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thelordofgifs · 2 years ago

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hi! while I hate to enable procrastination, I am... kinda doing the same thing and would love to read a dissection of the stabbing scene 👀

also for @that-angry-noldo, @aurorafaann and an anon!! Ty all for indulging me hehe <3 (and sending procrastination solidarity!)

Ok SO. Preface that I figured out the stabbing would occur only after writing part 12 - hence why part 13 foreshadows it very heavily and parts 11-12 more lightly. This is also why I feverishly wrote and published parts 13 and 14 very close together; I was gripped. consumed. I had a VISION. For this reason, the stabbing scene is not actually my best work ever. But! I did put a good amount of thought into it and, a week+ later, I think it holds up.

(This is also a good point to say that I genuinely did not intend to write a really mean cliffhanger and then not update the fic for ages. And I am sorry about that. Frankly, the stabbing felt like an excellent twist and I was worried about how to move the fic on from there without somehow destroying the emotional arc of the last few parts, but I've managed to work it out in the past couple of days which is cause for celebration!)

Anyway, we start out the stabbing scene with Maglor, who has not been having a very fun time lately, just glad to see his big brother again - uncomplicated gladness, for an instant at the end of part 13, but now he slips into his normal mode of feeling Guilty and Inadequate and starts to apologise to Maedhros for losing the Silmaril. But Maedhros is deep in the whole delusional episode situation and reacts oddly to Maglor's apology - which Maglor notices pretty much immediately:

Maglor has made Maedhros his chief study for many years.

He looks at him, now, and understands.

Subtext: Curufin is an Idiot who does not notice thingss but Maglor is a very good brother and we love him <3

Then there is the quiet refrain of Maglor's Rules For Dealing With Maedhros In A State: he is very careful with him, trying not to startle him or contradict him, making sure not to touch him. He is doing everything right! It's just that Maedhros has been spiralling so badly that that isn't enough.

Sidenote, but: I love writing Maedhros and Maglor interactions. I am in the silm fandom to write Maedhros and Maglor interactions. They are my bread and butter. This is the first time the two of them have met since Part 3, the first time they've had a proper conversation since Part 1 (!!), and so in addition to having obvious plot significance I really wanted this scene to depict some of the essential elements of their dynamic as I see it. So: Maglor's guilt, a dollop of mutual caretaking, all that endless complicated love, and! a thing I like to do! Mirrored dialogue!!

OKAY now I get to talk about the dialogue in this scene, which is my favourite part of it.

The boys' last conversation in the silm is one of my favourite pieces of dialogue, like, ever. It has so much tragic weight behind it; and the way their lines build off each other, reflect each other, is just perfection. Maedhros: "Who shall release us?" Maglor: "If none can release us..." To me this sets them up as foils for each other SO perfectly. When I write them I try to incorporate a little of this dynamic - they are both good with words, they like to debate with each other, and they often good-naturedly turn the other's words back on them.

I couldn't do this overtly in the stabbing scene because, frankly, I was in a possessed haze and wasn't thinking that deeply about it. But it did come through a little: "No doubt it amuses you," Maedhros says, and Maglor responds with, "Nothing that hurt you could ever amuse me." (Also, more subtly: "If none of it was real at all--" -> "It was real, Nelyo, I promise.")

More intentionally, Maedhros and Maglor are using very different registers of speech in this scene. Generally in tfs I don't make too much effort to make dialogue sound Tolkien-esque, as I do in my other fic; part of the tfs style is rooted in informality, so that Fingon can make a veiled sex joke to Curufin, and Mablung can casually say "Sure is" in response to a question. Maglor is adhering to this "standard style", so to speak: he uses contractions liberally, splices his commas, and so on. Maedhros, on the other hand, is speaking very formally: no contractions, a slightly more archaic way of constructing sentences: "If he lives" vs the more modern "if he's alive". This is deliberate! They're speaking Quenya in this scene, the language of their childhood, but while Maglor is using casual, familiar tones, Maedhros has reverted to very formal, classical Quenya - the sort that's one step removed from being a language solely of lore. This is what Maedhros spoke in Angband (Sauron is a language enthusiast, after all!) - a conscious effort to demarcate himself the High King of the Noldor, and the son of the world's best linguist. But because he's in such a bad place he is also swinging between registers, dropping in contractions on occasion, stumbling over and repeating his words as he grows more overcome.

I do humbly think Maedhros went OFF with dialogue here actually. "You have overstretched your hand, Sauron. He cannot be both dead and alive. You will have to pick one." and “Well, then, which is it? If he is dead then you are only a wraith wearing his shape. If he lives – and – and none of it was real at all—” and "I do not, I do not want this anymore. It was – it was not so terrible, when I could still pretend – but now – you are only taunting me now, doing this. Let it end." HE'S SO UPSET

Another thing that's impossible to get through in English is the use of formal vs informal second person: unfortunately in modern English, "thou/thee" sounds hopelessly archaic, so I couldn't have Maglor use it without breaking the casual and familiar vibe I was going for with his dialogue. But, in my head, he is thou-ing and thee-ing the whole time, whereas Maedhros is using the crushingly formal "you" instead. A little of this came across, hopefully, through Maglor's repeated use of Maedhros' childhood nickname: he calls him Nelyo in pretty much every sentence he speaks, whereas Maedhros, importantly, does not address Maglor by name even once.

Okay I just spent five paragraphs talking solely about dialogue WHY are you people indulging me like this. Moving on. In terms of actual plot... well, I think how well the scene works depends on how overt you found the foreshadowing in earlier parts. Did anyone predict that Maedhros would attack Maglor? If so, I imagine a lot of the mounting tension in the scene is kind of pointless. If not... the fact that Something Is Wrong is hopefully obvious from the start; the reader knows, unlike Maglor, that Maedhros has been having a terrible time of it. By the time Maglor has failed a couple of times to make any headway in convincing Maedhros, I was intending you to grow steadily more stressed. And

(It's worth noting that, with the exception of the twins, Maglor and Curufin are the two sons of Fëanor who most resemble each other: they have the same colouring, and they're both slighter than their brothers, with the same long skilful fingers.)

(It is not implausible that a shape-shifter, tired of impersonating Curufin, might switch to Maglor's form without too much difficulty.)

This small break from the close, limited Maglor POV that most of the scene is in, to give a quick glimpse of what's going on in Maedhros' head, was intended to Freak The Reader Out. Maedhros has literally just planned to kill the thing impersonating Curufin in Part 13 - if he is now starting to suspect that it's here with him, that killing it is the key to breaking the illusion, shit is getting serious.

Maglor gets out of bed. MAGLOR WHY ARE YOU GETTING OUT OF BED. He is almost afraid of Maedhros. MAGLOR BE MORE AFRAID OF MAEDHROS.

Maedhros says, "It was – it was not so terrible, when I could still pretend – but now – you are only taunting me now, doing this. Let it end." He has spent some time debating whether or not he prefers the illusion to the reality of his captivity - and he wasn't sure - but now that Sauron is mocking him with the image of his dead brother, he has decided enough is enough.

Maglor's bad leg gives out. Before he can fall Maedhros catches him, putting his right arm around Maglor's waist.

This is partially cute. Maedhros still has his big brother instincts, even like this! He isn't going to let Maglor fall!

But alarm bells were intended to be Extremely Ringing here. Maedhros puts his right arm around Maglor. His left hand is still free. His left hand is still free–

And Maglor, who is still just absolutely not realising how much danger he is in, responds to this extremely worrying statement by saying, "Thank you, Nelyo," - was he not LISTENING?? Maglor!!!!

Then, of course, Maedhros stabs Maglor, Maglor's instinctive response is to comfort him (do I need to get back on the "Maglor is an excellent brother" soapbox or can we take that as given), he sings him a lullaby - callbacks to Part 1 and the Carcharoth encounter, Maglor has sacrificed himself for Maedhros more than once in this fic - before just sitting down to die. That was a clear image in my head for a while: Maglor sitting in a pool of blood, singing quietly, Maedhros' head in his lap and the Silmaril in his hand, and then the orc-horns sounding outside for extra cliffhangeriness. In fact this is probably my single favourite image of the fic. I just love them ok.

This is SO LONG and so procrastinatey but also an extremely fun exercise actually!! I am now fired up to go and work on part 15.

#asks #leucisticpuffin #the fairest stars #maedhros #maglor #this was so much fun tysm!!

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archinform · 6 months ago

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Life is…Life

"A plate is a plate. A man is a man. Life is ... Life."

Reflecting on Jean-Luc Godard's Vivre sa vie

[I originally published this post on September 4, 2009, in my blog Running Into Myself, while living and teaching in China.]

"...I don't think there's any better way to fight off the chill of winter than a big bowl of carbohydrates swimming in melted butter." David Lebovitz, Wed., Dec 31, 2008 Imagine if all the tumult of the body were to quiet down, along with our busy thoughts. Imagine if all things that are perishable grew still. And imagine if that moment were to go on and on, leaving behind all other sights and sounds but this one vision which ravishes and absorbs and fixes the beholder in joy, so that the rest of eternal life were like that moment of illumination which leaves us breathless. Saint Augustine

Anna Karina in Vivre sa vie

Among my obsessions lately have been all things French; witness my continual references to David Lebovitz' blog about food and Paris.

I've also been watching a bunch of French films recently. Is it my imagination, or am I understanding more of the dialogue, since the downloads and DVDs don't include English subtitles? Jean-Luc Godard's Vivre sa vie (1962), which I watched again last night for the third or fourth time, is rapidly becoming one of my favorite movies.

Nana in a cafe, opening scene of Vivre sa vie

I was mesmerized by the unusual, voyeuristic camera placement that often photographs conversations showing the backs of people’s heads; by the informal, everyday atmosphere of Paris in the early 60s; and, most of all, by the images of Anna Karina (then married to Godard). The film, above all, seems to be a meditation on her face in its many expressions and moods. It's a many-layered evocation of life, living, choices, and death, through masterful use of sound, silence, symbolism, dialogue, and camera work.

"The film was made by sort of a second presence," Godard said; "the camera is not just a recording device but a looking device, that by its movements makes us aware that it sees her, wonders about her, glances first here and then there, exploring the space she occupies, speculating."

Anna Karina

The streetwalker's endless beat begins

The story in brief: a young woman's loss of income leads her to become a prostitute; she hooks up with a pimp, eventually finds love, and finally, er, suffers a tragic and abrupt end. Can you even imagine an early 60s American film dealing matter-of-factly with prostitution? (Vivre sa vie includes a voice-over, clinical dissection of the facts and daily routine of a prostitute's life) Yes, I know Shirley MacLaine played a whole series of hookers-with-a-heart-of-gold, but the word was never used. Nor did money change hands. Nor did we ever get a great shot like this:

Some things are slightly less obvious, though:

Anna Karina as...Louise Brooks?

Louise Brooks, 1920s

Compare the expression on Karina's face above with with that of actress Ellen Andrée in Degas' painting of L' Absinthe below:

Edgar Degas, Dans un café (L'Absinthe), 1875 -1876, oil on canvas,H. 92,0 ; L. 68,5 cm. Musée d’Orsay

This has always been one of my favorite paintings, maybe because of the deep alienation and sadness in the woman's downcast eyes. She also reminds me of my mother, who had a lot of her own sadness.

Enough said. You'll just have to watch the film, or read an excellent interpretation here:

https://www.sensesofcinema.com/2000/cteq/vivre/

Oh, and don't let the conversation about the chicken confuse you:

Nana's lover tells her about a homework assignment submitted by a little girl to his father the teacher. In this essay, the little girl writes: "The chicken has an inside and an outside. Remove the outside and you find the inside. Remove the inside and you find the soul."

Criterion trailer for Vivre sa vie

#Godard #Vivre sa Vie #Anna Karina #film #France #Jean-Luc Godard

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coffeewithcutcaffeine · 11 months ago

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Nobody move because I am celebrating the entire month. Tiffany and Ethan are back and I am ready to bask in the sheer beauty of these two souls — as well as in your marvellous and magical writing that steals my breath away once more. Witnessing the magnificence that is your storytelling fills my heart with endless joy. 🥺️❤️️

First things first, I will always be utterly in love with how you set each and every one of your scenes — the mood, the feelings it invokes in the reader, the way you use the perfect words to capture the essence of what is unfolding. And this was no different because immersing myself into the hustle and bustle of the chaos that is Edenbrook on Monday morning nearly gave me fifty shades of anxiety skdjsksjfkshd and of course, Dr. Ramsey once again perfectly embodies my spirit animal in these instances!

“Mondays suck!”

Striding across the hustly-bustly pediatric ward, Doctor Ramsey overhears an agitated boy explicitly expressing his annoyance.

This literally has me wheezing on the floor sksksk.

It is the way that you always craft Ethan so masterfully, perfectly grasping the very spirit and core of his character while managing to build on it and expand him in such depth that it makes one's head spin. You truly are one of the writers that understand him like no other, that never see him as just another sexy and hunky love interest but give him the love and care you would to a living and breathing human being (and just the same goes for my beloved Miss Tiffany who is a delight and a goddess). And that is why he feels so real to me, almost to the point you could cross the street and meet him somewhere. He is a tricky character but always remains safe in your hands.

A pang of dejection pierces Ethan all of a sudden when a long-forgotten fragment of the past he buried flashes through his mind. Before its splinters reopen old wounds, he swiftly pushes the unwanted memory back to the unexplored depths of his psyche.

As soon as the elevator door closes behind Ethan, the confined space becomes his temporary resort. He takes a deep breath, rubbing his sunken, aweary eyes to relieve the tension—an aching remnant of the sleepless night. The exhaustion begins to mess with his senses, but it’s nothing out of the ordinary; permanent fatigue has been his steadfast companion for more than a decade of his career as a doctor.

Proof 1,087,095,538,183 why I love and admire your works to the point I would dissect it word for word and write a whole dissertation on it. You explore every nook and crevice of this man. He does not escape your keen eye and your brilliant mind. (Also, these paragraphs make my heart shatter, but I am a glutton for angst and pain and suffering, so my little dark heart thanks you for this. 😌)

“You wouldn’t even know what to do with it.”

“No need to worry, it’s not contagious.”

It's the trademark dry sense of humour for me, and no one does it like Miss Hilde! 🙏❤️️

Ethan acknowledges that he must ignore the tempest raging inside his chest, but he’s unable to focus on anything else other than the energy she exudes, luring him in like a siren’s song.

Another thing that I adore so much about your writing is that you make Ethan sexy in an irresistible, refined way. I have grown quite fed up with the alpha macho types that always make my skin crawl, but your Ethan is just not that nor ever will he be — he is respectful of her even when he often breaks her heart which kind of makes you want to hit him because who would ever hurt such a wonderful woman that Tiffany is?, he never looks at her as if she were a piece of meat but rather as pure magic conjured up in front of his eyes, you can tell he is obsessed with her but not in a possessive way; it is with pure devotion and awe. Even when he lusts for her, it feels so sacred. Long story short, this is a man who will never fail to make my knees buckle. 🥺️

This isn’t the first time the infamous Doctor Terminator is utterly powerless in the face of her—the most intriguing mystery he’s tempted to unravel for some godforsaken, unfathomable reason.

I get it, Ethan. She makes my heart skip a beat, too. ❤️️

As though pulled by a magnet, his feet carry him towards the room while Ethan shuffles through a myriad of excuses plausible enough to start a conversation. A good excuse, however, requires an elaborate background story, supported by a carefully planned follow-up—both of which clearly out of his reach at the moment.

IT'S THE WAY THIS IMPLICITLY SHOWS HE IS LOWKEY NERVOUS AND YES!!! We love a perfectly composed man who loses his shit at the sight of the actual goddess.

The visual representation of me in this moment:

Long onyx locks neatly tamed in a sleek bun reveal the exquisitely sculpted contour of her features, its sharp edges so far removed from the overpowering warmth hiding in her sparkling emeralds and tenacious kindness dripping from the corners of her full mouth.

Seeee?!?! This is what I am talking about; the way his attraction borders — no, transcends — worship. He is mentally sinking to his knees at the sight of her.

Loud, treacherous voice snarls inside his mind like a beast at the gates of his sanity.

Is that all he’s become? A disappointment, a fraud. One of the best diagnosticians of the generation, the esteemed Dr. Ethan Ramsey is consistently failing to do his job. His own mind appalls him—once the most treasured asset, his pride and joy, now compromised, useless, struggling to cut through the veil of his inappropriate longing.

We love it when Ethan Ramsey hits his personal mental multiverse of madness. Make him suffer a little more. 🤭 (Not me showing my love for favourite characters by craving to see them dragged through mud and blood and tears and—)

This isn’t staring, this is a comprehensive risk assessment.

Is that what we call it these days? 😂

The short clack doesn’t make her flinch, though she straightens immediately, a glimmer of surprise shining in her riveting eyes when she looks up at the intruder and deems him worthy of a smile.

"deems him worthy of a smile" — Someone should tattoo this on that fool's forehead so that he remembers how goddamn lucky he is whenever he looks at himself in the mirror.

“Before you drop your sarcastic grenades on me: no, I have not found my true calling elsewhere. I have not been slacking up either. These aren’t even mine, so insulting someone else’s artistic skills would be totally inappropriate.”

It's the sarcasm and intellect for me that makes me lose my wits for good. Ethan Ramsey can you fight. 🤨🤨🤨

“Early Pollock must cost a fortune or two. How come such rare artworks ended up in your possession?”

“You made a pretty solid assumption, Doctor Ramsey, but I have to disappoint you: early Pollock had an affair with surrealism and his style was way more compositional than this.”

*makes screeching noises* I did not expect to see that, but I assess it, I approve it, I fall in love with them even more.

Also, I am always and forever in love with the intellectual level of your writing. Your pieces always scratch the right spots on my brain every single time. You don't just mention they are intelligent — it drips from every single word they utter, from the way how deeply they contemplate the world around them.

Miss Addams and her irreplaceable wit painfully remind him of the golden rule he often pretends doesn’t concern his giant ego: do not speak on the topics your knowledge of is insufficient.

When she outsmarts him >>>>>>> She is so hot for that.

Doctor Addams gasps theatrically and presses her slender fingers to her mouth, lowering her head slightly. “What gave me away?”

She has me blushing!!!

Except he wants this. He needs to feel her.

Even though the mere ghost of an idea may bring his demise, he cannot break free, imprisoned by the torturous vision of her vanilla-scented skin gliding smoothly against his.

I don't even know what to add other than I am making velociraptor sounds. What the heck. The tenderness of the moment, the sheer intimacy, the beauty of how simple and yet meaningful it is. The impact it makes, it literally crushes you under the weight of how moving and beautiful it is. These sentences are my kryptonite, the tsunami that crashes into me.

The sky didn’t tear in half, there was no divine retribution exacted upon a sinner like him, no sign of punishment fit for his appalling misdeed.

No but the sheer poetry of your magnificent writing, the way you weave together such magic with mere words. It's just one sentence, but the heaviness of it on one's heart, the wide spectrum of emotions and inner turmoil this captures... This goes onto my list of the best quotes I have ever stumbled upon in literature. This is everything to me.

“The balance between mockery and flattery is a bit too delicate to be used in a professional environment, don’t you agree, Addams?”

Like he's not doing that all the time. 🥴️ Liar, liar, pants on fire, indeed.

„An attending befriending his intern? I can’t see that happening.”

Ooooh, my darling... If you knew the ways you befriend each other soon skdhskfhskdjf you would not believe your luck, mister.

She mimics the military salute, right hand raised sharply, touching her forehead, fingers and thumb extended and joined, palm facing down. „The colossal pain in your ass reporting for duty, sir.”

No but I love it when she has her silly and playful moments. This woman is such a multi-dimensional, real-like being, I am utterly obsessed with the woman you have created through Tiffany. A girl can only hope to ever reach just a bit of her brilliance. ❤️️

At last, Doctor Terminator’s perpetually grim face blooms with an ear-to-ear smile, so wide and genuine that Tiffany blinks once, twice, most probably questioning whether the exceptionally unusual scene in front of her is real.

Ooooh, after what feels like an eternity, we get to see him smile! 🥰️

“You should smile more. You…” Her plush lips part when she trails off, then sucks in a breath, as if to stop the profanation of their professional relationship jumping on the tip of her tongue from slipping out recklessly.

Hell must have frozen over: his fearless protégée, strong-willed and sharp-tongued at all times, befuddles him with this uncommonly demure armor plate she has put on. The most challenging obstacles and cases fail to break her down, stress and pressure never threaten her admirable strength, and yet there she is—bleeding from her own sword.

This drills a hole in my HEART she can be so soft and precious, I am weeping. 😭❤️️

She freezes, visibly offended, but still intent on avoiding his gaze. “I know. I want to.”

Ramsey, move your ass, I am marrying this woman right now.

Wasting no time, Ethan scoots to the exact place where she stood prior to this moment, soaking up the delicious cloud of fragrance, unable to resist sniffing the air like some sort of disgustingly pathetic creep.

We love to catch this man red-handed. 🤭

Beyond dispute, Ethan Ramsey is not an easy man to defeat. The King of Quiet Desperation wears his broken crown with arrogance, each burnished gem representing his sins, though the ultimate one hasn’t brought him down yet.

He doesn’t have many vices—she is all of them.

How am I supposed to carry on with my life after these words? How am I supposed to simply close this app and move on with my day when I have witnessed the pearly gates of heaven with this masterful prose.

Thank you, my beloved Hilde, for gracing us with this masterpiece — although is there a work of yours that would not be ever worthy of this title? These are the moments when one can feel so blessed to have eyes and the capacity to absorb and bask in the beauty of your writing. And still I think a single word will never do justice to the magic you create through your storytelling. Thank you for an absolute literary feast, for making me forget the world for a while so I could curl into myself and quickly reread this wonder to type up a reaction that will never fully convey the emotions I feel right now. Thank you for giving me the pleasure to once again rediscover my love for great love stories, for making me find a bit of love in my heart for Ethan's character again. Thank you for once again letting us witness the sheer wonder that is Miss Tiffany. Hands down, they will always be one of my most cherished couples.

Hopefully you grace us with a piece of heaven again. Meanwhile, I will be waiting patiently and rereading your exquisite works some more. 🥰️❤️️

Vices & Virtues - Ethan Ramsey x MC

Dr. Ramsey's weaknesses don’t disturb his everyday life often, but when they do, a certain intern happens to always be involved.

Book: Open Heart, Intern Year (between Chapters 5 & 6)

Warnings: language, my rusty writing, a truckload of pining

Rating/Category: Teen+ / fluffy angst

Author’s note: [insert the ‘surprise, bitch’ & 'it's been 84 years' reaction GIFs]

I’m eternally grateful for the very few angels still waiting for new E&T content—this one’s for you 🫶🏻 Hope you’ll find a moment to read my word vomit and enjoy the mess (aka my writing). I appreciate every comment and like more than words can convey!

Edenbrook is indigestible on Mondays. Though Ethan Ramsey doesn’t believe in whatever ‘curse’ the human kind attributed to an absolutely random day, he cannot deny the madness that usually ensues upon the beginning of each week. An inexplicable air of post-weekend malaise does tend to envelop the globe, and Boston is no lucky exception.

“Mondays suck!”

Striding across the hustly-bustly pediatric ward, Doctor Ramsey overhears an agitated boy explicitly expressing his annoyance.

Ethan’s Monday has been a doozy of a day as well, but he’d rather keep his troubles six feet under, preferably in concrete. Nevertheless, a drop of sympathy implores him to stop near the patient’s room and watch the scene unfold at a safe distance.

The child blows a raspberry at the nurse preparing him for a corridor-long wheelchair ride, clearly upset about the surgery he’s being taken to.

A heavy sigh followed by the unmistakable giggle of a certain copper-haired radiologist interrupts Ethan’s first break during today’s demanding shift.

“It’s not Monday, kid. It’s just your life.” Doctor Herbert whispers into Ethan’s ear, a large cup of raspberry tea in her hand. “But at least it’s going to be all rainbows and candy again in three weeks.”

Meanwhile, the situation has escalated quickly: a river of tears streams down the young Monday-hater's cheeks now, his concerned mother shooting pleading looks between her shuddering offspring and the strict nurse trying to efficiently finish the task so she could move on with her hectic schedule.

“I don’t think he’s heard you.”

“Gee, Doctor Ramsey, share some of that cheerful attitude with the rest of us!” Liz nudges his side, almost spilling her hot beverage on his foot. She mouths an apology, but his unimpressed gaze falls elsewhere.

“You wouldn’t even know what to do with it.”

“Thank God your interns still haven’t caught that grumpiness you’re suffering from.”

“No need to worry, it’s not contagious.” He gives a dismissive wave of his hand, partially to announce his departure, then continues the journey to his primary destination: the harmonious sanctuary of his private office.

There’s a crack in that orderly, borderline clinical life of his, as big as a closed fist, and he’s slowly beginning to realize its detrimental consequences.

But none of that matters now.

What matters is that his desperate efforts to bend Naveen’s stubbornness weren’t in vain; there’s still hope—a notion Ethan isn’t exactly on board with, but he puts his trust in science, and beyond any doubt science will point him in the right direction. As long as there’s time, he’ll do whatever it takes to save his mentor, his friend. He’s confident he can do it, he’s capable of diagnosing and curing whichever mysterious illness keeps Naveen captive.

He’s the only one who can do it.

A double shot of deep roasted espresso shall help this cause. Or, at the very least, make his Monday slightly more endurable.

Loud metallic thud followed by a streak of bright fluorescent lighting annunciates the arrival. Empty, windowless corridor welcomes his nostrils with the odious mixture of staleness and antiseptic, typical of the office wing on the sixth floor. He operates on autopilot, mindlessly trudging ahead, marginally consoled by the aura of eerie quietude. Blissfully oblivious to what the so-called Manic Monday has prepared for him next.

All his rational thought and peerless logic evaporate into thin air the second his drowsy gaze zooms in on the old waiting room under renovation currently withheld by the recent budget cuts. Within its hoary walls, a familiar sylphlike figure catches his eye, unwittingly staking her claim to his undivided attention.

Ethan’s dire need of coffee has vanished as well; he’s wide awake now.

Smiling to herself, a sense of pride evident in the alluring dimples carved into her cheeks, Doctor Addams arranges a stack of papers atop a massive couch protected by thin plastic sheet.

Ethan acknowledges that he must ignore the tempest raging inside his chest, but he’s unable to focus on anything else other than the energy she exudes, luring him in like a siren’s song.

This isn’t the first time the infamous Doctor Terminator is utterly powerless in the face of her—the most intriguing mystery he’s tempted to unravel for some godforsaken, unfathomable reason.

Everything he knows about Tiffany Addams has been collateral damage from their close proximity and the isolating nature of their work. Against better judgment, Ethan has stored every single crumb of information thrown at him, like it’s a treasure guarded in the vault of his mind, acquiring new pieces and adding them to this clandestine collection.

With certainty, there’s a new element behind that glass wall, ready to be studied in secret.

Fully aware of the possible disaster awaiting inside, Ethan steps into the room quietly, leaning against the doorframe with arms crossed over his chest. A sophisticated scent of sultry vanilla wrapped with notes of luminous lavender pervades the space, handily smothering the musty odor of the old hospital furniture stored here for at least a year.

Heedless of his presence, Tiffany remains locked in her own bubble. She’s seated on the couch, browsing through a large leather bag with a lot of noise.

That stark contrast surely must be a part of her allure, he reckons. Not that there’s any evidence at his disposal—he’s her boss, for fuck’s sake. But the set of cardinal rules applying to the situation doesn’t stop him from looking, nor does it dilute the poison seeping from that singular contaminated thought…

Loud, treacherous voice snarls inside his mind like a beast at the gates of his sanity.

This isn’t staring, this is a comprehensive risk assessment.

Regardless of the pretext, watching her feels almost perverse, but he’s too transfixed to listen to his voice of reason hopelessly trying to redirect him to the path of impeccable propriety.

He can’t look away. Can’t move either. She'll notice him…Eventually.

Perhaps instead of triggering a spiral of destruction, he should address a more pressing matter: why is there a splotch of purple paint on her cheek?

Better late than never, his focus switches from Tiffany to the negligible surroundings. On her left, spread across the polythene-covered couch, lie a couple of ridiculously abstract drawings, colorful and confusing, each of them made with the skill and precision equal to a six-year-old if he has to guess.

Suddenly, it all clicks.

Along with his tongue.

The short clack doesn’t make her flinch, though she straightens immediately, a glimmer of surprise shining in her riveting eyes when she looks up at the intruder and deems him worthy of a smile. Her lush, rosy lips curl up generously, greeting him with a beam so dazzling his body heats up like bare skin kissed by the blazing midday sun in the middle of summer.

The older doctor doesn’t return the cordial gesture—he has a reputation to uphold and his bruised dignity to save. He quickly takes refuge in the shadow of his perfect decorum, dexterously covering the unjustifiable act of treason committed by his very own carnality.

Tiffany, however, is undeterred in her mission to melt his callous indifference with the disarming sincerity of her vivacious spirit.

“I wouldn’t dare to insult a respected artist and credit you with their art.” He retorts flatly, then spills the aforementioned sarcasm like the Lord intended. “Early Pollock must cost a fortune or two. How come such rare artworks ended up in your possession?”

His comment inspires a peal of infectious laughter; the powerful melody of Tiffany’s unadulterated amusement conquers the room, all but obliterating the chronic sternness of Ethan’s face.

He cannot help but bask in the glory of this unexpected outcome: he’s the reason behind the glorious, velvety sound; she’s laughing because of him.

“You made a pretty solid assumption, Doctor Ramsey, but I have to disappoint you: early Pollock had an affair with surrealism and his style was way more compositional than this.” She points at the glittery mess splashed in the center of one of the pieces, not so subtly suppressing another wave of laughter.

Miss Addams and her irreplaceable wit painfully remind him of the golden rule he often pretends doesn’t concern his giant ego: do not speak on the topics your knowledge of is insufficient.

Lustrous vivid-green eyes fixed on him and the urgency he’s facing at the moment leave him no choice but to quickly shake off the embarrassment and adapt his reaction accordingly.

Reluctantly, Ethan clings to brutal honesty. “I’m not an art connoisseur, so I’m afraid I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.”

“Oh, trust me, you would.”

A smudge of amethyst retrieves the diagnostician’s attention for one split second, demanding a seamless change of topic.

“I presume you spent your lunch break on the pediatric ward again, trying to start a new art movement.”

Doctor Addams gasps theatrically and presses her slender fingers to her mouth, lowering her head slightly. “What gave me away?”

Ethan considers revealing the truth through another shot of bluntly delivered sarcasm (something he would have done in any other case), but his body betrays him, subconsciously drawing near Tiffany.

“Apart from the excited chatter on the second floor? Nothing.” He replies, straining to keep his impeccable composure just as she bites into her lower lip tantalizingly in what appears to be keen anticipation.

A few risky steps later she’s at his arm’s length, and he decides to measure that dangerously short distance; akin to an audience member of some ludicrous soap opera, the diagnostician observes his hand move towards the intern’s face in slow motion, as if that bloody limb wasn’t his and the falsely innocent intention swarming inside his incisive, virtuous mind filled him with repulsion.

Except he wants this. He needs to feel her.

Even though the mere ghost of an idea may bring his demise, he cannot break free, imprisoned by the torturous vision of her vanilla-scented skin gliding smoothly against his.

Much to his bewilderment, her breath quickens just as much as his; the evergreen forest in her eyes bursts into flames when their gazes meet, burning his hesitation down.

She wants this too.

Nothing could convince him to refrain from acting on this forbidden desire now, not a single reasonable thought seems to be charged with a cogent argument.

So he lets his thumb brush down her right cheek, down the lick of wet paint smeared across her warm skin, taking most of the dark purple off the silken canvas along the way.

The sky didn’t tear in half, there was no divine retribution exacted upon a sinner like him, no sign of punishment fit for his appalling misdeed.

“Nothing. At. All.”

Nothing but the silky smoothness of her face, rapid rise and fall of her shapely chest, and fiery heat searing through his veins…

Inevitably, the unbearable tension crackling between them dissipates in a flash when Tiffany snorts at the sight of his acrylic-stained thumb, a soundless ‘fuck’ escapes her mouth as she sprints to find a prompt solution for the paintmergency, stripping him of time to ponder on what the living hell just happened.

He takes advantage of the moment, immediately scolding himself, forcing his thoughts to flee from the crime scene concocted by his newly depraved brain.

“Must be your enviable instinct of an outstanding diagnostician then.” Cheeky as ever, she casts a playful eye over Ethan while rummaging through the drawers, summoning him to focus on her.

Within a long minute, she scuttles back to him, stretched arm offering one of the two pieces of paper towel sprayed with hand sanitizer. They use it to rub the paint off their skin. As soon as they’re done, Ethan quips back. Sort of.

“The balance between mockery and flattery is a bit too delicate to be used in a professional environment, don’t you agree, Addams?”

Unintimidated by the tricky question, Tiffany lifts her shoulder in a half shrug. “It all depends on the intelligence of the person you’re speaking with. You’re ultrawealthy in that department, so I assumed you wouldn’t mind some harmless friendly banter.”

“We’re not friends.” The speed with which he retaliates might have just sealed his fate. Deep down, he doesn’t quite believe those words himself, but there are rules to be followed unconditionally, rules that cannot be broken under any circumstances.

Dark, noble brows accentuating the breadth of her radiance crease together in sheer bewilderment. He can almost hear the scoff she’s choking back when she sees right through the cone-shaped hole in the thick wall separating them.

Liar, liar, pants on fire.

“We’re getting there.” She nods vigorously, openly mocking his well-meaning mendacity with lips pursed into a thin line and narrowed eyes surveying him diligently.

„An attending befriending his intern? I can’t see that happening.”

A winning grin lights Tiffany’s features up. „It’s already happening, whether you like it or not.”

The more she pushes forward, infuriatingly so, the more he resists, fortifying his helpless defense.

„Would you be kind enough to explain why on Earth would I let it happen?”

“It’s beyond your control.” She shakes her head. „There’s nothing you can do now.”

He frowns at her, takes her fierce expression in, feigning utter disinterest in the mesmerizing spatter of freckles adorning her glowy skin.

Is the intensity of his glare too revealing? Can there be a flash of ardent curiosity swimming in his eyes and acting up against him?

„You’re awfully confident about all the wrong things, Rookie.”

She mimics the military salute, right hand raised sharply, touching her forehead, fingers and thumb extended and joined, palm facing down. „The colossal pain in your ass reporting for duty, sir.”

This display of her goofiness, derived from the smidgeon of irreverence he’s found himself covertly fond of, successfully penetrates his ruptured facade.

The way she gapes at his mouth almost drills a hole in him—she’s that awestruck, like a pious believer who stumbled upon irrefutable evidence confirming the foundation of her faith.

She wants this too.

“It suits you.”

Ethan’s cheeks erupt with disgraceful heat, resembling an awkward teenager attracting his crush’s attention for the very first time—the feeling almost as mortifying and inexcusable as the unprecedented lack of any snarky response.

As if the worst was yet to come, Tiffany keeps on staring at him with such exhilarating wonder and sureness he doesn’t quite know how to proceed with such abundance of emotion meddling with his stoic approach.

She wants this too.

For a fleeting moment, the abyss of his solitude shrinks significantly, purple paint filling the crack on the illusory contentment with the life he’s chosen, just as her piercing gaze invites him further into the impossible fantasy.

Then, a jolt of sobering guilt runs along his spine in a rude awakening, at the same time when Tiffany realizes the gravity of her daring statement and its perilous implications.

“I, erm…”

“Uhm, my…”

Ethan smashes the uncharacteristic uneasiness descending on them, a benign half-smile and barely perceptible nod encourage her to continue. “Go on.”

Her gaze flickers towards the hall, a tinge of crimson reddening freckled porcelain. “My break is almost over. I should head back to the ER.”

This supremely fascinating token of hidden vulnerability sheds new light on the beguiling collection of contradictions making her whole.

He examines the younger doctor pacing around the room as she gathers her belongings up, stuffing her capacious bag with them. Half-way, she spins to address him directly and points at her cheek.

“Am I…Still…?”

“No, you’re alright. The paint is gone.”

“Splendid.”

As she goes forward, assembling her patients’ drawings into a neat pile, and—rather intentionally—ignoring Ethan, he readjusts his tie and dives headfirst into the pool of her discomfort.

“Addams?”

“Hm?”

“You don’t have to dedicate such a vast portion of your free time to helping others.”

She freezes, visibly offended, but still intent on avoiding his gaze. “I know. I want to.”

“What I meant...Is that you need to add yourself to the equation, Tiffany.”

“I’m doing just fine, thank you.” She scoffs, the barely noticeable defensive undertone reverberating in her firm answer not entirely convincing for the diagnostics virtuoso.

His evaluation is disrupted by the abominably loud beeping of Tiffany’s pager. Their eyes finally clash for a brief shootout with no winner before she shuts the damn thing up.

“Well then. See you later, Doctor Ramsey.” She blurts out hastily without giving him a second glance and turns round to rush out of the room, but stops in her tracks near the door.

Something sparks inside that brilliant mind of hers, reigniting her boldness. Dense curtain of long lashes flutters at him over her shoulder, inky-black and luxurious akin to the finest lace, the signature magnetic smile dancing on her lips again—this time infused with genuine concern. She inspects his countenance for a still moment, inch by inch, crease by crease, until her head falls to the side like she has just uncovered his biggest secret.

“Consider locking the door in your office and getting some rest.”

“Giving me advice isn’t included in your job description.” He sneers, the unnecessarily harsh huff of his disapproval concealing the alien sentiment spilling inside his chest.

Somehow it’s still not enough to antagonize her.

Her eyes bore into his audaciously; the gentleness gleaming from elusive emerald green, reminiscent of safety, offers shelter he despairingly seeks, but cannot take. “But it’s nice to have someone watching out for you, isn’t it?”

Somehow they might have more in common than one would think.

Careful not to expose the motley collection of feelings stirring his blood, Ethan draws in a long breath and slips his hands into the pockets of pristine white coat, perfecting his posture, with tense body standing even taller, as though to appear completely unaffected by her undeniable appeal, more unrelenting.

He’s been looked at countless times, yes, but this must be the first instance where he feels truly seen.

It is indeed nice.

The attending doesn’t say a word, for he would have to agree with the intern. She smirks triumphantly, accepting the tacit disbelief etched on his face as conclusive proof of her diagnosis.

Instead of claiming victory through verbal manifestation of her sass, Doctor Addams attacks him using a different weapon: a provocative wink. “Just think about it.”

With a graceful twirl indicating goodbye, his Rookie struts out, leaving a dizzying mist of her divine scent behind.

Thankfully, there are no witnesses to this particularly revolting descent into madness.

No witnesses to the beginning of his fall.

Mind over heart has never sounded more delusional than now, that his hard-won empire of spotless reason stands on the verge of crumbling. But he’s not giving up–he can’t give up. There’s too much at stake.

Having put the mask of nonchalance back on, Doctor Ramsey turns off the lights and stomps into the empty corridor—his hand still carrying the heavenly softness of Tiffany’s skin like a fingerprint, like a sin, shaky fingers curling at the very thought of the contact—then begins a seemingly casual stroll to his office.

He doesn’t have many vices—she is all of them.

_____

A/N2: Hope you enjoyed this bad boy ❤️ Sorry (not sorry) if it's too long and repetitive...I literally can't shut up when it comes to these two fsksjdkfjs Plus it felt really good to find my writing mojo after such a long time!

PS. If there are any typos and/or mistakes...No, there aren't lol I'm fighting COVID at the moment, so my brain's a little foggy. I had this fic sitting in my drafts and decided to just go with the flow while I'm feverish and can't see any faults sjfskfkjf I'll get back to everyone waiting for a reply when I'm more coherent. Stay safe, lovelies!

#ethan x tiffany #my beloved hilde has me in a chokehold again

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rahleeyah · 3 years ago

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What's your stance on showrunners actively engaging with fans on social media? I'm old & have been thru many fandoms and have never seen someone who got as involved as 💡 did. You know that West Wing episode Sorkin wrote based on his experience with TWoP? The one where CJ threatens to shove a motherboard up Josh's ass unless he stays off his fansite? I always thought 💡 needed a CJ.

I am a firm believer in "the author is dead". That means I think we should engage with the text, and that the audience's interpretation of the text is just as valid as the author's intent. Sometimes the audience gets it wrong - thinking now about the way Lolita, for example, has been grossly misinterpreted - but for the most part once a thing has been released to the public it belongs to the public. The spn show runners, for example, tried their best to beat back their audience's interpretation of the text, were mortified that their work was not being received only in the narrow way they wanted it to be, but the audience was engaging with what was there, and the show runners could scream until they were blue in the face but that didn't change the fact that it was easy to read their work thru a homoerotic lens, and it didn't invalidate that reading. I think most of the time - that's a big caveat, there is a small handful of examples where it's gone well but only a few - no good comes from a show runner being engaged with fans on social media. It is their job to create something according to their vision; it is the audience's job to watch it, and make of it what they will. Too much crossing of that line invites hurt; you will never, ever please everyone, and reading an endless litany of comments from people who disagree with you is disheartening, and attempting to appease the masses instead of pursuing the original vision hurts art. And it hurts the fans who feel like they've screamed until they're blue in the face but still aren't getting what they want. It invites confrontation and ill will.

My favorite comparison here is Neil Gaiman vs JKR. when asked a meta question about something in the good omens verse that is not explicit in the text, his standard response is "I don't know, what do you think?" He does not try to control the narrative, he leaves room for interpretation - and crucially does not endorse any one word of god answer that fans can use to gatekeep one another. JKR couldn't keep her fucking mouth shut, and lost the goodwill of most of her audience.

The fans need space to dissect and celebrate and mock and transform the work in peace without being told they're doing it wrong, and the creators need space to fulfill their vision without being distracted by the noise of fandom. The two spheres shouldn't intersect, imo.

And Josh learned that lesson when he wandered into a space that was about him but not for him. He wanted to control people's perceptions of him, but none of us can do that, not on any level.

In a perfect world, we shouldn't know the names of the show runners. Let someone in the head office monitor socials to make sure there's not a mutiny in the offing, and maybe throw in a pineapple or two, but don't engage.

And definitely don't be sending dms and snippets of unaired scenes to a small group of nasty fans, either.

#anonymous #e.o asks #s.vu

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scapegrace74-blog · 4 years ago

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Ginger Snap, Chapter 2

A/N I am breaking probably the only rule I gave myself when I started writing fanfic, which was Don’t Ever Post a WIP. But lord knows I’m not immune to peer pressure and the narcotic that is reader feedback, so here it is, the second chapter of what is now an open-ended modern AU story about Jamie the Chef and Claire the Kitchen Disaster. Still a first person Claire POV, so I apologize in advance for any stray pronouns.

For the first chapter, I recommend reading it on Ao3, since I’ve made some minor edits since I first posted it on Tumblr. See above re. not planning on posting a WIP.

Oh, and funny story. When I decided to check the location of the real Ginger Snap catering company in Edinburgh, it was squished between “FrazersOnline” and “McKenzie Flooring”. If that’s not kismet, I don’t know what is. The location I describe below, however, is based on a catering venue here in Ottawa called Urban Element, where I’ve attended a few team-building events. I have yet to set anything on fire, though.

I checked my phone for the third time, confirming I wasn’t lost.

Frank and I moved to Edinburgh over the summer, just in time for him to start his position as Associate Professor of History at the University of Edinburgh. Despite our years spent in America, neither of us cared overmuch for driving, so we chose a flat (or rather, Frank chose a flat and I concurred) not far from campus. Therefore, this was the first time I’d ventured as far afield as Leith, a maritime enclave just to the north of the capital that couldn’t seem to decide if it wanted to be grittily working class or artistically hip.

When I finally reached the address, I had to smile. No main street pretensions or non-descript commercial frontage for Ginger Snap Catering. Before me stood a two-story red brick fire station, still emblazoned with the crest of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Services. The two massive truck bays were now enclosed by see-through doors that could be drawn back on a sunny day. Through these a warm yellow light could be seen, spilling onto the grey, damp pavement.

A petite woman with dark hair manned the small reception area, a red-haired toddler clinging to her like a marsupial. She held a phone to one ear while simultaneously pacing the polished concrete floor. I stood as unobtrusively as possible near the door, but in such an open space it was impossible not to overhear her side of the conversation.

“... they willna take ‘im back until ‘is fever goes down... aye, an hour ago when I picked him up but it hasn’t... nay, i dinna think it’s... tis jus’ terrible timing with two weddings t’morrow... Could ye? Och, I owe ye Mrs. Fitz, a million times o’er... Anytime, we’ll be here. Alright, soon.”

The speaker turned to me, the harried look of a working mother sharpening her already honed features.

“I apologize fer keeping ye waiting. What can I do fer ye t’day?”

Before I could respond, the young boy, probably no older than two, began to fuss, rubbing his flushed cheek against his mother’s shoulder.

“Och, mo ghille, Mam kens ye’re poorly. Mrs. Fitz is coming as fast as she may.”

Unable to quell my instinct to diagnose and then cure, I spoke up.

“I couldn’t help overhearing your conversation. Based on his age and the way he’s holding his head, it may be an ear infection.” At the woman’s penetrating look, I hastened to explain: “I’m a doctor. Would you mind if I took a closer look?”

Permission granted, I carefully palpated the boy under the jaw and peered as best I could without an otoscope into the offending ear canal. Confident in my diagnosis, I recommended treatment with a warm compress, an over-the-counter analgesic ear drop, and children’s paracetamol to control his fever. If, after twenty-four hours the symptoms had not improved, they could consider seeing his pediatrician for antibiotics, but these were only truly necessary for a persistent infection.

“Och, ye ‘ave no idea what a relief it is tae hear ye say so, lass. He’s my first bairn, ye ken, an’ I can ne’er tell if I’m over-reacting or being negligent. Can ye say thank ye tae the nice doctor, Wee Jamie?”

My stomach jumped. “Wee Jamie? Is he related by chance to Jamie Fraser?”

“Aye, tis his nephew. I’m Jamie’s sister, Jenny. Ye ken my brother, then?”

The pieces fell into place, and my insides settled.

“We’ve spoken before,” I explained. “I’m Claire Beauchamp. You and your brother helped me with a dinner party emergency last Tuesday. I came to return your market bags, and to thank you again for coming to my aid during my hour of need.”

Jenny and I spoke for another ten minutes, sharing the superficial narratives of two strangers brought together by circumstance. She was warm and thistly by turns, and I felt a longing for the honesty of female friendship that I’d given up when we left Boston. Eventually a matronly woman arrived to collect Wee Jamie. I carefully wrote down the exact names and dosages of my prescribed remedy.

After Mrs. Fitz and Wee Jamie had left, it occurred to me that Jenny needed to get back to work. I’d accomplished what I’d set out to do, even if I hadn’t thanked Jamie himself. As I began to make my goodbyes, however, Jenny interjected. “If ye’re no’ in a rush, why dinna ye join our afternoon cooking class? My brother will be demonstrating how tae make quiche. Tis the least we can do, after ye helped Wee Jamie.”

Which was how I found myself standing behind one of six cooking stations arranged across the fire station’s main area, a bright red apron covering my black slacks and saffron turtleneck. My impetuous curls were slowly breaking ranks from where I’d slicked them into a bun that morning. I worried I looked like a human Pez dispenser.

I glanced at the workstation immediately to my left. A slight woman who I guessed to be roughly my own age was engrossed in her phone, a cheeky smirk playing on her berried lips. Her strawberry blond hair was swept into an effortless chignon that made me twitch with envy. She looked up from her screen and caught me looking her way.

“Geillis Duncan,” she said, offering a well-manicured hand.

“Claire Beauchamp. Pleased to meet you.”

“Is it yer first time taking a class, Claire?” At my nod, she leaned in and whispered conspiratorially: “Ye’re in for a treat.”

Before I could enquire what she meant, a murmur amongst the other students (all women, save one) was accompanied by the heavy tread of work boots on polished concrete and a familiar Scottish burr.

“Good afternoon, everyone. Thank ye fer joining me on this dreich Scottish day. I ken a few of ye are new, so let’s start with a brief overview of yer stations and some basic safety reminders, before we tackle the quiche.”

Today Jamie was wearing a pair of olive pants that tapered down his endless legs and a technical shirt that clung valiantly to his upper body. He looked like he’d just stepped off the nearest rock climbing pitch. I wondered if he owned anything that answered to the name of a professional wardrobe, but I couldn’t deny that he looked impressive, in an athleisure sort of way.

“See what I mean?�� Geillis hissed at me as Jamie made his way to the front of the hall, speaking now about optimal burner temperatures. “That man is a dozen kinds of yes.”

I concentrated on each step of the ostensibly simple recipe. Pie crust had been the previous week’s assignment, so I had only to blind bake the prepared dough already at my workstation. Once I had the crust centered exactly in the pie pan, pierced with a fork in orderly rows and placed in the oven, I rushed to catch up with the others. I’d missed Jamie’s instructions regarding pan frying the bacon, so I increased the flame, thinking I could make up a little time. The fatty meat crackled pleasingly as I set it in the lightly greased pan. I was inordinately proud of myself.

Things went very badly, very fast. First, my eyes wouldn’t stop watering as I meticulously peeled then dissected the onion into near-transparent crescents. Tears obscured my vision and I tried to wipe them away without contaminating my hands. To my left I could make out Geillis skillfully cracking eggs into a glass bowl, her pie crust already elegantly filled with crispy morsels of bacon and caramelized onion bits.

A vague sense of having forgotten something important tickled my mind. My pie crust! Grabbing a silicone glove (I wasn’t making that mistake twice) I rushed to the wall oven and extracted the pan. Giddy with relief, I saw the dough was only a little dark around the edges.

Before I could return victorious to my station, Jamie uttered a Scottish noise of alarm from his vantage at the front of the class. We both rushed across the room to where my rashers of bacon now resembled blackened shoe laces obscured by a heavy veil of smoke. With practiced ease, Jamie lifted the entire skillet into the adjacent sink and turned on the cold water. A cloud of steam enveloped his head, highlighting his auburn curls. I bit my lip as he looked my way in amusement.

“I hope ye werena planning on serving quiche to yer faculty guests t’night, Ms. Beauchamp?”

I stood meekly next to Geillis for the remainder of the class, no longer trusted around open flame without adult supervision. She graciously allowed me to extract her quiche when it was done baking. It looked like a magazine cover. Meanwhile, my workstation looked like the scene of an industrial accident.

While we were waiting for her quiche to cook, Geillis and I got to know each other a little better. She was a Highland lass from up near Inverness. Married to a wealthy older man, her life sounded like an endless quest for diversion. Despite this, or because of it, she had a sharp-witted frankness that I appreciated. She was also a hard-core gossip.

“Wee besom,” she remarked with a nod towards a blond girl who was currently monopolizing Jamie’s attention with endless questions punctuated by manufactured giggles and flicks of her pin-straight hair. “Tha’s Laoghaire Mackenzie of the Mackenzie brewing dynasty. They’ve a live-in cook, so there’s only one reason she attends these classes, and it isna for the quiche.”

I watched Jamie laugh over something the girl said, mineral eyes alight and his perfect white teeth on display. I suppose I couldn’t blame her. I wasn’t here for the quiche either.

The interminable ninety minute lesson finally ended. I thanked Geillis profusely and we exchanged numbers before she rushed off for her reiki treatment. Gathering my trench coat and purse, I tried to slink away without calling any further attention to myself.

“Ms. Beauchamp!”

I cursed under my breath, then turned to face him.

“Please, call me Claire. After I nearly burned down your place of business, we should probably be on a first name basis.”

Jamie chuckled. It sounded more natural and lived-in than his earlier response to Laoghaire, but I was likely fooling myself.

“Och, wha’s a cooking demonstration wi’out a wee bit of drama. Will ye be joining us next week? We’ll be making ceviche, sae I willna need tae put the fire brigade on stand-by.”

“Bastard,” I replied to his cheeky smirk. “Alas, I don’t think I’m cut out to be a cook. It appears to be the one science I can’t master.”

“Cooking isna a science, Claire,” he explained with sincere intensity. “Tis an art. Perhaps tha’s the root of yer struggle.”

“Perhaps it is. But in that case, I may as well give up now. I haven’t an artistic bone in my body.”

His languorous perusal of said body lit a different kind of flame in my belly. Geillis was right; he really was a dozen kinds of yes.

“I canna say as I agree. Come back any time if ye’d like tae try again.”

I blushed, thoroughly discomfited by his blatant flirting. He knew about Frank. He’d fled from him onto my fire escape, for Christ’s sake! Maybe when you looked like James Fraser, every interaction with a woman was merely a chance to hone your craft. Or maybe he was truly ignorant of his effect.

“I’ll take that under advisement. Thank you again, Jamie.”

“Until the next time, Arsonist.”

#my writing #outlander #ginger snap

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ikuzeminna · 4 years ago

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Scene Analysis - Heero’s Farewell

AKA The Helmet Scene

This is one of the most famous scenes in the entire series. And it’s certainly one of the most interesting as well, thanks to a number of factors. We have a mood change, we have Heero finally fulfilling his promise to Relena to bid her farewell, we have a clear picture of how their relationship has evolved throughout the series, we have a retcon of the previous episode to make this scene work and a million other things, frankly. So, let’s get to dissecting it.

First, the setup. The previous two episodes, episode 46 and 47, present us with a Heero who, in my opinion, acts a lot like during the beginning of the series. It may just be me, but he comes off as rather brusque. Sure, he and Relena may be throwing compliments at each other, but there is a curtness to his tone and the ordering around (”You’ll stay here with me”) that annoy me personally. When Relena initially asks him if he came for her he even deflects, claiming that Noin and the others are worried about her. Sure.

Again, I don’t like it.

If I had to guess, I’d say Ikeda’s intention of not making their relationship romantic but keeping it symbolic paired with being unable to write normal teenager relationships is at play here. I’m putting the blame on him since he is the director, but I may be wrong, so sorry if I am. In any case, the farewell between Heero and Relena is just a loaded glance. They don’t speak, there is a huge distance between them, they just look at each other meaningfully and then Heero gets ready to fight. It’s pretty much Earth and Space, ever at a distance, yet bound by ...uh, something.

Come episode 48, the other writers apparently bound and gagged Ikeda, locked him up in a closet and gave us take 2 of the farewell, which the fandom knows as the helmet scene. And it really shows that someone else was in charge during the last two episodes because we suddenly have the most gentle, most tender sounding Heero in the entire series, complete with sparkly eyes and teddy bears.

And this, I like because the point of Heero’s character arc is regaining his humanity. So having him act like in the beginning kinda ruins that. So thank you, person, who made these decisions.

To clarify, episode 47 has Relena in a dark hangar with her helmet in her hands looking up at Heero who is about to board Wing Zero. He then enters the cockpit and closes it. That’s apparently the end of their interaction. Come episode 48 though, the hangar is lit, the helmets are on and the cockpit is wide open for Relena to jump up and talk to Heero one last time.

And here we see the aforementioned mood change. Gone is Heero’s brusque tone and his weird reluctance to admit any kind of fondness or affection. Instead, he freaking pulls her in during the conversation, because an inch from your face is the ideal distance when speaking to a person apparently. And not just that; he is softly smiling at her the whole time and instead of making it an order, he gently asks her to let him go.

I trust everyone can see how glaringly different this is from their interaction in the previous two episodes.

And there is so much more still. In their conversation Heero reveals his newly made promise to protect Relena (and the Earth Sphere). This goes aaaall the way back to Cinq, where he initially told Quatre he didn’t see much sense in fighting for Relena or her country. Through the various events, he did end up protecting her though, then he was forced to attempt to assassinate her again as Chief Representative of Romefeller and now we are at the point where the peace Relena promises, or at least wants to fight for, is something that Heero believes in.

This is so important for his character because he was the guy who would spout stuff like peace only being the result of war and not believing in it. This is also the lesson he later tries to make Wufei see in their fight in Endless Waltz. Heero is not a soldier anymore at that point; he has become a normal kid who belongs to and wishes for a peaceful world. So yeah, very important moment here.

It really makes me wonder why anyone thought the loaded stare of ep. 47 was enough.

Even more so because here Heero finally fulfills the promise he made Relena back in Cinq: he bids her farewell before leaving. Back in Cinq, and frankly, in all their previous interactions, Heero would just up and leave without a word. It started in episode 6, it happened in 10 and again in Cinq when he went on the suicide mission to Luxembourg. And Relena didn’t even ask anything special of him. She just wanted him to let her know when he’d leave. She didn’t demand a reason, she didn’t want to give him permission, it was just a simple goodbye she wanted.

Yet, Heero does all of the above when they talk. He tells her why he leaves to fight, he asks her to let him go and when she refuses, thinking he is intending to kill himself again for the billionth time, Heero shines even more light on his character development by telling her to believe in him. He isn’t trying to die on the battlefield.

Heero pushes Relena out of the cockpit at this point and gives her a look that honestly creeps me out a little even to this day, as the cockpit closes and he maneuvers Wing Zero into position to take off. Relena, placated by his plea and stare, says the she does believe in him.

And then, because he may not plan to die but is prepared to do so nonetheless if it can bring peace, he actually holds up his end of the promise and tells her that which she previously wished to hear. And it’s wonderful, because he really shouldn’t have.

See, at this point Relena has witnessed and heard of seven attempts and brushes with death of Heero’s. On the beach, at the harbor, falling down the side of the hospital, blowing himself up with his Gundam, asking the Noventas to kill him, nearly getting slaughtered by Zechs and then later by the mobile dolls in Luxembourg, this girl has seen a lot with him. So it’s a very reasonable assumption of hers to think he would do the same thing again here and throw his life away. Which is why Heero has to assure her that’s not his intention.

But because he knows the risks, he knows this might be the last time they talk, so he kinda chickens out a bit there after that bold “believe in me” and bids her farewell nonetheless, just to be on the safe side, I assume. Because he later also tells her not to worry over him since his life isn’t worth much anyway.

And while getting her wish of hearing a goodbye should normally make her happy, Relena freaks here. Here he is, a friend she has known for a long time and who means a lot to her, as he was what gave her the strength to carry on after her father died, sounding like he isn’t going to return. And Relena is heartbroken because Heero is important to her. The parallels to her father show us how much Heero’s death would affect her.

Her crying out Heero’s name in that agonized manner isn’t meant to be taken romantically. This is a girl fearing her friend will die.

I really love this entire scene because it not only gives us heaps of character development and normal human interaction, which those two sorely lack, it also brings a bunch of stuff full circle, illustrates their personalities well and makes for another interesting break from traditions.

What I mean with the last point is that normally (or at least in the 90s), the guy is all business when he has to go out and fight, being all stoically manly about it, while the woman will be emotional and initiate one final time of intimacy, and the guy may respond before going off to battle. I have this overblown image of Chuck Norris, Steven Seagal, Clint Eastwood type of flicks in my head. You know, the manly stuff.

And here we have Gundam Wing, where Relena doesn’t even care about herself or her feelings for him, but instead is only concerned about Heero’s well-being. Which is why I would have totally bought Relena’s feelings for Heero being purely platonic had Endless Waltz with that super tender caress not happened.

Which also portrays her natural selflessness, in contrast to Heero’s credo of living life acting on your emotions. And boy does he act. He is very much cranking up the romance here with how close he pulls her to him and how very tenderly he speaks to her. Ship it or not, it’s obvious here he likes her. Which in turn tints all their previous interactions.

Ikeda might have wanted a purely symbolic relationship between them, but the geniuses behind this episode ruined that. They gave us Heero displaying his feelings for her, which in turn made all that came before a massive slow burn of sorts.

Hah.

This is something I find highly amusing personally. If you removed the helmet scene and that caress from Endless Waltz, I wouldn’t see it. But those two scenes are enough to make me believe there are feelings there and it’s amazing to see how little it takes to make me change my mind. Then again, Gundam Wing is big on subtlety so this is practically on par with screaming it from the rooftops.

But still, thank you. Thank you writers for inserting this scene and generally giving us two amazing final episodes. You hit all the right marks in my book.

#gundam wing #meta #analysis #extra large #episode 48 #heero yuy #relena peacecraft #1xr #episode 47 gave us too little #episode 48 kinda too much #but if I have the choice 48 it is #progress is always better than regression #and I ship it :P

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sailormoonandme · 4 years ago

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My thoughts regarding the Usagi/Mamoru age gap

I am writing this in response to this thread.

To be clear as crystal here, this is just my take on the situation.

With all that said, for the sake of argument let's say we are in total agreement that in real life a 14 year old middle schooler and a 17 year old college student shouldn't be dating.*

But that is the key phrase here: 'Real life'.

The thing is...there is no end of fairy tales or media aimed at children that at best start to fall apart or at worst become extremely creepy when you apply a realistic lens to it.

That is the joke about the majority of Disney's canon in fact. For instance, Aladdin was 18 whilst Jasmine was 16. I'm British and over here 16 is the legal age of consent for sex but even so I'm at least iffy on a 16 year old dating an 18 year old. And to trade off some of the comments elsewhere in the above linked thread, you could absolutely argue there was a 'mental gap' between Al and Jas given how she was a sheltered and somewhat naive princess who'd never left the palace and he was a streetwise older guy who'd obviously flirted and charmed his way out of trouble before.

But let's consider a different Disney classic, perhaps their most famous movie, the Lion King.

The Lion King is a beloved and rightly iconic movie but if you take it at face value and realistically (albeit ignoring the fact that animals can talk, sing and are capable of human emotions and cultural references) it's guilty of:

Promoting incest because Simba and Nala would have at best been first cousins (Nala being Scar's daughter) at worst brother and sister. Because that is how lions work. Male lions murder the cubs of other males with the possible exceptions of their brother's cubs where they co-rule a pride. Even with the best case scenario, deleted scenes had Scar try to make Nala his queen and those scenes were reinserted for the hit Broadway musical. So either a brother and sister hook up or two first cousins hook up and a Dad tried to have sex with his daughter.

Promoting racial/class segregation: The Hyenas are from the 'dark shadowy' place and are given traits you can easily interpret as associated with black, Hispanic, Latinex or mentally disabled people. They are also framed with Nazi imagery and it is Scar's decision to let them roam freely that causes famine. Simba beats them, they are forced back to 'where they came from' and all is well.

Promoting authoritarian absolute monarchies. That's the whole movie's plot. Simba must embrace his destiny as the 'rightful ruler' of the pridelands whereby all other animals bow down to him. It's not even like the lions are the ruling class and they are at least democratic amongst themselves, it's literally this ONE specific bloodline that is not only in charge but is SUPPOSED to be in charge. Even if the wrong person from that bloodline is in charge the entire land suffers until the 'right' person takes the throne. That's a pretty terrible and pretty anti-democratic message isn't it, and that's coming from someone who lives in a country WITH a monarchy.

And, I admit this one is a serious stretch, but you could even argue that it's saying two men raising a child is a detriment to said child. Because Timon and Pumba raise Simba into an adult and the movie is very clear that he's grown up wrong, he is not the person he should be because he's embraced Timon and Pumba's upbringing.

So you see...the Lion King is mega terrible.

Except it isn't.

Because we all have the cognitive ability and understanding to grasp that you are not SUPPOSED to take it that realistically nor at face value. Even as children we grasped that, hence the generation that grew up with the Lion King (by and large) obviously don't think incest is okay, don't oppose same sex couples raising children, don't think segregation is a good idea and clearly do not think monarchies are the bee's knees.

Maybe as kids people couldn't put it into words, but material like this essentially exists in this realm of symbolism, psychological shorthand if you will.

In fact all fairy tales do that.

And Sailor Moon IS a fairy tale, or at the very least it borrows a whole lot from fairy tales.

In addition to being a fairy tale though Sailor Moon is a wish fulfillment fantasy story intended for a female audience (or at least a predominantly female audience).

Now of course what one woman's wish fulfillment fantasy might be may not be another's and I wouldn't be so presumptuous as to argue that Sailor Moon even clicks with the wish fulfillment fantasies of MOST female audience members. But I think it's fair to say from the cultural impact it has had, and how it's fanbase is clearly mostly made up of women, that the wish fulfillment fantasy it offers clicks with a sizeable enough number of women.

The reverse is true of something intended as a male wish fulfillment fantasy. James Bond was obviously intended as a male wish fulfillment fantasy, and it's success speaks to how it clearly clicked with a sizable enough number of people. And I don't think I'm being overly presumptuous here when i say MOST of those people were male.**

Both SM and 007 are wish fulfillment power fantasies but they are also romantic/sexual fantasies too.***

I don't think it's unreasonable to argue that for a sizable number (but not necessarily the majority) of women, including the tween/teen girls SM was aimed at, having an OLDER lover is a romantic wish fulfillment fantasy. On the flipside I don't think it's unreasonable to argue that for a sizable number of men and boys having an endless string of casual and completely consequence free sexual encounters with (traditionally speaking) gorgeous women who find you incredibly attractive is a sexual wish fulfillment fantasy.

And the thing is BOTH those things can become bad when you apply a realistic lens to either of them.

James Bond's sex life realistically would involve at least a few sexually transmitted diseases, unintended pregnancies (one of which occurs in the novels) and at least a few callously broken hearts. Even when you look at it strictly from Bond's POV that life only seems glamorous at first glance. Perhaps it is a fun fantasy, but only when it remains in the realm of fantasy. Because in real life that kind of life if lived long term is ultimately incredibly empty and unfulfilling. Even James Bond media has acknowledged this because there have been occasions in the novels and films where he has at least attempted to settle down with a stable partner. Many Bond fans (understandably) decry this as undermining part of the appeal of the character hence Bond inevitably defaults back to being single because that is a baked in part of the wish fulfillment fantasy the character offers.

Let's consider some other ways the Sailor Moon anime offers a wish fulfillment fantasy, namely the future of Crystal Tokyo.

At first glance it seems wonderfully utopic right. It is a beautiful crystalline world where everyone lives in peace and harmony, hunger disease and even aging having been functionally eliminated.

Well, that isn’t the case if you apply a realistic lens to it.

It's an absolute monarchy wherein everyone is functionally immortal and children don't reach maturity even after 900 years. Chibi-Usa clearly chafes at this reality so how do you imagine other children (who aren't royalty) might feel? How might their parents feel having to raise their children and be responsible for them for centuries as opposed to around twentysomething years? What if you became immortal in your 80s, you might be a very healthy 80 year old but you aren't in the prime of your life and you are stuck that way for what is essentially forever. Not to mention what if you don't like or do not agree with Neo-Queen Serenity's policies? What if they are actively detrimental to you, your family, your livelihood, etc? You can't vote her out of power and you can't even hope for things to change because everyone is healthy, provided for and lives forever. The chances of someone else coming to power are at best very, very, very slim.

Then you have the fact that it’s surely a society that would’ve stagnated because everyone is provided for. That’s the whole point of a utopia. It is perfection. But what if you are someone who defined your live by striving for improvement? What if you were a doctor and now found yourself redundant. Sure, you might acknowledge that’s for the greater good but you are still yourself left completely without purpose in this world.

And that’s not even considering the inevitable monotony of existing for hundreds of years. Modern medicine and science has allowed human beings to extend their life spans FAR beyond how long we’d live if we were still just cave people. As biological organisms are concerned we never evolved to live for 80-90 years. Even if your body isn’t breaking down across the centuries the human mind would never realistically be able to cope with centuries worth of memories and life experiences. Mental illnesses and conditions would be rife. If nothing else living in that world would sooner or later become utterly BORING!

Hate to say it and obviously it doesn’t justify their methods, but the Black Moon Clan kind of have some valid points against the world of Crystal Tokyo. At least they do when you break things down REALISTICALLY.

And that’s my thesis here. Sailor Moon isn’t supposed to be dissected realistically, at least not to THAT degree. It is a wish fulfilment fairy tale fantasy and demands a certain amount of suspension of disbelief and understanding of what the fantasy is offering.

And for the record I can 100% assure that no teenager in real life has, or could, ever get into a harmful relationship with someone older than them BECAUSE they watched Usagi and Mamoru’s relationship in the anime.

The human mind is a very complex and very powerful thing. At a younger age it’s impressionable and can therefore be influenced. But it’s not so susceptible that the romantic relationships in a cartoon about schoolgirl super heroes is going to influence a viewer into making any major life decisions that OTHER factors weren’t also influencing them to do.

In other words if a real life 14 year old girl began dating a 17 year old college guy it would’ve happened regardless of whether they watched Sailor Moon as a child or not.

Indeed, one of my frustrations with the podcast Sailor Business is how many guests on the show cite how they liked Usagi and Mamoru as children but now think their relationship is bad and creepy. I disagree with them for the reasons I cited above, but the fact that those panellists nigh universally give that same narrative proves how nobody was ever going to be prompted to do anything potentially harmful to themselves in real life by the show.

*Personally speaking that is certainly my own off the cuff attitude.

**Not to dismiss the fans who aren't, same goes for the non-female SM fans.

***Although I think you could argue SM is more on the romance side of things and 007 on the sexual side of things.

#My Essays #bishojo senshi sailor moon #pretty soldier sailor moon #pretty guardian sailor moon #sailor moon #tuxedo mask #mamoru chiba #chiba mamoru #usagi tsukino #tsukino usagi #James Bond #007 #Lion King #The Lion King #Disney #Crystal Tokyo

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quietya · 5 years ago

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31 Days of quietYA with Rosiee Thor

What’s up friends, let’s talk some quiet books about the quietest subject of them all

MURDERRRR!!!!

Look, I know what you’re thinking. MURDERRRR is pretty loud. And I guess it can be if you’re like shouting it from the rooftops, which is what I’d like to do about these delightfully murdery books you may not have on your TBRs yet!

Kicking things off with the most murder book cover I could find, NOT EVEN BONES by Rebecca Schaeffer has all the blood and guts and literal dismemberment a girl could ask for. Nita lives in a world full of supernatural creatures like zanies (monsters who feed on human pain), dacts (cute as heck), and unicorns (but not the good kind). Her mother sells their body parts on the internet and Nita helps dissect the bodies. But when her mother brings home a live boy, Nita’s moral compass is tested… and then shattered… and then stomped on repeatedly by a cruel world that asks her to be cruel right back. This book messed me up in a big way and I loved every second of it! It’s full of moral questions that don’t have easy answers, unlikely partnerships, and more than a few dead bodies.

Do we have any Slytherins in the house? How about some background Slytherins? Well, the author of the super popular (and deeply relateable to my disaster Slytherin soul) comic series My Life as a Background Slytherin, Emily McGovern, released a delightfully bloody graphic novel, BLOODLUST AND BONNETS, which follows Lucy, an unwieldy young lady who would much rather become a vampire than talk to rich dudes about economics. She vibrantly displays this fact by running an unnamed gentleman through with a sword in the first scene as he bemoans the burdens of rich dude life. She’s quickly joined by Lord Byron (“you know, from books”) and his trusty eagle friend as they set off on a ripping adventure through europe, coming up against a sentient castle, a colorful vampire cult, and Lord Byron’s whole entire melodramatic personality. As a bonus, this book is extremely queer, and I’m extremely here for it!

If you prefer your murder with a bit of realistic bent, HERE LIES DANIEL TATE by Cristin Terril is the book for you! Inspired by real events that are almost more unbelievable than the fictionalized tale, the book follows an unreliable narrator who finds himself posing as the long missing Daniel Tate. He’s hoping to get a few days of square meals and a bed out of the con, but what he gets is a whole family eager to welcome him home. Taking the life of Daniel Tate has its perks--like the large family home and seemingly endless supply of money--but it soon becomes apparent that not everyone in the Tate family believes he’s their missing relative… and at least one person in the family knows he’s a fraud… because they killed Daniel Tate, and they want to use him to cover it up. This book has TWISTS, my friends. I saw absolutely none of them coming and it kept me reading late into the night… which was a big mistake because I am easily scared and AHHHH.

Revenge is a dish best served in two helpings, which is why RUIN OF STARS by Linsey Miller, the sequel to MASK OF SHADOWS, is one of my favorite books. MOS gave us the assassin murder competition we deserved, but the sequel is just as good. Book two follows Sal’s ultimate revenge plan through to the finish. After their homeland was destroyed in a war between two other countries, Sal hatches and ambitious revenge plot, marking the nobles who orchestrated the attack for death. After becoming an elite assassin in book one, Sal must juggle doing the Queen’s bidding and executing their own agenda… and a few nobles along the way. With the sequel, we get more political machinations, more terrifying magic, and a lot of Sal, our favorite genderfluid revenge machine, giving the rich what they deserve: a funeral. If you’ve been sleeping on this sequel, wake the heck up!

Rosiee Thor began her career as a storyteller by demanding to tell her mother bedtime stories instead of the other way around. She lives in Oregon with a dog, two cats, and four complete sets of Harry Potter, which she loves so much, she once moved her mattress into the closet and slept there until she came out as queer. Tarnished Are The Stars is her first novel. You can find her on her website and on her twitter.

#31 days of quietYA #rosiee thor #guest post #ya books #quietya #wndb #mogai #book list #tarnished are the stars

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a-cai-jpg · 5 years ago

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this is a very stilted post.

I have a collection of songs that make me cry.

I'm not in the habit of playing them very often. I don't even save them in my YouTube favorites, or my wormhole of a Spotify account. I kind of leave it up to fate for the familiar melody and lyrics to find me again, and on days where I feel especially brave, I'll queue it up on a drive. But only on a drive.

I watched a variety show about songwriters a few months back, and one of my favorite contestants said something along the lines of, "I think everyone has a theme that they just can't touch."

Sometimes, it's because the pain is still too raw. Sometimes, it's because we're too fearful to truly reckon with the sorrow, unwilling to drink it in, let it roll around in our mouths as the bitter flavor penetrates our tongue, and feel it burn on the way down.

I don't listen to the songs often because I'm afraid I'll become desensitized, that the most humane and most compassionate part of me will become numb.

But also because I'm not in the business of seeking out pain.

I used to be obsessed with tragedy, chasing it with a sort of masochistic relish because I thought you could never be as human as you were when you cried. It's kind of like why people really like those sad, touching Thai commercials that make you bawl your eyes out without fail every time.

But as I grew older, I realized there really is something that I can't touch. Sometimes, I tongue the edges of it, prodding with caution, but only on very, very rare occasions do I peel away the protective layer. There are some things I can't watch, can't listen to too closely, or else I'll feel myself unravel around the edges.

And not gonna lie, but now is not a time I'm willing to tug at the ends of the thread. So instead, I'll let a past me do that.

When I was a sophomore in university, I submitted a monologue for the annual Asian cultural show. It was submitted anonymously, because at the time, it wasn't something I was ready to talk about.

(it still isn't, but i have gotten more practice talking about it in the years that have elapsed.)

See, what had happened was, I was watching Moon Lovers: Scarlet Heart Ryeo (disappointment of my life, sorry the Chinese version is better even though the Korean cast is bEaUtIfUl), and suddenly, I had a mini-panic attack about death.

It was the dumbest thing. I was watching Park Soondeok try to woo Wang Eun, and the silly girl--bless her heart--hunted a whole bear to express her love for him. I remember the scene had startled me, because she popped on screen with a bear skin covering her body. And I was like, "Uh that's like, a lot of bad karma right."

And I don't really know how karma works, but I suddenly remembered something that my grandmother had said a long time ago. She said that she was a sinner, because she's "killed" so much for our family.

In Chinese, the words she used were 杀生, which literally means "kill life" but generally, animal life.

She said it because she is the main chef of our family. Whenever she visited China, our family would go through a bit of crisis because that meant either my grandfather cooked or my mom's boyfriend cooked.

Once, my grandfather served me Palmier cookies and the same fried rice we'd eaten for a week for dinner. Often, my mom's boyfriend chopped up carrots and celery to dip with ranch for dinner.

It was great.

(no, but our family barely functioned when my grandmother was gone. those six months would be us sitting silently around the dinner table, daring each other to be the first to try a dish.)

Weirdly, that little thing she said stuck with me. And in that moment, sophomore year of college, sitting in my top bunk watching Scarlet Heart Ryeo, I panicked.

I can't really dissect why I panicked. But the result was this ridiculous plan that I had to stop eating meat for the rest of my life to collect all the good karma for my grandmother.

(yeah, so that didn't last because I literally got sausages that weekend cus hello, continental breakfast.)

It wasn't that I never thought about death or my family members dying before then. In the second grade, I read a story about the friendship between a squirrel and a leaf, and cried and cried and cried when the story ended and the leaf died, not because the leaf died but because the leaf promised to be reborn, and would be reborn at the turn of the year, but humans wouldn't be.

But for some reason, all of the separate moments of panic and fear dispersed over a decade culminated in that moment, as I watched Soodeok pull the bearskin off of her head, and I started crying so hard I couldn't breathe.

So I wrote a monologue. The original draft was very, very long and very, very detailed, and I probably went through half a box of tissues writing it. I eventually cut it down and didn't save the first copy because I never wanted to read it again.

The theme of the monologue comes up every time I talk about my Chinese American identity. It comes up in personal statements, in creative narratives, in discussion groups, and in the Facebook likes I dish out whenever I see a relevant Subtle Asian Traits post. It's the sense of biculturalism and the accompanying endeavor to somehow reconcile my reality with that of my immigrant parents and grandparents. It's the weary acceptance that ultimately, there may be no reconciliation, and all that's left is regret.

Whenever someone asks me what my favorite food is, I would say spring onion noodles. But this is the funny part--I will never order them in a restaurant. Some time in middle school, I went on a family trip with my extended relatives in China. Every time we stopped to eat, my aunt would order me a bowl of spring onion noodles because she knew I loved it so much, and every time, I would make a face and say, "Grandma does it better."

See, I don't know if she actually does. I just knew I liked hers more.

After my grandmother returned to China, I started making spring onion noodles myself, because it tasted more like home even if I never got it right.

I also really like dumplings. My grandma makes the best dumplings, but I'm afraid to ask her to make them, because the last time I did, they were too salty. Now, I'm afraid to ask her to make spring onion noodles too, because maybe my memories tasted better than the real thing.

But the real, real reason I'm scared is that I'm scared she's getting old. I'm scared her tastebuds are not the same as they were when she lived in Monterey Park, cooking in our second floor kitchen.

In my senior year of college, I called my grandmother for the first time on my own. The moment I heard her voice, staticky over the long distance call, I started crying, and it was stupid because I had to pretend I wasn't crying and I was trying to talk normally and it was awful because it was the kind where your voice came in hiccupy stutters, and she definitely knew I was crying because she kept asking, "Why did you call? What's wrong?" while acting casual, for my sake.

When I was in the eighth grade, I was walking a friend's German Shepherd that ended up dragging me across the pavement in the park. It's a story I tell a lot, because it is truly hilarious in hindsight, but the ending goes like this:

I go home crying, because my glasses broke and I have cuts on the back of my left hand and down my face. I take a bath, something I grew out of doing years ago, and my grandmother doesn't reprimand me. She sits next to me and speaks in that vaguely disapproving voice of her, the tone of so many old Asian ladies, and tells me that life is hard and you will meet people that you don't get along with, but you just have to suck it up. And I start crying harder, because she cared.

That day, she also followed me from the front door of our house to my mom's master bathroom, asking, "What's wrong?"

We talk a lot about the Chinese zodiac in our household, more when my grandmother and grandfather still lived with us, but my aunt brought it up a few days ago. In the Chinese zodiac, the ox and the sheep are foils to each other--me and my grandmother. When I was little, I would say, "Ugh, this is why we fight so often." A few days ago, my mom said, "That's why you and grandma never got along," and I stayed silent.

I sometimes tell people that my grandmother is more like my mother figure, and my mom is more like an older sister. And my mom hates it. But, it's because everything that others associate with an Asian mom, I associate with my grandmother. All the memes about immigrant mother bringing their children peeled and cut fruit are about my grandmother, fending off my complaints about having to eat apples every single day, and stubbornly bringing me sliced apples and pears. All the stories about immigrant parents expressing their love through the words "Come eat. Food is ready," is my grandmother who singlehandedly kept her family together through sheer will and a kitchen stove.

Sometimes, when I'm brave enough to talk to people about how I feel about her, I would say that I would gladly give her half of the rest of my life, just so we can leave together. I'm scared her life would be less than perfect, and I wish I made money earlier so I can take her to Cambridge and Rome, but I'm also scared that I'm selfish and weak and unable to give her what she really wants.

Anyways.

Four tissues later, here's the monologue:

I am obsessed with time.

I am obsessed with time, but I hate the way the second hand moves relentlessly in an endless loop on the face of an old clock. I am obsessed with time, but I hate the way the mention of it tightens my throat, squeezing until the pressure travels to my heart and lungs, and finally settling somewhere deep in my gut.

I was told that time is linear. The Second Law of Thermodynamics. Chaos and disorder grow infinitely—there is no going back.

When I was little and time was but a tiny grain of sand in a large, foreboding hourglass, I believed in guardian angels. They were the ones who caught me tumbling from a swing, having flown too high on my too weak wings. They were the ones who waited outside the gates of my elementary school—a familiar face of comfort floating amidst a crowd of foreign visages. They were the ones who promised me plates and plates of hand-wrapped dumplings, and most importantly, they were the only ones who could cook spring onion noodles with a sunny side up egg the way I liked it, and no restaurant could ever hope to get the taste just the same.

But also, when I was little, I believed that guardian angels existed outside of time. They were immortal, they gave me life. But as the number of years they conferred to me increased, they seemed to become more and more human.

Sometimes, I’d blink, and for a terrifying moment, I’d catch glimpse of an elderly couple, backs hunched and hair splattered with grey, standing in my kitchen.

This is me, a girl obsessed with time. I had the liberty of being born and raised in the United States. My Chinese immigrant parents labored long days at work, and my grandparents were given the roles as my primary caretakers.

My grandfather was the quiet one, a retired electrical engineer who made it his mission to somehow teach me to love mathematics. My grandmother was the loud one, previously a librarian—the irony, I know—who never went to college but could calculate prices of groceries faster than I could pull out a calculator. I grew up dancing around their peculiar dynamic, seesawing back and forth between going ant-watching with my grandfather as I recited the Chinese timestables and trying to finish too many platters of food my grandmother piled in front of me as she told me stories of life back in China—in the good old days.

Growing up in California, it was inevitable that I saw the United States as home to both me and my family. It was where I had spent nearly two decades of my life—and where my mother, grandmother, and grandfather had spent nearly two decades of their lives.

And yet, two decades was not nearly enough time. Space could not be reconciled, and time was rendered obsolete.

Home, for them, was not our little town in the suburbs of LA. When my father passed away, my mother said, “We don’t have enough money to bring him home.” She’d said it carelessly in front of me, perhaps thinking 6-year-old me wouldn’t notice, let alone understand. But 6-year-old me did. Home, I realized, for them wasn’t home for me.

The thought was terrifying. I realized that there will come a time, when I’d return home, and it wouldn’t be the same place my mother, my grandmother, and my grandfather returned to.

I began to play with the idea of condensing time and space. How great it would be, if home was simultaneously California and China. Time differences, traveling time, the Pacific Ocean would be utterly abolished, and our hearts would return home together.

But time flew by and the pile of sand grains at the bottom of the hourglass grew without my noticing. I hadn’t yet the chance to tell my grandparents about my meditation on time and space, and suddenly, my grandfather decided to return home. Time had seemed to warp, fastforwarding the years I’d taken for granted, and now refusing to slow down.

Here’s the thing—I do not wish to be selfish. I want my family to be happy—to return home—but I am terrified that my own fragile notion of home will shatter in return.

Because the reality is, home isn’t physical space. Home is, in all truthfulness, time. Time I’d spent with my family, and the years I have left to spend with them.

I’d let time slip through my fingers as I tried to come up with this theory of “home.” I’d tried to condense “home” into a condominium, apartment D, a large peach tree shading the backyard. Yet now, the tree has been cut down, and my mother speaks of moving to a city forty minutes away. What then, I ask myself, is home?

Home is the promises I’d made to my grandparents—promises I’m no longer sure I can keep because I cannot cover large enough distances with so little time. Home is the way I could never tell them “I love you,” and the regret that builds in my heart as I realize that home is a ticking time bomb that threatens to throw the world into chaos. Entropy increases. Things fall apart.

In a little bit, home will be too many miles away, too many hours away, for me to return to. Home will be in a foreign city surrounded by a peculiar amalgamation of unfamiliar modernity and history she’d lived through. Home will be on the opposite shore of an ocean I cannot swim across, with no one to cook spring onion noodles for.

I am a girl obsessed with time. I’d been blessed with a lot of time, and yet, I’d tossed it all out of the window of my second story bedroom. I am a girl obsessed with time, and I’d trade in my soul for it to reverse, so I can make home a little more concrete, a little more happy, a little more lasting. I am a girl obsessed with time, and when I wake up 2:30 in the morning, I think I can see the sands rushing down the chute of the hourglass, and the sight of it tears me apart.

I am a girl obsessed with time, and I would like to apologize to my beloved mother, grandmother, and grandfather for taking so much of it for granted. If I had another run at these eighteen years, I only hope to reach this conclusion sooner and fulfill my promises.

Dear grandma and grandpa,

I am a girl obsessed with time. Every day, I pray to God to give you a little more. How had the time flown by so quickly? Was yesterday not the day you brought me on the airplane for the first time? I can still taste the juice of the grapes a stranger had given us—snacks for the little girl—in the back of my tongue. Yet now I’m no longer the toddler you held in your arms. Grandma and grandpa, time is rushing by on a train I cannot seem to catch. Will you forgive me for reaching our home a little too late?

Love.

(i included my favorite part in a creative narrative project i did for a class in college. if you want to hear it in my voice: here.) (pls don’t click for the sake of my voice bc i sound like a literal duck. click for my grandparents wandering around hangzhou.) (also, if it is different its cus i tried to fit it in somehow with a longer poem i was writing.) (i don’t like poems.)

The reason I wrote this isn't that I wanted to pick at a scab. I heard a song recently, from the same songwriter variety show, that I had blindsided a few months back. I heard it at around 1 am in the morning, and I cried.

Here is the collection of songs:

橘子 by 邓见超

考试考得好不好啊？ how did you do on your test? 有没有拿到大红花 did you get the big red flower? 老师夸我是个乖仔啊 my teacher said i was a good kid 奶奶自己保重圣体吧 grandma, take care of yourself 长大了出息了要晓得回家 when you grow older and do big things, remember to come home 别忘了这里的青山和路弯 don't forget the green mountains and windy roads here 记得要带一瓶辣椒在身上 remember to bring with you a bottle of peppers 还时常跟妈妈报平安 and often let your mom know you're doing fine ... 房子旁两棵树都被砍掉了 the two trees by our house have been cut off 墙上还贴着小时候的奖状 my childhood awards are still plastered on the walls 一个字一个字好像昨天啊 each word, each word, like it was just yesterday 宝贝儿子啊吃饭了 son, it's time for dinner 再不回家妈妈要教训你了 if you don't come home now, mom's going to be mad 这个淘气的孩子跑去那里玩了 this mischievous kid, where did he go? 找他都找不到人了 i'm looking for him, but i can't find him.

一荤一素 by 毛不易

一张小方桌有一荤一素 a small, square table with one vegetable and one meat 一个身影从容地忙忙碌碌 a figure good-naturedly bustling about 一双手让这时光有了温度 a pair of hands allowed this time some warmth 太年轻的人他总是不满足 the one who is too young, he's not satisfied 固执地不愿停下远行的脚步 stubbornly unwillingly to stop the footsteps traveling far away 望着高高的天走了长长的路 looking at the far, far sky; walking a long, long road 忘了回头看她有没有哭 he forgot to turn around to see if she's crying 月儿明风儿轻 >the moon is clear, the wind is light 可是你在敲打我的窗棂 is it you, knocking on my window? 听到这儿你就别担心 now that you've listened till here, please don't worry 其实我过的还可以 actually, i'm doing okay ... 你又可曾来过我的梦里 have you been to my dreams lately? 一定是你来时太小心 you must've been too careful when you came 知道我睡得轻 knowing that i sleep lightly 一定是你来时太小心 you must've been too careful when you came 怕我再想起你 afraid i'll miss you

父亲 by 筷子兄弟

时光时光慢些吧不要再让你变老了 time, time, please slow down. don't let you grow any older 我愿用我一切换你岁月长留<<br>i'm willing to trade everything i have for more years and months for you ... 微不足道的关心收下吧 please accept my inadequate care for you 谢谢你做的一切双手撑起我们的家 thank you for holding up our family with your hands 总是竭尽所有把最好的给我 always doing everything to give me the best ... 我是你的骄傲吗还在为我而担心吗 am i your pride? do you still worry for me? 你牵挂的孩子啊长大啦 the child you think of has grown up now.

时间都去哪了 by 王铮亮 (this is a cover)

时间都去哪儿了 where has all the time gone? 还没好好感受年轻就老了 haven't even truly experienced youth, and i'm already old 生儿养女一辈子 took care of children my entire lfe 满脑子都是孩子哭了笑了 all i can hear is the cries and laughter of children 时间都去哪儿了 where has all the time gone? 还没好好看看你眼睛就花了 haven't even looked at you carefully yet, and my vision is already blurring

if only... by ozi

如果可以把時間退後 if i can rewind time 別讓命運把妳給帶走 i won't let fate take you away 對妳能說著我最近做些什麼 i want to be able to tell you what i've been doing these days 希望別再錯過 i hope i won't miss it again 如果可以讓我跟她說 if only i can just tell her 願意付出我所有為了 i'm willing to trade everything i have 能換一點時間just to see you again for a little time just to see you again 別再擔心著我 so you don't have to worry about me anymore

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gaymirajane · 6 years ago

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What's your favourite mirajane moment ?

I was tempted to just say All of them!!!! and call it a day, but I wanted to actual 89think about this and form a legitimate answer so uhhhh…. Here we go I guess? You probably wanted like a paragraph and a gif but I’m just Like This and I love her so… yeah. Sorry anon.

I couldn’t choose just one, I’m sorry. But I did get a top three, and I figured that that was sufficient. I hope that’s okay! I promise I thought super hard about this.

All moments are taken from the manga, although I will be adding images from the anime. I did not take omakes or filler anime arcs into consideration here, or any of the spin-offs.

Right… Here are some honorary mentions that I wish I could have added:

Mirajane vs Seilah (Poison? A dessert for a demon like me), Mirajane pretending to be Lucy to save her from Phantom, the final scene of Mirajane vs Jenny that wasn’t fanservice and she knocks Jenny the fuck out (I accepted your request, now I need you to accept my power), Mirajane running to Erza on the battlefield even though she knows full well that she cannot protect herself from Phantom Lord, the song she sings for team Natsu’s return from the Tower of Heaven (prime Erzajane content that I STAN), and how she transforms into a snake / members of the guild during the Fantasia arc because she wants to be seen as more than just ‘sexy’.

Now then! Buckle up because I imagine this is gonna be a long ride.

Three: Mirajane vs Azuma

This was so close to being my number two but I’ll explain why it isn’t when I get to what is in the second place.

So naturally any battle with Mira in is of interest to me, but this one had the added bonus of being her AND Lisanna; the first time Lisanna has seen her sister fight since she “died”.

In many ways, this is the first time that we see Mirajane fight ‘seriously’, (in the battle of fairy tail she still sees Freed as a family member, a comrade; Azuma is nothing to her), and she shows her S-Class powers. It’s a great battle!

But she doesn’t win, and that says so much more about her character than if she had.

Let’s really dissect this line folks okay. So firstly and most importantly: she’s protecting Lisanna here. The Lisanna that she saw die in front of her a few years earlier. Mirajane swore to protect her, and now she’s got to admit to herself that she can’t doesn’t have it in her to do so. This is not something we see Fairy Tail wizards do often, and even what Gildarts was trying to teach Natsu: admitting defeat does not make you less of a wizard.

This is made even better for me because the person that does defeat Azuma is Erza and I’m Erzajane trash but that’s not especially relevant here.

tl;dr: I love this fight because Mirajane is admitting her flaws even if they play into her greatest fears of losing a family member, or not being strong enough to protect who she loves. It’s a good character building session for her and the fight is generally very good.

Two: Mirajane vs Kamika

Okay so this one was almost swapped with the scene that I just mentioned, but I’m gonna explain why I’ve decided to do it the way that I have.

This fight, in so many ways, is the greatest reveal of Mirajane’s character that we receive in the series. Am I gonna explain why? You bet!

Mostly, it comes down to this single line:

Please do not for a second forget that Mirajane is an S-Class wizard who gained that title when she was 15 / 16! Mashima said that in a one-on-one fight between Mirajane and Erza, he would expect Mirajane to be the winner, but the thing is she wouldn’t unleash that power on a girlfriend friend. If a member of the guild is present, especially one of her siblings, she does not use even half of her ability.

And I seriously love this fight! Yes, there is so much wasted potential in that Mashima only uses one Satan Soul, but I’ll take any Mirajane that I can get. She spends so much time being the bartender, the cook, the model, people forget to take her seriously for her power, and how much control she has over it. Like there are literal demons living inside of her and she!! Looks like this!!

Kamika even says that she is gonna expel the demons and the darkness from Mirajane, and she laughs at that.

Mirajane knows that her magic is evil, that she is essentially a demon, and she uses that strength for good. It must be so exhausting for her, but she does it because she knows how it feels to be seen as a villain (during her childhood), and she doesn’t wanna be that person anymore. Also, knowing that she has so much more potential is as satisfying to me as it is frustrating. I would love to see more of her Satan Souls but I don’t expect Mashima to think that much about anything in this manga so it’s like, whatever you know?

tl;dr: Mirajane is so much more powerful than we can even comprehend and she deserves endless credit and respect for that.

One: Mirajane vs Freed

Okay, so this one is obvious and I know that, but I love it for so many reasons and it was honestly what made me fall in love with her character, so it had to be number one.

This image gives me chills

You can see it in her eyes, she’s reliving her trauma, the death of her sister, and Freed knows that Lisanna is dead and died in front of Mirajane. Yet still he threatens the life of Elfman, Mirajane’s only living blood relative. This scene, for me, is like a switch flipped. We see for the first time that Mirajane can go from the sweet barmaid who cries when people criticise her drawings to a literal feral demon with enough magic to shake Magnolia.

But you know? That isn’t why this is my favourite Mirajane moment. The fight is excellent, and finally we understand that she’s an S-Class wizard and deserves that title; she’s an incredible wizard who everyone respects.

However this, this is the true gem of the scene for me:

Yes, this is one of the most iconic lines from Mirajane, maybe even from Fairy Tail as a series, but the mistake many people make is thinking that she is predicting what will happen to Freed, and that just is not the case. Well, not entirely. The truth? Mirajane is referring to herself.

Think about it like this; she watched her sister die. Her sister who was like 14. And it was their brother who killed her. Mirajane was S-Class, she had the power to protect her family, and yet she was unable. That pain was so strong she literally repressed her magic for years, and Freed cracked that armour until it came flooding back, and she was overwhelmed with it. She literally almost kills Freed, but Lisanna’s smile and voice bring her back from that. Mirajane could have abandoned Elfman for what he did, and yet she would not force him to be alone; she’s too kind.

What I love about Mirajane is her layers. Her skin is made of beauty, her soul chaos, and yet her heart? That’s kind, more than anything else, and it’s her true power. She is able to sit across from the man who killed her sister, cook him dinner, smile and laugh along with him, because her heart is so big, her entire being forgiving and loving. It changes her personality from the angry teen we see as she joins the guild to a strong and sweet young woman, and this is why the fight during the battle of Fairy Tail will always be my favourite Mirajane moment.

tl;dr: This is the first time we see her S-Class power and understand how loving and kind Mirajane is. It opens us up to her trauma and her heart and it is one of the best fights in the series in my opinion.

I hope that somewhat answers your question anon, but the fact still stands that any moment with Mirajane in is one of my favourites. Thanks for the ask, sorry for the essay!

#long post #rip mobile users #mirajane strauss #demon princess

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mindareadsoots · 7 years ago

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“Final” Thoughts on Homestuck

Now that’s a laugh.

You know how when you play an MMO, you reach the level cap AND THEN you start playing the game? That’s kind of what it feels like to be finishing Homestuck. It’s been about a week and a half since I first watched Collide and Act 7, and there are an endless number of topics to discuss (which ironically might be my biggest problem with the ending, but we’ll get to that later).

Let’s start with the nuts and bolts: Collide and Act 7 are both gorgeous in beautifully contrasting ways. Collide is primarily animated with the classic sprite models, which sounds like it should be really lame, but it gives all of the fight scenes this interesting 2D beat ‘em up aesthetic.

And then Act 7 of course is a goddamn anime.

There are so many little moments to pause and dissect (not that you want to with the epic music playing in the background) that even after rewatching both of them a few times in the intervening days, I’m sure I’ll be catching new things to appreciate on every subsequent viewing.

However, despite the hidden potential within the finale, it still leaves a lot of unanswered questions. Unanswered questions can be fun. They can leave certain things open to interpretation, but there’s a difference between intentional ambiguity and refusing to explain shit. One’s an interesting starting point for a conversation, and the other is just frustrating.

In my mind, the two biggest open questions are what happened to Vriska and what happened to the kids after Caliborn’s Masterpiece.

Let’s start with Vriska because you all know me by now so you all know that Vriska is one of if not my absolute favorite character in the comic, so it may surprise some of you to hear that I actually don’t mind the possibility that she died fighting Lord English. It’s a death that would be both Heroic and Just. Heroic because she died fighting the greatest monster across all of paradox space. Just because her arrogance and her need to be at the center of the action lead her to a battle with no escape.

(During the reaction stream, I mused that the absolute WORST case scenario is that somehow Vriska and Lord English both got sucked into the juju, meaning that next time Lord English comes back he has Vriska’s luck and ruthlessness in addition to Gamzee’s clown immortality and Arquius’ super intelligence)

The thing I get hung up on though is Terezi. The last we see of her, Terezi is out looking for Vriska near the final battle ground, so if Vriska just got sucked into the green black hole, what then? Does Terezi just fly around out there for the rest of her life hoping to find some sign of Vriska? Or does she give up and spend the rest of her life wondering? Both options sound rather depressing.

Honestly, I don’t even need to know Vriska’s f8 for myself, I just want to know that Terezi knows. Like, it would honestly make me so happy if there was an epilogue scene like this:

John: so did you ever find out what happened to vriska? Terezi: Y3S. John: ... John: WELL! Terezi: <3< John: >:O That’s it! That’s all I’d need!

The Alpha kids are left in a similar situation after Caliborn’s Masterpiece. What do they do after the Beta kids get sucked into the Plot Hole? For that matter, how do they even get home after the battle? They showed up to fight Caliborn using John’s retcon powers, but they don’t have John anymore. Are they just... stuck there?

A few people have already sent me asks or discussed on discord the possibility that there are some time shenanigans involved in that fight, and that it really wasn’t the Prime versions of the kids who leapt into battle. On the one hand, there is a certain logic to that. Caliborn is the Lord of Time. He is the master of the Alpha timeline, so it makes sense that only forces from outside the main timeline could pose a threat to him. Notably, the version of Calliope who directly confronts him is also from a doomed timeline.

On the other hand, that answer is... way more convoluted. Remember that John did not master his retcon powers until after everything had gone to hell in the Game Over timeline, which means that for all eight of the kids to gather together to fight Lord English, John would have had to have gone on an entirely different adventure than the one we saw in the comic. The much simpler explanation is the one implied by the credits scene: on or shortly after John’s 20th birthday (Four years of peace. That’s all the kids got after everything they fought for.) Caliborn goaded John into a fight, and the rest proceeded as Caliborn described in shitty claymation.

And again, it’s not necessarily the self-sacrifice that bothers me. Lord English is no pushover, so some sacrifices had to be made to defeat him, but it leaves all of the other characters in a lurch where even they don’t necessarily know if their friends and family are alive or dead. So now (much like the fandom) Jake, Jane, Dirk, Roxy, and Terezi are just left wondering.

The whole situation very much reminds me of the original ending to Mass Effect 3. As released, the ending cinematic left a lot of players with the impression that regardless of their decision, galactic civilization was doomed and all of your companions from across the trilogy were dead or dying. The extended ending had to clarify that no, that’s not what happened (only because they retconned a bunch of shit, but let’s stop complaining about THAT ending when I’m in the middle of complaining about THIS ending).

I can’t say for sure if I’m picking up the intended implications of the ending. Maybe Hussie did want me to walk away from the ending thinking about how Dirk will never see Dave again, and how Kanaya was only married to Rose for three years before she disappeared forever. Maybe I am picking up the intended narrative and the fabled Homestuck Epilogue will be the story of the Alpha kids and surviving trolls dealing with the Betas’ absence, or maybe there’s something I missed and some series of time shenanigans can alleviate my concerns. Either way the story feels incomplete with so many beloved characters in limbo like this.

That really is the operative word. Incomplete. That’s my strongest impression of the ending. I could certainly go on (and will in time, I’m sure) but we’re stretching the definition of “live reaction” to the limit here. We’ll be coming back to this soon. Until then, cya later!

#homestuck #minda reads homestuck #minda reads #hsday305

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proudtobeadepphead · 7 years ago

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GQ Germany Interview:

Interviewer: Mister Depp, let's talk about coolness: You often been called "cool". What does that mean to you? Who would you call cool?

Johnny: Cool can mean so many different things. I have always thought that an individual personality is cool. Someone who is just himself. It's actually quite simple - I like those people cool. Patti Smith is cool, she is unadulterated. Iggy Pop is cool, he is unadulterated. Jim Morrison was cool and unadulterated. Marlon Brando was cool and unadulterated. Hunter was cool. You know, only today someone told me about his work as a counselor for children with HIV. Children who have been adopted. It is so brave of him to give something back to others in this way. He impressed me so much that I wanted to be hugged by him. I worked a lot with the Make-A-Wish Foundation and got to know these children. Children with whom fate has not meant well, who have to deal with serious illnesses and pain. In their eyes is not fear, but only bravery and courage. That's really cool. Would I call myself cool? I do not know if that really applies to me, maybe people will see me that way because I'm rather quiet.

I: In the summer you go on a european tour with your band Hollywood Vampires. How important is music in your life?

Johnny: Music is everything, even in my work. The access to my work as an actor is the same as that to my work as a musician. I deal with it, I learn, I listen. By teaching myself how to play the guitar, just by listening to records, I had a pretty good starting position to train my hearing for the shades in the human voice. Be it the timbre, the accent or the attack. As a kid, I've been puzzling various people, and probably this trained hearing helped me a lot. I constantly use it in my work. I think we all have a soundtrack in our heads at all times. For certain scenes I use music. If I want to mentally get back into a situation, or if I have to feel or show something, then it works with a song within seconds. Certain songs immediately evoke memories. My memory is sorted by music. That's why I use music very often.

I: What does "male" mean to you?

Johnny: A real man is a man who keeps his word. The definition of a man is to be true, loyal and present. He must fight against any injustice, be it on the small everyday level or on a large scale, with or without fear. The masculine is to go out into the world as oneself, when there is nothing else. And being sincere and trustworthy.

I: You made a campaign for Dior for the second time - do you think that the image that Dior and photographer Jean-Baptiste Mondino created for "Sauvage" reflects your personality?

Johnny: I think when Jean-Baptiste looks at someone, it's like dissecting his personality. He shifts layer after layer to find the aspect that interests or inspires him, and then he catches some of you in it. This is shown, for example, by the wolf. The wolf is a lonely figure, right? There is definitely a part of me that tends to be a loner. You can never find me in the middle of a crowd.

I: So you're more of a loner?

Johnny: I prefer to stay in the shade and like to hold back. I feel better in the dark. Jean-Baptiste Mondino has captured this side of me. I am a shy person. It's interesting if I play a role, I have no restrictions at all. I can do anything in front of the camera. It's a bit strange to feel better in front of the camera in a role than in your own skin. If I had to get up at a dinner party and say a toast ... I would be a disaster! As a character, a completely different world opens up. Jean-Baptiste has captured something of mine, the part that does not want to talk about all these strange words, or even to perceive them at all. "Celebrity" or "prominence" and all the other nonsense that I can not really connect with.

I: Do you think that Mondino has incorporated some of your roles in the campaign? Did you remember something about the movie characters you played?

Johnny: No, it does not have that. Do you know what has reminded me more than anything else? For an actor it is not the most important thing to act, but to react. That's what it's all about, and you have to do one of the hardest things in the world, being easy. Being in a state of being. It felt very natural, not at all like a roll. I gave him this state of being, and he laid free, layer by layer, until he found what he was interested in. He revealed it, and I accepted it. He allowed me to get involved, and that's the beauty of it. It had nothing planned, cumbersome or intentionally cool or unusual. Just the look that he has for the light, how it hits the mountains. He is a master in it. Honestly, I had more fun with the few days of filming in the desert than with most films, because it felt natural.

I: Is there a person you would like to play once? A character of history or the present, or someone who inspires you in particular?

Johnnny: Oh yes, there are people who fascinate me and books that I'm obsessed with. It is possible to really love a fictional character. For example, the "catcher in the rye". No one should actually watch a movie version of Holden Caulfield. Holden Caulfield must look like the imagination of the reader, as described by J. D. Salinger. Then you have these great personalities, Picasso for example: you can never do it justice, and that's why you should rather stay away from it. Or take "On the Road" by Jack Kerouac. That was my Bible as a child and still is in many ways. It has given me so much and helped me grow up. I never thought that this book should be filmed. I did not see the movie a few years ago, but I know the director, Walter Salles. He's a nice guy, but the character Sal Paradise from "On the Road" is Jack Kerouac himself, right? It is difficult to think of someone else or to imagine someone else. It's just too good to falsify.

I: Are there any Hollywood icons that inspired you during your career that made you do what you want?

Johnny: Ultimately, I have always been inspired by individual personalities, whether on television or in films. Real individuals, very different types of comedians, entertainers, actors or singers. These unique individuals really inspired me, for example Charlie Callas or Don Rickles, Foster Brooks, who was able to imitate a drunk, Dean Martin, Marlon Brando, Yul Brynner. These were all clearly defined and completely unique individuals, and for me that is the most important thing. They never tried to imitate anyone. They just went their own way and it was unique. The present generation and the generation that comes after me think that they do not have to experience this individuality, these people who are absolutely unique. In the meantime, everyone just wants to become famous to be famous. But why would you want to be famous? I do not know, and I do not care. It never really mattered to me.

I: Your most famous character is undoubtedly Captain Jack Sparrow. How much fun is it to play this character? How connected do you feel with him?

Johnny: To play a man like Jack Sparrow - who can just say anything, even if it does not make any sense at all, and then somehow has to try to make sense of the whole thing, which in turn makes it more tangled and abstract, and he can get away with it … It is strange. When I play Captain Jack, I have to grin almost all the time. Being him makes me laugh. He can do anything, he can say everything. "Hello, sweetheart!" He can be incredibly naughty. His character is the opposite of mine. I can also be naughty, but I've never been so extroverted. I have always been very shy. To become Captain Jack Sparrow, to find him in me, to allow myself to drop that curtain, and to be simply absurd and disrespectful and to try out nonsense in a roll, is an endless experiment.

I: How much of that is written in the script? And how much of yourself is in the role?

Johnny: I have been in this business for a long time, and I have always rewritten individual sentences. Sometimes you have a script and it sounds fantastic, but in reality it just does not work because people do not speak the way it stands there. In general, people do not talk as much in reality as in movies. That's why I've always rewritten individual parts. But I write everything with Captain Jack. I stopped reading scene instructions many years ago. Sure, when I read a script for the first time, I read the dialogues and instructions to understand what the movie as a whole is. But after that I never read the instructions again. I do not want to know what to do or where to stand, it should just happen. So you have more freedom. Of course, the director can point out the script if he wants. But I would prefer to know nothing about it. Sometimes a scene is self-explanatory.

I: What criteria do you use to select your films?

Johnny: It depends. For a script, I can usually say it after the first ten pages, or even after the first three or four pages. Normally I give ten pages to a script. After that, I know if I'm the right person for the movie. I agree if I feel like I can contribute something to the film, to the vision. Something that has not been done a thousand times before regarding the performance or the interpretation of a role. That's all. If something touches me or makes me curious, then I can think of pictures of the character I am reading about. First thoughts come to me, and nine times out of ten, the first thoughts are the best. Kerouac also said that the first thought is the best. Hemingway too. When asked how to become a good writer, which is the biggest challenge, he said, "All you have to do is write a true sentence." It sounds so easy, but it's incredibly difficult. (X)

#Johnny Depp #wearewithyoujohnnydepp #youcantkeepagoodmandown #dior #sauvage #made by me

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fireinmywoods · 7 years ago

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fic: palimpsest [3/8]

“Skip to the point, Jim. The sooner you spit it out, the sooner I can refuse and get back to work.”

“It’s really no big deal,” Jim says as the door slides closed behind them. “I just need you to come down to Hearth with us…as my husband.”

The Enterprise has been sent to negotiate reaccession to the Federation with an isolationist religious group known as the Kindred. While there, Jim notices that some of the children seem to be gravely ill. The problem is, the Kindred practice faith healing and refuse to allow a doctor to be brought in. So Jim does what he does best: he improvises.

CHAPTER 3: In which dinner is served, Leonard is not a people person, and Hearth’s newest celebrity couple finally get a moment alone. Sort of. PG/Teen, ~4,300 words. [Chapter 1] [Chapter 2]

Given the Kindred’s apparent fondness for living metaphors, Leonard isn’t surprised to learn that their main hall is built around an actual hearth: a colossal stone fireplace in the center of the room, open on all sides and laid with a roaring fire which fills the entire hall with heat and light.

The Kindred apparently eat most every meal together, and they’re not overly fussy about individual family units. They really do seem to view the whole clan as one big family, and that extends to mealtimes, when they all sit themselves down at the long tables filling the congregation hall, sharing a bench with whatever Brothers or Sisters or Aunts or Uncles they happen to end up near.

The Enterprise crew is more intentionally seated at a table with several Councilors and what seem to be some portion of their immediate families. To Leonard’s chagrin, he and Jim are placed front and center, right where everyone at the table can get a nice clear look at them. Leonard hasn’t felt so overtly on display since his and Jocelyn’s wedding reception. At least the Kindred aren’t likely to start tapping their cups to make him and Jim kiss – though he has no doubt they’d be all for it if they knew it were an option.

Their fellow diners are obviously hoping for an encore to Jim’s earlier performance, and Jim doesn’t disappoint. He’s very much on from the moment they sit down, chatting away with everyone around them, asking endless questions about their families – How long have you been married? How many grandchildren do you have? When’s the baby due? – and listening to their responses with what appears to be genuine interest, smiling and nodding and offering compliments in all the right places. He peppers the conversation with lighthearted anecdotes of his own, blending fact and fiction so skillfully that even Leonard can hardly tell where one ends and the other begins: his disastrous first attempt at recreating his grandmother’s pot roast recipe, the Enterprise’s recent visit to a planet where the natives aged backwards, the time he dropped his wedding ring in the Tullisian Poison Swamp and nearly lost a hand getting it back, the neighbor girl who lived downstairs from his and Leonard’s first apartment and decided the best strategy for pursuing her passionate seven-year-old crush on Leonard was to compose elaborate signed confessions from “Jim” disclosing all the terrible crimes he’d committed.

(“Oh, she hated my guts,” he says, laughing along with his audience. “Poor kid. I had to feel for her. If I’d had any real competition for Leonard back before we were married, I probably would’ve done something ever crazier – and I was an adult.”)

Through it all, he’s constantly checking in with Leonard, looking over to take in his reaction to a story, turning to him for confirmation of some trivial detail or another, lavishing him with a thousand unnecessary touches. He brushes imaginary crumbs off Leonard’s sleeve and steals bites from his plate, teases and flatters him, leans in close to whisper side comments in his ear. He’s playing his role as smitten, attentive husband to the absolute hilt – well past the point of overkill, in Leonard’s opinion, but the Kindred are eating it right up. They really must be starved for entertainment out here.

Leonard supposes he should be thankful for the dynamic they’ve established, in which Jim does the heavy lifting and all he has to do is play along. Even so, it’s nerve-wracking being so intensely under the spotlight, knowing his every word and expression are being scrutinized and dissected by a bunch of strangers. And as for the touching – well, he can’t say he minds it, if he’s being honest with himself, but there’s something profoundly disconcerting about how performative it all is, the unsettling nagging thought that Jim’s just giving the people what they want to see. It’s been a long time since he felt like he had to second-guess Jim’s intentions or wonder what he’s really thinking. This feels like backsliding, and it bothers him more than he’d like to admit.

At least the food is decent: platters of golden cornbread, bowls of creamy polenta seasoned with little bits of bacon, a bittersweet corn-based drink the Kindred call avati. It’s the plainest of fare, but well-prepared. At least it hasn’t come out of a food slot, which gives it an edge over most of what Leonard’s eaten since they left Earth.

At one point while most people at the table are distracted with side conversations, the man on Leonard’s other side leans over and tops up his and Jim’s tankards with a strangely meaningful smile. Leonard awkwardly smiles back, not understanding – at least not until he raises his cup to drink and catches a whiff of what’s inside.

“Wow.” Jim sputters a laugh into his tankard. “This is, uh…very strong, Brother Ernesto.”

“Even the most conscientious among us are not immune to momentary lapses, I’m afraid,” Ernesto says gravely, his eyes alight with a distinctly un-Kindredlike glint of mischief. “You see, some time ago I produced a barrel of good wholesome avati and stored it overnight in the back corner of my cellar, intending to retrieve it the next afternoon for my daughter’s wedding. In all the fuss of preparation the next day, however, it simply slipped my mind. Sadly, by the time I discovered my error, the damage was already done, and the avati had degraded into this…subpar swill. But the gods bid us not to waste that which they have so graciously provided, so I resigned myself to consuming it myself so as not to make others suffer for my mistake.” His mouth twitches, not quite disguised by the cover of his bushy, grey-threaded beard. “Fortunately, I am blessed with a few steadfast friends who are willing to partake of the vile brew in order to share my burden.”

“We should all have such friends,” Jim says with a smile. “My husband and I are honored to be counted among them.” He takes a draught off his tankard, maintaining an impressively straight face while he rolls it around his mouth and swallows.

“It has quite a strong taste, but not altogether unpleasant, wouldn’t you say?” Ernesto says, watching Jim keenly for his reaction.

“Not unpleasant at all,” Jim says, lying through his teeth. That poker face may have fooled Ernesto, but Leonard’s been drinking with him for years. He could tell it took all Jim’s considerable willpower not to spit his mouthful right back into the cup.

Leonard can’t say he blames him. He’s drunk his fair share of moonshine and home brews, but this stuff is first cousin to rubbing alcohol; he feels like he might go blind just sniffing at it. If it wouldn’t cause a scene, he’d seriously consider smacking the tankard out of Jim’s hand to keep him from poisoning himself.

A pair of little boys run up to the table, tugging on the baggy sleeve of Ernesto’s robe, and he turns away to address them. Jim takes the opportunity to lean over and whisper in Leonard’s ear, “Oh my God, it’s like orientine acid. I think it’s eating a hole through my stomach lining.”

“You need to stop drinking every damn thing people hand you,” Leonard mutters back. “I’d’ve thought you’d know better after your little adventure on Rejo II.”

“Are you kidding? I’d drink that elixir again in a heartbeat. I could see sounds, Bones. How awesome is that?”

Leonard doesn’t know why he bothers. “Yeah, well, keep drinking that shit and the only thing you’ll be seeing is the inside of a toilet bowl.”

“They don’t have toilets here,” Jim says cheerfully. “Indoor plumbing is a worldly luxury to be shunned by all the gods’ righteous children. Did I not mention that?”

Leonard mentally adds a week to Jim’s imprisonment in medbay. And more beets. The little bastard’s gonna be up to his eyeballs in beets by the time Leonard’s through with him.

Leonard is hopeful that dinner will mark the end of what has been a longer, weirder, and exponentially more stressful day than he expected when he got up this morning. Unfortunately, their hosts have other plans. After the meal is over and the dishes have been cleared away, they’re ushered outside to where another massive fire has been laid in an open pit, surrounded by rings of rough-hewn wooden benches. From the noises the Kindred are making, this is the setting for some kind of socializing and fellowship hour, which is sure to drag on even more torturously than dinner without the distraction of food. The prospect makes Leonard want to scream, or maybe take off running through the cornfields, comm the ship and beg Scotty to please please please bring him back before he has to feign interest in one more rambling account of which great-great-grandmother begat which branch of cousins.

But then – as with most of the disasters Leonard finds himself in the middle of these days – there’s Jim to consider. Jim needs him here. He’s worried about the kids, about this mystery illness Leonard has yet to catch hide or hair of, and he’s counting on Leonard to help him figure it out. Leonard can’t just leave him in the lurch.

He steals a glance at Jim, hoping to shore up his resolve one way or another, and startles when he meets Jim’s eyes, having evidently caught him in the middle of his own glance. The tiny shock of it jolts through him, tightens his grip on Jim’s hand. It’s pure reflex, nothing more, but Jim squeezes back anyhow, and smiles at him – as if he’s really and truly happy to be standing here in the ass-end of nowhere, surrounded on all sides by cornfields and sanctimonious puritans, holding Leonard’s hand.

Damn it all to hell.

All right, fine. Leonard will play nice a while longer, for Jim’s sake. If he’s going to do that, though, he needs a break, and he needs it right the fuck now.

He makes a beeline for one of the farthest-flung benches, Jim following close behind, clinging to his hand like he has been all day. That’s fine. Leonard’s only trying to escape the slavering wolf pack of their audience, not Jim himself. He just needs some space to decompress, turn off for a few minutes, and Jim’s the one person in the universe who doesn’t feel like work to be around. Even after all the shit he’s pulled today, Leonard would still rather have the jackass with him than not.

He takes a seat at the very end of one of the outer benches – whoever’s going to be pestering them next, they can be Jim’s problem, not his – and Jim plunks down beside him, so close he’s practically in his lap.

“How you holdin’ up?” he asks quietly, drawing their hands over to rest on his leg. That particular move is undoubtedly for the Kindred’s viewing pleasure, but the question is just regular old Jim, direct and unaffected, and it goes a little way toward soothing Leonard’s frazzled nerves.

But only a little way. “You owe me big time.”

Jim gives a low whistle. “That well, huh?” He takes a sip from his tankard. Leonard left his behind in the congregation hall, glad of the excuse, but Jim seems to like having a prop, or else he’s quickly developed a taste for shitty hooch. “Well, the good news is, this shouldn’t last too long. The Kindred are the ‘early to bed, early to rise’ type.”

“No,” Leonard says sardonically. “These party animals? And here I was looking forward to sampling the local nightlife.”

Jim grins into his cup. “Careful Brother Ernesto doesn’t hear you say that. The guy’s running a secret still right under the Mother’s nose – I bet he’d be happy to invite us over for some after-hours boozing. Who knows who else is in on it? We could end up partying the night away with half the Council.”

Leonard makes a face. “I’ll pass, thanks.” Jim can have another hour of halfhearted civility out of him, tops, and then he is well and truly done for the night. His tolerance for small talk and ass-kissing only extends so far, even for Jim.

He’s actually kind of surprised that they haven’t already been swarmed by their adoring fans. In what may be the first stroke of luck he’s had all day, Sulu and Aaronson are sitting all the way on the other side of the fire, each of them having been waylaid by Kindred members eager to show off their (many, many) children. So far, though, Leonard and Jim have managed to escape the same fate. The benches around them are gradually filling up with grey-robed occupants, but no one has joined them on theirs.

Speak of the devil. Leonard spots an older fellow heading in their direction and groans internally, steeling himself for another onslaught of chitchat and platitudes – but then a ruddy-faced woman (the man’s wife, most likely) catches him by the arm and steers him to another bench, whispering something in his ear. She glances back over at them once she and her husband are seated, and Jim raises his tankard in a toast and shoots her a showy wink.

Oh. So that’s what this is. They’re not really out of the spotlight at all. The Kindred are just giving them their own little stage apart from the crowd, like zoologists keeping a prudent distance from their research subjects to observe how they behave in their natural environment.

It’s a faux privacy they’re being offered, but Leonard will take it. Anything to get a few minutes of peace and quiet – or what passes for it where Jim’s concerned, anyway.

He eyes the tankard Jim’s been nursing, wondering if he needs to worry about him getting sloppy on top of everything else. Jim’s a pretty mellow drunk these days, but there’s no telling what a bellyful of bathtub gin will do to him. “How much of that rotgut have you had?”

“Just the one taste,” Jim says, which seems like an unusually bold lie even for him, at least until he sticks his cup under Leonard’s nose, cluing him in to the fact that the contents have somehow been reverse-miracled from whiskey into water. “Switched it out as soon as I could. That shit’s like 200 proof, and my doctor told me I’m not allowed to do anything stupid.”

Leonard cracks a smile at that, his nerves settling a little more. “Sound advice. Color me impressed that you’re actually following it.”

“Excuse me, I have been an angel these past few weeks,” Jim says with exaggerated affront. “I’ve been doing my PT, haven’t I? I’ve come for all my follow-ups, on time and everything, even though you always pawn me off on Chapel and you know she loves finding excuses to jab me with stuff. I took a break from sparring, I’ve been eating all the gross vegetables on your list, I haven’t been in a single fistfight – I’m following your rules to the letter, and you’re still not satisfied.”

“Oh, get off your damn high horse,” Leonard says. “What do you want, a medal? Keeping yourself alive for a few measly weeks isn’t some back-breaking ordeal for most folks, you know. Besides, you’ll be back to your old tricks as soon as the clock runs out. You’re like some little hellraiser pretending to be nice until Christmas to impress Santa. You ain’t fooling me, kid. We both know good and well which list you belong on.”

“Unbelievable,” Jim says – another of his uncanny impersonations, though he never can get Leonard’s accent quite right. He raises his cup for a drink and adds loftily, “I guess there’s no pleasing some people.”

They fall into a comfortable silence after that, Jim probably eavesdropping on nearby conversations while Leonard does his very best to tune them out as he casts fruitlessly around for something to distract him from his slowly ebbing agitation. He doesn’t want to glance around the crowd too much, wary of making eye contact and accidentally inviting over unwanted company, and there’s not a lot else to look at. They’re surrounded by corn, corn, and more corn, the peaked roofs of the congregation hall and a few nearby houses barely visible over the towering stalks. The double moons overhead are kinda interesting, one nearly full, the other a slender reddish crescent, but they can only hold his attention for so long. The rest of the sky is just stars, and lord knows he’s seen enough of those to last him a lifetime.

For lack of anything better to focus on, he winds up looking down, examining his and Jim’s hands where they’re propped on Jim’s leg: Jim’s paler fingers twined through his, the angles of their knuckles, the familiar topography of veins and metacarpals standing out in the back of Jim’s hand, the glint of that damn creepy-ass ring.

Christ, this is all so fucking weird. Only Jim could get them into a mess like this.

By the look of the corn, it’s early fall here on Hearth. The temperature has dropped since the sun went down, a cool breeze whistling through the corn stalks and ruffling their hair, and the heat from the fire doesn’t quite reach the outermost ring of benches. Still, Leonard’s immediately on his guard when Jim sets his tankard down and gives a big, dramatic shiver. Sure, it’s a bit chilly, but Jim normally likes to pretend he’s immune to silly little things like ambient temperature, as evidenced by the countless cases of frostbite, chilblains, and hypothermia he’s presented with over the years. Suffice it to say, Leonard’s not falling for the delicate flower act.

His skepticism is rewarded a moment later, when Jim finally releases his hand only to wrap that arm around his back, cuddling closer to him on the bench. He widens his eyes in response to Leonard’s arched brow, all innocence. “What? I’m cold. And my big, strong husband is right here to cozy up with. It’d be out of character if I didn’t take advantage of that.”

Leonard nudges his elbow into Jim’s ribs, hoping it’s too dark for Jim or anyone else to see the color he can feel rising in his cheeks. “You’re enjoying this way too much.”

“I think I’m enjoying it the exact right amount,” Jim says breezily. He pokes Leonard in the chest. “You, on the other hand, need to lighten the fuck up. This isn’t really that bad, is it?”

Leonard grunts, noncommittal.

Jim scooches closer still, his hand creeping up Leonard’s back to rest on his shoulder. “On a scale of, I don’t know…Risa to mole people.”

Leonard winces. “Would you stop bringing them up? Criminy.” Jim cackles to himself, and Leonard elbows him in the ribs again, a good deal more sharply this time. “And you know what, if it were up to me, I might pick them. At least they didn’t stare at us like we were some kind of sideshow act.”

“Because they were blind. Now you’re just being difficult.” Jim rubs Leonard’s shoulder, his supposedly cold hand feeling very warm indeed through Leonard’s shirt. “Look, tomorrow we’ll get you in to see the kids, you’ll do your genius doctor thing and figure out what’s going on, and then I promise I’ll let you get back to terrorizing innocent ensigns who forget to come in for their BC injections. In the meantime, could you please just try to relax? Of course these guys are paying attention to us – it’s either that or watch the corn grow. Our visit is probably the most exciting thing that’s happened here in years. C’mon, loosen up a little. Have some fun with it.”

Fun is a pretty far cry from the mood he’s in, what with the Kindreds’ beady eyes boring into them from all angles, Sulu smirking or making kissy faces every time he catches Leonard’s gaze – and that’s not even getting into the twisted, contradictory feelings he has about the quietly possessive weight of Jim’s hand on his shoulder, the way Jim’s been staking his husbandly claim all night with one casually familiar touch after another.

Leonard’s not sure how to explain all that, though, and he’d probably just end up digging himself even deeper into this mess if he tried. Instead, he chooses the lesser evil of a slight concession, working his arm between them and sliding it around Jim’s waist, telling himself as he does so that it’s no big deal. It’s just Jim. He’s put an arm around Jim plenty of times before. No need to overthink it.

Jim shifts agreeably into the hold, somehow managing to tuck himself even closer against Leonard’s side. “There we go,” he says with an infuriating touch of condescension. “Now was that so hard?”

“You are without a doubt the most godawful obnoxious husband a man could have,” Leonard informs him.

“Aww, Bones, you old romantic, you.” Jim cranes over and pecks Leonard’s cheek, which should not make Leonard’s fool heart flutter like it does. “Good thing you let me handle our grand origin story earlier, Romeo.”

Leonard shakes his head in disbelief. “You are so full of it. I can’t believe they bought half the horseshit you were selling back there.”

Jim shrugs. “Ah, everyone likes a good story. That’s just human nature. And it wasn’t all horseshit. I just…embellished some things.” His hand has migrated across Leonard’s shoulder to his neck, fiddling idly with the layers of his uniform collar. “After all, you know what they say: what is a lie but the truth in masquerade?”

His tone is one of airy nonchalance, but it doesn’t land quite right. Leonard has known him too long and too well not to recognize when he’s only pretending not to give a shit.

Leonard turns his head and finds Jim already looking at him, the hint of a smile playing around his mouth. He’s sitting so close, intimately close, and Leonard wants to ask just exactly how much truth they’re talking, here, but he can’t quite bring himself to speak the words. This whole day has him so goddamn turned around; his heart is a snake nest of competing emotions, chaotic and confused, and he’s more unnerved by the fact that he’s not sure how Jim would answer that question than by any possible answer he could give.

Jim doesn’t say anything either, just keeps looking at him with that cryptic little almost-smile. The light from the fire casts a flickering coppery-gold glow over the right side of his face, gilding his features, catching in his lashes. His eyes are gleaming, unreally bright, so heartstoppingly beautiful that Leonard wants to touch them, insanely, wants to capture that glittering fiery blue in his own hand like an opal and take it with him everywhere he goes.

God, he wants all kinds of crazy, paradoxical things. He wants the pretty lie Jim told the Council earlier, that sweet and gentle romance, how easy it sounded, but even more than that he wants to go back to their first semester at the Academy, to the ugly reality of their cheerless library nest, just so he can grab hold of that loudmouthed, wounded, insecure stray and give him a fucking hug.

He wants Jim to kiss him again, right here and now, pull him close in front of all these people and kiss him like he means it, like he was teasing at earlier, like he’s loved him from the start and he’ll give him anything he asks for, anything at all, and then he wants to take Jim to some dark quiet place and kiss him back, kiss him again and again until he can breathe past all this raw tangled-up ache inside him that he can’t put into words. He wants to hold Jim’s fire-gilded face in his hands and kiss the truth into his not-quite-smiling mouth and know that he gets it, he understands what Leonard’s trying to say even when Leonard himself doesn’t, because that’s how it works when you fall in love with your best friend.

He wants all of that, and at the same time he wants to never leave this moment, sitting here together on this uncomfortable bench, Jim molded to his side with an arm curled around him and two fingers tucked into his shirt collar, watching him with fire in his eyes.

“Brother James!”

Jim turns toward the voice, plastering on an expression of ever-so-slightly tipsy good humor for the benefit for the woman who’s hailed him and for the rest of their audience. He’s on again, ready to launch back into the masquerade, but he doesn’t budge a millimeter from Leonard’s side, and somehow these past few minutes have flipped some kind of switch in Leonard’s brain which makes him find that comforting rather than disquieting.

A whole gaggle of people are approaching them, a couple Councilors among them, and Leonard resigns himself to another long spell of chatter and scrutiny. There’s no use fighting it, so he just wraps his arm more securely around Jim’s waist and gives himself permission to enjoy the feel of Jim’s warm body fitting so naturally against him, the comfortable pressure of Jim’s thigh and hip and flank against his own.

At the end of the day, what he really wants is Jim – the craziest, most paradoxical thing of all. If this as much of him as he can have right now, he’ll take it, and be damned thankful for it, too.

[Chapter 4]

#mckirk #mckirk fic #fireinmywoods fic #otp: bedside manner #star trek #aos #mccoy #kirk

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pinknerdpanda · 7 years ago

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The Wedding Singer - Track 5

“Love Stinks”

Characters: Dean, Sam, Reader, Lisa (mentioned), Ketch

Word Count: 1,513

Series Warnings: Angst, Fluff, Language, Mentions of Infidelity, Alcohol

A/N: This is the fifth chapter of an AU SPN Series co-written by myself and @hannahindie entitled The Wedding Singer and is inspired by the movie. We have been working on this for the last few months and are very excited to share it with you. The series tag list is open. If you would like to be added, please send one of us an ask. Hannah made our beautiful aesthetic and the series was Masterbeta’d by @wheresthekillswitch.

Track List

Track 5: “Love Stinks”

The morning sun burned brightly overhead as it’s warm rays danced across the dashboard, their shapes growing and changing as the car rumbled down the road. The sky was a brilliant blue and only a few soft, cottony clouds dotted its surface. In all respects it was a perfect day. She wondered if Dean would get a chance to enjoy the sunshine today, or if he would lock himself away in his room in the basement. Not that she would blame him if he did, it’s not like he could just wake up and have his broken heart healed. She sighed and pushed the thought aside, turning to gaze out the passenger window.

“I can’t thank you enough for taking care of him, y/n,” Sam’s voice broke the silence, filling the small space. Y/n turned toward him and offered him a weak smile.

“It’s really no big deal. I just hate that this all happened. How could she do that to him?” Y/n stopped. The sudden flare of anger she felt was startling and she ground her teeth, trying to get her temper under control.

“Between you and I?” Sam lowered his voice. “I never liked her,” Sam smirked at y/n before slowing down to turn onto the gravel road toward her house.

“Well, I’ve never met her, but at this point, I don’t think I want to. Thanks for driving me home, Sam.”

“Of course. How are…” Sam broke off abruptly, his eyes widening as he slowed down, gaping as they neared the house. “Is...is that an Aston Martin?”

A surge of excitement washed over her as she turned to see the familiar red car.

“I had no idea he was coming!” She pulled her phone from her purse and grimaced as she saw that she had eight missed calls, seven of them from the same person. She realized she’d never taken her phone off of silent after taking Dean home from the reception last night.

“So, you know James Bond, huh? What else are you not telling us, y/n?” Sam teased as he put the Impala into park, his handsome dimples on full display.

“Actually, his name is Ketch. He’s my fiance,” Y/n laughed nervously, her attention immediately drawn to the glittering gem on her left hand. After what happened to Dean, she was more anxious than ever. What if the same thing happened to her? What if Ketch never picked a date at all? She couldn’t decide which would be the more painful scenario to deal with.

Luckily, she didn’t have to think about it too long, because the front door to her home swung wide. A tall, dark haired man strode across the porch and down the steps toward the car, his eyebrows drawn up as his gaze flicked between Sam and y/n.

“Y/n! There you are! I have been worried sick about you.” His words didn’t match his tone. He may have been trying to play the concerned fiance card, but it was clear to y/n that he was furious. The excitement that she’d just felt at his unexpected appearance melted away as he glared across the front seat at Sam. “And just who, exactly, are you?” Ketch’s British accent accentuated each syllable in a way that managed to sound both polite and threatening.

“I’m Sam Winchester,” Sam offered. “That’s an amazing car you have.” Y/n opened the door and hopped out quickly.

“Thanks again for the ride home, Sam,” she smiled and nodded, before Ketch could say anything.

Sam took the hint and drove off, kicking small bits of gravel and dust to life with his tires.. Y/n took a deep breath before turning around to Ketch.

“I’m gone for a month and I come back to this?” Ketch threw an arm out toward the car shrinking into the distance. “Slumming it, eh?”

“It’s nice to see you too, Arthur. What the hell is your problem?” She crossed her arms across her chest and shifted her weight.

Ketch scoffed, blinking hard and scrunching up his nose in an air of superiority. “What’s my problem, love? Well, let me tell you my problem. I come to see my fiance only to find that she is not home. What’s more? When she does turn up, she’s still wearing her server’s uniform from the night before and being driven home by a strange man in a rusty old beater car. I’m sure I don’t have to spell out what exactly this all looks like.” Ketch quirked an eyebrow haughtily, and y/n guessed he wasn’t actually looking for a response, but she didn’t care.

“I can’t believe that you would think me capable of something like that, Ketch. For your information, I am in my server’s uniform because the bride of the wedding I was hired to work decided to stand the groom up at the altar. They went on with the reception but then he showed up drunk and needed someone to take him home. So, I did and then I fell asleep on his couch.”

“Well, he seems to have made a speedy recovery, doesn’t he.”

“Sam is the brother of the would-be groom. His name’s Dean; he sings in the band that plays at all the events at the community center. I felt so bad for him, I couldn’t just leave him there alone.” Y/n sighed and looked up into Ketch’s softening green eyes before sliding a hand up to his neck and brushing her thumb across his cheek. “I’m so happy to see you, Ketch. I’ve missed you.”

“I’ve missed you too, y/n.” A hint of a smile tugged at the corners of Ketches lips and and he wrapped a hand around her waist. “I’m sorry, I was worried when I couldn’t get ahold of you, and I suppose I may have overreacted, a tiny bit. Forgive me?”

Y/n pulled his face gently down to hers before planting a sweet, soft kiss on his lips. “Forgiven,” she smiled.

-----

Dean stared blankly at the television, the remote held limply in one hand. The faces of the actors and actresses on the screen blurred together in a pulsing wave of colors and light. He really had no interest if Juliana's unborn twins belonged to her mother’s best friend’s son’s vocal coach or not, he just needed some background noise to try and diffuse the barrage of voices and scenes playing on an endless loop in his mind’s eye.

More than half of Dean’s life had been intertwined with Lisa in some way and now that she was gone, he felt lost; hopeless. He’d spent all morning playing the conversations they’d had in the last few weeks over and over again in his head, dissecting each word looking for some hint that she was having second thoughts.

She’d been edgy, but she’d been planning a wedding and Dean knew she had been stressed. When had she made up her mind? What was the nail in the coffin for her? No matter what angle he looked at it from, she’d seemed happy. Was he really that clueless or could it be that she acted on a whim? For a moment, he considered the idea of her coming back to him, teary-eyed and begging for forgiveness - could he take her back?

The front door squeaked open and Dean glanced up to see Sam shutting it behind him. Dean looked away quickly, not willing to meet his brother’s gaze. He knew Sam’s eyes would be full of worry and pain for his older brother, but he feared finding pity there too, and Dean couldn’t stand the idea of it.

“Hey,” Sam said as he crossed the room and headed for the kitchen, tossing his keys on the counter. “Thirsty?”

Dean grunted in response but Sam was already reaching into the fridge for two cans of beer. He didn’t condone day drinking, necessarily, but considering the circumstances, it seemed appropriate. He came to join Dean on the sofa and handed him one of the beers.

“Thanks, Sammy.” Dean popped the top before taking a long swig. He ran his thumb over the lip of the can absently.

“Well, I got y/n dropped off back at Bobby and Ellen’s house. I’m glad she drove you home last night, Dean. I know you must be really upset, but to be drinking and driving is really irres…”

“You have no idea how I am feeling right now, Sam,” Dean interrupted, glaring at him. “Don’t even pretend like you do.” Dean looked away and dropped the remote. He rubbed a hand over his jaw angrily, sighing. “I’m sorry, man. I know you’re right, and you are just trying to help.”

“No, man. You’re right. I don’t have a clue how you must be feeling, Dean. I’m just glad that you’re ok.”

“I’m not, Sam.” Dean met his brother’s eyes, finding everything he’d feared. He clenched his jaw in frustration as the first few tears trailed down his cheek. “I’m not ok.”

Track 6 “Tainted Love” Coming 11/28/2017

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