#But waugh I am so bad at... speaking to people............

[emile-hides]

Do I want to try reaching out to new people and try RPing again, or is it just 3:30 in the morning

[sodrippy]

*shows up in your inbox covered in sweat and tears* okay so i finished wci

hi!! it's op anon, how are you? how have you been? did you have fun on your vacation?

so ik this is on me for knowing the whole plot before reading it + taking big breaks between reading + having a migraine for half of it BUT i feel like it was just okay. idk, what do you think?

like i feel like the parts with sanji wayy outweighed the rest of it. but i mean i am biased so... although i will say i liked bege and chiffon a lot more than i thought i would. they're probably my favorite side characters along with carrot, pekoms and pedro. who were some of your favorites?

speaking of - zou was so good!! love sanjis cunty little blue fur jacket, but more than that i liked the lore parts about wano! and the minks <3 (also am i just yaoi brained or are duke dogstorm and cat viper supposed to be another zoro/sanji parallel like dorry and broggy were?) and the heart pirates! they're such cuties

okay now the sanji parts: OUGH WAUGH AHHHH

he really is all heart isn't he 🥺 that first fight with judge in the present where he's like talking to himself like "he treated you worse than anyone but you still can't go all out on him?" ough. god.

and i LOVED reiju putting him in his place about trying to blame himself for their mom's death. (and i mean i know he had to save them because that's who he is) but he still has yet to learn that lesson of respecting women's agency

speaking of! zeff's parenting... sanji really walked out of one prison of masculinity into another huh? 😬🚬

but little sanji... i knew what happened but actually seeing it... you'll find people who are good to you! and then he did!!! 🥺

and i like that we see a return of his east blue coping style of like.. feeling stuck so just rolling over and accepting whatever comes. but like you cannot just let life happen to you. you have to act! you have to ask for help! not making a choice is choice itself! (i am having a totally normal reaction to this btw 👍)

also sanji getting luffy after he defeats katakuri and going i knew you could do it! waugh.. they really love and trust each other completely T.T not to mention their talk in the rain! :c to be loved is to be known and to know you can rely on someone :cc

i think that's all i had to say about sanji, other than that jinbe was so cool!! i love that dude so much

and pedro </3 i can't believe he actually died, i'm worried about pekoms too, i hope he's alright at least :(

also i kind of think the big mom pirates should just commit regicide and rule as siblings that would kind of slay. they seem to actually care for each other ( at least more than their mother does), thoughts?

aaaand i do not usually think this ( i am a zosan and sanuso enjoyer only) but that scene where pudding tells a captured nami and luffy that she's gonna kill sanji did make me think for like FIVE seconds: east blue polycule real?? now i've shaken that off but i just had to get it off my chest

ummm i think that's it? i hope you're having a wonderful day and i look forward to hearing your thoughts!! <3

HIII!

im good, thanks, yes my holiday was incredible! i hope youve been well too 💖

no im totally with you on this, but i also watched it in a kind of backwards bad way. the parts w sanji and his backstory + interactions w his family and pudding were soooooo good oh my god. but the rest of it was....i just didnt care fhdsjn like uh huh ok cool whatever WHERES SANJI...

i really liked chiffon too! and bege gets a pass bc i always think a Wife Guy is so sweet. like oh god he loves his family...wow... i think pedro was probably one of my fave new/side characters from the arc, as well as katakuri. im also not immune to a like, 'villain' w strong morals/code of honor, plus his character design just fucks. can i be so real, i knew about pudding from the start but even so i was like 'damn, if pudding wasnt Like That i could get on board w her and sanji being together..' and like honestly, the bit at the wedding where she shows her third eye and sanjis like 'wow youre beautiful' i was like yeah they could make this work i think fdhcjxn

sanjis outfits>>>>> i actually dont even really remember the lore drops bc ive watched back a lot of those episodes as Research so its all confused in my memory, but the guys ALL being so into meeting a real ninja was so fucking funny. like when even law and zoro have requests of him...ok losers. and yeah its always funny when they introduce a new 'i hate you but actually youre my bestie forever' duo. also just zoro being soooo cranky all throughout zou was insanely funny. why did they have him say all that.

OH I LOVED THE HEART PIRATES YEAH. law being such a closed off guy and his crew all being SOOO affectionate n missing him so much and stuff 😭😭😭 it was so sweet theyre so cute

RAAAAAAAA SANJI......literally there is no better description of sanji than all heart. hes so everything foreverrrr. the deep conflict he has between like, knowing that how they treated him was abhorrent and he doesnt owe them anything with still not being able to let go and not care what happens to them was so ough. like yeah you are fundamentally different to them, you continue to defy what judge wanted to make you w your every choice huh 😭 i could talk about this for hours fr

actually kind of funny to think that, well...judge isnt the one who made sanji chauvinistic, it was zeff......

LITERALLY not making a choice IS a choice!! you get it! sanjis martyr complex makes me insaaaaane-insane fr

every luffy and sanji thing in this arc was so good like oh my god they love each other. completely. entirely. they would die for each other. and luffys TOTAL trust in sanji...sobwail

omg yeah i was so shocked about pedro like. no way theyd actually have him die?? bro...but he was so steadfast and amazing, and his sacrifice was done so well, i really loved his character so much!

i agree! esp by the end in the big fights you see like, oh, no they actually kind of do just love their family in a really genuine way, i found that really sweet honestly. they should def kill big mom i hate her so bad.

mwah, i hope your day and weekend are great! 💞💞💞

[sarasa-cat]

Writing meme: 7, 10, 11 (Even the Littlest Monsters), 12 (V)

7. what books have shaped the way you think about writing the most? why?

Ooooh. Tricky. For Monsters, it is actually more difficult to pinpoint than if just in general (although even in general is lolololol hard to nail down).

In the past, a lot of my old fanfic (FFXII, DA:O and DA2 especially) were written as long-format writing exercises that were PURPOSEFULLY exploring and reacting to specific authors' styles. One FFXII WIP that I never finished was very much a cross-over with Evelyn Waugh's Brideshead Revisited. A set of interconnected FFXII WIP was a mashup of a few different authors' collection of works (poetry and prose fiction). Ondaatje. McEwan, Prouxl, Sa... and probably a few others. A DAO story that I started by never finished was a purposeful 1:1 replacement that erased all of the Joss-esque writing from DG's Alistair and replaced it with the voice of a Murakami-esque disaffected(tm) male protagonist.

Monsters, on the other hand, is really just a big patchwork of my own memories superimposed onto the crazypants that is FFVII canon cross pollinated with historical research and current events. So much of it is (very subtly) influenced by a million little real life memories tucked away in nearly forgotten corners of my brain that just come to light when my brain makes a sudden connection between some interesting little gap in FFVII's canon/characterizations and something it reminds me of that does far more than merely fill in the gap. For instance, Lucrecia is literally a composite of a half dozen real-life people. Same for Vincent.

But is Monsters influenced by ANYTHING that I have read since 2017??? Hard to say. I had a lot of trouble figuring out what to do with Yuffie (as a late teen and slightly older) and ended up reading a lot of really good, excellently-voiced fanfic for ideas.

I am sure that various fiction from the past has influenced my writing since 2017 and is subtly coloring the feel of Monsters but, to be honest, I cannot think of a single book that has had any real influence on it. Go figure?

10. which patterns keep popping up in your projects/characters?

Complexity, complex interpersonal relationships, complex motivations, lots of waffling due to the character feeling torn between choices, bad decisions, regrets, not knowing how to handle those regrets, shitty situations, etc.: complexity. This is really the summary of Monsters. Bad decisions, rash "decisions," bad assumptions, bad at life, impulsive characters vs fence sitters. Professional, interpersonal, and relationship trainwrecks galore.

That pattern comes up a lot in my prior fiction: just putting that magnifying glass up close while slloooowwwwwing down time to dwell on the moments that surround epic stupidity and all of the cringe/pain/discomfort/oh-god-no/wtf???!/why?/facepalm that it brings. Or, you know, people just being people. Painfully. ;)

Another pattern in Monsters that has popped up before is how The Big Faceless Machine of Societal Power grinds you down. Even though FFVII is a fantastic world that sort of mirrors our modern world except for it being far too fantastical, Monsters is all about the faceless machine of the corporate-academic-military complex so, thematically, it is actually very modern and real world: the neoliberalization of academia, the military takeover of STEM research. etc etc. And this really just echoes the same sort of themes Bring Ground To Bits by The Big Faceless Machine that drove some of my FFXII and DA fic but re-cast in a more fantasy-world light.

Much like an FFXII-postcanon epic (that I have put on hold forever), one portion -- perhaps the main story, idk? -- of Monsters can be viewed as the five stages of grief, so to speak, that a character goes through after that character REALIZES how they have been ground into dust by the Big Faceless Machine.

11. give three songs or images that fit [Monsters].

Three? Ahahaha. Whereas I couldn't think of a single book that inspires or shapes my thinking for Monsters, I have an entire SOUNDTRACK that has inspired so many key scenes in Monsters. Lol. This happened because I thought about Monsters while doing other things (work-related in the arts, but without a keyboard at hand) while listening to music for ideas. Music became my prompts and my memory device for scenes. I could re-listen to the same song over many different days and re-envision the scene in my head (like a movie) but with more and more detail each time. I literally spent most afternoons just raiding streaming services for EVERYTHING that was big in the late 1960s through the 1970s, and then big again in the 1990s, and just waited for ideas to strike.

For instance:

Blondie, Dreaming -- a set of scenes during graduate school in which Lucrecia was trying to start an affair with Grimoire, HER PHD ADVISOR who is also Vincent's father.

Bowie, Aladdin Sane -- the song LITERALLY appears in the scene, while Vincent is living in the Shinra Mansion (as a project and facilities manager/security person) where Lucrecia, Hojo, and others are working on their top secret science-disaster. He is drunk, angry, and playing the piano part of this song on the canonical piano in that building, and has an epic run in with Hojo before and after all of this. ;)

The Beatles, the second side of the album Abbey Road -- Vincent's experiences when first signing on as a Shinra employee.

...and the list goes on and on and on. ;)

12. give three songs or images that fit [V- presumably CP2077?!].

No songs as of yet. But images? Hm! A quick-image search for a proto-moodboard --- here's five!

[protecticarus]

Prompt: let’s reach for the ultimate cliche. Todd takes a bullet for Dirk. Not fatal, but dangerous enough that for a while Dirk is fairly certain he’ll die, and it’s his ‘fault’.

some clichés don’t get old!

~

Dirk could barely register the series of events taking place.The horrid man refused to cooperate. He refused to listen. All Dirk and Todd wanted was his help, but he was too far gone.The man raised a gun and pointed it at Dirk.��You are why this shit went down in the first place.” He said.“No… I, well, yes, but listen-“ Dirk stuttered.“Shut up!” The man screamed. “Just shut up!”“Dirk… What do we do?” Todd whispered.“I… am at a loss.” Dirk whispered back. “I can’t reason with him.”“Shit… Goddamn it.” Todd whispered.The man took a step closer to Dirk and Todd. Dirk stiffened and Todd breathed out in fear. They had dealt with many dangerous situations but most of them included crazy supernatural circumstances and evil bad guys. However, an unstable, scared man with a weapon was less common.“You can’t be here.” The man said, staring at Dirk. “You have to go.”“Alright, we will leave you alone, just-““No. You have to go.” The man said and before Dirk could say or do anything, he heard a gun go off.Dirk felt like he was seeing everything in slow-motion. The man looked desperate. Tears streamed from his eyes and down his face as his shaky hand pointed the gun. He jerked back a little from the power of the bullet flying towards Dirk.As the bullet began its travel towards its target, Todd took action. He shoved Dirk as hard as he could from his close proximity, but it was enough to throw Dirk off balance. Dirk dropped onto the ground in shock.Todd now stood where Dirk previously had, just in time for the bullet to reach its new target.Suddenly everything was happening in high-speed.

Todd whined in agony. Dirk cried out and crawled where Todd was suddenly laying on the ground.“Todd!” He cried.Dirk looked for the man with the gun, only to see him shakily running away from them, seemingly upset about having actually shot a person.“Fuck that hurts. Getting shot really fucking hurts.” Todd coughed.“Why would you do this, Todd!” Dirk sobbed desperately and removed his scarf to press it against the bullet wound on Todd’s abdomen.“Love you too.” Todd groaned in response.Dirk let out a sob. “Why…”“It would’ve-“ Todd’s sentence was interrupted by violent coughing, “killed you.” He finished eventually.“It may very well kill you!” Dirk screamed.Todd was about to reply, but Dirk interrupted him.“Don’t speak! Focus on staying still and staying awake.” Dirk said and fished out his phone from his pocket and dialed 911.

And so followed the most exhausting and terrifying 8 hours of Dirk’s life.

He forced himself to be brave enough to call Amanda, praying that she wouldn’t hate him. He also called Farah, who rushed to the hospital to be by his side.The next hours were filled with silent tears and Dirk’s mind scratching itself raw.‘Your fault’ was all he could think.“Dirk.” Farah tried to get his attention.Dirk’s face was wet with tears and his ears were ringing. Nothing felt real.“Dirk!” Farah raised her voice.Dirk looked up to see her gesturing towards the hallway. Dirk shifted his gaze to see Todd’s surgeon walk into the waiting area.Dirk practically flew to stand and walk towards the doctor.“How is he?” Dirk asked. He felt Farah walk next to him.“Mr…?” The doctor questioned.“Gently.” Dirk replied impatiently. “How is Todd?”“Mr. Gently, your friend’s surgery was successful. We removed the bullet and were able to stop the bleeding. The bullet did little damage to any vital organs. The most alarming was the loss of blood, but we got transfusions going in time. We will need to keep him here for a few days to look for any complications, but he seems to be doing well so far.” The doctor explained.Dirk let out a breath of relief he hadn’t realized he was holding.“Thank you. Thank you so much, Doctor Waugh.” Dirk sobbed.The doctor placed a hand on Dirk’s shoulder and smiled. “Your friend should be fine.” She added.“Can I see him?” Dirk asked.“He should be moved into his room by now. Visiting hours are over at 9.” She replied.“Thank you.” Dirk smiled.“Any more questions?” The doctor asked.“No, thank you Doctor Waugh.” Dirk said and the doctor gave him a nod and turned to walk away.“Let’s go.” Dirk said to Farah and turned to basically sprint towards Todd’s room.“You go. I’ll update Amanda.” Farah yelled after him.When Dirk got to Todd’s room, his breath got caught in his throat. Todd looked… So different. He looked pale and somehow… Small. Well, smaller.Dirk sat on the seat next to Todd’s bed and looked at his friend. His eyes filled with tears once again.“I’m so sorry, Todd. I’m so sorry.” Dirk whispered. “I never wanted this to happen. I cause pain to everyone around me, but I was really hoping I could spare you. I’m so sorry, Todd… I love you. I’m sorry.” His last apology got swallowed by his cries.Dirk let his head rest on Todd’s bed as he cried. After a while, unconsciousness finally found him.

When Dirk woke, he found Todd looking at him with a smile on his face.“Todd!” Dirk screamed and threw his arms around Todd’s neck.Todd groaned. Right. Bullet wound. Shit.“Shit! Sorry!” Dirk exclaimed and sat back in his seat.“It’s okay, Dirk.” Todd laughed as soon as he got his breath back.“No, Todd, it’s not okay. You got shot!” Dirk exclaimed.“Yeah, I know, I was there.” Todd mumbled.“Why on earth would you do that! Never, ever do that again!” Dirk’s voice got even louder and higher.“I saved your life?” Todd replied, confused.“I don’t care! I mean, yes, thank you, but my life is not worth yours!” Dirk screamed.“I’m not dead, Dirk. I’m gonna be fine.” Todd reassured him.“But you could’ve died!” Dirk replied angrily.“Yeah, well, I didn’t, so-““God, Todd, stop pretending like it’s not a big deal!” Dirk screamed.“Well, it seems like the universe didn’t want me dead just yet.” Todd joked.“Fuck the universe!” Dirk yelled.Todd looked stunned. He blinked a few times and then took a deep breath.“Dirk. I’m okay.” Todd said.“But you could’ve easily not been.” Dirk whispered. “I’m surprised you are okay.”“Why?” Todd asked.“Because! I always get people hurt! And you… I can’t lose you, Todd. I simply can’t. So do not do anything like that again. Ever.” Dirk said.“Oh Dirk…” Todd sighed and took Dirk’s hand into his. “I made that decision by myself. You had nothing to do with it.”“That bullet was meant for me!” Dirk exclaimed.“Yeah, I know. But I chose to…”“Take a bullet for me!” Dirk exclaimed in anger.“Yeah, that. That was my decision. It’s not on you. And I really am fine, Dirk.” Todd explained.A silence filled the hospital room for a minute. Then Dirk stood up.“Maybe you should quit.” Dirk said.“What?” Todd asked.“Quit. Being my assistant. Quit.” Dirk explained.“What? No. Why? No!” Todd exclaimed.“I can’t have you hurt. I can’t.” Dirk said.“Dirk, no, you didn’t do this, I did. I’m not going anywhere!” Todd protested.“It would be better-““I don’t give a shit, Dirk! I’m not quitting. Period.” Todd growled.Dirk sighed in defeat. “I can’t lose you.”“You won’t.” Todd replied.“Don’t ever do that again.” Dirk demanded.“I’ll try.”“No. Just don’t do it.”Todd laughed. “Then don’t get a gun pointed at you.”“I didn’t mean to! I never mean to!” Dirk groaned.“I know.” Todd laughed.“So just… don’t risk your life for me.” Dirk said.“So just don’t make me love you so much.” Todd shot back.“I don’t know how that happened either…” Dirk muttered. “So, how do I do that?”“You can’t.” Todd shrugged.Dirk sighed. “You’re impossible.”“Only way to put up with you.” Came Todd’s reply.

~

if you have any ideas for fics, send me prompts! I’d be happy to write them. my inbox is open! xx

[faersflower]

Nice argument. Except for the fact that you fundamentally misunderstand Eliot and the split attraction model.

The split attraction model is meant for Ace and Aro identifying people. Not for people like Eliot who is both a sexual and a romantic person.

[Edit: I am not saying it is only for them. Just that that model was made for/by acespec and arospec people, and in this context specifically really just proves to be more homophobic and transphobic than people intend.

Like seriously when people say "Eliot is bi." It almost always reads as homophobic. Like really? Just because he enjoys Margo's company physically in a very obviously non-romantic way, both of them say it, he can't be gay? Sounds homophobic to me.

The whole "p*ssy" line of arguement will never cease to piss me off because it is INSANELY transphobic. PLUS who is to say that Eliot wasn't outright denying p*ssy in the sense that he is saying "but I'm not transphobic about it!"]

Sure he was "fine" having sex with women in that he put up with it for the sake of his friends when he was forced into a marriage with a woman. And that Margo would sometimes join him AND OTHER MEN in threesomes. And the other time we see him enjoying sex he is with a man in his consciousness and Fen in his technical reality.

So I greatly dislike the way that a bunch of people in the fandom interpret the Thai Food Line so let me just transcribe the entire conversation for you and also tell you how Eliot says the line and then we can just get that out of the way.

Margo: You're not leaving me in a castle full of barbarian frat bros.

Eliot: [scoffs, probably because he so often gets left alone in Fillory because he is Literally Stuck There while Margo is not. Margo can leave, even if Eliot is upset.] Okay, fine, but while we're talking about them, you could've been a little diplomatic.

Margo: By agreeing to marry a complete stranger on the spot?

Eliot (honestly? He sounds a little distressed and definitely exasperated here): I did it!

Margo (she drops her voice, understanding): That was different.

Eliot: [scoffs] You're right, this would only really be equivalent if Ess was a girl, and you found p*ssy, you know, interesting in a sometimes-you-like-Thai-food kinda way, and now its all Thai food forever till you die.

"Till you die" is said angrily by the way. Like almost in that holding your teeth gritted while you talk kind of way. Eliot is Not Happy about this. Its pretty plain to see that? Eliot is upset this entire scene but from the mention of marriage onward he is Clearly Upset.

Also I cannot speak for bisexuals here but I question my identity at times yeah, but because my preference is heavily skewed I feel uncomfortable trying to fit bisexual onto me. 

Eliot sounds nearly disgusted at the thought. He actively avoided having sex with Fen earlier in season 2. The only reason he did was because he was also having sex with a man and focusing on that. All of these things add up, and sound like the opposite of what I would want to hear if Eliot were a bisexual person. But exactly what I would assume a gay man would say.

[Edit: like honestly the way that Eliot treats Fen in their marriage simply proves that he is a gay man. Margo *says it* in a deleted scene in season 1. I just ⁠—

Like if you call Eliot bisexual it paints him as a bad bi person. Like he is so up front about disliking women romantically and sexually. How in the fuck are you all missing this????]

Anyway.

Eliot Waugh is a gay man.

If anyone even questioned my opinion on the discourse.

[jarpadandjensenaremyheroes]

Safe Place

@queen-of-deans-booty requested “Can you do a DeanxReader where Dean gets turned into a toddler and he always goes to the reader since he feels safe with her and she takes care of him until he’s back to normal and then after, he confesses his feelings?”

A/n- I had waaaay too much fun writing this! This is all unbeta’d and written mostly at 12-3 am, so any and all mistakes are mine. I hope y’all get a couple good laughs out of this!

Edit: I fixed the "Keep Reading" option. Again, I'm so sorry this monster was clogging up your dashes!

Word count: 4,366 (sorry not sorry)

Warnings: Swearing, typical Supernatural violence, witches putting spells on people, toddler!Dean (Yes, that is a warning), Sammy is kind of an asshole in the beginning. So is Dean. But just for a hot minute.

As soon as Sam found this hunt, you had a pit in your stomach. You knew something was off from the moment he started explaining it in the Impala. People were turning up dead in their homes, with no sign of forced entry. They were all young adults, 18-25, and Sam thought it may have been a shtriga.

“But it’s not feeding on kids, Sam,” you argued.

“Yeah but it’s a college town. Not a whole lot of kids around, Y/N. 18 is still really young. We need to take a look around and check it out.”

“I’m telling you guys, this screams ‘witch’ to me… Why can you never believe me?”

Sam turned around to look at you with his bitch face. “Because the last time you insisted it was something else, we went in prepared for a werewolf and almost got our hearts ripped out by a damn ghost!”

“That was two fucking years ago, Sam. I’m real tired of you holding that over my head! Even Dean thought that was a werewolf! You-”

Then Dean lost it. “Alright, that’s enough! I’m sick of the two of you at each other’s throats all the god damn time. Sam, you work the angle you want, Y/N and I will work the other. Then we’ll pool our findings and find the solution. Now knock it off!”

Sam rolled his eyes with an aggravated sigh and turned to face the window to pout. You leaned forward to give Dean a peck on the cheek. “Thanks, De.”

“Look here princess, I’m not taking sides. I’m just shutting this shit down. If it is a shtriga, Sam is safe by himself in the day. If it is a witch, you would not be safe by yourself during the daytime. That’s why I’m going with you. I want you safe. So keep your head out of the clouds, alright?”

You shrank back into your seat at his harsh tone. You had been harboring a crush on Dean for a long time now, but every advance you made in the past had been futile. You were convinced he would never care for you the way you did him, and you pushed your feelings aside to continue hunting. But every now and then, they would peek through the lock box you had them in and it always put you in a sour mood.

The rest of the car ride was silent. Dean found a motel and you booked a room for the three of you. You all got settled in and changed into your fed suits before heading out. The most recent vic’s house was only a few blocks away, so Sam announced that he wanted to do a little more research before he headed that direction and would call you when he found anything. You and Dean got back in the Impala and drove across town to go visit the few other crime scenes. You were still brooding, so you stayed quiet on the way there.

What you don’t know is what Dean is brooding about. He hates it when you’re like this, and he hates knowing that he’s the one who made you that way. But pushing you away is easier and better than trying to tell you how he really feels. There’s no way you could feel the same for him, so holding you at arm’s length is better than not holding you at all. You’re his safe place. The person he can let his guard down in front of. The one he can curl into and cry on at night when he has nightmares or after a bad hunt. You hold him together in more ways than one, and he honestly doesn’t know if he would survive without you. So he keeps his feelings in check, just like you do.

As you moved to get out of the car, Dean grabbed your hand.

“Y/N wait. I’m sorry I snapped at you earlier. I didn’t mean to. I was just angry that Sam talked to you that way. I lost my cool, and I’m sorry I took it out on you. Forgive me? Please?”

You sighed and squeezed his hand with yours. “Of course. Always, Dean. You know that.” You gave him a small smile.

He smiled back and let out a sigh of relief. “Good. You’re my best friend, Y/N, and I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you.”

His words made your heart pang with sadness, but you didn’t let it show. Of course he only thinks of you as a friend. How could he see you as anything more? You’re practically his sister! “I’m not going anywhere Winchester.”

With that, you pulled your hand away and stepped out of the Impala and walked up the short sidewalk to the front porch. Stepping under the police tape, you noticed a brick that was loose near the threshold of the front door. “Hey Dean! Come look at this!” As you stooped lower to get a better look at it, you noticed an insignia etched into the front face. Dean looked over your shoulder and watched as you pulled out your pocket knife to pull the brick out. As it fell, half a dozen roaches scattered up the wall and you jumped back shrieking, almost knocking Dean over in the process. You immediately started scratching your scalp, feeling like they were crawling all over you.

Dean rushed over to you and grabbed your shoulders to wrap you in a hug. “You’re alright, I got you. They’re not on you I promise. It’s okay.”

“God damn fucking demon bugs! I hate fucking roaches!”

“I know you do princess. It’s alright. They’re gone. You want me to check the hole while you hang back?”

You nodded your head and Dean moved back to look in the small hole.

“Well would you look at that! You were right Y/N. It’s a friggin’ witch!” he exclaimed as he pulled a small hex bag out.

You felt your face almost split in a grin as you jumped up with a fist pump. “YES! I knew it was a witch! Suck it Samuel!”

Dean just laughed. “Alright Judd Nelson, take it easy. We still gotta go check out the inside.”

Dean opened the front door of the house and it let out a loud creak, making both of you cringe.

“Well, if there is anything in here, they know we’re here now,” you whispered to him.

You both had your guns drawn, loaded with witch killing bullets, as you moved through the house one room at a time. Dean opened a door in the kitchen that led to a basement. He groaned.

“Why is it always a basement? Why can’t it be a nice garden with flowers and rose bushes? But nooo. It’s always gotta be a damn basement!” he whined.

“Can you handle that by yourself? I’m gonna go check out the upstairs.”

He looked at you warily before you rolled your eyes. “I’m a big girl, Dean. I can handle myself.”

“Alright. But you see anything, you shoot first, ask questions later! Got it princess?”

“Yes Dad. I think I can handle one little witch.”

He started down the stairs as you made your way to the second set of stairs leading up. You cleared each of the 3 bedrooms and their closets before you made it to the bathroom. As you opened the door a figure flew past you, knocking you over in the process.

“HEY!” You cocked your gun. “Freeze, bitch.”

The witch stopped in her tracks and turned around with a wicked grin on her face. “You can kill me if you want, but it won’t save your little boyfriend down there. My sister is waiting on him right now. We knew who you were before you even walked in the door, Y/N.” She sneered your name, and it sent shivers down your spine. “You and those Winchester boys are as good as dead. So go ahead, shoot me if you want, but it won’t stop-”

BANG.

The witch dropped dead and you took off running down the stairs and into the basement, where you found an unconscious Dean with another witch standing over him dropping a fluorescent green powder on his body. You didn’t hesitate to drop that one too. As the bitch hit the ground, there was a blinding light coming from Dean’s body.

“Dean!” you cried out to him as you shielded your eyes. As soon as it dissipated, you turned to run to him but stopped short in your tracks. Where Dean had just been lying, there was now a toddler sitting in his spot staring at you.

“Dean?” you hesitantly asked.

“I hate fweakin’ witches Y/N. Fix dis! I can’t even speak wight! I can’t wet Sammy see me wike dis! Pwease Y/N, don’t wet him see me.” The little boy cried as he wrapped his arms around your legs.

You stooped down to pick him, trying to contain your laughter. “Honey it’ll be okay. We’re going to need his help changing you back though. You know I’m no good with this magic stuff. If you make me do it myself, I could turn you into a toad for all we know!”

Dean’s eyes went wide at that statement. “Awight fine. But he better not waugh at me! I’m gonna kick his sowwy ass if he does!”

You couldn’t hold back your laughter any longer. “Oh Dean, I’m sorry! I just can’t help it! You’re so tiny and adorable and your little toddler speak is just so god damn funny!” He glared at you as you wiped at the tears streaming down your face.

“Are you done yet? Can we go find Sammy now, pweeeeease?”

With one more small outburst of laughter, you nodded your head. You went to grab the keys to the Impala off the basement floor when your phone started ringing. You grinned when you saw Sam’s name pop up on the caller ID.

“Heya Sammy. So, is it a shtriga?”

“No. I didn’t see any rotten handprints outside the windows. You still think this is a witch?”

“Oh yeah. Two witches, actually. But don’t worry, I took them both out. It was pretty easy actually. You ready to say sorry?”

“Oh shut it. Where is Dean? Put him on the phone.”

Dean vehemently shook his head. “He’s…ahh…not able to talk right now Sam.”

Sam groaned. “He got hit, didn’t he?”

You giggled. “Yeah, he did. But it’s really not that bad!”

“Ugh. Just get back to the motel so we can pack up and get back to the bunker. I’ll fix…whatever is wrong with him when we get there. Why is it always his dumbass that gets hit with the spells? He gets so whiny and childish when it happens.”

You chuckled again. “Oh Sammy, you have no idea. We’ll see you soon.”

You hung up on Sam and wrapped Dean in your arms once more, carrying him out to the Impala. You definitely didn’t miss the way his little toddler hands clung to your shirt and how his head nestled into the crook of your neck. You smiled to yourself, knowing that even in his current state he still sought out comfort in you; and this time it was literally in your arms.

By the time you made it back to the motel, Sam was already packed and ready to go. You walked up to the door and put dean on the ground just out of sight. Crouching down to his level once more, you whispered, “wait here for just a second, okay? I’m gonna try to ease him into this and try to get him not to laugh at you. I know this is hard, but we’ll be home and you’ll be back to your macho, manly self in no time.” You kissed his forehead and as you pulled away, you could have sworn you heard a little whimper come from the tiny boy. He grabbed your hand as you opened the door.

“Sam!” you called out to the giant.

“Hey. Where’s Dean? I need to know what kind of spell he was hit with so I can start doing research. I should have all the ingredients I need for the counterspell back at the bunker, but I just need to make sure. So what is it this time? Is he blind again? Or deaf this time? Or maybe he was turned into an animal! Ahahaha that would be great. What-”

“SAM!” you finally yelled, and you felt Dean shrink back just a hair. You whispered “I’m sorry,” to him and gave his hand a little squeeze to comfort him. “It’s none of those. He hasn’t been turned into an animal either. He’s been turned into…well…he’s still Dean, just…smaller?”

Sam gave you a confused look.

“Ugh. Just, don’t laugh, alright? The poor thing is already terrified and that’s enough. One of the witches knocked him out, and by the time I got back to him, the bitch was sprinkling this really bright green powder on him and I was too late to stop the spell. I ganked her, but it didn’t reverse it. It’s not his fault. I shouldn’t have left him alone… Just wait here for two seconds.” You turned back to Dean outside. “You ready?” you asked him. He gave you a small nod and you could tell he was trying to hold back tears.

This wasn’t easy for him, especially with Sam here. He was always protecting you and Sam, and being this little, he was helpless really. That was a new feeling for him, and it wasn’t lost on you. You felt horrible for him. You picked him up the way a mother would her own children and pressed his face against your neck.

“Shhh, sweetheart. It’s gonna be okay. I’m right here, and I won’t let you go, okay? I’ll be right here the whole time.”

He nodded and you felt a few tears wet the skin of your neck, and your heart broke for him. He deserves so much better than this.

“Sam if you laugh at him, I’ll string you up myself. He’s been through enough, alright?” you said as you poked your head in through the door.

“Scouts honor. Is he alright? Is he injured?”

You sighed and gave the toddler one final squeeze as you stepped over the threshold, letting the door click shut behind you. As the door shut, Dean let out the tiniest of whimpers. That one you heard. You ran a hand soothingly up and down his back as Sam slapped a hand over his mouth and his eyes went wide. You gave him a glare as a warning. Slowly, Sam composed himself enough to speak.

“Dean? You alright dude?” he asked softly.

“I’m good, Sammy. Pwease just fix me. I don’t wanna be wike dis anymore…”

Sam’s eyes went wide again, but this time it was in shock. Dean sounded wrecked, and it took everything you had not to sob against his little shoulder. Sam looked at you and saw the tears in your eyes, and gave you a curt nod.

“I’ll fix this man, as soon as we get home. I think I know what I need, but if I’m right it may take another day. The potion has to sit for 24 hours in order to turn you back to the right age. Otherwise, it could backfire and have some serious consequences.” Sam grinned. “Don’t worry, Jerk.”

You felt Dean perk up a little at Sam’s addition. “Shut up, Bitch,” he mumbled against your neck, and all three of you gave a little laugh.

Dean asked you to drive, but Sam grumbled about his legs being crushed if the seat was moved up that far. After a few minutes of the two of you arguing with a toddler in the parking lot, and a handful of very strange looks from people passing by, you had finally come to an agreement. You would sit in the back with Dean while Sam drove you all home. Dean wasn’t happy because he wasn’t the one driving, but seeing as his legs were only a foot long, it was impossible for him to do so.

Dean curled up against your side and fell asleep about 30 minutes into the trip. You felt your eyes grow heavy not long after, so you let Sam know you were gonna take a nap as well. You carefully picked Dean up and scooted down the seat so you could lie across the length of it. Pressing him to your chest, you rolled the both of you onto your sides with his back to the back of the leather seats, and his face resting against your chest. His little hand came up to rest on your cheek and he let out a small sigh. Just before you fell asleep, you could have sworn you heard Dean whisper, “I wuv you Y/N.”

Sam was gently shaking you awake a few hours later, letting you know you had made it home. He smiled when you instinctively wrapped your arms around Dean a little tighter before your eyes shot open. He held his hands up, knowing you wake up ready to fight when you get protective like this; especially when it came to Dean. You relaxed a little when you took in your surroundings.

You tried to move off the seat without waking Dean, but your right ass cheek had fallen asleep and you lost your balance. You fell off the seat and hit the floorboard with a loud “OOMPF!” and Dean shot up like a bullet. You pulled him to you and gave him a quick hug, letting him know everything was okay.

“We’re home now sweetheart. Sammy’s already hitting the books. Why don’t we go get you cleaned up?” You offered him your hand, which he promptly took in his own, and you led him to the bathroom. You picked him up and sat him on the sink top. You grabbed a washcloth and let the water from the sink get nice and warm before soaking the water up with it. As gently as possible, you ran the washcloth over Dean’s face, trying to get all the dirt and tear streaks off him. Then you wiped his hands and feet. When he was sufficiently clean, you threw the washcloth back into the sink and placed Dean on your hip, humming some tune to yourself as you went. Dean watched you with admiration.

“You know, you’d make a good mommy,” he said as he placed his head on your shoulder once more.

You froze at his words, not knowing how to respond. Your heart clenched at thoe thought of having your own children. You leaned your head against his smaller one and let out a sigh. “I don’t really think that’s in the cards for me… I’ll just take what I can get for now.”

“What’s dat?” he hummed in response.

You knew he was falling asleep again, but you decided to take a chance anyways. “You. I like taking care of you Dean. You and Sam, you’re all I have left. So I dote on you and love you because you deserve it. And you deserve it more than anyone, Dean. You deserve to be loved and to have someone take care of you from time to time. You don’t always have to be the macho, manly man. It’s okay to need and want to be taken care of sometimes, and I want to be that person for you. So when this is all over, please, let me in. Let me love you and take care of you the way you do me and Sammy…” You trailed off, waiting for a response. “Dean?”

He was passed out on your shoulder once more. You sighed in defeat when Sam startled you from behind.

“Don’t give up, Y/N. Not yet, anyways. He loves you just like you do him, I swear. I wouldn’t tell you that if it weren’t true; you know I’m not that cruel. It’s just hard for him. I can’t even begin to imagine how hard this is for him. He hasn’t been treated like this since before mom died…”

And just like that, your heart broke all over again. This time, for both the boys. With Dean still balanced on your hip, you pulled Sam in for a hug and he let out a short sob. He wrapped his long arms around both you and the little boy and allowed himself to cry for a few moments.

Sam sniffled. “Anyways, I found the right counter-spell for him. It’s ready now.”

“I thought it had to ‘stew’?”

“No, that was for a different one. The powder the witch used was simple.”

“Alright, you go get it set up. I’ll wake little man here and let him know.”

You tried to keep the disappointment out of your voice, but when Sam shot you one of his sympathetic looks before he walked off, you knew you had failed. You held Dean to you a little tighter as you swayed and hummed your way down the hallway. You stroked Dean’s hair, trying to gently coax him awake.

“Dean baby, it’s time to wake up,” you quietly murmured against his head. “Sammy got the potion ready for you.”

“Not a baby. Wanna sleep. Dwink it in da morning.” He snuggled in closer to your neck and began softly snoring.

You let out a sigh and went to go talk to Sam. You found him in the library hovering over some foul smelling concoction.

“Does he have to drink it now? I can’t get him to wake up…”

“It takes a while to take effect, so he should really do it now. Let me see if I can wake him.”

You gave Sam a small shrug as you handed Dean to him. Sam started tickling the boy’s sides, and Dean responded by bolting upright and yelling.

“I’m awake, Bitch. Tanks for dat.”

Sam chuckled. “You’re welcome. Jerk.”

He set Dean down on top of the nearest table and handed him the potion. You watched as Dean awkwardly plugged his nose and simultaneously tipped the cup back, downing all the liquid like he would a glass of whiskey. He gagged and coughed after it was done and immediately reached for you with a whine. You picked him up once more and let him curl into your body as you moved back down the hall to his bedroom. You placed him on his bed before drawing up the blankets to cover him up, tucking him in with care. You had almost gotten out of the room when you heard his small voice.

“Y/N? Pwease stay. I don’t wanna be awone…”

You quickly moved back into the room, clicking the door shut behind you. As you got into his bed, he wrapped his little arms around your neck, and you curled your body around his. You began petting his hair and singing.

Hey Jude

Don’t make it bad

Take a sad song, and make it better

Remember to let her into your heart

Then you can start to make it better

Hey Jude

Don’t be afraid

You were made to go out and get her

The minute you let her under your skin

Then you begin to make it better

And anytime you feel the pain

Hey Jude, refrain

Don’t carry the world upon your shoulders

For well you know that it’s a fool who plays it cool

By making his world a little colder

Soon, the soft snores coming from his tiny form lulled you into sleep as well.

-----

When you woke in the morning, you quickly realized that Dean was not tiny any longer. He was quite large, in fact, and currently smothering you with his arm slung over your neck and one of his legs on top of both your own. You gently tried to lift his arm, but he moved it suddenly and it dropped on your face, causing you to squeak in surprise.

He shot upright and looked at you for a moment before he realized he was back to his adult self. He tackled you back down onto the bed with a roaring laugh and hugged you tight. Before you could even react, his lips were on yours in a passionate kiss. As soon as he released you, you opened your mouth to say something, but he shushed you with his hand against your mouth.

“I need to say this, so please, let me get it all out, okay?”

You nodded in agreement.

“I’m so sorry. I’ve been an ass. I’m terrified of caring too much about you, Y/N, because the people I care about always leave. I’m terrified of loving you, because then you become a playing piece for some monster to use and hurt, and I can’t have that happening. But drowning myself in all that fear, I blinded myself to what was actually going on; I never meant to hurt you. I thought that I was keeping you safe by doing this, and now I know I’m not. Please tell me I’m not too late with this. I’ll understand if I am, I know I should have said all this a long time ago. I was just too much of a coward. But please, please forgive me. I need you. You-”

You cut him off with a bruising kiss. “Of course I forgive you. You could never be too late with this. I could be walking down the aisle to marry some other knucklehead and I would still come running to you. But you have to promise me that you won’t take the easy way out if things get hard with us. I know you, and because I know you, I know that if some big bad tries to hurt me to get to you, you’ll close yourself off. So don’t do that shit, ya hear?”

He nodded violently.

“Good. Now shut up and love me, Winchester.���

“Always and forever, Y/N,” he whispered as he kissed you once more.

@spn-dean-and-sam-winchester

@queen-of-deans-booty

@gone-to-fight-the-fairies

@spnfanficpond

[youmightfindyourself]

What follows is a version of a lecture given to the students of Columbia University’s writing programme in New York on Monday 24th March 2008. The brief: “to speak about some aspect of your craft.”

1. Macro Planners and Micro Managers

First, a caveat: what I have to say about craft extends no further than my own experience, which is what it is—12 years and three novels. Although this lecture will be divided into ten short sections meant to mark the various stages in the writing of a novel, what they most accurately describe, in truth, is the writing of my novels. That being said, I want to offer you a pair of ugly terms for two breeds of novelist: the Macro Planner and the Micro Manager.

You will recognise a Macro Planner from his Post-its, from those Moleskines he insists on buying. A Macro Planner makes notes, organises material, configures a plot and creates a structure—all before he writes the title page. This structural security gives him a great deal of freedom of movement. It’s not uncommon for Macro Planners to start writing their novels in the middle. As they progress, forwards or backwards, their difficulties multiply with their choices. I know Macro Planners who obsessively exchange possible endings for one another, who take characters out and put them back in, reverse the order of chapters and perform frequent—for me, unthinkable—radical surgery on their novels: moving the setting of a book from London to Berlin, for example, or changing the title. I can’t stand to hear them speak about all this, not because I disapprove, but because other people’s methods are always so incomprehensible and horrifying. I am a Micro Manager. I start at the first sentence of a novel and I finish at the last. It would never occur to me to choose among three different endings because I haven’t the slightest idea of the ending until I get to it, a fact that will surprise no one who has read my novels. Macro Planners have their houses largely built from day one, and so their obsession is internal—they’re forever moving the furniture. They’ll put a chair in the bedroom, the lounge, the kitchen and then back in the bedroom again. Micro Managers build a house floor by floor, discretely and in its entirety. Each floor needs to be sturdy and fully decorated with all the furniture in place before the next is built on top of it. There’s wallpaper in the hall even if the stairs lead nowhere at all.

Because Micro Managers have no grand plan, their novels exist only in their present moment, in a sensibility, in the novel’s tonal frequency line by line. When I begin a novel I feel there is nothing of that novel outside of the sentences I am setting down. I have to be very careful: the whole nature of the thing changes by the choice of a few words. This induces a special breed of pathology for which I have another ugly name: OPD or obsessive perspective disorder. It occurs mainly in the first 20 pages. It’s a kind of existential drama, a long answer to the short question What kind of a novel am I writing? It manifests itself in a compulsive fixation on perspective and voice. In one day the first 20 pages can go from first-person present tense, to third-person past tense, to third-person present tense, to first-person past tense, and so on. Several times a day I change it. Because I am an English novelist enslaved to an ancient tradition, with each novel I have ended up exactly where I began: third person, past tense. But months are spent switching back and forth. Opening other people’s novels, you recognise fellow Micro Managers: that opening pile-up of too-careful, obsessively worried-over sentences, a block of stilted verbiage that only loosens and relaxes after the 20-page mark is passed. In the case of On Beauty, my OPD spun completely out of control: I reworked those first 20 pages for almost two years. To look back at all past work induces nausea, but the first 20 pages in particular bring on heart palpitations. It’s like taking a tour of a cell in which you were once incarcerated.

Yet while OPD is happening, somehow the work of the rest of the novel gets done. That’s the strange thing. It’s as if you’re winding the key of a toy car tighter and tighter… When you finally let it go, it travels at a crazy speed. When I finally settled on a tone, the rest of the book was finished in five months. Worrying over the first 20 pages is a way of working on the whole novel, a way of finding its structure, its plot, its characters—all of which, for a Micro Manager, are contained in the sensibility of a sentence. Once the tone is there, all else follows. You hear interior decorators say the same about a shade of paint.

2. Other People’s Words, Part One

It’s such a confidence trick, writing a novel. The main person you have to trick into confidence is yourself. This is hard to do alone. I gather sentences round me, quotations, the literary equivalent of a cheerleading squad. Except that analogy’s screwy—cheerleaders cheer. I put up placards that make me feel bad. For five years I had a line from Gravity’s Rainbow stuck to my door:

“We have to find meters whose scales are unknown in the world, draw our own schematics, getting feedback, making connections, reducing the error, trying to learn the real function… zeroing in on what incalculable plot?”

At that time, I guess I thought that it was the duty of the novel to rigorously pursue hidden information: personal, political, historical. I say I guess because I don’t recognise that writer any more, and already find her idea of the novel oppressive, alien, useless. I don’t think this feeling is unusual, especially when you start out. Not long ago I sat next to a young Portuguese novelist at dinner and told him I intended to read his first novel. He grabbed my wrist, genuinely distressed, and said: “Oh, please don’t! Back then, all I read was Faulkner. I had no sense of humour. My God, I was a different person!”

That’s how it goes. Other people’s words are so important. And then without warning they stop being important, along with all those words of yours that their words prompted you to write. Much of the excitement of a new novel lies in the repudiation of the one written before. Other people’s words are the bridge you use to cross from where you were to wherever you’re going.

Recently I came across a new quote. It’s my screen saver now, my little scrap of confidence as I try to write a novel. It is a thought of Derrida’s and very simple:

“If a right to a secret is not maintained then we are in a totalitarian space.”

Which is to say: enough of human dissection, of entering the brains of characters, cracking them open, rooting every secret out! For now, this is the new attitude. Years from now, when this book is done and another begins, another change will come.

“My God, I was a different person!”—I think many writers think this, from book to book. A new novel, begun in hope and enthusiasm, grows shameful and strange to its author soon enough. After each book is done, you look forward to hating it (and you never have to wait long); there is a weird, inverse confidence to be had from feeling destroyed, because being destroyed, having to start again, means you have space in front of you, somewhere to go. Think of that revelation Shakespeare put in the mouth of King John: “Now my soul has elbow room!” Fictionally speaking, the nightmare is losing the desire to move.

3. Other People’s Words, Part Two

Some writers won’t read a word of any novel while they’re writing their own. Not one word. They don’t even want to see the cover of a novel. As they write, the world of fiction dies: no one has ever written, no one is writing, no one will ever write again. Try to recommend a good novel to a writer of this type while he’s writing and he’ll give you a look like you just stabbed him in the heart with a kitchen knife. It’s a matter of temperament. Some writers are the kind of solo violinists who need complete silence to tune their instruments. Others want to hear every member of the orchestra—they’ll take a cue from a clarinet, from an oboe, even. I am one of those. My writing desk is covered in open novels. I read lines to swim in a certain sensibility, to strike a particular note, to encourage rigour when I’m too sentimental, to bring verbal ease when I’m syntactically uptight. I think of reading like a balanced diet; if your sentences are baggy, too baroque, cut back on fatty Foster Wallace, say, and pick up Kafka, as roughage. If your aesthetic has become so refined it is stopping you from placing a single black mark on white paper, stop worrying so much about what Nabokov would say; pick up Dostoyevsky, patron saint of substance over style.

Yet you meet students who feel that reading while you write is unhealthy. Their sense is that it corrupts voice by influence and, moreover, that reading great literature creates a sense of oppression. For how can you pipe out your little mouse song when Kafka’s Josephine the Mouse Singer pipes so much more loudly and beautifully than you ever could? To this way of thinking, the sovereignty of one’s individuality is the vital thing, and it must be protected at any price, even if it means cutting oneself off from that literary echo chamber EM Forster described, in which writers speak so helpfully to one another, across time and space. Well, each to their own, I suppose.

For me, that echo chamber was essential. I was 14 when I heard John Keats in there and in my mind I formed a bond with him, a bond based on class—though how archaic that must sound, here in America. Keats was not working-class, exactly, nor black—but in rough outline his situation seemed closer to mine than the other writers I came across. He felt none of the entitlement of, say, Virginia Woolf, or Byron, or Pope, or Evelyn Waugh or even PG Wodehouse and Agatha Christie. Keats offers his readers the possibility of entering writing from a side door, the one marked “Apprentices Welcome Here.” For Keats went about his work like an apprentice; he took a kind of MFA of the mind, albeit alone, and for free, in his little house in Hampstead. A suburban, lower- middle-class boy, a few steps removed from the literary scene, he made his own scene out of the books of his library. He never feared influence—he devoured influences. He wanted to learn from them, even at the risk of their voices swamping his own. And the feeling of apprenticeship never left him: you see it in his early experiments in poetic form; in the letters he wrote to friends expressing his fledgling literary ideas; it’s there, famously, in his reading of Chapman’s Homer, and the fear that he might cease to be before his pen had gleaned his teeming brain. The term role model is so odious, but the truth is it’s a very strong writer indeed who gets by without a model kept somewhere in mind. I think of Keats. Keats slogging away, devouring books, plagiarising, impersonating, adapting, struggling, growing, writing many poems that made him blush and then a few that made him proud, learning everything he could from whomever he could find, dead or alive, who might have something useful to teach him.

4. Middle-of-the-Novel Magical Thinking

In the middle of a novel, a kind of magical thinking takes over. To clarify, the middle of the novel may not happen in the actual geographical centre of the novel. By middle of the novel I mean whatever page you are on when you stop being part of your household and your family and your partner and children and food shopping and dog feeding and reading the post—I mean when there is nothing in the world except your book, and even as your wife tells you she’s sleeping with your brother her face is a gigantic semi-colon, her arms are parentheses and you are wondering whether rummage is a better verb than rifle. The middle of a novel is a state of mind. Strange things happen in it. Time collapses. You sit down to write at 9am, you blink, the evening news is on and 4,000 words are written, more words than you wrote in three long months, a year ago. Something has changed. And it’s not restricted to the house. If you go outside, everything—I mean, everything—flows freely into your novel. Someone on the bus says something—it’s straight out of your novel. You open the paper—every single story in the paper is directly relevant to your novel. If you are fortunate enough to have someone waiting to publish your novel, this is the point at which you phone them in a panic and try to get your publication date brought forward because you cannot believe how in tune the world is with your unfinished novel right now, and if it isn’t published next Tuesday maybe the moment will pass and you will have to kill yourself.

Magical thinking makes you crazy—and renders everything possible. Incredibly knotty problems of structure now resolve themselves with inspired ease. See that one paragraph? It only needs to be moved, and the whole chapter falls into place! Why didn’t you see that before? You randomly pick a poetry book off the shelf and the first line you read ends up being your epigraph—it seems to have been written for no other reason.

5. Dismantling the Scaffolding

When building a novel you will use a lot of scaffolding. Some of this is necessary to hold the thing up, but most isn’t. The majority of it is only there to make you feel secure, and in fact the building will stand without it. Each time I’ve written a long piece of fiction I’ve felt the need for an enormous amount of scaffolding. With me, scaffolding comes in many forms. The only way to write this novel is to divide it into three sections of ten chapters each. Or five sections of seven chapters. Or the answer is to read the Old Testament and model each chapter on the books of the prophets. Or the divisions of the Bhagavad Gita. Or the Psalms. Or Ulysses. Or the songs of Public Enemy. Or the films of Grace Kelly. Or the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. Or the liner notes to The White Album. Or the 27 speeches Donald Rumsfeld gave to the press corps during his tenure.

Scaffolding holds up confidence when you have none, reduces the despair, creates a goal—however artificial—an end point. Use it to divide what seems like an endless, unmarked journey, though by doing this, like Zeno, you infinitely extend the distance you need to go.

Later, when the book is printed and old and dog-eared, it occurs to me that I really didn’t need any of that scaffolding. The book would have been far better off without it. But when I was putting it up, it felt vital, and once it was there, I’d worked so hard to get it there I was loath to take it down. If you are writing a novel at the moment and putting up scaffolding, well, I hope it helps you, but don’t forget to dismantle it later. Or if you’re determined to leave it out there for all to see, at least hang a nice façade over it, as the Romans do when they fix up their palazzi.

6. First 20 Pages, Redux

Late in the novel, in the last quarter, when I am rolling downhill, I turn back to read those first 20 pages. They are packed tighter than tuna in a can. Calmly, I take off the top, let a little air in. What’s amusing about the first 20 pages—they are funny now, three years later, now I’m no longer locked up in them—is how little confidence you have in your readers when you begin. You spoon-feed them everything. You can’t let a character walk across the room without giving her backstory as she goes. You don’t trust the reader to have a little patience, a little intelligence. This reader, who, for all you know, has read Thomas Bernhard, Finnegans Wake, Gertrude Stein, Georges Perec—yet you’re worried that if you don’t mention in the first three pages that Sarah Malone is a social worker with a dead father, this talented reader might not be able to follow you exactly. It’s awful, the swing of the literary fraudulence pendulum: from moment to moment you can’t decide whether you’re the fraudulent idiot or your reader is the fraudulent idiot. For writers who work with character a good deal, going back to the first 20 pages is also a lesson in how much more delicate a thing character is than you think it is when you’re writing it. The idea of forming people out of grammatical clauses seems so fantastical at the start that you hide your terror in a smokescreen of elaborate sentence making, as if character can be drawn forcibly out of the curlicues of certain adjectives piled ruthlessly on top of one another. In fact, character occurs with the lightest of brushstrokes. Naturally, it can be destroyed lightly, too. I think of a creature called Odradek, who at first glance appears to be a “flat star-shaped spool for thread” but who is not quite this, Odradek who won’t stop rolling down the stairs, trailing string behind him, who has a laugh that sounds as if it has no lungs behind it, a laugh like rustling leaves. You can find the inimitable Odradek in a one-page story of Kafka’s called “The Cares of a Family Man.” Curious Odradek is more memorable to me than characters I spent three years on, and 500 pages.

7. The Last Day

There is one great advantage to being a Micro Manager rather than a Macro Planner: the last day of your novel truly is the last day. If you edit as you go along, there are no first, second, third drafts. There is only one draft, and when it’s done, it’s done. Who can find anything bad to say about the last day of a novel? It’s a feeling of happiness that knocks me clean out of adjectives. I think sometimes that the best reason for writing novels is to experience those four and a half hours after you write the final word. The last time it happened to me, I uncorked a good Sancerre I’d been keeping and drank it standing up with the bottle in my hand, and then I lay down in my backyard on the paving stones and stayed there for a long time, crying. It was sunny, late autumn, and there were apples everywhere, overripe and stinky.

8. Step Away from the Vehicle

You can ignore everything else in this lecture except number eight. It is the only absolutely 24-carat-gold-plated piece of advice I have to give you. I’ve never taken it myself, though one day I hope to. The advice is as follows.

When you finish your novel, if money is not a desperate priority, if you do not need to sell it at once or be published that very second—put it in a drawer. For as long as you can manage. A year or more is ideal—but even three months will do. Step away from the vehicle. The secret to editing your work is simple: you need to become its reader instead of its writer. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sat backstage with a line of novelists at some festival, all of us with red pens in hand, frantically editing our published novels into fit form so that we might go onstage and read from them. It’s an unfortunate thing, but it turns out that the perfect state of mind to edit your own novel is two years after it’s published, ten minutes before you go onstage at a literary festival. At that moment every redundant phrase, each show-off, pointless metaphor, all the pieces of deadwood, stupidity, vanity and tedium are distressingly obvious to you. Two years earlier, when the proofs came, you looked at the same page and couldn’t see a comma out of place. And by the way, that’s true of the professional editors, too; after they’ve read a manuscript multiple times, they stop being able to see it. You need a certain head on your shoulders to edit a novel, and it’s not the head of a writer in the thick of it, nor the head of a professional editor who’s read it in 12 different versions. It’s the head of a smart stranger who picks it off a bookshelf and begins to read. You need to get the head of that smart stranger somehow. You need to forget you ever wrote that book.

9. The Unbearable Cruelty of Proofs

Proofs are so cruel! Breeding lilacs out of the dead land, mixing memory and desire, stirring dull roots with spring rain. Proofs are the wasteland where the dream of your novel dies and cold reality asserts itself. When I look at loose-leaf proofs, fresh out of the envelope, bound with a thick elastic band, marked up by a conscientious copy editor, I feel quite sure I would have to become a different person entirely to do the work that needs to be done here. To correct what needs correcting, fix what needs to be fixed. The only proper response to an envelope full of marked-up pages is “Give it back to me! Let me start again!” But no one says this because by this point exhaustion has set in. It’s not the book you hoped for, maybe something might yet be done—but the will is gone. There’s simply no more will to be had. That’s why proofs are so cruel, so sad: the existence of the proof itself is proof that it is already too late. I’ve only ever seen one happy proof, in King’s College Library: the manuscript of TS Eliot’s The Waste Land. Eliot, upon reaching his own point of exhaustion, had the extreme good fortune to meet Ezra Pound, a very smart stranger, and with his red pen Ezra went to work. And what work! His pen goes everywhere, trimming, cutting, slicing, a frenzy of editing, the why and wherefore not especially obvious, at times, indeed, almost ridiculous; almost, at times, indiscriminate… Whole pages struck out with a single line.

Underneath Pound’s markings, The Waste Land is a sad proof like any other—too long, full of lines not worth keeping, badly structured. Lucky Eliot, to have Ezra Pound. Lucky Fitzgerald, to have Maxwell Perkins. Lucky Carver, we now know, to have Gordon Lish. Hypocrite lecteur!—mon semblable—mon frère! Where have all the smart strangers gone?

10. Years Later: Nausea, Surprise and Feeling OK

I find it very hard to read my books after they’re published. I’ve never read White Teeth. Five years ago I tried; I got about ten sentences in before I was overwhelmed with nausea. More recently, when people tell me they have just read that book, I do try to feel pleased, but it’s a distant, disconnected sensation, like when someone tells you they met your second cousin in a bar in Goa. I suspect White Teeth and I may never be reconciled—I think that’s simply what happens when you begin writing a book at the age of 21. Then, a year ago, I was in an airport somewhere and I saw a copy of The Autograph Man, and on a whim, I bought it. On the plane I had to drink two of those mini bottles of wine before I had the stomach to begin. I didn’t manage the whole thing, but I read about two-thirds, and at that incredible speed with which you can read a book if you happen to have written it. And it was actually not such a bad experience—I laughed a few times, groaned more than I laughed and gave up when the wine wore off—but for the first time, I felt something other than nausea. I felt surprise. The book was genuinely strange to me; there were whole pages I didn’t recognise, didn’t remember writing. And because it was so strange I didn’t feel any particular animosity towards it. So that was that: between that book and me there now exists a sort of blank truce, neither pleasant nor unpleasant.

Finally, while writing this lecture, I picked up On Beauty. I read maybe a third of it, not consecutively, but chapters here and there. As usual, the nausea; as usual, the feeling of fraudulence and the too-late desire to wield the red pen all over the place—but something else, too, something new. Here and there—in very isolated pockets —I had the sense that this line, that paragraph, these were exactly what I meant to write, and the fact was, I’d written them, and I felt OK about it, felt good, even. It’s a feeling I recommend to all of you. That feeling feels OK.

This lecture appears in her new collection “Changing My Mind: Occasional Essays” (Hamish Hamilton). © Zadie Smith

[toldnews-blog]

New Post has been published on https://toldnews.com/sports/everyone-loves-virat-kohli-because-he-always-speaks-honestly-shane-warne/

Everyone loves Virat Kohli because he always speaks honestly: Shane Warne

The Indian Premier League’s (IPL) 2008 champions Rajasthan Royals are ready with a makeover. The franchise is turning all ‘pink’ this season with a change in the colour of their apparels and will have it as the official colour in line with the city of Jaipur. As RR goes about reinventing itself in its 10th year of IPL (having missed out two years), Shane Warne – their first captain who led RR to victory in the inaugural year of the IPL – is once again the face driving that change. On Sunday, the legendary leg-spinner sat with TOI for an extensive interview.

Ten years with Rajasthan Royals. What does it take to have so much of Shane Warne’s attention?

I think the people. There’s a loyalty factor attached to club sport and I like that. I’ve always only played for one team. Australia, Victoria, St Kilda and Rajasthan Royals. In county cricket, it was Hampshire. I’ve had many roles here but what really drove me was the people of Jaipur. There wasn’t much expectation, they just wanted their team to do well. There was a feeling of appreciation and I felt they took me for who I was. They gave me the space. I want to pay back that loyalty.

When this space that you mention, is given to Shane Warne, does it bring out the best in him?

Yes, absolutely. Firstly, there’s a huge difference between being liked and being respected. I got both in plenty with RR. Today, franchises have a bowling coach, a batting coach, physios, mentors, team managers – there are so many people around the team now doling out advice. In my case, it was a one-stop shop. That helped. Being honest with the players helped. If a player wanted to know why he was in the team, or why he wasn’t, all he had to do is come to me and I always kept that door open. All of that resulted in a nice build-up and we could create an amazing team. It’s the most satisfying thing I’ve ever done in cricket – help create everybody’s favourite underdog in IPL.

Cricket Australia is seeking a culture change. Do you think it is working? I really don’t know if there was a problem with the culture. But what I do know is after Sandpapergate, how many people loved seeing the Australians in trouble and how many people sunk their boot in. How many people kicked them when they were down. There might have been an issue because every team did not like the Australians and that’s OK. You don’t have to be liked but you need to be respected. And there are a few things the Australian team did (to lose that respect). They need to earn back that respect.

Signing autographs will help do that?

The Australian way of playing cricket is tough, uncompromising but above all, fair. Maybe that’s where the Australians weren’t doing it right, pushing it too far and with the culture change policy, they’ve gone too far the other way. Now I think everything they’re doing is for public image. As soon as the last ball is bowled in a game, they’re all signing autographs near the fence. People should sign autographs if they want to. I was one of the guys who signed all the time, took pictures and I think all cricketers should. But, there’s a time when it should hurt. You may not want to speak to anyone if you’ve lost. You need your own time to get into the dressing room and get over it.

Is CA trying to fix something that’s not broken?

CA needs to work out what’s important to them. I can understand why they’re (CA) doing this (read: Trying to improve image in public). But it should happen because they (players) want to (do it), not because they have to. Steve Smith made a huge error in judgement, but Steve Smith is not a bad person. But it is the punishment that has amplified the problem. A 12-month ban? Really? Think about some of the other teams and individuals and what they’ve done. Let’s say a $10m fine could’ve been levied. He (Smith) made a mistake but I think he has been punished very harshly.

With today’s social media scene, authorities seem to be under some kind of pressure to be seen as doing the right thing… I think too many people worry about what people say. It’s about being true to yourself and standing for what you believe in – to do the right thing. For instance, the Australian cricket team – they want to play tough, aggressive, uncompromising cricket but it has to be fair. As simple as that. There are too many people in the world, not just cricketers, that get on their phone and create something that isn’t real. They try and portray a life that isn’t real.

Too much rule-setting can result in dumbing down of expression? It’s happening in cricket…

We live in a world that’s increasingly becoming politically correct. And what we want to see from sportspersons is them being real. We want to see their emotions, see them playing with freedom, expressing themselves. We don’t want to see them conforming. For instance, most player interviews these days go like this: Question: Well, that was a fantastic result today. How do you feel? Answer: Well, it was a great team effort. Everybody played well and did their part. I’m just trying my best and happy to contribute to the team – That’s what everyone says. Guys have to get more real.

Is that why Virat Kohli comes as a breath of fresh air? Speaks his mind … He’s fantastic. I love watching him bat and I love listening to him. I am a big fan. One of the things he doesn’t do is he doesn’t take things lying down. You know what he does? He stands up for what he believes in. He speaks how he feels and he’s real. He’s emotional, a bit too emotional sometimes on the field. But that’s the part of the charm.

Is that why Australia loves him?

I think world cricket loves him. Everyone loves Virat Kohli because it’s refreshing to hearing him talk so honestly and openly. He loves confrontation. That’s why he has those 100s in chases. How many, 23, 24? The next best is how much? I can’t remember who’s second. That’s something inbuilt into you. That’s not skill or talent. He’s got a lot of that. That is just pure competitiveness and pure desire – to get the job done.

You’ve seen Sachin so closely. Where do you place Kohli in comparison?

Very hard to judge when someone is playing and very hard to judge eras. Think about the bowlers in the ’90s. Different surfaces that seamed. Now they’re a lot flatter. The ball swung more. So many invariables. But to think that someone was better than Brian Lara and Sachin – in those mid-’90s – against Wasim, Waqar, Curtly, Courtney, McGrath, Donald, Saqlain, Mushy, Vettori, Murali, myself. You can go on. (Pauses) Virat is breaking all the records, which is great but I want to wait. See, what people miss is this: You can set benchmarks, score those many centuries, average that high, score a lot many runs. But what people are going to remember you for is the way you played the game. Someone should run down the street and ask fans, how many runs did Mark Waugh make or what his average was? They wouldn’t have a clue but chances are, here’s what they’ll say: I loved watching him play. To my mind, what’s already evident is that Virat is one of the best players of all time. In One-dayers, he probably has to go down with Viv Richards as the greatest ever, not so much for the record but for the way he plays his game. But I’ll judge him at the end of his career.

DRS – you’re clearly not a fan…

Hang on. I think any improvement to the game that can help us get to the right decision is fine. I don’t mind. I’m a fan of DRS only if it is used right. And at the moment, I don’t think it is used right. It’s simple: Take away the original umpire’s decision. You can’t have exactly the same ball being given out and not out depending on what the on-field decision was. Identical deliveries: one results in ‘out’ and the other results in ‘not out’. That can’t be the case. It’s either out or not out, but because of what the on-field decision is, there can’t be two alternatives to the same delivery. If I bowl a ball and it hits the guy in front of the stumps, and the umpire says not out. I review and it says: The ball would’ve gone to hit the stumps. But it says ‘umpire’s call’. The next ball, I bowl exactly the same one, and the umpire says ‘it’s out’ – that’s wrong. The same ball can’t be out and not out. The simpler way to do it is ‘take away the original decision of the umpire. If its hitting in line and hitting the stumps, it’s out – no matter what the umpire says.

Can it be applied against the force of nature?

I don’t know. I’m sure most deliveries are faster through the air. If it hits the pitch, it has to take off some pace. But if I think of Perth in the late ’80s & early ’90s, the ball seemed to always gather pace off the pitch. Maybe that was the swiftness from the bounce, I don’t know. But you’ve got to rely on science and they’ll have to tell whether that’s the case.

Those who operate the DRS during a match sit in the broadcast room, the TV umpire sits elsewhere, the match-referee sits elsewhere… The DRS should be on their own, sitting alone, and maybe the fourth umpire should sit with them, to see they’re hitting the right button (laughs). But because of the telecast, you get to see all of that on the live feed. So, it’s pretty hard for anyone here to make a mistake. But yes, those who operate the DRS should be sitting alone so that you’re not influenced by anyone.

What’s that one rule you want changed?

1) Take away the on-field umpire’s decision on DRS; 2) Introduce the rule that if you don’t bowl your overs in time, the captain misses two games. You’ve got 90 overs in a day, if you miss them, the captain misses the next two games.

What if the game finishes in under-three days, like in the case of West Indies versus England?

Yes, (above should apply) unless the game finishes in less than 225 overs. Five days make way for 450 overs. So, if the match has lasted less than 225 overs, it’s OK. But there has to be a clampdown on overrates. The flat rule should be that a team cannot bowl less than 90 overs in a day. If it’s a half-day’s play we’re talking about, do a pro-rata calculation.

Recently, Hardik Pandya and KL Rahul were in news for all the wrong reasons…

Yes. Good lord. As I said, it’s all about political correctness these days. If a player steps out of line, everybody has an opinion and I thought that this particular thing was ridiculous. Just let them be.

[physicalkideliot]

Great minds...

Fan fic for @cldfiredrgn based on your suggestion of El’s sister in law in an accident and the daughter surviving... as a side note... this may have to be a continuing story... liking what’s going on...

*****************************************************************************************************

It had been a few months since I had been kicked out of Fillory, gone back and fought for my place as king. That had become my home. Now here I am once again kicked out. There had better be a good damned reason for all this shit.

 I found myself waking up in a small apartment. There were people above us yelling about lord only knows what. They were Italian so they were not quiet about their disagreements. I rolled over to try and get a bit more sleep before facing the world only to discover I was the only one still in bed. I heard the shower running and decided to go investigate.

 “Hello??”

“Hi. I’ll be out in a minute.”

“Quentin?”

“Eliot.”

“What are you doing here?”

“Uhhh.. I live here.”

“Then… do I?...”

“Yeah, we both do.”

“What exactly happened……..”

“Not again El. I don’t have time for this again this morning. I’m already running late.”

 I slowly backed out of the bathroom trying to figure out exactly what was going on. Apparently whatever it was had happened before. I looked down at my hands and noticed I had been absent mindedly playing with a ring. Was I still married? I mean surely if I was kicked out of Fillory then the marriage to Fen and Idri was null now. I guess I could take the ring off.

 I slipped it off to see it was engraved on the inside. ‘Queliot’. What the hell?

 I barely had time to finish my thought before I heard the phone ring.

 “El, can you grab that? If it’s Jenny tell her I’m running about five minutes late.” I heard Quentin yell from the bathroom.

 I walked over to answer the phone. I saw the area code and didn’t want to answer it.

 “Not them.” I whispered to myself. “How would they have even gotten my number?”

“El? Answer that!”

“Ok! Got it!”

 I picked up the phone.

 “Hello?”

“Eliot?” The voice on the other end sounded distraught and was crying.

“James?”

“Eliot….. It’s Karen… she’s…..” He continued to cry. “She’s gone.”

“Shit. What happened?”

“They were in a car wreck. Her and Sara.” He was still crying. The last time I saw Sara, she was two. I hadn’t seen any of my family in ten years. I went to Brakebills and then Fillory and just kind of moved on.

 “Eliot?”

“Yeah, I’m here” he had snapped me out of my thoughts.

“I need your help.”

“How can I help? I don’t know about car wrecks or anything.”

“Sara lived and now I’m alone and I have no idea how to raise her on my own.”

“I don’t know anything about raising kids.”

“You have to help me Eliot.”

“James, I don’t know anything about being a parent or raising kids or any of that.”

“Pleas Eliot.” He sounded so desperate and he did call me after not speaking to me in ten years, that was the definition of desperation.

“Ok. I’ll come home and see what I can do.”

“When?”

“This weekend.”

“Thank you Eliot.”

“It’s fine. I’m not happy about it and I’m not staying long. I’ll help you get things sorted but then I’m done.”

“Fine. Anything helps.”

 I heard Quentin getting out of the shower.

 “I have to go. See you this weekend.”

“Ok. See you then.”

 He hung up. I was curious as to what exactly happened and dreading going home.

 “What’s wrong El?”

“Ummm… oh.. nothing.”

“El you’re white as a sheet. That’s not nothing.” He sat down beside me.

“I have something I have to deal with.”

“El you don’t keep secrets from me.” He reached over and took my hand. I felt a stray tear roll down my face. “Shit, you never cry, this must be serious.

“My sister in law…. Is….. dead….”

“Shit, El. I’m so sorry.” He hugged me. “Hang on.” He stood up and grabbed his phone and started calling someone.

 “Hey Jenny, it’s Q. I have some personal things I have to deal with. I won’t be in today. Can you handle that meeting this morning?.... Great….. Yeah he’s ok….. it’s a long story. I’m using my personal time….. Yes, the whole week…..He needs me….. yes…that’s fine…. Goodbye.”

 “What the hell?”

“You need me El.”

“I’m fine. Really.”

“No. You’re not, and I’m sure as hell not letting you go back home alone.”

“Q… it’s fine…..”

He walked over and kissed me. He put his hands on my face and wiped the stray tears away and ran his hands through my hair.

“El. I love you. You’re not facing this alone. Let’s get some things packed. I can get us a flight out there.”

 We packed a suitcase and Quentin booked us a flight.

 We had gotten to the airport and I filled Quentin in on the things that had happened and he in turn explained to me how we got kicked out of Fillory when magic seemed to have died but somehow it came back but we never found another way back to Fillory. I had found home with him and we spent a lot of time together and decided to get married in Central Park since it reminded us of the fields at Brakebills.

 As we flew I told Quentin all about the small town my family lived in and how they would be less than thrilled about their dandy son coming home with his husband.

 “It’s nothing against you so don’t take it personally, it’s just how they are. “

“It’s fine El. Not like I haven’t heard it all before.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Nothing to be sorry for. I’m more sorry for you with all this. At least your niece survived.”

“Yeah, they said they don’t know how though. They said the car was totaled and it was a miracle she survived. She only had a few scratches and a bloody nose.”

“Odd.”

“Yeah.”

 “Good afternoon folks, we are beginning our decent. In a few moments we will be touching down in beautiful Indiana. Local time is 5:47pm and it is currently a glorious 67 degrees.” We heard the pilot announce. I felt sick.

 I instinctively reached over and grabbed Quentin’s hand.

 “Oh…. Sorry….”

“I’m not.” He smiled back and held my hand.

 The plane landed and we got off. We walked through the small airport and grabbed our bags and picked up the rental car Quentin had reserved for us.

 “Really? That’s the car you picked?”

“It sounded like it would be good for this.”

“You got us a blue four door pickup truck.”

“When in Rome?” He smiled and shrugged as he put his bags in the back seat.

“Some days, I hate you.” I glared at him as I put my bags in.

“You drive.” He smiled as he tossed me the keys.

“Fuck you.”

“You wish”

“Whatever Quentin Coldwater Waugh!!”

“Whatever Eliot Waugh Coldwater!!”

“Just get in you dick.”

He laughed at me as we both got in and I tried to acclimate myself to this monstrosity he was making me drive.

 We drove for about an hour before reaching my brother’s house.

 We both got out and gathered our things.

 “Eliot.” He came out to greet us. “Who’s your friend?”

“This is Quentin.”

“The Quentin.”

“What do you mean?”

“Isn’t he the one who designed the huge skyscraper in New York?”

“That’s me.” Quentin chimed in.

“Wow. Not what I pictured.”

“Ummm… Thank you?”

“No offense but you look a little small…”

“Fuck James, just let it go.” I rolled my eyes as I walked in and set my things in the guest room.

 I walked into the living room and saw my mom and dad sitting there.

 “So, we heard you got married.” My mom snarked.

“Yeah.”

“Is she nice?” my father chimed in.

“He is.” I stated glaring at him.

“Oh. Well then.” He huffed and sat back down.

“Where is he?”

“He’s coming.” I heard Quentin and James come in and close the door.

“Hi.” Quentin walked in and greeted everyone.

“Mom, dad, this is Quentin.”

“He’s the one you married?” my father frowned.

“Yes.”

“He’s cute.” My mom chirped.

“Yeah, that’s why I claimed him.” I half smiled.

“He’s the one who built that huge building out in New York.” James interjected.

“Well, I didn’t build it, they have a team for that, I just kind of designed it.” Quentin stated in his usual nerdy matter of fact way.

“So where’s Sara?” I asked in an attempt to escape this conversation.

“She’s upstairs.”

“Good. I’ll go see how she is.” I walked away and headed upstairs.

 I knocked on her door.

 “Come in.”

“Hi.”

“Uncle Eliot!!” She ran over and hugged me. “I thought I’d never see you again.”

“I’m here.” I laughed and hugged her. I had spoken to her on the phone. Usually on her birthday when her mom called me.

“You’re back for mom’s funeral aren’t you?”

“Yeah, but let’s talk about something else.”

“Did you see the photos?”

“What photos?”

“Of the crash.”

“No.”

“They said I should have died.” She just stated all this so matter of fact while continuing to brush her doll’s hair.

“They said it was bad.”

“Uncle Eliot, why did you go away?”

“I had to go to school.”

“You were gone a long time.”

“I know.” I looked down, almost feeling guilty.

“Are you a doctor now? Mom said people who go to school for a really long time are doctors.”

“No. I’m not a doctor.” I smiled at her. I tried to think of things little girls would like. Looking around the room I saw pictures of princesses and knights. “I was a king though.”

“A king!!!”

“Yeah, with a horse and carriage and everything.”

“Did you have a crown?”

“Yeah and a castle and a cook.”

“And a queen?”

“Yeah, a few queens and there were other kings with me.”

“Did you fight?”

“Yep, with swords.”

“You’re so brave uncle Eliot.” She ran over and hugged me. “I wish I was a queen, I’d save people.”

“I know.” I hugged her tighter.

“Do you want to see the pictures?”

“Ummm… Sure….”

She pulled out a newspaper and showed me the front page. It was a car wrapped around a tree under a semi.

“Wow.”

“Yeah, it was bad.”

“It was.”

“I had some scratches and a bleeding nose.”

I looked at the picture and tried to figure out how anyone survived all that.

“Sara?”

“Yeah uncle Eliot?”

“Did you think about anything before the wreck?”

“Yeah. I saw the semi coming and I felt really scared and I just kept thinking of how scared I was and how I didn’t want to die. I thought about putting myself in a bubble and floating away. I wish I put mommy in a bubble too.”

“It’s ok, it’s not your fault. You couldn’t stop it.” I half smiled at her and let her play.

 I walked downstairs and found Quentin in the guest room changing. I walked in and closed the door behind me.

 “Shit.”

“What’s wrong El?”

 I showed him the newspaper.

 “Wow. How did she survive?”

“She didn’t want to die.”

“Well yeah but that’s a bad wreck. Nobody would survive that.”

“Q.”

“What?”

“She’s fucking Telekinitic.”

“How would you know that?”

“She build a ward around herself.”

“How.”

“Same way I killed Logan Kinnear. She was scared and it’s all she could think about and then, bam, it happened. She walked away with scratches and a bloody nose. That happened to me my first time too.”

“El.”

“No, she is. I just know it. She has to be to live through this.”

 A few days passed. The funeral happened and we had the usual family dinner.

 Quentin and I went up to Sara’s room where she was playing.

 “Hi Sara.”

“Hi Quentin.”

“Can we talk?”

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“Have you ever thought about stuff and then it happens?”

“Yeah.”

“When?”

“The wreck. I didn’t want to die and I didn’t.”

“Sara, I want to try something.” I walked over and sat on the bed.

“What’s that uncle Eliot?”

I set a small marble down on the table.

 “I want you to try and move that just by thinking about it.”

“Ok.” She stared at the marble. “It’s not working uncle Eliot.” She looked sad.

“It’s ok. It takes a minute. Try again.”

 She looked back at the marble.

 “It’s still not working.”

“It takes practice.”

 She started crying.

 “What’s wrong?”

“I can’t do it! I want to make you happy uncle Eliot and I want to be a princess like you were a king!” She cried and the marble shook then shot around the room before breaking a picture hanging on the wall.

“That’s it!!” Quentin yelled.

“Shit!”

“Uncle Eliot!!”

“I know I said a bad word but you did it!!”

“Does that mean I’m a princes??”

“Not yet but closer.” I smiled.

“What’s going on up there?” I heard James yell coming up the stairs.

“Nothing!” I yelled back as I heard him open the door.

“There’s a picture broken on the floor and you two sitting in here like idiots.” He snapped.

“Daddy!!! I’m a princess!!”

“What?”

“I have mag…” I grabbed her and wrapped her in a hug to help stifle her saying she was magic.

“I broke the picture. I’ll clean it up. Sorry.”

“Just don’t let her get hurt.” He snapped and walked back down stairs.

“Why did you lie uncle Eliot?”

“People here can’t know you are magic.”

“Why?”

“They get scared.”

“But daddy likes magic. He watches the shows on TV.”

“That’s different. That’s not the kind of magic we have.”

“Oh. So what do I do?”

“Sara, you’re telekinetic.”

“What’s that?”

“You can do things by thinking about them, it’s magic. That’s how you survived.”

“How do you know?”

“Cause I can do it too. So can Quentin, but his magic is different.”

“What do I do with it?”

“You have to learn to control it and then you can learn spells and learn how to cast.”

“How do I do that?”

“School.”

“School?”

“Yes, that’s the school I went to. They can help. I’ll call them in the morning.”

“Thank you uncle Eliot!!”

 She ran over and hugged me again and I smiled. I helped clean up the broken picture and let her play with her dolls.

 Quentin and I walked back downstairs and outside. I called Dean Fogg.

 “Hello.”

“Hi Dean, it’s Eliot.”

“Hello Eliot.”

“I need your help.”

“How can I help?”

“It’s my niece. She’s telekinetic.”

“I’ll stop by in the morning.”

“Thanks.”

 I hung up the phone. Holy shit. More Waugh magicians.

************************************************************************************************

[misscrawfords]

Happy Easter everyone!

Had a lovely Lent away from tumblr and there was barely a single time I’ve thought about it or wished I could post something or reblog a particular show. I’ve just scrolled back through my dashboard for the first time in 40 days and seen like one post that actually interests me.

So I guess I’ll be on tumblr less that I was! And if I unfollow people whose interests have so totally diverged from mine, please don’t take it personally. It’s not like I’m posting Matthew/Mary fanfiction every day these days anyway.

So! In the past forty days, I have:

- got a great new job! It’s at the school I did my training at so I know I love it and the people and it felt so good going back. I’m really excited! I mean, it’s also a state school, so I’m moving across country, taking a pay cut and will be teaching larger classes so I’m a little apprehensive. BUT. It is an amazing school and I’ve been really unhappy with my current job since Christmas so it’s definitely the right time to make a move.

- Speaking of moving, I am definitely going to be able to get my own place by hook or by crook - the new school is in a much cheaper part of the country. Buying would be nice (with deposit basically from my parents) or renting for a year first. But either way, MY PLACE. (And if I buy... you know what that means? CAT. CAAAAATTTTT. Yes.)

- Have you watched the BBC Decline and Fall? Nobody’s talking about it on Facebook, but it’s hilarious in a really dark comedy way. Adaptation of Evelyn Waugh’s Decline and Fall. Stars Jack Whitehall and so basically Bad Education: period drama AU. I would have thought tumblr would be all over it, but possibly not. Going to spam you all with gifs if there are any once I post this.

Actually struggling to think of anything else significant that’s happened, though I feel the new job is big enough! It’s been... quite a lot of very rapid change - and I won’t even be moving till the summer!

[booksimanagedtofinish]

The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson

The difference between fault and responsibility is how many f*cks you should give. Spoiler alert: More in the latter. 

A Million Little Pieces by James Frey

I love sprinkles. This book was not about sprinkles.

Thirty Rooms to Hide In by Luke Sullivan

Wanted to find the advertising bible but found this instead. Glad I did.

Behind the Beautiful Forevers by Katherine Boo

Highly recommend if you want to get over your first world problems.

Modern Romance by Aziz Ansari

How does one be a part of a focus group? Are donuts involved?

Him Her Him Again the End of Him by Patricia Marx

Neuroticism is cute.

Being Mortal by Atul Gawande

Mandatory reading for everyone. And I mean everyone. Forreal. Please check this one out.

Cutting for Stone by Abraham Verghese

Does empathy make life easier or harder?

Food: A Love Story by Jim Gaffigan

Most relatable title goes to…

Life of Pi by Yann Martel

I’m never going out into open water again. But damn, what a great story.

The Paris Wife by Paula McLain

Is this why everyone says Hemingway was kind of a douche?

Mountains Beyond Mountains by Tracy Kidder

Respect and admiration over 9000.

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath

Madness never made more sense.

River Town by Peter Hessler

*Re-read on repeat*

So Much I Want to Tell You: Letters to my Little Sister by Anna Akana

Much respect to share one’s life so poignantly and candidly. Also, I rarely see a work ethic that is so incredible. 

Everyday Zen by Charlotte Joko

Didn’t know inner peace could read like a master thesis.

The Road by Cormac McCarthy

Heartbreaking. Plus any reason to watch Viggo Moretenson.

The Housekeeper and the Professor by Yoko Ogawa

I was not expecting math.

 The Accidental Billionaires by Ben Murzich

Was it accidental though?

  Shadow Divers by Robert Kurtson

Underwater is scarier than space.

  Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom

I like the size of this book.

�� Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom

Always aim to make people cry.

 Have a Little Faith by Mitch Albom

Might as well read what else he’s got.

  Bossypants by Tina Fey

*Best with Mai Tai in hand*

 World War Z by Max Brooks

Brilliant. Now onto the audiobook.

  The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Did I ever watch Battle Royale?

  Brideshead Revisited by Evelyn Waugh

That’s the best surname ever.

  The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini

Should be mandatory reading for everyone.

  Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins

Let’s watch Battle Royale.

Mockingjay by Suzanne Collins

I really need to watch Battle Royale.

  The Book Thief by Markus Zusak

Beautiful book cover.

  A Cat Abroad by Peter Gethers

This lucky duck of a cat went to Paris. And here I am sitting on the bus, stuck in traffic, and eating discounted cookies. What. 

  How to be a Hepburn in a Hilton World by Jordan Christy

Y tho.

  Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris

‘Big Boy.’ ‘Nuff said.

  Oracle Bones by Peter Hessler

When in doubt, use pyromancy.

  Strange Stones by Peter Hessler

Guess I have a favorite author.

  Women's Travel Writing volume 10 by Lavinia Spalding

A club worth joining.

 The Craggy Hole in my Heart and the Cat Who Fixed It by Geneen Roth

A librarian’s recommendation. Lol. 

 You can Buy Happiness (and it’s Cheap) by Tammy Strobel

*Immediately Googles how to buy micro-home*

  Tokyo Vice by Jake Adelstein

I want to see Daniel Radcliffe speak Japanese.

  Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card

If Andrew can be Ender, can Catherine be cooler too?

  The Fault in Our Stars by John Green

Articulate teens are articulate.

Cinnamon and Gunpowder by Eli Brown

I’m telling you, nothing good happens out in the ocean. 

  The Good Luck of Right Now by Matthew Quick

‘The Good Luck of Right Meow’

  An Abundance of Katherines by John Green

What is with all this unexpected math?

  Shotgun Lovesongs by Nikolas Butler

The one time the book title was better than the book. 

  David and Goliath by Malcolm Gladwell

Thought it’d be my brain’s slingshot against the big, bad scary world out there.

  The Promise of a Pencil by Adam Braun

*instantly Googles how to pack up your life and teach in another country*

  This I Know for Sure by Oprah Winfrey

I’ve never watched Oprah, but at least I can say I’ve read her book.

The Alchemist by Paulo Coehlo

I packed up and moved across the country. The End.

Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn

How to get motivated.

When Your Parent Becomes Your Child by Ken Abraham

Sobering yet comforting.

  Is Everybody Hanging Out Without Me by Mindy Kaling

Mindy’s expression is one I make quite often.

  Smoke Gets in Your Eyes and Other Lessons from the Crematory by Caitlin Doughty

When death comes for you, it’s best to ease into it.

  Ready Player One by Ernest Cline

WTF is an Easter Egg?

 The Signature of all Things by Elizabeth Gilbert

A protagonist like no other.

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo by Stieg Larsson

Poor kitteh :(

Adultery by Paolo Coehlo

This is nothing like ‘The Alchemist’

The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold

Only took me a decade to finish.

  Eat Pray Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

*Increased gelato sales worldwide*

  The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up by Marie Kondo

If I feel no joy in anything I own, can I go on a shopping spree?

[itsnelkabelka]

Speech: Foreign Secretary's speech at Raisina Dialogue, New Delhi

Good afternoon.

It’s a great honour to be speaking here at the second Raisina Dialogue and fantastic to be back in India.

I have come on several official trips now as well as various family weddings and we always try to remember to bring something for our Sikh relatives who live in both Delhi and Mumbai can you guess what it is; that’s right – we tend to bring a bottle of whisky, Black Label whisky to add to the astonishing 1.5 billion litres of whisky that are consumed every year in this country and why do we bring a bottle of scotch – to our relatives in Mumbai and Delhi - normally black label though I have just bought something called green label.

I hope it isn’t crème de menthe the reason my friends is that this wonderful country still sets a tariff of 150 per cent on whisky imports and I believe this matters.

Though I have no particular desire to attack Indian whisky tariffs. I think the time has come to stick up for free trade to make the case once again for the immense benefits of a globalised economy where we learn from each other and trade freely with each other and that case needs setting out here now and I believe I am perhaps the man to do it because I belong to a select group of people who are not always approved of by the global elites.

In the pages of good left liberal papers I am denounced as…wait for it…a populist because I was involved in a movement opposed to what I see as the undemocratic nature of the EU, and we were successful and so I am bracketed with various other leaders around the world who are said to be populist people who come to power on the tide of a sort of pitchfork wielding rebellion against the conceit of the ruling classes and so I want to stick up not for the populists, they can take care of themselves - we populists have pretty thick skins. I want to stick up for those who vote for them because they aren’t bad people.

They may feel worried about the security of the world, or about terrorism. They feel that they aren’t allowed to hold widespread opinions, and that they are being sneered and disapproved of. They look at this great glittering globalised economy and they see some people getting very rich indeed and they wonder why their own families aren’t keeping pace and they fear that they will be the first generation not be overtaken, in prosperity, by their own children, and so I say that these people should not be dismissed, or patronized, but nor should we draw the wrong conclusions, about the wave of populism.

The answer is not to put up barriers or weaken trading systems the answer is to give them jobs and a sense of respect and to show how trade can work for both sides how fair exchange benefits everyone is not zero sum.

The answer is for great nations such as India and Britain to tackle their concerns together not to go back to the world of the 1930s with strong men in power everywhere with autarkic and beggar thy neighbour policies of tariffs and other barriers to trade.

You may remember Lord Copper of the Beast, in Evelyn Waugh’s satirical novel scoop, published in 1936 who personally briefs a young reporter about his world view, and the coverage he wants to see. “The policy of the Beast is for strong, mutually antagonistic governments everywhere,” he says.

Well, that is not my policy, and it is not our policy. We believe still in military cooperating in the UK, and we believe in NATO as the cornerstone of our defence and we are one of the few countries in the alliance to meet the target of spending two per cent of our GDP and we have shown our commitment to our collective security in sending a battalion to Estonia as part of Nato’s enhanced forward presence.

We support the UN in holding to account the regimes of such men as Bashar al Asad and by the way we were the first P5 country to call for India to join the Security Council as well as the Nuclear Suppliers Group.

Like India we know the threats of terrorism - and I can tell you that some of my wife’s family were there that night in Mumbai in 2008 when the appalling attacks took place - and we are already working together to tackle those threats with ever greater intelligence sharing and we have some of the most formidable intelligence capabilities in the world; and we have no inhibitions in sharing our most advanced technology with India.

Take the Hawk jet trainer – a world beating aircraft, designed and made in Bangalore by Hindustan aeronautics, in alliance with BAe systems; and I know Mr Jaishankar said this morning, he thought Europe was in danger of shrinking from the world. I am here to tell you in the nick of time, this is not the UK’s ambition.

We have reach, we have just decided to restore our military presence east of Suez with a £3 bn commitment over ten years and a naval support facility in Bahrain We have a commitment to the whole world.

The Royal Air Force has just sent Typhoon fighters to Japan and South Korea on Exercise Eastern Venture, showing that Britain remains one of a handful of countries able to deploy air power 7,000 miles from our shores.

We have ambition. Our Strategic Defence and Security Review makes clear that the Royal Navy’s new aircraft carriers will be present in Asian waters.

The Five Power Defence Arrangement – which joins Britain with Malaysia, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand – remains the only permanent and multilateral defence pact in Asia.

Twice a year, British forces exercise alongside our allies in South-East Asia.

And as our naval strength increases in the next ten years, including two new aircraft carriers, we will be able to make a bigger contribution. In the Indian Ocean, we have a joint UK-US facility on Diego Garcia – an asset that is vital for our operations in the region.

We’re also a member of the UN Command on the Korean Peninsula; while in Brunei we have a deployable garrison of British Gurkhas.

And like this country we have our principles, a similar approach to the world.

When it comes to the tensions in the South China Sea. We are in favour of the rules based order. Britain takes no position on the merits of the competing claims.

But we do take a view on how they are pursued.

We oppose the militarisation of the South China Sea and we urge all parties to respect freedom of navigation and settle their disputes peacefully in accordance with international law.

We regard last year’s ruling by the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague as binding on both China and the Philippines.

Indeed, may I respectfully say to our Indian friends that we believe in respecting all such judgments as binding.

We believe India can be a vital force for stability in this region, the keystone of a giant natural arch, created by the Indian ocean running from Perth in the east to Cape Town in the west.

This is the vast hinterland in which India rightly seeks to influence events and we support Prime Minister Modi in his ambition for India to rejoin the neighbouring geographies. Imagine how wonderful it would be if the nations of south Asia, Afghanistan, India and Pakistan, could break down the barriers of mistrust and make the most of their economic opportunities.

And that is why security matters. Because without trust between countries; without freedom of the sea lanes, 25% of world trade goes through the Straits of Malacca; without a rules based international order, we will find our world reverting to that uncertainty of the 1930s.

When trade declined and we know the consequences of this, and it is declining, as a share of GDP, for the first time since the 1990s, and that is partly why I am so excited by the opportunities presented to the UK today. Because as our Prime Minister Theresa May said yesterday, we believe we can strike a new and healthy relationship with the European Union, supportive of the EU.

And as I have said before, we can be outside the main body of the cathedral, but still be a flying buttress, based on free trade and intergovernmental cooperation but allowing us, for the first time in 44 years, to campaign for free trade not just because it is in Britain’s interest but because it has lifted billions out of poverty in the last 50 years and has been the single greatest engine of human progress and that is because free trade and economic interpenetration are of massive mutual benefit and it is a cliché but it is true that Britain and India achieve together what they might never manage to pull off individually.

It is an astonishing fact that India invests more in the UK than it invests in the rest of the EU put together. I need hardly tell you that the biggest manufacturing employer in Britain is an Indian company, which makes beautiful Jaguars in Castle Bromwich I in the West Midlands, and then sells them back to India.

You may have heard that curry restaurants in Britain manage to employ more people than the ship-building, coal mining and steel industries combined, which may explain the struggle that some Britons now have with their waistline.

But I don’t want you to think we are just sitting around crunching poppadoms. We Brits are here too. There are four JCB factories here in India. We have British scientists teaming up with Indian counterparts to fight superbugs.

One in 20 private sector jobs in India is in a UK-owned company, and our trade is growing by 3 per cent a year. But when you consider that this is a country where there are 800 m people under the age of 35 you can see the scale of the opportunity because the population of Ireland is less than 4 million and Britain somehow does more trade with Ireland than with the whole of India.

Prime Minister Modi has laid out an exciting plan for an $830bn infrastructure plan and it is time for British engineers and surveyors and planners and consultants and architects and lawyers and bankers, and I hope they are here today, to step up to the plate and o take part in this incredible development and break down these barriers.

And that is why the time is coming when we need to turbo charge this relationship with a new free trade deal. We can’t negotiate it now. But we can sketch it out in pencil.

And so let us go back to the whisky with which I began.

It is an extraordinary fact that no-one can deny, that even though Scotland is incontestably the home and progenitor of Scotch, the only place in the world where the water trickles through the peaty glen in exactly the right way; to turn into liquid fire even though whisky is itself a Gaelic word uisge beatha. Does anyone know what it means? H2o – water of life.

The total share of Scotch whisky – the authentic whisky – in the Indian market, the biggest single market in the world, is something like 4 per cent netting the UK only £80m a year in exports.

Now imagine if we could just double or treble that – by removing those pesky tariffs and giving the Indian consumer more money to spend on other things to a mere 8 per cent. Think of the boost to the morale of the Indian whisky drinker and the boost to Scottish industry.

And then think how wonderful systematically it would be if we could have zero tariffs on Indian products such as those electric cars or buses that we are now seeing on the streets of London.

This is not the time to put up walls and barriers.

This is the time to tear these barriers down.

We may be leaving the EU, and we may be taking back control of our borders. But my Indian friends, that does not mean we want to haul up the drawbridge or deter Indian talent from our country.

I am proud to say that the UK economy, the fastest growing major economy in Europe, is the most diverse on earth.

With the biggest tech sector in our hemisphere; with the biggest banking sector – indeed 40 per cent of all foreign exchange transactions take place in London. More dollars are bought and sold in London than in New York.

The most visited museums in the world, in fact there are more visitors to the British Museum than to some EU countries, which I won’t name, such is my diplomatic finesse.

We have the best universities in the world – Cambridge alone has produced more Nobel prize winners than every university in China and Russia added together and multiplied by two.

Of the kings, queens, presidents and prime ministers of the world, 1 in 7 was educated in Britain, and that is a ratio we want to keep, and we are improving on.

There are more Chinese students than any other city in the world (other than China, which clearly has a lot) and why do they come because we welcome talent.

And it is by being open, and by breaking down barriers that we will in the long term create the good jobs, and good incomes, that offer real hope and comfort to our electors.

And so let’s work together. Not to ignore or condemn the voices of populism, but to understand and address their concerns Britain and India are united by our values, and by our approach to the problems of the world.

And it is by working together to improve our security that we will allow the freedom and openness that will drive our prosperity.

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