#Best Venetian blinds

[sureshade]

 Enhance Your Home Aesthetics with External Venetian Blinds

Discover the perfect blend of style and functionality with External Venetian Blinds. These versatile window treatments offer excellent light control and privacy and enhance your home's exterior appearance. Ideal for modern and traditional settings alike, External Venetian Blinds are a must-have for any homeowner looking to elevate their home's curb appeal.

[thoughtfulenemyking]

[deaddovedecadence]

Title: First Meeting (The Sunshine Verse)

Summary: You come face to face with the leader of the Batclan mob

Warning(s): Possesive behavior, scarring, kidnapping

You don’t remember being drugged, you don’t remember losing track of Lyre, you don’t remember going anywhere and yet you’re here, stuck in an unfamiliar room, a chain on your ankle. You’re unsafe, you know this, and there’s nothing you can do about it. The room is clean, not a speck of dust anywhere, and it smells like lemons, not lemon scented cleaner but real, fresh lemons. You hate it. It's not your first time being kidnapped but usually you’re confined to a dark room or messy, dirty basements that make you want to throw up. This is your first time being kidnapped since joining the force (you had a really unique childhood okay)  and you can’t help but wonder why you've been taken, if someone thinks you'll have real information for that.

Soft, well muffled sounds start up next to the door but quickly fade to silence. You hate it here, the thick silence, the not knowing where your best friend (brother) is, the chain that rests on your ankle. Speaking of the chain, you haven’t tried to walk yet and you can’t help but be curious. Slowly, carefully,, you get yourself out of bed and walk to one of the doors, letting it creak open. It;s only a bathroom. There’s one other door in the room and you’re pretty sure that you know where it leads. Out of here. You start walking towards that door but the chain stops you before you can get too close. Going back a few steps, you make a few loops in the area that seems safe and attempt to run towards the door. Immediately the chains are pulling you back and you slam to the floor. Well whoever has you certainly isn’t an idiot, which makes your job all that much harder. 

Eventually you pull yourself off of the floor and crawl to the bed. As soon as you’ve arranged yourself in a manner that doesn’t hurt too much, you’re asleep. 

“Lyre,” you call, listening to the echoing chirps of the birds, trying to ignore the sounds of “lyre, lyre, not lyre,” to themselves, loud as can be. It’s foggy out today, but not so much that you can’t see in front of you. The walk to work is weird without your best friend, but peaceful, even though the birds are chirping loudly, mocking birds calling Lyre’s name. As you’re approaching the police station, you note the crowd of people, how their murmurs grow and change. They’re all saying his name. You get closer and your best friend (brother) is just laying there, spread out on the pavement, his blood staining everything a terrible shade of red. You kneel down, staring at him. Lyre’s eyes are wide open, unseeing and you can’t help closing them. Your hands are red now. 

You wake up screaming. 

It takes a minute of blind panic for you to calm down and become aware of your surroundings again. You’re in the same room as yesterday and still sore as fuck. The only real change is that there’s a chair in the middle of the room, well more like a throne (you may or may not role your eyes) and a man sitting on the throne. He’s wearing a venetian carnival mask, black with a white bat around each eye. Every gothamite knows it as Sire’s mask. 

You’ve been kidnapped by the fucking bats. Shit! 

“May I help you?” You ask politely as you can manage. Sire’s mask, cold and porcelain keeps smiling,golden even as the man takes off his fucking mask. You’re going to die, you’re going to fucking die. You look down so you can’t see his face. The man sighs.

“You can look up. I have no plans to kill you. Rather I’d like to thank you. You took care of my son while he wouldn’t allow me to.” Now you’re confused. You chance a look up and meet the eyes of bruce fucking wayne, gotham’s biggest  philanthropist. You don’t even know what to say, because the man who’s been credited for saving Gotham is the one keeping it in order as the cruelest man on the east coast.  “I don’t understand Mr.Wayne. I don’t know any of your children.” 

Bruce Wayne smiles faintly, “Not even Jason?” Every single person born and bred in Gotham knows the tragedy of Jason. It’s said that a mobster went after him and killed him, and in revenge Mr. Wayne swore to oust the mob from Gotham city. Knowing what  you know now makes you wonder what really happened. “No offense but I’m pretty sure that Jason is dead.” Wayne laughs bitterly. “We thought so but when your friend Lyre had to go to the hospital,, my doctors found something pretty interesting. A blood match. Would you like to guess who exactly is the match” everything starts to fade out and go dizzy. You were the one that made Lyre go to the hospital because he’s always hated hospitals. “Was it Jason?” 

“It was Jason.” Wayne unless his legs, neatly rearranging himself. “I’d like to tell you a story.” You shrug, looking away. “When my son was a child, he lived on the streets. One day I had a meeting in Crime alley and he was crazy enough to try and steal the tires off my car. You can’t help the laugh that bubbles out of you. It’s so much like the Lyre you know that you know, mischievous and carefully reckless, always doing something that he shouldn’t be. What was real? “And when I came back to my car, there was this tiny vicious little boy fighting my guards and fucking winning. I’ve always been fond of stubbornness and there was something about Jason’s desperate desire to survive that stuck me so I brought him home with me. He’s been a member of the family ever since.” 

When Wayne talks about Jason, you’re reminded of a Pet owner talking about their best show animal or something. He’s not talking about them like they’re humans but as if they’re prizes to be won. He sounds like a collector, marveling over his trophies. You can’t help but want to upset this man, can’t help but dislike him. 

“If he was a member of your family, why did he leave you?” Maybe he’ll hurt you, maybe he’ll kill you but either way you’re going to mouth off for lyre. Wayne’s expression doesn’t even change.  “I have six other children,” he explains, “and half of them have anger issues. Do you really think that you’re going to phase me?” 

Your logical mind reminds you to be polite, your desire to live tells you to go apeshit. “That doesn’t answer my question,” you snap, ignoring his question all together. He doesn’t even blink. “Jason left because he didn’t agree with our methods. He did not understand the reasons I allowed my youngest to work in the basement at twelve nor did he appreciate our love. “ You’ve heard the stories from Lyre about his family, about the scars he carries from their love. Now that you've met Wayne you can’t help but wonder how many of those scars are physical. There’s a scars on Lyre’s back, tally marks, five of them to be exact. Are those from here? Are his tattoos from here? 

“When do I get to see Lyre again?” 

Wayne smiles Serenely, and for a moment he doesn’t look like a monster, instead he looks soft, and almost genuine. “When Jason calms down enough to be safe to be around again.” You tilt your head, wonder what he means and carefully do not ask. “Am I stuck in here permanently?” Wayne shakes his head politely. “No you’ll be coming to dinner tonight and Alfred will help you order anything that you might need.” That’s not what you mean. You want to go home. “Can I go home?” “This is your home.” You scoff and bear teeth. “My home is a little apartment by the wharf, not a mansion full of crazy people.” 

Wayne’s smile turns sharp, vicious. “I’d like to remind you that your privileges hedge on your good behavior. It’d be very easy to lock you away until you’re feeling more polite.” You get the feeling that wayne isn’t making a threat. He’s making a promise. 

[two-white-butterflies]

peaches - am. targaryen

Description: Your father decided to marry you to the elusive, Aemond Targaryen. After a year of marriage, he still refuses to acknowledge your existence - that is until after Criston Cole becomes his son's teaching instructor. Cole isn't only interested in teaching your son. (MODERN AU) Rating: Mature 18+ (breast play, jealousy sex, desk sex, slight breeding kink, size kink, spit kink because it wouldn't be an aemond fic without it.)

There was nothing to love - no personality or show of appreciation. He kept to himself and expected you to do the same. "Aegon, please calm down." you mumble aware of Aemond's gaze from inside his office. "I wanna go swimming!" the child demands staring at the pool with his adorable purple eyes.

Aemond has shown no interest in helping you raise his son. He's there for parties and events - there when the child has a nightmare, but when it comes to Aegon's day-to-day activities - he's absent. You sigh. Aemond is a great father, but he's occupied with his work.

"We have to wait for the instructor, ñuha tresy." you smile, adjusting the skimpy swimsuit that you wore. It was revealing - it exaggerated the best parts of your body, while hiding the parts that you hated. Any husband wouldn't be able to keep his hands off you - but he was able to. Aemond has never touched you before - not even a strand of your hair. "Please, I won't go in the deep parts." he promised, jumping up and down with excitement.

A laugh escapes your lips, not trusting the little boy.

You lean down to his body - pushing a strand of his hair away from his face. "Have patience, little one." you answered firmly, prompting the boy to give you his best puppy eyes. You were about to allow him down the pool but someone clears their throat from behind you.

Criston Cole was staring at you - specifically your endowments. Your posture shifts as your body regains it's full height. He had that porno look in his eyes. The one that a man has before fucking a girl in a pornhub video. You didn't like it - you felt disgusted.

"Well, Mr. Cole will take care of you now." you walked to the side - gathering the robe on the daybed. You walk away from the pool - trusting the maids to supervise your step-son.

Completely unaware of Aemond's gaze.

He tried to focus on the mountains of paperwork on his desk - but he couldn't. His mind was elsewhere. He imagines you wearing that red swimsuit. The fucking swimsuit that you bought for him - the swimsuit that he should be the only one looking when you wore. He sees the way Criston Cole stares at you.

He places his pen down, opening his venetian blind slightly to watch his son learning to swim. You were standing there again - hovering over them with a blue-towel on your hands.

His son wasn't learning to swim - he was on top of a fucking floater while the instructor ogled at your breasts. His grip on his fountain pen tightens, spilling ink on his brand new pants.

He'll fucking gouge that man's eyes.

He reaches for his telephone, dialing his sister. "Helaena, are you there?" he pauses waiting for his sister's reply.

"Yeah?" she questioned.

"Can you escort Mr. Cole to his car? We won't be needing his services any longer." he commands, earning a snort from his older sister. "Is this because of his wandering eye?" she inquired, and he could hear the faint sound of someone slurping milkshake on the other line.

"If you have a problem with him staring at (your name)'s body, then you should fire all of your house-staff." she taunted, not telling the full truth - but also wanting to see how the situation would turn out. You were a pretty little thing - the eye-candy inside the Targaryen manor.

Everyone but Aemond seemed to be engrossed with you.

"What?" he interrogated, voice suddenly raising with anger. He could imagine all of his servants staring at you, watching you strut like a model on fashion-week.

"Fire Mr. Cole, right? I'm on it." she promised, ignoring his outburst and hanging up on him.

You were annoyed with everything.

Annoyed with Aegon singing his favorite nursery rhyme while underwater. Annoyed by your husband's lack of emotion and annoyed with Cole trying to talk to you.

Helaena comes to save you.

"Mr. Cole." she looks down with her sweet voice. "Yes?" he asked, pretending to hold little Aegon. "The maids have prepared your towels and the shower that you will be using. We do not need your lessons anymore." she announced and his face falls flat on the ground. "What? That's impossible - Aeg doesn't know how to swim yet." he defended but Helaena's thin-lipped smile proved that he wasn't doing shit.

"We can have that arranged, but as of the moment we have no need of you." the woman added, one of the maids held unto the boy while Criston emerged from the pool - mumbling strings of insults.

There were three rules before your marriage to him. One, don't do anything that would ruin his reputation. Two, remain loyal to him. And three, never go inside his rooms.

This was your first time stepping on the carpet that was outside his office door.

"Aemond." you call out.

The door opens automatically and you welcome yourself inside.

He doesn't stare at you - or even acknowledges your existence. He keeps on jotting down his notebook. "Did you have to fire Mr. Criston? I don't like him but Aegon adores him." you ask in a soft tone, careful to not offend him.

It was impossible to offend him - no matter how hard you tried, he always kept his cool.

"He's incompetent. There's no room for that in my household." he replies in a cold tone, continuing to sign a few bands of contracts. "I suppose," you look around the room - scanning around his decor. There were pictures of history around the walls - the beginning of industrialism and the decline of tradition.

He was a man of the arts - and you didn't know that.

You knew nothing about your husband. How fucking stupid.

" - and don't wear that swimsuit again." he added after a deep breath. Your eyebrows merged into each other. He wasn't going to tell you what you could and couldn't wear. "I beg your pardon?" you inquire.

He looks up from his paper - and unto you. The girl who was still wearing the said swimsuit.

"It's not appropriate." he asserted through gritted teeth. He couldn't understand why he was riled up at the thought of other man staring at you - and your round and perfect peaches. "What is appropriate to you? I cannot wear my pajamas around the pool." you responded in a brash manner, his eye widens at your show of rebellion.

"You can wear a bikini but not around men." he tried to reason, navigating himself around the labyrinth of his own reasoning. He didn't make sense. "Not around you, then?" you take a step forward, dominating over him in front of his desk.

He stands up, reaching for the collar of the bathrobe that you wore - he pulls your body closer, merging his lips with yours.

What is his is yours.

His money, his empire, even his son - but you were only his.

His to fuck. His to breed.

A moan escapes your mouth as you began climbing over the desk. Kneeling but you weren't able to reach his height. Your head only reached his eyebrows. "He was staring at you, huh?" he asked, slowly untangling the strings that held your top.

With a tug of a string, your breasts were revealed to him. Taut and bouncy, like he imagined them. His hands fondled your breasts, playing and teasing them. He lowers his head, sniffing your neck and placing a nipple inside of his mouth.

He was sucking you - like a newborn babe searching for milk.

"Aemond." you moaned, pulling his head closer.

His right hand trails down to your mound, teasing it through the cloth. "You are mine." he announced, pressing kisses on both of your breast - alternating between the two of them. "Yours." you replied, his hands untangling the string that held your bottom - letting it loose.

He frees himself from your grasp, reaching down to unbuckle his belt. He lowers his boxers - freeing his cock that stood tall and proud. Your eyes widened at his length - it was going to fit, but it was going to hurt.

You sit properly on his desk, legs wide open as you welcomed him. "Do it." you demanded earning an amused chuckle from the business magnate. He places a hand on your face - cupping your cheeks. He inserts a finger inside your mouth, allowing you to suck on it as his cock enters your hole.

It was pleasure - breath taking pleasure.

Your grip on his shoulder tightens, telling him to go deeper.

"Harder." you moaned.

He complies with your order, lifting your leg to reach the top of his elbows. "Fuck - shit." you cursed, entering a new realm of pleasure. There were stars in your eyes. You hold unto his shoulder, eyes gazing up to interlock with his.

His eye was beautiful.

It was a deep shade of lavender.

"Keep moaning and I'll cum." he threatened, pulling your body closer and rocking his desk. The paperwork was forgotten - all in favor of his beautiful girl. "Cum inside of me." you moaned again, feeling his length prod inside your cervix. "You want to give our son a sibling?" he chuckled darkly.

"Yes!" you moan. His cock was reaching places you didn't believe was possible.

You hear the desk rock loudly - like an earthquake. Your leg falls on his side, and he raises the other one over his shoulder - slightly tipping your body to be lying down. "Oh - Aemond!" you scream feeling otherworldly bliss.

His hands squeeze around your cheeks, staring at your face - mouth wide open with lust. "Who owns you?" he asks, squeezing it tightly. "You do!" you answer, and he smiles.

Rocking on a steady rhythm.

"Open your mouth, princess." he commands and you follow him, opening wider. He closes his mouth - gathering the spit on his tongue, releasing it on your mouth. "Swallow." he ordered and you obeyed him - the faint taste of whiskey lathering inside your mouth.

"I love you," you confess feeling a hot sensation in the bottom of your stomach. "I love you to, princess." he replies, merging your lips together as thick ropes of cum populate your ovaries.

[omegaversereloaded]

Youtube link for the music video version of the song from ElCexar, which is slightly different. I like the album version a little more :)

The Frozen Autumn is a darkwave/coldwave band from Italy and one of my favorite bands of all time! Their music is so moody and atmospheric and really get you into the goffik mindset. They're still active and you can support their newest release on their Bandcamp here! It's a really good album~

If this one's not for you, don't stop now – a lot of sounds fall under the goth umbrella and I'm trying to post different stuff every day. No repeats allowed~

If you like this song, I highly recommend these other songs by them, including one of my favorite songs ever:

one of the best songs ever ^^

[cricketfucker]

Will Wood Song Tournament!

Good morning ladies, gentlemen, boys, girls, neithers, boths, and in-betweens. We gather here to vote upon the best Will Wood songs of all time.

Below is our roster of 64 Will Wood / Will Wood and the Tapeworms songs, placed in a randomized order, my only rule being that none of the matches in the first & second round will be from the same album:

ROUND 1 - Voting Date & Time: January 31st, 2pm CST

Match 1: Becoming the Lastnames VS Self-

Match 2: Euthanasia VS Chemical Overreaction / Compound Fracture

Match 3: Welcome to Camp Here & There VS You Liked This (Okay, Computer!)

Match 4: Falling Up VS Cotard's Solution (Anatta, Dukkha, Anicca)

Match 5: Momento Mori: the most important thing in the world VS Sex, Drugs, Rock 'n' Roll

Match 6: Laplace's Angel (Hurt People? Hurt People!) VS Morning Announcements

Match 7: Mr. Capgras Encounters a Secondhand Vanity: Tulpamancer's Prosopagnosia/Pareidolia (As Direct Result of Trauma to the Fusiform Gyrus) VS Everything Is a Lot

Match 8: Evening Announcements VS Ferryman

Match 9: Love, Me Normally VS Good Morning, Campers!

Match 10: Afternoon Announcements VS Destroy to Enjoy

Match 11: Misanthrapologist VS Lysergide Daydream

Match 12: Hand Me My Shovel, I'm Going In! VS That's Enough, Let's Get You Home.

Match 13: Dr. Sunshine Is Dead VS Yes, to Err is Human, so Don't Be One.

Match 14: When Somebody Needs You VS Big Fat Bitchie’s Blueberry Pie, Christmas Tree, and Recreational Jell-o Emporium a.k.a. “Mr. Boy is on the Roof Again” (Feat. Pasta by Sneakers McSqueakers) [From “B.F.B.’s B-Sides: Bagel Batches, Marsh-Mallows, & Barsh-Mallows”]

Match 15: 2econd 2ight 2eer (that was fun, goodbye.) VS Your Body, My Temple

Match 16: Cover This Song (A Little Bit Mine) VS The Main Character

ROUND 2 - Voting Date & Time: February 1st, 2pm CST

Match 1: Red Moon VS I / Me / Myself

Match 2: Cicada Days VS Outliars and Hyppocrates: a fun fact about apples

Match 3: BlackBoxWarrior - OKULTRA VS Half-Decade Hangover

Match 4: Front Street VS Vampire Reference in a Minor Key

Match 5: Tomcat Disposables VS Thermodynamic Lawyer Esq, G.F.D.

Match 6: White Knuckle Jerk (Where Do You Get Off?) VS ...well, better than the alternative

Match 7: Marsha, Thankk You for the Dialectics, but I Need You to Leave VS Alma Mater

Match 8: Um, It's Kind of a Lot VS Under a Monochromatic Sky

Match 9: ...And If I Did, You Deserved It. VS Against the Kitchen Floor

Match 10: -ish VS Venetian Blind Man

Match 11: Under a Technicolor Sky VS 2012

Match 12: 6up 5oh Copout (Pro / Con) VS The Song with Five Names, a.k.a. Soapbox Tao, a.k.a. Checkmate Atheists! a.k.a. Neospace Government, a.k.a. You Can Never Know

Match 13: Jimmy Mushroom's Last Drink: Bedtime in Wayne, NJ VS White Noise

Match 14: Willard! VS ¡Aikido! (Neurotic / Erotic)

Match 15: The Rhumba of Death VS The First Step

Match 16: Skeleton Appreciation Day in Vestal, NY (Bones) VS Suburbia Overture / Greetings from Mary Bell Township! / (Vampire) Culture / Love Me, Normally

ROUND 3 - Voting Date & Time: February 2nd, 2pm CST

Match 1: Becoming the Lastnames VS Chemical Overreaction / Compound Fracture

Match 2: Welcome to Camp Here & There VS Cotard's Solution (Anatta, Dukkha, Anicca)

Match 3: Momento Mori: the most important thing in the world VS Laplace's Angel (Hurt People? Hurt People!)

Match 4: Mr. Capgras Encounters a Secondhand Vanity: Tulpamancer's Prosopagnosia/Pareidolia (As Direct Result of Trauma to the Fusiform Gyrus) VS Ferryman

Match 5: Love, Me Normally VS Destroy to Enjoy

Match 6: Misanthrapologist VS Hand Me My Shovel, I'm Going In!

Match 7: Dr. Sunshine is Dead VS When Somebody Needs You

Match 8: 2econd 2ight 2eer (that was fun, goodbye.) VS The Main Character

ROUND 4 - Voting Date & Time: February 3rd, 2pm CST

Match 1: I / Me / Myself VS Cicada Days

Match 2: BlackBoxWarrior - OKULTRA VS Front Street

Match 3: Tomcat Disposables VS Thermodynamic Lawyer Esq, G.F.D. VS ...well, better than the alternative

Match 4: Marsha, Thankk You for the Dialectics, but I Need You to Leave VS Um, It's Kind of a Lot

Match 5: Against the Kitchen Floor VS Venetian Blind Man

Match 6: 2012 VS The Song with Five Names, a.k.a. Soapbox Tao, a.k.a. Checkmate Atheists! a.k.a. Neospace Government, a.k.a. You Can Never Know

Match 7: White Noise VS Willard!

Match 8: The First Step VS Suburbia Overture / Greetings from Mary Bell Township! / (Vampire) Culture / Love Me, Normally

ROUND 5 - Voting Date & Time: February 5th, 2pm CST

Match 1: Chemical Overreaction / Compound Fracture VS Cotard's Solution (Anatta, Dukkha, Anicca)

Match 2: Laplace's Angel (Hurt People? Hurt People!) VS Mr. Capgras Encounters a Secondhand Vanity: Tulpamancer's Prosopagnosia/Pareidolia (As Direct Result of Trauma to the Fusiform Gyrus)

Match 3: Love, Me Normally VS Hand Me My Shovel, I'm Going In!

Match 4: Dr. Sunshine is Dead VS 2econd 2ight 2eer (that was fun, goodbye.)

Match 5: Cicada Days VS BlackBoxWarrior - OKULTRA

Match 6: ...well, better than the alternative VS Marsha, Thankk You for the Dialectics, but I Need You to Leave

Match 7: Against the Kitchen Floor VS The Song with Five Names, a.k.a. Soapbox Tao, a.k.a. Checkmate Atheists! a.k.a. Neospace Government, a.k.a. You Can Never Know

Match 8: Willard! VS Suburbia Overture / Greetings from Mary Bell Township! / (Vampire) Culture / Love Me, Normally

ROUND 6 - Voting Date & Time: February 7th, 2pm CST

Match 1: Cotard's Solution (Anatta, Dukkha, Anicca) VS Laplace's Angel (Hurt People? Hurt People!)

Match 2: Love, Me Normally VS 2econd 2ight 2eer (that was fun, goodbye.)

Match 3: BlackBoxWarrior - OKULTRA VS Marsha, Thankk You for the Dialectics, but I Need You to Leave

Match 4: Against the Kitchen Floor VS Suburbia Overture / Greetings from Mary Bell Township! / (Vampire) Culture / Love Me, Normally

ROUND 7 - Voting Time & Date: February 8th, 4pm CST

Match 1: Laplace's Angel (Hurt People? Hurt People!) VS Love, Me Normally

Match 2: Marsha, Thankk You for the Dialectics, but I Need You to Leave VS Suburbia Overture / Greetings from Mary Bell Township! / (Vampire) Culture / Love Me, Normally

ROUND 8 - Voting Time & Date: February 9th, 5pm CST

Final Match: Love, Me Normally VS Suburbia Overture / Greetings from Mary Bell Township! / (Vampire) Culture / Love Me, Normally

WINNER!

Suburbia Overture / Greetings from Mary Bell Township! / (Vampire) Culture / Love Me, Normally

[klaineccfanficlibrary]

Good ones with Santana and/or Finn Friendship?

Here are some recommendations. ~Jen

Also try our Santana tag. Here are some recent fics with Santana featuring:

Fire Island Follies by @bitbybitwrites

From a Tumblr Friday Ficlet prompt from bowtiesandboatshoes : "We're going to Fire Island.  It's like gay Disney World."

~~~~~

Running Interference by @RockItMan

Kurt and Blaine don't want to get set up on a blind date. But when their friends get involved, what they want doesn't really matter.

~~~~~

Cause and Effect by @heartsmadeofbooks

Sometimes heartbreak and betrayal can lead you down a road you never imagined, can make you do things you never thought you'd do, and can take you straight to the love of your life... even though you're already married to someone else. Here's how Kurt and Blaine find each other, a little later than they should have.

~~~~~

And some older fics:

Drunk on You by flaming_muse

It takes Kurt three times to fit his key in the lock of the apartment’s door, partly because Blaine is swaying heavily against his side, a warm, drunk weight keeping him off-balance, and partly because the alcohol in his own system is making the lock swim just enough in the plane of the door that he can’t quite catch it.

~~~~~

Bushwick Game Night by flaming_muse

Pictionary in the Bushwick loft is serious business.

~~~~~

One fine day by botaboxed

Kurt witnessed many moments in his life as a bridal designer – he moment a bride found her dress, saw herself in it for the first time, the one where she could see herself standing up in front of her family and friends and saying 'I do.' Working as he did in that industry, he hardly expected to have a moment of his own while he was at work, but that was exactly what happened.

~~~~~

Alliance verse by rainjoyswriting

A glee fic based on the fact that a united!Kurt and Santana could take on the world.

Summary: "Kurt," she yells again. "I need some of your homo-wisdom, okay?"

~~~~~

Until Further Notice verse by lostinfictionalworlds

Money can't buy happiness. Businessman Kurt is still trying to figure that one out, and performer Blaine thought he knew what he wanted, until he came across a Personal Assistant Ad. A story of acceptance and love, from one's self and that of others, more specifically, one other.

~~~~~

The Seduction by @hkvoyage

Venetian Blaine arrives at Carnival’s masquerade ball, looking for his next conquest. His reputation as a lover is legendary, and no one can resist him. Virgin Kurt captures his attention, but seducing him will require careful planning. As they spend time together, will Blaine be able to carry out his plan successfully? A historical Klaine AU set in 18th-century Venice.

~~~~~~~~~~~

Our Finn tag

Not Exclusive by nellie12

Finn happens to be doing well for himself in the University of Florida. He is starting QB for the Gators, and he’s a member of Phi Beta Kappa, and his grades aren’t terrible. He also has his favorite step-brother coming to visit from New York, and Kurt has no idea he’s about to have the Spring Break of a lifetime until he meets Finn’s best friend and frat mate- Blaine Anderson.

~~~~~ Not another ghost story by @sunshineoptimismandangels

When Kurt Hummel began an online ghost investigation show with his best friend and his step-brother he never expected to find himself alone in an abandoned and reportedly haunted hotel, but one stormy night Kurt finds more than he ever expected in the derelict and chilling Whispering Wolf Hotel. In fact, Kurt may have found exactly what he’s has been looking for. A story of romance, comedy, and sinister plots.

~~~~~

Island Adventure by doeswhatever

“That guy has been following us around the city for the past hour. I'm sort of freaking out.”

“He’s our tour guide you moron”

~~~~~

Best Summer Ever verse by tonks42

AU Klaine. During the summer between his junior and senior years, Kurt returns to camp as a Junior Counselor. His plans for having his best summer ever change when Kurt becomes a friend and mentor to a hurting new guy, Blaine.

~~~~~

There from the start By @blurglesmurfklaine

What if Blaine had been the 12th member of the New Directions instead of Matt? (bc lbr he had like two lines the whole season and had zero storylines) Set in Season One canon, same(ish?) storyline, but with Blaine and Klaine. Not too sure what I’ll change yet ;) Football Player!Blaine

[soggytapeworm]

Round 1 - 26th Battle

REMEMBER: VOTE FOR THE SONG YOU THINK IS THE WORST, NOT THE BEST! WHICHEVER SONG HAS MORE VOTES IS GOING TO BE COUNTED AS THE WORST. so like consider that.

last battle of this round‼️‼️

Venetian Blind Man

“No, not like this, any but this breakdown”

Yes, To Err Is Human, So Don’t Be One

“Drain you of your love until you hate me”

[jamisonwritestf2trash]

TF2 Mercs and The Will Wood Songs I Think Fit Best.

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What can I say, I'm a huge Will Wood fan lmao

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Also, slight warnings most of these are sad. One are two aren't, but a lot of the reasons why these songs resonate with the Mercs will be sad.

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Demo- Half A Decade Hangover and The First Step. I genuinely think this man hates being an alcoholic. He loves it when he can be fun and have a good time, but he hates the fact that he depends on it so hard.

Engie- Um, It's Kind Of A Lot. Okay, so this ties back into one of my first headcanons, I think. So I genuinely think the reason Engie is so close with Pyro and the other Mercs is because this man didn't have a family that really cared for him. Like not abusive but just not present. He. Is. Scared. Of. Love. He's scared the people he cares about will be taken from him. He's scared that he cares too much and that he'll never feel that in return.

Heavy- (When I tell you I struggled on this one) Venetian Blind Man. Okay, I'm not going to lie. This one is more of the style and music than the lyrics. I just think it fits, I really can't explain it.

Medic- Your Body, My Temple, and Yes to Err is Human, So Don't Be One. I think Your Body, My Temple fits him well because this man literally loves the human anatomy. He views the body as a temple, but not in the way like gym bros and fitness bloggers do. No, like this man thinks the human body is something to worship (nonsexual). Also, a lot of connections to people, which is shown in the song and i also think the religious aspect just fits some how. Yes to Err is Human, So Don't Be One is definitely a song that for me captures a sense of eerieness and almost inhumanity in a person, not saying that Medic isn't human or doesn't have humanity but I definitely think he has moments where he forgets about that. He always catches himself, tho. EDIT- JevTheJester let me know that BlackBoxWarrior - OKULTRA also fits Medic, and I agree. I think the upbeat tempo is a great fit, and it fits insanely well! ( The longest description goes to my wife, of course 😮‍💨)

Scout- Tomcat Disposables and Love, Me Normally. Oh boy. Tomcat Disposables just fits him so well. Like I think this man loves his family and home so much and just wants to provide that for a future family. I think he's also just really scared of dying (again)? Because I definitely think on the outside, he's all like cocky and chill about it but on the inside he's so fucking scared. Another mix of being confident and cool on the outside while also being really scared on the inside, but this time it's about getting close to people! Abandonment issues and all that wacky stuff. Give this man a hug pls.

Sniper- Becoming Lastnames. Let's be real. This man has family trauma. He loves his mom to death, but I definitely think his dad was distant, and when he was present, he was very strict and cold. He definitely wants a family he can be a good father/husband to, but he also knows that's probably not possible.

Spy- Cicada Days and I/Me/Myself. Commitment issues and genderfluid? He's just like me fr. (Jokes) I think Cicada Days can represent the times he's actually felt love, but he got scared and left. Specifically with Scout and his mom. I/Me/Myself, I don't think this man knows how he feels about his gender identity and hates it. Like def has internalized a lot of shit, being queer being one of the major ones. (all people who can change appearances at will in media are genderfluid come at me).

Soldier- (I struggled with this one too, ngl.). Morning Announcements. I think it just matches him and upbeat vibe with no really idea behind it.

Pyro- 2econd 2ight 2eer and Memento Mori: the most important thing in the world. This dude definitely has high energy, and I can picture them singing 2econd 2ight 2eer and like really getting into it (if they could actually be understood). Okay, a thought. I can vividly imagine Pyro (if they could be understood). Singing this song with Medic. Both of them actually like the concept of death.

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Ugh, that was a lot. I'm sorry 😭 I really like Will Wood, as I am mentally ill. Thanks again to all of you who make me actually want to post things I think you guys will like <3

[chnt-confessions]

i love will wood but HOW DID THEY GET HIM ON THE PODCAST??? i mean regardless the songs he made for it are GENUINELY THE BEST amd ughghjg (but if im honsst i dont really listen to venetian blind man much) OH ALSO INCLUDING THE TRANSITION MUSIC TOO evening announcments is seriously amazing and just all of it

I'M PRETTY SURE M&B TALKED ABOUT IT ON A STREAM 😊

[whump-me]

Obscure: Chapter 2

Chapter 2 of Obscure, novel-length interrogation whump about a rebel leader who can erase memories with a thought, an interrogator who can see inside his subjects’ minds… and the connection they share that neither of them suspects.

Masterpost | the Mind Games universe | Read the completed novel on Patreon

---

Kirill

Kirill and Camille woke slowly together, crawling toward consciousness inch by cozy inch. They tugged each other unwillingly upward toward the lazy Saturday morning waiting for them. Kirill surfaced from dreams of fire. He gratefully emerged into the softness of her vanilla-scented hair against his nose and the arm she had draped possessively over his chest in her sleep.

Soft cotton sheets draped over the two of them like a lighter caress. They smelled like fresh laundry. Kirill eased his eyes open a little at a time. The first thing he saw was Camille’s expanse of long blond hair. Then, beyond her, the ferns he had brought a few weeks ago.

The ferns hadn’t died yet. Sunlight lay across their leaves in stripes formed by the Venetian blinds. The fronds drifted back and forth in the breeze from the air-conditioning vent. Like Kirill and Camille, they looked in no hurry to move fast on this long, lazy morning.

Camille opened her eyes with a groan that was half happiness, half reluctance. She blinked up at him and smiled. “I never knew your apartment was so comfortable,” she said, her voice thick with a half-asleep haze. The warm notes thrummed in his bones, threatening to send him drifting off again.

He smiled at her and tapped the tip of her nose. “It’s not like this is the first time you’ve seen it.”

“No, but it’s the first time I’ve stayed over,” she said. “And I wasn’t really paying attention last night.” She gave him a teasing grin. Then the grin turned into a soft smile of pure pleasure. She flopped off him, onto her back, and moved her arms up and down like she was making snow angels. “It’s so… soft,” she said, with the tone in her voice that people normally reserved for a beautiful sunset or a sublime bowl of ice cream.

“What can I say?” he said, making a couple of snow angels of his own. “I like soft and comfortable.” And for now, that was true, because that was what Camille liked, and he liked Camille. Loved her, even—if love was the word for discovering someone whose company could fill the hole inside you for a few blissful months.

The silky sheets were as new as the ferns. The ferns had come after he had visited Camille’s apartment and seen the explosion of greenery she kept there. He had asked her what kind of plant she liked best. She had said ferns.

It wasn’t manipulation. Not in anything but the most benign sense. He wasn’t trying to get anything more from her than she already wanted to give. Someday, maybe six or twelve months from now, they would be done with each other, with no hard feelings on either end. Kirill had long years of practice at keeping his breakups amicable. And when that day came, the soft sheets and the ferns would find their way to the trash bin outside.

But while she was here, he would give her what she liked. Because what he liked, more than any sheets or plants or long lazy mornings, was making her happy.

Her, or whoever took her place once she was gone.

“I’m going to make a pot of coffee,” he said, swinging his legs over the side of the bed.

“No, don’t leave,” she said in a playful groan, grabbing his wrist.

He tensed without meaning to. The hand around his wrist felt like a cuff holding him down to a hospital bed. Back before they had known they could trust him. Back before he had shown them they could take him at his word.

Back when they hadn’t known what effect their injections would have on him—and how dangerous he might be once the drugs did their work.

But that had been a long time ago. He had no need of old memories. Not his own, at least. And Camille’s skin was soft as her finger traced the vein on the underside of his wrist. It was nothing like the cold metal of his memory.

He forced himself to take a deep breath. Camille, mistaking it for a sigh, answered with one of her own.

“Go,” she said with theatrical resignation, loosening her grip. “Someone has to take one for the team and leave this slice of heaven so we can both have coffee. I’m just glad it doesn’t have to be me.” She screeched to the middle of the bed and lay back with an angelic smile. She closed her eyes. “Wake me when the coffee is ready.”

He stood and looked down at her with a soft smile and basked in the glow of being exactly what she needed.

He unplugged his phone, slipped it into his pocket, and padded toward the kitchen on bare feet. In the hallway, to his left, was a blank spot on the wall where his running medals had hung. His last girlfriend, Amanda, had been into races. She liked the exertion, and she liked the competition. They had run a race together almost every weekend.

Back then, he had genuinely enjoyed rising at the crack of dawn to sweat his way through the morning. It had made Amanda happy, and that was what had made him happy. Now, with the lazy weekend glow of Camille settling over the apartment like a pleasant scent in the air, the thought of all that running sounded impossibly exhausting.

His phone rang as he stepped into the kitchen. It was the ring that meant work—not the soothing buzz he had assigned to Camille, but a shrill sound that cut through the air like a freshly sharpened blade. A little of his weekend haze drifted away. He frowned as he pulled the phone from his pocket.

“Kirill Catallo,” he said. He said nothing else. He knew better than to complain about it being a weekend. PERI called him whenever they needed him.

“We have a job for you.” The voice on the other end didn’t bother with pleasantries. Sandhya Ramachandra, his assigned handler, never did. Not since Kirill had shown up in PERI headquarters almost thirty years ago in shoes with holes in the bottoms and pants that didn’t reach his ankles.

He poured water into the coffee machine by rote. “Where am I going this time?” It wouldn’t be hard to explain the sudden trip to Camille. He always told his girlfriends he had some job or other that involved large amounts of travel, to cover situations like this. Camille thought he was a sales rep for a pharmaceutical company. But he wasn’t ready to end his lazy weekend just yet.

“No travel,” said Ramachandra. “This one is at headquarters. Convenient for you.”

He frowned, even though Ramachandra was right about the convenience. He lived near headquarters because he needed to go in for his mandated checkups every three months, and because PERI didn’t want to let him too far out of their sight. But he stepped inside headquarters every four months, as required, and that was it.

He never accepted jobs at headquarters. They knew that. They had stopped asking.

He knew what a job at headquarters meant.

“No,” he said as the last of the lazy weekend haze burned off. “We’ve talked about this.”

“I know. But we need you.” Ramachandra’s voice was devoid of sympathy.

“You need me to get information from terrorists trained to resist interrogation, and to find where any but the most emotionless serial killers have buried their bodies. You have people for PERI business. People who aren’t me.”

“For this,” said Ramachandra, “we need you. And this is important enough that you can’t play the waste-of-your-talents card. This prisoner has been poaching talent from PERI for fifteen years. He has an entire network set up to change the identities of candidates and relocate them. We need that network located and shut down. We need you.”

“I don’t work with Enhanced prisoners.”

“Why not?” Ramachandra’s voice remained perfectly even, but Kirill read the challenge there. “You can’t say it’s beneath you this time. So what is it really about?”

Kirill understood the question underneath the question. Ramachandra had never outright accused him of having residual loyalties to his fellow Enhanced, but the insinuation was there every time he refused another headquarters job.

“I’m not trying to protect this person,” Kirill said, in a voice every bit as cold as Ramachandra had trained him to be. “You know better than that.”

“Then get in here,” Ramachandra said, and hung up.

Kirill shoved his phone back into his pocket.

His shoes were wet. Water ran in wide rivulets off the counter and onto the floor. He had filled the coffeemaker with twice as much water as he needed to make a pot of coffee. He was still filling it.

He stopped pouring. He blinked down at the puddle on the floor.

Then he softened his shoulders and his jaw. The lazy weekend smile returned effortlessly to his face as he walked back toward the bedroom to make his excuses to Camille. With any luck, she wouldn’t ask about the wet footprints.

---

Tagged: @cakeinthevoid @suspicious-whumping-egg

Ask to be added or removed from taglist.

[some-pers0n]

Hello im. Sorry to bother you but I see you on my dash as "the will wood person"(well also the tf2 person and the wof person but that doesn't pertain to this) and was thinking about listening to his stuff but idk where to start do you got any recommendations?

Yippee!! I managed to be so Demented about William Woodard that it made me the "Will Wood person" to somebody :))) That's so silly

Okay, so recommendations. It's...really quite difficult to recommend stuff from Will because a lot of his music is quite varied and it kinda just depends on what music you've already listened to. If you've gone down the Jack Stauber, Tally Hall, or Lemon Demon path, chances are you're going to be somewhat on board with his music.

Will Wood is an experimental music artist who never exactly sticks to one sound. He said he doesn't quite like it. Self-Ish, his second album, he considers a concept album due to the fact that it's mostly grungy and rough vocals with frantic and wild instrumentals all with lyrics spouting stuff relating to a singular theme. However, if you ask me there are some things about him that stick out as being "Will Wood".

Piano. A lot of his songs have piano. In some places, what other songs would have as a guitar riff, is a piano bit. Piano (along with the baritone ukulele and also occasionally glockenspiel) is his main instrument.

Jazzy instruments. Saxophones, trumpets, all that. In his latest main album, In Case I Make It, Will forgos that sort of jazzy tunes a lot in favour of more calm and folk songs, but they still linger.

Tons and tons of lyrics. Will's lyricism is one of the main draws of his music to me. He often writes about his own experiences with his mental health and struggles in his songs. Themes of mental illness, being loved despite being human, and generally just being a person trying to get through this messy, cold world.

Yeah that's about goes for the constants.

Okay, so, depending on your music taste, I don't know how to quite recommend stuff. His newer album, In Case I Make It, is a lot more folksy and softer than his previous work. It still has that Will Wood flare, but just with less loud screaming matches between Will and an alto sax. His earliest albums (Everything is a Lot and Self-Ish) are more edgy and dark with those grungy and gravely vocals. The Normal Album is a middle ground.

I personally believe the best way to experience Will Wood is to listen to the albums, but for individual songs? Here's some ordered from softer to more intense.

Skeleton Appreciation Day (Bones), Everything is a Lot

When Somebody Needs You [Song], Camp Here & There

That's Enough, Let's Get You Home., In Case I Make It

White Noise, In Case I Make It

Venetian Blind Man, Camp Here & There

...well, better than the alternative, The Normal Album

Falling Up, In Case I Make It

Against the Kitchen Floor, In Case I Make It

The Main Character, In Case I Make It

Memento Mori, The Normal Album

Laplace's Angel (Hurt People? Hurt People!), The Normal Album

I/Me/Myself, The Normal Album

Marsha, Thankk You for the Dialects, but I Need You To Leave, The Normal Album

BlackBoxWarrior - OKULTRA, The Normal Album

Suburbia Overture, The Normal Album

The Song With Five Names, Self-Ish

Mr. Capgras, Self-Ish

6up 5oh Cop-Out (Pro/Con), Everything is a Lot

Dr. Sunshine is Dead, Self-Ish

Hand Me My Shovel, I'm Going In!, Self-Ish

Aaannnddd if we're giving song recommendations, I also highly, HIGHLY recommend checking out his live stuff. Not just his live albums (those are fantastic though), but live performances recorded of him. They range from in-studio and professionally done recordings to somebody with a phone. I love them.

Here are some performances I recommended for one reason or another.

The entire BBQ show, as it shows off Will's character a lot as well as being fairly charming and fun (also good music)

Marsha Live in the Studio

Mr. Capgras (this one's I think something he did with patreon people)

Mr. Capgras/White Knuckle Jerk (WFMU radio)

Yeah that's about everything off the top of my head. See ya.

[revunant]

THE BUILDING THAT HOUSES AZARI'S LITTLE OFFICE is under new management. Management by a different kind of person, who sees nothing but unnecessity and unprofessionalism in frivolous things (in a medical setting, no less!). The room smells like paint, the shelves are empty, the floor is bare. Even the curtains are Venetian blinds now. Cold and white. Jean can’t speak for the entirety of her clientele, but he knows it brings peace to at least one among them. 

“You say you’ve had a breakthrough?”

Breakthrough seems like too grand a word; let alone that a breakthrough isn’t something he should be able to have for himself. Pieter had breakthroughs. Teddy speaks of his hope for them. Azari hopes for them too, he's sure.

Jean looks into his lap and begins to curl his fingers between the tendons of his right wrist. It’s the third time this session that Azari has had to reach over the coffee table to press a stress toy into his grip - a small ball covered in firm spikes, designed for him to cup into the palm of his hand and squeeze, to chase the same sensations with less risk of doing damage. Compliant, he does just that, but he can’t help but cling to the sharper, slightly more feverish sensation of the welts streaking his arm. 

Shameful. Stop that.

“...My son found an old gear a few weeks ago."

It's a slow start, as he tries to assure Azari without words that he's not trying to change the subject. "I put it in my wallet. I never ended up taking it out, and now, by accident, it comes everywhere with me.” He reaches into his pocket to drive the point home, pulling the ‘treasure’ out of the slot where cash should be, laying it on the coffee table - brass, gleaming, but scratched and gouged and eroded by age and duress. “I’ve taken to using it as a bottle opener, or to pry things apart. It works well. And it doesn’t complain when I use it for those things.”

Azari has been very good at entertaining him, his spiels, his thought processes, the warped, twisting ways in which he’s so very wrong about the world, about other people, about himself. But this makes even Azari raise her eyebrow, egging him to continue without having to use the words - a silent, trepidatious go on.

“It's being used for something it wasn't made for. Maybe it was better at what it was made for, but it does just fine now. And it…” There’s a frustrated pause, in which he wrestles with how best to get his point across. This point that he’s been turning over in his mind all damn week, pacing around it in circles like an animal maddened by hunger - because he tends to need to practice his logic to stand a chance of it being understood, and it brings with it a kind of manic desperation. Sometimes it’s like he has to translate every thought he has into a language he doesn't speak. “It doesn’t ask me why I don’t treat it like any of its owners before me. It doesn’t ask me why it’s not still part of a machine. It certainly won’t punish itself for its inadequacy. The only one who can do that is me.”

He shudders at the absolute wrongness of comparing himself to something absolutely above him, even in a scenario as abstract as this one.

“One day it’ll probably run its course. Be worn too thin in the places it’s useful, and not be useful anymore. I’ll probably throw it out. It won’t care. If it could think, it would probably wonder what it could have done better, and thank me for a time well-served. It won’t anguish over not having been good enough, and it won’t bargain for another chance.”

Azari, still quiet, giving him ample space to drive his point home, watches as he picks the gear up and slots it back into his wallet, and in turn slots his wallet back into his jacket’s lining.

Suddenly Jean is aware that he’s spoken for too long, made stark by their usual arrangement being the exact opposite; Azari asks him questions, and then usually asks him clarifying questions, and then re-phrases her questions in a way that doesn’t make him feel threatened, and then tells him what he needs to do. The only reason he’s stuck this therapy thing out for so long, other than probation hanging a threat of imprisonment over his head like a piano on a rope, is that he’s been mostly successful in re-framing it as such;

a new set of orders, a new way of following them.

It’s led him here. Even the harmless spike-ball in his fist is being gripped so tightly that he can feel the points beginning to bruise into the flesh of his palm, leaving a bone-deep ache that’ll still be there tomorrow.

“...I’ve been unfair.” He sounds so much less sure of himself now, no longer reciting something rehearsed. Vulnerability, even in small amounts, has been such a novel kind of terrifying; not just a nakedness, but a woundedness, a vivisection, carved open and peeled apart and just begging for parts of him to be ripped away by the handful. “To Teddy. In expecting him to be this…amalgamation of everyone who’s ever-”

well-practiced, well-trained, he skips over the word owned, and then the word handled, conversation as a minefield. conversation as a dance,

“-had me before him.”

Recognition passes over Azari’s features like a cloud revealing the sun. “It’s not uncommon to expect, or even crave, mistreatment from non-abusive partners after having been mistreated for so long. I’m not surprised that-”

She’s interrupted not by Jean talking over her - he tries to keep that to a minimum - but by him shaking his head and frowning as though in some kind of pain. “It’s not about mistreatment." I thought you knew. I've told you this. "Nobody’s mistreated me, there was no- It was about purpose. It is about purpose. But it’s clicked. The gear can't just be put back in a machine. I couldn’t do the job I did before, either. But I’m doing this one now, so I need to be good at it. Instead of trying to be good at the old one.”

Azari bundles away the urge to re-assert that he’s not an object, and therein is where this analogy begins to unravel, in favour of pursuing another, less futile, thread. “What is the job you’re doing now?”

It’s not a difficult question, but it’s difficult to gauge which answer to give. Jean is all filter. When he says things that are poorly received, it’s because his concept of right and wrong and good and bad and harmful and benign are so warped that no amount of wrangling with consequences and contingencies could have predicted the poor reception. Every cruelty laid into him had, until the moment he’d divulged them, seemed so normal, so innocuous - and now, only ever met with disgust, with outrage. It’s okay. He’s a quick learner when it counts, and one by one, he learns the things that need to be kept un-divulged. 

The only thing is- Azari is an outlier. Jean can tell when she disapproves of the things he says, when she thinks he’s wrong, or mistaken, or being dishonest; but there’s never disgust, never outrage. She may think of him the way the world outside this office thinks of him, but she certainly expresses it differently. 

She listens. The lack of reprobation cuts just as sharply with her as it does with anyone else - always, always, this heavy throbbing pain in his chest, waiting for bad news that these days never seems to come - but at least she can always muster the courage to look him in the eye, and at least she so rarely hurts on his behalf. He can’t trust her with everything, far from it, but there’s an inkling, there, that she knows what he is, and how he must be handled.

“Whatever’s wanted of me,” he says simply. “I just don’t always know what that is.”

“Your husband loves you.” She’s looking down at her notes, but Jean can tell from the stillness of her eyes that she’s not reading anything. “What’s wanted of you is for you to be happy and healthy, and for you to treat yourself less like a machine, and more like a human being.”

They’ve been over this. They’ve been over this.

But Jean grows weary of trying to correct what has been left so blatantly crooked. Maybe if he keeps righting it, it'll stick in place eventually - but while Pieter instilled in him the resilience, the endurance, the determination to do just about anything over and over and over forever until it works or the sun itself goes cold and dark (whichever comes first), Jean can’t bear to be looked at like some small, broken, weeping thing any longer. It’s always felt wrong. But it’s rasped at his skin for too long, and the bleeding is heavy, and the bones are exposed, and every time someone does it, it feels a little bit like they’re actually, earnestly trying to kill him.

“So I’ve been told.”

Azari sighs. She tries not to sigh at her clients, but sometimes it’s just so hard. 

“You, in your head - you’re the gear.” Long has she been aware that in his winding analogies, he’s always an it - a thing, not a human, never even an animal. His husband, when comparing him to things, has always at least done him the service of imagining him as something living. “You’ve been repurposed for something new. And like the gear, you’ve accepted it, because you think you’re incapable of complaining, or protesting.”

Solemn, he shakes his head. “That’s the problem. I’ve been protesting this whole time.”

Of course- she’s seen it herself- his heels being dug in, while his frayed, sparse support system tries to wrench things from his grip that have only ever caused him unfathomable harm, only sometimes succeeding, but always leaving claw marks behind. Like a dog having poison pried from its jaws, heedless to the fact that it is poison. And she only sees him for an hour a week.

“He asks things of me, sometimes, and I have to decline, because it conflicts with something someone else asked of me, years ago. And this was what always made sense to me. But his orders-” Azari’s eyes practically flash at him from over the coffee table, urging him to course-correct- “-his wishes are more important, because they’re now. I should be pleasing him. Not someone who's been dead for fifteen years.”

There’s a tricky precipice. Azari is at war with what to tell him, as she often is when he stumbles upon the right conclusion for all the wrong reasons. It’s not this that’s the issue; it’s the real risk of him shying away from the revelation if he’s asked to rework his approach to it. If she had known she’d be this stumped, this often, she’d have tried to shrug his case onto someone else’s shoulders.

Not that she’d abandon him now that she knows him, and his family. Jean winds up to try something new.

“Have you ever had something that belongs in the kitchen just end up in the shed one day? A knife, maybe. It’s got oil and paint and all kinds of stuff on it now, and it’s rusty, so you can’t possibly put it back where it came from. It’s not good enough for that anymore. But maybe you’re the kind of person who doesn’t just want to throw things away, so you put it in an empty plant pot and only ever use it when you need to pry something open.”

He is the knife in this one, too - Azari sees the pattern before it's even conceived. She’s not quiet by choice now, and she keeps her eyes stubbornly on her notebook, knowing how much Jean squirms under a sympathetic gaze.

“Maybe you tell yourself you’ll clean it up and sharpen it and put it back in the kitchen where it belongs.” He’s trailing again, fettered by that fear of being opened up, torn away in handfuls, by fingers less kind than hers. “But it’s never going to happen. It’s easier to get a new one.”

When the silence stretches long enough that Azari’s sure there’s nothing else he wants to say, she leans forward and places her hand palm-up on the table between them, offering contact without expressly asking for it, the only way she’s found Jean’s able to refuse something unwanted. He refuses it now, as he often does, but she still dares speak, despite the ache in her throat. 

“And would you rather be thrown away?”

A pause. She’s almost scared he’s sensed it for a moment, sharp and perceptive and crushingly vigilant as he can be - the pity wringing her dry. It's how he'd see it, but it's not pity. Unbeknownst to Jean, unimaginably to Jean, she doesn’t see him as small or broken or a thing, but as another person in need of help. She’s doing her best to offer it, as is her job, but a little bit beyond that, too. She goes a little bit beyond for everyone who needs it.

“I used to.” The spike ball has been abandoned, his forearm the target of his tension once more. “And if it happens, I’ll let it. But I think what my family needs from me is to stay in the plant pot and occasionally be used to pry something open. That I embrace the purpose I have now, even if it’s not what I was meant for. What I was supposed to be wouldn’t punish itself for that. I won’t, either.”

It’s not music to Azari’s ears. Far from it; an unsteady, discordant heaving and screeching, a whole orchestra tuning their instruments at once. But it’s something, and god help her, something often feels like everything with this one. She withdraws her hand. Together, they reflect, wrap up, and say goodbye.

What goes unsaid is what endures; the unrelenting expectation of that punishment coming from elsewhere. Of that punishment being, unshakeably, the right thing to do. Of her, of his husband, of everyone who has touched his life, being morally wretched in their choice not to strike him down for taking things unowed to him, doing things unowed to him, parading as something, anything, other than a knife in a hand or in a drawer or in an empty plant pot. 

They can, must, see it as clearly as he can. They choose to do nothing about it. As is their right.

But the onus to act on it can be his no longer; perhaps never was his. His punishment is to be carried out by those who command him. He is not to receive what he deserves at his own hand. Perhaps the self-flagellation, marks scored into his back as punishment in the absence of all else, had always been an order misinterpreted, and perhaps he’ll see justice for that too. Perhaps the real punishment was the lack thereof, leaving the knowledge of having done wrong to fester. 

Still festering, all the worse for the unrelenting softness of the hands that now hold his. 

[mymovingfingerwrites]

A Father at His Son’s Baptism

Cutlet carved from our larger carcasses: thus were you made — from a spit and a hug. The scratchy stuff you’re lying on is wool. You recognize the pressure of your mother’s hand. That white moon with a bluish cast is a priest’s face, frowning over a water bowl. Whatever befalls you now, you’ve been blessed, in a most picturesque and ineffective ceremony dating from the Middle Ages. Outdoors, the church lawn radiates a lethal green. A gas truck thunders down the street. Why, at emotional moments, do the placid trees and landscape look overexposed, almost ready to bleach away, and reveal the workings of “the Real” machine underneath? All bundled up on such a hot day: whose whelp, pray tell, or mutton chop are you? — tail-less, your cloudy gaze a vague accusation, not of the sins of my history, but ignorance to come, future cruelty. You’re getting red in the face, blotchy, ready to wail. Good. From now on protest and remember everything. Your cries assail even the indigent dead, buried in charity plots right outside, slowly releasing their heat, while you, born out of the blue into a wheezing spring, watch a chaotic mosaic assemble itself. You tune up. My love for you is half-adrenaline, half gibberish. More Latin and the priest splatters you. He’s got one good eye, and a black patch, like a pirate. Now, smiling as if he knows something I don’t, he hands you to me. If I drop you, loudmouth, will you bounce or fly? You were chalky and bloody at first, in the doctor’s grip, looking skinned and inside-out. Boyhood, a dangling carrot. I stare at you and experience the embarrassment of riches. I need to loosen my tie or I’ll faint. Outside a rake scrapes, sprinklers hiss. It might be best to set you down in one of these squares of light on the floor, striped by venetian blinds, and leave you safe in that bright cage. I could go have coffee, and come back when we can carry on a conversation. Men and women are afraid of each other. It’s true. Whisper and drool of my flesh, I’m terrified of you.

— Amy Gerstler, from Bitter Angel, Carnegie Mellon University Press, 1990

[dummygothicc]

imagine you're crowley and you've just pulled off the biggest theological stunt with your best friend and suddenly he turns and looks at you and smiles and his face breaks into creases like sunlight refracting through venetian blinds and you realise that the only thread of consistency in your millennia is this fat bumbling angel with his plates of sushi and silly old books, and you love him more than heaven loves order and hell loves chaos, you have loved him and you will love him, always, always

[altrbody]

The Hole (Notes): William Pope.L's Hole Theory

by Thom Donovan

In William Pope.L’s book, Hole Theory, the artist writes:

What I mean by having Something is the fantasy That having is possessing [and]* That possessing is knowing

Therefore this sort of theorizing/[deodorizing] Could only come from someone Who believes in having things As a political condition

Conversely, this theory Could only come from someone Who lacks something As a political condition

Hole Theory engages lack Across economic and cultural And political boundaries [Lack is where it’s AT]

1. Between having

and not having things as a fantasy of possession, Pope.L cleaves lack as a cultural, political, and economic condition (of possibility). Theory (seeing, knowing) becomes founded on lack; theorization risks “deodorization”–desensitization and senselessness.

2. For Pope.L,

how could one work otherwise as an African-American artist working out of the multiculturalism of the 80s? Via abjection (for instance, uses of waste materials, perishables, excrement in some cases) and ironic performance (crawling Manhattan sidewalks in a Superman costume, ‘wearing’ a 5 ft. long PVC pipe from his groin while strolling around Harlem) Pope.L attacks any easy affirmation of (African-American) identity.

3. One could

say that he “deconstructs“ it; perhaps it is better to say that he is drawing on negative characterization in ways that draw-out both white-centric mis/understandings and fears of Blackness, as well as Black fears of being understood (for fear of re/possession?).

4. Pope.L also

draws upon the association of African-American Blackness with homelessness, drug addiction, and insanity (the fate of many of the artist’s family members).

5. Perhaps, a

la Fred Moten’s brilliant book In the Break, it could be said of Pope.L that he is drawing upon a radical Black aesthetic of “combativeness,” where to antagonize (or in Adrian Piper’s term “cataylze”) engages lack, negativity, and antimony as the starting point for theorization.

6. Central to

the production of Blackness (as Moten also points out), is that which is irreducible to African-American history alone, though particularized by African diasporic cultures (is Blackness not then the condition of all struggle, insurrection, contestation in lieu of domination, persecution, genocide? The singular case substituting for the universal?).

7. That aesthetic

expression makes visible contradiction—being opposed, being against—lacking belonging, lacking home or a being ‘at home’ from which overcoming or transcendence might be accomplished.

8.

Hole Theory affirms what Tyrone Williams in his poem “I Am Not Proud to be Black” calls “sublime despair,” and what Theodor Adorno idealizes as a “methexis of the tenebrous” (the catastrophe of thought/theorization that potentializes art for the utopian—abandoned futures, futures not imagined or unimaginable).

9. When Adorno

writes in his table of contents to Aesthetic Theory the heading “Black as Ideal,” I want to take Black both as hue and in terms of a social condition which embraces shadiness to produce the catastrophe of thinking which art should affirm in order for it to overturn the order of the current world/to affirm other worlds.

10. The idealization

of Black affirms one’s participation in the shady, the opaque, absurd, incomprehensible. Through it this world flickers with an other/other ones.

11. Cross-outs of

language under erasure—holding in suspension both language’s necessity and inadequacy—become more like venetian blinds, or the aperture of a camera rapidly opening and closing, albeit soundlessly (senseless in the best possible sense).

*The above quotation

is taken from a facsimile of Pope.L’s book, Hole Theory, reproduced in William Pope. L: the Friendliest Black Artist in America (MIT Press, 2002). Brackets indicate language that has been hand-written into and at times over the type-set text.