kiss as He fumbles behind the both of you to get rid of the blunt in an ashtray on his bedside table. His lips were soft against yours, wet from where he had been licking them. You move to hold onto his shoulders, moving your lips against his in perfect harmony.

The hand that had previously been fiddling with the ashtray moved to rest on your waist, massaging the soft flesh through the hoodie you were wearing. Slowly, he began to guide you, swivelling you around until your head was laying on his pillow. Not once was did his lips move away from yours while he shifted.

Your hands move from where they had been resting on his biceps, slowly gliding up to his shoulders and into his messy golden-blond locks. Carding your fingers through his hair, you began to feel the need to breathe and had to gently tug on his hair to get him to pull away.

The second his lips were parted from yours, He was attacking your neck. Sloppy kisses down the side of your neck, right over your pulse point. He was leaving a trail of saliva as He went, beginning to slowly nip at the conjunction between your shoulder and your neck.

Kenny began to nip harder at your skin, sucking gently on the spot he was nipping. You let out a quiet moan from deep in your throat, pulling gently at his hair as he continued his ministrations. Finally, he pulled away, kissing the small and newly forming bruise.

“Fuck…” His breath puffed out over your now wet neck.

“Kenny,” You moaned gently, head tilted back and eyes squeezed closed.

Kenny’s hands began to slide under your shirt, splaying over your stomach. His thumbs began to move, brushing gently over your soft skin. You arch you back, pushing against his gently calloused hands.

“Can I take this off?” He mumbled into your neck, hands pulling out of your shirt to gently tug at it. You nodded gently as an answer, mumbling out a soft yes.

With your confirmation, he began to pull your shirt up and over your head. You had to arch your back and roll with him to help him pull it off. As soon as the shirt was no longer on your body, it was thrown to the floor beside his parka and his mouth was on your abdomen. More sloppy kisses were being placed on your heated skin, trailing down towards the top of your jeans.

He doesn’t even speak this time, just looking up at you with his gorgeous blue eyes and hooking his fingers into the top. The gentle tugging and ideas of what were to come drove you to lift your hips and let out a gentle whine. As soon as he felt your hips lift up, he was undoing the button and tugging your jeans down your legs. They were discarded on the floor beside your shirt within seconds of finally being freed from your legs.

You felt arousal drip into a pool un your stomach, causing your slick to pool in your panties as you waited for him to remove them. Instead, shock hit you as you felt his tongue press against your core through the silk material of your panties.

“Kenny!” you gasp, propping yourself up on your elbows to look down at him. His eyes were closed in what looked like bliss, lips pressed against your clothed entrance. He didn’t open his eyes, even when you laced a hand into his hair and tugged slightly.

Kenny pulled away slightly, lips still ghosting your panties as he mumbled something. You couldn’t hear it, but you didn’t have time to ask about it as he pressed his mouth against you again. It felt amazing, even through your panties.

It doesn’t last much longer as Kenny presses his hands against the outsides of your thighs. Pushing against them slightly and moving upwards until his fingers are slipping under the thin straps that hug your hips. He pulls away far enough to slide off your panties, letting them drop one he’s pulled them off your knees. You take a second to kick them off properly, tossing them in a direction you’re not quite sure of. They were probably gonna be lost in Kenny’s room until he cleaned up a little.

You look down as him, watching him carefully as he stares at your dripping core. Embarrassment rises in your chest as you watch him stare. Eventually it becomes too much and you let yourself fall back, pulling an arm over your face and hiding in the crook of your own elbow.

The feeling doesn’t last long though, as Kenny grabs your things, pulling them up onto his shoulders and tentatively pressing his lips against your now exposed core. Everything felt so sensitive as he began to run his tongue through your folds, groaning against your pussy. You manage another peak at the blond caged between your thighs, face contorted in pleasure as he eats you out. Deep moans reverberate from somewhere within his chest, rising though his throat and passing straight into your pussy.

Your thighs pull in tighter around his head as his tongue finds your clit, pressing small, tight circles into the sensitive bundle of nerves. The muscles in your lower stomach and leg begin to twitch as he stimulates the little swollen bud, pushing against it in was that your fingers could never achieve. Even with such little stimulation your back was already beginning to arch, legs bending to pull him in closer against you.

“Fuck, Kenny…” You mumble, feeling a hand trace gentle yet calming circles on your outer thigh. They kept you in the moment, seeming to stop you from floating off and pulling you back into his mattress.

“You taste so good.” You barely hear him as he mumbles his words against your cunt. His voice carried something so loving that you couldn’t help but let out a gentle sigh, pulling at his soft locks slightly.

Your ankles cross as he pushes his mouth harder against you, tongue moving to run through your folds and press against your clit in a repetitive motion. It was driving you mad, the perfect feeling.

Slowly, the hand that had been practically massaging your thigh came to trace the underneath of it, never breaking contact with your skin as It moved. You felt it travel further, eventually moving to your inner thigh before gently tracing your entrance.

One of Kenny’s finger dipped into your cunt, only slipping in up to the second knuckle before pulling out again. You could feel your pussy fluttering as he did it again, sliding in a little further this time. He kept doing it, pulling his finger out and gently sliding it back in, until he reached the base of this finger – then he stopped being so careful. His finger began to pump into you a bit faster, curling up against your soft walls. You were already squirming, but it only gets worse as Kenny continues swirling his tongue over your sensitive clit.

His moaning only serves to drive you further towards the edge, making your face scrunch up in pleasure as his face begins to move, encouraging you to grind your hips against his face. And you did. He begins to moan more, and you half expect him to grab your hip and pull you in closer, only to feel him shift below you and hear him start to whimper.

The pleasure was only building up in your body, dripping and pooling into a white-hot puddle in your belly. Back arching and other hand digging into his hair, pulling him impossibly closer against you. His tongue felt like it was working magic with every flicker, searing pleasure shooting though your body.

Your climax edged ever closer, only pushed by the fact that you could feel Kenny’s arm moving. Everything about the moment felt perfect.

Finally, the rope snapped and you were sent tumbling over the edge, thighs tensing and hands tugging at his hair. You became deaf to your own moans, his name tumbling form your lips as he guided you through your orgasm.

You felt like you were floating as you finally began to come down from your high. Kenny’s head was still pressed neatly between your legs, blond locks now messy and covering his eyes. However, he didn’t move, slit gently lapping at your now encroaching overstimulated pussy. His hand working faster to finish himself as he kept his focus on you.

Whimpers began to fill your throat and mouth, spilling into the air, accompanied by the wet sounds of your own pleasure and the quiet murmurs of his. His moaning got louder, lips finally separating from your hot core so his face could press into your thigh, gasping against your soft skin as he pushed himself further and further towards the edge.

“Fuck… (Y/n)...” he was speaking into your thigh as your hands still scratched lightly at his scalp, hips bucking up into his fist and panting. You could hear him reaching his own end, mumbling words bubbling up in what seemed like begging.

Kenny finally reached his end, body twitching and free hand gripping your thigh. He buried his face into your soft skin, nuzzling slightly as he rode through his high. His hand stopped, pulling away from himself and moving to rest on your thigh.

His face stayed there for a moment, regaining his breath recovering from the feeling. The warmth of his breathing puffing against your thighs was comforting and almost began to lull you into sleep. You could feel your mind slipping, drifting away as your eyes fought it stay open.

In your half-awake state, you could feel Kenny rise, pressing his palms against your thighs to help himself up. He gently rubbed his hands against the hot, soft skin in small, soothing motions.

Kenny leant down, pressing a kiss against your neck, holding himself chest to chest with you for a second. His voice was gentle as he mumbled something into your ear that you didn’t really pick up, both hands cupping your hips, thumbs massaging the skin.

A whine is pulled from your throat as his warmth is peeled away from your body. You reach up, eyes still closed, searching for the body that has already left. The faint noise of feet padding out of the door lets you know he’s leaving.

After a few minutes, you heard Kenny renter the room. His body once again moved to rest between your thighs. Shivers ran through your body when a warm washcloth pressed against your thighs, cleaning where his hands had pressed against you. You let out a light whimper as he pressed it against your core, gently cleaning you.

“Are you ok?” His voice was soft, causing you to crack your eyes open to look at his face. His soft blue eyes scanned your face, waiting for a reaction. You couldn’t summon much more than a small nod, feeling yourself melt into the mattress.

There was a small shuffle as hands slid under you, moving you until your body was laying properly on the bed. The mattress dipped as a warm body slipped in next to you. Kenny’s warmth was once again pressed against your bare skin, a hand sliding around your body until his hand was pressed into your back, keeping you pressed against him. You didn’t fight this, nuzzling into his warmth, your face pressing against his chest. The gentle hands of sleep finally took you, letting you fall into that floating feeling as you listened to Kenny breathe just above your head.

[marmosa]

short fuse.

Fred Weasley x Fem!Reader

Word Count: 4.6k

Warnings: zero proof reading, ha sorry 

A/N: hey guys, so i’m swamped with work rn so my writing process is totally stunted, so i’m sorry about the wait for a new fic. aside from that, i hit 118 followers??? that’s absolutely insane to me that 118 people wanna stick around to see more of my work, it makes me undeniably happy and so proud. So thank you, thank you, thank you. i wanna celebrate somehow, but i’m running dry on ideas. i shot a soulmate!au fred by my best friend and she was keen on it, so i’m leaning towards that, but i do want to celebrate in a way that caters to you guys. so my inbox is open for suggestions and requests while i handle personal obligations. sorry this was a bit of a long a/n, but i just wanna thank you all again so very much for choosing to stick around. it means a lot to me. thank you and enjoy <3

***

“I haven’t got a single clue as to what you’re talking about, she says! That’s a load of rubbish if I’ve ever heard it!”

[y/n] finally laxed and looked up from her hand, furrowing her brows as she continued to blow a soft gust of air onto the drying layer of nail varnish. Her eyes trailed along with Fred who was pacing around her dormitory, his face flushed in anger as he ranted on about some girl in his potions class who happened to piss him off earlier that morning.

“You’d think after Snape chewing our heads off about a less than perfect presentation she’d at least pull some of her weight! And I’m no academic mind you, but I would really prefer to avoid another one of my mum’s howlers this week,” he huffed, finally sitting down in one of the loveseats with an aggressive thump.

“If it’s angering you this much I suggest you either speak to Snape, but he’s insufferable so chance are that’ll bust. How do you feel about me hexing her?” [y/n] offered, offering him a small consoling smile, trying her best to lighten his mood.

It didn’t seem to work as the cloud of frustration continued to thunder above his head, the crease in his forehead more prominent than ever. He dragged his hand down his face and let his head loll back with a grunt, “I appreciate the offer but if I’m forced to another insufferable detention with Snape I’m going to do something awful.”

“What happened to the Fred who spends detention pranking Snape until he’s decided to stop giving you detention simply to avoid having to deal with your pranks again?” [y/n] queried, looking back up from the thumb she’d just fixed up.

“He went and died,” Fred grumbled, sinking further into his chair and frowning.

“Oh shove it, come here,” she waved him over, giving him a demanding stare when he remained deflated in his seat, “I said come here!”

He groaned like a petulant child and slid out of his chair, dragging all his weight as he shuffled over, plopping down onto the floor with a thud strong enough to shake the nail varnish container, earning himself a narrow glare from [y/n].

“Let me paint your nails,” she hummed, grabbing his hand and placing it in front of her without so much as a nod of confirmation.

He remained silent as she got to work, coating his nails in a fine layer of a lovely light blue, humming a small tune to herself as he continued to have the anger peel off him ever so slowly. As soon as she finished the first hand he silently gave her the other, resigning to blow a small gust of air onto the drying paint.

“You’ve gone all quiet, d’ya like getting your nails done?” she mused, grabbing one of the many q-tips spilled across her surface to wipe away at the still wet polish that dripped off the side of his thumbnail.

“Wouldn’t you like to know,” he mumbled, back-tracking when she squeezed his hand to emphasize that she was just asking him a genuine question, “a little, yeah.”

“Well then you should ask me to paint them more often! I think I did a pretty good job and look-!” she held up their hands together, pressing hers right under his just enough to where you could still see his nails, “we match!”

Fred couldn’t carry his anger anymore, a smile finally creeping its way onto his lips, his eyes crinkling at the edges as he returned the kind gesture. His heart decompressed, his posture relaxing as he blew off his remaining steam.

“See, all better- ah! Don’t move yet, they’re not dry,” she chastised him, bringing his hands back down flat against the surface, earning herself a shocked grimace from him, “sorry, I’d just hate for it to smudge.”

“S’alright,” he blew out a breath of air, his eyes scanning her appearance as she fussed over his nails just to make sure they were still intact.

He felt another smile coming on as he admired her. A concentrated crease in her brow, her hair out of place from the morning past, robes long discarded as she got comfortable despite the school uniform. It was impossible, he thought, to not be in love with her.

“What’re you lookin’ at Weasley? Planning to kill me in cold blood are ya?” she teased, finally content with her scan of his nails.

“If you keep biting at me with all that sass, maybe I will be,” he replied, sticking his tongue out playfully and scrunching his nose.

“Well if you wanna keep coming to me to vent you’re going to have to get used to sass. Besides I’ve known you for ages, this isn’t new, is it?” she queried, cocking her head to the side.

“It certainly isn’t,” he shook his head, “doesn’t mean you should keep doing it. But I rest my case.”

“Good, because we’re gonna be late to class, come on now.”

***

“I like the color mate, where’d ya get that fancy thing done?”

Fred looked up from the parchment in front of him, glancing over to Oliver who’d seemingly already finished up with his charms notes, “oh, it’s uh, [y/n]’s. She painted them for me before class.”

“Nice. Hopefully it doesn’t get ruined at practice today, which is after class don’t  you forget it,” Oliver added, nodding his head as if he’d just aided Fred in avoiding a perilous fate.

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Fred chuckled, rolling his eyes at Oliver’s typical attitude.

Oliver seemed content with that answer and went back to his work leaving Fred be. Before he could focus back on his work he felt a piece of paper pelt the back of his head, anger twitching in his temple at the annoying gesture. He glanced behind him and saw the crumpled paper on the floor, looking around the class to see a group of Slytherin quidditch players sitting around laughing amongst themselves.

Fred glowered at them and picked up the paper, unfurling it to see a few insults and some shitty grade-level doodle that insinuated Gryffindor was going to lose the upcoming match later that week. Anger bubbled within him once more as the small gesture relit the fuse [y/n] had supposedly managed to completely put out earlier that day.

Without so much as a side glance he stuck his arm out just enough to where the Slytherin’s could see it and Flitwick couldn’t, muttering a small incantation and feeling the paper burst into flames and reduce itself to ashes in his palm within seconds.

The Slytherin’s had gone and picked a poor day to get on Fred’s nerves as it didn’t take long for another few pieces of paper to be pelted at the back of his head. Unfortunately he had quite literally had it, his stool scraping behind him bringing everyone’s attention to him in the silent class as he thundered over to the Slytherin’s.

He approached them with fury biting into every step he took, his arm surging forward as he grasped the collar of one of the upper year players, a nasty glare painted onto his features.

“You’ve got something you wanted to say to me you slimy bastard?” Fred seethed, his other hand clenched at his side, ready to swing had things decided to take the turn he was anticipating.

“Yeah, didn’t you read the papers?” The Slytherin boy replied smugly, not frightened enough for the immanent danger he was in.

“I would’ve, but none of you are literate enough to form an understandable sentence,” Fred bit back, his brows set heavy on his face, anger practically rolling off him in waves.

The other boy didn’t seem to enjoy having his intelligence insulted, his own chair scraping behind him as he stood up, though it was comical to onlookers just how much taller Fred was than he.

“What’d you say to me, Weasley?”

“I said you’re a piece of shit who’s dumb as rocks.”

That was it. Fists started flying and a ruckus had immediately begun, some students cheering while others called Flitwick’s attention, begging him to intervene in the situation. Being as tall as he was, Fred didn’t have much difficulty tackling the other boy to the ground, taking a sharp swing to his face that landed with a uncomfortably loud thump. The kid cried in pain at that and was finally overtaken by his fighting spirit.

It want on like that for a while, the other kid managing to get in a few hits too, punching Fred in the mouth and landing a nasty kick to the stomach, before Professor Flitwick and another teacher who’d been panic called in finally stopped the brawl.

“Mr. Weasley, enough!” McGonagall snapped, standing in front of him as Oliver and two other Gryffindor’s corralled him to the side and away from the boy who was groaning in pain on the floor.

“But professor he-,”

“Forget detention, you need to be taken to the infirmary this instant! Wood, escort him there immediately and please try not to track blood in the corridors,” McGonagall sighed, exasperated with having to deal with yet another issue, turning on her heel to go attend to the obviously more battered student.

As Fred’s adrenaline finally subsided, pain started to seep into his face and chest, the feeling of fresh blood spilling out of his nose finally registering to him.

“C’mon mate, we’ve got to go before it gets worse,” Oliver insisted, trying his best to forcefully move Fred who was rooted in his place without hurting his injuries.

“Yeah, yeah, right,” Fred nodded, a far away quality to his voice as he and Oliver left the class to head to Madame Pomfrey’s.

***

“Is Fred here? Where is he? Oh, Fred!”

He looked up from the cup of medicine he’d just downed, his face recoiling in disgust at the flavor, eyes sealing shut as he forced it down. When he’d finally recovered from the rancid taste he saw [y/n] barreling towards him, panic glued to her features, her robes billowing behind her.

“Hey, [y/ln],” he grinned, setting the glass down and wincing in pain as he went to uncurl his hands, the knuckles still split open and raw as he waited to have them wrapped up.

“Don’t ‘hey [y/ln]’ me, what were you thinking?” she chided, grabbing a nearby chair and pulling it to the side of his bed, “you look terrible.”

“Hey,” Fred pouted, endeared at her display of worry for his wellbeing, “But you honestly should’ve seen the other guy.”  

“I did and as mad I want to be, you did do quite a number on him. But your hands! Oh dear me,” she sighed shakily, jumping up to go collect some gauze, tape, and disinfectant.

“They’re not that bad,” he mumbled as she grabbed one of his hands, guiding it in her direction ever so gently.

“You always say that,” she clipped, taking a cotton ball out of its container on the nightstand and soaking it in disinfectant, “now just brace yourself, it’s going to sting.”

Before Fred could get a word out he was hissing in pain, collapsing his shoulders inward as his body shivered with the sting. She cooed sweet words under her breath, quickly replacing the cotton ball with gauze to protect the now freshly clean wound. After repeating the same process over again she set his now wrapped hands in his lap, discarding of the used things and returning the tools to their designated spot.

“All better,” she smiled, reaching forward and squeezing the uninjured part of his hand kindly, rubbing her thumb over the tightly wound gauze.

Fred’s heart swelled as he watched her, the fight feeling all the more worth it to have her fawn over him, “Yeah, all better.”

“Madame, he should be free to leave shouldn’t he?” [y/n] asked as Madame walked over, a tray of tools and medications in her hands.

“I’d wish it so. Mr. Weasley please remove your shirt so I can get a good look at your injury,” Pomfrey instructed, setting her tools down on the nightstand, “and [y/n] please move to the other side so I can get to work.

[y/n] passed him a wide-eyed glare as she maneuvered to the other side of the bed, her worry quickly being shoved to the side as he revealed his toned abdomen right in her face. Had circumstance not have been so worrisome, she probably would’ve been all over him, however the school infirmary was the last place she was going to do something like that.

She cast her gaze down, pretending to occupy herself with picking at her nails as she desperately tried to focus on anything but him. She could see him looking at her quizzically, but she still refused to cave and play into her not to so pure thoughts.

“Alright, luckily there isn’t more than a bit of nasty bruising and some small fractures. I’ll go get you another dosage of medication but it’ll require that you stay the night in the infirmary,” Madame Pomfrey nodded, lifting her tray and scurrying away, continuing onto the next ailment she had to attend to.

“Stay the night, rubbish,” Fred groaned, letting his fall back against the railing of the bed with a small thunk, his chest rising and falling softly as he stared at the ceiling.

“Don’t get any bright ideas, you’re staying here or I’ll give you different reason to,” [y/n] deadpanned, folding her arms across her chest as she finally looked up at him.

“And what will you do? Hmm?” He smiled smugly, sitting back up and folding his arms over his chest, his muscles flexing with the movement.

“I-,” her brain ran blank as she quickly averted her gaze, her leg bouncing conspicuously fast, “I don’t know. Something bad probably.”

“Something bad,” he repeated with a lilt, quirking his head to the side, “ is that ‘something bad’ bothering you, [y/n]?”

Her eyes proceeded to grown wider if that was at all possible as she fumbled to find a witty response to snip back at him, but it was no use, she was all hot and bothered and at a loss of words. She resigned herself to a small shake of her head, casting her eyes down to her lap.

“Oh,” he hummed, a smugness practically dripping from his voice, “I get it, you like what you see don’t you?”

“Okay you know what, I think you’re in good hands and you’re going to be just fine on your own and now that I know you’re not dead, I’m going to head back to my dormitory now!” She jumped up, her chair scraping across the floor with an uncomfortable screech as she turned on her heel to leave.

“Now hold on-,” he interjects, grabbing her wrist the best he could with his restricted mobility, tugging her back slightly, “I was only kidding, you know that. I appreciate you coming to check up on me.”

He watched her decompress, her eyes glancing down to where he held her wrist with a tiny smile pulled onto her lips, “Of course, any time Freddie. Now if you’ll excuse me, I actually must go for homework purposes, but I might be back later. Take care.”

“Take care!” he called after her.

***

Fred cozied himself into the covers, the gentle pitter patter of the rain outside the many infirmary windows becoming the background to his thoughts as he tried to fall asleep. With a sigh he rolled onto his back, folding his hands over his chest as he found himself uncapable of falling asleep.

He was bored out of his mind, usually when he found himself in similar circumstances in his dorm he had something on hand to occupy his busy brain. However the infirmary didn’t really provide much to do unless he wanted to get up, steal a stethoscope, and start playing a one-sided game of doctor.

Before he could roll back onto his side and pull the covers closer to his chin to try and force himself asleep, a small outburst of noise drew his attention. As alertness spiked in him, he quietly reached for his wand on his nightstand, wrapping his hand around it and drawing it back under the covers, his mind starting to recite as many defense hex's he could think of.

As he prepared himself to turn around he felt a hand clasp his shoulder and before he could start screaming to try and grab everyone and their mother’s attention, another hand placed itself over his mouth followed by a shushing command.

He turned his head and felt a sudden wave of relief flooding over him as he registered the faux perpetrator, his heart then picking up pace for the same reason.

“Hey,” [y/n] smiled softly, he eyes sunken in a sleepy sort of way. “I’m gonna move my hand, don’t scream.”

Fred rolled his eyes, but nodded none the less, “you could’ve given me a heads up that you were coming, I would’ve tried harder to look more presentable.”

She looked up from her open bag at her side, her brows pushing together as she stared at him with a confused yet amused look, “you look just fine, Freddie. What’re you on about?”

Fred struggled to bite back a laugh, shaking his head as he pushed himself up into a sitting position, the blanket bunching around his waist, “Nothing, nothing- hey, what’d you even come here for anyway? Couldn’t resist being away from me for so long?”

“You wish, Weasley,” she rolled her eyes, thanking her lucky stars that there was a chair nearby and she wouldn’t have to make any extra noise bringing it over, “I’m here to paint your nails.”

“Oh,” he glanced down at his hands, noticing she was, in fact, right about the presumed notion that he needed a repaint, “Are they still gonna be blue?”

“Well, I brought the lot of the varnish with me, I was just going to let you pick,” she smiled, setting the bag down into his lap.

His face beamed as he rolled the tote bag down, revealing the pile of nail varnish containers, a childish grin spreading out on his face as he browsed the collection. [y/n] smiled to herself and prepped the nail varnish remover to get rid of the cracked and chipped polish already on his fingers.

“Can I mix ‘n match?” he quipped, holding up two colors to the moonlight to get a better look at them.

“If you’d like,” she shrugged, “it’s up to you.”

“Sick! Can I do one hand black and one red?” his voice buzzing with excitement.

“Certainly, hand them over and we can start,” she chuckled, taking the two colors and setting the rest at the foot of the bed

She pulled one of his hands to her gently, swirling the cotton ball over his nails to remove the polish. A giggle escape her when he scrunched his nose at the bitter smell of the acetone, the fumes making him blink rapidly as he got used to it.

“Well that’s mad, it feels like that stuff should’ve melted my fingers off,” he breathed incredulously, shaking his head to get rid off the weird buzz that had fanned over his brain.

“It certainly does and unfortunately the effects don’t change, you can never really get used to it,” she sighed, grabbing his other hand, continuing to wipe away at the blue.

The two feel back into silence as she feel into her focused stupor, her lips pursed to blow a small gust of wind to dry the remaining acetone while she shook a bottle of varnish in her other hand. Fred watched her with wide, adoring eyes, absolutely enamored with how dedicated she was to the task at hand. He let her continue on without interjecting, for the first time that night the silence was inviting and he quite enjoyed just hearing the clink of the cap against the bottle and the intermingling of their breaths.

“You have nice hands,” she noted absentmindedly, capping the black varnish and beginning to help it dry, missing the look Fred gave her at the suggestive nature of her compliment.

“Thanks,” he hummed, redirecting his attention to the shiny layer of red on his right hand while she continued to blow air onto his left.

“Of course,” she hummed, “now let me see both of your hands, I don’t want it to be messy.”

Fred complied and shifted his body so he was facing her, setting both his hands in her own while she inspected his nails, her focus so dedicated to her task that she yet again missed the adoring look he was giving her. A smile quirked at his lips as she absentmindedly ran her thumb over his hands, triple-checking that the varnish was indeed dry.

“Well, I suppose that does it,” she nodded, satisfied with her handy work, “d’ya like it?”

“More than anything,” he beamed, “are you going to leave now?”

“Only if you want me to, I don’t have classes tomorrow morning so I have no problem staying up,” she shrugged, secretly wishing he’d request her company.

“That’d be lovely, I was having trouble sleeping anyway,” he nodded.

“Same here. I can imagine it was only harder for you with your injuries,” she noted sadly, glancing over at his still wrapped hands, the gauze looking like it was fresh.  

“It’s not too bad, Madame Pomfrey gave me some painkillers so I’m doing alright. Besides it’s not so bad since I have you,” he added, fiddling with the folded covers around his knees.

Her eyes widened a bit as she processed his confession of sorts, her heart picking up pace in her chest at his vulnerability, her next words coming out in a hush, “That’s sweet, Freddie.”

“I’d hope so,” he whispered, raising his brows as he bobbed his head in an awkward sort of nod.

[y/n] reached forward again and took one of his hands into hers, boldly lifting it to her lips and pressing a chaste kiss to his bandaged knuckles, squeezing his wrist gently. It was all too much for Fred, she’d been too kind all day and here she was sitting in front of him now, kissing his hand and smiling at him all too innocently for how badly he wanted to kiss her then and there.

But he was at a loss of words and she was at a loss of restraint, trailing her lips up so she could press another kiss to the inside of his wrist and then the small divot of his elbow, slowly but surely pulling him forward towards her. Fred didn’t mind it though, he leaned into her with every advance, his breath coming to a stand still in his throat as she neared his face.

Her chair pushed behind her with a faint scraping noise as she stood up to accommodate for their height difference, his hand now intertwined with her own down at her side as she looked him straight in the eyes. The tension in the air was palpable and though she had been taking the initiative all day, he didn’t need anyone to tell him twice just what he needed to do.

“Can I kiss you?” he asked barely above a whisper.

“You most certainly can.”

Though he felt himself surge forward with urgency, the entire thing was as slow and sultry as they could get it. Their lips molded together softly, gentle kisses passed between each of them, quiet endearments passed between each pause for breath before going in for more. Fred cupped the back of her head with his free hand, hers doing relatively the same as she lifted her knee to his side so she could stabilize herself.

The kisses quickly became deeper, not necessarily desperate, but long and drawn out, both of them wanting to melt into the other for eternity. [y/n] wished so desperately that the circumstance were different enough to where she could curve into him, be able to feel over his arms and chest and relish in every inch of him that she’d fallen in love with. Fred similarly thought the same, his hand squeezing hers every so often to remind himself that she was there and this was happening and she was his.

When they pulled away, [y/n] pressed her forehead to his, letting their hands unwind so she could cup his face and he could caress her hips. Their breaths mingled in the buzzing silence, heart’s thumping in their ears as they relished in one another’s presence. She turned her head to the side to pepper kisses against his cheek, tilting it downward to trace loving kisses along his jawline too. He let out a breathy chuckle, feeling bad that he couldn’t just pull her into his lap and show her as much affection as she was showing him, but he knew deep down their current options were limited.

“I adore you Freddie,” she whispered, pressing a kiss to the divot where his ear met his jaw, her fingers moving to card through his hair.

Fred couldn’t believe how utterly at a loss for words he was. It was so unlike him to not have a witty word or two to put in, especially after such a moment that begged for its tension to be resolved. But after the rough day he’d had, he thought it fine to let himself receive rather than give, even if just this once.

“You’re amazing, [y/l/n],” he chuckled softly, moving his hands so they were rubbing her back gently, her shirt riding up every so often with his movements.

“As are you,” she hummed, finally pulling back to admire her lover’s face, her thumb tracing over his jaw, nose, and lips, an adoring gaze melted onto her features.

“Thank you. For all you’ve done for me today,” he added, wanting to emphasize just how appreciative he was of her, knowing he’d hopefully be able to truly make it up to her later.

“That’s what you do for people you love, right?” she smiled, biting back a giggle when his face drew into one of bashfulness.

“I suppose so,” he returned the smile, pulling her face back down for one more savored kiss, a sigh escaping her as she melted into his embrace once more, “now what do you suppose we do for the next couple hours, that is if you intend to stay?”

“Well see,” [y/n] shrugged, “now scoot over that chair is ghastly, I don’t want to sit in it anymore.”

“And were back,” Fred chuckled, obliging her request to make room for her on the bed.

“What?”

“Oh it’s nothing,” he shook his head.

“Yeah, nothing, sure,” she rolled her eyes, crossing her legs under her as she got comfy across from him.

“It is nothing!” he scoffed, kicking her before crossing his legs underneath him.

“Rubbish.”

“I warned you what would happen if you kept giving me sass didn’t I,” he quirked a brow, folding his arms over his chest.

“Maybe you did, maybe you didn’t, we may never know,” she lilted, batting her eyelashes innocently.

Fred exhaled and lolled his head to the side, unable to hide the grin on his face, “whatever, now, I bet you’re wondering how the fight went!”

“Oh yes! But spare the nasty details, I can handle it, I’d just prefer not to.”

“Whatever you say, love.”

[sarasmallmanwrites]

A-Level Playing Field

Nobody wanted my opinion on this, but it’s hard growing up poor. 

1988. It’s that damp kind of evening outside, clouded by condensation on the single glazed windows, and the smoke from my Nan’s Benson and Hedges. We’ve just had tea – this is North, of course – and everything is accompanied by slices of springy bread heavily lacquered in ‘soft spread’. The gold foiled butter is, usually, saved for my grandad, who works at a fibreglass factory. It’s a very long way away (actually 3.7 miles) and he leaves on his bike every evening with three rounds of tinned ham sandwiches in his bag. Tonight, my mum is out until half nine, working in the care home in the next town, picking me up at ten-ish, depending on how fast she walks. My mum is 27. Five years out of a loveless marriage, living in a council house, she has no qualifications but is working for her City and Guilds and her English ‘O-Level’, GCSEs haven’t hit our vocabulary yet, and won’t until my second cousin Mark does his two years later.

Tonight is Thursday. Nan goes out on a Thursday, which means she will leave the house at half seven in a haze of Vitapoint, Elnett and Lily of the Valley, to play Bingo at the local club. I am being looked after by Alan, my mum’s younger brother, living at home, working in the Mill that overlooks the town below like a stern Victorian overseer. He’s always grumpy, stuck in a town that has no opportunities, and no visible exit. The eighties have been cruel to young, working-class men. The vehement cry of ���get the fuck out’ hasn’t reached our town but will do in eight years time, on a wave of Britpop, New Labour, cigarettes, and alcohol.

My uncle looks to the television for nightly escape. Thursday is Blackadder, it’s Not The Nine O’Clock News, it’s Comic Strip, it’s A Bit of Fry and Laurie, it’s Red Dwarf, it’s shipwrecked and comatose, and me engrossed on the couch, not sipping mango juice, but milky tea (the North!), as my uncle laughs his head off in between cigarettes. My mum returns, smelling like TCP and the outside, with salty, vinegary chips, and we eat them as we walk the newly tarmacked paths under the orange street lights. I ask her what a goldfish shoal is. She tells me to shush.

I decided that weekend that I wanted to be funny. I mean I could make people laugh when I did my Cilla Black impression, so surely that was a start, and thank to Carry On films I was brilliant at ‘Infamy, Infamy!’, I knew this because my grandad (the cleverest man I knew) had told me so. Even though I was only in Junior One, I knew that you had to be taught how to be funny, that there was definitely some kind of class that you would have to take to learn it, because I had never really been a natural at anything; apart from whistling, which I did with gusto in shrill, high- pitched tones wherever I could.

I read a lot, especially the paper – particularly the Daily Mirror, which probably explains why I am always heavily weighted to the left, and not just because of my ineptitude in heels – and found out that Hugh Laurie, who is obviously the funniest man I have ever encountered, went to Cambridge and was in something called ‘The Footlights’. Then was it, I decided. I was going to go to Cambridge and join ‘The Footlights’ and be funny like Victoria Wood and Dawn French. I imagine ‘The Footlights’ to be a rag-tag theatrical group living on their wits, humour, and more importantly, Pot Noodles. I tell my Grandad that I want to go to Cambridge. He tells me not to be daft.

Now, when I think about it, wanting to go to Cambridge was not a preposterous idea for any child at the age of seven; you are at the start of your education journey. There is plenty of time to get better at things, to practice, to be coached, to improve yourself; but for a working-class girl, who would eventually be the first member of her family to go to university, I might as well have said that I wanted to fly to Mars on fairy wings. But, children who attend private schools are told from the age of four that Oxford or Cambridge are the end goals for their education, with any of the higher-performing Russell Group universities being something that they could settle for, at a push. I didn’t even know what a Russell Group University was until about three years ago, and why would I? For me, in my small artsy primary school with forty children across four year groups, a dismissive attitude towards formal English education, and a liberal fancy for devoting the whole of the summer term to the end of year show, this was not something that was even thought about. Oxford and Cambridge were places printed on the back of books, they weren’t places that you went to university. In fact, most of my primary school teachers hadn’t even been to university but received their qualifications at the local teacher training college; the only exception is a brown jumpered gentleman with a penchant for using cupboards as a disciplinary technique. 

We’ll skip forward a few years later, and high school is a vigorous mixing bowl of talents, it takes until at least year nine before anyone even notices who I am amongst the squall of kids churning about in KS3. Dinner is pink sausage meat wrapped in a translucent puff pastry duvet, a treat even on the hottest days when the fat sticks to your lips; and the terms pass in a haze of cheap cider (the kind that tastes like sick), the floral pout of Cherry Lypsyl, and Chris Evans on the Radio One Breakfast Show; who is hastily snoozed every morning before I smell the lukewarm coffee my mum has left by my bed before she goes to work.  At this point my mum is a newly qualified nurse at the hospice two towns over, her fingers raw from hand sanitiser, but with rolls of antiseptic scented micropore tape that I use for a cacophony of projects. She is on nights right now, spooning gravelly granules of instant coffee into a mug, blurry from sleep, I am cobbling together a mask out of old Cornflake packets, stuck together with nursing supplies and painted with nail varnish that went past its best around the same time as the Thompson Twins. It is 1995, and the country feels like it is on the cusp of something.  I don’t know what, but I’m looking forward to the Year 2000 because I will be fully grown. Well, nineteen.

But what about Oxbridge? Well, for starters, if you attend a state school you have to be so immediately impressive to your teachers that they discuss you in the staffroom. It’s not enough to be good at one particular thing, you have to excel across the board. You have to be so amazingly shiny, that even the most jaded teacher in the school cannot fail to be dazzled by your brightness. For state school kids, Oxbridge is not something that they suggest to the average 10 A*-C kids, it’s not something that they even dangle in front of 10 A*-B kids who are pretty good. At state school, you have to be exceptional for your teachers to even consider you as a candidate, and then you have to achieve enough A*s in your GCSEs that you might as well open a Planetarium. Even then, all they can really do is say ‘I think you could go to Oxford or Cambridge, you know’, or flag you up to the local authority careers service as ‘potential Oxbridge’. There is no Oxford Fast Track programme in state schools, even for exceptional kids.

In a recent social media fracas, one lady proclaimed that if you gave kids a level playing field then poor kids would always triumph because they were more resilient - all those Crispy Pancakes, surely? But for children from a working-class background, we’re not even on the playing field yet; we have to borrow trainers with non-marking soles, scrape around for a quid for the bus. By the time we get to the playing field, we have already been running around for half the day trying to get there, we miss the warm-up because we were late and, honestly, by this point, we’re just knackered because we’ve had to work so much harder just to get there in the first place.

The warm-up is a given to those whose parents have been able to pay for their education – they even get complimentary orange slices for afterwards, just for extra pep and vigour. There are Oxbridge prep classes, extracurricular activities slanted towards the Oxbridge admissions interviews, and chances to take unpaid internships during the summer using family connections. It’s not just that though... it’s little things like knowing it’s pronounced ‘Barkshire’, not Berkshire, it’s when you use a napkin, it’s spending a week skiing at Courchevel. It’s olives. 

In 1998, I don’t know any of these things and, even if I did, my accent with its flat vowels and its Lancashire intonation would give me away in a heartbeat, because I sound like I’ve fallen off a pit pony on my way back t’mill. Things change quickly though. My mum has a baby. A screaming, mewling little boy born during The Simpsons on a Friday evening in October. Now there is absolutely no money for luxuries, and when our TV gets nicked, we end up using the small portable from upstairs. My Nan lends me money here and there to get to college, but it only covers the bus fare, and the small endowment that I receive  - supposedly to cover driving lessons - gets swallowed up with everyday things that seventeen-year olds shouldn’t have to pay for. I’m working for 4 hours a week in Woolies too, £3.10 p/h to stand around the toy department in a slippery polyester blouse the colour of synthetic mint ice cream, before skulking off to the bookshop to spend that money on things for college.  Nothing fancy but, by this point, I am well on my way to being a ‘Funny Girl’, studying a raft of ‘arty-farty’ A-Levels and English thrown in for good measure. The Cambridge Footlights hardly crosses my mind anymore, because Oxford and Cambridge are reserved for the kids doing the hard sciences, maths, law, politics, things that you need a calculator for. You don’t get into Oxford with A-Levels in Theatre Studies, Media, and Performing Arts, despite what they tell you about diversity.

Oxford or Cambridge do not offer a typical British university experience, and how can teachers who have never passed through the rigorous and exhausting Oxbridge admissions procedure be expected to offer any kind of advantage to their gifted and talented students? If you are a working-class parent relying on underfunded, underpaid and overworked FE lecturers to help coach your child through this, then you are immediately on the backfoot compared to a child whose parents can afford private tutors, admissions booklets, and interview coaches. This is no reflection on sixth form teachers in FE establishments across the country, who do all they can to nurture the kids with Oxbridge potential, but when some classes haven’t received new textbooks for two years, where students are encouraged to photocopy their own materials to save costs, you can see where the class difference begins to draw attention to itself without the need for neon yellow highlighters.

My UCAS book arrived in September; an impressive, thinly papered tome with a glossy black and white cover, University Colleges and Admission Services stamped across it in orange. It smells like a cross between the Argos catalogue and a phone book, which I feel is rather apt given that it contains the codes of institutions and courses that will break me out of this godforsaken town: a cypher that I etch out on the application form in black biro.

London

Southampton

Buckinghamshire

Preston

Liverpool

Manchester.

I don’t want to go to any of the bottom three, of course, far too close to where I came from to be relevant.  My second cousin Mark’s stint at Sheffield Hallam seemed to be an excuse for his mum to visit his ‘digs’ once a month with catering sized tins of Nescafe, and I would be lying if I said I wasn’t quite looking forward to edging the lid off with a knife and stabbing through that ridged foil. My mum writes a cheque out in her secondary modern handwriting, crossing her fingers that they won’t cash it until after payday.

The discrepancies between low-income working-class families and those with a better income also show here too - this can be something as simple as slow internet connection, not having a working laptop and doing work on smartphones, access to transport, costs for travel to visit universities. Things like this are not included when factoring in costs for students from low income. How can you visit all the different university campuses, with all the travel costs and maybe even overnight accommodation, when your parents can barely afford to keep the lights on? There was only one institution that I wanted to go to. London Institute, a glamourous collection of art colleges that included the London College of Fashion, Central St Martins, and, more importantly for me, The London College of Printing.  The competition was fierce, but I was shortlisted for an interview in the capital with a former editor of the Daily Mirror. My house was showered in happy expletives that day. Even in 1999, tickets from Wigan to London were over £50 for a pre-booked return. My mum cashed in all of her Clubcard points for the ticket. But, just for me, because she hadn’t bought enough milk to cover the cost of two tickets. However, I must have impressed Tony Delano in that office in Clerkenwell, because he gave me an amazingly lowball offer meaning that my A-level results became a terribly graded self-fulfilling prophecy.

Oxford is different from usual universities in that there are colleges, thirty-nine in total. You might have seen them on University Challenge – Balliol, Trinity, Emmanuel, Brasenose – or from reading the Wikipedia pages of any of our last three Prime Ministers, including the incumbent Boris Johnson, who graduated with a 2:1 in 1987. That’s the other thing – you don’t study something at Oxford, you read it – you don’t start your studies, you matriculate, for which you need a robe. Now, I have been told by helpful and obstinate alumni via social media that Matriculation Robes are £25, ex-hire. However, I have also been told by a current Oxford student that the robe cost is £50 minimum, and no-one would dare wear a secondhand robe as ‘everyone would know’. It’s immediately singling yourself out as a Weasley in a room filled with Malfoys.

The accommodation costs are comparable to London prices; however, this does not cover the Christmas break, which means everything needs to be packed up and stored. Not only do you pay for the storage, but you pay for the boxes too. Much to my disappointment, no-one nips out for a Pot Noodle either, students are expected to dine ‘in hall’ (again, more cost!) where you can choose between an informal and a formal sitting – where your gown is required. I imagine for a working-class kid attending Oxford or Cambridge is very much like cosplaying on a Harry Potter set, but without the magic of a bottomless purse. There are balls too at the end of each term, formal affairs with ticket prices over £50. Again, said the former alumni, you don’t have to go! It’s not obligatory!

But let me tell you a harsh reality. Nothing ostracises a poor kid more than not being able to join in because they can’t afford it. Nothing. And we might have great friends who would all chip in and pay for our ticket, or lend us the money, but there is something very working-class about not wanting people to know that we can’t afford it. Surely we should not be asking these young adults who have studied and worked against all odds, to have a second class university experience because they know their parents won’t be able to help. You can’t even get a job to supplement your income either; the majority of colleges stipulate this, and as someone who had to work two term-time jobs at a much less prestigious university to live (even with the glorious student overdrafts of pre-austerity Britain), this really hit home at how much I would have struggled financially if I had gone to either of these institutions.

Recently my daughter applied for university. We get in the car and visit a university each week, driving miles up and down and across the country. We fight over choices and analyse each course based on employability, and whether or not she would like it. The process is completed in clicks and feels much more clinical than twenty years earlier, but rather than heading into unchartered waters, I have a map. It might be old and tattered, but I have a much better idea of where we are going now. My daughter believes that the meritocracy is a lie, and she tells me this in sharp, pointed tones as we receive her A-level results on a rainy Thursday morning. She goes to University in September and spends the autumn sending me videos of the Minster, or tutorials on how to swear in Japanese. She is only the second person in our family to continue on to higher education. I don’t just mean in her generation. I mean in total. We are the exception, not the rule.

One of the first questions someone at Oxford was asked by a fellow student last year was ‘private or state’, she replied ‘private’ and was met with a smile. There was no need to ask who the state school entrant was, as she queried the partridge and asparagus served for dinner – ‘this chicken is tough. Is that grass?’- and arrived for the formal sitting with her gown covering a denim skirt and shimmery top underneath. Private school teaches these things, no desperate faux pas for Isobel or Jeremy, whereas state schools do not have the resources or the knowledge to run classes on etiquette for the small number of their students that make it through the intense application procedures. This is not saying that low-income children should be discouraged – not at all – instead, it is saying that there is something inherently wrong with the system. At private school, you are disappointed if you don’t get into Oxbridge, whereas the state school child who gets in is an extraordinary anomaly talked about for years in hushed tones of reverence by the faculty.

And this is the issue with saying that children are on a level playing field, that everyone is measured on their own merit; because it is not true. For children on very low incomes, the odds are unfairly stacked against them, and the issues such as 2020’s disastrous A-Level results just add more bricks to an already near-insurmountable wall.

[shedyou-blog]

Rush (Adonis Creed One-Shot)

Summary: A young intern has a rough start to her day, and running into a certain stranger is just the icing on the cake. 

Warning: Mild language.

Word count: 3,399

Notes: I might turn this into a series, but for now it’s just a quick one-shot that I wrote last night. This is my first ever piece of writing that I’ve shared, so I’m pretty nervous. Feel free to leave your feedback or any requests, as I’m keen on wanting to better myself as a writer. Also, thank you to my friend, Brittani, for being my proofreader/editor! I appreciate you! You guys can check out her material @killmongers-counselor ❤️

───✱*.｡:｡✱*.:｡✧*.｡✰*.:｡✧*.｡:｡*.｡✱ ─── 

“Thank you so much, Greg!” I cried out to the barista behind the Starbucks counter as I made my way past the crowded sea of people trying to get their morning beverages and breakfast. Holding a piping hot cup of coffee in one and my briefcase in the other, I used my shoulder to quickly push the door of the Starbucks open and made my way on to the ever so lively, busy streets of New York City.

This morning had been a doozy, considering the fact that I overslept, and was now running late for work. As an intern for one of the top public relations firms in the country, I made it my mission to appear as professional as possible in order to achieve the career that I’ve always wanted, which was to be the best damn publicist in the entertainment business that the world had ever seen.

Glancing down at the rose gold Apple watch on my wrist, I cracked one eye open, scared to look at the time displayed on the tiny screen. “Fuck!” I let out a tumultuous groan as I proceeded to power walk down the congested sidewalk amongst other wayfarers trying to get to their individuals destinations. There was never a time where NYC wasn’t busy, especially during the weekdays. The streets were always filled with employees making their way to their nine to fives. I fret that I wasn’t going to make it to my job on time, becoming annoyed and panicked as I damn near sprinted, finally approaching the area in which my workspace was located. The only issue was that I was on the wrong side of the street and making it across the hectic street would prove a challenge. However, at this moment in time, I didn’t care about anything other than making it to my job, so I took my chances. Holding up my hand that was preoccupied by my briefcase, I began to jog across, passing by a few cars. The owners of the cars were obviously irritated, making sure that they honked their horns at me to let me know how dumb I was, but I didn’t care.

I was halfway across the street when suddenly, my heel got caught in a subway grate, causing me to lose my footing, but I quickly recovered by stretching my arms to my sides, which helped me with my balance. Once I got my body to stop swaying back and forth, I crouched down to try and retrieve my heel which was still stuck in the subway grate. “Oh, my fucking god, you have to be kidding me right now.” I harshly whispered to myself, thinking my morning couldn’t get any worse than what it already was.

“Aye, watch out!” I heard someone bellow out, but I was way too focused on trying to save my heel to pay them any attention. “Hey!” They yelled again, and that’s when my entire body crashed into the sidewalk. It was as if something, or more so, someone, had collided right into me.

I let out a shriek, bewildered and thinking over what the hell had just happened. A few seconds later, the weight that had slammed into me removed itself while I still laid on the hard, gray concrete. “What the fu- “I turned my body around and sat up, so I was sitting on my butt, and that’s when I looked up to see a well-built African-American man standing over me with his somewhat swollen hand extended to me. Before I grabbed his hand, I analyzed him quickly. His torso was clad in a skin tight, long sleeved black shirt, which was layered with a warm black leather jacket with beige fur lining the outsides. His jeans were a dark wash blue and they slightly sagged a little, but not too much to where they were falling off his ass. He adorned a pair of classic tan Timberlands on his feet. He was good looking, handsome, actually. I’ll give him that. Hesitantly, I took his hand into mine and he pulled me up, helping me stand to my feet. My feet. Underneath my left foot, I could feel the hard, cold, gravely pavement. I glanced down, finding that my shoe was no longer attached to my foot and my eyes immediately darted toward the street to see that it had already been ran over, and was continuing to be ran over by other vehicles making their way through town. “SERIOUSLY?!” I huffed out, sulking and stomping my feet, to which the male currently standing before me found to be amusing. I quickly shot him the hardest glare I could muster which only made him laugh even harder. If I wasn’t so angry, I would have noted how perfect his teeth were, but I was way more focused on giving him a piece of my mind than complementing his features. “I don’t see what it is that you find so funny. Now what am I gonna do? I literally have to be at work in three minutes and I’m missing a fucking shoe!”

With a shake of his head, he beamed down at me. “It was either gonna be you or the shoe. I figured you were worth more than an object that could be easily replaced.”

“Well that’s where you’re wrong, because that shoe was VERY expensive, limited edition actually, therefore it can’t be replaced!” I spoke loudly with an eye roll and with as much venom that I could lace into my voice.

“Listen, if the shoes mean so much to you, I’ll buy you another pair to cover the damages.” He said with an exasperated sigh, sensing my anger through the tone of my voice.

“What part of these are limited editions did you not understand? Did you not listen to a word I just said?” I was pretty much yelling at the guy now.

He cocked an eyebrow at me as he looked at me in shock. “You know usually when someone gets their life saved, they show a bit of gratefulness by saying thank you. You’re crazy to wanna risk your life over a shoe of all things.”

“Yet you’d risk your life for a complete stranger, someone who you don’t know and will probably never see again?” I inquired, raising my eyebrow to imitate his earlier facial expression. I knew I was coming off as extremely rude and bitchy, but I was too far gone in rage to even care.

He gave a slight shrug of his broad shoulders. “Well, I’d rather die as a hero than die as a moron.”

“Excuse me? The hell is that supposed to mean?” I questioned, getting offended by his smart comment.

He rolled his eyes and shook his head while waving me off. “It doesn’t mean anything. Just leave, y’know…. so you won’t be late for work.”

“Oh, I’m going! You don’t have to worry about that!” I clapped back, making sure the tone in my voice was dripping with nothing but sarcasm. I quickly turned around and limped my way to my destination, before growing even more annoyed and taking the remaining heel off. Once inside the building where my job was located, I scurried through the front lobby with my head down, embarrassed to be seen by my fellow coworkers in my current state. I could hear murmurs and whispers as I felt people’s eyes burning a hole through my body. After what felt like forever, I reached the elevator and climbed in with a number of other employees, squeezing my way through so I could press the button that would take me to the tenth floor of the building. Once again, I could feel eyes on me, so I concentrated on getting to my meeting on time, and also tried to come up with an explanation as to why I was walking into a professional setting barefoot. This internship meant everything to me and was the key to achieving my dream job. I couldn’t let this mishap cost me everything that I’ve worked so hard to get.

When the elevator doors opened, I lightly jogged to the conference room, walking in to see my boss, Mr. Addington, and multiple other colleagues sitting at the long, freshly varnished conference table. I nodded my head swiftly as a greeting, and hurriedly made my way to my seat.  “You’re just in time Ms. Bridges. I was starting to think I was going to have to let you go. We are waiting on our new client to arrive and then we’ll proceed with the meeting.” I sighed, giving him a light “okay” as a response, honestly exhausted from how rough my morning had been. I was just grateful he hadn’t noticed my missing shoes.

Once seated, I took a deep breath, trying to relax my thoughts. I looked around the table nervously and spotted that everyone had their required paperwork stacked in front of them, just in case the client decided to pick who he or she wanted to represent them. Then it hit me. When I got knocked over on the sidewalk earlier, my coffee AND briefcase fell out of my hands and onto the jam pact streets of the Concrete Jungle. “Shit!” I said under my breathe so no one around me could hear. I scooted my chair back and stood up, straightening my outfit which had been wrinkled due to my fall a few minutes earlier. “Mr. Addington,” I squeaked out. “I apologize for the inconvenience, but I just realized that I left my paperwork out- um, on my desk! If you don’t mind, could I go and get it really quick?”

“Go ahead.” He finally spoke after a few seconds of sitting in silence, which seemed like an eternity. I nodded, trying to make a beeline for the conference room door, but then Mr. Addington stopped me.

“Ms. Bridges?” He called out from behind me, resulting in me stopping dead in my tracks, shutting my eyes tightly in order to brace myself for what I knew was about to come. “Why on earth are you walking around in a professional setting without shoes on?”

Turning around slowly, I gave him the most apologetic look that I could assemble, opening my mouth to say something, but someone standing behind me decided to speak for me. It was him.

“It’s because I spilled coffee on them. I might have gotten some on her briefcase too.” I turned my head in the direction of where the voice was coming from, only to see the man I had encountered earlier standing before me, holding a pair of the very same shoes that had been damaged along with my briefcase. He sported a dazzling smile, showing off his pearly whites while handing the items over to me. “Here you go, ma’am. Sorry about all the trouble.”

My mouth was wide open as my jaw hung low, in complete shock and disbelief that 1) I would run into him again and 2) he had found the same exact limited-edition shoes I was sporting earlier. I struggled to find the words to say, until I saw him stalking over to the other empty seat at the table, that’s when the realization hit me. “Wait, you’re our new client?!” I whispered to him before he got too far out of ear shot. He turned his head slightly, winking his eye at me with a cheeky grin plastered along his face.

“Well then Ms. Bridges, if you don’t mind, could you please take a seat, so we can get this meeting started?” Mr. Addington suggested. “Y-yes sir.” I stuttered while clearing my throat, ecstatic that I wasn’t going to lose my internship and headed towards the table to take my seat.

  ───✱*.｡:｡✱*.:｡✧*.｡✰*.:｡✧*.｡:｡*.｡✱ ───

When the meeting was over, everyone in the room stood up from their seats and began to fill out of the room, including the man whose name I had already forgot despite him being the topic of discussion at today’s meeting. I was still wanting to hold on to a little bit of anger, but it was hard to do so after his grand gesture of retrieving my briefcase and finding me my prized heels. Apparently, he was really popular in the boxing world, being the gifted seed of another popular boxer who had died before he was born. He recently became the new heavyweight champion of the world and was in need of a publicist to help mold his public image to the world. It seems as if he was known by the majority of the employees in the conference room, except me, considering I’m not into sports like that. The meeting ended with him not deciding who he wanted as a publicist, so Mr. Addington decided that we’d have another meeting soon unless he made up his mind later on today.

I quickly caught up to the man in the hallway, tapping him lightly on his shoulder with a manicured nail to get his attention. “Excuse me.” I croaked out, slightly nervous and embarrassed that I had made such a fool out of myself earlier.

He stopped walking and turned his head halfway, looking at me out of the corner of his eye. I could tell he was smirking, his eyes held a glint of amusement in them. “Yes?” He responded.

“Um, h-how did you get these? They’re-“I began to ask before he turned around fully and cut me off.

“Limited edition?” He chuckled, finishing my sentence for me. His shoulders bounced lightly, finding the turn of events humorous. “Girl, you ain’t the only woman in this building with these. You know that, right? They aren’t as limited as you thought.”

I nodded my head, beginning to stumble over my words. “I mean, yeah but- I know b-but- “He cut me off again.

“Look, I bought ‘em off some woman’s feet ‘ight? Don’t even trip. There yours now so you should be happy now, right?” He answered in the most sarcastic tone he could convene, imitating how I was acting earlier. He started to walk away again toward the elevator.

“Thank you!” I blurted out loudly and he stopped dead in his tracks, his back facing me while his finger hovered over the button that would take him to the first floor of the building.

“What are you thankful for? The shoes, saving your life, or saving your job?” He cocked his head to the side. I couldn’t see his face, but I just knew he was sporting an exasperated look on his features.

“Everything.” It came out more like a question and he kissed his teeth in response. “Look, I was dead wrong to not say thank you. I know I came off as a bitch and I truly apologize for being so nasty to you. I was just really stressed out and I know that isn’t an excuse to treat you the way that I did. I’m really sorry.”

He was still turned around the other way, nodding his head as a sign that he accepted my apology. “’Ight, I forgive you, but you owe me for doing me like that.”

“I’ll do anything! Just say the word.” I quickly rushed out, only to ponder that what I just said could be taken the wrong way. “Except sex. That’s out of the question. Anything but that.” He spun around at that statement, letting out a hearty laugh, his eyes squinting and his nose crinkling a bit. I hated to say it, but he looked absolutely adorable. He reminded me of a little kid at that moment. When he finally calmed down, he let out a small chuckle, shoving his hands into the pockets of his coat. “I promise no sex. Just dinner and movie… and for you to be my new publicist.”

“Wait, whoa, whoa, whoa. You mean like a DATE date? I asked, taken aback that he’d even mention that as an option. Not to put myself down or anything, but I considered myself to be pretty average compared to the women I’d assume were his type. He seemed to be out of my league. “And also, you want me to be your publicist? Nigga, did you see how we were butting heads earlier? Plus I’m just an intern. There are other people who were in that room that are way more qualified and have more experience than me. You really think that’s a good idea?” I said with hand on my hip.

He gave me a blank stare, kissing his teeth again. “Nah I mean a conference.” He responded sarcastically to my first question. “And how are you gonna get experience if you don’t go out in the field first hand? If you do a good job, you might get hired for a full-time position. I think it’s a great idea.” I nodded my head slowly, taking in what he just said. He was making a lot of sense.

“Well when you put it that way… okay, what the hell, I’ll do it.” I obliged, glancing down at the shoes that were now on my feet, clasping my hands together behind my back as I rocked back and forth on the heels of my feet to the tips of my toes. “And as for the date, I mean, that’s cool. I would love that…” I trailed off, trying to remember the name Mr. Addington referred to him by during the meeting.

As if he read my mind, he chuckled once again. “You can just call me Donnie.” He smiled, shaking his head lightly in delight.

“Donnie” I repeated under my breathe a few times, making sure his name was ingrained in my brain. I looked up at him, his gaze was slightly intimidating. “Well, I’m- “

“Amondi. How could I forget such a unique name?” He had a habit of finishing my sentences, I could see. It seemed like he always had a way of knowing exactly was I was going to say, and he just met me. “Wait, Mr. Addington never referred to me by my first name. How did you know?” I gave him a side eye, curious as to how he found out that piece of information.

“This morning must really got you frazzled.” He spoke, amusement lacing his voice. “It’s labeled on the front of your briefcase.”

“Oh… well yeah, that’s correct. So, uh, do you wanna take my number or should I take yours? My mom always told me that if a guy gives you his number, then that means he has nothing to hide and is serious about wanting to get to know you, but if he takes yours instead, then that means he probably has a boatload of other women and would rather have your number, so you won’t have such easy access to him. He can call you whenever he wants but you can’t do the same.” I gave him a knowing look, analyzing his face to see if I could gauge his reaction.

“Well then, you got a pen?” He raised a brow at me, a smirk slowly forming across his face. I nodded my head, reaching in to my briefcase to retrieve my favorite red ink pen. I was expecting him to hold his hand out, so I could scribble my number onto his palm, but was shocked we he briskly grabbed the pen from my hand, holding it in his to write his own number on my palm. I smiled at him for what was probably the first time today as he quickly wrote each digit one by one onto my somewhat shaky palm that he held still with his own.

I knew for a fact my mom would cuss me out and would continue to do so until the cows come home if she knew I had agreed to a date with a guy I barely knew, but he just seemed different. He actually seemed like he wanted to get to know me for me, plus he was encouraging me to step out of my comfort zone by being his publicist. Most of the guys I’ve been with could care less about my career.

And after all, he found a way to make the impossible, possible, and not just once, but three times.

Let’s just hope I’m right.

[translightyagami]

Lawlight (for prompts list) 41, 53, 93

(this fic is in the same hotel au as the previous prompt, so go read that before you read this one!!)

How it started, Light couldn’t forget. In the long swelledhallway between the hotel’s conference room and the lobby, where those crystallinewindows reaching to the vaulted ceiling let in near-white panels of sunlightcast over sleek, just cleaned wood flooring, he had turned with surprise when Ltapped his shoulder. Light stood centered in the hallway with a crest of redacross his cheeks after running from the lobby. Embarrassment, in hisrecollection, consumed him. After his entire life at his family’s hotel—doing chores,waiting on people who gave him less notice than God, smiling from every praisethat did come—he should have known better than to have been so shocked to seeL.

But that wasn’t the start. Those events—the prance of antagonisticflirtation they’d shared in his late teens and L’s early twenties, his hollowchest as seasons passed without the detective’s usual visit to the hotel, thecoat that slipped from his hands the moment he saw once again L’s slouchedfigure—were set dressing. As they stood staring at each other in the hall, snowmelted and dripped from Light’s coat that L clutched between knobby hands. Lightstepped back and then forward again. L lifted the coat.

“You dropped this,” he said. “It’s a little soggy, if I’m being honest.”

“I was having a walk.” Light cast his gaze on L’s dirtyshoes, his jeans, and the unfamiliar but warm looking sweater wrapping up his torso—lankyin a way that he’d never outgrown. “Just around the property, before the snowgets too thick. I’d suggest it, but you’re not much for outdoor activity, hm?”

“I’d be open to it.” L tilted his head, one long strand ofhis dark hair brushing the tiny uptilt of his otherwise Roman nose. “Winterbrings out something in me that Watari calls spritely. I think he means that Ibehave childishly when snow appears, which is true enough. What is moreyouthful than a long walk with a friend through nippy weather?”

This startled a rough laugh from Light, who found small joyin the words L obviously picked up from his time around an older whiteEnglishman. Smiling in return, L shook the coat free of leftover snow. Itclumped onto the floor and sunk into a clear puddle, sure to be derided byLight’s mother later for ruining the wood varnish. L raised the coat up andwith one hand, held the front flap open for Light like a doorway into his ownsilk lined clothing.

Quiet pulsed through Light’s blood and he moved withoutsound in his ears. In his deafness, Light slipped first his left arm and then hisright into the coat as L lifted and angled the garment until it finally heldall of Light. His skin blazed at each wool-blunted brush of L’s hands. The coatwas at once delicate while held aloft, and then a pound of bricks once Lsettled it on Light’s shoulders. At that moment, Light knew a shift occurred thatcouldn’t be taken back, that could never be undone or twisted free of hisspirit. The shift was unnamed when it happened and as L patted him, swung toLight’s side and started them back toward the lobby, he lost track of thesensation which moved him so much until that night. He lay in bed, bare skinsizzling, and knew that what changed was the power between he and L.

Power was something Light noticed in the world from a youngage, and now as a young man, power was something he coveted. Not in the ways hesaw many guests covet power with their secrets and deception—though he loved agood hat trick, done exquisitely—and not in the way people outside the hotelslavered over small title changes and bigger offices. When Light desired power,he wanted the bend of will that made others turn to him, made them ask hisfavor. He saw that power in his father, a man who unwillingly retired from hispolice work after not taking bribes from a powerful gang that the rest of hisforce seemed eager to please. His father ran the entire hotel on his earnest,firm, and forthright power that even the most slippery of guests respectedabove their scruples.

In L holding his coat out and Light letting himself bedressed, Light knew that where power once rested in an equal measure betweenthem was now an unstable factor. It was just like L, who clouded Light’sthoughts more than anyone, to perform an act of waiting on the man serving himand somehow suffuse his movements with gentle yet excruciating dominance. Thatcoat, held open and worn warmly, was where everything started—a point ofsubmission for Light to allow another man to serve him, a point of command forL to dictate what the service was.

Light rested his hand on the crown of L’s dark hair andtwined his fingers through it. Every bobbed motion as he licked across Light’scunt and small cock brought with it a low, rumbled sound. Those sounds rangedbetween fervent gulps and softer gasps, both of which vibrated though Light ashe imagined thunder rattled the clouds. He pushed L further down, rocked hiships into the wet kisses layered upon his center, his thighs, and for a briefmoment, his asshole. The sensation stunned him in how delicate the flick of L’stongue was, how his muscles fluttered in response and wanted more.

“Oh, fuck!” Light hummed, sweat on his cheeks trickling anddissolving salt onto his lips. “Don’t stop.”

When they’d kissed in the dining room, Light imagined beingswept into the same bent over position as the previous night. Although he wasn’topposed to fucking again—his exhilaration that they both reached ages andmindsets ready enough to copulate overshadowed any logical thought—the dullache haunting his pelvis and cunt after being rammed for longer than they wereused to made him beg off penetration. Still, he didn’t expect L to listen. Theystumbled into L’s room of one-oh-eight with Light knocking over an ornamentalvase in his haste to break open the bedside drawer for lube. L grasped his fumblinghands, took them from the drawer and set them on Light’s chest, pressed downfirmly by L’s own cool fingers.

As the same mouth devoured him below, Light shut his eyesand recalled it whispering into his ear to stay still and let L get things.Wildfire across his skin rekindled the surrender of slipping one arm afteranother into a held open coat and Light lay back, unbuttoning himself until hisclothes puddled on the familiar green sheets every hotel bed wore. L going downon him was just the first in their evening excitement and while his own insidesprotested penetration, L had, of course, known a perfect alternative.

“If you’re up for it,” he had said. “I’ve been thinking ofthat lovely cock you wore the other night, and what a shame it didn’t get used.”

[reekierevelator]

A Case of What Suits

a very short story

An American road trip was something Belinda and I had dreamt of, even fantasised about, for many years. So there we were at last, enjoying driving down the eastern seaboard from Washington DC to Charleston, South Carolina, albeit in the rather cramped hire car which was all we could afford, when it dawned that the journey was taking much longer than we’d bargained for. Evening was coming and I wasn’t enthusiastic about driving on strange foreign roads in the dark.  Drawing into Fayetteville we spotted a small motel and Belinda agreed to call a halt to our travels for the day.

A small shack-like office tacked onto the end of a long two-storey block of peeling plasterwork and wooden outdoor balcony constituted the reception hall.  An unshaven man scruffily dressed in jeans and a grey t-shirt was sprawled over an ancient armchair reading a pulp novel behind a thick glass divide. No signing in, no ID requested. He barely looked at me as he said ‘Fifty dollars’ and took my money through the tiny cashier’s window space before throwing through a key. Then he immediately settled back down to his reading.

We climbed the mouldy wooden stairs to the grimy upstairs corridor, found our room and opened the door. The cleaner was obviously as fastidious as the receptionist.  Dumping our luggage we were met by a locker-room ambience of stale sweat rather than fresh pine. Black marks were visible where a mop had been quickly run over the grey vinyl floor covering.  While Belinda investigated the toilet with some trepidation I ran my eye over the room: the curtain hanging limply from a broken rail, a wall-mounted TV tilted at a curious angle, and the broken doors on brown varnished plywood cupboards, some relying on over-stressed bent hinges and hanging on for dear life.  

One of the closet doors fitted so badly that even without opening it I could see there was something inside.  I opened it.  A small suitcase lay on the bottom shelf. The case was slightly open and I could see a bundle of hundred dollar bills inside and, alongside it, the unmistakeable glinting blue metal handle of a revolver. 

‘Belinda,’ I shouted, ‘what do you make of this?’

She emerged from the toilet with that look on her face that she usually reserves for the pile of tripe in the butcher’s shop or people who revel in Blackpool holidays. ‘Bert, this place is disgusting,’ she confirmed. ‘I wouldn’t be surprised if there are bed bugs. Late as it may be, we need to find somewhere else. Surely there are other places. You’ll have to find somewhere better than this.’  Then she noticed that I stood transfixed, staring into the closet, and came over for a closer look.

Fascinated, I cautiously lifted the lid of the case a little further. Suddenly I wasn’t so tired. Apart from the gun the case was stuffed full with dozens of bundles of high denomination U.S. banknotes.  

           ‘I think I should close this suitcase again immediately and deliver it to the front desk,’ I stammered, aware of the quavering in my voice.

But Belinda’s no-nonsense voice was quickly beside me saying ‘We must be looking at hundreds of thousands of dollars there, maybe half a million. God, what fun we could have with it. No more scrimping and saving for holidays and staying in cheap hotels.’

‘But…’

‘A suitcase full of cash?  It’s obvious no-one’s going to report it to the police if it disappears.’

‘But…’

‘What’s stopping us Bert?  It’s a windfall isn’t it?  It’s our one lucky break. Let’s grab it and get out of this hell-hole.’

‘But…’

‘What on earth’s holding you back?’

           A nervous little voice in my head replied ‘But the money belongs to someone else Belinda. It’s theft. Bad guys will come looking for it.  They’ll come looking for us, checking the hotel register, tracking us down.  Do you want constantly live in fear?’

‘My father always said you were too much of a wimp.  In this world you have to look after number one.  Take advantage of any opportunities than come your way and don’t be too pernickety about it. He never could understand at all why I married you.’

‘But there might be a bad guy coming up the stairs this very minute, coming back to retrieve the suitcase he’s forgotten.’

           An assertive woman’s voice replied ‘For God’s sake Bert. That money doesn’t really belong to anyone.  It’s ours for the taking.  That cruising holiday you’ve always promised me.  That car you admired in the Masarati showroom window.  There’s no time like the present.  Act now or it might be too late.  Time to get off your knees and do something for once. And if there’s a bad guy coming up the stairs well, you’ve got the gun haven’t you.’

           Her words seared my soul.  ‘Fingers trembling, I picked up the revolver.  I felt its heft. It was a solid piece, loaded. Then I remembered about finger-prints and it dropped from my hands to the floor like a red hot coal.

‘It’s only a little pistol Bert.  For heaven’s sake, there’s no need to wet your pants.  I mean, we see them all the time don’t we, on the TV, at the cinema…’

‘But finger-prints – you know, evidence for the police to arrest me.  Or bad guys to frame me.’

‘Stop talking like an idiot Bert. ‘We’ve got the gun stupid, not them.’

‘But… ‘

‘And if it comes from robbery or blackmail we were somewhere else at the time anyway, weren’t we?  There’s no risk. No risk at all.’

‘But maybe I should take a towel and wipe the gun?’  My head was throbbing painfully.  We’d been married nine years. Belinda had always been a little headstrong and over-assertive but now I wasn’t sure I really knew her very well at all.  I’d always done my best to please her, but lately I’d been thinking that maybe wasn’t always the best thing to do. Maybe it encouraged her to treat me as a doormat.

She scooped the pistol up from where it had clattered on to the floor, and said ‘See, that’s how to take the catch off, the rest is just squeezing the trigger,’ and thrust it into the pocket of her slacks, before concluding ‘I’ll just got to finish in the toilet’ and strode away, closing the toilet door behind her.

There was a tap on the motel room door.

           Startled I jumped backwards, landing on the bed. I cringed, curled up against the dusty wall, and lay there for a moment breathing quickly.

           A tall man in a grey suit appeared in the doorway. From of his heavily lined face searching eyes darted immediately towards the closet.

           ‘Hi bub, sorry to bother you.  Had to leave for an urgent meeting with the Boss, my, er, employer. I come back they’ve already let the room.  Turnaround in this motel - pretty fast huh?  Left my luggage.  Thought I‘d be back, pick it up before the next occupant.  Seems I was wrong.  You don’t mind, do you?’

           He stepped over to the closet and turned to face me, nodding slowly as he registered that the lid of the case was wide open. ‘There wouldn’t be anything missing from this case, would there, chum?’

           ‘No, no, the money’s untouched, honest,’ I babbled.

           ‘Limey huh?  Not the dough, it was another little item I had in mind, cowboy.’

           My mind was blank.

           The toilet door flew open and Belinda stood there, feet apart, revolver in hand.

           ‘What’s this, another one huh?’ He chuckled darkly, bemused. ‘Your old lady? Bonnie and Clyde huh?’  He grinned malevolently as he stepped casually towards the pointed gun, nothing to fear.  He fell backwards before the explosion, a loud crack like a big vase shattering, assaulted my ears, and lay there not moving on the inadequately cleaned floor, blood spooling from a hole in his head on to the vinyl.

           But Belinda had already opened her own wheelie suitcase and was squashing the cash from the closet suitcase into its spare capacity with amazing speed and efficiency.

           ‘But…’ I whimpered from the bed.

           She pointed the gun at me.  ‘Are you coming?  I don’t want to leave any witnesses.’

           This woman was someone I really didn’t know. So I decided I was coming.  I got off the bed, stood up on wobbly legs, and grabbed the handle of my wheelie case for stability.

           ‘Let’s go. Now!’ she yelled.

           She flung open the door. We were along the corridor, down the stairs, and into the car with our luggage in a flash.  No-one emerged from a room or looked out of a window to watch us go.  Apparently the sound of gunfire does that to people in some parts of America.

           My hands were unsteady so Belinda grabbed the wheel.

‘We told people in Washington DC we were heading for Charleston. That’s where we’re going to be tonight. Tomorrow it’s Atlanta for a flight back to Heathrow.  This is fun isn’t it?’

It was a command not a request. ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I suppose it’s true, as they say, that you shouldn’t treat foreign holidays in a superficial way, you should really try to engage with the culture of the country.’

But in truth I’d seen a side of Belinda I never ever wanted to see again. And as they also say, there’s no honour amongst thieves.  The next day we were in the rural heat of Georgia, half-way to Atlanta, when I suggested we pull over to drink some water, cool down, and I could throw the gun far away into the fields.  

We got out the car. Belinda checked her handbag and passed me the gun. She was right about one thing, it was time to get off my knees and do something for once.  She didn’t criticize or say too much at all after I shot her through the heart.  Then I hurled the gun as far away as I could into the sweet smelling field of green tobacco. I left her in the ditch at the side of the road.  I stuffed the money into my own suitcase and then I made a small bonfire of the gangster’s suitcase and all her own belongings. I made sure there was nothing left to identify her. Then I got back in the hire car and drove to Atlanta.

The flight was on time.  I’ve always fancied a Maserati and a world cruise.  They’ll suit me fine. And with all that money surely some less domineering woman was bound to find me attractive wouldn’t you say?  

[thistimeforrealus-blog]

A beginners guide

Hi Guys and Girls, this is a short introduction and practical guide to Femdom aimed at women who are new to the genre and don’t know how to get started.

Before we begin it’s very important to remember that as with all things communication is key, talk these things through with your partner and don’t do anything you’re not comfortable with, remember – you’re in control in this type of relationship and your word is law. Secondly if your partner is the one who brought up the idea of a Femdom relationship he obviously trusts you enough to reveal his innermost desires but is probably still nervous about how he is going to look in your eyes because of this it is important to reassure him that you still love him and don’t think any less of him. Anyway with that out of the way lets jump right in.

Vocal control

This is one of the aspects of Femdom that often gets forgotten about but if anything it’s one of the most important things to learn. When you first begin you’re not likely to know how to speak to your partner when you want them to do something or when you’re trying to force them to do something. You must remember to use a more forceful tone of voice than you would usually, be as commanding as you can and don’t back down if they push back or try to play what you’re say off as a joke, if you stand firm the first few times you get them to do something (it could be something as innocuous as getting you a drink or washing the dishes) they’ll soon know what to expect and are much more likely to comply without fuss in the future. A way of getting them used to this faster is to demand responses such as “Yes Mistress” when you get them to do something, this gets them it immediately act out the submissive role and gets them used to the relationship dynamic.

Another part of vocal control is simply what you choose to call your sub, depending on the type of Femdom you’re interested in there’s lots of options (slave, sub, slut, sissy), another common choice in the feminisation community is using a female name then you want to put your partner in the submissive mindset, often people use the female version of their everyday name. This can be very useful because as soon as you call your sub by their female name they know that you’re planning on dominating them (even if it’s just for the next few minutes to get the chores done that you don’t want to do) and that they need to get into their submissive role to avoid punishment.

Punishment

I’m going to keep this short and (not so) sweet as there are so many different forms of punishment we could be here all day. Needless to say the punishments you use should be specific to your relationship, what your partner enjoys and what you’re comfortable with, again, you’re the one in control.

Chastity – Good for both short term and long term control chastity can be incorporated into your sex life very easily and with very little effort on your part, simply leave out their cage (or a note or send a text) saying that your sub must put it on and hand you the key. The length of time is up to you although I personally don’t like to use it for extended periods and instead prefer to cage my sub for the duration of a day and then enjoy his desperation when it comes to the evenings fun…

Tease and denial – This covers a wide range of things from simply groping your sub until they get aroused and them leaving them alone all the way up to spending hours bringing them to the edge of orgasm and then stopping, or finally allowing them to orgasm and then “ruining” it (this can be achieved by stopping stimulation as soon as they cum or slapping their balls as soon as they cum, be as evil as you want!). It’s a great way to keep your sub on their toes and always leave them wanting more.

Feminisation – This isn’t a component in all Femdom relationships but it is something I indulge in with my sub so I’ll go into it in detail here. Feminisation is a brilliant way to bring your sub under your control with very little effort. The degree of feminisation you go into is entirely up to you and your comfort zone, here’s a few ideas to get you started.

Underwear – The easiest way to let your sub know their place is by getting them a few pairs of sexy and everyday panties (some relationships go as far as getting rid of all “male” underwear). You can then order your sub to put on a pair at the start of the day or before you go out and be safe in the knowledge that they’re going to be very aware that they’re a horny sub for the rest of the day. You can make sure they change out of them before sex if you’re not a fan yourself as they will have already done most of the work of keeping them aroused all day (Although some Doms do prefer to make their subs dress in full lingerie while they fuck – it’s entirely up to you and how humiliated you want to make them feel). If you’re going to do this make sure you do it regularly enough and use the vocal control so you don’t get any push back from your sub, remember you need to get them used to the dynamic in order for it to have power over them.

Nail varnish – Another low effort thing you can do is paint your subs nails. Like the underwear this is a constant reminder to your sub of their place and can be used in everyday life. I recommend painting the toenails regularly as it’s an area of the body that others can’t see but you can count on the fact that your sub will be thinking about them.

Waxing and make-up – This again depends on how far down the feminisation rabbit hole you want to go, sometimes I will make my sub put on some lipstick and eyeliner (Especially when I make him suck on a dildo) but you can go as far as you want with it. Waxing is the same, I personally make my sub shave everything below the neck as I can’t stand the sight of hairy legs in lingerie but you do you. It’s another one of those things that reminds him of his place and that will be arousing in daily life to him, having a secret hidden in plain sight.

Bondage - The possibilities are endless. I personally like to tie up my sub, blindfold him, gag him, and plug him, then I’ll leave him while I go and do my own thing, when I remember about him and free him he is always putty in my hands. I did once do that which playing a sound recording of me pleasuring myself while moaning another mans name, needless to say after an hour or so the levels of arousal were pretty spectacular!

Keeping track

As a way of keeping your man under control and setting clear boundaries, what I have found useful is setting up a kind of points system. When he fails to do something I’ve asked or if he’s pushed back against one of the punishments I’ll add a point to his tally. Then when we come to have sex I’ll see how many points he has and treat him accordingly – for example (Items listed are cumulative).

0-3 points – Congratulations normal sex

4 Points – Buttplug

6 points – He has to wear lingerie

8 points – I peg him before letting him have a go.

10 points – He has to suck the strap on before I peg him.

12 points – He wears a cage the whole time.

15 points – All of the above but he doesn’t get to cum.

I would add that it’s worth adding in a few steps that you know he isn’t fond of to help keep him compliant, my sub isn’t fond of anal for example so he is very careful to not overstep his bounds or he’ll get pegged in the near future!

This is a useful game to play as it lets you continue the dominant role away from the bedroom.

As with all of the above it is important to remember that you’re the one in control, if you feel like you just want vanilla sex that day just tell your sub that you want him to fuck you like a man, if he complains, just add more points for the next time you feel like punishing him.

[daysixdreams]

you bite and hold on until we all fall down | Sungjin [1/2]

you gotta see blood, girl

flangst, supernatural mystery, paranormal romance | ~5.6k words | werewolf!au | Blood  | Part Two

prompt: Hey can I get a werewolf!au for sungjin where he and the reader are in a forbidden relationship??? Please let it be as angsty and fluffy as possible!!!😉☺Thanks so much!!!☺😊😙  - requested by @taespiration

a/n: hope you like it? I took a few liberties with the werewolf aspect but i hope it still works? let me know what you guys think =) part 2 will be up next week. ish. 

“I hope there isn’t anywhere else you need to be,” I say as soon as Sungjin appears from the street corner. He’s dressed as usual: scuffed sneakers, dark grey jeans torn at the knees, black shirt, and that leather jacket he’s grown a liking to recently. As have I. It will be a sad day for humanity when the weather warms and to the back of the closet the jacket goes. Or maybe not. Summer does have its wardrobe perks.

He grunts and scrunches his nose. “You mean at eleven in the evening on a Friday night? Where else would I be?”

Clearing my head of the image of exposed collar bones and knees, I gesture toward the dark alley without explanation. Mostly because I don’t have a good one, but that does allow me to receive an unbiased opinion.

Sungjin turns to me with a barely stifled grimace. “Another dead body. Why am I not surprised.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“You only call me when someone’s dead.”

“Oh, come on,” I contest weakly, “I call you for other things, too.”

Cleansing the city of evil is not the one-person job my ancestors liked to think it is. Especially when murder is involved. Even less so when you’re the only openly practicing witch in the country willingly offering your services to a special unit law enforcement agency for a consulting fee. Extra difficulty points when you’re next in line to inherit the responsibility of protecting the city. Raise that to the power of nine when you’ve spent your formative schooling years and part of your early adult life in another country studying for said witchcraft degree, thus alienating you from the culture and heritage you were born in.

Hence, Sungjin.

The incidental fact that Sungjin is a Lycanthrope is a happy coincidence I just happen to benefit from. Unlike a shifter, he doesn’t transform into a wolf neither through magic— his own or someone else’s— or through a curse via the rise of the full moon. Physically, Sungjin is human, indistinguishable from any other regular person— at least on the surface. On the inside, he’s a little more unique. Born as a natural channel for a spirit of rage, Sungjin houses a Wolf spirit, an alpha that makes him stronger, more aggressive, and resistant to physical damage and disease.

This means I get to walk around undetected with a guide/bodyguard. Heavy on the guidance, light on the bodyguarding. Sungjin knows I’m more than capable of defending myself. It’s embarrassing myself and doing something I shouldn’t that he’s worried about. And fine, I may have a history of getting myself into life-threatening situations but that doesn’t minimize or invalidate my skill. It just means that sometimes, I can’t go into these things alone.

Sungjin steps into the alley, and with the light of the full moon, large and silver, overhead, our shadows cast long and gangly on the concrete. I follow closely behind him extending my Sense. The easiest way to explain what Sense is is to liken it to an awareness of the paranormal and the supernatural, it’s not simply seeing, hearing, or feeling more the way Sungjin can. It’s that weird ghost of a feeling that makes the hair at the back of your arm stand on end, that niggling that you’ve forgotten something, and that odd just knowing something isn’t quite right.

“What do you think?” I ask. It’s never good when Sungjin takes this long to assess the crime scene. His heightened senses help cover what my Sense fails to catch— which is very little but ever since that one time with the raining frogs, Sungjin’s made this rule about never running into a scene until after he’s cleared the vicinity. I do as he says because you really don’t want a Lycan’s rage directed at you.

Further in, the expression on his face pulls into a mix of concern and confusion. “Well, whatever it is, it’s not good.”

The smell reaches us first, a sickly-sewer smell, rank and metallic. I knew it was a dead body even before I crossed the street, felt the void taking a life left behind in the energies surrounding the area, but I’m never prepared for it. My stomach quails and I press my palm against my mouth to keep from gagging. Up ahead, is blood. A lot of blood. It pooled thick and scarlet around a mound of bodies, two of them, both with their ribcages expanding outward like their hearts had exploded right out of their chests. I sway backwards despite my strict training and the walls of self-control I’ve built. Sungin’s hand, just barely touching the small of my back, anchors me to the present.

“You okay?”

I close my eyes and take a deep breath. “Yeah,” I answer, voice steadier than I thought it would be. I don’t ask how he’s doing even if I see the tightness in his jaw and the strain in his eyes. Sungjin hates showing vulnerability, and the last thing I want is to tell him I notice he’s not okay. On that vein, I right myself before I fall into his arm or something ridiculous like it. With his senses turned up to eleven, being touched becomes an unpleasant experience for him. I can’t imagine what it’s like for him now, seeing all this, smelling all this, experiencing all this and just being here at all. “Can you get anything useful?” I ask. “Do you think you can track...anything?”

“I’ll try. But we need to take a closer look before the local police arrive and process the scene.”

And then we’re out of the loop. Human crime scene units don’t exactly cooperate with, or are even aware of, the High Council of Elders that govern the Others— Magic folk, every other sentient being not quite your strain of plain regular human, you get the picture.

Sungjin and I circle the scene carefully, noting down all the details we can as fast as we could. I can remember most of the details, look back in my memories for whatever I can’t recall immediately, and cross-reference with Sungjin should the need arise.

“What do you think?” Sungjin asks.

“I don’t know, we’ll need more information. But something like this can’t be a crime of opportunity. There’s too much involved in making someone’s heart explode like that.”

“So that’s what you’re saying? Their hearts exploded? What about the defensive wounds?”

“I can’t explain the defensive wounds right now, but exploding hearts is the only way to explain why their ribs look like they were pried open from the inside. This is really powerful magic. We’re looking for a very specific individual and I might have ideas where to start asking around.”

Like me, Sungjin isn’t looking at the bodies anymore, both of us with our heads turned away and leaning toward the main street. “I’ll see what I can find. I’ll see you again tomorrow?”

I nod and we go our separate ways just as the lights from a patrol car pass by.

 ***

 The following morning, Sungjin drops by the bookstore just before lunch to exchange notes and updates. He comes into the shop, announced by the bright tinkle of the bell above the door, with a large brown bag of sandwiches and coffee, and a smile that rivals the sun. When he’s like this, dressed in a warm grey hoodie and denim jeans, it’s easy to forget he’s a natural born killer trained for the hunt.

“Hello?”

“Up the loft,” I answer. I’ve been looking through the old texts and reference scrolls for anything that might be useful for tracking down what kind of magic is needed to blow someone’s hearts up.

Needless to say, the bookstore is a cover. On the outside, it’s a 24-hour off-the-wall kitschy affair just off-campus. Your non-standard independent bookstore. You’d think 24-hour bookstore equates to study cafe or a euphemism for something, but it’s exactly what it says on the label. On the inside, it’s an actual bookstore with shelves lined so closely to each other the ends fade into each other’s shadows. The inventory is eclectic: used books in excellent condition, the nigh unheard of trade books, and nothing from the Top Anythings. Just a lot of books that make you feel like you’ve walked into a wizarding world. And it smells. Like old books, wood varnish, and bergamot that’s permeated through the old walls. The guy who takes the nightshift, Jae, loves it. 

“Find anything interesting?” Sungjin asks, climbing up the narrow spiral staircase.

I’m on the ladder, about a full storey up, retrieving a book on Thaumaturgy. The way the shelves are set, dizzyingly high and looming above, always make me think I’m climbing into another world unknown. I’m fairly certain the air is thinner up here, too. “I think so? I might have some ideas. And you didn’t have to bring me lunch.”

“I didn’t,” he deadpans. “Wonpil made me do it.”

Wonpil is his housemate, information I know of as a side effect of having worked with Sungjin for more than a year now. I’m not sure what Wonpil is exactly as we’ve never met, but the way Sungjin talks about him gives me the impression Wonpil isn’t human. Or at least he gives Sungjin an inhuman amount of mental stress.

I crane my neck to look at him from over my shoulder. I almost fall off, and Sungjin rolls his eyes at me. “Did you hear anything interesting from your network?”

He sets the paper bag on a work desk. “Get down from there before you fall. And then we’ll talk.”

“Let me get this book first.” With one hand, I’m holding on for dear life, while my other is pressed white on the lip of a shelf. I spot the spine of the book I’m looking for and lean until my fingertips graze the old leather. Obviously, the solution here is to go back down the ladder, move about an arm’s length to the left, and go back up to retrieve the book. But, no. I lean.

It all happens so fast. First, there I am leaning. Next, my finger catches the edge of the book dislodging it from the shelf, but only just so. Then the books are whizzing past me in a blur of colorful spines and the floor is zooming in at me in alarming speed. Before I know it, I’m landing in a tangle of limbs with the air knocked out of my lungs in a muffled oomph. The fall hurts, but not as much as it does on the inside.

Sungjin catches me, of course. Inhuman reflexes and all that. I look up just as he lifts his head to give me his most insufferable I told you so look. The fact that he is right is only secondary to the fact that I am sprawled on top of him— my nose on top of his chest, his hands on my upper arms, my knees splayed over his hips, and my eyes hovering over his parted lips. For a moment, I am distracted by his Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat as he swallows. I know it’s taking him all his strength to make sure he’s not crushing me in his hands. Only Sungjin would take the impact of a fall and ask you if him saving you is hurting you. I look up and our eyes meet.

This is not the time for this, and yet it’s as if we are both frozen in the moment. Sungjin’s eyes are a deep, earthy brown with flecks of gold revealing the beast within. Yet when he’s looking at me like this, there is nothing but warmth and safety in his eyes. He’s afraid he’ll hurt me, but he’s the only person I trust to never do that. He thinks he’s a monster, but I can’t remember the last time I’ve seen him as anything but brutally soft. Like this, feeling the warmth of the soft fabric of his hoodie against me, and inhaling his clean oceany scent, it’s almost as if I can just be a girl, and he can just be a boy, and there could be something more. But in this world, attachment is both a vulnerability and a weakness. Sungjin and I, we have no room for anything but duty and honor-bound responsibility.

Sobered by the thought, my heart comes to a stop from its wild beating in my chest. It’s an easy roll to the side and we’re back up on our feet, both of us feigning nonchalance. I pick the book up from the floor, silently muttering an apology to the book deities watching over us.

“There aren’t a lot of ways someone can make someone’s heart explode,” I begin, “So we’re looking for someone really strong or really stupid. Definitely a wizard. Definitely premeditated. That kind of magic...” I shudder at the thought. “It’s dark. And angry.”

“And it’s personal.”

“Very.”

Magic in itself is a personal experience. It comes from inside you. Not everyone is born with the aptitude to tap into the energies of the universe to harness its power, and even for those who do it’s hard to explain. Magic isn’t just something you do. Magic is the flow of energy from one form to another, it can neither be created nor destroyed, only redirected and transformed. Magic is created by life, it is awareness, intelligence, and emotions. For magic to cause death, and in such a violent way, is the utter perversion of its very nature.

Through lunch, Sungjin fills me in with the information he’s gathered over the night and I update him with what I’ve found out so far. All in all, we know nothing about who could have done this, how, or even why. Only that the victims were two university students, a couple celebrating their first anniversary at the club. Witnesses say they were arguing, but what kind of argument would explain the kind of defensive wounds they had? They had been in a fist fight before their hearts exploded.

After lunch, Sungjin and I comb through our known networks and contacts through the Underground and the Magic Folk hiding in plain sight. We visit clubs and other establishments that catered to Others but find nothing. The old antique shop near the palace, always the source of local gossip and whispers offer us no new information, saying they heard nothing, know nothing of any dark magic being used around the city. No one seems to know anything about what’s going on. Which only means everyone knows about it but no one wants to talk about it.

“You’re asking about something that could get you killed,” the old pigeon lady by the church said to us. “I’d stay away from those deaths if I were you.”

Which only meant we had to work harder finding answers. This is easily becoming one of those days when neither Sungjin nor I feel much like useful members of the Magic World’s secret society of Guardians. At least for me, that’s the role I was born into. For Sungjin, his participation is by association. But he hasn’t abandoned me. Yet. Even on the days when we look and look and look and find nothing. All this magic and resource under our disposal, there exist days when we still come up with blanks.

“Do you want to take a break?” Sungjin asks just before sunset.

“I hate this,” I answer.

We’re strolling down a busy thoroughfare down a strip mall. Everywhere I look, it’s colors from fashion boutiques or cosmetics, or from stalls selling street food. The smells are the best part of this, sweet and spicy all together and all at once. The better food smells, the more likely it’s bad for you. Be it sugar or meat or something cooked in fat and oils. It’s life’s greatest irony. But then again, who knows. Maybe this is the sign from someone out there watching over us saying we don’t have to diet all the time. So I take it all in, the scent of food, perfumes, air conditioning, and a hint of beer and alcohol. I love my sense of smell.

You nose knows. I’m sure Sungjin would agree.

“How can folks not know anything? What are they so afraid of?” I say, resigning myself to the twilight. “Dark magic like that doesn’t go unnoticed. I felt it happen. You felt traces of it too, didn’t you?”

Sungjin nods somberly. “Whoever was there with them didn’t leave enough of themselves to track down. I’m starting to think our killer did this from afar. Which leaves a magic trace. And tracking down magic is your specialty.”

“I’m good but I’m not that good. There was barely a trace left. No dust or breadcrumbs to follow at all.”

He releases a small laugh from his chest. “Come on, I’ll buy you an ice cream. It’ll make you feel better.”

“Catching the killer will make me feel better.” But even as I say that, I follow Sungjin to a stall and pick out the flavors I want on my cone: strawberry, milk, and green tea. The girl behind the glass case carves the ice cream into a rose and hands it to Sungjin who hands it to me.

“This is for you,” he says with a smile so tender, I look away.

I don’t dwell on the split second our fingers touch, or on the lingering heat from where the rough pad of his fingertips come in contact with my knuckles. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome.”

A blanket of awkward silence envelopes us, and I struggle to fill in the blank spaces. All those other nights with Sungjin, tracking a bad guy or searching for clues, not once did the silence bother me until tonight.

I clear my throat after he gets a cone of his own. “Is it just me, or are there more flowers than usual?” Specifically roses. Red roses. Single, long-stemmed red roses or large bouquets of red roses. Couples everywhere wearing matchy-matchy outfits.

Sungjin grunts and scratches the back of his ear. “You really don’t know?”

“Know what?” I scrunch my nose at the group of couples who pass by us. This place is known to have couples in varying states of lovey-doveyness everywhere, but something about tonight has them all extra ooshy and ugh.

“It’s Valentine's Day.”

“That’s today?”

“You seriously don’t know?”

“I don’t keep track of these things,” I counter, annoyed. “I can barely keep track of what I need to accomplish in a day and this case...it’s driving me crazy.”

Sungjin just hums and keeps walking alongside me.

“I’m serious. Besides, look at all these people. They look like they’ve all been brainwashed into celebrating the day when what’s there to celebrate? It’s all so...I don’t know. Fake. And manufactured.”

“If you say so.”

“Wait, is there somewhere you need to be tonight?” Like a date. I don’t pry into his personal life, only picking out the details he’s comfortable sharing, blurted out confessions I wasn’t meant to hear, habits I find out only because we tend to spend inordinate amounts of downtime together like this. Of course, he’s free to see people if he wants to. He probably should.

“I’m exactly where I need to be because if you die in a ditch, this city loses its last Guardian and I don’t think the High Council will appreciate that.”

“I won’t die in a ditch,” I mutter petulantly. “And you need a life. You should probably go find yourself a girlfriend or something. I mean, I’m a lost cause because, well, Guardian and all that applies, but you…”

“You and I both know that’s physically impossible for me.” Because he’d be too much. Feel too much. Give too much.

I shrug. “Maybe you’ll find someone who’s fine without being physical? There are all sorts of people in the world. Or maybe you’ll find another Lycan and you won’t be so afraid to touch her for fear of tearing her into pieces—” I pause mid-step and hold back a war cry.

“You just had an epiphany, didn’t you.”

I start down the street in a power walk just below the level of a jog, acceptable enough without rousing suspicion. “I can’t believe I didn’t think of this before.”

“Good. Now this time use your words and share with the rest of the class.”

“Those two students must have been possessed by a Horror.” Horrors are amorphous blobs of pure negativity, parasites that possess objects that in turn posses humans and Turn them into shapeshifting monsters. Part of my job is hunting down these pools of evil and eliminating them before they find a host and wreak havoc. Yes, my ancestors decided this is a one-person job. I may be magic, but I’m still only human.

“If that’s the case, why didn’t they Turn? They were human when we found them.”

“I don’t know yet,” I admit. Then, “That’s what we’re about to find out. We need to get back to that club.”

 ***

 Sungjin and I make it halfway to the club when I realize we’re being followed.

The trick to this is to keep yourself from reacting. Stay cool. Calm. “Could be just me, but I think someone might be following us.”

Sungjin doesn’t even raise a brow and his face is almost always out of his control. “Tall guy, black coat, face mask, sunglasses? I’ve seen him all day, I think. But considering this is standard Look at me, I’m cool look, who knows for sure.”

“You would know for sure,” I shoot back, “I’ve seen him just standing there trying really hard to make it look like he’s not watching us. And he has a very distinct set of piercings.” I notice these things now because Sungjin also has a very distinct set of piercings that are utterly fascinating to study if only it weren’t so inappropriate.

“It’s not like there’s anything we can do about it,” he offers, “Everyone’s out tonight, there are about a bajillion people on the street and when we get to the club, that’s two bajillion people.”

“You know, the sass? It doesn’t help. But fine, if that’s how you want to play it.”

“You can’t just go whacking people around,” he chides, “besides, what if it’s not that? Maybe he wants to ask you out tonight. He looks lonely.”

I snort. I happen to be good at whacking people, and other sort, around. It’s very effective. “Maybe he wants to ask you out tonight.”

“Well I am pretty good looking, aren’t I? Can’t really blame him.”

“Your confidence astounds me.”

“As it should. Let’s just play it by ear and see what happens.”

 ***

 A shiver runs down the back of my arm as soon as we reach the club’s vicinity. It’s a tactile feeling owing to my witching Sense. Nighttime always did amplify powers from creatures of the dark, and while Night and Day themselves are neither good nor evil, there’s something about the shadows and the moonlight that make things go bump in the night.

Sungjin and I drift around, our Cool Friend always at a respectable distance behind us. The club, called Daydream, is located underground with the entrance located in a narrow alley between two commercial buildings. You’d miss it if not for the long line of people, about fifty or so, waiting impatiently along the street. This section of the city is full of university students, another kitschy affair of the fashion forward, the nonconformists, and the otherwise artistically inclined. It was full of excited yelling, raucous high-pitched laughter, and music blaring from every imaginable direction. Lights flashed and danced, buskers filled the streets each of them inside their bubbles of merry chaos.

I feel it then, a near unnoticeable quiver like a metallic ping from an unplugged electric guitar. Stepping closer to the club amplified the feeling. Something is definitely going on in there. I can feel it in the thrum of the music and the concrete beneath my feet.

Sensing the change in my tension, Sungjin says “Something’s here, isn’t there.”

“Something for sure. How’s our friend?”

Sungjin inhales sharply and his eyes flash amber. “Still interested. I’m not entirely sure if he’s following us because he’s looking for what we’re looking for, or if he’s following us to make sure we don’t find what we’re looking for.”

“If only we knew what we were looking for.”

Sungjin rolls his shoulders. A gesture of frustration. “Only one way to find out.”

We don’t have to communicate the decision out loud. Sungjin and I are already on our way toward the back of the club to find an alternative entrance. The back of the building is dark with shadows the light of the full moon cannot reach. I keep my guard up, just in case. Next to me, I can feel Sungjin do the same, his now amber eyes alert for any physical danger. Just knowing he’s with me, feeling his calm assured strength around me, is more than enough to rest my fears.

Because no matter how long I’ve been doing this, no matter how much training I’ve endured to get to where I am or how confident I am of what I can do, it doesn’t change the fact that every day I risk my life and that I’m afraid of death.

But not as long as Sungjin is with me.

“Just stay close to me,” Sungjin mutters close to my ear.

“I’m not a child,” I shoot back, voice steadier than I expect. “I’m a trained witch. And Guardian of the City. I’m not helpless. I can defend myself.”

“I know,” he says patiently. “That’s why I said stay close to me. Did you ever consider that I need defending? You’re not the only one putting your life in danger here. Don’t be selfish.”

I stifle a smile. Now is not the time for this. “We’re just going into a club. With dancing. Do you like dancing?”

“I’m an epic dancer,” he says, leveling me with a look. “But we can go dancing some other time when there isn’t a probability of some kind of murderer or Horror in the club.”

We step in through the back door, me first then Sungjin behind me. Music blasts at us, a deep psychedelic trance mix all the patrons are swaying to. The bassline goes straight to my bones, anchoring the music to time and pulling me deeper into the pit. Like a hive-minded organism, the moshpit flails and writhes to the hypnotic beat and neon lights. Everywhere the strobe hits, it’s body to body, eyes closed and gyrating against each other. We tread carefully through the darkness, avoiding elbows and other extremities while navigating our way to the center of the dance floor. On stage is a DJ shrouded by the shadows, but it’s from there I feel the center of this dark energy. No wonder this club is so popular.

“Anything?” I ask Sungjin. I have to stand on tiptoe and tug at his sleeve so he’d lean closer for me to speak into his ear. I don’t even need light to know his ear’s probably flushed neon pink.

“Nothing you haven’t figured out yet.”

I don’t let go of his sleeve. “Is our friend still here?”

Sungjin closes his eyes and hums. “Shouldn’t you be tracking his energy signature?”

Stepping closer, I lay my other hand on his chest. His heartbeat is slow and steady in this sultry heat. My heart starts beating faster. “Sungjin…”

“Yeah?”

I look up at him, and my fingers curl and tangle into the collar of his hoodie. “You’ve been really good to me. No one’s been this good to me.”

His breathy laugh tickles my cheek. “That’s because you don’t know a lot of people.”

“You risk your life for me.”

“According to my last count, we’re split 60-40, but I’ll give you a chance to save my life if that will make you feel better,” he answers quietly.

I lick my lips. “You and me…we’ve never really...we’re not a we-we.”

“No, we’re not.”

“Why not? I know we’ve only known each other for a little more than a year, but after all we’ve been through? How come nothing’s ever...happened?”

“Reasons,” he exhales softly. “Work, mostly. And I am what I am, and…” He runs his nose down my cheek. “And you...it wouldn’t be right.”

I shift just enough to touch my nose to his. “But...technically...we could...if we wanted to. Even if it were forbidden, it’s so easy breaking the rules…”

“Are we deciding to?”

I push up on my toes and press my lips to his. Gently, at first. Very gently. Sungjin sighs into the kiss and pulls my body against his and I entwine my arms around his neck. The kiss turns hungry, deep. Hot and desperate. Sungjin all but growls into my mouth.

He pulls away first. “We’re working.”

“We’re always working,” I whine. “It’s all we ever do.”

He grins. “Doesn’t look like we’re getting more information out of tonight. We’ve been hitting dead ends from the start.”

“We can take a break for the night, right?” I feel a rumble of excitement deep inside me.

“We could. We should. We’ve been working too much.”

My face splits into a smile before I’m even aware. “We deserve a break, right? Why haven’t we thought about this before?”

“Can we go back to your place?”

I giggle into his collar bones. My heart is beating so fast. I can’t remember if it’s ever gone off this way before. “Sounds like a really good idea. You always did have the best of ideas.”

We start moving again, this time toward the exit. Hand in hand, we slip through the moshpit laughing silly at each other. When we emerge back out the alley, he kisses me again, pressing me hard against him.

“Sungjin,” I wheeze between the kiss. “Let go a bit, you’re crushing me.”

“I just can’t believe we’ve never done this before.”

“I know, it’s crazy.” It’s so crazy my heart hurts.

“I think I’m crazy.”

“Sungjin, let go. I can’t breathe.” But his hold on me tightens and my feet lift off the ground. I push against him. “You’re hurting me.”

Sungjin blinks and lets go so quickly I drop to my feet on unstable legs. He runs his hand through his hair and mutters to himself. “What just happened? Something happened.”

I look up, confused. “What do you mean?”

“Something weird is happening.”

I feel a sledgehammer in my chest. “Something good is happening. Why are you making it sound like it’s a bad thing?”

“I’m not saying that, I’m just saying...look at us.”

“I am.” I take a step closer to him. “I am looking at us. Don’t you like what you’re seeing? How long have you felt this way? And pretended not to? Denied the feeling? Because...this doesn’t just come out of nowhere. There could be something real here.”

“Listen to yourself.”

I launch myself at him and shove him as hard as I can. My heart hurts so much. He doesn’t even budge so I hit his chest with my fists. “You can’t just do this to me. You can’t tell me you don’t think we have something here that could be real. I’m not crazy!”

But even as I say that, the words bounce around in my head. Real. Crazy.

“Oh,” I groan. “Oh no.” My heart is still beating fast, but this time it’s from embarrassment.

“Hey, it’s okay. We got hit with something, maybe it was the lights or the music…”

“Oh no.”

Sungjin smiles warmly at me. “Hey. It’s okay. I got hit, too.”

Until his trigger words slapped sense into him. “I should’ve known better.”

“You’re right. I should’ve too…I shouldn’t have...you know. I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to apologize for,” I tell him. I clutch at my chest to calm my beating heart. “It wasn’t us. If it were...it would’ve been…”

“Different?”

“Yeah. Not like this.”

He nods. “It was a little too easy.”

“Shouldn’t it be easy?” I may not know much about love, but I know I’ll know it when I feel it. I’ll know it when it’s there...and it’s been there. But...

“Not for you and me.”

I take a deep, shaky breath. “How messed up is that?”

“Pretty messed up. You know for someone’s who’s tasked to keep the city safe, you’re terrible at avoiding traps. Physical, or otherwise.”

He looks away when I turn to him, and I study his averted face. “That’s why I have you.” And that’s why we can’t have each other.

A cold shiver passed through the air. Dark and twisted. Sungjin glances at me, and the color drains from both our faces. We run down the direction of the void and careen to a stop.

Two more dead bodies, a couple with their hearts blown out of their chests. Exactly like the first murder.

[caroundtheworld-blog1]

Putting my foot in it.

13/07/2017

We’ve had two full days to work on the van, with no work shifts, or other engagements to slow us down. So of course, the universe would choose these two days to plague us with issues to delay our progress.

Yesterday, we were driving to Bunnings to pick up the wood for the bed frame when Marge broke down, we managed to get her restarted to pull into a safe place but we had to call RACQ, for the fourth time since we got Marge. We had to wait for over an hour for the guy to arrive, only for him to tell us that it was a minor issue with the cylinders not sparking or whatever, and that it would be easy to fix and it just means that until it is fixed, she might cut out from time to time. So we lost almost two hours yesterday, on the day we were meant to build our bed and take all the pallets apart. In the end we managed to get the outside frame of the bed and flooring underneath it done, and three pieces of wood off the pallet, with one sanded and varnished by nightfall. We're also limited by the fact that it is not acceptable to drill, use a reciprocating saw, or hammer after around 5pm everyone gets home and night falls. 

So today, the aim was to finish the bed frame, insulate the ceiling, take all the wood required for the walls off the pallets, and sand and varnish them all. We were up at 7am and by 8am, the dogs were fed, walked, the whole house was clean and the insulation was done. So far so good. We took a break to go out for breakfast to a place called Rafter and Rose nearby, amazing breakfasts and a very cute, quirky little place that offers veggie and vegan options too! When we got back, Daniel got started on the bed frame, and I on the sanding and varnishing the wood we had managed to get off the pallets. Everything was going well when a lost dog wandered up the drive and into the garden. Daniel looked up and down the street for any sign of an owner, but there was nobody around. He was a bit jumpy and obviously a bit confused so he was wary of us and wouldn't come when we called. The house is located on a very busy road just beyond a bend and cars come speeding round there, it's a nightmare trying to reverse out the drive every morning! This little dog was wandering around, and if he happened to wander into the road, someone coming round that bend couldn't stop in time. So when he wandered into the front garden we tried to keep him there. I almost had him when he hopped through some bushes, over the front wall, and towards the road. I didn't think I just went after him in a panic, through the bushes, and over the wall, but unfortunately for me, as I stood on the edge of the little wall made of big slabs of stone and concrete blocks, the stone below my feet decided to come loose. I fell, and the big slab of stone fell, on top of my foot.

Thankfully I saw it coming and managed to move my foot out of the way a bit. But I didn't escape injury, the slab landed on half of my foot, and left me with a few big grazes, and a lovely big chunk taken out right on the bone, near my big toe. The pain was unbelievable, I screamed for Daniel and the sight of my foot, purple, shredded, and bleeding sent me into shock. Daniel found me crying and shouting and trying to gesture what had happened because I couldn't get my words out. My main concern was the dog, but Daniel said he was back in a garden. My next concern was that I had broken a bone in my foot, it was swelling, and the pain was a hot burning sting from the grazes, and a dreadful shooting pain through my foot. I had been in flip flops so there was nothing at all to cushion the blow. Daniel supported my weight and got me back up to the house, and searched for antiseptic wipes, painkillers and bandages. I just remember howling. No antiseptic wipes, so boiled water and salt would have to do. As he sat down to calm me down and clean me up, we heard car horns, the dog. I sent Daniel down and the dog was in the road, okay but wandering around and in danger. After a while of walking near him and stopping traffic, Daniel finally caught him and bought him up to the porch, locked him in,and called the RSPCA. He got some water and cuddles and the council came to take him so they could check his chip, and get him home. I’m so glad he's safe, because I went to a lot of trouble to help him!

We finally managed to get it cleaned, through the screams and me threatening to kill him if he went anywhere near my foot. It's bandaged, and elevated, and the swelling has gone down a bit. I can't drive, because of course it hit my driving foot. I also can't put weight on it, though I can use the very outside edge of it which is a good sign. So I am currently couch-bound, in a fair amount of pain and screaming any time one of the dogs gets anywhere near it, one of them stood on it and I uttered words I didn't even know I knew.  We're going to see how it is tomorrow, I don't really want to go to hospital or wherever unless absolutely necessary because it will cost us, god knows how much. I’ve never broken a bone in my life and now would be a spectacularly bad time to have that first.

More than anything I’m just really annoyed, because this happened around 1pm, so Daniel had to do most of the work by himself today. I felt very useless, and bored, and even a bit sorry. It's frustrating for me, but these things happen. Thankfully, Daniel managed to finish the bed frame and sand and varnish some more wood, and get the first piece of wood for the wall up today! So we're still on track. Hopefully I'll be a bit more helpful tomorrow and we can get a lot done. 

[thisbookisaboutmonsters]

Sigi, pt 2

here’s part 2! we get some backstory, some uncanny valley stuff, some weird side effects of living too long.

mature content warning: hungry vampire scenes! if that doesn’t bother you, go on ahead c:

“Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It has been one week since my last confession.”

The church is full of its usual smells. Smoke and candle wax. Old and new paint. The tarnish of metal decorations. And the bodies, young and old, their various functions.

“I continue to be spiteful and show hatred. I am vain, above all, and use the vanity and greed of others for my own gain.”

There are four people bleeding in the church today, whether from a cut sustained while gardening or due to biological routine. Two other people suffered a nose bleed upon waking this morning. One person vomited, twice, in the middle of the night; the smell of bile is still in their breath.

“I am lustful, and show no love to the people around me. I don’t think I ever learned how to do so. I am too proud to worry.”

The ancient varnish coating the wood of the confessional booth. The dust in the cloth and tapestries. Years of saliva floating in the air and staining the furniture.

His confession is almost word for word the same as it was the week before, and the week before that. Nothing has really changed; he hasn’t made much effort to try. He knows where he is going if he ever dies, but it’s nice to have a routine, and he’s always liked the church.

*

If you asked Stefan, Sigi was his most terrifying on camera. Video clips seemed to work differently as soon as Sigi was in the shot.

Stefan couldn’t stomach any video with Sigi in it, and he lived with the guy.

It was hard to explain what exactly seemed so unbearably wrong in these recordings. Sigi was not out of focus or hard to understand; on the contrary, he was almost too in focus. It seemed as though he was too sharp, too clear, in comparison to everything else onscreen.

Sigi seemed to be permanently trapped in high definition, even on older, cheaper equipment. They had experimented with this, on one of Sigi’s more inquisitive days, with a camera so old Stefan had to balance it like a suitcase on his shoulder, and Sigi walking, moving, speaking, was too much for him to look at through the machine.

It was almost passable when Sigi was alone in the clip. The trouble was that Sigi was almost never alone in the clip. Interviewers leaned into the shot, traffic moved behind them, and suddenly Sigi was too… too much.

When Stefan sat in with editors to peek at Sigi’s clips there was always a murmur of the frame rate being ‘weird’. Sigi had learned quickly that clips had to be kept very short, and any documentary appearances had to be limited to voiceovers or else he had to sit extremely still, to avoid everyone else reacting to him the way Stefan did looking through the viewfinder of a camera built in 1986.

He enjoyed upsetting Stefan, but with everyone else he had to be sure they could still like him, even only a little bit.

*

Sigi wakes up lying on the floor, each of his two hundred and six bones feeling exactly like a bruise. There is a foul taste in his mouth. He thinks at first that he’s had too much to drink, that he brought some new friend home after spending too many hours in the tavern downstairs, but this is not the taste of beer in his mouth. This is worse, a thousand times worse…

When he opens his eyes the pain intensifies. He’s suffered too much drink before, and this is nothing at all like the morning after a party. The pain reminds him of being a child for a moment.

He sees the man standing over him, watching him expectantly, as if he were about to touch Sigi.

Rage bubbles up within Sigi’s aching chest. He does not know this man, he does not know why he’s on the floor in such pain, but he knows this man is the cause. He can tell from the way he watches. He’s proud of his work.

The force of his fury terrifies Sigi later, once he’s able to think clearly, but as he lies on the wooden floor in a room he does not recognize with a strange man leaning over him, in horrifying pain, he cannot think of anything but vengeance. He has been wronged. He ignores the pain holding him to the floor and is on his feet again, too furious to really feel how his joints scream in unison. The taste in his mouth sinks into his throat and he coughs up something thick, something he can’t identify.

The man is not as tall as Sigi. He does not expect Sigi to beat him to the floor, nor is he prepared for Sigi to grind the heel of his shoe into his throat, again and again, until something crackles loudly. Sigi stops. The room seems to whirl about him, too fast, much too fast, and he’s distantly stunned to notice he isn’t appalled by the sight of all that blood…

Of course you’re used to blood, he tells himself, you’re a student of natural philosophy. You’ve seen blood before. Plenty of it…

His limbs quake. He can’t tear his gaze away from the spreading pool of blood on the floor. Soon it will drip between the boards, into the room below. Someone will see.

There is a sound upon the stairs. Sigi feels faint and sick to his stomach, but before he can lean down to vomit the door opens fast, clattering against the wall. Sigi reacts as his eyes meet those of the intruder, and before either of them understand what has happened, Sigi is outside, the broken glass of the upstairs window showering over him in glittering pieces.

He runs. His body has never hurt this much. Several streets north he finally stops to double over, catch himself on hands and knees, and vomits onto the cobblestones.

When he dares to look at the mess he’s made his stomach lurches again from fear; he seems to be losing a lot of blood. Through the mouth. He can feel it surging up from his throat again, bubbling up with the rage brought on by the sight of the strange man, and he is helpless to prevent himself vomiting twice, thrice, each expulsion a deeper red than the last.

That done, fully aware of how much blood a body needs to function, he’s more than a little concerned. He wobbles up to his feet again, holding the wall of a nearby shop to keep his balance.

He’s seen plagues before. He’s seen what happens to people who fall ill, vomiting blood and God only knows what else. He’s dying of a plague. Should he attempt to find his way home, wish his fellow lodger good-bye, bequeath his equipment and his books to Johannes? He knows he cannot, if he wants to avoid Johannes suffering the same fate.

He sits down, leaning against the outside of the shop, and stares at the sky. People glance at him as they pass. He should tell them he’s dying of plague.

But no. He knows there are other complaints to look for, and apart from the troubling vomit there is nothing truly amiss. He’s a student of natural philosophy, he knows there is nothing happening to his skin, no itch or irritation, nothing but a badly upset stomach.

Poison, then. The man whose neck he just trod on has poisoned him. It would explain the hideous taste on his tongue, still sharply noticeable beneath the taste of his own blood and bile. Perhaps he’d just gotten rid of every trace of the poison. He does not feel worse… And he is still alert, if shaken.

Standing again, moving slowly, quaking violently with every step, he suddenly understands why his stomach pains him so: he is hungry.

Once the thought occurs to him it latches onto his mind with the vicious tenacity of a rabid dog. He is hungry. He’s never felt this empty in his life. He staggers along the streets to a tavern he does not recognize, inhales the smell of the beer and stew inside, and promptly shakes his way back onto the street.

He is not hungry. He is… ill. He is very, very ill, and he is about to prove it all over the street again.

Somehow he finds his way back to the room he shares with Johannes, who is out attending to his studies. Grateful for the privacy, Sigi takes too long to unlock the door, shut it again, and pull his bedding over his head.

Everything hurts.

Almost immediately the blankets are pulled from his face and Johannes is standing over him. His soft, round face is worried. “Good God, where have you been? What’s happened to your clothes?”

Sigi didn’t see when the room went dark, but he’s clearly been in there all day. Johannes has lit the candles, his books are strewn about the floor where he dropped them, and he’s pulling at Sigi’s collar to loosen everything. “Please, don’t… I’m poisoned,” Sigi murmurs, his eyes unable to settle on one thing for very long. Everything is too much. He’s shaking like a man with a fever but his body is cold, so cold…

Johannes is unable to get Sigi to undress himself, but with patience he’s removed the worst of Sigi’s stained clothing. Sigi doesn’t know how long he’s been lying on this bed, quivering and tense, but Johannes is still there, clucking like a hen over him.

“…had too much to drink, made yourself sick, I’ve asked you not to do this again…” Johannes says. Can he not see how cold Sigi is? He must want it to be too much beer and not poison.

Sigi has to concentrate to keep his hands from swinging about as he lifts them to hold Johannes gently by the head. “Write to my mother,” he breathes, “Tell her. Poison.”

Johannes shakes his head free. “Your murderer is inept, then. You’ve been here for eight hours, landlord saw you come in…”

Sigi groans and shuts his eyes when Johannes touches his face. His fingers are too rough. Every ridge of his fingerprints scrapes too deep. Sigi grasps Johannes by the wrists. “Listen to me. Take my equipment.”

Johannes touches his face again, ignoring Sigi’s whine. “You’re not poisoned but you’re chilled through. Come on.”

Everything is too much. Sigi keeps his eyes shut tight as Johannes wipes a wet cloth over him, pulls on a fresh shirt, and gives him the blanket off his own bed. Johannes talks through it, obviously more worried now that it’s clear Sigi is not merely too deep in his cups.

Sigi doesn’t fall asleep so much as lose track of time. He’s in too much pain to sleep, but Johannes, exhausted and still worried, has stretched out beside him on Sigi’s bed. Sigi hasn’t stopped shaking yet. He twists onto his side to cling to Johannes’ warmth and only tightens his grip when Johannes sighs and fidgets.

Now that he’s changed position, Sigi can’t look away from Johannes’ mouth. The man always did breathe loudly in his sleep, but Sigi can see his breath and the room is not cold. Sigi can see as much as feel the heat rising off of Johannes and he doesn’t understand why his eyes are playing tricks on him now, in the dark—

That’s right. The candles burned out a while ago. Sigi forgot all about them, too entranced by the sight of Johannes lying next to him.

Sigi keeps his arms wrapped around Johannes’ waist as he squirms up off the mattress to press his mouth to Johannes’ lips. He is not shy with his mouth, never has been, but Johannes has not been a frequent playmate. His decision to kiss Johannes is sudden; he wants to taste that warm breath, he wants to lick that tongue…

Johannes stirs and leans into the kiss, half-asleep but welcoming. Sigi finds himself licking underneath Johannes’ tongue, tracing the shape of the blood vessels there, feeling them pulse against his flesh, hot and delicious.

The taste reminds him of the taste he woke up with in that unfamiliar room, but less revolting. Much less revolting. Sigi feels like he’s tasted the first small spoonful of a delicious stew. Warm, inviting, thick and delightful.

That is when he realizes he is about to bite through Johannes’ tongue. He doesn’t find the idea upsetting, or even in poor judgement, but the fact that this is Johannes gives him pause. He wants very, very much to bite down, so he pulls away and burrows deeper into the blankets, resting his face against Johannes’ side as the latter returns to sleep unaware.

The night passes impossibly slowly. Sigi counts every second as it passes, watches the shadows cast by moonlight as they move across the wall, listens to Johannes draw breath, exhale… When Johannes finally stirs again, the sun has started to rise, and Sigi has not slept.

“There’s glass in your hair?” Johannes’ voice creaks as he sits up.

Sigi lets him pluck the shards of glass from his hair, unable to move until Johannes lifts him out of bed. He leads Sigi downstairs to the dining room and nudges him into a chair.

Breakfast is an abject failure. Johannes brings Sigi a plate of food and sets down a cup of water. Sigi stares at the plate, motionless, his hands resting in fists on either side of his meal. The smell of the food is terrible; Sigi thinks everything must have gone rancid. When Johannes urges him to try, at least try to eat something, Sigi grimaces.

Perhaps he means to please Johannes when he lifts a piece of bread to his mouth. He bites down slowly. Chews methodically. He has to remind himself how to swallow. Johannes watches the whole laborious process with concern.

Sigi reaches for the water with a trembling hand, takes one sip, and replaces the cup.

Johannes sits back. “Did you sleep—”

He is interrupted by the sound of Sigi’s chair scraping back quickly as he hurries to the side door. Sigi staggers around the servant girl sorting laundry outside to vomit against the tiles of the courtyard. He nearly collapses with the force of his body’s revulsion.

Johannes follows him outside and places a careful hand on Sigi’s back. “…God in Heaven,” he gasps when he sees all the blood.

Sigi stands up, ignoring the way the servant girl is trying not to look at him. She’s tried not to look at him since they first arrived at this house. He’s grown used to that sort of thing, although now she’s staring transfixed at the red stain he’s thrown onto the tiles. No doubt she’ll hate him for the extra work he’s just given her.

She finally looks at him, for only the second time since he’s come here. She seems to regret it immediately, as she glances sharply back to the ground.

Sigi shakes Johannes’ hand off of his back and walks unsteadily around the house to the street. He wonders if it’s possible to die of a stomach ache. He catches a glimpse of his face in a mirror in a merchant’s window; his complexion looks almost grey, his teeth stained with the blood coming up from his insides. No wonder the servant girl couldn’t look at him, he thinks dizzily.

He walks along the streets, looking at shops that haven’t yet opened for business, watching servants return home from the marketplace. Someone passes him with fresh meat in their basket and his mouth fills with saliva, a rush so alarming that he doubles over with his hands held up to catch any overflow.

The marketplace, he decides. The butcher’s stall. The meat smells so appealing, so delicious, almost as beautifully enticing as Johannes’ juicy tongue. Perhaps he’ll find something he can stomach there.

Half of the meat at the stall smells rancid, too old, even though Sigi knows it can’t have been on display that long. No butcher would dare sell such rancid meat… But he can smell the pigs strung up for butchering behind the stall proper, and those have just been slaughtered. Sigi pushes every last bit of money he’s brought with him into the butcher’s hands and demands cuts from that pig, that one, that perfect one. The one that smells so heavenly.

Sigi doesn’t even wait for the butcher to finish wrapping the cut before he takes it in both hands and walks away. It is all he can do to keep himself from licking and sucking at the red, oozing meat in front of everyone by the stall. He makes it to a nearby alleyway and kneels down, bending over the half-wrapped meat to sink his teeth into it.

It’s a good thing he found some privacy; he’s never tasted something so wonderful. He groans around the meat and closes his eyes in a rapture almost holy in its purity. His hands tremble and his thighs press together. He can feel everything in his body improving so rapidly that he nearly faints. His stomach settles, his head stops pounding, and little by little he stops shaking.

And that vile, foul taste in the back of his mouth is finally gone.

Sigi chews his way through the thick cut, managing to swallow some without feeling ill at all. Glad that there is something that won’t cause him to vomit again, no matter what it is, he decides to eat it all. Blood stains his fingers and smears his jaw. When he’s swallowed the last mouthful he licks and sucks his fingers clean, wipes his face and licks his fingers again.

He feels as though he’s just stepped in front of a blazing fire after walking through snow all night. He kneels there, breathing slowly, revelling in the sensation.

Minutes pass. He realizes very suddenly that he has company; he turns to see the intruder, a small child standing in the street, looking in at him.

Sigi feels so euphoric and flushed that he forgets himself: he smiles at this strange child. He doesn’t smile at people. Johannes actually gripes frequently about how Sigi never seems to smile, but Johannes is lucky enough to have seen it more than once in private.

The child is entranced by the sight of Sigi, curious, and Sigi motions for the child to step closer. “Come here, boy. It’s rude to stare. Come and meet me, like a proper gentleman.”

The child wanders closer, staring. Sigi waits for him to make it to within his reach before he puts a hand on the boy’s shoulder. He can’t be more than five, if that. “Here, boy, do you go wandering off around the market often?”

The child shakes his head, wide eyes fixed upon Sigi’s face. He has one fat little fist held close to his pink mouth.

“And you didn’t think your mama would miss you?” Sigi asks. “Wandering off to stare at a strange man eating his breakfast.”

The child shakes his head again.

Sigi sniffs, then pauses. Had he been holding his breath? Sniffing feels… as if he’s interrupted something. But along with that sudden sniff, meant to be a show of disdain, Sigi can suddenly smell something. How hasn’t he noticed it yet?

The child.

The child smells glorious.

Sigi stares at the child, who stares back at him. It isn’t a soap smell, or anything he can categorize as a good smell. The child smells like the freshly slaughtered pigs at the butcher’s stall but… warm. Living.

The child smells like blood.

Sigi’s mouth fills with saliva again. Without thinking, his hand moves to the centre of the child’s back and pulls him in close. Sigi’s teeth close around the boy’s neck and cut through the flesh, his jaws crushing the spine. The child goes limp over Sigi’s knee as he swallows the blood fountaining into his mouth.

He does not think of what he’s done. He only thinks about the taste gushing over his tongue and down his throat, the pulse of wet pleasure between his thighs. His eyes roll and he moans, shuddering over the child’s body.

Sigi no longer feels newly recovered. He feels as though his frame is too big for his skin. His hands shake, his pupils dilate, his muscles tighten. He drops the bloodless child onto the ground and tries to walk away. He tugs his jacket closed over his bloodstained shirt as he shudders his way into another side street.

Walking proves difficult. He wants to run. He quivers with the strain of moving slowly but finds himself marching like a soldier on orders down the streets nevertheless.

He can still taste the meat and the blood between his teeth. He licks at them restlessly as he walks. His cheeks feel hot, blazing hot; he’s become a furnace.

He can smell that glorious smell everywhere now that people are out walking the streets in droves, going about their daily chores. Sigi’s teeth ache as if they might fall out, but the rest of him is too full of good for him to feel concerned.

He feels as though he is filled with the light of Heaven.

Sigi has never been able to blend unnoticed into a crowd, but now he’s more than his usual noticeable. He can’t stop laughing. Everything in the world is beautiful, he has not died of poison, and he’s finally managed not to vomit half of his innards after a bite of something delicious.

He must go tell Johannes. He is alive and doing well, very well, too well. Sigi stops, turns on his heel, and walks back to the room he rents with Johannes to share the good news.

The servant girl avoids his eyes as he walks in. The landlord demands an explanation for the mess in the courtyard. Sigi hops his way upstairs much quicker than he normally travels after a morning out in the marketplace and shoves the door open.

Johannes is out.

With a frustrated huff, Sigi clatters excitedly outside again, ignoring the landlord’s query as to whether Sigi has brought some new horrifying illness into his home. He keeps his forced-march pace all the way to the lord’s library across town, where Johannes likes to dig through the books. Sigi staggers into the building, looks around, marvels at the glorious smell of the woman cleaning the shelves by the door, but cannot find Johannes. Sigi leaves, groaning with annoyance. Where is Johannes?

Perhaps it would be wise to stay in his room until Johannes returns. He hurries back, startles the poor servant girl, alarms the landlord with his ‘constant hurrying about’ and shuts himself in the room upstairs. With nothing better to do, Sigi paces back and forth.

An hour later, still pacing, Sigi stops when he can hear the landlord speaking to Johannes downstairs, as clear as if they were in the same room with Sigi. The landlord is worried about him, cautions Johannes to be on his guard. Johannes doesn’t make it to the room before Sigi flings the door open and grabs at him.

“Sigi, what—!”

Sigi doesn’t let him finish the sentence. He crushes his mouth to Johannes in a kiss as he kicks the door shut again. Johannes voices surprise into Sigi’s mouth but is not able to speak until Sigi has him pinned down against his bed.

“I’m alive,” Sigi states simply, flushed and unable to be still.

Johannes has not looked at him like this in years: he’s terrified. Sigi used to terrify him on sight, but familiarity eroded some of that fear. Now he’s worried, even more than he was the previous night.

“Sigi, what were you doing? Where did you go? I was out all morning trying to find you!”

Sigi laughs. “I found my cure and I feel wondrous.”

Johannes puts a hand to Sigi’s face, then pulls it back in alarm. “You’re too hot!”

“No, no, I’m just right. Celebrate with me, darling Johannes!”

Sigi has his hands inside of Johannes’s clothing and his lips around Johannes’s tongue when he realizes he can feel his own heart pounding irregularly. He pulls back to pay attention, leaving Johannes gasping and flushed by himself for a moment.

“What—“ Johannes begins.

“Hush,” Sigi snaps, just as his heart thuds especially hard and seems to give up. He sits absolutely still, straddling Johannes’s hips and pointedly ignoring the erection prodding his backside, expecting to feel pain now that his heart has apparently… stopped.

Johannes leans up on his elbows, still very flushed but regaining his worried expression. “Sigi, you’re scaring me. You’re ill. We shouldn’t…”

Sigi bites his lip and squirms, just so, atop his friend’s arousal. Johannes cringes, ashamed of himself. Glad that he’s shut the man up for a moment longer, Sigi pays close attention to the sudden lack of a racing heartbeat against his ribs.

A few minutes pass. Sigi does not feel faint, nor does he so much as lose his balance. Johannes is too frightened, apparently, to move out from underneath Sigi. Sigi, having decided that his heart must be back to normal by now, sinks back down to drape himself lengthwise over his friend.

It’s strangely comforting to kiss Johannes when Sigi finds his tongue so delicious. Like with the child in the streets, Sigi can taste the blood inside of Johannes’s tongue, pulsing hot and rich through the thick muscle. Sigi’s jaw tightens with the effort of trying not to bite down, bite through that tongue as easily as he tore through the child’s throat.

Once Johannes has had all he can take, Sigi lies atop him, listening to the sound of his friend fighting to calm his breath again. Sigi feels dissatisfied, but too preoccupied to really want to take care of that right now. At least Johannes had fun.

In the middle of his heavy breathing, Johannes puffs, “My father begged me not to come here with you.”

Sigi contemplates this. “I’m not surprised. Is that supposed to upset me?”

Johannes lifts his head to better look at Sigi. “You knew? …Did he threaten you?”

“No.” Not this time. “I guessed. No one really likes me.”

Johannes sits up, apparently upset. When Sigi looks at his face he’s taken aback by the concern still there. “If that’s true, what do you think I’m doing here?”

Sigi doesn’t think about his response. It’s not the sort of thing that’s ever caused him distress, merely a fact of his life. “You’re either a fool or you want something.”

Johannes frowns and tries to put his clothes back on. “Am I a fool for worrying about you, then? You’re acting like a lunatic.”

“Do you want me to stop fucking you?”

“You know exactly what I meant, Siegfried, don’t be difficult. You spent the night telling me you were dying of poison, which I was beginning to believe after what happened at breakfast, and then i have to chase you around town before I find you again—”

Sigi gently presses his hand to Johannes’s lips, which are swollen and rough from kissing. “Why did you bring up your father? I know he doesn’t like me. Why are you thinking of him?” He’s still too full of energy, although his mind is relatively calm after toying with Johannes.

“He says you’re strange. Today you’re acting the part!” he insists when Sigi scoffs and climbs off the bed.

“If I gave any thought to every person who considers me odd I’d never get a single thing done,” Sigi tells him archly as he pulls his breeches on. “You’re days away from your buffoon of a father; please don’t start thinking of him whenever I touch you.”

“Wait, where are you going? What is that all over your shirt? Is that yours?”

Sigi pauses to look at the bloodstains all over his chest. Odd that Johannes didn’t notice until now, but then again, Sigi did climb onto him as soon as he came back. “I visited the butcher.”

“For goodness’s sake, at least change your shirt.”

Sigi wrestles Johannes down to steal the shirt off his back, then trades it for his own. He drops his stained shirt on Johannes’s chest. “There, I’ve changed. I’m going for a walk.” If he stays here any longer he knows he’s going to want to chew a hole in Johannes’s throat, and despite his current annoyance with his friend he does want to keep Johannes around. He’s one of the few people who’s managed to accept Sigi’s peculiarities. Sigi privately thinks having a plainer friend like Johannes nearby has helped other people get used to him quicker.

“Wait, Sigi, wear a jacket!”

Sigi ignores him and heads outside in his breeches and borrowed shirt, no jacket, no hat, burning hot and freezing cold all at once, not in the least bit bothered by it.

He still can’t feel his heart beating.

*

The strangest part of living so long, he decided, was being forgetful over certain things. You just carried on until one fine day you realized, quite suddenly, that it had been in fact over sixty years since you last spoke to someone, and they were more than likely dead.

He found himself wondering, out of nowhere, how Johannes must be doing lately… before abruptly remembering that Johannes had most definitely been dead for several centuries. Might have fully decomposed by now, climate permitting. Nothing left.

Irate at thinking about Johannes like that as if he could hop on a boat and go visit him, a few hundred years after they parted ways, Sigi closed his book and crawled into bed for a nap. It was noon, the sun was up, and it was unseasonably warm; it made him feel sluggish. He didn’t have any appointments until four o’clock.

Stefan was never encouraged to attempt to wake Sigi, even if they had pressing engagements. If Sigi ever woke to see the man standing in his room again, Stefan would not live another day. Luckily for Stefan, Sigi had a lot of practice deciding to sleep for very specific stretches of time, and he awoke two hours later with plenty of time still to spare.

He crawled back out of bed, feeling no more rested but not at all groggy, a little more alert now that the temperature outside had fallen somewhat. He could hear Stefan in the kitchen downstairs making himself a late lunch. Sigi never cooked, had no idea what Stefan kept stocked in the pantry and didn’t care to look.

Since Stefan was so stubborn about keeping the plumbing functional, Sigi had grown more fond of taking baths when he was feeling especially bored. He’d once experimented with not bathing— only tidying up when it rained, or borrowing a pump or a faucet while he traveled— to see whether it would render him less attractive to people in any way, but as far as he could tell they didn’t notice whether he had or had not bathed. Either their sense of smell was much, much duller than he realized, or he didn’t have enough of a scent himself. Maybe it wasn’t something people could pick up.

Cats liked him more when he didn’t bathe, which changed his mind about the whole practice of avoiding it.

He heard Stefan fumble in the kitchen when he started filling the bathwater, which suggested Stefan had no idea he was home. Making a mental note to keep an eye on Stefan later, wondering why he’d expect to have the house to himself this afternoon, Sigi shrugged out of his clothing and slid into the water.

Johannes had been dead for at least three hundred years. Sigi did the math while he soaked, staring at a crooked tile in the ceiling: if Johannes had lived to the age of seventy, if he was lucky enough to become an old man, he’d be dead three hundred years. Had he had any children? Grandchildren? Where had they gone? How many people living today had come from Johannes? His friend, diluted, branching out into descendants…

Good God, he hoped Stefan wasn’t by some freakish coincidence one of Johannes’s relatives. That would be appalling.

He’d done some further research into the new mummy’s background and wasn’t entirely shocked to confirm his suspicions: he had known her when she was alive. Briefly, but they had met. He hadn’t liked her then as much as he did now. She’d told her mother that Sigi had caught her father’s attention. Sigi, eight years old, only learned what had happened long after the girl’s mother dragged him through the streets, screeching with rage at the thought of her husband being stolen away by a child.

Sigi, who didn’t know what the woman’s husband even looked like, had to accept a beating first from her, then from his mother, then his father, for apparently catching his eye. He was eight years old.

It was a strange sort of revenge to now have that girl’s mummified body kept in his house, centuries after she lied to her mother because she didn’t want Sigi to play on her street.

The bathwater was hot. Sigi had installed a large enough tub for his long legs to fit comfortably, and he liked sliding down until his head was fully submerged. Underwater he could still hear Stefan in the kitchen, using the blender.

Soak for half an hour. Get dressed. Interview at four o’clock for a magazine. Launch new makeup collection in the evening. A party. He was going to be busy.

He stopped in the room of mummies to pat the glass case around the girl and smile at her before leaving for the night.

[libidomechanica]

Untitled Poem # 722

And who will call the wild-briar fair? But came the waves and washed it away: Again I wrote it with a glittering comb, As she toils a song’s befalling. & Somewhere away from here And I was a bum on the bumpers a thousand memories, And asks you Beautiful, unanswerable questions. It has been so wet stones glaze in moss; everything blooms coldly.

How do we come to be here next to each other in the night Of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all that’s best of dark and bright Meet in her aspect and her eyes: Thus mellow’d to that tender light Which heaven to gaudy day denies. Our nerves were frayed like ravelled sleeves, We cherished each our minor griefs To keep them warm until the night, When it was time again to fight;

But we were young, did not need much To make us laugh instead, and touch, And could not love thee, Dear, so much, Loved I not honour more. Oh, find it, Sir, for me! My bonnet but to tie, And close the door unto my house No more to do have I? We loved right down to the bone. Varnished bats, blinded rabbits, cows with windows in their flanks but obviously I’m fascinated.

Upon your throat And when you come upon me I won’t look back at you You will feel a hand upon your throat And when she does I will be wandering moon, beyond the wandering moon, beyond the wandering moon, beyond the star That tracks her night by night. And now, an Amethyst remembrance Is all I own

My true-love hath my heart and I have his, By just exchange one for the other given; I hold his swift foot back? And likes to rent her movies, for a treat. Death, the gray mocker, Comes and whispers tales of Mary. By a most dauntless, voiceless fortitude, Lest one touch of this heart convey its grief. And on that cheek, and o’er that brow, So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, The smiles that win, the tints that glow, But tell of days in goodness spent, A mind at peace with all below, A heart whose love is innocent! A barbell or a bowling ball,

And from the window by the bed, Echoing inside my head, Alley cats expended breath In arias of love and death.

In the fall of the year, I walked the road beside my dear.

[sexatoxbridge]

TWO THINGS I LOVE: SURVEYS AND TALKING ABOUT MYSELF

So @vocabularryonthemind​ did this survey the other day and I was reading through like, “heh…dat me” because we’re the same person in different bodies. Naturally I thought, “She’ll tag me in this.” THEN SHE DIDN’T. And I was like, “I can’t BELIEVE Y-” so then she tagged me in it, but I’m gonna pretend that part didn’t happen. 

Anyway here’s a bunch of information literally no one asked for.

I wasn’t kidding about us being the same person so I’ve taken screen shots of some of her answers that were verbatim what I would’ve said anyway. Here’s a visual representation of us as people made by Choe:

Dat me.

Dat her. 

1: Are you named after someone?
 My mother got the idea for my name when she ran into her ex-boyfriend with his new girlfriend because that’s normal and sane. She liked his new girlfriend’s name so that’s what’s on the records. If I was a boy I was going to be called Maxamillion because my mum is an extra ass heaux™.   

2: When was the last time you cried? I…actually don’t know. Which is pretty cool. Not that I’m like anti-crying or anything, it’s just that I’ve been livin la vida loca and having a good time. So no crying for me as of late. 

3: Do you like your handwriting?

4: What is your favorite lunch meat?
 Prosciutto…I eat it as a meal sometimes.  

I’m so proud of our 32 year-old son, John Mulaney.

7: Do you use sarcasm?
 I…don’t know what that is…

8: Do you still have your tonsils?
 I do.

9: Would you bungee jump?
 I actually almost bungee jumped off of the Stratosphere casino in Las Vegas a couple of weeks ago but it was like $120 so I decided to just do the roller coaster instead. So, I would. If it didn’t interfere with my drinking and gambling funds. 

10: What is your favorite kind of cereal?
 I’m not really a breakfast person.

Okay but I’m like freakishly strong for my size…my uncle calls me She Hulk. Before I became a coxswain I was a rower but I’m only 5′3 which is about a foot shorter than you want to be for rowing, but because I was fueled by rage and a vendetta to prove everyone wrong I ended up always making the top boats thanks to my JLo booty and freakishly strong legs.  

Livin dat Lactose Intolerant Lyf™

14: What is the first thing you notice about people?
 Their bum. 

15: Red or pink?
 

Would we call his lips red or pink? 

16: What is the least favorite physical thing you like about yourself?
 My ovaries. 0/10 would not recommend. 

17: What color pants and shoes are you wearing now? UK pants as in underpants? Or US pants as in trousers? UK – blue. US – I don’t wear trousers. I’ve got tights on. And dark brown Uggs. 

18: What was the last thing you ate? Half of a cucumber (whoa! Go crazy!) I had some delicious tacos for lunch though.

19: What are you listening to right now?
 “Minute 5” by a band called Boega, which is a folky-rock song. Hear me out…so Ed Sheeran was on Mista Jam’s show on BBC Radio 1 today and did a “house party playlist” and this was on it. It’s interesting. And if Ed loves it imma give it a try. The weirdest gypsy soulmate shit was that I was all ready to add his tracks to my January playlist (I make one every month of new music I find) and the first song he played was Chance the Rapper “All Night”…and I shit you not, that is the FIRST song I put on my playlist last week.

 Fate. Ed was meant to be at a wedding I went to a year ago and I was like, “Yes. Gonna woo Ed Sheeran,” but then he was, like, busy or something. Whatever I don’t wanna talk about it. ANYWAY, I’m still convinced I’ll meet him someday and be like, “Yo…remember that playlist you made? WELL-”

20: If you were a crayon, what color would you be? 
I don’t fuckin know, man. I don’t think I’ve looked at a crayon in 20 years. If I were an OPI nail varnish colour however I would be “I’m Really Not A Waitress”.

Mmm…good man smell…or good woman smell…people. My favourite smell is people I’m attracted to. It usually smells like ginger biscuits. But like the combination of someone I’m attracted to and a nice cologne…mmm. 

Same, except my brofriend. Not her brofriend, although technically her brofriend is the last person I texted to warn him that I’m watching him. We have a rivalry for who is the true Lewis to Choe’s Harreh. I obviously am. ANYWAY, yesterday I ran out of gas so my brofriend brought me some, but he somehow drove right past me and got lost in a car park even though I was just standing by my car shakin my head until I called him to be like, “wyd…” Otherwise, I hate talking on the phone so I avoid speaking on one at all times. 

23: Favorite sport to watch? 
RUGBY

It’s true, we even look the same. 

26: Do you wear contacts? Nay. Both my parents are blind as bats, but I was like, “Not today, genetics. NOT TO-DAY,” cos I’ve got 20/20. 

27: Favorite food to eat?
 Mexican food. Because I’m a MexiCAN. 

28: Scary movies or comedy? Comedy. My favourite films in no particular order are: Old School, Wedding Crashers, Talladega Nights, Superbad…basically that kind of thing. 

29: Last movie you watched?
 I watched John Mulaney’s standup special The Comeback Kid for the sixtieth time the other night.

30: What color of shirt are you wearing?
 I’m wearing a black dress.

31: Summer or winter?
 Summer. I hate being cold. So much so that I’ve adjusted my lifestyle to live in an endless summer where I move between California, Mexico and London at optimum temperature and sunlight times. 

32: Hugs or kisses? Both. But only from dogs.   

33: What book are you currently reading?
 Does fan fiction count?

34: Who do you miss right now? CHOE. WHERE SHE AT. SHE MAKIN ME TAKE THIS SURVEY WHILST SHE’S PROBS DRINKING WHISKEY AND PONTIFICATING ON THINGS. 

35: What is on your mouse pad?
 Mouse pad? Someone’s doing well…

36: What is the last TV program you watched?
 THE OA. So good. 

37: What is the best sound?
 “Fireproof” by One Direction

I wanted Paul McCartney to be my grandfather when I was younger, but musically…I like them both. 

39: What is the furthest you have ever traveled? 
China? I think China. 

Is being a psychic gypsy heaux™ a talent? I’m savant as hell, but also kind of psychic. Specifically when it comes to randomly putting on the same outfit as Choe. We gross. Don’t look at us. 

42: People you expect to participate in this survey?
 Every goddamn one of you. If I have to do this WE ALL DO.

I’m tagging Smelly because she the other third of our Gypsy Hoe Network™. @mellygrant​ 

Dat us.

[alexandraburton-x]

@zachwinthrop      zach slung yet another glass of champagne to the back of his throat, becoming addled with the frothy ( b u b b l e s ) ascending beyond his logic. low-bass heartbeats thumped throughout the vehicle, causing tremors to rumble right beneath their feet. faith’s laugh chimed in his ears. he turned his chin to her, grinning, a weightlessness floating through his body. he was sure he had gotten everything R I G H T this time. faith wasn’t destined to be in his life forever, they were both more than aware of that, but it didn’t mean he couldn’t retain and relish in her for now. his game plan was simple – wait patiently for alexandra to recognise that whatever asher did for her wasn’t half of what he could do for her – and then it would all work out. he was certain. and if it didn’t he would invoice her his car repair bills.         the couple pulled up outside the apprised cocktail lounge and emerged to a squall of flashing lights, shielding the mouths curling around their names, shouting to look here, smile this way, and do you have any comment on the photos from the bbmas after party? amanda must have tipped them off – there had been solicitude surrounding his name the past two weeks after his great DISAPPEARING act and accounts sighting him drunk and disorderly, or just plain disorderly, in more than one location. faith had followed suit and hastily gone into hiding until his team had reigned him back under their control – their anxieties simmered, but it was known among them, ( although unspoken ), that zach did what he wanted, and it was their job to cover his tracks. but to amanda’s relief he returned as though nothing had happened at all, and she knew better than to grill him. leaking his whereabouts to the press didn’t bother him – in fact, it lulled him into a faux entrapment that his life had settled into a comfortable M E D I A N.         inside, garish lights swathed the surface of his sun-deepened rind until he appeared to be natant in rippling colour. the paparazzi subsided, leaving only the underlying thrum of music and slurs ghosting the rims of cocktail glasses. ❝ i’ll never get tired of having the thing everyone in the room is gawking at on my arm, ❞ faith drawled, redolent syllables pronounced upon the shell of his ear. he tosses an idle smirk over his shoulder. ❝ did you just call me a THING? and also imply that you own me? faith coleman… ❞ he mocked, leaning across the bar to open a tab. ❝ people don’t own me, i own everything. ❞ he murmured, emerging his lips upon hers. she perches upon a barstool looking like some perverted fantasy – with her hips stretched like a wooden Christ, lips painted dark as blood and even hair so golden it could have only been the result of some somber presage. he stood at her back, his hand cradling the exposed base of her embowed spine. zach wilts around her, balancing the unopened phial of moët & chandon dom perignon in a greedy palm.         they share the exorbitant elixir between them until the bottle is almost drained and he feels dizzily inebriated – the kind that doesn’t leave his memory with boring holes the next morning – and he had taken a seat at the plush barstool beside her. ❝ i’m drunk, ❞ he garbles merrily, tipping his flute toward her. she raises a sculpted eyebrow. ❝ as am i. are we lowering the cachet of this place? ❞ zach laughs. ❝ obviously not. we’re the coolest people here. ❞ he is jeering, but faith allows her misted gaze to dance over the crowds of people adorning the lounge as if searching for a worthy contender to their ‘coolness’. and then she freezes on the space hanging right above his shoulder. he doesn’t notice.        ❝ zach, i think alex is here. ❞ his heart gyres, but he keeps his eyes steady upon faith’s defined features, hand on her knee. ❝ yeah? ❞ he goads. he could have laughed aloud. she disappears, positively UNTRACEABLE for three years, and suddenly, she’s everywhere. she’s all over him like some kind of terminal ( r a s h ). not that he particularly minded. perhaps this would be fun, he mused. ❝ that B I T C H, ❞ she seethes, stunning zach for a moment. but then he remembers the lies he had spun her. whoops. ❝ i should go over there and say something. i want to. i want to say something to her, see how brave she is then. ❞ a clean row of ivory sinks into his plush lower lip, biting back a laugh. he takes her chin in his fingers, re-directing her gaze to him. ❝ i promise you i’m telling you this for your own good, ❞ he cautions. ❝ faith, that girl will eat you A L I V E. ❞ faith physically deflates in her seat, a pout protruding her bee-sting lips. ❝ no sulking, ❞ he instructs, standing and holding her hand to guide her. ❝ we can do this theeasy way… who knows? maybe you’ll even become friends. ❞ zach grins at her reassuringly, turning on his heel.        and there she f u c k i n g is. clinquant and glowering at him like some kind of scorned norse goddess. he smiles obliviously, ear to diamond-adorned ear. he almost doesn’t see that pathetic excuse of a clone practically clasped around her like she was his life-source at her side. ❝ alexandra! and C O. ❞ zach doesn’t even offer asher a glance – his eyes entirely transfixed on a woman he would never, E V E R, be able to fucking shake. he takes the liberty of seating himself at the private booth, tugging faith’s arm lightly to join him. he wasn’t sure what he was feeling – hysterical, maybe? he was too giddily drunk to care. he was teetering somewhere between outrageously jealous, realising he had no right to be as the FRIENDSproposal was entirely his idea, and amusement in its purest form.       ❝ well isn’t this just a merry fuckin’ coincidence! ❞ he squeezes faith’s thigh encouragingly, then glances to her. she smiles, and then he does too, because she’s fucking gorgeous and all four of them know it. and it was sort of SEXY that she had the confidence to put a brave face on. stupid and asking to be buried six feet beneath alex’s louboutins, but sexy regardless. ❝ hi, ❞ she coos sweetly, curling a possesive claw around zach’s bicep. ❝you must be alex. i’ve heard plenty about you. i’m faith. coleman. and you..? ❞ she turns to asher, raking honeyed hues over him as painfully slowly as she could manage.

        alexandra protracted her daedal, manicured fingers out toward the bottle of armand de brignac, whirling them around the neck of the generous glass. ❝ friends? ❞ asher S T I F L E D, his starless tinctures immense with amusement. ❝ i must’ve missed something in between the psychopathic rage & his charming mug shot that would warrant ( f r i e n d s h i p ). ❞ her delicate shoulders wrenched without care, soft laughter fading from between her varnished, plush sepals. hearing someone else drawl what she’dA L W A Y S known was hilarious, substantiating zach’s plaintive position in her otherwise peachy life. she poured the blush tinged bubbly into her crystalline flute, which compulsorily danced toward her mouth – watering pout. ❝ you’re right, babe, ❞ she respired, the delicious scent of candied liquor laced within her warm breath. she placed her palm gently upon his inner thigh, wanton curves twining to lure his pure petals into a kiss. ❝ and that’s why i need you. because you’re N O T H I N G like him. ❞          asher grinned, immaculate ivories melting her into a plash of ( a p h r o d i s i a ). ❝you’re wasted, aren’t you?” she wrinkled her cherub nose, molten chocolate curls spilling over her shoulders as dipped her head to the right. ❝ no? what? ❞ alex began to laugh, her full glass of champagne threatening to spill from its vessel. but her twinkling moment of pretending zachariah winthrop was V A P O R O U S was over before it started. the sound of his fabricated timbre caused her blood to simmer. it wasn’t an amiable act, but rather one to demonstrate his dominion. she wouldn’t allow him that, not now & not ever. restraint laved her ireful silhouette as she turned to attend to him. alexandra smiled, not out of charm or civility, but out of M E R C Y. auric hues relented as he opts to secure a place at their table – a bold choice, but not unexpected. their ( e n t i r e ) relationship had been a game and his moves were as predictable as his envy.          ❝ isn’t it though? ❞ she mused, folding her sun – kissed stems one over the other as she swilled from her glass. she admired faith’s affinity, coiling a gentle hand around her fraudulent swain. it made her laugh at how S A D the entire show had become. ❝ have you? mm, to be a fly on the wall during that conversation. ❞ ironically, she had heard very little about faith with the exception of zach divulging she was a mere distraction from real life. asher shifted indignantly beside of her, his thickset fingers smoothing through onyx tresses, ❝ asher, nice meeting you, ❞ he forced in his dulcet tonality, providing scarce eye contact to either of their new guests. she cleared her throat, reclining softly into the crook of asher’s sinewy chassis, ❝ it’s nice seeing you again, zach. dry this time. ❞ she reminded, raking her manicured crescents against the stem of her glass.

[nofomoartworld]

Hyperallergic: The Open-Ended Narratives of a Small Museum

Arthur B. Davies, “Heifer of the Dawn” (c.1905), oil on canvas, gift of Helen Farr Sloan, 1975 (All images by the author for Hyperallergic.)

WILMINGTON, Delaware — The quirks, diversions, and counter-narratives offered by small museums often feel preordained to shake up engrained attitudes and assumptions, and so it goes with the Delaware Art Museum, which, to be honest, didn’t seem at first glance to be a such a promising prospect.

Founded in 1912 with a large purchase of work by the Wilmington-based illustrator Howard Pyle, who had died the previous year from a kidney infection, the museum has made a specialty of American illustration and Pre-Raphaelite painting.

This core group, however, is augmented by a substantial selection of American painting, starting with a portrait of George Washington from around 1825-1830 — not by the ever-reliable Gilbert Stuart, but by either Rembrandt Peale or his dad, Charles Willson Peale (the attribution is unresolved) — which a wall label describes as “the first work of art not by Howard Pyle to enter the Delaware Art Museum.”

Peale’s dome-headed Washington, posthumous by a good quarter-century, is much more streamlined and sculptural than Stuart’s gruffly brushy “Atheneum” portrait (the one we think about when we think about Washington), which was begun three years before the first president’s death. The Peale version is currently serving as the co-anchor of a single-room display simply called American Portraits, 1757-1856. 

The painting of Washington hangs to the right of an introductory wall text; to the left, there is a portrait in oil on paper by yet another Peale, this time Raphaelle [sic]. (The ultimate Old Master fanboy, Charles named a third son and two daughters from his first marriage after Rubens, Angelica Kauffman, and Sofonisba Anguissola, respectively. One of his six children from a second marriage was named after Titian.)

Raphaelle Peale, “Absalom Jones” (1910), oil on paper mounted to board, gift of Absalom Jones School, 1971; Rembrandt Peale or Charles Willson Peale, “George Washington, (c.1825-1830), oil on canvas, bequest of Dr. Joseph Pyle, 1919

The second portrait, painted in 1810, formally mirrors the one of Washington: the sitter, Absalom Jones, is turned to the right and Washington is turned to the left. The wall label describes Jones as:

[T]he prominent minister of St. Thomas African Episcopal Church in Philadelphia. Born a slave in Sussex, Delaware, Jones eventually won his freedom, became a founding member of the Free African Society, was ordained the first African American minister of the Episcopal denomination, and helped organize a school for African American children.

The pairing of the two portraits — the minister born enslaved and the patrician, slaveholding president — is uncommonly moving. The curling-over-the-ear hairstyles (Jones’s in black, Washington’s in white), the white collars and black coats, the dignified mien and dark backgrounds split open our embalmed response to the image of Washington by complicating his received context.

Jones, whose right arm cradles a copy of the Bible in a pose that uncannily prefigures that of the Statue of Liberty, is a contemporaneous rebuke to the racist hypocrisies that tainted the Enlightenment principles infusing the creation of the Constitution. Peale paints him with unerring realism, conveying an unembellished sense of strength and wisdom that eschews all trappings of the heroic.

The presentation of these two works couldn’t be more understated or more effective: a curatorial masterstroke allowing the paintings to speak for themselves, with just the right amount of supplemental information. It is also a clue to the openness and diversity found throughout the museum, especially in the postwar collection, which, it can be argued, seems to imagine an American art scene in which Abstract Expressionism didn’t exist, or at the very least, did not play such an outsized role.

The emphasis suggested by the layout of the second floor (where 20th-21st century art is held) is already revisionist, with a large gallery dedicated to “John Sloan and The Eight / Early American Modernism,” and a slightly larger one containing “American Art after 1940 / Postmodernism: American Art since 1960.” In between the two, there is a much smaller room for “Abstraction and the American Scene.”

The proportionately large amount of space given over to The Eight, a group of artists (Robert Henri, Everett Shinn, John Sloan, Arthur B. Davies, Ernest Lawson, Maurice Prendergast, George Luks, and William J. Glackens) who rebelled against ossified academic standards and adopted an invigorated use of paint-as-paint, was made possible by another large acquisition, this time from John Sloan’s widow, Helen Farr.

But this gathering of artwork is also a fascinating reminder of the underground ferment that characterized progressive culture in this country from the very beginning of the 20th century. (The Eight are so named for a protest show they held in New York City in 1908, after their work had been rejected by establishment venues.) The surprise here is the diversity of imagery and technique, given that the work of these artists is often equated with the grayed-down, loosely painted cityscapes of the Ashcan School, a larger group that they joined later on.

John Sloan, “Helen at the Easel” (1947), casein tempera underpaint, and oil-varnish glaze on panel (some Shiva Ponsol colors used), gift of the John Sloan Trust

Sloan, for one, shows an unusually wide range of both subject matter and use of paint, from the Ashcan-y “Wet Night on the Bowery” (1911) to the Impressionistic “Autumn, Rocks and Bushes” (1914) to the quasi-Metaphysical “Evening, Santa Fe, Down by the D and R Track” (1919), not to mention the truly odd portrait he made of Farr, “Helen at the Easel” (1947), which is striated by innumerable, short, thin brushstrokes (which are unexplained by the wall text) streaking across the head, body, clothing, and background, as if the painting were a pedagogical exercise in volumetric form.

This selection of Sloan’s work presents him as a restless experimenter, which may explain why his idiosyncratic and iconoclastic student, John Graham, was so devoted to him. But the room overall establishes the variety of the group, from the faceted brushstrokes and crepuscular light of Arthur B. Davies’ “Heifer of the Dawn” (c.1905) to George Luks’ high contrasts and muscular impasto (“Trout Fishing,” 1919).

There are also moodily gorgeous landscapes by the non-Eight artists Charles Burchfield and Marsden Hartley, as well as an expressionistic bronze head of Marcel Duchamp from 1943 (cast in the 1960s) by Reuben Nakian.

The Duchamp portrait, with its exaggerated, hawklike features, feels out of place in the room, but it is interesting as a link between the first generation of American rebels and the postwar artists who seized the initiative of vanguard painting in the wake of World War II, fueled by European ideas of Cubism, Surrealism, and Dadaism (the last, of course, via Duchamp).

The curious thing about this array of works from the permanent collection is that the trademark moves of those postwar artists, otherwise known as the Abstract Expressionists, are embodied in just two paintings, both by Robert Motherwell — and only one of them is a gestural abstraction, “Je T’aime No. VII (Mallarme’s Swan: Homage)” (1957), which is hanging in the small room reserved for “Abstraction and the American Scene.”

The other Motherwell, in the larger gallery occupied by modern and postmodern art, is one of his majestic “Open” series (“Open No. 12 in Raw Sienna with Gray,” 1968), a long, horizontal acrylic-on-canvas with a gray rectangle floating on a raw sienna field, and sectioned off by vertical charcoal lines.

“Open No. 12” evinces none of the helter-skelter emotionalism associated with AbEx; it is instead an image of serenity and reason, a calm that is picked up by a painting of vertical stripes by Gene Davis and a tall, black, totem-like sculpture by Louise Nevelson. The most conspicuous effect of what we might call Abstract Expressionist tokenism is the absence of a historical center of gravity: instead of all succeeding art appearing to line up or against its influence, the other works seem to float freely in their own orbits.

Like the pairing of Absalom Jones and George Washington, this realignment of aesthetic forces takes its hold on you in its own space and time; nothing is forced or obviously underscored, with content taking a step ahead of form in the way you approach the work.

There’s a wall of New Image Painting, which is not something you find in museums every day, with vintage works by Joe Zucker (“Candle,” 1976) and Donald Sultan (“Hats,” 1979) as well as more recent paintings by David True (“Untitled,” 1987) and Pat Steir (“Little Red Waterfall,” 1994). All of these titles, with the exception of True’s (which depicts a woman wearing a bright red coat lying in a blue, storm-tossed rowboat, while a human-sized artist’s mannikin swims beneath the waves), denote the images on the surface, even if they are partially disguised, as in the Zucker and Sultan. In such a context, the “how” of these images is subservient to the “why.”

Melvin Edwards, “We Know” (1986), welded steel, gift of Mike and Rob Abel, 2006

And the “why” — the desire to plumb the extravisual meanings of the works — increases as the art proceeds generationally from the Abstract Expressionists’ glory days, with an increasing level of racial and gender diversity. One section of the gallery, labeled “Art after 1980: Identity and Politics,” holds three of the most striking works in the collection, all by African Americans: a sculpture by Melvin Edwards and paintings by Robert Colescott and Peter Williams.

“We Know” (1986) is an agglomeration of shapes made from Edwards’ characteristic welded steel, comprising a base, a spike, a hammer or hatchet, a hook, and an indecipherable, candle-shaped cylinder. Edwards’ art, which combines abstraction with found objects that manifest the trenchant material legacy of tools and chains, ripples with uncompromising integrity and intelligence — Exhibit A for a perennially unfashionable body of work that has only grown in strength, decade after decade, while retaining its humility in light of the history it cites.

The paintings of Robert Colescott, who died in 2009 at the age of 83, are most often associated with nasty send-ups of white culture in general and Western art history in particular. But he was also an endlessly inventive colorist, combining the lush and the garish to bracing effect.

Robert Colescott, “Big Bathers, Another Judgment” (1984), acrylic on canvas, F.V. du Pont Acquisition Fund, 1986

His work on display here, “Big Bathers, Another Judgment” (1984), is a parody of the Judgment of Paris, with a multiracial cast of characters — fleshy, awkward but defiantly beautiful nudes, with skin tones ranging from juicy pink to syrupy umber — surrounded by a tranquil but turbulently colored landscape: magenta clouds, cobalt blue sky, violet shoreline, and a gray-green body of water that looks like an acid bath.

The darkest-skinned woman is the most arresting — the deep umber of her body is highlighted with swipes of what looks like red, white, and orange mixed to a burnished glow, and further energized by a shock of alizarin in her hair and the bands of white across her breasts and hips, which could be unnatural tan lines or an exceptionally revealing bikini.

Either way, the painting presents more questions than answers, among them, who is doing the judging? Is it the woman elbow-deep in the water, or the face barely glimpsed behind a rock? Certainly it isn’t the sole male in the picture, a gray-haired nude asleep in the bottom left corner. Mostly it looks as if the three women, each a different skin color, are sizing each other up and, by extension, daring us to examine our own culturally defined standards of beauty.

Peter Williams, “Smile” (2016), oil on canvas, F.V. du Pont Acquisition Fund, 2016

The most challenging work of this group, however, is “Smile” (2016) by Peter Williams, which rivals the Motherwell in size — the most monumental painting I’ve seen by this perpetually unsettling artist. According to the wall text, it was made during a residency at the Joan Mitchell Center in New Orleans, and it consequently “references New Orleans, its history, colors, and architecture and the 1811 slave rebellion—one of the largest in United States history—that took place in the city.”

That’s all well and good, but the imagery is floridly unhinged, a horror show played out on a sunny summer’s day. Done on six panels, each painted a bright color that serves as a ground (yellow, blue, aquamarine, and three shades of orange), the canvases are stacked two by three — yellow over orange, blue over aquamarine, orange over a darker orange — so that the painting overall reads as a triptych, and the images are arrayed accordingly.

On the right, a maniacal caricature of an African American man sits with his legs splayed out before him, manipulating a crane-like structure that seems assembled from an Erector Set. Perhaps punning on the name of that vintage toy, the crane emerges from the man’s groin and stretches across all the entire composition.

The middle, almost abstract portion is taken up by the crane, while in the left-hand section, a large black man, who is just as caricatured as the one on the right, hangs upside-down from the crane as four small, dark-skinned, bare-chested, gremlin-like figures scurry around him.

The upside-down man wears a form-fitted white shirt, narrow black tie, and plaid trousers that parallel the plaid jacket on his tormentor on the right. The imagery is perplexing to say the least — if the picture alludes to the 1811 rebellion, who is attacking whom? It’s a reasonable question given the peculiar racial history of New Orleans, where mixed-race Creoles were slaveholders alongside the whites. A second look at the man on the right reveals that his hair is red, a swatch of Caucasian skin borders his black face, and the miniature profile of a white woman is planted in his ear.

Is he a white man in blackface? His hands and sandal-clad feet, both dark, say otherwise. Is the hanging man a leader of the revolt? His well-pressed clothes disagree. And who are the diminutive figures grieving over him or, in an equally plausible interpretation, assisting in his execution?

Perhaps the key is the rickety crane, which evokes, at least for me, the compromises cobbled together to accommodate the demands of the slave states after the Revolution. These moral failures included the Electoral College, an inherently undemocratic system that has proven its ability — not to prevent a demagogue from winning the presidency, as its apologists have perpetually insisted — but to enable the most vilified and unpopular candidate in recent history to assume power over the future of the planet.

If Williams painted “Smile” (and who could come up with a more sardonic title?) before November 8th, it’s a safe bet that this particular idea wasn’t on his mind. But the deranged imagery and skewed racial dynamics that he superimposes over the history of the 1811 rebellion is grounded in a distinct vision of an America unravelling from the fatal aftermath of its original sin, which no quantity of blood can wash away.

The post The Open-Ended Narratives of a Small Museum appeared first on Hyperallergic.

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